Christopher Moore - Lamb - The Gospel According to Biff, Christ’s Childhood Pal

“I can’t believe you fell for that,” said Joshua. He ran across the water and helped us pull Peter into the boat. “Peter, you’re as dumb as a box of rocks. But what amazing faith you have. I’m going to build my church on this box of rocks.”

“You would have Peter build your church?” asked Philip. “Because he tried to walk on the water.”

“Would you have tried it?” asked Joshua.

“Of course not,” said Philip. “I can’t swim.”

“Then who has the greater faith?” Joshua climbed into the boat and shook the water off of his sandals, then tousled Peter’s wet hair. “Someone will have to carry on the church when I’m gone, and I’m going to be gone soon. In the spring we’ll go to Jerusalem for the Passover, and there I will be judged by the scribes and the priests, and there I will be tortured and put to death. But three days from the day of my death, I shall rise, and be with you again.”

As Joshua spoke Maggie had latched onto my arm. By the time he was finished speaking her nails had drawn blood from my biceps. A shadow of grief seemed to pass over the faces of the disciples. We looked not at each other, and neither at the ground, but at a place in space a few feet from our faces, where I suppose one looks for a clear answer to appear out of undefined shock.

“Well, that sucks,” someone said.

We landed at the town of Hippos, on the eastern shore of the Sea of Galilee, directly across the lake from Tiberius. Joshua had preached here before when we had come over to hide the first time, and there were people in the town who would receive the apostles into their homes until Joshua sent them out again.

We’d brought many baskets of the broken bread from Bethsaida, and Judas and Simon helped me unload them from the ship, wading in and out of the shallows where we anchored, as Hippos had no dock.

“The bread stood piled like small mountains,” Judas said. “Much more than when we fed the five thousand. A Jewish army could fight long days on that kind of supply. If the Romans have taught us anything it’s that an army fights on its stomach.”

I stopped schlepping and looked at him.

Simon, who stood next to me, set his basket down on the beach, then lifted the edge of his sash to show me the hilt of his dagger. “The kingdom will be ours only when we take it by the sword. We’ve had no problem spilling Roman blood. No master but God.”

I reached over and gently pulled Simon’s sash back over the hilt of his dagger. “Have you ever heard Joshua talk about doing harm to anyone? Even an enemy?”

“No,” Judas said. “He can’t speak openly about taking the kingdom until he’s ready to strike. That’s why he always speaks in parables.”

“That is a crock of rancid yak butter,” said a voice from the ship. Joshua sat up, a net hung over his head like a tattered prayer shawl. He’d been sleeping in the bow of the ship and we’d completely forgotten about him. “Biff, call everyone together, here on the beach. I haven’t made myself clear to everyone, evidently.”

I dropped my basket and ran into town to get the others. In less than an hour we were all seated on the beach and Joshua paced before us.

“The kingdom is open to everyone,” Joshua said. “Ev-ree-one, get it?”

Everyone nodded.

“Even Romans.”

Everyone stopped nodding.

“The kingdom of God is upon us, but the Romans will remain in Israel. The kingdom of God has nothing to do with the kingdom of Israel, do you all understand that?”

“But the Messiah is supposed to lead our people to freedom,” Judas shouted.

“No master but God!” Simon added.

“Shut up!” said Joshua. “I was not sent to deliver wrath. We will be delivered into the kingdom by forgiveness, not conquest. People, we have been over this, what have I not made clear?”

“How we are to cast the Romans out of the kingdom?” shouted Nathaniel.

“You should know better,” Joshua said to Nathaniel, “you yellow-haired freak. One more time, we can’t cast the Romans out of the kingdom because the kingdom is open to all.”

And I think they were getting it, at least the two Zealots were getting it, because they looked profoundly disappointed. They’d waited their whole life for the Messiah to come along and establish the kingdom by crushing the Romans, now he was telling them in his own divine words that it wasn’t going to happen. But then Joshua started with the parables.

“The kingdom is like a wheat field with tares, you can’t pull out the tares without destroying the grain.”

Blank stares. Doubly blank from the fishermen, who didn’t know squat from farming metaphors.

“A tare is a rye grass,” Joshua explained. “It weaves its roots amid the roots of wheat or barley, and there’s no way to pull them out without ruining the crop.”

Nobody got it.

“Okay,” Joshua continued. “The children of heaven are the good people, and the tares are the bad ones. You get both. And when you’re all done, the angels pick out the wicked and burn them.”

“Not getting it,” said Peter. He shook his head, and his gray mane whipped around his face like a confused lion trying to shake off the sight of a flying wildebeest.

“How do you guys preach this stuff if you don’t understand it? Okay, try this: the kingdom of heaven is like, uh, a merchant seeking pearls.”

“Like before swine,” said Bartholomew.

“Yes! Bart! Yes! Only no swine this time, same pearls though.”

Three hours later, Joshua was still at it, and he was starting to run out of things to liken the kingdom to, his favorite, the mustard seed, having failed in three different tries.

“Okay, the kingdom is like a monkey.” Joshua was hoarse and his voice was breaking.

“How?”

“A Jewish monkey, right?”

“Is it like a monkey eating a mustard seed?”

I stood up and went to Joshua and put my arm around his shoulder. “Josh, take a break.” I led him down the beach toward the village.

He shook his head. “Those are the dumbest sons of bitches on earth.”

“They’ve become like little children, as you told them to.”

“Stupid little children,” Joshua said.

I heard light footsteps on the sand behind us and Maggie threw her arms around our necks. She kissed Joshua on the forehead, making a loud wet smacking sound, then looked as if she was going to do the same to me so I shied away.

“You two are the ninnies here. You both rail on them about their intelligence, when that doesn’t have anything to do with why they’re here. Have either one of you heard them preach? I have. Peter can heal the sick now. I’ve seen it. I’ve seen James make the lame walk. Faith isn’t an act of intelligence, it’s an act of imagination. Every time you give them a new metaphor for the kingdom they see the metaphor, a mustard seed, a field, a garden, a vineyard, it’s like pointing something out to a cat—the cat looks at your finger, not at what you’re pointing at. They don’t need to understand it, they only need to believe, and they do. They imagine the kingdom as they need it to be, they don’t need to grasp it, it’s there already, they can let it be. Imagination, not intellect.”

Maggie let go of our necks, then stood there grinning like a madwoman. Joshua looked at her, then at me.

I shrugged. “I told you she was smarter than both of us.”

“I know,” Joshua said. “I don’t know if I can stand you both being right in the same day. I need some time to think and pray.”

“Go on then,” Maggie said, waving him on. I stopped and watched my friend walk into the village, having absolutely no idea what I was supposed to do. I turned back to Maggie.

“You heard the Passover prediction?”