“And they are not alone,” Carmi shouted. “Eliab and his father Helon say the same thing. And Elizur—I talked to him. And Shelumiel. We need meat to eat! Meat! Savory meat! We remember the fish of Egypt, cucumbers and melons and leeks and onions and garlic. Oh, the garlic! Just a little garlic! But there’s nothing to look at here but…manna!”
Little Achan also looked down at his little bits of manna. He pushed it away. Immediately he felt a burning like a bee-sting at the tip of his ear.
But this was no bee. It was a clip from his mother’s fingernail. He took back the manna and ate it.
MOSES LED THE TWELVE TRIBES and all their hosts north by northeast from the wilderness of Sinai, through the wide wilderness of Paran, and into the wilderness of Zin.
Now, it happened on the way that he heard crying in the camps of Israel. At night the people were weeping over their miserable lot.
Moses was dismayed. He turned to the Lord and said, “Did I conceive this people? Did I bear them that you, O Lord, should command me to suckle them like a wet nurse? Where am I going to get meat for these, these—children! Six hundred thousand mouths and gullets and stomachs of craving!”
Then the anger of the Lord burned hot against Israel. Tell them, he said to Moses, that they shall eat meat tomorrow. And the next day. And the next! Tell them they shall eat meat for an entire month! Meat till it comes from their nostrils. Meat till it looks loathsome to them. Meat—because they are rejecting the Lord their God!
So there came from the Lord a violent wind. It crossed the sea and brought quantities of quails, flocks of fat quails that fell all round the camp, covering the wilderness two cubits deep in meat, even to the distance of a day’s journey in every direction.
The people began to gather it. They kept on gathering meat till no one had less than the load ten donkeys could carry. But as soon as the meat was between their teeth, the fury of God shot forth and smote the people with a plague, and many perished there.
That place was called Kibroth-hattaavah: The Graves of Craving.
III
AT THE SOUTHERN EDGE of the Negev, near Kadesh, the cloud of the presence of the Lord came down and the northward journey of Israel was over.
“Canaan is across that desert,” Moses said to them. “The land the Lord God swore to our fathers, to give to their descendants forever—it is just across that desert.”
So the children of Israel pitched camp in that place, according to the instructions of the Lord. The Tabernacle was assembled in the center of two huge circles of tents. Aaron and his people constituted the eastern side of the circle closest to the Tabernacle—the side to which its door opened. The rest of the inner circle belonged to the families of Levi, so that the priests and the servants of the Lord were ever near to serve him.
The great outer ring was composed of the other tribes, so the Lord was in the midst of them all. From his central seat, God called to Moses, and Moses bore his word to all the people:
You have seen the signs I wrought for you in Egypt. In the same manner shall I go with you into this land, that you might take it for yourself. Now, then, O my people, do these two things: send men to spy out the land of Canaan; and when they return, go in yourselves and by my might make it your own, for it is yours!
Moses chose twelve men, one from each of the tribes of Israel, and all of the people came out to watch them go. A mere handful of kinsmen went north, walking until they were too distant to be seen.
Then the people returned to their tents. Land! Rehoboth! They tingled with anticipation.
CARMI LAY OUTSIDE his tent in the cool of the evening. He was talking out loud.
Elisheba, who was inside washing their son with the leftover drinking water, thought that a visitor had come by. She was hurrying so she could go out and enjoy the conversation before night forced them to sleep.
“Yes, yes, yes,” Carmi was saying. “It will be two fields. At least two fields. One for planting and one for grazing. I myself will tend the flocks. There will be very large flocks. Many sheep, I assure you. No more bricks for me—I am going to be a rich man. And I’ll let the woman take care of my crops. She can plow and plant. She walks well. She has big feet. Yes, yes, yes, I will have my own land. Three fields. Why not three? Of course, three! And I will order my servants to build big bins for the harvest.”
Just as Elisheba laid young Achan down on his mat, the boy opened his eyes wide and said with slow wonder: “Bins, Mama. Bi-i-ins.”
“Hush, don’t worry about bins,” she said. “You go to sleep, Achan.”
Then she stepped outside, smiling. Elisheba didn’t talk much. It wasn’t in her nature. But she loved to listen. Therefore she was sorry to find Carmi lying on the ground alone, his hands locked behind his head.
“Where is he?” she said softly.
“Where is who?” The tone of her husband’s voice implied that she had asked a ridiculous question. But he answered her question with a question, so she was bound to speak again.
“Him,” she said as softly as she could. “Our visitor. Him.”
“Well, I haven’t seen anyone around here. You must have better eyesight than me, woman.”
Elisheba put her head down and said nothing.
From inside the tent there came a tiny voice: “Mama? Mama? What’s bins? Can I have one, too?”
A CRY WENT UP: “They’re coming!”
All Israel rushed out of their tents. They ran to the north side of the encampment, breathless with anticipation and glee, squinting to see where the spies were.
There they were!
Yes, there they were—but they, too, were running. They were not in a group. They were stretched across the Negev, every man for himself, the young ones racing top speed, the old ones nearly dead with exhaustion. Their clothing was torn! They were disheveled and frightened.
Shaphat’s mother began to scream. Of all the spies, Shaphat was the youngest. The wives of the others covered their mouths with fear.
Shaphat, the first to arrive, fell down gasping. He couldn’t speak. He could only shake his head. Others came in with bloody feet. Water was brought. The people surrounded them. And then they began to speak.
“We can’t,” they said. “No, we cannot do this thing!”
Their faces reflected such horror that the rest of the people felt it, too. Here on the edge of a strange land, Israel trembled and waited to hear the name of the horror in Canaan.
“The cities there are large and fortified. And the people!” The spies rolled their eyes remembering. “We saw there the descendants of Anak! No, this is a land that devours its inhabitants. The people are of enormous stature. Giants! Yes, we saw the Nephilim! And we seemed no bigger than grasshoppers next to them!”
Moses had come through the multitude in time to hear the last part of the spies’ recitation: Nephilim. Grasshoppers.
“What?” he said, astonished. “Is there no good news?”
Just then the last two of the spies arrived, Caleb and Joshua. They were not bleeding. They were not disheveled. They had not been running, but walking—and they were the last to come because they were carrying a single cluster of grapes so huge that it hung from a pole between them.
“Yes,” they said, grinning, “there’s wonderful good news. This is a land flowing with milk and honey. See the sort of fruit it produces? And there are figs and pomegranates just like this! The Lord has made it an exceedingly good land for us.”
Caleb raised his right arm and said, “Let’s go now, at once, and occupy it.”
But the other spies yelled at him. “What’s the matter with you? Didn’t you see what we saw? Our wives and our children will be food for those giants!”
At that the whole congregation began to whine and wail.
Caleb and Joshua were stunned. They had expected everyone to share their triumph. “The Lord delights in us,” they said. “Don’t fear the people of this land. God will make them bread for us. The Lord is with us. He has taken their prot
ection away—”
But all the children of Israel wept aloud: “Oh, why didn’t we die in the wilderness! Why did the Lord bring us to this land, to fall by the sword? Let’s choose our own captain! Let’s command our captain to take us back to Egypt.”
Then Caleb the son of Jephunneh and Joshua the son of Nun tore their clothes in shame. “Israel!” they cried, “Do not rebel against the Lord our God!”
Moses said nothing at all. He had seen enough to know what the Lord thought of this people now. He turned and walked back through the camp to its center, to the Tabernacle; and there the Lord met him, and the Lord spoke:
How long will this people despise me? And how long will they not believe in me, despite the signs which I have wrought among them? I will disinherit them.
Moses lay down on his face. He spoke in tones so quiet that none but God could hear him: “But I have heard the word in your own mouth, O Lord. You declared yourself to be slow in anger and abounding in love. You said you forgive iniquity. I beg you, then, to pardon the iniquity of this people according to the greatness of your own steadfast love. I beg you, O Lord.”
In the dark interior of the Tabernacle, above the mercy seat in the holy of holies, the Lord God said: Even so, I pardon them. Even so. But none of those who saw my glory against Egypt shall live to enter the land. Only my servants Caleb and Joshua, because they have followed me truly—they and the children whom Israel thought would be food for the giants—shall enter and dwell there.
Moses, tell this people that they must wander the wilderness yet forty more years. I, the Lord, have spoken.
So Moses rose up and went out and told the people this unhappy word.
There was no laughing in the camps of Israel that day. No, nor was there much laughter for years to come; but the children longed to hear it again. They remembered the day when the whole congregation had laughed aloud. The little children longed to laugh like that again.
IV
WHILE YET THE TWELVE TRIBES of Israel were encamped near Kadesh, Miriam, the sister of Moses and Aaron, and the oldest of the three, died.
She who had watched over the infant Moses with tenderness and wit; she who had sung at the redemption of Israel and who had taught the women to dance—she was buried in that place.
SO ISRAEL BECAME Shasu, a nomad wandering from place to place without plan or direction, waiting. Waiting until this time of dying was over.
When they lacked water, the people complained to Moses and Moses prayed on their behalf.
Once, when God had commanded Moses and Aaron to speak to a rock that it might pour forth water for the people, the brothers chose rather to strike it with Aaron’s rod.
The striking worked. Water indeed came out, and the people drank.
But unto Moses and Aaron the Lord said, Because you did not believe in me, neither of you shall bring this assembly into the land which I have promised.
ONE NIGHT ACHAN was awakened by a strange sound in the tent—a strangled, choking sound, as if someone couldn’t breathe.
Achan was seventeen years old by now; he slept in a compartment of his own; the sound was coming through the wall of his father’s room.
He almost got up to see what the trouble was, but then he heard his mother’s voice. She, too, had heard the sound and had crept into Carmi’s room.
“What’s the matter?” she whispered in her low, gentle voice.
“Nothing!” Achan’s father was gasping for air. “Go away.”
His mother whispered, “But why are you crying, Carmi?”
“Because,” the man sobbed, “because I think I will never have a plot of land for myself.”
“Hush, hush.” His mother’s voice was so familiar, so consoling. “Don’t worry about land,” she said. “Go to sleep now, Carmi.”
WHEN THE CONGREGATION of Israel was encamped near Mount Hor, the Lord said to Moses, Take Aaron up the mountain. Tell him to don his priestly garments, then lead him together with his son Eleazar up Mount Hor, for he shall be gathered to his people now.
Moses did as the Lord commanded.
Early in the morning he and his brother and his nephew, climbed the mountain together. They sat and looked out over the tents of the people. After a little while, Moses stripped Aaron of his garments. He put them on Eleazar.
Aaron lay down, then, and died there on the top of the mountain.
Moses and Eleazar came down alone.
And when the house of Israel saw that Aaron was dead, they wept for him thirty days.
Moses was silent all those days. He did not weep. He did not speak a word.
FROM MOUNT HOR the people of Israel set out by the way of the Red Sea, moving south-southeast toward Ezion-geber, where they camped.
Then they encamped at Elath.
They set out by the way of the plain northward from Elath and encamped in Punon.
Again, they set out from Punon and encamped at Oboth.
They set out from Oboth and began to climb to higher ground. They encamped at Iye-abarim.
From there they set out and encamped in the valley of Zered.
ON THE WAY the people became irritable and impatient. They murmured against God and against Moses.
Despite the rigid order of their lives, despite the many commands of God, their movement lacked a plan or point or purpose! It was ridiculous. Wandering, wandering nowhere—but doing it all with stiff rules and wonderful precision!
A general mood of bitterness infected Israel, until it seemed to some that everyone must feel the same, though few had the courage to say it. So those few became bold on behalf of the rest. With the added swagger of self-righteousness, they complained loudly, in public places.
Carmi was among the loudest.
Sixty years old, thin and stooped, gaunt in his cheeks, balding and blotched on the top of his head, Carmi chose to speak of the food. He stood in front of his tent and shouted, “There is neither food nor water!”
His son, now thirty years old, watched with a scornful indifference. He wasn’t embarrassed or ashamed. In fact, he no longer felt anything at all for this disappointed old man.
Carmi’s wife, on the other hand, was terrified of his rash behavior. She begged him to come in and be quiet. She said, “Carmi, you know better. There is water when we need it, and there has been manna every morning—”
But the man bellowed the louder: “When I think what my life could have been! When I think what I might have made of myself! A little land! A few fig trees, a few sheep—no, Elisheba, this is not food. Moses!” he roared, waving his hands. “Moses, do you hear me? I am the voice of ten thousand now. I am pointing at a jar of manna! I am remembering manna, day after day for thirty years, manna! And I gag! I say for ten thousand: we loathe this worthless food!”
That same night, Carmi the son of Zabdi died.
He was bitten by a snake. And though the bite produced a fiery inflammation all over his flesh, the man chose silence at the end. He did not cry out. He did not speak. His wife took him in her arms and stroked his sweating forehead and rocked him. Once he opened his eyes and looked up at her. His swelling countenance seemed to say, I expected nothing else. And then he breathed his last.
But from other tents in Israel there went up many an agonized cry that night.
The entire camp had been overrun by serpents. They came in silence, surprising the people by the sudden fire of their bite.
And in the morning light the serpents were visible everywhere, dropping from loose clothing, lying in the folds of the tents, sliding through the dry grass—and killing the children of Israel.
So they went to Moses with wounded bodies and broken hearts. They found him at the Tabernacle in the midst of all. And they said, “We have sinned. We’ve spoken against the Lord and against you. Moses, we repent the iniquity! Please pray to the Lord, that he take away the serpents from us!”
Moses listened, his fierce old eyes probing the faces of those who surrounded him, then he turned and entered the Taber
nacle, and there he stayed for the space of an hour.
During that same day, Elisheba also was bitten by a snake.
Achan heard the tiny sigh his mother made for the pain she had sustained. He went into her room and saw the dry eye of the serpent. Immediately he crushed its head and gathered his mother into his arms and ran outside. He raced westward through the wide encampment from the tents of Judah to the center of all the circles—the Tabernacle.
As he arrived, he saw several of the men of Levi lifting a dull yellow snake to the top of a pole. It had been molded of bronze.
Moses was calling to all the people: “The Lord has commanded me to raise this serpent before you. In mercy he says, If those who have been bitten look upon the serpent, they shall live.”
Achan laid his mother down before the pole. Already her breath was labored and foul. Her face was swollen and red.
Slowly she opened her eyes. She looked upward. She gazed upon the bronze effigy for a brief moment. Then she closed her eyes and relaxed and fell into a deep sleep.
When she woke, she was well.
FROM THE VALLEY of Zered the children of Israel set out and encamped on the far side of the Arnon.
From there they continued to Beer. This is the well at which the Lord said to Moses, Gather the people together, and I will give them water.
And this is the place where Israel sang:
Spring up, O Well! (Come, sing to the water.)
Run sweet for the lips of our sons and our daughters!
You are the source our nobles once dug
with scepters and staves and faith and love.
Spring up, O Well, for the good of our daughters:
forever our princes! Forever your waters!
The Book of God: The Bible as a Novel Page 14