THE FIFTH MOUNTAIN - AFTERMATHS

OF PAST AND FAILURE
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"It's better to start rebuilding life right away," he said. "It will take a long time for everything to return to what it was."

"It will never return."

"You look like a wise young man, and you can understand many things that I cannot. But nature has taught me something that I shall never forget: a man who depends on the weather and the seasons, as a shepherd does, manages to survive the unavoidable. He cares for his flock, treats each animal as if it were the only one, tries to help the mothers with their young, is never too far from a place where the animal can drink. Still, now and again one of the lambs to which he gace so much of himself dies in an accident. It might be a snake, some wild animal, or even a fall over a cliff. But the unavoidable always happens."

Elijah looked in the direction of Akbar and recalled his conversation with the angel. The unavoidable always happens.

"You need discipline and patience to overcome it," the shepherd said.

"And hope. When that no longer exists, one can't waste his energy fighting against the impossible."

"It's not a question of hope in the future. It's a questiono of re-creating your own past."

"I didn't understand what you said before," commented ELijah. "About re-creating your own past."

"I have long seen people passing through here on their way to Sidon and Tyre. Some of them complained that they had not achieved anything in AKbar and were setting out for a new destiny. One day these people would return. They had not found what they were seeking, for they carried with them, along with heir bags, the weight of their earlier failure.

A few returned with a government position, or with the joy of having given their children a better life, but nothing more. Their past in Akbar had left them fearful, and they lacked the confidence in themselves to take risks.

On the other hand, there also passed my door people full of ardor. They had profited from every moment of life in Akbar and through great effort had accumulated the money for their journey. To these people, life was a constant triumph and would go on being one.

These people also returned, but with wonderful tales to tell. They had achieved everything they desired because they were not limited by the frustrations of the past."




OF PERHAPS... PERHAPS
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"Perhaps I could have prevented the invasion."

The shepherd laughed. "even if you were governor of Akbar, you would not be able to stop the unavoidable."

"Perhaps the governor of Akbar should have attacked the Assyrians when they first arrived in the valley with few troops. Or negotiated peace, before war broke out."

"everything that could have happened but did not is carried away with the wind and leaves no trace," said the shepherd. "Life is made of our attitudes. And there are certain things that the gods oblige us to live through. Their reason for this does not matter, and there is no action we can take to make them pass us by."



OF PAIN AND SUFFERING
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"The pain you and I feel will never go away, but work will help us to bear it. Suffering has no strength to wound a weary body."



OF LIFE LESSON
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"A child can always teach an adult three things: to be happy for no reason, to always be busy with something, and to know how to demand with all his might that which he desires."



OF STRUGGLES
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THAT NIGHT, a man entered Jacob's tent and wrestled with him until the break of fay. And when he saw that he prevailed not against him, he said, :Let me go."

Jacob answered, "I will not let thee go, except thou bless me."

THen the man said to him:"As a prince, hast thou power with God and with men, and hast prevailed. What is thy name?" And he said, Jacob.

And the man answered:" Thy name shall be called no more Jacob, but Israel."

ELIJAH AWOKE WITH A START AND LOOKED AT THE FIRMAMENT. That was the story that was missing!

Long ago, the patriarch JAcob had encamped, and during he night, someone had entered his tent and wrestled with him until daybreak. Jacob accepted the combat, even knowing that his adversary was the Lord. At morning, he had still not been defeated; and the combat ceased only when God agreed to bless him.

The story had been transmitted from generation to generation so that no one would ever forget: somethimes it was necessary to struggle with God.

Every human being at some time had tragedy enter his life; it might be the destruction of a city, the death of a son, an unproved accusation, a sickness that left one lame forever. At that moment, God challenged one to confront Him and to answer His question: "Why dost thou cling fast to an existence so short and so filled with suffering? What is the meaning of thy struggle?"

The man who did not know how to answer this question would resign himself, while another, one who sought a meaning to existence, feeling that GOd had been unjust, would challenge his own destiny. It was at this moment that fire of a different type descended from the heavens - not the fire that kills but the kind that tears down ancient walls and imparts to each human being his true possibilities.

Cowards never allow thier hearts to blaze with this fire; all they desire is for the changed situation to quickly return to what it was before, so they can go on living their lives and thinking in their customary way. THe brave, however, set afire that which was old and, even at the cost of great internal suffering, abandon everything. including God, and continue onward.

"The brave are always stubborn."

From heaven, God smiles contentedly, for it was this that He desired, that each person take into his hands the responsibility for his own life. For, in the final analysis, He had given His children the greatest of all gifts: the capacity to choose and determine their acts.

Only those men and women with the sacred flame in their hearts had the courage to confront Him. And they alone know the path back to His love, for they understood that tragedy was not punishment but challenge.



OF MEANING TO LIFE
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Many, many years before, on a night like this, Jacob had not allowed God to leave without blessing him. It was then that the Lord had asked: "What is thy name?"

The essential point was this: to have a name. When Jacob had answered, God had baptized him Israel. Each one has a name from birth but must learn to baptize his life with the word he has chosen to give meaning to that life.

"I am Akbar," she had said.
The destruction of the city and the death of the woman he loved had been necessary for Elijah to understand that he too must have a name. And at that moment he named his life Liberation.

Like Elijah, they too could choose a name for themselves. Reconciliation, Wisdom, Lover, Pilgrim - there were as many choics as stars in the sky, but each one had need to give a name to this life.

Elijah rose and prayed," I fought Thee, Lord, and I am not ashamed. And because of it I discovered that I am on my path
beacuse such is my wish, not because it was imposed on me by my father and mother, by the customs of my country, or even by Thee. It is to Thee, O Lord, that I would return at this moment. I wish to prasie Thee wit hthe strength of my will and not with the cowardice of one who has not known how to choose another path. But for Thee to confide to me Thy important mission, I must contniue this battle against Thee, untill Thou bless me."

To rebuild Akbar. What Elijah thought was a challenge to God was, in truth, his reencounter with Him.



OF CHALLENGE
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"There are moments when God demands obedience. But there are moments in which He wishes to test our will and challenges us to understand His love. We understood that will Akbar's walls tumbled to the ground: they opened our horizon and allowed each of us to see his capabilities. We stopped thinking about life and choose to live it."



OF THOSE CROSSED PATH
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"Long since, the desert wind wiped away our footprints in the sand. But at every second of my existence, I remember what happened, and you still walk in my dreams and in my reality. Thank you for having crossed my path."


OF SADNESS AND DEPARTING
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"This sadness you read in my eyes is part of my story. Only a small part that will last but a few days. Tomorrow, when I depart for Jerusalem, it will not have the strength it had before, and little by little it will disappear. Sadness does not last forever when we walk in the direction of that which we always desired."

Is it always necessary to leave?"

"It's always necessary to know when a stage of one's life has ended. If you stubbornly cling to it after the need has passed, you lose the joy and meaning of the rest. And you risk being shaken to your senses by God."

"The Lord is stern."

"Only with those He has chosen."



OF GOOD AND EVIL
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" Can God be evil?"

"God is all-powerful," answered Elijah. "He can do anything, and nothing is forbidden to Him, for if it were, there would exist someone more powerful than He, to prevent His doing certain things. In that case, I should prefer to worship and revere that more powerful someone."

"Still, because of His infinite power, He chose to do only Good. IF we reach the end of our story, we shall see that often Good is disguised as Evil, but it goes on being the Good, and is part of the plan that HE created for humanity."