Joshua Valiant (Chronicles of the Nephilim) (3 page)

It was
the mercenary, who promptly cut off the monster’s head from his long muscular neck.

“Whew,”
said the mercenary. “That was close. I almost had a lot of explaining to do to Yahweh.”

The two Israelites stood catching their breaths, looking at their benefactor
with astonishment.

“Are you
—mal’akim?” asked Caleb. It meant, “angel,” one of Yahweh’s heavenly host, and he knew their presence ever since his visits from Gabriel years ago.

“
I am Mikael the archangel, prince of Israel, sent to watch over and protect Yahweh’s people.”

Joshua thought to himself that this must mean he was destined for a higher purpose in Yahweh’s plan if this guardian angel of Israel was watching over
him. Joshua had hoped and prayed for such an honor. Being the assistant of Moses had fed that hope in his heart, handpicked by the ruler of Israel himself. And now that hope was growing stronger.

He had no idea just how wrong he was.

Mikael said, “You had better hurry and catch up with the other spies. They are almost back to the camp in the Negeb.”

Joshua bent down and picked up a sword and scabbard from one of the smaller warriors. He smiled and wrapped it onto his horse.

“What about these soldiers?” asked Caleb. “If those commanders, Seshai and Talmai, find them, they will know for sure that we are the ones whom they seek. They might chase us all the way back to our camp.”

“
Do not worry,” said Mikael. “Be strong and courageous. I will bury them. You just get moving.”

Joshua said, “What about you?”

“Oh, do not worry about me,” said Mikael. “You will be seeing plenty of me in the future. Now, go.”

They went.

Moses stood before the assembled congregation of Israel’s seventy elders at the entrance to the Tent of Meeting. He was well over eighty years old and was weary with the burden of this nation of ingrates. They had seen Yahweh crush the power of Pharaoh and the Egyptian gods beneath the might of his strong right arm. The ten plagues, the parting of the Red Sea, and the drowning of Pharaoh’s minions in the waters were still fresh in their memories. As was the thunder and lightning upon Mount Sinai. A pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night had led them out of Egypt and through the desert, and they had had their bellies filled by heavenly manna and miraculous quail.

Now, they stood poised
on the edge of Canaan that Yahweh himself had promised to give them, and these spoiled selfish juveniles were grumbling and complaining about how much better things were in Egypt. Even Moses’ sister, the prophetess Miriam, and his brother, the high priest Aaron, had challenged his leadership of the nation not many days earlier.

They had always been bitter
and jealous that Moses had married Neferhetep, the dark Nubian Cushite woman in Egypt, after Zipporah had died. And they began a murmuring campaign, accusing Moses of being like Pharaoh in claiming God’s special authority. Did not Yahweh also speak through the prophetess and the high priest?

The band of twelve prophets, of which Miriam was a part, had also supported her and Aaron. In the shadow of Moses, the prophets were not as elevated in their status, but they were conduits through which Yahweh sometimes spoke.

In this case, he certainly did not.

For their rebellious spirit, Yahweh gave Miriam
temporary leprosy and then healed it, which scared the Sheol out of them both and put them back in their place.

But that was
not even the last of it. Being slaves for four hundred years in Egypt had corrupted the soul of the people. They had adopted many of the very gods that Yahweh had condemned and judged. It would be a long and arduous task to purge the idols engraved on the hearts of this nation. He wondered if it was even possible to do so.

Moses
loved his people, but they wore his patience down.

They were encamped in the desert of Kadesh just south of their Promised Land.
They had a fighting force of about six thousand men for a nation of close to seventy thousand people.

Moses had sent out an elite scouting force of twelve spies
, one chief from each tribe, to search out the land and bring back a report. They had taken forty days to traverse the length of Canaan and reconnoiter any intelligence they could to help their military strategy. They were supposed to find out how many people were in the land, what their fighting strength was, and whether they dwelt in villages or strongholds, as well as the fertility and produce of the land itself.

T
he spies had returned.

They
stood before Moses and the elders and judges to give their report—more accurately; ten of the twelve spies were there. Joshua and Caleb had not yet returned because they were making a pilgrimage visit to the tomb of Abraham their ancestor in Machpelah. They were supposed to catch up with the others, but for some reason had been delayed.

For some reason.

Moses wore a veil over his face, as he always did after talking with Yahweh face to face. This was because something had happened to Moses’ body when he was on Mount Sinai. When he came down from the mountain carrying the tablets of law, his skin shone with bronze light much like the Bene Elohim, or Sons of God. It was as if being so close to the presence of Yahweh had transfigured his body to that of a Shining One. It was not a complete transformation because it would fade with time. But whenever he re-entered the presence, his skin would glow again so bright that the Israelites could barely look at him and were frightened. So Moses put a veil over his face to calm their fears. Whenever he would go into the Tent of Meeting before Yahweh, he would remove the veil, and then he would stand before the congregation with shining face and tell all Israel what Yahweh had commanded, whereupon he would return the veil over his face.

Whenever his emotions ran strong, from joy or anger, the
brightness would increase in intensity. He was so angry with these wretched ingrates currently that he kept the veil on to protect them from the blinding brilliance.

Ammiel
from the tribe of Dan was the spokesman for the group. He was sweating nervously under Moses’ expectant gaze.

Moses could
see a frightened look on all their faces.

Ammiel
’s words were hesitant. “We traveled the length of the land of Canaan, from Bashan in the north all the way down to the Negeb. The Amalekites dwell in the land of the Negeb. The Hittites, Jebusites, and Amorites dwell in the hill country, and the Canaanites dwell by the sea.”

“What of the Girgashites, Perizzites, and Hivites?” said Moses. These were
the rest of the Canaanite nations that Yahweh had promised he would drive out before the Israelites. They were to make no covenant with these pagan peoples, avoid intermarrying with them, and show them no mercy, devoting them to complete destruction, lest they turn away Israel from following Yahweh to serve evil gods.

Ammiel
replied, “They are spread throughout the countryside in various territories.”

“And what of the fertility of the land?”

“It is true, as you told us, the land is rich and abundant, and flows with milk and honey.”

“
So where is the sample of produce you were to bring back? The fruit of the land.”

Ammiel
and the others looked at one another with trepidation.

Moses snapped, “Speak up.”

Ammiel took a deep breath before confessing. “My lord, Moses, we were unable to procure any sample produce.” He paused again and swallowed. “Because we feared for our lives and could not afford the encumbrance.”

Now, the seventy elders looked at one another and whispered amongst themselves at the scandal.

Ammiel continued, “The people we saw who dwell in the land are stronger than we are. They live in fortified cities with walls that reach up to heaven.”

“Yahweh
did not say it was going to be easy, Ammiel,” said Moses. “Our years of being Egypt’s sentry forces in Goshen has prepared us for just such a war.”

“
Not for this kind of war, my lord,” Ammiel interjected.

“We saw
the Nephilim.”

A hush of silence swept over the entire congregation.

Moses gulped.

The Israelites were familiar with the gossip and legends about the Nephilim. But now they were hearing trustworthy eyewitnesses confirm their greatest fears.

The Nephilim were the legendary giant
offspring of the fallen Watcher gods, also called Sons of God, who mated with the daughters of men before the great Flood. In the days of Jared, two hundred of these rebels from Yahweh’s heavenly host came to earth on Mount Hermon in Canaan. Two bitter commanders, Semjaza and Azazel, led them. They revealed to mankind all kinds of sorceries and evil secrets. They sought to draw worship away from the Creator by posing as gods over the people.

And they engaged in a nefarious
plot to corrupt creation through miscegenation, the unholy elimination of the distinctions of the created order. They violated the separation of kinds, by creating hybrids of male and female, man and animal, and the most vile of all: human and divine. These were the Nephilim, the unholy hybrid offspring of human and divine seed, the giant gibborim warriors of old. The rebel Sons of God had hoped to corrupt the seedline of Eve that Yahweh had prophesied would be at war with the seedline of the Serpent. The spies had seen the giant clans that were the descendants of those original Nephilim.

This violence of humanity and divinity brought down the waters of the Deluge in judgment.
The leaders Semjaza and Azazel, along with some of the other Watchers, had been bound into the earth to await their judgment.

But not all of them.

Seventy remained. And their corruption was passed through some of the sons of Noah down through history until this very day.

Moses had heard that
King Chedorlaomer and a coalition of Mesopotamian kings had wiped out most of the Nephilim descendants in the time of their father Abraham. But during his forty years in the Arabian desert with the Midianites, he learned that there was a surviving remnant of these giants thriving in Canaan, but he did not know just how many.

Ammiel
’s throaty voice shattered Moses’ thoughtful optimism.

“Canaan is crawling with giants.
They are of great height, and we were like grasshoppers before them. The land devours its inhabitants.”

Hushed whispering broke out again
through the assembly.

Moses
’ thoughtful pause made them uncomfortable.

And then he said,
“What is their organization?”

Ammiel nodded to Shammua from the tribe of Reuben. He stepped forward with Geuel from the tribe of Gad
, and Gaddi from the half-tribe of Manasseh.

“
My lord, we scouted the northernmost regions,” said Shammua. “We found the Transjordan ruled by King Og of Bashan. Og is the mightiest and last of the Rephaim, the most ancient of giant rulers.”

“Describe these Rephaim,” said Moses.

“They reach heights of ten and twelve feet, and they are heinous looking. Their bodies are without hair, their skin is pale grey, and they have large elongated skulls. They have two rows of teeth in their jaws, six fingers on each hand, and six toes on each foot. It is said King Og sleeps on a bed of iron fourteen feet long and six feet wide.”

That would make Og
ten to eleven feet tall.

A shiver went down Moses’ spine. A shiver went down everyone’s spine who was listening.

“Human sacrifice is ubiquitous,” he continued. “It is unconscionable that many parents make their children to pass through the fires of Molech, god of the underworld.”

Moses
’ stomach turned. He felt nauseous. Groans of horror swept through the crowd.

“But that is not all,” added Gaddi. “
Serpent worship is widespread. There is talk of snake clans that engage in unspeakable abominations between human and reptile. And I personally witnessed a tribe led by satyrs at Banias in the foothills of Mount Hermon. These goat demons lead the hairy descendants of Esau into depraved sexual atrocities. Their tribe is called the Seirim.”

Satyrs were chimeric creatures
said to have the upper torso of a human and the lower legs of a hoary goat.

Just when Moses thought it could not get worse, three other spies, Palti, Gaddiel, and Igal, stepped forward. Palti spoke for them.

“We surveyed the hill country and there we found the Anakim, who come from the Nephilim. The sons of Anak.”

Moses had heard of the Anakim. He knew they had ties that went back to the Israelites’ forefather Abraham.

“What are they like?”

“They
are the fiercest among the giants in the land. They reside mostly in the southern region. They have extra-long muscular necks with pale skin and blond or reddish hair. They also have the extra digits on their hands and feet. They worship Ba’al the storm god and they are cannibals. No one can stand before them. Three brothers called the Sons of Arba are famous in the region for their ferocity. Ahiman, Sheshai, and Talmai. Ahiman is legendary. No one is larger or mightier than he. It is said he is twenty feet tall and two thousand pounds.” The exaggeration that gossip brought often added many feet to height and many pounds to weight. But how much, who could know?

Moses noticed that word must have spread through the camp because
common Israelites were assembling around the meeting place to listen in on the report. By the end of this exchange, their numbers were large—and they were becoming restless.

Ammiel stood forward again and announced, “I
t does not seem right to me that Yahweh would claim to lead us into such a lion’s den of fierce savagery.”

Just before the tension was about to break, everyone’s attention turned to the sound of Joshua’s voice.

“Sons of Israel, be strong and courageous!”

Joshua and Caleb materialized out of the darkness carrying a large pole between them. On the pole was a bunch of grapes so large it dwarfed the two of them. It looked like it was the fruit of the gods.

“I beg your indulgence to forgive our tardiness, lord Moses. But Caleb and I were a bit delayed.”

Moses nodded with stern curiosity.

Joshua added, “This bunch of grapes we were able to bring from the valley of Eshcol. As you can see, the fruit of the land is magnificent.”

Ammiel
interrupted, “Yes, it is food of the Anakim, before whom no man can stand!”

And now the crowd was becoming unruly. A heckler yelled out, “Why has Yahweh brought us into this land only to fall by the sword?”

Another added, “Our wives and children will become food for giants!”