A
blast of bad air had come from the east, bringing a plague into the
country. Every day, with the
rising of the sun, the old women sat at the gates of the village to watch for
the angel of death. Would he come
from the east? From the South or
the West? Or from the North?
One
woman, a great great grandmother, still had wonderful eyes and ears. She could see a bird fall to the ground
ten miles away, or hear bells on a honeybee's necklace, or smell the first
blush of love, and the villagers, knowing this, set her inside the belltower,
up high so she could see far off.
They
waited and waited. They told
stories about death, about how terrible he was. How awful. They pictured him--a giant with five heads and
six pairs of black wings and a sword fifty miles long. Every time a cloud passed in front of
the sun, the people jumped to their feet, expecting to see a giant stepping over the mountains. But it didn't happen that way, for he
angel of death was nothing like that.
When he finally arrived, he was more like a shadow, nearly invisible, a
heat ripple in the air as he crept from rock to rock. If it hadn't been for the old woman, he would have been upon
them between one breath and the next.
From
the top of the belltower, the great grandmother smelled him coming, like the
odor that comes off of old books long collecting dust, and she cried out. "From the East!" she said,
and everyone in town ran to see.
At first, they couldn't find him.
They strained their eyes, but saw nothing. Then a child pointed to a pale shadow which killed the
flowers as it passed. In terror,
the people called out to God.
"Save us, Oh God! Save
us!"
From
the top of heaven, where he hears everything, God turned an ear. "What's all that shouting
about?" he said, looking down.
"Save
us!" said the people in the village.
"Save
you?" said God, seeing the angel of death nearby. "Save you from my own
servant?"
"But
aren't you a God of the living and not of the dead?" shouted the
villagers.
"Oh...yes. Quite right," God said, clearly
taken aback. "I am the
God of the living. I nearly
forgot. You people are quite
right." So he called out to
the angel. "You there! Angel of death! Bypass that village for the time being."
Frustrated,
the angel of death let off his skulking, stood straight. He shaded his eyes from God's
brightness, shouted back, "But Lord," he said. "What about your command that
cannot be changed?"
"That's
right," God said, his brow furrowing in thought. "My command cannot be changed. I nearly forgot. Oh bother!" This was a problem--he was a God of the
living and not of the dead. That
was certain. But his commands,
once given, couldn't be changed.
That too was certain. More
than a problem--it was a paradox. God hated paradoxes. He thought and thought on it, but he
didn't know what to do, so finally he shouted back. "Wait till next year!"
Unhappy,
the angel of death bypassed the town.
No one died in the village that year, not even the sick or the very
old. In fact, no one took ill, and
no one grew any older. Those who
were sick to begin with climbed out of their beds and were never sick again. But the angel was coming back, one way
or the other, so their good fortune was only temporary.
Luckily,
the old woman was high enough in the belltower to overhear the exchange between
God and death, so the next year, when the angel was due to return, the village
was ready once again.
"From
the north!" the old woman shouted, hearing his footsteps on the sand like
the skittering of a wasp, and all the people ran to the northern gate. Just as they had done the year before,
the people called out to God, "Have you forgotten already, oh God, that
you are the God of the living, and that you save even sinners from death?"
"That's
right!" said God, clapping his hand to his forehead. "I nearly forgot. I save even sinners from
death." So once again, God
leaned down to speak. "Angel of death!" he called out. "Bypass the town."
The
angel, thoroughly angry now, kicked at the dust and stamped his feet. "Lord," he said. "Why won't you let me take
them? You promised me!"
God
frowned at the angel. The sun
dimmed and several mountain ranges cringed. "Just do as I say," he
said, his voice rolling over the countryside. "And no backtalk."
The
angel, who didn't want to displease God anymore than he had, bypassed the town
once again. This went on, year
after year. The angel came, the
people prayed, and God gave them a repreive. It went on a hundred years, a thousand years. Everyone in all the surrounding
villages had long since died, but this village, with the old woman and her
belltower, was as healthy and young and alive as ever before. The flowers were
brighter, the bees busier, the sheep and goats fatter. The dogs barked only for the fun of
it. It went on for a thousand
years, for a million years. It
went on for a billion more. It
went on until the sun dimmed and the galaxies burned out, until the stars
winked out of existence one by one, and all the universe became a cold empty
place. The people in that town
knew nothing of this, however, for in their world, the sun was bright and the
great great grandmother’s eyes and ears were still keen. The children played and every year the
angel of death arrived, and every year the people prayed to God, and every year
the sentence of death which could not be denied, was postponed.