by Brian Godawa
Barabbas smirked.
“Very funny,” said Demas. “This way.”
By the time they arrived at the Zealot hideout, the waste had dried on them and was cracking off in pieces. They had stolen some horses and arrived shortly before the other brigands.
When the others arrived, they were two men short, with several wounded. “We lost Daniel and Micah,” said the lead brigand.
“Get these men’s wounds dressed,” said Barabbas. The wounded were helped off their horses and brought inside the caves.
Barabbas turned to Demas and Gestas, surrounded by the men. “Well, Demas. What say you now of the cause?”
Demas could not say much. Barabbas had risked his own life to help rescue his brother. Two men of this band of brigands had given their lives in the venture.
“I thank you for your help. But I also know that Gestas was important to the secrecy of your plans and protection.”
“True enough,” said Barabbas. “But where else will you go? Who else will not give you up? You are both too famous to hide in cities.”
Demas cursed himself for the truth of Barabbas’ point. The brothers were both considered insurrectionists regardless of the facts, and they were both under the death sentence of sedition. They would never be able to return to their home. They could never have their lives back. If they tried to hide out in another city, it would only be a matter of time before they were recognized and captured.
They had no choice. They had to join Barabbas.
Demas protested, “We will carry our weight, but we will not kill innocents and we will not rob the rich.”
“I like a man of principle,” said Barabbas. “But I do believe your brother can speak for himself.”
Barabbas looked to Gestas, whose eyes darted back and forth between his brother and this powerful leader.
“I am truly grateful for your rescue of me,” said Gestas. “I owe you my life and allegiance. But I also stand by my brother.”
Barabbas said to them both, “I respect your steadfastness of mind, and I trust you.” He thought for a second, then concluded, “I trust you such, that I will ask you to go on a mission for me. Not as warriors, but as spies.”
The brothers glanced at one another, wondering what they were getting into.
“Some time ago, I sent my closest ally, a man named Simon ben Josiah, to investigate stirrings around upper Galilee. There is an itinerant rabbi they call the Nazarene, who has gained a following. The rumors are that he speaks of a messianic kingdom and the visitation of Yahweh in judgment. I sent Simon to find out if the rumors were true and if this—rabbi—is with us or against us. I never heard from Simon again. It has been months.”
“How do you know something is wrong?” asked Gestas.
“Simon was like a brother to me at Qumran. We left the Community together with one purpose. I owe him my life. And he owes me his.”
Demas looked to Gestas again for agreement. They could communicate without words. “Where did you last hear of him?”
“Capernaum. It’s where the Nazarene had lived for a time.”
“We will find Simon for you,” said Demas. “But first, we need to bathe. We stink like excrement.” The men around laughed.
“Indeed we do,” said Barabbas. “And if the Nazarene is for revolution, perhaps you might persuade him with your happy disposition to join our stinking party.”
The men chuckled again and broke up to care for the camp and take their posts of watch. Gestas took some wine from a fellow bandit to quench his thirst before washing.
Barabbas pulled Demas aside.
“The rumor is this Nazarene shares my name, Jesus.”
Demas nodded.
Barabbas added, “If he is against us and Simon has changed his allegiance, I want you to kill them both.”
Demas looked reluctantly at his new leader.
“I am sure you can understand how serious it would be if your own brother betrayed you.”
Demas would not answer him. What would it take to kill his own brother? What would he do if the only person he had left in all the world turned against him?
“Do not worry, Demas, this rabbi and his followers are not rich—or innocent.”
Chapter 6
Simon ben Josiah could not believe what he had just seen. He had been staying at Simon Peter’s home with Rabbi Jesus and his other disciples, and the Rabbi had just healed Peter’s mother of a fever, when a Roman lord arrived to thank him for healing his servant of paralysis.
It was not the healings that he was astounded by. That was almost a daily occurrence with the Rabbi. Simon had seen epileptics calmed, fevers cooled, and even yesterday, a leper instantly cleansed. It seemed that every time they entered a new town, the Rabbi would cast out a dozen demons riled up by his presence, in addition to the dozens he would heal of sicknesses. This one had been healed remotely, without the Rabbi being in his presence.
It was not this miraculous healing that astonished Simon. It was who he had healed. The lord of the servant was a Roman centurion! Not merely a Gentile, but the armed oppressor of Israel!
Simon had been with Jesus for quite a while now, but the Rabbi was still a mystery to him. Simon had been sent by Barabbas to find out if the Nazarene was a fellow revolutionary, a self-proclaimed messiah, or something else. Simon’s heart had been strangely moved by this stranger and he was still trying to figure him out.
But the Rabbi remained a mystery to him. The centurion had asked him to heal his servant and Jesus replied that he had not seen such great faith in all of Israel. That was shocking enough, to attribute such goodness to a filthy, unclean stranger to the covenant. But then he said that many such people would come to the feast of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven, while the sons of the kingdom—in other words, Israelites—would be thrown into the outer darkness where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth.
As an Essene scribe at Qumran, Simon had spent his whole life in rituals of cleanness and separation. He had spent days with the Pharisees, the Sadducees and even amongst the Essenes themselves debating who were the true Jews of Israel and who were not. The existence of the monk community of Qumran, separated from the rest of Israel on the isolated shore of the Dead Sea, was for this very reason. They had concluded that they alone were the only true remnant of Israel and all the rest were apostate frauds who would be thrown into that outer darkness of wailing and gnashing of teeth.
The Rabbi’s condemnation of Israelites was all too acceptable to Simon. But then, to eat meals with sinners and harlots, to touch the unclean, and to embrace the godless Kittim was incomprehensible to Simon. It was like making the unclean clean and the clean unclean. It was like saying that God would adopt his enemies and disinherit his own children. The opposite of everything Simon had learned.
The centurion and his servant hugged the Rabbi in the presence of all the disciples. The centurion said, “Jesus, I can never repay you.”
Jesus replied, “Your faith is enough. Now, stop extorting money from those beneath you, and be content with your wages.”
Simon wondered, as all the disciples had wondered, that if Jesus was the Messiah long hoped for, why would he not call for this man to lay down his arms or join him in preparation for revolt against Rome? Did not the Scriptures say,
Yahweh said to me, “You are my Son;
today I have begotten you.
Ask of me, and I will make the nations your heritage,
and the ends of the earth your possession.
You shall break them with a rod of iron
and dash them in pieces like a potter’s vessel.
And the scrolls of the Dead Sea Community confirmed a War of the Messiah against the Roman Kittim:
As it was said by Isaiah the Prophet, there shall come forth a shoot from the stump of Jesse the Branch of David,
And they will enter into judgment with the Prince of the Congregation,
But the Branch of David will kill him
&nbs
p; And a Priest of Melchizedek will command the slain of the Kittim.
Simon could not forget the sermon Jesus had proclaimed on the mountain not many days ago. It haunted him. Roman law granted the right for a legionary to force any civilian to carry his supplies for him at least one mile. Rather than countering such an unjust law, Jesus said that they should carry the supplies an extra mile above and beyond their duty. He spoke of loving their enemies and praying for those who persecuted them. Local rabbis scoffed at him as he offended their interpretations of Torah, the Law of Yahweh.
So much of that sermon was offensive to Simon’s own sense of holiness, and yet, there was something so right with this man. Simon was rethinking everything he had been taught in the Community. He was afraid of how the rabbi had affected him. He failed to return to Barabbas or even send a report, because he was drawn more to Jesus than Barabbas. If Jesus should prove to have hidden plans of revolution that opposed Barabbas, he was supposed to kill him. But Simon could never do such a thing. The Rabbi was the incarnation of Shalom, the peace of wholeness that he had sought for all his life. And it seemed to be a wholeness that worked against the division that was fomented by the revolutionaries.
But what was Jesus hiding? If he was Messiah, when would he rise up? Where was his army? He needed more time with him.
“Simon,” said Jesus, breaking Simon’s wandering thoughts.
“Yes, Rabbi?”
“I would like you to meet Gessius and his servant Joram.”
Simon nodded uncomfortably. The centurion smiled.
“This is Simon the Zealot.”
Jesus knew Simon’s Zealot background and used the nickname to tease him.
Then, looking straight at Simon while talking to the Roman, Jesus said, “I think you two have more in common than you think.”
Simon was thrown. What did he mean by that remark? A zealous Jew having anything in common with an aggressive Kittim? All this mixing of clean and unclean, Jew and Gentile confused him to no end.
Gessius spoke up. “I am sorry to say, my lord, that a large crowd has followed us.”
Peter turned from looking out the window. “Oh no, not again,” he complained. “Sometimes these crowds are suffocating.” He looked at Jesus. “You are exhausted, Rabbi. There will be plenty more time tomorrow for you to cleanse and heal.”
“I have an idea,” said Jesus.
Outside Peter’s house, the crowds were indeed suffocating. They filled the streets and back alleys, hundreds of them. Many were sick, looking for healing, others were simply miracle hunters looking for a spectacle. Jews may have disparaged the arena and its games, but they still loved their entertainment like anyone else, and miracles were truly entertaining. As some watched the door, a number of them crying out for help, others watched for any little movement that would indicate Jesus’s presence.
Suddenly, the door of the home opened up, and the twelve disciples exited quickly, as if in a hurry. The whole group of them moved together so fast that people were not sure if they could see Jesus with them or not. But these were all his disciples, so they had to be protecting their master. The crowds followed them, yelling out and begging for healing and attention.
The disciples got down to the shoreline of the city and quickly entered their boat to take them across the lake. It was getting dark, so the people could not see the faces of the men clearly to determine whether or not Jesus was among them.
It was a diversion. Jesus had told his men to cross the Sea of Galilee and he would see them on the other side. While the crowds followed the group of disciples, Jesus stayed behind and snuck out of the house alone.
By the time the disciples cast off into the waters, the crowd had already begun to disperse back to their homes for the night. Their entertainment had left them.
Some of the children stayed to watch the boat glide away on the water as the sun was setting behind them. Calls for dinner drew them all back to their homes, except for one curious little eight-year old girl, Anna, who noticed something in the water. There was a swirling movement like that of a large fish just beneath the surface. It approached the land where she stood transfixed.
She drew her breath in a hush as she saw a large creature rise from the water. It looked human and female, but it was almost twice as big as any woman she ever saw. She was naked and her battle-maiden body glistened like bronze from the water. Was this a Shining One that she had heard of in her bedtime stories?
She wasn’t afraid. She was mesmerized. She forgot to breathe.
The being saw her and tread the sand right up to her with a graceful smoothness that made her feel safe. She noticed the being’s eyes were like that of a serpent, thin pupils in lapis lazuli blue eyes. Anna’s head tilted skyward to look up at the charming shining woman that towered over her as a goddess.
Asherah reached down, placed her hand over the little girl’s mouth, and snapped her neck.
She had just finished marking her enchantment spells in the bottom of the sea as a means to draw forth Leviathan, and she needed a human sacrifice to complete the ritual. A child was perfect. Innocent blood carried more weight in the world of spirit. Molech would have been happy for such opportunity. If he were here now, he would have asked for the remains so he could engage in his despicable acts with the corpse.
She had to hurry. She had little time.
• • • • •
Thunder rumbled in the night sky above the fishing boat that carried the twelve disciples across the Sea of Galilee. Lightning cracked. Simon could see one of the disciples leaned over the boat’s side, retching into the waters in the pelting rain. Obviously not one of the fishermen. Earlier, the wind had whipped up as if from nowhere into a tempest that hindered their journey across the huge lake.
They had taken down the sail before it ripped off the mast. Now, everyone’s attention focused on keeping the boat from capsizing. Water was filling the boat. Several tried desperately to bail it out.
Another lightning bolt lit up the sky. Someone screamed, “A phantom!”
Everyone turned to see a human figure walking toward the boat on the surface of the water about a hundred feet out. Who else but phantoms of dead ones could do such a thing?
Simon, however, had looked down when the lightning flashed and saw something below the boat that captured his attention. It looked like the scaled back of a huge fish a couple feet down into the murky water. But a second flash illuminated several heads stretching out on several necks.
Leviathan the sea dragon.
He had read about this monster in the Scriptures and in other ancient manuscripts from the Qumran library. It was the unstoppable monster of chaos. No human harpoon could pierce its hide. Leviathan was there when the Sons of God sang over creation. It was at the War of Gods and Men before the Flood. It was there at the Red Sea when Pharaoh attacked the Israelites. On earth there was not its like, a creature without fear. It was the king over all the sons of pride.
And right now, it was a couple feet below the waves, ready to rise up and crush their boat into splinters.
But it didn’t. It didn’t seem to swim or move. It was as if the sea dragon had been hypnotized into stillness. Then Simon could see it was Jesus who was walking upon its back, mere inches below the water.
That is when Simon heard the voice of Jesus calling to them from the water. “Take heart! It is me. Do not be afraid!”
The storm was subsiding and the waves had lessened. The rain became a drizzle.
Peter blurted out, “Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water.”
Simon knew Peter was gutsy, but he was also a bit thoughtless. He obviously had not seen what was lurking in the dark waters.
Simon watched as Peter stepped out of the boat and onto the water. His eyes were fixed on Jesus, so he did not see the creature that he was walking upon below his feet in the darkness. Nobody did, except Simon.
The dragon was so huge that he must have created a walkway for Jesus to approac
h the boat. Did he ride the creature to this location as one would a trained pack animal? Simon saw Peter look down and when he did, he began to sink in the water, but then Jesus held out his hand, Peter grabbed it, and he rose back up.
The two of them walked back to the boat and got inside it.
As soon as they did, the wind stopped, the rains ceased, and Simon could see that the sea dragon was gone. How could he explain to the others what he knew? They had seen the miracles that Jesus performed. But would they be able to handle a vision into the spiritual reality he just experienced?
It became clear to Simon what had just happened. Jesus had shown mastery not merely over the storm, as Ba’al might, but over the forces of chaos. He tamed the untamable Leviathan. He walked upon its back as would a conqueror upon the neck of his defeated foe. When Yahweh had divided the Red Sea in the exodus, he crushed the heads of Leviathan. He pushed back the chaos of the waters to establish his covenantal order with Moses and the people of Israel. He created order out of the disorder of the cosmos, like creating the heavens and the earth. What was this amazing event but a sign of Jesus’s power to vanquish the chaos and establish a new covenantal order, a new heavens and earth? This rabbi was no mere human Messiah, he was a god-man.
Chapter 7
After the disciples had crossed the Sea of Galilee, they stayed near the town of Gergesa of the Gadarenes. The next day, some of the townspeople led Jesus and his followers up to a cliff where the tombs of the area lay. Graveyards were locations that caused uncleanness because of the corpses and death. To Simon, it was yet another violation of his heritage of ritual separation so necessary to holiness. To make matters worse, this area was part of Bashan, the place of the Serpent, the old kingdom of Og, last of the Rephaim. It had too many dark connections in his mind to allow him any peace of mind.
As they neared the tomb area just above the cliff wall, they passed a pig herder leading a herd of swine. The herder was a Jew who seemed ashamed when he saw Jesus. Simon knew it was because Jews were forbidden pork in their diet, so a Jew herding pigs was a particularly shameful act against their Torah.