Rebekah's Treasure (5 page)

Esther is the first to find shade and a place to sit. It’s a good enough distance from Absolom’s ornate tomb and away from the many passing travelers, so Aaron and I follow. While Esther and I sit, Aaron slips the goatskin flagon from his shoulder. It’s full of wine mixed with honey and water. It’s the only thing he carries that’s visible. Under his robe he conceals at least two weapons that I know of, plus food. Esther also carries hidden food. After we drink, Aaron passes out a handful of raisins and a piece of flatbread. So I sit quietly and eat, and watch passersby pile stones against the side of Absolom’s tomb in scorn as they curse the traitorous son of David.

I tear large chunks of bread with my teeth and nearly swallow them whole. My haste is not due to hunger as much as my desire to put more distance between us and Jerusalem. In no time only crumbs fill my hand, and after taking a few more sips of our watered wine, I turn to Esther. “Come, it’s time to go.”

“Oh, Mama, this is hardly the rest you promised!” Esther wails in frustration. But there’s a rebuke in her voice, too, as if implying she was not the only one who broke a promise today.

“Mama’s right,” Aaron says, tucking his half-eaten bread back into the scrip hidden inside his robe. “We must continue. Our journey is long.”

In one of the hills north of Absolom’s Tomb lies the family burial cave. We’ll place Uncle Abner’s bones in the ossuary, as we’ve said. But at dusk, we’ll leave the cave and go out under the cover of night to begin our real journey. Our destination is far—nearly as far as the Sea of Galilee. It’s to a place I’ve never desired to go. A place where blended Roman-Greeks study the entrails and livers of birds to determine the will of their gods, and pour libations to Charon, ferryman of the dead. It is the Gentile city of Pella.

It was Ethan who said it must be Pella, and not Ashdod or Jabne—both refuge cities, declared so by Vespasian for those Jews refusing to
fight him, and who seek the protection of his Roman army. I think Ethan insisted on Pella because many followers of the Way have gone there, and he knows their presence will be a comfort to me. But his insistence has a ring of foreboding, too. Didn’t the oracle tell Christians to flee the coming destruction of Jerusalem? And didn’t he tell them to go to Pella?

Has Ethan come to believe destruction
will
come?

I gather my thoughts like crumbs and sweep them aside. “Come, up on your feet,” I say, looking down at Esther.

“My feet are as bruised as crushed grapes,” she groans. “Have pity and let me rest awhile longer.”

I shake my head. We’re still too close to Jerusalem. Close enough for Esther to make her escape. Close enough to be overtaken by rebels. “You can rest when we get to Pella.” I pull at her arm to force her to rise. How had it come to this? When had the world turned upside down? My heart is like kneaded dough as I look back at my beloved city one last time.

Oh, Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who slew the prophets, will you now slay my husband and sons?

J
ERUSALEM
70 A.D.

CHAPTER 2

“Ethan? What’s the trouble?” Eleazar shouts, rushing to where I stand gazing down upon the body of a lifeless child.

“I never thought it would come to this,” I say. Near the small crumpled form lies a woman, the child’s mother by the looks of their matching tunics. The woman’s face is caked with blood; so is her seamless garment of dyed purple. Her neck is badly bruised, and amid the bruises are numerous cuts. I’ve seen this before, on other dead bodies of the wealthy, bodies where jewelry had been ripped off necks or arms. What I haven’t seen is this happening in the
Temple
. “Have we sunk so low?”

Eleazar ben Simon watches as I stoop and close the little girl’s eyelids. “Did you think it would come without cost? Our freedom from Rome?” He stands to the side as though not wanting his garments to touch the dead bodies and make him unclean. It’s out of habit, I think, for neither of us has been ritually clean for a very long time.

“Is this how we win freedom? By robbing and killing women and children? And in the Court of Women?
The Court of Women!
” I point to the Corinthian brass gate, so glorious in scope and detail, the gate named Beautiful. “There was a time when a worshiper could pass through that and be safe. Have we become barbarians?”

“Surely the days are evil,” Eleazar says, tugging at his beard. He’s a strange sight in his white priestly robe and battered leather cuirass, and with a sword belted to his waist. “Men’s hearts have turned to stone.
Can we neglect the Law of Moses and it be otherwise? It’s not only Romans we must fight, but wickedness among our own people.”

“I’m weary of this bloodletting.” I brush my fingertips lightly across the child’s cheek. I’ve been fighting at Eleazar’s side for four years. Together, we have driven the corrupt priests from the Temple. Priests who enriched themselves by stealing the tithes. Priests who performed daily sacrifices for the Roman Emperor and allowed Roman soldiers to expose themselves in the Temple courts. And then we replaced those corrupt priests by the casting of lots.

“We’re all weary, but we must see it through. There’s still much to do. As we have restored holiness to the Temple, so we will restore it to Jerusalem,” Eleazar says.

“
Holiness
?” My arm sweeps over the two lifeless bodies. “Is this holiness?” Then gesturing beyond the Temple walls, I add, “And how will Jerusalem be restored? The city has been cut into threes with each warring faction surrounding its territory like a girdle around a bloated belly. And in those bellies people are murdered for gain. For filthy lucre, Jews kill Jews. Where is the holiness in that? Surely, this grieves the heart of God.”

“Not all. Not all are killing for gain. There is still the righteous remnant. Like always,
Hashem
has preserved the faithful.” Eleazar rests his hand on the hilt of his sword. “Many rightly administer His judgment. Those who are called to it, must obey. Didn’t Moses, at God’s command, order the sons of Levi to slay those who repented not their worship of the golden calf? And didn’t three thousand fall in the camp of Israel that day? Slain by the sword? We, too, will cleanse Jerusalem with the sword.”

I peer again at the pale, wax-like face of the little girl. Was Eleazar right? Was Jerusalem to be purged by the sword? Was Jew to slaughter Jew? Or . . . was Rebekah right? Had God abandoned His Holy City? Was this slaughter just a sign of His curse upon us?

When I glance up, Eleazar is already walking away. His white robe flaps around him as he shuffles stooped-shouldered. He’s nearly
swallowed by the throng of incoming worshipers now streaming past me.
The faithful remnant
? If they are, they’re a sorry lot, tattered and dirty. Some carry small wicker cages with a pigeon or turtledove inside. Others carry small containers of wheat—hardly the required omer. None have brought animals. Fewer and fewer animals were available for sacrifice. And more bronze
leptas
than silver shekels were being placed in the collection receptacles rimming the Women’s Court. Now, amid the sound of
leptas
dropping into one of the thirteen trumpet-shaped containers, I hear Eleazar’s voice. He’s looking back at me. “There’ll be an inquiry. Let your heart be at peace. The guilty will be punished. Oh, yes, the guilty will be punished.” Then he heads for the large rounded steps leading up to the Nicanor Gate, the same fifteen steps where, not so long ago, Levites sang the fifteen Songs of Degrees, one on each step. Beyond the Nicanor stands the gold trimmed Temple; so white one can hardly look at it when the sun strikes its stones. Before it, now, plumes the smoke of the morning sacrifice.

With a heavy heart, I gaze at the spot where Eleazar disappeared. I love the man. I’ve pledged him my sword. And my life, too, if need be. But no inquiry will be held. What are two deaths among so many? And death’s hand has yet to exceed its grasp. New refugees flood the city daily. And now pilgrims come, too, for Passover. How will we feed them all with Simon and John’s men burning the grain storehouses, and more and more caravans fearing to enter Jerusalem with fresh supplies? How long before hunger becomes the new enemy? And on its heels—panic and more violence? The whole city is in peril.

Eleazar knows it, too. He well understands the problems we face. They burden him and make him close his eyes to the atrocities committed by our fighters. And like the
sicarii
, he punishes, with imprisonment, those who speak out against the rebellion or those who try to escape the city. And he calls these actions “necessary.”

I wonder what he’d say if he knew about Rebekah’s escape? And about my hand in it? But what was I to do? Is it right that she pay for my fire? And I do burn. My zeal for Jerusalem and the Temple is like molten
wax that seeps into the very marrow of my bones. It’s this zeal that has forged a bond between Eleazar and me. It’s this zeal that has allowed me to fight at his side, even though others who follow The Way have been denied. It’s curious that we never speak of Jesus. Curious because, though we fall on opposite sides of the matter, Jesus consumes us both. To Eleazar, He’s a “false prophet.” But unlike the false prophets who have come before or since, Jesus of Nazareth was the only one who unrolled the sacred scroll of Isaiah in the synagogue and uttered that mouthful of blasphemies, declaring himself
Messiah
and then making himself equal with God; the only one who healed the blind and lame, raised the dead. For Eleazar, such a man had to be discredited, his memory destroyed.

While I do not side with Eleazar in this, I do understand him in part. Many followers of The Way have shown disrespect for our Temple and Law. “Grace, grace,” they say. “We live under grace, not the Law.” What? Are we to throw out the Law? Are we to pull down the Temple? How can Eleazar abide this? How can any Jew who doesn’t understand this grace, abide it? At times, it’s even difficult for me.

This “grace” has split our people. It has caused a split in my own heart. I signal two guards, then watch them remove the bodies of the mother and child. Surely, holiness must be restored to our city, to our Temple. In that, Eleazar is right. And Roman rule must be broken. And that meant spilling blood, and, unavoidably, even innocent blood. But I see no alternative. To live outside the law of God is death. To live under Roman rule is slavery. I’ll not live as one dead. Nor will I live as a slave.

From nowhere, Rebekah’s familiar words fly at me like gnats and deliver their sting
. Rome can’t enslave you. You’re already a slave to your pride and your hate
.

Was she right? I cannot say. I’m like two cleaved halves of a man. One longs for the peace Jesus promised. The other longs for the Temple and Jerusalem to be as they once were. Did hate push away one and drive the other? If yes, then . . . so be it. Whatever my fate, it lies here, in Jerusalem, with Eleazar, even if that means my death.

Many in the city cling to the slender hope that the Romans will not come. After all, Vespasian has left his headquarters in Alexandria and sailed for Rome to allow the Senate to do what his legions have already done—proclaim him emperor. There he will don the imperial purple and receive his string of seven titles. “Why, then, would he leave Rome to bother with dusty Judea?” many ask. “Didn’t the new
Pater Patriae
, the “father” of his country, have enough troubles?” Yes, it was true. Rome was in shambles. What’s more, there were rumors that the new emperor’s power might be challenged by others who thought themselves more worthy. “No, no,” people were saying, “with so many problems facing Vespasian, Jerusalem will be forgotten.”