[The Innocents Abroad Part 5 of 6 by Mark Twain]@TWC D-Link bookThe Innocents Abroad Part 5 of 6 CHAPTER XLVII 19/21
It was near one of them that the miraculous draft of fishes is supposed to have been taken, and it was in the desert places near the other that he fed the thousands by the miracles of the loaves and fishes.
He cursed them both, and Capernaum also, for not repenting, after all the great works he had done in their midst, and prophesied against them.
They are all in ruins, now--which is gratifying to the pilgrims, for, as usual, they fit the eternal words of gods to the evanescent things of this earth; Christ, it is more probable, referred to the people, not their shabby villages of wigwams: he said it would be sad for them at "the day of judgment"-- and what business have mud-hovels at the Day of Judgment? It would not affect the prophecy in the least -- it would neither prove it or disprove it--if these towns were splendid cities now instead of the almost vanished ruins they are.
Christ visited Magdala, which is near by Capernaum, and he also visited Cesarea Philippi.
He went up to his old home at Nazareth, and saw his brothers Joses, and Judas, and James, and Simon--those persons who, being own brothers to Jesus Christ, one would expect to hear mentioned sometimes, yet who ever saw their names in a newspaper or heard them from a pulpit? Who ever inquires what manner of youths they were; and whether they slept with Jesus, played with him and romped about him; quarreled with him concerning toys and trifles; struck him in anger, not suspecting what he was? Who ever wonders what they thought when they saw him come back to Nazareth a celebrity, and looked long at his unfamiliar face to make sure, and then said, "It is Jesus ?" Who wonders what passed in their minds when they saw this brother, (who was only a brother to them, however much he might be to others a mysterious stranger who was a god and had stood face to face with God above the clouds,) doing strange miracles with crowds of astonished people for witnesses? Who wonders if the brothers of Jesus asked him to come home with them, and said his mother and his sisters were grieved at his long absence, and would be wild with delight to see his face again? Who ever gives a thought to the sisters of Jesus at all ?--yet he had sisters; and memories of them must have stolen into his mind often when he was ill-treated among strangers; when he was homeless and said he had not where to lay his head; when all deserted him, even Peter, and he stood alone among his enemies. Christ did few miracles in Nazareth, and staid but a little while.
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