The Missing Madonna, Part 2, Chapter 12

Part 2 Pharaoh’s Children

“And when he was cast out, Pharaoh’s daughter took him up, and nourished him for her own son.”
(Acts, chapter 7, verse 21)

“When Israel was a child, then I loved him, and called my son out of Egypt”
(Hosea, chapter 11, verse 1)

“And was there until the death of Herod: that it might be fulfilled which was spoken of the Lord by the prophet, saying ‘Out of Egypt have I called my son.”
(Matthew chapter 2, verse 15)

BC 4, Ab Urbe Condita 750
Chapter 12: Joseph

“Mari,” I said, “I’m worried.”

Mari had been settling Joshua after the disturbance of our visitors. It was a quite extraordinary occurrence and our minds were still reeling. These men from Babylon or somewhere east of that, they said – I didn’t understand everything and I might have misunderstood – just suddenly appeared out of the blue as we were finishing our meal. I thought they’d got the wrong house at first but they were insistent that they’d come to see our son, so we had to let them in and I was most embarrassed that we had just eaten and had little we could offer them. They insisted that they had come to bring us gifts, not the opposite and produced the most sumptuous offerings. I was really scared that something was wrong, especially when we learned they had come straight from Herod’s palace in Jerusalem. And when I saw what they had brought – that really shocked me – I’d never seen such riches.

Mari to my surprise didn’t seem in the least put out by their visit. It was almost as if she’d expected them. She’d gone to fetch Joshua without any hesitation and shown the boy off to them with pride. The men, there were five of them – two older and three younger men, perhaps their sons - crowded round and praised the boy and told Mari that they’d divined from their astrological calculations that he was to be a great king. I don’t believe in all that mystical stuff myself, I don’t see how we can be influenced by all those stars and planets but the rumour is that Herod and his advisers pay great heed to it. In which case it doesn’t seem to have done him much good because everyone says he’s ill and losing his influence and is becoming paranoid about his children and their threats to his throne.

Anyway I was assuming we’d have to find room to accommodate our visitors and they were clearly people used to luxuries that we could not possibly offer. I was all for sending for the rabbi from our synagogue to see if he could help us, when the men said that they had servants - they’d remained outside the village so as not to create a crush in the small house. They were therefore not staying but had to get back to Herod’s palace as he and his courtiers were keen to honour the prince also. That’s when I panicked. If Herod could murder his own sons because he feared that they were plotting to overthrow him, what could he not do to a peasant family who were rumoured to have a claim on the throne, however ridiculous that might be?

I implored them not to go back to Herod, but they said they had promised and that the king had been most courteous and had expressed great interest in their pilgrimage and quest. That worried me even more and I pleaded with them not to tell Herod or any of his court who we were or where we lived. I risked telling them what I knew to be common knowledge about the tyrant and recounted how he’d had his own sons, Alexander and Aristobulus, executed for treason as he’d feared they were trying to usurp his position. They were clearly unsettled by this and discussed it in their own language so I’ve no idea whether they have taken my pleas to heart or whether they have returned to the king, in which case I fear our lives might be in danger.

All this went right over Mari’s head. “I told you Joshua is very special. God has protected me from the very beginning and the visit of these rich and powerful men just proves that God has planned great things for him.”

When I expressed concern at what Herod might do, if he believed what these men were saying, Mari, bless her, just said that God will protect us just as he’s done for over three years now. She looked so lovely as she cradled the boy and offered to hand him to the men to hold, but the men looked in awe and even bent as though they were bowing before him.

And then they just went, as suddenly as they came. All that way just for an hour or so, it seemed extraordinary and incredible. You’d have thought they’d want to stay for several days – perhaps they found our house full of smells they are unused to, with all the wood and dust mingling with the odour of the donkey and the chickens, and just wanted to get back to the comfort of rooms that the court would surely have made available for them.

I was curious and asked how they had travelled as they didn’t look as though they’d walked from Jerusalem, and they replied that they’d left the camels with their handlers well before the village and arrived on foot as they did not want to cause a disturbance or get the attention of everyone in the village. Their visit was to pay their personal respects to the boy, not to cause us the embarrassment of having everyone crowding in and making our lives impossible. I was certainly grateful for their thoughtfulness on this matter and hopefully their visit has gone unnoticed as everyone was in from the fields and eating their evening meals before settling for the night when they entered the village. I doubt if anyone was in the street to see them.

And so I repeated to Mari after they’d gone “I’m worried.” Mari looked so surprised at me. She does not hear the tales of the king and his goings on that I hear when I’m with the men, or when we hear news from the rabbis on the Sabbath. These things don’t interest the women. I doubt if they gossip over such matters round the well, they talk about their children and who is getting married and who is ill and problems with their husband’s families and all the latest scandal. I haven’t bothered Mari with news of politics in Jerusalem because I’ve never thought that she’d be interested in the slightest. Perhaps I should have done, because Mari does not now comprehend the danger we might be in.

I try to tell her the risks we now face, especially if the strangers return to Herod as they said they’d been commanded to do. It would only take them a couple hours, less even, to get back to the city and therefore they’d be reporting what they’d found to Herod tomorrow morning. Herod could send his soldiers to find and arrest us as early as the middle of the next day. I have a decision that has to be made now.

I leave Mari with Joshua for a while and go into my workshop to think. We can stay here and take the risk that the visitors will heed my pleas and not go back to Herod; or that they do but Herod thinks it’s all too improbable and takes no action. Or we can escape before Herod’s soldiers are sent for us, in which case we can either go back to Mari’s people in Galilee or join the other refugees that take the coast road to Egypt as I hear is common practice these days as Jews find themselves in trouble from the Romans or the Herodian authorities.

The more I think about it, the more agitated I become. We have so little time to make such a life-changing decision. The temptation is to stay here and rely on Mari’s profound faith that God will look after us whatever happens. But perhaps it is God prompting my mind now to protect my family by fleeing this dangerous place. She’ll think I’m mad to uproot us just from fear, but I can’t help it. I’m convinced that Herod will seek us out – why else would he tell the strangers to return to him and report where we are so he can honour the prince?

I know it’s absurd, we have no claim on the throne whatsoever, but from what I hear Herod will act if there’s the slightest chance of a rival to his crown. We can deny this until the day we die, but his guards will torture us until we confess anything that they want. I can’t risk it. We must be out of here before daybreak and well away before Herod’s soldiers are sent to arrest us. We must spend the next hour sorting out what we need to take with us – please God, let this be the right decision.

Now for the really difficult bit. Mari is going to take this very hard. I return to our main living room and find Mari already lying on her bedroll and nearly asleep. I must arouse her quickly and get her thinking about the food we’ll need for ourselves and Joshua. I shake her roughly by the shoulder.

“Mari, Mari, we’ve got to get up. We can’t stay here any longer!”

Mari stirs and looks at me with shocked eyes.

“Why, Joseph? It’s not that bad, is it? Has something else happened?”

“They’ll come for us, I know they will. We can’t wait. They may even come today. We’ve got to leave before it gets light.”

“But I thought you asked those men not to go back to Herod.”

“I can’t trust them. Herod’s spies have probably been following them and know who and where we are. I’m not going to risk your life or Joshua’s.”

“But he’s only a baby. What threat could he possibly be?”

“Well you convinced me and Eli in Nazareth that he would be the expected Messiah. It won’t take much to persuade a credulous vicious tyrant like Herod not to take a risk. He won’t bother about the life of one inconspicuous family from an outlying village. We’ve no-one of influence to speak for us.”

“Trust God, Joseph. I did when everyone was threatening me with death and God saved me.”

“Suppose God is saving us now by telling us to flee?”

“Do you really think he is, Joseph? Really?”

“I believe so. I’ve been thinking and praying this last hour or so and I’ve become more and more convinced we have to go.”

“But where, Joseph? Back to Nazareth? Our family can hide us there.”

“You know as well as I do that Herod’s soldiers are even more active in Galilee than here in Jerusalem. At least here they are garrisoned in the city. In Galilee they are everywhere on patrol because of the rebel groups. It’s still Herod’s land and he has spies there in every village. I don’t think we can risk Nazareth although I know you’d like to go back and be with your mother and sisters.”

“Where then, Joseph? Where else can we go?”

Before I can answer, she suddenly bursts into tears. It’s all too sudden, all too much for her. I realise that she’s still confused, she was nearly asleep and my decision has come like a bolt from the blue. She’s had no time to get her mind round the issue I’ve been tussling with this last hour or so. I put my arms around her and dry her tears and hold her until she’s pulled herself together. When I think she’s listening again, I say something that I know will really shake her.

“We could go to Egypt. At least we’d be out of Herod’s jurisdiction and protected by Roman law.”

“But Egypt! That’s a foreign country. We don’t even know the language. How could we live there?”

“Many Jews live in Egypt. Lots have gone there because the harvests are better and many who have fallen foul of Herod have fled there. I’m told that most of the cities have a Jewish population so we could live among them and I could find work.”

“It’s a huge decision, Joseph. Do we have to decide tonight or can we wait and think about it in the morning? We could ask the opinion of Rebecca and her husband or Jude or Andrew to see what they think.”

“We can’t share this, Mari. We mustn’t breathe a word. If we go, no-one must know why or where we’ve gone so that if soldiers come looking they can genuinely answer that they don’t know. They’ll try to guess where we’ve gone and probably assume that we’ve returned to Nazareth to your family. That’ll give us a head start if we’ve gone in the opposite direction.”

“Do you really think that’s the only choice for us? Are you sure?”

There is a long silence. I decide not to rush her, despite my increasing conviction that every minute is precious and we must be away as soon as possible. Minutes pass. I must bite my tongue and let her wrestle with the momentous decision before us. At length she speaks very slowly and carefully as though she herself has come to the decision.

"I’ll not try to dissuade you. Perhaps God is looking after us this way after all.”

“I think so, Mari. I wish I had your confidence and certainty sometimes, but every moment that passes makes me more convinced that this is the right, indeed, the only thing to do.”

Again there is a long silence. I can see her screwing up her brow in deep thought. She gives a sudden sigh, shakes herself as though she is brushing off the implications of this life-shattering and momentous decision and becomes suddenly very practical as though she’d been resolved on this course of action for days.

“Then what shall we need? What do I need to pack? How much can we carry?”

I breathe a sigh of relief. I was fearful that I’d have to spend a long time - time that I fear we haven’t got - persuading her. A fear perhaps that she’d refuse absolutely to go. What would I do then? I become practical too.

“We can take the donkey. I’ll kill the chickens and you pack them – we’ll need fresh meat. Don’t pluck them now, we haven’t time. Get a set of spare clothes for all of us – just one change of clothes. We’ll have to eat mainly grain and fruit we can pick on the journey. One cooking pot and one water jar – no more. We need to set a good pace so we mustn’t overload the beast.”

“What about the things you’ve been making in your workshop? Is everything finished?”

“No, that’s very unfortunate. I feel bad about that. But it can’t be helped. We can’t warn them or they will guess where we’ve gone and will be a risk to our safety. That reminds me, I’ll need to take my tools to be able to earn some money wherever we finish up.”

I’d nearly forgotten that. I go into my workshop and look round. I gather my tools together and look at the unfinished work promised to my neighbours. I feel guilty about letting them down, although to be honest they’ll get nearly-finished articles for nothing. To be fair to Mari, now she has accepted my decision she doesn’t argue any more but hurries about her work and is busy harnessing the packs on the donkey before I’m ready. She is just about to go to fetch Joshua from his cradle, when she points to the extravagant gifts the astrologers had brought.

“We can’t leave those things, not after they brought them all that way for Joshua.”

“Perhaps we should take them to sell in case we need food or other essentials.”

“Joseph! They belong to Joshua, not us! We can’t sell them.”

“If we take them all the way, there’s a danger we’ll get robbed. Things of such obvious value will be a great temptation to people we meet on the way, let alone outlawed thieves.”

“So let’s hide them here, ready for our return. Somewhere really safe. Should you bury them? No-one knows they’re here.”

I start looking around for somewhere safe to put them. There are nooks and crannies in my workshop, but perhaps some of my customers will root about searching for the things I’m still making for them and look for my tools. I can’t risk them finding these things – they’ll be too much of a temptation. I think Mari’s idea of burying them is probably best. I find an old cloth to wrap the caskets in and dig in the yard where the chickens normally scratch about. When I’ve dug deep enough, I lay the cloth inside and cover it up with earth and batten the soil down as hard as I can to try not to show too obviously that the earth has been disturbed.

I’d better slaughter a couple of chickens for our journey too – to take all of them will be foolish – the meat will rot before we can finish them. We’ll just have to eat off the land. I’ll take the money we have to buy food when we can. I’m sure our neighbours will take the remaining chickens when they realise that we’re not coming back. I chase the chickens round the yard and catch and tweak the heads of a couple and wrap them ready for Mari to pack with the other food she is gathering. There are four eggs as well so I collect those and wrap them carefully although they’ll probably crack with the movement of the donkey.

I suppose it must be less than an hour since I woke Mari up and here we are ready to leave our home for another life. It’s all been so sudden. I realise that I’m in shock as well. I’ve been so intent on persuading Mari of the need to leave that I haven’t really taken in the impact of my decision until we are ready to go. I’m the one who is now dithering, double-checking everything, fearful that in our rush, I might have forgotten something that might give ourselves away, or not packed something that will be vital to our survival.

And now Mari is waiting for me, though she’s let Joshua sleep right up until we’re ready to go. I nod to her and she picks the boy up and he doesn’t stir. I put all we’ve prepared into the saddle packs on the donkey’s back and we slip as silently as we can out of the house and into the street. At least the child’s asleep and hasn’t woken and cried to alert the neighbours, but I’m petrified that the donkey will bray as I get him under way, but apart from a quiet snort, the animal picks its way out of the yard and we set foot on the street, Mari carrying the sleeping child, with me leading the beast. But which way shall we go? In all the hurry of our preparations I’d given that little thought. Which way is Egypt? Which way shall we go….?