Humour

Jesus - A Re-visit

by SANGAT SINGH

 

 

A growing child worth his salt has to belong to a gang.

I aspired to be a member of such a most feared gang rated by the peers. It had some stringent requirements. The application had to be signed in freshly drawn blood in front of two witnesses, or, in case the lout couldn't write, a thumb impression smeared with blood would do. The other requirement was to have at least one fracture. If not, you could only be admitted as a probationer. Unfortunately, this chapter was dissolved at the time of the Partition of Punjab despite its secular membership. My chance to break a bone came much later.

In 1958,  I was a cadet planter on Bukit Asahan Estate, Asahan (Malacca).  While doing a stunt on my Norton 350 cc motorbike, I successfully fractured my heel and had to be put in a plaster that put me out of action for a month. My light duties, as a result, were to attend office in the morning and spend the afternoon in my quarters to do whatever I pleased. 

It was during that time I did some extensive reading. I read Tolstoy's War and Peace and Anna Karenina, and Dostoevsky's Brothers Karamazov. Any story that held my attention was archived by me as part of an ostensible manual, should some prophet foolishly decide on a re-visit to our planet.  Here is one that I saved and wish to share with you, suitably remixed on the laptop:

 

Thus the story happened. Jesus was very much interested - naturally - that half of humanity had become Christian.  He started to think that  "I had come to the earth a little early. Now's the time to run a check, a couple of millennia later. Had I come later, perhaps I would not even have been crucified.  People now worship me devotedly. They worship the cross, they are worship my images,, and they are worship my churches all over the earth. Millions of Christians, thousands of priests, monks, nuns, all praying - this is the right time for a re-visit. Obiously, the timing of the last visit wasn't at the right time."

So he came back ... only to be utterly disillusioned.

He appeared one Sunday morning. Of course he had chosen Sunday because on other days people are engaged in other things.  On Sundays they are all Christians - it is a Sunday religion, or, at least for one hour everybody pretends to be a Christian.

He appeared before the church in Bethlehem.  People were coming out of the church. He thought, "This is the right moment.  They will immediately recognize me!"

And recognise they did, and crowded around him. They started laughing, and said, "You did well to dress up like Jesus."

He asked, "What do you mean?"

They said, "You seem to be a perfect actor. You have done your makeup perfectly to look like Jesus."

Jesus said, "You fools! I am Jesus, I am not acting."

They said, "Don't try to fool us. And, if you listen to us, you'd better escape before the Archbishop comes out; otherwise you will be in big trouble. Disappear fast while you can."

Jesus could not believe that these are the people who were kneeling down and praying to him, and calling him Lord, and now he is standing before them and they cannot even recognize him, taking him to be an actor who's trying to fool them.  He thought, "maybe these are uneducated people, but the Archbishop must surely recognize me!"

And then, the Archbishop came out, and everybody fell on his knees in respect. Jesus was puzzled. Nobody had fallen on his knees to honour him, and his servant was now being worshipped like a god."

And they said, "Your Grace,  look at this man. This is very wrong on his part to pretend to be Jesus Christ. This is irreligious.  This is blasphemy. He should be punished forthwith"

The Archbishop looked at Jesus with very stern eyes and said, "Young man, come and follow me into the church."

Jesus could not believe his eyes. He went in, the doors were closed and he was locked into a small room. The whole day he was there, and was wondering, "What is going to happen now?  Am I going to be crucified again? That time I thought it was because they were not Christians, they were Jews; but now these are Christians behaving in the same way."

In the middle of the night, the Archbishop came and opened the door. He had a candle in his hand. He fell on his knees before Jesus and said, "Lord, I recognized you immediately. But I could not recognize you before the others. You are an old disturber, you will again create chaos. Somehow we have managed everything perfectly well. You are no more needed. This is no longer your work anymore. We have taken over the work. And, if you insist, then I am sorry, we will have to crucify you again."

"So it's better you escape, because in the morning there will be trouble. I have just come to inform you. I recognized you, and couldn't talk to you before the crowd.  You leave right now and never come back; although you have promised the second coming. Please don't make that mistake again. We are your representatives; we are doing your work. You will create chaos. That's what you did the last time, and we don't want that to happen again. You will disturb our whole profession, our whole business. Please leave us alone."

This is of course a fictitious story invented by Fyodor Dostoevsky, but has tremendous significance. Yes, the same would happen to Buddha, Zarathustra, Krishna, Moses, Mohammed and to Guru Nanak and Guru Gobind Singh should they decide on a re-visit. 

 

March 28, 2010

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