by Jay Parini
A true son of his father, Paul always showed interest in commercial dealings, and he spoke at length with the Greek captain about his experience with hides in Jerusalem some decades ago. “They paid too much for these hides, I suspect,” Paul said.
Alerted to our arrival, a number of followers met us in Tyre. It astonished me how word traveled in our circle, leaping from harbor to harbor. Paul knew many of them, as a few had once lived in Jerusalem but fallen out with James, who continued to expand his influence. To this gathering, after the sacred meal, Paul spoke freely. I saw that, to them, he was the true apostle of the Christ, although one of their number claimed that, in a dream, he had been warned by an angel that Paul should not proceed to Jerusalem. “It’s unsafe for Paul,” the angel had said.
Paul took no notice of this. “There are too many angels,” he said. “And each of them has an opinion.”
We set off again, sailing past Cyprus, which prompted Paul to recall his months there with Barnabas and John Mark, whom he referred to as “that plump little toad.” I noticed that Paul, for the most part, looked away from the island, as if shielding his eyes from a version of himself that provoked discomfort. I never understood what had gone amiss on that journey, though scandalous rumors spread among Paul’s enemies.
From the deck I watched in awe as the limestone Promontory of Zeus swelled before us.
“Mount Carmel,” Paul said. “It’s where Elijah confronted the priests of Baal. A brave moment for him.”
“What’s that again?” My weak knowledge of history was on display now.
“Gamaliel always spoke of this incident with a kind of special energy. The Canaanites would make unholy sacrifices there. I’ll never set foot on that hill, believe me. It’s full of evil spirits.”
I believed him. Not being a Jew, I relied on Paul’s knowledge of such things, and he liked to play the wise rabbi with me. Timothy, of course, could never get enough of this, and I listened as he questioned Paul about the Canaanites. Who were they? What did they want? Where had they gone? So many questions…
“Alexander sat beside Aristotle,” I said to Paul one day, with Timothy listening.
“What does that mean?”
“I’m thinking of you and Timothy.”
Paul raised one eyebrow. “I believe you’ve just been compared to Alexander the Great, my boy,” he said. “Perhaps you will conquer Palestine one day.”
* * *
The arrival in Jerusalem, where political tensions had reached a threatening level, frightened me, and confrontations in the streets between Jews and Roman soldiers had risen to a level of violence unknown in recent decades. I revealed my misgivings to Paul, and this was always risky.
“How can they harm us, with God as our protector?” he asked me as we drew near Ptolemais, one of the ports along this coastline. In a moment of peculiar self-revelation, he added, “I’m more spirit than flesh these days.”
“It’s one of the benefits of aging,” I said.
We disembarked with our treasure and were joined by another band of followers led by Philip. They came with camels and donkeys, who swelled this caravan taking our gift to the Way. A sense of something awesome, without precedent, filled me; almost no one in our company spoke, as if aware of our moment in history. We moved in grandeur, with respect for the deed before us, which could unite everyone in the love of the Christ.
Apparently Philip had known Paul in Jerusalem many years ago, and he admired a holy man named Agabus, who occupied a lonely shepherd’s hut above the city, where he lived on honey and locusts. He came to meet us as we drew close, summoned by Philip, and said to Paul directly, “Do not proceed to Jerusalem. They want to kill you there.”
“You had better listen,” said Philip.
This was his second warning, and I suggested he take it seriously. He could return to Antioch, and a few of us—less conspicuously—could drop off the Collection and retreat as well. The less splash we made, perhaps, the better.
Paul shrugged. “I trust in God. And go where I go. If I should die in Jerusalem, I die for the one I serve.”
I bit my tongue, as it was not my place to argue with Paul about his destiny or vision. Yet a gloom settled over me as we set off for Jerusalem the next day, with Paul intensely conscious of the fact that this could well be the final leg of his meandering journey through life. At least he didn’t climb up on a donkey as the walled city loomed, this mirage that grew into reality before us, with its amber walls and the Temple gradually asserting itself, that sacred center of the world, rebuilt after the Babylonian captivity by Ezra and Nehemiah. We stopped for a meal by the roadside and listened to Paul, who had such a memory for the details of history that everyone marveled. He recalled that Herod had added the impressive Second Wall between the Jaffa Gate and the Temple Mount.
“I don’t know Jerusalem well,” I said.
Paul looked at me sternly. “Pay attention, Luke. This will be important for your writing.”
Art is an act of attention, and I was writing down everything at night, making notes while the rest of our company slept. My story of the adventures of Paul would attract readers. How could it not? Someone had to remember everything that had happened, what we did, what Paul had said and accomplished. In his letters, he refused for the most part to talk about himself, addressing problems at hand in Galatia, Thrace, Thessalonica, Philippi, Derbe, Cyprus, Corinth, Antioch, and Ephesus. Everywhere unique conflicts and tensions arose, and Paul did his best to advise them, offering the fruits of his prayers.
As it was, no fanfare greeted us as we entered Jerusalem, no buzzing cloud of witnesses, clanging cymbals or drums. No feathery palms spread before our path. No wreaths of laurel.
Paul was anonymous, for a time. And it was good that we attracted no attention since the gold in our possession made us a clear target for thieves.
“Mnason the Cypriot is expecting us,” Paul said.
Surely enough Mnason, a wealthy dealer in olive oil, welcomed us to his large house only half a mile from the Temple. The Jews disliked him, this man with no roots in their tradition; he had been, as Paul explained, “a disciple from the beginning, only briefly a Godfearer.” I believe that Peter had often engaged him, seeking financial advice if not gifts for the Way.
“Their incompetence annoys me,” Mnason said. “James would have everyone a pauper, and Peter can’t manage his own finances.”
I worried that Mnason had no sympathy for those affected by the famine, but I didn’t mention this, as Paul caught my eye with a look that, of course, I understood. It was as if he could read my mind and objected to my remarks even before I made them.
Mnason said we could stay with him as long as we liked, though Paul had very little sense of how long we might remain. Would we simply return to Antioch after giving the Collection to Peter and James, accepting their thanks and bowing in retreat? That would have pleased me, as I could then reclaim my family home, perhaps resume my medical practice. We had done the work we set out to do, and the Kingdom of God would unfold in its proper time. One could not hurry the Christ. God’s plan for his creation remained his own, and we could not expect to understand everything now.
“We’re going to Rome, in due course,” said Paul, vaguely to Mnason but also to me.
Always Rome. And I knew that I, too, would be drawn to the center of the empire with him. My dream of settling in Antioch for good was, alas, short-lived.
* * *
Paul could hardly wait to bring the Collection to Peter and sent a message announcing our arrival. Peter replied warmly, saying we should go to the house of James the following day. The brother of Jesus lived at the edge of the Upper City, in a villa with a surprisingly large interior garden.
“A gift from an admirer,” Paul whispered.
The next day we arrived, several of us, with the box. Anxiety pulsed in the villa, wher
e any number of unknown faces appeared: The Way in Jerusalem had acquired its own complexion, and we had lost touch with them. Everyone looked out of sorts, unhappy to see us. Even when we presented them with our gift, they barely acknowledged us. James, in particular, reacted with only a quick, nervous glance at one of his associates, who remained impassive.
Peter tried his best now to make us comfortable. “I can hardly thank you enough, all of you. Especially you, dear Paul. We will put this gift into service. The poor among us will benefit. Nobody will starve, even if there’s another dry season.”
Sitting in a wicker chair, arms folded across his chest, James sighed. He had grown very old and strange-looking, with dark hollows in his cheeks. John the Baptizer could not have appeared more haggard, wizened, or otherworldly. He mumbled to himself continuously, as if in dispute with some invisible spirit. His eyes twitched, these tiny red orbs with black circles beneath them.
“You look tired,” Paul said to James. “Do you live on locusts?”
“I eat no meat,” said James. “But locusts are fine.”
“So you pluck the wings of these poor insects, and eat them greedily,” Paul said. “Is that right? Should we not consider locust as a form of meat?”
James’s mouth puckered slightly, as if a lemon had been pushed into it, and the skin of his brow tightened. Did Paul really wish to cause offense at the moment we should have been reconciled, at last, with the Jerusalem contingent? Peter looked glumly at me when I caught his eye.
“I don’t know where you hear such things,” said James.
“One hears things, especially about you. Of course I dismiss most of what I hear. Gossip is tedious.”
Somehow I didn’t expect Paul to taunt the brother of Jesus.
Peter made an effort to shift the conversation onto happier ground. “Tell us where you have been, Paul and Luke. And Timothy. We hear rumors, but we can’t keep track of your travels in the West.”
“The West,” said Paul, “is larger than you know.” He launched into an account of our travels, observing that many Godfearers and Greeks had come into our circle, and that the Kingdom of God drew ever closer. “We have seen our numbers grow, our gatherings spilling over. The seeds we planted have taken root, often in stony soil. The little green shoots push through the dirt. There are flowers, here and there, and there is fruit!”
He went a little overboard—Peter and James might have preferred a modest answer—but Paul could not restrain himself.
James looked quietly angry as Paul continued in a manner that most would consider boastful.
“They say you teach the Jews who live among Greeks to ignore the teachings of Moses altogether,” James said. “The Law of Moses is irrelevant, that is apparently what you say to them. They find our traditions ludicrous, or irrelevant. Even the Jews refuse to circumcise their sons. They eat meat that is improperly slaughtered. Do they eat pigs now? Do they fornicate as well?”
Paul said, “We had an agreement, I believe, some years ago. Am I mistaken? I have only done as we agreed. Jews are Jews, and they should follow the Law to whatever degree accords with their hearts.”
I was quite relieved that he didn’t bring up what he had written to the Romans, where he said without equivocation: “No, my friends, no! A man is a Jew inwardly and not by circumcision. I call this circumcision of the heart, by the spirit, not in accord with any written code. We do not obey the letter of the law but understand its spirit. A man who has been transformed by the spirit seeks praise only from God, not from others.”
James had something in mind now, and said, “We have four men among us who are newly admitted to our circle. They are Jews. Show them that you are a Jew, a Pharisee, of the tribe of Benjamin. You observe the Law yourself, as I understand. So take them into the Temple for the ritual purification. Pay for the shaving of their heads. And shave your own head, Paul!”
Paul was so bald it would take the most superfluous effort to shave his head, and I could see this vaguely amused him.
“I shall do as you suggest,” he said.
“Do you love my brother, Paul?”
It was another odd remark by James. Did Paul love Jesus? Here was the man, after all, who wrote to the Roman assembly: “For I am convinced beyond doubt that neither death nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor present things, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in this whole of creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus, our Lord.”
And yet James would not let it go. “You do love my brother?”
Paul said, “As much as you, shall we say?”
That seemed to end it.
The next day we met at the steps of the Temple with the four young men who had been raised as Jews but vowed to serve only Jesus, our Christ. The Temple Guards watched us nervously, while Jews crowded the courtyard in more than the usual numbers, hovering in conversation on the steps. Many still recalled Paul as a fellow worshipper, though it had been a long time since he had been among them in this way. Paul certainly understood the rituals of the Temple and what was required. Now he stood with the four men and said, “I will take you in. They will shave our heads, as you know. Remember that we do this as Jews who understand that Jesus is the Christ, that we give ourselves to his mind, God’s mind in ours. Enlightenment is at hand. The night is gone, far gone. The day arrives.”
I don’t think they quite understood this overcharged declaration, nor did I. Not exactly. Paul doubtless had an impulse to define this moment for the young men in ways separate from what the ritual portended. He searched to find a language adequate to the experience at hand, but he had not found it, at least not this time.
Having never been a Jew, I stayed well beyond the boundaries. In truth, I didn’t understand their passion for dividing lines and directives. Paul had told me about the priests, the children of Aaron, who guarded the Holy of Holies with a jealousy beyond comprehension to a Greek. One entered this area at risk of death. A gentile could not go anywhere near the inner courts, and I could see the guards with their swords ready to slay any intruder. An aura of menace hung over the place, and it failed to inspire the love of God in me.
As we all knew, the high priest of the Temple had recently been murdered by a zealot from the Galilean hills, who had been immediately stoned to death by Temple Guards. The potential for disruption terrified the civil authorities, too, and Roman soldiers gathered at the entrance to the Temple, keeping watch. The imperial army was omnipresent in Jerusalem, in encampments outside the city walls, prowling the streets, guarding the entrance to the Temple. They feared, with justification, that the beginnings of a large revolt could erupt anywhere, anytime, and one could not predict how this destructiveness would end.
The world did seem near its end.
Leaving me to wait by myself in a shady spot, Paul took the young men into the Temple. They emerged a few hours later, their heads shaven. They all looked quite happy, chattering among themselves. Paul walked in the center of their little circle, and I could see that he was full of stories.
Suddenly a large, gruff man began to shout at Paul from nearby, shaking a fist. I could not easily comprehend the accusation he made, though I heard the name of Trophimus. Paul had recently been seen in the company of Trophimus, a well-known Ephesian, who had been visiting Jerusalem on business. We all knew Trophimus well. He was a friend. And Paul and I had certainly walked in the street with him the day before, even stepping briefly into the courtyard of the Temple while Paul explained certain things before we passed on.
“He took a Greek into the Temple, into the sacred place!” the man cried, as the mob intensified in number and heat. Others shouted accusations of blasphemy.
Paul refused to answer them, even to acknowledge their shouts.
“He is innocent!” I said as loudly as I could.
One of them hit me i
n the jaw, and I fell to the ground, losing consciousness briefly. Paul rushed toward me, wanting to help, but they held him back. Where had they all come from? As they would, the well-trained Roman guards knew exactly what they must do in these circumstances. A riot must not happen. They had been instructed to isolate and calm an uprising before it actually started, and they were told to arrest the culprit at once and disperse the mob by any means necessary.
They quickly identified Paul as the instigator.
“He’s not the one!” I said as clearly as I could. I would do anything to protect Paul, but someone kicked me in the head as I tried to sit, knocking me to the paving stones, and the last thing I saw was the apostle, my dear friend, being led away in chains.
Chapter Seventeen
PAUL
I had never seen the Roman presence in Jerusalem in such profusion, with legionaries on every street as Passover approached. They watched keenly, even warily, while visitors spilled through the eleven gates of the city. Guards on horseback stood in the dark shadow of the Temple Mount, swords drawn for use if needed. I saw a man arrested for shouting at a huckster in the marketplace, another seized for staring at a soldier. Violence had erupted near the Zion Gate the week before, with the death of a Roman policeman, the first in a few years. This act only intensified the imperial glare.
The whole of Judea, and Palestine more broadly, had been tense for years, as Jews clashed with the occupying forces, who misunderstood and probably hated our people, our culture, our God. Outlaws and rebel groups roamed the countryside, with occasional skirmishes, some of them deadly. For the most part, the disturbances had been isolated in Galilee and the northern provinces, with their long Maccabean history of rebellion, but now Jerusalem had become a flash point and flames could easily engulf the holy city.