Six

When we returned on the next day, Levi hobbled out, obviously still the worse for wear, and spoke sharply to the dogs, which only reluctantly gave up their desire to feast on us, and returned growling to the back of the house while he approached the gate.

"You have returned to life on the third day, I see," said Jesus. Levi paused, thinking, and I wondered "Where have I heard this before?" And then I remembered, "Destroy this Temple (my body?) and in three days I will rebuild it." Just as there were forty days at the beginning, there seemed to be something about dying and returning to life on the third day. I would have to keep note of this.

"If one can call it 'life,'" returned Levi. "I am as dead as I am alive."

"Ah, well, your new life is barely born, and you are still feeling the pains of the birth canal."

"I am feeling pains, truly," he returned.

"Do you still wish to follow me and learn from me?"

"I cannot see that I have any alternative. I am totally at a loss. I know not what you are; you are certainly not the one I once thought you to be. But you seemed to be saying that you could put back the pieces of me that have been scattered all over the ground."

Judging by the outside of the mansion, the inside would have to have been finished by a skilled carpenter, or team of carpenters. Almost certainly Jesus and his father. That made perfect sense of "you are certainly not the one I once thought you to be."

"Well, perhaps not put them back," Jesus was answering. "The self that you were is not something you are proud of and would have restored, is it not?"

"There is wisdom in that."

"That is why I said a new life has been born, if you would choose to live it. It is your choice, however."

"As I say, what choice have I? I cannot go back, and I see no way forward. What would a tax-collector who renounced tax-collecting do? How would I live?"

"Well, you can try what I have to offer, and we will see."

"What I cannot understand is what possible use you could have for me, given what I am, in whatever it is you are doing."

"Ah, well if it comes to that, there are many things you could be useful for. You can read and write well, in several languages, and we know your skill with money. But that is beside the point, really. The point really is what can be done for a sheep that wandered off as a lamb and has fallen among wolves. The others, here, of course, are not quite convinced as yet that you are not really a wolf. They will learn."

So he knew other languages--of course he did. And Jesus seemed to be behaving with him as he did with Thomas, who, indications were, had a mind that could perform well once he had been rescued. It almost seemed as if Jesus was gathering about him people who needed to have him about them for their rescue.

But of course, how could that apply to me? What would I need to be rescued from? Of course, Jesus had not sought me out, and so perhaps that was the difference. And his stroking his beard may have been his request to the Force within him as to whether he should take on someone who did not need him, and perhaps he himself needed. So that would fit even in my case.

Then I need not worry about the others. However unpromising they seemed (and in some cases, it was very unpromising), Jesus, with his infinite Power inspiring him, could make them into effective instruments of what the Power had in "mind," if one wished to call it that. Of course, it was greater than anything we would call a "mind."

Interestingly, I overheard at one time a conversation with Ezra (which I was interested in, since I had serious misgivings about any role he could play), in which he indicated that he would prefer to take on the role of a mere observer, and perhaps return to Ethiopia to spread the Good News there. It seemed a wise move, and Jesus apparently assented to it. That took care of the incongruous member of the group.

He, by the way, seemed attracted to John, which was understandable, since John was in many ways very attractive. And, to be sure, John seemed attracted to him--as he also was to me, and if I am not mistaken to Andrew, based on the way he sometimes looked at us when he thought we were not aware of it. But John was resisting this, presumably because of interpreting Leviticus a bit too broadly. But it was interesting, and perhaps something could be done with it. I made a mental record of it; it might be useful in some way.

Jesus now introduced Levi to the rest of us, and afterwards said, "Let us proceed to the house, and I think it would be useful as we go if I told you a little story. I tell this just to you and not the crowds at the moment.

"Two men once went into the Temple to pray, one a Pharisee and one a tax-collector. The Pharisee stood there and whispered this prayer: 'My God, I am grateful to you for not being greedy, dishonest, and adulterous like other people--or even like this tax collector.'"

Did I see someone praying in the front of the synagogue? Certainly, as I looked at Levi, he took it that the "tax-collector" in the Temple was the tax-collector we saw at the back of the synagogue; and he seemed to think that there was another one there in the front.

Jesus was continuing, "'--a week, and I pay my tithes on everything I own.' The tax-collector, however, stood in the back of the Temple and would not even raise his eyes to heaven; he only kept beating his breast and saying, 'My God, please have mercy on this sinner!'

Levi turned pale, evidently reacting to Jesus's knowing what he had been doing, though he could not have been there to see him. But of course, the Power could know things--"see" things--that Jesus himself as a man could not. One wondered, nevertheless, why Levi was there, and why he had come to see himself as a sinner--no great feat, one would think, except for someone who had to have blinded himself quite thoroughly to the real situation he was in, or he could not have brought himself to do what he had been doing.

"--point is," Jesus continued following his custom of acting as if nothing was happening, "that he was the one who left the Temple virtuous, not the Pharisee. Everyone who elevates himself will be lowered, and one who lowers himself will be elevated."

In the silence that followed, Levi's face turned from deadly pale to scarlet, as he noticed everyone looking at him. For all of us, this was a new experience; Jesus had not told stories--or perhaps spoken in analogies or parables--before, and some of us had trouble making the connection between the fiction, such as the Temple, and the fact of the synagogue.

James the throat-clearer came up to Levi and asked, "Were you (hem) ever in the Temple, Levi?"

"Call me Matthew, please. That is the name I was born with, and I now no longer have to disguise it. The one I wished to avoid now knows who and where I am. No, I was never in the Temple. It is a story. You must ask him if it applies to me, and how, if at all."

This change of name indicated to me more clearly that he had somehow escaped from Pontius Pilate, who now had discovered who he was. But doubtless he was as safe as anyone could be in the entourage of Jesus.

But the intriguing thing here was that Jesus was saying that Matthew's admission that he was a sinner effected his forgiveness. He had had the "change of way of thinking" that made him (mentally at least) a new man, as if he had been born again, as Jesus indicated. But what this meant, evidently, was that such a change of heart erased all the sins--and they had to be many and serious--he had committed in the past. Of course, the Power that possessed Jesus could forgive sins, just as It could do anything else, and what Jesus seemed to be saying was that under certain conditions, It actually did so.

Clearly this Matthew was struggling with the same concept. Finally, it seemed to occur to him that if it were possible, perhaps a new life could begin after all.

Philip, who could not let go of an idea, came up to him at this point, and said, "Did I not see you in the synagogue in Nazareth, a couple of mornings ago?"

"I have been in that synagogue but once in my life." "Oh. I thought I saw you when--but it is of no consequence."

Levi obviously was quite astute. He had doubtless seen already how naive and literal Philip was, and had given him a true answer that was not responsive to his question. No doubt he had been in that synagogue but once, and that was the time. It was obvious that this was the way John, Thomas, and Ezra, took it, since they nodded at each other.

Andrew, interestingly, had a problem with the forgiveness. He said to Nathanael--a good person to consult, unless one came to me--"But how can he say that the Pharisee did not leave the Temple virtuous? In what had he sinned? He did everything he was required to do. Who pays tithes on everything? And what did the tax-collector do except admit that he was a sinner? Does recognizing what you are absolve you from your sins?"

Matthew, who heard this, and did not quite understand it, shrank as if stung, but the two took no notice of him. I felt like telling him that sometimes a change of heart meant a complete change of life; one becomes a different person. But they did not see fit to consult me.

Nathanael then answered, "Clearly, there is more to it than that. The tax-collector was beating his breast and begging for mercy, after all. He was hardly bragging at how clever he was at sinning. He wished forgiveness, and forgiveness was granted him. It is a question of attitude, I suppose. Remember David after Bathsheba, and his psalm. He was forgiven."

"But he had to pay," Andrew countered. "His beloved son was killed." True, but clearly, he had not completely changed his personality, as could be seen from the fact that Bathsheba was the mother, not only of the boy who died, but of Solomon also.

"True. But he was forgiven, and so was the tax-collector. We know not what he had to pay afterwards."

"Well I think he should have mentioned it. Why should sinners simply have everything wiped away as if they had done no harm?" Probably, I thought, it would take time, but the change of personality would lead him to restitution in the future. One did not have to revolutionize one's whole life all at once.

"I think, Andrew, that we have entered a new order of things."

"It seems we have." answered Andrew. "Especially since the Pharisee's virtue did him no good. I might grant what you say about the tax-collector, but why should the Pharisee's virtuous acts count for nothing? Explain me that!"

"You notice how proud he was of everything he did? 'Not like the rest of men,' or whatever he said."

"Did you notice, Bartholomew, that he expressed gratitude to God that he was as he was?"

He paused for a moment. "Yes, but he had a list of all his good deeds ready to hand. Why was he praying thus to God, reminding him of all that he had done for him? One does nothing for God! God is infinite; he needs nothing from us."

"Then why does he require us to do things?"

Another brief pause. "Obviously, for our sake. They make us better--"

"You see?"

"But not if we do them as if we were doing favors for God, or bargaining with him. No one bargains with the Almighty."

"But it is not fair! It is not just!"

"You sound like what Ezekiel says the Master said about the Israelites when they complained that he was not fair in punishing a man who had been virtuous his whole life and then committed one sin and in forgiving a notorious sinner who then turned and became virtuous. He said something such as, 'Am I unfair, Israel, or is it you who are unfair? If I reward the man I reward him for his virtue, not for his previous sins, and if I punish the man, I punish him for his sin, not for the previous virtue.'"

"Yes, I know." Andrew answered. "I have heard the Scripture, and it has always bothered me."

"Evidently, you do not see things as God sees them."

"And you do, I suppose."

"Put it this way: I am willing to consider that there may be another way of looking at things. And to return to this story, the Master's point was that those who elevate themselves will be lowered, apparently whatever the reasons they can give for elevating themselves, and those who lower themselves--and I suppose, beg for mercy--will be elevated, whatever they have done. Perhaps that is because of the way things will be when God takes over as King."

"It seems a rather easy way to escape the consequences of one's acts."

"I rather suspect it is anything but easy. It requires a whole new way of thinking--and after all, the Master is constantly saying that we must change our way of thinking, since God is about to begin his rule over us."

Andrew paused, and then said in a rather disgruntled tone, "I suppose I have not managed it, then."

"I doubt if any of us has."

Nathanael, I suspected, had hit upon the basic point. It was not enough to act virtuously, if one thought that one was doing favors to the Almighty by doing so. No one does favors to the Almighty and constrains "Him" to make a return. It is not a bargaining process; "He," not being a person in our sense, does not operate in that way. We are all insects or worse in "His" sight, beneath his notice. The best we can do is beg like the tax-collector and acquire the attitude of receptivity.

The fascinating thing was that Jesus had enunciated what the greatest scholars had tentatively arrived at; one learned this sort of thing only after years and years of study--or, as in Jesus's case, by being "instructed" by the Force inspiring one.

Jesus now seemed to have reached the house he had mentioned, which turned out to be Simon's. He stopped in the doorway, and immediately a rather large crowd began to gather around him.

He began a speech or sermon, which no one was paying particular attention to; they were all still too interested in the fact that Matthew was evidently going to be one of their number, and were anything but happy about it, and some even quite annoyed that all his sins would have been simply forgotten, if the story had any meaning at all. Of course, thinking of God as the Power that made the universe solved this problem, since "He," though "He" knew everything in some sense, could not be affected by anything that went on in the universe "He" created.

But suddenly there was a commotion behind Jesus in the house, drawing everyone's attention. Something was going on on the roof, but we students were too close to see what it was.

All at once, the ceiling opened, and a stretcher came down through a hole made in the thatch of the roof. Simon looked indignantly up at the vandalism, and was about to mount the ladder on the side when the stretcher, with a young man lying on it, came to rest just at the feet of Jesus, who was actually standing slightly inside the doorway, talking to the crowd that packed the space in front of the house.

Jesus looked at the youth, and then up through the hole in the roof, and said to the--evidently paralyzed--boy lying there, "Child, your sins are forgiven." The boy's face suddenly lit up with relief and joy; it was as if this was what he had hoped for, rather than the obvious, to be free of his paralysis.

Another "change of thinking!" But it was intriguing that Jesus was now saying that he forgave the sins! Well, not in so many words, but what else could it mean? But perhaps it simply meant that he saw the transformation of the young man's soul. Everything he did had a thousand purposes, one of which in this case clearly was a graphic answer to Matthew's problem.

The crowd, however, was in no mood to engage in philosophical speculation. "Why does he speak thus? This is blasphemy! Who is able to forgive sins except the one God?" Well, the reign of God was about to start, was it not? It looked more and more as if the reign of Jesus was to be the reign of God--a true statement, if an exceedingly dangerous one. Another of his purposes. How he could manage to get this idea across, especially to the Pharisees, without telling them that he himself was God (that is, the one whose name we do not pronounce) was going to be a feat of ingenuity greater than any miracle he had performed so far, including "forgiving" sins.

Jesus looked over the crowd, at one or two of those who had been complaining. "Why are you having debates about this, and harboring evil thoughts? Which is easier, to tell him his sins are forgiven, or to tell him to stand up and walk?

"But to let you know that the Son of Man has power on earth to forgive sins," and he turned to the paralyzed lad, "I tell you, stand up, take your stretcher, and go home."

And the boy stood up, and crying, "Hallelujah! Hallelujah!" picked up his stretcher, and went off, leaping and shouting.

Everyone was awestruck. "We have never seen anything like this." "Praise God!" "How did he do it?" "Strange things are happening today!" "Then his sins must have been forgiven!" "Nonsense!" "What else could it mean? You heard what he said!" "But if only God can forgive sins--" "Yes. What then?" "I do not understand it."

I myself did not understand it for a moment. He seemed to be saying, "Only God can forgive sins, and I forgave sin"--but he did not explicitly draw the conclusion. "I--the Son of Man--have the 'power on earth' to forgive sins," presumably because I am the channel by which the true Power is exercised on earth. This would make a distinction between him and the One we do not name, and yet one and the same Force forgave the sins, because he was the chosen channel by which the Force acted.

Still, it was an extremely tenuous distinction, and what disturbed me about it was that Jesus, not having studied widely (though he seemed to know whatever he needed to know) might not be clearly aware of it. It might be that Jesus was beginning to think that he himself was the author of such acts as forgiveness of sins, especially since he had followed up the statement by the act of curing the cripple, something presumably only the Infinite Power could do, by simply commanding him to get up and walk, as if he had by his own power, effected the cure.

If he believed this of himself, he was on the road to insanity, simply because a (finite) human being cannot be infinite. It was my task, foreordained by the Power, to rescue him from this, while leaving him his ability to act as a channel for the "Father," as he called him. It would be exceedingly difficult, but I had to try, and I felt I had the talent to succeed.

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