El ó Him

For García-Márquez

Gabriel is the name of an angel. In America, women who are born with this name pronounce it the same way the mexicanos do. In Mexico, women who are born with this name pronounce it with the letter a at the end, so it sounds more beautiful and feminine.  In America, if you are a boy and you have this name, it means that your name is pronounced with a long a sound in the first syllable. The name is Hebrew. It means man of God. According to Wiktionary.com, it comes from the Hebrew word géver, which means, man (an adult human male being). The second part is El, the name of God.

Géver-El
Géber-El
Gébre-El,
Gabre-El
Gabri-El

When the very old man with enormous wings fell from the sky, he was greeted by those who hid their faces and would not receive the message El had sent him to deliver. He returned to heaven in order to tell El that the people would not receive the message that he was supposed to have delivered, but he was fearful that El would be unhappy that his adult human male being was unable to communicate with the people to whom he was sent, so Gabriel invented a plan to convince El that the people were wicked because they had sinned.

"Have you considered your servant?" Gabriel asked El. 

"I have," El replied.

"Have you considered his faithfulness to you?" Gabriel asked El.

"I have," El replied.

"Have you considered that his faithfulness to you is dependent upon your faithfulness to him?" Gabriel asked El.

"I have," El replied.

"Then I suggest you should not be faithful to him," Gabriel suggested.

"I cannot be unfaithful," El replied. "I am faithful. I cannot be otherwise."

Gabriel considered this problem carefully for many eternities, for the sun had not yet come into existence in those days, and the ocean rose and fell one hundred hundred times, for the moon pulled eternally on the face of water for ageless ages before the sun came into being. At last, Gabriel discovered in his mind a satisfactory solution to the problem and approached the throne of El again.

"Have you considered yourself?" Gabriel asked El.

"I have," El replied.

"Have you considered your faithfulness to yourself?" Gabriel asked El.

"I have," El replied. 

"Then I suggest that you consider your servant as you consider yourself, then you will know if he is faithful to you," Gabriel declared.

So, El planted a garden in the East and formed man from the clay to work in it. In the garden El planted two trees. One tree was called The Tree of Life and the other tree was called The Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. El told the man whom he had formed from the dust of the ground and the wind of his breath to enjoy the fruits of any tree in the garden, but not to eat the fruit of The Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, for if he did, he would surely be forgotten.

Then El created a companion for the man and called it "companion of man" for it was a companion to man. So man and companion of man dwelled together in the garden, eating fruits of many trees, and wearing no clothes.

Then, the very old man with enormous wings awakened the serpent (who was asleep) and said to the serpent: "Awake! There is a man and a companion of man inside your gardens!"

The serpent, who was dreaming, stood and hissed, for it had great fear of man. 

Then, the very old man with enormous wings said to the serpent, "You should not tolerate a man in your garden. Look! He reaches to take fruit from your trees! Watch! He shares your fruits with his companion!"

The serpent saw that the companion of man was naked, and he desired to take the companion of man for himself. So he came to where the companion of man was standing and seduced it, saying, "Eat of this fruit, for you are beautiful, and I am giving you this fruit to eat."

"Which fruit shall I eat?" the companion of man asked the serpent.

"This good fruit, which grows where my belly crawls," the serpent replied.

The companion of man looked down and saw the serpent among vines that sprawled along the floor of the garden path. A large, round fruit grew from white and yellow flowers that bloomed among the vines, and the companion of man reached down to pluck and eat it, for the serpent had offered it to eat and said that it was good. 

The seed of that fruit grew within the belly of the companion of man, and the companion of man became a woman and gave birth to two sons: Forethought and Afterthought, and Time began.

Then there was morning, and there was evening, and that was the first day.

Then the woman tempted the man, who was still innocent of guilt, and the woman seduced the man, who had been innocent of guilt up to that very moment.

When the man understood what the woman had done to him, he saw that she was naked and beautiful, so he made her bear his sins upon her back for nine months, and he cursed El for sending him such a companion.

"What have you done?" he asked the woman. "Why have you eaten the fruit that is forbidden to eat?"

"I have not eaten fruit that is forbidden to eat," the woman replied. "I have eaten only the fruit that was offered for me to eat."

"Fool!" the man cried. "We are destroyed! We have been undone! You have made me guilty! I have seen my nakedness! Let us hide our skin beneath skin! Let us bear children in pain! Let us plant our own gardens!"

Then, the man drove the serpent and all the serpent's children from the garden and killed an ox, whose skin he stretched across olive branches to provide shelter from sun and rain and hailstones. 

In the morning, Afterthought offered sacrifices of meat to El in thanksgiving for delivering them from the sinful nature of the serpent, and El believed that man still was faithful to him, so El gave Afterthought a beautiful woman named Venus to be his wife. But when Forethought saw Venus bathing as he watched her from his balcony, he became jealous and killed his brother to take the woman for his own.

When Forethought took Venus into his bedchamber, she would not receive him, for she was still in mourning over the death of her beloved. Forethought wrestled her to the ground, and she cried out for help, but no one answered, for her husband was dead. Nine months later she gave birth to a son and named him Ishmael, for she had cried out but no one answered. After this, Forethought wrestled her 12 more times, and she bore for him twelve more sons.

When Ishmael grew old, he vowed to take revenge upon the aggression of the man who had fathered him against his mother's will. "I will destroy all of your works!" he declared. "I will wipe your memory from the face of earth so the world will no longer bear your sin!" Then, Ishmael set out to destroy his father and his brothers, but his father could see into Ishmael's intentions, for he could see the future, so he transformed his children into diamonds and rubies and sapphires and threw them into the sky, where they hid among the planets and the stars, and because they are the children of Forethought, they hold the secrets of the future.

When Gabriel looked down upon the earth, he saw Ishmael roaming from village to village, seeking out his brothers to destroy them, but they could not be found anywhere. Gabriel took pity upon Ishmael and appeared to him, saying, "Behold, I bring you glad tidings of great joy! You will give birth to a son, and through him you will rule over all generations!" 

Ishmael did not believe this, for he had no woman to bear him children, so he mocked the very old man with enormous wings, saying, "Can a man enter the womb again and be reborn a second time?"

"Yes!" the man from El replied.

So Ishmael was received by Venus, and she gave birth to a son, who was named Oedipus, for he was born when a son entered his mother's womb to be born a second time. Oedipus became a mighty king and conquered many nations, and Venus ruled beside him, a righteous judge and lawgiver.

When Gabriel looked down from the heavens, he saw that his plan to fool El had worked, for he had never been asked to give account of the message he had been sent to deliver, and which he could not remember after so many years. So again he approached the throne of El and asked, "Have you considered the faithfulness your servant?"

But El rebuked the angel for his wickedness, demanding an accounting for his actions. "Why have you forgotten the message I entrusted to you?" El demanded, and Gabriel, unable to reply, was cast down among the crabs, where he was discovered by a poor farmer and locked up with the hens.