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Jesus in our time – 9

Jesus in our time – 9

In those dawns, Jesus would pray in the foothills surrounding the city. Late mornings or early afternoons, Jesus would walk down the rugged, dusty, rocky hills into town, and stroll along the Greenbelt series of parks that wind along with the river as it winds through the city center, and I promise you that the wood-fenced and -gazeboed Rose Garden in front of the Zoo and the artsy movie house with foreign films and where you can buy food and beer with your movie and the wine samplings in the galleries and the local blues band in the smoke-free bars: all of this and more was known to and enjoyed by Jesus Christ the Savior.

And also: Jesus did not scorn the small art museum directly in front of the Rose Garden and across the street from the library, but said that some of the art was interesting and neat and even beautiful; though it is true that someone’s grandmother did once disparage this little local museum, but this was unfair: it’s just a small affair and to compare it to the MET and other grand experiences of her life and times was like comparing the Book of Obadiah with the Book of say Genesis or some other grand chunk of the glorious whole. Edom, founded by Esau, in the cliffsides around a Sea dead even in the ancient of days, did indeed fall; and this was worth prophesizing, and this prophecy fit in a few slender pages, and in the mouth of a minor prophet, and tucked away towards the end of the Holy Bible, and yet: there it stands!

Not far from the art museum, nor far from the rose garden, and quite close to the wide tree-shaded paths and to the sparkling Capitol Boulevard and to the glinting river, and facing a wide green field lined by trees and bright in the morning sunlight: There stood a wide white bandstand with a flat stage extending beyond the cavernous bandshell behind the red and blue archway opening the rectangular facade. At the front of the stage around 10AM round about the time of the vernal equinox of 2024, Jesus sat in green khaki shorts and a yellow-with-black-zagging-stripe Charlie Brown T-shirt, swinging his legs and squinting in the bright morning light.

And a crowd gathered around him as if summoned by the silent shout of the Holy Spirit, or perhaps in anticipation of a free concert that was scheduled for 11AM that day, a concert whose framework was being constructed in bangs and clicks and thumps and thuds behind Jesus Christ, with friendly roadies in black T-shirts and shorts who told him he’s going to have to move at some point, since there’s a concert there coming up.

And Jesus stood up at the edge of the stage that extended a dozen or so feet beyond the facade into which the bandshell was hewn, and he began to preach to the crowd of (mostly young) people on blankets and drinking water, soda, tea, coffee, health elixirs, and even some alcohol disguised as water, soda, tea, coffee, or perhaps a health elixir.

“Blessed are the tender hearted; a gentle smile and open heart live already in the Holy, reacting to things as they really are.

“Blessed are the humbly courageous, who know the child of God in everyone they meet.

“Blessed are the lonely, for God’s community has room for all, and its fellowship is only kind, excluding none and remembering all.

“Blessed are those who seek the Truth and speak gently and honestly.

“Blessed are those who choose the freedom of shared delight over the freedom to lie, cheat, and twist the Light.

“Blessed are those who refuse to follow bullies and liars — even when they bully on your behalf, and lie for your advantage.

“Blessed are those who accept their human hands and holy fire; in their humility and courage they are the conduits through which God-as-Joy flows into this world: Not as a command, but as a prayer and an offering; for every soul knows itself divine, but wisdom remembers that human minds, hearts, mouths, and fingers are fallible, are here to serve Love, not to boast in self-pretended holiness, making believe that one’s own thoughts and feelings themselves were the divine Love that thoughts and feelings must serve if the human is to live the life-overflowing.

And with many such exhortations did he teach them, and they were surprised and said, “Who is this who teaches Something Deeperism, but not as complicated, self-looping philosophizings — as do the Bartlebies and the Ambles –, but in simple, earnest language in bandshells in the bright sunlight that we who grew up in this safe little town have come to accept as our birthright, as the background guarantee of our covenant with this lucky break and outrageous grace we sometimes accidentally pretend we earned?”

And the band began to play, and they played as they had never before played, and Jesus sat in for a couple sets, but he didn’t know the lyrics, so he sang some Psalms in ancient tongues and everyone’s hair stood on end at the nearness of the Spirit in a free concert in a wide park in the Greenbelt series of parks that follows the river through town and helps make the city into a playground for old and young alike. Sometimes a few hours float outside of time and everyone present knows for a time that all are one and in this One all hang forever outside of their times, their places, their names, their shapes, their sizes, their hearts, their minds, their attitudes and expressions. Such times have no price and point towards the Good, although sometimes fees are associated with them and sometimes the experience is co-opted by lies of us-versus-them and other follies that would wad up the Infinite Light into a little narrow weapon. But that didn’t happen to this event; no, this moment stayed pure and sweet, gentle like a newborn’s giggle, and light and merry-quick like the flick of a squirrel’s bushy tail.

Author: Bartleby Willard
Editor: Amble Whistletown
Copyright: Andy Mac Watson

Jesus in our time – 8

Jesus in our time – 8

The problem is political evil

But what is the solution?

Jesus is the English form of the Greek form (Iēsous) of the Aramaic Yeshua, which is a version of the Hebrew Yəhôšua, which we translate as “Joshua”: YHWH is salvation, or saves, or is a saving-cry, or is-a-cry-for-help, or -is-lordly. Anyway, something to do with Yahweh.

Wikipedia believes that Yahweh was originally one God among many and that the ancient Israelites were a subset of the ancient Canaanites, and they all worshipped the same basic pantheon of Gods, and that in the Iron Age the Israelites were worshipping “El, the ruler of the pantheon, Asherah, his consort, and Baal.” Wikipedia then says that in Deuteronomy 32:8-9* Yahweh used to be named as a son of “El”, but that was edited out in later versions.

*[In the Most High causing nations to inherit, In His separating sons of Adam — He setteth up the borders of the peoples By the number of the sons of Israel. For Jehovah’s portion [is] His people, Jacob [is] the line of His inheritance.]

In support of this statement, Wikipedia links to a book Monotheism and Yahweh’s Appropriation of Baal by James S. Anderson (published 2015 by Bloomsbury T&T Clark). On page 3 of this book, we find,

As the examination of the relevant evidence makes clear, Iron Age Israel and
Judah worshipped a small pantheon headed by Yahweh and Asherah. The Hebrew
Bible evinces the co-opting of Asherah by Yahweh as Yahweh takes over her
domain: presiding over care of the womb, childbirth and child-rearing activities.
Other domains, which Canaanite religions ascribed specifically to Baal, were also
transferred to Yahweh, such as the rule over the Rephaim and the care of these
deified ancestors: …

So maybe Wikipedia got the pantheon a little wrong? Maybe El is the most important God, but the romantic pair Yahweh and Asherah are the ones looking out for the Iron Age Israelites and Judeans? See this next bit:

On page 77, in the section 5.7 The Song of Moses, we find the part that I guess Wikipedia had found:


Within these triumphal monotheistic affirmations, Deuteronomy 32.8–9
explains how Elyon organized the sons of Adam into distinct peoples, and set
the boundaries of the territory allotted to each people according to the number
of the sons of El. Yahweh received Jacob as his lot. In the received Hebrew text,
the sons of El have been turned into “sons of Israel” (ראלׂיש > אל(, a reading that
spoils the logic of the text but erases the pantheon implied by the notion that El
has many sons. That the reading “sons of Israel” is an emendation of “sons of El”
is confirmed by texts found near Qumran, and by the Septuagint which reads
ἀγγέλων θεοῦ, rendered in the New English Translation of the Septuagint as
“divine sons.” The Alexandrian translators either had too much respect for the
Hebrew text they worked on, or they reconciled with monotheism the idea that
Yahweh was a subordinate deity among others in the pantheon ruled by the “Most
High” by understanding Elyon as a synonym for Yahweh. In any case, the text
does not make any sense in the context of a song that pictures Yahweh not only
as the head of the pantheon but also as the sole and only god. …

James S. Anderson is an adjunct professor in Texas. Other books by the same author: Bethlehem the House of Bread, Defending Catholicism, Extolling Yeshua, and Manifesting Peace. This is his author page.

I promise you, I had never heard of this man until today!

But to return to our story.

Jesus in our time 7

Jesus in our time 7

And come together again doth a multitude, so that they are not able even to eat bread;
and his friends having heard, went forth to lay hold on him, for they said that he was beside himself,
and the scribes who [are] from Jerusalem having come down, said — ‘He hath Beelzeboul,’ and — ‘By the ruler of the demons he doth cast out the demons.’

And, having called them near, in similes he said to them, ‘How is the Adversary able to cast out the Adversary?
and if a kingdom against itself be divided, that kingdom cannot be made to stand;
and if a house against itself be divided, that house cannot be made to stand;
and if the Adversary did rise against himself, and hath been divided, he cannot be made to stand, but hath an end.

‘No one is able the vessels of the strong man — having entered into his house — to spoil, if first he may not bind the strong man, and then his house he will spoil.

‘Verily I say to you, that all the sins shall be forgiven to the sons of men, and evil speakings with which they might speak evil,
but whoever may speak evil in regard to the Holy Spirit hath not forgiveness — to the age, but is in danger of age-during judgment;’
because they said, ‘He hath an unclean spirit.’

Then come do his brethren and mother, and standing without, they sent unto him, calling him,
and a multitude was sitting about him, and they said to him, ‘Lo, thy mother and thy brethren without do seek thee.’
And he answered them, saying, ‘Who is my mother, or my brethren?’
And having looked round in a circle to those sitting about him, he saith, ‘Lo, my mother and my brethren!
for whoever may do the will of God, he is my brother, and my sister, and mother.’

[Mark: 3:20-35]

In the first year of Belshazzar king of Babylon, Daniel hath seen a dream, and the visions of his head on his bed, then the dream he hath written, the chief of the things he hath said.

Answered hath Daniel and said, ‘I was seeing in my vision by night, and lo, the four winds of the heavens are coming forth to the great sea;
and four great beasts are coming up from the sea, diverse one from another.

‘I was seeing till that thrones have been thrown down, and the Ancient of Days is seated, His garment as snow [is] white, and the hair of his head [is] as pure wool, His throne flames of fire, its wheels burning fire.
A flood of fire is proceeding and coming forth from before Him, a thousand thousands do serve Him, and a myriad of myriads before Him do rise up, the Judge is seated, and the books have been opened.

‘I was seeing in the visions of the night, and lo, with the clouds of the heavens as a son of man was [one] coming, and unto the Ancient of Days he hath come, and before Him they have brought him near.
And to him is given dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, and all peoples, nations, and languages do serve him, his dominion [is] a dominion age-during, that passeth not away, and his kingdom that which is not destroyed.

‘Pierced hath been my spirit — I, Daniel — in the midst of the sheath, and the visions of my head trouble me;
I have drawn near unto one of those standing, and the certainty I seek from him of all this; and he hath said to me, yea, the interpretation of the things he hath caused me to know:

‘These great beasts, that [are] four, [are] four kings, they rise up from the earth;
and receive the kingdom do the saints of the Most High, and they strengthen the kingdom unto the age, even unto the age of the ages.

‘Thus he said: The fourth beast is the fourth kingdom in the earth, that is diverse from all kingdoms, and it consumeth all the earth, and treadeth it down, and breaketh it small.

And the ten horns out of the kingdom [are] ten kings, they rise, and another doth rise after them, and it is diverse from the former, and three kings it humbleth;
and words as an adversary of the Most High it doth speak, and the saints of the Most High it doth wear out, and it hopeth to change seasons and law; and they are given into its hand, till a time, and times, and a division of a time.

‘And the Judge is seated, and its dominion they cause to pass away, to cut off, and to destroy — unto the end;
and the kingdom, and the dominion, even the greatness of the kingdom under the whole heavens, is given to the people — the saints of the Most High, His kingdom [is] a kingdom age-during, and all dominions do serve and obey Him.

‘Hitherto [is] the end of the matter. I, Daniel, greatly do my thoughts trouble me, and my countenance is changed on me, and the matter in my heart I have kept.

[Daniel 7:1-; 7:9-10; 7:13-18; 7:23-28]

And as he is going forth into the way, one having run and having kneeled to him, was questioning him, ‘Good teacher, what may I do, that life age-during I may inherit?’

And Jesus said to him, ‘Why me dost thou call good? no one [is] good except One — God;
the commands thou hast known: Thou mayest not commit adultery, Thou mayest do no murder, Thou mayest not steal, Thou mayest not bear false witness, Thou mayest not defraud, Honour thy father and mother.’

And he answering said to him, ‘Teacher, all these did I keep from my youth.’

And Jesus having looked upon him, did love him, and said to him, ‘One thing thou dost lack; go away, whatever thou hast — sell, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven, and come, be following me, having taken up the cross.’

And he — gloomy at the word — went away sorrowing, for he was having many possessions.

And Jesus having looked round, saith to his disciples, ‘How hardly shall they who have riches enter into the reign of God!’

And the disciples were astonished at his words, and Jesus again answering saith to them, ‘Children, how hard is it to those trusting on the riches to enter into the reign of God!

It is easier for a camel through the eye of the needle to enter, than for a rich man to enter into the reign of God.’

And they were astonished beyond measure, saying unto themselves, ‘And who is able to be saved?’

And Jesus, having looked upon them, saith, ‘With men it is impossible, but not with God; for all things are possible with God.’

[Mark 10:18-27]

And lo, a certain lawyer stood up, trying him, and saying, ‘Teacher, what having done, life age-during shall I inherit?’

And he said unto him, ‘In the law what hath been written? how dost thou read?’

And he answering said, ‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God out of all thy heart, and out of all thy soul, and out of all thy strength, and out of all thy understanding, and thy neighbour as thyself.’

And he said to him, ‘Rightly thou didst answer; this do, and thou shalt live.’

And he, willing to declare himself righteous, said unto Jesus, ‘And who is my neighbour?’

and Jesus having taken up [the word], said, ‘A certain man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell among robbers, and having stripped him and inflicted blows, they went away, leaving [him] half dead.
‘And by a coincidence a certain priest was going down in that way, and having seen him, he passed over on the opposite side;
and in like manner also, a Levite, having been about the place, having come and seen, passed over on the opposite side.
‘But a certain Samaritan, journeying, came along him, and having seen him, he was moved with compassion,
and having come near, he bound up his wounds, pouring on oil and wine, and having lifted him up on his own beast, he brought him to an inn, and was careful of him;
and on the morrow, going forth, taking out two denaries, he gave to the innkeeper, and said to him, Be careful of him, and whatever thou mayest spend more, I, in my coming again, will give back to thee.

‘Who, then, of these three, seemeth to thee to have become neighbour of him who fell among the robbers?’

and he said, ‘He who did the kindness with him,’ then Jesus said to him, ‘Be going on, and thou be doing in like manner.’

[Luke 10:25-37]

[In Mark, the most famous commandment story comes while the Pharisees and Sadducees are trying to trip Jesus up, but Jesus keeps coming up with awesome replies to their riddles.]

And one of the scribes having come near, having heard them disputing, knowing that he answered them well, questioned him, ‘Which is the first command of all?’

and Jesus answered him — ‘The first of all the commands [is], Hear, O Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord is one;
and thou shalt love the Lord thy God out of all thy heart, and out of thy soul, and out of all thine understanding, and out of all thy strength — this [is] the first command; and the second [is] like [it], this, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself; — greater than these there is no other command.’

And the scribe said to him, ‘Well, Teacher, in truth thou hast spoken that there is one God, and there is none other but He; and to love Him out of all the heart, and out of all the understanding, and out of all the soul, and out of all the strength, and to love one’s neighbour as one’s self, is more than all the whole burnt-offerings and the sacrifices.’

And Jesus, having seen him that he answered with understanding, said to him, ‘Thou art not far from the reign of God;’ and no one any more durst question him.

[Mark 12:28-34]

And after the delivering up of John, Jesus came to Galilee, proclaiming the good news of the reign of God,
and saying — ‘Fulfilled hath been the time, and the reign of God hath come nigh, reform ye, and believe in the good news.’

[Mark 1:14-15]

[The below (Mark 4:10-15) comes after Jesus had delivered the parable of the sower to a crowd. The sower throws seed on grounds of various types — where only the seed thrown on the “good ground” grows, and that ground (and/or the seeds??) “was giving fruit, coming up and increasing, and it bare, one thirty-fold, and one sixty, and one an hundred.” (from the end of Mark 4:8)]

And when he was alone, those about him, with the twelve, did ask him of the simile, and he said to them,

‘To you it hath been given to know the secret of the reign of God, but to those who are without, in similes are all the things done; that seeing they may see and not perceive, and hearing they may hear and not understand, lest they may turn, and the sins may be forgiven them.’

And he saith to them, ‘Have ye not known this simile? and how shall ye know all the similes?

He who is sowing doth sow the word; and these are they by the way where the word is sown: …

[Mark 4:10-15]

And he said, ‘To what may we liken the reign of God, or in what simile may we compare it?

As a grain of mustard, which, whenever it may be sown on the earth, is less than any of the seeds that are on the earth; and whenever it may be sown, it cometh up, and doth become greater than any of the herbs, and doth make great branches, so that under its shade the fowls of the heaven are able to rest.’

And with many such similes he was speaking to them the word, as they were able to hear, and without a simile he was not speaking to them, and by themselves, to his disciples he was expounding all.

[Mark 4:30-34]

“Why, blast your eyes, Bildad,” cried Peleg, “thou dost not want to swindle this young man! he must have more than that.”

“Seven hundred and seventy-seventh,” again said Bildad, without lifting his eyes; and then went on mumbling—“for where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.”

“I am going to put him down for the three hundredth,” said Peleg, “do ye hear that, Bildad! The three hundredth lay, I say.”

Bildad laid down his book, and turning solemnly towards him said, “Captain Peleg, thou hast a generous heart; but thou must consider the duty thou owest to the other owners of this ship—widows and orphans, many of them —- and that if we too abundantly reward the labors of this young man, we may be taking the bread from those widows and those orphans. The seven hundred and seventy-seventh lay, Captain Peleg.”

“Thou Bildad!” roared Peleg, starting up and clattering about the cabin. “Blast ye, Captain Bildad, if I had followed thy advice in these matters, I would afore now had a conscience to lug about that would be heavy enough to founder the largest ship that ever sailed round Cape Horn.”

“Captain Peleg,” said Bildad steadily, “thy conscience may be drawing ten inches of water, or ten fathoms, I can’t tell; but as thou art still an impenitent man, Captain Peleg, I greatly fear lest thy conscience be but a leaky one; and will in the end sink thee foundering down to the fiery pit, Captain Peleg.”

“Fiery pit! fiery pit! ye insult me, man; past all natural bearing, ye insult me. It’s an all-fired outrage to tell any human creature that he’s bound to hell. Flukes and flames! Bildad, say that again to me, and start my soul-bolts, but I’ll -— I’ll —- yes, I’ll swallow a live goat with all his hair and horns on. Out of the cabin, ye canting, drab-coloured son of a wooden gun -— a straight wake with ye!”

As he thundered out this he made a rush at Bildad, but with a marvellous oblique, sliding celerity, Bildad for that time eluded him.

[Moby Dick, Chapter 17, when Ishmael signs up to ship with the Pequod. Author: Herman Melville]

If with the tongues of men and of messengers I speak, and have not love, I have become brass sounding, or a cymbal tinkling; and if I have prophecy, and know all the secrets, and all the knowledge, and if I have all the faith, so as to remove mountains, and have not love, I am nothing; and if I give away to feed others all my goods, and if I give up my body that I may be burned, and have not love, I am profited nothing.

The love is long-suffering, it is kind, the love doth not envy, the love doth not vaunt itself, is not puffed up, doth not act unseemly, doth not seek its own things, is not provoked, doth not impute evil, rejoiceth not over the unrighteousness, and rejoiceth with the truth; all things it beareth, all it believeth, all it hopeth, all it endureth.

The love doth never fail; and whether [there be] prophecies, they shall become useless; whether tongues, they shall cease; whether knowledge, it shall become useless; for in part we know, and in part we prophecy; and when that which is perfect may come, then that which [is] in part shall become useless.

When I was a babe, as a babe I was speaking, as a babe I was thinking, as a babe I was reasoning, and when I have become a man, I have made useless the things of the babe; for we see now through a mirror obscurely, and then face to face; now I know in part, and then I shall fully know, as also I was known; and now there doth remain faith, hope, love — these three; and the greatest of these [is] love.

QED

Author: Various
Editor: Amble and Bartleby
Copyright: The texts are in the public domain (Bible passages translated by Robert Young, Moby Dick translated from Herman Melville’s clanging cavern to his vouching voice. Yes, the texts are in the public domain, but this ordering and the grand proof flowing thereof: This is copyrighted by Andy Mac Watson of the Sands Springs Watsons.

And what was proven? Why, everything anyone would ever need was here proven!

For nations rise and fall, prophets sound the alarms, and children grumble about grammar school only to later discover how cushy they had it way back when; for people surmise, but only the God Knows, and in our heart of hearts we find that God is Love or there is neither God nor Love, for God must be Kind to be God and Love must be Real to be Love — and so we ask ourselves if our sense that God is Love and Love is All is True, or if our various (less fundamentally sensed) hopes and fears about this and that are truer than that our widest deepest most fundamental sense. What is the reason that poetries pointing towards the sense that Love is the Supreme Reality resonate so deeply with we human-things? Poetries like Jesus’s “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and soul and mind and strength, and your neighbor as yourself”; and like Paul’s praise of Love as the highest and surest path of discipleship?

There are those who would follow Jesus Christ into forever and beyond; but what did Jesus in the earliest Gospel (Mark) [excepting the part someone added way later at the very end (Mark 16)]: What did Jesus himself say when asked about the path to salvation?

In one spot, he says keep the ten commandments PLUS sell everything you own, give every single drop of money to the poor, and follow me right now! Hurry it up! And then he says it’s really hard for the rich to get into heaven, but with God all things are possible. OK, that’s encouraging, I guess, but what about for the guy who just went away depressed at having to lose out on eternal life because he can’t part with his property and (one would surmise) the family it supports? Doesn’t he look a lot like pretty much everybody — regardless of what we claim to believe and prioritize?

In another spot in Mark, Jesus says the most important commandment is to Love the Lord with all your heart and soul and mind and your brother as yourself, and that the grasping of this amounts to being close to the reign of God; and then in Luke, Jesus gives the same answer to the question “what must I do to inherit eternal life”, with a bonus track explanation of who one’s neighbor (the Good Samaritan knows who’s whose neighbor).

And then we have in Mark something very strange, where Jesus says he is telling the crowds about the “reign of God” in parables and gives his disciples this explanation: “To you it hath been given to know the secret of the reign of God, but to those who are without, in similes are all the things done; that seeing they may see and not perceive, and hearing they may hear and not understand, lest they may turn, and the sins may be forgiven them.” What? Why? That doesn’t sound fair, or helpful, or Jesus-like.

There are those who would follow Jesus Christ into forever and beyond, but who among us mortals truly loves the Lord our God with our all and our neighbor as ourself?, and who among we sons-of-woman truly keeps God’s Love first in our lives? And so the path to salvation is narrow, and many are called, but few chosen. And all those formulations we think we find in and out of scriptures are interesting thoughts of interesting people; but God alone Knows, and if Jesus spoke for God, then what God spelled out was a radical, relentless commitment to a Love that chooses everyone — it wasn’t what anyone except the most loving people of any faith are even starting approach. And some really confusing Riddler stuff that either wasn’t from Jesus or was. But the most important pair of commandments is recorded in all four gospels; and on the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus is heard to say, ‘All things, therefore, whatever ye may will that men may be doing to you, so also do to them, for this is the law and the prophets.’ (Matthew 7:12)

And so fall those elegant towers, built into the cliffs over the sea — and so fall it all down with a mighty rumble and crash into the heavy crashing waves that swallow all and then forget completely.

We thought we’d find salvation in a ritual, in a life of ritual, essays, dramatic pronouncements, and/or part-time goodness. But salvation came to us only through the part of us that loved everyone, and salvation came only to that part of us that loved all, and salvation was only that part of us that was Pure Love; as to the rest, as always, every time, over and over: it goes into the fire, leaving behind only the Love that choose everyone; and so we start again, and again, and then again again.

Author: Bartleby Willard
Editor: Amble Whistletown
Copyright: Andy Watson

Who were the Sands Springs Watson? What became of the clan of the barber with one shoe raised to make up for a hip broken perhaps riding horses and perhaps playing baseball? I want to see the home with all the spitoons, to wander back into the back room where men drank, gambled, and argued religion and politics late into the night. I want to see for myself!

‘If I may not see in his hands the mark of the nails, and may put my finger to the mark of the nails, and may put my hand to his side, I will not believe.’

And after eight days, again were his disciples within, and Thomas with them; Jesus cometh, the doors having been shut, and he stood in the midst, and said, ‘Peace to you!’
then he saith to Thomas, ‘Bring thy finger hither, and see my hands, and bring thy hand, and put [it] to my side, and become not unbelieving, but believing.’

And Thomas answered and said to him, ‘My Lord and my God;’

Jesus saith to him, ‘Because thou hast seen me, Thomas, thou hast believed; happy those not having seen, and having believed.’

Many indeed, therefore, other signs also did Jesus before his disciples, that are not written in this book; and these have been written that ye may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing ye may have life in his name.’

Jesus in our time – 6

Jesus in our time – 6

Susan was reading the Bible on the sofa in the living room in the evening in the summer when the sun is up until 10PM and nothing could ever go wrong in the world.

The trees outside in the yard were tall and breathing cheerfully and gracefully in the forever-light. A gray squirrel dashed across the little lawn. No one saw him. I remember the year the squirrels were dying with broken hind-backs. Some evil paralysis would steal away first their locomotion and then their life breath. But that was a while ago, and nothing ever seems to have come of it — not really.

Jesus was seated at the little table in the corner, writing in his notebook — which I am going to steal and auction off for a billion dollars; just kidding; mostly kidding.

I was sitting cross-legged on the sofa down the way from Susan. I wasn’t doing anything.

“Why so hard on divorce?,” asked Susan of the one they call Immanuel, which means “God with us”, and of which the Scofield Bible glosses that it’s more of a title than a name, and that’s why Jesus’s name — already very appropriate, since it means “to save” or “to deliver” — wasn’t literally “Immanuel”, even though Isaiah clearly stated “Therefore the Lord Himself giveth to you a sign, Lo, the Virgin is conceiving, And is bringing forth a son, And hath called his name Immanuel,” [Isaiah 7:14]

Jesus looked up from his notes and, since he was seated facing the wall, with his left side pointed towards the sofa, turned chair and body a little to the left to address the question.

Susan continued,

“Some say that it’s because men were distorting the Hebrew scriptures to justify divorcing their wives on any grounds. Here’s Leviticus 24:1-4, the only verse that specifically mentions a certificate of divorce:

When a man doth take a wife, and hath married her, and it hath been, if she doth not find grace in his eyes (for he hath found in her nakedness of anything), and he hath written for her a writing of divorce, and given [it] into her hand, and sent her out of his house, and she hath gone out of his house, and hath gone and been another man’s, and the latter man hath hated her, and written for her a writing of divorce, and given [it] into her hand, and sent her out of his house, or when the latter man dieth, who hath taken her to himself for a wife: `Her former husband who sent her away is not able to turn back to take her to be to him for a wife, after that she hath become defiled; for an abomination it [is] before Jehovah, and thou dost not cause the land to sin which Jehovah thy God is giving to thee — an inheritance.

“The Pharisees, scribes, and everyone else talking with Jesus in the temple — in Matthew 19:1-12, I mean — would’ve known that verse and how it was being used for men to divorce their wives for any old reason, and in a time when women without husbands were very vulnerable. With that background knowledge, listen then as if for the first time, to Matthew’s account:

And it came to pass, when Jesus finished these words, he removed from Galilee, and did come to the borders of Judea, beyond the Jordan, and great multitudes followed him, and he healed them there.
And the Pharisees came near to him, tempting him, and saying to him, `Is it lawful for a man to put away his wife for every cause?’
And he answering said to them, `Did ye not read, that He who made [them], from the beginning a male and a female made them, and said, For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and cleave to his wife, and they shall be — the two — for one flesh? so that they are no more two, but one flesh; what therefore God did join together, let no man put asunder.’
They say to him, `Why then did Moses command to give a roll of divorce, and to put her away?’
He saith to them — `Moses for your stiffness of heart did suffer you to put away your wives, but from the beginning it hath not been so. `And I say to you, that, whoever may put away his wife, if not for whoredom, and may marry another, doth commit adultery; and he who did marry her that hath been put away, doth commit adultery.’
His disciples say to him, `If the case of the man with the woman is so, it is not good to marry.’
And he said to them, `All do not receive this word, but those to whom it hath been given; for there are eunuchs who from the mother’s womb were so born; and there are eunuchs who were made eunuchs by men; and there are eunuchs who kept themselves eunuchs because of the reign of the heavens: he who is able to receive [it] — let him receive.’

[The Bible passages were translated by Robert Young, as literally as he could in 1862 and then again in 1887, and then with post-humous collaboration in 1898. We chose this translation for its admiral accuracy, its charmingly old-fashioned English, and because we like picture Robert Young there in Edinburgh in his bulky black suit jacket and tidy black cravat in white starched-collar; we like to see his white, mustacheless, sailorly beard jutting forward with his thin lips (almost smiling!) and strong triangular nose following close behind; and with his small crow-footed eyes (almost certainly smiling!) and large bald pate (white hair on the sides and behind) sloping back the other way, back towards a youth binding books at his father’s side while spending nights in the solitary pursuit of Greek, Hebrew … the tools of his dawning vocation. We like see him writing, in the preface of the 1862 version of his translation of the Old and the New Testaments

If a translation gives a present tense when the original gives a past, or a past when it has a present; a perfect for a future, or a future for a perfect; an a for a the, or a the for an a; an imperative for a subjunctive, or a subjunctive for an imperative; a verb for a noun, or a noun for a verb, it is clear that verbal inspiration is as much overlooked as if it had no existence. THE WORD OF GOD IS MADE VOID BY THE TRADITIONS OF MEN. [Emphases in original.]

We like to see that. Why? Are we making fun? Is it all a big joke to us? Or do we in time slide beyond our jokes into the wider hilarity of a Love that is All? Must every good joke grow ever-gentler, and must all true gentleness lead one to the infinite gentleness at the core of all things? Dear God of Abraham, oh Fear of Isaac, lead us, we pray as one, into the deeper merriment, where we recognize all as one and all in one.

Wikipedia – Young’s Literal Translation]

Jesus put his hands on his thighs, on green khaki shorts. He was barefoot — his all-terrain kevlar-strap sandals left at the door. His T-shirt was light blue emblazoned with a (now peeling) wind-whipping American flag, with the words “These Colors Don’t Run” in red, white, and (darker than the shirt) blue written underneath. Tun had bought it years ago at a local thrift store, and had worn it ironically in those years when he was most desperately ironic (I’m thinking of youth, I’m thinking of teens, I’m thinking of the giddy delight of those heady years when one first gets good at jokes, when one feels suddenly so completely and competently “in on it”).

Jesus had picked that T-shirt out of a drawer the other day and brought it, still pristinely folded, forward in his open palms like an offering to the living room, where Tun and Arch were visiting me and Susan, with Bartleby and Frank still on the way, but busy being seagulls gadding over the garbage dump — a strange game, to be sure; but everything’s stranger and more kaleidoscopic when one can shift forms at will. Jesus looked at Tun and said, “I will wear your shirt with irony. I will wear it with irony at the irony of your youth and irony at the irony of my irony at your youth. And I will heap layer upon layer — multitudes of irony will I pile upon the wearing of this shirt.” To which Tun, looking a little embarrassed down towards the dark wood floorboards, replied, “It’s a rare time and place where people can get away with as much irony as we did — our high schools far removed from war and rumors of war; our homes ignorant of poverty and despair. It was a privilege, a grace, maybe a temptation — maybe privilege and grace are always temptation.” Jesus laughed, “Oh faithless and ironic generation, how long must I suffer you?”* But there was a seriousness to his laughter, because one of Donald Trump’s weapons against democracy was a facade of “just kidding”, and so did he pervert humor fun mirth and fellowship even as he perverted truth justice and the American way.

*[See Matthew 17:17. While there, you may as well also see Matthew 17:20 (in which faith the size of a mustard seed is enough to move mountains); and here consider the impossibility of faith, which is incorporeal, having the expanse and mass of any material object — even something as small as a mustard seed. Tun: “He’s setting us up for failure! He’s giving the mountains all the advantages!” But that was when we were young and silly — when a great irony blanketed us all in the snug comfort of knowing that we were gathering up every last nuance; and that with those final insights/perspectives collected and kidded over, we would have finally banished every last danger from our world.]

Anyway, that was the other day.

To return to this conversation in this part of our story:

Jesus said to Susan:

“I think you and Amble are lucky to have each other.”

“Well, yes, of course. I am very grateful … But some people are not so lucky in their marriage …”

“Can what’s unlucky come from God?”

“No, … I don’t know. Are you saying if people are irreconcilably miserable in their marriage, God never cleaved them together in the first place? Or that God has now uncleaved them? Or that God cleaved them, but now, through mutual mistreatments, they’ve uncleaved themselves from each other? Or that God cleaved them, so they’re lucky to be cleaved the one to the other, and they need to work harder to appreciate and love each other?”

But Jesus just nodded all through her questions and then said, “What about the part about the eunuchs? What did you think about that?”

Susan set the Bible down. “I don’t know, Jesus. It sounded to me like Paul had written that part. But I think you’re dodging the question.”

Jesus smiled. He stood up and stretched. “I think you’re dodging the question: How do we make this country realize how lucky they’ve been, and that they owe this luck to a system where the people keep the government honest and the government lets the people find their own truths and speak their own minds? As it is written, ‘A man convinced against his will is of the same opinion still.'”

Susan shrugged her thin shoulders and pouty cheeks, “I’m just curious, and, well, here you are!”

So then I reached over and picked up the Bible and started shaking it about in front of my face and saying to Jesus, who by now had sat back into the wooden straight-back chair:

“And what about all this stuff about God needing to sacrifice his son to save us from our sins and so he could offer salvation to both Jews and gentiles? It makes no sense. I mean, why should God need such weird rituals to grant us all life overflowing, the peace that passes understanding, and true salvation? And didn’t other people in previous times and places already find salvation? None of that makes any sense. And did you think you were the Messiah and that the Kingdom of God was about to come literally — with a great purge of the wicked and then the governments of the world all fully replaced by a universal holy rule? And what do you think now, two thousand years later, when you’ve become a famous part of a famous three-part God: The biggest boy band in of human history, except that the Holy Spirit doesn’t ever get personified.”

Jesus frowned. And then he said, “Okay, Amble, if you place such store in such knowledge about such matters, I will explain it to you. … But this doesn’t leave this room.”

[Susan had been reading blog posts about Jesus’s statements about marriage:

“Hardness of Heart” and Jesus’ Audience, Then and Now (JDR-10)


https://cslr.law.emory.edu/news/releases/2012/02/what-jesus-said-marriage-and-divorce.html]

Author: Bartleby Willard
Editor: Amble Whistletown
Copyright: Andy Watson

Jesus in our time – 5

Jesus in our time – 5

But Amble was falling into drink and soon we had the regular pile-up of aches and moans:

Surprising Violence

I was suprised to learn how violent Amble Whistletown is.

I was surprised to see this man, now approaching middle age but still shining with the lithe musculature and carefree square-jawed charm of his youth, stalking ghosts with his knife and expression drawn.

I was surprised to see him cut the throat of a long-dead story-less crime. I was surprised to see him quick-as-a-wink twist off the neck off of the very monster his family told him existed only in his mind, desperate as it was for they guess excuses and drama.

I was surprised by the blood all over the dusty brown flat-top carpet. I was surprised to see his violence so free of hesitation, patience, sympathy, compassion, joy, or any of the other goods that he says he serves.

I was surprised by the blood droplets flying everywhere once he’d gotten the strength and focus to speak his mind back into the time before time.

I was surprised.

Author: Bartlebly
Editor: Amble
Copyright: Andy (Watson)

Trump an abuser. Privately and Publicly. What are persistent jokes about being made president for life and looping threats about how he’s going to go use the power of the federal government to correct the media and his perceived enemies — bad, vermin, and the real woe of the world — but the semi-cautious fingertips of an abuser getting the nation acclimated to his touch, normalizing what’s to come? What is a lie-based politics if not the upside-down reality of self-righteous abuse?

I know an abuser when I hear one.
I know an abuser when I smell one.
I know an abuser when I feel one.
I know.

And now I see you aid and abet crimes written on the edge of the white curving dam holding back deep waters warm at the face and ice cold in the belly.

[Here we see a drunken fool swiping desperately at real injustice: the victory of Donald Trump and his enablers over the Republican Party.]

Author: BW
Editor: AW
Copyright: AMW

One more inappropriate Love Poem; here a couple excerpts:

You’re a nice person

It’s not like you think; not like I think; not like anyone thinks

What should I do with myself?

And how would I do it?

I could go to Quito, to the center of the world, touching the sky

But it would probably hurt my skin

I could dance across the waters of the Sea of Galilee and party with Jesus

But I would certainly sink

I could …

I could

let everything go

[Yes! Let all that go! A man can’t beg, cajole, bully, or extemporize love into being. Please forgive my overreach; please accept my resignation from a thought I took too far with too little regard for you.]

A Disappointment

a disappointment
over and over again
the snake on the leg
tugging
winning
and you fail
you disappoint
for how many years now
?

[And there you have it. You think alcohol helps to keep your mind loose and to get at nuances you couldn’t otherwise reach. Maybe. But at what price? And to the exclusion of what other, perhaps more fruitful, methods? We know how far we can get with wine and loneliness. Why not test some other waters?]

Jesus in our time – 4

Jesus in our time – 4

There used to be a taco restaurant in the downtown in one of the old stone buildings, giant sandstone bricks with little waves texturing their outward facings — with show (1/2ft thick, and not actually supporting anything) and other flourishes in smoothest sandstone; and topped with a parapet of rough-quarried granite.

I was telling Jesus about it and wishing I could take him there for a bean burrito and a wine, though they didn’t used to sell wine, still, while I’m wishing. We were hungry and thinking of lunch, and walked by the spot where it had been and that’s what made me think of it and point it to to our candidate who was spending all his time hanging out with anybody and everybody, or off praying by himself, or doing miracles but in secret so no one — not even the healed — could pin them on him.

Suddenly the taco restaurant was back in its former place, and the restaurant that had taken its place had disappeared. And we ate bean burritos with watered-down wine on wire-mesh tables on the wide red-and-gray brick sidewalk out front. And when people who wanted to go to the old restaurant passed by, Jesus felt their anguish and confusion and he transported them to the clouds, where he was temporarily storing that restaurant and its waitstaff, all of whom called it a miracle, but also cautioned the customers not to go outside, since clouds can’t support any weight — they’re actually just cold condensed water vapors and only look warm and solid and inviting from below, when we gaze up through a pale blue sky filled with sunlight and aren’t we lucky to enjoy such skies so many hours of the year here in this city in the sun?

Crowds gathered to witness the miracles of the restaurant resurrection and the restaurant placed in cloud storage. They ate tacos and burritos and drank wine and beer and soft drinks and iced tea and iced water — everything served by angels from heaven who charged nothing and were so holy that tips bounced out of their tip jar, back into the wallet purse or pocket of their would-be tipper. So word spread, the crowds grew, and the people were amazed.

A woman in blue jeans over cowboy boots, and a satiny off-white blouse and red “Make America Great” hat spilled her beer on Jesus and apologized. Jesus said, “Nothing that falls onto one’s green khaki shorts can make one unclean!”, laughed at his own joke, and bade the woman to sit down in the chair next to him that no one had noticed until right then (because he made it appear miraculously! But shhh). “What do you want for this nation?”, he asked the woman, who was maybe fifty, with features a little rough under makeup a little thick.

“I want us to be great again. I want us to stand tall. I want us to be the land of the free. No more hand-outs. No more freebies. I want us to be a strong nation of strong people.”

Jesus leaped onto the table. Miraculously, the food and drink was not disturbed and “Somebody that I used to Know” from Gotoye began to play over the speakers that didn’t used to be there and everyone stopped to listen to the man on the table.

“You have heard it said, love your neighbor and hate your enemy. But I say to you: Love your enemies and bless those who curse you, do good to those hating you, and pray for those who accuse you falsely and persecuting you, that you may be sons and daughters of your God in heaven. For if you love only those who love and agree with you, what have you learned? Be then perfect, as Love is perfect.

“You have heard it said, the Truth is on your side; but I say to you: the Truth has no sides. The Truth is kind, the Truth is gentle, the Truth is eternal, the Truth does not grasp, the Truth does not put anyone down ever, the Truth lifts everyone up, the Truth is clear, the Truth is loving, is what flows out of Love.

“You have heard it said, the Democrats are liars and Trump is the Truth, but I say to you: The Democrats are people, Trump uses dishonesty as a weapon for victory no matter the cost to the nation, democracy cannot survive unless its citizens share reality, and to share reality people must share those values that come from the Light within and shining through all things: aware, clear, accurate, competent, loving-kind, joyfully-together. I say to you: democracy is a spiritual Good because what works for democracy works for the human soul: listen to one another, cherish one another, work together, be fair and honest with each other. I say to you: Tyranny is where lies, corruption, and cruelty reign; and democracy is where loving thoughtful discourse centered on the Light beyond all dogmas reigns. I say to you: ‘Idaho’ is a made-up word and has four electoral votes. The etymology of ‘California’ is uncertain — it may mean ‘hot furnace –, and California has 54 electoral votes. I say to you: Forget everything you think you know and listen to Love. I say to you: Everyone in the world is wrong about the details and right about what matters; don’t listen to the details — listen to the Love that chooses everyone and let that guide your heart and mind; don’t listen to the pang within desperate to win and put everyone else in their place — listen to gentle resolve that is glad to see everyone, because everyone is your friend forever. I say to you: Your beliefs about what you believe are mistaken — the Love that overwhelms every moment is the one Reality. I say to you: Pizza with olive oil and wine is fun.”

And on this day many Trump-voters were saved and realized Trump was a mean boring abusive lying bully, and not a wise chaperon of the human heart and mind as it unfolds itself in collective thought and enterprise.

But Jesus just laughed and said that it’s sometimes lonely to be completely holy on this earth, that it’s sometimes lonely to be 100% kind and to never take anything for yourself, that it’s sometimes lonely to never cheat a little, never tell a little fib, never pull a little pain and pleasure over to your flame, never do anything but shine God’s Love, never flinch in the face of the flesh.

And I Amble told Susan that she’s my little girl, and that I can’t help what flows through me and tosses everything like a windstorm forward. And Bartleby told us he was sad and couldn’t think well and needed to turn into a barn owl and live in a barn far up in the Rockies, and so he turned into a barn owl and flapped away, and everyone wondered what we could do when even the God among us was just a human and hurt with just human hurts and knew about the Love but were by flesh heart mind separated from the glowing center of all things.

Author: B. Willard
Editor: A. Whistletown
Copyright: AM Watson

Jesus in our Time – 3

Jesus in our Time – 3

It was in the time of President Biden, after the would-be reign of the would-be-king Trump — pretender to the throne that should never be –, before the Great Election of 2024, where the people of the United States, within the constraints of their existing, never perfect, and now — due to the Republican party’s decision to coalesce around rather than repudiate a man who neither understood nor valued this democratic republic (seeking instead personal domination over whatever powers and wealth the government had, over time, acquired) — perilously wobbly, would make a choice of profound consequence, though many of them seemed to grasp neither the stakes, nor their privileges, nor their responsibilities.

It was a time that tried the soul and taxed the mind, for much worked to tempt one’s heart away from the heart of the matter, and one’s mind away from the God’s honest truth.

It was a pleasant time to work and live there in a warm, sunny, dry-aired city nestled into the rolling, brown-grassed foothills of the Rocky Mountains, sacred gray-based, white-sharp teeth cutting through the gumlands of the Western United States and Canada.

Oh how the sun rose over the park-lined sparkling river, and ah how it shined upon the cute downtown nestled beside the rock-baring hills, and mmmh how the Light blared through the hearts and minds of the many who lived in the joy of a free city in a free country. Can you imagine the happiness of not having to fear your government? Can you imagine what it is like to speak your mind, not just in private, but anywhere, to think and say what you find is best, and to find the Truth in your own way and in your own time, without having to pretend you understand or agree with whatever dogma your rulers demand you bow to? I’m talking about not having to fear falling with your loved ones into poverty, prison, or worse. I’m not talking about having your feelings hurt. I’m talking about actually bad things — not having to fear those. It’s so great!

And yet the people had forgotten. They had forgotten how lucky they had been for so long. They had forgotten how shitty things could get. And so they danced and/or pouted upon the brink, confusing God’s grace for God’s stamp of approval, confusing God’s glory for their own, confusing their luck for their salvation, confusing everything, and often drinking and eating or at least eating and tv-ing too much all the time.

But the underlying truth of this time and place was that these were all just people, no better or worse than anyone else in the world. They were all just people, and God did not love them any more or any less than God loves anyone. Indeed, it has been mathematically proven that God loves everyone equally:

1. God’s Love is absolutely infinite (infinite in kind as well as degree)

2. Thus does God’s Love explode with complete infinity (simultaneously in all possible forms to all possible degrees, getting therefore at every possible nuance of kind regard and gentle touch) and so bursts through everyone and everything like an atomic explosion through your sleepy unsuspecting but now evaporating village.

Therefore, all are super-saturated with God’s Love, all are 100% overwhelmed and claimed by the Love that chooses everyone.

Therefore, God loves us all equally — we all receive, and are indeed blasted asunder by, an absolutely infinite portion of Purest Love (a Love not diluted with any hopes, fears, greeds, delusions, or etc. human follies*).

QED

*We call them “follies” because they are not the wisest way, but it is wise to remember that we need illusions to play at being creatural, and it sin is not so much being mistaken about what’s really going on as prioritizing that mistake over the wider, deeper insight that Love is All and Love is kind, is gentle, is careful, is honest, is clear and whole.

I was there in the campaign office in a beige-stone building not far from the church we went to before but didn’t attend there I don’t know why I guess Jesus worshipped somewhere because he was really serious about God and holiness and communities of believers don’t you know

The office was two small rooms with white walls, tall woodframed windows, and tightly woven industrial grade carpeting with little bounce and no ambition. It was near our apartment in the fancier, older part of this straight-shooting, newish city and just inside the downtown. Between our neighborhood and the office loomed a giant health food coop and its mighty rectangular parking lot of asphalt and patient memories under elms and fronted by a row of shops, including a kind of fun vegan or at least hipstery restaurant.

The sun was shining brightly as winter melted and spring froze or congealed or otherwise became solid and certain.

I was on a cushion at a small rectangular wooden coffee table, writing important memos on my laptop. Bartleby was pacing near the double windows across from me, but Susan was at a small wooden table in the corner, and so the space was small and his pivots often. Jesus was in the other room, the front room, sitting on a cushion praying. I didn’t want to say anything, but I was getting a little nervous to be working for a candidate who spent so much time praying in the office or the foothills or in the apartment or just praying all the time. “Praying for a big win?” I joked as I walked past him, on the way to the restroom down the hall. He didn’t open his eyes but smiled gently.

I’d never ran a campaign before, and I was pretty much banking on the Messiah to help me with the vision, general organization, and even some of the concrete plans and executions. Also I thought the candidate should be out there, talking to people, giving interviews, explaining his policies and why the good people of these United States should choose him over everybody else and their ideas and organizations.

Susan was helping me put together some campaign events and I was hoping Jesus would attend them, but he was pretty noncommittal.

Like we’d talk over pizza, salad and a very diluted wine at lunch.

And I’d say, “So, we’ve announced the campaign, ‘Jesus Chrysanthemum for President: Because Democracy’s a spiritual Good!’ So far no one even thinks it is a joke; no one seems to even notice at all. Slow start. And so that’s got me thinking: What if the candidate spoke in public about his candidacy and the issues he believes in, the systems he wants to put in place, the legislation and national direction he wants to nurture? Maybe that would get some people interested in our political campaign.”

And Jesus chewed his pizza thoughtfully, gazing out at the sunlit peopled sidewalk and becarred street in the windows across the room from our white linoleum table near the white marble countertop. “This innovation, this delicious bread spiced with sauce from giant New-World berries and salted with melted cheese! If we had had such as this to rest our olive oil upon! But prophets have no honor and wonders no recognition in their hometowns. As it is written.”

“OKay, and maybe that’s a good point, maybe you’re pointing out that we don’t have to worry about Nazareth not being in the United States, since you, being a savior first, a prophet second, and a politician a distant third, are bound to lose your hometown. But what I’m trying to get at here is that it’s traditional — and I think traditional because effective — for candidates to get out there in the world, to make speeches, meet people, buy ad slots … you know? I could be volunteering for Biden and trying to save the world that way, but I’m here with you because you’re Jesus Christ (here he shot me big worried eyes while his shoulders scooted back, leaving his head to turtle-telescope out in stern reproach or mock reproach or whatever), sorry, you’re who they say you are, and, … so here I am.”

Jesus laughed from his belly and gave my forearm a playful pinch. Just then a young man in a mechanical wheelchair rolled through the door. His body was so thin he looked famished, and his head was turned upward, mouth dropped open. He was accompanied by a young woman. Both wore shorts and T-shirts, for it was an unseasonable warm March day in an already mild climate where winter arrives and departs early. The man’s head banged from side to side between the rectangular cushioning-strips on either side. His eyes bulged forward. With difficulty he maintained his focus and steered himself with a little black joystick mounted on the front of one of the wheelchair arms. The young woman held the glass door open, and worked to stay out of his way as he maneuvered into the white-tiled pizzeria. Jesus’s eyes flickered with caring and then with a gently-smiling joyful love. He looked away quickly, but it was too late — the young man’s eyes were fastened onto Jesus as his head movements became less jerky, and his fingers moved the joystick more easily, without any trembles.

Later that same week, I read in the paper of a miracle cure, and I saw the young man in a photo, standing up, looking straight ahead, smiling wide for the camera. The doctors could not explain it, although some speculated that they’d misdiagnosed him and what he really had was a condition that, in rare cases, could spontaneously improve on its own, although not usually anywhere near this much this quickly; all agreed it merited further study. The young man was allowing them to run medical tests. He — still learning to speak on his own — typed through a voice box to say his recovery was a miracle, but that maybe miracles can be studied and repeated by skilled scientists who do their best and have a little luck.

I was having coffee with Bartleby when I read about the miracle in the local paper. In the coffee shop that’s in the same building as the pizzeria, which is in the downtown a couple blocks from our office on the outskirts of the downtown. The coffee shop has eclectic furniture and giant windows on two sides let the abundant sunlight pour into coffee drinkers of all ages, nodding to indie music, chatting over coffee, or coloring or playing games or otherwise hanging out with coffee and yummy little treats like blueberry scones and health nut-filled muffins with almost no sugar and more fiber than even the healthiest colons can imagine.

I said, “Maybe Jesus doesn’t really want to run a political campaign. He isn’t participating in the campaign.”

Bartleby gave a little shrug. “We lack the faith to move mountains, but surely we have the faith to tag along with Jesus when he visits us in flesh and blood, performing miracles, showing no malice only kindness, and agreeing with our political concerns.”

I smiled through the coffee haze of aroma taste caffeine ritual — why so much opulence!? and what kind of gratitude is appropriate when we live like kings together in our private workadays?, “I wouldn’t want to go around rearranging mountain ranges anyway. It’s one thing to be able to do something; it is another to be able to know how to do it wisely, without harming yourself or others. We need a faith that helps us live well — from the inside out: joyfully, decently, happily.”

Author: Bartleby Willard
Editor: Amble Whistletown
Copyright: Andy Watson

Can can’t see

Can can’t see

I can see it but I can’t see it
Along with millions of my fellow Americans
Trump and his collaborators have to be stopped
Biden is not just the better choice, he is the hope for this nation and for the world
I mean, assuming there’s no other possible Democratic candidate at this point, which seems
likely
I see it
But I don’t see the contours
I don’t see the path
I don’t see the way to snap
us out of this
grave error
that’s gone too deep
that must stop here and now

what is political evil?
What is the dividing line between politics as usual and political evil?
What do those helping Trump think they are doing?
What are they doing?

He’s an abuser, a bully, a liar, a cheat
And he’s already tried to steal a fair election blatantly for months and via various avenues
And now he has to win and pervert the system to get his money back and possibly to stay out of jail
For him, this is a no-brainer
It should be for us too
But we
we
we
we don’t think well together at the moment

Jesus in our time – 2

Jesus in our time – 2

We were surprised by a knock at our door. I had been surprised that Susan had come home early. She was surprised to find me smoking a cigarette. I was not surprised when she did not believe me when I told her that it was the first cigarrette I’d smoked in years. We were surprised by a knock at the door.

“Hello.”

He was a young man, shorter, slight of build but sturdy and with a strong posture, clean shaven, with tidy short haircut. He wore fresh denim jeans, blue running shoes (canvas, the kind that are designed more for everyday than for actually, you know, running), and shy smile. His eyes shone forward into our living room.

“Hi.”

“You might wonder why I’ve knocked at your door.”

I gave a little side-shrug/head-tilt. Susan smiled wide. Both gestures were meant to say, “Well, now that you mention it, wouldn’t mind hearing what this is all about.”

“I’m a traveler. I come from afar.”

“Yeah?”

“I am not sure from how afar. I can tell you that where I come from, we do not dress like this, nor speak like this.”

“Do you want to come in and rest while you explain? It’s a lazy Sunday morning. We were just going to make some pancakes with bananas, served with coffee and the New York Times crossword puzzle.”

“We’re not going to church,” explained Susan.

“I’ve been briefed on the customs of this time and place,” the stranger assured us as he followed my lead towards the small square wooden table that we keep in the corner of the living room next to the kitchen and then, as now, I pull out a little bit so we can fit chairs around all sides and feel like we’re having a real meal at the table like a family like tradition like the generations flowing seamlessly into one another chatting and chortling across time and space at one grand table stretching from here back to the dusty savannas of prehistoric Africa.

The stranger laughed. “An interesting image!”

“What’s that?, a sparsely furniture hardwood floor living room?” said Susan.

“No, the table stretching through all time and space, binding all generations together as an active, chatty family.”

Susan looked around for something like that image. The walls were mostly bare, with a couple scenes of the Foothills that Susan had painted, and one I’d taken a picture of, that had stray cat holed up in a little cave under a basalt ridge, a little gray stray cat pretending to be a puma or some other wild thing.

“You read my thoughts!” said I.

“Oh, yeah, I’ve been doing that. It’s a new thing. I sometimes get mixed up about what people say versus what they just think. The people who were briefing me said that I did it before as well. They even had a book full of things I’d done, some of which I’d actually done, at least kind of. And they showed me a couple parts where I seem to know what people are thinking of without them saying it out loud.”

“So then it’s not a new thing.”

“Well, I don’t know. I’m not really sure what to make of the book. It’s pretty good, though, on the whole. And then, the funny thing is, they bundle it together with the scriptures, and make one big book, and say it’s all one story, the greatest story ever told, which is flattering, since, you see, I’m like the headliner.”

“Ah, so you’re Jesus Christ. But you still haven’t explained to what we owe the pleasure of this visit in the eager morning sunlight of forever-summer here in the Foothills of the Rocky Mountains.”

“I came as soon as I heard.”

“Heard what?”

“I came as soon as I heard you praying for God to help you save the country.”

“But surely lots of people, with all kinds of crazy ideas about what ‘helping’ means, are praying for that.”

“Yeah, and Amble doesn’t even have any very concrete ideas how the country can be saved, nor does he have the discipline to get off the treadmill of work, work, work, work, work, lounge, drink, lounge, drink, lounge, work, work … ”

“Susan! You don’t have to say that to Jesus! He already knows my failings. And he showed up anyway. So clearly he thinks I’ve got potential.”

Jesus laughed and shook his head, “No, not really. I mean, yes, of course, in a spiritual sense, the Kingdom is available to all and I’m glad to help you renounce folly and rest upon and draw strength from the Pure Love exploding infinitely beyond being and nonbeing — as you’ve put it. But I’ve had a look at the country and I’ve had a look at you, and I don’t think you can save the country. Not unless … well, look here, what if I were to tell you that you weren’t really all that gifted as an author, that you’re better in the fray, in the conversation, that you’re best at organizing, communicating, at creating a living, moving community.”

I sighed so deep my shoulders collapsed through the floorboards and are still echoing as they crash through miles of stone towards the molten center of this curve-balling earth.

Susan said, “He’s a good editor! And he and Bartleby do the philosophy pieces together. And I, for one, remain convinced that what this world needs right now is a Something Deeperism founded on Pure Love and tempered with years facing the loneliness, the Hurt!”

Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior nodded politely. A plate piled high with fresh seven-grain flapjacks with banana slices and blueberries embedded in their soft underbellies appeared, along with pasture-raised butter, organic crunchy peanut butter, real maple syrup, and organic applesauce on the side, cinnamon there too. And coffee and tea in clay carafes that looked like they came out of a museum shelf from the ancient lost but now dug up Middle East, and the table set with the finest china and silverware.

“Well, shall we eat?”

“Do you always do this?”

“No, but I’m very hungry. The people briefing me said they expected I’d want to fast for forty days and forty nights. I didn’t understand the logic. Something to do with the same devil but new temptations. I for one, know only one true evil: Blaspheming against the Holy Spirit, by which I mean contradicting me.”

Here Jesus cracked up until a stray-spray of coffee went down the wrong pipe and he started coughing and had to open-handed thump his chest — demonstrating via this merriment both a knowledge of the Christian Bible and a sense of humor.

“You should consider the things they say. They’ve spent their lives studying you, I imagine.”

“You can’t study me anymore than I can study you. To know a person, you break bread with them. Or pancakes.”

“I feel like that underestimates the power of the biblical literature, and completely skips over the possibility of a spiritual union with the Living Christ, which I’m sure your briefers have long believed they possess.”

“Are you going to argue with Jesus Christ?”

“Maybe, if I think he’s being flippant and more interested in pancakes than the Truth.”

Susan, who had started gathering the ingredients for pancakes, and who now, smelling the Miracle of the Lazy Sunday Morning Pancakes, was tucking into the table, touched Jesus’s right forearm, and said, “I’m so glad you’ve come to visit! Amble only ever spends time with me and Bartleby, and neither of us now how to heal the Hurt. … Did you (looking now at me) tell him about the Hurt?”

“He doesn’t have to tell me. If there’s one thing I know, it is every affliction of every sort in every human! You’d think such intimate association with the suffering of those around me would drive me mad, or make me callous. But (Jesus raises here a finger next to a stern eye, head turned slightly towards the finger near the eye) that’s not how it works: for the Truth, Amble, is that we are all One, joined in the Love that Knows; and so compassion is not just a nice thing to do: compassion is the path through and to the Truth of the human condition.”

“I know that! I could’ve written that! I think we did write that. In an essay somewhere. Take that, Haters!, or, I guess, Ignorers! Jesus Christ is quoting me! So, who’s worth reading now?! I humbly ask you to consider.”

Susan said, “It was more Bartleby’s phraseology. I remember, because you’d been jealous of it. You took me out dancing to show him up, since he’s always so alone like you used to be until you found me and now we’re alone together except I of course have my girlfriends, who are a source of comfort, companionship, and a happiness that I believe is more shared-joy than shared-frivolity. Anyway, it was mean what you did. Although I don’t think Bartleby noticed. He had, if memory serves, taken the form of a great albatross and drifted far out to sea, earlier that same afternoon. So, I guess it was a self-contained temper tantrum, and not so bad. We had a good night dancing.”

“Don’t listen to Susan,” I said,”She’s always wanted to make me look bad in front of the Savior of Humankind.”

“That’s not true!,” said Susan, though garbled because she’d started chewing some pancake with melted butter and running syrup.

“These are good pancakes,” I added, “Right up there with milk and honey.”

Jesus agreed with a little laugh. Almost a giggle, really. Like a small child’s belly laugh that giggles out with unrestrained and completely innocent merriment. A kind, generous, open laughter. Compare that, if you will, with the jeering, mean-spirited, us-vs-them, name-calling laughter that fills so much spacetime of late. There is such a thing as a kind humor, one that opens the heart, rather than closes it, one that relishes and frolics in the brother-, sister-, yeah even them-hood of all: There is such a thing as kind delight, and it is not the same as a laughter that accepts only those who rub your fucking belly right you bunch of babies forgive if for a moment I lost the merriment of the up and down turning porcelain-painted-horse-reeling merry-go-round.

“But seriously, JC, if you can help me help the country, I’ll do whatever you ask of me. What are you thinking? You gonna run for president?”

“Yes. And you will be my campaign manager. And Susan will be in charge of data analytics. And Bartleby will run my letter-writing campaign.”

“Okay, sure, I’m in. Susan?”

Susan nodded sagaciously, took a sip of black coffee from a white porcelain cup with thin blue figures tumbling and dancing around its midriff. (Susan’s midriff, by the by, is perfect: taut, but soft and supple; ready and discerning, but not pushy or spiteful, rather yielding and forgiving. Of course, if I may be permitted one by-upon-by, it couldn’t be the gently bending respite it is were it not bookended by such opulently maternal considerations.) Susan then nodded sagaciously some more, “Bartleby will definitely want the letter campaign. (After a pause, a sip of amazing and, due to its miraculous origins, eco-footprint-free coffee, and another sagacious pause) He’ll make Amble help him, though.”

Jesus smiled. Jesus of Nazareth smiled and gave a little forward shoulder shrug. “It’s going to be a team effort.”

“We’ll have to run as Independents. It is too late to get on either the Democratic or Republican tickets. Normally I’d be worried about splitting the ticket and helping Trump hammer democracy — possibly into the ground, never to spring back up into the joyously-efficient (he said joyously, meaning spiritually) system where mortals duke it out in honest words and within and for the law, not with lies and in and for brute force and mindless power: I swoon here for democracy: a grand arena slash performance hall where we all win because we together seek and find win-wins and so at the end of the day go home wiser and better and as friends; a shared platform atop which we as-one weave a government and society based on the understanding that we are all in this together and when you win, I win too. Where was I? Yes, normally I’d fear that running an Independent who put sharing and serving ahead of bullying pride would split the anti-Trump vote and possibly, world-historic-ironically hand the victory to the very scoundrel that we wish — for the good of all, even his own wayward heart and thought — to defeat. But, if Jesus Christ is running for president of the United States of America, well, Jesus Christ is going to be the next president of the United States of America. No questions asked.”

Susan looked down at her half-eaten pancake, warm and soft, holding and contemplating both richest softest creamiest butter and sweet sweet syrup (Yes, Susan! I am thinking of you while I describe your breakfast. So sue me already!). “I worry … If Jesus isn’t the Jesus they expect, they might not vote for him — whether they believe he’s Jesus Christ or not.”

“Good point,” and I took a sip of darkest coffee, beamed from Heaven down into my lonely hair-schemed life; “Good coffee. But, Jesus, do you have a plan for this? For letting everybody know that you’re Jesus Christ and we can all trust you to do what’s best for everyone, and for the systems, organizations, laws, and norms wherein we three hundred million and more shelter, and with which we would if we could do more good than harm in the wider world? After all, last time you were not very political. At least not overtly. ‘Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s’ and all that.”

“We won’t tell them.”

“Then you’ll lose. And we’ll split the ticket. And Trump will win. And democracy for by and of the People will suffer a perhaps fatal blow, at least here in this grand experiment of democracy on a large, continent-sprawling scale — and bundled now with the most dangerous weaponry the world has ever known. Is that your goal?”

“No. My goal is to win the presidency. I aim to steer the nation towards a healthy, sustainable liberal democratic republic. My goal’s first and foremost defeating Donald Trump and those who would pervert truth, justice, and the American way with lies, bullying, corruption, cheating, misdirection and confusion. My purpose is the same as always: To love the Lord my God with all my heart and soul and mind and strength, and myself and everyone else with the love appropriate for a child of God, for a ray of the One-Light that Eden saw and every nook-and-cranny since then has seen play, and play well — play a life overflowing. Susan, could you pass the peanut butter, apple sauce, and cinnamon: This is a hotcakes-topping I must surely try!”

Author: Bartleby Willard
Editor: Amble Whistletown
Copyright: Andrew Mackenzie Watson