IV. The Scroll
My Dear Dr. Kessler:
I trust you found your meeting with Father John interesting, if not entirely enlightening. Please forgive him as he was instructed to reveal little in the way of detail. In the case you will find a very old document, a scroll which I understand from your articles that you are quite familiar with, at least in legend. You will note that the case contains its own precise atmosphere, indicated on the display, and must be opened in a similar environment.
To be brief, there are those of us who believe that this important piece of theological history may be in danger and, as we are unable to rescue it ourselves for reasons you surely can appreciate, we are asking for your help. We have chosen you with great care, having read your papers and followed your career for some time now. It is our firm belief, Dr. Kessler, as a matter of conscience, that the scroll must be ‘discovered’ and made available for study and contemplation before it is lost forever. There are many, as you may well imagine, who do not share this belief.
We are putting our faith in you, Dr. Kessler. Without your help, this vital clue to the very mystery of faith itself will surely return to the dust from whence it rose.
God Is Great! May his presence be with you always.
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“Bullshit.”
Harvey had driven all night from Kansas to Utica, New York, where his old friend Richard Blake lives and works. He had been Harvey’s roommate at NYU, where they both majored in archaeology. Richard was always the quiet one; he didn’t seek the limelight the way Harvey did, so they complemented each other well. They had gone their separate ways after college, but had occasionally collaborated on the subject of biblical history, a subject in which they shared a common interest if not a common point of view.
“Hand delivered by the Grand Inquisitor himself.” Harvey pulls two cold ones from the case he had brought with him.
“Who?”
“Father John Patrick Collins, the Cardinal’s messenger.”
“Come on; it’s a prank.” Rich pops the tab, “One of those Delta lunatics, no doubt.”
“I thought so too; but it’s too elaborate, even for them.”
“You don’t seriously believe there’s a scroll in there.”
“Not a scroll, my friend; The Scroll. I’d bet the farm on it. There really is a Cardinal Kovacs at the Vatican, I checked with the Catholic Press before I left, and this custom built portable atmosphere will set you back six, maybe seven grand easy. That’s a little much for a prank, even for a Delta.”
“Harv, common; if you’re talking about the Scroll of Yahweh, it’s nonsense; it doesn’t exist. And even if it did, after denying its existence for eight hundred years why the hell would they expose it now?”
“I’m not sure. Father Collins said that these progressives want to do some clandestine house cleaning; improve the image of Old Mother Church. So, this way they get the scroll out of the closet without getting their sacred hands dirty.”
“Their sacred hands would be pretty damn dirty, wouldn’t they, sneaking it out like thieves in the night? Why would they do that?”
“Maybe the Cardinal doesn’t think the Church of Absolute Truth should be in the business of hiding it. I don’t know, Rich, and frankly I don’t care. For a hundred years archaeologists have been digging up the Holy Land. I’ve been out there four years myself. Canaan, Jericho, Jerusalem; Jesus, we’ve been everywhere and everything we find, or don’t find, points to the same conclusion. But will anyone listen?”
“Harv...”
“Damn it! This is the big one, Rich; come on! I need you with me on this.”
“Harvey, it can’t be real; it just can’t. And, no offense, but why would this person, a Cardinal for Christ’s sake, come to you? I mean, of all people?”
“Who else? Hell, it makes perfect sense. It’s what I do; it’s what I’ve been looking for. Plus, I won’t piss around like that old fart Lowenstein would. Personally, I think it was a damn good choice.”
“Okay,”, says Richard, softening slightly, “even if by some miracle this turns out to be true, you know they’ll make a mockery of it. No matter how much proof you have they’ll line up a hundred experts that will swear it’s a fake. They’ll expose this Cardinal as a raving queen or some damn thing. They know how to deal with these kinds of problems, Harvey. I mean, look what they did with the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Gospel of St. Thomas.”
“Maybe you’re right. I say, so what? Bring it on! This could be the greatest discovery of the century, maybe the millennium, and it’s ours. It’s God’s gift to Richard Blake and Harvey Kessler, his two favorite Jews in the whole wide world. So, what do we do with a gift from God, Rich? Give it back?”
“I’m not Jewish.”
“I’ll tell your mother you said that. Look, I know it’s too damn much to cope with, but here it is and it has fallen right into our laps. Man, you just can’t leave me hanging on this.”
“Harv, come on…”
“You’re my buddy, my roomie, and the only person on the planet I can trust with this.”
“Shit.”
“He’s weakening, folks!”
“You bastard.”
“Yes!”, Harvey jumps up, gives a fist pump and goes palms up for a high five.
Rich responds with a weak tap back, shakes his head and pops another cold one.
“Okay,”, says Rich, starting to get into the idea, “just hypothetically now, if this actually turns out to be what you say it is, and we actually succeed in ‘discovering’ it before being struck by lightning or whatever, what do you honestly expect will happen?”
“You mean other than us becoming disgustingly rich and famous? Well, our mothers will disown us immediately, which in my case is another plus. On the down side, as you suggested, they’ll come at us hard from every direction. Our people will be particularly angry, most likely playing their favorite card right away. The Christians, I suspect, will be more subtle, except for the Baptists. We’ll have to watch out for them. And, ah yes, the Pope. Let’s see, after sending out his assassins, he will make another heartfelt apology for all the past sins of the Church…and that should be about it.”
“What about the Muslims?”
“Good point; those Islamic types are kind of unpredictable.”
“And you’re not worried at all about the legend?”
“What? Of course not; are you? Is that what’s bothering you?”
“No; shit no. But, Harvey, you are a Jew after all. What about the scroll itself? I mean, if it is what it’s supposed to be, it could destroy people’s faith. You want that on your conscience?” “That’s the whole point, Richard! Unquestioning faith is not the sweet miracle it’s cracked up to be; it’s exactly the opposite. It’s responsible for all the horrors that mankind has endured from the Inquisition to the Holocaust. Destroy people’s faith? Hell yes, I want that on my conscience.”
“What is this hang-up you have with people needing gods in their lives?”
“I don’t have a problem with gods. I don’t have a problem with the tooth fairy either. My problem is with men, Rich; it has always been with men. And how about you? How can you possibly have any faith at all? Your mother’s Jewish and your father’s Lutheran, for Christ’s sake. Where does that leave you?”
“I don’t confuse the myth and the metaphor with faith in a higher power, that’s all. But a lot of people do, and this, on the remote chance that it actually exists, could hurt them deeply.”
“They’ll get over it,”, says Harvey, sipping smugly from his brew, “and their lives will be richer for the experience.”
“You know, sometimes you can be an absolute asshole.”
“Those who are absolutely right can afford to be absolute assholes.”
“Okay, screw this. Let’s get over there right now and open this thing. Ten bucks says we find Father John’s funky pajamas.”
Once in the cool room on the campus of NYU-Utica they adjust the temperature, humidity and pressure within the room to match that of the alleged artificial atmosphere within the case. The cool room is really no more than a larger version of the case itself, where archaeology students can examine ancient artifacts without fear of damaging them.
As they release the four latches securing the case and raise the cover, they hold their respective breaths and neither speaks. Finally, in unison, as the scroll reveals itself, they manage to utter two words in perfect unison; very slowly and with each syllable receiving its full share of emphasis.
“Ho Lee Shit.”
Without taking his eyes off the case, Richard takes all the money from his pocket and hands it shakily to his friend, who is weeping uncontrollably. It is by far the most beautiful thing Harvey has ever seen in his entire life.
Despite the laughing, singing, dancing and sporadic crying, they manage to separate, preserve and seal all seven papyrus sheets in only three sleepless days and nights. It was by far, they agreed, the most perfectly preserved pre-Christian document either of them had ever encountered. Richard even went so far as to venture that it was too well preserved for its age, but Harvey could not hear him. The scroll would be conclusively dated to between 600 and 650 BC, he was certain of it. The handwriting and grammar were consistent with the time of Hilkiah and the impact of his discovery would be nothing short of earth shaking.
And Harvey knows, without a shadow of a doubt, that there is only one place to unveil what will surely be the find of the century, and Lowenstein’s conference begins next week. There is no time to lose. After a few hours’ sleep, they begin the translation.