by Alan Gold
For fifty years the Jews lived by the waters of the two rivers, the Euphrates and the Tigris, which were the lifeblood of the Empire of Mesopotamia, and which made it one of the most fertile areas of the world. Some of the Hebrews remained faithful to their religion and their god; others eased into the comforts and wealth of Babylon and began to worship stone and wooden idols.
And it was an easy life, even for the Hebrews. Apart from dates, which grew everywhere and provided the people with food, wood, and fodder for their cattle, the Jews luxuriated in plentiful supplies of wheat, barley, lentils, onions, and leeks. Wherever they walked in the land between the two rivers, there were grapes and olives and figs. Spices and fruits grew everywhere, and medicines made from the herbs became readily available to the poor as well as the rich.
It was a land of plenty, unlike the harshness of Jerusalem and much of Israel, which was dry and often barren. And so, because they were exiles far from their land, as one generation succeeded another, the love of Jerusalem and the worship of Yahweh dimmed, generation after generation.
Few who were born in Babylon looked to the south where the land of Israel lay; fewer still had any desire to go there. Only a handful of older ones who did remember Israel yearned for the land, and they wrote psalms and songs to the distant glories of Jerusalem, but their yearnings fell on deaf ears.
Certainly few remembered Ahimaaz, the man who was once high priest. The descendants of those Israelites who sat beside the languid waters of the rivers of Babylon may have known his name, as they knew the names of Moses and Aaron, Joshua and David, but to them these were figures in the history of their people, as remote and invisible as God Himself.
Neither did the exiles in Babylon remember Ahimaaz’s colleague, the much lesser figure of Gamaliel, son of Terah of the tribe of Manasseh, who had collected taxes so that King Solomon could build his temple. For unlike the descendants of Ahimaaz, who handed the mantle of priest down the generations, the offspring of Gamaliel failed to make a mark on the people; and as one generation succeeded the next, they changed their occupations from tax gatherers to merchants to landlords to financiers of caravans carrying goods from place to place, and now were counselors to the rulers of Babylon.
All was well with Babylon and the Children of Israel, until the appearance beyond the horizon of Cyrus, king of Persia. In the few years since the people of Babylon first heard his name, Cyrus the Great had conquered the lands of foreign kings and was now marching toward their city. The people were gripped by panic.
And the exiles from Israel, having long experience of fighting would-be conquerors, were more afraid than most. The Israelites held Nebuchadnezzar’s successors in low regard, and now that King Nabu-na’id had usurped the throne and was ruling with his son Belshazzar, things had gone from bad to worse. Learning of the rise of Cyrus, Nabu-na’id tried to make an alliance with the pharaoh Amasis II of Egypt and had even approached King Croesus of Lydia, but they’d rebuffed him, and so, like a spoiled child, he’d amused himself with things inside the city and paid no attention to the outside world. King Nabu-na’id spent all his time building temples and improving Nebuchadnezzar’s hanging gardens, waterways, and parks, and had no interest in defending the nation against the rise of the Persian Cyrus the Great, for his ministers had assured him that there was food for years within the city, and the walls were impregnable.
But the conquest of the impregnable walls of Babylon proved to be so simple, it came close to engendering respect among those captured. Not a stone from a catapult hit the wall, not a spear was thrown nor an arrow loosed. Indeed, until the Persians were inside the walls of the city, nobody in Babylon was aware of their capture by the Persians.
Arrogantly celebrating a feast day of their god Marduk, and all but a few guards watching what was happening in Cyrus’s encampment outside the walls, the people of Babylon were rejoicing while Cyrus’s engineers executed one of the most brilliant plans in military history. It was audacious—many thought it impossible—yet it happened, and with a minimum of deaths the city fell without a fight.
THE RIVER EUPHRATES RAN underneath the walls of the city, but massive iron girders had been constructed at the base of the walls and deep into the river. Some youths had died trying, but it was now recognized that nobody could hold his breath long enough to swim under the iron girders. So when he knew that the city was celebrating a religious festival, Cyrus ordered the vast river to be diverted. Huge blocks of stone were built into a wall in the river’s path, and the flow diverted away from the city. The water stopped flowing through Babylon and was sidetracked into the desert, where it flooded the ancient sands. The level of the river quickly fell, and a small detachment of men was able to walk chest-high through the water until they were inside the wall, where they fought a troop of guards and opened the massive Ishtar Gate. Cyrus’s troops swarmed into the city and took possession while men and women slept soundly, confident they were safe from invasion.
The following day, after his surrender, a shocked King Nabuna’id assembled with his family on the top of the ziggurat of the Temple of Etemenanki in the middle of Babylon to await the arrival of King Cyrus and the certainty of torture and execution. The entire citizenry also assembled, and all the streets leading to the capital were bursting with terrified men, women, and children wailing and praying, waiting to hear their fate. Would they be enslaved? Raped? Murdered?
Arriving on his golden chariot, King Cyrus walked up to the top of the ziggurat in the unusual silence. Even the birds of the city were quiet. The citizens as well as slaves and prisoners held their breath as he began to speak, and were astounded to hear him begin by blessing their god, Marduk. Then he blessed the people in the name of Marduk. Then he said, “Hear me, people of Babylon. Only a fool would destroy a city of this beauty, one of wealth and one producing such an abundance of food.
“I say to all the slaves gathered before me that you will be free men and women as of this day. I will allow you to remain in Babylon should you wish it, and you will live here as freedmen and -women, or you can return to your homelands. I am told that there are 150,000 Jews in exile in Babylon. You are allowed to return to Israel, where you will rebuild Jerusalem and pay me and my heirs a tribute for my protection. There is no reason to allow Israel to remain barren and unproductive, earning me no tribute, while you Israelites are living in Babylon. Return home, rebuild your nation, and all will benefit.”
Hearing these words, words that had never previously been spoken by any conqueror in history, the people rejoiced with cheers and screams and praise.
Less than two weeks later, a column of Jews, stretching from the east to the horizon on the northwest, trudged slowly westward out of Babylon toward Damascus. They could have walked directly south toward Jerusalem, but the roads were full of bandits, and the Damascus road to the west was guarded by soldiers and was well used by merchants. It was safer to travel by the western route and then south down the coast. Once they were level with Jerusalem, it was an easy road from the sea, up the rugged hills, to the City of God.
Once they reached Damascus and replenished their supplies, the Jews had two choices. They might travel farther westward toward the coast of the Great Sea and the cities of Tyre and Sidon before heading south to follow the sweep of the land toward Israel and then up the hills to the ruined city of Jerusalem. Or they could walk the route in the hills of the King’s Highway and from Damascus they could reach Hazor and then Shechem before climbing to Jerusalem. Joshua, descendant of Ahimaaz and leader of the Jewish people, told his Council of Elders that they should take the advice of travelers and merchants in the marketplaces of Damascus before deciding. Much depended both on what the weather had done to the roads and whether brigands and bandits were active in the areas.
Some of the community rode out of Babylon on wagons, some on horses, some on donkeys and asses and mules, but most walked. Fathers carried young children on their weary shoulders; mothers hefted heavy sacks full of whatever possessions
they could carry. Most of those who had decided to leave Babylon were exultant to be returning to the land that they remembered from stories told to them by their parents and grandparents, or from the sermons they heard in the synagogues; yet others, despite wearing a broad smile on their faces, were wary of the difficulties that lay ahead, both on the road and when they reached the ruined city of Jerusalem.
It was the tenth day since the gates of Babylon had opened and the Jews had walked slowly, majestically, out of the city as a free people, their heads held high, westward as the sun rose behind their backs in the eastern sky. Merchants had trodden this road many times on their way to trade in Damascus, but few of their families—indeed, few of the Jews who had lived in Babylon for two generations—had been this far from the city.
The noise of the cheering for their freedom was still ringing in high priest Joshua’s ears, ten days’ walk westward from Babylon. Those who were intent on leaving Babylon had packed their few possessions and trudged behind him and the other religious leaders. More than fifty thousand Jews decided to return to Jerusalem, but twice that number determined to remain in Babylon, fearing that the one hundred days of traveling were too much for them to undertake, knowing that there would only be fifteen days on which they could rest for the holy Sabbath. And when they arrived in Israel, there would be no relief from exhaustion, as they would immediately have to rebuild the derelict cities and the devastated land.
The road to Damascus was pitted in places, and wagons found it difficult to negotiate the dips and ruts and surface erosion. Where the people traveled through a valley, the path was often well marked; but when they had to climb over a hill that had been more exposed to rain and wind, and where large boulders had fought their way to the surface, the going was slower and more tortured.
The high priest, Joshua, wasn’t surprised but was horribly disappointed that only a third of the Jews of Babylon had opted to return to Israel. But he had great pleasure in welcoming as a fellow traveler one of the richest Hebrews in Babylon, Reuven the merchant. Although neither man was particularly aware of it, the stories that were his family’s history told of Reuven’s ancestor Gamaliel as a close friend and associate of Joshua’s ancestor Ahimaaz.
Reuven’s wife, Naomi, was pregnant, and the sudden and unexpected status of fatherhood changed him. He and Naomi had been trying for years to have a son, but the Almighty hadn’t favored them. And then, just when Cyrus began his siege of the city of Babylon, Naomi announced that she was with child.
The moment Cyrus freed the Israelites from their Babylonian captivity, Reuven announced that he and Naomi would travel to Israel and establish a branch of his business enterprise in Jerusalem, its capital.
For Joshua, it was a coup to have such an important man making the journey. Most of the wealthy, established Jews hadn’t wanted to leave their homes and businesses and the comforts found in Babylon to go to a desolate, overgrown, parched, and infertile landscape. Reuven’s decision had influenced only a few of the wealthy members of the Hebrew community to leave Babylon, and so a diminished number of Jews traveled west to Damascus and then south toward Jerusalem.
Riding on a wooden wagon, Joshua said to Reuven, “It’s going to be much harder to rebuild the land with so few people, but our journey is supervised by the Almighty One and so we will be safe.”
Reuven looked at him in amazement. “Tell me, Rabbi Joshua, do Jews ever die?”
“Of course.”
“But why, if Adonai is our God and He protects us, shouldn’t we live forever?”
“Reuven, don’t be silly. You know that God . . .”
The merchant laughed as the rabbi tried to argue, and said, “You’re as much of a fool as is this god of ours. You have a big task ahead of you, Joshua. Not only clearing a devastated land and rebuilding a city, but establishing farms, growing food, setting up trading links for merchants who have little connection with Israel . . .”
“Life will be hard for us all—even for you, Reuven.”
The merchant laughed again. “Some of us only know how to make a bed from straw. But others, like me, know how to make our beds from the down of birds. Trust me, Joshua, my wife and I won’t suffer hardships.”
“But how?”
“You don’t think that I would have turned my back on everything I’ve built during my lifetime? I have good people working for me in my businesses in Babylon. I will develop trading routes into Israel from Damascus, Tyre, and even as far as India. I intend to establish a series of caravanserai throughout the country, and my caravans will bring precious merchandise from the east and return with what Israel can produce and sell. So where once, hundreds of years ago, the caravans used to visit Jerusalem, I will reestablish that trade. It will take two or three years, but it will happen.”
“With God’s will,” said Joshua.
“No, with my money and brains,” Reuven said sharply.
* * *
October 22, 2007
ONCE BILAL HAD BEEN RETURNED to his cell, the imam was led to the general population area of the prison by a scrawny and impassive guard. The two men walked along stinking corridors and through guarded doorways until they reached the inner exercise yard, surrounded by ten-meter-high walls and guard towers every twenty yards.
In the exercise yard, there were hundreds of prisoners, most of them Palestinians, many of them terrorists, as well as Arabs from other nations who had committed crimes while they were in Israel, such as burglary, crimes of violence, and offenses against the state. The moment the imam entered the large area, people milling around or playing basketball or other games stopped almost immediately and began to gravitate toward him. Few knew him but almost everybody smiled at the preacher as they gathered in a large circle around him, hoping that he’d come there to pray with and for them and to offer them solace.
He smiled at the crowd and said to the Israeli guard, “Out of courtesy to our faith, I ask you to leave me while I pray with my brothers.”
The guard turned and walked back through the door into the corridor. The imam looked at the prisoners, and said loudly, “As-salamu alaykum.”
Almost as one, they responded, but some, more formally, replied, “Wa alaykum as-salamu wa rahmatu Allah wa barakatuh.”
The imam held up his hands and said a blessing over all the prisoners. They responded to him and waited for a lesson from the Koran, but none came. Instead, the imam said softly, knowing that he was being viewed with suspicion by the guards, “Are any of you brothers living in the K wing?”
He noticed that two of the men nodded, although they looked surprised and were immediately suspicious. “Let me speak privately with you. For the sake of the Jews, let it look as though I am giving you a private blessing. Other brothers, I beg you to crowd around so that I can speak to these two brothers privately and not be observed too keenly.”
The crowd milled around the imam and the two residents of K wing. He put his arms around their shoulders and spoke quietly to them both as though he were praying silently for their souls.
“Your name, brother?” he asked.
One man said he was Mahfuz. The other told him he was called Ibrahim.
“Have you met a young man whose name is Bilal? He came here from the hospital. He was the boy who—”
“He tried to blow up the Jew temple,” said Ibrahim. “Yes, I’ve seen him. He stays in his cell most of the time. He seems as though the sky has fallen on his head. Why?”
“I’m worried about him,” said the imam. “He is a dear boy, and he was once a good Muslim. I pray for him every night, I beg Allah to look after him and protect him, but I think that the underhanded Jews have offered him . . . no, I don’t know, it’s not fair of me to say . . . it’s not his fault . . . but since he’s been here, he’s changed. He talks to them of things, and he won’t tell me of what he speaks. Would you brothers take care of him?”
* * *
BILAL NOTICED the change of attitude among the other prisoners during the fi
rst exercise period the following day. His guard checked on him through the peephole in the door, opened it, and walked inside. Sitting on his bed, Bilal looked up, stood, and walked beside his guard in silence along the corridors until they came to the large dining hall where prisoners were already seated at bare steel tables, gulping down bowls of oats, pita bread, and lentils. Although he was allowed to eat with the other prisoners, he was always carefully scrutinized by the guards.
Bilal stood in line for his food, and when it was his turn to be served by one of the trusty prisoners, the food was slopped onto his plate; then, checking that the guard wasn’t watching, the trusty spat into the food. Revolted, Bilal began to object, but the prisoner standing beside him turned and hissed, “Shut your fucking mouth or you’re dead. Go eat your shit and I hope you choke.”
In surprise and shock, unsure what to do, Bilal walked from the food table to find a seat beside other prisoners who he was beginning to recognize. But the moment he sat down, the others looked at one another and shifted away from him, further isolating him.
The guard noticed and came over to speak to Bilal. “What’s wrong here?” he asked.
“Nothing,” said Bilal.
The guard carefully scanned the prisoners, who averted their eyes.
“If there’s any trouble here, even the slightest, I’ll have you all in the punishment cell before you can blink. Got that?”
The others at the table shrugged, but the guard stood close beside Bilal. It was something well noticed by all of the prisoners in the room.