The first depictions of Jesus showed Him as a small man, clean shaven and with short hair. In the sixth century, He was first depicted with long hair and a beard, and He’d grown slightly. By about the eighth century, what’s now the present picture of Jesus had fully emerged. It’s probable that the image on the Turin Shroud, now positively established to be an extremely accomplished medieval forgery, simply served as a reinforcement of the physical appearance of this ‘new’ Jesus.
Finally, I mentioned the ‘Baigdandu anomaly’ in the novel. This is real. Every few generations, a child is born in the village of Baigdandu with red hair and blue eyes. A local legend states that centuries ago a tribe of Greeks arrived in the area looking, oddly enough, for the tomb of Jesus Christ, and eventually settled there, and it’s their genes that cause this aberration. I’m not a geneticist, but I have met a lot of Greeks and most of them have brown eyes and black or very dark brown hair. The idea that the present anomaly could be caused by this particular intermarriage doesn’t seem to me to make sense.
But some of the descriptions of Issa refer to him as fair-haired with blue eyes, and logic suggests that this is a far more likely explanation of this anomaly. So it’s just possible that the bloodline of the man we know as Jesus Christ is still present on Earth after two millennia, and that His genes can still be found among the inhabitants of a tiny mountain village high in one of the remoter parts of the Kashmir.
James Becker
Principality of Andorra, February 2010
THE FIRST APOSTLE
James Becker
An Englishwoman is found dead in a house near Rome, her neck broken.
Her distraught husband enlists the help of his closest friend, policeman Chris Bronson, who discovers an ancient inscription on a slab of stone above their fireplace. It translates as ‘Here Lie the Liars’.
But who are the liars? And what is it they are lying about to protect?
Pursued across Europe, Bronson uncovers a trail of clues that leads him back to the shadowy beginnings of Christianity; to a chalice decorated with mysterious symbols; to a secret code hidden with a scroll.
And to a deadly conspiracy which – if revealed – will rock the foundations of our modern world.
Now available in Bantam paperback and as a bestselling ebook
THE MOSES STONE
James Becker
AN ANCIENT CODE
A clay tablet covered in ancient writing is found by an English couple in Morocco. A day later they are dead, killed in a car crash. But where is the relic they died to protect?
A SINISTER SECRET
Determined to uncover a secret that’s endured for two millennia, Chris Bronson follows a trail of clues that lead him from the hustle of a Moroccan souk to the deserted caves of Qumran; from the sinister echoes of a water-filled tunnel under the city of Jerusalem to a windswept fortress whose name spells death.
A DEADLY CHASE FOR THE TRUTH…
Threatened on every side by violent extremists, Bronson is plunged into a mystery rooted in biblical times. For the stone he must find is older and far more dangerous than he could ever have imagined …
Now available in Bantam paperback and as a bestselling ebook
Table of Contents
Cover
Title
Contents
Copyright
Dedication
About the Author
Also by James Becker
Acknowledgements
Prologue
England
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Egypt
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
India
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
Chapter 55
Chapter 56
Chapter 57
Chapter 58
Chapter 59
Chapter 60
Chapter 61
Chapter 62
Chapter 63
Chapter 64
Chapter 65
Chapter 66
Chapter 67
Chapter 68
Chapter 69
Chapter 70
Author’s Note