The Days of Peleg (81 page)

“Everything must have a source!” he said, much too intensely for the young, trapped audience of one. “You are much more complex than these trinkets you sell. You
know
who created them. But who created you, and the trees, and the stars, and everything else?”

Lot’s eyes were glazed over as if squinting to hold back tears. He wanted nothing more than for this agitated, unpredictable man to go away.

“The Creator, that’s who!” Shem triumphantly answered his own question, caught up in his own oration—not considering the youth of the person in front of him. “His name is
Yahweh
, and he made you!”

A large finger swung around to point directly at Lot’s heart. Lot glanced down at it, and then looked up past Shem to the doorway where his father, Haran, had exited earlier.

“Father!” Lot called out, not loudly; but more like a strained whimper, with a sense of mounting panic.

Shem was shocked back to the reality of his surroundings, and lowered his voice.

“Don’t be afraid,” he said hurriedly. “Remember, these icons can do nothing for you. You must trust the Creator to be both your councilor and your provider. Only the Creator can fulfill all of the needs of your life. These trinkets are worthless pieces of rock and metal, and all they can do is …”

A strong hand grabbed Shem’s left elbow and yanked him bodily from the room. He was forced to jump from his stooped position into a flailing, off-balanced landing that twisted his left ankle and brought his right shin smashing excruciatingly into a small stone table just inside the other room. He yelped uncontrollably at the sharp pains as small woodcarvings rattled and fell over on the tabletop.

Haran was glaring up into Shem face. There was no empathy for his injuries.

“How dare you speak to my son in that manner!” He was yelling breathlessly, and seemed to be trying very hard to keep from striking Shem. “And how dare you degrade our merchandise and demean its value!”

Shem was shaken and trying to ignore his pains, but he was also suddenly aware of how right Haran was. Shame and self-indictments flooded his thoughts, and all he could feel was immense anger at himself for getting so carried away.

“Please,” he stammered, “I am so sorry. You are correct. I had no right. I was just…”

Haran raised a fist, but it was only to silence Shem.

“Whatever business you may have had with my father,” he said, “You may consider it concluded.”

Before Shem could say anymore, Haran spoke with finality.

“I suggest you leave this place, and this city. There is nothing for you here.”

He was still holding Shem’s elbow, and with a slight twist, he propelled the tall graying man through the outer doorway and out into the street. He released Shem with a small push, and then wordlessly turned his back on him.

Shem slowly retraced his steps back towards the western gate, looking back only once. Soon he passed through the gate and began his three-week journey home.

He should have been hungry by now, but he had no appetite. Somehow, no matter how wonderful the opportunity, something always went wrong, and this time he couldn’t even blame the Creator.

He had sensed His warnings throughout the entire tirade, but had ignored Him. He should have waited quietly for the opportunity to talk with Terah—which had been his original objective. Now, it was all lost.

During the next few days he was often tempted to turn around and run back, but there was no possibility that either Haran or Terah would listen to him now. He wondered, despairingly, if he would have to wait another generation until Lot’s offspring would be ready, but he didn’t know if he would last that long.

He had strived his entire life, attempting to complete this one mission, and again its success had slipped away from him.

This is My plan, not yours.

Shem jumped, as if the voice had been audible. Again the Creator was trying to comfort him, but this time Shem submitted to His voice, although fearing a well-deserved rebuke.

But there was none. Shem meditated upon the words and began to realize that an all-powerful, all-knowing Creator would not risk
His
all-important plan by relying on poor, frail, weak, impulsive Shem. “
Manic
” was the word that Peleg had once called him. He also began to realize that since the Creator knew the future, He also knew—in advance—that Shem was going to fail. And surely, an all-powerful Creator could plan
around
such failures.

Slowly, his mood brightened, and by the time he was nearing the end of his first week of travels, he was actually enjoying the idea that the Creator could work everything together to accomplish what He willed. That night as he curled up under a small fig tree, the Creator spoke to him again.

Obedience is its own reward.

Shem fell asleep that night, happy (however unreasonably) for the first time in decades. He truly felt rewarded—but the reward was based on the bountiful grace of his Creator, not on his own, feeble efforts.

During the third week of Shem’s return to the Community of Peace, the Creator suddenly revealed to him during meditation that neither Haran nor little Lot was in the lineage of the
Zeh-ra
. In fact, Terah’s youngest son, Abram, would be the founder of a new line from which the coming Seed would emerge. Haran had called him “just my little baby brother”. Or as the child Lot had said, “My uncle Abram”. Once again, just as in the case of Joktan and Peleg, the Creator had chosen the youngest instead of the eldest.

Shem found himself laughing at his earlier anguish, amused at his worries about not succeeding. He had actually felt ashamed for failing to convince a four-year old about the truths of the Creator!

Somehow, he would contact Abram and try again. Someday.

But as he began to contrive great and exciting plans for this new future mission, he was suddenly stopped by the lesson he had just learned.

It was up to the Creator. Perhaps Shem would be the one, or it might be someone else. The Creator would provide.

As he approached his home, he realized he was happier than he had ever been in his life. A mountain of worry and strain from a lifetime of trying to accomplish the Creator’s will had washed away, and, although his body was beginning to feel the onslaught of time, his heart was as light and as joyful as a care-free child.

His newfound gladness was challenged when he returned home, however. His informant from the
Citadel
had sent news which had arrived while he was gone.

Peleg had died.

He had actually passed away seventeen years earlier—one year
before
Nahor—but since Nahor was a famous entrepreneur and successful businessman, the news of
his
demise had spread throughout all of the known lands—along with the added fears of one dying at such a young age.

The effort to remove Peleg’s name from history was almost complete—just as knowledge of the Great Discovery had been purged. But Peleg’s contribution was more monumental than just about any other person. The truth of the Coming Seed had been buried in fear, hidden underground for more than one hundred years, lost and forgotten by the rest of the world. And Peleg had found it. He had revitalized Shem’s faith, and then set in motion the events that would allow the message to be restored to humanity—and to the lineage of the Seed.

Shem smiled to himself. Ultimately, Peleg had accomplished more for the Creator
without
trying than Shem had accomplished with over four hundred years of striving.

Somehow Shem would be sure to include a special note about him in the
Amar
—if the Creator allowed it.

Chapter 40

Consummation

“Designs of the Serpent are meant for evil, but the Creator converts them to good.”

E
schol twitched his cheek and blinked rapidly, trying to dislodge a mosquito, which had somehow selected his face, from among all of the other possible locations within these vast swamplands, to land upon. He did not dare wave it off with his hands, because the splashing would alert the sentries who stood nearby, watching for any signs of infiltration.

He had spent the entire afternoon half-swimming and half-crawling through the marshes of Siddim, trying to reach the enemy camp before nightfall. He was now resting, almost totally submerged, at the edge of a particularly filthy bitumen bog within a stone’s throw of King Tidal’s tent, from which a banner brazenly (and carelessly) fluttered in the evening breeze, displaying his symbol—that of a long-horned goat.

As soon as the sun set, Eschol would emerge from the swamp, under cover of twilight, and do some basic reconnaissance. He would then return until the signal to strike.

For the moment, however, only his face and ears were above the slimy water as he rested motionless, listening to the foreign conversation above him. He understood very little, except he heard the words Am'raphel and Ar'ioch, names belonging to two of the four enemy kings.

He stopped himself from laughing out loud as he considered how men, who happened to be in charge of a small village or a gang of ruffians in these wastelands, astonishingly proclaimed themselves to be “Kings”—and then demanded all of the honors of state that a legitimate king should be accorded. Warlord or gang-leader would be a better label.

Pompous idiots.

The undeterred mosquito had its fill and finally left.

It was all his brother’s fault. When that strange group of travelers had arrived at Mamre’s land, he had allowed them to settle near his oak-tree farms, and then promised them protection by making an alliance with them.

Later, part of that same group had decided to lease land from King Bera, (another pompous idiot), and now the “enemy” kings had attacked and plundered the settlements of King Bera, King Birsha, and three other kings (whose names he didn’t know and didn’t care about), taking food and valuables, and capturing their people.

Unfortunately, on one of their raids, their prisoners also included the relatives of those that his brother, Mamre, had promised to protect and defend. As subjects of King Bera, they were rounded up and taken along with the rest of the plunder. There was a fairly decent market for slaves, if one could get his product to the wealthier countries in the south where ambitious building projects paid well.

Eschol had protested to his brother, claiming that their promise of protection was void, once the strangers had left the oak groves, but Mamre had insisted.

“An alliance is an alliance,” was Mamre’s stubborn assertion.

So now, here he was, hiding in the mud, waiting for the moment to attack. He was in charge of a band of twenty-three men who were currently hiding in similar fashion elsewhere in the area. Mamre had thirty-seven men to the west, also hiding in the marshes, and his youngest brother, Aner, was waiting with only eleven men in the rock outcroppings to the north.

Eventually the sentries left the area, and the sun finally disappeared beneath the horizon. Eschol hauled himself on to dry land and began looking around, still clinging to the ground; crawling on his hands and knees, or walking hunched over in an attempt to blend in with the scrubby foliage and large rocks which were scattered over the region.

Soon he was able to identify a General’s tent, a quartermaster supply hut, and a small armory. However, he was unable to find where the captives were, or where the bulk of the loot was hidden.

It was a basic rescue mission. The plan was to spring a synchronized attack on the kings and officers, and then, in the resulting confusion, rescue all of the captives and reclaim as much food and valuables as possible.

Unfortunately, the combined armies of all four enemy kings were over eight hundred troops. Fortunately, the actual rescue was not up to him or his brothers. The strangers were providing more than three hundred armed men who would rush in on
their
signal during the confusion and accomplish the liberation. It seemed only fair. The least these strangers could do was to go in and rescue their own people.

But they would rush in without knowing whether he and his brothers had succeeded. And there was no way he could control their signal.

The mud covering his body had just barely begun to dry when he returned to the bog. He had no intention of climbing back in, though, unless absolutely necessary. He sat next to a rock and waited as the evening air grew colder and the insects became more predatory.

Mamre rested beside a large boulder, watching the waxing crescent moon make its passage through the brilliant star fields of the clear night sky.

He had just returned from his reconnaissance, but he, too, had failed to discover the whereabouts of his friend’s people. However, he
had
found one of the most important targets for this night’s mission.

The tent housing King Chedor-lao'mer and his servants! This was the ruffian; the strongman; the
thug
; (these “Kings” were all the same) who had betrayed the pact made over fourteen years earlier. There had been an agreement of mutual protection and defense amongst all nine kings, but just over a year ago,
this
King had selected three others and declared war on the remaining five for no apparent reason whatsoever; attacking their cities and stealing their food, their property,
and
their subjects.

Mamre looked forward to the part
he
would play tonight, once the signal occurred.

He looked up into the night sky and spotted Nergal, the dark red wanderer. In the local folklore, it was called Baal, and (traditionally) was believed to be the god of war. But the new religion of the Queen of Heaven taught that Baal was the son of Queen Astarte, and that he was the god who ruled the underworld. He brought plague and death, but if one presented Queen Astarte with sufficient gifts and supplications (given to the local temple priestesses), she would intervene and convince Baal to withhold his malevolence—at least for a period of time.