Timothy stood up quickly, dusting off his robe and apologizing quickly. “Sorry masters. Sorry.” He was about to continue running when Jesus stopped him. “Timothy, wait.”
Tom heard the name as David helped him up. He looked over and saw Timothy. As their eyes met, Tom realized that they were connecting; Timothy was looking Tom right in the eyes. Timothy was seeing! Tom nearly fell back down, but David held on tight. Tom later thought that his shocked facial expression must have been confusing to Timothy, who had never seen before, but right now, he was distracted by a sudden shift in Timothy’s eyes. Timothy was no longer staring at Tom. He was looking just beyond Tom, and his demeanor became that of a scared rabbit.
Tom followed Timothy’s eyes and saw a large, angry crowd, led by Tarsus, Simeon and Silas. Tom didn’t know who these men were, but they looked important. He looked to David, planning to ask, but kept his question to himself as he noticed David’s body language; David was stepping back, away from the crowd.
Jesus dusted Timothy off with a pleased expression, as though the encroaching mob did not exist and quipped, “Your eyes are working and still you walk like a blind man.”
“Sorry, Master, I-” Timothy said, as he tried to move away.
But Jesus held him still and asked, “Do you believe in the Son of Man?”
Timothy stopped trying to move. He stood still and looked Jesus in the eyes.
“Who is he? Tell me and I’ll believe,” Timothy said, having not yet recognized Jesus.
“You have seen him,” Jesus said. “In fact, he speaks with you now.”
“Jesus…?” Timothy’s face beamed as he recognized the man who had healed his blind eyes. “Lord, I believe!” said Timothy, as he knelt before Jesus and bowed his head.
Tom had little time to hypothesize about what had happened before he was snapped out of his daze by Jesus’s loud voice addressing the crowd, who had stopped only a few feet away, “For judgment I have come into this world, so that the blind will see…”
Jesus looked Tom in the eyes and continued, “And those who see will become blind.”
“Are we blind too?” Simeon asked with as much intimidation as he could muster.
“If you were blind, you would not be guilty of sin; but now that you claim you can see, your guilt remains,” Jesus replied with just the hint of a smile.
The Pharisees got a strange look on their faces. Tom could see that they had been defeated in verbal combat as quickly as he was normally. He knew that for these men to continue the conversation would be futile and would reveal to the crowd that Jesus had beaten them. It seemed the strangers knew this too. It took ten seconds for one of them to speak.
Simeon squinted. “Are you the one called Jesus?” Simeon asked, changing the subject and dodging a bullet.
“I am.”
“We’ll be seeing you again,” Tarsus said, as he and the other Pharisees turned and pushed their way through the crowd, which dispersed quickly for lack of action.
Jesus nodded in agreement, then turned and walked away. Bewildered, Tom turned to David and said, “I don’t think I understand half of what that man says.”
David smiled. “I don’t think they do either,” he said, as he watched the three Pharisees pound away. He turned to Tom and said, “You should hear it in the King James Version.”
Tom smirked and looked at the retreating Pharisees, “Who are they?”
“Pharisees.”
“They seem to be on the same page as me,” Tom said.
David’s eyes grew wide. “Stay away from them, Tom. I mean it.”
“Why?” Tom asked.
“Think of them as ultra-right wing Republicans,” David said.
“ You’re a Republican,” Tom pointed out.
“That’s not the point,” David said. “Left or right doesn’t matter. What does matter is that they’re the legalistic fringe of the current culture. They’re well read, well spoken and intelligent, but clouded by tradition and will defend their beliefs to the point of violence.”
“So they’re evil?”
David sighed and said. “No. Maybe some. ‘Misguided’ might be a better word. But others choose a different path. Look, let’s just say that nothing good can come from you speaking to those Pharisees.”
“Afraid they might help me?”
“Aren’t you forgetting something?”
“What?”
David looked at Timothy, who was talking with Jesus.
“Timothy can see,” David said.
“I was set up,” Tom replied without pause, as though it were a forgone conclusion.
“How was Jesus supposed to know what you had planned?”
Tom paused and then said, “You warned him…didn’t you? You knew I would try something and came to the same conclusion I did, that if I chose a person for Jesus to heal, someone that wasn’t working with Jesus, that he couldn’t heal that person. But you warned him and he had this Timothy pretend to be a blind man along the route he knew we’d take through the city! He knew I’d pick the first beggar we came to!”
“Ugh. Now you’re being paranoid!” David fumed as he shook his head and stormed away.
“I’m not paranoid… I’m… I’m…” Tom became distracted by the three figures walking away, their ornate robes dancing in the wind. These Pharisees might be useful. They were the only people who seemed to make sense in this backward culture. Tom decided to find out more about them. Maybe they could reveal the chink in Jesus’s armor?
FOURTEEN
Beginning
30 A.D.
Jerusalem, Israel
Tom was up and moving at the crack of dawn. He knew it was the only way he could see the Pharisees without being noticed or questioned extensively by David. Tom worked his way through the streets of Jerusalem, which he was proud to say he had nearly memorized. Finding his way to the upper-city, street-side home of Tarsus was no problem.
Not having been to the upper city too often, Tom forgot how stunning it was. Not at all like the lower city, full of beggars, blind men and the pungent odor of filth. Here it was clean. The homes were spaced apart nicely, with landscaping and statue decorations. It was like stepping out of the middle ages and into the glory of Rome.
A pang of guilt struck Tom in the stomach as he approached and admired the smooth marble home. He had convinced himself he wasn’t betraying his friends. He wasn’t plotting against them, just gathering information. David was always one step ahead of Tom and it was time to educate himself. He would learn from his own sources what the future was going to bring. Tom knew that by the way David glared at the Pharisees whenever they crossed paths, they must have something to do with a resistance to Jesus’s claim to be God. He figured they must know something that David didn’t. They must know and perhaps be able to prove that Jesus was a fake. Tom was convinced of it.
Tom knocked on the hand-carved wooden door. No answer. He banged harder and thought he heard some movement inside. Crash! Something fell over and seconds later, the door flung open. “What? What is it?” Tarsus asked with his eyes half shut. “Every time I send Silva to the market…”
“Sorry, did I wake you?” Tom asked.
