Joseph made his way from Bethlehem to Nazareth flying on the wings of future. Those days were bad times for free riders moving on from town to town. But life was so hard for lots of people, and they had to jump on the road to earn their money working here and there. Carpenters were among them.

Those nomads used to meet on the road, walk their way together and help each other against those who made their living killing in the wilderness every free rider they found. Joseph knew about them nomads, and as he wasn’t in a real hurry he loved to sit by the fire with them and hear their stories.

His road companions found Joseph very helpful the night out there in the wilderness. Joseph travelled in the company of three Assyrian dogs each one as big as a lion. Those three Assyrian dogs were a present from his godfather’s friends.

Joseph’s godfather was Simeon, a Babylonian living in Jerusalem whose family kept relations with the people and family his father left behind. From time to time Simeon’s Babylonian relatives came to Israel to pay the holy taxes in the name of the Jews from the other side of the Jordan River. One day they brought with them three little puppets in their homeland called ‘king’s lions’ because the Assyrian kings used those kind of dogs to go out and hunt lions; they were a present for Joseph, ‘son of King David’. And Joseph raised them with the whole lot of love their big bodies deserved. Soon they reached the size of a lion, and to see Joseph walking his dogs was a magnificent show. To magnify the picture his godfather gave him another present, a Spaniard horse, black as a night and smart as a creature born to be one thing with its master. On those days that Joseph felt lonely and missed his future wife he used to jump on his horse, called his assyrian dogs and went out for a ride until his nerves cooled down.

And a third present got Joseph from the Babylonian relatives of his godfather. A sword! Yes, a sword named Goliath. They said nothing the day they gave it to him. They bowed down before him and went away. Goliath was the biggest sword a man could see those days. Joseph never needed to take Goliath for a walk, but in this journey to Nazareth he did. His road companions could fall sleep and share sweet dreams, the strangest carpenter they had never met around was there to watch their backs.

Yeah, while somewhere about the Samarian wilderness Joseph stared at the logs on fire, there was a young man in Nazareth Town looking at the stars with eyes full of dreams. His name was Cleophas.

Cleophas was around eighteen years old or so when Joseph came into town. At that age Jewish parents used to put a pressure on their children to get married. But Cleophas got not a father who could sit by his side and talk to him about the pleasure and delights of manhood. His father died when Cleophas was a baby.

Thanks to the Lord his elder sister had been like a father for him. She had refused marriage to devote all her heart and soul to her little brother. She never said so, but he knew so well his sister Mary! He had no doubt about it, she had sacrificed the pleasure and delights of a womanhood for the sake of her sisters and him, Cleophas. Only God knew how much he loved his beloved sister Mary!

This next morning we are talking about Cleophas woke up early. In fact his soul was up before his body got out of bed. He kissed his mother and sister, had his breakfast and went out to see the daylight. After a while he heard a noise coming from the south. That’s a donkey, he said. Another sound came to his ears. And that’s a horse, he said again.

From his home on the hill he saw the kids in town running to meet the stranger. He wasn’t going running after them, but when horse, donkey and stranger broke through he could not stop his soul moving to meet the man.

He was an impressive rider in the company of the most impressive dogs he had ever seen. The kids stopped as they got close to the rider. Cleophas moved on in front of Joseph. Joseph smiled, looked at the lad straight in the eyes, reached Cleophas and from his horse spoke these words:

“You know the landlord?”, asked Joseph pointing Cleophas’ house.

“Follow me”, answered Cleophas to the stranger.

Joseph shot his arm to the lad. Cleophas took the arm of the rider. Joseph raised the lad and Cleophas found himself on the back of the most wonderful horse he had never seen.

As one mysterious force had suddenly touched the animal, Joseph’s horses raised its front legs and spell its joy in the tongue of the horses.  Up there in the hill, where Nazareth Town exists from the days of its foundation by Abihud,  son of Zerubbabel, father of Eliakim,  father of Azor,  father of Zadok,  father of Akim, father of Elihud, father of Eleazar, father of Matthan, the father of Jacob, father of Mary, wife of Joseph, by his wife becoming the heir of Jacob; up there in the hill where today stands the Basilica of the Annunciation, there was in those days a house build in the old ways of the Phoenicians, with stables and barn.  Abihud, son of Zerubbabel, prince of Judah, was as powerful and rich as a Jews could be in the days of the Kings. Once Jerusalem was founded by his father and his men, he moved on to the north to find himself a home, and wandering about Galilee Abihud discovered the Hill of Nazareth, bought the place from their old landlords and began to build Nazareth Town. The people Abihud took with him were used to work with sword in hand, the House of the son of Zerubbabel became the fortress where to gather in case of an assault from enemies. We see in the books of Ezra and Nehemiah that the Jews where not very much beloved by the new owners of the land of the Jews. We are to imagine that the Liberation from Cyrus did not surrender the land of Judah in their hands, just the Hill of Jerusalem to build the Temple. Beyond that Zerubbabel and his people had to buy the land where to live and grow from the new owners of the Old Kingdom of the Jews. They were given Freedom but they had to give back Peace. Not in vain the Jews filled the pockets of Zerubbabel and his sons with gold. To conquer the hate of the new owners of the land, war forbidden, they had to show the color of their gold. With a lot of hardship and a good amount of gold they won the battle and as time passed by the land of their fathers came back to their hands. The Bible does not tell us about the sons of Zerubbabel because the Messianic design was supreme and the Holy Writers wrote what they wrote because they meant to do so. Zerubbabel was a man, a son of David, and, having being by Daniel told not to even dream with the Messianic Crown to himself, he understood perfectly his duty, the Davidic line had to keep on growing. He got a woman and brought children to the world. Of those children the heir of Zerubbabel, Abihud, the elder, so to speak, left Jerusalem and with a bunch of fellow brothers in arms went wandering around Galilee till he found the Hill of Nazareth. It was from this Hill that Abihud began to buy pieces of lands to the owners of the surrounding, giving land to his people to live upon. Abihud family became the heart of Nazareth, and during the centuries from him to Matthan, the father of Jacob and grand-father of Mary held the position of the town mayor. Abihud children married their fellows Jews and spread around Galilee. You may understand that being the right heir of King Solomon the heir to the crown of David did not marry outside the Davidic clan, this way Abihud genealogic tree spread its branches all over Galilee.

The reason why the number of generations in the list of Mathew and the list of Luke have been causing trouble to the students of the Bible painted a big smile in the faces of those witnessing the marriage contract between Anna of Jerusalem, the sister of Elizabeth, wife of Zechariah, the father of John the Baptist, and Jacob of Nazareth, the son of Matthan, son of Eleazar, of Elihud, of Akim, of Zadok, of Azor, of Eliakim, of Abihud, son of  Zerubbabel, son of king Solomon, son of King David.

Rhesa was the name of the son of Zerubbabel who, being a carpenter in the land of the Kings, build one of the gates of the New Jerusalem, and made himself a home in Bethlehem. You have to understand that, though today princes, they were slaves the day before, and as slaves they had to work and make a living. Beyond all confusion we have to see in the final solution from which they were saved by Queen Esther, the source of the wealth of the Jews was in them being hard working people. Gold does not comes down from heaven; cloud do not rain silver and gold, you got to work for it. The Jews of the days of the kings did work so hard and well as to rise the envy of the Hitler of the day. This is why they needed help from no one to build the New Jerusalem, they were both hard working men and good warriors.  Back in their homes Abihud and Rhesa were princes, but to the people in the streets they were Jews. No wonder, then, that Abihud was a farmer and Rhesa a carpenter.

Thus the family of Rhesa of Bethlehem used to pass the Davidic right from father to son, the more so given the position of Judah in the board of the war of the kings. Compared with Galilee, Judah was a safe province of the empire of the Persians. While Judah knew no invasion except that of the Greek Alexander, Galilee was a land close to the Hellenic World, always fighting for their independence from the king of kings.  War was the lot of the people of Galilee. And war was an enemy of life of men. Thus, while in the house of Rhesa the heirdom was passed from father to son, the succession in the house of Abihud was passed from the living heir to the next following the patriarchal way, this is to say, by election.

Let’s suppose that Abihud had only girls, that happen often. Being the right heir of the crown and throne of David and Solomon, he had to call “son” the husband of his elder girl, by his marriage with his daughter entitled to the heirdom of the Messianic Kingdom. Imagine now that this “son” die in a war, leaving a girl as his messianic heir; in this case the succession pas two generation in blank, until the Line finds a heir who pass the succession to his son. It is this the way Joseph became the son of Jacob, son of Mattham. Joseph became son of Solomon through his marriage with the Daughter of Solomon. In terms of flesh and blood Joseph was the son of Heli of Heli, the son of Matthat, the son of Levi, the son of Melki, the son of Jannai, the son of Joseph, the son of Mattathias, the son of Amos, the son of Nahum, the son of Esli, the son of Naggai, the son of Maath, the son of Mattathias, the son of Semein, the son of Josek, the son of Joda, the son of Joanan, the son of Rhesa, the son of Zerubbabel.

Joseph and Mary getting marry meant the coming back of the two Davidic main lines to the source, the son born of this marriage be the Right Heir of the Throne of David and Crown of Solomon, the Messiah. For the sake of Love we will go in the next section to the day Jacob and Anna met.