Nineteen

But did the people realize what he had just said? "If you do not believe that I AM, you will die in your sins." They took it to mean, "If you do not believe in what I am," meaning the Prince. But he did not say that. He said "if you do not believe that I am--that is, that I am 'I AM.'" He called himself by the Divine name.

But he then said, "When you lift up the Son of Man"--and he held his arms out in the form of a cross--"you will recognize what I AM, and that I do nothing by myself and only say what the Father has taught me."

Still, there was a way one could construe what he was saying that he was not calling himself God Almighty, using the Name one must not pronounce. It was very, very close, but it would not stand up in court. And he knew it. He was mad, no doubt, but he was exceedingly clever. Could he keep up "informing" people of who--he thought--he was and still make it impossible for two witnesses to agree that he had actually called himself God, the One God, the only God?

Some of the people now turned away in disgust. "He never comes out and says he is the Prince, and keeps telling us conundrums! He is a waste of time!"

But Jesus was talking to those who remained. "--real students of mine," he was saying. "You will recognize what the truth is, and the truth will set you free."

"We are children of Abraham," said someone in the crowd. "We have never been slaves. How can you tell us we will be set free?"

"Amen amen I tell you," said Jesus, "anyone who commits a sin is a slave; and a slave does not stay in the family forever. The Son stays in it forever. And if the Son frees you, you really will be free."

Free from what? Free from our sins, presumably. Jesus had before now claimed that he could forgive sins.

"--telling you what I saw with the Father, and you are doing what you heard from your father!"

"Our father is Abraham!" they shouted.

"If you are Abraham's children, then act like Abraham!" Jesus countered. "But no! You are trying to kill me, a person who has spoken to you of the facts he heard from God. Abraham did not do that sort of thing. No, you are doing what your real father does."

"We are not bastards!" shouted the crowd. "We have the one God for our father!"

Jesus looked on them sadly. "If God were your father, you would love me," said Jesus, "because I came from God. And I did not come of myself; he sent me. Then why can you not understand what I say? Because you cannot hear my words! You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father's desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, and could not bear the truth, because the truth was not in him. And when he tells lies, he does what is natural to himself, because he is a liar, and the father of liars. And when I tell you what the truth is, you do not believe me!"

But it was not that simple. If you were not a madman, one could believe in you; we all know that you have miraculous powers from God. But you are a man, and a man is not God.

The people were making outraged cries to that effect, and that he was the one who had a devil. Jesus looked out over them with anger and said, "Can any one of you name one sin that I have committed? Then if I tell you what the truth is, why do you not believe it? Anyone who belongs to God can hear what God says; and so you cannot hear, because you do not belong to God!"

I felt he was talking to me as much as to everyone else. True, I could not name a single sin he had committed--which was unlikely if he were possessed by a devil. But it did not mean that he was not deluded by the strength of the Force that took over his soul. He was "possessed," as it were, by the Holy Spirit, which was fine, except that his finite mind could not bear it, and so he thought he was one and the same as the Spirit who possessed him.

I could hear him, but I could not listen to him, because what he said was impossible. A man cannot be God. What is finite cannot be infinite. There can be no discussion here.

"--men I tell you," said Jesus, "Anyone who keeps what I say will never see death!" What was that? He was promising that if they followed him, they would never die!

"Now we know you are out of your mind!" shouted someone in the crowd. "Abraham died, and so did the prophets! And you say"--he repeated Jesus's words with bitter sarcasm--"that if anyone 'keeps what you say' he will not taste death forever! Are you greater than our ancestor Abraham? Who died! Or the prophets? Who died! Just who are you making yourself out to be?" The crowd roared assent.

Jesus looked out at them and let them quiet down somewhat. Then he raised his hand for silence, and said calmly, "If I were to tell you how great I am, my greatness would be nothing. But there is my Father," he pointed to the sanctuary of the Temple, "who is showing how great I am. He is the one you call your God--but you do not recognize him. But I know him. If I said I did not know him, I would be a liar like you. I do know him, because I came from him, and he sent me!"

Now he was saying that he came from God, and God sent him. But he had called himself "I AM" just a short while ago.

Then Jesus looked over them once again, and said, "And your ancestor Abraham was glad to see that my day was coming; and when he saw it come, it filled him with joy!"

"You are not even fifty years old," shouted the man who had spoken earlier, and you have 'seen Abraham!'" Everyone laughed, and Jesus, stung, broke into their cacophony with the angry retort, "Amen amen I tell you, before Abraham came into existence, I AM!"

One could hear the intake of breath as the whole crowd reacted in stunned horror. Jesus stood there in front of them for a silent moment, and then cries of "Blasphemy!" "He has blasphemed on the very steps of the Temple!" as people scurried about to find stones to throw at him.

--To throw at no one. He was not there.

We dispersed, intending to go to the Mount of Olives,

but as soon as we left the Temple precincts, there was Jesus, walking among us. I had an errand to do, however, and went ahead by myself, and Andrew, who had spotted me, raced after me.

It was a while before he caught up with me; but finally, he came behind me and, grasping me by the shoulder, spun me around, and said, "I saw what you did with John!"

Another fight. Well, he would discover that size was no match for skill. Besides, I had little time. I quickly tripped him onto his face upon the ground, which left me standing behind him with a foot on his back, and his arm held in such a position that if I moved it toward his head, it would break. I saw no point in going further; he was hopeless in his ineptitude. "What do you mean, 'what I did with John? It was what John did with me!'"

"Oh, please! I saw the two of you!"

"Then your eyes are defective! He came up to me as you did, and challenged me to a fight, spouting some nonsense he got from that slave Ezra that I had put a spider in Nathanael's pouch or something, and then I showed him that I knew a thing of two about fighting. But as I was trying to pin him down, he decided to pleasure himself against me--I had seen him look at me with lust in his eyes many times--and I was trying to keep him motionless, but I could not."

"Oh, of a certainty!"

"You may think what you may think, but facts are facts. And no doubt you have seen him look at you thus also."

"What!"

"Good heavens, Andrew, you are blind! What, did you think he admired you?" I laughed. "He admired your shoulders and your arms and your chest--and other parts of your body. Admired you? He wanted you, just as he wanted Ezra and me! Wake up!"

I could see that what I had said went through him like a shock. It had never occurred to him until this moment! The fool! the blind fool!

I looked down, and with pity and scorn in my voice said, "It does not seem as if you are quite so eager to come to his defense now. No, Andrew, he is not the exemplary, holy young man that you thought he was. In a way, I feel sorry for you, and so I will let you go with just a bit of a warning to think before you try such things with such as I." and I moved Andrew's arm to the point where it gave him intense pain, but did not break it, and went away.

As I returned to the group, Jesus had joined us, but evidently still using whatever it was that made him disappear, because we were the only people who were aware of him. It seemed that he planned on making a reappearance that day, however, from the way he was acting. I must say, it was confusing to be with him.

We happened to pass a blind beggar, and Jesus stopped. Andrew asked how long he had been blind, and was told, "from birth." "Rabbi," he said, "if he was born blind, was he the one who sinned, or was it his parents?"

Jesus looked at him with some contempt, and answered, "It was no sin of his or his parents either." He stroked his beard. Aha! This was the inspiration he was anticipating. Cure of a man blind from birth was a colossal miracle. It would enable him to make an advance in his claims."It was to use him as a proof that God is really the one who is acting here. We have to do the deeds of the one who sent me while it is still day. The night is coming when no one can act. While I am in the world, I am the world's light."

The night is coming. We were reaching the point of no return. Could he save himself? Evidently not; he foresaw that he would not. I noticed that a crowd had begun to gather; evidently, Jesus was now letting himself be seen.

Jesus, one supposes to create a little fanfare to call attention to what he was going to do to the blind man, spat on the ground and made mud with the saliva. He put this rather unwholesome mixture on the man's eyes, and said, "Now, go wash them off in the Siloam pool."

And the man left, and after a short time, came back shouting "Hallelujah! I can see!" He did not, of course, recognize Jesus, since he had never seen him before. He had never seen anything before, and was marveling at whatever his eyes looked upon. People began saying, "Is this not the one who used to sit here and beg?"

"No, it is only someone who looks like him."

"No, I am the one," he shouted.

"But how did you come to be able to see?" said one in the crowd, looking at Jesus, who was right beside him.

"The man called Jesus made mud and rubbed it on my eyes," he answered. Jesus wore an amused smile. "And I washed it off, and I can see."

"Where is he?" they asked, looking again at Jesus.

"I know not," he answered, looking around. Everyone laughed.

But a group of Pharisees caught him by the arm and took him rather roughly inside. After a while, someone emerged and asked where his parents were, and brought them in. They were there a considerable time, and finally, the man was shoved out the door with "So you will teach us our lessons, will you? You were born full of sin!"

Jesus stepped over to him, and asked, "Do you believe in the Son of Man?"

The man, who recognized Jesus's voice, answered in embarrassment at having seen him without knowing him, "Who is he, Master, and I will believe in him!"

"You have already seen him. He is the one speaking to you."

"Master, I believe!" he said, and fell to his knees.

Jesus put his hand on his back, and said, looking off into the distance, "I have come into the world to separate people. To give sight to the blind, and to blind those who can see."

One or two of the Pharisees who had come out to see what happened to the man said, "You mean, we are blind."

Jesus looked at them. "If you were blind, you would not be guilty of any sin. But when you say you can see, your sins stay fixed within you."

That statement hit me for some reason. Suppose I could be wrong. Then I am blind and think I can see. --Bah! Nonsense! Jesus is a man claiming to be infinite; but men are finite. A man simply cannot be God! It is unthinkable to anyone who has a mind. Much as I admire and love Jesus, I cannot accept absurdity!

But was that the question? Not could a man be God, but could God be a man? But how could he undo himself while still remaining God, since clearly the universe still existed, and he had to act as his infinite self in order for it to do so? No, there was no rational way out in this direction either. The only answer was that the man was insane.

Jesus was now talking about sheep and shepherds, but I missed practically everything he said, since I was wrapped up in my own internal debate, trying to justify him if I could. But Jesus was once again gathering an audience, and he broke into my musings with "--I am ready to give up my life, and then take it back again. No one is going to take it from me; I am giving it up of my own free will. I have the right to give it up, and I have the power to take it back. This is the command I have from my Father."

There was the proof that his claim was valid. He would come back to life on the third day after his death. But he had to die first. And then, of course, it would be all over.

--Unless he was what he said he was. But then we run into the wall of absurdity again!

"We are going back to Galilee in a short time," he said to me, "If you see any of the others, tell them to make ready. I want the effect of the blind man to sink in before I return here.--and Judas,"he added quietly. "Cannot what can do more, also do less?"

What did that mean? Clearly, he had "heard" my thought that perhaps the question was whether God could be a man, even if a man could not be God. If something was infinite, could it "add" a finite dimension to itself without altering its infinity?

But I was again distracted by the fact that the speech he had just made had set off another controversy among the Judeans. Numbers of them said, "He is crazy! He's possessed! Why do you listen to him?" and others answered, "This is not the raving of a madman; and can a demon give sight to the blind?"

I wandered off by myself to think, and suddenly, Thomas appeared as if out of nowhere and almost ran into me, since his eyes were on the ground, and he was desperately concerned about something--as were we all. As he straightened up to apologize, he realized, with supreme loathing, that it was I.

"I am sorry, Judas," he managed to say through his teeth. I was--preoccupied."

"One can see that. A pity you did not learn the lesson a while back in Galilee."

"Lesson? What lesson?"

"Are you really so dense? Did you not see that I showed you that you could take a little wine with no ill effect?"

Thomas stared at me, and the light began to dawn. "You mean that that was deliberate?"

"And did you suffer any ill effect from it?"

"How did you dare?

"Come, now, Thomas. Dare what? It was nothing but a little wine."

Thomas was too enraged to reply, or even move.

"But if you want to continue drinking nothing but water, that is your prerogative, I suppose. No harm was done, as you yourself said." I put my hand onto his chest, just above where he had "hidden" his little wineskin that everyone knew about, and said. said, "And you do act admirably in that regard, with one small exception, that we are all aware of." And with a sudden snatch inside his tunic for the the skin--which turned out to be a sheep's bladder or some such thing--and yanked it out, tearing the cloth, and with my dagger in my other hand, I slashed it open.

Thomas stared in horror at the stain the pungent liquid inside had made, as if his soul was in it. I tossed the useless bladder down beside it, and its odor filled the air. "Well!" I said. "It was not wine, then, but something special, it seems."

Thomas looked slowly up from the stain into my smiling face, and softly said, "You know, I killed someone once for doing that."

I answered, "I always wondered how accidental that 'accident' was. We learn something new every day, do we not?--But I doubt if you would attempt killing with your bare hands someone with a dagger."

Thomas stared at me, too full of helpless fury to speak.

Then I said, calmly and quietly, "Consider, Thomas. I have done you a favor. You have drunk nothing but water for--what is it? A year and a half now. You have no need of that wineskin, or whatever it is, if you never drink from it. But you have been trusting in it all this time, relying on it. Jesus would have you trust in him. Now you must trust in him. I have but made it possible."

And I had done him a favor. If he would not resume drinking wine, he at least would not have the temptation at his very side at every moment. He could do without it; he had done without it, and all he needed was a little push. Without what I had done, he would still be patting that bladder for years and years. Now he had either to go through the trouble to find and new one and prepare it and fill it with his super-wine, when all the time he would know that he would never drink from it, or he would go back to being sensible--or, I suppose, Thomas being Thomas, he would give up in despair and drink himself to death as he had planned originally. But I suspect he would not take that course--unless, of course Jesus was crucified and did not have the decency to return to life on the third day. How absurd! What had I been bothering my mind with? It would not happen.

I decided that I needed to calm myself down a bit, so I went back to my house and looked at the little treasure that I--that we--had amassed. If Jesus was killed, then it really would belong to no one, and of course, if it belonged to no one, it was as much as mine. I could live quite comfortably on this for years. But I had better begin distancing myself from Jesus, since he was clearly doomed, and coming back to life was simply an insane dream. I had to begin cultivating those who were on the other side, seeing how I could curry their favor, so that when the crisis came, they would receive me instead of having me join Jesus in his condemnation.

But how? Especially without antagonizing Jesus, who could apparently--certainly--read thoughts. I had best, before I began "plotting," stay as far away from him as possible, on the assumption that he could not discover what I was thinking unless I was reasonably close to him. With many people between us, the noise of many thoughts at once would not make my thoughts stand out.

Or so I hoped. If not, I was doomed myself. And when I was near him, I could toy with the idea that if God could do "more" in the sense of infinitely more, then why could he not do "less" and restrict his activity in this one space to no more than the activity of a human being?--since a human being was, after all, simply activity that was limited in a certain way, and the limitation was itself nothing at all.

When I put it that way to myself, it even sounded, if not plausible, at least possible. Still, there was the problem of why the Infinite would do such a thing, even supposing that It could. What possible interest could It have in imitating and joining the limited creatures It had made?

And let us face it, Jesus, for all his powers, displayed too much of the finiteness of his reality to be simply a manifestation of the God who was above everything. That God was impassible; he could not suffer; and Jesus did suffer various human ailments, and he became angry, as at the Temple when the animals were sold, and at Philip and others when they acted in egregiously stupid ways. If he was human, he was all-too-human at times. No, the whole theory that God, the infinite God, had decided to partially finitize himself had too many holes in it to be tenable. And that left me with the man Jesus, intimately connected with this infinite Power, becoming mad because of its influence on his mind--which made perfect sense. What was I to do? What was any rational human being to do?

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