Moses, Man of the Mountain

by Zora Neale Hurston

  “Well, if he did that he’s a friend of the race, and that’s something we ain’t got too much of. When can I meet him and see him? I wants to shake his hand.”

  “He was at the house of Aaron, they tell me, but he’s hard to locate. Don’t stay in one spot too long. That’s to keep them secret police all fuddled up in case they try to grab him. But they tell me everybody is going to have a chance to meet him, first and last.”

  Other whisperers were asking, “Now this god that Aaron says Moses has got, where do he come from and what is his sign?”

  “Nobody ain’t seen no sign yet. Ain’t even made no motion to build him a temple yet. It seems funny a god without a place to stay or anything.”

  And as for Moses himself, now that he had accepted the call and was down in Egypt, a sort of grim and stony peace came to him. He set himself to his task with determination.

  Immediately after his arrival in Goshen he told Aaron to summon the Elders of the tribes to meet him, and anyone else of influence. When they came, Moses was surprised to find a woman among them.

  “Who is this woman, Aaron?” Moses asked.

  “That’s Miriam, my sister.”

  “But what is she doing here? I have called the Elders to me on serious business.”

  Aaron showed irritation, pointed up by a certain arrogance.

  “My sister Miriam is a great prophetess, Moses. Talking about influence, she’s got plenty. We couldn’t make out without her, that’s all. Everybody comes to her to get things straightened out. She’s a two-headed woman with power.” He looked at Moses and challenged him with his eyes.

  “She can hit a straight lick with a crooked stick, just the same as you can do.”

  Moses closed his eyes for a moment so that Aaron could not look through them into his mind and said simply, “In that case we need her. Tell her to stay. She would be useful in handling the women.”

  “Oh, she can handle the women, all right. In fact she can handle anybody. We ought to call a meeting of all the people right away and let her speak before everybody for you.”

  “No, Aaron,” Moses said positively, “this is not the time I have appointed for speech-making. It is too soon. First we have to organize the Elders, then let the Elders prepare the people for us.” He saw the petulant look on the goatlike face of Aaron and asked, “When did Miriam address the whole congregation of Israel last?”

  “Oh, she ain’t never done it yet,” Aaron stammered.

  “Did she ever speak to your whole tribe of Levi?”

  “No, she ain’t, not yet. She ain’t never needed to, that’s all. But she could really do it if she wanted to.”

  “Then what makes you so sure she could do all this speaking and influencing if you never have seen her do it?”

  “Because her house is full every night of the people who come to her house to get help. Miriam got a certain little bundle that she makes, that ain’t no bigger than a man’s thumb. You put that around your neck and wear it, and nothing can’t do you no harm.”

  “Hmm! It’s a wonder every Hebrew in Egypt wouldn’t have one of them. Pharaoh and his overseers wouldn’t be a bit of trouble then. Why haven’t you and Miriam done that on a large plan and freed Israel long ago?”

  “We haven’t considered like that and if we did, we might say that we, that is, Miriam, was called to prophesy to the people and not to save ’em.”

  “Oh, I see,” Moses said significantly. “It’s nothing for us to get angry about anyway.”

  “Who said I was mad?”

  “I wouldn’t say you were mad exactly, but we do seem to argue a lot about everything, Aaron, and none of it is necessary. The point I want to get clear in your mind is that if you, I mean Miriam, is called to prophesy to Israel and I am called to save Israel, our paths don’t conflict at all.”

  Aaron was caught off guard by this statement and he didn’t like it, and Moses saw it. Finally he said sullenly, “That ain’t the point at all.”

  “What is the point?” Moses persisted.

  “Well, er—the point is, I don’t see how come she, that is, both of us, can’t get credit for what we got to do in saving Israel. And that is mighty important.”

  “Oh, you will be of great help in gathering the people and explaining my plans and you will get proper recognition for it, too. But we don’t need to worry about recognition right now. What we need to worry about is the success of the plan. It’s a mighty big project we got on our hands, Aaron. Let’s bury ourselves in it, Aaron, and give it our whole devotion, It’s too big for us to be mere people. We’ve got to give up being people and feel like the tools of destiny, that’s a big honor in itself, Aaron. I want you to think it over.”

  A certain good humor was restored and Moses went on working out his plans and passing them out through Aaron, until finally the meeting of the Elders of Israel took place. When Moses spoke to them he said nothing about his whole plan. He merely said to them, “I come to bring you a message from a god who has chosen you as his people to love and protect.”

  “How did this god hear about us?” the Elders wanted to know. “You say he spoke to you in a far-away mountain. How did he hear about us here in Egypt?”

  “You cried out for deliverance in your great sufferings, didn’t you?” Moses asked.

  “We sure did. We been crying a long, long time, but no gods, least of all the very ones we worship, didn’t hear us at all,” the Elders told Moses with suffering in their eyes and hopelessness in their voices.

  “But this god of the mountain has ears,” Moses said with conviction. “He heard your cries and sent me to tell you that he has chosen you and that he has the power to save you, even in spite of Pharaoh.”

  There was great excitement at this.

  “What is the sign of this god?” they wanted to know.

  “His sign is power,” Moses answered with assurance.

  “What we want to know is, What is his messenger?”

  “I am his messenger,” Moses answered with equal assurance.

  “We want to know how we can recognize his signs when we meet ’em. What animal does he live in? Is he a bull like Apis, a cow like Isis, a cat like—”

  “This god never shows himself through any animal. He has no representation on earth in any form. He speaks in fire and smoke, but the fire and the smoke are not god. He has no images and wants none made in his name.”

  “What is the name of this god, Moses? Maybe he is a god of Egypt who has left Egypt and sends to us from some place away off.”

  “No, he is no Egyptian god. He has not uttered his name as yet.”

  “You must not know a whole heap about this god your own self, Moses, if you don’t even know his name. Didn’t you even find out that much about him?”

  “I asked him his name.”

  “And what did he tell you?” the Elders asked.

  “‘I am what I am,’ is all he said, but that is a great answer. It takes in the whole world and the firmaments of heaven.”

  That was a great mouthful for the people and they went off muttering to themselves in their unlettered tongues “I am what I am” over and over and blowing in the ashes of their hopelessness to kindle hope. They had intended to ask many more questions about this strange god who had sent to them—about his wife, and his food and his children, and what especial sin he punished, but all these questions had been smothered. So the Elders went off from the meeting to begin to spread the word to the people to meet Moses in a secret grove for a ceremony.

  There, deep in the forest and amid the silences, Moses built the altar of rough stone as Jethro had taught him and performed the sacrifice as he had come to do for so long on the mountain with Jethro. And the people began to catch fire and worship.

  Moses instituted the ceremonies to the god of the mountain and established altars and more and more the people came to them and began the new practices.

  “The god of the mountain detests the flesh of hogs,” Moses told them. “No wors
hipper of I AM WHAT I AM may eat pork,” Moses commanded, and people began to give it up. He taught them many other laws. His god loved justice, he taught them justice and right among peoples, more than obligations to altars.

  “When do we bear down on Pharaoh and this freedom?” Aaron asked impatiently.

  “One thing at a time,” Moses told him. “We have to lay a foundation before we try to build.”

  After several weeks had passed the Elders asked Moses, “When will we be free?”

  “You will be free when you hear the thunder,” Moses told them. “Pharaoh will issue a decree and you will think that you are free. You will march out and you will think that you are free. But one day, after you have suffered many things, when the thunder is heard from the mountain, you will be free, if you have courage.”

  “You can see further with your eyes closed than we can with ours wide open,” some of the people clung about Moses and told him. “You’re our rod of salvation, Moses. Lie down and sleep and dream for us.”

  And the Hebrews, working and suffering, and wondering about the nature of thunder, went through their days holding their hearts still against the present, prayed for the day of thunder.

  CHAPTER 21

  Therefore Moses took his rod in his hand and went to see Pharaoh. He took Aaron along for his dressing. It looked better to the people anyway for Aaron to go. Suspicion was too easy to arouse if Moses went alone. Some would think he had only stirred them up in order to betray them to Pharaoh. He had heard hints and whispers that maybe he was buying his way back in with Pharaoh by stirring them up to show what was in them so Pharaoh could have an excuse to butcher them all. Pharaoh had done everything else that could be done. Nothing else for him to do but kill them and they didn’t put that past him for a minute. Anyway, Moses had reason to believe that few if any accepted the story of his kinship with Miriam and Aaron. He was still an Egyptian noble to them. If he wanted to cast in his lot with them, well and good. But blood was thicker than missionary zeal and he would bear watching. Why should he serve them anyway? It looked mighty funny when you come to think of it, at that.

  Now Moses was at the palace with Aaron.

  Pharaoh took his seat and had his Queen with him so that Moses could see that she was the Ethiopian Princess who had once been his wife away back there when he was a Prince in Egypt and wore a jewelled sword at his side. Moses could see that it was supposed to hurt him and he was sorry for them a little. She had been all these years living off of more treaty kisses and Pharaoh had been living off the power, when he had gotten hold of it at last. Moses could picture just how fretful Ta-Phar and his wife had been while they waited for Rameses the Great to die. Moses could see Ta-Phar’s old face slipping down into his neck. His Queen’s hips looked like they had moved round in front of her, or more like they had abdicated in favor of her stomach. No, he still didn’t care, no matter how much he saw that they wished he would. He stood with his rod in his hand and measured them. He stood before Pharaoh and felt as if he stood in the presence of the evil dead. And he was glad that he stood facing them at last. The past and the future were pouring out of time.

  Pharaoh let Aaron stand before him and say what Moses had told him to say. He listened to the end, but he paid little attention to the ex-slave who he saw was quaking inside while he tried to put on a show of arrogance. At the same time Pharaoh kept looking to Moses for confirmation and assurance. So he listened casually to the voice of Aaron. But he paid strict attention to Moses. When Aaron had finished he ignored him and acted just as if Moses had spoken directly.

  “Well, Moses, so you are back again doing your best to destroy the country.”

  “No, I leave that job to you. I am here by divine command to save a people, not to destroy.”

  “Oh, yes, I know. You are bent on being King of something, even if it is nothing but the Hebrews.”

  “No, Pharaoh, my call is higher than that. I am commanded to lead them out of their suffering to something better. And I’m going to carry them off.”

  Pharaoh laughed without moving his features. But Moses could see the formal set of his expression change to scornful banter. “And how do you aim to do that, Moses? Those Hebrews are mighty poor fighting material, and you ought to know what my army is.”

  “You have your army and I have my powers. I mean to attack you with what I have. Our side is stronger than yours.”

  “Since when?”

  “Since a new and a stronger god has called them through me to his service. Your gods never were anything more than a dedication of the forty-two judges of the forty-two Names of Egypt, and they are still servants to be ordered. The god I represent is one who commands. We shall win.”

  “With what?”

  “With my uplifted right hand. If you can stand that, you can stand the flood.”

  Pharaoh indulged in a broad sneer. “Oh, you are still messing around with hoodoo, eh? You ought to know better than to come back here depending on that.”

  “And why not, Pharaoh?”

  “You forget, Moses, that the priests of Pharaoh are the greatest priests on earth.”

  “I don’t forget any such a thing, because I never knew it. I do remember though that I could surpass any priest in Egypt long before I left here.”

  “That’s rich! First you come here pretending that you can’t talk—bringing a slave to do your talking. Then you open your mouth in the wrong place. I’m going to call your bluff so these Hebrews can see what a friend they are trusting. And then I’m going to show you up for the pleasure of the thing.”

  “You mean we are going to show each other up. You fear me more than I do you and with good reason, too.”

  “Moses, I could call the palace guard and have you dead in a few minutes. I am going to do something worse. I am going to expose you first and then leave you to the people.” He turned to a guard. “Call the priests from the temple. I want them here right now.”

  While they waited Ta-Phar smiled at Moses with utter cruelty in his face.

  “You see, Moses, I know why you have come back to Egypt and it is not to rescue these miserable Hebrews. You are merely trying to use them to frighten Egypt into making you a King. I’m glad that you have come in the way you did. I intend to keep you at your activities so that Egypt can see you as the country’s worst enemy—trying to arouse the slaves against the people.”

  “To me, Ta-Phar, the Hebrews are people.”

  “To me, Moses, slaves are slaves.”

  Moses could see Aaron wilting and he could see Pharaoh gloating at the sight. The priests came in, never missing a convention sacred nor civil until Pharaoh told them to rise and listen to what he had to say.

  “This fraud and hypocrite was run out of Egypt around thirty years ago, after trying to be a priest, a soldier and a Prince, and first one thing and another. Now he’s back trying to tote off our slaves on some religious cock and bull story. He claims he has enough magic in his right hand to outdo all my army and all my priests and the Hebrews are stupid enough to believe him, it seems. Go ahead with your skill and make a fool of him so the people can go on back to work and he can go on back wherever he has been hiding out all these years.”

  The chief priest bowed and announced the marvelous feat of turning their rods into snakes and back again.

  Moses said, “Excuse me, Pharaoh, but I don’t believe I want to be bothered with such children’s foolishness. I won’t work on that trick at all. Let Aaron do it. I’ll wait till they do something worth noticing.”

  “Oh, you won’t get out of it that easy,” Pharaoh sneered. “Go ahead, men, and make him show you. We’ll give him something to do besides brag on himself.”

  So the priests manipulated their rods and danced and finally threw them down on the floor before Pharaoh and they began to writhe and crawl. Pharaoh looked triumphantly at Moses. But Moses was looking all around the throne room in unconcern. So Pharaoh sent him a challenging snort. Moses merely handed his rod to Aaron and said, �
��Throw the rod down, Aaron, if that is the only thing that will pacify Pharaoh. Throw it down and get back out of the way.”

  Aaron dropped the rod of Moses to the floor with a “plop” and stepped back. The rod of Moses came alive. Its head darted out and seized the snake nearest it and swallowed it. The next one and the next one was run down and disappeared head first down the throat of Moses’ living rod.

  “Is that all you got to show me?” Moses asked casually.

  “Show him something else!” Pharaoh ordered angrily.

  “Er—er—Pharaoh, we didn’t prepare anything more for right now, but if you have him back here later on we’ll guarantee to show him.”

  “Oh, I’ll have him back here and you are going to show him,” Pharaoh retorted.

  “Well, let me know when you get ready,” Moses said. “And if that is all for right now, Aaron, go pick up that rod and show it to Pharaoh.”

  Aaron picked up the rod and found it a budding stick. So he showed it to Pharaoh and the priests and the sight of it made their eyes pop.

  “You see what power I got behind me, Pharaoh. Will you let my people go?” Moses asked earnestly.

  “No! I got work for those Hebrews to do, and they are going to do it, too.”

  “But the god of the mountain told me to tell you to let them go regardless.”

  “Moses, do you think you can come back here and scare me with a jumped-up tale about a mountain god and a few tricks and make me change my plans?”

  “Pharaoh, do you think you can holler loud enough to break into a god’s arrangements? Will you let those Hebrews go?”

  “No! I won’t.”

  “I see you call yourself a hooking-bull at the landing. You don’t aim to let nothing pass.”

  “That’s right, Moses. And certainly I won’t let those Hebrews go.”

  “You’re right sure about that, I take it?”

  “Just as sure as you snore.”

  “One of us is bound to be wrong because I am just as sure that you will.”