The Testament of Mariam

by Ann Swinfen

  When we sat down at last to the best meal we had eaten for many long months, the conversation round the table was cheerful, growing ever more cheerful as Zaccheus’s excellent wine circulated. The table was laid with Roman glasses. I was afraid, at first, that I would bite a piece out of mine, for I had never drunk from glass before.

  ‘Now are we come to Judaea and the neighbourhood of Jerusalem,’ Yehûdâ called out, raising his glass to my brother. ‘I feel at last the joyous kingdom is near at hand!’

  The other shelîhîm laughed and raised their glasses in turn. There was an air of rejoicing in the room. Yet I saw that my brother, though he smiled an acknowledgement to Yehûdâ, looked thoughtful. It seemed to me that his eyes were full of sadness and despair. I felt myself go cold, despite the warmth engendered by the wine. Jerusalem. Death. Betrayal. Then Yehûdâ too caught his eye, and I saw him flinch.

  Chapter Sixteen

  We stayed for several days in Jericho, and our time there was like a pleasant dream from which you wake reluctantly. When you try to recapture it by seeking sleep again, the second sleep brings only nightmares. Zaccheus and several of his friends provided lodgings for us, and when we were not in attendance on my brother we wandered about the town enjoying the pleasures of the fruitful oasis, after our exhausting walk from the Galilee through hostile Samaria and the cruel countryside of Judaea.

  One early morning I encountered Yehûdâ sitting down by one of Jericho’s fresh springs. It lay glittering under the sun, which had not yet reached the full heat of summer (something the inhabitants of Jericho told us could be nearly unbearable at midday). I sat down beside him on the bank, careful to keep a little distance. Most of the disciples, I believe, had forgotten that we were betrothed, but nevertheless we had always to behave with great circumspection, lest they should think that we were betraying our vow to remain chaste.

  ‘Strange to think,’ he said, ‘that these lovely waters flow, in just a few miles, into the Jordan, and from there into that cesspit, the Sea of Sodom, to become something stinking and corrupt, where there’s no life in the waters and none on the shores round about. The waters are bitter with salt and other unnameable substances, fumes rise from it, and the islands that float on it are not of living reeds but blocks of bitumen and rings of crusted salt. If you immerse your cut hand in the water it will burn like fire.’

  ‘I suppose Yeshûa would say that the river Jordan is like a man’s life, and if he does evil he will end like the river in the poisoned water.’

  ‘Ah, but where is your metaphor for the good man’s life?’ he said. ‘Are the sweet waters of Jordan, which bring such fertility to the Galilee, and are these springs in the oasis of Jericho, a metaphor for an evil life? Surely not! No, you will need to do better than that.’

  ‘I am no preacher,’ I said, lying back on the grass and resting the back of my arm on my eyes to shield them. ‘I cannot tell stories like my brother.’

  ‘It was just a little way east and south of here,’ he said, ‘on the banks of the same sweet Jordan, that I met your brother when he came from Qumrân.’

  ‘Why did they choose such a desolate place as the edge of the desert to set up their Community?’

  ‘I believe they thought that to live apart from the rest of mankind, and to mortify their flesh, and to live subject to rigid rules, made them more godly.’

  ‘Do you believe that?’ I asked, lifting my arm from my eyes so that I could look at him.

  ‘No. And this beautiful place . . . so peaceful . . . somehow it makes me remember how much I have given up, even if you and I have not withdrawn to the desert.’

  I saw something then in his eyes that made me blush and hide my face again, for I too had been wishing that I might live a more normal life. I found I was longing to be free of our vow, to be free so that Yehûdâ and I could marry at last.

  ‘Mariam,’ he said softly, ‘do you wish to leave Yeshûa’s following, so that our marriage can take place?’

  ‘How can we leave him? Just when he is going to Jerusalem?’

  ‘Yes, Jerusalem.’

  He sighed.

  ‘I think we will come to the crisis in Jerusalem. I cannot think the Temple authorities will let him preach and heal in Jerusalem as he has done elsewhere. Jerusalem is too volatile. When insurrection breaks out, it’s usually in Jerusalem. That’s why the Roman prefect, Pontius Pilate, always comes with armed troops at the times of the great festivals. He’s there to reinforce the regular Roman garrison in the city.’

  I sat up abruptly.

  ‘But I thought we were going to Jerusalem simply for Pesah!’

  ‘I think Yeshûa has something else in mind. I don’t like the way he keeps referring to his death, and saying that the only place for a prophet to die is in Jerusalem.’

  ‘You think he is deliberately seeking his own death?’ I cried. ‘I thought, when he spoke of it, he meant only that it might happen.’

  Regardless of whether we might be seen, he reached out and took my hand.

  ‘I told you once that, when he came from Qumrân, he made me promise that if some day he asked me to do something against my will, I would do it, in return for his promise to meet me one year after he entered the Community at Qumrân.’

  ‘I remember.’

  ‘Well, yesterday he reminded me of that promise. He said he might soon call in my debt. I did not like the sound of that. And I think he means to do something in Jerusalem that I will be forced to agree to.’

  ‘He would not do anything wrong.’

  ‘What is “wrong”? If he defies the chief priest and the Sanhedrin, is that wrong? If he preaches against the Emperor, when the Roman prefect is in the city, is that wrong?’

  He was silent for a moment, then said so softly that I could hardly hear, ‘And if he seeks his own death as a fulfilment of the prophecies in the scriptures, is that wrong?’

  ‘Would he?’

  ‘I do not know.’

  ‘It would be a sin,’ I whispered. ‘Surely, surely . . . it would be a sin?’

  He shook himself, as if to drive away these thoughts, and we stood up, still hand in hand. I heard a rustling in the bushes behind us and then caught sight of a figure moving away along the road. It was Yôhânân. Had he overheard our conversation? Had he seen my hand in Yehûdâ’s?

  ‘I know it is wrong of me,’ I said, ‘but I do not like that man.’

  He smiled. ‘Is it because your brother often favours him?’

  ‘And why does he?’

  ‘I don’t know. Perhaps because he manifests so much loud-voiced enthusiasm?’

  ‘Yeshûa would not be taken in by that.’

  But perhaps it was a little true. When many of the disciples had seemed doubtful, Yôhânân had always been loud in his assertions of his belief.

  ‘I do not like the way he stirs up trouble wherever he goes,’ I said carefully. ‘I do not like the way he tries to force Yeshûa into armed insurrection. I do not like his hysteria and his feigned ecstasies. I do not like his contempt for women.’

  I paused.

  ‘And I do not like the way he has been spying on us for months.’

  In the cool of that evening, after we had eaten, my brother asked Yehûdâ and me to walk with him in the garden. We found a place to sit on the fresh spring grass under an apple tree, and as we talked the last of the blossom drifted down upon us like perfumed rain. I could tell that something was troubling Yeshûa, and he could not bring himself to speak of it.

  At last he said, ‘I am minded to release you both from your vow.’

  I stared at him.

  ‘What do you mean? Our vow to follow you? We will not leave you now, of all times.’

  Yeshûa looked uncomfortable. No, he was embarrassed. The colour rose in his cheeks.

  ‘It has been hard for you both, harder than for any of us. You have been betrothed for so long, and so long denied the fulfilment of that betrothal. To be constantly in each other’s company, and to be pinion
ed by your vow of chastity . . . I would not blame you. I do not blame you, if it has proved too much, if your need to express your love for each other has overcome you.’

  I was suddenly enlightened, and glanced at Yehûdâ.

  ‘Yôhânân,’ I said bitterly. ‘It is Yôhânân who has been spilling poison into your ear.’

  ‘It was Yôhânân,’ he admitted.

  ‘What has he said?’ Yehûdâ asked quietly. ‘I’ll wager he has lied. Your sister is as pure as the day she was born. I won’t deny that it has been hard, to sacrifice the fulfilment of our love to the mission we have all undertaken. But Mariam and I have spoken of this more than once, and we agreed that we must wait, until you are ready to release us.’

  ‘I am ready.’

  ‘But we are not,’ I said. ‘Jerusalem lies ahead, the culmination of all we have striven for. We will not leave you now.’

  I touched his hand lightly.

  ‘We love you too much.’

  He took my hand in his and turned it over, as if he would read my mind in my palm.

  ‘Yeshûa,’ I said, ‘why will you not look me in the face? What has Yôhânân said to you?’

  He raised his eyes to mine and I saw that he was wretched.

  ‘He said that you had had carnal knowledge of Yehûdâ.’

  I felt anger rise in my breast like a burning fire, and my head grew tight with my fury.

  ‘He lied!’ I scrambled to my feet, and they followed me. ‘From time to time, Yehûdâ has taken my hand. He did so this very day, when Yôhânân spied upon us from behind some bushes, sly as the serpent in Eden. And we have kissed. Yes, a few times we have kissed. But nothing more. I swear to you, Yeshûa, by Our Holy Father in Heaven, nothing more.’

  I fell at his feet, sobbing.

  I felt his arms around me then. He was kneeling before me.

  ‘Hush, talithâ,’ he said. ‘I believe you. For you have never lied to me in all your life.’

  He pulled me to my feet, and embraced us both.

  ‘I am sorry,’ he said, shame-faced. ‘I should never have listened to him. Both of you are so dear to me, and I bear the guilt of what you have had to endure in being kept apart. I suppose it was my own guilt that made me gullible.’

  ‘It’s forgotten,’ said Yehûdâ, slapping him on the shoulder, as if they were boys again. ‘Come. Didn’t Zaccheus say he was to broach an amphora of vintage wine for us?’

  But as we walked back to the house, I heard my brother murmur to himself, ‘I pray you have not made the wrong choice.’

  That was our last day in Jericho before we moved on to Bethany, a village barely half an hour’s walk from Jerusalem. My conversation with Yehûdâ by the spring, and my brother’s offer to set us free of our vows to him, had left me in turmoil. It was clear that Yehûdâ wanted our marriage as much as I, and soon, if it were possible. But his fears for what might happen in Jerusalem made me uneasy, and I watched my brother for any sign of what he might be planning.

  In Bethany some of us—Yehûdâ, Yeshûa, Shim’ôn, Yôhânân, the Magdalene and I—stayed with two sisters and a brother, who were hospitable and kind. The elder sister, Martha, cooked us prodigious meals, until my brother groaned and patted his stomach, saying that he could have lived for a week at Qumrân on what he had just eaten at one meal. The brother Lazarus brought out his best wines for us and engaged Yeshûa in enthusiastic and intelligent discussion about his teachings, so that I saw him happy and relaxed as he had not been for a long time.

  ‘You mean that this new dispensation,’ said Lazarus, ‘will come about suddenly, by a kind of miracle? We will wake one morning, and all wrongs will be righted, the sick healed, the poor no longer despised by the rich?’

  Yeshûa laughed, for he saw that Lazarus was teasing him.

  ‘Ah, that it could be so! No, nothing good comes without working for it, as you very well know.’

  He sipped his wine, and I could see that he was turning phrases over in his mind.

  ‘King David was a fine harpist. Did that come about by a miracle?’

  ‘I expect, like any common musician,’ said Lazarus, ‘he was taught as a child, and practised many hours.’

  ‘My father Yosef is a wonderful craftsman. When I was apprenticed to him, I did not expect, on the first day, to make a beautiful table inlaid with ivory and ebony, fit for the Emperor, such as he could make. No, on my first day I learned to sweep out his workshop.’

  ‘As any boy would do.’

  ‘Your sister Martha, as we have seen, is a fine cook. But when she was a young girl, did she not sometimes burn the stew in the bottom of the pot? Or turn out raised bread that was heavy as a brick?’

  ‘Often!’ said Martha with a laugh.

  ‘You make your point,’ said Lazarus. ‘Every craftsman or artist must learn his trade, but what has that to do with the new kingdom?’

  ‘We are still apprentices,’ said Yeshûa. ‘Only when every son and daughter of man has become a master craftsman in the art of loving kindness will we inherit the right to the new kingdom.’

  The younger sister, who was hardly more than a child, constantly sat at my brother’s feet, listening to him open-mouthed and staring at him adoringly. She followed him around like an eager puppy, until her sister scolded her for not helping to look after the guests. Yeshûa chided Martha for this, but in my heart I sympathised, and did all I could to help her with all the cooking and washing for so many unexpected guests.

  On the eighth day of Nisan, we joined the stream of pilgrims heading for Jerusalem, for the beginning of the rituals and festivities leading up to Pesah. We had reached the outskirts of the city, a place called Bethphage, where there is a customs post, when Yeshûa called a halt and we gathered round him.

  ‘Go over to the next village,’ he said to two of the disciples, ‘and you’ll find a young ass colt tethered, which has never been ridden. Untie him, and bring him here. If anyone challenges you, say that the Lord needs him, and he will send the colt at once, without question.’

  They did as they were bid, and brought the donkey, to the surprise of many of us. It was a fine young beast, large for a donkey and unmarked as yet by hard labour and the galls rubbed by the heavy burdens these poor creatures spend their lives carrying. There was no saddle, so we made a pad out of several mantles, and Yeshûa mounted. I watched a little fearfully, for an unbroken mount can be dangerous, but the colt stood quietly, and we set off again, Yeshûa riding in front and the rest of us following on foot. I could not understand his strange behaviour, for my brother had always walked everywhere. Why should he ride now? Then I remembered what Yehûdâ had said about Yeshûa wanting to fulfil prophecies. I thought I recalled something about the mashiha riding humbly into Jerusalem on an ass. The ass would be important. If Yeshûa had ridden in on a horse, a symbol of power, he would have been announcing that he came as a military leader.

  But Yeshûa had denied over and over again that he was the mashiha, for whom all Israelites longed. I remembered how he had once turned on Shim’ôn, furious at being so named. Why was he doing this now? Even in our most private conversations he had said nothing of this to Yehûdâ and me. Though indeed he had grown more secretive in recent days. Was he trying deliberately to provoke the authorities? Perhaps I was mistaken. Perhaps it had nothing to do with prophecies. Even so, I entered Jerusalem in a state of fear. Everyone’s attention was on Yeshûa. He was recognised at once, even here, so far from the Galilee. The crowds of pilgrims were whispering his name amongst themselves, and soon they began to call out, ‘Hosannah! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Blessed is the son of David!’

  Somewhere in the crowd a voice cried, ‘Hail, the King of the Jews!’

  Alarmed, I twisted round and searched the faces, trying to make out who had spoken. It sounded like Yôhânân’s voice, but the press of people was too great for me to be sure. The cry was taken up here and there: ‘Hail, the King of the Jews!’

  I looked around for Y
ehûdâ. He was walking with Shim’ôn, who was transfixed with joy and excitement. I could read in his face the belief that the new kingdom was on the point of birth. Yehûdâ looked tense and worried. I was glad that we were still far from the Temple, so that there were no Temple guards or officials to hear the greetings of the crowd, for I was afraid they would seize my brother, even though it was not he but the pilgrims who were calling out these words, words which were surely seditious. I knew how nervous those in power were at the time of the Pesah festival, when riots and other trouble broke out.

  I dragged my eyes away from the crowds round my brother and turned to look at this city we were entering, the Holy City, which I had heard about all my life. I could never have imagined such a place. Everywhere there were hills and valleys, so that the buildings climbed higher and higher above us, so crowded together and precipitous that I was afraid they might topple over and crush us. I was familiar with the usual whitewashed buildings in every village and town, but their white was flat, chalky, dull. The buildings of Jerusalem shone in the morning sun, reflecting the light from their sparkling surfaces like ice on a pond. Many of them must be marble, I realised, and reached out to touch the wall of a building at the side of the road, running my palm across the surface. The stone was hard and smooth, the white streaked here and there with faint grey lines, like the veins on the back of my hand.

  In Jericho I had seen one or two buildings of marble, standing out strangely amongst the humbler constructions, but here the abundance of marble reflected the sunlight back and forth from building to building, until my eyes grew tired with the dazzle of it.

  The streets were so jammed with people that we made very slow progress into the centre of the city. Everyone seemed happy and in holiday mood. Men had brought their wives and children, it was a fine spring day, there was a general air of festivity. We pushed our way through a market, like the one Yeshûa had seen when he came to make his bar mitzvah vow. I was dizzy with the colour of it, and the scents heaped up in almost sickening profusion. There were the clean perfumes of jasmine and astringent herbs, but I could also smell putrefying meat, and underfoot I trod on overripe grapes, reeking of sour wine and mould. I kicked something with my foot and looked down to see a rotten pomegranate roll away into the ditch. Beyond it, a narrow alley led downhill. It was strewn with rubbish and lost itself amongst a mean huddle of slums.