up his hand to speak. By his dress it was evident that he was one of the
Temple leaders. “O noble Procurator,” he said in a loud voice, “though
your soldiers run us through with swords until each of us has perished,
we cannot submit to the profanation of God’s holy Temple; we cannot
countenance without protest the treading into the dust of our God’s
commandments. Before we agree to Rome’s profanation of our holy places
and her flouting of our God’s laws, O Procurator, we will bow our necks
to the Procurator’s soldiers. We will die, and gladly, for our God!”
“Profanation! Profanation! All I hear is Rome’s profanation of your
traditions. By all the gods, in every other land our Emperor is honored,
his banners and his emblems, his likenesses paraded on our staffs, all
these are hailed with shouts and acclamations! And yet you Jews....”
Suddenly Pilate paused. The priestly leader who had just addressed him
had fallen on his face in the dust of the great stadium, and beside him
and behind him others now were prostrating themselves. Within moments
every Jew in the place was lying face down upon the ground before the
Procurator of Judaea. Mouth open, eyes darting from one area of the
great concourse to another, aghast, Pilate stood silent. Then quietly he
spoke to Longinus, who was standing near him. “Centurion, I cannot order
men on their faces ran through with swords. It would be massacre.”
“So it would be, Excellency, on their faces or standing, since they are
defenseless.”
Pilate turned back to face the prostrated multitude. “Stand on your
feet!” he commanded. “I shall withhold for the moment at least my
command to the soldiers.”
Without a word being said, without a change of countenance even, the
Jews rose to their feet and faced the Procurator. “Now send me your High
Priest and his father-in-law the former High Priest Annas,” Pilate
commanded. “No harm will be done them; this I swear by the great Jove.”
Hours later Caiaphas and Annas returned from the conference with the
Procurator at the palace. Mounting the rostrum from which Pilate had
previously addressed them, Caiaphas held up his hand for silence. “Men
of Israel, we have just concluded our meeting with the Procurator
Pilate,” he announced. “An agreement has been reached. Now you may
return in peace to your homes. The offensive emblems of Rome, the
Procurator has assured us, will be removed so that they will no longer
profane our holy places. The God of Israel, He is One!”
“The God of Israel, He is One!” The multitude of suddenly exultant Jews
echoed his words in a great chorus, and a hosanna of shouts swept wave
upon wave across the immense arena. Then, laughing and chattering, the
people began pushing toward the Hippodrome’s exits.
And in all the throng not a man ventured to inquire of the High Priest
what the terms of the agreement with Pilate had been.
17
An hour before the “Actium” was to sail out of the harbor at Caesarea on
the return voyage to Rome, Centurion Longinus went aboard and handed the
captain a heavily sealed communication addressed to the Prefect Sejanus.
“This is an army message of great importance,” he announced. “It must be
delivered in person to the Prefect. He is expecting it, and if it is not
delivered immediately after the docking of your ship, he will begin to
inquire why he has not received it.” Actually, the centurion knew that
Sejanus was not expecting a message from him on the returning “Actium,”
but telling the captain so would insure the message’s getting quickly
into the hands of the Prefect. The captain might well think that the
centurion’s letter was in reply to a message brought him from Sejanus by
the Tetrarch Herod Antipas.
The “Actium” two days before had brought the Tetrarch and his new wife
Herodias and her daughter Salome to Caesarea, and from the wharf they
had been escorted by Longinus and a detachment of his century to the
Procurator’s Palace to be guests of Pilate and Claudia while resting a
few days after the long voyage out from Rome. From Caesarea they planned
a short visit to Jerusalem, and then they would travel northward through
the Jordan Valley to the Tetrarch’s gleaming white marble palace at
Tiberias.
It was when Longinus learned that the “Actium” would be returning
directly to Rome that he decided to dispatch a report to the Prefect.
The report related in considerable detail the events of the Procurator’s
recent visit to Jerusalem, his flaunting, in disregard of Sergius
Paulus’ warning, of the cohort’s banners from the Antonia ramparts, the
subsequent storming of Caesarea by the irate Jews, and Pilate’s yielding
to them, after a conference with Caiaphas and Annas. Longinus advanced
no suggestion concerning the probable terms of the agreement between the
Procurator and the Temple leaders. The centurion was confident, however,
that the astute and suspicious Sejanus would infer from what he had left
unwritten that Pilate had profited handsomely. Longinus concluded the
message with an avowal that the report was factual and uncolored.
From the “Actium” Longinus returned to the headquarters of the cohort
and that evening was a guest, along with Sergius Paulus, of the
Procurator and his wife at a small, informal dinner honoring the
Tetrarch, his wife, and her daughter. When they had finished the meal,
Herodias and her hostess retired to Claudia’s apartment, and Salome went
to her chamber. The four men remained reclining at the table, where
after a while, as they drank wine and nibbled grapes and figs, the
inhibitions of Pilate and Antipas, each vain and domineering and jealous
of the other’s authority, began slowly to disappear. Gently at first
Antipas chided the Procurator for his profanation of Jerusalem by
flaunting the ensigns of Imperial Rome from the Tower of Antonia.
“Profanation! Profanation! All I hear in this contentious province is
profanation. I am sick of the word.” Pilate wiggled a forefinger at the
Tetrarch. “Do you consider Rome’s display of her honored emblems
profanation of Jerusalem and this province, I ask you, Tetrarch?”
Antipas studied the fig he held between finger and thumb. “I don’t
consider it profanation, nor do the Emperor and the Prefect, but I do
agree with the Emperor and the Prefect that it is a wise course not to
offend unnecessarily the people of Israel who do so hold.” It was a
clever answer, and Antipas, knowing it, pressed the point. “It would be
politic if the new Procurator learned to uphold the traditions of this
land,” he continued, “so long, of course, as they do not seriously
conflict with the interests of the Empire and certainly”—he smiled—“so
long as the Emperor and the Prefect uphold them.”
Pilate was quick to strike back. “I was sent out to this province to
rule it,” he declared, his eyes flashing indignation. “I was not sent
here to cower and truckle, to lower Rome’s ensigns at the demands of
your obstinate, cantankerous Jews,” he hissed. “I came to rule....”
“But you did lower Rome’s ensigns when those obstinate—Jews bared their
necks to your swordsmen and refused to obey your command to return
home,” Antipas interrupted. Then suddenly, as though seeking a truce, he
changed his tone. “But I don’t blame you, Procurator. In fact, I admire
you; you’re a very intelligent man. Living in this province must be
trying to one who has never lived here before, and of course it’s
unrewarding unless there are ... ah ... extra benefits, shall we say ...
not provided by Rome. And there is much gold in the Temple’s coffers, I
am told. It seems that no matter how much is withdrawn, a great deal
still remains for the use of the Temple leaders, hmm?” He smiled
appreciatively. “And no doubt the Prefect will approve, too,
provided....” Grinning, he left the observation unfinished. “And with no
Jewish blood shed by your soldiers, there will be nothing to explain to
Tiberius, Excellency.”
Pilate glared, mouth open. But he did not deny the Tetrarch’s thinly
veiled charge. “Profanations! Violated traditions!” He hurled across the
room the grape he had selected from the silver dish of piled fruit and
pointed a quaking finger at the Tetrarch. “And how dare you, Antipas,
speak of my violating the traditions and offending the religion of the
Jews, when you have just taken to bed your brother’s wife! Is that not a
heinous offense for a Jew himself...?”
“Excellency!” Sergius Paulus, palpably fearful of what the exchange
might quickly be leading to, jumped to his feet. “The hour is growing
late, and the Centurion Longinus and I must be getting back to
headquarters. Please excuse us, sir. We’ve enjoyed your hospitality, and
we beg you to express our thanks to your wife.” He glanced toward
Longinus, who nodded agreement. “And I thought, Excellency, that the
Tetrarch perhaps might honor us by going with us—we have a sedan chair
at the door—to inspect our cohort headquarters, should you, sir, be
willing to excuse him.” He looked questioningly toward the Procurator
and then the Tetrarch.
“Should the Tetrarch wish....”
“I shall be happy to accompany you,” Antipas interrupted. Carefully he
pulled the stem from the fig. “It will be a change of air.” But he was
smiling, and his manner was jovial; the tension of the moment had been
dispelled.
“When you have finished with him, Sergius”—Pilate had calmed, too, and
no rancor was revealed in his tone—“have him brought back, properly
attended. He and the Tetrarchess are always welcome at the Procurator’s
Palace.”
But Longinus knew, as the three prepared to leave the great dining hall,
that relations between the Tetrarch and the Procurator were still
strained; he suspected that they would remain so. The temperaments of
the two men, coupled with the situations in which they had been placed,
would demand it. In his own dealings with them, in his observation and
appraisal of them and their activities, he told himself, he must bear
this always in mind.
Meanwhile, lounging comfortably on Claudia’s large couch, pillows at
their backs, the two women had been exchanging news of their own
activities since they had last seen one another in Rome, and, more
interesting to Claudia, Herodias had been revealing tidbits of gossip
involving the more lively set in the Empire’s capital city. But soon the
discussion narrowed to their own changed circumstances. Claudia was
frank. “Yes, it’s just as I told you it would be that day you came to
return my call. I said marrying Pilate would make no difference.
Remember? Well, it hasn’t.” A cloud passed across her countenance. “Of
course, we will have to be patient, though, and wait for things to work
out.”
“But until they do, must you never...?” Herodias paused.
“No, it isn’t that bad,” Claudia hastened to reply, smiling. “We can see
each other and we can be together ... more and more hereafter, I hope.
We have been together already, for hours, in fact, both here at Caesarea
and in Jerusalem at the Herod’s Palace, while Pilate conveniently, I do
believe, busied himself at the Antonia Tower.” She shook her head.
“Really, Herodias, I don’t know whether the man is stupid, quite wise,
or just indifferent. But whatever he is, his being the way he is will
help Longinus and me to arrange things.”
Herodias’ large dark eyes were bright now with scheming. “My dear, you
have never been in Galilee, have you? It’s a beautiful land, especially
now that spring is beginning to break, so much more interesting than
this barren Judaea. We have so many flowers, and willows and oleanders
and bright-blooming shrubs along the watercourses. I remember Galilee in
the spring from my childhood days and on occasional visits since.
So”—her eyes were dancing now—“you must go with us to Tiberias. We can
contrive to have Longinus escort us. And in the Palace there”—her voice
dropped to an intimate whisper—“you will have no one to disturb you.”
“But Antipas’ other wife? What would she say if I should go with you?”
“_I_ am the Tetrarchess of Galilee and Peraea,” she said evenly. “As
soon as we get there, Antipas is going to divorce her and send her back
to old Aretas.”
18
Before they reached the bend in the road roughly paralleling the Jordan,
whose banks were beginning to color now with the awakening of willows
and oleanders to advancing spring, the Tetrarch recognized the voice.
“By the beard of the venerable High Priest!” Antipas exclaimed. “This
isn’t the place where he was making his stand when I came this way
before, but it’s the same fellow, that mad prophet of the Wilderness.
I’d know his haranguing anywhere.”
Longinus was riding beside the Tetrarch. Herodias and Claudia, with
lively Salome a few paces back, were following in the narrow column, and
just behind them rode Neaera, Tullia, and several other servants of the
two households. Soldiers were in the vanguard and at the rear.
Antipas turned to Longinus. “Centurion, I wonder if we shouldn’t go
another way and avoid encountering this fellow. I’d rather not see him
or hear more of his ranting.”
“But _I_ want to see him.” Herodias had ridden abreast of the Tetrarch.
“He must be the one I’ve just been hearing so much about in Jerusalem.
Everybody was talking of his ability to sway the multitudes and his
fearlessness in denouncing the Temple priests.”
“Yes, he’s the one. But, my dear Herodias,” the Tetrarch began to
protest, “he’s likely to say something that will offend you, too. The
fellow has no respect for the Tetrarch’s office or authority and no
bridle on his loose tongue.”
“By the gods, then, that’s all the more reason I want to hear him.” She
laughed gaily, then quickly grew sober. “And certainly the Tetrarch
should be concerned,” she added, “if the man flouts the Tetrarch’s
authority.” She signaled to Longinus to resume the march. “Let’s ride
down and join his audience. After the boredom of our journey, this
should at least provide a diversion.”
Antipas shook his head grudgingly but offered no further protest.
“She’ll regret it as soon as she hears him, by the gods,” he muttered to
the centurion as they started. “But I warned her.”
At the bottom of the slope the group dismounted, and on Longinus’
summons, soldiers came up to hold the horses. The servants remained
behind with them except for Neaera and Tullia who followed their
mistresses as the Tetrarch’s party quietly slipped around a screening
clump of willows to join the throng about the gaunt and weathered
speaker. To Antipas, John seemed little changed since that day when they
had come upon him at the ford farther up the Jordan. His clothes looked
the same; fleetingly the Tetrarch wondered if the haircloth mantle had
ever been cleaned since he had last seen it.
Although the Tetrarch’s group had slipped unobtrusively into the rim of
the crowd, Antipas was quickly recognized, and soon a murmur moved
through the multitude and heads began to nod as intent black eyes
shifted from the fiery prophet to study the newly arrived ruler of
Galilee and Peraea.
“It’s old Herod,” Longinus heard a beak-nosed, thin Jew whisper to the
man beside him. “And that woman, she must be the new wife he’s fetched
from Rome, the one he took away from his brother, and that must be the
brother’s daughter beside her.” Both men turned to stare, then smile. “I
wonder what John will say to that!” one said to the other as they turned
back to peer again at the thundering prophet.
John, too, had recognized the Tetrarch, Longinus was sure; yet the
prophet made no immediate reference to his presence. Instead, he
continued preaching on the necessity of repentance and on the use of
baptism as a sign of Yahweh’s forgiveness. The man was a powerful
speaker; he had native ability, Longinus immediately perceived, to
command attention and sway his hearers. The crowd listened, entranced,
to his every word; now and then one would step forward and, crying
loudly in repentance, ask for baptism.
Sometimes a man would interrupt the prophet to seek an answer to some
deeply perplexing problem. But no one yet had spoken openly of the
Tetrarch’s presence among them.
Then a tall, narrow-faced Jew, unkempt, ill-clothed, evidently a man of
the earth, stepped forward and held up his hand. “This repentance of
which you speak,” he questioned, “is it necessary for the rich man in
the same manner as it is for the poor and dispossessed, for the man of
authority as well as for the servant? I ask you, does the measuring rod
measure the same for all men, or is there one rule for one man and
another rule for another?”
“Repentance is necessary for all men, my brother,” John replied calmly.
“The same measuring rod measures for both the man of authority and the
servant who serves him, for both the rich man and the man of earth.”
John paused. Then slowly his dark eyes moved from the face of his
questioner to that of the Tetrarch. “The same measuring rod measures for
the Tetrarch of Galilee, my brother, that measures for you, and it is
the same for even the lowliest servant in that iniquitous marble pile
above the graveyard in Tiberias!” The prophet’s eyes were blazing now,
and he raised his gaunt, sun-bronzed arm to point a lean forefinger
directly at Herod Antipas. “Repent, O Tetrarch, repent!” His voice was
thunderous now, and the finger darted forward like the tongue of a
serpent. “Repent while yet there is time! Repent of the evil you have
done, and seek in true penitence the forgiveness of our God Whom you
have scorned and despised!”
Antipas stood silent and stared straight ahead, looking as though
suddenly he had been turned to stone. But Herodias, though amazed, had
not been rendered speechless by the torrent of the prophet’s
denunciation. Calmly she turned to her husband. “Do you intend to stand
here and allow this madman to vilify you? Are you going to stand
patiently while...?”
“And you! You evil woman!” John’s shout interrupted her. Now the angry
hand was pointed directly at her. “You call me a madman,” he said. “Yes,
I am a madman. I am a madman for our God. And I call upon you, too, to
repent. Repent before our God turns His face from you forever. I call
upon both you sinners to fall on your faces and cry out to the God of
Israel, imploring Him for forgiveness.” Then the prophet’s stern eyes
turned again toward the Tetrarch. “Herod, cast this foul woman from you!
Have you not stolen her away from the bed of your brother? You cannot
have her, O Tetrarch! Does not God’s holy law forbid a man from taking
to bed the wife of his living brother in the flesh? Adulterer! Repent!
And you, evil woman, you adulteress”—John’s eyes were fiery now with a
wild zeal as he faced Herodias, whose flushed cheeks and lips drawn into
thin lines revealed her fury—“neither shall you have him! Get you back
to the bed you have deserted, if the husband you have abandoned has the
grace to forgive and receive you! O Tetrarch”—John lifted his gaunt arms
toward the heavens—“cast her from you before your grievous sinning
brings ruin down upon the land. Send her back to your brother, and
humbly beseech the forgiveness of our God! Repent, O Tetrarch, repent!
Repent!”
Still Herod Antipas stood staring, unmoving, rooted.
“By all the great and little gods, Antipas”—Herodias, infuriated,
whirled upon the Tetrarch, grabbed his arm and shook him—“will you stand
there like a statue and permit that fanatic to insult and intimidate you
and your wife before this crowd?” Scornfully she measured him, and her
lips curled with disgust. “Are you indeed the Tetrarch of Galilee, or
are you a frightened mouse?” She stood back, taunting him with her
shrill laugh.
Her challenging words and her mirthless laughter broke the spell the
prophet had cast. “No, I am not afraid of him,” Antipas replied slowly,
as though he were arguing with himself. “Nor can I any longer permit
this abuse to go unpunished. He has not only vilified your Tetrarch and
his wife”—Antipas was now addressing the crowd rather than Herodias—“but
he has challenged my honor and authority. His words are a call to
insurrection. I can no longer permit the preaching of rebellion.” He
turned to confront Longinus. “Centurion, arrest this man. Have him taken
at once to the Fortress Machaerus and there placed in its dungeon. Order
him held until I pronounce judgment.”
Without even a glance toward the now silent but calm and seemingly
untroubled prophet of the Wilderness, Herod turned and started along the
gentle rise toward the horses.
19
As they approached the southern shore line of the Sea of Galilee,
Longinus sent riders ahead to notify Chuza of the impending arrival of
the Tetrarch and his party at Tiberias. So the steward, with household
servants to handle the baggage, was waiting at the palace gate when the
caravan entered the grounds.
But Chuza, though he greeted them warmly and with profuse smiles, was
obviously troubled, and Antipas quickly drew the man aside to question
him. “Sire, you will not find the Tetrarchess here to welcome you,” the
steward explained, his tone apologetic and his expression patently
pained. “She has departed from Tiberias. I suggested that she might wish
to delay her leaving, Sire, until your return, but she insisted on going
at once.”
She had received a message, she told Chuza, that her father, King Aretas
of Arabia Petraea, was desperately ill and that he had summoned her to
his bedside. Although the steward had seen no messengers, he had not
been disposed to question the Tetrarchess. She had prepared for the
journey very quickly. The Centurion Cornelius had provided her with a
detachment of soldiers to escort her to her father’s capital in the
country southeast of the Dead Sea, beyond the Fortress Machaerus; she
had taken with her, in addition, her best raiment and many of her
choicest personal possessions.
“Then you think that she is not planning to come back to me? Is that
what you’re suggesting, Chuza?”
“Sire, I am suggesting nothing. I am relating only what I saw and heard.
I have no opinion as to what plans the Tetrarchess....”
“The Princess Herodias is Tetrarchess now, Chuza,” Antipas interrupted.
“Indeed, Sire”—Chuza bowed to the Tetrarch and then to Herodias—“the
former Tetrarchess....”
“But when did she depart, Chuza?” Antipas interrupted again.
“A week ago, Sire. The escorting soldiers have not yet returned.”
“Had she heard that I was returning from Rome with a new Tetrarchess?”
“She said nothing to me about it, Sire, but I am confident that she knew
of the Tetrarch’s marriage. Passengers coming ashore at Ptolemaïs from
the vessel on which you and the Tetrarchess sailed out from Rome brought
to Tiberias word of the new Tetrarchess. I myself heard it, and surely
the report must have come also to her ears here at the palace.”
“Very well, Chuza; think no more of it.” By now they had entered the
lofty, marble-columned great atrium. A faint smile crossed his heavy
face. “Do you know, I believe she must have suspected all along?” He
turned to Herodias. “By all the gods, my dear, she has made our course
all the easier.”
Longinus declined the invitation of the Tetrarch and Herodias to take a
chamber in the palace during his stay at Tiberias. He had promised
Cornelius that he would be his guest when next he came to Galilee.
Tempting though the Tetrarch’s invitation had been, Longinus reasoned
that it might be wise to assume that the watched might also be the
watching.
Besides, Claudia had been assigned an apartment which, the centurion had
observed, looked out upon a broad terrace facing the Sea of Galilee. A
door from Claudia’s bedroom conveniently opened onto the terrace.
Longinus smiled as he reviewed the details of the arrangement.
The sentry at the palace gate, he also knew, would be a Roman soldier.
20
Cornelius shook his head solemnly. “Herod will regret it. Arresting the
prophet was unwise, Longinus.”
“But the fellow is an insurrectionist, Cornelius; certainly it can’t be
denied that he’s been inciting rebellion against the Tetrarch’s rule.
You should have heard what he called Antipas and Herodias.” A wry smile
twisted the corners of his mouth. “Of course, just between you and me, I
think he was right. But that doesn’t absolve him from agitating against
the Tetrarch, and in this province, of course, the Tetrarch represents
Rome.”