“Thank you, Rabbi,” the rich man gushed. He hurried off and waved for us to follow.
“Where are you taking us?” I asked.
“Only as far as Magdala,” he said.
To Joshua I said, “That’s farther than a Sabbath’s journey allows.”
“I know,” Joshua said.
As we passed through all of the small villages along the coast on the way to Magdala, people came out of their houses and followed us for as long as they dared on a Sabbath, but I could also see the elders, the Pharisees, watching as we went.
The mayor’s house was large for Magdala, and his daughter had her own sleeping room. He led Joshua into the bedchamber where the girl lay. “Please save her, Rabbi.”
Joshua bent down and examined the girl. “Go out of here,” he said to the old man. “Out of the house.” When the mayor was gone Joshua looked at me. “She’s not dead.”
“What?”
“This girl is sleeping. Maybe they’ve given her some strong wine, or some sleeping powder, but she is not dead.”
“So this is a trap?”
“I didn’t see this one coming either,” Joshua said. “They expect me to claim that I raised her from the dead, healed her, when she’s only sleeping. Blasphemy and healing on the Sabbath.”
“Let me raise her from the dead, then. I mean, I can do this one if she’s only sleeping.”
“They’ll blame me for whatever you do as well. You may be their target too. The local Pharisees didn’t devise this themselves.”
“Jakan?”
Josh nodded. “Go get the old man, and gather as many witnesses as you can, Pharisees as well. Make a ruckus.”
When I had about fifty people gathered in and around the house, Joshua announced, “This girl isn’t dead, she’s sleeping, you foolish old man.” Joshua shook the girl and she sat up rubbing her eyes. “Keep watch on your strong wine, old man. Rejoice that you have not lost your daughter, but grieve that you have broken the Sabbath for your ignorance.”
Then Joshua stormed out and I followed him. When we were a ways down the street he said, “Do you think they bought it?”
“Nope,” I said.
“Me either,” Joshua said.
In the morning a Roman soldier came to Peter’s house with messages. I was still sleeping when I heard the shouting. “I can only speak to Joshua of Nazareth,” someone said in Latin.
“You’ll speak to me or you’ll never speak again,” I heard someone else say. (Obviously someone who had no desire to live a long life.) I was up and running in an instant, my tunic waving unbelted behind me. I rounded the corner at Peter’s house to see Judas facing down a legionnaire. The soldier had partially drawn his short sword.
“Judas!” I barked. “Back down.”
I put myself between them. I knew I could disarm the soldier easily, but not the legion that would follow him if I did. “Who sends you, soldier?”
“I have a message from Gaius Justus Gallicus, commander of the Sixth Legion, for Joshua bar Joseph of Nazareth.” He glared at Judas over my shoulder. “But there is nothing in my orders to keep me from killing this dog while delivering it.”
I turned to face Judas, whose face was on fire with anger. I knew he carried a dagger in his sash, although I hadn’t told Joshua about it. “Justus is a friend, Judas.”
“No Roman is the friend of a Jew,” said Judas, making no effort whatever to whisper.
And at that point, realizing that Joshua hadn’t reached our new Zealot recruit with the message of forgiveness for all men, and that he was going to get himself killed, I quickly reached up under Judas’ tunic, clamped onto his scrotum, squeezed once, rapidly and extremely hard, and after he blasted a mouthful of slobber on my chest, his eyes rolled in his head and he slumped to his knees, unconscious. I caught him and lowered him to the ground so he didn’t hit his head. Then I turned to the Roman.
“Fainting spells,” I said. “Let’s go find Joshua.”
Justus had sent us three messages from Jerusalem: Jakan had indeed divorced Maggie; the Pharisees’ full council had met and they were plotting to kill Joshua; and Herod Antipas had heard of Joshua’s miracles and was afraid that he might be the reincarnation of John the Baptist. Justus’ only personal note was one word: Careful.
“Joshua, you need to hide,” said Maggie. “Leave Herod’s territory until things settle down. Go to Decapolis, preach to the gentiles. Herod Philip has no love for his brother, his soldiers won’t bother you.” Maggie had become a fiercely dedicated preacher herself. It was as if she had channeled her personal passion for Joshua into a passion for the Word.
“Not yet,” said Joshua. “Not until Philip and Thaddeus return with John’s followers. I will not leave them lost. I need a sermon, one that can serve as if it was my last, one that will sustain the lost while I’m gone. Once I deliver it to Galilee, I’ll go to Philip’s territory.”
I looked at Maggie and she nodded, as if to say, Do what you have to, but protect him.
“Let’s write it then,” I said.
Like any great speech, the Sermon on the Mount sounds as if it just happened spontaneously, but actually Joshua and I worked on it for over a week—Joshua dictating and me taking notes on parchment. (I had invented a way of sandwiching a thin piece of charcoal between two pieces of olive wood so that I could write without carrying a quill and inkwell.) We worked in front of Peter’s house, out in the boat, even on the mountainside where he would deliver the sermon. Joshua wanted to devote a long section of the sermon to adultery, largely, I realize now, motivated by my relationship with Maggie. Even though Maggie had resolved to stay celibate and preach the Word, I think Joshua wanted to drive the point home.
Joshua said, “Put in ‘If a man even looks at a woman with lust in his heart, he has committed adultery.’”
“Really, you want to go with that? And this ‘If a divorced woman remarries she commits adultery’?”
“Yeah.”
“Seems a little harsh. A little Pharisee-ish.”
“I had some people in mind. What do you have?”
“‘Verily I say unto you’—I know you like to say ‘verily’ when you’re talking about adultery—anyway, ‘Verily I say unto you, that should a man put oil upon a woman’s naked body, and make her go upon all fours and bark like a dog, while knowing her, if you know what I mean, then he has committed adultery, and surely if a woman do the same thing right back, well she has jumped on the adultery donkey cart herownself. And if a woman should pretend to be a powerful queen, and a man a lowly slave boy, and if she should call him humiliating names and make him lick upon her body, then surely they have sinned like big dogs—and woe unto the man if he pretends to be a powerful queen, and—’”
“That’s enough, Biff.”
“But you want to be specific, don’t you. You don’t want people to walk around wondering, ‘Hey, is this adultery, or what? Maybe you should roll over.’”
“I’m not sure that being that specific is a good idea.”
“Okay, how ’bout this: ‘Should a man or a woman have any goings-on with their mutual naughty bits, then it is more than likely they are committing adultery, or at least they should consider it.’”
“Well, maybe more specific than that.”
“Come on, Josh, this isn’t an easy one like ‘Thou shalt not kill.’ Basically, there you got a corpse, you got a sin, right?”
“Yes, adultery can be sticky.”
“Well, yes…Look, a seagull!”
“Biff, I appreciate that you feel obliged to be an advocate for your favorite sins, but that’s not what I need here. What I need is help writing this sermon. How we doing on the Beatitudes?”
“Pardon me?”
“The blesseds.”
“We’ve got: Blessed are those who hunger and thirst after righteousness; blessed are the poor in spirit, the pure in heart, the whiners, the meek, the—”