Fifth Gospel(111)

The council erupted in agreement:

‘Blasphemer!’ said an ungainly Pharisee.

‘Devil!’ said a Sadducee with sheep’s eyes.

A crusty old rabbi shook his fist. ‘Conjuror of magic tricks!’

‘No, he is more…he is the son of Beelzebub!’

The roar of their words was so fierce that Caiaphas thought their vehemence had seized the torches at that moment to make them flap.

‘What will he do next?’ said a pale priest with no teeth, ‘If we let this man go on his way the people will believe in him and what will that mean for us?’

‘I’ll tell you what it shall means, Jeroboam!’ answered another. ‘The Romans won’t stand for it and our temple and nation will be taken from us!’

Supporters of this rang out their loud approval.

A Pharisee tried to rise above the din, ‘All week he is at the temple! We’ve tried to trap him and make him speak blasphemy, but he twists our laws around his tongue!’

A Sadducee called Simon, snarled, ‘That’s because, you have so many laws, that loopholes can be found everywhere – loopholes big enough for thieves and murderers to crawl through!’

Rabbi Tolomei, said, ‘Without laws, we are no better than animals! But you would not know it, being an animal yourself!’

‘Listen to me, to rid ourselves of this animal, we have to forget laws!’ The toothless priest countered.

The room broke out into a tirade of disagreement and insult. When a representative of the Pharisees spoke, a representative of the Sadducees countered it, and so the meeting degenerated into a free for all.

‘He healed a blind man on the Sabbath! This is enough to convict him!’ said one.

‘But it is permissible to pour wine over the eyelids on a Sabbath!’ said another. ‘Since it’s considered washing!’

‘On the eyes, yes, you fool! But not in the eyes! And not with spit, since that constitutes a remedy and remedies are forbidden on the Sabbath from the neck upwards. Besides, he made clay with his spit and applied it to the eyes – this is work!’

‘He has transgressed the Sabbath many times!’

‘But the people love him!’

‘Even the proselytes, those hateful Greeks, are spellbound! What shall we do?’

‘Cut his throat!’ said a priest.

‘This is above the law!’ said a rabbi. ‘I will not stand for it!’

‘Can we not appeal to Rome?’ asked another priest.

‘If we bring Rome into it, you idiots, what shall the people say – that we are licking the skirts of our enemies!’ retorted a rabbi.

‘This is no good! You are all fools, the people will revolt against us, for they love him!’ snapped another.

Caiaphas was fed up. He stood but no man noticed it. Finally, he yelled, ‘Silence!’ And there was quiet. ‘We can pay men to hate him and those that love him shall not wish to do so when they learn that I shall impose the highest excommunication extending to all places and all persons on any man who comes forward in support of Jesus. Meaning that such a man must be considered dead by his relatives, for he shall never again have intercourse with his family and his people. He shall be shown the road out of the city and told never to return again to the temple. Who would risk such a fate to defend a blasphemer?’

There was a sudden silence.

‘But how can you do this?’ the toothless priest said, ‘Since any accused man has the right to answer to accusations and to witnesses who can speak on his behalf without fear of excommunication!’

Caiaphas waved it away, ‘Yes yes…we shall listen benevolently to our little heretic and it is my guess that if the right questions are asked, he shall profane the name of God again. He must do so before the crowds, so that thereafter it is clear that whoever confesses that he is the Christ is likewise profaning the name of God and shall suffer the same fate he suffers!’

‘What you speak of is unlawful to my ears!’ cried the ugly rabbi. ‘Such doings are evil!’

Caiaphas bore down his condescension over the Pharisee and said, quite plainly, ‘Is it not fate that this man should die? Is not everything foreordained to the Pharisees?’

Another spoke out against it, ‘If we do not follow the law this council shall be defiled!’

Caiaphas stamped his foot and brought down his crosier at the same time. ‘Silence! In this Jesus is right…you Pharisees are hypocrites! You say that pure water does not lose its purity, despite the vessel, and yet you cannot see how this council will not lose its purity for having dirtied its hands to cleanse itself of a defiler!’

A great commotion erupted, one side against the other, until Caiaphas, irritated and itchy, stood and raised his crosier.