The Silence of Gethsemane

by Michel Benoît

  No one is a prophet in his own lifetime. As Elijah’s successor, I was born to be killed. And what better place for a prophet to die than in Jerusalem?

  Without another word to my disciples, I set my face to go south.

  43

  As we made our way along by the Jordan I went on ahead by myself, separated from the Twelve, who followed behind, sweating with fright. We had to move aside to let dispatch riders gallop past; the Roman garrison in Caesarea was being sent to reinforce Jerusalem. The same as every year, thousands of pilgrims were expected for the Passover. Several times in the past, this great gathering of Jews from every corner of the Empire had provided an opportunity for rioting; the Essenes and the Zealots were always quick to seize their chance.

  So what were the Twelve contemplating behind my back? Peter now held sway over the small group of former activists, John, James, Simon and Iscariot. Embittered by poverty, this hot-headed fisherman seemed to want to get closer to our treasurer, who looked after the common purse with such scrupulous honesty. Were they thinking of taking action? Because there would never be a better moment than during this Passover, in the year 30. Was the fear that could be seen in their eyes prompted by the knowledge that there was going to be an attack on the Temple – and that like so many others, they were hoping for this at the same time as being afraid that it might end badly? Blood would be spilt, possibly their own.

  I have often disagreed with them, and have sometimes berated them, while still continuing to love them – even tonight, when I know they have betrayed me. They are a reflection of the Jewish people itself, beside themselves with the anguish that they have had to bear for so long, the hopes that have been repeatedly dashed. But they have followed me all the way from Galilee, and since I didn’t choose them, I have had to accept them as they are.

  We had just come through Jericho, where I had been staying at the house of a wealthy tax collector by the name of Zacchaeus. Before us lay a great wilderness of sand and stones, in the distance beyond it a range of small mountains through which winds the narrow road that leads to Jerusalem, teetering here and there along the edge of canyons whose depth and severe beauty takes your breath away.

  Jericho could never forget that it was the first oasis that Joshua captured, long before David made Jerusalem his capital. A proud town, it kept its distance from the vainglorious city of the Temple. It had its share of activists, although unlike those elsewhere they were less inclined to discriminate against people who worked for the inspectorate of taxes: since there was no escaping the scourge of the occupying forces, wasn’t it better if the dirty work was done by one’s fellow countrymen, provided they didn’t line their pockets at the taxpayer’s expense? Zacchaeus was such a man, so my presence in his house didn’t attract any adverse comment.

  As we were leaving the town a large crowd gathered round me, publicly defying Jerusalem’s policy of suspicion towards me. There was a blind beggar who had taken up permanent residence at the roadside. Hearing the noise, he asked what was happening. When he was told that Jesus the Nazarene was passing by, he raised his sightless eyes to heaven and cried out at the top of his voice:

  “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!”

  According to an old Jewish legend, David’s son Solomon had possessed great powers of healing. With nothing else to hope for, the man suddenly remembered this and seized on it. People sternly told him to be quiet, but he shouted even louder: “Son of David!…” Touched by this reference to our shared heritage, I asked what his name was; he was called Bartimaeus, and lived shut away in eternal darkness. I told everyone to stop trying to make him keep quiet, and to let him come to me. When he heard my voice he leapt up, threw off his cloak and hurried over.

  Bartimaeus seemed very excited, so I asked him:

  “What do you want me to do for you?”

  He immediately replied:

  “Rabbouni, let me see again!”

  Rabbouni, or “my little master”: it was impossible to resist this affectionate diminutive. Was the man comparing me with Solomon? What did it matter? In his blindness he had called on God, so he was healed already. I told him so:

  “Go; your faith has made you well.”

  Unable to believe that he had recovered his sight, he insisted on coming with me. But news of the healing had already spread around the oasis. As I made my way into the mountains, local activists went on ahead to tell the Zealots in Jerusalem. It was only right that the new Solomon should be given a fitting reception in the City of David.

  As I climbed the steep-sided path, I thought about my healing of Bartimaeus. I think it was the first time I had ever said to a sick person, “What do you want me to do for you?” Coming to me, displaying his condition in public was an act of faith – but faith in whom? Every time I performed a healing I always followed it by saying something that made it clear that God alone was responsible. Yet they put their trust, as well as their lives, in the hands of the charismatic rabbi from Galilee – they had faith in me.

  Should I spurn this personality cult? Bartimaeus had called me rabbouni: ought I to correct people when they used this name, with its emotionally charged overtones? I never dared. For them, being healed was the beginning of a new life; it was only later they would realize that this rebirth wasn’t brought about by me.

  As I suspected, when I came down into the Kidron Valley there was a little welcoming committee waiting for me. They insisted on performing a symbolic gesture, and had managed to find a donkey, which they sat me on, then tore armfuls of leafy branches from the trees and threw them in front of it. Urged on by the Zealots, the small crowd began shouting “Hosanna to the Son of David!” As always, up on the walls Roman legionaries were watching for the slightest activity among the crowd on the Temple esplanade – so you had to know just how far you could go. Deciding to call a halt to this public display that might provoke an armed response, I climbed off the donkey and the hotheads from Jericho went home. Without entering the city walls, my disciples and I walked along a dried-up stream bed that led to Bethany.

  I had returned to Jerusalem for the last time.

  44

  When we were still a short way from the village, the Judaean came out to meet me. He had never left Lazarus’s bedside, and told me that he had died four days earlier. So, our friend had slipped away at the very moment I was told he was ill! When I expressed my regret for not coming sooner, he said I shouldn’t be sorry for healing Bartimaeus in Jericho – word of which had just reached Bethany, along with that of my so-called triumphal arrival at the gates of Jerusalem. He also said I was mad to come back to Jerusalem – Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea were keeping him up to date with the discussions that were going on in the Sanhedrin, who were looking for any excuse to have me arrested.

  We walked on ahead, the Twelve some distance behind. I was expecting to find the house full of friends and hired mourners, acquaintances from Jerusalem where Lazarus had had many clients. All of a sudden Martha came rushing up to us, eyes red and hair covered in ashes. She stopped in front of me and chided me for not coming sooner – if only I had been there!

  “I know that my brother will rise again in the resurrection on the last day,” she said, holding back her tears.

  Resurrection! That word! It leads us nowhere. It proves just how strong a hold death has over the minds of the Jewish people, to the extent where they believe it is something final. Standing in front of Martha, I searched her face, which was gaunt with grief. What could I say to release her from the straitjacket of Jewish beliefs? It wasn’t the time or the place. I just mumbled:

  “Your brother will rise again.”

  Without replying she hurried back to the house. I didn’t want to go near the place, not now, when Lazarus was no longer in a home that he had filled with his lively, infectious warmth, to find Mary prostrate and surrounded by people trying to comfort her… But then she suddenly appeared, breathless from running, and knelt at my feet:

  “Rabbi, if you h
ad been here, my brother would not have died!”

  Dear, sweet Mary! It was more than I could bear. I gave a shudder, struggling to hold back my tears. By now the crowd of friends, clients and official mourners had gathered round. To disguise my lack of composure, I asked them:

  “Where have you laid him?”

  “Rabbi, come and see…”

  I looked round to ask my disciples to come with us, but they were nowhere in sight.

  The tomb was in a cave cut into the rock on a slight slope. It was a rich man’s burial chamber, as could be seen from the large circular stone that had been placed over the opening. Inside there would be a table, on which the body had been laid out after being anointed with precious lotions and perfumes. Like the Judaean, Lazarus had been an Essene; the body would shortly be moved to a side alcove, and then after a year the mortal remains would be exhumed. According to the rites of the Qumran community, the bones would be ceremonially washed in a final baptism, after which they would be reinterred in a permanent tomb, possibly in an Essene, not a Jewish cemetery – in untainted ground.

  About a dozen paces from the entrance, the crowd suddenly halted: the same as entering a room where there is a dead body, to go near a tomb would render them unclean, a state that requires a week of purification, and the Passover was in six days’ time. The lack of stress I place on the purity laws was well known – so would I go in? But I just took a step forward and went no farther, unable to contain my tears any longer. Behind me I heard people whispering, “See how he loved him!” But some of them said acrimoniously, “Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man have kept this man from dying?”

  Again a shiver ran through me. Tears like those I shed in the wilderness were now streaming down my face, blurring my vision. Yes, I had loved Lazarus dearly, as I did his sisters. Yes, like them I grieved at the sight of this stone, which to a detached observer represented an insurmountable barrier. For them, Lazarus was dead for ever… while for Martha there was still hope. The last day? Indeed so, but I had seen something else in the way she looked at me, heard it in her voice, as well as in Mary’s unspoken plea. The two of them had often listened to me, and they believed that this something else was possible.

  I turned to Martha and said: “Take away the stone!”

  Hopes suddenly raised, she wanted to do what I said, except…

  “Rabbi,” she said, whispering in my ear, “already there is a stench because he has been dead for four days!”

  Martha, Martha!… Death isn’t like a piece of rotting meat, an oozing corpse! Death represents the ultimate victory for the Evil One and his deadly dance. What is the difference between being reborn from inner decay while you are still alive, or when your body has begun to decompose? You believe that life never ends, don’t you Martha? So do I. Tell your servants to move the stone.

  As they rolled away the heavy slab, the crowd shrunk back at the sickly smell that came from the tomb. I closed my eyes: Abba, never do you allow our faith to be in vain… I cried in a loud voice:

  “Lazarus, come out!”

  As Lazarus staggered from the tomb, still wrapped in winding bandages, the crowd gave a gasp of terror. Like so many birds, some of them took flight, and I told the others to help this living man to unbind himself from the very thing that still bound them to what lay deep inside them.

  Preceded by the crowd, in its midst a Lazarus who was still unsteady on his feet, I strolled back to the house with the Judaean. He said that among those who had fled from the tomb he had seen one or two Sadducees. As far as they were concerned, what they had witnessed could only have been a resurrection, the very thought of which filled them with disgust – so much so that they wouldn’t allow it to be discussed in Jerusalem. Why were they in such a hurry to get away, if not to tell the Sanhedrin? The Judaean often went to Caiaphas’s palace, and had contacts there whom he could call on at any time of the day or night. My name was apparently on everyone’s lips; I had to leave Jerusalem immediately.

  Then Martha came over, her face wreathed with joy. To celebrate her brother being restored, she wanted to give a dinner party that evening and make it open house – I simply had to be there.

  A feast to mark a rebirth… Martha, I wouldn’t miss it for the world. You want to give a party for Lazarus and his friends that will reflect well on your household? But what I have in mind is a feast to celebrate the coming of the Kingdom. And tonight, you will give us a foretaste of that Kingdom.

  It will hide the smell of death that hangs round the Evil One.

  45

  The main dining room had been specially decorated, the tables laid out in a U shape according to the Roman custom which had been adopted by well-to-do Jews. When I arrived I saw Lazarus, now bathed and dressed in his finest robes, sitting among a crowd of people I didn’t know. He gestured me to sit on his left, the place of honour. As I made my way round the table I saw Judas and my disciples standing by the wall.

  After the chanting of the Ritual Blessings, I and the other guests reclined on couches to have our feet washed, as tradition required. Mary came over to me, followed by a servant carrying a bowl of water. To my amazement she produced a small casket, opened it and held it out to me with a smile: it was full of a thick ointment, whose heavy smell was similar to the one that had come from Lazarus’s tomb. She had used this costly balm to anoint her brother’s lifeless body, and once she had washed my feet she began rubbing it on them.

  As Martha served dinner, the house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume.

  How quick you are to see, Mary… you don’t say much, you listen. Among all the people who walked back to the house with us, you were the only one who heard the Judaean’s warning, apart from him you are the only one to appreciate the danger that confronts the man who saved your brother. As a sign of your eternal gratitude you are anointing him with perfume – an honorary gesture much used by the people of the East. But as you lean over me, are you thinking that it might soon be my dead body that you will have to embalm?

  From behind us I heard Judas mutter: “Why was this perfume not sold?” It must have cost as much as a year’s wages for a labourer, so why wasn’t the money given to the poor?

  This was the former Sicarius talking – with the cry for social justice that this offshoot of the Zealots likes to make their watchword – as well as the honest treasurer. You couldn’t really reproach him for it. But this was the first time since he joined the Twelve that he had criticized me openly – so what was on his mind?

  I turned to him:

  “You always have the poor with you! But me…”

  No, you won’t always have me.

  At daybreak the next morning, the Judaean went off to find out what was happening. Caiaphas had called an emergency late-night session of the Sanhedrin, which Nicodemus had attended. The Council listened to a series of witnesses, and when they heard the description of events at the tomb, the Sadducees were unanimous in protesting about this magic trick that would only reinforce people’s belief in resurrection. They then exchanged insults with the Pharisees, and Caiaphas had had to call them to order so the other witnesses could be heard.

  The accounts of the celebratory dinner united them in a shared sense of outrage. All the witnesses spoke of the vast crowd of Jews who had come to the house in an endless cortège, not only because I was there but to see Lazarus risen from the dead. Forgetting their long-standing hatred for each other, the Pharisees and Sadducees eventually managed to agree that it was vital to put an end to my activities.

  “What are we to do? This man is performing many signs. If we let him go on like this, everyone will believe in him, and the Romans will come and destroy both our Holy Place and our nation!”

  Then Caiaphas got up and spoke in his capacity as High Priest:

  “You know nothing at all! You do not understand that it is better for you to have one man die for the people than to have the whole nation destroyed!”

  In the end, reasons of State p
revailed over petty infighting – what was the son of a country carpenter worth compared with the safety of the Jewish people as a whole? He had the majority behind him: I had to die.

  Only Nicodemus had defended me against the rest. Ever the good Pharisee, he pointed out that Jewish case law requires the facts to be fully established and then judgement pronounced after hearing both parties.

  “Our Law does not judge people without first giving them a hearing to find out what they have done, does it?”

  But he was confronted by a vengeful mob. This Jesus was nothing but a village Pharisee, was there a single respected figure from his area who had any faith in him? Surely Nicodemus wasn’t from Galilee as well was he, that breeding ground for everything associated with Zealotry? If he looked closer, he would find that no prophet had ever come from that part of the country.

  When in the pale light of dawn Nicodemus told the Judaean about the meeting, he was still quivering with rage. The Council of the Sanhedrin had eventually decided to issue an arrest warrant: anyone who knew my whereabouts was to inform the authorities. And, since it was due to this resurrection that they were losing public support, Lazarus would have to die too!

  After which they all went home, very pleased with their night’s work.

  The Judaean was aghast. Lazarus would be protected by his wealth and personal connections, he said. But me, a little rabbi who was just one of the common people – whom the Pharisees in Jerusalem regarded as no more than a rabble who lived in ignorance of the Law – from now on I would have to stay hidden, and stop coming and going as I pleased.

  As he was talking, the Twelve gathered round, terrified. They were willing to follow an up-and-coming rabbi, but not a fugitive. In Galilee I had had no difficulty in galvanizing the crowds – so where were my supporters now? I had gradually turned everyone against me. First the Essenes, by criticizing their edict of hatred towards their enemies. Then Herod, whose police were on my trail. Then the Zealots, who after the scandal at the Temple believed that I was one of them – but what did I do yesterday? Fail to take advantage of their official welcome at the gates of Jerusalem. And now today I had been condemned to death by the highest authority in Israel before I had even done anything. So did I regard these dignitaries who wanted to have me killed as my neighbours too?