“Do not worry, my dove. It is you I have come to see, not your clothing, nor your station.” He reached out to pull one of the leaves playfully from her hair.
She smiled up at him, adjusting her shift and brushing at the dirt. “My brother will not see it that way,” she said with mock concern.
Lazarus was very stern with her in matters of protocol and honor; he would have been beside himself if he had known that his sister was currently standing in their garden, unescorted and improperly dressed — and in the presence of the future Davidic king.
“I will handle Lazarus,” Easa reassured her. “But just to be safe, why don’t you run inside and pretend you didn’t see me. I will leave through the back and return this evening after I have been properly announced. That way, neither your brother nor Martha will be caught unaware.”
“I will see you tonight then,” Mary replied, suddenly shy. She paused for one brief moment, before turning toward the house.
“Act surprised,” Easa shouted after her, laughing as he watched the retreating form of his future wife run through the garden toward her brother’s home.
That day and the night that followed would burn in Mary’s memory for the rest of her life. It was the last time she would know how it felt to be carefree, young, in love, and happy.
Jonathan Annas did come the next day, but he arrived with a new agenda. The political and spiritual climate in Jerusalem showed escalating instability, and plans had changed to avert increased threat from the Romans. The priests had selected a new leader during a secret council, a council that deemed Yeshua unsuitable to take on the duties of the anointed one. Members of that council appeared with Annas to present their findings.
Mary had been sent with Martha from the room upon their arrival, but she refused to remain hidden while her future was discussed by the most powerful of her people. Easa had smiled his assurances at her, but she saw something in his eyes that frightened her. Uncertainty. She had never seen him appear uncertain before, but it was there and it terrified her. Against Martha’s wishes, Mary hid in the corridor outside and listened.
There were raised voices, some shouting, men talking over each other. It was often hard to hear precisely what was being discussed. The harsh voice, loud and raspy, belonged to Jonathan Annas.
“You have brought this about yourself by aligning with the Zealots. The Romans will never allow us to show any kind of alliance with you because of the assassins and revolutionaries among your supporters. We would be inviting slaughter on our own people.”
The calm, melodic voice that followed belonged to Easa.
“I accept every man who chooses to follow me and seek the kingdom of God. The Zealots acknowledge my descent from David. I am their rightful leader. And yours.”
“You don’t understand what we’re up against,” Annas snapped back. “The new procurator, Pontius Pilate, is a barbarian. He will shed as much blood as he feels is necessary to silence even our most basic demands. He flaunts his pagan banners in our streets, stamps his symbols of blasphemy on our coins, and all to remind us that we are powerless against it. He would not hesitate to eliminate any of us here if he sensed that we were supporting insurgence against Rome from within the Temple.”
“The tetrarch will support us,” Easa said. “Perhaps he would intervene with the new procurator.”
Annas spat. “Herod Antipas supports nothing but his own lust and pleasure. Rome butters his bread. He is only a Jew when it suits his ambitions to be one.”
“His wife is a Nazarene,” Easa said pointedly.
This comment was met with silence. Easa had embraced the liberal teachings of the Nazarene people, of whom his mother was a leader. The Nazarenes did not keep the law in the strict way of the Temple Jews. Among their differing traditions, they included women in their rituals and even acknowledged women as prophets. They also allowed Gentiles to listen to their teachings and participate in their services.
While Annas emphasized the Zealot faction as the council’s primary reason for withdrawing their support from Easa, everyone in the room knew that was a smokescreen for the truth. Easa’s teachings were too revolutionary, too influenced by the Nazarenes. The Temple priests simply could not control him.
By raising the issue of Herod’s wife as a Nazarene, Easa had thrown down a challenge before the Temple priests. He would step into his prophesied role of Davidic king and messiah without them, and do so as a Nazarene. Such a choice was extremely risky. While it could dimish the power of the Temple priesthood, it could also work against Easa if the people withdrew their popular support from him in favor of their traditional leaders.
But Annas wasn’t finished with his attack. His voice rang out through the tension of the room.
“He who has the bride is the bridegroom.”
Silence dampened the room again, and Mary froze in her position outside the door. Her tongue was dry and thick in her mouth. This was a reference to the Song of Songs, the poem written by King Solomon to celebrate the supreme dynastic union of the noble houses of Israel. Here, it was a pointed and overt reference to the betrothal of Mary to Easa. In order for a king to reign over the people, tradition proclaimed that he have a bride of equally royal lineage. Mary, as the Benjamite descendant of King Saul, was the highest-ranking princess in Israel by blood. As such she had been betrothed to Yeshua, the Son of the Lion of Judah, from infancy. The tribes of Judah and Benjamin had been conjoined since antiquity, and the dynastic marriage of these two lines had been secured since Saul’s daughter Michal had married David.
But to be a dynastic king within the law, one had to have a dynastic queen. Annas was issuing a direct threat to the betrothal.
It was Mary’s brother who spoke next. Lazarus was a man in total control of his emotions at all times, and only those very close to him would have heard the strain in his voice as he addressed the high priest.
“Jonathan Annas, my sister is betrothed to Yeshua by law. The prophets have shown him to be the messiah of our people. I do not see how we can stray from this course as God chose it for us.”
“You dare to tell me what God has chosen?” Annas snapped.
Outside the door, Mary cringed. Lazarus was a righteous man, and he would be mortified at offending the high priest. “We believe that God has chosen another man. A righteous defender of the law, a man who will uphold all that is sacred to our people without creating political offense to the Romans.”
There it was, the truth laid out for all to hear it. A righteous defender of the law. This was Annas’ way of showing Easa that they would not tolerate his Nazarene reforms despite his flawless bloodline.
“And who is that?” Easa asked quietly.
“John.”
“The Baptizer?” Lazarus was incredulous.
“He is kin of the Lion,” another harsh voice chimed in, one Mary did not recognize. It was possibly that younger priest, Caiaphas, the son-in-law of Annas.
“He is not a David.” Easa’s voice remained calm.
“No.” This was Annas. “But his mother is from the Aaron line of priests and his father from the Zadokites. The people think he is the heir to the prophet Elias. It will be enough to sway the people to follow him, if he is married to the proper bride.”
They had come full circle. Annas was here to secure Mary’s betrothal to the candidate of their choice for messiah. She was the commodity they all required to legitimize any kingship.
The next voice was angry, shouting. Mary had never met James, a younger brother of Easa, but she guessed that this was who she heard yelling now. This man sounded like Easa, but without the calm control that was always present in his elder brother.
“You cannot just pick and choose your messiahs like items in a bazaar. We all know that Yeshua is the chosen one to lead our people out of bondage. How dare you adopt a substitute because you fear for your own prized positions.”
Shouting erupted as men yelled over each other to be heard. Mary tried to discern the voices an
d the words, but she was shaking now. Everything was about to change; she could feel it in the marrow of her fine bones.
The raspy command of Annas’ voice pierced through the others.
“Lazarus, as the guardian of this girl, only you can make the decision to break the betrothal and bestow the daughter of Benjamin upon the candidate we have chosen. It is all in your hands now. But may I remind you that your father was a Pharisee and a loyal servant of the Temple. I knew him well. He would expect you to do what is best for the people.”
Mary could feel the heaviness in Lazarus from across the room. It was true, their father was dedicated to the Temple and a servant of the law until his death. Her mother had been a Nazarene, but that would not matter to men such as this. Lazarus had sworn to their father on his deathbed that he would uphold the law and preserve the position of the Benjamites at all costs. He was facing a horrible choice.
“You wish to marry my sister to the Baptizer?” Lazarus asked carefully.
“He is a righteous man and a prophet. And once John is anointed as messiah, your sister will have the same status as his wife that she would have had with this man,” Annas answered.
“John is a hermit, an ascetic,” Easa interrupted. “He has no desire or need for a wife. He chooses to live in seclusion as he feels this brings him closer to hearing the voice of God. Would you destroy his solitude and end his good work by forcing him into a marriage with all the responsibilities of that under the law?”
“No,” Annas replied, “we would force John into nothing. He will marry the girl to confirm his status as messiah with the people. After that, she will live in the house of his kin and John can return to his preaching. She will perform dynastic duties as necessary under the law, and so will he.”
Mary listened, praying that the roiling sickness in the pit of her stomach would not overcome her and reveal her hiding place. She knew that “dynastic duties under the law” meant breeding, having children — with John the ascetic. It wasn’t bad enough that these men were attempting to strip her of the greatest happiness she had ever dreamed of, which was her marriage to Easa. But with all of that they were attempting to remove Easa from his place as their future king.
And then there was the idea of the Baptizer himself. Mary had never seen this man who preached on the banks of the Jordan, but he was legendary among the people. He was Easa’s elder cousin, but the two of them were very different in temperament. Easa revered John, spoke of him often as a great servant of God and a true and righteous man. But Easa also saw John’s limits. He had explained this to Mary once when she asked about the fiery preacher who baptized with water. John rejected women, Gentiles, the lame, or any he considered unclean, while Easa believed that the word of God belonged to all people who wished to hear it. It was not an elite message, Easa explained. It was a message of good news for everyone. These differences had been the cause of argument between Easa and John.
John had spent a great deal of time on the barren shores of the Dead Sea after his parents died. He became entrenched with the Qumran Essenes there, a severe sect of ascetics from whom many of his strict observances were derived. The Qumran sect lived in harsh conditions and disdained those they called “seekers after smooth things.” They spoke of a Teacher of Righteousness who would bring repentance and ultimate adherence to the law.
Easa had spent time among the Essenes as well, and had explained their ways to Mary. He respected their devotion to God and the law, and praised their good and charitable works. Easa would count many Essenes among his close companions throughout his life, and would retreat to the absolute solitude of Qumran for periods of meditation. But where John embraced the harsh observances of the Essenes, Easa ultimately rejected many of their beliefs as harsh and judgmental.
Easa gave Mary further details of John, about the strange diet he had adopted in Qumran, of locusts mixed with honey, and his odd clothing made from animal skins and coarse camel’s hair that itched and tore the skin. He explained how his cousin the Baptizer chose to live in the wilderness, under the sky, where he felt closer to God. It was not a proper existence for a noblewoman or a child. And it was certainly not what Mary Magdalene had been prepared for throughout her young life.
It was all up to Lazarus now, Mary thought sadly. The men were arguing again in the next room, as the tears rolled down Mary’s face. She could no longer discern one voice from another. Which was Lazarus and what was he saying? Her brother loved and respected Easa, as a man and as a descendant of David, although he had never taken to the reforms of the Nazarene Way. Lazarus was highly traditional; their father had been a Pharisee as well as a strong financial supporter of the Temple in Jerusalem.
Jonathan Annas was forcing him to make an excruciating choice: support Easa, the rightful dynastic king and heir to all the prophecies, and Lazarus would be severed from the Temple. That was implicit in the high priest’s words. Lazarus would have no real option then but to align with the Nazarenes, embracing a reformist credo that he did not believe in.
The more moderate among the people, Lazarus included, had been content as long as Easa had been accepted by both the Nazarenes and the Temple priests. But this was the eve of a terrible schism, a full separation of the two parties that would create hostility among the great dynastic families of Israel and give birth to a bitter rivalry. It required a choice that would prove agonizing for many within the common populace.
But at that moment, Mary cared about only one choice that had to be made.
A decision by Lazarus to uphold the rule of the Temple priests would do far more than shatter Mary’s girlhood dreams and force her into an abhorrent marriage. It was a choice that would change the course of history indelibly for thousands of years to come.
Easa made an agreement with Lazarus that night: he wanted to be the one who broke this news to Mary. Lazarus agreed, likely with great relief, and Mary was brought into a private chamber to meet with the man she had always believed would be her husband.
When Easa saw her trembling body and tear-stained face, he knew she had overheard much of the encounter. And when Mary saw the sorrow in Easa’s eyes, she knew her destiny had been sealed. She threw herself into his arms and cried until there were no tears left.
“But why?” she asked him. “Why did you agree to this? Why did you let them take the kingdom that is yours?”
Easa stroked her hair to calm her, and smiled down in his comforting way. “Perhaps my kingdom is not of this earth, little dove.”
Mary shook her head; she didn’t understand. Easa saw this and continued his explanation.
“Mary, my work is to teach The Way, to show the people that the kingdom of God is at hand, that we have the power to free ourselves here and now from all oppression. I do not require an earthly crown or kingdom to do this. I need only reach as many people as I can to share the word of God’s Way with them.
“I had always thought that I would inherit the throne of David and that you would sit beside me, but if that is not to occur in the flesh, we must surrender to it as God’s will.”
Mary considered his words, trying very hard to be brave and accept them. She had been raised as a princess; this was why she was given the name Mary, a title reserved for daughters of noble families within the Nazarene tradition. She had also been trained by the Nazarene women, led by Easa’s mother. The Great Mary had taken over the younger Mary’s training at an early age, to prepare her for life with the Son of David, but also to school her in the spiritual lessons of their specific reformist creed. Once she was married to Easa, Mary would don the red veil of the Nazarene priestesses, the same red veil worn by the Great Mary.
But now, that was not to be.
Mary could not endure the loss of it and began to cry again. As she did, a terrible thought struck hard and a jerking sob cut through her.
“Easa?” she whispered, terrified to ask the question.
“Yes?”
“Will — who will you marry now?”
; Easa looked at her with such astounding tenderness that Mary thought her heart would burst. He took her hands and spoke to her softly, yet firmly.
“Do you remember what my mother said when you last entered our home?”
Mary nodded, smiling through her tears. “I will never forget it. She said, ‘God has made you the perfect mate for my son. You two shall become one flesh. There will be no more two, but one. And what God has joined together, no man can tear apart.’ ”
Easa nodded. “My mother is the wisest of women and a great prophet. She saw that you were made for me by God. If God has decided within his plan that I shall not have you, then I shall have no other.”
Relief flooded through her. Of all the things she could not bear, another woman at Easa’s side was the most unthinkable. Another reality struck her then with stunning force.
“But…if I am to be John’s wife…he will never allow me to become a Nazarene priestess.”
Easa’s face grew very serious as he answered. “No, Mary. John will insist that you keep the law in strictest observance. He despises the reforms of our people, and he may be very hard on you and enforce severe penance. But remember what I have told you, and what my mother has also taught. The kingdom of God is in your heart, and no oppressor — not the Romans, nor even John — can take that from you.”
He lifted Mary’s chin and looked directly into her huge hazel eyes as he spoke. “Listen closely, my dove. We must walk this path with grace, and we must do what is right for the children of Israel. This means that I cannot at this time oppose Jonathan Annas and the Temple. I will uphold their decision so that the teaching of The Way may continue in peace and grow across the land, and I have agreed to do two things as a show of my support. I will attend your wedding to John with my mother, and I will allow John to baptize me in public to show that I recognize his spiritual authority.”