A COVENANT OF PEACE OVER LAPIS LAZULI

I am a sucker for lapis lazuli. Perhaps that’s because my simplistic taste in colors draws me to Crayola-crayon blue. Perhaps it’s that I fell in love with its alliterative name the first time I read it in the book of Exodus. Regardless, I own about 15 pairs of lapis cufflinks, most purchased off eBay during a manic episode.

I otherwise wear no jewelry save my wedding band. One day, I got it into my head that I’d like to own a simple ring with lapis inlay. I searched where? On the internet, of course, and found precisely the style from a jeweler whom I had good reason to believe was reputable. The ring arrived, a perfect fit to all aesthetic expectations.

One day, though, I gave the ring a knock, and a big chunk of the lapis fell out. The jeweler would simply not make good on it. I took the ring to a reputable lapidary. Could he replace the lapis? He took one look and announced, “Why? All you have now is high-quality blue polymer.” End of story.

You and I will never forget the day that radical Muslim terrorists bombed the London underground. That very day, Linda and I were strolling the “Rodeo Drive of Toronto.” What do we behold but a jeweler who specializes in . . . lapis. There before our very eyes was a clone of my ring.

I ask the proprietor if it is Afghani lapis. Yes, he says, the finest quality.
We warm to each other. With trepidation, I ask him his nationality.

“Do you promise not to hold it against me?”

I shake my head.

In a hush, he tells me that he is Afghani.

He asks me my nationality. I know that he has already figured out that I am American, that he is looking for something else. I ask if he promises not to hold it against me. He, too, nods his head.

“I am Jewish. You must be Muslim.”

We shake hands. “Well,” I say, “I guess we’ve signed our own peace treaty.”

He agrees, calls his wife and daughter from the back and introduces them.
Now I tell him of my interest in the ring. I tell him the story of its counterpart, the lapis-cum-polymer one from the internet.

“Sir,” he says. “Do you like this ring? If you do, I will cast another one in your size. I will have to charge you $30 for the additional gold. I will send it to you. Please take it to any lapidary you wish. If you want to keep it, send me a check. If for any reason you do not want it, simply send it back to me.”

“You trust me?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“Because you speak like an honest man.”

Let’s not be naïve. This momentary exchange between Muslim and Jew may not portend of a world free from cataclysm and strife. If nothing else, though, it was a stirring reminder that God has made a good way for us, a word or two here, an island of trust there, a serendipitous counterpoint to mangled bodies beneath metropolitan London.

Then I think of the Oriental proverb: “When a butterfly flutters its wings on one side of the world, its power can be felt on the other side.” I dare to wonder whether my lapis merchant and I might be a couple of those butterflies.

How the fluttering works its way to the other side of the world, God only knows. Maybe the child was impressed by the beneficence of his father. Maybe his father explained his beneficence to him. Maybe I will regale my own children in this story of extraordinary trust. Maybe the waves of influence will ripple outward. All I do know is that war may end through physical domination, but peace is of the metaphysical world, a world in which miracles may be consummated even over an inert chunk of lapis lazuli.