James the Brother of Jesus and the Dead Sea Scrolls II (36 page)

Regarding the
twelve talents of silver
Nakdimon had promised to pay if he were late in fulfilling the surety he had pledged, his Rich creditor finally asks him either to
refill the cisterns by the stipulated date or pay an additional twelve talents, for a total of twenty-four
.
18
It is at this point in this oddly-labored story that Nakdimon’s/Nicodemus’
rainmaking
occurs and he actually
goes into the Temple and,
like James,
prays for rain
.

As this is described in Talmudic tradition: ‘
He wrapped himself in his cloak and stood up to pray
.’
The Jerusalem
Talmud
even knows the words of Nakdimon’s prayer. Of course, we have already encountered this theme of ‘
wrapping himself in a cloak
’ (again, a
prayer shawl
evidently being intended); that was when Elijah’s ‘
consuming zeal for the Lord of Hosts
’
in a cave on Mount Sinai
was evoked in 1 Kings 19:9–14.
Nakdimon, in this prayer, claims that it was not for his ‘
own Glory
’ nor that of his own ‘
house
’ but rather
for God
’
s
‘
Glory
’ that he would perform the
sign
or
miracle
, namely,
filling the cisterns
in order that there should be enough water
in the Temple to accommodate even those on pilgrimage
.
19
In the process, Nakdimon alludes to his ‘
father
’
s house’
, the very cry that John 2:17 (evoking Psalm 69:9) puts into Jesus’ mouth when depicting his ‘
consuming zeal
’ and ‘
purification of the Temple’
. When Honi used similar language, the Pharisee leader Simeon ben Shetach considered pressing
blasphemy
charges against him for ‘
speaking to God like a son’
.
20
According to
Ta‘anith
, this was because in his prayer – much like Nakdimon’s prayer in
Ta‘anith
here as well – Honi had added the words about being ‘
looked upon as one of (God
’
s) household’
. Simeon relents, saying: ‘
If he were not Honi
,
I would have excommunicated him
’!
21

All this is rife with meaning for future events. Honi’s ‘
blasphemy’
, presaged in these
Friendship
/
Sonship
claims by these
rain-making
Zaddik
s
/
Adam
redivivus
es
, is echoed in the Gospels as similar charges are leveled against Jesus. For the Gospels, the
blasphemy
charge concerns a perceived claim of divine
Sonship
made by Jesus (or made retrospectively on his behalf by his Hellenizing enthusiasts or partisans).
22
When evaluating the New Testament’s focus on
the Son of God
motif amid accus
a
tions of
blasphemy
, it is well to recall the controversy over these
rainmaking
Zaddik
s
and Elijah
redivivus
es
like Honi as prefigu
r
ing the accusations against the person in the Gospels called ‘
Jesus
’ or ‘
Saviour’
.

Nakdimon Fills the Cisterns and Hanan
the Hidden
Locks Himself in the Toilet

So
Nakdimon
prayed, as the story goes, and ‘
immediately the sky was covered by clouds until the
twelve wells
were
filled
with water
’
in a torrent so strong that they
‘
filled
beyond
overflowing
’. Then much wrangling ensues over ‘
the wages which were held back
’ from Nakdimon by the foreign lord or those Nakdimon held back from him, whereupon Nakdimon again
enters the Temple
,
wraps himself in his cloak a second time
,
and prays
for it
not to rain
! This time he even evokes ‘
the Beloved
’ or ‘
Friend of God
’ language we have been describing above with regard to James, Honi, and Abraham in writings like the Damascus Document, Tractate
Ta‘anith
and the New Testament.

This wrangling over payment due and not performed
reflects
to some degree
Josephus
’
account of the stoning of Honi as well
, when the Pharisees besieging the Temple refuse to provide the Priests inside with the animals they have already paid for. It was at this point that the Maccabean Aristobulus’ and Honi’s supporters
inside the Temple pray to God
, who then sends
a whirlwind
or an intense rainstorm to ‘
repay them for their impiety
’ and, presumably,
their prior ‘
i
mpiety’
in having stoned Honi
.
23

In fact,
Ta‘anith
connects Nakdimon and Honi in almost the very next line, when it adds the curious statement that ‘
his name was not Nakdimon but Boni’
. It then
explains that he had only been called
‘
Nakdimon
’ ‘
because the sun broke through (
nikdera
) on his behalf
’!
24
But
this is what we have been trying to point out from the beginning: when the
Talmud
is talking about
Nakdimon
, it really is talking about
Honi
or, more comprehensibly, a Honi
redivivus
, as little else can be made out of this ludicrous alias. Nor is this to say anything about the real reason for Honi’s stoning – and, consequently, about the rainmaking and stoning of James – namely,
refusing to cooperate with the dictates of foreign power
.

In another startling variation on traditions regarding
Hanan
/
Hanin
’s cognomen,
Ha-Nehba
(
the Hidden
), the Talmudic tradition sarcastically observes that he was given this cognomen ‘
because he used to hide himself in the toilet
’
.
25
Again, this story is typical of Talmudic narrative which, like the Gospels, is often so absurd and malicious that it fairly jolts one and makes one laugh outright. But this is the way these writers often treated their ideological opponents. This tradition carries overtones of the scurrilously humorous Jacob of Kfar Sechania story about
Jesus the Nazoraean
’s position on gifts from prostitutes’ ear
n
ings given to the Temple:
they should be used to build an
outhouse
for the High Priests
. Surely Jesus’ purported response to this question is important, not only
vis-a-vis
persons perceived as being no better than
prostitutes
(perhaps including Bernice, her sister Drusilla, and even possibly Queen Helen herself), but also the picture of Jesus in the Gospels
keeping table fellowship
with prostitutes
and tax-collectors
.

Moreover,
Nakdimon
in these odd Talmudic
miracle tales
now asks the foreign lord
to pay him
for the excess wells of w
a
ter produced out of the
overflow
his efforts had produced. Thus he gives his creditor
a chance to object that the day was already done and the sun already gone
,
so he
(
the creditor
)
owed Nakdimon nothing,
setting the stage for Nakdimon’s even more ce
l
ebrated miracle, from which he supposedly derived his name, namely,
making the sun
‘
shine through’
, ‘
pierce through the clouds
’ or, in the manner of the Lord’s special dispensation to Joshua, ‘
making the sun stand still’
.

What does finally
shine through
in these convoluted stories is the connection of the
twenty-four cisterns
that are
being
filled
with the twenty-four priestly courses in the Temple. One can draw an even more impressive connection to Epiphanius’ description of the ‘
Standing One
’ or ‘
the High Power which is above God the Creator
’ and thought of, as well, in terms of being ‘
the Christ and the Great Power of the High God which is superior to the Creator of the world’
,
26
the dimensions of which are: ‘
Twenty-four schoeni or ninety-six miles in height
and six schoeni or twenty-four miles in width’
.
27

Rabbi Akiba’s
Disciples

An even more germane parallel relates to the Royal House of Adiabene and involves the ‘
Zealot
’ Rabbi Akiba, who su
p
ported the Bar Kochba Uprising in 132–36 CE, one of the important students of whom was also called ‘
Monobaz
’
. The two times either ‘
twelve talents of silver
’ or ‘
twelve cisterns of water
’ in the Nakdimon stories likely
echoes the double period of twelve years
‘
the Poor shepherd’
, Rabbi Akiba, reportedly worked to earn the right to marry the daughter of Nakdimon’s ‘
Rich
’ colleague
Ben Kalba Sabu‘a
.
28
Rachel, as she is called in the
ARN
, in her model faithfulness encourages this ‘
Poor
’ country boy in his studies and, rather than marry him immediately, pays for the two consecutive ‘
twelve-year
’ study periods he seems to have spent with the famous quasi-heretical Rabbi Eliezer ben Hyrcanus.
29

In Talmudic tradition, Rabbi Akiba was not only one of the most nationalist rabbis, he was also the rabbi who proclaimed Bar Kochba
the Messiah
at the time of this Uprising from 132–36 – much to the reported derision of his peers and confrères. Akiba applied to Bar Kochba the famous ‘
Star Prophecy
’ from Numbers 24:17, a prophecy we have seen reflected in the New Testament, the Scrolls and Josephus as well. Called ‘
Ben Kalba Sabu‘a
’s
shepherd’
, Rabbi Akiba was also pictured as twice r
e
turning to his wife Rachel with ‘
twelve thousand Disciples
’ (no doubt evocative of
the number of adepts ready to participate with Bar Kochba in the Second Jewish Revolt against Rome
30
).
Ultimately he too was martyred in the cruelest of ways.
31

Rabbi Akiba’s teacher, R. Eliezer ben Hyrcanus, was considered a
Christian
sympathizer of sorts and was perceived of as knowing a tradition from ‘
Jesus the Nazoraean’
via ‘
Jacob of Kfar Sechania
’ about the aforementioned ‘
prostitutes’ wages
’ and the High Priest’s ‘
outhouse
’. Eliezer’s testimony to ‘
Jesus the Nazoraean
’ in the
Talmud
is one of the most convincing co
n
cerning this personage on record, though its wry humor and intense anti-Establishmentism is quite different from Gospel po
r
trayal. Ultimately excommunicated by the Rabbis for being a little too self-assertive and opposing Rabban Gamaliel II, Lame
n
tations
Rabbah
significantly calls
Eliezer
, ‘
Liezer’
.
32
Chronological difficulties aside, he (or a prototype of his) is still one of the best candidates for the mysterious ‘
Galilean
’ Rabbi Josephus calls ‘
Eliezer
’, who countermands Ananias’ and his companion’s teaching that circumcision was not required for the conversion of the males in Queen Helen’s household.
33