The way of imagination

Got enemies?   Winston Churchill, the Prime Minister of Great Britain during World War II, famously said, “You have enemies? Good. That means you've stood up for something, sometime in your life.”   As anyone who has read the Gospels knows, Jesus had enemies .   The opening line of today’s reading says it all: “Jesus …did not wish to travel in Judea , because the Jews were trying to kill him.” (Jn. 7.1-2) Now, in order to understand who was out to kill Jesus and why , we need to take a closer look at 3 elements of the story .   First of all, the hostility towards Jesus had been provoked by a specific event ; secondly, the location of Jesus’ movements and thirdly, the precise identity of the group St. John refers to as “the Jews”.   Event, location, identity. Event .   What had Jesus done to provoke such hatred in the hearts of his countrymen?   Indeed, none of the enemies of Jesus, at least at first, were foreigners – they were actually those members of his own p