Chapter 3

At the end of one short month we find him so desperately enamored that he said to Laban, Rachel's father: "I will serve thee seven years for thy younger daughter;" and the old gentleman, seeing an opportunity to get a hired man cheap, consented.

"And Jacob served seven years for Rachel, and they seemed unto him but a few days for the love he had to her."

What a world of devotion that one sentence reveals. As we read that we forget all about the prosaic age in which we live; forget the modern I'll-give-you-a-brown-stone-front-and-diamonds-in-exchange-for-your- youth-and-beauty-love, and believe in the kind that makes a man a god and a woman an angel, and we imagine that an affection so intense and deep that it could make seven weary years of labor "seem but a few days" must be as constant as the flowing tide, as steadfast as the stars--and then after a while we are desperately, despairingly sorry that we have read any further than that verse because we are so sadly disillusioned.

For a little further on we find that Jacob wasn't as shrewd about getting married as he was about breeding cattle that were ring-streaked and grizzled, and so Laban, with the cunning of a modern politician, palmed off his daughter Leah on Jacob as a bride. But the next morning, when he discovered the trick, there were probably matinees, side-shows and circuses in the tent of Laban, and finally the upshot of the whole affair was that he agreed to serve seven years more for Rachel, and then married her also. Far be it from me to disparage Jacob's love, but we cannot help but notice that we have no inspired statement saying that the seven years he served for Rachel, after he had married her, "seemed but a few days for the love he had to her."

But we can't censure him for that, for as we read we discover that in his earnest and constant endeavor to save his precious person he had no time to nurture his love. For the two wives, the two sisters, were madly jealous of each other of course (and we can't blame them either, for there never was a man so great that he could be divided between two wives, several handmaids and more concubines, and be enough of him to go around satisfactorily) and they made his life a howling wilderness.

Leah, poor thing, longed for her fraudulent husband's love, and he hated her. Rachel "envied her sister," and "Jacob's anger was kindled against Rachel," and altogether the picture of their home is not very enticing, and having gotten thus far we are more than ever convinced that we do not want to follow the example of the "holy women" of old, as Peter complimentarily, but ignorantly, calls them.

And Rachel and Leah, in order to spite and humble each other, each gave her maid "to Jacob to wife" and strange as it may seem, he accepted them both. It was like him.

Now about this time Leah's son "found mandrakes in the field" and brought them to his mother. We suppose Rachel had a sweet tooth from the fact that a little further on we find her offering to sell her husband for one night to Leah, for some mandrakes, whatever they were; and we notice that women held their husbands rather cheap in those good old days.

You see Rachel and Leah made Jacob a thing of barter and sale and (without consulting his desires) Leah consummated the bargain, and she went out toward the field when the harvest was progressing, and met Jacob as he came from his work tired and dusty, and informed him he must come with her, "For surely I have hired thee with my son's mandrakes," and he did not resent the insulting idea that he had been "hired," but like all the other distractingly obedient men of the Bible--he went.

Rachel next distinguishes herself as a disobedient daughter and headstrong wife by "stealing her father's gods" without consulting or confiding in her husband, for we read that "Jacob knew not that Rachel had stolen them."

And Laban, Rachel's father, and Jacob had a lively altercation, and they said exceedingly naughty things to each other in loud voices, but at last they came to an agreement, and Laban said he would give up his children, grandchildren and cattle, but he was bound to have his "gods" or know the reason why. The entire story is a curious mixture of heathenism and belief in one God.

Then Jacob rose in all the confidence of perfect innocence and told him he might search the whole camp for all he cared, and he added in his outraged dignity, "with whomsoever thou findest thy gods, let him not live."

You will observe by that that it was a terrible crime to steal "gods," and as it is the first offense of the kind on record, you can infer what a reckless, ungovernable female Rachel must have been to do so dreadful an act.

Well, Laban went like a cyclone "unto Jacob's tent" (notice what humiliation and disgrace Rachel subjected her husband to, and what a scandal it must have raised in the neighborhood), and into Leah's tent and into the two maid-servants' tents; but he found them not. Then he entered into Rachel's tent.

Now she had hidden the precious little images in the camel's furniture and sat upon them, and she said she didn't feel very well this morning, papa dear, or words to that effect, and she hoped he would excuse her for not arising; and she probably smiled sweetly, put her arm around his neck, and finally did him up completely by kissing him tenderly; and of course, as in those days men never dreamed of asking a woman to do anything she didn't want to do, papa dear did not insist upon her arising, and so missed his sole and only chance of getting his "gods."

It was a very serious and perhaps terrible loss to her father, and we can gather no idea from the scripture why she did it unless out of pure spite, or else she wanted to use them as bric-a-brac in the new home to which she was going.

In the history of the "beauteous and well-favored" Rachel and the "tender-eyed" Leah, we find hatred, deadly jealousy, anger, strife, dissensions and envy, but none of the forbearance, self-sacrifice, obedience, meekness and submission that we have been taught that the ladies of the Old Testament possessed, and we are almost sorry that we didn't take the preacher's "say so" for it, instead of studying the Bible diligently and intelligently for ourselves.

ALL NAUGHTY, BUT FAIR.

ALL NAUGHTY, BUT FAIR.

The next young lady whom the Old Testament presents for our admiration and edification is Dinah, the daughter of Jacob and Leah, who set the passionate but agonizing style of "loving not wisely, but too well," and brought about one of the shrewdest military stratagems that was ever perpetrated, a terrible massacre, and the slavery of many innocent women and children.

Several other ladies are mentioned casually and then we come to Tamar, whose father-in-law, Judah, had broken his solemn promise and defrauded her of her rights. And did she submissively consent to be deprived of her just dues? Not at all. She simply disguised herself, and by deception and a thorough knowledge of man's nature, mixed up with a shrewd business tact, completely out-generaled her dear papa-in-law, gained her revenge, and by a sagacious artifice protected herself from the possible consequences of her folly and from future punishment by persuading Judah to give her, as a pledge of his good faith, "his signet and bracelets and staff." In short, she was the original pawn-broker of the world; and Judah left his treasures "in escrow" until he could redeem them by delivering her a kid in liquidation of his debt.

And for many days the sun blazed and faded, the stars sparkled and paled, and the moon rode high in silvery radiance; the winds and birds and flowers blushed and sang and sighed, and in due course of time Judah sent a kid to redeem his valuables, but alas! Tamar had slipped away and left no trace by which she could be identified, and Judah, who had broken his pledge, was left in suspense.

But finally the time of retribution came, as come it does and must to every possessor of a pawn ticket. The days, those bright beads on the rosary of time, were counted one by one and shadows began to gather about the fair name of Tamar. Then the whispers of suspicion grew to pealing thunders of scandal which reached and shocked the good Judah, and he rose up in his moral rectitude and righteous indignation at such depravity and cried: "Bring her forth and let her be burnt."

But my lady, with a woman's wit, had foreseen this possible denouncement and punishment, and prepared for it, and she quietly sent the articles he had left in pawn, and humbled him to the very dust with her message.

"Discern, I pray thee, whose are these, the signet and bracelets and staff?" And I will add here that there was no fire, because Tamar skillfully avoided being the fuel.

I do not relate the above to harrow up your feelings, but simply to show you the stuff the women of the Old Testament were made of.

About this time the matchless Joseph appears upon the stage of the Old Testament as the monument of masculine virtue, and lo! the woman in the case enters upon the scene in the shape of Potiphar's wife, and plays her part in the comedy or tragedy--as you happen to look at it--in Joseph's life.

She doesn't come before the public with a burst of melody, a blaze of light and the enticing music of applause, but she enters softly, quietly she "casts her eyes upon Joseph" and she sees he is "a goodly person and well favored"--and the mischief is done. She lavished her wealth in all the follies, fashions and pleasures of her time to attract him; she met him in the hall, gave him roses in the garden, smiled at him from the doorway. When she slept she dreamed sweet dreams of kisses and soft hand-clasps. When she lifted her gaze to the stars, 'twas his eyes she saw there. When she walked by the river's side, the rippling waters were no sweeter than his voice. When the summer wind, perfume-laden, fanned her face she fancied 'twas his warm breath on her cheek. Then she forgot husband and duty, heaven and hell, and she listened for his footsteps, lingered for his coming, watched and waited for his smile--and all in vain.

And Joseph, who loved this woman with an incomparable love; this woman who from the eminence of her wealth, rank and beauty, in the utter abandonment of her passion cast herself at his feet, Joseph was man enough to bend and sway and falter before her temptations, but for friendship's sake, for honor's sake, for the sake of her he loved, divine enough to resist them.

Out from among the seductive fables and shocking facts of history Joseph stands forth a shining example as the first man, and perhaps the last, who loved a woman so well that he refused her outstretched arms, declined the kisses from her lips, rejected the reckless invitation in her eyes, and saved her from himself. Who loved with a passion so tender and deep that, unlike all other men, he refused to make her he loved a victim on the altar of his passions, but would have enshrined her there a goddess, "pure as ice and chaste as snow."

Men have always sacrificed women "who loved not wisely, but too well" upon the altar of their own selfishness, but Joseph saved her and taught the world what true love is.

The facts of history stab our faith in man's love, woman's constancy, friendship, honor and truth, but Joseph's peerless example revives it, and we feel that there are characters that are incorruptible, honesty that is unassailable, virtue that is impregnable and friendship that is undying. He shines out from among the other characters of the Old Testament as distinctly and clearly as a star breaking through the sullen clouds of heaven, as a lily blowing and floating above the green scum and sluggish waters, as a rose blooming in a wilderness. Thank the Lord for Joseph!

But Potiphar's wife, womanlike, scorned a love that would make her an angel instead of a victim, and by a succession of plausible, neat little lies, gained her husband's ear, had Joseph cast into prison, and teaches us that, indeed, "Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned."

But what we wanted to say was, that she was a faithless wife, a reckless lover, a revengeful and unforgiving woman, since Joseph was left to languish in captivity for two long years, without any effort on her part, as far as we can learn or infer, to accomplish his release.

At this period in the history of the Jews a new king arose in Egypt, and fearing the great number of the Jews, he "set over them task-masters, to afflict them with their burdens;" "but the more they afflicted them the more they multiplied and grew."

Then the king, in the usual arrogance of power, ignorantly supposing that women were obedient and never dreaming they would dare to disregard the commands of royalty, spoke to the Hebrew midwives, and in the easy, off-hand manner that kings had in those days, told them to kill all the boy babies that came to the Jews, but to save the girl babies alive.

And did they do it? Not at all! They simply looked at each other, laughed at the king, and utterly ignored his commands, and then when majesty in dread power called them to account, with a shrewdness characteristic of the females of the Old Testament they invented a plausible excuse, baffled the king, shielded the Jews and saved themselves.

STORY OF SOME WOMEN AND A BABY.

STORY OF SOME WOMEN AND A BABY.

So the king was balked by the Hebrew midwives and the Jews continued to "increase abundantly and multiplied, and waxed exceeding mighty; and the land was filled with them."

And the king, fearing the multitude of the Jews, again pitted himself against the fecundity and rebellion of the women, and issued the cruel but famous command:

"And Pharaoh charged all the people, saying, Every son that is born ye shall cast into the river, and every daughter ye shall save alive."

And shortly after that, one night when all the Egyptians slept, and only the stars, the moon and the winds were awake, in the silence and the silvery gloom, a baby boy came to a daughter of Levi, and "when she saw him that he was a goodly child" she quietly determined that no murderous hand should ever toss him in the rolling river, or check the breath on his sweet lips; "and she hid him three months."

I don't know how she did it, but perhaps when he was crying with all a baby's vigor for his supper the embryo diplomat in his heart shrewdly caught the meaning in his mother's warning "hush, sh!" and, king and tyrant tho' he was, he knew "that there was a greater than he," and stilled his cries. Perhaps when the colic gripped his vitals he bore the pain in unflinching silence, if he heard an Egyptian footstep near the door. Perhaps he stopped his gooing and cooing in his hidden nest, and held his very breath in fear, when he heard an Egyptian voice in the house.

And all these three months he had been growing plump, and strong and healthy, and I suppose he became a little reckless, or perchance he began to think he knew more than his mother did about it, and wouldn't keep still. Anyway, whatever was the matter I don't know, but there came a day when "she could no longer hide him," and then she laid a plot to baffle the king, defeat death and save the child.

Being an ambitious woman as well as a loving mother, she was not content that he should be as other children, forced "to serve with rigor" and his life made "bitter with hard bondage in mortar and brick and in all manner of service of the field." I presume she thought he was a little more beautiful and more clever than any child that ever lived before, for we all do that when a baby comes without an invitation and often against our most urgent wishes, and nestling in our arms says, without uttering a word: "I've come to stay and I want my supper; I'm hungry, for the journey has been long and dark--and why don't you make haste?"

Perhaps she had caught the fire of the future statesman in his dark eye; perhaps she had heard the ring of sublimity in the melodious voice that afterward said "Honor thy father and thy mother." Perhaps she had seen the shrewdness of the future great diplomat in his maneuvers to have his baby way, and being a bright woman she set her wits to work to defy the king, defeat his law and elude the cruel vigilance of the Egyptian spies; and she conceived a plot which for boldness of thought and shrewdness of execution stands unsurpassed. She would not save him to live the toilsome, slavish life of the Jews. She sighed for all the advantages of the Egyptians. She lifted her ambitious eyes to the royal household itself, and in spite of the accident of birth, in spite of king and law and hatred, in spite of the fatal fact that he was a dark-eyed, dark-haired Jew, she vowed he should mingle with royal nabobs, laugh and thrive and prosper under the very eye of his enemy the king, be clothed in purple and fine linen, skilled in all the arts and learned in all the sciences of the Egyptians; and she was clever enough to see at a glance that in this almost hopeless scheme she must have accomplices.

And where did she turn for aid? To her husband, as a meek, submissive and obedient woman naturally would? Not at all. Perhaps she doubted the intelligence of his assistance. Perhaps she had no faith in his courage for the undertaking. Perhaps she did not believe he could keep a secret; at any rate she refused to confide in him. I suppose, as no mention is made of it, she utterly ignored him, scorned to ask his advice, and planned to dispose of his child without telling him of it, much less asking his permission.

But where did she turn for aid? Did she clothe herself in the gayest costume of the Jews, and, conscious of her beauty, try with smiles and coquetry and caressing touch to beguile the King? No. Did she steal into the tent of his greatest general and kneeling at his feet seek to bribe him with her love? No. She simply and utterly ignored the men, and selected the King's own daughter as the instrument to execute her design. She knew the royal girl came down to the river to bathe, and trusting in her baby's great gift of unrivaled beauty and the woman's compassion, she planned a dramatic surprise for her.

"And when she could not longer hide him, she took him an ark of bulrushes, and daubed it with slime and pitch and put the child therein. And she laid it among the flags by the river's brink." But before she put him in it she bathed him in perfumed water to make him sweet, put on his prettiest dress, tied up his short sleeves with something that just matched the color in his cheeks, and borrowed a golden chain of an Egyptian woman to clasp about his milk-white neck. Then she lined the ark with roses, laid a little pillow in the bottom, put the baby softly in, partly closed the top to shield him from too much light and air, and laid it among the flags by the river's brink; and then the cleverness that had designed the scheme and the bravery that had executed it so far, was overwhelmed by a mother's love and she fled, and hid herself among the foliage and the reeds, too frightened to watch the result; "but his sister stood afar off to wit what would be done to him."

And the baby had a nice time while he waited, for the wind with noiseless feet and invisible hands came and softly rocked the cradle to and fro; the sunbeams sent a bright ray and put golden bracelets on his wrists, which with the true instinct of human nature he tried to catch and hold, and the birds coming down to wash in the rippling waters peeped into the cradle, and, enraptured with the pretty sight, forgot to bathe, but stopped to sing.

And the King's daughter and her maidens came laughing and singing down to the river's brink to bathe, as was their custom--a custom which baby's mother knew about and took advantage of.

And the girls spied the basket and wondered what it was, and finally the royal damsel "sent her maid to fetch it." And Pharaoh's daughter opened it and "she saw the child," and the girls crowded around and gazed in silent admiration. Then the baby, who never before had seen the purple and fine linen of majesty or the sparkling jewels of wealth, knowing this was the opportunity of his life put up his hands in welcome and said in the universal language of babyhood, "Ah, goo! ah, goo!" He was a worthy child of a great mother, and the minute he was left to himself he came before the footlights and with one word captivated his audience, and a storm of kisses fell upon his lips and neck and arms. And when the girls ceased lest they should kiss him to death, he looked at them a minute, and then he opened his mouth and laughed a little soft, gurgling laugh; a laugh so sweet that I'm sure even the terrible God of the Jews must have smiled had he heard it.

He didn't laugh because he felt particularly funny, but because the little diplomat, bent on conquest, wanted to show a tiny tooth that came into his mouth one day, he didn't know how.

He had never seen it himself, but he knew it was there and was a treasure, for one time in the dead of the night when all his dread enemies, the Egyptians, were fast asleep, and the wind howled and the rain beat upon the roof, his mother brought his father to his hiding place and holding the light high up above his head, she touched him lightly under the chin and said: "Laugh, now, and show papa baby's tooth." Then he did as he was told and his father looked long and carefully and then laughed too, kissed him and went away.

When the girls saw it they all smiled and kissed him too.

About this time he wanted his mother and "the babe wept."

When the king's daughter saw his red lips quivering and the tears hanging on his long, curling lashes, love and compassion filled her heart, and thinking of her father's wicked command: "Every son that is born ye shall cast into the river," she said, sadly, "this is one of the Hebrews' children."

Then his sister--I suppose it was the same one who had "stood afar off to wit what would be done to him" and who had approached--said, "Shall I go and call to thee a nurse of the Hebrew women, that she may nurse the child for thee?"

"And Pharaoh's daughter said to her, 'Go.' And the maid went and called the child's mother."

"And Pharaoh's daughter said unto her, 'Take this child away and nurse it for me and I will give thee thy wages.' And the woman took the child and nursed it." Wasn't that the sublimest conquering of ambition and crime by love ever known?

I suppose the King's daughter went every day to see the little black-eyed beauty and kiss his rosy lips, his soft white neck, his dimpled arms; and every kiss strengthened her determination to defy the King, her father and the law, and save this baby for her own.

I don't know how she managed it, but somehow she overcame all obstacles, and they were many and great there is no doubt, and "he became her son," and the future lawgiver of the Jews, and the world was saved.

And so after all we owe the ten commandments to a Jewish woman's wit, strategy and love, and an Egyptian woman's compassion and disobedience, for the stern command that "Every son that is born ye shall cast into the river" was not given to the army, the navy or the church, to one man or woman, to doctors or midwives, but to "all the people," and in this affair there were a number of women, who all connived to foil the "powers that be" and refused to do the King's bidding. First there was the mother of Moses and the sister, the King's daughter, her maid and "her maidens" who came down to the river's brink with her, at least two of them and perhaps twenty.