Thus they were unclear on that very Easter Day even as to His Mission and Work: unclear as to the past, the present, and the future. What need for the Resurrection, and for the teaching which the Risen One alone could bring! These two men had on that very day been in communication with Peter and John. And it leaves on us the impression, that, amidst the general confusion, all had brought such tidings as they, or had come to hear them, and had tried but failed, to put it all into order or to see light around it. The women' had come to tell of the empty Tomb and of their vision of Angels, who said that He was alive. But as yet the Apostles had no explanation to offer. Peter and John had gone to see for themselves. They had brought back confirmation of the report that the Tomb was empty, but they had seen neither Angels nor Him Whom they were said to have declared alive. And, although the two had evidently left the circle of the disciples, if not Jerusalem, before the Magdalene came, yet we know that even her account did not carry conviction to the minds of those that heard it. [6268]
Of the two, who on that early spring afternoon left the City in company, we know that one bore the name of Cleopas. [6269] The other, unnamed, has for that very reason, and because the narrative of that work bears in its vividness the character of personal recollection, been identified with St. Luke himself. If so, then, as has been finely remarked, [6270] each of the Gospels would, like a picture, bear in some dim corner the indication of its author: the first, that of the publican;' that by St. Mark, that of the young man, who, in the night of the Betrayal, had fled from his captors; that of St. Luke in the Companion of Cleopas; and that of St. John, in the disciple whom Jesus loved. Uncertainty, almost equal to that about the second traveller to Emmaus, rests on the identification of that place. [6271] But such great probability attaches, if not to the exact spot, yet to the locality, or rather the valley, that we may in imagination follow the two companies on their road.
We have leave the City by the Western Gate. A rapid progress for about twenty-five minutes, and we have reached the edge of the plateau. The blood-strained City, and the cloud-and-gloom-capped trying-place of the followers of Jesus, are behind us; and with every step forward and upward the air seems fresher and freer, as if we felt in it the scent of mountains, or even the far-off breezes of the sea. Other twenty-five or thirty minutes - perhaps a little more, passing here and there country-houses - and we pause to look back, now on the wide prospect far as Bethlehem. Again we pursue our way. We are now getting beyond the dreary, rocky region, and are entering on a valley. To our right is the pleasant spot that marks the ancient Nephtoah, [6272] on the border of Judah, now occupied by the village of Lifta. A short quarter of an hour more, and we have left the well-paved Roman road and are heading up a lovely valley. The path gently climbs in a north-westerly direction, with the height on which Emmaus stands prominently before us. About equidistant are, on the right Lifta, on the left Kolonieh. The roads from these two, describing almost a semicircle (the one to the north-west, the other to the north-east), meet about a quarter of a mile to the south of Emmaus (Hammoza, Beit Mizza). What an oasis this in a region of hills! Among the course of the stream, which babbles down, and low in the valley is crossed by a bridge, are scented orange-and lemon-gardens, olive-groves, luscious fruit trees, pleasant enclosures, shady nooks, bright dwellings, and on the height lovely Emmaus. A sweet spot to which to wander on that spring afternoon; [6273] a most suitable place where to meet such companionship, and to find such teaching, as on that Easter Day.