By day Joseph took care that the youth should not dream too much.  Jesus must learn his trade.  He did so willingly but not gladly, for his head was not with his hands, and while he should have joined two beams to make a door frame, the dark saying of the Prophet sounded in his head:  “He is numbered among the transgressors.”

“What are you doing there?  Is that a door frame?  It’s a cross!” So Joseph awoke him out of his reverie, and Jesus was terrified to see that he had nailed the pieces of wood crosswise.

“Tell me,” said Joseph to the boy, “what are you thinking of?  If you’ve any sense in your head use it for your honest work.  The simplest handicraft needs it all, and not only a piece here and there.  And especially carpentering, which builds people houses, bridges, ships, and yea, temples for Jehovah.  You cannot imagine what mischief a bad carpenter may do.  You’re thinking of divine things?  Well, work is a divine thing.  With work in his hands, man continues the creation of God.  People say that you are clever; then let your master see it.  You make the tools blunt and the work is not clean and sharp.  This can’t go on, child.”

Jesus let the lecture pass in silence, and worked far into the night to make the mischief good.

Joseph confided his grief to his wife.  Not that the boy would turn out a bad carpenter.  If he liked he could succeed in anything.  But Joseph was grieved to have to scold his favourite so often.  He had to do that to every apprentice.

Mary said:  “Joseph, you are quite right, to direct him.  I am indeed anxious.  I observe the child carefully, and I am not satisfied.  He is so different, so very different from boys of his age.”

“I think, too, that he is different,” said Joseph.  “We must not forget that from the very beginning it was different with this child.  Jehovah understands it; I can’t fit it together.  He reads too much, and that’s bad for young people.”

“And I almost fear he reads the Law in order to criticise it,” said Mary.

“He’ll find himself.  At his age boys exaggerate in everything.”  So Joseph consoled himself.  “He’s a singular boy.  Look at him when he plays with other children!  The tallest of them all!  No, after all, I wouldn’t have him other than he is.”

They had talked in sorrow and joy while Jesus was nailing the wood correctly out in the workshop.  And when he had gone to bed, Joseph crept into his room, and laid his hand gently on his head.

And so the years went by.  Jesus improved in his work, and grew in intelligence, and in cheerfulness.  The Sabbath day was all his own.  He liked to go up to the hill top where the sheep were feeding among the stones and the olive-trees, whence he could see the mighty mountains of Lebanon and, the wide landscape, partly green and fertile and partly barren, down to the lake.  He stood there and thought.