How Jesus led us, in our exile, to the Rock of Salvation

Philochristus: Memoirs of a Disciple of the Lord by Edwin Abbott Abbott is part of the HackerNoon Books Series. You can jump to any chapter in this book here. How Jesus led us, in our exile, to the Rock of Salvation; and how he founded the Temple of his Congregation thereon; and how he gave the Key thereof to Simon Peter.

How Jesus led us, in our exile, to the Rock of Salvation; and how he founded the Temple of his Congregation thereon; and how he gave the Key thereof to Simon Peter.

As soon as day dawned on the morrow, we left the village where we had lain that night, and journeyed northward; and Jesus set his face once more toward Mount Hermon. We were all very silent, more than was our custom; for we were downcast and dejected by reason of our often fleeing from before the face of our enemies, and because of the delay of the day of Redemption. And though we still loved Jesus and trusted him after a manner, yet we knew not what to think concerning the things that he had done of late. As we journeyed, Jesus spake much concerning faith, and how, without faith, no one could truly believe in him. From time to time he looked at us, as we went by his side; and he seemed as if he were measuring our thoughts by our faces, and reckoning up the sum of our strength: and now he seemed desirous to speak, and now to delay speaking; watching over us as if some great burden were at hand, and as though he feared lest the burden should be more than we could bear.

But as concerning faith he said some things hard to understand; to wit, that if a man had not faith, there should be taken from him even that which he seemed to have; and yet, at the same time, he said that no man could have faith in him nor come to him unless he were drawn by the Father. Moreover he said that whoso had faith as a grain of mustard-seed, should be able to overthrow trees or mountains. Likewise he added that, if two or three would agree together touching anything that they would ask of the Father in heaven, it should be done for them.

Now as touching the overthrowing of mountains or destruction of trees, some have supposed that Jesus really wrought such wonders as these; and I have heard that stories of this kind are currently reported in the Church. But Jesus did never any such thing. But in our language an “uprooter of mountains” was a name given to any Rabbi that had power by his words to remove great difficulties out of the path of the righteous, and to make smooth the rough places in the ways of the Law. And after the like manner, as I suppose, are to be interpreted the words of Jesus touching the answer to prayer. For it entered not into his mind that his disciples should ask for earthly things as their hearts’ desire; but they were to ask for heavenly things, and earthly things should be added to them, sufficient for their needs. Howbeit Quartus explaineth this saying somewhat otherwise, as I shall set forth further on.

As we journeyed, Jesus would not that any should know him: and few took heed of us; for instead of a great multitude, none now went with him, save the Twelve, and three or four others beside myself. But passing by a certain house wherein dwelt one of our countrymen (though we were by this time far beyond the bounds of Galilee) Jesus entered in asking for water; for the weather was exceeding sultry. And so it was that in the house the good folk were making ready to circumcise a child; and (after the manner of the people in Galilee) an empty chair had been set for the prophet Elias, as being the prophet of the covenant of circumcision. But some one of our company (Judas of Kerioth, as I remember) not knowing wherefore the chair was thus set, asked the cause thereof. So the good man of the house said that it was set for Elias the prophet, “who hath ofttimes appeared,” said he, “in the guise of a merchant, to one or other of the Scribes in old times; and, three days before the Messiah come, he needs must appear for to anoint the Messiah: but I have heard it said of many, these ten days, that he hath appeared indeed as a prophet, on the other side of the lake, for to avenge the death of John the son of Zachariah.”

When he said these words, we looked each at other but held our peace: and Jesus, after he had courteously thanked the man, came forth and addressed himself again to the journey; but, methought, even more sadly and sorrowfully than before. But still his discourse (as oft as he said anything) was on faith; and presently he began to say in a low voice a certain psalm (which was both at this time and during many days afterwards upon his lips); and in the psalm are these words, first of supplication and then of praise: “Deliver my soul from the sword, my darling from the power of the dog, save me from the lion’s mouth, thou hast heard me also from among the horns of the unicorns. I will declare thy Name unto my brethren; in the midst of the congregation will I praise thee.” Now when he spake these words touching the “congregation,” and also the following words, “my praise is of thee in the great congregation,” then so it was that Judas, who had been scarce able, these many days, to restrain himself because of his anger at the tarrying of Jesus, spake aloud and very vehemently, saying that, but one or two months ago, there was indeed a congregation, and a great congregation, which also had been ready with one consent to have risen up against the Romans; “but now,” said Judas, “we be scarce a score in all.”

Hereat Jesus stayed, and turned round and looked at Judas, methought, to have rebuked him; but when his eyes fell upon our “little flock,” as he was wont to call us at this time, not a score in all (for herein had Judas spoken truly), then it seemed as if his thoughts for us drove out the thought of Judas: and he paused as if he would have questioned us: “Do ye also say as Judas saith?” But then he turned again and went before us, beckoning to us to follow a little behind; and so he continued his journey, steadfastly looking toward the north, where the Mount Hermon rose up before us all glorious to behold. But so far as I could gather from some words that I heard, he still spake to himself concerning the “congregation:” and once I thought I heard him praying for us with great passion, and beseeching God that he would bring us out of the horrible pit, out of the mire and clay, and set our feet upon the rock.

When I spake with one of the disciples concerning that which was to come, and how the Kingdom was to be established, now that all Israel was against us, he would fain have kept silence; and when I urged him, he said, “What know I? Sometimes I am lifted up in my soul, and I know and am sure that the Kingdom shall come; but at other times I know not what to think, nor can I understand why Jesus would work no sign in heaven. But then again I say unto myself that whether he be the Redeemer of Israel or no, he is of a surety the Redeemer of my soul. For in his presence I find life: but to be absent from him is death. The sum is, that I trust in him to-day, for I know not what else to do: but as for the morrow and what it may bring forth, behold, all things are uncertain and unshapen in my mind.” The like also said others of the disciples, albeit not in such plain terms, for almost all spake unwillingly. Yet could I not but perceive that the most part had been sorely shaken in their faith, because Jesus had denied to work a sign in heaven: and it was even as Jesus had warned us; the leaven of the Pharisees and of the Sadducees had entered into our souls. Wherefore, although we all still called our Master, as before, the Christ or Anointed, and the Redeemer, or at the least, the Prophet, yet inwardly we were wavering in our hearts; and a breath would have moved us this way or that way, towards belief or towards unbelief. For indeed we were being driven down, as it were, from our former faith, whereby we had believed in Jesus as a worker of wonders or fulfiller of prophecy; and we were falling (as it seemed, but in truth we were rising) to another and a new belief in Jesus as a man, full of tenderness, and suffering, and patience, and withal of a goodness that could not be deceived nor disappointed; and this perchance was the very thing whereat Jesus aimed, to wit, that we should believe in him as the Son of man, conquering through weakness. For our former belief was as the mire or shifting sand, because it could give no firm footing: but our new belief in the Son of man was to be as the rock whereon we and all others were to stand immovable for ever. But we, at this present, being, as it were, still on the sand, and not yet aware of the Rock, how nigh it was at hand, we, I say, knowing in our minds that we wavered, were notwithstanding desirous to keep our wavering secret; insomuch that we spake little on this matter one to another, yea, we would scarce confess it each man to himself: so greatly did we tremble at the very thought of severing ourselves from Jesus. Yet, for all our dissembling, Jesus knew our thoughts; even as though he had been seated in our hearts.

By this time the aspect of the country shewed that we were leaving the region of the lake. For the thickets of oleander, which but yesterday we had seen blossoming thickly with red blossoms, were here, in these northern and higher parts, still green and in bud. Now also the snows of Hermon seemed very nigh, even over our heads; and we were not far from the town called Cæsarea Philippi. The grass was everywhere green under our feet as though the land knew not drought; and trees of diverse foliage shaded us overhead; and as we drew nigh to the town, we heard the sound of many rushing waters.

Yet though all things shewed thus fair around us, our hearts were sad, yea, all the sadder for the beauty of the place, which seemed to rejoice while we sorrowed. Jesus himself looked not now (as he was wont to do) on the glories of the mountainous country, but rather on our faces; neither did he take note of the cedars, and the olives, and the groves of oak-trees; nor of the great plains of green grass; nor even of the Mount Hermon, the top whereof, all covered with snow, waxed daily larger and yet larger as we journeyed still northward. Ever and anon he turned to us as if he would have said some new thing to us; but as often, he turned again, as if still perceiving that the hour was not yet come.

We were now nigh to the outskirts of the town called Cæsarea, even at the place where the fountain of the Jordan floweth forth; and here Jesus bade us sit down. If we had had leisure to admire, there was much cause for admiration. Before us, just above the spring, was a cavern wherein the inhabitants worshipped a certain false god of the Greeks, which haunteth thickets and forests, and he is called Pan: whence also the town in former times had been called Paneas. Higher up, on the summit of the cliff, stood a temple of marble, white and fair to look on, built by Herod in honour of Augustus Cæsar. Below, from the foot of the same rock, there flowed forth, under cover of poplars and oleanders, many little rills of pure clear water, which, meeting together, made a rushing stream, the noise whereof was exceedingly pleasant. This stream it is which passeth through the lake called Merom, and, flowing southward, becometh our river of Jordan.

But for all these sights we had at that time no leisure; or if we noted them, they brought no delight to our eyes, being unto us but as signs and tokens that we were exiles. Our great river Jordan, the river of Joshua and of Gideon, a river of mighty works and wonders of the Lord, how exceeding small did it appear, even as a mere rivulet, in this land of the Gentiles where it first arose! The cavern of Pan also and the temple of Augustus filled us with sad thoughts, to think how all the world was covered with the worship of false gods as with a net; so that, save in one little corner of Syria, the true God was not known. The name of Augustus also, yea, and the very names of the town whereon we looked, Paneas and Cæsarea Philippi, these all but spake aloud, testifying unto us how great was the power not only of the Greek worship, but also of the Roman kingdom, inasmuch as our own princes built these temples and towns, and called them by the names our conquerors. Wherefore it was not possible that a son of Israel, fresh from Galilee, should look on such sights as these and not feel downcast.

Jesus stood a while, steadfastly beholding the temple; then he sat down amid the rest of us. Our speech among ourselves had, even before, become less and less while we waited for that which was to come from Jesus: for we had all perceived these many hours that he purposed to say unto us some new and strange thing. But now, because we knew that the time was at hand, none dared so much as to open his mouth; and a deep silence and a great fear fell on us; and we saw the lips of Jesus moving as if in prayer. But when Jesus at last opened his mouth to speak, he said nothing at first such as we had expected and dreaded. For he neither rebuked us nor prophesied evil, but only asked us touching himself (calling himself by that familiar title whereof I have made mention above) what the common people considered him to be, saying, “Whom do men say that I the Son of man am?” Straightway all the disciples began severally to make answer, saying that most men in that region deemed him to be Elias risen from the dead; but that others supposed him to be the prophet concerning whom Moses had prophesied, and others again called him one of the prophets. These several answers we made to Jesus readily and promptly, for our hearts were lightened because we supposed that this was the question that he had had so long in mind, for which we had all been waiting. But Jesus, as I noted, listened to our speech as a mother listeneth to the prattle of her children. For his lips still moved as if in prayer, and his eyes were fixed upon the temple on the rock before him; and his mind was not with us nor with our words, but with something that still was to come from the depths of the future.

And lo, while we were still reporting this and that, touching the opinions of the common people, Jesus turned himself round and set his eyes full upon us who were sitting before him, but most directly (as it seemed to me) upon Peter, who was face to face with him: and he opened his mouth and said, “But whom say ye that I am?” As he spake these words, he looked at us for an instant as if he could read our inmost hearts, and as if he knew that we could not and would not deceive him. Then he turned from us again, as though to leave us to our own thoughts, because he would not constrain us nor draw forth from us any word that was not our own: and so he remained, gazing steadfastly on the rock and waiting for our answer, for as long, I suppose, as one would take to count ten very slowly.

I have read in a certain story of enchantments how a prince was caused by a magician to plunge his head into a vessel of water and to hold his breath, and behold, while he was holding his breath beneath the water, he seemed to himself to have travelled long journeys and to have been shipwrecked and to have had many other adventures, and to have married a wife and reared up children, and to have passed through a life of many years even till he had reached old age, and all this within the compass of a single breath. Even so was it with us while Jesus was waiting our answer. For we seemed in that moment to be summing up all our past life and all the life that lay before us, in order to answer this question of Jesus aright. For we dared not lie to him nor flatter him; yea, rather we would have displeased him sooner than have flattered him. Such a constraint lay upon us to speak the truth at all times in his presence; and especially now. But what the truth might be we knew not, and searched through all the past and groped in the future, if perchance we might light upon it.

A few Sabbaths, before, we should have been very ready with an answer; for then all men said that Jesus was the Redeemer, the Christ; and we had often said the same thing. But now many stumblingblocks lay in our path. The Scribes and the pious and the learned, all, save a very few, had rejected Jesus. The patriots had joined themselves to him for a long time, but they too had cast him off; yea, and even the rest of the men of Galilee had been led away with them. The poor, as well as the rich, were now against us. In fine, none were now on our side except a few of the lowest of the people, sinners and tax-gatherers and the like. Besides all this, John himself, a prophet, and one whom Jesus had called the greatest of the prophets, even he seemed to have wavered in his faith in Jesus; and when he had besought help in prison, Jesus had helped him not. Yea, and Jesus himself of late seemed to have cast off faith in himself. For when he had been challenged to work a sign in heaven, which seemed an easy thing for a prophet to do, he had refused to do it. Also, he had fled from the face of Herod and from the Pharisees, and seemed to have become a wanderer rather than a deliverer. Else, why were we, children of Abraham and inheritors of the Land of Promise, sitting there like exiles, looking on the temples of false gods in a foreign land? Even in the words wherein he had questioned us, Jesus had spoken of himself as the Son of man. Might it not be indeed that he was, and knew that he was, naught more than one of the common sons of man? When had he called himself the Redeemer? Never.

We seemed in that instant to have been brought by the hand of the Lord into a place where two roads met, and we had to choose one of the two. And if we went by the one, behold we had against us not only Rome and Greece and the whole inhabited world, but also the princes of our own people, and the priests and the patriots, and the traditions also of our forefathers handed down through many hundreds of years, and the Law given unto us by God for which many generations of our countrymen had fought and died; yea, even Moses himself seemed to be as an adversary if we went by that road. But on the other road no one stood against us; only we saw not Jesus there. So the conclusion seemed to be that we had in that instant to choose between Jesus and all the world.

And, as I judge, even for this cause did the Lord lead us into the wilderness together with our Master in sorrow and in exile, to the intent that there, being apart from the world, we might weigh, as it were in a balance, on the one side all the world, and on the other side the Son of man; a man of sufferings and sorrows, a man of wanderings and exiles, acquainted with rejections and contempts; and then that, having weighed the two, we might prefer the Son of man, because of a certain voice in our hearts which cried within us, “Whom have we in heaven but thee? And there is none on earth that we desire in comparison of thee.” And this, as I judge, was the faith that Jesus desired of us: and to this faith was the Lord leading our hearts, while Jesus was patiently waiting for our answer. But though it needeth many words to show even a very little of the searchings of our hearts in that sore extremity, yet the time thereof was short, not more (as I said before) than while a man could count nine or ten very slowly.

Then Peter rose up. If it were possible to judge from their countenances, some of the other disciples also were very nigh unto speaking; for their features were as it were in a flux, dissolving in passion, and speech seemed welling upward through them, and the lips of John the son of Zebedee were trembling as if upon the brink of utterance. Notwithstanding it was reserved for Simon Peter to set forth in words and to shape by the force of his soul the thoughts of John and all the rest. He therefore rose up and spake as I never heard man speak before, neither think I ever to hear man speak again, saying, “Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.”

Twice or thrice at least, before this time, I had heard words like unto these; when either the disciples or the multitude, marvelling at his mighty works, had hailed Jesus as the Son of God. Also many thousands of times have I heard the like confession made in the accustomed worship of the Church. But never till this day, nor ever after, did I hear the words uttered in the same way. For there seemed to come forth from the mouth of Simon Peter no mere airy syllables, unsubstantial beatings of the wind, but a certain solid truth, able as it were to be seen and touched, and not to be destroyed by force of man. What made the difference I know not: nor know I how to explain the difference, except it came from Jesus himself. For indeed it seemed to me that power passed from Jesus into Peter and gave unto him a strength more than his own, and not human. Yea, again and again, pondering that saying of Simon Peter in my mind, I have thought of the words of Nathanael, how he said that Jesus gave a voice to all visible things even though they be voiceless by nature; and, in the same way, it might have been said also that Jesus had power to give a kind of light to sounds: such brightness did he seem to cast upon the words of Simon Peter, insomuch that the words, though old, seemed new, yea quite new, and never heard before. For the tongue and the voice seemed the tongue and the voice of Peter, but the spirit and the light thereof seemed to proceed from Jesus; so that one scarce knew whether it were truer to say that it was Jesus speaking through Peter, or that it was Peter speaking in the spirit of Jesus.

But when Jesus heard the words of Peter, he turned and looked upon all the disciples and upon Peter, and he rejoiced with an exceeding joy, as if in that utterance of faith the first seed had been sown which was to grow up into the Tree of Life; or as if he had seen before his very eyes the laying of the foundations of a great temple, not like unto the marble temple of Augustus built upon the visible rock, but a temple of human souls compacted together by no hands of man, but by the Spirit of God, and destructible by no power in earth or hell. Howbeit he called it not Temple, but rather (using the word which our fathers had used in old days concerning Israel) Congregation. For oftentimes he had instructed us to believe that the gathering together of the disciples made a temple, wheresoever it might be, even at the ends of the earth: but the Temple could not of itself make disciples: yea, though the Temple itself were destroyed yet he said that God would raise up even in two or three days a new temple not made by hands. So Jesus made answer unto Peter calling him by his two names, first by the name which he had from his father (which name he had as being “born of woman”) and then by that name of Peter which he bore in the Kingdom, which name Jesus himself gave unto him: and he signified that Simon the son of Jonah, being changed by faith into Peter (which name meaneth a stone or rock), presented and manifested forth that very Rock upon which the Congregation should be built; and these were his very words: “Blessed art thou, Simon son of Jonah: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven. And I say also unto thee, Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Congregation; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.”

Then, as if he already saw the Temple of the New Congregation standing on the Rock, he added yet another blessing upon Simon Peter and his faith, making mention of the key of the New Temple, and promising that he would give this key to Peter, because they which have faith, those alone can forgive: and forgiveness is the key which openeth the Congregation to all the world. Now it is a common prayer with the scholars of the Scribes that “We may not make defiled the pure, nor make pure the defiled; that we may not bind the loosed, nor loose the bound.” But Jesus promised unto Peter something better than this, to wit, that the faith which Peter had this day manifested (that is, the faith of the New Congregation) should have power to loose them that else had been bound; and that forgiveness below should go hand in hand with forgiveness above; saying that he would give unto Peter the keys of the kingdom of heaven: and he added, “Whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.”

When he had spoken these words, he arose and went into Cæsarea, where we were to tarry that night. We followed him, marvelling much at his words, and especially because of this promise touching binding and loosing. For we did not understand how we could receive such a power; and even though we should receive it, we did not perceive how it would avail us to conquer the Romans nor how it could hasten the Redemption of Sion. Notwithstanding, we rejoiced even more than we marvelled; partly because we dimly understood that the Lord had this day wrought some great work for us; partly because we felt ourselves to be more settled and confirmed in our allegiance to our Master; but most of all because we perceived that Jesus rejoiced with an exceeding joy, and we could not but rejoice with him.

Only Judas said that he liked not that Jesus should speak of a Congregation and not of a Nation or People. “For,” said he, “a Congregation goeth not forth to battle, nor taketh cities, nor setteth up empires and kingdom: but this is the work of a People. Wherefore my mind misgiveth me lest our Master, becoming desperate of his first purpose of setting up a kingdom, should now determine within himself to found a sect such as the sect of the Essenes or Pharisees. For he was not wont before to speak of a Congregation, but he ever spake of a Kingdom of God, or a Kingdom of heaven.” But one made answer and said that it was written, “Let the Congregation of saints praise him; let the saints be joyful with glory; let the praises of God be in their mouth, and a two-edged sword in their hands, to be avenged of the heathen:” wherefore, said he, the meaning of our Master perchance is, that in the time to come, Israel shall be both a nation of conquerors and a congregation of saints. And to this we all agreed.

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This book is part of the public domain. Edwin Abbott Abbott (2015). Philochristus: Memoirs of a Disciple of the Lord. Urbana, Illinois: Project Gutenberg. Retrieved https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/48843/pg48843-images.html

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