The spies spent the night at the woman Rahab’s house, which was built into the very wall of Jericho. The king heard and sent his men to capture them. Rahab said the spies had already left. She urged the king’s men to pursue them. But, in fact, she had hidden the spies on her flat roof, among the flax stalks she slept on in the hottest weather. After the king’s men left, Rahab explained to the spies why she had lied to her own people. “I know the Lord has promised you this land. We all know what happened at the Reed Sea. We quake in fear at you Children of Israel.” She made the spies promise they would save her family when the Children of Israel entered the city. After all, they owed her. The spies told her to gather her parents, siblings, extended family, all within her home. She should hang a scarlet cord from her window.
The Children of Israel would see the cord and leave her clan undisturbed.
Rahab then lowered the spies out her window and told them to hide in the hills for three days.
The spies hid. When they finally returned to Joshua’s camp, they told him the lay of the land. The Children of Israel prepared to enter Jericho, across the River Jordan. The priests led the way, carrying the golden ark with the covenant—the tablets of laws. Behind them came Joshua with 12 men, one from each tribe of Israel.
When they got to the river, Joshua told the priests to step in; the water would be no barrier. The priests stepped in at the edge of the fast, high river. Instantly, the water stood still. It rose up in a single mound. The Children of Israel, a nation of hundreds of thousands of people, crossed on the dry riverbed into Canaan. Once all had passed, the waters gushed again.
The 12 men, one from each tribe, had picked up large stones from the riverbed. They set those 12 stones in a circle at Gilgal, to the east of Jericho, where they camped that night. The stones would remind future generations of how the Jordan had stopped flowing, like the Reed Sea had parted—how waters opened the way for the Children of Israel to reach their destined home.
In Gilgal the Children of Israel celebrated Passover. For the last time, they ate manna. For now they were in Canaan, where produce was abundant.
Joshua lifted his eyes—ah, that simple act that had led to so many past revelations—and he saw a messenger of the Lord with an unsheathed sword in his hand. The Lord’s army had come to aid in overtaking Jericho! The messenger made Joshua take off his sandals, for this was holy ground.
A man from each of the 12 tribes of Israel picked up a large rock from the riverbed to bring to Gilgal.
The Lord gave Joshua directions. Men carried the Ark of the Covenant once around the walls of the city of Jericho for six days. Seven priests accompanied them, blowing on ram horns. On the seventh day, they circled Jericho seven times. Then Joshua told the people, “Shout! For the Lord has given this town to us.” He reminded them not to harm Rahab’s clan.
The Children of Israel shouted.
The walls of Jericho came crumbling down.
The Children of Israel marched in and slaughtered men, women, children, oxen, sheep, donkeys. They burned everything but the gold, silver, bronze, and iron—which they took as treasury for the Lord’s house.
All those people died.
All those animals died.
The air stank of pain.
All existence must have shrieked.
But Jericho belonged to the Children of Israel. At last.
The Children of Israel continued taking over city after city. It wasn’t easy, especially since they often did evil in the eyes of the Lord and, so, suffered from the Lord’s wrath. But then, battles aren’t meant to be easy.
THE SITE OF JERICHO
The capture of Jericho is not based on actual history; Joshua’s time would have been the late 13th century B.C.E. By then, Jericho, a former bustling metropolis, was abandoned, perhaps with no walls. But it’s clear from the excavated remains that the ancient Jericho had once had thick walls and tall towers, all of which would have taken many people a long time to build. This is evidence of a structured society. It had extensive underground burial chambers and elaborate agricultural practices. On the same site another town was built around the ninth century B.C.E. and it grew big, only to be destroyed again by the Babylonians in the sixth century B.C.E. It grew once more and became the private estate of Alexander the Great in the fourth century B.C.E.
The Children of Israel surrounded Jericho, circling the walls for days, blowing on ram horns. On the seventh day, they shouted, and the walls of Jericho crumbled.
Samson passed through a vineyard, where a lion attacked him. To his astonishment, he killed it with his bare hands. He hadn’t known his own strength before that.
SAMSON AND DELILAH
As punishment for evil deeds, for 40 years the Lord put the Children of Israel under the power of the Philistines, from along the eastern coast of the Mediterranean Sea. During this time, among the Children of Israel lived a man named Manoah with his wife, but without children. One day a man appeared to the woman and told her not to drink wine and to eat only clean food, for she was going to have a son. No razor should touch that boy’s head. He would be a servant of God—a Nazarite—who drinks no wine, eats nothing unclean, and grows his hair.
The woman told Manoah. He rushed to offer this man a meal as thanks. The man told him to make a sacrifice to God, instead. When Manoah sacrificed a kid goat, the messenger went up in the altar flames. Manoah was afraid, but the woman wasn’t; this was God’s wish.
When the woman gave birth, they named the babe Samson. Samson grew into a man driven by compulsions. One day he saw a beautiful Philistine woman and his heart pumped hard. He told his parents to arrange a wedding. His parents pleaded with him to choose a wife among the Children of Israel. But Samson was smitten.
On the way to visit her, Samson passed through a vineyard. A lion charged him. The spirit of the Lord seized Samson; he ripped that lion apart with his hands. He was astonished at his own strength. He told no one of this feat—perhaps he hardly believed it. He simply continued to the town where the Philistine woman lived.
After a while he visited again, this time to marry her. He stopped in the vineyard to look at the lion’s remains. Yes, there it was; he had truly killed a lion. And what was this? Bees buzzed; honey pooled among the bones. Samson scooped up the glistening honey and licked it from his palms—he ate that unclean food and took some home to feed his parents.
Soon his father Manoah arranged the wedding. Samson invited 30 companions. Impressed with his own feat, he set them this riddle:
From the eater came what could be eaten.
From the fierce came what was sweet.
(SUPER)HEROES
Traditional stories often have figures with strength enough to do astonishing feats. Some of those figures had one parent who was a deity, and perhaps the source of their powers, like Herakles of ancient Greece, Karna of the Hindu epic Mahabharata, and Cú Chulainn of the Irish. But others were ordinary humans, such as the warrior Beowulf of the Anglo-Saxons. Like Samson, these larger-than-life figures sometimes had a secret weakness (think of the heel of the warrior Achilles).
If they could solve it within the seven-day wedding feast, he’d give them 30 fine cloths and 30 new garments. If they couldn’t solve it, they’d have to give him the same. He was risking 30 times what each of them was risking. Still, it was unfair odds; nothing in that riddle gave a clue about the lion or honey.
They couldn’t figure it out, naturally. On the fourth day, those companions took a new and vicious strategy: They threatened Samson’s wife. “Lure Samson into telling you the solution, or we’ll burn your and your father’s home.” In terror, Samson’s wife badgered him, until, on the seventh day, he explained. She told the men and they then told Samson the eater was a lion and the sweet was honey.
In rage at his wife’s disloyalty, Samson slew 30 Philistine men. He stole their armor and gave their garments to the riddle-solvers. Then he went home to his father’s house.
After a while, Samson wanted his wife a
gain. That’s how wild his feelings were for her. But his father-in-law refused to let him in. He had thought the marriage was broken off, given how Samson’s wife had betrayed him. So he’d married her to another man.
Samson shouted that he was not guilty for what he was about to do. He caught 300 foxes and tied them in pairs, tail to tail, and put a flaming torch between those tails. He set them loose among the grain, the vineyards, the olive groves. The harvest burned.
The Philistines went berserk. They burned up Samson’s wife and her father, since they had caused this. But Samson could rage more than anyone. He gave those Philistines a savage thrashing, killing many, then hid in a cave near the Children of Israel.
The Philistines pursued him. The poor Children of Israel were so frightened, they told Samson they had to turn him over to the Philistines. Once they agreed not to harm Samson, he let the Philistines bind him. They brought him back to their people. The instant Samson saw his enemies, he erupted in a rage even more furious than before. He burst free, picked up the jawbone of a dead donkey, and ran through the crowds, striking at random. He killed a thousand men.
For the next 20 years, Samson led the Children of Israel.
But the Philistines were biding their time. They plotted to bring Samson down. Then Samson fell in love with another Philistine woman. Her name was Delilah, and the Philistine leaders each offered her 1,100 silver shekels if she’d find out his weak spot.
Delilah wasn’t clever. She simply asked Samson how someone could bind and torture him. Samson himself may not have been clever. But in this instance he showed caution. He said, “If I were bound with seven moist leather straps, I’d become weak.” The leaders gave Delilah seven wet straps. She bound him in his sleep, then announced, “The Philistines are upon you, Samson!” as the leaders exploded into the room. Samson burst those straps with a single flex of his muscles.
She tried again. Samson told her that new rope could bind and weaken him. The leaders gave Delilah new ropes. She bound Samson in his sleep, then announced, “The Philistines are upon you, Samson!” He burst those ropes like thread.
A third time she tried. Samson told her if she wove his seven braids into a web and hammered them to the wall with a peg, he’d weaken. She did. “The Philistines are upon you, Samson!” He freed himself in a snap.
Delilah badgered Samson, like his ill-fated wife had done before. And, like before, Samson caved. He had loved only two women in his life, both in that all-encompassing way. How could he not reveal his secret to Delilah? He told her that if she cut off his hair, the hair that marked him as a Nazarite, he’d go weak. Delilah knew love made him speak truth. She laid Samson’s sleeping head in her lap and shaved off his seven braids. Then she tortured the man, this woman who knew his heart and soul. “The Philistines are upon you, Samson!”
With a shaven head, weakened Samson prayed to the Lord for a burst of strength, then he pushed apart the pillars at his sides, making the temple fall and kill the Philistines within.
Samson woke, confused. The waiting Philistines gouged out his eyes. They imprisoned him to work grinding grain. They celebrated and had Samson brought up from prison to amuse them with his blind stumbling. They set him between the two pillars of the temple. Three thousand men and women jeered at him.
Samson asked the lad who was leading him to let him feel the pillars, that he might rest against them. He prayed. “Lord, grant me one last moment of strength.” He pushed those two pillars apart. The temple crumbled, killing all within, including Samson.
The Children of Israel buried him in the grave of his father Manoah. Twenty years he’d been a leader. Stronger than anyone else. Yet love had undone him.
David was but a slight boy, the youngest of his brothers, who tended sheep and had a mild manner. He hardly looked like the king he was about to become.
DAVID AND GOLIATH
The Children of Israel had never had a human king. There were judges, priests, and prophets as leaders. But mainly, everyone followed the Commandments and laws of the covenant, thus the Lord was their one and only ruler.
The prophet Samuel, however, was more of a leader than others. As he aged, it became clear that his sons didn’t have what it took to step into his place after his death. And, oh, the people wanted a king.
Along came Saul. Tall Saul. He stood head and shoulders above the rest. If anyone looked the part of a king, Saul did. God told Samuel to give the people a king—that very Saul. So the prophet Samuel took out a horn of oil and anointed Saul king.
Then the troubles of the Children of Israel worsened. Ammonites, living to the east of the River Jordan, threatened. So did the Philistines. Moabites from the mountains, Edomites from the northwest, Zobahites from the northeast, all brought troubles, too. The Children of Israel sharpened their plowshares, axes, sickles, and mattocks, and followed Saul into raging battles. They won.
The Lord wanted Saul to annihilate the Amalekites, a long-standing enemy of the Children of Israel, down to every last beast of the field. But Saul, once he had conquered the Amalekites, stopped; he allowed some to live, especially the beasts. It seemed a waste not to take the spoils of the dead; at the least, they could be sacrificial offerings to God. This disobedience cost him his kingship: The Lord told Samuel to anoint another king—a son of the man Jesse in Bethlehem.
What? Saul was king. And he led a formidable army. Samuel feared that if Saul heard of a second king, he would kill him. In secret, Samuel went to Jesse’s home, where Jesse paraded his seven sons in front of him. But the Lord didn’t choose any of them.
“Don’t you have any other boy?” asked Samuel.
KING DAVID
David might be the first actual historical figure in the biblical stories. Archaeologists discovered a stone tablet in Jordan from around 840 B.C.E. and another in northern Ireland from around 100 years later, both referring to David’s earlier rule. And an ancient fortress above the Elah Valley to the southwest of Jerusalem—perhaps the fortress where the Philistines fled after Goliath’s death—has materials carbon-dated to 1020 to 980 B.C.E., approximately the time of King David.
“I do. The youngest.” Jesse shrugged. “He’s tending sheep.”
Samuel nodded. That must be who the Lord wanted. “Fetch him.”
This last son, David, was a ruddy boy, handsome with bright eyes. David was not kingly to look at—his father hadn’t considered him worthy of mention. But Samuel understood that the Lord had had enough of kingly appearances; it was time for a king chosen by the heart, not the eyes. Someone obedient, who paid attention, like Moses. Samuel poured oil from his horn a second time, and anointed David as king of the Children of Israel.
Still Saul knew nothing of this. But an evil spirit entered him; he was afraid all the time. His servants said he needed a good lyre player to soothe him. They chose none other than David, the son of Jesse, the secret second king. Whenever Saul’s nerves made him miserable, David played. Saul felt relief and came to love the boy. Saul was so kind; David’s own father had never been that kind.
Meanwhile the Philistines gathered for another attack. Among them was a tall, strong man named Goliath, dressed in armor, with a bronze helmet and a spear that weighed 600 iron shekels. Goliath challenged the Children of Israel to produce someone to fight him, man-to-man, and thus avoid a war. The people of the loser would be slaves to the people of the winner. At that time, David was near the Philistines, for his father Jesse had sent him to bring provisions to his older brothers in Saul’s army. Why would David’s father do that, given the stature of that boy? Was he like Joseph’s father Jacob-Israel, who sent him out to his brothers knowing full well how they despised him? But David was happy to go. He was fascinated by Goliath’s challenge. When his brothers realized this, they scorned him. All the same, David offered to fight Goliath for the Children of Israel.
“You’re just a boy,” said Saul. “He’s a warrior.”
“I’ve fought off lion and bear when they’ve come to threaten my fa
ther’s flock. The Lord who rescued me from them will rescue me from this Philistine.”
Saul put his armor on David, but it was so big, slight David couldn’t walk in it. Instead, David went in his ordinary clothes, a stick in one hand, five smooth stones from the creek in his pouch, and a slingshot in the other hand. Goliath was offended when he saw this puny fellow. “I’ll feed your flesh to birds and beasts.” David invoked God and made his own threats. Then he took out his slingshot. The very first stone struck Goliath in the forehead. He fell flat on his face. David grabbed Goliath’s sword, massive though it was, and slew him. The Philistines fled.
The boy David was sure the Lord would rescue him as he fought the big man Goliath. He had only a slingshot and stones, while Goliath had a huge sword. But David was right; it was he who won.
David snuck up behind Saul in a cave and cut off a part of his cloak. Then he showed him, so that Saul would know David could have killed him but never would. He loved Saul like a boy loves his father.
KINGS STRUGGLE
After defeating Goliath, David returned to Saul’s home. Saul was amazed to realize the victor was his lyre boy. Women danced in the streets with timbrels and lutes, singing,
Saul killed thousands, and David, tens of thousands.
The words grated on Saul. But Saul’s son Jonathan loved David more than a true brother. Jonathan gave David his cloak and battle gear, and they fit perfectly. It was as though their souls joined, as though Jonathan was ceding to David what was his as heir to Saul, even the kingship. David wore Jonathan’s battle gear into more wars and won. Everywhere he went, women sang,
Treasury of Bible Stories Page 8
