literary works

The Fable of a Worship Team

Beyond the seven towns, beyond the seven parishes, there was a community that served God and the people by playing and singing. The most important man in the community, the first musician and at the same time the conductor of all the musicians, was the worship leader. The story begins when the old leader announced his departure and a new one was appointed in his place. His name was Barnabas.

Barnaba had every predisposition for this position. He had undergone many years of musical training, but he also had innate talent and an expensive, excellent instrument which he cared for according to luthier recommendations. He also worked regularly on his voice. He practised songs that the community knew, sought out new songs and arranged them, and even composed his own. He took regular lessons to improve his already virtuosic skills. There was no one better to fulfil the task entrusted to him – of this everyone in the community was certain, as was the local parish priest, who was proud of him. What is more, Barnabas’ wife Barbara could also sing beautifully. Her clear mezzo-soprano was something that everyone in the community couldn’t help admiring, unless they themselves were deaf as a stump. She was also a major influence on the overall music of the ensemble. At every worship, she embellished the melodic line of the songs with fine ornaments. Her gently ascending glissando lifted the listeners up to the heavens, and her concluding vibrato left the listeners trembling for a long time. Barbara and Barnabas thus make a unique couple, but even so, they did not become worship leaders together, which may have been significant in its implications for the story as a whole, but let’s keep quiet about that in the meantime by putting a pause here.

Although everything favoured Barnabas to make the worships stand at the highest level it was not that easy. It is well known, the musicians were not a perfectly harmonised orchestra. As some came into the ensemble, others left for personal reasons. Some showed up for rehearsals and some did not. Some had musical knowledge, others were amateurs. Some instruments were too quiet, others too loud. Some had a lot of enthusiasm for playing and others had… too much enthusiasm and it was difficult to control them without disturbing the other musicians. It’s just the way it is, between players, that the less skilled they are, the louder they want to show off. There were therefore plenty of problems. In a word, being the concert master of this assemblage was not an easily digestible porridge, but rather a heavy piece of the band leader’s daily dry bread. However, all this did not deter Barnaba until certain events in the life of the group he led.

Well, once someone heard a false sound while playing, but kept it to themselves. Then someone else heard it and looked around significantly. When the false sounds started to appear more frequently, the musicians could no longer keep quiet. At first among themselves, and later on in the community, there was more and more talk about the fact that a musician was not playing cleanly. The matter also reached Barnabas, who tried to listen more closely to what was actually being heard. The situation was becoming increasingly tense, as despite their efforts, they could not find the source of the disturbing disharmonic tones. In private, one of the artists warned another not to get involved, because there was supposedly something wrong with the band. Someone else ostentatiously withdrew from playing first fiddle. Everyone got caught up in a web of suspicion, accusation, manipulation, hurt and forgiveness and apologies for wrongly made insinuations. One musician, offended to the core by an innocent remark, walked away slamming the door in the process. The others thought that this would solve the problem definitively, but in the meantime they started to play more quietly and carefully. They lost the content of playing con spirito (with spirit), con passione (with passion), vigoroso (with vigour), risoluto (resolutely), piena voce (in full voice). Gone were the magnificent solos that happened to be played con fuoco (with fire) under the influence of the Holy Spirit, which, after all, you don’t get in studio controlled conditions.

The band’s music was fading away regardless of all the efforts made by Barnaba, and perhaps these efforts even accelerated the process. Barnaba himself no longer knew where dissonance was played and where the right note was. He had already lost all spontaneity and joy. He could not cooperate with the rest of the performers. At the musicians’ meetings, he kept asking what could be done so that this sepulchral murmur would not appear again. For his ostinato doloroso, for this persistent and painful chatter his interlocutors plugged their ears. Complicating matters was the fact that Barnaba’s wife was a member of the band. Barbara was quietly or even outright accused of being a sing falsely, and yet she was the leading voice in the line-up.

In the end, it came to a situation where all the artists realised that they were faced with only two choices. They could watch as more players left for other bands and the desire to play completely died down in those who remained. Or they could have suggested to Barnaba that he should resign if he can’t get the team back together. After all, he himself has not found out for so long what is really the cause of this cacophonous impotence that has reached the band. The precise mechanism that he once was has become, over the last few years, a disorderly, shapeless, gelatinous musical mass – a cold and bitter sonic jelly. The people of the parish no longer wanted to listen to it and stopped coming to the masses for worship.

After another – it seemed – falsehood, after another argument about this seemingly false sound, after another fermenting allusions, suspicions, accusations, manipulations and forgiveness… Barnaba announced his resignation. He sensed that if he didn’t then the other musicians would leave on their own. Officially, of course, he did not hold a grudge against anyone, but after all, he announced it in the context of recent events which sounded unconvincing. He hid a grudge in his heart that he was not supported by the others, a grudge that was quite justified, but was it their fault that their hands were already fainting from the chronic exhaustion of this tension of nerves they felt over controlling themselves? It was impossible to breathe in such an atmosphere, let alone act fraternally. It would appear, therefore, that the blame was shared. The simplest and perhaps fairest thing to do with this statement would be to write Fine and end there. After all, who or what was the cause of this collapse of the band? We can raise questions, we can float hypotheses, we can carry out an entire investigation, but is it possible to find an answer to this question?

Perhaps the root cause of the problems was the decision for Barnaba to be the leader himself, as I mentioned at the beginning. If Barbara had been co-leader of the ensemble with him her situation would have been clear, and so many of the other soloists looked on with an envious eye as Barbara was singled out by Barnaba, for on more than one occasion he entrusted her with the most beautiful songs. Many have claimed that he is downright deaf to her lapse and bravura over-interpretations. To make matters worse, Barbara, indeed somewhat barbaric in her character, was not liked at all in the ensemble. There was no denying that she did not have at least one single friend from the heart. But was this somehow her fault? After all, everyone has some vices.

Perhaps the explanation for the whole conundrum is not in the people. Maybe it was simply a faulty piece of equipment, not for the first time, a damaged cable or a faulty dibox socket? Or was it external interference from the devil that tore into this infernally complicated mixer? Many raised the spectator’s voice that this was all part of a spiritual battle and called on everyone to pray more together. To this, others argued that it was a convenient excuse for failing to see their own laziness and the shortcomings of the workshop by not turning up for the communal supplication dates set by Barnabas.

Another hypothesis was that perhaps the worship harmony had changed over the years, the way they played had changed. Music, like any other art, is subject to change, to new fashions to follow or to accept being left behind. It is difficult to explain this to someone not familiar with the principles of consonances and intervals, but I will try no less. It is possible that while some musicians were playing the old-fashioned triads, others – without even knowing what they were doing – were already playing septim, non or augmented chords. In a word, they were playing richer sets of notes – composed of four or five different notes – or of notes shifted in relation to each other. It was impossible to look at everyone’s hands, and inevitably the riddle of dissonant tones must have remained unsolved.

There is also a completely different explanation, which many readers will probably scornfully describe as the deux ex machina of the whole story: Perhaps it was God’s will! It all happened in order to fulfil some divine intention that no one could know or understand. So man, the devil or God was the author of the false notes – it does not matter in the least! All that matters is the result. The only thing that matters is the spiritual path that, it is to be trusted, all were led in an unknown direction. For if it were not for the Logos, it would all make no sense at all. It would only be a mutual enjoyment of playing pretty notes in the key of minor or major – creating music that is apparently only authentic, but in fact spiritually false, because it is empty.

So the question to which this story leads us is not: who played dissonantly? This is not a detective story but a spiritual story. This most important question is: can we play… con amore? Are we able to play with love? If there is no love in us then there can be no Unity either. Without it, each of us becomes just a clanging copper, a dead cymbal – yes, an instrument perfectly tuned according to an equal temperament, but one that does not stir any deep values in those who listen. They listen to this cymbal when it sounds, but when its reverberation dies down nothing remains in the listeners afterwards.

So it is not musical skill that is the issue here, but the art of loving in which we all need to exercise ourselves. Especially for those who want to lead others on gospel paths. One can possess almost everything – talents, skills, commitment, equipment – but without love we are nothing. And one cannot love God without loving people. Some of us seem to be beginners in this art, others seem to be masters, but why judge anyone? And how are we supposed to do that? Each of us has to find out for himself how much of his inner self is still humming impurely, how many strings he has to tune in order not to let the sound of love in him be drowned out by anything.

The inquisitive reader will ask: What happened to the band after this leader’s resignation severed that Gordian knot emotionally entangling all the musicians? Did Barnabas and Barbara’s departure heal the ensemble and did it return to its former normalcy, unfettered by suspicion of falsehood? Or, without such great leadership, did the orchestra disintegrate completely and the musicians scatter to the surrounding Renewal in Spirit communities? Possibly, on the contrary, new, hitherto dormant talents were born in the place of Barnabas and Barbara, and the band was rewarded with even more adoring applause than in the old days? Who knows, after all, Barnabas and Barbara themselves in a different place may have found new tasks and experiences they had not even dared to dream of before?

So that we can hear the answer to the above questions I, the author of this tale, now put down my pen and hand it over to someone more clever. He’s an author with a capital ‘A’. A creator like no one else, experienced and professional in his craft. Whatever one may say about him – for he is reticent and secretive, and likes to put off his work until it is too late, so that he can be reminded of his most famous number, his magnum opus, which would have been impossible without the resurrection of the protagonist – one must nevertheless admit that imperfection is an alien trait to him. So whatever the continuation of the story may be, it cannot be poorly composed. So let us arm ourselves with patience and give Him a free hand. Unlike us, He knows. He knows everything.

Chorzów, 10.03.2024 The Third Sunday of Advent: Joy to the World

Dersu Uzala micro-adaptation

My name is Polycarp Olientiev. The story I want to tell you begins in 1902, when I was 26 years old. I was a man of medium height, well-built. I had fair hair, prominent facial features and a small moustache. I served in the army as a gunner, and without boasting I was one of the best. I was stationed in Vladivostok, known as the ‘Pearl of the East’, unlike any Siberian city. In the picturesque harbour amidst warships and merchant ships, graceful Chinese junks were spinning. Here one met Japanese merchants, Chinese and Korean fishermen, Norwegian whale catchers, American traders and vagabonds from all over the world feeling perfectly at home in any latitude. The smell of the distant seas mingled in this unusual town with the scent of the primeval taiga, which pressed in at all pores. Herds of wild boar grazed just a stone’s throw from the town, and there were times when a hungry tiger would venture right between the houses. Tiger Street got its name from the fact that it was here, among a company of soldiers, that the tiger kidnapped a soldier.

So it is no surprise that as soon as they were looking for volunteers to take part in a military expedition deep into the taiga, I volunteered. Strange and unique is the Ussurian country. The glaciers that once flowed down into Siberia did not cover its areas, so the vegetation and animal world here have preserved traces of the ancient heyday of the warm climate. Siberia’s general cooling could not, however, remain unaffected by its fauna and flora. Full of hustle and bustle, the cheerful deciduous forests were slowly displaced by the dark taiga. And hence a strange mixture of plant and animal worlds emerged in this area, not found elsewhere. Northern firs wrap around vines here, and nuts grow alongside spruce and cedar. Bear and sable live alongside tiger and panther. Spotted deer, wild boar, Japanese ibis and cranes, Chinese ducks and Australian curlews were plentiful here. Unfortunately, with increasing population, this original multitude was being lost. Only five years later, the gold rush broke out here and so-called ‘gold prospectors’ – people of the worst of the worst, capable of unscrupulous killing out of a lust for profit – started arriving from all but the surrounding areas. However, when I was there, the forests along the Ussuri River still resembled the original paradise land. Their original inhabitants still lived there. And I had heard that they were an extraordinary people.
The Siberian natives of the Tunguz (Orochon, Menegrins, Lamut), Yakut and others were said to be among the most honest and orderly people to exist anywhere. They owed this to their innate gentle nature, the ennobling influence of the nature in which they lived and, of course, their remoteness from the corruption spread by pseudo-European culture. Many tribes did not understand at all what stealing meant, and in the languages of some tribes there was, for example, no word for ‘liar’ at all, because such transgressions were incomprehensible to them.
So that year I set off with an expedition towards the Sichote-Aliń – the ‘Dark Mountains’, resembling from afar a rough and rapidly petrifying sea. We were six Siberian riflemen and four horses. Our detachment was to explore the pass from the military point of view of the Shkotovsky district and to get to know the pass and the Da-diań-shan mountain chain. We were also to explore all the paths around Lake Khanka and in the area of the Ussuri railway. I might add that this is one of the two extreme sections of the Trassiberian Railway – the world’s longest rail route, connecting Vladivostok to far Europe at the time, to Warsaw.
It was from the unit stationed in Warsaw that our commander, Captain Vladimir K. Arseniev, arrived here. When I was posted under his command I was initially full of bad thoughts. Usually, those who particularly offended the command were sent to the Far East. No one voluntarily gave up a career and comfortable service in civilised Europe. Captain Arseniev, however, was an uncommon man. Many times, during our late-night fireside chats, he told me that since childhood he had dreamt of travelling far. This desire to explore the world was instilled in him by his father, the cashier of the Nikolaev Iron Road, Claudius Arseniev. It was in the family home, in a poor flat on the outskirts of St Petersburg, that the young Arseniev read adventure novels. The boyish interest in adventure did not pass with age, as it does for many people. In grammar school, geography became his favourite subject. Even awake at night, he could draw the route of Columbus’ voyage to America, Vasco da Gama’s journey to India or Yermak’s Siberian route. However, he was happiest drawing himself and his adventures on imaginary distant journeys.
Over time, scientific works by geographers, travellers and naturalists took the place of childish adventure novels. The boy voraciously swallowed knowledge, reports of scientific expeditions. Dreaming in his boyish way of accomplishing great things, he sometimes worried that he had been born too late, that great discoveries had already been made in the world without his participation, and that by the time he grew up, everything had already been discovered and explored.
Over time, I became fascinated by this extraordinary man – an inquisitive, meticulous researcher on the one hand, and a dreamer, even a poet, on the other. And he must have seen positive qualities in me, such as hunting experience and optimism, because we became friends. When he needed a company he always chose me from among the other shooters. It was no different until that memorable night.

That evening we had to set up camp in a very hostile area, among deep, carpel-collapsed clefts, hollows and moss-covered rocks.
– It reminds me vividly of Walpurgisnacht,’ said the Captain. – It is hard to imagine a more wild and unpleasant place.
We talked about how the forest and the mountains are sometimes cheerful and attractive, so that one would like to stay there forever. Sometimes, on the other hand, the mountains seem wild and dreary.
– And the strange thing,’ mused the Captain, ’this feeling is never individual, subjective, but always collective, involving a whole group of people.
Indeed, just as he had said, everyone here felt a sadness and a horror that made an overwhelming impression on us.
– ‘It’s nothing,’ I said, trying to comfort him, ‘we’ll get through the night somehow. We won’t be spending the winter here after all. Tomorrow we will find a more cheerful place.
After setting up camp and fetching wood, we saddled the horses and set about cooking the evening meal. Later, everyone went about their business: one cleaned his rifle, another repaired his saddle or mended his torn clothes. The captain took out his journal and began to write down the events of the last leg of the journey. As I mended my shoes, I also recalled what had happened the day before.

The previous evening, while the gunners were setting up their tents, the Captain had taken advantage of his free time to view the area. Of course, he had taken me with him. We crossed a low ridge and found ourselves in a neighbouring valley covered with thick forest. It was crossed by the wide, dry bed of a mountain stream. Here our paths diverged. The captain went left along the gravel-covered shoal, and I went right, through the forest. Suddenly, I noticed an animal sitting in a tree. I quickly but calmly aimed and fired. When the animal ran away, I wanted to load again immediately, but, as luck would have it, one cartridge jammed in the magazine and the lock would not engage.
The Captain jumped up to me.
– Who were you shooting at?
– I think I was shooting at a tiger,’ I replied, ’I was aiming well and I definitely hit it.
Now I slowly cocked the rifle again and we both moved carefully towards where the animal was hiding. The blood on the dry grass showed that I had indeed wounded it. We stopped and I strained my hearing. There was a snarling sound coming from the front right. Nothing could be seen through the thicket of ferns. A large fallen tree was blocking our path. I wanted to overtake it with a leap, but the wounded animal overtook me and dashed violently to meet us. Without putting my flask to my shoulder, in a hurry, I fired at close range. I succeeded. The bullet hit the very head of the animal – it fell on a fallen tree and hung on it with its head and front paws on one side and its rump on the other. The wounded animal, after a few convulsive movements, began to bite the ground and, sliding slowly down the tree trunk, collapsed heavily at my feet. It was a Manchurian panther, called ‘bara’ by the local people.

Before we knew it, everyone was exhausted and had fallen asleep. The horses, having found no food in the forest, approached the bivouac and, hanging their heads, fell asleep. Finally, around ten o’clock, the Captain closed his notebook and lay down by the fire. We began to talk. Suddenly the horses lifted their heads and tuned their ears, but after a while they calmed down and fell asleep again. We did not pay much attention at first and continued talking. A few minutes passed. Finally, I heard a noise coming from the forest. I sprang to my feet and, shielding myself from the glare of the bonfire with my hand, stared ahead, slightly to one side.
– What happened? – asked the Captain.
– Someone is coming down from above,’ I replied in a whisper. We both started to listen, but it was quiet all around, as quiet as it can be in the forest on a cool autumn night. Suddenly, small pebbles came tumbling down from above.
– ‘It’s probably a bear,’ I said, and began to recap the rifle.
– Shoot no need. My people… – a voice could be heard from the darkness and after a few minutes a man approached our campfire.
He was dressed in a jacket and trousers made of leather deerskin. He wore a sling of some sort on his head, unts on his feet, a large bundle on his back, and in his hands were a wooden buckskin and a long berdanka.
– ‘Hello, Captain,’ said the newcomer, turning to Vladimir Klavdiyevich, and then he leaned his rifle against a tree, took the bundle off his back and, wiping his sweaty face with his shirt sleeve, sat down by the fire. I could now get a good look at him. He looked to be about forty-five years old. He was not very tall, stocky and probably physically strong. His breasts were bulging, his arms muscular and strong, his legs slightly crooked. His tanned face was typical of the natives: prominent cheekbones, a tiny nose, Mongolian eyes with a crease on the eyelids and a wide mouth with strong teeth. A small, dark mustache framed his upper lip and a small reddish beard adorned his chin. What attracted the most attention, however, were his eyes. They were dark grey, gazing calmly and somewhat naively. They expressed determination, integrity of character and good-naturedness.
The stranger did not watch over us as curiously as we watched him. He extracted a tobacco slipper from behind his breastplate, scooped up his pipe and began to smoke in silence. Without asking who he was or where he was coming from, the Captain gave him a meal. This is the custom of the taiga.
– Thank you, Captain,’ he said. – My very much wants to eat, my did not eat today.
While he was eating, I looked at him further, There was a hunting knife hanging from his belt, so he was probably a hunter. His hands were gnarled and scratched; he had similar, only deeper scars on his face: one on his forehead, the other on his cheek near his ear. When he took the veil off his head, I noticed that he had thick, fawn-coloured hair; it grew disorderly and hung down the side in long strands.
Our guest was not talkative. Finally, I couldn’t stand it and asked him directly:
– Who are you? Chinese or Korean?
– My Gold – he answered briefly.
– You must be a hunter? – asked the Captain in turn.
– Yes – he said. – My still goes hunting, no other job, fish catching too, only one hunting understood.
– And where do you live? – I asked him further.
– My has no home. My still sopka lives. Smokes the fire, puts up the tent, sleeps. Always goes hunting, how do you live in a house?
He then told me that today he was hunting maralas and wounded one mother, but lightly. Following the shot, he came across our tracks. These led him to a ravine. When it got dark, he saw the fire and headed straight towards it.
– My is walking quietly,’ he said. – Thinks, what people far sopka walks? He looks – there is a captain, soldiers. Mine then walks straight.
– Here’s the hunter who lost the deer! – it broke out.
– And yours always hit? – he turned to me.
– A soldier never misses! – I boasted.
– Your a great hunter! Yours to kill everything and ours to eat nothing – he replied good-naturedly.
The captain and the guest laughed. They laughed for a long time, and I felt offended. At the time I didn’t understand it, but now I know that it was then that I first felt jealous of the Captain. I saw how interested he was in this man. I don’t deny it, you could immediately see something special, original in him. He spoke simply, quietly, behaved modestly, without adulation, but at the time I still couldn’t appreciate that. On the contrary. I was a young, boisterous soldier. Offended, I went to bed.
– What is your name? – The captain asked the stranger when they had finished laughing.
– Dersu Uzala,’ he replied.

The next morning I found out that the Captain and Dersu had talked until dawn. As we set about yoking the horses after tea, Dersu also began to prepare for the journey. He threw a bundle on his back and took a wooden trestle and a berdanca in his hand. After a few minutes, our troop set off. It turned out that Dersu was coming with us.
The ravine through which we were walking was long and winding. Water flowed out of its many branches with a noise. The crevice became wider and wider and gradually turned into a valley. Old notches in the trees showed us the path. Gold walked in front and looked carefully underfoot all the time. Occasionally he would lean towards the ground and rake up the foliage with his hands.
– What happened? – asked the Captain.
Dersu said that this path is not for horses, but for pedestrians; it leads along sable traps and a few days ago a man walked along it – probably a Chinese.
We were amazed by Gold’s words. Noticing our disbelief he exclaimed:
– How can you not understand! Look for yourself!
He directed my attention to the details, which dispelled all doubts at once. It was so clear and simple. I was surprised that I hadn’t noticed it myself before. Firstly, there were no horse tracks anywhere on the path, and secondly, it had not been cleared of branches; our horses had trudged through with difficulty and kept snagging their jukes on the trees. Then the turns became so sharp that the horses found it difficult to walk and had to go around the path. Across the streams, the tracks led over logs and the path went nowhere down to the water; the path was blocked by fallen logs that no one tried to remove. People were not bothered by them, and horses had to be guided around. So everything indicated that the path was not intended for travellers with saddlebags.
– Long time one people walk – said Dersu, as if to himself.
– People finish walking. – And he began to calculate when the last rain fell.
We walked along this path for about two hours. The coniferous forest gradually turned into mixed forest. Poplars, maples, aspens, birches and lime trees became more frequent. The captain already wanted to make a long stop, but Dersu advised him that we should walk some more.
– Our soon-to-be-found hut,’ he said and pointed to the trees stripped of their bark.
I understood him at once. So somewhere nearby there must have been what we needed the bark for. We hastened our steps and after ten minutes we saw a small hut with a monopitch roof, built by hunters or ginseng seekers, on the bank of a stream. On inspecting it all around, our new acquaintance confirmed that a Chinese man had walked along the path a few days ago and had spent the night in this hut. This was evidenced by rain-washed ash, a single grass bed and abandoned old daba kneepads.
It was then that we realised that Dersu was not a common man. We had a seasoned tracker in front of us and, despite myself, the characters of Cooper and Mayne Read came to mind. Dersu was a primal hunter who had spent his entire life in the taiga. He earned his livelihood with a rifle he inherited from his father; he exchanged his hunting prey with the Chinese for tobacco, gunpowder and lead. As it turned out, Dersu was fifty-three years old and had never had a home; he always lived in the open air and only in winter did he build himself a temporary yurt out of oak or birch bark.
While stopping to feed the horses, the Captain took the opportunity to lie down in the shade of a cedar tree to sleep. I woke him up after an hour had passed. I said that Dersu had chopped wood, gathered birch bark and put it all in the hut.
– He probably wants to burn the hut – I concluded.
We approached him and tried to dissuade him from this intention. Instead of an answer, Dersu only asked for a pinch of salt and a handful of rice. Clearly curious as to why he needed it, the captain told him to give him everything he wanted. Gold carefully wrapped the matches in birch bark, separately cobbled the rice and salt into the bark and began to cook for the journey.
– ‘You’re probably going to come back here? – The captain asked Gold.
He shook his head negatively. He then asked him for whom he had left the rice, salt and matches.
– Some other people are walking,’ Dersu replied. – A hut he finds, dry wood he finds, matches he finds, not an abyss.
This made a strong impression on us. Gold cared for a man he did not know, whom he would never see and who would never know who had prepared his wood and food. I remembered how often we used to burn bark on the fire when we left. We did it simply for fun, not through any malice, and I never stopped my colleagues from doing it. Concern for the traveller… Why have these good feelings, this concern for others, been so suppressed in people who live in cities? And yet these feelings used to undoubtedly exist.

And we learned a great deal more about the high ethics of the forest dwellers, about the plaques placed by the Chinese, ginseng seekers and hunters, on lonely paths or passes with inscriptions such as ‘passer-by, at such and such a distance from here is my cottage. You are hungry, go there and take what you need’ and how hospitality was supposedly never abused.
This is how Dersu became our guide and soon our teacher. He taught us things unheard of in our world. Once, Dersu and I went to watch at night near a clearing where a herd was to come out. The deer failed, but not far away a powerful tiger roar sounded, which even the bravest hunter is cold. Arseniev, expecting an onslaught, pointed the barrel in the direction from where the roar began to repeat itself more and more furiously, but Dersu put the rifle on the ground, fell to his knees and turned to the tiger with a speech. He apologised to him that they had come here, for they did not know that this was the place where the tiger hunts, he explained to the tiger that the wilderness was great, there was enough room for everyone, so they too would go to look for another. Arseniev had a great desire to confront the tiger (he later killed two more), but for Dersu’s sake he abandoned his intention and they left there without being harassed by the tiger. The Golds never hunted the tiger, as it was of common origin with them.
In time Dersu took my place at the Captain’s side, which I resented. I was young so it was no wonder that I felt jealousy. However, Dersu’s advantages were invaluable, for he had saved the Captain’s life many times.
At the end of our expedition, and it was late autumn, we camped near the mouth of the river Lifu into Lake Khanka. Arseniev suggested to the old man that they go duck hunting together. Dersu advised against it, as it was quite windy, and pointed to some distant clouds, but since Arseniev told him he would go himself, he went with him. The hunt lasted a couple of hours, with them getting quite far from the encampment, frequently jumping over small streams flowing into the Lif or its minor branches. Meanwhile, towards evening, just when they needed to think about returning, the wind began to pick up, dragging the black snow cloud closer and closer. They took to the retreat, but it was already too late. The tiny streams they had previously jumped over had now turned into wide rivers, as the wind blowing off the lake spilled their waters more and more. Soon it began to get cold and dark and snow began to fall thicker and thicker. They were both lightly clad and understood well that the terrible purga, which had just begun and could last for three days or more, might not let them out of here alive again. Dersu turned: ‘if you don’t listen to me now, we will die’ and set about vigorously cutting down bundles of rushes and reeds, ordering Arseniev to do the same. They hurriedly began to cut and rake into a pile in the increasing snow and increasing darkness. Arseniev soon lost his knife, Dersu told him to rip up the rushes with his hands, but a drenched and cold Arseniev could not do this for long. Anyway, he was already beginning to lose hope of this being of any use and soon fell to the ground half-frozen. Only now did he realise what the cane was needed for. Dersu began to throw this reed and rush at him, and when he had collapsed a large pile, he crawled under it himself and lay down beside him. The snow swamped them more and more, but lying side by side under the pile of reeds and rushes, they were saved from being covered in snow and began to warm up slowly. They lay like this under the snow for a whole day and it was only on the second day in the afternoon that the purgah stopped, a strong frost took hold and they returned to the encampment across the frozen streams and lakes.
Soon we returned to Vladivostok and Dersu remained in the taiga. A few years after this expedition, Arseniev, this time from Khabarovsk, set off on another expedition and again met Dersu in the taiga. I was unfortunately no longer on that expedition. They experienced numerous adventures familiar to me from Arseniev’s wonderful books. Their unique friendship sadly came to an end.
After a couple of years of wandering with Arseniev, it happened to Dersu that he once missed an animal, frowned at the old man and began to ponder in a half-hearted voice that it was old age going, and he alone in the world and soon there would be no one to hunt game for him or catch fish. Arseniev shrugged and, reminding the old man how many times he had saved his life, said that for this he would not let him go anymore. Dersu answered nothing, but when they happened to be after some time near the mouth of the Lif, he led Arseniev to the taiga and, pointing to a tiny clearing, said: ‘to this place for years I have borne the ginseng I found, take them all for it, something he told me at the time’ and recalled his missed shot. Dersu came with Arseniev to the city, but he could not endure in it for a long time, already after a few weeks he went for a hunt to the Chichcyr range, not far from Khabarovsk. Unfortunately, he himself fell a victim there, killed by some suburban vagabond or colonist Muscovite, who was able to make a fortune with just a few rubles and a double-barrelled shotgun.

***

The micro-adaptation is mainly a compilation of text fragments from the following books. I have only added single sentences and made the necessary changes in these texts to create a coherent whole story. The fact that the narrator is a third person, the shooter Olientiev is my original idea.

1. Almost the entire first part of the micro-adaptation is a text entitled ‘Po Ussuryjskim Kraju’ taken from the preface to ‘Na bezdrożach tajgi’, 2nd edition, 1960, MON.
The third paragraph of the first part of the micro-adaptation – Kazimierz Grochowski’s remarks on the Siberian natives – comes from the book ‘Fort Grochowski’ by Edward Kajdański, from Chapter II entitled ‘Śladami Dersu Uzały’. Grochowski was a professional gold prospector working in the place and time of our heroes’ adventures. Literally… he walked in their footsteps.

2. The entire part two of the micro-adaptation is excerpts from ‘Na bezdrożach tajgi’ by V. Arseniev (Chapter I titled ‘The Glass Gorge’, Chapter II titled ‘Meeting with Dersu’, Chapter III titled ‘Wild Boar Hunting’).

3. The whole of the third part of the micro-adaptation comes from the manuscript by Stanislaw Poniatowski entitled ‘Dziennik wyprawy do kraju Goldów i Oroczonów w 1914 roku’. This manuscript is in the collection of the Scientific Archive of the Main Board of the Polish Folklore Society in Wrocław. I have quoted it after Antoni Kuczyński’s book entitled ‘Ludy dalekie a bliskie’.
Poniatowski’s account begins as follows: „Around 5 Arseniev comes in, we chat, he tells me some of the adventures of his expeditions, I absorb them with great interest. He tells me about the old Gold Dersu Uznal, who came hungry to his camp in the taiga one night and from then on accompanied him on expeditions for several years, sharing adventures together and sometimes saving lives. He tells the story of him with real emotion.”

The Stone and the River

A Fable

The Stone

High on a mountainside lay a stone. No, it was not some precious or sacred stone such as for example, the Hajar – the black meteorite to which all Muslims make pilgrimage because they believe it was brought by the Archangel Gabriel himself. No, our stone is the most ordinary, in no way different from others, worthless grey boulder. Simply, on the steep slope of a high mountain next to dozens of other similar stones lay a certain stone.
There was nothing strange or extraordinary about this stone’s life. It lived a solitary life. Like all stones, it expected nothing from others and gave nothing to others. This is, after all, a matter of course among stones and, were it not for something that happened, which I am about to describe, it would have unconsciously remained in this stone’s fate for all time.

It happened once that a man was climbing up this slope. Unintentionally, a small stone broke free from under the man’s foot. This pebble hit another. These in turn hit yet another. And finally a whole stone avalanche came tumbling down. Various pieces of rock and gravel rolled like mad, and the stronger stones smashed the weaker ones to pieces.
In the avalanche there was also our stone. He was afraid of being smashed or injured. It wanted very much to escape this mad pursuit and return to its former, dreamy existence. So when the right opportunity arose, he bounced hard off a springy clump of moss and soared far ahead. Just like that, he fell with a loud splash into the river.

The River

The river is the other protagonist of this story. No, it was not some special or sacred river, such as the Ganges River flowing out of an ice cave in the Himalayas, to which all Hindus make a pilgrimage because they believe it is the embodiment of the goddess Ganga. No, our river is the most ordinary mountain stream. Simply, a certain river flowed at the foot of the mountain from which a stone rolled down.
The stone was previously unfamiliar with the river and now that he found himself at the bottom of it, it seemed like a completely new and unusual world to him. He could not marvel at the fact that the river was prodigiously giving away the best it had to everyone – itself. Animals came to its banks every day whenever they wanted and happily drank the invigorating water. The river never skimped on its gifts and expected nothing in exchange.
What’s more, animals and even people could wash in it, as it happily took the dirt and dust from everyone. Stone was full of amazement. He could not comprehend the river’s behaviour, because he had never offered anything to anyone. Nor did he ever ask anyone for anything. Occasionally, only an animal would stumble over him and it cut itself, but he himself, after all, did not want to maliciously injure anyone. These similar feelings were completely alien to him. He just wanted to be stuck in his solitude. His only silent prayer was the desire for ‘holy peace’.
This is how the stone and the river lived together from then on. Completely different. Two opposites, one might say, but could one say that one was good and the other evil? No, that is not the right thing to say.

III

The Stone or the River

This is the end of the story of the stone who fell into the clear river and was surprised to see that she was able to live very differently from him – without selfishness and fear, but with love and boundless generosity. Yes, that’s the end of this simple story, but I’ll add a little warning from me.
Many people and many religions try to convince us that in ourselves good fights against evil, but in my opinion it is otherwise. See for yourself. Look carefully inside yourself, and instead of good and evil, you might just see this joyfully murmuring river with a stone resting motionlessly in its current.
You will then find that half of you wants to be like this river. It wants to selflessly impart what is benevolent and wash others of what is harmful. This part of you does not want to be separated from the world. On the contrary, full of love and compassion, it hopes to dissolve in the world – to be One with everything. But in contrast, another part of you is like a stone. And it is just as strong. This other half of you tries very hard to keep its own distinct shape, its own independent, even dead, stone life.
This river flowing within you, wise people used to call the soul or true self. The fossilised part of you people call the ego or little self. But that is not what is important what is wisely called. What is important is that the stone is strenuously trying to convince you that you are just that – a stone. Similarly, the i river would like you to believe that you are just it – the river. Be careful, because whoever you allow yourself to be convinced by, that is who you will become… a stone or a river.

Towards Extinction

Tomorrow it will be exactly ten years since the outbreak of the Third World War. There is no longer any hope that this war will end in peace. Both camps are still fighting gruelling battles. Several million people have died so far. Hundreds of millions are sick and starving. Our once vibrant cities now stand depopulated. Vast areas have been radioactively and chemically contaminated. The biological balance has been irreparably damaged. A tragic end is inevitable, and it will be the end of all humanity. On the occasion of this sad anniversary, let us remember how it happened.

Since time immemorial, humans have eaten meat. The ways of producing animal-based foods were man-made technologies. With the development of culture, different eating habits developed in different societies. The consumption of meat products was often sanctified by religious rites. Often, it was simply a necessity of life, not least for the Inuit. In a word, meats have always occupied a place of honour on the tables of the whole world. Despite this, in the course of the progress of civilisation, the ominous voices of the vegetarian were increasingly heard.

After the Second World War and the Cold War, times of peace and prosperity followed. Armies were disarmed and borders were annulled. The world turned into a big happy village. Scientists constructed hundreds of useful inventions every day. Robots replaced humans in manual labour, so artistic creativity flourished. Parents raised their children more wisely than before. Teachers educated them more wisely. And linguists have created new languages so that it is easier for all people to communicate with each other and understand themselves.

Religious tolerance prevailed, as religion ceased to be politics. Democratic continental governments were established, as a result of which politics ceased to be religion. Law, by contrast, ceased to be law, because law ceases to exist when its cause disappears. So, when crime disappeared, the institution of the police was abolished. All this because external discipline was replaced by internal discipline. Of course, in every corner of the globe, with universal consent, it was possible to engage in prostitution, to deal drugs and to commit suicide. However, this happiness did not last long.

In the 1980s, the euphemistically named Humanitarian Nature Lovers Party came to power. Vegetarian activists hid under this code name. At first, they very innocently began to introduce a new and better order. First, under pressure from vegans, the price of eggs was raised. This was soon followed by the price of fish, cheese and other supposedly harmful animal products. Finally, the vegetarians showed their true demands: they raised the price of meat products. People suffered a hitherto unknown, paralysing shock: they had to pay attention to what costs how much.

Cries for reason rang out, but were perfidiously silenced. Even back then, vegetarian propaganda referred to lovers of beef or pork as ‘cannibals’. The vegetarian Inquisition imprisoned and tortured those suspected of savouring venison with stomach washings. The Jews were not spared this persecution either. Followers of the pseudo-scientific macrobiotic doctrine hated them for their traditional kosher cuisine. Above all, the fate of certain X-rays eaters from outer space, who were contemptuously labelled ‘others eating’ and sent back, is appalling.

In February 2093, meat prohibition was introduced. The customary gastronomy went underground. Milk bars triumphed. Not for long, however, as it soon became apparent that milk was a deadly poison. In the name of the slogan ‘healthy food YES, sick freedom NO’, new bans were introduced month after month. Not only that! The bans were followed by injunctions: ‘Not a single day without leafy greens!’, “Start every meal with raw food”, etc. Fearless suppliers and recipients of banned food were threatened with a severe punishment: several years of vegetable and fruit salad three times a day.

The order to eat a daily portion of wheat bran overflowed with measure. It was motivated by a twisted and unpalatable claim that bran was rich in dietary fibre, while the fibre consisted of cellulose, gum, glue and similar abominations. After a few days of this inhumane treatment, on 7 April 2095, at lunchtime, the world officially split into two camps. On the one side stood vegetarians, and on the other the people who were not in the habit of looking into someone else’s plate. This split is commonly referred to as the outbreak of World War III, the successive stages of which are colloquially known as the ‘plate expeditions’.

The armies of the Vegetarian North broke into the territory of the liberal South without warning. The heroes of the Diet Independence Volunteer Army, being unarmed and unfortified, were doomed to defeat. Nevertheless, they defended themselves extremely valiantly, and by no means were these skirmishes over cutlery and toothpicks. Admittedly, vegetarian morality categorically forbids killing, but the fact is that the war took a tragic toll: seven million casualties. These were prisoners of war who died of starvation because they refused to take any plant food into their mouths. A spirit of sacrifice gone to the point of heroism!

After the demise of Africa and Australia, the last bastion of the meat-based culinary art became America – the home of the hamburger. But even here there are no peaceful breakfasts and dinners. Fructan terrorists are damaging nuclear power stations so that the food cannot be cooked in microwave ovens, supposedly having a deadly effect on the nutritional components of the food. Witarian Airborne Brigades drop chemical bombs behind laxatives. The picture of wartime destruction is grim. Field hospitals are running out of beds for the constant stream of patients suffering from gastritis and irritable bowel.

Further compounding the suffering and hunger makes absolutely no sense. Peaceful liberal leaders have repeatedly attempted to reach a truce. The parsley tyrants rejected every proposal, claiming that the envoys were ‘digging their own graves – with your own teeth’. These dietary hypocrites know no mercy. And their appetites are insatiable. Indeed, they demand unconditional surrender and, as war reparations, the supply of inspector vegetables. The vegetarian Supreme Court in absentia has sentenced all slow eaters to a meat-free diet for life.

Nevertheless, the possibility of capitulation was considered for some time. It was not accepted because even such a martyr’s act of sacrifice would not have been able to save human civilisation from the apocalypse. Its foreshadowing was the whole-burning of medical books, pharmacies and pharmaceutical laboratories. This was done at the behest of the most ardent fanatics of the vegetarian philosophy, for in their view, viruses – as living beings – must not be killed by drugs. They decided to correct Mother Nature’s alleged mistake. To this end, they embarked on a disastrous plan for the mass sterilisation of plants and carnivorous animals.

What has this coming to an end of human history taught us? What did the Third World War, the greatest attempt in history to physically and psychologically glamourise man, expose to us? Without doubt, any idea can become the cause of senseless drama. Examples could be multiplied where ideas of mercy and compassion have led to acts of cruelty or mass murder. Where does the cause of this paradox lie? Is it in the lack of tolerance, as freedom politicians try to convince us? Or somewhere deeper: in the nature of the human psyche? Let us consider this for a moment.

People who call themselves vegetarians postulate that sentient beings should not be killed or eaten. But have they experienced the agony of death to be able to make statements about it on the basis of personal experience? No! Like all human beings, vegetarians experience death only from the outside. Thus, like everyone else, the sight pierces them with horror. When they speak of the end of life, they mean the dread of it. It is for this reason – and not out of a spontaneous impulse of the heart as experienced by the first, unattached vegetarians – that they focus their attention so strongly on the preservation of life.

Vegetarianism, a seemingly only practical thing, is one ideology. As a transnational and even transcultural concept, it has the broadest dimension, a global one. However, it would be absurd to accuse the enthusiasts of this ideology of deliberately starting a world war. For it was unleashed by the demons of fear that have dwelt in people since time immemorial. Vegetarians have unwittingly become another instrument of the fear of dying that drove our ancestors so many times to barbarism. Yet it was undoubtedly the vegetarians who proved to be a remarkably effective tool in the hands of fear.

Fear, unlike timidity, is the most human emotion. It begins where humour ends. By imposing seriousness, fear takes away the individual’s ability to perceive reality from a distance. By taking away the ability to think independently, it imposes a black-and-white mob mentality. And by thinking in terms of good and evil, it provokes the individual to take a place on either of the opposing sides. From there, it is only a step to bloody conflict. Once set in motion, this complex process is unstoppable. Ignoring it by all of us leads the human population towards extinction.

How do Dead Butterflies Fly?

A Fable

During the Han Dynasty, in a small village located in U Province, there lived two boys who were extraordinary friends. Their names were Fan Yan and Pin Szy. Fan and Pin spent their days exclusively in each other’s company, and although they usually had nothing to say to each other, they were never bored. They did not fight or quarrel, as is common among children. They shared an extremely strong bond of friendship and a secret, wordless understanding. This was because they shared a common fascination – butterflies. From dawn to dusk, they could run after them in the meadows or lie on the grass and watch in awe at their graceful, aerial twirls. They were not perturbed by the mocking smiles of the villagers, the mischievous jokes of their peers or the complaints of their parents that fate had dealt them a child without brains. Without a doubt, they were the best friends in the world. However, this was not always the case…

Once upon a time, a boy called Pin had the idea to make a butterfly net and catch a few for himself. He was very pleased by the thought, so he immediately shared it with his friend. Fan thought the idea was silly, which caused the boys to have their first disagreement. From that day on, they avoided each other, as neither of them wanted to admit the other was right. Pin, as he thought of it, made a net and increased his collection day by day. He was now not happy with the butterflies that flew around the meadow. He only rejoiced in the ones he caught himself. Fan also could not enjoy the sight of flying butterflies as he used to. He often sat by the lake and gazed for hours at its unmoving surface. As he sat there motionless, almost lifeless, he was thinking of his friend, who at that time was carelessly catching butterflies.

One day his gaze, sunk in the watery depths, suddenly brightened. He realised what he should do. Soon he went to visit a friend. Pin, seeing him on the doorstep of his house, was very happy, forgetting the dispute that had separated them. He was happy because they were together again, but also because he could finally show his friend his collection.

– ‘This is a yuan ben de butterfly,’ said Pin, not containing himself with joy, pointing his finger at one of the multi-coloured butterflies pinned to the mat, ‘and this one is a ge ren de,’ he continued proudly with his collection.

Fan did not share his feverish joy. He knew his friend as well as he knew himself, so he immediately noticed that Pin’s joy had a different colour. His eyes had changed their gentle expression to a cold and hard one; they were now cloudy, impenetrable… He himself, in turn, was behaving differently from before. But Pin seemed to know nothing of the changes that had taken place in himself. Fan, in spite of the fact that the friend so close to him before now seemed like a stranger, acted according to his own idea.

– I see your finger and I see the pins pinned into the mat, but I don’t see any butterfly here,’ he replied calmly.

– It is a butterfly! – Replied the amused Pin – And this is a butterfly, and this too … How can you not see them?

– So they are butterflies? – Asked Fan – If so, show me how these butterflies fly.

Fan Yan’s words puzzled Pin. Perplexed, he replied that his request made no sense, as these butterflies could not fly, and that… But Fan did not listen fully to his friend’s answer. He silently walked out of his house. As he looked at the departing boy, Pin was overwhelmed by a chill-piercing feeling of inner emptiness and loss.

Once again, the days of separation between the two friends had come to pass. But now Pin was not concerned with the butterflies, for he no longer enjoyed any of them – either the free ones or the ones caught. He wondered about his friend’s strange words. He did this constantly. Day and night, awake and dreaming, he was immersed in his meditations, as if his life depended on understanding the content of these words. For their friendship was more precious to each of them than their own lives.

Finally, one day, Pin understood what Fan wanted to convey to him, and in doing so he had the feeling as if he had woken up from a dream. He gently unhooked the butterflies he had caught from the mat and, having lit a small bonfire not far from his home, arranged them on the shoulders of the flames. Without hesitating, he went to the lake. Fan was waiting for him, but did not ask anything when Pin arrived. The boys looked into each other’s clear and sparkling eyes like a sky full of stars, laughed and, as before, without a word, ran to the meadow to admire the butterflies.