our great men?
PONTIUS PILATUS
MY WIFE SPOKE OF HIM MANY TIMES ERE HE WAS brought before me, but I was
not concerned.
My wife is a dreamer, and she is given, like so many Roman women of her
rank, to Eastern cults and rituals. And these cults are dangerous to the
Empire; and when they find a path to the hearts of our women they become
destructive.
Egypt came to an end when the Hyksos of Arabia brought to her the one God
of their desert. And Greece was overcome and fell to dust when Ashtarte
and her seven maidens came from the Syrian shores.
As for Jesus, I never saw the man before He was delivered up to me as a
malefactor, as an enemy of His own nation and also of Rome.
He was brought into the Hall of Judgment with His arms bound to His body
with ropes.
I was sitting upon the dais, and He walked towards me with long, firm
steps; then He stood erect and His head was held high.
And I cannot fathom what came over me at that moment; but it was suddenly
my desire, though not my will, to rise and go down from the dais and fall
before Him.
I felt as if Caesar had entered the Hall, a man greater than even Rome
herself.
But this lasted only a moment. And then I saw simply a man who was
accused of treason by His own people. And I was His governor and His
judge.
I questioned Him but He would not answer. He only looked at me. And in
His look was pity, as if it were He who was my governor and my judge.
Then there rose from without the cries of the people. But He remained
silent, and still He was looking at me with pity in His eyes.
And I went out upon the steps of the palace, and when the people saw me
they ceased to cry out. And I said, "What would you with this man?"
And they shouted as if with one throat, "We would crucify Him. He is our
enemy and the enemy of Rome."
And some called out, "Did He not say He would destroy the temple? And was
it not He who claimed the kingdom? We will have no king but Caesar."
Then I left them and went back into the Judgment Hall again, and I saw
Him still standing there alone, and His head was still high.
And I remembered what I had read that a Greek philosopher said: "The
lonely man is the strongest man." At that moment the Nazarene was greater
than His race.
And I did not feel clement towards Him. He was beyond my clemency.
I asked Him then, "Are you the King of the Jews?"
And He said not a word.
And I asked Him again, "Have you not said that you are the King of the
Jews?
And He looked upon me.
Then He answered with a quiet voice, "You yourself proclaimed me king.
Perhaps to this end I was born, and for this cause came to bear witness
unto truth."
Behold a man speaking of truth at such a moment.
In my impatience I said aloud, to myself as much as to Him, "What is
truth? And what is truth to the guiltless when the hand of the
executioner is already upon him?"
Then Jesus said with power, None shall rule the world save with the
Spirit and truth."
And I asked Him saying, "Are you of the Spirit?"
He answered, "So are you also, though you know it not'"
And what was the Spirit and what was truth, when I, for the sake of the
State, and they from jealousy for their ancient rites, delivered an
innocent man unto His death?
No man, no race, no empire would halt before a truth on its way towards
self-fulfilment.
And I said again, "Are you the King of the Jews?"
And He answered, "You yourself say this. I have conquered the world ere
this hour."
And this alone of all that He said was unseemly, inasmuch as only Rome
had conquered the world.
But now the voices of the people rose again, and the noise was greater
than before.
And I descended from my seat and said to Him, Follow me."
And again I appeared upon the steps of the palace, and He stood there
beside me.
When the people saw Him they roared like the roaring thunder. And in
their clamor I heard naught save "Crucify Him, crucify Him."
Then I yielded Him to the priests who had yielded Him to me and I said to
them, "Do what you will with this just man. And if it is in your desire,
take with you soldiers of Rome to guard Him."
Then they took Him, and I decreed that there be written upon the cross
above His head, "Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews." I should have said
instead, "Jesus of Nazareth, a King."
And the man was stripped and flogged and crucified.
It would have been within my power to save Him, but saving Him would have
caused a revolution; and it is always wise for the governor of a Roman
province not to be intolerant of the religious scruples of a conquered
race.
I believe, unto this hour that the man was more than an agitator. What I
decreed was not my will, but rather for the sake of Rome.
Not long after, we left Syria, and from that day my wife has been a woman
of sorrow. Sometimes even here in this garden I see a tragedy in her
face.
I am told she talks much of Jesus to other women of Rome.
Behold, the man whose death I decreed returns from the world of shadows
and enters into my own house.
And within myself I ask again and again, What is truth and what is not
truth?
Can it be that the Syrian is conquering us in the quiet hours of the
night?
It should not indeed be so.
For Rome must needs prevail against the nightmares of our wives.
BARTHOLOMEW IN EPHESUS
THE ENEMIES OF JESUS SAY THAT HE ADDRESSED
His appeal to slaves and outcasts, and would have incited them against
their lords. They say that because He was of the lowly He invoked His own
kind, yet that He sought to conceal His own origin.
But let us consider the followers of Jesus, and His leadership.
In the beginning He chose for companions a few men from the North
Country, and they were freemen. They were strong of body and bold of
spirit, and in these past twoscore years they have had the courage to
face death with willingness and defiance.
Think you that these men were slaves or outcasts?
And think you that the proud princes of Lebanon and Armenia have
forgotten their station in accepting Jesus as a prophet of God?
Or think you the high-born men and women of Antioch and Byzantium and
Athens and Rome could be held by the voice of a leader of slaves?
Nay, the Nazarene was not with the servant against his master; neither
was He with the master against his servant. He was with no man against
another man.
He was a man above men, and the streams that ran in His sinews sang
together with passion and with might.
If nobility lies in being protective, He was the noblest of all men. If
freedom is in thought and word and action, He was the freest of all men.
If high birth is in pride that yields only to love and in aloofness that
is ever gentle and gracious, then He was of all men the highest born.
Forget not that only th
e strong and the swift shall win the race and the
laurels, and that Jesus was crowned by those who loved Him, and also by
His enemies though they knew it not.
Even now He is crowned every day by the priestesses of Artemis in the
secret places of her temple.
MATTHEW
UPON AN EVENING JESUS PASSED BY A PRISON THAT WAS
in the Tower of David. And we were walking after Him.
Of a sudden He tarried and laid His cheek against the stones of the
prison wall. And thus He spoke:
"Brothers of my ancient day, my heart beats with your hearts behind the
bars. Would that you could be free in my freedom and walk with me and my
comrades.
"You are confined, but not alone. Many are the prisoners who walk the
open streets. Their wings are not shorn, but like the peacock they
flutter yet cannot fly.
"Brothers of my second day, I shall soon visit you in your cells and
yield my shoulder to your burden. For the innocent and the guilty are not
parted, and like the two bones of the forearm they shall never be
cleaved.
"Brothers of this day, which is my day, you swam against the current of
their reasoning and you were caught. They say I too swim against that
current. Perhaps I shall soon be with you, a law-breaker among
law-breakers.
"Brothers of a day not yet come, these walls shall fall down, and out of
the stones other shapes
shall be fashioned by Him whose mallet is light, and whose chisel is the
wind, and you shall stand free in the freedom of my new day."
Thus spoke Jesus and He walked on, and His hand was upon the prison wall
until He passed by the Tower of David.
ANDREW
THE BITTERNESS OF DEATH IS LESS BITTER THAN LIFE
without Him. The days were hushed and made still when He was silenced.
Only the echo in my memory repeats His words. But not His voice.
Once I heard Him say: "Go forth in your longing to the fields, and sit by
the lilies, and you shall hear them humming in the sun. They weave not
cloth for raiment, nor do they raise wood or stone for shelter; yet they
sing.
"He who works in the night fulfills their needs and the dew of His grace
is upon their petals.
"And are not you also His care who never wearies nor rests?"
And once I heard Him say, "The birds of the sky are counted and enrolled
by your Father even as the hairs of your head are numbered. Not a bird
shall lie at the archer's feet, neither shall a hair of your head turn
gray or fall into the emptiness of age without His will."
And once again He said, "I have heard you murmur in your hearts: 'Our God
shall be more merciful unto us, children of Abraham, than unto those who
knew Him not in the beginning.'
"But I say unto you that the owner of the vineyard who calls a laborer in
the morning to reap, and calls another at sundown, and yet renders wages
to the last even as to the first, that man is indeed justified. Does he
not pay out of his own purse and with his own will?
"So shall my Father open the gate of His mansion at the knocking of the
Gentiles even as at your knocking. For His ear heeds the new melody with
the same love that it feels for the oft-heard song. And with a special
welcome because it is the youngest string of His heart."
And once again I heard Him say, "Remember this: a thief is a man in need,
a liar is a man in fear; the hunter who is hunted by the watchman of your
night is also hunted by the watchman of his own darkness.
"I would have you pity them all.
"Should they seek your house, see that you open your door and bid them
sit at your board. If you do not accept them you shall not be free from
whatever they have committed."
And on a day I followed Him to the marketplace of Jerusalem as the others
followed Him. And He told us the parable of the prodigal son, and the
parable of the merchant who sold all his possessions that he might buy a
pearl.
But as He was speaking the Pharisees brought into the midst of the crowd
a woman whom they called a harlot. And they confronted Jesus and said to
Him, "She defiled her marriage vow, and she was taken in the act."
And He gazed at her; and He placed His hand upon her forehead and looked
deep into her eyes.
Then He turned to the men who had brought her to Him, and He looked long
at them; and He leaned down and with His finger He began to write upon
the earth.
He wrote the name of every man, and beside the name He wrote the sin that
every man had committed.
And as He wrote they escaped in shame into the streets.
And ere He had finished writing only that woman and ourselves stood
before Him.
And again He looked into her eyes, and He said, "You have loved overmuch.
They who brought you here loved but little. But they brought you as a
snare for my ensnaring.
"And now go in peace.
"None of them is here to judge you. And if it is in your desire to be
wise even as you are loving, then seek me; for the Son of Man will not
judge you."
And I wondered then whether He said this to her because He Himself was
not without sin.
But since that day I have pondered long, and I know now that only the
pure of heart forgive the thirst that leads to dead waters.
And only the sure of foot can give a hand to him who stumbles.
And again and yet again I say, the bitterness of death is less bitter
than life without Him.
A RICH MAN
HE SPOKE ILL OF RICH MEN. AND UPON A DAY I QUESTIONED
Him saying, "Sir, what shall I do to attain the peace of the spirit?"
And He bade me give my possessions to the poor and follow Him.
But He possessed nothing; therefore He knew not the assurance and the
freedom of possessions, nor the dignity and the self-respect that lie
within.
In my household there are sevenscore slaves and stewards; some labor in
my groves and vineyards, and some direct my ships to distant isles.
Now had I heeded Him and given my possessions to the poor, what would
have befallen my slaves and my servants and their wives and children?
They too would have become beggars at the gate of the city or the portico
of the temple.
Nay that good man did not fathom the secret of possessions. Because He
and His followers lived on the bounty of others He thought all men should
live likewise.
Behold a contradiction and a riddle: Should rich men bestow their riches
upon the poor, and must the poor have the cup and the loaf of the rich
man ere they welcome him to their board?
And must needs the holder of the tower be host to his tenants ere he
calls himself lord of his own land?
The ant that stores food for the winter is wiser than a grasshopper that
sings one day and hungers another.
Last sabbath one of His followers said in the market-place, "At the
threshold of heaven where Jesus may leave His sandals, no other man is
worthy to lay his head."
But I ask, at the threshold of whose house that honest vagabond could
have left
His sandals? He Himself never had a house nor a threshold; and
often He went without sandals.
JOHN AT PATMOS
ONCE MORE I WOULD SPEAK OF HIM.
God gave me the voice and the burning lips though not the speech.
And unworthy am I for the fuller word, yet I would summon my heart to my
lips.
Jesus loved me and I knew not why.
And I loved Him because He quickened my spirit to heights beyond my
stature, and to depths beyond my sounding.
Love is a sacred mystery.
To those who love, it remains forever wordless;
But to those who do not love, it may be but a heartless jest.
Jesus called me and my brother when we were laboring in the field.
I was young then and only the voice of dawn had visited my ears.
But His voice and the trumpet of His voice was the end of my labor and
the beginning of my passion.
And there was naught for me then but to walk in the sun and worship the
loveliness of the hour.
Could you conceive a majesty too kind to be majestic? And a beauty too
radiant to seem beautiful?
Could you hear in your dreams a voice shy of its own rapture?
He called me and I followed Him.
That evening I returned to my father's house to get my other cloak.
And I said to my mother, "Jesus of Nazareth would have me in His
company."
And she said, "Go His way my son, even like your brother."
And I accompanied Him.
His fragrance called me and commanded me, but only to release me.
Love is a gracious host to his guests though to the unbidden his house is
a mirage and a mockery.
Now you would have me explain the miracles of Jesus.
We are all the miraculous gesture of the moment; our Lord and Master was
the centre of that moment.
Yet it was not in His desire that His gestures be known.
I have heard Him say to the lame, "Rise and go home, but say not to the
priest that I have made you whole."
And Jesus' mind was not with the cripple; it was rather with the strong
and the upright.
His mind sought and held other minds and His complete spirit visited
other spirits.
And in so doing His spirit changed these minds and these spirits.
It seemed miraculous, but with our Lord and Master it was simply like
breathing the air of every day.
And now let me speak of other things.
On a day when He and I were alone walking in a field, we were both
hungry, and we came to a wild apple tree.
There were only two apples hanging on the bough.
And He held the trunk of the tree with His arm and shook it, and the two
apples fell down.
He picked them both up and gave one to me. The other He held in His hand.
In my hunger I ate the apple, and I ate it fast.
Then I looked at Him and I saw that He still held the other apple in His
hand.
And He gave it to me saying, "Eat this also."
And I took the apple, and in my shameless hunger I ate it.
And as we walked on I looked upon His face.
But how shall I tell you of what I saw?
A night where candles burn in space,
A dream beyond our reaching;
A noon where all shepherds are at peace and happy that their flocks are
grazing;
An eventide, and a stillness, and a home coming;
Then a sleep and a dream.
All these things I saw in His face.
He had given me the two apples. And I knew He was hungry even as I was
hungry.
But I now know that in giving them to me He had been satisfied. He