The Book of Life
Libretto: Niklas Rådström Music: Sven-David Sandström 2019 Opera in Three Acts
Music: Sven-David Sandström
The Book of Life
2019 Opera in Three Acts Act 1
PROLOGUE (Choir)
SCENE 1: Creation (The Woman, The Man)
SCENE 2: Cain (Cain, The Angel of the Lord)
SCENE 3: On Board the Ark (Choir (also Soli), The Man, The Woman, Japheth, Adataneses)
SCENE 4: The Noahic Covenant (The Angel of the Lord, Noah, Japheth, Shem)
SCENE 5: The Tower of Babel (Choir (also Soli), The Lord’s Three Angels)
SCENE 6: Abraham (Abraham, Sarah, The Lord’s Three Angels)
SCENE 7: The Wife of Lot (The Man, The Woman, Choir, The Wife of Lot)
SCENE 8: Abraham and Isaac (Abraham, The Lord’s Three Angels)
SCENE 9: The Israelites Oppressed in Egypt (Pharaoh, Pharaoh’s Wife)
SCENE 10: Moses by the River (The Woman)
Libretto: Niklas Rådström
Characters
The Woman ..............................
Lyric mezzo soprano [362 bars]*
The Man Baritone [192 bars]
Moses Baritone [377 bars]
The Lord’s Three Angels: The Angel of the Lord ............. Dramatic soprano [592 bars]
The Lord’s Second Angel ...... Dramatic mezzo soprano [297 bars]
The Lord’s Third Angel .......... Lyric mezzo soprano [157 bars]
Abraham Bass [129 bars]
The Wife of Lot Alto [105 bars]
Aaron Bass [95 bars]
Jesus Baritone [94 bars] Job Baritone [88 bars]
Miriam Soprano [85 bars]
Mary of Magdala Mezzo soprano [74 bars]
Joshua Tenor [63 bars]
Jonah Baritone [56 bars] Pharaoh Baritone [53 bars]
Woman 1 Soprano [47 bars]
Woman Mezzo soprano [49 bars] High Priest Tenor [46 bars] Pilate Baritone [45 bars]
Cain Tenor [44 bars] Japheth Tenor [44 bars] Paul Baritone [39 bars]
Pharaoh’s Wife Mezzo soprano [34 bars] Noa Bass [31 bars]
Adataneses, Wife of Japheth Soprano [11 bars] Elisabeth Mezzo soprano/Alto [26 bars]
Sarah Alto [24 bars]
Zophar Tenor [25 bars]
Isaiah Tenor [23 bars]
A Prophet ................................. Tenor [6 bars]
A Prisoner ................................. Tenor [3 bars] Amos Baritone [16 bars]
Shem .......................................... Baritone [11 bars]
Peter .......................................... Baritone [6 bars]
Eliphas ...................................... Bass baritone [11 bars] Jeremiah .................................... Bass [8 bars]
The Three Apostles ................. Tenor; Bar./Bass; Bar./Bass [8; 3; 6 bars]
Mixed Choir ............................. (S Mz A T Bar B), minor solo parts *) Total number of bars sung in the entire opera.
Instrumentation *
2 Flutes
2 Oboes
2 Clarinets in Bb
2 Bassoons
4 Horns in F
2 Trumpets in C
2 Trombones
2 Tubas
Timpani
Percussion (2 players)
I. Tuned gongs, 3 Piatti, Tom, Gran cassa, Tamburo basco, Marimba, Campanelli
II. 3 Tam tams, 5 Tom toms, Gran cassa, Vibraphone, Gran cassa Harp
Strings
* Instrumentation Act 2: 1111 1111 12 0 str (soli 66432)
The music engraving of this opera was made after the composer’s death. Contradictions and discrepancies between the handwritten score (MS) and the libretto has been revised; minor rhythmical adjustments in the vocal parts has been made accordning to the libretto to keep the meaning of the text intact, a few cases of incomplete bars has been adjusted to fit the meter, and presumed misspelling and left out music and/or dynamics has been replaced with suggested alternatives. The latter are marked * accompanied by an editorial note. The editorial work was made by Anders Annerholm 2022.
Duration: Act 1: 1 h 15 min Act 2: 1 h 20 min Act 3: 1 h 20 min Total: ca 4 h
World premiere October 14, 2022; Louis De Geer Concert Hall, Norrköping Norrköping Symphony Orchestra, cond. Tobias Ringborg Staging: Peter Oskarsson
Copyright © 2019 Gehrmans Musikförlag AB, Stockholm
Setting: The land between the rivers and the sea.
Note: The scenographic design of the opera should neither aim at a historical re creation nor define the scenes in a specific time period. The set should not include any recognizable religious symbols.
SCENE 1: Creation
(The stage is empty. The only thing that exists of the world is a solitary tone.
The conductor comes in with a large book under his arm. It is the book that holds the whole world and the story of it. It is also the book that contains the score of the opera.
/We will meet this book with the score for the world and the opera we also see later in the performance. Finally in the penultimate scene where The Angel of the Lord in the words of Revelation tells Jonah to write his name in the Book of Life /
When the conductor opens the book, a strong light radiates from it. Note by note, gesture by gesture, the conductor lifts all the orchestra’s instruments from the book and brings them to life.
At the same time, the stage is filled with figures, shadows, movements, silhouettes, people. Out of the multitude of figures on stage come voices, shouts, screams, growls, chirps and noices.
What we see is both beautiful and frightening, with a fragility torn apart by sudden outbursts. The Lord’s Three Angels are among the crowd on stage. When the voices and figures disperse two people are visible in the middle of the stage, the Woman and the Man. They are embracing each other. In a gesture from the conductor, the others push them center stage and starts to leave. The Woman and the Man try to follow but are stopped by The Three Angels and are finally left alone, two refugees condemned to wander the earth.)
The Woman: Why couldn’t he let us stay?
The Man: I saw you naked. And you saw me.
The Woman: You saw me. And I saw you.
(They embrace and kiss one another.)
The Man: You are a wild rose, a lily in the valley.
Like a lily among thorns.
The Woman: You’re an apple tree in the forest. I rest in the shadows with great delight, your fruit sweet to my taste.
(They separate from each other.)
The Man: He wanted us to obey all that he said.
The Woman: We just talked as if we were of the same kind.
The Man: That he couldn’t stand.
The Woman: Give me something to drink.
(He gives her their sack of water.)
The Man: We can’t stay in the wilderness. Soon the rain will be here.
The Woman: I want a home. Somewhere where we belong.
The Man: A Child. Maybe a small boy?
The Woman: Two.
The Man: Two?
The Woman: A small shepherd.
The Man: And one to help us with the earth.
The Woman: Two brothers, they will just fight.
The Man: Our love will carry both of them.
(Sudden blows from a hammer. The woman tries to shy away.)
The Man: Don’t be afraid. It’s only the thunder.
The Woman: Come now, we must go on.
(Just as they are about to leave the stage, they are almost knocked over by a younger man, Cain. They leave. Cain is afraid as if hunted.)
SCENE 2: Cain(Cain rushes across the stage straight at The Angel of the Lord. Cain does not see him and knocks a load of the papers out of his hands so that they are spread across the stage.)
Cain: I’m sorry. Pardon. I didn’t see you.
(They begin to pick up the papers.)
The Angel of the Lord: What’s your hurry?
Cain: I must get to my land. I have soil to plow. To sow and harvest.
The Angel of the Lord: You’re out of breath. What’s your name?
Cain: Cain.
The Angel of the Lord: Rest a while, Cain. The earth lies where it is.
(Cain picks up some papers and gives them to The Angel of the Lord.)
Cain: What’s all these papers?
The Angel of the Lord: It’s contracts and covenants that the Lord has sent me to make with all men.
Cain: So much paperwork.
(The Angel of the Lord sees that the papers Cain has given him are bloodied.)
The Angel of the Lord: You’re bleeding.
Cain: No.
The Angel of the Lord: Yes, you’re bleeding.
Cain: No, it is not my blood.
Cain: No, no. It was a beast that... a sheep sacrificed at the altar.
The Angel of the Lord: A sacrificed sheep? I thought you were a farmer?
Cain: It was my brother’s sacrifice. My brother Abel is... a shepherd.
The Angel of the Lord: So, this is your brother’s blood?
Cain: The blood my brother sacrificed. He sacrificed to the Lord the firstlings of his flock and the fat thereof.
I brought of the fruit of the ground: the finest I could harvest ...
My brother’s offerings the Lord greeted with all the joy in the world.
But for my sacrifice the Lord had no respect.
Do you think that’s fair? Is it?
Is my sacrifice not as fine as that my brother gave?
(Cain looks away.)
The Angel of the Lord: What’s this anger? And why do you look away?
Where is he, Abel, your brother?
Kain: I don’t know. Why ask me? Am I my brother’s keeper?
The Angel of the Lord: What have you done? This blood, it’s your brother’s!
Cain: No!
The Angel of the Lord: The voice of your brother’s blood cries unto me from the ground.
Cain: No! (realizes he is exposed)
The Angel of the Lord: You have killed your brother. You are cursed…
Cain: I didn’t know...
The Angel of the Lord: You are cursed from the earth, which has opened her mouth to receive your brother’s blood from your hands.
When you till the earth, it shall not yield unto you her strength.
A fugitive and a vagabond you shall be on the earth.
Cain: A fugitive and a vagabond; be on the earth.
Whoever finds me shall slay me… This is more than I can bear.
(The Angel of the Lord wets his finger with Cain's brother's blood and attaches a mark to Cain's forehead.)
The Angel of the Lord: I promise you, whoever slay Cain, vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold. Now go, east of Eden.
(Cain starts to leave, but stops as if to say something. The Angel of the Lord gives him a brief glance and then turns his back on him. Thunder rumbles. A sudden rain begins to fall.)
SCENE 3: On Board the Ark
(Heavy rain and wind tear throughout the stage. In the distance we hear the song of whales, long drawn out notes that will later return in the opera and be given a special meaning. We are transported through the rain and the storm down into a huge ship that drifts on the agitated waves of the ocean and down to a cargo hold at the bottom of an ark. There are animals everywhere in the shadows, perhaps in the form of a large choir in animal masks.
Among them, the Man and the Woman hides as stowaways in the dark. We hear creaking cordage, stomping waves and distant whale song.)
Bluetit: Listen!
Giraffe: What?
Bluetit: Listen!
Giraffe: What?
Horse: There’s someone out there!
Giraffe: What?
Fox: It’s only the sea.
Bluetit: Listen!
Chorus: The sea! The sea!
Horse: What does it want?
Chorus: What does the sea want!
Elephant: The waves are beating.
Bluetit: Listen?
Chorus: Waves are beating. Beating!
Hare: Does the sea want to come in here!
Chorus Waves are beating. Beating!
The sea! The sea!
Goat: Can we live there?
Giraffe: What?
Fox: No one can live there.
Elephant: All sinners are drowned in the sea.
Chorus: The sea! The sea!
Bluetit: Listen!
Pelican: The fishes live there.
Chorus: Fishes live there!
Elephant: Are there no sinners among the fishes?
Fox: All of our kind must die, but the fishes can live!
Giraffe: Fishes can live!
Fox: No sinners in the sea.
Chorus: The sea! The sea!
(The Woman leave their hiding place, neither she or The Man can understand the animals.)
The Man: Where are you going?
The Woman: To find something to eat.
Goat: Now she is awake again.
Horse: I think she’s nice.
The Man: Come back here.
The Woman: You want some milk? I can milk a goat.
Goat: No! Enough already!
The Man: Just some water.
(Suddenly Japheth enters, he's a bit drunk. The animals are frightened and backs away. Japheth sees the Woman who has not had time to hide.)
Japheth: What… What the… Who are you?
The Woman: Wait…
Japheth: (shouting:) Dad! Dad! A stowaway!
(The Man gets up.)
The Man: Wait…
Japheth: What the... One more. Stowaways! Hey (to the Man and the Woman) How many are you?
The Woman: It’s just us.
(Japheth glare at her. The rain slowly recedes.)
Japheth: Are you the chosen ones? Eh?! Did the Lord ask you to build the ark? Eh?! Did he? We’re the ones that were chosen. It was us. Us. Dad says…
The Man: (interrupts) So you have built this ark yourselves?
Japheth: The Lord told us to build it. Do you think you could have done it? Eh?! Dad says the Lord told us…
The Woman: (interrupts) Did the Lord also tell your father why everything and everyone should perish in the flood?
Japheth: Dad says God regrets all that he has created.
The Woman: Regrets? Already?
Japheth: Dad says all men are evil.
The Man: All?
Japheth: All except us. Dad says… All shall perish. All except us. Dad says…
The Man: Why you?
Japheth: Dad says we’re the chosen ones...
The Woman: And how about us?
Japheth: You’re stowaways. We shall throw you into the sea. Dad!
(Japheth grabs them violently, but is interrupted by a sudden crash and the whole scene tremble. They fall over and Japheth is knocked unconscious. Upset noices from the animals. The Man and the Woman get on their feet.)
The Man: What was that? What happened?
The Woman: I think we ran aground.
(They examine Japheth.)
The Woman: Is he dead?
The Man: No, just knocked out.
(Japheth’s wife Adataneses shouts off scene.)
Adataneses: Japheth!
(The man and the woman hides. Adataneses enters.)
Adataneses: Japheth!
(Japheth awakens.)
Adataneses: It’s over.
Japheth: Over?
Adataneses: The water flows away. Come.
Japheth: But there were stowaways here!
Adatanese: Come. Let’s go ashore
Japheth: Ashore?
Adataneses: On solid ground.
Japheth: On solid ground. And the stowaways?
Adataneses: Forget them. Come.
(Adataneses and Japheth leaves.)
Dog: There they go.
Giraffe: What?
Bluetit: Listen.
Elephant: Back to dad.
Antelope: What’s a stowaway?
Cat: Someone that doesn’t belong.
Ostrich: Like the worm in the wood.
Dog: The fleas in the fleece.
Fox: The mould in the bowl.
Elephant: The worm in the wood.
(A sudden light penetrates from above through the darkness as if a hatch is opened high up in the ark and a ray of sunshine wanders down through the ship. The man rises in the beam of light.)
The Man: (to the Woman who lingers) Look! No more rain.
Chorus: (a receding herd of animals)
No more rain! Let’s go. No more flood.
Let’s go. No more rain. No more flood.
The Man: (to the Woman) Come. Gate is open.
(The animals leave the stage one by one. The Man and the Woman are left alone. The man tries to lure the woman into the light, but she lingers hesitantly.)
The Man: Come, my love.
Rise, my fair one, rise and come away.
The winter is past.
The rain is over and gone.
The flowers appear on the earth,
The time of singing is come.
Soon the fig tree will blossom, soon the vines are full of tender grapes. Come, my love, in the clefts of the rock, in the secret place. Let me see you. Let me hear your voice. Your voice as sweet as yourself is beautiful.
The Woman: I think of everything that the flood has destroyed.
The Man: Think instead of today as the day when the world begins.
SCENE 4: The Noahic Covenant
(It's a beautiful sunny day, the first for the new world. Shimmering clouds, budding greenery, music that lets us breathe. A twinkling rainbow arches over the stage.
Noah, an elderly man, is by a table negotiating with The Angel of the Lord. Next to them is Noah's sons Shem and Japheth with Adamates. The Angel of the Lord has a large contract from the bundle of papers we saw during the scene with Cain. The Angel of the Lord reads from the treaty.)
The Angel of the Lord: As a sign of the covenant the Lord today has instituted, between himself and you and all living things. For all future generations, he puts his rainbow in the clouds. (Wondering, suspiscously.)
Noah: What does this really mean?
The Angel of the Lord: It means that the Lord never again will try to destroy all living things. Noah: Never again?
The Angel of the Lord: Never.
Noah: Can we be sure?
The Angel of the Lord: As long as the world exists there will be sowing and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night
Japheth: Dad! I know there were some stowaways!
Noah: Not now, Japheth! Can’t you see I’m busy! (to The Angel of the Lord:) And this in small print?
The Angel of the Lord: It says that you, be ye fruitful, and multiply. Bring forth abundantly on the earth, And multiply therein.
Noah turns to his second son, Shem.)
Noah: What do you think, Shem? It sounds good, doesn’t it?
(Shem looks sceptically at the papers.)
Shem: (sceptically) I’m sure there’s a catch somewhere.
The Angel of the Lord: Flesh with the life thereof, which is the blood thereof, shall ye not eat.
Noah: Is this necessary?
The Angel of the Lord: It’s the will of the Lord.
Adamates: We can fix it in the slaughter...
Noah: (Reads something in small type) And this: ”Who so sheddeth man’s blood, by man shall his blood be shed…”
The Angel of the Lord: Retribution must be demanded...
Noah: And this retribution, this vengeance…
Shem: Who will see to it. We ourselves or the Lord?
The Angel of the Lord: That will be stipulated in a separate covenant.
Noah: (to Sem) What do you think? Shall I sign?
Shem: Have you read it all?
Noah: It’s hundreds of pages!
Sem: This is just the beginning. There will be covenants and contracts and treaties and deals…
Noah: I’m tired of the sea. Give me some wine(to The Angel of the Lord:) I’ll sign!
(The covenant is signed.)
Noah: Come now, boys. Let’s celebrate.
(The Angel of the Lord is calling for them.)
The Angel of the Lord: Be ye fruitful, and multiply; bring forth abundantly in the earth, and multiply therein.
(When the animals leave the ark, they take on human shape and populate the world. Their song about how they populate the world is like a whirlpool of names and people. The Man and the Woman are also there, but more as passive spectators.)
Chorus: These were the sons of Noah as they left the ark: Shem, Ham and Japheth. And their sons were Gomer, Magog and Madai and Kush and Put and Canaan and Tubal and Meshech and Tiras and Javan and Kittim and Tarshish and Raamah and Sheba and Dedan and Lubim and Sidon and Heth… and from them came the Sinite, the Arkite and the Hitite and the Caananite and the Zemarite and the Hamathite and the Jebusite and the Amorite and the Girgashite, Naphtuhim, Pathrusim, Casluhim, Caphtorim, Mizraim…
(The voices are gathered into one unit)
All: All the people of the world. (As they sing, a ladder is erected and the crowd climb it, happily playful.)
All: Tribe by tribe, People by people, word by word, land by land.
Solo: And all can speak with each other and understand one another like sister and brother, father and mother.
SCENE 5: The Tower of BabelAll:
Like sister and brother, father and mother. Speak and squeak, talk and squawk, bicker and snicker, chit and chat.
In Babel we’re able to build us a tower that gives us power. We’re building a tower, a tower of words, of language, a tower that gives us the power, to look God in the eye, way up in the sky, higher and higher that’s our desire that we can acquire our own great empire through this high tower that gives us power to look God in the eye up in the sky, a tower so high reaching the sky.
Tribe by tribe, people by people, land by land, word by word speak and squeak, talk and squawk, bicker and snicker, chit and chat.
(The Angel of the Lord is watching the people playing. The two other angels join at the side of the first angel. Humans continue to build the tower while the angels watch.)
The Angel of the Lord: Behold, the people are one, and they have all one language.
The Lord’s Third Angel: They’re playing happily together.
The Lord’s Second Angel: This can’t be! Now they can do whatever they want.
The Lord’s Third Angel: But they’re content and understand each other?
The Lord’s Second Angel: This can’t be! Nothing will be restrained from them.
All: We’re building a tower, a tower of words, of language, a tower that gives us the power, to look God in the eye, up in the sky, a tower so high reach to the sky.
The Lord’s Second Angel: We can’t let them think they are like us. They mustn’t believe that anything is possible, that they can do what they want. that they are like us.
The Lord’s Third Angel: Let them play.
The Lord’s Second Angel: No, let’s go down and confound their language. Ha! This will be fun.
(The Lord's Second Angel walks among the people and one by one they change languages.)
Solo 1: (Finnish) Kuinka korkealle pitäisi kiivetä? (How high shall I climb?)
Chorus: (English) What?
Solo 1: (Finnish) Kuinka korkealle pitäisi kiivetä? En halua taittaa niskaani. (How high shall I climb? I don’t want to break my neck.)
Chorus: (Spanish) Que? (What?)
Solo 2: (German) Es ist hoch. Er hat Angst… (It’s high. He’s afraid.)
Chorus: (French) Qu'est ce qu'il dit? (What is he saying?)
Solo 3: (Danish) Tår net er for højt? (The tower is too high)
Solo 4: (Polish) Wieża powinna być wyższa. (The tower shall be higher)
Solo 1: (Finnish) Kuinka korkealle pitäisi kiivetä? (How high shall I climb?)
Solo 5: Smettere di parlare di merda! (Stop talking bullshit!)
Chorus: (Spanish) ¿Qué está diciendo? (What are you saying?)
Solo 6: (Czech) Nechápu, co říkáte. (I don’t understand what you saying)
Solo 7: (British English) What´s the matter with you? Climb the bloody ladder!
Solo 1: (Finnish) Alkaa tulla kylmä. (It’s getting cold.)
Solo 8: (French) Êtes Vous complètement fou tout le monde? (Are you all completely mad?)
Solo 2: Hochsteigen! Worauf wartest du denn? (Climb up! What are you waiting for?)
Chorus: What?
Solo 2: Ich glaub, er macht sich gleich in die Hose. (I think he’s about to pee his pants)
Chorus: Que?
Solo 2: Steig hoch, steig hoch, zum Herrgott steig hoch. (Climb up, for God’s sake!)
Chorus: Qu'est ce qu'il dit?? (What’s he saying?)
Solo 3: Hva fan laver i? Har i blevet fullstaendige gale?! (What the hell are you doing? Have you gone completely mad?)
(The Man and the Woman sneak away.)
(The Choir is more and more confused and frustrated with one another, ending in complete cacophony. The Lord's Second Angel laughs.)
The Lord’s Second Angel: That’s it.
The Lord’s Third Angel: They were so happy.
The Lord’s Second Angel: Now they will never be like us.
The Angel of the Lord: Let’s move on.
The Lord’s Third Angel: Where are we going?
The Angel of the Lord: To find Abraham.
The Lord’s Second Angel: Where is he?
The Lord’s Third Angel: Where is Abraham?
(The choir stops on the way out and pushes forth Abraham.)
Chorus: (first individual parts)
(Turkish:) Bu Abraham.
(Filipin:) Ito ay Abraham.
(Swahili:) Hii ni Ibrahimu.
(Spanish:) Se trata de Abraham.
(Italian:) Si tratta di Abramo.
(French:) Il s’agit d’Abraham.
(German:) Dies ist Abraham.
(Danish:) Dette er Abraham.
(Full chorus:) This is Abraham.
(The choir leaves Abraham alone with the angels. The man and the woman linger in the background, as if they are the servant and maid of Abraham.)
(Abraham steps forward.)
Abraham: Why me?
Why was I the one to be chosen and blessed?
Why should I endure these battles, be forced from one land to another, from one captivity to another?
I follow the slightest whim of the Lord, leave my country, my kindred, my father’s house. I do all that He asks of me but why?
(Abraham gives up a desolate scream. Sarah comes rushing in and runs up to him.)
Sarah: What’s the matter?
Abraham: What?
Sarah: You screamed
Abraham: It is that dream again.
Sarah: Again!
Abraham: The angels of the Lord came to me.
They say that my descendants shall populate the earth.
Sarah: These dreams! Me the Lord has made barren!
I have tried everything, but my womb is as dry as this soil.
Abraham: My love.
Sarah: I am too old. It’s too late.
Abraham: We’re left cold. It’s our fate.
(Sound as of shattered glass is heard from outside the stage.)
Sarah: It’s Hagar’s boy Ishmael again. That kid will be a wild man.
(Sarah goes to look for Ishmael. In a glittering light the three angels appear before Abraham.)
The Angel of the Lord: I will make of you a great nation, I will bless you and make your name great,
SCENE 6: Abrahamand you shall be a blessing.
Abraham: But I have nothing.
Sarah gives me no children.
I will die childless and alone.
My servant will inherit me.
The Lord’s Second Angel: It won’t be your servant that inherits you, but one of your own blood.
The Lord’s Third Angel: Look up at the sky and count the stars, if you can.
The Angel of the Lord: So many shall your descendants be.
Abraham: As the stars?
The three angels: As the stars. And as the sand on the shore of the sea.
(Abraham looks dreamingly up at the sky, but is then once more taken back by his doubts.)
Abraham:
And still this fear, still this great darkness.
Who is this Lord that asks all this of me?
The Angel of the Lord: He is the one who is.
Abraham: You know him. What does he look like?
The Lord’s Third Angel: No one can see The Lord and live.
The Lord’s Second Angel: He who sees The Lord shall die.
The Lord’s Third Angel: The Lord says to you:
The Lord’s Second Angel: Fear not, Abraham.
The Angel of the Lord: I am your shield.
The Angel of the Lord: I will make you exceedingly fruitful.
The Lord’s Third Angel: I will make nations of you.
The Lord’s Second Angel: And kings shall come out of you
Abraham: All that The Lord has asked of me have I done.
The Lord’s Third Angel: Is every man child circumcised?
Abraham: Each and every one.
The Lord’s Second Angel: Everyone?
(Abraham lifts his garment and shows the angel.)
Abraham: Every single one. So many foreskins.
The Angel of the Lord: The token of the covenant betwixt me and you.
Abraham: As when you earmark a sheep or brand a cow.
The Angel of the Lord: The Lord will give unto you the land wherein you are a stranger…
The Lord’s Third Angel: All the land of Canaan!
The Lord’s Second Angel: An everlasting possession for you and the seed after you.
The Angel of the Lord: And the Lord shall be your God.
Abraham: Don’t you see! Sarah and I have no children!
I can’t be a father, I’m one hundred years old, and Sarah, she’s ninety.
The Angel of the Lord: Sarah will give you a son and you shall name him Isaac.
The Lord’s Second Angel: Where is Sarah, your wife?
Abraham: In the house.
(The Second and the Third angel go to the side to look where Sarah disappeared from the stage.)
The Angel of the Lord: When I return at this time next year, your wife Sarah will have a son.
Abraham: A son?
(The Second and the Third angel laugh.)
The Angel of the Lord: What is it?
The Lord’s Second Angel: We’re just wondering why Sarah smiled.
The Angel of the Lord: Why do you think your wife smiled?
Abraham: I don’t know. Did she smile?
The Lord’s Second Angel: Oh, she smiled all right.
The Lord’s Third Angel: She smiled.
Abraham: I don’t know.
The Angel of the Lord: Do you think she thought: Should I bear a child, I who am so old?
The Lord’s Third Angel: Or does she think there are some things impossible for The Lord?
(Abraham calls for Sarah.)
Abraham: Sarah!
The Lord’s Second Angel: Maybe she thought: Should I be filled with lust now when I am withered and my husband old?
(Sarah comes in.)
Abraham: Sarah. Why did you smile?
Sarah: (frightened) I didn’t smile.
The Lord’s Second Angel: (almost threateningly, while he caresses her cheek) Yes, you did.
(Sarah draws herself back from the angel and leave. The Angels are also preparing to leave.)
The Angel of the Lord: No, we must go on. I hear the screams.
The Lord’s Second Angel: The screams of gluttony and lust.
The third angel of the Lord: And they hurt and kill each other, just for the pleasure of it, just for fun ...
Abraham: Where?
The Angel of the Lord: In Sodom and Gomorrah.
Abraham: My nephew lives in Sodom!
(The angels nod thoughtfully, they know that Lot lives there.)
The Lord’s Third Angel: Yes, your nephew Lot.
The Lord’s Second Angel: We know he lives there.
Abraham: What are you going to do?
(The angels of the Lord look at one another and decide to tell Abraham.)
The Lord’s Second Angel: The Lord will destroy the city.
Abraham: But my nephew has done nothing! He belongs to the righteous.
(The angels shake their shoulders as if they can’t do anything about and starts to leave.)
Abraham: Wait!
(The Angel of the Lord is left while the others start to go on.)
Abraham: Maybe there are fifty righteous in the city. Shall you truly destroy them with the unrighteous?
The Angel of the Lord: If I find fifty righteous in Sodom, I will spare the city for their sake.
Abraham: Forgive me, Lord, I am dust and earth. If you only find forty. Shall you then destroy the city?
The Angel of the Lord: If I find forty righteous, I will not destroy it.
Abraham: Do not be angry, Lord, if I speak, but maybe there are only thirty.
The Angel of the Lord: Then I will not do it for the thirty.
Abraham: I dare to speak to you, Lord. Maybe there are twenty.
The Angel of the Lord: I will not destroy the city, for the twenty of them.
Abraham: Do not be angry, sir, if I speak a last time, but maybe there are ten.
The Angel of the Lord: Then I will not destroy the city for the ten righteous Are you happy now?
Abraham: Thank you. I’m sure you’ll find ten righteous souls I Sodom.
(The angels leave.)
SCENE 7: The wife of Lot
(The Man and The Woman is fleeing the burning cities of Sodom and Gomorra. The Woman hesitates.)
The Man: Come. We must move on.
The Woman: I can still see the flames from the burning cities.
(A woman, the wife of Lot, steps forward from the shadows.)
The Wife of Lot: When my husband saw two strangers coming by the city gate he met them with reverence and invited them to stay. We gave them to eat, but before they went to bed before the men of the city came
The men of Sodom surrounded the house. They cried: "Where are the men who came to you tonight? Give them to us. We'll put them on our poles. "
My husband refused. He went out to them and prayed to let the men be. He would offer men of Sodom our pristine daughters. But they just shouted: “You are a stranger here yourself. Don’t try to be a judge over us! Then we’ll put you on a stake! "
I could hear them out there, screaming, swearing. That's when it happened!
In a single moment
All the men were blind, young and old. I heard them against the doorstep, tearing, clinging, beating. The two men who came to the city were angels, angels in disguise.
They said, "Do you have more relatives here?
A grandson, sons, daughters?
Take them away from here. The Lord has sent us to destroy the city.”
We tried to get our daughters’ boyfriends to understand, But they thought we were joking. "Hurry," we said, Flee! But they just laughed. We left our house at dawn. The angels followed us a bit along the way. "Run for your life," they said, "run and do not look back. Do not stop until you get away from the plain. Get safely to the mountains, or you will die. "
As the sun rose over the earth, we were safe. Then a rain fell upon Sodom and Gomorrah, A rain of sulphur and fire from the Lord, from heaven. From the cities, the plain, all who lived there, From all that grew on the ground Rose the smoke like from a melting furnace.
The angels said: "Run and do not look back." How could I not look back when I heard the screams of despair, when I felt the heat from the sparkling rain against my back, when my fleeing shadow in front of me was broken by the glimmer from the flames?
I looked back, I saw the fires And the charred bodies, I saw the ruins of the burned houses like blackened skeletons, I saw the children and the women, the burned bodies Of the men in the fields, I saw all the dead
And in my tears and in my horror, I froze into a pillar of salt.
I'm still standing there staring at the burned cities.
The rooms blackened by the flames, The charred remains of the cattle, The burned earth where the gardens lay.
I still see them.
I'm still there and I see them.
SCENE 8: Abraham and Isaac.
(Abraham and the three Angels.)
Abraham: Why did you force me to go so far?
I was alone when the Lord called out my name:
Abraham & The Angels: Take your only son Isaac, whom you love and go to the land of Moriah and offer him there on a mountain that I will show you.
The Lord’s Second Angel: And you didn’t protest?
Abraham: How could I protest? Against God, my Lord?
The Angel of the Lord: When we were going to destroy Sodom you tried to save the city.
Abraham: My Nephew lived there.
The Lord’s Second Angel: Yes. And Isaac is your son.
The Angel of the Lord: What would your servants have said if you came back from the desert without your son?
Abraham: All I could think of was to do what God demanded of me.
The Lord’s Second Angel: Or maybe you never planned to do what God demanded. You thought you could trick God.
Abraham: No, I...
The Lord’s Third Angel: Maybe you thought God would get you out of this fix?
The Lord’s Second Angel: To kill Isaac, your son, whom you love …
Abraham: (paus) He looked right into my eyes oh that look! and I said: “My son, God chooses the sheep to be sacrificed to him.” (starts to cry)
Then I reached for the knife to slaughter my son.
The Lord’s Second Angel: And that’s how I found you.
The Angel of the Lord: Do you remember?
Abraham: You shouted from heaven.
Abraham: “Don’t lift your hand against the boy, and do him no harm.”
The Angel of the Lord: How did that feel?
Abraham: Relief. Divine relief. (Pause.) Why did you force me to go so far?
The Angel of the Lord: Now I know that you fear me, seeing that you have not withheld your only son from me.
The Angels: I will multiply your seed as the stars of the heavens and as the sand on the shore of the sea.
Abraham: as the stars of the heavens and as the sand on the shore of the sea.
The Lord’s Third Angel: And Isaac? What did he say after you tried to kill him?
Abraham: He’s married now. He was very sad when his mother died, but has found solace in his wife.
(Pause. The Angels prepare to leave. The Angel of the Lord hesitate.)
The Lord’s Second Angel: One more thing. If the Angel of the Lord hadn’t stopped you, would you then have killed your son?
Abraham: I don’t know. (pause) I will never know. Nor will God ever know.
SCENE 9. The Israelites oppressed in Egypt.
(The Pharaoh of Egypt and his wife is dressing for a banquet in front of a mirror, trying to push one another to the side. The Woman serves as a servant for Pharaoh’s wife and The Man for Pharaoh himself.)
Pharaoh: I will finally take a hard line.
Pharaoh’s wife: What are you talking about?
Pharaoh: The Israelites. It’s time to deal with them.
Pharaoh’s wife: What harm have they done?
Pharaoh: These immigrants. They are too many and too strong.
Pharaoh’s wife: We couldn’t manage without our servants.
Pharaoh: This is not about our servants.
Pharaoh’s wife: Then what is it about?
Pharaoh: What if there’s war? They could unite with our enemies.
Pharaoh’s wife: Nonsense, they are kept where they are. If we didn’t have them, who would do all the work?
Pharaoh: There are just more and more of them. They’re all over the place.
(She pushes him to the side to look in the mirror.)
Pharaoh’s wife: No, you’re all over the place.
Pharaoh: Their midwives have received clear instructions. If it’s a boy, he is to be killed, if it’s a girl, she lives.
Pharaoh’s wife: Oh, you men. All this rivalry.
Pharaoh: Those Hebrew women are not like ours. They’re strong, they give birth before the midwife arrives.
Pharaoh’s wife: Women have always had to fend for themselves.
Pharaoh: My orders are clear: Throw all new born boys in the Nile and let only the girls live.
(Pharaoh and his wife are ready for the banquet. They leave. The Man follow them to the side of the stage.)
SCENE 10. Moses by the river.
(The Woman have remained centre stage. She loosens some of her garment, like when an actor leaves the stage for an intermission. When she sings, it is not as much in the character of The Woman, but a story the singer tells herself.)
The Woman: I remember first hearing of Moses. All new born Hebrew boys were to be killed. Levi’s daughter gave birth to a fine boy. She kept him hidden for three months. Suckling, soft lips at her breast, small hands gripping her fingers, the jubilant bliss of motherhood. When she could hide him no longer she wove a basket and placed it in the bulrushes on the bank of the Nile. Pharaoh's daughter came to bathe with her ladies in waiting. And she saw the boy in the basket, his eyes seeking hers, the random twitching of his limbs, his laughter when she slid her hands across his belly. And she took him from the river as a child of her own. Once I saw a map of Egypt with the Nile winding through the desert. The rivers delta, branching out toward the sea as the veining of a leaf. And the next day I saw an image of a woman’s uterus and fallopian tubes and I remember thinking: ”The Nile and its delta!” A woman’s insides and the ancient river were reflections of each other. Infants in small woven baskets are all the time placed in the bulrushes to be found. For each life a woman goes down to the riverbank and lifts the basket from the bulrushes.
That little basket bearing life, carried toward the sea, left in the reeds for a woman to find.
That was Moses’ fate; it is yours and it is mine.
(When The Woman leaves, she is met by The Man who takes her hand. He has also loosened his garment during her aria. When they leave the stage, they are both “out of character” and we understand that it’s time for a short intermission.
Music: Sven-David Sandström
The Book of Life
2019 Opera in Three Acts Act 2
SCENE 1: Moses and Aron . 3
(The Woman, Moses, Choir, The Angel of the Lord, Aaron)
SCENE 2: The Torments of Egypt. 37 (Moses, Choir, Aaron, Pharaoh, Pharaoh’s Wife)
SCENE 3: Exodus . 55
(The Man, The Woman, Miriam, Woman 1 2)
SCENE 4: The Ten Commandments and The Golden Calf. 69 (Choir, Moses, Aaron, The Lord’s Three Angels)
SCENE 5: The Laws . 91
(The Man, The Woman, Choir, The Wife of Lot, Japheth, Miriam, Sarah, Joshua, Aaron, Moses)
SCENE 6: The Man and Woman Separate Ways . 108 (The Woman, The Man)
SCENE 7: After Many Years Wandering in the Desert . 113 (Choir, Aaron, Moses, Joshua)
SCENE 8: Moses’ Death. 125 (Moses, Joshua, The Man, Choir)
SCENE 9: The Endless Wars. 134
(The Lord’s Three Angels, The Woman, Amos, Isaiah, Choir, Elisabeth, Woman 2, Mary of Magdala, Jesus, The Man)
SCENE 10 . 153
Libretto: Niklas Rådström
ACT 2 – SCENE 1. Moses and Aaron.
(Moses is alone, a fugitive working as a shepherd, guarding a flock with goats. We hear them bleat in the distance. Moses sits with a small radio in his hands. Like an echo from the last act, we hear a single voice and a few instruments, as from another shepherd in the night far away.)
The Woman: For each life a woman goes down to the riverbank and lifts the child and the basket from the bulrushes.
That little basket bearing life, carried toward the sea, left in the reeds for a woman to find.
That was Moses’ fate; it is yours and it is mine.
Moses, now a refugee in a foreign land, guarding a herd of sheep in the desert.
(From the small transistor radio there are noises and then some voices as from a news broadcast.)
Voice from radio A: Let’s go back to the question of the Israelites.
Voice from radio B: No true Egyptian can deny that the Israelites is our greatest threat. Some say we should treat them mildly. Hell no! If we do, they will take our fertile land out of our hands. We must push them even more ruthlessly, get them to build our cities of Pithom and Rameses at double speed, make their lives miserable by stacking bricks and struggling in the fields …
(Moses grabs the radio and violently throws it away, showing strung temper. When Moses speaks he stutters, when he sings he is forceful.)
Moses: Shu shu shut up! Shut the hell up! E e enough! Enough! Leave me alone!
(Suddenly all around him strong voices come forward like flames in a hot fire. He is thrown to the ground just by the sound of them. The burning bush is a choir of polyphonic, kaleidoscopic voices and among them is The Angel of the Lord.)
Choir of the burning bush: Moses! Moses! Moses! Hear me! Hear us!
Stand up! Lay yourself down! Kneel!
Come here! Don’t come any closer!
Moses! Moses! Where are you?
Moses: Here I am.
Choir of the burning bush: Moses! Moses! Moses! Hear me! Hear us!
Stand up! Lay yourself down! Kneel!
Come here! Don’t come any closer!
The Angel of the Lord: Take off your shoes! You’re on holy ground!
(Moses hides his face from the angel. When the Angel sings the choir is constantly echoing the word, like a kaleidoscopic fire with burning flames.)
The Angel of the Lord: I am your fathers God.
Abrahams God, Isaacs God, Jacobs God.
I have heard their cries, I have known their sorrows.
I have come to bring them to a land
Flowing of milk and honey. Come now!
(Choir: Stand up! Lay yourself down! Kneel!)
The Angel of the Lord: Come now.
I will send you unto Pharaoh That you might bring forth my people
The Children of Israel out of Egypt.
(Choir: Moses! Hear me! Stand up! Kneel!)
Moses: Why why why me? Why me! I am a waif living in exile!
The Angel of the Lord: I will be with you.
Moses: And if they ask your name, What shall I say to them?
The Angel of the Lord: I am that I am. Thus shall you say to the children of Israel.
I AM has sent me to you. I AM.
(Choir: I AM. I AM. I AM. I AM. I AM.)
The Angel of the Lord: The God of their fathers.
(Choir: Of Abraham, of Isaac, of Jacob.)
The Angel of the Lord: The God of their fathers
Will bring you out of the affliction of Egypt onto the land of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, the Jesubites, unto a land flowing with milk and honey.
(Choir: The Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, the Jebusites …)
Moses: And tho tho those… those that live there now?
The Angel of the Lord: We drive them away!
(Choir: Away with them! Off they go! Away! Away! Drive them away!)
Moses: The king of Egypt will not let us go, n n no, not by a mighty hand.
The Angel of the Lord: I will stretch out my hand And after that he will let you go.
Moses: B b but, b b behold…
(The Angel and the Choir of Flames ridicule Moses for his cowardice and for his stutter.)
The Angel of the Lord: B b b but?!
Choir: B b but? B b behold? B b but?! But!
Moses: But, behold, they won’t believe me. The the they will say, the Lord has not appeared unto you.
The Angel of the Lord: What is that in your hand?
Moses: A r r rod. A rod!
The Angel of the Lord: And if it becomes a snake when you cast it on the ground, Will they believe you then?
Moses: I I I don’t know.
The Angel of the Lord: Cast it on the ground!
(Choir: Cast it! Cast it on the ground!)
(When Moses drops his rod it becomes a snake.)
The Angel of the Lord: Now, take it by the tail!
(Moses takes the snake by its tail and it becomes his rod again.)
The Angel of the Lord: Now, will they believe you?
Moses: I b b beg of you, send someone else.
I am not e e eloquent, neither heretofore.
I am s s slow of speech, and slow of tongue.
The Angel of the Lord: Who has made man’s mouth!
Who maketh the dumb, or deaf,
Or the seeing, or the blind?
Is it not the Lord?
I will be by your side
And teach you what to say.
Moses: I b b beg of you, Send someone else!
(The Angel is frustrated and angry with Moses. Suddenly Aaron is thrown on to the stage.)
The Angel of the Lord: (Angry)
Here! Your brother Aaron! Let him talk to the people!
Moses: Aaron!
Aaron: Moses?
(Moses and Aaron look astonished at one another. They haven’t seen each other for many years. The Moses seems to make up his mind.)
The Angel of the Lord: He will be your mouth and you will be his god.
Moses: I will be your god.
Aaron: My god?
(Moses kiss Aaron.)
Moses: Your god. (to the Angel:) And now what?
The Angel of the Lord: Aaron will do what you ask of him.
Moses: Anything?
Aaron: Who are you talking to?
(Moses understands that Aaron can’t see or hear the Angel. Moses takes Aaron by his arm to lead him.)
Moses: Come.
Aaron: Where are we going?
Moses: To Egypt.
Aaron: To do what?
Moses: Free our people.
Aaron: But how?
(Moses searches for the Angel.)
Moses: Yes, how?
The Angel of the Lord: You will be a god to Pharaoh
And your brother Aaron will be your prophet.
Moses: I will be a god to Pharaoh
And you will be my prophet.
Aaron: What!?!
(The Choir of burning flames is no longer there.)
The Angel of the Lord: Do as I have said.
Moses: Do as he has said.
Aaron: Who!?! Who has said what?
(The Angel has left them. Moses and Aaron are all alone. Moses puts a finger to his mouth to quit Aaron and looks around as if to make certain no one hears them when he is sharing his secret.)
Moses: We won’t make it alone. But the Lord, our God, has multiplied us as many as the stars in the heavens. We shall take wise and understanding men, known among our tribes. Our people will be free in their own land, flowing with milk and honey. We shall not be afraid, for the judgement is Gods.
Aaron: But… Wait…
(Moses starts to leave.)
Moses: Don’t be afraid. The Lord which goes before you, he shall fight for you.
(Moses leaves. Aaron stands astonished looking after him. Then he runs off to join his brother.)
SCENE 2. The torments of Egypt.
(First a sudden, very intense interlude depicting the ten plagues of Egypt. It shall be short, but long enough to leave space for a shift of the scene and maybe give some room for a small, choreographed scene.)
(Then we meet Moses and Aaron. They are now experienced warriors, leaders of an army of rebels. They act as revolutionary leaders that has just seized power. They address their followers. Moses is visibly very powerful but has still some difficulty in expressing himself. Aaron is the great orator addressing the people.)
Moses: Israelites! One more plague will come upon Egypt. Thus says the Lord: “About midnight every firstborn in the land of Egypt shall die. From the firstborn of Pharaoh who sits on his throne, to the firstborn of the slave girl by the hand mill, the prisoner in the dungeon and all the firstborn of the livestock. There shall be a great cry throughout the land, such as there has never been, nor ever will be again. But not a dog shall growl at any of the people of Israel, neither man or beast, that you may know that the Lord makes a distinction between Egypt and Israel. (leaves room for Aaron) Aaron.
Aaron: Thus says the Lord: Go fetch a lamb and slaughter it as a sacrifice. Take some of the blood and put it on the lintel and the doorposts of your house. None of you shall go out before morning.
For the Lord will pass through the land of Egypt this night, And smite all the firstborn, both man and beast. But the Lord will see the blood and pass over you, The plague shall not be upon you to destroy you
This day shall be unto a memorial. You shall keep it as a feast to the Lord throughout your generations, as a statute forever.
It is the Lord’s Passover. And when your children ask you, “What do you mean by this service?” you shall answer
“It is the sacrifice of the Lord’s Passover; when he killed the Egyptians he passed over the houses of the people of Israel and spared them. Thus spoke the Lord.
(The People cheer.)
Choir: Thus spoke the Lord. Thus spoke the Lord. Thus spoke the Lord.
(The Choir is silenced when the Pharaoh and his wife staggers in. He is carrying their dead child in his arms. Her grief is beyond belief.)
Pharaoh: Swarms of locusts…
Pharaoh’s wife: … mosquitoes and flies…
Pharaoh: …fish rotting in the river and the water red as blood…
Pharaoh and Pharaoh’s wife: …livestock lying dead in the fields.
Pharaoh’s wife: And then darkness…
Pharaoh and Pharaoh’s wife: …darkness for three days.
Pharaoh’s wife: Only the vultures can be pleased by what you’ve done.
Pharaoh: Look at my son.
Pharaoh’s wife: My child!
Pharaoh and Pharaoh’s wife: Not even our child was spared.
Moses: You should have let us go as we requested.
Pharaoh: I let you walk out in the desert to worship.
Moses: We couldn’t bring our women, our slaves or our livestock.
Aaron: We warned you that the Lord’s wrath would fall upon you. Thus says the Lord: “How long will you refuse to bow down before me?”
Pharaoh: And surrender to threats of terror?
Couldn’t you just have gone to worship without the livestock?
Moses: Our livestock must come with us not a hoof shall be left behind!
Pharaoh: Rise up and go.
Never enter my sight again!
Moses: We shall never enter your sight again. (starts to leave)
Pharaoh’s wife: Look at my boy. Look what you have done to him.
Aaron: It is you alone who has injured your child.
Pharaoh: Leave.
Go, serve the Lord, as you have said.
Take your flocks and your herds and be gone.
And bless me also.
Pharaoh’s wife: (a whispering echo) Bless me also.
(Moses and Aaron leave as the stage darkens.)
SCENE 3. Exodus.
(Early morning. The Man and The Woman are waiting for someone to help guide them as refugees through the desert.)
The Man: Do you think we can trust them, him and his brother?
The Woman: We’ll never make it on our own across the desert.
The Man: You’ve heard the way they talk. They’re promising us miracles.
The Woman: Would you rather stay here and beg for a roof over your head night after night?
The Man: I don’t know what to make of him.
(Miriam, the sister of Moses and Aaron, comes in with two other women. They’re singing and beating on tambourines.)
Miriam, Woman 1 and Woman 2: Sing ye to the Lord, for he has triumphed gloriously; the horse and his rider has he thrown into the sea.
Miriam: You’re looking worried.
The Man: Your brother…
The Woman: Can we trust him to show us the way through the desert?
Miriam: He led us here.
The Man: But how did you escape?
Miriam: We reached the sea. There it was…
Woman 1: Roaring and surging.
Woman 2: waves beating on the shore.
Miriam: They chased after us on horseback, in chariots, hundreds of soldiers. Many of us were terrified and regretted having fled.
Woman 1: “There were graves where we came from as well!”
Miriam: My brothers tried to calm them down, but they yelled:
Woman 2: “What good is this, it is better to be a servant than to be dead!”
Woman 1: Flow and ebb.
Miriam: The storm that broke out from the east.
Woman 1 and Woman 2: A rumbling pillar of clouds.
Miriam: I swear, when my brother…
Woman 1: Moses.
Woman 2: Our leader
Miriam: When he stuck out his staff before him the sea was divided and we wandered straight out onto its bottom.
Woman 1: The sky of whining clouds and twinkling stars above us.
Woman 2: The seabed like a road between walls of waves.
Miriam: In the starlight I spotted a glistening seashell and stopped to pick it up.
Miriam, Woman 1 and Woman 2: All night we walked on the bottom of the sea.
Miriam: With a rumbling cloud before us filled with flashes of lightning.
Miriam, Woman 1 and Woman 2: As an angel of the Lord.
Miriam: Just before dawn we reached the other shore and Moses turned around.
Woman 2: They came closer and closer.
Woman 1: Our pursuers.
Woman 2: The running feet of the soldiers…
Woman 1: The horses’ hoofs on the oceans floor…
Miriam: The chariots bursting towards us when my brother…
Woman 2: Moses.
Woman 1: Our leader.
Miriam: … once again pointed his staff over the sea…
Miriam, Woman 1 and Woman 2: The walls of waves suddenly burst and came rushing over the army.
Miriam: At dawn every one of them was washed into the sea.
Woman 1: Chariots and soldiers.
Woman 2: Horses and weapons.
Miriam: Everything sank into the depths like stones.
Miriam, Woman 1 and Woman 2: Sing ye to the Lord, for he has triumphed gloriously; the horse and his rider has he thrown into the sea.
(The Man and The Woman stand in amazement of what they’ve been told.)
The Woman: Is all of this true?
Miriam: Would we otherwise stand here telling you about it?
The Woman: I don’t know.
Miriam: Come now It’s Time to break camp.
(Miriam and the women leave, wordlessly humming on the small theme: “Sing ye to the lord…”. The Man and the woman still look in amazement after them. Then The Woman takes The Man by his hand.)
The Woman: Sing ye to the Lord, For he has triumphed gloriously; the horse and his rider has he thrown into the sea. (They give out a laugh, take their things and run after the women, hand in hand.)
(The scene begins with the notion that Moses people has walked a long way through the desert. They are tired after their long journey. Moses has gone up on the mountain and been gone for almost forty days. During the time he has been away his people has been dancing, drinking and fornicating. With them is Aaron. The music is increasingly hectic. Suddenly Moses is among them and everything stops. He is raging with anger. He raises the stone tablets with the Ten Commandments over his head and throws then to the ground so hard that they shatter. The Man and The Woman is in the background looking on in amazement. Moses voice I quietly full of rage and resentment.)
Moses: For forty days forty days! I’m on the mountain before the Lord. He burns my skin to ashes. He gives me the laws carved in stone. He tells me to bring them to my people. And what do I find! What do I find!
Aaron: I couldn’t hold them back.
Moses: What sort of people has the Lord asked me to lead? Are these the Lord’s chosen people who behave like swine, root in the ground, fornicate and grovel before false gods? How can the Lord love such a people?
Aaron: The people were impatient. They were exhausted, thirsty...
Moses: Didn’t I let them rest? Didn’t I strike the stone with my staff so that a spring sprang forth before them?
Aaron: Yes, but hunger had...
Moses: Manna fell from heaven each and every day!
Aaron: But they were impatient... They believed that you had abandoned them.
Moses: Forty days. Couldn’t they wait forty days? My skin was burned by the radiance of the Lord. All had been shown to me: the Commandments, how to build the ark of the covenant, everything… Enough! I’m fed up with you. All of you!
SCENE 4. The Ten Commandments and The Golden Calf.(Moses spits on the ground and prepares to leave. The people seem to be afraid and mourning. Suddenly the Angels are there.)
The Angels: Wait! Stay! Be with your chosen people!
(Moses stops before the Angels.)
The Angel of the Lord: What was it you found when you came down from the mountain?
(Moses points to Aaron.)
Moses: Ask him there. It’s his work.
Aaron: I couldn’t hold them back!
They shouted: “Make us a god to go before us and lead us!”
(Maybe an echo in the choir, murmuring, full of guilt: “Make us a god to go before us and lead us!”)
Moses: And what did you make?! A golden calf!
And a damned ugly one at that.
And yet God’s first commandment is that we shall have no other gods than the Lord.
The Lord’s Second Angel: (to Aaron) Then what did you do?
(Aaron shamefully silent.)
Moses: I know what they did...
Aaron: ... They amused themselves.
The Lord’s Third Angel: Amused...?
Moses: Fucked! Fornicated! Mounted each other! Screwed like rabbits! (to Aaron:)
What have these people done to you, since you got them to sin like this?
Aaron: You know how they are drawn to evil.
(The Angels are trying to calm down the situation.)
The Angel of the Lord: And then what did you do?
Moses: I smashed the golden calf with the tablets.
The Lord’s Second Angel: You crushed both the idol and the laws.
Moses: I was furious! Those disgusting swine. What could I do?
It was an uprising that needed to be subdued!
The Lord’s Third Angel: And you did just that?
Moses: I could trust my Levites, but that... that mob.
The Angel of the Lord: You had them killed?
Moses: Yes.
The Angel of the Lord: Your men, the Levites, slew them....
The Lord’s Second Angel: Joshua led them through the camp.
The Lord’s Third Angel: How many were killed?
Moses: (shy, hesitating) It might have been three thousand.
The Angel of the Lord: Young and old?
The Lord’s Third Angel: Men?
The Lord’s Second Angel: Women?
The Lord’s Third Angel: Children?
The Angels: Fathers? Mothers? Brothers? Sisters?
(Moses defiantly steps up to the Angels.)
Moses: With sword in hand
the Levite said of his father and mother: “I have never seen them.”
He wanted nothing to do with his brothers and denied his children.
The Angel of the Lord: And what did you say to those that survived?
Moses: I said: “Today you have become consecrated to the Lord, for you have turned against your own sons and brothers.”
The Lord’s Second Angel: What was the sixth commandment on the tablets you destroyed? Do you remember?
Moses: It says: “You shall not kill.”
The Lord’s Second Angel: Did you obey that commandment?
Moses: The tablets were shattered.
The Lord’s Third Angel: Because you broke them.
Moses: The seventh commandment said: “You shall not commit adultery.” (to Aaron) “You shall not commit adultery”!
The Lord’s Second Angel: Yes, and you shattered that commandment to.
Moses: Didn’t the second commandment say: “You shall not make graven images”?
The Lord’s Third Angel: And you shattered that one to.
Moses: Like drunks and whores they behaved.
The Three Angels: And you had them killed.
The Angel of the Lord: You both have sinned greatly, created graven images even though you ought to know that the Lord’s name is The Jealous One…
(Moses and Aaron bow down before the Angels.)
The Three Angels: He is a jealous god.
The Angel of the Lord: And you have slain, that of which only the Lord has the right to do.
The Lord’s Second Angel: The Lord says:
The Lord’s Third Angel: He who sins against me shall I strike from my book.
The Angel of the Lord: Moses, go now!
Lead your people!
The Lord’s Second Angel: The covenant is to be re established
The Lord’s Third Angel: And you shall make new tablets of laws.
The Angel of the Lord: Go.
The Lord’s radiance will shine from your face and dazzle the people.
SCENE 5. The laws.
(The Man and The Woman steps forward. They are very hard trying to remember the laws that Moses has brought to them. In the background the Choir is doing the same.
The Man: You shall not boil a kid in its mother’s milk.
The Woman: I cannot possibly remember all these laws.
The Man: You shall not eat meat.
The Woman: No, you shall not eat meat that has not been drained of its blood.
The Man: I shall not eat meat that.
The Woman: You shall not practice... something.
The Man: Fortune telling! Fortune telling and...
The Man & The Woman: ...soothsaying!
The Man: I cannot possibly remember all these laws.
(Voices from the Choir steps forth, trying to remember the laws. A cacophony of voices are slowly building up to a cacophonic whirlwind.)
The Wife of Lot: The Lord bless and keep you.
The Wife of Lot and Japheth: The Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace
Miriam and Chorus: You shall build a sanctuary to the Lord, a portable tent, a holy case for the laws, altar, candlestick stand and washbasin. In violet, purple and crimson, beams, brackets, boards, posts, pedestals, showbread and curtains you shall do all this, all this you are to build. Go and do it.
Chorus: Do as you’re told.
The Wife of Lot: You shall not boil a kid in its mother’s milk.
The Man & The Woman: We shall not boil a kid in its mother’s milk.
Miriam: You shall not plant your field with two different kinds of seed.
Sarah: You are not to lie with your father’s brother’s wife; you are not to become intimate with her, she is your aunt.
Joshua: You shall not have sex with any animal
and thereby defile yourself.
Aaron and Chorus: You shall erect a sanctuary, set in the ark, hang up the curtain, bear in the table, set up the alters, lay out the showbread, provide pure oil of pressed olives for the lamp stand. You shall take sifted flower and bake twelve cakes. Each cake shall consist of two tenths of an ephah of sifted flour. Go and do it.
Chorus: Do as you’re told.
The Woman: We cannot possibly remember all these laws.
The Man: How much flour did you say it was?
Chorus: Go and do it. Do as you’re told.
Moses and Chorus: If anyone kills a person, he shall be punished by death. He who kills an animal shall replace it: life for life. Of the small creatures that move on the ground, these are unclean: the weasel, the rat, the lizard, salamander and chameleon.
And the following birds should be seen upon with disgust, they are not to be eaten: the eagle, the vulture, the kite, the falcon, the raven, the owl and the hawk, the pelican, the heron, piper and bat.
Aaron: Did you name the hoopoe? Don’t forget the hoopoe. And the dirt vulture, the fish owl, the barn owl...
Moses: You shall build the Lord’s sanctuary. Go and do it.
Chorus: Do as you’re told.
The Man: When I read the law I see the sanctuary before me, but when I look up it already lies in ruins.
Moses: If a man lies with another man as with a woman, both have done something detestable. They should be punished by death, the blame for their deaths are their own.
(Pause.)
Aaron: Are you sure? Does it really say that?
Moses: Yes, it says so. Do you think I’m making this up? (to the Man and Woman) Go now, and do as I’ve said.
Chorus: Go now, and do as he said.
The Lord blesses and keeps you.
The Lord lets his countenance shine upon you and shows you mercy.
(They leave.)
Moses: You shall not boil a kid in its mother’s milk.
The Man & The Woman: We won’t.
SCENE 6. The Man and Woman – Separate Ways
(The Man and The Woman are alone on the stage, except for one of Moses’ men who impatiently awaits the Man.)
The Woman: Build a sanctuary? Where will they find the wood? There are no trees as far as the eye can see.
The Man: I must go with them, I have no choice. We will soon be together again. Don’t be afraid.
The Woman: I’m not afraid. I will go with you.
The Man: You are a woman.
The Woman: As if I didn’t know that.
The Man: The Lord’s sanctuary is the men’s responsibility.
The Woman: Yes... how could I forget something like that?
The Man: They say everything should be ready by spring. Will you wait for me?
(The Woman embraces the Man.)
The Man: You shall not boil a kid in its mother’s milk.
The Woman: You shall not forget me.
(The Man follow the guard. The Woman is alone.)
The Woman: (aria) My friend is mine and I am his, he who tends his flock among the lilies. Until the wind awakes and the shadows flee, like a gazelle, like a young stag on the herb scented hills. In my bed at night I seek my beloved. I seek but cannot find him. I want to get up and walk about, and seek him through the streets and the squares,
Where is he, my friend?
The guards find me, “Say, have you seen him I cannot see, cannot find?
On your way through the night, have you seen my beloved? Have you seen love?”
SCENE 7. After Many Years Wandering in the Desert.
(Moses and Aaron have just come from their sister Miriam’s burial. They are now two very aged and worn leaders of their people maintaining their power with unbroken stubbornness. At the beginning of the scene, a female choir is heard as an echo of Miriam's song from earlier.)
Female choir: Sing ye to the Lord, for he has triumphed gloriously; the horse and his rider has he thrown into the sea.
Aaron: Miriam. Our sister, dead.
Moses: I can still hear her singing.
Aaron: How her songs strengthened the people.
Moses: For forty years, struggling through the desert.
Aaron: Unity under the law is all we have.
Moses: Without the laws our people would be nothing.
Aaron: Without the songs of Miriam even less.
(Joshua enters, followed by a group of guards.)
Joshua: Moses!
Moses: Joshua!
Joshua: Some of the Levites… They rebel!
Moses: (mockingly) Rebel!
Joshua: They say you have gone to far! They say that we are all holy!
Aaron: (amused, ironical) We are all holy?
Joshua: Everyone of us.
They think you lift yourselves above the congregation of the Lord!
(Moses and Aaron exchange glances and give up an ironic laughter. Aaron cough and remain seated.)
Moses: Tell them… these Levites, it is they who have gone too far!
The Lord chooses himself who is holy.
Don’t they remember when we placed staffs of all the twelve tribes on the altar?
Only one bore a shoot.
Joshua: Aaron’s staff budded, bloomed and bore ripe almonds. We will tell them.
(Joshua starts to leave. Moses stops him.)
Moses: Tell them … if they live a common life and die a common death, then the Lord has not sent me.
But … If something else happens… Go now. Deal with them. We will see who is holy.
(Joshua and the guards leave. Moses and Aaron alone.)
Moses: Aaron, do you remember him that we caught gathering wood on the Sabbath? He said his pot of manna was cool and thought it gave him the right to break the law. Then those Levites gladly followed the Lord’s sentence and stoned him to death.
But when the laws don’t suit them, then they grumble and complain…
(Joshua and the guard’s return.)
Moses: What now?
Joshua: The Levites stood by their tents with their wives and children then the earth opened its gape and swallowed them alive, tumbling down into the underworld with everything they had.
Moses: The Lord unleashed his wrath. So who do they think is holy now? How often have I not sent Aaron with censers among the crowd to bring calm and reconciliation? Aaron?
(Aaron doesn’t reply and sits lifelessly in his chair.)
Moses: Aaron?
(Joshua goes up to Aaron.)
Joshua: He’s dead.
Moses: (lamenting) Aaron, my brother. Our sister dead, and now you. The desert is cold, the stars blinded by grief.
(Moses turns to Joshua.)
Moses: Joshua, how far have we come?
Joshua: We have reached the land of Midian...
Moses: My homeland.
Joshua: We went into battle as you told us.
We killed all the men and burned the cities.
Tomorrow we can cross the river.
Moses: The Lord will not let me cross the Jordan to the rich land he has promised us.
You are to cross the river alone. I will stay here.
Joshua: You must lead us.
Moses: Take Aaron’s staff and place it on the altar as a warning.
Then there will be an end to all rebellion and grumbling against the Lord.
(Joshua takes Aarons staff.)
Moses: You will take over after me.
Joshua: You are our leader.
Moses: Go and do what you must.
(Joshua leaves.)
SCENE 8. Moses’ Death.
(A tired, very old Moses is helped to a podium as an abdicating leader giving his final speech. Joshua awaits in the shadows. Maybe the speech is projected on large TV screens. Moses speaks to his people one last time. During the speech the Man walks about looking for his Woman.)
Moses: I know I have been harsh. But you are a moody, a headstrong people. Now the Lord rages against me for your sake. I shall die here, but you shall move on to the prosperous land we were promised a land with great cities you did not build, with well stocked houses you did not fill, with olive groves you did not plant.
Do not forget that the Lord, guided you out of the slave camp in Egypt, for the Lord, God of the gods, Lord of the lords, clothes the fatherless and the widow and loves the immigrant. You too shall show the immigrant love, for you yourselves have been immigrants in Egypt. But if you do not listen to the Lord he will turn the rain into dust and sand, he will let your enemies conquer you, strike you with madness, blindness and horror and no one will help you.
As pouring rain is my faith, as dew drops my words fall, as showers of rain, as drizzle over grass. Aaron has gone before me and now I will die.
Joshua shall carry my staff.
Fortunate Israel, who are as you?
You are a people loved by the Lord, your protective shield, your victorious sword.
Rejoice and praise him, for he avenges the blood of his sons and purges the land for his people.
(Moses disappears in the shadows and Joshua, the new leader, comes forth.)
Joshua: Moses, our leader, is dead. No one shall withstand us as long as we live. Be brave and strong! I shall make this land our people’s property as the Lord promised our fathers. Strap on your swords, grab your shields. Prepare your provisions. Tomorrow we cross the river.
(The men onstage gather around Joshua and line up Joshua notices the Man who is still looking for his woman.)
Joshua: You. What are you doing?
The Man: I’m looking for my woman.
Joshua: Your woman? How many haven’t lost their loved ones during this long walk?
The Man: I don’t belong here…
Joshua: Are you not one of us?
The Man: I’m a refugee…
Joshua: We are all refugees. Take a weapon.
The Man: I’m no warrior.
Joshua: Do you deny me your service? Join us or die here.
(The other men gather around the Man. He reluctantly grabs a weapon and leaves with them.)
SCENE 9. The Endless Wars.
(The Woman is searching for the Man. The Lord’s three angels enter and see the soldiers from the previous scene leave. We can still hear their song of war.)
The Lord’s Second Angel: There they go!
The Lord’s Third Angel: Listen! A mighty cry as the walls of Jericho come tumbling down!
The Woman: Have you seen my love?
The Lord’s Angel: All men join in the conquest of Canaan’s Land.
The Lord’s Second Angel: The promised land!
The Lord’s Angel: There they will be led by just judges and great kings.
Saul, David, Solomon.
The Lord’s Third Angel: Solomon, who built the great temple!
(The Prophet Amos rushes in.)
Amos: Thus the Lord says about your temple: I hate Israel’s pride, I hate its castles, I shall sacrifice this city and everything in it.
The Lord’s Angel: These Prophets!
The Lord’s Second Angel: Get him out of here!
(Stagehands show Amos out.)
The Lord’s Third Angel: This is a war that never ends.
The Lord’s Second Angel: The killing will last for centuries.
The Woman: My husband is no murderer.
The Lord’s Angel: None who left Egypt knew how to fight.
The desert turned them into warriors.
The Woman: God must want something else for the world than war, rivalry and raging revenge.
The Lord’s Third Angel: The Lord wants all peoples to forge their swords to ploughshares and their spears to shears.
(The Prophet Isaiah rushes in.)
Isaiah: The boot worn in battle and the cloak stained with blood, all will be burnt, devoured by flames.
The Lord’s Angel: Isaiah! Enough!
(Isaiah leaves.)
The Lord’s Third Angel: God wants peace.
The Woman: And still, I can hear the cries from cities in flames.
The Lord’s Second Angel: It’s to instil unity.
The Woman: If all men are fighting in Canaan. Why then are you here?
The Lord’s Third Angel: We are not men.
The Lord’s Angel: We are angels.
The Woman: Angels! Then you can stop the war!
The Lord’s Second Angel: It is not what the Lord wants
(The woman looks at the Angels in disbelief. A group of women comes in. In a simple dance they pick kernels left on the ground after harvest.)
Choir of Women: Don’t make me leave you, for where you go, I will go; and where you lodge, I will lodge: your people is my people, your God my God.
(The Angels watches them.)
The Lord’s Angel: Look at them. They have lost their men to war and captivity.
(The woman goes to the other women. The Angels watches her.)
The Lord’s Angel: There she goes.
The Lord’s Third Angel: Will she find her beloved?
The Lord’s Second Angel: She’s no one, a refugee among thousands. Who knows where she will end up?
The Lord’s Angel: Look. It’s a beautiful day. Late summer.
The golden rays of the sun, a warm wind through the dry grass.
The Lord’s Third Angel: It’s as if the war doesn’t exist.
(The Prophet Amos returns. He turns to the audience.)
Amos: And you! You lie on your ivory beds and laze on your sofas. You shall go first in the prison transport! so says the Lord.
(The Angels quietly tries to calm Amos.)
The Lord’s Angel: Not now, Amos.
The Lord’s Third Angel: Their temple is destroyed. Their holy shrine is shattered.
The Lord’s Second Angel: In tens of thousands they’ve been driven to captivity in Babylon.
The Lord’s Third Angel: And then their land will be occupied by the Romans. The Lord’s Angel: Come. Let them be.
(The Angels leaves with Amos.)
Choir of Women: Don’t make me leave you, for where you go, I will go; and where you lodge, I will lodge: your people is my people, your God my God.
The Woman: I seek my beloved.
(One of the women comes forth. We will meet her again as Elisabeth.)
Elisabeth: We have all lost our men in captivity.
The Woman: I can no longer remember his voice.
(Another woman comes forth.)
Second woman: I remember my man’s voice. I can still hear him nagging.
(They laugh. The Woman dries her tears.)
The Woman: My husband is not like that. His head is the finest gold, his locks are black as the raven. His lips are lilies. His mouth is sweetness. This is my friend, Him that I love.
Elisabeth: If I had a man like that, I’d miss him too.
(Laughter.)
The Woman: I ask you, O daughters of Jerusalem: if you find my friend, tell him I am sick with love!
(Suddenly Mary of Magdala is among them. Her eyes are empty and distant, as if she had experienced something very shattering.)
Elisabeth: Mary, what’s happened?
Mary of Magdala: I saw him die. He hung between two others also sentenced to death. I can still hear his weak voice calling:
Jesus: (softly, from a distance) My God, why have you forsaken me?
Mary of Magdala: Seven words. I will wait by his grave with his mother. It is said that on the third day he will live again.
Elisabeth: Who?
Mary of Magdala: He who drove seven demons from me and set me free. He who rebelled and said it was he and not Caesar who is the son of God. He…
(She is interrupted by the tones of singing whales. The Women listen.)
Elisabeth: What’s that?
Mary of Magdala: It’s whales singing.
The Woman: It’s like a song of someone who never can die.
(They listen. It is a magic moment, at once peaceful and intensely charged. Suddenly the moment is broken by a piercing signal from a mobile phone. Some of the actors try to continue acting; others stare angrily at the audience, some exchange questioning looks. Elisabeth realises it’s her phone ringing. She picks it up and answers She looks at the Woman and gives her the telephone.)
Elisabeth: It’s for you.
The Woman: (listens hesitantly in the phone) Yes?
The Man: (off) My love, my love.
(The Woman staggers as she hears The Man’s voice.)
The Woman: Where are you?
The Man: Far away. I’m in prison.
The Woman: You must be careful.
The Man: Like a lily among thistles is my beloved among girls.
The Woman: Like an apple tree in the forest is my friend among men.
The Man: I will soon be with you, my lily…
(The connection is broken.)
The Woman: Hello? Hello…
(She understands that the call has been cut off.)
The Woman: He’s alive. As if returned from the dead. He’s alive.
SCENE 10: The Last Supper
(Stagehands and others come in with a large table. Some on the scene leaves. Left is thirteen anonymous people on stage. They set up the table as for a feast. One by one they take their places, but there are only twelve seats. The singer we later will meet as Peter goes out and gets a thirteenth chair. When everyone is in place we recognize the setting as the well known image of The Last Supper, maybe with a projection on the figures on the stage.)
Music: Sven-David Sandström
The Book of Life
2019 Opera in Three Acts Act 3
SCENE 1: A Dungeon. 3 (The Man, The Woman, Jeremiah, A Prisoner, Amos, Isaiah, Choir, Pilate, Peter, High Priest)
SCENE 2: The Angels Watch the Last Supper. 25 (Peter, The Lord’s Three Angels, Jonah)
SCENE 3: Job’s First Trials . 34 (Choir, The Lord’s Three Angels, Job, A Prophet)
SCENE 4: The Healed Blind Man . 45 (High Priest, A Young Man (Choir soloist))
SCENE 5: Job Interrogated . 48 (Job, Zophar, Eliphas, The Lord’s Three Angels, Choir)
SCENE 6: Sermon on the Mount . 71 (The Woman, Mary of Magdala, Choir, Jesus)
SCENE 7: After the Sermon on the Mount. 81 (Mary of Magdala, Jesus, The Lord’s Second Angel, The Woman)
SCENE 8: Jesus Tempted by the Devil in the Desert. 87 (Jesus, The Lord’s Second Angel, Jonah, The Woman, Elisabeth)
SCENE 9: On the Road to Damascus. 95 (The Man, Paul)
SCENE 10: The Woman and the Man . 99 (The Man, The Woman, Choir)
SCENE 11: The Sea. 108 (Choir (also The Crew T Bar B), The Three Apostles, Jesus, Jonah)
SCENE 12: Jonah in the Belly of the Whale. 116 (Choir, Jonah, The Angel of the Lord)
SCENE 13: Birth . 133
Libretto: Niklas Rådström
(A dungeon where prisoners sit along the wall. The man stands at the centre with a mobile phone to his ear.)
The Man: (off) My love, my love.
The Woman: (off) Where are you?
(The Man staggers as she hears The Woman’s voice.)
The Man: Far away. I’m in prison.
The Woman: (off) You must be careful. Do as they say, worship their gods.
The Man: Like a lily among thistles is my beloved among girls.
The Woman: (off) Like an apple tree in the forest is my friend among men.
The Man: I will soon be with you, my lily…
(The connection is broken.)
The Man: Hello? Hello…
(He understands that the call has been cut off.)
The Man: She’s alive. She’s alive. Winter is over everywhere: She’s alive… (Jeremiah mutters from a corner.)
Jeremiah: Bah. Then you judge him by your law.
A Prisoner: Let him be. He’s heard from his beloved.
Jeremiah: I curse the day I was born!
Sad day when my mother gave me life! Why did I have to leave the womb to encounter all this misery and sorrow?
A Prisoner: Shut up, Jeremiah.
ACT 3 – SCENE
1: A Dungeon
(Amos comes out of the shadows and after him the Choir. From the choir the other prophets steps forward until finally Isaiah sings his part and everything calms down and they disappear in the shadows again.)
Amos: Woe to you who yearn for the Day of the Lord!
Choir: Woe to you who yearn for the Day of the Lord!
Amos: What joy will you get from the Day of the Lord?
Choir: What joy will you get from the Day of the Lord?
Ecclesiastes: Vanity of vanities
Choir: all is vanity.
Isaiah: A day has come when all are taken to Babylon.
Choir: Your sons, your own flesh and blood, serve at the court of the Babylonian king.
Ecclesiastes: Vanity of vanities.
Choir: All is vanity.
Ecclesiastes: This I saw under the sun:
Choir: To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven: a time to be born, and a time to die a time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance; a time to keep, and a time to seek a time to rend, and a time to sew; a time to love, and a time to hate; a time of war, and a time of peace.
Ecclesiastes: This I saw under the sun:
Choir: The race is not to the swift, the battle not to the strong, neither bread to the wise, nor richness to those of understanding; time and chance is all there is.
Ecclesiastes: Vanity of vanities.
Choir: All is vanity.
Ecclesiastes: This too I saw under the sun:
Choir: In the place of judgment – wickedness, in the place of righteousness – iniquity.
Isaiah: The people who wander in the dark see a great light…
Choir: … above those living in the land of darkness shines a light.
Isaiah & Choir: The boot worn in battle and the cloak stained with blood, all will be burnt, devoured by flames.
Isaiah: For a child is born, a son is given to us. All wise ruler, Divine hero, Eternal father, Prince of Peace.
(Amongst them there is suddenly a dressed up official, the governor Pontius Pilate, who enters the dungeon followed by a Pharisaic high priest and some guards.).
Pilate: Which one is it?
(The high priest looks around and then points to someone in the audience.)
Pilate: Him, that one?
(Pilate turns to Peter, a prisoner standing beside him.)
Pilate: And you? Are you here with him?
Peter: No, I don’t know him.
(Peter shamefully withdraws. Pilate looks toward the unknown person in the audience. During the scene the singer who will later play Jesus approaches and listens.)
Pilate: You there!
(No answer.)
Pilate: Do you know I have the power to set you free or to kill you?
High Priest: He has broken the law.
Pilate: How?
High Priest: They say he heals the ill and the lame.
Pilate: Is that a crime?
High Priest: He does it on the Sabbath!
(Pilate is not impressed.)
High Priest: He turned the merchants out of the temple. Now, who will finance us?
(Pilate shrugs his shoulders.)
High Priest: He says we shouldn’t pay taxes to the emperor.
(To this Pilate listens. He turns to the person in the audience.)
Pilate: Is this true?
(No reply.)
High Priest: It’s true.
Pilate: They say you stir up the people with your teachings. They say you entered the city on a donkey as a king. Are you the king of the Jews?
(No reply.)
Pilate: What am I to do with you? It’s either you or Barabbas, a rebel and murderer. Him they want me to release. I ask them: “Shall I really crucify your king?”
High Priest: We have no king but Caesar.
Pilate: Yes, you hear what they say.
High Priest: He who makes himself king opposes Caesar.
Pilate: They want me to kill you.
(No reply.)
Pilate: Are you king of the Jews?
(The singer later to play Jesus whispers something into the High Priests ear.)
High Priest: He claims to have been brought into this world for one reason: to testify to the truth.
Pilate: Truth. What is truth?
(No reply.)
Pilate: What shall I do with you?
High Priest: He’s a criminal.
Pilate: Then you judge him by your law.
High Priest: Only you can do that. He claims to be the son of God. Kill him and set Barabbas free.
Pilate: This will be on you. I have no guilt in spilling this man’s blood. I wash my hands of it.
High Priest: One who claims to be the son of God is more dangerous to Rome than a murderer
(The high priest hands Pilate a paper, Pilate writes something and signs it. Meanwhile a guard puts a crown of thorns on the head of the actor who’s going to play Jesus and drapes a purple cloak over his shoulders. The high priest inspects the execution order.)
High Priest: Here it says Jesus of Nazareth, king of the Jews. Write what he himself have said: “I am King of the Jews.”
Pilate: What I have written, I have written.
(As Pilate begins to leave, he sees Peter in the shadows.)
Pilate: Aren’t you with him?
Peter: No. No.
(Peter runs of. Pilate leaves. One of the guards strikes Jesus, the high priest spits on him. As they take him out, maybe we hear a screaming crowd.)
SCENE 2: The Angels watch the Last Supper.
(The Lord’s three angels come forth and watch Jesus and the others disappear. The Lord’s Second Angel approaches from one direction, the two others from another. Peter returns.)
Peter: There are only twelve chairs. There’s use for one more.
The Second Angel: So you’re with him?
Peter: No, I’m just fetching a chair…
(Peter turn silent as we hear a cock that crows. The Second Angel takes a chair and gives it to Peter.)
The Lord’s Second Angel: Here, give this to Judas.
(Peter takes the chair and leave. The three angels watch as he joins the others that are preparing the Passover meal offstage.)
The Lord’ Second Angel: The son of God! Who does he think he is?
The Lord’s Third Angel: Aren’t they all God’s children?
The Lord’s Second Angel: Bah.
The Lord’s Angel: Don’t argue!
The Lord’s Second Angel: Don’t you see what’s going on?
The people. They’re not listening to us anymore.
The Lord’s Third Angel: That’s not true.
The Lord’s Second Angel: When was the last time they asked for advice? They do nothing but battle each other over some little burnt out piece of land. Half the Empire is lost to the Assyrians. And in Nineveh they worship false gods!
The Lord’s Angel: In Nineveh?
(The Lord’s Angel looks around, and points to a person in the audience or maybe in the archestra.)
The Lord’s Angel: You. What’s your name?
Jonah: Jonah.
The Lord’s Angel: Jonah! I set you free. Go to Nineveh and hold a sermon.
Jonah: Me?
The Lord’s Angel: You.
Jonah: But I can’t…
The Lord’s Angel: Off you go.
(Jonah slouches off.)
The Lord’s Angel: The prophets are right, people only care for themselves.
The Lord’s Angel: God wants them to be free.
The Lord’s Second Angel: I have wandered the earth. I have seen people indulge in all kinds of lechery and filth. No one is righteous. Not one of them.
The Lord’s Angel: Have you met my servant Job? In all the world there is no one as blameless and upright as he.
The Lord’s Second Angel: Because you yourself protect him and bless everything he does. But take from him what is his and he will curse you to your face.
The Lord’s Angel: I don’t think so.
The Lord’s Second Angel: He’ll turn away from you.
The Lord’s Angel: No.
The Lord’s Second Angel: Let me try him, or don’t you dare? You know he will let you down.
The Lord’s Angel: Take from him what you want but let him be.
The Lord’s Second Angel: I will show you!
(The Lord’s Second Angel starts to leave but stops and looks where Peter disappeared to help prepare for the Last Supper.)
The Lord’s Second Angel: The Son of God! Look at him. Tomorrow he will be arrested and sentenced to death, but now he’s sitting there having supper with his friends.
The Lord’s Third Angel: He’s breaking bread and sharing wine with them to tell them that whatever happens they will always be together. This will show us that love and grace embrace us. For eternity.
The Lord’s Second Angel: Bah, tell him that when they kill him on Friday and see what he says.
(The Lord’s Second Angel leaves. The Third Angels goes after him.)
SCENE 3: Job’s First Trials.
(The Lord’s Angel lingers. From the shadows the Choir of the Prophets returns.)
Choir: You! You Angel of the Lord!
The Lord’s Angel: Yes.
Choir: It is said that great changes will come, but still there’s nothing. When will the Lord show mercy on Jerusalem and the cities of Judah?
The Lord’s Angel: The Lord is angry, but his wrath is moderate.
Once again the Lord will comfort Zion, once again he will choose Jerusalem.
Choir: But when? How long must we wait?
(From the wings a cry of despair from Job is heard.)
Choir: What was that?
The Lord’s Angel: It is Job, God’s servant, being tried.
(Another cry of despair is heard from Job.)
Job: (off) My children! What have you done to my children!
Choir: Why is he made to suffer so?
A prophet: To that the angels has no answer.
A Prophet Where then is justice?
(The Lord’s Angel is speechless.)
A prophet: The angels can’t answer that either.
Choir: Bah…!
(The Choir mumble disappointedly when they return to in the shadows as the Second and Third Angel enters. Some of the members of the choir remain on stage.)
The Lord’s Third Angel: Job made it! He passed the test!
The Lord’s Second Angel: Nah. He skipped out.
The Lord’s Angel: What did you do to him?
The Lord’s Second Angel: A whirlwind destroyed his house.
His children died in the rubble.
The Lord’s Angel: And did he deny the Lord?
The Lord’s Third Angel: He cursed his own life. But the Lord he kept holy. He said: “The lord giveth and the Lord taketh away, blessed be the Lord’s name.”
The Lord’s Angel: There’s none so blameless and upright as him, none who so fears God and shuns evil.
The Lord’s Second Angel: Nah. He just lost what he had.
Reach out and touch him, and he will curse you to your face.
The Lord’s Angel: No, he will not.
The Lord’s Second Angel: I’ll show you.
The Lord’s Angel: Do what you will, but spare his life.
(The Lord’s Second Angel rushes off, rubbing his hands in delight. The other two angels go after him as the Choir sounds in the distance.)
Choir: Vanity of vanities, all is vanity. All days are of sorrows, and travail is grief. Not even at night does the heart rest.
SCENE 4: The Healed Blind Man.
(A few of the members of the choir has remained on stage. The High Priest, maybe with some guards, enters and go up to one of them, a young man looking in wonder at everything as if he sees it for the first time.)
High Priest: You there. Was it you that was blind?
Young Man: Yes.
High Priest: How did that happen?
Young Man: Jesus put clay on my eyes.
I washed and now I see.
High Priest: Jesus?
On the Sabbath that this man opened your eyes.
Give God the honour That man is a sinner.
Young Man: Maybe he’s a sinner. But I was blind and now I see.
High Priest: But he did it on the Sabbath!
(The High Priest leaves in anger. The once blind man joins the choir.)
SCENE 5: Job Interrogated.
(Job is like dying hospice patient or a tortured prisoner. Parts of the choir is around, among them Eliphaz and Zophar. The Lord’s Second Angel stands at a distance watching Jobs half naked body covered with wounds and abscesses.)
Job: I am innocent!
Zophar: What innocent man ever perished?
Those who sow trouble reap the same.
Job: Why do the evil get to live?
Zophar: God does not punish the innocent.
Job: The wicked, the rich, always get away.
Job: He punished me.
Eliphas: Ask for his mercy.
Job: Mercy? For what crime?
Zophar: For that which you are being punished for.
Job: O I pray, that God would lift his hand and crush me.
Zophar: For how long will you go on speaking like that? Do you think God reverses justice?
Job: Look at me! No one has proven my guilt.
Eliphas: God does not reject an honest man, or give support to the evil.
Job: But I who am righteous lie here, I have lost everything, my body is full of wounds.
Eliphas: What God does is right.
(The Lord’s Angel and the Lord’s Third Angel has joined the Lord’s Second Angel.)
The Lord’s Third Angel: He retains his righteousness.
The Lord’s Angel: That’s what I expected.
The Lord’s Second Angel: We will break him.
Job: No man can prove God wrong. In might he is unequalled, in right unaccountable.
I am innocent!
My life has no meaning, I no longer want to live.
Eliphas: It is He who gave you life, no one else could give it to you.
Job: Then let him take it back.
I tell God: Judge me not, There is no escape from you. Whether innocent or guilty, God destroys both. He sneers at the fall of the innocent. The world is at the mercy of a criminal.
Zophar: So you know the truth?
Job: I am not dumber than you. I know that this is the Lord’s work. He has the life of all creatures in his hands, the spirit of every human being.
I have seen it all, I have heard it and understood. May he kill me, but I will still defend myself before him.
Zophar: Before God all are equal, rich and poor. Both are laid in the earth and covered by maggots.
Job: But the rich man dies, light hearted and safe. Another dies broken down by woes, never having tasted happiness. We are not equal before God. The poor look for food in the wilderness. At night they lie naked.
God does not hear their prayers.
Zophar: God does not punish the innocent.
Eliphas: Confess your guilt.
Job: Never! For then I would be lying. I’m innocent unto my death.
I’m righteous and refuse to renounce it.
Zophar: If only God were to speak and answer you!
(The Lord’s Second Angel loses his patience.)
Job: I have become the jackal’s brother, I am the owl’s peer. O that there was someone to hear me!
(The Lord’s Second Angel goes forth allowing threats, spit and blows rain down on Job. Maybe parts of the choir, shaped in the Angels image, join him like a lynch mob. Suggestions of what the choir can sing to emphasize the Angels rage are shown within. The aria is getting stronger and furious with extreme force until Jobs response. Job is then small and crushed like an insect, he’s voice weak.)
The Lord’s Second Angel: Who do you think you are? /Who!?/ Where were you when God created the earth? /Where!?/ Have you ever called forth morning, /Have you!?/ have you shown dawn its place? /Have you!?/ Let us hear if you know all this!
Have you been at the stores of snow, or seen the stocks of hail? Who begets the drops of dew? /Who!?/ Can you call to the clouds above so that they answer with torrents of water? Is it you who give the horse its strength? /Is it you…/ He runs across the battlefield. Arrows fly around him, /Arrows fly around him/ Swords and sables flash. /Swords and sables flash/ You who disagree with the Lord, you who blame God: Who do you think you are?
Job: I am so small, how can I answer you?
The Lord’s Second Angel: Do you question the Lord And hold him guilty?
Job: I know that God can do anything, nothing is impossible for Him.
The Lord’s Second Angel: So you take back what you accuse him of?
Job: Before I had only heard what His might could do, now I have seen it with my own eyes.
(The Second Angel again cast his shadow over Job and lifts his hand to hit him. The Lord’s Angel stops him. The Choir disappears in the shadows.)
The Lord’s Angel: That’s enough.
(The Lord’s angel turns to Elifaz, Zophar.)
The Lord’s Angel: Take Job with you. He is free.
(Job is led away by his friends.)
The Lord’s Angel: (to Lord’s second angel) Why did I let you to put Job through this!
The Lord’s Second Angel: Oh, this moaning!
The Lord’s Angel: I feel dirty.
The Lord’s Second Angel: But You were right. He held on to his righteousness and the might of the Lord.
The Lord’s Angel: Yes, might is God’s domain.
Dominion over night and day, light and darkness, life and death. But does his people still trust him?
Power is God’s, but faith is being lost. That has Job shown us.
The Lord’s Second Angel: Never mind. We’ll get Job a new family and double his fortune.
(Lord’s second angel prepares to go.)
The Lord’s Third Angel: Where are you going?
The Lord’s Second Angel: I’m off, there’s much to be done.
The Lord’s Angel: I hope I have nothing more to do with you.
The Lord’s Second Angel: Our paths will cross again. You can’t avoid me.
(The Lord’s second angel leaves. He casts a demonic shadow behind him. The Lord’s angel and the Lord’s third angel stand watching him.)
The Lord’s Angel: He’ll go on accusing, seducing and destroying...
The Lord’s Third Angel: But he’s one of us, the Angels of the Lord.
The Lord’s Angel: This power we have! I don’t want it anymore
The Lord’s Third Angel: Why?!
(The Lord’s Angel thinks for a short while.)
The Lord’s Angel: If I speak the tongues of men and angels, but lack love, I am as sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal. And if I have all faith to move mountains, but lack love, I am nothing. I must find another way to be in the world.
The Lord’s Third Angel: And what about me?
The Lord’s Angel: Do what you can. Everywhere men will fight over what the Lord wants. So be careful what you say.
The Lord’s Third Angel: Will we meet again?
The Lord’s Angel: We’ll see.
(The Lord’s angel leaves.)
SCENE 6: Sermon on the Mount.
(The Woman, Mary Magdalene and the Choir maybe can hand out bread to the audience.)
The Woman, Mary of Magdala and Choir:
Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are they who mourn, for they shall be comforted.
Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.
Blessed are they who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be filled.
Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy.
Blessed are the pure of heart, for they shall see God.
(On stage Jesus strews a circle of salt.)
Jesus: You are the salt of the earth. But if salt lost its savour wherewith shall it be salted? You are the light of the world. A lamp gives light for all in the house. In the same way shall let your light shine.
(Jesus turns to the audience:)
Jesus: Each and every one of you.
_ _ _ I’m not here to destroy the law or the prophets.
You’ve heard it said: “An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth” But I say: whosoever shall smite your right cheek, turn to him the other also
It is said: Love your neighbour and hate your enemy. Anyone can hate, there is nothing remarkable about that. But I say: love your enemies and pray for them.
The sun rises on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.
Don’t be like the hypocrites, praying on the street for everyone to see. Turn to your father, he knows what you need before you ask him.
(The Woman, Mary of Magdala and the Choir join Jesus I quiet prayer.)
Jesus, The Woman, Mary of Magdala and Choir: For His is the power and the glory forever.
(The others scatter around him and quietly listening to him. He points to his eye.)
Jesus: Here is the eye. It is the lamp of the body. But If your eye is bad, your body will be full of darkness. No one can serve two masters, you cannot serve both God and your own greed, your vanity, your comfort. Look at the birds in the sky, they neither sow nor reap. They know their heavenly father feeds them. Judge not, lest you be judged. Whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them.
SCENE 7: After the Sermon on the Mount.
(Jesus is tired after his sermon. Mary Magdalene massages his shoulders. The Woman listens in a telephone that someone hands her.)
Mary of Magdala: Your mother and your brothers are here to see you.
Jesus: Send them away. (makes a gesture towards Those around). You are my mother and my brothers
(The Lord’s Second Angel enters, deeply disturbed.)
The Lord’s Second Angel: Salt? Salt! What salt of the earth?
And the light of the world? And this… “Whatever you wish that others…”
So if I’m attacked, shall I not defend myself?
Jesus: Can you fight evil by being on its side?
(Lord’s Second angel slaps Jesus on his cheek.)
The Lord’s Second Angel: Will you not strike back? (Slaps Jesus’ other cheek) Here’s one on the other cheek.
(Jesus only looks compassionately at the Second Angel.)
Mary of Magdala: What should we do with the leftover bread?
Jesus: Did everyone get enough to eat?
Mary of Magdala: Everyone.
The Lord’s Second Angel: (like an overtired child) I didn’t get enough!
I’m hungry! Hungry! And I’m cold! Lend me your shirt!
Jesus: Take my cloak as well.
(Lord’s second angel is enraged by his failed provocations.)
The Lord’s Second Angel: To hell with this.
(The Lord’s second angel starts to leave but stops.)
The Lord’s Second Angel: If I ask you to come along, would you come?
Jesus: How far do you want me to follow?
The Lord’s Second Angel: A mile.
(Jesus gets up wearily.)
Jesus: Then I will follow you for two.
(Jesus caresses Mary of Magdala tenderly on the cheek and then leaves with the Second Angel. The Woman drops the phone and takes a few unsteady steps as if in chock. Mary tries to support her.)
Mary of Magdala: How are you? Has something happened?
The Woman: He’s free. He’s coming home now.
(We see that The Woman is worried.)
Mary of Magdala: Aren’t you happy?
The Woman: I’m happy, but...
Mary of Magdala: What is it. Tell me.
The Woman: It’s nothing.
(Woman rushes away. Mary M watches her.)
SCENE 8: Jesus Tempted by the Devil in the Desert.
(Jesus and the Lord’s second angel have walked far. The Lord’s second angel I tired after the long walk and falls to the ground.)
Jesus: Shall we move on?
The Lord’s Second Angel: I’m tired! I’m hungry!
If you’re the son of God, turn these stones to bread!
Jesus: “Man shall not live by bread alone.”
The Lord’s Second Angel: Yes, I know what is written! I’m not stupid! I can also read! (sighs)
You’re a pain in the ass! You know that?
Jesus: Shall we go on?
The Lord’s Second Angel: Damned demanding!
(The Second Angel takes Jesus to the front of the stage and shows him the audience and the beautiful theatre where the opera is staged.)
The Lord’s Second Angel:
So you say you’re the son of God! Tell it to them! Tell it to the good people out there.
They will look at you in wonder and doubt. These good people, look what they have made!
This beautiful room, this great society!
They have made it be themselves. Hospitals when they are ill!
Schools for knowledge, police for safety!
They can get their house cleaned, their lawns mowed!
Competent people! Go see the glittering light in their shopping malls! Look at the riches! This is our world!
I will give you all this glory, if you only… if you only… worship me!
Jesus: “The Lord, thy God, only Him shall you worship. You shall not tempt the Lord thy God.”
The Lord’s Second Angel: The hell with this.
Damn, I’m tired of you!
But don’t think you’re rid of me.
I’ll be back. You can’t avoid me!
Jesus: I know. You will be back. Every day.
(They part ways and Jesus leaves. Just before the Lord’s Second Angel disappears he catches sight of Jonah hiding. The Lord’s second angel drags him out.)
The Lord’s Second Angel: And you! Didn’t we send you to Nineveh to hold a sermon?
Jonah: I didn’t dare go there.
The Lord’s Second Angel: (laughs) Didn’t dare!
Oh well, screw it. Nothing matters anyway.
(They leave. The Woman enters. She calls from one side of the stage to the other where Elisabeth, whom is to be the mother of John the Baptist enters. Elisabeth is pregnant.)
The Woman: Elisabeth!
Elisabeth: When I heard you call the child within me kicked for joy. Feel!
(She guides The Woman’s hand to her swollen belly for her to feel the child kicking. The Woman is somewhat preoccupied.)
Elisabeth: And they said I would never be blessed with a child. (She can see that the Woman is sad.) But what’s the matter?
The Woman: I’m waiting…
Elisabeth: He will soon come home.
The Woman: You don’t understand. I am also expecting. I’m waiting a child.
(Elisabeth holds her tenderly away from her and looks at her belly. We now see that The Woman’s belly is also swollen with child.)
The Woman: What will he say?
He won’t want me.
Elisabeth: How could he turn away when he sees you?
Look at you! How could he not love you.
Don’t be afraid.
All you bear is a message of great joy, joy to everyone.
Come! Stay with us until he comes home.
(The women embrace and leave arm in arm.)
SCENE 9: On the road to Damascus.
(The Man and another elder man, Paul, who is blind, have met on the road to Damascus.)
The Man: Where are you going, Paul?
Paul: I’m on my way to Damascus.
And who are you who is guiding me?
The Man: Just a refugee on my way home to my beloved.
I’ve been gone for so many years.
Paul: You love her.
The Man: I love her.
Paul: But you’re worried she no longer loves you.
The Man: Yes.
Paul: Listen to me.
Love is patient and good.
Love longs not for battle, is neither boastful nor conceited.
It is not defiant, not selfish, doesn’t rage, and wishes no harm.
It finds no joy in injustice, but rejoice in the truth.
It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
Other things perish, other things die.
Not love. Love never dies.
The Man: I hope so. I believe it.
Paul: That’s what you have.
Your faith, your hope and your love, these three, and above all is love. Go now, she awaits you.
The Man: But I cannot leave you here.
Paul: I’ll be all right. Go.
SCENE 10: The Woman and the Man.
(The Woman stands waiting for the Man. She is nervous. When The Man comes in he sees her before she notices him. He looks at her tenderly and lovingly. When she hears him she remains turned away from him.)
The Man: I no longer know how long we’ve been apart, days, years or centuries, but when I see you it cannot be longer than yesterday. No, turn your gaze away, it confuses me.
You glow like the dawn, You’re as beautiful as the white moon, perfect as the hot sun, frightening as a host of stars.
Turn, turn my perfection, Turn, turn so that I may see you.
(They are both shy, frightened, hesitant, longing. So when she turns toward him he discovers her pregnant swollen belly. First silent disbelief, then sorrow and raging anger overwhelm him.)
The Man: You couldn’t wait for me.
The Woman: I have waited. It’s not what you think.
The Man: If you only knew how I have longed for you.
The Woman: I am here, my beloved.
(The Man prepares to leave. The Woman suddenly gasps and grabs her belly. She stumbles. He looks at her worriedly.)
The Man: What is it?
The Woman: Nothing. The child is kicking.
(They stand silently, as if neither of them knows what to do. Then she approaches him, takes his hand and places it on her belly. He remains standing and gives a start, delighted, amused. They embrace and kiss. He falls to his knees, places his ear to her belly and listens.)
The Woman: What do you hear?
The Man: The sea. I believe I hear the sea.
(They listen together. The sea breeze and within it whale song.)
The Woman: Can you hear the whales singing?
The Man: What do you think they sing of?
The Woman: They want to tell us we are alive.
(He places his hand again on her round belly.)
The Man: That everything living is worthy of our love.
(The sounds of the sea become louder and louder. A wind begins to blow. A heavy rain begins to fall. A storm is coming. The Man and the woman seek shelter.)
SCENE 11: The sea.
(The troubled sea sweeps across the stage. The Choir form the sonic background of the violent waves. It’s evening and dark clouds rush across the sky. In the back of the stage three apostles row in a small boat through the waves. They’re frightened.)
Apostle 1: We will all die!
Apostle 3: The waves will swallow us!
Apostle 2: Help us!
(A figure, Jesus, appears in the shadows, walking on the water.)
Apostle 3: Look!
Apostle 1: What’s that?
Apostle 2: Where?
Apostle 3: There!
Apostle 1: Someone is walking toward us on the water.
(Jesus walks calmly over the waves toward them.)
Jesus: Be calm, it’s me. Don’t be afraid.
Apostle 3: My Lord, help me!
Apostle 2: We will die!
Jesus: You of little faith. What made you doubt?
(Jesus climbs into the boat.)
Apostle 1: You must be the Son of God.
Jesus: Don’t be afraid. Row us ashore.
(They row of the stage. The storm increases in force. A shark’s fin appears on the surface. A whale spouts in the distance. Flying fish skip over the waves. A larger ship approaches and heels over with flapping sails. The small crew or a single crewman scream in fear and desperation.)
The Crew Help! We’re sinking... God, help us!
(Jonah appears on deck.)
Jonah: This storm is my fault.
The Crew: What have you done?
Jonah: The Lord sent me to Nineveh to hold a sermon.
But I fled from the Lord, which is why this storm is upon us.
The Crew: What are we to do with you to calm the sea?
Jonah: Throw me overboard, and the sea will be calmed.
The Crew: Lord, let us not be doomed for taking this man’s life.
Judge us not if we kill an innocent man.
(The crewmen throw Jonah overboard. The waves wash over him. The ship disappears from our view. Jonah is tossed back and forth in the waves. Suddenly, the Choir forms itself into a giant whale rises to the surface and swallows him. The whale disappears under the surface with Jonah. The storm slowly settles down. There is traces of a pale sunrise.)
SCENE 12: Jonah in the belly of the whale.
(Jonah is in the belly of the whale. The Faceless Choir forms the inside of the wave through which we can hear the sea outside. Inside the whale it’s cramped and damp, with living, pulsating walls. He is simultaneously buried alive and amidst everything live, as if in life itself. The whale’s heart beats wheezily and the sea’s currents whine. Jonah is terrified.)
Choir
The sea caresses the wave Sea embraces the wave Wave, whale caressing Jonah, swallow him whole into the hole, eat him, swallow
Life is hollow
Into the hole swallow him whole Jonah.
Jonah: Help me, oh Lord! Help me!
You hurled me to the depths, the depths of the sea. I have been banished from you. The stars have closed their eyes on me. My cries arise from the depths of doom: Give me life, oh Lord, my God, lift me from my grave! Hear me! Hear me!
(Suddenly the Lord’s angels appear by his side, as if from nowhere.)
The Lord’s Angel: I hear you.
Jonah: Help me! Stay with me!
The Lord’s Angel: Don’t be afraid. I am with you.
(The Lord’s angel shows Jonah a large book. It is the Book the conductor had in the beginning of the opera. Maybe the conductor has come up on stage and given it to the Angel. The Angel opens the book and holds it out to Jonah.)
The Lord’s Angel: Here is the book of life. Write your name among the living.
Jonah: Tell me what to do!
The Lord’s Angel: Take the book and eat it up.
Jonah: Eat it?
The Lord’s Angel: Your name shall be written in the book and you shall eat it.
It will burn in your stomach, but taste sweet as honey in your mouth.
You, your name, and your life shall be one.
Tell me where you are.
Jonah: I am in the belly of a whale.
The Lord’s Angel: No, you’re alive.
Everything lives. Everything is living.
You are in the midst of life.
(Jonah moves his hands over the walls of the whale’s belly. Everything pulsates with life.)
Jonah: Help me! Am I alive or dead?
The Lord’s Angel: Don’t be afraid. I will bring you life.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. It was with God from the beginning.
Everything arose from it, but without it nothing could have arisen of all that is.
In the Word was life, and life was the light of mankind and the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not conquered it.
Look! A great sign in the sky! What do you see?
Jonah: A dragon stands before a pregnant woman, to eat her child as soon as it is born.
The Lord’s Angel: For such is life: we are born to die.
Death gives us life. No life without death, no death without life.
Jonah: Who are you?
The Lord’s Angel: I am the word written in the book of life.
Jonah: No life without death, no death without life.
The Lord’s Angel: The woman bears her child into the mouth of a raging dragon.
The Lord’s Angel: Fallen, fallen will the great Babylon be.
Jonah: We are born to die.
The Lord’s Angel: And death brings us life.
Jonah: No life without death and no death without life.
The Lord’s Angel: Fear not. Death makes you alive.
Jonah: There can be no life without death and no death without life.
The Lord’s Angel: I am the first and the last, the beginning and the end.
Come! And those who hear this shall say: Come!
And those who thirst shall drink freely of the water of life. Go now, the whale will soon spit you up. Your life awaits you.
Choir: Life. Living. Dying. Death. Be born.
The Lord’s Angel: The book of life is open and your name is already inscribed.
Fear not. I am by your side. I am with you. I am with you for all your days until the end of time.
Choir: Be born.
(The Lord’s angel thrusts Jonah out from the whale’s insides through a thin gap and thereby the scene fades into the performances last image.)
(The Woman gives birth to her child with the Man by her side. It is a serene, magical moment. It can be a stylised image with an unending night sky arching over them. It can be the ensemble in a choreographic performance. It can be a film collage of birth scenes: children being born and placed on their mothers’ breasts, fathers by their sides, healthcare personnel, laughter and tears... It can be any way but this shall be told: a child is born.)
SCENE 13: (The Last Scene) Birth