Speaker for the God

By Henry Millstein

The world of Yirmeyahu—known to the later English-speaking world as Jeremiah—is crashing down around him. The tiny kingdom of Yehudah, the last remnant of the people of Yisra’el, lies caught between superpowers, Egypt and the new, and aggressive, empire of Babylon. Yirmeyahu, a speaker for the war god Yahweh, warns his uncaring people of threatening catastrophe, throwing himself into a maelstrom of political intrigue, as kings strive desperately to play one power against the other. And his own life is no happier than his nation’s: he has been haunted from his earliest youth by visions of a goddess whose surpassing beauty makes any merely human woman pall in comparison. She blocks his path whenever he seeks another lover. As Yehudah girds itself for its final, fatal battle against empire, Yirmeyahu goes to war with the goddess, until, in exile, a new series of devastating revelations leads him towards reconciliation with the god, the goddess, his people, and himself.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Henry Millstein
• Release date: Jan 4, 2020
• ISBN: 9781370352944

Henry Millstein

I am Brooklyn-born, but a Left Coaster by choice and adoption—I live in San Jose, California, which advertises itself as the capital of Silicon Valley but, fortunately for me, is surrounded by a good many square miles of open space where I can run my dog. I write because I have to. Whenever I try to move away, words and stories always call me back. I am blessed with a wonderful family, both nuclear and extended. My wife is a United Methodist pastor and my daughter is a student at the University of California at Davis, majoring in political science. Which reminds me: I'm surely among the world's most overeducated people. I have a B.A. in classics (Latin and Greek) from Reed College, an M.F.A. in playwriting from Carnegie-Mellon University, and a Ph.D. (Permanent Head damage) in Jewish Studies from a joint program at the University of California Berkeley and the Graduate Theological Union. Oh, and my wife Rebecca has a Ph.D. in theology from the GTU. I am grateful too for the decades I have spent with the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs in Oregon, helping them develop a program to maintain their languages and culture; I am currently working on a dictionary of the language they call Ichishkiin. And I am also blessed to be working for Islamic Networks Group, a Muslim-founded interfaith organization working to combat bigotry and racism in all their forms. Finally—though this should really go at the top—I am a practicing Catholic Christian and a passionate social justice advocate and organizer. I could say more about myself, but you will be better off reading my books, the first of which, Speaker for the God, is now available on preorder and will launch on January 4, 2020.

Book preview

Foreword: Fiction and History

Speaker for the God is a work of historical fiction. As a historical work, it is based on a reconstruction, to the extent that that is possible (scholarly opinions differ on this point), of the life of the Judahite prophet known in English as Jeremiah, based largely on the biblical book named after him. As a work of fiction, it is a creation of the imagination. As a person trained to be an academic historian, I point out these two poles, as it were, of the novel, to indicate that my choices in constructing this novel were governed more by the needs of the story as I conceived it than by what may have been historically most probable. To give but one example, the understanding of the Asherah as a consort goddess to Yahweh that is assumed in this novel is by no means universally accepted by scholars. The one rule that I have followed is that I have endeavored not to present anything in the novel that is known with reasonable certainty to be historically impossible. Were I writing a biography of Jeremiah—an impossible task given the state of the evidence—I would, in some cases, have made different choices. I hope, nonetheless, that Speaker for the God tells a truth that cannot be recovered by a work of history.

A Note on Proper Names

While knowledge of the Bible—or what passed for knowledge of the Bible—is far less widespread than it was only a few decades ago, I believe it is still the case that many of the readers of this book will have long-standing stereotypical views of the world and the people of biblical times. One of my chief aims in Speaker for the God is to break down these—still largely pious—stereotypes and see the world of that time and place in a new way. It is for this reason that I have eschewed using the usual Anglicized names of people and places and replaced them with closer transcriptions of the actual Hebrew forms. I have made exceptions to that, however, with names outside the land of Judah and Israel, lest the reader be left entirely at sea. I doubt that many readers (save those who know Hebrew) would make much of Mitzrayim instead of Egypt or Pelishtim in place of Philistines. I have, however, retained the use of Kittim, as that name appears in contemporary English Bible translations; it refers to Crete, i.e., to the Greek world.

Here are some names that may give trouble, with the proper accents indicated:

Adoniyáhu Adonijah

Avrahám Abraham

Evyathár Ebiathar

Hanányah Hananiah

Hilqiyáhu Hilkiah

Hizqiyáhu Hezekiah

Hoshiyáhu Hosea

Liwyathán Leviathan

Moshé Moses

Rívqah Rebecca

Shlomó Solomon

Yehezqi'él Ezekiel

Yehoyachín Jehoiachin

Yehoyaqím Jehoiakim

Yehudáh Judah

Yerushalém Jerusalem

Yeshiyáhu Isaiah

Yirmeyáhu Jeremiah

Yisra'él Israel

Yitzháq Isaac

Yoséf Joseph

Yoshiyáhu Josiah

For Becky and Kristen

Lights of my life

It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.

—Hebrews 10:31

Love in action is a harsh and dreadful thing, compared to love in dreams.

—Fyodor Dostoevsky, The Brothers Karamazov

PROLOGUE: GODDESS

There were whisperings behind the door.

I heard them. I stood at the door, knowing they did not want me to hear. But I did hear.

My name is Baruch, Blessed. I rarely felt blessed. Only when I was in his mother's lap—and I was getting too big for that now. Big enough to glean grain from the corners of the fields, left for the poor in obedience to the Teaching. Big enough to know that we were poor, despite my mother's Speaking for the goddess, despite my mother's healings—

The other woman had come late that night, after the stars hung clear and stark against the black of the sky-vault, and my mother had sent me to sleep in the courtyard rather than in the bed by her side. That was all right. I was a big boy now, and it was qayits, the season of heat that turned everything brown and sere, and the night was warm. The goat, the only beast we owned, would keep me company.

But I could not sleep. I heard the whisperings.

I had gone up to the door to listen. I knew that was wrong. But I could not help myself. This was my mother, and the strange woman, the woman who was young yet no longer young, with a swelling belly. My mother often helped women with swelling bellies, like this one. And yet this one was different. I did not know how. I only knew I could not sleep while she was there. I had to listen.

The whisperings stopped. Time to go to sleep, I told myself. That is what mama wants. Not standing at the door, listening.

I did not move. The wind rattled the door. There should be no wind, not now, not in a summer night. Was it a Lilith, a night-demon, stirring the air?

And then it was still again. I listened to the silence. It seemed to say more than the whisperings, which I had never been able to shape into words.

Then there came sound from behind the door again, but it was not whispering. It was gentle as a breath, but then grew harder, then faded again to a breath and less than a breath, so that I thought that perhaps I only imagined hearing it. Or that I was dreaming, that I had lain down as my mother told me to, and there was no door, no wind, no stars, only the black of the night sky-vault and my dreams.

I heard the sounds again. They were no longer light as breath, and this was not a dream. I strained to make out words, as I had before, and then gave up, letting myself ride on the waves of sound. They were like a wind, bellowing and falling, and then like a moan, like the loneliness of stars singing in the long, black silence that enveloped them. And then that silence itself became a voice, quivering with excitement—

I felt the wind again, felt it more than heard it, and there was a rattle from the door, and it swung open, just a crack, but by the starlight and the merest sliver of the moon pouring its silver-milk light I could see the shadow forms of two women on my mother's bed. But which was which? I made out the gently swelling belly of the woman who had come that night—so slight the swelling I wondered that I had noticed it, or had the goddess already made it smaller? The goddess could do that. Yes, sometimes women came to my mother for that.

The moaning became a panting, and I watched. I no longer thought about the wrongness of it. Baruch. Blessed. For the first time in many moons I knew my name was true. I was blessed. Waves of joy flooded from my mother, invisible as wind but stronger, oh, how much stronger—

The two women were intertwined, and I noticed, but without shame now, that both were naked. My mother had put her lips to the woman's crotch, to that mountain of black hair that I had seen only once or twice on my mother, but that now seemed to bristle silver in the moonlight. They were both lying on the straw mattress, side by side, but with feet at opposite ends, and the other woman now brought her face down onto my mother's crotch, and they both moved, they both writhed, but not in pain, in a joy I had never known, never seen before, and it washed over me, I felt a tingling in my own groin and wondered at it—the goddess, this must be the goddess, coming over me too, and I saw her form, from the figurines my mother had scattered all about the house, with their great breasts and the mouths puckered in what I now knew to be delight—

And I knew I must hide. I knew I must feel shame. The same shame I had felt when my mother had come upon me once fingering my member, wondering at the stabs of feeling that shot from it, at its sudden hardness in my hand—

I felt no shame. This was all natural, this was all the goddess. Did not my mother Speak for her? And this, surely, was part of her Speaking—

Baruch! I heard the word as if it came from the stars above rather than from my mother's mouth. It was not a rebuke; it was an invitation.

Come here, she said. You can be witness. This is the work of the goddess. But you must speak of it to no one.

I nodded; I had no breath to speak.

Why did my mother's face seem brighter here in the darkness of the room than out in the courtyard, beneath the moon?

Yes, this was the goddess. Here., I shivered, despite the warm night and the close air.

The other woman was looking at me, up and down, a faint smile playing across her face, her mouth slightly ajar, her teeth showing silver-white. She was not ashamed.

We bless each other this way, said my mother. We bless each other, we women, in the name of the goddess. In the name of Asherah.

A terrible thought struck me. I knew why I shivered. Mama, I said, and then stopped; I could barely get the words out. Only the sight of my mother's eyes, and the other woman, now showing him a full smile, gave me breath to go on. Mama, is this what they called abomination? The thing they would not talk of to me? Is this why papa cast you out?

Yes, said my mother, but they know nothing. Nothing. Nothing of the goddess. Without Asherah there would be no world. There would not even be any god. Any Yahweh.

None of them said anything more. I stood, and waited, and watched, as they twined themselves about each other once again, and laid their lips to the other's crotch, and their bodies undulated like waves on the sea, until a gasp of joy, no, more than joy, a cry of the goddess herself, broke from them—and a moment later, I found myself lying on my bed beneath the stars and the slivered, silver moon, not knowing if I was awake or asleep, not knowing if all I had seen was dream or waking, knowing only that it was all goddess.

PART I: YAHWEH

1

When I had become a man, I remembered nothing except the door that I had cowered at, and even that only in dreams.

So, for many years, I thought the story began here:

Come quickly, Baruch, the reedy voice of my fellow-scribe Hanamel called from the corridor, the gods have set another Speaker raving against us.

I sighed. A Speaker. Mouthpiece of the god. With a grunt I laid down the knife with which I'd been sharpening my reed-pen and hurried out of my cubicle. Hanamel's back swayed from side to side as he pursued his bird-like gait ahead of me, and I called out to him. Where?

You know! In the Temple courtyard, by the New Gate. Where else? Got quite a crowd out there already, eager to stone him. The priests want some people from the palace there, so that the King's hand's in it. A regular trial, you know, not just a riot. Elnathan needs you to stand at his side.

I groaned. Why me? Why did I have to stand at his side and whisper into his ear the Teachings of the elders, to ensure that everything was done according to the Law of Yahweh? Once the stones fly, who cares?

I'm no god, that I should take life and death into my hands; I was scribe to Elnathan the King's mazkir—Herald, you might say in Aramaic; he announced the King's will to the people of the Land, and had charge of the ceremonies of the Palace, and—on and on and on; it doesn't matter, save that he charged me with knowing the Teaching and seeing that he stuck to it, especially at trials. And so I've seen more than my share of floggings and stonings; we were called out any time anybody—anybody influential, that is—wanted to have the King's stamp of approval put on a judgment.

I don't like blood. But I'm a practical man. I look out for myself. That's why it's taken me years to figure out why I did what I did that morning.

The stuccoed corridor seemed to stretch on without end as I followed Hanamel; and then, unexpectedly, I was through the door, squinting at an unforgiving sun that bleached everything whiter than the whitewashed walls I had just passed through. We went across the Palace courtyard to the Temple gate, and as we approached I heard a voice ringing across to us—not the hot and frenzied voice I'd expected, but cool and firm, forceful as the measured pounding of a skilled stonemason, thrusting words at us like mallet-blows.

The calm, relentless rhythm of the voice discomfited me even before I could make out the words. It sounded so familiar, yet I was sure that I had never heard it before. I thought back to King Yehoyaqim pounding his fist into his palm in that same rhythm as the god-speaker. Uriyahu—whom Elnathan had personally dragged back from Egypt—made his defense before him—no, no defense really, merely the same angry words denouncing Yahweh's City and Yahweh's House, predicting our doom, that had led Yehoyaqim to seek him out in the first place. The King did not bother with the niceties of the Teaching that day. Elnathan swung his sword with a casual grace, severing the Speaker's head even as he cried out Shiloh!—the ancient sanctuary that Yahweh had repudiated and destroyed, centuries ago; no doubt Uriyahu meant us to fear that Yahweh would likewise destroy his current House.

I remember the blood pouring forth from the severed neck, bathing the fallen head, its mouth still open from its last, fevered word, drinking in its own blood.

Yehoyaqim's fist had stopped pounding.

We passed over the limestone pavement towards the New Gate of the Temple. Now words began to come:

I will do to the House that is called by my name, the House in which you trust, and to the place that I gave to you and to your ancestors, just what I did to Shiloh—

The severed head rolled on the floor, swimming in the Speaker's blood—

And I will cast you out of my sight, just as I cast out all your kinsfolk, all the offspring of Ephraim

and the mouth gaped, drinking in the red stream that glistened in the torchlight—

I tried to drive the memory from my mind. The severed head kept bobbing up before me, like a rotting apple tossed into a fetid pond.

Why me? I am only a scribe, a scribbler of words, of speech clotted like blood on skin and crushed reeds.

We arrived at the ragged edge of the crowd. People were already cursing and raising their fists; some of the women were chanting praise-songs to Yahweh, hoping to avert the disaster the words would bring. Words have power; they are the breath of gods. Let them rage unchecked, and they tear down even the thickest city walls. I became so engrossed in the sounds around me as I pressed through the crowd that I did not bother to look up until I was almost at the gate, right below the voice.

The Temple guards were already closing around him, now that he was finishing—when a god possesses a man, he's too dangerous to touch; I've always wondered how Elnathan could so casually have cut off Uriyahu in the middle of his ranting, treason though it may have been. And then, just as he stopped and the guards rushed him, I caught a glimpse of the Speaker’s face—as cool and steady as his voice.

I had seen that face before—but where?

I turned my face away. It doesn't matter, I told myself. But it did matter. Although the crowd seethed around me, and the rank smell of bodies overpowered my senses, I saw nothing, felt nothing, but the gaze of those eyes, focused on—what? On something I dared not see but would always long for. I knew that face. A boy's face. I had been a boy once, fierce yet innocent as he was. That was long ago. That was another self that I did not dare remember. I closed my own eyes—the Speaker's eyes loomed out of my darkness.

Why me?

Elnathan was already there; he must have come through the King's gate into the courtyard, from the other side of the New Gate. Apparently the priests had wasted no time in summoning him. I heard his voice, low and gravelly, trying to subdue the crowd. I knew that I had to step forward, to stand beside him for the trial to follow, to see that all the niceties were followed, that this death was seen as a proper act of Yahweh's anointed king.

My feet stayed rooted on the ground.

2

The crowd swirled around me, pressing me forward like a wave of the sea casting a dead fish on the shore. I found myself standing before the Speaker, the Temple guards now holding him. I looked into his face; he looked into mine, and at once I sensed that he recognized me. But how? His eyes stayed riveted on mine; I felt his gaze burning through me. I turned my eyes away, only to catch sight of Elnathan. He beckoned me forward. I had no choice, if I wanted to keep my job. I went over to his side.

As I drew closer I saw the cold fury in his eyes—the same cold fury that had propelled that sword, so casually and yet so precisely, onto the neck of Uriyahu.

I had to save him.

I did not know where the thought came from. I fought it off. What was this man to me? I shook my head as if to rattle myself awake. He was young and handsome; that was all. I am a foolish man, and getting old. This man was nothing to me. Let him go. His words are dangerous.

And yet—

Words flowed past me like chaff blown by the wind from the threshing floor. What right has he to turn the name of Yahweh against us, against Yahweh's house, Yahweh's City?...He aims to turn even the gods against us...This man tells lies in our god's name—what god would tear down the House and the City that are his?...The Law demands that Speakers of lies be put to death...

The charges flew like stones at a criminal's body.

And the Speaker smiled.

Well, he might as well smile, I thought; no one needed to bring charges; he had spoken plainly enough. Surely the accusers were right: Yahweh would not turn on his own House, his own City; the Speaker had said that he would; therefore, the Speaker had uttered lies in the name of the god; therefore, he ought to die. Simple logic. Relentless as the summer sun beating us with its heat. He had spoken doom against himself. Did he trust Yahweh to save him, when he thought Yahweh would not even save his own House?

What could I do to stop it?

Perhaps I could give some counsel to Elnathan that would turn the trial in a different direction. But Elnathan did not ask me for counsel. Everything was straightforward; his presence was enough to bring the King's seal over the proceedings. I waited impatiently, shuffling my feet, hoping for a nod of his to draw me over—though I had not yet figured what I would tell him.

At least it would be a stoning. There wasn't much blood to a stoning. Perhaps a little around the mouth, that's all. And if the crowd is riled enough—and this crowd was certainly riled, snarling like hyenas in the wilderness—their shouts drowned out the victim's cries. Nothing but the pelting of the stones, and you could pretend it was the pounding of rain on parched ground.

No, you couldn't. It was a bloody business, and neither the howling of the crowd nor the press of their bodies could hide the horror of it. And this young man had done nothing but speak—

I could not let him die.

I pronounced myself a fool for my determination, and then went ahead. The crowd was turning ugly. Dust and pebbles were already flying through the air. Elnathan would not want a riot on his hands—no, this was to be the King's judgment, not a mob's.

There was one person whose words might silence them. One person, apart from the King, whom not even Elnathan could oppose to his face. Not before a crowd.

I sidled over to my master. I didn't lie to him—oh, no, as Yahweh lives, I told the truth—but only half of it. The crowd is getting rowdy, I told him. Perhaps I should go and get more of the Temple guard? He nodded. I rushed off toward the Palace, through the King's Gate.

3

Ahiqam ben Shaphan's white beard flung itself out in a sudden breeze like a banner—a token, if I had but known, of battles to come—as we stepped through the gate into the Temple courtyard. He bore his shoulders bowed, as if with some immense weight, but his head, with its snow-white hair cascading over his shoulders, he held erect, his eyes watchful and alert, bright as a child's. Here was a man who had guided kings since before I was born; his was the word that had upheld Yoshiyahu in all his strivings for Yahweh and Yehudah. The King's scribe—how little that title said of his true role! He was no mere scribbler of words, as I was; no, he was the voice of the King's thoughts—yes, in his mind had been born the passionate convictions that had led Yoshiyahu to try to overturn the old order of things in Yehudah. Not that I was ever an unqualified admirer of Yoshiyahu as he tossed down the altars of all deities but Yahweh. Men must have their gods—and above all, their goddesses. Who wants just one god, lonely in the heavens? Would such a god even want himself, with all the ages going by? But still I had to admire the tenacity with which Yoshiyahu, Ahiqam always at his side, had pursued his passion. Such passion intrigues me even now, as long as I've no more to do than watch it from the sidelines.

Ahiqam was no more than a useless shard in the court of Yehoyaqim; the new king held on to him only because, young man and young king that he was, he dared not dismiss Yehudah's most revered elder.

The crowd around the young Speaker was now seething like a stew-pot at full boil. People were ready to tear each other's hair out, with some shouting that the Speaker had spoken words of Yahweh, and others—a good many more others—shrieking that he spoke in the name of demons, that he uttered curses that would tear down the city walls. Elnathan had his hands raised and was calling out words no one could make out over the din. Only a few Temple guards held the throng back from the young man, still standing, unperturbed, barely a cubit from the fists of his would-be assailants. Soon, those raging fists would break through the guards, and the young man with the far-off look in his eyes—I tried not to think of it as I led Ahiqam on. I wanted to run, but the old man moved with steady gait, as if in procession, indifferent to the tumult ahead of him.

A few men saw us as we came up from the side, and at once they gawked and settled down. A wave of quiet swept through the crowd as they caught sight of Ahiqam's white-crowned head crossing the courtyard; I saw on their faces a mix of awe and irritation, as if we were unwanted adults bursting in on children harrying stray dogs for fun. At last Elnathan could be heard: Here comes the King's Scribe, Ahiqam ben Shaphan; we owe him homage. But I saw his brows wrinkle with displeasure—I knew the look all too well. He knew why I had brought Ahiqam.

Elnathan bowed slightly, as custom demanded, as Ahiqam mounted the steps to stand beside him. The old man surveyed the mass of people, saying nothing, then turned to Elnathan: What is this man accused of?

Cursing the House.

He's a god-speaker?

He talks like one. He was a Speaker, a Speaker of the court, when Yoshiyahu was alive.

Ahiqam looked down at the young man, and suddenly smiled. Oh yes, I know him. He called down to the man, surrounded by guards. Yirmeyahu! So you still think yourself a Speaker for the god. His voice rang with the gentle smile spread across his face.

I know myself a Speaker for the god, the young man replied, neither relief nor awe showing on his face. I know whose word I speak.

At this, the murmuring in the crowd began again, a droning as of wasps massing to sting from a wrecked nest. Ahiqam raised his hand for quiet; the droning grew quieter, but fiercer.

Calm, you men of Yehudah! Ahiqam said. I can barely hear myself speak, let alone this young man. And then he said to Yirmeyahu: Sounds like you've stirred up a bit of trouble, eh?

Yirmeyahu did not answer at first; he merely looked Ahiqam straight in the eye—I thought this quite rude for a man his age to do to an elder—and finally said again, I know whose word I speak. If they stone me, they stone me.

Ahiqam raised his eyebrows and shrugged. He turned to me: Rather a wild man, this one. Did you ever know him?

I think I saw him once. I— I stopped myself. What was I saying?

The boy's eyes were hard on me. I looked away, but they were still with me. I could not even see the sky—

Ahiqam paid me no mind. He turned again to the crowd and said, Men of Yehudah! If you have complaints against this man, let's hear them in some sort of order, as the Teaching demands. Mobs don't serve Yahweh.

At least half those assembled probably cared less for Yahweh than for Ba'al or Ashtart, but Ahiqam took charge of them nonetheless. He conducted a regular trial, calling witnesses on one side and the other. After a time, he had difficulty finding those who wanted to testify in favor of Yirmeyahu, but by then it didn't matter: mere weariness at the proceedings had blunted people's anger. Some still murmured, probably cursing themselves for being cowed by this venerable and boring elder; but all the fight had gone out of them. The droning now sounded like sated flies buzzing over a pile of manure.

The sun was already on its downward course, and the crowd had dwindled, when Ahiqam called out, You have heard the witnesses, men of Yehudah! What do you say concerning this man?

One man, a small wiry fellow who had sided with Yirmeyahu from the start, said, This man has spoken to us in the name of Yahweh. He should not be stoned. There came murmurs of assents, and grumblings; but both were so tired that it was hard to tell one from the other.

So say I, Ahiqam said—a fierce authority in his voice that I had not heard before. Does anyone say differently?

Mumblings rose from a dozen throats, but no one dared contradict the King's Scribe. It was over. I had saved the young man. Ahiqam dismissed the crowd, and it began to disperse, some heading home and others for the altar where soon the priests would burn the remnants of the day's sacrifices and the Levites sing praise-songs at the sun's departure.

I looked over to Elnathan. He was glaring at me. Ahiqam had snatched the conduct of the trial out of his hands.

Elnathan had wanted Yirmeyhau dead. Legally, not by a mere mob—but She'ol is She'ol, no matter how you get there.

I felt a flicker of pride. I had foiled him, and he knew I had foiled him, by bringing on the one elder who could and would block his hopes, and Yehoyaqim's. One more look into those fierce eyes, however, and I realized that I had lost my job. And maybe more.

4

Ahiqam leaned on me. The long standing had finally wearied him. He had a right to his fatigue; I felt I could barely stand on my feet myself.

Elnathan, without a word to me, went off toward the palace. We were alone, the three of us: Yirmeyahu, Ahiqam and me.

Yirmeyahu looked up into Ahiqam's eyes again—not proudly, this time, as he had before, but searchingly, as if to ask a question his tongue could not quite form. The two men looked at each other a moment, and then the old man spoke, So, Speaker, have you any more words for us?

None, until Yahweh gives me more.

Giving god-words under Yehoyaqim's a different thing from being a king's Speaker under his father, isn't it?

Belonging to Yahweh's a different thing from being a king's pet, yes it is.

Ahiqam looked startled. A king's pet?

That's all I was.

Wasn't it the god's words you spoke then?

The god's words—yes. If they would please the king. Now they please no one, so I can be all the surer it's Yahweh's words I'm speaking. Then a fleeting smile crossed his face. And you can be the surer too, master. And he bowed his head in respect and headed off toward the altar for the evening praise-songs of the sons of Levi.

A cold sweat swept over me; I felt my legs tremble beneath me, and feared for a moment I wouldn't be able to hold up my own weight, let alone Ahiqam's. Here was a young man—ten years my junior at least—who could stand firm, as no one in Yehudah could these days. Oh, I'm not one for standing firm myself. I blow with every wind, and don't blame myself for it. Life's to be enjoyed, is it not? What else did the gods put us here for? Why step into a volley of stones? But there was still some fierce spark in me that yearned after that man's spirit. That look in his eyes, even when he spoke to the revered Ahiqam—he had a reverence, yes, but not for the mere man who stood before him.

His eyes looked on the very realm of the gods. And goddesses. Perhaps the goddess, the Asherah, Yahweh's consort herself. I thought back to the great Feast, now abolished, when we sang to the coupling of Yahweh and his Asherah, not just with our voices but with our bodies. A memory was welling up in me, and the face of the young man rose to the surface of my roiling mind like a diver breaking the surface of the water—

And was gone.

I knew I had to see him again, to speak with him, to look into those eyes and catch at least some faint reflection—

Ahiqam leaned on me again, and nodded his head toward the palace. I led him back.

5

The flesh of a sacrificed lamb crackled and blackened on the altar, sending a pillar of smoke up to Yahweh's sky-throne, as I dashed back into the Temple courtyard. I circled the altar at an unseemly run, looking for Yirmeyahu. I hardly knew why I had to meet him—to warn him? To wring gratitude from him for bringing Ahiqam to save him? I myself didn't know; I only knew that, now that Elnathan's look had told me that my old life was coming apart, that young man held the key to whatever future I had. It was more than desire that drove me; it was—already—desperation.

The late sun cast a tangled skein of shadows from the people assembled at the foot of the altar steps, their faces turned upward, as if they expected to see Yahweh inhaling the sacrificial smoke. I had no difficulty picking out his face. He gazed straight in front of him; he had no need to look up to see the god. I wondered if, for him, the world were not transparent as clear water, the forms of all the goddesses and gods that are the world's life showing through. Longing seized me again; I tried to squelch it, and could not. What was taking hold of me? I'm a practical man, not a boy throwing himself about at every breath of passion. And then the Speaker turned and, in a gesture more unseemly than my dashing frantic around the altar steps, spat on the ground. No one noticed.

The sacrifice done, the crowd began to disperse as the priests hefted away their portions of the meat. I stepped up to Yirmeyahu. He must have heard me coming; he turned to look at me.

At once I stopped, as if my feet had taken root in the pavement. I felt shards of ice pierce my belly. His look—I cannot describe it. He might as well have looked through me. It was not hate that showed in his face; it was something deeper, fiercer, a savagery known only to a god of war like Yahweh, but forbidden—I would have thought—even to the boldest of mere humans.

I knew I had seen that face before—I had been hiding from it, in terror. In well-justified terror.

He said nothing. I opened my mouth to greet him, to say his name, and nothing emerged but empty air. I tried to look at the folds of his tunic, to see if perhaps he had a knife in his girdle—or his right hand, which he held hidden beneath the blue cloth. It would have been a relief; better a blade of iron than the cold blast that came from his face.

All at once he spoke, his voice surprisingly gentle. Don't look so startled. You know me. I started. He smiled as he saw my bewilderment. Rivqah, he said softly, remember Rivqah—and then he was gone, the name still ringing in my mind. Rivqah—who was Rivqah?—I had known many Rivqahs in my day. I murmured the name, and another chill went through me; but I could remember nothing that made any sense.

I rushed off to follow him, but as he heard my footsteps he picked up his pace. Finally we were both running, but he was the faster, and he lost himself in a crowd gathered around a camel caravan spreading out its wares at a city gate. I stopped, and leaned against a wall, feeling faint, as the last red glow of sunset vanished, and twilight sank over the city.

6

There was nothing to do but to go back to my niche at the King’s House. My scribe's table stood slightly crooked; I had jarred it on my way out; and reeds waiting to be sharpened lay helter-skelter on its scarred surface. I shoved the table back into place, and a mass of gray dust rose from it, reminding me of the smoke pillar hanging over the altar.

The message, when it came only moments later, was brief. Elnathan did not even bother to deliver it himself; he sent a servant boy to tell me I was dismissed. He lied, to mock me: he claimed the Palace had to cut back because of the debts Yoshiyahu had contracted in his futile fight against Egypt; he couldn't afford a scribe to himself.

I knew he'd have someone to replace me the next morning.

I sat at the table and threw the reeds against the wall. What foolishness had possessed me to bring Ahiqam ben Shaphan in right under Elnathan's nose? The whole house of Shaphan was mortal enemy to Elnathan and his party, who were partisans of Yehoyaqim with his riotous horde of deities, while Shaphan and his sons had always fought for the harsh principles of Yoshiyahu who would have banished even Yahweh's Asherah from the Temple—and from men's hearts, if he could have accomplished that. Myself, I love goddesses—what had possessed me? Yehoyaqim should have been my man. I pulled my sharpening knife from its tattered pouch and started to carve letters into the table top, so my successor would have something to remember me by.

I knew what had possessed me—that curious infatuation with that god-speaking-boy—yes, he was barely even a man, with only a shadow of dark stubble on his chin—and not even with him, not even with his body—a man could understand that!—but with that look in his eyes. With the god—no, the goddess I thought I saw in them. No sense in that. That boy was dangerous. Better to have gotten him stoned.

No time to think of that now. I was out of a job and out of favor. I sat there a while awash in self-recrimination, carving letters all over the table; I started to carve my name, and then drew deep ugly slashes through it, knowingly dulling my knife. I wished I had the courage to carve my flesh with it. Fool!

Night had already fallen, and the air was thick with torch-smoke when I at last began to think straight. Who could help me? All my friends were now on the other side, partisans of Yehoyaqim. With Elnathan seeing me as traitor, there was no way I could get back into their good graces, not right away at any rate. So—regardless of my affection for goddesses—I needed to make some friends in Ahiqam's party.

Lulled by the quiet of night and thick heady air weighted with smoke and the fumes of candles, my mind began to wander. Yirmeyahu's eyes came back to my memory. I tried to suppress them, but then thought: I'd just saved him; he ought to be grateful. He was, I'd heard, Yoshiyahu's pet; he must still have friends at court. I leaned back against the wall and smiled; my future had just brightened.

It took but a moment for my smile to fall. I hadn't been able to get near him. Why should he trust me? He hadn't seen me come in with Ahiqam; he'd had his back to us. And he knew—if he knew my name—that I was Elnathan's scribe. I flung the knife down on the table. The clatter startled me—as if I'd roused all the night-demons in Yerushalem. I looked about fearfully. I was alone. I stuffed the knife and the reeds and all my paraphernalia into my scribe's kit; none of that would I leave to my successor. I started down the hall, grumbling at myself again.

7

The corridor was as dark as the Wadi Kidron on a moonless night. I have no fear of the dark—but this night the walls seemed to press in on me, as if the darkness were trying to seep into my very bones. I shivered, not from cold. Then I noticed up ahead a faint sliver of light. I walked toward it, ignoring the passageway that led to the door to the courtyard. For all the darkness, I did not want to the leave the King’s House; it had been my home for so many years, and when would I enter it again? It struck me suddenly: that light up ahead came from Elnathan's reception room, where he, as King's Herald, met with dignitaries both of our own land and of the nations. I had spent days in there, taking down notes from intrigues and schemings couched in the politest of diplomatic language—a game that intrigued as much as it disgusted me.

But what would Elnathan be doing there now, at this dead hour? Our intrigues were smooth enough to be done in light of day. I kept walking.

Agitated voices came from behind the door, at the base of which shone that sliver of light that I had seen. Coming closer, I recognized one as Elnathan's, the other as that of Lemuel, a captain of the Temple guards.

...and you—you—it must be you! Elnathan said.

Respect my position, said Lemuel, I can't be a mere assassin—

Not an assassin, Lemuel—an avenger! You heard this afternoon how he assailed the honor of the King and the god’s House. He was a Speaker, Lemuel—perhaps still is—perhaps the words of the god still live in him. If they do, we cannot stand idly by while he hurls them at us. A god's words have power, you know that.

A moment of silence—clearly Elnathan's words had hit home to Lemuel. And to me—I shuddered. I'm not such a fool as not to know the power of a god's words. And yet I had defended him—what if the curses he uttered fell on me?

Finally Lemuel spoke again. You're right, but he was acquitted today. I thought you wanted it all done according to the Teaching—

Elnathan cut him off. Yes, while it could still be done so. The King didn't want anything—messy—. But then that fool Baruch dragged Ahiqam into it. Acquitted? He wasn't acquitted; Ahiqam seduced the men of Yehudah and got him off. You saw how; everyone knew he'd decided the case before he even went up the steps, and they all went baa like sheep at the sight of his white hairs. And you know why he was there; he wants to undermine the King. He's not on our side, and Baruch knew it. I'd have you kill Baruch too, if I thought the runt were worth it.

To this day I don't know why I didn't run just then. Did Yahweh hold me to that spot? What business should it be to gods if mortals live or die—or run? In any event, I did not run. My heart pounded, and yet I did not run.

When I listened again, their voices were no longer agitated. It is all so matter of fact, even a murder—perhaps especially a murder. But nothing messy, you understand, Elnathan said. Get rid of the body quickly. Let him just—disappear. His family's tossed him out, no one will think of him.

Not so—one will, I thought, and—despite my racing heart—I smiled. I knew one thing, at least, that Elnathan did not.

If I come upon him at his house, others may hear.

No! Not at his house, if you can help it. He walks about the Temple wall almost every night, late, muttering to himself—or to his god. Alone. Your own sentries have seen him.

Strange man.

Dead man.

At that moment, as if waking from a trance, I jumped up from the squatting position in which I'd been listening and pulled off my sandals—so as not to be heard as I bolted for the door. Elnathan, unknowing, had handed me the key to my dilemma. I'd find Yirmeyahu and prove to him that I was on his side—at least for now.

8

No moon shone. The next night a splinter of moon would appear and the month would begin anew. I've always feared the end of months, when the moon dies. It's as if we're caught in a time that is no time, a dark and nameless wilderness outside the named and measured walls of months. Lilith and all the other demons play abroad at such a time. So my mother told me, and she knew.

I strove to keep my mind off demons and onto my task. Was I a fool? To circle the walls that enclosed the House and its courtyard—vast enough in themselves—one had to circle the walls of the Palace and its courtyard as well, since the walls of both joined without a break; so one circuit was longer than traversing all the City. Who knows if I could find Yirmeyahu before Lemuel did? Or before Lemuel found me?

And would Yirmeyahu believe me? Would he even let me get close to him? I remembered how he had fled me just that afternoon.

A cool breeze blew over me as I approached the nearest gate leading out of the Palace compound into the City. I listened for footsteps behind me; I realized, quite suddenly, that Lemuel could be tracking me that very moment; but apparently he was not. Where was he then? Lurking in some recess in a wall already, waiting for Yirmeyahu—or me—to pass? Had he somehow snuck out before me? I began to sweat, even in the cool night air. I felt cold iron entering my gut—or would it be my throat, opening my neck to let my blood spill on the ground?

The sentry at the gate let me through without a word. What if Lemuel were, after all, behind me, and asked the sentry if anyone had passed? Both Palace and City lay deserted and silent this time of night; anyone passing through the gate would be noticed—and remembered. A good time for Yehoyaqim to do away with his enemies, silently.

I turned right, following the wall in the direction of the Temple. Every few steps I stopped and listened for footsteps. The silence pressed down on me harder than the sound of anyone tracking me would have; it spoke of enemies lurking on any side, on every side, ready to spring from their stillness at any moment. At least footsteps would have given me a direction for my fear.

Courses of smoother-hewn stones, polished almost to a gloss, told me I had reached the Temple walls. The King's House, in comparison with Yahweh's House, was run-down, the facing on its walls almost gone; Yoshiyahu had spent all his building labors—and funds—on renovating the Temple, and had ignored the Palace, much, I heard many times, to his son Yehoyaqim's annoyance. I ran my hand along the walls; its burnished touch felt somehow comforting.

I imagined the assassin appearing out of nowhere, and my blood spattering these milk-white walls. Would Yehoyaqim even bother to wash it out?

No sign of either Yirmeyahu or Lemuel. I wandered the walls alone. I looked off to my side, to the humps of houses separated only by the narrow, writhing streets. I was passing one of the poorer districts that spilled upwards from the lower city towards the very wall of the Temple. I expected, no, I hoped, to see someone or other walking about, or young men carousing, half-drunk or more, looking for loose women. No one.

At such a time, even the she-demon Lilith would be company. She'd set my groins burning, and I'd have something to distract me from my fear. Fear and longing. Yes, the longer I stayed out alone in this city of night, the more I felt that longing drawing me to Yirmeyahu. A longing I thought I had long ago dismissed, when I failed to find it fulfilled in a woman's arms. I thought only the raw hunger of the body could be filled, and I dismissed that other, larger longing—for how can a mortal dare to lust for deities? And now it came gnawing at me again. I did not know whether to feel disgust or delight.

I walked on, listening to my own footsteps. Above me, a bird fluttered. I started, flinging myself unwittingly against the wall so hard I bruised my shoulder. Then, a rush of air, and scuffling on the ground, a tiny squeal, and silence again. An owl had swooped upon its night meal. I forced myself to step forward, following the wall.

The silence continued to press in on me. I took comfort in hearing, from time to time, the scurrying of a mouse, or the scrape of a faint breeze against the walls. Finally I reached the end of the north wall and turned to go south along the east wall.

I saw a faint figure ahead of me.

Yirmeyahu—or Lemuel?

The ground felt cold and dank against my feet. I reached into my scribe's kit and pulled out my sharpening knife. The blade, small but keen, glinted in the starlight. Scant protection, but at least I could draw blood; I need not die with a mere squeal like the owl's prey.

I stepped up my pace. The figure stopped and started to turn, looking about. I dashed into an alleyway between two rows of houses just opposite the wall and hid. Peering around the corner of a house wall, I saw the figure begin to move on.

Clearly, I could not get near whoever it was coming from behind—not even near enough to see who it was. I looked out again at the receding figure. It moved slowly—because it was Yirmeyahu, listening for his god as he went? Or because it was Lemuel, hoping to sneak up on his victim?

Either way, it moved slowly enough that I could devise a way—desperate enough, but all I had. I was now in the part of the city near my home—I knew well every twist of its streets. If I could run through it, parallel to but away from the wall, without raising a commotion, I could overtake the walking figure and lurk behind a complex of jutting house walls that almost grazed the Temple wall near its southeastern corner.

I ran through the streets, dodging piles of dirt and garbage. In the night silence, I realized what a stink rose from human habitations crowded together; in the commotion of day, I never registered the stench. I understood why Speakers wander open hills to feel the presence of a god. Once, I stepped on a rat and nearly tripped; the animal scurried on without a sound. The bristly hair made the sole of my foot tingle for some time, as if I'd brushed up against some demon of the night.

I was sweating by the time I reached the cluster of houses that thrust themselves almost to the wall. Too old for games like this, I thought. I slowed myself, so as not to be heard, and peered out from behind a corner.

The figure came on slowly but steadily. I could not make out the face; Yirmeyahu, as best I could recall, stood about the same height and build as Lemuel. I strove to make out whether the figure's tunic was the grey Yirmeyahu had worn or the blue of the Temple guards. Finally, I saw the figure stop. I dove again behind the house wall, thinking that perhaps he had heard or seen me and was looking about; but when I looked out again, letting only half of my face from behind the wall, I saw him staring up at the sky-vault. Looking towards the throne of Yahweh. No man who was stalking another would have done that. Yirmeyahu it must be.

I should have been able to relax; but I could not. What if I came up to him and he fled? What if he listened and did not believe me? I had this one chance; and if I missed it, if I did not get him to trust me, then all was lost. Forever. The prospect of that loss gaped before me like an abyss darker than She'ol itself.

Madness this all seems now; but such a madness as could come only from a god. Or goddess. At that moment, it seemed as inevitable as death and sunrise that my whole life should hang on this one meeting. If I could not somehow befriend this young man, I might as well descend right now empty to She'ol; I would be a bag of wind, a scribbler of words without meaning, of lines scratched in the dust.

I write this not so much to convince you that I was god-driven—though surely I was—as to explain, as best I can, what I did next. You must understand how desperate I was. Whatever he did, I did not want him simply to flee, to ignore me. I needed to be more than a voice speaking words that he might—or might not—heed. He was walking about so nonchalantly—so uncaring, at least, about the world around him, if not about the gods. I had to jolt him from his half-slumber, prove to him what lurked at his heels.

With a snarl—never have I snarled that way before or since—I leapt upon him, throwing my arm about his throat. I brought him down, though I took the worst of the fall. I rolled on top of him and started to bring my knife toward his throat—but just as I was about to speak, he kicked my shins and tossed me off. He started to rise, but I jumped up and pinned him to the wall, again bringing up my knife. He was about to bat it away when I blurted out, You're a careless one, Yirmeyahu, to be wandering alone at night in this city. If I were an enemy of yours your blood would be spoiling the finish of this wall. That was a lie, of course—he could easily have bested me if I'd been serious in my attack—but he was so startled that for a moment he just stood there staring at me in puzzlement, long enough for me to let the knife down and stuff it back into my scribe's pouch.

He laughed. I never knew scribes could be so quick. Were you ever a Temple guard?

No, but you'll be meeting a Temple guard if you go on walking along this wall unprotected. I work in the Palace—or did work there, until today—and right within this watch of the night I overheard Elnathan ordering a captain of the guard to kill you as you circled the Temple.

He looked at me from beneath his bushy eyebrows, rough and ragged as shrubs in the Negev after a winter rainstorm. He stared, silent, straight into me, as if I were some transparent sea-thing, like those I've found beached on the Philistines' coast. Unable to bear his silence, I spoke again. I was—impressed with your words today. I wanted to let you know what danger you're in, in a way you couldn't easily dismiss.

He answered me with more silence.

My name is Baruch ben Neriyyah.

I know your name.

Now the silence settled over both of us. I stared at him, not knowing why. The mad longing I had felt had been driven out of me; I felt drained, a worn and empty wineskin fit only for the rubbish heap. Then he spoke again, his face twisted into a half-smile: Well, you're right about one thing, Baruch; I can't easily dismiss your warning. It could have been Lemuel behind that wall. How many men did Elnathan send after me?

Just one. He insisted that it be done quietly, that you simply disappear.

Ah. Then it's your idea that he won't attack the two of us together—can't risk the commotion, eh?

True enough.

So you get to stick by my side for the night, is that what you're after? Very clever of you, really.

I'm offering myself, I said quietly, for your protection. I wondered: how had he read me so exactly? I myself had barely known what I wanted.

I knew you were after something like that this afternoon, he said, ignoring my offer and answering my unspoken question. Well, you win. The danger's real enough; I'm not surprised. I should have thought of it myself. You can come with me, if you like. He reached beneath his tunic and took out a dagger, which he kept out and ready for as long as we kept walking. Perhaps he wasn't quite so careless as I'd assumed.

Look, I think it would be best if you came to my house, I said. I have two servants; Lemuel wouldn't dare attack us there.

Your house? No, I don't think so. I don't feel comfortable in rich folks' houses. Not rich folks in the City, anyway. I'm from Anathoth. We're country people, we even had our own bamah, our own High Place, to worship Yahweh; my father was priest. That was before Yoshiyahu destroyed all the country bamoth, of course. He started his walk by the wall again, and I, perforce, kept pace at his side. So I'm a man of the open country, even though I preached for Yoshiyahu. Against my own father. But my heart is still in open spaces. The City hems me in. The Temple courtyard is the closest thing to open space within the walls, and so I circle it, every night, listening for the god.

And do you hear him?

He laughed again, a dry, disquieting laugh, barely distinguishable from clearing his throat. Even Yahweh's hemmed in by these walls.

I wonder what it's like to have the voice of a god welling up in you.

He did not answer. We walked in silence for some time. We were halfway down the southern wall when I heard sandals behind us scraping on the dust. I froze, and motioned him to stop.

He's making no great effort to keep his presence secret. The footsteps had stopped too; but Yirmeyahu started walking, and they started again as soon as we moved, but came no closer. I think he wants us to know he's there, waiting for the moment, Yirmeyahu said. In other words, he wants to scare us. Or me, rather. He doesn't know I'm long past caring.

About what? I asked, and got no answer.

We should go back into the streets, I said after we'd reached the edge of the palace wall.

Why? To let him know he can intimidate us? I'm going all the way around. Yahweh may yet have a word for me. Or you. You can do what you like, of course.

I kept with him. After a short while the footsteps faded, and we were left in the night silence again. You see? said Yirmeyahu. We outlasted him.

I still think you should come to my house when we're done.

Oh no, I wouldn't want you to put yourself out, he said, curling his lips into the faintest shadow of a smile—or was it a snarl? I've an invitation for you—come to my house tonight. I've no servants, and nothing but a few crumbs of barley bread and some dried figs for a night meal, but what I have is yours.

And if I don't accept your invitation?

Then I sleep alone.

For longer than you expect, perhaps.

He shrugged.

Something about his manner made me uneasy, but I saw no choice but to accept.

9

Even in the courtyard of Yirmeyahu's house I felt I could not see the sky. The walls closed in around me like a fist, as if all the world were wattled stone and dirt. He lived in the poorest section of Yerushalem, in that tendril of poverty that stretched out toward the Temple wall. I need to know there's open sky somewhere near, he told me on the way over; in the middle of the City I'd feel crushed, as if Yahweh had turned his face from me. Not that I don't feel that way enough as it is. And I wondered, not for the last time, how he could be so firmly bound to a god so distant.

The house lay in the midst of a jumble of poor two-room houses, all pressed against one another. In a usual household, the smaller room flanking the tiny courtyard would have been for storage, or for animals; but in Yirmeyahu's house the storage