Wincing, Marcus pushed himself until he was sitting upright. He studied the deepening lines around Ezra’s eyes. “What can’t you have, old man?” Whatever it was, he would give it to him at the first opportunity—a better house, animals, luxuries. He could give Ezra Barjachin anything he wanted. Why shouldn’t he? If not for Ezra, he’d be dead. His body would be rotting away in that foul wadi.
Ezra clutched the phylacteries tighter. “I cannot be like Enoch.” With a rueful smile, he looked at Marcus Valerian and wondered why he was sharing such deep feelings with an unbeliever, and a Roman at that.
“Who is Enoch?”
“Enoch walked with God as a man would walk with a friend. Others saw God. Adam. Moses. But only Enoch had a heart that so pleased God that he was caught up into heaven without ever tasting death.” He looked at the velvety deep blue of the evening sky. “That is what I pray for.”
“Not to taste death?”
“No. All men taste death. It’s a natural part of life. I long for a heart that pleases the Lord.”
Marcus’ face became rigid. “Hadassah wanted to please God and look what it got her, old man. Death.” His eyes darkened. “What does this God of yours want from you other than every drop of your blood?”
“Obedience.”
“Obedience!” Marcus spat the word. “At what cost?”
“Whatever the cost.”
Yanking back the overhang of the canopy, Marcus stood abruptly. A sound of pain hissed from his lips, and he gripped his side. He uttered a short, foul expletive and went down on one knee, light-headed. He swore again, even more vilely than the first time.
Ezra watched him with a strange swelling of pity.
Marcus raised his head, his face ravaged by pain. “Your god and hers sound one and the same. Obedience to his will no matter what the cost.” His pain incensed him. “What manner of god killed a girl who loved him more than anything else in the world, even her own life? What manner of god sends his own son to die upon a cross as a sacrifice for mistakes of others?”
Ezra was pierced by his words. “You speak of Jesus.”
“Yes. Jesus.” He said the name like a curse.
“Tell me what you’ve been told about him,” Ezra said. “Only do so quietly.”
Marcus poured out the story Satyros had told him on the voyage. Ezra had heard his father speak of Saul of Tarsus, at first in glowing terms and then in fury and derision.
“If this Christ had the power to do miracles, why does he let his believers die?” Marcus said. “First his disciples, and now hordes of others. I’ve seen them burned alive in Rome. I’ve seen them cut down by gladiators. I’ve seen them eaten by lions. . . .” He shook his head, wanting to shake the memories out of his mind.
“What else did this Satyros tell you about Jesus?”
Marcus raked his fingers through his hair. “Why do you want to know this now? You said yourself he was a false prophet.”
“How do we fight what we don’t understand?”
What Ezra said was true. Marcus needed to know and understand his adversary.
“All right. I was told this Jesus was betrayed by a friend for thirty pieces of silver. He was deserted by his own disciples before his trial for crimes he hadn’t committed. He was hit, spit upon, wounded, and beaten. Does that sound like the son of a god to you? He was crucified between two thieves while people hurled insults at him and the guards cast lots for his clothing. And while he was dying, he prayed for them. Prayed that his father would forgive them. Tell me what kind of a god would allow all that to happen to him or his son, and even worse to come on those who followed after.”
Ezra didn’t respond. He could not. He was filled with a numbing chill that struck to his very core. He stood and went to the roof wall, clasping it. After a moment, he looked at the heavens. The Roman’s words had brought the prophecies of Zechariah and Isaiah ringing in his ears. Closing his eyes tightly, Ezra prayed.
Deliver me from my doubts! Show me the truth! What came was a conviction so swift and startling, he swayed.
“So they weighed out for my wages thirty pieces of silver . . . ‘Throw it to the potter’—that princely price they set on me.”
His fingers pressed into the plaster as he remembered the old prophecy. And then another came.
“He was oppressed and He was afflicted, yet He opened not His mouth; He was led as a lamb to the slaughter. . . .”
Ezra could see words he himself had copied onto the scrolls, counting each letter, rechecking over and over for accuracy. Every jot and tittle had to be exact.
“And they made His grave with the wicked—but with the rich at His death. . . .”