I am old and ready to die. To be truthful, I have been ready to die for years, but right now, I feel ready as I have never been before. You see, earlier today, in the temple in Jerusalem, I met a young couple who had come with their young son for the ritual of purification, and I knew when I saw them that a promise which God had made to me had been fulfilled. Now I am ready to die.

I suppose I should explain. Perhaps you know me; perhaps you don’t. My name is Simeon. I am a rabbi, a member of the Sanhedrin, one of the seventy men charged with the oversight of Jewish faith throughout the world. We are responsible for the purity of our religion. We are the ones to whom the people look for guidance concerning true and false teachers; we are the ones ordained by God to keep the faith in the fac…