My Glorious Brothers by Howard Fast

Author:Howard Fast
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: Sourcebooks, Inc.
Published: 2011-09-19T18:30:00+00:00

Part Four

Judas,

without Peer,

without Reproach

And now I must tell what is hardest to tell, how the end came to my glorious brothers. The Greeks, who have many gods and many versions of the truth, and many notions of liberty, too, have a goddess whom they call the Muse of History, and they are very proud that they set down the truth when they write of their history; but the making of history among us, who are Jews, is like the searching of a people’s soul. We are not obsessed by the truth, since our past and our future too is a pact between ourselves and our covenant and our God—and all those things in which we believe; and what else should we state but the truth? Would we hide the fact that Cain slew Abel, in cold and terrible anger, or that David ben Jesse sinned as few men have sinned? We are not like the nokri, for we were slaves in Egypt; and for all time to come, through our children’s time and their children’s, we will not forget that; and we will bend our knee to no man and not even to God. Can you separate freedom from truth? And with what other people is it said, as we say, that resistance to tyrants is the highest and truest obedience to God?

And so I write, seeking in the past, that is given to no man to visit again, but only for God and for His immortal records; and the memories come like clouds driven by the winds, so that I want to put aside the parchment and lay my head on the table and cry out:

“Oh, my brothers, my glorious brothers, where are you—and when will Israel or the world see your like again?”

Already in the synagogues there is a new scroll, the scroll of the Maccabees, as they call it—as if there could be more than one, more than Judas, my brother Judas, who of all men was without peer and without reproach—and in this scroll it is written thus:

Then his son Judas, called Maccabeus, rose up in his stead.

And all his brethren helped him, and so did all they that held with his father, and they fought with cheerfulness the battle of Israel.

So he got his people great honor, and put on a breastplate as a giant, and girt his warlike harness about him, and he made battles, protecting the host with his sword.

In his acts, he was like a lion, and like a lion’s whelp roaring for his prey.

For he pursued the wicked, and sought them out, and burnt up those that vexed his people. Wherefore the wicked shrunk for fear of him, and all the workers of iniquity were troubled, because salvation prospered in his hand.

He grieved also many kings, and made Jacob glad with his acts, and his memorial is blessed forever.

Moreover, he went through the cities of Judah, destroying the ungodly out of them, and turning away wrath from Israel; so that he

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