There are scattered records of an old gospel, supposedly written in Aramaic, perhaps before any of the others, called the Gospel of the Hebrews. Only a few fragments have been preserved. One of them had been read by me so many times, in my early years of struggling with “The Christ Commission,” that I had memorized it:

Now the Lord, when he had given the linen cloth unto the servant of the priest, went unto James and appeared to him (for James had sworn that he would not eat bread from that hour wherein he had drunk the Lord’s cup until he should see him rising again from among them that sleep).

Servant of the priest who had received the linen cloth from Jesus? Shobi—as he had told me, himself, only yesterday!

Appeared to James? I had just heard it from his own lips!

I tried to recall the end of that gospel fragment:

He took bread and blessed and broke and gave it unto James the Just and said unto him: My brother, eat thy bread, for the Son of man is risen from them that sleep.

Without knowing how I got there, I found myself on my knees, not on the mattress but on the stone floor. “James,” I sobbed, “I have not prayed since I was a little boy. Will you help me with the words?”

“You?” he asked in dismay. “How can that be? What manner of prayer is it, from your youth, whose words you cannot recall?”

“The Lord’s Prayer,” I replied and instantly realized my blunder. Based on the life calendar of James, the Lord’s Prayer, taught by Jesus to his apostles, had only existed for seven years or so, and therefore I could not possibly have known the words when I was a little boy!

“Who are you, Matthias?” he whispered softly.

I reached inside my tunic and held the gold amulet so that he could see the fish and the inscription and the anchor of hope. “I am no one of importance, James. Just a follower … like all the others.”

He clasped his hands together and bowed his head. “Our Father, which art in heaven …”

And I repeated after him, “Our Father, which art in heaven.…”

sixteen

THERE IS NOTHING more difficult than to walk to one’s own death. Only a few hundred legionaries were gathered on the western half of Antonia’s parade grounds, laughing and shouting obscenities at me, when I was led stumbling from our cell on the following morning and marched across the dew-covered pavement.

As my ankle was being shackled to the chain attached to the post nearer the gate, the same one on which Pilate had said Jesus was scourged, I heard the procurator’s unmistakable voice. He was on his balcony, half reclining on a white couch, flanked by Marcellus and Cornelius.

“Matthias?”