Daughter of Cana Read online

  If Jude was anxious, he hid it well. “I do not deny it.” He boldly met her gaze. “I met Chuza in Tiberias nearly three years ago. He wanted us to escort his wife to Capernaum. We agreed to let her travel with us.”

  The corner of Herodias’s mouth quirked. “You are followers of this Nazarene, correct? As is Chuza?” She glanced around. “Where is the steward?”

  A tall, dignified man stepped forward and bowed before Herodias. “Chuza is overseeing preparations for the royal dinner, my lady. Perhaps I can be of service?”

  Herodias lifted her chin. “Perhaps, Manaen. Do you know this couple?”

  I closed my eyes, desperately trying to place the man’s name. I did not know his face, but I had heard the name before—from Joanna. He had gone with her and Chuza to see the Immerser and was impressed with what he had heard.

  Manaen turned toward me and Jude, his eyes softening as he smiled. I felt a measure of anxiety leave my shoulders—a man who smiled like that could not mean us harm.

  “I do not know these people,” Manaen said. “I have not had the pleasure of meeting them.”

  “Still.” Herodias frowned. “I do not like the idea of our steward consorting with followers of this Nazarene. If he did it once, he will do it again.”

  Jude barked a laugh. “A follower of the Nazarene? Excuse me, my lady, but I am no follower. I am his brother, and I have spent years trying to convince him to give up his teaching and return to Nazareth.”

  Jude’s honest answer was clearly not what Herodias expected. She narrowed her eyes at me. “Is he telling the truth? Are you a follower of the Nazarene?”

  Following Jude’s example, I smiled in false confidence. “I went in search of him only to persuade my brother, one of the man’s disciples, to come home and help with the harvest. I seek my brother still, which is why I have come to Jerusalem.”

  “But you believe this Yeshua is the son of God.”

  I shook my head. “HaShem is One. So how can this Yeshua be His son?”

  Our answers seemed to satisfy Herodias, for she stepped away, dismissing us and our one-eyed escort with a flip of her hand. But before we were ushered out of the audience chamber, I saw the servant enter with a regal purple robe draped over his arm. He took it to Yeshua, who looked at us with understanding and compassion as he turned to watch us go.

  I should have been happy to be released from Antipas’s custody, but my blood ran thick with guilt. We had come to Jerusalem to help Yeshua and Thomas. Though our honest answers had saved us, we had done nothing to help our brothers.

  As Jude and I left the palace, my heart twisted with a wretchedness I had known only when my mother died.

  Jude and I were still outside Antipas’s palace when the Roman wagon passed again, four guards at its corners and Yeshua sitting in the center, clothed in the tetrarch’s purple robe.

  “They’re taking him back to Pilate,” Jude said, his voice grim. “We could go there, but the governor might pass judgment before we arrive.”

  “What sort of judgment could he pass?” I asked, trying to sound hopeful. “Antipas did not find Yeshua guilty of any crime. Surely Pilate will do the same.”

  “We will see.” Jude grabbed my hand and led me through the churning crowd.

  By the time we reached the governor’s mansion, the gates had been opened and a crowd filled the courtyard. We worked our way through the mob, then stood among the others as Pilate stepped forward to address the people. Pointing to Yeshua, who stood behind him in royal purple, Pilate said, “You brought this man to me as one who incites the people to revolt. But having examined him in your presence, I have found no case against this man regarding what you accuse him of doing. Nor did Herod Antipas, for he sent him back to us. Indeed, he has done nothing worthy of execution.”

  The mob around us surged forward, shouting, “Take this fellow away! Release to us Bar-abbas!”

  I rose on tiptoe and shouted in Jude’s ear, “Who are they asking for?”

  “A rebel and a murderer.”

  Again Pilate lifted his hand. “But what shall I do with this Yeshua of Nazareth?”

  “Execute, execute him!”

  Pilate lifted both hands, attempting to speak, but the crowd drowned him out as they called for Yeshua’s execution. I glanced up and saw a glazed look of despair spread across Jude’s face. Unable to bear the sight of his pain, I closed my eyes and clung to his hand, knowing that each cry from the crowd had to be a stab at his heart. If they had been calling for Thomas’s death, I would be groveling on the paving stones, sobbing, begging for my brother’s life . . .

  Finally, the mob stilled long enough for Pilate to speak. “Why?” He scowled at the discontented rumble that continued beneath his words. “What evil has this one done? I have found in him no fault deserving of death. Therefore I will scourge and release him.”

  Like water pouring through a broken dam, the crowd’s disapproval roared over the dais where the procurator stood, accented by renewed calls for Yeshua’s execution.

  Pilate’s features hardened in a mask of disapproval as he called for a basin of water. In full view of the chief priests and Temple authorities, he dipped his hands in the water and held them aloft, illustrating that he had washed his hands of the entire matter.

  While Jude and I watched, the procurator released the criminal Bar-abbas, who had been jailed for insurrection and murder. Then he surrendered Yeshua to the will of the frenzied mob.

  Roman guards dragged Yeshua from the elevated patio where he had been on display and took him away.

  I will never forget what happened next. While Jude and I stood stupefied on the pavement, a howling cacophony of fiendish glee rent the air. Men’s faces distorted into horrible expressions of devilish euphoria, derision, and unholy triumph. Those who had sought to destroy Yeshua waved their hands, clapped each other on the back, and pounded the paving stones in a mad dance of delight. Surely their hatred had been inspired by the father of lies . . .

  I had not been one of Yeshua’s followers, but I would never want to destroy him. How could I when he had healed Yagil, raised a man from the dead, and banished seven demons from Miriam of Magdala? Whatever his motivation, Yeshua met people in need and made them whole; he brought healing and hope to their lives.

  These celebrating his downfall were not healers but coldhearted destroyers. Whatever their motivation, they were opposing everything Yeshua had worked for, and he had worked only for the kingdom of God, never for himself.

  Somehow Jude and I managed to escape the uncontrolled mob. We spilled onto the street with a handful of others, then wandered aimlessly through crowds that roiled with news of what had happened in Pilate’s courtyard. This Passover would be anything but a time of celebration for our people.

  “What—what will they do now?” I asked Jude as we searched for an alley that would lead us back to the inn.

  “They will kill him quickly, before the news becomes widely known,” he said, his voice breaking. “By all that is holy, I must find my mother. She must not—must not see this.”

  “Where could she be?”

  Jude tightened his jaw. “Knowing her, she is near him. If we find Yeshua, we will find her.”

  We did not know how to find Mary or Yeshua, so we decided to travel back toward Pilate’s palace, hoping to learn some news on the way. As we walked, spurts of overheard conversations kept us apprised of all that had happened since we escaped the mob. We learned that after Pilate surrendered him, Yeshua had been stripped, beaten, crowned with thorns, and re-clothed in purple before being made to stand before a cohort of Roman soldiers, who mocked and spit on him.

  Jude went pale when he heard each report, yet I could not tell if his distress sprang from sorrow or anger. But the hand wrapped around mine felt like iron, and his eyes burned with determination.

  We halted in the middle of the street when we heard an old man say he had seen Yeshua with two criminals on their way to the execution site. “Where?” Jude i
nterrupted, his throat bobbing as he swallowed. “Where did you see him and where will they die?”

  The old man lifted his walking stick and pointed it toward the northwest. “Outside the city, at a hill called Golgotha. That’s where the Romans crucify those they intend as a warning for the rest of us.”

  An anguished wail nearly escaped me, but for Jude’s sake I sealed my lips as he lengthened his stride and hurried toward the city gate. I followed with rising dismay, dreading what we would see once we reached our destination.

  As a child I once saw a crucifixion, and afterward Abba scolded me for stopping to stare. “The Torah says anyone hanged on a tree is a curse of God,” he chided. “You should never look on anyone who is cursed.”

  But how could I not look on Yeshua, who had done so much for so many?

  Jude and I worked our way through the crowds, moving toward the gate in the western wall. Because it was Passover, merchants, traveling families, Roman officials, and harried shoppers filled every street and alley. Everyone wanted to complete the day’s business before sunset, because as soon as the first three stars could be seen in the night sky, the Passover meal could be shared and the Feast of Unleavened Bread would begin. Already the sun stood almost directly overhead.

  By the time Jude and I passed through the city gate, we could see the Romans doing their evil work on a distant hill. “I know that place,” Jude said, his eyes abstracted. “They call it Golgotha because it resembles a skull.”

  I stared at the desolate spot with tears in my eyes. Though my heart squeezed so tightly I could barely draw breath, I forced myself to speak: “The old man was right. They want us to see it and fear them.”

  His grip tightened on my hand. “Let us get closer.”

  My heart pounded as we wound our way through the tangle of travelers. Jude led me until we stood at the base of the treeless hill. A wide path, deeply rutted by the wheels of Roman wagons, led up to a clearing where a group of soldiers sweated and cursed as they fulfilled their heinous duty.

  We could not see the condemned men from where we stood, so I assumed they lay on the ground. The majority of the executioners were occupied with hammers. Another, a soldier with gold embellishments on his breastplate, propped his hands on his hips and stared up at the sky, where a thin scarf of cloud did little to provide shade.

  Jude and I moved off the road and stood on the wayside, uncertain of what we should do next. A small group of observers stood only a few paces from the soldiers. Four of them were women, their heads bowed and their arms around each other. Two men in traditional Jewish garb stood off to the side while a group of Pharisees and Temple officials stood near them.

  I looked at Jude, willing to go wherever he wanted to lead me.

  “There she is.” He pointed to the women. “The woman in blue—that’s Ima. She’s with Aunt Salome, Mary, and Miriam.”

  I squinted to better differentiate between the figures. Yes—I recognized the set of Mary’s shoulders, though now they were bowed with grief. Miriam of Magdala stood at her right hand with Mary, wife of Clopas. Salome stood at her left.

  I stared up at Jude, recognized grief behind the indecision on his face, and decided to abide by his wishes, whatever they were. “Do you want to go up there?”

  “I can’t.” He swallowed hard. “Yeshua would see me, and what do I say to him? I tried to warn him, HaShem knows I tried my best, but he would not listen . . .”

  Tears welled in his eyes.

  “We don’t have to go.” I slid my fingers over his. “Your mother is not alone. Miriam, Mary, and Salome will take care of her.”

  We stood in silence as the Romans lifted the heavy beams supporting the two criminals and slid them into prepared holes. As each vertical beam fell into place, the movement wrenched the man nailed at the wrists and feet, and the criminal’s scream reverberated across the bleak landscape. Passersby jeered at the sound, many lifting their fists in support of the Roman atrocity.

  I felt a shudder run through Jude as the soldiers in the center huddled and bent to lift a third execution stake. The commander barked an order, and the soldiers lifted the heavy timber. A flash of wild grief ripped through me when Yeshua came into view—somehow I had hoped I would see a stranger—and when they lowered the stake into the prepared cavity, Jude groaned and Yeshua’s face contorted in agony, but he did not cry out.

  I lowered my head as nausea followed grief, rippling through my stomach, up my throat, and burning the back of my mouth. For Jude’s sake, I choked it down. If I was sick with grief, what must he be feeling?

  I looked up and saw that his eyes were wide and as empty as windows, as though the soul they mirrored had died.

  Not knowing what else to do, I drew a trembling breath and forced myself to witness what I had dreaded for months.

  Because the three men on the execution stakes bore their bodies’ weight on pierced wrists and feet, they struggled to breathe. Even from a distance I could see them suffer renewed agonies every time they pressed on their broken feet to propel themselves upward and snatch a breath. After each inhalation they collapsed against the stake, their torn and wounded backs sliding over raw wood, starting the slow process all over again.

  I kept looking at Jude, whose face had settled into stony lines. He might have been a statue, so still was his countenance.

  Though the travelers behind us commented, jeered, or wept, we watched in silence. We saw the Romans hang a written placard above Yeshua’s head, then gamble for his clothing. We saw the chief priests, the Torah teachers, and the elders walk forward to observe his near-nakedness and mock his humiliation. Their voices floated down to us: “He saved others, but he can’t save himself?”

  “He’s the king of Israel! Let him come down now from the stake and we’ll believe in him!”

  “He trusts in God—let God rescue him now, if He wants him. For he said, ‘I am Ben-Elohim, the Son of God.’”

  A man on the road walked toward the execution site and shouted, “You who are going to destroy the Temple and rebuild it in three days, save yourself!”

  We were not the only people watching from the roadside. Others stopped to question, curse, or criticize the Roman violence. As I listened to one man deride all things Roman, I remembered that one of our own kings, Alexander Jannaeus, had crucified eight hundred Jews, mostly devout Pharisees, while he feasted with his concubines. Violence was not a Roman trait; it was as human as the curiosity that compelled dozens of travelers to gawk at this exhibition of cruelty.

  At midday, about the sixth hour, the nearly cloudless sky went dark. This was not the gray light of dawn or an impending storm—this was an eerie absence of light that left an oily darkness in its place.

  Yeshua’s words came back to me on a tide of remembrance: “I am the light of the world. The one who follows me will no longer walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.”

  A prophet was dying, but what prophet took the light of the world with him?

  I reached for Jude’s arm—as much to give comfort as to receive it—and watched as Yeshua said something to a man standing near the foot of the execution stake. When the man nodded and turned, I recognized him—John, one of Zebedee’s sons. He slipped his arm around Mary’s shoulders and led her and the other women away from the place of execution.

  Even from a distance, I realized what had happened. Yeshua had asked the disciple he trusted most to care for his mother, a duty Jude and his brothers had forfeited. I brought my hand to my mouth, heartsick to realize how that knowledge would affect them.

  “I cannot watch any more of this,” Jude said, his voice dissolving in a ragged whisper. “I can’t—”

  “Let’s go.” I took him by the hand and pulled him toward the city gate, hoping we would reach the inn before the full measure of grief overtook him.

  The man who had squirmed through the crowd like an eel now walked with a leaden step, his eyes glassy, his face a mask. We passed through the gate, where the guards carrie
d torches and tried to make light of the foreboding darkness. “I think Tiberius forgot to sacrifice to Sol,” one guard joked. “The god has hidden the sun in retribution.”

  As if in answer, a low growl rumbled from beneath the earth, and the stones in the Jerusalem wall scraped against each other. Men and women ran out of nearby buildings while the earth trembled.

  If that weren’t enough, Jude and I were on a narrow street near the Temple when the air filled with tremulous bleats of pain and terror. My heart pounded until I realized it was the ninth hour on the day of Passover—the hour when the Temple priests began to slaughter the sacrificial lambs. For the next three hours, the priests would kill thousands of lambs and collect their blood for the altar . . .

  I had never been able to watch the bloodletting. Yet earlier I had observed a far more tragic sight as the Romans executed an innocent man.

  “It is nothing,” I whispered to Jude, whose face had gone deathly pale when the dreadful sound wrapped around us. “It’s only the Passover lambs.”

  “Does the earth move when the lambs die?” he asked.

  I pressed my lips together and pulled him away from the haunting screams.

  “It is over,” Jude mumbled, shuffling forward with uncharacteristic clumsiness. “And what did my brothers and I tell him the last time we were together? ‘You should take your show to Jerusalem, so more people can see you. You’re wasting your time here in Galilee.’” He stopped and put his hand beneath my chin as if to bring me closer. “One thing I know, Tasmin—God had no part in this tragedy today.”

  Seeing him in such a fragile state, I pulled him out of the crowd, wrapped my arms around him, and drew his head to my shoulder as he went quietly and completely to pieces.

  Jude and I eventually made our way to the inn, where the innkeeper had just returned from the Temple, his slaughtered lamb draped over his shoulders. Seeing him and his wife involved in such festive, ordinary preparations struck me as surreal. Could they not see that we had just endured an unthinkable horror?