THE COUNTRY

THE COUNTRY

Jesus, like all great souls, loved the country. The sinner craving purification, the saint moved to prayer, the poet eager to create, take refuge on the mountains in green shadows, by the sound of the water, in the midst of fields which perfume heaven, or on steep desert hills parched by the sun. Jesus took His language from the country: He hardly ever uses learned words, abstract conceptions, drab and generalizing terms. His talk blossoms with colors, is perfumed by odors of field and of orchard, is peopled by the figures of familiar animals. He saw in His Galilee the figs swelling and ripening under the great, dark leaves: He saw the dry tendrils of the vine greened over with leaves, and from the trellises the white and purple clusters hanging down for the joy of the harvest; He saw from the invisible seed, the mustard raise itself up with its rich light branches, He heard in the night the mournful rustle of the reeds shaken by the wind along the ditches: He saw the seed of grain buried in the earth and its resurrection in the form of a full ear; when the air first began to be warm, He saw the beautiful red, yellow and purple lilies in the midst of the tender green of the wheat: He saw the fresh tufts of grass, luxuriant today and tomorrow dried and cast into the oven; He saw the peaceful animals and the harmful animals, the dove a little vain of its brilliant neck, cooing of love on the roof, the eagle swooping down with widespread wings upon its prey; the swallows of the air which like kings cannot fall if it is not God's wish: the crows tearing flesh from carrion with their beaks; the loving mother-hen calling the chickens under her wings when the sky darkens and thunders; the treacherous fox, after its kill, slinking back into its dark lair; and the dogs un­der the table of their masters begging for scraps that fall to the ground. He saw the serpent writhing through the grass and the dark viper hiding among the scattered stones of the tombs.

Born among the shepherds, He who was to become shepherd of men knew and loved the flocks; the ewes searching for the lost lamb, the lambs bleating weakly, and sucking, almost hidden under their mother's woolly bodies, the flocks sweltering on the thin hot pastures of their hills; He loved with equal love the tiny seed which you can scarcely see on the palm of your hand and the ancient fig tree, casting its shade over the poor man's house; the birds of the air which sow not neither do they reap; the fish silvering the meshes of the nets to feed His faithful; and raising His eyes in the sultry evenings of gather­ing storm, He saw the lightning flashing out of the east and shattering the darkness of the night, even into the west.

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 the teacher.