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The story concerns a
monastery that had fallen upon hard times. Once a great order, as a result
of waves of antimonastic persecution in the seventeenth and eighteenth
centuries and the rise of secularism in the nineteenth, all its branch
houses were lost and it had become decimated to the extent that there were
only five monks left in the decaying mother house: the abbot and four
others, all over seventy in age. Clearly it was a dying order.
In the deep woods
surrounding the monastery there was a little hut that a rabbi from a
nearby town occasionally used for a hermitage. Through their many years of
prayer and contemplation the old monks had become a bit psychic, so they
could always sense when the rabbi was in his hermitage. "The rabbi is in
the woods, the rabbi is in the woods again " they would whisper to each
other. As he agonized over the imminent death of his order, it occurred to
the abbot at one such time to visit the hermitage and ask the rabbi if by
some possible chance he could offer any advice that might save the
monastery.
The rabbi welcomed the
abbot at his hut. But when the abbot explained the purpose of his visit,
the rabbi could only commiserate with him. "I know how it is," he
exclaimed. "The spirit has gone out of the people. It is the same in my
town. Almost no one comes to the synagogue anymore." So the old abbot and
the old rabbi wept together. Then they read parts of the Torah and quietly
spoke of deep things. The time came when the abbot had to leave. They
embraced each other. "It has been a wonderful thing that we should meet
after all these years, "the abbot said, "but I have still failed in my
purpose for coming here. Is there nothing you can tell me, no piece of
advice you can give me that would help me save my dying order?"
"No, I am sorry," the
rabbi responded. "I have no advice to give. The only thing I can tell you
is that the Messiah is one of you."
When the abbot
returned to the monastery his fellow monks gathered around him to ask,
"Well what did the rabbi say?" "He couldn't help," the abbot answered. "We
just wept and read the Torah together. The only thing he did say, just as
I was leaving --it was something cryptic-- was that the Messiah is one of
us. I don't know what he meant."
In the days and weeks
and months that followed, the old monks pondered this and wondered whether
there was any possible significance to the rabbi's words. The Messiah is
one of us? Could he possibly have meant one of us monks here at the
monastery? If that's the case, which one? Do you suppose he meant the
abbot? Yes, if he meant anyone, he probably meant Father Abbot. He has
been our leader for more than a generation. On the other hand, he might
have meant Brother Thomas. Certainly Brother Thomas is a holy man.
Everyone knows that Thomas is a man of light. Certainly he could not have
meant Brother Elred! Elred gets crotchety at times. But come to think of
it, even though he is a thorn in people's sides, when you look back on it,
Elred is virtually always right. Often very right. Maybe the rabbi did
mean Brother Elred. But surely not Brother Phillip. Phillip is so passive,
a real nobody. But then, almost mysteriously, he has a gift for somehow
always being there when you need him. He just magically appears by your
side. Maybe Phillip is the Messiah. Of course the rabbi didn't mean me. He
couldn't possibly have meant me. I'm just an ordinary person. Yet
supposing he did? Suppose I am the Messiah? O God, not me. I couldn't be
that much for You, could I?
As they contemplated in this manner,
the old monks began to treat each other with extraordinary respect on the
off chance that one among them might be the Messiah. And on the off off
chance that each monk himself might be the Messiah, they began to treat
themselves with extraordinary respect.
Because the forest in which
it was situated was beautiful, it so happened that people still
occasionally came to visit the monastery to picnic on its tiny lawn, to
wander along some of its paths, even now and then to go into the
dilapidated chapel to meditate. As they did so, without even being
conscious of it, they sensed the aura of extraordinary respect that now
began to surround the five old monks and seemed to radiate out from them
and permeate the atmosphere of the place. There was something strangely
attractive, even compelling, about it. Hardly knowing why, they began to
come back to the monastery more frequently to picnic, to play, to pray.
They began to bring their friends to show them this special place. And
their friends brought their friends.
Then it happened that
some of the younger men who came to visit the monastery started to talk
more and more with the old monks. After a while one asked if he could join
them. Then another. And another. So within a few years the monastery had
once again become a thriving order and, thanks to the rabbi's gift, a
vibrant center of light and spirituality in the
realm. |