PAPER 126: Section 5.
The Financial Struggle
P1392:8, 126:5.1 Gradually Jesus and his family returned to the simple life of their earlier years. Their clothes and even their food became simpler. They had plenty of milk, butter, and cheese. In season they enjoyed the produce of their garden, but each passing month necessitated the practice of greater frugality. Their breakfasts were very plain; they saved their best food for the evening meal. However, among these Jews lack of wealth did not imply social inferiority.
P1392:9, 126:5.2 Already had this youth well-nigh encompassed the comprehension of how men lived in his day. And how well he understood life in the home, field, and workshop is shown by his subsequent teachings, which so repletely reveal his intimate contact with all phases of human experience.
P1392:10, 126:5.3 The Nazareth chazan continued to cling to the belief that Jesus was to become a great teacher, probably the successor of the renowned Gamaliel at Jerusalem.
P1393:1, 126:5.4
Apparently all Jesus' plans for a career were thwarted. The future did not
look bright as matters now developed. But he did not falter; he was not discouraged.
He lived on, day by day, doing well the present duty and faithfully discharging
the immediate responsibilities of his station in life. Jesus' life
is the everlasting comfort of all disappointed idealists.
P1393:2, 126:5.5
The pay of a common
day-laboring carpenter was slowly diminishing. By the
end of this year Jesus could earn, by working early and late, only the equivalent
of about twenty-five cents a day. By the next year they found it difficult
to pay the civil taxes, not to mention the synagogue
assessments and the temple
tax of one-half shekel. During this year the tax collector tried to squeeze
extra revenue out of Jesus, even threatening to take his harp.
P1393:3, 126:5.6
Fearing that the copy of the Greek scriptures might be discovered and confiscated
by the tax collectors, Jesus, on his fifteenth birthday, presented it to the
Nazareth synagogue library as his maturity offering to the Lord.
P1393:4, 126:5.7
The great shock of his fifteenth year came when Jesus went over to Sepphoris
to receive the decision of Herod regarding the appeal taken to him in the
dispute about the amount of money due Joseph at the time of his accidental
death. Jesus and Mary had hoped for the receipt of a considerable sum of money
when the treasurer at Sepphoris had offered them a paltry amount. Joseph's
brothers had taken an appeal to Herod himself, and now Jesus stood in the
palace and heard Herod decree that his father had nothing due him at the time
of his death. And for such an unjust decision Jesus never again trusted Herod
Antipas. It is not surprising that he once alluded to Herod as "that fox."
P1393:5, 126:5.8
The close work at the carpenter's bench during this and subsequent years deprived
Jesus of the opportunity of mingling with the caravan passengers. The family
supply shop had already been taken over by his uncle, and Jesus worked altogether
in the home shop, where he was near to help Mary with the family. About this
time he began sending James up to the camel lot to gather information about
world events, and thus he sought to keep in touch with the news of the day.
P1393:6, 126:5.9
As he grew up to manhood, he passed through all those conflicts and confusions
which the average young persons of previous and subsequent ages have undergone.
And the rigorous experience of supporting his family was a sure safeguard
against his having overmuch time for idle meditation or the indulgence of
mystic tendencies.
P1393:7, 126:5.10
This was the year that Jesus
rented a considerable piece of land just to the
north of their home, which was divided up as a family garden plot. Each of
the older children had an individual garden, and they entered into keen competition
in their agricultural efforts. Their eldest brother spent some time with them
in the garden each day during the season of vegetable cultivation. As Jesus
worked with his younger brothers and sisters in the garden, he many times
entertained the wish that they were all located on a farm out in the country
where they could enjoy the liberty and freedom of an unhampered life. But
they did not find themselves growing up in the country; and Jesus, being a
thoroughly practical youth as well as an idealist, intelligently and vigorously
attacked his problem just as he found it, and did everything within his power
to adjust himself and his family to the realities of their situation and to
adapt their condition to the highest possible satisfaction of their individual
and collective longings.
P1393:8, 126:5.11
At one time Jesus faintly hoped that he might be able to gather up sufficient
means, provided they could collect the considerable sum of money due his father
for work on Herod's palace, to warrant undertaking the purchase of a small
farm. He had really given serious thought to this plan of moving his family
out into the country. But when Herod refused to pay them any of the funds
due Joseph, they gave up the ambition of owning a home in the country. As
it was, they contrived to enjoy much of the experience of farm life as they
now had three cows, four sheep, a flock of chickens, a donkey, and a dog,
in addition to the doves. Even the little tots had their regular duties to
perform in the well-regulated scheme of management which characterized the
home life of this Nazareth family.
P1394:1, 126:5.12
With the close of this fifteenth year Jesus completed the traversal of that
dangerous and difficult period in human existence, that time of transition
between the more complacent years of childhood and the consciousness of approaching
manhood with its increased responsibilities and opportunities for the acquirement
of advanced experience in the development of a noble character. The growth
period for mind and body had ended, and now began the real career of this
young man of Nazareth.