OTHNEIL

The Force of God

Chapter Eight

by Richard S. Barnett

CHAPTER EIGHT

That's how the men of Judah and Benjamin began to claim their share of the highlands. The other tribes seemed to do just as well and they all took the share the Lord gave them. Joshua settled in Timnath Serah, and the land had peace.
Yet the other tribes didn't try to drive out all of the Canaanites. Many of those whom they didn't drive out, they forced into hard labor. Strong as they were, the tribe of Manasseh would not even try to drive the Canaanites out of the cities of Beth Shan and Taanach. The other tribes simply made peace with Dor, Ibleam, and Megiddo, and Canaanites occupy them to this day. Furthermore, Israel never took full possession of the plains.
That happened before your time, of course, Ehud, my son. That's why the men of Dan came to be so weak. The men of Simeon would have fallen into a worse state if they had gone their own way. I thank the Lord to this day that the men of Benjamin came back to join us. Three troops of your Benjaminites are worth more than the whole tribe of Simeon.
I knew for the first time after the battle of Jerusalem that somehow, some day, Acsah and I would belong to each other.
I understand now that Acsah always kept anyone who admired her at a distance because of her brothers. Kenash only meant to protect Acsah, but Gedawr thought he owned her and was so jealous he would have killed anyone whom he thought showed too much interest in her. He was always friendly with my brothers Shabab and Kenabi, however, and he never kept them from bringing gifts to Acsah as long as they gave him something.
Little good did that do them. Kenabi brought Acsah a marvelous necklace that he had found in Jerusalem. I could have died with envy because I knew it would please her. Rifaz told me it was Egyptian work and fit for a queen of Egypt. The necklace was made of beads of gold, carnelian, and turquoise in the form of lotus seeds and palm fronds, and it bore a large pendant carved like a woman's head with the horns of a cow. Acsah took one glance and spurned it.
"It's an unclean thing," she told him. "Don't you know what kind of a woman wore this?"
Kenabi didn't know any more than the rest of us, but Rifaz told me that the pendant was the head of Hathor, the Egyptian goddess of lust. Kenabi's shame and anger at her rejection only made him all the more determined to have Acsah. He and Shabab made themselves the leaders of a band of rough, hard-drinking fellows who set out to show everyone what great warriors they were, though Caleb could never rely on them.
Nevertheless, the greatest thing to come out of the battle for Jerusalem was that it brought Judah and Benjamin together. Caleb couldn't thank the Benjaminites enough because joining his forces with Benjamin made his army twice as swift and powerful. You left-handed men of Benjamin may be few in number, Ehud, but your skill with sling and bow has always counted for more than numbers.
Caleb first had to make sure that our people had their share of the land, just as Joshua promised us. We had no more great battles after we took Jerusalem because, other than Crag City, the Canaanites had no more cities between Jerusalem and Ai, our part of the land. We only had to take our land from the Canaanites and stay on watch for trouble.
Caleb soon led us south to claim the rest of the highlands for Judah. After Jerusalem, the next stronghold of the Highborn was Hebron, a good day's march to the south. The Highborn called Hebron "Arbah City" in those days, after its first king who also fathered the kings of Jerusalem, Summit City, Lachish, Eglon, and Monument City. Caleb already knew about the city and the land around it, and he decided to make Hebron a stronghold at the heart of Judah.
Caleb had another reason for wanting to settle near Hebron. The sons of Heth, the Hittites, lived in Hebron long before Arbah named the city for himself. Abraham, the father of our people, dwelt among the Hittites and he bought a cave for a burial place. Caleb had the task of laying Joseph's bones to rest there among the bones of his fathers.
Caleb called his leaders together when he was ready to move against Arbah City. Acsah and her brothers stood at his side.
"The highlands between Jerusalem and Hebron stand almost empty because the Canaanites have not yet cleared many fields here. The soil of the plains and the foothills is deeper and richer, and the Canaanites tilled them first. Nevertheless, you'll find good land here for grazing and sowing crops. It's well wooded and you’ll find springs in every valley. Kenash my son, I want you to send men to look around these highlands and find new places for our people to bring their herds."
I thought this might be my chance, but Caleb had other plans.
"Next, Rifaz, we must know more about the new king of Arbah City. Will he fight or will he give in?"
"May it please you, sir," Rifaz answered, "Hoham, whom you hanged at Makkedah, had three sons: Sheshai, Ahiman, and Talmai. As the firstborn, Sheshai became king, but he is weak minded and spends his days in filling his lusts. His brothers rule in his name, but they are jealous of each other and each wants to be king in the place of Sheshai."
"Ah, has the Lord given us a field where we may sow trouble?" Caleb laughed. "The Lord has given me an idea, my wise friend. Gera and Othniel; you two will take Rifaz and do what you can to stir up strife between these Highborn brothers. You could tell Sheshai that you have come to thank him for sending word that he's ready to make a covenant with us. Then tell him that the men of Judah have no need of a covenant because the Lord God of Israel has already given his city into our hands, even as He gave the life of Hoham his father into our hands. Let him give up the city, for why should he die, he and all his people?"
Gedawr spoke up, his voice thick with anger and jealousy: "My father, the Highborn will turn away these youths and their dwarf. Why not let the elders of Judah take your message? The Highborn will listen to real warriors like Shabab and Kenabi, and fear will surely grip their hearts."
"I have spoken and it will be done as I've said," Caleb snapped. He smiled and said more softly, "The Highborn will learn to listen to whomever I send in the name of the Lord God of Israel."
I saw Acsah cover her mouth to hide her mirth at Gedawr's anger, and I took it as another sign that she wanted nothing to do with my brothers. I had nothing to gloat over, however, because for all I knew she had rejected me with them. I wondered for a moment if I should tell Gera or Rifaz about my hopes for Acsah and ask them to give her a present or a message for me, but Caleb gave me no chance to dwell on the idea.
Having dealt with Gedawr, he turned to us and said, "Go, my sons, and the Lord be with you. The young ravens are hungry again!"
Gera and I left for Arbah City at dawn the next morning, taking Rifaz and our hundreds. The first rains had taken the strength out of the sun's heat, and we marched at a brisk enough pace to bring us to Arbah City that afternoon. As I walked beside Rifaz on his donkey, he helped me learn what I should say in the Canaanite speech.
"Remember, we want all the Canaanites to listen and tremble, sir," he told me.
"What if Gedawr is right and they won't listen? What if they get angry because they think we're insulting them?" I wondered.
"Then they can blame themselves for what happens, sir," Rifaz answered. "If they see the ravens following us, they'll take that as a sign of your power, for they dread such signs."
"Rifaz, you know that ravens don't really follow us. That's only Caleb's jest--nothing more!"
"Aren't ravens the wisest of birds, sir? Why not teach them to follow a trail of meat scraps?" he suggested.
I wasn't sure whether to laugh or be cross with Rifaz, but I asked Gera to have his bowmen and slingers watch for something to feed the ravens. His men all laughed and one soon brought me a hare. I cut it up into small pieces, and left a piece wherever I saw a boulder that looked like a good perch for a raven.
We reached the rim of the hills that overlook Arbah City after midday without seeing any sign of Highborn scouts watching the trails.
"A city built in a low place needs eyes in high places more than it needs walls," Gera remarked.
"So why haven't they sent anyone to keep watch?" I wondered. "The Highborn must know that we'll come sooner or later."
"Perhaps they have no soldiers to spare for keeping watch," Rifaz thought.
"Let's watch for any signs of strength and weakness," I decided. "We'll march up to the gateway and call for Sheshai."
We walked downhill toward Arbah City, passing fields where Canaanites labored at breaking the soil for planting. Dogs came barking after us, but Gera's slingers sent them yelping back to the clusters of huts where the Canaanites lived in squalor. Naked infants came out and stared at us, the more daring ran after us begging for food, and many of us gave them pieces of our bread. We stopped at a well in a terebinth grove to fill our water skins before marching up to the gateway of Arbah City. We met no one at the well to stop us or ask us who we were, and we saw not so much as one Highborn soldier until we reached the gateway. Gera and I left our weapons with our men and told them to be ready for trouble and wait beyond arrow range while we went to the gate and called for the king.
We found the gateway closed to us and so quiet the whole city seemed to be asleep. We saw nothing moving except vultures picking at waste below the walls. They sidled away from us and kept feeding.
"You'd think the Highborn don't fear us or anyone else," Gera murmured. "I still don't see anyone on watch."
"Let's wake them up," Rifaz answered.
Gera sounded his horn.
The Highborn were not asleep after all. Helmeted faces appeared on the walls that looked down on each side of the gateway, and we saw arrows aimed at us.
"Let them send for the king," I told Rifaz, who shouted in the Canaanite speech to the guards. They shouted back, "The king of Arbah City will not answer to strangers."
"If he wants to live, Sheshai your king will listen to the messengers of Caleb and the Lord of Israel," Rifaz answered.
I heard a caw above our heads, and a raven swooped out of the sky to settle above the gateway.
"Hear the voice of death," Rifaz added. "Let the king choose as he wishes: life or death!"
The Highborn guards shouted and waved their weapons at the bird until it flew off, but they didn't dare to aim their bows and arrows at it.
"These Highborn think that ravens are evil spirits, and they dread them. The king will come," Rifaz whispered.
"What if he wants us to come into the city?" Gera asked.
"Have we come to seek his favor? No, we make him come out to us," I answered.
We waited with our men until the king came to the gateway. While we waited, we studied the state of the city walls and tried to count the number of guards.
The gateway opened and three men walked out wearing the golden trappings of the Highborn and carrying bronze battleaxes. A troop of guards followed them. Gera, Rifaz, and I went toward them, stopped midway, and looked at the three leaders walking down the ramp toward us. One of the three was as big and ugly as Shikha, but flabby and wasted. I knew he had to be Sheshai. The others were just as tall but leaner, fitter, and plainly his younger brothers.
Sheshai halted before us and stood glaring while one of the brothers demanded, "Who dares to trouble Arbah City?"
"O, Sheshai," I said to them as loudly as I could, "we come in the name of Caleb, the son of Jephunneh and the right hand of Joshua, the slayer of the five kings of the Highborn and the servant of the Lord God of Israel. Hear these words of Caleb to the sons of Arbah.
"The Lord God of Israel has surely given your city into the hands of Israel. Have we not already sent your father to his rest? Have we not laid waste the kings and the flower of the Highborn as a reaper puts a sickle to the standing grain? Who are you to stand against Israel?
"Come now, says Caleb, come now and make your peace with Israel before we draw near and smite you as we have smitten your brothers at Summit City and Jerusalem."
Sheshai blinked and blurted, "Let your master come and we will make a covenant with him."
"Hold your tongue, you fool!" hissed the first brother. "No," he told us, "there will be no peace and no covenant as long as we breathe!"
"Israel needs no covenant," I told the three men, "and it's all the same to Israel whether you live or not. Hear what my lord Caleb will do if you stir up his wrath: those of Arbah City who survive the day of battle he will enslave. They will spend the rest of their days as hewers of wood and drawers of water."
"The children of Israel are nothing but slaves and the sons of the runaway slaves of Egypt!" the first brother shouted. "Begone before we turn our warriors upon you!"
"What warriors?" I scoffed. "Those old men and children cowering behind your walls? They tremble at the voice of a raven!"
Gera and Rifaz laughed, and the rest of our men joined in and edged closer so they wouldn't miss a word.
"Silence!" the second brother roared. He drew something out of his girdle and showed it to us--an image of a man made of sticks, clay, and straw.
"Come and curse Israel for me, O Milcom, lord of the underworld!" he shouted. He pulled off the image's straw hair, flung it to the ground, and stamped on it as he chanted,
"What slaves are these who dare defy
Sons of Arbah, born from the sky?
Let all take heed who would try
to break the might of Milcom's ally!
Terrors shall stalk them in the night;
their hearts shall quail with fright;
Trample them, Milcom, till they're crushed,
and grind their bones into dust!
So will Milcom smash all who strive
Sons of Arbah from their thrones to drive!"

"The sons of Arbah will praise their precious Milcom in his underworld tomorrow," I laughed, "for this we promise them in the name of the Lord God of Israel:
"Lo, we shall fight you tooth and nail,
and laugh and jeer when you turn tail!
Your women will weep
while Milcom sleeps,
and we shall praise the God of Israel!"

Our men howled with laughter. Sheshai turned pale, but his brothers swelled with rage. They shook their battleaxes at us, took Sheshai by the arms, and dragged him back into their city. Our men mocked and taunted them all the way.
"It's hard for a son of Arbah to endure mockery," Rifaz laughed.
"They have no time left to learn," Gera added. "Wherever did you learn the ways of mockery yourself, Othniel?"
"Like me, he has learned at the hands of cruel teachers, sir," Rifaz told him. "Yet any man can learn to be spiteful and tread on those who are weaker than himself. Few remember how it is to be tormented and to care for the downtrodden."
I turned and gripped his shoulders with both hands. "Rifaz, my brother, the Lord our God hears their cries."
The Highborn gave up so easily that we found it rather amusing. We had frightened Sheshai, their king, so badly that he tried to run away that night but we caught him outside the walls. The last of his hired soldiers deserted as soon as they knew what Sheshai had done. They wouldn't serve his brothers Ahiman and Talmai because they were too busy fighting each other for his throne to keep Caleb from marching into their city. We entered the city without a battle by the end of the next day, which marked the end of Arbah City’s existence because Caleb restored the city’s ancient name of Hebron.