Fishers of Men

by Gerald N. Lund

  Marcus nodded. He had been briefed on that shortly after his arrival. Some thirty years before, Quirinius, a new legate in the province of Syria, of which Judea was a part, had called for a census. This counting of people and property was done for purposes of assessing taxes. Publicani, or publicans, contracted to raise the assessment in each district. Anything they could get beyond what was assigned, they kept as their “salary.” It was the Roman way and was a very efficient way to tax a vast empire. But by its very nature it encouraged widespread corruption. Many of the great fortunes in the empire had been made by the publicans, drawn from the sweat and blood of the people in their districts. The system was particularly hated by the Jews. Not only did they feel the injustice of the extortion and heavy financial burden placed upon them, but they were also angry that the taxes went directly to the support of the Roman emperor. With the coming of the Caesars had come the idea that the emperor was divine, one of the gods. Therefore, the Jews saw taxation as a direct support of idolatry and a tremendous affront to their religion.

  Thus, when Cyrenius called for the census, the Jews revolted. Spurred by a charismatic leader named Judas of Gamla, the whole of Galilee rebelled. Judas told his followers that if they had any faith in their god, they would show forth their zeal for him by fighting against any and all forms of paganism, even by the sword if necessary. This had struck a deep chord in the fanatical Jews, and they took upon themselves the name of Zealots. It had taken three full Roman legions to finally put the rebellion down. Judas and about two thousand others had either been killed in the battle or crucified afterwards. Unfortunately, their defeat hadn’t stamped out the Zealot movement. The people weren’t in open rebellion at the moment, but the hot coals still glowed just beneath the surface of the whole society.

  “Well,” Rubrius went on, his eyes moving everywhere as he spoke, “we go now to the home of David ben Joseph, a merchant. He is one of Capernaum’s wealthiest citizens and is greatly respected here. He is one of the few moderate voices among the Galileans.”

  “Good.”

  Rubrius shook his head. “His wife’s name is Deborah.” When Marcus didn’t respond to that, he added. “Deborah was a famous woman general in Israelite history. She led the people in battle against their enemy. She was very fierce, very courageous.”

  Marcus was watching him closely, trying to read what lay behind the words.

  “Are you saying—?”

  “Judas of Gamla was Deborah’s uncle.”

  “Ah,” Marcus said slowly.

  “We will need to be very careful, sire.”

  III

  Marcus stood in the spacious courtyard of David ben Joseph, leading merchant of Capernaum, and remembered the words of his centurion. The naked hatred in the eyes of the family was like a hot poker thrust against his flesh. The four of them—the mother, a daughter, and two sons—stood in a tight knot at the edge of the courtyard facing the soldiers who had thrust their way in a moment before. A fountain murmured softly just behind them. Though she was slender and a full handspan shorter than Marcus, no queen could have stood more regally than Deborah, the wife of David. There was not the slightest trace of fear in her, though there were four quaternions—sixteen men—with drawn swords around her. Her head was up, her back stiff, and her fists clenched, and she did not shrink back from the legionnaires. Suddenly “zeal” took on a new meaning for Marcus. He could see it smouldering in her eyes, and now he understood why Rubrius had doubled the number of men and warned them to be especially alert.

  Deborah’s daughter—probably fourteen or fifteen—stood just behind her, luminous dark eyes frightened but also angry and resentful. Already taller than her mother, the girl was surprisingly fair of complexion. According to Rubrius, though, that was common in the Galilee.

  The youngest son—about ten, Marcus guessed—stood apart from his mother and sister, hands on his hips, legs hardened into tight muscular knots, valiantly trying to stare down the intruders. On a man that stance would have caused the hairs on the back of Marcus’s neck to prickle a little. On a boy it was almost amusing. And yet somehow Marcus felt a sudden grudging admiration. Someday, the gods willing, he would raise such a son as this.

  But it was the oldest son that Marcus watched most closely. He had moved slightly ahead of his mother and sister, letting Marcus clearly know that he was the one they would have to deal with today. The moment he had seen him, Marcus felt instant wariness, like entering a room and suddenly sensing someone was standing in the shadows. Probably near twenty—only a few years younger than Marcus himself—his arms were powerfully muscled and bronzed by the sun. Like his sister, he was fair of complexion. His eyes were light brown and quite wide set. He was also clean-shaven, which was surprising. The beard was highly esteemed among Jewish males, and most boys began growing a beard as soon as they passed puberty. A full, carefully trimmed beard was a mark of wisdom and maturity. To see a young Jew as clean-shaven as the Romans was not unheard of, but it was unusual. But Marcus’s thoughts stayed on the absence of a beard for only a moment. The young man was a picture of hostility. His eyes were hard pinpoints of glittering contempt. His fists were up, clenched tight enough to show the knuckles gleaming white.

  Suddenly Marcus remembered something that Rubrius had told him on the ride over from Caesarea. He still found this to be in- credible, but Rubrius swore that he had been there and witnessed it with his own eyes. One of the Jews’ ten laws, the “ten commandments” as they called them, forbade the worship of graven images. The Roman battle standards often carried carved busts of the emperor, which therefore were a great affront to the Jews. When Pontius Pilate arrived in Judea, he had determined that he would show these stubborn Jews that their new governor was not about to coddle their foolish attitudes. That was not hard for Marcus to believe. He had already learned that Pilate had an ego the size of the Circus Maximus in Rome.

  When Pilate sent a garrison of soldiers from Caesarea to Jerusalem, he commanded them to carry the standards with the bust of the emperor on them. His only concession was to send them into the city by night. By morning, word had spread, and the whole city was in an uproar. Thousands of Jews came down to Caesarea to protest. They came to the praetorium and virtually laid siege to the governor’s palace. For five days and nights they entreated Pilate to withdraw the offensive images.

  But what happened next was what caused Marcus to marvel. According to Rubrius, on the sixth day the governor lost his patience. He invited all of the Jews into the hippodrome, the stadium where the chariot races are held, and had them surrounded by legionnaires with drawn swords. “People of Judea,” Pilate had shouted, “we have not harmed your religion. This is matter for us alone. Accept the standards or die now!”

  As one, the multitude lay on the ground and bared their necks. Humiliated, but realizing that he couldn’t begin his reign with a massacre, Pilate backed down, and the standards had been removed. Now as Marcus looked into the face of this young Jew who stood defiantly before him, he believed it. Here was one who was baring his neck in his own way at this very moment.

  With a slight motion of his head, Marcus motioned Rubrius forward. His centurion was the only man in the cohort who could speak fluent Aramaic. As Rubrius began to speak to the mother, slowly and patiently, Marcus nodded to himself. Rubrius was like an ox in both body and temperament—slow, methodical, not easily shaken from his task. And yet he was powerful, full of strength. The Jews could not bait him, nor did he taunt and ridicule them, which, next to knucklebones and dice, was a legionnaire’s favorite pastime.

  Marcus glanced around. All sixteen of the men he had brought into the courtyard with him and Rubrius were fully alert. The rest of the maniple was stationed outside at both ends of the long street that led to the merchant’s house.

  As the centurion finished, the woman responded with a quick stream of Aramaic. Marcus caught the word for “my husband” two or three times and the name Damascus, but the rest was a blur. He was studying the la
nguage, but it was mostly still a bewildering babble.

  He spoke quietly in Latin. “What is it, Rubrius?”

  The soldier did not turn his head. “They do not have the money, sire.”

  Both Marcus and Rubrius stiffened as the older son took a menacing step forward, thrusting his face toward Marcus. “My mother said that my father is in Damascus obtaining the money and will return soon.” He spoke in flawless Latin, with none of the Jewish tendency to let the final consonants hiss off into nothingness. Marcus was surprised, but then understood. Greek was the common language of business throughout the empire. Latin was the language of the Romans. A successful merchant would be well advised to speak both languages in order to carry out his business. Then Marcus had a sudden intuition that the young man had deliberately spoken in Latin so that all of the legionnaires would perfectly understand his defiance.

  Marcus touched Rubrius on the arm. The centurion moved back, but one hand had grasped the hilt of his sword and Marcus sensed that his sergeant was strung as tight as a bow. That tension was communicated to the men who were in the courtyard with them, and they too were stiff, holding spears and swords more tightly.

  “I am Tribune Marcus Quadratus Didius, commander of the second cohort of the emperor’s tenth legion. We are here under the direct orders of Pontius Pilatus, procurator of Judea, to collect the taxes owed by your family. We mean you no harm and wish no trouble.”

  The young Galilean spat on the tiles. “Pontius Pilate is a pig!”

  As one man, every soldier stiffened, their swords coming up. Marcus flung his hand out, freezing them in position. The boy’s mother had reacted with equal speed, clutching at her son’s arm. “Simeon!” It came out as a hiss, but Marcus saw that her reaction was not so much that of fright, but rather that she knew this was not the place for foolhardy bravado. Good, perhaps there was some sanity behind the fanaticism that burned in her eyes.

  The young man jerked free from her grasp, and she turned quickly to Marcus. “Your tax collector knows my husband could not raise the assessed sum in so short a time. He also knows that my husband has every intention of paying it, in spite of the fact that it is nothing short of the most blatant extortion. There would be more honor if a man broke into our home and stole from us at the point of a sword.”

  The son named Simeon spoke again, his voice strained with bitterness. “Absalom the publican sucks the life blood from his own people. He is a pig, and the governor who supports him is a pig, and I spit on their names!”

  Marcus whirled at the slap of sandals on the pavement. “Stand!” he barked sharply. “The first man who moves without my express command will bend over the scourging tree until there is not a shred of skin left on his back. Now hold your ground!”

  He turned back to the defiant young Jew, not waiting to see that his men grudgingly obeyed, their faces ugly with anger. “What is your age?” Marcus asked, amazed that his voice held a quiet calmness and was under perfect control.

  The boy did not so much as flicker.

  “My son is twenty years of age, soon to be twenty-one,” his mother answered in halting Latin. Marcus nodded.

  “That is old enough to man the oars of a slave galley or to fill the buckets in the Egyptian copper mines. One day in either place would teach you that a sharp tongue is an expensive luxury, my young friend.”

  Simeon responded with a sneer of disgust, but again his mother cut him off by grasping his arm sharply. Then she spoke to Marcus. “I do not disagree with my son’s assessment of Absalom. He is a thief and a robber. How Rome, which professes such nobility of purpose, can support such extortion is another question. However, my son has not yet learned the wisdom of controlling his tongue.”

  Marcus was amazed. It was—what? Not an apology. In fact, there was an insult in her words as well. But she had acknowledged that she accepted his superior position in this circumstance. She did not want to provoke him.

  Marcus took a deep breath, then spoke firmly, slowly enough that she could follow his Latin. “I do not know this Absalom the publican. We are not here at his behest.” Which was not completely true. They had come because Pilate had sent them. And Pilate had sent them because Absalom, Rome’s hired tax collector, had complained—and had offered a tempting cut in order to get what he wanted.

  “We have collected taxes from three other families today without incident. Like the others, your husband was given a week to raise the necessary money. Now I am asking you. Do you have the ten thousand shekels?”

  She straightened slowly, and Marcus saw again that the fires that lit the Zealot movement were not reserved for Galilean men alone. “So,” she answered sadly, “you would be party to this thinly disguised plunder?”

  Marcus tried not to flinch in the face of such utter contempt. “I do not sit as a judge in these matters,” he said. “I am only a soldier who has orders that he must obey.”

  “My husband went to Damascus to raise the money. He said he would be back as soon as possible. He told all of this to Absalom. My husband is a man of his word. We expect him soon, and then you shall have your precious taxes.”

  Marcus hesitated, moved by the honesty in her face. There was no doubt but what she spoke the truth. But with equal clarity he knew exactly what awaited a young tribune who returned to Caesarea with three successes and one excuse. Nor was he comfortable waiting with his troops here in Capernaum to see if David ben Joseph was a man of his word. He had already seen Pilate’s reaction when someone did not perform as expected, and Marcus had sworn that he would never be a target of such rage.

  He took a deep breath, then shook his head. “I am sorry,” he said quietly. He glanced at Rubrius who seemed to be staring right through the family at the walls of the large home behind them. “By decree of the governor,” Marcus said slowly, “we are empowered to confiscate all of your property and possessions in order to fill the assessment.”

  He hesitated as the family gasped, then went on, not meeting their eyes. “I am also authorized to arrest your family and sell you as slaves to help pay off this debt. However—”

  At that moment, Marcus Didius made a serious error. He was not proud to be part of this, and in consequence, he had decided to be magnanimous and forgo taking them prisoner. He was watching the woman, hoping to see that his leniency might soften her in some way. And that was a mistake. There was a blur of movement out of Marcus’s eye; then an arm of iron sinew clamped around his throat. He was jerked around hard, and instantly he felt the sharp prick of a dagger through his tunic at that spot just below the rib cage where his leather breastplate ended.

  “Stand, or the tribune dies!” Simeon shouted. As one, the legionnaires had lunged forward. The command, barked in Latin, froze them in mid-stride.

  “Simeon, no!” The mother fell back, shocked at the sight of her son holding a Roman officer prisoner.

  “You will not be taking any slaves today,” Simeon hissed into Marcus’s ear. Then he gave one quick guttural grunt. The younger son leaped forward, looking up at his brother, the young eyes wide and frightened. Simeon barked another sharp command in Latin to the soldiers. “Stand clear of the stairs!”

  Sextus Rubrius hovered near his commander, sword out, waiting for an opportunity to strike. He swung around. “Move!” he bellowed.

  Half-dazed, the soldiers shuffled away from the wall where stone steps led from the inner courtyard to the roof. Without looking down at the ten-year-old, Simeon snapped out a quick stream of Aramaic. Like a stone flung from a sling, the boy raced across the courtyard and scrambled up the stairs. In the time it took to realize what was happening, he was gone. The boy had been sent for help. That galvanized Marcus to action.

  To give a legionnaire better grip on gravel or stone while on the march, the Roman quartermaster issued each man a pair of caligulas, a thick leather sandal studded with short iron spikes in the sole. Most officers of the equestrian class refused to wear them, preferring a smooth sole for the stirrups. From the time of hi
s enlistment, Marcus had ignored the jibes of his fellow officers, determined he would wear what his men wore. Now as his captor dragged him toward the stairs, shouting at the women to come, Marcus raised his right foot and then jammed it downward, raking the spikes across the bare shin of the Jew.

  The scream of pain nearly broke his eardrum, but Marcus was hardly aware of it. He hurled himself backward, simultaneously throwing out both elbows to push the dagger’s point up and away from his ribs. He and Simeon crashed heavily to the paving tiles, Simeon hitting with a sickening thud. Instantly Marcus rolled clear and moved into a crouch, his sword out. But Rubrius was quicker. He leaped past Marcus, sword arcing downward. The Jew scrambled back, dagger up to ward off the blow, but the sword snapped the blade like a dried reed and slashed into the young man’s tunic. He screamed and crashed back to the floor again, blood streaming from his chest.

  “Simeon!” The mother flung herself toward her son.

  Dazed by the swiftness of what had happened, Marcus watched her throw herself down beside her son. The girl also dropped beside her wounded brother. Marcus slowly straightened, breathing hard. He stumbled back, groping for the fountain as a wave of dizziness swept over him. Rubrius was instantly at his side. “Get me a cloth,” Rubrius bellowed at the nearest legionnaire. Marcus stared at his centurion in bewilderment. He was only now aware of a searing pain along his right forearm and the sticky warmth engulfing the hand that held his sword. He stared at the gash, half a handspan long, not sure how he had gotten it. Only slowly did an understanding come. He had not completely escaped the slashing dagger. Rubrius gently took the sword from Marcus’s hand, wiped the blood from it on the skirt of his own tunic, then slid it backhand into Marcus’s scabbard.

  One quaternion moved around Marcus in a protective circle. Another had closed around the two women and Simeon, swords drawn and ready even though any threat was now gone. Marcus saw another squad of four had gone over to block the stairs that led to the roof. Wonderful, he thought. Now that the boy was gone, they wouldn’t let anyone else disappear on them. He shook his head, struggling to think, fighting to decide if he was doing all he should to make sure they were protecting themselves.