True Life of Jesus, cont.
Now before Jesus could begin his earthly ministry, he had to be baptised by immersion – not as a sign that his sins had been washed away (because he had none to wash), but only to set a good example to the Jews and to future Roman Catholics that immersion, not sprinkling, is the way to go. But when Jesus met John at the river's edge that day, and shook his hand, and introduced himself, they had a lively, fast-paced, exchange:
JESUS: I have come to be baptised.
JOHN THE BAPTIST: But why?
JESUS (pointing heavenward): Him.
JOHN: God forbid. You must baptise me.
JESUS: No, you, me.
JOHN: No, you. I am unworthy to untie thy sandal.
JESUS: I'm not asking for untied sandals, I'm asking to be baptised.
JOHN: No, me.
JESUS: You.
JOHN: Hold it, which?
JESUS: You, me. Suffer it to be so for now: for thus it becometh us to fulfill all righteousness.
JOHN: All right, all right! (Matt. 3:14-15).
Then came a big surprise. Jesus, after he was baptised in the Jordan, "stood straight up out of the water; and, lo, Heaven opened, and he watched as the holy Ghost of God descended as a dove and landed on him" (
Matt. 3:16).
That really amazed me, and here's why: this was not just some large local pigeon who happened to dive for food in that exact place at that exact moment. It was the full-fledged holy Ghost, whom I had not seen with my own eyes on this planet in 500 years, not since the days of Zechariah Ben-Jehoida, when the holy Ghost did the very same thing – he descended from Heaven as a large dove and landed on the head of Zechariah. But on that occasion, the hard-hearted King Jehoash, who thought it was probably just a trained bird of some sort, and that Zechariah himself was a loud-mouthed prophetical nuisance, ordered the Jews to stone Zechariah to death in the Temple courtyard; which they did (the holy Ghost escaped injury); after which, the assassins' grandchildren built a monument to Zechariah in the Kidron Valley, which tourists can still visit to this day (
2 Chron. 24:20-21).
So when I saw the holy Ghost coming down from Heaven that day to land on Jesus' head, my first thought was, "Oh, no, not again!" But this time, no one picked up any rocks, for there was an even-bigger surprise: "Out of Heaven came a Voice, which said, 'This is my beloved Son [i.e., Jesus, not the pigeon], in whom I am well pleased!'" (
Matt. 3:17).
If you had been there and heard how it thundered, I would not have to tell you this was definitely the Voice of God the Father. The Virgin Mary and I looked up when we heard it. I did not actually see Yahveh, and I don't think Mary did; but when Jesus looked up toward the clouds, he broke into a big,
Hi, Dad, how am I doing so far? kind of smile; and he jumped up and down, and waved, very excitedly. I found it quite touching to see that – even though I do not always agree with them – to see that kind of a bond between Father and Son, and the holy Ghost flying so, zipping back and forth between the two of them like the happiest damn bird you ever saw in your life (
Mark 1:10-11).
For a moment, I also felt a kind of wistfulness, a kind of half-conscious, melancholy wish that the Lord would say, "And do you see that other one over there on the riverbank? Although he has rebelled against Me, I still love him." That is how I knew, deep down in my heart of hearts, or in the depths of my unconscious, or somewhere, that I must still feel the sting of His rejection. But the Voice went suddenly silent, and the holy Ghost flew back up into the clouds, and Jesus dried himself off. And then we all had lunch.
Joseph the carpenter did not attend his stepson's baptismal service that day, which is just as well. Joseph was not a bad man, nor even a bad Jew, but he misunderstood the necessity of the Immaculate Conception. His very traditional beliefs concerning biblical heterosexual monogamy could not be shaken by such pagan stories as Leda and the Swan, much less by what he took for adulterous rumors of a holy "Trinity." I am therefore glad, with the Virgin Mary, that her husband Joseph was never allowed to see the holy Ghost with his own eyes. If Joseph had been down at the riverbank when Jesus was baptised – if he had seen that large dove descending from Heaven toward his wife and learned it was "the holy Ghost" – Joseph would have grabbed the nearest rock and hurled it, not at his stepson, but to knock his rival out of the sky; offering the lame excuse that he did it in defense of his wife's "honour." Joseph, young and impetuous, was just itching to see the feathers fly, because (in Joseph's words) he could never forgive "the liberties that were taken by that bird."
– L.
