The Crimson Cord: Rahab's Story (24 page)

“Do you understand the purpose of this act, my son?” It was a question Salmon had asked hundreds of times in the past few hours.

“Yes, my lord. To fulfill the covenant God made with Abraham,” Salmon said, lifting his chin. He was of Abraham’s seed, a rightful heir to the land Yahweh had promised.

Joshua knelt at Salmon’s feet, the flint knife in his right hand. Salmon closed his eyes, bracing for the jolt of pain. “How well you know the answer, my son,” Joshua said, causing Salmon’s pulse to jump as he looked into the man’s soulful gaze. “But I will ask you again before I do this. You are a prince in Judah. Do you truly understand why our God commands all Israelite men to undergo this ritual? For if it is just to keep an outward covenant because you must, you are missing our God’s intent.”

Salmon’s face heated, his mind a muddle of unanswered questions. Why did God command such a thing? And why had his father not obeyed the command when Salmon was still an infant in arms, as the law prescribed?

The tip of the blade pricked his skin, and the jolt of pain he’d anticipated shot through him. The deed was completed before he could formulate a response to Joshua. A servant offered Salmon a jar of healing ointment, and Joshua dropped the foreskin into a hole in the dirt and buried it.

Joshua rose, his hand extending the flint knife back to Salmon. “Experience will teach you the reason for the covenant we keep, Salmon. You have spent the day asking the
questions. But until you felt the edge of the blade yourself, you could not fully know the cost of the covenant. As you go to your tent to heal, think about these things. Ask our God to give you insight, my son.”

Salmon nodded, unable to speak past the lump in his throat. He limped past Joshua, wishing for a walking stick or shepherd’s staff, not sure he had the strength to make it down the hill to the sea of Judah’s tents spread before its base, where the men in his tribe lay on their mats, unmoving.

Pain nearly crippled him as the terrain grew seemingly rockier with every step. How had he not noticed these annoyingly jarring stones beneath his sandals? He stopped, hands to his knees, dragging in a breath. As he slowly straightened as best he could, he glimpsed the walls of Jericho in the distance. Walls with windows and the house of one beautiful, helpful prostitute. How many men would have thought twice about visiting her bed if they had undergone such personal, private pain?

Was that the answer Joshua intended him to see? But Joshua didn’t know how wayward his thoughts had been of late. He shuffled forward, the shock of every movement like a fiery touch. If he’d taken a wife, what would she say to him if she could see him now—so weak, so vulnerable?

“The day after tomorrow is the fourteenth day of the month,” Joshua said a week later, as his wife passed around a tray of sweets and his young daughters served Salmon and the other heads of tribes cups of watered wine.

“You want us to celebrate the Passover,” one of the men said, his cup held loosely in one hand.

“As we should have done in obedience every year since we escaped Egypt.” Joshua’s gaze moved from man to man. “But as you all know much more fully now, your forefathers were not an obedient people. If they had been, each of you would have been circumcised on the eighth day of your birth.”

“And saved ourselves a lot of discomfort,” another said, eliciting chuckles from the group.

“That night of Passover in Egypt was no small thing,” Joshua said, drawing Salmon’s attention. “Our people hovered beneath the blood sprinkled on the doorposts and lintels of our homes, with sandaled feet, staffs in hand, unleavened bread eaten in haste. Terror floated in the skies above, and the screams of the Egyptian people sometimes still invade my dreams.”

Salmon’s heartbeat slowed, his thoughts sobering. Before the experience at Gibeath Haaraloth, he had itched to take his sword and plunge into Canaanite lands. His hands had trained since his youth for war. But now . . . He met Joshua’s gaze. Circumcision had changed him. He’d been vulnerable. Unprotected. Had the Canaanites known what Israel’s God had commanded of His men, they could have swooped down on the whole regiment of fighting men and wiped them out with hardly a whimper in return.

“I want you to go throughout the camp,” Joshua continued, “and tell each household to prepare for the Passover. Choose an unblemished lamb for the sacrifice. Smaller households may share with others so that none is wasted. After Passover, we will harvest the grain and eat from the land.”

They talked of the coming feast rather than war and ate of the treats Joshua had supplied, then moved as one to do his bidding. Salmon felt a hand on his shoulder and held
back to accept Joshua’s parting kiss. “I would make you my right-hand man, Salmon. As I was to Moses, so you shall be to me. Will you accept this calling?”

Salmon looked into Joshua’s lined face, seeing the trust the man placed in him. Trust he was not sure he deserved. He swallowed, aware of a sudden shift in emotion. “I would be honored,” he said. “If that is our God’s wish.”

Joshua ran a hand over his graying beard. “I will admit, it is my wish, but I also believe God sees our hearts and with yours He would be pleased.”

“I fear I am far from being a man that pleases Him, my lord.” He studied the woven rug beneath his feet. “I know my wayward thoughts too well.”

Joshua cupped his shoulder. “You will find your courage challenged and your faith failing at times, my son. But our God is a patient God, a merciful God. One who gives courage to the weak, to those who trust in Him—even with their wayward thoughts.” He smiled and Salmon lightly returned it.

“He is a true God and one worthy of our trust,” Salmon said. Circumcision had taught him that much.

“Then I can count on you?” Joshua asked.

Salmon nodded, wondering just where such a calling would lead him.

21

R
ahab startled out of a sound sleep. Steady pounding of the earth’s surface and the jangling of warriors’ armor fairly shook the walls of the city. Had they entered the gates?

She sat up. She must get to her family. Convince them to come now!

Tangled covers seemed to fight her efforts. Her heart thumped hard as she opened the shutter and peered from her window to the sea of men below.

First priests carrying a golden box, then men dressed as military leaders, then soldiers tromped in straight lines around the circle of the town, saying not a word. Just as her townsmen had done during the Festival of Keret several months earlier.

Israelites. Were their actions mocking Jericho’s feast honoring the moon god?

A wave of fear and excitement moved through her. Israel’s God had mocked the gods of Egypt. Surely He was powerful
enough to do the same to the moon god of Canaan. The god the people of Jericho also worshiped.

She glanced at the scarlet cord, relieved to see it still held secure. A breath she’d held too long escaped as she stepped back and closed the shutter up tight. She must make her father see that there could be no more waiting.

Although Adara had tried to convince the family to move to Rahab’s home, they had refused. And once news of Dabir’s apparent suicide spread, the town had lost all hope. Even Prince Nahid refused to visit her. No men ventured from their homes to hers. Except for the cook and Tendaji and a stray cat that had found its way to her courtyard, she lived alone. She looked down as the cat, back arched, rubbed against her bare leg. She bent to pick him up. The poor thing had been scrawny, nearly starved when she found him. And the cook had protested feeding the animal. Cats, especially black and brown like this one, she’d said, were evil tools of the gods. Only the Egyptians held them in high regard.

“You’re not a tool of evil, little one.” She kissed the cat’s brown nose and stroked the dark stripes down his back. “No more than I am.” Her words trailed off. What was true of her could not be true of such a small, charming creature.

He rewarded her with a kiss against her check, and she felt an uncommon motherly bond to the animal, as though he understood her and needed her, like she’d needed the babe she’d lost.

“Do you need me?” she whispered against his cheek. His loud purr was her reward. But a moment later he buried his head against her arm, as though she could protect him from the strange silence . . . the sounds of steady, heavy marching, but missing a battle cry.

“Are you afraid?”

His purr ceased, and she realized that even this animal was not safe from Israel’s invasion if he did not stay within her walls. Soon there would be a breach, and since she did not know when, she must convince her family to come to her for safety today.

“Perhaps you could convince them.” She spoke to the cat but knew she was really speaking to herself, bolstering her courage. “I will leave you with Tendaji, for I do not trust that the cook won’t put you in a soup and feed it to me. Perhaps when I return you will have many arms to hold you.”

She set the cat on the end of her bed, patted its head, then hurried to dress in her plainest garments and old, dull robe. She must not be recognized as she took the streets to her father’s house. But she must hurry and bring her family back with her before it was too late.

The sun was halfway between dawn and the day’s midpoint when Rahab knelt before her father, arms outstretched, pleading with him to listen to her. “Father, please, come stay with me. We are surely safer together than separate.”

Her brothers laughed outright at her words, causing a sinking feeling to settle within her. “Why should an entire household move to stay with
you
, when you are one woman alone?” Tzadok said, his expression carrying its familiar frown. “I have no intention of living in the home of a prostitute.”

Silence followed his caustic remark until an argument broke out between her brothers and sisters. Her mother came to stand behind her father, placing a hand on his shoulder as though to infuse him with her strength. Rahab noted the deep
lines along her father’s weathered brow, her pulse suddenly quickening at the realization that he was indeed not as strong as he had been the day she married Gamal.

“What possible reason can you give us for coming to stay with you?” her brother Jaul asked, breaking her train of thought. “Are you privy to something the rest of us do not know?”

She rose slowly and let her gaze sweep the room, resting on each of her brothers. “Men tell me many things they would normally keep to themselves.” She swallowed the impossibility of keeping the truth from them yet trying to convince them to see things her way. She had to convince them without revealing Salmon’s secret.

Help
me, God of Israel.
If only Salmon had not insisted they stay within her walls.

She straightened. “Did you not think it strange the way they marched in silence in one complete circle around the city? Just like we do during Keret’s festival? If my guess is right, they will do the same again tomorrow. Perhaps they will take until the seventh day to attack, as our festival lasts a week, but we cannot be sure. What if they challenge us on the third day to surprise us?” She watched their skeptical faces, their doubt evident. And why should they listen to her, a prostitute?