His listeners laughed, some pointed to their foreheads, one or two asked him a few questions. The friar expostulated against the Moors and the Saracens who had defeated the Crusaders, were knocking at the gates of Vienna, and threatened to destroy Europe and Christianity.
The people dispersed one by one. Only Kotikokura and I remained. Prester John—Presbyter Johannes—for some obscure reason, troubled my mind, like a word that one tries to restore in time and space but cannot.
“Brother,” I said to the friar, “where is his empire and who is Presbyter Johannes?”
He looked at me startled. “Who is Presbyter Johannes?”
I nodded.
“He is…the Lord of Lords.”
“I understand that…and yet– —”
He approached my ear and whispered mysteriously, “He is John, the Apostle.”
“But John the Apostle is dead.”
“How can he be dead, having drunk of the Fountain of Youth?”
“Of course,” I said vaguely.
“The Lord Jesus has kept His beloved disciple alive and has made him great and powerful that he may save the cross from destruction.”
‘John,’ I mused. Could it really be he? Speaking of John, Jesus said to Peter: “If I will that he tarry till I come, what is that to thee…?” There was a rumor among the Christians based on these words that John could not die. But Jesus merely said: “If I will.” Had he willed it? Had his love wrought for John what his hate had wrought for me…?
“Whence, brother friar, will Prester John start?” I asked.
“From the center of his empire, which is the center of the earth—a far-off land, thousands of miles beyond Jerusalem, which, however, he will deliver first…”
“In the heart of Asia, then?”
He nodded.
I gave him a coin.
He bowed very low, making the sign of the cross over Kotikokura and me.
“Kotikokura, man is incapable of inventing a pure lie or discovering a pure truth. What this friar said today must have a grain of reality…”
Kotikokura grinned.
“And if John lives…alas, you do not remember John…that is true. It was a few centuries before I discovered you. You are a mere stripling, Kotikokura…”
Kotikokura laughed, and danced about me.
“Let us go in search of this fabulous land, Kotikokura, and see what scrap of reality suffices to create a legend…”
The reputation of Presbyter Johannes or Prester John was much more widespread than I suspected. Some laughed at the notion, some disputed; others proved his existence or nonexistence by the Scriptures. But everywhere his name was mentioned and discussed.
We wandered about, taking now one road, now another, according to the vague and contradictory directions we received, stopping only to recuperate and replenish our supplies. The farther Europe disappeared behind us, the less resplendent became the empire of Prester John.
“We are on the right path, Kotikokura, for falsehood shines like a sun, but truth is a modest jewel.”
“Where is the empire of Prester John?” I asked a very stout Buddhist monk.
He smiled leisurely. “The empire?”
“Yes.”
“You are speaking metaphorically, sir, are you not?”
“Metaphorically?”
“A man’s soul may be a vast empire.”
“Is it in that sense only that Prester John has an empire?”
“Not quite in that sense, nor quite in the other.”
‘How strangely his empire shrinks! ‘I mused.
“Don’t let me discourage you from visiting the empire of Prester John,” the Buddhist remarked, as if reading my thoughts. “It is about two hundred miles in this direction– —” He pointed toward the East.
I thanked the Friar very cordially, and gave him the expected alms.
“Kotikokura, truth is not even a modest jewel. Truth is a moss-covered stone pushed aside by angry travelers.”
XLIX: THE CITY OF GOD—I RECOGNIZE PRESTER JOHN—PRESTER JOHN DISCUSSES THE BEAST—TIME HAS A HEAVY FIST
THE people were assembling in the public square, mostly fishermen and small merchants, dressed in the manner of the Hebrews of the time of Jesus. Their faces, too, their angular gestures, and their incessant disputations wrenched time back a thousand years.
Kotikokura whose foot was caught in the meshes of a fisherman’s net pulled vigorously to regain his freedom.
“Who allows you to interfere with an honest man’s means of livelihood?” the man shouted in Hebrew, discovering that several of the meshes had been torn.
Kotikokura was about to jump at his throat. I grasped him by the arm.
“I regret infinitely, sir,” I addressed the fisherman. “We are strangers and know neither the name of the country we are in nor its customs. I am inclined to believe, however, that all such mishaps may be adjusted peacefully here as elsewhere.”
I gave him a few pieces of silver. He looked at me critically. “This hardly pays for my loss.” I knew that he lied atrociously, but in order to avoid any further dispute, I doubled my gift.
“What is the name of this country, my friend?” I asked him.
“Ours is the Realm of God, and yonder comes our Patriarch, Prester John—may his name be blessed!”
A man, apparently seventy or seventy-five, approached gravely, followed by several priests, if judged by their garb, but rabbis by their long beards and curls. John carried in his arm the Torah, while from his neck hung a large crucifix.
The people bowed and crossed themselves, and made room for the procession which stopped where four fishermen deposited upon a stone platform a large arm-chair, in the shape of two lions from whose foreheads rose grotesque horns,—stars surmounted by crosses.
Presbyter Johannes seated himself. The people knelt. I did likewise. Kotikokura, dazed a little by the proceedings, remained standing. One of the priests glared in our direction.
“Kotikokura,” I whispered, “kneel or we are lost.”
He knelt.
Two priests sprinkled holy water and scattered incense, which was welcome to the nostrils, for the fishermen smelt rankly of their profession.
Johannes rose. I watched him intently. Was it really John? His eyes, perhaps,—but where was their brightness? His nose more likely,—but was it not rather a racial than a personal characteristic? John’s face had been almost feminine in delicacy, and the down upon it was soft and silky. This man’s beard was a mixture of gray and white, and his skin, whatever was visible of it, was yellow and thin like parchment.
He raised his hand, blessed the people in Hebrew, then made the sign of the cross over them. He reseated himself.
Could that be his voice,—a hard staccato thing that sounded like iron struck against stone?
The priests covered their heads with tallithim, and bowing and beating their breasts incessantly, chanted an old Hebrew prayer, mixed with barbaric Latin. The people, still kneeling, repeated at intervals a phrase or a word.
Johannes meanwhile, his head between his palms, meditated or prayed.
The ceremony over, the Patriarch rose. His right arm raised, he exclaimed: “Do not forget our mission, brethren! We are the chosen of the Lord to conquer the heathens and the unbelievers. We are the children of Jesus and of Moses. We are the Fountain of Youth. They who drink of our words shall inherit the earth and heaven forever.”
“Amen,” the people answered.
“We shall go forth embattled,—mighty knights who will deliver Jerusalem and the world. We shall bring perfection unto man. He shall be happy and rich beyond his present dreams. The mountains shall open at his command, and lo, he shall find them filled with gold! The sands on the river banks shall turn to precious jewels; the fish shall be odorous like flowers. Yea, we shall bring Eden once more unto the earth. In the name of Jesus, our Lord and David, His Father, and Moses whose Word is the Word of God, now and forever, Amen!”
“Amen,” the
people repeated.
Johannes made the sign of the cross over them. The people dispersed. The priests helped their Patriarch descend and followed him in silence.
I seated myself at the edge of the shore and meditated. Kotikokura, bored, drew pebbles into the water.
“Have you ever seen, my friend, greater poverty than here? Even in China,—you remember—during the Revolution, the people seemed more prosperous.”
Kotikokura continued to throw pebbles into the water.
“Perhaps you are right, Kotikokura. It is just as rational to throw pebbles into a river as to endeavor to discover logic in the universe. I think I shall join you.”
He laughed uproariously. We threw pebbles, vying with each other as to the distance and the height of the waves we could raise.
Suddenly, I felt someone grasp my shoulder. I turned around.
“Who are you?” the man asked stentoriously.
“We are strangers from far-off lands.”
“Why are you disturbing the waters?”
“Forgive a little innocent pleasure, sir.”
“There is no innocent pleasure. Every mundane pleasure is tainted with sin.”
“Will you not forgive two strangers their great ignorance?”
“It is not for me to forgive, but for our Lord. Come along!”
Kotikokura’s nostrils shivered, his fists opened and shut spasmodically. I looked at him, shaking lightly my head. The man we followed was dressed as a priest, but about his waist dangled a long sword. “Will you enlighten me, sir,” I asked. “I am not quite certain, as yet, in what country we landed and who the king may be.”
He did not answer. I repeated my question.
“He who does not recognize Virtue when he sees it, and does not distinguish God’s own country from man’s deserves no answer.”
“How shall a man distinguish God’s own country from man’s?”
He turned around and glared at me. “How dare you blaspheme against Yahweh and Jesus! Is it not self-evident that our country is the most beautiful, the most blessed of all? Have you not heard the words to our Master this morning? Do you doubt– —?”
He placed his hand upon the hilt of his sword. I remembered the horseshoer and the fate of the man who dared to question the divinity of Mohammed.
“How can I doubt when I see so much zeal? Is not zeal the sign of truth? Can a lie inspire such passion?”
He dropped his hand and ordered us to follow.
The Court of Justice was a long room dimly lit. At one angle, a large arm-chair, the exact counterpart of the one I had seen in the square—or was it perhaps the same one—upon two wooden lions with grotesque horns. Opposite an enormous cross with an agonizing Christ and the stone tablets of Moses.
“The Lord deliver us from justice, Kotikokura,” I whispered, “particularly in this land of God. It will be a miracle if we escape unscathed. Be ready.”
He nodded. Presbyter Johannes entered, followed by four priests. He seated himself. The priests remained standing, two on either side.
My captor crossed himself, and made a long complaint against Kotikokura and myself. We were disturbing the peace of the river; we were blasphemous and cynical; we were frivolous, and preferred sin and pleasure to virtue and righteousness. He asked that justice be unadulterated with pity.
Presbyter Johannes stared at me, his brows knit. Did he recognize me? Was I merely a culprit?
He ordered everybody except myself and Kotikokura to leave the courtroom and continued to stare at me for a long while, saying nothing.
“Once more you have blasphemed against our Lord!” he thundered.
“John…” I asked mildly.
“Yes, I am John…and you are Isaac… Isaac Laquedem!”
“John,” I whispered, almost pathetically.
“You rejected the words of the Lamb and you still wander like a hunted beast.” His lips twisted into a malevolent snarl.
“John.”
“I warned you, but you shrugged your shoulders. Do you believe in Jesus now?”
I shook my head.
“Cursed and damned forever!”
“John,” I whispered, and my eyes filled with tears.
“Weep, for you have reason to weep if your heart is stone and your brain a forest of thistles that will not permit truth to pass through except bleeding and mutilated.”
Kotikokura, not understanding the drift of our conversation, looked distressed and his eyes also filled with tears.
“Cursed wanderer and companion of men-beasts!”
“John.”
He looked up, crossing himself. “I thank Thee, O Lord, for having kept me alive long enough to meet Your enemy face to face again. I thank Thee, O Lord, for having permitted me to reach an age when my shameful sentiments toward Your enemy can no longer distort my reason. Amen.”
“John.”
His forefinger pointed at me, his words sharp and biting as a whip that is cracked, he continued: “And now you have come into God’s realm, and once more you have mocked Him! Once more you have rejected Him. You are neither man nor beast, neither Jew nor Christian, but a monster possessed by the Evil One.”
“John.”
“I could release you from your bondage; I could give you peace at last,—but I will not until you accept our Master and kneel before His Cross.”
I shook my head.
“No punishment that I can conceive can add to your curse. Go…wander again! Tarry, until the Lord Himself shall visit the earth again. And woe unto you, Isaac, when that day come to pass!”
I did not budge.
“Anti-Christ! Beast!” he shouted. Closing his eyes and raising his right hand, he continued: “I see the Beast rise out of the sea, having seven heads and ten horns, and upon his horns are crosses and upon his foreheads the names of his blasphemy.”
He remained silent.
“I see the Lord coming to slaughter the Beast. I see seven golden candlesticks. And in the midst of the seven candlesticks, I see the Son of Man: His head and His hair are white like wool, as white as snow, and His eyes are as a flame of fire. He has in His right hand seven stars, and out of His mouth goes a sharp two-edged sword, and His countenance is as the sun, shining in its strength…”
His teeth clenched, his legs stiffened. Two bits of foam dotted the corners of his mouth. I remembered that in his youth he had suffered from epileptic seizures. I was on the point of raising him in my arms as I did, so long ago, and speaking to him tenderly.
I yearned to whisper to him: “John, how have you forgotten your friend? I am Isaac,—he who loved you and whom you loved. Do you not remember the hours we spent together? Do you not remember that in each other’s company we discovered Woman? Oh, the starry nights when we walked together along the shore of the Jordan and upon the hills that surround Jerusalem! Oh, the golden words we uttered! John…has your heart turned to stone?”
The foam trickled over his beard. He had the appearance of some unclean animal. Could not Jesus relieve him of his affliction? He gave life without improving upon it. I had improved mine, but in spite of him…
John opened his bloodshot eyes.
“Go! Continue your devil’s work that your soul may become blacker and blacker. Fight the Lord, neglect virtue and sanctity that your punishment may be the greater. I shall remain in this place. When the Lord returns, He shall find one spot where His gospel is inviolate, one disciple more faithful than Peter…”
‘Still jealous of Peter,’ I thought. ‘My search for John is ended. That which may be found, is it worth the seeking? If time has such evil power, may I never behold the face of Mary again.’
“Go!”
“Come, Kotikokura,” I whispered.
I took Kotikokura’s arm and walked out slowly.
L: “KOTIKOKURA, WHAT ARE WE?”—DO THE STARS HAVE A PURPOSE?—GROWTH
THE Mediterranean had never been so beautiful nor I so sad.
“You cannot imagine, Kotikokura, what I hav
e lost. You saw John…if it was really John and not merely the wraith of an evil dream– —”
Kotikokura made a grimace.
“But had you seen him in his youth– —”
He shrugged his shoulders and twisted his mouth. Kotikokura was jealous. Whenever I mentioned John’s youth and beauty, he became irritable or made gestures of depreciation.
John! John! Was it possible? Could a man change so, or was it merely a normal development? Was the youthful rebel destined to become the middle-aged hard and relentless zealot? Must the beautiful courtesan change into a hag, loveless and unforgiving? Had I escaped the inevitable only because I remained young? Were the mind and soul conditioned upon the functions of the body, upon a mere nerve, a slow or fast pulsing heart, a well-developed or atrophied muscle?
“Kotikokura, what are we? What are we?”
Kotikokura grinned.
“What shall I seek now, Kotikokura? Have I not already found what I sought?” Kotikokura continued to grin. He was not at all displeased by my disillusionment.
“And yet,—I cannot live without a purpose. It is foolish. Do the stars have a purpose? Does the Mediterranean have a purpose? Why should I?… And yet…”
“Whither shall we go, Kotikokura? Are we indeed wanderers, aimless and hopeless? Is it not for us scorners and unbelievers to crush under foot gods and circumstances? Are we not the flame that rises above the ashes?”
Kotikokura knit his forehead and pouted his lips.
“Let us never acknowledge defeat! Crusades, Jerusalems, Armenian Bishops, Johns,—what are they to us? We shall survive them all, destroying their illusions and superstitions.”
Kotikokura stamped his foot.
“Disillusioned? Why not? Disillusion is a sharp sword that cuts the chain about our necks. Pain? Sorrow? No matter! Does the mountain complain against the cloud that darkens it or the rain that beats against it or the snow that freezes its peaks? The mountain lives on. Living, after all, is what matters. If we live long enough, we shall conquer everything. We shall pluck and eat of every fruit on the Tree of Knowledge.”
My First Two Thousand Years; the Autobiography of the Wandering Jew Page 25