Iscariot: A Novel of Judas by Tosca Lee Page B
Authors: Tosca Lee
Tags: Fiction - Historical
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farmers here. For an instant I wondered if Simon was right. We didn't belong.
I turned to the man who'd spoken behind me and my next question died on my lips.
Before me stood the Nazarene.
"Go on to the boat, Peter," he said.
Peter ducked his head and went ahead toward the dock.
"I've seen you before," the Nazarene said, turning to smile at me.
Was it possible he remembered me? Even now I remembered that first day, the gaze that had drawn me back to the river days later to look for him again.
"Yes," I said. "At the river. I came to warn John."
"What are you called?"
"Judas bar Simon. From Kerioth. Jerusalem, originally. And this is Simon bar Isaac, who studied under the great Shammai."
"Teacher," said Simon, who was nothing if not proper even in the face of doubt.
I couldn't gauge if the name of Shammai meant anything to the Nazarene. I knew only that the words he spoke next changed my life.
"Judas Ish-Kerioth. Simon bar Isaac," he said, looking at each of us. "Come with me."
"Now?" Simon said.
He chuckled. "Yes, now."
He went down to the pier where Peter was waving at us from the boat.
Exchanging a last look with Simon, we hurried after him and got in.
106
I desperately wanted to look into the Nazarene's face, to see if I could find in his expression a hint of the thing within him that had healed the leper, some secret in those too ordinary eyes. But he had pulled his mantle up over his head against the morning sun glancing off the water and I couldn't crane to see him without feeling like I might topple from my seat in the rocking of the boat.
Instead, I found myself staring at his feet, stretched out before him. At his simple sandals, and the worn and dirty toes. At the muddy hem of his tunic and his hands, dangling over his knees, fingers calloused and rough. They were not the hands of a scholar but of the laborer who works with stone, or in the field, or with wood when he can get it--or at anything that will earn him a day's dinar.
Introductions were made, but I hardly heard them.
My mind was on the Nazarene.
Come.
And we had.
As we pulled away through the opening in the breakwater I could see the crowd forming along the shoreline, following us.
"You look a little ill, city man," Peter said, taking up one of the oars.
"It's my first time in a boat," I confessed.
Jesus chuckled, and Andrew joined with him. And soon the others were laughing.
I didn't realize just then that in the short distance of shoreline between Heptapegon and Capernaum, I had begun the great journey I had waited for all my life.
At that moment, with the sun lowering against our backs, I knew only that the world of the Temple, of Jerusalem, seemed very far
107
away. That here, beneath the Galilean sky, the coming kingdom might truly be a seed taking root in the Golan hills or even between the mismatched boards of a fishing boat.
If only I had fallen overboard or drowned with a millstone around my neck.
108
12
Capernaum.
In the weeks and months to follow I would come to know her streets, her wine and oil presses, the basalt of her houses and synagogue. The winds that came down from the hills to the north, gusting through her streets on their way to the lake.
But the first Capernaum I knew was a tangled mass of faces, of arms and hands, all reaching for one man. Some came to lay eyes on him, others their
hands, to touch him as one touches a relic or rubs the foot of an idol.
In such a crowd one cannot shy away from those noticeably deformed or ill.
Cannot shirk the grasping of the desperate, the old, the mothers with their babies. The twisted faces of the weeping, the mesmerized, and the frantic.
They came to him as though he were wheat to feed the hungry, only to melt back into the press with beatific expressions. I didn't hear what he said to them, but I saw the way that Simon, standing closer by, stared at the teacher in the waning light of that day he'd called us to come with him. He was stunned, as though the
I turned to the man who'd spoken behind me and my next question died on my lips.
Before me stood the Nazarene.
"Go on to the boat, Peter," he said.
Peter ducked his head and went ahead toward the dock.
"I've seen you before," the Nazarene said, turning to smile at me.
Was it possible he remembered me? Even now I remembered that first day, the gaze that had drawn me back to the river days later to look for him again.
"Yes," I said. "At the river. I came to warn John."
"What are you called?"
"Judas bar Simon. From Kerioth. Jerusalem, originally. And this is Simon bar Isaac, who studied under the great Shammai."
"Teacher," said Simon, who was nothing if not proper even in the face of doubt.
I couldn't gauge if the name of Shammai meant anything to the Nazarene. I knew only that the words he spoke next changed my life.
"Judas Ish-Kerioth. Simon bar Isaac," he said, looking at each of us. "Come with me."
"Now?" Simon said.
He chuckled. "Yes, now."
He went down to the pier where Peter was waving at us from the boat.
Exchanging a last look with Simon, we hurried after him and got in.
106
I desperately wanted to look into the Nazarene's face, to see if I could find in his expression a hint of the thing within him that had healed the leper, some secret in those too ordinary eyes. But he had pulled his mantle up over his head against the morning sun glancing off the water and I couldn't crane to see him without feeling like I might topple from my seat in the rocking of the boat.
Instead, I found myself staring at his feet, stretched out before him. At his simple sandals, and the worn and dirty toes. At the muddy hem of his tunic and his hands, dangling over his knees, fingers calloused and rough. They were not the hands of a scholar but of the laborer who works with stone, or in the field, or with wood when he can get it--or at anything that will earn him a day's dinar.
Introductions were made, but I hardly heard them.
My mind was on the Nazarene.
Come.
And we had.
As we pulled away through the opening in the breakwater I could see the crowd forming along the shoreline, following us.
"You look a little ill, city man," Peter said, taking up one of the oars.
"It's my first time in a boat," I confessed.
Jesus chuckled, and Andrew joined with him. And soon the others were laughing.
I didn't realize just then that in the short distance of shoreline between Heptapegon and Capernaum, I had begun the great journey I had waited for all my life.
At that moment, with the sun lowering against our backs, I knew only that the world of the Temple, of Jerusalem, seemed very far
107
away. That here, beneath the Galilean sky, the coming kingdom might truly be a seed taking root in the Golan hills or even between the mismatched boards of a fishing boat.
If only I had fallen overboard or drowned with a millstone around my neck.
108
12
Capernaum.
In the weeks and months to follow I would come to know her streets, her wine and oil presses, the basalt of her houses and synagogue. The winds that came down from the hills to the north, gusting through her streets on their way to the lake.
But the first Capernaum I knew was a tangled mass of faces, of arms and hands, all reaching for one man. Some came to lay eyes on him, others their
hands, to touch him as one touches a relic or rubs the foot of an idol.
In such a crowd one cannot shy away from those noticeably deformed or ill.
Cannot shirk the grasping of the desperate, the old, the mothers with their babies. The twisted faces of the weeping, the mesmerized, and the frantic.
They came to him as though he were wheat to feed the hungry, only to melt back into the press with beatific expressions. I didn't hear what he said to them, but I saw the way that Simon, standing closer by, stared at the teacher in the waning light of that day he'd called us to come with him. He was stunned, as though the
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