By
Obododimma
Oha
The biblical
character, Joseph of Arimathea, commands my respect a great deal. I can’t
even say that much for Grandpa Abraham who enjoyed sexual pleasures with his domestic worker and even had a baby with her, later to claim God asked him to send
her away into the desert with the baby! But Joseph of Arimathea was
different: he braved the no-nonsense Roman soldiers whose military dressing was
enough to put the fear of God into somebody and offered to help Jesus Christ, a
person facing execution, to carry his cross! He had a heart, and, as we say in
Nigeria, he was lucky the soldiers did not “panelbeat” him! He helped the “criminal,”
which amounted to identifying with the “criminal”. That itself, for
over-zealous people, is an offence equal to criminality! Well, Joseph of
Arimathea carried the condemned man’s cross, but he was not the one to be
executed. The one to be executed was Jesus of Nazareth. Joseph was only a
helper. It so happened that the narrative of Jesus Christ included the narrative
of Joseph of Arimathea. Their narratives intersected. In this world of
inter-subjectivity, it is good to know when our roads have intersected; when our
being is the meeting of roads.
I learnt a
lot from Joseph in terms of the meeting of roads and why the roads meet. I
learnt a lot from him that a battalion of brutal looking Roman soldiers cannot
prevent roads that have met from forming an aba (or orita in Yoruba).
And imagine
Joseph, a mere human, helping the son of God! Surely, the son of God could have
asked for an army of angels and that army could have been sent to help him. But
he allowed a full mere mortal to help him. That set me thinking: our roads have met
with that of our maker and when our roads meet, what? Did he not create us in
the first place to join “him” in continuing this journey to Golgotha? Did he
not produce us so that we could join in producing, in wrestling with life until
dawn? We are here to help.
But how often
do we, at least, exhibit the courage to speak out in condemnation of injustice
done to others? How often do we have the courage to say that evil is evil? How
often do we join Joseph in carrying the cross? When somebody is branded a "terrorist" so that there could be an excuse to continue the injustice against
him or to have a more convenient way of infecting and corrupting the word “terrorism,”
do we start keeping a distance from that person in compliance with injustice?
Are we not also those looking for the crucifixion?
Do you see
why I have great respect for Joseph of Arimathea? He was not a mere alabaru (or
porter). No sir! He wanted to carry the world, too! And he did. Don’t mind that
the narrative was not exactly his. It was that of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, with
important trajectories.
When we are
scared away by injustice, it holds sway and flourishes. And we are answerable
for that. Didn’t Martin Luther King, Jr say that “Injustice anywhere is
injustice everywhere”? Wait till it directly affects you. Wait till the
marauders enter your hut also and slaughter your pregnant wife and your
children in your presence. Then, you would know that Joseph of Arimathea was
not a mere alabaru. Don’t you can discard your “big” grammar and say boldly
that evil is evil. It is not incitement. It is just that you must carry the
cross to Golgotha, too.
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