Keepers of the Covenant (3 page)

The door opened. He looked up, expecting to see his brother, but it was one of his Torah students, a young man named Shimon. “Rebbe Ezra, I don’t understand—”

“Neither do I!” His words came out harsher than he intended, but he wanted to be left alone. Instead, Shimon took a step closer.

“Rebbe, you said God’s punishment and exile ended when our people were allowed to return and rebuild the temple, but this decree—”

“This decree came from Gentiles, Shimon, not God.”

“But the Almighty One allowed it, didn’t He?”

Ezra didn’t reply. He propped his elbows on the table and covered his face, hoping Shimon would leave.

“Why do the Gentiles hate us, Rebbe?”

“Because we follow God,” he said, his hands muffling his reply. “Men who worship false gods want to wipe out all remembrance of the one true God and His moral laws, and so they attack us, the keepers of His Torah.”

The stool scraped across the stone floor as Shimon sat down across from him. Ezra lowered his hands, resisting the urge to shout at him to go away.

“Rebbe, this decree reminds me of Pharaoh’s order to throw our baby boys into the Nile. I know the Holy One spared one of those babies, Moses, but many more must have died. I asked you once why the Holy One allowed it, why He didn’t save all of the babies, and you said He allowed it for a time because it served His greater purpose. You said God wanted to show the Egyptians His power, and rescue
all
of us.” Ezra watched Shimon through his tears, unable to recall ever saying those words. “Could this decree be part of some greater plan, Rebbe?
Do you think the Almighty One wants to show His power to the Persians the way He did to the Egyptians?”

Ezra couldn’t reply. Maybe he would arrive at a place of understanding someday, but not today. Today he was too shaken, his mind too numb to do anything but cry out in grief. He didn’t want to die—not this way, not at the hands of the Amalekites, not after striving so hard all his life to study and obey God’s law.

At last he found his voice. “Go home to your family, Shimon. They surely need all the comfort you can offer. I’m going to do the same.” He pulled himself to his feet and wrapped the scroll in its covering. Shimon rose to help him, but Ezra waved him away. “I can finish. Go home. There won’t be any classes today.”

When he had put everything away, Ezra returned home to his room in Jude’s house. He didn’t want to talk to anyone, but Jude’s wife, Devorah, stopped him in their courtyard before he could slip past her. He saw fear in her dark eyes and knew Jude must have told her about their death sentence.

“What’s going to happen to us?” she asked. “If we fast and pray to the Holy One, He’ll surely save us, won’t He?”

Ezra glanced at his two small nieces, babbling as they shared a bowl of dates, and his brother’s words from earlier that morning pierced his heart:
“For
once in your life, put away your scrolls and join
the real world!”
The king’s edict wasn’t another Torah passage to wrestle with and interpret but a decree that affected flesh-and-blood people. His people.

“Tell me, Ezra, please! You know the Almighty One better than the rest of us—”

“No, Devorah. I don’t. You know Him as well as I do. Maybe better because you have children. You understand the need to discipline them when they do wrong, but you also understand mercy. I’ve watched you pull your girls into your arms and love them after you’ve punished them. I may know God’s law and the history of our people, but I don’t think I truly understand His mercy. And right now, we need to plead for His mercy.”

The door from the inner rooms opened and Jude came out. He stared at Ezra as if surprised to see him. “You came home?”

“I’ve put away my scrolls. I’m joining what you call the real world. Tell me what you want me to do. How can I help?”

“We’re going to need a new leader. Nathan is . . . well, you saw how upset he was. He fell to pieces after you left.”

“You expect
me
to take his place?”

“You have more wisdom than the rest of us put together. And that’s what we need right now—wisdom and . . . and guidance.”

“I’m a scholar, not a leader.”

“I know! I know! An expert on the God of Abraham and His Torah!” Jude’s temper, always volatile under pressure, threatened to explode. “Tell us why this is happening. Why God is doing this to us, and what we can do about it. Give us answers!”

“I don’t think—”

Jude stepped closer. “You asked me how you can help, and I’m telling you. We need a strong leader, a man of faith. Our faith has been shattered by this decree.”

“And what makes you think mine hasn’t?” Ezra raised his voice for the first time. Jude’s two small daughters froze in place, clutching their bowls as if the loud voices had frightened them. Devorah bent to lift the baby, then prodded the older child to her feet, leading her inside.

“Pray about it,” Jude said. “Study your scrolls. Find out what we’ve done to deserve this. Then, if you still refuse to lead us, pray that the Almighty One will send someone who will.”

“I can do that,” Ezra said quietly. “I can pray. And I can see what the law and the prophets have to say.” He would start today. And he wouldn’t stop searching the Scriptures until he found the reason for the decree—and the solution. But to become the leader of his people in Rebbe Nathan’s place? Ezra couldn’t promise such a thing.

B
ABYLON

D
evorah was still awake when Jude finally came to bed. As tired as she was from her day’s work, the bewildering news wouldn’t allow her to sleep. Her mind fluttered about like the dove that Noah had released from the ark, searching in vain for a place to land. She floundered about through stories from her ancestors’ past, seeking a way to understand what the Almighty One was doing. And what He might do next.

“Do you want me to light the lamp for you?” she asked as she watched Jude strip off his tunic.

“No. It might wake the girls.” He finished undressing but didn’t lie down beside her. Even without the light, Devorah saw the expression of bafflement and fear on his face, the same expression she imagined on their ancestors’ faces when they reached the shore of the Red Sea and heard Pharaoh’s chariots thundering behind them. In the four years she and Jude had been married, Devorah had never seen her strong, dauntless husband so pale and overwhelmed. The moment he’d walked into their courtyard today in the middle of the afternoon, she’d known something terrible had happened.

“What’s wrong?” she had asked, abandoning her dough in
the kneading trough. “Is it one of your brothers? Is someone hurt?” She could think of no other reason for him to be home so early or in such a state of shock.

“The Persian king has sentenced all of our people to death. Men, women, and children. We’re all going to die.”

“What? . . . No . . .” She had tried to embrace him, but he held her back, as if too tense to accept comfort. “But why, Jude? What’s the reason for it?” He shook his head, unable to speak, then fled inside their house, refusing to say more. She had cornered her brother-in-law, Ezra, the moment he came home, hours earlier than usual. Ezra knew more about the Almighty One than anyone in Babylon, but he’d also been in shock, unable to offer assurance that God was in control.

Now she waited for Jude to lie down beside her, but he couldn’t stop pacing, as if desperate to do something to change their situation. Devorah rose from their pallet and went into his arms, resting her head on his broad, solid chest. “I want to know the truth, Jude. Tell me everything about this death sentence and what we can do about it. Don’t shelter me.” He was a bear of a man, a giant alongside her tiny frame. Tonight he held her as if she might break, as if afraid to cling to her with the full force of his emotions. He stroked her dark hair, the color of the midnight sky, he always said.

“It’s my job to shelter you,” he said. “Men are supposed to protect their wives in situations like this.”

She released him, looking up at him in the dark, fighting the urge to shout at him. “I don’t want to be sheltered! I told you before we were married that I’m not like other women, content to live in ignorance of what’s going on, letting my husband do everything and decide everything. I told you that I wanted more from our marriage than to simply cook your food and have your children—and you agreed, Jude. You agreed that I would be your partner as well as your wife. You promised you’d never hide anything from me—”

He put his fingers over her lips, stopping her, glancing at their children sleeping nearby. “You know why I agreed, Devorah? Because you captivated me. I was as helpless as Samson with his head shorn. You were right; you weren’t like other women. You were an ‘old’ woman of twenty, for one thing.”

She couldn’t help punching his arm at the familiar tease. Jude was trying to distract her, and it made her furious. “That’s because I was waiting for a man who would agree to my terms. And you did. You can’t go back on your promise now. And don’t change the subject. I’m not a child, like Abigail, who you can distract. Tell me what you know about this decree.”

Jude exhaled. She could tell he was searching for words, trying to shape them in his mind the way he shaped his clay pots. He was a man who preferred action over words. But Devorah wanted to know everything, believing she had enough faith to handle the truth. She had grown up as the much-loved, only child of a scholarly father who had treated her like a son, immersing her in the stories of their ancestors, discussing the Almighty One and His Torah with her the way mothers discussed household duties with their daughters. She would have preferred not to marry at all than to live with a husband who didn’t confide in her and consider her his best friend.

“If I tell you what I know, it will distress you,” Jude finally said. “And I don’t want you to be upset. I’m sorry I said anything in the first place.”

“If you don’t tell me, I may have to stop speaking to you and feeding you—and sleeping with you.”

He turned away and sank down on the bed. Devorah wondered if he was going to be stubborn, but he beckoned for her to join him. “The decree came from the Persian king,” he said when she had nestled beside him. “The law has been signed and sealed in his name and can never be changed or cancelled. He sent it to every province in the empire.” He paused, then finished in a rush. “It allows our enemies to execute every Jew
in the world—men, women, and children—on the thirteenth day of Adar. This year.”

Devorah felt sick. They would kill children, too? “Our enemies?” she asked when she could speak. “We don’t have any enemies here in Babylon.”

He sighed again. “Have you ever heard of the Amalekites?”

“Yes, they attacked our people when we were helpless in the desert.”

“Well, Ezra discovered that an Amalekite prince is behind this order of execution. And this prince—our enemy—is the Persian king’s right-hand man.”

She was beginning to see the hopeless trap that had been set for her people and to understand Jude’s despair. She rested her head on his chest, listening to the steady thump of his heart, inhaling his familiar scent of hard work and earthy clay, wishing she could wake up and discover that this had only been a nightmare. “What do the elders say? Have they decided what we’re going to do?”

“There hasn’t been time. The decree came without warning. The elders are in shock. We all are. Rebbe Nathan fell apart. I’m sure you heard me trying to convince Ezra to take over for him. If anyone knows about God and His ways, it’s my brother. Maybe he can figure something out, find something we did that angered God and caused this to happen. Maybe we haven’t been faithful enough or haven’t followed all His laws the way we should—although it’s pretty hard to obey the Torah here in Babylon.”

Devorah was glad she was lying down. She felt shaken by Jude’s words and the fear she heard in his halting voice. When he’d first told her about the decree earlier today, it had seemed unreal to her, something that couldn’t possibly be true. Was it a natural reaction to believe you’ll live even when the Angel of Death unsheathes his sword in front of your face? She heard the rattle of his saber now, and it seemed as if the God she’d known since childhood had disappeared. She drew a shaky breath, trying to summon strength.

“God performed miracles for our ancestors, Jude. We both know the stories of how He parted the sea and brought water from a rock and gave us manna to eat in the desert. He made a covenant with us, promising to always be our God—and He’ll keep that promise. He will!” She was trying to convince herself as well as Jude. “I know things look bad right now, but we just need a little time to find a way out. Our armies have been outnumbered before, but God always came through for us and saved us.”

“Not always,” Jude said. “Look where we are.”

A chill went through her. Jude was right: not always. Not if her people turned away from Him and disobeyed His laws. Wasn’t that why they were living here in Babylon, marched into exile under the sword of God’s wrath? “We’ll figure something out,” she repeated.

“Maybe you should lead our people instead of Rebbe Nathan. You’ll be like your namesake, General Devorah.”

“Are you making fun of me?”

“No, my love,” he said, pulling her closer. “If any woman in the empire could lead an army, it’s you.”

The baby began to stir, tossing restlessly in her bed before starting to whimper. “Did we wake her?” Jude whispered.

“No, a new tooth is bothering her. I’ll rub her gums.”

This planned execution of her people would never happen, Devorah told herself as she lifted one-year-old Michal into her arms. God would never allow it. If all the stories in the Scriptures were true, then the Almighty One had a plan. Her people could trust God no matter what.

Even so, as Devorah soothed her daughter back to sleep, she couldn’t deny that she was terrified—not for herself but for her children. She understood Jude’s compulsion to protect her, because she would die to protect Michal and three-year-old Abigail. Tears stung Devorah’s eyes, but she forced them back, holding the baby closer, refusing to cry. She would be strong. And she would teach her daughters to be strong. And to trust God.