Dear and Glorious Physician by Taylor Caldwell
"Dear and Glorious Physician" by Taylor Caldwell presents a fictionalized account of the life of Saint Luke, focusing on themes of healing, faith, and the search for God. The narrative begins with Lucanus, a young boy who is deeply affected by his father's past as a freed slave, and his relationship with Diodorus, a man struggling with his own emotional complexities and philosophical inquiries. The story explores Lucanus' journey as he develops his healing abilities, grapples with the nature of suffering and divine justice, and ultimately pursues a life dedicated to helping the impoverished.
As Lucanus progresses through medical school in Alexandria, he faces moral dilemmas posed by his experiences with disease, loss, and the corrupt society of Rome. His encounters with significant historical figures, including Jesus and Mary, shape his understanding of spirituality and compassion. Caldwell's narrative intertwines elements of Christian doctrine and reflections on traditional values, portraying strong female characters as moral anchors for the male protagonists.
The novel also addresses broader social issues, such as slavery and intolerance, drawing parallels between historical and contemporary struggles for dignity and justice. Through Lucanus' transformative journey, "Dear and Glorious Physician" serves not only as a biography of Saint Luke but also as a commentary on the human condition, making it a thought-provoking read for those interested in historical fiction and spirituality.
Dear and Glorious Physician by Taylor Caldwell
First published: Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1959
Genre(s): Novel
Subgenre(s): Catholic fiction; historical fiction (first century)
Core issue(s):Alienation from God; compassion; despair; healing; Judaism; pilgrimage
Principal characters
Lucanus , Saint Luke, the protagonistDiodorus , Saint Luke’s Roman stepfatherIris , Saint Luke’s motherRubria , a girl Saint Luke lovedPriscus , Saint Luke’s brotherSara ben Solomon , a woman Saint Luke loved
Overview
At the start of Dear and Glorious Physician, the child Lucanus looks at his father’s hands, covered with scars from his years of servitude before he was freed from slavery by Diodorus’s father. Lucanus decides that he loves his father despite his prideful attempts to forget his former lowly status. Meanwhile, the lonely Diodorus is in need of a companion with whom he can discuss philosophy. He grew up with Iris, the mother of Lucanus, and remains in love with her despite his happy marriage to Aurelia, the mother of his sickly daughter, Rubria. One evening he comes across Lucanus praying for Rubria in the garden. He is fascinated by the boy’s quick intelligence and mature demeanor and especially impressed when he tells Diodorus that he prays to the unknown God, who is kind and loving unlike the vengeful Roman gods. Lucanus gives Diodorus herbs for his daughter, and Diodorus decides to send him to Alexandria to attend medical school when he is older.
From the beginning, the physician Keptah realizes that Lucanus is an exceptional student. While gazing on a star from the east one evening, they share their common love of the unknown God. One day the young man Lucanus accompanies Keptah to a temple, where the Magi predict Lucanus will live a life of deep sorrow. Lucanus suffers terribly after Rubria dies, and he begins to hate God. However, he cannot deny his gift as a healer and comes to defy God by saving his people’s lives in the study of medicine. After Diodorus’s wife Aurelia dies in premature childbirth, he miraculously saves the infant’s life. Diodorus returns from Rome, asks Iris to marry him, and adopts Lucanus.
At medical school in Alexandria, Lucanus cannot reconcile how God can inflict pain on mortals and not offer them consolation in the form of salvation. He has no time for fun and shuns company, but his heart is filled with pity and love for all those who suffer. He miraculously cures a leper, and after he has finished his studies and is returning to Rome, Lucanus cures plague-infected slaves on the ship. All Lucanus wants from life is to heal people, and he realizes he can best serve humankind in this regard by going among the poorest of the poor. Even Sara ben Solomon, a woman with whom he falls in love, cannot move him to do otherwise. He promises during his travels to look for her brother who was kidnapped as a child.
Before Lucanus arrives in Rome, Diodorus dies after taking the senate to task for corruption. Lucanus refuses a job as chief physician, and when he is called before Tiberius Caesar, he explains that he would rather cure the poor. Impressed, Tiberius forces him to remain in the luxurious but morally corrupt Imperial City for six months, believing Lucanus will also fall into corruption. Soon, Julia, the bare-breasted, wanton wife of Tiberius, attempts to seduce the young Lucanus, but he spurns her and is forced to flee Rome. Tiberius writes and vows eternal friendship.
In Greece, Lucanus works as a physician. One day in the slave market, he buys a suffering young African man named Ramus only to free him and save him after he is blinded by a mob. Lucanus miraculously restores his sight, and they travel together and care for the sick. When they hear of Jesus of Nazareth, Ramus leaves for Israel to ask Jesus to remove the biblical curse of Ham that plagues his people. Lucanus also saves another slave named Arich, Sara’s missing brother.
In the final section of the novel, Lucanus encounters a wide variety of people who inform him about Jesus. One patient, the wealthy Hilell ben Hamram, informs him how Jesus died and insists that Lucanus accompany him to Israel. At this point, Lucanus begins to write an account, which grows as he talks to others. In Israel he meets the Romans Pontius Pilate and Herod Antipas, and his own brother Priscus, a Roman centurion who was present at Christ’s crucifixion. Finally, Lucanus travels to Nazareth to visit Mary, Jesus’ mother, who, in the form of the Magnificat of John the Baptist, tells him about the Annunciation and her joy over being the mother of God. The account Lucanus created became the Gospel according to Saint Luke, the third book of the New Testament.
Christian Themes
In Dear and Glorious Physician, Taylor Caldwell writes enthusiastically about how the Roman gentile Lucanus, who later became Luke, goes on a search for God. The story of Saint Luke is the story of Everyman’s pilgrimage. Taylor’s text provided a characterization of Saint Luke that critics never appreciated, but she intertwined in it homilies that teach and inspire. For example, Iris says to her son that now he must put aside “childish things” and be a man, a quote from the first letter from Paul of Tarsus to the Christians at Corinth (1 Corinthians). Also, when Diodorus lies dying, he replies to Tiberius that a higher power to whom he “must commend [his] spirit” calls instead. Here Caldwell casts Diodorus as a holy character because his statement mirrors Jesus’ final words on the cross: “Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.” In short, Dear and Glorious Physician is a didactic novel—it instructs and forces the reader to think.
Caldwell’s popularity has been attributed to her support of traditional American domestic and ethical values by portraying male characters as strong and successful and female characters, especially wives and mothers, as the heart and moral center of the home. Men might go out into the world and excel, but in the evening they return to strong women for nurturance and guidance. The tired governor Diodorus goes first to Aurelia for comfort and, after her death, to Iris. Lucanus repeatedly turns to women for comfort, ultimately to Mary, Jesus’ mother. Men are heroes, Iris thinks, after Aeneas drowns attempting to save the financial records, but women are sensible. After a young woman undergoes a horrific operation, Keptah remarks to Lucanus that the surgery was harder on her husband. However, Caldwell’s good and generous women suffer. Sara waits patiently, never once looking at another man, and when Lucanus finally does propose, she realizes that he belongs to God instead. Mary’s sufferings are beyond description.
Caldwell also preaches against intolerance, speaking out in particular against slavery. The characters who free slaves are blessed. In addition, she makes a parallel between the conflicts experienced between the powerful Romans and Rome’s subservient colonies with those experienced by majority and minority groups in twentieth century America. Rome’s decline, she suggests, is due to its increasing moral laxity and posits this as a warning to the United States.
Sources for Further Study
Detweiler, Robert. Uncivil Rites: American Fiction, Religion, and the Public Sphere. Champaign: University of Illinois Press, 1996. Scholarly analysis that demonstrates how religious works influence American society and culture, especially during times or crisis and war. Includes a discussion of Caldwell’s Dear and Glorious Physician.
Jasper, David. The Sacred Desert: Religion, Literature, Art, and Culture. Malden, Mass.: Blackwell, 2004. Engages the works of various authors to explore the depth of spiritual meaning in works of literature, film, and art.
Stearn, Jess. In Search of Taylor Caldwell. New York: Stein and Day, 1981. Deals with reincarnation and past-life regression. Caldwell starts out a skeptic but under hypnosis recalls past lives that explain the psychic revelations from which many of her books originate, including Dear and Glorious Physician.