The Psalter Read online

  “I don’t understand,” Romano said.

  “I suppose I’m saying that I’m a Jew and a Christian as well, but not in forms you recognize.”

  “I don’t pretend to be an expert on theology, but I feel certain Judaism and Christianity are two different things. Unless you’re saying you’re Jewish by heritage and converted.”

  “Not at all, I’m Jewish by accident of birth, as is Isabelle, and I’m also a follower of Judaism, but not very orthodox. Still, I’m a disciple of Jesus, but not the Jesus you know.”

  Romano didn’t wish to sound impolite so he said as delicately as possible, “I just don’t believe one can be both.”

  Pascal leaned forward in his chair, hands on the table clasping his knife and fork, “Mon Père, I assure you one can.”

  “I don’t understand how.”

  “I’m a Jew who believes Jesus was the Messiah and could have become the rightful King of Israel, but not in the way Christians view him. I consider myself a Nazorean. Your church stuck us with the name Ebionite.”

  “The heretical group?”

  Pascal hunched his shoulders. “The church thinks Ebionites were heretics, but many scholars believe the Ebionites, who were led by Jesus’ relatives, were more faithful to his teachings than Paul.”

  “You’re not trying to convert me, are you?”

  “Certainly not, Father. I’m not a proselytizer, only an arguer. I think every man comes to his own philosophies through personal experience and study. It’s rare when one man changes another’s mind. I’m simply telling you my beliefs.”

  Isabelle gave Pascal a sidelong glance. “Father never says anything simply.”

  “That’s not fair, chérie. Perhaps I’m a bit provocative, but you make me sound sinister.” Pascal feigned hurt feelings.

  “Maybe I’m not fair Papa, but you must admit it’s true.”

  Romano was confused by Pascal’s claim. “The Ebionites haven’t existed for over a thousand years. How can you claim to follow a group that doesn’t exist?”

  “I wouldn’t say I was a follower.” Pascal spoke more reflectively. “I don’t follow anything. My belief in Ebionite doctrine grew out of my loyalties. Or more accurately, I knew who I had become when I discovered their ancient beliefs and they fit me well, like an old sweater. But here I am assaulting you with provocations you certainly find objectionable. In truth, I owe my life to the church.”

  “I don’t understand,” Romano said.

  “Of course you don’t.” Pascal Héber shoveled the last morsel of fish into his mouth and pushed his plate forward. Isabelle, as if on cue, refilled his glass with wine. “It’s obvious that I’m Jewish since I wear my yarmulke and perhaps you recognize that my name is Jewish. In fact, my parents raised me as an Orthodox Jew. The war changed everything. I remember the day so well because my friends and I couldn’t concentrate on our lessons and we whispered back and forth. Not because of the heat, although that summer was certainly hot, but because the next day was Bastille Day and we could only think about fireworks. Our poor teacher was quite relieved when class was over. As usual, I dawdled to avoid coming home to Torah studies and homework. Marseilles was awash with Jews, in those days, who had fled the Nazi invasion of Paris. The Germans began rounding us up by summer. I listened to my father and mother whisper about it when they didn’t think I could hear, but a ten-year-old can scarcely grasp terror. I had just rounded the corner to our building and a hand grabbed my arm. It was my teacher, red-faced and out of breath. I tried to jerk away and turned to yell as I watched the Gestapo pushing Mother and Father into a black car. I never saw them again.”

  “I’m so sorry,” Father Romano said sincerely.

  “Thank you Father. You’re very kind.”

  “But how did the church save you?”

  “Ah, yes. I remember clearly that I wanted to scream at the Nazis to let my parents go. The teacher must have anticipated it. He slapped his hand across my mouth and pulled me away. I don’t recall how we got to the monastery since my eyes were filled with tears as we wandered through the streets. I didn’t understand at the time, but he was taking me to my next home and to the only other father I’ve ever known. You certainly heard of Father Pierre Marie-Benoit?”

  “I recognize the name.”

  “Father Benoit was a Capuchin monk. Mother and Father worked with him to get Jews out of France and place hundreds of children, whose parents had been arrested, with Catholic families. He had organized a printing operation in the basement of the Monastery to produce thousands of travel documents, Baptismal Certificates, and the like. He told me he had begged Mother and Father to leave France, but they refused.” Pascal leaned back in his chair, reflecting. “I think he must have wished he had insisted more forcefully because instead of putting me in a family like the others, he kept me with him. I helped him forge papers and studied Catechism so the Germans would believe I was Catholic. So while I owe my birth to my Jewish parents, a monk saved my life. Now, I belong to both and thanks to Father Benoit, I’m an expert forger.” A sly smile accented Pascal’s face.

  “But if you’re a Christian, why aren’t you Catholic?”

  “Certainly, my parents influenced my study of the Torah. However, I also learned to understand Christianity because of my gratitude to Father Benoit. Still, I have a third loyalty, fidelity to history. My studies of Judaism and Christianity led me to believe they’re the same religion, extensions of each other. I’m convinced the original followers of Jesus held the same belief. When I think about the person I became, I sometimes reflect on my name. Did you know that Pascal comes from the Latin pascha for Easter, which in turn comes from the Hebrew pesach for Passover. I seemed to be destined somehow become both Jewish and Christian.”

  “Your story is touching, Pascal, and I’m sorry for what you’ve been through. I hope you won’t think ill of me if I say that I don’t share your belief.”

  “Not at all, Father.” Pascal reflected for a moment as though he was trying to read something on the priest’s face. “Your name is also quite interesting.”

  “Romano? Pretty common in the States, at least in Italian neighborhoods.”

  “Of course, you must know Romano means the Roman.”

  “I suppose so. I never thought about it.”

  “If your name were Peter, then you would be Peter the Roman.”

  “You mean like the Apostle Peter?”

  “Peter was in Rome, but he wasn’t Roman. No, I’m thinking about a medieval prophet.”

  “Like Nostradamus?” Romano raised his eyebrows.

  “Much earlier—twelfth century—and this prophet was an Irish priest, Saint Malachy. He had visions of the future popes and wrote down their names. The last was Petrus Romanus, Peter Romano.”

  “Did he mention any Michael Romanos?” The priest smiled, making light of Pascal’s interest in Catholic esotericism.

  Pascal giggled, “Not that I recall. I’m surprised that being raised Catholic, you didn’t learn about Malachy.”

  “I wasn’t raised Catholic.”

  “Protestant?” Isabelle said.

  “I wasn’t anything.”

  “That’s difficult to believe,” Pascal said. “A man such as yourself? How were you raised?”

  “On the streets mostly.”

  “An orphan?”

  Romano squirmed in his chair.

  “I’m sorry, Father,” Pascal apologized. “We’re being impolite.”

  “It’s an unoriginal story. My father left when I was so young, I don’t remember him. Mother was…well, intolerant. Maybe she saw Dad in me. So I ran away and ended up in foster homes until I was tough enough to run from there. January is cold in New York, so I hid in a church to sleep. Like you, Pascal, a priest saved me. He sent me to a Catholic high school on the Upper East Side, which is where my life and education began.”

  “Now I’m the one who’s sorry. It’s one thing to have your parents taken from you, but quite another to have to run
from them.”

  “It was for the best. I found my home.”

  “So we both ended up alone.”

  Isabelle stood up from the table. “It’s getting late, Father, and we still have a document to translate.”

  Romano rose as well and offered his hand to Monsieur Héber, who rose and shook it affectionately. As the priest turned away toward the entry, Pascal called to him, “Where’re you going?”

  “Like your daughter said, we have some work to do.”

  “Of course you do. You have a first-century Aramaic text to translate.”

  Romano was flummoxed. His eyes bolted toward Isabelle, who cleared dishes.

  “Father,” Pascal said with a grin, “I’m the translator.”

  11

  Gospel of Thomas

  Romano sank into a green, overstuffed chair. His heavy eyes surveyed the walls. Old paint covered uneven plaster. Dark beams jutted from above. The junction of the wall and ceiling had been deformed by centuries of settling. Isabelle handed Romano a demitasse, then held out a silver bowl. He took two sugar cubes from the bowl and plopped them into the cup.

  Pascal Héber sat opposite the priest on the other side of the coffee table. The photograph of the ancient page lay in front of him. He peered at the image through half-moon reading glasses while scratching notes on a tablet. Isabelle had neglected to explain that her father was a retired professor of linguistics at the Sorbonne, where he had been the department head of Arab and Hebrew studies. Most importantly, he had a perfect working knowledge of Aramaic.

  The coffee helped revive the priest, who had become drowsy after dinner. As he savored its aromatic richness, the caffeine awakened his brain. Only then did he realize Pascal was speaking to him as he read and scribbled notes. “This apartment has been in my family for two hundred years.” He didn’t look up as he spoke. “It belonged to my aunt and uncle. After the war, I was the only one left, so I inherited it. Someday, it will belong to Isabelle. She’s a lovely old building, don’t you think? Age adds lines and texture like grooves gouged in vinyl records. I’ve always thought that buildings record the essence of the lives lived in them. It gives them character, like me.”

  Romano gazed over at Isabelle, who appeared and disappeared, carrying dishes from the dining room to the kitchen, casting looks at her father as she passed. Finally, she walked to the sofa and sat next to him, staring at his notes. Romano tried to divine what she read by the expression on her face, but her widened eyes could mean anything.

  Pascal rose and stepped to the bookshelves that covered an entire wall. He pulled down a thick volume and flipped the pages. He scribbled on his notepad and read a little further. Finally, he took off his glasses and folded them slowly. Romano and Isabelle edged forward in their seats.

  “Well, Papa?” Isabelle asked.

  Pascal turned to the priest. “Are you certain this is a first-century manuscript and not a few hundred years later, perhaps?”

  “Positive. Around fifty A.D., plus or minus.”

  Pascal blew out a breath of astonishment. “Then, my boy, let me be the first to congratulate you. You’ve discovered what scholars have sought for almost two thousand years.”

  The paleographer was now wide awake. “Is it a New Testament manuscript?”

  Pascal half smiled. “You found the only first-century Christian scriptures written in Jesus’ language.”

  Romano noticed the emphasis Pascal placed on the word scriptures. “What do you mean? Is the passage from a Bible book?”

  “Papa, don’t play games,” Isabelle said. “This is too important.”

  “My child,” Pascal touched his daughter’s cheek, “I never play games with God.” He scanned the first line once again. “It appears to have been written by a certain Mathaias who is recalling a conversation between Jesus and his Apostle Thomas.”

  “I don’t recall those scriptures,” Romano said.

  “Why don’t I read the important part.” Pascal translated the text into English. “The Savior said, ‘Brother Thomas,’” Pascal mumbled some unintelligible words, then, “Oh yes, here it is, ‘it has been said that you are my twin and true companion.’”

  Romano leaned back in his chair, dazed.

  “What do you mean twin?” Isabelle looked dumbfounded. Are you saying Thomas and Jesus were twin brothers?”

  “You see darling, rumors circulated from the earliest Christian days that the Apostle was in fact Jesus’ twin, but this was more than a rumor. There are certain—” Pascal paused as though searching for precise yet diplomatic words, “problematic books that weren’t allowed into the Bible. Historians had only heard rumors about them because they were destroyed by the church. We would never have known what they said had they had not been discovered by an Egyptian peasant digging for fertilizer.”

  “You mean the Dead Sea Scrolls?”

  “No, chérie. It’s a misconception that the Dead Sea Scrolls are Christian. They’re all Jewish. The discovery at Nag Hammadi, on the other hand, was completely Christian. The books were buried near the Egyptian monastery of Saint Pachomius after the church declared possession of these types of writings heresy.” Pascal scratched his head, stood, and padded to the bookshelf. He slid his finger down a row of tomes until he came to a thin booklet. He pulled it out and opened the cover to the first page. “These are the secret sayings that the living Jesus spoke and Didymos Judas Thomas recorded.”

  “So?” Isabelle shrugged.

  “You’re an expert in ancient Greek. How do you translate Didymos?”

  Isabelle thought for a moment. “It means twin.”

  “Very good, darling, but what you couldn’t know is that Thomas is the Greek spelling of the Aramaic word Te’oma, which also means twin. So Thomas’ name is really Judas the twin, twice over. Whenever they call him Thomas in the New Testament, the author is calling him the twin.”

  “What book are you reading from?”

  “The Gospel of Thomas, a Nag Hammadi find.”

  “Does the Bible refer to the Apostle as a twin?”

  “The Gospel of John uses the name Thomas Didymos or twin, twin on three separate occasions.”

  Father Romano’s face was glum. “What else does it say?”

  Pascal rose and put his hand on the priest’s shoulder. “Will you be all right?”

  “Sure. I’m just shocked to learn Jesus may have had a brother—and a twin no less. So if he had a twin who was not God’s son, then…”

  “Mary had another son and Joseph fathered at least one of them. I think I know which book this is. One text discovered at Nag Hammadi is called Thomas the Contender. Many scholars believe the book is actually the lost Gospel of Mathaias. This is certainly written by a Mathaias.”

  “Read the rest.” The priest’s face bore a mix of weariness and distress.

  Pascal scanned the rest of the page. “I’m happy to report nothing earthshaking in what’s left, Father, so you can breathe easy; only something about Thomas getting in touch with his inner self. Very 1960s. I’ll draft a translation for you.”

  Romano pushed himself out of the overstuffed chair. He offered his hand to the seated professor. “Thank you for your help, Monsieur Héber. It’s late and I need to find a hotel.”

  Pascal rose and took the priest’s hand between both of his, “Nonsense, Father. You can stay here. Isabelle, please show Father Romano to the guest room.”

  “I’ve already imposed too much.”

  “Don’t be silly. You’ve had an exhausting day and I won’t accept no for an answer.”

  Isabelle placed clean towels on the nightstand and turned back the bedspread, fluffing the pillows. “You’ll be more comfortable here than a hotel.”

  “You and your father are too kind.”

  “Get some sleep, and we can talk tomorrow.” Isabelle kissed him on the cheek and Romano jerked away.

  “Oh, I apologize, Father. We French kiss everyone. I should’ve thought.”

  “No, I’m the one who
’s sorry. It’s not being a priest…but…something else.”

  “Well, let’s forget it.” Isabelle squeezed his hand and closed the door.

  As the priest pulled the blankets on the iron-frame bed to his chin, the implications of the Thomas fragment spun in his head. He hoped he would sleep; he had to sleep. His overtired brain wasn’t processing clearly and he needed clarity, but the coffee or the shock of the discovery made him feel as though he could jump out of his skin.

  He had ended up in the Secret Archives by sheer circumstance. He only wanted to study ancient books and manuscripts to learn their mysteries. He seemed to have spent his life looking for answers to secrets. Why was his mother violent, his father gone? Why did people hurt others for their own gratification? If he could but read the thoughts and disputations of the earliest Christians, those closer to the era of the Lord, he might understand more, get closer to the truth. But the School of Paleography fell under the auspices of the Secret Archives. He was educated there and was now the vice-prefect.

  However, much more resided in the Secret Archives than just the School of Paleography, hidden things not intended to be seen by outsiders, even priests. Romano had access to everything and had read many texts branded as heresies. Yet these long-lost accounts were not written by pagans or unbelievers, but by Christians who wrote what they believed. Priests like the author of the little tract he had translated, Anastasius Bibliothecarius, and Disciples of Christ like the author who claimed he was Jesus’ twin brother.

  Who had the right to say what should be part of the canon or what would be forever branded as heretical, suppressed, and destroyed? Romano asked himself the question over and over. Now, however, he had begun to grasp that what the church allowed to be read, published or even uttered was scrutinized, dissected, and censored. How had he not seen this before? Perhaps he had chosen to turn a blind eye.

  Romano had translated a simple pamphlet and almost lost his job at the hands of the Grand Inquisitor. But what he had uncovered tonight would shake the very foundation of the church. Jesus had a twin brother; Joseph was his father, Mary their mother. Such a thing was unthinkable and definitely punishable by the anonymous enforcers within the thick, impenetrable walls of the Pallazo del Sant’Uffizio.