Anno Stellae 4148, Anno Stellae 4149, Anno Stellae 4150, Anno Stellae 5909, Anno Stellae 5913: RetroStar Chronicles

By R.D. Ginther

Chronicle 34, Anno Stellae 4148 is the continuation of the retrogression of Earth II and the life of Yeshua. It is at this period of time that the life of an obscure woman by the name of Noahdiah is revealed. She is exposed as a very wealthy woman and the aunt of Maryam, Yeshua's mother. She is also exposed as a miserly widow who puts her love for money above her own needs and the needs of others. Her character is rather unsavory and wanton. How long will she go on like this? In the meanwhile Pontius Pilatus struggles to stay on top of the political platform and his marriage to Procula. Knowing that his days as Governor are numbered, Pilatus tries his best to become political allies with the Sanhedrin but is this sufficient to secure him in his position as Governor?

 

Chronicle 35, Anno Stellae 4149 opens with Wally IV keeping a careful watch on the events in Nazareth. What is the Red Star up to? Why is OP (Opposing Player) re-enacting these particular biblical events? Wally IV remains silent in the background hovering over each turn of events to calibrate the possible strategy of OP.  Meantime, Governor Pilatus makes a big mistake which may cost his seat as Governor. Noahdiah too has had a change of events in her life; from riches to rags she now has the unique opportunity to put her miserly ways to good use, not suffering too much emotional damage from her downfall. She is able to cope but with the help of an unusual beggar woman. The story of the Samaritan woman at the well called Basemath begins to unravel revealing that the true water to quench her thirst was mercy. It is through Basemath that the paths of Noahdiah and the strange beggar widow converges at Yeshua, the living nexus that reveals all their true significance.

 

Chronicle 36, Anno Stellae 4150; Noahdiah is troubled in her sleep at night. There is a turning of the tide in her life and she has no control regarding its outcome. Her friend and constant companion seemed to have disappeared and a bizarre young woman seems to have taken her place, but only for a short while. Tragedy strikes and Noahdiah's life is turned upside down once again, but not without its amazing discoveries. Pilatus is struggling to bring about damage control over his debacle at the temple and instead adds fuel to his growing bonfire of errors. Now there is one last chance for him to prove that he is a true politician and governor, the trial of a lifetime, that of Yeshua. But despite the outcome of the fiery trial, events of epic proportions rock Roma, and Judea, leaving Wally IV stunned and the Red Star confounded. In comes a new player, who isn't really new but is unstoppable.

 

Chronicle 37, Anno Stellae 5909, Wally IV is assessing the strange turn of events in Roma and Judea, and also his position in the wargame. Is it all over for him? Wally has no choice but to stay the course and keep a careful eye on OP and its intervention in the times already past. Wally begins to oversee Yacob and his sons and their errors committed while under the influence of the Red Star. It is increasingly apparent to Wally that this Hebrew patriarchal family and line is of some mysterious but prime importance. But why and how?

 

Chronicle 38, Anno Stellae 5913, still more information is unveiled about Yacob's sons especially Judah. Judah takes a heathen wife and much is reflected on the inappropriate behavior of Yacob's other sons. Is this all the work of the Red Star? Wally has to wait this all out to be sure and is driven to assess the key importance of two individuals, one a grown man, the other a teenager, in this key Hebrew fam

• Language: English
• Publisher: K.A.Edwards
• Release date: Jun 17, 2021
• ISBN: 9798201384555

Book preview

CHRONICLE 34

ANNO STELLAE 4148

1  Have you ever heard such nonsense?

Yeshua left home for good, as it turned out.  Though his mother was much relieved when he did not join up with Yohanan, he raised sharper fears in her heart. 

Her first-born collected a rag-tag following and started tramping about the countryside preaching on his own, as if he was a rabbi with disciples.  What possible good could come of that? 

As the Lord’s Anointed,  he should rather try to set up at the Temple, and that, of course, entailed recognition by the high priests and  Sanhedrin.  Again, just when she thought the danger was receding, he was acting wild like poor Yohanan! 

People in Nazareth were talking about it too, and Noahdiah, naturally, in the thick of the gossip. 

Maryam’s aunt was quick to sally forth to the roadside hut to keep Yosef’s widow abreast of latest  bad and alarming developments.  Not bothering to dress up for relatives, she wore what she wore every day—and was more proud of her widow’s rags the richer she became.

Rapping the broken mezuzah with her heavily beringed finger, she  stepped into Maryam’s house.

Maryam  wiped her eyes as Noahdiah finished her long tale of  Yeshua’s latest misdeeds and vainglorious acts on the Sabbath—of all days! 

Oy vey, he’ll go bad like poor Elizabeth’s son, mark my words!  I realize the Dearly Departed laid the yoke on the ox dreadfully late—didn’t find you, I mean, until he wasn’t much of a catch himself. Just the same, Yeshua need not have followed his example!  You should have let me get him a good Jewish girl,  like Nahal’s fourth daughter.  Maybe she isn’t one for  saucy, citified looks and a turned up nose, but that girl’s lumpy cheeks and big feet don’t hinder her one bit, she can pick a spent ram out of the flock and carry it on her shoulder all the way in from the fields!  So what if she shows her tongue when she eats and her eyebrows run together?  What does that matter?  She’d make Yeshua rich with her strength, and bear many strapping sons too, all strong like her!  But you had your chance and wouldn’t listen to your poor old Auntie!  What does she know?  But I can tell you one thing for sure!  Now he’ll go bad, with no woman to guide him to the right path where he’ll make something of himself in this world!

Maryam was weeping, silently, by this time.

Relenting a bit, the older woman rose stiffly from Yosef’s chair, where she had sat by way of paying respects to the Departed. First pulling up an expensive Alexandrine bracelet, she put her arm  around Maryam’s trembling shoulders.

He’s saying to everyone he’s the Messiah, but of course we all know better here in his hometown.  You wouldn’t be encouraging him in that abomination, would you,  dear?  Some people think you have put him up to it,  citing your odd behavior at that Cana wedding. I wasn’t there, had business in Caesarea, but I heard everything and don’t believe for a minute a word about that water  he turned into wine business.  That was just a prearranged trick of  Yeshua’s in cahoots with the host!  And don’t deny it!  Just because you’re his mother, it’s no use your defending his trickeries and follies to me!  Imagine, Yosef’s son calling himself  the ‘Bread of Heaven’!  the ‘Aleph and the Tau!’  and other such fine titles he invented to exalt himself, a mere carpenter’s son!  Even Yohanan dared not puff himself up like that!  And you should hear how disrespectfully he speaks to our holy men, venerable scribes and doctors of the law of Moses!  It’s a scandal!  Why, when they said to him, ‘Teacher, we would like to see your token of proof,’ he answered, ‘A wicked and disloyal generation craves a sign and no sign will be given it except the Sign of a dreamer of dreams who is to come again after Me.’

Noahdiah paused for effect. Then she pressed home for the kill. Have you ever heard such nonsense?  ‘The Sign of a Dreamer of dreams who is to come again after  Yeshua’!  What on earth could that mean?  We don't need any such dreamers in the country!  They need to do good Jewish work, not lie around all day and dream dreams!

Sweeping dramatically to the door in her rag-wrapped feet, she tapped a finger beringed with four rubies and one black adamas to her right temple significantly. Her gesture only brought a greater flood of  tears from Maryam. Noahdiah saw her dull-witted but nimble-fingered niece was no good for anything more than weeping that day, so took her leave rather than waste more valuable time.

Old, gray but foxy hairs streamed out beneath a long, trailing, oft-patched black shawl as she shuttled back to town to pull a fast deal she just then thought of.

2  The Power of Life and Death

The town gossip turned to a streak of black,  darting this way up and that down the topsy-turvy streets of Nazareth.

She paused to poke in one house and then another along dusty, dingy lanes full of lounging, old men and naked, dirty-faced infants with sores on their behinds from squatting and playing in the gutter that ran down each street and where people threw garbage.

She had not yet gotten home by this round-about fashion when far off, a gold-and-crimson robed Sejanus, in sunny Capri at the court of  Tiberius,  turned from a matter of  imperial state importance—the secret new steam caravan project of  his—to something of more personal interest to himself.

Highly pleased that the emperor had unwittingly acceded to the project, which would put Sejanus and Rome on top of  the whole world,  he continued to capitalize on his winning streak.

Pontius Pilatus is a good soldier, sire, he began, facing the emperor in his chair as he handed him peeled grapes from a gold dish, as only a favorite was allowed to do.  He has a proper regard for our law and a conciliatory spirit—the perfect combination for a Judaean governor, do you not agree?  Don’t you think it’s high time to acknowledge the fact by granting full powers?  I realize his predecessors did not work out and caused you considerable concern, but this man is different.  He’s proved he can raise Rome’s taxes for the steam caravan project, insuring  Rome’s everlasting power and stability, without bearing down any harder than necessary to keep the peace.

The emperor stared at the directive Sejanus held out for him acknowledge.

He knew it granted the additional power of life and death, ius gladii,  already signed and sealed by this Praetorian commander and court favorite as though he, Sejanus, were Caesar.  This was happening maybe once too often.

Tiberius made a mental note,  that playing with  mechanical steam caravans  by a royal favorite was one thing and taking imperial powers to himself was quite another!  He might have questioned just why was Sejanus taking up a mere procurator’s career to heart,  but he smiled generously, and Sejanus beamed with self-satisfaction.  Best wait and his overreaching favorite would step into his own noose!

Lucius Aelius, do you not think he has a pretty wife? Tiberius laughed. He was not above a heavy but playful poke now and then even at a favorite’s penchant for philandering.

Sejanus’s handsome, smooth-shaven face blushed slightly red, then he recovered with a flashing smile and characteristic wit. Claudia Procula is noble in blood, as we know.  One could never guess her age either. Everyone can see the good effect a regular diet of porphura has on the human physique.

Everyone? said the emperor dryly. He took a few steps, then paused.  I have heard tell you are more qualified than others to make that judgment, he added as he rose and walked away from the staring Sejanus.

Was this clever cut a rebuff or just cleverness?

After a moment of consideration and frown, the royal favorite shrugged and handed the directive to a bowing  Greek secretary. 

This was a matter of top priority.  Palestine,  though a petty precinct of Syria Major, was a thorn in the emperor’s flesh and must never again be pressed deeper in the royal side as previous governors had foolishly done.

If that should ever happen again,  Tiberius would be greatly displeased and high-placed heads would,  indeed, roll! 

Soon steam caravans, however, would move the army quickly now everywhere the tracks were laid down—nobody could stop Roman might now!  Nobody!  Why should Rome rule only a portion of  the world—why not all?  This steam wagon caravan was unstoppable!  Parthia’s empire would fall like grass before the mower’s scythe, and the whole East would be next!

The slave hurried off to call a courier who would personally deliver the important, secret message direct from the emperor’s hundred-roomed villa to the man named,  Pontius Pilatus, Governor of Judaea.

His wife Procula, however, received the messenger with the royal decree at the Roman capital of the region,  Caesarea.  In the governor’s absence in Jerusalem,  the wife was as good an authority, she reasoned.  So she intercepted the missive, before the courier could stop her.

Thank you for your trouble,  she said, seizing the red portfolio containing the letter.  I will spare you leagues of an already long and arduous journey. I will personally see to it the message is opened only by my dear husband.  In a few days Lord Pontius will break divine Caesar’s seal himself.

The royal courier flushed red,  then pale.  He knew his life was forfeit if anyone heard of it and objected. By Caesar’s decree, no hand was authorized to receive the royal letter but the one to whom it was addressed.

Procula put her hand on his arm as if to steady him. I swear by my life that only my husband will break the seal!  Do you not trust his wife?

Gallantly, he smiled in return. My wretched life is in your hands, Madame.  May we meet again in  the Eternal City!

Procula smiled most charmingly.

I should like that very much. But my husband’s duties may require our presence here for quite some time yet, unfortunately.  Of course, there is always this city.  It is a fine place for  parties, I find. The setting, I mean, is civilized enough, thanks to the late Herod’s good taste in selecting what we Romans prefer to have around us. But society here is frightfully provincial and will never come up to  Rome’s. I’ve done the best I could with it, however.

After a low bow the courier, now with color restored,  turned to take leave of the palace.

The moment his back turned Procula ripped into the box. 

At last!  At last! she thought, her mind racing. Maybe I won’t be an old crone after all when he’s appointed Legate of  something truly important,  such as ruler over Gaul, or Spain,  or Britain!

The courier heard the ripping sound but diplomatically kept walking to a waiting chariot that would take him back to his ship in Herod’s magnificent, marble-walled  harbor.

A look of triumph spread across the lady’s carefully painted features as she read her friend’s decree granting full gubernatorial powers  to her husband. Now he wouldn’t have to bear the humiliation of having to refer the most important court cases involving capital punishment to either the legate of  Syria Major and to Roma. His sphere of power was complete.  Though Judaea  technically remained a part of Syria Major, the legate was too far off, stationed in Damascus or someplace, to really matter in Palestine.  With the power of life and death,  Pilatus was as good as independent of Syria Major, and could operate as his own boss.

This news was too good to keep in Caesarea.  How long she had waited and waited!  It seemed many times that Sejanus would never be able to pry the emperor out of his  immobility and towering suspicion of his courtiers and even his own family. 

Canceling a series of parties to which she had sent invitations to a dozen princes and kings in the client  kingdoms in the east and north, Procula called for preparations to be made for immediate departure.  She was going up to Jerusalem and would have the pleasure of telling Pilatus in person of his supreme power.

Since chariots were not at all ladylike, it was slower going for Procula. She was carried by slaves in a splendid, gilt-and-crimson chair all the way from Caesarea to Jerusalem. Her caravan of servants and wardrobe-wagons and mounted soldiery was long and excited much attention along the way.

Dirty, ragged children ran out, followed by goggle-eyed adults, from every town and hamlet. Some of Maryam’s sons also stopped what they were doing.  With wide, expressionless eyes they watched the slow progress of the glittering spectacle bypass Nazareth and turn toward Sepphoris.

The sight made them despise their humble home and their mother and sisters all the more.  Their own ragged robes, despite their mother’s artful repairs, were a shame to their eyes after glimpsing the rich apparel of the passing soldiers and attendants.

3  Thirty Silver Pieces

Maryam  never saw the foreign noblewoman, the wife of the Governor Pontius,  pass by Nazareth.  Absorbed by her loom and motherly duties, the Mother of  Israel had no time for gorgeous events in the outside world.  If she wanted to know anything, she asked Noahdiah.  She seemed to know everything in Judaea, Galilee, and Peraea, plus a thing or two about  Decapolis and the Gentile world.

Maryam also had  things on her heart to trouble her brow with deep furrows.

Several weeks before, her second son James insisted she make up her mind about the unfinished business of the chair.  It took needed work space, he declared.  Why not sell it?  he kept asking. 

Prodded to the breaking point by Yosef’s First-Born,  who was, after all, grown to manhood,  she had done a very foolish thing.  Forsaking her loom and taking her entire family, she left Nazareth to confront Yeshua with  Yosef’s chair, the one she dreamed he would occupy one day as Messiah in Jerusalem. 

She could not demand  it in speech, but the chair would say, she thought, everything on her heart and mind.  But he refused to come out from the crowds, nor let them pass to him, and so she had gone away humiliated before all and crushed in heart.

Word for word, Noahdiah repeated to Maryam everything  Yeshua had said at that terrible time.  She had accompanied Maryam, but somehow was able to squeeze through the throng to Yeshua’s vicinity, so she heard what he told Noahdiah’s manservant after he announced  that Maryam  his mother was waiting to see him with his departed father’s  blue chair.

As Noahdiah related it to Maryam a number of times,  Yeshua cried out, in the most scornful voice imaginable to the crowd gathered to hear him:  Who is my mother, and who are my brothers? 

Then Maryam’s ungrateful first-born had stretched out his hand to his good-for-nothing followers, saying, Here are my mother and brothers!  For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother.

Noahdiah,  as it turned out, was far from through with the subject. She repeated saying after saying of  Yeshua’s to her cringing, wretched niece:  Forgive those who persecute you—'can you imagine that?’  ‘Bless those who despitefully use you’—'ridiculous!  A good stout Jewish curse will do much better in that case!’ ‘Love your neighbor as yourself’—why, if we did that, we’d have him and his family sitting at our table eating us out of house and home!  And I suppose he thinks we should forgive these foreign idolaters and blasphemers,  the Romans!  They’re out to grind us under their heel and steal our good Jewish money!  Forgive them?  Never!  Never!  How could good Jews do that,  tell me please!  It’s always been eye for eye,  tooth for tooth!  That’s the divine law of  Moses and we are bound to obey it!"

Then, pressing for greater effect, the widow had stamped her feet, raising dust clouds into the beams of light from the window.  She had just thought of  an old proverb and it seemed admirably suited. 

Ha!  she cried. Handsome Aleph will jig with comely Tau,  Lord Alpha will lead Lady Omega to the bridal chamber! Yes, your Yeshua won’t amount to a hillock of  beans unless he learns to respect his elders and the reverend doctors of the law and do right by the temple priests.  Mark my words, they’ll see to it he comes to grief someday, if he continues dancing down his present path.  Mark my words!  He isn’t the first young fool and know-it-all who started this way.  Nor is he the last! 

But it wasn’t the words about forgiveness that bothered Maryam  so much.  After his stinging rebuke and rejection concerning the chair, substantially reinforced by Noahdiah’s account,  Maryam could see  no further reason to object, and one day the place where the chair had stood for years was bare. Rather, the place was taken by a half-finished plow that James was hacking out of some sycamore