The Origin of the Welcome Message of [the Divine] Yoshua, the Chosen One
[As told to Yohanan Marcus]
Lo, I send my messenger before thy face,
which shall prepare thy way before thee.
The voice of one crying in the wilderness
—Prepare ye the way of the Master;
make his paths straight.
– Esias the Prophet1
Comes now Yohanan the abluter, preaching in the wasteland an ablution of reconceptualization and acquittal of failure. All Youdaia and Yerushalem come out to him. They acknowledge all their failures. They are abluted by him in the Yordan river.
Yohanan is swathed in camel hair with a leather belt, and eats locusts and wild honey.
— There comes after me one more powerful than I, he preaches, for whom I am unfitted to bend and untie a sandal’s strap. I ablute in water; He will ablute you in the Sacred Æther.
One day Yoshua comes from Nazareth in Galilaia. He is abluted in the Yordan by Yohanan.
Then, rising from the water, he sees the skies splitting
and the Æther
like a dove
settling on him.
And comes a voice from the sky — You are my beloved son. In you I am well pleased.
Then the Æther sweeps him out into the desert. He is in the desert forty days, tested by the Accuser. He is with the Living Creatures, and Messengers attend to him.
After Yohanan is arrested, Yoshua goes to Galilaia. He preaches the Welcome Message of God — Time is complete; the kingdom of God is near. Reconceptualize and trust the Welcome Message.
He walks along the lake of Galilaia. He sees Shimon and his brother Andreas casting into the lake, they being fishermen. — Come here, after me, Yoshua says to them. I will make you into fishers of people. So they leave their nets to follow him.
Ahead a little he sees Yaakov [son] of Zebediyah and Yohanan his brother in a boat, maintaining nets. He calls them. They leave their father Zebediyah in the boat with the [deck]hands, and they follow him.
Then they go to Kapernaoum. On Shabbat he teaches in the synagogue, and they are startled by his teaching: authoritative teaching, not like the scholars.
In the synagogue is a person with an unclean æther, who shouts — What have I to do with you, Yoshua the Nazarenos? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are, the Sacred Divine One!
— Be muzzled! Yoshua admonishes him. Come out of him. The foul æther tears at him, and shouting a great shout, comes out of him.
All are so astounded, they ask one another — What is this new teaching, with authority to admonish the unclean aether, and it obeys?
So goes out the telling of him everywhere around Galilaia.
Then, leaving the synagogue, he goes with Yaakov and Yohanan to Shimon and Andreas’s house. Shimon’s mother-in-law is prostrate with a fever. They speak to him about her. Going to her, he wakes her, seizing her hands. The burning heat rushes from her, and she attends to them.
Come evening, at sunset, they bring before him all those in distress, and those [malevolently] influenced. The whole city gathers at the door, and he attends to many who have various ills and dispels many influences. He does not allow these influences to speak, for they have known him.
Very early in the morning, he rises. He goes out and away to an empty place, and prays there. Shimon and those with him seek him, and find him, and tell him — All are seeking you.
— Let us carry on to other towns elsewhere, he says to them, for me to preach there, because for this I came. So he goes through the whole of Galilaia, preaching in their synagogues and dispelling influences.
There comes to him a scabby [outcast] calling him and kneeling, who says to him — If you wish it, you are able to cleanse me
Impassioned, he stretches out his hand to grasp him. — I wish it. Be cleansed. Then the scabs leave him, and he is made clean.
Then, bellowing, he sends him away — Look, say nothing to anyone, but take yourself to show the priest, and bring what Moshe prescribed to prove your cleansing.
But he leaves and begins to preach very much and spread the Idea, so that he is unable to enter a city openly, but is out in the wasteland. They come before him from everywhere.
- Et al. ↩