Letters from Adina - #37c

Letter XXXVII (iii) Jesus appears before Mary of Bethany.

“Touch me not, Mary. I am not yet ascended to my Father."

Jerusalem, First Day of the Week.

… Mary of Bethany, however, remained, near the tomb, hoping that Jesus had not yet left the garden, and that she might once more behold Him.

As she stood upon the steps of the tomb, weeping for joy at His resurrection, and wishing once more to behold Him, she heard a footstep behind her, and, turning round, saw a man standing near.

It was Jesus Himself; and kneeling, she was about to clasp His feet, when He said to her -

“Touch me not, Mary, I am not yet ascended to my Father. But go and tell Lazarus, and my brethren, and my mother, that I ascend ere many days unto my Father and your Father, and unto my God and your God.”

Jesus then vanished out of her sight, and she came and told all these things to us and to the disciples; and we all believed, never more to doubt, that Jesus was Messias and Christ, the immortal Son of the Father.

Such joy as filled the hearts of his friends was never before felt by men. Our happiness and joy now were as great as our sorrow before His resurrection.

But what pen can describe, my dear father, the amazement and consternation of Caiaphas, and the chief priests, and the rest of His enemies!

The soldiers who had kept guard of the sepulchre had entered the city by different ways, and spread the report of the mighty miracle of the resurrection through the principal streets in Jerusalem as they fled onward.

Caiaphas hearing the uproar, sprang from his couch to inquire the cause, and on being assured by his servants that Jesus has burst His tomb and risen alive from the dead, he trembled, and became deadly pale.

But he soon rallied; and sending for two or three of the soldiers, who were describing what they had witnessed to a large concourse in the street, he questioned them closely upon the matter. The soldiers’ testimony agreed together, and could not be gainsaid.

When Pilate received the account from the centurion of the guard, he said -

“We have crucified a God, as I believed! Henceforth I am accursed!” And leaving the hall of judgment, he went and shut himself up in his own chamber, which he has not since left.

But men say he neither eats nor sleeps, and that a darkness and gloom has settled upon his soul.

Caiaphas and the priests in the meanwhile assembled together in full Sanhedrim, and hearing the testimony of the centurion, were convinced that the fact could not be concealed of Jesus’ resurrection.

“Who has seen him alive?” asked the High-Priest.  

“I have seen him, my lord,” answered the centurion; “I saw his pierced feet and hands as he walked by me; and the morning wind blew aside his mantle and exposed to my eyes the open wound made by the spear of my soldier Philippus. He was alive, and in full strength of limb.”

“Thou-sawest a vision, O Roman,” answered Caiaphas. “Come hither with us, and let us talk with thee.”

In a few minutes afterwards the centurion left the court of the High-Priest’s palace followed by a Gibeonitish slave, bearing after him a vase of Persian gold.

He has told every one since that he must have seen a spirit, for “that the disciples of Jesus came by night and stole away the body of their Master while the guards slept, overcome with watching."

His soldiers have also been bribed to tell the same tale.

Such is the false version that now goes about the city, my dear father; but there are few that believe it, even of our enemies.

As Aemilius, who is filled with great joy at the resurrection of Jesus, to-day said - “If these soldiers slept on guard, they deserved death by the military laws of the empire. If, while they slept, their charge - the dead body of Jesus - was taken away, they deserve death for failing to hold it.”

“Why, then, are they not placed under arrest by Pilate’s orders, if this story be true? Because Pilate well knows that it is not true! He knows, because he has privately examined many of the soldiers, and knoweth full well that Jesus did burst His tomb, and that angels rolled away the stone without breaking his seals, which could not have been left unmarred, but by a miracle.”

He knows that Jesus has arisen, for it is believed that he has also beheld Him - at least such is the rumor of the Praetorium.

“It was the form of Jesus visible before him, doubtless, that drove him in such amazement from his hall to his secret-chamber; for it was remarked that he started, turned deadly pale, and essayed to speak to the empty space before him, as if he saw a spirit.”

“Therefore his soldiers are not punished; and that they are allowed to go free is proof that the body of Jesus was not stolen away while they slept. Besides, if these soldiers were asleep, how could they tell that it was stolen away, and declare the persons who did it ?”

This is the unanswerable, reasoning of the Prefect Aemilius; and thus you, see, dear father, that Caiaphas can gain little by his cunning and by his diligently circulated falsehood.

My dear father, remember no more my unbelief, but with me believe in Jesus, that He is the Son of God, the Savior of Israel, the immortal Christ of the prophets.

Your loving daughter,

Adina

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LADY DONNA PROGRAM

The new Lady Donna Immersion in Spirituality, Academics and Citizenship @ the "I AM" School will study abridged excerpts of the Letters from Adina taken from Reverend Ingraham's original edited version of 'The Prince of the House of David', published by Cassell & Co. Ltd (1903), that reveal remarkable insights into the Living Etheric Record left by Beloved Jesus's Ministry in the Holy Land.