The Galilean Secret: A Novel
Read The Galilean Secret: A Novel Online
Authors: Evan Howard
The
Galilean
Secret
EVAN
HOWARD
THE GALILEAN SECRET
All Rights Reserved © 2010 by Evan Howard
No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form
or by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including
photocopying, recording, taping, or by any information storage
or retrieval system, without the written permission of the publisher.
Published by Evan Howard
Originally published by Guideposts, New York, NY
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I owe my deepest thanks to many people who made the publication of this novel possible. To the incomparable Robert Gottlieb, chairman of Trident Media Group, and to his entire E-book Operations team, especially Mark Gottlieb, Adrienne Lombardo, and Lyuba DiFalco; and to Linda Cunningham, David Morris, and everyone who worked on the original hardcover edition at Guideposts Books.
To Carol L. Craig for her extraordinary editorial skill and unfailing encouragement; to Marjorie Hanlon for her wealth of experience and keen sense of what was working and what wasn’t; and to Judy Kellem for reflective feedback early in the process.
To my wife, Carol, and my sons, Evanjohn and Peter, for persevering with me on this long journey and for bearing the strains of living with a writer.
To my friends Lou Quetel, Mike Burch, Stephanie Merrim, Dave and Anne Burnham, Hank and Fran Pedersen, Jeana Whittredge, Shlomit Yusifon, and Jon Almond. Thanks so much for reading the manuscript and/or discussing it with me.
To Peter Miano of the Society for Biblical Studies, Ghada Abdelqader and Barbara Martens for sharing your knowledge of Israeli and Palestinian society.
To members of my writers’ group: the late A.D. Van Nostrand, Joan Pettigrew, Scott Allen, Dick Upson, Keith Cooper, David Howard, Jan Molinari, Kathleen Tremblay, Pat Trodson, and John Patrick.
To my spiritual guides Paul Sanderson and Roberta Cote. You lived the intricacies of this story with me and made the process of writing it a matter of prayer and spiritual exploration.
To attorney Eric Raymon for his friendship and wise counsel.
To the congregation of Community Church of Providence for your encouragement and support.
To the staff of Canonicus Camp and Conference Center for your warm hospitality.
While I drew on too many scholarly books to mention all of them here, I want to acknowledge
How God Do We Have to Be?
by Rabbi Harold S. Kushner as the source of the interpretation of the Hebrew word
tsela
used in this novel. I am also grateful to the late Lewis B. Smedes for his books about forgiveness and to the Swiss psychologist Carl Jung and his modern interpreters John A. Sanford and Robert A. Johnson for their psychological insights.
I owe all of you a profound debt of gratitude!
DEDICATION
For
Paul D. Sanderson
with deepest gratitude
The Galilean Secret
“A very imaginative story that will touch the hearts of many, many readers.”
—JOSEPH F. GIRZONE, author of the
Joshua
series.
“. . . a finely crafted novel with a message of hope.”
—HARVEY COX, Harvard University and author of
The Future of Faith
“[
The Galilean Secret]
will give you new eyes with which to read the old story!”
—RICHARD ROHR, author of
The Naked Now
“A powerful and moving parable that can be shared by all who seek peace in a turbulent world.
The Galilean Secret
offers an inspiring message that transcends religion.”
—DEEPAK CHOPRA, author of
Jesus
“Thought-provoking and riveting. . . a tale of truth and treachery that will stay with you long after the final page is turned.
—JON LAND, author of
The Seven Sins
and
Strong Enough to Die
“Compelling reading! Evan Howard presents a unique point of view that takes the reader into profound areas of wisdom and healing regarding love and loving relationships.”
—DR. MARGARET PAUL, author of
Do I Have To Give Up Me To Be Loved By You?
“A narrative rooted in vivid characterizations of human longings and the perennial search for the sacred.”
—THE REVEREND JANET COOPER NELSON, Brown University Chaplain
From
The Day the World Changed
Copyright © 2063
By Karim Musalaha
CALL ME ANYTHING, BUT NOT A LIAR. A man would be a fool to lie about something this big. Something that the media covered all over the world. What no one knows is how it happened, or who started it, and certainly not why.
No one but me.
I kept the secret because it’s so hard to believe.
I believe because I was there. I saw the events take place, and who was behind them, and how they affected everyone involved.
Now it’s time to tell the story.
Before the change came, I only believed in hate—and the anguish and despair it caused. That’s all anyone believed in. On either side. But they wouldn’t admit it, because no matter how wrong they were, they declared that their religion made them right. This kept the tears flowing so long that no one knew how to stop them.
Or how to quench the thirst of the blood-soaked earth.
But that was long ago now, and anyone still alive today can hardly remember back then. Back before peace finally came between my people, the Palestinians, and our sworn enemies, the Israelis. Back when the world thought it was impossible.
And no one had ever heard of Karim Musalaha.
CHAPTER ONE
Present Day
The Dead Sea
Wednesday, March 5
THE FOOTSTEPS WERE GAINING ON KARIM MUSALAHA. Desperate to escape, he scrambled toward a cave midway up the sculpted limestone cliff, his heart pounding in his throat. He wiped sweat from his forehead and stumbled across jagged rocks. When he climbed into the cave, bats flew out with raucous, high-pitched squeals, as if mocking his distress. He dove for cover and began to crawl, careful to avoid the pitted walls of hardened sand and the scorpions that patrolled them. As he scraped hand and knee against stone, a thought—more oppressive than the thick darkness—struck him: If he died here, no one would care. His decision to run away had left him utterly alone, as bereft of human contact as the Dead Sea was of life.
He paused and listened, afraid that the footsteps belonged to Abdul Fattah, a soldier of the Palestinian Patriotic Alliance intent on capturing and returning him to Nablus. Under his breath he cursed Abdul’s loyalty to Sadiq Musalaha, Karim’s father and the political leader of the alliance. Karim reached the back of the cave, knelt and took off his pack. His jeans and T-shirt were covered with dust. Three days earlier he had dropped out of graduate school at Birzeit University and fled with his refunded tuition. His body reeked from not having had a shower since he left Ramallah.
Never would his father understand, let alone forgive. Karim despised Sadiq Musalaha’s use of suicide bombers against Israel and refused to join the PPA militia. The words of a music video broadcast on Palestinian TV haunted his thoughts: “How sweet is the fragrance of the
shahids
. How sweet is the scent of the earth, its thirst quenched by the gush of blood, flowing from the youthful body.” A ribbon of sweat slithered down Karim’s back. The best way to express his outrage was to join the Palestinian-Israeli peace movement. He had come here, a kilometer south of the Qumran visitors’ center, to seek spiritual guidance, as the Prophet Muhammad had in a cave on Mount Hira, outside of Mecca. Karim also hoped that a sojourn in the desert would throw Abdul off his trail. But he only now realized the cost: a life as barren as the sun-scorched peaks of Qumran.
The footsteps rumbled outside. He ducked behind a section of rock that jutted from the wall. The Islam he had learned at Birzeit condemned both suicide and the murder of innocents. He twirled the gold band on his little finger. The ring had belonged to his deceased mother and bore the inscription “True Islam is peace.” To him those words affirmed the saying in the Qur’an, “Do not throw yourselves to destruction with your own hands.” The inscription also echoed a powerful hadith of Muhammad: “If people do good to you, do good to them; and if they mistreat you, still refrain from being unjust.”
He searched the floor with a hand, probing in the dark for a stone to throw. His fingers brushed something smooth and round protruding from the floor of hard-packed sand. With no time to explore, he kept searching and probing until he found several sharp stones, which he then held in his palms. He remained still, vowing to fight if necessary, while wondering about the smooth object.
The clatter of falling rocks caused him to recoil. He pressed his shoulders against the jagged back wall of the cave, the air dusty. A scorpion crawled down his arm, but he dared not move. The footsteps neared the entrance. He held his breath and waited, sweat stinging his eyes. So this was the price of freedom—to suffer terror and exhaustion in a desolate cave as he pondered a lonely future.
Yu Allah! Please don’t let Abdul find me
. Karim believed that Allah answered prayers and would protect him, as Allah had protected the Prophet Muhammad and Ishmael and Hagar in the desert. The Islam he practiced honored Jews and Christians, as well as Muslims, as children of Abraham. The thought of murdering twenty-three of his brothers and sisters and injuring seventy-six more, as his older brother Saed had done on a bus in West Jerusalem, repulsed him.
Karim dreamed of becoming a journalist, of marrying and raising a family. But what hope did he have of marriage now? Very little. And yet he yearned to find a wife who would be more precious to him than the seventy-two virgins who awaited a
shahid
in heaven. If he could only survive, he would flee to Bethlehem, far from his father and the militants in Nablus, and support the movement for peace.
Flashlight beams darted into the cave. Voices murmured. He squeezed the stones, realizing that two people were pursuing him. He held his breath and waited, ready to defend himself, his blood running colder than a desert night.
“Over here. Look over here!”
“Okay, but quickly. Then I’m leaving.”
The two voices grew louder, the light flashes closer to him. He exhaled in relief: the people were speaking English. Abdul Fattah, Sadiq Musalaha’s chief lieutenant, spoke Arabic and also wouldn’t have traveled with a partner. Karim had successfully eluded Abdul, at least for now. The voices probably belonged to tourists or researchers of some sort. Still, he continued to grip the rocks, prepared to fight if necessary.
“It’s dark inside, and steep and rocky. I’m going home with Dr. Jordan.”
The footsteps began to fade along with the male voices. Karim dropped the stones and waited for the haunting stillness of the desert to return. Then he began to feel around for the smooth object. His fingers probed the crusty, jagged surface until he grazed the object again. He thought it was probably a stone and tried to pry it loose, but it wouldn’t budge.
The hardened sand resisted his attempts to dig with his fingers. Only by taking the pocketknife from his pack and jabbing deep did he make progress. He dug all around the object and then scooped the rocks and sand away. Finally he was able to unearth it. To his amazement, the object was tall, perhaps fifty centimeters, and round like a ceramic vessel. He remembered the Bedouin shepherds who had discovered the Dead Sea Scrolls in these caves in 1947, and wondered if he, too, had stumbled upon treasure.
His pulse throbbed in his ears as he listened for footsteps. When he heard none, he put on his backpack and carried the object to the entrance. Only then could he see what it was—a tall, round clay jar sealed with a cork. He pried the crumbling cork loose, reached inside, and to his surprise, withdrew something that looked like a cylinder wrapped in linen. He unfurled the linen to find what appeared to be a scroll made of fragile papyrus.
Brittle and soiled in places, the scroll reminded him of his life—a relic of its earlier promise, fighting a losing battle against decay. At least the scroll was in fair condition. The top part of it contained a document written in black and signed boldly at the end. Below the signature was another section of writing, equally long, but written by a different hand. The script of both sections reminded him of Hebrew, only less cluttered and with fewer dots. It was square in appearance and probably read from right to left.
The scroll must be ancient and was probably valuable. He hoped that finding it was a sign of Allah’s favor. His friend, Brother Gregory Andreou, a Greek Orthodox monk and visiting professor at Birzeit University, lived in Bethlehem. As a scholar of Near Eastern languages and civilizations, he might be able to translate the scroll.
Karim gazed at the barren beige cliffs, which were turning gold from the setting sun. Under different circumstances, he would have found the sight exhilarating, but it would take more than the discovery of a scroll for that to happen. The salt of the Dead Sea smelled pungent and burned his lungs. He formulated a plan as he gazed down at his motorbike parked in a grove of date palms below the cliffs. He would lock the jar in the fiberglass carrying case on the back and ride for Bethlehem.
He rolled up the scroll and placed it inside the jar. The sun was almost all the way down, but he could still see. If he didn’t leave soon, he would have to spend the night in the cave. He rose and peeked outside the entrance. Seeing no one, he climbed out, the jar tucked under an arm.
He started down the rocky slope and had gone no more than a dozen meters when he heard footsteps behind him. He turned and saw a middle-aged man, well built, with wire-rimmed glasses and a full head of sandy hair, rushing toward him, trowel in hand.
The man wore an army-green shirt and pants. “I’m the only one who has permission to excavate these caves. You’ll need to give me that jar.”
Karim bristled at the order. “No, I don’t. I found it. I’ll decide what to do with it.”
“I’m afraid you don’t have a choice.” The man lunged at him with the trowel. Karim sidestepped and narrowly escaped the thrust. He spun away from the man and started down the moderate incline, half sliding, half bolting down the hillside. The man continued pursuing him, his steps quick and determined, his breathing heavy. Karim darted right and then left so he wouldn’t fall headlong onto the ground below. He struggled to keep his balance, his loaded backpack shifting, his feet slipping on the pebble-strewn limestone.
“I said give me the jar!” The man neared to within a couple feet of Karim and stabbed at him, tearing the sleeve of his T-shirt. But the thrust threw the man off balance and Karim lurched past him. If he could beat the man to the limestone plain beneath the ridge, he could get to his motorbike. But the backpack and the jar were slowing him down. Just then he felt the man grab his T-shirt from behind, which made Karim fall. He hit the stone. The jar broke into pieces, exposing the scroll. He scooped it up and scrambled to his feet.
“Give me the scroll,” the man said.
“I found it, and you’re not going to—”
Before Karim could finish, the man charged. Karim parried the man’s thrust with his free arm. He set the scroll down and grabbed the man’s wrist, pulling and twisting. The trowel hit the ground as Karim slammed a knee into the man’s gut and shoved him down. The man lay groaning. Karim kicked the trowel away, grabbed the scroll and started zigzagging down the sloping cliff face.
Once in the open, he broke into a sprint, his defiance hardening with each step on the limestone plain. He raced toward the grove of palms and glanced over a shoulder: the man was gaining on him. Karim would have to lock the scroll in the carrying case and kick-start the motorbike in one motion.
He reached the bike and dug in his pocket for the key. The footsteps pounded closer. He laid the scroll in the carrying case and slammed it closed. He swung his leg over the bike and brought his weight down on the kick-start pedal.
Nothing.
He kicked again.
A sputter.
The thudding footsteps were bearing down, strong as hoofbeats. Terror roiled Karim’s gut. He kicked one last time with frenzied determination.
The engine roared to life.
He gave it gas as the man reached him and latched on to the carrying case. Karim swerved right and then left to shake him loose.
The man coughed on the swirling dust. “I’ll kill you!”
Karim revved the engine: the motorbike surged forward. The man’s weight shook the bike, causing it to swerve wildly. Karim fought to keep his balance, steering straight and accelerating until he broke the man’s grip. Glancing over a shoulder, Karim saw him hit the ground. When Karim reached the road, he watched him get up and start running. Turning left, Karim passed a gray Chevy Impala parked on the shoulder. The man must be running toward it.
Karim guided the motorbike up the highway. He decided to ride through the desert, where no car could follow.
Tires squealed behind him.
He turned and glimpsed the Impala catching up. He left the road and steered into the desert, wondering who the man was and why he was prepared to kill for the scroll. Even more, he wondered about the writing. Whose hand had etched it onto the papyrus? What did the writing say? These questions were impossible to answer, but thinking about them sent excitement snaking through him as he sped into the desert.