Novel
In this section we present our english translation of ‘Jesus of Nazareth’. It is the first such translation of this unique novel.
The Happening At The Altar of Incense
At the time when Herod was washing his face, Zechariah, Abijam’s shift manager, arrived in Jerusalem after a few hours of riding his faithful donkey, Midbar. He left his house at Ein Karem at midnight, intending to arrive in Jerusalem before the opening of the Lord’s Temple gates, where he was due to begin his service for the glory of the Invisible One. He always experienced elation at the calls of the Levites announcing the sunrise from the Temple towers. He felt crisp and robust. Despite his age, he jumped off the donkey before reaching the city and, to prove his deep reverence for Jerusalem, he braved the rest of the way from the valley to the high city on foot, and did so without much fatigue. He entered the city through the Garden Gate, left Midbar in Xystus, under care of a keeper, and went to the Courtyard of the Gentiles – a wide square for trade, meetings and strolls for Jerusalem’s residents and incomers from the whole country.
Here, from an early hour, the faithful gathered waiting for prayers and offerings to begin. Here, in the courtyard itself and under the nearby porticoes, amid the hustle, amid chit-chats, deals and loud callings, the traders of goat and sheep, of pigeons and doves, the sellers of incense, myrrh and aloe vera, they would bustle about and call each other needlessly – only to multiply the ubiquitous racket in which they felt like fish in the rustling element. And then the publicans would exchange the greek, roman and egyptian money for the Temple shekels (only shekels were allowed in the Temples money box) and they would also strike profitable deals lending money with high interest rate, even though the Torah has repeatedly condemned loan-sharking, or ribith, and threaten, with extreme penalties, the usurers who collect with high interest.
A boy walked down the middle of the courtyard with a one-year-old lamb on a lead, which, bucking and bleating, dragged him in the in the opposite direction, towards the gate, in spite of the lively, but tender and gentle, persuasions of this bemused youngling. Zechariah patted the lamb’s neck, then stroked the boy’s black, curly shag with the same tenderness. He mused sadly on how he liked children, but Elohim has not given him his own offspring. Instantly, however, he regretted this musing and sadness because of his wife, Elisheba, whom he loved very much even though she was barren. With a deep sigh – and it was a really innocent and moving sigh, because there was no complaint or bitterness in it, still less reproach, but only a humble acceptance of Justice – he entered the priestly house and took a purifying bath in which life-giving water cleansed his body from the filth of the earth, and his soul from all sighs, even the most moving and innocent. He spent all day and all night in prayers. Next day, early at dawn, when the gates of the Temple were opened and the Levites struck the harps and zithers to sing psalms, and when the people, lying on the ground, called to God with a loud moan and recited Shema Israel together with the choir of priests, Zechariah, dressed in a long-sleeved white tunic, girded with an embroidered belt, drew lots in the Chamber of Black and White Cubes. This time Fate appointed him to perform the priestly duties before the Altar of Incense.
In a long procession, the priests returned to the Temple through the Courtyard of Priests by the Altar of Burnt Offering, each to their allotted position, and, crossing the cedar thresholds of the Holy Tabernacle, they bowed their heads low – their faces animated by admiration and reverence for the importance and austerity of this place. They passed under the bunch of grapes carved in gold, hanging over the Tabernacle’s gate – a symbol of the Elohim’s Wisdom and of the act of Creation.
Zechariah felt a poignant angst in his heart. It seemed like the prayers he said at dawn were cold and hollow, and so they certainly did not find favor before the Lord. He experienced such moods often, despite his deep and fervent faith. Unable to fight them off, whenever he sensed his ability to pray becoming weaker and weaker, he would cease to dress these surging feelings in words and instead try to show the Ancient of Days his love and affection only with his silent inner life. But he was never sure if those attempts were successful, especially that this peculiar contemplation was a result of a bitter impotence of spirit more than of a conscious striving towards the union with the Lord of Hosts. Now, one such hard time came over him again. He stood before the Altar of Burnt Offering, grabbed some hot coals with his tongs and threw them into the censer, and then, together with a young Levite, who was sprinkling a handful of amber, powdered myrrh and aloe vera on the embers, Zechariah went to the Altar of Incense, built of acacia wood, covered with gold sheets. Its four corners were decorated with golden horns, the symbols of the Lord’s omnipotence. Zecharia paused at each of the corners to sway the censer in a pendulum-like motion, the incense bursting with silver smoke and filling the interior of the temple. And it seemed to the old man like the clouds of smoke were arranging themselves into the shape of a human. At first he thought it was an illusion, but as the mirage became clearer – the shape of the head, torso, arms and legs was drawn, although somewhat blurred and stirred, as if it was a reflection of a man in rippling water, yet still clear enough to be described as a human form – the priest comprehended he was becoming a witness to a mystery incomprehensible to him, and so he trembled with great trembling. And when he finally heard the voice, he was so surprised by it he wasn’t even sure if it was coming from the lips of the incense figure, or was the figure more like its guardian with the voice itself coming from some distant space. But why would El Shaddai need a guardian for His voice? (and Zechariah was instantly certain it was El Shaddai’s voice). So maybe the figure was more like a guardian to him, poor old Zechariah, a guardian making sure he understands everything unambiguously and clearly. Yet he was so terrified by all he had heard and by what was happening before his eyes that he could hardly grasp the meaning of the words.
“Fear not, Zechariah”, said the Voice, “for your prayer is heard. Your wife Elisheba will bear a son, and you will call his name Johanan, which means ‘Yahweh is merciful.’ He will be your joy and gladness; and many will rejoice at his birth. For he will be great before Elohim, and shall drink no wine nor other strong drinks; and he shall be filled with the Holy Ghost, even in his mother’s womb. And many of the sons of Israel he will turn to the Elohim, their God. He will go before Him in the spirit and power of the prophet Eliahu, and he will turn the hearts of the fathers to the sons, and the rebellious will return to righteous behavior; and so he will prepare a people obedient to the Lord.”
So said the Voice, and Zechariah remembered he hasn’t prayed for Elisheba’s fruitfulness today, yet he quickly understood that before Elohim not everything is a prayer that is a prayer, and a prayer doesn’t need to be a prayer – it may just be pleading eyes turned up to the Heaven, or weeping, or simply a deep sigh. And since when entering the temple of the Lord he sighed as he stroked the boy’s curly head and thought then about the sad barrenness of his wife, the Lord took his sigh as a prayer, for all things are in His power, and every step of man is measured by His will. Zechariah understood that much. But, because of his and his wife’s old age, he couldn’t comprehend another matter, hence he just stood there, motionless as a pillar of salt, only able to make some denying motions with his head – surely a reflection of the censer’s pendulum-like swings. And then the voice, recognizing the old man’s unbelief and weakness, announced to him that the Lord will punish this despair with muteness until such time that His will is fulfilled.
The smoke of incense vanished into thin air.
Zechariah was reasonable and sober by nature and like every son of Israel believed above all in what he had not seen (after all, he believed in the Invisible One), so looking upon a young Levite ministering during the incense ritual, he was inclined to believe that this temple servant and the billowing smoke figure were one and the same, if not for a certain small but very disturbing detail, fully confirming the truth of what he had heard and seen. For when he had gone out to the courtyard, where the crowds were waiting for his blessing, he wanted to sing a hymn to the glory of the Lord and of His hosts, but instead of words, an incomprehensible gibberish came out of his mouth. He threw his hands out, and through rapid gestures he wanted to convey his joy, happiness and blessing, but since these motions were illegible, convoluted and dark, the people did not understand their meaning. They could only guess that Zechariah, the priest from Abijam’s shift, has had a vision in the Temple of the Lord.
And the old man fell to the ground, weeping.