Wandering Moslem and a Wandering Christian.
LEVIN SCHÜCKING, too, brings our hero before us in an episode, full
of imagination, called “The Three Suitors” which belongs to his novel
_The Peasant Prince_, 1851. In the hotel of “The Three Moors,” at
Augsburg, during the twelve nights after Christmas in the year 1700,
three strangers met together. One was a weary half-decayed Jew, with
a long dirty gown, who next morning changes into a handsome young
Armenian Prince, Isaac Laquedam. The second was the Dutch admiral Van
der Decken, who arrives in a carriage with four horses. The third was
his Excellency the Master of Chase _en chef_, Herr von Rodenstein, with
a large suite. These individuals have a rendezvous in this inn every
hundred years, and pass one year together in revelling, after which
they disappear. They lose their human form and wander as spectres, one
over the earth, one over the sea, the third in the air, as the Eternal
Jew, the Flying Dutchman, the Wild Huntsman; all in bond and service
of Satan, except for this one year, wherein he has no power over them.
Whenever one century is passed, Ahasuerus-Laquedam is seized by a
burning fever, after which his body resumes the appearance it had when
he raised his hand against Jesus.
All three do a great deal of mischief during that year in quiet
Augsburg, especially in the hearts of the young women. Among these is
one distinguished by great beauty, but also by her haughtiness and
disdain towards the male sex. All three try to win her proud and frosty
heart, which unfortunately has been chained to an ugly, paralytic
husband. She once says to them that she is not proud of her beauty,
but that she would take a pride in standing a danger or conquering a
difficulty of which, centuries later, the world would say, _a man
would have been unable to subdue it_.
The handsome Armenian prince takes her at her word and invites her to
follow him one whole year: she promises it, and gives him as pledge of
her word a ring. The two others obtain similar promises. At the end
of the year she accompanies the Armenian. Suddenly she sees his youth
disappear, a musty smell comes from him, and a third shadow walks at
their side. “Who are you,” she cries aghast. “I am Ahasuerus!” She
tries to fly, but Ahasuerus holds her with an iron hand. In her despair
she sells her soul to the third shadow (the Devil) who promises her
deliverance. But first, she has to keep her word to the Rodensteiner.
With him, the Wild Huntsman, she rides through the air, and from aloft
beholds the depravity of human life. From what she has seen, and from
the wild ride, her soul and body are tormented, she is unable to go
any farther, and again implores deliverance of the Devil. Already the
Flying Dutchman has come to claim fulfilment of her promise to him. The
Devil agrees to save her if she will pledge him, besides her own, the
soul of her child.
“No, never my child, never!” the tortured woman cries; she prefers
another year’s ride, over the sea. “Take her, she longs still for a
third trial,” says the laughing Devil to the Dutchman; but he replies:
“The trial was great enough, she is released. Her force was superior to
that of a man. _A man would not have spared the soul of his child more
than he did his own._” She wakes to find her child sleeping sweetly in
its cradle; she finds also the three rings; but from the dream of a
night her beautiful hair was grey.
JOSEPH VON ZEDLITZ, an Austrian poet, in his _Wanderings of Ahasuerus_
(1844), transfers the end of the Jew’s life to the Golden Age, when the
reign of eternal Peace has begun. Ahasuerus has long been buried on
Golgotha, when an angel awakes him, and bids him wander until Noah’s
white dove, the messenger of peace, comes back, bringing peace on
earth and songs of joy, dispersing all wrath and hatred, uniting the
nations under the sceptre of Humanity. Ahasuerus, lying in his grave,
half-dreaming, sees history pass before his eyes; he awaits the time
that shall come. Whenever he thinks this moment has arrived, he rises
from his grave, and wanders about to see the world. It seems to him
that the Golden Age is near, when the Roman Empire sinks and the star
of Christendom rises; when the cherub’s song of peace strikes his ear,
he begins his pilgrimage. He expected to find peace, but he finds
ruins, ashes, death. He meets Attila’s wild bands on his way. When
Ahasuerus, 1300 years later, rises once more, he finds another Attila,
who wants to bend a whole world under his sceptre. Terror-stricken,
Ahasuerus cries: “Who can say Attila will not return a third time?” and
returning to his grave, he asks: “Jehovah, how long must I still sleep?”
HANS CHRISTIAN ANDERSEN’S _Ahasuerus_ is the angel of Doubt, who comes
upon earth to live with men, whom he resembles, for like them he denies
and doubts. He is born on earth at the same moment with Jesus, and now,
as a human being, bears the name Ahasuerus. As a man he grows wiser and
better, like his fellow-men, whose increasing perfection will, in many
thousands of years, lead them to heaven. Then Ahasuerus too will return.
After this Prologue Ahasuerus is seen as a Jewish shoemaker; he is
at the same time a favourite narrator of the stories of the Bible.
Merry children, as well as serious Pharisees, come to his workshop,
and listen to his words. He becomes conceited, and complains that he
is only a shoemaker, and not allowed to sit among the Scribes. Among
his auditors is young Veronica, who is enchanted with the new prophet
from Nazareth, who had just made his appearance. Ahasuerus counts Jesus
amongst the false prophets; he also regards him as the cause of the
death of his mother and sister, who had been slain by the agents of
Herod. But when he hears Jesus preach in the desert, he changes his
mind, and shares the admiration of Veronica. Now, he thinks, the days
of splendour will come, according to the prophets, and the reign of
David in all its magnificence. Judas, the friend of Ahasuerus, and the
enthusiastic disciple of Jesus, is the first to doubt him. He thinks
Jesus does not show enough energy in his proceedings, calls him a
loiterer; at length decides to test whether he is really the Messias.
If so, legions of angels will certainly assist him at his call; if not,
he may perish. Judas betrays Jesus, in order to give him an opportunity
to show his power--an idea suggested by Goethe. The hope of Judas is
not realised. Jesus consents to be made a prisoner. “Man he was, and
not Messiah!” says Ahasuerus, turning apostate; “how could I imagine
that the son of a carpenter was a prophet? He feels the cold, suffers
hunger, thirst, needs sleep.”
After the usual scene on the way to Golgotha, a voice from above says
to the disbelieving Ahasuerus: “Ahasuerus, Ahasuerus! thou art the type
of mankind; thou disputest and deniest God himself. Ye are all alike;
so thou mayest wander until we shall meet once again!”
It is not real Atheism, but a rigid Judaism that will not surrender to
what the author deems the unfolding purposes of God, which appears in
this Ahasuerus.
The first person whom Ahasuerus meets in his wanderings is Barabbas,
who lives as an hermit in Lebanon, repenting his sins. He has already
been mentioned in the poem as a profligate who only knows the god of
his senses; but the crucifixion and the resurrection of Christ, which
he has witnessed, have converted him. He receives his friend with the
words, “Blessed be Jesus Christ.” Ahasuerus answers with a curse.
Full of wrath, not believing in the resurrection, he takes his leave
of Barabbas. He trusts in the strength of Israel, but soon after he
is told of Jerusalem’s fall. He travels to Rome, where Domitian is
persecuting the Christians. He rejoices when he sees the burning pyres
and the Christian martyrs. He stands at the side of executioners who
torture some Christians. Among these is Veronica. He cannot convert
her, and tries therefore to slay her. He does not succeed in so saving
her from torture, but is suspected and (apparently) killed by the
executioners. Ahasuerus awakes to find beside him the dead Veronica,
and many other bodies of martyred Christians. He starts forth in terror
to flee the kingdom of the Crucified, which he sees consisting only of
“graves laden with the smell of Pestilence.”
Having passed through distant parts of the world, Ahasuerus, at the
end of three centuries, returns to Rome. He finds that the doctrine
of Christ has conquered heathendom. The Emperor and his people are
kneeling with Christ’s name on their lips. “The spirit of Jehovah has
left the earth; his people is lost in this world-chaos. The old is all
dead; the new is vain and empty! Jehovah! my breast is Thy temple, the
last in this ruined world!”
Ahasuerus passes the Alps. The Huns sweep by. He inspires Attila to
attack Rome and crush Christendom. But he--he wanders on, farther on,
to the region of the Northern Light. On his return he finds thick in
the forests the symbols of Christ; he finds Christ now worshipped in
Gaul, and in Rome the first Pope. Compelled now to believe in the power
of the Christian faith, he yet persists in his belief that a still
greater God will come, the true Messiah promised to Israel. The poet
then describes the small communities of Jews, with their quiet and
secret worship, still awaiting their Messiah. Some think he has come in
the person of Mohammed, and to him Ahasuerus now goes. He advances with
him to Jerusalem; there he is about to set the temple on fire, when
Veronica appears and prevents him. He journeys on. In Rome Charlemagne
has been made emperor; the Jews have become slaves of the Christians.
The hate of this inflexible believer in Jehovah increases. By a vast
leap the poet brings Ahasuerus to Canossa, where, full of astonishment,
he sees the emperor, barefooted and in tears, standing before the
Vicar of Christ. Before such evidence of the Majesty of Christendom,
Ahasuerus, too, stands with bended head. He cannot escape this new
kingdom, for he is in the closed yard of the world which it fills. “The
emperor stood for nights; my nights are millenniums!”
And now for the first time the idea rises in him that he is not only
the Opposing Jew, but that he represents everything earthly in conflict
with the divine.
The time of the Crusades comes. From all parts of the world the nations
rush to Jerusalem, where once the altar of Jehovah stood. They are
impelled by many selfish motives: no single thought or aim unites the
warriors, and so they struggle in vain. Ahasuerus now learns to doubt
the progress of mankind. In vain a master-builder beside his work
instructs him that in the structure of the world God is the builder.
“He does not die; each century is a stone block added to the rest: so
mankind gradually ascends.” “But,” Ahasuerus says, “often the work
stands still.” “It does,” answers the stonemason, “but only to gather
new strength.” To this Ahasuerus answers that all the blood that has
been shed in the Crusades was of no use to Europe; but the guildmaster
replies that they formed a vast step in human progress, because they
brought the different nations closer together, and brought “liberty”
into the world. Many knights sold their estates, which passed into the
hands of the commons; the supremacy of nobles was destroyed, new life
sprang up in sciences and art. Then suddenly the cry of battle rings
through the air, robber knights menace the peaceful citizens; the
tocsin sounds; the workmen rush to the battlefield; the building stops.
Full of mockery and derision at this new retrogradation in place of the
vaunted human evolution, Ahasuerus walks on.
The errors of the age, the doings in the convents, the excesses of the
Hussites, the mad demeanour of King Wenceslas, only increase Ahasuerus’
disbelief in the progress of mankind. An angel leads him to Mayence,
where Gutenberg’s printing-press is seen. Ahasuerus does not believe
in the importance of this invention. He also thinks Columbus a fool,
but, nevertheless, follows him to the deep whirlpools of the sea,
which he hopes will swallow him. But Columbus is spared by the waves,
he reaches land--the New World is discovered. There the god of the
primeval forest complains like Ahasuerus, because he has been roused
from his rest and deep silence and is dragged into the history of men.
The all-pervading Spirit of the Universe addresses him, “Oh, might the
discovery of this new hemisphere come also to thee, that thou mightst
see the divine wisdom, take comfort, and know that in the future of
Humanity there shall be One people, One mind, Unity and Reason!”
Amid the New World, and with this vision over it, Ahasuerus gains
Belief. He now sees that “it was the ruin of Israel, once as rich a
land as America, to reject the New, which comes from God.” In human
evolution the Old always denies the New: “God is born, crucified,
and--lives.” The wave of each century brings the accumulated treasures
of the Past nearer to the shores of Perfection.
Then Ahasuerus stretches out his hands towards the endless Ocean,
and in the chaos of his mind he begins to understand what _once_ he
was and what has become of him. In his own life he sees the progress
of mankind, and so the wings grow that bring him back to Heaven. But
the time has not yet come, only a day of Eternity has elapsed; and
Andersen’s Muse tells us in the last words of her song that “the myth
of Ahasuerus is only an echo of the endless tide of Time; a better
Scald will come and tell the meaning of that other pilgrimage.”
HELLER imitates Andersen in his poem, _The Wanderings of Ahasuerus_.
In his introduction he says that Ahasuerus shall lead us through all
nations to the modern world: from God becoming human to Humanity
becoming God. In the first edition (1865) the poet did not bring his
theme to its end. But in a later edition (1868) he continued his
work, and leads his hero on to the days of Goethe. The conception and
execution of his poem are exactly like those of Andersen, but Heller
presents more historical details, and his ideas and suggestions are
full of interest. His Ahasuerus is an adversary of Jesus, as one who
does not comprehend his high mission and his own doctrine. A wealthy
shoemaker, his workshop full of workmen, he is ugly and deformed; his
wife, however, is beautiful. He is an old schoolfellow of the new
prophet, who in former days has often been protected by him when people
asked him tauntingly his father’s name. Ahasuerus’s own son bears the
name of Jesus. But now Ahasuerus calls Jesus an adventurer, who had
always been a favourite of women, on account of his fine looks. He says
Jesus has learned the black art in Egypt, which enables him to win the
multitude with miracles; that he misleads poor fishermen to leave
their work and homes; that he poisons the pure fountain of the Bible,
deriving from it that he is the Son of Man. He, Ahasuerus, will unmask
this dangerous impostor. So, when he is told by some children that a
fine-looking man much like Jesus has sat down to take some rest at his
door, he scornfully bids him move on, and not bring a curse upon his
house by touching his threshold. Peter intervenes, but Ahasuerus laughs
at him. Then Jesus rising, he answers, “Unhappy man! the feelings that
so violently move thy heart come from a misled but believing mind.
Sincere as is thy anger, even now thy heart is kind. If thou couldst
only understand me, no one would shed his blood for me like thou. The
time will come when thou shalt know me. Until the day when all the
world shall have accepted Christianity thou shalt wander through the
earth with thy people, spared by Death. Nations shall come and go, but
ye shall remain until the day of the last trumpet.”
Ahasuerus re-enters his house speechless. On the day of the Passover,
Saul comes to him, and is told what happened. He declares Jesus one
of those fanatics who rise everywhere and disappear like meteors; the
streets of Rome are crowded with them. “Men,” says Saul, “are bending
under the burthen of their sins and long for forgiveness, which they
do not find in their Ancient Law. Love, the only thing that brings
release, must be delivered from the chains of the old institutions.”
Unconsciously, Saul is already of the new belief, and is soon after
formally converted. Peter and James try to convert Ahasuerus also, but
they succeed only in engaging him to hear Saul, now Paul, who preaches
in Athens of Christ’s resurrection. Ahasuerus finds out that this
doctrine is not in the Scriptures: Paul must be deceived. He returns
to Jerusalem, in his old disbelief. Jerusalem is conquered, destroyed;
Ahasuerus joins in the combat; at length all whom he has loved are
buried, he leaves the ancient city in ruins: his wanderings begin.
We find him again, with other fugitive Jews, in a cavern, gathered
about an old Rabbi. They mourn for Jerusalem, but their master reminds
them of the Law; he exhorts them to adhere firmly to that--it is
stronger than that of Christ’s apostles, which is sealed only by a man,
not by God. As Jewish apostles they go forth into the world. The war
begins between Paganism, Christianity, and Judaism. Ahasuerus tries
to win over the pagans, to bring back those that turn apostate. The
wild movements and anomalies of the world gradually lead Ahasuerus to
the hope of a kingdom not of this world. He is now seen longing for
Jesus; he flies the noisy world and arrives at the Lake of Tiberias.
There Christ appears to him, and Ahasuerus implores forgiveness. He
has already lost something of his rigid Jewish faith. When Constantine
has become a Christian, and when Rome falls, he believes that his
new idea will be realised: but no, straightway begin the disputes of
Christian sects. Ahasuerus turns his back on the contending Gnostics,
Simonians, Arians, and the rest, and comes to the desert, where he
finds Anthony, the hermit. Anthony has delivered himself from the world
and its controversies to find peace amid nature. They exchange their
experiences and thoughts. Ahasuerus acknowledges that Christ’s doctrine
has spread a kingdom of love over the earth, but that his great work
has been degraded to a mere fable. “I did not find the kingdom of
God, but of men. Here I will rest until some Angel wakes me from my
dream to begin once more my earthly pilgrimage.” Anthony has the same
faith; he will struggle on patiently and imitate the life that was so
full of suffering and love. Henceforth the two live together in a long
brotherhood.
This was the end of Heller’s first edition. In the second he enlarged
and transformed the entire poem. He separates the whole in three
different wanderings. He calls the first, which we have already
described, _Ahasuerus’s Error of Faith_; the second, _Picture of
the Universe_; the third, _Humanity_. During his first pilgrimage,
Ahasuerus moves still in the restricted horizon of a Pharisee, but he
loses much of that in his intellectual intercourse with Anthony. In
his second pilgrimage, although the whole scene of history lies open
before him, he persists still in his hope of a coming Messias. At
last he doubts that his hope will ever be realised; he frees himself
from his rigid belief. The discovery of the New World, the invention
of typography, and the Reformation, he now regards as contributing
to a free evolution of mankind, leading to the only true religion:
Humanity. Ahasuerus, like Faust, sees in this the high destiny of
mankind. History unfolds itself before Man; he moves after it,
observing, investigating, looking forward to the fulfilment of his
desire. The movement of mankind over the Old World goes on; new gods
replace the old; contrasts of all kinds meet together--nowhere is room
for God’s empire of peace. Mohammed, too, is not the right prophet.
Under Charlemagne and Leo the empire of God’s majesty on earth is
founded, but this is not the real empire of God for which Ahasuerus
looks. Besides, it does not prove to be everlasting. Priesthood, to
which all nations blindly submit, degenerates; whilst in Germany, under
the Saxon emperors strong conventional worldly power arises. Then a
new Messias seems to appear in Hildebrand, this monk so possessed of
worldly wisdom; but his empire is only maintained by the strong reins
of obedience, not by love. The Crusades do not satisfy Ahasuerus.
New persons come before us, one forming a contrast to the other.
Jehuda Levita, who praises the sublime inheritance of Adam against
the “original sin” of Christendom; then the pious buffoon, Francis
d’Assisi, contrasting with Tannhäuser, whom Ahasuerus meets in Rome,
and whose longing for the fresh and natural world of his heathen land,
amid the helpless ossification of the Christian priesthood, he can well
understand; Dante, who tries at least to harmonise the contrasts in
poetry; Rienzi, a political fool, who makes a step backwards into the
old Roman time; Huss, who, a second saviour, a martyr of the old pure
Christian doctrine, expires on the pyre.
Then Ahasuerus begins to doubt of the duration of God’s empire. When
he sees how Christ is always vanquished, and has now been crucified
so often, a deep melancholy overcomes him; he longs for death, he is
disgusted with seeing the world any longer. Then Faust appears to him,
his congenial brother; Faust, the realist, who enjoys the life and
liberty given to him, who, though a true friend of Christendom, does
not join the theological disputes, but with a happy mind prefers the
fresh hearts of the people to the musty churches with their endless
supplications. With Faust’s appearance a change of mind comes over
Ahasuerus. Both have still a third mythical brother, the Spaniard,
Don Juan. Ahasuerus, the first-born, is continually occupied with
the highest problems; he takes no notice of life, and awaits the day
when his faith will be one with that of Jesus. In sharp contrast
with this, the Spaniard enjoys life and its pleasures, with all his
natural enthusiasm. Between these two, as a mediator, stands Faust,
susceptible of high and noble things as of the pleasures of the world.
He opens Ahasuerus’ heart to the love of humanity; he teaches his dim
eyes to look around him in the world; he shows him all the productions
of industry and art. In his house he shows him the wonders and first
performances of typography; he leads him to magnificent Florence,
residence of the Medicis; and, escaping the Spanish Inquisition, they
voyage with Columbus to America. Ahasuerus, who until now thought the
earth to be miserable and small, wishes to remain on it.
In the third part of the poem, Ahasuerus leaves the New World and
returns to the Old, to follow there the evolution of human thought.
He goes to Rome, and rejoices to see the flourishing state of sciences
and arts; he finds there the great master, Raphael, who exalts
Christianity into Humanity. There also he meets Luther, who, beholding
the corruptions of the Church, conceives the idea of the Reformation.