Killing Jesus

This happened when I was twelve. I was there and I saw it with my own eyes. I know what happened. There’s no talking or threatening me out of this.

I have kept my silence since, all the way to this day. I have kept my silence all these years in order not to shame my parents, for I ask you: who on earth would have believed me? And for that matter, who will believe me now? My parents would surely have thought me deranged beyond repair and I would have shamed them greatly had I spoken before now. Imagine: to have a delusional son, how shameful. Seeing things.

You too will think me delusional and deranged, I am sure. Nevertheless, what I say is true.

I was there.

I saw it happen.

With my own eyes.

I disobeyed my father three times that day. That is what silenced me at first.

He told me to stay at home that day. Stay in the house, do not to go anywhere, he said, not even for bread or milk or to the well for water. He said trouble was coming. For my own safety, he said, you must stay inside.

He was a stern man, my father. He did not take kindly to disobedience of any kind, no matter what the reason. He would never have forgiven my defiance that day.

Yes, I remember it clearly, him telling me that trouble was coming and to stay inside and not to go out. It was not a suggestion; it was a decree. That is what commanded my initial silence, for how could I have told him that I was there and that I saw it with my own eyes when he had told me, specifically, and more than once, to stay inside that day, and to not leave the house, not even for water?

But now they are gone, both mother and, now, father. Aaron, too. A few years back. Now there is no one left to shame. Father left us this Friday last and I am recently back from laying him to rest. Mother died almost seven years ago now, in spring. I have no brothers or sisters. That’s why there is no one left to shame.

Now that there is only me left to shame, but shame means nothing to me. I need to tell for any shame, no matter how great, is dwarfed by the burden of seeing and not telling.

:

He was a short man. I remember thinking he must not be fully grown for he was not much taller than I was, and I was of a height normal for my age; well, perhaps I was just a little taller than normal but not that tall. But he wore a full beard and I remember wondering how could a boy have such a beard before I realized that he was a man. A boy with a beard, that’s what I thought at first. A bearded boy. How strange! Then I saw that he was a short man and not a boy at all.

Mother had left for the country that very morning. The early sky had promised heat and she did not take well to our dusty sun. She and Naomi, her cousin, they both left shortly after breakfast, mother saying it would be a very hot day. Even though I did not hear him do so, I now think it likely that Father had commanded her to go. ...