They must all keep the law, even as it is written and as the
elders have taught it to us. There is no other way."
The Boy was silent for a time, while the others talked of the law,
and of the Torah, and of the Talmud in which Hillel in those days
was writing down the traditions of the elders. When there was an
opportunity he spoke again.
"Rabbi, if most of the people should be both poor and ignorant
when the Messiah came, so ignorant that they did not even know Him,
wouldn't He save them just because they were poor?"
Hillel looked at the Boy with love, and hesitated before he answered.
At that moment a man and a woman came through the colonnade with
hurried steps. The man stopped at the edge of the circle, astonished
at what he saw. But the woman came into the centre and put her arm
around the Boy.
"My boy," she cried, "why hast thou done this to us? See how sorrowful
thou hast made me and thy father, looking everywhere for thee."
"Mother," he answered, "why did you look everywhere for me with
sorrow? Did you not know that I would be in my Father's house? Must
I not begin to think of the things my Father wants me to do?"
Thus the lost Boy was found again, and went home with, his parents
to Nazareth.
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