by Daniel Silva
In the mid-1980s, he learned he was not alone. Without the knowledge of the Jesuit superior general or his chancellor at the Gregoriana, he joined the Jesus Task Force, a group of Christian scholars who attempted to create an accurate portrait of the historical Jesus. The group published its findings in a controversial book. It argued that Jesus was an itinerant sage and faith healer who neither walked on water nor miraculously fed the multitudes with five loaves of bread and two fish. He was put to death by the Romans as a public nuisance—not for challenging the authority of the Temple elite—and did not rise bodily from the dead. The concept of the Resurrection, the task force concluded, was based on visions and dreams experienced by Jesus’ closest followers, a view first put forward in 1835 by the theologian David Friedrich Strauss, a German Protestant.
“When the book was published, my name didn’t appear in the text. Even so, I was terrified my participation would become public. Late at night I waited for the dreaded knock at the door from the Holy Office of the Inquisition.”
Donati reminded Father Jordan that the Holy Office was now known as the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith.
“A rose by any other name, Father Donati.”
“I’m an archbishop, Robert.”
Father Jordan smiled. His participation in the task force, he continued, did not shake his belief in the divinity of Jesus or the core tenets of Christianity. If anything, it strengthened his faith. He had never believed that everything in the New Testament—or in the Torah, for that matter—happened as described, and yet he believed with all his heart in the Bible’s core truths. It was why he had come to Assisi, to be closer to God, to live his life the way Jesus had led his, unburdened by property or possessions.
He remained deeply troubled, however, by the Gospels’ accounts of the Crucifixion, for they had led to countless deaths and untold suffering on the part of the Jewish people. Father Jordan had made it his life’s work to find out what really happened that day in Jerusalem. He was convinced that somewhere there was a firsthand account. Not an apocryphal document but a genuine eyewitness report, written by an actual participant in the proceedings.
“Pontius Pilate?” asked Donati.
Father Jordan nodded. “I’m not alone in my belief that Pilate wrote about the Crucifixion. Tertullian, the very founder of Latin Christianity, the first theologian to use the word Trinity, was convinced that Pilate sent a detailed report to Emperor Tiberius. None other than Justin Martyr shared his opinion.”
“With all due respect to Tertullian and Justin, they couldn’t possibly have known whether that was true.”
“I concur. In fact, I believe they were wrong on at least one key point.”
“What’s that?”
“Pilate didn’t write about the Crucifixion until long after Tiberius was dead.” Father Jordan looked down at the page. “But I’m afraid we’re getting ahead of ourselves. To understand what happened, it’s necessary to go back in time.”
“How far?” asked Donati.
“Thirty-six C.E. Three years after the death of Jesus.”
Which is where Father Robert Jordan, in the common room of the Abbey of St. Peter in the sacred city of Assisi, picked up the thread of the story.
28
ABBEY OF ST. PETER, ASSISI
IT WAS THE SAMARITANS WHO finally did Pilate in. They had a holy mountain of their own, Mount Gerizim, where it was said that Moses had placed the Ark of the Covenant after the arrival of the Jews in the Promised Land. Jewish rebels had dealt the Romans a humiliating defeat there eighty years earlier. Pilate, in one final act of brutality, evened the score. Untold numbers were massacred or crucified, but a few survived. They informed the Roman governor of Syria of Pilate’s savagery, and the governor told Tiberius, who ordered Pilate to return to Rome at once. His decade-long reign as prefect of Judea was over.
He was given three months to put his affairs in order, say his goodbyes, and brief his successor. Some of his personal records he undoubtedly destroyed. But some he surely carried back to Rome, where Tiberius waited to pass judgment on his conduct. It promised to be an unpleasant encounter. The best he could hope for was exile. The worst was death, either at the emperor’s hand or his own. He was certainly in no hurry to get home.
By December of 36 C.E., he was finally ready to leave. A journey by sea was not possible, not in the dead of winter, the season of storms, so he traveled by Roman roads. Fortuna, however, was smiling on him. By the time he arrived, Tiberius was dead.
“It’s possible Pilate appeared before Tiberius’s successor,” said Father Jordan. “But there’s no record of it. Besides, the new emperor was probably too busy consolidating his own power to waste time on a disgraced prefect from a distant province. Perhaps you’ve heard of him. His name was Caligula.”
It is at this point, Father Jordan continued, that Pontius Pilate vanishes from the pages of history and enters the realm of legend and myth. In addition to the fabricated accounts of the apocryphal gospels, countless stories and folktales circulated throughout Europe during the Middle Ages. According to the thirteenth-century Golden Legend, a compendium of stories about the lives of saints, Pilate was allowed to live out his days in relative peace as an exile in Gaul. The author of a popular fourteenth-century chivalric romance disagreed. Pilate, went the tale, was cast by his enemies into a deep well near Lausanne, where he spent twelve years alone in the darkness, weeping inconsolably.
Much of the lore depicted him as a deathless soul condemned to wander the countryside for all eternity, his hands soaked with the blood of Jesus. One legend claimed he was living atop a mountain near Lucerne. The story was so persistent that in the fourteenth century the mountain’s name was changed to Pilatus. It was said that on Good Fridays, Pilate could be seen sitting atop the chair of judgment in the middle of a foul-smelling lake. Other times he was seen perched on a rock, writing. Richard Wagner scaled Pilatus in 1859 to have a look for himself. Nine years later, accompanied by a royal party, Queen Victoria did the same.
“I actually hiked up it once myself,” confessed Donati.
“Did you see him?”
“No.”
“That’s because he was never there.”
“Where was he?”
“Most of the Church Fathers believed he committed suicide not long after his return to Rome. But Origen, the early Church’s first great theologian and philosopher, was convinced that Pilate had been allowed to live out the remainder of his life in peace. On this matter, at least, I side with Origen. That said, I suspect we might disagree over how Pilate spent his retirement.”
“You believe he wrote?”
“No, Luigi. I know that Pontius Pilate wrote a detailed memoir of his tumultuous years as prefect of the Roman province of Judea, including his role in the most portentous execution in human history.” Father Jordan tapped the plastic-covered page. “And it was used as the source material for the pseudepigraphic gospel that bears his name.”
“Who was the real author?”
“If I were to hazard a guess, he was a highly educated Roman, fluent in Latin and Greek, with a deep knowledge of Jewish history and the Laws of Moses.”
“Was he a gentile or a Jew?”
“Probably a gentile. But what’s important is that he was a deeply committed Christian.”
“Are you suggesting that Pilate became a Christian as well?”
“Pilate? Heavens no. That’s apocryphal nonsense. I have no doubt he remained a pagan until his dying breath. The Gospel of Pilate is a work of history rather than faith. Unlike the authors of the canonical Gospels, Pilate had seen Jesus with his own eyes. He knew what he looked like, how he spoke. More important, he knew exactly why Jesus was put to death. After all, he was the one who sent him to the cross.”
“Why did he write about it?” asked Gabriel.
“A good question, Mr. Allon. Why does any public servant or political figure write about his role in an important event?”
“To ma
ke money,” quipped Gabriel.
“Not in the first century.” Father Jordan smiled. “Besides, Pilate had no need of money. He had used his position as prefect to enrich himself.”
“In that case,” said Gabriel, “I suppose he would have wanted to tell his side of the story.”
“Correct,” said Father Jordan. “Remember, Pilate was only a few years older than Jesus. If he had lived for fifteen years after the Crucifixion, he would have known that the followers of the man he executed in Jerusalem were in the early stages of forming a new religion. Had he lived to the age of seventy, not unheard of in the first century, he would have been hard pressed not to notice the flourishing early Church in Rome itself.”
“When do you think Pilate wrote his account?” asked Donati.
“That’s impossible to know. But I believe the book that became known as the Gospel of Pilate was written at approximately the same time as Mark.”
“Would the author of Mark have known of its existence?”
“Possibly. It’s also possible that the author of the Gospel of Pilate knew of Mark’s existence. But the more relevant question is, why was Mark canonized and the Gospel of Pilate ruthlessly suppressed?”
“And the answer?”
“Because the Gospel of Pilate offers a completely different account of Jesus’ final days in Jerusalem, one that contradicts Church doctrine and dogma.” Father Jordan paused. “Now ask the next obvious question, Luigi.”
“If the Gospel of Pilate was suppressed and hunted out of existence by the Church, how do you know about it?”
“Ah, yes,” said Father Jordan. “That’s the truly interesting part of the story.”
29
ABBEY OF ST. PETER, ASSISI
TO TELL THE STORY OF how he had learned of the existence of the Gospel of Pilate, Father Jordan first had to explain how the book was disseminated, and how it was suppressed. It was written for the first time, he said, in the same fashion as the canonical Gospels, on papyrus, though in Latin rather than Greek. He reckoned it was copied and recopied perhaps a hundred times in this fragile, unstable form and that it circulated among the Latin-literate portion of the early Church. Around the dawn of the second millennium it was produced in book form for the first time, almost certainly at a monastery on the Italian peninsula. Like the Acta Pilati, the Gospel of Pilate was read widely during the Renaissance.
“The Acta was translated into several languages and circulated throughout the Christian world. But the Gospel of Pilate was never translated out of its original Latin. Therefore, its readership was far more elite.”
“For example?” asked Donati.
“Artists, intellectuals, noblemen, and the daring priest or monk who was willing to risk Rome’s wrath.”
Before Donati could pose his next question, his phone pinged with an incoming text message.
Father Jordan glared at him with reproach. “Those things aren’t allowed in here.”
“Forgive me, Robert, but I’m afraid I live in the real world.” Donati read the message, expressionless. Then he switched off the phone and asked Father Jordan when the Gospel of Pilate was suppressed.
“Not until the thirteenth century, when Pope Gregory IX launched the Inquisition. He was more concerned about the threat to orthodoxy posed by the Cathars and Waldensians, but the Gospel of Pilate was high on his list of heresies. I found three references to the book in the files of the Inquisition. No one seems to have noticed them but me.”
“I suppose His Holiness gave the job to the Dominicans.”
“Who else?”
“Did they happen to keep any copies?”
“Trust me, I asked.”
“And?”
Father Jordan laid his hand on the page. “In all likelihood, this is the last one. But at the time, I was convinced there had to be another copy out there somewhere, probably hidden away in the library or archives of a noble family. I wandered the length and breadth of Italy for years, knocking on the doors of crumbling old palazzi, sipping espresso and wine with faded counts and countesses, even the odd prince and principessa. And then, late one afternoon, in the leaky cellar of a once-grand palace in Trastevere, I found it.”
“The book?”
“A letter,” said Father Jordan. “It was written by a man called Tedeschi. He went into considerable detail about an interesting book he had just read, a book called the Gospel of Pilate. There were direct quotes, including a passage regarding the decision to execute a man named Jesus of Nazareth, a troublesome Galilean who had ignited a disturbance in the Royal Portico of the Temple during Passover.”
“Did the family let you keep it?”
“I didn’t bother to ask.”
“Robert …”
Father Jordan gave a mischievous smile.
“Where is it now?”
“The letter? Somewhere safe, I assure you.”
“I want it.”
“You can’t have it. Besides, I’ve told you everything you need to know. The Gospel of Pilate calls into question the New Testament’s account of the seminal event in Christianity. For that reason, it is a most dangerous book.”
The Benedictine appeared in the doorway.
“I’m afraid I have kitchen duty tonight,” said Father Jordan.
“What’s on the menu?”
“Stone soup, I believe.”
Donati smiled. “My favorite.”
“It’s the specialty of the house. You’re welcome to join us, if you like.”
“Perhaps another time.”
Father Jordan rose. “It was wonderful to see you again, Luigi. If you ever want to get away from it all, I’ll put in a good word with the abbot.”
“My world is out there, Robert.”
Father Jordan smiled. “Spoken like a true liberation theologian.”
DONATI WAITED UNTIL THEY WERE outside the walls of the abbey before switching on his phone. Several unread text messages flowed onto the screen. All were from the same person: Alessandro Ricci, the Vatican correspondent for La Repubblica.
“He’s the one who texted me while we were talking to Father Jordan.”
“About what?”
“He didn’t say, but apparently it’s urgent. We should probably hear what he has to say. Ricci knows more about the inner workings of the Church than any reporter in the world.”
“Have you forgotten that I’m the director-general of the Israeli secret intelligence service?” Donati didn’t answer. He was typing furiously on his phone. “He was lying, you know.”
“Alessandro Ricci?” asked Donati absently.
“Father Jordan. He knows more about the Gospel of Pilate than he told us.”
“You can tell when someone is lying?”
“Always.”
“How do you go through life that way?”
“It isn’t easy,” said Gabriel.
“He was telling the truth about at least one thing.”
“What’s that?”
Donati looked up from his phone. “There’s no one named Father Joshua who works at the Secret Archives.”
30
VIA DELLA PAGLIA, ROME
ALESSANDRO RICCI LIVED AT THE quiet end of the Via della Paglia, in a small rose-colored apartment building. His name did not appear on the intercom panel. Ricci’s work had earned him a long list of enemies, some of whom wanted him dead.
Donati pressed the correct button, and they were admitted at once. Ricci was waiting on the second-floor landing, dressed entirely in black. His fashionable spectacles were black, too. They were propped on his bald head, which was polished to a high gloss. His gaze was fixed not on the tall, handsome man wearing the cassock of an archbishop but on the leather-jacketed figure of medium height standing next to him.
“Dear God, it’s you! The great Gabriel Allon, savior of Il Papa.”
He drew them into the apartment. No one would have mistaken it for the home of anyone but a writer, and a divorced one at that. There wasn’t a single flat s
urface that wasn’t piled with books and papers. Ricci apologized for the clutter. He had spent much of the day on the BBC, where his elegantly accented English was much in demand. He had to be back at the Vatican in two hours for an appearance on CNN. He hadn’t much time to talk.
“Too bad,” he added with a glance at Gabriel. “I have a few questions I’d like to ask you.”
Ricci cleared a couple of chairs and immediately dug a crumpled pack of Marlboros from the breast pocket of his jacket. Donati in turn produced his elegant gold cigarette case. There followed the familiar rituals of the tobacco addicted—the stroke of a lighter, the offer of a flame, a moment or two of small talk. Ricci expressed his condolences over the death of Lucchesi. Donati asked about Ricci’s mother, who had been unwell.
“The letter from the Holy Father meant the world to her, Excellency.”
“It didn’t stop you from writing a rather nasty piece about how much money the Vatican was spending renovating the apartments of certain curial cardinals.”
“Did I make any mistakes?”
“Not one.”
The conversation turned to the coming conclave. Ricci mined Donati for a nugget of gold, something he might reveal to his American audience later that evening. It didn’t need to be earth-shattering, he said. A juicy piece of curial gossip would suffice. Donati failed to oblige him. He claimed he had been too busy putting his affairs in order to give much thought to the selection of Lucchesi’s successor. At this, Ricci smiled. It was the smile of a reporter who knew something.
“Is that why you went to Florence last Thursday to find the missing Swiss Guard?”
Donati didn’t bother with a denial. “How did you know?”
“The Polizia have pictures of you on the Ponte Vecchio.” Ricci looked at Gabriel. “You, too.”
“Why haven’t they tried to contact me?” asked Donati.
“The Vatican asked them not to. And for some reason, the Polizia agreed to keep you out of it.”
