“What?” said Jesus. “What is your question, sirs?”
Andrew heard an iron severity in Jesus’ voice. The master was glaring at these scribes as if they were jackals in a corner.
“I’ll tell you your question,” Jesus declared. “You’re wondering which is the easier to say and the harder to prove: whether I say, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or else, ‘Rise and walk.’ Well, sirs, in order to show you that the Son of man truly has power to forgive sins, I will do the lesser thing with visible proofs. Watch! Listen!”
Jesus knelt down and in a tempered voice said, “Rise, lad. Gimel, get up and fold your bedding and go home.”
The body of the young man relaxed. For a moment he lay flat on his bed, then he rolled over, stretched with a trembling luxury, and stood up.
Immediately his four friends clattered down from the roof.
Andrew was glad for them. But he had seen how bitterly the scribes had received Jesus’ rebuke. For them there had been no goodness in the healing of a paralyzed man.
From his vantage on the rooftop, Andrew watched as Gimel now broke through the crowds and ran to his friends, waving his arms in limber joy. He watched, too, the small knot of sullen men who also were moving away from the people, their heads bent in a dark dialogue together.
V
THE NEXT DAY AT NOON Jesus was walking down the main thoroughfare of Capernaum. Shops and booths lined both sides of the street, various foods for sale and dry goods, craftsmen offering skills, coppersmiths, barbers, butchers, oil merchants, tailors, potters.
In the midst of the marketplace a tax officer sat behind his table, collecting from the other businesses taxes required by Herod Antipas.
This is where Jesus stopped, at the tollbooth.
He gazed at the tax collector, a dour man of grey complexion, a bony nose, and sunken eyes. When the collector noticed the gaze and looked back, Jesus said, “Your name is Matthew?”
“Yes,” said the collector.
Jesus said, “Follow me.”
Immediately, Matthew the tax collector stood up and left his business and followed Jesus.
Because of their royal patrons, tax officers took generous portions of the revenue for themselves. They were not much loved by the population. In fact, Matthew seemed to have lived a spare existence despite his generous income. But on this particular night he loosened his purse and spread a rich feast in honor of Jesus of Nazareth.
Not only did Jesus come, grateful for the good food; not only did his disciples come, Andrew, Simon, John, and James; but many of Matthew’s acquaintances came as well, other tax collectors, people who ignored the laws of Moses, and some who lived in an obvious immorality. They all reclined at the same table. They all joined in noisy conversation.
And news flew through the city that Jesus had been seen entering this place of questionable reputation.
When he and his disciples bade the rest of the company good night and left Matthew’s house, they noticed in the shadows a group of scribes who had gathered to confirm what they had heard.
“What rabbi eats with tax collectors and sinners?”
Jesus paused and said, “Those who are healthy need no physician. Those who are sick do. Write this down somewhere, you righteous scribes; memorize it; sing it as a song:
I am not come to call the righteous;
But sinners to repentance.”
Jesus continued walking down the dark street of the city. In a moment he spoke again, this time to his disciples alone.
“Unto you it is given to know the secrets of the kingdom of heaven,” he said. “But to those who are outside, I will always speak in parables so that seeing they may not see, and hearing they may not understand.”
Andrew gasped and stopped walking. “Ah, Jesus!” he wailed.
“Andrew? What’s the matter?”
“Then I am outside the kingdom. You just said that I’m outside the kingdom of heaven!”
Jesus also stopped. “How did I say such a thing?”
“Because I don’t understand,” Andrew wailed. This was a genuine anguish. Andrew was overcome with loneliness and very close to tears. “When we were in the rowboat you told the people a parable about a farmer sowing seeds. I heard it. Jesus, I truly heard it, but I don’t understand it.”
“Simon,” Jesus said, “do you?”
“I remember it,” the big man answered. “Hard ground, rocky ground, thorny ground, I remember it.”
“But you don’t understand it.”
“No.”
“John? James? Don’t any of you know this parable? Ah, how shall you know all the parables?”
Jesus began to walk again. The disciples had no choice but to follow. There was a breeze blowing in the direction of the lake and drawing the cold with it. The men wrapped their robes tightly about themselves.
Jesus said, “The sower sows the word. His seeds are the word of God broadcast over all the people. Those who are like the beaten path receive the word with their hearing only. Soon Satan comes and snatches it away from them. Those who are like the thin soil over rock—they receive the word with joy and quickly shoot up in the sunlight. But they have no root. So when tribulations and temptations come, they are scorched in the heat of that light. They wither and die. Those who are like soil among thorns—they hear the word. It roots in their hearts. But as they go on their way they are choked with the cares of the world, with riches and pleasures and lusts, so they bear no fruit in the end. But those who are like the good ground—Andrew, they receive the word in an honest and good heart; they hold it fast; they live in patience; and they bring forth some thirtyfold, some sixtyfold, and some a hundredfold.” Jesus stopped in the road. “Andrew,” he said, “do you understand the story now?”
“Yes,” said Andrew, very softly. “Thank you.”
Jesus said to them all, “The kingdom of heaven is like a treasure hidden in a field. When someone happens to find it, he covers it up again and in sheer joy goes and sells all his worldly possessions, then he returns and buys the entire field.”
Jesus said, “Or, the kingdom of heaven is like this: a merchant spends his whole life searching for fine pearls; yet when he finds a pearl of perfect purity, he sells all that he has and buys that single jewel and counts himself perfectly content.
“Tell me, Simon,” Jesus said, “have you understood all this? James, John, have you?”
“Yes,” they said.
“Good,” he said. “Go home. Go home, now, and sleep. You are mine. You needn’t worry. I want to go up into the mountains to pray. Good night.”
VI
IN THE MORNING Jesus’ disciples discovered that he had not returned all night long. He was not in Simon’s house.
They went out and looked for him, but found him nowhere in the city.
As they moved from building to building and street to street, their numbers began to swell. Gimel went with them.
Gimel bounded ahead of them like a gazelle in a grassy field. When his four friends saw Andrew, they immediately attached themselves to the group as well. Shobal was there, grinning with wet lips. Matthew came. And Philip, who had grown up in the same city as Simon and Andrew. There were Zealots and Pharisees and Essenes. There were those who had been followers of John the Baptizer. Men and women, both rich and poor, citizens of cities large and small. Two women of some rank and substance walked side by side: Joanna, whose husband was a steward of Herod Antipas, and Susanna. Their clothing was cool and dyed light purple. Another woman followed, a pale young woman who had lived in Magdala until Jesus quietly and privately had cast seven devils out of her. Her name was Mary. She also walked with the multitude into the countryside to find him whom she called Rabboni, My Teacher.
Simon preceded them all with a robust stride. He seemed to have made up his mind.
“Remember what Jesus said last night?” he asked Andrew, who was keeping pace with him, but dolefully. Andrew lacked his brother’s vigor. His narrow forehead was written with worry.
Andrew murmured, “He said that we are his.”
“No, no! He said he was going up into the mountains. Don’t you remember that? I do! Going into the mountains to pray. We’ll find him.”
So there was a destination. Simon led the great crowd north and west into the hills, five and ten miles throughout the morning, higher and higher as they went.
To Andrew, the hill country seemed mazy and unforthcoming. It did not reveal secrets. People could wander among the caves, cliffs, ravines, the dead-stone heights, and never be seen again.
But Simon had the innocence of sunny bluster. Andrew followed his brother simply because of that grand self-assurance, and in the end he wondered whether Simon had been following the Spirit of God after all, but unaware.
Because it happened that the people following Simon lifted their eyes all at once—exactly as if they were of one mind and one body—and spied a solitary figure standing on rock above them: a man whose long hair blew eastward, snapping like a black flag in the noonday wind, whose white tunic outlined an efficient frame, whose eye even at this distance acknowledged them and seemed to know their names.
Jesus.
He stepped backward and vanished.
Pell-mell the people rushed up to the rocks where he’d been standing and found on the other side a small valley, a high mountain valley. Its floor was grassy, scattered with tiny lilies, gentian, wintergreen, and white limestone; its walls were rounded like a cup and rimmed with choppy rock; its far side formed a concave slope of stone, a natural canopy.
It was under that canopy that the people saw Jesus. He was seated like a candle on a sconce-like shelf of limestone. He said, “Peace be with you.” He said it in his natural voice, yet the people were astonished by the nearness of his word. Sound in this valley was an intimacy, a murmuring into personal ears.
“Peace be with you,” Jesus said, and the people began to settle themselves on tussocks of grass, on the rising sides of the valley—near to Jesus and far from him: they filled the little amphitheater with color and life.
Jesus allowed his gold-bright eyes to linger here and there among the people, plucking forth individuals, Philip, Matthew, Shobal, Mary from Magdala, Gimel, Andrew, Simon.
An eagle wheeled the blue air above him. Sparrows flitted among the shrubs.
Jesus spoke.
“Blessed are the poor in spirit,” he said, “for theirs is the kingdom of God.”
Andrew bowed his head to listen. Why had he worried? How could Jesus ever have gotten lost in the mountains—he whose confidence knew this world in all its particularity, both its visible form and its invisible spirit. Andrew felt ashamed of himself and also much relieved. It was his blessing, to be humble.
Jesus said, “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.
“Blessed are the meek! They shall inherit the earth.
“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness. They shall be filled.”
Andrew thought of John the Baptizer, his first master and his friend. Could he be filled in the Machaerus dungeon?
Jesus said, “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy.
“Blessed are the pure in heart. They shall see God.
“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God.”
Jesus paused a moment, then added an urgency to his tone: “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven—”
Ah, then John can be filled, thought Andrew. For the Machaerus prison is his righteousness!
“—and blessed are you,” Jesus was saying, “when others abuse you and persecute you and utter every manner of evil against you falsely, on my account! Rejoice then, and be glad, because your reward is great in heaven. Oh, my children, you are joining a sacred company, for it is in exactly this way that people persecuted the prophets before you.”
Jesus fell silent and swept his gaze over the great variety of disciples seated everywhere in the valley. Andrew felt a sudden start of recognition: Jesus’ eyes! They were the color of a golden wheat field, ready for the harvest. They had the same soft rolling motion as a wheat field bowing beneath the breezes, and the texture was forbearing.
To those gathered before him, Jesus said, “You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt has lost its savor, with what can it be salted again? It’s no longer good for anything except to be cast on pathways to kill the soil and be ground underfoot.
“You,” he said, “are the light of the world. But who would light a lamp and put it under a bushel? It must be set on a stand, giving light to the whole house. Let your light so shine that everyone may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven.
“Now, you must never think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets. Children, I have come to fulfill them!
“You have heard that it was said to our ancestors, You shall not kill; whoever kills shall be liable to judgment. But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother shall be liable to judgment. Yes, and whoever insults his sister shall be liable to the council. And whoever says, ‘you fool!’ shall be liable to the pits of fire.
“You have heard that it was said, You shall not commit adultery. But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart.
“Again, you have heard that it was said, An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. But I say to you, do not resist one who is evil. If anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also. If anyone sues you for your coat, let him have your robe as well. If anyone forces you to go one mile, go with him two. Give to him who begs from you, and do not refuse him who would borrow.
“You have heard it said, You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy. But I say to you, love your enemies. Pray for those who persecute you, and you will be children of your heavenly Father—because God makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good; he sends rain upon the just and the unjust alike. You must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”
Jesus lowered his face and looked down into his hands. Yet his voice was audible from the lowest to the highest rocks of the valley. “When you pray,” he said, “do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do. They think they will be heard for their many words. Your Father knows what you need even before you ask.
“When you pray,” he said, “pray like this:
Our Father in heaven,
Hallowed be your name.
Your kingdom come,
Your will be done
on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us today our daily bread,
And forgive us our sins
as we forgive those who sin against us.
Save us from the time of trial,
And deliver us from evil.”
Jesus raised his face again. “People,” he called, “do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust can consume it, where thieves break in and steal. But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven! Neither moths nor rust nor thieves are there—and where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.
“I beg you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or drink, or what you will wear. Look there! Look at the birds of the air. They don’t sow or reap, yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Aren’t you of more value than a thousand birds? Which of you by taking thought can add one day to your span of life? And why do you worry about your clothing? Consider the lilies around you now, how they grow. They don’t toil or spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. If God so clothes the grass of the field which today is and tomorrow is cast in the oven, won’t he clothe you so much more, O people of little faith?
“Therefore, don’t be anxious anymore. But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things shall be yours as well.”
Jesus stood up.
A stiffer wind had begun to
blow. Small clouds scudded the sky.
Jesus’ black hair rose and fell like loose soil.
“Judge not,” he called, “that you be not judged!
“Why do you notice the speck in your brother’s eye and miss the log in your own? That’s hypocrisy. First take out your log, and then you can see clearly to pluck the speck from your brother!
“Ask, and it will be given you! Seek, and you will find! Knock, and it will be opened unto you! Or which of you, when your children ask for a loaf, would give them a stone instead? If you who are by nature evil give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good things to those who ask?
“Whatever you wish that others would do to you, do the same to them!
“O my children, enter by the narrow gate. For the gate which leads to destruction is wide and easy. But the one which leads to life is narrow and hard.
“Everyone who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock. The rains fell, the floods came, the winds blew and beat upon the house, but it did not fall because it was founded on rock!
“Everyone who hears these words and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on sand. The rains fell, the floods came, the winds blew and beat upon that house, and it fell, and great was the fall of it!”
Abruptly, Jesus turned and stepped through a cleft in the valley wall and was gone. No one tried to follow him—not even Simon. Jesus’ departure had a certain finality about it: he had separated himself. Simon quietly began to return the way that he had come. So did the rest of the people.
Andrew no longer worried about Jesus. Perhaps because his own shy spirit suffered in the blunt, boisterous, self-confident public, he seemed to understand his master’s withdrawals. The most significant decisions must be made in private. The hardest knots must be loosed in solitary prayer.
The Book of God: The Bible as a Novel Page 60
