The Parable of the Seeker

At age twelve, Alex joined a monastery. At age twelve and two weeks, he quit, finding the monks insufficiently motivated, too preoccupied with the comforts of the body. Leaving behind their mountains, he wandered into the woods and found a quiet, moss-carpeted shack in the lowlands. He entered it intent on preparing himself for the coming of the Most High.In the barest of clothes, he knelt, foregoing as much food, water, and sleep as he could, inviting God to enter his life. It took five years for doubts to creep in.

He diagnosed the sickness correctly: lack of faith. To remedy it, he allowed himself even less to eat than before. He trained himself to pray while he slept, and began to drink only what dripped through the rafters after rain, sucking on his spit to keep himself hydrated. After ten years of such efforts, meager as they were, with no sign from God, nor any of the celestial visions which were said to feed the spirit of mystics, Alex became convinced he was doing something very wrong.

In fact, looking around himself, the idiocy of his method struck Alex so obviously he shot up from the floor, cursing all the time he’d wasted.

He rose from the cushion and walked to the front of the house. First touching the top of the frame, which was a foot or so taller than him, and then spreading his arms to span the sides. He pulled the door open with care, listening to the scratch of the hinges. The air fanned by the door was humid and heavy. From outside, he noticed with grim satisfaction the middle portions of the door were warped from rain, and a layer of dust had accumulated under the frame. After testing the door with his knuckles and watching it wobble with the sound of rot, he broke off a slab of the wood.

After a day, he had broken down the entire door. By the end of the week, the front wall.

When the entire house was gone, Alex again began kneeling on the earth, beseeching God for forgiveness, denying himself all pleasures and necessities. This he did for about a day. It seems he had become smarter now, for it did not take him long to realize he was caught in the same trap. He looked at the frame of his body, poked the sores that had accumulated from constant friction and lack of nutrition. He inspected his joints that shrieked when lifted out of supplication. Understanding, he put his pinky finger to his lips and bit off a small flaky peel of skin.

His left arm was used to pull and mangle what he could not bite. Rocks and stones for what the arm could not handle. He did not succeed cleanly. He required the help of certain animals, which he recruited by smearing his blood on the dirt and crying out for attention. It was hard work.

A few travelers chanced on him near the end. He bid them finish his work ,and when they refused, he shooed them away. God would not come with such decadents around, and God was coming soon, he knew.

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