Джеймс Миченер - The Source

Before long they were convinced that she was behaving strangely, and one afternoon they lingered near the main gate to overhear her saying good-bye to her lover, and as soon as she was outside the range of the guards they grabbed her and started running with her to Zadok’s tent. But the governor’s son had gone up to the tower to watch her cross the fields; without summoning assistance he ran after the three, catching up with them inside the Hebrew camp.

“She’s been whoring with the Canaanites!” Epher shouted to his father.

Zibeon, running up from behind, struck Leah’s brother across the lips. Stone knives flashed and the Hebrews would have killed the young man had not old Zadok intervened. “What have you done?” he asked his daughter.

“Hiding in the dark with a Canaanite,” Epher broke in,

Again Zibeon leaped for the young Hebrew, but Zadok intervened and waited for Leah’s reply. She said that she loved the governor’s son and that if their fathers could arrange it, they wished to marry.

“They have married already,” Epher warned, and Leah flushed as the men of her family felt her body and satisfied themselves that she was pregnant.

“Let us stone them now!” Epher demanded, but Zadok sent his hotheaded son away and interrogated young Zibeon for some time. Like many of the Canaanites he was circumcised. He was willing to accept El-Shaddai as the one god. He would not force Leah to worship either Baal or Astarte. And he seemed an attractive, honest young man whom Leah obviously cherished.

Satisfied on these points, Zadok handed Zibeon over Jo the protection of his older sons and withdrew to the tabernacle before which he had prayed for so many years. “El-Shaddai, what is your intention in this matter? Are we to accept a Canaanite into our family? Are we to submerge their gods in you?” No answer came, but at least the great god of the clan of Zadok did not object to the union, so the patriarch returned to his sons, saying, “If Governor Uriel approves, your sister will marry his son.” Further argument he would not permit, and in silence he led a delegation back to the zigzag gate, where an excited crowd lined the walls and where the Hebrews confronted Uriel and his wife Rahab.

“Our children wish to marry,” the patriarch announced, and the good will that marked the two leaders was put to the test. Uriel signified his acceptance of the marriage, for this was the kind of development he had hoped for. He was surprised that his own son was involved, but it was a merging of the two groups that should be encouraged.

His wife took a different view. “Zibeon should marry inside the walls,” she said. “One day he will be governor …”

“This is a good marriage,” her temporizing husband said.

“Baal will not approve,” Rahab warned. “Astarte will not bless our fields.”

“Your son will not marry under Baal and Astarte,” Zadok pointed out.

“Have you agreed to join their god?” Rahab asked her son. When he nodded, Governor Uriel was startled, but he remained hopeful that peace of some kind could be maintained.

“It’s possible to worship Baal and El-Shaddai both,” the governor said.

It was a difficult moment, one which could destroy the Canaanite-Hebrew relationship, and Zadok made a generous concession: “Governor Uriel is right. His son can worship both gods.”

Uriel sighed. He appreciated Zadok’s desire to avoid trouble and he knew how close the two groups had been to an open rupture. He started to discuss ceremonies, hoping that contentious problems were past, but his clear-seeing wife said bluntly, “Such a union of gods will not work. This marriage must not take place.”

Red-headed Epher elbowed his way forward and said sternly, “Leah is with child.”

Rahab tried not to speak harshly. “I am sorry,” she said, “but my son is to rule this town one day, and he must have a proper wife.”

“Your son has contaminated my sister,” Epher cried, and there would have been fighting if Uriel and Zadok had not pacified their adherents. The governor went to Leah and asked if she was pregnant, and when she nodded, the black-bearded Canaanite said, “They shall marry.” But Rahab and Epher, appreciating the dangers of such a union, maintained their opposition.

With great force of character Uriel and Zadok worked to evolve a plan whereby the marriage could go forward, and thanks to their determination, Canaanite and Hebrew began to show signs of being able to live together in some kind of harmony. Zadok’s only demand was that the couple be married under the auspices of El-Shaddai, and this was granted, Uriel insisted that in all other respects Leah must become a Canaanite, must live within the walls and must rear her forthcoming child as a Canaanite. To these demands Zadok surprisingly agreed, reminding his rebellious sons, “The wife should follow the husband.” He furthermore astonished both the Canaanites and the Hebrews by volunteering to send with his daughter six fat sheep.

So the marriage was solemnized before the small red tent of the Hebrews, and a kind of peace, engineered solely by the good will of the leaders, settled over Makor. But Leah had lived in the town only two weeks when one of the Hebrew women reported that they had seen her and her husband in the public square praying openly to Astarte. There was protest in the Hebrew camp, but Zadok silenced it by reminding his people that he himself had given the young man permission to continue worshiping his old gods so long as he acknowledged that El-Shaddai was superior. But two days later other Hebrew water carriers saw Zibeon patronizing the temple prostitutes and word of this also reached Zadok. Again he explained to his people that the young man was entitled to worship his gods in the accustomed manner, but he was apprehensive about what might happen next.

And then his attention was taken away from his daughter, for Epher and Ibsha asked him to go with them to the top of the mountain, and as he reached the high place of Baal he saw that stubborn Hebrews had rescued their monolith to El-Shaddai and had hauled it back to the crest of the mountain, where once more it stood close to Baal. Father and sons tried to dislodge the evil thing, but they could not, and Epher spat upon it many times, crying, “Father, your laxity has encouraged this,” and a bitterness grew up between them.

Now Zadok was alone. His daughter was surrounded by gods of the basest sort. His Hebrews were worshiping stone idols. His brilliant son, Epher, was drifting away from him, and he felt contamination oozing out of the town, but he did not know what to do. At the foot of the mountain he walked alone for many hours, calling upon El-Shaddai for guidance.

“What shall I do with my stiff-necked people?” he pleaded. “I have told them of you. I have instructed them in your ways and I have thrown down their heathen altars, but they have gone whoring after false gods. What can I do?”

In the rocky fields he found no answer, and in the plowed fields near the oak trees there was no reply. At the tabernacle there was no voice, and among the tents no echo. “What shall I do?” the old man begged. He muttered, “I’ll lead my clan to some other spot,” but he knew that if this was required El-Shaddai would have advised him. Furthermore, would not the next location contain the same kinds of temptation? Was it, perhaps, intended that the Hebrews be submerged into the corruption of Makor? “El-Shaddai, what shall I do?”

For several days no answer came. Then, as the critical period of the growing season approached, when the collaboration of the gods was essential—and this even Zadok acknowledged, for in the portentous days he prayed repeatedly to El-Shaddai for good crops—three of his water-women came running into camp, their eyes wide in wonder and horror, to tell him of the other god that Makor worshiped. “He is fiery,” they gasped, “and has a mouth of flame into which little children are thrown while men and women dance naked.”