What could remain more timely than an 18th Century play about reconciliation and unity among Christians, Jews and Moslems?
In my new novel We Are Like Fire, the American and German characters perform the German playwright Gotthold Lessing’s 1779 play Nathan the Wise. I drew from multiple translations to create a ten-minute short-story form of the play.
NATHAN THE WISE
Renaissance Theater
Denver
March 7, 1959
We’ve thrown Rosy a party for her sixth birthday. We prompted our theater friends in advance to speak up so Rosy could hear them. She had a grand time and when Vera and I left her with a babysitter outside the theater she’d already fallen fast asleep.
Opening night for Nathan the Wise doesn’t draw a full house. But 270 people is a sizable audience, and each of us delivers our best performance.
Dieter’s playing Nathan. Gisela’s playing Nathan’s daughter Rachel. Vera’s playing Nathan’s maid Daya. Jakob is playing the Templar. My dad Riis is playing Saladin the Sultan. And I’m playing the friar.
Klaus is running around with schedules, lists, and a script with cues filling each margin. Cousin Zoe’s handling costumes and has taken over Erna’s responsibilities managing hair and make-up. Jakob, still managing sound, has also taken over Erna’s responsibilities managing the props, and can be see handing each prop to each actor as he or she heads onto stage.
Klaus shouts “lights up”, and we’re all in motion performing Lessing’s play.
“Who questions, Nathan,” Daya the maid (Vera) asks, “but that you are big-heartedness itself?”
Nathan’s daughter Rachel (Gisela) welcomes him home. “You are here, my father, your very self. And do not hesitate to embrace your Rachel. Poor Rachel! She was almost burnt alive.”
Nathan (Dieter) embraces Rachel. “My child, my dear darling child!”
Rachel responds that “I am not burnt alive. We will rejoice. We will praise God – the kind good God, Who bore him upon the buoyant wings of unseen angels across the treacherous stream. The God Who bade my angel visibly on his white wing athwart the roaring flame.”
“White wing?” Nathan asks. “Oy aye, the broad white cloak worn by the Templar.”
Daya admonishes him. “Beware of banishing so pleasing an illusion.”
“Yes,” says Rachel, “visibly he bore me through the fire. Face to face I’ve seen an angel, Father, my own angel.”
“Rachel, you deserve it,” replies Nathan. “Yet had a man done you this service, he to you had seemed an angel.”
“No,” Rachel insists, “he was indeed a true and real angel.”
Nathan considers this. “If you were by a real templar saved, is it any less a miracle? Is it not enough then for my Rachel to owe her preservation to a man? You art saved from the fire. Ask ye for signs and wonders after that? What need of calling angels into play? Attend now to the being who preserved you, be he an angel or a man.”
In a scene after this, Daya calls out. “Oh Nathan, Nathan!”
“What is it?” Nathan asks.
“He’s there,” Daya tells him. “He shows himself again. Beneath the palms he strolls up and down, and gathers figs.”
“Gladly will he accept the father’s invitation,” Nathan says. “Say I most cordially request him –”
“—All in vain!” Daya interrupts. “He will not visit any Jew.”
“Then do your best to detain him.”
In the next scene, the Templar (Jakob) sees Nathan approach. “Well, Jew, what would you have?”
“The liberty of speaking with you,” says Nathan.
“Can I prevent it?” the Templar asks. “Quick, then, what’s your business?”
“Patience,” Nathan says. “Don’t hasten so proudly a man who has not merited contempt and whom you’ve put forever in your debt.”
“How so?” the Templar asks him.
“My name is Nathan,” he replies, “father to the maid your generous courage snatched from encircling flames.”
“You owe me nothing,” the Templar responds. “’Tis a templar’s duty to rush to the assistance of anyone we see in distress. Even if she is a young Jewish lady.”
“All faiths produce good men,” Nathan says.
“Fine words,” the Templar snaps back. “And yet I trust you know the faith whose people first began to strike at fellow men, and who first baptized themselves the chosen people. Who passed on their pride to the Muslims and the Christians, so that all three claim to have the best god and the true god. Where, when, has ever the pious rage and frenzy about God shown itself more, and in a blacker form, than here and now? Leave me alone.”
“Ha!” laughs Nathan. “You do not know how much closer I shall now cling to you. We must be friends, we will be friends. Despise and disdain the people of my faith, as ever will. We did not choose our religion for ourselves. Are we our religion? Must Jews and Christians be Jews and Christians before they are human beings? I found in you one more who will stand here and say that it is enough to be a man.”
“By heaven, yes you have,” says the Templar. “I do stand here and say just that. Forgive me for having misjudged you. Yes, Nathan, yes, we must and we will be good friends.”
“Then so we are,” says Nathan. “And your name?”
“My name has been – is – Conrad of Stauffen.”
In one of the next scenes, Saladin the Sultan (Dad) is looking at Nathan. “Come nearer, Jew. Still nearer. Here, close by me. Have no fear. Your name is Nathan?”
“Yes.”
“Nathan the wise?”
“No.”
“If you don’t say so,” Saladin tells him, “this is what the people call you.”
“Maybe, the people.”
“Do not suppose that I think of the people’s voice scornfully. I have long been wishing to know the man whom the people call wise.”
“By ‘wise’, the people may have meant only ‘prudent’ or ‘shrewd’ about his self-interest,” Nathan tells him.
“I know what it is I need to know. I willed your presence here.”
“Command me, Sultan.”
“I seek instruction from you. Since you are a man regarded as wise, tell me which faith appears to you the best?”
“Sultan,” says Nathan, stunned, “your Highness knows that I am a Jew.”
“And I am a Muslim,” says Saladin. “The Christian stands between us. Of these three religions, only one can be true. Share with me your insight. Let me hear your reasoning. This is a matter which I have not had time to examine and ponder through. Reflect. I’ll soon return.” The Sultan steps into another room, out of sight.
Nathan wrestles with his situation. “Hmm. Hmm. How strange! I’m so confused. What does the Sultan want of me? I came prepared with money. He asks for truth. Is he using his request for truth as a trap? Is truth what he requires, his aim, his end?”
The Sultan returns. “You have deliberated. Well, then, speak.”
“Allow me to share a story.”
“Why not?” Saladin asks. Nathan tells him his story:
In days of yore, there dwelt in the East a man, who received from a beloved hand a ring of endless worth. The stone it held was an opal, in which a hundred fair colors played, ever-changing. Moreover, trusting in its strength, the wearer of the ring was filled with tender love and was beloved by God and by people. The Eastern man never drew it off his finger and vowed to secure it forever to his household, by bequeathing that each most dear and beloved son in turn would pass it down to his most dear and beloved son. And each favored, chosen son would become master of the house.
From son to son, at length this ring descended to a father with three sons whom he found equally dear and beloved. Each received the overflowings of his heart. Each was an equally worthy heir to the ring. And in his good-natured weakness, he privately to each in turn promised the ring.
When death approached the good father grew embarrassed. What’s to be done? He took the ring in secret to a jeweler and commanded him to spare no cost nor pains to make two more rings like the true ring. The jeweler succeeded. Even the father’s eye could not distinguish. Quite overjoyed, he summoned each son and bestowed his blessing and a ring. Then he died.
Scarce is the father dead when each son with his ring appears and claims to be the lord of the house. They ask questions, seek the facts, complain, accuse, quarrel, and fall into strife – all in vain. For the ring could no more be distinguished than now can be the true faith.
“How,” Nathan asks the Sultan, “can I less believe in my forefathers than you in yours?”
“By the living God,” Saladin exclaims, “you are right!” Nathan continues:
The sons each complained to a judge. “Am I to guess at riddles?” the Judge asks. “But wait, you tell me that the real ring enjoys the power to make the wearer beloved by God and men. Let that decide. Which of you loves most deeply his other two brothers? Does each of you love but himself?
“Oh splendid, splendid!” says the Sultan. Nathan concludes:
And the judge speaks to the three brothers. “Your father loved all three of you alike. Let each of you feel honored by your father’s affection. Let each of you aspire to emulate your father’s love. Assist your ring’s power with humility, gentleness, and benevolence.”
Saladin takes hold of Nathan’s hand. “Nathan, my dearest Nathan, the judge’s judgment seat is not mine. Go, go, but forever be my loving and beloved friend.”
In another scene, Daya is talking with the Templar when she makes a revelation to him. “Rachel is not a Jew. She’s a Christian. Of Christian parents born and baptized.”
“And Nathan?” the Templar asks her.
“Is not her father,” Daya informs him.
“Has only brought her up as his daughter,” the Templar asks, “educated and raised a Christian child as a Jew?”
“Exactly.”
“And she does not know this?” the Templar asks her. “She’s not been told that she was born a Christian?”
“Never yet,” says Daya.
“But she’s a grown woman.”
“He’s never told her anything.”
In one of the next scenes, the Templar is with the Sultan. “What if this chosen sage Nathan were so fervently and thoroughly a Jew that he sought to obtain Christian children to bring up as Jews?” the Templar asks the Sultan. “How then? Is he unmasked as a Jewish wolf?”
“Who says this of him?” Saladin asks.
“Even the maid with whom he frets me,” says the Templar. “This very maid is not his daughter. No, she is a kidnapped Christian child.”
“Calm down, Christian!” says Saladin. “Nathan is my friend. Tread carefully. Say nothing about this to the fanatics of your faith.”
In one of the next scenes, the friar (me) tells Nathan that “someone whispered in the Sultan’s ear today that there lives a Jew who educates a Christian child as his own daughter. Now, do you recognize me, Nathan? Do you remember a knight’s squire, who 18 years ago gave to your hands a female child a few weeks old? I was the man on horseback who brought the child and consigned her to you.”
“Yes,” Nathan replies.
“A baby needs love more than a baby needs Christianity,” says the friar. “There’s always time enough for that. You seem touched. You seem moved. Your eyes swim in water.”
“A few days before you met me with the child,” Nathan responds, “the Christians murdered every Jew northwest of Jerusalem. Including every woman and child. Among these, my wife with seven hopeful sons, who all were burnt alive.”
“O just and righteous God!” cries the friar.
“And when you came,” Nathan tells him, “three days and nights I had lain in dust and ashes, wept, and cried out to God. Against Christianity I swore unrelenting hatred. But bit by bit my reason did return, speaking with its gentle voice, ‘And yet God still remains’. So I pledged to carry out God’s Will.
“And behold, at that moment, you dismounted from your horse and handed me the child, wrapped in your cloak. I took the child, I bore her to my couch, I kissed her, and I flung myself upon my knees and sobbed. ‘My God, in place of seven, I have at least now this one!’”
“O Nathan, Nathan,” says the friar, “by God, you are a Christian soul! Never did a better Christian live.”
“Heaven bless us!” exclaims Nathan. “What makes me to you a Christian makes you to me a Jew. Can you tell at least the mother’s family name? She was, I think, a Stauffen.”
“May be,” the friar replies, as he takes out a book of records and looks in it. “Yes, in fact, you’re right.” He hands the book of records to Nathan.
Nathan looks at the page. “Conrad of Stauffen was her brother’s name. He was a templar.”
In a future scene, Nathan and the Templar are again speaking with each other. “We know now to whom Rachel is related,” Nathan tells him.
“Who are they?” the Templar asks.
“A brother has been found,” Nathan tells him.
“A brother!” the Templar exclaims.
“A good and brave man.” Nathan tells the Templar. “If you would behold her brother, meet with the Sultan and me later today.”
In the middle of another scene, Rachel is crying out. “I am sprung of Christian blood – and baptized – not Nathan’s daughter – and he not my father. God, God, he not my father!”
In the final scene, everyone is together. Nathan addresses the Sultan. “There is a man, Saladin, with whom we must talk.”
“Who?” Saladin asks.
“Rachel’s brother.” Nathan replies.
“My brother?” a surprised Rachel asks. “Have I then a brother?”
“Where is this brother?” the Templar asks. “Not yet here? ‘Twas here I was to meet him.”
Nathan approaches the Templar in a friendly manner. “Patience yet awhile. Suspicion, knight, leads soon to mistrust. Had you at first revealed to me your real name.”
“What?” the Templar replies.
“You are not Conrad of Stauffen,” Nathan declares.
“Who am I, then?” the Templar asks. “What is my name?”
“Leonard of Filnek.”
“How?” the Templar asks him.
“You’re startled,” Nathan says.
“I should be.”
“In fact, your mother, she was a Stauffen,” Nathan continues. “And her brother’s name, the uncle to whose care you were resigned, when they returned to this land, was Conrad. He perhaps adopted you as his own son.”
“What can I say?” the Templar asks. “So in fact it stands. To be sure, you’re right. But tell me, what has this story to do with Rachel’s brother?”
“Your father was my friend,” Nathan says.
“Your friend?” the Templar responds. “Is that possible? How wondrous!”
“He called himself Leonard of Filnek but he was no German. He had married a German and he followed your mother for a time to Germania, where you were born.”
“Enough!” yells the Templar. “No more! I beg of you to stop! But Rachel’s brother –”
“—He is standing before me now,” Nathan says.
“Enough!” yells the Templar again. “Tell me where Rachel’s brother is.”
Nathan looks the Templar in the eyes. “You are Rachel’s brother.”
“Me?” the Templar replies with astonishment. “Her brother?”
“He,” asks Rachel, “my brother?”
After moments of doubt, the Templar throws his arms around Rachel. “Oh, you my sister, my darling sister.”
“Brother and sister?” asks the Sultan. “Is it true?”
“Lena of Filnek,” says Nathan. “And my daughter’s brother is my child as well.”
The Sultan pulls Nathan aside to speak with him alone. “I’m trembling. Nathan, were you not saying also that her own father was no German born? What was he then? Where was he from?”
Nathan replies that “he would never tell me that. From his lips I know no word of it. But his first language was Persian.”
“Persian,” the Sultan responds. “Need I more? I know it. It’s him. It was him!”
“Who?” Nathan asks.
“My brother, Assad,” says Saladin. “I have no doubt. I’m certain. My brother Assad.”
“If you yourself perceive it, be reassured. Look in this book,” Nathan tells the Sultan, handing him the book of records, “where he wrote.”
Saladin looks at the page eagerly. “Oh, it is my brother’s handwriting! I remember it well.” He gives the book back to Nathan and turns to the Templar and Rachel. “How could I not acknowledge my own brother’s children, my own niece and nephew? Yes, it is you! You are my brother’s lost children!”
He rushes to embrace Rachel and the Templar. He turns to the Templar. ”And now, you proud young man, son of my lost brother Assad, you’ll have to show me some respect. And love me. And you,” he says to Rachel, “to you I shall be the prince of all uncles.”
The Templar responds to the Sultan. “I of your blood – then those were more than stories with which they filled my dreams in my earliest childhood, which I never dared believe. Much more than stories! Much more than dreams!” He falls at the Sultan’s feet.
Saladin raises him up and they embrace each other as Saladin speaks to him. “Look at you, my brother’s lost son!”
Everyone’s embracing as the curtain falls.
Correction: The play was from 1779 (not 1758).