Lives Between Walls

Oh Lord God of Israel, please hear our prayer and deliver us in this troubled time. This was my silent prayer in that moment. Literally, the only thing that stood between our death or freedom was this woman – Rahab. I had never been so scared in my life, I could literally feel my knees knocking against each other. I was wondering if they could hear the sound of them in that room. I know Ishmael was terrified as well but not like me, he looked poised for action with that knife in hand, as though he was ready to try and fight for his life should the soldiers come bursting through that door. He was a great fighter from youth, a man of action that one – but the type that acts without thinking. If the soldiers were to burst through that door I think I would just freeze. Maybe that’s why Joshua let him come with me. I wasn’t a soldier, I was more of a thinker. But that wouldn’t help me now. But if I am really honest with myself, if Ishmael hadn’t talked us into going to that prostitute, we would surely be dead because these soldiers had been waiting for us at the gate. I was beginning to see what Joshua meant when he said that God’s ways are not as straightforward as I think.

“Rahab!” The bold and authoritative voice outside continued along with the repetitive pounding on that wooden door, “In the name of the king, I command you to open up or I swear by the gods I will break this door down!” I stared into Rahab’s frightened teary eyes. I could hear Ishmael’s faint whispers for mercy, “Rahab please, please don’t let them kill us.” At this point he was now kneeling before her feet, still carrying the knife, but crying and wiping the tears off her feet with his hair. So much for being ready to fight. As probably the first Israelites that she had ever seen, she must have thought that we were pathetic – servants of the God who had split the Red Sea, and here we were groveling for mercy at the feet of a prostitute. If our God was so high and mighty, why couldn’t he deliver us himself? I said a silent prayer as I watched Rahab walk toward the door, “Oh Lord of Abraham Isaac and Jacob, have mercy on your servants.” Just then, she turned her head, and her eyes locked into mine for a moment. And there it was! Grace! She motioned with her eyes towards my left. And when I turned to look, there was a rickety wooden ladder that led to a trap door that presumably led to the roof. That’s it! She wanted us to go and hide! She was going to protect us from the soldiers! I slapped the back of Ishmael’s head who was still crying on the floor, “Shut up your crying fool, and let’s go,” I hasted up the stairs and pushed the wooden trap door, trying to cause as little ruckus as possible. Ishmael followed suit and we found ourselves in an attic, surrounded by what felt like bundles of wheat – it was too dark to see anything. The texture of the wheat grazed against my skin as me and Ishmael immersed ourselves, making sure that we were well hidden.

After a few seconds of silence, I heard Rahab open the door. She answered, “Could you not pound on my door so hard officer?” There was a hole on the floorboards through which I could see what looked like the captain of the soldiers push through the door and walk into the house. He had a black moustache and wore gold plated armour. He was majestic, I had never seen anything like it. The captain replied with a smug expression, “Oh sorry. I guess I just reckoned that ‘hard pounding’ was your thing.” There was an eruption of laughter from outside the house. That was probably his battalion of soldiers that had been brought to arrest us – these two dangerous spies from Israel. Rahab glared at him angrily as he strolled into her house, looking around the room. I could tell that these two had had some history. “So I assume you have some sort of search warrant, bringing your ugly face into my house and all?” Rahab struck back which threw the soldiers outside into a frenzy. The captain chuckled. He carried on looking around the room, “My ‘search warrant,’ is the anonymous tip from a citizen who says that he saw two strange men coming into the whore’s house,” he smiled as he bent down to look under the bed. “And I only know of one whore in this city, well, the best whore in the business,” he continued. I hated him just listening to him talk. He was so arrogant, the way he addressed her, I didn’t like it. I wished he would just die. When Joshua and all Israel come with their army, I want to be the one to drive the spear through this fool’s heart. Rahab replied crossing her arms, “That’s right, Hadad, the best in the business, and you would know.” The soldiers outside were in uproar again. Hadad raised his hands to silence the mob. He then walked over to Rahab, with a tightened jaw. He was certainly getting agitated now. I was hoping that he wouldn’t do anything to hurt Rahab. She mocked him further, “So what, am I a whore now that you are with your soldiers? That’s not what you called me the last night you spent with me.” Hadad suddenly grabbed her by the throat, “Listen whore! Don’t play games with me. Where are those bloody men?” Rahab struggled for breath and scrambled to pry Hadad’s cold callous hands off her neck. But her hands were too petite and gentle to put up any fight. I was fuming with rage, and it took everything within me to keep from going down and helping her. Ishmael knew me well – he knew that compassion was my weakness, and I felt his hand on my shoulder in the dark. Without words he was saying to me, “Brother, don’t do it. You’re only going to create more trouble for her.” And he was right, because if they found out that she had hid spies in her home, they would not only kill her, but they would kill us too.

“Had…Hadad,” choked Rahab, “please…please let me go.” Hadad smiled as he heard her pleading for her life. “Say that you are sorry, you have been a bad girl,” Hadad replied. Rahab stared at him in the eyes. “Say it!” Hadad shouted. “I’m sorry…I’ve… I’ve been a bad girl,” Rahab managed to say weakly – and with that Hadad let her go. “Tell me, where are the men who came to you?” Hadad continued his investigation, as Rahab inhaled deep gulps of air, rubbing her neck around where Hadad’s grip had been. “They are not here Hadad,” she replied softly with a slight tremble in her voice, “they did come here and they left through the window not too long ago. If you go now you can still catch up with them.” Hadad stared at her, and then he smiled. “Good girl.” He then walked towards the door and instructed the soldiers to head out in the direction that Rahab had said. He then turned swiftly to Rahab, “And if you are lying to me, just know that I will not only kill you, but anyone related to you. That includes your parents, cousins, cat, and friends – so think very carefully about lying to me.” Rahab maintained a blank expression and she replied, “I’m not lying to you.” Hadad looked around the room for a moment, then the wooden ladder caught his eye. I went cold. Oh Lord, please no. Let him not search here. Rahab interjected, “Do you want to search in the attic as well?” What was she doing?! She was literally inviting him to find us. It was a trap! “Ishmael,” I whispered out to him just as I heard the sound of his blade being opened. I closed my eyes as I heard the sounds of Hadad’s footsteps walking toward the ladder. It was over. We were going to die here. God was probably punishing us for coming into a prostitute’s house. The footsteps walked closer and closer until they stopped. “It’s fine Rahab, I know you would not betray our nation,” he said as he brushed his hand along her cheek. He leaned in to whisper in her ear, “Afterall, you have served us so well in the past.” With that he walked out and Rahab hastily slammed the door shut, letting out a huge sigh of relief as she slid her back against the door collapsing to the floor, sobbing. After a few minutes, when we were convinced that the soldiers had left, me and Ishmael hurried down from the attic to go sit with Rahab. I put my arms around her, her whole body was shivering. She was scared and I don’t blame her. It was no easy task to turn on your own nation, your own religion for two spies from another nation that you had only met today. She had literally given her life for us.

Later that evening, after we had taken a bath, we sat down to eat. We ate our food in silence. Ishmael kept looking at me, obviously trying to signal something to me with his eyes. I don’t think he trusted the lady, and from his expression he was probably saying, “Why are we even still here?! Lets get as far away from here as possible!” But I didn’t want to leave her, not after what she did for us. I asked her, “Why did you save us Rahab?” I felt Ishmael rolling his eyes at my question. Rahab was quiet, and continued sipping on her soup. In hindsight the soup was quite nice, it tasted a bit like beef but the meat was another animal. Perhaps it was buck? I don’t know. But at the time of eating I wasn’t really paying attention to my tastebuds, I was just hungry and I was stuffing myself with food to try and forget my plight. Rahab was even more beautiful having just come out of the shower, her hair curly and frizzy. She could have been much more than a prostitute, I wonder what had made a woman with such potential end up doing this. She raised her eyes from her food and looked at both of us, one by one. “You know, when I was a little girl, I heard the story of nation who’s God was so powerful, he split the Red Sea,” Rahab took another deep breath and continued. “And once I heard that this story was a reality, and that the nation of Israel was on its way here, I was amazed. Unlike most people, fear is not what I felt, but surrender. I wanted to be part of this nation, to surrender to such an amazing God.” Rahab paused to take a sip of water. I looked at Ishmael who was listening attentively with his hand on his chin. He was unusually quiet now, I guess he was trying to figure out what he would tell Joshua. This was not turning out to be the mission where he got to be the hero or the brave soldier who saves the day. No, it was a sexworker that he went in to. He is probably thinking, they might want to leave this one out of the history books. Or maybe he feels a bit awkward because he had had no strings attached sex with her and now he does not know what to say – now that things were getting emotional. Rahab put her glass down and continued, “And when I heard that you guys where Israeli spies, I was taken aback.” I laughed, “You were taken aback because you realised that the people of God are such losers.” Rahab didn’t laugh, infact she ignored me. “I was taken aback, and honoured that God would give me an opportunity to serve you,” she was sobbing by now, “of all the people in the city of Jericho, he would allow a piece of unworthy filth like me to serve his people.” Whoa okay, unworthy filth – what a description. I responded, “You shouldn’t describe yourself like that Rahab, you are not unworthy, and you are definitely not filth. You are beautiful, and you are loved.” Rahab managed a weak smile as she continued sipping her soup.

“Thank you sir, but you know what I mean. You heard what Hadad called me, a whore. If you are a prostitute, you are the lowest of the low.”

“I get you.”

“But your God counted me worthy to help his servants. It means that this God is different. He doesn’t look down on me because of what I do.”

“Yes I understand what you are saying Rahab. And clearly I don’t know this God as well as I thought either. His ways are not as straightforward as I thought. What do you say Ishmael?”

Ishmael stared at me, and carried on munching on his food. Rahab laughed at him, “It’s okay Ishmael, I don’t condemn you for using my services. It’s because of you that I ended up meeting you guys.”

I added, “Yeah Ishmael, and if it weren’t for your lack of sexual restraint, we would be dead.” Ishmael leaned over and ruffled my hair, “Shut up dweeb!” He exclaimed. Argh, I hated when he messed my hair up, “Stop it you goat!” Rahab was beside herself laughing at us. “You know its amazing how human you guys are,” she responded heartily. “I used to think a God that powerful, only wanted perfect people in his nation, but after meeting you two, I see how wrong I was.” Ishmael shoved me playfully, “Ooooooh! She’s talking about you Raziel!”

Later on Ishmael helped Rahab clear up the table while I washed the dishes. I asked Rahab, “So what do you want from us?” She thought for a moment, “I know that God has given you this city. All I ask is that when you launch your attack, remember me and my family. Remember what I did for you and spare me.” Ishmael interjected, “But we can’t do that, God doesn’t want us to spare anyone, lest there be a curse on us!” I glared at Ishmael, “Are you kidding me?! If it were not for Rahab there would be no mission! We would be dead! I think God would be fine with us sparing the person who saved us.” Ishmael shook his head pacing around the room. Rahab looked afraid. I continued, “You’re just worried about telling Joshua how we ended up at a prostitute’s house!” Rahab was alarmed at this, “Is that what you’re worried about Ishmael?” She put her hand on Ishmael’s shoulder, “Look you don’t have to tell him I’m a prostitute if you don’t want to. But if he serves the same God that had mercy on me today by bringing us together, this Joshua will accept me and not hold your sin against you as well. I trust in the mercy of the God of Israel, you should to.” These words seem to get through to Ishmael as he finally nodded and said to Rahab, “Have this scarlet thread dangle outside the window that we come out of. By this we will be able to distinguish which one is your house and will spare it on the day we launch our attack.”

“Oh thank you, thank you for your mercy.”

“Also, make sure your family members are all in this house on that day, otherwise their blood will be on their own hands.”

“I will definitely do that.”

“And if you tell anyone about us, then we won’t be obliged to keep our promise to you.”

“I understand and I won’t tell a soul.”

At midnight, Rahab bid us farewell, as me and Ishmael escaped the city though the window in her house. It was quite convenient that her house was built within the city wall. We ran and made our way for the hills as Rahab instructed us. We were going to stay there until the city’s soldiers returned. Only then would we make our way back to our camp where we would hopefully get to brief Joshua on everything that had transpired. As we ran and made our way to the mountain, against the cold desert winds, I turned to look at Ishmael running alongside me. I was so grateful to God for having sent me with this man. God’s ways are certainly not as straightforward as we think. We nearly died, but God kept us. And now it seemed like our mission was going to be a success – nothing could go wrong now!