Thirteenth Tale Of Seven Beggars #6
Just then he entered and said, I am here.
I have come to you on your wedding day. He spoke to them as the other beggars had, falling upon them and embracing them: You may think that my 216 hands are lame, but really I am not crippled at all.
I do indeed have strength in my hands, but I do not use this strength in the world for I need it for something else.
And I have that on good authority from the Watery Castle.
One time, several of us were sitting together and each was boasting of the strength he had in his hands.
This one boasted of the particular prowess he had in his hands, and that one boasted of the particular prowess he had in his hands.
One boasted he had such power and prowess in his hands he could shoot an arrow and draw it right back again.
For such was his skill that even though he had loosed the arrow he could make it turn around and come back to him.
So I asked him, What kind of arrow can you draw back to you?
For there are both ten kinds of arrow and ten kinds of poison.
When you wish to shoot an arrow, you daub it with one of the poisons.
Doing so makes the arrow harmful. Daubing an arrow with a different poison makes each an even more harmful type of arrow.
And of these ten kinds of poison, each one is more harmful than the next.
That is why I asked him, Which kind of arrow is it that you can draw back to you?
I went on to ask him whether he could not only draw it back before it had hit its mark, but also whether he could draw it back even after it had hit its mark. To which he replied, Even after the arrow hits its mark I can draw it back.
But to the question: Which kind of arrow can you draw back to you?, he answered, This kind here.
I said to him, Then you cannot heal the princess. Since you can draw back to you but a single kind of arrow, you cannot heal her. 217
Another of them boasted his hands had such a power that whomever he took from he gave to. And as such he was a man of charity.
I asked him, What kind of alms do you give? He answered that he tithed.
So I said to him, That being the case, you cannot heal the princess either. Indeed, you cannot even get to where she is. You can enter no further than one wall of the princess’s abode, but past that you cannot reach.
Another of them boasted that his hands had a particular power. He explained, There are officials in the world, each one requiring wisdom. I have such a power in my hands that by laying my hands on him I can give him wisdom.
I asked him, What kind of wisdom can you give through your hands? After all, there are ten measures of wisdom in the world.
He answered, This wisdom here.
So I said to him, You, too, cannot heal the princess. Indeed, you cannot even take her pulse. There are ten kinds of pulse and you cannot even take one, for you can give but a single kind of wisdom through your hands.
Another of them boasted that his hands had such a power that when a tempest blew he could quell the gale; he could capture the wind and restrain it and give it the moderation required of a wind.
I asked him, What kind of wind can you capture with your hands? For there are ten kinds of wind.
He answered, This wind here.
So I said to him, You cannot heal the princess. Indeed, you cannot even play the right melody for her. There are ten kinds 218 of melody. The princess’s cure is a matter of melodies, and you can play for her but a single one.
They asked me, What can you do?
I answered, I can do what you all cannot. For I possess the nine lacking aspects of each skill you boast of.
Then they asked, But who is this princess?
I replied, There is a whole story to that.
Once upon a time there was a king who was enamoured of a princess. He undertook all manner of ruse to ensnare her until he had caught her and she was his.
One time the king dreamt that the princess rose up against him and killed him.
He awoke, but the dream stayed with him in his heart.
He summoned all his oneiromancers and they interpreted that his dream would actually come true—she would murder him.
The king had no idea what to do about her.
Should he kill her? That would make him feel regret.
Should he banish her? That would upset him greatly, for someone else would marry her.
And, after all, had he laboured so much over her just for her to become someone else’s?
What is more, if he cast her out and she married another, the dream could still come true and she could kill him, since she was with someone else.
But if he held on to her he feared the dream would come true. The king did not know what to do.
Meanwhile, his love gradually languished because of the dream, diminishing more and more. Her love, too, began to wither little by little until she was left with nothing but hatred for him, so she fled.
The king ordered his men to look for her.
They came and told him that she was out near the Watery Castle.
For there 219 was a Watery Castle, and it had ten walls, one inside the other.
And all ten walls were made of water. And the ground inside the castle upon which one walked was also made of water, as was the garden and the trees and the fruit.
Everything was made of water. But the beauty of the castle and its splendour beggared description.
Certainly it was extraordinary for an entire castle to be made of water.
Of course you could not enter the castle because you would drown, the whole thing being made of water.
In the course of her flight, the princess reached the castle.
There she was seen wandering, and that is why the king was told she was out near the Watery Castle.
The king then went with his troops to capture her.
When she caught sight of them she resolved to run into the castle, for she would rather drown than be captured by the king and have to stay with him.
Perhaps she would escape after all and make it into the Watery Castle.
When the king spied her running into the Watery Castle he said, So be it…, then ordered her to be shot. If she is to die, let her die.
She was shot, hit by all ten kinds of arrow bedaubed with all ten kinds of poison.
But the princess kept running into the Watery Castle, all the way inside.
She passed through all the gates of the ten watery walls of the Watery Castle, until she had arrived deep inside the castle itself.
And there she collapsed and remained unconscious.
And I, continued the lame-handed beggar, am the one to heal her.
He whose hands do not possess all ten kinds of charity cannot pass through all ten walls of the Watery Castle, for he will drown. 220 Just so, the king and his troops pursued the princess and they all drowned. But I can pass through all ten walls of the Watery Castle.
The walls of water are the sea’s billows that stand like a wall.
The winds heap the waves and raise them up.
And the billows that are the ten walls stand there forever; the winds hold the billows and keep them there.
I can pass through all ten walls of the Watery Castle.
I can draw all ten kinds of arrow from the princess.
The arrows which the one boasted of being able to draw back to him come from a particular sacred verse.
And the charity that is before the walls of water also comes from a verse, namely, Thy righteousness is as the waves of the sea.
I can take all ten kinds of pulse through these ten fingers.
For with each of my ten fingers I can take one of the particular kinds of pulse.
And the ten kinds of pulse and the ten kinds of melody, these come from the Zohar, the Book of Splendour.
I can heal the princess through all ten kinds.
Thus can I, indeed, heal the princess. I have such a power in my hands. Now I grant it to you as a gift.
And there was great celebration and they were very merry.
What happened on the seventh day with the lame-footed beggar—and, indeed, what became of the prince who began the tale, he never told.
And he said he never would, nor would one know it until the Messiah comes.
And may it be speedily and in our days.
Amen.
221 This he said:
Were I to know nothing else, it would be this extraordinary tale. For this tale is truly extraordinary. It possesses an abundance of moral edification and our entire view of the world. Contained within it are exceedingly deep mysteries, from beginning to end.
All the tales in this book plumb the world’s deepest mysteries. Each word, each object, means something completely different.