Martin Fieber - He Who Returned

Michael stretched out for a moment and started the film again.

“I would like to begin my narrative on the day, when Rachel and I... yes, see for yourself. You will not regret it, for the events that follow now have the power to change you and your life. I am aware that not many have the opportunity to be so closely befriended with a person who did not come from this world and yet was more human than all other humans. I know that this person will be a very well known personality in your time. I doubt that there will ever be a more exact description of the life of this man. After all you will be seeing original recordings of the Santinians, and I never noticed any other scribe such as myself who would have written down the life of Jesus and his teachings. Unfortunately not many people knew how to write in those days. Actually almost none did. And those who could write did not want to follow the life of Jesus, but rather try their hand as merchants. Believe me, that which you now hold in your hands is unique and precisely documented. After all Jesus was my best friend and also my life, as I now know.

What I now want to tell you began on the day when ....”

3 B.C. according to the common calendar

“Eeny, meeny mice, who has lice? Eeny, meeny moo, and lice have you! Joshua, you are Jacob, and I am the Lord.”

“Why does it have to be you, Simeon? You always want to be the Lord. You always only want to be the catcher.”

“That’s not true.”

“Yes it is. You always want to be the Lord.”

“Who cares, I simply am. Rachel, tie the cloth around Joshua’s eyes already. Get going.”

Joshua was angry. This idiot Simeon always had to act the big shot. It was not enough for him to constantly put Joshua down, he also had to declare himself ruler and decision maker for the girls.

Rachel approached him with the cloth. Now all grumbling was forgotten. Joshua liked Rachel and enjoyed it when she bound his eyes with the dirty rag.

“Rachel“, he whispered, “don’t let it get to you, Simeon is only a dumb Zealot. He can’t help it.” Both of them had to giggle.

The alleyways of Nazareth were always firmly in the hand of the children on afternoons. Most of the time they played ‚Jacob and the Lord’, since it was the favorite game of Simeon, and Simeon was the nearly undisputed King if the children in the village. Bigger than the others, no one dared to take him on. Except Joshua. He could still remember that day a couple of months ago very well, when he and Simeon had fought. There had not been a clear winner then, but a proud one. Since then Joshua had a scar on his left cheek. Simeon had injured him with a knife at the end of the fight. The running blood had ended the fight. He could still remember well how the girls then descended on him and gave him the attention befitting a hero. Simeon on the other hand was awarded with a beating from his father shortly after. Nonetheless Joshua enjoyed playing with the children now and then since he normally had to be learning and studying the torah in the house of his father around this time. For his father Samuel, the rabbi of the small village, did not like it when he played in the dust with other kids and wandered about. Especially not with Simeon, the brute, as he always tended to say. But Samuel disliked it even more, when Joshua played catch with the girls among the green hills of Nazareth.

Joshua had to obey and learn to be calm, for his father had ordained that he would become a scribe later on. For then he would be respected man, would serve the faith of his forefathers and would also never have to worry about his future.

However today Joshua had gotten away to play with the other children, for the rabbi was far far away in Sepphoris to meet with some folks who had journeyed there all the way from Jerusalem. Joshua had heard much about Sepphoris, but had never been there himself.

Eyes bound, Joshua stood in the middle of the largest alleyway and waited for Rachel to give him the sign to go ahead. Since the cloth also covered his ears, he could not hear much and waited quietly for his turn. However there was no sign. Only the wind grew stronger and stronger, until it turned into a storm that swirled up dust and fears and tormented his body as if with many little pinpricks. The children screamed and yelled as they fled. Joshua would have normally also quickly ran home, for like all other children he was afraid of sandstorms. They were all warned and taught about the dangers of these forces of nature and the demons dwelling in them. However today he remained standing and calmly pulled the cloth from his eyes. All of the kids had disappeared, only Rachel was still next to him and watched the happening with him. The storm became so strong that both of the children had to seek shelter behind a hut. They put their hands in front of their eyes, for the storm was raging and hurt. It felt as if the demons were playing one of their games with the people again. His father always said that only the Messiah could protect people from the demons.

Oh, couldn’t the Messiah come soon? By now he also knew what a Messiah was. After all his father spoke ever more often of the pressing need of the Jewish people for a Messiah, a saviour. He, Joshua, also was urgently awaiting him. The Messiah would surely rescue him from the relentless strictness of his father and from that boaster Simeon.

“Joshua, look. There are some people coming up the path. They were in the middle of the storm. They survived the demons“, Rachel shouted excitedly in order to come up against the howling of the wind. Only then did he realize that he once again had passage from the torah in front of his inner eye.

“I don’t see anything. Where?”

“Are you blind? There behind the house of Zephaniah.”

Joshua pinched his eyes together in order to recognize the new arrivals at the entrance to the village. Yes, Rachel was right. Who could that possibly be? They were not Romans, although their soldiers rode through Nazareth often in these days. His father was not supposed to be back till evening and did not own a donkey. For now, as the figures approached, he discerned a man leading a large donkey on which a woman sat.

“Who is it, Rachel?”

“I don’t know. Who in our village owns such a large donkey?”

Joshua could not look away from them until he also spotted a child in their age on the donkey, seated sheltered behind the woman. Joshua saw a glowing and froze. There had been something like a bright flash in the darkness, but he could only barely make out the outlines of the strangers. Who was that? Then he saw them. The blue eyes of the child lit up the darkness which was descending over Nazareth just now. The child looked directly at him. It became quiet about Joshua. The demons which had been audible shrieking and cursing in the storm, could not take away the holiness of this moment. These deep blue eyes dug deeply into Joshua’s soul. He became very warm and he felt sheltered. Who was this child?

∞

The sun had risen and shone its golden yellow light on the roughly sixty huts, houses and cave-dwellings of Nazareth. The village lay gracefully snuggled up against the hill behind it, like a panther. A majestic olive tree presided over all of it with its silvery leaves. A few inhabitants strolled comfortably through the alleyways.

The prayers had all been spoken, the family of the rabbi was complete, sitting at the morning meal. Finally they could eat. Like almost every morning they were having unleavened bread, cheese, milk and garlic olive oil. Additionally gigs and dates were served. His father had returned very late yesterday evening from Sepphoris and as always sat at the head of table. And besides, everything in the house of the Rabbi had to be the way it always had been. The seating order was a part of this. Samuel’s wife Sarah sat on the rabbi’s right hand side, to his left Joshua, then came Joshua’s half-sister Esther, whose mother had been the first wife of the rabbi up until her death, and then his younger sister Judith. It was forbidden for Joshua and his sisters to talk while they were seated at the table. They obeyed that rule, for obedience to the father was one of the most important virtues that existed. Obedience was an obligation. In this way Joshua became a good observer.