The Last Journey of Jesus Christ From Galilee to Jerusalem

Meanwhile, as Jesus Christ, in firm resolve soon to lay down His soul for the salvation of the world, was preparing His disciples for this extraordinary event (Mk 8:31) and wished to work a saving change of mind in His very enemies, the feast of Passover was drawing near—the fourth in the course of Jesus’s ministry, and, by the ordaining of Providence, destined to mark the end of that ministry. The God-man had been accustomed even before this to come up to Jerusalem every year for this feast, where the Law of Moses prescribed that the Passover be kept; now necessity itself required it. Therefore, journeying about Galilee, He had already, some weeks before the feast, begun to bend His way toward the borders of Judea—not directly, however, but by the valley of the Jordan—continuing meanwhile His ordinary occupation: the preaching of the Gospel and the miraculous healing of the sick (Lk 9:51, 13:33).

In the neighborhood of the Jordan, news reached the small company of Jesus of a circumstance that, it would seem, should have moved Him to hasten His journey. A certain Lazarus, a longtime friend of Jesus, who lived in Bethany near Jerusalem, had fallen ill. His sisters, Martha and Mary, who likewise enjoyed the Lord’s favor, finding, it seems, no natural means to help their ailing brother, sent to inform Jesus of his illness—in the hope, no doubt, that He, who helped all who suffered so readily, would all the more not leave His own sick friend without help. The messengers had only to say: «Lord, see—he whom You hold dear is ill!» — every other persuasion and plea to hasten to his aid seemed superfluous for so holy a friendship (Jn 11:1–3).

On hearing of Lazarus’s illness, Jesus showed, it would seem, neither particular compassion nor indifference; it was plain that He was hearing of a matter that, being all-knowing, He had already long known. In the presence of the disciples, who likewise knew and loved Lazarus, He said only to the messengers: «This illness does not lead to death, but exists for the glory of God, that through it the Son of God may be glorified» (Jn 11:4).

Such an answer resembled a prophecy more than the counsel of a friend from whom help is sought, and while at first providing the sisters of Lazarus the reassurance they needed, it served at the same time as no small trial of their faith. Having until now seen in their brother’s illness only a natural and unhappy mischance, they now had to learn that this bitter mischance lay under the direct disposition of the very Providence of God, and had a purpose most exalted and beneficent—the glory of God and the glorifying of the Son of God—and not the death of Lazarus, which they so dreaded. This alone should have set their minds at rest concerning the future, and disposed them to full trust in the will of God and to the expectation of something higher and extraordinary. What true Israelite would not have consented to endure sickness, even to die, for the glory of his Messiah?

But all this could hold only on condition of a living and lofty faith; for an ordinary faith, such as was that of Lazarus’s sisters, the Lord’s words—especially when compared with the sorrowful events that followed—might seem incomprehensible, strange, contrary to the facts, and therefore even distressing. Not to mention that the answer did not disclose in what manner the glory of God and of the Messiah would be revealed in Lazarus’s illness—it gave not the slightest forewarning even of what was most needful to know, namely that the sick man must, if only for a short time, die and be buried. The words, «this illness is not unto death» (Jn 11:4), even prompted the firm expectation that Lazarus would not die; and so, when Lazarus did die, these words, once so comforting, lost all their meaning, and could seem nothing but some kind of riddle—the more cheerless and distressing for having served, in vain, as a real comfort before. Only the faith of Abraham could have stood unshaken at the tomb of Lazarus; but the sisters of Lazarus, for all their reverence and sincere love for the Lord, were, as we shall see, not yet so near to that height of faith.

Nor did the Lord’s momentous words produce in Jesus’s disciples any higher expectation. Content merely that Lazarus’s illness, as the Teacher had said, was not fatal, they were not even curious as to how their Teacher’s divine glory was to be revealed through it.

After the departure of the messengers, Jesus Christ, no doubt with a particular purpose, remained two more days in the very place where the news of Lazarus’s illness had reached Him (Jn 11:6). From such delay one could all the more conclude that Lazarus was in no danger at all, for the Teacher never delayed in giving needed help, and would have delayed still less now. But that He should remain here waiting for the day appointed by Providence to display His divine omnipotence over Lazarus—this, after the Teacher’s words, can scarcely have occurred to any of them.

When Lazarus and his illness had thus been, as it were, forgotten, three days later the God-man, without any fresh occasion, suddenly said to His disciples: «Let us go into Judea!» (Jn 11:7). Since the disciples knew nothing of what had now happened to Lazarus, and the Passover was not yet so near, the Teacher’s words astonished them and struck them with fear: the imagination of some at once pictured the dangers to which, some months before, they had been exposed in Jerusalem, when they were there for the feast of the dedication of the temple (Jn 10:22)42. And so, to turn Him from a journey that seemed premature and therefore dangerous (though at the feast of Passover itself, with such a multitude of people generally devoted to Jesus, it would not have been so dangerous), some ventured to recall the past to mind: «Rabbi, — they said — was it not lately that the Jews sought to stone You … and are You going there again?» (Jn 11:8).

Such language, plainly, breathed sincere zeal and caution, yet was not altogether worthy of the disciples of Jesus. Having been with Him for the space of three years, and having witnessed the whole of His life and works, they ought to have observed that all their ways and doings stood under a guardianship from on high, that the Heavenly Father never withholds His help from the Son, in whom He had placed all His good pleasure (Mk 1:11). Even an ordinary trust in the great qualities of their Teacher should have sufficed to guard the disciples against a groundless fear that He might expose Himself to dangers without foreseeing them or without thought of them. Only inattention to the ways of Providence, a certain forgetfulness of the divinity of Jesus’s ministry, and an excessive human concern for their own safety could have brought the disciples to the thought that Jesus’s enemies were able to hinder His great work and stone to death, before His time, Him who could «raise up children to Abraham from these very stones» (Mt 3:9).

The God-man showed no displeasure at this; yet He gave the disciples to understand how unworthy their fears were of men engaged, as they were, in the great work of God. «Are there not twelve hours to the day?» He said to them in reply — «He who walks in daylight does not trip, for he sees this world’s light; but he who walks by night trips, because the light is not within him» (Jn 11:9–10). From these somewhat veiled words the disciples of Jesus were meant to grasp three truths of the greatest weight and necessity for them, now forgotten or not rightly understood: first, that the Providence of the Heavenly Father can in no case leave their divine Teacher without help; second, that for Jesus’s ministry, by reason of its extraordinary importance, a time has been appointed from above with perfect precision, which no efforts of His enemies can either prolong or shorten; third, that this predetermined time had not yet ended, but was still continuing. The Savior’s comparison of His ministry to the course of a day’s journey is used here, no doubt, because the subject of His present conversation with the disciples was nothing other than the journey into Judea.

This discourse again confirmed that the Lord was accustomed to answer the perplexities of His disciples only so far as was needed for their present instruction and reassurance, without entering into the reasons why He acted in one way and not another. For in Jerusalem there awaited Him now not only great dangers but suffering and death itself; and yet He says nothing of this now, and even says something that seems to run contrary to it—that the disciples fear for Him in vain. And why does He act so? Because the true force of the question the disciples had put above lay not in whether dangers awaited them in Jerusalem, but in whether one could, without incurring the reproach of rashness, go where the danger was. The Lord answers that one could; for this journey belonged to the works of the day, to the time of His ministry, which, whatever the disciples’ fears, no one on earth and by no means whatever can either shorten or prolong.

The disciples grew calmer, or at least fell silent. Then the Lord, as though recalling Lazarus, said to them: «Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep; but I go that I may wake him» (Jn 11:11). Thus He spoke of Lazarus’s death, which occurred at that very time and was indeed a kind of sleep both for Lazarus, in its brevity, and for Jesus, in the ease with which He roused those who had fallen asleep in death. The disciples, however, understood His words literally, of a sleep and not a death. Being accustomed to proofs of His all-knowledge, they did not think to ask how He knew of Lazarus’s condition; only some remarked that this was a good sign, for, they said, «if he has fallen asleep, he will recover» (Jn 11:12)—that is, if he had fallen asleep, he would soon be well43. And so it was implied that there was no need, for Lazarus’s sake either, to go now into Judea.

Then the Teacher said, no longer speaking in riddles: Lazarus is dead; and I rejoice, for your sake, that I was not there (otherwise Lazarus’s own entreaties, and his sisters’ tears, would have moved the All-merciful to heal His ailing friend and not let him come to death). Let us go to him (Jn 11:14–15).

It is likely that some of the disciples, even at this, did not show the full resolve expected of them to go into Judea, even for the burial of Lazarus—which seemed to one of them, called Thomas, altogether out of place. «Why then do we delay,—he exclaimed to his fellow disciples — let us go too, and die with him» (Jn 11:16). For Thomas, to go into Judea to one who was dead meant almost the same as going to his own death; yet not only does he not go on trying to turn the Teacher from His purpose, he is even displeased at the slowness of the other disciples, and calls on all to die with Lazarus and with Jesus—a summons worthy of a disciple of Jesus! Though we shall see later that Thomas’s heart was not yet in fact so self-denying as his lips…

After this, the Lord and His disciples set out for Judea, though now without the haste that no longer seemed necessary. They reached the borders of Jericho, from which no more than six hours’ journey remained to Jerusalem itself, and still less to Bethany. The road was thronged with travelers streaming from every side toward Jerusalem for the approaching feast. The Teacher walked alone (Mk 10:32), ahead of His disciples, who followed at some distance, pondering and talking among themselves about the future. Their inward state, as the evangelist Mark notes, was greatly troubled (Mk 10:32). As far as one may judge from a comparison of the circumstances (Jn 11:8; Mk 10:35), two feelings now contended within their souls: the desire to see, as soon as possible, the opening of the Messiah’s kingdom and to share with their Teacher the glory of His earthly dominion over the whole world, and an unwillingness to be exposed to the fearful dangers that, by common notion, were reckoned unavoidable in this. The words Jesus Christ had spoken in one of His discourses in Galilee, promising to make them, as a reward for their sacrifice and labors, judges of Israel and to seat them on twelve thrones (Mt 19:27–30) (a promise that held within it a higher spiritual sense, but which the disciples understood literally); the hope that the present journey to Jerusalem would be the last, and that with the coming of the Passover feast the kingdom of the Messiah—their Teacher—would be opened; their observation of the general disposition of the people toward civil and religious change, and in particular a strong disposition toward Jesus Christ; and other circumstances besides, filled the disciples’ imagination with the most delightful thoughts. But when their imagination grew still, and they turned from these vague future hopes to the harsh reality of past and present, when they began to judge impartially their own defenselessness, their poverty, and the strength and malice of their enemies—then they fell inevitably into perplexity and fear, and grew fainthearted and timid. «And they were filled with dread, and as they followed, were afraid» (Mk 10:32).

Such a disposition of soul could not remain hidden from the Knower of Hearts. Since the chief source of their fear was indecision of thought and ignorance of the future, He found it needful once more to repeat to His disciples, with all possible clarity, what they had not until then rightly understood—namely, that what awaited Him in Jerusalem was not a throne but a cross, which, however, would not put an end to the work of God and His great labor, but would bring salvation to the whole world and to Him a glory incomparably higher than any glory or greatness they imagined. For this, calling the disciples to Himself and withdrawing apart from the other travelers, the Lord began to speak to them thus: «See, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man» (so He loved to call Himself) «will be handed over to the chief priests and the scribes, and they will condemn Him to death, and deliver Him to the nations to be mocked, scourged, and crucified, and on the third day He will rise!» (Mt 20:17–19; Mk 10:32–34; Lk 18:31–34). Never before had He spoken so decisively, so plainly, and with such detail of circumstance about His coming fate; in these words was contained, in brief, the whole history of the events now approaching, all that was in them most sorrowful and all that was most consoling. «Our Teacher will soon be betrayed, condemned, tormented, crucified, dead; but afterward He must rise again in glory; therefore—so the disciples ought to have reasoned—it is in vain that we now give ourselves over to unrealizable dreams of His earthly kingdom, in vain, too, that we fear for Him and for ourselves: the judgments of the Most High must be fulfilled!» Yet the disciples of Jesus not only drew no such conclusions from this present prediction, but, as the evangelist testifies, did not understand even a single word of it. «And they understood nothing of this, and this saying was hidden from them, and they did not grasp what was said» (Lk 18:34).

An incomprehension astonishing to us, for whom it is now so hard to place ourselves in mind in the position of Jesus’s disciples and enter fully into their way of thinking and feeling; but in them all this came about quite naturally. Never having imagined, in accordance with the popular belief, that the Messiah must die—still less die in the manner the Lord now foretold, by a death most shameful, upon a cross—but expecting, on the contrary, the opening of His glorious earthly kingdom from day to day, the disciples, for all the goodness of their hearts, could not for that very reason understand His words in their direct and proper sense. To explain this, let us suppose that someone, being a friend of a king’s son, had heard from him and from others that his father had appointed him heir to the throne, and had more than once seen proofs of the father’s particular favor toward him; and then heard from that same son that his father, without in the least changing his thoughts of him or his love for him, would nonetheless allow certain depraved men to subject him to disgrace, torment, and death itself, though able to avert all of it—would such a man, hearing all this, believe the king’s son, his friend? Or, believing him, would he grasp his words at once, as he ought? Would he not sooner be inclined to suppose in them some figurative sense unknown to him, especially if he knew that his friend loved to speak in the language of parables?

Something similar happened with the apostles: no doubt they took their Teacher’s words for some figure of speech incomprehensible to them. But in that case, of what use was the Lord’s prediction of His sufferings and death? It was useful, even though the disciples did not understand it. Besides, it was revealed most clearly afterward from it that the God-man had foreseen His cross with all its horrors, and therefore had every possibility of avoiding it, and that if He submitted Himself to death, He did so voluntarily, for the good of the human race. Besides this, the disciples themselves, or at least some of them, when their Teacher’s sufferings began, would have had to call this present prediction to mind, and, seeing its sorrowful part exactly fulfilled—that is, in the calamities—would thereby have been moved to await with good courage the fulfillment of its joyful part as well, the glorious resurrection of the Lord. (Was it not by this very prediction that St John was afterward inspired, who, as we shall see, in the time of Jesus’s sufferings and death, notwithstanding his youth, will show himself more courageous than all the rest of His disciples?)

As if in proof that the discourse on the cross remained now unheeded, two of the disciples, James and John, the sons of Zebedee, betrayed at this very moment traces of a most childish ambition. The Lord plainly set them apart from the other disciples, granting them special trust and closeness; only Peter alone could rival them in this regard, for the Lord distinguished him too. It was this prediction, no doubt, ill understood, that had bred in their young minds the hope that their Teacher, once He had ascended, as they supposed, the throne of Israel, would not fail to distinguish them from the rest in the distribution of rewards and favors. Their mother Salome (who was now going up with them to Jerusalem for the feast) shared, and perhaps even stirred up, hopes of this kind. Imagining that her request (Salome was known to the Lord) might not be without use in this matter, and wishing to obtain in advance from Jesus Christ a promise concerning her sons’ future reward, she resolved to make use of a private moment with the Lord, and, coming up to Him together with her sons, declared with all submission and friendliness that she wished to ask of Him something of no great weight to Him, but of the greatest weight and delight to her, to her sons, and to their whole family (Mt 20:20). «What do you wish?» the Lord asked (Mt 20:21). «Nothing more—she answered—than to commend my sons to Your favor. You will, no doubt, soon ascend the throne of David; grant then, out of Your love for them, that one may sit at the right hand and the other at the left hand of Your throne.» That is, Salome wished her sons to be first after the Messiah in His kingdom, and to be honored above not only all the rest of the people, but even above His nearest disciples and friends44. Both brothers showed by their bearing that their mother’s wish was their own wish as well.

No petition could be found more contrary to the present state of soul of the God-man, who was wholly absorbed in the thought of His coming sufferings. Some excuse may be found in the fact that James and John had not understood His prediction, and sought closeness to their Teacher, no doubt, not from ambition alone, but also from a love for Him that feared to be kept far from Him in His glory. The Lord’s answer serves as an instructive example of the gentleness with which He corrected even the gravest errors of His disciples. Instead of any reproach, He answered simply and meekly: «You do not know what you are asking. Can you drink the cup» (among the Hebrews the cup signified sufferings and calamities (Ps 59:5; Is 51:17, 22; Lam 4:21)) «that I drink, and be baptized with the baptism» (so, figuratively, were great trials called)45 «with which I am baptized?» (Mk 10:38). That is, the Lord wished to impress upon these dreamers that they ought to be thinking, not yet of the reward, which will of itself come to the worthy, but of the means by which to earn it. «We can,» the disciples answered, moved, no doubt, more by the desire to obtain what they asked and to show themselves worthy of it than by any inward conviction of the necessity of suffering to attain glory (Mt 20:22); for they had as yet no clear notion either of the cup that lay before them or of the baptism of which the Lord spoke. But the Teacher, as Knower of Hearts, already foresaw that these words, spoken now without clear awareness of the matter, would in time come to their complete fulfillment, and that the sons of Zebedee would indeed, in time, be baptized, like Him, with sufferings46; and so, in the spirit of prophecy, which they were to understand fully only afterward, He continued: «You will indeed drink My cup, and be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized; but to sit at My right hand and at My left is not Mine to give, but is for those for whom it has been prepared by My Father» (Mt 20:23). With this the discourse ended.

Evidently the Lord wished to give the sons of Zebedee an admonition necessary for them, but without the severity that the request deserved more than the petitioners themselves. They needed to learn that in a matter so weighty as the establishment on earth of the Kingdom of God, nothing can depend on personal caprice or favoritism, but everything on law and justice; that their Lord and Teacher Himself, if one may say so, cannot grant them any favor apart from their own fitness and merit. After this they were to be convinced, of themselves, that in this respect too they did not know «what they were asking»47 (Mk 10:38).

Though this conversation was not heard by the other disciples, they were not slow to learn what its subject had been. This produced displeasure and murmuring among them—not unjust with regard to the seekers of the first place, but pointless in substance, since they were seeking the impossible. Peter especially had reason to remain displeased, for he had been distinguished in the company of Jesus’s disciples no less than the sons of Salome (Mt 19:27; Mk 10:41–45), and had no less claim to it, yet he never went so far in ambition as visibly to desire dominion even over his fellow disciples, content with the Teacher’s promise to seat each of them on his own throne.

This mutual displeasure among the disciples became the occasion for imparting to them the most edifying lesson in humility and brotherly love. «You know—said the Lord, having gathered them around Him—in what the rulers and princes of this world set their dominion: in being served and obeyed, glorified and exalted. But among you—My disciples—this must not be; no one must seek a distinction bound up with the humbling of others; among you — whoever wants to be great among you must become your servant, and whoever wants to be first among you must become your slave!» (Mt 20:26–27). «Remember—the Lord continued, turning His words to a matter the disciples had forgotten, but which now most of all deserved their thought—remember that the Son of Man Himself, to whom all glory belongs, came into this world not, as many falsely suppose, to subdue nations and receive honors and service from others, but to render these, for His part, to others, and to give His very soul for the ransom of the world!» In this way, concerning that which the disciples could in no way reconcile with the dignity of the Messiah—His sufferings and death—Jesus Christ spoke once again as of the chief and first purpose of His coming into the world. So often and so forcefully repeated a reminder of this might have turned the disciples away completely and forever from ambitious dreams and designs, but the prejudice of an earthly kingdom for the Messiah, their Teacher, was so strong that not even the cross and Golgotha itself could wholly root it out. And even after the resurrection, at the Teacher’s first appearance, they will ask Him: «will You at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?» (Acts 1:6). Only the descent of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost fully regenerated them, destroying in their souls every carnal notion, so that they could all say of themselves in the words of St Paul: «even though we once knew Christ according to the flesh, we know Him thus no longer» (2Cor 5:16).

In the course of such discourses the Lord and His disciples drew near to Jericho, one of the most considerable of the Jewish cities for its antiquity and wealth48. Before the city gates, by the roadside, sat two blind men49, begging alms of those who passed. The noise of the crowd of travelers accompanying the Lord was not slow to draw their attention, and they were curious to know who was coming—that is, whether it might be some nobleman with a great retinue, from whom a rich alms could be had (Lk 18:36). When they were told that it was Jesus, the well-known Wonderworker and Prophet of Galilee, hope at once revived in them of being healed by Him. And so, with all the impatience of men who long to enjoy God’s light, they began to cry out: «Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!» (Lk 18:38; Mt 20:30). In calling Jesus the son of David, the blind men were publicly acknowledging Him as the Messiah—an acknowledgment that, though very many had long shared it, few dared make openly, all the more since the Lord Himself did not always approve of it, judging it premature. For this reason many in the crowd surrounding Jesus, fearing, no doubt, the Pharisees and the Romans, now bade the blind men be silent, or at least not to utter the title son of David, as dangerous as it was dear to everyone. In vain! The blind men went on crying out still louder: «Son of David, have mercy on us! Son of David, have mercy on us!» (Lk 18:39; Mt 20:31).

The God-man stopped and ordered the blind men to be called: their cry moved Him to help them. Hearing that Jesus was waiting for them, the blind men threw off even their outer garments, the sooner to appear before the Divine Physician. «What do you wish Me to do for you?» He asked. «Lord, let our eyes be opened!» The Lord touched their eyes, and at once they were opened. «Go your way,—He then said — your faith has saved you» (Mt 20:32–33; Lk 18:42).

Indeed, whether it was the affliction that oppressed these unfortunate men, often disposing people to a better cast of mind, or other circumstances that were the cause—the present conduct of the blind men toward Jesus Christ showed only that the eye of their soul was incomparably purer and more far-sighted than the eyes of the scribes and Pharisees. The blind men of Jericho were incapable, unlike those false zealots, of being scandalized by Jesus Christ’s origin from Galilee, from poor parents; His great and holy works remained for them great and holy, whatever day they were done—Friday or Sabbath; the wise judgment of the blind man of Jerusalem, that God does not listen to sinners, and that Jesus could not work wonders unless He were from God (Jn 9:33), served for them too as a guide in judging His divine dignity. Their hearts, no doubt, had long since acknowledged Him the true son of David; the occasion arose, and they publicly testify their faith in Him, disregarding the danger of being excommunicated from the synagogue for it, or accused of sedition against the Romans.

Notwithstanding the Divine Physician’s permission to go wherever they wished, the healed blind men went on after Him, glorifying God and their Savior. They passed through Jericho. News of the miracle at once spread through the whole city and swelled still further the crowd surrounding Jesus; everyone wished to see the great Wonderworker, and for that very reason many could not see Him. Among the latter was a certain Zacchaeus, a chief among the tax collectors (Lk 19:2), or gatherers of tribute. By his trade he had acquired great wealth, not always, it seems, disdaining even such means as John the Baptist had already reproached men of his calling for using (Lk 3:13). Avarice, hardness of heart, and a tendency to extortion were common traits of the tax collectors50, to which their very calling disposed them. Farming the taxes from the Romans, they naturally used every means not to be left at a loss; their countrymen, besides their unwillingness to pay tribute to foreigners, saw in them an instrument of Roman dominance, hated all the more for being embraced by Jews. Hence tax collector and Gentile were reckoned words of equal meaning (Mt 9:10–11; Lk 15:1–2; Mt 18:17): for both alike there was even one common name—«sinner» (Lk 19:7). Zacchaeus was chief of the tax collectors, and so, in the people’s opinion, one of the foremost of sinners.

Yet Zacchaeus, as is plain from all his present conduct, was no longer what he had once been (if indeed he ever truly was): in his soul a revulsion toward vice had awakened, gold no longer charmed him, and he was beginning to feel the need to acquire treasure that does not perish51. In such a disposition of mind men usually seek someone before whom to lay open the wounds of their conscience; and who could heal them better than Jesus? Thus Zacchaeus’s heart was drawn, almost against his will, toward the great Loosener of sin’s bonds. But he did not yet dare hope for so great a mercy—that the Holiest of Prophets should turn His attention upon the foremost of sinners; and, conscious of his own unworthiness, he sought only «to see Jesus» (Lk 19:3): to compare the features of His divine countenance with what was said of Him, of His mercy, majesty, holiness; to draw for himself some edification and comfort from His gaze; to read in it the future fate of sinners—his own included52. And even this wish could not be fulfilled! Being small of stature, Zacchaeus was quite lost in the crowd of people accompanying Jesus. But along the road Jesus was to pass stood a tree: Zacchaeus, outrunning the rest, hastily climbs it, in the sweet hope of gazing his fill on the Prophet’s face (perhaps, thought Zacchaeus, the Messiah, who would soon judge him)—the less noticed, the better.

Jesus Christ might well not have seen Zacchaeus; nor is there any sign that this tax collector was known to Him before—but could anything be hidden from the Knower of Hearts? Could the Lover of Mankind fail to take upon His shoulders the straying sheep that had itself begun to seek its Shepherd? No sooner had they drawn level with the tree in which Zacchaeus sat than Jesus stopped, and, fixing His gaze upon Zacchaeus, said to him: «Zacchaeus, hurry and come down, for today I must stay at your house» (Lk 19:5).

Astonished at such condescension, the tax collector hastens to leave the tree and receive so extraordinary a Guest into his house, not yet knowing the purpose of His visit, but convinced by the very fact that the Prophet of Galilee was nothing like the celebrated Pharisaic rabbis, who would have counted it a defilement even to speak a single friendly word to him in public. Jesus, on the contrary, showed nothing to suggest that Zacchaeus’s house, into which He was going, seemed to Him any less clean than others, or that in entering it He was departing from any rule. But the crowd accompanying Him judged otherwise. To enter into friendly conversation with a wealthy tax collector—a man supposed to be without love for his country, without faith—to invite Himself to visit his house, and not even to take, on entering it, the precautions for preserving ritual purity that the Pharisees habitually observed in such a case53—all this seemed to the unreasoning zealots for the Pharisaic traditions strange, blameworthy, altogether unworthy of the opinion they wished to hold of the great Prophet.

Zacchaeus himself felt how far Jesus’s condescension toward him extended, and how much His reputation among the people might suffer through it. As if wishing to give an account of his conduct, to show that he was no longer a slave to his riches, and that in his heart there still lived, or had come to life again, a love for all that is good, the prudent tax collector stood before Jesus and, in the presence of all who were scandalized at the mercy shown him, declared that (in memory of Jesus’s visit) half of his estate would be given to the poor, and that if he had wronged anyone, he would restore it fourfold. Such a promise could indeed persuade everyone that Zacchaeus wished to become worthy of his own name (Ezra 2:9; Neh 7:14)54. By the Law of Moses (Ex 22:1–4; Num 5:7), only one who had been brought to judgment and convicted of the offense was bound to restore double or fourfold what he had stolen; one who confessed his sin of his own accord had only to restore what he had taken with a fifth part added; but Zacchaeus, who until now had stood below the law, suddenly rises above it, and wishes henceforth to act by a law not only of justice but of love, whose divine pattern he saw before him in Jesus.

By all appearances, the prudent tax collector understood the purpose of Jesus’s visit, and entered, so to speak, into the very spirit of the mercy shown him. The evangelist does not say that he troubled himself overmuch (as Martha once did) with entertaining the Lord and His disciples; he does not even say that he entertained them at all. His sincere promise to make restitution to all he had wronged, and to give half his estate to the poor, was the best entertainment for Him whose food was to do the will of the Heavenly Father (Jn 4:34).

The Lord did not leave so pure a zeal without reward. As though to assure everyone that He in no way doubted the fulfillment of Zacchaeus’s promise, nor regretted having visited his house — «Today — He said to those around Him — salvation has come to this house» (the beneficial change in the master of the house was bound to work a change in the household too); — «since he too is a son of Abraham» (as the present event proved, though until now many had reckoned him no better than a Gentile); — «for the Son of Man came to seek and to save what was lost» (Lk 19:9–10).

The last words plainly were directed against those who took offense at the mercy shown to the chief of the tax collectors; in them was disclosed the mystery of Jesus’s fellowship with sinners, which the Pharisees were forever holding up against Him as a reproach. Dreaming only of glory, riches, and honors, these hypocrites forgot that there is no greatness higher than that which consists in doing good—and especially moral good, in teaching and correcting sinners—and so they could not conceive that the chief purpose of the Messiah’s coming was «to seek and to save what was lost» (Lk 19:10). The same blindness showed itself, too, in their judgment of their neighbors. Accustomed to seeing the small splinter in a brother’s eye and not noticing the beam in their own, these false zealots would not so much as consider that many of the open sinners whom they despised were far nearer than they to the Kingdom of Heaven, precisely because they were nearer to an awareness of their own unworthiness, to repentance for their sins. But Jesus Christ looked otherwise—and in the crowd of Gentiles He sometimes found the very faith He sought in vain throughout all Israel. Repeated experience proved that the mercy of the Son of Man, in His dealings with sinners, produced effects still greater than His wonders. Many of the living dead, as though quickened by the loving breath of the Lover of Mankind, rose up out of their tombs—utterly changed their wicked lives—having this advantage over those raised from bodily death, that the latter fell subject to death once more, while the former could enjoy the life of the spirit forever. A proof of this, among others, is Zacchaeus himself: according to the most ancient tradition, he became a true follower of Jesus Christ, was afterward a companion of the apostle Peter on his apostolic journeys, and was ordained by him bishop of Caesarea in Palestine55.

Having left the house of Zacchaeus, Jesus continued on His way toward Bethany, and might have arrived there that very day, had not about a week still remained before the Passover, and had it not been necessary for Lazarus to be buried and become a dead man of four days; and so He walked slowly, stopping in the villages along the way, and making use of every occasion to instruct His disciples and the people.

The disciples, however (so great was the force of the popular prejudice!), forgetting the death of Lazarus and their Teacher’s recent discourse on the cross, gave themselves over once more to fanciful hopes, and more than ever before. They took it, among other things, for a certainty that with the coming feast all their labors and dangers would come to an end, and that their Teacher, on the occasion of the great gathering of the Jewish people for the feast, would solemnly declare Himself the Messiah (Lk 19:11). This hope was fed, besides other causes, by the favor with which, on entering Jericho, He had publicly accepted the title of son of David from the blind men of that city. «Is this not,—the disciples might well have reasoned—a direct summons for everyone at last to acknowledge Him now as the Messiah? And if He has indeed resolved to declare Himself the Messiah before all the people, when better to do it than at the feast of Passover?» And of their fellow travelers many thought as the disciples did, delighting beforehand in the glory in which they would soon see that very Jesus who walked with them on the same road, conversed with them, and, perhaps, shared their meal along the way.

Since in the Jews’ opinion of the Messiah’s earthly kingdom not everything was false and unrealizable, but there was some truth in it too, one could not simply say to the disciples in this case, «Your expectations are in vain!» They would not have been in vain, had the disciples and all the Jews known how to distinguish the Messiah’s first, humble coming from His second, glorious and majestic coming, and had they not confused His spiritual, universal dominion with an earthly rule over Judea. To show them the true point of view on these matters, and to give them a key to understanding the events now approaching—events that indeed contained a great deal exceeding their notions of that time, and much that was wondrous—the Lord had recourse to His accustomed manner of speech: a parable.

«A man of noble birth was setting out for a distant country to receive a kingdom; and he was so assured of receiving the royal crown that, before his departure, he made all necessary arrangements so that his usual revenues should not suffer at all during his absence. To ten of his chosen servants he gave a mina each56, that they might trade with this money. After this he set out. But many of his fellow citizens, though he had given them no cause, were ill-disposed toward him. To keep him from the throne, they sent an embassy to the king who was to confirm his right to the kingdom. Anyone else, the envoys said, they would rather accept as king—only not him. But their representations had no effect: the unloved heir returned as king. An accounting of the money entrusted to the servants then began. «Master,—the first said joyfully—see: your mina has earned ten minas!» «Well done,—the king answered—you are a good servant; I entrusted you with little, but you have done much: take charge of ten cities!» «And I have made five minas out of one,» said the second. «Receive your reward for your labor too,—the king answered—five cities shall be under your charge.» «But I,—the third began to say—have done nothing, and made nothing from your mina. Knowing that you are a hard and exacting man—reaping where you did not sow, gathering where you did not scatter—I was concerned only to keep it safe, and so I kept it hidden away, wrapped in a cloth. Here it is! Neither more nor less than it was when given to me!» «By your own words,—said the king—I will judge you, wicked servant! You knew that I am a hard man, who demands more than he gives, reaping where I did not sow, gathering where I did not scatter—why then did you not put my silver to work, so that on my return I might have received it back with interest?» «Take the mina from him,—he said to the other servants—and give it to the one who has ten minas.» Such a reward for one man seemed too great to them, especially in comparison with the one from whom everything was taken away. «Master,—they remarked—he already has ten minas.» «What of it? — the king answered—To him who has—and uses it well—more will be given; but from him who does not know how to use it—who uses it wrongly, or not at all—even what he has will be taken away!..»»

Having settled accounts with his servants, the king ordered his enemies to be brought before him. There was no need to try or convict them, and all of them were put to death (Lk 19:12–27).

Deep and weighty instructions were contained in this parable. That Jesus Christ must depart to a distant country—to the Father, to heaven—to receive a kingdom (against the error that He would soon ascend the throne of Judea); that His fellow citizens, the Jews, even after His departure, would not be persuaded of the reality of His right to the kingdom, but would turn everyone away from acknowledging Him as the Messiah (against the prejudice that the Messiah could not possibly be unrecognized and rejected by the Jewish people); that His chosen servants—the apostles and other followers—would each receive, in the meantime, a certain number of minas, spiritual gifts, which they must employ for the good of the king and the kingdom (against the false notion that His followers would soon share power with Him, and earthly power at that, without first earning the reward by the faithful discharge of their duties); that He would appear in due majesty only upon His return, a majesty beneficent to faithful subjects and diligent servants, but terrible and unbearable to rebellious subjects and wicked servants (against the doubt that the prophets’ predictions concerning the Messiah’s kingdom might perhaps never be fulfilled, if they were not fulfilled now). That all this is contained, more or less clearly and definitely, in the parable given, anyone may be convinced for himself, if he compares its content with what we generally know of the nature, duration, and various aspects of the kingdom of Christ. But that the disciples rightly understood the meaning of this parable at the time is not evident either from the Gospel or from the circumstances. Afterward, following the Lord’s Resurrection, they would have had to recall this parable too, among the other discourses of their Teacher that were incomprehensible to them, and, illumined by the Holy Spirit, grasp its deep meaning. For later readers, such as ourselves, this parable serves as an abridged version of the whole great design of Jesus, of His twofold kingdom, of His followers and His enemies, and, showing what has already come to pass, disposes us to expect what is yet to be fulfilled in the future.

The material for this parable could have been furnished by one of the civil events of that very time. The man of noble birth represented in it recalls Archelaus, the son of Herod, who after his father’s death set out to Augustus to receive from him the royal scepter, and indeed obtained it—despite every effort of the Jews, who through a special embassy asked Caesar not to give them over into subjection to Archelaus57. Thus, on the lips of the Heavenly Teacher, the most earthly of events served to depict the spiritual realities of the kingdom of grace. Meanwhile the journey continued, and the Lord, with His disciples, drew near to Bethany, where Lazarus had dwelt, who now lay in the tomb already four days.