The Strength of His Hand (3 page)

While Hezekiah waited, Hephzibah’s question continued to nibble at the edges of his faith:
“Do you know how many years it has been?”

For more than ten years he had waited, trusting for an heir. Ten long years. He could understand Hephzibah’s bitter accusations toward God.

He looked at the scroll again.
“He must not take many wives.”
Why had he stubbornly interpreted the Law to mean something God never intended? Why hadn’t he listened when Shebna showed him this passage several years ago? He could have saved Hephzibah years of frustration and sorrow. He could have had several sons by now.

A few minutes later his valet returned, followed by Joah and Eliakim. “I found them both, Your Majesty.”

“Good. Have a seat, gentlemen.” He motioned to his couch, then took a seat opposite them and passed the scroll to Joah. “I need an interpretation of this law. Read the section about kings’ wives—here.”

Hezekiah pointed to the place, then leaned forward anxiously, his elbows on his knees, watching Joah’s face as he read. When the Levite finished, he passed the scroll to Eliakim, who squinted at the tiny letters and tilted the scroll toward the light to read it.

“Now, according to that Law, is the king allowed to marry only one wife?” Hezekiah asked when Eliakim finished reading. “Is that how you interpret this passage?”

Joah pondered a moment. “No—it doesn’t say only one. But I think it’s important to examine the reason Yahweh gave us this law.”

“And what would you say that reason is?”

“I think this particular passage warns Israel’s kings that a lack of self-control in their personal affairs can lead to a lack of self-control in other areas of their lives. And this can threaten their relationship with Yahweh.”

“I see. And is that how you interpret it, Eliakim?”

“Yes, I think King Solomon’s troubles with his many wives and the idolatry that resulted is a good example of the dangers this warns against.”

Hezekiah stroked his beard thoughtfully, then leaned forward with his elbows on his knees again, his fingers laced together in front of him. “Then if I married a second wife, one who worshiped only Yahweh, would I be in violation of the Torah?”

“No, Your Majesty,” Joah said after a pause. “I don’t think you would be. But again, obeying the purpose of the Law is just as important as obeying the letter.”

“Then I want to make my reasons for taking a second wife very clear. I love Hephzibah, but after all these years she is still barren. If the Law allows it, I would marry again to provide an heir to the throne.”

“That’s a valid reason,” Joah said. “But there’s another law I should warn you about. It’s found in the fifth book of Moses, I believe. It says that if an unloved wife bears a son first, the rights of the firstborn belong to him, even if the favored wife has a son later on.”

“You mean once my new wife gives me a son, Hephzibah’s son cannot inherit the throne of Judah, even if God miraculously opens her womb?”

“That’s right, Your Majesty.”

This law seemed unfair, and again Hezekiah recalled Hephzibah’s accusations that Yahweh’s laws were unfair. But the alternative might be no heir at all.

“I see,” he said at last. “Anything else, Joah?”

“Only a word of advice. For the sake of domestic harmony, you’ll need to give both wives equal time and attention.”

“I understand.” But Hezekiah wondered if Hephzibah would. She had offered to share him so he could have a son, but did she realize that she would have to continue sharing him for the rest of her life?

“Eliakim, would you like to add anything?” Hezekiah asked.

“No, Your Majesty. Joah knows more about the Law than I do.”

“Then I won’t keep you. Thank you for coming.”

Hezekiah pondered Joah’s interpretation for a long time after the two men left. Although it seemed as though the Torah would permit a second marriage, he found it difficult to accept the idea after believing differently for so many years. He knew he could never love a second wife as much as Hephzibah, and it would be hard to treat them equally—even harder to share his time with another woman. And deep inside, he still longed for a son of Hephzibah’s to inherit his throne.

As he struggled with these thoughts, he wondered how Hephzibah would react to what the Levite had told him. Would this news cheer her and offer her hope or enflame her bitterness and jealousy? She would have a lot to think about, and Hezekiah would need to talk everything over with her carefully before he made his final decision.

But why wait until tomorrow night? He would go back to Hephzibah’s room and tell her tonight.

He quickly walked the short distance to the harem and saw a beam of light shining under her door. He knocked softly. Then, not waiting for the maid to answer, he opened the door and stepped inside.

“Hephzibah, I—”

But Hezekiah never finished what he had come to say. Hephzibah was kneeling in worship before a golden statue of Asherah.

2

T
HE FLOOR SWAYED BENEATH
Hezekiah’s feet as he slowly walked toward his wife. He stared at the shrine, then at Hephzibah, unwilling to believe what he was seeing. He had stepped into a nightmare. This wasn’t his wife kneeling before an idol. It couldn’t be. He tried to speak, but nothing came out. He fought the urge to be sick.

Please let this be a dream
.

But it wasn’t a dream. It was real. And an agonized cry rose from deep inside him.

“No! Oh, Yahweh … please … no!”

He grabbed the front of his tunic with shaking hands and tore it down the middle. Then he ripped the fabric to shreds, crying out in anguish as he pulled it again and again, “How could you do this to me? How could you?”

All the blood drained from Hephzibah’s face as she cowered before him. Hezekiah seized her by the shoulders, but his hands shook uncontrollably as rage pounded through him, and he quickly let go, afraid he would kill her.

“How long have you had this in my house?” he shouted. “How long have you worshiped an idol?”

“I-I’m sorry,” she stammered. “I-I can explain—” Hezekiah couldn’t look at her. He turned away in revulsion, and his eyes fell on the shrine she had made. Fine olive oil from his storehouses filled the silver lamps. The royal incense intended for Yahweh’s sanctuary burned in the incense stands. The smiling goddess with her swollen belly and heavy breasts gazed up at him with contempt.

Then he saw the urn bearing his own seal. He picked it up and read the damning symbols of Hephzibah’s vow.
Oh, Yahweh, no—not
this
. Horror rocked through him. She had pledged to murder his child.

“Hephzibah, you would sacrifice our son?”

“But I made the vow for you—so the enemy wouldn’t invade your nation.”

“No,” he moaned, fighting tears. “No!”

His father had sacrificed his sons to Molech for the same reason. Hezekiah remembered his brother’s terrified screams as he had rolled into the monster’s flaming mouth. He shuddered in horror at the thought of Hephzibah throwing their son into the flames.

He stood paralyzed. Time had frozen, and it seemed as though he would be trapped in this chilling moment forever. But gradually his blood began to flow through his veins once again, transforming his shock into uncontrollable rage.

Hezekiah slammed the urn against the far wall with all his strength, shattering it into dust. He saw the obscene goddess smiling at him, mocking him, and he lost all control. He picked up the table as if it weighed nothing and hurled it across the room with a savage cry. The golden idol crashed to the floor, breaking open, spilling sand from its hollow center. What had appeared to be a solid gold statue had been a fake, molded from clay and thinly coated with gold.

The table and lamps and incense burners he’d overturned flew in every direction, knocking over one of the blazing lampstands. Before Hezekiah could react, the puddles of splattered oil quickly ignited and burst into flames. The fire licked across the carpet, engulfed a pile of reed mats, then spread to the silken floor cushions.

He heard a
whoosh
as dried palm branches in an earthenware jar caught fire, then the angry crackle of flames as they jumped to a tapestry banner hanging above the jar. Beside him the woven lattice screen that shielded Hephzibah’s bath erupted in flames, and from there the fire quickly leaped up the gauzy curtains that enclosed her bed. It was spreading out of control. He had to do something.

Hezekiah tore off his outer robe and used it to fight the rapidly spreading fire. Hot smoke choked him as he swung the robe into the middle of the flames, over and over again, beating with desperate strength.

But the fire spread faster than he could fight it. A wall of flames surrounded Hezekiah, following the arc of spilled oil. Heat seared his chest where he had torn his tunic; flying sparks singed his arms and face. He ignored the pain as he battled on.

Suddenly he heard Hephzibah scream. She had backed into a corner beside the flaming bed with no way to escape. He tore the blazing curtains from the canopy to clear a path for her, shouting, “Run, Hephzibah! Get out of there!” She didn’t move.

Before he could grab her and pull her out, a piece of flaming debris suddenly fell onto his clothing, igniting the hem and tassels of his tunic. He wrestled to extinguish his burning clothes, crying out in agony as the oily flames burned off a large patch of skin on his leg.

Dizzy with shock and pain, Hezekiah fought for his life and for Hephzibah’s, desperate to bring the fire under control. When he could no longer use his robe to beat the flames, he bailed water from the bath to soak the carpet. He scooped handfuls of sand from the toppled idol to douse burning puddles of oil. He grabbed the flaming tapestry banner and tore it down so the fire wouldn’t spread to the ceiling beams. Choking on acrid smoke, he yanked the curtains off the windows before the fire reached them and used the heavy cloth to smother the flames. After what seemed like many hours, the fire was finally out.

Hezekiah sagged with exhaustion. His lungs ached from breathing smoke. His blistered hands burned as if still immersed in the flames, and the shin of his right leg where his clothes had caught fire was a throbbing, open wound. But it was better that he suffered, better that he burned in the flames than his firstborn child.

The smell of burnt flesh and hair lingered in Hezekiah’s nostrils, and it seemed appropriate to him. It was the smell of idolatry.

Hephzibah’s shattered Asherah lay among the ashes where it had fallen, its severed head smiling as if nothing had happened. Hezekiah bent down and painfully scooped up a fistful of sand, then walked over to where Hephzibah still cowered beside the bed. He grabbed her hand and forced it open, pouring sand into it.

“Here’s your goddess,” he said. “Pray to this.”

Then, stepping over the smoldering wreckage, he left her.

Servants rushed into Hephzibah’s room from all directions, but she didn’t move from where she sat slumped in her gutted bedroom.

“What have I done? What have I done?” she sobbed.

Hezekiah was gone. The moment he walked out her door, Hephzibah knew she had lost him forever. The anguish and bewilderment she’d seen on his face would haunt her for the rest of her life. She wished she had died in the fire.

She knew how much Hezekiah’s God meant to him, how hard he had worked for religious reform. Why had she deceived him and betrayed him by worshiping an idol? Her reasons seemed trivial to her now, beside the enormity of Hezekiah’s anger and hatred. He would never forgive her. She wanted to die.

She stared at the handful of sand she clutched and watched it slowly slip away between her fingers. She had lost Hezekiah, her only reason for living, over a handful of worthless sand.

————

Hezekiah limped down the hall toward his chambers in a daze, coughing smoke from his lungs. The searing pain from his burns was slowly penetrating his shock, but the pain of what Hephzibah had done to him was far greater.

Before he reached his door, he saw Eliakim running up the hall toward him. “What happened, Your Majesty? We smelled smoke. Are you—God of Abraham, help us! Look at you!”

Hezekiah glanced down at his torn, burnt clothes. “There was a fire in the harem… .” he said dazedly. “Some oil lamps spilled. It’s … out now… .”

“Your Majesty, you’re badly burned! Here—let me help you.”

With Eliakim’s aid, Hezekiah stumbled inside his chambers and sank onto his couch. He heard Eliakim calling for servants and issuing orders, but his voice sounded as if he were shouting from the end of a long tunnel.

“Fill a basin with cold water. Hurry! You—run to the harem. There was a fire there. Make sure it’s out. And you—fetch the royal physicians quickly.”

Hezekiah’s valet stood over him, wringing his hands.

“Get some strong wine,” Eliakim told the man. “Now!” The servant dashed off, leaving them alone.

Hezekiah felt the pain surging and expanding like a powerful tide, strengthening every minute. His hands and his chest burned as if still immersed in the flames, but the greatest agony came from the burn on his leg. He forced himself to talk between labored breaths, struggling to stay conscious.

“I guess I was foolish … to try to fight the fire … myself. But I couldn’t call for help… . I didn’t want … anyone … to see …”

Sweat poured down Hezekiah’s face into his eyes. He tried to wipe it away with his forearm, his swollen hands as useless as if they belonged to someone else. Eliakim grabbed a linen cloth and mopped his face and neck.

“Hold on, Your Majesty. Help is coming.”

“My leg,” Hezekiah groaned.

“Yes, I know. God of Abraham—it’s very bad.”

Hezekiah had to keep talking. He didn’t want to pass out. “Eliakim, you’re married, aren’t you?”

“Yes, don’t you remember, Your Majesty? I married the Israelite woman who escaped from the Assyrians.”

“I remember her … astounding courage …” He leaned his head against the cushions and stifled a moan. “Do you … do you love her?”

“Yes. I love her as I love my own life. She is a precious gift to me, from God.”