Jerusalem's Hope by Brock Thoene Read Free Book Online

argued, “Do we know how many rebels are around us? Do we? Some rebel is bound to recognize us before we do him. He’ll tell Kittim and bar Abba! Then good-bye throats!”
    Avel considered taking off the robes, stashing them in a ditch somewhere. Then he quickly dismissed the thought. He had possessed an uncanny sense of importance since donning the Baptizer’s mantle. Hadn’t Yeshua touched the fabric fondly as he remembered the man for whom it had been woven? Surely it was significant to wear the cloak of a prophet.
    Emet, age five, was not very strong. There had been a lot of travel in the past weeks with little time for recovery, and they were on the road again. It was especially hard for one with feet and legs so small.
    The warm, sheltering robes had to remain. “I’ve got an idea,” Avel asserted reluctantly. “We split up. If Kittim’s hunting for us at all—which I doubt, but if he is—he’ll be looking for the three of us to be together.” Avel noticed that Emet’s eyes turned downward and his chin drooped at this, but he was so certain he was correct that he kept on. “Anyone by himself will be just another servant traipsing along after one family or another.”
    Ha-or Tov ventured bravely, “You’re right. Anyone alone won’t stand out so much.”
    Avel noticed Emet’s protruding lower lip. The little boy clearly didn’t want to be left unaccompanied. So Avel finally added, “Ha-or Tov, keep Emet with you.”
    Emet brightened a bit at this compromise. Avel reasoned that the biggest danger to them was from Kittim. Avel, who had been well known to Kittim as a Sparrow in the Jerusalem quarry, was the one Kittim most easily recognized and certainly most thoroughly hated. This was a difficult decision, but Avel remembered the charge Yeshua had given him to care for Emet. Traveling separately seemed the best way to protect his friends.
    â€œIt’s settled then,” Avel said. “I’ll keep away from you, but where I can see you. That way if you run into trouble I can help.” As he said this, Avel realized there wasn’t much he could actually do. How could he oppose rebels with knives? How could he run to total strangers and ask for their assistance against bar Abba’s men? “Go on,” he said. “We’ll meet up again after sunset.”
    Avel stepped away from his friends into the shade of an overhanging willow branch and immediately regretted his decision to part from them. Had he let Ha-or Tov fret him into breaking up the group? He was just getting used to the idea of the new name given him by Reb Yeshua: Haver, “Friend to the brokenhearted.”
    Alone again he could sense Avel . . . the mourner . . . creeping back into his heart, stealing his courage.
    Peeping out of the branches, Avel watched Ha-or Tov and Emet attach themselves to the rear of a family group. When they were a hundred yards ahead Avel could still recognize them by the robes, but he judged the distance between them was enough. So Avel merged with the throng once again.

    Prominently displayed on a man-made knoll in the center of Caesarea was the Temple of Caesar Augustus. It had been commissioned by Herod the Great as the centerpiece of his new city. From the front terrace of the rotunda there was a splendid view over the harbor, which meant the structure was the first thing noticed by a seafaring visitor upon his arrival in port.
    The sanctuary was also placed so the main avenues of town crossed immediately before its base. Thus foot travelers couldn’t avoid noting its significance either. It had suited Herod the Great to make certain the whole empire recognized his devotion to Augustus.
    Though Augustus had been dead and gone this decade and a half, his adopted heir, Tiberius, found it suited the Imperial dignity to be the son of god. It was not Roman policy to interfere in matters of local religion if