Voice in the Wind: The Road to Destruction

Voice in the Wind, pp. 303-314

With Julia’s abortion out of the way, we’re back to Atretes, who is wondering which of the many women with dark hair and eyes in Rome is the one his mother prophesied he would fall in love with. He believes this woman is near, because he’s once again dreamed about his mother and her vision. (In case you’re wondering, yes, Julia has dark hair.)

Oh also—Atretes has now amassed 89 kills. As I’ve mentioned before, this isn’t at all realistic. Gladiators typically fought only twice a year, and only one in three matches on average ended in a death. Even if Atretes participated in three fights each time he was involved in the games, it would take forty-five years to amass Atretes’ kill count. A kill count in the teens would have been far more realistic, while still being impressive.

In any case, Atretes is now a celebrity in Rome—his mere presence caused a riot—but it all means nothing to him. He’s discontent. He remembers killing Caleb, a more experienced gladiator who had been kind to him. Caleb had understood and had welcome death, but Atretes can’t stop thinking about it.

Atretes opened his eyes, trying to obliterate the memory, but it remained, like a cancer eating at his soul.

Anyway, so Atretes goes and trains, and guess who shows up to watch? Julia, tagging along with Octavia. Atretes gets a weird feeling and concludes that she’s the girl his mother prophesied. He also gets angry, because she’s Roman. He turns and gestures toward her mockingly, and she freaks out. Afterward, Bato tells him who she was. In telling Atretes about Julia, Bato states that “her father relinquished his rights to her inheritance and turned the management over to his son,” suggesting that Rivers definitely didn’t know how inheritance worked with a cum manu marriage; there’s no benefit of the doubt left to be given.

Anyway, the basic thing to take away from this section is that Atretes saw Julia and was moved by her. He’s angry, he’s going through things, but he’s pretty sure he’s supposed to end up getting to know Julia in a romantic fashion, which is convenient for Julia. It also means Julia won’t have to work too hard to put herself out there—he’s already interested in her in a way he’s not in any other woman. This seems convenient from a story telling perspective. It’s all very nice and tidy.

Let’s not stop there, though! Hadassah is about to make some friends! While at the market with Julia she had noticed a fish symbol carved into the counter at one of the shops. She came back the next day, alone, got the shopkeeper’s attention, and traced the symbol.

Her heart pounding, she whispered, “Jesus Christ, Son of God, Savior.”

Warmth filled his expression. Jesus is Lord,” he said and put his hand over hears. “I knew the moment you came yesterday that you were of the body.”

She let out her breath, the rush of relief so great it almost overwhelmed her.

Hadassah’s mojo rears its head again! Also, is everyone in this book handsy?

Also, based on a quick foray of the internet, it appears that the fish sign was not used among Christians until the 2nd century, and that it wasn’t popular among Christians until the late second 2nd century. So no. This would not have happened this way. The guy introduces himself as Trophimus, and tells Hadassah how to come to one of their late-night secret meetings. Once again, this is not how this would have happened. First century Christians weren’t secretive like this. Persecution was sporadic and unusual. More formal persecution didn’t happen until much later, and even then it was still sporadic.

Next we turn to Julia, and Caius. This won’t be pleasant. It’s late afternoon and they’re fighting. Caius wants Julia to come with him to Anicetus’ birthday celebration that evening, but Julia wants to go to a playa its Calabah. Did Roman women go to plays alone? Anyway, Caius is livid because he needs Julia there to put Anicetus in a good mood with some flirtation so that he (Caius) can talk down the debt he owes Anicetus.

Julia chides Caius for his gambling habit and says she still will not go. Caius sends Hadassah out of the room. We’re with Hadassah now, so for the rest of the scene we only have what she hears from the hallway.

Glass shattered and Julia screamed in rage. “How dare you break my things!”

She cried out again, this time in pain. Caius spoke again, his tone dripping with mockery, taunting her. Her response was full of defiance. She cried out again.

Biting her lip, Hadassah clenched both hands, feeling helpless, wanting to flee their madness.

Their madness?

Urbanus spoke again, low and cold this time. More glass shattered, and then the door burst open and he stormed out, his face livid with rage. He grabbed Hadassah and flung her toward the open door. “See that your mistress is ready to leave in an hour or I’ll have the skin flogged off your back.” When Hadassah entered the room, she found Julia bleeding.

Julia raised shaking fingers to her lips and dabbed at the blood. She stared at it. “I hate him,” she said with chilling intensity. “I wish he were dead!” She clenched her fist, staring darkly into space. “May the gods curse his black heart.”

Hadassah was horrified at such words, almost as horrified as she was by the look in Julia’s eyes.

Anyone who claims evangelicals don’t have an abuse problem ought to be pointed straight to this passage. Their madness, Rivers writes. The problem is both of them. And when Julia, having been hit multiple times by her husband, says she hates him, Hadassah, the good godly character who can do no wrong, is horrified. How dare an abused woman hate her abuser? I mean, she was yelling too, so is it really fair to see her as a victim in this situation? This stuff is really, really toxic.

Most of Julia’s cosmetics have been destroyed, so Julia decides to make herself so beautiful that Caius will be jealous of the way Anicetus looks at her. Julia is magnificent, and when Caius comes for her he is impressed.

With Julia gone to Anicetus party, Hadassah hits the street. She finds the house and knocks the secret knock and is admitted. She is brought “into a room crowded with people of all ages and social stations” with “freemen among slaves, rich sitting beside the poor, the old with small children in their lap.” It is my understanding that early Christianity spread most quickly among slaves and women, but the book of Acts and the letters of Paul suggest that at least some people of standing were converted , so we’ll let that one go.

First, they sing. They’re impressed by Hadassah’s voice, which of course embarrasses her, because Hadassah is nothing if not modest. Next, a scroll is unrolled and … wait what. “We will continue our reading of Matthews memoirs tonight,” a man says.

Rivers tells us that “Hadassah and never heard the memoirs of the apostles before,” which is good, because this is 70 A.D. and the gospels hadn’t been written yet. The very earliest date the first memoir, Mark, could have been written was 70 A.D. Matthew wasn’t written until the 80s or 90s A.D. So yeah. They weren’t reading Matthew. They might have reread the book of Romans, which was sent by Paul as a letter to the church in Rome over a decade earlier. But Matthew? No.

Next they have communion, or the eucharist. Rivers doesn’t devote nearly enough time to this portion of the evening, given the oversized role the Lord’s Supper appears to have played in early Christian communities. But then, evangelicals aren’t really sure what to do with the Lord’s Supper. In moving away from the Catholic view, which elevates the eucharist to a sacrament that bestows grace, evangelicals have in many ways neutered the observance. It’s no surprise to me that Rivers moves past it quickly.

“Are there any new believers among us who would like to share their testimony?”

OMG, this is such evangelical rhetoric. This is not how the word “testimony” is used in the New Testament. It’s the way Rivers is used to hearing it use in evangelical churches.

Anyway, at this point Hadassah tells the whole story about her father dying and being raised to life by Jesus. Amazingly, some of those present know Hadassah’s father’s name—they’ve known people who knew him, etc. Hadassah finishes with a prayer request.

“Please pray of amy masters, Decimus Vindacius Valerian, his wife, Phoebe, and their son, Marcus Lucianus. They are lost in a wilderness. Most of all, I beseech you to pray for my lady, Julia. She is on the road to destruction.”

Because of course she is. In Rivers’ hands, this isn’t about Caius’ abuse. It’s about Julia’s hedonism. The problem, in other words, is Julia. It isn’t her father, for giving her none of the experience necessary to recognize a potential abuser and then tossing her to the wolves. It isn’t her brother’s fault, for making himself inaccessible in her time of need. It’s not Caius’ fault for abusing her both emotionally and physically. No, it’s Julia’s fault. She’s not in trouble. She’s on the road to destruction.

Also, what. I don’t think we’ve heard Marcus’ nomen yet. It makes literally zero sense that Marcus would have a different nomen—Lucianus—than his father—Vindacius. Rivers appears to have assumed that the Cognomen is the same as a last name today. It wasn’t. The cognomen, in this case Valerian, was sort of a nickname given to a specific branch of a family. Consider the name Gaius Julius Caesar. Gaius was the praenomen, like Marcus or Decimus. Julius is the nomen, the family name, similar to a last name today. Caesar is the cognomen, used by a branch of the Julian family. Marcus’ name should be Marcus Vindacius Valerian.

Now, I’ve been saying all along that it’s odd that Hadassah has been so oriented toward the lives of her mistress and masters. It would make far more sense for her to be building relationships among the other slaves, and converting those who were dissatisfied with the gods they already had. Then she could have brought those new converts along with her to this meeting. It would make more sense, too, for her life to begin to revolve more around the individuals she is meeting here, in this gathering.

But no. This is only a brief interlude. The Valerian family will soon move from Rome to Ephesus, and Hadassah’s relationships with the individuals at this meeting are never developed.

What are we left with, then? We’re left with a German gladiator who has just noticed Julia. We’re left with an escalating level of abuse by Caius, even as Hadassah views the domestic violence in the household as somehow mutual. And we’re left with a late-night meeting with a group of anachronistic early Christians. Next week, we find out what Julia does at Anicetus’ party—and what Caius does afterwards.

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