Awakened Woman e-magazine
The Story of Elijah
As told by Starhawk
in Fifth Sacred Thing
That night Maya dreamed of the prophet Elijah. He came and sat at the foot of her bed. Much to her surprise, she realized he was a redheaded man.
"What do you want, you old bigot?" she asked him. "I know you and I know your story. You're nothing but a murderer with an inflated reputation."
"I want you," he said.
"Forget it."
"I want to help you."
"And what help have you ever been? Did you help the four hundred priests of Baal that you slaughtered in Jezebel's time? Did you help the hundreds of generations who starved and sweated and suffered and, instead of raising a hand to better their own lot, waited on you to herald the Messiah? And what about women? Have you ever raised a finger of your hallowed and prophetic hand to help a single Jewish woman escape from an unhappy marriage, or learn to read the sacred books, or express her own thoughts and have them heard by the congregation? For hundreds of generations, Jewish women have invited you in each year to eat the sacred foods prepared by their own hands, the egg and the greens, the salt water of tears and the sweet charoset, the unleavened matzoh -- bread of affliction, we call it -- yet when have you ever lightened so much as a crumb of our affliction? And I'll tell you something else -- those foods are the real carriers of the tradition, the sacred mysteries. Not what comes out of your men's mouths, the words and the stories and the endless arguments and explanations, but what we women provide to put into your mouth, the taste of pain, the taste of spring, the taste of hope and new beginnings." Maya was sitting up in bed now. The room was filled with a faint light that seemed to emanate from the prophet's body, and this made her angrier still. "What in hell are you doing here in my bedroom, you old fraud? Get out! I'm not opening any doors for you or leaving you any offerings. In my book, you are the enemy."
Elijah shifted his white robe, hitching it up on his left shoulder, and settled himself more comfortably on the bed.
"Are you finished? Can I get a word in?"
"I say to you what my grandmother would say -- feh!"
"Maya, since that's what you choose to call yourself, let me just ask you this. What happens to the enemy who is invited to share the feast? Does the enemy not transform?"
"What are you trying to tell me? That you've gone over to the side of the Goddess?"
"You'll never know if you don't stop yelling at me."
"I'm not yelling! But you barge into my bedroom uninvited, refuse to leave, invade my space, as we used to say, so don't be surprised if I get a little testy."
"I'm only here to do my job."
"Which is what?"
"You know what. I'm the herald of the Messiah. I am the forerunner of deliverance, the harbinger of redemption."
"Did I send out for a Messiah? I'm sorry, I don't remember. Look, Elijah, this one's been done already,l and not done well. The last Messiah gave us two thousand years of grief. Crusades, pogroms, missionaries, holy wars. Now the Millennialists. Do we really need another round?"
"Maya, you're an old woman, but I'm even older than you. Hasn't it occurred to you that redemption might have changed its form in the last few millennia? How could it not? Is not God change?"
"Jehovah? Doesn't sound like him."
"Goddess, then. Does the name matter so much, or the form of the mythical divine genitalia? Maya, for year after year, generation after generation, I have been fed each spring by women. I have tasted the spring and the tears and the blood until something in me wanted to rise up and dance, to roll in the mud. I'm, a changed man, Maya. Can't you see? The Messiah I herald has become the redemption of the earth."
He was gazing at her with eyes that glowed softly, like water mirroring clouds, Oh, this is my problem, Maya thought, I always fall for them, the wounded men. Wouldn't you think that at my age I would have outgrown it? Nevertheless, she could feel his appeal.
"How can I trust you?" she asked, finally.
"Touch me."
She reached a tentative finger forward, and he clasped her hand in his big freckled had, the red hairs on its back glinting in the lamplight. Something moved through her, like a great unfolding tear wringing itself loose and flooding her, washing her clean, clean, so that all her empty, hurting spaces shone with light. The room filled with light, golden and silver and palest green, like tender new leaves budding off an old shoot, and and a fragrance like the morning of flowers.
"Listen to me, Maya," Elijah said. "Tell your enemies this: 'There is a place set for you at your table, if you will choose to join us.' "
Then he was gone. She sank into a dreamless, silver sleep. In the morning when Bird brought in her tea, he sniffed the air curiously.
"Why does your room smell like roses?" he asked.
pp. 217-218, Fifth Sacred Thing, New York: Bantam, 1993.