This
is an old story which comes from the 10th century quill of Petrus
Alfonsi. Born a Sephardic Jew named Moses, he was educated in both Hebrew and
Arabic and may have been a physician attached to one of the Islamic courts in
al-Andalus (modern Spain). After migrating to England, Petrus made a strong
impact on the history of science as well as literary history
He
wrote two major works: the Disciplina
Clericalis and the Dialogi contra
Iudaeos (Dialogues against the Jews). This is a story from the first one.
The
Parable of the Weeping Bitch
It is
related that a nobleman had a very chaste and beautiful wife. He wanted to go
to Rome to pray in the holy places, and he did not want to leave any other
guardian for his wife but herself, trusting in her chaste habits and the honor
of her uprightness. When the retinue was ready, he departed and the wife
remained, living chastely and acting prudently in all things.
It
happened that she needed something, and she left her own house and went to a
neighboring house. As she came home after transacting her business, a young man
saw her and fell madly in love with her. He, desiring to be loved by her for
whom he burned so ardently, sent many messages to her. But she refused his
messages and rejected him completely.
The
young man seeing himself utterly scorned, grief-stricken, fell gravely ill; but
nevertheless he would often go where he had seen his lady leave, hoping to meet
her; but he was not able to effect it at all. Weeping for sorrow, he met an old
woman wearing the habit of a nun, and she asked the cause of his unhappiness;
but the young man was not very anxious to reveal what was going on in his mind.
The
old woman said to him, “The longer a sick man delays in revealing his illness
to the doctor, the more he will suffer from the illness.”
Hearing
this, he told her what had happened to him and his secret.
The
old lady said to him, “With God’s help I’ll find a remedy for what you have
told me.”
And
she left him and returned to her own house. She forced a little dog which she
had at home to go without food for two days. On the third day she gave the
hungry dog bread made with mustard, and as the dog ate the bread, its eyes
began to water with the sharpness of the mustard. The old woman brought the
little dog to the house of the chaste woman whom the young man loved, and the
woman received her respectfully because of her very religious appearance. The
little bitch was following the old woman. When the woman saw it weeping, she
asked what was wrong with it and why it was crying.
The
old woman said to her, “Dear friend, do not ask what is wrong, because the sorrow
is so great that I can hardly talk about it.”
And
the woman begged her even more earnestly to tell her.
The
old woman: “This little dog which you see was my daughter, who was very chaste
and modest and was loved by a young man; but she was so chaste that she spurned
him and rejected his love. The young man, pining away, became very ill. For her
sin, my wretched daughter was turned into a little bitch.” And so saying, the
old lady burst into tears.
The
decent woman said at this, “O dear lady, what shall I do? I am guilty of a
similar crime; for a young man loves me, but because of my love of chastity I
have disdained him, and he has also fallen ill.”
“Dear
friend, I advise you to have pity on him as quickly as possible and do what he
asks, so that you may not be turned into a dog just as my daughter was. If I
had known of the love between my daughter and the young man, my daughter would
never have been transformed.”
The
chaste woman said to her, “I beg you to give me good advice, so that I may not
be turned into a little bitch, deprived of my own form.”
“Willingly,”
said the old woman, “for the love of God and the health of my soul and because
I feel sorry for you, I will seek the young man, and if he can be found, I will
bring him back to you.”
The woman
thanked her, and the wily old woman kept her word and brought back the young
man, as she had promised and thus brought them together.
The
pupil said to the teacher, “I have never heard anything so astounding, and I
think it was done with black magic.”
The teacher: “Have no doubt!”
The
pupil: “I think that if any man is wise enough always to fear being deceived by
women’s tricks, perhaps he will be able to guard himself against them.”
The
teacher: “I know of a certain man who took great precautions to guard his wife;
but he did not gain anything by it.”
The
pupil: “Tell me what he did, teacher, so I will be better able to guard my
wife, if I ever marry.”
For more fun try books by Rex Hurst
