Nikos Kazantzakis: The Last Temptation of Christ

The young man did not reply. The redbeard glanced at him furiously.

“Are you ready?” he asked again. He had already begun to get up in order to grab him by the arm and shake him awake so that he would give an answer, but before he could do so a trumpet blared and cavalry rushed into the narrow street, followed by the heavy, rhythmic march of Roman soldiers. The redbeard clenched his fist and raised it toward the ceiling.

“God of Israel,” he bellowed, “the time has come. Today! Not tomorrow, today!”

He turned again to the young man.

“Are you ready?” he asked once more, but then, without waiting for a reply: “No, no, you won’t bring the cross-that’s what I say! The people are assembled. Barabbas has come down from the mountains with his men. We’ll break into the prison and snatch away the Zealot. Then it will happen-don’t shake your head!-then the miracle will happen. Ask your uncle the rabbi. Yesterday he gathered all of us together in the synagogue-why didn’t your Highness come too? He stood up and spoke to us. ‘The Messiah won’t come,’ he said, ‘as long as we remain standing with crossed hands. God and men must fight together if the Messiah is to come.’ That’s what he told us, for your information. God isn’t enough, man isn’t enough. Both have to fight-together! Do you hear?”

He grasped the young man by the arm and shook him. “Do you hear? Where is your mind? You should have been there to listen to your uncle-maybe you would have come to your senses, poor devil! He said the Zealot-yes, the very Zealot the Roman infidels are going to crucify today-might be the One we’ve waited for over so many generations. If we leave him unaided, if we fail to rush out and save him, he will die without revealing who he is. But if we run and save him, the miracle will happen. What miracle? He will throw off his rags and the royal crown of David will shine on his head! That’s what he told us, for your information. When we heard him we all shed tears. The old rabbi lifted his hands to heaven and shouted, ‘Lord of Israel, today, not tomorrow, today!’ and we, every one of us, raised our hands, looked up at heaven and yelled, threatened, wept. ‘Today! Not tomorrow, today!’ Do you hear, son of the Carpenter, or am I talking to a blank wall?”

The young man, his half-closed eyes pinned on the strap with the sharp nails which hung on the wall opposite, was listening to something intently. Audible beneath the redbeard’s harsh and menacing voice were the hoarse, muffled struggles of his old father in the next room as he vainly opened and closed his lips, trying to speak. The two voices joined in the young man’s heart, and suddenly he felt that all the struggle of mankind was a mockery.

The redbeard gripped him on the shoulder now and gave him a push.

“Where is your mind, clairvoyant? Didn’t you hear what your uncle Simeon told us?”

“The Messiah will not come in this way,” murmured the young man. His eyes were pinned now on the newly constructed cross, bathed in the soft rosy light of the dawn. “No, the Messiah will not come in this way. He will never renounce his rags or wear a royal crown. Neither men nor God will ever rush to save him, because he cannot be saved. He will die, die, wearing his rags; and everyone-even the most faithful-will abandon him. He will die all alone at the top of a barren mountain, wearing on his head a crown of thorns.”

The redbeard turned and gazed at him with astonishment. Half his face glittered, the other half remained completely dark. “How do you know?” he asked. “Who told you?”

But the young man did not answer. It was fully light out now. He jumped off the bench, seized a handful of nails and a hammer, and approached the cross. But the redbeard anticipated him. Reaching the cross with one great stride, he began to punch it rabidly and to spit on it as though it were a man. He turned. His beard, mustache and eyebrows pricked the young man’s face.

“Aren’t you ashamed?” he shouted. “All the carpenters in Nazareth, Cana and Capernaum refused to make a cross for the Zealot, and you- You’re not ashamed, not afraid? Suppose the Messiah comes and finds you building his cross; suppose this Zealot, the one who’s being crucified today, is the Messiah… Why didn’t you have the courage like the others to answer the centurion: ‘I don’t build crosses for Israel’s heroes’?”

He seized the absent-minded carpenter by the shoulder. “Why don’t you answer? What are you staring at?”

Lashing out, he glued him to the wall. “You’re a coward,” he flung at him with scorn, “a coward, a coward-that’s what I say! Your whole life will add up to nothing!”

A shrill voice tore through the air. Abandoning the youth, the redbeard turned his face toward the door and listened. There was a great uproar outside: men and women, an immense crowd, cries of: Town crier! Town crier! and then once more the shrill voice invaded the air.

“Sons and daughters of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, by imperial command: attention! Close your workshops and taverns, do not go to your fields. Mothers, take your babies; old men, take your staffs-and come! Come, you who are lame, deaf, paralyzed-come to see, to see how those who lift their hands against our master the Emperor-long may he live!-are punished; to see how this villainous rebel, the Zealot, will die!”

The redbeard opened the door, saw the agitated crowd which was now silent and listening, saw the town crier upon a rock-skinny, hatless, with his long neck and long spindly legs-and spat. “Damn you to hell, traitor!” he bellowed. Slamming the door furiously, he turned to the young man. His choler had risen clear to his eyes.

“You can be proud of your brother Simon the traitor!” he growled.

“It’s not his fault,” said the youth contritely; “it’s mine, mine.”

He paused a moment, and then: “It was because of me that my mother banished him from the house, because of me-and now he…”

Half the redbeard’s face sweetened and was illuminated for an instant as though it sympathized with the youth. “How will you ever pay for all those sins, poor devil?” he asked.

The young man remained silent for a long time. His lips moved, but he was tongue-tied. “With my life, Judas, my brother,” he finally managed to say. “I have nothing else.”

The redbeard gave a start. The light had now entered the workshop through the skylight and the slits of the door. The youth’s large, pitch-black eyes gleamed; his voice was full of bitterness and fear.

“With your life?” said the redbeard, taking hold of the other’s chin. “Don’t turn your head away from me. You’re a man now, look into my eyes… With your life? What do you mean?”

“Nothing.”

He lowered his head and was silent. But suddenly: “Don’t ask me, don’t ask me, Judas, my brother!”

Judas clasped the young man’s face between his palms. He raised it and looked at it for a long time without speaking. Then, tranquilly, he let it go and moved toward the door. His heart had suddenly been roused.

The din outside was growing stronger and stronger. The rustle of naked feet and the flapping of sandals rose into the air, which jingled with the bronze bracelets and thick ankle rings of the women. Standing erect on the threshold, the redbeard watched the crowds that continually poured out of the alleyways. Everyone was mounting toward the opposite end of the village, toward the accursed hill where the crucifixion was to take place. The men did not speak; they cursed between their teeth and beat their staffs against the cobbles. Some of them secretly held knives in their fists, beneath their shirts. The women were screeching. Many had thrown back their kerchiefs, undone their hair and begun to chant the dirge.