Nazareth has been cruel to my mother, more cruel than any village ever was.
All the village says that my blood father is not the man who married my mother.
They have shamed her on the matter all my life.
Every woman asks which man of the village is my blood father.
Every man scowls and says he was not the one my mother seduced.
My mother will not tell who is my blood father.
My mother … tell who is my blood father.
My mother will not speak on the matter.
My mother bears her shame in silence.
Some righteous man, a prophet, said a word over me when I was a babe in arms. He told how I will redeem Israel when I grow to be a man.
Now I have grown to be a man, but I do not know how to redeem Israel. The scriptures do not explain the matter.
My people say that the man who redeems Israel must take up the sword and throw off our enemy, Rome, which we call the Great Satan.
My family says I must take up the sword.
Only I am no man of the sword. I wish with all my heart to redeem Israel, but HaShem, the God of our fathers, must tell me how.
Lately, there came a new prophet to Israel, who immerses for repentance at the river Jordan.
I went to ask the prophet how I should redeem Israel.
He said I am to smite the four Powers.
I asked what are the four Powers.
He could not say, but he said HaShem will reveal the matter to me.
I wish HaShem will reveal the matter, only I am not a prophet. Not yet.
But I will be.
Here is what I know. Every hour of every day, I feel the Presence of HaShem.
I do not know why I should feel the Presence always. My mother does not. My village does not. Even the prophet of HaShem does not.
I think the Presence will teach me the way to redeem Israel.
But I am afraid to redeem Israel.
To redeem Israel is to leave my mother to the scorn of the village.
The rage of the village.
My mother begs and cries on me to make a justice for her.
To make a justice on the village.
I do not know how to make a justice on the village.
I do not know how to redeem Israel.
But HaShem will show me the way.
I will learn how to be a prophet of HaShem.
I will learn how to redeem Israel.
I will learn how to make a justice for my mother.
I will smite the first Power.
Or I will die in the trying.
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Could have happened this way!
With this novel, Randy Ingermanson has completed the first book in the series that will, I believe, become his magnum opus and will define not only his career as a novelist but also his place in literary history. SON OF MARY is a compelling, heart-stirring story, authentic in its writing and transformational in its impact. You will weep, worry, laugh, and learn as the story immerses you in the pivotal days when Jesus Christ walked the earth. I highly recommend this novel to all fans of Biblical fiction—and non-fans, as well–and look forward to reading the next one in the series. ~ MaryAnn Diorio, Novelist
Son of Mary: A Tale of Jesus of Nazareth is a profound and deeply moving novel that ranks with some of the finest Christian-themed fiction ever written. I was led to Christ by the writings of George MacDonald and C.S. Lewis, so when I tell you this book is on par with their works, that’s the greatest compliment I can give. It had me crying or laughing or simply awe-struck in every chapter, and, after 565 pages, wishing it were far longer–but consoled by the knowledge that it’s the first of four volumes in the complete Crown of Thorns saga.
Writing a fictionalized account of the Gospel story is a challenge that has defeated more than a few famous authors, from Norman Mailer to Nobel laureate José Saramago. Randy Ingermanson succeeded in a way only possible for a writer guided by the Holy Spirit. He’s been researching first-century Palestine for nearly forty years, so I wasn’t surprised at the compelling way he evokes its sights and scents and sounds. He’s an award-winning writer, so I took it for granted that his Gospel characters would be convincingly portrayed as men and women with motivations and emotions I understand and relate to. Other authors, including Anne Rice and Nikos Kazantzakis, have done that, if perhaps not so movingly as in Son of Mary. But what sets this novel apart is the author’s profound feeling for and insight into the Gospel. In fact, if I could give my young son only one book to read to accompany Scripture when he comes of age, this would be it.
First-person narration is one of the keys to the novel’s power. Most of Son of Mary is told through the eyes of six characters: Yeshua of Nazareth (Jesus), Miryam of Nazareth (his mother Mary), Yaakov of Nazareth (his brother James), Shimon of Capernaum (Simon Peter), thirteen-year-old Yoni (John, son of Zebedee), and Miryam of Bethany (Mary sister of Martha).
As one might imagine from the book’s title, Miryam of Nazareth (along with Yeshua) is central to the story, which begins and ends with her narration. In this version of the Gospel story, neither she nor her husband ever told their son or the village of Nazareth the true story of his birth (people then were no more likely than people today to respond well to a teenage girl, pregnant out of wedlock, telling them some wild story about a meeting an angel). As a result, the townspeople—who might cut her some slack if she’d only own up to the truth and tell which man really got her pregnant—despise and torment her. Miryam in turn is filled with a fierce, bitter resentment, and how she (and Yeshua) deal with those emotions is at the heart of volume one of Crown of Thorns.
Of course, any retelling of the Gospel will succeed or fail based on its portrayal of Jesus. Ingermanson’s Yeshua deals with uncertainty and doubt, but his charisma, compassion, and courage are beautiful and utterly convincing. I’d have a hard time picking a favorite among the other characters.
Yaakov of Nazareth, filled with a mighty macho spirit, is eager to take on the mantle of Messiah himself and bring the fight to the Romans. He’s a sharp study in contrast to his brother, whom Yaakov views as utterly unfit for the job of liberating his people. This is a good example of how Ingermanson takes full advantage of the reader’s familiarity with the Gospel story, because this portrayal of James heightens our anticipation of—and longing for–the man he will one day become.
Yoni—short, of course, for Yohanan (John)—often steals the show. It makes sense that in the year 29 he would only have been a young teenager, given that his Gospel was almost certainly written at the end of the first century. His brilliance, sensitivity, and youthful exuberance are a delight.
Miryam of Bethany, divorced by her husband because she is barren, treated disrespectfully by her sister, is one of the novel’s most moving characters.
Shimon, the Rock, is well drawn; we love him at the same time we’re frustrated with him, and we see that Peter’s legendary obtuseness is more a reflection of first-century Israel’s misunderstanding of what sort of man the Messiah would be. And Shimon’s flashes of insight in Son of Mary are appropriate for the man who we know will one day correctly answer Jesus’ question, “Who do you say I am?”
But that’s for a later volume, because Son of Mary ends with the Messiah being rejected by the people of Nazareth, as depicted in Luke 4:16-30, when Yeshua was hustled out of the temple and taken “to the brow of the hill on which the town was built, in order to throw him off the cliff.” I don’t do spoilers, so all I will say is that this scene is replete with both high drama and rich theological insight. And if it doesn’t reduce you to a puddle of joyous tears, well, you’re made of tougher stuff than I am!
By choosing to tell the story in four volumes, Ingermanson gives himself room to create an epic. If I were still a betting man, I’d put serious money on the proposition that people will be reading the Crown of Thorns quartet one hundred years from now, just as they’ll still be reading another classic it brings to mind, Lord of the Rings.
–Jess Lederman