The Goat for Azazel

In the late evening, beside the crumbling stones of the wall that guarded the city, I came upon Iblis, who had taken the disguise of a beggar, toothless and decayed. He outstretched the arms of appeal, but no one offered the coin of mercy. Passersby looked away, forbidding their eyes a glance. Like them, I walked by, pretending no notice of him. But he called after me, saying, “Has even my biographer forgotten me?”

At first hesitating, I stopped and turned, though I still averted my gaze, fearful that his divine beauty might burst forth from the corrosion of his accursed form. I said, “You should not beg from those you despise.”

He said, “I seek redress from their curses. My opinion of them is not relevant.”

I said, “Why do you hold man in such contempt?”

He said, “I am more aware of your faults than you are of your own. Among the Hebrews, I was called Azazel. They tied the unnumbered threads of their transgressions against God’s law to my horns and cast me down to die. You think I am the personification of your sins, but, like the goat for Azazel, I am the victim of them. What use have the innocent with the devil? For every sin you commit, I bear a stripe from the lash of your self-absolution, a wound from the spear of your inconscient denial. God did not disfigure me; you did. And this is why I hate you.”