The Crown and the Cross: The Life of Christ (31 page)

In spite of his friendship with Zadok, the bright-eyed cripple whose hovel adjoined his, Jonas had been bitterly lonely at first. Zadok went into the city each morning to beg, swinging himself along on his powerful arms and dragging his body behind him. Zadok had been born without legs. Often it was after dark when the beggar returned to his hovel, boasting of the alms he had obtained during the day. But on the hillsides there had been no one to talk to, for the woodgatherers were too busy to have time for idle chatter.

For a while Jonas had considered following Zadok’s suggestion that he pretend some affliction more striking than the hump on his back, his stiff and painful joints, and his age; perhaps some dramatic infirmity such as being seized by devils whenever a crowd gathered, inciting the pity of onlookers so that they would give generous alms. It would have been an easy way to make a living, but Jonas had refused to beg; he had always earned his keep, and when he could no longer do that he was determined to he down and die.

And then one day, Jonas had found an old mule limping through a field outside the city. Its coat was ragged and crusted with dirt and it had not been fed lately so that the hollows between its ribs stood out painfully. But it had come to Jonas when he called it and had nestled its gray muzzle into his palm. With that gesture of need, of desire for companionship, Jonas had felt his loneliness fade. To be needed, if only by a grizzled old mule which, like himself, had been thrust out because it no longer earned its keep, gave him a feeling of pleasure such as he had not known for a long time.

“What is your name, old fellow?” Jonas asked the mule. The animal only nuzzled his hand the more and lifted trusting eyes. Jonas’s forehead creased in a frown.

“I had a brother once named Eleazar,’’ he said to the mule. “Would you like that name?”

Jonas borrowed salve from Zadok for the animal’s sores, he found patches of green grass among the rocks where Eleazar could graze while he gathered thorns, and soon the hollows between the mule’s ribs began to fill out and his coat grew sleeker under Jonas’s nightly currying.

Working at night, Jonas wove a light pannier of withes and with this strapped on Eleazar’s back he was able to carry more than twice his former load of thornwood into the city. Now he bought grain for Eleazar and food for himself, although their combined efforts brought in little more than enough to supply their needs. Whenever stormy weather or the hot sirocco of summer made it impossible to gather the daily load of wood, both of them were likely to go hungry the next day.

But both—Jonas and Eleazar—were happy this bright spring morning as they came down a path winding along the slope of the Mount of Olives on their way to the city with a load of wood. It was only five days until the Passover and, if the weather held, Jonas could even hope to have a small coin or two left with which to buy a dove for the sacrifice. He was hurrying to the city this morning with his load of thorns in order to reach the establishments of the lime burners and the potters before they had laid in their supply of wood for the day. Eleazar followed him down the mountainside, patiently picking his way along the rocky hail. The mule had traveled these paths many times and needed no guidance.

Just above the point where the path debouched upon the caravan road, Jonas stopped short. A small crowd had gathered where the roadways met, held back from entering the main road to Jerusalem because it was filled completely by a happy, jostling procession of pilgrims, waving palm branches and shouting, “Hosanna!” as if they were escorting a king.

Jonas felt Eleazar’s muzzle nudge him in the back and reached out to rest his hand upon the animal’s neck. A Pharisee, by his rich dress, Jonas judged, one of the wealthy landowners of Bethphage who had estates here on the Mount of Olives, stood nearby, his face heavy with displeasure. Jonas moved closer and, though the Pharisee reminded him of his former master Elam, dared to speak.

“Can you tell me who these people are, noble sir?” he asked respectfully.

“Galileans!” the Pharisee exploded. “The Romans should not allow pilgrims like this to clutter up the main roads. I have urgent business in the city this morning.”

Jonas, too, had business in the city. If he did not reach the potters and lime burners soon with his load of wood, others would be ahead of him. Then he would have to wait until morning to sell and a whole day would be lost. Still he could not agree with the Pharisee that everyone did not have the same right to the road.

“All men are equal before the Most High,” he said.

“If you believe that, you are a fool,” the Pharisee snorted. “Galileans are nothing but trouble.” His angry gesture took in the slope of the mountain now dotted with tents and cooking fires. “Do they stay in the city and help to support honest innkeepers? No. And they steal food from the landowners.”

“At least they make sacrifices in the temple,” Jonas said mildly.

The Pharisee from Bethphage shrugged. “Twenty men to one lamb—as many as the Law will allow. Or a dove.”

Jonas felt a sudden surge of anger. “Do you know what it is to be hungry?” he demanded. “You with your fine robe and your fat belly? Do you know what it is to sleep in a hovel with only a sackcloth for a cover and it full of vermin? Do you not—” He stopped short, aghast at his effrontery.

The Pharisee drew back his head and surveyed the old woodseller coldly. “You speak disrespectfully, little man,” he said. “How do I know you have not been trespassing on my land to gather thorns?”

Jonas lowered his head. “I spoke in the heat of anger. These pilgrims will keep me from selling my wood today and I will lose a day’s work.”

“I am a tolerant man so I forgive you,” the Pharisee said magnanimously. “Are these Galileans never going to clear the road?”

A sleek mule led by a handsome youth with dark hair and bright intelligent eyes had just come down the hill from above Bethany and joined the group. Riding on the animal was a slender girl of about eighteen who strongly resembled the boy. She carried a basket filled with exquisitely molded vases of rough pottery and when she saw Jonas, her eyes softened in a smile.

“There is Jonas, Jonathan,” she cried to her brother. “And Eleazar!”

Jonas heard his name and turned. At sight of the girl on the mule and the boy leading it, the frown of worry was smoothed from the old man’s face.

“Shalom, Veronica,” he said. “And you, Jonathan.” They were the son and daughter of Abijah, one of the finest potters in Jerusalem. He often sold burnet wood to their father for his kilns.

“Eleazar is growing younger, Jonas,” the girl said. “And so are you.”

The old woodseller smiled and rubbed the mule’s neck. “He thanks you, Veronica, and so do I.”

The people gathered by the roadway turned to look at the girl and her brother and words of greeting now came from all sides, for she was well known in Jerusalem. With her fresh, natural beauty, her slender loveliness, Veronica was like the spring morning itself. Nothing in her demeanor would have told anyone that she had been unable to walk for years, or that often she had to remain in bed for months at a time while the inflamed bone in her leg throbbed with almost unbearable pain.

“We have been to Bethany to buy vases,” Veronica explained to Jonas. “They have been selling faster than father can make them.”

“No wonder,” he said, “when you paint such pretty scenes on them.”

The Pharisee turned to look at the girl. “Are you the one who paints vases for the potters on the street below the temple?”

“Yes, sir.”

“You deserve success since you work so hard and do such good work.”

Veronica’s eyes sparkled. “No work is hard when you love it.” She looked at the procession which showed no sign of ending. “Did you ever see such happy people?”

“They are keeping honest folk from their work,” the Pharisee growled.

“Who are they?” the girl asked.

“Galileans!” Again he gave the word all the scorn he could put into it. “Escorting some prophet into Jerusalem, they say.”

“A prophet? What is His name?”

“They call Him Jesus of Nazareth.”

“The one who raised Lazarus from the dead?” Veronica asked excitedly.

“So He claims,” the Pharisee admitted grudgingly.

Veronica looked down at the drawn and twisted leg hidden under her skirts. “They say people who only touched His garment have been healed,” she said a little wistfully.

“Many so-called prophets heal foolish people who only think they are sick,” the Pharisee said loftily. “It does not last; I have seen many such.”

“But in Galilee Jesus fed five thousand people with only a few loaves and fish,” she insisted.

“Then He should be rich by now,” the Pharisee sneered.

Veronica shook her head. “I heard them talking of Jesus in Jerusalem at the Feast of Dedication. He helps the poor and those who are sick and crippled and have no money, and He doesn’t take anything for Himself.”

“A man with such powers would be a fool to use them without being paid,” the Pharisee said disapprovingly. “After all, the laborer is worthy of his hire. What sort of world would this be if everybody gave everything away?”

Jonas had turned to examine the load of wood on his mule’s back. A small sore had been rubbed on the animal’s shoulder by the pannier, and he gently lifted up the wooden frame and placed his knitted cap under it to protect the irritated skin, though the hot sun would now beat down upon his own unprotected head.

“Forgive me, Eleazar,” he said in a low voice. “I was in a hurry to get to the city and did not lash the load properly.” He straightened up painfully, for his joints had grown stiffer through the years. “It will be better now,” he promised the old animal.

“Jonas,” Veronica said concernedly. “Your back is troubling you again, isn’t it?” She looked toward the procession and the slender man with the brown beard who was riding, an ass in the midst of it. “You should go to the Nazarene while He is in Jerusalem and let Him heal you.”

“First I must sell this load of wood so Eleazar can have some grain,” Jonas said. “I can see the Galilean another time.”

“But you will go to Him?” Veronica insisted.

“Maybe tomorrow when I have sold this load of wood,” Jonas promised. “He does look like a good man.”

“Galilean rabble!” the Pharisee snorted. “Cluttering up the roads! I shall report this to Caiaphas.”

Veronica was still looking at the old woodseller with concern. Characteristically in her sympathy for him, she gave no thought to what the Teacher of Nazareth might do for her.

Abiathar was waiting with the guards at the gate nearest to Bethany, but he quickly saw that he had no more chance of stopping the procession than he would have had in holding back with his bare hands the source-waters of the Jordan. Shouting “Hosanna!” and still strewing palm leaves and even their own garments upon the path before Jesus, the crowd ushered Him into Jerusalem as the King He rightfully was, now that at last He had allowed Himself to be acclaimed the Messiah.

As Jesus rode along, the tears He had shed for Jerusalem when it had first burst into view from the Mount of Olives were still wet upon His cheeks and His face was ravaged with pity and sorrow, His eyes bleak. Only a few people noticed His mood, however, excited as they were by the tumultuous welcome He was receiving.

Peter, seeing Jesus’ face, was sobered and felt again the doubt about this final visit to Jerusalem that had troubled him. Mary of Magdala, who always watched the Master, noticed Jesus’ mood and her heart was torn with concern. The mother of Jesus, pleased naturally by the acclaim that had come to her son, saw it and experienced a deep sense of foreboding; there was ample reason for her concern, too, for plainly visible across the Kedron Valley and a short distance to the right of the temple itself were the four towers of the Antonia. Behind it, on the western edge of Jerusalem, loomed the three towers of Herod’s own fortress with the newly added stories of the upper levels plainly distinguishable from the old. Both were grim reminders that the power of Rome ruled here, a power which any king named by the people must either acknowledge or overthrow if he were to live.

Judas and Simon the Zealot were much too pleased by the public acclaim and the proof of Jesus’ power over the multitude to be concerned by His sorrow or the threat of Rome. They felt He would surely use His power now to seize the reins of government. James and John too were vastly pleased by the tumultuous welcome and what it meant to their own ambitions to be among the highest in the kingdom of God, even now being inaugurated here in Jerusalem.

At the Passover season every possible precaution was taken to keep Jerusalem ritually pure. The narrow streets were cleaned daily, but the Pharisees carried their fear of defilement even further, walking only in the middle of the streets and leaving the outer edges to the heathen and the
am haarets
who troubled themselves little about such things. Even at the gates, the Pharisees were careful to pass through by way of the steps and a higher passage, while the defiled used the ordinary way.

Jesus was not concerned with Pharisaic scruples, however, nor were many of those in the crowd with Him. Since He was going directly to the temple, the center of religious and political life for all of Israel, He had chosen the eastern entrance, often called the Golden Gate. In using it He was giving direct affront to the scribes and Pharisees, for according to custom decreed by the rabbis, this gate could be entered only after proper attention to the ritual cleansing.

On the Porch of Solomon, where Jesus always taught, a group of children was listening to one of the rabbis. When Jesus arrived they left their teacher and flocked around Him and, as the crowd that had followed Jesus, they too began to shout, “Hosanna to the Son of David!”

One of the chief priests who was nearby heard the greeting of the children and his face went pale with anger. It was one thing for the people to acclaim Jesus the Messiah on the roads and in the streets, but quite another for it to be done here in the temple itself. Such an act was an affront to the priests, and he immediately reprimanded Jesus for allowing Himself to be named the Messiah. Jesus, however, silenced him sternly.