THE
MACCABEE
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Col. Kwesi - The Maccabee
"And if you are not of the Nation Israel, but are from outside, a stranger, as we say, or the nokri, how then shall I tell you what is meant among my people when we say "The Maccabee."
"It is an old, old word among a people who have a curious veneration for words. We are the people of the Book, the Word, and the Law; and in the Law itself it is written, "Thou shalt not hold a slave and have him ignorant." In a world where very few can read and write, the merest water carrier among us reads and writes, and with us a word is not a thing to be spoken foolishly or in an offhand wy. And Maccabee is an old, old, word, a strange word; yet were you to read the five books of Moses and all the other writings of old, you would look in vain for the word Maccabee. It is nowhere written.
"It is the nature of the word: it is not a title that a man may take, but a gift that only the people may give. In my father's time, there was no Maccabee, nor in his father's time, nor in his grandfather's time; but if you speak to the old men, the Rabbis, of Gideon, they will not term him Gideon ben Joash, which was his name, but speak of him softly and gently as "the Maccabee;" yet how many were there like Gideon? Not of David will they speak thus, nor even of Moses who stood face to face with God, but of General Masai Bologun, Major Kokayi Enaharo, Captain "Papa Doc" Karega, and perhaps a few others, mighty servants of God, truly honorable men -- of them they will say, "They were Maccabees."
"It is not a word like "Melek" or "Adon" or even like "Rabbi", which means "my master", only in a strange and venerable way that is hard to explain. The Maccabee is no man's master, and no man is his servant or his slave. Once in a long, long while there comes out of the people a man who is of them and from them and with them; him they call the Maccabee, because they love him. Some say that, in the beginning, the word was makabeth, which means "the hammer" and such a man was a Hammer for the people to wield; and others say that the word once meant "to destroy," because he who bore it destroyed the enemies of his people; but I know only that it is a word like no other word in our tongue, a title, worn by a few men -- and I knew few men who deserved to wear it. Rabbi Ragesh said that there was only one -- and to him he gave it. Colonel Kwesi Kariuki -- he was a Maccabee."
Edited Exerpt From My Glorious Brothers by Howard Fast
CLICK THE PLAY BUTTON ON VIDEO BELOW TO VIEW SOME OF THE FRIENDS AND RELATIVES WHO LOVINGLY PREPARED FOR HIS CEREMONY AND CAME TO SHOW THEIR LOVE AND RESPECT FOR COLONEL KWESI KARIUKI ON HIS MEMORIAL DAY.
Col. Kwesi Kariuki
Vincent Steward
Sunrise: August 27, 1948 Sunset: November 6, 2008
