Читать книгу The Cloak and the Parchments - Frank P. Spinella - Страница 7

It was just after sunrise when I made my way down to the already busy Ephesian waterfront. The fishermen were long since out on their boats, hidden from sight by the early summer’s morning mist. On the dock in front of the ship that was soon to bear me to Italy, a centurion stood speaking in Latin to the first mate, apparently going over the supply list. Not quite fluent in the language, I hoped their Greek was better than my Latin. Still, I would have Timothy with me; if need be, I could depend on him to serve as translator once we reached Rome.

Timothy! Where was he?

I was thankful that Timothy had been able to book our passage on such short notice, and with a military escort, at that. Our ship was a commercial vessel, a three-masted navis oneraria without oars, preparing to sail in the company of two Roman warships, which likely meant that there would be particularly valuable cargo on board. Galley convoys were the safest way to travel. In general, Rome had made the shipping lanes safe for trade over a century earlier; Pompey’s campaign against the Cilician pirates in the Eastern Mediterranean had made sure of that. No serious challenge to Roman naval supremacy had been mounted since, and while piracy had not been entirely eliminated, attacks were mostly confined to unaccompanied cargo ships. “The Lord will protect us,” Timothy had said. But a couple of fully-armed Roman galleys nearby couldn’t hurt.

At length I spotted my traveling companion, coming down the main road to the harbor, his trailing donkey laden with two small trunks for our journey. I waved vigorously at him, and caught his smile as he recognized me. “You’re late!” I shouted. His smile grew slightly impish in response.

Timothy was a small man, in his late thirties although he looked even younger. His demeanor was calm and even-keeled at all times, but with a presence that commanded respect befitting an acknowledged leader of the church in Asia Minor. He gave me an embrace and a kiss, and as I looked in his steely eyes I felt the worries of the morning evaporate. Timothy had that effect on people.

“We have not much time before we depart,” he said. “Please attend to the trunks, Mark. I must speak to the . . . the . . . what is the proper word?”

“Magister navis,” I informed him with a grin. The twinkle in his eye showed that Timothy was testing my vocabulary rather than asking for help, but I played along. “For one who grew up in Galatia, Timothy, your Latin leaves much to be desired; perhaps it would be best to address him in Greek!”

As Timothy strolled down to the dock to find the captain of our ship, he was recognized by several of the brothers, whom he quickly dispatched to assist me with the animal and our trunks. I thanked them for their help. There were a good many faithful believers in Ephesus; Paul had spent a number of years here, and despite his forced departure after organizing a mass burning of pagan writings right in the shadow of the Temple of Artemis, his teachings had taken root.

Nevertheless, I feared for the local church while Timothy and I would be away, perhaps for many months. The factions among us could easily grow more divisive without Timothy’s presence, and more believers could be led astray, at least until Tychicus, dispatched by Paul to take Timothy’s place, would arrive from Rome. Timothy had tried to reassure me that Paul would not have sent for us if he thought Tychicus and the elders could not shepherd the flock during our absence. I was less sanguine. Was this fear a reflection of my own wavering faith, my own latent doubts surfacing again? I could not be sure. But I hoped to use this trip to discuss a great many things with Timothy. I looked forward to having him all to myself for a time, undistracted.

As we brought our things down to load on the ship, I felt a tingling excitement. It had been several years since my last and only trip to Rome. While Ephesus was itself a great city of over 200,000 souls and could justly lay claim to preeminence in the eastern Mediterranean as a trade and cultural center, it could not hold a candle to Rome.

Still, my excitement was laced with apprehension. Paul was once again in a Roman prison, awaiting a second trial on the sedition charges levied against him by his Jewish enemies. He had been imprisoned there once before, when I was last in Rome with him, but conditions were more uncertain now than they had been then. Priscilla and Aquila, recently arrived from Rome, reported that the Emperor Nero was increasingly coming under the influence of Tigellinus, his sinister prefect of the Praetorian Guard, and was becoming even more unstable, reviving trials for treason throughout the City. Rome was typically tolerant of most other religious groups, particularly of the Jews since Nero’s marriage two years earlier to Poppaea Sabina, a Jewish sympathizer—but such tolerance was extended only if those groups refrained from proselytizing. Judaism was by and large not a proselytizing religion. Paul, however, was concerned with little else. In converting Jews, whom the Romans permitted to refrain from offerings to their gods in recognition of Jewish monotheistic culture, Paul committed no offense. But inducing Gentiles to deny the Roman gods or to reject the prevailing cult of emperor worship could certainly count as treason. The dangers could not be ignored, not by me at least.

Timothy, however, displayed no such concerns. “Come, Mark,” he greeted me at the gangplank with a calming smile. “Let us give thanks to God, and ask his blessing on this journey.”

We boarded the ship and each went down on a knee, heads bowed, as Timothy prayed aloud for fair winds and calm seas. My mind strayed as I felt the eyes of crew and passengers upon us. Less than a minute on board a Roman vessel bound for Italy, and already we had given ourselves away as Christians! But that, of course, was precisely what Timothy wanted. He planned to use the trip as an opportunity to preach the message of salvation to a captive audience, as many as would listen.

He couldn’t know how much I myself needed that message renewed.