Jesus
A novel
Chapter One
The Room
Zechariah and his son, John, had preceded the rest of the families by
ten days to the city of Jerusalem. Indeed, all the able-bodied priests in
Palestine, and all the Levites too, arrived in the Holy City some few days
ahead of the worshipers: they had to prepare themselves for their sacred
service, and then to prepare-to purify-the Temple and its precincts for
the remembrance of the Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread.
More than one hundred thousand pilgrims would pour into a city whose
normal population was thirty thousand. Jerusalem, swelling four times its
size, required the services of all twenty-four divisions of priests and all the
weekly courses of Levites, a workforce of eighteen thousand men.
Zechariah's division was the eighth, that of Abia out of the hill country
of Judea. It lay closer to Jerusalem than most of the others. Nevertheless,
Zechariah left home a full week earlier than priests from regions
more distant than his. He had reasons. He had purposes. But, though the
man was pious truly, ... read full excerpt from: Jesus ebook
