“I for one would not dispute your claim. There is nothing in what you have told me that precludes a Jew—even though we do not believe Jesus is the Christ as you do—from an equal participation in that fatherhood you speak of.”

“It’s a delight to hear you, Rabbi. God is our Father—yours as well as mine. I believe we have an elder Brother, whose name is Jesus, who came to help us know our mutual Father better. The fact that you do not consider him your elder Brother certainly does not make the Father any less your Father than he is mine.”

“It is not common to hear Christians express such an equable, open-armed view of God’s family.”

“I happen to believe in a wider reach of the Father’s embrace than most Christians,” agreed the baron. “If it is a fault, I readily admit it. I am convinced that God’s arms stretch to infinities of inclusion our feeble brains cannot begin to grasp. That, however, is a discussion we must reserve for another time.”

Now it was the rabbi’s turn to laugh. “Do I detect in your tone that your religion has its sacred taboos just as does ours, to venture too near which can prove dangerous?”

“How right you are, Heziah,” laughed the baron. “There remain many widely practiced but acceptable forms of burning at the stake and excommunication that occur right within the mutual fellowship of believers!”

“I will question you no further along those lines, Baron. I can see I have stumbled unwittingly into a theological quagmire and I want to return to the practicality inherent in something you said.”

“Happily.”

“You spoke of knowing the Father and obeying him.”

“Yes. Such is the cornerstone of my faith.”

“My question then is this: Do we not possess all that is required to know God and obey him, as you say, in the Holy Scriptures?”

“I couldn’t agree more, Rabbi.”

“Then what is the mystery, the process of discovery you are so fond of speaking of? Isn’t everything clearly laid out in front of us?”

“Ah yes, I see the dilemma,” the baron said, nodding.

He pondered the rabbi’s question.

“You, as a Jew,” he finally said, “view obedience to God as obedience to the Law, would that be accurate?”

“Of course.”

“That is perhaps where the true distinction between us comes in. I view it as obedience to the Father himself. Here we come to the heart of the personal element of my belief we were talking about earlier.”

“You do not believe the Law to be the method by which God reveals himself?” asked the rabbi.

“I believe that the Law, the Levitical law of what we call the Old Testament, was and is a true revelation of God. But only a partial revelation.”

“Partial?”