The Rise and Fall of Mammon

Chapter I

Madison, WI, Spring Semester, 1954

Jesse Caspar Goldsmith looked longingly at Mary Lou Walker. They shared a political science class taught by Abdulfattah John Jandali, a teaching assistant working toward his Ph.D. The situation was a bit awkward as Jesse, a World War II veteran, was thirty, some seven years older than his teacher.

To further complicate matters, Jandali was romantically involved with another twenty three year old student in speech therapy from Green Bay, Joanne Schieble. Schieble in turn was the same age and a friend of Mary Lou Walker. The four of them sometimes socialized outside class.

That summer, Jandali and Schieble took a trip to Syria together. When they returned, Joanne confided in Mary Lou that she was pregnant. Coincidentally, Mary Lou was also pregnant, and planned on marrying Jesse in a few weeks, before she showed. Mary Lou came from a Protestant family, Congregationalists, and her parents expressed reservations about Jesse due to the fact that he was Jewish. The problem was resolved, however, when Jesse agreed to allow the child and any to follow the freedom to choose his or her religion, if any. Both Mary Lou and Jesse were largely secular; neither were observant. Mary Lou rarely attended Church and Jesse only occasionally attended a Reform Synagogue. Neither one was financially dependent upon their parents and were dismissive of any objections.

Jandali and Joanne, on the other hand, were overly concerned with the objections of their parents, especially her father, a devout Catholic. Jesse and Mary Lou were dumbfounded by the lack of resolve shown by Jandali and Joanne. It was the mid-twentieth century. Neither could understand all the Sturm und Drang exhibited by the couple. In early 1955, without telling Jandali, Joanne flew to San Francisco and had her baby, a boy. She then gave him up for adoption.

Jesse and Mary Lou could not understand how a couple supposedly in love could do such a thing. Their friendship cooled and they drifted apart as friends. Jandali and Joanne married a few years later and had a daughter, Mona, whom they kept. But divorced shortly thereafter.

The child given up for adoption was, of course, Steve Jobs, the computer entrepreneur. The brief friendship would profoundly affect the life of Jesse Caspar Goldsmith IV, the great- grandson of Jesse and Mary Lou. Carlyle famously stated The history of the world is but the biography of great men, the so-called Great Man theory of history. In this case, it seems true. For like Jesus of Nazarath, an entire epoch of history would come to be known as the Age of Goldsmith. Indeed, in 1966 John Lennon made a controversial remark that the Beatles were more popular than Jesus. This comment went largely unnoticed in Great Britain but five months later when Datebook, an American teen magazine, reprinted the comment, extensive protests occurred in the Bible Belt. Some radio stations quit playing Beatles songs, their records were publicly burned, press conferences were canceled and threats were made. This all coincided with the Beatles tour of the US in August of 1966. They were even picketed by the Ku Klux Klan. Something similar was to happen decades later when Jesse Goldsmith IV came into his own overwhelming fame. Only this time it was true. Christ’s followers then comprised less than a fourth of all mankind, many of them nominal. But Jesse became a larger than life figure for all peoples.

Chapter II

Madison, WI May 17, 2000

Jesse Caspar Goldsmith III and his wife, Mary Jane, had recently decided to have a baby. Both were in their mid-twenties and at their most fertile. It was about this time that Mary Jane’s mother, a devout Catholic, gave her a recently published book, titled The Star of Bethlehem: The Legacy of the Magi, by Michael R. Molnar. The author had a tangential connection to Mary Jane’s parents. He was a doctoral student in astronomy in 1970 who worked out of Sterling Hall. On the night of August 24, a bomb went off destroying much of the building and killing one graduate student. Luckily for Molnar, he had left the building three hours earlier.

The bomb had been planted by antiwar activists. Sterling Hall was the home of The Army Mathematics Research Center, funded by the Department of Defense. Its head was a man by the name of Dr. John Barkley Rosser. In 1936, Rosser proved Rosser’s trick, a stronger version of Godel’s first incompleteness theorem which shows that the requirement for co-consistency may be weakened by consistency. Rather then using the liar paradox equivalent to I am not provable, he used a sentence that stated For every proof of me, there is a shorter proof of my negation. In prime number theory, he proved Rosser’s theorem. The Kleene-Rosser paradox showed that the original lambda calculus was inconsistent. This is big stuff in the field of logic and mathematics. For some, it also had philosophical implications, buttressing a Platonic view and even mysticism. His son, John Barkley Rosser, Jr, was at the time of the bombing a doctoral student at the University in economics, where he specialized in mathematical models and analysis. Like his Dad, he was a math genius. Barkley Jr. was at the time also a teaching assistant, and Mary Jane’s mother and father both had taken one of his classes. They knew him and would read a book first published in 1959, titled, Godel’s Proof, a popular explanation of logic theory for laymen. Its author was James R. Newman Godel Nagel, presumably a descendant of Kurt Godel. It was the closest they came to understanding Barkley senior’s accomplishments. In addition, in August of 1970 they lived together in an apartment only a mile or so from Sterling Hall. They were awakened by the blast. As antiwar activists, they were saddened to hear that one person had been killed. It was later revealed that the bombers had purposely timed the explosion for the middle of the night when they thought the building would be vacant.

At any rate, Mary Jane’s parents later married and started a family. Like her parents, Mary Jane was raised Catholic, but like her husband, of mixed Jewish and Christian ancestry, was largely secular. Still, she was interested in history and read the book on the star of Bethlehem.

Molnar, who got his PhD from UW-Madison in 1971 despite having much of his research material destroyed in the Sterling Hall bombing, was then a professor at Rutgers in New Jersey. He had found an ancient Roman coin depicting a ram and a star that led him to ancient astrology, the forerunner of modern astronomy. He learned that the planet Jupiter, thought of as a regal star two thousand years ago by middle eastern astrologers, conferred kingship, a power that was amplified when in close conjunction with the moon. Jupiter underwent two occultations or eclipses by the Moon in Aries in 6 BC. The second occultation on April 17 coincided when Jupiter was in the East, a condition mentioned twice in the Biblical account of the star of Bethlehem. In August of that year, Jupiter became stationary and then went before Aries where it again became stationary on December 19, 6 BC. This is when Jupiter stood over–a secondary royal portent also mentioned in the Bible.

In addition to the Roman coin from Antioch commemorating this event centuries later, during the Christian era of Rome, Molnar found confirmation from a contemporary Roman astrologer that the conditions of April 17, 6 BC were believed to herald the birth of a divine, immortal, and omnipotent person born under the Ram, the sign of the Jews. Aries the Ram.

So it appears that Jesus or Nazarath or the Christ really did exist, and was born on April 17, 6 BC.

Mary Jane was intrigued. She was not yet pregnant, but might become pregnant in the following months. Their was a chance, however slim, that her child would be born on April 17, 2001, the first year of the new century and millennium.

Chapter III

November 23, 2000 Thanksgiving Day

Jesse Goldsmith III and his wife, Mary Jane, traveled to Cedarburg, WI from Madison to enjoy Thanksgiving with Mary Jane’s parents. Mary Jane was about four months pregnant and just beginning to show. She had delayed telling her mother especially that she was pregnant out of fear of a miscarriage. A prior pregnancy had ended abruptly that way.

Her parents were thrilled, especially her mother. She asked Mary Jane if she had finished reading the book about The Star of Bethlehem. Mary Jane smiled. Her doctor had told her the baby boy would be due in April, most likely mid-April. There was a good chance that April 17, the day claimed as the birthday of Jesus would also be her son’s natal day. Of course, few of high intelligence believed in astrology anymore. During the Reagan years, her husband had often made jokes about their belief in astrology. But there was a gleam in her mother’s eye that told her otherwise. Over the years, her mother had claimed lucky hunches. Although embarrassed to admit it among their highly educated, intellectual circle of friends, she believed that she was psychic. And when she had first read the book, she had one of her premonitions. But it would seem idiotic and unsophisticated to say so in so many words. Mary Jane smiled. She knew her mother well.

Her husband, Jesse Goldsmith III, was a psychiatrist by profession. He did not believe in the validity of psychic phenomenon. But he certainly knew that the belief in such events was a psychological reality. And so when on Tuesday, April 17, 2001, his first child and only son was born late in the evening, he attributed it to self fulfilling prophecy. His wife subconsciously bought into her mother’s wish that she deliver on that date. The mind controls the body as much as the body controls the mind.

As it turns out, his parents also thought the day auspicious. In the news of the day Steve Jobs made a press release announcing an upcoming Apple Worldwide Developers Conference. Due to the coincidence that his Great- Grandparents had briefly known Jobs’ biological parents at the University of Wisconsin-Madison during 1954-5, they had bought large amounts of stock in Apple from late 1980 at its initial offering to 1985, when the stock finally consistently rose to more than $22 per share. Their about $25,000 investment from that period would become worth about 7.5 million dollars by the end of 2014, due to stock splits and appreciation. This growing nest egg was already apparent by 2000 and would ensure their retirement security, as well as potential inheritance for their children and grandchildren, among their other investments and assets. His family thus greatly benefited from the personal computer revolution. As Jesse IV grew up, this became part of family lore and legend, the personal connection to Steve Jobs and his company, Apple.

That Christmas, the Goldsmith’s received a Christmas card from Mary Jane’s parents, with the following verse:

"O Star of wonder, Star of Night

Star with royal beauty bright

Westward leading, still proceeding

Guide us to thy Perfect Light"

It was from a poem written in 1857, We Three Kings, by the Rev. John Henry Hopkins. Also on the card was a huge Star of Bethlehem.

Not at all like what really happened, Mary Jane commented to her husband. According to the book by Molnar, It was an astrological conjunction of Jupiter and the moon, not this huge star.

I don’t think they make Christmas cards accurately depicting what Molnar claims actually happened, her husband replied. I think that was the closest thing she could find that expressed her feelings.

Chapter IV

April 17, 2005

Jesse IV was spending the afternoon of his fourth birthday at the home of his maternal Grandmother. His Grandfather was out of town and his parents were working. Grandma Ruth lived in Cedarburg, about an hour and a half drive from Madison and so did not get to see Jesse as often as she would like. This was a real treat.

She made a special birthday cake for him, flourless dark chocolate, his favorite, with vanilla ice cream. His parents had neglected his religious education in her opinion, declining to take him to either Temple or Church. Largely secular without being committed atheists, Jesse III and Mary Jane felt that Jesse IV could make up his own mind in time. They did not believe that indoctrinating a child of his age in any particular dogma or mythology was wise.

Grandma Ruth had other views. She sat Jesse down at the dining room table with three objects: a Christian cross hanging from a rosary, a menorah with a silver Star of David pendant on a chain, and a green enamel star and crescent on a black background medallion.

Choose, she instructed. Jesse hesitated for a moment and then picked up the menorah with the silver Star of David pendant. I recognize this, he replied.

Do you recognize any of the others? Grandma Ruth asked.

Yes, Jesse replied. And then he picked up the rosary with the Christian cross. I also recognize this.

Grandma Ruth was pleased. As far as she knew, Jesse IV had never been to Temple or Church; yet, he remembered the most recognizable symbols of Judaism and Christianity. She had gotten the idea for this test from reading an account of the Dalai Lama. The Buddhists believed in reincarnation, something the Catholic Church does not teach