Scarlet Robe Creations

Feast in the house of Simon the Pharisee by Rubens, c. 1618 Why am I asked the question.  A parable about debts.  Certainly, the man who owes a greater amount will be all that much more grateful to have a loan forgiven.  But the spectacle at the table, kneeling on the floor, crying, how does this relate to transactions of coin? You have judged correctly. Was this a test of some sort.  Do I need to be tested.  The woman, God knows what she is.  Is that the debt he refers to.  He is a prophet.  Does he not know that this is a woman who sells her flesh.  She defiles the temple of her body.  Yet he looks at her with deep compassion and looks at me like I am a student who requires to be taught a simple lesson. Simon, do you see this woman?  You have judged her to be unclean. You have walked on a separate side of the street, so that you would not pass her and fall unto the same judgement. Simon, when I came to your house my feet were dust...

You sit with your hands between your knees.  In another time you would have been stoned.  Instead, in this time, they simply stare.  Judgement screams out in their silence.  You don't belong here.  You don't belong among their kind.  They are the ones who have listened and heard.  They are the ones who will be harvested as the wheat. You are a weed. There is singing from the loft behind you.  As a child you would have shifted in your pew, turned and watched the singers.  Your mother would have sternly told you to turn around.  Now, you face the front of the church, if only to avoid the faces of those who knew you when you were trying to run away from God. How foolish.  How do you run away from someone who knows everything about you.  He has watched you enter the vile realms of this world and He has watched you stumble out.  He knows you have failed at love and succeeded at lust.  He knows you have sold priceless parts...

So he was the talk of the dusty streets.  Many had come to listen to this man of little education, a carpenter by trade.  I have to admit though, the things he has said must have come from God.  His words do not ridicule or chastise, as most of our laws.  His words are compassionate and the people, we take upon ourselves to lead spiritually, flock to him. I saw him out in the fields, a few days ago, this man who does not dress like any of the temple leaders.  He holds himself with authority, wearing garments of the poor.  His followers claim he is more than just a man.  They say they have witnessed miracles.  Demons have been ripped free from tormented souls.  A paralytic has been raised to his feet and given the power to walk and dance. I realize these claims may be exaggerations.  Still, I find myself, as do the others of my sect, drawn into the crowd with a desire to listen to his voice. So when master Simon extended the in...