A Star out of Jacob

By Martha Carver Harris

Faye is an overweight Sunday school teacher of Persian extraction with a dog walking business and no self-esteem. Mysterious dreams play on her ancestral links to the Parthian Empire and an elite priestly class known as the magi. Faye is, in fact, a link to the ancient group of men who followed the Star to Bethlehem. But she ignores that and doggedly pursues modern-day progressive causes like animal rights and climate change. Quite by accident she meets Sebastian, an intelligent and irresistible Jew who, like Faye, has a serious side. Together they explore the scientific underpinnings of Intelligent Design, ancient astrology, apocalyptic theories, and the Big Bang. A romance develops. But a fatal disease leads Faye to abandon Sebastian and discover the full story of her Parthian forebears. Heavenly personages explain her mystic connection to a child who traveled with the Wise Men. Through them, she discovers the startling synchrony between movements of the cosmos and the Truth revealed in Bethlehem.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Archway Publishing
• Release date: Nov 24, 2020
• ISBN: 9781480895706

Martha Carver Harris

Martha Harris spent her twenty-eight-year career as a US Foreign Service officer working at US embassies in Europe, Southeast Asia, and the Middle East. She speaks Russian, French, and Italian and is an avid student of first-century Palestine. Currently retired, she lives in northern Virginia.

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Copyright © 2020 Martha Carver Harris.

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except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, names, incidents,

organizations, and dialogue in this novel are either the products

of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

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Map images by Gwendolyn C. Bragg.

Scripture marked (KJV) taken from the King James Version of the Bible.

Quotations marked (NETS) are taken from A New English Translation of the

Septuagint, ©2007 by the International Organization for Septuagint and Cognate

Studies, Inc. Used by permission of Oxford University Press. All rights reserved.

Scripture quotations marked (NIV) are taken from the Holy Bible, New

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Scripture quotations marked (REB) taken from the Revised English Bible, copyright

© Cambridge University Press and Oxford University Press 1989. All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-1-4808-9571-3 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4808-9569-0 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4808-9570-6 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2020917250

Archway Publishing rev. date: 11/17/2020

In the century leading up to Christ’s birth, and throughout the Hellenistic world, there was tremendous interest in the exotic, including dream interpretation, secret cults and the mysterious wisdom of astrology. There was a widespread restlessness and the conviction that some cataclysmic change was about to happen. The stars—believed to govern men’s lives—moved in a previously unknown manner. A new star constellation would soon dominate the sky, ushering in a New Age. Some saw the impending New Age in a golden light, as a return to virtue. Others warned of an apocalypse. Among the Romans, unsettling oracles abounded and even the Phoenix was rumored to be returning. But Hebrew prophesies predicted the coming of a Messiah, a righteous King who would rule the entire world and set things right.

Against this backdrop, the magi made their way to Bethlehem, following a Star. This is the story of their journey, and the story of how God—to this day—uses holy scripture, pagan superstition, and the most advanced sciences known to mankind to lead us to the Light.

Contents

PART I:   END TIMES

Chapter 1     Hidden Ally

Chapter 2     Everett’s Domain

Chapter 3     Sunday Frolic

Chapter 4     Endangered Species

Chapter 5     Chaos Theory

Chapter 6     Sunday Disaster

Chapter 7     Cellular Adventures

Chapter 8     Death of a Vulture

Chapter 9     Cambrian Surprise

Chapter 10   Herod’s Court

Chapter 11   Disintegration

Chapter 12   Latin trauma

Chapter 13   The cosmos

Chapter 14   The Star

Chapter 15   Almost Christmas

Chapter 16   Starlight, Star Bright

Chapter 17   Afternoon delight

Chapter 18   MAGA, baby!

Chapter 19   Springtime

Chapter 20   Sweet surprise

Chapter 21   Final battle

Chapter 22   Waiting room

Chapter 23   The End and the:   Beginning

Chapter 24   Lessons from Heaven

PART II:   A STAR OUT OF JACOB

Herod’s World, early 4 BC

Chapter I

Chapter II

Chapter III

Chapter IV

Chapter V

Chapter VI

Chapter VII

Chapter VIII

Chapter IX

Chapter X

Chapter XI

Chapter XII

Chapter XIII

Chapter XIV

Chapter XV

Chapter XVI

Chapter XVII

Light versus Darkness

Chapter I

Chapter II

Chapter III

Chapter IV

Chapter V

Chapter VI

Chapter VII

Escape to Parthia

Chapter I

Chapter II

Chapter III

Chapter IV

Chapter V

Chapter VI

Chapter VII

Chapter VIII

Chapter IX

Chapter X

Chapter XI

Chapter XII

Chapter XIII

Chapter XIV

Chapter XV

Chapter XVI

Chapter XVII

Chapter XVIII

Chapter XIX

Chapter XX

Chapter XXI

Chapter XXII

Chapter XXIII

Chapter XXIV

Chapter XXV

Chapter XXVI

Chapter XXVII

Chapter XXVIII

Chapter XXIX

Chapter XXX

Fatemah’s Story

Chapter I

Chapter II

Chapter III

Chapter IV

Chapter V

Chapter VI

Chapter VII

Chapter VIII

Author’s Note

Further Reading

End Notes

About the Author

PART I

End Times

1

Hidden Ally

Faye bent over to look at her toes and could barely breathe. They had a blueish tinge, just barely concealed by her hot rose nail polish. She straightened up, gulped in a breath, grabbed the folds of her belly and wondered, What has happened to me? No time for that. She slipped into her soft Italian mules, surveyed her swollen ankles, and walked out the door. She did not look forward to this.

Faye stashed her ’97 Honda in a questionable spot close to a fire hydrant, plugged coins in the meter, and gathered her wits.

She heard the low, measured drone of voices as she approached the school gymnasium. A make-shift sign on the door said Environmental Awareness. Someone had thoughtfully scrawled the words in green and brown magic marker, with a red arrow pointing to the right and a hand-drawn palm tree. She grabbed the door knob, sucked in her gut, and walked into a chaotic scene of unsmiling faces shouting about carbon emissions. End-of-the-World signs flanked the outskirts of the assembly, and a silent film depicted dying polar bears. The opposite side of the room solicited donations for the anti-fracking movement and demanded an end to the coal industry. There were five recycling bins stationed about the room for plastic water bottles or paper, but only one designated trash. It was overflowing.

Faye scanned the room for signs protesting the excessive use of water for recycling paper, especially newsprint. She’d brought this up at the last meeting, but everyone had yawned. And water was the next endangered species!

Anyway, Faye hated-absolutely-hated to stand up at these meetings and say anything because she knew the skinny little girl-children with surgically enhanced breasts and pencil arms were laughing at the way she looked. So were their wimpy boyfriends whose unbelted jeans showed the cleavage of their derrieres when they sat down. Faye knew she was fat and disgusting looking. She couldn’t replicate the casual, supercilious manner of the millennials or their intentionally gravelly voices. Her presentations were too earnest, too devout in defense of the environment. She could never master the art of pointing her finger at the so-called real culprits—the red states and right-wingers. Consequently, no one listened.

Today, though, she had something that should get their attention. She sat down next to one of the shabby little cages of bewildered, abandoned animals—the dogs, cats and birds up for adoption. Once somebody brought a goldfish, but it died before the end of the meeting. The memory of its tiny floating carcass, glimmering and golden, brought tears to her eyes. She was a pushover for small creatures. Sometimes she thought the four-legged beasts she cared for in her pet-sitting business were her only true friends. Faye was lonely.

She stretched her sturdy legs forward and pointed the tips of her toes at the row in front of her. She took a deep breath, and as soon as the meeting came to order, she raised her hand. Five, maybe six people got to speak before Faye was called upon—they always did this out of spite—but finally she got her chance. She stood up.

My name is Faye Masgarha. I’m a regular at these meetings. Sweat broke out on her brow, and her ample chest pounded.

"Yes, Miz Masgarha," said the moderator, with an emphasis on the miz. He was a pale, thirty-something cis male with a diamond stud in his left eyebrow, and he knew how to raise that eyebrow while the other one remained stationary. His left eyebrow went north as he added, We all know you. Please proceed.

Well, I have a question for our climate-change experts. You see, I’ve recently become very interested in astronomy—an amateur’s interest, mind you. And I wonder if the computer models we use to predict the earth’s warming trends have factored in such things as the obliquity of the earth’s tilt, which is decreasing, or the eccentricity of the earth’s orbit, which is getting rounder? You see, these things are more likely to impact the earth’s climate than, say, ending Styrofoam and recycling plastic bottles, and—

"Is there anyone here who can answer Miz Masgarha’s question?" the moderator cut in. He looked around. His left eyebrow glittered while he breathed impatience.

Yes, said one techno-puke, buzz-cut man/woman sitting along the wall. His name was Manville. I’m sure those issues have been factored in. Everything has. And BTW, he added with an air of superiority, eccentricity and obliquity have predictable cycles.

Well then what about sun spots? yelled an anonymous voice from across the room, somewhere near the polar bears. "Solar flares can also affect earth’s climate, can’t they? And I don’t know how in the world a computer model could predict them. I mean, the spiking of solar energy levels is not foreseeable. Even the sun doesn’t know when, or how much . . ."

Faye looked quickly around, but couldn’t see the man who raised sunspots. Hmmm. She hadn’t thought about solar flares. Whoever said that, he’s right, she chimed in, nodding her head. Obliquity of the earth’s axis is on a 41,000-year cycle and is presently declining, while the change of the earth’s orbit from elliptical to more circular occurs over a 100,000-year cycle, I think. So both those phenomena could, theoretically, be factored into a computer model. But not solar activity! Anyway, she added modestly, I don’t think so.

Faye craned her neck trying to spot the sunspot speaker, but couldn’t find him. Could the person who raised sunspots please comment? asked Faye. Or maybe the computer-modeling expert?

Murmuring in the audience grew like a roaring tide after Faye asked her questions and finally erupted into chaos. There were shouts to sit down and shut up. Two people saluted Hitler-style. Several others hissed. The moderator banged the table with the flat of his hand and said, weakly, This will have to be resolved offline, later, after the meeting adjourns. We still haven’t heard from the committee against overpopulation, and then we have a report from our treasurer, and let’s see . . . It was clear he wanted to keep order, but others sensed Faye’s hesitancy and scented blood. They had a dissenter on their hands!

But . . .! objected Faye, unwilling to let her serious, well-reasoned question be ignored. She failed to get the moderator’s attention again over the noise, and people in front of her looked around with irritation. One guy spit out the words climate denier. Others joined in, and threw clumps of wadded paper. Mortified and feeling faint, Faye swayed slightly, then sat down with a klomphf. Two seconds later, she scooped up her large fake-leather purse from the floor and moved toward the aisle, stepping over Whole Food grocery bags and multicolored Crocs. She ignored the comments about her large butt blocking their view of the podium, and emerged with a run in her last pair of discount stockings.

What a disaster, she thought, as she made her way to the door. She would never raise her hand again! She would never say another word at these meetings! She’d keep her trap shut. Scuzzballs, all of them. Insular, uninquisitive, arrogant millennials. Of course, she’d continue to attend because she believed in saving the world; she honestly did! But why were people so averse to expanding their scientific understanding? She wasn’t denying climate change. She was just saying that it might depend on factors other than man alone. Why did it make her a denier? Maybe she’d skip the next several meetings. Let things cool down. Or maybe she should find another group? There had to be other ones around . . .

But who was the man who raised sunspots? WTF! He set her up, then abandoned her to the wolves.

2

Everett’s Domain

Faye jiggled the key of her second-floor walk-up apartment along Four Mile Run. She could hear Everett, her cat, yowling his exasperation on the other side of the door. It was way past his feeding time, and he was cranky.

She emptied a cup of dry cat food into Everett’s bowl and freshened his water. His tail twitched methodically as he waited for Faye to get out of the way, then like the prince of a foreign kingdom, he leisurely and delicately ate one pellet at a time, chewed with satisfaction, and swallowed. Only after his royal repast did Everett, with great majesty, deign to lie beside Faye on the couch and watch television.

The news of the day was the Natural Resources Defense Council complaining about the president’s update of rules governing the Endangered Species Act. To hear the unsmiling announcer tell it in grave and remorseful tones, it sounded like the approach of doomsday. Courts all over the country were challenging it. Damn. Something else to worry about. Faye promised herself to read up on this development. Maybe tomorrow, when she was stronger. But she also had to advertise for more Farsi language students, walk dogs for two of her clients, pay her bills, and prepare for Sunday school. Life was more, not less, complicated now that she’d retired. Just trying to do the right thing occupied her twenty-four seven. And she was exhausted by it.

She remembered the Bible story she’d taught her kids the Sunday before, where Jesus distinguishes between Mary, who sits at Jesus’s feet and simply listens, and Martha, who busies herself with cooking, preparing, cleaning, and all the necessities of life. It was Mary whom Jesus smiled at, not at Martha. I am Martha, she thought. I am worried and careful about many things. And they’re all important.

She looked at the picture of her mother and father on the wall—her mother in rich Persian brocades and conspicuous gold earrings, heavy dark eyebrows and widely elliptical eyes that slanted ever so slightly downward. She was a beauty in her youth, and had infatuated Faye’s father (the man in the portrait, wearing a severely gray suit and brown tie). He’d been a university professor in Hamadan, a renowned astronomer despite the outdated equipment his country possessed to view the heavens. He had written well-regarded papers on cosmology, spoken at conferences in Switzerland, had even been invited to collaborate with Centre national de la recherche scientifique, CNRS, in Paris. Her family’s Christianity had never been a problem in Iran. The Pahlavi government was, in general, tolerant of non-Muslims. But when the Shah fell ill and started to lose his grip on power, stability disintegrated.

Mama, listen to me, said Faye, speaking from a pay phone in northern Virginia. You and Papa have to immigrate to America! Things could get difficult for you. The Mullahs—

Daughter, no such language! You know your father is well-respected here. He is sure our religion will have no impact on his job. You are creating problems and worries out of nothing.

That was the year Faye started attending Indiana University, worked part time in a doctor’s office and applied for her U.S. citizenship. She considered herself well-off compared to the salary she might have earned back in Iran.

I hear things, Mother. The situation does not look good. You and Papa might come under suspicion merely for having a daughter in the U.S. Not to mention that you are Christians!

Nonsense. Now tell me, Faye, are you seeing anyone? What about that nice man Varuzh—the cousin of our friend here? Did he call you yet?

Oh, Mother! Faye sighed, looking down at her broken fingernails and remembered their one and only date. And so the conversations went.

But in late 1979 when radical Iranian students seized the U.S. Embassy in Tehran and took its American personnel hostage, Faye’s father saw clearly for the first time the danger they were in. Somehow, someway, he pulled strings with his contacts in Switzerland and finagled a speaking engagement in Western Europe. He and Faye’s mother left Iran with two suitcases and the clothes on their back.

Since that time, they had never quite adjusted to a 1980’s America. But once they were accepted by U.S. immigration, Faye brought them to her church, introduced them to her friends, and helped her mother’s broken English. Her father managed better, since his spoken English language was more advanced. He also worked at it, listened to tapes, and watched the nightly news. It was a sad ending for his brilliant academic career, but—Faye told herself—they got out with their lives, and with each other.

You should study astronomy, Faye’s father urged her sometime before his death. You love God, and astronomy is all about God!

Faye rolled her eyes when he said it. But since that time a Bible verse from Luke kept popping into her mind: And there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, . . . Men’s hearts failing them for fear, . . . for the powers of heaven shall be shaken.¹ That was Jesus’s description of the End of the World. It would scare the crap out of her climate-change friends.

3

Sunday Frolic

So, what happened after the Wise Men returned home? asked Valentina, an artistic 12-year-old with darkly defined eyebrows, a porcelain skin and inquisitive manner. Getting ready for the season of Advent, she was sketching a scene of Bethlehem.

Yeah, smirked Elysse, her older sister. Did they just forget everything they saw in Israel? Did they forget the Star? The baby Christ Child? Did they just return to their old lives? Fourteen years old and adept at conveying an air of boredom, Elysse was razor sharp and good at bringing the class down to earth.

This was Faye’s third year teaching Sunday school. Her corpulent body and big legs seemed to take up half of the 10x10-foot classroom in the basement of the Rectory—a tight space accommodating eight eager children and a large map of Israel. Faye’s recurring thought: The Vestry should try meeting here. The room was crammed with two long tables covered in crayons, construction paper, Scotch tape and a rainbow of spilled glitter in gold, purple, red and yellow. Book shelves stuffed with art supplies and Anglican Prayer Books lined one of the walls. A big paper star hung from the ceiling with a red tack.

Faye smiled. She loved their questions. There are legends, she began, that the Wise Men went back to Judaea. Nothing in the Bible, mind you, but it was said that the Empress Helena, mother of the Roman Emperor Constantine, traveled to Palestine in AD 327 or 328 and discovered the remains of the three Wise Men. This to me seems highly unlikely. But if true, it would imply that the Wise Men did go back at some point.

Well then what happened? asked Harvey, one of only two boys in the class. Precocious, perceptive, but never aware that his tie was cleaving to drops of liquid glue as he cut out letters for the word G-O-D.

You mean, what happened with the Wise Men? Or with the Empress? Faye countered.

Both, answered Harvey.

The Empress was said to have collected the remains of the Wise Men and brought them back to Constantinople. They were transferred to Milan in the fifth century, and finally to Cologne in 1163. Their final resting place is at the Cologne Cathedral in Germany.

"And the Wise Men? If they did go back to Israel, what did they see? What did they expect to see?" demanded Elysse. She needed Faye to get to the point.

You want me to speculate? asked Faye.

Yes! shouted Harvey, putting his scissors down.

Alright, I’ll try, Faye answered, and pointed with a pencil to a vast map of the world Scotch-taped to one wall. We do know that Christianity didn’t just spread westward towards Rome and Europe. It also spread eastward through Mesopotamia and Parthia—the probable homes of the Wise Men—and all the way eastward to India and China. The Wise Men may have had a hand in this. They might have even prepared the ground for the apostles Thomas and Bartholomew who are said to have evangelized all the way to India.

You mean the Wise Men themselves became Christians? asked Elysse, who pretended to be absorbed by a piece of wooden molding broken off from the whiteboard. In reality, she was listening intently.

Well something like that might have happened. And up until the Muslim conquests of the seventh century, Christianity did thrive in that part of the world. Now only a small remnant remains. I am proof of that.

What? Elysse jerked her head away from contemplation of the wooden molding and stared at Faye. What do you mean ‘proof’?

I mean, that my family comes from that part of the world. Our ancestors were Christians dating all the way back to the days of the Wise Men, and Christ’s birth. My parents fled Iran because of their Christianity.

But how do you know this? I mean, your ancestry? Did you do DNA testing? pursued Elysse, interested. The other children stared intently at Faye, who looked at the clock on the wall. Only five minutes left to explain a very complicated subject.

Briefly put, began Faye, "We just know. We Iranians kept meticulous track of our ancestry long before the discovery of DNA testing. It’s part of our heritage. I myself am descended from a family of astrologers—Wise Men, or magi, to use the Bible’s words—who studied the stars in Heaven, tracked their pathways, predicted their movements, and were known as interpreters of dreams."

But ‘Faye’ is an English-sounding name, interjected Harvey.

Yes, it is. My real name before coming to America was Fatemah. Fatemah Gholimasgarha. And that’s all the time we have today. We’ll continue same time next week.

The children shot up from their seats like bullets and started to rush out, leaving the detritus from St. Luke’s coffee hour behind.

Wait! Please carry your left-over brownies and paper plates with you. Put them in the trash outside. We’ve had mice in here . . . Faye smiled to herself, thinking this had been a good class.

4

Endangered Species

Another emergency meeting of the animal rights group! An email blast went out this morning. Then a text-blast then something else on instant messaging. The spotted-something-or-other was in danger of extinction!

Faye grabbed her coat, momentarily paused to watch Everett-the-cat twitching his tail left and right in anger. He hated it when she rushed out early. He preferred those long, lingering mornings when Faye lounged on the couch beside him and rubbed his tummy. They would watch the loose cat hair floating upward in the sunlight, and snooze a little.

But this was not that morning. Faye held her breath while she tried to start her 22-year-old wreck. The only disagreeable thing about the animal rights group was that it met way out beyond the Beltway. They could have found a more progressive neighborhood. Everybody knows we’re not safe in the hinterland, thought Faye, and exhaled when the motor turned over.

Faye found a parking spot then sprinted down the sidewalk in her old black pumps. The Manassas meeting place was still 20 feet away and she was out of breath. She prayed that the safety pin on her bra strap did not give out.

You’re the woman they slapped down at our last Environmental Awareness meeting, aren’t you? a lovely baritone voice called out behind her.