Rebekah

by Jill Eileen Smith

The older will serve the younger.

  The thought troubled her. Such was not the way of things. And yet, was not Isaac the younger of his father’s first two sons? God had chosen the younger. She must tell Isaac. And she would not forget God’s word to her.

  “Praise be to the God of Abraham, blessed be His name! What a red, hairy son you have!”

  Deborah lifted the child, wriggling and slimy, and Rebekah opened her eyes for a brief moment to gaze on her firstborn before another contraction bore down on her. The baby’s cry split the damp night air, a joyous sound amid the ripping of Rebekah’s insides as she pushed, seated on the birthing stool.

  “Look, his brother has hold of his heel.” Selima rested both hands beneath her, ready to catch the twin as Rebekah pushed. “He is almost out, Rebekah. Two more good pushes.”

  Rebekah groaned and cried out and fisted both hands while she bit hard on a linen cloth. But at last her months of anguish ended in a gush of baby, blood, and water. She leaned back against another maid’s strong grip, sweat clinging to her.

  After the women had cleaned her up, Rebekah moved to the softer bed of cushions and settled among them. She breathed deeply, in and out, relief flooding her that the ordeal and the many months of turmoil were finally past.

  “Let me see them.”

  Deborah moved closer to her left, holding a cleaned, red, and hairy infant to her face, his angry fists clenched and his lips puckering in indignation in the dim light of the birthing tent.

  Rebekah laughed at the sight of him. “Surely you have been the one causing most of the fighting within me all these months, little one.” She met Deborah’s motherly gaze. “He shall be Esau, my red and hairy one.”

  “And what of this child?” Selima’s sturdy arms lifted the most beautiful child she had ever seen. “Your little heel grabber.”

  Joy filled her at the sight of him, and she took in the light brown skin and hair and the mewling mouth that looked for sustenance without a sound. Love for him surged in an instant, and she wondered how he had fared against his twin during their preborn battles.

  “He shall be Jacob, he who grasps the heel.” She held out her arms to take him from Selima. “My son.” The words sounded as foreign as the truth that two sons of hers had now been born into the world. “You must tell Isaac that his sons are safely here.”

  Isaac. The thought of him made her warm with contentment, and she felt a strange glow fill her that his prayers for her, for them, had at last been answered. How good of him to take her to the mount of his suffering, to pray for a mere woman’s request. And God had answered!

  She looked up at the sound of the tent flap rustling. Isaac stood in the opening, moonlight bathing him in its ethereal light.

  “What have you named them?” He took their firstborn from Deborah’s arms, laughing at the child’s boisterous, flailing arms and urgent cries. “I think he wants his mother.” But he sat in the chair beside her and held him on his knee just the same.

  “His name is Esau, and his brother is Jacob. If you agree, my lord.” She lifted Jacob from her breast and handed him to Deborah, who switched boys with Isaac and handed Esau to Rebekah. Her milk had not yet come in full, but Esau suckled as though by working hard enough, he could force his own nourishment.

  “He is an insistent one.” Isaac held Jacob, but his eyes were focused on Esau. “Perhaps he was the cause of your misery.” He smiled down at Jacob, who seemed completely docile and content to be held on his father’s knee.

  “They’ve been fighting to divide into separate peoples from the start.” She smiled at the memory of God’s messenger speaking the words of their future to her only two months before.

  “Perhaps you are right,” Isaac said, holding Jacob closer to his heart, but he did not look at her.

  He had never fully accepted her vision, though she had spoken of it often enough. Why did he not believe her?

  “In any case, they are here now.” She looked down at Esau at last content in her arms. “You will be a strong man, little one.” She glanced at Isaac, and he nodded his approval. “But your brother will be stronger.” She looked away as she said the words, unwilling to face Isaac’s response, fearing she would lose that approving smile.

  “Thank you for my sons,” he said, letting her comment stand silent between them. “And they are good names you have given.”

  She looked at him, relieved at the genuine love in his gaze. She smiled her response, letting the soft sounds of the newborns answer for them both.

  23

  Deborah moved among the tents, feeling the breezes of early fall lift the tree limbs up and down like waving arms. She cinched the scarf closer to her face and continued on, all too aware of the effect the chill had deep in her bones. She still walked upright and did not creak and groan like Lila and Eliezer or Abraham, but the signs of aging were close on her heels.

  Life had fallen into a gentle rhythm since Keturah’s parting, and Abraham often spoke to Deborah as she passed his tent, when the men were not around. She approached the broad awning now, where Abraham sat beneath a flapping overhang.

  “Greetings to you, my daughter,” Abraham said as she came to kneel near his side.

  That he called a servant his daughter had at first made her think he had surely lost his eyesight, but after years of his so doing, she had warmed to the affection the word carried.

  “And to you, my lord.”

  “You will never consent to call me Father, will you, faithful Deborah?” He smiled and patted the cushion near him, bidding her to sit. She complied, releasing a sigh at the effort.

  She smiled, looking into his wrinkled face. “I’m afraid not, my lord. I am but a servant. But Rebekah is pleased to call you such.”

  They had had the same conversation more times than she could count, and the realization that his memory was not what it used to be always brought sorrow. But she did not show him what lay hidden in her heart.

  “Rebekah is busy with those two grandsons of mine. She has little time for an old goat like me.” He fingered the staff Isaac had long ago carved for him, examining the intricate lion’s head at the slight curve in the top. “My son thinks I am like a lion. Ach! Those days passed long before he was born.” He looked into the distance as though time had slipped backward and he could see what no longer existed.

  “You are still a lion at heart, my lord. You are strong in your faith, in the God of Noah, of Shem, of Eber, and now Elohei Abraham, the God of Abraham.” She picked up a cushion and looked at the threads, though she felt his eyes on her.

  “It is your faith that has endeared you to my family, Deborah. You have passed that faith on to your daughter and grandchildren. You are truly blessed.”

  His words warmed the dark places in her heart, where the doubts lived. She looked at him but could not hold his gaze as the familiar shame surfaced. Shame she thought long past.

  “I only hope Adonai Elohei accepts my faltering faith, my lord. I am unworthy of His notice.” She looked down at the cushion again and played with a loose thread, wishing for a bone needle and thread to mend it. She expected him to agree with her or at the very least question her statement.

  Silence followed her remark until at last she glanced up, fearing he had fallen asleep and not even heard her comment. But his clear dark eyes were focused on her.

  “We are all unworthy, my daughter. It is only because of God’s great mercy that we are not consumed.” The lines around his eyes softened as he continued to look at her. “But I sense there is a reason you have made such a statement.”

  She studied the cushion, surprised at the intense emotion suddenly coming over her in waves. It had been years since she and Bethuel had spoken in confidence, since he had learned of her plight and taken her in, protected her. She had told no one of the circumstances of Selima’s birth, not even Rebekah, who had at last given up asking. But something in Abraham’s spirit reminded her of the kindness of Bethuel, and she did not realize until this moment how s
he longed for a confidante to replace him.

  But could such an old man as Abraham, a man who had loved three wives, be trusted with a lowly servant’s secrets?

  “Will you tell me what troubles you, Deborah?”

  “It is an old tale, one that does not matter any longer.”

  And in truth it didn’t. It only mattered when Selima was still a maiden. Now that she had a husband, even Rebekah could not turn Selima away, though the news might cause a rift between them, just for the length the secret had been kept.

  “Sometimes the oldest tales matter the most because the longer they are held within us, the more pain can gather to them.”

  She looked up at that and searched his aged face. Compassion etched his smile, though the lines around his eyes held sadness.

  “You speak from experience, my lord?”

  He laid the staff across his lap and folded his hands. “I have made many a mistake in my lifetime . . . many a mistake.”

  He lifted his head and looked across the circle of tents, where a woman chased a young toddler away from the fire and others took up their daily tasks and moved in the direction of the various tents for weaving, spinning, grinding, and the working of clay and straw. She should join Rebekah in the weavers’ tent, but it was understood that time spent with Abraham was time well given.

  “But my God has been ever faithful to forgive, to restore, to mend what was broken.”

  “How so, my lord?”

  Everyone knew Sarah’s heart had never quite mended after Isaac’s binding. Keturah might have remained a servant if it had.

  He looked into her eyes and patted the place over his heart. “He is faithful to heal in here, where faith lives. He would have restored and strengthened Sarah’s faith in me, in Him, if she had allowed it. Our God does not force His will on us. We must receive and request it.” His gaze grew intense. “What is it from long ago that you need our God to restore, my daughter? Tell me.”

  Deborah looked quickly around her, making sure they were alone, then scooted slightly closer to him. “I fear to tell you, my lord. I have feared to tell anyone since Rebekah’s father Bethuel. He took the secret to his grave, though his wife looked at me sometimes as though she knew. Rebekah did not know, and I could not bring myself to tell her. I was relieved when she brought us with her here, away from Nuriah’s scornful glances.”

  “So you have carried the burden alone all these years.”

  She nodded. “But it is really not so big a burden. It happened so long ago, I barely remember it now.” She lifted a hand as though to brush the words away like a pesky insect. She should leave before she said more.

  “But you do remember. Does the memory bring pain, my daughter?”

  Deborah leaned away from him, searching her heart. She closed her eyes, the memory of that day flashing in her thoughts.

  Samum, a wealthy merchant of Harran, had won the right to marry her, tearing it away from Bethuel, who had been her friend from childhood, the man she had always hoped to marry. But Samum had convinced her father, then had gone away for so long she feared he would never return. And when he did, he’d had no patience to wait until the wedding tent and took her forcibly among the olive groves near the outskirts of town. When her pregnancy was discovered, rather than take her to wife, he divorced her quietly, leaving her to live in shame. If not for Bethuel taking her in after Selima was born, to help Nuriah nurse Rebekah . . .

  She opened her eyes, but the memory would not leave. Did she still feel the pain of Samum’s betrayal? Of her father’s shame at the condition Samum left her in?

  She rolled her shoulders, suddenly realizing how stiff they were, and met Abraham’s solemn gaze. “You are right, my lord. The memory has brought pain until this day.” She swallowed, determined to at last be rid of the thoughts.

  “I was betrothed years ago to an unworthy man who first left me waiting for three years, then suddenly returned and took me before our wedding night, and he divorced me when he found out I had so quickly conceived. We discovered later that he had taken another wife in the three years he was gone and no longer wanted me. My pregnancy was the excuse he needed to be rid of me.” Tears stung her eyes that the man could do such a thing. “I bore Selima in my father’s house and nursed her there until Bethuel discovered what had happened and took me in as a nurse to Rebekah.” She held Abraham’s gaze. “Bethuel and I should have married years before. He wanted me. We had grown up together. But my father chose Samum instead.”

  Abraham stroked his beard, his look thoughtful, introspective. “A man who does not care for his wife and child is a foolish man indeed. You were not to blame in this, Deborah.”

  “But Selima was born without a father, without a home.”

  “It seems to me that my nephew took care to see that this was not true.” He shifted, and she could tell that the conversation had wearied him.

  “You should rest, my lord.” She plumped the cushions and placed them around him.

  He nodded, and she wished she had not spoken of such weighty topics with a man whose strength was so limited.

  “Were you ever with Bethuel?” He held her with a look that brooked no argument, that would allow no lies.

  She shook her head. “No, my lord. He would not betray his wife in that way.” She glanced beyond him. “Though in truth, we were one in spirit, in companionship, more than he ever was with Nuriah. He confided in me. He trusted me. Though he never touched me in that way.”

  He closed his eyes, and for a moment she thought he had fallen asleep. But several heartbeats later, he opened them and nodded. “My daughter, be at peace with your past. Your husband betrayed you, but Bethuel protected you. Sometimes a man does foolish things and a woman takes the blame for them. Stop taking the blame for your husband or for Bethuel. Live in faith and trust Adonai, my daughter. Let Him heal your heart.”

  Tears filled her eyes as his words washed over her.

  He placed a veined hand over hers and squeezed. “We are often harder on ourselves than we need to be. Our God is just, but His heart is also filled with mercy.” He closed his eyes again, and she knew the conversation was at an end.

  “Thank you, my father,” she said, noting his smile at her use of the endearment. She suddenly realized that the pain where the memories lived was not as intense, the worries of the past eased with Abraham’s words.

  “May you be blessed, my daughter. Your past is over. Let it rest in peace.”

  She left him with a lighter heart than she could have imagined.

  24

  Rebekah stopped her work, letting the shuttle on the weaver’s loom grow still, then stretched and rubbed the crick in her back. She glanced at Deborah, but the woman’s head was still bent where she knelt over another loom, threading colorful red strands through the brown and yellow and green already taking shape beneath her skilled fingers.

  The summer’s heat seemed to grow more oppressive with each passing year, and she feared drought would ruin the crops Isaac had taken such care to plant. A crop failure would make them rely more on the game Isaac and Esau hunted, but even the wild animals would grow scarce if a famine ensued.

  She kneaded the knot at the back of her neck and walked through the tent’s opening, grateful for even the slightest breeze. The sun glared down on her, and she shaded her eyes to better see the rows of black goat’s-hair tents and the open circle of stones separating several campfires among them. Jacob walked toward her, the carcasses of two young goats flung over his shoulder. She smiled at his sure stride, heard his clear whistle as he drew nearer.

  He dropped the goats at her feet, his smile wide, and bent to kiss her cheek. “Are you ready to help me?”

  She looked into his dark eyes and had the sudden longing to thrust the tan turban from his head and ruffle his hair, as she had done so many times when he was but a boy. How quickly those days had passed! And now he stood before her a man, yet not quite a man, in his fifteenth year. So much had changed in him, in her.
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  “Of course I am ready.”

  First they would skin the kids, then clean and dry the skins and sew them together to hold milk or water or wine. She retrieved two large clay pots from her tent to hold the meat and fat and led him to the area outside of the circle of tents, where a wide stone slab had been set up for this specific purpose.

  “Your father did not mind parting with these?”

  Isaac had been training the boys to care for the flocks since they were old enough to wield a staff and sling. But it was Jacob who had taken to the task, who enjoyed the times of solitude with the sheep, as Isaac had so often when he wasn’t tending the fields of grains or going off to the wilderness to hunt.

  “My father enjoys a good goat stew.” Jacob’s grin showed white, even teeth, and a hint of mischief was in his dark eyes. “And if you help me to season it just right, he will think Esau succeeded in a great hunt.”

  Rebekah searched Jacob’s face. “Does your father even know you took the kids from the flock? You know he will want an accounting.”

  Jacob shrugged. “My father trusts me, Ima. He knows we need to eat.”

  “There are lentils and barley to fill our bellies. We don’t need to kill the goats and sheep unnecessarily.”

  Isaac had indulged both boys too often. But it was clear to her that he more often favored Esau. Esau who had followed Isaac’s love of the wild and of the game that came from a successful hunting season. The boy who carried Ishmael’s rebellious streak. And yet if the angel’s words were true . . .

  “He has told me more than once that I am free to choose from the flock for special occasions. And this is such an occasion.” His grin left no doubt to his mischief making.

  She laughed despite the silent urging within her not to. “What foolishness is this of which you speak? There is no day to remember, no festival, no sheep shearing.” She forced her lips into a scowl.

  He looked at her and winked, but unable to hold himself back, he burst into laughter. She knelt beside Jacob and held the legs of the first goat, watching her son deftly skin the hide with all the skill of a craftsman. She beamed at him, love for him surging from a place deep within her, a place only Isaac used to hold.