Twenty

In the course of my musings, I happened upon Thomas (who did not see me) talking to Matthew, who had an expression on his face that mirrored his. Evidently, if Matthew had any prop like Thomas's that he relied on--a secret cache of wealth, perhaps--he had just discovered that it was gone. It seemed that all the members of the group were now rapidly being left with nothing to rely on but Jesus, and on a Jesus who openly said that he was going to be killed. None of them, except perhaps Philip, had the temerity to have faith that he would rejoin them after being killed, and so they faced the prospect of being alone.

As did I, but I was preparing myself for it. With this, we all went to the garden to sleep, though I noticed that most of them did not actually sleep much.

That evening, I went for one of my walks in the woods, and I encountered that Man of Shadow, who was almost invisible, but who made his presence felt by grabbing the front of my tunic. "What?" I said. "First the little boy and now the man of coal? You wish to fight? Very well, strip, and I will teach you a lesson also!" Fortunately, he had shiny skin, and the little light that was left glinted off it.

We threw off our mantles and tunics, and squared off at each other. I, thinking that he was as unskilled as John, tried what I had done to him; but he evidently had been schooled in fighting, and took me by surprise. After a very brief skirmish, in which I lost the upper hand, I found myself standing in front of him, with my arm in more or less the position I had held Andrew's. I was convinced he intended to break it; but he simply held it that way bending it up a little from time to time, causing immense pain--and then the fiend, the disciple of Satan, violated me, and I was not able to prevent it.

It was much more painful than I had ever imagined (how some people can find this enjoyable!), and he, seeing my anguish, prolonged it beyond measure. I regret to say that I began pleading with him to stop, and that only seemed to give his fury greater fire. I thought I was going to die. Eventually, I began to collapse, and he held up my hips as he continued until he reached a climax inside me and let me slip, groaning, to the ground.

And left me there.

When I could move, which was far into the night, several hours later, I decided to hobble to my house and rest, which I did for four days, until I could manage without help. Even then, when I went back to the group, I held myself aloof for a time. It was just as well; none of the people there now considered me a companion, though I had once been quite popular. Such is the fate of those who adhere to the truth.

The next day, we traveled the hour-long walk over to Bethany, where Martha was busy preparing the meal, and Lazarus was not present, having told Martha to inform Jesus that pressing business had kept him in Jerusalem that night. Of course, of course. What Lazarus meant was that Jesus gave promise of being a liability. Obviously, he had not yet discovered that Mary was Mary Magdalene, as he was bound to do if he had any extended contact with the entourage of Jesus. Chusa's Joanna came to mind.

But what interested me was was that Mary was not about either. She would hardly be expected to be bustling about as Martha was, but she must be in the house somewhere. Was Mary another one who had all her props knocked from under her? It looked as if every one of the students had begun to realize what "take up your own cross" really meant.

Jesus sat outside the house to wait for the dinner, and Mary's former slave Judith came out to speak to him briefly, and then said, "I will try," and ran inside.

Shortly afterward, Mary emerged, blinded by the sun, obviously staggering under her cross, even before her relatives had found out who she really was. Something else had happened in Bethany.

Finally, she noticed Jesus and sat down on the bench beside him, looking at the ground. Jesus began speaking to her, and at first she said not a word, and then made a few laconic replies, in a tone of complete and utter despair. My heart went out to her. She was so compellingly attractive in her despair. My desire flared up into a tormenting fury.

Suddenly, Martha came out and said, in a voice clearly meant to be overheard by everyone, "Master, does it not concern you that my sister has left me alone to take care of waiting upon you?"

"Martha, Martha," said Jesus. "So much is important to you, and you have so much on your mind. But there is only one thing that matters. Mary has chosen the better part, and it will not be taken away from her." --Yet, from her demeanor, it certainly appeared as if Mary had chosen the worst of all possible parts.

Martha looked indignantly at the two of them, and marched back into the house, muttering (also for all to hear) that unless someone took the worse part, those who chose the better part would do so on empty stomachs. Jesus laughed, and resumed his conversation.

Mary then began to be more and more earnest, and finally she cried, "Stop! Stop!" and covered her ears.

"Mary, Mary," said Jesus audibly, "you worry too much."

"Master," she pleaded, "listen to me! I am no one, I am dirt, but listen to me! If you say such things in public, they will kill you!"

"I know. It does not matter."

"It matters to me!" she almost shouted.

Spoken like the One that he thought he was, to whom absolutely everything that happened, even to his "finite self" was of no significance.

Mary said again in a loud voice, "I do not want to be chosen!"

I imagine even Jesus did not want to be chosen, but he was chosen whether he liked it or not, and it would lead to his death. And the others: Matthew, Thomas, Nathanael, John, Andrew--all of them, wished to be "unchosen," now that they had discovered what was in store for the "chosen." I myself was not happy about it, especially that I would have to repudiate Jesus in the near future--and would have to do so without risking my own skin. But the prospect was unbearable.

We returned to Galilee after that. Jesus had apparently accomplished whatever it was he wanted in Judea, including saving Mary from suicide, or whatever she was contemplating. It seemed that everyone was on the brink of suicide, especially Thomas.

I was trying to see if I could find Ezra by himself. I had a sword under my cloak, and intended to run him through; I knew a painful way to kill a person with a sword. But I could not find him alone. The irony was that he and that David, the one who had been dead, were apparently watching me, and I noticed that Ezra himself now sported a sword when he did so. Could he also have studied swordsmanship as part of his lessons on how to be a bodyguard for his future master? The thought gave me pause.

I heard him talking to John about how Thomas's father had to be fired from his father's fishing business because he too was a drunk. But Thomas had "rescued" him as he had been rescued by Jesus--whereupon his father cursed him and drove him away. But apparently Ezra had shamed the father into staying sober by asking him if he wished to imitate Thomas! It was a mess.

Shortly afterward, during the winter, as the Feast of Dedication approached, Jesus said that it was time to return to Jerusalem. I had recovered completely by that time, and had no problem walking or even sitting down.

And as soon as Jesus set foot on Solomon's Porch, the Judeans crowded round, and said, "How long are you going to leave us in suspense? If you are the Prince, come out and say it!"

"I have told you," said Jesus, "but you do not believe me. And the deeds my Father has sent me to perform give proof of it; but you will not believe them either--because you do not belong to my sheep. My sheep recognize my voice, and I know who they are. And they follow me, and I will give them eternal life, and they will never be lost and no one will take them out of my hands." Now he was making wild statements not only about himself, but about his followers. We--at least, those of us gullible enough to believe--would never die, and "no one would take us from his hands."

At least, if he were accepted as King. I suspect that the coming Feast of Passover would be the time of crisis. I could not imagine that the authorities would let it go any farther, if that far. But who could believe not only that he would come back to life but that the whole world would be transformed, and lions would eat hay like oxen? It was absurd. Absurd.

I thought he looked at me as he was saying this about taking people from his hands. "My Father, who gave them to me is greater than anyone, and no one can take anything from his hands--and the Father and I are one and the same thing!"

There! He had finally said it! There was no way to misinterpret it now! He called himself the "Son of Man" because he was God emptying himself somehow into human skin while remaining still the Infinite God. "Blasphemy!" came the shouts. They picked up stones once again.

But this time, instead of vanishing, Jesus held up his hand and said, "I showed you many good deeds from my Father. For which of them are you going to stone me?"

"We are stoning you for blasphemy, not any good deeds!" was the answer. "You are a man, and you are claiming to be God!" Or, as he would have it, You are God, deciding to limit yourself to human reality in this one manifestation of yourself.

Jesus looked at them, made his left hand into the shape of an open book, and pointed at it. "Is it not written in your Law, 'I said you are gods?'"

He was right. There was a psalm in which God said, "I said 'you are gods.'" referring, as I recall, to the ones he set over others as judges. He went on, "Now if Scripture calls 'gods' those through whom the words of God were uttered, and if you cannot deny that Scripture says this, why do you say that I am blaspheming when I say I am the Son of God, if I am the one the Father consecrated and sent into the world? Do not believe me if I do not do deeds that can only be done by my Father; but if I do do them, then if you do not believe me, believe the deeds, so that you will recognize and know that I am in the Father and the Father is in me!"

They screamed and rushed upon him to seize him--and grasped nothing but air. "How does he do that?" one said. "Perhaps he is what he says he is," answered another, awestruck. "Nonsense!" was the angry reply. "He is a madman, who knows a few tricks!"

Of course, what he said was sophistry. Scripture did not intend in any way to mean that those God appointed were actually Himself. That would be nonsense. No, they had the place that a Gentile would call a "god," but not the Hebrew God at all.

But what did he mean by "I am in the Father, and the Father is in me." The part contains the whole within itself. What could that mean but "one and the same thing"?

It turned out that Jesus, who once again appeared among us students as if nothing had happened, now decided to go across the Jordan into Peraea, outside of Judea, where John had once bathed the people. Jesus evidently realized the danger from the Judeans, and was going outside their territory. The people there had heard of him, and were willing to accept him.

We students did not know what Jesus intended. Perhaps he was content to work among these foreigners up until the Passover, where he would create the final confrontation with the Judean authorities.

"I think that is what it will be," said Andrew. "The city will be full of Galileans, and the Judeans from this territory, who are well-disposed toward him."

"And then what?" asked Nathanael.

"Well, what I think is that he is counting on having this large crowd to overcome the resistance of the Judean authorities to making him King."

"I am inclined to believe that you are right," said Nathanael. "I cannot see how he can come any closer to the crisis without actually being in the middle of it. Probably the Passover will decide things one way or another."

"God grant it is the right way!" said Matthew.

"God grant. But he himself does not seem sanguine about it."

"But he told me once that it could happen. Unfortunately, he added that it would not."

"Well, if it could, it can," said Andrew. "We must not lose hope."

"None of us has," said Nathanael.

But of course, all this was wishful thinking, since he himself had predicted explicitly that he would be killed. --And return to life. But though the prediction of being killed was probably trustworthy, the rest was fantasy.

Jesus startled them all shortly afterward, by saying, "We must return to Judea. Make ready."

"Rabbi," said the Rock, "The Judeans are trying to stone you now. Are you going back there?"

"Are there not twelve hours in a day?" answered Jesus. "If a man travels during the day, he does not stumble, because he can see this world's light. If he travels at night, he might fall, because then there is no light in him." He looked out across the Jordan to the gray, barren hills beyond which lay Bethany and Jerusalem. "Our friend Lazarus is resting," he said. "We must go and awaken him."

"Master, if he is resting, he will get better," said Andrew. Word had reached the group a few days previously that Lazarus was ill.

"Lazarus," said Jesus, looking solemnly around at them, "is dead." There was a shocked intake of breath. "I am glad of it for your sake, so that you will believe in me, because I was not there. Now. Let us go to him." What? Was he going to bring Lazarus back to life after three days--it would take them almost that long to get there--as a kind of rehearsal, so to speak, of his own return to life? To prepare us not to be overwhelmed when he died?

There was a silence. Everyone knew the implications. Perhaps this was to be the crisis, not the Passover.

Finally Thomas said, "We might as well go--and die with him." Well, if they had to, they had to. What did they have to live for now, in any case? I would have to find someone among the authorities to talk to about Jesus, without anyone's knowing.

As we were on the way, word came that Lazarus was indeed dead, and that by the time we reached Bethany, he would be in the tomb four days.

Jesus stopped just outside the town in a secluded place and sent word by David that he had arrived. Ezra came up and stood between Thomas and John. He put a hand on each of their shoulders. He certainly had made himself popular, in spite of his color and status. But they were both fools, of course.

Shortly afterward Martha came out. "Master," she said, "If you had been here, my brother would not have died! --And yet," she went on, "even now I know that God will give you anything you ask him." It was not an act of faith so much as it was a plea, and she dared not even voice what she was hoping. It was too fantastic. Four days! This was no David, being led out on the stretcher to be buried.

"Your brother will return to life," said Jesus.

Martha hedged. "Well, I know that he will return to life at the resurrection on the last day, when everyone returns to life. But--" Her voice trailed into silence. Everyone knew what she meant.

"I am resurrection," said Jesus, "and I am life. Anyone who believes in me will be alive even if he is dead. And anyone who is alive and believes in me will not die ever." He looked fixedly at her. "Do you believe this?"

Again, Martha hedged. "Yes, Master," she said, "I have always believed that you are the Prince, the Son of God who has come into the world." She did not say that she believed that she would never die, however, or that Lazarus was alive, though dead, whatever that might mean.

Jesus inquired about Mary, and Martha rushed away to fetch her. Where was Mary? Had Lazarus died somehow because he found out about who she was? Good Lord, had he killed himself?

We waited for a while in silence, each of us evidently thinking about what all of this might signify, and finally Mary came up, followed by a small group of Judeans, who had come to the house to console the sisters.

She rushed up to Jesus and fell at his feet, wailing, "Master, if you had been here, my brother would not have died!" It was almost a reproach--it was a reproach. Jesus waited, clearly wanting to see if, as in Martha's case, there followed any hint of a glimmer of hope in him. But nothing was heard but her weeping.

Jesus finally gave up. He heaved a great sigh of resignation, and said, "All right, where did you bury him?"

Next