Thou hast given me a voice;
I continually bless Thy name.
I seem to hear John’s commanding voice, his loving benediction as I
left his prison:
The Lord bless thee and keep thee,
the Lord make His face to shine upon thee
and be gracious unto thee...
Ephraim
Nisan 14
I am staying at a beautiful old stone house in nearby Ephraim. I have
allowed myself a respite, among pomegranate, olives, roses. Herons
fly at dawn and evening. Children run in and out. A boy with shaggy
head has a pet dove. A girl with almond eyes is learning to weave. My
disciples are here, the new and the old. We have met in a low room,
plain and bearded men, clothes new and disheveled; Ezra shows me his
injured leg; Luke works over it; Lamech (a strong youth) is from
Casarea, an expert swimmer, he said.
“I will walk to Jerusalem tomorrow. I’ll remain there. The high
priests will accost me. They may mock and scourge me, as they have
many others...but I will return.” I tried to speak calmly. I could
not be forthright...
Calling me “Rabboni,” a pretty girl knelt in the jammed room and
anointed me with fragrant oil. It was a moment of calm, a moment of
beauty.
Nisan 15
Holy Week has begun.
I walk accompanied by my disciples.
As we pass a tall wooden cross I remembered that the Romans have
crucified as many as two thousand men at one time because of
religious dedication. Almost every single one of us has witnessed a
crucifixion.
Hail Caesar!
Ours was a solemn path on a clear morning, larks singing, the air
brisk.
Carrying fronds, waving, hoping to speak to us, hundreds filled the
paths and streets, wanting the miracle of love and life.
Our path crooked upward to the “House of the Figs,” where I was given
a donkey, a tall, white one. Children shouted joyously. For me, he
was my donkey of peace. I waved as I rode along. Some women cut
branches and tossed them in front of me. Others threw flowers and
shouted “Hosanna.”
Jerusalem spread around me, blocks of stone, yellow walls, piles of
ancient masonry, new porticos, towers, shops... It was my city, my
hated city; I esteemed the meaning it has for my forefathers, men who
slept in the valley, with peaked cypresses above their graves.
Dust fanned over us as we followed a narrow way. Romans turned on me
and turned on the crowd but I warned them to desist.
At the temple I found more money changers. The courtyard was
cattleyard; waiting rooms were storerooms. Animals bellowed. I struck
again at the vendors, toppling tables, hurling money trays. The crowd
screamed, cheered. In the midst of this bedlam strangers, travelers,
stopped Philip and Andrew. They insisted upon being presented to me.
The four men offered me sanctuary in the kingdom of Edessa.
Priests, soldiers, young and old crammed around me as I explained the
life eternal, the image of redemption, eternal salvation and the
price we must pay.
God is our Father...the world of nature proclaims His goodness...men
must share His divine harmony...you reach God from within...reborn,
you recognize the light.
Children sang.
My love went to them.
Astride my donkey I preached to them in simple words.
As the sun slipped behind the city towers there were scores listening
and we lingered on the terrace:
“There is light for you for a little while longer...walk while there
is light... darkness will come...he who walks in darkness cannot tell
where he is going... believe in the light...”
The evening air was becoming chilly; a wind was blowing in from the
desert.
With my twelve I walked through the Golden Gate, passing great herds
of sheep and goats, grey pastoral sheep and black mountain goats. I
was proud of my men, proud of their courage and love, proud of their
humility.
Jerusalem
Nisan 29
We met in an upper room—a white-walled room. Centering it was a long
table and we sat around it, sharing bread and wine...below us roses
were in flower.
God was with me as I told them, my legatees, that I must die.
“Tonight you are entrusted with the keys of the kingdom. Two at a
time you are to go about the world, preaching the gospel. Faith is
our church.”
I loved each man. Such faces! Bartholomew, Matthew, Luke, James,
Simon, Peter, Thaddeus, Judas, John, Phillip. I gazed at one and then
the other, fisherman, cobbler, farmer, physician, lawyer...brothers.
“Your task is to save mankind!”
The lamps on our table shaped shadows on the walls, on the floor, far
more than shadows. The white walls enshrined each of us. When the
wind puffed our lamps blinked. Ours was an aura that may never recur.
“Soon my enemies will crucify me...one of you will betray me...”
What consternation! What hysterical exclamations! What accusations!
Then the pleas began: you must escape! Let us help you! We can!
Listen...flee...tonight.
“Faith is the miracle for everyone,” I said. “Heal the sick. Remember
Cana... Galilee...Lazarus...the lepers on the roadway...”
I reminded them that we are samaritans. Mercy is ours, ours to give.
We are to help the heavy laden. Love our children. We are to teach by
example.
Israel, I told myself, you are to nurture goodwill, tolerance, peace,
hope.
So it was in that white room, at that hour.
Clibus’
By the light of candles I write, to shepherd words, to commune once
more. There is little time for writing, little time for thinking. I
feel that I must endure. By the flickering lights I commune with
Father, Mother, earth.
I would like to go on healing the sick, alleviating pain, the body’s
pain, the soul’s. To be a good shepherd, yes. Will my disciples
persevere?
I can write no more tonight.
Peter’s
Iyyar 2
O
h, Jerusalem, you killer of prophets, stoner of those sent to help
you! How I have wanted to care for your children as a hen cares for
her chicks under her wings. You would not have me!
Plotters have attempted to trap me. A group cornered me near the
temple. Is it lawful to pay tribute to Caesar? they asked. I asked
for a coin. I called their attention to the face on the coin, the
face of Caesar Augustus.
“Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s and unto God the
things that are God’s.”
Not to be defeated, men queried me, as I sat in the court of the
temple, old, old questions. It seemed to me they were stunned when I
reminded them that God is not the god of the dead but of the living.
Other interrogators appeared at noon. A huge grey-bearded priest
demanded:
“Master, which is the greatest commandment of the law?”
I deliberated, wanting to impose on his arrogance.
“You shall love the Lord will all your heart and with your soul and
with your mind...this is the first and greatest commandment,” I said.
“The second commandment is similar,” I pointed out. “You shall love
your neighbor as yourself.”
By now I was angry and left these idlers and when I was alone with my
disciples I shamed the trouble-makers who clean the outside of the
cup and leave the inside dirty... I called them a generation of
vipers...they are the ones who will persecute the faithful from town
to town...crucify them...
Grief overcame me. I could talk no longer.
Disgusted with the day, Matthew asked if the world would come to an
end soon. That question had to be left unanswered. Inventors of
questions are everywhere. I wanted to add, watch, be on guard, pray
ceaselessly, work... Don’t be careless while your master is away. You
can’t tell when he may return.
Mother came to visit me, she arrived in the night, afraid. Rumors had
reached her that I was ill. She was ill. It is a long, long walk,
from Nazareth. Peter gave us melon and though it was long past
midnight we sat at a little table under the stars and ate.
It is impossible to go on writing.
I see what is to take place. I am frightened. I must wait until I
have risen from the dead to continue writing. I have spoken to
Matthew. I will entrust my journal to him.
Judas, in a drunken rage, has gone to the authorities and has
promised to deliver me to them for a sum. He ridiculed me when I
refused to ask God’s protection.
Here are my final thoughts:
I beg You, dear Lord, hear me. Be attentive to my last supplications.
I wait, my soul waits. My soul waits for You more than any who wait
for the morning. I say, more than those who watch for the morning.
Peter’s
Iyyar 10
I am alive.
A tremor roused me and I slowly unwound my grave clothes, noticing
how beautiful they were. I looked at my left hand. I looked at my
right hand. They had healed. The stone that blocked my crypt had been
rolled aside. It was dawn when I went out. Outside I found a
discarded robe.
The sky was grey but sun slanted across spring hills. I walked toward
the sun on a path that led away from the tombs. Perhaps no one can
grasp my bewilderment and my happiness. I tasted the air. My brain
rushed about, rebounded from a bush, crashed against rocks. Light was
splintering around me; inside that light was the realization that my
suffering is over. I need not die. Life was living in me like a seed,
but a perpetual seed.
Following a path across flowering fields I picked flowers; then,
across the field, I saw Mary Magdalene. She was sobbing, crying. I
called her and she ran to me, saying “Rabboni” over and over.
“Dearest...”
Mary and Martha appeared. The women surrounded me, laughing, touching
me, kissing my robe, my hands. Later in the day we set out for
Nazareth, for my home, Mother and Father. Halfway Mother met us and
threw her arms around me—no words were necessary.
That evening, as we ate together, Mother described Father’s
imprisonment. He had sold the gifts of the Magi to obtain bribe
money: he planned to bribe the soldiers to free me. The merchant who
bought the gifts summoned officials. By lying he got Father jailed
for theft.
It required four days to free him, our Nazarene priests testifying...
Liberated from death I see life as a singular continuity, a
continuity embodying my imperfections, many hopes. I find a new calm
in all that I experience: as I project into tomorrow I sense this
serenity. Simplicity itself wears an aura of riches.
Tonight, living in this composure, I write freely. Time, as a force,
has dropped away. Pressures are comprehensible such as the stress at
our last supper, the betrayal of Judas. Though I held my emotions in
check I felt confused by many doubts: above all I felt that my
ministry would fail. Ah, that white room, those shadows, our courage
as we sipped salt water in memory of the Egyptian exodus. Those faces
as we sang. Now those memories are glassed inside a mirror,
unblemished. And I may open that mirror and experience a memory or I
may close the surface.
I stand alone. It is a beautiful feeling. I stand here without past
and without future. I am a naked man, a man of the wilderness. This
is the miracle of self. The mind owns itself. It does not ask.
Acceptance blocks out intrusion. Each of us should experience the
wilderness of mind.
Iyyar 18
This is how it was:
As I knelt in the garden I thought of John and his prison bars, for
around me were bars of shrubbery, blacker than any I had seen.
Immobile bars.
Death was in the bars and in the air around me, imagined but none the
less real, as real as death had been in the street that day men
wanted to stone the woman taken in adultery. This was my death—I
listened for approaching soldiers, for the voice of Judas.
“If it is possible,” I prayed, “let this cup pass from me quickly.”
I heard the brook below: it had a place to go. I had this, this
waiting, this expectancy, my disciples asleep on the ground.
Death...death is the ransom for man’s sin, I reminded myself.
Cries of sentinels rang out.
Judas knew that I was here, that I had come here to pray; presently I
heard the unmistakable clank of side arms and men’s voices, foreign
speech. I could wait no longer. I stood up and waited for Judas to
identify me.
Stumbling over shrubbery, Judas called.
I answered.
“Who are you looking for?” I asked a soldier carrying a torch.
“Jesus of Nazareth,” he said.
“I am Jesus.”
Lanterns and torches appeared. Peter saw and heard the soldiers and
snatching a sword from one of the guards he slashed a man’s ear. I
rebuked him and cared for the guard, an Arabian named Malchus, who
was singularly afraid of me, afraid of the garden, his task.
“We shouldn’t have come...you were praying...this is the garden where
you come to pray,” Malchus said.
“Is Judas with you?” I asked.
“He has gone... I’m captain here...you must come with us. We have
been commanded to take you to the high priest, Ananias.”
“You take me with swords and shields—like a thief. I taught in the
temple... I prayed daily for you...”
Malchus, his face in torchlight, mumbled in Arabian and turned away.
“Leave him alone...get out of here,” Peter shouted; I saw the guards
struggle with him.
Malchus led me along the narrow streets, dark. People lay asleep in
corners and doorways. Donkeys were hobbled together. We walked over
piles of garbage. As we filed toward the house of Ananias wind smoked
our torches. At the door of the house we were kept waiting. Two of my
guards fell asleep.
Amid bickering I was led into a small room and left there; then, late
in the morning, I was brought before Caiaphas, before scribes and
elders, in an open courtyard. There I heard someone say that it is
expedient for us that he die for his people.
Caiaphas asked me about my teachings and I responded:
“I have spoken openly. I have taught in the synagogues of Nazareth
and Cana and Capernaum and in this city... I have said nothing in
secret. Ask those who have heard me what I have said.” I spoke
tersely because I realized this was a false trial.
One of the scribes struck me across my face and hurled me to the
floor.
Witnesses were brought—citizens. One testified that I had vowed to
destroy the temple within three days and rebuild it without hands.
Other witnesses disagreed. A woman said I faked miracles. A man
testified I had threatened to depose the governor. Others disagreed.
“Are you Christ...are you the man the people call Christ?” Caiaphas
asked.
“I am.”
A priest gestured; he seemed to tear his robe. Caiaphas smiled.
“You have heard this blasphemy,” he said. “We need no more witnesses.
I condemn this man to death.” I knew nothing more could be said in my
defense.
As I sit at my table, underneath the trees, at Peter’s home, I write
as if I were writing about someone else, a friend perhaps. I write
without prejudice. I am shaken by man’s corruption and yet my lack of
faith in man does not influence my writing.
I was left in the hands of guards and palace servants and then I was
led into a room where my hands were roped behind me. I was thrown on
the floor and beaten and kicked and spat on. Men placed me in a chair
and covered my eyes and asked me to guess who struck me, everyone
laughing.
I fell asleep on the floor and was wakened for a trial before
priests, elders, scribes, in a marble-floored room, Roman insignia on
the wall, the room icy, airless, officers and soldiers at one end,
one of them in battle gear—to impress me, I thought. But I was
scarcely able to stand, scarcely able to think. My hands on the back
of a chair, I put my mind to work: I singled out my home, its doors,
its windows, the grass growing in the street. I forced myself to
visualize my mother and father. Though I was in pain I remembered my
little friend, Amos: we were kneeling in the dust before my house,
playing marbles: dust flipped as we shot.
I was asked if I was the son of God.
The trial was not a trial. There were no witnesses.
Temple officials conferred.
Roman authority was not involved.
A judge or priest condemned me to death.
Such authority had been denied forty years ago by the Romans. Being
aware of this added to my resentment; I tried to speak out but was
silenced. From the courtyard I was marched to the paved square called
Babbatha; troops lined the square, spectators gathered. The sun’s
warmth lessened my pain. One of the guards, secretly, gave me bread.
I saw Judas with Pontius Pilate; Pilate was accompanied by
councilors, guards. I felt I had been hurled into a wholly alien
world—enemy world.
Pilate, stepping forward in his robe, asked Caiaphas the nature of my
crime. I will remember that scarlet robe.
Caiaphas, annoyed, said:
“If he were not a malefactor we would not bring him before you.”
Pilate understood the evasion. He responded:
“Take him, judge him according to your law.”
A priest declared:
“We found this man saying he was Christ the King.”
Perhaps Pilate was remembering his troubled past, the servitude of
his ancestors, some problem, for he hesitated, suspecting a ruse,
that the priests were deceiving him. He must have known that I had
not preached revolt.
“Are you king of the Jews?” he asked, motioning me to come closer.
“Your people have brought you here. What have you done?”
“My kingdom is not of this world.”
“Are you a king?”
“I was born to bear witness to the truth.”
Pilate shrugged.
“What is truth?” He resumed his seat.
I did not respond.
“What is truth?” he repeated. He waited a little while and then said,
looking at me closely: “I find no fault in this man.”
Spectators and priests protested. Someone shouted:
“He stirs up the people from here to Galilee. He’s a troublemaker. He
drove us out of our temple market.”
At that moment Pilate may have become aware of my accent or
remembered I was born in Nazareth for he ordered me brought to trial
before Herod, the local governor. Herod, I thought, the name stunning
me as I recalled his crime.
We crossed a bridge, a hostile crowd following; young Herod welcomed
me because he had heard of my miracles and wanted me to perform for
his benefit. Was I wizard, necromancer, fakir?
I could not speak to this murderer: I envisioned John in prison,
waiting, waiting for the liberty that never came. I saw his
decapitated head on a tray, displayed for a dancing girl.
Because I could not speak Herod had his men throw a purple robe over
my shoulders and place me on a chair. They mocked me, spat on me, and
demanded I save myself.
Herod refused to try me and ordered guards to return me to Pontius
Pilate. It was then, as we recrossed the bridge where the populace
jeered, it was then I attempted to think of home. Something like an
actual wall blocked me. All the emptiness of life, the savageness of
the wilderness, the enmity of mankind, came into being. I prayed but
prayer was useless. A man held my arm or I would have fallen: his
sword hit my side.
Peter’s
Iyyar 25
Pilate resented a jeering mob and tried to establish order.
He commanded men to assume positions in the Babbatha yard. Calling
several priests, he said, shouting at them:
“You have brought this man before me. You say he perverts the people.
I find no fault in him. I will punish him and release him.”
He sat on his tribunal chair, his wife beside him. Raising his hand
he resumed:
“I will free a man. Who will it be? Barabbas? Do you want Barabbas
free or Christ? Choose your man.”
“Barabbas...Barabbas,” the priests shouted, and the crowd repeated
his name, a man known for his crimes.
“What shall I do with Jesus?”
“Crucify him...crucify him.”
“What has he done?”
The crowd answered: “Crucify him.”
Shall I continue this journal? Will others accept my account? Shall I
simply destroy these words? As days pass I am able to re-live the
sadness. There is a chance to diminish man’s cruelty. I take that
chance. We are here in this world to make life worthy. We are here to
teach others. Teaching is no easier than learning. No one has ever
had my vantage point: this permits me to continue.
I searched for a friendly face among the
mob...Peter...Mother...Matthew... Clibus...
Barabbas was brought before the judges and liberated with jeers and
laughter. He passed by me, a great, tall man. As he walked away I was
led to a whipping post, bound, and lashed with thongs; I was lashed
until unconscious. Courage, where was my courage to bear the cru-
cifixion.
I tried to think...
In a barren hall soldiers stripped me and put a filthy robe around me
and forced a crown of thorns on my head. Six or eight men confronted
me. They mocked me.
“Hail, king of the Jews,” they hollered.
Priests appeared and cried: “Crucify him...he calls himself the Son
of God. Kill him.” Pilate appeared and asked: “Who are you?” I could
not speak because of pain.
“Speak to me...don’t you realize I have the power to set you free.”
I was thinking of Judas.
A Roman officer spoke out: “He’s an enemy of Rome...he defies
Caesar.” “Our emperor is Caesar,” a priest shouted.
“Take him away,” Pilate said. “He is yours.” He took water and washed
his hands before the crowd. “I am innocent of the blood of this man,”
he said.
Again I looked for my disciples but now a centurion in cuirass and
armed soldiers, carrying shields, grabbed me and forced me outside.
“To the cross,” someone said. “To the cross,” another repeated.
I was amazed to find myself walking. It isn’t far, it isn’t far, I
told myself.
We descended a stepped path. The bridge lay ahead. People jammed the
bridge. We climbed a steep bank, passed houses, trees, rocks. The
centurion ordered me to carry the crossbeam. As he compelled me to
take the beam he gave me water.
It was nearly noon.
I shouldered the beam, fell, tried again. The officer ordered an
onlooker to carry the beam. I heard a priest shout: “If any man
wishes to prove the innocence of Jesus, let him speak.” His voice,
his robe, the beam, the crowd... I can’t remember. Yet I remember men
selling dates, hawking fruit. I wanted the food of earth, life
itself.
My mother broke through the crowd and embraced me. A little farther
on I heard Lazarus call. I saw Martha. She was kneeling, reaching
toward me. Peter, Luke, Clibus, Mark. I saw. I loved them, their
faces like old graven coins.
I saw them all the way to the spot where they laid the cross on the
ground. I prayed for courage, strength to endure, as they stripped
off my clothes.
Then men pounded a nail through my hand and I was blinded, torn with
pain. Then I felt greater pain as they pounded a nail through my legs
and then I felt no more pain until I hung on the cross.
I looked and looked but could make out nothing; then I saw two men
hanging on crosses beside me. I looked at them and they looked at me.
I saw people below me; I heard women and children crying. I tried to
speak to them. But as I hung there everything began to move away from
me: a great distance swam around me. I thought of a mirage. Someone
put a sponge to my mouth. Then I saw my mother, I saw Martha,
Lazarus, people I had cured. A soldier shoved his spear into me. I
tried to say something... That is all that I remember.
Joseph of Arimathea obtained permission to remove my body from the
cross. He and my disciples placed it in his family crypt. He provided
a robe and cloth to cover my face. I lay in his tomb, myrrh and aloe
about me; there I lay for three days.
Peter’s Home
Sivan 2
P
eter is a descendant of a nomadic tribe. Euodia, his mother, is a
gnarled woman, dark, serious. She and Peter built this house after
her husband died. She had had enough of desert privation. Last night
she spread a special table for my homecoming: pomegranate juice,
melon, cheese, bread, nuts, chromis and another fish, clarias, my
favorite. Euodia is an expert with olive oil—perhaps some are nomad
recipes. At supper time she accepted me easily; Matthew and Peter
were wary, afraid, shy.
While we were eating, Peter said:
“Master, how can it be you were crucified eight days ago... Can you
say that you are well?” He brushed his hand over his yellow beard. “I
couldn’t forget the terror...will you help us understand? When all of
us meet will you explain? Is it faith?...”
We were eating at a makeshift table under Peter’s olives; it was well
after sunset and we felt the quiet of the extensive fields that make
Peter’s home a retreat.
Matthew, picking at his supper, nervous, kept watching my hands—I
knew he was studying the scars.
“I hope you never return to Jerusalem,” he exclaimed.
I agreed: I agreed for several reasons: one reason was my desire to
send my disciples to remote places, villages, towns.
“Our work is to be carried out among our countrymen while governments
interfere.”
“We love you...we had nothing to do with the crucifixion,” Euodia
blurted out.