The Garden of Eden 9

The Garden of Eden 9

Now Balak had gone out to meet Balaam that he might take him to the top

of a high hill whence he should curse the Children of Israel. And they

two went together. And Balaam said, “I am come in vain. The Lord God is

against you. Even as I came, the ass on which I rode refused to go and

crushed my foot against the vineyard wall, and the ass said, ‘Behold,

there is an angel in the way,’ and lo, there was an angel with a drawn

sword to keep me back! I cannot do you any good. I cannot curse the

Children of Israel.”

 

But Balak urged him, and on they went. And as they climbed the hill, at

last the army of Israel came in sight, all in their goodly tents along

the valley, as gardens by the river’s side, and as cedar trees beside

the waters. And Balak built seven altars and offered on every altar a

bullock and a ram; and Balaam prayed amidst the altars, and God told him

what to say, and Balaam cried aloud and blessed the Children of Israel.

Then Balak took Balaam

 

[Illustration: THE ASS AND THE ANGEL]

 

to another mountain, to the top of Pisgah, and there built seven altars

and offered on every altar a bullock and a ram; and Balaam prayed in the

midst of the altars, and again he cried aloud and blessed the Children

of Israel. And so a third time, on a third mountain, from the top of

Peor.

 

Then Balak’s anger was kindled against Balaam, and he smote his hands

together. And Balak said, “I called thee to curse my enemies, and thou

hast blessed them these three times!” And Balaam answered, “That is what

I told you before I came, what the Lord saith that will I speak.” And he

blessed them a fourth time. And Balaam rose up and went and returned to

his place: and Balak also went his way.

 

 

 

 

XIV

 

THE WALLS OF JERICHO

 

 

The Promised Land, toward which the Children of Israel were marching

through King Balak’s country, was bordered on that side by the river

Jordan. The Jordan flows through a very deep valley from a large lake in

the north to a large lake in the south: the northern lake is called the

Sea of Galilee, and the southern is called the Dead Sea. King Balak’s

land was beside the Dead Sea; so when they had passed through that

country they came to the river, and thus to the first place where they

could cross over into the Promised Land. And on the other side of the

river was a city, called Jericho. The first thing to do was to attack

Jericho.

 

Moses was now dead, and in his place Joshua was the leader and general

of Israel. Moses had climbed one day to the top of Mount Pisgah, to the

high place where Balaam had stood with Balak, and there had looked over

into the Promised Land. It lay before him, full of hills and valleys, a

good land and a large, with vineyards and olive trees, and streams of

water, and walled cities. There Abraham and Isaac and Jacob had fed

their flocks. Moses had done his great work; he had brought his people

out of Egypt, and had given them the laws of God, and had made them a

nation and an army, and had led them to the very entrance of the

Promised Land. Below were the people waiting and waiting; as they had

waited at the foot of Mount Sinai for Moses to come down. But this time

he did not come. On the mountain top, in sight of the Promised Land, he

died. And Joshua took his place.

 

So General Joshua sent two men to go as spies to Jericho. They were to

enter very quietly into the city, without letting anybody know who they

were, and, having found out all they could, they were to come back and

report. So they went to Jericho and found a lodging place, and began to

look about. They saw that the town had a wall around it, and that the

gate was shut every evening as the sun went down. And they could see at

a glance that the people were rich. But the men of Jericho discovered

the spies and told the king, and the king sent to their lodging place to

take them.

 

But the woman of the house, whose name was Rahab, was very good to the

spies. Her house was by the city wall, and on the flat roof there were

stalks of flax drying in the sun. So when the pursuers came knocking at

the door, Rahab hid the spies under the flax, and sent off the pursuers

on a vain search. And when they were gone she took a stout rope and let

down the spies out of her window down the wall, and while the pursuers

ran one way toward the river, the spies ran another way toward the

hills, and so escaped.

 

And Rahab said, “We have all heard about you here. We know how you came

over the Red Sea, and how the Lord is with you; and we are all afraid.

When you take the town, have pity on me and on my father and mother and

on my brothers and sisters, and save us alive.”

 

And the spies said, “Bind a scarlet line in this window by which we

escape, and when we come back with the army of Israel we will spare all

who are in this house.”

 

Then they climbed down the rope, and away they went to the hills, where

they stayed three days till the pursuit was over. And they returned to

Joshua, and said, “The Lord has delivered the city into our hands. They

are all afraid of us.”

 

Then Joshua sent his captains among the people to tell them what to do.

“The priests,” he said, “shall go down first into the river, and the

people shall follow.” So the priests went, carrying the Ark of the

Covenant; that is, the great chest in which were the Ten Commandments

cut in stone, as Moses brought them down from Sinai. And as they went,

it was like the Red Sea over again. They marched across as if the river

had been a sandy road. And in the middle of the river stood the priests

with the Ark till all the people were gone over. And they took twelve

stones out of the river where the priests had stood, and built an altar

with them on the other side, and thanked God that He had brought them at

last into the good land which He had promised to their fathers.

 

The next thing to do was to take Jericho. At first, the men of Jericho

came out to fight, but they soon ran back and hid behind their walls and

locked their gate. And the Children of Israel made a camp around the

city so that nobody went out or came in.

 

And Joshua said, “Form a procession: first the armed men, then seven

priests with trumpets, then the Ark, and then the people. And march

around the city. Let the priests blow their trumpets, but let all the

rest of you keep silence. Let nobody speak a word, until I tell you to

shout. Then shall ye shout!” So they marched around the city, and the

people of Jericho looked on from the walls in great amazement. And the

next day, they did it a second time; and the third day a third time, and

so on for six days.

 

At last, on the seventh day, the Children of Israel rose up very early,

just as the sun came up over Mount Pisgah. And that day they went around

and around the city seven times. And it came to pass at the seventh

time, when the priests blew with the trumpets a longer and louder blast

than ever, Joshua cried to the people, “Shout! for the Lord hath given

you the city.” And all the people shouted with a great shout. And the

walls fell flat, and the armed men marched straight in and took the

city.

 

Indeed, the walls were already falling that day when the spies climbed

down over them hand under hand on Rahab’s rope. For the true walls of a

city are the stout hearts of its citizens, and these had failed for

fear. Thus the Children of Israel began the conquest of the Promised

Land. But they spared the people who were in the house which had a line

of scarlet bound in the window on the broken wall.

 

 

 

 

XV

 

THE WEDGE OF GOLD

 

 

There was a soldier in the army of Joshua whose name was Achan. He had

taken part in the siege of Jericho. He had marched before the Ark around

the city; he had joined in with all his might when the army shouted with

a great shout; and he had rushed with the others into the streets when

the walls fell flat.

 

Now Joshua had given strict orders that no man should take anything for

himself. All the gold and silver and whatever else was of value was to

be saved for the Lord: it was to be put into the common treasury. But

Achan had stolen something.

 

The citizens of Jericho were neither strong nor brave to fight, but they

were rich. The sun beat down upon the town, and the mist came drifting

in from the river, and it was very hot there, and the heat made the

people weak; but they lived in handsome houses, and wore fine clothes

every day, and had money to spend. To Achan, who had been born in the

wilderness, and had never known any other roof than the top of a tent,

and had never seen a city in all his life, the houses of Jericho seemed

like the magic treasure houses of the fairy stories.

 

So when Achan came with the other soldiers, running though the Jericho

streets, and breaking into the houses, he looked about him with great

surprise. And when, at last, in one house he found a wedge of gold, it

blazed in his eyes like the sun shining in the clear sky at noon. Beside

the gold was a glittering pile of two hundred pieces of silver, and a

splendid cloak made in Babylon, stiff with embroidery and colored like a

jewel. And Achan was so dazzled by these riches that he did not see the

difference between right and wrong. He took them for his own. Under his

gown he hid them, and back he hurried to his tent, and then he dug a

hole in the earth in the middle of the tent and buried them.

 

The next day, Joshua sent two spies to visit the next city, which was

called Ai. And they came back and reported that Ai was only a small

town, and that there was no need to send the whole army to take it.

Three thousand men, they said, would be enough. Now Ai was built upon a

hill. So up the soldiers climbed, expecting a quick and easy victory,

but the men of Ai came out to meet them like a pack of bears and tigers,

and the men of Israel turned their backs like scared sheep, and ran away

down the hill as fast as they could go, and the men of Ai after them.

So it was a great defeat.

 

And Joshua was troubled exceedingly, and he and all his captains tore

their clothes and threw dust upon their heads, and lay down on the

ground before the Ark all day; for that was the custom when men were in

great distress of mind.