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THE LIGHT OR THE DARK

His stallion tossed its head and shifted beneath him, possibly because of the many flies but more probably because it sensed his fear. For Simon De Montfort, Earl of Leicester, now also Duke of Narbonne, fifty eight years old and the victor of many battles and countless skirmishes, was very frightened.
            The sun, rising above the battlements of Toulouse, dazzled him and reminded him of his old tutor’s words. “You must choose boy, between the light or the dark. You will stand before God and he will weigh the light in your life against the dark and if the light wins then you will to heaven with the saints, but if the dark, you shall burn.” Father Lucien had been responsible for Simon’s education and his soul, and if the old priest’s righteousness had been unrelenting, so had been his kindness to an eight year old boy, taken from his mother.
            Simon looked over his shoulder at his men. He guessed they took his pale face and tight lips as determination. He knew of course that they too were afraid, some joked too much, their voices over loud, some pulled on straps long since tightened - but their fear was nothing to his. His fear was overwhelming, a terrible, dark tide that threatened to sweep him away, but, may God be praised, before he fled a field and was labelled a coward for ever, Simon had been given a remedy.
            It was Father Lucien who had found it. When, just before his first tournament, Simon’s fear threatened to overwhelm him, the priest had seen his anguish. Lucien had tried to re-assure Simon, but eventually seeing that it would take more than words, he had taken a silver cross to the armourer, demanding that it should be fixed to Simon’s helm. The armourer firmly refused, on the grounds that a point might lodge against it, instead, with a fine punch, the armourer had outlined the shape of a cross on the shining steel above the helmet’s eye slit.
            As he waited in the lists the next day, Simon had prayed that he might escape his fate. For he knew, with a terrible certainty, that he would fail. Knew he would fall from his horse before they even clashed, would drop the lance or else would veer away in the charge.  He had panicked as the great helm was placed on his head, for he was plunged into a darkness as deep as his fear. The sounds of the world disappeared with the light and the only smell was of leather, sweat and metal. Then, as the great weight settled on his shoulders, God heard his prayers and a greater weight was lifted.       Out of the darkness came a flash of light and as Simon’s eyes adjusted and he looked out through the frame of the eye slit, the world was transformed. Now it was a world clearer than before and all he could see was his enemy. All thoughts were banished, all confusion gone, and he had lowered the heavy lance with a fierce concentration. And so, in the many fights to follow, as he looked out on the world from within the great helm, he found surety and courage.
            From his place of safety Simon had observed battles and the pillaging of cities. He had watched as people were burned or maimed by his soldiers on the orders of the Pope. Even as they died he thought God’s enemies found their eyes drawn to the great helm and the dark eye slit. He thought they perhaps wondered at the man that was hidden from them and who could preside so calmly over such horror.
            So what was the source of his fear? Strangely it was not generated by the thought of death or mutilation. As much as he could examine an emotion, that by its nature cast all thought aside, his fear had two layers.  The first was that he was frightened of being humiliated, for men often died badly in a fight, like clowns, even as they struggled to survive. But, above all else, he was frightened of God and his judgement.
            So in his life Simon had done everything to please God. He was chaste, abstemious, dutiful and devout. He had even left the fourth crusade when its leaders, instead of marching to free the Holy Land as the Pope had ordered, had sacked Byzantium. What had the Pope’s legate said? “Simon, you are much loved by God and by the Church, you are a true crusader, steadfast when many others have wavered, lead this new crusade in our name.” And so he was here, outside the last Cathar stronghold that he had besieged and burnt once already and would, since they were tenacious in both their heresy and their defence, take and burn again. Yes, surely he had done his duty to God.
             And today even more would die by his orders, for he had been told the townspeople were gathering behind the walls and had guessed what they would attempt. He had built a wheeled engine roofed by hides, so that his men could get close to the wall and fill the ditch. This morning the garrison and townsfolk would sortie out and try and burn it, but he was here, waiting.
            There was movement high up on a tower, three hundred yards to his left. Women, some said whores others washerwomen, were readying a mangonel. It seemed a shameful thing that even their women fought him. They had carried up the frame of the catapult beam by beam and then others had carried up the heavy stones it was intended to launch. His men had jeered at their efforts, said they had something for them with more spring in it. The women ignored them and worked on. He thought it unlikely it would serve them. Mangonels were temperamental things.
            His stomach churned and the sweat was running although the sun was not yet hot. Why today was his fear as bad as when he had been a boy? If he needed the helm to truly be free of it, it had at least abated with time. Now it was back in full force, why? Then he remembered that they had burnt two Cathar priests before the walls, a man and a woman. They had been taken trying to creep through his lines. The woman had said nothing as she gave up her soul, but the man had called out to him. He had said that Simon was cursed and would suffer for his sins. “I do God’s will”, Simon had calmly replied.
             “Fool!” the Cathar priest said. “God has no will, there is only paratge!” Then he too had died in silence. Puzzled, Simon had asked his clerk, who spoke the language of D’Oc, what ‘paratge’ was.
            “My Lord, there is no Frankish word that matches paratge. It is honour, but not honour in the eyes of men. It is harmony, honour of the self, the conscience. It means choosing the right way for yourself.”
            Yes, it was this that troubled him, the Cathar priest had laid the seeds of doubt. He had striven now for nine long years to do God’s will here, but still the common people and their priests defied him and he was weary and sick at heart. He had even wondered sometimes if it was the lust for land rather than love for God that drove the Church. What if God did indeed not have a will and what if the Pope did not know it? What then of all he had done in their name?
            There was movement at the foot of the wall, they were spilling out of gate into the ditch. They would get amongst the siege works, trying to undo months of patient work. The sight of the rabble sparked his anger. There was barely a handful in armour and many carried kitchen knives and cleavers. Why could these peasants with their twisted language and religion not accept they were beaten? He would wait until they were well away from the safety of the gate, then he would cut them to offal. The women high on the tower were loading the mangonel, fools, peasants, harlots, heretics all!
             He reached out and took his great helm from his esquire. Lifted it and held it up to the sky. “Oh Lord God, show me again your will, let me feel the surety of your love.”  Then, with a sigh of relief that at last his fear would be gone, he let the helm settle on his head. First it would be dark but then would come freedom. But just as the white light of the eye slit opened up, it was slammed quickly shut - as if God’s hand had reached out and slapped him. His head rang like a bell, he felt his jaw break, his back-teeth shatter. At first, crushed down into the saddle, he hung there. Then, slowly, he slid from the horse and lay alone in the dirt, helpless in the dark. And Simon De Montford knew that God had given him his answer and he was surely damned.
Footnote
                Simon De Montfort, leader of the Cathar crusade and much admired as a Christian knight, was killed on 25th June 1218 at the siege of Toulouse to the great rejoicing of the besieged. He was struck on the helm by the first stone fired from a mangonel by a group of townswomen. Taking his improbable and humiliating death as a sign, his dispirited troops abandoned the siege. The helm was so mangled that it could not be removed from his shoulders and went with him to the grave.
                The author of the Song of the Cathar Crusade, referring to the epitaph on Simon’s tomb, said:
 “The epitaph says, for those who can read it, that he is a saint and martyr who shall breathe again, and shall in wondrous joy inherit and flourish and wear a crown and sit on a heavenly throne. And I have heard that it said that this must be so- if by killing men and spilling blood, by wasting souls and preaching murder, by following evil counsels, and raising fires, by ruining noblemen and besmirching Paratge, by pillaging the country and exalting Pride, by stoking up wickedness and stifling god, by massacring women and their infants, a man can win Jesus in this world, then Simon surely wears a crown resplendent in heaven.”

Cited on www.languedoc-france.info/120503_simon.htm as taken from a translation by Janet Shirley (1996). "The Song of the Cathar Wars". Ashgate Publishing, Aldershot. Retrieved February 10, 2009. Details also based on information from this excellent website.