A
s Jesus approached the Sheep Gate in his trip back to Jerusalem, his mood was black. The pain in the eyes of Hermas and Julia had concerned them deeply. They were embarrassed, apologetic and hopeful that Jesus would not see their son as his enemy.
“That is the least of your concerns,” said he to them comfortingly. “I understand what has happened to Urbanus, but do not despair. He has the heart and the attitude of a soldier, but unless I am mistaken, I believe he will return to you.” And to me. Jesus was not mistaken. A thought he did not share with them. He didn’t believe that he had offered them much comfort, but they put the best face on it and by the time he came to take his leave, they gave the impression that nothing had happened except the sweet pleasantries of old friendships renewed. But Jesus knew better. Julia was heartbroken and Hermas ben David, outraged and confused.
Passing through one of the five entrances with its lovely covered colonnades, Jesus came upon what is known to everyone as the Pool of Bethesda. He was struck by the great number of disabled people lying about. Jesus knew why they were there. They were waiting for the moving of the water. They accepted legend was that an angel would come down from time to time into the pool and disturb the water and whoever first stepped in after the water was troubled, became well of whatever affliction he had. It was an empty hope. No angel had ever come. One never would. Many of those lying about the pool had been there for years. Jesus admired their faith — if that was what it was, but was nonplussed that it was so completely misplaced. Jesus knew angels and he knew that they did not play arbitrary, magical games.
There were both men and women. Many could not walk, could not see, staring with white eyes at perpetual darkness. Some had had their tongues cut out for some misdemeanor. Others were disfigured by birth or other painful events of life on earth. As he was so often, Jesus was touched within himself at the ethos of human misery and the ignorance it evoked. He approached a man who had been lying there almost forty years, his feet twisted and deformed, wrapped in rags to protect them from the harsh surfaces of the streets as he dragged them along. Here, he occupied his “place.” No one else dared approach that spot. He had his few things there and had established ownership of that spot for decades. As they all did, he kept about him other small artifacts and clothing that comprised his “possessions.” The streets had been his home so long, he knew nothing else. And like all men and women who felt nothing but the pain of life, he could think of nothing else. Jesus stooped next to him and said quietly, “Do you want to get well?” On the surface of it, the question seemed absurd. But Jesus knew that most of the people here had resigned themselves to this kind of life until they died. They had come to the place where they expected nothing else. To paw through the trash receptacles in the back of homes and inns, to step gingerly through the piles in the Valley of Gehenna looking for things fellow human beings had discarded, was a way of life they never expected to change. For some, the answer to the question, may well have been, “No, I do not want to get well,” for the simple belief that for them, such wellness was an impossibility.
This poor soul responded to the question, “Sir, I have no one to help me into the pool when the water is stirred. If I try to get in, someone else will go down ahead of me.” A total fabrication of course. He had never seen the water miraculously disturbed. He had never seen an angel. But he knew that almost everyone believed in this fiction. So, in the hope that Jesus might proffer a denarii or two, he hoped to play on his sympathies. He would not have guessed in a thousand years what was about to happen, nor of Jesus’ next words . . .
“Get up, man! Pick up your mat and walk.” The man’s eyes reacted with cruel incredulity, almost as if Jesus had struck him. Beneath the rags that bound his feet something felt different. Sitting up, he looked at Jesus and reached tentatively for the bindings. As he unwrapped one foot he saw it no longer deformed but normal in every way. Feverishly, almost desperately he unwrapped the other foot. It too, appeared normal and healthy. Amazed, he looked at Jesus in fear. Jesus was smiling. The man grinned back. And then he tried it. He tried to walk. He had forgotten the last time he walked. He couldn’t remember, but he stood. He walked. The joy so swept him up that he whooped and jumped.
Turning to the others lying about he cried, “Look.” The response was interested but nominal. “Look!” he cried again. One of the beggars leaned over to another and whispered just loud enough to be heard, “Looks like the old fool has been faking all these years.”
“Pretty smart,” said the other. “Wonder what he’s going to do now?”
“Not so smart,” said the first man, “He’ll have to get a job now.”
The man whooped, jumped and yelled again, “Look!!!”
“Shut up and go away, you old liar!” shouted one of his colleagues.
Another voice whined, “Can I have your place now?”
