The brethren waxed rich, and after their midday meal they talked of the
exceeding good fortune that had been vouchsafed to them, dwelling on the
matter so earnestly that a scruple sometimes rose up in their hearts.
Did we do well to forgo all troubles? Do the selfish find favour in
God's sight? they were asking, when Caleb said: we have visitors to-day,
and looking across the chasm they saw three men emerging from the shadow
of the high rock. They may be robbers, Benjamin cried, and we would do
well to tell the brethren working along the terraces to pass the word
down to him who stands by the bridge-head that he is to raise the bridge
and refuse to lower it till the strangers speak to him of their
intentions and convince him that they are peaceful. That is well said,
Benjamin, Eleazar replied: Amos, who is standing by the fig-tree yonder,
will pass on the word. They cried out to him and watched the warning
being passed from Essene to Essene till it reached the brother standing
by the bridge-head. He looked in the direction of the strangers coming
down the path, and then in haste set himself to pull the ropes and press
the levers whereby the bridge was raised and lowered. Now they are
speaking across the brook to each other, Benjamin said: and the group on
the balcony saw the bridge being let down for the strangers to cross
over. It seems to me, Benjamin continued, Bartholomew might have spent
more time inquiring out their intentions. But we are many and they are
few, Caleb answered, and the Essenes on the balcony watched somewhat
anxiously Bartholomew conducting the strangers back and forth through
the terraces. Is not Bartholomew as trustworthy as any amongst us?
Eleazar asked. It isn't likely that he would mistake robbers for
pilgrims; and as if Bartholomew divined the anxiety of those above him
he called up the rocks that the visitors he was bringing were Essenes
from the lake. Essenes from the lake! Caleb cried. Then we shall learn,
Eleazar replied, which is preferable, celibacy or marriage. But we
mustn't speak at once to them of such matters. We must prepare food for
them, which they will require after their long journey. Our president
will be with you in a moment, Bartholomew said, addressing Shallum, a
tall thin man, whose long neck, sloping shoulders and dark round eyes
reminded his brethren of an ungainly bird. His companions, Shaphan and
Eleakim, were of different appearances. Shaphan's skull, smooth and
glistening, rose, a great dome above a crumpled face; he moped like a
sick monkey, dashing tears from his eyes continually, whereas Eleakim, a
sprightly little fellow with half-closed eyes like a pig, agreed that
Shallum should speak for them. Shallum began: we are, as you have
already heard, from the great cenoby at the head of the lake and,
therefore, I need not tell you the reason why you are here and why the
residue are yonder, but will confine myself to the story of our flight
from the lake to the brook. Honourable President and Brethren, it is
known unto you that the division of our order was not brought about by
any other reason than a dispute on both sides for the maintenance of the
order. We know that, Hazael answered, and attribute no sinfulness to the
brethren that differed from us. Our dream, Shallum continued, was to
perpetuate holiness in this world, and our dream abides, for man is a
reality only in his dreams; his acts are but a grotesque of his dream.
At these words the Essenes gathered close together, and with brightening
eyes listened, for they interpreted these words to mean that the
brethren by the lake had fallen headlong into unseasonable pleasures,
whereof they were now reaping the fruit: no sweet one, if the fruit
might be judged by the countenances of their visitors. As I have said,
Shallum continued, it was with us as it has been with men always--our
acts became a mockery of our dreams almost from the beginning, for when
you left us we gave out that we were willing to receive women who would
share our lives and with us perpetuate holiness. We gave out that we
were willing to view all who came and consider their qualifications, and
to take them as wives if they should satisfy us, that they would obey
our rule and bear children; but the women that came in response to our
advertisement, though seemingly of pious and honourable demeanour, were
not satisfied with us. Our rule is, as you brethren know well, to wear
the same smock till it be in rags, and never to ask for a new pair of
sandals till the last pieces of the old pair have left our feet. We
presented, therefore, no fair show before the women who came to us, and
when our rule was told to them, they withdrew, dissatisfied with our
appearances, with the food we ate, and the hours we kept, and of all
with the rule that they should live apart from us, only keeping company
with us at such times when women are believed to be most fruitful. Such
was the first batch in brief; the second batch (they came in batches)
pleaded that they could not be wives for us, it being that we were held
in little esteem by the Sadducees and the Pharisees, and we were
reproved by them for not sending animals for sacrifice to the Temple, a
thing that we must do if we would have them live with us. But it being
against our rule to send animals to the Temple for sacrifice, we bade
them farewell and sent forth messengers into other lands, inviting the
Gentiles to come to us to receive instruction in the Jewish religion,
with promises to them that if our rule of life was agreeable to them,
and they were exact in the appointments of all rites and ceremonies, we
should be willing to marry them after their time of probationship was
over. On this second advertisement, women came to us from Arabia and
Mesopotamia, and though we did not approve of the fine garments they
wore and the sweet perfumes that trailed after them, we liked these
things, as all men do, with our senses; and our minds being filled with
thoughts of the children that would continue the order of the Essenes,
we spoke but little against the fine linen that these women brought and
the perfumes they exhaled, whereby our ruin was consummated. Joazabdus,
our president, himself fell into the temptation of woman's beauty and
was led into sinful acquiescence of a display of the images she had
brought with her; for without a display of them on either side of the
bridal bed she would not permit his embraces. She was of our religion in
all else, having abjured her gods and goddesses at every other moment of
the day and night; but licence of her body she could not grant except
under the eyes of Astarte, and Joazabdus, being a weak man, allowed the
images to remain. As soon as the news of these images spread, we went in
deputation to our president to beg him to cast out the images from our
midst, but he answered us: but one image remains--that of Astarte: none
looks upon it but she, and if I cast out the image that she reverences
she will go hence and with the fruit of my body within her body, and a
saint may be lost to us. But we answered him that even as Jacob set up
parti-coloured rods before the conceiving ewes that they might bear
parti-coloured lambs, so to gaze in the marriage-bed upon the image of
Astarte would surely stamp upon the children that might come the image
of that demon. But he was not to be moved, whereupon we withdrew, saying
to one another: we shall not move him out of his wickedness; and that
was why we went to his brother Daddeus and asked him to accept the
headship of the community in his brother's place. And seeing that he was
unwilling to set himself against his brother, we said: our God comes
before all things, and here we have heathen goddesses in our midst; and
the end of it was that Cozby, that was the Chaldean woman's name, put
poison into Daddeus' food, thinking to establish her rule thereby, but
as soon as the death of Daddeus became known many left the cenoby
polluted in their eyes by heathenism and murder.
So it always falls out, Hazael cried, wine and women have lost the world
many saints. Wine deceives the minds of those that drink it, and it
exalts men above themselves, and leads them into acts that in any other
moment they would shrink from, leaving them more stupid than the
animals. Nor is the temptation of women less violent than that of wine.
Women's beauty is even more potent, for once a man perceives it he
becomes as if blind to all other things; his reason deserts him, he
broods upon it by day, and falls at last, as our brother has told us,
into unseasonable pleasures, like Solomon himself, about whom many
things are related, but not so far as I know that he became so
intoxicated with women's various beauty that he found his pleasure at
last in his own humiliation. If Solomon did not, others have; for there
is a story of a king that allowed his love of a certain queen to take so
great a hold upon him that he asked her to come up the steps of his
throne to strike him on the face, to take his crown from his head and
set it upon her own. This was in his old age, and it is in old age that
men fall under the unreasonable sway of women--he was once a wise man,
so we should refrain from blame, and pity our brethren who have fallen
headlong into the sway of these Chaldean and Arabian women. I might say
much more on this subject, but words are useless, so deeply is the
passion for women ingrained in the human heart. Proceed, therefore,
Brother: we would hear the trouble that women have brought on thee,
Brother Eleakim. At once all eyes were turned towards the little fellow
whose wandering odours put into everybody's mind thoughts of the great
price he must have paid in bracelets and fine linen, but Eleakim told a
different story--that he was sought for himself alone, too much so, for
the Arabian woman that fell to his lot was not content with the chaste
and reasonable intercourse suitable for the begetting of children, the
reason for which they had met, but would practise with him heathen
rites, and of a kind so terrible that one night he fled to his president
to ask for counsel. But the president, who was absorbed in his own
pleasures, drove him from his door, saying that every man must settle
such questions with his wife. Hazael threw up his hands. Say no more,
Brother Eleakim, thou didst well to leave that cenoby. We welcome thee,
and having heard thee in brief we would now hear Brother Shaphan. At
once all eyes were turned towards the short, thick, silent man, who had
till now ventured into no words; and as they looked upon him their
thoughts dwelt on the strange choice the curator had made when he chose
Brother Shaphan for a husband; for though they were without knowledge of
women, their sense told them that Brother Shaphan would not be pleasing
to a woman. But Eleakim's story had prepared them for every strange
taste, and they waited eagerly for Shaphan. But Shaphan had not spoken
many words when tears began to roll down his cheeks, and the brethren of
the Brook Kerith bethought themselves that it might be a kindly act to
avert their eyes from him till he recovered his composure; but as his
grief continued they sought to comfort him, telling him that his
troubles were now ended. He would not, however, lift his face from his
hands at their entreaty, and his companions said that the intervals
between his tears since he was married were never long. At these words
Shaphan lifted his face from his hands and dashed some tears from his
eyelids. He will tell us now, the brethren said to themselves, but he
only uttered a few incoherent words, and his face sank back into his
hands.
And it was then that Jesus appeared at the end of the domed gallery.
Hazael signed to one of the brethren to bring a chair to him, and when
Jesus was seated Hazael told him who the strangers were in these words:
great trouble has fallen upon our order, he said, the wives the brethren
have taken unto themselves against my counsel have not obeyed their
husbands. Wilt tell our Brother Jesus the trouble that has befallen
those that stayed by the lake, Shallum? I will, Shallum replied, for it
will please him to hear my story and it will be a satisfaction to me to
tell the quarrels that set my wife and me apart till at last I was
forced to send her back to her own people. My story will be profitable
to you, though you are without wives, for to err is human. The brethren
were at once all ear for the new story, but Shallum was so prolix in his
telling of his misfortunes that the brethren begged him to tell them
again of the ranging of the gods and goddesses on either side of the
president's marriage-bed. He paid no heed to them, however, but
proceeded with his own story, and so slow was his procedure that Hazael
had to interrupt him again. Shallum, he said, it is clear to me that our
shepherd has come with some important tidings to me, and it will be
kind of thee to forgo the rest of thy story for the present at least,
till I have conferred with our shepherd. I should have been loath, Jesus
interposed, to interrupt a discourse which seems to be pleasing to you
all and which would be to me too if I had knowledge of the matters which
concern you, but the differences of men with their wives and wives with
their husbands are unknown to me, my life having been spent on the hills
with rams and ewes. As he said these words a smile came into his eyes.
The first smile I have seen on his face for many years, Hazael said to
himself, and Jesus continued: I have left my flock in charge of my
serving boy, for I have come to tell the president that he must not be
disappointed if many sheep are lost on the hills this year; robbers
having hidden themselves again in the caves and fortified themselves
among cliffs so difficult that to capture them soldiers must be let down
in chests and baskets--a perilous undertaking this is, for the robbers
are armed and determined upon revolt against Herod, who they say is not
a Jew, and holds his power in Judea from the Romans. They are robbers
inasmuch as they steal my sheep, but they are men who value their
country higher than their lives. This I know, for I have conferred with
them: and Jesus told the Essenes a story of an old man who lived in a
cave with his family of seven, all of whom besought him to allow them to
surrender to the Romans. Cowards, he said, under his breath, and made
pact with them that they should come out of the cave one by one, which
they did, and as they came he slew them and threw their bodies into the
precipice, sons and daughters, and then he slew his wife, and after
reproaching Herod with the meanness of his family, although he was then
a king, he threw himself from the cliff's edge.
It is a great story that thou tellest, Jesus, Manahem said, and it is
well to hear that there are great souls still amongst us, as in the days
of the Maccabees. However this may be, Saddoc interposed, these men in
their strife against the Romans must look to our flocks for food. Three
sheep were taken from me last night, Jesus answered, and the rest will
go one by one, two by two, three by three, unless the revolt be quelled.
And if the revolt be not quelled, Saddoc continued, the robbers will
need all we have gotten, which is little; they may even need our cave
here, and unless we join them they will cast us over the precipices. It
was to ask: are we to take up arms against these robbers that I came
hither, Jesus said. You will confer amongst yourselves, brethren, Hazael
said, and will forgive me if I withdraw: Jesus would like to speak with
me privately.
The Essenes bowed, and Hazael walked up the domed gallery with Jesus,
and as soon as they disappeared at the other end Shallum began: your
shepherd tells you the truth; the hills are once more infested with the
remains of Theudas' army. But who may Theudas be? one of the brethren
asked. So you have not heard, Shallum cried, of Theudas, and you living
here within a few miles of the track he followed with his army down to
Jordan. Little news reaches us here, Saddoc said, and he asked Shallum
to tell of Theudas, and Shallum related how Theudas had gathered a great
following together in Jerusalem and provoked a great uprising of the
people whom he called to follow him through the gates of the city, which
they did, and over the hills as far as Jordan. The current of the river,
he said, will stop, and the water rise up in a great wall as soon as I
impose my hands. We have no knowledge if the waters would have obeyed
his bidding, for before the waters had time to divide a Roman soldier
struck off the prophet's head and carried it to Jerusalem on a spear,
where the sight of it was well received by the priests, for Theudas
preached against the Temple, against the law, and the traditions as John
and his disciples had done beforetimes. A great number, he continued,
were slain by the Roman soldiers, and the rest dispersed, having hidden
themselves in the caves, and become robbers and rebels. Nor was Theudas
the last, he began again, there was another, an Egyptian, a prophet or a
sorcerer of great repute, at whose bidding the people assembled when he
announced that the walls of the city would fall as soon as he lifted up
his hands. They must follow him through the breach into the desert to
meet the day of judgment by the Dead Sea. And what befell this last
prophet? Saddoc asked. He was pursued by the Roman soldiers, Eleakim
cried, starting out of a sudden reverie. And was he taken prisoner?
Manahem asked. No, for he threw a rope into the air and climbed out of
sight, Eleakim answered. He must have been a great prophet or an angel
more like, for a prophet could not climb up a rope thrown into the air,
Caleb said. No, a prophet could not do that. But it is easier, Shaphan
snorted, to climb up a rope thrown into the air than to return to a
wife, if the flesh be always unwilling. At the words all eyes were
turned to Shaphan, who seemed to have recovered his composure. It is a
woeful thing to be wedded, he cried. But why didst thou accept a wife?
Manahem asked. Why were ye not guided by our counsels? We hoped, Shaphan
said, to bring saints into the world and we know not yet that robbers
may not be the fruit of our wives' wombs. But if the flesh was always
unwilling, Manahem answered, thou hast naught to fear. It would be
better, Shallum interrupted, to turn us adrift on the hills than that we
should return to the lake where all is disorder now. Ye are not many
here, Eleakim said, to defend yourselves against robbers, and we have
hands that can draw swords. Our president alone can say if ye may
remain, Manahem said; he is in the gallery now and coming towards us.
Our former brethren, Hazael, have renounced their wives, Manahem began,
and would return to us and help to defend our cave. You come submissive
to our wisdom? Hazael asked. The three strangers replied that they did
so, and Hazael stood, his eyes fixed on the three strangers. We will
defend you against robbers if these would seek to dispossess you of your
cave, Eleakim cried. We have but two cells vacant, Hazael said. It
matters not to us where we sleep if we sleep alone; and the president
smiling at Shaphan's earnestness said: but three more mouths to feed
will be a strain upon our stores of grain. Even though there be three
more mouths to feed, Shallum answered, there will be six more hands to
build a wall against the robbers. To build a wall against robbers?
Hazael said. It is a long while we have been dreaming of that wall; and
now it seems the time has come to hold a council. We have been speaking
of a wall to protect us against robbers ever since we came here, Manahem
cried, and Saddoc answered: we have delayed too long, we must build: the
younger brethren will reap the benefit of our toil.
We all seem to be in favour of the wall, Hazael said. Are there no
dissentients? None. For the next year or more we shall be builders
rather than interpreters of the Scriptures. Mathias will come to the
wall to discourse to us, Caleb interjected, and Saddoc answered him:
whatsoever may befall us, we are certain of one thing, we shall always
be listening to Mathias. But Mathias is a man of great learning, Caleb
replied. Of Greek learning may be, Saddoc answered. But even that is not
sure, some years ago---- But if Greek wisdom be of no value why is it
taught here? Caleb interrupted, and the old Essene answered: that Greek
wisdom was not taught in the Brook Kerith, but Greek reasoning was
applied to the interpretation of Scripture. But there will be no
occasion for Mathias' teaching for some years. Years, sayest thou,
Saddoc? Amos interjected. I spoke plainly, did I not? Saddoc answered.
If it will take us years to build the wall, Amos said, we may as well
save ourselves the trouble of becoming builders, for the robbers will be
upon us before it is high enough to keep them out; we shall lose our
lives before a half-finished wall, and methinks I might as well have
been left to my flock on the hills. Thou speakest truly, Saddoc replied,
for I doubt if thou wilt prove a better builder than thou wast a
shepherd. If my sheep were poor, thy interpretations of the Scriptures
are poorer still, Amos said, and the twain fell to quarrelling apart,
while the brethren took counsel together. If this mischief did not
befall them, and a wall twenty feet high and many feet in thickness were
raised, would they be able to store enough food in the cave to bear a
three-months' siege? And would they be able to continue the cultivation
of their figs along the terrace if robbers were at the gates? But a
siege, Manahem answered these disputants, cannot well be, for the
shepherds on the hills would carry the news of the siege to Jericho,
whence troops would be sent to our help, and at their approach the
robbers would flee into the hills. What we have to fear is not a siege,
but a sudden assault; and from a successful assault a wall will save us.
That is true, Saddoc said. And to defend the wall we must possess
ourselves of weapons, Caleb, Benjamin and Eleakim cried; and Shallum
told them that a certain hard wood, of which there was an abundance in
Jericho, could be shaped into cutlasses whereby a man's head might be
struck off at a blow.
At these words the brethren took heart, and Hazael selected Shallum for
messenger to go to Jericho for the wood, and a few days afterwards the
Essenes were busy carving cutlasses for their defence, and designing a
great wall with towers, whilst others were among the cliffs hurling down
great masses of stone out of which a wall would soon begin to rise.
And every day, an hour after sunrise, the Essenes were quarrying stone
and building their wall, and though they had designed it on a great
scale, it rose so fast that in two months they were bragging that it
would protect them against the great robber, Saulous, a pillager of many
caravans, of whom Jesus had much to say when he came down from the
hills. The wall will save you, Jesus said, from him. But who will save
my flock from Saulous, who is besieged in a cave, and comes forth at
night to seek for food for himself and his followers? But if the cave is
besieged? Caleb said, laying down his trowel. The cave has two
entrances, Jesus answered, and he told them that his belief now was that
what remained of the flock should be sent to Jerusalem for sale. The
rams, of course, should be kept, and a few of the best ewes for a flock
to be raised in happier times. These were his words one sad evening, and
they were so convincing that the builders laid down their trowels and
repaired to the vaulted gallery to sit in council. But while they sat
thinking how they might send representatives to the procurator the
robbers were preparing their own doom by seizing a caravan of more than
fifty camels laden with wheat for Jerusalem. A very welcome booty no
doubt it was considered by the robbers, but booty--was not their only
object? They hoped, as the procurator knew well, to bring about an
uprising against Roman rule by means of bread riots, and this last raid
provided him with a reason for a grand punitive expedition. Many troops
of soldiers were sent out with orders to bring all that could be taken
alive into Jerusalem for crucifixion, no mean punishment when carried
out as the procurator meditated it. He saw it in his thoughts reaching
from Jerusalem to Jericho, and a death penalty for all. Pilate's methods
of smoking the robbers out of their caves has not proved a sufficient
deterrent, he said to himself, and a smile came into his face and he
rubbed his hands when the news of the first captures was brought to him,
and every day small batches were announced. We shall wait, he said,
until we have fifty-three, the exact number of camels that were stolen,
and then the populace shall come out with me to view them. The spectacle
will perhaps quench the desire of robbery in everybody who is disposed
to look upon it as an easy way of gaining a livelihood. And the renown
of this crucifixion will spread through Judea. For three days at least
malefactors will be seen dying at distances of half-a-mile, and lest
their sufferings should inspire an attempt at rescue, a decree shall be
placed over every cross that any attempt at rescue will be punishable by
crucifixion, and to make certain that there shall be no tampering with
Roman justice, the soldiers on guard shall be given extra crosses to be
used if a comrade should cut down a robber or give him drugs to mitigate
his agony. And all this was done as had been commanded. The robbers were
exposed at once on the road from Jerusalem, and it was on the first day
of the great crucifixion that Jesus, coming round the shoulder of the
hill with his flock, was brought to a sudden stop before a group of
three.
These, about six or seven hours, a Roman soldier said, in answer to
Jesus' question as to the length of time they had been on their crosses,
not more than six hours, the soldier repeated, and he turned to his
comrade for confirmation of his words. Put a lance into my side, a
robber cried out, and God will reward thee in heaven. Thou hast not
ceased to groan since the first hour. But put a lance into my side, the
robber cried again. I dare not, the soldier answered. Thou'lt hang
easier to-morrow. But all night I shall suffer; put a lance into my
side, for my heart is like a fire within me. And do the same for me,
cried the robbers hanging on either side. All night long, cried the
first robber, the pain and the ache and the torment will last; if not a
lance, give me wine to drink, some strong, heady wine that will dull the
pain. Thy brethren bear the cross better than thou. Take courage and
bear thy pain. I was not a robber because I wished it, my house was set
on fire as many another to obtain recruits. Yon shepherd is no better
than I. Why am I on the cross and not he? His turn may come, who knows,
though he stands so happy among his sheep. To-night he will sleep in a
cool cavern, but I shall linger in pain. Give me drink and I will tell
thee where the money we have robbed is hidden. The money may not be in
the cave, and if it be we might not be able to find it, the soldier
answered; and the crucified cried down to him that he could make plain
the spot. The soldier was not, however, to be bribed, and they told the
crucified that the procurator was coming out to visit the crosses on the
morrow, and would be disappointed if he found dead men upon them instead
of dying men. Shepherd, the soldiers will not help us, canst thou not
help us? Happy shepherd, that will sleep to-night amongst thy sheep.
Come by night and give us poison when these soldiers are asleep. We
will reward thee. Lift not thy hand against Roman justice, the soldier
said to Jesus, lest thou takest his place on the cross. Such are our
orders.
Jesus hurried away through the hills, pursued by memories of the
crucified robbers, and he went on and on, with the intent of escaping
from their cries and faces, till, unable to walk farther, he stopped,
and, looking round, saw the tired sheep, their eyes mutely asking him
why he had come so far, passing by so much good herbage without halting.
Poor sheep, he said, I had forgotten you, but there is yet an hour of
light before folding-time. Go, seek the herbage among the rocks. My
dogs, too, are tired, he added, and want water, and when he had given
them some to drink he sat down, hoping that the crucified might not
return to his eyes and ears. But he need not have hoped: he was too
tired to think of what he had seen and heard, and sat in peace watching
the sunset till, as in a vision, a man in a garden, in an agony of
doubt, appeared to him. He was betrayed by a disciple and taken before
the priests and afterwards before Pilate, who ordered him to be scourged
and crucified, and beneath his cross the multitude passed, wagging their
heads, inviting him to descend if he could detach himself from the
nails. A veil fell and when it was lifted Joseph was bending over him,
and soon after was carrying him to his house. The people of that time
rose up before him: Esora, Matred, and the camel-driver, the scent of
whose sheepskin had led him back to his sheep, and he had given himself
to their service with profit to himself, for it had kept his thoughts
from straying backwards or forwards, fixing them in the present. He had
lived in the ever-fleeting present for many years--how many? The
question awoke him from his reverie, and he sat wondering how it was he
could think so quietly of things that he had put out of his mind
instinctively, till he seemed to himself to be a man detached as much
from hope as from regret. It was through such strict rule that I managed
to live through the years behind me, he said; I felt that I must never
look back, but in a moment of great physical fatigue the past returned,
and it lies before me now, the sting taken out of it, like the evening
sky in tranquil waters. Even the memory that I once believed myself to
be the Messiah promised to the Jews ceases to hurt; what we deem
mistakes are part and parcel of some great design. Nothing befalls but
by the will of God. My mistakes! why do I speak of them as mistakes, for
like all else they were from the beginning of time, and still are and
will be till the end of time, in the mind of God. His thoughts continued
to unroll, it was not long before he felt himself thinking that the
world was right to defend itself against those that would repudiate it.
For the world, he said to himself, cannot be else than the world, a
truth that was hidden from me in those early days. The world does not
belong to us, but to God. It was he that made it, and it is for him to
unmake it when he chooses and to remake us if he chooses. Meanwhile we
should do well to accept his decrees and to talk no more of destroying
the Temple and building it up again in three days. Nor should we trouble
ourselves to reprove the keepers of the Temple for having made
themselves a God according to their own image and likeness, with
passions like a man and angers like a man, thereby falling into
idolatry, for what else is our God but an Assyrian king who sits on a
throne and metes out punishments and rewards? It may be that the priests
will some day come into the knowledge that all things are equal in God's
sight, and that he is not to be won by sacrifices, observances or
prayers, that he has no need of these things, not even of our love, or
it may be that they will remain priests. But though God desires neither
sacrifices, observances, nor even love, it cannot be that we are wholly
divorced from God. It may be that we are united to him by the daily
tasks which he has set us to perform.
Jesus was moved to put his pipes to his lips, and the sheep returned to
him and followed him into the cavern in which they were to sleep that
night.