at once to this lady.... Now, Rachel, you ought to go home at once.
Though you are not unaccustomed to such work as this, I can see that you
are tired and worn. If you were of the fainting sort I should hold out
my arms to catch you from falling—your cheeks are so white and your eyes
so——”
She would have fallen had she not hastily staggered toward him and caught
his arm.
“Yes, grandfather, I think I had better go home as soon as possible,” she
said in a low and trembling voice. “The closeness of the room till you
came, together with the anxiety and excitement, has been too much for me.
But the open air will set me right.”
“Ought not the lady to have a sedan?” inquired Aleph. “I saw a stand at
the last corner as we came.”
“Certainly,” said Seti: “and where are the two servants, Rachel, who came
with you?”
“Are they not at the door? I left them there, to be within call.”
“I did not notice them when we came. Did you?”—turning to Aleph.
Aleph shook his head. “Allow me to go for a sedan,” said he, “and we will
see the lady safely home.”
“Thank you—that will do.”
Aleph hastened away. During his absence, which was short, Rachel
reclined; and on his return with a chair and two stout porters he found
her much revived and quite disposed to dismiss the vehicle as being
unnecessary. But this Seti would not permit. And she speedily found that
he was right; for, on trying to walk to the door, she found it necessary
to accept support from both men. But the open air of the street seemed to
recall her strength at once, and she entered the sedan without help.
Seti walked before the vehicle to guide. Aleph walked behind—every now
and then quieting the motion of the bearers by a word, and once or twice
venturing to draw aside the curtain and inquire in a grave, sympathetic
way how the lady was enduring the jolting. The answer was satisfactory
and cordial: and when the house of Alexander was reached she professed to
feel as well and strong as ever, and proved it by darting up the steps
without aid. Turning, as the door opened, she threw down thanks and adieu
with the gesture of a goddess and disappeared.
“There goes the Gem of Alexandria,” murmured Seti to himself.
Aleph said nothing, but he thought that, whatever the gem, it was a
wonderfully fine casket that contained it. He was sure that he had
never seen a finer. And those _eyes_! As he turned away the twin stars
again ventured to show themselves above his horizon in all their dewy
splendors. But what had he to do with a maiden’s starry eyes? Just
nothing at all. So back they timidly sank to the horizon’s edge; but
refused to go farther. They must wait till they had burned a path through.
That evening at the khan Cimon and Aleph compared experiences. Cimon had
revived his acquaintance with the city, but had not found any of his
old acquaintances. Thirty years and more had dismissed all of them to
new homes or to the Necropolis. No directory made it possible for him
to be sure but that, somewhere in the great city, some one whom he had
known as a young man was still living with whitening locks; but no doubt
nearly all of his generation were dead. That was the way of things in
Alexandria: as it is everywhere else. Cimon was sad that night. O Time,
thou mighty thief, when will Government apprehend thee and bring thee
to justice! Or, better still, when will it take thy scythe from thee,
and put thee into some Reformatory to learn giving instead of stealing,
addition instead of subtraction, flowing instead of ebbing, the art
of ever setting poor men forward from strength to strength instead of
backward from weakness to weakness! Well, that is what will be done some
day—for some. For whom?
IV.
THE SYNAGOGUE.
Καὶ ἀρίστους δὲ καὶ θεοφιλεστάτους.
—XENOPHON, _Memorab._ iii. 9.
_That the best men are most observant of Divine worship._
1. Is it a recognition?
2. Diapleuston the magnificent.
3. Has the Messiah come?
4. Procul este profani.
IV.
THE SYNAGOGUE.
If the reader is curious to know how the two friends passed the long
Sabbath morning, before it was time to go to the synagogue, I can inform
him. They prayed apart, they prayed together; they produced a copy of the
Septuagint and read what the prophets had written about the Messiah. They
found many mysteries, and much material for conversation, until the dial
in the centre of the court told them that it was time to be moving.
On their way up Emporium Street they kept to the right side for two
reasons—because the right was first reached, and because on that side the
current of people was in their own direction. And a strong current it
was. Men, women, and children, with Jewish faces and apparently dressed
in their best, in great numbers were leisurely moving northward. Aleph
was tall enough to look over the heads of most of the people before him
and noticed in the distance the living stream turning into a building. It
occurred to him that this building was probably the synagogue of Malus,
of which the Alabarch had spoken. He was confirmed in this idea by the
light behavior of most about him. The principle of reverence was neither
in their feet nor in their faces. And as to their tongues—these seemed
to have the freedom of all the days of the week. They were talking
shop, talking ships, talking fashions, talking gossip—talking everything
but politics and religion. These last topics they prudently left to the
Romans and “whom it might concern.”
When they came to the synagogue they saw that it was large; though by no
means as large and imposing as the Diapleuston. They lingered a little
among the many standing on the street in order to get a better view. Just
then came up a group of persons more richly dressed than the rest, and
for whom the rest made way with special deference as they mounted the
steps. One of these, whose dress was particularly showy, turned when he
had reached the last platform, and looked down among the people as if
seeking some one. His eye rested on Aleph. Both Cimon and Aleph noticed
an involuntary start. It could hardly have been greater if the man had
received an unexpected blow.
He was a man of middle stature, somewhat past middle life, and more
than middlingly obese. His face was a curiosity. It was as round as
a full moon, and as pocked: but the great peculiarity of it was its
characterless or wooden expression. It neither laughed nor cried, it
neither promised nor threatened, it was neither happy nor miserable, it
was neither saint nor sinner. Yet one hesitates a little over this last
statement. There was a certain thin, very thin, something about the face
that asked to be considered religious. But to the eyes of our friends
it seemed sanctimoniousness instead of sanctity, a gauze white veil
which, however well worn, is no part of the person and can be put off at
pleasure. Perhaps they were mistaken. Sudden judgments sometimes shoot
wide of the mark. And it was but a moment they had in which to study his
face before he disappeared within the synagogue.
Cimon turned to a by-stander, and asked: “The ruler of the synagogue?”
The man bowed assent.
“I wonder,” said Cimon, musingly, as they passed on, “whether Malus
recognized your father in you. You resemble him strongly—as he was,
thirty years ago.”
As they came up to the Diapleuston there burst from the summit of the
side tower a chorus of trumpets—rich, soft, yet far-sounding. Looking up
they saw seventy men standing behind a circular balustrade and chanting
through silver trumpets toward all points of the compass.
“How amiable are thy tabernacles, O Lord of Hosts,” went sounding broadly
forth over the city.
They were met just within the doors by Alexander himself—to whom Aleph
presented his “preceptor and friend” Cimon. The Alabarch received them
with great courtesy, and thanked the young man for the service rendered
to his daughter the day before; and when Aleph expressed the hope that
she had quite recovered from her indisposition, he said:
“Quite so, she tells me; and so I have brought her with me to give thanks
for the good news this morning received that her nurse continues to mend.”
And he led the way toward a distant canopy not far from the centre,
near which his daughter was sitting. She was simply dressed and closely
veiled; but Aleph had no difficulty in recognizing the exquisite shape
and bearing of the Gem of Alexandria.
Alexander then said that he had asked them to come somewhat in advance of
the congregation, partly in order that they might have time to look about
them, and to get familiar with the building before the services should
begin.
“Walk about freely,” he continued, “until the trumpets cease summoning;
then return and occupy the seats yonder (he pointed). They are reserved
for visitors in accord with us. Meanwhile I have to meet the elders.”
He bowed himself away; and they began to look about them. But few people
had yet come in. It was the largest and finest synagogue in the world.
Just before them, abutting on the east side of the building, was a low
platform surrounded by a delicate silver railing and surmounted in part
by a canopy of cloth of gold. Under this was an ornate seat curiously
wrought in various precious woods. Near the front of the platform stood
an equally elaborate reading desk, with several rolls upon it. By the
side of the platform was a door by which Alexander had disappeared; and
in front of the platform, arranged in several semicircles, were the
famous seventy gilded chairs for the seventy elders of the synagogue.
Back of these were the seats for the families of the elders with a
narrow aisle separating the males from the females. On the first seat
to the left of this passage sat Rachel. Behind these seats, and skirted
by immense columns on either hand, ran a broad aisle from end to end
of the synagogue. The building was so long that the signal for the
responses had to be given by a flag to the more remote worshippers; for
all were expected to join vocally in the prayers as read at the centre,
though addresses to the people were made simultaneously at several
other platforms placed at convenient intervals. The walls were covered
with Scripture verses in both Hebrew and Greek, beautifully done in
mosaic—one wall with prayers, another with praises, a third with the Ten
Commandments, a fourth with the leading Messianic prophecies. One mystery
of the building was the pleasant illumination without any sign of windows
or sources of artificial light.
While they were lingering over the Messianic inscriptions they suddenly
awoke to the fact that the synagogue was becoming thronged and that
the summoning trumpets were about concluding their sonorous chant. So
they made their way back, as rapidly as the incoming stream of belated
worshippers (not wholly unknown in any age) would allow, to the seats
which had been shown them.
AMEN, sang the trumpets in long-drawn note from their tower. AMEN,
answered the packed multitudes on their knees. The door at the side of
the platform opened; and the seventy elders, with Alexander and another
younger man, who strongly resembled him, at their head, entered in long
flowing robes elaborately fringed and decorated on the breast with
phylacteries lettered in gold. The leaders ascended the platform: the
others passed on to the gilded chairs. The Alabarch seated himself under
the canopy: his companion advanced to the lecturn, bowed his head upon
it for a moment, then placed the _tulith_ on his head—and at once the
service began.
Began with a doxology—spontaneous, universal, mighty; flooding the whole
temple with rhythmic billows of uplifting sound. As the last note died
away, the man at the desk began to read from a roll that vivid picture of
the consequences to Israel of both obedience and disobedience contained
in Deut. 28th—read them sonorously and with great distinctness, but not
without something of the artificial and professional in his tone—read
them with here and there a word of comment which did not always content
itself with the literal sense instead of an allegorical and mystical
one. This reading concluded, he waved a small flag; and all the people
broke out again into a doxology—this time the entire psalm, beginning
with, “Praise ye the Lord; praise the Lord, O my soul; while I live will
I praise the Lord,” in a rapid and triumphant march of unified sound. He
then proceeded to read on his knees, the people all kneeling, the prayer
contained in the psalm that begins with “Give ear, O shepherd of Israel,
thou that leadest Joseph like a flock, thou that dwellest between the
cherubims shine forth;” at the conclusion of which he waved the flag
again and a universal AMEN arose. This was followed by readings from the
prophets of selections commonly understood to point to the Messiah. Again
the flag waved, and the people exclaimed as with one voice, but in a
plaintive tone:
“Though he tarry long he will surely come.”
The reader then became a preacher. His theme was the Messiah. He spoke of
the certainty of His coming, of the time and other circumstances of it,
of the character and functions that would belong to Him, of the way in
which He would prove Himself, and of the universal current expectation of
Him among their own people. He showed that from the beginning of the race
hints of Him had been given—hints that gradually enlarged and brightened
as the ages rolled on, until, in the later prophets, all veils were
removed and the dimmest eye could see the King that cometh in the name
of the Lord. As to the time—he shared the common belief of the present
and the last generation that the time was near, if not already arrived.
How could the dates of Daniel be reconciled with any other view? To
be sure, some allowance should be made for round numbers: it would not
do to say that this or the next year is the time for the Coming; but
after all it is safe to say in a general way that we are living in the
times of the Christ. It ought not to surprise them if He should come
to-morrow. As to the family from which He is to spring, the place of His
birth, the forerunner Elias He is to have, there is and can be but one
opinion. Exactly how He will prove himself to the people it were hard
to say: perhaps by a supernatural beauty and glory of person, perhaps
by a mysterious inward voice speaking to the whole nation as it spoke
to individual prophets, perhaps only by His wonderful success over all
obstacles in becoming our Redeemer and King.
The preacher evidently did not deem it wise to be at all specific on this
last point—the conquering and kingly character of the Messiah—in a city
held by the Romans for the Cæsars. He contented himself with glittering
generalities. He spoke ornately and enthusiastically of the prosperity
and felicity of Israel in the golden age that was sure to come. What the
Gentiles call by that name was a poor thing compared with that which was
knocking at the doors of the Chosen People.
He, however, cautioned his hearers not to allow themselves to be
impatient in their waiting for this good time. Their faith might be
tried. They must be on their guard against pretenders. It would not be
strange if the current expectation should itself produce false Christs.
It would seem indeed as if this had already happened. At this moment, as
most of them knew, there was a man in Judea who was making much noise
with his claims, but whom the principal men of the nation did not feel
able to accept. When the true Messiah comes he doubtless will commend
Himself to the natural leaders of the people. Meanwhile the people should
rest quietly in their various places and occupations.
When the orator had finished, the Alabarch rose and gave the usual
invitation to approved persons to speak—immediately adding, however,
that he saw that one of their own elders, Simeon the son of Simeon, had
returned from Jerusalem, and that whatever account he could give of
religious matters there would be acceptable.
A venerable looking man rose from among the Seventy. He brought
salutations from the Sanhedrin at Jerusalem. They had been much disturbed
over the case of Jesus of Nazareth to whom the preacher had just
referred. The multitude were disposed to listen to him; attributing to
him many signs and wonders, and asking whether he is not the Messiah.
It was not clear, however, that he himself had put forward any such
claim. His Messiahship seemed to be merely an inference of the multitude
from his wonderful works at a time when all are on the lookout for the
Shiloh. As to the reality of these wonderful works, the brethren of the
Great Council and the principal men generally do not seem to call it in
question. They concede that Jesus has, with a word or a touch, cured
all sorts of incurable diseases; given sight to the blind, hearing to
the deaf, wholeness to the maimed, reason to the insane, and even life
to the dead. Two of them, Joseph of Arimathea, and Nicodemus, a cousin
of the great teacher Gamaliel, go further than this, and affirm that no
man could do such mighty works unless God were with him. “If such deeds
could not prove a Divine mission, they were at a loss to see how such a
mission could ever be proved. How was Moses authenticated?” But the rest
agree in ascribing the marvels to magic and evil spirits; especially as
there never has been known a time when so many people seemed possessed
with demons. They say that they are compelled to resort to this
explanation, not merely by the fact that Jesus speaks so unfavorably of
the ecclesiastical authorities and of their oral traditions, but still
more by the fact that he does not answer in origin, appearance, or aims
to the Messiah. The Messiah comes from Bethlehem, Jesus from Nazareth:
the Messiah comes from the royal family of David, Jesus from a peasant
family of no property or social standing; the Messiah is a mighty King
and Deliverer, Jesus is plain in his appearance, associates even with
publicans and sinners, and has nothing of the warrior and statesman
about him—in fact, says that his kingdom is not of this world. He has
even been understood to give out that his mission here is to teach and
suffer rather than to conquer and reign. Such a person differs so widely
from what they have been accustomed to expect and from what the Sacred
Books have been supposed to promise, that the leading brethren in Judea,
with the exceptions mentioned, are unanimous in ascribing the miracles
of Jesus to the Evil One, and in trying to break his influence with the
people. Whether they will succeed seems doubtful. But their determination
to do so is very strong and will probably lead to severe measures. He was
sorry not to be able to judge of the man from personal observation; but
Jesus at the time was in Galilee, and could not be reached in the time at
command. Besides, it was evident that a visit of Simeon to Jesus would
be looked upon as a discourtesy by the chief men—so decided have their
views become, and so high runs the tide of feeling.
Such in a few words was the purport of what Simeon said in more.
The reading of the psalm beginning, “Give the king thy judgments O God,
and thy righteousness to the king’s son;” the waving of the flag; AMEN
and AMEN by the people, as with one voice, concluded the service.
The congregation rapidly disappeared through the many doors that suddenly
revealed themselves; for the architect had thought it possible that
occasion might arise for a hasty evacuation of the premises—had also
thought it possible to have the means of egress as unnoticeable by a
stranger as were the means of light. But a few of the elders, among whom
were Alexander and the preacher, gathered about Simeon, whose chair stood
near the daughter of Alexander. Cimon and Aleph had also lingered; it may
be with the idea of making some inquiry of Simeon or the preacher. Seeing
this, the Alabarch beckoned them near, and, simply introducing them as
co-religionists, proceeded to say to Simeon:
“I am sorry that you were not able to see and hear Jesus for yourself.”
“My desire was strong to do so: and I did my best to get as near as
possible to personal observation. I sought reliable information from all
quarters. There seemed to be no difference of opinion, even among his
greatest enemies, as to the reality of his miracles.”
“What do you understand,” inquired another elder, “to be the general
character of his teaching? How does he treat our Sacred Writings?”
“With the highest honor. It is agreed on all hands that no word has
fallen from him that savors of irreverence toward the Law and the
Prophets: on the contrary, he makes them final authorities on all matters
of which they speak; and when he rebukes the leaders of the people it is
in their name. He does not belong to the synagogue of Malus.”
“That is a great point in his favor,” said another. “But are his own
manners and morals blameless in the view of the Law?”
“I must confess that I heard nothing to the contrary—not being able
myself to see wrong in a religious teacher eating and drinking like other
people, or in his being accessible to the lowly and sinful.”
“Have not I heard you say, brother Philo,” said Alexander to the
preacher, “that the chiefs of the people charge Jesus with blasphemy?
Blasphemy can hardly be considered a point of good behavior.”
“I spake as I heard,” said Philo. “Perhaps Simeon can tell us whether I
heard correctly.”
“It seems,” said Simeon, “that Jesus has sometimes spoken of himself as
the Son of God; and, in a mysterious way, of a certain unity between
himself and his heavenly Father; and, probably, it is this lofty way of
speaking of himself which has given occasion for the charge of which you
speak.”
“Do not the prophets sometimes use language equally strong about the
Christ?” asked Cimon deferentially.
“For example,” said Aleph: “His name shall be called Wonderful,
counsellor, the mighty God, the everlasting Father.”
“Such passages, I believe, have always been understood by many among
us as declaring that the Christ will not be a mere man, but will have
something of a Divine quality about him,” said Alexander reflectively.
“Perhaps, then,” added Cimon, “it is not so much the magnificence of the
claims of Jesus that has led the fathers at Jerusalem to view him as a
blasphemer, but rather the striking contrast between such claims and the
humble appearance and circumstances of him who makes them, and which
have already led them to decide against him. Of course, if he is not the
Christ, such lofty pretensions are blasphemous—not otherwise.”
“But it appears to me,” said another elder, Ben Abner, whose dress was
specially showy, phylacteries specially many, and air specially haughty,
“that the humble condition of the man is itself decisive against him. Our
wise men, for generations, have understood from the Scriptures that the
Messiah would appear in great splendor as a conqueror and king. For my
part I expect no other Messiah, want no other, will have no other. I hope
they of Jerusalem will away with the impostor.” He spoke with flashing
eyes.
“So _I_ think,” said half a dozen voices with emphasis and gesture.
“Possibly the friends of Jesus would say,” returned Simeon coolly, “that
great endings sometimes have small beginnings, and that there is time
enough yet for the outward splendor. Indeed, I happen to know that this
is what some of his friends do say. But others claim, and I must confess
that this is what Jesus himself seems to teach, that the prophets have
been misunderstood; that the kingdom and the glory and the conquests
of which they speak are spiritual and so perfectly consistent with a
lowly and even suffering Messiah. And for evidence they appeal to the
prophecies of Isaiah, and other Scriptures. Perhaps our friend Philo, who
believes so thoroughly in the allegoric and spiritual meanings of our
Sacred Books, will not blame this interpretation as severely as some do.”
Philo smiled at this, and said that he never intended to spiritualize
_away_ the Scriptures. It would be very hard for him to give up the
brilliant hopes that had so long been entertained as to the times of the
Messiah and what he would do for his Israel.
“I should not have so much difficulty,” said Alexander, “with the present
humble condition of Jesus, and the spiritual character of his claims, as
with the apparent fact that he was not born in Bethlehem and is not a son
of David—as the Messiah must be.”