Two from Galilee (12 page)

She had never been so happy, so poised upon the brink of wonder. She felt a tender ecstasy in every living thing: her parents, the hobbling grace of Esau, the very beggars on the street.  The little silver-gray donkey in its stall, the blunt-nosed sheep. And the inanimate—the fecund, seedy smell of newly wakened earth—how could she bear its fragrance? The odor of bread fresh from the oven, the raw tangy scent of clay drying on her hands. She would lift them sometimes and gaze upon them in amazement. To be alive was a miracle, a holy thing. To be alive and roused to your being as a woman. At times she could not sleep. She would rise up from her couch and go out to the places where Joseph had kissed her, under the silvery olive trees. Or she would climb to the roof and lie gazing at the infinity of stars. And the words of the psalm would rejoice in her.

When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars which thou hast ordained;

What is man, that thou art mindful of him? and the son of man, that thou visitest him?

The singing silence of God was overpowering. He would speak to her any moment now. He had a message to give her before her marriage. A blessing perhaps, or an admonition surely; for to marry would be to leave childhood behind. The innocent bliss of its unquestioning acceptance. She had an instinctive knowledge that once she became totally a woman, a wife, she would feel God's presence so completely no more. . . .

Yes, Lord? . .
.
Lord?
... It was too late even now; the pure channel of childhood was closed.

Then one day toward sundown she had gone down the path a little way, into the stable cave to water the ass. She had emptied the skins into the trough and the stubby creature had bent its head to drink, when its pointed ears laid back. It shied and made an odd whimpering sound. "Hush now, what's wrong?" Mary stroked its quivering nose to gentle it, following its blank stare toward the doorway where a shaft of sunlight poured through.

Mary.

She heard her name, and at its sound the little beast reared.

"Yes, Father?" she said, though it seemed strange that he should be home from the fields so early. "Here I am. In the stall."

Mary!

Suddenly she realized that it was not her father's voice that called. She could not place it, nor the source of it, though she went to the low leaning doorway and peered out. The yard and the grove and the adjoining fields lay quivering with the falling light, peaceful and undisturbed. There was no one by the old stone cistern, no one by the vine-covered fence. Strange.

Puzzled, she turned back to the donkey. It had bent its prickly nose again to the water, but only hovered there, not drinking. Its sides were heaving. She could hear its uneasy breath. And now her own heart began to pound. She clutched its dry fur for comfort. "We must be hearing things, you and I," she said.

Then she saw that the shaft of light pouring dustily through the doorway had intensified. It had become a bolt, a shimmering column, and in it she dimly perceived a presence. Neither man nor angel, rather a form, a shape, a quality of such beauty that she was shaken and backed instinctively away, though her eyes could not leave that living light.

Mary. Little Mary. . . .
The voice came again, gently, musically.
Have I frightened you? I'm sorry. Be still now, be at ease, there is nothing to fear. I am sent from God, who has always loved you, don't you remember? He has watched you grow from childhood into womanhood, and now he has a message of great importance. So listen carefully, my child, and heed.

"I am his unworthy servant," Mary whispered, though she scarcely believed her own voice. She was trembling. Could it be that her recently heightened awareness had affected her senses? Why was she speaking thus, alone with only the beast in the sun-white stall? "What . . ." it was difficult to form the words, "what is it that the Lord would have of me?"

There was a second of silence. Then, in clear ringing tones the answer came:
Behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son and you shall call his name Jesus. He ivill be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. . .
.

"The
Messiah!"
Mary gasped. Involuntarily, she shrank away. "I?
I
am to bear the Messiah?"

Even so. And the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end.

"But I am unworthy!" Mary cried. She was grasping the nibbled manger; she felt her bare feet upon the gritty earthen floor. The sweat poured down her face. "I have many faults. I have rebelled against my parents, I often envy my cousins, I have impure thoughts. How can I be the mother of this long awaited child?"

God knows the secrets of his handmaidens heart. He does not expect perfection. This child that he will send you will be human as well as holy. The Lord God wills it so, in order that man, who is human, can find his way back to God.

"But I am not yet married," Mary protested. "How can this thing be when it is many months yet before I come to the bed of my husband?"

With God all things are possible,
the voice said.
Already he has quickened the womb of your aged aunt Elizabeth, so that soon she too will bear a son. Now the Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; and the child that is born unto you will be the Son of God.

"I
will strive to be worthy," Mary whispered. It was a moment before she could go on. For one stark, appalling instant she could feel something fleeing from her, something precious. She felt a sense of incalculable loss. "Behold, I am the willing handmaiden of the Lord."

She closed her eyes, still gripping the donkey's fur, the stall. When she opened them again the little beast was quietly drinking, and though the shaft of light still slanted through the doorway its intensity was diminished, the voice of her destiny was gone.

But something else remained—some quiet consciousness that told her she must be still and wait now upon God. If he had sent his messenger at this quiet hour of evening, then surely he must be near, perhaps gazing at her even now. Soothing her, calming her, bidding her be still and yielded to this astounding command. Again, for the flick of an instant, she felt the whiplash of dismay. Not fear, but sheer human bewilderment.

Joseph!
What of Joseph, my beloved?

There was no answer. Only the breathless quiet, heightened by the beast that had dipped its head now contentedly to drink from the trough. The stillness, laced with birdsong. The trembling, pervading stillness that comes with sunset after a hard day's work, when the body aches with weariness and yet is alive, alert, the more receptive to love. Mary stood waiting, humble, bowed, flowing out to it, whatever it was. As the glory of God had possessed her in childhood, so it would possess her now in whatever manner it saw fit. Hers not to question, hers not to fear, hers only to submit.

And even as she waited, it happened as the angel had said. The Holy Spirit came upon her, invaded her body, and her bowels stirred and her loins melted, her heart was uplifted, her whole being became one with it—the infinite, the unknowable, the total fusion that is the bliss of God. Beside it even the kiss of Joseph was as nothing, even the dream of becoming his wife.

"My God, my God!" she cried, and the sweat ran down her limbs.

And so it was that Mary knew God and was one with God and became at once his child, his mate and his mother, and the miracle was achieved.

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I
T had happened.

She had not dreamed it. Nor was it but one last sweet conversation with the Most High before she shed forever the innocence and trust of her maidenhood. It was a thing apart. And if it had been impossible ever to convince Hannah that such things were not untruths to be punished, or at best feverish imaginings, how then would it be possible to convey to her this astounding thing?

Yet it had happened. The finger of God had touched her, the presence of God had consumed her and kindled life within her. As surely as if Joseph had taken her unto himself.

Joseph . .
. she scarcely dared think of him. He had become one of a company of strangers. Her parents, her family, people on the street—all laughed and spoke and prayed and toiled and moved in the usual way, so commonplace as to be well nigh terrifying. They did not know, they did not suspect, they could not see the awful veil that hung between them. They did not recognize the mark of God upon her.

But the time was fast approaching when they must.

She was newly nubile. Her blood should flow freely every four weeks—this much she knew. Yet twice now the moon had waxed and waned. Her breasts were swelling, and the nipples stung like little apples bitten and browned by the frost. Sometimes she felt so dizzy it was all she could do to creep to the chest for her clothes. And the smell of certain foods was nauseating. Once, straining the curds with Salome, her face went as white as the soured milk and she had to rush for the basin.

"What's the matter, Sister?" Salome asked. "Are you nervous about the wedding?"

"Yes, that must be it." Mary wiped her clammy brow with her apron. "It's nothing. Please don't tell Mother."

Again she had gone into the cave to fill the lamps. And suddenly she could not bear the rich rank smell of the slippery oil. Her hands shook, she dropped and broke a little pink lamp that Hannah had carried all the way from Bethlehem, one that she always kept burning in her room at night.

In a panic Mary knelt to scoop up the fragments, knowing already it could never be mended. Even as she was trying to think what to say, she heard her mother's brisk step. "Oh, Mother, forgive me," she pleaded. "I'll make you another. Though I know how much it meant to you, that it can never be replaced. The last thing I want is to grieve you."

She could hear her own foolish lamentings while Hannah only stood shaking her head. But her mother's eyes in the dim half-light of the cave were sharp upon her. "Rise, child," she said. "You shouldn't be kneeling on the cold floor like that, it's nearly the time of your outflowing." Hannah squatted to pick up the last shreds of the lamp, tucked them, these pitiable precious bits of the clay of Bethlehem, into her handkerchief. "It's not good for a woman to take a chill, it can hold her back."

So she was watching, Mary realized. Counting the days. And in her dread already providing excuses to stave off suspicion, forestall a possibility too monstrous to credit. Yet the time was fast approaching when Hannah could be put off no longer. Spiritual though the child in her womb might be, God had seen fit to grip her flesh and give it substance. Purely human symptoms that would soon be evident to all eyes. Her parents. Joseph. His people.

What then? What then?

She was frightened and confused. She did not understand. She could only pray blindly: "Help me, help me to be worthy of this thing that you have done unto me, oh my God. And these others who are so dear to me—when the time comes that they must know, help them to understand. Don't let them cast me out!"

Meanwhile Joseph continued to come to the rooftop, a fervent young shadow still preparing for their wedding day—by which time she would be deep in shame. (Or glory? Oh, God, sustain me, give me courage, let me not drag around drawing puzzled attention in my ignorance and wretchedness; let me grasp thy purpose, let me lift up my head and be proud!) Meanwhile her mother continued to guard her daughter even more zealously against the temptations of youth. And to watch. To watch.

One bright morning when the cistern was full and the sun hot for drying, they carried the linens into the yard to soak in a wooden tub. Hannah loved to wash. She enjoyed the pounding and flailing and wringing things out with her sturdy little red fists. And when she shook them and spread them to dry on bushes and grass and fence, it was as if she had personally come to grips with all the problems and evils that harass a woman, and bested them. She had made them clean and smooth. She was in a buoyant mood. For this day she was determined likewise to cleanse the air and banish forever the dark and delicate thing upon her heart.

"Go now and see about the bees," she bade the children. "Salome, you take them and see if they're about to swarm. We'll need honey aplenty in store for the wedding. Take care now," she warned as they trooped off down the path. "Put your kerchiefs over your faces if they come near, don't get stung." Her eyes followed them fondly a moment, then with a conspiratorial air she turned to Mary. "I thought it well to be rid of them while we soak our stained cloths." A reminiscent look came into her eyes. "Ah, daughters, daughters," she mused. "How well I remember my mother making the same request of me. Though she usually did it for me. I can see her yet bending over the tubs."

Mary rose slowly from her attempts to make the fire in the pit burn brighter by fanning it. She had carried out coals from the oven but the sticks were green, they only smoked and sputtered. Now the smoke coiled between her and her mother, separating them further. She shrank back into the protection of its bitter blue-gray screen.

"It's a task I'm afraid you won't have to do for me," she said. She drew a deep breath, for now the time was come and she must be calm. "Mother, I must tell you. It has been three months now since my loins have bled." She waited, heart pounding, her eyes fixed upon the face that fell suddenly, as if a blow had struck it, then slowly drained.