Recovering from the creative slump of Collin and Five Days in June,
Heym is again recognizable as the vibrant author of Hostages and
The King David Report - in this startling, bold, half-successful
historical/theological novel. "We are falling," the book begins:
the "we" are angels, Lucifer included, cast out of Heaven soon
after Creation. And one of these fallen angels is Ahasverus, who
continues thereafter to show up in history as the Wandering Jew -
ordered by Jesus to exist forever, to serve as a reminder of those
who rejected Christ's divinity. An East German scholar is
uncomfortably made aware of the Jew's reappearance as a shoemaker
in contemporary Jerusalem; and four hundred years earlier, a
Reformation-era German pastor, Paulus von Eitzen, finds the Jew (in
yet some other guise) tormenting him, which leads to a vile,
virulent, but apparently routine church campaign of anti-Semitism,
Heym isn't subtle here: this is a very head-on indictment of
Christianity's problems with the Jews, suggesting that Christianity
may be inherently incapable of bringing about peace and justice;
instead, murder and oppression are fomented. Also, by chopping tho
allegory into such disparate time-zones, the book palls under an
air of schema, rigidity, set-up. But many of the scenes are
electric with imaginative courage - especially an apocalyptic
reunion between Rabbi Joshua (Jesus) and God. (In a father-son
confrontation of disappointment and revulsion, they discover that
they have no use for each other.) And though too stiff and
disjointed to provide steady narrative interest, this is fiery,
passionate, mordantly discomforting work. (Kirkus Reviews)
According to the myth of the Wandering Jew, Ahasverus denied Christ
a resting place while Christ was traveling to Golgotha. In turn,
Ahasverus was cursed to roam the earth until the Second Coming.
Stefan Heym's novel re-creates and expands this myth to propose
that the right synthesis of love and rebellion can bring humankind
to the Kingdom of Heaven.
Heym introduces both Ahasverus and Lucifer as angels cast out of
heaven for their opinions on God's order. Their respective
oppositions continue throughout the rest of time: Ahasverus remains
defiant through protest rooted in love and a faith in progress,
while Lucifer is rebellious by means of his old, familiar methods.
In a funny eternity of run-ins, debates, and meddling with
characters such as Christ, a disciple of Luther, and a Marxist
professor in East Germany, Ahasverus and Lucifer struggle on,
awaiting the Second Coming.
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