She kissed the image and whispered her prayer.
Her shoulders rose to her ears as though she were about to pounce as she shuffled quickly to the door; she almost ran as she cleared the threshold. The laughter of the young women danced off the walls of the portico from the street.
I looked back to the image, bathing in the early sunlight. Its gaze rested on the child cradled in its muscled arms and soon, so did mine.
That baby crying out in confusion. As a young boy I had wondered if it was me. I imagined staring up into the immortal eyes of the god and seeing his terrible horns; I would have cried too.
I had found it under a weave in the corner of my room; looking back I have no doubt that it was hidden hastily. It was my treasure and the image was burned into my imagination.
“Mother, whose house is this?”
“It is our house son.”
She was making bread and did not look up from her work.
“But how did we get here? This was not always our house.”
Her hands rested a moment and then continued.
“We came here from Eshtaol, but that was not our home. You remember the journey; you were strong and walked for much of the way.”
I did remember. My father had gone before us as had many of the fathers. I remember the man who returned and told us to pack our things and follow. When I had asked my mother at the time she had simply said, “God has given us a home” and that was it. She said the same now. I thought of the image.
“Did God build this house?”
“God gave us this home.”
I could tell she was tiring of my questions, but I had to know.
“Where is he now?”
“Who?”
“God. Where did he go after he built this house?”
She did not speak for while and I began to grow restless; I thought about asking again before sleep.
“If we are faithful, he is still here with us -”
“Here in this house? Is he still here?”
I asked the question so quickly it startled her. She looked up suddenly with concern in her eyes. She must have mistook the excitement in my face for mere childish curiosity because her concern softened into a gentle smile.
“You may not see him, son. He is rarely seen. But he sees you, and listens when you speak and, if you listen, you will hear his voice.”
I nodded, a knowing smile spreading across my face. My mother did not know about the image. I quickly ran back to my room with my secret and checked beneath the weave. God had chosen to stay in my room.
There were very few places to hide things in our house, but my parents had not disturbed the items in my room. Looking back, I wonder at this. We did not have much to speak of and they could have traded the items for oil or a goat or something more practical. I think they were proud to let me keep some things; most kids did not own anything other than their sleeping mat. So the image remained there under the weave for many years.
My father died before I took a wife and I became the head of the household. She did not approve of Amora, but the disease soon became an infirmity and she no longer searched for another. We laid my mother down beside my father only a few days after the celebration. I had no brothers or sisters and so we were alone in the house. The image, which had so long been my secret; the god who had chosen to be seen by me alone, now stood prominently in the home.
A sudden cry from the street shook me from the memory; I turned from the image and rushed to the door.
“… we did not take for each man of them his wife in battle, neither did you give them to them, else you would now be guilty.”
This last phrase was punctuated with the sound of an unsheathing blade.
“Will you take our daughters and kill us too? Cursed is Benjamin and cursed are you who rise against your brothers without reason!”
I broke through the crowd in time to see the hilt strike Gilead in the temple. He dropped like a stone and I rushed to his side, working quickly to staunch the flow of blood from his head as other men from the town pursued his fleeing assailant. The frightened faces of the women encircled me and the man in my arms.
“He will be alright. Please bring him some water.”
His eyes opened suddenly and he tried to sit up, but I held him in place. His face, which had been serene while unconscious, suddenly contorted in rage and sorrow.
“They took them” he choked “On the road to Shiloh – they took them.”
His words became an icy dagger, penetrating my mind with their meaning and making me cold. I saw my daughter’s face as she kissed the head of the bull. I saw the child in his lifeless arms, crying in confusion.
“If we are faithful, he is still here with us.”
This story was inspired by Judges 17 – 21
