The Second Messiah

by Glenn Meade

  “What photograph?”

  Anna slipped open a drawer, withdrew a newspaper clipping, and handed it to Becket. “This photograph.”

  Becket saw that it was an old newspaper photograph of a couple and recognized Robert and Margaret Cane. “May I keep this?” he asked.

  “If you wish. Franz told me he had to see you before he died. But he refused to say why. Do you know why, Holy Father?”

  Becket slipped the photograph of the Canes into his gown. “Yes, Anna, I know why. It’s because of a terrible secret your brother and I share.”

  “Secret?”

  At that precise moment Franz Kubel’s eyes flickered awake. It was as if he had been jolted out of his coma. His watery eyes tried to focus. His face looked tortured as he sucked a breath of air into his cancer-riddled lungs.

  Becket spoke gently and rubbed the priest’s scrawny hand. “Franz, it’s good to see you again, old friend. I have given you the last rites. Soon you will be in God’s loving embrace. Do you understand me, Franz? Nod if you do.”

  Franz Kubel seemed to make a supreme effort. He nodded and grasped at John Becket’s hand.

  The pope whispered, “Good, you understand. You are absolved now from all your sins, my dear friend.”

  Tears welled up in Franz Kubel’s eyes.

  The pope said quietly, “Franz, the time has come. We must share with Anna the secret we have both kept all these years. You must do the right thing for both our sakes, and above all for the sake of the church. Anna is ready to bear witness, to hear the confession of our crime.”

  A puzzled Anna Kubel stared at her brother, then at Becket. “Crime? What—whatever are you talking about?”

  “Anna, I will explain everything later. For now, please, just listen—”

  The pope fell silent as Franz Kubel’s bony fingers grasped his sister’s hand, his wheezing voice as dry as sandpaper. “Anna, I … I need you to listen to what I have to tell you. And then dear sister, you must do exactly as the Holy Father instructs you …”

  99

  “OKAY, HERE WE go, guys,” Fonzi said.

  A blinding whiteness lit up the whiteboard projector screen. Jack and Lela blinked, their eyes stung by the powerful light explosion as they sat together on a couple of plastic chairs in a dimly lit basement room.

  Fonzi operated the projector screen using a laptop computer he’d hooked up. He flicked on a study lamp, stuck a pair of half-moon glasses on the end of his nose, and consulted a sheaf of handwritten notes. “I transferred the digital images from my cell into the computer. I then had my software program decode and interpret the data three consecutive times to be certain I’d got it right. I’ve used this program before to translate Dead Sea documents and it’s pretty reliable.”

  “What about decoding the text?”

  “The program to decode Atbash text is very simple. Atbash is a basic substitution code that merely reverses the Aramaic alphabet. Are you with me so far?”

  “Sure, I’m with you,” Jack said.

  Lela nodded.

  “Good.” Fonzi tapped the laptop keypad and the projector screen burst into life with scrolling Aramaic symbols. Seconds later the images blanked, a scroll segment appeared, then another, until finally eight segments filled the screen.

  Fonzi’s voice had an excited edge. “Okay, Jack, here’s the complete scroll you sent me via eight photographs. Now I’m going to merge them into a single translated text, including the uncoded first few lines, in clear. This is where things get very interesting.”

  Fonzi hit the keyboard and a chunk of English text replaced the eight segments on screen. Then he flicked on a laser pointer. With a circling motion of its red dot he indicated the entire body of text.

  “What you see here is about half the scroll contents. First I decoded and translated the text myself, then I ran it through the translation software and compared the two. What you see on the screen is as close to a literal translation of the original as I can give. Peruse at your leisure, and then we’ll move on to the rest.”

  Jack and Lela looked up at the screen and read:

  This story concerns the man known as Jesus the Messiah. Having traveled from Caesarea to Dora where his name had become well-known, he failed miserably to cure the blind and the sick, despite his promises to do so. Soon after, he was arrested in Dora by the Romans, tried and found guilty, and sentenced to be executed.

  This story was told to the Chosen of God by our brother Judas Iscariot, who while visiting nearby Caesarea in the company of Jesus’ brethren, learned of the Messiah Jesus’ presence in Dora. Yet when he traveled there to see and hear his master Jesus preach, Judas found him to be a false messiah, a usurper who was misusing Jesus’ name. On learning the truth, Judas now believed his master to be a false messiah, and not the true messiah, the one come to change the world. Judas Iscariot confessed that after discussing the matter with his brethren, it was decided that he would betray the false messiah to the Romans in Dora.

  Indeed, this false messiah was believed to be a man who traveled the land widely, pretending to be the chosen one. He made use of Jesus the Nazarene’s name and reputation, falsely promising to cure the sick and the possessed, and made claims to be the son of God. He is believed to have traded on the name of Jesus the Nazarene for his own ends, and to have gathered worldly riches in his name. But in truth, Jesus the Nazarene forbade the gathering of such riches. He believed that man should divest himself of all excessive possessions, and give alms to the poor, and help to the ill and the needy. But this false messiah’s greed for eminence was to condemn him.

  The text stopped there. As Jack finished reading, he felt an icy chill ripple down his back. He flicked a look at a confused Lela but before either of them could say a word, Fonzi broke the silence.

  “What we’ve got here,” he announced, pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose, “is a story unheard-of before now. It’s also one mountain of a mystery. As always the language used in the scrolls can be a little stilted, but what it seems to be saying is this: about the same time as the figure we know from biblical legend as Jesus the Nazarene—or Jesus Christ, Christ meaning “messiah” in Greek—there was another Jesus, an alter ego, a con man if you like, pretending to be him. It seems this con man traveled the Holy Land while at the same time attempting to carry out miracles and hoping to profit by his pretense, financially, egotistically, or both.”

  Fonzi paused to take a breath. “That’s what the text and subtext seem to be saying to me. Does it make sense to everyone so far?”

  His excitement rising, Jack nodded his approval. “Go on.”

  Lela said, “Hold on a second. Doesn’t the Jewish Talmud claim that Jesus is a false messiah who practiced magic and was rightly condemned to death? Our Bible, the Tanakh, is full of references to false prophets, deranged or not, who all claimed to be the chosen one.”

  Fonzi smiled. “True. Jesus even talks about it in Luke, for example. ‘Be not deceived for many shall come in my name, saying I am Christ.’ Except this is different. It’s extremely specific. We’re given details of someone who existed at the same time as Jesus. We’re given exact incidents. And if you think about it, what’s written about here is really a likely scenario.”

  “What do you mean?” Lela asked.

  “Successful people always have their imitators. Pretenders who try to make money or achieve notoriety on the backs of others. Whether it’s Elvis, a rock band, or a businessman with a brilliant idea, they’ve no sooner started to make a buck when there’s a bunch of clones trying to cash in on their achievement. Would it have been any different in Jesus’ time that someone might try to profit by imitating him?”

  “Profit how?” Lela asked.

  “Lots of ways. Jesus attracted a lot of attention, respect, and awe from his followers. He also attracted crowds, and gifts of alms and money, and was accommodated with food and lodging most places he went. Those are pretty tempting rewards to an impersonator.”

 
Fonzi added with a smile, “In other words, he was a magnet for attention. No doubt women hit on him too. He probably resisted the groupies, but all that attention and reward is a pretty enticing cocktail for a con artist.”

  Fonzi paused a second before going on. “And it would have been easy to carry out a deception. Travel in the Holy Land back then was done by donkey or horse or cart, or in most cases, by foot. Roads were bad, and it took an eternity to reach anywhere and news spread slowly. No TV, no radio, no newspapers.”

  Jack said, “Even Judas’s short journey along the coast from Caesarea to Dora, a distance of about ten miles, could have taken half a day. How many people would have known what Jesus looked like in a town where he’d never visited?”

  Fonzi nodded. “Exactly. In those days nobody carried IDs. If someone shows up and announces that he’s Jesus the Nazarene, there’s a good chance folks are going to believe him.”

  Fonzi pointed the laser’s red dot to underscore a portion of screen text. “Know what else is important? A couple of things appear to lend credibility to this text. The Chosen of God are the Essenes—they alone liked to refer to themselves by that name. And the mention of Judas Iscariot in an Essene document makes sense. The Essenes were known to be Zealots—fanatics if you like. The word Iscariot is thought to be a corruption from the Greek of the word Sicarius, which derives from the word Zealot. Some scholars believe that Judas Iscariot is a corruption of Judas Sicarius, and that he at some stage belonged to the Essene community. So it seems plausible that he’d confide in the Essenes. You know what else intrigues me, Jack?”

  “What?”

  “I’ve always found it incredible in the Bible that Judas has no valid motive to betray Jesus. Okay, he gets his thirty pieces of silver, but the money means nothing to him. He betrays Jesus because he betrays Jesus, and there’s absolutely no good reason for his treachery. Judas always claims to be totally loyal to Jesus, so scholars might say that the betrayal was simply to fulfil a prophecy. But to me, that’s bull, a total cop-out. Here, the text tells us that Judas’s betrayal had a genuine motive. A con man was guilty of identity theft. Judas betrayed him to protect the real Jesus. The motive makes sense of a betrayal that up until now is often seen as a complete mystery. That’s mega.”

  Lela said, “What are you trying to imply?”

  It was Jack who answered. “I think what Fonzi means is that if the text could be verified it could throw the Bible into doubt.”

  Fonzi stabbed a finger on the desk. “Exactly. Scripture records only one Jesus the Nazarene. Now we have two. And two betrayals by the same disciple. Two trials in two different Roman provinces. Two sentences of death by different prosecutors, and two crucifixions. We’re muddying the waters, creating a huge mystery that raises enormous questions.

  “All that aside, even the message of the real Jesus the Nazarene forbidding the gathering of riches is of colossal significance. That he believed man should divest himself of all excessive possessions for the benefit of the poor, the ill, and the needy. There are churches out there that have accumulated vast wealth, and I’m not just talking about Rome. Still others encourage their followers to accumulate riches. This is going to blow a lot of their so-called values out of the water. This is dynamite.”

  Jack blew out a breath. “Is there any chance you got the decoding or translation wrong?”

  “Are you kidding? I’ll bet my baguettes on it.” Fonzi replaced his glasses, his excitement rising. “And it’s about to get even more explosive. This last part is guaranteed to blow both your minds.”

  100

  FONZI POISED HIS fingers over the keyboard. “Question: what’s the bedrock on which Christianity is built?”

  Lela raised her eyes. “Don’t look at me, I’m Jewish.”

  “Jack?”

  “This is starting to sound like a quiz show.”

  Fonzi smiled. “It’s a question most Sunday schoolers could answer. What’s the rock?”

  “I can think of several. For one, a belief that Jesus Christ is the son of God.”

  “Sure. But I’m talking about something even more fundamental, which supports that belief.”

  Jack considered. “The resurrection? Jesus had to have been the son of God if he was raised from the dead.”

  “Bingo.” Fonzi stabbed the laptop keyboard with his finger. “Read on, be enlightened, and then we’ll discuss.”

  The screen cleared and then presented another chunk of text:

  The Roman commander in Dora, a harsh man known for his brutality, having heard of Jesus the Nazarene’s deeds and that he was gathering crowds around him and that he had claimed to be the King of the Jews, promptly imprisoned the false messiah on charges of sedition.

  A trial was quickly arranged. The prisoner was found guilty on Judas’s evidence, and on the evidence of the brethren in Judas’s company, who spread rumors about the prisoner and conspired against him. All this time the fearful prisoner had begged to be cleared of his charges, no longer claiming that he was Jesus the Nazarene. But the commander failed to heed him, the charges remained, and the sentence of execution was carried out by crucifixion.

  When the messiah’s corpse was removed from the cross, it was placed in a tomb in the burial caves outside Dora, on the road to Caesarea. On the third day, several of Jesus the Nazarene’s disciples went to the tomb and removed the body, to prevent it becoming a false shrine to their master. And there the matter ended. All this was told by Judas Iscariot to the Chosen of God.

  The text ended. As Jack read it again he felt as if his lungs had turned to stone. “It—it’s astonishing,” he said hoarsely.

  “Astonishing doesn’t even come close.” Fonzi shook his head. “But right now, we don’t know when exactly this other crucifixion happened in the timeline of Jesus’ life. Was it in the same year he was crucified? Or before, or even after? But for various reasons, which I’ll come to, I’d suggest that it’s likely to be some time between 30 A.D. to 33 A.D., which is generally agreed to be about the time when the real Jesus was executed. And if this means what I think it means, then it may cast doubt on the most powerful core of Christian belief—the resurrection itself.”

  “How?” Lela asked.

  Fonzi massaged his temple with the fingers of one hand. “The pretender—let’s call him the false Jesus—is caught, sentenced, crucified by the Romans, and then his corpse is removed from his tomb by the real Jesus’ disciples. In effect, his body has disappeared. At some point, before or after this event, we assume that the real Jesus is caught, sentenced, crucified by the Romans, and then rises from the dead.

  “But clearly this raises questions. One story mirrors the other. What if this second event is misrepresented? What if the two stories—the one concerning the real Jesus, and the other story that reflects the false Jesus—have essentially blurred to become one? Or even that one of them replaced the other?”

  “You mean the resurrection may have never happened?”

  Fonzi said, “Hey, I’m just throwing out thoughts, Jack. Like any sane, reasonable thinker would do if they read this material. And some of those thoughts might be adhesive enough to stick. It’s even conceivable that this story we’ve just read may cast doubt on whether the real Jesus was crucified, and not a substitute, as many early Christian heresies and the Koran have claimed.”

  Fonzi paused, then added, “Something else that’s worth considering—Bible experts have been known to suggest that there had to be some kind of collusion between Jesus and Judas for his betrayal to take place. This report makes you wonder if the collusion went even deeper. That Jesus might never have died on the cross in the first place. You get my point? The pretender’s crucifixion was the only one that took place. Those are the kinds of speculations that might arise from this material.”

  “How come a story as controversial as this hasn’t surfaced before now?”

  A knowing smile twisted Fonzi’s face as he addressed Lela. “How do we know it hasn’t? Lots of stuff got c
ut out of the Bible. It’s not a book that’s come down to us from history in one solid piece. It evolved, Lela. For example, do you know about the Council of Nicaea?”

  “No.”

  “Jack, can you explain?”

  “The Council of Nicaea was convened by the Roman emperor Constantine in 325 A.D. Bishops met to decide what writings should be considered Holy Scripture and included in the Bible.”

  Fonzi nodded and added, “Even the divinity of Jesus was up for discussion. Legend has it that Constantine got majorly cheesed off when the proceedings were going nowhere. So he threw a batch of papers he was to choose from on a table. Those that remained on the table were in, those that fell off were out. He ordered that the controversial material left out of the Bible be completely destroyed. When some bishops disagreed, Constantine had them murdered.”

  Fonzi sat back in his wheelchair. “You see, Lela, down through the centuries the Bible’s been assembled and disassembled, edited and re-edited, had lines cut, words altered.”

  “You mean to reflect what the church’s leaders, its cardinals and scholars, wanted it to reflect?”

  “Exactly. Most of the gospel may truly represent what was written by its four authors, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, but as any biblical expert can tell you, other gospels and testaments have been left out. There were even rumors of a gospel according to Judas that was deliberately destroyed. Who knows, maybe this text is part of it? And something as contentious as this, if it was known by the church’s forefathers, my belief is they would have left it out because it might seriously cast doubt on aspects of the Bible.”

  Fonzi grabbed a bottle of water from the desk, unscrewed the cap, and swallowed a couple of gulps as if to quench the fire of his exhilaration. “Do you realize what you’ve found, Jack? The echo of Jesus’ drama has come to light in an ancient parchment preserved in the Judean desert. A drama that may now be called into question. So long as the scroll is original, so long as it’s not a fake, then you’ve opened an explosive can of worms.”