The Darkness in the Light
(a parable)
Once there was a quaint little village. And as the years passed, the people of the village lived happily and in harmony together.
Then one day, a beast began visiting the village at night, poisoning their crops, killing their sons, and raping their daughters. And as the days and weeks went by, every night the beast would return. And unable to abate its guile, dissention slowly sowed itself among the villagers.
But then one day the men of the village banded together and, under the light of the sun, ventured into the wilderness to hunt the beast down and kill it. But at the end of every day the men returned empty-handed. And each night, the beast, again, returned.
Then one day, the men of the village came to me and asked for my help.
"I will help you," I told them. "But I must do it alone."
"Go then," they ordered.
"No, not yet," I replied. "I must wait until nightfall, for only there can the beast be seen." And so, accepting my condition, they departed.
That night, under the cover of a moonless shade, while the villagers slept, I rose. And I wandered into the wilderness, armed with nothing but my words, and I found the beast. Then I said to him, "leave those people alone."
But he replied, saying, "I cannot leave them alone for it is my nature to hate that which lives in the light. And I cannot be killed, for darkness is immortal, so forever they must be tormented by my indignation."
"I thought you might say that," I said. And then I ate the beast -- and in eating him, I became him.
The next morning, at the light of dawn, I walked back into the village and was greeted by the villagers. With hope in their eyes they asked me, "did you slay the beast?" To which I simply answered, "he will not plague you any more."
But I hated them, because from that day on they lived happily and with glee, never knowing what it had cost me to buy their freedom.
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