In this episode, searching the depths of Sheol for the Prophet to dispel Shlomo’s doubts.

The Eternal Jew’s Tale Messiah Tractates, a Montage Shlomo Molkho’s Traum, 3

But comes the night, comes the fears. What is this? The anointed is in fear? Tyrants? Can’t he change their thoughts? Futures? Doesn’t he know them all? Yet the anointed seeks a sorcerer. The Witch of Iskender comes in a dream with a bright halo around her head and many oracles affirming her:

‘The wisest of us, but costly, you know.’

The next night with incantations and prayer, after fasting and other mortifications, Shlomo drones a psalm, reading it backwards, til he’s weary and sleep drops its veil and thru its fabric she ascends and in an eerie and ancient voice:

“You, who woke me in sheol, awful thing you should not do, confess to me your secret wish, what demon would you couple with?”

“Grizzled sister, no such sin stains my drear concerns. Rather, we would speak with him who hacked apart that evil king, Agag, who Saul refused to kill.”

A cruel and terrifying scowl replaces the witch’s wrinkled leer, and from her throat, gurgles and groans, and then a mannish whispering…

“…Arggg… what… who is this waking me from the first sleep these vicious dogs have let me cop in many an age… what demon, you? Be you one of my jailers in hell?”

“Samuel… can this really be, that you are bound in sheol’s grip?…”

“Samuel? Samuel? Who is that? Surely not the one I know who slaughtered me and sent me here?”

“I don’t understand you, man. Speak more clearly. Who are you?”

“What? You’re breaking up. Damn! I’m Agag. Who are you? Can you hear me? Speak up, thing.”

“Did you say that you’re Agag? I’m calling the Prophet, not his prey!”

“What the fug! A stinkin’ man? Don’t bother me, you rotten meat… worm food is all you are…”

“Witch! Wake up out of your trance. Ho. Wake up. Your connection’s all wrong. Witch. Witch. Damn it! Wake up! What the hell is going on?”

“… stinkin’ rotten meat… whaaa… where am I… who are you? Roman ruins… oh you, that Jew…”

“Witch, we wanted the spirit of Samuel, the angel-born messiah priest. Instead, you served up wicked Agag, rank with evil thought and deed. Arouse yourself, focus, recall that glowing spirit in the lightless depths.”

“You human donkeys lack the sense to know how hard it is to find one particular soul among the myriads that populate the tangled wormholes down in death. Samuel, you say, that savage priest, him with Amalek’s blood on his hands?… animal… emunah*… amelek… mollekho…” * Hebrew: faithfulness; steadfastness

So the witch descends once again, and once again her voice changes…

“Molkho, Reubani, you wanted me? What more troubles will you wreak? Then go on, stir it up and ask…”

“Anointed one, please explain these fearful tremors shaking us. Can the pope defy our will? Is not law but wetted clay in our hands, that we may mold? Tell us Samuel, why our fear?”

“Samuel? Do you call on him whose soul towers far above my petty life, my futile deeds? I’m the Saul that Samuel chose to leave his father’s plow behind, that Philistines might plow me down. I’m no Samuel, that’s certain, but I declare that such as you have no credence here, above. Go away you little men.”

With this insult Iskendor returns with hoarse and acrid whispering:

“You haven’t brought enough change to make such long distance calls.”

Then she fades and disappears, and Molkho, once a shining face, grows ashen as his flame burns out.

Gone and followed closely by shame, and yet that urge to world-redeem, to change the world in one fell swoop, to play God-All-Powerful, that urge persists most urgently. Or is it just to play the world, to see how high their spirit can fly, a thrilling game, a deadly game, how many can they hold in thrall? Or do they dupe themselves, the same? Who can say? But like the sea that ever churns and washes up exotic shells and detritus, so the messianic urge encoils in the human surge.

End of Shlomo Molkho’s Traum

Finally, we shine a new light on Isaac Luria…

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)