by Lynn Austin
“Abba will never let me stay behind with your family. The only way I can stay is if I run away. But you can’t tell anyone, Zaki.” She poked his arm again, harder this time. “You promised!”
He felt trapped. He couldn’t break a promise, but he couldn’t let his friend run away to live with that wicked woman, either.
Yael stood, brushing sand off her clothes, and started walking back home without him. Zechariah hurried to catch up. “Listen, I can help you talk to your father about staying here and living with me and my parents.”
“Your parents won’t let me learn about the stars and worship the moon goddess.” She broke into a run, sprinting the rest of the way home, leaving Zechariah behind.
“Do what you want, then,” he shouted behind her, kicking at stones. “I don’t care.” But he did care. He slouched through the gate into his courtyard, weighed down with worry, and nearly collided with his grandmother.
“Where have you been, Zaki? We’ve been looking all over for you.”
“I went for a walk with Yael.”
“Well, go up to the rooftop right now. Your father and grandfather are waiting to talk with you.”
“Am I in trouble?”
She shook her head. He saw tears in her eyes. “No, Zaki. You’re not in trouble.”
He took his time climbing the steps, afraid to face them. They were talking quietly when he arrived, but they stopped when they saw him and waited for him to sit down on the rug beside them. Zechariah saw his father’s jaw tighten and his hands squeeze into fists as he waited for Saba to speak.
“Just so I’m clear, Berekiah,” his grandfather began, “you said you plan to return to Jerusalem at a later time—just not with this first group?”
“I have small children to consider.”
“So if you are coming at a later time, why not let Zechariah come with Dinah and me now?”
Zechariah’s stomach plummeted as if he’d fallen down a deep well. Go with Saba on the long journey to Jerusalem? Without his mother and father? He couldn’t speak. Abba appeared stunned as well, as he groped for words. “He . . . he’s my oldest son. My firstborn. He belongs here with me. His mother and I would grieve if he moved so far away from us.”
“Exactly! And that’s how your mother and I feel at the thought of being separated from you—our firstborn son.”
“I know, I know, but—”
“And if you’re coming soon,” Saba continued, “you’ll only have a short time to miss Zechariah. Let him be among the first to return, to be part of this new exodus. You’ll be reunited with him when you come with the rest of your family, no?”
Zechariah’s father groaned. He stared down at the rug, holding his head in his hands. “I know what you’re trying to do, Abba, and I don’t want to argue about this anymore. I’m tired of arguing.” He lifted his head again as he rose to his feet. “Come on, Zaki.” Zechariah stood and was about to walk away with Abba when Saba stopped them.
“Why not let Zechariah decide for himself if he wants to stay or go? He’ll be an adult in one week, a Son of the Commandments. He’ll be responsible for following God himself from now on, so a decision as important as this one should be his to make.”
Abba reached for Zechariah and pulled him close as if he’d been about to fall off the roof and it was up to Abba to save him. “Don’t put my son in the middle of this. He can’t make a decision as difficult as this one.”
“Why not? I allowed you to decide important matters once you became of age, remember? You decided you didn’t want to come to prayers with me anymore. I tried to change your mind, but you said it was your decision to make, not mine, and so—”
“Stop it,” Abba pleaded. “Just stop!”
Zechariah longed to run back to the canal and hide until all of this was over, but Abba clung to him.
“No, I won’t stop,” Saba said. “Is what we’re telling Zechariah about his bar mitzvah true or isn’t it? If he’s truly of age and responsible for following God on his own, then he should be allowed to decide for himself whether he wants to return to Jerusalem or stay here in Babylon.”
Abba looked down at Zechariah, ran his hand over his head, stroking his hair. Then he looked at Saba again. “Listen, I understand how hard it must be for you and Mama to leave all of us behind, I truly do. But—”
“Don’t change the subject. Your son is old enough to decide for himself. Do you want him to resent you when he’s older because you made this decision for him? That’s the choice I had to face, you know. If I forced you and your brother to come to prayers with me every day, you would have seethed with resentment.”
Zechariah watched his father’s face as he struggled to reply. Then he saw defeat in Abba’s eyes before he closed them and lifted his hands in surrender. “You win,” he said. “Zechariah is old enough to decide if he wants to stay or go.” He gave Zechariah a gentle shove toward his grandfather and walked away from both of them, hurrying down the stairs. Zechariah started to follow, but his grandfather stopped him.
“Wait, Zechariah. Listen to me.” Zechariah’s stomach twisted as he looked at his grandfather. “You have a calling to be a man of God. To serve as His priest. Your father and your uncle do, too. Your life will be without meaning if you don’t follow that calling. Do you understand that?”
“Yes, Saba.” The knowledge terrified him. The God who had worked a miracle at Passover, who was working the miracle of a second exodus, was calling Zechariah to serve Him.
“You must choose for yourself,” his grandfather continued. “And you mustn’t let either your father or me sway you. Do you understand?”
He couldn’t reply. How did adults make up their minds? How did Saba decide it was right to go and Abba that it was right to stay? And even if Zechariah did choose, how would he know if he was making the right choice or a mistake, as Saba insisted that Abba was doing? He thought of Yael and her fortune-tellers, searching the stars, seeking omens to glimpse the future, and for a moment Zechariah thought he understood why people went to seers and used sorcery.
“I don’t know how to decide,” he finally said.
“Ask God for guidance. From now until the day we leave, every morning when you pray, every time you go to the house of assembly with me, ask the Holy One to show you what He wants you to do. Then listen for His voice.”
“Will I hear Him talking to me?”
“He has many ways to answer us besides a voice that we can hear. Sometimes the answers come in dreams, but most often the answers we seek are found in His Word.”
It seemed impossible to Zechariah. His parents and grandparents had been deciding for him all his life. He nodded to Saba and went downstairs, wondering how he could ever make such an important decision.
Chapter
8
Zechariah sat cross-legged beside his study partner in the house of assembly, staring at the scroll as his partner read aloud from Genesis. Zaki heard none of it. They were supposed to be studying this weekly portion from the Torah so they could discuss it with the rebbe later today—and the rebbe was notorious for asking difficult questions. Zechariah had to be prepared. Yet he couldn’t seem to concentrate. The buzz of droning voices sounded like a beehive. He looked up at the room full of yeshiva students with their faces bent over their scrolls in concentration and saw only the tops of their heads, covered by the dark circles of their kippahs.
He watched an older boy stroke his chin and the stubble of his newly grown beard. A younger boy played with the fringe on the corner of his garment, twirling the tassels around his finger. All of the students seemed intent on their work. None of these students, he guessed, wrestled with a decision as impossible as the one he wrestled with.
“Zechariah . . . Zechariah!” His study partner elbowed him in the ribs. How long had he been calling his name?
“Huh? . . . Sorry . . .”
“What’s wrong with you today? You were a long way from here—and not even pretending to listen to this Torah passage.”
“What kind of dreams?”
They were nothing like Saba’s nightmares, but they still alarmed and confused Zechariah. “I don’t know . . . galloping horses and Torah scrolls that fly through the air like birds. Last night I dreamed about workmen measuring the foundations of Jerusalem as they got ready to build.” And one dream that he didn’t want to share had been about Yael. She was lost, and he’d searched everywhere for her only to discover that the Babylonian sorceress had hidden her inside a large storage basket. He awoke from these dreams drenched with sweat, wondering what they meant. If God had sent them as signs or as an answer to his dilemma, Zechariah had no idea how to interpret them.
“Well, we’d better finish studying this passage, or the rebbe will give us both nightmares. He always seems to know when we aren’t prepared.”
Zechariah bent over the scroll again, forcing himself to concentrate. Every morning and evening when he’d gone to the house of assembly to pray with his grandfather, Zechariah asked the Holy One whether he should stay in Babylon or go to Jerusalem. Nothing ever happened. No voice called down to him from the clouds, no answer leapt off the page of the Torah, no burning bushes appeared. And every day as the time of departure drew closer, Zechariah felt more and more pressure to choose.
This was too hard, he decided as he looked around at the other students again. How could he concentrate on his studies? Tomorrow was his bar mitzvah. He would go up to read the Torah for the first time, and from that day forward he would be considered a man in the Almighty One’s sight. He would have to make difficult decisions like this for the rest of his life. Was it always going to be this hard?
Somehow, Zechariah got through the rest of his studies that morning. Thankfully, the rebbe called on every student but him that afternoon, as if aware that Zechariah’s mind was elsewhere on the day before his bar mitzvah.
“So, Zechariah. Have you decided what you will do?” his grandfather asked as they walked home from prayers later that evening. It was the first time that Saba had mentioned the decision since telling him he had a choice a week ago. Abba hadn’t asked him about it either, but Zechariah had caught his parents gazing at him as they ate together as if he were a stranger.
“No,” he told his grandfather. “My heart says to stay here with my parents.”
“You are a man now, not a child.”
“Even so . . .” Zechariah’s eyes filled with tears at the thought of never feeling his mother’s arms around him again or seeing Abba smile at him in pride. “How will I know for sure if the Holy One is speaking to me?”
“His answer will be unmistakable. In the meantime, you can’t trust your emotions if you want to do what God is telling you to do.”
They walked side by side in silence the rest of the way, but Saba stopped when they reached home, pausing just outside the gate to their courtyard. “Tomorrow will be a joyful occasion for all of us as we celebrate with you. But you must be careful not to let your parents or me or anyone else pressure you into choosing what they want you to do. It must be what the Holy One tells you to do.”
Zechariah barely slept, tossing on his mat all night. He walked to the house of assembly with his family the next morning with the new prayer shawl they had given him draped around his shoulders. Abba hired musicians with flutes and cymbals and drums to accompany his procession, making music as their neighbors and friends walked with Zaki, clapping and singing. As they crowded inside the house of assembly, Zechariah suddenly felt nervous about reading the Torah for the first time, even though he had practiced and practiced. Everyone in his family, everyone in his community, would be listening.
The leader began with prayer, and while Zechariah waited to be called up to read, he prayed, just as he’d prayed every day, asking the Holy One to show him if he should go to Jerusalem or stay in Babylon with his family. God still didn’t answer him.
At last the moment came. It was time for Zechariah to read. His heart beat faster as he stepped onto the bimah. He watched in a daze as the leader carefully removed the scroll from the ark and laid it out before him, opening it to today’s passage. Zechariah drew a breath and exhaled slowly to calm himself. He looked down at the page, focusing on the tiny Hebrew letters. Then he cleared his throat to read from the first book of the Torah.
“‘The Lord had said to Abram, “Leave your country, your people and your father’s household, and . . .”’” Zechariah paused, hearing the words as if for the first time. He had read this Hebrew passage over and over during the past few months as he’d practiced it. But his daily language was Aramaic, and he had been so intent on learning to read and pronounce the unfamiliar Hebrew words that he hadn’t paid any attention to the meaning of them. Now God’s words to Abraham seemed to pierce him like an arrow.
Leave your father’s household.
He swallowed and drew a breath to continue. “‘“And go to the land I will show you. . . .”’” The room shrank until it seemed as though all of the other people had vanished. A bright light, shining like a hundred torches, illuminated the page. It was so bright it made his eyes hurt. He put the pointer under the words to keep from losing his place.
“‘“I will make you into a great nation and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing. . . .”’”
Could this be the answer Zechariah had prayed for? Leave your father’s household. The assigned Torah portion for this day had been scheduled long before Zechariah was born, long before King Cyrus gave his proclamation to return to the Promised Land. Zechariah cleared his throat again.
“‘So Abram left, as the Lord had told him. . . . ’” As Zechariah continued to read the passage, every word, every letter shimmered on the page like sunlight rippling on the waves of the canal. This was much more than a trick of lighting or the slant of the glowing sun, because along with the light, Zechariah also sensed a Presence beside him, surrounding him, loving him. He knew without knowing how that it was the Presence of the Almighty One. And Zechariah never wanted Him to leave his side.
Somehow he kept reading. The golden warmth that filled the page and surrounded Zechariah seemed to consume him, filling him with joy. This was what it was like to be in the presence of God, the God of his ancestors. This was the Presence that had once filled the temple. And the Holy One was speaking to him—to him! God was calling him to leave Babylon and follow Him.
Zechariah must return to the Promised Land. And to God.
He closed the Torah scroll and looked up. Everyone in the room was looking at him, smiling at him. He should feel proud of the job he had done. He had read perfectly. But God’s presence had vanished along with the light, and now he felt terrified.
Saba hugged him tightly after the service, and Zechariah could tell he was proud. “That was perfect, son. Perfect.” The musicians played their joyful music again as Zechariah walked home for the celebration. But he wondered if the day really had begun or if he was still in bed, still dreaming. When his mother took his face in her hands and kissed both of his cheeks, he nearly changed his mind. How could he ever bear to kiss her good-bye? How could the Holy One expect him to? He thought of Abraham and Sarah and remembered that they had left their families behind, too.
Everyone gathered to eat the feast that his mother and grandmother had prepared, but Zechariah wandered away from the food-laden table without an appetite. He stood looking through the gate, wishing he could gallop far away on one of the horses from his dreams and never tell anyone about what had happened when he’d read from the Torah. After a few moments, he felt a hand on his shoulder.
“What’s wrong?” Abba asked. “You did very well. You read every word perfectly. Why aren’t you celebrating?”
What could he say? How could he describe what he had experienced in the assembly hall that morning? It would be like trying to describe a dream, and they always slipped through your grasp when you
tried to put them into words.
“Zechariah, what’s the matter?” Abba asked again. He lifted Zechariah’s chin until he was looking up into his father’s eyes.
“Saba told me to pray and ask the Holy One whether He wanted me to stay here with you and Mama or go to Jerusalem. So I did that. I’ve been praying and praying every day and . . .” He was afraid to say the words out loud, afraid they would sound silly. But he was even more afraid of their permanence.
“Tell me, son.”
“The Holy One said, ‘Leave your father’s household—’”
“Wait . . . You mean the Torah passage you just read?”
Zechariah nodded. “I think . . . I think the Holy One wants me to go to Jerusalem. To the land He promised to Abraham’s offspring—to us.” He saw emotion twist his father’s face, as if he was fighting tears. Abba gave his shoulder a hard squeeze and hurried away.
Zechariah shivered at the enormity of what had happened this morning. The God of Abraham and Moses had spoken to him through the words of the Torah. Those sacred scrolls weren’t mere stories of the dusty past for old men to read, but the living Word of God. The Almighty One was real, and He was inviting Zechariah to walk with Him in faith the way Abraham had, the way Moses had.
He closed his eyes for a moment, longing to pray for strength, for guidance, longing to feel God’s presence again, but he didn’t know how to pray to the Almighty One outside of the house of assembly. He opened his eyes again and gazed around at the gathered crowd, eating, laughing, balancing plates of food in their hands. Some of them would be going to Jerusalem. Others had decided to stay here. He thought of Yael and realized that now, more than ever, he had to convince her not to run away with Parthia and be a seer and adopt Babylonian ways. He wanted her to go with him and follow God. They would go together.
Zechariah wove his way through the courtyard, dodging around all of the adults, searching for her. He found Yael sitting with his younger sisters and cousins, eating the sweet treats that Safta had made, giggling with them. She was just a child, he realized, like he had been yesterday. Today he was an adult, and he felt responsible for her. He reached for her hand and pulled her to her feet. “Come with me, Yael. I have to tell you something.”