The Gospel According to the Son

by Norman Mailer

  "You speak," I said, "as if you agree with them."

  "In my thoughts I am often closer to them than I am to you."

  "Then why are you with me?"

  "Because many of your sayings are closer to me than any enjoyment I receive by witnessing their games. Having grown up among them, I know what is in their hearts, and I detest them. They continue to believe they are good. They see themselves as rich in charity, in piety, and in loyalty to their people. So I scorn them. They not only tolerate the great distance between the rich and the poor, they increase it."

  "Then you are with me?"

  "Yes."

  "Is it because I know that we cannot reach the Kingdom of Heaven until there are no rich and no poor?"

  "Yes."

  "Still, you almost speak as if you do not care about entering the Kingdom of Heaven."

  "God strike me, but I do not believe in it."

  "But you say you are with me. Why, then, are you with me?"

  "Can you bear the truth?"

  "I am nothing without it."

  "The truth, dear Yeshua, is that I do not believe you will ever bring us all to salvation. Yet in the course of saying all that you say, the poor will take courage to feel more equal to the rich. That gives me happiness."

  "That alone?"

  "I hate the rich. They poison all of us. They are vain, undeserving, and wasteful of the hopes of those who are beneath them. They spend their lives lying to the lowly."

  I hardly knew what to reply. He had left me not unhappy. Indeed, I was all but merry. For I could see that he would work for me, and work hard. So, he would help to bring us all to salvation. What a smile of joyous disbelief would be on his face when we entered the gates together.

  Only then would he see how all I said came truly from my Father.

  I loved Judas. In this hour I loved him more even than I loved Peter. If all my disciples would dare to be as truthful with me as Judas had been, then I could be stronger and accomplish many things.

  "If," I now asked, "I ceased to laborùby even a jot or a tittleùfor the needs of the poor, would you see less of value in me?"

  "I would turn against you. A man who is ready to walk away from the poor by a little is soon ready to depart from them by a lot."

  I had to admire this man. Judas had not seen the glory I knew. Yet his beliefs were as powerful to him as were mine to me. Yes, he was more admirable even than Peter, whose faith was as blind as a stone and so could be split by a larger stone.

  So too did I know that trouble might arise between Judas and me. For he had none of the accommodation that my Father had given to my heart to make me ready for those trials that could come upon us unforeseen.

  I can also say that this conversation with Judas was wondrous for clearing disarray. At last all seemed to be in order. We were ready. I could hardly believe we were ready to set out at last for Jerusalem, but it was a good morning. If none of us were without fear, we were touched by happiness as well. For we had not been enslaved by our fear. Our legs knew their own joy.

  Then, and only then, did we truly step out. And in the vigor of our march, many began to believe that in two days when we were close enough to see Jerusalem, the Kingdom of God would appear. The Lord would be among us.

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  All the same, my conversation with Judas must have disturbed me more than I knew, for on the road to Jerusalem I became feverish. As I walked, my limbs ached. At night I had no rest that was without pain. And it was the same on the second morning.

  By evening, still a full day's march from Jerusalem, we passed through Jericho and there a rich man named Zacchaeus wished to welcome me. Many were in the throng, however, and he was a small man; therefore he had climbed to the top of a sycamore so that we could see him.

  I said: "Zacchaeus, come down. Tonight I will stay at your house."

  He received me joyfully. Others said that it was not fitting that I should be the guest of the wealthiest publican in Jericho. But Zacchaeus said: "Lord, now that I know you, half of my goods I will give to the poor."

  I was gladdened. For if a rich man could surrender half of his fortune because he believed in me, then there might be walls ready to fall in Jerusalem. I slept well that second night in the house of Zacchaeus.

  Next morning as we set out, two sisters of my follower Lazarus came to meet us. I had dined with Lazarus in Capernaum, and he was a good man. Now his two sisters, Mary and Martha, had walked from his house in Bethany to find me, and they said, "Lord, Lazarus is sick, our Lazarus."

  And by the way it was said, I knew that he had a sickness unto death.

  They wept. As if I were brother to his illness, my fever came back; my night of rest was lost. I had to stay two nights more in Zacchaeus' house, and we were still a full day's march from Jerusalem. When I awoke on the fifth morning of our departure from Galilee, I was well in body but otherwise full of woe, and I said, "Lazarus is dead."

  The apostle Thomas was simple, and often uttered what others thought. Now he said aloud, "Let us go to Jerusalem so we can die with him." There was much displeasure at Thomas' remark.

  We walked all that day and into the evening before we came to Bethany, where Lazarus lived in a house an hour's walk from the walls of Jerusalem. And I could see many Jews on their way to his home. Indeed, his sister Martha came to meet me, and said, "Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died."

  I was ready to agree. Nonetheless, I said, "Your brother shall rise again."

  Then came Mary, the other sister, and she sat at my feet and was followed by others also weeping, and when they looked at me, I said, "Where have you laid him?"

  "Lord, come and see."

  How could I know whether God would grant me the power to return him to his sisters? Lazarus had been dead for two days.

  Many Jews around me, friends of the dead man, seeing me in anguish, said, "Behold, how he loved Lazarus!"

  They led me to a cave with a stone across the entrance. I said, "Take away the stone."

  But Martha said: "Lord, who can speak now for his body?"

  Yet at my sign they removed the rock from the entrance. I lifted my eyes and cried out, and my voice roared in my throat: "Father, let Lazarus come forth!"

  Then I was silent. When the spirit left a man, all that was unclean in his spirit was loosed as well. So I waited for the odor to enter my nose. Indeed, I asked myself: "How can one raise a dead man from his tomb when all the evil of his past holds him down?"

  The Lord must have heard me. I saw the face of Lazarus. I saw him stir.

  Again I cried: "Lazarus, come forth." And I heard him answer.

  "Oh, Yeshua," said Lazarus, "small creatures speak to me, and they say, 'You are not our master, Lazarus, but our wiping-cloth.' Thus speak the maggots."

  I prayed for his misery to cease. And it was then that Lazarus rose in his tomb. I saw him come out of the mouth of the cave and take small steps toward me. These steps were small because he was bound in his winding sheet. His face was also covered. I said to his sisters, "Loosen him, but do not look at him."

  Then, in the voice of a man who has dwelt in lands that others have not entered, Lazarus said, "The maggots have left me." His voice was like the small cry of a bird. Yet he was alive.

  All who witnessed this fell back in wonder. I knew that the High Priest Caiaphas of the Great Temple, on hearing of this, would gather a council. For more than a few had seen Lazarus rise. So they knew that he stank of the grave. The Pharisees would call me a demon. Why not? I had the power to raise a man who had begun to rot.

  I could hear the High Priest. He would declare: "If we leave this Jesus in peace, all Jews will go to him. The Romans will believe that we are in rebellion. Before it is over, the Romans will take all that we have."

  I knew that the High Priest Caiaphas might even say, "Is it wrong for one man to die so that the rest will not perish? Is it wrong for this one man to die?"

  That day I did not go to Jerusalem but s
lept in the house of Lazarus. In the morning when I said good-bye, he was weak and his spirit was low. I asked, "Do you believe?" and Lazarus said, "I am frightened of the things I saw when dead. Yet I try to believe." In his weakness, he still took my arm and said, "An angel came to me. All is not heavy."

  I said to Lazarus: "Do not fear. You are well favored by the Lord." And to myself I prayed that I was telling the truth.

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  Since I wished my people to feel heartened by our entrance into Jerusalem, I sent forth two of my disciples and told them: "Go into this village before us and ask for a colt on whom no man has ever sat. When you find one, bring him to me. Tell them that the Lord is in need of such an animal."

  And they went away and soon found a colt, young and spirited, and led him back. I sat upon this animal, which, until now, had been ignorant of a rider, and I held to its mane. For if I could not subdue such a young beast, how then could I calm the uproar in the hearts of men awaiting me at the Temple?

  In time, the colt jumped less and pranced more, and we were able to walk in procession. And I liked the animal. I also felt as hungry as if I might never eat again.

  Whereupon, seeing a fig tree that was heavy with leaves, I trotted toward it in order to take my fill. Yet on its branches I found no ripe figs.

  Did an ill wind blow toward us? I said to the fig tree, "Let no man eat fruit from you again."

  But a weight came upon my heart for cursing the roots of another. "I am the Son of God," I told myself, "yet also a man; by a thread does man live without heedless destruction."

  So I also knew that Satan still clung to me. Like a hawk who searches the fields below for one small creature, then swoops for the kill, so had I scourged the tree.

  Now the crowd of men and women who walked ahead of me took branches from the palms we passed and strewed them on my path. They sang, "Hosannah! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. Blessed is the kingdom of our David who comes in the name of the Lord. Hosannah in the highest." And some cried out, "Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord." These people of Jerusalem (and most had not seen me before) were full of favor; in the windows, many waved. Word of our good deeds had come to Jerusalem before us.

  Yet I did not forget the fig tree. Its branches would now be bare. Such thoughts made me brood upon the end of the city of Tyre. A thousand years ago it had dwelt in splendor, renowned for its tables of ebony, its emeralds and purple linens, its stalls of honey and balm, its coral and agate and chests of cedar. Yet the sea had washed it all away. Would this yet be said of Jerusalem, as wealthy in this hour as Tyre once had been?

  I gazed upon great white buildings with columns so tall that I could not know whether I beheld a temple or a seat of Roman government. I said to myself, "A good name is rather to be chosen than great riches," but the words were too pious (for my heart had leaped at the sight of these riches). So I also said: "The mouth of a strange woman is a deep pit. And a great city is like a strange woman."

  Yet I could not scorn Jerusalem. The people of Israel lived with as much magnificence now as in the time of King Solomon, when his palanquin had been made from cedar of Lebanon, its pillars fashioned of silver, its base of gold. The seat of the palanquin was purple and its claws had been wrought by the daughters of Jerusalem. Wondrous was Jerusalem in the time of Solomon, and wondrous was it now.

  Yet my followers could hardly share such glory. I saw a Roman noble stop before our procession and stare at our hundreds walking by twos and by threes and fours in the lane. Some were well attired, but most of my people were in plain clothing, or in rags.

  I, too, now stared at this throng that belonged to me.

  The people of Jerusalem were joining us in large numbers; and I was seeing as many faces as there are aspects of man. Among those who followed were many who could be counted as less than believers but were rather among the curious and the tormented and the cynical, and these last were accompanying us to jeer at the Pharisees and thereby repay them for old rebukes.

  Some of these new followers were solemn. So in their eyes shone the hope that I might provide a new piety that weighed upon them less than their old piety, which had turned drab in their hearts from too much repetition of the same prayers. And there were children who looked on all the sights and laughed at the wonder of God's bounty when it came to the faces of people; they were the closest to joy. There were also men with the fearful dissatisfaction of boredom on their brow.

  And there were the poor. In their eyes I saw great need, and new hope, and much depth of sorrow; they had been disappointed many times. And I spoke to all, good and evil equally, as if they were one, since changes for the better can occur rapidly at times like these. In a bad man, evil and good can shift more quickly than in a good man; bad men are familiar with their sins and often weary of the struggle to deny remorse.

  As the throng increased, so was the colt full of many wicked spirits, but they were young and without the foul odors of more practiced devils. Still, my beast would

  buck, and I knew it was in his mind to throw me over his head onto the stones of the road. Yet I rode him. He was the colt for me. And for this moment I felt like the master of good and evil.

  Only at this moment, however. For as I approached the Temple, I grew solemn with awe. I could not believe I was more than a Jew with a modest trade approaching a great and consecrated edifice. We were coming near to the Temple of Temples, and they had built it on a mount.

  Even before I came to it, I remembered that its steps would rise from courtyard to courtyard, facing ever more august chapels and sacred sanctuaries, and there would be one chamber into which only the High Priest could enter and then only on one day of the year. That was the Holy of Holies. I was the Son of God, but I was also the child of my mother and so my respect for the Temple was, with each breath, growing larger than my urge to change all that was within. I shivered when the men and women in front of me, on mounting an incline in the road, began to cheer, and soon I too, on mounting the hill, saw the Temple walls.

  But as I took in the sight, so did I also know that the future of this magnificence was in peril. In years to come, enemies would be ready to tear down the walls until nothing would remain but one wall. Hardly a stone would be left to rest upon another. All this would pass unless the priests of the Temple came to understand that my message was from the Lord.

  Sitting upon the colt, I wept openly at my first sight on this morning of the Great Temple. It was beautiful, but it was not eternal. And I thought of the words of Amos, who had said: "The houses of ivory shall perish." It was then that I dismounted, and continued on foot.

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  Having climbed the steps of the entrance, I came into the Temple itself. Beyond the first gate was a large court where all could exchange money and goods. How one had to admire the beards of these men of Mammon! They had been curled by a warm iron and were immaculate in their pride. So these moneylenders looked like peacocks. And the priests also looked like peacocks as they moved among them. All was vanity. At home, their tables would be bountiful, while the poor sat in the stinking alleys of the city.

  I wrapped silence about me like a holy cloth that others would not dare to touch. I sat alone on a stone bench and looked at how these people cast money into the alms box. Many who were rich cast much. But then came a poor woman, and her shawl was threadbare; she threw in her small coin. My heart leaped.

  I called to those disciples who were near and said: "This poor woman has put in more than all the rich. They leave a tithe of their abundance. She gave her living. So she has turned money into a tribute to the Lord. The wealthy give only to impress each other."

  I thought of money and how it was an odious beast. It consumed everything offered to it. What slobbering was in such greed! I thought of how the rich are choked with the weight of gold, and their gardens grow no fruit to satisfy them. There is oppression in the perfume of the air, and none of the rich man's blooms bring happiness. For his neighbor is
wealthier than himself and his gardens are more beautiful. So are the rich always envious of the next man's gold.

  Here, in the outer court of the Temple, surrounded by these moneylenders, I spoke to all, and my voice was my own. I said: "No man can pay allegiance to two masters. For he will cling to the one he needs and, in secret, despise the other. You cannot serve God and Mammon."

  Then I heard the Devil speak to me for the first time since I had been with him on the mountain. He said: "Before it is over, the rich will possess you as well. They will put your image on every wall. The alms raised in your name will swell the treasure of mighty churches; men will worship you most when you belong to me as much as to Him. Which is just. For I am His equal." And he laughed. He knew what he would say next:

  "Greed is a beast, you say, but note this! Its defecations are weighed in gold. Isn't gold the color of the sun from which all things grow?"

  The Lord chose to reply in my other ear: "Everything he says makes sense until it does no longer. He gives this speech to all who catch his eye, and his eye is only for the best, and most beautiful, whom I have fashioned with great hope. He scorns those who are modest but remain with Me."

  And this was more than my Father ever said again about Satan, but at this moment it gave little force to my faith. Did my Father speak well of the meek because they were the only ones who remained loyal to Him and to me? How full of chaos was such a thought! I fell prey to a wrath greater than any I had known before.

  In the eyes of the moneylenders, greed was as sharp as the point of a spear; the rage of Isaiah came to me. In his words, I cried out: " 'These tables are a pool of vomit. In such filth, nothing is clean!' "