I have long been interested in Judea during the early Christian era. I saw an advertisement for John Merrill’s Sons of Light in Biblical Archaeological Review. The book was highly praised. It is a well-bound hardback with a beautiful illustration on the front cover, but, after reading it, I’m very much disappointed.

Merrill’s novel opens in 47 B.C. Hezekiah, the founder of the Zealots, his two daughters and his parents are trapped in a cave high on a steep cliff. They are hiding from Herod the Great and his Roman allies at the base. Faced with capture, Hezekiah slits his daughter’s throats while his father slits his mother’s throat and commits suicide. Hezekiah then stabs himself and jumps to his death. It’s surprising that a novel about the “Sons of Light” should start off with the founder murdering his own family and committing suicide. I soon discovered reading the book that the main topic wasn’t merely a historical novel about the Zealots (the Sons of Light); it goes into considerable detail about the young Yeshua (Jesus), his mother Miriam (Mary), his father Joseph, and his cousin John the Baptist.

Merrill distorts the historical account of these persons considerably. Miriam is raped by the Roman Centurion Julius Panthera, who, therefore, is the father of Yeshua. When Miriam visits her cousin Elizabeth, Elizabeth takes Miriam to visit Elizabeth’s friend, the elderly Joseph, to ask Joseph if he would agree to marry Miriam because Elizabeth did not want to report Miriam’s rape to the Bet Din. Joseph agrees.

King Herod sends an assassin to Sepphoris to bring back the head of Miriam’s newborn baby. Menachem saves Miriam and the baby by killing the assassin. After Miriam’s husband Joseph’s dies, Menachem proposes marriage to Miriam. She accepts. Miriam has five children with Menachem: Jacob, Joseph, Jude, Simon, and Diana, plus Yeshua, her first born. Yeshua is learning to be a fisherman.

Because of the planned Zealot attack against the Roman army, the Baptist tells Miriam that he will take her six children to Egypt to get them out of danger. Miriam insists that Yeshua remain with the Zealots to bolster their hope. When the Zealot forces leave to engage the Romans, Miriam takes Yeshua and Jacob to Sepphoris. The Zealots are defeated. Of their 3000-man force, 2960 were killed in battle and 40 were brought back to Sepphorus to be crucified. Miriam searched through the crosses for her husband, Menachem. She found him while he was still alive on a cross in the same position as the Gospels described Jesus on a cross.