Elkiah , the Pharisee, with others of his own kind, is deliberating on the measures to be taken with the Elder Simon (the one who threw his father out of his house, for having become a follower of Jesus, Who placed him with a righteous man in his business, even there, Simon had his own father murdered...), who, maddened on Good Friday, speaks and says too many things. Several are the proposals. There are those who propose to isolate him in some deserted place, where his cries can only be heard by a very faithful servant and of the same ideas as them; there are those who, more benign, trust that, being a passing disorder, it would be enough to leave him where he is.
Elkiah replies:
-I have brought him here because I did not know where else to take him. But you know that I have many doubts about my relative Daniel?
Others, even more wicked than Elchijah, say:
-He wants to flee, to go over the sea. Why not indulge him?
-Because he is incapable of orderly acts. In the sea he alone would perish; and none of us is capable of guiding a boat.
-And even if we were! What would happen at the place of arrival with those things he says? Let him choose the way.....
In the presence of all, even your kinsman, let him express his will: and let it be done as he wishes.
This proposal is approved. Elkiah, calling a servant, orders Simon to be brought in and Daniel to be called. They both appear, and, if Daniel has the appearance of a man who feels violent in the company of certain people, the other has the appearance of a madman.
-Hear us, Simon. You say we're holding you prisoner because we want to kill you...
-You must. Because that's the order.
-You're delirious, Simon. -Shut up and listen. Shut up and listen. Where do you think you'd be cured?
-In the sea. In the sea. In the middle of the sea, where there is no voice, where there is no grave; because the graves open and the dead come out, and my mother says....
-Shut up! Listen. We esteem you. As if you were our flesh. Are you sure you want to go to the sea?
-Of course I want to. Because here the tombs open and my mother...
-Well, you'll go. We'll take you to the sea, we'll give you a boat and you....
-Doing that, you commit murder! He's out of his mind! -He can't go alone! - cries honest Daniel.
-God does not force the will of man. Could we do what God does not do?
-But he does not reason! He has no will anymore. He has less intelligence than a newborn baby! You can't...!
-You shut up, you're just a peasant! We know... Tomorrow we'll leave for the sea. You can be happy, Simon. To the sea, do you understand?
-Ah! I'll stop hearing the voices of the Earth! Even without the voices... Ah! - a long cry, a spasm of agitation, a covering of the eyes and ears. And another scream, that of Daniel, who flees in terror.
-What's going on? What's happening? Stop that madman and that fool! Are we all losing our minds? - cried Elijah (Elkiah).
But the one whom Elkiah calls "the fool", that is, his relative Daniel, after having run for a few meters, prostrates himself on the ground; the other, on the contrary, in the place where he is, foams while suffering a horrible convulsion, and shouts, shouts, shouts:
-Make him be quiet! He is not dead, and he screams, screams, screams! More than my mother, more than my father, more than on Golgotha!
There, there! Can't you see there? - He points to where Daniel is, serene, smiling, raising his face, after having been face down on the ground.
Elijah comes to Daniel. He shakes him sharply, furious, without taking care of Simon, who rolls on the ground and foams and emits bestial screams in the center of the terrified circle formed by the others. Elijah rebukes Daniel:
-"You idle missionary, do you want to tell me what you are doing?
-Let me go. Now I know you. And I'm getting away from you. I have seen - to me benign, to you terrible - the One you would have me believe is dead. I go away. More than money and all other riches, what I guard is my soul. Farewell, accursed one! And if you can, try to deserve God's forgiveness.
-But where are you going? Where? I don't want to go!
-Do you have the right to keep me prisoner? Who gave you that right? I leave to you what you love and follow what I love. Farewell - he turns his back on him and leaves quickly, as if dragged by a superhuman force, down the hillside clothed in the green of olive and fruit trees.
Elkiah - and not only him - is livid. Anger chokes them all. Elchias threatens revenge against his relative, against all those who "with their frenzies", he says, affirm that the Galileo lives. He means he wants to act...
One - I do not know who it is - says:
-We will act, we will act, but we will not be able to close all the mouths, nor the pupils, who speak because they see. we are defeated! The crime weighs on us. Now comes the atonement... - and he beats his chest, wrapped in an anguish that makes him look like one who is climbing the steps of a scaffold - The vengeance of Yeohveh - he says, and all the millennial terror of Israel
of Israel comes out in his voice.
Meanwhile, wounded, foaming, terrified, Simon bellows with reprobate cries:
-Parricide he called me! Make him shut up! Make him shut up! Parricide! The very word of my mother! Do all the dead say the same words!.....