Something banged the metal case, loud and hard, knocking it from Sharon’s hand. There was a big dent in it. Another crash came, shattering splinters of rock like shrapnel, making a big white mark of impact at the bedrock outside the tomb door.
Sharon reached for her case. Jim suddenly felt a sharp pain in his upper back. Something hit him there. Something hit the case again. Rocks. People were throwing rocks from above. They were being stoned.
He stumbled out to Sharon, and got her back into the cave, covering her body with his. She wanted to get her case, but he wouldn’t let her. The rocks could kill them, coming down three stories like that, especially if they were being thrown with force.
One bounced harmlessly off the black case, and he pulled that back into the tomb. They were pinned down there by an artillery of rocks.
He saw the lower ladder jiggle at its base. Someone was descending. He reached for the metal case. A rock cracked close, sending hard limestone fragments into his palm, wounding it.
Yelling came from above. It sounded like Yiddish.
“What are you doing? What are you doing?” he yelled in Hebrew.
But there was no answer in a language he understood.
“What are they yelling?” asked Jim.
“I don’t know.”
“That’s Yiddish, right?”
“I think so. I don’t know.”
“Great, a Jew who doesn’t speak Yiddish.”
“What do I need Yiddish for? My parents spoke Farsi. Persian’s my first language. Hebrew is my next, and third is Arabic …”
“Shh. We don’t have time.”
A black shoe encased in black tight wrappings appeared, followed by billowing black pants. It had to be the ultra-Orthodox. When the man was at dig level Jim lunged for the case. He felt a blow as the man fell on him. Then another man had his arm, and another had another arm. They were attacking the dig in force. Sharon was out of the cave, screaming. The case was wrenched from beneath Jim, like a log powered by a Roman sling. Jim heard Sharon yelling. Something was ripping. Jim got an arm free. Then another arm. Then his leg was free. They were running. Sharon was ripping her own blouse. The ultra-Orthodox were fleeing her bare breasts.
“Animals,” she yelled at them in Hebrew. “Superstitious animals.”
Jim got to the last ultra-Orthodox with a good punch in his back. But the case was already on top of the first level with the first one.
It was a useless, futile punch of helplessness. Another rock came down, and Jim got Sharon back into the cave, while under the cover of the rocks, the black-coated men made their escape. Jim took off his own shirt to cover Sharon, who was crying in uncontrollable anger. He had come to Jerusalem on a holy mission for his Pope and now he was punching rabbis.
“Animals. Animals. Animals,” she sobbed.
“They must have heard those rumors about bodies being here,” said Jim.
“They’re from Mea Shearim, where the animals live.”
“We’ve got to get the disk back,” said Jim. And then he felt the cuts on his forehead and the pain in his back and noticed how fragments of limestone were still imbedded in his palm.
Sharon tended to him, and he felt her tears on his palm, and the salt stung, but it was warm and good, and his own shirt opened, and he noticed how perfectly formed her shadowed breasts were, how the nipples darkened at the end, where gold became dark brown. And he thought he should tell her to close the shirt he had given her, but he did not want her to stop tending his palm, so he said nothing, and even as he looked at her exposed breast, he told himself he could easily avert his eyes if he had to.
Mendel Hirsch was reviewing the month-long Christmas schedule. At shortly after noon on the twenty-fourth, His Beatitude, the Latin Patriarch, accompanied by clergy, was to leave the Latin Patriarchate in Jerusalem for the square opposite the Citadel in the Jaffa Gate, where they were to collect their cars for the procession to Bethlehem. Fifteen minutes later the Armenians were scheduled to ring the bells of their churches. By 1:15 P.M. His Beatitude had to be through the small ceremony at Rachel’s tomb on the way to Bethlehem, and be at Manger Square no later, absolutely no later, than 2:15 P.M.
At 12:45, simultaneously with the Armenian bells, the Greek Orthodox in Bethlehem were to place their icons in the grotto of the Nativity and ring their bells.
If anything went wrong with the first processions on the day before Christmas, disaster would be reaped at the midnight Pontifical High Mass and could foul up everything right through Epiphany. The meaning of Christmas was quite clear to Mendel Hirsch, as it had been to Jordanian, Briton, and Turk before him. Timing. And it was this timing that had to be so well coordinated, because if it weren’t, the Greek Orthodox dragoman might be banging head on into His Beatitude, the Latin Patriarch, to say nothing of the Copts and the Syrian Church. And this disaster would go on right through late January.
Suddenly his phone was ringing. The municipal police, which had been told to keep a casual eye on the dig at Haneviim Street, had some bad news.
An ultra-Orthodox sect had set upon the archaeologist in the dig, apparently causing minor harm, from eyewitness accounts, and the archaeologists had gone looking for the group in Mea Shearim itself.
What should the police do? They were not allowed to do anything in relationship to the dig without clearing it with Mendel’s office first.
“You have done everything, now stay out. Thank you,” said Mendel, and immediately looked up a number without an explanation beside it in a little pad in the top drawer of his desk.
“There has been some trouble at the dig,” said Mendel. “We need the help we discussed … No. I do not know exactly what happened, but there has been some physical violence to Pesci’s man.”
Within fifteen minutes two carloads of very dark young men had pulled into the courtyard outside Mendel’s office. They were from the Mossad, and, as planned, they were Yemeni.
It was important that an Ashkenazi, who would be familiar with Christianity, not be used. They had to be Sephardi but, as Mendel had specifically requested, not Moroccans. Moroccans, he felt, were animals. Prone to violence, lazy, irresponsible, and generally untrustworthy.
Yemeni, on the other hand, were intelligent, honest, and reluctant to go for their guns, and, most important, very effective.
Mendel and the Mossad men got to Mea Shearim within four minutes, and quickly found Father Folan and Sharon Golban wandering around the quarter trying to question passersby, looking for their attackers.
Father Folan had a cut on his forehead. His hand was bandaged. He moved his left arm with pain, occasionally rubbing the back of his right thigh.
Mendel sent two Yemeni Mossad to get Father Folan and Sharon into the car.
Jim was startled to see a black man touch him on the arm in the middle of Mea Shearim. Only when they addressed him in Hebrew did he realize these young men in winter jackets and dungarees were Israelis. He was also carrying a concealed weapon under the jacket. Jim saw a bit of the shoulder holster.
Then Jim saw the car.
“It’s Mendel,” he said.
“We’ll get those animals now,” said Sharon.
Mendel wanted to know what had happened, and Sharon poured out a story of barbarism. Jim interrupted.
“They took the disk. We were removing the disk and the body from the tomb, and they attacked us with rocks from above. They got the disk. We have to get it back.”
“Animals,” said Sharon.
“We know the group. They are the troublemakers who follow the Reb Nechtal,” said Mendel. “We know where they live around here.”
“We can get the disk, do you think?” said Jim.
“And throw them in jail,” said Sharon.
“If they attacked you, yes. I guess,” said Mendel.
“No,” said Jim. “I don’t want a trial.”
“If I may intrude,” said the Mossad man from the front seat, in Hebrew, “I think we ought to establish what we want befo
re we enter the home of the Reb Nechtal.”
“I want the disk,” said Jim. “We’ve got to have it back.”
“The disk,” said Mendel.
“And we do not want a court trial or anything else that would entail publicity, I take it.”
“Correct,” said Mendel.
“Then, I would suggest we not let them know that. We should make this appear like a police raid on them.”
“Isn’t it?” said Sharon.
“Not if we are as vulnerable as they are, and they have something we want,” said the Yemeni officer.
“What is it, then?” said Sharon.
“It’s a negotiation,” said Jim somberly.
“Do you think you can reason with animals?” asked Sharon. Jim was struck by the neatness of this quarter. The buildings were very plain, with little, hidden courtyards, and before one entered the quarter one saw many signs admonishing modest dress.
The Reb Nechtal’s home was on Avraham Mislonim Street. The Yemeni officer knocked on the door, announcing himself as a policeman. But there was no answer. A crowd of ultra-Orthodox men in black hats and black pantaloons began massing at both ends of the street.
“Mendel, I think you should talk,” said Jim. “They are not going to talk in Hebrew, and that officer doesn’t know Yiddish.”
“Right,” said Mendel.
“Not talk in Hebrew, where the hell do they think they are? Some Polish ghetto?” said Sharon. Mendel glanced at Sharon with a fast frown.
“Not you,” said Sharon to Mendel.
The Yemeni officer had extra kepahs in his jacket, little cookie-sized head coverings, to be clipped on to the back of a man’s head so that, according to the Talmud, the head would be covered before God. A handkerchief was procured for Sharon.
A woman opened the door. She was elderly, and wore an ornamental kerchief.
A dark-haired man in his mid-thirties, with a ferocious-looking beard, stood behind her. He and Mendel spoke in Yiddish.
Jim tried to make out what was being said, but couldn’t. The street was filling up, both sides massing with men and boys in dark coats and dark hats.
The Yemeni officer very casually, and smiling pleasantly, went back to the car, and just as casually had the driver move a microphone over beneath the window, where he radioed his contact in the Jerusalem police.
At that moment three special units of the Jerusalem municipal police positioned themselves just outside Mea Shearim, and waited.
Jim looked around. Indeed, this probably was like a Polish ghetto, which was right. The Jews, like the Christians, had gone out to the four corners of the world and, like the Christians, had returned as many peoples with many different customs. A Polish ghetto was as valid a religious trapping as Latin for the Mass. Everything seemed to come home to Jerusalem.
Mendel returned. He had been speaking to Zalman, the Reb Nechtal’s assistant. He and Jim could enter, but the unclean woman could not.
“That shit,” said Sharon.
“He says you exposed yourself or something. In any case, he will not allow you in the Reb Nechtal’s house.”
“I think Sharon should be with us. She is the ranking archaeologist,” said Jim.
“What do animals care about archaeologists? They operate on smell, not credentials.”
“Ask Zalman who has authority here for his group,” said Jim.
“It’s the Reb Nechtal,” said Mendel. “They follow him in everything in their lives, they look to him.”
“Is he called an authority unto himself?” asked Jim.
“You mean Fascist,” said Sharon.
“No. No,” said Jim. “Every rabbi has to quote the Talmud as his authority. These men are so respected that it is assumed they have the Talmud within them.”
“They can make up whatever they want, then?” said Sharon.
“No. No. It’s exactly the opposite,” said Jim. “They have studied the Talmud so impeccably that no one would assume they would make up anything. But, if there is something new, which is unlikely, they are so respected that they are considered equal to those rabbis quoted in the Talmud.”
“So I should ask Zalman if the Reb Nechtal is one of those,” said Mendel.
“And say we ask an audience with him, that we have a dispute and that we would like to resolve it. Don’t get into whose law we are going to resolve it through, just stress ‘resolve.’ A dispute to be resolved, resolution.”
“What makes you think that will work?” said Mendel. “I ask because we have some clout. We can cut off their garbage collection, and we’ve done that, and generally squeeze them. They do respond to that at times.”
“They must know that. And it will help the reasoning process,” said Jim.
“Reasoning is not what they do,” said Sharon. “They wouldn’t be that way if they had any reasoning at all.”
“It’s all reasoning,” said Jim.
He watched Mendel approach Zalman, who looked at Jim suspiciously. With an abrupt movement, Zalman beckoned Jim and Mendel to enter. Jim and Mendel followed Zalman through a small courtyard, and into a large room that looked like a library, with a balcony all around. There were books on shelves all the way up to the balcony, where even now young men and old were coming to stand and look down.
In a corner, behind a large wooden desk, was the object of this reverence and attention, a white-bearded old man in a skullcap, with parchment flesh, and light-blue eyes. He did not look up, nor did he move, but seemed to contemplate his frail hands. Zalman took an honored place to his right.
Neither Mendel nor Jim was to address the Reb Nechtal, it was understood. There were chairs brought by young students for Jim and Mendel.
It was too late now to review his Talmudic logic, but even if he had had months it might not help. So complex and deep was the study of Jewish law that the Gospels themselves considered it worthy of mention that Jesus, before manhood, had discussed law with the elders. For Jews of the time, it was considered virtually a miracle, definitely a sign.
Word came back from Zalman that the Reb Nechtal indeed was one of those who was an authority unto himself. No matter, thought Jim, even an ordinary rabbi would have to be more learned than Jim in this matter. It required a lifetime.
The Talmud was both laws and commentaries on the laws growing since Moses came down from Mount Sinai with the Ten Commandments.
Books were only the written portions of the Talmud. Jim remembered his teacher saying many contended the Talmud had no beginning or end. No end because as man studied the Talmud it grew with the men themselves. No beginning because every written book of the Talmud referred to a previous book including the first.
The Reb Nechtal undoubtedly would use the stricter Palestinian Talmud codified in the five decades at the end of the fourth century instead of the later Babylonian.
“Mendel,” said Jim, “thank the Reb Nechtal for letting us appear before him to resolve the dispute,” said Jim.
Mendel repeated in Yiddish to Zalman what Jim had said. Zalman answered:
“He says he would be happy to decide, according to the law, what should be done,” said Mendel to Jim.
“No. Thank him for accepting us into his house and hearing us in his house, in which he has authority,” said Jim, and Mendel did that, and Zalman answered that the law had authority over all of them.
“Nothing greater than the law of God was there”—this, to Jim in English, from Mendel, with Jim sure that Mendel had added the word “God,” because Zalman would never say it,” but use an abbreviation, the name being too holy to pronounce.
“Ask the Reb Nechtal that Sharon be admitted because she is a scientist,” said Jim, and then added that he thought the nature of what they were doing was going to come up, and that Sharon should be there when it did.
To this there was a loud protest. Jim heard a buzzing up on the balcony.
“He says she is unclean because she bared her breasts before men, many men, in a wanton display, and this
is not something to bring before the Reb Nechtal.”
“Say that she did that to save a life, not as a sexual enticement,” said Jim, and Mendel translated that into Yiddish, and returned to Jim with this:
“The law is the law. It was sexual, because that was why they did not stay.”
And Jim answered that that was their interpretation, but it would not necessarily apply to a woman saving a man’s life. “You must be subjective in the interpretation. Not absolute.”
Mendel repeated this. Jim could see a smile crack across the face of Zalman, black beard revealing white teeth. And laughing, he asked, according to Mendel, who is this man who instructs us in the Talmud? Where did he study? Who was his rabbi?
“I think we’d better stick with threatening their garbage. It works better in the summer than the fall, but they’re not certain what is down here on Haneviim Street,” said Mendel.
“Tell them that I am a Gentile, and that I studied at a Gentile school in America,” said Jim.
“Are you sure you want me to say that?” said Mendel.
“Yes,” said Jim, and as soon as the Yiddish came out of Mendel’s mouth there was laughter from the balcony. Even Zalman was laughing. The only one not laughing at Jim was the Reb Nechtal himself. His clear blue eyes now focused on Jim, indicating nothing.
When the laughter abated, Zalman asked, through Mendel, what they taught of the Talmud at this Gentile school? Do they teach you can eat ham, or that you can blaspheme? What do Gentiles teach about Jews?
And Jim remembered his first lecture from the teacher he later met on the plane to Rome, the man whose personal life forbade him to be here on this mission.
“Tell him they teach that the reason why someone does something is important. That the Talmud is not an absolute instrument, but a subjective one that needs man.”
“I think you’d better rethink that,” said Mendel.
“Say it,” said Jim.
Mendel glanced nervously up to the balconies.
“The Talmud is what they live for. I don’t think you understand what it means. Which is understandable, if you understand? You see …” said Mendel. He pressed his hands against the pants legs. He was wiping off perspiration.
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