The Weeping Chamber Read online

  “Silence,” the old man barked. To John and Peter he spoke more quietly. He knew there could be no harm and possibly great gain in extending a favor to a famous worker of miracles. “Take the animal.”

  Both disciples led the donkey toward Bethany, where the teacher had already begun leading a procession on foot.

  As soon as Peter and John turned a corner in the road, the young men at the inn scattered to spread the news in all directions. They took proud ownership in the arrival of the miracle man of Nazareth by being the first to have knowledge of His coming to Bethphage from Bethany on His way to the Holy City.

  This news reached me as I walked among the pilgrims on my return to Jerusalem, news that stirred me from thoughts of despair and aroused a little curiosity from my depths of self-pity.

  As for the old men, after the departure of the two disciples, they merely waited by the side of the road. They had long since learned that much of life arrived with or without their efforts.

  Chapter Four

  With pilgrims surrounding the donkey, Yeshua rode in silence, cushioned from the vertebrae of the animal’s spine by cloaks provided by His disciples.

  Beside the animal, among the twelve of the teacher’s closest followers, walked Lazarus, smiling and vigorous, the picture of anything but a man who some claimed had once been dead. Behind them, maintaining a respectful distance, were the women who took comfort from Yeshua’s presence and teachings.

  The small group of pilgrims traveling from Bethany—close followers and friends of the teacher—was also silent. Politically astute, the followers feared Jerusalem’s reaction to their teacher’s arrival. For some time, public postings had dictated that any person who saw the man from Galilee must report Him. If He had chosen to arrive in full view and defiance of the temple authorities, however, they were not going to abandon Him. Not yet.

  As the procession left Bethany behind and continued toward Bethphage, the caravan road remained a broad, easily traveled mountain trail. The footing was rock, loose stones, and sand, paler brown than the reddish soil of the arid lower hills of Jericho. The Mount of Olives sloped upward on one side of the road and dropped steeply on the other.

  Unexpectedly, as the travelers neared Bethphage, they saw a stream of pilgrims heading toward them, away from Jerusalem. These pilgrims were loud, almost boisterous in their enthusiasm.

  Peter, walking a few paces behind the donkey, squinted as he tried to make sense of it. But too many hours of fishing with sunlight bouncing off the lake had made his sight notoriously untrustworthy among his friends.

  “What’s that?” he whispered to Judas. “A mob? Why?”

  Judas Iscariot, a thin, handsome man with a well-trimmed beard, grinned. “Ask the teacher. He knows everything.”

  “He doesn’t appear to be in the mood for jokes,” Peter said.

  Judas had a knack for ill-timed humor.

  Peter squinted again. “All those people, what are they carrying?”

  The redheaded fisherman’s hand had unconsciously fallen to the hilt of his sword.

  “Relax, hothead,” Judas said. “Those are branches.”

  The large crowd swept toward them.

  **

  I was among that crowd. After hearing the babble and rumors and excitement and stories regarding this man, my curiosity had grown.

  And so, I was about to see Him. I had no idea how the intersection of our lives would change who I was.

  “Is this the prophet from Nazareth in Galilee?” a man near me shouted.

  “It is,” one of the followers called back.

  Shouts and cries carried back to reach those behind me. The crowd swelled forward. A few in the front removed their cloaks and placed them on the road.

  Others began waving their branches. And yet others shouted for Lazarus to step forward, to prove he was alive.

  Somewhere from the middle of the throng came the first cries of praise. “Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna!”

  As I well knew from my previous Passovers in Jerusalem, people were shouting the welcoming chant extended to pilgirms from one of our ancient psalms. According to tradition, the pilgrims would respond with the second clause of each verse, with both parties singing the last verse together.

  This occasion proved to be different from tradition, however. Much different.

  Before us walked Lazarus, whose miraculous rising from the dead provided heated debate, speculation, and awe among the pilgrims to the Holy City. Lazarus was the proof, they cried, proof that all the other stories about Yeshua could be believed! Proof that a new Messiah had arrived to fulfill the ancient prophecies—a new Messiah with powers to break Roman oppression!

  As a man of wealth and education, I did not need such stories to entertain me. Still, I understood how the stories could affect common people who had little variation or hope in their daily lives.

  The crowd’s fever grew, and the hosannas became hoarse, broken utterances. From voice to voice, from soul to soul, the fire of unencumbered joy spread.

  “Hosanna! Blessed is the King of Israel! Blessed is the coming kingdom of our father David! Hosanna!”

  **

  Yeshua did not alter the pace of the donkey. People had plenty of time to rip down more branches to throw onto the road before the animal.

  As the long procession spilled over the highest ridge to begin descending the Mount of Olives, the twelve followers finally saw the true extent of the crowd behind me and understood how the joyful noise could have reached such deafening levels.

  The followers were dazed by the wonder of it all. This was no death march, they told themselves! This was a celebration of thousands streaming out through the gates of Jerusalem to join a spontaneous parade up the Mount of Olives. The majority were visitors to Jerusalem, most of them hardly aware of why they were dancing and singing with strangers.

  This was no death march! Surely now the teacher did not have an execution to fear in Jerusalem. Not with the support of so many people.

  “Hosanna! Hosanna! Blessed is the King of Israel! Blessed is the coming kingdom of our father David! Hosanna! Hosanna!”

  The singing was so joyous, it almost lifted me from my despair. The singing remained joyous for some time—until a group of Pharisees pushed through the crowd.

  **

  These men were set apart by their religious caps and the tassels on their cloaks. Disgust showed obviously on their faces. Disgust at the possibility of contaminating themselves. Disgust at the spectacle of the public worship of a man they hated.

  As the religious authorities began to shout and strike those around them, the hosannas quieted. Silence fell, all the more eerie in contrast to the almost frenzied shouting that had preceded it.

  “Teacher, rebuke Your followers for saying things like that!” the lead Pharisee commanded with the full power of a man accustomed to making people shrink back simply by lifting an eyebrow.

  Another spoke. “You are not worth this adulation. Call out now and send them away!”

  The teacher slowly pulled His gaze from the view of Jerusalem. From where He sat, He could not see the temple or the northern portions of the Holy City. But to the south and east of Mount Zion, He could see rising terraces and the large homes of the wealthy Jews of the upper city. Yet the magnificent homes seemed dwarfed by Herod’s palace with its great towers and lush gardens. The white walls of the buildings glowed in direct sunlight, looking like the entrance to heaven.

  Yeshua stared at the Pharisees. He pointed at the rocks visible on the road, those not covered by the branches and cloaks spread before His donkey. Then He spoke slowly and clearly, so the crowd could hear His restrained anger. “If they kept quiet, the stones along the road would burst into cheers!”

  The Messiah had spoken! New shouts of acclamation drowned out anything the Pharisees might have said in reply.

  Unbidden, the donkey moved forward. The teacher swayed gently with its movement and ignored the Pharis
ees as He passed them.

  The procession surged toward the final descent into Jerusalem.

  And because I remained on the outskirts of the crowd, drawn to the prophet yet not committed, I heard one Pharisee say to the other, “We’ve lost. Look, the whole world has gone after Him.”

  I did not hear the reply.

  Yet I would remember that prediction when they chose their course of action to defeat Him.

  Chapter Five

  A girl and a boy—scruffy, dirty children whose parents obviously had little concern for their whereabouts—dodged and twisted among us as we moved closer to Jerusalem.

  The girl chased the boy past me, under the waving branches and palm leaves, both children unaware of the reason for celebration but giddy with laughter and the joyous mood of the adults around them.

  They shrieked with play until the boy shot into a gap in the crowd. Although space opened for him, he stopped so quickly that the girl tumbled into him. She lifted her hand to slap the boy in mock vexation, but the sight that had mesmerized him stayed her hand, and she, too, froze to stare upward in awe.

  A man on a donkey rode beneath the branches held aloft like a royal arch.

  They saw what I had first seen.

  The man’s features were neither ugly enough nor handsome enough to set Him apart from other men. His hair was neither shaggy nor cut in a fashionable style. His physique was compact from carpenter’s work, but not overwhelming. This was a man easy to overlook on a crowded street. Except for His eyes.

  Men and women looked into His eyes and felt eternity tug at their souls; a music of peace seemed to still time until finally, reluctantly, they were able to pull their eyes from His. These were eyes with the authority to cast aside demons of torment, eyes that with a single look could make a person whole. Eyes that made His smile unlike any other man’s.

  It had been this smile that had first riveted the boy. When the girl joined him, the man cast it upon her too. He focused His gentle attention on them with a gaze of such presence that a silence of instinctive, untroubled yearning covered them like the cloaks upon His donkey, a silence so powerful that years later, in occasional quiet moments, this memory could soothe their souls as a caress.

  I understood why the children stared. His eyes kept me there in the crowd, unable to leave with a cynical snort of derision at the madness of the crowd’s behavior; His eyes cast the first doubts on my disbelief of the Lazarus miracle.

  Then the moment ended for the boy and the girl.

  The throng surged forward, moving the animal down the road. Pilgrims swept in front of the children, blocking their view of the man riding it.

  In unison, without exchanging words or glances, the two turned, squeezing and bumping around the legs of the changing adults in their need to follow. They stayed with us as the road dipped into a shallow depression. When the road rose again, it suddenly brought the Holy City into full view for the first time.

  The temple tower dominated the line of the sky as easily as it lorded over the vast courts spread beneath it. And the monstrous temple walls were cliffs—unassailable and as fixed as eternity. The white lime paint of the buildings, the burnish of hammered gold on the temple, and the softness of the green of the gardens gave an impact of unearthly splendor, an ache of beauty that could never be captured by words.

  What the children could not see, the man they followed did.

  I can only imagine what brought forth Yeshua’s next words, as if time’s curtain had rippled, shifting until it parted to give Him a ghastly vision of the same city with earthen ramps heaped to the top of the walls, of legions of soldiers swarming triumphantly, of the sky marred by the smoke of destruction, of temple walls shattered to rubble, of hills stark with hundreds of rebels groaning and impaled on crosses so numerous it was like a charred forest, of wailing mothers searching the ruins for their children’s torn bodies. And then, with another ripple of the curtain of time, a new vision: of dust swirling in an eerie dance to a haunting dirge sung by the wind as it blew across a plateau lifeless and desolate for centuries, the rejection by God as a horrible, cold punishment for a city that had butchered His Son.

  This is what the children could not see and what I would not understand until decades had passed: the beauty of the city and the inexorable tragedy ahead.

  Yet at that moment, Yeshua knew.

  The force of the contrast tore from Him a wrenching sob so loud it startled those beside Him. His sorrow deepened into heaving lamentation that cast the circled followers into an uneasy, puzzled silence.

  It was as if He spoke to the women of the city when the agonized words left His mouth. “I wish that even today you would find the way of peace. But now it is too late, and peace is hidden from you. Before long your enemies will build ramparts against your walls and encircle you and close in on you.”

  Yeshua closed His eyes but was unable to shut out the vision. “They will crush you to the ground, and your children with you. Your enemies will not leave a single stone in place, because you have rejected the opportunity God offered you.”

  His weeping did not stop.

  The boy and the girl crept forward. Unlike the adults, they were not frightened by the terrible sorrow of the man on the donkey, but they were filled with a longing to comfort, as if He were a smaller child in need, and His sorrow drew them slowly to the donkey, where each shyly rested a hand on its flank.

  For as long as He wept, they wordlessly shared His grief.

  Chapter Six

  As the procession continued on toward Jerusalem, a conversation took place, one that I would learn of later from well-placed friends who enjoyed telling me of their successes. Friends, I am ashamed to say, accustomed to political intrigue.

  If that says something about my character—to have these friends—I accept the judgment. It is part of the danger that comes with accumulating wealth, and there was a time in my life when I found it exciting to associate with such people—before I realized the price I was paying for my gold by giving it more devotion than I did my wife and children.

  These friends I mention had sent spies to fish among the twelve followers of the man of Galilee. Later, they conveyed the conversation to me.

  **

  “Hello, my friend.”

  Walking behind the others, Judas glanced at the man who joined him. Older and of medium height, the most striking portion of the man’s face was a bulbous nose, skin thick and pitted. The man’s smile was ingratiating, dulled by several missing teeth.

  “Who calls me friend?” Judas asked. He carried the moneybag for all the disciples. His natural shrewdness with money also made him naturally suspicious.

  “Does it matter in this great crowd? We are all for the Messiah, are we not?”

  Despite the ringing of song and cheers that had resumed around them, Judas caught the duplicity in the man’s voice. “We are,” Judas said evenly.

  “And you are one of His closest followers. Judas Iscariot. A Judean when all the others are Galilean.”

  That the man knew Judas’s name was one thing. That he was prepared to show this knowledge was another. It was the essence of Judas to understand cunning subtlety. He knew the man was playing a game and was unafraid to show it. What game, however, roused Judas to curiosity.

  “It is a great thing to be close to someone with such power, is it not?” the man continued.

  Judas lifted an eyebrow, not agreeing, not disagreeing. At this point, it was in his interest to listen without committing any kind of answer.

  “After all,” the man said, “if He ever led crowds like this to a successful revolt, He would need capable administrators. Which, of course, is another sort of power.”

  The man alluded to the position Judas held among the disciples, showing he had even more knowledge about their workings. Outwardly, Judas hid his enjoyment of the intrigue.

  They walked without speaking for a few steps. Halfway down the Mount of Olives now, they passed through the mottled shadow
s of olive trees.

  “After all,” the man said, content that he had Judas’s interest, “if half of the stories of His miracles are true, with a single word He could fell Roman armies.”

  “They are true,” Judas said. “My own eyes claim witness.”

  “Yes, yes,” the man answered, still smiling his ingratiating, toothless smile, “but in the region of Dalmanutha, a group of Pharisees challenged Him to show a sign from heaven, and He was unable to produce a miracle. Had He but taken that opportunity . . .”

  “My own eyes claim witness to His miracles,” Judas repeated.

  “Then why has He not taken the cloak of Messiah? I have spoken to other followers who left Him. Followers who tell me that in Capernaum, He commanded them not to rise up against the Romans. Surely you saw how many fell away from Him?”

  Judas did not rise to his teacher’s defense. For somehow, this grubby man had squeezed juice from the very same doubts Judas held.

  “Yes,” the man mused, “there is such a thing as a sinking ship. I, for one, would never hesitate to swim to safety. There is nothing noble about drowning unnecessarily, particularly if power is to be found elsewhere.”

  He winked at Judas. “You asked me my name, friend? Should you ever want to know, you may find me among the Sanhedrists. Those who hold true power.”

  He gave Judas a final oily smile before blending back into the flow of pilgrims.

  Chapter Seven

  Simeon, you are quiet this evening.”   I brought my attention back from the flame of the oil lamp. Dusk had yet to arrive, and although the room received ample sunlight through the slatted window overlooking the central courtyard, Seraphine had insisted on the flame and incense to accompany the meal.

  I found both Seraphine and Pascal staring at me. Pascal, I guessed, was curious because of our earlier conversation in his shop, a curiosity I did not wish to attend to immediately. Seraphine, perhaps, was still accustoming herself to the sight of a scarred cousin from a distant land, trying to match my appearance to all the wild stories Pascal had undoubtedly told about me before my arrival.