Letter from Egypt

Alexandria, Egypt

December 25th, 0001

Dear Mother and Father,

I do miss you so, especially as it is now getting close to Jesus’ first birthday. Joseph told me that I should get out my quill and my papyrus and tell you all about it, and then we will give the letter
to a merchant who is going in your direction sometime soon.

I do wish we could come back home. Egypt is a fine country - in many ways more advanced than Palestine, and we have a good life here. Joseph is sympathetic to my homesickness, but he told me that as we had been sent to Egypt by an Angel - and since we were told our son’s life was at risk if he stayed there, we must remain here patiently until the angel comes again to tell us that we are safe to go home.

I decided to have a gathering of the local mothers and their children, and I planned to make a special cake for Jesus. It would be mostly symbolic rather than practical, of course. Jesus is pretty
picky when it comes to foods at the moment. He is cutting his first teeth, and his poor cheeks are bright red. He is still very happy drinking my milk, but I think it is now time for him to be weaned,
and to start eating like a child rather than a baby.

Jesus is a very good baby, as babies go, but at the moment, he is fussy with his sore gums and his futile attempts at walking which frustrate him. I keep remembering that we were told that he is special. Both Joseph and I were told by angels that he was God’s son - the Messiah - and yet
to my eyes, he just seems just like any baby. He needs to have his napkins changed. He needs to be fed. He can’t walk or talk. But he does have a wonderful smile and every now and then he says Da-Da - or Ba-Ba and I am sure he will soon be saying real words and of course we think he's wonderful and love him very much.

Egypt is a very interesting country - and having come to live near Alexandria has proved a real treat for Joseph as they have a wonderful library. Joseph is able to go and read with the elders and it contains more than 500,000 papyrus rolls. The Ptolemies ordered that each visiting scientist should donate to the city a copy of his works, thus bringing the number of books at the Alexandria Library to more than 700,000. I expect Elizabeth’s husband Zachariah will be very jealous when Joseph tells him all he has learnt. How is their baby John getting on? He must be walking and talking by now.

It has been easy for Joseph to fit into the life here as a skilled carpenter - and the Egyptians love items made of wood. He is never short of a project and the home owners who are his main
customers are very generous.

I must tell you something about where we live. Our town is quite small and completely enclosed by a wall. The main street is two to three metres wide. The houses, most of them roughly the same size, are chiefly built of stone. This is unusual as most in Egypt on the banks of the Nile are built from mud bricks. Our house measures 13 meters by 4 meters, and we have a staircase to get to the flat roof. We have a small vestibule, a main room, and a small niche or inner room which serves as a bedroom. Entering the house from the street one descends a few steps. The whitewashed entrance hall contains a construction similar to a cupboard bed, which most would use as an altar. We don’t of course.

Through a further door one enters the main hall, where a wooden pillar supports the roof. This room is lit by a window set high in the wall above the first room. We have a chair for Joseph and a
number of stools, several tables and a chest, all made my Joseph, of course. The whitewashed walls are decorated with paintings.

Adjacent to the hall is the bedroom, which serves for storage as well. We sleep on mattresses which can be rolled up and put away when not in use. Another door leads from the hall to a small corridor and to the kitchen which is not properly roofed over, but has just a covering of branches to give shade and let the smells escape. An oven for baking bread, a kneading-trough and a mortar set into the floor are very necessary items. Our kitchen has a cellar which serves as a larder.

Our climate with its hot summers and mild winters is not much different from yours, and we wear linen or cotton clothing. I make my own linen, beating and combing the flax plants and then spinning the threads which I weave on a horizontal loom. We can do very fine sewing as we have many types of needles from wood, bone and copper, and we have scissors to cut the fabric. Our robes, the same for both of us, are covered on one shoulder, and go down to our ankles. Joseph wears a belt over his. Jesus goes around without anything on at all in the summer, but has a wrap and cloak when the temperature dips. I sometimes wear a shawl or cape too. We mostly go barefoot but occasionally wear sandals on special occasions.

As far as what we have to eat and drink - beer is plentiful and very acceptable but we also drink water and wine. Shall I tell you how to make beer? Wheat, barley or millet is coarsely ground. One quarter of the grain is soaked and left in the sun for a while; the rest is formed into loaves of bread and lightly baked in order not to destroy the enzymes. The loaves are crumbled and mixed with the soaked grain, which will have fermented. Then water and some old beer are added and the mixture is left to ferment. The fermentation complete, the liquid is strained. We flavour it with herbs. Our staple food is supplemented by onions or other vegetables and dried fish. We also have olive oil, honey and figs. I cook in a clay oven or on an open fire. We burn wood, but sometimes have charcoal. I have some herbs to flavour the food - wild marjoram, cumin and rosemary. When I bake bread I sometimes add dates, sesame seeds and honey to make it rich and sweet. We use bread as a form of hospitality. A common saying is, “Do not eat bread while another stands by without extending your hand to him.” The Egyptian religion tells that good deeds in lifewill count in one's favour in the afterlife.

I go shopping in a market where there are little stalls run by the womenfolk. They sell such things as sandals, cloth, bread and cakes, spices, and oil.

Jesus has a few toys but the most common you see children here playing with is a ball made of a leather skin filled with chaff, dry papyrus reeds tied tightly together, string or rags. When he is
older, we will let him have marbles, which are dangerous for him now as he might try to eat them. Joseph makes him tiny boats from wood, which he loves to see float. We also have made him some clay animals and rattles.

I intended inviting one of my neighbours Hera, married to Shepset, to the party but I had such a shock. Her daughter, Sherit, which means “little one” in Egyptian, died last night and what I found was a household not only of mourning, but preparing her for being mummified. How they could do those things to her I don’t know. But as they cried, they worked. They felt it was important for her to be embalmed, and it needed to be done immediately after death. Her tiny body was lying on the table. They had removed all of her organs, including her brain, and replaced her heart with a scarab beetle. They took the organs and packed them in salt to cure them. Her body was rinsed with palm wine and aromatic herbs were placed into the body cavity which was then sewn up, then wrapped in linen coated with perfumed resin. This was covered with divine salt and will be allowed to dry for 70 days. Only then can they make the finishing touches for her burial.

I asked how Sherit had died. “It was an intestinal complaint,” said her mother. “She ate something and become very sick, and then before the night was over, she was dead.” They are mixing the
scented resin now which will be applied on her golden face mask.

“She didn’t live long, but she lived well,” said her mother. “She will have a good afterlife.”

Joseph and I took Jesus with us to go over to see their family again tonight after work, to see how we could help, taking some sweet bread I had just baked. Somehow our visit made a difference, and the wailing and moaning became much less. After a time my friend Hera told me that just as we came in, she had a vision in her head of her daughter, happy and smiling in the afterlife, and she was much relieved.

I think this papyrus is getting very full, so I must stop. I hope it won’t be many more years before we are back and celebrating Jesus’ birthday with you.

Much love from

Mary, Joseph and your grandson, Jesus.