The Redemption of Pontius Pilate (51 page)

Four years after Jesus was crucified, the Zealot movement, temporarily scotched by the capture of Bar Abbas, began to stir again—but without its former leader. Somehow the notorious brigand had been changed by the circumstances of his release, and after several lengthy conversations with Peter and John, Bar Abbas had departed Judea forever. Some said he had gone to carry the teachings of Jesus to Gaul, others said that his guilt had driven him to suicide. But the new Zealot movement was centered in the district of Samaria, north of Jerusalem, and led by yet another Galilean, who called himself Moses ben Judah. This Moses claimed to be a direct descendant of the Jewish lawgiver from over a thousand years before, and he began preaching to the multitudes that he knew the location of a rod and sword that the great hero had buried near Mount Gerizim in Samaria. He quickly drew a large following, although he did not commit direct attacks on Romans as Bar Abbas had done.

Pilate was deeply concerned about this new movement. He summoned Longinus from his new home in Jerusalem to see if his old friend could tell him anything about this new Galilean cult, and whether or not it was related to the followers of Jesus. The former centurion, now beginning to show white in his beard and at his temples, was a bit reluctant to appear before his old commander.

“Nothing to do with you, sir,” he said, “but many of the disciples who have joined The Way since the events of Pentecost have no idea who I am. When I am summoned to appear before the governor, it makes them nervous.”

Pilate nodded. “I understand, old friend,” he replied, “but your religious scruples must sometimes take second place to the needs of Rome. What do you know about this Moses character, and is he related to The Way?”

Longinus sighed. “No,” he said. “He followed us for a brief while, but he was preaching that what Jesus wanted was an armed assault on Rome to usher in the Day of the Lord. Peter and John finally expelled him from our midst for his disruptive nature and unwillingness to submit to the leadership of the Apostles. Since then, he has been going all through Samaria and Galilee, saying that if the disciples of Jesus will not challenge Rome, then he will—using the very sword of Moses to drive the Empire into the sea. He has called all his disciples to follow him to Mount Gerizim today.”

Pilate snorted. “Where do these people get their delusions?” he said. “I suppose that I will have to pay a visit to Mount Gerizim and put a stop to this nonsense once and for all.”

Longinus winced. “Be gentle, Prefect,” he said. “I understand your responsibilities, and the needs of Rome. But these are simple country folk who have been misled by a charlatan. Imprisoning Moses will be enough to disperse them back to their farms.”

Pilate's face hardened. “I am tired of being gentle!” he snapped. “I have sent the humble folk back to their farms again and again, and every time they jump back up to follow whatever terrorist waves a sword and screams ‘Death to Rome!' I am tired of insurrection and rebellion in this damnable province! I wish I had never seen Judea, or heard of Moses, or Caiaphas, or Galilean carpenters who won't stay dead when you kill them!”

Longinus looked at Pilate sadly. “Your anger is misplaced, my friend,” he said. “Your deepest loathing is for yourself. You can lay down that burden of sin and misery any time you choose—and I wish for your sake that it would be soon! You are too good a man to punish yourself thus.”

Pilate snarled: “I am also sick and tired of good Romans forgetting who they are! I have lost you and now my wife to this gentle Galilean who saps the mettle from warriors and turns them into women! Even my son says this Jesus talks to him in his dreams! When my wife makes love to me, I see in her eyes that she loves this foreign god more than she does me! I am sick to death of Jesus!!”

Longinus bowed and left the room, and Pilate took a deep drink of wine, and then called for Brutus Appius. The burly centurion appeared promptly, and Pilate thought to himself again what an excellent soldier the former troublemaker had become.

“What do you need, Governor?” he asked.

“Tell the cohort to saddle up,” he said. “We are taking a little ride.”

“Where to, Excellency?” asked Appius.

“Mount Gerizim,” said Pilate. “We are going to dig up a sword and kill some Jews with it!”

He mounted the stairs to his quarters to don his cuirass and helmet. Procula Porcia was there, with Decimus, now nearly nine years old. She watched him strap on his sword with trepidation in her eyes.

“Where are you going, husband?” she said.

“To put down a rebellion before it gets started, my dear,” replied Pilate.

She nodded. “I never really liked you going into battle,” she said, “but now I positively hate it! Jesus said those who take up the sword will perish by the sword, and I live in fear that those words will prove true of you.”

Pilate bit his lip before replying. “I am a servant of the Empire, my love. My job is to keep the peace, whatever the cost. I cannot let the Zealots rise up yet again.”

She sighed and kissed his cheek. ‘Come home safe to me,” she said.

Mount Gerizim was only a couple hours' brisk ride from Caesarea, and Pilate was relieved to find it unoccupied when he and his men arrived. It was the highest point for miles around, and using his Greek telescope, he could see a mob of people about five miles off, slowly coming in the direction of the mountain.

“Looks like good timing, sir,” said Appius.

“Indeed,” said Pilate, handing him the bronze tube. “How many are there, do you reckon?”

Appius stared at the oncoming mass for several minutes before speaking. “I'd make it three or four thousand, sir, but about half the numbers are women and children.”

Pilate shook his head. “These rustics are so inept,” he said. “What do they hope to accomplish?”

“They probably expect their god to fight for them, like in the old tales,” said the centurion.

“Well, if he shows up, we fight him too!” Pilate said. “Now put the men in that ravine over there, and you and I will take cover in those boulders. Let's see what they are up to, and then scatter them good and proper. The leader—this Moses ben Judah—I want him for myself, but keep an eye on the fight. My leg has not bothered me in a while, but if it goes out from under me, I may need you to keep me alive!”

The men quickly followed orders, and from a cleft between two boulders, Pilate watched as the mob grew closer. Leading them was a tall, white-bearded Jew with strong shoulders and a wild-eyed look about him, leading them in a song about horses and riders being cast into the sea. When the congregation had climbed the slopes of the mountain, he hopped on a rock and addressed them.

“Children of Judah and Samaria!” he said. “Too long have you let the Temple priests teach you to hate one another, while they grovel to the true enemies of God—the dreadful minions of Rome! The spirit of my great ancestor Moses appeared to me and told me where to find his rod and his sword, and the God of Abraham promises that with them, we will drive the Romans into the sea and restore the Kingdom of David forever! Oh, I know many of you thought that Jesus of Nazareth was the Messiah—but Jesus was weak! He tried to tell you to love your enemies! God has commanded me to hate the enemies of Israel with hatred never-ending, until the soil of Judea has drunk the last drop of their pagan blood. In the name of Elijah and Elisha, of Moses and of Judas Maccabee, I command you to fight until you can fight no more. Behold the sword and staff of Moses!”

He nodded at four young men and hopped off the boulder he had stood on. They levered it out of the way, revealing a stone box buried in the ground. From within, Moses ben Judah retrieved a long wooden rod and a blade, and then held them aloft. Pilate suppressed a snort of contempt. The sword had probably been in the ground no more than a month, and it looked for all the world like a legionary's gladius given a new hilt, with the Star of David etched on each side of the pommel. As Moses held the blade aloft, Pilate put a small horn to his lips and blew a note.

Roman legionaries poured from the gully and launched themselves at the crowd, cutting down the armed men in the front ranks before they could even draw their blades. Pilate drew his own gladius and swiftly moved toward Moses ben Judah, who was watching his revolution die before his eyes.

“Defend yourself, Jew!” snapped Pilate as he raised his weapon.

The shock on the Zealot's face twisted into rage, and he flew at Pilate, screaming as he did. If he had any skill to match his passion, it might have been an interesting fight, but the man had apparently never wielded a weapon before in his life. He made great, sloppy swings as if he were trying to cut down a tree, signaling his every move in advance. Pilate laughed at the pitiable quality of his opponent, angering him even more.

“Die, Roman pig!” shrieked Moses ben Judah, taking a massive swing at Pilate's head.

“Not today, I think,” Pilate said evenly, parrying the blow with such force that Judah's blade buried itself in the ground. As the Zealot leader tried to yank it free, Pilate drove his own blade through the man's chest. Moses' eyes widened for a moment, and then he went limp, slowly sliding to the ground.

Pilate wiped the blood from his blade, using his enemy's robe, and looked around. Several dozen Jews lay dead, and the rest were running away in terror. A half dozen of the men had been rounded up and disarmed, while their wives and daughters shrieked and begged for their lives. Not a single Roman had been killed, although two legionaries had been lightly wounded.

Brutus Appius came over and saluted. “Too easy, sir!” he said.

“Indeed,” replied Pilate. “This man was the most incompetent leader the Zealots have thrown up yet. Throw him in the stone box and put the boulder back over it, but remove his head first and bring it back to Caesarea and display it on the battlements. Crucify the men, let the children go, and do as you please with the women. I am going home.”

He retrieved his horse from the valley where he had tethered it, and looked over the battlefield, such as it was. He noticed that some of the slain were hardly more than children; and one or two were actual children, probably trampled in the crush. He let out a long sigh. When would the Jews learn that Rome was not to be defied?

Reaction to Pilate's crushing of the Samaritan rebellion was widespread and very negative. Caiaphas had been deposed by the new governor of Syria, Vitellius, but the new High Priest, Jonathan ben Ananias, led a delegation to Caesarea to protest the “excessive brutality,” and Roman legionaries were hissed at and jeered in the streets. Angry letters were sent to the proconsul of Syria and to the Emperor himself. One Roman patrol was bombarded with the contents of chamber pots in the Merchants' Quarter of Jerusalem. Pilate was secretly amused—he doubted that the High Priest and his associates would spit on a Samaritan who was on fire, but now the despised half-breeds were being idolized as martyrs to the brutality of Rome. Just to be safe, Pilate fired off a quick, accurate report to Tiberius on the event and then ignored the storm. By midsummer it seemed as if the tempest had passed. The routines of governance and trade continued, and the outrage of the Judean people began to fade.

But on the Ides of the month of Julii, Pilate received a letter with the familiar seal of the Emperor, delivered by a swift courier ship. The captain informed Pilate that he had been ordered to stand by while Pilate read the letter, prepared to sail instantly with a reply. Puzzled, Pilate retreated immediately to his office, where he broke the seals and unrolled the letters. There were two sheets of papyrus, one nearly covered with the spidery, tremulous handwriting of the elderly Emperor, the other shorter and more official-looking, in the clear writing of a professional scribe. He read the scribe's letter first.

Gaius Julius Tiberius Caesar, Princeps and Imperator of Rome, to Lucius Pontius Pilate, Proconsul and Prefect of Judea, Greetings!

You are recalled to Rome immediately to face a disciplinary hearing before the Emperor on charges of corruption, unnecessary use of force, misappropriation of state funds, and for generally failing to honor the customs, traditions, and laws of the Jewish people, whose homeland has been committed to your care for the last ten years. Your Proconsular imperium is revoked. Report to the Emperor on Capri as soon as possible. Your family is commanded to remain in Caesarea until your case is heard and your sentence pronounced. This letter is to be forwarded to your superior offer, Lucius Vitellius, and recorded in the official annals of the province.

Pilate shook his head as he read the letter. Nothing about it sounded right—the cold, impersonal tone, his abrupt relief of command, and the utter lack of interest in the circumstances which had led to the complaint. He turned then to the letter in the Emperor's own shaky hand and began to read. After the first three sentences, he turned pale and sat down slowly, read the rest of the letter and then reread it three times.

My dear Pilate,
it began, dispensing with the usual ceremonies.

First of all, I must command you to burn this letter as soon as you have read it and memorized it. Not a word of its contents can be revealed to anyone in Caesarea, not even your wife! You see, old friend, I require one last favor from you before I can restore to you the honor and dignitas that I wrongly stripped from you ten years ago—you must kill Gaius Caligula.

He has suborned most of my servants. I wrote this letter alone in my writing nook in the middle of the night, and now carry it inside my tunic, waiting for a chance to send it to you without being detected. The High Priest's whining letter about your very effective action against the Samaritan rebels gave me a perfect opportunity. I told Caligula I was going to relieve you of your command and try you for treason and corruption before the Senate. How he smiled! After the scribe takes my dictation, I shall carefully slip this letter inside the other and seal it.