Marco Polo - Laurence Bergreen [35]
Decades before Marco Polo appeared on the scene, William reported on the existence of currency printed on “paper made of cotton the length and breadth of a palm”—a system of commerce so far in advance of anything in the West that it mystified Europeans.
WILLIAM ENGAGED the Buddhist monks in spirited theological debate, only to have his expectations confounded. When he inquired “what they believed concerning God,” they replied, to the friar’s dismay, “We believe there is only one God.” That was not the anticipated answer; William expected to hear about idol worship and other heathen practices among these non-Christians.
He tried again: “Do you believe that he is a spirit or some bodily substance?”
“We believe that he is a spirit,” came their reply.
Convinced this was an evasion, William demanded to know why, if they believed God to be a spirit, they made so many images to represent him. To this he added: “Since also you believe not that he was made man, why do you make him more like the image of a man than any other creature?”
The monks responded that William was mistaken; the images to which he referred did not represent God; they were tributes to the wealthy dead, whose relatives commissioned each image. “We, in remembrance of the dead, do reverence to it.”
Surely this was a corrupt practice. William said scornfully, “You do these things only for the friendship and flattery of men.”
“No, only for their memory.” With that, the monks turned the tables. “Where is God?” they asked the friar.
“Where is your soul?” William shot back. His hosts replied that their souls resided in their bodies.
William launched into a harangue. “Is it not in every part of your body, ruling and guiding the whole body, and yet it is invisible? Even so God is everywhere and ruleth all things, and yet he is invisible, being understanding and wisdom itself.”
Just as William was warming to his theme, his interpreter “became weary,” and the debate ended abruptly.
A PALPABLE spiritual thaw lessened the grip of the Karakorum winter as the region’s ruler, Möngke Khan, a grandson of Genghis Khan, explained to William that as God had given humans five fingers on each hand, so the Supreme Being had passed on various religious beliefs to different peoples. This vision of religious tolerance, deeply ingrained in the Mongol consciousness, challenged everything that William, as a Christian missionary, believed; yet he could not deny the appeal of the khan’s point of view, or the implication that the totality of faith exceeded any single approach.
On the heels of this intriguing dialogue with William, Möngke expressed a guarded wish to establish diplomatic relations, or at least a dialogue, with the Christian West: “If you will obey us, send your ambassadors, that we may know whether you wish for peace or war.”
William of Rubruck never delivered this message, but his mission, which had lasted from 1253 to 1255, achieved partial success. Henceforth, the Mongol Empire would take a greater interest in the West, at least in matters of trade, if not religion.
WITH EACH JOURNEY, and each subsequent written account, the world appeared to Europeans to be getting bigger and more chaotic rather than smaller and more manageable. The travelers emphasized the great distances and unavoidable hardships they endured, and the irreconcilable differences that characterized the innumerable countries, cultures, languages, customs, and religions they encountered. The reports of emissaries as varied as Benjamin of Tudela, Giovanni da Pian del Carpini, and William of Rubruck all told of a world beyond Europe that was complex, tumultuous, and menacing, but nonetheless porous.
One way of appreciating the magnitude of Marco Polo’s accomplishment is to compare his account to those given