Name Your Own Price Ebooks: Free ebook sample of "Prophet of Israel" by Timothy Wilkinson

1

Samuel awoke in fear, wrenched from sleep in the unsettled hour before sunrise by the hiss and moan of a storm blowing in from the west. The tempest was flailing water and wind with such force that the wood-framed, cloth walls of his room alongside the sacred Tabernacle creaked with the strain of holding themselves together.

He sat and pushed free of his thin blanket, closing his eyes against the utter blackness to try to force his ears to work harder. All but lost in the gale’s discordant song, he could just make out the cries of panicked voices and the slap of bare feet on wet flagstones outside his room.

He opened his eyes, revealing nothing more of the room around him, crawled from his bed and pushed aside the wool curtain that served as his door. Icy raindrops spattered on his forehead as he squinted across the dark Tabernacle Courtyard. Instantly, he found words for the sense of dread that had torn him, gasping, from nightmared sleep.

In the attack of wind and rain, the sacred Altar’s Eternal Flame was in danger of being extinguished.

The storm had stripped the sky of stars and moon—the only light a pale grey dimly silhouetting the Curtain Wall surrounding the Courtyard. Through the haze of wind-swept rain, he saw the shadowy outlines of Priests and their acolytes, the Levites, scurrying around the Courtyard, their pale, linen robes soaked through and clinging to their bodies.

“Bring those skins!”

“Hang on to it!”

The bitter wind bit through his own thin tunic, already damp from the rain, and he wrapped the bottom portion of his woolen door around his lean body; the coarse material scratched against his bare shins. The wool warmed his skin, but the icy pit of fear in his stomach did not abate. He searched the Courtyard for his mentor and friend Priest Ahitub but cowled robes and sheets of stinging rain shrouded the men’s faces.

A great muscle of cloud flexed somewhere above them, allowing dusky moonlight through to paint details on the shadowy shapes Samuel was watching. He saw a knot of people clustered around the burnished-copper Altar of Burnt Offering, mantled shoulders hunched against the assault of the storm. To the south of the Altar a ramp ascended, the means by which Priests and Levites bore the animal offerings to the copper grating on its top. A waist-high heap of rock salt slouched to its west, dissolving in the rain. Men knelt in front of the firebox door on the east side, trying to re-awaken the flame. Four others were attempting to stretch a mottled-grey sealskin oilcloth over the top of the Altar; it whipped and jerked in their hands like a thing possessed.

“Hold it!

“Pull your corner tight!”

“Farther down! Farther down!”

A snarl of wind ripped the oilcloth from their fingers and hurled it, fluttering like an autumn leaf, over the Courtyard wall and into the dark city of Shiloh.

Samuel ducked back into his room, whispered a quick prayer, and tugged his me’il on over his tunic; his mother, Hannah, had woven the linen sleeveless coat for him to wear whenever he was serving, but that had been nearly a year ago, and it no longer fit him properly. He wished he could wear something else, but to do so felt like a rejection of his mother’s gift. As he pulled it over his head and its musty smell filled his nostrils, he saw her face. He saw her the way he saw all people, registering each detail of expression and body, compiling the elements to uncover whatever truths might be hiding behind the masks and postures they wore for the world. His mother’s face, even in memory, was easy to read: mouth hovering between a smile and a frown; wide, soft eyes characteristically downcast but full of the expectation of an unspoken hunger she waited for her firstborn to satisfy.

He remembered that he had been dreaming of her before the storm wakened him, dreaming about the day she had given him to Tabernacle service. Moments before she and his father, Elkanah, had left the holy city of Shiloh without him, she had knelt within sight of the Altar and offered a prayer that still haunted his waking and sleeping. “My heart does exult in You, O Jehovah” she had said, her gentle voice quavering. “By Your power, even the barren woman has given birth.”

The unbidden memory supplanted his fear of the storm’s fury. He tied his apron-like ephod of white linen around his waist, threw his tattered cloak over his shoulders and stepped outside.

The wind buffeted him and the rain stung his face and bare arms. He struggled forward toward the center of the Courtyard, toward the Altar. The Levites and Gibeonites were huddled around it, shoulders hunched and robed arms spread to shield it from the downpour. Three or four of them cupped palm-sized clay lamps to their chests as if they were holding injured doves; tiny, useless wisps of flame guttered at the end of reed wicks.

When Samuel had struggled against the wind to within a few feet of the men, his eyes adjusted and he saw Priest Ahitub, kneeling in front of the firebox. Bits of the charred carcass of the last evening’s sacrifice still rested, dark, shapeless, and sodden atop the Altar’s grating. While other Priests spread outstretched cloaks and sealskins like shiny, black bat-wings over him, Ahitub was placing dry slivers of wood onto the coals in the firebox. The flickering lamps turned streaks of rainwater on the Altar’s sides into lines of burnished gold. In the dim light, Samuel could just make out the color and grain pattern of the wood chips: Cypress. A good choice.

He glanced around at the anxious faces of the other Priests and Levites. Where was Chief Priest Phinehas? He was the one who was supposed to be tending the flame this night. Of course, Phinehas rarely did what he was supposed to do. Phinehas and his brother Hophni were the kind of men who disobeyed the Torah just to demonstrate their own sense of superiority.

His unspoken criticisms of the Chief Priests made him think of his mother again, this time of the horror she would feel if she knew he entertained such disrespectful thoughts. He pushed the condemnation from his mind and eased nearer to the Altar. Ahitub was leaning in close to the firebox, blowing gently on the bed of ashes.

“Is it out?” a young Levite asked, but he was not answered.

Samuel leaned to one side to see past the Priest’s head, glimpsed the ashes, and spider’s legs of cold fingered his skin, chilling him as though all his clothes had been stripped away and he stood naked before the fury of the storm.

Samuel knew fire. For as long as he could remember, it had fascinated him. He had served at the Tabernacle for nine years now, and in all that time, he had never tired of seeing the Altar’s flames writhe upward to the waiting skies, of watching their darting tongues lick at the offerings placed on the grating.

Dirty white ash filled the firebox. Samuel narrowed his eyes and read it the way he read a person’s face: not the black of ash newly-formed, nor the drab grey of cooling ash—the dirty white of ash whose energy is spilled already into the flame. The top layer, in fact, was the peculiar, sullen grey of damp ash; Ahitub had scraped some of this aside and was laying his cypress slivers onto the powdery bed beneath. Samuel could hear almost nothing beyond the noise of the storm enveloping him, but he could feel the tension, the stilled inhalations of everyone gathered around the Altar.

Ahitub turned to look back at the Levites and Priests. Rain dripped from his turban to his wild, jutting eyebrows and trickled down the deep creases in his weathered, brown face. He noticed Samuel and for a brief moment their eyes met. Samuel took a mental inventory of what he saw: knots in the clenched jaw beneath the full, grey beard, eyes wide, the almost imperceptible flaring of nostrils in the long, straight nose. He saw what the Priest wanted to hide from the eyes of those watching: his mentor was haunted by desperation.

“Is it out?” Voice cracking, the young Levite again asked the question on all of their minds.

Ahitub did not answer. Instead, he brushed water from his dripping turban, turned again to the firebox and leaned in close to the powdery ashes. They stirred and rose fitfully in the tendrils of wind that slipped past the cloaks and oilskins raised all around him. Adjusting the chips of dry wood, Ahitub blew gently into them. Samuel was struck by the irony of it: the Priest’s controlled sigh of air was indiscernible amidst the howl of the gale. In response, the ashes rose and roiled like mist, then swirled and settled atop the wood like a fine dusting of snow.

No flame appeared.

“Is it out?” the young Levite asked again, the panic in his voice discernible even amidst the cacophony of the storm. “Should we re-light it with the lamps?”

“Hush, Eliab!” someone answered him.

“It is an Eternal Flame, Eliab,” someone else added, with the emphatic tone people use when they want someone to know they are being foolish.

“It cannot be out,” one of the Priests said, as if saying the words could make them true.

“The guilt is in Phinehas’ hands,” another Priest responded. “He was supposed to be tending the Flame this night!”

“Laying blame will not resurrect the fire,” Ahitub said.

“What do we do if it’s out?” Eliab asked, his voice cracking again. This time, everyone ignored him. Jehovah God Himself had lit the Eternal Flame. There was no procedure for re-igniting it if it were truly extinguished.

Samuel saw the taut muscles in Ahitub’s neck lurch as the Priest swallowed once, hard, and Samuel wondered how much of what he swallowed was pride and how much was fear; and Samuel felt fear forming into a lump in his own throat.

Still, Ahitub did not speak. Instead, he grasped one of the copper shovels used for cleaning the firebox and stirred the ashes with it, the cautious probing of a man searching for some tiny, fragile treasure that has been lost. Samuel watched his apprehensive movements, and in those moments forgot the raging wind and the cold rain dripping from the hood of his cloak onto his forehead and nose. Only the dull, white ashes and the rhythmic sweep of the copper shovel remained.

The shovel continued its rhythmic sweep, and Samuel’s eyes followed it as though mesmerized by its movements.

And then he saw it.

Something appeared in the patch of ash over which the shovel passed, nothing more than a lump among the rough embers. The shovel brushed it and scraped past, still searching.

But Samuel knew fire. He reached out without thinking and grasped Ahitub’s forearm.

The shovel stopped moving.

Samuel leaned closer to the firebox, forgetting for a moment that he was the youngest person present, and the least qualified for so solemn a task.

The Altar was only as high as his chest when he stood upright. Now, he knelt on the wet flagstones and placed his face right at the firebox’s door, as if he were going to climb into the tiny opening head-first. His mother’s me’il, too tight to let him bend freely, caught on his knees and he tugged at it irritably.

“Hand me that lamp,” Ahitub said to someone, and a moment later the Priest was holding one of the guttering flames next to the firebox door.

Samuel reached slowly inside, the flared sleeve of his linen undershirt dragging across the powdered ash. With the nail of one finger, he uncovered the tiny patch he had seen.

It was an ember. At first glance, it looked no different from the dust and cinders all around it. One side of the ember, no larger than the tip of Samuel’s middle finger, was still dark—not black, but darker grey than the spent ash that coated it. As he rolled it over, Samuel saw a faint glimmer of crimson.

Cupping his hand around the ember, he blew as Ahitub had blown, the faintest breath he could muster. From behind him, he heard the anxious voice of one of the Priests. “What did you find, Samuel?”

He could not take the time to answer him. Instead he breathed at the ember again; this time, in response, a tiny crimson bud glowed on one side of it. Hardly daring to move, he reached slowly for the collar of the me’il his mother had made him. Keeping his eyes focused on the ember, he felt for a section of unraveled cloth at his neck, and his fingers told him that it was still dry.

He pulled a wad of threads free and dropped it onto the ember. He breathed onto it again, feeling the air flow from his lungs and out past his dry lips, a part of himself given to the flame. He thought suddenly of the creation of man, of the Creator breathing life into Adam, the father of all. He could almost see his exhalation brush the ember, and when it did so, the crimson bud blossomed into a tiny flame that pounced on the loose tangle of wool.

The Priests and Levites gasped as the light of the resurrected Flame glimmered on his face. He scrambled back from his crouched position and Ahitub knelt in his place, extending his hand into the firebox and sprinkling it with slivers of dry cypress chips. The flame licked at them hungrily; more slivers followed, then aromatic cedar kindling, and the fire began to crackle and pop. Ahitub reached for larger pieces of seasoned oak.

The crimson tongues streamed skyward, slipping through the grating and around the charred remnants of the offering with the effortless grace of fish sliding upstream. They hissed and spat defiance at the rain, and threw fierce sparks upwards amidst the blue-grey smoke, scattering into the darkness like stars whirling back to their places in the heavens. The previous evening’s sacrifice smoked and steamed, and the sweet smell of roasting meat filled the area immediately around the Altar.

The storm began to abate then. Defeated and ready to search for less intrepid prey, the wind spun off toward the brightening horizon. The sound of the re-awakened fire grew louder, and Samuel found himself staring into the flames as he had so many times before.

He felt Ahitub’s hand on his shoulder, and turned to find the aging Priest smiling down at him, the wrinkles around his eyes carved deeper by the expression. “Jehovah bless you, Samuel.”

Samuel realized that many of the Priests and Levites were likewise standing still, smiling at him. Embarrassment burned his cheeks, and he shrugged. “My hands did nothing, my lord. Jehovah will not let the Flame be extinguished.”

Ahitub cocked his head sideways. “We who serve at the Tabernacle are Jehovah’s means of keeping it alive. This morning, I am even more grateful than usual that you are among us.”

The first light of morning glowed on the horizon, barely visible through the darkness. The rain graduated from drizzle to mist, and then stopped falling as the somber clouds overhead began to break. Samuel glanced around the Courtyard, searching for an escape from the awkwardness of accepting Ahitub’s compliment. The warm light of the Altar fire cast dancing shadows off the Levites scurrying to clean the storm’s debris from the Courtyard. The light gleamed off the copper laver the Priests used for washing, and off the five polished, golden pillars aligned across the entrance to the Tabernacle itself. Everything looked clean and bright, bathed by rain and burnished by firelight. Nothing hinted at the corruption that remained within the sacred walls, the disease that had been growing in Shiloh ever since High Priest Eli had become too old to keep his sons, Phinehas and Hophni, in check.

The storm outside is easing, Samuel thought. The storm inside is still raging.

Ahitub’s voice interrupted his musing. “Let all who have washed gather for the casting of lots!” he called, and the Priests who were on duty started toward him.

At that moment, the door of one of the rooms attached to the Tabernacle swung open, and Chief Priest Phinehas stepped out into the waxing light. Samuel, and everyone else in the Courtyard, froze.

Phinehas’ stained robe stretched over his broad shoulders and huge stomach. Six decades had clawed a bitter story onto the skin of his wide, fleshy face. One meaty fist gripped the arm of a slender girl whose head lolled forward so that her limp hair obscured her features; she slouched as if all that kept her from collapsing were the thick fingers clenched over her upper arm. Samuel could not tell if it was a pose of exhaustion or shame.

Phinehas scanned the scene before him, white eyebrows knitted over his veined, bulbous nose. His gaze lingered a moment on Samuel. Under that baleful stare, Samuel felt the urge to escape, to run as far from Shiloh as roads or paths would carry him. Then the Chief Priest’s eyes flicked toward the debris scattered across the Courtyard, and settled on the face of his son, Ahitub.

“What is going on here?” he growled, not in query, but in accusation.

Samuel saw the mixture of indignation and shame that swept across Ahitub’s features. For an instant, it looked like a mask, or veil, that Samuel’s mentor had donned to face his father, a mask that Ahitub was not comfortable wearing. In that moment, Samuel wondered if in one way or another, everyone had to wear something their parents had made for them, whether it fit anymore or not.

2

Ahitub’s voice was ice. “We are about to cast lots, Father.”

“And is that not my job, as heir to the High Priest?” Phinehas asked.

Ahitub remained very still. “The time for the morning’s rites had come, and I had not seen you—.”

“Don’t lecture me!” Phinehas glanced at the Altar, where Gibeonites were stacking wood. “I heard the commotion earlier. You let the Flame go out, didn’t you?”

“Samuel reawakened it. It did not go out.”

“Samuel!” Phinehas spat the name like a curse, but did not look toward him. “I should have known the Nazirite child was a part of this mess.”

“It was not Samuel’s duty to tend the flame this night, Father. Nor was it mine.”

“How dare you!” Phinehas bellowed. He released the girl’s arm; she collapsed, as though her joints had all come unhinged, in an unmoving heap onto the flagstones. Phinehas took two threatening steps toward his son, his face reddening and his hands clenching into fists. “Are you accusing me…?”

Abruptly, he paused, as though noticing for the first time all those watching. He raised his nose and pushed his shoulders back. “I was indisposed. I trusted that my son would willingly care for things in my place—and not resent the opportunity to handle so sacred a duty.”

Indisposed! Samuel thought. The night before, Phinehas had sent his pregnant wife, Mara, away to sleep with her relatives in the city. He had then taken this girl who served at the gate, barely more than a child, off to his bed. It was a surprise to no one; he did the same thing nearly every night with a different girl. Samuel often heard his drunken laughter, and sounds like muffled cries of pain, from across the Courtyard as he fell asleep.

Ahitub opened his mouth to respond, then closed it again and turned his back to his father, facing the Priests who had gathered. Phinehas watched him a moment. “Go on, then, my son. My hands bestow upon you the privilege of caring for these duties in my stead.”

Phinehas bent, grabbed the girl’s bruised arm again and lifted her as if she were a sacrificial corpse; Samuel winced at her quiet gasp of pain. “Go back to your duties as well, my sweet,” Phinehas breathed into her ear. “I have already given you something more than a blessing.”

For a moment, the girl looked up and Samuel saw her face through a veil of stringy hair. Bruises purpled her mouth and neck, and her eyes were as empty as the maw of a cave. Gathering her torn skirts, she fled without a word toward the gate.

Phinehas disappeared back into his home as the Priests formed a circle around Ahitub. Samuel wanted to scream, wanted to stand atop the Tabernacle and shout condemnation down on the Chief Priest. However, the morning ritual would not wait; the sun was about to rise. Somehow, Ahitub continued with the ceremony, but his face was grim.

Ahitub assigned responsibilities by lot, so that all Priests serving had an equal opportunity for each privilege. The Priests each stretched one arm toward the center of the circle they had formed, extending however many fingers they chose. Ahitub paused a moment, closed his eyes, and chose a number at random: “Thirty-three.”

Aloud, eyes open, he began counting outstretched fingers until he arrived at the number he had chosen. The man on whom the count had ended stepped from the circle and bowed. “Clean and prepare the Altar,” Ahitub commanded, and the Priest left to perform his task.

Ahitub turned to the next man in the circle. “Go, and look for the dawn.”

The Priest nodded and ran to climb the stone steps that ascended to a squat watchtower built into the Curtain Wall’s northeast corner. When he reached the top, he glanced eastward, then turned back to face the gathered Priests. “The sky is lit, as far as Jerusalem!”

At that signal, Priests led the morning offering forward with a short, flaxen rope around its neck: a young ram, its mottled brown-and-white wool matted and streaked in dark patches from the rain, hooves clicking on the flagstones. Behind it, another Priest carried a copper pot of flour, moistened with olive oil, and a small jug of wine. Samuel felt himself relaxing, only then realizing how taut the muscles in his shoulders were. Watching the morning rites comforted him, a reminder that in the midst of the maelstrom that Shiloh had become, some things remained the same, customs that invisibly bound them to their past, to times when the heartbeat of Israel’s traditions was steady and sure.

“Samuel!” Ahitub’s voice pulled him from his reverie. “It is nearly dawn.”

Samuel nodded and hurried across the Courtyard toward the gate. Behind him, he heard Ahitub begin the second lot, to choose which priest would slaughter the ram. Ahead he saw Tirzah, Judge Jephthah’s daughter, gathering the Women’s Corps and lining them up on their low risers opposite the Levite orchestra.

When Samuel reached the gates, old High Priest Eli was already there, as he was every morning, his immense girth wrapped in the white robe, blue me’il, and purple ephod of his office. He supported his massive bulk by leaning heavily on a polished acacia staff, his sightless eyes staring toward the east. As Samuel drew near, the orange morning light softened the lines of the old Priest’s face, melting away a few of the myriad wrinkles that creased it. The light glimmered off the golden headband that encircled his white turban, inscribed with the words “Holiness Belongs to Jehovah,” and off the square, gold breastplate decorated with twelve precious stones in four rows, each one engraved with the name of one of the tribes of Israel. It hung from his shoulders and hips by slender, gold chains and blue cords, its simple elegance inconsistent with the obese body that swayed ponderously beneath it. With each movement he made, the hem of his robe, fringed with alternating golden bells and golden pomegranates, softly tinkled and chimed.

Eli’s ears had borrowed his eyes’ strength when his vision failed; he heard Samuel’s barefoot approach. “May peace be with you, my son.” The High Priest’s voice, deep and warm, had grown no less powerful in his twilight years.

“May peace be with you, my lord,” Samuel responded.

Eli looked toward him with milky eyes that seemed to be functioning still, but focused on something that lay beyond the power of ordinary men to see. “May Jehovah bless you for your faithfulness in caring for this duty,” Eli said, folds of wrinkled flesh on his jowls and neck quivering as he spoke. He turned his face again toward the sunrise, shifting his great bulk and gripping the acacia staff tightly. “These gates were once tended by the grandson of Aaron himself, a faithful and zealous priest named Phinehas…”

The High Priest trailed off, but Samuel had heard the story many times before. Eli told it to him at least once every other week, his aging mind sometimes losing its way as he sought to remember which words he had already spoken, which deeds he had already done. Phinehas, son of Eleazar, son of Aaron, was a legend among Israelites, held up as an example of what a Priest of Jehovah should be.

Eli was speaking again, softly, as though to himself. “I named my own son after him, with the hopes that he, too, would…”

His voice faded again to silence. Samuel took a step forward and grasped the High Priest’s forearm. “Dawn is near, my lord.”

A smile whispered across Eli’s face, then disappeared. “Tend to your duty, my son.” He clasped Samuel’s hand with one of his own—it was warm but shook with palsy. “You have not betrayed my trust.”

The compliment was more of a condemnation against Hophni and Phinehas than Samuel had ever heard the High Priest make, and the thrill of hope prickled the back of his neck. Was Eli going to, at last, take action against his sons?

When the High Priest released his hand, Samuel walked to the wooden gate and grasped its copper handles; they were cold and damp from the rain. He could hear the sounds of the people gathered outside, waiting for dawn. He bowed his head until his brow rested on the worn wood of the gates and let the sounds wash over him: the bleating of sheep, the gentle murmur of early-morning conversation. A cow lowed in the distance, and a woman’s voice sprinkled the air with quiet laughter. “Please, Jehovah,” he whispered. “Let these gates open on a new day in Israel, the day when reproach and corruption are cleansed from Your house.”

From the Courtyard behind him, a Levite sang:

“Out of the depths I call to You,

O Jehovah, hear my voice!

My soul has longed for You

More than watchmen for the dawn!”

A Priest standing beside the Altar raised a crimson flag atop a long, intricately carved pole. Near the gate the conductor, willowy, white-haired Benarza, lifted his arms, and the Levite orchestra struck their cymbals and blew three blasts on silver trumpets, clear and hard, shattering the morning’s stillness. The sun had crested the mountains to the east. Samuel swung the gates open and stood off to one side. The mass of waiting people surged forward a few steps, crowding into the gateway, eyes focused on the Altar.

On the other side of the Altar, through the rising flames, Samuel watched two Priests disappear into the Tabernacle itself while another led a young ram forward to the Altar. Once there, he positioned its neck over a U-shaped slaughtering stone. A groove in the stone led to a niche in which he placed a copper pan. The Priest chosen by lot reached down and slit its throat in a single, swift movement. It collapsed, and the pan filled and then overran with crimson. When the blood had stopped flowing, the Priests hefted the ram’s limp carcass and hung it from a hook on one of the six posts sunk through the flagstones nearby. They flayed and butchered it deftly, salting the skin and setting it aside. The offal was removed, the intestines and shanks washed with water from the Laver, and the head and flesh carried up the ramp to be salted and laid just outside the grate of the Altar.

Samuel watched the firelight flushing Ahitub’s face even as the brightening dawn reddened the face of his grandfather, Eli. At that moment, it looked as if the blush of shame darkened both, and a hollow, aching sadness opened within Samuel. Grandfather and grandson stood disgraced by the same men, by the selfish betrayal of Phinehas and Hophni. But while Ahitub could do nothing but endure, the High Priest, the most powerful man in Israel, chose to ignore his sons’ rebellion. In a tribal nation without a king, only the High Priest had the power to appoint and remove Priests and Judges. In Samuel’s opinion, this High Priest had let his love of his children overtake his good judgment.

Levites loaded the offal, steaming in the brisk air, onto a two-wheeled cart and hauled it from the Courtyard while Ahitub gathered the Priests into a circle yet again. They raised their eyes and arms heavenward as Ahitub prayed loudly so that the people gathered at the gate could hear: “With great love You have loved us, O Jehovah our God, and with overflowing pity You have pitied us. Our Father and our King, for the sake of our forefathers who trusted in You, and whom You taught the Torah, have mercy on us, and enlighten our eyes, that we in love may praise You. Blessed be Jehovah, who in love chose His people Israel.”

Samuel raised his voice with all the Priests and Levites in chorus, reciting the Shema, Israel’s declaration of faith: “Hear, O Israel: Jehovah our God is One.”

The gathered Priests stretched their arms toward Ahitub again, and he chose numbers and counted fingers twice more to select two more Priests for duty. The first selected went immediately to the Altar, gathered fig-wood coals from the firebox in a golden bowl, and filled a golden censer with incense. Then, he disappeared into the Tabernacle, striking a gong beside the door as he entered. At the solemn sound, all the assembly stilled.

A few moments later, the Priest emerged again, the incense on the golden censer having burned. As the smoke from both altars ascended, Ahitub again raised his arms heavenward and led the people in prayer: “Be pleased, Jehovah our God, with Your people, Israel, and with their prayer. Accept, please, the burnt offerings of Israel and their prayers; let their service be always pleasing to You. Bless us, O our Father, with the light of Your face. For in the light of Your countenance You, Jehovah our God, have given us the life-giving Torah, and righteousness, and blessing, and compassion. Blessed are You, Jehovah, who bless Your people Israel with peace.”

The supplicants spread their hands and offered their own private prayers as the Priest chosen by the final count walked solemnly up the ramp to the Altar. He had just reached the top of the ramp and was leaning down to place the pieces of the ram onto the fire when a shout interrupted the ceremony.

“Wait!”

All turned toward the voice. Chief Priest Phinehas had come forth from his rooms again, still pulling on his formal Priestly garments. He strode across the Courtyard to the Altar and pointed at the Priest standing with the sacrifice in his hands. “Come down from there. My hands will offer the sacrifice this morning.”

The crowd murmured at the interruption of the services, and Samuel saw the young Priest’s brow furrow in stunned disappointment. But no one in Shiloh dared defy Phinehas, and the Priest quickly descended the ramp. Phinehas took his place, tossing the gobbets of flesh onto the grating and then pouring the flour and wine, hissing and steaming, onto the flames. Samuel watched his thick, blunt hands, and an image flashed through his mind of young women subjected to the brutal caresses of those hands…

He turned away from the hypocritical Chief Priest and craned his neck upward to watch as the smoke roiled from the sacrifice. He wanted to believe what Ahitub taught him: that Jehovah could still accept the sacrifices in behalf of the people, even if the one presiding at the offering was not pure in heart. But at that moment, the smoke did not look like a pathway that prayers could follow to heaven. It just looked like smoke.

The chorus sang a different Psalm each day of the week; the Priests blew their silver trumpets and the orchestra clashed their cymbals, signaling the Levite chorus and the Women’s Corps.

“Jehovah is great and worthy of praise,

In the city of God, on this holy mountain.

We have considered Your love, O God,

Within the walls of Your Tabernacle.

Like Your name, O God, so Your praise is

To the ends of the earth

Your Hands are filled with Righteousness.

For this God is our God for all eternity,

He will guide us until we die.”

After each verse, the silver trumpets blared, and the people knelt or bowed their heads in prayer. When they completed their supplications, they entered the Courtyard, leading their sacrificial animals and delivering seasonal offerings of grapes, dates, figs, and carob pods to the waiting Priests.

Samuel watched them as they passed, letting his eyes tell him a story about each of them. Fathers walked forward: long strides, heels landing hard with purpose, focused on their own thoughts, not noticing wives and children falling behind. Wives and mothers glanced sidelong at the Women’s Corps: swift, anxious looks, eyes moving up and down, weighing another’s beauty against their own. Some men walked more slowly: steps steady and measured, eyes wandering surreptitiously over everyone around them, wanting someone to see them fulfilling their sacred duty. Grandfathers hobbled by: gnarled hands clenched tightly around worn staffs, eyes fixed on the smoke rising from the Altar. Like blind Eli, Samuel thought, they perceived something there that young eyes could not see.

As the crowd entered, the High Priest raised his shaking arms as if to encompass all of them and boomed out the Priest’s Benediction: “May Jehovah bless you and keep you. Make Jehovah make His face shine toward you, and may He favor you. May Jehovah lift up His face toward you, and assign peace to you.”

Samuel loved to hear him recite the Benediction, even though it was Eli’s ritual and not commanded by the Torah. It made Samuel recall a question that had plagued him for weeks now; he chose his words carefully before he spoke. “My lord?”

Eli faced the dawn again. “Yes, my son?”

“My lord…Why do you still come out to greet the sun each morning, when it has been…hidden from your sight?”

Eli shifted his weight and the shadows on his face slid into wrinkles and creases in his age-spotted skin. “Hear me, my son, and remember. No one can hide the dawn.”

He turned, then, and Samuel felt chilled staring into his milky eyes. “I can feel the sunrise in my bones.”

Samuel was about to ask him to explain his answer, but the High Priest extended one trembling hand toward him. “Come, my son—be my eyes.”

Samuel took the Priest’s hand and placed it on his own shoulder; Eli squeezed it affectionately. “Lead me to the gatepost, please.”

With short, slow steps, Samuel guided the High Priest to a stone bench built into the wall next to the gate; the tiny, golden bells on the hem of Eli’s robe tinkled as he shuffled along. When he was settled, Eli said, “Now gather the Priests, and send men to summon the Elders —all of the Elders of Israel who are present in the city today. Have them come to me here. And then bring my sons, Hophni and Phinehas.”

He coughed, the phlegm rattling in his lungs. When he spoke again, emotion choked his voice. “It is time for my hands to take up a task I have tried to put off for far too long.”

For the second time that morning, a thrill prickled Samuel’s spine. “Yes, my lord! Just as you have said, so I will do!”

It took the better part of an hour to fulfill Eli’s request. Samuel sent Levite messengers into the city to find and bring any tribal Elders they could find. The messengers looked at him strangely, puzzled that the High Priest had charged so young a boy with so weighty a task, but they did as he asked. When the High Priest of Israel made a request, everyone listened, no matter how lofty their position in the nation. Samuel enlisted the help of several other Levites to spread the word among all the Priests serving that day in the Tabernacle.

Samuel brought the summons to Ahitub himself. He found his mentor laboring at the Altar, rearranging the sacrifices on the grate with a copper fork, droplets of sweat glimmering on his forehead below his turban. Samuel watched him for a few moments in silence before Ahitub glanced over and saw him waiting. “Samuel! What is it, my son?”

“High Priest Eli has summoned all the Priests of Israel to the gates of the Tabernacle.”

Ahitub stopped what he was doing and hung the fork on its prong alongside the Altar. “I will come, and bring the Priests on duty with me.”

Samuel watched anxiously for Ahitub’s reaction to his next words. “He asked me to summon also his sons. My lord—he told me that he is going to do something that he should have done long ago!”

Samuel saw the muscle in Ahitub’s jaw bulge as the Priest gritted his teeth. His bearded chin sank to his chest and he stared into the flames enveloping the sacrifice.

“My lord?” Samuel stepped nearer the Altar. “What is wrong, my lord? Is this not the answer to our prayers?”

Ahitub looked up then and smiled. Corners of his mouth hard. Smile not touching his eyes. “Perhaps,” he said, nodding. “Do as my grandfather told you, Samuel. I will come shortly.”

“Yes, my lord.” Samuel turned and wended through the crowd, back toward the gate. Ahitub’s reaction was not what he expected. He had thought he would be joyful that Hophni and Phinehas were about to be expelled from the Priesthood. The brazen apostasy of his father and uncle affected Ahitub more than any other person in Shiloh. He also stood to gain more than anyone else did, since with their rejection he would become…

Abruptly Samuel knew why Ahitub had reacted the way he had. With his father and uncle expelled, Ahitub would become the next High Priest of Israel. In his humility, Ahitub was feeling unworthy of the honor and probably concerned that he would have to begin serving at a young age for a High Priest since Eli could not live many more years. Besides, Samuel realized, even though Ahitub hated the reproach and shame that Phinehas and Hophni brought upon Israel and upon the Priesthood, they were still his family. The condemnation of the father left its mark on the son, no matter how faithful that son was. And Ahitub would have to see his mother disgraced as well, a good woman who was now stained forever by the unfaithfulness of her husband.

Even a denunciation of his father and uncle, necessary though it was, was a two-edged sword for Ahitub, and would not erase the memory of the corrupt Priesthood of Hophni and Phinehas or the terrible effects this had visited upon the nation.

Still, in his heart Samuel believed that Ahitub’s reaction meant something more. He thought back to the look on the Priest’s face: jaw tightening beneath his beard; shoulders sagging; eyes hollow. Ahitub had acted more defeated than nervous, more distressed than sad. Ahitub loved Jehovah and longed for a clean Tabernacle—it was his zeal for true worship and steadfast opposition to the corruption in Shiloh that had fostered the same feelings in Samuel.

Despite his mentor’s reaction, the possibility that Ahitub could someday become High Priest was enough to resurrect hope in Samuel’s heart. Samuel thought again of his mother’s prayer: You raise the lowly one from the dust, and the poor one from a pit of mourning, to make them sit with nobles. Jehovah could change the fortunes of the nation. It was the people who suffered when the Priesthood was corrupt. Jehovah had withdrawn His blessing from the land, and something had taken its place, a malignancy that was killing Israel. Blind though he was, Eli had to see it, too. The offerings coming in were paltry, the animals sickly, the people hopeless and resigned. Eli may have tolerated his sons due to a father’s love, but he could not forever ignore the suffering of the people he served. Even if he did, Jehovah could not overlook it for much longer—and putting Ahitub in the position of High Priest could be the True God’s way of handling the situation.

He found Phinehas and his brother Hophni in one of the dining booths attached to the Curtain Wall. Samuel tried to read their faces as he approached, although he knew already what he was likely to find there: pride, anger, and disdain were the only emotions at home on the brothers’ features. He studied Hophni a moment before they noticed him: he looked dramatically different from Phinehas. Both were big men, but while Phinehas’ size was intimidating, Hophni’s was comical. His large, bald head rested on his bony shoulders with no neck to separate them. His stomach, swollen by gluttony and drink, bulged beneath a sunken chest and spindly shoulders. He was eating as he listened to his brother, his bulbous eyes staring at the food in front of him, blinking in his slow way that reminded Samuel of a toad. The two men were alone, talking in low voices as they ate. A platter of cold mutton and fresh bread sat on the table; Samuel could hear the crackle of tearing cartilage as they gnawed on the bones, wiping grease from their mouths with the backs of their hands.

They quieted when they saw him, frowning in unison. “So! It is the little disciple of my rebellious son, Ahitub,” Phinehas said.

Samuel stopped, forcing himself to breathe slowly. He was emboldened by Eli’s words to him that morning, enough to respond, “I am a disciple of the Torah, as is your son.”

Phinehas slid his plate across the table and his eyes narrowed. “Do not dare to correct me, child! Do not think for a moment that I cannot send you back to that cluster of huts your family calls a town. What would they think of you then? The ‘Nazirite for life’ who failed to fulfill his vows—their local hero returned in shame to his hovel?”

Samuel went cold and spoke before thinking about his words. “You cannot…Only the High Priest has the power to revoke my mother’s vow.”

Hophni snorted in disdain and shook his head.

“And do you think my father would not support me if I decided to declare you shammata, eternally banished from the Tabernacle?” Phinehas asked. “Cut off from all spiritual help, unable to have your sins atoned for by sacrifice, and all the house of your father become a stench in Israel?”

“You would be better off as a leper!” Hophni said, smacking his wide, thick lips. “At least then you might get thrown a few scraps of food now and again.”

Samuel’s heart raced and the room seemed to spin around him. “I was sent by the High Priest,” he said, seeking to escape the conversation as quickly as possible. “He has summoned both of you to the Tabernacle Gates.”

“And he sends the little gatekeeper with the message, eh?” Phinehas asked. “Tell my father we will come when we are ready, boy.”

The Priest turned back to his brother dismissively, and Samuel bowed and hurried out of the dining hall, his ears burning. His mind raced, wondering what he had possibly done to earn the ire of the Chief Priests, and how many people they had told their opinions of him. He replayed in his mind the conversation in the dining booth, and then tried to recall everything Hophni or Phinehas had said to him over the course of the last several weeks. Were they turning other people at the Tabernacle against him?

He did not stop until he was once again at the gates, where he took up his position alongside the High Priest. Ahitub and the last of the Priests were gathering as he did so, and he looked around at their faces. One or two of them were looking in his direction, and he imagined that he could see hatred etched on their faces. He shook his head, forcing the thoughts from his mind, telling himself he was seeing only what he was afraid he would see. Trying to focus, he leaned down and whispered in Eli’s ear that all were present except for Hophni and Phinehas.

Eli reached out and found his shoulder with one hand. “Help me to rise, my son.”

Samuel shifted himself nearer, and the High Priest rocked forward, resting his weight briefly on Samuel’s shoulder and his staff. When he got to his feet, he stood for a few moments, breathing heavily, leaning on the polished stick. Samuel looked across at Ahitub’s face, but his expression was unreadable, a careful, emotionless mask. Then the arrival of Hophni and Phinehas caught Samuel’s eye, and he saw that the brothers took their places with arms crossed over their chests, smug and confident. Hophni stood with his peculiar loose-jointed stance next to his brother. Phinehas saw Samuel staring and smirked back at him, eyebrows raised. Neither fear nor humility were in the look; realizing at once what was about to happen, Samuel felt as if the world beneath his feet had disappeared and he was falling into an endless abyss.

“Hear me, O Israel,” Eli intoned. “For forty years I have served you as High Priest and Judge. From my father, a son of Ithamar, a son of Aaron, I received the anointing oil. In this office I should have served for all my days, since that is the way among the High Priests of Israel.

“But now I am a son of ninety-eight years. My eyes have set so that I cannot go out or come in without the hand of another. In seven days, the children of Israel will celebrate the solemnest of our festivals: the Day of Atonement. On that day, the High Priest must assume his most sacred duty, to enter alone into the Holy of Holies, where the Shekinah, everlasting light of Jehovah’s presence, burns above the Ark of the Covenant. There, he must make atonement for the sins of the Priesthood, and of all the people, that Jehovah’s Hand may not come to be heavy upon us, and that He may not remember our sins for all time.”

Eli paused, and Samuel saw his knuckles whiten as his grip on the staff tightened. His voice rasped as he continued, “And so this day I must ensure that the Day of Atonement takes place. I must anoint a new High Priest, a Priest who can find his way alone into the Holy of Holies, and atone for Israel in my stead.”

A communal gasp whispered through the crowd as they comprehended what was about to happen. Eli stretched out one arm in a gesture that encompassed them all. “Phinehas, step forward.”

Phinehas glanced once at his brother and took three long steps toward his father, unable to wipe the smirk from his lips. “I am here, O High Priest.”

Eli lowered his arm. “Kneel before me.”

Phinehas went down on one knee. Eli reached into a fold of his robes and drew forth a pale, yellow phial of Egyptian glass. He removed the stopper and poured a pool of golden oil onto his shaking palm. “Samuel!” he whispered, holding out the phial; Samuel reached woodenly and took it from his hand.

The old Priest dipped his fingers in the oil and slowly reached forward to draw an “X” on his son’s forehead. The rest of the oil he poured from his palm over Phinehas’ thinning, grey hair; it ran in pale, golden lines down his veined cheeks and dripped into his beard.

“Rise,” Eli intoned. “Rise, Phinehas, son of our forefather, Ithamar, son of Aaron, chosen one of God. Rise, High Priest of Israel.”

3

Cackling like a man gone mad, the Prophet Rohgah fled, his shuffling feet whisking the paper-dry leaves carpeting the forest floor. From behind him, he heard the Philistine soldiers getting closer: the tramp of heavy footsteps, the clink of armor, and the thump of bronze swords hacking at the brush that barred their way.

His lungs burned, and he cursed his age. Years ago, he would have considered the passage of eight decades interminable, but it had fled so quickly, stealing his strength without affording him sufficient opportunity to get used to the idea. He hobbled through the forest like a cripple, driven on by the fate he knew awaited if the Philistines caught him. His bald head and wrinkled skin would waken no mercy in them—he had seen them crush the skulls of more than one old man in the years since they had begun encroaching on the borders of Canaan. And most of their victims had done nothing to deserve their wrath. The Philistines needed no reason to slaughter and pillage, beyond their desire for whatever food stores one might have secreted away. Crops had been so poor in recent seasons, flocks and herds failing, ancient vineyards and orchards withering and desiccated—and the fertile plains of Philistia had been affected just as Israel’s land had. A darkness was slipping over Israel, a darkness that whispered at Rohgah in his dreams. It had a name, but he did not say it, even to himself.

Behind him, he heard a triumphant shout and his heart pounded in his chest as he realized that his pursuers had caught sight of their quarry. He tried to quicken his pace, but his joints ached with every movement. Of course, he reflected, smiling even as he panted, they might be chasing him for some other reason than to steal his food. It could be because they had heard about the speeches he made in every town he visited, inciting his fellow Israelites to rise up and drive the Philistines out of Canaan. Alternatively, it could be because he had set fire to one of their sacred groves and taken a hammer to their stone idols of Dagon, Baal, and Ashtoreth, smashing them to powder. He cackled again at the memory, but his lungs failed him and the laugh came out as more of a wheezing cough.

Just ahead of him, a narrow wash ascended to a cluster of willows, terebinth, and acacia, grown so thickly that they hid the gathering of boulders behind them. An arrow whispered past his left ear and glanced off a tree just ahead of him. He gritted his remaining teeth and clambered up the wash, grasping at rocks and trees to steady him as he climbed.

When he arrived at the cluster of trunks, he allowed himself a quick glance over his shoulder. Another arrow whizzed past, but flew wide of its mark and clattered into the boulders behind him. The Philistines, four of them, were several hundred paces down the slope, but the distance was narrowing quickly. “Sons of Belial!” he cursed at them, and then dove into the broom and willow trees.

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