Text:  Matthew 18:21-35                                                                         17^th Sunday after Pentecost

A Spark Neglected Burns the House

A story by Leo Tolstoy (Edited, condensed, and slightly Lutheranized)

(Somewhere in Russia, about two hundred years ago …)

There once lived in a village a peasant named Ivan Stcherbakof.  He was comfortably off, in the prime of life, the best worker in the village, and had three sons all able to work.  The eldest was married, the second about to marry, and the third was a big lad who could mind the horses and was already beginning to plow.  Ivan’s wife was an able and thrifty woman, and they were fortunate in having a quiet, hard-working daughter-in-law.  There was nothing to prevent Ivan and his family from living happily.  There was only one idle mouth to feed; that was Ivan’s old father, who suffered from asthma and had been lying ill near the brick oven for seven years.  Ivan had all he needed:  three horses and a colt, a cow with a calf, and fifteen sheep.  The women made all the clothing for the family, besides helping in the fields, and the men tilled the land.  They always had enough grain of their own to last over beyond the next harvest and sold enough oats to pay the taxes and meet their other needs.  So Ivan and his children might have lived quite comfortably had it not been for a feud between him and his next-door neighbor, Limping Gabriel, the son of Gordy Ivanhof.

Back when old Gordy was alive and Ivan’s father was still able to manage things, the peasants lived as neighbors should.  If the women of either household happened to want a sieve or a tub, or the men required a sack, or if a cart-wheel got broken and could not be mended at once, they used to send to the other house, and helped each other in a neighborly fashion.  And such things as locking up the barns and outbuildings, hiding things from one another, or backbiting were never thought of in those days.  But that was in the fathers’ time.  When the sons came to be at the heads of the families, everything changed.

It all began about a trifle.  Ivan’s daughter-in-law had a hen that began laying rather early in the season, and she started collecting its eggs for Easter.  Everyday she went to the cart shed, and found an egg in the cart; but one day the hen, probably frightened by the children, flew across the fence into the neighbor’s yard and laid its egg there.  The woman heard the cackling, but said to herself, ”I’ve no time now; I must tidy up for Sunday.  I’ll fetch the egg later on.”  In the evening she went to the cart, but found no egg there. She asked if anyone had taken the egg. Everyone said, “No,” they had not; but one of the children said, “Your Biddy laid its egg in the neighbor’s yard. It was there that she was cackling, and she flew back across the fence from there.”

So she went to the neighbor’s, and Gabriel’s mother came out to meet her. “What do you want, young woman?” “Why Granny, you see, my hen flew across this morning.  Did she not lay an egg here?”

“We never saw anything of it.  The Lord be thanked, our own hens started laying long ago.  We collect our own eggs and have no need of other people’s!  And we don’t go looking for eggs in other people’s yards, lass.”

The young woman was offended, and said more than she should have.  Her neighbor answered back with interest, and the women began verbally abusing each other.  Ivan’s wife, who had been to fetch water, happening to pass by just then, joined in too.  Then Gabriel’s wife rushed out, and began reproaching both women with things that had really happened and with other things that had never happened at all.  A general uproar commenced, all shouting at once, trying to get out two words at a time, and not choice words either.

“You’re this!” and “You’re that!” “You’re a thief!” and “You’re a slut!” and “You’re starving your old father-in-law to death!” and “You’re a lazy good-for-nothing!” and so on.  Then it was, “You’ve made a hole in the sieve we lent you, you tramp!  And it’s our yoke you’re carrying your pails on – you just give it back right now!”

Then they caught hold of the yoke, spilt the water, snatched off each other’s shawls, and began fighting.  Gabriel, returning from the fields, stopped to take his wife’s part.  Out rushed Ivan and his son and joined in with the rest. Ivan was a strong fellow.  He scattered the whole lot of them, and pulled out a handful of Gabriel’s beard.  People came to see what was the matter, and the fighters were separated with difficulty.  That was how it all began.

Gabriel wrapped the hair torn from his beard in a paper, and went to the District Court to have the law on Ivan.  “I didn’t grow my beard,” said he, “for pockmarked Ivan to pull it out!” And his wife went bragging to the whole village, saying they’d have Ivan condemned and sent to Siberia.  And so the feud grew.

The old man, from where he lay by the oven, tried from the very first to persuade them to make peace, but they would not listen.  “It’s such a stupid thing you’re after, picking quarrels about such a paltry matter.  Just think! All this began about an egg.  The children may have taken it – well, what the matter?  What’s the value of one egg?  God sends enough for all!  And suppose your neighbor did say an unkind word – put it right; show her a better one! If there has been a fight – well, such things happen; we’re all sinners, but make it up and that will be the end of it! If you nurse your anger it will be the worse for you yourselves.”

But the younger folk would not listen to the old man.  They thought his words were mere senseless dotage.  Ivan would not humble himself before his neighbor. “I never pulled his beard,” he said, “he pulled the hair out himself.  But his son has burst the fastenings on my shirt, and torn it … Look what he’s done to it!”

And Ivan also went to the law.  They were tried by the Justice of the Peace and by the Court.  While all this was going on, the coupling pin of Gabriel’s cart disappeared.  His womenfolk accused Ivan’s son of taking it.  They said they’d seen him going toward the cart after dark; and that a neighbor said he saw him at the pub trying to sell it.

So they went to the law about that.  And at home not a day passed without a quarrel or even a fight.  The children too abused one another, having learned from their elders; and when the women met at the river where they went to rinse the clothes, their arms did less wringing than their tongues did wagging, and every word was a bad one.

At first the peasants only slandered one another; but afterwards they began in real earnest to snatch anything that lay handy, and the children followed their example.  Life became harder and harder for them.  Ivan and Gabriel kept suing one another at the Village Assembly and the District Court until all the judges were tired of them.  Now Gabriel got Ivan fined or put in jail; then Ivan did the same to Gabriel; and the more they spited each other, the angrier they grew.  “Wait a bit,” they’d say, “and I’ll make you pay for it!”  And so it went on for six years.  Only the old man lying by the oven kept telling them, “Children, what are you doing? Stop all this paying back.  Keep to your work, and don’t bear malice – it will be better for you.  If not, it will only get worse.”  But they would not listen to him.

In the seventh year, at a wedding, Ivan’s daughter-in-law held Gabriel up to shame, accusing him of having been caught horse stealing.  Gabriel was tipsy, and unable to control his anger, gave the woman such a blow that she was laid up for a week; and she was pregnant at the time.  Ivan was delighted.  “Now I’ll get him!  He won’t be able to escape imprisonment or exile to Siberia!”  But Ivan’s wish was not fulfilled.  The magistrate dismissed the case because by that time the woman was up and about and showed no sign of injury.  But Ivan wouldn’t give up.  He went to the Justice of the Peace who referred the matter to the District Court. Then Ivan treated the clerk and the Elder of the Court to a gallon of vodka, and got Gabriel condemned to be flogged. The clerk read the sentence to Gabriel: “The court decrees that the Peasant Gabriel Gordeyef shall receive twenty lashes with a birch rod in the public square.”

Ivan too heard the sentence read, and looked at Gabriel to see how he would take it.  Gabriel grew pale as a sheet, and turned round and went out into the passage. Ivan followed, and he heard Gabriel say, “Very well!  He’ll have my back flogged: that will make it burn; but something of his may burn worse than that!”

Hearing these words, Ivan went back into the court, and said:  “Upright judges!  He threatens to set my house on fire!  He said it in the presence of witnesses!”  Gabriel was recalled.  “Is it true that you said this?”  “I haven’t said anything.  Flog me since you have the power.  It seems that I alone am to suffer, and all for being in the right, while he is allowed to do as he likes.”  Gabriel wished to say something more, but his lips and his cheeks quivered, and he turned towards the wall.  Even the officials were frightened by his looks.  “He may do some mischief to himself or his neighbor,” they thought.

Then he old Judge said:  “Look here, my men; you’d better be reasonable and make it up.  Was it right of you, friend Gabriel, to strike a pregnant woman?  It was lucky it passed off so well, but think what might have happened!  You had better confess and beg his pardon, and he will forgive you, and we will alter the sentence.

The clerk heard these words and remarked, “That’s impossible under the law! The parties remain in disagreement, and a decision of the Court has been made and must be executed.”  But the Judge would not listen to the clerk. “Keep your tongue still, my friend,” said he.  “The first of all laws is to obey God, who loves peace.”  And the Judge tried again to persuade the peasants, but could not succeed.  Gabriel would not listen to him.

“I shall be fifty next year,” he said, “and I have never been flogged in my life.  And now that pockmarked Ivan has had me condemned to be flogged, and I am to go and ask his forgiveness?  No; I’ve borne enough … Ivan shall have cause to remember me!”  Again Gabriel’s voice quivered, and he could say no more.  He turned around and went out.

It was seven miles from the court to the village, and it was getting late when Ivan reached home.  No one was there.  The women had gone to drive the cattle in, and the young men were not back from the fields.  Ivan went in and sat down thinking.  He remembered how Gabriel had listened to the sentence, and how pale he had become; and Ivan’s heart grew heavy.  He thought how he himself would feel if he were sentenced, and he pitied Gabriel. Then he heard his old father near the oven cough, and saw him sit up, lower his legs, and slowly drag himself into a seat at the table.  He was tired out from the exertion, and coughed a long time to clear his throat. Then, leaning on the table, he said, “Well, has he been condemned?”  “Yes, to twenty strokes with the rods,” answered Ivan.

The old man shook his head.  “A bad business,” said he.  “You are doing wrong Ivan; it’s very bad – not for him so much as for yourself! … Well, they’ll flog him, but will that do any good?”  “He’ll not do it again,” said Ivan.  “What will he not do?  What has he done worse than you?”  “Why, think of the harm he has done me!” said Ivan.  “He nearly killed my son’s wife, and now he’s threatening to burn us up. Am I to thank him for it?”

The old man sighed, and said, “You go about the wide world, Ivan, while I am lying here all these years, so you think you see everything, and that I see nothing … Ah, my son, it’s you that don’t see; malice blinds you.  Others’ sins are before your eyes, but your own are behind your back.  Is strife among men ever bred by one alone?  Strife is always between two.  If he were bad, but you were good, still there would be no strife. Who pulled the hair from his beard? Who spoilt his haystack?  Who dragged him into the law court?  Yet you put it all on him!  You live a bad life yourself, that’s what is wrong!  That’s not the way we used to live around here. It’s not the way I taught you. Why, we used to live as neighbors ought: helping each other, sharing the work, and borrowing freely from each other as we had need.  The other day, there was a soldier here telling us about the war and the awful battle at Plevna – why, there’s a worse battle than that going on right here!  And you are the man and master of this house; it’s you that will have to answer.  What are you teaching the women and children? Why, the other day I heard your youngest swearing at the neighbor girl Irena, calling her names; and his mother listened and laughed.  Is that right?  It is you who will have to answer.  Think of your soul.  Christ, when he walked on earth, taught us fools something very different … If you get a hard word from someone, keep silent, and his own conscience will accuse him. If you get a slap, turn the other cheek. ‘Here, beat me if that’s what I deserve!’  And his own conscience will rebuke him.  He will soften, and will listen to you.  That’s the way Christ taught us, not to be proud and unforgiving!  …Why don’t you speak?  Isn’t it as I say?

Ivan sat and listened.  The old man coughed, and continued:  “You think Christ taught us wrong?  Why, it’s for our own good.  Just think of your life around here since this battle began; are you better or worse off? Just reckon up what you’ve spent on all this law business – what the driving there and back and your food on the way have cost you.  And all the time!  Here you’ve left the work to your sons; you should be doing the plowing and sowing yourself.  But the devil carries you off to the judge, or some pettifogger or another.  The plowing is not done in time, nor the sowing, and mother earth can’t bear properly.  Why did the oats fail this year?  Because you sowed them when you came back from town.  And what did you gain?  Yet another burden for your shoulders.  Lad, think of your own business, and work with your boys at home and in the field.  And if someone offends you, forgive him, as God forgives you.  Then life will be easy and your heart will be light.

Ivan remained silent.  “Ivan, my boy, hear your old father!  Go and harness the roan, and go at once to the government office; put an end to all this affair there; and in the morning go and make it up with Gabriel in God’s name, and invite him to your house for tomorrow’s holiday (It was the eve of the Virgin’s Nativity).  Have tea ready, and get a bottle of vodka and put an end to all this wicked business, and tell the women and children to do the same.”

Ivan sighed, and thought, “What he says is true,” and his heart grew lighter.  Only he did not know how to begin to set things right.  Guessing what Ivan was thinking, the old man said, “Go, Ivan, don’t put it off!  Put out the fire before it spreads, or it will be to late.”

Just then the women came in chattering like magpies.  The news of Gabriel’s sentencing and of his threat to burn the house had already reached them.  They had heard all about it and added to it something of their own, and had a row, in the pasture, with the women of Gabriel’s household.  They began telling of how Gabriel’s daughter-in-law threatened a fresh action:  Gabriel had got on the right side of the examining magistrate, who would now turn the whole affair upside down; and the schoolmaster was writing a petition to the Tsar himself this time, about Ivan; and everything that had happened was in the petition – all about the coupling pin and the hay and the kitchen garden – so that half of Ivan’s land would soon be theirs.  Ivan heard what they were saying, and his heart grew cold again. He gave up the thought of making peace with Gabriel.

In a farmstead there is always plenty of work for a man to do.  Ivan did not stop to talk to the women, but went out to the barn.  By the time he had tidied up there, the sun had set and the young men had returned from the field.  Ivan met them, helped them to put everything in its place, and was going to do a few more chores, but it had grown quite dusk, so he decided to leave them until the next day.  Then he gave the cattle their food and opened the gate so the horses could pasture during the night.  “Now,” he thought, “I’ll have my supper, and then to bed.  By this time he had forgotten about Gabriel and about what his old father had said.  But, just as he took hold of the door handle, he heard his neighbor on the other side of the fence cursing somebody in a hoarse voice:  “What the devil is he good for?” Gabriel was saying.  “He’s fit only to be killed!”  At these words all Ivan’s former bitterness toward his neighbor re-awoke. He stood listening while Gabriel scolded, and, when he stopped, Ivan went into the hut.

 It was light inside; his daughter-in-law sat spinning, his wife was getting his supper ready, his eldest son was making straps for shoes, and others were busy with various household tasks.  Everything in the hut would have been pleasant and bright, but for that plague of a neighbor next door!

Ivan entered, sullen and cross; threw the cat down from the bench, and scolded the women for putting the slop pail in the wrong place.  He felt despondent, and sat down frowning.  He began to mend a horse collar he’d been working on for some time, but he had difficulty.  Gabriel’s words kept ringing in his ears:  his threat at the courts, and what he had just been saying in a hoarse voice about someone who was “only fit to be killed.”

After his supper, which he ate without pleasure, though the food was good, he stepped outside the hut.  His mind was unsettled.  As he stood by the gate he could not get Gabriel’s words out of his head:  “Mind that something of yours does not burn worse!” “He is desperate,” thought Ivan. “Everything is dry, and it’s windy weather besides.  He’ll come up at the back somewhere, set fire to something, and be off.  He’ll burn the place and be off Scot free, the villain! … But wait!  If one could but catch him in the act, he’d not get off then!” And the thought fixed itself so firmly in his mind that he did not go back into the hut, but went out into the street and round the corner.  “I’ll just walk round the buildings; maybe I’ll see what he’s up to.”  And Ivan, stepping softly, patrolled the yard and round about the outbuildings for some time.  Once he thought he saw something move near the corner of the henhouse.  He stood listening and looking intently; but he saw nothing, and there was only the sound of the willows rustling in the steady evening breeze.

“A mistake,” thought Ivan; “but still I will go round a bit more,” and Ivan went stealthily along by the shed.  As he reached the far corner, something seemed to flare up for a moment near the plow and to vanish again.  Ivan felt as if struck to the heart; and he stopped.  Hardly had he stopped, when something flared up more brightly in the same place, and he clearly saw a man, crouching down, with his back towards him, lighting a bunch a straw he held in his hand.  Silently rushing forward, Ivan thought, “Ah, now he won’t escape!”

He was still some distance off, when suddenly he saw a bright light, but not in the same place as before, and not a small flame.  The thatch had flared up at the eaves, the flames were reaching up to the roof, and, standing beneath it Gabriel’s whole figure was clearly visible. Like a hawk swooping down on a lark, Ivan rushed at Limping Gabriel.  But Gabriel must have heard his steps, and he managed to scuttle away past the barn like a hare.  “You won’t escape!” shouted Ivan, darting after him.

He managed to grab a corner of Gabriel’s coat, but it tore off, and Ivan fell down.  He recovered his feet, and shouting, “Help!  Seize him!  Thieves! Murder!” ran on again.  Ivan overtook Gabriel at the gate and was about to seize him, when something hit his temple, stunning him.  It was Gabriel who, taking an oak wedge that lay near the gate, had struck out with all his might.

Sparks flew before Ivan’s eyes, then all grew dark and he staggered.  When he came to his senses, Gabriel was no longer there:  it was as light as day, and from the side where his homestead was something roared and crackled like an engine at work. Ivan turned round and saw that his back shed was all ablaze, and the side shed had also caught fire, and flames and smoke and bits of burning straw mixed with smoke were being driven towards his hut.

“What have I done? …” cried Ivan, lifting his arms and striking his thighs. “Why, all I had to do was just to snatch it out from under the eaves and trample it.  What have I done? …” he kept repeating.  He wished to shout, but his breath failed him; his voice was gone. He wanted to run, but his legs would not obey him, and got in each other’s way.  Before he got around the back shed to reach the fire, the side shed was also all ablaze; and the corner of the hut had caught fire as well.  A large crowd had collected, but nothing could be done.  The neighbors were carrying their belongings out of their own houses, and driving the cattle out of their own barns.  After Ivan’s house, Gabriel’s also caught fire; then, with the wind rising, the flames spread to the other side of the street and half the village was burnt down.

At Ivan’s house they barely managed to save his old father; and the family escaped with only what they had on; everything else, except the horses in the pasture, was lost: all the cattle, the fowls on the perches, the carts, plows, and harrows, the women’s trunks with the clothes, and the grain – all were burnt up.  Gabriel’s homestead fared little better.

The fire lasted all night.  Ivan stood in front of his homestead and kept repeating, “What have I done?  One need only have pulled it out and trampled it.” When the roof fell in, Ivan rushed into the burning place, and seizing a charred beam, tried to drag it out.  The women saw him and called him back; but he pulled out the beam, and was going in for another when he lost his footing and fell among the flames.  Then his son went in after him and dragged him out.  Ivan had singed his hair and beard and burnt his clothes and scorched his hands, but he felt nothing.  “His grief has stupefied him,” said the people standing around.

In the morning the village Elder’s son came to fetch Ivan.  “Your father is dying!  He has sent for you to say good-bye.”  Ivan had forgotten about his father, and did not understand what was being said to him.  “What father? Whom has he sent for?” “He sent for you, to say good-bye; he is dying in our cottage!  Come along now, quickly,” said the boy, pulling him by the arm; and Ivan followed the lad.

When he was being carried out of the hut, a clump of burning straw had fallen on the old man and burnt him, and he had been taken to the village Elder’s in the farther part of the village, which the fire did not reach.  The old man lay there on a bench holding a wax candle in his hand, and he kept turning his eyes towards the door.  When his son entered, he moved a little.  The old wife of the Elder went up to him and told him that his son had come.  He asked to have him brought nearer.  Ivan came closer.

“What did I tell you, Ivan?” began the old man.  “Who has burnt down the village?”

“It was he, father!” Ivan answered.  “I caught him in the act.  I saw him shove the firebrand into the thatch.  I might have pulled away the burning straw and stamped it out, and then nothing would have happened.”

“Ivan,” said the old man, “I am dying, and you in your turn will have to face death.  Whose is the sin?”  Ivan gazed at his father in silence, unable to utter a word.  “Now, before God, say whose is the sin? What did I tell you?

Only then Ivan came to his senses and understood it all.  He sniffed and said, “Mine, father!”  And he fell on his knees before his father saying, “Forgive me, father; I am guilty before you and before God.” 

The old man moved his hands, changed the candle from his right to his left so that he could use his right hand to cross himself.  “Praise the Lord!  Praise the Lord!  All my inmost being, praise his holy name!” he said; and again he turned his eyes towards his son.

“Ivan!  Ivan, my son.”  “What, father?”  “What must you do now?”  Ivan was weeping.  “I do not know.  I do not know how to bear my guilt.  I do not know how I am to go on living,” he said.

The old man closed his eyes and placed his hand on his Ivan’s head. “Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world,” he said; and then he said the same words again slowly and deliberately before he continued, “Who redeems your life from the pit, and crowns you with love and compassion.  …For he does not treat us as our sins deserve, or repay us according to our iniquities. …As far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us.”  Ivan’s body trembled beneath his father’s hand, but in his heart he understood, and he was glad.

“Mind, Ivan! Don’t tell who started the fire!  Hide another man’s sin, even as the Lord Jesus has hidden yours away.”  And the old man took the candle in both hands and, folding them on his breast, he sighed, stretched out, and died.

Ivan did not say anything against Gabriel, and no one knew what had caused the fire.  His anger toward Gabriel passed away, and Gabriel wondered that he did not tell anybody. At first he felt afraid, but after a while he got used to it.  The men left off quarreling, and then their families left off also.  And when the village was rebuilt and they might have moved farther apart, Ivan and Gabriel built next to each other, and remained neighbors as before.

They lived as good neighbors should.  Ivan Stcherbakof remembered his old father’s command to obey Christ’s teaching, and to quench a fire at the first spark; and if anyone does him an injury he does not seek revenge, but rather to set matters right again; and by his example and words, he teaches his family to do the same.  And Ivan Stcherbakof is on his feet again, and lives better now even than he did before.

Soli Deo Gloria!