“We shall never know for a certainty. Not once was this incident ever openly discussed in our home, but just before her death my mother confided some of the details to me as best she could remember. It seems that after she had embarrassed Jesus by chastising him in the presence of the rabbis, he placed his hands on her face and asked, ‘What reason had you to search for me? Could you not tell that I must needs be in the place that belongs to my Father?’ However, the noise from the crowded courtyard made it difficult for her to hear, especially in her distraught condition. My father, standing close by, later told her that he believed Jesus had said, ‘What reason had you to search for me? Could you not tell that I must be about my Father’s business?’ ”

“Let me understand. Your mother believed she heard Jesus say that he must be in the place which belongs to his Father. Yet your father heard him say that he must be about his Father’s business. Is that correct?”

“That is so.”

“Did they later ask Jesus to repeat the actual words he had spoken?”

“If they had, I believe my mother would have told me. Apparently they sealed the matter in their hearts and never discussed it later with anyone, even him.”

Cross-examination. I waved my hand at the architectural wonder before our eyes and said, “James, every Jew considers this Temple to be the place of his only god, which he also calls ‘Father,’ is that not true?”

“Yes.”

“There was nothing unusual, then, in Jesus referring to the Temple as the place of his Father?”

“You are correct. I believe it was in part the other remark, that which my father thought he heard Jesus utter, which frightened them.”

“You mean if he said that he must be about his Father’s business?”

He nodded.

“But why should those words have alarmed them? Here was a young boy from the country being exposed to the sounds and excitement of a crowded Jerusalem for the first time, followed by the pomp and fervor and general bedlam of this Temple during feast days. Could he not, in this atmosphere, have been so impressed by all he saw that he decided to devote his life to his Father’s business, meaning religious pursuits, just as a Roman child might dream of becoming a gladiator after his first visit to the games in the Coliseum?”

James shrugged his shoulders. “Look around you, Matthias. Can you conceive of any youth from the country, one who had always been very close to his parents, suddenly deciding to abandon their love and protection in order to spend his days here, among total strangers?”