Chosen

by Lisa T. Bergren

  During the moment of silence that followed, neither Ridge nor Alexana chewed or spoke as they contemplated such an idea. Jerome began again: “When Jesus would not speak in his own defense, Pilate ‘washed his hands’ of him and sentenced him. They took him to ‘skull hill’—Golgotha, a rocky outcropping that resembled a human skull—and crucified him.

  “After he died, his followers took him down and laid him in a tomb. Tradition holds that the tomb lies under those domes over there,” he said, gesturing to the west, “beneath what is now the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. There he was laid to rest; three days later, his body was gone. He had risen. In his passage, he began the Great Hope for us: Because of his ultimate sacrifice, we are forgiven of our sins and promised eternal life. Through ourselves, we die; through him, we live.”

  Ridge nodded, trying to absorb the information. His brow was furrowed in concentration. “Go on,” he urged.

  “You have heard Jesus referred to as ‘the Lamb of God’?”

  “I believe so.”

  “It builds upon the biblical imagery and Jewish tradition from which he emerged. The Jews traditionally offered a lamb in the temple each year as a sacrifice. Ideally, it was a perfect lamb—unblemished, in good health, of a good demeanor. To give up such an animal was truly a sacrifice—in the modern sense of the word. One lamb could provide food or money for a family. It could even be bred to produce more food and money. But they wanted to atone for their sins, and so they sacrificed the animals as God had dictated.

  “When Christ—the Lamb—was sacrificed, Jesus gave the ultimate gift, and the need for animal sacrifice was eliminated forever. For how could one compare the death of an animal to that of a man, let alone the man we consider to be the Son of God? It was the end of salvation based on observance of religious law and the beginning of grace. Some believed Jesus was the Savior; others condemned him, seeing not the Messiah, but a weak, beaten man. They wanted a political king, the new David. By turning away, they missed the King of kings. They missed salvation.”

  Ridge looked at the professor, then at Alexana, appearing a little irked at their obvious religious enthusiasm. “So you’re saying that all of the Jews and Muslims and any other religion in the world are condemned?” His voice was tense.

  Alexana spoke up for the first time. “The Bible and Christ were very clear. Jesus said, ‘No one comes to the Father except through me.’ I know,” she said, placing her hand emphatically on her chest, “that I am saved. I know the Messiah in a very personal way. That brings me great hope for my life, now and in the future.

  “Will everyone else be condemned?” She echoed his question. “I don’t know. My God is a gracious, loving, and fair God. I trust him to make those decisions; I’m not capable of saying who will ‘get in’ and who will not. But as for me, I know. I know.” She stared into Ridge’s eyes, willing him to understand, to grasp the passion, until he looked away.

  “I hear you,” he said, “I must admit, I don’t understand.”

  O’Malley turned back toward Jerusalem, and the others followed his gaze. “The City of David,” the professor mused. “The Golden City. To understand Jerusalem is to understand a piece of God. Passion for their Lord drives Palestinians to despair in their displacement, Christians to panic at the thought of losing access to their holy sites, and Jews to distraction at their tenuous hold on things. They all want to hold her. But you cannot ‘hold’ the Golden City any more than you can hold God.”

  He gained momentum as he spoke, becoming more impassioned with each word, and Alexana suddenly saw him as a young man: strong, stalwart, intense. “It is like a volcano, ready to erupt. It is foolish to think that anyone could hold a natural phenomenon like a volcano.” O’Malley smiled benevolently.

  “Yet despite its potential for destruction, a volcano warms the earth’s crust and spews forth minerals that enrich her soil, bringing new life. God is like a volcano—capable of destroying at a moment’s notice, yet seeming to slumber peacefully for centuries. Can you grasp it?” He turned toward Ridge. “It is a primal, basic need, to know God.” He looked at Ridge curiously. “You know him, Mr. McIntyre. You’ve just forgotten him.”

  Jerome sat down again. Ridge waited patiently for him to finish. “Ask yourself if you’ve gone so far here,” Jerome said, pointing to his head, “that you cannot know the light here,” he said, pointing to his heart. “Sometimes we try to think out something that is better felt.”

  Ridge looked from Jerome to Alexana, seeming unsure of what to say.

  “Search, my friend,” Jerome entreated softly. “It will be here in Jerusalem, if anywhere, that you will understand the Christ or walk away from him. He knocks; open the door, or your future will be darker than the Solomon’s Stables that Alexana will soon explore.”

  His tone was sure and confident, and Ridge did not ask another question. The three finished their oranges and bread in silence, each lost in his or her own thoughts.

  Later that afternoon Ridge and Alexana approached the West Jerusalem neighborhood of Mea Shearim. Before them, a sign proclaimed in poor English: MODEST DRESS, SKIRTS REACHING UNTIL BELOW THE KNEE. Ridge scanned the rest of the oddly translated sign, which asked visitors to respect the Jews’ code of righteous clothing, while Alexana removed her backpack and pulled out a paper yarmulke.

  “Here,” she said, handing it to him. “I’m dressed to walk through, but you need to cover your head.”

  Ridge unfolded the small disc and awkwardly placed the cap on his head, but his heavily moussed hair made it difficult for the yarmulke to stay in place. Alexana grinned at him, despite herself. As they were passed by several men in long, black coats and shaved heads with one long curl at each temple, she struggled to control her laughter. “You fit right in,” she managed to say, smiling behind her hand.

  “Yeah, right,” Ridge said looking down at her. “Lead on, my new friend,” he said grandly.

  She passed in front of him, through the limestone brick gates of the haredi, or “God-fearing community.” “As you might have been able to tell from the entrance, this is an ultra-Orthodox section of Jerusalem. They maintain the old traditions and religious lifestyle of the Eastern European Jews.” They turned a corner and walked several blocks, then Alexana pointed toward the window of a classroom.

  Ridge looked in at sixteen sleepy-looking boys. “They’re just tots! How old are they?”

  “Four,” Alexana said. Catching the eye of the teacher, she waved and smiled and kept on talking. “That is Rabbi Josef Shek, a friend of my father’s. This yeshiva preschool is the heart of the community, where boys study and discuss the Torah and Talmud.”

  She pointed past Ridge at three neatly bundled little girls walking down the street, following their mother like goslings after a goose. “For one of those haredi girls to marry one of the little scholars you see inside is the highest hope of any haredi father. They will most likely be properly educated and remain devout Jews.”

  “Will it be a challenge to find a suitable match?” Ridge asked, grinning as a sleeping boy was jostled awake by the rabbi.

  “Not too tough. Most will remain in the yeshiva until they’re eighteen, or older. In all of Eastern Europe before the Holocaust, there were perhaps thirty-five thousand yeshiva students. Today, in Israel alone, there are almost fifty thousand. The government obviously encourages these schools. They give grants to the families of the students; that tradition, and the high birthrate among haredi Jews, will keep the schools in business.”

  “And find those girls the right man.”

  “Of course.” Alexana grinned. They walked down several streets in silence, eventually making their way to the Western Wall of the Temple Mount.

  “Ah, the Wailing Wall,” Ridge nodded in recognition. “Maybe you can enlighten me …”

  Alexana nodded sadly. “It’s as close as they can come to their God and an understanding of where he lives. So they stick prayers between the stones that Herod had placed there, and they pray t
hat the Temple will be theirs again.”

  “By the looks of the Dome of the Rock, that’s not likely to happen.”

  “No, especially after 176 pounds of gold has just been plastered over it, a gift from King Hussein. You understand the significance of this place?”

  “Not as deeply as you do. And that’s where you hope to excavate Solomon’s Stables—under the Haram, as Palestinians call it?”

  “Yes. You can see that the Temple Mount is huge: the length and width of five football fields. Once it housed the grand Jewish temple. Or I should say twice. It was destroyed and rebuilt. People used to enter it from the eastern side, through the Golden Gate, or from the south end at the Triple Gate—you know, the ones we saw earlier, walled off, as we entered the Dung Gate?

  “Behind the Double Gate is a staircase that Christ and his disciples walked. For centuries, erosion and filler, as well as political or religious differences, have kept scholars from exploring the structure underneath. The Crusaders used the caverns as stables. Thus, the name.”

  “The excavation is a big deal because no one has done it before?”

  “Well, yes. To excavate anywhere on or under the Haram would be a dig of significance. Under the Dome of the Rock is the stone where Abraham is thought to have gone to sacrifice Isaac and where his hand was stayed. The Temple Mount itself held the two greatest temples ever built for Jews, one of which was attended by Jesus Christ himself. Today the Temple Mount, or the ‘Haram el Sharif’ as Muslims call it, holds two holy Muslim mosques, one of which is the El Aksa Mosque, a pilgrimage site for all believers. Directly under it and eastward,” she said, gesturing toward the smaller dome, “is where I intend to dig. The work is bound to anger those who mistrust the motives of those considered a threat to the Haram.”

  “Especially Hamas,” Ridge said.

  Ignoring his comment, Alexana gestured for him to follow her. They quickly walked another three blocks and soon were standing in front of a store called The Bookstore of the Temple Mount Faithful. The window appeared to be made of bulletproof glass, and protective bars could be seen inside. “Look at this picture,” Alexana said, pointing.

  Ridge stared through the glass at the picture of Jerusalem, then whistled as he saw the importance of it. Someone had taken a photo, airbrushed out the El Aksa Mosque and Dome of the Rock, and added a computer-generated image of the Temple as it once had looked. He glanced up at Alexana. “I bet this fuels the fire between Jew and Muslim.”

  They walked away from the window, past a coffee shop where men sat drinking dark liquid out of exotic-looking, long-necked pots. “That bookstore,” Alexana indicated, “has been firebombed several times and rebuilt. With a holy pilgrimage site on one hand and the passion, the calling, that Jews have to rebuild the temple, how can the two sides not battle?”

  Ridge walked beside her, studying her face. “It all pains you, doesn’t it?”

  “I feel this is my homeland, despite my dual citizenship with America. This is where my heart is. Even with the peace accord that began between Arafat and Rabin, the upheaval continues. I’ve had a Palestinian friend die in my arms, shot by accident, and I’ve seen Jewish children wounded in other street battles. It is an insane, wonderful, passionate place to live.” Her eyes begged him to understand.

  Alexana glanced at her watch. “Oh my, it’s almost four. I’ve got to pick up some food for dinner. My brother and a friend are coming over. Sorry, but I must go. I hope these last few days have been helpful.”

  “Oh yes. Yes, they have. You’ve been a great guide, but I think I’ve only gotten a glimpse of what I’m seeking.”

  “True enough. There will be other days.”

  Impulsively Ridge reached out and took her hand. “When?”

  She smiled and gently pulled her hand from his. “Call me,” she said evasively. “We’ll find a time. Good-bye.” With that, she walked away. Ridge stared after her for a moment, then forced himself to turn away as well. After glancing back over his shoulder several times, he finally gave up, stopped, and watched until she was out of sight.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Sam and his dark-haired companion walked through the winding streets of Old Jerusalem, down countless stairs worn smooth by centuries of foot travel. The streets were nearly empty as cool darkness enveloped the city, making the damp streets even chillier. They passed the building that once housed the Knights of Saint John, then the towering Lutheran Church of the Redeemer.

  Absorbed in conversation, neither paid much attention to the impressive buildings. Initially awkward, they had soon gotten past their shyness and talked nonstop from the airport in Tel Aviv, catching up on their personal and professional lives. Passing the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, they entered the Christian quarter of the city, where Alexana lived, and were soon knocking on her door.

  “Christina!” Alexana grinned and hugged her old friend from grad school. “It’s so good to see you.” She glanced over the brunette’s shoulder toward her brother, wondering if it troubled him to see his old girlfriend. It had been five years since they had broken off their relationship, but she knew that Sam had had a hard time forgetting the woman. Then he had finally found Lydia—his someone special—but that hadn’t lasted. Losing love twice must have made his breakup with her even tougher, Alexana thought for the hundredth time.

  “How are you?” Christina pulled back to admire the attractive woman she had considered a little sister ever since their days at Columbia. “You look beautiful. And I hear that you’re making waves as a biblical archaeologist—the Temple Mount, no less!”

  “Well, we haven’t started yet. And it doesn’t outshine what you’ve been up to. Sam and I have been keeping track of you. We were so worried last summer when we heard over the BBC that you were tangling with Hobard. Suddenly my most scholarly friend is playing Pirates and Treasure Hunter. But wait … we have so much to catch up on! Please, sit down, and Sam will get us something to drink. Dinner will be ready soon.”

  The two women seated themselves on Alexana’s couch as Sam obediently went to get them warm beverages. “Nice place!” Christina raised an eyebrow. “Spacious,” she teased, looking up at the loft that had been made into a bedroom, then down at the narrow kitchen that stood beside the bathroom. The living room measured only about ten by fifteen feet.

  “I was lucky to get an apartment with its own bathroom!” Alexana exclaimed. “Could you see me traipsing down a hall to share one with five other apartments? By the time I get home, I want a tub all to myself.”

  “It’s wonderful,” Christina assured her warmly. “Cozy, but wonderful.”

  “It’s all I really need, as often as I camp out at dig sites.”

  “I know the feeling. By the time I get home, I can’t believe how much room is in a real bed and I usually stick to the space I’m allotted on a ship bunk. I’ve had dry-land quarters for the last year, and Mitch still can’t get me to take more than that three-foot section of our king-size bed!”

  The two laughed, then quieted as Sam came in, suddenly aware that their conversation might make him uncomfortable. He and Christina had parted amicably, but even years after their breakup, things were still a bit awkward at times.

  “I sure appreciate your having me over for dinner,” Christina said, pushing a wave of dark brown hair over her shoulder.

  “No problem,” Alexana assured her. She took a sip of hot tea from a mug painted with the traditional blues and golds of Palestinian pottery. “If I know my brother, by the time he gets you out to Caesarea, I won’t have a chance to see you again. I assume you’re only staying for a brief consultation visit.”

  “Afraid so. Mitch and I have a ton of work to do on El Espantoso at Robert’s Foe, and we still want to search for La Canción. We’re close—I can almost feel her when we dive in a certain harbor we’re searching off the coast of Mexico. He’ll have my hide if I stay too long, but he realizes I can’t pass up the chance to see another Greek mariner. Especially here.”

&n
bsp; Sam sat down in a wicker chair beside the couch, smiling. “It sounds like you finally found a man who can understand your obsession with work.”

  “Just a little better than you. The difference is that he’s a sea lover through and through. Except for this Caesarea dig, I bet you’ll spend most of your career deep in the sands of Israel.” She looked at him fondly. “I have to admit, though, that our run-ins with Hobard made Mitch and me think long and hard. We both came to the decision that work would never come between us—that our marriage would be priority over everything else. We think God really worked through that whole, awful situation to show us what’s really important in life.”

  Sam smiled at her frankness and nodded. “I agree, as we decided five years ago: A relationship marked by separations halfway around the world would not be a good idea.”

  “I’m hoping to drag him away from Caesarea for the Solomon’s Stables dig,” Alexana interceded.

  “If she can convince Hoekstra,” Sam said, knowing full well that his sister could sweet-talk the older man into anything. Robert had been like an uncle to the two since they were toddlers; without kids of his own, he doted on them.

  “Do you have the rest of your team pulled together?” Christina asked.

  “No. I was given the news that I would be supervisor just a few weeks ago. Even with the peace process under way, Israel has been in even more upheaval than usual. I assume you heard about the Beit Lid massacre. If things don’t smooth out soon, I might never get a chance to dig; you can imagine the uproar there will be once this news gets out.”