King Jesus (Penguin Modern Classics) (11 page)

“Carmenta ?”

“An Arcadian goddess whom King Evander had brought to Italy in the generation before the Trojan War. She had migrated to Arcadia from Byblos in Phoenicia. By ‘goddess’ I mean, of course, a line of priestesses in whom a divinity is held to be incarnate, as Miriam (or Rahab) is incarnate in the Michal line.”

“I understand the theory,” said Antipater. “But before I examine its relevance to Jewish history I must protest that according to the First Book of Chronicles the House of Eli has no claim to be regarded as the senior line of Aaron’s family. And does it not lie under a divine curse since Eli’s day ?”

“That curse is an unhistorical interpolation of the time of King Josiah, who reigned some six centuries ago. Eli’s son Abiathar, King David’s faithful High Priest, remained loyal after the King’s death to Adonijah the heir to the throne, whom Solomon supplanted with the help of his chaplain Zadok. With Solomon’s help Zadok similarly supplanted Abiathar, who was forced into retirement, and the Zadokites have regarded themselves as the only legitimate High Priests ever since.”

“But surely it was Zadok who was descended from Eleazer the elder son of Aaron, and Abiathar who was descended from Eleazer’s younger brother Ithamar? I was reading the First Book of Chronicles only yesterday.”

“No, Prince, that is another interpolation of the same date. In the First Book of Samuel it is stated that Eli, Abiathar’s ancestor, was of the original priestly House ; and it is also stated in the Second Book of Kings that Zadok was not of this House. In other words, Zadok, like Solomon, was a usurper and his descendants tampered with the genealogies. A plausible reason had to be found for Abiathar’s supersession in the High Priesthood. It was given in the form of a fable about some man of God or other who prophesied that the High Priesthood would leave the House of Eli as a punishment for Eli’s indulgence of his wicked sons, and that the House would be reduced to beggary. But the Zadokites were clumsy. They should have stuck to a single story : either that Zadok was of the elder line and Abiathar of the younger, or else that Abiathar was of the elder line but lost his ancient privileges because the curse of Eli happened to fall on him. They cannot have it both ways : that Abiathar was of the younger line and also that he lost the ancient privileges which he enjoyed as a member of the elder line. As I say, the
texts were tampered with by King Josiah, nearly four hundred years after the time of King Solomon, when with the help of the Zadokites he expelled the descendants of Abiathar from the priesthood altogether.”

“Loth as I am to believe that there are unhistorical interpolations in the Scriptures, I am still more loth to believe that it contains forgeries.”

“Is it not better to believe even this than to weaken your intellect by accepting logical absurdities ?”

Antipater was not easily convinced. “You may be right about the law of succession in Rome and other western cities and islands, but you have yet to prove to me from the Scriptures that matrilineal descent was of any regard even as early as the time of Abraham, let alone that of Saul and David.”

“I can do so easily,” said Simon. “You will find the relevant text in the twelfth chapter of Genesis : Abraham when he visited Egypt gave his wife Sarah in marriage to the Pharaoh, whom I take, however, to be the Pelasgian King of Pharos ; whom the Greeks call Proteus. But Sarah, though the daughter of Abraham’s father Terah, did not rank as Abraham’s sister because she was the daughter of a different mother. In other words, descent in Abraham’s time was traced in Aegean style through the mother, not the father ; and women were polyandrous. Isaac’s wife Rebeccah similarly married a King of Gerar in Isaac’s lifetime. And since you doubt what I have told you about the swallowing up of Caleb by Judah, you will find the event obscurely recorded in the account of Judah’s rape of his daughter-in-law Tamar after the death of his wicked son Er (which means the Calebites) ; for Tamar, the palm-tree, is another title of the ancient Goddess of Hebron. The identification of Tamar with Rahab is made in the same chapter of Genesis, the thirty-fourth, where she plays the harlot, bears twins to Judah and ties the scarlet thread of Rahab about the wrist of Zarah, who is supplanted by his brother Pharez—the bastard whom the Judahites have unkindly made Caleb’s great-grandfather, as if to prove the Calebites dishonourable upstarts. But Zarah is an Edomite, ancestor of a clan renowned for their wisdom ; therefore his twin Pharez is also of Edom. Moreover, that David ruled over Israel in virtue of his marriage with the heiresses of the twelve tribes—Levi excepted—is distinctly stated in the story of Barzillai. The northern tribes complained that, instead of making a royal progress from one tribal shrine to another, he favoured the tribe of Judah above all others and lingered at Jerusalem. His defiant answer was to refuse marital intercourse to the ten northern heiresses, reserving his favours for the heiress of Judah, presumably Eglah, the youngest daughter of Michal.”

Antipater sighed. After a pause he said : “Well, let me be sure that I have understood you clearly. My father is, you say, descended from Caleb the Kenite, a sort of Edomite, whose sons were reckoned to Judah and one of whom, Salma, eventually became the lord of Bethlehem. After some centuries the head of this House was expelled from Bethlehem by the Maccabees, presumably because he was an idolator, and fled to
Ascalon, where he became a priest of the god Hercules-Melkarth. The Edomites raided Ascalon and carried off his grandson, my great-grandfather, because of his Calebite blood, and made him their prince. To this House of Salma, since David’s royal line became extinct, reverts the title to the throne of Israel. You have told my father so much, but not that his title can be traditionally perfected only by marriage to the heiress of the still extant Michal line, who is the daughter of a Levite of the House of Eli.”

Simon nodded slowly, without a word.

“But why do you not tell my father about the Michal heiress ?”

“For several reasons. The first, because the House of Eli hate your father, and would never tolerate the marriage. The second, because they would refuse their consent on the ground of his being a foreigner ; which would incense him to such a degree that lopped heads would soon go bowling down the steep streets of this city. The third, because if he succeeded in marrying the heiress in spite of all, your mother and my daughter, who are at present the King’s two senior wives, would lose their ascendancy at Court. The fourth, because the King would insist on elevating the girl’s father to the High Priesthood and I should be obliged to step down, which I should not enjoy. The fifth, because if an heir were born of the marriage, he would be preferred in the succession both to you and to my grandson, who I hope will one day become your junior colleague in the Kingdom. The sixth, because the King is happy in his ignorance. The seventh, because the girl has been committed by her father to my own tutelage, and to give her in marriage to the King, while knowing how much trouble must grow out of such a union, would go against my conscience.”

“I understand your reasons for not wishing my father to marry the girl, but I cannot understand why you have confided in me. Do you wish me to marry her myself? Surely, if the House of Eli would not tolerate my father’s marrying her, they would not tolerate my marrying her either.”

“True, but in your case the marriage could be kept secret, whereas your father—”

“Such a marriage would be indecent : it would give me a truer title to the throne than my father.”

“Only to the spiritual throne ; the political sovereignty conferred on him by the Romans would remain his, and you would continue to be his junior colleague. Besides, he would not be aware of your title. Nobody would be aware of it except yourself and myself and one or two others who are perfectly to be trusted.”

“This is absurd! And tell me, how would the title benefit me ?”

“It would benefit you by a sense of royalty which would strengthen you and abash your enemies. They would be aware that they stood in the presence of their rightful King. They might even learn to love and honour your father for your sake.”

“Who is this girl ?”

“She is a Temple ward and therefore under my tutelage. Her mother is Hannah, wife of Joachim the Levite.”

“This is a strange way of saying that Joachim is her father.”

“He is her father according to the Law, but the girl was born under the old dispensation. If you do not understand me, read again the story of the rich Shulamite, or rather Shunemite, woman and her son ; and of Hannah, mother of Samuel. She is, in a sense, a daughter of the Lord. In any case, it is her maternal ancestry that conveys the title : to mention Hannah’s marriage to Joachim is, genealogically speaking, irrelevant.”

“Tell me more of Hannah’s daughter,” Antipater said.

“She is young, beautiful, good-natured, high-spirited, truthful. She carries herself with royal dignity.”

“Her name ?”

“Miriam.”

“Simon, what is your intention? How could I marry this girl secretly? Within two days the whole world would hear of it.”

“I have considered the problem carefully. Let her pass as the wife of another until you can acknowledge her as your queen. Neither she nor anyone else need be injured by the ruse. Leave everything to me !”

“The notion of marrying a wife whom I dare not acknowledge displeases me.”

“It will not be long before you can acknowledge her.”

“Why do you say this ?”

“Your father, I fear, has not long to live. This grievous news was recently given me in confidence by Machaon of Cos, his physician.”

“My father sick ?” The news surprised and shocked Antipater. “Can it really be so? His seventy years lie more lightly on him than fifty on most other men. Oh, the unfortunate man! May the Lord postpone his end for many years! Has Machaon told him the worst ?”

“Machaon has wisely told him nothing. But there is a cancerous lump in the King’s bowels which he recognizes as a certain messenger of death within the next two years at the most. The end will be very painful. It was in this knowledge that I dared speak to you about your marriage.”

“If my father is to die so soon I prefer to postpone this marriage.”

“The girl is already nubile. I cannot long delay her betrothal.”

“You are forcing my hand.”

“Not I, but Time. However, at present she is spinning flax for the Sacred Curtain, and I can keep her at the task for some months yet.”

Antipater asked after a pause : “You believe that I can undertake this marriage with a clear conscience towards the Lord and my father ?”

“I do. You are free to marry without your father’s consent, as is proved in the classical case of Esau. Though Esau grieved his parents by a foreign marriage they could not forbid him to take what wives he pleased or force him to put them away. And no law compels you to make a detailed report to your father of all your domestic affairs.”

“But to pass off one’s bride as the wife of another !”

“Abraham—if you care to read the story literally—not only concealed
his marriage with Sarah but allowed her to marry the Pharaoh of Egypt ; Isaac not only concealed his marriage with Rebeccah but allowed her to marry Abimelech of Gerar. I do not propose that you should go as far in your deception as these patriarchs are said to have gone : the supposed husband will be denied sexual access to her, as Pharaoh and Abimelech, according to the story, were not.”

“I scorn ruses and stratagems of whatever sort, and all who employ them.”

“Come, Prince, that is too downright a declaration. It is to express contempt not only for Abraham and Isaac but for Jacob too, whose whole life was a network of ruses, and who did not hesitate to trick his old blind father in order to obtain the blessing destined for Esau. Yet Jacob became Israel, and you would be a hardy man if you dared to confess a scorn for Israel. After all, you are the King’s eldest son. The succession to the throne is yours by birthright, according both to Jewish and Roman law, and your father has already bestowed his blessing on you and made you his colleague. Why be so squeamish? Esau vexed his father by a foreign marriage ; but the marriage which I am counselling you to make is with a virgin of your own tribe, and it is the only marriage by which you can become the authentic King of Israel.”

“Simon, your words are sober enough, but the suppressed vehemence of your tones does not escape me. Confess, you have some other motive for urging me to this dangerous course than a desire to see me happy ?”

Simon did not reply at first. He took a sip of wine and twisted his fingers in his little beard.

“Simon, now your eyes are shining as I have never before seen them shine. Your hands are trembling as you play with your beard. Tell me honestly what is in your mind. You are a philosopher and conduct your life according to strict philosophic principles. You keep hope and joy on the curb like unruly stallions, but they are champing and rearing and the white froth flies from their mouths.”

“Prince,” said Simon at last in an uneven voice, “it is this. Jerusalem is at the meeting-place of continents, it is the fortress commanding the cross-roads through which all nations have marched and counter-marched since history began. Jerusalem lies midway between India and Spain, between the frozen White Sea of the North where the were-wolf Finns are found, and the insufferably hot deserts beyond Punt to the Southward, where the ape-men beat devilishly upon their hairy chests and East and West are confounded. Jerusalem is the centre of the known Universe ; here we are centrally situated in Space. And what of Time? The Egyptians reckon the life of a nation at eight thousand years, and in two years’ time, by our reckoning, Adam will have been born four thousand years ago.”

“I have heard otherwise : I have heard that the fourth millennium ended a century and a half ago in the days of Judas the Maccabee.”

“Judas misreckoned. We are at the meridian of Adam’s day. The fourth millennium draws swiftly to a close, and the close of each millen
nium has always been marked by some great event. At the close of the first millennium Enoch the Perfect One, Keeper of Books, was caught up alive into Heaven. At the close of the second, the Lord swore his covenant with Abraham. At the close of the third, King Solomon with great magnificence celebrated the dedication of the First Temple, at which time the All-Merciful granted him a visible sign of favour. Ah, Prince, does not your heart beat with pride and hope to think what the Lord in his bounty may hold in store for us at this four-thousandth year, this half-way house of destiny? Adam was true-born ; Enoch, Keeper of Books, was without sin ; Abraham obeyed the Lord with superb faith ; Solomon, when asked by the Lord in a dream what gift he most desired, chose wisdom. All these men are counted as patriarchs of our nation, and are reckoned in a single genealogical line. What if this latest millennium should close with the appearance of a King who combines all the qualities of his predecessors : true-born like Adam, sinless like Enoch, faithful like Abraham, wise like Solomon ?”