Abraham and Sarah (28 page)

Abram was excited to use the age-old procedure of men everywhere who wanted to make a lasting covenant that could never be broken. The animals would be separated and the parties making the covenant would walk between them, thus sealing their decision in blood. His God was willing to covenant with him in a way he could understand.

Slowly the euphoria passed. The thick silence was broken by a wolf’s lonesome howl. A bat swooped low, and he dodged back into the shadow of the rock. Abram became acutely aware of his surroundings: the harsh cliffs touched by moonlight, the low stone wall circling the olive trees near the path. He stood up and wondered how long he had been out on the hillside.
Would Sarai be asleep? He wanted to share this encounter with her. Perhaps she would believe and be encouraged.

Back at the tent he saw that she was asleep and he decided to wait until morning to tell her all that had happened. He pulled the tent flap back, stepped inside, and lay down on the hard, straw mat.

In the morning he tried to tell Sarai what God had told him the night before, but she was preoccupied with building a fire. She insisted on making comments about how hard it was to make the coals come alive in the clay fire pot and even harder to make the small twigs catch fire. She did everything possible to let him know she didn’t want to hear any more about visions. She did stop and look at him when he mentioned “altar.” He knew she was hearing, even though she was rejecting the message.

He ate quickly and then ordered his men to help him pick the animals for the sacrifice. They had to be perfect. No blemishes would be accepted. The altar had to be enlarged so he could divide the animals, putting half on one side and half on the other. When the men asked him where the fire was to light such a sacrifice, he was at first silent and then confessed, “The Lord God, Elohim, will light my sacrifice this time, or it will not be lit.” That was one of the conditions necessary to make sure it was God who was joining him in covenant. The men grew silent and concerned. Sometimes the old priests used the sun with the help of a bronze shield to light altar fires, but the men saw no such shield.

He thanked the men and then dismissed them. It was obviously his sacrifice, and he had no intention of including the rest of them in the proceedings. They stood back and watched, disturbed to see the ravens and vultures gathering. They saw Abram take off his cloak and begin to swing it at the birds, shouting, “Yah! Yah!” Some of his servants went out to herd their sheep, but when they came back hours later, Abram was still there, and his sacrifice lay just as he had placed it on the altar, unburned.

Sarai tried to act unconcerned, but in the late afternoon she had her loom moved to the door of her tent. She could see the altar, but Abram had his back to her. She could tell by the droop of his shoulders and the way his arm hung limp with his cloak dragging on the ground that he was exhausted and disappointed. She saw the vultures now joined by hawks and the frightening bearded vultures circling, then swooping down to claim his sacrifice. She moved to the tent door and leaned against the tent pole to watch.

It makes me feel guilty, she thought, seeing him out there all alone driving off the birds from his sacrifice. This will be another failure. The promises are never kept. Why won’t he give up? He never gives up. She felt the tears of frustration flood her eyes, and she turned away and fingered the rough material she was weaving. She couldn’t bear to watch.

“Oh Abram,” she whispered, “I love you so. Why can’t you be reasonable like other men? Isn’t it enough that we packed and left friends, family, and our familiar idols to travel to this barren land your God promised you?”

She moved back to the door of the tent and lifted the flap so she could see everything. Her head ached with the strain and her throat was dry. She could not stand to see what was happening, and yet she could not turn away. I don’t believe his God will come and light his sacrifice, she thought. What will he do? Surely he’ll give up.

It was too much to think of. She paced back and forth, trying not to look out the door. Finally she came to stand again by the tent pole, but instead of looking out at Abram, she reached for a brass mirror hanging by a piece of sheep gut from the pole. She adjusted her mantle and tucked in her hair.

“I loved Egypt,” she murmured. “If we could just go back to Egypt. It was like Ur with fine foods and lotus pools. We could have stayed but … for the problem with the pharaoh. He had so many sons, and you, Abram, with all the promises, had none.”

There were questions she had pushed down into the very depths of her soul, but now they came pouring out. “Is it my fault?” she whispered with tortured, twisted lips. No tears came, but her eyes were dark with the old fear. “Is it the curse of Ningal that we have no son? I never wanted land, but, oh, the child, Abram. Where is the child your God promised?” Her hands gripped the tent pole so hard her fingers turned white and her eyes had a wild, hopeless look.

She heard more loud shouting and the sharp cracking sound of the cloak hitting on stone. She leaned out and looked toward the altar in time to see the ugly birds clawing at the cloak and Abram shouting hoarsely, “Yah! Yah! Yah!”

The sun was setting and she was conscious of others now. She knew the shepherds would be hiding their laughter and the servants buzzing with the master’s final failure. Always before it had been just words, but now it was more, much more. He’d dared to do this impossible thing, to make his God do something everyone could see. He’d dared to expect his God to light his sacrifice.

“I can’t watch,” she said. “I’ll go get Hagar. The time has come. Together we’ll make plans. We’ll do what Abram’s God can’t do. I’ll give her to him for a night, and I will have my child without this endless waiting.” She hurried toward the place at the back of the tent where the side pieces were lifted. She ducked down and went through and out into the growing darkness to find Hagar.

Abram was exhausted. “Lord,” he said, “I don’t understand You.” Looking up at the sky, he stood with his cloak at his side. His hair was damp and matted, and the lines in his face had become deep grooves down which the sweat ran untouched. “Why do You have to wait so long to do everything?” he thundered in exasperation. “Sarai has lost all patience and now she is angry with me. She doesn’t believe You are going to do anything. She thinks I have imagined it all.”

He watched the sun hang for a moment above the distant hill and then disappear. A star shone dimly in the reddened sky. “I told her about the stars. How You said I’d have descendants as the stars. She just laughed. Not a happy laugh. It was bitter and choked with pity. She feels sorry for me. ‘Look at Asa,’ she says, ‘he’s even younger than you and he already has fifteen sons and ten daughters. Even a man without wit can see he’s more likely to found a great nation than you with no son at all.’ Lord, I’m the laughingstock of everyone I meet.”

Once again the birds were swooping down, croaking and screaming as they dived toward the sacrifice. “You shall not eat one bite of God’s sacrifice. Yah! Yah! Yah!” The birds flew off, and Abram sank down at the base of the altar exhausted.

“Lord,” he said finally, “is there something wrong? You told me to build this altar and prepare this sacrifice.” He began to count on his fingers. “A three-year-old heifer, a three-year-old female goat, a three-year-old ram, a turtledove, and a young pigeon. You were so exact in Your instructions.”

He looked toward the tent and saw that Sarai was no longer watching. He knew she’d given up. He heard laughter in other tents and imagined they were discussing the day’s events.

For a moment Abram stood with his cloak dragging on the ground. He waited for some answer, some bit of encouragement, but there was only the
quiet of evening and always the birds, the big, hungry, evil-eyed birds, now circling high above the altar. Rubbing his sleeve across his face, he wiped his brow. He stood looking at the altar, clenching and unclenching his fists in frustration. “I’m just a man … just a man, God. I’m tired. My arms ache from driving off the birds.”

He looked in all directions as if expecting some answer, but when none came, he turned back to the altar, which was now in shadows. The birds had moved to a nearby thornbush and sat watching and waiting. The time for fire to descend and light his sacrifice was long overdue. He shrugged in resignation. “You’ve got to take over, God. Do You hear? I can’t do any more. If Your birds eat Your sacrifice, I can’t help it.”

He sank down beside the altar, holding his head in his hands, and wept. “You shouldn’t expect so much from just a man.” Dazed and numb, he stared out into the growing darkness. He felt the cool night air swirling around him in gentle gusts. He relaxed and in moments he was sound asleep. His hand loosened and the cloak slipped down on the warm stones. His head fell back and a horror of great darkness came upon him.

The voice he had come to know so well spoke, but the words were not pleasant. “Your seed, Abram, shall be a stranger in a land that is not theirs, and shall serve them, and be afflicted for four hundred years. That nation, whom they shall serve, will I judge; and after these things they will come out with great wealth.

“Do not be afraid. You will go to your fathers in peace at a good old age.

“But your descendants in the fourth generation will come here again and take this land, for the iniquity of the Amorites will by that time be full.”

Then Abram woke to a strange sight. Darkness had settled over the land. The moon had not yet risen, and the stars were bursting out one after another, covering the dark dome of heaven. Out of the darkness came a red-hot, glowing fire pot, and Abram watched in awe as it passed between the pieces on the altar. No hand held the pot, and yet as he watched there was a great roaring, thundering sound as a pillar of fire burst out and ignited the sacrifice. He heard again the voice speaking in tones used when covenants were made: “Unto your seed have I given this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river Euphrates.”

Within minutes there was shouting and pounding of feet running on hard-packed earth. The whole camp was aroused. They stood back and
watched, not daring to come close. Abram stood transfixed, his arms upraised, his head thrown back. Then covering his face with his hands, he fell to his knees and prostrated himself before the roaring pillar of fire on the altar.

When at last the sacrifice was consumed in the raging flames and the fire died down, Abram raised himself and watched with unspeakable joy as the coals glowed on the crude altar. Tears ran down his face as he raised his hands high over the altar, and vibrant words of praise poured from his lips.

“Stand back, stand back,” the men whispered. “It’s holy ground. His God has answered him.” Abram heard nothing and was not even aware of their coming, so lost was he in adoration of the Elohim.

Later some parts of what he’d been told puzzled him: Could it be true that I have not been given the land because my God is waiting, giving the Amorites time to repent? Abram also pondered for a long time the words “your seed.” That meant he was to have children. How this would come about he could not imagine, and when Sarai came to him with a plan, it somehow seemed right and proper.

“My handmaiden, whom the pharaoh gave me saying she would have a child in my place, is ready. She has agreed. In fact she finds you handsome. She told me as much.”

“And you don’t mind?” Abram said, searching her face for any sign of hurt or holding back.

She shrugged. “It is my fault you don’t have a son already. I was the one cursed, and I’m the one to set it right.” Her voice had a catch in it, and Abram could see the decision had not been easy.

“The Egyptian seems independent and even headstrong. Are you sure she will agree?”

“As I said, she finds you handsome and she’s my friend. She’d do anything to please me. Besides, what harm can it do? If she conceives, you’ll have your son. If not, at least we tried.”

“Give me time to think. Perhaps to talk to the girl. This may have more complications than you realize.”

Sarai tossed her head in the old teasing way. “Talk to her, think about it, but don’t pray about it. You’ve proved your point. The fire came and now it’s time for us to act.”