John the Baptist: A Play

Excerpt

SCENE I

Dark shadows flit in groups across the background from right to left.

MIRIAM

Hadidja, I am afraid!

HADIDJA

Come!

MIRIAM

I am afraid. Seest thou not those gliding shadows? Their feet scarce touch the stones, and their flesh is like the shadow of the night-wind.

HADIDJA

Fool that thou art! Thou art afraid of thy companions in misery and suffering. The same need as thine brings them hither; the same hope leads them on to the heights.

MIRIAM

Do they also wish to go to him?

HADIDJA

Every one wishes to go to him. Is there a light in Israel which doth not irradiate from his hand? Is there water for the thirsty which doth not flow from him? Streams of sweet water gush forth from these dead stones, and his voice is born out of silence.

MIRIAM

But I am afraid of him. Why dwelleth he among the terrors of the desert? Why flieth he from the paths of the joyous, and shunneth the suffering?

HADIDJA

The joyous need him not. The suffering will find their way to him.

MIRIAM

Look, Hadidja! There is the glow of fire yonder above Jerusalem. The Romans are burning down our houses, and yet we tarry here!

HADIDJA

What! Dost thou not know that is the great altar on which, day and night, the priests offer up a tenth part of the sweat of our brows?

MIRIAM

[In horrified amazement.] And would he let the great altar fall too?

HADIDJA

I know not. But what he willeth is best. See--who is coming?

SCENE II

The same; two men, half carrying, half dragging a paralytic who moans.

FIRST MAN

Women, say, have ye met the great Rabbi whom men call the Baptist?

HADIDJA

We also are seeking the Baptist.

[The Paralytic, moaning.] Put me down; let me die!

FIRST MAN

We have carried this palsied man here in our arms, and they are weary, and he whom we hoped to find is not here.

THE PARALYTIC

[With a groan.] I shall die!

MANASSA'S VOICE

[Crying aloud from the right.] John! John!

MANASSA

[Rushing on the scene.] John, where art thou, John? I cry unto thee in my distress. Have mercy; let me behold thee, John!

MIRIAM

[Pointing to the left.] Look! A crowd of people are drawing near. They go before him.

HADIDJA

Kneel; for it is he.

The same. John, behind him a number of men and women, among them Amarja.

JOHN

Whose wretchedness is so great that he wails aloud, and forgets that grief should be silent?

MANASSA

[Kneeling before him.] Rabbi, mighty Rabbi. If thou art he of whom men are talking in the streets of Jerusalem, help me, save me!

JOHN

Stand up and speak.

MANASSA

I am Manassa, the son of Jeruel, and my father was sick and blind; and I lived with him on the road to Gibeon, close by the well which is never dry. And men came unto me who said, "It is the will of the Lord our God that ye refuse to pay tribute to the Romans," and I refused to pay the Romans tribute. Then have the soldiers fallen on me and burned my house, and my young wife hath perished in the flames, and my father, who was blind. And I am now left alone and desolate. Help me, Rabbi!...