Book Description

Yeshua with his father and brother go to Magdala as hired carpenters to repair boats. He is caught in the middle of a bloody massacre and is traumatised. It is a baptism of fire for him. He goes to a breakaway community in Qumran to reflect. The community’s main function is to collect the fragile fragments of scripture and copy them onto fresh parchments. He acquires an in-depth knowledge of the scriptures. He spends seven years there and is elected as leader, the Teacher of Righteousness. Yeshua visits a similar group in Alexandria, Egypt, called the Assayya. They specialise in healing. King Ashoka of India had sent emissaries to Egypt with Hindus and Buddhist monks who assimilate with the Assayyas. Yeshua learns a new way of meditating and the art of healing. Realizing that this idyllic hermitic way of life is but an escape from reality, Yeshua leaves to be among the common people. He walks among people living between poverty and destitution besieged by malnutrition, physical impairment, disease and sickness from which they know no medical remedy. They are also overburdened by taxation and debt while the rich and powerful live a different life. Yeshua addresses these issues with practical solutions. He urges the people to protest unjust taxation and not to listen blindly to all the teachings of the Temple incurring the wrath of the elite. People come to listen to him. Ten men and six women become his close followers. They set up a base camp on the shore of the Sea of Galilee and move around Galilee. King Herod who beheaded John the Baptist is after Yeshua. With his followers he leaves his territory and travels beyond Galilee to foreign lands where they meet people who worship different gods and practise religions condemned by Judaism. They meet merchants who have travelled the Silk Route and the Incense Route and dialogue with them on their beliefs. It is a religious and cultural shock for him and his followers. On returning to base camp Yeshua teaches his followers of the medicinal use of herbs and sends them on mission. Finally, they join a caravan to Jerusalem. They confront Caiaphas, the High Priest and Pontius Pilate who have conspired to steal money from the Temple treasury, the Qorban. Together with the Zealots they protest corruption and religious misguidance of the Temple. Yeshua is arrested, tried by the Sanhedrin and condemned to death. Since the Romans had withdrawn the use of capital punishment by the Sanhedrin, they take him to Pilate and accuse Yeshua of stirring up trouble against Roman control. Pilate says Ecce Homo and orders his crucifixion.