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Authors: Kathleen O'Neal Gear

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BOOK: The Betrayal
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This morning, Nisan the seventeenth, had been the first morning people were allowed to leave their homes. Maryam would have found the tomb empty and run to tell the disciples. Why weren't Kepha and Cleopas in Yerushalaim consoling their heartbroken, grieving flock, which numbered over one hundred people?
“Perhaps there was rioting and they needed to get away,” he said.
But he didn't believe it.
Titus surveyed the darkness. “Where is the Dawn Bather? I didn't see you ride in with him.”
“I left him a good distance back. I suspect that when he saw the soldiers, he assumed the worst. He and his brothers must have fled.”
Titus' lips pressed together in disdain, as though he'd always known Mattias was a coward, but was restraining himself from voicing that opinion.
Yosef forced himself to breathe, hoping it would relieve some of his anxiety. His gaze returned to the body of Dysmas. The sense of utter astonishment had not diminished.
Bewildered, Titus said, “I don't understand. I thought we—”
“As did I.”
Titus exhaled hard. “Well, now we have another problem. What shall we do with Dysmas? We can't just leave him out here for the wild animals.”
“Let's bury him and be on our way.”
“To where?”
Yosef ran a hand through his dirty hair. “Maryam wrapped the bodies in linen. She's the only one who knows the truth.”
Following behind a young monk named Albion, Pappas Meridias tramped across the once beautiful city of Jerusalem. The boy was around fifteen years old, with soft brown eyes and short, sandy hair. His tattered brown robe looked as though it had recently been plucked from a trash heap. Meridias eyed it distastefully. Surely Pappas Macarios of Jerusalem could do better. Was he teaching the youth some lesson in poverty? Or perhaps self-denial? Regardless, such dress did not project the image of the Faith that Rome wished to cultivate. Who would convert if he thought he had to look like a derelict?
As they strode up the flagstone-paved street toward the hilltop, Meridias got a good view of the city. Remarkable. The devastation caused by the Tenth Legion during the Jewish wars of 66 and l32 was still evident. The Temple Mount, at the emperor's orders, had been left in ruins, and everywhere he looked he saw the remains of Roman camps, as well as the infamous pagan temples built by Emperor Hadrian: the Temple honoring Jupiter built on the Temple Mount, and the Temple to Aphrodite built over the site of the crucifixion. From this angle, he could just see the top of Aphrodite's Temple.
After the defeat of Shimeon Bar Koseva and his rabble in 135, the Tenth Legion had remained in Jerusalem for almost two hundred years. Their main occupation had been the production of clay bricks baked in
fireproof kilns. The demand for bricks was great, and each brick was marked with the Tenth Legion's emblem and trademark: LEG X.
As Meridias and the youth crested the hill and walked into a thick cloud of dust, Meridias drew a scarf from his pocket and placed it over his nose. Then he carefully scrutinized the huge excavation.
110
Only the might of Rome could have orchestrated and engineered the filling and leveling of an entire valley. And now, only the might of Rome could have initiated the massive effort to restore an entire valley to its original condition.
Meridias might have stood atop some unnatural human hive. Hundreds of men carried baskets of dirt on their backs or shoveled it into carts to be hauled away. The mountains of refuse, stones, artifacts, and earth that had been dug up, were growing by the instant. As well, another group of laborers worked to tear down the magnificent Temple to Aphrodite. Meridias shook his head. In his opinion it was unfortunate that they couldn't have saved the structure and reconsecrated it to the Virgin Miriam, or to the Magdalen. But perhaps the emperor was right; it had been irreparably tainted by idolatry. Not only that, they had to remove the massive landfill if there was any hope of locating the actual remains of the crucifixion and tomb of Iesous. Unfortunately, the Temple to Aphrodite sat on part of the landfill.
“There he is,” Albion said with a big, boyish smile. “Down there.”
Meridias squinted against the dust and saw a man dressed in a long black robe apparently directing the excavation. He was short and ugly, with heavy jowls and wispy brown hair. “He's not very impressive, is he?” Meridias said.
Albion's smile dissolved in horror. “But … he's a very holy man.”
“Yes, well, perhaps he is. Let's go meet him.”
Albion led the descent into the yawning excavation, picking his way down through the gray haze. As they descended, the banging of hammers against chisels, of shovels striking hard-packed dirt and cart sides, along with the sharp ringing of picks on rocks, became almost unbearable.
Macarios saw him coming, detached himself from a group of engineers, and walked to meet Meridias with a smile on his ugly, dust-coated face. He had a large gap between his two front teeth.
“Pappas Meridias?” he greeted. “May the peace of our Lord be with you. I hope your arrival here has been—”
“Pappas Macarios,” he interrupted with a dismal sigh. “I am happy to find you busy obeying the emperor's orders. What have you found?”
Macarios, clearly taken aback by the lack of polite opening conversation, said, “Uh, well, many things. Firstly, how was your journey?”
“Long and dirty.
What
have you found?”
Macarios blinked. “To b-begin, let me explain that when Emperor Hadrian built the Temple to the god—”
“To the pagan deity Aphrodite,” he corrected.
“Yes, of—of course. Anyway, in order to build the Temple, the emperor had to fill in the garden and the rocky escarpments to raise the level of the garden to the level of the remaining saddle of the mountain. We're talking tens of thousands of square cubits of—”
“I know all that. What have you found?”
Macarios' jowls jiggled as he rushed to say, “Just today we uncovered the rocky spur of Golgotha itself. That's it there.” He pointed.
Through the dust, Meridias studied what looked like a small nondescript hump of rock. It was little more than a ridge of
malaky,
or “royal stone.” “What else?”
Macarios' expression drooped. “Well, on the west side, the escarpments of the saddle contain at least two tombs.”
“Our Lord's tomb?”
“I don't know yet. Not for certain. We've only just begun our excavations. As we proceed, we will be able to answer your questions more reliably.”
“That will be a welcome change. The emperor wants answers now.”
Something on the ground caught his eye. Meridias reached down and pulled a small clay lamp from the soft earth. As he brushed it off, the image of a naked woman suspended with her legs spread over an erect male became clear. He roughly tossed it to the ground again.
Macarios glanced at it and said, “Appalling, aren't they? We've uncovered a number of pornographic oil lamps in the vicinity of the Tenth Legion's camps. Apparently they amused the soldiers.”
111
Meridias lifted his scarf and, again, covered his nose. Already his clean robe was coated with a fine powder, and he imagined that his blond hair looked the same.
Macarios studied his expression for several moments before bravely asking, “Meridias, can you tell me what this is all about? Pappas Silvester
sent a series of questions regarding biblical place names that he wished me to answer. He seems to believe they are a map, but I could make no sense of them. Do you know what he's talking about?”
Gruffly, Meridias pulled a small roll of papyrus from his cape pocket. He'd written down every word he'd gleaned from the library assistants he'd questioned. He shoved it at Macarios. “Are these the names he sent you?”
Macarios took the papyrus and unrolled it. “Yes.”
“I'm the one who provided Pappas Silvester with the list.”
Macarios handed it back. “And where did you get it? It's very interesting, but I don't see how it could be important. We should focus—”
“That list has existed for almost three centuries, Macarios. I suspect it was written by Ioses of Arimathaia, at least that's what my sources suggest. It
is
important. Didn't you have any significant observations to report to Pappas Silvester after you reviewed it?”
Macarios flinched at his tone. For a time, he just stared at Meridias as though in a futile effort to peer past his eyes to locate a soul. Finally, he said, “I noted one thing.”
“What was it?”
Macarios reached out gently and tapped a word in the middle of the papyrus. “This word intrigues me.”
“
Selah?
What of it?”
“Well, the papyrus is written in Latin, but I wonder if the original Hebrew word wasn't really
Shelah,
from Nehemiah, chapter three, verse fifteen.”
Irritated, Meridias demanded, “What difference would that make?”
Macarios drew himself to his full height and squared his shoulders. Apparently, knowledge had bolstered his courage. “A good deal, my brother. Since Shelah is located right there.” He thrust his arm out, pointing to the south.
A strange, fiery sensation swelled around Meridias' heart. He took a step forward and tried to see what Macarios was pointing at. “I can't see anything through this haze. What's down there?”
“We call it the Pool of Siloam. Actually, there are two pools, an upper and a lower pool. They're fed by the Gihon Spring mentioned in First Kings, chapter one, verse thirty-three.”
“What would it have to do with the word
Shelah
?”
“The pool has two names in the Hebrew holy books. In Isaiah it's
called
Siloah,
but that same pool is referred to as
Shelah,
in Nehemiah. The terms also clearly referred to the area around the reservoirs as, for example, Luke says, in thirteen-four, that there was a tower in the place called ‘the Siloam.'”
“So, you mean”—he paused while he considered the implications—“the entire area near the pools may have been called Siloam or Shelah?”
“Yes.”
A gust of wind blew over the excavation and peppered Meridias' face with sand. He turned away until it passed, then stared in the direction of the pool again. “Why would the area around the pools have been important?”
Macarios opened his mouth to answer, but from behind Meridias, young Albion suggested, “Perhaps because of the tombs?”
“What tombs?” Meridias swung around to peer at the boy. He'd forgotten he was there. Albion was biting his lower lip as though expecting a reprimand for speaking up.
Albion looked to Macarios and softly said, “Forgive me, Pappas. I didn't mean to—”
“It's quite all right, Albion,” Macarios said gently. “Go ahead and tell Pappas Meridias about the tombs.”
As though excited, Albion broke into a silly grin. “They are everywhere, Pappas! The tombs fill every hole in the limestone, and we suspect there are many you can't even see because Emperor Hadrian covered over so many when he was filling the Kraniou Topon. But we—”
“Show me these tombs.” Meridias took off without further discussion, striding down the hill toward the Siloam.
Melekiel
 
 
 
NISAN THE 14TH, THE TWELFTH HOUR OF DAY
I am standing in my home, sipping a cup of wine, surrounded by my four sisters and their families. The sun has set, but it is not yet Pesach. The Temple priests have not yet blown the horn to announce the arrival of the holy day. We are all waiting.
My eight nieces and nephews are running about, playing. But for the rest of us, this is a somber gathering. I couldn't bear to watch him die, to see the sacred light go out of his eyes, but as my sisters were preparing the Pesach meal, I watched the crucifixions from afar. Only Yeshua's female disciples were brave enough to follow him to the cross: Maryam, and Yeshua's two sisters, Mariam and Salome. They made certain that he did not die alone, but surrounded by people who loved him. They remained there, praying, through the entire terrible ordeal. It is perhaps curious that in Aramaic there is no feminine form of the word “disciple,”
talmida,
but through their deeds, Yeshua's female followers have proven themselves disciples nonetheless, especially in light of the fact that his male disciples betrayed, denied, and abandoned him.
Shortly after the ninth hour, Centurion Petronius sent word that I could
remove two of the bodies. Dysmas and Yeshua were dead. Gestas was still alive, still suffering.
A tremor goes through me. I only heard his voice once. At the end, he shouted, “My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?”
112
While the Romans in the crowd, who didn't understand Hebrew, began taunting him, saying that he was calling for Elijah to save him, I lifted my eyes to the heavens expecting to see a legion of angels descending, clothed in garments of pure light, or perhaps a pillar of fire, even a dove fluttering down to settle upon his head. A simple sign from God that he had not died in vain would have been enough.
I saw nothing but clear blue sky.
113
I open my right palm and stare at it. I pulled out the nails myself, then lowered Yeshua's limp body into the arms of Titus, who carried him to the horse-drawn cart where he gently laid him down. Then we repeated the process with Dysmas. Because of the crowds of pagans and Greeks on the streets, it took almost an hour to get the bodies back here and placed in the newly hewn tomb in my garden.
Involuntarily, my eyes drift to the nails that rest in a pot upon my table. Nails removed from crucified victims are believed to have great medicinal value. They reduce swellings, inflammations, and fevers. Even the Romans hold that blood-soaked nails from victims of crucifixion cure epilepsy, and halt the spread of epidemics. Perhaps that's why the only mode of crucifixion practiced by the Romans in Judea is crucifixion by nailing, not binding, the victim to the cross.
114
If I were wise, I would carry one of the nails with me, to protect me from illness … but I cannot bear to touch them. Besides, I have already made arrangements to return them to Pilatos in fulfillment of our agreement. He will count them carefully, and hold me to blame if one is missing.
My gaze moves to the window where a charcoal veil is settling over the land. In my mind's eye, I imagine Maryam and Mariam in the tomb, preparing the bodies, annointing them with spices and oils, wrapping them in the finest linen I could afford … .
“Yosef.” My sister Yuan touches my sleeve. “The woman, Mariam, is at the door. She requests to speak with you. I told her you were grieving and that she should come back after the holy days, but she said it was urgent.”
As though waking from a terrible nightmare, I blink at her pretty face, actually seeing it for the first time today, and say, “Thank you.”
I stride past her, through the middle of my confused family, and duck out my doorway into the gray gleam of dusk. Mariam is standing quietly, wringing her hands. She is Yeshua's youngest sister, thirty-two, married to Clopas. They have two sons. The rest of her family is home celebrating, as best they can, the holy day. But she is here. She has her white himation pulled over her head and it accentuates the oval shape of her face and the size of her large, dark eyes. She looks very much like a female version of Yeshua.
“What is it, Mariam?”
“Forgive me for disturbing you, elder, but you must come. It
—
it's Maryam. I swear she has lost her mind!”
“What do you mean? What's happened?” I close the door behind me, blocking out the sounds of the sacred evening, of children's voices, and the smell of food. “Is she ill?”
When we arrived with the bodies at the tenth hour, we'd found Maryam standing by the tomb with a basket of spices. Her beautiful face had gone as pale as death. She hadn't wept, or railed. She'd just watched us carry the bodies into the tomb as though her soul had long ago left her body and flown away. Mariam had arrived shortly thereafter with an amphora of oil.
“Maryam asked me to go and fetch her himation. She'd left it near the cross today. She was getting cold. Even though I knew it was a long walk, I did it. It had been so hard to watch her, I actually welcomed the trip.”
“Why was it hard to watch her?”
Tears fill her eyes. She uses the hem of her himation to wipe them. “For the longest time, she wouldn't let me near my brother's body. She was h-holding him, crying against his shoulder, sobbing, ‘the light in the darkness shines, the light in the darkness shines.' She kept repeating those words. She wouldn't even let me wash the wounds in his hands and feet. Honestly, I didn't know what to do to comfort her.”
“What happened when you returned with her himation?”
“She shouted at me to go away!” Mariam clutches Maryam's himation to her chest. “I called to her several times, but she told me to keep out or she'd kill me! When I tried to force my way in, she ran at me with a dagger! I don't know where she got it, but her eyes blazed as though her demons had returned.”
“She's overwhelmed by grief, Mariam. That's all. I'm sure she isn't possessed
—”
“You have to come and talk to her,” she pleads and tugs at my sleeve. “She'll listen to you. She always has.”
“I'll help any way I can.”
I lead the way across the courtyard toward the tomb where faint lamplight etches a golden line around the stone that, when Maryam is finished preparing the dead, will be rolled over the entry to seal it until the holy days are over. Then we can finish preparing the bodies in our traditional ways.
Nearby, in the stable, lamplight also gleams. I try not to look at it, try not to draw Mariam's attention to it. I know Titus is in there saddling our horses, readying our packs. We will leave just after supper, after the city has quieted
—
but Mariam does not know this
—
nor does my family. Our conspiracy is small, consisting of only myself, Maryam, two Essene brothers, and three of Yeshua's most trusted apostles. Even Titus does not know the whole truth, just the necessary facts.
The agonizing sound of muffled weeping reaches me long before I get to the tomb. She has always been brave. I am stricken to the heart by her cries. Not only that, the thought of arguing with a woman as grief-crazed as the one Mariam describes makes my soul shrivel. What can I do or say to ease her pain when my own is strangling me?
I stop by the stone outside, and call, “Maryam? It's Yosef. May I enter?”
The weeping stops. Sandals scrape the stone floor.
I stand irresolutely, wishing I could avoid this, then I brace myself and call again, “Maryam, please let me see him. I need to see him.”
She appears, and stares at me with wide, burning eyes. Insane eyes. Without a word, she grabs my hand and pulls me into the tomb. The two bodies are already wrapped in white linen, and the intoxicating fragrances of myrrh and aloe are almost staggering.
Maryam stands as though frozen, looking up at me with those wild eyes. “Yosef, please, I beg you. The savior himself must be saved. You understand that, don't you?”
I nod, endeavoring to appear calm. “That's what we're trying to do, Maryam. Tonight, we
—”
“If you love them that love you, what reward have you?”
They are his words. I know, as well as she does, that Yeshua meant we must love our enemies. I stare into her strange eyes for a long moment. “Who are you talking about?”
She steps forward, very close to me, and whispers, “He would want us to save him, don't you see? And by saving him, we can save the savior.”
I am totally confused now. “Maryam, please, slow down. I don't understand anything you're telling me. Yeshua would want us to save …”
Outside, down the lane, I hear hooves pounding. In only heartbeats it becomes clear that the horses have turned onto the path to my home. Several men dismount.
“Yosef Haramati?” an authoritative voice calls.
“Here! I'm here.” I hurry across the floor and duck outside into the dusk. Four members of the Temple police stand holding their horses' reins. The captain of the guard says, “You are under arrest by the order of High Priest Kaiaphas.”
Gamliel was right. They are deeply afraid. They mean to stop me.
All of my family rushes out of my house. My sisters begin shouting questions while my nieces and nephews bawl. My brothers-in-law tug their wives back as I am led away.
I mount the horse they've brought for me, and as we ride down the path toward the Damascus Gate, the horn blows. The sound echoes from the walls of the city and floods out over the surrounding hills.
The holy day has begun … it is Nisan the fifteenth.
BOOK: The Betrayal
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