by Jay Parini
“It’s very good.”
Indeed, I knew I could work with this, as it chimed nicely with one of the sayings of Jesus, and I teased out from Paul some of its implications. He had, since the trouble in Antioch some years earlier, thought deeply about the nature of the Law, its implications for the Greeks who came to God through Jesus. He now recited a flurry of quotations from the scriptures, combining them into a hymn of his own, finding a fresh tempo:
Not one is righteous, no, not one!
No one seeks God.
All turn aside from him, do wrong, do no good thing.
Their throats are graves!
Their tongues deceive!
The venom of the asp lies under their lips.
The way of peace eludes them.
“This is all so good,” I said. “One hears the voice of David in your phrases. But what about God’s role here, and the path that Jesus opens?”
Paul twisted in thought. I had never seen him so convulsed, so eager to forge a view, to separate the strands of argument and lay his meaning bare. When he burst out with language, I could hardly write down everything he uttered, though he would mercifully pause and say, “You’ve got that, I hope?”
I got fragments, which I would rework in the evening, making them whole. My methods had evolved over the years, and I had some confidence in my ability to complete Paul’s thoughts, to emend and revise them. I knew what he intended, or believed I did. God was, I think, working in me, moving my hand.
He nearly bit the air as he spoke now. “The righteousness of God has been made evident apart from the Law, although the prophets and the Law reveal it: We who emulate the faithfulness of Jesus are, like him, made whole. Everyone has sinned and falls short of God’s glory. We are splintered but made whole by God’s grace, the gift of his son.”
I liked this, however rough and scattered, and knew I could improve upon it. The trick was to anticipate the direction of his thought, to complete in reality what he had begun in hope.
Over several days, Paul churned through ideas about redemption, the meaning of the fall of man, the grace of God at work in the world, even the meaning of the Christ’s death and resurrection. “All thinking in the Way is resurrection thinking,” he told me. “We die to ourselves. Lose our little selves. We take on the larger mind of the Christ, hiding in him as he lodges in us.”
“Remember that we must live in this world,” I said, “at least for now.”
He raked his beard with scrawny fingers. “Write this: ‘Do not be conformed to this world. Resist it. Find the will of God, and be transformed in the flesh. Find whatever is good, acceptable, and perfect.’ ”
“Perfection? Can we ask them for this?”
“God works for the benefit of those who love him, who are called according to his purpose.”
I reminded him that Prisca had wondered about the relation of body and soul.
“There is no soul apart from the body,” he said. “And no body that does not flourish in the soul. So I will appeal to them all, by God’s will and mercy, to put forward their bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God. The Christ showed us with his body how to perfect himself before heaven.”
“This is going to be difficult in practice,” I said.
“Tell them that God asks only what is possible, in the measure of their faith. No more, no less. Tell them to give everything they have. But not more.”
Not more than everything! I would need to consider that again. Would anyone understand? Or find it possible?
Paul defended his role as apostle to the Greeks, saying that he had a plan. He would go first to Jerusalem, would meet with the Pillars, and then make the journey to Rome. A clear path opened in his head, a trajectory, with Spain as a distant goal, a step beyond Rome to what he called “the farthest edge of the world as we know it.”
I reminded Paul that some would find his assertions troubling and provocative.
In response to this, he added a warning to the Roman circle: “Take note of those who create dissent and trouble, opposing the good things you have been taught. Avoid these people. For they do not serve the Lord our Christ as they attempt to satisfy their own appetites; they flatter and deceive. I would have you wise to what is good and guileless to what is evil.”
After several further weeks of reading over what we had done, I realized that we had assembled the core of the Good News in a succinct and suggestive manner. With a feeling of triumph, I dispatched this letter to Phoebe, who would soon be making her way to Rome. (I gave another copy to Quintus, a commercial traveler we had met in Corinth, who had business in Rome as well. This letter was so good, and so useful, it must find its destination.)
The Roman letter marked the end of our time in Ephesus, which concluded in a flourish of sparks. A number of our friends in the Way had been seized, and they would be taken into the amphitheater for an interrogation led by Demetrius, the intemperate silversmith, who had convinced so many of his fellow tradesmen that the Way posed a threat to their livelihood. The Jews in this city had seized on and multiplied the resentments against us, hoping to drive us away.
Lucius, Paul’s jailor, told us about the forces marshalling against us, and he took it upon himself to liberate Paul, saying: “I believe they will come for you and kill you. So take note. The door will be left open briefly tonight, when I step outside after dark. You will know what to do.”
Paul kissed Lucius on the forehead and thanked him.
That night, after the others had fallen asleep and when Lucius stepped outside into the yard, Paul gently pushed at the door, and it swung free.
Outside, Lucius said, “You must leave Ephesus in the morning. It’s not safe here, I assure you.”
“Will you be in trouble for my sake?”
“It doesn’t matter,” Lucius said. “We have enough prisoners here.”
Paul came to my room that evening, and at first I thought it must be a ghost.
“We must go to the amphitheater in the morning,” said Paul. “I can’t abandon them.”
“But you can’t help them. They will murder you.”
“I’ve been murdered before. Yet here I am. Do you recognize me, Luke?”
I could only smile. But I would not, under any circumstances, allow him to go to the amphitheater.
“You’re telling me what to do?”
I said, “I’ve devoted myself to you. I think you know this. And there is work to be done elsewhere. Antioch calls us. And we have the Collection.”
Paul sighed. And I knew that, for once, he would listen.
Chapter Sixteen
LUKE
On the night of our arrival in Antioch, we were shown such a quantity of gold—Phoebe laid it out on a table in her house, the glittering coins—that I wondered how we might safely transport this bounty to the Pillars. It would be dangerous to send it ahead with messengers, and of course Paul relished the idea of putting the Collection on a similar table in Peter’s house himself, with James standing to one side and wringing his hands.
“We carry this ourselves,” said Paul.
Timothy had recently joined us again, so we had three men to transport the Collection. The famine had, sadly and cruelly, continued in Jerusalem without respite, and grain was beyond the reach of the poorest in our circle. We heard rumors of children and the elderly dying for lack of nourishment. The rest could manage, but uncomfortably. This gift had become more than symbolic. It would save many of them from starvation.
We set off quickly, as Paul saw no reason to wait, sailing for Troas in the hot, unblinking sun. Paul looked triumphant as he stood on the foredeck and gripped the rails, his face turned upward. He was the earth itself, hard-packed, with cracks in his face like a baked mudflat. He had aged, his sparse beard going white. Hair had mostly disappeared from his head, with a slight fringe at t
he back and sides, a few isolated strands on top. His eyebrows bushed, unruly and white as well. But the quick eyes always caught you, alive with movement. As ever, he leaned close to talk, too close, whispering or shouting, depending on his mood.
We rounded a spar with purple cliffs and entered the calm harbor, where the water was so clear one could see schools of orange fish that burst into light and faded into shadow. Troas had once been famous for a school established by Aristotle, and we still thought of it in these terms, although the philosophical rumblings had long disappeared. There we called at once on Judah, a prosperous fishmonger who owned several vessels and was a member of our circle, and he invited us to stay with him for as long as we found it useful.
We shared our sacred meal in his good company on the second story of his narrow house overlooking the harbor and held a gathering with a dozen or so members of the Way, who were drawn from local Jews and Greeks. Paul led the meeting and, afterward, preached for three full hours. I hadn’t seen him so enthused in a while, with language pouring from him. The room seemed to relish the stories about what had happened to us in Galatia, Corinth, and Ephesus, and Paul drew everyone forward in their seats with excitement, and some of them would call out in affirmation to whatever he said. This was the purest kind of performance, theatrical in manner, with Paul taking on voices like a man possessed.
But the evening took a dark turn when, toward the end of Paul’s reflections, the son of our host, a boy of eleven, fell backward through the open window and landed on the path below. His name was Eutychus, a skinny talkative boy who looked younger than his age, with wide brown eyes and curly auburn hair. Paul had been charmed by him and spent more time than usual in his company, telling him stories about our adventures.
“The boy is a wonder,” Paul had said, “with pressing questions. All good questions.”
We ran outside and watched in horror as Judah cradled the boy in his arms, kneeling in the dirt with him, weeping. Blood bathed the boy’s face, pouring from a wound just above the brow. The eyes rolled back in his head, the whites marbled with red. The mother wept as well, standing at the side, held aloft by two friends.
“He is gone,” Judah said, and several women trilled their tongues in grief.
I never saw Paul so focused or determined to summon the spirits. He knelt beside the boy and held a hand out over him, and he prayed passionately, “Dear Jesus, Jesus, Jesus! Hear me, son of God, Jesus, our Christ. Heal this child. Heal! Almighty father, waken the boy from this slumber. In the name of your beloved son.”
After only a moment, as if thinking it over, Eutychus opened his eyes, wiped a swash of blood from his brow with one hand, looked dismissively at the vermillion smear on his small palm, and smiled, saying, “I’m fine, Mother. Why are you crying? Why is everyone afraid?”
Judah knelt before Paul, still in tears. I thought he would kiss Paul’s feet.
“Stand, Judah. I did nothing,” Paul told him. “God will, if he chooses, answer prayers offered in his son’s name. With him, anything is possible. I have seen this. The spirit rises when we bow before the throne of the Almighty with the name of Jesus on our lips.”
Paul knew how to handle these situations, and he had God’s ear, that much I knew.
I myself thought that Eutychus had tumbled to his death. It was a high window, and the fall was precipitous, the ground unforgiving. But once they cleaned the blood from his face with a wet cloth, he seemed even better than before, even quite happy, moving easily among the gathering. He chattered and basked in their love, now amplified by his revival.
Paul never appeared livelier, or more spirit-filled.
Taking Timothy aside after the meeting, Paul said to him, “Walk with me in the morning, if you will. To Assos. I need to stretch.”
Paul asked me to accompany them, too, but it was a steep climb over a stony pass in the hot sun with near-vertical patches. I preferred to go by ship, and I didn’t actually mind a few days away from Paul. I had been deeply in his company for some time and looked forward to a break from that torrent.
Paul was glad, in any case, to walk with Timothy, who was eager for his mentor’s company. I watched them shrink into the distance, the slight young man with curly hair and Paul, hunched and brown and bald, always with a stick in hand since he could lose his balance unexpectedly. (It was for this reason I tried to discourage his walk to Assos, but he ignored my plea for caution.)
A number of friends joined us there, including Aristarchus, that quiet but lovely young man from Thessalonica, who had worked with Jason in the leather trade. That he had come such a distance to find us moved me. I had forgotten how much I liked him.
Paul and Timothy joined us three days later in Assos, where we all boarded a large sailing vessel that took us to Miletus, stopping along the way at the port of Mytilene on the southeastern edge of Lesbos, the home of Sappho, the lyric poet who wrote so heartbreakingly about love. We also stopped briefly at Chios, the birthplace of Homer and Ion. I knew this pause in our journey would excite the apostle, who appeared to hold in memory all of Ion’s ten thousand lines.
“There is poetry in the air,” said Paul.
I stood beside him on a shingle of bone-white pebbles that scrambled after the tide with a rhythmical sucking sound, and there he recited Ion in a voice that carried over the knock of waves against the rocks:
And the long white cloud continues,
This dear world wherein we dwell:
Part heaven and part hell.
So the gods allow us to be fed
With fruit of words, these openings to worlds
Beyond our present: fragrant portals
Where we enter, linger, breathe, begin
these orisons, with tongues of many angels.
Nobody in my experience could recite poems with such feeling, the words and phrases ravishing the air. Paul had no ear for music as such, which had surprised me. He simply could not sing, however much he tried, often to the amusement or despair of friends at gatherings. Instead, language was his instrument, and he played it well, summoning the music of ideas.
“God spoke to me last night,” Paul said that morning. “He has asked me to prepare myself for the conclusion of this mission. My work is done. I’ve given what I have, though—I confess—I long to go to Rome, even to Spain.”
We would donate our Collection—an impressive sum—to the Way in Jerusalem, and it would surely help them through a dark time of famine and self-doubt. Perhaps the diverging roads of the Way would merge again, if luck held. But I wondered if our gift would really provoke a change of heart. Gifts can also stir resentments, as nobody actually likes to stand at the receiving end of charity. Gratitude is a difficult emotion to master. Perhaps I should have kept my worries to myself, but I asked Paul directly if James and Peter would appreciate our work on their behalf.
“You ask me things I can’t answer,” he said. “It is annoying when you do this.”
I did my best to let arrows like this skim off my breastplate. I had a good deal of natural armor and could withstand occasional attacks by the apostle. But I prayed that God would fortify and protect me from these unnecessary jibes. I never quite knew what provoked them. It was better to put my head down and proceed, as a vision of loveliness opened before us.
At Rhodes, perhaps the most beautiful of the islands on this coast, our ship stopped for two days to unload a quantity of grain in heavy sacks and to collect crates of amphorae filled with wine and oil. From the deck we could see the ruins of the Colossus, a bronze statue of unimaginable proportions. It had once stood aloft in the brilliant sky, improbably balanced, before an earthquake toppled it. One could not hold even the thumb of this figure in one’s arms, it was so mammoth. Now untold quantities of bronze lay at the harbor’s entrance, glistening at dawn, a ruined Leviathan asleep in these green waters, never to waken.
“Why does this make me so sad?” Paul asked, gazing over the rail of our ship at the ruins.
Was this yet another omen, a sign of his demise?
Timothy would have none of Paul’s dark mood. “The pagan world must fall, must fail. It has already failed! This statue—I see it as a kind of false triumph. I hope the sea carries it away.”
Paul smiled at his protégé. “You say wise things, my dear friend.”
Timothy often said foolish things, in fact, but I had no wish to correct him. The young speak confidently in ways that must embarrass anyone over a certain age. I know that I, as a young man, believed quite firmly that I had a complete knowledge of medical science. That “complete” knowledge dwindled year by year as I came to know how little I knew or could possibly know. I grew increasingly wary of predictions. As Herophilus, the legendary anatomist who taught in Alexandria, once said, “Don’t predict. Observe and be still.”
When I mentioned this to Paul, he said, “You’re a fount of irrelevant quotations, dear Luke. Herophilus! Another of your medical mountebanks.”
I forgave Paul for this and other rebukes, knowing he couldn’t help himself. As we set sail for Palestine, I saw he was fearful, unhappy, and overwrought, as if he understood that nothing could go as we hoped, not in Jerusalem, where so many in the Way had no understanding of Paul’s vision. His words would feel oddly discordant to them, and—with so many angry Jews on full alert—he must have understood that he faced the challenge of his life. From what we had heard, James lay in wait for us, eager to make light of our gift.
We changed for another vessel in Patara, on the southern coast of Lycia; its hold was filled with a large quantity of timber, and it listed ominously to port. Which meant the captain kept urging us to stand at the starboard rails: never a welcoming command. We hugged the shoreline closely on our journey to Caesarea, stopping for a full week at Tyre, a major port in Phoenicia. With so much timber in store, the ship required twenty men to unload it, and this cargo was immediately replaced by copper and iron, as well as hides.