The Crown and the Cross: The Life of Christ (30 page)

At Bethphage the road was lined with fig trees which grew in the rocky soil and produced well under the influence of the
moreh
. By now Bethany was out of sight behind the shoulder of the mount, and the stream of people pouring out of Bethphage to join the procession filled the rocky track and prevented anyone from passing.

At Bethphage they had already entered the outskirts of Jerusalem, although the main part of the city was still out of sight around the shoulder of the Mount of Olives on the right. Here, they began to meet the vanguard of those coming out through the gates. The Jerusalem Jews were somewhat more familiar with the ancient writings than those from the provinces, for the city abounded in teachers and synagogues where the pronouncements of the prophets were read regularly during the sacred services. The significance of the way in which the procession was organized struck some of these immediately. For Jesus had chosen to enter Jerusalem in the manner which the prophets had said would characterize the coming of the Messiah, “upon a colt, the foal of an ass.”

A shout of praise and wonder went up from these newcomers, to be caught up and echoed again and again along the line of people as word of its cause was passed back to them. And with that shout, Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem became something other than the usual procession of a teacher with a considerable following.

“Hosanna to the Son of David!” someone cried.

Instantly a dozen answering cries arose. “Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest!”

These phrases were usually chanted by the people as a response in the sacred readings of the psalm which began with:

O give thanks unto the Lord for He is good:

Because His mercy endures forever.

Like a flame sweeping through a field of dry straw, a burst of fervor swept through the crowd, firing those who had come from Bethany and Bethphage with excitement over what, it seemed, had now become the triumphal entry of a king into the Holy City.

Progress was slow, for the crowd had now begun to break palm and olive branches from the groves and gardens that lined the roadway to cast them before Jesus. Some, in the sheer excess of enthusiasm, took off their robes and spread them on the rocky path to make a carpet over which He could pass.

As they marched, the people continued to cry, “Hosanna to the Son of David!” until Simon Peter, his tall form easily visible above the heads of the crowd, started to shout the verses of the psalm which, according to tradition, was chanted as a welcome to pilgrims coming to Jerusalem for the feasts.

“Save now, I beseech thee, O Lord,” he intoned in a voice that carried easily along the procession and echoed from the shoulder of the mountain beside the road.

“O Lord, I beseech thee, send now prosperity,” the people answered in unison.

“Blessed be He who comes in the name of the Lord,” Peter chanted.

“We have blessed you out of the house of the Lord,” the people replied.

“God is the Lord, which hath showed us the light.”

“Bind the sacrifice with cords, even unto the horns of the altar,” the people answered.

“Thou art my God and I will praise thee.”

“Thou art my God, I will exalt thee.”

Then, as was the custom, the entire body chanted in unison the concluding verse, “O give thanks unto the Lord for He is good. For His mercy endures forever.”

As they rounded an outthrust crag, a breathtaking vista of the city momentarily lay before them. The temple in the northerly part of Jerusalem was still hidden behind the slope of the Mount of Olives but the sacred Mount of Zion was clearly visible in the warm spring air. Terrace upon terrace ascended the slope of the mount, surrounding the luxurious palaces of the high priest, the Maccabees, and the richer men of the city. Upon the summit was the great palace of Herod, located where the palace of David had risen almost a millennium before. Even the turreted battlements of the fortress, tangibly threatening, could not detract from the rich beauty of the gardens, the green brought forth by the spring rains for this most sacred of all seasons.

This was the real Jerusalem, the monument to a God who had made the people His very own through the ages, a place of worship and thanksgiving for His mercy and His divine love. Seen thus, hardly anyone could doubt that Jerusalem would endure forever, in spite of venal priests, in spite of injustices, intolerance, cruelty, in spite of the deliberate forgetting of God’s laws.

The long procession was now passing over the ridge that marked the highest part of the road before beginning the descent of the Mount of Olives to the gates of Jerusalem itself.

As it moved, it gathered new recruits, more and more people joining the throng to swell the shouting that floated across the Kedron Valley to the guards at the gate through which the procession must pass.

It was too late for Caiaphas to stop Jesus now. The entire complement of Abiathar’s guards would have been thrust aside by the sheer numbers of the throng which now accompanied the Nazarene.

As the road began to descend, the view of Jerusalem was for a moment cut off, and as if the removal of the threat posed by the momentary glimpse of Herod’s citadel had released them, the disciples led by Simon Peter cast off all restraint.

“Blessed be the King!” they shouted boldly now. “The King who comes in the name of the Lord! Peace in heaven and glory in the highest!”

Some Pharisees who owned estates along the road had come out to see the cause of the clamor. Horrified that the disciples had dared to name Jesus King, an act of treason, they called out to Him: “Master, rebuke Your disciples!”

Jesus drew the animal He was riding to a halt in order to answer the Pharisees.

“If these should hold their peace,” He said, “the stones would immediately cry out.”

At His tone and His words, the Pharisees fell back in horror, but when the people heard Him thus announce His own kingship, a great shout burst from them again as they hailed Him for the Son of David so long expected by the Jews as their Savior.

“Behold, the whole world has gone after Him!” one of the Pharisees said in amazement.

Moving again, the procession followed the path as it climbed slightly, following a short but rugged section of roadway until it came out upon a broad ledge of solid rock almost like a floor. Here the full glory of Jerusalem burst before their eyes.

Seen across the deepest part of the Kedron Valley, the effect was that of a great golden city rising from an abyss, a truly spectacular and inspiring sight. Dwarfing even the beauty and magnificence of the city itself was the broad area of the sanctuary with the temple courts opened out around it like the pages of a book. The sun shone with its fullest brilliance and the great golden dome blinded the eyes like the glory of God itself. Even the plume of black smoke rising from the altars of sacrifice could not detract from the beauty of the scene as, clearly heard across the intervening depths, came the clear tone of a Levite’s trumpet, calling the devout to worship.

The breathtaking beauty of the city, bursting on them so suddenly, momentarily stilled the clamor of the crowd. In the silence only one voice was heard, a voice torn by anguish almost beyond bearing.

“O Jerusalem! Jerusalem!” Jesus cried as tears ran down His cheeks. “If you had known, at least in this day, the things which belonged to your peace! But now they are hid from your eyes. The day shall come when your enemies shall cast a trench about you and compass you around and keep you in on every side. And shall lay you even with the ground, and your children with you. They shall not leave in you one stone upon another, because you knew not the time of your visitation!”

Jesus’ voice broke on the last word and He turned His eyes away, reaching blindly for the rope as He started His colt moving again.

My house is a house of prayer, but you have made it a “den of thieves.”

Luke 19:46

Pontius Pilate was not in a pleasant mood. For more than six years he had ruled in Judea for the Emperor Tiberius, longer than any procurator before him, more than long enough, in his opinion, for any one man to be assigned to such an outpost of hell. It was not so much that the climate or even the country itself was bad. Caesarea on the seacoast was tolerable enough, and the winter palace of Herod Antipas in Jericho from which he had just come was quite comfortable, as was the lovely villa Herod had placed at his disposal at Tiberias on the Sea of Galilee. There were many good things, in fact, to be said for the land. What made life so burdensome in this part of the world was the people, their eternal contentiousness, their constant vying with each other for control, and the various contrasting shades of nationality represented among them. In fact, all Jews seemed alike in only one respect: a hatred for Rome.

Other captive peoples had shown their good judgment, in Pilate’s opinion, by accepting Roman rule for what it was, the strongest civilizing influence the world had ever known. Rome had almost finished pacifying Gaul, and great universities, population centers with a real culture of their own, were springing up all over that pleasant and prosperous land. Even the barbarians to the north occasionally had the good sense to accept Roman rule philosophically and absorb from it what they could—while, it was true, preparing for new resistance.

But at least they fought battles like soldiers and died bravely on the battlefield.

The Jews were different, and even after years as ruler of Judea, Pilate admitted that he had never come really to understand them. The priestly class, under Caiaphas and Annas, were as luxury-loving and greedy as any Roman official. Those impulses Pilate could understand, but the self-righteousness of the Pharisees and the absurd attention to ritual was another matter. Those he would never comprehend, but he had noticed that when it came to the consummation of a shrewd business deal, they were as ruthless as any, rarely practicing what was taught in their ancient writings.

Then there were the fanatics, like the followers of the fellow Barabbas who was a prisoner in the dungeons of the Antonia in Jerusalem. One thing alone had saved Barabbas, the accident of Roman citizenship. Even a brigand could carry his case to Rome, though the emperor nearly always supported the decisions of his provincial governor.

If ever there was a senseless rebellion, that was it, Pilate thought as he rode from Jericho to Jerusalem this fine spring morning. Caiaphas had been angry because his own guards for the temple had not been able to handle the situation. Knowing Caiaphas, Pilate was sure that if he had been able to keep the swiftly rising revolt in hand, Barabbas would have been spirited away from the temple and the dagger of a sicarius would have found its way between his ribs before he had had a chance to demand a Roman trial. Caiaphas had handled situations like that before and Pilate admired his thoroughness—up to a point.

The forces with Barabbas had been small, only a few turbulent Galileans. Success could have come only through arousing enough people to join him once the fighting began. Considering that the city teemed with robbers and those who hated Rome, enough might easily have joined Barabbas if the affair had lasted sufficiently long to make the people believe Roman power was unable to control the situation. It was this possibility which had moved Pilate to order his small complement of Roman soldiers out of the Antonia and into the temple itself when the first outcry of revolt was raised. Revolution, he had learned by experience, was much like a forest fire. Stamp out the first blaze and nothing follows, but let the fire make only a little headway and it quickly flames out of control.

Pilate smiled now as he remembered Caiaphas’s shocked protest when the Galileans were cut down on the floor of the temple. The desecration, as they called it, had been a good lesson for Caiaphas as well as for the rebels and the rest of the population, a warning that Pontius Pilate had no intention of letting things get out of hand. Or of letting Caiaphas take too much upon himself either, lest he become too ambitious. Pilate had once, in a short-lived attempt to understand them when he had first been assigned to Judea, read a history of the Jews. He had quickly learned that there was a vast difference between many of the basic concepts of their religion and the way they had been put into effect during the history of Israel. Once he had discovered that fact, he had realized the Jews were like any other subject people, to be constantly watched and ruthlessly put down if they dared to rebel.

It would have been more comfortable to have remained in Jericho during this spring season when the sun there was warm and the gardens at their height. But Pontius Pilate had learned that the religious festivals were always times of tension in which malcontents flocked to the city, often with the intention of stirring up confusion through which they might profit by thievery and rapine, as Barabbas had hoped to do. At times like these, a strong hand was needed in Jerusalem and this required Pilate’s presence there. Once the period of tension was over, he could journey on to Caesarea and the games which would be beginning in the arena.

Pilate had been riding in the midst of the column near the heavily curtained animal-borne litter that carried his wife, Claudia ProcuIa. It was only a few miles to Jerusalem now and he was anticipating the bath awaiting him and the cup of spiced wine his body servant would bring him. Except for the accursed smell of burning flesh that hung over the city at this season, the Antonia was not really uncomfortable. It was not so luxurious as Herod’s palace, where he could have stayed, for the Antonia was actually a fortress guarding the very heart of Jerusalem. But his own quarters were passable enough and were on the other side of the building, away from the smoke of the sacrifices, though not wholly from the stench of burning meat. And it was just as well to be where he could keep his eyes upon the temple during the next six days.

Pilate’s reverie was interrupted when the horse in front of him was suddenly reined in as they were passing around the Mount of Olives in the neighborhood of the fig groves of Bethphage. Lurching forward in the saddle, when his horse stopped suddenly, he almost fell on its neck and he righted himself with a curse.

“Sir,” the decurion riding ahead of him apologized. “Pelonius stopped the column without warning.”

Pilate spurred his horse along the road past the line of legionnaires who were now standing at rest. The centurion Pelonius, who commanded the detachment and had been riding at its head, was standing up in his stirrups now, shading his eyes as he looked ahead.

“The road is blocked, sir,” Pelonius called back, hoping to anticipate and prevent one of the sudden fierce outbursts of temper for which Pilate was famous. “By pilgrims.”

Pilate reached the head of the column and reined in his own mount. He could see Pelonius had spoken the truth. As far ahead as the gates of Jerusalem itself the road was filled by a procession of pilgrims on their way to the city, just such a procession as they had been passing all morning on the way from Jericho, but many, many times larger.

“I have never seen so many on the road before, sir,” Pelonius said. “They seem to be with that man riding the ass ahead of them.”

From their elevation on the mountainside, Pilate and his party could look down upon the procession winding down the slope toward the Kedron Valley just beyond the low, terraced hill called Gethsemane.

“Have you any idea who they are?” Pilate asked the centurion.

Pelonius removed his helmet and wiped sweat from his broad face with his arm. “I recognize a few people in the procession, sir,” he said. “They are Galileans, followers of a Nazarene called Jesus.”

“The one Herod was speaking of last night?”

“Yes, sir. They think He is a prophet.”

“Galileans, eh?” Pilate was estimating the number of people in the procession and comparing it with the number of legionnaires now standing at rest behind him. If he knew Galileans—and he should by now—fully half that group wore daggers under their cloaks and probably some of them had swords hidden as well. To try to force a way through the procession could easily end in a melee whose outcome was far from certain.

“There are a lot of them, sir,” Pelonius said, voicing Pilate’s own thought.

“Are you afraid of a motley band of fishermen and farmers?” the procurator asked.

“N—no, sir.”

Pilate gave a sharp bark of a laugh, a sound of merriment and disdain. “Then you are a fool, Pelonius. They could cut us to pieces and no one would ever know who killed us. Rest the column and let them go ahead of us into the city.”

Pelonius’s face cleared. “Yes, sir.”

As Pilate rode back along the column, the rich curtains of the mule-borne litter parted and Claudia Procula looked out. She was a beautiful woman, with her proud Claudian heritage evident in the delicate loveliness of her face. Whatever his faults, Pilate loved her greatly and, understanding his weaknesses as well as his strength, she loved him.

“Is anything wrong, Pontius?” she asked.

“A group of pilgrims blocking the trail.”

Her eyes widened with surprise. “And you are letting them go on ahead?”

Pilate laughed again, but the sound was not so harsh now. “A lot of your Galileans are among them.” Procula loved Tiberias and the Galilean region best of all. “Frankly, I have to ambition to get my throat cut.”

“They are going to the Jewish Passover.”

“So Pelonius says,” Pilate agreed. “He recognized some of them, followers of a man called Jesus of Nazareth.”

“I heard the servants at Tiberias speak of Him,” Procula said. “And once I listened to Him in Capernaum. He is a good man, Pontius. Thousands of people in Galilee follow Him.”

“Half of them must be with Him now by the looks of that procession.” Pilate turned in the saddle to look about him. “You know, I never bothered to study this countryside before, Procula. From the looks of these vineyards, it must be prosperous. I wonder if we are getting all the taxes we should from the owners.”

Claudia Procula laughed. “Be careful. You might even come to like Judea.”

“By the gods, no!” Pilate protested. “If I know Herod, he owns these vineyards or has an interest in them. His greedy fingers try to take everything else.”

“Including Judea for his tetrarchy,” Claudia agreed. “Herodias drank too much again last night and talked more than she realized.”

“Herod would like to see me in trouble,” Pilate agreed. “But after all these years I know how to handle that fox. Besides he doesn’t seem to be as sure of himself as he used to be.”

“The palace servants say he’s been afraid since he killed a prophet named John,” Procula said. “My maid had it from Herod’s own body servant.”

“Guilt can warp a man’s judgment,” Pilate agreed absent-mindedly. “But I can’t understand being concerned over the death of one fanatic.”

“In Israel a prophet is a holy person,” Procula explained. “The Jews believe he is sent by their God as a warning.”

Pilate looked at her sharply. “Surely, you don’t believe any of this heresy, my dear?”

Procula shook her head. “If I were to choose anything of what you call heresy, it would be what I hear of the teaching of this man Jesus of Nazareth. He teaches that all men should love and respect each other.”

Pilate laughed. “If I were to try loving and respecting these Galileans ahead of us,” he said, “I would end with a knife in my back.” He reined up the horse’s head as the order to march came from Pelonius at the head of the column. “Good, we are moving again. Close the curtains, my dear. The hoofs stir up much dust.”

“I am glad you did not spur through the pilgrims, Pontius,” Procula said softly.

Pilate answered with his short bark of laughter. “Don’t think I am softening. I only want to live long enough to shake the dust of this accursed country from my feet.”

The rocky slope of the Mount of Olives, except where it had been cleared and dug up for vineyards or fig groves, was covered by thickets of the tough burnet bush with its murderous thorns. The
moreh
had already turned the entire hillside green and here and there an occasional bush was precociously putting forth a few of the brilliant red blossoms that resembled nothing so much as drops of blood.

During the winter a few clumps of the burnet had died and the wood of these was now sere and gray against the green that covered the hillside. The green bushes served no useful purpose except to spread upon the hillside a scarlet blanket that for a few weeks in the spring was incredibly beautiful. The dead bushes were much prized for fuel and gathering them was a slow, painful task.

It was the task to which old Jonas, thrust out of Elam’s household many years ago, had been forced in order to make his living. Each day he trudged up the mountain to gather the thorny limbs, carefully piling them into a pack which he could carry on his back. Dry now, they weighed little but were a trial to him because of his hump; more than once the cruel thorns had pierced through the worn piece of leather he used to protect his skin, causing painful wounds. He could carry barely enough to bring in sufficient money for his meager needs. Like thousands of beggars, lepers, and other unfortunates, Jonas lived in a warren of hovels built against the outer walls of the city.