never have occurred to him to be unfaithful to her. Perhaps they would
not even believe that he had never eaten the flesh of a pig.
So he tells them the story they want to hear. It is a jesting version of tale, he has rehearsed it many times at many such
dinners. He knows exactly where to pause, where to emphasize a joke, where to undercut a tragic moment, turning it to ridicule.
In the version he tells, he is the impudent puck, the fool who dares to challenge the king. In this story, Yehoshuah—his friend,
the man he loved best in all the world—becomes a puffed-up little prince who waved his needlelike sword at Roman rule. Iehuda
becomes the naïve innocent who says, “If you irritate their skin, they will swat at us all.” He paints himself as foolish,
giving his friend up and believing that Pilate would do no more than scold him. The men laugh. They drink more wine. Calidorus
is pleased.
And while he tells this liar’s tale, Iehuda reminds himself of how it really was. He does this every time, although it pains
him, because he must know it, if only in his heart.
He had been so holy and abstemious that no Roman would believe it. His father had died when he was a boy. He had worked the
farm, and attended the Temple on holy days, and cared for his mother and his two younger sisters, and only when they were
fed, and wed, did he think of himself. He was a boy who loved the Lord too much, if such there is. Loved Him too much and
thought of Him too much, and wanted only to do His will and know His words. The days in Jerusalem for the three festivals
were his only respite from work, and they were joyous indeed, for then he was close to the place where God lived. And when
he married—yes, at twenty-eight, and yes, a virgin, and yes, this had not seemed a special hardship to him—a thoughtful and
hardworking and quiet man, when he lay with his wife that first time he thought of the deed as much a joining with God as
with the shrewd and lusty woman, Elkannah, who had consented to marry him.
She worked in the fields by his side and spun wool and wove cloth and baked bread, and he felt lucky past imagining—though
he was too serious a man ever to be freely joyful. His beard was long and full, though Elkannah used to sit astride him on
the bed and trim it with the knife when he let her. He still remembers the curve of her behind and how neatly it fitted into
his two cupped palms, and how his cock would rise to meet her while she wriggled on his lap and laughed and told him to hold
still or she would end by stabbing him with this knife and who then would provide for her and the children they would surely
have, would he think about that?
But when he was twenty-nine a hard fever passed through the village of Qeriot. It had been a long hot spring when they were
taken down and water was short in the mountain streams. Only the well gave a good supply and some days they were too weak
to lift and turn the bucket. It was a blinding fever, putting black spots in front of the eyes and then making it too painful
to look out in full sunlight. But it was his fault, he knew, even though he had been as sick as her. He should have found
a way to get water.
On the third day, he managed to leave his bed to walk to the well. He tottered like a newborn lamb all the way there and all
the way back, with the black spots hovering at the edges of his sight, but when he brought back the water Elkannah was dead.
Quiet in the bed, as if she had slipped out between one breath and the next. As if she had simply forgotten to take that next
breath and might remember in a moment, wipe her hands on her apron, chide herself for her foolishness. But she was gone.
And then something else was gone, suddenly and without his consent.
It was not the sweet soft scent of his wife in bed in the mornings that he missed the most—though he missed her beyond enduring.
He missed most the God who he had
not even believe that he had never eaten the flesh of a pig.
So he tells them the story they want to hear. It is a jesting version of tale, he has rehearsed it many times at many such
dinners. He knows exactly where to pause, where to emphasize a joke, where to undercut a tragic moment, turning it to ridicule.
In the version he tells, he is the impudent puck, the fool who dares to challenge the king. In this story, Yehoshuah—his friend,
the man he loved best in all the world—becomes a puffed-up little prince who waved his needlelike sword at Roman rule. Iehuda
becomes the naïve innocent who says, “If you irritate their skin, they will swat at us all.” He paints himself as foolish,
giving his friend up and believing that Pilate would do no more than scold him. The men laugh. They drink more wine. Calidorus
is pleased.
And while he tells this liar’s tale, Iehuda reminds himself of how it really was. He does this every time, although it pains
him, because he must know it, if only in his heart.
He had been so holy and abstemious that no Roman would believe it. His father had died when he was a boy. He had worked the
farm, and attended the Temple on holy days, and cared for his mother and his two younger sisters, and only when they were
fed, and wed, did he think of himself. He was a boy who loved the Lord too much, if such there is. Loved Him too much and
thought of Him too much, and wanted only to do His will and know His words. The days in Jerusalem for the three festivals
were his only respite from work, and they were joyous indeed, for then he was close to the place where God lived. And when
he married—yes, at twenty-eight, and yes, a virgin, and yes, this had not seemed a special hardship to him—a thoughtful and
hardworking and quiet man, when he lay with his wife that first time he thought of the deed as much a joining with God as
with the shrewd and lusty woman, Elkannah, who had consented to marry him.
She worked in the fields by his side and spun wool and wove cloth and baked bread, and he felt lucky past imagining—though
he was too serious a man ever to be freely joyful. His beard was long and full, though Elkannah used to sit astride him on
the bed and trim it with the knife when he let her. He still remembers the curve of her behind and how neatly it fitted into
his two cupped palms, and how his cock would rise to meet her while she wriggled on his lap and laughed and told him to hold
still or she would end by stabbing him with this knife and who then would provide for her and the children they would surely
have, would he think about that?
But when he was twenty-nine a hard fever passed through the village of Qeriot. It had been a long hot spring when they were
taken down and water was short in the mountain streams. Only the well gave a good supply and some days they were too weak
to lift and turn the bucket. It was a blinding fever, putting black spots in front of the eyes and then making it too painful
to look out in full sunlight. But it was his fault, he knew, even though he had been as sick as her. He should have found
a way to get water.
On the third day, he managed to leave his bed to walk to the well. He tottered like a newborn lamb all the way there and all
the way back, with the black spots hovering at the edges of his sight, but when he brought back the water Elkannah was dead.
Quiet in the bed, as if she had slipped out between one breath and the next. As if she had simply forgotten to take that next
breath and might remember in a moment, wipe her hands on her apron, chide herself for her foolishness. But she was gone.
And then something else was gone, suddenly and without his consent.
It was not the sweet soft scent of his wife in bed in the mornings that he missed the most—though he missed her beyond enduring.
He missed most the God who he had
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