Iunius, AD. 64

My dearest friend, another letter from Rome. It’s quite a testing time here... a hell hole. Things are getting overheated. Fires are raging. People are burning. Our fellow Christians are being fed to the wild beasts in the circus and recently some of our followers have been doused in pitch, raised on poles and ignited to provide street lighting at night. Half of Rome has been incinerated. The Imperator Nero has proclaimed that members of our sect are responsible, but others are saying that he had the fires set deliberately so that he could remove the slums and rebuild Rome as a showplace in marble. We followers of Jesus are copping the blame, convenient scapegoats because of our "outlandish" habits, beliefs and practices.

I was going to call this letter an "epistle" but changed my mind after bumping into Saul the other day. Yes, he's finally made it to Rome. There's no stopping him, you know. That fellow has got me very worried, I don't think he's doing our cause any good at all. What a pretentious schmuck! He even thinks he knows more about the Master than you and James, Matthew and Phillip, or even more than I do. He tells our stories as though he were an eye-witness when he wasn't even there! He then accuses us of sloppiness and forgetfulness when our version, the eye-witness account differs from his Johnny-come-lately version. And, as if that's not enough... the plans he has for our movement! He wants to make it into a regular "religion", replacing the established religions of Egypt, Greece, Persia, Rome and Judah. He imagines a vast enterprise with a hierarchy of priests, bishops, archbishops, cardinals, and eventually, a Pope.

He even had the temerity to suggest when we met the other day, that I would make an ideal Pope. He called it Pontifex Maximus. I asked him if that wasn't a name previously attached to Julius Caesar before he got his. He said “Yes, but we could change it to Pope, short and to the point and much easier for the plebs to remember.” I was rather taken aback and a little lost for words. I told him that Jesus didn't talk about priests and bishops and popes and whatnot, never said anything at all about these things.

Saul answered, (I hate to call him Paul, ok, yes, yes, so it is his baptismal name, but it really sticks in my craw!) that Jesus mentioned these hierarchies to him after he fell off his horse on the road to Damascus. I then said "It seems the Master had quite a lot to say to you as you lay by the side of the Damascus road. Things he failed to say to any of us while he was alive."

This irony was lost on Saul, he just didn't get it. He plowed on. Occasionally he tries to make me call him Paul, but I just pretend that I forgot. In his pompous, self-opinionated, nasal way, he said, "The Master has much more to reveal and He will choose the time, the place and the ideal person to reveal it to, in fact there is rather a lot of unfinished business."

So, dear John, I retaliated, pointing out that there were far too many versions of the main events getting around. I told him I was really pissed off that one version described me as betraying the Master three times before the cock crowed. I said “I never did that, well, once maybe, but not three times”. He wasn't the slightest bit perturbed by this, saying, "That's ok! It's great story. We need great stories to hang this on. When you're giving sermons to assembled bodies of cretins and fuckwits you gotta have plenty of good stories to hold their attention, otherwise you'll just lose them. And remember, their religions are full of colourful myths and legends, We must have some fables and legends of our own."

I then suggested that we should just tell it like it happened, but he broke in brusquely, "My dear Petros", (he always chooses the Greek form, gone are the old days when we both had good, simple Hebrew names starting with "S", now our names both start with "P", and as you know, there is no "P" in Aramaic... makes it very difficult to say my own name), "You say one thing, and James says another, John has his way of saying it and Mary from Magdala says her account is the only reputable one. Thomas has gone awol, no-one knows quite where, and John is in his splendid isolation on Patmos writing his version of events. So who can say which is the correct version? That's why it would be best if you were to stand up, bite the bullet and become "Ponitfex" or "Pope", whichever you prefer, and then we'll put in an ambit claim for infallibility for good measure."

Believe me John, I told him this didn't sit well with me, (what's in a name, a Saul by any other name would not smell any sweeter), "Don't you remember Paul, Jesus told us: Do unto others!"  Once again he interrupted, "He may well have said it, but he didn't invent it. It was not an original idea of his. He was just quoting (without acknowledgement, I might add) an idea he pinched from one of our Jewish sages who died a hundred and fifty years ago!"

Well! What could I say to counter that? As you know I'm not much of a scholar, and Saul, for all his faults is certainly a scholar, a well educated man. A man who is extremely hard to best in any discussion or argumentum. I took him to task for his directive "Wives be subservient to your husbands." You know what he said? He said, "It simply doesn't matter what Jesus thought about women. If Jesus liked women and hung around with prostitutes and and even stopped one of them from being stoned, as Judaic Law proclaimed, well, he was wrong, and if we're not careful the women will soon be on top and running the whole show, and then it'll be all over Red Rover." I don't think we're going to have many converts amongst our feisty Jewish women with this sort of attitude.

So John, as you can see it's very trying here in Rome. No pizza, no cappuccinos, no pasta. Just bread and circuses, and guess who's top billing at the circus? Guess who's on the menu? Rome is a huge, sprawling, putrid excressence on the Earth. The people of Rome like to call themselves Romans, but really they come from everywhere in the empire, from all corners of the known world. From Egypt, Syria, Greece, Germania, Gaul, Iberia, Britannia... people of all shapes, sizes and skin-colour. Languages such as we could never have imagined: forget "talking in tongues", over here mate, here anyone can do it, it's normal. The Romans themselves are truly an extraordinary people, they have built this city from the spoils of countless wars. They have built the "empire" from centuries of warfare. And yet all they ever really think about is having a good time. I bumped into a chappy the other day, in fact he came to visit me, sought me out, heard I was in town and wanted to make my acquaintance. What bright eyes he had, a very sharp cookie. He said his name was Petronius, a name not dissimilar to my own. It seems he mixes in the highest circles, no names of course, but of the top echelon you can be sure, a darling of the decadent literati. He told me he was a writer and I tried to draw him out on this but he was too modest. He has a huge appetite for knowledge, wants to know everything, that's why he was interested in our movement, why he looked me up. He wanted to know firsthand what we stood for, and in what respects our beliefs were different from those of other Jews. I told him many of our stories, some of the more notable events in the Master's life, but he was extremely sceptical. For example, he said that Jesus had no choice in dying on the cross, it was not between the Son and the Father at all. It was between Pilate and the Sanhedrin, a purely political issue. They just needed someone like Jesus to come along and that's what happened. It seems Petronius had already discussed this with Pilate and Pilate assured him that Jesus was just a simpleton who had a confused notion of his own "grandeur", perfectly harmless. But the High Priests needed to re-assert their authority over the pernickety Hebrews, show that they were still a force to be reckoned with, and that's all there was to it... just another scapegoat sacrificed to authority. Wrong place, wrong time!

I asked if he ever thought about the life after death. He said he had no facts to go on concerning this matter, but that he preferred the pursuit of pleasure and the avoidance of pain. "You see this city... we didn't just go out into the world, warring, seigeing, killing and enslaving, losing many worthy Roman lives along the way for nothing. We got spoils, riches, slaves to do the cooking and all the the other domestic things. Nations to supply us with a wonderful range of food and materials. In return we just try to show them a better way to live rather than killing each other and squabbling amongst themselves. The Pax Romana. The good life. Civilisation! We didn't go to all this trouble simply to sit around and worry about life after death, a concept which has no basis in scientific fact, nor in logic. We did it for the here-and-now, enjoy today 'cause it won't last. Live for today and let forever look after itself!" I said,"Caius Petronius, you may call it civilisation, but from where I sit it ain't so civilised."

So what do you think happens next? He asked me if I believed all that garbage about 'turn the other cheek", and I said, "Of course I do, the Master specifically told us that we must do it." So Petronius up and smashed me with his fist on the right side of my face, a very forceful blow, nearly knocked me over. Considering my advanced years you might be surprised to hear I almost took a swipe at him, but then I remembered and held myself in check, and turned the other cheek. Then he smashed me on that cheek too. Now with two aching cheeks and a few loosened teeth I asked him, "What did you have to do that for? It’s only a figure of speech, it wasn't meant to be taken so damned literally." And he smiled and said he would like to see me hit a Roman on the cheek and see what a Roman would do in return. As he sat back on his seat his toga moved ever so slightly to reveal the hilt of a silver dagger. I thought it best not to pursue this matter.

Then he told me about a friend of his who had recently been commissioned to prepare a couple of legions to go to Judea to sort out our compatriots. There's been a lot of bloodshed since we left John, but Petronius assured me that Wes would fix it up. Those pesky Jews didn't have any idea what the Fates were sending their way. They wouldn't have much energy left for their endless internecine warfare after the muleteer had finished with them.

So, my dearest John, much beloved of the Master, I don't think it's likely Petronius will join our movement. He's busy hiding himself away from Nero just at the moment. Just as Saul is, and just as I am. Isn't it strange that three such different people are all hiding away from the same monster? God, I miss the old days, getting up in the early hours, pushing the boats out to sea, casting the nets, pulling in the loads of struggling fish, selling the catch on shore to the traders, and then going home to dinner and a well-earned rest. Then He comes along with his fables and his tricks and gets us all wrought up and confused. I'll never forget that day out on Galilee when he walked on the water... how did he do that? I told Petronius about it and laconically he answered, "Sandbar?" I told him there were no sandbars in that part of the Sea of Galilee, then I described how I tried to walk to Him and got horribly wet and nearly drowned, and got pretty embarrassed about it, and would have drowned if you fellows hadn't hauled me in and saved my life. The Master was just smiling that benign smile of his. Thomas writes me from India that there are statues in India with smiles the same as His smile. By the way, how is old Thomas, have you heard from him lately? They say he's writing his version of our story in his own inimitable fashion. I received a draft the other day which had some interesting passages, a bit like Matthew’s, but mostly like Thomas himself. How about this John...

          "For no-one lights a lamp and puts it under a basket, nor does one put it in a hidden place. Rather, one puts it on a lampstead so that all who come and go will see its light".

Now Matthew puts it like this: (Matt: 5, 15)

          "You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hid. Nor do men light a lamp and put it under a bushel, but on a stand so that it gives light to all in the house."

I'm wondering, my dearest brother, how are you going to report this saying and how are you going to place it within your text? The way I recall it after the passage of thirty years is,

 "Don't hide your lamp in a cellar, or under a bushel; put it on a stand so all who enter may see the light."

Personally, I prefer "bushel" to "basket".  I hope you get it closer to the way the Master said it. But hats off to old Thomas, I'll bet you none of you can beat this:

          "If a blind person leads a blind person, both of them will fall into a hole."

That's pretty good, eh? But as I said before, far too many versions going round. I think I'd better keep my version to myself. I'm still trying to come to terms with all the things that happened in those turbulent years. I tell you my friend, I was really knocked off my feet that day Jesus took Thomas' hand and inserted his fingers into the open wound in His chest. My knees started to wobble and I nearly fainted. (Yes, I agree, I always was a bit of a wuss, can't work out how you found the courage to stay at the foot of the cross... it was much too gruesome for me, and risky.) But crikey, that was one hell of a trick! How did he do that?

Anyhow my dear young friend, strange isn't it, I feel quite old myself, but I always think of you as "young", as you were then. I must sign off now and get this letter away to you. Probably take two months by snail-mail. There's a commotion out on the street and the sound of soldiers approaching. Can you imagine on my visa or work permit: "Occupation: Pope" ?

Knock! Knock! Knock!

* * * * *

p.s., It appears that this "epistle" from Peter in Rome to John on Patmos never arrived on Patmos. Nor was it listed amongst the formally accredited epistles of the New Testament. However, Petronius had access to it for a while, and entertained his friends at dinner with a humorous reading from it, before he had to slip away quietly and slit his veins. Then he bound up his veins, got out of the bath and came back to the assembled guests. He picked up his precious fluorspar wine-dipper, which Nero so desperately coveted, and although he had paid 300,000 sesterces for it, Petronius dropped it onto the marble floor so that the Emperor could never inherit it, then went back to his bath and unbound his wrists.

From this time, the scroll disappeared into the fog of history. Like the Holy Grail it has surfaced from time to time, until it was eventually discovered by another Peter raking the leaves in the forest of Denver, Australia, a country far removed from ancient Rome and unknown to the dilettantes and decadent literati of those days, in a ceramic jar decorated with strange letters in Greek characters around the rim which read "anachronista". In the jar this Peter of Denver also found something which resembled a purple soup ladle which was broken in two. This Peter of Denver has now decided to fix the soup ladle with super glue, and is now forwarding the scroll to his esteemed friend, John Thomas O'Fearna Flaus, The Collector General of Castlemaine, for safekeeping, where it can be assured of being saved for at least another millenium.

Peter Tammer