“I mean, when did you start preparing for the baby?”
“Well, it’s silly.” Pink blotches rose from her neck to her cheeks as she reached for a loosely woven fabric of heavy wool. “The next day I started weaving this blanket. At first, my husband laughed at me, but then he started building that cradle.”
“Yes, that is right.” Uriel smiled as he contemplated the woven basket next to their reed sleeping mats.
The older sister pursed her lips and glared at the blanket. “You’re not suggesting that if I wove a blanket, I would have conceived too, are you?”
“Of course not. The blanket itself was insignificant, as was the cradle. Your sister’s conviction made her a fitting vessel.” Rumah’s mouth was a thin line, and her eyes darted back and forth between the blanket and Uriel. “Milcah acted as if the blessing was already fulfilled. She created a space in her heart for the blessing to rest, allowing it to bear fruit.” Rumah’s hands unclenched as her eyes settled on his face. “Do you remember what you thought when you left me last?”
“I do.” She bent her head with a short laugh. “I even remember talking to my husband when I got home. He asked me, ‘Do you think it will work?’ I told him, ‘Who can tell? Milcah thinks it will. What harm could there be in going along?’” Her eyes rose back to Uriel’s, filled with a new light. “So if I believe, it will work?”
“I cannot promise you that. As I said, the key of birth is beyond my grasp.” Uriel’s words extinguished the light in her eyes, but his face remained radiant.
“And if it fails? If there is no child?”
I knew the look in her eyes well; I imagine such a look also brightened my eyes whenever my hopes rose. Despite the misery I’d suffered from dashed hopes, despite all the dangers, I wanted Uriel to keep her hope alive. Milcah turned away from her sister, as I held my breath.
“Then you have a choice. You can embrace your present state, receiving it as the will of the Holy One, and seeing it as an opportunity for growth in this world. Or you can struggle against it. But know now that your struggle will not succeed. I cannot say that joy in this decree will provide what you desire, but bitterness certainly dries up the wellsprings of blessing.”
One Year Later
In the Cave of Dotan
“Master, is it true that our futures can be read in the stars?”
Hesitation lingered in the black air. Was it wrong of me to mention the stars, which my master surely knew he would never see again? I twisted a loose string on my worn tunic.
“It is true,” he eventually responded, “…most of the time.”
“Do the nevi’im read the future there?”
“No, Lev. We keep far from that path.”
“Why, Master?”
“The stars are a bridge between this world and the one beyond. One skilled at reading their movements can see what is coming into this world before it arrives.”
“Then why avoid them, Master?”
“Our father Abraham was a master stargazer and read in the heavens that he and his wife were never to have children together. But the Holy One raised Abraham above the stars, promising him that they would no longer bind him and his descendants.”
“So the fortunes of Israel don’t lie in the stars?”
“Most of the time our destiny can be seen there as well. But when we choose a higher path, our destiny is ruled directly by the Holy One, bypassing the stars. That is why the prophets avoid their guidance: they do not wish to limit the future to the confines of the present.”
Rabbi Eliezer said: Warm yourself by the fire of the Sages, but beware of their glowing coals lest you get burnt—for their bite is the bite of a fox, their sting is the sting of a scorpion, their hiss is the hiss of a serpent, and all their words are like fiery coals.
Pirkei Avot 2:15
3
Honoring the Calf
“When you find Yosef ben Avner,” Uriel’s voice was soft, but no less commanding, in the dawn light, “tell him we shall meet tomorrow at the junction.”
I peered across the mist rising from the valley, westward toward the ancient walls of Beit El. “How will I find him?”
“Quite easily, I imagine. There is no other like him in the city.”
“But where does he live?”
“He once lived in the weavers’ quarter, but I do not know if he has remained there. I have not entered Beit El in upward of sixty years.”
My head swung back to stare at the prophet. Sixty years? The men in Levonah who reached sixty years ground their food to mash before eating it, yet Uriel still had a full set of teeth. Just how old was he?
The prophet waved at my untouched bread. “Eat. There is no knowing how long you’ll be gone.”
I took a bite of the dry loaf, forcing myself to chew—I shouldn’t fail in my task because of hunger. Uriel walked out to a precipice that cast a shadow over the junction below and sat down on its rocky edge.
“Are you going to sit here alone all day?”
“Probably, though sometimes visitors come to me even in this place.”
I swallowed another bite. “Why haven’t you entered Beit El in sixty years?”
The prophet shifted his eyes to a cloud of dust rising above the road in the distance, and my question evaporated in the morning light. “That looks like a royal messenger riding toward Beit El. If you hurry, you can catch him. There might be news.”
I shoved the last chunk of bread into my mouth, slung my water skin over my shoulder, and raced toward the path. My legs ached from the long march the day before, their stiffness resisting every step. Hoofbeats echoed in the distance, and I pushed myself into a run down the steep, rock-strewn path. This was a mistake. I didn’t notice a cluster of loose pebbles until my foot was upon it. My arms shot out for balance, a weak compensation for fumbled footing. My backside hit the ground first, and I slid down the hard-packed trail until my left knee banged into a boulder.
