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

John began to raise his shirt and I caught his arm. “We’ll take your word for it.”

The Baptist fell to his knees, then prostrated himself before Joshua, shoving his face against Josh’s feet. “You are truly the Messiah. I’m sorry I ever doubted you. I shall declare your holiness throughout the land.”

“Uh, maybe someday, but not now,” Joshua said.

John looked up from where he had been grasping Josh’s ankles. “Not now?”

“We’re trying to keep it a secret,” I said.

Josh patted his cousin’s head. “Yes, it would be best not to tell anyone about the healing, John.”

“But why?”

“We have to find out a couple of things before Joshua starts being the Messiah,” I said.

“Like what?” John seemed as if he would start crying again.

“Well, like where Joshua left his destiny and whether or not he’s allowed to, uh, have an abomination with a woman.”

“It’s not an abomination if it’s with a woman,” Josh added.

“It’s not?”

“Nope. Sheep, goats, pretty much any animal—it’s an abomination. But with a woman, it’s something totally different.”

“What about a woman and a goat, what’s that?” asked John.

“That’s five shekels in Damascus,” I said. “Six if you want to help.”

Joshua punched me in the shoulder.

“Sorry, old joke.” I grinned. “Couldn’t resist.”

John closed his eyes and rubbed his temples, as if he might squeeze some understanding out of his mind if he applied enough pressure. “So you don’t want anyone to know that you have the power to heal because you don’t know if you can lie with a woman?”

“Well, that and I have no idea how to go about being the Messiah,” Josh said.

“Yeah, and that,” I said.

“You should ask Hillel,” John said. “My father says he’s the wisest of all of the priests.”

“I’m going to ask the Holy of Holies,” Joshua said. (The Holy of Holies was the Ark of the Covenant—the box containing the tablets handed down from God to Moses. No one I knew had ever seen it, as it was housed in the inner room at the Temple.)

“But it’s forbidden. Only a priest may enter the chamber of the Ark.”

“Yes, that’s going to be a problem,” I said.

The city was like a huge cup that had been filled to its brim with pilgrims, then spilled into a seething pool of humanity around it. When we arrived men were already lined up as far as the Damascus gate, waiting with their lambs to get to the Temple. A greasy black smoke was on the wind, coming from the Temple, where as many as ten thousand priests would be slaughtering the lambs and burning the blood and fatty parts on the altar. Cooking fires were burning all around the city as women prepared the lambs. A haze hung in the air, the steam and funk of a million people and as many animals. Stale breath and sweat and the smell of piss rose in the heat of the day, mixing with the bleating of lambs, the bellowing of camels, the crying of children, the ululations of women, and the low buzz of too many voices, until the air was thick with sounds and smells and God and history. Here Abraham received the word of God that his people would be the Chosen, here were the Hebrews delivered out of Egypt, here Solomon built the first Temple, here walked the prophets and the kings of the Hebrews, and here resided the Ark of the Covenant. Jerusalem. Here did I, the Christ, and John the Baptist come to find out the will of God and, if we were lucky, spot some really delicious girls. (What, you thought it was all religion and philosophy?)

Our families made camp outside the northern wall of the city, below the battlements of Antonia, the fortress Herod had built in tribute to his benefactor, Marc Antony. Two cohorts of Roman soldiers, some twelve hundred strong, watched the Temple courtyard from the fortress walls. The women fed and washed the children while Joshua and I carried lambs with our fathers to the Temple.

There was something unsettling about carrying an animal to its death. It wasn’t that I hadn’t seen the sacrifices before, nor even eaten the Passover lamb, but this was the first time I’d actually participated. I could feel the animal’s breathing on my neck as I carried it slung over my shoulders, and amid all the noise and the smells and the movement around the Temple, there was, for a moment, silence, just the breath and heartbeat of the lamb. I guess I fell behind the others, because my father turned and said something to me, but I couldn’t hear the words.

We went through the gates and into the outer courtyard of the Temple where merchants sold birds for the sacrifice and moneychangers traded shekels for a hundred different coins from around the world. As we passed through the enormous courtyard, where thousands of men stood with lambs on their shoulders waiting to get into the inner temple, to the altar, to the slaughter, I could see no man’s face. I saw only the faces of the lambs, some calm and oblivious, others with their eyes rolled back, bleating in terror, still others seeming to be stunned. I swung the lamb from my own shoulders and cradled it in my arms like a child as I backed out toward the gate. I know my father and Joseph must have come after me, but I couldn’t see their faces, just emptiness where their eyes should have been, just the eyes of the lambs they carried. I couldn’t breathe, and I couldn’t get out of the Temple fast enough. I didn’t know where I was going, but I wasn’t going inside to the altar. I turned to run, but a hand caught my shirt and pulled me back. I spun around and looked into Joshua’s eyes.

“It’s God’s will,” he said. He laid his hands on my head and I was able to breathe again. “It’s all right, Biff. God’s will.” He smiled.

Joshua had put the lamb he’d been carrying on the ground, but it didn’t run away. I suppose I should have known right then.

I didn’t eat any of the lamb for that Passover feast. In fact, I’ve never eaten lamb since that day.

I’ve managed to sneak into the bathroom long enough to read a few chapters of this New Testament that they’ve added to the Bible. This Matthew fellow, who is obviously not the Matthew that we knew, seems to have left out quite a little bit. Like everything from the time Joshua was born to the time he was thirty!!! No wonder the angel brought me back to write this book. This Matthew fellow hasn’t mentioned me yet, but I’m still in the early chapters. I have to ration myself to keep the angel from getting suspicious. Today he confronted me when I came out of the bathroom.

“You are spending a lot of time in there. You don’t need to spend so much time in there.”

“I told you, cleanliness is very important to my people.”

“You weren’t bathing. I would have heard the water running.”

I decided that I needed to go on the offensive if I was going to keep the angel from finding the Bible. I ran across the room, leapt onto his bed, and fastened my hands around his throat—choking him as I chanted: “I haven’t been laid in two thousand years. I haven’t been laid in two thousand years. I haven’t been laid in two thousand years.” It felt good, there was a rhythm to it, I sort of squoze his throat a bit with every syllable.

I paused for a moment in choking the heavenly host to backhand him across his alabaster cheek. It was a mistake. He caught my hand. Then grabbed me by the hair with his other hand and calmly climbed to his feet, lifting me into the air by my hair.

“Ow, ow, ow, ow, ow,” I said.

“So, you have not been laid in two thousand years? What does that mean?”

“Ow, ow, ow, ow,” I replied.

The angel set me on my feet, but kept his grasp on my hair. “So?”