AND then Lancelot marvelled not a little, for him thought the priest was so greatly charged of the figure that him seemed that he should fall to the earth. And when he saw none about him that would help him, then came he to the door a great pace, and said: Fair Father Jesu Christ,* ne take it for no sin* though I help the good man which hath great need of help. Right so entered he into the chamber, and came toward the table of silver; and when he came nigh he felt a breath, that him thought it was intermeddled with fire, which smote him so sore in the visage that him thought it brent* his visage; and therewith he fell to the earth, and had no power to arise, as he that was so araged,* that had lost the power of his body, and his hearing, and his seeing.* Then felt he many hands about him, which took him up and bare him out of the chamber door, without any amending of his swoon, and left him there, seeming dead to all people. So upon the morrow when it was fair day they within were arisen, and found Lancelot lying afore the chamber door.
* ‘Ne take it for no sin’ means ‘Do not take it for a sin’. He is aware that he has been told not to enter the chapel. As prophesied, he is about to enter the chamber with full knowledge of his actions.
* In Malory’s tale, Lancelot calls God ‘the High Father’, and Jesus ‘father Jesus’, as does Sir Percival. There is some justification for this admittedly confusing manner of speech in Isaiah 9:6, which is traditionally taken to be a prophecy of Jesus Christ.
* An obsolete word meaning ‘burnt’.
* An obsolete word from Old French meaning ‘enraged’. Malory is not saying that Lancelot was angry, but that he was as blind, impotent and speechless as an angry man.
* Lancelot’s limp condition is a direct consequence of his decision to enter the chapel in defiance of the heavenly Voice that spoke to him. He had already been scolded for drawing his sword as he passed by the lions that guarded the entrance to the castle. “O man of evil faith and poor belief,” spoke a Voice, “wherefore trowest [trustest] thou more on thy harness than in thy Maker? for He might more avail thee than thine armour, in whose service that thou art set.” See also 2 Samuel 6:3-8, where Uzzah saves the Ark of the Covenant from toppling over and dies from the touch of so holy a thing. The authors tell us that King David himself was among those who thought Uzzah unfortunate, and he afterwards named the place Perez-uzzah, meaning ‘a breach upon Uzzah’.