The Testimonium (32 page)

Isabella thought for a moment. This young man had obviously done his homework, and the question deserved an honest reply. “There are many histories that are very critical of Tiberius and his reign,” she said. “It is worth noting that the further removed from his lifetime the sources are, the more wild and bizarre the stories they record about him. The earliest sources, which are also the sketchiest, paint a picture of an emperor who was stern and unhappy, but not a monster. I will say that the text of the letter we recovered seems to lean more towards that point of view. Certainly, it seems to refute the tales repeated by Suetonius portraying the old emperor as a twisted and cruel pedophile. But, at the moment, there is not enough information to make a solid statement one way or the other.”

Eastwood nodded, seemingly satisfied with the answer. Isabella looked around the room and saw that no one else seemed eager to question her.

“Well, then, gentlemen, if that is all—” she began.

“One last thing,” said Cynthia Brown. “When do you think the Pilate scroll will be ready to read and translate?”

Isabella paused. “Sooner rather than later,” she said. Then the team exited before anyone could ask them what that might mean.

Caesar, I write these last pages with my own hand, because I am not sure that I trust even my faithful scribe with the words that follow. As soon as Longinus made his report, I ordered him to arrest some of the Temple guards who had been at the tomb and bring them to me immediately. It took a couple of hours, as they were closeted with the priests in some secret meeting. My legionaries discreetly nabbed two of them as soon as they left, and dragged them to the Praetorium.

At first they tried to pass off the story that the disciples of Jesus had stolen the body as they slept near the tomb. This tale was obviously a concoction—a guard detachment of twenty all asleep at the same time? The band of frightened peasants that had been too afraid to rescue their beloved rabbi, suddenly risking life and limb to retrieve his ravaged corpse? Ridiculous! I ordered them scourged, and their story soon changed.

What they told us was that before dawn Sunday morning, about half the detachment was asleep as the other half stood in front of the tomb, bored, and talking among themselves. Suddenly there was a blinding flash of light and a great earthquake that knocked them all to their knees, and the stone in front of the tomb was flung about ten yards away, nearly crushing one of them. As they stared at the entrance of the tomb, two glowing balls of light descended from the sky and assumed human form at the entrance. These two beings turned and looked at the guards, and every one of them fell down as if dead. When they came to, the tomb was empty, and two Roman soldiers were there unconscious as well. They fled to the Temple to report what they had seen to the High Priest, leaving my men stretched out on the grass.

The story sounds unbelievable, but even after another dose of the cat-o-nine-tails, they refused to change it. I ordered them both put to death and buried outside the city walls, so that no one would know what they had told me. Then I summoned the High Priest and met him outside the Temple District.

“What has happened?” I demanded.

“Exactly what I warned you of!” he snapped. “The Galileans came at night and stole the body of the Nazarene!”

“You mean all of your Temple guards let themselves be overpowered by a dozen frightened fishermen?” I sneered.

“There were nearly a hundred of them!” he said, obviously shaken that I refused to believe him.

“So how many did your guards kill?” I asked.

“None!” he said. “The blackguards overwhelmed them as they slept!”

His lies were so preposterous I did not want to listen any more. I turned on my heel and called over my shoulder: “It sounds like your guards were derelict in their duty. Let me know if you want them crucified, too!”

By evening the city was abuzz with rumors that the crucified Galilean had been seen again, by several of his disciples and by a group of women as well. There were also stories that the earthquake had torn the veil of the Temple, that several long-dead holy men had been seen wandering the streets preaching about the Messiah, and that the disciple who betrayed Jesus had hung himself. The Jewish priests were strangely silent, and I did not know what to believe myself.

The next morning, I walked down to the tomb where the crucified Jesus had been interred four days before. The heavy stone that had been rolled across the entrance was indeed several yards away, and one side of it was strangely scorched. The seal that had been placed on it was now a half molten blob of wax. I looked into the tomb, but there was only the lingering scent of myrrh and some empty linen wrappings lying where the body of the Nazarene prophet had been placed. I sat down on the stone outside, lost in thought.

“Why do you seek the living One among the dead?” a voice asked me.

I looked up to see the young disciple of Jesus whom I had recruited to act as my interpreter at the trial. He was alone and unarmed, and I motioned my legionaries to let him approach. He looked to be just out of his teens, and his expression was one of confidence and . . . for lack of a better word, joy.

“What happened here?” I demanded.

“Here the man you killed returned to life,” he said simply.

“That is impossible!” I snapped.

“All things are possible with God,” he calmly replied. “Our prophets have long predicted that the Lord’s Messiah would be betrayed, tormented, and killed, and then rise again from the dead. I watched it happen. I saw Him tried, I saw Him nailed to the cross, and I saw your soldiers drive a spear through His heart. I wrapped His body in the shroud, and I stepped into the tomb yesterday morning to see the same empty cloths you just did.”

“An empty tomb and an abandoned shroud don’t mean a corpse came back to life!” I snapped. “They mean a grave was robbed, and I intend to find out who did it!”

His eyes softened. “Noble governor,” he said. “I saw that you did your best to spare Him, and I am grateful. As long as I live to tell the story, I will tell that you did your best to save His life. But there is more to the story than the empty tomb. I know that He lives because I have seen Him myself! Alive, healthy, eating supper, the wounds of his ordeal healed! I have touched the nail scars in his hands! If you had seen what I have seen since yesterday morning, you too would believe in Him!”

The audacity of this peasant stunned me! That he would dare to
forgive
me for simply carrying out my duties as governor! I raised my hand to strike him, and then lowered it again, unnerved by his unwavering stare. Whatever he had seen, I realized that it had left him utterly without fear. As quickly as my dignitas would allow, I turned on my heel and left that accursed place.

And that is the end of my tale, Caesar. I have tried to conduct myself as a Roman prefect and proconsul should. I still do not know what it is I have done. Have I been the victim of an incredibly elaborate fraud? Have I lost my mind? Or was I the unwitting accomplice in the murder of a god? I do not know. So I leave judgment of this matter in your hands. Mine are too stained with blood to deal with it any further. I beg you, Caesar, recall me from this benighted place and let me return to Rome! I remain, respectfully yours, Lucius Pontius Pilate, Governor of Judea.

As soon as they were out of sight of the journalists, Josh and Father MacDonald began walking faster and faster, both of them hitting a jogging pace by the time they got to the door of the research lab. Guioccini was still waiting inside, but there were two armed security guards outside the door who looked carefully at their ID badges before allowing them in. It was already apparent that the Bureau of Antiquities was taking this find very seriously.

The scroll was exactly as they had left it, spread out fully on the table. Its color had lightened a bit as the stabilizing compound bonded with the papyrus and slowly dried. Both men stared at the ancient document for a few moments as the rest of the team assembled behind them.

“Did you take a peek for yourself, Dr. Guioccini?” asked MacDonald.

“Not really,” replied the lead archeologist. “I translated the first line, then made myself back off. You and Dr. Parker will have this privilege to yourselves.”

The priest nodded and turned to Josh. “I think that my photographs have clearly captured every line of the original script,” he said, “and you will be able to magnify them as needed on your laptop. I am going to suggest that we separately translate the entire manuscript, then swap notebooks and compare results.”

“Agreed,” Josh replied. “Keyboard or longhand?”

“I’m old school,” the priest said. “I just like using a yellow legal tablet.”

“Not a problem,” Josh said. “Writing longhand does seem to flow more naturally when translating a handwritten document.”

“All right then,” said the priest. “I suggest we begin.”

For the next four long and tedious hours Josh pulled up the photographs one after the other, carefully translating the ancient epistle one word at a time, occasionally pulling out his battered Latin-English dictionary when he ran across a particularly obscure term. He was focused on the individual words and phrases and did his best not to think about the actual narrative at first, but as he got further and further into the story he found himself looking back at his earlier writing, looking at the ancient text, and shaking his head in amazement. The letter was quite long and wound up taking about half the yellow tablet up when he was done. Despite the cool temperatures and low humidity of the lab, the perspiration was pouring down his brow when he finally set down his pen. He looked up to see the entire team, and Castolfo and Guioccini, staring at him. He looked over at MacDonald and saw that he was still writing. Deliberately, Josh covered his yellow pad up with a binder and went over to the fridge to pull out one of the Dr Peppers he had stored there as soon as he arrived on the mainland. He drank half the can in one long sip, then let out a long sigh.

Isabella sidled up next to him. “Well?” she whispered, not wanting to disturb MacDonald.

Josh grimaced. “Not yet!” he said. “I want to double and triple check our translations against each other before we start reading it. This is way too important to screw up!”

Isabella nodded, frowning. “My scientific half wants to congratulate you on your professional ethics, but my nosy woman half wants to tie you down and torture you until you tell all!”

“Talking bondage are we, my dear?” asked Rossini. “I didn’t think you two were that far along yet!”

Josh flushed beet red, but Isabella simply glared and elbowed her old mentor. “You know my grandfather was in Mussolini’s secret police!” she snapped. “I know how to deal with compulsive eavesdroppers!”

The grey-haired professor laughed and put one hand on each of their shoulders. “After everything we have been through since I found that chamber,” he said, “I think this wait is the most nerve-wracking!”

“Can you believe it’s only been ten days?” asked Josh.

“The quickest—and slowest—ten days of my life,” replied Giuseppe.

“Well, laddie, shall we compare results?” asked MacDonald. He had gotten up and walked over unnoticed as they conversed.

“I’m ready when you are,” he said. “But let us make one concession to the twenty-first century, shall we?” He walked over toward the lab’s one copier, a Konica Minolta, and entered his security code. He frowned when the machine beeped and a red light came on.

“Sorry, professor,” said Dr. Castolfo, rushing over. “Due to the extraordinary need for security, all copying now requires my code as well as the user’s.”

“Smart move,” said the priest, and then copied his yellow tablet one page at a time after Castolfo entered the code.

Josh fetched his own tablet and did likewise. Now each of them would have their own original translation notes as well as a precise copy of the other’s work, so they could compare word by word, line by line, at the same time. Once the copies were made, each of them retreated to his original position and began the comparison.

This part of the work was easier. The clear, strong Latin hand was easy to read, and for the most part, their work matched exactly. A few times they had translated synonyms instead of the same word, but the meanings were not altered. It took an hour to read through the whole thing silently, comparing and correcting as they went along. When they were finished, they moved their legal tablets to a large table where they could go over their work together. The handful of discrepancies was quickly ironed out, and about an hour after making the copies, they looked at each other and nodded, then turned to the group. Apriceno had wandered back to her lab, so Giuseppe quickly ran to get her. Isabella had stepped down the hall also, but she returned before the other two.

“Our work is done,” said the priest. “We each translated the rather lengthy epistle individually, compared our notes, and reconciled the few slight differences between our versions of the manuscript. What you are about to hear is, as we suspected from the moment of its discovery, the report filed by Lucius Pontius Pilate, Prefect of Rome and Proconsul of Judea, to the Roman Emperor Tiberius Caesar about the crucifixion of Jesus of Nazareth. Joshua, would you like to do the honors?”

Josh shook his head. “No, Father,” he said. “In this case, I will defer to your seniority and experience. You have earned this right in my book!”

The priest beamed at him. “Ya know, laddie, for a Protestant heretic, you are a true gentleman,” he said.

Isabella, Rossini, and Apriceno all said at the same time, rather loudly, “GET ON WITH IT!”—unconsciously echoing one of Josh’s favorite scenes from
Monty Python and the Holy Grail
. Castolfo and Guioccini chuckled, and Josh suppressed his smile as the Scottish cleric began to read.

“Lucius Pontius Pilate, Senior Legate, Prefect, and Proconsul of Judea, to Tiberius Julius Caesar Augustus, Princeps and Imperator of Rome, Greetings.

“Your Excellency, you know that it is the duty of every governor to keep you informed of events in the provinces that may in some way affect the well-being of the Empire. While I am loath to disturb your important daily work with a matter that may seem trivial at first, upon further reflection, and especially in light of subsequent developments, I find myself convinced that recent events in Judea merit your attention. And I would be telling an untruth if I were not to say that I am concerned that other accounts of these happenings may reach your ears which are not just unfavorable but frankly slanderous of my actions and motives. The situation was one of unusual difficulty and complexity, and hard decisions were called for. As always, I tried to make the decisions that I felt would most lend themselves to a peaceful and harmonious outcome for the citizens of the Republic and the people of Judea . . .”