Life of Christ

by Giovanni Papini

But Jesus did not read only in the open many-colored book of the world. He knew that God spoke to men through angels, patriarchs and prophets. His words, His laws, His victories are written in the Book. Jesus knew the magic black signs by which the dead pass on to those not yet born, the thoughts and memories of olden times. Jesus read only the books where His ancestors had set down the story of His people, the will of the Lord, the vision of the Prophets, but He knew them in the letter and spirit better than the scribes and the doctors: and that knowledge gave Him the right to leave off being scholar and to become teacher.

THE OLD COVENANT

Among all peoples the Jew was the most happy and the most unhappy. His story is a mystery which begins with the idyl in the Garden of Eden and ends with the tragedy of the hill of Golgotha. His first parents were molded by the luminous hands of God, were made masters of Paradise, the country of eternal, fertile summer, set in the midst of rivers, where the rich Oriental fruits hung down ready to their hand, heavy with pulp in the shade of the new young leaves. The new-created sky, not yet sullied by clouds, not yet riven by lightning, or harassed by winds, watched over the first two with all its stars.

The first couple had as their duty to love God and to love each other. This was the First Covenant. Weariness unknown, grief unknown, unknown death and its terror! The first disobedience brought the first exile; the man was condemned to work, the woman to bring forth her young in pain. Work is painful, but it brings the reward of harvests; to give birth means suffering, but it brings the consolation of children. And yet even these inferior and imperfect felicities passed away like leaves devoured by worms. For the first time brother killed brother: human blood fallen on the earth became corrupt, gave forth an exhalation of sin: the daughters of men united themselves with demons and from them were born giants, fierce hunters and slayers of men, who turned the world into a bloody hell.

Then God sent His second punishment: to purify the world in an exterminating baptism He drowned in the waters of the flood all men and their crimes. One only, a righteous man, was saved and with him God signed the Second Covenant.

With Noah there began the happy days of antiquity, the epoch of the patriarchs, nomad shepherds, centenarians who wandered between Chaldea and Egypt searching for grazing lands, for wells, and for peace. They had no fixed country, no houses, no cities. They brought along in caravans, numerous as armies, their fruitful wives, their loving sons, their docile daughters-in-law, their innumerable descendants, obedient man-servants and maid-servants, goring, bellowing bulls, cows with hanging udders, playful calves, rams and strong smelling he-goats, mild sheep laden with wool, great earth-colored camels, mares with round cruppers, she-goats holding their heads high and stamping impatiently; and hidden in the saddle-bags, vases of gold and silver, domestic idols of stone and metal.

Arrived at their destination, they spread their tents near a cistern, and the patriarch sat out under the shade of the oaks and sycamores contemplating the great camp from which rose up the smoke of the fires, the sound of the bustling steps of the women and herdsmen, the mooings, the brayings, the bleating of the animals. And the patriarch’s heart was filled with content to see all this progeny issued from his seed, all these, his herds, the human increase and the animal increase multiplying year by year.

In the evening, he raised his eyes to greet the first punctual star which shone like white fire on the summit of the hill; and sometimes his curled white beard shone in the white light of the moon, which for more than a century he was wont to see in the sky at night.

Sometimes an angel of the Lord came to visit him, and before giving the message with which he was charged, ate at his table. Or, in the heat of the day, the Lord Himself, in the garb of a pilgrim, came and sat down with the old man in the shadow of the tent where they talked with each other, face to face, like two old friends who come together to discuss their affairs. The head of the tribe, master of the servants, became a servant in his turn, listened to the commands and counsels and promises and prophecies of his divine master. And between Jehovah and Abraham was signed the Third Covenant, more solemn than the other two.

The son of a patriarch, sold by his brothers as a slave, rises to power in Egypt, and calls his race to him. The Jews think that they have found a fatherland and grow great in numbers and riches. But they allow themselves to be seduced by the gods of Egypt, and Jehovah prepares the third punishment. The envious Egyptians reduce them to abject slavery. That the punishment may be longer, Jehovah hardens the heart of Pharaoh, but finally raises up the second Saviour, who leads them forth from their sufferings and from the mud of Egypt.