An hour passed. Aaron sat on a bench on the opposite side of the courtyard, deep in thought, absently pulling at his beard as he pondered the previous few days. In a way, this had been a troubling day for Aaron. Still bitter over his dismissal from the council, it was not that he harbored any sympathy for Azariah and his fellow Pharisees. Nor was there any faltering in his conviction that Jesus was the Messiah. But Aaron had committed his life to the Pharisees. How many thousands of hours had he spent in the yeshiva studying the Torah? How many times had he gone through the meticulous process of washing and purification so that he could be worthy of God’s approbation? He had carefully counted out his steps on the Sabbath lest he violate the limitations of a Sabbath day’s journey. He had strenuously avoided any contact with the Gentiles lest he be defiled. He watched what he ate, how he dressed, what he did almost hour to hour. Convenience had long since been pushed aside to make way for commitment. Wasn’t there some justification in taking pride in that kind of commitment? If Simeon and David and Deborah had seen that as some sort of spiritual elitism, then so be it. In a way, he had achieved a spiritual superiority over those who couldn’t be bothered with the burdens of the Law.
His change of heart about Jesus hadn’t simply wiped all of that away. Aaron was still a Pharisee down deep in his soul. So when Jesus had said that the publicans and the harlots would enter the kingdom of heaven before the Pharisees and the chief priests, that had hit him hard. Harlots in the kingdom of God? And yet, even as those doubts arose, back would come the other. A man born blind. Huldah and her deliverance. And Lazarus. He shook his head, sighing deep within his soul. One didn’t simply set aside Lazarus. Not after seeing him shuffle forth out of that tomb wrapped up in his burial clothes. It was incredible. Who could doubt this man’s power? How could Jesus be anything but the Messiah?
A disturbance across the way pulled him out of his thoughts. He could no longer see Jesus. People were moving in swiftly around the spot where Aaron had last seen him. Something was up. Feeling a sudden foreboding, he hauled himself up and hurried in that direction. Perhaps his help would be needed.
As Aaron pushed his way forward, he saw immediately what was drawing the people in. Jesus was still in his earlier position on a bench, but four other men now stood directly in front of him. Aaron felt his heart jump a little. They were Pharisees, and though Azariah was not one of them, Aaron recognized Caleb. If Caleb was there, it was because Azariah had asked him to be there. The other three were all prominent in the hierarchy. One of them also had a seat on the Great Council with Caleb and Azariah. He had been one of those who voted that Aaron should lose his seat on the governing body.
One of the men moved slightly, and then Aaron saw a fifth man. It was Menachem the Sadducee, Mordechai’s number one lackey. So, he thought, the battle had not been conceded. Of course not. The issues were too deep, the outcome too important to men like Azariah and Mordechai and Caiaphas. They had sent in another team for the next round.
Caleb stepped forward, smiling unctuously. Jesus did not rise.
“Master?” His voice oozed warmth and cordiality. “We would ask some questions of you. We hope you can help us understand things better.”
So that was it. Aaron should have guessed it. The Great Council feared Jesus’ popularity with the people, so they were launching a new offensive. These crafty wordmongers loved to debate. The more twisted and convoluted the question, the more they loved it. Aaron himself had been a master of it. That was one of the reasons he had risen so rapidly in the movement. He could carry on for hours with the best of them, debating every nuance, raising every obscure and arcane argument he could muster.
It was a continuing strategy of Jesus’ opponents. The questions were brilliant. Was it lawful to pay tribute money to Caesar? If a woman was married to more than one man, whose wife would she be in the resurrection? Which of all the commandments is the greatest? Each question was like a sharp sword, designed for one purpose and one purpose only: to expose Jesus for what he really was in the eyes of these men—a country peasant with no formal learning, no sophistry, no experience in the Law.
It was a trap that backfired on them in every case. Jesus wouldn’t be led into their snares. Instead, he turned the question around, taking them in completely different directions than they expected. Time after time, the questioners became the questioned, and the learned became the fools.
The crowd loved it. On this occasion, Menachem looked like he had been skewered with a lance. Caleb was sweating heavily and kept mopping at his brow, even though the day was relatively cool. The people began to openly jeer. They loved seeing these pompous donkeys bested in verbal battle. They loved seeing them twist like rags in the wind. They loved their dismay when Jesus didn’t fall into the pits they had dug for him, but instead tripped and tumbled into those pits themselves. The end result was that the delegation actually did more to endear Jesus in the hearts of the people than they did to discredit him.
By the time they were ready to quit, Aaron was filled with hot shame. To think that he had presumed that he might step forward and help Jesus, that his mind was better at this than the Messiah’s. He felt as much the fool as Menachem and Caleb and their associates.
Caleb shot Jesus one last searing look in an attempt to mask his retreat. He threw his cloak around himself and whirled away in a huff. “We don’t have to sit here and be insulted in this manner,” he muttered to his companions. They stalked off, the crowd opening a way for them to pass. They slunk away like some nocturnal animals caught suddenly in the glare of the sun.
Once they were gone, the people turned back to see what Jesus would say next. After several moments, his head lifted, and Aaron was surprised to see a touch of fire in his eyes. He let his gaze sweep over those gathered around him, and then he began to speak.
“The scribes and the Pharisees sit in Moses’ seat,” he said. To everyone’s surprise, he chose to use the Greek word kathedra. It carried much deeper significance than the idea of a mere place to sit. The kathedra was the official seat of high office, especially religious office, from which pronouncements and declarations were made.
By choosing that word, Jesus had made his meaning unmistakable. The Pharisees claimed for themselves the “seat” of Moses. They spoke as if they sat in his chair as prophets and servants of God.
“Therefore, whatsoever they bid you to observe, that observe and do. But do not after their works, for they say, and do not.”
Aaron leaned forward, feeling his heart drop. Not again. Not more condemnation.
“They bind heavy burdens on you which are grievous to be borne. They lay them on men’s shoulders, but they themselves will not so much as move them with one of their fingers. All their works they do to be seen of men. They make broad their phylacteries and enlarge the borders of their garments.”
Aaron winced. That one hit too close to home. It had become a kind of silent contest among his group to try to visibly outdo one another to prove their commitment and faith. The phylacteries, or tefillin as they were known in Hebrew, were small leather boxes worn on the forehead and forearm in response to a commandment in the Book of Deuteronomy. They had no set size defined in the Law. But in recent years, some of the leading Pharisees had begun to order larger phylacteries for themselves. Feeling somewhat pressured, Aaron himself had put aside the set that had been in his family for four generations and purchased a set half again as large. It had cost him dearly, for phylacteries required considerable attention to detail and laborious handwork.
He looked down, feeling his face burn a little. Along the bottom of his robe was a thick ribbon of blue. Again, this was in response to a commandment in the Torah. Blue was the color of the sky, and therefore, by extension, the color of heaven. It symbolized spirituality and purity. Here, too, the latest fashion among the Pharisees was to put wider and wider trimming on their garments. Some robes, such as the one Azariah wore to the council meetings, had trim a full hand-span wide. It was a way of sayi
ng to the world, “Look at me. See how spiritual I am.”
He glanced up to see if Jesus had singled him out, but Jesus wasn’t looking at him at all.
“The Pharisees love the uppermost rooms at feasts,” Jesus was saying, “and the chief seats in the synagogues. They love the greetings in the markets and to be called of men, ‘Rabbi, Rabbi.’ Be not called Rabbi: for one is your Master, even Christ; and you are all brethren.”
He paused for a moment, then went on. His voice elevated sharply, startling those around him. “Wo unto you, scribes and Pharisees—hypocrites!” The words were like hornets spilling out of a nest that had been disturbed. “You shut up the kingdom of heaven for others, but do not go in yourselves. Neither will you suffer them that are entering to go in. Wo unto you, scribes and Pharisees—hypocrites! You devour widows’ houses, and then for a pretense of righteousness make long prayers. Therefore, you shall receive the greater damnation.”
Aaron could feel the color draining from his face. This was a withering, scathing attack. The words almost smoked, like they were being drawn from the bowels of a fiery furnace.
“Wo unto you, scribes and Pharisees—hypocrites! You compass sea and land to make one proselyte, and when he is made, you make him twofold more the child of hell than yourselves. Wo unto you. You are blind guides. You say, ‘Whosoever shall swear by the temple, it is nothing; but whosoever shall swear by the gold of the temple, he is a debtor! You fools and blind! Which is greater? The gold, or the temple that sanctifies the gold?
“Wo unto you, scribes and Pharisees—hypocrites! You pay tithe of mint and anise and cummin, but omit the weightier matters of the law: judgment, mercy, and faith. These ought you to have done, but not to leave the other undone.”
Aaron wanted to crawl into a hole. It was as though every word was directed squarely at him. He swore by the gold of the temple to give added significance to his oaths. He had sat more than once at his table and carefully counted out every tenth leaf of a sprig of mint and set it aside for tithing. It was as though Jesus had secreted himself in Aaron’s house, in his very life, and watched him in his religious devotions. Aaron felt his ears flaming with every new condemnation.
“You blind guides!” Jesus cried, his eyes flashing. “You strain at a gnat and yet will swallow a camel. You make clean the outside of the cup and platter, but inside them, they are full of extortion and excess. O blind Pharisees, cleanse first that which is within the cup and platter, that the outside of them may be clean also.
“Wo unto you, scribes and Pharisees—hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed sepulchres. They indeed appear beautiful outward, but within they are full of dead men’s bones and of all uncleanness. So it is with you. You outwardly seek to appear righteous unto men, but within you are full of hypocrisy and iniquity. You serpents! You generation of vipers. How can you escape the damnation of hell?”
Jesus stopped, breathing hard. Gradually the passion in him subsided. His jaw relaxed, his eyes softened. And then, as surprising to the listeners as had been the explosion of indignation, sorrow followed. His shoulders slumped forward. His mouth pulled down. He was no longer looking into the faces of the people, but staring off into space, suddenly far away from them.
When he spoke again, his voice was hushed and heavy. “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem,” he cried, “thou that kill the prophets and stone them which are sent unto thee. How oft would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathers her chickens under her wings? But you would not! Behold, this generation shall not all pass away before your house is left unto you desolate. And I say unto you, you shall not see me henceforth, till you shall say, ‘Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord.’”
He fell silent, his head dropping until his chin nearly touched his chest. His fingers rubbed softly against his robes. All around there was not a stir. The words had been too shocking. Even his closest disciples had not been prepared for what had just happened. Then, at last, Jesus looked up. His eyes fell on Peter. “I would spend time with the Twelve,” he said quietly. He stood and moved away.
II
Aaron was surprised when he felt someone sit down beside him. He looked up. Deborah had joined him on the bench. David stood directly in front of him. He looked away again. “I’d rather not talk right now,” he said.
“Aaron,” David said. “We saw Luke. He told us what happened here.”
Aaron just shook his head.
“He wasn’t condemning you, Aaron,” Deborah said. “He was condemning some of the excesses that have crept into Pharisaism.”
“Don’t patronize me,” he snapped. “I know what Jesus said. You were not here.” He got to his feet, not meeting her eyes.
David stepped back as Aaron pushed past him. “Aaron?”
He stopped, not turning.
“It is not what Jesus says or does that makes him the Messiah, Aaron.”
Aaron’s head came around slowly.
“It is because he is the Messiah that he says those things and does those things.”
“I’m not sure I see the difference.”
“Let me tell you something, Aaron, something that I have told very few people. It happened more than thirty years ago, while I was staying in Bethlehem with Benjamin and his family.”
In spite of his desire to escape, Aaron didn’t move. “What?”
David told him. He spoke quietly and without dramatics. He told him of the angel appearing in the fields, of the glorious song of exultation that burst from the heavens, of going to the manger and seeing the newborn baby. Then he told him what Mary, the mother of Jesus, had told them, of Gabriel and his declaration that the child born of her would be of God.
For a long moment, neither of them spoke. Aaron looked at his sister. “Is that what you meant the other day?”
“Yes,” she exclaimed. “He is the Son of God, Aaron. True, he is the Messiah. Yes, he is the Prophet foretold by Moses. But above all that, he is literally, in every possible way we can imagine, the Son of God.”
He began to shake his head, not able to take in what that might mean.
David stepped closer to him. “If that is true,” he said, “and I testify with all the power of my being that I know it is true, then, whether it hurt you or not, whether it enrages the Pharisees and the Sadducees or not, who has a better right to declare what is pleasing to God and what is not?”
He was finished. He stepped aside for Aaron to pass. For a long time Aaron just looked at him. Then, lowering his head, he turned and walked away.
“Oh, David,” Deborah said, moving up beside him. “He’s hurting so much.” When David didn’t answer, she looked up into his face. “Will he be all right?”
He hesitated momentarily, then looked down at his wife. “Why do we love Jesus so, Deborah? Why are we willing to follow him anywhere, do whatever he asks, even put our lives at risk to protect him if necessary?”
“Because of who he is.”
“Exactly. Not just because of what he does, but who he is.”
She began to nod slowly. “Aaron has come to Jesus because of what he did, is that what you’re saying?”
“Yes. Think about it. There was Huldah and Lazarus. The man with the withered hand. All of those things were so overwhelming that Aaron couldn’t deny them. And it’s true, the miracles can draw people to Jesus so they can begin to learn more about who he is. But if miracles are the only basis for what we believe . . .” He shrugged, not needing to finish.
She turned and looked in the direction where Aaron had disappeared into the crowds, her eyes troubled. “What can we do?”
“Pray for him. Pray for his faith. And pray for Hava. Sharing his feelings with her may be exactly what he needs right now.”
Deborah studied his face, this man with whom she had shared her bed and her life, childbirth and sickness, joys and sorrows. “Do you know what else?” she said in a half whisper.
One eyebrow lifted. “What?”
“You are exactly what I
need right now, too.”
III
2–3 April, a.d. 33
Again that night, the women of the family returned to Bethlehem and the men went to Bethany. The sun was down by the time Jesus finally gave the signal that he was ready to leave the city, and so it was full dark when they made their way over the Mount of Olives.
The next morning, as they once again made their way toward Jerusalem, they received another shock.
It had rained during the night, and the morning was cool and pleasant. They moved at a leisurely pace, enjoying the freshness of the air. Simeon, David, and Ephraim walked together near the back of the group. Aaron had not appeared again, and no one knew where he was. David hoped he had gone to Jericho to talk to Hava. She was wise and steady. And she, too, believed in Jesus. She would be good for Aaron.
Then, for the third time in as many days, the group came to a stop near the spot where the lane that led to Bethphage branched off from the Bethany-Jerusalem road. Simeon looked around and saw where they were. “Not again,” he groaned. “What is it now?”
Then his eyes grew very wide. Those in the lead had come to a stop in front of a large dead tree.
Ephraim gave a low cry. “Look!” he said in awe.
It took Simeon a moment to realize what he was staring at. Then he gulped, feeling a sudden prickling down his back. It was the same tree! He was looking at the fig tree they had stopped at just twenty-four hours before to see if they could find fruit.
His head tipped back as his eyes took in every detail. The limbs were bare and shriveled. Here and there a solitary leaf twisted slowly in the breeze, but the luxuriant foliage of yesterday was gone. He looked down. The ground was a thick carpet of brown, dead leaves.
Ephraim fell back a step, his eyes darting here and there. Perhaps they had stopped at a different tree. It couldn’t be the same one. “Even if someone poisoned it,” he breathed, “it couldn’t have died that quickly.”
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