The Crown and the Cross: The Life of Christ (36 page)

“If the Galileans are with Him, blood will be shed,” Jochai warned. “It must not be in the temple.”

“Why not when He leaves the city?” one of the priests asked. “It is known that He spends each night at Bethany.”

‘That would seem to be the best course,” Caiaphas agreed, “except for one thing. He must be taken quickly. Tomorrow is the day of unleavened bread and tomorrow night the Passover will be eaten. We are pressed for time.”

“Send guards to arrest Him at Bethany,” Elam suggested. “Pilate will surely give you whatever Romans you need.”

“The Galileans surround Him there,” Caiaphas objected. “Some of them probably hold Roman citizenship and Pontius Pilate must be kept out of this matter until the Sanhedrin formally asks him to approve the sentence of death. It will be better to take Lazarus, as we had planned before. I believe Jesus will give Himself up when we do that.”

There was a knock upon the door of the room and the guard stationed there opened it to admit Abiathar. The burly guard’s face wore a pleased look and the high priest’s face took on a similar expression as Abiathar whispered into his ear.

“Our problem is solved!” Caiaphas announced triumphantly. “One of the Nazarene’s own disciples is outside. He has offered to betray Him!”

“It may be a trick,” Elam warned.

“This man is a Judean, of Kerioth,” Caiaphas said. “I spoke of him before, you will remember. I have had my eye on this man for some time.”

Abiathar ushered Judas into the room. The traitor tried to appear completely at ease, even in the presence of the high officials of Jerusalem, but there was a wary look in his eyes. “Who are you?” Caiaphas demanded brusquely.

“Judas of Kerioth. Formerly a disciple of Jesus of Nazareth.”

“Why are you not with Him in Bethany then?”

“I can no longer follow a false prophet and a blasphemer,” Judas said in a tone of unctuous self-righteousness.

“You followed Him until today.” Caiaphas’s voice was scornful. “Why do you want to leave Him now?”

“I want no part of a blasphemer.”

“Or of His punishment?” Caiaphas shot at him.

Judas weighed his words carefully, conscious that if he did not drive the hardest bargain now, he might condemn himself. “You wish to seize Jesus,” he said boldly. “But you fear the crowds. I can tell you where to take Him when only a few will be with Him.”

“Where?”

“There are some details to be considered first.”

“Your price?” Caiaphas suggested.

“My price, yes,” Judas said, more sure of himself now.

“What do you ask?”

“Amnesty for myself,” Judas said. “And whatever such a service is worth to you.”

Elam started to speak, but Caiaphas forestalled him. “The Nazarene has blasphemed against the temple. That alone is enough to insure His death.”

“If you can take Him without stirring up a revolt, and bringing in the Romans,” Judas agreed.

“Very well,” Caiaphas told him. “Betray the Nazarene to us so we can take Him easily and you will be spared whatever punishment His followers receive.”

Judas breathed more easily. At first Caiaphas’s manner had made him feel he could not hope to win that much. Now he took courage and determined to try for more.

“Such a service deserves a greater reward,” he suggested. Caiaphas looked at him contemptuously and for a moment Judas quaked with an inner fear, sure he had pushed the cruel high priest too far. Then Caiaphas turned to the clerk at the table beside him. “Give this man thirty pieces of silver, the price of a slave,” he said. ‘But no more.”

“But—” Judas began.

“I said no more,” Caiaphas told him sharply. “The Galilean is losing favor with the crowd and we could soon have taken Him whenever we wished. Thirty pieces of silver or nothing.”

Inwardly seething at the cheapness of the price and at Caiaphas’s scorn, Judas nevertheless recognized that the high priest could be bargained with no more. “I will do as you ask,” he said and added righteously, “After all, it is right to bring a blasphemer to judgment.”

“And right for a traitor to be paid no more than what he is worth,” Caiaphas agreed sarcastically. “When can we take the Nazarene?”

“Tomorrow. Jesus will eat the Passover somewhere in Jerusalem, I do not know where yet. It will be late when He leaves and only a few will be with Him. I will bring you word myself.”

“See that you do,” Caiaphas said. “And if you betray us, you will die beside your false Messiah. Be sure of that.”

A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; as I have loved you, that you also love one another.

John 13:34

Zadok was bursting with news when he reached home that night. “They say Caiaphas is sure of destroying the Nazarene now,” he told Jonas. “One of His own disciples has betrayed Him.”

“If they love Him, how could they do that?”

“Men love many things, hunchback,” the cripple said philosophically. “But most of all money. Caiaphas paid the fellow well, of course.”

“I could never betray a man who has been kind to me.”

“That’s why your ribs are showing, my friend,” Zadok said. “If you would steal and beg as I do, you would not have to work.” He crunched a date and spat out the seed. “By the way, have you done anything wrong lately?”

“No. Why?”

“I saw Abiathar as I was leaving the temple area. He asked about you.”

Jonas paled a little. His conscience was clear but that meant little. The captain of the temple guards was a cruel man who made the beggars pay him well for the best places near the temple. But he could have no reason to trouble Jonas, or so the woodseller tried to assure himself.

“Abiathar is coming to see you in the morning,” Zadok added. “He said to tell you not to go up to gather thornwood before he comes.”

“Why would he want to see me?”

“You’ve done something wrong. What else? If I were you, I would take Eleazar and run away to Emmaus for a few days. Or to Bethany.”

Jonas straightened himself painfully. “I’ve broken no law. I will not run away.”

“Whatever happens is your own fault then,” Zadok said virtuously. “I warned you.”

Jonas did not sleep well that night. In his dreams a giant Abiathar pursued him and brutally beat Eleazar. By morning he was fully expecting the worst, but when the captain of the temple guards appeared, he held himself as proudly erect as his painful back would let him.

“So?” Abiathar said heavily. “Even beggars like you dare to look your betters in the eye now, Jonas. You must have been listening to the Nazarene.”

“I have no time for anything but work,” Jonas said. “With the lime burners and the potters no longer firing their kilns.”

“They’ll fire them again soon enough. You are the one who gathers the thorn bushes on the hillside outside the gate, aren’t you?”

“Yes. But I have paid the tribute—”

“Be silent and listen,” Abiathar said, “I have a mission for you:”

“A mission?” Jonas repeated, startled.

“Gather an armful of green thorns on the hillside outside the gates for me today and I will pay you a shekel.” A shekel was considerably more than Jonas ordinarily earned in a day.

“The green ones will not burn,” he protested.

“Did I say anything about burning?” Abiathar laughed at the blank look on the little woodseller’s face. “Bring the thorns to the palace of the high priest before midnight. There will be another shekel for you if you are prompt.”

“But why green thorns?”

“For a crown,” Abiathar said and laughed hugely again at the little man’s mystification. “A crown of thorns—for a king of Israel!”

John Mark had been busy ever since Peter and John had come to tell his mother that Jesus would eat the Passover supper that evening in the upper room of their house on the outskirts of Jerusalem. Mark’s days were usually spent at the scribes’ school where he was a brilliant and promising student, but since this was the day of the unleavened bread at the end of which the Passover meal would be eaten, there had been no school.

Instead of coming into the city on the day after His dramatic denunciation of the scribes and Pharisees, Jesus had remained at Bethany with His disciples. Jerusalem buzzed with rumors all day long. Some said Caiaphas and the Sanhedrin had a definite plan for taking Jesus; others that His followers would use up in revolt if Abiathar attempted to arrest Him. On one point there was general agreement now. Some sort of clash between Jesus and the authorities was inevitable; things had gone too far.

Mark, his mother, Mary, and his Uncle Barnabas had become followers of Jesus during His first visit to Jerusalem as a Teacher. They had many friends and relatives in Galilee and so had known of Him before He had appeared in the city. Since then they had been staunch believers in Jesus as the Messiah, and awaited the coming of the kingdom of God which He would inaugurate on earth. Barnabas was not one of the Twelve, but he had been one of the seventy and was particularly close to Simon Peter.

There had been errands for Mark to run all afternoon. The task of preparing the Passover feast for such a large company was not an easy one and the neighboring women had been called in to help Mary. Many things still had to be purchased at the last moment, though, and Mark had been busy running back and forth between his house and the shops. He did not mind, for it was a great honor indeed that Jesus had chosen to celebrate the Passover in their home in Jerusalem rather than the luxurious one of Mary, Martha, and Lazarus at Bethany. Besides, Simon Peter had asked him that morning to keep watch outside the house during the supper lest the agents of the high priest learn where Jesus was and try to arrest Him.

One rumor had been particularly rampant in Jerusalem that day, and Mark had heard it at several of the shops. It was said that one of Jesus’ own disciples had betrayed Him to the high priest, but this Mark found hard to believe. It was incredible that any of the Twelve who were closest to Jesus would betray Him to Caiaphas and thus insure the Master’s death.

Barnabas had gone with Peter and John to the temple to purchase the paschal lamb early that morning. After it had been slaughtered on the altar there, they had brought the carcass home and it had been roasting all afternoon. Now the savory smell of the meat and the fragrant herbs and other delicacies which his mother was preparing filled the house and drifted out into the yard where John Mark watched for the arrival of the honored guest.

The youth had bathed and put on a new robe, one he had been saving for the ceremony when he would complete the year at the scribes’ school and go on to another level of study. Now he waited in the shadows of a large sycamore tree beside the house, which was on a secluded side street. He was to warn his mother when the guests appeared so that she could be ready to greet them.

It was dark when, from his vantage point in the shadow of the large tree, Mark heard the voices of people approaching. He did not call out yet, for it might be only a group of neighbors returning home for the feast or even the temple guards who, if it were true that Jesus had been betrayed by one of His disciples, might have learned where He was to eat the Passover and be coming to take Him.

Then Mark heard the booming voice of Simon Peter among those approaching and, knowing now that the expected guests were arriving, ran to tell his mother and his Uncle Barnabas. Jesus was at the head of the group with John on one side and Simon Peter on the other. Reaching the house they took the stairway leading directly to the upper room where the meal had been prepared.

Reluctantly Mark went back to the tree. He would much rather have been with the men, listening to the talk, but Peter had commanded him to watch, and he would not betray the tall fisherman’s trust. Then the thought came that he could accomplish both things by climbing into the tree whose spreading branches were near one of the open windows of the upper room. Scrambling up, he perched himself there just as Jesus and the others came through the door.

The traditional Passover meal consisted mainly of the lamb which had been slaughtered in the temple that morning, its fat and entrails burnt upon the altar. It was served along with unleavened bread, thin wine, and the bitter herbs which symbolized the persecutions in Egypt from which the Children of Israel had been delivered by God’s mercy at the request of Moses.

The meal began at the setting of the sun when a trumpet blast from the highest point of the temple announced the Passover. A rather rigid routine was customary, beginning with a benediction which was followed by a cup of wine and then the formal washing of hands by the company. Thirteen different steps were observed in all, ending with the singing of the hallel at midnight in a psalm of thanksgiving.

The low table had already been prepared and the cushions upon which Jesus and the disciples were to recline were in place. In the street outside, the disciples had been wrangling among themselves over who should occupy the place of honor at the right hand of Jesus and the controversy continued into the house. Peter naturally felt that he should be the privileged one because Jesus had designated him at Caesarea-Philippi as the stone upon which He would build His church. John and his brother James were also particularly beloved by Jesus, and felt that it was they who should occupy the places of honor. Judas, as keeper of the purse, always sat close to the Master so that he could receive any instruction which Jesus wished to give him from time to time.

Jesus stopped the argument almost as soon as they entered the room. “The kings of the Gentiles exercise leadership over them and they that exercise authority upon them are called benefactors,” He said. “You shall not be so, but he that is greatest among you, let him be as the youngest. And he that is chief, as he who serves. But who is greater, he that sits at meat or he that serves? Is it not he that sits at meat? Yet I am among you as He who serves.

“You have continued with Me in My temptation,” He went on warmly, “and I appoint to you a kingdom as My Father has appointed to Me, that you may eat and drink at My table in My kingdom and sit on thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel.”

Subdued now by the rebuke, however gently delivered, the disciples took their places, with John at the place of honor and Judas on the left hand. Peter sat directly across the table from John. Jesus had treated Judas like the others all day and the man of Kerioth was sure that his visit to the high priest had not been noted and that no one knew of his intention to betray the Master.

At the beginning of the meal, Jesus pronounced the benediction and the ritual cup of wine was then passed. After that, when the time came to wash their hands, Jesus took off His robe and, taking up a towel and a basin of water placed at the entrance of the room for that purpose, knelt first before Simon Peter who reclined at the end of the row of cushions surrounding the table on three sides. The tall fisherman was ashamed now because he had argued with James and John over who among them should have the highest place at the feast and protested against Jesus abasing Himself thus.

“Lord,” he asked humbly, “do You wash my feet?”

“You do not know what I do now,” Jesus told him. “But hereafter you shall know.”

“You shall never wash my feet,” Peter still protested, not understanding what Jesus meant by the action or the words.

“If I do not wash you,” Jesus told him quietly, “you have no part of Me.”

Contrite now, Peter knelt before Him. “Do not wash my feet only,” he begged, “but also my hands and my head.”

Jesus shook His head slowly and kneeling, washed Peter’s feet and dried them with a towel. “He who has bathed needs only to wash his feet and is every whit clean,” He said. “But you are not all clean.”

Judas felt a sudden stab of fear. Could Jesus have somehow learned of his plan to betray Him?

Jesus said no more. He washed the feet of the other silent disciples, put on His robe again, and then sat down with them. Judas’s fears began to fade.

“You call Me Master and Lord, and you speak well, for so I am,” Jesus said as the meal progressed. “If I then, your Lord and Master, have washed your feet, you ought also to wash one another’s feet, for I have given you an example that you should do as I have done to you.

“I do not speak of you all,” He continued. “I know whom I have chosen. But that the Scriptures may be fulfilled, he that eats bread with Me has lifted up his heel against Me.”

Judas suddenly pushed away the dish before him. If he could have escaped without betraying himself, he would have done so, but Jesus went on speaking in the same matter-of-fact tone. “Truly I say to you, that one of you will betray Me.”

John was beside Jesus, and Simon Peter beckoned him to ask the Master who it was that would betray Him. When John asked the question, Jesus did not immediately answer but reached out and dipped a piece of bread first in the bitter herbs and then into the savory juices from the meat.

“It is he to whom I shall give the sop,” Jesus said in a low tone which only a few of them heard but which was perfectly audible to Judas.

The giving to another of the bread dipped in herbs and the juices of the lamb was an act of humility quite in keeping with Jesus’ early action in washing the disciples’ feet. And as He passed the sop to Judas Iscariot, He said quietly, “That which you do, do quickly.”

His face frozen with fear and shame, Judas took the sop mechanically and put it into his mouth, but the taste of the herbs was like gall and pushing himself away from the table, he rose and plunged from the room into the night.

Because Judas carried the purse and paid for whatever was bought, most of the disciples, assuming that he had gone on some matter in connection with the meal, were not alarmed when he suddenly left the room. The paschal supper was at its height now, but when Jesus spoke again the gravity in His voice stilled their merriment.