Bloodline (53 page)

Today was the anniversary of his grandfather Samuel's death all those years ago, and so it was Abram's duty to visit the cemetery and say prayers. The young lad remembered his grandfather with enormous fondness; remembered how he would sit beside him in the synagogue and Grandfather Samuel would explain the meaning of every stone, every column, every artifact, and why he had the builders place them there. His favorite moments were when Grandfather Samuel told him of the way he'd escaped the Romans when they'd destroyed Jerusalem, of Samuel's bravery on the journey, of the way he'd saved the life of Grandmother Sarah and her family, of how he'd tricked the Roman centurion when he'd boldly faced him on the road north
by sending Grandmother Sarah to hide in the woods, and of how he'd entered the village of Peki'in to crowds lining the streets and thinking that he was the king of Israel.

But those days were long gone. The Romans now owned all of Israel and the surrounding nations, their legions were everywhere, Jews were servants in their own land, and anybody who opposed their Roman rulers was crucified along the roadside. Many of the Jews of Israel, especially those who had somehow survived the siege of Jerusalem, had been expelled, sent to other countries as slaves. But those who remained had learned to live their lives in isolation, and the village of Peki'in was rarely bothered by centurions or their troops, who generally marched north and south along the coast road and the Highway of the Kings.

And so life in Peki'in continued as it had always continued: growing olives in the valley, making pottery, and supplying other villages with herbs and spices, which grew in abundance on the rugged hills.

Abram had lived in Peki'in all his life, and in the past years had tended to his family's graves now that his father Yitzhak was bedridden. Unusually, Grandfather Samuel had written before his death that he wanted his bones to be dug up after two years, when his flesh had been eaten by worms, and placed in a limestone ossuary, a practice that had not been undertaken for at least two lifetimes. He had learned of the technique because he'd lived for many years in Jerusalem, where the cemeteries were full of such bone boxes, as the villagers crudely called them. When his testament had become known two years earlier, there was disquiet in the village, but the rabbi of the synagogue had decreed that there was no part of Jewish law that forbade it, nor did Roman law in Judea deny the right of a Jew to an ossuary, and so it had been done.

Now, as Abram left the small but beautiful synagogue, he kissed the two stones that his grandfather had taken from the destroyed temple in Jerusalem built by King Herod, a curse on
his name and may his evil children piss on his grave, and walked the half a league to the village cemetery up on the hill. He found his grandfather's grave and said the memorial prayer, said a prayer for his Grandmother Sarah, placed fruit and bread on both graves, and left the cemetery by a different road. Instead of returning to the village, Abram sat on a rock and scrutinized the surrounding countryside. Satisfied that there were no Romans, no spies looking at his activities, and no villagers to notice what he was doing, Abram walked along a shepherd's track to the upper hills above Peki'in.

He continued to stop and sit on rocks with a commanding view of the village and its roadways, checking, always checking, that nobody was watching him. Only four people in the village knew who was living in the cave he was about to enter. If word spread and the information came to the ears of the Romans, then not only would the two blessed men be crucified but the entire village would suffer decimation, in which one in ten of the residents would be hauled out of the square and whipped, have his eyes gouged out, and then be nailed upside down on a cross of wood as a Roman lesson to all who dared to disobey.

After Abraham climbed a narrow rocky track that led to the top of the mighty hill, the mouth of the cave came into sight. Panting from exertion, Abram stood beside the low-lying limbs of a carob tree and rested. Above the screams of two ospreys circling high in the sky searching for prey, he heard the voices of two men, one older than the other, in heated argument. He smiled and continued to listen to the frenzied words, the fury of one, the denial of the other. Abram could have spent the day just listening to them arguing. The anger, the indignation, the vehemence, the wounded pride, the treachery, the forgiveness, the love, the concern—it was a school for adults, an energetic and animated search for the truth, which he loved listening to.

“Fool of a son,” said the father. “How could your mother have given birth to such a blockhead? Don't you understand the
beauty of what I'm describing? How could you argue for such a simplistic form of the Divine when you just have to look around you and—”

“Father,” interrupted the son, shouting over the other's voice, “my love for you knows no bounds, but your portrayal of the Shekinah shows me that your eyes are dim and your mind needs rest. Moses could not enter the Tent of Meetings because the cloud had settled upon it. And the cloud was the Glory of the Lord. It is the very nature of—”

“Idiot! Imbecile! This shows you have no understanding of the word ‘cloud.' What it means is . . .”

And so they continued, and Abram would have listened for much longer had it not been the Sabbath and his mother expecting him home from synagogue and the cemetery. He coughed and called out the code. The interruption immediately made the men stop speaking. From the mouth of the cave, a tentative voice said softly, “Abram?”

In a low, gravelly voice, the boy said mischievously, “It is Yahweh, the Shekinah, Adonai, the Cloud and Spirit of our people Israel.”

A man walked out of the cave, beaming with joy. “Abram,” said the older of the two men, Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai, who had lived there for the past twelve years. He opened his arms, and Abram walked gleefully forward and hugged the scholar. “How are you, my lovely child?” he asked.

Abram was about to answer, when Rabbi Shimon's son, Rabbi Eleazar, walked out, smiled when he saw his father and the young boy, and joined in the hug.

Eagerly, Abram said, “I've brought you food and—”

“Wait,” said Rabbi Eleazar, “let us thank the Lord God Almighty that you are safe and that you have been spared to visit us again.”

And the three of them prayed. When they'd finished thanking the Almighty for His many blessings, the two rabbis eagerly
waited for Abram to open the sack he was carrying, and gazed ravenously at the food. His mother, one of the few who knew of the rabbis in the cave, had packed cheese and bread, fish caught from the sea the previous day, and pastes of olive and herbs.

Eleazar thanked the Almighty that for at least a few days they wouldn't have to eat the fruit of the nearby carob tree, which, though delicious, was boring after days of eating nothing else. They went into the cave and sat on wooden stools, which Abram had brought to them when his father had become bedridden from a farming accident and handed over the care of the rabbis to his trust.

Yitzhak had first hidden the rabbis when they escaped the vengeance of the Roman commanders in Jerusalem. It was an incident that had become Jewish folklore: Rabbi Shimon was debating the effect of the conquerors on the land when he openly criticized the Romans for constructing marketplaces, baths, forums, roads, and bridges not for the benefit of those who had been conquered but for their own benefit. He mused about the reasons why conquerors rape and pillage a land instead of bringing the benefits of their civilization to those people now under their control. Overheard by a Jewish spy who reported his words to a centurion, Rabbi Shimon was condemned to death, but he escaped to the uncharted wastes of the Galilee with his son. They were taken in by Abram's father and given safety in a distant cave far above the village in the mountains, where they'd lived for year after year.

Abram sat with his friends, the rabbis, and refused their offer of food. “My mother prepared this for you, and I can eat freely when I go home this afternoon,” he said.

The rabbis nodded and continued eating the bread, saying separate blessings over each different part of the meal.

“Rabbi,” said Abram.

“Yes?” they both said at once, the son smiling and nodding in deference to the father.

“Yes, Abram, what is it?” asked Rabbi Shimon as he stuffed another piece of sheep's cheese into his mouth.

“There's talk of another uprising against the Romans. Another Zealot uprising. If there is one, should I join in?”

Rabbi Shimon reeled in horror. “God forbid, my child. Don't talk that way. Don't think that way. The last time there was an uprising against the Romans, they crucified Zealots by the thousands, called our land Judea, and even then took away our name, Israel, the name that our forefather was given when he changed his name from Jacob. It means triumphant with God, but God's home has now been destroyed. And to further humiliate us, the devils now call our beloved nation Philistia, mocking us by calling us after King David's mortal enemies, the Philistines. And Jerusalem, our precious Jerusalem, was destroyed. And look at it now. A foul Roman city they call Aelia Capitolina with pigs roaming the street and with temples and idols where their gods Jupiter and Mars and Venus are worshipped.

“No, Abram, God's eyes are closed when He looks at the Israel of King David and the prophets. He smiles on our brothers, who have been exiled to distant lands, but He doesn't smile on us, and if we do anything to further anger the Romans, they'll bring legion after legion to our hills and valleys and then there will be nobody left. We'll be crucified or exiled. And only God Almighty knows which is the worse fate for the Jews.”

Abram shook his head. He was only fourteen years of age, a man by Jewish custom and tradition, but he was still loath to argue with such a renowned figure as Rabbi Shimon. “But, Rabbi, when the emperor Hadrian visited Jerusalem a few years ago, he promised to rebuild the temple. Isn't that good?”

Rabbi Eleazar interrupted. “He will rebuild the temple, but he's announced that the new building will be dedicated to their god Jupiter. And don't forget Hadrian's ban on circumcision, the act of commitment of Jews to our Lord God. No, Abram, we are a defeated people, and you must not—”

“But what about Simon bar Kokhba? Even Rabbi Akiva has called him a messiah. He will rise up and defeat the Romans and save us all. Won't he?” the boy said plaintively.

The two rabbis looked at Abram's eager face, a young Jewish boy hoping for an end to the misery of the Romans, a boy just wanting to be free of the chains that bound him into servitude.

Rabbi Shimon sighed, smiled at the lad, and nodded. “Perhaps Bar Kokhba will gather our people together and fight the Romans. And please God Almighty that if he does rise up, that he wins, because if he loses, then the Romans will be merciless. They'll exile every Jew and the land will be empty and desolate of people, our fields sowed with salt, our woods burned. Then where will we go?”

Abram looked at Rabbi Shimon, his face creased with a frown.

“But these things probably won't happen, my dear. God will protect us. Those who were sent into exile will return. It may take a hundred years, a thousand years, maybe more, but they will return. Meanwhile, those of us who remain in Israel will keep the flame of Judaism alive, just like the Maccabees kept their flame alive in the time of the Greeks. Who knows what plans the Almighty has in store for us?”

Now the father and son looked at each other. Abram wondered what they were thinking.

“Abram, my child. As you know, my son and I are unable to leave this cave. And it is very likely that most of the Jews who live in Israel will be expelled should there be another onslaught by the Romans. Many will tell you that it is not going to happen, but God has spoken to us and has told us to prepare the Jewish people for a long and sorry separation from our land.”

Abram began to argue, but the elderly rabbi held up his hand. He reached into his robes and took out a piece of stone. It was beautiful, made perhaps of alabaster or white onyx. Looking at it closely, it had very odd Hebrew writing on it, writing such as Abram hadn't seen before.

“My child, this tablet was put inside a tunnel that runs from the floor of the Kidron Valley to the top of the mountain, where the Romans now live. The top of this tunnel comes out at the very foot of the temple. It was placed there in the time of King Solomon and was removed by those Jews who were exiled to Babylon in the time of King Nebuchadnezzar. They returned it and replaced it, Abram, but when we were forced to leave Jerusalem, my son, Rabbi Eleazar, though but a child, risked his life to retrieve it. We didn't know then what would happen to us Jews, but it now looks as though there will be no Jews living here when the Romans are done with us.”

The old rabbi didn't know how to make the request he had in mind, and he looked at his son, tears filling his eyes. But suddenly Abram said, “Why don't I go to Jerusalem and put it back? Then, if all the Jews leave Israel, at least the Lord God Adonai Elohim will know that we used to be here.”

The boy's eager and innocent face, completely unaware of the dangers that faced him on the incredible journey he was offering to undertake, made the old rabbi cry. He hugged the boy and kissed his head.

“And,” said Abram excitedly, “when I get to Jerusalem, I'll hide the tablet in a crack in the wall and cover it with mud so that no Roman will find it. Of course, Adonai will know where it is, because He sees everything.”

Rabbi Eleazar said softly, “Let us pray, Abram, for God's love and mercy to save our people, Israel. Let us pray that we are not exiled as we were in the time of the Babylonians. Let us pray for your safe return from this journey.”

They walked to the precipitous edge, surveyed the village of Peki'in far below them, and prayed together. In the center of the village was the square, populated by many people walking about on a Sabbath afternoon, sitting on stools shaded by cloths from the midday sun, and enjoying the weekly luxury of not working. In the middle of the village square, a spring, which slaked the
thirst of the rabbis in the cave before it descended back into the mountain, ran out and cascaded down the ruts it had cut into the rock over countless millennia. Not far from the square was the roof of the synagogue where the villagers had just been praying, a prayer house built by Abram's grandfather to the memory of a good doctor, long forgotten.