Johnston Annie Fellows
Joel: A Boy of Galilee
CHAPTER X
ABIGAIL sat just inside the door, turning the noisy hand-mill that ground out the next day's supply of flour. The rough mill-stones grated so harshly on each other that she did not hear the steps coming up the path. A shadow falling across the door-way made her look up.
"You are home early, my Phineas," she said, with a smile. "Well, I shall soon have your supper ready. Joel has gone to the market for some honey and – "
"Nay! I have little wish to eat," he interrupted, "but I have much to say to you. Come! the work can wait."
Abigail put the mill aside, and brushing the flour from her hands, sat down on the step beside him, wondering much at his troubled face.
He plunged into his subject abruptly. "The Master is soon going away," he said, "that those in the uttermost parts of Galilee may be taught of Him. And He would fain have others beside the twelve He has chosen to go with Him on His journey."
"And you wish to go too?" she questioned, as he paused.
"Yes! How can I do otherwise? And yet how can I leave you and the little ones alone in these troubled times? You cannot think how great the danger is. Remember how many horrors we have lately heard. The whole country is a smouldering volcano, ready to burst into an eruption at any moment. A leader has only to arise, and all Israel will take up arms against the powers that trample us under foot."
"Is not this prophet, Jesus, He who is to save Israel?" asked Abigail. "Is He not even now making ready to establish His kingdom?"
"I do not understand Him at all!" said Phineas, sadly. "He does talk of a kingdom in which we are all to have a part; but He never seems to be working to establish it. He spends all His time in healing diseases and forgiving penitent sinners, and telling us to love our neighbors.
"Then, again, why should He go down to the beach, and choose for His confidential friends just simple fishermen. They have neither influence nor money. As for the choice of that publican Levi-Matthew, it has brought disgrace on the whole movement. He does not seem to know how to sway the popular feeling. I believe He might have had the support of the foremost men of the nation, if He had approached them differently.
"He shocks them by setting aside laws they would lay down their lives rather than violate. He associates with those they consider unclean; and all His miracles cannot make them forget how boldly He has rebuked them for hypocrisy and unrighteousness. They never will come to His support now; and I do not see how a new government can be formed without their help."
Abigail laid her hand on his, her dark eyes glowing with intense earnestness, as she answered: "What need is there of armies and human hands to help?
"Where were the hosts of Pharaoh when our fathers passed through the Red Sea? Was there bloodshed and fighting there?
"Who battled for us when the walls of Jericho fell down? Whose hand smote the Assyrians at Sennacherib? Is the Lord's arm shortened that He cannot save?
"Why may not His prophet speak peace to Jerusalem as easily as He did the other night to the stormy sea? Why may not His power be multiplied even as the loaves and fishes?
"Why may not the sins and backslidings of the people be healed as well as Joel's lameness; or the glory of the nation be quickened into a new life, as speedily as He raised the daughter of Jairus?
"Isaiah called Him the Prince of Peace. What are all these lessons, if not to teach us that the purposes of God do not depend on human hands to work out their fulfilment?"
Her low voice thrilled him with its inspiring questions, and he looked down into her rapt face with a feeling of awe.
"Abigail," he said softly, "'my source of joy,' – you are rightly named. You have led me out of the doubts that have been my daily torment. I see now, why He never incites us to rebel against the yoke of Cæsar. In the fulness of time He will free us with a breath.
"How strange it should have fallen to my lot to have been His playmate and companion. My wonder is not that He is the Messiah; but that I should have called Him friend, all these years, unknowing."
"How long do you expect to be away?" she asked, after a pause, suddenly returning to the first subject.
"Several months, perhaps. There is no telling what insurrections and riots may arise, all through this part of the country. Since the murder of John Baptist, Herod has come back to his court in Tiberias. I dislike to leave you here alone."
Abigail, too, looked grave, and neither spoke for a little while. "I have it!" she exclaimed at length, with a pleased light in her eyes. "I have often wished I could make a long visit in the home of my girlhood. The few days I have spent in my father's house, those few times I have gone with you to the feasts, have been so short and unsatisfactory. Can I not take Joel and the children to Bethany? Neither father nor mother has ever seen little Ruth, and we could be so safe and happy there till your return."
"Why did I not come to you before with my worries?" asked Phineas. "How easily you make the crooked places straight!"
Just then the children came running back from the market. Abigail went into the house with the provisions they had brought, leaving their father to tell them of the coming separation and the long journey they had planned.
A week later, Phineas stood at the city gate, watching a little company file southward down the highway. He had hired two strong, gayly-caparisoned mules from the owner of the caravan. Abigail rode on one, holding little Ruth in her arms; Joel mounted the other, with Jesse clinging close behind him.
Abigail, thinking of the joyful welcome awaiting her in her old home, and the children happy in the novelty of the journey, set out gayly.
But Phineas, thinking of the dangers by the way, and filled with many forebodings, watched their departure with a heavy heart.
At the top of a little rise in the road, they turned to look back and wave their hands. In a moment more they were out of sight. Then Phineas, grasping his staff more firmly, turned away, and started on foot in the other direction, to follow to the world's end, if need be, the friend who had gone on before.
It was in the midst of the barley harvest. Jesse had never been in the country before. For the first time, Nature spread for him her great picture-book of field and forest and vineyard, while Abigail read to him the stories.
First on one side of the road, then the other, she pointed out some spot and told its history.
Here was Dothan, where Joseph went out to see his brothers, dressed in his coat of many colors. There was Mount Gilboa, where the arrows of the Philistines wounded Saul, and he fell on his own sword and killed himself. Shiloh, where Hannah brought little Samuel to give him to the Lord; where the Prophet Eli, so old that his eyes were too dim to see, sat by the gate waiting for news from the army, and when word was brought back that his two sons were dead, and the Ark of the Covenant taken, here it was that he fell backward from his seat, and his neck was broken.
All these she told, and many more. Then she pointed to the gleaners in the fields, and told the children to notice how carefully Israel still kept the commandment given so many centuries before: "When ye reap the harvest of your land, thou shalt not wholly reap the corners of thy field, neither shalt thou gather the gleanings of thy harvest. And thou shalt not glean thy vineyard, neither shalt thou gather every grape of thy vineyard, thou shalt leave them for the poor and the stranger."
At Jacob's well, where they stopped to rest, Joel lifted Jesse up, and let him look over the curb. The child almost lost his balance in astonishment, when his own wondering little face looked up at him from the deep well. He backed away from it quickly, and looked carefully into the cup of water Joel handed him, for more than a minute, before he ventured to drink.
The home to which Abigail was going was a wealthy one. Her father, Reuben, was a goldsmith, and for years had been known in Jerusalem not only for the beautifully wrought ornaments and precious stones that he sold in his shop near the Temple, but for his rich gifts to the poor.
"Reuben the Charitable," he was called, and few better deserved the name. His business took him every day to the city; but his home was in the little village of Bethany, two miles away. It was one of the largest in Bethany, and seemed like a palace to the children, when compared to the humble little home in Capernaum.
Joel only looked around with admiring eyes; but Jesse walked about, laying curious little fingers on everything he passed. The bright oriental curtains, the soft cushions and the costly hangings, he smoothed and patted. Even the silver candlesticks and the jewelled cups on the side table were picked up and examined, when his mother happened to have her back turned.
There were no pictures in the house; the Law forbade. But there were several mirrors of bright polished metal, and Jesse never tired of watching his own reflection in them.
Ruth stayed close beside her mother. "She is a ray of God's own sunshine," said her grandmother, as she took her in her arms for the first time. The child, usually afraid of strangers, saw in Rebecca's face a look so like her mother's that she patted the wrinkled cheeks with her soft fingers. From that moment her grandmother was her devoted slave.
Jesse was not long in finding the place he held in his grandfather's heart. The old man, whose sons had all died years before, seemed to centre all his hopes on this son of his only daughter. He kept Jesse with him as much as possible; his happiest hours were when he had the child on his knee, teaching him the prayers and precepts and proverbs that he knew would be a lamp to his feet in later years.
"Nay! do not punish the child!" he said, one morning when Jesse had been guilty of some disobedience. Abigail went on stripping the leaves from an almond switch she just had broken off.
"Why, father," she said, with a smile, "I have often seen you punish my brothers for such disobedience, and have as often heard you say that one of Solomon's wisest sayings is, 'Chasten thy son while there is hope, and let not thy soul spare for his crying.' Jesse misses his father's firm rule, and is getting sadly spoiled."
"That is all true, my daughter," he acknowledged; "still I shall not stay here to witness his punishment."
Abigail used the switch as she had intended. The boy had overheard the conversation, and the cries that reached his grandfather as he rode off to the city were unusually loud and appealing. They may have had something to do with the package the good man carried home that night, – cakes and figs and a gay little turban more befitting a young prince than the son of a carpenter.
"Who lives across the street?" asked Joel, the morning after their arrival.
"Two old friends of mine," answered Abigail. "They came to see me last night as soon as they heard I had arrived. You children were all asleep. We talked late, for they wanted to
hear all I could tell them of Rabbi Jesus. He was here last year, and Martha said He and her brother Lazarus became fast friends. Ah, there is Lazarus now! – that young man just coming out of the house. He is a scribe, and goes up to write in one of the rooms of the Temple nearly every day.
"Mary says some of the copies of the Scriptures he has made are the most beautifully written that she has ever seen."
"See!" exclaimed Joel, "he has dropped one of the rolls of parchment he was carrying, and does not know it. I'll run after him with it."
He was hardly yet accustomed to the delight of being so fleet of foot; no halting step now to hinder him. He almost felt as if he were flying, and was by the young man's side nearly as soon as he had started.
"Ah, you are the guest of my good neighbor, Reuben," Lazarus said, after thanking him courteously. "Are you not the lad whose lameness has just been healed by my best friend? My sisters were telling me of it. It must be a strange experience to suddenly find yourself changed from a helpless cripple to such a strong, straight lad as you are now. How did it make you feel?"
"Oh, I can never begin to tell you, Rabbi Lazarus," answered Joel. "I did not even think of it that moment when He held my hand in His. I only thought how much I loved Him. I had been starving before, but that moment He took the place of everything, – father, mother, the home love I had missed, – and more than that, the love of God seemed to come down and fold me so close and safe, that I knew He was the Messiah. I did not even notice that I was no longer lame, until I was far down the beach. Oh, you do not know how I wanted to follow Him! If I could only have gone with Him instead of coming here!"
"Yes, my boy, I know!" answered the young man, gently; "for I, too, love Him."
This strong bond of sympathy between the two made them feel as if they had known each other always.
"Come walk with me a little way," said Lazarus. "I am going up to Jerusalem to the Temple. Or rather, would you not like to come all the way? I have only to carry these rolls to one of the priests, then I will be at liberty to show you some of the strange sights in the city."
Joel ran back for permission. Only stopping to wind his white linen turban around his head, he soon regained his new-found friend.
His recollection of Jerusalem was a very dim, confused one. Time and time again he had heard pilgrims returning from the feasts trying to describe their feelings when they had come in sight of the Holy City. Now as they turned with the road, the view that rose before him made him feel how tame their descriptions had been.
The morning sun shone down on the white marble walls of the Temple and the gold that glittered on the courts, as they rose one above the other; tower and turret and pinnacle shot back a dazzling light.
It did not seem possible to Joel that human hands could have wrought such magnificence. He caught his breath, and uttered an exclamation of astonishment.
Lazarus smiled at his pleasure. "Come," he said, "it is still more beautiful inside."
They went very slowly through Solomon's Porch, for every one seemed to know the young man, and many stopped to speak to him. Then they crossed the Court of the Gentiles. It seemed like a market-place; for cages of doves were kept there for sale, and lambs, calves, and oxen bleated and lowed in their stalls till Joel could scarcely hear what his friend was saying, as they pushed their way through the crowd, and stood before the Gate Beautiful that led into the Court of the Women.
Here Lazarus left Joel for a few moments, while he went to give the rolls to the priest for whom he had copied them.
Joel looked around. Then for the first time since his healing, he wondered if it would be possible for him to ever take his place among the Levites, or become a priest as he had been destined.
While he wondered, Lazarus came back and led him into the next court. Here he could look up and see the Holy Place, over which was trained a golden vine, with clusters of grapes as large as a man's body, all of purest gold. Beyond that he knew was a heavy veil of Babylonian tapestry, hyacinth and scarlet and purple, that veiled in awful darkness the Holy of Holies.
As he stood there thinking of the tinkling bells, the silver trumpets, the clouds of incense, and the mighty songs, a great longing came over him to be one of those white-robed priests, serving daily in the Temple.
But with the wish came the recollection of a quiet hillside, where only bird-calls and whirr of wings stirred the stillness; where a breeze from the sparkling lake blew softly through the grass, and one Voice only was heard, proclaiming its glad new gospel under the open sky.
"No," he thought to himself; "I'd rather be with Him than wear the High Priest's mitre."
It was almost sundown when they found themselves on the road homeward. They had visited place after place of interest.
Lazarus found the boy an entertaining companion, and the friendship begun that day grew deep and lasting.
CHAPTER XI
WHAT are you looking for, grandfather?" called Jesse, as he pattered up the outside stairs to the roof, where Reuben stood, scanning the sky intently.
"Come here, my son," he called. "Stand right here in front of me, and look just where I point. What do you see?"
The child peered anxiously into the blue depths just now lit up by the sunset.
"Oh, the new moon!" he cried. "Where did it come from?"
"Summer hath dropped her silver sickle there, that Night may go forth to harvest in her star-fields," answered the old man. Then seeing the look of inquiry on the boy's face, hastened to add, "Nay, it is the censer that God's hand set swinging in the sky, to remind us to keep the incense of our praises ever rising heavenward. Even now a messenger may be running towards the Temple, to tell the Sanhedrin that it has appeared. Yea, other eyes have been sharper than mine, for see! Already the beacon light has been kindled on the Mount of Olives!"
Jesse watched the great bonfire a few minutes, then ran to call his sister. By the time they were both on the roof, answering fires were blazing on the distant hilltops throughout all Judea, till the whole land was alight with the announcement of the Feast of the New Moon.
"I wish it could be this way every night, don't you, Ruth?" said Jesse. "Are you not glad we are here?"
The old man looked down at the children with a pleased smile. "I'll show you something prettier than this, before long," he said. "Just wait till the Feast of Weeks, when the people all come to bring the first fruits of the harvests. I am glad your visit is in this time of the year, for you can see one festival after another."
The day the celebration of the Feast of Weeks commenced, Reuben left his shop in charge of the attendants, and gave up his entire time to Joel and Jesse.
"We must not miss the processions," he said. "We will go outside the gates a little way, and watch the people come in."
They did not have long to wait till the stream of people from the upper countries began to pour in; each company carried a banner bearing the name of the town from which it came. A white ox, intended for a peace-offering, was driven first; its horns were gilded, and its body twined with olive wreaths.
Flocks of sheep and oxen for the sacrifice, long strings of asses and camels bearing free-will gifts to the Temple, or old and helpless pilgrims that could not walk, came next.
There were wreaths of roses on the heads of the women and children; bands of lilies were tied around the sheaves of wheat. Piled high in the silver vessels of the rich, or peeping from the willow baskets of the poor, were the choicest fruits of the harvest.
Great bunches of grapes from whose purple globes the bloom had not been brushed, velvety nectarines, tempting pomegranates, mellow pears, juicy melons, – these offerings of fruit and flowers gleamed all down the long line, for no one came empty-handed up this "Hill of the Lord."
As they drew near the gates, a number of white-robed priests from the Temple met them. Reuben lifted Jesse in his arms that he might have a better view. "Listen," he said. Joel climbed up on a large rock.
A joyful sound of flutes commenced, and a mighty chorus went up: "I was glad when they said unto me, let us go into the house of the Lord. Our feet shall stand within thy gates, O Jerusalem!"
Voice after voice took up the old psalm, and Reuben's deep tones joined with the others, as they chanted, "Peace be within thy walls, and prosperity within thy palaces!"
Following the singing pilgrims to the Temple, they saw the priests take the doves that were to be for a burnt-offering, and the first fruits that were to be laid on the altars.
Jesse held fast to his grandfather's hand as they passed through the outer courts of the Temple. He was half frightened by the din of voices, the stamping and bellowing and bleating of the animals as they were driven into the pens.
He had seen one sacrificial service; the great stream of blood pouring over the marble steps of the altar, and the smoke of the burnt-offering were still in his mind. It made him look pityingly now at the gentle-eyed calves and the frightened lambs. He was glad to get away from them.
Soon after the time of this rejoicing was over, came ten solemn days that to Joel were full of interest and mystery. They were the days of preparation for the Fast of the Atonement. Disputes between neighbors were settled, and sins confessed.
The last great day, the most solemn of all, was the only time in the whole year when the High Priest might draw aside the veil, and enter into the Holy of Holies.
With all his rich robes and jewels laid aside, clad only in simple white, with bare feet and covered head, he had to go four times into the awful Presence. Once to offer incense, once to pray, to sprinkle the blood of a goat towards the mercy-seat, and then to bring out the censer.
That was the day when two goats were taken; by casting lots one was chosen for a sacrifice. On the other the High Priest laid the sins of the people, and it was driven out into the wilderness, to be dashed to pieces from some high cliff.
Tears came into Joel's eyes, as he watched the scape-goat driven away into the dreary desert. He pitied the poor beast doomed to such a death because of his nation's sins.
Then came the closing ceremonies, when the great congregation bowed themselves three times to the ground, with the High Priest shouting solemnly, "Ye are clean! Ye are clean! Ye are clean!"
Joel was glad when the last rite was over, and the people started to their homes, as gay now as they had been serious before.
"When are we going back to our other home?" asked Ruth, one day.
"Why, are you not happy here, little daughter?" said Abigail. "I thought you had forgotten all about the old place."
"I want my white pigeons," she said, with a quivering lip, as if she had suddenly remembered them. "I don't want my father not to be here!" she sobbed; "and I want my white pigeons!"
Abigail picked her up and comforted her. "Wait just a little while. I think father will surely come soon. I will get my embroidery, and you may go with me across the street."
Ruth had been shy at first about going to see her mother's friends; but Martha coaxed her in with honey cakes she baked for that express purpose, and Mary told her stories and taught her little games.
After a while she began to flit in and out of the house as fearlessly as a bright-winged butterfly.
One day her mother was sitting with the sisters in a shady corner of their court-yard, where a climbing honeysuckle made a cool sweet arbor. Ruth was going from one to the other, watching the bright embroidery threads take the shape of flowers under their skilful fingers. Suddenly she heard the faint tinkle of a silver bell. While she stood with one finger on her lip to listen, Lazarus came into the court-yard.
"See what I have brought you, little one," he said. "It is to take the place of the pigeons you are always mourning for."
It was a snow-white lamb, around which he had twined a garland of many colored flowers, and from whose neck hung the little silver bell she had heard.
At first the child was so delighted she could only bury her dimpled fingers in the soft fleece, and look at it in speechless wonder. Then she caught his hand, and left a shy little kiss on it, as she lisped, "Oh, you're so good! You're so good!"
After that day Ruth followed Lazarus as the white lamb followed Ruth; and the sisters hardly knew which sounded sweeter in their quiet home, the tinkling of the silver bell, or the happy prattle of the baby voice.
Abigail spent many happy hours with her friends. One day as they sat in the honeysuckle arbor, busily sewing, Ruth and Jesse came running towards them.
"I see my father coming, and another man," cried the boy. "I'm going to meet them."
They all hastened to the door, just as the tired, dusty travellers reached it.
"Peace be to this house, and all who dwell therein," said the stranger, before Phineas could give his wife and friends a warmer greeting.
"We went first to your father's house, but, finding no one at home, came here," said Phineas.
"Come in!" insisted Martha. "You look sorely in need of rest and refreshment."
But they had a message to deliver before they could be persuaded to eat or wash.
"The Master is coming," said Phineas. "He has sent out seventy of His followers, to go by twos into every town, and herald His approach, and proclaim that the day of the Lord is at hand. We have gone even into Samaria to carry the tidings there."
"At last, at last!" cried Mary, clasping her hands. "Oh, to think that I have lived to see this day of Israel's glory!"
"Tell us what the Master has been doing," urged Abigail, after the men had been refreshed by food and water.
First one and then the other told of miracles they had seen, and repeated what He had taught. Even the children crept close to listen, leaning against their father's knees.
"There has been much discussion about the kingdom that is to be formed. While we were in Peter's house in Capernaum, some of the disciples came quarrelling around Him, to ask who should have the highest positions. I suppose those who have followed Him longest think they have claim to the best offices."
"What did He say?" asked Abigail, eagerly.
Phineas laid his hand on Ruth's soft curls. "He took a little child like this, and set it in our midst, and said that he who would be greatest in His kingdom, must become even like unto it!"
"Faith and love and purity on the throne of the Herods," cried Martha. "Ah, only Jehovah can bring such a thing as that to pass!"
"Are you going to stay at home now, father?" asked Jesse, anxiously.
"No, my son. I must go on the morrow to carry my report to the Master, of the reception we have had in every town. But I will soon be back again to the Feast of Tabernacles."
"Carry with you our earnest prayer that the Master will abide with us when He comes again to Bethany," said Martha, as her guests departed. "No one is so welcome in our home, as the friend of our brother Lazarus."
The preparation for the Feast of the Tabernacles had begun. "I am going to take the children to the city with me to-day!" said Reuben, one morning, "to see the big booth I am having built. It will hold all our family, and as many friends as may care to share it with us."
Jesse was charmed with the great tent of green boughs.
"I wish I could have been one of the children that Moses led up out of Egypt," he said, with a sigh.
"Why, my son?" asked Reuben.
"So's I could have wandered around for forty years, living in a tent like this. How good it smells, and how pretty it is! I wish you and grandmother would live here all the time!"
The next day Phineas joined them. It was a happy family that gathered in the leafy booth for a week of out-door rejoicing in the cool autumn time.
"Where is the Master?" asked Abigail.
"I know not," answered her husband. "He sent us on before."
"Will He be here, I wonder?" she asked, and that question was on nearly every lip in Jerusalem.
"Will He be here?" asked the throngs of pilgrims who had heard of His miracles, and longed to see the man who could do such marvellous things.
"Will He be here?" whispered the scribes to the Pharisees. "Let Him beware!"
"Will He be here?" muttered Caiaphas the High Priest. "Then better one man should die, than that the whole community perish."
The sight that dazzled the eyes of the children that first evening of the week, was like fairyland; a blaze of lanterns and torches lit up the whole city.
In the Court of the Women, in the Temple, all the golden lamps were lit, twinkling and burning like countless stars.
On the steps that separated this court from the next one, stood three thousand singers, the sons and daughters of the tribe of Levi. Two priests stood at the top of the steps, and as each gave the signal on a great silver trumpet, the burst of song that went up from the vast choir seemed to shake the very heavens. Harps and psalters and flutes swelled with the rolling waves of the organ's melody. To the sound of this music, men marched with flaming torches in their hands, and the marching and a weird torch-dance were kept up until the gates of the Temple closed.
In the midst of all the feasting and the gayeties that followed, the long-expected Voice was heard in the arcades of the Temple.
The Child of Nazareth was once more in His Father's house about His Father's business.
On the last great day of the feast, Joel was up at day-break, ready to follow the older members of the family as soon as the first trumpet-blast should sound.
In his right hand he carried a citron, as did all the others; in his left was a palm-branch, the emblem of joy. An immense multitude gathered at the spring of Siloam. Water was drawn in a golden pitcher, and carried back to be poured on the great altar, while the choir sang with its thousands of voices, and all the people shouted, Amen and Amen!
When the days had gone by in which the seventy bullocks had been sacrificed, and when the ceremonies were all over, then the leaves were stripped from the green booths, and the people scattered to their homes.
Long afterward, Jesse remembered only the torch-light dances, the silver trumpets and the crowds, and the faint ringing of the fringe of bells on the priest's robes as he carried the fire on the golden shovel to burn the sweet-smelling incense.
Joel's memory rang often with two cries that had startled the people. One when the water was poured from the golden pitcher. It was the Master's voice: "If any man thirst, let him come unto me." The other was when all eyes were turned on the blazing lamps. "I am the Light of the World!"
Reuben thought oftenest of the blind man to whom he had seen sight restored. But Lazarus was filled with anxiety and foreboding; through his office of scribe, he had come in close contact with the men who were plotting against his friend. Dark rumors were afloat. The air was hot with whisperings of hate.
