Jesus On Mars

Why, then, was his heart so heavy and tears so close to his eyes?

Bronski and Shirazi seemed to be happy. They had no doubts. Like all the other men of the crew of the Maranatha, they went around smiling, singing songs in Krsh and Hebrew, some joyous folk songs, others devout prayers.

Except for the hours after the evening meal, Orme did not have much time to think of other than official matters. He was kept busy conferring with the chiefs of the state and the higher officials of the fleet. Occasionally, Jesus sat in on the details of the broad plans outlined for Earth. Orme was to be the chief administrator for the North American area. Shirazi was to be the main consultant in the dealings with the Moslem states. Bronski would be the head of the liaison department handling the affairs of Western Europe and Israel. He was also to be head of the department which dealt with the non-Moslem Communist nations.

In addition, Orme was taking short lessons in the Hebrew language, so he'd understand the liturgies thoroughly. By the time he went to bed, he was very tired. But his dreams were lively. Too much so, since his nightmares were hideous, and he woke more than once sweating and whimpering. Usually, a dim figure in the crouching darkness pointed an accusing finger at him, and it glided towards him without moving its legs until Orme was just about to recognise the face. Then he would start awake, and sometimes Nadir and Avram would call from their bunks, asking what the trouble was.

Once, in the day-watch, he told them. Bronski said, 'I think, Richard, that you conversion was not complete. You still haven't accepted with a whole heart what your mouth has acknowledged.'

'Don't say that,' Orme said. 'Of course, I believe that he is the Messiah, the true Jesus Christ. How could any man who's seen what I've seen believe otherwise?'

'Allow me to remind you of the parable Jesus once told about Lazarus and the rich man,' Bronski said. 'Remember? The rich man feasted while Lazarus, the beggar, lay at his gate. Lazarus was covered with ulcers which the dogs licked. And the rich man would not even bother to cleanse and feed the beggar. He ignored him. Then both died, and the beggar went to heaven and the rich man to the flames of Hell. So the rich man appealed to Abraham for succour but was told it was impossible to get him out of Hell or even to bring him water to cool his burning tongue. Then the rich man asked that Lazarus be sent to his five brothers to warn them that they too might go to Hell if they did not mend their ways. But Abraham said, "If they won't heed Moses and the Prophets, they won't be convinced if someone should rise from the dead." That applies to you also. You have seen far more than a man raised from the dead, yet you still have doubts.'

'But you don't?'

'No. Perhaps you should go to Jesus and tell him you're troubled. I'm sure that he could settle your doubts.'

Orme thought about this. Then, having summoned up his courage, he sent word through Azzur ben-Asa, the Messiah's chief secretary, that he would like an audience. Azzur replied that the Messiah was available to no one at this time.

'He will be residing with his Father for three days.'

For a moment, Orme didn't understand this. Then he said, 'Oh, you mean he is in the ship's nuclear reactor?'

'That is one way of putting it,' ben-Asa said.

Orme thanked him and turned off the intercom. There it was, that which was at the basis of his misgivings. How could any man, even Jesus Christ, go into an atomic furnace and come out unaffected? More significant, why should he?

If only Jesus had not told him that story about the energy-being. That story and the others were supposed to be speculations, made up on the moment to show Orme what absurd rationalisations could be created by unbelievers. Jesus had seemed to be having a good time doing it. He was not the always-serious person that a reader of the Gospels might take him for. But could he, under the guise of fantasy, have been telling Orme the truth? Was he playing cat to Orme's mouse and enjoying it? Or was he just testing the depth of his disciple's convictions?

His thoughts returned to the reactor. Jesus retired there and also to the deadly furnace inside the globe that acted as the sun for the Martian cavern. If he was indeed only a man, could he survive for more than a microsecond in it? No, he couldn't. But the Martians regarded him as both a man like themselves and more than a man. He could perform miracles and not just by hearsay. They were awed by his ability to live within that reactor, but they thought it was natural. Nothing was u

But - oh, damn him for telling it! - there was the story of the energy-being. Was Jesus indeed in that atomic Holy of Holies with the Presence? Or was he restoring his strength, eating, as it were, the raging radiations?

On that day, Orme prayed three times with the others. When he'd gone to his bunk and the breathing of his two companions assured him they were sleeping, he climbed out. Getting down upon his knees, he prayed in a very low voice that he be shown the light.

'Oh, God, let me know the truth! I am in despair, in a hell of uncertainty. Cleanse me of this. Let my soul be firm, unshakeable, riveted with the truth. I beseech you, Father. Amen.'

He could hear nothing except the wind of Shirazi's and Bronski's breaths, see nothing but the darkness. He got back into the bunk and lay there for a long while before he fell into troubled sleep.

In his dream someone was telling him that Jesus had warned against three types of people: the man who loved to display his piety in public, the faultfinder, and the false prophet.

'Now, which is he?' the deep voice said.

'Who is he?' Orme said.

'You know,' the voice said.

'But... I don't know,' Orme said, and he groaned. Then, as the voice did not speak, 'The false prophet?'

'You have said it.'

Orme came up out of the deep, and as he swam just below the surface of wakefulness, he felt that familiar, and now somehow comforting, awareness that someone was standing by his bed. He opened his eyes. A man was standing by him, a man who shed a bright light. He wore a black robe, and his hair and beard were reddish. His face was aquiline and very handsome, though his eyes looked as if he had suffered much.

Orme did not try to rise. He lay on his back with his head turned towards the man, his heart beating hard, his hands clutching the sheets. This man looked as he had imagined Jesus Christ did; even in his fright he thought that he resembled the conventional pictures of Jesus hung on the walls of his parents' house.

The glowing man held up a hand and made a sign as if to bless him. Then he glided backward, and as he did so, the light began to fade. It was gone and with it the figure.

The whole event had taken perhaps ten seconds.

He thought that that man was not the Jesus whom he had first seen coming from the sun in the cavern. This was the man who had come to his bedside from time to time, the true Jesus Christ. He had been watching over him. And now, in his disciple's crisis of despair, he had appeared to him. The light had come, that light which shone from him. No words had been needed; his presence was enough.

Or it should have been. In previous ages the beholder of such a vision would have accepted it literally. The figure would have been what it seemed to be. There was no other explanation. But he was born in a less naive, more knowledgeable time. Could this shining figure be just one of those phenomena that occasionally happened to people when they were in a half-awake, half- asleep state? Orme had never experienced such things before, but he had read about them. He had known a man who sometimes experienced these visions. His friend had said that the things scared him, they seemed to truly exist, and he would swear that he had been wide awake when he saw them. But he admitted that he may just have thought he was fully conscious and that the phenomena were probably exteriorisations, projected subjectivities of his unconscious.