One night in the summer of 1985, I was stretched out in a banged up old
rowboat listening to the branches of eucalyptus trees nudge each other in the
breeze, and resting in that sweet rocking motion made by night wind on water.
Just past midnight the stars began to wink out. Quickly I was caught in the
midst of a full-fledged squall. The shore was close so I wasn't in danger, but
the speed and ferocity of the storm are something I will never forget. I'll also
never forget that it happened on the Sea of Galilee.
There have been times in my life when the Holy Writ passed down to me these
last 2,000 years suddenly gets the dust blown out of it and comes frighteningly
to life—sometimes in a situation like the one above and sometimes on the S2
bus headed home from work. Those moments are steps in my journey of conversion,
and send me running back to scripture to see if the words I remember there are
really true.
In Reynolds Price's Three Gospels I met a kindred soul. In the
preface he writes, "Reading the gospels, in whatever language or era, is
the same perilous and incessantly demanding transaction that we conduct by the
moment with our nearest kin and loved ones. What do you mean? How have I
failed you? What do you demand of me?" Social customs and worldviews
aside, an elemental spark in the human dialogue lives on in the scriptures.
Price has spent most of his life celebrating and investigating that spark.
Simply put, Three Gospels is Price's "close and thoroughly
plain translations of the two entirely original gospels—Mark and John, with
prefatory essays—and a modern gospel written [by Price] on the basis of the
classic ancient four, other early documents pertaining to Jesus, and...in
reading widely in the recently revived attempts by scholars to provide a
minimally reliable history of Jesus' life and work." In Price we have both
rigorous academic and passionate poet bringing all his skill and art to bear on
the most significant texts the world has ever known.
When exploring "new" translations of the old familiars, I usually
take a most un-intellectual approach. I flip to some of my favorite passages to
see if the new translation provides the same chilling thrill. One example from
Mark's gospel is the reaction of the family and servants when Jesus says "Talitha
koum" to Jairus' daughter. My favorite King James version says, "and
they were astonished with a great astonishment"; the New Revised Standard
says, "they were overcome with amazement"; Reynolds Price's version
is, "and at once they were astonished with great wildness." I get
goosebumps when I read it.
PRICE'S WORK ON the gospel of John is equally stunning, although the real
revelations come in the prefatory notes. Here Price unveils the power of John
bar Zebedee. "If two thousand years of pious handling had not dimmed both
John's story and its demand, his gospel would still be seen as the burning
outrage it continues to be, a work of madness or blinding revelation....Does
John's gospel bring us a life-transforming truth; or is it one gifted lunatic's
tale of another lunatic, wilder than he?"
Price writes that he could not fully understand the gospel of John in his
youth. He says it's an "old man's book" written at the end of John's
life, full of reflections on the long strange trip his life had been. Price
probes the depths and shallows of an old man's memories.
The third "gospel" comes from an assignment Price gives in his New
Testament class at Duke University. Using the four canonical gospels and other
reliable texts of the time, students write a version of the life of Jesus.
Many students choose to write it from the point of view of the women in the
narrative. A little snippet from Price's completion of his own assignment, "An
Honest Account of a Memorable Life," is as follows: "At the end of the
meal, Mary came forward with a pound of expensive perfumed ointment. She wiped
Jesus' feet with it and dried them with her hair. The splendid odor filled the
whole house....Judas was plainly indignant....But Jesus said 'You'll have the
poor with you always but not me. Let Mary be. She'll keep the remainder to
sweeten my corpse.' No one but Jesus smiled."
In "Our Life at the Foot of the Mountain: Sojourners Community's
Statement of Faith," it is written, "If people of faith are to stay
true to the mission of Christ in the world, we must be in constant dialogue with
the Word of God. We must place the Word in the most intimate and tender center
of our lives. We must always touch the face of God before we stretch out our
hands to the work of the world, and we must reach back to God again and again.
In this way is the passionate, consuming imagination of God borne forward."
Price's Three Gospels gives song to that "constant dialogue."
Review of Three Gospels. By Reynolds Price. Scribner, 1996.
ROSE MARIE BERGER is a former Sojourners intern who now directs
Sojourners Internship Program. In addition, she is a pastor of Sojourners
Community in Washington, D.C., and a part-time groundskeeper.
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