by Jeff Spence
But he nodded — a slight, imperceptible nod meant more as an answer to himself than to David. He lifted the glass to his lips, took in a fragrant sip, and then a pull on the cigar, letting the two complexes of aroma and taste blend and linger on his tongue and cheeks.
He looked at David.
David looked back and smiled.
They lifted a silent 'cheers' into the air.
From the doorway, Marina stood, silent and unnoticed until she spoke.
"Time to eat, boys, the turkey's getting cold," She stepped back into the kitchen again, smiling at the two men and winking at Ben as she did so.
"And don't let them bring those cigars in with them!" Mimi called, "They smell like a couple of old boots as it is."
THIRTY-SEVEN
Ben stood on the podium, a digital slide projected wide behind and above him, an image of a newspaper headline printed across the top of it, "Dead Sea Treasure Found: A trove of ancient scrolls unearthed at Masada." He watched the crowd in front of him, listening to the timbre of the debate, awaiting the right moment to draw them back in.
A woman in the third row. "The Israelis found them, they belong to the Israelis!"
A man near the back. "But we don't even know what's in them yet — What if they contain Arabic scrolls?"
One of Ben's students. "The Israelis still found them."
Another one. "Professor Gela, found them… should they be his?”
Ben smiled.
The woman again. "Would you use that same argument for the other scrolls? Then the Bedouin should own them!"
The man. "Sure, if they hadn't sold them. If the Israelis sell them to the Arabs, then they can be owned by the Arabs. Are you telling me that the Greek scrolls are owned by the Greeks?"
A woman in the front row. "That's totally different, the Jews wrote them in Greek, the Greeks didn't have anything to do with them, unless they were Jewish Greeks.”
The man again. "So what makes you think that Arabic writing should make them automatically Arabic?"
The woman from the first row. "There aren’t even any of them in Arabic… You’re just being thick-headed now.”
"Okay, okay," Ben broke in, a touch too late, "Let's reign it in there."
"You're the specialist, Professor Gela — what do you think?"
Ben paused. He had been asked that question a hundred times or more in the past two months, but it wasn't until the week before, the day they'd found the cavity in the side of the hill that held the stacks of pristine scroll jars, that it had become very difficult to answer. Before then it had been speculation. Hope. Now it was real.
"In a way, one could say I found them. I like the suggestion that they’re mine!" He smiled and chuckled a bit. "I didn't do it alone though. Arguments can be made for Israeli ownership — good arguments — and likewise for any organisation that can properly conserve them, care for them, and share them with experts in the field so we can learn from them.
"Before I can answer properly though, I need to ask each of you one thing — but don't answer out loud — is ownership of these artefacts a cultural question? Political? Legal? Even ethical? How you answer that question will move you much of the way to how you answer the question of ownership of the Scrolls in general. If we can agree on my question, then we can agree on an answer. Or, if the answer is a muddy blend of these things, then my answer will, as well, be muddy and perhaps indecisive.
"But I put one more thing to you, to further complicate the theoretical end of things and yet, in a practical sense, it makes things so very simple: The people who own these artefacts, own them. Unless we are going to take them away by force, or buy them, they are staying where they are. Even then, if we take them away or buy them, or gain them by some other means, we become just another player in the game, don't we? Another layer in a stack of layers?"
"So if it was up to you, who would get them?"
"I say with great relief, and not for the first time — I am pleased that such a decision is not mine to make." He glanced to the side but did not see the sly smile from the shadows off-stage.
He took a shallow bow to the audience as they stood to give their applause, and he walked off into the wings of the auditorium. There, smiling and ready with a kiss, Marina waited to accompany him home.
BONUS SECTION
The Copper Scroll is very real, and the information about it included in this book is accurate, according to knowledge at the time of writing.
The Silver Scroll, however, is fictional. Several decent theories exist as to what the scrolls, as a whole, are, what they represented in their time, and what scholarly value they have now. What follows is a fictitious account of how they might have been hidden, why they were hidden, and the story of how the small fragment of the Silver Scroll came to rest in the hands of an eccentric, and also fictitious, Oxford scholar, Eli Bannerman.
70 CE.
Northeast of Jerusalem.
"Moshe… Moshe! Hurry up. Don't drop them, we haven't much time." Ibrahim trotted ahead of his student, their sandalled feet slipping and scuffing along the narrow path. The first sharp rays of the sun were now shooting like spears through the clouds over the eastern horizon, but they had been hurrying along for some hours already, since the quiet cool of the morning.
Moshe glanced over his shoulder. They had time. He understood the feeling of urgency, the sense of flight, but his conscious mind also knew that the coming army was engaged with a far bigger event than two sectarian stragglers, living alone in the hills. The Essene threat, such as it was, had been taken care of some years ago. Had it only been three? Seemed a lifetime.
He missed the old buildings, remembered the flames and violence that had brought them down.
Yes, three long years ago, but the memory was as clear as yesterday.
Some of the survivors had returned to the cities or villages from which they had come. Others, like him and Ibrahim, had lived in the caves since then, or out in the open, huddled together in twos or threes; homeless and roaming, like the Bedouin, across the barren rock. This day, important above all others, a scout might spot them, might be looking for some trouble… But even that was unlikely in such a remote, trackless place.
At least with the sun up, Moshe could see better where to place his feet, but his steps were still unsure, as fatigue and stress took their toll. He topped a little rise and turned to the south to make sure they were not being followed. Chills spread like long fingers up his sleeves.
"Ibrahim, look!"
The older man turned and gazed southward, but the eyes of his student were not looking in the direction of Qumran, the ruins of their former home. Farther to the west, a tall plume of grey-black smoke rose among hills set alight by the glow of the dawn.
Jerusalem.
"They are there,” Ibrahim's voice was a whisper, “The Romans.” Both men had known the soldiers were going to deal with the rebellion by making a military assault against Jerusalem itself. The beating heart of the whole region. Both of them knew that the emperor's retribution would be swift and brutal. The outlying areas first — remove the support, prevent flanking — then the core of the rebellion, the heart of the people. The city of David.
Titus was there, taking the ancient stronghold in his father's name. There was a statement to be made, and it needed to resound throughout the furthest reaches of the empire. Jerusalem was to be made an example of. They all knew it. They had all felt it coming. Still, to see the Holy City burning, even with the Temple still in the hands of the false High Priest and the teachers of wickedness…
"Do you think Yeshua has hidden the other one?"
"He must. It must be hidden or all is lost."
"They will flee to the south?"
"It is not for you to know. Nor for me." He fell silent.
"Ibrahim… the Temple."
"I know. But they will spare it. Surely they will spare it."
"Can you be certain?"
"They will use it as a centre from which to
rule. To collect taxes, as the False Priest has been, and the Righteous Priest before him. They will also avoid angering the God within. Such are the ways of invaders." Most invaders, he thought to himself, a chill of sweat trickling down his back beneath his white robe.
"I hope you are right. But why then did the Pharisee bring us the treasures? Does he not know this too?"
"The treasures are the physical marks of our legacy… that and the sign of circumcision. They are too precious to risk looting, and looting will take place, even if the Temple is left to stand. Such men, such conquerors, are not to be trusted in any case. Thieves. Killers.”
Tears streamed from the old man's eyes and then Ibrahim rent the front of his white garment, tearing a gash in it from neck to belly. Moshe watched his teacher, and did likewise.
"The world will not be the same after this. It is a profound wickedness." Ibrahim paused a while, as if daydreaming. "Now quickly, Moshe, we are almost there."
They continued down the slope and across a short, flat area, then altered their course toward a sloping bank of jagged rock. The ground rose slightly below it and there, tucked under the shadow of the overhang, was a narrow opening, the main of it already covered by a wall of stacked stones. The two men crawled over it, squeezed into the opening, and then back toward the farthest depths of the cave.
There were scrolls there already, in the darkness, stacked neatly to one side about halfway down the cavern, but they were not like the scroll now brought by Ibrahim and Moshe. The stacked cylinders were made of parchment and papyrus, the one Moshe held wrapped in the sleeve of his garment was of pounded copper, a precious material, the letters hammered into the metal itself. The item was valuable for the copper on its own, but what it contained in the writing was beyond price. Moshe paused beside the neat pile of scrolls and jars.
"Come, Moshe, as deep in as we can get them."
Moshe did not move. "Will we be expelled for this?"
Ibrahim turned and squinted at the silhouette of his student in the dim light. "We may, if the Teacher finds out. But…" He fell silent.
"But what?"
"I do not think the Community will fare much better than Jerusalem. And I do not think Jerusalem will fare well." The older man took the bundle from his student and slid it farther down, into the darkness in the heart of the cave.
"But it must! The Teacher, the Yahad — are we not chosen to fight in the final battles?"
"Perhaps these are the final battles."
"Then we shall overcome the Sons of Darkness."
Ibrahim tucked the scroll into a hollow place, and pushed sand up over it, hiding it as best he could in the dim light. They then began to crawl back toward the opening and the bright sunshine of day.
Ibrahim squinted as they approached the opening. "Yes, the writings tell us we will win in the end, but not without loss. We shall lose three times, as we win three times. Only when Adonai steps in will the equilibrium be tipped to the side of good."
"Surely the loss of the buildings was one loss. Our survival one victory. The battle for Jerusalem might be victory, or a loss. Perhaps a great event of cleansing — perhaps we will be given rule of the Temple again! The battles will come and then pass. And will we not then be victorious? Does faith not demand that we think thus?”
"We may be victorious… those who are left may be… but that is not to say that the Community itself will build itself up again. Perhaps it will not survive at all. Tribulation awaits us, my friend. We must brace for great tribulation. That is true faith, not blind assurances of ease and victory.”
"And so you are cooperating with the Temple?" Moshe frowned, watching his teacher's face in the light that shone in through the opening, "With a corrupt priesthood?"
"I am cooperating with a just man, who also sees the coming darkness and wishes to safeguard the treasures that are rightfully ours, they are the Community's — the Teacher of Righteousness himself! It may not be for him to see all mysteries. In this thing, I see, and so I must do what is needed to keep the treasures of our people from the hands of those — Kittim!" He spat on the hot sand as he said the word, emerged from the cave and squinted into the sunshine, his scowl apparent even from Moshe's view in the darkness behind him.
"You are certain he is just?"
"Yes. He is a man of great presence. Destiny is upon him. And too, he was an Essene, once."
"But they say now he is a Pharisee."
"He lives thus, yes, but such matters are complex, Moshe. Not everything is thus, or thus. God’s mystery is upon us. This man… God gives him visions. He dreams dreams, like the prophets of old.”
"Still… I am unsure of him."
"And yet you are here with me?"
Moshe smiled grimly, coming up to stand at his teacher's shoulder, "I am more sure of you."
Ibrahim nodded. "Then that must do for the moment. Calamitous things are upon us. We must take great steps to face them."
"They will hide it all?"
"They will leave enough that the soldiers will not think to look for more. We cannot have them finding everything. Even so, what is left behind and what is found by chance will be a great loss."
"They cannot hide the furnishings?"
"The Romans know of them… there are spies as well, no doubt. If such items are missing, men will search. We must not allow that. Some will be replaced with similar things, but appearances must ring true. And we must use our wits, for our power is less than theirs… for this battle at least. We must rely on our destiny. The prophecies.”
The two men stood still, watching pillars of smoke rise in the distant air, their thoughts pregnant with ancient tales of their forebears, also wanderers in the desert."
"If I am expelled, Brother, I have no place to go. My initiation has passed, and my property was added to the communal treasury — before the kittim came."
"If we keep God's wealth secure, and if we can present it at the Teacher's feet after this great calamity, then I suspect your place in whatever is left will be secure as well."
"It is much to lose."
"It is much to gain, as well.”
After a moment's thought, Ibrahim took the first few steps back toward the south, toward the caves that sheltered what was left of the little community on the northwestern shores of the Great Salt Sea. "Come, we must not be found near this place. It must be forgotten until such time as its finding is safe once again."
Moshe followed him, his heart heavy with the weight of it all. "May God keep our brothers safe until we return."
“Amen,” his teacher muttered, “…and from then onward."
Circa 73 CE.
The Fortress of Masada.
"You must take it Ruth."
"I cannot, father, please… please you bring it with us."
"I will not go below. My place is here, with my brothers."
The Roman troops had been at it for weeks. First they had built a circumvallation, a wall designed not to keep people out, but to keep their enemies in. Since its completion they had concentrated on only one thing: steady streams of men, like ants, hauling woven baskets of stone and sand and pouring them into the ravine between the fortress and the plateau on which the army was encamped. The heat was brutish, but the men kept moving. Slow. Steady. At first the majority of the Jewish warriors laughed at the actions. A wall to keep them in! Wells had been dug down through the rock when Herod built the place, cisterns filled from the rains every year since then, and stores of food were plentiful. They could outlast any army in a siege and defend themselves at the wall if any of the invaders were fool enough to attack them up the steep and treacherous slope; they weren't fleeing anywhere. And filling in a ravine of that size? Had they become so desperate, the great juggernaut of the oppressor?
But the wiser among them were silent, and more men grew wise as the days passed.
As the weeks came and went and the trail of human ants continued without abatement, the marks of their progress, almost imperceptible day by d
ay, began to show themselves. The sharp, rugged walls at the base of the ravine could no longer been seen. Then a band of the ravine appeared flat at the bottom, like centuries of floods had washed sediment in to choke the flow of the next season's torrent.
But there had been no water. The flood was one of soldiers, commanded by men who were well aware of the power of mass labor, of unquestioned orders, patience, and of the importance of finishing the Jewish rebellion with a show of decisive force. Vespasian had gone to his capital to vie for the seat of the emperor, now that Nero had taken his own life in the face of public rejection and disgrace. Lucius Flavius Silva, Governor of Judaea, now stood at the head of the many thousands of armoured faces. He was a veteran military and tactical commander. He was intelligent and had a will of iron. A sense of fate no less adamant than that of the men he faced. As the remaining Jewish warriors were starting to realise, as the very earth slowly rose to grant passage to the massive army, the governor had the imagination to match his will.
"They will rape us, father. They will torture us. It is best that I die!"
"God will protect you, my child," he put his hands on her cheeks and looked into her eyes, almost too close to focus, "And if he does not, it is his will." Tears began to flow from her eyes, and then from his.
"I am afraid."
"I too, am afraid. Not for me, but for you. God's wealth is there, my child, his holy treasures and gifts to his chosen people. If the kittim get it, it will be profaned… we will have let the holy riches of God be profaned. But the Almighty One has shown his providence. He has chosen to hide it well," he could not help but grin at his own words and at the truth of them, "but we must let the others know. It must be found by those who survive."