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The Brook Kerith: A Syrian story, a novel by George Augustus Moore |
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Chapter 33 |
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_ CHAPTER XXXIII The Essenes, ten in number, were seated in an embrasure. A reader had been chosen (an elder) to read the Scriptures, and the attention of the community was now engaged in judgment of his attempt to reconcile two passages, one taken from Numbers in which it is said that God is not as man, with another passage taken from Deuteronomy in which God is said to be as man. He had just finished telling the brethren that these two passages were not in contradiction, the second being introduced for the instruction of the multitude and not because the nature of man is as God's nature, and, on second thoughts, he added: nor must it be forgotten that the Book of Deuteronomy was written when we were a wandering tribe come out of the desert of Arabia, without towns or cities, without a Temple, without an Ark--ours having fallen into the hands of the Philistines. He continued his gloss till Mathias held up his hand and asked Hazael's permission to speak: the words that had been quoted from Deuteronomy, those in which the Scriptures speak of God as if he were a man, attributing to him the acts and motives of man, were addressed, as our reader has pointed out, to men who had hardly advanced beyond the intelligence of childhood, whose minds were still simple and unable to receive any idea of God except the primitive notion that God is a greater man. Now the reason for my interruption is this: I should like to point out that for those who have passed beyond this stage, whose intelligence is not limited to their imagination, and whose will is not governed by selfish fears and hopes, there is another lesson in the words: we can rise to the consciousness of God as an absolute Being, of whom we know only that he is, and not what he is, and this is what is meant when God is spoken of by the name I am that I am. Eleazar was minded to speak: Mathias begged of him not to withhold his thoughts, but to speak them, and it was at this moment that Paul entered, walking softly, lest his footsteps should interrupt Eleazar, whom he heard say that he disagreed with the last part of Mathias' speech, inasmuch as it would be against the word of the Scriptures and likewise against all tradition to accept God as no more than the absolute substance, which strictly taken would exclude all differences and relation, even the differences and relation of subject and object in self-consciousness. I shall not be lacking in appreciation of the wisdom of our learned brother, Paul heard him say, if I venture to hold to the idea of a God whom we know at least to be conscious, for he says: I am, a statement which had much interest for Paul; and while considering it he heard Manahem say: it is hard to conceive of God except as a high principle of being and well-being in the universe, who binds all things to each other in binding them to himself. Then there are two Gods and not one God, Saddoc interposed quickly, an objection to which Manahem made this answer: not two Gods but two aspects, thereby confuting Saddoc for the moment, who muttered: two aspects which have, however, to be reduced to unity. Paul's eyes went from Saddoc to Mathias, and he thought that Mathias' face wore an expression of amused contempt as he listened and called upon other disputants to contribute their small thoughts to the discussion. Encouraged by a wave of his hand, Caleb ventured to remark: there is God and there is the word of God, to which Hazael murmured this reply: there is only one God; one who watches over his chosen people and over all the other nations of the earth. But does God love the other nations as dearly as the Hebrew people? Manahem asked, and Hazael answered him: we may not discriminate so far into the love of God, it being infinite, but this we may say, that it is through the Hebrew people that God makes manifest his love of mankind, on condition, let it be understood, of their obedience to his revealed will. And if I may add a few words to the idea so eloquently suggested by our Brother Mathias, I would say that God is the primal substance out of which all things evolve. But these words must not be taken too literally, thereby refusing to God a personal consciousness, for God knows certainly all the differences and all the relations, and we should overturn all the teaching of Scripture and lose ourselves in the errors of Greek philosophy if we held to the belief of a God, absolute, pure, simple, detached from all concern with his world and his people. But in what measure, Manahem asked, laying his scroll upon his knees and leaning forward, his long chin resting on his hand, in what measure, he asked, speaking out of his deepest self, are we to look upon God as a conscious being; if Mathias could answer that question we should be grateful, for it is the question which torments every Essene in the solitude of his cell. Has any other brother here a word to say? Now you, Brother Caleb? I am sure there is a thought in your heart that we would all like to hear. Brother Saddoc, I call upon thee! Brother Saddoc seemed to have no wish to speak, but Mathias continued to press him, saying. Brother Saddoc, for what else hast thou been seeking in thy scroll but for a text whereon to base an argument? And seeing that it was impossible for him to escape from the fray of argument, Brother Saddoc answered that he took his stand upon Deuteronomy. Do we not read that the Lord thy God that goeth before thee shall fight for thee, and in the desert thou hast seen that he bore thee, as a man bears his sons, all the way that ye went till ye came unto this place. But Saddoc, Eleazar interrupted, has forgotten that one of the leading thoughts in this discourse is that the words in Deuteronomy were written for starving tribes that came out of Arabia rather than for us to whom God has given the land of Canaan. We were then among the rudiments of the world and man was but a child, incapable, as Mathias has said, of the knowledge of God as an absolute being. But then, answered Saddoc, the Scriptures were not written for all time. Was anything, Mathias murmured, written for all time? Paul was about to ask himself if Mathias numbered God among the many things that time wastes away when his thought was interrupted by Manahem asking how we are to understand the words, the heavens were created before the earth. Do the Scriptures mean that intelligence is prior to sense? Mathias' face lighted up, and, foreseeing his opportunity to make show of his Greek proficiency he began: heaven is our intelligence and the earth our sensibility. The spirit descended into matter, and God created man according to his image, as Moses said and said well, for no creature is more like to God than man: not in bodily form (God is without body), but in his intelligence; for the intelligence of every man is in a little the intelligence of the universe, and it may be said that the intelligence lives in the flesh that bears it as God himself lives in the universe, being in some sort a God of the body, which carries it about like an image in a shrine. Thus the intelligence occupies the same place in man as the great President occupies in the universe--being itself invisible while it sees everything, and having its own essence hidden while it penetrates the essences of all other things. Also, by its arts and sciences, it finds its way through the earth and through the seas, and searches out everything that is contained in them. And then again it rises on wings and, looking down upon the air and all its commotions, it is borne upwards to the sky and the revolving heavens and accompanies the choral dances of the planets and stars fixed according to the laws of music. And led by love, the guide of wisdom, it proceeds still onward till it transcends all that is capable of being apprehended by the senses, and rises to that which is perceptible only by the intellect. And there, seeing in their surpassing beauty the original ideas and archetypes of all the things which sense finds beautiful, it becomes possessed by a sober intoxication, like the Corybantian revellers, and is filled with a still stronger longing, which bears it up to the highest summit of the intelligible world till it seems to approach to the great king of the intelligible world himself. And while it is eagerly seeking to behold him in all his glory, rays of divine light are pouring forth upon it which by their exceeding brilliance dazzle the eyes of the intelligence. Whilst he spoke, his periods constructed with regard for every comma, Mathias' eyes were directed so frequently towards Paul that Paul could not but think that Mathias was vaunting his knowledge of Greek expressly, as if to reprove him, Paul, for the Aramaic idiom that he had never been able to wring out of his Greek, which he regretted, but which, after hearing Mathias, he would not be without; for to rid himself of it he would have to sacrifice the spirit to the outer form; as well might he offer sacrifice to the heathen gods; and he could not take his eyes off the tall, lean figure showing against the blue sky, for Mathias spoke from the balcony, flinging his grey locks from his forehead, uncertain if he should break into another eloquent period or call upon Paul to speak. He was curious to hear Paul, having divined a quick intelligence beneath an abrupt form that was withal not without beauty; he advanced towards Hazael and, leaning over his chair, whispered to him. He is telling, Paul said to himself, that it would be well to hear me as I am about to start for Rome to proclaim the truth in that city wherein all nations assemble. Well, let it be so, since it was to this I was called hither. Hazael raised his eyes and was about to ask Paul to speak, but at that moment the bakers arrived with their bread baskets, and the Essenes moved from the deep embrasure in the wall into the domed gallery, each one departing into his cell and returning clothed in a white garment and white veil. Paul was about to withdraw, but Hazael said to him: none shares this repast with us; it is against the rule; but so many of the rules of the brethren have been set aside in these later days that, with the consent of all, I will break another rule and ask Paul of Tarsus to sit with us though he be not of our brotherhood, for is he not our brother in the love of God, which he has preached travelling over sea and land with it for ever in his mouth for the last twenty years. Preaching, Paul answered, the glad tidings of the resurrection, believing myself to have been bidden by the same will of God that called me hither and saved me from death many times that I might continue to be the humble instrument of his will. I will tell you that I was behoven to preach in Jericho--called out of myself--God knowing well they would not hear me and would drive me into the mountains and turn my feet by night to this place. Be it so, Paul, thou shalt tell thy story, the president answered, and the cook put a plate of lentils before the brethren and the baker set by each plate a loaf of bread, and everyone waited till the grace had been repeated before he tasted food. The peace, concord and good will; all that he had recommended in his Epistles; Paul saw around him, and he looked forward to teaching the Essenes of the approaching end of the world, convinced that God in his great justice would not allow him, Paul, to leave Palestine without every worthy servant hearing the truth. So he was impatient to make an end of the food before him, for the sustenance of the body was of little importance to him, its only use being to bear the spirit and to fortify it. He took counsel therefore with himself while eating as to the story he should tell, and his mind was ready with it when the president said: Paul, our meal is finished now; we would hear thee. _ |
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