As they sat talking the servant brought in a letter which, he said, has
just arrived from Galilee. The messenger rode the whole journey in two
days, Sir, and you'll have to do the same, Sir, and to start at once if
you would see your father alive. If I would see my father alive! if I
would see my father alive! Joseph repeated, and, seizing Nicodemus by
the hand, he bade him farewell.
Let an escort be called together at once, he cried, and an hour later he
was on the back of a speedy dromedary riding through the night, his mind
whirling with questions which he did not put to the messenger, knowing
he could not answer any of them. And they rode on through that night and
next day, stopping but once to rest themselves and their animals--six
hours' rest was all he allowed himself or them. Six hours' rest for
them, for him not an hour, so full was his mind with questions. He rode
on, drinking a little, but eating nothing, thinking how his father's
life might be saved, of that and nothing else. Were they feeding him
with milk every ten minutes?--he could not trust nurses, nobody but
himself. Were they shouting in his ear, keeping him awake, as it were,
stimulating his consciousness at wane?
Once, and only once, while attending on his father did Joseph remember
that if his father died he would be free to follow Jesus: a shameful
thought that he shook out of his mind quickly, praying the while upon
his knees by the bedside that he might not desire his father's death.
As the thought did not come again, he assumed that his prayer was
granted, and when he returned to Jerusalem a month later (the new year
springing up all about him), immersed in a sort of sad happiness,
thanking God, who had restored his father to health (Joseph had left Dan
looking as if he would live to a hundred), a strange new thought came
into his mind and took possession of it: the promise given his father
only bound him during his father's lifetime; at his father's death he
would be free to follow Jesus; but the dead hold us more tightly than
the living, and he feared that his life would be always in his father's
keeping.
He was about his father's business in the counting-house; his father
seemed to direct every transaction, and, ashamed of his weakness, he
refrained from giving an order till he heard, or thought he heard, his
father's voice speaking through him, and when he returned to his
dwelling-house, over against the desert, it often seemed to him that if
he were to raise his eyes from the ashes in which some olive roots were
burning he would see his father, and as plain as if he were before his
eyes in the flesh. But my father isn't dead, so what is the meaning of
this dreaming? he cried one evening; and, starting out of his chair, he
stood listening to the gusts whirling through the hills with so
melancholy a sound that Joseph could not dismiss the thought that the
moment was fateful. His father was dying ... something was befalling, or
it might be that Jesus was at the door asking for him. The door opened,
and he uttered a cry: what is it? Nicodemus, the servant answered, has
come to see you, Sir. And he waited for his order to bid the visitor to
enter or depart.
His master seemed unable to give either order, and stood at gaze till
the servant reminded him that Nicodemus was waiting in the hall; and
then, as if yielding to superior force, Joseph answered he was willing
to receive the visitor, regretting his decision almost at once, while
the servant descended the stairs, and vehemently on seeing Nicodemus,
who entered, the lamplight falling upon him, more brilliantly apparelled
than Joseph had ever seen him. A crimson mantle hung from his shoulders
and a white hand issuing from a purfled sleeve grasped a lance; weapons,
jewelled and engraved, appeared among the folds of his raiment, and he
strode about the room in silence, as if he thought it necessary to give
Joseph a few moments in which to consider his war gear (intended as an
elaborate piece of symbolism). In response to the riddle presented,
Joseph began to wonder if Nicodemus regarded himself rather as a riddle
than as a reality--a riddle that might be propounded again and again, or
if he could not do else than devise gaud and trappings to conceal his
inner emptiness, a dust-heap of which he himself was grown weary. A
great deal of dust-heap there certainly is, Joseph said to himself as
his eyes followed the strange figure prowling along and across the room,
breaking occasionally into speech. But he could not help thinking that
beneath the dust-heap there was something of worth, for when Nicodemus
spoke, he spoke well, and to speak well means to think well, and to
think well, Joseph was prone to conclude, means to act well, if not
always, at least sometimes. But could an apt phrase condone the
accoutrements? He had added a helmet to the rest of his war gear, and
the glint of the lamplight on the brass provoked Joseph to beg of him to
unarm and relate his story, that burdens you more than your armour, he
said. At these words Nicodemus was raised from the buffoon to a man of
sense and shrewdness. I have come here, he said, to speak to you about
Jesus. But the story is a somewhat perilous one, and as it rains no
longer I will walk with you along the hillside and tell it to you.
He raised his hand to Joseph, forbidding him to speak, and it was not
till they reached a lonely track that Nicodemus stopped suddenly: his
death had been resolved upon, he said, and the two men stood for a
moment looking into each other's eyes without speaking. It was Nicodemus
who fell to walking again and the relation of circumstances. He had come
straight from the Sanhedrin, where he defended Jesus against his enemies
and accusers at some personal risk, as he was quickly brought to see by
Raguel's retort: and art thou too a Galilean? And walking with his eyes
on the ground, as if communing with himself, Nicodemus related that
there was now but one opinion in the Sanhedrin: Jesus and Judaism were
incompatible; one or the other must go. Better that one man should
perish than that a nation should be destroyed, he said, are the words
one hears. Stopping again, he said, looking Joseph in the face: it is
believed that sufficient warrant for his death has been gotten, for he
said not many days ago he could destroy the Temple and build it again in
three days, which can be interpreted as speech against the law. Joseph
asked that a meaning should be put on the words, and Nicodemus answered
that Jesus spoke figuratively. To his mind the Temple stood for no more
than observances from which all spiritual significance had faded long
ago, and Jesus meant that he could and would replace dead formulæ by a
religion of heart: the true religion which has no need of priests or
sacrifices. We must persuade him to leave Jerusalem and return to
Galilee, Joseph cried, his voice trembling. By no means, by no means,
Nicodemus exclaimed, raising his voice and stamping his lance. He has
been called to the work and must drive the plough to the headland,
though death be waiting him there. But he can be saved, I think,
Nicodemus continued, his voice assuming a thoughtful tone, for though he
has spoken against the law the Jews may not put him to death: his death
can be obtained only by application to Pilate. Will Pilate grant it to
please the Jews? Joseph asked. The Romans are averse, Nicodemus
answered, from religious executions and will not comprehend the putting
to death of a man for saying he can destroy the Temple and build it
again in three days.
Nicodemus became prolix and tedious, repeating again and again that it
was the second part of the sentence that would save Jesus, for it was
obvious that though a man might destroy the Temple in three days (a
great fire would achieve the destruction in a few hours), he could not
build it again in three days. This second part of the sentence proved
beyond doubt that Jesus was speaking figuratively, and the Romans would
refuse to put a man to death because he was a poet and spoke in symbols
and allegories. The Romans were hard, but they were just; and he spoke
on Roman justice till they came round the hills shouldering over
against Bethany, and found themselves in the midst of a small group of
men taking shelter from the wind behind a large rock. Why, Master, it is
you. And Joseph recognised Peter's voice, and afterwards the voices of
James and John, who were with him, called to Matthew and Aristion, who
were at some little distance, sitting under another rock, and the five
apostles crowded round Joseph, bidding him welcome, Peter, James and
John demonstratively, and Aristion and Matthew, who knew Joseph but
little, giving him a more timid but hardly less friendly welcome. We did
not know why you had left us, they said. But it is pleasant to find you
in Jerusalem, for we are lonely here, Matthew said, and the
Hierosolymites mock at us for not speaking as they do. But you are with
us here, young Master, as you were in Galilee? John asked. We knew not
why you left us. But we did, John, Peter interposed, we knew well that
Jesus said to him, when he returned from his father's sick-bed, that
those who would follow him must leave father and mother, brother and
sister, wives and children to live and die by themselves, which is as we
have done. Yes, Sir, Peter continued, freeing himself from John and
turning to Joseph, we've left this world behind us, or if not this world
itself, the things of this world: our boats and nets, our wives and our
children. All that Jesus calls our ghostly life we have thrown into the
lake. My wife and children and mother-in-law are all there, and John and
James have left their mother, Salome. But, said James, the neighbours
will not be lacking to give her a bite if she wants something when she
is hungry. She'll be getting men to fish for her, for we've left her
our boats and nets. They've done this, Peter chimed in, and my wife and
children will have to be fishing for themselves; but we hope they'll
manage to get somehow a bite and a sup of something till the Kingdom
comes, which we hope will not be delayed much longer, for we like not
Jerusalem, and being mocked at in the Temple. But say ye, Master, that
we've done wrong in leaving our wives and children to fish for
themselves? It seemed hard at first, and you were weak, Master, and
stayed with your father; but after all he has money and could pay for
attendance, whereas our wives and little ones have none; ourselves will
be in straits to get our living if the Kingdom be delayed in its coming,
for what good are fishermen except along the sea coast or where there is
a lake or a river, and here there isn't enough water for a minnow to
swim in. Our wives and our children are better off than we are, for
they'll be getting someone to fish for them, and will stand at the doors
at Capernaum waiting for the boats to return, praying that the nets
weren't let down in vain; but we aren't as sure of the Kingdom as we
were of a great take of fishes in Galilee when the wind was favourable
to fishing. Not that we'd have you think our faith be failing us; we be
as firm as ever we were, as John and James will be telling you. And
Peter, interrupting them again, reminded Joseph that if they lacked
faith the promised Kingdom would not come.
It was Jesus' faith that upheld us, John said, pushing Peter aside, and
the promises he made us that we might hear the trumpets of the cherubims
and seraphims announcing the Kingdom at any moment of the day or night.
And making himself the spokesman of the five, John told Joseph and
Nicodemus that Jesus now looked upon the arrival of the Kingdom as a
very secondary matter, and his own death as one of much greater import.
He says that he'll have to give his blood to the earth and his flesh to
the birds of the air else none will believe his teaching. He says that
God demands a victim; and looks upon him as the victim; but if that be
so, the world will get his teaching and we shall get nothing, for we
know his teaching of old.
As Peter has told you, James interrupted, there be no water here, not a
spring nor a rivulet, nothing in which a fish could live; we're
fishermen stranded in a desert without boats or nets, which would be of
no use to us, nor am I gainsaying it; but if he gives himself as a
victim how shall we get back to Galilee? He now talks not of these
matters to us, but of his Father only, and of doing his Father's will.
He seems to have forgotten us, and everything else but his Father and
his Father's will, and we cannot make him understand when we try that we
shall want money, that money will be wanting to get us back to Galilee,
nor does he hear us when we say: our nets and our boats may have passed
into other hands. We know not what is come over him; he's a changed man;
a lamb as long as you're agreeing with him, but at a word of
contradiction he's all claws and teeth.
The walk is a long one, Matthew interjected, and the taxes will be
collected by the time we get back if the Kingdom don't come, and sore of
foot I'll be sitting in a desolate house without wife or children or
fire in the hearth. But we have faith, they all cried out together, and
having followed Jesus so far we'll follow him to the end. But we are
glad, Sirs, James said, that you've come, for you'll see Jesus and tell
him that we would like to have a word from him as to when we may expect
the Kingdom; and a word, too, as to what it will be like; whether
there'll be rivers and lakes well stocked with fish in it, and whether
our chairs shall be set; Peter on the Master's right hand to be sure, we
are all agreed as to that. But you remember, Master, our mother, Salome,
how she took Jesus aside and said that myself and John were to be on his
left with Andrew one below us? Peter began to raise his voice, and,
straightening his shoulders, he declared that his brother Andrew must
sit on Jesus' left. You remember, Master? I remember, Joseph
interrupted, that the Master answered you all saying that every chair
had been made and caned and cushioned before the world was. You can't
have forgotten, Peter, this saying: that every one would find a chair
according to his measure? Yes, Master, he did say something like that.
I'm far from saying we'd all sit equally easy in the same chairs, and if
the chairs were before the world was, all I can say is that there seems
to have been a lack of foresight, for how could God himself know what
our backsides would be like years upon years before they came into
being.
About that we will speak later; but now point out the house of Simon the
Leper to us where Jesus lodges, Joseph asked. You see yon house, James
replied, and they went forward together, meeting on the way thither
several apostles and many disciples; and these accompanied Joseph and
Nicodemus to the door, telling them the while that Jesus had driven them
out of the house. It is a main struggle that is going by in him, Philip
said, and so we left him, being afraid of his looks. Isn't that so,
Bartholomew? And they all acquiesced, and Bartholomew nodded, saying:
yes, we were afraid of his looks. It was then that Simon the Leper
opened the door, and Joseph, remembering his promise to his father, laid
his hand on Nicodemus' shoulder: I may not enter, he said. I have come
thus far but may not go into the house; but do you go in and tell him,
Nicodemus, that in spirit I am with him.
On these words Nicodemus passed into the house, leaving Joseph in the
centre of a small crowd of apostles, disciples and sympathisers in
several degrees, all eager to talk to him and to hear him say that they
had but to follow Jesus to Jerusalem and the Scribes and Pharisees would
give way before them at once. You that are of the Sanhedrin should know
if we are strong enough to cast them out of the Temple. But, my good
men, I know nothing of your plot to clear the Temple of its thieves,
Joseph answered, and there'll always be thieves in this world, wherever
you go. But the Day of Judgment is approaching. When may we expect his
second coming? somebody shouted from out of a group of men standing a
little way back from the others, and the cry was taken up. He is coming
with his Father in a chariot, one said. With our Father, somebody
interrupted, and an eddying current of theology spread through the
crowd. I've come from Galilee, from my father's sick-bed, and know
nothing of your numbers and have not seen him these many months, Joseph
said. He is the true Messiah, and we believe in him, was an unexpected
utterance; but Joseph was not given time to ponder on it, for a woman,
thrusting her way up to him, cried out in his face: he can destroy the
Temple and build it again in three days. And when Joseph asked her who
had said that, she told him that Jesus had said it. He turned to Peter,
John and James to ask them the meaning of these words. What did Jesus
mean when he said he could destroy the Temple and build it again in
three days? He means, said half-a-dozen voices, that the priests and the
Scribes are to be cast out, and a new Temple set up, for the pure
worship of the true God, who desires not the fat of rams. Joseph
understood that the rams destined for sacrifice were to be given to the
poor.
If you don't mind, will you be telling us why you refuse to go up with
Nicodemus to ask Jesus to delay no longer, but to lead us into
Jerusalem? he was asked, and perforce had to answer that Nicodemus
wished to talk privily to Jesus, at which they pressed round him, and
from every side the question was put to him: is he going to lead us into
Jerusalem? And then Joseph began to understand that these people would
find themselves on the morrow, or perhaps the next day, fighting with
the Roman legions, and, knowing how the fight would end, he answered
them that the Romans would be on the side of the priests and Scribes.
Whereupon they tore their garments and cast dust on their heads, and in
his attempt to pacify them he asked if it would not be better for Jesus
to go up to Galilee and wait till the priests were less prepared to
resist him. No, no, to Jerusalem, to Jerusalem, they cried on every
side, and voices were again raised, and the Galileans admitted that they
had come down from Galilee for this revolution, and had been insulted in
the Temple by the Scribes, and laughed at, and called "foolish
Galileans"; but they would show the Scribes what the Galileans could do.
Was it true that Jesus was the Messiah promised to the Jewish people by
the prophet Daniel?--and while Joseph was seeking an answer to this
question a woman cried: you're not worthy of a Messiah, for do you not
know that he is the one promised to us in Holy Writ? And do not his
miracles prove that he is the Messiah we have been waiting for? None but
the true Messiah could have rid my son of the demon that infested him
for two years; and with these words gaining the attention of the crowd
she related how the ghost of a man long dead had come into her boy when
he was but fourteen, bringing him to the verge of death in two years--a
pale, exhausted creature, having no will of his own nor strength for
anything. But how, asked Joseph, do you know that the demon was the
ghost of a man that had lived long ago? Because in life he had dearly
loved his wife, but had found her to be unfaithful to him and had died
of grief twenty years ago, and was captured then by the beauty of my
boy; and his grief entered into the boy and abode in him, and would have
destroyed him utterly if Jesus had not imposed his hands upon him and
put the vampire to flight. Whither I know not, but my boy is free. It is
as the woman says, a man cried out, for I've seen the boy, and he is
free now of the demon. My limb, too, is proof that Jesus is a prophet.
And the lion-hunter told how in a fight with a great beast his thigh had
been dislocated; and for seven years he had walked with a crutch, but
the moment Jesus imposed his hands upon him the use of his limb was
given back to him.
Another came forward and showed his arm, which for many a year had hung
lifeless, but as soon as Jesus took it in his hand the sinews reknit
themselves, and now it was stronger than the other. And then a woman
pressed through the crowd, and she wished everybody to know that a flux
of blood that had troubled her for seven years had been healed. But the
people were bored with accounts of miracles and were now anxious to hear
from Joseph if Jesus was going up to Jerusalem for the Feast of the
Passover. But, my friends, I have but just returned from Galilee, and
have come from there to learn these things. He is watching for a sign
from his Father in heaven, a woman cried, shaking her head. A man tried
to get some words privily with Joseph: will he speak against the taxes?
he asked, but before he could get any further Nicodemus appeared in the
doorway, and the people pressed round him, asking what Jesus had said to
him, and if he were coming down to speak to them. But before Nicodemus
could answer any of them the lion-hunter cried out that a priest was not
so terrible a beast as a lion, and while he was with them Jesus had
nothing to fear. At which his enemy in the crowd began to jeer, saying:
Asiel wears the lion's skin, we all know, but he has never told anybody
who killed the lion for him. And the men might have hit each other if
the woman who suffered for seven years had not cried out: now, what are
you fighting for? know ye not that Jesus cannot come down to us, for he
is waiting for a sign from his Father? From our Father, John thundered
out. Nicodemus said he had spoken truly, and the crowd followed
Nicodemus and Joseph a little way. Do not return to the house of Simon
the Leper. Leave Jesus in peace to-night to pray, meditate, and rest,
for he needs rest. He'll lead you to Jerusalem as soon as he gets a sign
from our Father which is in heaven, Nicodemus said.
At these words the people dispersed in great joy, and Joseph and
Nicodemus walked on together in silence, till Joseph, feeling that they
were safely out of hearing, asked if Jesus spoke of his intention to
take Jerusalem by assault. Nicodemus seemed to examine his memory for a
moment, and then, as if forgetting Joseph's question, he began to tell
that Jesus was standing in the middle of the room when he entered,
seemingly unaware that his disciples were assembled about the house. His
eyes fixed, as it were, on his thoughts or ideas, he did not hear the
door open, and to get his attention Nicodemus had to lay his hand upon
his arm. At his touch Jesus awoke from his dream, but it seemed quite a
little while before he could shake himself free from his dream, and was
again of this world. Joseph asked Nicodemus to repeat his first words.
Was he violent or affectionate? Affectionate, gentle, and winning,
Nicodemus answered. A few moments of sweetness, and then he seemed
suddenly to become old and wild and savage.
The two men stopped on the road, and Nicodemus looking into Joseph's
eyes, said: I asked him if he were going up to Jerusalem for the Feast
of the Passover, and after speaking a few words on the subject he broke
out, coiling himself like a diseased panther meditating on its spring,
and as if uncertain if he could accomplish it, he fell back into a chair
and into his dream, out of which he spoke a few words clear and
reasonable; and then with a concentrated hate he spoke of the Temple as
a resort of thieves and of the priests as the despoilers of widows and
orphans, saying that the law must be abrogated and the Temple destroyed.
Until then there would be no true religion in Judea. It is like that he
speaks now; the one-time reformer sees clearly that the Temple must go.
And would he, Joseph asked, build another in its place? I'm not sure
that he would. I put the question to him and he was uncertain if the old
foundations could be used. The old spirits of lust, and blood, and money
would haunt the walls, and as fast as we raised up a new Temple the
spirits would pull it down and rebuild it as it was before. We are
forbidden by the law of Moses to create any graven image of man, of bird
or beast. Would that Moses had added: build no walls, for as soon as
there are walls priests will enter in and set themselves upon thrones.
The priests have taken the place of God, and I have come, he said, to
cast them out of their thrones, and to cut the knot of the bondage of
the people of Israel. I come, he said, with a sword to cut that knot,
which hands have failed to loosen, and in my other hand there is a
torch, and with it I shall set fire to the thrones. All the world as ye
know it must be burnt up like stubble, for a new world to rise up in its
place. In the beginning I spoke sweet words of peace, and they were of
no avail to stay the sins that were committed in every house; so now I
speak no more sweet words to anybody, but words that shall divide father
from son, and mother from daughter, and wife from husband. There is no
other way to cure the evil. What say I, he cried, cure! There is none.
The evil must be cut down and thrown upon the fire, and whosoever would
be saved from the fire must follow me. The priests hate me and call me
arrogant, but if I seem arrogant to them it is because I speak the word
of God.
And then, seizing me by the shoulder, he said: look into my eyes and
see. They shall tell thee that those who would be saved from the fire
must follow me. I am the word, the truth, and the life. Follow me,
follow me, or else be for ever accursed and destroyed and burnt up like
weeds that the gardener throws into heaps and fires on an autumn
evening. Yes, he cried, we are nearing the springtime when life shall
begin again in the world. But I say to thee that this springtime shall
never come to pass. Never again shall the fig ripen on the wall and the
wheat be cut down in the fields. Before these things come to pass in
their natural course the Son of Man shall return in a chariot of fire to
make an end of things; or if thou wilt thou can say that he'll come not
to make an end but a new beginning, a world in which justice and peace
shall reign. And it is for this end I offer myself, a victim to appease
our Father in heaven. I'm the sacrifice and the communion, for it is no
longer the fat of rams that my Father desires, but my blood, only that;
only my blood will appease his wrath. As I have said, I am the
communion, and thou shalt eat my flesh and drink my blood, else perish
utterly, and go into eternal damnation. But I love thee and---- And
after a pause he said: those that love God are loved by me, and
willingly and gladly will I yield myself up as the last sacrifice.
Nicodemus stopped, for his memory died suddenly, and, unable to discover
anything in the blank, he turned to Joseph and said: he speaks with a
strange, bitter energy, like one that has lost control of his words; he
is hardly aware of them, nor does he retain any memory of them. They are
as the wind, rising we know not why, and going its way unbidden. I have
seen him like that in Galilee, Joseph answered. Ah! Nicodemus answered
suddenly, I remember, but cannot put words upon it. He said that before
the world was, he and his Father were one, and that his great love of
man induced him to separate himself----
At that moment a man came out from the shadow of a rock and approached
the wayfarers, who drew back quickly, thinking they were about to be
attacked. It is Judas, Joseph whispered, one of the apostles. You have
seen Jesus? Judas asked breathlessly, and when Nicodemus told how Jesus
had said he would go up to Jerusalem for the Passover he cried out: to
lead us against the Temple? He must be saved. From what? Nicodemus
asked: from his mission? He must go on to the end with the work he has
been called out of heaven to accomplish. I can see that you have been
speaking with him. Called out of heaven to accomplish! And then,
clasping his hands, Judas looked with imploring eyes upon them: save
him, he cried, save him, for if not, I must myself, for every day his
pride redoubles and now he believes himself to be the Messiah, the
Messiah as sent by God, Judas cried. By whom else could he be sent?
Joseph replied. If he be not taken by the priests and put to death he
will be driven by the demon into the last blasphemy; one which no Jew
has yet committed even in his heart, and if that word be spoken all will
be accomplished, and the Lord will choose another nation from among the
Gentiles. He will declare himself God, Judas continued. Nicodemus and
Joseph raised their hands. He speaks already of the time before the
world was, when he and his Father were one; and setting aside the
Scriptures in his madness he has begun to imagine that the angels that
revolted against God were changed into men, and given the world for
abode till their sins so angered the Father (remark you, of whom Jesus
was then a part) that he determined to destroy the world; at which Jesus
in his great love of men (or of fallen angels, for betimes he doesn't
know what he is saying) said he would put Godhead off and become man,
and give his life as atonement for the sins of men. Sirs, I'll ask you
how God or man may by his death make atonement for the sins that men
have committed? Hear me to the end, for as many minutes as you have
listened, I have listened hours. By this sacrifice of his life his
teaching will become known to men and he will reign the one and only
king till the world itself crumbles and perishes. Then he will become
one with his Father, and from that moment there will be but one God.
These are the thoughts, noble Sirs, on which he is brooding, and if he
go up to yon town it will be to---- Judas could not bring himself to
pronounce the words "declare himself God," so blasphemous did they seem
to him. And before the wayfarers could ask him, as they were minded to,
if he were sure that he had rightly understood Jesus, the apostle had
bidden them farewell, and, running up a by-track, disappeared into the
darkness, leaving behind him a memory of a large bony nose hanging over
a thin black moustache that barely covered his lips.
As they walked towards the city, over which the moon was hanging,
filling the valleys and hills with strange, fantastical shadows, they
remembered the black, shaggy eyebrows, the luminous eyes, and the
bitter, penetrating voice, and they remembered the gait, the long
striding legs as they hastened up the steep path; even the pinched back
often started up in their memory. And the next three or four days they
sought him in the crowds that assembled to make the triumphal entry
with Jesus into Jerusalem, but he was not to be seen; and if he had been
among the people they could not fail to have discovered him. He is not
here to welcome Jesus, Joseph muttered under his breath, and added: can
it be that he has deserted to the other side?
He is a sort of other Jesus, Nicodemus said. But yonder Jesus comes
riding on an ass, on which a crimson cloak has been laid. As Jesus
passed Nicodemus and Joseph he waved his hand, and there was a smile on
his lips and a light in his eye. He seems to have become suddenly young
again, Joseph said. He is exalted, Nicodemus added sadly, by his
following. And they counted about fifty men and women. Does he think
that with these he will drive the Pharisees and Sadducees out of the
Temple? he added. He is happy again, Joseph answered. See how he lifts
up the fringe of the mantle they have laid upon the ass, and admires it.
His face is happier than we have seen it for many a day. He likes the
people to salute him as the Son of David. Yet he knows, Nicodemus said,
that he is the son of Joseph the Carpenter. Ask him to beg the people
not to call him the Son of David, Joseph pleaded. And, running after the
ass, Nicodemus dared to say: ask the people not to call thee the Son of
David, for it will go against thee in the end. But Jesus' heart at that
moment was swollen with pride, and he answered Nicodemus: what thou
hearest to-day on earth was spoken in heaven before our Father bade the
stars give light. Be not afraid for my sake. Remember that whomsoever my
Father sends on earth to do his business, him will he watch over. He has
no eyes for me, Joseph said sadly, for I left him to attend my father in
sickness. And, taking Nicodemus' arm, he drew him close, that he might
more safely whisper that two men seemed to be searching in their
garments as if for daggers. Nicodemus knew them to be hirelings in the
pay of the priests. Look, he said, how their hands fidget for their
daggers; the opportunity seems favourable now to stab him; but no, the
crowd closes round his ass again, and the Zealots draw back. God saved
Daniel from the flames and the lions, Joseph answered. But will he,
Nicodemus returned, be able to save him from the priests?