Elijah (37 page)

“Shammah,” a friend said softly. He turned to see the man beside him. “Shammah, I fear Baana has informed Abinadab of your words.”

The slave buried his face in his hands. “Baana is my best friend. He would not do that.” He felt the companion’s hand on his arm and looked up. The face reflected both concern and certainty. Baana, both of them knew, had become a different man in his quest to satisfy both Abinadab and Asherah. “What am I to do?” Shammah asked simply.

“You are not the only one,” the friend answered. “Several of us spoke out. We will be identified in the end. Slaves are not brave for long.”

Other voices surrounded Shammah, each one of whom was guilty of insurrection against their masters. Shammah knew that he was responsible, since he began the tragedy-bound discussion. “We must flee,” he said in a low voice. “It is better to be a free bandit than a maimed slave.” The others nodded. Six men slipped the bolt from the gate and edged through the narrow opening. They turned southeast, toward the hills of Judah.

Elisha lay on his back in the darkness of their room. “Elijah,” he called, “are you still awake?”

“Yes.”

“What will happen now?”

“Only Yahweh knows.”

The young man raised himself on his elbow. “Elijah the people are angry. They are ripe for rebellion.”

“Yes, they are angry,” Elijah spoke flatly, without emotion or real involvement.

“Should we not be with them? Shouldn’t we teach them the right was to act?”

“And what is the right way? Has Yahweh given you such a word?”

Elisha lay back without answering.

“Teaching is not done in a night, Elisha. That is the first thing a prophet must learn.”

“But what will happen?” Elisha asked worriedly. “Aren’t we responsible for what might happen?”

“We are responsible for telling the way of Yahweh, and for telling it as clearly as we can to everyone. The wealthy ones heard Yahweh’s word as clearly as did the poor and the slaves. It is up to those who heard to act. The wealthy should act first, for they have the power. If they do not, they will reap the whirlwind.”

Elisha lay back. He was silent for a moment, then said simply, “I wish I could help.”

Elijah smiled in the darkness. “That is why you’re a prophet. It is in the word of Yahweh that the poor and distressed, and the rich, are helped.” He spoke more intimately. “But, my young friend, you will not change Israel in a day. Men’s hearts are more complicated than that. The clear teaching of Yahweh is that every man should have his own plot of land. When the poor hear that law they clamor for their share. But do you think they are different from the rich? No, one man is as greedy as the next, rich or poor. The rich and poor alike must be taught compassion.”

The prophet rose from his bed and stood over Elisha. “Get up, Elisha,” he said. “This is the time I must tell you all that Yahweh said to me at Horeb.”

Chapter Eighteen

Ahab arranged for throne chairs, one for himself, one for Jehoshaphat, to be placed at a large assembly area near Samaria’s main gate. The two kings, contemporaries, were older now, but both remained in good health, especially the bear-headed Ahab.

The Judean king was as excited about his state visit as Ahab was, but his reason was different. Jehoshaphat’s top officials had accompanied him. They were occupied in conferences with Ahab’s advisors to establish economic and trade agreements. Ahab’s reason was war. He needed Jehoshaphat’s aid against Ben-hadad. To that end he greeted his southern neighbor with great regal pomp. He used well the promise of trade agreements, his chief bargaining tool, along with a convincing case that Ben-hadad soon would be at Judah’s borders, too.

In the end Jehoshaphat agreed to fight. “What is mine is at your disposal,” he said, “but first let us seek Yahweh’s consent.”

The court prophets, always on call for advice, were summoned without delay, the entire retinue of four hundred. Surely, Ahab reasoned, the dependable support of so many would offset the voices of a few dissidents. Their spontaneous answer came too quickly, though, too predictably: “Attack, Yahweh will give the victory.”

Jehoshaphat shifted uneasily on his throne. The answer was patently man-made. He knew court prophets well and was surprised that, after Mount Carmel, Ahab still accepted the force of numbers as an indication of divine strength. He turned to Ahab. “Is there not some other prophet in Israel who may give us more dependable counsel?”

Ahab shrugged. The shallowness of the mass of prophets was as apparent to him as to Jehoshaphat. “There is a man,” he answered. He ignored Elijah, whom he had not seen during the several years since the Naboth affair. “His name is Macaiah. But I tell you that I despise the man. He never prophesies good about anything I do, only evil.”

“Don’t prejudge the man like that, my friend,” the king of Judah replied. “If he is a true prophet of Yahweh, let us hear him.”

“Very well,” Ahab agreed. He turned to an attendant, a eunuch, who stood nearby. “Go find Macaiah and bring him here quickly.”

The prophets were unaware that their veracity was in question. They continued to moan incantations and prayers, dance their frenzied dances, throw small bones onto the ground to search their patterns for answers already determined in their minds, and send themselves into hypnotic trances to utter words they could have said as well—but less exotically—in their sanity. One prophet, Zedekiah, ingeniously fashioned a set of iron horns. Mimicking a charging bull, he ran at the other prophets and bystanders, who dodged adroitly out of his way. He turned to the two kings to announce, “This is the word of Yahweh. You will gore the Arameans as a wild bull gores everything in its path.”

Macaiah, who had been preaching regularly in Samaria, arrived after the lunch hour, coached already by the eunuch on what the four hundred prophet had said. Macaiah had answered him simply, “As Yahweh is alive and real, I will prophesy only what he tells me.”

Ahab immediately directed the question to him. “Shall we attack Ramoth-gilead or refrain?”

Macaiah smiled wryly. Most of the prophets were seated now on the ground, only a few of them still in states of ecstasy crying for Ahab to attack. “Why, King Ahab, you know the answer,” he said in a falsetto voice. “Attack and win the day. Yahweh will deliver the city into your hands.” He waved his arms in frivolous mimicry of the court prophets, who rose to their feet in anger. Jehoshaphat laughed heartily.

Ahab, not amused, slapped the arm of his throne. “Don’t make fun of me, Macaiah,” he said angrily. “I have warned you before about that. Speak what Yahweh says to you and say nothing more.”

Macaiah bowed slightly and shut his eyes. He stood erect and quiet. His right arm rose several times, slowly, toward the sky, then lowered. His left arm stayed limp at his side. At last he opened his eyes and spoke in a natural voice. “I saw all Israel scattered on her mountains, like sheep without a shepherd, and I heard Yahweh say, ‘They have no master. Let the warriors go home in peace.’”

Ahab turned quickly to Jehoshaphat. “Did I not tell you that Macaiah never prophesies anything good about me?”

Macaiah interrupted the king to continue his prophecy. “Listen now to Yahweh’s word,” he shouted. “I saw the Lord seated on his heavenly throne. A host surrounded him. All the hosts of heaven waited on him. Yahweh asked the host, ‘Who will go and entice Ahab to attack Ramoth-gilead so he will fall in battle?’ Many answers came from the host, but at last one angel stepped up and said, ‘I will entice him.’ ‘How?’ Yahweh asked. ‘I will go out,’ the angel answered, ‘and enter the spirits of the court prophets to speak in lies from their mouths.’ Yahweh answered, ‘Your plan will succeed. You shall entice him. Go and do it.’ ” Macaiah gestured toward the prophets. “You see that the plan works well. These prophets have a lying spirit inside them. Yahweh allows you to go into battle because it is his will that you shall die.”

The prophets began to shout at Macaiah. Zedekiah approached him quickly and slapped him hard across the face. “And how do you suppose that God speaks through you rather than through me?” he demanded.

Macaiah gritted his teeth to ignore the physical insult. “I will tell you how you shall discover who prophecies the truth. After the battle, when you run from one room to another to escape arrest for your false prophecy, then you will know that Yahweh does not speak through you.”

Ahab rose from his throne chair. His loud voice interrupted the argument between the prophets. “Arrest Macaiah,” he ordered sternly. “He must not spread this poison through the land. Take him to Amon, governor of the city, and to my son Joash. Tell them to lock him up and feed him sparingly on bread and water until I return safely from the battle.”

Guards obeyed immediately. Two of them caught Macaiah’s arms to pull him away. The prophet shouted back at the king, “If you return safely, then you will know that Yahweh does not speak through me.”

Macaiah’s prophecy worried Ahab. Yet the prophet did not predict defeat, but rather that the king would be killed. With a chill he recalled Elijah’s prophecy made years ago in Naboth’s vineyard. He convinced Jehoshaphat to proceed with the battle, but as a precaution Jehoshaphat was to dress in his royal attire to draw attention, while he himself would put on the ordinary armor of a charioteer.

A few weeks later the combined army camped on two sides of Ramoth-gilead, to the west and the south, to wait for dawn. The battle began at sunrise. Ben-hadad, well aware of the battle plans, came from Damascus to command his own army. While Ahab’s engineers cut trees from the forests of Gilead to construct the heavier parts of siege engines, the armies of the opposing forces met on the plains and rolling hills outside the city.

Ben-hadad gave orders to concentrate on Ahab. All other priorities were low.

The Aramaeans directed their thrusts toward the regally dressed Jehoshaphat, mistaking him for Ahab, as planned. Within hours his contingent was isolated. Only when his Judean accent became apparent through his battle shouts and orders did the enemy turn away, disinterested in any save Ahab.

Ahab fought with his chariots on the wide flat below the city. On the wall and behind shields along its base, archers sent clouds of arrows toward the approaching Israelites. Ahab raised his arms high as he screamed a command to one of the captains. The gesture pulled his breastplate above the edge of the underlapping stomach armor. At that critical moment a chance arrow struck through the narrow slit with a soft thump. Ahab gasped in surprise at the sharp, sudden pain.

He did not fall. Clenching his teeth against the pain, he choked the command to the driver, “Take me to the rear. I’m wounded.”

Behind the lines his armor bearer grasped the end of the arrow and jerked it hard from Ahab’s body. The king muffled his shout of pain with his hand. The blood spurted from the wound to flow from beneath his armor and down his legs. Ahab recalled in a fleeting moment the prophecies of Elijah and Macaiah, but he forced away the thought of death and commanded his driver to hold him erect.

Only by sheer heroism did Ahab save the battle from disaster. His shouted commands to his captains renewed the army’s courage. Word spread quickly. The king was alive. Past noon and well into the long day Ahab stood in his chariot. The driver wept and had to force himself not to look at the deepening pool of Ahab’s blood that formed on the chariot floor.

Ben-hadad’s army held. The siege machines were of no use, for the Israelites and Judeans could not force the Aramaeans back into the city. Ahab’s shouts became softer and died into whispers. Two, then three men were required to hold him upright.

He died late in the afternoon, still held upright with strong arms at his back and under his armpits. The word was sent out, “Every man return to his home. The battle is over.”

They were not pursued, for Ben-hadad’s loses were great. He was content to save the city. The driver turned the king’s chariot west. He drove carefully, determined not to jostle Ahab’s unfeeling body, now slumped on the floor of the chariot between two soldiers.

They drove all night and arrived at the palace just after daybreak. Jezebel heard the news stoically. She ordered his body prepared for burial. After the driver and attendants left, bowing with deep respect out of sorrow and concern, Jezebel walked numbly to the window. The chariot was there in the courtyard, the royal battle chariot where her beloved had died. She opened the lattice and threw it back. The horrible sounds tore through the open air. Growling, greedy dogs surrounded the chariot, lapping the blood off its floor, snarling at others in the pack that struggled for the delicacy. Jezebel screamed at the attendants, just emerging from the outside door. “The dogs,” she shouted, near hysteria, “get the dogs away.”

The driver ran to the chariot for his whip and lashed at the dogs. Yelping in pain, they ran from the chariot and disappeared down a side street. Jezebel covered her face with her hands and slumped to the floor.

Three attendants mounted the chariot and drove it to Samaria’s main pool. Prostitutes stood naked in the water, taking their morning baths. They stopped to watch the chariot back into the shallow end of the pool. One of them whispered, “It’s the king’s chariot.” They splashed toward the attendants, shouting excitedly, “Is Ahab wounded?”

The men glanced at the women. “The king is dead.”

The prostitutes, shocked, were silent for a moment. They watched the men begin to throw water onto the chariot. Then the water turned faintly pink around it. “I’m going to bathe in the king’s blood,” one said. She smiled. “Surely that will bring good luck.” The prostitutes, their sorrow quickly over, jumped at the chariot. The rolled in the discolored water and splashed it at one another gleefully. The men, ignoring the trauma of the king’s death for the moment, stopped to stare at the naked prostitutes.