A cool breeze rustled the trees as Theophilus went on, telling of the animosity between the women and their sons. Atretes nodded in agreement as he heard how Hagar and Ishmael were cast out, for it was through Isaac that the promised nation would come forth.
“God tested Abraham, for he told him to make of Isaac a burnt offering. Abraham rose early, took his son and wood, and went to the place the Lord had told him to go. There he built an altar, arranged the wood, bound his son, and laid him upon it. But when he took the knife to slay him, an angel of the Lord told him to stay his hand. Abraham believed, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness. God provided a ram for sacrifice and renewed his covenant with Abraham, telling him yet again that through his seed all the nations of the earth would be blessed.”
Theophilus leaned forward, face glowing. “For it was through Abraham that a people of faith came into being, and from them, God promised all mankind the Messiah, the anointed one, who would overcome the sin in the Garden of Eden and give those who believe in him eternal life.” He smiled. “But I’m jumping ahead.”
Retracing, he told Atretes how Isaac married Rebekah, who bore him twin sons, Esau and Jacob. Esau, the elder, sold his birthright to his younger brother for a bowl of food, and Jacob later stole his brother’s blessing by trickery and deceit. Enmity arose between the two brothers, and Jacob fled to Laban, his mother’s brother. He fell in love with Laban’s younger daughter, Rachel. Through Laban’s trickery and deceit, Jacob married Leah and then Rachel and was bound to his uncle for more than fourteen years. From these two women and their two handmaidens, Jacob fathered twelve sons.
“The favorite son was Joseph, son of Jacob’s beloved wife, Rachel. Joseph was a dreamer of dreams and prophesied a time when he would rule over his brothers and his own father. His brothers despised him and, in their jealousy, plotted against him. They threw him into a cistern and sold him to a traveling caravan that took him to Egypt, where he became a slave of Potiphar, an Egyptian officer of the pharaoh. Joseph was a handsome young man, and Potiphar’s wife wanted him for her lover, but Joseph refused. When she tried to seduce him, he ran away. Scorned and angry, she told her husband that Joseph had tried to rape her, and so Potiphar cast Joseph into the dungeon.”
Atretes gave a cynical laugh. “Women have been causing trouble for men from the beginning,” he said, stretching out on his side.
Rizpah glanced up from where she was changing Caleb’s linens. “That’s true,” she said, smiling. “When men are weak and given to passion rather than obedience to the Lord, they usually do run into trouble head-on.”
Atretes ignored her observation and raised his brow at Theophilus.
Suppressing a smile, Theophilus continued, telling of Joseph’s God-given ability to interpret dreams and how this gift brought him into the palace of Pharaoh and made him second in power in all Egypt. When the prophesied famine came, Joseph’s brothers journeyed to Egypt for grain, thus fulfilling the prophesies of his youth that he would rule over them as well as his father.
“Joseph forgave them, telling them that what they had done for evil, God had turned to good.”
Rizpah settled Caleb in a nest of packs and blankets and came back to sit near Atretes.
“Another pharaoh rose who didn’t know of Joseph’s deeds. He saw a threat in the increasing number of Joseph’s descendants and made them slaves. When their number continued to grow, Pharaoh became alarmed and commanded that all male newborns were to be killed. Moses, a descendant of Abraham, was born and placed in a basket and hidden among the reeds of the Nile. Pharaoh’s daughter found him and raised him as her own son. When he grew to manhood, he went to his brethren and looked upon their hard labors. He saw an Egyptian beating a Hebrew and struck him down. When word spread among the Hebrews of what he had done, he fled to Midian. There, after years in exile, God spoke to Moses from a burning bush.”
Theophilus smiled slightly. “Now, Moses was an ordinary man and terrified that God was speaking to him. When God told him he wanted him to return to Egypt and lead the Hebrew slaves out of bondage, Moses was more afraid of the mission than of God himself. He pleaded, saying he was nobody. God said he would be his spokesman. Moses said he didn’t know God’s name and the Hebrews wouldn’t believe him. God told him to say that I AM had sent him. Moses still resisted, insisting they wouldn’t believe him. God told him to throw his staff on the ground, and when he obeyed, the Lord turned it into a serpent. Moses ran from it, terrified, but God called him back and told him to take hold of the tail. When he obeyed, the serpent became a staff once more.