Mary felt the sweet weight and smiled. Ah, if it were possible for God always to come down so sweetly over men! As she thought this, she recalled the morning she and her fiancé Joseph had climbed to the prophet Elijah’s summit, to heaven-kissed Carmel. They wanted to beg the fiery prophet to mediate with God so that they might have a son, whom they would then dedicate to the prophet’s grace. They were to marry that same evening and had departed before dawn to receive the blessing of this flaming prophet whose great joy was the thunderbolt. Not a cloud in the sky; it was a lovely autumn. The human ants had gathered in their crops; the must was boiling in the jars; the figs drying, strung up on the rafters. Mary was fifteen at the time, her groom an old man with gray hair, but in his firm hand he held as a support the staff which had been foreordained to blossom.
They reached the holy summit at exactly noon. They knelt and touched the sharp, blood-stained granite with their fingertips, trembling. A spark flew out of the rock and cut Mary’s hand. Joseph opened his mouth to call the summit’s wild inhabitant, but before he could utter a sound the bellowing hail-laden clouds bounded angrily down from the foundations of heaven and formed a swirling funnel over the sharp granite. As Joseph darted forward to clasp his fiancée and take her to the shelter of some cave, God slung a terrifying flash of lightning, heaven and earth joined and Mary fell over backward in a swoon. When she came to and opened her eyes and looked around her, she saw Joseph lying face down on the black granite-paralyzed…
Mary placed her hand on the dove which sat upon her knees. She caressed it lightly so that she would not frighten it. “God descended in a savage form on top of the mountain and spoke to me in a savage way,” she murmured. “What did he say to me?”
She had often been questioned on this by the rabbi, who was bewildered by the repeated miracles which surrounded her.
“Try to remember, Mary,” he would say. “This is the way God sometimes speaks to men-by means of the thunderbolt. Fight hard to remember, so that we may discover your son’s fate.”
“There was thunder, Father. It rolled down from heaven like a creaking ox cart.”
“And behind the thunder, Mary?”
“Yes, you’re right, Father. God spoke behind the thunder, but I wasn’t able to discover the actual words. Forgive me.”
Caressing the dove, she struggled to bring the lightning back to mind after thirty years and to untangle its hidden meaning.
She closed her eyes. In her palm she felt the dove’s tiny warm body and beating heart. Suddenly-she did not realize how, she did not know why-dove and lightning were one; she was sure of it: these heartbeats and the thunder-all were God! She uttered a cry and jumped up in terror. Now, for the first time, she was able to make out the words hidden in the thunder, hidden in the dove’s cooing: “Hail, Mary… Hail, Mary…” Without a doubt, this was what God had cried: “Hail, Mary…”
Turning, she saw her husband propped up against the wall, still opening and closing his mouth. It was dark now, yet he still toiled and sweated. She went to the doorway, passing in front of him but not speaking to him. She wanted to see if by any chance her son was coming. She had watched him twist the crucified man’s bloody kerchief over his hair and start down the road toward the plain. Where had he gone? Why was he late? Was he going to stay out in the fields again until daybreak?
As she stood on the threshold she saw the old rabbi approaching. He was puffing, leaning heavily on his crosier. The tufts of white hair at each of his temples waved in the evening breeze which had begun to come down from Mount Carmel.
Mary stepped to one side with respect, and the rabbi entered. He took his brother’s hand, patted it, but did not speak to him-what could he say? His mind submerged in dark waters, he turned to Mary.
“Your eyes are shining, Mary,” he said. “What’s the matter? Did God come again?”
“Father, I’ve found it!” said Mary, unable to restrain herself.
“You’ve found it? Found what, in God’s name?”
“The words behind the lightning.”
The rabbi gave a start. “Great is the God of Israel,” he cried, lifting high his arms. “This was precisely why I came, Mary, to ask you once more. Today, as you know, one of our hopes was crucified, and my heart…”
“I’ve found it, Father,” Mary repeated. “While I was sitting this evening and spinning and thinking again about the lightning, I felt the thunder grow quiet within me for the first time, and behind it I heard a serene, clear voice, the voice of God: ‘Hail, Mary’!”
The rabbi collapsed onto a stool. Squeezing his temples between his hands, he plunged deep into thought. After a considerable interval he lifted his head.
“Nothing else, Mary? Bend far down within yourself so that you’ll be sure to hear. The fate of Israel may depend on what you say.”
When Mary heard the rabbi’s words she became terrified. Her breast began to tremble, and once more her mind strained to discover what was behind the thunder.
“No,” she murmured finally, exhausted, “no, Father. He said more, much more, but I can’t hear it. I’m trying as hard as I can, but I cannot hear what he said.”
The rabbi placed his hand on top of her head, above her large eyes.
“Fast, Mary, and pray; do not dissipate your mind on daily tasks. There are times when a glowing halo as bright as lightning moves all around your face. Is it truly light, I wonder? I can’t tell. Fast, pray, and you will hear. ‘Hail, Mary…’: God’s message begins with kindness. Try hard to hear what follows.”
In order to hide her agitation Mary went to the shelf where she kept the jugs. She unhooked a brass cup, filled it with cool water, got a handful of dates also, and bent over to hand them to the old man.
“I’m not hungry or thirsty, Mary,” he said, “thank you. Sit down; I have something to say to you.”
Mary took the lowest stool and sat at the rabbi’s feet. Tipping up her head, she waited.
The old man tested the words one by one in his mind. What be wanted to say was difficult: it was a hope so spidery fine and slippery that he was unable to find words spidery and slippery enough to avoid giving the hope too much weight and turning it into a certainty. He did not want to terrify the mother.
“Mary,” he said finally, “a mystery roams outside this house, like a desert lion. You are not the same as other women, Mary. Don’t you feel that?”
“No, I don’t, Father,” she murmured. “I am like all women. I love all the cares and joys of women. I like to wash, to cook, to go to the fountain for water, to chat merrily with the neighbors; and, in the evening, to sit in my doorway and watch the passers-by. And my heart, Father, like the hearts of all women, is full of pain.”
“You’re not the same as other women, Mary,” the rabbi repeated in a solemn tone, raising his hand as though he wished to prevent all objections. “And your son…”
The rabbi stopped. How could he find words to express this, the most difficult part of all. He looked up at the heavens and listened. Some of the birds in the trees were preparing to go to sleep, others to wake up. The wheel turned; the day sank below men’s feet.
The rabbi sighed. How the days rushed by, how rabidly one pursued the next! Dawn, dusk, the passage of the sun, the passage of moon after moon; children became men, black hairs whitened, the sea ate into the land, mountains were stripped bare-and still the One they awaited did not come!
“My son?” said Mary, her voice trembling. “My son, Father?”
“He is not like other sons, Mary,” the rabbi boldly replied.
He weighed his words once more, and continued after a moment. “Sometimes when he is alone during the night and thinks no one is watching him, the whole circumference of his face gleams in the darkness. May God forgive me, Mary, but I’ve made a small hole high in the wall. I climb up and watch him from there; I spy on what he does. Why? Because-I confess it-I’m completely confused; my knowledge is of no help whatsoever: I unroll the Scriptures tirelessly but I cannot comprehend what or who he is. I spy on him in secret, therefore, and in the darkness I discern this light which licks him and devours his face. That is why he’s been growing paler day by day and melting away. It’s not because of sickness, fasting or prayer; no, he is being devoured by this light.”