Judas Iscariot and others read. Leonid Andreev - Judas Iscariot III-IV (1907)

The purpose of the lesson: expand students’ knowledge about the work of L. N. Andreev, show the relevance of his work, improve text analysis skills.

Lesson equipment: portrait of L.N. Andreev, publications of his books.

Methodical techniques: teacher’s story, conversation, repetition of what has been covered, interdisciplinary connections (with history), commented reading, text analysis.

During the classes.

I. The teacher’s word about Leonid Andreev.

Leonid Nikolaevich Andreev (1871-1919) is one of those Russian writers who determined the mentality of society at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. it is enough to cite the opinion of I. A. Bunin, who was not generous with praise: “Still, this is the only modern writer to whom I am attracted, whose every new thing I read it right away.”

He began as a newspaper feuilletonist and court reporter, later began writing stories, became close to Gorky, with the writers of the Sreda literary circle, and participated in the publication of the Knowledge collections.

You are a little familiar with the work of Leonid Andreev. What works of his do you remember?

(Stories “Petka at the Dacha”, “Bargamot and Garaska”, “Kusaka”, etc.)

The writer himself explained the choice of the hero of the last story as follows: “In the story “Bite” the hero is a dog, for all living things have the same soul, all living things suffer the same sufferings and merge into one in greatness and equality before the formidable forces of life.” These words largely reflected the writer’s philosophical ideas.

Andreev wrote about loneliness (no matter a person, a dog or an abstract character), about the disunity of souls, and thought a lot about the meaning of life, about death, about faith, about God. He also wrote on topical, contemporary topics, but even in them the writer’s view was generalized and philosophical. This is the story “Red Laughter” (1904), dedicated to events Russian-Japanese war.

With extraordinary expressiveness, Andreev showed the madness of bloodshed, the madness, the inhumanity of war. The symbolic title of the story emphasizes its accusatory, anti-war pathos. A deep insight into the psychology of a doomed man in “The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men” on the topical topic of terrorism a hundred years ago. The author writes with sympathy about the revolutionary terrorists sentenced to death. This story is a response to real events

In the work of Leonid Andreev, the urgency of contemporary issues is combined with the desire for their deep interpretation, the desire to comprehend the “abyss” of the human soul, the contradictions of existence.

Andreev did not accept the October Revolution of 1917; he became an emigrant, remaining in the territory that went to Finland.

Let's remember our history. What events started the first Russian revolution of 1905–1907?

(The first Russian revolution began with Bloody Sunday, January 9, 1905, when, on the initiative of priest Gapon, St. Petersburg workers went to Winter Palace with a petition to Nicholas II, and this peaceful mass procession was shot by the tsarist troops. A year later, it turned out that Gapon had been exposed by the Socialist Revolutionaries as an agent of the secret police and hanged by them in Ozerki, a dacha suburb of St. Petersburg.)

Leonid Andreev conceived a work that would reflect these events. From Andreev’s letter to Serafimovich: “By the way, I’m thinking about eventually writing “Notes of a Spy,” something on the psychology of betrayal.” Over time, the plan acquired more general, philosophical features: the writer rethinks the gospel plot, poses the eternal questions of good and evil from an unusual angle.

Gradually, the conceived story grew into a novel; it was completed in February 1907.

III. Conversation on the story "Judas Iscariot".

Find a description of the appearance of Judas Iscariot. What is unusual about his portrait?
First, let us note the unusualness of the selected details of the portrait. Andreev describes the skull of Judas, the very shape of which inspires “mistrust and anxiety.” Secondly, let us pay attention to the duality in the appearance of Judas, emphasized several times by the writer. Duality is not only in the words “double”, “doubled”, but also in pairs of homogeneous members, synonyms: “strange and unusual”; “mistrust, even anxiety”, “silence and harmony”;
“bloody and merciless” - and antonyms: “cut... and put together again”, “living” - “deadly smooth”, “moving” - “frozen”, “neither night nor day”, “both light and darkness” . Such a portrait can be called psychological

: he conveys the essence of the hero - the duality of his personality, the duality of behavior, the duality of feelings, the exclusivity of his fate.)

Why did Judas spend his entire life searching for a meeting with Jesus?

(Judas is connected by blood with the poor and hungry people. Life left its deadening imprint on one half of both his soul and appearance. The other half thirsted for knowledge, truth. He knew the truth about the sinful, dark essence of people and wanted to find the power that could transform this essence .)

Whose side is Judas on: the side of the people or the side of Jesus?

(Judas is one of the people, he believes that Jesus will not be understood by those who do not even have their daily bread. By mocking the apostles, he commits a sin: he steals money, but steals to feed a hungry harlot. Jesus is forced to approve the act of Judas, dictated love for his neighbor. Jesus recognizes the victory of Judas over the apostles. Judas is able to influence the crowd, with the power of his humiliation he protects Christ from the rage of the crowd.

Judas becomes a mediator between Jesus and the people.)

What is the root of the conflict between Jesus and Judas?

(Jesus preaches mercy, forgiveness, long-suffering. Judas passionately desires to shake the foundations of a sinful world. He always lies, he is a deceiver and a thief. Jesus knows about Judas’ betrayal, but accepts his fate.)

How does Judas behave after the betrayal? Jesus Christ was warned many times that Judas of Kerioth was a man of very bad reputation and should be avoided. Some of the disciples who were in Judea knew him well themselves, others heard a lot about him from people, and there was no one who could tell about him kind word

“He constantly quarrels with us,” they said, spitting, “he thinks of something of his own and gets into the house quietly, like a scorpion, and comes out of it noisily. And thieves have friends, and robbers have comrades, and liars have wives to whom they tell the truth, and Judas laughs at thieves, as well as at honest ones, although he himself steals skillfully, and his appearance is uglier than all the inhabitants of Judea. No, he is not ours, this red-haired Judas from Kariot,” said the bad ones, surprising the good people, for whom there was not much difference between him and all the other vicious people of Judea.

They further said that Judas abandoned his wife a long time ago, and she lives unhappy and hungry, unsuccessfully trying to squeeze bread for food from the three stones that make up Judas’s estate. He himself has been wandering around senselessly among the people for many years and has even reached one sea and another sea, which is even further away, and everywhere he lies, makes faces, vigilantly looks out for something with his thief's eye, and suddenly leaves suddenly, leaving behind troubles and quarrel - curious, crafty and evil, like a one-eyed demon. He had no children, and this once again said that Judas was a bad person and God did not want offspring from Judas.

None of the disciples noticed when this red-haired and ugly Jew first appeared near Christ, but for a long time he had been relentlessly following their path, interfering in conversations, providing small services, bowing, smiling and ingratiating himself. And then it became completely familiar, deceiving tired vision, then suddenly it caught the eyes and ears, irritating them, like something unprecedentedly ugly, deceitful and disgusting. Then they drove him away with stern words, and for a short time he disappeared somewhere along the road - and then quietly appeared again, helpful, flattering and cunning, like a one-eyed demon. And there was no doubt for some of the disciples that in his desire to get closer to Jesus there was hidden some secret intention, there was an evil and insidious calculation.

But Jesus did not listen to their advice, their prophetic voice did not touch his ears. With that spirit of bright contradiction that irresistibly attracted him to the rejected and unloved, he decisively accepted Judas and included him in the circle of the chosen. The disciples were worried and grumbled restrainedly, but he sat quietly, facing the setting sun, and listened thoughtfully, maybe to them, or maybe to something else. There had been no wind for ten days, and the same transparent air, attentive and sensitive, remained the same, without moving or changing.

And it seemed as if he had preserved in his transparent depths everything that was shouted and sung these days by people, animals and birds - tears, crying and a cheerful song. prayer and curses, and these glassy, frozen voices made him so heavy, anxious, thickly saturated with invisible life. And once again the sun set. It rolled down heavily like a flaming ball, lighting up the sky, and everything on earth that was turned towards it: the dark face of Jesus, the walls of houses and the leaves of trees - everything obediently reflected that distant and terribly thoughtful light. The white wall was no longer white now, and the red city on the red mountain did not remain white.

And then Judas came.

Short red hair did not hide the strange and unusual shape of his skull: as if cut from the back of the head with a double blow of a sword and put back together again, it was clearly divided into four parts and inspired distrust, even anxiety: behind such a skull there cannot be silence and harmony, behind such a skull there is always the sound of bloody and merciless battles can be heard. Judas’s face was also double: one side of it, with a black, sharply looking eye, was alive, mobile, willingly gathering into numerous crooked wrinkles.

On the other there were no wrinkles, and it was deathly smooth, flat and frozen, and although it was equal in size to the first, it seemed huge from the wide open blind eye. Covered with a whitish turbidity, not closing either at night or during the day, he met both light and darkness equally, but whether because he had a living and cunning comrade next to him, one could not believe in his complete blindness. When, in a fit of timidity or excitement, Judas closed his living eye and shook his head, this one swayed along with the movements of his head and looked silently. Even people completely devoid of insight clearly understood, looking at Iscariot, that such a person could not bring good, but Jesus brought him closer and even sat Judas next to him.

John, his beloved student, moved away with disgust, and everyone else, loving their teacher, looked down disapprovingly. And Judas sat down - and, moving his head to the right and to the left, in a thin voice began to complain about illness, that his chest hurts at night, that, when climbing mountains, he suffocates, and standing at the edge of an abyss, he feels dizzy and can barely hold on from a stupid desire to throw himself down. And he shamelessly invented many other things, as if not understanding that illnesses do not come to a person by chance, but are born from the discrepancy between his actions and the precepts of the Eternal. This Judas from Kariot rubbed his chest with his wide palm and even coughed feignedly in the general silence and downcast gazes.

John, without looking at the teacher, quietly asked Peter Simonov, his friend:

“Aren’t you tired of this lie?” I can't stand her any longer and I'll leave here.

Peter looked at Jesus, met his gaze and quickly stood up.

- Wait! - he told his friend. He looked at Jesus again, quickly, like a stone torn from a mountain, moved towards Judas Iscariot and loudly said to him with broad and clear friendliness:

- Here you are with us, Judas.

He affectionately patted his hand on his bent back and, without looking at the teacher, but feeling his gaze on himself, decisively added in his loud voice, which crowded out all objections, like water crowds out air:

“It’s okay that you have such a nasty face: we also get caught in our nets who are not so ugly, and when it comes to food, they are the most delicious.” And it’s not for us, our Lord’s fishermen, to throw away our catch just because the fish is prickly and one-eyed. I once saw an octopus in Tyre, caught by the local fishermen, and I was so scared that I wanted to run away. And they laughed at me, a fisherman from Tiberias, and gave me some to eat, and I asked for more, because it was very tasty. Remember, teacher, I told you about this, and you laughed too. And you. Judas looks like an octopus - only with one half.

And he laughed loudly, pleased with his joke. When Peter said something, his words sounded so firmly, as if he was nailing them down. When Peter moved or did something, he made a far-audible noise and evoked a response from the most deaf things: the stone floor hummed under his feet, the doors trembled and slammed, and the very air shuddered and made noise timidly. In the gorges of the mountains, his voice awakened an angry echo, and in the mornings on the lake, when they were fishing, he rolled round and round on the sleepy and shining water and made the first timid rays of the sun smile. And they probably loved Peter for this: on all the other faces there was still night Shadow, and his large head, and wide naked chest, and freely thrown arms were already burning in the glow of the sunrise.

Peter's words, apparently approved by the teacher, dispelled the painful state of those gathered. But some, who had also been by the sea and seen the octopus, were confused by its monstrous image, which Peter so frivolously dedicated to his new student. They remembered: huge eyes, dozens of greedy tentacles, feigned calm - and time! – hugged, doused, crushed and sucked, without even blinking his huge eyes. What is this? But Jesus is silent, Jesus smiles and looks from under his brows with friendly mockery at Peter, who continues to talk passionately about the octopus - and one after another the embarrassed disciples approached Judas, spoke kindly, but walked away quickly and awkwardly.

And only John Zebedee remained stubbornly silent and Thomas, apparently, did not dare to say anything, pondering what had happened. He carefully examined Christ and Judas, who were sitting next to each other, and this strange proximity of divine beauty and monstrous ugliness, a man with a gentle gaze and an octopus with huge, motionless, dull, greedy eyes oppressed his mind like an unsolvable riddle. He tensely wrinkled his straight, smooth forehead, squinted his eyes, thinking that he would see better this way, but all he achieved was that Judas really seemed to have eight restlessly moving legs. But this was not true. Foma understood this and again looked stubbornly.

Peter went somewhere, Jesus sat thoughtfully, leaning his head on his hand, and quietly shaking his tanned leg, the disciples talked among themselves, and only Thomas carefully and seriously looked at him like a conscientious tailor taking measurements. Judas smiled - Thomas did not return the smile, but apparently took it into account, like everything else, and continued to look at it. But something unpleasant was disturbing the left side of Judas’s face; he looked back: John was looking at him from a dark corner with cold and beautiful eyes, handsome, pure, not having a single spot on his snow-white conscience. And, walking like everyone else, but feeling as if he was dragging along the ground, like a punished dog. Judas approached him and said:

- Why are you silent, John? Your words are like golden apples in transparent silver vessels, give one of them to Judas, who is so poor.

John looked intently into the motionless, wide-open eye and was silent. And he saw how Judas crawled away, hesitated hesitantly and disappeared into the dark depths of the open door.

Almost everyone was already asleep when Judas heard the quiet voice of the returning Christ. And everything became quiet in the house and around it. A rooster crowed, resentfully and loudly, as if during the day, a donkey, who had woken up somewhere, crowed and reluctantly fell silent intermittently. But Judas still did not sleep and listened, hiding. The moon illuminated half of his face and, as in a frozen lake, was reflected strangely in his huge open eye.

Suddenly he remembered something and hastily coughed, rubbing his hairy, healthy chest with his palm: perhaps someone was still awake and listening to what Judas was thinking.

Gradually they got used to Judas and stopped noticing his ugliness. Jesus entrusted him with the money box, and at the same time all household worries fell on him: he bought the necessary food and clothing, distributed alms, and during his wanderings he looked for a place to stop and spend the night. He did all this very skillfully, so that he soon earned the favor of some students who saw his efforts. Judas lied constantly, but they got used to it, because they did not see bad deeds behind the lie, and it gave special interest to Judas’ conversation and his stories and made life look like a funny and sometimes scary fairy tale.

According to Judas' stories, it seemed as if he knew all people, and every person he knew had committed some bad act or even a crime in his life. Good people, in his opinion, are those who know how to hide their deeds and thoughts, but if such a person is hugged, caressed and questioned well, then all untruths, abominations and lies will flow from him, like pus from a punctured wound. He readily admitted that sometimes he himself lies, but he assured with an oath that others lie even more, and if there is anyone in the world who is deceived, it is he. Judas.

It happened that some people deceived him many times in this way and that. Thus, a certain treasure keeper of a rich nobleman once confessed to him that for ten years he had been constantly wanting to steal the property entrusted to him, but he could not, because he was afraid of the nobleman and his conscience. And Judas believed him, but he suddenly stole and deceived Judas. But even here Judas believed him, and he suddenly returned the stolen goods to the nobleman and again deceived Judas.

And everyone deceives him, even animals: when he caresses the dog, she bites his fingers, and when he hits her with a stick, she licks his feet and looks into his eyes like a daughter. He killed this dog, buried it deep and even buried it with a large stone, but who knows? Perhaps because he killed her, she became even more alive and now does not lie in a hole, but runs happily with other dogs.

Everyone laughed merrily at Judas’ story, and he himself smiled pleasantly, narrowing his lively and mocking eye, and then, with the same smile, he admitted that he had lied a little: he did not kill that dog. But he will certainly find her and will certainly kill her, because he does not want to be deceived. And these words of Judas made them laugh even more.

But sometimes in his stories he crossed the boundaries of the probable and plausible and attributed to people such inclinations that even an animal does not have, accused them of crimes that never happened and never will happen. And since he named the names of the most respectable people, some were indignant at the slander, while others jokingly asked:

- Well, what about your father and mother? Judas, weren't they good people?

Judas narrowed his eyes, smiled and spread his arms. And along with the shaking of his head, his frozen, wide-open eye swayed and looked silently.

-Who was my father? Maybe the man who beat me with a rod, or maybe the devil, the goat, or the rooster. How can Judas know everyone with whom his mother shared a bed? Judas has many fathers, the one you are talking about?

But here everyone was indignant, since they greatly revered their parents, and Matthew, very well read in the Scriptures, sternly spoke in the words of Solomon:

“Whoever curses his father and mother, his lamp will go out in the midst of deep darkness.”

John Zebedee arrogantly said:

- Well, what about us? What bad things can you say about us, Judas of Kariot?

But he waved his hands in feigned fear, hunched over and whined, like a beggar vainly begging for alms from a passerby:

- Oh, they are tempting poor Judas! They are laughing at Judas, they want to deceive poor, gullible Judas!

And while one side of his face writhed in buffoonish grimaces, the other swayed seriously and sternly, and his never-closing eye looked wide. Peter Simonov laughed the loudest and loudest at Iscariot’s jokes. But one day it happened that he suddenly frowned, became silent and sad, and hastily took Judas aside, dragging him by the sleeve.

- And Jesus? What do you think about Jesus? – he leaned over and asked in a loud whisper. “Just don’t joke, I beg you.”

Judas looked at him angrily:

- And what do you think?

Peter whispered fearfully and joyfully:

“I think he is the son of the living god.”

- Why are you asking? What can Judas, whose father is a goat, tell you?

- But do you love him? It's like you don't love anyone, Judas.

With the same strange malice, Iscariot said abruptly and sharply:

After this conversation, Peter loudly called Judas his octopus friend for two days, and he clumsily and still angrily tried to slip away from him somewhere into a dark corner and sat there gloomily, his white, unclosed eye brightening.

Only Thomas listened to Judas quite seriously: he did not understand jokes, pretense and lies, playing with words and thoughts, and looked for the fundamental and positive in everything. And he often interrupted all Iscariot’s stories about bad people and actions with short businesslike remarks:

- This needs to be proven. Have you heard this yourself? Who else was there besides you? What's his name?

Judas became irritated and shrilly shouted that he had seen and heard it all himself, but stubborn Thomas continued to interrogate unobtrusively and calmly, until Judas admitted that he had lied, or invented a new plausible lie, which he thought about for a long time. And, having found a mistake, he immediately came and indifferently caught the liar. In general, Judas aroused strong curiosity in him, and this created something like a friendship between them, full of shouting, laughter and curses on the one hand, and calm, persistent questions on the other. At times Judas felt an unbearable disgust for his strange friend and, piercing him with a sharp gaze, said irritably, almost with a plea:

- But what do you want? I told you everything, everything.

“I want you to prove how a goat can be your father?” - Foma interrogated with indifferent persistence and waited for an answer.

It happened that after one of these questions, Judas suddenly fell silent and in surprise examined him from head to toe with his eye: he saw a long, straight figure, a gray face, straight transparent-light eyes, two thick folds running from his nose and disappearing into a tight, evenly trimmed hair. beard, and said convincingly:

- How stupid you are, Foma! What do you see in your dream: a tree, a wall, a donkey?

And Foma was somehow strangely embarrassed and did not object. And at night, when Judas was already covering his lively and restless eye for sleep, he suddenly said loudly from his bed - they were both now sleeping together on the roof:

-You're wrong, Judas. I have very bad dreams. What do you think: should a person also be responsible for his dreams?

- Does anyone else see dreams, and not himself? Foma sighed quietly and thought. And Judas smiled contemptuously, tightly closed his thief's eye and calmly surrendered to his rebellious dreams, monstrous dreams, insane visions that tore his lumpy skull to pieces.

When, during Jesus’ wanderings through Judea, travelers approached some village, Iscariot told bad things about its inhabitants and foreshadowed trouble. But it almost always happened that the people about whom he spoke ill greeted Christ and his friends with joy, surrounded them with attention and love and became believers, and Judas’s money box became so full that it was difficult to carry it. And then they laughed at his mistake, and he meekly threw up his hands and said:

- So! So! Judas thought that they were bad, but they were good: they believed quickly and gave money. Again, it means they deceived Judas, poor, gullible Judas from Kariot!

But one day, having already moved far from the village that greeted them cordially, Thomas and Judas argued heatedly and returned back to resolve the dispute. Only the next day they caught up with Jesus and his disciples, and Thomas looked embarrassed and sad, and Judas looked so proudly, as if he expected that now everyone would begin to congratulate and thank him. Approaching the teacher, Thomas decisively declared:

- Judas is right, Lord. These were evil and stupid people, and the seed of your words fell on the stone.

And he told what happened in the village. After Jesus and his disciples left, one old woman began to shout that her young white goat had been stolen from her, and accused those who had left of the theft. At first they argued with her, and when she stubbornly proved that there was no one else to steal like Jesus, many believed and even wanted to go in pursuit. And although they soon found the kid entangled in the bushes, they still decided that Jesus was a deceiver and, perhaps, even a thief.

- So that’s how it is! - Peter cried, flaring his nostrils. - Lord, if you want, I will return to these fools, and...

But Jesus, who had been silent all the time, looked at him sternly, and Peter fell silent and disappeared behind him, behind the backs of the others. And no one spoke about what had happened anymore, as if nothing had happened at all and as if Judas had been wrong. In vain he showed himself from all sides, trying to make his bifurcated, predatory face with a hooked nose appear modest; no one looked at him, and if anyone did, it was very unfriendly, even with contempt.

And from that same day, Jesus’ attitude towards him changed somehow strangely. And before, for some reason, it was the case that Judas never spoke directly to Jesus, and he never directly addressed him, but he often looked at him with gentle eyes, smiled at some of his jokes, and if he did not see him for a long time, he asked: where is Judas? And now he looked at him, as if not seeing him, although as before, and even more persistently than before, he looked for him with his eyes every time he began to speak to his disciples or to the people, but either he sat with his back to him and threw words over his head. his own towards Judas, or pretended not to notice him at all. And no matter what he said, even if it was one thing today and something completely different tomorrow, even if it was the same thing that Judas was thinking, it seemed, however, that he was always speaking against Judas. And for everyone he was gentle and beautiful flower, fragrant with the rose of Lebanon, and for Judas he left only sharp thorns - as if Judas had no heart, as if he had no eyes and nose, and no better than everyone else, he understood the beauty of tender and immaculate petals.

- Foma! Do you love the yellow Lebanese rose, which has a dark face and eyes like a chamois? – he asked his friend one day, and he answered indifferently:

- Rose? Yes, I like its smell. But I have never heard of roses having dark faces and eyes like chamois.

- How? You also don’t know that the multi-armed cactus that tore yours yesterday new clothes, just one red flower and just one eye?

But Foma didn’t know this either, although yesterday the cactus really grabbed his clothes and tore them into pitiful shreds. He knew nothing, this Thomas, although he asked about everything, and looked so straight with his transparent and clear eyes, through which, as through Phoenician glass, one could see the wall behind him and the dejected donkey tied to it.

Some time later, another incident occurred in which Judas again turned out to be right. In one Jewish village, which he did not praise so much that he even advised to bypass it, Christ was received very hostilely, and after preaching him and denouncing the hypocrites, they became furious and wanted to stone him and his disciples. There were many enemies, and, undoubtedly, they would have been able to carry out their destructive intentions if not for Judas of Karioth. Seized with insane fear for Jesus, as if already seeing drops of blood on his white shirt.

Judas fiercely and blindly rushed at the crowd, threatened, shouted, begged and lied, and thus gave time and opportunity for Jesus and the disciples to leave. Amazingly agile, as if he was running on ten legs, funny and scary in his rage and pleas, he rushed madly in front of the crowd and charmed them with some strange power. He shouted that he was not at all possessed by the demon of Nazareth, that he was just a deceiver, a thief who loved money, like all his disciples, like Judas himself - he shook the money box, grimaced and begged, crouching to the ground. And gradually the anger of the crowd turned into laughter and disgust, and the hands raised with stones dropped.

“These people are unworthy to die at the hands of an honest man,” said some, while others thoughtfully watched Judas quickly retreat with their eyes.

And again Judas expected congratulations, praise and gratitude, and showed off his tattered clothes, and lied that they beat him - but this time he was incomprehensibly deceived. The angry Jesus walked with long steps and was silent, and even John and Peter did not dare to approach him, and everyone who caught the eye of Judas in tattered clothes, with his happily excited, but still a little frightened face, drove him away from them with short and with angry exclamations. As if he didn’t save them all, as if he didn’t save their teacher, whom they love so much.

- Do you want to see fools? - he said to Foma, who was walking thoughtfully behind. - Look: here they are walking along the road, in a group, like a herd of sheep, and raising dust. And you, smart Thomas, trail behind, and I, noble, beautiful Judas, trail behind, like a dirty slave who has no place next to his master.

- Why do you call yourself beautiful? – Foma was surprised.

“Because I am beautiful,” Judas answered with conviction and told, adding a lot, how he deceived the enemies of Jesus and laughed at them and their stupid stones.

- But you lied! - said Thomas.

“Well, yes, I lied,” Iscariot agreed calmly. “I gave them what they asked for, and they returned what I needed.” And what is a lie, my smart Thomas? Wouldn't the death of Jesus be a greater lie?

-You did wrong. Now I believe that your father is the devil. It was he who taught you, Judas.

Iscariot’s face turned white and suddenly somehow quickly moved towards Thomas - as if a white cloud had found and blocked the road and Jesus. With a soft movement, Judas just as quickly pressed him to himself, pressed him tightly, paralyzing his movements, and whispered in his ear:

- So the devil taught me? Yes, yes, Thomas. Did I save Jesus? So the devil loves Jesus, so the devil really needs Jesus? Yes, yes, Thomas. But my father is not the devil, but a goat. Maybe the goat needs Jesus too? Heh? You don't need it, do you? Is it really not necessary?

Angry and slightly frightened, Thomas with difficulty escaped from Judas’ sticky embrace and quickly walked forward, but soon slowed down, trying to understand what had happened.

And Judas quietly trudged behind and gradually fell behind. In the distance, the people walking mixed up in a motley bunch, and it was impossible to see which of these small figures was Jesus. So little Foma turned into a gray dot - and suddenly everyone disappeared around the bend. Looking around, Judas left the road and descended with huge leaps into the depths of the rocky ravine. His fast and impetuous running caused his dress to swell and his arms to fly upward, as if to fly. Here on the cliff he slipped and quickly rolled down like a gray lump, scraping against the stones, jumped up and angrily shook his fist at the mountain:

– You’re still damned!..

And, suddenly replacing the speed of his movements with gloomy and concentrated slowness, he chose a place near a large stone and sat down leisurely. He turned around, as if looking for a comfortable position, put his hands, palm to palm, on the gray stone and leaned his head heavily against them. And so he sat for an hour or two, not moving and deceiving the birds, motionless and gray, like the gray stone itself.

And in front of him, and behind him, and on all sides, the walls of the ravine rose, cutting off the edges of the blue sky with a sharp line, and everywhere, digging into the ground, huge gray stones rose - as if a stone rain had once passed here and its heavy drops froze in endless thought. . And this wild desert ravine looked like an overturned, severed skull, and every stone in it was like a frozen thought, and there were many of them, and they all thought - hard, boundless, stubbornly.

Here the deceived scorpion hobbled amicably near Judas on his shaky legs. Judas looked at him, without taking his head away from the stone, and again his eyes fixed motionless on something, both motionless, both covered with a strange whitish haze, both as if blind and terribly sighted. Now, from the ground, from the stones, from the crevices, the calm darkness of the night began to rise, enveloped the motionless Judas and quickly crawled upward - to the bright, pale sky. Night came with its thoughts and dreams.

That night Judas did not return to spend the night, and the disciples, torn from their thoughts by worries about food and drink, grumbled at his negligence.

One day, around noon, Jesus and his disciples were passing along a rocky and mountainous road, devoid of shade, and since they had already been on the road for more than five hours, Jesus began to complain of fatigue. The disciples stopped, and Peter and his friend John spread the cloaks of theirs and the other disciples on the ground, and strengthened them on top between two high stones, and thus made it like a tent for Jesus. And he lay down in the tent, resting from the heat of the sun, while they entertained him with cheerful speeches and jokes.

But, seeing that speeches tired him, being themselves little sensitive to fatigue and heat, they retired to some distance and indulged in various activities. Some along the mountainside looked for edible roots between the stones and, having found them, brought them to Jesus; some, climbing higher and higher, thoughtfully searched for the boundaries of the blue distance and, not finding them, climbed to new pointed stones. John found a beautiful, blue lizard between the stones and in his tender palms, quietly laughing, he brought it to Jesus, and the lizard looked with its convex, mysterious eyes into his eyes, and then quickly slid her cold body over his warm hand and quickly took her tender, trembling tail somewhere.

Peter, who did not like quiet pleasures, and Philip with him began to tear off large stones from the mountain and let them down, competing in strength. And, attracted by their loud laughter, the rest gradually gathered around them and took part in the game. Straining, they tore an old, overgrown stone from the ground, lifted it high with both hands and sent it down the slope. Heavy, he struck briefly and bluntly and thought for a moment, then hesitantly made the first leap - and with each touch to the ground, taking from it speed and strength, he became light, ferocious, all-crushing. He no longer jumped, but flew with bared teeth, and the air, whistling, passed his blunt, round carcass. Here is the edge - with a smooth last movement the stone soared upward and calmly, in heavy thoughtfulness, flew roundly down to the bottom of an invisible abyss.

- Come on, one more! - Peter shouted. His white teeth sparkled among his black beard and mustache, his powerful chest and arms were exposed, and the old angry stones, stupidly amazed at the strength that lifted them, one after another obediently were carried away into the abyss. Even fragile John threw small stones and, smiling quietly, Jesus looked at their fun.

- What are you doing? Judas? Why don't you take part in the game - it seems to be so much fun?

- Foma asked, finding his strange friend motionless, behind a large gray stone.

“My chest hurts, and they didn’t call me.”

- Is it really necessary to call? Well, so I’m calling you, go. Look at the stones Peter throws.

Judas glanced sideways at him, and here Thomas for the first time vaguely felt that Judas from Kariot had two faces. But before he had time to understand this, Judas said in his usual tone, flattering and at the same time mocking:

- Is there anyone stronger than Peter? When he screams, all the donkeys in Jerusalem think that their Messiah has come, and they also start screaming. Have you ever heard them scream, Thomas?

And, smiling welcomingly and bashfully wrapping his clothes around his chest, overgrown with curly red hair. Judas entered the circle of players. And since everyone was having a lot of fun, they greeted him with joy and loud jokes, and even John smiled condescendingly when Judas, groaning and feigning groans, took hold of a huge stone. But then he easily picked it up and threw it, and his blind, wide-open eye, swaying, motionless stared at Peter, and the other, sly and cheerful, filled with quiet laughter.

- No, just give it up! - Peter said offended. And so, one after another, they lifted and threw giant stones, and the disciples looked at them in surprise. Peter threw a large stone, and Judas threw an even larger one. Peter, gloomy and concentrated, angrily tossed a piece of rock, staggered, lifted it and dropped it down - Judas, continuing to smile, looked for an even larger piece with his eye, tenderly dug into it with his long fingers, licked it, swayed with it and, turning pale, sent him into the abyss. Having thrown his stone, Peter leaned back and watched it fall, but Judas leaned forward, arched and extended his long moving arms, as if he himself wanted to fly away after the stone. Finally, both of them, first Peter, then Judas, grabbed an old, gray stone - and neither one nor the other could lift it. All red, Peter decisively approached Jesus and said loudly:

- God! I don't want Judas to be stronger than me. Help me pick up that stone and throw it.

And Jesus quietly answered him something. Peter shrugged his broad shoulders displeasedly, but did not dare to object and returned back with the words:

– He said: who will help Iscariot? But then he looked at Judas, who, panting and clenching his teeth tightly, continued to hug the stubborn stone, and laughed cheerfully:

- So sick! Look what our sick, poor Judas is doing!

And Judas himself laughed, so unexpectedly caught in his lie, and everyone else laughed—even Thomas slightly parted his straight gray mustache hanging over his lips with a smile. And so, chatting and laughing in a friendly manner, everyone set off, and Peter, completely reconciled with the winner, from time to time nudged him in the side with his fist and laughed loudly:

- So sick!

Everyone praised Judas, everyone recognized that he was a winner, everyone chatted with him friendly, but Jesus - but Jesus did not want to praise Judas this time either. Silently he walked ahead, biting a plucked blade of grass, and little by little, one by one, the disciples stopped laughing and went over to Jesus. And soon it turned out again that they were all walking in a tight group in front, and Judas - Judas the victor - Judas the strong - alone trudged behind, swallowing dust.

So they stopped, and Jesus put his hand on Peter’s shoulder, with the other hand pointing into the distance, where Jerusalem had already appeared in the haze. And Peter’s broad, powerful back carefully accepted this thin, tanned hand.

They stopped for the night in Bethany, in the house of Lazarus. And when everyone gathered for a conversation. Judas thought that now they would remember his victory over Peter, and sat down closer. But the students were silent and unusually thoughtful. Images of the path traveled: the sun, and stone, and grass, and Christ reclining in a tent, quietly floated in my head, evoking soft thoughtfulness, giving rise to vague but sweet dreams of some kind of eternal movement under the sun. The tired body rested sweetly, and it was all thinking about something mysteriously beautiful and big - and no one remembered Judas.

Judas left. Then he returned. Jesus spoke, and the disciples listened to his speech in silence. Maria sat motionless, like a statue, at his feet and, throwing back her head, looked into his face. John, moving close, tried to make sure that his hand touched the teacher’s clothes, but did not bother him. He touched it and froze. And Peter breathed loudly and strongly, echoing the words of Jesus with his breath.

Iscariot stopped at the threshold and, contemptuously passing by the gaze of those gathered, concentrated all his fire on Jesus. And as he looked, everything around him faded, became covered in darkness and silence, and only Jesus brightened with his raised hand. But then he seemed to rise into the air, as if he had melted and became as if he all consisted of a fog above the lake, penetrated by the light of the setting moon, and his soft speech sounded somewhere far, far away and tender.

And, peering into the wavering ghost, listening to the gentle melody of distant and ghostly words. Judas took his entire soul into his iron fingers and, in its immense darkness, silently began to build something huge. Slowly, in deep darkness, he raised some huge things, like mountains, and smoothly placed one on top of the other, and raised them again, and laid them again, and something grew in the darkness, expanded silently, pushed the boundaries. Here he felt his head like a dome, and in the impenetrable darkness a huge thing continued to grow, and someone was silently working: raising huge masses like mountains, putting one on top of the other and lifting again... And somewhere distant and ghostly words sounded tenderly.
So he stood, blocking the door, huge and black, and Jesus spoke, and Peter’s intermittent and strong breathing loudly echoed his words. But suddenly Jesus fell silent - with a sharp, unfinished sound, and Peter, as if waking up, exclaimed enthusiastically:

- God! You know the verbs of eternal life!

But Jesus was silent and looked intently somewhere. And when they followed his gaze, they saw a petrified Judas at the door with his mouth open and eyes fixed. And, not understanding what was the matter, they laughed. Matthew, well-read in the Scriptures, touched Judas’s shoulder and said in the words of Solomon:

- He who looks meekly will be pardoned, and he who meets at the gate will embarrass others.

Judas shuddered and even screamed slightly in fright, and everything about him—his eyes, arms and legs—seemed to run in different directions, like an animal that suddenly saw the eyes of a man above him. Jesus walked straight to Judas and carried some word on his lips - and walked past Judas through the open and now free door.

Already in the middle of the night, worried Thomas approached Judas’s bed, squatted down and asked:
- You are crying. Judas?
- No. Step aside, Thomas.

- Why are you moaning and grinding your teeth? Are you unwell?

Judas paused, and from his lips, one after another, heavy words filled with melancholy and anger began to fall.

– Why doesn’t he love me? Why does he love those? Am I not more beautiful, better, stronger than them? Wasn't it I who saved his life while they were running, crouching like cowardly dogs?

- My poor friend, you are not entirely right. You are not at all handsome, and your tongue is as unpleasant as your face. You lie and slander constantly, how do you want Jesus to love you?

But Judas certainly didn’t hear him and continued, moving heavily in the darkness:

- Why is he not with Judas, but with those who don’t love him? John brought him a lizard - I would have brought him a poisonous snake. Peter threw stones - I would move a mountain for him! But what is a poisonous snake? Now her tooth has been pulled out, and she is wearing a necklace around her neck. But what is a mountain that can be torn down with your hands and trampled underfoot? I would give him Judas, brave, beautiful Judas! And now he will perish, and Judas will perish with him.

-You're saying something strange. Judas!

- A dry fig tree that needs to be chopped with an ax - after all, it’s me, he said it about me. Why doesn't he chop? he doesn't dare, Thomas. I know him: he is afraid of Judas! He is hiding from the brave, strong, beautiful Judas! He loves stupid people, traitors, liars. You are a liar, Thomas, have you heard about this?

Thomas was very surprised and wanted to object, but he thought that Judas was simply scolding, and only shook his head in the darkness. And Judas became even more melancholy; he groaned, gnashed his teeth, and one could hear how restlessly his whole large body moved under the veil.

– Why does Judas hurt so much? Who put the fire on his body? He gives his son to the dogs! He gives his daughter to robbers to be mocked, his bride to be desecrated. But doesn't Judas have a tender heart? Go away, Thomas, go away, stupid. Let the strong, brave, beautiful Judas remain alone!

Judas hid several denarii, and this was revealed thanks to Thomas, who accidentally saw how much money was given. One could assume that this was not the first time Judas had committed a theft, and everyone was indignant. The angry Peter grabbed Judas by the collar of his dress and almost dragged him to Jesus, and the frightened, pale Judas did not resist.

- Teacher, look! Here he is - a joker! Here he is - a thief! You trusted him, and he steals our money. Thief! Scoundrel! If you allow me, I myself...

But Jesus was silent. And, looking at him carefully, Peter quickly blushed and unclenched the hand that was holding the collar. Judas bashfully recovered, glanced sideways at Peter and assumed the submissively depressed look of a repentant criminal.

- So that’s how it is! – Peter said angrily and loudly slammed the door, leaving. And everyone was dissatisfied and said that they would never stay with Judas now - but John quickly realized something and slipped through the door, behind which the quiet and seemingly gentle voice of Jesus could be heard. And when, after a while, he came out of there, he was pale, and his downcast eyes were red, as if from recent tears.

- The teacher said... The teacher said that Judas can take as much money as he wants.

Peter laughed angrily. John quickly, reproachfully looked at him and, suddenly burning all over, mixing tears with anger, delight with tears, he loudly exclaimed:

“And no one should count how much money Judas received.” He is our brother, and all his money is like ours, and if he needs a lot, let him take a lot without telling anyone or consulting anyone. Judas is our brother, and you have seriously offended him - that’s what the teacher said... Shame on us, brothers!

A pale, wryly smiling Judas stood in the doorway, and with a slight movement John approached and kissed him three times. Jacob, Philip and others came up behind him, looking at each other, embarrassed - after each kiss, Judas wiped his mouth, but smacked loudly, as if this sound gave him pleasure. Peter was the last to arrive.

“We’re all stupid here, we’re all blind.” Judas. One he sees, one he is smart. Can I kiss you?

- From what? Kiss! – Judas agreed.

Peter kissed him deeply and said loudly in his ear:

- And I almost strangled you! At least they do, but I’m right by the throat! Didn't it hurt you?
- A little.

“I’ll go to him and tell him everything.” “After all, I was angry with him too,” Peter said gloomily, trying to open the door quietly, without noise.

- What about you, Foma? – John sternly asked, observing the actions and words of the disciples.

- I do not know yet. I need to think. And Foma thought for a long time, almost all day. The disciples went about their business, and somewhere behind the wall Peter was shouting loudly and cheerfully, and he was figuring everything out. He would have done it faster, but he was somewhat hindered by Judas, who was constantly watching him with a mocking gaze and occasionally seriously asking:

- How are you, Foma? How's it going?

Then Judas brought out his cash drawer and loudly, jingling coins and pretending not to look at Thomas, began to count the money.

- Twenty-one, twenty-two, twenty-three... Look, Thomas, a counterfeit coin again. Oh, what swindlers all these people are, they even donate counterfeit money... Twenty-four... And then they will say again that Judas stole...
Twenty five, twenty six...

Foma decisively approached him - it was already evening - and said:

- He's right, Judas. Let me kiss you.

- Is that so? Twenty nine, thirty. In vain. I'll steal again. Thirty one…

“How can you steal when you have neither your own nor someone else’s.” You'll just take as much as you need, brother.

– And it took you so long to repeat only his words? You don’t value time, smart Thomas.

“You seem to be laughing at me, brother?”

“And think, are you doing well, virtuous Thomas, repeating his words?” After all, it was he who said “his,” and not you. It was he who kissed me - you only desecrated my mouth. I still feel your wet lips crawling over me. This is so disgusting, good Thomas. Thirty-eight, thirty-nine, forty. Forty denarii, Thomas, would you like to check?

- After all, he is our teacher. How can we not repeat the words of the teacher?

“Did Judas’ gate fall off?” Is he naked now and there is nothing to grab him by? When the teacher leaves home, Judas again accidentally steals three denarii, and won’t you grab him by the same collar?

- We know now. Judas. We get it.

– Don’t all students have bad memory? And weren't all teachers deceived by their students? When the teacher raises the rod, the students shout: we know, teacher! And the teacher went to bed, and the students said: isn’t this what the teacher taught us? And here. This morning you called me: thief. Tonight you call me: brother. What will you call me tomorrow?

Judas laughed and, easily lifting the heavy, clinking box with his hand, continued:

– When a strong wind blows, it raises rubbish. And stupid people look at the rubbish and say: that's the wind! And this is just rubbish, my good Thomas, donkey droppings trampled underfoot. So he met a wall and quietly lay down at its foot. and the wind flies on, the wind flies on, my good Thomas!

Judas pointed a warning hand over the wall and laughed again.

“I’m glad that you’re having fun,” said Thomas. “But it’s a pity that there’s so much evil in your gaiety.”

- How can a person who has been kissed so much and who is so useful not be cheerful? If I had not stolen three denarii, would John have known what rapture was? And isn’t it nice to be a hook on which John hangs his damp virtue, Thomas his moth-eaten mind?

“I think it’s better for me to leave.”

- But I’m joking. I'm joking, my good Thomas, - I just wanted to know if you really want to kiss old, nasty Judas, the thief who stole three denarii and gave them to a harlot.

- To the harlot? – Foma was surprised. “Did you tell the teacher about this?”

– Here you are doubting again, Foma. Yes, a harlot. But if you knew, Thomas, what kind of unfortunate woman she was. She hasn't eaten anything for two days...

– You probably know this? - Foma was embarrassed.

- Yes, sure. After all, I myself was with her for two days and saw that she was not eating anything and drinking only red wine. She staggered from exhaustion, and I fell with her...

Thomas quickly stood up and, having already walked a few steps away, said to Judas:

“Apparently, Satan has possessed you.” Judas. And as he was leaving, he heard in the approaching twilight how the heavy cash box jingled pitifully in Judas’s hands. And it was as if Judas was laughing.

But the very next day Thomas had to admit that he was mistaken in Judas - Iscariot was so simple, gentle and at the same time serious. He did not grimace, did not make malicious jokes, did not bow or insult, but quietly and imperceptibly did his business. He was as agile as before—not exactly two legs, like all people, but a whole dozen of them, but he ran silently, without squeaks, screams and laughter, similar to the laughter of a hyena, with which he used to accompany all his actions. And when Jesus began to speak, he quietly sat down in the corner, folded his arms and legs and looked so well with his big eyes that many paid attention to it. And he stopped saying bad things about people, and was more silent, so that the strict Matthew himself considered it possible to praise him, saying in the words of Solomon:

- A weak-minded person expresses contempt for his neighbor, but man of sense is silent.

And he raised his finger, thereby hinting at Judas’s previous slander. Soon everyone noticed this change in Judas and rejoiced at it, and only Jesus still looked at him aloofly, although he did not directly express his dislike in any way. And John himself, to whom Judas now showed deep respect as the beloved disciple of Jesus and his intercessor in the case of the three denarii, began to treat him somewhat softer and even sometimes entered into conversation.

- How do you think. Judas,” he once said condescendingly, “which of us, Peter or I, will be first near Christ in his heavenly kingdom?

Judas thought and answered:

- I assume you are.

“And Peter thinks that he is,” John grinned.

- No. Peter will scatter all the angels with his cry - do you hear how he screams? Of course, he will argue with you and try to be the first to take the place, since he assures that he also loves Jesus, but he is already a little old, and you are young, he is heavy on his feet, and you run fast, and you will be the first to enter there with Christ. Is not it?

“Yes, I will not leave Jesus,” John agreed. And on the same day and with the same question, Peter Simonov turned to Judas. But, fearing that his loud voice would be heard by others, he took Judas to the farthest corner, behind the house.

- So what do you think? – he asked anxiously. “You are smart, the teacher himself praises you for your intelligence, and you will tell the truth.”
“Of course you are,” Iscariot answered without hesitation, and Peter exclaimed indignantly:

- I told him!

- But, of course, even there he will try to take first place from you.

- Certainly!

- But what can he do when the place is already occupied by you? Surely you will be the first to go there with Jesus? Won't you leave him alone? Didn't he call you a stone?

Peter put his hand on Judas's shoulder and said passionately:

- I'm telling you. Judas, you are the smartest of us. Why are you so mocking and angry? The teacher doesn't like this. Otherwise, you too could become a beloved disciple, no worse than John. But only to you,” Peter raised his hand threateningly, “I will not give up my place next to Jesus, neither on earth nor there!” Do you hear?

Judas tried so hard to please everyone, but at the same time he was also thinking something of his own. And, remaining the same modest, reserved and inconspicuous, he was able to tell everyone what he especially liked. So, he said to Thomas:
“A fool believes every word, but a prudent man is attentive to his ways.” Matthew, who suffered from some excess in food and drink and was ashamed of it, cited the words of the wise and revered Solomon:

– The righteous eats until he is full, but the belly of the wicked suffers deprivation.

But he rarely said anything pleasant, thereby giving it special value, but rather remained silent, listened carefully to everything that was said, and thought about something. Thoughtful Judas, however, looked unpleasant, funny and at the same time fear-inspiring.

While his lively and cunning eye moved, Judas seemed simple and kind, but when both eyes stopped motionless and the skin on his convex forehead gathered into strange lumps and folds, a painful guess appeared about some very special thoughts, tossing and turning under this skull. Completely alien, completely special, having no language at all, they surrounded the pondering Iscariot with a dull silence of mystery, and I wanted him to quickly begin to speak, move, even lie. For the lie itself, spoken in human language, seemed like truth and light in front of this hopelessly deaf and unresponsive silence.

- I started thinking again. Judas? - Peter shouted, with his clear voice and face suddenly breaking the dull silence of Judas’s thoughts, driving them somewhere into a dark corner. “What are you thinking about?”

“About many things,” Iscariot answered with a calm smile. And, having probably noticed how badly his silence affected others, he began to move away from his students more often and spent a lot of time in solitary walks, or climbed onto a flat roof and sat there quietly. And already several times Thomas was slightly frightened, unexpectedly stumbling upon some gray pile in the darkness, from which Judas’ arms and legs suddenly protruded and his playful voice was heard.
Only once did Judas somehow particularly sharply and strangely remind him of the former Judas, and this happened precisely during a dispute about primacy in the kingdom of heaven. In the presence of the teacher, Peter and John argued with each other, hotly challenging their place near Jesus: they listed their merits, measured the degree of their love for Jesus, got excited, shouted, even cursed uncontrollably, Peter - all red with anger, rumbling, John - pale and quiet, with trembling hands and biting speech. Their argument was already becoming obscene and the teacher began to frown when Peter casually looked at Judas and laughed smugly, John looked at Judas and also smiled - each of them remembered what the smart Iscariot told him. And, already anticipating the joy of the imminent triumph, they silently and in agreement called Judas to be a judge, and Peter shouted:

- Come on, smart Judas! Tell us, who will be first near Jesus - him or me?

But Judas was silent, breathing heavily and with his eyes he eagerly asked the calm, deep eyes of Jesus about something.

“Yes,” confirmed John condescendingly, “tell him who will be first near Jesus.”

Without taking your eyes off Christ. Judas slowly stood up and answered quietly and importantly:

Jesus slowly lowered his gaze. And, quietly beating himself in the chest with a bony finger, Iscariot repeated solemnly and sternly:

- I! I will be near Jesus!

And he left. Struck by the daring act, the disciples were silent, and only Peter, suddenly remembering something, whispered to Thomas in an unexpectedly quiet voice:

– So that’s what he’s thinking about!.. Have you heard?

It was at this time that Judas Iscariot took the first, decisive step towards betrayal: he secretly visited the high priest Anna. He was met very harshly, but was not embarrassed by this and demanded a long conversation face to face. And, left alone with the dry and stern old man, who looked at him contemptuously from under drooping, heavy eyelids, he said that he. Judas, a pious man, became a disciple of Jesus of Nazareth with the sole purpose of convicting the deceiver and delivering him into the hands of the law.

-Who is he, this Nazarene? – Anna asked dismissively, pretending that she was hearing the name of Jesus for the first time.

Judas also pretended to believe the strange ignorance of the high priest, and spoke in detail about Jesus' preaching and miracles, his hatred of the Pharisees and the temple, his constant violations of the law and, finally, his desire to wrest power from the hands of the churchmen and create his own special kingdom. And he mixed truth and lies so skillfully that Anna looked at him carefully and lazily said:

– Are there not enough deceivers and madmen in Judea?

- No he a dangerous person“,” Judas objected hotly, “he is breaking the law.” And it is better for one person to die than for the whole people. Anna nodded his head approvingly.

– But he seems to have many students?

- Yes many.

“And they probably love him very much?”

- Yes, they say they love you. They love them very much, more than themselves.

“But if we want to take it, won’t they intercede?” Will they start a rebellion?

Judas laughed long and evilly:

- They? These cowardly dogs that run as soon as a person bends over a stone. They!

-Are they that bad? – Anna asked coldly.

– Do the bad ones run away from the good ones, and not the good ones from the bad ones? Heh! They are good, and therefore they will run. They are good and that is why they will hide. They are good, and therefore they will appear only when Jesus must be laid in the tomb. And they will put it down themselves, and you will just execute it!

- But they love him, don’t they? You said it yourself.

“They always love their teacher, but more dead than alive.” When the teacher is alive, he can ask them for a lesson, and then they will feel bad. And when a teacher dies, they themselves become teachers, and bad things happen to others! Heh!

Anna looked shrewdly at the traitor, and his dry lips wrinkled - this meant that Anna was smiling.

-Are you offended by them? I see it.

“Can anything hide from your insight, wise Anna?” You have penetrated into the very heart of Judas. Yes. They offended poor Judas. They said that he stole three denarii from them, as if Judas were not the most fair man in Israel!

And they talked for a long time about Jesus, about his disciples, about his disastrous influence on the Israeli people, but this time the cautious and cunning Anna did not give a decisive answer. He had been following Jesus for a long time and, at secret conferences with his relatives and friends, leaders and Sadducees, he had long decided the fate of the prophet from Galilee. But he did not trust Judas, whom he had heard before as a bad and deceitful person, and did not trust his frivolous hopes for the cowardice of his disciples and people.

Anna believed in his own strength, but was afraid of bloodshed, afraid of the formidable revolt, which the rebellious and angry people of Jerusalem so easily led to, and, finally, afraid of the harsh intervention of the authorities from Rome. Inflated by resistance, fertilized by the red blood of the people, giving life to everything it falls on, heresy will grow even stronger and in its flexible rings will strangle Anna, and the authorities, and all his friends. And when Iscariot knocked on his door for the second time, Anna was troubled in spirit and did not accept him. But for the third and fourth time Iscariot came to him, persistent, like the wind, who knocks on a locked door day and night and breathes into its wells.

“I see that wise Anna is afraid of something,” said Judas, who was finally admitted to the high priest.

“I’m strong enough not to be afraid of anything,” Anna answered arrogantly, and Iscariot bowed slavishly, stretching out his hands. “What do you want?”

- I want to betray Nazarene to you.

- We don't need him.

Judas bowed and waited, obediently fixing his eyes on the high priest.

- Go.

- But I must come again. Isn’t that right, dear Anna?

- They won’t let you in. Go.

But once again, and once again, Judas from Kariot knocked and was admitted to the elderly Anna. Dry and angry, dejected by thoughts, he silently looked at the traitor and seemed to count the hairs on his lumpy head. But Judas was also silent - as if he himself was counting the hairs in the high priest’s sparse gray beard.

- Well? Are you here again? – irritated Anna threw arrogantly, as if he spat on his head.

- I want to betray Nazarene to you.

Both fell silent, continuing to look at each other with attention. But Iscariot looked calmly, and Anna had already begun to tingle with quiet anger, dry and cold, like the early morning frost in winter.

- How much do you want for your Jesus?

- How much will you give?

Anna said insultingly with pleasure:

“You’re all a bunch of crooks.” Thirty pieces of silver is how much we will give.

And he quietly rejoiced, seeing how Judas fluttered, moved, and ran around - agile and fast, as if he had not two legs, but a whole dozen of them.

- For Jesus? Thirty Silvers? - he shouted in a voice of wild amazement, which delighted Anna. “For Jesus of Nazareth!” And you want to buy Jesus for thirty pieces of silver? And do you think that they can sell Jesus to you for thirty pieces of silver?

Judas quickly turned to the wall and laughed in her flat white face, raising Long hands:

– Do you hear? Thirty Silvers! For Jesus!

With the same quiet joy, Anna indifferently remarked:

- If you don’t want to, then go. We will find someone who will sell it cheaper.

And, like merchants of old clothes, who in a dirty square throw worthless rags from hand to hand, shouting, swearing and scolding, they entered into a hot and furious bargaining. Reveling in a strange delight, running, spinning, shouting, Judas calculated on his fingers the merits of the one he was selling.

- And the fact that he is kind and heals the sick is not worth anything, in your opinion? A? No, tell me like an honest person!

“If you…” the pink-faced Anna tried to interject, whose cold anger quickly warmed up at Judas’s heated words, but he shamelessly interrupted him:

- And the fact that he is handsome and young - like the daffodil of Sharon, like the lily of the valleys? A? Is it worth nothing? Perhaps you will say that he is old and worthless, that Judas is selling you an old rooster? A?

“If you…” Anna tried to shout, but his senile voice, like fluff in the wind, was carried away by the desperately stormy speech of Judas.

- Thirty Silvers! After all, one obol is not worth a drop of blood! Half an obol does not go beyond a tear! A quarter of an obol for a moan! And the screams! And the cramps! And for his heart to stop? What about closing his eyes? Is it for free? - Iscariot screamed, advancing on the high priest, dressing him all over with the insane movement of his hands, fingers, and spinning words.

- For all! For all! - Anna gasped.

- How much money can you make from this? Heh? Do you want to rob Judas, snatch a piece of bread from his children? I can't! I’ll go to the square, I’ll shout: Anna robbed poor Judas! Save!

Tired and completely dizzy, Anna furiously stomped her soft shoes on the floor and waved her arms:

- Out!.. Out!..

But Judas suddenly humbly bent over and meekly spread his hands:

- But if you are like that... Why are you angry with poor Judas, who wants the best for his children? You also have children, wonderful young people...

- We are different... We are different... Out!

- But did I say that I cannot give in? And don’t I believe you that another can come and give you Jesus for fifteen obols? For two obols? For one?

And, bowing lower and lower, twisting and flattering. Judas obediently agreed to the money offered to him. With a trembling, withered hand, the pink-faced Anna gave him the money and, silently, turning away and chewing with her lips, waited until Judas tried all the silver coins on his teeth. From time to time Anna looked around and, as if he had been burned, again raised his head to the ceiling and chewed vigorously with his lips.

“There is so much counterfeit money now,” Judas explained calmly.

“This is money donated by pious people for the temple,” said Anna, quickly looking around and even faster exposing the pinkish bald back of his head to Judas’s eyes.

– But do pious people know how to distinguish the fake from the real? Only scammers can do this.

Judas did not take the money he received home, but, going out of the city, hid it under a stone. And he returned back quietly, with heavy and slow steps, like a wounded animal slowly crawling into its dark hole after a cruel and mortal battle. But Judas did not have his own hole, but had a house, and in this house he saw Jesus. Tired, thin, exhausted by the continuous struggle with the Pharisees, the wall of white, shining, learned foreheads that surrounded him every day in the temple, he sat with his cheek pressed against the rough wall, and, apparently, was fast asleep. IN open window the restless sounds of the city flew in, Peter knocked behind the wall, knocking down a new table for the meal, and hummed a quiet Galilean song - but he heard nothing and slept calmly and soundly. And this was the one whom they bought for thirty pieces of silver.

Moving forward silently. Judas, with the tender caution of a mother who is afraid to wake up her sick child, with the amazement of a beast crawling out of the lair, which was suddenly enchanted by a white flower, quietly touched his soft hair and quickly pulled his hand away. He touched it again and crawled out silently.

- God! - he said. - Lord!

And, going out to the place where they went to relieve themselves, he cried there for a long time, writhing, writhing, scratching his chest with his nails and biting his shoulders. He caressed the imaginary hair of Jesus, quietly whispered something tender and funny, and ground his teeth. Then he suddenly stopped crying, moaning and gnashing his teeth and began to think heavily, tilting his wet face to the side, looking like a man who was listening. And for so long he stood, heavy, determined and alien to everything, like fate itself.

... Judas surrounded the unfortunate Jesus with quiet love, tender attention, and affection in these last days of his short life. Shy and timid, like a girl in her first love, terribly sensitive and insightful, like her, he guessed the slightest unspoken desires of Jesus, penetrated into the innermost depths of his feelings, fleeting flashes of sadness, heavy moments of fatigue. And wherever Jesus' foot stepped, it met something soft, and wherever his gaze turned, he found something pleasant. Previously, Judas did not like Mary Magdalene and other women who were near Jesus, joked rudely at them and caused minor troubles - now he became their friend, a funny and clumsy ally.

He talked with them with deep interest about the small, sweet habits of Jesus, asking them for a long time with persistence about the same thing, mysteriously thrust money into his hand, into the very palm - and they brought ambergris, fragrant expensive myrrh, so loved by Jesus, and wiped it for him. legs. He himself bought, desperately bargaining, expensive wine for Jesus and then became very angry when Peter drank almost all of it with the indifference of a man who attaches importance only to quantity, and in rocky Jerusalem, almost completely devoid of trees, flowers and greenery, he took out young spring wines from somewhere flowers, green grass and through the same women passed them on to Jesus.

He himself carried small children in his arms - for the first time in his life, picking them up somewhere in the courtyards or on the street and forcibly kissing them so that they would not cry, and it often happened that something small, black, suddenly crawled onto the lap of Jesus, who was lost in thought. , with curly hair and a dirty nose, and was demandingly looking for affection. And while they both rejoiced at each other. Judas walked sternly to the side, like a stern jailer who, in the spring, let a butterfly in to the prisoner and now feignedly grumbles, complaining about the disorder.

In the evenings, when along with the darkness at the windows, anxiety also stood guard. Iscariot skillfully directed the conversation to Galilee, alien to him, but dear to Jesus Galilee, with its quiet waters and green shores. And until then he rocked heavy Peter until the dried memories woke up in him, and in bright paintings, where everything was loud, colorful and dense, the sweet Galilean life did not rise before the eyes and ears. With greedy attention, his mouth half-opened like a child, his eyes laughing in advance, Jesus listened to his impetuous, loud, cheerful speech and sometimes laughed so much at his jokes that he had to stop the story for several minutes. But even better than Peter, John said, he had no funny and unexpected things, but everything became so thoughtful, unusual and beautiful that Jesus had tears in his eyes, and he sighed quietly, and Judas pushed Mary Magdalene in the side and with whispered to her with delight:

- How he talks! Can you hear?

- I hear, of course.

- No, you better listen. You women are never good listeners.

Then everyone quietly went to bed, and Jesus tenderly and gratefully kissed John and affectionately stroked tall Peter on the shoulder.

And without envy, with condescending contempt, Judas looked at these caresses. What do all these stories, these kisses and sighs mean compared to what he knows? Judas of Kariot, red-haired, ugly Jew, born among the stones!

With one hand betraying Jesus, with the other hand Judas diligently sought to upset his own plans. He did not dissuade Jesus from the last, dangerous journey to Jerusalem, as the women did; he even leaned rather towards the side of Jesus’ relatives and those of his disciples who considered victory over Jerusalem necessary for the complete triumph of the cause. But he persistently and persistently warned about the danger and depicted in vivid colors the formidable hatred of the Pharisees for Jesus, their readiness to commit a crime and secretly or openly kill the prophet from Galilee. Every day and every hour he spoke about this, and there was not a single believer in front of whom Judas would not stand, raising a threatening finger, and would not say warningly and sternly:

– We need to take care of Jesus! We need to take care of Jesus! We need to intercede for Jesus when that time comes.

But whether the disciples had boundless faith in the miraculous power of their teacher, or the consciousness of their own rightness, or simply blindness, Judas’ fearful words were met with a smile, and endless advice even caused a murmur. When Judas got it from somewhere and brought two swords, only Peter liked it, and only Peter praised the swords and Judas, but the rest said displeasedly:

“Are we warriors who must girdle ourselves with swords?” And isn't Jesus a prophet, but a military leader?

- But what if they want to kill him?

“They won’t dare when they see that all the people are following him.”

- And if they dare? What then? John spoke dismissively:

“You might think that you, Judas, are the only one who loves the teacher.”

And, greedily clinging to these words, not at all offended, Judas began to interrogate hastily, ardently, with stern insistence:

-But you love him, right?

And there was not a single believer who came to Jesus whom he did not ask repeatedly:

- Do you love him? Do you love me deeply?

And everyone answered that they loved him.

He often talked with Foma and, raising a warning dry, tenacious finger with a long and dirty nail, mysteriously warned him:

- Look, Thomas, a terrible time is approaching. Are you ready for it? Why didn't you take the sword I brought? Thomas answered judiciously:

“We are people unaccustomed to handling weapons.” And if we enter into a fight with the Roman soldiers, they will kill us all. Besides, you only brought two swords; what can you do with two swords?

- You can still get it. “They can be taken away from the soldiers,” Judas objected impatiently, and even serious Thomas smiled through his straight, drooping mustache:

- Oh, Judas, Judas! Where did you get these? They look like the swords of Roman soldiers.

- I stole these. It was still possible to steal, but they shouted and I ran away.

Thomas thought for a moment and said sadly:

“You did something wrong again, Judas.” Why are you stealing?

- But there is no stranger!

- Yes, but tomorrow the warriors will be asked: where are your swords? And, not finding them, they will punish them without guilt.

And subsequently, after the death of Jesus, the disciples recalled these conversations of Judas and decided that, together with their teacher, he wanted to destroy them too, challenging them to an unequal and murderous struggle. And once again they cursed the hated name of Judas of Keriot, the traitor.

And the angry Judas, after each such conversation, went to the women and cried in front of them. And the women willingly listened to him. That feminine and tender thing that was in his love for Jesus brought him closer to them, made him simple, understandable and even beautiful in their eyes, although there was still some disdain in his treatment of them.

-Are these people? - he complained bitterly about the students, trustingly fixing his blind and motionless eye on Mary. - These are not people! They don't even have enough blood in their veins!

“But you always spoke badly about people,” Maria objected.

-Have I ever spoken ill of people? - Judas was surprised. “Well, yes, I spoke ill of them, but couldn’t they be a little better?” Oh, Maria, stupid Maria, why aren’t you a man and can’t carry a sword!

“It’s so heavy, I can’t lift it,” Maria smiled.

- You will pick it up when men are so bad. Did you give Jesus the lily that I found in the mountains? I got up early in the morning to look for her, and today the sun was so red, Maria! Was he happy? Did he smile?

- Yes, he was happy. He said that the flower smelled like Galilee.

“And you, of course, didn’t tell him that Judas got it, Judas from Kariot?”

“You asked me not to talk.”

“No, it’s not necessary, of course it’s not necessary,” Judas sighed. “But you could have spilled the beans, because women are so talkative.” But you didn't spill the beans, did you? Were you hard? Yes, yes, Maria, you good woman. You know, I have a wife somewhere. Now I would like to look at her: maybe she is also a good woman. Don't know. She said: Judas is a liar. Judas Simonov is evil, and I left her. But maybe she’s a good woman, don’t you know?

- How can I know when I have never seen your wife?

- Yes, yes, Maria. What do you think, is thirty silver coins a lot of money? Or not, small?

- I think they are small.

- Of course of course. How much did you get when you were a harlot? Five Silvers or ten? Were you dear?

Mary Magdalene blushed and lowered her head so that her lush golden hair completely covered her face: only her round and white chin was visible.

- How unkind you are. Judas! I want to forget about this, but you remember.

– No, Maria, you don’t need to forget this. For what? Let others forget that you were a harlot, but you remember. Others need to quickly forget this, but you don’t. For what?

- After all, this is a sin.

- Those who have not yet committed a sin are afraid. And who has already done it, why should he be afraid? Does the dead fear death, but not the living? And the dead laughs at the living and at his fear.

They sat so friendly and chatted for hours - he, already old, dry, ugly, with his lumpy head and wildly bifurcated face, she - young, shy, tender, enchanted by life, like a fairy tale, like a dream.

And time passed indifferently, and thirty Serebrenikov lay under a stone, and the inexorably terrible day of betrayal was approaching. Jesus had already entered Jerusalem on a donkey, and, spreading clothes along his way, the people greeted him with enthusiastic cries:

- Hosanna! Hosanna! Coming in the name of the Lord! And so great was the rejoicing, so uncontrollably did love burst out for him in cries that Jesus wept, and his disciples said proudly:

– Isn’t this the son of God with us? And they themselves shouted triumphantly:

- Hosanna! Hosanna! Coming in the name of the Lord! That evening they did not go to sleep for a long time, remembering the solemn and joyful meeting, and Peter was like crazy, as if possessed by the demon of joy and pride. He shouted, drowning out all speech with his lion's roar, laughed, throwing his laughter on heads like round, large stones, kissed John, kissed Jacob and even kissed Judas. And he confessed noisily that he was very afraid for Jesus, but now he is not afraid of anything, because he saw the love of the people for Jesus. In surprise, quickly moving his lively and keen eye, Iscariot looked around, thought and listened and looked again, then took Thomas aside and, as if pinning him to the wall with his sharp gaze, asked in bewilderment, fear and some vague hope:

- Foma! What if he's right? If there are stones under his feet, and under my feet there is only sand? What then?
- Who are you talking about? - Foma inquired.

– What then about Judas from Kariot? Then I myself must strangle him to do the truth.

Who is deceiving Judas: you or Judas himself? Who is deceiving Judas? Who?

- I don't understand you. Judas. You speak very unclearly. Who is deceiving Judas? Who is right?

And shaking his head. Judas repeated like an echo:

And the next day, in the way Judas raised his hand with his thumb outstretched, in the way he looked at Thomas, the same strange question sounded:

-Who is deceiving Judas? Who is right?

And Thomas was even more surprised and even worried when suddenly at night the loud and seemingly joyful voice of Judas sounded:

“Then there will be no Judas from Kariot.” Then there will be no Jesus. Then it will be... Thomas, stupid Thomas! Have you ever wanted to take the earth and lift it up? And maybe quit later.

- This is impossible. What are you saying. Judas!

“This is possible,” said Iscariot with conviction. “And we will raise it someday, when you are sleeping, stupid Thomas.” Sleep! I'm having fun, Foma! When you sleep, a Galilean pipe plays in your nose. Sleep!

But now the believers had dispersed throughout Jerusalem and hid in houses, behind walls, and the faces of those they met became mysterious. The rejoicing died down. And already vague rumors of danger were creeping into some cracks, the gloomy Peter tried the sword given to him by Judas. And the teacher’s face became sadder and more stern. Time passed so quickly and the terrible day of betrayal inexorably approached. Now the last supper has passed, full of sadness and vague fear, and the unclear words of Jesus have already been heard about someone who will betray him.

– Do you know who will betray him? - Thomas asked, looking at Judas with his straight and clear, almost transparent eyes.

“Yes, I know,” answered Judas, stern and decisive. “You, Thomas, will betray him.” But he himself does not believe what he says! It's time! It's time! Why doesn’t he call the strong, beautiful Judas to him?

...The inexorable time was no longer measured in days, but in short, fast-flying hours. And it was evening, and there was evening silence, and long shadows lay along the ground - the first sharp arrows of the coming night of the great battle, when a sad and stern voice sounded. He said:

“Do you know where I’m going, Lord?” I am coming to deliver you into the hands of your enemies.

And there was a long silence, the silence of the evening and sharp, black shadows.

-Are you silent, Lord? Are you ordering me to go? And again silence.

- Let me stay. But you can't? Or don't you dare? Or don't you want to?

And again silence, huge, like the eyes of eternity.

“But you know that I love you.” You know everything. Why are you looking at Judas like that? The mystery of your beautiful eyes is great, but is mine less so? Order me to stay!.. But you are silent, are you still silent? Lord, Lord, why, in anguish and torment, have I been looking for you all my life, looking for you and finding you! Set me free. Take away the heaviness, it is heavier than mountains and lead. Can't you hear how the chest of Judas of Kerioth is cracking under her?

And the last silence, bottomless, like the last glance of eternity.

The evening silence did not even wake up, it did not scream or cry, and did not ring with the quiet clink of its thin glass - so weak was the sound of retreating footsteps. They made noise and fell silent. And the evening silence began to reflect, stretched out in long shadows, darkened - and suddenly sighed all with the rustle of sadly tossed leaves, sighed and froze, greeting the night.

They huddled, clapped, and other voices began to knock—as if someone had untied a bag of living, sonorous voices, and they fell from there to the ground, one by one, two by one, in a whole heap. This is what the disciples said. And, covering them all, knocking on trees, on walls, falling on himself, Peter’s decisive and authoritative voice thundered - he swore that he would never leave his teacher.

- God! - he said with anguish and anger. - Lord! I am ready to go with you to prison and to death.

And quietly, like the soft echo of someone’s retreating steps, the merciless answer sounded:

“I tell you, Peter, the rooster will not crow today before you deny me three times.”

The moon had already risen when Jesus prepared to go to the Mount of Olives, where he spent all his last nights. But he incomprehensibly hesitated, and the disciples, ready to set off on the journey, hurried him, then he suddenly said:

“Whoever has a bag, take it, and also a bag, and whoever doesn’t have it, sell your clothes and buy a sword.” For I tell you that this which is written must also be fulfilled in me: “And he is numbered with the evildoers.”

The students were surprised and looked at each other with embarrassment. Peter answered:

- God! there are two swords here.

He looked searchingly at their kind faces, lowered his head and said quietly:

- Enough.

The footsteps of those walking echoed loudly in the narrow streets - and the disciples were frightened by the sound of their steps; on the white wall, illuminated by the moon, their black shadows grew - and they were frightened by their shadows. So they silently walked through sleeping Jerusalem, and now they came out of the gates of the city, and in a deep ravine full of mysteriously motionless shadows, the Kidron Stream opened up to them. Now everything scared them.

The quiet murmur and splash of water on the stones seemed to them like the voices of creeping people, the ugly shadows of rocks and trees blocking the road disturbed them with their diversity, and their night immobility seemed to be moving. But as they climbed the mountain and approached the Garden of Gethsemane, where they had already spent so many nights in safety and silence, they became bolder. Occasionally looking back at abandoned Jerusalem, all white under the moon, they talked among themselves about the past fear, and those who walked behind heard the fragmentary quiet words of Jesus. He said that everyone would leave him.

In the garden, at the beginning of it, they stopped. Most of them remained in place and began to prepare for bed with quiet conversation, spreading their cloaks in a transparent lace of shadows and moonlight. Jesus, tormented by anxiety, and his four closest disciples went further into the depths of the garden. There they sat down on the ground, which had not yet cooled down from the heat of the day, and while Jesus was silent, Peter and John lazily exchanged words that were almost meaningless. Yawning from fatigue, they talked about how cold the night was, and how expensive meat was in Jerusalem, and how fish was absolutely impossible to get. They tried to determine with exact numbers the number of pilgrims who had gathered in the city for the holiday, and Peter, drawing out his words with a loud yawn, said that it was twenty thousand, and John and his brother James just as lazily assured that it was no more than ten. Suddenly Jesus quickly stood up.

- My soul grieves mortally. “Stay here and stay awake,” he said and quickly walked away into the thicket and soon disappeared into the stillness of shadows and light.

- Where is he going? - said John, raising himself on his elbow.

Peter turned his head after the departed man and answered wearily:

- Don't know.

And, yawning loudly again, he fell onto his back and fell silent. The others also fell silent, and a sound sleep of healthy fatigue engulfed their motionless bodies. Through his heavy sleep, Peter vaguely saw something white leaning over him, and someone’s voice sounded and went out, leaving no trace in his darkened consciousness.

- Simon, are you sleeping?

“So you couldn’t stay awake with me for even one hour?”

“Oh, Lord, if you knew how much I want to sleep,” he thought half asleep, but it seemed to him that he said it loudly. And again he fell asleep, and a lot of time seemed to pass, when suddenly the figure of Jesus appeared near him, and a loud waking voice instantly sobered him and the others:

-Are you still sleeping and resting? It’s over, the hour has come - the Son of Man is being given over to the hands of sinners.

The students quickly jumped to their feet, confusedly grabbing their cloaks and shivering from the cold of the sudden awakening. Through the thicket of trees, illuminating them with the running fire of torches, with stomping and noise, in the clang of weapons and the crunch of breaking branches, a crowd of warriors and temple servants was approaching. And on the other side, students, shaking from the cold, came running with frightened, sleepy faces and, not yet understanding what was the matter, hurriedly asked:

- What is this? Who are these people with torches? Pale Thomas, with his straight mustache sloping to one side, gnashed his teeth chillily and said to Peter:

“Apparently they came for us.”

Now a crowd of warriors surrounded them, and the smoky, alarming glare of the lights drove the quiet glow of the moon somewhere to the sides and upwards. Judas from Kariot hurriedly moved ahead of the soldiers and, keenly moving his living eye, looked for Jesus. I found him, gazed for a moment at his tall, thin figure and quickly whispered to the attendants:

“Whoever I kiss is the one.” Pick it up and drive it carefully. But just be careful, did you hear?

Then he quickly moved closer to Jesus, who was waiting for him in silence, and plunged his direct and sharp gaze like a knife into his calm, darkened eyes.
- Rejoice, Rabbi! - he said loudly, putting a strange and menacing meaning into the words of an ordinary greeting.

But Jesus was silent, and the disciples looked at the traitor with horror, not understanding how the human soul could contain so much evil. Iscariot took a quick look at their confused ranks, noticed the trembling, ready to turn into a loudly dancing trembling of fear, noticed the pallor, meaningless smiles, sluggish movements of the hands, as if tied with iron at the forearm - and a mortal sorrow was kindled in his heart, similar to the one he had experienced before this is Christ. Stretching out into a hundred loudly ringing, sobbing strings, he quickly rushed to Jesus and tenderly kissed his cold cheek. So quietly, so tenderly, with such painful love and longing that if Jesus had been a flower on a thin stem, he would not have shaken it with this kiss and would not have dropped the pearly dew from the clean petals.

“Judas,” said Jesus, and with the lightning of his gaze he illuminated that monstrous pile of wary shadows that was the soul of Iscariot, “but he could not penetrate into its bottomless depths. “Judas!” Do you betray the son of man with a kiss?

And I saw how all this monstrous chaos trembled and began to move. Silent and stern, like death in his proud majesty, stood Judas of Kariot, and inside him everything groaned, thundered and howled with a thousand violent and fiery voices:

"Yes! We betray you with the kiss of love. With the kiss of love we hand you over to desecration, to torture, to death! With the voice of love we call the executioners from the dark holes and erect a cross - and high above the crown of the earth we raise love crucified on the cross with love.”

So Judas stood, silent and cold as death, and the cry of his soul was answered by the screams and noise that arose around Jesus. With the crude indecision of armed force, with the awkwardness of a vaguely understood goal, the soldiers were already grabbing him by the arms and dragging him somewhere, mistaking their indecision for resistance, their fear for ridicule and mockery of them. Like a bunch of frightened lambs, the disciples crowded together, not hindering anything, but disturbing everyone - and even themselves, and only a few dared to walk and act separately from the others.

Pushed from all sides, Pyotr Simonov with difficulty, as if he had lost all his strength, drew his sword from its sheath and weakly, with an oblique blow, lowered it on the head of one of the servants, but did not cause any harm. And Jesus, who noticed this, ordered him to throw down the unnecessary sword, and, with a faint clink, the iron fell at his feet, so apparently devoid of its piercing and killing power that it did not occur to anyone to pick it up. So it lay there underfoot, and many days later children playing found it in the same place and made it their amusement.

The soldiers pushed the students away, and they gathered again and stupidly crawled under their feet, and this continued until the soldiers were overcome by contemptuous rage. Here one of them, frowning his eyebrows, moved towards the screaming John, the other roughly pushed the hand of Thomas, who was convincing him of something, from his shoulder, and brought a huge fist to his straightest and most transparent eyes - and John ran, and Thomas and James and all the disciples, no matter how many there were, left Jesus and fled. Losing their cloaks, bumping into trees, bumping into rocks and falling, they fled into the mountains, driven by fear, and in the silence of the moonlit night the earth resounded loudly under the tramp of numerous feet. Someone unknown, apparently just out of bed, for he was covered with only one blanket, was excitedly scurrying about in the crowd of warriors and servants. But when they wanted to detain him and grabbed him by the blanket, he screamed in fear and rushed to run, like the others, leaving his clothes in the hands of the soldiers. So completely naked he ran with desperate leaps, and his naked body flickered strangely under the moon.

When Jesus was taken away, a hidden Peter came out from behind the trees and followed the teacher at a distance. And, seeing another man ahead of him walking silently, he thought that it was John, and quietly called out to him:

- John, is that you?

- Oh, is that you, Peter? - he answered, stopping, and by his voice Peter recognized him as a traitor. - Why didn’t you, Peter, run away with the others?

Peter stopped and said with disgust:

- Get away from me, Satan!

Judas laughed and, no longer paying attention to Peter, walked further, to where the torches sparkled smokily and the clang of weapons mixed with the distinct sound of footsteps. Peter followed him carefully, and almost simultaneously they entered the courtyard of the high priest and intervened in the crowd of servants warming themselves by the fires. Judas gloomily warmed his bony hands over the fire and heard Peter speak loudly somewhere behind him:

- No, I don’t know him.

But they obviously insisted that he was one of Jesus’ disciples, because Peter repeated even louder:

- No, I don’t understand what you’re saying! Without looking back and reluctantly smiling. Judas shook his head affirmatively and muttered:

- Yes, yes, Peter! Don’t give up your place near Jesus to anyone!

And he did not see how the frightened Peter left the yard, so as not to show himself again. And from that evening until Jesus’ death, Judas did not see any of his disciples near him, and among this entire crowd there were only the two of them, inseparable until death, wildly connected by the commonality of suffering - the one who was given over to reproach and torment, and the one who betrayed him. From the same cup of suffering, like brothers, they both drank, the devotee and the traitor, and the fiery moisture equally scorched clean and unclean lips.

Looking intently at the fire of the fire, filling his eyes with a feeling of heat, stretching out long moving arms towards the fire, all shapeless in a tangle of arms and legs, trembling shadows and light. Iscariot muttered pitifully and hoarsely:

- So cold! My God, how cold it is! So, probably, when fishermen leave at night, leaving a smoldering fire on the shore, something crawls out of the dark depths of the sea, crawls up to the fire, looks at it intently and wildly, reaches out to it with all its limbs and mutters pitifully and hoarsely:

- So cold! My God, how cold it is!

Suddenly, behind his back, Judas heard an explosion of loud voices, screams and laughter of soldiers, full of familiar, sleepily greedy anger, and sharp, short blows on a living body. He turned around, filled with instant pain throughout his whole body, all his bones—it was Jesus who was beating him.

So here it is!

I saw how the soldiers took Jesus to their guardhouse. The night passed, the fires were extinguished and covered with ashes, and muffled screams, laughter and curses were still heard from the guardhouse. They beat Jesus. Like getting lost. Iscariot ran nimbly around the deserted courtyard, stopped in his tracks, raised his head and ran again, bumping into fires and walls in surprise. Then he stuck to the wall of the guardhouse and, stretching out, clung to the window, to the cracks of the doors and eagerly looked at what was happening there. I saw a cramped, stuffy room, dirty, like all the guardhouses in the world, with a spit-stained floor and such greasy, stained walls, as if they had been walked on or rolled on.

And I saw a man who was being beaten. They beat him in the face, on the head, they threw him like a soft bale from one end to the other, and since he did not scream or resist, then for minutes, after intense staring, it really began to seem that this was not a living person, but some kind of... it’s a soft doll, without bones or blood. And she arched strangely, like a doll, and when, as she fell, she hit her head on the stones of the floor, there was no impression of a blow from hard to hard, but still soft, painless.

And when you looked at it for a long time, it became like some kind of endless, strange game - sometimes to the point of almost complete deception. After one strong push, the man, or doll, fell with a smooth movement onto the knees of the sitting soldier, who, in turn, pushed away, and it turned over and sat down next to the next one, and so on and again. There was a lot of laughter, and Judas also smiled - as if someone strong hand she tore his mouth with iron fingers. It was the mouth of Judas who was deceived.

The night dragged on and the fires still smoldered. Judas fell away from the wall and slowly wandered to one of the fires, dug out the coal, straightened it, and although he no longer felt the cold, he stretched out his slightly trembling hands over the fire. And he muttered sadly:

- Oh, it hurts, it hurts a lot, my son, my son, my son. It hurts, it hurts a lot - Then he again went to the window, which was turning yellow with a dim fire in the slot of the black bars, and again began to watch how they beat Jesus. Once, before Judas’s very eyes, his dark, now disfigured face flashed in a thicket of tangled hair. Someone's hand dug into this hair, knocked the man down and, evenly turning his head from one side to the other, began wiping the spit-stained floor with his face. A soldier was sleeping right next to the window, his mouth open with white shining teeth, but someone’s wide back with a thick, bare neck blocked the window, and nothing else was visible. And suddenly it became quiet.

What is this? Why are they silent? What if they guessed it?

Instantly, Judas’s entire head, in all its parts, is filled with a rumble, a scream, the roar of thousands of frenzied thoughts. Did they guess? They realized that this is the most best person? – it’s so simple, so clear. What's there now? They kneel in front of him and cry quietly, kissing his feet. So he comes out here, and they meekly crawl behind him - he comes out here, to Judas, he comes out victorious, a husband, the lord of truth, a god...

-Who is deceiving Judas? Who is right?

But no. Again the scream and noise. They hit again. They didn’t understand, they didn’t guess, and they hit even harder, they hit even more painfully. And the fires burn out, becoming covered with ash, and the smoke above them is as transparently blue as the air, and the sky is as bright as the moon. The day is coming.

-What is a day? - asks Judas.
Now everything caught fire, sparkled, became younger, and the smoke above was no longer blue, but pink. This is the sun rising.

-What is the sun? - asks Judas.

They pointed fingers at Judas, and some said contemptuously, others said with hatred and fear:

– Look: it’s Judas the Traitor!

This was already the beginning of his shameful glory, to which he doomed himself forever. Thousands of years will pass, nations will be replaced by nations, and words will still be heard in the air, spoken with contempt and fear by good and evil:

– Judas the Traitor... Judas the Traitor!

But he listened indifferently to what was said about him, absorbed in a feeling of all-conquering burning curiosity. From the very morning, when the beaten Jesus was taken out of the guardhouse, Judas followed him and somehow strangely did not feel any melancholy, pain, or joy - only an invincible desire to see everything and hear everything. Although he did not sleep all night, he felt his body light when he was not allowed forward, he was crowded, he pushed the people aside with pushes and quickly climbed out to the first place, and his lively and quick eye did not remain at rest for a minute. When Caiaphas interrogated Jesus, so as not to miss a single word, he stuck out his ear with his hand and shook his head affirmatively, muttering:

- So! So! Do you hear, Jesus!

But he was not free - like a fly tied to a thread: it flies buzzing here and there, but the obedient and stubborn thread does not leave it for a single minute. Some stone thoughts lay in the back of Judas’s head, and he was tightly attached to them; he didn’t seem to know what these thoughts were, he didn’t want to touch them, but he felt them constantly. And for minutes they suddenly approached him, pressed down on him, began to press with all their unimaginable weight - as if the roof of a stone cave was slowly and terribly descending on his head. Then he grabbed his heart with his hand, tried to move all over, as if frozen, and hurried to turn his eyes to a new place, another new place. When Jesus was taken away from Caiaphas, he met his tired gaze very close and, somehow without realizing it, nodded his head several times in a friendly manner.

“I’m here, son, here!” - he muttered hastily and angrily pushed some bastard who was standing in his way in the back. Now, in a huge, noisy crowd, everyone was moving to Pilate for the final interrogation and trial, and with the same unbearable curiosity, Judas quickly and greedily examined the faces of the ever-arriving people. Many were complete strangers, Judas had never seen them, but there were also those who shouted to Jesus: “Hosanna!” - and with each step their number seemed to increase.

"So-so! - Judas thought quickly, and his head began to spin like a drunk. - Everything is over. Now they will shout: this is ours, this is Jesus, what are you doing? And everyone will understand and...”

But the believers walked in silence. Some feigned a smile, pretending that all this did not concern them, others said something restrained, but in the roar of movement, in the loud and frantic cries of Jesus’ enemies, their quiet voices were drowned without a trace. And it became easy again. Suddenly Judas noticed Thomas carefully making his way nearby and, quickly thinking of something, wanted to approach him. At the sight of the traitor, Thomas was frightened and wanted to hide, but in a narrow, dirty street, between two walls, Judas caught up with him.

- Foma! Wait a minute!

Thomas stopped and, stretching out both hands forward, solemnly said:

- Get away from me, Satan. Iscariot waved his hand impatiently.

- How stupid you are, Foma, I thought you were smarter than others. Satan! Satan! After all, this must be proven. Lowering his hands, Thomas asked in surprise:

“But weren’t you the one who betrayed the teacher?” I myself saw how you brought the soldiers and pointed them to Jesus. If this is not betrayal, then what is betrayal?

“Different, different,” Judas said hastily. “Listen, there are a lot of you here.” We need you all to come together and loudly demand: give up Jesus, he is ours. They won’t refuse you, they won’t dare. They themselves will understand...

- What you! “What are you doing,” Thomas resolutely waved his hands away, “haven’t you seen how many armed soldiers and temple servants are here?” And then there was no trial yet, and we should not interfere with the trial. Will he not understand that Jesus is innocent and order his immediate release?

– Do you think so too? – Judas asked thoughtfully. “Foma, Thomas, but if this is true?” What then? Who is right? Who deceived Judas?

“We talked all night today and decided: the court cannot convict an innocent person.” If he condemns...

- Well! - Iscariot hurried.

-...then this is not a trial. And it will be bad for them when they have to give an answer before the real Judge.

- Before the present! There is still a real one! – Judas laughed.

- And all of our people cursed you, but since you say that you are not a traitor, then, I think, you should be judged...

Without listening enough, Judas turned sharply and quickly rushed down the street, following the retreating crowd. But soon he slowed down his steps and walked leisurely, thinking that when a lot of people are walking, they always walk slowly, and a lonely walker will certainly overtake them.

When Pilate brought Jesus out of his palace and brought him before the people. Judas, pressed against the column by the heavy backs of the soldiers, furiously turning his head to look at something between the two shining helmets, suddenly clearly felt that it was all over now. Under the sun, high above the heads of the crowd, he saw Jesus, bloody, pale, wearing a crown of thorns, its points piercing his forehead; he stood at the edge of the dais, visible from head to small tanned feet, and waited so calmly, was so clear in its purity and purity, that only a blind man who does not see the sun itself would not see this, only a madman would not understand. And the people were silent - it was so quiet that Judas could hear the soldier standing in front of him breathing and with each breath the belt on his body creaked somewhere.

"So. Everything is over. Now they will understand,” thought Judas, and suddenly something strange, similar to the dazzling joy of falling from an infinitely high mountain into a blue shining abyss, stopped his heart.

Contemptuously pulling his lips down to his round shaved chin, Pilate throws dry, short words into the crowd - like throwing bones into a pack of hungry dogs, thinking to deceive their thirst for fresh blood and living, quivering meat:

“You brought this man to me as one who was corrupting the people, and so I investigated in your presence and did not find this man guilty of anything of which you accuse him...

Judas closed his eyes. Waiting. And all the people shouted, screamed, howled in a thousand animal and human voices:

- Death to him! Crucify him! Crucify him!

And so, as if mocking themselves, as if in one moment wanting to experience all the infinity of fall, madness and shame, the same people shout, scream, demand in a thousand animal and human voices:

- Release Varrava to us! Crucify him! Crucify!

But the Roman has not yet said his decisive word: spasms of disgust and anger run across his shaven, arrogant face. He understands, he understands! So he speaks quietly to his servants, but his voice is not heard in the roar of the crowd. What he says? Tells them to take their swords and strike at these madmen?

- Bring some water.

Water? What kind of water? For what?

So he washes his hands - for some reason he washes his white, clean, hands decorated with rings - and angrily shouts, raising them, to the surprised silent people:

“I am innocent of the blood of this righteous man.” Look!

Water is still rolling from his fingers onto the marble slabs, when something softly spreads out at Pilate’s feet, and hot, sharp lips kiss his helplessly resisting hand - they cling to it like tentacles, drawing blood, almost biting. With disgust and fear, he looks down - he sees a large writhing body, a wildly double face and two huge eyes, so strangely different from each other, as if not one creature, but many of them are clinging to his legs and arms. And hears a poisonous whisper, intermittent, hot:

- You are wise!.. You are noble!.. You are wise, wise!.. And this wild face glows with such truly satanic joy that with a cry Pilate pushes it away with his foot, and Judas falls on his back. And, lying on the stone slabs, looking like an overturned devil, he still reaches out with his hand to the departing Pilate and shouts like a passionate lover:

- You wise! You wise! You are noble!

Then he quickly gets up and runs, accompanied by the laughter of the soldiers. It's not all over yet. When they see the cross, when they see the nails, they can understand, and then... What then? He catches a glimpse of the dumbfounded, pale Thomas and for some reason, nodding his head reassuringly at him, catches up with Jesus, who is being led to execution. It’s hard to walk, small stones roll under your feet, and suddenly Judas feels that he is tired. He spends his entire time worrying about how to place his foot better, looks dully around and sees Mary Magdalene crying, sees many crying women - loose hair, red eyes, twisted lips - all the immense sadness of a tender female soul, given over to reproach. He suddenly perks up and, seizing a moment, runs up to Jesus:

“I’m with you,” he whispers hastily.

The soldiers drive him away with blows of their whips, and, twisting to escape the blows, showing his bared teeth to the soldiers, he explains hastily:

- I'm with you. There. You understand, there!

He wipes the blood from his face and shakes his fist at the soldier, who turns around laughing and points at him to the others. For some reason he is looking for Thomas - but neither him nor any of the students are in the crowd of mourners. She feels tired again and moves her legs heavily, carefully looking at the sharp, white, crumbling pebbles.

...When the hammer was raised to nail it to the tree left hand Jesus, Judas closed his eyes and for an entire eternity did not breathe, did not see, did not live, but only listened. But then, with a grinding sound, iron struck iron, and over and over again there were dull, short, low blows - you could hear how a sharp nail entered the soft wood, pushing its particles apart...

One hand. Not too late.

Another hand. Not too late.

One leg, another leg - is it really all over? He hesitantly opens his eyes and sees how the cross rises, swaying, and settles in the hole. He sees how, shuddering tensely, Jesus’ arms stretch out painfully, widening the wounds - and suddenly his fallen belly disappears under his ribs. The arms stretch and stretch, become thin, turn white, twist at the shoulders, and the wounds under the nails turn red, creep - they are about to break off... No, it has stopped. Everything stopped. Only the ribs move, raised by short, deep breathing.

At the very crown of the earth rises a cross - and Jesus crucified on it. Iscariot’s horror and dreams have come true - he rises from his knees, on which he stood for some reason, and coldly looks around. This is how the stern winner looks, who has already decided in his heart to give up everything to destruction and death and for the last time looks around at a strange and rich city, still alive and noisy, but already ghostly under the cold hand of death. And suddenly, as clearly as his terrible victory, Iscariot sees its ominous instability. What if they understand? Not too late. Jesus is still alive. There he looks with calling, yearning eyes...

What can keep from breaking the thin film that covers people’s eyes, so thin that it seems as if it is not there at all? What if they understand? Suddenly, with their entire menacing mass of men, women and children, they will move forward, silently, without shouting, they will wipe out the soldiers, drench them up to their ears in their blood, tear out the cursed cross from the ground and, with the hands of the survivors, raise the free Jesus high above the crown of the earth! Hosanna! Hosanna!

Hosanna? No, it would be better for Judas to lie down on the ground. No, it’s better, lying on the ground and flashing his teeth like a dog, he will look out and wait until all those rise up. But what happened to time? One minute it almost stops, so you want to push it with your hands, kick it, beat it with a whip, like a lazy donkey, then it rushes madly down some mountain and takes your breath away, and your hands search in vain for support. There Mary Magdalene is crying. There Jesus' mother is crying. Let them cry. Do her tears, the tears of all mothers, all women in the world, mean anything now?

-What are tears? - Judas asks and furiously pushes motionless time, beats it with his fists, curses it like a slave. It is alien and that is why it is so disobedient. Oh, if it belonged to Judas - but it belongs to all these crying, laughing, chatting, as in the market, it belongs to the sun, it belongs to the cross and the heart of Jesus, dying so slowly.

What a vile heart Judas has! He holds it with his hand, and it shouts “Hosanna!” so loud that everyone can hear it. He presses it to the ground, and it shouts: “Hosanna, Hosanna!” - like a chatterbox who scatters holy secrets on the street... Be silent! Shut up!

Suddenly there was a loud, broken cry, muffled screams, and a hasty movement towards the cross. What is this? Got it?

No, Jesus dies. And this could be? Yes, Jesus dies. The pale hands are motionless, but short spasms run across the face, chest and legs. And this could be? Yes, he is dying. Breathing less frequently. It stopped... No, another sigh, Jesus is still on earth. And further? No... No... No... Jesus died.

It's finished. Hosanna! Hosanna!

Horror and dreams came true. Who will now snatch victory from the hands of Iscariot? It's finished. Let all the nations that exist on earth flock to Golgotha and cry out with millions of their throats: “Hosanna, Hosanna!” - and seas of blood and tears will be shed at its foot - they will find only a shameful cross and a dead Jesus.

Calmly and coldly, Iscariot looks around at the deceased, rests his gaze for a moment on the cheek that only yesterday he kissed with a farewell kiss, and slowly moves away. Now all the time belongs to him, and he walks leisurely, now the whole earth belongs to him, and he steps firmly, like a ruler, like a king, like one who is infinitely and joyfully alone in this world. He notices the mother of Jesus and says to her sternly:

-Are you crying, mother? Cry, cry, and all the mothers of the earth will cry with you for a long time. Until we come with Jesus and destroy death.

Is he mad or is he mocking, this traitor? But he is serious, and his face is stern, and his eyes do not dart around in mad haste as before. So he stops and examines the new, small land with cold attention. She has become small, and he feels all of her under his feet, looks at the small mountains quietly blushing in the last rays of the sun, and feels the mountains under his feet, looks at the sky, which has opened its blue mouth wide, looks at the round sun, unsuccessfully trying to burn and blind - and feels the sky and the sun under his feet. Infinitely and joyfully alone, he proudly felt the powerlessness of all the forces acting in the world, and threw them all into the abyss.

It's finished.

An old deceiver, coughing, smiling flatteringly, bowing endlessly, appeared before the Sanhedrin Judas of Kariot - the Traitor. It was the day after Jesus was killed, around noon. There were all of them, his judges and murderers: the elderly Annas with his sons, obese and disgusting images of their father, and Caiaphas, his son-in-law, consumed by ambition, and all the other members of the Sanhedrin, who had stolen their names from human memory - the rich and noble Sadducees, proud by his strength and knowledge of the law. They greeted the Traitor in silence, and their arrogant faces remained motionless: as if nothing had entered. And even the smallest and most insignificant of them, to whom others did not pay attention, raised his bird-like face upward and looked as if nothing had entered. Judas bowed, bowed, bowed, and they watched and were silent: as if it was not a man who had entered, but only an unclean insect that could not be seen. But Judas of Kariot was not the kind of man to be embarrassed: they were silent, but he bowed to himself and thought that if he had to until the evening, then he would bow until the evening. Finally, the impatient Caiaphas asked:

- What do you need?

Judas bowed again and said loudly:

“It is I, Judas of Kariot, the one who betrayed Jesus of Nazareth to you.”

- So what? You got yours. Go! - Anna ordered, but Judas did not seem to hear the order and continued to bow. And, looking at him, Caiaphas asked Anna:

- How much did they give him?

- Thirty pieces of silver.

Caiaphas grinned, and gray-haired Anna himself grinned, and a cheerful smile slid across all the arrogant faces, and the one who had a bird’s face even laughed. And, noticeably turning pale, Judas quickly chimed in:

- So-so. Of course, very little, but is Judas unhappy, is Judas screaming that he was robbed? He's happy. Didn't he serve a holy cause? To the Saint. Aren’t the wisest people now listening to Judas and thinking: he is ours, Judas from Kariot, he is our brother, our friend. Judas of Kariot, Traitor? Doesn't Anna want to kneel down and kiss Judas' hand? But Judas won’t give it, he’s a coward, he’s afraid that he’ll be bitten.

Caiaphas said:

- Drive that dog out. What is he barking?

- Get out of here. “We don’t have time to listen to your chatter,” Anna said indifferently.

Judas straightened up and closed his eyes. That pretense that he had carried so easily all his life suddenly became an unbearable burden, and with one movement of his eyelashes he threw it off. And when he looked at Anna again, his gaze was simple, and direct, and terrible in its naked truthfulness. But they didn’t pay attention to this either.

- Do you want to be kicked out with sticks? - Caiaphas shouted.

Choking under the weight of terrible words, which he raised higher and higher in order to throw them from there on the heads of the judges, Judas asked hoarsely:

- Do you know... do you know... who he was - the one whom you condemned and crucified yesterday?

- We know. Go!

With one word, he will now break through that thin film that obscures their eyes - and the whole earth will tremble under the weight of the merciless truth! They had a soul - they will lose it, they had life - they will lose life, they had light before their eyes - eternal darkness and horror will cover them. Hosanna! Hosanna!

And here they are, these scary words throat-tearing:

- He was not a deceiver. He was innocent and pure. You hear? Judas has deceived you. He betrayed an innocent to you. Waiting. And he hears Anna’s indifferent, senile voice:

“And that’s all you wanted to say?”

“It seems you didn’t understand me,” says Judas with dignity, turning pale. “Judas deceived you.” He was innocent. You killed an innocent.

The one with the bird's face smiles, but Anna is indifferent, Anna is boring, Anna yawns. And Caiaphas yawns after him and says wearily:

– What did they tell me about the mind of Judas of Kariot? He's just a fool, a very boring fool.

- What! - Judas shouts, filling himself with dark rage. “And who are you, smart ones!” Judas deceived you - do you hear! He did not betray him, but you, the wise, you, the strong, he betrayed to a shameful death that will not end forever. Thirty Silvers! So-so. But this is the price of your blood, dirty like the slop that women pour outside the gates of their houses. Oh, Anna, old, gray-haired, stupid Anna, who swallowed the law, why didn’t you give one piece of silver, one obol more! After all, at this price you will go forever!

- Get out! - shouted the purple-faced Caiaphas. But Anna stopped him with a movement of his hand and still indifferently asked Judas:

- That's it?

– After all, if I go into the desert and shout to the beasts: beasts, you heard how much people valued their Jesus, what will the beasts do? They will crawl out of their lairs, they will howl with anger, they will forget their fear of man and they will all come here to devour you! If I say to the sea: sea, do you know how much people valued their Jesus? If I say to the mountains: mountains, do you know how much people valued Jesus? Both the sea and the mountains will leave their places determined from time immemorial, and will come here and fall on your heads!

– Does Judas want to become a prophet? He talks so loud! - the one with the bird's face remarked mockingly and looked ingratiatingly at Caiaphas.

– Today I saw a pale sun. It looked at the ground with horror and said: where is the man? Today I saw a scorpion. He sat on a stone and laughed and said: where is the man? I came close and looked into his eyes. And he laughed and said: where is the man, tell me, I don’t see! Or Judas went blind, poor Judas from Kariot!

And Iscariot cried loudly. At those moments he looked like a madman, and Caiaphas, turning away, waved his hand contemptuously. Anna thought a little and said:

“I see, Judas, that you really haven’t received much, and this worries you.” Here's some more money, take it and give it to your children.

He threw something that clinked sharply. And this sound had not yet ceased when another, similar one, strangely continued it: it was Judas who threw handfuls of pieces of silver and obols into the faces of the high priest and the judges, returning the payment for Jesus. Coins flew crookedly like rain, hitting faces, hitting the table, and rolling across the floor. Some of the judges covered themselves with their hands, palms facing out, others jumped up from their seats, shouted and cursed. Judas, trying to hit Anna, threw the last coin, for which his trembling hand fumbled for a long time in the bag, spat angrily and left.

- So-so! - he muttered, quickly walking through the streets and scaring the children. - You seem to have been crying. Judas? Is Caiaphas really right when he says that Judas of Kariot is stupid? He who cries on the day of great vengeance is unworthy of it - do you know this? Judas? Don’t let your eyes deceive you, don’t let your heart lie, don’t flood the fire with tears, Judas of Kariot!

Jesus' disciples sat in sad silence and listened to what was happening outside the house. There was also a danger that the revenge of Jesus’ enemies would not be limited to him alone, and everyone was waiting for the invasion of the guards and, perhaps, new executions. Near John, for whom, as the beloved disciple of Jesus, his death was especially difficult, Mary Magdalene and Matthew sat and consoled him in an undertone. Maria, whose face was swollen from tears, quietly stroked his lush Wavy hair, Matthew instructively spoke in the words of Solomon:

“He who is long-suffering is better than the brave, and he who controls himself is better than the conqueror of a city.”

At that moment, Judas Iscariot entered, loudly slamming the door. Everyone jumped up in fright and at first didn’t even understand who it was, but when they saw the hated face and the red, lumpy head, they started screaming. Peter raised both hands and shouted:

- Get out of here! Traitor! Leave, otherwise I will kill you! But they took a better look at the face and eyes of the Traitor and fell silent, whispering in fear:

- Leave it! Leave him! Satan possessed him. After waiting for silence, Judas exclaimed loudly:

– Rejoice, eyes of Judas from Kariot! You have seen cold murderers now - and now there are cowardly traitors before you! Where is Jesus? I ask you: where is Jesus?

- You know it yourself. Judas, that our teacher was crucified last night.

- How did you allow this? Where was your love? You, beloved student, you are a stone, where were you when your friend was crucified on a tree?

“What could we have done, judge for yourself,” Foma threw up his hands.

– Is that what you’re asking, Foma? So-so! - Judas from Kariot bowed his head to the side and suddenly burst out angrily: - He who loves does not ask what to do! He goes and does everything. He cries, he bites, he strangles the enemy and breaks his bones! Who loves! When your son drowns, do you go to the city and ask passersby: “What should I do? my son is drowning!” - and don’t throw yourself into the water and drown next to your son. Who loves!

Peter responded gloomily to Judas’s frantic speech:

“I drew my sword, but he himself said no need.”

- No need? And did you listen? - Iscariot laughed. - Peter, Peter, how can you listen to him! Does he understand anything about people, about struggle!

“Whoever does not obey him goes to hell fire.”

- Why didn’t you go? Why didn't you go, Peter? Gehenna of fire - what is Gehenna? Well, let you go - why do you need a soul if you don’t dare throw it into the fire whenever you want!

- Shut up! – John shouted, getting up. “He himself wanted this sacrifice.” And his sacrifice is beautiful!

“Is there such a beautiful sacrifice as you say, beloved disciple?” Where there is a victim, there is an executioner, and there are traitors! Sacrifice means suffering for one and shame for all. Traitors, traitors, what have you done with the land? Now they look at it from above and below and laugh and shout: look at this land, Jesus was crucified on it! And they spit on her - like me! Judas spat angrily on the ground.

“He took upon himself all the sin of the people.” His sacrifice is wonderful! - John insisted.

- No, you took on all the sin. Beloved student! Is it not from you that the race of traitors, the race of cowardice and liars will begin? Blind people, what have you done with the land? You wanted to destroy her, you will soon kiss the cross on which you crucified Jesus! Yes, yes, Judas promises you to kiss the cross!

- Judas, don’t insult! - Peter growled, turning purple. “How could we kill all his enemies?” There are so many of them!

- And you, Peter! - John exclaimed with anger. “Don’t you see that Satan has taken possession of him?” Get away from us, tempter. You are full of lies! The teacher did not order to kill.

- But did he forbid you to die? Why are you alive when he is dead? Why do your legs walk, your tongue talk trash, your eyes blink when he is dead, motionless, silent? How dare your cheeks be red, John, when his are pale? How dare you shout, Peter, when he is silent? What to do, you ask Judas? And Judas, the beautiful, brave Judas from Kariot, answers you: die. You had to fall on the road, grab soldiers by their swords, by their hands. Drown them in the sea of your blood - die, die! Let his Father himself scream in horror when you all entered there!

Judas fell silent, raising his hand, and suddenly noticed the remains of the meal on the table. And with strange amazement, curiosity, as if he saw food for the first time in his life, he looked at it and slowly asked:

- What is this? Did you eat? Perhaps you slept the same way?

“I was sleeping,” Peter answered meekly, lowering his head, already feeling in Judas someone who could give orders. “I slept and ate.”

Thomas said decisively and firmly:

- This is all wrong. Judas. Think about it: if everyone died, who would tell about Jesus? Who would carry his teaching to people if everyone died: Peter, John, and me?

– What is truth itself in the mouths of traitors? Doesn't it become a lie? Foma, Foma, don’t you understand that you are now only a watchman at the tomb of dead truth. The watchman falls asleep, and the thief comes and takes the truth with him - tell me, where is the truth? Damn you, Thomas! You will be barren and poor forever, and you and him, damned!

- Damn yourself, Satan! - John shouted, and James, Matthew, and all the other disciples repeated his cry. Only Peter was silent.

- I'm going to him! - said Judas, extending his imperious hand upward. - Who is following Iscariot to Jesus?

- I! I'm with you! – Peter shouted, standing up. But John and the others stopped him in horror, saying:

- Crazy! You forgot that he betrayed the teacher into the hands of his enemies!

Peter hit himself in the chest with his fist and cried bitterly:

-Where should I go? God! Where should I go!

Judas had long ago, during his lonely walks, marked out the place where he would kill himself after the death of Jesus. It was on a mountain, high above Jerusalem, and there was only one tree standing there, crooked, tormented by the wind, tearing it from all sides, half-withered. It extended one of its broken crooked branches towards Jerusalem, as if blessing it or threatening it with something, and Judas chose it to make a noose on it. But the walk to the tree was far and difficult, and Judas from Kariot was very tired. All the same small sharp stones scattered under his feet and seemed to pull him back, and the mountain was high, blown by the wind, gloomy and evil. And several times Judas sat down to rest, and breathed heavily, and from behind, through the cracks of the stones, the mountain breathed coldly into his back.

- You're still damned! - Judas said contemptuously and breathed heavily, shaking his heavy head, in which all thoughts were now petrified. Then he suddenly raised her, opened his frozen eyes wide and muttered angrily:

- No, they are too bad for Judas. Are you listening, Jesus? Now will you believe me? I am going to you. Greet me kindly, I'm tired. I am very tired. Then you and I, hugging like brothers, will return to earth. Fine?

Again he shook his stony head and again opened his eyes wide, muttering:

“But maybe you will be angry with Judas of Kerioth there too?” And you won't believe it? And will you send me to hell? Well then! I'm going to hell! And on the fire of your hell I will forge iron and destroy your sky. Fine? Then will you believe me? Then will you come with me back to earth, Jesus?

Finally Judas reached the top and the crooked tree, and then the wind began to torment him. But when Judas scolded him, he began to sing softly and quietly - the wind flew away somewhere and said goodbye.

- Good good! And they are dogs! - Judas answered him, making a noose. And since the rope could deceive him and break, he hung it over the cliff - if it breaks, he will still find death on the rocks. And before pushing off with his foot from the edge and hanging, Judas from Kariot once again carefully warned Jesus:

- So meet me kindly, I’m very tired, Jesus.

And he jumped. The rope was stretched, but it held: Judas’s neck became thin, and his arms and legs folded and sagged as if they were wet. Died. So in two days, one after the other, Jesus of Nazareth and Judas of Kariot, the Traitor, left the earth.

All night long, like some monstrous fruit, Judas swayed over Jerusalem, and the wind turned his face either towards the city or towards the desert - as if he wanted to show Judas to both the city and the desert. But, no matter where the face disfigured by death turned, red eyes, bloodshot and now identical, like brothers, relentlessly looked into the sky. And the next morning someone sharp-eyed saw Judas hanging over the city and screamed in fear. People came and took him down, and, having found out who it was, they threw him into a remote ravine, where they threw dead horses, cats and other carrion.

And that evening all the believers learned about terrible death A traitor, and the next day all of Jerusalem learned about her. Stony Judea learned about her, and green Galilee learned about her, and the news of the death of the Traitor reached one sea and another, which was even further away. Neither faster nor quieter, but along with time she walked, and just as time has no end, so there will be no end to the stories about the betrayal of Judas and his terrible death. And everyone - good and evil - will equally curse his shameful memory, and among all nations, which were and are, he will remain alone in his cruel fate - Judas of Kariot, Traitor.

Leonid Andreev (1871-1919) - one of the greatest Russian writers of the Silver Age, who created a number of equally significant works both in realistic and symbolic prose. This collection includes stories created in different periods and written in different stylistic and genre manners.

Leonid Andreev

Judas Iscariot (collection)

Judas Iscariot

Jesus Christ was warned many times that Judas of Kerioth was a man of very bad reputation and should be avoided. Some of the disciples who were in Judea knew him well themselves, others heard a lot about him from people, and there was no one who could say a good word about him. And if the good ones reproached him, saying that Judas was selfish, treacherous, prone to pretense and lies, then the bad ones, who were asked about Judas, reviled him with the most cruel words. “He constantly quarrels with us,” they said, spitting, “he thinks of something of his own and gets into the house quietly, like a scorpion, and comes out of it noisily. And thieves have friends, and robbers have comrades, and liars have wives to whom they tell the truth, and Judas laughs at thieves, as well as at honest ones, although he himself steals skillfully, and his appearance is uglier than all the inhabitants of Judea. No, he is not ours, this red-haired Judas from Kariot,” said the bad ones, surprising the good people, for whom there was not much difference between him and all the other vicious people of Judea.

They further said that Judas abandoned his wife a long time ago, and she lives unhappy and hungry, unsuccessfully trying to squeeze bread for food from the three stones that make up Judas’s estate. He himself wandered around senselessly among the people for many years and even reached one sea and another sea, which was even further; and everywhere he lies, makes faces, vigilantly looks out for something with his thief's eye; and suddenly leaves suddenly, leaving behind troubles and quarrels - curious, crafty and evil, like a one-eyed demon. He had no children, and this once again said that Judas was a bad person and God did not want offspring from Judas.

None of the disciples noticed when this red-haired and ugly Jew first appeared near Christ; but for a long time now he had been relentlessly following their path, interfering in conversations, providing small services, bowing, smiling and ingratiating himself. And then it became completely familiar, deceiving tired vision, then suddenly it caught the eyes and ears, irritating them, like something unprecedentedly ugly, deceitful and disgusting. Then they drove him away with harsh words, and for a short time he disappeared somewhere along the road - and then he quietly appeared again, helpful, flattering and cunning, like a one-eyed demon. And there was no doubt for some of the disciples that in his desire to get closer to Jesus there was hidden some secret intention, there was an evil and insidious calculation.

But Jesus did not listen to their advice; their prophetic voice did not touch his ears. With that spirit of bright contradiction that irresistibly attracted him to the rejected and unloved, he decisively accepted Judas and included him in the circle of the chosen. The disciples were worried and grumbled restrainedly, but he sat quietly, facing the setting sun, and listened thoughtfully, maybe to them, or maybe to something else. There had been no wind for ten days, and the same transparent air, attentive and sensitive, remained the same, without moving or changing. And it seemed as if he had preserved in his transparent depths everything that was shouted and sung these days by people, animals and birds - tears, crying and a cheerful song, prayer and curses; and these glassy, frozen voices made him so heavy, anxious, thickly saturated with invisible life. And once again the sun set. It rolled down like a heavy flaming ball, lighting up the sky; and everything on earth that was turned towards him: the dark face of Jesus, the walls of houses and the leaves of trees - everything obediently reflected that distant and terribly thoughtful light. The white wall was no longer white now, and the red city on the red mountain did not remain white.

And then Judas came.

He came, bowing low, arching his back, carefully and timidly stretching his ugly, lumpy head forward - just as those who knew him imagined him to be. He was thin, of good height, almost the same as Jesus, who was slightly stooped from the habit of thinking while walking and this made him seem shorter; and he was quite strong in strength, apparently, but for some reason he pretended to be frail and sickly and had a changeable voice: sometimes courageous and strong, sometimes loud, like an old woman scolding her husband, annoyingly thin and unpleasant to the ear; and often I wanted to pull the words of Judas out of my ears, like rotten, rough splinters. Short red hair did not hide the strange and unusual shape of his skull: as if cut from the back of the head with a double blow of a sword and put back together again, it was clearly divided into four parts and inspired distrust, even anxiety: behind such a skull there cannot be silence and harmony, behind such a skull there is always the sound of bloody and merciless battles can be heard. Judas’s face was also double: one side of it, with a black, sharply looking eye, was alive, mobile, willingly gathering into numerous crooked wrinkles. On the other there were no wrinkles, and it was deathly smooth, flat and frozen; and although it was equal in size to the first, it seemed huge from the wide open blind eye. Covered with a whitish turbidity, not closing either at night or during the day, it met both light and darkness equally; but was it because there was a living and cunning comrade next to him that he could not believe in his complete blindness? When, in a fit of timidity or excitement, Judas closed his living eye and shook his head, this one swayed along with the movements of his head and looked silently. Even people completely devoid of insight clearly understood, looking at Iscariot, that such a person could not bring good, but Jesus brought him closer and even sat Judas next to him.

John, his beloved student, moved away with disgust, and everyone else, loving their teacher, looked down disapprovingly. And Judas sat down - and, moving his head to the right and left, in a thin voice began to complain about illness, that his chest hurts at night, that, when climbing mountains, he is out of breath, and standing at the edge of an abyss, he feels dizzy and can barely hold on from a stupid desire to throw himself down. And he shamelessly invented many other things, as if not understanding that illnesses do not come to a person by chance, but are born from the discrepancy between his actions and the precepts of the Eternal. This Judas from Kariot rubbed his chest with his wide palm and even coughed feignedly in the general silence and downcast gazes.

John, without looking at the teacher, quietly asked Peter Simonov, his friend:

Aren't you tired of these lies? I can't stand her any longer and I'll leave here.

Peter looked at Jesus, met his gaze and quickly stood up.

Wait! - he told his friend.

He looked at Jesus again, quickly, like a stone torn from a mountain, moved towards Judas Iscariot and loudly said to him with broad and clear friendliness:

Here you are with us, Judas.

It’s okay that you have such a nasty face: we also get caught in our nets who are not so ugly, and when it comes to food, they are the most delicious. And it is not for us, the fishermen of our Lord, to throw away our catch just because the fish is prickly and one-eyed. I once saw an octopus in Tyre, caught by the local fishermen, and I was so scared that I wanted to run away. And they laughed at me, a fisherman from Tiberias, and gave me some to eat, and I asked for more, because it was very tasty. Remember, teacher, I told you about this, and you laughed too. And you, Judas, look like an octopus - only with one half.

And he laughed loudly, pleased with his joke. When Peter said something, his words sounded so firmly, as if he was nailing them down. When Peter moved or did something, he made a far-audible noise and evoked a response from the most deaf things: the stone floor hummed under his feet, the doors trembled and slammed, and the very air shuddered and made noise timidly. In the gorges of the mountains, his voice awakened an angry echo, and in the mornings on the lake, when they were fishing, he rolled round and round on the sleepy and shining water and made the first timid rays of the sun smile. And, probably, they loved Peter for this: on all the other faces the shadow of the night still lay, and his large head, and wide naked chest, and freely thrown arms were already burning in the glow of the sunrise.

Peter's words, apparently approved by the teacher, dispelled the painful state of those gathered. But some, who had also been by the sea and seen the octopus, were confused by its monstrous image, which Peter so frivolously dedicated to his new student. They remembered: huge eyes, dozens of greedy tentacles, feigned calmness - and time! - hugged, doused, crushed and sucked, without even blinking his huge eyes. What is this? But Jesus is silent, Jesus smiles and looks from under his brows with friendly mockery at Peter, who continues to talk passionately about the octopus - and one after another the embarrassed disciples approached Judas, spoke kindly, but walked away quickly and awkwardly.

And only John Zebedee remained stubbornly silent, and Thomas, apparently, did not dare to say anything, pondering what had happened. He carefully examined Christ and Judas, who were sitting next to each other, and this strange proximity of divine beauty and monstrous ugliness, a man with a gentle gaze and an octopus with huge, motionless, dull, greedy eyes oppressed his mind like an unsolvable riddle. He tensely wrinkled his straight, smooth forehead, squinted his eyes, thinking that he would see better this way, but all he achieved was that Judas really seemed to have eight restlessly moving legs. But this was not true. Foma understood this and again looked stubbornly.

And Judas gradually dared: he straightened his arms, bent at the elbows, loosened the muscles that kept his jaw tense, and carefully began to expose his lumpy head to the light. She had been in plain sight before everyone, but it seemed to Judas that she was deeply and impenetrably hidden from view by some invisible, but thick and cunning veil. And now, as if he was crawling out of a hole, he felt his strange skull in the light, then his eyes stopped and resolutely opened his entire face. Nothing happened. Peter went somewhere; Jesus sat thoughtfully, leaning his head on his hand, and quietly shaking his tanned leg; The students talked among themselves, and only Thomas looked at him carefully and seriously, like a conscientious tailor taking measurements. Judas smiled - Thomas did not return the smile, but apparently took it into account, like everything else, and continued to look at it. But something unpleasant was disturbing the left side of Judas’ face; he looked back: John was looking at him from a dark corner with cold and beautiful eyes, handsome, pure, not having a single spot on his snow-white conscience. And, walking like everyone else, but feeling as if he was dragging along the ground like a punished dog, Judas approached him and said:

Why are you silent, John? Your words are like golden apples in transparent silver vessels, give one of them to Judas, who is so poor.

John looked intently into the motionless, wide-open eye and was silent. And he saw how Judas crawled away, hesitated hesitantly and disappeared into the dark depths of the open door.

Since the full moon rose, many went for a walk. Jesus also went for a walk, and from the low roof where Judas had made his bed, he saw those leaving. In the moonlight, each white figure seemed light and leisurely and did not walk, but as if glided in front of its black shadow; and suddenly the man disappeared into something black, and then his voice was heard. When people reappeared under the moon, they seemed silent - like white walls, like black shadows, like the entire transparent, hazy night. Almost everyone was already asleep when Judas heard the quiet voice of the returning Christ. And everything became quiet in the house and around it. The rooster crowed; A donkey who had woken up somewhere screamed offendedly and loudly, as in the daytime, and reluctantly, intermittently, fell silent. But Judas still did not sleep and listened, hiding. The moon illuminated half of his face and, as in a frozen lake, was reflected strangely in his huge open eye.

Suddenly he remembered something and hastily coughed, rubbing his hairy, healthy chest with his palm: perhaps someone was still awake and listening to what Judas was thinking.

Leonid Andreev

Judas Iscariot

L. Andreev. Collected works in 6 volumes. T.2. Stories, plays. 1904-1907 OCR: Liliya Turkina Jesus Christ was warned many times that Judas of Kariot was a man of very bad reputation and should be avoided. Some of the disciples who were in Judea knew him well themselves, others heard a lot about him from people, and there was no one who could say a good word about him. And if the good ones reproached him, saying that Judas was selfish, treacherous, prone to pretense and lies, then the bad ones, who were asked about Judas, reviled him with the most cruel words. “He constantly quarrels with us,” they said, spitting, “he thinks of something of his own and gets into the house quietly, like a scorpion, and comes out of it noisily. And thieves have friends, and robbers have comrades, and liars have wives to whom they tell the truth, and Judas laughs at thieves, as well as at honest ones, although he himself steals skillfully, and in his appearance he is uglier than all the inhabitants of Judea. No, he is not ours, this red-haired Judas from Kariot." the bad ones spoke, surprising the good people, for whom there was not much difference between him and all the other vicious people of Judea. With that spirit of bright contradiction that irresistibly attracted him to the rejected and unloved, he decisively accepted Judas and included him in the circle of the chosen. The disciples were worried and grumbled restrainedly, but he sat quietly, facing the setting sun, and listened thoughtfully, maybe to them, or maybe to something else. There had been no wind for ten days, and the same transparent air, attentive and sensitive, remained the same, without moving or changing. And it seemed as if he had preserved in his transparent depths everything that was shouted and sung these days by people, animals and birds - tears, crying and a cheerful song. prayer and curses, and these glassy, frozen voices made him so heavy, anxious, thickly saturated with invisible life. And once again the sun set. It rolled down heavily like a flaming ball, lighting up the sky, and everything on earth that was turned towards it: the dark face of Jesus, the walls of houses and the leaves of trees - everything obediently reflected that distant and terribly thoughtful light. The white wall was no longer white now, and the red city on the red mountain did not remain white. When, in a fit of timidity or excitement, Judas closed his living eye and shook his head, this one swayed along with the movements of his head and looked silently. Even people completely devoid of insight clearly understood, looking at Iscariot, that such a person could not bring good, but Jesus brought him closer and even sat Judas next to him. In the gorges of the mountains, his voice awakened an angry echo, and in the mornings on the lake, when they were fishing, he rolled round and round on the sleepy and shining water and made the first timid rays of the sun smile. And, probably, they loved Peter for this: on all the other faces the shadow of the night still lay, and his large head, and wide naked chest, and freely thrown arms were already burning in the glow of the sunrise. But something unpleasant was disturbing the left side of Judas’ face; he looked back: John was looking at him from a dark corner with cold and beautiful eyes, handsome, pure, not having a single spot on his snow-white conscience. And, walking like everyone else, but feeling as if he was dragging along the ground, like a punished dog. Judas approached him and said: “Why are you silent, John?” Your words are like golden apples in transparent silver vessels, give one of them to Judas, who is so poor. He readily admitted that sometimes he himself lies, but he assured with an oath that others lie even more, and if there is anyone in the world who is deceived, it is he. Judas. It happened that some people deceived him many times in this way and that. Thus, a certain treasure keeper of a rich nobleman once confessed to him that for ten years he had been constantly wanting to steal the property entrusted to him, but he could not, because he was afraid of the nobleman and his conscience. And Judas believed him, but he suddenly stole and deceived Judas. But even here Judas believed him, and he suddenly returned the stolen goods to the nobleman and again deceived Judas. And everyone deceives him, even animals: when he caresses the dog, she bites his fingers, and when he hits her with a stick, she licks his feet and looks into his eyes like a daughter. He killed this dog, buried it deep and even buried it with a large stone, but who knows? Perhaps because he killed her, she became even more alive and now does not lie in a hole, but runs happily with other dogs. They are laughing at Judas, they want to deceive poor, gullible Judas! What do you see in your dream: a tree, a wall, a donkey? In vain he showed himself from all sides, trying to make his bifurcated, predatory face with a hooked nose modest; no one looked at him, and if anyone did, it was very unfriendly, even with contempt. Judas fiercely and blindly rushed at the crowd, threatened, shouted, begged and lied, and thus gave time and opportunity for Jesus and the disciples to leave. Amazingly agile, as if he was running on ten legs, funny and scary in his rage and pleas, he rushed madly in front of the crowd and charmed them with some strange power. He shouted that he was not at all possessed by the demon of Nazareth, that he was just a deceiver, a thief who loved money, like all his disciples, like Judas himself - he shook the money box, grimaced and begged, crouching to the ground. And gradually the anger of the crowd turned into laughter and disgust, and the hands raised with stones dropped. Yes, yes, Thomas. But my father is not the devil, but a goat. Maybe the goat needs Jesus too? Heh? You don't need it, do you? Is it really not necessary? The disciples stopped, and Peter and his friend John spread the cloaks of theirs and the other disciples on the ground, and strengthened them on top between two high stones, and thus made it like a tent for Jesus. And he lay down in the tent, resting from the heat of the sun, while they entertained him with cheerful speeches and jokes. But, seeing that speeches tired him, being themselves little sensitive to fatigue and heat, they retired to some distance and indulged in various activities. Some along the mountainside looked for edible roots between the stones and, having found them, brought them to Jesus; some, climbing higher and higher, thoughtfully searched for the boundaries of the blue distance and, not finding them, climbed to new pointed stones. John found a beautiful, blue lizard between the stones and in his tender palms, quietly laughing, brought it to Jesus, and the lizard looked into his eyes with its bulging, mysterious eyes, and then quickly slid its cold body along his warm hand and quickly took away its tender , trembling tail. But before he had time to understand this, Judas said in his usual tone, flattering and at the same time mocking: “Is there anyone stronger than Peter?” When he screams, all the donkeys in Jerusalem think that their Messiah has come, and they also start screaming. Have you ever heard them scream, Thomas? Silently he walked ahead, biting a plucked blade of grass, and little by little, one by one, the disciples stopped laughing and went over to Jesus. And soon it turned out again that they all walked in a tight group in front, and Judas - Judas the victor - Judas the strong - alone trudged behind, swallowing dust. So he stood, blocking the door, huge and black, and Jesus spoke, and Peter’s intermittent and strong breathing loudly echoed his words. But suddenly Jesus fell silent with a sharp, unfinished sound, and Peter, as if waking up, exclaimed enthusiastically: “Lord!” You know the verbs of eternal life! But Jesus was silent and looked intently somewhere. And when they followed his gaze, they saw a petrified Judas at the door with his mouth open and eyes fixed. And, not understanding what was the matter, they laughed. Matthew, well-read in the Scriptures, touched Judas’s shoulder and said in the words of Solomon: “He who looks meekly will receive mercy, but he who meets at the gate will embarrass others.” And Judas became even more melancholy; he groaned, gnashed his teeth, and one could hear how restlessly his whole large body moved under the veil. Peter kissed him deeply and said loudly in his ear: “And I almost strangled you!” At least they do, but I’m right by the throat! Didn't it hurt you? Tonight you call me: brother. What will you call me tomorrow? And he raised his finger, thereby hinting at Judas’s previous slander. Soon everyone noticed this change in Judas and rejoiced at it, and only Jesus still looked at him aloofly, although he did not directly express his dislike in any way. And John himself, to whom Judas now showed deep respect as the beloved disciple of Jesus and his intercessor in the case of the three denarii, began to treat him somewhat softer and even sometimes entered into conversation. But he rarely said anything pleasant, thereby giving it special value, but rather remained silent, listened carefully to everything that was said, and thought about something. Thoughtful Judas, however, looked unpleasant, funny and at the same time fear-inspiring. While his lively and cunning eye moved, Judas seemed simple and kind, but when both eyes stopped motionless and the skin on his convex forehead gathered into strange lumps and folds, a painful guess appeared about some very special thoughts, tossing and turning under this skull . Completely alien, completely special, having no language at all, they surrounded the pondering Iscariot with a dull silence of mystery, and I wanted him to quickly begin to speak, move, even lie. For the lie itself, spoken in human language, seemed like truth and light in front of this hopelessly deaf and unresponsive silence. Without taking your eyes off Christ. Judas slowly stood up and answered quietly and importantly: “I!” Heh! - How much do you want for your Jesus? .. Why are you angry with poor Judas, who wants good for his children? You also have children, wonderful young people... - We are different... We are different... Out! ...Judas surrounded the unfortunate Jesus with quiet love, tender attention, and affection in these last days of his short life. Shy and timid, like a girl in her first love, terribly sensitive and insightful, like her, he guessed the slightest unspoken desires of Jesus, penetrated into the innermost depths of his feelings, fleeting flashes of sadness, heavy moments of fatigue. And wherever Jesus' foot stepped, it met something soft, and wherever his gaze turned, he found something pleasant. Previously, Judas did not like Mary Magdalene and other women who were near Jesus, joked rudely at them and caused minor troubles - now he became their friend, a funny and clumsy ally. He talked with them with deep interest about the small, sweet habits of Jesus, asking them for a long time with persistence about the same thing, mysteriously thrust money into their hands, into the very palm - and they brought ambergris, fragrant expensive myrrh, so loved by Jesus, and wiped his legs. He himself bought, desperately bargaining, expensive wine for Jesus and then became very angry when Peter drank almost all of it with the indifference of a man who attaches importance only to quantity, and in rocky Jerusalem, almost completely devoid of trees, flowers and greenery, he took out young spring wines from somewhere flowers, green grass and through the same women passed them on to Jesus. He himself carried small children in his arms - for the first time in his life, finding them somewhere in the courtyards or on the street and forcibly kissing them so that they would not cry, and it often happened that something small suddenly crawled into the lap of Jesus, who was lost in thought. , dark-haired, with curly hair and a dirty nose, and was demandingly looking for affection. And while they both rejoiced at each other. Judas walked sternly to the side, like a stern jailer who, in the spring, let a butterfly in to the prisoner and now feignedly grumbles, complaining about the disorder. Can you hear? Thomas answered judiciously: “We are people unaccustomed to handling weapons.” And if we enter into a fight with the Roman soldiers, they will kill us all. Besides, you only brought two swords; what can you do with two swords? She said: Judas is a liar. Judas Simonov is evil, and I left her. But maybe she’s a good woman, don’t you know? What then? - Who are you talking about? - Foma inquired. “But you know that I love you.” You know everything. Why are you looking at Judas like that? The mystery of your beautiful eyes is great, but is mine less so? Order me to stay!.. But you are silent, are you still silent? Lord, Lord, why, in anguish and torment, have I been looking for you all my life, looking for you and finding you! Set me free. Take away the heaviness, it is heavier than mountains and lead. Can't you hear how the chest of Judas of Kerioth is cracking under her? But as they climbed the mountain and approached the Garden of Gethsemane, where they had already spent so many nights in safety and silence, they became bolder. Occasionally looking back at abandoned Jerusalem, all white under the moon, they talked among themselves about the past fear, and those who walked behind heard the fragmentary quiet words of Jesus. He said that everyone would leave him. And on the other side, students came running, shaking from the cold, with frightened, sleepy faces and, not yet understanding what was the matter, hurriedly asked: “What is this?” Who are these people with torches? Pale Thomas, with a straight mustache that had curled to one side, flashed his teeth chillily and said to Peter: “Apparently they came for us.” With the crude indecision of armed force, with the awkwardness of a vaguely understood goal, the soldiers were already grabbing him by the arms and dragging him somewhere, mistaking their indecision for resistance, their fear for ridicule and mockery of them. Like a bunch of frightened lambs, the disciples crowded together, not hindering anything, but disturbing everyone - and even themselves, and only a few dared to walk and act separately from the others. Pushed from all sides, Pyotr Simonov with difficulty, as if he had lost all his strength, drew his sword from its sheath and weakly, with an oblique blow, lowered it on the head of one of the servants - but did not cause any harm. And Jesus, who noticed this, ordered him to throw down the unnecessary sword, and, with a faint clink, the iron fell at his feet, so apparently devoid of its piercing and killing power that it did not occur to anyone to pick it up. So it lay there underfoot, and many days later children playing found it in the same place and made it their amusement. Peter followed him carefully, and almost simultaneously they entered the courtyard of the high priest and intervened in the crowd of servants warming themselves by the fires. Judas gloomily warmed his bony hands over the fire and heard Peter speak loudly somewhere behind him: “No, I don’t know him.” And I saw a man who was being beaten. They beat him in the face, on the head, they threw him like a soft bale from one end to the other, and since he did not scream or resist, then for minutes, after intense staring, it really began to seem that this was not a living person, but some kind of... it’s a soft doll, without bones or blood. And she arched strangely, like a doll, and when, as she fell, she hit her head on the stones of the floor, there was no impression of a blow from hard to hard, but still soft, painless. And when you looked at it for a long time, it became like some kind of endless, strange game - sometimes to the point of almost complete deception. After one strong push, the man, or doll, fell with a smooth movement onto the knees of the sitting soldier, who, in turn, pushed away, and it turned over and sat down next to the next one, and so on and again. A strong laugh arose, and Judas also smiled - as if someone’s strong hand had torn his mouth with iron fingers. It was the mouth of Judas who was deceived. The day is coming. " - and with each step their number seemed to increase. "So, so! - Judas thought quickly, and his head began to spin like a drunken one. “It’s all over.” Now they will shout: this is ours, this is Jesus, what are you doing? And everyone will understand and..." But the believers walked in silence. Some feigned a smile, pretending that all this did not concern them, others said something restrained, but in the roar of movement, in the loud and frantic screams of Jesus' enemies, their quiet ones drowned without a trace. voices. And again it became easy. Suddenly Judas noticed Thomas carefully making his way nearby and, quickly thinking of something, wanted to approach him. At the sight of the traitor, Thomas was afraid and wanted to hide, but in a narrow, dirty street, between two walls, Judas caught up with him. - Thomas! Wait a minute! Thomas stopped and, stretching out both hands, solemnly said: “Get away from me, Satan waved his hand impatiently.” Satan! Satan! This must be proven. Throwing his hands down, Thomas asked in surprise: “But didn’t you betray the teacher?” “Another, another,” Judas said hastily. “Listen, there are a lot of you here.” We need you all to come together and loudly demand: give up Jesus, he is ours. They won’t refuse you, they won’t dare. They themselves will understand... - What are you talking about! “What are you doing,” Thomas resolutely waved his hands away, “haven’t you seen how many armed soldiers and temple servants are here?” And then there was no trial yet, and we should not interfere with the trial. Will he not understand that Jesus is innocent and order his immediate release? Under the sun, high above the heads of the crowd, he saw Jesus, bloody, pale, wearing a crown of thorns, its points piercing his forehead; he stood at the edge of the dais, visible from head to small tanned feet, and waited so calmly, was so clear in its purity and purity, that only a blind man who does not see the sun itself would not see this, only a madman would not understand. And the people were silent - it was so quiet that Judas could hear the soldier standing in front of him breathing and with each breath the belt on his body creaked somewhere. And he hears a poisonous whisper, intermittent, hot: - You are wise! . And, lying on the stone slabs, looking like an overturned devil, he still reaches out with his hand to the departing Pilate and shouts, like a passionate lover: “You are wise!” You wise! You are noble! Only the ribs move, raised by short, deep breathing. No, another sigh, Jesus is still on earth. And further? No... No... No... Jesus died. Judas bowed, bowed, bowed, and they watched and were silent: as if it was not a man who had entered, but only an unclean insect that could not be seen. But Judas of Kariot was not the kind of man to be embarrassed: they were silent, but he bowed to himself and thought that if he had to until the evening, then he would bow until the evening. Finally, the impatient Caiaphas asked: “What do you want?” And he hears Anna’s indifferent, senile voice: “And that’s all you wanted to say?” Coins flew crookedly like rain, hitting faces, hitting the table, and rolling across the floor. Some of the judges covered themselves with their hands, palms facing out, others jumped up from their seats, shouted and cursed. Judas, trying to hit Anna, threw the last coin, for which his trembling hand fumbled for a long time in the bag, spat angrily and left. my son is drowning!" - and you don’t throw yourself into the water and drown next to your son. Who loves! Peter gloomily responded to Judas’s frantic speech: “I drew my sword, but he himself said - don’t.” ? And you obeyed? - Iscariot laughed. - Peter, Peter, is it possible to listen to him! Does he understand anything about people, about struggle! - Whoever does not obey him goes to hell - Why? “You didn’t go? Why didn’t you go, Peter? Hell of fire—what is hell?” Why do you need your soul if you don’t dare to throw it into the fire when you want—Shut up! John, rising. - He himself wanted this sacrifice. And his sacrifice is beautiful! - Is there a beautiful sacrifice, what do you say, beloved disciple? a shame for everyone. Traitors, traitors, what have you done to the earth? Now they look at it from above and below and laugh and shout: look at this land, they crucified Jesus on it - like I angrily spat on the ground! . Thomas said decisively and firmly: “This is all wrong.” Judas. Think about it: if everyone died, who would tell about Jesus? Who would carry his teaching to people if everyone died: Peter, John, and me? Then will you come with me back to earth, Jesus?

III
One day, around noon, Jesus and His disciples were passing along a rocky and mountainous road, devoid of shade, and since they had already been on the road for more than five hours, Jesus began to complain of fatigue. The disciples stopped, and Peter and his friend John spread the cloaks of theirs and the other disciples on the ground, and strengthened them on top between two high stones, and thus made it like a tent for Jesus. And He lay down in the tent, resting from the heat of the sun, while they entertained Him with cheerful speeches and jokes. But, seeing that his speeches tired Him, being themselves little sensitive to fatigue and heat, they retired to some distance and indulged in various activities. Some along the mountainside looked for edible roots between the stones and, having found them, brought them to Jesus; some, climbing higher and higher, thoughtfully searched for the boundaries of the blue distance and, not finding them, climbed to new pointed stones. John found a beautiful, blue lizard between the stones and in his tender palms, quietly laughing, he brought it to Jesus, and the lizard looked with its bulging, mysterious eyes into His eyes, and then quickly slid its cold body along His warm hand and quickly took away its tender , trembling tail.
Peter, who did not like quiet pleasures, and Philip with him began to tear off large stones from the mountain and let them down, competing in strength. And, attracted by their loud laughter, the rest gradually gathered around them and took part in the game. Straining, they tore an old, overgrown stone from the ground, lifted it high with both hands and sent it down the slope. Heavy, he struck briefly and bluntly and thought for a moment, then hesitantly made the first leap - and with each touch to the ground, taking from it speed and strength, he became light, ferocious, all-crushing. He no longer jumped, but flew with bared teeth, and the air, whistling, passed his blunt, round carcass. Here is the edge - with a smooth last movement the stone soared upward and calmly, in heavy thoughtfulness, flew down roundly to the bottom of an invisible abyss.
- Come on, one more! - Peter shouted. His white teeth sparkled among his black beard and mustache, his powerful chest and arms were exposed, and the old angry stones, stupidly amazed at the strength that lifted them, one after another obediently were carried away into the abyss. Even fragile John threw small stones, and Jesus, quietly smiling, looked at their fun.
- What are you doing, Judas? Why don't you take part in the game, it seems to be so much fun? - Foma asked, finding his strange friend motionless, behind a large gray stone.
- My chest hurts, and they didn’t call me.
- Is it really necessary to call? Well, so I’m calling you, go. Look at the stones Peter throws.
Judas somehow looked sideways at him, and here Thomas for the first time vaguely felt that Judas from Kariot had two faces. But before he had time to understand this, Judas said in his usual tone, flattering and at the same time mocking:
- Is there anyone stronger than Peter? When he screams, all the donkeys in Jerusalem think that their Messiah has come, and they also start screaming. Have you ever heard them scream, Thomas?
And, smiling welcomingly and bashfully wrapping his clothes around his chest, overgrown with curly red hair. Judas entered the circle of players. And since everyone was having a lot of fun, they greeted him with joy and loud jokes, and even John smiled condescendingly when Judas, groaning and feigning groans, took hold of a huge stone. But then he easily picked it up and threw it, and his blind, wide-open eye, swaying, motionless stared at Peter, and the other, sly and cheerful, filled with quiet laughter.
- No, just give it up! - Peter said offended. And so, one after another, they lifted and threw giant stones, and the disciples looked at them in surprise. Peter threw a large stone - Judas threw an even larger one. Peter, gloomy and concentrated, angrily tossed a piece of rock, staggered, lifted it and dropped it down - Judas, continuing to smile, looked for an even larger piece with his eye, tenderly dug into it with his long fingers, licked it, swayed with it and, turning pale, sent it into the abyss. Having thrown his stone, Peter leaned back and watched it fall - Judas leaned forward, arched and extended his long moving arms, as if he himself wanted to fly away after the stone. Finally, both of them, first Peter, then Judas, grabbed an old, gray stone - and neither one nor the other could lift it. All red, Peter decisively approached Jesus and said loudly:
- God! I don't want Judas to be stronger than me. Help me pick up that stone and throw it.
And Jesus quietly answered him something. Peter shrugged his broad shoulders displeasedly, but did not dare to object and returned back with the words:
- He said: who will help Iscariot?
But then he looked at Judas, who, panting and clenching his teeth tightly, continued to hug the stubborn stone, and laughed cheerfully:
- So sick! Look what our sick, poor Judas is doing!
And Judas himself laughed, so unexpectedly caught in his lie, and everyone else laughed - even Thomas slightly parted his straight gray mustache hanging over his lips with a smile. And so, chatting and laughing in a friendly manner, everyone set off, and Peter, completely reconciled with the winner, from time to time nudged him in the side with his fist and laughed loudly:
- So sick!
Everyone praised Judas, everyone recognized that he was a winner, everyone chatted with him friendly, but Jesus... but Jesus did not want to praise Judas this time either. Silently He walked ahead, biting a plucked blade of grass, and little by little, one by one, the disciples stopped laughing and went over to Jesus. And soon it turned out again that they all walked in a tight group in front, and Judas - Judas the victor - Judas the strong - alone trudged behind, swallowing dust.
So they stopped, and Jesus put his hand on Peter’s shoulder, with the other hand pointing into the distance, where Jerusalem had already appeared in the haze. And Peter’s broad, powerful back carefully accepted this thin, tanned hand.
They stopped for the night in Bethany, in the house of Lazarus. And when everyone gathered for a conversation, Judas thought that they would now remember his victory over Peter, and sat down closer. But the students were silent and unusually thoughtful. The times of the path traveled: the sun, and the stone, and the grass, and Christ reclining in the tent - quietly floated in my head, evoking soft thoughtfulness, giving birth to vague but sweet dreams of some kind of eternal movement under the sun. The tired body rested sweetly, and it was all thinking about something mysteriously beautiful and big - and no one remembered Judas.
Judas left. Then he returned. Jesus spoke, and the disciples listened to His speech in silence. Mary sat motionless, like a statue, at His feet and, throwing her head back, looked into His face. John, moving closer, tried to make sure that his hand touched the Teacher’s clothes, but did not bother Him. He touched it and froze. And Peter breathed loudly and strongly, echoing the words of Jesus with his breath.
Iscariot stopped at the threshold and, contemptuously passing by the gaze of those gathered, concentrated all his fire on Jesus. And as he looked, everything around him faded, became covered in darkness and silence, and only Jesus brightened with His raised hand. But then He seemed to rise into the air, as if He had melted and became as if He all consisted of a fog above the lake, penetrated by the light of the setting moon, and His soft speech sounded somewhere far, far away and tenderly. And, peering into the wavering ghost, listening to the tender melody of distant and ghostly words, Judas took his entire soul into his iron fingers and, in its immense darkness, silently began to build something huge. Slowly, in the deep darkness, he raised some huge masses, like mountains, and smoothly laid one on top of the other, and raised it again, and laid the shaft again, and something grew in the darkness, expanded silently, pushed the boundaries. Here he felt his head like a dome, and in the impenetrable darkness a huge thing continued to grow, and someone was silently working: raising huge masses like mountains, putting one on top of the other and lifting again... And somewhere distant and ghostly words sounded tenderly.
So he stood, blocking the door, huge and black, and Jesus spoke, and Peter’s intermittent and strong breathing loudly echoed His words. But suddenly Jesus fell silent - with a sharp, unfinished sound, and Peter, as if waking up, exclaimed enthusiastically:
- God! You know the verbs of eternal life!
But Jesus was silent and looked intently somewhere. And when they followed His gaze, they saw a petrified Judas at the door with his mouth open and eyes fixed. And, not understanding what was the matter, they laughed. Matthew, well-read in the Scriptures, touched Judas’s shoulder and said in the words of Solomon:
- He who looks meekly will be pardoned, and he who meets at the gate will embarrass others.
Judas shuddered and even cried out slightly in fright, and everything about him - his eyes, arms and legs - seemed to run in different directions, like an animal that suddenly saw the eyes of a man above him. Jesus walked straight to Judas and carried some word on His lips - and walked past Judas through the open and now free door.
Already in the middle of the night, worried Thomas approached Judas’s bed, squatted down and asked:
-Are you crying, Judas?
- No. Step aside, Thomas.
- Why are you moaning and grinding your teeth? Are you unwell?
Judas paused, and from his lips, one after another, heavy words filled with melancholy and anger began to fall.
- Why doesn't He love me? Why does He love those? Am I not more beautiful, better, stronger than them? Was it not I who saved His life while they fled, crouching like cowardly dogs?
- My poor friend, you are not entirely right. You are not at all handsome, and your tongue is as unpleasant as your face. You lie and slander constantly, how do you want Jesus to love you?
But Judas certainly didn’t hear him and continued, moving heavily in the darkness:
- Why is He not with Judas, but with those who do not love Him? John brought Him a lizard - I would have brought Him a poisonous snake. Peter threw stones - I would have turned a mountain for him! But what is a poisonous snake? Now her tooth has been pulled out, and she is wearing a necklace around her neck. But what is a mountain that can be torn down with hands and feet and trampled on? I would give Him Judas, brave, beautiful Judas! And now He will perish, and Judas will perish with Him.
- You're saying something strange. Judas!
- A dry fig tree that needs to be chopped with an ax - after all, it’s me, He said it about me. Why doesn't He cut? He doesn't dare, Thomas. I know Him: He is afraid of Judas! He is hiding from the brave, strong, beautiful Judas! He loves stupid people, traitors, liars. You are a liar, Thomas, have you heard about this?
Thomas was very surprised and wanted to object, but he thought that Judas was simply scolding, and only shook his head in the darkness. And Judas became even more melancholy; he groaned, gnashed his teeth, and one could hear how restlessly his whole large body moved under the veil.
- Why does Judas hurt so much? Who put the fire on his body? He gives his son to the dogs! He gives his daughter to robbers to be mocked, his bride to be desecrated. But doesn't Judas have a tender heart? Go away, Thomas, go away, stupid. Let the strong, brave, beautiful Judas remain alone!

IV
Judas hid several denarii, and this was revealed thanks to Thomas, who accidentally saw how much money was given. One could assume that this was not the first time Judas had committed a theft, and everyone was indignant. The angry Peter grabbed Judas by the collar of his dress and almost dragged him to Jesus, and the frightened, pale Judas did not resist.
- Teacher, look! Here he is - a joker! Here he is - a thief! You trusted him, and he steals our money. Thief! Scoundrel! If you allow me, I myself...
But Jesus was silent. And, looking at him carefully, Peter quickly blushed and unclenched the hand that was holding the collar. Judas bashfully recovered, glanced sideways at Peter and assumed the submissively depressed look of a repentant criminal.
- So that's how it is! - Peter said angrily and slammed the door loudly, leaving. And everyone was dissatisfied and said that they would never stay with Judas now, but John quickly realized something and slipped through the door, behind which the quiet and seemingly gentle voice of Jesus could be heard. And when, after a while, he came out of there, he was pale, and his downcast eyes were red, as if from recent tears.
- The teacher said... The teacher said that Judas can take as much money as he wants.
Peter laughed angrily. John quickly, reproachfully looked at him and, suddenly burning all over, mixing tears with anger, delight with tears, he loudly exclaimed:
- And no one should count how much money Judas received. He is our brother, and all his money is like ours, and if he needs a lot, let him take a lot without telling anyone or consulting anyone. Judas is our brother, and you have seriously offended him - that’s what the Teacher said... Shame on us, brothers!
A pale, wryly smiling Judas stood in the doorway, and with a slight movement John approached and kissed him three times. Jacob, Philip and others came up behind him, looking at each other, embarrassed - after each kiss, Judas wiped his mouth, but smacked loudly, as if this sound gave him pleasure. Peter was the last to arrive.
- We are all stupid here, we are all blind, Judas. He alone sees, He alone is smart. Can I kiss you?
- From what? Kiss! - Judas agreed.
Peter kissed him deeply and said loudly in his ear:
- And I almost strangled you! At least they do, but I’m right by the throat! Didn't it hurt you?
- A little bit.
- I’ll go to Him and tell him everything. After all, I was angry with him too,” Peter said gloomily, trying to open the door quietly, without noise.
- What about you, Foma? - John sternly asked, observing the actions and words of the disciples.
- I do not know yet. I need to think.
And Foma thought for a long time, almost all day. The disciples went about their business, and somewhere behind the wall Peter was shouting loudly and cheerfully, and he was figuring everything out. He would have done it faster, but he was somewhat hindered by Judas, who was constantly watching him with a mocking gaze and occasionally seriously asking:
- How are you, Foma? How's it going?
Then Judas brought out his cash drawer and loudly, jingling coins and pretending not to look at Thomas, began to count the money.
- Twenty-one, twenty-two, twenty-three... Look, Thomas, a counterfeit coin again. Oh, what swindlers all these people are, they even donate counterfeit money... Twenty-four... And then they will say again that Judas stole... Twenty-five, twenty-six...
Foma resolutely approached him - it was already evening - and said:
- He's right, Judas. Let me kiss you.
- Is that so? Twenty nine, thirty. In vain. I'll steal again. Thirty one…
- How can you steal when you have neither yours nor someone else’s? You'll just take as much as you need, brother.
- And it took you so long to repeat only His words? You don’t value time, smart Thomas.
- You seem to be laughing at me, brother?
- And think, are you doing well, virtuous Thomas, repeating His words? After all, it was He who said - “his” - and not you. It was He who kissed me - you only desecrated my mouth. I still feel your wet lips crawling over me. This is so disgusting, good Thomas. Thirty-eight, thirty-nine, forty. Forty denarii, Thomas, would you like to check?
- After all, He is our Teacher. How can we not repeat the words of the Teacher?
- Did Judas’ gate fall off? Is he naked now and there is nothing to grab him by? When the Teacher leaves home, and again Judas accidentally steals three denarii, and won’t you grab him by the same gate?
- We know now, Judas. We get it.
- Don’t all students have bad memory? And weren't all teachers deceived by their students? When the teacher raises the rod, the students shout: we know, teacher! And the teacher went to bed, and the students said: isn’t this what the teacher taught us? And here. This morning you called me: thief. Tonight you call me: brother. What will you call me tomorrow?
Judas laughed and, easily lifting the heavy, clinking box with his hand, continued:
- When a strong wind blows, it raises rubbish. And stupid people look at the rubbish and say: that's the wind! And this is just rubbish, my good Thomas, donkey droppings trampled underfoot. So he met a wall and quietly lay down at its foot, and the wind flies on, the wind flies on, my good Thomas!
Judas pointed a warning hand over the wall and laughed again.
“I’m glad you’re having fun,” said Thomas. - But it’s a pity that there is so much evil in your gaiety.
- How can a person who has been kissed so much and who is so useful not be cheerful? If I had not stolen three denarii, would John have known what rapture was? And isn’t it nice to be a hook on which John hangs his damp virtue, Thomas his moth-eaten mind?
- It seems to me that it is better for me to leave.
- But I'm joking. I'm joking, my good Thomas - I just wanted to know if you really want to kiss old, nasty Judas, the thief who stole three denarii and gave them to a harlot.
- A harlot? - Foma was surprised. - Did you tell the Teacher about this?
- Here you are doubting again, Foma. Yes, a harlot. But if you knew, Thomas, what kind of unfortunate woman she was. She hasn't eaten anything for two days...
- You probably know this? - Foma was embarrassed.
- Yes, sure. After all, I myself was with her for two days and saw that she was not eating anything and drinking only red wine. She staggered from exhaustion, and I fell with her...
Thomas quickly stood up and, having already walked a few steps away, said to Judas:
- Apparently, Satan has taken possession of you, Judas.
And as he was leaving, he heard in the approaching twilight how the heavy cash box jingled pitifully in Judas’s hands. And it was as if Judas was laughing.
But the very next day Thomas had to admit that he was mistaken in Judas - Iscariot was so simple, gentle and at the same time serious. He did not grimace, did not make malicious jokes, did not bow or insult, but quietly and imperceptibly did his business. He was as agile as before - as if he had not two legs, like all people, but a whole dozen of them, but he ran silently, without squeaks, screams and laughter, similar to the laughter of a hyena, with which he used to accompany all his actions. And when Jesus began to speak, he quietly sat down in the corner, folded his arms and legs and looked so well with his big eyes that many paid attention to it. And he stopped saying bad things about people, and was more silent, so that the strict Matthew himself considered it possible to praise him, saying in the words of Solomon:
- A weak-minded person expresses contempt for his neighbor, but a reasonable person remains silent.
And he raised his finger, thereby hinting at Judas’s previous slander. Soon everyone noticed this change in Judas and rejoiced at it, and only Jesus still looked at him aloofly, although he did not directly express His dislike in any way. And John himself, to whom Judas now showed deep respect as the beloved disciple of Jesus and his intercessor in the case of the three denarii, began to treat him somewhat softer and even sometimes entered into conversation.
“What do you think, Judas,” he once said condescendingly, “which of us, Peter or I, will be the first near Christ in his Heavenly Kingdom?”
Judas thought and answered:
- I assume you are.
“And Peter thinks that he is,” John grinned.
- No. Peter will scatter all the angels with his cry - do you hear how he screams? Of course, he will argue with you and try to be the first to take the place, since he assures that he also loves Jesus, but he is already a little old, and you are young, he is heavy on his feet, and you run fast, and you will be the first to enter there with Christ. Is not it?
“Yes, I will not leave Jesus,” John agreed.
And on the same day and with the same question, Peter Simonov turned to Judas. But, fearing that his loud voice would be heard by others, he took Judas to the farthest corner, behind the house.
- So what do you think? - he asked anxiously. - You are smart, the Teacher Himself praises you for your intelligence, and you will tell the truth.
“Of course you are,” Iscariot answered without hesitation, and Peter exclaimed indignantly:
- I told him!
- But, of course, even there he will try to take first place from you.
- Certainly!
- But what can he do when the place is already occupied by you? Surely you will be the first to go there with Jesus? Won't you leave Him alone? Didn't He call you a stone?
Peter put his hand on Judas's shoulder and said passionately:
“I’m telling you, Judas, you are the smartest of us.” Why are you so mocking and angry? The teacher doesn't like this. Otherwise, you too could become a beloved disciple, no worse than John. But only to you,” Peter raised his hand threateningly, “I will not give up my place next to Jesus, neither on earth nor there!” Do you hear?
So Judas tried to please everyone, but at the same time he was thinking something of his own. And, remaining the same modest, reserved and inconspicuous, he was able to tell everyone what he especially liked. So, he said to Thomas:
- A fool believes every word, but a prudent man is attentive to his ways.
Matthew, who suffered from some excess in food and drink and was ashamed of it, cited the words of the wise and revered Solomon:
- The righteous eats until he is full, but the belly of the wicked suffers deprivation.
But he rarely said anything pleasant, thereby giving it special value, but rather remained silent, listened carefully to everything that was said, and thought about something. Thoughtful Judas, however, looked unpleasant, funny and at the same time fear-inspiring. While his lively and cunning eye moved, Judas seemed simple and kind, but when both eyes stopped motionless and the skin on his convex forehead gathered into strange lumps and folds, a painful guess appeared about some very special thoughts, tossing and turning under this skull . Completely alien, completely special, having no language at all, they surrounded the pondering Iscariot with a dull silence of mystery, and I wanted him to quickly begin to speak, move, even lie. For the lie itself, spoken in human language, seemed like truth and light in front of this hopelessly deaf and unresponsive silence.
- Thinking again, Judas? - Peter shouted, with his clear voice and face suddenly breaking the dull silence of Judas’s thoughts, driving them away somewhere into a dark corner. - What are you thinking about?
“About many things,” Iscariot answered with a calm smile. And, having probably noticed how badly his silence affected others, he began to move away from his students more often and spent a lot of time in solitary walks, or climbed onto a flat roof and sat there quietly. And already several times Thomas was slightly frightened, unexpectedly stumbling upon some gray pile in the darkness, from which Judas’ arms and legs suddenly protruded and his playful voice was heard.
Only once did Judas somehow particularly sharply and strangely remind him of the former Judas, and this happened precisely during a dispute about primacy in the Kingdom of Heaven. In the presence of the Teacher, Peter and John argued with each other, hotly challenging their place near Jesus: they listed their merits, measured the degree of their love for Jesus, got excited, shouted, even cursed uncontrollably, Peter - all red with anger, rumbling, John - pale and quiet, with trembling hands and biting speech. Their argument was already becoming obscene and the Teacher began to frown when Peter casually looked at Judas and laughed smugly, John looked at Judas and also smiled - each of them remembered what the smart Iscariot told him. And, already anticipating the joy of the imminent triumph, they silently and in agreement called Judas to be a judge, and Peter shouted:
- Come on, smart Judas! Tell us, who will be first near Jesus - him or me?
But Judas was silent, breathing heavily and with his eyes he eagerly asked the calm, deep eyes of Jesus about something.
“Yes,” confirmed John condescendingly, “tell him who will be first near Jesus.”
Without taking his eyes off Christ, Judas slowly stood up and answered quietly and importantly:
- I!
Jesus slowly lowered his gaze. And, quietly beating himself in the chest with a bony finger, Iscariot repeated solemnly and sternly:
- I! I will be near Jesus!
And he left. Struck by the daring act, the disciples were silent, and only Peter, suddenly remembering something, whispered to Thomas in an unexpectedly quiet voice:
- So that’s what he’s thinking about!.. Have you heard?