The above is Alvord Lake, in a rare moment at which I walked it (the same day as the Lily Pond) ... the tannins from sunken leaves have turned the water a rich amber brown with golden leaves still floating on top ... surreal and yet beautiful ... like the contrast of knowing a disaster is brewing, and yet hope is still so beautiful as a lived experience.
We live and walk and rest in hope.
There is no rational way of arguing with that ... there are deep realities to contend with ... so, back to Hoffnung in 1825 with Gurnemanz Kantor and his family dealing with the reality of disaster approaching their neighbors who may or may not heed the warnings they are being given, and may or may not cooperate with a plan being put together to save them ...we shall go through on the beautiful modal third movement of Beethoven's A minor quartet as gratitude and hope and joy filled his life with new strength, also written in 1825...
Over in Hoffnung, life was continuing to go on as Advent season and winter approached ... I was settled in character as Diane Matthaus, 23-year-old immigrant in German, out of slavery in the United States and settled down as the unofficially but firmly adopted daughter of Herr and Frau Kantor, working in all the good work they were doing in the village for those most in need and studying music and German with Herr Kantor while teaching his wife and the children of the village how to speak English and to sing the Negro Spiritual. It was a busy, full life, and hopeful even as winter approached.
But the mayor and high officials of Hoffnung were concerned about what was happening down the hill and around the corner ... an avalanche and ice break had piled up against the Eitel Dam and it was going to eventually give way ... the problem was that the people of Eitelkeitsmesse, the nearest town to the dam, simply did not believe after 300 winters of the dam standing strong. All of them would need to resettle, and Hoffnung was well away from the Eitel River and on a hillside -- a logical place for survivors to come.
But as of yet, the news was not known across the region, and because the people of Eitelkeitsmesse were not worried, they were not talking about it. The people in the nearest town of Sicherwald, who lived above the Eitel Dam, could see the danger at hand -- they were the ones who had alerted the prince of the province, but they were not coming down below the Eitel Dam to talk with anyone but their relatives in Eitelkeitsmesse to urge them to escape!
All officials were silent for another reason: Prince Solomo, lord of the principality, was to come down and survey the situation and decide what was to happen, and no one dared run ahead of him. His judgment of the matter, and his pronouncement, would be the framework for every other person of responsibility to situate their actions. This also said a great deal about how much the regional leaders respected the wisdom of Prince Solomo, all the more remarkable given his relative youth.
But, the ruler of Hoffnung had just that much respect for the town's rector ... he had told Herr Kantor what was going on, and Herr Kantor told his wife and me ... so we knew, and said nothing in Hoffnung, for there was no reason to worry the entire town yet. We talked with each other and the Lord, and waited.
A week passed; life and ministry went on, and, as it often was, travelers passed through Hoffnung, bringing new faces into the church. There was a lot of moving around before Christmas as people braved the winter to get to their relatives, and seasonal work wound down for the year with preparations for Christmas. But also Hoffnung was known for its hospitality and generosity, and thus lived up to its name for many.
It was not uncommon for people on more inward journeys to come to Hoffnung. Herr Kantor was famous outside of Germany for his singing, so that had followed him home a little bit: people came to Hoffnung just to hear him sing ... but the fact that he came home to be a humble rector made him a curiosity, and his humility made him approachable.
And so, notably on one day, a young workman came to speak with Herr Kantor, a workman who stood out just a bit.
"He is probably the heir of a successful craftsman or soldier, because his clothes are worn, but in a particular way," Frau Kantor said to me as she observed the young man. "He has traveled and worked in many places, but his clothes are holding up somewhat better than most that we can get in the smaller villages."
"Do you think he will be coming for Mittagessen?" I said.
"Of course, and if the weather breaks he will be staying the night -- you know we have three guest rooms in addition to your own now," Frau Kantor said. "We are not forgetful to entertain strangers, for occasionally one can entertain angels unaware ... and even if we have not entertained an actual angel yet, we have been greatly blessed by the passers-by, and what they know about the world around us."
This reminded me of Tchaikovsky's "Pilgrim Song," in which a traveler on a holy pilgrimage ends up blessing everything around him as he goes as he is overcome by the blessing of common grace given to him -- the principle of reciprocation is everywhere!
So, we made ready for a guest, and sure enough, Herr Kantor and the young man walked in about half an hour later.
"Yes, you are understanding this very well," the rector was saying to his guest. "The Samaritan, even being hated by the people whose representative was harmed by the side of the road, was indeed good, for good is not determined by the disposition of those in need of it. Because the Lord has said, 'Love your enemies, and do good to those who misuse you,' it is good that we should do that, and it is His pleasure that we should, and His delight to reward obedience although the reward may not be obvious immediately.
"Yet it must also be said that should it be that your neighbors have become your enemies, the good you must do to them must be balanced with the good you must do those under your protection from them. There are levels of responsibility, and it is by no means easy."
"Which is why I am seeking counsel," the young man said. "I miss my father so much, but many men who were in the wars who remember you as their chaplain and their doctor speak well of you."
"There are many such young men who come to seek my advice," the rector said gently, "but all I can really do is point people back to Christ, and what He said to do."
"That is rare enough in the age of scratching itching ears, Herr Doktor Prediger."
Herr Kantor smiled.
"Oh, you must have been talking with some of the people who are impressed with my university days," he said.
"What impresses me about you is that, given the temptations that you have, you are not impressed," the young man said.
By that time, Frau Kantor had walked up with a curtsy and a huge mug of mulled apple cider for our guest, and Herr Kantor had taken his hat and coat and boots and offered him some bear-pelt house shoes before showing the guest to his very own chair. I went to the kitchen and gently stirred Frau Kantor's ever-ready stew pot and added the fresh herbs that went in just before it was served. She came in and buttered the bread we had baked that morning and also put the cheesecake she and I had prepared in the oven for Kaffee und Kuchen, the next meal coming up.
"I am surprised Hoffnung is still off the main traveler routes, Herr Prediger," the guest said, his calm, confident baritone carrying well through the stone house. "Every journeyman in this region of Germany would be blessed to come through here. The wanderers might think they had at last reached home!"
"That's the point," Herr Kantor said. "If a man says that he represents a loving God Who saves and redeems, he and his family had better show that! And, the Lord is kind enough to share enough with us to share with anyone He sends us!"
Herr Kantor worked hard for that extra, writing widely in English and German on theological and musical matters, and arranging music for the Lutheran church's use. Apparently, I was a most capable assistant, for both of us banked in London as well as Berlin! But he was not getting rich ... it was as he said ... enough to share with others in an endless flow, including entertaining his guests like royalty in terms of abundance if not in complexity.
"That is the best meal I have eaten in my journeys, Frau Kantor and Fräulein Matthaus," he said. "Thank you much! I am so full I shall have to walk back to Sicherwald to be ready for the meal of the evening [Abendessen, the last of the traditional German meals of the day]!"
"You have come from that far today?" Herr Kantor said, "How are things there?"
"Things there are as well as they are in Hoffnung!" our guest said with a gentle laugh followed by a sigh. "However, down the valley and around the bend at Eitelkeitsmesse, there are going to be problems soon enough."
"Has the prince come down to see yet?" Herr Kantor said.
"He has," the young man said.
"It is a difficult decision he has before him," Herr Kantor said. "I do not think of His Highness without remembering to say a prayer for him."
The young man smiled, radiantly, as he rose and then stopped by the nearest lantern, giving us a clearer view of his features.
"I have come to thank you in person, Herr Kantor."
It was the prince himself!
We almost knocked over the table, trying to get up and bow and curtsy, only to have the prince step right back and stabilize the table and us -- "At ease! You have treated me like a king as your guest -- I require no more!"
"Your Highness, please forgive me -- I should recognize you, with all you have done for Hoffnung!" Herr Kantor said.
"You have never seen me outside my finery," Prince Solomo said, "and beside that, you were very ill when we met. Dr. Lukas told me you scarcely remembered anything that happened over that entire time period once you had begun to recover. You have not offended me -- sit down again and be at rest!"
"To what do we owe the honor of a personal visit, Your Highness?" Herr Kantor said as we all sat down again.
"All wise men in my principality are not in my court," he said, "and I need counsel from all of them."
"Indeed you do me deep honor, Your Highness," Herr Kantor said, and bowed.
"Your love for Hoffnung, such that you sacrificed your life for its peace, is an example I need before me at this time," he said. "God spared you, but the offer you made for your town and its people was real. I needed to remind myself that even in these decadent times, there was a rector who still understood Christ."
"Indeed, Your Highness, this is too much honor for me," Herr Kantor said, bowing even more deeply. "I only did that which I was commanded to do."
"And because you are loyal to the King of Kings, I can trust you to be loyal to me, Herr Kantor -- light work for you," Prince Solomo said, "though perhaps not today, as you see the reason for the advice I was asking you. Indeed I have a terrible decision to make concerning Eitelkeitsmesse."
"I understand," Herr Kantor said.
Now, generally in 1825, the women were not officially a part of such life and death discussions, so Frau Kantor and I started clearing up the table and brought out strong coffee from the kitchen before doing what we were expected to do from there: eavesdrop as the prince laid out as complex and tense a matter as Beethoven's Opus 77 fantasy... complete with a spoiler alert happy ending for the prince's ultimate conclusion...
"There is no situation I have ever seen, even on sharing the latter of my father's battlefields," the prince said, "that is at the same time more hopeless and yet more deceiving from the wrong angle. To look down on the Eitel River from Sicherwald and see and hear all that ice pushing on the dam is a horror that defies description. Yet they in the village are looking up, and it is so high and so steep that they cannot gauge what is happening behind it and already pushing slightly above it. They literally cannot see it from there!
"There is no situation in which I have ever committed more to merely delaying the inevitable. We have opened all the sluice gates in order to keep the liquid water level down so that the dam is not over-topped by all that floating ice and thus torn down from above, but we cannot do anything about the weight of the ice constantly pressing against the dam.
"Now, the architect anticipated this moment in the dam's future, and keyed the dam into the banks exceptionally well for 1525. He also anticipated a winter disaster; the keying in accounts for the extra strength given by the fact that the ground is frozen by December. So it will take months for the dam to be levered out of the bank as a single piece and thus pushed over -- however, if there is a single flaw in the earthenware anywhere, this kind of pressure will eventually force a crack, and that we cannot predict."
"So," Herr Kantor said, "it could hold until April, and it could go in the next minute."
"And closer to the minute," the prince said, "because not only are we not going to be able to keep it from being over-topped during the spring melt and flow, we may not be able to hold it through a warm snap in the weather before or during winter if there are further ice breaks and avalanches. The ice is already above the top of the dam by a few inches."
Herr Kantor gasped.
"My dilemma is complex," Prince Solomo said. "Obviously I have the forces necessary to forcibly evacuate Eitelkeitsmesse, but if I do that, my new greatest enemies will settle everywhere in the region and spread their hatred of me both across to other malcontents and down to their children and grandchildren. The fomenting of that much discontent would imperil the peace and prosperity of the entire principality and also make us more vulnerable to our external enemies. Disloyalty works out in a thousand ways that sap the prosperity and peace of a land."
"You would ultimately be justified in your decision to use force, Your Highness," Herr Kantor said, "but without it making the least bit of difference. Those convinced they have a right to hate generally do not consider honest evidence as to why they should give that right up."
"And then," the prince said, "there is something to be said for the reality that the people who hated my father so much that they prayed for him to die for trying to save them in 1822 are concentrated in one place, and all I have to do is do what they want me to do and leave them right where they are. I can do that ... but I remind myself that all the people who have offended the King of Kings could all have been left where they are, and the lesser son of a lesser David dare not arrogate rights to himself that the King of Kings, having come Himself to rescue us, declined to exercise."
"It is Advent season, indeed -- a good time to remember," Herr Kantor said.
"I also remembered that the Greater Son of a greater prince named David on His mother's side is running a voluntary evacuation from earth to heaven," Prince Solomo said, "and so I thought I might learn from Him."
"What do you have in mind?" Herr Kantor said.
"I am considering opening the royal coffers and incentivizing both the people of Eitelkeitsmesse to evacuate and all the villages and towns of the region who are willing to resettle them," the prince said. "I am considering offering a premium for immediate obedience, but to the last day, there would be sufficient support to make the move as easy as possible for anyone who availed themselves."
Herr Kantor considered this.
"Expensive," he said, "but elegant, and just and fair. You might consider compensating Sicherwald first and most, since it is the nearest safe ground and the last people to leave Eitelkeitsmesse might be trapped up there for some time."
The prince smiled.
"You did not even think to promote Hoffnung first and foremost," he said.
"It is too far away from Eitelkeitsmesse," Herr Kantor said.
"Which fact would not have stopped anyone who loved money from doing it anyway!" the prince said. "But you love God and people, so you focus on the simple facts of what One requires and what the people of His concern need. You are right, of course. The men of Sicherwald are already volunteering to help their neighbors through working with the royal engineers at the dam -- so of course, first and most Sicherwald shall be."
"When you have made your proclamation," the rector said, "I shall lead as many as are willing in Hoffnung to daily prayer for the people of Eitelkeitsmesse, and I am considering extending the call to all the clergy of the region."
The prince smiled, but then thought of something, and that smile faded into a look of deep concern.
"If the King of Kings commands the latter, so do: you do not need my permission," the prince said, "but, I will return the kindness of good counsel you have shown me and advise you that unless you are certain about the regional call, you would be well served not to do that. The rector of Eitelkeitsmesse is quite aware of you, and quite envious."
"What? Why?" Herr Kantor said.
"Let me begin the story where it begins," the prince said. "There are generations of resentment to unpack, and you just happen to have walked into it."
Herr Kantor gave a heavy sigh, but said nothing, and the prince began the explanation ... slow to come into view, but clear enough in the end, like the last movement of Beethoven's Opus 95 quartet...
"Would you care to know who, at the beginning of his reign some 53 years ago, listened to the complaint of the lord of Sicherwald about his forest lands being poached and shut down the hammer mills that were out of wood in the region around Eitelkeitsmesse?"
"Your father, His Highness Prince David," Herr Kantor said.
"Correct," Prince Solomo said. "That is where the hate begins, passed down two generations. Simon Zischen is the grandson of the last of the hammer lords. His whole goal in scratching itching ears has been to restore himself through the misuse of religion to the standard of money, power, and influence his grandfather enjoyed.
"Now, by 1823 he had succeeded, and all would have been well -- he had also outlived his enemy Prince David, and was also the chief voice in the region among the clergy ... yet he was swiftly overshadowed by the new rector of Hoffnung, already the favorite of Prince David's abominable spawn, capable of putting all music programs to shame in Eitelkeitsmesse just by opening his mouth and singing, and having successfully gotten the new cathedral looking at least half as good and grand as the cathedral at Eitelkeitsmesse.
"Add with that: the new rector is such a specimen of physical and intellectual and spiritual prowess that Prince David attributed the morale of his troops to him for a few years, and also on the offensive side of the ledger outwitted Lord Edward von Schadenfreude, fought him to a draw in personal combat, and drove him from his castle and his position before I could even arrive to mop up -- oh, and captured the heart of fair Lady Vanessa, the widow of the house of Ridderbusch, without doing her the slightest dishonor that would hinder her, when she is ready, for remarriage!"
"Where do they get this stuff?" Herr Kantor roared. "I loaned the Ridderbusch carriage a horse, sang for Lady Vanessa's entertainment at the hotel because somebody got sick, was loved by baby Moritz, second of that name to be Lord Ridderbusch, because my voice reminds him of his father's, and so got to come to lunch with him and of course his mother who loves him, and then got beat to within an inch of my life by that same Edward von Schadenfreude and remember nothing else until one morning I woke up in my home!"
Prince Solomo laughed.
"The way we are in other people's imaginations," he said. "He has roughly the same reaction you just did to hearing about all your great deeds, but for a very different reason!"
"My apologies, Your Highness," the rector said, gathering his big voice in. "It is a trial to my patience to know that I strive to live a quiet and peaceful life to avoid the situations that people keep making up reasons to put me in!"
Prince Solomo laughed.
"Unfortunately for you, as much as it is a blessing, you have the gift of being able to move easily between all strata of men -- but of course, no one cares when you move among the poor and needy. It causes interest that you can just as easily sit and stand with princes, and enjoy access most other people never will. Thus the rector of Eitelkeitsmesse sees you as having power he does not, and allied with his worst enemy. He sees all that I am doing at the dam now as he saw my father's work in 1819 -- a threat to his position. He has five sons and 15 grown grandsons that are of the same mind. If you get involved publicly, you would become a part of the threat that he already hates, and while he cannot reach me to do me harm with his resources, he can reach you."
Herr Kantor chuckled grimly.
"How does a man imagine all of that about me, and then imagine he can do anything to me?"
"I was trying to work that out while I was talking with him in my incognito way -- I cannot say it makes perfect sense to me, either, Herr Kantor."
There was a long moment of silence, and then Herr Kantor said, "I thank you for telling me we have a mutual enemy, Prince Solomo, for links up to our conversation while you were incognito. It is written: 'love your enemies,' so I shall love him enough to pray that he be saved both temporally and spiritually, and not to allow my imagination to have me thinking he is such a monster that he could be a threat to me doing whatever the Spirit commands me to do."
There was another long moment of silence, and then the prince answered, "That is a high form of love, indeed ... to take an enemy for what he is but no more, and to pray for his highest good while not allowing him to oppose you. I glimpse something my father studied intently in his last days: 'We are more than conquerors through Him Who loved us.'"
"Well, a peacemaker is blessed to inherit the earth, not have to destroy upon it to take it, so, my peaceful royal guest, that's an approach for you to the idea," Herr Kantor said. "As for me, there is always the path of being so humble that a proud man can't stoop long enough to stop me, lest he fall down and harm himself in the attempt!"
The prince chuckled grimly.
"I know that Edward von Schadenfreude got maneuvered into charging headfirst into his own castle wall," he said. "I see what you mean!"
"I have no memory of that," Herr Kantor said, "but it does sound like my type of move! Thank you for the reminder!"
The weather held, so our royal guest departed shortly thereafter to get back to his command base at Sicherwald, carrying our entire cheesecake as a token of our loyal affection for him. His retinue awaited him just out of town, and all of them would eat and be glad.
Three days later, the postman blew his horn in the streets again ... there was a letter for Herr Kantor, and he began to laugh merrily upon reading it.
"It is from our humble royal guest -- he has made his pronouncement, and the rector at Sicherwald has been given precisely the same idea as I was -- leading his people to prayer, and making a regional call to all ministers! This is wonderful! Less distraction and difficulty this way!"
"Knowing you," Frau Kantor said with a smile, "that just means certain people aren't going to see you coming should you choose to go look over things for yourself."
"We shall see if I am called to Sicherwald to pray," he said, with a smile. "In the meantime, we will have enough to do -- like you said last week, Ursula, we must make ready. That is enough to do, now that everyone is going to have their own reaction to the news and our obligations around it. For the rest we have no control -- could be March, could be in the next minute, but as long as we have time, we walk and work on in hope."
To be continued ... we leave with the piece of music that informed the conversation between the political and spiritual leader here: "He Shall Feed His Flock" by Handel ...
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