The Wanderings of a Spiritualist

One cannot help speculating about those great ones who first carried to / the world the Christian revelation. What were their domestic ties! There / is little said about them, but we should never have known that Peter had / a wife were it not for a chance allusion to his mother-in-law, just as / another chance allusion shows us that Jesus was one of a numerous / family. One thing can safely be said of Paul, that he was either a / bachelor or else was a domestic bully with a very submissive wife, or he / would never have dared to express his well known views about women. As / to his preaching, he had a genius for making a clear thing obscure, even / as Jesus had a genius for making an obscure thing clear. Read the / Sermon on the Mount and then a chapter of Paul as a contrast in styles. / Apart from his style one can reconstruct him as a preacher to the extent / that he had a powerful voice -- no one without one could speak from the / historic rocky pulpit on the hill of Mars at Athens, as I ascertained / for myself. The slope is downwards, sound ascends, and the whole / conditions are abominable. He was certainly long-winded and probably / monotonous in his diction, or he could hardly have reduced one of his / audience to such a deep sleep that he fell out of the window. We may add / that he was a man of brisk courage in an emergency, that he was subject / to such sudden trances that he was occasionally unaware himself whether / he was normal or not, and that he was probably short-sighted, as he / mistook the person who addressed him, and had his letters usually / written for him. At least three languages were at his command, he had an / intimate and practical knowledge of the occult, and was an authority / upon Jewish law -- a good array of accomplishments for one man.

There are some points about Paul's august Master which also help in a / reconstruction of Himself and His surroundings. That His mother was / opposed to His mission is, I think, very probable. Women are dubious / about spiritual novelties, and one can well believe that her heart ached / to see her noble elder son turn from the sure competence of His father's / business at Nazareth to the precarious existence of a wandering / preacher. This domestic opposition clouded Him as one can see in the / somewhat cold, harsh words which He used to her, and his mode of address / which began simply as "Woman. " His assertion to the disciples that one / who followed His path had to give up his family points to the same / thing. No doubt Mary remained with the younger branches at Nazareth / while Jesus pursued His ministry, though she came, as any mother would, / to be near Him at the end.