Posted: Mar 21, 08 2:06am

Nothing but tumbleweed and the sound of distant bells around here. Anyone looking for a 'critique' fix can have a go at this.

THE ZEALOT'S MOTHER

When I was young they called me Peter - the rock. It sounds impressive, but I should tell you that the name was given more out of levity than anything else. Not reverence. In those days I had a tendency to jump in feet first, so to speak. I wanted to believe. I felt I had the right to believe. I was solid in belief – a rock! Well named, as it turned out – for when the whole thing went sour I was the first to crumble. The rock indeed!

When they killed him, I mean when I found out that he had truly died, I had no answers. It was as if everything he had promised had come to nothing - a time of unbearable darkness, of despair, loneliness, fear and foreboding… I hid for a day in the cellar of a sympathetic gentile called Linus. Then I made up my mind to try to scuttle out of Jerusalem unnoticed. I wanted my old life back. I wanted to get back up to the lake, back to my wife, to be a poor fisherman and work out the rest of my days in peace. I nearly made it too. But just as I was about to leave the city I was spotted. I heard them behind me, ‘Look, there’s Peter, a friend of the dead Jesus,’ someone said. ‘Wheel him up. Let’s see if anything’s rubbed off on him.’

I didn’t know what they meant, but when they caught up with me it was obvious I wasn’t in any danger. They wanted assistance. They’d come to me for miracles, of all things. It was insane. I told them it was over, the light had gone out, that it was time for everyone to wake up and get on with their lives. But they wouldn't listen. They pleaded with me and, in the end, I went along - to prove my point more than anything else.

They took me down to Gennath, one of the poorer areas of Jerusalem, full of harlots and criminals. I was rather weary of the place. The streets are very dark and dense there, crammed full. But eventually we reached a market square and I was relieved to see the evening sun again. I noticed the commotion straight away. It was hard to miss.

There was this old woman dancing around the square and frothing at the mouth, and her sisters wailing and shouting for assistance. All the locals were standing around her, little kids throwing pebbles, shopkeepers tutting at the distraction and others smirking as though at some free entertainment. She was the mother of Hab the Zealot, one of the Sicarii who'd shared Golgotha with Christ. She'd been there. She'd seen what I'd missed - his death, her sons too. And the pain of that day had laid her open. Now she was just a sack full of evil spirits, or so her kin believed. She was out of control, violent, desperate; to them, better off dead.

When I got there she was in that part of her routine that mimicked the death of her son - hands outstretched, head on her chest. She spun around in an obscene fashion, a representation of the spiral, the fall to death, it seemed to me.

I felt sorry for her. But also for myself. I hadn’t been expecting this. I‘d assumed I was needed to say a few prayers over some old soul who was slipping away. I was worried as to how I was going to get out of this.

And then I heard it. I heard his voice, clear as day. The voice of Christ. I heard it.

Be the enemy of sin.

I trembled. Nearly jumped out of my skin.

Be the enemy of sin.

I must have looked terrible, like a ghost. I felt the colour drain out of me, and I thought I was going to faint right there and then.

Be the enemy of sin.

After a moment I knew I just had to accept it, let it come. I closed my eyes and the voice filled my head. My heart felt like a drum in my chest - strong, massive. And when I opened my eyes I just knew. I knew I had the answer. God had given me the power - but the power was in my mouth, not my hands. I knew what to do, what needed to be said. I touched her arm. I held her. Her hands were crusted with old blood, the blood of her son. Her face too, as though she'd stood beneath his cross and let his fluid run all over her. But I knew. Because on her blood-crusted face there was not the trace of a single tear. It was as though tears were not enough. Not enough for her. She would have to die everyday just as he had died. Everyday the same performance. Her demon, if that's the word, was the spirit of withheld tears.

'Why not weep?' I said to her. She looked at me with dry eyes, dry as the desert.

'It would be a sham to weep,' she said in this low, lifeless voice.

'Not so,' said I. 'Weep in waves, mother. In torrents. Weep until the ground beneath you has been transformed into a mud. And the answer will be at your feet.'

She scratched at her face. She made some noises in her throat that terrified the pebble throwers. I heard young children crying and mothers guiding them away from the fray. And then that voice again, loud and demanding:

Be the enemy of sin.

'Weep,’ I said, ‘and then fall to your knees.'

She spat and swore but I would not be distracted.

'Weep,' I said again, 'and then take into your hands the clay of tears that your misery has made, and with it shape a cup. And when the time comes for you to stand before the god of Israel you will be able to say; 'Here Lord, here's the chalice of my despair, here's what I made with my grief - not a house for the devil, nor a home for hatred and bitterness, but a cup that's proof of the faith I had in you. A cup kept empty. And now here I stand, ready to collect what's due. Oh mother, what then will you possess!'

So this old woman, this poor old woman, looked at me, straight into my eyes for what seemed an age. But in that time she realised she had a choice to make. She had to decide whether she would follow the way of goodness - of love, forgiveness, redemption - or of evil.

Now let me tell you about the commotion that followed. For that whole market square fell apart in the most dreadful of uproars. There were terrible screams and shouts for mercy because those who'd looked on, entertained, now had to watch as the old woman’s demons emerged from her eyes. Of course, those who were wise saw only tears.