[ p. 35 ]
JESUS stayed there in the desert where he was, having conquered the last onslaught of the old enemy, waiting for the signal for his work to begin.
The signal came. Suddenly John the Baptist’s course was ended. He had called upon a king to repent, and declared aloud that the marriage of Herod Antipas, tetrarch of Galilee and Peraea, with Herodias, his stepbrother’s wife, was a forbidden thing* Therefore Herod had sent his men to lay hold of John, and had flung him into prison in his strong town of Machaerus, on the edge of the Arabian desert. The news of John the Baptist’s arrest came to Jesus.
The forerunner had run his course. He had done his work: he had proclaimed the imminent coming of the End, baptized Jesus into the knowledge what the End was to be not the Wrath, but the Love of God.
[ p. 36 ]
But why had Jesus waited till then? For two reasons, we believe. First, that he knew his message was, for all its outward likeness “Turn and be changed, for the Kingdom of God is upon you” profoundly different from John’s. And Jesus would not appear in open difference with John. John had been his master. At all times in his life Jesus insisted upon the greatness of John : he was more than a prophet; among men born of women there had been none greater than he. Jesus felt that in some sort he owed it to John that he himself was what he was. He owed John a loyalty, which he was to show most exquisitely in his dealings with John’s masterless and perturbed disciples. While John was still preaching his message, Jesus would refrain from preaching his.
But the message of Jesus was urgent and precious. Was he to wait indefinitely? No, for he had a presentiment that John woulcj run his course. Jesus felt that for all his greatness John was but his destined forerunner. John would end and he would begin, and John’s ending would be the sign for his beginning. There could be no confusion between them : a new message, a new prophet.
At the sign, Jesus went up from the desert into [ p. 37 ] Galilee, proclaiming the wonderful news of God and saying:
“The time is fulfilled, and the Kingdom of God is at hand. Repent, and believe in the wonderful news.”
And it was wonderful news. None more wonderful has ever been poured into the ears of longing and mistrustful men; and none more incredible. Very few of the millions who in some sort or other have believed in Jesus have believed in his message; very few have cared to understand it. To most of those who would have cared the way to understanding has been barred by their belief in Jesus as God, as the Son of God in some peculiar and transcendental sense.
This he was not, nor ever claimed to be. He believed he was the son of God, in precisely the same sense as he believed all men to be sons of God. The difference between him and other men, in his eyes, was simply this : that he knew he was the son of God, while they did not. Therefore he was God’s first-born, or first-reborn, son. But even that had no part in his message. His wonderful news was simply this: that all men were [ p. 38 ] God’s sons, if they would but become his sons, and that he was sent to show them the way. That was the strange and simple message of Jesus, the “wonderful news” that he went to proclaim through Galilee. The rest of the message was John’s message: that the time was fulfilled and the End was at hand. But on Jesus’ lips that message, though in words the same as John’s, was utterly transformed, by the simple fact of his knowledge that men were God’s sons, and God their Father. It was not, therefore, Wrath, but Love, to come : men had to expect not the grim sentence of a Judge, but the joyful welcome of a Father.
That this knowledge and this bliss might be theirs, men had only to repent But “repent” is a Christian word; it is not a word of Jesus. The significance of Jesus’ own word has been impoverished. Man had not to repent, but to turn and be changed, as Jesus %nself had turned and been changed. They would be reborn, and the world would be reborn. All men would know themselves for God’s sons, and Him for their Father, and the Kingdom of God would be, there and then, at the very moment that he spoke. The only time that [ p. 39 ] was needed was time for the wonderful news to be spread abroad. It would spread swift as fire in stubble. All that men had to do was to believe in it.
This was, and is, and ever will be, the wonderful news of Jesus. Men have seldom believed in it, though they have believed in things concerning him far more incredible than this. But to believe as Jesus meant the word “to believe” has been given to few. Jesus said that men had only to believe the wonderful news for it to be true ; they had only to believe that they were sons of God to be sons of God ; they had only to believe that God was their Father, to find him their Father. That was all : only to believe. But for Jesus to believe was to know.
With this wonderful news Jesus went to Capernaum, on the shore of the lake of Galilee. Round about that city he proclaimed his message: and crowds flocked to him. Sometimes he spoke to them inland, sometimes by the side of the lake. The substance of what he said was this :
“The Kingdom of God is coming now. To enter it you must become a son of God. To become a son of God, you must believe you are a son of [ p. 40 ] God. To believe you are a son of God means you must act like a son of God. To act like a son of God means many things. But chief of all it means this : that you must trust your Father utterly, and behave to every man as to a beloved brother, knowing that he also is a son of God.”
Whether before he went to Capernaum he had gone back to Nazareth it is hard to say. But there is no reason why we should not trust Matthew’s word that he did return to his native place; Luke seems to have heard the same story. But he quickly left it In his own family his message was not acceptable : it never was. It is one of the many strange ironies in the history of the Church that Jesus’ brother James, whose only recorded activity in Jesus’ lifetime was an attempt to take him as a madman, should emerge after Jesus’ death as the head of the Church in Jerusalem. The skeptic might suspect James’ good faith, and see in him one ready to exploit a relationship of flesh and blood where relation of the spirit there was none. But there is no need. James seems to have been a religious fanatic. Perhaps, as the Gospel of the Hebrews relates, Jesus’ family had been out to be baptized by John and were followers of his. [ p. 41 ] They knew Jesus’ message was in essence a negation of John’s; it seemed to them almost a blasphemy, and they rejected it and its bearer. During all his lifetime the cleavage between Jesus and his family was absolute.
So Jesus made his way to Capernaum. Capernaum, not Nazareth, became his home, or what little home he thenceforward possessed. He went there to find old friends of his to accept his message and help him in proclaiming it men who had known him when they followed John together : Simon and Andrew, James and John, and perhaps Philip of Bethsaida hard by. The tradition of the fourth gospel squares with the words of Simon Peter in the Acts in declaring that their acquaint^ ance with him had begun when he was baptized by John. It conflicts with nothing in Mark’s story, but rather fits perfectly with it. For Mark’s story, as the oldest tradition and the newest criticism unite in believing, is built up from Peter’s memories. The memories are of one who had known Jesus at his baptism, lost sight of him for a mysterious interspace, and been sought out by him again on the shores of the lake at the beginning of his active ministry.
[ p. 42 ]
We may imagine that, when Jesus parted from them, he to go into the desert, they to return to their homes, he had told them that he might have need of them. He did not know. When the im-< perious Spirit called him apart, its purpose might have been that he should become a desert anchorite like John, prophesying the End and preaching repentance far from the haunts of men. But he had proved his knowledge and his message to be far different. He had wonderful news to give, and he must seek men out to give it them.
He sought out first his friends of Capernaum. As he was walking by the side of the lake he saw Simon and Andrew putting out a seine. Both were in the boat, close inshore, one rowing, the other paying out the net from the stern. Jesus called to them: “Come here, and follow me: I will make you fishers of men.” And they left their boat and nets and followed him.
A little way further on he saw James and John, with their father Zebedee, sitting in their boat, mending their nets. He called them also ; and they left their father in the boat, with their hired men, and followed behind him.
Then Jesus, with his four followers, returned to [ p. 43 ] Capernaum, where they lived, and Jesus stayed at the house of Simon and Andrew. Henceforward their house was his home.
On the following Sabbath he went into the synagogue, and when the reading of the Law was ended he spoke. These, or like these, were the words he said:
“Think riot that I am come to undo the Law or the Prophets. I am not come to undo, but to complete them. For verily I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not a mark or a comma shall be taken from the Law until everything has been accomplished. Whoever therefore shall undo one of these smallest commandments, and teach men so to do, shall be the smallest in the Kingdom of Heaven. But whoever shall do them, and teach men so to do, shall be great in the Kingdom of Heaven.
“For I say to you: that unless your holiness is more than the holiness of the Scribes and Pharisees, you cannot enter into the Kingdom of Heaven.
“You have heard that it was said to the men of old : ‘Thou shalt do no murder,’ but whoever shall do murder shall suffer the judgment.
“But I say to you : that every man who is angry [ p. 44 ] with his brother shall suffer the judgment. Whoever shall say to his brother Rakal shall be haled before the council ; and whoever shall say to him Fool! shall be worthy of the undying fire.
“Therefore if you are bringing your offering to the altar in Jerusalem, and you remember that your brother has something against you, leave your offering there and then before the altar, and go away to be reconciled first to your brother, and then return and bring your offering.
“You have heard that it was said, Thou shalt not commit adultery.
“But I say to you: that every man who looks at a woman to desire her has already committed adultery with her in his heart
“Therefore, if your eye cause you to offend, pluck it out and cast it away. It is better that one of your members be destroyed, and not your whole body cast into the undying fire. And if your hand cause you to offend, cut it off and cast it away. It is better that one of your members be destroyed and not your whole body go into the undying fire.
“Again, you have heard that it was said to the men of old : ‘Thou shaft not swear falsely; but thou shalt fulfill thy oaths to God.’
[ p. 45 ]
“But I say to you : swear not at all. Neither by heaven, because it is the throne of God ; nor by the earth, because it is the footstool of his feet ; nor by Jerusalem, because it is the city of the great king. And do not swear by your head, because you cannot, make one hair of it black or white. But let your speech be : Yes, yes ; No, no. What is more than these comes of evil.
“You have heard that it was said : ‘An eye for an eye’ and ‘A tooth for a tooth.’
“But I say to you: Do not resist evil. Rather, whoever smites you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also. And whoever seeks to go to law with you, to take your shirt, let him have your cloak also. Whoever compels you to carry a mile for him, carry two. Give to the man that asks, and from the man who would borrow from you, do not turn away.
“You have heard that it was said : ‘Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy. ’
“But I say to you : Love your enemies, and pray for them that do you harm. That thus ye may become sons of your Father; for he makes his sun to rise upon good men and bad, and his rain to fall lupon the just and the unjust. If you love those [ p. 46 ] who love you, what reward have you? Do not the tax-gatherers do the same? Do not the pagans do the same?”
“Do you therefore be perfect, as your Father in Heaven is perfect.”