#53.1, Thurs., Feb. 1, 2024

Historical Setting, 626 C.E. The farm in the Vosges

         The little painting, the icon, that Greg and Gaillard brought as a gift to our household is captivating. People who know the story well, children who’ve never heard it, the peasantry who have heard it all bedazzled with mystery by priests and scholars, everyone, now sees it just this way. Since the pale, frail Lazarus in the image, all wrapped in linens really looks nothing like me, even at my worst, having the image in our house seems to stifle the rumors that I am that same Lazarus.  I am probably the only one seeing it who is surprised by seeing a Jesus image who looks like a man of today in Constantinople. This wardrobe of Jesus makes that common Jewish man look like a Roman ruler. And the style and detail of the burial vault is not at all what my sister provided for this, her dead brother, even though she could afford the best.

         But an image is always made for the time in which it was created. We pretend to know the look of history but it’s always invented simply from a few relics and a lot of imagination. Yet this little picture speaks perfectly of the story it tells. It shows a “sign” from Jesus.  Jesus did this thing of raising this dead man back to life to show something of the nature of earthbound humanity, a metaphor or sign or maybe say a visible window on the invisible heaven.  “On earth as it is in heaven.” It is what signs in the Gospel of John have to say.  On earth a friend of Jesus was sent back into life on earth, and in that way, the mirror to the invisible world of Spirit offers an image of resurrection. It’s a forever story and so here I am, metaphor for everyone’s Spiritual forever. If I must be a relic, let me always speak for the time we are living in now.

         Maybe Jesus hadn’t a thought about a complicated earthly forever he gave to this friend. But maybe that vague, invisible reality of Spiritual life is no less overwhelming.

         Whatever way the picture tells the story, it’s been an inspiration for our youngest son, Brandell, to learn this technique of art so that all the stories from our family lessons in bible can be told seemingly alive and in brilliant tones. Then others can see the stories through his eyes.  Now he is preparing for this journey to find a teacher.

(Continues Tuesday, February 6)

#52.14, Weds., Jan. 31, 2024

Historical Setting, 626 C.E. The farm in the Vosges

         While Brandell is completely committed to a journey somewhere he knows nothing of, using shear creative imagination to solve a problem he has no control over, he is simply answering God’s dare. He has no imagination for any of the dangers of travel. He doesn’t know the loneliness of strange places or even the pitfalls of standing against the edicts of the Church right here. He just has no idea.

         I, on the other hand, know exactly what God is calling me to do. And instead of jumping head long into it teaching the message for which I am a  mere earthly sign — that life is many times over, resurrection in spirit, in healing, in hope, in love, in renewal…

         And I haven’t been speaking of the sign my life was intended to reflect. On this metaphorical earth I am the resurrection and the life of one metaphorical human. While in heaven, the spiritual truth in the full eternal reality of the love of God, Jesus is the resurrection and the life for all spirit. On metaphor earth, the visual image shows an invisible heaven. So, I have been remiss. I’ve been quietly living a farmer’s life for these years now, while the Church gropes blindly in the darkness of ignorance, feeding the spiritually deprived a diet of edicts and platitudes and contrivances of doctrine to fit earthly politics, sending people plundering after anything but the love of God.

         So here it is in our house on the shelf for precious things, a little icon from the imagination of some stranger master artist showing a story I have been hesitant in telling. And even though I saw it when it was happening, I hardly understand now how the error persists in the retelling of the Gospel as stories that are disparaging of the Jews. It was a Roman hate, not a God hate, or a gospel hate yet it seeped into gospel words.

         Surely Brandell has no way to know anything of this. Clearly, the Roman trick of redirecting blame to the victims of crucifixion seeped into the Gospel of John. Now for all these hundreds of years the Church and the people who obey the law of the Church, just let those words say what isn’t even possibly true: “The Jews killed Jesus.” It was skewed to suit the ancient Roman politics and to accommodate Gentile Christians in an emerging sect of Christianity rising in the turmoil after the destruction of the Temple.

         For Brandell, setting the record straight is his holy mission. For me, this is personal because it is the pages of the story of my own family.

(Continues Thursday, February 1, 2023)

#52.13, Tues., Jan. 30, 2024

Historical Setting, 626 C.E. Creekside near the farm in the Vosges

         “I did pray about it, Papa. And God answered with that kind of backwards answer when God expects us to already know something. So, the second verse of my prayer was, ‘Yes, dear God, Creator of all Creation, I don’t even want to think about going off for a year or two to a foreign land that speaks a strange language just to look for that icon painter to teach me how to tell the bible stories in pictures so not speak them with poetry and dancing.’”

         So, Brandell believes God is calling him to become an “icon painter.” 

He feels his prayer was answered with a holy dare.

         He tells me, “God knows it’s all I can think about. I’ve tried not to think of it at all.  But now I really have to go to Constantinople to find the teacher of this art. I have to learn this so I can give the gospel stories to the people who are illiterate, the common people Jesus most wanted to teach, those who are hungry for stories of how God loves them like a mother, when what the Church provides for these longing hearts is hollow incantations of doctrine.”

         “Maybe Greg and Gaillard will be going back there again soon. You can go with them.”

         “They said they are gathering sponsors for a journey to escort bishops to Rome. But probably Constantinople is on the way to Rome, wouldn’t you think?”

         He has no idea of faraway places. And yet he feels such an urgency to go off somewhere and learn something new. It’s more than the words of a song, or even the rumors of a living Lazarus. He isn’t running from anything so much as he is driven to find a way to retool his skills to tell bible stories using visual images that speak without words. And he feels God is demanding this holy mission.

         Brandell explains, “When I talked with Greg about my need to go to Constantinople he said I would have to wait until they went there again, which might be months or years, or else I will have to go alone without any sponsors or purse.”

         “He told you that?”

         “Well, actually Greg said he couldn’t imagine anyone going alone on a journey like that. And so, I’m hoping they will stop off at Constantinople on their other journey, or else I’ll have to go it alone.”

(Continues tomorrow)

#52.12, Thurs., Jan. 25, 2024

Historical Setting, 626 C.E. The farm in the Vosges

         “Brandell.” I ask, “sing for me this so-called evil verse?”

         He sings shamedly, nearly under his breath.

         “My grandpapa was a Pharisee, fine,

           A God beloved, obedient Jew!

         He feasted on lamb and sipped blest wine

          And remembered the Sabbath, solemn and true.”

         This little verse hides no devils. But in these times the Church seems to be looking for any way to sever the Jewishness of Jesus from doctrine. It is non-sensical that Church authorities would banish a people simply in remembrance of ancient Roman propaganda.

         Brandell explains, “The Church authority said don’t think about using gospels for music, but when someone says don’t think of something like bible stories, I think of more bible stories for songs that only make it more complicated.  I could sing a different song, but I really don’t want to never ever do the vine dance again. 

         “And what’s worse, I’m afraid the Jesus love will just be pushed aside, especially among the common people and the illiterate poor who go to Church thirsty for the bread and wine of Christian belonging, and then are given the cross — the sign of death by imperial power — when we are the child who asks for love – and what father would give a stone when asked for bread?” [Matthew 7:9 ]

“Brandell, I hear what you’re saying.”

What can I say to him? Maybe my silence is my failure. I let my own calling to life and life again go silent. All Creation and all people are like a great pot of vegetable soup with all varieties of sweet flavors together in God’s love on earth as it is in heaven. Then picky people sort out the peas and carrots from the barley in the soup, and by the time the illiterate peasants are served it is a bland barely broth.

We are varieties of people yet all are one in God’s loving Spirit. Maybe I, as nothing more than a sign from a gospel, should be making the plea for others to see through me the sign of the ever-healing love of God, because that is how we are all gifted. Yet, here I have allowed the Church doctrine to invent a death of me in order stifle the true reading of the variety of gospels and law.  My silent prayer is Forgive me God. It seems a long silence.

         “So Papa, I know you are so quiet so not to lecture me. I know you will tell me to pray about this.”

         “Of course, Brandell. Just pray about it.”

(Continues Tues. Jan. 30)

#52.11, Weds., Jan. 24, 2024

Historical Setting, 626 C.E. The farm in the Vosges

         I can understand Brandell’s frustration with that Church authority at Luxeuil. For all these centuries the ancient Roman’s rumors of poison hate against Jews have been lingering in the shadows, seemingly harmless. Rome is long gone. But now, suddenly, one emperor, far away in the East has himself a skirmish with a tribe of Jews and he decides the Jewish warriors are obstinately undaunted even by the heaps of horrors of wars. Of course, the emperor had no imagination for Jewish fighters winning against the empire. They are a small Persian tribe and he has armies. But he strikes out at that resilience by turning around the longstanding religious tolerance. Now, in the East, Jews must be baptized Christian or die!  So, the unbaptized whom the Gentiles called, “stubborn,” maybe really meaning faithful, decided they won’t be Christianized and they are picking up their families and seeking safety in Gaul. Now that Emperor, Heraclius, calls on the kings of Gaul to make similar edicts against Jews. One Merovingian king rising in Austrasia, Dagobert, rules in solidarity with the Emperor, and he is also requiring Christian baptism of Jews. [Footnote] And when it comes to baptism, the Church is the responsible administrator. Hating Jews seems to be the Church’s political responsibility.

         The fearsome thing is the animosity that is intentionally taught against Christianity’s own Jewish root.Brandell is concerned that the authority of the Church Doctrine is not only opposed to the Christian songs but also to the ancient dance.

         “Papa, I’m definitely not allowed to mention that the vine dance is very likely what Jesus was dancing when he said, ‘I am the vine and you are the branches?’ [John 15:5] When we are dancing together, reaching, connecting one to the next and set ourselves as the vine linked as we are, surely, we are in remembrance of Jesus’ words to his friends. Bound together he told us we are in the spirit of love, ‘you are in me as I am in you,’ and in dancing we are all a part of the same vine together. But Father Albestus says that even the ancient dance should be banned if it tells a gospel story to the illiterate.”

         “Why does it matter that the stories are kept hidden from the illiterate?” I wonder.

         “He said, offering the stories without knowing Doctrine was the source of my error.”

[Footnote] As noted earlier, #52.6, Dagobert did make an edict against the Jews, and the Jewish encyclopedia article followed the notion that Dagobert’s support of Heraclius was unlikely because the communications between Frankish Gaul and Constantinople would not have supported solidarity. But Carroll and others point to on-going and extensive communications between the East and the West in the early Byzantine era.  A better reason for no connection with the edict by Heraclius is that antisemitism was already widespread anyway.

(Continues tomorrow)

#52.10, Tues., Jan. 23, 2024

Art Notes: This gouache painting is this artist’s interpretation of a detail of the relief from the Arch of Titus (in ruin) showing the Roman looting of the Temple in Jerusalem.

Historical Setting, 626 C.E. The farm in the Vosges

         Brandell asks me, “So Did Rome ever conquer the Jews?”

         “Rome is gone and Jewish people still worship one God as they always have.” That’s an easy, but incomplete answer, that seems to break open a ray of light into Brandell’s deep darkness. He nearly smiles.

         So, I throw a little more history into that darkness. “The Romans used every warring way they knew to try to subdue the Jews. They infiltrated the leadership with their own puppet king and even the appointment of the Sadducee, high priest, required Roman approval. When a popular leader arose from the people and went around teaching the old law of God’s love, it was an impossible challenge to imperial pride — to love one’s neighbor as self — so they crucified him. They sacked and burned the Temple built with stone. Before that, they massacred the Jewish people at Sepphoris. [Footnote]  When flat-out killing people and destroying the temple didn’t make Jews dissolve away into Roman, rumor and propaganda hammered away at truths to make Jews seem to be devils.

         “Even when Rome took thousands of Jewish lives and their property, they couldn’t break their deep bonds of faith and obedience to God’s law that made them a people together. The Jews could never become Rome’s war prize. Rome would have had to separate the people of the Hebrew root from God and the law that made them/us, a people together. All the conquering Rome could muster could never twist these people into Roman to worship a pantheon of imaginary gods, or even a serial monotheism of flesh and blood Caesars.

         Brandell wonders, ”What do I do with a song about a Jewish Grandpapa? Is he still beloved by God when the Church follows the king’s edict against the Jews?”

I can affirm, “It is the broken bonds of love among people that surely must break God’s heart. Brandell,” I ask, “what do you suppose is in the extravagant resilience of Judaism that so wrankled the Romans and now annoys the Church?”

         “You are going to tell me, aren’t you, Papa?”

“It was pure obstinate faithfulness that was taught us by our mothers and our prophets. It was the story of God’s love for all the followers as a whole people with God always goading us through each wilderness.”

         “So, how was it that Romans conquered all these tribes of Gaul and never conquered the Jews?” Brandell asks.

[Footnote] Carroll, James Constantine’s Sword: The Church and the Jews, A History, [Boston, New York, Houghton Mifflin C. A mariner Book, 2001.] p. 83

(Continues tomorrow)

#52.9, Thurs., Jan. 18, 2024

Historical Setting, 626 C.E. The farm in the Vosges

         “Beware!” I tell Brandell, “When a voice of authority says, ‘Since you can’t read,’ or ‘because this is voluminous and technical let me tell you what it really says’ then you can expect misinformation, lies and untruths which are easily doled out to the illiterate and ignorant. And within the web of half-truths and lies, dangle prejudices and unfounded hates that sever human ties to one another and wound the very heart of God’s love for all people.

“While Rabbi’s read the Torah scrolls to those inside the Temple, the Roman propaganda spreads like a plague of hate throughout the illiterate masses in streets. So, Jesus went out to those who were being miss-led to follow rumors of hate, and he told the common people what was actually written in the law: ‘Love God with all your heart and mind and soul and strength and the second important law is to love your neighbor as yourself.’”

  “In these times this matter of Christians turning against their own history warps truth and bears horrific consequences of hate simply by nurturing ignorance.”

  Now my son is telling me, “Christians are not even supposed to say that Jesus was Jewish.”

“Brandell this is a complicated time.”

“Papa. I wish it was only the time – the tempo of the dance that was complicated. Then people could just dance themselves into the mythical bliss of love, and never have to worry over nurturing the hates. But I guess we have to deal with it as it is.”

         “What can I say, Son? Old words sound different in new seasons but no one should rewrite history just to raise up some nearly extinct Roman empire.”

         “The Church authority talked about that. He said we are Christian now and it is for the Church to tell us what the bible really means to say, regardless of what the words say.”

         “I would call that ridiculous, but I know even invented hates are serious when ignited by power-thirsty lies. Maybe it is that devil side of human nature that prefers hateful rumors over facts.”

“So, you blame devils too, Papa?”

“That was just a figure of speech.  Back in that time when the Romans so brutally killed Jesus, even when we tried to see things through the vantage point of God’s universal love, vision was blurred by so many hates and hurts, crucifixions, persecutions, obliteration and annihilation. Roman political propaganda made Jews appear as the enemy of Christians.”

Brandell asks, “Then, did Rome finally conquer the Jews?”

(Continues Tuesday, January 23, 2024)

#52.8, Weds., Jan. 17, 2024

Historical Setting, 626 C.E. Walking by the creek near the cottages

His mother tells Brandell he has to eat soup now, so he dutifully sips from the bowl as though eating is a weighty chore he has to do. There is no sign on his face of that infectious smile that can drink up the drear like the sunshine swallows up mist. It pains us to see this son so oddly sorrowful.

“I don’t agree with the Church on this one, Brandell. I’m sorry if I disappoint them. I know they don’t mind calling me ‘Ezra’ because it seems to solve the Lazarus problem for them. But I wonder if they even know Ezra was a Jewish priest who finally got the Temple rebuilt after it was demolished by the Babylonians. Apparently, those most literate scholars don’t read the prophets. Maybe those Jewish scrolls aren’t even in the library over there. Sure they keep up with the Christian Doctrine, but what do they know of the Christian root?”

         Brandell can’t seem to brush off the Churchman’s criticism. He tells me, “Also, the Church authority said this problem came into my poetry because I can read and I have read the bible without the guidance of those who are knowledgeable and speak for the early Church Fathers. He said it is important to teach the bible stories in a Christian way. So, in one place a ‘Pharisee’ won’t be considered a ‘fine grandpapa’ while in another he is the murderer of Christ.”

         “Don’t you see, Brandell, that is exactly the flaw in their argument? People who are trying to invent information their own way use the illiteracy of the populace to re-inflict the Roman propaganda leftover from the time when a power thirsty empire tried to rule the world! It was a dangerous time for common people. Jesus was executed by the Romans just for teaching people to love God and to love one another and, perhaps, for being popular with the people.” 

         It worries me that Brandell is popular with the common people and now he finds the politically powerful fear his message.

         “What do they expect you to do about this, Brandell?”

“They want me to stop singing bible stories. I thought that gospel story about Grandpapa eating dinner with Jesus, was meant to say Jesus was a friend of a Pharisee because ‘God loves everyone.’  But then the Church authority says the love of God comes with expectations that are only maintained by the Church.”

(Continues tomorrow)

#52.7, Tues., Jan. 16, 2024

Historical Setting, 626 C.E. The farm in the Vosges

         I ask Brandell, “Why would you think I would be angry with you?”

         “The Church authority said my little silly rhyme is against the Doctrine of the Church because it speaks favorably of Jews. And right now, there is a King’s ban on Jews. [Footnote] But also, he said that you would be angry that the song encourages the Lazarus rumor.  He said you didn’t want that rumor circulating about the friend of Jesus, Lazarus, who is said to be living among us in Gaul.”

         I ask, “The Church said it is I who don’t want the Lazarus story known?”

 “He said you accidentally got caught up in the rumor, and you really want to be known as Ezra, as they call you at Luxeuil. So my little song was encouraging common people to continue to spread those rumors about a Lazarus living in Gaul.”

“Well, I’ve never tried to stop the story from spreading. I know with so many political things affecting the rules of the Church, now the people who speak for the Church don’t have easy answers. But I didn’t think they intended to stop people from knowing truths.”

         Apparently, Brandell’s song was criticized, not only because it mentions the Jewish root of Christianity, which is now against Christian they say, but because, to some of the local Church brothers it seems to imply an acceptance of my own strange circumstance life and life again, and particularly that I was a friend to Jesus.  I realize it’s hard for a monastery to know what to do with me, but to use it as a wedge between my son and I, is just wrong.

         We are home again now.

         “Papa, he said that the Church authorities are grateful you don’t support the idea that you are that Lazarus.  He said were there really a Lazarus come back into this life, he would never, ever, be a common farmer. He would be a saint and he would spend all his time making miracles happen.”

         Ana laughs, and I have to laugh. Surely Brandell sees the humor in that too. But he isn’t even smiling.

         Where’s his sense of humor?  We depend on him to have that cleaver clarity that tells a truth and at the same time sets us all laughing. Now here he is, his harp silent, sitting at the uneaten supper left on the table, hardly touching anything.

         Ana tells him, “At least have some soup.”

[Footnote] “Dagobert decreed, about 629, that the Jews who were not converted to Christianity by a certain date should either leave his dominions or be put to death. Many changed their faith at that time, while large numbers were slain by the sword,” says the Jewish historian (“‘Emeḳ ha-Bakah,” p. 8).” https://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/4848-dagobert, retrieved 10-8-2023, this article by Richard Gottheil and Meyer Kavserling continues to debate the reason for this decree.

(Continues tomorrow)

#52.6, Thurs., Jan. 11, 2024

Historical Setting, 626 C.E. The farm in the Vosges

         Ana is telling me of the criticism Brandell heard from the Church. “It isn’t the Pagan root the Church authority was concerned about.” She tells me. “It was the Jewish root. They told Brandell his creative whims are the devil’s work because his newest song put a Jewish grandpapa in a favorable light.”

         Oh, now I understand, this is not about some poorly worded phrase in a little song for a Pagan celebration; this is a very deep and personal criticism of our own heritage.

I ask Ana, “So he made up a song about a Jewish grandpapa?”

“Apparently, he thought of it and imagined your father dining with Jesus, as a message for the peasants to celebrate that God loves all people. Brandell was thinking you, especially, would like his song. But the Church authority said you, especially, would be angry with him for it. That was the hardest part of the criticism for Brandell to hear. That’s why it is you who needs to talk with him.”

He is still sitting here alone with his harp and sorrowful discord is dripping from his fingertips. The music is morose.

“Brandell, your mother said you have a new song and it is very popular with the commoners.”

         He puts his harp aside when he sees me waiting to hear his song.

“Papa, I have to tell you what I’ve done. It seems to be a sin. The Brother who teaches Doctrine at Luxeuil said the devil is using my songs to set hellfires on earth.”

         “That is a terrible thing for him to say.”

         “But it might be true, Papa. And I have to atone for it. I have to tell you what I’ve done and please, believe me, I meant no harm by it.”

         “What is it, Brandell?”

“The song the people like and the Church has banned is about my grandpapa.”

         “By ‘grandpapa’ do you mean any grandpapa, or particularly yours?”

         “The one that is named in the bible ‘Simon the leper.’  In the song I said he was a ‘Pharisee, fine’. And that he was an ‘obedient Jew.’ The Church authority thought I was making a Jew sound like a good thing to be, and also that I was promoting that Lazarus rumor about you, Papa, and he said that you would be angry when you heard my song. I didn’t mean to say anything wrong, Papa. I just hope you aren’t angry with me?”

(Continues Tuesday, January 16, 2024)