Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal

Chapter 4

Chapter 4

Yet another reason that I loathe the heavenly scum with whom I share this room: today I found that I had offended our intrepid room service waiter, Jesus. How was I to know? When he brought our pizza for dinner, I gave him one of the American silver coins that we received from the airport sweet shop called Cinnabon. He scoffed at me - scoffed - then, thinking better of it, he said, "Señor, I know you are foreign, so you do not know, but this is a very insulting tip. Better you just sign the room service slip so I get the fee that is added automatically. I tell you this because you have been very kind, and I know you do not mean to offend, but another of the waiters would spit in your food if you should offer him this."

I glared at the angel, who, as usual, was lying on the bed watching television, and for the first time I realized that he did not understand Jesus' language. He did not possess the gift of tongues he had bestowed on me. He spoke Aramaic to me, and he seemed to know Hebrew and enough English to understand television, but of Spanish he understood not a word. I apologized to Jesus and sent him on his way with a promise that I would make it up to him, then I wheeled on the angel.

"You fool, these coins, these dimes, are nearly worthless in this country."

"What do you mean, they look like the silver dinars we dug up in Jerusalem, they are worth a fortune."

He was right, in a way. After he called me up from the dead I led him to a cemetery in the valley of Ben Hiddon, and there, hidden behind a stone where Judas had put it two thousand years ago, was the blood money - thirty silver dinars. But for a little tarnish, they looked just as they did on the day I had taken them, and they were almost identical to the coin this country calls the dime (except for the image of Tiberius on the dinars, and some other Caesar on the dime). We had taken the dinars to an antiquities dealer in the old city (which looked nearly the same as it did when I'd last walked there, except that the Temple was gone and in its place two great mosques). The merchant gave us twenty thousand dollars in American money for them. It was this money that we had traveled on, and deposited at the hotel desk for our expenses. The angel told me the dimes must have the same worth as the dinars, and I, like a fool, believed him.

"You should have told me," I said to the angel. "If I could leave this room I would know myself."

"You have work to do," the angel said. Then he leapt to his feet and shouted at the television, "The wrath of the Lord shall fall upon ye, Stephanos!"

"What in the hell are you shouting at?"

The angel wagged a finger at the screen, "He has exchanged Catherine's baby for its evil twin, which he fathered with her sister while she was in a coma, yet Catherine does not realize his evil deed, as he has had his face changed to impersonate the bank manager who is foreclosing on Catherine's husband's business. If I was not trapped here I would personally drag the fiend straight to hell."

For days now the angel had been watching serial dramas on television, alternately shouting at the screen or bursting into tears. He had stopped reading over my shoulder, so I had just tried to ignore him, but now I realized what was going on.

"It's not real, Raziel."

"What do you mean?"

"It's drama, like the Greeks used to do. They are actors in a play."

"No, no one could pretend to such evil."

"That's not all. Spider-Man and Doctor Octopus? Not real. Characters in a play."

"You lying dog!"

"If you'd ever leave the room and look at how real people talk you'd know that, you yellow-haired cretin. But no, you stay here perched on my shoulder like a trained bird. I am dead two thousand years and even I know better." (I still need to get a look at that book in the dresser. I thought maybe, just maybe, I could goad the angel into giving me five minutes privacy.)

"You know nothing," said Raziel. "I have destroyed whole cities in my time."

"Sort of makes me wonder if you destroyed the right ones. That'd be embarrassing, huh?"

Then an advertisement came on the screen for a magazine that promised to "fill in all the blanks" and give the real inside story to all of soap operas: Soap Opera Digest. I watched the angel's eyes widen. He grabbed the phone and rang the front desk.

"What are you doing?"

"I need that book."

"Have them send up Jesus," I said. "He'll help you get it."

On our first day of work, Joshua and I were up before dawn. We met near the well and filled the waterskins our fathers had given us, then ate our breakfasts, flatbread and cheese, as we walked together to Sepphoris. The road, although packed dirt most of the way, was smooth and easy to walk. (If Rome saw to anything in its territories, it was the lifelines of its army.) As we walked we watched the rock-strewn hills turn pink under the rising sun, and I saw Joshua shudder as if a chill wind had danced up his spine.

"The glory of God is in everything we see," he said. "We must never forget that."

"I just stepped in camel dung. Tomorrow let's leave after it's light out."

"I just realized it, that is why the old woman wouldn't live again. I forgot that it wasn't my power that made her arise, it was the Lord's. I brought her back for the wrong reason, out of arrogance, so she died a second time."

"It squished over the side of my sandal. Well, that's going to smell all day."

"But perhaps it was because I did not touch her. When I've brought other creatures back to life, I've always touched them."

"Is there something in the Law about taking your camel off the road to do his business? There should be. If not the Law of Moses, then the Romans should have one. I mean, they won't hesitate to crucify a Jew who rebels, there should be some punishment for messing up their roads. Don't you think? I'm not saying crucifixion, but a good smiting in the mouth or something."

"But how could I have touched the corpse when it is forbidden by the Law? The mourners would have stopped me."

"Can we stop for a second so I can scrape off my sandal? Help me find a stick. That pile was as big as my head."

"You're not listening to me, Biff."

"I am listening. Look, Joshua, I don't think the Law applies to you. I mean, you're the Messiah, God is supposed to tell you what he wants, isn't he?"

"I ask, but I receive no answer."

"Look, you're doing fine. Maybe that woman didn't live again because she was stubborn. Old people are that way. You have to throw water on my grandfather to get him up from his nap. Try a young dead person next time."

"What if I am not really the Messiah?"

"You mean you're not sure? The angel didn't give it away? You think that God might be playing a joke on you? I don't think so. I don't know the Torah as well as you, Joshua, but I don't remember God having a sense of humor."

Finally, a grin. "He gave me you as a best friend, didn't he?"

"Help me find a stick."

"Do you think I'll make a good stonemason?"

"Just don't be better at it than I am. That's all I ask."

"You stink."

"What have I been saying?"

"You really think Maggie likes me?"

"Are you going to be like this every morning? Because if you are, you can walk to work alone."

The gates of Sepphoris were like a funnel of humanity. Farmers poured out into their fields and groves, craftsmen and builders crowded in, while merchants hawked their wares and beggars moaned at the roadside. Joshua and I stopped outside the gates to marvel and were nearly run down by a man leading a string of donkeys laden with baskets of stone.

It wasn't that we had never seen a city before. Jerusalem was fifty times larger than Sepphoris, and we had been there many times for feast days, but Jerusalem was a Jewish city - it was the Jewish city. Sepphoris was the Roman fortress city of Galilee, and as soon as we saw the statue of Venus at the gates we knew that this was something different.

I elbowed Joshua in the ribs. "Graven image." I had never seen the human form depicted before.

"Sinful," Joshua said.

"She's naked."

"Don't look."

"She's completely naked."

"It is forbidden. We should go away from here, find your father." He caught me by my sleeve and dragged me through the gates into the city.

"How can they allow that?" I asked. "You'd think that our people would tear it down."

"They did, a band of Zealots. Joseph told me. The Romans caught them and crucified them by this road."

"You never told me that."

"Joseph told me not to speak of it."

"You could see her breasts."

"Don't think about it."

"How can I not think about it? I've never seen a breast without a baby attached to it. They're more - more friendly in pairs like that."

"Which way to where we are supposed to work?"

"My father said to come to the western corner of the city and we would see where the work was being done."

"Then come along." He was still dragging me, his head down, stomping along like an angry mule.

"Do you think Maggie's breasts will look like that?"

My father had been commissioned to build a house for a wealthy Greek on the western side of the city. When Joshua and I arrived my father was already there, directing the slaves who were hoisting a cut stone into place on the wall. I suppose I expected something different. I suppose I was surprised that anyone, even a slave, would do as my father instructed. The slaves were Nubians, Egyptians, Phoenicians, criminals, debtors, spoils of war, accidents of birth; they were wiry, filthy men, many wearing nothing more than sandals and a loincloth. In another life they might have commanded an army or lived in a palace, but now they sweated in the morning chill, moving stones heavy enough to break a donkey.

"Are these your slaves?" Joshua asked my father.

"Am I a rich man, Joshua? No, these slaves belong to the Romans. The Greek who is building this house has hired them for the construction."

"Why do they do as you ask? There are so many of them. You are only one man."

My father hung his head. "I hope that you never see what the lead tips of a Roman whip do to a man's body. All of these men have, and even seeing it has broken their spirit as men. I pray for them every night."

"I hate the Romans," I said.

"Do you, little one, do you?" A man's voice from behind.

"Hail, Centurion," my father said, his eyes going wide.

Joshua and I turned to see Justus Gallicus, the centurion from the funeral at Japhia, standing among the slaves. "Alphaeus, it seems you are raising a litter of Zealots."

My father put his hands on my and Joshua's shoulders. "This is my son, Levi, and his friend Joshua. They begin their apprenticeship today. Just boys," he said, by way of apology.

Justus approached, looked quickly at me, then stared at Joshua for a long time. "I know you, boy. I've seen you before."

"The funeral at Japhia," I said quickly. I couldn't take my eyes off of the wasp-waisted short sword that hung from the centurion's belt.

"No," the Roman seemed to be searching his memory. "Not Japhia. I've seen this face in a picture."

"That can't be," my father said. "We are forbidden by our faith from depicting the human form."

Justus glared at him. "I am not a stranger to your people's primitive beliefs, Alphaeus. Still, this boy is familiar."

Joshua stared up at the centurion with a completely blank expression.

"You feel for these slaves, boy? You would free them if you could?"

Joshua nodded. "I would. A man's spirit should be his own to give to God."

"You know, there was a slave about eighty years ago who talked like you. He raised an army of slaves against Rome, beat back two of our armies, took over all the territories south of Rome. It's a story every Roman soldier must learn."

"Why, what happened?" I asked.

"We crucified him," Justus said. "By the side of the road, and his body was eaten by ravens. The lesson we all learn is that nothing can stand against Rome. A lesson you need to learn, boy, along with your stonecutting."

Just then another Roman soldier approached, a legionnaire, not wearing the cape or the helmet crest of the centurion. He said something to Justus in Latin, then looked at Joshua and paused. In rough Aramaic he said, "Hey, didn't I see that kid on some bread once?"

"Wasn't him," I said.

"Really? Sure looks like him."

"Nope, that was another kid on the bread."

"It was me," said Joshua.

I backhanded him across the forehead, knocking him to the ground. "No it wasn't. He's insane. Sorry."

The soldier shook his head and hurried off after Justus.

I offered a hand to help Joshua up. "You're going to have to learn to lie."

"I am? But I feel like I'm here to tell the truth."

"Yeah, sure, but not now."

I don't exactly know what I expected it would be like working as a stonemason, but I know that in less than a week Joshua was having second thoughts about not becoming a carpenter. Cutting great stones with small iron chisels was very hard work. Who knew?

"Look around, do you see any trees?" Joshua mocked. "Rocks, Josh, rocks."

"It's only hard because we don't know what we're doing. It will get easier."

Joshua looked at my father, who was stripped to the waist, chiseling away on a stone the size of a donkey, while a dozen slaves waited to hoist it into place. He was covered with gray dust and streams of sweat drew dark lines between cords of muscle straining in his back and arms. "Alphaeus," Joshua called, "does the work get easier once you know what you are doing?"

"Your lungs grow thick with stone dust and your eyes bleary from the sun and fragments thrown up by the chisel. You pour your lifeblood out into works of stone for Romans who will take your money in taxes to feed soldiers who will nail your people to crosses for wanting to be free. Your back breaks, your bones creak, your wife screeches at you, and your children torment you with open, begging mouths, like greedy baby birds in the nest. You go to bed every night so tired and beaten that you pray to the Lord to send the angel of death to take you in your sleep so you don't have to face another morning. It also has its downside."

"Thanks," Joshua said. He looked at me, one eyebrow raised.

"I for one, am excited," I said. "I'm ready to cut some stone. Stand back, Josh, my chisel is on fire. Life is stretched out before us like a great bazaar, and I can't wait to taste the sweets to be found there."

Josh tilted his head like a bewildered dog. "I didn't get that from your father's answer."

"It's sarcasm, Josh."

"Sarcasm?"

"It's from the Greek, sarkasmos. To bite the lips. It means that you aren't really saying what you mean, but people will get your point. I invented it, Bartholomew named it."

"Well, if the village idiot named it, I'm sure it's a good thing."

"There you go, you got it."

"Got what?"

"Sarcasm."

"No, I meant it."

"Sure you did."

"Is that sarcasm?"

"Irony, I think."

"What's the difference?"

"I haven't the slightest idea."

"So you're being ironic now, right?"

"No, I really don't know."

"Maybe you should ask the idiot."

"Now you've got it."

"What?"

"Sarcasm."

"Biff, are you sure you weren't sent here by the Devil to vex me?"

"Could be. How am I doing so far? You feel vexed?"

"Yep. And my hands hurt from holding the chisel and mallet." He struck the chisel with his wooden mallet and sprayed us both with stone fragments.

"Maybe God sent me to talk you into being a stonemason so you would hurry up and go be the Messiah."

He struck the chisel again, then spit and sputtered through the fragments that flew. "I don't know how to be the Messiah."

"So what, a week ago we didn't know how to be stonemasons and look at us now. It gets easier once you know what you're doing."

"Are you being ironic again?"

"God, I hope not."

It was two months before we actually saw the Greek who had commissioned my father to build the house. He was a short, soft-looking little man, who wore a robe that was as white as any worn by the Levite priests, with a border of interlocking rectangles woven around the hem in gold. He arrived in a pair of chariots, followed on foot by two body slaves and a half-dozen bodyguards who looked like Phoenicians. I say a pair of chariots because he rode with a driver in the lead chariot, but behind them they pulled a second chariot in which stood the ten-foot-tall marble statue of a naked man. The Greek climbed down from his chariot and went directly to my father. Joshua and I were mixing a batch of mortar at the time and we paused to watch.

"Graven image," Joshua said.

"Saw it," I said. "As graven images go, I like Venus over by the gate better."

"That statue is not Jewish," Joshua said.

"Definitely not Jewish," I said. The statue's manhood, although abundant, was not circumcised.

"Alphaeus," the Greek said, "why haven't you set the floor of the gymnasium yet? I've brought this statue to display in the gymnasium, and there's just a hole in the ground instead of a gymnasium."

"I told you, this ground is not suitable for building. I can't build on sand. I've had the slaves dig down in the sand until they hit bedrock. Now it has to be back-filled in with stone, then pounded."

"But I want to place my statue," the Greek whined. "It's come all the way from Athens."

"Would you rather your house fall down around your precious statue?"

"Don't talk to me that way, Jew, I am paying you well to build this house."

"And I am building this house well, which means not on the sand. So store your statue and let me do my work."

"Well, unload it. You, slaves, help unload my statue." The Greek was talking to Joshua and me. "All of you, help unload my statue." He pointed to the slaves who had been pretending to work since the Greek arrived, but who weren't sure that it was in their best interest to look like a part of a project about which the master seemed displeased. They all looked up with a surprised "Who, me?" expression on their faces, which I noticed was the same in any language.

The slaves moved to the chariot and began untying the ropes that held the statue in place. The Greek looked to us. "Are you deaf, slaves? Help them!" He stormed back to his chariot and grabbed a whip out of the driver's hand.

"Those are not slaves," my father said. "Those are my apprentices."

The Greek wheeled on him. "And I should care about that? Move, boys! Now!"

"No," Joshua said.

I thought the Greek would explode. He raised the whip as if to strike. "What did you say?"

"He said, no." I stepped up to Joshua's side.

"My people believe that graven images, statues, are sinful," my father said, his voice on the edge of panic. "The boys are only being true to our God."

"Well, that is a statue of Apollo, a real god, so they will help unload it, as will you, or I'll find another mason to build my house."

"No," Joshua repeated. "We will not."

"Right, you leprous jar of camel snot," I said.

Joshua looked at me, sort of disgusted. "Jeez, Biff."

"Too much?"

The Greek screeched and started to swing the whip. The last thing I saw as I covered my face was my father diving toward the Greek. I would take a lash for Joshua, but I didn't want to lose an eye. I braced for the sting that never came. There was a thump, then a twanging sound, and when I uncovered my face, the Greek was lying on his back in the dirt, his white robe covered with dust, his face red with rage. The whip was extended out behind him, and on its tip stood the armored hobnail boot of Gaius Justus Gallicus, the centurion. The Greek rolled in the dirt, ready to vent his ire on whoever had stayed his hand, but when he saw who it was, he went limp and pretended to cough.

One of the Greek's bodyguards started to step forward. Justus pointed a finger at the guard. "Will you stand down, or would you rather feel the foot of the Roman Empire on your neck?"

The guard stepped back into line with his companions.

The Roman was grinning like a mule eating an apple, not in the least concerned with allowing the Greek to save face. "So, Castor, am I to gather that you need to conscript more Roman slaves to help build your house? Or is it true what I hear about you Greeks, that whipping young boys is an entertainment for you, not a disciplinary action?"

The Greek spit out a mouthful of dust as he climbed to his feet. "The slaves I have will be sufficient for the task, won't they, Alphaeus?" He turned to my father, his eyes pleading.

My father seemed to be caught between two evils, and unable to decide which was the lesser of them. "Probably," he said, finally.

"Well, good, then," Justus said. "I will expect a bonus payment for the extra work they are doing. Carry on."

Justus walked through the construction site, acting as if every eye was not on him, or not caring, and paused as he passed Joshua and me.

"Leprous jar of camel snot?" he said under his breath.

"Old Hebrew blessing?" I ventured.

"You two should be in the hills with the other Hebrew rebels." The Roman laughed, tousled our hair, then walked away.

The sunset was turning the hillsides pink as we walked home to Nazareth that evening. In addition to being almost exhausted from the work, Joshua seemed vexed by the events of the day.

"Did you know that - about not being able to build on sand?" he asked.

"Of course, my father's been talking about it for a long time. You can build on sand, but what you build will fall down."

Joshua nodded thoughtfully. "What about soil? Dirt? Is it okay to build on that?"

"Rock is best, but I suppose hard dirt is good."

"I need to remember that."

We seldom saw Maggie in those days after we began working with my father. I found myself looking forward to the Sabbath, when we would go to the synagogue and I would mill around outside, among the women, while the men were inside listening to the reading of the Torah or the arguments of the Pharisees. It was one of the few times I could talk to Maggie without Joshua around, for though he resented the Pharisees even then, he knew he could learn from them, so he spent the Sabbath listening to their teachings. I still wonder if this time I stole with Maggie somehow represented a disloyalty to Joshua, but later, when I asked him about it, he said, "God is willing to forgive you the sin that you carry for being a child of man, but you must forgive yourself for having once been a child."

"I suppose that's right."

"Of course it's right, I'm the Son of God, you dolt. Besides, Maggie always wanted to talk about me anyway, didn't she?"

"Not always," I lied.

On the Sabbath before the murder, I found Maggie outside the synagogue, sitting by herself under a date palm tree. I shuffled up to her to talk, but kept looking at my feet. I knew that if I looked into her eyes I would forget what I was talking about, so I only looked at her in brief takes, the way a man will glance up at the sun on a sweltering day to confirm the source of the heat.

"Where's Joshua?" were the first words out of her mouth, of course.

"Studying with the men."

She seemed disappointed for a moment, but then brightened. "How is your work?"

"Hard, I like playing better."

"What is Sepphoris like? Is it like Jerusalem?"

"No, it's smaller. But there are a lot of Romans there." She'd seen Romans. I needed something to impress her. "And there are graven images - statues of people."

Maggie covered her mouth to stifle a giggle. "Statues, really? I would love to see them."

"Then come with us, we are leaving tomorrow very early, before anyone is awake."

"I couldn't. Where would I tell my mother I was going?"

"Tell her that you are going to Sepphoris with the Messiah and his pal."

Her eyes went wide and I looked away quickly, before I was caught in their spell. "You shouldn't talk that way, Biff."

"I saw the angel."

"You said yourself that we shouldn't say it."

"I was only joking. Tell your mother that I told you about a beehive that I found and that you want to go find some honey while the bees are still groggy from the morning cold. It's a full moon tonight, so you'll be able to see. She just might believe you."

"She might, but she'll know I was lying when I don't bring home any honey."

"Tell her it was a hornets' nest. She thinks Josh and I are stupid anyway, doesn't she?"

"She thinks that Joshua is touched in the head, but you, yes, she thinks you're stupid."

"You see, my plan is working. For it is written that 'if the wise man always appears stupid, his failures do not disappoint, and his success gives pleasant surprise.'"

Maggie smacked me on the leg. "That is not written."

"Sure it is, Imbeciles three, verse seven."

"There is no book of Imbeciles."

"Drudges five-four?"

"You're making that up."

"Come with us, you can be back to Nazareth before it's time to fetch the morning water."

"Why so early? What are you two up to?"

"We're going to circumcise Apollo."

She didn't say anything, she just looked at me, as if she would see "Liar" written across my forehead in fire.

"It wasn't my idea," I said. "It was Joshua's."

"I'll go then," she said.

***