Now, lying on the cobblestones looking up at the blue sky and smelling the burning I cry out to God in my agony: ‘O God!’ I say, ‘Why is this? What’s the use of it? What good is it to anybody?’
God says nothing to me.
‘Hear, O Israel,’ I cry: ‘the Lord our God, the Lord is One. Magnified and sanctified be his great name in the world which he hath created according to his will. What are we? What is our life? What is our piety? What is our righteousness? What our helpfulness? What our strength? What our might? What shall we say before thee, O Lord our God and God of our fathers? Are not all the mighty men as nought before thee, the men of renown as though they had not been, the wise as if without knowledge, and the men of understanding as if without discernment? For most of their works are void, and the days of their lives are vanity before thee, and the pre-eminence of man over the beast is nought, for all is vanity.’
Still no word from God. The blue sky is perfectly blank, the smoke of the burning synagogue drifts in the still morning air; it’s going to be a hot day.
‘God!’ I cry, ‘Whatever you are and whatever I am, speak to me! O Lord, do it for thy name’s sake. Do it for the sake of thy truth; do it for the sake of thy covenant; do it for the sake of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob; do it for the sake of Moses and Aaron; do it for the sake of David and Solomon. Do it for the sake of Jerusalem, thy holy city; do it for the sake of Zion, the tabernacle of thy glory, do it for the sake of thy Temple’s desolation; do it for the sake of the destruction of thy altar; do it for the sake of those slain for thy holy name; do it for the sake of those slaughtered for thy Unity; do it for the sake of those who went through fire and water for the sanctification of thy name. Do it for the sake of sucklings who have not sinned; do it for the sake of weanlings who have not transgressed; do it for the sake of the school-children.
‘Answer us, O Lord, answer us; answer us, O our God, answer us; answer us, O our Father, answer us …’
It was then that the air began to shimmer and Christ appeared to me. He was tall, lean, and sinewy. One of those fair Jews with his hair further lightened by the bleaching of the sun. Very light blue eyes, perfectly intrepid eyes drooping a little towards the outside of the face, the eyes of a fighter, the eyes of a lion. He was wearing a patched robe, his sandals were worn, his feet looked hard and hard-travelled. He stood there with a silence flung down in front of him. He was no one in whom I had any belief but there he was and there was no mistaking who he was.
I looked at him and listened to his silence for a while. When I was able to speak I said, ‘You’re not the one I was calling.’
He said, ‘I’m the one who came through. I’m the one you’ll talk to from now on.’
I saw his lips move but his voice came from inside my head. It made me feel very strange, being on the outside of his voice. I knew that if I were capable of running and were to run away to a distance where I could no longer see his lips move I should still hear his voice inside my head. A woodwind sort of voice with something of the timbre of a modern oboe, it seemed to have in it a capability of vibration that would move the plates of the earth apart; it was a voice that made a great space happen all round it, and all that space was inside my head. Feeling vast and hollow, hearing only a silence all round me and my own voice far, far away inside my head, I said, trying to synchronize my lips with my words, ‘Until now I’ve dealt with your father.’
He said, ‘Until now you’ve dealt with no one and no one’s dealt with you.’
I said, ‘Is this the Day of Reckoning then?’
He said, ‘Every day is the Day of Reckoning.’ The way his voice filled all the great echoing vastness inside my head was frightening; I wanted to get away from him but I was afraid to try even to stand up because of the bleeding. I looked all round me; my member and testicles were nowhere in sight. I thought of them thrown away like offal, I thought of them eaten by the Jew-finding sow, I vomited again.
I said, ‘I want to talk to your father,’ then I held my head and waited for his answer to echo inside me.
He said, ‘Humankind is a baby, it always wants a face bending over the cradle.’
I said, ‘God’s our father, isn’t he?’
He said, ‘God isn’t a he, it’s an it.’
I said, ‘Where is it, his strong right arm that was stretched out over us?’
He said, ‘It’s gone.’
I said, ‘Have I got to be my own father now?’
He said, ‘Be what you like but remember that after me it’s the straight action and no more dressing up.’
Neither of us said anything for a little while. I didn’t want him to go away but I didn’t want to hear his voice inside my head.
‘Will there be a Last Judgment?’ I said.
He said, ‘The straight action is the last judgment; there’s no face on the front of it, it has no front or back.’
We are walking, I am leaning on Jesus; with his right arm round me he keeps me from falling. I feel the strength in him rising like a column. In the morning sunlight rises the smoke from the synagogue. The fire crackles, the flames are pale in the bright morning. Suddenly there is so much space between the Jewish quarter and the rest of the town! Suddenly the Christian roofs are sharp and distant, they are looking away. In the great space all round the synagogue the bodies of the dead are vivid, the blood fresh and dark on the cobbles that seem to have put themselves into patterns I have not noticed before: there are twisting serpents, shifting pyramids, I see the face of a lion that comes and goes. There are many Jews flattened to the earth, limbs all asprawl, mouths open. The children are just as dead as the grown-ups, it seems precocious. It is a very informal gathering, there have been scenes of intimacy with no attempt at privacy. Here among a scattering of random guests and witnesses is an impromptu bride of the soldiers of Christ. White thighs, black hose, skirt flung over her face. Did they call her thou?
‘Thou Jew,’ I say to Jesus, ‘tell me about this conversion of the Jews.’
‘What conversion?’ says Jesus.
‘From life to death,’ I say. ‘Why does it keep happening? Why is it God’s will?’
Jesus turns his face to me and opens wide his eyes. There come upon me such a shuddering and a blackness, such an expanding pleroma, such an intolerable fullness that I am filled to bursting with it. I open, open, open but cannot contain it, I explode in all directions to infinity, I contract to a point, I explode again from the point, I come back together and return shuddering and full of terror.
‘Forgive me, Lord,’ I say.
There come into my mind thunders and lightnings and a thick cloud on the mountain and the voice of a trumpet exceeding loud. There comes into my mind the sanctified mountain that might not be touched, neither by beast nor man. There comes into my mind a voice saying in Greek:
For not ye have approached to a mountain being felt and having been ignited with fire and to darkness and to deep gloom and to whirlwind and of trumpet to a sound and to a voice of words, which the ones hearing entreated not to be added to them a word; not they bore for the thing being charged: If even a beast touches the mountain, it shall be stoned; and, so fearful was the thing appearing, Moses said: Terrified I am and trembling …
Jesus says, ‘Can you contain even the expectation of the full reply of me to you? Can you contain even the silence before my answer to you?’
I say, ‘No, Lord, I cannot contain it.’