“Well, here it is,” said MacDonald. “Impressive, isn’t it?”
It was indeed an impressive sight. The Testimonium was neatly placed on the center of a large, stainless steel table, covered with its clear plexiglass box, resting on a black plastic stand that had been specifically crafted over the last few days to hold it in position and display the ancient papyrus in a visually striking manner. The scroll appeared to float above the blackness of the stand, the ancient Latin letters leaping from the page in their clarity.
Josh’s dad leaned forward, his nose inches from the glass as he studied the ancient papyrus. He studied it a long time in silence. “Amazing,” he finally said. “Not just that it dates to the time of Jesus, but that it was actually written by the man who presided over his trial. You can even see the distinct handwriting changes where Pilate takes over for his scribe, and then down here where Tiberius added his comments. Oh, how I wish my Latin weren’t so rusty! We studied it in high school when I was a kid, but in college and seminary I focused on Greek because that was the language of the New Testament.”
Louise Parker was also studying the scroll. “Even having read the text and heard the tale of its discovery, it is still hard for me to believe that the writing is so crisp and clear after twenty centuries. It is such a shame that all the other artifacts from the chamber were destroyed!”
“We have recovered far more than we thought we might,” said Dr. Castolfo. “The sword that belonged to Julius Caesar is still intact and in its scabbard, after being hurled aloft and coming down on the windshield of my car! We also recovered the original Tiberius letter, his signet ring, two unbroken pollen sample vials, and the pendant from the reliquary. The will of Augustus Caesar was burned pretty badly, but we did salvage about one-third of the scroll. The salvage workers have folders full of pictures of all the artifacts we recovered on Capri, and are watching for them as they clear the rubble from the site.”
Josh smiled. “That is more than they had the last time we talked,” he said. “I am excited that so much has been recovered.”
His dad straightened and looked over his glasses at Josh. “Any way I could get a look at that sword, son?” he asked.
“I don’t see why not,” Josh said. “Dr. Castolfo?”
The president of the Antiquities Board nodded, and Josh opened the sealed cabinet where the sword was kept. Donning a pair of acid-free gloves, he carefully lifted the ancient blade out and pulled it from its scabbard.
Ben Parker gave a low whistle of amazement. “My word,” he said, “it’s not even rusted over! I’ve got hunting knives that are in worse shape than that!”
“That sword was really carried by Julius Caesar?” his mother asked.
“This inscription is from his mother.” Josh pointed at the Latin words. “Aurelia Cotta dedicated it to her son, and said ‘Wield it with honor.’ Apparently he bequeathed it to Octavian, who gave it to his adopted son Tiberius.”
She studied the ancient gladius. “I remember as a schoolgirl, my Latin teacher had us read The Gallic Wars in the original language. He would dress up in a toga and go on and on and on about Caesar, the greatest Roman of them all! He would just die if he knew that I was looking at Caesar’s sword.”
“Joshua,” said his dad, “thank you for letting us come and take a look at your finds. I know you have a busy day ahead of you, and I don’t want to use up any more of your time. Dear, let’s get out of our son’s way and let him get back to work.”
“I’ll walk you to the front,” said Josh. He led his parents back to the elevator and they boarded together.
“Thank you son,” said his dad. “That was something to see!”
“You can’t imagine how exciting it was watching those things come out of the chamber,” he said. “The sword was completely unexpected. It was buried in a thick layer of stone dust, and when Simone uncovered it we were all stunned!”
“I guess we will see you at Dr. Apriceno’s funeral this afternoon,” said his mom.
“I am not looking forward to it,” said Josh, “But I’m not dreading it as much as I did Giuseppe’s. Not that I didn’t love Simone, but I haven’t been asked to speak at her service, so I can just sit in the audience and cry with everyone else.”
“You did very well yesterday, my boy,” said his dad. “There is no such thing as an easy funeral, but you spoke very eloquently.”
“I never met the man, but you made me wish I had,” his mother said.
“I couldn’t even open my mouth until I looked out there and saw you two,” Josh said. “You have always been there for me, and words can’t say how grateful I am.”
“What else are parents for, dear?” Mrs. Parker asked.
Josh walked them to the door and saw them off, and then returned to the lab. Dr. Martens had arrived, and Isabella and Father MacDonald pulled some chairs around one of the extra tables. Castolfo and Guioccini joined them.
Guioccini spoke first. “Dr. Martens, you were my first choice to be a part of this team, but could not be here when the excavation began. Joshua has done an admirable job in your place, but since our numbers are cruelly reduced, would you consider stepping in as a fourth member of our group? Even though the excavation is complete, there is still much to do in curating and cataloguing the remaining artifacts, and any others that we may recover from the wreckage of our lab.”
“I should be delighted, Bernardo, but as you can see by these crutches, I am still not fully mobile. I find myself depending on my wife’s help to get around,” said Martens. “But, if you would be willing to allow her full access to the lab to help me when I need her, I will accept your kind offer.”
Guioccini looked over at Castolfo, who nodded. “Welcome aboard to you, and your lovely wife, old friend!” he said. “I look forward to getting to know her.”
Castolfo spoke next. “We will be transporting the scroll to Rome for further testing on Friday, to be conducted by Dr. Henderson from the Smithsonian. I am very concerned that the terrorists who tried to destroy it before may strike again while we are in transit. We are arranging some very heavy security for the day—we do not want to risk the scroll’s safety. The police and the army will be assisting.”
“The army?” Josh asked. “Wow! That seems a little extreme—but, then again, so does blowing up a lab to destroy a two-thousand-year-old scroll!”
“We are dealing with extremists here, lad, no doubt about that,” said MacDonald. “I just wonder how many, and how well organized, they are.”
“I am amazed that any of the papyrus survived the blast at all,” said Dr. Martens. “And we found pieces of two documents?”
Guioccini nodded. “The Tiberius scroll was fused to the top of that ancient writing desk,” he said. “The desk was broken by the blast, but only the legs landed in the flames. The top of the desk, with the papyrus attached, came down in an area of rubble that never caught fire, thanks to the quick response of the local fire trucks, and the sprinkler system, which did function briefly in the area of the lab left standing. As for the will of Augustus, it was apparently blown into the air and set ablaze, but came down in a puddle of water which saved part of it.”
“I must admit, although they were a pain to work with, I will miss not being able to piece together all those ancient documents that the rats had chewed,” said Josh.
“Well,” said Castolfo, “so far we have recovered none of the fragments. I think the drawer that they were in was completely consumed by the flames. But we will be able to digitally piece them together—the two graduate assistants Father MacDonald assigned had just finished photographing all of them shortly before the blast.”
“Excellent!” said Josh. “We found a few fair-sized fragments that had interesting contents. It will be neat to see if we can piece together enough to make complete documents. There was so much potential for understanding Augustan Rome in those pages!”
“I’m sorry I didn’t get to poke through those myself,” said Martens. “The idea o
f reading the personal correspondence of Tiberius Caesar—it’s a classical historian’s dream!”
The phone in the corner rang, and Guioccini picked it up.
“Excellent!” he said in Italian. “I shall be right up to escort him here personally.” He hung up and turned to the others. “Dr. Henderson is here,” he said.
“I look forward to seeing him again,” said Martens. “He and I had a fascinating conversation at the Smithsonian’s annual ball last year that got interrupted. I’d enjoy finishing it.”
Moments later, Guioccini returned with Dr. Henderson in tow. Behind them trailed two young college-aged men, dressed in khaki pants and polo shirts, each one carrying large briefcases and clipboards. The team rose, Josh helping Dr. Martens with his crutches. “Andy!” bellowed Martens. “How good to see you again!”
“Luke!” said the Smithsonian paleographer. “You look a bit the worse for wear, my old friend!”
“Occupational hazard of having a younger spouse, I suppose,” replied Martens. “So who are these two youngsters?”
“These are my two lab assistants, Cameron Hargrove and Justin Arnold,” said Henderson. “They will be helping me measure and photograph the scroll so that we can be ready for testing on Friday. I have brought some equipment with me, so that we can begin to do some preliminary work today.”
“By all means,” said Guioccini. “We want to confirm the authenticity of all the pieces we found, but this one above all because it is so important to so many people.”
Henderson nodded to his assistants, and they placed their cases on the table on either side of the Testimonium, and began pulling out various pieces of equipment. Meanwhile Henderson reached into his pocket and pulled out an old, well-worn, 15x lighted loupe.
“Gadgets are great, but for my first look at an important manuscript, I always prefer to kick it old school,” he said. “You would be amazed how many things you can spot with a simple old hand-held magnifier like this, especially when it has different lights attached.”
“Different lights?” said Isabella.
“Watch,” said the professor. He flicked a small thumb switch on the side of the loupe’s handle, and a powerful beam of light emerged from just below the magnifying glass, illuminating whatever it was pointed at.
“I have seen that before,” she said. “I have used them on occasion. But that is just plain old white light!”
“Not done yet!” he said. There was a small wheel switch just below the lens, and he rolled it with his thumb. Immediately the light switched to UV. He scrolled it again to get infrared, and then a strong, greenish beam. “Handiest thing in the world for checking fluorescent properties,” he said. “Flint authenticators use them to look for modern tool marks on fake projectile points.”
“You’ve been lurking on the dark side!” said Josh. “Not many archeologists will admit to even knowing a collector, much less a commercial authenticator!”
Henderson laughed. “I realized a few years ago that the average collector of flint points and knives knows far more about them than the average archeologist,” he said. “We are big picture guys, and they focus exclusively on complete tool forms. In the process, some of them acquire a lot of expertise. I’m willing to poach knowledge wherever I can find it. Now, can we take that cover off the scroll?”
Josh grabbed one end and Guioccini grabbed the other, and they lifted the plexiglass cover off of the Testimonium. Henderson leaned in very close and inhaled deeply, careful to turn his head before exhaling. Then he straightened up and smiled.
“Your stabilizing solution does mask a lot of the aroma,” he said to MacDonald. “But there is still no smell in the world like ancient papyrus. I find it more exciting than the sweetest cologne!”
He clicked the light on his loupe and began poring over the ancient scroll line by line, occasionally switching the color of the light to study the ink or some of the ancient spots of stain and discoloration. His two assistants assembled a small, rolling tripod and mounted a digital camera with an enormous lens on it, canted at a slight downward angle. Then one of them pulled out what appeared to be a large remote control and hit a couple of the buttons. A small motor whirred as the tripod rolled across the table toward the scroll for a few inches, and then stopped.
“What on earth is that?” Joshua asked.
One of them—Josh wasn’t sure yet which was Cameron and which was Justin—turned and answered.
“A little device Dr. Henderson invented,” he said. “The small servomotor moves the tripod smoothly, without any vibration. It will give us a clear, sharp video image, better than any handheld camera could manage.”
“Impressive,” said Isabella, coming up behind Josh and putting her hand on his shoulder. She stared at the ancient scroll that Dr. Henderson was studying so closely. “It’s still hard to believe it all,” she commented. “The chamber, the artifacts, the scroll and the story it tells, the deaths of our friends, the crazy publicity—every morning I wake up and wonder if it was all just a dream.”
“Are you OK?” Josh asked. “You’ve been awfully quiet since the funeral.”
She nodded toward the elevator, and he turned to Castolfo and Guioccini. “I imagine he is going to be awhile examining the scroll,” said Josh. “I think we may head up to the cafeteria and get a bite to eat.”
“Take your time, Josh,” said Martens. “I’ll text you when he is done.”
The two of them got in the elevator and went to the third-floor cafeteria. Josh got a sweet roll and some cola, and Isabella ordered a small fruit salad. There were quite a few tourists coming and going, but they found a quiet corner and sat down facing each other.
“So tell me what is on your mind,” he said to Isabella. “It hurts me to see you so quiet and sad.”
“I guess I am just mourning for my friend,” she said. “That’s most of it.”
“And the rest?” he asked gently.
“Well,” she said, “after I listened to you at the funeral yesterday, I went back home and read the rest of John’s Gospel. There was so much there that I had forgotten—or perhaps never even knew to begin with. I am wrestling with the whole concept of belief right now. John’s claims about Jesus are so extraordinary, and yet the proofs he lays down are very convincing! I would reject it all as simply good propaganda, but the Testimonium confirms so many of the details of Jesus’ trial, it makes it very hard for me to doubt the overall truth of the rest of the story. There is part of me that teeters on the brink of faith, wanting to go ahead and take the plunge and cry out ‘I believe!’ But something keeps holding me back.”
“What is it?” he asked.
“Well,” she went on, “some of it is just good old-fashioned scientific skepticism. That God should become a carpenter in a backwater province of the Empire two thousand years ago—ten years of higher education screams to reject such silliness! And yet that same education has forced me to accept that the Testimonium must be authentic. And, to be honest, some of it is personal. Belief demands action, doesn’t it? Taking that step of faith will mean giving up control of my life. I have worked so hard to be independent; the idea of surrendering to anyone—even God—scares me to death! And so I sit here, miserable and conflicted, pulled in two directions and not sure which way to go.”
Josh took her hand. “Do you trust me?” he asked.
“Of course!” she said. “How could I not, after all we have been through?”
“Think about it,” he said. “Why do you trust me?”
“Because you saved my life at the risk of your own,” she said. “Because you are good, and decent, and honorable. And, most of all, because I have fallen in love with you!”
“Isabella,” he said, “I am not that good. Decent? My thoughts are as polluted as anyone’s. I am one flawed, sinful, mortal human being. But I do love you, and I am flattered and astonished that you return my love, and that you are willing to trust me. But if you can trust me, and love me, a wicked, fallen, mortal creature,
how can you not trust a loving and perfect God—who has no wickedness in Him, who loves you more perfectly than I ever possibly could?”
She sighed. “Because I don’t know Him!” she wailed. “I know about Him, but I don’t know Him like I know you! And I’m a little bit afraid of Him. He sent His own Son to the cross—what sacrifice might He require of me? I have lost so much already!”
“That’s where faith comes in,” said Josh. “At some point, you just have to put your trust in the goodness and love of God, and invite Him in.”
She bowed her head, pressing his knuckles against her forehead. “I just wish it was that easy,” she said softly.
Josh’s cell phone chimed, and he looked at the incoming text. “Looks like Dr. Henderson has finished his initial examination of the text,” he said. “Let’s go hear what he thinks of our find.”
They walked back to the elevator hand in hand, each one thinking about what the other had said. Josh was hoping that Isabella’s doubts would give way at some point, that she would see a clear path to embracing the faith that was so important to him. Isabella was wondering if she could ever find the strength to do so.
They entered the lab with lighter hearts than they left with—each of them felt a measure of comfort and strength in confiding in the other. Alicia had joined her husband at the table, and Isabella took a long look at them as she and Josh sat down. How confident they seemed, in their love for each other and their love of God!
Dr. Henderson had been taking a last, long look at the Testimonium, but as they sat down he turned and faced the group. “Well,” he said, “what I can tell you with confidence is this: we are either looking at an authentic papyrus manuscript from the first century, or else we are looking at the cleverest forgery I have ever seen.”
Isabella bristled. “Don’t tell me you think there is any credence to the venomous slurs that Tintoretto has been—” she began.
Henderson held up his hand. “Hundred-year-old Vatican conspiracy theories?” he said. “I seriously doubt it. I am familiar with Dr. Tintoretto and her anti-Church crusade. I know all of you by reputation at least, and several of you personally. I have no doubt of your professionalism, and I have watched the video footage of the excavation. I believe you! But, we are talking about a document that will have a powerful influence on the faith of over one billion human beings—perhaps more. What I believe is immaterial. What the tests will prove beyond all doubt is whether or not the Testimonium was in fact written in the first century AD. The papyrus looks right, the ink looks right, and the document gives every apparent, visible sign of great age. But C-14 dating will confirm the accuracy of our assessments, and prove beyond all doubt the antiquity of this remarkable manuscript.” He paused and looked at the papyrus again. “Or it will prove we have been the victims of the hoax of the century!”
The Testimonium Page 42