A Star Out of Jacob

Signal fires flashed an alarm long before the invasion. Blazing like midnight suns they flamed from fortress to fortress, Damascus down to Jericho. King Herod had built these mountaintop installations along his eastern border, 20 or so miles apart, as a precaution against intruders and impending danger. Two days hence, the first messengers burst through the gates on horseback.

Report: a large assembly of Parthians was moving south along the trade route towards Moab. Warriors? No, didn’t look like it. Traders? Certainly not. The caravan leaders wore rich brocades of purple and red, copious beards and floppy, conical hats. Gold-threaded lappets draped their camels. Porters carried supplies. A retinue of slaves and bodyguards surrounded them. Well, hostile intent? Destination? Why travel through Herod’s territory? One more week and they’d be in striking distance of Jericho.

The king slept peacefully at his palace at Machaerus. His ulcerated body had soaked and soaked at the warm springs in Callirrhoe, east of the Salt Sea. He was in the same foul temper after the baths. Traveling was torture. The doctors had drugged him with soporifics upon return and no one dared wake him. It was almost daybreak.

Herod had started his career as a vigorous young man, striking in appearance, with dark black hair and sun-bronzed skin. He was adept in courtly circles, good at war, and utterly ambitious. Like his father before him, he’d become a favorite of Caesar. He’d gained control over Judaea, Samaria, Galilee, Idumaea, and vast areas of Greek-populated land east of the Jordan River. But today he was 70 years old, diseased and dying.

“What the hell day is it? Where am I? Bring me food, you sons of bitches!” Herod lay supine on his in bed, his red face peering over the bloated gut of his belly.

“Herod’s awake!” the servant croaked as he raced to get victuals, and other slaves attended the king.

Stationed just outside the king’s door, the soldier Jairus edged into Herod’s presence. He was short and thickset with a low forehead and a wide, pock-marked face. He had one large ear. The other was missing due to a military wound. His eyes were small and pig-like, lurking as horizontal slits between his heavy brow and lumpy cheekbones. He had no eyelashes. He walked into Herod’s chamber and stood like a man preparing for attack, legs apart, chin down, peering up over his brows at the king. He crisply saluted.

“Yes, what is it?” Herod asked, and eyed the soldier suspiciously. Jairus for him was a puzzle. Sometimes he thought he hated him.

The young soldier was a Roman, on loan from the great Caesar Augustus. An astute military strategist with a supernatural gift for languages. But, Herod thought, he looks like hell and he doesn’t pay the proper respect.

“Yes? What is it, soldier?” he asked again.

“We’ve had warning signals, sire. Watchfires relaying an alarm all the way from Damascus. A large party of Parthians has entered your Kingdom.”

“What? What are you saying? Here? Where are they now?” Herod’s fingers pressed into the bed sheets but he didn’t sit up because it made him short of breath.

Jairus took a step closer. Herod’s hearing was fine, but his breath—which came more quickly now—was known to be foul and pestilential. “They’re still a week away from Jericho, your Greatness, but moving steadily.” He relayed the midnight riders’ report.

Herod listened to Jairus and noticed the dead silence around him. His entire population of fan-boys, female bathers, wardrobe assistants and other slaves had turned to listen. Even his tantalizing masseur Dzadur, with a towel over his arm and aromatic ointment in one hand, paused in his approach.

Realizing he had an audience, the king composed his face into a contemptuous expression. “Well don’t just stand there!” he barked. “Send out a company of soldiers to greet the travelers, find out their purpose, slaughter them all if the intent is hostile.” He dismissed Jairus with a flick of the hand, then smiled and beckoned to Dzadur.

Utterly expressionless, Jairus saluted, turned and left the king’s chamber. “And come back and report directly to me!” fumed Herod under his breath after Jairus departed.

Damned man, thought Herod. I’ve killed people for less. Just because Caesar sponsors him, I’m supposed to restrain myself. Just once, just once I’d like him to lick my boots. Take Dzadur for instance. . .

Dzadur stepped closer with his towel, disrobed to a loin cloth, rubbed ointment between his monstrous hands and got to work on Herod’s beleaguered body. All the while managing to roll out honeyed phrases of adulation.

The illiterate Dzadur was cunning and tall, almost twice the size of Jairus. He held a favored position at court. Not only did his Olympian body give the female slaves palpitations, but the sight of Dzadur in a loin cloth excited their imagination. What other heroic attributes might he possess? In any case, the old king rather enjoyed the gossip. Dzadur was Armenian and the most skillful masseur Herod had ever encountered. His beauty and grace of movement made Herod think of himself as a young man, when he was stalwart and unstoppable, unafraid, masterful, riding at the head of armies! When women’s eyes followed him across the room, courtiers feared him, and kings kneeled at his feet. Too bad Dzadur didn’t have anything of interest to say other than flattery. In fact, Dzadur was dull as muck.

Jairus on the other hand, what depths lurked behind that severe demeanor?

Herod remembered the Roman training session he had witnessed at the gymnasium in Jerusalem, and his own astonishment. There was the miniature Jairus pitted against an opponent who towered over him. Jairus’s uncanny speed and surprise maneuvers with the blade were a sight to behold. Because he was lower to the ground and maintained an abnormally low crouch, it aided him in ducking the man’s jabs. His footwork displayed a dancer’s flexibility. He would thrust, parry,