The Last Temptation of Christ (38 page)

“No! No! No!” Jesus then shouted, and two large tears rolled from his eyes.

All at once the serpent writhed, unglued herself from him and with a muffled roar exploded. The air was glutted with the stench.

Jesus fell on his face. His mouth, nostrils and eyes filled with sand. His mind was blank. Forgetting his hunger and thirst, he wept—wept as though his wife and all his children had died, as though his whole life had been ruined.

“Lord, Lord,” he murmured, biting the sand, “Father, have you no mercy? Your will be done: how many times have I said this to you until now, how many times shall I say it in the future? All my life I shall quiver, resist and say it: Your will be done!”

In this way, murmuring and swallowing the sand, he fell asleep; and as the eyes of his body closed, those of his soul opened and he saw the specter of a serpent as thick as the body of a man and extending in length from one end of the night to the other. She was stretched out on the sand with her wide, bright-red mouth opened at his side. Opposite this mouth hopped an ornate, trembling partridge struggling in vain to open its wings and escape. It staggered forward uttering small, weak cries, its feathers raised out of fear. The motionless serpent kept her eyes glued on it, her mouth opened. She was in no hurry, for she was sure of her prey. The partridge advanced little by little directly toward the opened mouth, stumbling on its crooked legs. Jesus stood still and watched, trembling like the partridge. At daybreak the bird had at last reached the gaping mouth. It quivered for a moment, glanced quickly around as though seeking aid; then suddenly stretched forth its neck and entered head first, feet together. The mouth closed. Jesus was able to see the partridge, a ball of feathers and meat and ruby-colored feet, descend little by little toward the dragon’s belly.

He jumped up, terrified. The desert was a mass of swelling rose-colored waves.

The sun was rising. “It is God,” he murmured, trembling. “And the partridge is ...

His voice broke. He did not have the strength to complete his reflection. But inside himself he thought: ... man’s soul. The partridge is man’s soul!

He remained plunged in this reflection for hours. The sun came up, set the sand on fire; it pierced Jesus’ scalp, went inside him and parched his mind, throat and breast. His entrails were suspended like bunches of left-over grapes after the autumn vintage. His tongue had stuck to his palate, his skin was peeling off, his bones emerging; and his fingertips had turned completely blue.

Time, within him, had become as small as a heartbeat, as large as death. He was no longer hungry or thirsty; he no longer desired children and a wife. His whole soul had squeezed into his eyes. He saw—that was all: he saw. But at precisely noon his sight grew dim; the world vanished and a gigantic mouth gaped somewhere in front of him, its lower jaw the earth, its upper jaw the skies. Trembling, he dragged himself slowly forward toward the opened mouth, his neck stretched forward. ...

The days and nights went by like flashes of white and black lightning. One midnight a lion came and stood in front of him, proudly shaking its mane. Its voice was like a man’s: “Welcome to my lair, victorious ascetic. I salute the man who conquered the minor virtues, the small joys, and happiness! We don’t like what’s easy and sure; our sights are on difficult things. Magdalene isn’t a big enough wife for us: we wish to marry the entire Earth. Bridegroom, the bride has sighed, the lamps of the heavens are lighted, the guests have arrived: let us go.”

“Who are you?”

“Yourself—the hungry lion inside your heart and loins that at night prowls around the sheepfolds, the kingdoms of this world, and weighs whether or not to jump in and eat. I rush from Babylon to Jerusalem, from Jerusalem to Alexandria, from Alexandria to Rome, shouting: I am hungry; everything is mine! At daybreak I re-enter your breast and shrink; the terrifying lion becomes a lamb. I play at being the humble ascetic who desires nothing, who seems able to live on a grain of wheat, a sip of water and on a naïve, accommodating God whom he tries to flatter with the name of Father. But secretly, in my heart, I am ashamed; I grow fierce and yearn for nightfall when I can throw off my sheepskin and begin once more to roar, roam the night and stamp my four feet down on Babylon, Jerusalem, Alexandria and Rome.”

“I don’t know who you are. I never desired the kingdom of this world. The kingdom of heaven is sufficient for me.”

“It is not. You deceive yourself, friend. It is not sufficient for you. You don’t dare gaze within yourself, deep within your loins and heart—to find me. ... Why do you look askance and think ill of me? Do you believe I am Temptation, an emissary of the Sly One, come to mislead you? You brainless hermit, what strength can external temptation have? The fortress is taken only from within. I am the deepest voice of your deepest self; I am the lion within you. You have wrapped yourself in the skin of a lamb to encourage men to approach you, so that you can devour them. Remember, when you were a small child a Chaldean sorceress looked at your palm. ‘I see many stars,’ she said, ‘many crosses. You shall become king.’ Why do you pretend to forget? You remember it day and night. Rise, son of David, and enter your kingdom!”

Jesus listened with bowed head. Little by little he recognized the voice, little by little he recalled having heard it sometimes in his dreams and once when he was a child and Judas had thrashed him, and one other time when he had left his house and roamed the fields for days and nights pinched by hunger, then returned shamefully home, to be greeted with hoots by his brothers, lame Simon and pious Jacob, who were standing in the doorway. Then, truly, he had heard the lion roar inside him. ... And only the other day, when he carried the cross to the Zealot’s crucifixion and passed before the stormy crowd, everyone looking at him with disgust and moving out of his path, the lion had again jumped up within him, and with such force that he was thrown down.

And now, in this forsaken midnight—look! The bellowing lion inside him had come out and stood before him. It rubbed itself against him, vanished and reappeared, as though going in and out of him, and playfully tapped him with its tail. ... Jesus felt his heart grow more and more ferocious. The lion is really right, he thought. I’ve had enough of all this. I’m fed up with being hungry, with wanting to play at humility, with offering the other cheek only to get it slapped. I’m tired of flattering this man-eating God with the name of Father in order to cajole him to be more gentle; tired of hearing my brothers curse me, my mother weep, men laugh when I go by; sick of going barefooted, of not being able to buy the honey, wine and women I see when I pass by the market, and of finding courage only in my sleep to have God bring them to me, so that I can taste and embrace the empty air! I’m sick of it all! I shall rise, gird myself with the ancestral sword—am I not the son of David?—and enter my kingdom! The lion is right. Enough of ideas and clouds and kingdoms of heaven. Stones and soil and flesh—that is my kingdom!

He rose. Somewhere he found the strength to jump up and gird himself, gird himself interminably with an invisible sword, bellowing like a lion. He was ready. “Forward!” he cried. He turned, but the lion had disappeared. He heard pulsating laughter above him and a voice: “Look!” A flash of lightning knifed through the night and stood fixed, motionless. Under it were cities with walls and towers, houses, roads, squares, people; and all around, plains, mountains, sea. Babylon was to the right, Jerusalem and Alexandria to the left, and across the sea was Rome. Once more he heard the voice: “Look!”

Jesus raised his eyes. A yellow-winged angel dropped headfirst from the sky. Lamentations were heard: in the four kingdoms the people lifted their arms to heaven, but their hands fell off, gnawed away by leprosy. They parted their lips to cry
Help
! and their lips fell, devoured by leprosy. The streets filled with hands and noses and mouths.

And while Jesus cried with upraised arms, “Mercy, Lord, have pity on mankind!” a second angel, dapple-winged, with bells around his feet and neck, fell headfirst from heaven. All at once laughter and guffawing broke out over the entire earth: struck down by madness, the lepers were running helter-skelter. Whatever remained of their bodies had burst into peals of laughter.

Trembling, Jesus blocked his ears so that he would not hear. And then a third angel, red-winged, fell like a meteor from the sky. Four fountains of fire rose up, four columns of smoke, and the stars were extinguished for want of air. A light breeze blew, scattering the fumes. Jesus looked. The four kingdoms had become four handfuls of ashes.

The voice sounded once more: “These, wretch, are the kingdoms of this world which you are setting out to possess; and those are my three beloved angels: Leprosy, Madness and Fire. The day of the Lord has come—my day, mine!” With this last clap of thunder the lightning disappeared.

The dawn found Jesus with his face plunged in the sand. During the night he must have rolled off his stone and wept and wept, for his eyes were swollen and smarting. He looked around him. Could this endless sand be his soul? The desert was shifting, coming to life. He heard shrill cries, mocking laughter, weeping. Small animals resembling rabbits, squirrels and weasels, all with ruby-red eyes, were hopping toward him. It is Madness, he thought, Madness, come to devour me. He cried out, and the animals disappeared; an archangel with the half moon suspended from his neck and a joyous star between his eyebrows towered up before him and unfurled his green wings.

Jesus shaded his eyes against the dazzling light. “Archangel,” he whispered.

The archangel closed his wings and smiled. “Don’t you recognize me?” he said. “Don’t you remember me?”

“No, no! Who are you? Go farther away, Archangel. You’re blinding me.”

“Do you remember when you were a small child still unable to walk, you clung to the door of your house and to your mother’s clothes so that you would not fall, and shouted within yourself, shouted loudly, ‘God, make me God! God, make me God! God, make me God!’ ”

“Don’t remind me of that shameless blasphemy. I remember it!”

“I am that inner voice. I shouted then; I shout still, but you’re afraid and pretend not to hear. Now, however, you are going to listen to me, like it or not. The hour has come. I chose you before you were born—you, out of the whole of mankind. I work and gleam within you, prevent you from falling into the minor virtues, the small pleasures, into happiness. Behold how just now when Woman came into the desert where I brought you, I banished her. The kingdoms came, and I banished them. I did, I, not you. I am reserving you for a destiny much more important, much more difficult.

“More important ... more difficult ...?”

“What did you long for when you were a child? To become God. That is what you shall become!”

“I? I?”

“Don’t shrink back; don’t moan. That is what you shall become, what you have already become. What words do you think the wild dove threw over you at the Jordan?”

“Tell me! Tell me!”

“’You are my son, my only son!’ That was the message brought you by the wild dove. But it was not a wild dove; it was the archangel Gabriel. I salute you, therefore: Son, only son of God!”

Two wings beat within Jesus’ breast. He felt a large, rebellious morning star burning between his eyebrows. A cry rose up within him: I am not a man, not an angel, not your slave, Adonai—I am your son. I shall sit on your throne to judge the living and the dead. In my right hand I shall hold a sphere—the world—and play with it. Make room for me to sit down!

He heard peals of laughter in the air. Jesus gave a start. The angel had vanished. He uttered a piercing cry, “Lucifer!” and fell prone onto the sand.

“I shall see you again,” said a mocking voice. “We shall meet again one day—soon!”

“Never, never, Satan!” Jesus bellowed, with his face buried in the sand.

“Soon!” the voice repeated. “At this Passover, miserable wretch!”

Jesus began to wail. His tears fell in warm drops on the sand, washing, rinsing, purifying his soul. Toward evening a cool breeze blew; the sun became gentle and colored the distant mountains pink. And then Jesus heard a merciful command, and an invisible hand touched his shoulder.

“Stand up, the day of the Lord is here. Run and carry the message to men: I am coming!”

HOW QUICKLY he traversed the desert, reached the Dead Sea, went around it and once more entered plowed land and air thick with the respiration of men! He did not walk unaided—where could he have found the strength? Two invisible hands were holding him up by the armpits. The thin cloud which had appeared over the desert thickened, blackened, invaded the sky. There was a clap of thunder, followed by the first drops of rain. The land grew dark; roads vanished; and suddenly the cataracts of heaven were released. Jesus cupped his palms. They filled with water, and he drank. He halted, wondering which way to go. Lightning tore through the air. For an instant the face of the earth glittered a pale blue yellow, then suddenly plunged back again into darkness. Which was the way to Jerusalem, which to John the Baptist? And what about his companions, waiting for him in the reeds by the river? “God,” he whispered, “enlighten me, throw a thunderbolt, show me my road!” As he spoke, a flash incised the heavens directly in front of him. God had given him a sign, and he proceeded with assurance in the direction shown him.

It was pouring. The male waters of heaven spouted down and united with the rivers and lake, the female waters of earth. Land, sky and rain became one; they were pursuing him, directing him toward mankind. He slopped through the mud, became tangled in roots and branches, traversed pits. In the gleam of a lightning flash he saw a pomegranate tree heavy with fruit. He cut off a pomegranate: his hand was filled with rubies, his throat was refreshed. He took another, then another; he ate, and blessed the hand that had planted the tree. With new strength he set out again and marched and marched. Darkness. Was it day? Was it night? His feet became heavy with mud; he seemed to be lifting the entire earth at each step. Suddenly in the gleam of a lightning flash he saw before him a small village high up on a hill. The lightning ignited the white houses, then blew them out. His heart jumped for joy. Men were sitting in those houses—brothers. He desired to touch a human hand, to breathe in human exhalation, to eat bread, drink wine, talk. How many years he had longed for solitude, roamed through the fields and mountains, spoken with the birds and wild game, not wanting to see men! But now, what a joy it would be to touch a human hand!