Marco Polo in Central Asia: 08: A Cobbler Moves A Mountain

Now, I am to tell you of a great miracle, which happened between Baldach and Mosul in the year 1225.  A Caliph in Baldach very much hated Christians, as it is natural to all Saracens.  He thought day and night how he could compel all his subjects to convert into his faith.  Many others concurred in that wicked purpose and they agreed upon his plan.  They found in the gospel a text saying that if a Christian had as much faith as a grain of mustard seed and made his prayer to God, he would be able to join two mountains together.  On finding this text, they felt great joy, thinking they had thus either a means of converting them or a pretext for killing them.  He therefore sent for all the Jacobite and Nestorian believers in his country, who were very numerous; and when they came before him, he showed them this gospel, and made them read it, and asked them if it were true.  They replied that it was so.  Then continued the Caliph, since so many Christians are here, there surely must be among you this small measure of faith; therefore, said he, pointing to a large hill in his view, you must remove that mountain, or I will put you all to death, or otherwise you must be wholly destitute of faith, and on that account deserve to die.  If, however, you will turn to our good law of Mohammed you shall be forgiven; and in the meantime I allow you ten days to do what is required.  He then dismissed them. They were in great fear.  Caliph's words resounded in their ears.  They came together, men and women, small and big, bishop and archbishop, rich and poor, and they remained eight days and eight nights in prayer, that God is mercy, would come to them in these dark days, shall have his mercy upon them.  An angel came in their prayer, by the message of God, and appeared before a bishop of holy deeds and words.  The angel said, "Oh, bishop!  Go to a cobbler with one eye, and tell him that at his prayer the mountain will be moved." The angel disappeared.  They went in search of the cobbler, very honest and chaste man who fasted and went regularly to mass, and gave bread to the poor.  One day a very beautiful woman came to his workhouse to purchase a pair of shoes.  He was obliged to look at her foot and ankle, finely shaped, that he felt something creeping from his foot and going upward.  As soon as she was gone, he began to reproach himself, and remembered the text, "If thine eye offend thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee."  He then took a sharp weapon, and stuck it into his eye, so that it burst in his head, and he could never see with it again.  Thus, you see, he was a most holy and good man.  The bishop told of his story to the others, they agreed that he be called before them, and when he came, they requested him to pray to god, that he would make the mountain move.  But when the cobbler heard what the Bishop and others said, he answered that he was not so good a man as that God or our lady should for his sake do so great a miracle.  But the Christians pressed him so earnestly, that he at last agreed, and made the prayer.  When the final day was come, they all rose early in the morning; great and small, male and female, and entering the church, they sung the holy mass, and then proceeded out to the plain in front of the mountain.  They were fully a hundred thousand, and they all placed themselves in front of the cross.  The Caliph then came, along with him a number of Saracens, eager to slay the unarmed men and women.  They were in great fear, but they had full faith in their Creator.  The cobbler fell on his knees before the cross, lifted his hands to heaven, and prayed fervently that the mountain might be moved, and the Christians there assembled escape a dreadful death.  When he had made his prayer, and it was not before, the vast eminence began to stir, and move from its place.  The Saracens, on seeing this wondered greatly, and many of them were converted; nay the Caliph himself became a believer in the gospel, but secretly, and when he died, a cross was found on his neck; for which reason he was not buried in the same place with the other sovereigns, but in a tomb by himself.  Now, let us leave Baldach and go to Persia.

End of the Section 

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