Tales from the Old Testament
Posts in The Copybook tagged ‘Tales from the Old Testament’
In The Copybook
Posts in The Copybook tagged ‘Tales from the Old Testament’
In The Copybook
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A prophet-for-hire agreed to help Balak, King of Moab, try to do something about the flood of Israelites pouring into his kingdom.
The story of Balaam and his ass, told in the Book of Numbers, is set in the late thirteenth century BC, some forty years after the Israelites escaped slavery in Egypt. Now they were massing in Moab on the eastern side of the Dead Sea, ready to cross the River Jordan into their Promised Land; but Balak, King of Moab, was feeling far from hospitable and already had a plan for moving them on.
The Israelites crossed over into the Land of Promise, only to find their progress barred by the well-fortified city of Jericho.
In 1300-1250 BC or so, the people of Israel escaped a life of forced labour in Egypt, and fled east and north into the desert. Assured by Moses and his brother Aaron that a land ‘flowing with milk and honey’ awaited them, they endured forty years of wandering before reaching the borders of Canaan. As the brothers had now died, the task of making a home there fell to Joshua.
Abraham invites his son Isaac to accompany him to a nearby mountain to offer sacrifice, and the boy is naturally curious to know what gift his father proposes to offer.
The story of the sacrifice of Isaac seems troubling until it dawns upon us that Abraham risked his son’s life precisely because he knew Isaac was never in danger. The heartwarming tale stands as a rebuke to human sacrifice and to all evil done in God’s name, as a blessing upon the sacrifices of the Temple, and as a prophecy of Christ, the ‘lamb of God’.
Goliath, a giant of a man from Philistia, has challenged Israel’s warrior-heroes to meet him in single combat, but only a shepherd boy is brave enough to step up.
When Goliath, a mountain of a man from Philistia, challenged Israel’s warrior-heroes to mortal combat only David, a shepherd boy, stepped up. King Saul felt shame that only this brave but hopeless boy was ready to fight for the nation. On the other hand, the prophet Samuel had foretold that a man ‘better than thou’ would take Saul’s crown, and it was a relief to know that there was no such man in all his kingdom.
King Saul’s jealousies drove those who loved him away, but David was a very different kind of leader.
Before he became Israel’s King, David was a loyal servant of King Saul and a close friend of Saul’s son, Jonathan. But Saul’s impetuous jealousies made him see treachery at every turn, just when Israel needed unity against the invading Philistines. David was another kind of leader entirely — as this little tale shows.
A young Jewish woman in ancient Babylon falls victim to a heartless conspiracy.
‘Susannah’ is one of the books of the so-called Apocrypha, not as widely read as they once were but part of the classic English translation published in 1611, and ‘authorised to be read in churches’. It is a story about the use and the abuse of law, a reminder that even courts do not guarantee justice where there is no fear of God.