Johnston Annie Fellows
Joel: A Boy of Galilee
CHAPTER VIII
HIGH up among the black lava crags of Perea stood the dismal fortress of Macherus. Behind its close prison bars a restless captive groped his way back and forth in a dungeon cell. Sometimes, at long intervals, he was given such liberty as a chained eagle might have, when he was led up into one of the towers of the gloomy keep, and allowed to look down, down into the bottomless gorges surrounding it. For months he had chafed in the darkness of his underground dungeon; escape was impossible.
It was John Baptist, brought from the wild, free life of the desert to the tortures of the "Black Castle." Here he lay at the mercy of Herod Antipas, and death might strike at any moment. More than once, the whimsical monarch had sent for him, as he sat at his banquets, to be the sport of the passing hour.
The lights, the color, the flash of gems may have dazzled his eyes for a brief space, accustomed as they were to the midnight darkness of his cell; but his keen vision saw, under the paint and purple of royal apparel, the corrupt life of king and court.
Pointing his stern, accusing finger at the uneasy king, he cried, "It is not lawful for thee to have thy brother's wife!" With words that stung like hurtling arrows, he laid bare the blackened, beastly life that sought to hide its foulness under royal ermine.
Antipas cowered before him; and while he would gladly have been freed from a man who had such power over him, he dared not lift a finger against the fearless, unflinching Baptist.
But the guilty Herodias bided her time, with blood-thirsty impatience; his life should pay the penalty of his bold speech.
Meanwhile he waited in his cell, with nothing but memories to relieve the tediousness of the long hours. Over and over again he lived those scenes of his strange life in the desert, – those days of his preparation, – the preaching to the multitudes, the baptizing at the ford of the Jordan.
He wondered if his words still lived; if any of his followers still believed on him. But more than all, he wondered what had become of that One on whom he had seen the spirit of God descending out of heaven in the form of a dove.
"Where art Thou now?" he cried. "If Thou art the Messiah, why dost Thou not set up Thy kingdom, and speedily give Thy servant his liberty?" The empty room rang often with that cry; but the hollow echo of his own words was the only answer.
One day the door of his cell creaked back far enough to admit two men, and then shut again, leaving them in total darkness. In that momentary flash of light, he recognized two old followers of his, Timeus bar Joram and Benjamin the potter.
With a cry of joy he groped his way toward them, and clung to their friendly hands.
"How did you manage to penetrate these Roman-guarded walls?" he asked, in astonishment.
"I knew the warden," answered Benjamin. "A piece of silver conveniently closes his eyes to many things. But we must hasten! Our time is limited."
They had much to tell of the outside world. Pilate had just given special offence, by appropriating part of the treasure of the Temple, derived from the Temple tax, to defray the cost of great conduits he had begun, with which to supply Jerusalem with water.
Stirred up by the priests and rabbis, the people besieged the government house, crying loudly that the works be given up. Armed with clubs, numbers of soldiers in plain clothes surrounded the great mob, and killed so many of the people that the wildest excitement prevailed throughout all Judea and Galilee.
There was a cry for a national uprising to avenge the murder.
"They only need a leader!" exclaimed John. "Where is He for whom I was but a voice crying in the wilderness? Why does He not show Himself?"
"We have just come from the village of Nain," said Timeus bar Joram. "We saw Him stop a funeral procession and raise a widow's son to life. He was followed by a motley throng whom He had healed of all sorts of diseases; and there were twelve men whom He had chosen as life-long companions.
"We questioned some of them closely, and they gave us marvellous reports of the things He had done."
"Is it not strange," asked Benjamin the potter, "that having such power He still delays to establish His kingdom?"
The captive prophet made no answer for awhile. Then he groped in the thick darkness till his hand rested heavily on Benjamin's arm.
"Go back, and say that John Baptist asks, 'Art Thou the Coming One, or must we look for another?'"
Days passed before the devoted friends found themselves once more inside the prison walls. They had had a weary journey over rough hills and rocky by-paths.
"What did He say?" demanded the prisoner, eagerly.
"Go and tell John what ye saw and heard: that the blind receive sight; the lame walk; the lepers are cleansed; the deaf hear; the dead are raised; and the poor have the gospel preached unto them."
The man stood up, his long hair hanging to his shoulder, his hand uplifted, and his eyes dilated like a startled deer that has caught the sound of a coming step.
"The fulfilment of the words of Isaiah!" he cried. "For he hath said, 'Your God will come and save you. Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped. Then shall the lame man leap as a hart, and the tongue of the dumb sing!' Yea, he hath bound up the broken-hearted; and he shall yet 'proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound, to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord!'"
Then with both hands clasped high above his head, he made the prison ring with the cry, "The kingdom is at hand! The kingdom is at hand! I shall soon be free!"
Not long after that, the castle blazed with the lights of another banquet. The faint aroma of wines, mingled with the heavy odor of countless flowers, could not penetrate the grim prison walls. Nor could the gay snatches of song and the revelry of the feast. No sound of applause reached the prisoner's ear, when the daughter of Herodias danced before the king.
Sitting in darkness while the birthday banqueters held high carnival, he heard the heavy tramp of soldiers' feet coming down the stairs to his dungeon. The great bolts shot back, the rusty hinges turned, and a lantern flickered its light in his face, as he stood up to receive his executioners.
A little while later his severed head was taken on a charger to the smiling dancing girl. She stifled a shriek when she saw it; but the wicked Herodias looked at it with a gleam of triumph in her treacherous black eyes.
When the lights were out, and the feasters gone, two men came in at the warden's bidding, – two men with heavy hearts, and voices that shook a little when they spoke to each other. They were Timeus and Benjamin. Silently they lifted the body of their beloved master, and carried it away for burial; and if a tear or two found an unaccustomed path down their bearded cheeks, no one knew it, under cover of the darkness.
So, out of the Black Castle of Macherus, out of the prison-house of a mortal body, the white-souled prophet of the wilderness went forth at last into liberty.
For him, the kingdom was indeed at hand.
Meanwhile in the upper country, Phineas was following his friend from village to village. He had dropped his old familiar form of address, so much was he impressed by the mysterious power he saw constantly displayed.
Now when he spoke of the man who had been both friend and playfellow, it was almost reverently that he gave Him the title of Master.
It was with a heavy heart that Joel watched them go away. He, too, longed to follow; but he knew that unless he took the place at the bench, Phineas could not be free to go.
Gratitude held him to his post. No, not gratitude alone; he was learning the Master's own spirit of loving self-sacrifice. As he dropped the plumb-line over his work, he measured himself by that perfect life, and tried to straighten himself to its unbending standard.
He had his reward in the look of pleasure that he saw on the carpenter's face when Phineas came in, unexpectedly, one day, dusty and travel-stained.
"How much you have accomplished!" he said in surprise. "You have filled my place like a grown man."
Joel stretched his strong arms with a slight laugh. "It is a pleasure to work now," he said. "It seems so queer never to have a pain, or that worn-out feeling of weakness that used to be always with me. At first I was often afraid it was all a happy dream, and could not last. I am getting used to it now. Where is the Master?" Joel asked, as Phineas turned towards the house.
"He is the guest of Simon. He will be here some days, my son. I know you wish to be with Him as much as possible, so I shall not expect your help as long as He stays."
"If I could only do something for Him!" was Joel's constant thought during the next few days. Once he took a coin from the little money bag that held his hoarded savings – a coin that was to have helped buy his revenge – and bought the ripest, juiciest pear he could find in the market. Often he brought Him water, fresh and cold from the well when He looked tired and warm from His unceasing work.
Wherever the Master turned, there, close beside Him, was a beaming little face, so full of love and childish sympathy that it must have brought more refreshment to His thirsty soul than either the choice fruit or the cooling water.
One evening after a busy day, when He had talked for hours to the people on the seashore who had gathered around the boat in which He sat, He sent away the multitude.
"Let us pass over unto the other side," He said.
Joel slipped up to Andrew, who was busily arranging their sails. "Let me go, too!" he whispered pleadingly.
"Well," assented the man, carelessly, "You can make yourself useful, I suppose. Will you hand me that rope?"
Joel sprang to obey. Presently the boat pushed away from the shore, and the town, with its tumult and its twinkling lights, was soon left far behind.
The sea was like glass, so calm and unruffled that every star above could look down and see its unbroken reflection in the dark water below.
Joel, in the hinder part of the ship, lay back in his seat with a sigh of perfect enjoyment. The smooth gliding motion of the boat rested him; the soft splash of the water soothed his excited brain. He had seen his Uncle Laban that afternoon among other of the scribes and Pharisees, and heard him declare that Beelzebub alone was responsible for the wonders they witnessed.
Joel's indignation flared up again at the memory. He looked down at the Master, who had fallen asleep on a pillow, and wondered how anybody could possibly believe such evil things about Him.
It was cooler out where they were now. He wondered if he ought not to lay some covering over the sleeping form. He took off the outer mantle that he wore, and bent forward to lay it over the Master's feet. But he drew back timidly, afraid of wakening Him. "I'll wait awhile," he said to himself, folding the garment across his knees in readiness.
Several times he reached forward to lay it over Him, and each time drew back. Then he fell asleep himself.
From its situation in the basin of the hills, the Galilee is subject to sudden and furious storms. The winds, rushing down the heights, meet and clash above the water, till the waves run up like walls, then sink again into seething whirlpools of danger.
Joel, falling asleep in a dead calm, awoke to find the ship rolling and tossing and half-full of water. The lightning's track was followed so closely by the crash of thunder, there was not even pause enough between to take one terrified gasp.
Still the Master slept. Joel, drenched to the skin, clung to the boat's side, expecting that every minute would be his last. It was so dark and wild and awful! How helpless they were, buffetted about in the fury of the storm!
As wave after wave beat in, some of the men could no longer control their fear.
"Master!" they called to the sleeping man, as they bent over Him in terror. "Carest Thou not that we perish?"
He heard the cry for help. The storm could not waken Him from His deep sleep of exhaustion, but at the first despairing human voice, He was up, ready to help.
Looking up at the midnight blackness of the sky, and down at the wild waste of waters, He stretched out His hand.
"Peace!" he commanded in a deep voice. "Be still!" The storm sank to earth as suddenly as a death-stricken raven; a great calm spread over the face of the waters. The silent stars shone out in their places; the silent sea mirrored back their glory at His feet.
The men huddled fearfully together. "What manner of man is this?" they asked, one of another. "Even the wind and the sea obey Him!"
Joel, looking up at the majestic form, standing so quietly by the railing, thought of the voice that once rang out over the night of Creation with the command, "Let there be light!" At its mere bidding light had flowed in across the darkness of primeval night.
Just so had this voice thrilled the storm with its "Peace! Be still!" into utter calm.
The child crouched at His feet, burying his face in his mantle, and whispering, in awe and adoration, "He is the Christ! He is the son of God!"
CHAPTER IX
AFTER that night of the voyage to the Gadarenes, Joel ceased to be surprised at the miracles he daily witnessed. Even when the little daughter of Jairus, the ruler of the synagogue, was called back to life, it did not seem so wonderful to him as the stilling of the tempest.
Many a night after Phineas had gone away again with the Master to other cities, Joel used to go down to the beach, and stand looking across the water as he recalled that scene.
The lake had always been an interesting place to him at night. He liked to watch the fishermen as they flashed their blazing torches this way and that. A sympathetic thrill ran through him as they sighted their prey, and raised their bare sinewy arms to fling the net or fly the spear.
But after that morning of healing, and that night of tempest, it seemed to be a sacred place, to be visited only on still nights, when the town slept, and heaven bent nearer in the starlight to the quiet earth.
The time of the Passover was drawing near, – the time that Joel had been looking forward to since Phineas had promised him a year ago that he should go to Jerusalem.
The twelve disciples who had been sent out to all the little towns through Galilee, to teach the things they had themselves been taught, and work miracles in the name of Him who had sent them, began to come slowly back. They had an encouraging report to bring of their work; but it was shadowed by the news they had heard of the murder of John Baptist.
Joel joined them as soon as they came into Capernaum, and walked beside Phineas as the footsore travellers pressed on a little farther towards Simon's house.
"When are we going to start for Jerusalem?" was his first eager question.
Phineas looked searchingly into his face as he replied, "Would you be greatly disappointed, my son, not to go this year?"
Joel looked perplexed; it was such an unheard of thing for Phineas to miss going up to the Feast of the Passover.
"These are evil times, my Joel," he explained. "John Baptist has just been beheaded. The Master has many enemies among those in high places. It would be like walking into a lion's den for Him to go up to Jerusalem.
"Even here He is not safe from the hatred of Antipas, and after a little rest will pass over into the borders of the tetrarch Philip. We have no wish to leave Him!"
"Oh, why should He be persecuted so?" asked Joel, looking with tear-dimmed eyes at the man walking in advance of them, and talking in low earnest tones to John, who walked beside Him.
"You have been with Him so much, father Phineas. Have you ever known Him to do anything to make these men His enemies?"
"Yes," said Phineas. "He has drawn the people after Him until they are jealous of His popularity. He upsets their old traditions, and teaches a religion that ignores some of the Laws of Moses. I can easily see why they hate Him so. They see Him at such a long distance from themselves, they can not understand Him. Healing on the Sabbath, eating with publicans and sinners, disregarding the little customs and ceremonies that in all ages have set apart our people as a chosen race, are crimes in their eyes.
"If they only could get close enough to understand Him; to see that His pure life needs no ceremonies of multiplied hand-washings; that it is His broad love for His fellow-men that makes Him stoop to the lowest classes, – I am sure they could not do otherwise than love Him.
"Blind fanatics! They would put to death the best man that ever lived, because He is so much broader and higher than they that the little measuring line of their narrow creed cannot compass Him!"
"Is He never going to set up His kingdom?" asked Joel. "Does He never talk about it?"
"Yes," said Phineas; "though we are often puzzled by what He says, and ask ourselves His meaning."
They had reached the house by this time, and as Simon led the way to its hospitable door, Phineas said, "Enter with them, my lad, if you wish. I must go on to my little family, but will join you soon."
To Joel's great pleasure, he found they were to cross the lake at once, to the little fishing port of Bethsaida. It was only six miles across.
"We have hardly had time to eat," said Andrew to Joel, as they walked along towards the boat "I will be glad to get away to some desert place, where we may have rest from the people that are always pushing and clamoring about us."
"How long before you start?" asked Joel.
"In a very few minutes," answered Andrew; "for the boat is in readiness."
Joel glanced from the street above the beach to the water's edge, as if calculating the distance.
"Don't go without me," he said as, breaking into a run, he dashed up the beach at his utmost speed. He was back again in a surprisingly quick time, with a cheap little basket in his hand; he was out of breath with his rapid run.
"Didn't I go fast?" he panted. "I could not have done that a few weeks ago. Oh, it feels so good to be able to run when I please! It is like flying."
He lifted the cover of the basket. "See!" he said. "I thought the Master might be hungry; but I had no time to get anything better. I had to stop at the first stall I came to."
At the same time the boat went gliding out into the water with its restful motion, thousands of people were pouring out of the villages on foot, and hurrying on around the lake, ahead of them.
The boat passed up a narrow winding creek, away from the sail-dotted lake; its green banks seemed to promise the longed-for quiet and rest. But there in front of them waited the crowds they had come so far to avoid.
They had brought their sick for healing. They needed to be helped and taught; they were "as sheep without a shepherd!" He could not refuse them.
Joel found no chance to offer the food he had bought so hastily with another of his hoarded coins, – the coins that were to have purchased his revenge.
As the day wore on, he heard the disciples ask that the multitudes might be sent away.
"It would take two hundred pennyworth of bread to feed them," said Philip, "and even that would not be enough."
Andrew glanced over the great crowds and stroked his beard thoughtfully. "There is a lad here which hath five barley loaves and two small fishes, but what are they among so many?"
Joel hurried forward and held out his basket with its little store, – five flat round loaves of bread, not much more than one hungry man could eat, and two dried fishes.
He hardly knew what to expect as the people were made to sit down on the grass in orderly ranks of fifties.
His eyes grew round with astonishment as the Master took the bread, gave thanks, and then passed it to the disciples, who, in turn, distributed it among the people. Then the two little fishes were handed around in the same way.
Joel turned to Phineas, who had joined them some time ago. "Do you see that?" he asked excitedly. "They have been multiplied a thousand fold!"
Phineas smiled. "We drop one tiny grain of wheat into the earth," he said, "and when it grows and spreads and bears dozens of other grains on its single stalk, we are not astonished. When the Master but does in an instant, what Nature takes months to do, we cry, 'a miracle!' 'Men are more wont to be astonished at the sun's eclipse, than at its daily rising,'" he quoted, remembering his conversation with the old traveller, on his way to Nathan ben Obed's.
A feeling of exaltation seized the people as they ate the mysterious bread; it seemed that the days of miraculous manna had come again. By the time they had all satisfied their hunger, and twelve basketfuls of the fragments had been gathered up, they were ready to make Him their king. The restlessness of the times had taken possession of them; the burning excitement must find vent in some way, and with one accord they demanded Him as their leader.
Joel wondered why He should refuse. Surely no other man he had ever known could have resisted such an appeal.
The perplexed fisherman, at Jesus's command, turned their boat homeward without Him. To their simple minds it seemed that He had made a mistake in resisting the homage forced upon Him by the people; they longed for the time to come when they should be recognized as the honored officials in the new kingdom. Many a dream of future power and magnificence must have come to them in the still watches of the night, as they drifted home in the white light of the Passover moon.
Many a time in the weeks that followed, Joel slipped away to his favorite spot on the beech, a flat rock half hidden by a clump of oleander bushes. Here, with his feet idly dangling in the ripples, he looked out over the water, and recalled the scenes he had witnessed there.
It seemed so marvellous to him that the Master could have ever walked on those shining waves; and yet he had seen Him that night after the feeding of the multitudes. He had seen, with his own frightened eyes, the Master walk calmly towards the boat across the unsteady water, and catch up the sinking Peter, who had jumped overboard to meet Him. It grieved and fretted the boy that this man, of God-given power and such sweet unselfish spirit, could be so persistently misunderstood by the people. He could think of nothing else.
He had not been with the crowds that pressed into the synagogue the Sabbath after the thousands had been fed; but Phineas came home with grim lips and knitted brows, and told him about it.
"The Master knew they followed Him because of the loaves and fishes," he said. "He told them so.
"When we came out of the door, I could not help looking up at the lintel on which is carved the pot of manna; for when they asked Him for a sign that they might believe Him, saying, 'Our fathers ate manna in the wilderness!' He answered: 'I am the bread of life! Ye have seen me, and yet believe not!'
"While He talked there was a murmuring all over the house against Him, because He said that He had come down from heaven. Your uncle Laban was there. I heard him say scornfully: 'Is not this the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How doth He now say, "I am come down out of heaven"?' Then he laughed a mocking little laugh, and nudged the man who stood next to him. There are many like him; I could feel a spirit of prejudice and persecution in the very air. Many who have professed to be His friends have turned against Him."
While Phineas was pouring out his anxious forebodings to his wife and Joel, the Master was going homeward with His chosen twelve.
"Would ye also go away?" He asked wistfully of His companions, as He noted the cold, disapproving looks of many who had only the day before been fed by Him, and who now openly turned their backs on Him.
Simon Peter gave a questioning glance into the faces of his companions; then he pressed a step nearer. "Lord, to whom shall we go?" he answered impulsively. "Thou hast the words of eternal life. And we have believed, and know that Thou art the Holy One of God."
The others nodded their assent, all but one. Judas Iscariot clutched the money bags he held, and looked off across the lake, to avoid the searching eyes that were fixed upon him.
These honest Galileans were too simple to suspect others of dark designs, yet they had never felt altogether free with this stranger from Judea. He had never seemed entirely one of them. They did not see in his crafty quiet manners, the sheep's clothing that hid his wolfish nature; but they could feel his lack of sympathetic enthusiasm.
He had been one of those who followed only for the loaves and fishes of a temporal kingdom, and now, in his secret soul, he was sorry he had joined a cause in whose final success he was beginning to lose faith.
The sun went down suddenly that night behind a heavy cloud, as a gathering storm began to lash the Galilee and rock the little boats anchored at the landings.
The year of popularity was at an end.
