The mystery of ancient times: The Secret of the Kingdom by Mika Waltari

Book Review
The Secret of the Kingdom by Mika Waltari
Translated from Finnish by Naomi Walford
Published in 1961 in the U.S. by G.P. Putnam’s Sons

Mika Waltari is considered the best Finnish writer of all time. His other famous novels, “The Egyptian”, “The Etruscan”, and “The Roman”, are also first-rate historical fictions. They are on-par with great American historical fiction authors such as James Clavell and James Michener. Considering that the period in human history covered by Waltari is the ancient times—hence more mysterious—they are perhaps even more enjoyable as we get a first-hand glimpse into the lives of the ancients as seen from Waltari’s imagination, translated with a superior writing prose into magnificent stories that the reader wishes would never end.

“The Secret of the Kingdom” is written in an ingenious way: a series of letters written by Marcus Mazentius to Tullia, both Romans of high standing during the reign of Tiberius. Marcus is forced to flee Rome to Alexandria, presumably because of his associations with the married Tullia. As Marcus—a man who like many of the Roman aristocracy of the time, has spiritual beliefs that follow the scientific teachings of Greek philosophers—squanders his time and money in Alexandria awaiting his love’s arrival, he is mysteriously guided to Judea, where he personally witnesses the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. He is intrigued by his teachings and thereafter seeks to learn more about him, his followers, and his message. Along the way, we meet many of the faces of the Christian First Testament: Pontius Pilot, Claudia Procula, Mary Magdalene, Paul, Mathew and Johanna (Herod Antipas’ wife), among others. The characters are all intertwined in a series of remarkable events that follow parts of the First Testament somewhat loosely, yet they resemble many of the events, and here is where there is an additional enigma: Waltari must have named his character Marcus Mazentius because there is mystery about the author of the second gospel (the Gospel according to Mark) in the First Testament. Some scholars say that he was a Roman who converted to Christianity and lived in Rome and Alexandria (as in the novel):

“Unlike the author of Matthew (who very likely wrote his gospel for a Palestinian audience) the author of Mark appears much less less informed about the Palestinian area and Judaism. For example, Mark 8:27 speaks of "the villages of Caesarea Philippi" but Caesarea Philippi was a single town. This would be consistent with Mark being gentile writer living in Rome. The location where the gospel was committed to writing, however, was Alexandria, Egypt.”

Others scholars say that it was written in Syria or Galillee by Marc, or someone or some followers who associated themselves with Marc:

“A more accepted theory is that the gospel was written by a member or a group of members in a community that associated themselves with Mark, or that was founded by Mark, or even written by an unknown Christian named Mark. Modern scholars suggest Galilee or Syria as likely places of origin.”

Still others say that he was a Jew:

“There is also evidence that the author of Mark may have been Jewish or had a Jewish background. Many scholars argue that the gospel has a Semitic flavor to it, by which they mean that there are Semitic syntactical features occurring in the context of Greek words and sentences. Example of this Semitic "flavor" include verbs located at the beginning of sentences, the widespread use of asyndeta (placing clauses together without conjunctions), and parataxis (joining clauses with the conjunction kai, which means "and").”

Whoever in fact wrote the second gospel, what really makes this book so entertaining—regardless of whether or not you are a believer in Jesus Christ—is that as in his other books, Waltari’s superb description of characters and events really makes you feel as you were experiencing the ancient times through your own eyes. Some memorable quotes include:

“This incomprehensible kingdom of Jesus of Nazareth is not for me. But if I gathered up my belongings and went to Roman Caesarea, I would seek distraction in theatre and circus, wager on chariot races, and find delights enough and to spare.

“As I was thinking this I beheld a vivid picture of myself in years to come. I saw myself from outside. I saw a fat body and a bloated face. I had grown bald and lost several teeth, and with a babbling tongue I was repeating a story which I had already told a thousand times. My tunic was stained with wine and vomit, and I was surrounded by flute players and by girls who tried in vain to stimulate my jaded senses to enjoyment. This was my future if I now gave up and returned to seek the middle way. After that, the flames of the funeral pyre, ashes, and shadows.”
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"Have no fear; I seek no earthly kingdom, for in that case I might as well stay with you here in Jerusalem. I've experienced enough to know that all earthly desire is but a glowing pit in which there is no breath of coolness, but which grows hotter the deeper one goes. Therefore I desire only that other kingdom, which still lingers among us on earth. That is what I am going to Galilee to seek, with you."
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“While eating, Simon talked in a different voice, gentler than before. To amuse us he told us a story in his Cyrenean Greek:

“At the other end of the world lies a vast realm, from which silk is brought to Rome. It is so far away that the Silk Road runs through many countries and it takes two years for the merchandise to reach Tyre. In the Roman realm the earth is read, but in the silk realm it is yellow, and the inhabitants have yellow skins. This is no invention, for I myself have met a yellow-skinned man in Tyre, and his yellowness was not caused by any sickness; he assured me that in his homeland everyone was yellow from top to toe, that his country was mightier than Rome and with so lofty a culture that Greek culture was a barbarism compared. No doubt he was exaggerating the merits of his own land, for he was a fugitive from it. He told me—and this I heard from other far-traveled men—that a new kind had been born in his country who deposed the former ruler and called himself the son of heaven. He changed the existing order in the realm and proclaimed that the soil was common property. Thenceforth no one might possess any land, but all should cultivate it in common, and the king would see to it that each and every one obtained his livelihood. And it is not so long since this happened for the kind reigned for twenty years, and it is only a few years since news reached Tyre that the peasants had revolted and rioted and overthrown him, and a new ruler had restored the old order. The fugitive at once left Tyre for his own country, where he had held an exalted position before the time of the lunatic king.

“Of course much of this is fancy and fable,” Simon of Cyrene went on. “That yellow man declared, for instance, that the silk in his country was spun by worms, and that all the people had to do was to gather together the threads and weave them into stuff. But I’ve thought a great deal about that son of heaven and his mad idea. The same thing might happen in the Roman empire, where more and more land is being gathered into the hands of a few, so that at last everyone else will be either a day laborer or a slave. To the great majority it would be a matter of indifference whether the land were owned by everyone in common or by a few individuals; so, thinking of Jesus of Nazareth, I sometime fear that when he becomes king he may introduce a similar system, whereby no individual possesses anything and everything is owned in common. Only a man who has been a slave can fully appreciate how dangerous—how impossible—it is to live like that. Even a slave must have something he can call his own, however trifling, to exist at all. In Cyrene a slave might be proud even of his leg iron, if it was larger and heavier than others’. However, I’m relieved to know that Jesus’ kingdom is not of this world. If he’d aim at that sort of administration he’d have had to have himself born the emperor of Rome, not king of the Jews.””