Second Touch (31 page)

21 The dusty band of talmidim sat ¬under the shade of a stand of fig trees to eat a midday meal. Avel shared his food with Red Dog. The animal had become attached to the boy. Protective. Perhaps it was because there were no longer lambs to guard that Red Dog turned all his attention to herding children. The pace of the journey northward was not punishing, and they were still within ¬Jewish territory. Yeshua continued to attract new listeners to replace those who left, but with each gathering Avel thought he heard more open hostility. But maybe he imagined it. Today a brace of Pharisees, including Simon ben Zeraim, the one Avel had noticed in Capernaum, approached. Yeshua greeted them, asked them to join in the food. “That one won’t,” Zadok growled, indicating the same man Avel already spotted. “Simon of Capernaum.” None of the religious fraternity accepted, but they stood by, as if waiting for something to happen. Yeshua made the b’rakhah over the bread and divided a loaf. John broke off a chunk and passed it to Shim’on, who stuffed a corner in his mouth while wiping his hands on his tunic. As if that action were a signal, Simon demanded, “Why do your disciples disobey our age-old traditions?” Zadok snorted. “That Simon. Six thousand Pharisees in this land and he

aspires to be the most righteous of them all. Won’t go into a Gentile’s house. Won’t sell to a Gentile. Won’t have anything to do with anyone not upholding their standards. In all this land ¬only they are holy.” “Your disciples ignore our tradition of ceremonial hand-washing before they eat,”49 Simon persisted. His hands, encased in doeskin gloves, gave ¬every evidence of being especially fastidious about cleanliness. Yeshua looked around at His friends, then up at Simon. “And why do you, by your traditions, violate the direct commandments of God?” Simon puffed up like a toad, Avel thought. His cheeks quivered, and his frown devoured his eyes. Yeshua stared at Zadok for a long moment before continuing. “For instance,” the Teacher resumed, “God says, ‘Honor your father and mother,’ and ‘Anyone who speaks evil of father or mother must be put to death.’ ” A pair of Torah scholars standing behind Simon indicated their agreement with His words. “But you say,” Yeshua declared, pointing at Simon, as if this example was meant especially for him, “you say you ¬don’t need to honor your parents by caring for their needs if you give the money to God instead.” Simon looked uncomfortable, shuffling sideways. “And so, by your own traditions, you nullify the direct commandment of God.” “Aye, that’s poked him right where he lives,” Zadok noted. Yeshua paused to let the import of His words sink in. Avel knew Pharisees loved to make a big show of giving to the Temple charities. Yeshua made it clear that some of that show was ¬really not holy at all. The same self— righteous Pharisees failed miserably at caring for their own aging parents. “You hypocrites!” Yeshua shook His head in amazement at them. “Isaias was prophesying about you when he said, ‘These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far away. Their worship is a farce. They replace God’s commandments with their own man-made teaching.’50 Listen.” Yeshua hailed the crowd. Some now smiled their enjoyment at seeing the Pharisees embarrassed. “Listen closely and you’ll ¬understand. What goes into a man’s mouth ¬doesn’t make him unclean. But what ¬comes out of a man’s mouth. That’s what makes him unclean.”51 Yeshua stared openly at Simon’s gloved hands. He took a bite of bread and asked the Pharisee quietly, “Ah, Simon. Why do you worry about polishing the outside of the cup, you know? When it’s the inside of the cup that’s so unclean?” At this final insult, Simon gathered up his brother Pharisees. With a sweep of robes they stormed from the argument. “Do you realize how badly you offended the Pharisees by what you just said?” John asked. Avel watched the rigidly straight back of Simon’s retreating form. “If Simon’s from Capernaum,” the boy asked Zadok, “how do you know so much about him?” “Because,” the stern-faced shepherd replied, “he’s my son-in-law.” “The Pharisees? Ignore them!” Yeshua replied to His talmidim. “They’re

blind guides leading the blind, and if one blind person guides another, they’ll both end up in a pit.”52 Avel pressed Zadok for an explanation. “Your son-in-law?” “Aye. And it’s clear Yeshua knows it. Yeshua’s hit him where it hurts.” Avel asked, “You have a daughter?” “Simon married my ¬only daughter. She was born after my sons were killed. Yes, a beautiful girl. Looked like her mother. Her name is Jerusha. Sweet spirit as well. Married Simon many years ago. Loves him well, I hear. Obeys him. As for me and my wife, Rachel? We had some hopes of filling our house again with the sound of children’s laughter. Grandbabies. Dreamed of grandchildren. That joy was denied us by Simon. And Simon’s declared me dead to his family.” Avel repeated, “I ¬didn’t know you had a daughter.” “Might as well not have,” Zadok admitted. “She ¬can’t have anything to do with me. I’ve been too blunt in my opinions about the religious rulers. Simon won’t let me see my daughter or grandson. I ¬haven’t seen the boy ¬ever. And as for my daughter? Well, not in years. I tried to contact her when her mother died. But it made trouble.” As the Pharisees stalked away, Yeshua’s talmidim persisted in the discussion. “Explain what you meant when you said people ¬aren’t defiled by what they eat.” “Are you so dim?” Yeshua seemed amused. He tossed a piece of bread to John. “Anything you eat passes through the stomach and then goes out of the body. But evil words come from an evil heart and make the person who says them unclean. First from the heart come evil thoughts. Then following that are evil actions: murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, lying, and slander. An unwashed heart is what defiles you. But eating with unwashed hands? Put it in perspective.” He laughed. “Come now! A little dirt ¬under the nails is not what makes you unacceptable to God!”53 Zadok stared at the Pharisee’s back for a long time. “Aye. There goes a man who’s got it all turned round. Well. Perhaps if he ¬comes near Yeshua enough to ¬understand him, he’ll get the message right at last.”

Simon ben Zeraim trembled with rage. From head to toe he quivered like the topmost branch of a sycamore tree in the path of a Galilean gale. “I hate him!” he announced to Jerusha. “He’s evil. Maliciously evil.” There was no need to repeat Yeshua’s name as the subject of the diatribe. Since returning home from his last encounter with the Teacher, Simon had spoken of nothing else. Simon’s face was covered in fiery red blotches, which he attributed to his wrath. “Criticize me, will he?” the Pharisee demanded rhetorically. “Call me an ‘unwashed cup’? That charlatan! That heretic! He deserves to be stoned to death!” “But if he could help you . . .” Simon rounded on Jerusha savagely. “He ¬can’t help me!” he stormed. “If he were ¬really a prophet, he’d know what was wrong without my saying a word,

¬wouldn’t he? Wouldn’t he?” he challenged. “No, he’s a false prophet, and the Law requires that a false prophet be stoned.” “But . . . if you asked him to help you?” “Never!” Simon boomed. “He’s cruel, he’s evil, he’s a fraud, and I hate him! The sooner he’s brought low, the better.” Simon caught his reflection in a glass. After a sharp intake of breath, he gave a slow, deliberate exhale. “It’s not good for me to get excited,” he concluded. “Counteracts the benefit of the oil. You see how evil he is? Just speaking about him produces a bad effect. I insist: Don’t mention him to me again. Ever!”

Peniel sank down in misery and fell asleep almost immediately. What was the truth here? Peniel was lost. He had no idea where he was going. Like the Israelites of old, wandering forty years, he was taking his companions through the wilderness. Only Peniel was no Mosheh! The truth? Peniel had no staff with which he could lead a people free after four hundred years of slavery or part the Red Sea or cause water to come forth from the rocks! Truth? Peniel was ¬only Peniel. He was more comfortable in darkness than in light. He had liked his life beside Nicanor Gate. Had enjoyed a life without adventure. Who was he to lead anyone anywhere? The truth? Peniel could not tell them exactly where Yeshua was. So how could they expect to find Him? Peniel breathed a sigh. In his dreams he heard the distant whisper: Peniel, always speak the truth. It is the ¬only defense your soul will have when you stand before the Almighty! “But what is truth?” Peniel asked. The voice, familiar and amused by the question, replied, Peniel. “Mosheh? Ulu Ush-pi-zin. ¬I’m dreaming again. I know. I need a good dream to help me face tomorrow.” Trouble sleeping, Peniel? “Here’s the truth of it. Troubling dreams. Too many questions. And ¬I’m making up the answers. As if I know. And the truth is I know nothing at all. Except what I’ve heard.” A truthful answer. Tonight I’ll remind you of things your heart knows and yet has never fully ¬understood before. Yes. Just listen. What I tell you is the truth. “¬I’m in need of a good story. Will you tell me about plagues and crossing the Red Sea and drowning Pharaoh’s charioteers?” Not tonight. Tonight I’ll tell you a little something about Truth. About finding your way when you think you’re lost in this eye blink of time you call life. “At least you had pillars of fire and heavenly clouds and the Lord telling

you what to do and where to go. Here I am, pursued by assassins. Two stubborn beggars from ¬under the viaduct and a leper who stinks so bad he draws flies. What good can come of this?” Nothing is impossible with God. “It feels impossible.” Just listen. Open your heart. Your mind. Everything means something. Every word, ¬every number in Torah speaks about God’s love for us. About the redemption of our souls from the power of a terrible master who seeks to destroy our lives. Peniel exhaled. “Tell me, then. Teach me about truth. My heart longs to know.” The word truth is a tiny word in the Hebrew language. EmeT. Three letters. Spelled like this: Alef. Mem. Tav. Who would think that the story of eternity; of Messiah; of love, redemption, life, and death could all be contained within that one word? And yet within EmeT, all the truth of eternity exists. In the Hebrew Torah, as given on Mount Sinai, important phrases are all bracketed by a two-letter combination: Alef-Tav. The Greeks would call it Alpha and Omega. The Beginning and the End. Another name for the Lord. You see, Adonai inhabits all eternity. So we will begin with Alef-Tav, or eternity, shall we? Peniel agreed. “The beginning and the end. Eternity? Forever? It’s much bigger than here and now.” Mosheh laughed. EmeT, the word for truth, begins with the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet: Alef. “The One,” Peniel interjected. Well done. And the last letter is also the last letter of the Hebrew alphabet. “Tav.” You know your Hebrew, Peniel. And so now you see that Truth begins and ends with the Alef and the Tav. The Lord, Yahweh, the Almighty, and Eternal Father contains all Truth. “But what about the middle letter?” Think of what you already know, Peniel. There are twenty-two letters in the Hebrew alphabet, but twenty-seven when the variant endings are included. What is at the exact center of those letters? Peniel counted on his fingers. “The Mem! The Mem is in the center!” The Mem, the middle letter between the beginning and the end, represents man’s life in this world. So the word EmeT—truth—and Alef, Mem, Tav— beginning, middle, and end—tell us that Adonai our Elohim is truth from beginning to end and also inhabits ¬everything in the middle. He is with us even in our lives on this earth. “Well, I never thought of it before!” Peniel declared with satisfaction. But there’s more. So much more! “Yes, tell me! Teach me! I want to know it all!” Peniel felt immensely cheered. “I’ve missed my studies of Torah at the gate! They ¬didn’t know I

was listening.” But your heart heard it all as you sat beside Nicanor. And so now I’ll offer you another layer of truth that they did not teach and did not speak and did not ¬understand. I will tell you about Truth and the Messiah, the One who has come down from heaven to dwell among men on earth. He has said, “the Truth will make you free!”54 Peniel smiled in his sleep. “Catchy phrase, but what’s it mean? Tell me! Tell me ¬everything, Mosheh! Everything you heard on the holy mountain when the Lord taught you for forty days and forty nights!” At these words Peniel heard a sound like distant thunder and a howling wind. Mosheh lifted his chin, as though he was listening to a voice. Now there’s a story. The meaning of those numbers found in the word Truth. All recorded in Torah! Four hundred years of bondage for the children of Israel. Yes. Four hundred years waiting for the One who would deliver them from slavery. And then the years and days of my life. Count them. Forty years a prince of Egypt. Forty years of obscurity living as a shepherd in Midian. Forty days on the mountain of Sinai as I was given the Law directly from Adonai. Forty years of wandering with the nation of Israel in the wilderness because of their disobedience. And then, me, Mosheh. Forbidden by God to be the one to lead His people into the Promised Land. No. After forty years I failed. I failed, so I was not allowed to enter the Promised Land. Israel followed another leader across the river to enter Eretz-Israel. Peniel queried, “But what can all these forties and four hundreds in the Scriptures mean? They keep showing up. So many. I’ve always wondered. Nobody ¬ever could explain.” I’ll tell you plainly so you’ll never have to wonder again. All the explanation is found in the word Alef, Mem, Tav. EmeT, Truth. Hebrew words have numerical meanings as well. The letters of Truth add up to the number 441. The same number used to describe Israel’s deliverance from slavery. Four hundred years in Egypt. Forty years in the wilderness. One Deliverer to lead them out. 441. Remember this. It means something. The first letter of Truth is Alef. Alef is the number One. Every Jew knows Alef stands for the Eternal One. Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is One!55 The middle letter of Truth is Mem. This is the number forty. How many times is forty found in Scripture? The children of Israel wandered in the wilderness for forty years. And when you see this number it is always associated with testing, with trials, with going through a time of learning. Just like our lives in this world. The last letter of Truth is Tav. Tav is the number four hundred. The children of Israel were in Egypt four hundred years before their deliverer came to them to set them free. Are you following this, my friend? “I think so. Yes,” Peniel answered. “So much in one little word.” Much more than what I can teach you in a dream. But this will be the first lesson. The first of many about the meaning of truth. Four hundred years of