One day Jeremiah Joseph was fishing in the local stream. This was a somewhat lively stream with many rocks and boulders making for narrow channels and small places for the fish to hide, the currents odd and the eddies seemingly random. But no, the longer Jeremiah looked at it, the more it did make sense.
As he peered at the water, the ripples and waves, created by the flow of the water over, around, and under the rocks, he saw that the fish would take refuge in the shallow places, others in shade, some in the deeper sections.
He observed that some of the deeper sections, where the water suddenly slowed down had a different type of sand than the area where the water moved quickly. There was often a glint off of minerals or flakes, he wasn’t sure which, that were there. The fish seemed to take advantage of this glinting off the water and the glinting off the sand below. “Clever little guys” he thought to himself as he pulled in a smallish fish, maybe a little under the length of his forearm.
It was said sometimes, if you didn’t want to fish, you could dig deep in those sections of slow water where the sand was thick, and if you were lucky, you might find some gold. Jeremiah wasn’t feeling that lucky today.
Weibe Hsu came up beside him. He turned, not expecting a visitor, and especially not expecting this visitor. “Two fish” said Weibe Hsu. “How many do you think you could feed with that?” he asked.
“What?” said Jeremiah, confused by the randomness of the question and still processing who was standing next to him. The last time he and Weibe talked it was a rambling series of nonsense stories, told on the road, and then the guy just disappeared. No goodbye, no explanation, he just turned a corner and was gone.
“Uh, I mean, myself maybe” said Joseph.
“Okay, and what if I threw in five loaves of bread?”, asked Weibe Hsu. Jeremiah looked at him confused.
“Well, that’s an odd number. Five loaves? And just two fish? I mean, how big are the loaves? Like full round loaves, or little roll sized things? And how big are the fish? Dried fish? Cooked? Raw?”, prodded Jeremiah. This line of questions didn’t make sense. “Where was this coming from?”, he thought as he pondered about the fish and loaves.
“What? I don’t know. Do I look like a baker or the child whose mother sent him out with two fish and five loaves of bread out for the day?”, retorted Weibe.
“Well, I mean, you asked this nonsense question. Okay, so why?” Jeremiah asked.
“Ah, have you not heard the story of the man who made two fish and five loaves of bread feed 5000 people?” Asked Weibe.
“I mean, I’ve heard bits and pieces, but it sounded like a tall tale to me”, Jeremiah replied. He caught a second fish, this one no longer than the length of his hand.
Weibe looked at the fish, did a head tilt back and forth, both approving and giving a shrug as if saying “alright, it’ll do”.
Weibe gave Joseph the broad outline of when a mysterious traveler feed a group of five thousand folks. He was sparing in the details.
Jeremiah wondered at this. How did this many gather together and collectively be this completely unprepared. Were they all motherless? Was this child just the smart one? Clearly this kid’s mother made sure he had food for the day before she just let him leave, to go off and do wherever the hell it was that he was to do that day.
Or did all these people’s mothers just not care at all for them? Just let them leave the house, fend for themselves, like Jeremiah had for years after his own mother had passed. But surely these folks did in fact have mothers. None of this made any sense.
“None of this makes any sense”, said Jeremiah. “How could this many people all be gathered here and not a single one of them thought to themselves that they might need to bring food while out? Did they leave the house, their mother’s ignoring them, expecting some random guy to perform miracles?”
“Well, no, actually”, said Weibe, a little surprised at how cutting Jeremiah was about this. Weibe didn’t know of the years Jeremiah spent, fending for himself, how his mother gave him the last of her strength before she died and he then tunneled out of that mountain cavity. How he had to learn to hunt, trap, and fish on his own. How he had to prepare for any eventuality. That was before he was found wandering in the wilderness and taken in by the village mothers. Since then, he always tried to make sure the other youngins of the village were adequately prepared before long trips or time in the wilderness. You don’t go out hunting or fishing for food while having none. It makes a person desperate. “Huntin while hangry makes you crazy” one of the elder used to say.
Jeremiah said none of this to Weibe.
“Actually, there was supposed to be a gathering there that day. Vendors were said to have been arranged to sell food for this crowd. However, apparently, those vendors never showed up. They had been paid in advance and took that money and ran. That crowd who showed up was left far from the city with no food.” Weibe recounted.
“And so, what, this kid was supposed to take up the slack? Feed all these people who came expecting vendors?” Jeremiah asked.
“Also, no. At first, it was said that this mysterious long haired stranger offered to take the child’s fish and bread and multiply it many times, creating enough to feed everyone”.
“However, that was quickly dismissed. One of the merchants well know for his ability to do quick sums in his head said, first off, “why should this young man be punished for being prepared? No, we will not let you take this boy’s food”. There was some grumbling amongst some of the gathered folk, but he chastised them to many jeers. The man went on, “regardless, you greedy bastards, it wouldn’t matter. This isn’t a case of multiplication, it’s division. The only possible thing this man could do is make all the pieces of fish smaller to spread around. You will only get a tiny morsel, no one will be satisfied, and this boy will be punished”, Weibe said, relating the story to Jeremiah.
Weibe leaned in a little, conspiratorially, and whispered “yes, I know, how did everyone hear this man? I don’t know, it’s probably been simplified over the years”.
“Anyway” continued Weibe, slapping his knee for emphasis, “the man eventually convinced everyone that if they collectively put what money they had together, and got a volunteer or ten to run to town with that money, they could probably get some of the village mothers to cook for them. And maybe if we all promised to help with the laundry or something”. There was grumbling, but also nods. A few of the women went around, collecting money in the hats of their husbands, glaring and pushing the hats at those who didn’t immediately offer up some contribution of coin. A few runners were then sent back to town to procure these food stuff and soon, everyone was sated.
The boy sat under a tree, eating his own lunch, thankfully it not having been requisitioned by the stranger. The long haired man ambled by and sat down against the tree, next to the boy.
“I could have done it, ya know. He gave a meaningful look toward the boy’s lunch basket. An extra fish was there. The boy did a double take. He had eaten everything. And now there was some cheese too.
“Who are you?”, the boy asked.
“Oh, nobody really” the man said. He patted the boy’s shoulder and then stared off into the distance. No one you need worry about. Welp, I’m off, enjoy the fish and cheese””, he said standing up. He went around behind the tree as he wandered off, seemingly forgotten by everyone else. The boy looked around after a few minute, having eaten the newly appeared fish. The mysterious stranger was gone. He shrugged to himself and tried some of the cheese. It was quite good, like nothing he had ever had before.
Weibe explained that “As it turns out, this was the forbidden god. He took pleasure and satisfaction that the people worked together to solve their problem, not relying on some Deity or praying to the sky for some sky gods to solve their problems, ones for which only they were to blame. "
Jeremiah thought on this for a while. “Yeah, he said, it would have been a rather unfair to essentially punish that kid and give a free lunch to a bunch of complete bozos who came totally unprepared”.
“Well, remember, they were basically scammed” countered Weibe.
“Yes, but still, it seems a bit naive to just expect to be taken care of like that…” said Jeremiah Joseph.
“Yes, this is how the Forbidden god thinks” said Weibe Hsu.
“The Forbidden god? Who or what is that”, Jeremiah asked.
“I’ll tell you sometime, another time. Let me take you to their temple, far in the mountains, in the jungle, and you’ll see” said Weibe, and he patted Jeremiah on the shoulder and turned to walk away.
Jeremiah was focused on the fish in the stream as Weibe said this, and as he finally registered that Weibe had left, he turned around and looked in the direction he thought that Weibe had gone.
He was nowhere to be seen.
“How does he do that?”, Jeremiah thought to himself, and shrugged his shoulders. He didn’t notice a third fish had found its way to his basket of fish.