Christopher Moore - Lamb - The Gospel According to Biff, Christ’s Childhood Pal

“We have to take Maggie home and get back here for work,” Joshua said.

“You can stay here,” Maggie said. “I can go by myself.”

“No, we have to go.” Joshua held his arms out to his sides and we saw the bloody handprints the killer had left on his shirt. “I have to clean this before someone sees it.”

“Can’t you just make it go away?” Maggie asked. “It’s just a stain. I’d think the Messiah could get a stain out.”

“Be nice,” I said. “He’s not that good at Messiah stuff yet. It was your uncle, after all…”

Maggie jumped to her feet. “You were the one who wanted to do this stupid thing…”

“Stop!” Joshua said, holding his hand up as if he were sprinkling us with silence. “If Maggie hadn’t been with us, we might be dead now. We may still not be safe when the Sicarii realize that three witnesses live.”

An hour later Maggie was home safe and Joshua emerged from the ritual bath outside the synagogue, his clothes soaked and rivulets running out of his hair. (Many of us had these mikvehs outside of our homes—and there were hundreds outside the Temple in Jerusalem—stone pits with steps leading down both sides into the water so one might walk in over one’s head on one side, then out on the other after the ritual cleansing was done. According to the Law, any contact with blood called for a cleansing. Joshua thought it would be a good opportunity to scrub the stain out of his shirt as well.)

“Cold.” Joshua was shivering and hopping from foot to foot as if on hot coals. “Very cold.”

(There was a small stone hut built over the baths so they never got the direct light of the sun, consequently they never warmed up. Evaporation in the dry Galilee air chilled the water even more.)

“Maybe you should come to my house. My mother will have a breakfast fire going by now, you can warm yourself.”

He wrung out the tail of his shirt and water cascaded down his legs. “And how would I explain this?”

“Uh, you sinned, had an emergency cleansing to do.”

“Sinned? At dawn? What sin could I have done before dawn?”

“Sin of Onan?” I said.

Joshua’s eyes went wide. “Have you committed the sin of Onan?”

“No, but I’m looking forward to it.”

“I can’t tell your mother that I’ve committed the sin of Onan. I haven’t.”

“You could if you’re fast.”

“I’ll suffer the cold,” Joshua said.

The good old sin of Onan. That brings back memories.

The sin of Onan. Spilling the old seed on the ground. Cuffing the camel. Dusting the donkey. Flogging the Pharisee. Onanism, a sin that requires hundreds of hours of practice to get right, or at least that’s what I told myself. God slew Onan for spilling his seed on the ground (Onan’s seed, not God’s. God’s seed turned out to be my best pal. Imagine the trouble you’d be in if you actually spilled God’s seed. Try explaining that). According to the Law, if you had any contact with “nocturnal emissions” (which are not what come out of your tailpipe at night—we didn’t have cars then), you had to purify yourself by baptism and you weren’t allowed to be around people until the next day. Around the age of thirteen I spent a lot of time in and out of our mikveh, but I fudged on the solitary part of penance. I mean, it’s not like that was going to help the problem.

Many a morning I was still dripping and shivering from the bath when I met Joshua to go to work.

“Spilled your seed upon the ground again?” he’d ask.

“Yep.”

“You’re unclean, you know?”

“Yeah, I’m getting all wrinkly from purifying myself.”

“You could stop.”

“I tried. I think I’m being vexed by a demon.”

“I could try to heal you.”

“No way, Josh, I’m having enough trouble with laying on of my own hands.”

“You don’t want me to cast out your demon?”

“I thought I’d try to exhaust him first.”

“I could tell the scribes and they would have you stoned.” (Always trying to be helpful, Josh was.)

“That would probably work, but it is written that ‘when the oil of the lamp is used up, the wanker shall light his own way to salvation.’”

“That is not written.”

“It is too. In, uh, Isaiah.”

“Is not.”

“You need to study your Prophets, Josh. How are you going to be the Messiah if you don’t know your Prophets?”

Joshua hung his head. “You are right, of course.”

I clapped him on the shoulder. “You’ll have time to learn the Prophets. Let’s cut through the square and see if there are any girls gathering water.”

Of course it was Maggie I was looking for. It was always Maggie.

By the time we got back to Sepphoris the sun was well up, but the stream of merchants and farmers that normally poured through the Venus Gate was not there. Roman soldiers were stopping and searching everyone who was trying to leave the city, sending them back the way they came. A group of men and women were waiting outside the gate to go in, my father and some of his helpers among them.

“Levi!” my father called. He ran to us and herded us to the side of the road.

“What’s going on?” I asked, trying to look innocent.

“A Roman soldier was murdered last night. There will be no work today, now you both go home and stay there. Tell your mothers to keep the children in today. If the Romans don’t find the killer there’ll be soldiers in Nazareth before noon.”

“Where is Joseph?” Joshua asked.

My father put his arm around Joshua’s shoulder. “He’s been arrested. He must have come to work very early. They found him at first light, near the body of the dead soldier. I only know what has been shouted from inside the gate, the Romans aren’t letting anyone in or out of the city. Joshua, tell your mother not to worry. Joseph is a good man, the Lord will protect him. Besides, if the Romans thought he was the killer he would have been tried already.”

Joshua backed away from my father in stiff, stumbling steps. He stared straight ahead, but obviously saw nothing.

“Take him home, Biff. I’ll be along as soon as I can. I’m going to try to find out what they’ve done with Joseph.”

I nodded and led Joshua away by the shoulders.

When we were a few steps down the road, he said, “Joseph came looking for me. He was working on the other side of the city. The only reason he was near the Greek’s house is that he was looking for me.”

“We’ll tell the centurion we saw who killed the soldier. He’ll believe us.”

“And if he believes us, believes it was Sicarii, what will happen to Maggie and her family?”

I didn’t know what to say. Joshua was right and my father was wrong, Joseph was not fine. The Romans would be questioning him right now, maybe torturing him to find out who his accomplices were. That he didn’t know anything would not save him. And a testimony from his son not only wouldn’t save him, but would send more people to the cross to join him. Jewish blood was going to be spilled one way or the other over this.

Joshua shook off my hands and ran off the road into an olive grove. I started to follow, but he suddenly spun on me and the fury of his gaze stopped me in midstride.

“Wait,” he said. “I need to talk to my father.”

I waited by the road for nearly an hour. When Joshua walked out of the olive grove he looked as if a shadow had fallen permanently on his face.

“I am lost,” he said.

I pointed over my shoulder. “Nazareth that way, Sepphoris the other way. You’re in the middle. Feel better?”

“You know what I mean.”

“No help from your father, then?” I always felt strange asking about Joshua’s prayers. You had to see him pray, especially in those days, before we had traveled. There was a lot of strain and trembling, like someone trying to force a fever to break by sheer will. There was no peace in it.