by Bear, Robert
“But how can this be? With so many gods, aren’t some greater and others lesser? And if so many gods are necessary, how can any one of your gods be perfect?”
Daniel did not like the sound of this. He raised himself up on his arm and signaled the masseur to stop for a moment. “Jesus, it’s rude to criticize the religion of our hosts while—”
“No, it’s fine. I want to hear what Jesus has to say.”
“How is Mars so Roman then?” Jesus asked.
“Parcare subjectis et deballare superbos.”
“To spare the vanquished and humble the proud. What does that have to do with anything?”
It’s something that my tutor made me memorize. It sums up how we Romans see ourselves, and I’m sure Mars would say the same thing.
“Oh, that’s rich,” said Jesus. “I saw on the way here how you Romans made fences of the bones of the Cymbri women and children, as well as their warriors. Is that what you mean by humbling the proud?”
“They aren’t so proud now, are they?” said Longinus. “The Gauls around here now do fine.”
“Yes, that’s where the ‘sparing the subjected’ part comes in, doesn’t it? You only spare the Gauls because they pay your taxes. I bet they were doing just fine before the Romans came.”
“We civilize the barbarians,” Longinus shouted back.
“Yes, like you civilized the Gauls by killing millions and enslaving millions more. That’s what I got out of Julius Caesar’s account the other night. You should try reading it.”
“Stop it, both of you.” Daniel knew that this was getting out of hand. Jesus was getting personal, both of them were shouting, and Longinus was flushing with anger.
“Roman armies have conquered the world,” said Longinus. “They will never be defeated.”
“Roman armies are nothing to the power of the one true God. Our God of Hosts will sweep them away just like he humbled almighty Pharaoh. There is always hope for Israel, and our people will be free of you when the Messiah comes as prophesized in Scripture.” Jesus got up and stormed out.
“I’m sorry,” Daniel said. “He doesn’t know what he’s saying.”
Longinus just smirked back.
Daniel glanced around the room. The slaves were standing with their mouths agape. There was no undoing the damage now. Word was bound to get back to Septurius, and there would be hell to pay.
Later that evening Joseph came into the room and pulled his son outside. “How could you be so stupid as to let this happen?” Despite the low volume of his voice, the rage came through. “I just got a good talking to from my best Roman client.”
“I’m sorry, Papa—”
“You have no idea how lucky we are that Septurius happens to be a kind man! If he wanted, he could have Jesus on the cross and both of us in prison. To the Romans, that was both treason and blasphemy!”
“What will he do?”
“Nothing, but that’s no thanks to you. He said he was just warning me for Jesus’s own good, and he was absolutely right to do so.”
“I was going to tell you. I tried to stop Jesus, but he and Longinus started going at each other so fast. I’m sorry. I should have tried to stop it sooner.”
“Yes, you should have.”
Daniel could only nod his agreement; his shame left him speechless.
Joseph turned to leave. Then he abruptly turned back to his son. “There was one other thing. When Septurius was relaying all the things that Jesus had said, I tried to think of something to change the subject. I told him that he must be proud of his son’s progress in Greek for him to understand all of these things from Jesus. For some reason this only seemed to annoy him, and he told me that Longinus has made no progress at all since the last time we were here. At first he seemed to think that I doubted his son’s word, and after I told him this wasn’t the case he insisted that Jesus must have spoken these things to Longinus in Latin.”
“That’s true, Papa. The three of us have spoken Latin amongst ourselves since the day we arrived.”
“But Jesus’s parents told me Jesus couldn’t speak Latin. They were worried about him traveling through Gaul like that; it was one of their biggest concerns. They told me that Jesus learned Aramaic from the family and Hebrew from the priests. And somehow he managed to teach himself Greek well enough to have intelligent discussions with scholars passing through. But they were clear that he knew nothing of Latin.”
“Maybe Jesus picked up the Latin speech from passing soldiers in Galilee without his parents’ knowing.”
“Yes, that is what I thought of while talking to Septurius. I guess the explanation I gave the legate was the truth after all!”
After Papa left, Daniel returned to the room that he shared with Jesus. The boy lay wide awake now. Evidently, he had overheard what Joseph said. Jesus looked up at Daniel. “It’s true, you know.”
“What’s true? That you picked up Latin from Roman legionaries in Galilee?”
“I had never spoken a word of Latin before we got here.”
“Then, how—”
“I am not like other people, Daniel. I know that, and you seem to know it, too. I feel as though I carry hundreds upon hundreds of languages in my head. When I hear a new language, all I need to do is listen for a minute to figure out which language it is. I already know all the vocabulary and grammar. It is not something I try to do; it just happens.”
Septurius
The next day Septurius watched as the last of Joseph’s cargo was hoisted into the carts. With a wave, he wished Joseph and his party Godspeed as they left. Then he turned to contemplate the figure of his son wandering off in the distance. Septurius was anything but naive. He well understood that Longinus must have provoked Jesus and then turned upon him. It was a nasty trick that bore ill for his son’s character and future.
Chapter 3
A Problem with Prophecy
Joseph
Roman roads were engineering marvels, but the hard paving stones were uneven. The cart-wheels jolted and squeaked over each one, and the road grated upon Joseph. He tried to fashion a cushion, but no matter where or how he sat or reclined in the cart, he could not escape the jolts and vibrations. Neither Jesus nor Daniel seemed to be bothered, but for Joseph the passage north through Narbonne Province in southern Gaul was agony.
The road up the valley of the Rhodanus River north from Arelate traversed easy low hills suitable for the use of horses. The Roman engineers who laid out the road system did so with an eye to the efficient movement of troops, however, not the needs of merchants moving goods, so the roads went straight up hills when possible. If the grade could be surmounted by cavalry and infantry, they did not build switchbacks that would have eased the load for draft animals pulling carts. The Roman-style harness did not help, as it tended to cut the windpipes of horses when the strain of the load became too great. While horses did well pulling carts across flat land, they struggled on inclines. A few of the hills slowed Joseph’s baggage train, but they were not so steep or numerous as to require ponderous oxen unaffected by the harness.
The load was relatively light for a trading expedition. Joseph still had some amphorae filled with olive oil from Judea, although he had sold most of that in Arelate for a modest profit. He could offer the remainder to the Britons as a curiosity, but they preferred their native butter and pork rinds as cooking fat. Some of the money from the olive oil went to purchase pottery and other household items that now lay carefully packed away in straw on the carts. There was always a market among the richest Britons for the latest designs and patterns from the Romans. Rugs from Asia were bulky and heavy, but Joseph had a few of those because he knew the intricate patterns would fascinate and delight the Britons. Spices from the Orient traveled easily. But Joseph’s main stockin-trade was yet to be purchased; what the Britons craved more than anything was wine. Wine and the amphorae vessels to hold it could be bought farther ahead; there was no need to burden the carts now.
As the baggage train
made its way up the valley, Joseph gazed upon the River Rhodanus running a parallel course to the left. Whenever possible, merchants in the Roman Empire replaced their pack animals with boats to carry their goods at a fraction of the cost, but the current of that river ran fast on its way south to Arelate. Such a course would be favorable in bringing metals back from Britain, but not going upstream.
Joseph’s disposition improved as the baggage train neared the bridge across the Rhodanus into Lugdunum, the gateway to Lugdunensis Province. He looked forward to a much more relaxing barge trip north up the slow-moving River Arar tributary that joined the Rhodanus at the city. That would take them to a place near the River Sequana, which would carry them down to the Oceanus Britannicus.
As the cart turned a bend in the road they caught a glimpse of the city rising up all over the hillside in the distance. “There it is,” exclaimed Daniel. “Lugdunum”
“I was just thinking: that is a curious name for the Romans to give a city. Who is this Lugh fellow?” asked Jesus. “The name does not sound Roman.”
“It’s not,” Joseph said. “Lugh is supposed to be the greatest of all the druid gods.”
“But didn’t the Romans suppress the druids once they conquered Gaul?” Jesus asked. “Why would they name the provincial capital after one?”
“I don’t know. Maybe the Romans just used the old Celtic name for this place before they realized its significance,” Joseph responded.
“So, tell us more about Lugh,” Jesus said.
“I’m afraid there isn’t much I can tell you. On one of my father’s expeditions, a Celtic man from Gaul described Lugh as the greatest of all druid gods, and that was it. Julius Caesar compared him to the Roman god Mercury, but supreme among the druid gods as well. Anyway, we will be traveling on ahead in a few days with native bargemen, and perhaps they will be able to tell you more.”
They descended a hill to the bridge. The difficult road portion of the journey across Gaul was almost over, but Joseph was still troubled. He pondered his prospects for making a profit on this expedition. The fastest money to be made was in the slave trade, but Joseph was no trader in the misery of other human beings. What else might he find in Britain to sell to the Romans at a decent profit if the tin should not work out?
Then there was the problem of Jesus. He can be the sweetest boy imaginable. Whenever there is a chore that needs doing, I only have to ask him and then know that the task is as good as done. Never does he complain. Not even my own Daniel is as good-natured and obedient about his work. But try as Joseph might to make Jesus understand how rash it was to incur the wrath of the Romans, he did not seem to understand. Every time Joseph talked to Jesus about how foolish it had been for him to argue with Longinus, Jesus would listen respectfully and then ask where he had spoken falsely. When it came to proclaiming God’s truth as he saw it, Jesus either would not or could not grasp the concept of why discretion was necessary.
As the road turned just before the bridge, the city came into view again in a magnificent vista. “Jesus. Come here.” Joseph reached into his bag and drew out the map.
The boy scooted closer. “Yes, Uncle?”
Joseph unrolled the map and handed it to him. “See there, the Rhodanus runs along the southern side of the city from the east, and that slow-moving river meandering down the western side is the Arar. And here is where they meet.” He pointed from the point of confluence on the map to the one before their eyes. “That hill between the rivers is called Fourviere.”
“What’s that on the crown of the hill?”
“The forum.” Joseph pointed out other landmarks on the hillside: the Roman mint and the amphitheater. And below, warehouses were visible on a large lowlying island at the confluence. On the right bank of the Arar lay a busy commercial district and port with offices and docks.
A renewed sense of awe struck Joseph as he pointed out the sights to his great-nephew. “No more than seventy years ago, this site was nothing but a small Celtic settlement. Now it is the center of commerce and Roman administration for all of Gaul. Trade from Britain and Germania passes through: wheat, wine, olive oil, and lumber.” The traffic through the city was not quite as bad as in Rome, where merchant carts had to be banned from the streets until nightfall, but it was getting there.
Joseph spotted something atop Fourviere, and his heart withered. A small group of men worked at the high point of the hill just outside the forum—a place of execution that could be seen for miles around. Workmen busy at that site could only mean an imminent crucifixion.
But Joseph said nothing of that to Jesus.
The baggage train crossed the bridge into Lugdunum and around the Fourviere to another bridge that took them to the warehouse district on the island. While one group of workers stabled the horses, another unloaded the carts and stowed Joseph’s goods in an available warehouse.
Dusk approached as Joseph led Jesus and Daniel back across the bridge to the commercial district at the foot of the Fourviere Hill. “There’s no telling how soon we’ll be able to hire a suitable boat to take us north on the Arar,” he said, “but there’s no need to retain the hired horses and carts any longer.”
Up close, Lugdunum was a foul, overcrowded place. Occasionally one could spot a rich person clutching rose petals to his nose to mask the stench of the open sewers. The poor lived in the overcrowded tenements that rose eight stories high. Joseph often heard news of fires breaking out in the top floor garrets where the poorest of the poor resorted to dangerous charcoal braziers to ward off the drafts and dampness from the leaky roofs.
Joseph and the boys soon settled into an inn. It offered nothing like the luxury of Septurius’s dommus, but it was clean. The food and wine were a welcome relief from the scant but overpriced offerings of the inns on the road north from Arelate, and they would sleep in real beds for the next few nights and have a room to themselves. So much nicer than the vermin-infested common sleeping rooms they had shared with all sorts of men on the road. Going through Valentia, a town halfway between Arelate and Lugdunum, they had stayed outside in the rain through the night because there was only one common sleeping area in the inn for both men and women, and Joseph was not about to allow that. A good number of the women loitering near the inns appeared to be professional.
Joseph joined in the smiles and laughter of his son and nephew over dinner. It was a relief to be in a decent establishment for a change. But he was still troubled by the workmen he had seen preparing for the crucifixion.
The innkeeper brought steaming bowls of mutton stew that gave off an aroma of thyme and rosemary.
Joseph lowered his voice and asked about the workmen.
The innkeeper nodded. “A notorious case, sir. Two slaves struck their master in an attempt to escape. The execution is set for tomorrow.”
“Have you ever seen a crucifixion, Jesus?” Joseph asked with a sad heart. He spoke in Aramaic in case of eavesdroppers.
Jesus responded in the same tongue. “Mother and Papa always told me not to look when we passed one. They said it would upset me too much.”
“You must have stolen a glance or two.” Daniel said. “Weren’t you curious?”
“Of course I was curious,” Jesus replied. “Sometimes I couldn’t help but hear the victims crying out in pain, but I never looked. I always remembered how Adam’s curiosity to taste the forbidden fruit brought pain and death into the world. So, no, I never looked.”
“Under our laws and customs you are now old enough to be a man,” said Joseph. “And it’s time for you to learn how the Romans can bring down their wrath when anyone offends them. You will come with me tomorrow and watch.”
“How can I disobey my parents?”
“They are not here. They entrusted your well-being to me, and the circumstances have changed. Jesus, you must now obey me in this.”
“Very well, Uncle. I am sure you know best,” Jesus replied. “But I do not understand. These men were slaves and they struck their master. Would not
their punishment be death in any country?”
“Are you defending the Romans now?” Daniel asked of Jesus.
“This is different,” Jesus answered. “We’re not talking about pagan idols or taxes. These slaves are being put to death for rebelling against their master. Our people would have done the same thing even before the Romans came.”
“You’re wrong, Jesus,” said Joseph. “There’s more to it than just putting criminals to death. You will see tomorrow. Our people execute criminals, but never like this. The Romans don’t execute only murderers, traitors, and rebellious slaves.” Joseph looked directly into Jesus’s eyes. “They also kill those who offend or blaspheme their pagan gods, and even those they merely suspect of holding a rebellious spirit against the empire.”
Joseph exchanged knowing looks with his son. For the moment, Jesus was silent. Was the boy beginning to understand the danger his preaching could cause? Joseph could only hope so. He also hoped that what lay in store for Jesus to see on the morrow would drive the lesson home.
Despite that somber turn, Jesus seemed to lighten the mood as they finished eating. Soon the road-weary party made its way to their room where they slept soundly.
They rose early, but not at the first crack of dawn which was typically the rising time on the road. Joseph took the opportunity to assign readings to Jesus and Daniel from the scroll of Psalms that he carried with him—not that the boys lacked for religious learning. He did not want them wandering the city aimlessly.
Leaving them to their studies, Joseph went to the docks to check with the boatmen. Unfortunately, they were all out on river passages with none scheduled to return that day. This would cost him a day, but it could not be helped. He found the agent for the gentleman in Arelate who had rented the carts and horses, so at least that bill could be settled. He now had the rest of the day to deal with Jesus and would contact his merchant friends later that evening.