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MOUNTAINTOP GLIMPSES OF PERFECT LOVE

They're 17 of the most eloquent words ever spoken on this planet, and the Man who said them also proved them true less than 24 hours later. The words are found in the Bible book of John chapter 15, and they're said by Jesus, of course, on that last Thursday night. Here they are:
"Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends."

As we continue through this two-week series, The Everest Chronicles, which seems to get harder and harder, we find a powerful new example of that statement's truth. A New Zealander named Rob Hall, guide for the Adventure Consultants expedition to the top of Everest a year ago May, proved again that the words of Christ are painfully and wonderfully real.

Back in 1995, on a previous expedition, Hall had in his group a 45-year-old postal worker named Doug Hansen. He was basically 45-going-on-15, just a big happy kid whose greatest passion in life was climbing mountains. Somehow, even on a salary from the Seattle Post Office, he'd managed to work enough second jobs, doubling up on night shifts and moonlighting in construction, to cough up the $65,000 for a spot on Rob Hall's commercial expedition.

But for all that money and after 27 years of training, the team had been forced to turn around just 330 vertical feet from the top. They were right there at the South Summit! The peak was just above them! But the wind and the snow and the ticking clock and Rob Hall's firm, no-nonsense orders about turning around right on schedule had kept Hansen from actually getting to the roof of the world.

So in 1996, Hansen was back. He was a likable guy; in fact, author Jon Krakauer confesses that Hansen was his favorite on this trip. They were similar in temperament, both blue-collar climbers with a painfully intense passion for the mountains. Rob Hall had made many, many phone calls from New Zealand, encouraging Doug to give Everest another try, and finally giving him a huge discount off that $65,000 price tag for a repeat effort.

However, the climb wasn't going well for Hansen. During one of the acclimatization trips just up to Camp Three at 24,000 feet, they hit a big storm, and Rob Hall called them back down. By the time they were back at Camp Two, Doug's larynx was completely frozen. "I can't even talk," he moaned in a croak. "The climb is over for me."

But he was a tough climber, and a few days later he did manage to get up to Camp Three, and then finally Camp Four, perched up at 26,000 feet, just a few hours before the final push for the top, scheduled for midnight as they headed into Rob Hall's lucky day, May 10.

In his autobiography, Into Thin Air, Jon Krakauer writes about the emotions of his friend Doug Hansen, who by now did not look good at all. In the words of another climber:

"He was complaining that he hadn't slept in a couple of days, hadn't eaten. But he was determined to strap his gear on and climb when the time came. I was concerned, because I'd gotten to know Doug well enough at that point to realize that he'd spent the entire previous year agonizing over the fact that he'd gotten to within three hundred feet of the summit and had to turn around. And I mean it had gnawed at him every single day. It was pretty clear that he was not going to be denied a second time. Doug was going to keep climbing toward the top as long as he was still able to breathe."

However, just a few hours after they began climbing for the top, Doug Hansen stepped out of line and told Krakauer that he was quitting; he was feeling bad and had decided to go back down. Moments later, Rob Hall came up next to him and the two men had a brief conversation. No one will ever know what was said between them, but the tough postal worker got back in line and kept on going up toward the top of the mountain.

All during the six weeks of training, Rob Hall had emphasized one thing over and over: when it came to Summit Day, he was going to call the shots. When he said "Turn around," they were all going to turn around. They could argue with him later if they wanted, but not while they were "on the hill." "I won't take no for an answer," he asserted. And the turnaround time was going to be at either one or two in the afternoon depending on the weather; he hadn't announced which.

Then two huge factors came into the equation. With three expeditions going up on the same lucky May 10, there was a traffic jam at the infamous Hillary Step, a tricky 40-foot notch close to the top, where climbers had to go up with ropes, laboriously inching their way up one at a time. Secondly, by this time Doug Hansen was lagging seriously behind the others.

While most of the climbers, including Rob Hall, were at the summit not too much after two o'clock, Hansen hadn't yet appeared over the last ridge. In fact, it wasn't until around four when the completely fatigued postman finally showed up. Hall, who had been waiting for him, rushed to his aid and helped him stagger the last 40 feet to the top. Finally he'd made it to the roof of the world.

But why hadn't Hall turned him around earlier? Why hadn't the deadline been enforced as it had last time? Did he simply not have the stomach for dashing his friend's dream two years in a row? More on that later, but the simple truth now was that Rob Hall was on top of Everest with a client who had completely run out of strength. The needle was below empty and a storm was coming in.

At 4:30 and again at 4:41, Rob Hall radioed down to tell others that he and Hansen were stuck on the summit without oxygen. And when he got his client down to the tricky Hillary Step, their progress ground to a halt. Doug simply could not go on; there was no way.

Well, friend, let me make a long story short — partly because it hurts too much to tell it. But Rob Hall, who could have gotten down by himself, stayed up there on the summit with Doug Hansen all night. There were more radio calls at 5:36 and then again at 5:57. Another experienced mountaineer said quietly to Rob, "Look, man, if he can't get down, you better just come down yourself." It sounded terrible to say it, but it made no sense for both of them to die. However, Rob Hall simply would not leave his client alone on the top of Everest.

All through that horrible night, the wind was blowing at more than a hundred miles an hour, and the wind-chill was a hundred below zero. By the next morning, Rob Hall was still alive, but barely. By then Doug Hansen . . . was gone. To this day his fate is a mystery. And as that day, May 11, wore on, it was clear that Rob Hall no longer had the strength to move either. A rescue attempt by the two Sherpas failed, Hall had that final phone call to his wife, Jan, which we described yesterday . . . and he finally lay down to die. "Greater love hath no man than this . . ."

It's quite a story, isn't it? In his book, Jon Krakauer, who was both a climber and an observing journalist, had to openly analyze what went wrong. Why did that turn-around time get ignored? Why did Hall urge Doug Hansen to keep climbing when the big postal worker felt he should quit? Why weren't the ropes installed on the upper ridge? Why were three expeditions going up simultaneously, which caused that traffic jam at the Hillary Step? Some of Krakauer's questions in the book came across as criticisms — and he paid a political price for that. He apologizes profusely in the epilogue for the hurt his writing caused. But in the final analysis, he regarded Rob Hall with nothing but deep respect, and considered him to be a hero. Here and now, let me say the same: so do I.

It's a huge thing when a man loves someone enough to give his life, which Rob Hall certainly did. And yet, even that greatest of sacrifices is tainted by our very humanity. It's great love, it's incredible love . . . but it's not perfect love. Krakauer writes later about how Rob Hall and the guide for the Mountain Madness expedition, Scott Fischer, were competitors on the mountain. All of Fischer's clients were getting to the top, when five of Hall's had already turned around. Who was really the "Big Man on the Mountain"? Who would come away from this trip with the primo reputation for delivering the goods, getting people clear to the top safely? Were Hall's motives just a bit suspect, enough so that he suspended his own better judgment in order to get Hansen to the top a full two hours after quitting time? Again I say, these questions were respectfully asked, but they do remind us that even our heroic acts are stained by a million human motives.

But do you know something? That's not true of our Savior. Jesus came and died for us, and there was no competition with some other Savior. There was no pride, no record-keeping, no Everest resumé to worry about. When Christ was up on that cross, it was the purest, most holy love the universe has ever seen or ever will see. Right there, that was the greatest love. And with all the respect in the world for what Mr. Rob Hall did on Everest, that New Zealand guide's love is but a beautiful reflection of the perfect sacrifice made on another hill 1,935 years earlier.