opponent, but I find Isaac easier to live with.”
When they retired to their own tents, the talking didn’t stop. Each one came with new questions and some came with answers. One of the handmaidens, Tesha, had the news from her camel boy that Isaac had never gotten over his mother’s death. Rebekah fingered the bracelets she was wearing and thought about what it must have meant for Isaac to have sent her such dear treasures. Just wearing the bracelets made her feel a special kinship with her aunt Sarah.
She was learning many things about her aunt and each revelation made her more real. She knew that Sarah had been barren for many years. She could just imagine how difficult that would have been for her. Everyone believed only evil women or women under some terrible curse from the earth goddess were barren.
Rebekah spent some time thinking about blessings and cursings. Words had real power. Even a powerful curse written on a small bit of parchment and buried in a secret place could make someone ill.
Blessings could be just as powerful and would help a person overcome any difficulty. A blessing given by a parent or a priest was very strong. Usually only the sons in the family, and especially the firstborn son, received any blessing from their father. How amazing it was that her father had given her his blessing. It was more precious to her than great riches.
She was to be the mother of many. There would be no barrenness for her. She would give her husband strong children. She had been given that promise in the blessing of her father.
Then the strange blessing. What did it mean? “Let thy seed possess the gate of them that hate them.” She pondered on this a good deal. She knew very well that whoever controlled the gate of a city was in charge. So she finally decided it meant that even though the people within a city hated her descendants, her descendants would be in control of things. What an amazing, wonderful blessing.
She was elated with the blessing until she began to ponder on why the people of any city would hate her descendants. This was a great puzzle. It was only much later that she began to glimpse the larger meaning of the strange blessing.
She had a small brass mirror, which she looked in from time to time. The handmaids were always borrowing it. It was blurred and shaky but you could get some idea of how you looked. She had heard all her life that her aunt Sarah was the most beautiful woman in Ur and she worried that Isaac would think her too plain and ordinary to take her place. Maybe he would be sorry he sent his mother’s gold jewelry to her. She wondered if she would ever be to him what his mother had been, and how would she know.
Then she would think of Nazzim and how strange it was that only a short time before she had no hope but to marry him. The God of Abraham was indeed strong, and He obviously paid attention when even a maid prayed earnestly to Him. She felt a warm glow, a happy feeling of discovery. This God, who seemed to be known only to the men of her family, cared about her and had rescued her. She determined to give Him first place among the gods and to discover as much as possible about Him from the family of her uncle Abraham.
* * *
Though Eleazar pushed his caravan as fast as he thought wise, he indulged in considerable restraint for the sake of the young bride and her maidservants. As it developed, it was almost a month before they neared the area where Abraham was camped for the summer. Now when they pitched their tents for the night and sat around the fire waiting for the moon to rise or looking for the star clusters they called the seven sisters, Rebekah began to ask specific questions about Isaac. Eleazar had waited for just such a time to tell her the things he thought she should know about her bridegroom.
One night he told her how Abraham had taken Isaac up on Moriah to sacrifice him. Rebekah’s eyes grew round and questioning. “He would have sacrificed his only
When they retired to their own tents, the talking didn’t stop. Each one came with new questions and some came with answers. One of the handmaidens, Tesha, had the news from her camel boy that Isaac had never gotten over his mother’s death. Rebekah fingered the bracelets she was wearing and thought about what it must have meant for Isaac to have sent her such dear treasures. Just wearing the bracelets made her feel a special kinship with her aunt Sarah.
She was learning many things about her aunt and each revelation made her more real. She knew that Sarah had been barren for many years. She could just imagine how difficult that would have been for her. Everyone believed only evil women or women under some terrible curse from the earth goddess were barren.
Rebekah spent some time thinking about blessings and cursings. Words had real power. Even a powerful curse written on a small bit of parchment and buried in a secret place could make someone ill.
Blessings could be just as powerful and would help a person overcome any difficulty. A blessing given by a parent or a priest was very strong. Usually only the sons in the family, and especially the firstborn son, received any blessing from their father. How amazing it was that her father had given her his blessing. It was more precious to her than great riches.
She was to be the mother of many. There would be no barrenness for her. She would give her husband strong children. She had been given that promise in the blessing of her father.
Then the strange blessing. What did it mean? “Let thy seed possess the gate of them that hate them.” She pondered on this a good deal. She knew very well that whoever controlled the gate of a city was in charge. So she finally decided it meant that even though the people within a city hated her descendants, her descendants would be in control of things. What an amazing, wonderful blessing.
She was elated with the blessing until she began to ponder on why the people of any city would hate her descendants. This was a great puzzle. It was only much later that she began to glimpse the larger meaning of the strange blessing.
She had a small brass mirror, which she looked in from time to time. The handmaids were always borrowing it. It was blurred and shaky but you could get some idea of how you looked. She had heard all her life that her aunt Sarah was the most beautiful woman in Ur and she worried that Isaac would think her too plain and ordinary to take her place. Maybe he would be sorry he sent his mother’s gold jewelry to her. She wondered if she would ever be to him what his mother had been, and how would she know.
Then she would think of Nazzim and how strange it was that only a short time before she had no hope but to marry him. The God of Abraham was indeed strong, and He obviously paid attention when even a maid prayed earnestly to Him. She felt a warm glow, a happy feeling of discovery. This God, who seemed to be known only to the men of her family, cared about her and had rescued her. She determined to give Him first place among the gods and to discover as much as possible about Him from the family of her uncle Abraham.
* * *
Though Eleazar pushed his caravan as fast as he thought wise, he indulged in considerable restraint for the sake of the young bride and her maidservants. As it developed, it was almost a month before they neared the area where Abraham was camped for the summer. Now when they pitched their tents for the night and sat around the fire waiting for the moon to rise or looking for the star clusters they called the seven sisters, Rebekah began to ask specific questions about Isaac. Eleazar had waited for just such a time to tell her the things he thought she should know about her bridegroom.
One night he told her how Abraham had taken Isaac up on Moriah to sacrifice him. Rebekah’s eyes grew round and questioning. “He would have sacrificed his only
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