Simon of the Desert 1965

The ascetic Simón Stylites Claudio Brook has spent six years, six weeks, and six days perched on a small pillar in the middle of the Syrian desert, a stark, sun-baked stage for a life of vigil. A crowd of monks and peasants gathers below, and they urge him to accept a taller pillar raised by a wealthy family to honor him for healing one of them. As the procession moves the short distance toward the new height, his aging mother Hortensia Santoveña steps forward with a quiet plea to remain nearby until she dies. He agrees, yet he makes it clear that he will not acknowledge her presence so as not to disturb his prayers. The monks try to confer holy orders on Simón, but he rejects them, insisting that he is an unworthy sinner and not worthy of such rank.

Once atop the new pillar, Simón leads the gathered throng in the Lord’s Prayer, though the moment is broken when a woman interrupts to plead for mercy for her husband, whose hands were severed for theft. Simón prays, and miraculously the man’s hands reappear, yet the crowd’s response is tepid, and they drift away. The monks linger to pray with him, but they depart after he rebukes one for glancing at a woman who carries a jug. The day-to-day rhythm of asceticism presses in, and Simón’s voice remains a constant, even as distractions multiply.

Brother Matías, Enrique Álvarez Félix, a young monk, delivers lettuce and water to Simón, briefly interrupting his cycle of prayer. In the wake of the interruption, Simón longs for a connection with the earth—his body, a bite of food, a thirst quenched—and even for the warm embrace of his mother. Into this moment steps Satan, the tempter who has also appeared as the woman with the jug, now in the form of a young girl from a future time. Dressed in modern garb, she appears and tries to lure him with her offerings and her presence, but he resists, banishing her by calling upon Christ.

A quiet crisis erupts when, during a solemn ascent of asceticism, Brother Trifón interrupts to reveal cheese, bread, and wine hidden in Simón’s sack. Simón does not defend himself, and Trifón swears he did not plant the food, prompting the monks to invoke the Holy Ghost to reveal the truth. Trifón’s tremors and rantings about the Church culminate in an exorcism, and Satan is expelled from him. The other monks carry Trifón back to the monastery, while Simón instructs Matías to leave until he can grow a beard—an unusual penance that marks a new resolve in his solitary life.

As the years accumulate—eight, then eight more, and eight days beyond that—Satan returns, this time in the guise of God. The temptation is patient and polished: she flatters him and tempts him with the promise of earthly pleasures to draw him closer to God. He sees through the ruse, however, and refuses the invitation, deciding instead to endure a harsher form of penance by standing on one leg as a reminder of his vocation. A monk who had previously glimpsed the temptation seeks forgiveness and counsel from Simón, warning him that the Antichrist may be marching toward Rome and voicing his concern that humanity’s endless debates about ownership keep them divided. Simón blesses the monk, who departs with a fragile sense of distrust about the value of such mystic visions in a world that seems to spin beyond his reach.

Then a coffin slides across the desert toward Simón’s pillar, and Satan emerges once more, dragging him into a doorway of time. She transports him to a crowded nightclub in 1960s New York City, where a live rock band electrifies the room. The two sit at a table in modern dress, and Simón, clearly disengaged from the spectacle, asks what dance the people are performing. Satan explains they are dancing the “Radioactive Flesh.” As a man asks Satan to dance, Simón prepares to return to his ascetic vigil, yet she presses him to endure the moment, whispering with an unnerving certainty to “stick it out till the end.” In this clash of epochs—the ancient pillar against the electric pulse of a bustling city—Simón stands as a figure of unwavering devotion, even as the world around him hums with irreconcilable desires and temptations.

• Simón Stylites Claudio Brook

• The Devil/Satan Silvia Pinal

• The Mother Hortensia Santoveña

• Brother Matías Enrique Álvarez Félix

stick it out till the end