Dear and Glorious Physician (74 page)

“My grandson, Ezekiel, went down to the Jordan to be baptized by John,” said Isaac. “There was a great crowd at the river, and above its humming murmur could be heard John’s shouting exhortations as he baptized, demanding penance and promising the forgiveness of sins. In the interstices of these pronouncements he inserted his opinion of mankind in general — which was very low and very candid. The least of his cry to the people was, ‘Brood of vipers! Who has shown you how to flee from the wrath to come? Bring forth therefore fruits befitting repentance, and do not begin to say “We have Abraham for our father,” for I say to you that God is able out of these stones to raise up children to Abraham! For even now the ax is laid at the root of the trees; every tree, therefore, that is not bringing forth fruit is to be cut down and thrown into the fire.’

“The women wept, and the men beat their breasts, and the children cried, and all stepped to the bank of the river to be baptized and to confess what miserable sinners they were. I have no doubt that while they felt a thrill of holiness and cleanness they were also unbearably excited at the thought of the coming Saviour, who would make princes of them, in Israel, at His right hand. Some there were from Nazareth, and my grandson among them.”

John was in the midst of another, and louder, condemnation of humanity’s crimes — for he was a man who had no patience even with the smallest sin and little compassion in his soul — when suddenly Jesus appeared above him on the bank. What made all the people instantly lift their heads and regard Him in sudden silence? Only a few from Nazareth knew Him, yet they too were silent. He stood on the bank of the deep green river, and a shaft of sunlight brightened His golden hair and beard, and He looked down at John and the sobbing people with His blue and pitying eyes.

“Ezekiel has told me that He had the majesty of a king, the splendor of a great potentate, the glory of a prophet, the authority of a Moses, as He stood there in His peasant’s clothing and bare feet. One felt that a Visitation had appeared, and even those who knew Him were awed, for never before had they seen Him clothed in such supernal power.

“On seeing Him, John halted his reproachful speech, and he wept, holding up his hands to his kinsman. And then Jesus, in the midst of that inexplicable quiet, went down the bank and requested that John baptize Him. John was horrified; he folded his arms over his breast, after touching his forehead with his fingers.

“He said, in a faint voice, ‘But it is I who ought to be baptized by You!’

“Jesus smiled tenderly, and He looked into the faces of the people, and inclined His head. He stepped into the water and waited calmly. The people crowded the banks. Some of the Nazarenes muttered to their neighbors, ‘But this is Jesus, our neighbor, our carpenter, the son of Mary and Joseph, whom we know!’ They stared down at the two men in the river, one so savage in appearance, the Other so silent and full of dignity. And so John baptized Him, lifting the green water in his trembling hands, his face marvelously humble, and with tears in his eyes. The thick trees and bushes cast an emerald light on the two, yet the beard and head of Jesus appeared gilded.”

It was immediately after the baptism that a strange thing happened, though there had been some dispute as to the details. Jesus was suddenly illuminated as if the trees had parted to admit the sun in all its fiery light, and it was too dazzling to look upon Him. A white bird appeared from nowhere and rested on His shoulder, and a great Voice was heard from the sky: “You are My beloved Son! In You I am well pleased!”

“Ezekiel swears that this happened, my dear Lucanus,” said Isaac, and wiped tears from his old eyes on his sleeve, “and Ezekiel has never lied in his life. He returned to Nazareth in much agitation, and told me, and burst into sobs. ‘I have heard the voice of God!’ he cried over and over, holding his ears as if to retain that sound. He was beside himself with rapture and fear, and he is ordinarily a youth of much composure.

“When our fellow Nazarenes returned home, many of them were in the condition of Ezekiel. They crowded about the humble house of Mary and Jesus, where they had lived alone since Joseph had died. They shouted that Jesus come to them, and finally He emerged through the doorway, and they fell on their faces, prostrating themselves before Him, and He blessed them, smiling His kind and compassionate smile. He knew His people; He knew how poor they were, how despised by the Levites and Pharisees, how oppressed by Roman taxes, how hopeless. He loved them; they were His own.

“But some of the Nazarenes were namelessly angry and derisive. They declared that they had seen nothing of the miracle on the Jordan. What! This carpenter with His airs and graces! This son of Mary, who was even poorer than they were? What presumption! Prophets never came from Nazareth, nor from among such as they. If more gullible neighbors declared that they had seen Him illuminated, and had heard a Voice from heaven, and if a white bird had settled on His shoulder, it was all self-delusion. It was even blasphemy.”

Angry disputations came between friends and friends, between fathers and sons, between mothers and daughters, between neighbors and neighbors. It was shortly afterwards that Jesus left Nazareth, and it was said that He had gone into the desert for meditation. “He is a Zealot,” said some, darkly. “He will cause us sore trouble with Rome. Is not our life hard enough as it is, without this further affliction? Do you not remember what happened to us when the Romans hunted down the Zealots only a few months ago?”

It was very late now, and Isaac, though exalted, was old and weary. Lucanus could have listened all night, but seeing his host’s exhausted face, he rose and bid him good night and went to his room.

Alone, he wrote on his Gospel. The light of the yellow moon lay on his shoulder, and the lamp dimmed. A lonely dog barked, and distant jackals answered in their wild voices. Lucanus wrote rapidly, not pausing until he had inscribed Isaac’s story completely. Dawn finally changed the sky to pearl, and birds cried out in greeting to the still unrisen sun. Lucanus lay down on his bed, prayed, and fell peacefully to sleep. He dreamt that he stood on the bank of the Jordan, and that One in the river, clothed with light, emerged toward him, and he sank to his knees. He felt himself then bathed in radiance, and he put his hands over his eyes.

In the morning the youth, Ezekiel, knocked on Lucanus’ door, and, opening it, Lucanus saw that his face was full of fright and uncertainty. He pushed a package into Lucanus’ hands and stammered, “This was brought from Tiberias this morning by a Roman soldier, for you.”

“Do not be afraid,” said Lucanus, kindly, touching the boy on his shoulder. “They are merely letters for me, sent by my friend in Jerusalem, Hilell ben Hamram.”

He sat on the bed and read the letters, which had been delivered at Hilell’s home. There was a letter from Iris, another from Aurelia, his sister, one from Priscus, and still another from Plotius. He read them all with love. Sometimes he sighed. Would he ever again see these who had his affection? His mother was old. But for the first time she did not implore him to return to Rome, even for a visit. She wrote: “Dear Son, you must do as your spirit commands you, and I will understand. I have had a dream in which I was told that you no longer belong to your family, and that God has called you and you must obey Him. But remember us with love, for truly you are in our hearts always.”

There was much happy news from the family, and Lucanus rejoiced with them. But Tiberius Caesar was failing, and Rome secretly hoped for his death, for he had become most terrible and cruel, totally without pity or compassion. His crimes were legion. It was as if he were taking some awful vengeance on his Empire and people. Lucanus sighed. Let people beware the anger of their rulers, he thought, for they are guilty of his excesses.

He now read Hilell’s letter, and with deepening interest and excitement. First of all, Hilell was waiting for Lucanus’ return in order to proceed with the wedding of Arieh ben Elazar and Leah.

He had a visitor in his house. “You will remember, my dear Lucanus, that I wrote you of Saul of Tarsus, or Gaius Julius Paulus as he is known in his Roman citizenship. He is a Pharisee, and was formerly of the most narrow religious convictions and a profound observer of the Law in spite of his position among the Romans and his high estate as an administrator and a lawyer. He was also a prideful and arrogant man, of a very supple tongue, like most lawyers, and the most unbending opinions. Partly this is because of his temperament. He is given to strong enthusiasms and dogmatism, and fits of haughtiness. He would never let anyone forget that he was both a Roman citizen and a Jew of a noble and influential family, and insolence, to him, was unbearable and must be punished at once. For a young man he was enormously rigid, and, in his pride, most terribly honest. In courts of law his forensic genius was much feared and admired.

“Above all things, he was always a devout Jew, hating those who even dared to question the Torah in the slightest detail. When he heard of Jesus, the humble Nazarene, and the rumors that He was the Son of God, he was outraged and personally insulted. ‘Nothing good ever came out of Nazareth’, he once wrote to me. ‘When God sends us our Messias, He will arrive like the lightning, among the company of the archangels, and with the trumpets of the Lord our God, and all will know Him and the nations of the world will bow down before Him. How dare this peasant, this carpenter, this Jesus of Nazareth, be proclaimed the Saviour by the ignorant? This is blasphemy before the face of Jehovah. I am filled with rage, and just umbrage. The Law has been violated by fools and the unlettered masses. You know how I have always despised the unlearned, who chant their prayers by rote and know nothing of the true Law and its implications. If I had my way I would confine them to the outer courts of the Temple, for their smell and their dull faces are an affront before the glory of God! And their sacrifices should be rejected.’

“I fear, Lucanus, that my letters to him only increased his anger. How could I, Hilell ben Hamram, of a great Jewish family, a scholar, a man of position, honored in the Temple, be so deceived by rumors of this Jesus, this Man from the stark hills and gorges and gullies of Nazareth? A spell had been cast upon me. It was intolerable! And now the scattered Christians were causing much trouble in Damascus, quarreling with their neighbors, flouting the Law, declaring that the Messias had been born of a virgin, in a humble family, had preached throughout Israel, outraging the priests who were the guardians of the Law, speaking against the Pharisees who administered the Law, and calling them a generation of vipers and hypocrites. And then He had been justly crucified for inciting the people against Rome, to their mortal danger!

“As a Roman administrator he had gone on his lawful duty to Damascus to put down what the Romans called insurrection, but what he declared was blasphemy. He rode with his company of fellow lawyers, and with an entourage of Roman soldiers, full of vengeance and fury. So inflamed was he that he would not pause at an inn for the night, but rode on like the whirlwind to Damascus.

“And now, as my friend and a guest in my house, he tells me the most marvelous and the strangest of stories. He is full of passion and excitement as he repeats the story, as if I were a disbeliever and he the evangelist who must convince me!

“He was riding ahead of his entourage on the road to Damascus, his hair and clothes blowing in the wind of his passage. Suddenly his horse screamed out and reared up into the air, and Saul was sore put to it to control the beast. His entourage reared behind him, struggling with their horses and cursing; they milled about on the road, slashing their whips, while the front hoofs of the animals beat the air in frenzy and the harnesses glittered in the moonlight like agitated silver.

“Then before Saul a tremendous light appeared, like a new sun, and in the midst of it he saw a radiant Figure, crowned with thorns and clothed with blinding radiance. And the Figure lifted His wounded hands and said to Saul in a great yet gentle voice, ‘Saul, Saul, why do you persecute Me?’

“Saul gazed upon the Figure, half sheltering his eyes from the light. And an awful trembling came to him, and a sense of the most devastating guilt, and a powerful adoration. He did not know what to do, or what to answer. His soul was torn and shattered. This was the Messias, whom he was about to persecute, and whose followers he was about to destroy! He looked on the glorious Face, and his heart leaped for joy, and in humility. Human flesh could not long endure the vision. Saul was stricken with unconsciousness, and he fell from his horse.

“Some there were in his entourage who had seen nothing. Some declared that they had perceived a dazzling light, and had been filled with terror. In any event, Saul returned to Jerusalem, a changed and uplifted man, full of tears, full of mingled joy and anguish and passionate love. He had seen the Resurrected. His whole vehement nature accepted what that same nature had not long ago rejected with contempt and loathing.

“Now he is in my house. He declares that he will go at once to Peter, in Joppa, to be baptized, and to receive instructions. He will then go on his own mission. He has said to me, ‘He, Our Lord, came not only to the Jews, but to the Gentiles! I will become a voice to the Gentiles, and lead them to salvation!’ Remember this of the haughty Gaius Julius Paulus!

“I have persuaded him to wait until you return from your visit to Mary and to Galilee. He is still a very impatient man, and at first refused. He could not delay a moment in the work he must do. I have told him everything about you, my dear friend. And now he declares that you and he will go together to Peter. I do not know what Peter will make of him, Peter, the poor Galilean, the humble fisherman. Saul is so temperamental a man; he even now cannot forget that he is of a noble Jewish house and a Roman citizen. He is imbued with enthusiasm and adoration. Will he quarrel with Peter, and Peter with him? Saul believes he has received a special dispensation from Our Lord, one, he even hinted, which was much greater than the grace bestowed on the Apostles. Will he be arrogant with Peter? Humility comes with difficulty to him. Peter saw, and believed. Saul did not see the Lord in the flesh, but he now believes with an exultation that is sometimes intimidating. He even lectures me, and admonishes me, I who attempted to convince him long before. It is like having a storm in the house; he paces all night long, muttering to himself and praying.

“Yesterday he said to me, ‘I am much interested in this Lucanus, and the stories you have told me of him. But he is a Gentile, and must be convinced by me, for the Gentiles have obdurate hearts, and I am commanded to bring them into the Faith’. I restrained my smiles. Sometimes he almost convinces me I am an ignorant man, unaware of the message of the Messias.

“And now, my dearest Luke, we await you.”

This was the first time that Lucanus had been called by the affectionate diminutive. He read and reread Hilell’s letter. And his excitement grew. He had an intimation that he and Saul would understand each other, for neither had seen the Messias in the flesh. They had seen with their spirits only, and surely the vision of the spirit was purer than the vision of mortal eyes. He thought of Saul with a sudden affection, which was inexplicable. He smiled as he considered that proud and vehement man, a Roman citizen as he was a Roman citizen. Saul would accomplish great things. He would speak with emphatic authority. He would be a lash to the Apostles, who still suspected the Gentiles, and feared them. He would be a lash to the Gentiles.

Lucanus brought out his paints after he had dined in his room. He would portray Mary for the ages. He thought of her beautiful and tranquil features, her majesty, her grace, her serene and unworldly aspect. He thought of her piercing but gentle eyes, her heroic smile, her sweet demeanor. He began to work. But Mary eluded him. She was at once old and yet immortally young, simple yet profound. How could mere pigments portray her, the Mother of God?