Chapter Thirty-Nine
E
phraim in Peraea was hardly large enough to be called a "town." Not many families lived here. It seemed to be a dying community. How it came to be named is a mystery, especially in view of the fact that the land had no historical relationship with the son of Joseph. Peraea was situated on the east side of the Jordan, just north of the Jabbock, within the ancient tribal territory of Manesseh. The land accorded to Ephraim, Manesseh's brother bordered on the west by the great sea. I spoke to an old scribe who believed the present eastern Ephraim got its name as a result of Manesseh's wish to honor his brother somehow. At one time, he told me, it had been named Ephron which some scholars believe to be a corruption of the name, Ephraim. I was puzzled by this however, because Ephron (one of three locations by that name) had been located more than a day's journey to the north near or perhaps the same as Gadara.
It was to this fading community that Jesus and the rest of us came and here took place one of the most revealing incidents that spoke to the character and integrity of Jesus. These qualities were never questioned among those of us who followed him. But they were not only questioned; they often maligned by those who wished for him to go away. To them, Jesus of Nazareth represented an anomaly, an unpleasant interruption into the routine of they way things were. He was not a part of the religious leviathan and moreover, he upset it. This was difficult to tolerate.
Even here in this remote corner of Peraea, their spies and emissarys were rampant, observing every move the Lord made, compiling information, reporting back to superiors, plotting, relentlessly scheming toward one objective, his eradication. On occasion, they came close -- close enough to frighten us but never close enough to preturb Jesus. In all the time we spent together, I never once saw him afraid or anxious over the manner of events.
The beggar sat by an old well, the water of which had diminished to a trickle. This was one reason why the community was dying. People could not live where there was not enough water. Most of the dwellers had to walk several miles to the Jabbock for water and it was just too far to be practical. Like all other beggars, when people walked by, he held out his hand and as I observed him, he sometimes withheld his hand and just sat there staring at the ground, looking miserable in his poverty. Jesus approached him, apparently taking him for what he looked to be, a person burdend by many years of unrelenting hardship and pain. For these people, Jesus had great compassion. Most of them had some physical handicap, lameness, deafness, blindness or limitless proclivity to wine. Many could not speak. I thought this man to be among the latter and I fully expected Jesus to heal him. The Lord came and stood before the beggar, hardly an arm's length away.
The man stared at the ground and as he saw the feet of Jesus come into view, he raised his head. He was dirty. Lines in his face were creased with filth and accumulated dirt had turned his countenance gray. One eye was normal, the other had no pupil. It was covered with a milky substance that gave the appearance of agate marble. He looked monstrous. His beard matted with spittle and oil caked with filth. His clothes ragged, torn and disheveled. He looked as if he himself were on the verge of death.
"How much did they pay you?" We were at first stunned at Jesus' question. "Is it enough to slay the Son of Man? For that they should have paid you well." The beggar remained seated as Jesus stood before him and said nothing, eyes glancing in every direction for all the good it did for the blind one. We thought we had misunderstood Jesus. We couldn't have heard what we thought we heard. But the coldness of Jesus' words had an effect. The beggar seemed unnerved and then in one cat-like movement the man was on his feet, light from the sun glinting on the blade of a dagger. Before any of us could react, the dagger was held at Jesus' throat. One tiny movement would open his carotid artery. Our Lord was a flick of the wrist away from a certain, bloody death. Peter charged toward the man, but the others held him in check.
"Stay away!" screamed the beggar, "Or I will remove his head!" We all froze, our feet immobile. The anguish on Peter's face revealed a terrible mixture of fear and rage. The man's right hand held the dagger and his left gripped the front of the Lord's chest. He jostled Jesus so that he looked awkward and fell back against the wall of the well, his knees buckling beneath him, his head held against the parapet. Yet if there were fear in him, his face did not show it. We were powerless to help. The man could easily kill Jesus before we reached him. Despite his appearance, the man was a brute with the strength to move Jesus about with one arm as if he were a sack of salt. Then as if there weren't enough bizarre eventuality taking place before us, the dog came calmly forward and sat on her haunches not two paces from the beggar and Jesus. She watched the scene unfold with oddly curious interest. It was as if she were waiting to see what the man would do.
Everything flashed through my mind. All that we ever did together, his baptism, the cold nights and blazing campfires, the wondrous teachings, the healings, the compassion -- all of it flooded my thoughts in what seemed like an eternity. Everything moved is arrested motion. I could see myself charging, seizing the man and his blade, thrusting it into the attacker's breast yet my feet were immobile. I couldn't move yet the dog sat there, watching the entertainment. The blade pressed deeper into skin. I was amazed that it had not yet cut through and we, all of us were paralyzed.
Crazily, thoughts of that terrible night on Galilee came to me. The boat was being tossed like a toy. We were taking on water. There seemed to be no question of the outcome, we were all going to die. Yet he lay there, his head on a coil of rope, asleep. I looked at Jesus now. He was not asleep, yet -- and this was eerie -- he was the one who appeared to be in control, not his assailant.
"Do what you have come here to do." The silent, slow motion sequence of events were intruded upon by his words. "Slay me if that is your intent," the voice went on. The words were even, unaffected by fear or rage. There was a moment of poignant silence again. We waited. Would he do it? None of us doubted that he would. Any second we thought we would see an ugly crimson streak on the neck of Jesus. We waited for blood. It didn't come. "Do you need help?" asked Jesus. Slowly his hand rose and approached the assailant's knife-weilding arm.
"Move another inch and you're dead!" screamed the beggar, his voice rasping with emotion. Jesus did not hesitate. His hand continued on its path until it grasped the man's wrist.
"Here, let me assist," he said. Incredibly, Jesus applied pressure. We saw the sharp blade press even deeper into his skin. The dog simply cocked her head. Slowly, the truth began to come to me. Jesus was not going to die. He was in total control. He was in no danger. He would not lose so much as a whisker. This was some bizarre event with a surprise ending. The man relaxed his grip on the weapon. Yet Jesus now held his hand in place, the blade pressed hard against his skin. It was Jesus who held the beggar as his prisoner, not the other way around.
"Let me go!" The man cried.
"Why?" asked Jesus. "Did you not come to kill me? Get it over with. This is what you've been paid to do."
"I've not the stomach for it," the man whimpered. He was defeated. But Jesus held the knife in its ominous place.
"Please . . . Master . . ." When he said that, Jesus allowed the man to withdraw his weapon. He broke into weeping and fell in a heap at Jesus' feet. Peter started toward the man. The knife had fallen from his hand clinking on stone. In one motion Peter grabbed it, took hold of the begger and would have killed him were it not for Jesus.
"No, Simon." Peter stopped, looking at Jesus with rage in his eyes. "Release him." The fisherman could not believe his ears. "Release him, now!" Jesus commanded. Peter allowed the heavy body to fall back to the earth. He stepped back sensing that Jesus wished him to do so. The man groveled, weeping at the Lord's feet. The crying escalated into rough coughing. Thick heaves of loud sobs overtook the man and then he vomited blood bright red. In a moment the coughing and heaving stopped. "Bring him a towel," said Jesus. Stooping down, the Lord took the towel, lifted the man's face now pale with fear and wiped the blood and spittle from his face. The unholy orb that was his blind eye lolled in his head, uncontrolled and wild. At Jesus touch, at his compassion, the man's spirit calmed. "What is your name?" his asked.
The man's head bowed in shame. "I have no name," he said. "And now I have no life. As you said, I will be hunted down and killed."
"Then I will give you a name," said Jesus. "Henceforth, you shall be known as Barnabas, son of consolation. Your life begins, Barnabas. There is something within you that God can use." Jesus laid his hand on the man's eye and massaged gently. When he removed it, the eye was clear and matched the other one. Barnabas could see clearly in both eyes. Abishag licked the man's hand, the very hand that had held the weapon. Color returned to his face, his shoulders straightened. "Bring appropriate garments," said Jesus to the disciples, "for at the appointed time, this man Barnabas shall serve the living God."
Yes, dear friend, this is the same Barnabas about whom Luke the physician wrote, whose surname was Joseph, a Levite from Cyprus.
Barnabas remained with us for about a week before Jesus sent him home. How such a man ever became a murderer for hire stupified me as his deportment among us for that week was nothing short of enriching. That such a man could have such spiritual insight and use it -- without knowing it I might add -- to fill the hearts of those who only a few days before were victimized by him was remarkable. He offered no resistance to leaving, it was he who wanted to leave us. What had happened in his heart he had to share with his family, who would no longer recognize him, he said, and his former friends. Another surprise. How could such a man as he was, ever have friends? But as the Lord reminded us, buried deep within this Joseph of Cyprus, was a sweetness of character that had been covered over by the bitterness and cynicism of poverty.
