Black Saturday

Last evening my husband and I went to Good Friday services to contemplate what Jesus did for us on the cross. Tomorrow we will celebrate the joy of his resurrection and his power over sin and death. 

But what happened on Saturday? 

His disciples were holed up probably in the upper room where they had celebrated Passover on Thursday. They hid in fear and grieved the loss, not only of their dear friend and teacher Jesus, but of the dream that Messiah had come at last, Rome would be defeated, and the world was about to change. Here is how I wrote those feelings in The Innkeeper's Wife from the viewpoint of her son, Simon the Zealot. They don't know that Sunday is coming!

[Note: I use non-English names in The Innkeeper's Wife. Yaacov is James. Marcos is John Mark. Kefa is Cephas--Peter.]

Shimon

 

The sound of marching feet echoed loudly between the houses in the street below—the first patrol we’d heard since the light had begun to return. The Romans were as disturbed by the unnatural darkness that had shrouded the city as we were. 

God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble. The psalm ran in my head, a charm against evil, although I didn’t dare to speak the words aloud. 

No one moved. Talmai and young Marcos had been whispering in a corner, but they stopped and stared at the shuttered windows with the rest of us. 

The moments seemed like hours, but at last the steps passed. They didn’t so much as pause at Maria’s door. We let out a collective sigh. 

Yaacov ben Yosef muttered a curse under his breath. He and Yeshua’s other brothers had taken refuge with us. “They’ll expect us to take up the leadership of this crazy rebellion,” he’d said. “You fools! Couldn’t you see Yeshua was mad?”

“He may have been mad,” his brother Yehud said, “but he was a good man. He didn’t deserve to die. Not…” He couldn’t finish.

On a cross. 

Like a criminal.

“They won’t kill him,” Yudas had assured me. “He’s too popular.” 

And then Yudas had betrayed him. 

I’d known what was in his heart. I’d known he wanted to force Yeshua’s hand. Known and done nothing. Wretched fool that I am, I’d even thought it might be a good idea. 

Maria brought the news that Yudas had been found hanging in a field outside the city. “They say he tried to return the money to the Council—thirty pieces of silver. They wouldn’t take it.”

Thirty pieces of silver—the price of a slave accident-ally gored by an ox. 

The price of Messiah. 

The price of Israel’s future.

Yaacov and Talmai cursed Yudas and all his house, and I had to agree.

We lit no lamp. No light could be seen through the cracks in the shutters. The neighbors mustn’t know we were here.

A light knock sounded at the door. Matthaios unlocked it, and the light of day pierced the room as Maria and a serving girl slipped in. I raised my arm to shut out the brightness. Maria set a jug of watered wine on a table. The girl added a platter of flat crisp unleavened bread and a basket of fruit. Passover was done, but there were still eight days of the Feast of Unleavened Bread ahead of us—eight days of feast that none of us could stomach. 

“He’s dead,” Maria announced.

“Blessed be the Eternal, God of mercy,” I murmured. The torture of crucifixion could go on for days.

Maria nodded. “Yosef and Nikodemos have gone to Pilatus to ask for the body.”

“Won’t they get in trouble?” Talmai asked.

“Perhaps. But they’re members of the Council and well respected.”

“Couldn’t they have done something to stop this?” I demanded. The others quickly hushed me.

When all was quiet again, Kefa spoke from the farthest corner. “They weren’t there.” His voice had none of his usual confidence. “It was the middle of the night. They met at the high priest’s house, not in the Hall of Hewn Stones.” His eyes never left the floor. 

Kefa had been there. He and Yonas had followed at a distance while the rest of us hid, making our way back here in ones and twos to cower in the darkness in fear that they’d come for us. I wished I’d had his courage.

But now it was as if Kefa were reliving some terrible scene. “They weren’t all there—the members of the Council. They weren’t supposed to be.” He raised his eyes. Even the dimness of the room could not hide the sheen of moisture in them. “Only those who hated Yeshua and would do the will of the high priest.”

Netanel nodded understanding. “And Nikodemos and Yosef have defended him.” He looked around at Yeshua’s friends and disciples. “I think they would have liked to sit among us.”

“But they were afraid,” I said bitterly.

Netanel whirled on me. “And are you not afraid now that you see what it’s cost? Perhaps they had more sense than you, Zealot.”

I jumped to my feet and faced him defiantly across the darkened room. I would have died with him, I wanted to shout as Kefa had sworn last evening. 

But I hadn’t died with him. 

I’d fled. 

Even now I was hiding. 

Here. 

In the dark. 

I sat back down.

In the corner Kefa could be heard quietly weeping—Kefa who’d had the courage to follow, to enter the very courtyard of the high priest, with Yonas, whose family knew Malchus—that servant of the high priest whose ear Kefa had cut off last night. Malchus, whom Yeshua had healed.

How like him to heal even his enemies.

I took two cups of watered wine to where Kefa sat on a couch, leaning against the wall, his knees drawn up in front of him. I handed him one and sat beside him with my own. He wiped his face on his sleeve, took a sip, and stared at the cup. 

Kefa had returned to us well after cock’s crow this morning, bringing the news that Yeshua had been condemned. Yonas remained with his mother Salome and Miryam. And Magdalena, dear faithful Magdalena. My last hope had faded that Yudas had been right, that this arrest would prod our rabbi into announcing his kingdom. I might have known that Yeshua could not be forced into anything.  

“I betrayed him,” Kefa whispered beside me.

“What?” Had I heard him right?

He raised his eyes from the cup to my face. Those eyes were full of pain. “I betrayed him,” he said. “I denied him. I said I didn’t know him. She was only a serving girl, but when she asked if I’d been with him, I said ‘no.’”

I didn’t speak. 

“But she recognized my accent. ‘You were with him. You’re a Galilean.’ And I swore at her. I swore I didn’t know the man.” He’d raised his voice. The others were staring.

“Kefa! Kefa!” I felt sick to my stomach. “The rest of us ran away. We all failed him.”