Incarnation

On the way back from Egypt, Joseph, Mary, and the boy passed again through that town of closed inns and starry nights.  The women just stared at them.  The fury was mostly gone, now only the emptiness. Their sons were dead, and here, this One the cause of it all, was riding on though.  No angel was commanded to whisper to them in the night.  No Gabriel said,”Fly. Bundle him and flee now, tonight.”   Some of the fathers had burst forth to defend their little ones.  Maybe they hoped that the ancient songs were true, and the Holy One would command his angels to guard their ways.  But steel slit bare-handed rage just as easily as two-year old flesh.   The fathers, who watched this day’s parade, the ones who watched as the thugs took their sons and hacked and hacked, did not know of sacred dramas and holy imperatives.  Maybe they wouldn’t care even if they did know of such deeper purposes.  Who would tell them: Joseph, whose Son yet lived?  Was that day their cruel day on Moriah?  Indeed, what purpose could justify?  They knew only guilt, blood, burial, and Rachel’s tears without end.  Mary had heard hints of this hurt, the angel warned that her day too would come.  But for now, not for 30 more years and three long days, not even God yet understood loss such as this.