CHAP. Jesus enters Jerusalem on a former occasion, to a usage not uncommon in Oriental banquets. It is possible that vague thoughts of the royal character, which she expected that Jesus was about to assume, might mingle with those purer feelings which led her to pay this prodigal homage to his person. The mercenary character of Judas now begins to be developed. Judas had been appointed a kind of treasurer, and entrusted with the care of the common purse, from which the scanty necessities of the humble and temperate society had been defrayed, and the rest reserved for distribution among the poor. Some others of the disciples had been seized with astonishment at this unusual and seemingly unnecessary waste of so valuable a commodity: but Judas broke out into open remonstrance; and concealing his own avarice under the veil of charity for the poor, protested against the wanton prodigality. Jesus contented himself with praising the pious and affectionate devotion of the woman, and reverting to his usual tone of calm melancholy, declared that inadvertently she had performed a more pious office, the anointing his body for his burial. The intelligence of the arrival of Jesus at in triumph. Bethany spread rapidly to the city, from which it was not quite two miles distant. Multitudes thronged forth to behold him: nor was Jesus the only object of interest, for the fame of the resurrection of Lazarus was widely disseminated, and the strangers in Jerusalem were scarcely less anxious to behold a man who had undergone a fate so unprecedented. CHAP. VII. Nisan 2, Lazarus thus an object of intense interest to the people*, became one of no less jealousy to the ruling authorities, the enemies of Jesus. His death was likewise decreed, and the magistracy only awaited a favourable opportunity for the execution of their edicts. But the Sanhedrin is at first obliged to remain in overawed and trembling inactivity. The popular sentiment is so decidedly in favour of Jesus of Nazareth, that they dare not venture to oppose his open, his public, his triumphant procession into the city, or his entrance amid the applauses of the wondering multitude into the Temple itself. On the morning of the second day of the week †, Jesus Monday, is seen, in the face of day, approaching one of the March. gates of the city which looked towards Mount Olivet. In avowed conformity to a celebrated prophecy of Zachariah, he appears riding on the yet unbroken colt of an ass; the procession of his followers, as he descends the side of the Mount of Olives, escort him with royal honours, and with acclamations expressive of his title of the Messiah, towards the city: many of them had been witnesses of the resurrection of Lazarus, and no doubt proclaimed, as they advanced, this extraordinary instance of power. They are met § by another band advancing from the city, who receive him with equal homage, strew branches of palm and even their garments in his way; and the Sanhedrin could not but hear within the courts of the Temple, * John, xii. 9—11. ↑ John, xii. 12. Matt. xxi. 1-10.; Mark, xi. 1—10.; Luke, xix. 29-40.; § John, xii. 18. CHAP. tions in the Temple. the appalling proclamation, "Hosannah, blessed is the King of Israel, that cometh in the name of the Lord." Some of the Pharisees, who had mingled with the multitude, remonstrate with Jesus, and command him to silence what to their ears sounded like the profane, the impious adulation of his partisans. Uninterrupted, and only answering that if these were silent, the stones on which he trod would bear witness, Jesus still advances; the acclamations become yet louder; he is hailed as the son of David, the rightful heir of David's kingdom; and the desponding Pharisees, alarmed at the complete mastery over the public mind which he appears to possess, withdraw for the present their fruitless opposition. On the declivity of the hill he pauses to behold the city at his feet, and something of that emotion, which afterwards is expressed with much greater fulness, betrays itself in a few brief and emphatic sentences, expressive of the future miserable destiny of the devoted Jerusalem.* The whole crowded city is excited by this increasing tumult; anxious inquiries about the cause, and the intelligence that it is the entrance of Jesus of Nazareth into the city, still heighten the uniAcclama- versal suspense †; and even in the Temple itself, where perhaps the religion of the place, or the expectation of some public declaration, or perhaps of some immediate sign of his power, had caused a temporary silence among his older followers, the children prolong the acclamations; and as the sick, the infirm, the afflicted with different maladies, *Luke, xix. 41-44. + Matt. xxi. 10, 11. Ibid. 15. VII. are brought to him to be healed, and are restored at CHAP. once to health or the use of their faculties, at every instance of the power and goodness of Jesus the same uncontrolled acclamations from the younger part of the multitude are renewed with increasing fervour. Those of the Sanhedrin who are present, though they do not attempt at this immediate juncture to stem the torrent, venture to remonstrate against the disrespect to the sanctity of the Temple, and demand of Jesus to silence, what to their feelings sounded like profane violation of the sacred edifice. Jesus replies, as usual, with an apt quotation from the sacred writings, which declared that even the voices of children and infants might be raised, without reproof, in praise and thanksgiving to God. Greeks. Among the multitudes of Jews who assembled at The the Passover, there were usually many proselytes who were called Greeks* (a term in Jewish language of as wide signification as that of barbarians with the Greeks, and including all who were not of Jewish descent). Some of this class, carried away by the general enthusiasm towards Jesus, expressed an anxious desire to be admitted to his presence. It is not improbable that these proselytes might be permitted to advance no further than the division in the outer Court of the Gentiles, where certain palisades were erected, with inscriptions in various languages, prohibiting the entrance VII. CHAP. of all foreigners; or even if they were allowed to pass this barrier, they may have been excluded from the court of Israel, into which Jesus may have passed. By the intervention of two of the Apostles, their desire is made known to Jesus; who, perhaps as he passes back through the outward court, permits them to approach. No doubt as these proselytes shared in the general excitement towards the person of Jesus, so they shared in the general expectation of the immediate, the instantaneous commencement of the splendour, the happiness of the Messiah's kingdom. To their sur prise, either in answer to or anticipating their declaration to this effect, instead of enlarging on the glory of that great event, the somewhat ambiguous language of Jesus dwells, at first, on his approaching fate, on the severe trial which awaits the devotion of his followers; yet on the necessity of this humiliation, this dissolution, to his final glory, and to the triumph of his beneficent religion. It rises at length into a devotional address to the Father, to bring immediately to accomplishment all his promises, for the glorification of the Messiah. As he was yet speaking, a rolling sound was heard in the heavens, which the unbelieving part of the multitude heard only as an accidental burst of thunder: to others, however, it seemed an audible, a distinct, or, according to those who adhere to the strict letter, the articulate voice of an angel, proclaim *Kuinoël in loco. Some revert to the Jewish superstition of the Bath-Kol, or audible voice from heaven; but the more rational of the Jews interpret this Bath-Kol as an impression upon the mind, rather than on the outward senses. |