Europe -- Description and travel; Middle East -- Description and travel; Voyages and travels
I am aware that this is a pretty voluminous notice of Mr. Grimes' book.
However, it is proper and legitimate to speak of it, for "Nomadic Life in
Palestine" is a representative book--the representative of a class of
Palestine books--and a criticism upon it will serve for a criticism upon
them all. And since I am treating it in the comprehensive capacity of a
representative book, I have taken the liberty of giving to both book and
author fictitious names. Perhaps it is in better taste, any how, to do
this.
CHAPTER LI.
Nazareth is wonderfully interesting because the town has an air about it
of being precisely as Jesus left it, and one finds himself saying, all
the time, "The boy Jesus has stood in this doorway--has played in that
street--has touched these stones with his hands--has rambled over these
chalky hills." Whoever shall write the boyhood of Jesus ingeniously will
make a book which will possess a vivid interest for young and old alike.
I judge so from the greater interest we found in Nazareth than any of our
speculations upon Capernaum and the Sea of Galilee gave rise to. It was
not possible, standing by the Sea of Galilee, to frame more than a vague,
far-away idea of the majestic Personage who walked upon the crested waves
as if they had been solid earth, and who touched the dead and they rose
up and spoke. I read among my notes, now, with a new interest, some
sentences from an edition of 1621 of the Apocryphal New Testament.
[Extract.]
"Christ, kissed by a bride made dumb by sorcerers, cures her. A
leprous girl cured by the water in which the infant Christ was
washed, and becomes the servant of Joseph and Mary. The leprous son
of a Prince cured in like manner.
"A young man who had been bewitched and turned into a mule,
miraculously cured by the infant Savior being put on his back, and
is married to the girl who had been cured of leprosy. Whereupon the
bystanders praise God.
"Chapter 16. Christ miraculously widens or contracts gates,
milk-pails, sieves or boxes, not properly made by Joseph, he not
being skillful at his carpenter's trade. The King of Jerusalem
gives Joseph an order for a throne. Joseph works on it for two
years and makes it two spans too short. The King being angry with
him, Jesus comforts him--commands him to pull one side of the
throne while he pulls the other, and brings it to its proper
dimensions.
"Chapter 19. Jesus, charged with throwing a boy from the roof of a
house, miraculously causes the dead boy to speak and acquit him;
fetches water for his mother, breaks the pitcher and miraculously
gathers the water in his mantle and brings it home.
"Sent to a schoolmaster, refuses to tell his letters, and the
schoolmaster going to whip him, his hand withers."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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