Abstract
This dramatic monologue is inspired by Fyodor Dostoevsky’s chapter on the Grand Inquisitor in The Brothers Karamazov, trans. Constance Garnett (New York: Modern Library, 1996), part V chapter 5.
Ladies and gentlemen, it’s a pleasure to be here with you today. I always enjoy having the opportunity to speak at gatherings like this. Oh, I know what you’re thinking: ‘What did we do to deserve this unexpected honour? To have such an important personage come to our tedious little assembly?’ It’s true, ladies and gentlemen, you don’t deserve it. But nevertheless, here I am! Emperors and influencers beg for an audience with me. Lawyers and corporate executives rely on my consultancy services. I’m important, it’s true, but I do love to speak in churches all the same. Where would you be without my leadership? Why, without me you wouldn’t stand a chance. You are lambs. You can so easily end up on the wrong path. That’s why you need me. Yes, ladies and gentlemen: you need me. And here I am!
I know we’ve spoken recently, I know that. I can share my thoughts with you at any time. Don’t misunderstand me, ladies and gentlemen, I value our private times together, those special little conversations when it’s just the two of us. But it feels good sometimes to see you all in one place, to speak to you in my formal capacity as your superior and your guide. It pleases me to see your innocent, trusting faces. It gratifies me to hear your applause. There’s nothing like a good round of applause. It gets the blood pumping—or it would if I had blood in my veins. When I hear you clap for me it reminds me of how inferior every living creature is compared to me. It reminds me of my singular magnificence. What a feeling!
Sometimes one works so hard behind the scenes, but it’s as if nobody notices. Others take all the credit. But they could never get far without my—what shall I call it?—my encouragement. Yes, encouragement, that’s what it is. I know you’ve heard it called by other names. ‘Temptation’, they say. It hurts my feelings—oh ladies and gentlemen, it hurts!—when they use words like that. It’s defamation, that’s what it is. I would never tempt anyone. Who needs temptation anyway? You already know what you want. You know what you need. Sometimes all you lack is a bit of encouragement, just a nudge to get you going in the right direction. Think of me as your counsellor. Think of me as your friend.
When they invited me to speak to you today, they asked me to talk from the Gospels. I laughed at first. The Gospels! As if you can find anything of interest there! I told them I’d be happy to choose a real hero for my text: Nero, maybe, or my old friend Stalin. No, they told me, I have to talk about the Gospels.
Then it dawned on me. There is one worthy character in those scurrilous stories. Someone you can really learn from. Towering above all the lowlifes and nobodies is a specimen of true greatness. Someone the whole world looks up to. Can you think of who I mean? Can anybody guess? Does anybody know the worthy personage to whom I refer? Oh ladies and gentlemen, you’re too kind, you make me blush. Of course, those writers were full of guile and prejudice. They didn’t describe me accurately. They made out I was some kind of villain. They didn’t say one word about my intellectual superiority, my ancient and unsurpassable wisdom, my nobility of soul, my dashing good looks. They only described me as a ‘tempter’—that word again.
Believe me, ladies and gentlemen, I didn’t come to tempt. I came to help. Things could have been so different if only he had followed my advice.
I remember it all like it was yesterday. Finding him there in the desert. The hungry, emaciated carpenter. He had a messiah complex, that much was obvious. I love messiahs. They have such potential. He had potential. Anyone could see it. All he lacked was a proper platform to carry out his mission. He was aiming too small. They always aim too small at first—until they start listening to me.
What was I to do? I tried to help him, of course. I encouraged him.
‘So you want to save the world?’ I said. ‘Here’s how to do it. Turn this stone to bread.’
You can’t be a great leader without bread. You can’t be a messiah unless you give people something they want. What does everybody want? They want fulfilment. They want a saviour who can meet their needs, make their wishes come true. Satisfaction—bread—that’s what the world is looking for. All the great leaders have learned the art of turning stones to bread. ‘Follow me and I will fulfil your heart’s desires!’ That’s the promise of all great leaders.
He could have been a great leader. But he refused to turn the stones to bread. Instead of giving people what they want, he had the absurd notion that they ought to abandon their wishes altogether. They ought to lay aside their hunger and learn to hunger for eternal things. He was like a politician who says, ‘Vote for me and I will serve none of your interests, I will condemn your aspirations, I will take away the things you want! I will even take your life away. Yes, vote for me and I will see to it that you diminish in every conceivable way!’ He said no one could follow him unless they forsake their parents, abandon their interests, deny themselves. Instead of offering them bread he offered a cross—‘take up the cross and follow me,’ he said.
Ladies and gentlemen, no one ever got elected on a platform like that. Lofty ideals are fine and good, but at the end of the day you need to make a few concessions if you want to be a leader. If you want to save the world, you have to start with bread. Take it from me. You don’t get to be my age without learning a thing or two.
But he refused. Can you believe it, ladies and gentlemen? He didn’t want the bread, he preferred stone. Perhaps he hadn’t understood my advice. Perhaps he wasn’t listening. So I tried another angle.
‘So, you want to be a messiah,’ I said. ‘You want to save the world? Here, I will show you the world’—and I showed him in an instant all the kingdoms of the world in all their glory. ‘Who do you think is in charge of all this?’ I asked him. ‘Where do all the great leaders come from, all those emperors and rulers—and all the great messiahs too? They are my people,’ I told him. ‘They serve me. I give them everything they want: power, authority, fame, glory, whatever their hearts desire. Why do I do all this? It’s just because I’m generous, because I like to lend a hand. I only ask one thing in return—one little thing, a mere trifle. Just give me your allegiance. Bend the knee to me, just once, and I will raise you up and make you mighty. Bend the knee to me and I will make the whole world kneel to you. Become my slave—only for a moment—and all people will be your slaves to do with as you please.’
I said all this to him. I know what you’re thinking, ladies and gentlemen. Who could refuse such a magnanimous offer? Surely he’ll see that this is the only way to achieve his aims! You can’t be a messiah without power. And if you want power, you have to go to the powerful. And that means me.
But again he refused to listen to reason. Again he rejected my offer. Imagine my surprise! What kind of messiah is this anyway? Who does he think he is? There was something different about him, I could see that. He seemed a bit slow. But I don’t give up easily. It’s one of the things people admire about me.
So I reached out to him a third time. I took him by the hand and whisked him away to the temple. We stood there on the highest pinnacle, as high as a ten-storey building. We both leaned over the edge and looked down on all the worshippers crawling about like insects in the court below.
I said to him, ‘You don’t want to give them bread? You don’t want to be the kind of messiah who merely satisfies their desires? I understand that. My dear fellow, I commend you for it. You are better than that! You didn’t come merely to lead. You came to save their souls, to open their eyes to eternity. Excellent! That is exactly what you need to do. And I can help you.’ He looked at me, I have to say with a rather sceptical look in his eye, so I continued. ‘Yes, my excellent friend, I can help you. You want to save their souls? Here’s how to do it. Give them a miracle! Not one of those secretive, timorous miracles behind closed doors. Not something that has to be believed. Give them something solid, something absolutely indisputable. Give them spiritual certainty so that they never have to doubt again. Yes, take away their doubts and they will love you always!’
He was standing right on the edge. He looked down. One more step and he would plummet to the courtyard below. You can easily imagine how hard it was to restrain myself from rubbing my hands in glee. All he needed now was that last gentle nudge of encouragement. So I said to him, ‘Do it now, right now, don’t delay! Throw yourself down! You won’t be hurt! The angels will catch you—you won’t even dash your foot against a stone.’
You can guess what I was thinking, ladies and gentlemen. Any messiah worth his salt wants to perform miracles. What everybody wants is certainty. They want to feel secure. Believing is one thing, it’s fine as far as it goes. But believing is hard work. You never know for certain if you’re right. There’s always that niggling possibility that you’ve made a mistake. Frankly, I’ve noticed that people don’t want to believe. They want to know. They want a messiah who can take away their doubts and relieve them of their anxieties. If you give them certainty they will follow you anywhere.
It brings a smile to my face just thinking of it: religious certainty! It’s a wonderful thing. It’s been a personal favourite of mine ever since the days of Cain and Abel. And now I was offering him the chance to give his followers those righteous feelings. What messiah could ask for anything more?
A third time I tried to help him, and a third time he refused. Just think of it, ladies and gentlemen: he refused me—again! You’ll think all this is fiction. You’ll think I’m making it up. Who could possibly refuse me? Me with all my charms? Me with my superior wisdom?
Well, what can you do? Some people just don’t want to be helped.
It’s such a shame too because he had the makings of a great messiah. He could have been one of the best. I would have clothed him in purple and set him high on a throne with a sceptre in his hand and a crown of stars on his head. I would have prostrated multitudes before him to grovel at his feet. He could have had power beyond imagining. He could have subjugated the earth and ruled forever over that new kingdom that he was always talking about—a kingdom where everyone would have to do things his way. And if anybody opposed him, if anybody didn’t see things his way, he could have crushed them and scattered their dust to the four winds.
I was ready for a new kingdom. Rome was beginning to bore me. Instead of a Roman empire he could have been the leader of a Holy Empire, an empire where spiritual and political power, the scriptures and the sword, go hand in hand. You might have thought the Roman empire was given to violent excesses. But wait till you see what people will do when they have a messiah to follow! Wait till you see what they will do from the purest motives of religious certainty. Just think of the opportunities!
Ah but it wasn’t to be. It’s such a shame. If only he had listened to me. He missed his chance. Lucky for him, his followers stepped in to correct his mistakes. ‘We want power after all,’ they said. ‘We want to give the people certainty. Let’s negotiate.’
Ladies and gentlemen, it’s not too late for you either. If you have accepted the hard stone of discipleship, you can still trade it in for bread! Get something that will fulfil your wishes! Get something that will satisfy you! Above all, your religion should make you feel good. It should give you that contented glow. It should make your life easier, more pleasant. Who wants rocks when you can have bread!
And if you’ve made the mistake of following his example—choosing humility instead of power—it’s never too late to come to me and renegotiate. Power is what you need. What’s the point of religion unless you have the means to impose it on everybody else? Ladies and gentlemen, you have the answers that the world is looking for. You have the truth—and everyone else is in error. You have the light—and every other wretched soul is in darkness. You didn’t come into this world to learn but to teach. Oh the poor human race! Where would they be without you? You already have everything the world needs. Now take power, take it from me, and you’ll bring salvation to the world. Faith without power is dead—isn’t that written somewhere?
And if you’ve followed his way of vulnerable faith, it’s not too late to change your mind about that either. Trade in your faith for certainty. Certainty is what you need, ladies and gentlemen: religious certainty. Trust me, the stuff is dynamite. You’ll love it. You will go through life always knowing exactly what to do. You’ll never doubt, you’ll never be unsure of yourself, you’ll always have all the answers. Come to me, all you who are weary from living by faith, and I will give you certainty! Take my yoke upon you—it’s so much better than the freedom of faith. My yoke is easy—especially at the start.
The future, ladies and gentlemen, is yours. You have the opportunity to correct his mistakes. If you accept my offer, you will have a religion that always satisfies your desires. You’ll have a sure and certain mission, a clear path to follow, and, best of all, you’ll have power to drag others on to the same path. That’s what religion is all about. That’s where he went wrong.
It’s not too late to correct his mistakes. It’s never too late to turn around. Trust me, ladies and gentlemen, trust me. Would I lie to you?