wife a longing glance on all that he ought to fleewho made the attempt, at once impotent and disastrous, to serve both God and Mammon. As both Galilee and Samaria were now closed to Him, He could only journey on His way to Peræa, down the valley of Bethshean, between the borders of both provinces. There a very touching incident occurred. On the outskirts of one of the villages a dull, harsh, plaintive cry smote His ears, and looking up He saw "ten men who were lepers," united in a community of deadly misery. They were afar off, for they dared not approach, since their approach was pollution, and they were obliged to warn away all who would have come near them by the heart-rending cry, "Tamé! tamé!”— "Unclean! unclean!" There was something in that living death of leprosy-recalling as it did the most frightful images of suffering and degradation, corrupting as it did the very fountains of the life-blood of man, distorting his countenance, rendering loathsome his touch, slowly encrusting and infecting him with a plague-spot of disease far more horrible than death itself-which always seems to have thrilled the Lord's heart with a keen and instantaneous compassion. And never more so than at this moment. Scarcely had He heard their piteous cry of "Jesus, Master, have mercy on us," than instantly, without sufficient pause even to approach them more nearly, He called aloud to them, "Go, show yourselves unto the priests." They knew the significance of that command: they knew that it bade them hurry off to claim from the priest the recognition of their cure, the certificate of their restitution to every rite and privilege 1 Luke xvii. 11-19. THE UNGRATEFUL LEPERS. 111 of human life.1 Already, at the sound of that potent voice, they felt a stream of wholesome life, of recovered energy, of purer blood, pulsing through their veins ; and as they went they were cleansed. He who has not seen the hideous, degraded spectacle of the lepers clamorously revealing their mutilations, and almost demanding alms, by the roadside of some Eastern city, can hardly conceive how transcendent and immeasurable was the boon which they had thus received at the hands of Jesus. One would have thought that they would have suffered no obstacle to hinder the passionate gratitude which should have prompted them to hasten back at once-to struggle, if need be, even through fire and water, if thereby they could fling themselves with tears of heartfelt acknowledgment at their Saviour's feet, to thank Him for a gift of something more precious than life itself. What absorbing selfishness, what Jewish infatuation, what sacerdotal interference, what new and worse leprosy of shameful thanklessness and superstitious ignorance, prevented it? We do not know. We only know that of ten who were healed but one returned, and he was a Samaritan. On the frontiers of the two countries had been gathered, like froth at the margin of wave and sand, the misery of both; but while the nine Jews were infamously thankless, the one Samaritan 1 Lev. xiii. 2; xiv. 2. V. supra, Vol. I., p. 276. 2 See the dreadful yet not exaggerated picture drawn by Dr. Thomson, Land and Book, IV., ch. xliii.; Delitzsch, Durch Krankheit zur Genesung, § v. I had not, however, read either that little tale, or his Ein Tag in Capernaum, till the whole of this book was written. I mention this because there are some accidental resemblances between my language and that of Dr. Delitzsch. So it is only in the Biut el Masakin ("abodes of the unfortunate"), or lepers' quarter in Jerusalem, that Jews and Mohammedaus will live together. "turned back, and with a loud voice glorified God, and fell down on his face at His feet, giving Him thanks." The heart of Jesus, familiar as He was with all ingratitude, was yet moved by an instance of it so flagrant, so all but unanimous, and so abnormal. "Were not the ten cleansed ?" He asked in sorrowful surprise; "but the nine--where are they? There are not found that returned to give glory to God save this alien."2 "It is," says Lange, "as if all these benefits were falling into a deep silent grave." The voice of their misery had awaked the instant echo of His mercy; but the miraculous utterance of His mercy, though it thrilled through their whole physical being, woke no echo of gratitude in their earthy and still leprous hearts. But, nevertheless, this alien shall not have returned in vain, nor shall the rare virtue-alas, how rare a virtue of his gratitude go unrewarded. Not his body alone, but the soul-whose value was so infinitely more precious, just as its diseases are so infinitely more profound should be healed by His Saviour's word. 'Arise and go," said Jesus; "thy faith hath saved thee." 1 Luke xvii. 17, οὐχὶ οἱ δέκα ἐκαθαρίσθησαν; οἱ δε ἐννέα, που, 2 ἀλλογενής. 3 Wordsworth's lines "I've heard of hearts unkind, kind deeds With coldness still returning, Alas! the gratitude of men Hath oftener left me mourning," have been often quoted; but if he found gratitude a common virtue, his experience must have been exceptional. CHAPTER XLIV. TEACHINGS OF THE JOURNEY. rown, “And make a fence for the Law."-Pirke Abhôth, i. 1. EVEN during this last journey our Lord did not escape the taunts, the opposition, the depreciating remarksin one word, the Pharisaism-of the Pharisees and those who resembled them. The circumstances which irritated them against Him were exactly the same as they had been throughout His whole career-exactly those in which His example was most lofty, and His teaching most beneficial—namely, the performance on the Sabbath of works of mercy, and the association with publicans and sinners. One of these sabbatical disputes occurred in a synagogue. Jesus, as we have already remarked, whether because of the lesser excommunication (the cherem), or for any other reason, seems, during this latter period of His ministry, to have entered the synagogues but rarely. The exclusion, however, from one synagogue or more did not include a prohibition to enter any synagogue; and the subsequent conduct of this rosh hakkenéseth seems to show that he had a certain awe of Jesus, mingled with his jealousy and suspicion. On this day there sat 'Luke xiii. 10-17 among the worshippers a poor woman who, for eighteen long years, had been bent double by "a spirit of infirmity," and could not lift herself up. The compassionate heart of Jesus could not brook the mute appeal of her presence. He called her to Him, and saying to her, "Woman, thou art loosed from thine infirmity,"1 laid His hands on her. Instantly she experienced the miraculous strengthening which enabled her to lift up the long-bowed and crooked frame, and instantly she broke into utterances of gratitude to God. But her strain of thanksgiving was interrupted by the narrow and ignorant indignation of the ruler of the synagogue. Here, under his very eyes, and without any reference to the "little brief authority" which gave him a sense of dignity on each recurring Sabbath, a woman—a member of his congregation-had actually had the presumption to be healed. Armed with his favourite "texts," and in all the fussiness of official hypocrisy, he gets up and rebukes the perfectly innocent multitude, telling them it was a gross instance of Sabbath-breaking for them to be healed on that sacred day, when they might just as well be healed on any of the other six days of the week. That the offence consisted solely in the being healed is clear, for he certainly could not mean that, if they had any sickness, it was a crime for them to come to the synagogue at all on the Sabbath day. Now, as the poor woman does not seem to have spoken one word of entreaty to Jesus, or even to have called His attention to her case, the utterly senseless address of this man could only by any possibility mean either " You sick people must not come to the synagogue 1 Luke xiii. 12, àrоλéλvσai. The perfect implies the instantaneousness and permanence of the result. |