Brothers

by Angela Hunt

  But he knew Sebek was watching and waiting…somewhere.

  Chapter Forty-Four

  S him’on slept for hours, perhaps days. A fever burned through his body, but soft whispers and gentle caresses surrounded him as someone poured cooling water over his head, neck and shoulders. He was aware of being moved, then he lay still for a long time, lost in the twilight world between wakefulness and sleep, between life and death.

  He awoke in his prison chamber within Zaphenath-paneah’s house. A tray sat by the door, the food untouched. The same chair filled the corner; he lay on the same uncomfortable, too-short bed. He even wore a linen kilt like the one Tarik had given him.

  He stretched, feeling stiffness in his arms, and his head pounded when he tried to sit up. His mind spun with bewilderment. Had he managed to escape his confinement only through starkly realistic dreams? No, everything had changed. Though his surroundings belonged to his old life, he saw them through new eyes.

  “I’ve been sick,” he muttered, annoyed with his weakness. “A fever has played tricks upon my mind.”

  The usual sounds of activity flitted in from the windows. He heard the laughter of boys, the quiet whisper of slaves about their duties. From far away he heard the excited whinny of a horse and the lowing of cattle. And then, with startling clarity, Mandisa’s familiar knock sounded upon the door.

  “Come in,” he grumbled, sourness filling the pit of his stomach.

  The latch clicked and she entered, her glowing face wreathed in a smile. “I thought you would be better today,” she said, hurrying to his side. “Your fever broke last night.”

  He turned and lowered his legs to the floor. “I feel like I’ve slept a year. Look at that! I’m as weak as a kitten.” He lifted his arm, which trembled as he struggled to hold it straight. He lowered it, braced himself against the bed frame and was about to stand when he caught sight of her face.

  There was something pleased, proud and vaguely possessive in the way Mandisa looked at him. Shim’on paused to focus his confused memories.

  “Mandisa,” he began, closing his eyes, “I have been ill, so my thoughts are not as definite as I would like them to be.”

  “Perhaps I can help.” Laughter echoed in her voice.

  When he opened his eyes, he found her studying him with a gaze as soft as a caress. “I have dreamed—no, not a dream. Tell me, Zaphenath-paneah is my brother, is he not?”

  “Whatever gave you that idea?” she said, her tone light and mocking. But her right hand fell upon his shoulder, and he wondered if she could feel the quickening pulse of his blood.

  “And Idogbe took Adom, and you and I found the boy.”

  Her hand moved from Shim’on’s shoulder to his jawline. “Adom is safe here in Zaphenath-paneah’s house, where he belongs.”

  “And I fought with Idogbe, and afterward you said—”

  “I told you I loved you, but you weren’t awake to hear it,” she whispered, her fingers teasing his hair. “You fainted, for you were bleeding badly. Some men on the riverbank tended to your wounds, but then you took a fever. When Zaphenath-paneah heard of it, he sent a wagon and brought you here.”

  Sighing in relief, Shim’on caught her hands. “So we are back where we began.”

  A dancing light twinkled in the depths of her black eyes. “Do you think so?”

  “No.” He breathed the word, and pulled her into his arms. “We are miles from that day. Shim’on the Destroyer is no more, he is gone for good. Shim’on the father, the husband, is now your captive.”

  “And what shall I do with this prisoner?” she asked, looking down into his eyes. A thread of uncertainty ran through her voice. “Shall I release him so he can join his people in Goshen?”

  “Never release him.” He stood and pressed her to him, bolstering his weakness with her strength. “You were right to refuse him before, but now he has broken his bonds. He is finally free to love you as you deserve to be loved. Let him remain by your side always, let his people be your people.”

  “As my God has become his God,” she answered, her hand sweeping to the back of his neck. “For only God Shaddai could have broken through the stony stronghold of your heart.” She tilted her head back to look into his eyes. “You did not tell me, Shim’on, what happened in Canaan.”

  Shim’on looked away, trying to gather his thoughts. He had been broken, bruised, exposed, humbled, uplifted, forgiven, scorned and loved, all at the behest of the Almighty, and all within a short time. Only one force on earth could both destroy and comfort, simultaneously give light and pain.

  “I saw God as a fire,” he said, looking her straight in the eye. “A holy fire that cannot be contained or tamed. And yet in Him we can find safety, love and life.”

  “How unlike the gods of Egypt,” Mandisa whispered, slipping under his arm. “Though the people threaten and intimidate them, they remain silent. People believe their gods provide what they want, but idols cannot deliver what people need.”

  “I need you, Mandisa, as I have needed you since the day I first came here,” Shim’on answered. “I will always thank God Shaddai for a mercy severe and loving enough to send you into my prison chamber.”

  “Even with my acid tongue?” She nestled against him. “You were not fond of it in the early days.”

  “I did not know what was good for me.” He locked his arms behind her back. “It took an acid tongue to cut through the hardness of my anger.”

  Smiling, she lifted her face, and when Shim’on bent to kiss her, he felt the slow and steady, reassuring beat of his heart in his chest…no longer a stone, but a new and living creation.

  As Yosef watched in approval, Shim’on took Mandisa for his wife and Adom for his son. Tizara wept freely at the wedding, knowing that Shim’on would soon take her to meet her mother and a host of relatives to which she had never dreamed of belonging. “There is such a feeling of happiness inside me,” she said, looking at Yosef with bright tears in her eyes. “Only your Almighty God, my lord, could show such mercy and love to one like me.”

  After many warm farewells and heartfelt embraces, the quartet prepared to move northward to the well-watered plains of Goshen. Zaphenath-paneah’s entire household—slaves, servants, guards and stockmen—gathered at the gate of the villa to watch them go. Tarik and Halima, their hands gently intertwined, watched from the shadow of one of the portico’s pillars, away from prying eyes.

  As Yosef stood on his balcony, his hand shading his eyes from the sun, he looked down upon his household and felt his heart stir with compassion. His people were so dear to him. He led them as wisely as he could, and yet they continued to persist in blindness. Though God Shaddai had demonstrated His foreknowledge and power to save, Ani still worshipped the knowledge of Thoth. Though God had bountifully provided for them in times of direst want, Halima still ran to the kitchen and knelt before the food bins, desperately trying to eat her way out of anxiety. And though God Shaddai had demonstrated the most tender, protective love imaginable, Asenath had refused His guardianship, choosing instead to follow an adulterous and destructive path.

  But Asenath had returned, at the end. Shim’on had shattered his heart’s temple of hate and anger, and Mandisa had learned that El Shaddai was more than just another god. Those three had left the ranks of deceived thousands who preferred the illusion of a safe and manageable deity, a god fashioned into a congenial, serviceable likeness.

  “The others do not know, nor do they understand,” Yosef murmured, his heart aching as he watched the scene in the courtyard. “They feed on ashes, their deceived hearts have turned them aside. And they cannot deliver themselves, nor realize that the gods they hold in their hands are a lie.”

  Oh, how he wished they would seek the truth! He had seen too much in his life, witnessed too much pain. God had called him to lead, but on some days he would willingly cast the mantle of leadership aside to relive an hour of service in Potiphar’s house. In those carefree days his only concerns had been of pleasing
his easygoing master and capturing a sweet smile from Tuya, the love of his youth.

  Memories closed around him and filled him with a longing to turn back, but an inner voice, hauntingly familiar, nudged him out of his musings: Why are you in despair? And why have you become disturbed? Hope in God, for you shall yet praise Me.

  A sense of strength came to him, and Yosef lifted his head. The four travelers passed through the gates; the assembled company broke up as each man and woman went back to their duties. Yosef stepped back into the coolness of his chamber, grateful for a moment of reflection. The villa felt strangely quiet without Shim’on, Mandisa, Adom, Tizara and Asenath. In the days ahead he would undoubtedly feel the hollow sting of loneliness.

  But Pharaoh was a young man, and beginning to show real potential. The king’s first wife, Queen Tiy, was a commoner, and in dire need of a proper education. And beyond the palace lay Egypt, the bold, Black Land to which God had called Yosef years ago.

  Hope in God, for you shall yet praise me.

  Yosef would not allow himself to be distracted. He had not finished his work.

  Epilogue

  Y aakov was one hundred thirty years old when the children of Yisrael came into Egypt. There they prospered during the remaining five years of famine, and continued to live in Goshen under Pharaoh’s benevolence.

  After seventeen years in Egypt, at the age of one hundred forty-seven, Yaakov called his sons together. From Yosef he extracted a promise that he would not be buried in Egypt, but that his sons would carry his remains back to the Cave of Machpelah, the burial site of Avraham and Sarah, Yitzhak and Rebekah…and Lea.

  Yaakov called for his sons, and blessed them, including the two sons of Yosef, Efrayim and Menashe. And because he understood that God had willed that Yosef be sold into slavery, he did not fault the sons of Lea for their betrayal. But in his final blessing he did not forget other sins of his sons’ younger days:

  Re’uven lost the inheritance of the firstborn because he once slept with his father’s concubine.

  Shim’on and Levi were passed over because they had killed men and cruelly maimed bulls.

  A special blessing went to Yehuda, and from his descendants arose King David, and from David, a savior, Yeshua the Christ.

  The firstborn’s double inheritance went to Yosef’s sons, Efrayim and Menashe.

  Mandisa stood with the other women as Yisrael pronounced his final blessing. For an instant, as Yaakov harshly decried the past sins of Shim’on and Levi, the old unloved look shadowed her husband’s countenance.

  But then Yaakov motioned toward his sons, and passed his hands of blessing over each of their heads, bestowing favor and forgiveness in one gesture. As Shim’on stood, his eye caught Mandisa’s, and his face lifted in a weary smile. The anger had disappeared from his eyes; forgiveness from a holy fountain had washed it away.

  After Yaakov’s death, Yosef instructed the physicians of Egypt to embalm his father, and the people of the Black Land mourned seventy days. When the days of mourning had been fulfilled, Yosef, his brothers and their children and a company of Pharaoh’s servants went up to Canaan to bury Yaakov. When the Canaanites saw the great company, they remarked upon it and named the place where they mourned Abel-Mizraim, or “the mourning of Egypt.”

  When the burial was done, Yosef, his family and the Egyptians returned to Mizraim, the black and fertile land of the south.

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  I must begin by giving credit to the works of Thomas Mann, specifically the novels comprising the Yosef and His Brothers series. Though my books are nothing like his, Mann opened my eyes to several ideas and possibilities that would not otherwise have occurred to me. For this novel, I am also indebted to Donald W. McCullough and his book, The Trivialization of God. Without McCullough’s insights I would never have realized how prevalent idol worship still is—only the names have changed. Instead of Horus, we worship success. Instead of Min, we devote ourselves to prosperity.

  Reginald Heber, author of the hymn “Holy, Holy, Holy” once wrote, “The heathen in his blindness bows down to wood and stone.”

  In Romans 1:21–25, the Bible amplifies his comment:

  Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things. Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonour their own bodies between themselves: Who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed for ever. Amen.

  As I researched ancient Egyptian religion, I was struck by the similarities between their beliefs and Christian theology. In the earliest dynasties, the Egyptians were monotheistic, believing in one all-powerful and invisible God who created the world out of water. (Egypt was settled, after all, by descendants of Ham, one of Noah’s sons.) They were devout believers in an afterlife. They believed that their Pharaoh, a physical incarnation of a god, could give his life in intercession for his people and “resurrect” in the afterlife to take his throne.

  Though in the beginning they must have understood the Truth, in a relatively short time they forgot about the invisible, eternal God and worshipped gods they made themselves. They exchanged the Truth for a devious perversion.

  But we must not feel superior to them. Men still replace God with idols of their own making, many of which can appear even in the lives of Christians. To the human eye, the idols of this generation have little in common with the wooden and stone figures of ancient Egypt, but to a discerning heart they represent the same substitutes for our devotion.

  At various times during my years of following God Almighty, whom I know through the fellowship of His Son, I have allowed His place to be usurped by idols of my own making: my search for knowledge, my desire for personal comfort and happiness, a quest for the earthly definition of success, even the beloved faces of my husband and much-longed-for children. It is far too human a tendency to take our eyes off God and fasten our gaze to substitutes that, though they may be lovely and precious, were never intended to satisfy the soul’s yearning for God.

  But God Shaddai is faithful and forgiving beyond my capacity to understand. His mercy, a patient waterfall upon my stony heart, has hollowed out a place that can be filled with nothing but Him.

  Angela Hunt

  QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION

  Did you read the first book of this series, Dreamers ? Joseph, or Yosef, is not the protagonist of this story, but he still plays an important part. How is Yosef different in Brothers ? What has changed him?

  Reread the epigraph by Thomas Wolfe. How do you think it applies to this story?

  If Yaakov’s (Jacob’s) family lived in contemporary times, we’d probably label it dysfunctional. How did Yaakov’s children reflect Yaakov’s flaws and deficiencies? How did Yaakov’s grandchildren suffer for the mistakes of the previous generations?

  Why do you think Shim’on and Levi took such violent action against the city of Shekhem? What motivated their response? If you’d been their parent, would you have condoned their actions?

  Even if you had not read the story of Dina and Shim’on in this book, how could Shim’on’s assault on the city of Shekhem have affected his relationship with his sister?

  What sort of woman was Mandisa? What do you think drew her to Shim’on?

  Have you ever wondered why Yosef resorted to such manipulation of his brothers when they first appeared in Egypt? (Demanding they bring Binyamin, hiding the silver bowl, returning the silver, accusing them of being spies…) Did his thoughts and motivations become clearer after reading this fictional treatment of the story?

  What sort of attitude did the Egyptians hold toward their gods? Do you think contemporary people ever consider their gods (if t
hey claim to worship any god at all) in the same way?

  Can you imagine any reason why God might have wanted to move the children of Yisrael into Egypt for many years? (Hint: Read Genesis 15:14–16).

  If you were a lay counselor and Yaakov and his sons came into your office, how would you advise them to begin settling their family problems?

  Are modern people really that much different from ancient Egyptians? In what ways are they different? In what ways are they similar?

  Which character in the story could you most relate to? Why?

  Idolatry is one of the story’s themes. What sorts of idols did the characters of this story worship? How did the author illustrate this theme?

  BIBLIOGRAPHY

  Bianchi, Robert S. Splendors of Ancient Egypt: From the Egyptian Museum Cairo. London: Booth-Clibborn Editions, 1996.

  Brier, Bob. The Murder of Tutankhamen: A True Story. New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1998.

  Budge, E. A. Wallis. Egyptian Religion. New York: Barnes & Noble, 1995.

  —. The Mummy: A History of the Extraordinary Practices of Ancient Egypt. New York: Wings Books, 1989.

  Bunson, Margaret. The Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt. New York: Facts on File Publications, 1991.

  Cahill, Thomas. The Gifts of the Jews: How a Tribe of Desert Nomads Changed the Way Everyone Thinks and Feels. New York: Doubleday, 1998.

  Coleman, William. Today’s Handbook of Bible Times and Customs. Minneapolis: Bethany House Publishers, 1984.

  Comay, Joan. Who’s Who in the Old Testament. Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1971.

  Coogan, Michael D., ed. The Oxford History of the Biblical World. New York: Oxford University Press, 1998.

  David, A. Rosalie and Rick Archbold. Conversations with Mummies. New York: HarperCollins, 2000.