Return to Me (8 page)

“I don’t know how to decide,” he finally said.

“Ask God for guidance. From now until the day we leave, every morning when you pray, every time you go to the house of assembly with me, ask the Holy One to show you what He wants you to do. Then listen for His voice.”

“Will I hear Him talking to me?”

“He has many ways to answer us besides a voice that we can hear. Sometimes the answers come in dreams, but most often the answers we seek are found in His Word.”

It seemed impossible to Zechariah. His parents and grandparents had been deciding for him all his life. He nodded to Saba and went downstairs, wondering how he could ever make such an important decision.

Z
echariah sat cross-legged beside his study partner in the house of assembly, staring at the scroll as his partner read aloud from Genesis. Zaki heard none of it. They were supposed to be studying this weekly portion from the Torah so they could discuss it with the rebbe later today—and the rebbe was notorious for asking difficult questions. Zechariah had to be prepared. Yet he couldn’t seem to concentrate. The buzz of droning voices sounded like a beehive. He looked up at the room full of yeshiva students with their faces bent over their scrolls in concentration and saw only the tops of their heads, covered by the dark circles of their
kippahs
.

He watched an older boy stroke his chin and the stubble of his newly grown beard. A younger boy played with the fringe on the corner of his garment, twirling the tassels around his finger. All of the students seemed intent on their work. None of these students, he guessed, wrestled with a decision as impossible as the one he wrestled with.

“Zechariah . . . Zechariah!” His study partner elbowed him in the ribs. How long had he been calling his name?

“Huh? . . . Sorry . . .”

“What’s wrong with you today? You were a long way from here—and not even pretending to listen to this Torah passage.”

“Sorry,” he said again. “I haven’t slept all week. I keep having these weird dreams.”

“What kind of dreams?”

They were nothing like Saba’s nightmares, but they still alarmed and confused Zechariah. “I don’t know . . . galloping horses and Torah scrolls that fly through the air like birds. Last night I dreamed about workmen measuring the foundations of Jerusalem as they got ready to build.” And one dream that he didn’t want to share had been about Yael. She was lost, and he’d searched everywhere for her only to discover that the Babylonian sorceress had hidden her inside a large storage basket. He awoke from these dreams drenched with sweat, wondering what they meant. If God had sent them as signs or as an answer to his dilemma, Zechariah had no idea how to interpret them.

“Well, we’d better finish studying this passage, or the rebbe will give us both nightmares. He always seems to know when we aren’t prepared.”

Zechariah bent over the scroll again, forcing himself to concentrate. Every morning and evening when he’d gone to the house of assembly to pray with his grandfather, Zechariah asked the Holy One whether he should stay in Babylon or go to Jerusalem. Nothing ever happened. No voice called down to him from the clouds, no answer leapt off the page of the Torah, no burning bushes appeared. And every day as the time of departure drew closer, Zechariah felt more and more pressure to choose.

This was too hard, he decided as he looked around at the other students again. How could he concentrate on his studies? Tomorrow was his bar mitzvah. He would go up to read the Torah for the first time, and from that day forward he would be considered a man in the Almighty One’s sight. He would have
to make difficult decisions like this for the rest of his life. Was it always going to be this hard?

Somehow, Zechariah got through the rest of his studies that morning. Thankfully, the rebbe called on every student but him that afternoon, as if aware that Zechariah’s mind was elsewhere on the day before his bar mitzvah.

“So, Zechariah. Have you decided what you will do?” his grandfather asked as they walked home from prayers later that evening. It was the first time that Saba had mentioned the decision since telling him he had a choice a week ago. Abba hadn’t asked him about it either, but Zechariah had caught his parents gazing at him as they ate together as if he were a stranger.

“No,” he told his grandfather. “My heart says to stay here with my parents.”

“You are a man now, not a child.”

“Even so . . .” Zechariah’s eyes filled with tears at the thought of never feeling his mother’s arms around him again or seeing Abba smile at him in pride. “How will I know for sure if the Holy One is speaking to me?”

“His answer will be unmistakable. In the meantime, you can’t trust your emotions if you want to do what God is telling you to do.”

They walked side by side in silence the rest of the way, but Saba stopped when they reached home, pausing just outside the gate to their courtyard. “Tomorrow will be a joyful occasion for all of us as we celebrate with you. But you must be careful not to let your parents or me or anyone else pressure you into choosing what they want you to do. It must be what the Holy One tells you to do.”

Zechariah barely slept, tossing on his mat all night. He walked to the house of assembly with his family the next morning with the new prayer shawl they had given him draped around his shoulders. Abba hired musicians with flutes and cymbals and
drums to accompany his procession, making music as their neighbors and friends walked with Zaki, clapping and singing. As they crowded inside the house of assembly, Zechariah suddenly felt nervous about reading the Torah for the first time, even though he had practiced and practiced. Everyone in his family, everyone in his community, would be listening.

The leader began with prayer, and while Zechariah waited to be called up to read, he prayed, just as he’d prayed every day, asking the Holy One to show him if he should go to Jerusalem or stay in Babylon with his family. God still didn’t answer him.

At last the moment came. It was time for Zechariah to read. His heart beat faster as he stepped onto the bimah. He watched in a daze as the leader carefully removed the scroll from the ark and laid it out before him, opening it to today’s passage. Zechariah drew a breath and exhaled slowly to calm himself. He looked down at the page, focusing on the tiny Hebrew letters. Then he cleared his throat to read from the first book of the Torah.

“‘The Lord had said to Abram, “Leave your country, your people and your father’s household, and . . .”’” Zechariah paused, hearing the words as if for the first time. He had read this Hebrew passage over and over during the past few months as he’d practiced it. But his daily language was Aramaic, and he had been so intent on learning to read and pronounce the unfamiliar Hebrew words that he hadn’t paid any attention to the meaning of them. Now God’s words to Abraham seemed to pierce him like an arrow.

Leave your father’s household.

He swallowed and drew a breath to continue. “‘“And go to the land I will show you. . . .”’” The room shrank until it seemed as though all of the other people had vanished. A bright light, shining like a hundred torches, illuminated the page. It was so bright it made his eyes hurt. He put the pointer under the words to keep from losing his place.

“‘“I will make you into a great nation and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing. . . .”’”

Could this be the answer Zechariah had prayed for?
Leave your father’s household.
The assigned Torah portion for this day had been scheduled long before Zechariah was born, long before King Cyrus gave his proclamation to return to the Promised Land. Zechariah cleared his throat again.

“‘So Abram left, as the Lord had told him. . . . ’” As Zechariah continued to read the passage, every word, every letter shimmered on the page like sunlight rippling on the waves of the canal. This was much more than a trick of lighting or the slant of the glowing sun, because along with the light, Zechariah also sensed a Presence beside him, surrounding him, loving him. He knew without knowing how that it was the Presence of the Almighty One. And Zechariah never wanted Him to leave his side.

Somehow he kept reading. The golden warmth that filled the page and surrounded Zechariah seemed to consume him, filling him with joy. This was what it was like to be in the presence of God, the God of his ancestors. This was the Presence that had once filled the temple. And the Holy One was speaking to him—to
him
! God was calling him to leave Babylon and follow Him.

Zechariah must return to the Promised Land. And to God.

He closed the Torah scroll and looked up. Everyone in the room was looking at him, smiling at him. He should feel proud of the job he had done. He had read perfectly. But God’s presence had vanished along with the light, and now he felt terrified.

Saba hugged him tightly after the service, and Zechariah could tell he was proud. “That was perfect, son. Perfect.” The musicians played their joyful music again as Zechariah walked home for the celebration. But he wondered if the day really had begun or if he was still in bed, still dreaming. When his mother took his face in her hands and kissed both of his cheeks, he nearly changed his mind. How could he ever bear to kiss her
good-bye? How could the Holy One expect him to? He thought of Abraham and Sarah and remembered that they had left their families behind, too.

Everyone gathered to eat the feast that his mother and grandmother had prepared, but Zechariah wandered away from the food-laden table without an appetite. He stood looking through the gate, wishing he could gallop far away on one of the horses from his dreams and never tell anyone about what had happened when he’d read from the Torah. After a few moments, he felt a hand on his shoulder.

“What’s wrong?” Abba asked. “You did very well. You read every word perfectly. Why aren’t you celebrating?”

What could he say? How could he describe what he had experienced in the assembly hall that morning? It would be like trying to describe a dream, and they always slipped through your grasp when you tried to put them into words.

“Zechariah, what’s the matter?” Abba asked again. He lifted Zechariah’s chin until he was looking up into his father’s eyes.

“Saba told me to pray and ask the Holy One whether He wanted me to stay here with you and Mama or go to Jerusalem. So I did that. I’ve been praying and praying every day and . . .” He was afraid to say the words out loud, afraid they would sound silly. But he was even more afraid of their permanence.

“Tell me, son.”

“The Holy One said, ‘Leave your father’s household—’”

“Wait . . . You mean the Torah passage you just read?”

Zechariah nodded. “I think . . . I think the Holy One wants me to go to Jerusalem. To the land He promised to Abraham’s offspring—to us.” He saw emotion twist his father’s face, as if he was fighting tears. Abba gave his shoulder a hard squeeze and hurried away.

Zechariah shivered at the enormity of what had happened this morning. The God of Abraham and Moses had spoken
to him through the words of the Torah. Those sacred scrolls weren’t mere stories of the dusty past for old men to read, but the living Word of God. The Almighty One was real, and He was inviting Zechariah to walk with Him in faith the way Abraham had, the way Moses had.

He closed his eyes for a moment, longing to pray for strength, for guidance, longing to feel God’s presence again, but he didn’t know how to pray to the Almighty One outside of the house of assembly. He opened his eyes again and gazed around at the gathered crowd, eating, laughing, balancing plates of food in their hands. Some of them would be going to Jerusalem. Others had decided to stay here. He thought of Yael and realized that now, more than ever, he had to convince her not to run away with Parthia and be a seer and adopt Babylonian ways. He wanted her to go with him and follow God. They would go together.

Zechariah wove his way through the courtyard, dodging around all of the adults, searching for her. He found Yael sitting with his younger sisters and cousins, eating the sweet treats that Safta had made, giggling with them. She was just a child, he realized, like he had been yesterday. Today he was an adult, and he felt responsible for her. He reached for her hand and pulled her to her feet. “Come with me, Yael. I have to tell you something.”

“Don’t eat all the treats while I’m gone,” she called back to the others. Zechariah led her through the crowd and out through the open gate, stopping on the other side. “Why so serious, Zaki? What’s wrong?”

“The Holy One spoke to me, and now I know that He’s real and that all of the stupid Babylonian gods are false. The Almighty One is . . .” How could he describe the certainty he had experienced for those few brief moments, the sense of radiant awe and joy he’d felt in His presence?

Yael was gazing back at the celebration, not at him, shifting her feet impatiently. “Is that all you wanted to tell me?”

“Did you hear the passage I read from the Torah?”

“I guess so, but what does that have to do with anything?”

“I asked God for a sign, whether He wanted me to go to Jerusalem with you and the others or stay here in Babylon.”

“A sign?”

“Yes . . . You know how your father hired the seer and asked her to look at the stars so they would guide him? Well, I asked God to give me a sign—He can do that, you know, without using sorcery or the stars. And He answered me! He answered me through the words of the Torah, just like Saba said He would.”

“Why are you telling me this?”

“Because I’m going to Jerusalem, Yael, and you have to come with us. You and I belong with our own people, not here in Babylon. We’ll go together!”

She took a small step back, and he could see that his enthusiasm hadn’t convinced her. “But my mother is buried here.”

“So? That’s no reason to stay.”

“You’ll never understand.” She turned to go, but he grabbed her arm again.

“Maybe we can bring her bones with us. The Torah says that Moses carried Joseph’s bones back to the Promised Land so that he could be buried there.”

“Do you think Abba will do that?”

“I don’t know, but you belong with the living, Yael, not with the dead. And not with the Babylonians. You have to come with us.”

“Is your whole family going now? Did your father change his mind, too?”

“No. He’s still staying here.” Zechariah felt a new wave of misgiving. “But I’ve decided to go with my grandparents. And with you.”

“I told you, I’m not going. I’m staying here.”

She was just a slender little thing, the arm he was holding so thin he could almost encircle it with his fingers. He should let her go and be done with her. Why should he care what she did? Why did he feel the weight of her secret like a heavy stone that he had to drag everywhere with him? “Yael, your mother isn’t here anymore. Her spirit doesn’t live inside her body anymore—”