Man in White

by Johnny Cash

  He woke himself screaming and found he was standing in the middle of the room, disoriented for a moment. Then as he realized he had redreamed the terrible dream, he sat heavily on his ledge. He was concerned that he found himself asleep on his feet. I must reason this out, he thought. He meditated for a long time, and nowhere in the Scriptures, nor the Law, the Prophets, or the Writings, could he find the revelation of the dream in scriptural reflections. He could not rationalize the crying Gentiles or the thousands of Stephens. And why should he dream of the Nazarene? He had never seen Jesus of Nazareth. Yet in his mind he had. He had heard him described and had a mental picture of his face. And it was a Stephen-like face—not in the physical features, for the Nazarene had a beard—but in the expression of joy, that curious bliss.

  And the blood flowing from him? Against his will he interpreted the rest of the dream. The blood flowing from the Nazarene was offered as a sacrifice for them, and Saul on solid ground was to offer to rescue them through the blood sacrifice of the Nazarene.

  Saul shook his head and paced the floor. “No!” he said. “No, this is what the heretics believe, not what I believe.”

  “Forgive my being tricked by the Evil One,” he said.

  He lay back down to think. His mind. His mind was fairly alive with words. Words from the Scriptures. He could not close out the words. Thousands of verses of Scripture ran through his mind, and as he lay down again, the words took wing. A prism of colors flashed under his eyelids, and he was content as he recycled the Law through the machinery of his marvelous mind. He fell into a sweet, deep sleep.

  Following his morning prayers, he surprised himself by having slept soundly until the sun was an hour high. He could not remember having ever slept this late. But then, last night had not been ordinary. The dream had exhausted him emotionally, and his body, being denied sustenance, was weakening. For the first time in seven days, he allowed himself to think of food. Later today he would purchase a couple of barley and date cakes and some cheese and wine from the bazaar. I will forget the dream, he thought. “The dream was put there by the Evil One to trouble me. I will not despair,” he whispered. “To despair in a complicated or tragic situation is to deny God’s compassion for his creatures.” Saul praised aloud,“Merciful are you, O God, who gives me courage in adversity.”

  He put on a clean loincloth and tunic; he cleaned his sandals, put them on, and wrapped the leather lacings up to his knees. He put on his girdle and Temple cloak. He stuck the letter from the high priest inside his tunic.

  He stood before the mirror and placed his head cover on the back of his head. The small, round, bowl-shaped cap with its distinctive design and trim identified him to all Jewry as being of the tribe of Benjamin. Then, on second thought, he took it off and crowned himself with the conical headdress of the Pharisee. So adorned in his strange mixture of ecclesiastical and military clothing, Saul of Tarsus, lean and hawklike, ended his seven days of self-sacrifice and preparation and strode out for the Temple of God with his cloak flying behind him.

  Inside the Temple sanctuary was the Most Holy Place, and inside the Most Holy Place was the Holy of Holies, the dwelling place of the Most High. The room was without furniture of any kind, and the entrance to it was not a doorway but a heavy golden curtain or veil. The only person ever to enter the Holy of Holies was the high priest himself, and then only once a year on the Day of Atonement. He entered upon his knees and burned incense, “a sacrifice of sweet-smelling savor,” to the Most High. The rule of total exclusion of all others was so severe that the high priest entered with a rope around his waist in the event that he should faint or die while in the Holy of Holies. No one would be worthy to enter this inner sanctuary to bring the high priest out in such a case. The rope would be used to retrieve the body.

  From the Most Holy Place, there arose a perpetual column of black smoke from the endless number of lambs, rams, ewes, and doves that were killed as blood sacrifices and burned at the altar. On a clear day, the smoke could be seen as far away as Mt. Tabor in Galilee, eighty miles to the north. On windless, damp days such as this one, the smoke hung like a pall over the city. The pungent smell of burning hair and flesh permeated every house in Jerusalem. People who left the city from time to time discovered that their hair and clothing often smelled of the smoke from the Temple sacrifices.

  It was a pleasant smell to Saul. He had spent much time in this area, in the halls and courts beneath the enormous towering columns adjacent to the Most Holy Place. In reality, here he had spent many of his days from the time of the beginning of his instruction in the Law. He loved to share his own interpretation of certain Scriptures, and he loved to hear other students and masters of the Law expound their views.

  But he was always very selective about whom he chose to debate with. He had never taken seriously any of the poor wandering rabbis. The Temple courts were full of them, and small and large groups gathered everywhere to listen to various preachers expound various views. Saul, upon recognizing Galileans or foreigners such as Cilicians, people from his own country, steered clear of them. The Greek and Roman influence outside of Judea was sometimes damaging to their faithful practice of their religion. Saul saw this as evil, these new innovations in modes of worship.

  None of the foreigners were more despicable to him than the Galilean Jews. They had made up the nucleus of the Carpenter’s following. He even hated their dialect—the way they distorted the language of his fathers with their coarse speech angered him.

  But now he was happy, joyful, even ecstatic as he approached the sanctuary. He passed under a marble beam held high between two columns. Carved in the stone in Hebrew, Greek, and Latin in large letters were these words:

  JEWS ONLY: ALL OTHERS PASS UNDER PENALTY OF DEATH.

  Saul passed through the large Corinthian brass gates and ascended the fourteen wide marble steps. The gates were so heavy that twenty men were required to close them for the night. He felt as light as air. He fairly flew up the steps, and when he reached the level of the sanctuary, he was faint and would have fallen, had not a Temple guard caught him by the arm. It was not an unusual thing, however, for the Temple guard to see one of the faithful faint from fasting.

  He regained his balance and walked to the right of the great burning altar where the sacrifices were being made. Dozens of priests were in the area with hundreds of people who had come. A great variety of services and sacrifices were performed by the priests. Here the vows of the Nazirites were consummated. Here the animals were slaughtered. A great truth of his religion was “Without the shedding of blood, there is no remission of sin.”

  With the progressive decay and degeneration of worship and the growing emphasis on ritualistic form, a lucrative business had presented itself a few years earlier to the old high priest Annas. The business was now carried on by the retired high priest, his nephew Caiaphas; and the present high priest, his nephew Jonathan ben Annas.

  Most of the land between Jerusalem and Bethlehem had been owned by old Annas. In these fields, shepherds bred and raised the snow-white lambs to be sold for sacrifice. Most of those slain at the Temple altar came from those fields.

  In one of the many booths adjacent to the great altar—booths provided to afford a semblance of privacy for the final part of the Nazirite vow—Saul sat down before a low table and spoke quietly to the priest who stood by. “One he lamb of the year without blemish for a burnt offering; one ewe lamb of the first year without blemish for a burnt offering; and one ram without blemish for a peace offering. Also a small basket of unleavened bread and wafers anointed with oil, and cakes of fine flour mingled with oil.” As Saul spoke, the priest marked the amount of each item on a slate.

  “What is the purpose of your vow?” asked the priest, more as a matter of routine than as a question to obtain information.

  “To publicly testify of my dedication to the Most High,” Saul said proudly, “for a service which I am about to perform for him.”

  The priest, knowing he re
quired no payment from Saul in advance, then turned and showed the list of sacrifices required to an attendant, who left to get them. Saul paid his tithes regularly, and at the same time added enough to pay for his frequent sacrifices. His lack of worldly possessions and spartan lifestyle were partially necessitated by his generous contributions to the Temple, which came out of a fairly modest income he derived from his trade.

  The priest wrapped a towel around Saul’s shoulders, then, taking a bottle of scented olive oil, poured it slowly on his head. He gently massaged his scalp, working the oil in with his fingers. He faced Saul and gently rubbed the oil into his beard, then his eyebrows.

  He took a razor from a golden box and honed it carefully on a leather strap. He began at the top of Saul’s forehead and shaved straight back all the way down his neck, being careful to catch every one of the curly, wiry hairs and stuff them in a container. He shaved each side of the head until Saul was completely bald, his head smooth and shining from the olive oil.

  Saul sat very still with his eyes closed in a highly spiritual, prayerful state. The priest continued his work. He shaved the upper lip next, then the face. Now the only hair left on Saul’s face were the eyebrows. The priest shaved off first the left, then the right one, putting every hair into the container.

  He then folded small pieces of parchment with portions of the Law as found in Deuteronomy 6 and 11 and placed them in a rectangular black leather box. He laid the box against Saul’s forehead, then attached the leather straps around his head to hold the tephillin in place. Another set of scriptural passages was placed in its leather protection and strapped to Saul’s left wrist.

  The young attendant had hung the three small animals by their tied hind legs from a rope stretched from the booths to the altar. Saul followed the priest as he slid the animals along the rope to a pole at the edge of the altar. The priest quickly and painlessly cut the throats of the animals with a razor-sharp, two-edged ornamental knife. He was so adept at this work that the animals never let out a cry. The main arteries of their throats poured out most of their blood in a few seconds, and they died quietly.

  Saul stood before the priest, praying loudly as the blood ran into the furrow beside the altar and down into an opening in the ground. The priest slid the three dead animals down the rope to two young priests waiting at the tubs. They quickly opened the animals’ stomachs, removed the intestines and all the fat, and began washing the entrails in a large tub. Then the priest, seeing that the young priests were completing their work, picked up the container with Saul’s hair in it. Saul stood just behind him now as he dropped the hair into the fire. He took the three animals’ intestines from the boys and dropped them into the fire with the hair. Saul prayed,“Receive, O God, this as a memorial to my penance, to my sacrifice and dedication to your service.”

  The sun was down, and the giant brass gates were being closed as Saul walked back out through them.

  Baanah ben David recognized Saul by his walk as he came through the gates. He stood at the Court of the Gentiles watching Saul talk animatedly to the captain of the Temple guards. Saul was gesturing and speaking sharply. He saw him hold up six fingers and point to the fortress, Antonia.

  “Six Temple guards, and four Roman soldiers to oversee the mission,” thought Banaah aloud. “Plus his two Hebronite witnesses. There is no stopping him,” he added weakly.

  The captain of the guards had not nodded assent, so Saul quickly pulled out the letter from the high priest. Upon seeing it, the captain turned on his heel and left to procure the contingent Saul required. The Romans, however, would furnish ten soldiers. They would insist on outnumbering the Temple guards in Saul’s contingent.

  I will pray, then eat, and an hour from now the service for which I was born will begin, Saul thought as he turned to cross the Court of the Gentiles.

  “Saul,” said Baanah as Saul was passing without seeing him, taking long steps in his hurried walk to make up for his short legs.

  “Baanah, I hope you understand . . .” he fumbled.

  “Yes, it’s all right. I was just concerned about you. So were the others. Nicodemus asked about you.”

  Saul turned his eyes away.

  Baanah added quickly, “Your sister, Sarah, knows about your vow, and we determined that just about now you would be ready to enjoy a nice hot meal.”

  “I’m sorry, Baanah,” said Saul. “I have no time for dining. The Temple torches are lit. My preparation has ended.”

  The Temple was even more beautiful at night than during the day. It was well lit by great torches that lined the outer walls and inner building and columns. Actually the torches were great tubs on pedestals. The tubs contained a kind of pitch, large blocks of hardened petroleum and turf chopped from the asphalt pits near the Dead Sea. The pitch burned brightly, leaving no shadows in the Temple compound.

  “Saul,” the rabbi demanded, “we need to talk now.”

  Saul looked steadily into his friend’s eyes and past before he answered. Baanah was a man of middle age, tall, of medium build; he wore a simple homespun garment under his long black cloak, which seemed to have a habit of whirling about as he walked or even as he stood. He was slightly bent at the waist, his own frontal phylacteries the most imposing thing about him. Baanah’s quiet dark eyes searched Saul’s face.

  “My heart and mind are set steadily upon my task,” Saul said. He raised his left arm slightly to show the phylactery.“My determination to do the will of God is burned into my mind by the power of his commandments which I wear between my eyes. And this hand will do his work of deliverance from the infection of the Covenant as surely as Moses delivered our fathers.” He raised his wrist before Baanah’s face. “What else is there to talk about,Master Baanah?”

  “Saul,” said the rabbi, “during your isolation many things have happened. The city has trembled at the news of Stephen’s execution. The Nazarenes have scattered in every direction like ripples from a pebble tossed in the water. The ‘ripples’ think of you as the ‘pebble.’ Few of them are left in Jerusalem. A few congregations still are going to synagogues, but for the most part the ‘Synagogue of the Nazarenes’ has gone out of sight. Only small, quiet groups are meeting at the Temple.”

  “I will remove the residue of them from this holy city,Master,” said Saul. “I will find them. I will bring them to justice. Then I will follow the ones who have flown,” Saul paused. “I fully expected this.”

  “You’re pale, Saul,” said Baanah. “You’re down to bones and leather. Do not our own dietary laws for everyday living and eating impose sufficient restrictions on the body?”

  Saul changed the subject. “Did my sister come to see you?” he asked.

  “Yes,” said Baanah. “She had your old friend with her—Jemimah of Jericho.”

  Saul diverted his eyes. The mention of the girl from his youth disturbed him. He turned in anger to Baanah. “Your comments about my health— were they at my sister’s suggestion?”

  “She wants to see you, to cook you a good meal,” said Baanah.

  “She never gives up!” shouted Saul. “It’s Jemimah she wants me to see. I want you to know, all of you, finally, that I have no interest in that woman anymore!”He turned his back on Baanah and was seething. “I will not go.”

  “Where will you go?” asked the rabbi quietly.

  “I have work to do tonight,” said Saul menacingly. “And there is no place in it for Sarah or Jemimah, or even you for that matter.”

  “What work? Where?” he asked.

  “You will hear,” said Saul, leaving. “You will hear.”

  THREE

  THE PURGE

  In the Synagogue of the Isles of the Sea, a man named Barnabas of Cyprus was addressing the congregation of “the People of the Way.”

  “I stand before you boldly in this place to speak to you of the grace and mercy of our Lord Jesus. In him there is no fear. We have not been given the spirit of fear, but the spirit of power in his name. Therefore, we appeal to
him for mercy, and through him we find grace to help in time of need.”

  The gathering was made up mainly of men, but many wives were present, sitting among them with a few children on the floor at the feet of Barnabas. All of them were very attentive, listening carefully to the words of this great speaker.

  “I would not have you harmed by the persecutors,” Barnabas continued. “The Lord has not led me to call people to martyrdom, but to repentance and to his service. His kingdom is not of this world,” he said. “His kingdom is to be established in your hearts. The Holy Spirit will guide you, will comfort you in your fears.

  “Let Stephen’s death be considered a further sacrifice. If you must suffer likewise, so be it, and find the peace of the Prince of Peace in whatever befalls you. But we must strive to labor for him. We must not tremble in fear at the thought of what the Romans can do, nor what the Temple authorities can do. The lips of the Pharisees in the Temple do God’s service, but their hearts are far from him.

  “The Holy Spirit promised by the Lord Jesus will lead us into all truth. We experienced the infilling of that Spirit on the day of Pentecost. That promise was fulfilled. We must pray for the constant communication and instruction of the Spirit. Let us go forth in his name with boldness, in the Spirit of his holiness. Do not fear. Speak of him. Tell of his wonders. Do not deny him in any condition, that you will not be denied before the heavenly Father.”