by Paul L Maier
“Not really.”
Jon furrowed his brow and reflected on the whipsaw developments that improbable afternoon. Then he turned and said, “If I were you, Nikos, I’d examine all the edges of that fragment under a micro-scope. The papyrus cavity too. See if it looks the same as the rest of the bottom edge of the papyrus.”
“I had planned to do that in any case,” said Nikos, smiling. “I’ll phone you the results . . . probably this evening.”
“What do you have in mind, Jon?” inquired Jennings.
“Only a thought. Nikos probably won’t find any-thing amiss, but we’ve been splitting each hair five ways in this affair, now, haven’t we?”
“True enough!”
The moment they returned to Ramallah, Jon had Dick Cromwell pass out photographs of the papyrus. Jon studied the sharp, high-contrast print of the flattened papyrus that scholars across the world had been using. The rhomboid cavity was plainly present at the mid-right side of the bottom edge.
“Funny, I never noticed it before,” said Shannon. “But now it looks larger than life.”
“Well, the whole bottom edge is chipped and irregular,” said Jennings. “There was no reason for us to notice it.”
“Seems to back up Montaigne’s story, though, doesn’t it?” said Cromwell.
“Dick, I’ve asked you this a dozen times, I know,” said Jon, “and you’ve given me a dozen replies—all consistent. But, one last time, how in very blazes could that AP stringer have found a photograph like that lying open in your lab?”
“Omigosh! I’ve told you, Jon. I left nothing lying around the lab! And before I left for the States, I locked the lab tighter than a drum!”
“Do you suppose Montaigne had anything to do with it? Has he ever been inside the lab?”
“I doubt it,” Jennings replied. “He did all his work at the Ècole or the Rockefeller.”
The phone rang, and Jon answered. “Yes . . . Nikos. What do you have?” Jon listened intently for some time. Then he said, “Fine work, Nikos. Fine work! Thanks extremely!” and hung up.
“Well?” Shannon demanded.
“Nikos says that all the edges on the interface between the fragment and the papyrus show fresh cutting. It’s clean and compressed compared to the rest of the edging, which is irregular and fibrous.”
“But wouldn’t you expect that from Montaigne’s original surgery?” asked Shannon.
“No. Montaigne claimed he did this years ago. In that time, Nikos says, the edges would have puffed back out more, especially after humidification.”
“Well, when, then, could Montaigne have made his cut?” Brampton wondered. “The fragment was missing from the papyrus when we first discovered it, evidently—”
No one responded. Jennings beat a tattoo on the table with his fingers. “But was it, now?” he finally asked. “Do we know that it was really missing at discovery?”
“Hold it!” Jon shouted. “This ‘authorized’ print is not the earliest photo. Not by a long shot! Dick, where are those very first photos you took of the papyrus while it was still partially curled? You know, when you shot it from four different angles?”
“Well, those were a little fuzzy compared to these, so I threw them out.”
“You had bloody well better be kidding!” Jon seethed.
“Of course I am,” Cromwell laughed, while heading for the photo lab. He returned with the appropriate file. Jon quickly paged through the three photographs of the upper papyrus until he came to the print of the lowest quadrant.
“Great balls of fire!” he exclaimed. “Look, all of you,” he pointed. “There. No indentation! The fragment hadn’t been cut off yet!”
“Then when did Montaigne ever have access to the papyrus in order to do his dirty work?” Shannon wondered.
“We were always with him,” said Jennings, shaking his head. “God only knows.”
“And we do, too, I think,” said Jon, brightening. “Remember that appointment we had with Montaigne at the Rockefeller after we got back from Sinai?”
“Oh! Yes, of course! The bounder was looking at the papyrus all by himself, wasn’t he!” said Jennings.
“Won’t work, fellas,” said Cromwell. “I’d taken the ‘authorized photos’ long before that, and they show the fragment missing.”
“Darn! That’s right, Dick,” Jon agreed.
Jennings, meanwhile, was dialing Nikos, but there was no answer either at the laboratory or at his home. “Stuff and bother!” huffed Jennings. “He probably left with his family for the weekend.”
After a frustrating Saturday and Sunday trying to hold the media at bay, they finally reached Papadimitriou by phone on Monday morning. “We have an important question for you, Nikos,” said Jennings. “Think back to the time we first brought the papyrus in to you and the days thereafter, all right? Fine. Now, was there ever a time when Montaigne was alone with the papyrus during that period?” Jennings covered the phone and whispered, “He’s thinking.”
“What’s that? . . . You say it was the very first time we showed it to him? . . . He did what? . . . He came back into the laboratory after Jon left? . . . Well, thank you, Nikos. That solves it nicely.”
The confrontation took place in the private living quarters of the Latin patriarch of Jerusalem. Present were the Rama Five, as well as the directors of the Albright Institute, the British School of Archaeology, and the Ècole Biblique as witnesses. Besides the Latin patriarch and his secretary, the abbot of the Dominican Order in Israel and Père Claude Montaigne were also present. Out of courtesy to the Latin patriarchate, the press and public had not been notified. Kevin Sullivan, who had phoned from Rome the moment he heard the news “of proven forgery” on Radio Italiana, was expected to arrive imminently from Ben Gurion Airport, as personal representative of the pope. Jon had had the sad duty of calling Sullivan to report that any “proven forgery” was hardly that.
Umberto Cervantes, the patriarchal host, was a tall man with a full and generous face, elegantly crowned with a snowy mane and limpid emerald eyes. A good, honest man and a successful administrator, the Latin patriarch was unaware of the reason for the Jennings group’s visit, other than, perhaps, to probe further into the motives of the now-dis-graced Dominican.
Since it was midafternoon, the patriarch ordered tea for the group and bade Jennings open the discussion. Jennings began, but stopped when tea was poured. Lemon wedges and sugar cubes had hardly been distributed than Jennings resumed and Cervantes sat upright at the baleful tidings that Montaigne had lied about the fragment. At that moment, Kevin Sullivan burst inside, and, after briefest hellos, was updated on the discussion to that point. Jon then distributed Cromwell’s original papyrus photograph, revealing no recess, along with subsequent views showing the cut.
Claude Montaigne said nothing. Sitting rigidly in his chair, he merely studied the patriarch’s oriental rug. Cervantes demanded that he respond. He did not.
“I ask you again, Père Claude, answer these charges! As your ecclesiastical superior, I require that you answer them.”
Seconds of silence passed. Finally, Montaigne grasped the handles of his chair and looked at the group for the first time. “Oui,” he whispered. Then, more audibly, “I cut off the fragment inside the Rockefeller laboratory, and not years earlier.”
“Did you also lie when you claimed to have forged the papyrus?” the patriarch pressed.
“The papyrus is certainly a forgery,” he responded. “The false nuances in grammar and syntax, the—”
“What are those ‘false nuances’?” Jon interposed. “As I recall, you’ve never given us a proper answer to that question.”
Montaigne began a long, technical soliloquy on tiny points of grammar that seemed less and less convincing—even to himself—for at last he threw up his hands and said, “All right, I’ll stop. Ah . . . what was the question, Your Excellency?”
“Did you also lie when you claimed to have forged the papyrus?”
“Well . . . y
es. I did not forge it. But I have no doubt that—”
“Why?” Jon boomed. “Why would you, one of the greatest Semiticists—you, who have given such treasures to the world of scholarship—why would you have committed professional suicide by doing what you did? You are through in the company of scholars, Montaigne! No one will look at your writing again! How could you do this?”
Montaigne was silent for several moments. Then he smiled wanly and said, “My greatest falsehood was to say that I had lost my faith. Before my God and in your presence, I tell you that I have not! And if Jesus could give His life for me, the very least I could do was to surrender my scholarship to the Savior. Oh, happy sacrifice!”
Now it was the others who were silent. All seemed strangely touched. Shannon had tears in her eyes, while it was Jon’s turn to study the oriental carpet.
Montaigne continued, “Church bells are ringing again throughout the world, mes amis! Jesus has returned, as it were! People have faith and hope and love once again! First reports tell of churches crowded, cathedrals filled. Almost a million gathered in front of St. Peter’s yesterday, as the Holy Father chanted a Te Deum that the forgery has been exposed. Will you now—can you—tear this renewed faith out of their very lives? Can you? ”
No one replied. Again he took the initiative: “I was . . . how you say? . . . I was ‘buying time,’ mes amis. Someday Rama will be exposed as a fraud invented in hell itself. I have not been able to discover that, as yet. Nor have you. But in the meantime, how many hundreds, thousands, will have died without the comfort of the Resurrection? How many, I ask you?”
Again there was no response.
“All I ask, my colleagues, is that we let the world have its Christianity back, for it is indeed ‘a teaching of hope’—the only thing that malicious forger ever said properly.”
The silence, again, was deafening, until the host said, simply, “Why don’t we have a brief . . . a brief interlude . . . or, rather, recess, my friends. I’ll order more tea. Perhaps we can come back together in, shall we say, a half hour?”
The Rama Five walked onto a balcony overlooking Jerusalem, where Kevin Sullivan joined them. They stared eastward across the domes and cupolas, bell towers and minarets of the Old City toward the deepening gold of the setting sun against the Mount of Olives.
“Was it that way in Rome yesterday, Kevin?” asked Jon, quietly.
“Yes. I tried to get to the pope in time with your caveat, but I didn’t make it. The Italian faithful were beside themselves with joy.”
“Well, do you suppose we should let it go for now?” Jennings offered. “Continue our work secretly? Out of the glare of publicity?”
“Certainly would be easier that way!” Brampton agreed.
“What are you thinking, Jon?” asked Shannon.
“I . . . don’t know. It would be our first false step in this whole unlikely affair.” While gazing across the Old City, Harvard’s motto came suddenly, incongruously, to mind: VERITAS, truth. Let the Yalies cling to their LUX ET VERITAS, Jon mused, their “Light and Truth.” Truth is enough. Light, without truth, is no light at all. No “malicious forger” had been detected thus far. Likely, he didn’t exist. Or, conceivably, he did. But meanwhile, nothing—however ancient, grand, magnificent, or sustaining—must ever, ever stand in the way of Truth. Truth in the past, in the present, for the future.
Jon turned to the others and said, “However you decide, I, for one, will not go along with Montaigne’s scheme.”
As they went back inside, Jon felt an arm across his shoulder. “Nor will I, friend,” said Kevin, “much as it hurts.” The others concurred. Emphatically.
“We’ve come to a unanimous conclusion, Your Excellency,” said Jon, as they reconvened. “Truth is paramount. Admitting a false forgery now, however convenient, would make it more difficult to detect a true forgery later on, if such is the case. Truth, in any event, must prevail, whatever the cost. Our colleagues, the distinguished directors of the archaeology institutes here in Jerusalem, will have it no other way. The papal representative will have it no other way, and—”
“Nor will I,” said the Dominican abbot.
“Nor I,” said the Latin patriarch. “Brother Montaigne, while we can sympathize with your inten-tions, we cannot condone the means you employed to gain them. We must herewith strip you of your priestly functions for the time being and commend you to the spiritual care of your Dominican superiors. Under no circumstances are you to preach or teach or publish until further notice. All of us will pray for you, I’m sure.” Then he turned and asked, “And now, my dear professors, do you wish to draw up a public statement for the press? Or shall I?”
“We’ll be happy to leave that in your hands, Your Excellency,” said Jennings.
It seemed a particularly cruel trick to play on the world. Buoyant relief and exhilaration one day, a return to the pit of despair the next. Frustration, anger, bitter resentment boiled up at various corners of the globe. Some took the easy, the cheap, the obvious path, like Melvin Merton and his coterie, who were praising Claude Montaigne as “one very blessed Judas who repented” at the beginning of the week, and cursing him as “the excrement of the Evil One” at the end. “See?” said Merton. “You can’t trust any of these would-be scholars, these so-called archaeologists. They’re all in league with the devil!”
Just before he returned to Rome, Kevin Sullivan had lunch with Jon atop the Jerusalem Hilton.
“So, when will it all end, friend?” inquired Sullivan. “The Church has been trying to function with a razor across its throat for almost a year now.”
“The panels should be winding up their work by late summer. Unless something new comes up, that should be it. Have you been working on John 20:26? Our New Testament Panel has.”
“Yes, we have. You’re saying Rama’s all authentic, then? No put-up job?”
“I’m only saying that the Church had jolly well better be ready for something like that.”
“Okay, that John passage says the resurrected Jesus appeared to His disciples through shut doors—He materialized through the walls. Fine, that certainly sounds like a spiritual—not a physical—posture for the Resurrection. But don’t forget how that scene continues. Jesus invites ‘Doubting’ Thomas to touch the marks on His hands and side.”
“John doesn’t say Thomas did so, though I agree he might have.”
“Quibble, quibble, quibble! But what about the parallel account in Luke?”
“I know.” Jon held up his hands. “Jesus tells them, ‘Touch me, for a spirit doesn’t have flesh and bones as you see that I have.’”
“And after that, He ate a piece of broiled fish.”
“Fine, Kevin. There we have the other pole in the Easter account, a very physical Resurrection. And yet where were the bones during that transit through the wall? Maybe that’s what Saint Paul had in mind with his magnificent illustration in 1 Corinthians 15: just as a seed planted in the earth is transformed into something much greater—a living plant—so, he says, ‘it is with the resurrection of the dead. What is sown as a physical body is raised as a spiritual body.’”
“Agreed. But we’ve always understood that as true, glorified bodies, like Christ’s. In that same chapter, Paul says we’ll not be disembodied spirits but spiritual bodies. Any ‘bones’ are transformed. They’re not left behind.”
“I know, I know, Kev. It’s the way we both were taught. Hah! I’ll never forget how I reacted to an Easter article in the St. Louis Globe Democrat back in ’79. Four area clergy were asked how they’d react to news that some archaeological team had discovered the bones of Jesus ‘with scientific certainty’—”
“Sounds familiar, doesn’t it?” Kevin commented.
“And how! Anyway, a Lutheran seminary president gave an orthodox answer, but he begged the question by saying it couldn’t happen. A Methodist professor said he’d have to do a lot of rethinking. But an Episcopal rector said that finding Christ’s remains ‘would not affect me
in the slightest.’ I recall being totally disgusted at that response. The one I easily agreed with was a Catholic New Testament professor at St. Louis University who said that he ‘would totally despair.’ Now, that was honest! So you see where my heart is, Kevin. Or was.”
“And now you’re saying we’d better do that Methodist’s ‘rethinking’?”
“I’m saying we’d better be ready for anything. Surely you have Catholic theologians who agree with that Episcopal rector.”
“We certainly do, even in Rome. Some of our ultra-liberals have been smiling for months. Maybe you’re not aware of it here in the sacred boondocks, Jon, but right now there’s a fierce battle brewing inside the Vatican. It used to be polarization, but now it’s almost war. The liberals are pleading with the Holy Father to accept a spiritual-only Resurrection even before you announce your final results here, because some of them figure the odds for authenticity at a hundred to one. The moderate middle and the conservatives, of course, know all about this pressure from the left, and Pedro Cardinal Gonzales has warned the pope to resist it.”
“Warned?! And how is God’s Watchdog-for-the-Faith? Still sniffing out heresy in every echelon of the Church?”
Kevin smiled and said, “Well, Gonzales and his Holy Office have the support of Augustin Buchbinder, Vatican Secretary of State, and his large following in the Curia. They want no tampering whatever with the Easter event.”
“No one does. But what if there’s no alternative?”
“I don’t know.” He drained the final suds from his second beer, and Jon did the same.
“When you have all the panel reports, Jon, could you let us know the results before you go public with them? Per usual?”
“I’ll do better than that. I’ll fly to Rome and go over them with you and the pope personally.”
TWENTY-ONE
The Israeli government was hard pressed. The sacred catastrophe at Rama charged the land with a volatility that spread even to Palestinians in the West Bank. The intifada seemed to revive: Arab boys hurling stones, curfews reimposed, a bus bombed outside Bethlehem, kibbutzniks in reprisal raids—the same sad script of violence seemed to be plagiarized from the recent past.
