Naomi Alderman - The Liars' Gospel

“Is that the same teacher as this one?”

The woman shook her head. “We wouldn’t have him again in Emek. No, but this one will do cures, I expect, the same as the rest. Are you sick, any of you?”

She ran her eye appraisingly over the children. They had all come, leaving their families some of them. Yirmiyahu, tall and broad-shouldered, had a wife, Chana, with two months to go in her fourth pregnancy. Iehuda had two little boys with him. Shimon’s wife had not yet borne a child and there were fears…well, it was too early to fear that yet. Dina was becoming a woman — time to think of finding a husband for her — while Michal and Iov were still children, she older, he younger, tracing patterns in the dirt while they waited for the grown-ups to finish their conversation. They were a healthy family, may the Evil Eye stay far off. Miryam did not like the look the woman gave them — a jealous look, as a poor man might give a rich man’s flock.

“Thank God,” Miryam said, “we’re well. We’re bored, that’s all. The harvest is in and the sun is shining and we thought to entertain ourselves — perhaps we’ll see this teacher.”

The woman nodded. She knew Miryam was lying but could not quite tell why, or about what. She sniffed, moved her shoulders uneasily and the baby began to wail.

“He’ll be working his wonders at the synagogue on the hill.” She jerked her head towards the structure at the opposite side of the valley.

“May you be blessed in your going,” said Miryam.

“And you in yours,” said the woman, without a great deal of sincerity.

As soon as she passed out of sight, Iov tugged on her skirt and began:

“Why didn’t you tell her, Ima? Why didn’t you tell her we were going to see Yehoshuah? Why didn’t you tell her he’s our brother? He’s my brother—” this last addressed to Michal, as if Yehoshuah weren’t her brother too.

Yirmiyahu hoisted Iov onto his shoulders and said, “Not everything needs to be told, pipsqueak. Maybe Ima didn’t want to make the woman jealous.”

And this answer appeared to satisfy Iov for the time being.

They would not have needed directions. As they approached Emek, a great swarm of people became obvious, walking from every direction to the synagogue on the hill. Perhaps three or four hundred were here! A greater number than Miryam had seen anywhere outside Jerusalem. They pressed forward, towards the synagogue. Were all these come to see her son? His name must be larger than she thought. He had no such name in Natzaret, where the people remembered him as a stumbling infant, a complaining child, a petulant boy-man. The synagogue was full, the people had spilled out onto the street. At one side, a man was selling hot flour cakes to those waiting for the wonders.

Miryam did not see him at first, through the crowd — she, a woman with children, was kept to the back with the other women. But Iov wormed his way forward, tugging on her hand, until they were almost at the door of the synagogue. And two heads parted suddenly and there he was, speaking. Her body turned cold and then very warm. As if she were in love. Ridiculous! For her own son? The little boy she had washed and clothed and fed from her breast? She ought to have gone to him and washed his face off, where his forehead was always dirty because he would sit on the ground and sift the dirt and then rub his brow. She could see that little dirty smear even from where she stood. She ought to have strode over to him and said, “I am this child’s mother — give me the seat of honor.”

And she knew now why she had not done so, but she hadn’t known it then. Only in the seat of her soul, she had faltered. She thought it was the way the other men looked at him. He was the kind of man her own father would have uncovered his head for, stood up in the house of learning for, told her to call “teacher.” Yehoshuah looked so comfortable there.

He was debating with an older wise man — she heard others in the crowd call him Ezra the Teacher, his beard was as white as a lamb’s fleece. There was a jar of wine on the floor and a table before them. Ezra dipped a cup in the jar and placed it with a sharp slam in front of Yehoshuah. He dipped a cup for himself, took a mouthful, swirled it around. He pulled on his beard. The crowd became silent. This was the debate they’d come to hear.

Ezra said, “I’ve heard it said that you work wonders and make cures in the name of God.”

Yehoshuah nodded. Ezra smiled.

“Well, this is no crime. God gives great power to those who trust in him. When I was a child I saw Khoni the Circle Drawer bring down rain by his prayers from a cloudless sky. Those who are as old as me remember it.”

Ezra looked around the room, indicating a few gray-bearded men with his finger who murmur, “Yes” and “I saw it.”

“And many a man has come to this village to perform cures. And many of them found some success. Now tell me, is it true that you make your cures on the holy Sabbath day?”

Yehoshuah said, “It is true.”

Ezra banged the table so violently that the cups of wine jumped and spattered.

“Then you make yourself greater than God!”

There was a low rumble from the crowd, a murmur of agreement from the people of the village, a mutter of discontent from Yehoshuah’s friends.

Ezra turned to the crowd, bringing them with him as he spoke:

“Wasn’t it enough for the Lord Almighty, God of Hosts, to have six days to create the world? And didn’t he make man with one gesture of his finger”—Ezra flicked the little finger of his right hand—“on the very last hour before the Sabbath, along with all the diseases that plague us and, it must follow because God knows the end of all things, all the cures for those diseases?”

Yehoshuah stared directly ahead of him, neither agreeing nor disagreeing. Miryam had seen that look on his face many times before, a way of staring that made her think he wasn’t listening. Ezra evidently thought that Yehoshuah’s lack of response meant that he was winning the debate.

Ezra raised his voice so that even those standing outside could hear him with perfect clarity: “And if He Who is in All Places could create the cures for all diseases in six days and rest on the seventh, who are you to challenge him? Who are you to do away with the commandment to rest on the Sabbath?”

He lowered his voice again and brought a chuckle to it — he was a skilled orator, taking the crowd with him as he spoke: “Now, I don’t say it’s wrong to heal the sick, of course not. But you couldn’t do it on the other six days? Why make these unfortunate people wait till the Sabbath? Can’t you heal them on a Friday, so they can be home to enjoy their soup with the family like everyone else?”

The crowd laughed. Miryam heard people whispering, “That’s a good point,” and “If even God could make the world in six days…” to each other.

“But of course”—Ezra was coming to a conclusion—“there is an explanation, isn’t there?” His voice became hard again, low and firm and solid. “We know that our God rests on the Sabbath like all his creatures. And so if you heal the sick on that day, where does your power come from? Not from God.” He banged the table again and shouted, “Not from God! We’ve seen you jerking and crying out as you heal, and we know what it means. If not from our God, the God of our forefathers Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, your power comes from a foreign god like Ba’al Zvuv!”

His voice was loud and strong, and as he finished speaking the crowd erupted into foot-stamping and shouts of agreement.

And then Miryam’s son rose to speak. He spoke softly, rocking all the time on the spot and looking not at the crowd, as Ezra had done, but above their heads, as though reading from letters written in the air like a prophet.