All Who Came Before. Simon Perry
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a gathering of laborers who had so far failed to find their day’s work.
Theudas stopped to collect the bread for his breakfast while Yeshua gathered fruit for the journey. Within a few minutes the companions were fully stocked. All that remained was a quick visit to the well to fill new skins for the long walk south.
As Yeshua inspected his fruit, the noise of the market traders was drowned beneath a nearby commotion. His bowels plummeted the moment his eyes lifted. Cavalry. The market was surrounded by at least fifty horsemen. Every escape route was closed off. A dark-skinned centurion dismounted and climbed onto a low roof.
“People of Narbata!” A hundred busied individuals immediately became a single anxious crowd. “People of Narbata. Early this morning two soldiers were murdered in Caesarea. Shepherds on the plain saw two men fleeing for this town.” Expressions of horror echoed through the crowd, not so much at what had happened as at what would. “Your prefect, Pontius Pilatus, wishes it to be known that such acts of barbarism cannot be tolerated.” With that, a grey-haired market trader, still clinging to an earthenware jar, was thrown to the ground beneath the centurion’s platform. His face was full of pointless protest, but his eyes resigned to his fate. The chime of an unsheathing blade was followed immediately by the gasp of the spectators.
“It wasn’t me . . .” he sobbed. Yeshua hid his eyes. The now trivial sound of the ornamented jug, almost unnoticed as it smashed onto the gravel, spoke just loudly enough to foretell the horror that would inevitably follow. The marketer repeated his sentence with more emotion, but it was cut short. A moist thud echoed around the market. After a moment’s silence it was followed by another, and then a third and a fourth. The Egyptian’s eyes opened to see the soldier picking up the severed head by its curly grey hair and lifting it for the crowd.
“Let it be known, if you harbor murderers you share their crime and will suffer their fate.” He nodded at one of his soldiers, who brought forward another random crowd member. A young man, barely in his twenties, was dragged from the queue of would-be laborers and thrown onto the floor near the corpse of the market trader, his shattered jar and the reddening sand. His eyes declared that he was unable to comprehend what was happening to him. The crowd, still in shock, irrupted in a chorus of muted disbelief.
Yeshua couldn’t bear to watch the atrocity and scanned the people, every one of them innocent of his crime. In an instant, the spirit of the crowd became visible: its younger members had not yet learned the futility of a hope that had abandoned their elders, but all had been overcome by the same dark silence. Even the children’s previously carefree faces had aged an entire generation in a single moment. Their hollow gaze forced the Egyptian’s eyes back towards the soldiers.
Yeshua found himself possessed by a physical urge to confess his crime, but his body along with his tongue were paralyzed by the spectacle before him. The executioner’s sword was raised, but the soldier was distracted by a scuffle in front of him. A robed figure had burst through the mass and into the makeshift arena.
“Me for him,” shouted the Pharisee. “Me for him!” As silence spread through the crowd, he lowered his voice for one last offer. “Me for him.”
The centurion was as stunned as every other onlooker. This young Pharisee had momentarily seized control of the scene and glared up at the centurion in defiant humility. The executioner also looked up at his commander, who closed his eyes and threw his head to the right to gesture the laborer’s release. His attention then turned to this Pharisee whose childlike eyes looked as though he had merely issued a mischievous dare. He promptly dropped to his knees before the executioner.
“You for him?” he smirked. The centurion descended the rough worn steps to ground level, looked at the lowered head of the substitute, and addressed the crowd. “No deal.” With that, he mounted his horse, “Bloody Jewish market traders,” he grinned as his feet found their place. “Is there nothing you people won’t barter for?” The horses were gone as quickly as they had arrived, leaving the townsfolk to grieve their victim and celebrate their Pharisee.
Immediately the market became a place of wailing. The body of the fallen trader was swamped by companions, but one face remained painfully visible through the mass. A young girl, maybe ten years of age, was screaming. With one hand she caressed the chest of the severed corpse, the other clung to the side of her head. Screaming, screaming at the crowd, at the corpse, at the sky, at Yeshua. The girl’s wailing penetrated the Egyptian’s inner being, causing convulsions in his stomach. Yeshua’s body forced his hands to his knees, his stomach tensed up against his will, and he vomited.
He turned and, grabbing his brother by the arm, picked his way through the crowd that swept against them, away from the screams, away from that girl. No words passed between them as they hurried towards the eastern gate of the town. Before they emerged from the market stalls that had now fallen silent, they realized that not every soldier had departed Narbata. A hundred paces away sentries had been positioned at their exit point, ready to question those leaving.
Theudas halted, screwed his face up and looked toward the sun. “Now what do we do?” Silence followed. Covering his eyes he looked back towards the center of town. He sighed, paused, and spoke again. “That man. You know it wasn’t your fault.”
For the first time since this incident, the brothers made eye contact. Yeshua let his eyebrows express what he thought of Thuedas’ attempt to absolve themselves of this crime.
His little brother was undaunted. “It wasn’t our fault: an eye for an eye. We have not spilt one drop of blood too much. That man died because of Roman cruelty. They killed him. We didn’t.”
“Great. So what do we do next?” asked Yeshua. “Avenge that market trader as well to balance the books?”
“Well,” Theudas jested, “we are merchants!”
Yeshua grabbed Theudas by the shoulders, and bored his brown eyes into his brother’s. “From now on, I killed both of those soldiers! Do you understand? It was I.”
“Well, that’s almost true” Theudas frowned in confusion.
“I’m serious.” Yeshua shook him with covert violence. “If anything happens, if anyone asks us, it was me who killed them both. You had no part in this. Do you understand?”
Theudas looked vacant.
“Do you understand?” he repeated, trying to conceal his alarm from all but his brother.
“Yeshua!” Theudas looked embarrassed, and leaned forward to whisper. “I understand.”
“The next thing we do is dump the swords,” said Yeshua.
“Er—didn’t you want to keep them? Souvenirs of revenge . . .”
“What do you think’ll happen if we’re caught with them here?” The elder brother frowned.
“Fine. Shall we visit the well?” They turned to head back towards the wailing.
“Yeshua? Theudas? . . . Shalom! What brings you this far inland?” The brothers were speechless at being recognized. “Come to see how your cotton is selling? Or have you been murdering soldiers?” A tall, full-bodied, red-faced man clutching a hook full of fish smiled at them quizzically before he laughed and continued. “Not the best welcome to Narbata! Come on, let’s get out of here and celebrate being this far from the coast.”
“Yudah,” said Yeshua, as though he had no care in the world, “it’s great to see you, but . . . what’s all this about?” He gestured towards the sound of wailing? “Is Narbata always like this?”
“Not much trading here this morning. We can talk over breakfast.” The Egyptians looked at each other and shrugged shoulders. “Come on,” said Yudah, already disappearing into the crowd. “Come and see the house your cloth has built me!” They walked together through dusty streets still echoing with grief and distant wailing, towards a large house of grey stone turned into gold by the alchemy of morning sunshine. The dwelling was necklaced by a ring of palm trees that teased with the light above and bestowed gentle shade on the home below.