Fifth Gospel(142)

Caiaphas sighed a weary and bored sigh and waved a hand as if he were shooing a fly. ‘Very well, you may send three guards.’

‘But the Romans won’t allow it unless you go, Caiaphas!’ said the other annoying Pharisee, ‘for without you the soldiers have no authority.’

Caiaphas turned an indolent eye upon the man, a look that could wither a plant, but it did nothing to change the resolve on that stubborn face. ‘The lot, dear Solomon, has fallen to me, I must kindle the incense…do you see how impossible it is?’

‘If you send the captain of the guards with the lance of Phineas,’ Ananias offered from behind them, ‘the Romans will know that a mandate has been given and they must demure before it.’

Caiaphas was full of pleasure for this suggestion since the lance of Phineas had been that lance used to kill those idolaters and adulterers who had also not complied with the laws of Moses. There was a species of poetic eloquence in using it against Jesus. He wished that he had thought of it himself!

After he gave the orders that it be done he ascended the three steps to commence the ritual burning of the incense. At this point a speck of a feeling announced itself, a feeling against all logic. He pushed it back into the dull corners of his ill used heart and tried to preoccupy himself with his task, but it would not go away, it would have his ear until finally, it spread apart the curtains of his mind and announced itself loudly:

Could he have been the Messiah?

This petition rang out from his soul before he could snatch it. It fell over the heavy four-coloured veil that hung taut before the Holy of Holies. It fell over the golden altar of incense that glowed red with coals.

Oh no! He had unwittingly petitioned the ancient oracle!

Behind him the Levites were kneeled and he was full of relief – it had seemed to him that he had said it out loud, but he had not.

He gathered his wits to him, kindled the incense and took the golden censer from the fire, but at that moment a wind had entered the city, an ancient wind called Ruach. It moved over the colossal bridge and swept through the archways forcing its way through the gates of the Temple, curving its back around the sanctuary of shining marble and glittering gold, sweeping through the court of the women, the court of Israel and the court of the Priests and entering the chambers so strongly as to fan the sacred fires into flames.

Ruach…Elohim…Aur! Breath…Elohim…Light!

It moved from behind the columns and the walls and reached out its hands to grasp at Caiaphas’ vestments and to tear at his robes. He drew his hands to dampen its voice and dropped the sacred incense to the marble floor.

Dismay and confusion swirled around the sanctuary now, but Caiaphas heard only these words:

HE IS!

At this point day turned to night and the earth began to move of its own accord sending the golden candlestick with its seven lit lamps crashing to the floor. Caiaphas lost his balance and followed it hitting his head on the altar. The priests dissolved into panic as the wind, full of sand and dust, made them choke and the shaking of the earth tore through the ground like the hand of a furious god.

Caiaphas struggled to stand but his vestments were lifted up to his face like devil’s wings. And as the earth exchanged places with the air he was gripped by terror and tried to make a way out of the Temple but there was a great commotion and confusion among those who had come for the service. The crowds, coming together of a sudden, made a crush through the porches and many fell and were trampled underfoot. At this point a crack in the earth was heard and those veils guarding the holy place, those veils long and wide and thick and wrought in seventy-two squares joined together, gathered the wind into themselves like sails and were made pregnant. In their convulsions and birth throws there began a rip and a loud rent sounded as the four veils were torn from top to bottom laying bare the most Holy Place to the eyes of all.

The storm and the earthquake swallowed up the cries of terror and shock. God Himself, in His wrath, had rent the four veils with His own hands and was gone from that place where he had dwelt in mysterious gloom. What portent was this? The priests asked themselves.

Only Caiaphas knew the answer, for he had heard the voice of the oracle. God had forsaken their Temple because they had killed His only Begotten Son.





73


GRAIL SPEAR




The strange day was now near over. Each hour had caused Gaius Cassius to grow more anxious for what he was seeing and hearing, for in all of it he felt the acknowledgement of a peculiar truth.

Since his failed initiation he had held onto the only sure thing in his life – duty. But now this duty was pulling away and leaving him no firm foundation. For the deepest duty of an initiate was to keep the secrecy of the mysteries and these had been violated and revealed before the eyes of all through this man Jesus.