The Builder
Page 1 of 7
I. Sepphoris
The day was barely dawning as Yosef Bar Yakov rose from his hard pallet. In the quiet he paused briefly to draw a sash around the waist of his coarse tunic, pick up his cloak and retrieve his turban. He donned his clothing with practiced ease, then picked up the sack containing his lunch and a water-skin. He stepped out into the early morning air and took a deep breath, pausing to recite the ancient words of Moses.
“Shema, Yisrael, Adonai elohenu Adonai echad. Ve-ahabta et-Adonai Eloheka be-kol-lebabeka u-be-kol-nafsheka u-be-kol-meodeka… – Hear, O Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord is one. And you will love the Lord your God with all of your heart and with all of your soul and with all or your mind…”[1] He quickly continued on in his litany, eyes closed, reciting it in the pure old Hebrew language that few of the unschooled truly understood. How blessed Yosef was for having a father who not only could read and understand the ancient language, but who still spoke it fluently with his sons. Yosef savored his recitation of the Shema every morning and evening, feeling it brought him a step closer to his God, the One he truly loved, the One he longed to see.
At the end of his recounting the words of Moses, the sturdy builder quickly strode out of the courtyard of his father’s house. He turned left, down the main street of Nazareth to make the hour-long walk to near-by Sepphoris where he was currently working on expanding the house of one of the rich merchants of the city. As he walked he hummed a tune in the soft minor key of the eastern peoples, the one that his father often used when reciting the Psalms. This time Yosef was thinking of the mighty words of what would later be termed the second Psalm:
The One enthroned in heaven laughs;
the Lord scoffs at them.
Then he rebukes them in his anger
and terrifies them in his wrath, saying,
“I have installed my King on Zion, my holy hill.”
I will proclaim the decree of the Lord:
He said to me, “You are my Son;
today I have become your Father.
Ask of me, and I will make the nations your inheritance,
the ends of the earth your possession.
You will rule them with an iron scepter;
you will dash them to pieces like pottery.”[2]
He considered the words he sang as he walked in the slowly increasing light. He, a direct descendant of the kingly line of David, the beloved king of Israel, knew that these had special meaning for his house. His line should be the one to carry this promise: the “son of God,” the king who had the right to rule Palestine and crush the enemies of the Lord. Ah, that he would be able to see such a thing! But he knew from his studies of the Scriptures that much was yet to come. The Mashiah, the Anointed One, the peaceful King who was prophesied must arise, so he knew. And Yosef also knew that he was not the Messiah, though he could trace his lineage directly back to Jehoiachin, the next-to-last king of ancient Israel. If this king hadn’t failed, then perhaps it would have been Reb Yakov who would be ruling this country.
Perhaps the King would yet come in his lifetime. It was an odd feeling that had struck Yosef often as he had walked the four miles between his home and the most prosperous city of the area. He continued meditating on it as Sepphoris itself came into view, perched on the crown of a hill, much like a bird’s nest. After all, the old Hebrew name Zippori meant “bird,” an apt description of the city. The view was breath-taking no matter how often he looked at the clay and rock walls surrounding the peak of the hill. Living up there must give one the feeling of living at the top of the world. He understood a little of the feeling, as the cliff above which his little home village of Nazareth was situated gave him a similar view of the Beyt Netofa Valley.
Yosef’s final destination was on the western edge where old Eli Yoachim had his expansive home. The city gates were just opening as he arrived and he strode through with a friendly word to the men on duty. They greeted him in kind, while Yosef made his way up the path of the poorer quarter, pausing at a small house where Yehuda, his younger brother by a mere eleven months, lived along with his wife. Their brother Clopas stayed there that night, having been invited by a local scholar of the Law to dine with him and display the famed knowledge of the sons of Rabbi Yakov Bar Mattan. Clopas was the least scholarly of the four brothers, but he was also the one who was most persuasive, having inherited his father’s way with words. Many thought that this young man might have gone on to be a lawyer if his father’s trade as builder hadn’t already given him an area of work that any man should be proud of.
”Shalom, Yosef!” Yehuda called, as his older brother stepped through the low doorway into the small courtyard.
”Shalom, brother,” the builder replied with a smile. “I see you are well.”
”You say that every time, Yosef. We only saw each other yesterday!” Yehuda chuckled and slapped one pudgy hand on his brother’s shoulder. “Come and break bread with us so we can get going up to Eli’s. I’ll wager a new adz that he’s got more carving for you to do.” He glanced at the door behind Yosef, expecting to see Abiyah, their youngest brother. “Where is the runt off to?” he asked.
”Mother kept him at home,” the older brother replied. “Besides, someone’s got to take care of the furniture orders.”
”And he would never venture away from Father and his books unless forced to, right?” Clopas remarked, coming down from the roof of the house. He smiled and said, “Shalom,” embracing Yosef in the customary manner. They went up to the roof, where only a few minutes later Yehuda’s wife, Bat-shua, brought them some bread, goat’s cheese, and milk, as well as a few black olives. As the oldest, Yosef said a brief blessing before the three brothers breakfasted.
”So we’re off to old Eli’s again,” Clopas chuckled around a morsel of the flat bread. “I tell you, Yosef, I saw a sight there yesterday that would make any man strong again.”
”Looking at the girls again, Clopas?” Yehuda grunted. “You need to remember that Father already has someone in mind for you!”
”Right, isn’t it the cross-eyed girl from Cana, whom no one wants?” Yosef jibed, an impish smile on his face.
”Ha, Father wouldn’t do that if she were the only Israelite woman left in Palestine!” Clopas exploded. “He will let us select our own brides, and you know that!”
”What a responsibility for you, boy,” the oldest laughed. “Your eyes wander after everything that happens to have long hair and a shawl! I bet you never even notice if they’re mature or not!” Yehuda tried to hide a chuckle by sipping from his milk, only to have it choke him, so he sputtered and coughed and received a few well-meaning but useless slaps on the back from his brothers.
”I tell you, Yosef, this girl’s different!” Clopas said sincerely when Yehuda’s fit had passed. “She’s the most beautiful I’ve ever seen and I don’t say that lightly!” Yosef looked at Yehuda and gave him a knowing smile. Clopas Alphaeus the match-maker was hard at work again. It really, really galled him that his oldest brother was still single while Yehuda had already married. It was only six months ago, but still he felt a stigma being attached to Yosef, who at 23 was overripe for marriage by most standards. The older brothers looked at each other with a wry smile.
”So who’s the lucky girl this time, Clopas?” Yosef asked. His little brother gave him an I-knew-I’d-hook-you look.
”I’m not exactly sure yet, but I tell you she’s definitely of the family of David. The Word says he was ruddy and handsome. And this girl! All of the above!”
”A handsome girl,” Yosef returned good-naturedly. “Now that’s new. I thought I might be looking at a beautiful one instead.”
”She’s probably old Eli’s daughter, Yosef,” Yehuda put in. “Everybody knows the old man moved up here from Bethlehem years ago. He can trace his lineage all the way back to Natan, David’s son, I’m told.”
”My, my, my. You know a lot, dear brother, is this some kind of scheme you two put together to get me married into a rich family?” Clopas and Yehuda looked at each other, grinning like a couple youngsters caught in a prank. Yosef folded his arms and looked at them with a benign smile.
”I thought so,” was all he said. Then he looked up at the sun. “We’d better get going, hadn’t we?”
”Yes,” came a voice from down in the courtyard. “Eli doesn’t take kindly to slackers.”
”Ah, Micah, right on time,” Clopas laughed. “You always know when to show up.” The three brothers looked down at the wiry form of the local stone-mason. It was hard to imagine that such a small man had learned such a hard trade. He was a good friend to all of Reb Yakov’s sons, having grown up in Nazareth with them until he was about fourteen when his father had moved to Sepphoris because of better business opportunities.
”Yeah, let’s get going,” Yehuda sighed. “Bat-shua will clean up.” And so they did. They followed the narrow streets up and around the crown of the city, then back down into the well-to-do district. The houses here were larger and more luxurious, even the outer walls white-washed to a pristine white. The four men laughed and talked as they paused at one large door set in the wall and knocked. A few minutes later a porter opened it and noticed the workmen for the expansion of the house. He welcomed them in and the four of them immediately hurried over to the unfinished east wing. They had spend three weeks tearing it down and then the past three months rebuilding it. Eli was paying a pretty sum to get it done, not being content with the regular clay bricks that most people used, but wanting it built out of stone.
No other workmen were there yet, it being early. Yosef, his brothers, and Micah all threw off their cloaks, drew up their long tunics into their belts and set to work on their various tasks. The builder carefully scrutinized the beams that they’d lifted into place the day before. They were ready for him to complete the carvings he’d begun. There were lilies and pomegranates, stylized cedars, a few birds, and in the center of each one was to be a beautifully stylized lion’s head, the lion being the symbol of the house of Judah, which Eli proudly counted himself a part of. Half of the sixteen beams had been completed and the scaffolding had remained beneath for the carving of the eight. Yosef quickly scaled this and unpacked his mallet and chisel. He knew he’d be done with these by noon time, each one slightly different from the one before, beautiful hand-carvings in the sturdy cedar wood that Eli had paid a fortune to bring down from Lebanon.
The builder hummed to himself, thinking of the imagery of the lion and its bearing on the tribe of Judah. The ancient prophecy of Israel himself came to mind as his chisel formed the slanted eyes and the mouth open in a snarl:
Judah, your brothers will praise you;
your hand will be on the neck of your enemies;
your father’s sons will bow down to you.
You are a lion’s cub, O Judah;
you return from the prey, my son.
Like a lion he crouches and lies down,
like a lioness – who dares to rouse him?
The scepter will not depart from Judah,
nor the ruler’s staff from between his feet,
until he comes to whom it belongs
and the obedience of the nations is his.
[3]
Strange that he would think of the Messiah again even as he was carving the symbol of his family house. How everything around him reminded him of those eternal promises! He longed for the freedom of Israel from the Roman oppression as much as anyone else, perhaps more so, because as a descendant of David he might even be allowed to be in the line of Messiah! To his mind that was an honor far above holding a throne or commanding people. He did not mind his work as builder or his reputation as the best wood-carver in the valley, as a matter of fact he enjoyed it. The manual work gave him time to recite the vast passages of the Torah that he’d memorized under his father’s tutelage. Even as he was working with his father as a boy before the accident he was committing verses to memory. It was at that time he’d memorized the 150 Psalms as well as most of the five books of Moses. He smiled to himself as he remembered how he had stumbled through the first parts of Debarim, the fare-well speeches of the Prophet. His father had put down his plane and glared at the boy.
”You must take your study of the Word seriously,” Yakov said in perfect Hebrew, the language he always used when talking to his sons. “It is only in the knowledge and application of the Word that true immortality lies, my son. The Almighty gave us the Word to teach us how to please Him. You must learn it and learn to interpret it!” That was where the high regard for all things sacred began to be impressed upon Yosef Bar Yakov’s heart. When he was Bar-Mitzvah he did not read from the scrolls, but recited them from memory, by then having assimilated all of the prophecies of Isaiah and some of Jeremiah. And still the learning went on. Only yesterday evening his father had allowed him to memorize a new part of what was to his mind the most intriguing of the books of the Scripture: the words of the prophet Zechariah. The visions had been laborious, but in the poetry of the latter parts of the book Yosef could loose himself joyfully. He recited the words to himself, burning them into his mind with the intensity that he had learned from the time he’d been able to talk.
Rejoice greatly, O Daughter of Zion!
Shout, Daughter of Jerusalem!
See, your king comes to you,
righteous and having salvation,
gentle and riding on a donkey,
on a colt, the foal of a donkey.
I will take away the chariots from Ephraim
and the war-horses from Jerusalem,
and the battle bow will be broken.
He will proclaim peace to the nations.
His rule will extend from sea to sea
and from the River to the ends of the earth.
As for you, because of the blood of my covenant with you,
I will free your prisoners from the waterless pit.
Return to your fortress, O prisoners of hope;
even now I announce that I will restore twice as much to you.
I will bend Judah as I bend my bow
and fill it with Ephraim…[4]
Suddenly he stopped, realizing that a soft voice was taking up the sing-song recitation below him:
I will rouse your sons, O Zion,
against your sons, O Greece,
and make you like a warrior’s sword.[5]
He looked down and saw a girl of about sixteen setting down a water-jug with a ladle for the workers. In her quiet voice she continued singing the prophecy.
Then the Lord will appear over them;
his arrow will flash like lightning.
The Sovereign Lord will sound the trumpet;
he will march in the storms of the south,
and the Lord of hosts will shield them.[6]
At that instant she must have become aware of his penetrating gaze on her back. The song broke off and she turned and glanced up at him openly with wide eyes of brown flecked with gold and green. A small furtive smile swept across her rose-bud lips before she inclined her head and walked out of the unfinished room, self-consciously pulling her scarf closer around her face to hide the dark brown hair that peeked out from the edges of it.
Is that the girl Clopas was talking about? he wondered and with it came the thought. That’s Eli’s daughter? Who would have taught her the Scriptures? Certainly Yakov was less stringent about the women’s knowledge of Scripture. Yosef’s mother Yehosheba could not only read and write in Hebrew and Aramaic, but she also was able to recite vast portions of the history of the Kings straight from memory, being surpassed in her memorization only by her husband.
But Eli was a Pharisee and a strict one at that. Would he allow his daughter to study the Scriptures? Didn’t most Pharisees disallow such a thing? It was true that Yosef’s father held a loose affiliation to the popular party of Palestine, but he was much less tied to the oral law than his compatriots. He regarded the Scripture as the summation of all that was needed to know. For that reason he had no qualms about teaching women the ancient writings.
”Wasn’t woman created as man’s helper?” he’d say with a loving smile towards his wife. “She can only help in the depth that she understands the Law that was given and so she must be taught!”
So Eli allows the women of his household to study Scripture, Yosef mused wryly. He also allowed images of beasts to be carved into the rafters of his new banquet room. Old hypocrite!
Yosef returned to his work and tried to concentrate on the carving, but that brief glimpse of the girl would not leave his mind. He tried to chase the image away with recitation of Scripture, repeating the prophecies of Zechariah first, but when he found it only enhanced his memory of her voice he tried switching to the Psalms. Here he found himself reciting the wedding psalm:
My heart is stirred by a noble theme
as I recite my verses for the king;
my tongue is the pen of a skillful writer.
You are the most excellent of men
and your lips have been anointed with grace,
since God has blessed you forever …
Listen, O daughter, consider and give ear:
Forget your people and your father’s house.
The king is enthralled by your beauty;
honor him, for he is your lord.
The Daughter of Tyre will come with a gift,
men of wealth will seek your favor.
All glorious is the princess within her chamber;
her gown is interwoven with gold…[7]
As soon as he noticed where he was going, he forced his mind to slide to a halt and paused to examine the head of the lion he’d just finished. It was perfect. He smiled to himself. The lion of the tribe of Judah.
Just before lunch time came around Eli strolled into the banquet hall where Yosef was putting the finishing touches on the last of the sixteen lion heads, this one with its mouth shut, a royal light in the wooden eyes.
”Magnificent!” the old merchant exclaimed, stroking his beard with one broad hand. “Magnificent work, Yosef Bar Yakov! You were not recommended in vain!” The builder smiled and bowed slightly, coming down from the scaffolding while Eli walked back and forth in the hall, loudly praising the carvings. As Yosef descended from where he was working he noticed a slight figure standing in the doorway and recognized the girl who had brought the water earlier that morning. He forced his eyes away from her and on to the man who now had traversed the entire length of the hall and came back to where Yosef had come to stand at the base of the scaffolding.
”You are truly a master of your art, Yosef Bar Yakov,” the merchant laughed, clapping a hand on the young man’s shoulder. The builder didn’t quite know how to respond, as old Eli was not known to dispense praise much.
”Thank you, my lord,” he said with deference.
”Come now, don’t be so modest, Yosef. After all, I’d never hire any but the best and you must know that!” Another hearty laugh came from deep within the old man’s broad chest. He turned back towards the door and nodded at the girl who turned and quickly walked away across the courtyard, into the house. Is she his servant girl? the builder wondered.
”Today I am providing the fare for you, my friend,” the old Pharisee announced, “for you, your brothers, and your friends.” Up until now the old miser hadn’t cared to do so and the workers had brought their own meals. What had prompted such a change?
”The expansion is ahead of plan,” Eli explained as if sensing the young man’s question. “You and your friends have done a magnificent job and we need to reward that. From this day forth you’ll be eating from my table.”
It seems that the old man has made some unexpected profits in his cloth business, Yosef mused. Hadn’t Micah said something about possibly supplying Herod and the High Priest’s families with cloth and clothing? Yosef followed Eli out into the courtyard where some of the old man’s slaves had set up an awning. The workers were just beginning to put down their tools and head over to the shade. There were ten in all, the finest in the area. If Abiyah had been there Eli certainly would have the best wood-carver in all the Beyt Netofa Valley working on his house, but the youngest son of Reb Yakov tended to be bookish and not interested in manual labor, much to his father and mother’s chagrin.
The men sat down on the ground around a low table that was laid out with fresh bread, grapes, dates, roasted corn and a small portion of meat for each of the men.
”Eat well, my friends,” Eli laughed. “After all strong bodies need strong nourishment to work hard.”
Bribery to get us to finish even faster so it will save him more money, Yosef thought cynically. The head of the household asked the blessing on the meal and then allowed the men to eat. They were attended by male servants, all except the old man. As soon as he was finished a girl came to replenish his empty bowl. Yosef recognized her as she leaned past the merchant’s shoulder, her shawl slipping forward to veil the side of her face that was toward the man she was serving. Yosef noticed that her hair had fallen forward a bit as well. It was a dark brown, but shimmered reddish, the trademark of the house of David.
A loose woman, he thought for a moment, but as she glanced at him and gave him that same small smile from the banquet room, he decided otherwise. Here was purity incarnate. Suddenly he winced at a jab in his side and glared at a broadly grinning Clopas.
”Didn’t I tell you?” he mouthed silently. Yosef nodded demurely and went back to his food as the girl straightened and left the table. Who is she? he wondered. Has she been spoken for? It was interesting that she only served the old man. Might she be a concubine? That thought chilled him for a moment and he focused on his meal. It was not uncommon for the richer men to keep a concubine or two beside the wife, but he’d never thought a staunch a Pharisee as old Eli Yoachim to be such a hypocrite.
”What’s the matter with you, Yosef?” Yehuda asked from across the circle. “You’re awfully quiet today.”
”Oh, sorry,” the builder answered. “I was just thinking…”
”Ah, yes…” his younger brother returned with a knowing smile. “In case you were wondering, that girl’s Eli’s second daughter. That’s all I was able to wring out of one of the servants who brought us water. That, and the fact she’s not yet spoken for.”
What does that have to do with me? Yosef asked himself. I’m not interested, am I? And yet he found himself counting the moments until the girl reappeared. He sighed to himself as the men finished their meal and she did not reemerge from the house. Perhaps he was just being foolish, but a girl who could quote the Hebrew so well was a prize! Why would Eli allow something like that? He later voiced that question to his friend Micah who just happened to be chipping a stone block next to where Yosef was readying a cross-beam.
”They say that old Eli dotes on his children, especially the girls,” the mason explained. “One of the servants once told me that when his daughters requested a chance to learn the Torah, it had only taken one question from the second one to get him to agree. They say that two of his daughters can recite as well as the rabbi in the synagogue.”
Like the girl this morning, Yosef thought. She must be his daughter! And within him rose the desire to know this girl. Even before he’d noticed it, he sent a silent prayer to his God asking for a chance. Finally registering what he’d done he sighed to himself.
”Don’t listen to a fool, o LORD,” he muttered, scraping his plane along the beam. “I’m not even sure what I want here.”
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