The Jesse Tree

by Geraldine McCaughrean

  The Jesse Tree

  Inside a dusty old church, old Mr Butterfield is carving a ‘Jesse tree’, once so common, now a rarity, a tradition almost lost. From its branches, like tempting fruit, hang images of the Bible stories Mr Butterfield has known all his life. Then in from the sunlight strolls a boy who asks to be told the stories afresh. As the Jesse tree grows and the stories ripen, so a bond of friendship develops between the old man and the boy. Are there more wonders at work here than mere carpentry?

  Award-winning author Geraldine McCaughrean has written more than a hundred books for children of all ages. She is happiest when she is writing, and enjoys working both as a novelist and reteller of tales. Her sparkling career as a writer was brought even more decisively to the attention of the public when she was chosen to write a sequel to J. M. Barrie’s Peter Pan, Peter Pan in Scarlet.

  For my mother and father

  Text copyright © 2003 Geraldine McCaughrean

  This edition copyright © 2006 Lion Hudson

  The moral rights of the author have been asserted

  A Lion Children’s Book

  an imprint of

  Lion Hudson plc

  Wilkinson House, Jordan Hill Road,

  Oxford OX2 8DR, England

  www.lionhudson.com

  ISBN 978 0 7459 6076 0 (paperback)

  ISBN 978 0 7459 6713 4 (epub)

  ISBN 978 0 7459 6712 7 (Kindle)

  ISBN 978 0 7459 6714 1 (pdf)

  First hardback edition 2003

  First paperback edition 2006

  Revised paperback edition 2006

  1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2 0

  First electronic format 2011

  All rights reserved

  A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

  Cover illustration: Bee Willey

  CONTENTS

  Cover

  Dedication

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Introduction

  The Jesse Tree

  Paradise Garden

  A Boat Full of Animals

  Strange Visitors

  A Test of Love

  Stairway to Heaven

  The Dreamer

  Famine and Plenty

  “Let My People Go!”

  The Foreigner

  “Speak, Lord, for Your Servant is Listening”

  The Shepherd King

  Dancing

  The Wisdom of Solomon

  The Idol and the Still Small Voice

  War and Peace

  Dumbstruck!

  Mary

  Jumping for Joy

  The Worst of All Possible Times

  Wonderful News

  The Cunning and the Wise

  Angels

  The Brightest Star

  INTRODUCTION

  In the old days, in the front of any family Bible, a record was kept of that family’s history: the marriages, the children born of those marriages, the marriages and offspring of those children. Over the course of generations, those fading, spidery lines spread outwards, like branches and twigs from a single trunk. That is why we call such a record a “family tree”.

  Similarly, there would have been, in any number of churches, a “Jesse tree” – a depiction of Jesus’ family tree in wood, or stone, or stained glass. Church garments might even have been embroidered with a tree.

  Even thousands of years ago, when the stories of the Old Testament were first told, families were pictured as trees branching out from a single trunk.

  “A shoot will spring from the stock of Jesse, and from his roots a bud will blossom,” said the prophet Isaiah in the Bible, foretelling the birth of Jesus. It is this verse which gave rise to the tradition of Jesse trees in churches.

  Jesse trees were the Bible-storybooks of unlettered people. A priest could point to the figures or symbols and tell the stories of those Old Testament kings, prophets, heroines, warriors. And the tree itself served to show how the New Testament grew out of the Old Testament; how, for Christians, the birth of Jesus was not just a beginning, but a completion. He was the flowering of a tree planted long before, by God’s own design. By tracing his earthly ancestry back to King David and beyond, it was easy, too, to see Jesus as a real historical figure.

  That forest of ancient Jesse trees fashioned in the Middle Ages is long gone. Puritan vandals of the seventeenth century, in their attempt to destroy all “graven images”, smashed the heads from saints, the wings from angels, the figures from Jesse trees. No tree survives undamaged.

  But, in recent times, a new tradition has grown up – a new strain of Jesse tree “grown” at home. Still planted for the sake of its stories, symbols are added day by day during the season of Advent, and day by day the old stories are retold, culminating in the stories of the first Christmas.

  Whether you read the twenty-four stories in this book during Advent or enjoy it at one sitting, in the shade of a summer tree, remember that the Jesse tree’s roots were put down centuries ago, and that its fruit is as sweet as ever.

  THE JESSE TREE

  “What are you doing, Mister?”

  The old carpenter frowned. He hated people to watch him work. The big silence of the empty church suited him very well. When he saw the boy standing there, his frown turned to a scowl. “What are you doing in here?” he growled.

  “I asked first.”

  The old man ran a creased hand over his half-completed woodwork. “I’m carving a Jesse tree, if you must know. Now run along out of here. A church isn’t for playing in.”

  “Is that your name, then? Jesse?”

  The carpenter was impatient to get on. “Of course not. A Jesse tree is a very ancient tradition. A thousand years ago, every church had a Jesse tree. A stained-glass window or a carved wooden screen… Nowadays, it’s a lost art.”

  “No, it’s not,” said the boy. “You’re doing it.”

  He wore a tee shirt and shorts: a holidaymaker, thought the old man with disgust. Trippers! They came to town, they made a mess, made a nuisance, then away they went. Small boys on holiday were the worst.

  “Why a tree?” asked the boy.

  The carpenter breathed out through his teeth. “It’s like a family tree. You’ve heard of a family tree? Well, a Jesse tree is like that. It shows the ancestors of Jesus Christ, from the start of the world until his birth. You’ve heard of Jesus, I suppose?”

  “I’ve heard of Jesus. Were the sun and moon his ancestors, then?” asked the boy, pointing to the carvings near the base of the tree.

  “Of course not,” snapped the old man. “Those are symbols. They mark the start of the story. The beginning.”

  “I like stories,” said the boy.

  “Go and watch TV, then.”

  But the boy did not go. He sat down on a pew. “Have you forgotten the story?” he asked after a moment.

  “Huh! You should know it already, ignorant child. When I was your age, we knew all the stories in the Bible. These days…”

  “So tell me,” said the boy.

  And there was nothing for it but to tell him the story behind the carvings of the sun and moon.

  PARADISE GARDEN

  First there was the idea, complete and perfect: the beginning, the end and everything in between. (God is a craftsman, you see, and a craftsman always plans before he begins work.) Then God flexed his fingers and began. He made light and with it warmth and beauty (because you can’t see beauty in the dark). He took all the makings in his two palms – energy, gases, liquids and solids – and when he had finished, there was the world, spinning in and out of sunlight, with the moon to light the dark hours.

  He put fish in the seas and animals on land and, in the loveliest spot of all, he planted a
garden. Last of all, he made a gardener – made him out of clay – prettier than a sloth, not as marvellous as an angel; somewhere between the two. That was Adam: First Man.

  To keep Adam from being lonely, God took one of Adam’s ribs, and from it he made Eve – First Woman – smoother, softer, smaller. But in one special way, Adam and Eve were not like the other animals: when God breathed life into them, he passed on a little something of himself.

  “A family likeness, you mean. I get you. My mum says I look like my grandma,” said the boy. “But why the sun and moon? Why didn’t you carve Adam and Eve?”

  “I told you, boy. These are symbols. They represent the time when God began his great plan. As it happens, Adam and Eve almost ruined everything… But people who come into this church will look at this sun, this moon, and remember how God created the world.”

  “And now you are creating it all over again,” said the boy.

  The old man was so angry that his fist tightened around his chisel and he shook it. “Don’t talk wickedness, boy! I don’t liken myself to God! That’d be falling into the sin of pride, that would!”

  The boy looked startled. “Why? You said it yourself: there’s a likeness. A family likeness. It’s just that you’re using wood, not clay. Go on with the story.”

  “I’m not here to tell stories!” raged the old man. “I’m here to work – if I’m left in peace.”

  “Is that what Adam and Eve did? Stop God working? You said they nearly ruined everything. What did they do?”

  The old man felt cornered, as if a dog had pinned him against the wall of the great empty church. He looked towards the door for a mother or father who might come and call the boy off. No such luck.

  “There is everything here in Paradise Garden that you will ever need,” said God to Adam and Eve. “Food, shelter, birdsong. Me. Eat whatever you want – strawberries, mangoes, honey, anything. Just don’t eat from the tree in the middle of the garden – the tree of knowledge.”

  It was a test, you see; a test of their love for God.

  Suddenly, of course, there was nothing so interesting to Adam and Eve as that tree in the middle of the garden. Why was this one different from the rest? How? Time and again, Adam and Eve were drawn back to stare at the forbidden fruit of the tree of knowledge.

  “Eat,” said a voice to Eve. “Taste and then you will know. Why else is it called the tree of knowledge?” A beautiful creature with shimmering scales and a forked tongue crept out from among the roots. “Eat. Then you will know as much as God himself.”

  It was a test, you see, of whether they would put themselves or God first.

  With a delicious shudder of excitement, Eve picked a juicy piece of fruit and bit into it. Adam ate too. Bitter. No great wisdom descended on them. All they knew was that they should not have done it. They looked down, and their slender brown bodies looked nasty and rude.

  “Now look what you’ve done, woman! Cover yourself up!” snapped Adam.

  “You too! You too!” Eve complained.

  God knew at once, of course. They could hide among the bushes, stitch clothing out of leaves, but God knew. Suddenly the birds in Paradise Garden sang out of key.

  “Why did you disobey me?” God asked sadly. “Now you will have to go. The garden can no longer offer you a home. Don’t come back until you have found my forgiveness.”

  So Adam and Eve were driven out of the garden and began a long, hard journey that lasted all their lives and much, much longer. Their children and their children’s children went looking for the way back to Paradise Garden, but none of them could find it. They all disobeyed God, too – some in much worse ways than Adam and Eve’s. Much worse. God had a rescue plan, of course. One day he planned to send…”

  “So what happened to the garden?” the boy interrupted.

  The question took the old man by surprise. “God set an angel at the gate with a fiery sword – to keep out trespassers,” he added pointedly.

  “But what happened to the tree of knowledge? Did God chop it down?”

  This was insufferable. “I don’t know! Maybe. Why should he? It’s lost to us, at any rate. You and I will never see it.”

  The boy got up and came closer to examine the knobbly roots of the carved Jesse tree. “That’s why you are planting a new one.”

  The old carpenter grunted his disgust. “Haven’t you been listening to a word I said? I told you – this is a Jesse tree, not the tree of knowledge.”

  “It’s teaching me plenty,” said the boy.

  Then he was gone.

  A BOAT FULL OF ANIMALS

  “Get it out! Get it out!”

  Startled by the shout, the wet dog standing beside the boy began to bark. The noise rang round the church.

  “What are you thinking about, bringing an animal into the church!”

  “It’s raining,” said the boy. The dog shook itself and water drops spattered them both. “Don’t you like dogs?”

  “Isn’t it bad enough to have death-watch beetle eating away at the roof without having wet dogs, too?”

  “I like boats,” interrupted the boy.

  The carpenter scowled down at his latest carving. “It’s not a boat, you ignorant child. It’s an ark.”

  “It has no funnels. How did it go?”

  “It didn’t have to go. All it had to do was float.”

  The dog suddenly lay down, like a collapsing sandcastle, its eyes glistening and its ears cocked. Now two of them wanted a story!

  Too many boys making a nuisance of themselves. I expect that was half the trouble… As the world filled up with the sons and granddaughters and great-great-great-grandchildren of Adam and Eve, it got worse instead of better. In fact, God decided he had been wrong to create the human race at all. The earth crawled with wickedness – like when the flying ants swarm.

  Noah was different. A good man. He kept his tools clean, kept his conscience clear. God liked Noah.

  “Noah,” said God. “A flood is coming. It will wash away every living thing – wash the earth clean again. But you and your family are my friends: I wish you no harm. Do exactly as I say…”

  Now, this was a dry, hot part of the world, a long way from the sea. When Noah’s neighbours saw him building a ship, they sniggered and held out their palms and squinted at the sky. “What’s the ship for, Noah? Expecting rain? Tee-hee.”

  Noah’s ark was huge, with three decks and a roof over all.

  “Why so big, Noah? Expecting visitors?” snorted the neighbours, and scrawled on the hull with lumps of chalk.

  Then the animals started to come: lions and lynxes and leopards. The neighbours stayed away after that. There were warm-blooded and cold-skinned beasts, furry and feathered, smooth and scaly. There were crawlers and leapers, grazers and scavengers, wild and tame. There were creatures with names and ones so odd that only God knew what they were called. Inside the ark, they shifted, whined and gibbered. There were males and there were females: one of each. There were butterflies and even birds.

  “Why birds, God?” wondered Noah. “Surely birds can fly into the treetops when the flood comes.”

  But when the flood came, there were no treetops. Rain fell from the sky like a waterfall, uprooting trees and boulders and towns. Noah’s wife and family went aboard the ark and shut the doors. The darkness inside was warm with animals, sweet with animal breath. Things skittered unseen across the floor. Rain thudded on the roof.

  The neighbours beat on the hull. “Let us in, you – !”

  The rivers filled, burst, joined. The distant sea came ashore. The ark grated, rolled, pitched, spun, and was washed away like a coconut carried out to sea. Inside the ark, the animals blinked at Noah. The drumming of the rain wiped out every other sound.

  The tarry planks kept out the daylight. Aboard the ark, day and night were the same colour. The animals slept and woke. The smell was soon as thick as mud.

  Only after forty days and forty nights did the rain stop. But when Noah lifted off the
hatches, he saw only sun and sky and water. There were no treetops – not even any mountaintops. Litter floated by: a shoe, a basket, a wooden spoon.

  The wet ark steamed. The water dimpled. Bubbles rose. A fish jumped: the only sign of life. It was the beginning of the world again. Somewhere in the ark, a blackbird started to sing.

  Weeks passed. The ark stank. The elephants swayed listlessly from foot to foot. Now, surely, the flood must be drying up.

  “Fetch me a raven,” said Noah.

  The raven cruised out over the water, its reflection like a black fish. But it found nowhere to land.

  Next, Noah sent a dove. But after a while it returned; it had found the world still underwater. Seven days later, Noah sent the dove out again. When it came back, it held in its beak a tiny olive twig. Somewhere, an olive tree must be poking its branches through the shining water! Next time Noah loosed the dove, it did not come back at all.

  With a grinding shudder, the ark ran aground on a mountaintop. The animals growled and bellowed, squealed and chattered and spat. Noah’s daughter-in-law stroked her round stomach; her baby would after all be born on dry land. New life in a new world. The water and the sky and the breeze and the light whispered, “Never again!”

  Mud squelched under the hooves of a horse that picked its way across the sodden ground. “Now we must get things right,” said Noah, “or next time…”

  Suddenly, it was as if the sky remembered colour. A great triumphal arch of streaming colour bridged the sky from horizon to horizon. “Never again,” whispered God. “Never again will I drown the earth,” and he signed his promise with the world’s first rainbow.