A Pillar of Iron

by Taylor Caldwell

  “That,” said Roscius, “is the heart of the matter.” When Marcus did not speak, Roscius went on. “I am astounded at Job’s answer to those incredible questions. ‘Wherefore, I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes.’ That was unworthy of Job, who had endured so much. I suppose the wheel of which I have been speaking should have abased itself before its creator and have dashed itself against a stone in repentance for being what it had been made!”

  “You have become a philosopher,” said Marcus. He pondered. “The eternal question of Job is always asked. Men should gaze on the marvels of the universe and consider the stupendous laws and the miraculous intricacy of creation, and the evidence of immortal power and glory. That is the divine answer.”

  “That does not heal a man’s boils or restore to him his lands and his fields and his wife and his children and his treasure. It does not give him the return of his youth and his strength.”

  “But, it gives him peace.” However, despite his words, Marcus felt melancholy.

  “The peace of resignation. That is not enough.”

  “Nevertheless,” said Marcus, “it is a great boon. Come, come, Job was a man of tremendous courage, before which the courage of a gladiator is nothing. It is the fortitude of man which inspires the respect and love even of God. For it is the measure of man how he can overcome fear and gird up his loins, as Job was commanded—and be a man. No, no. I do not like Noë’s conclusions. Man was not made to pity himself before the Eternal, and to describe himself as a weak thing and not responsible for his condition of mind and soul and body. He was made to become like one of the gods, himself.”

  “What a Jew in your soul you are!” said Roscius, admiringly.

  Marcus smiled. He felt a sudden curious exaltation. “God needs not to justify Himself to man. Man has no rights except those rights bestowed on him freely by his Creator, out of that Creator’s love and mercy. He never earned those rights, for he has not the power to earn them. They are a gift, granted out of an affection beyond understanding. For, what is man? A little creature of mud, doomed to disintegrate. But God, out of His boundless and incomprehensible love, gave him a soul as well as a body. Man should spend his life in utter gratitude for that immeasurable gift. Is it not enough that he be alive and is able to contemplate the inexhaustible treasures about him, and the wonders and the glory and the beauty? That would be sufficient, even in the face of unwaking death. But God has promised immortal life, too. Why? That is the real question, one that should shake us to the heart.”

  Roscius reflected, his fiery blue eyes on Marcus’ face. Then he exclaimed, “You believe it! Ah, that stupid Noë! He thought himself very wise and sophisticated. Men who consider themselves so are such piteous fools, are they not? Their mouths are full of cynical words and they believe them so subtle, whereas they are the whinings of imbecile children, and the smirks of idiots. Why should Noë have written such a play? It is maudlin, and false.”

  “He thought it would be more comprehensible to Romans, who love to weep at tragedies, though they prefer dancing and comedy and brawling laughter in the theatre. We are a meaty race.” Marcus smiled. “We do not even question or defy the gods, as the Greeks do. We are very satisfied with our life, and remain satisfied so long as we have enough food and drink and a good shelter, and concupiscence and all the other delights of the body. We are complacent. We rejoice in our power. We love women and gladiators, sports, songsters and dancers and taverns and the wine shops and jewels and fine horses and decorated cars and soft carpets, and all the lustinesses. We wish only that the gods remain on Olympus and refrain from meddling in the affairs of men.”

  “That would perhaps be wise of the gods,” said Roscius, eating dates and spitting out the seeds. “I was not very happy in Israel. There was too much talk of souls and God. What a quandary is our life!”

  Marcus hesitated. “Do they still speak of the Messias in Israel?”

  Roscius winked. “Yes. They expect Him every morning. They are not discouraged.”

  Marcus enjoyed the brief visit of Roscius. Quintus, as usual, was jealous. Atticus was captivated. He gave banquets for the actor, who soon acquired adorers in Athens. After some persuasion, and a sound indication that something of worth would accrue to him, he condescended to appear in the theatre of Dionysus in Antigone, which he favored. He was a marvelous success. He departed from Athens in a state of high elation. He also carried letters from Marcus to his parents and his friends.

  A few days later a servant came to Marcus who was reading on the sunlit terrace and basking in the hot spring sunshine. “Master,” said the servant, “there is one Egyptian merchant to see you, who gives his name as Anotis, and who claims to have rescued you from thieves.”

  Marcus rose and exclaimed, “Bring him to me, and he must dine with me on the terrace!” He had seen none of his rescuers though they had left messages of solicitude with Quintus after accompanying the two brothers to an inn and securing a physician for them.

  The Egyptian was conducted to the flowering terrace, and he and Marcus exchanged deep bows. Then Marcus embraced him in the Roman manner and kissed his cheek and said, “Noble Anotis, you did not linger so I could thank you for saving my life and the life of my brother. How can I repay you?”

  Anotis smiled. “I did not know at first that we had helped the famous lawyer of Rome, Marcus Tullius Cicero. You have never left my mind. You have haunted my thoughts.”

  He was a tall and very thin man of middle-age, clad in long full robes of crimson, green, and yellow linen with a cloak of blue silk over his bony shoulders. His shoes were of fine blue leather ornamented in gold boss, and he wore a girdle of the same about his narrow waist in which was inserted an Alexandrian dagger encrusted with gems. His long black hair touched his shoulders and his narrow head was bound with a gold band with a strange large medallion which hung over his forehead to his brow and glittered in the sun with its many jewels. He was magnificent, but Marcus found his face more interesting than his garments or even his air of enormous dignity and quiet power. That face had been browned by the sun, but the eyes were a clear and pellucid gray, the features delicate yet strong, the mouth indicating both aristocracy and noble pride. From his chin grew a thin black beard, trimmed closely to a sharp point.

  “I am at your service, Anotis,” said Marcus, seating himself near his guest. “You will see that my arm is completely sound again. I should not be here today but for you and your friends.”

  Anotis smiled a little. “You owe me nothing. It was a privilege to assist you.”

  He paused, and those shining gray eyes fixed themselves on Marcus’ face.

  “I have some training as a physician. For, I am a merchant only by necessity, for my family’s fortune, as were the fortunes of all Egyptians, was seized centuries ago by the Greek Lagidae, when Alexander set the Greek Ptolemies on the throne of my sacred country, Khem. We do not forget. I have been trained in the ancient mysteries of medicine and my ancient religion.”

  He paused. Marcus waited. “I accompanied you, who were unconscious, to your room in the inn near Corinth. I helped undress you. I saw a strange object about your neck, on a fine chain which was ornamented with the holy falcon of Horus.”

  “Ah,” said Marcus, bringing forth the chain from under his tunic, and showing the scarred silver cross. “You mean this? It was given to me by an Egyptian client who told me it was the sign of the Holy One who shall be born to men. It was taken from an Egyptian tomb and is millennia old.”

  Anotis looked at the object, touched two fingers to his lips, then reached out and applied those fingers reverently to the cross. “It is so,” he said.

  “I wear it as a promise,” said Marcus, “and as a hope.” He was deeply interested. “You must tell me. I think always of the Messias of the Jews. Does this represent Him?”

  But at this moment servants brought a small table to the terrace and began to serve the noonday meal. Marcus and his guest lifted their goblets in a silent and mut
ual salute, and then poured a little wine in a libation to the gods. Marcus was fascinated by the fine profile, brooding and meditative, of Anotis.

  “Let me tell you, Cicero,” said the Egyptian, as they dined on the excellent viands of Atticus’ house. “It is possible that you know the story of our ancient gods, who have been supplanted by alien others, notably Serapis whom I do not honor. They were brought to Egypt by the Greek Lagidae, and we Egyptians of ancient family and ancient knowledge do not worship them. We remember our own.

  “You may recall the Holy Isis, our Mother, the spouse of the Osiris who was murdered by men and who rose from the dead in the springtime of the year, when the Nile is at its full and giving life once more to the earth.” Anotis brought forth a medallion from under the cloth that covered his breast. “Behold the Holy Mother and her Holy Child,” he said, and Marcus, leaning forward, could see that upon the golden medal there appeared a beautifully enameled little painting of a sweet-faced young woman with a man-child in her arms. The painting was not only of great artistry but of immense charm and loveliness and immediately inspired reverence.

  “Isis, the Holy Mother, and her Holy Child, Horus,” said Anotis. “They have left Egypt forever, for they could not endure the Greek Ptolemies who infest our sacred land. They have passed from the memory of most of our people, who worship the Greek gods or strange ones who have been imported.

  “The sign of Horus was not only the falcon, Cicero. His sign was also that cross, which appears in our old pyramids and represents resurrection of the body as well as the soul. And the old priests have foretold that He will be born of woman and lead mankind out of darkness. He will be born in a strange country of which we know not.”

  “It is said, in the Holy Books of the Jews, that He will be born of the house of David, in Bethlehem,” said Marcus. “That is what I have been told.”

  Anotis sighed. “There is not a race who does not have the legend that the Holy One will appear on this earth,” he said. “Therefore, the occult knowledge must have come from Ptah, God, the Creator Almighty. He must have imparted it to all nations, for do not the Greeks speak of Adonis who was incontinently killed and then rose from the dead during the celebration of Astarte? I have been in many countries, and the legend is there in their religions.

  “When I ascertained this, then I became full of doubt about Isis and Horus. I no longer believe that Isis is the Holy Mother and Horus her Holy Child. I believe that we Egyptians, too, were given the prophesy as were other nations. If Isis and Horus had truly been those prophesied from the ages then never should the worship of Horus have ceased, no, not even under the oppression of the Greek Ptolemies. Therefore, the Holy Mother and the Holy Child are still to come. There is also the mystery of the Cross. How does it really apply to Horus? It does not. So Horus is not our Savior, as once we thought. He has not yet been born. My medal, which I wear about my neck day and night, is still only the prophesy of she who is not yet known and the Holy One still in the breast of Ptah, the Creator.”

  Marcus thought. “I, too, do not believe that Isis and Horus are of the prophesies,” he said. “They are to come. But when?”

  The Egyptian was silent for some time. His eyes lifted and fixed themselves on the glowing Acropolis whose walls and buildings flamed like pure white light under the sun.

  Then Anotis said, “There are some of our priests who are still hidden in the land of Khem, our sacred land. As I am of a priestly family I am sometimes admitted to their presence as they brood and pray in the fastnesses of our crumbling temples. They tell me of great portents and omens.” He hesitated and looked at the Roman as if waiting for a smile of ridicule. But Marcus’ eyes darkened with emotion and he put down his knife and spoon and leaned toward his guest.

  “Tell me!” he cried. “For my heart hungers and thirsts for hope!”

  The Eygptian’s eyes glazed and brightened as if overlaid with tears. He bowed his head a little. “It is unlawful for me to tell what has been told me, and we do not love the Romans. Nevertheless, because of that holy thing which you wear constantly, Cicero, as an amulet, and which you love, and because of what I have heard of you, I will tell you a little.

  “The priests have told me of strange visions they have perceived in the fires of their secret altars. They have seen a woman clothed with the sun, as bright as the morning, crowned with stars and with a serpent under her foot whose head she is crushing. She is great with child, and her face is like the moon. She is very young, a mere girl-child, but all wisdom and beauty lie in her eyes and all tenderness, and all promise. When the priests saw this vision quivering with intense light above the altar fires they cried aloud and fell on their faces and murmured, ‘Isis! She comes again!’”

  Anotis shook his head. “But she is not the Isis we have worshiped in our far past. For I have discovered that the Jews have had a similar revelation concerning one they call a Virgin who shall bear a son and He shall be called Immanuel, for He shall deliver His people from their sins and be a light to all peoples.”

  Marcus felt a sad despondency. “Could it be possible that the Jews acquired the story of Isis and Horus during their slavery in Egypt and incorporated it into their own beliefs?”

  Anotis shook his head. “No, for they came to Egypt with that prophesy. They abhorred our gods, and never knew them. They lived in Chaldea before they ever saw Egypt, a white mysterious race walling themselves away from their brown-skinned neighbors whom they called Babylonians. The Chaldeans had that prophesy also, of the Holy Mother and her Holy Child, but the Hebrews never knew the Chaldean gods as they did not know ours.

  “I, too, have read the Holy Books of the Jews, and she described in them is one whom the priests I know have seen in their visions above the flaming altars.”

  Anotis paused again. “And they have seen other visions, of the glorious One hanging from the sacred Cross, dying, with the light of Ptah, the Creator Almighty, pouring down upon Him. This, the priests are unable to interpret, and they are baffled, but when I read the Holy Books of the Jews, the prophesies of one prophet, Isaias, I understood but I kept the knowledge to myself. I have read, also, the Books of David, the ancient king of the Jews.

  “And let me tell you of a matter most strange. I am a merchant, and I meet fellow merchants from all over the world. The Persians are full of excitement. They tell me that their god will soon be born to all men, for their salvation and their hope and their joy. They tell me that their astronomers have seen the omens in the skies, and their priests have gazed upon the beautiful child’s face of her who will bear the Holy One in their visions. But they, too, are puzzled, for their priests have had a vision of the Holy One dying infamously by the hand of man. How, they ask, can the Holy One be killed by men, He Who is immortal? They have no interpretation. Have you, Cicero?”

  “No,” said Marcus. He moved restlessly. “But, when will He be born and where is she who will bear Him?”

  Anotis sighed. He spread out his hands. “That I do not know, as you do not know, nor the priests. But it cannot be too far in the future, for all nations are suddenly and impatiently waiting. Except,” said Anotis in a wry voice, “the Greeks and the Romans, who honor their gods skeptically, the Greeks, because of their love of beauty whom their gods embody, and the Romans because of their love of power, which Jupiter embodies. In truth, the Greeks and Romans do not believe in God at all. Is it not peculiar that those who deny God in their hearts nevertheless are full of superstition? They listen eagerly to the divinations of their atheistic priests, and visit Delphi, which is a fraud, and they visit astrologers and soothsayers. They believe these. But they do not believe God.”

  “The Jews are the people of the Book,” said Marcus.

  Anotis smiled and inclined his head. “And to them, who are of the Book and have never forsaken their God, the Holy One will be born. He will delay not much longer. Let us pray that our eyes will behold Him.”

  They stood side by side and gazed at the Acropolis. Anotis sai
d, “And when He comes, who will recognize Him? There is but one thing certain, that He will pass away never from the minds of men, as Horus passed away from the memory of the worship of Egyptians. No, never will He pass away though men will despise Him as they have always despised God and have fled from Him. It is in our nature to hate and execrate that which is good and immortal, and to deify that which is evil. Who can fathom the darkness that is man, and the dark impulses of his spirit? Yet it would seem that God loves him and will visit him. It is not to be understood.”

  Anotis took the chain and the medallion from his neck and gave it to Marcus. “Keep it in hope, and wear it in faith, Cicero. I do not know why I give it to you, but I came for that purpose. Her name is not Isis, nor His name Horus. Their names are still hidden in Heaven.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  Quintus rejoiced to return to Rome after the long sojourns in Greece, Asia Minor, and in Rhodes. He declared he could not wait to embrace his wife, Pomponia, whom he had not seen in over two years. Nevertheless, he continued to warn Marcus concerning marriage. “A man is no longer a free entity when he has a wife,” he said.

  “I am nearly thirty-two years old,” said Marcus. “It is time I took a wife and had children.”

  When he and Quintus returned to Rome they found their parents in good health. Helvia was now a plump matron with whitening hair but with her old sturdiness of spirit and strong tranquillity and humorous short laughter. Tullius embraced his sons happily, but his eyes were anxiously upon Marcus. “Tell me of Greece,” he implored. But he wished only to be told of the Greece of his dreams, where the gods walked in the streets of Athens. He did not want to be told of the Agora and the shops and the vivacious Athenians who loved money and laughed and were black of eye and skeptical and lively. He wished to believe that the Athenians were uniformly fair and did nothing but posture in togas and utter philosophies, and quote Homer, and Socrates and Plato and Aristotle. It is apparent, thought Marcus with some irritation, that my father desires to believe that Athenians do not have any of the concerns of humanity. Athenians do not have bowels and bladders; they do not itch and scratch; they do not fornicate or spit. They are clothed in marble and their accents are poetry. Alas, thought Marcus, why do men have such silly fantasies?