Everyone knows what fate awaited the pagans of the Old Testament who opposed Yahweh’s chosen people, or who simply happened to be living in the wrong place at the wrong time.
The Hebrew authors made it plain: The Egyptians suffered horrible plagues, including one that killed Egyptian infants. The Egyptian army drowned in the Red Sea. The powerful Canaanite giant Goliath was beheaded by a resourceful Hebrew youth named David. Prior to authorizing the genocide in Canaan, venerable Moses slaughtered the Amorites of Heshbon, a city east of the Jordan River, and then did likewise to the city of Bashan, leaving no survivors.
Facing certain doom, what options were open to the goyim of the day?
David Haddad
Those same Hebrew authors of the Old Testament provided an answer: Capitulate, surrender, yield, submit, acquiesce, embrace and otherwise bow down to the omnipotent, benevolent, if sometimes stern rule of Yahweh. And ye shall be saved.
How best to convey this divine guidance? Enter the story of Rahab.
According to biblical scholars, Rahab was an innkeeper, no, a prostitute, who ran a hotel, no, a brothel, which was part of one of the city walls of Jericho.
To facilitate his plan to destroy Jericho, Moses’ dutiful successor Joshua sent two spies into the city. They stayed for some indeterminate time in Rahab’s “lodgings.” The king of Jericho learned about the infiltration of the spies. He immediately sent messengers to Rahab with orders to evict the two spies.
But Rahab had hidden the men on the roof. She claimed she did not know their whereabouts and did not know they were spies. She said they already had left and were outside the city gates. She suggested that the messengers should pursue the two spies. Maybe they still could be caught.
The king’s men set out in pursuit of the spies, to no avail.
Why did Rahab protect the spies? The Book of Joshua explains:
“I know that the LORD has given you this land and that a great fear of you has fallen on us, so that all who live in this country are melting in fear because of you. We have heard how the LORD dried up the water of the Red Sea for you when you came out of Egypt, and what you did to Sihon and Og, the two kings of the Amorites east of the Jordan, whom you completely destroyed. When we heard of it, our hearts melted in fear and everyone’s courage failed because of you, for the LORD your God is God in heaven above and on the earth below.”
What did Rahab earn for her belief in the Hebrew God?
“’Our lives for your lives,’” the spies assured her. “’If you don’t tell what we are doing, we will treat you kindly and faithfully when the LORD gives us the land.” So she let them down by a rope through the window, for the house she lived in was part of the city wall.
The noble Israelite spies honored their word:
“Christian Zionists are today’s remorseless Rahabs.”
Joshua said to the two men who had spied out the land, “Go into the prostitute’s house and bring her out and all who belong to her, in accordance with your oath to her.”
So the young men who had done the spying went in and brought out Rahab, her father and mother, her brothers and sisters and all who belonged to her. They brought out her entire family and put them in a place outside the camp of Israel.
Joshua spared Rahab the prostitute, with her family and all who belonged to her, because she hid the men Joshua had sent as spies to Jericho — and she lives among the Israelites to this day.
The rest of Jericho was not so fortunate:
They devoted the city to the LORD and destroyed with the sword every living thing in it — men and women, young and old, cattle, sheep and donkeys.
Then they burned the whole city and everything in it, but they put the silver and gold and the articles of bronze and iron into the treasury of the LORD’s house.
At that time Joshua pronounced this solemn oath: “Cursed before the LORD is the one who undertakes to rebuild this city, Jericho: At the cost of his firstborn son he will lay its foundations; at the cost of his youngest he will set up its gates.”
So the LORD was with Joshua, and his fame spread throughout the land.
The authors of this story made it clear that Rahab felt no remorse for enabling the genocide in Jericho and the demolition of the city. Such trifles paled in comparison to the divine joy of being seen as righteous in the eyes of Yahweh and on the side of his chosen people.
She felt no remorse when her beloved Joshua invaded the town of Ai, where Joshua and his men slaughtered the city’s 12,000 inhabitants and burned the city to the ground. She felt no remorse when they hung the king of Ai from a tree and then buried him under a pile of stones.
She felt no remorse when Joshua killed the five kings of Jerusalem. Joshua had his men force the kings to lie down on the ground. His men put their feet on the necks of the five kings. As they lay defenseless, Joshua killed the kings. She felt no remorse when Joshua had his men hang them from a tree.
She felt no remorse when later that day, Yahweh’s chosen people slaughtered the men, women and children of Makkedah and Libnah.
Christian Zionists are today’s remorseless Rahabs. They live in thrall of a 3,000-year-old work of Israelite propaganda. They are terrified of the wrath of a mythological Hebrew deity. They do not object to the genocide in Gaza. They stand by as the West Bank is ethnically cleansed. They say nothing as Lebanon is demolished. They shrug as journalists are murdered. Hospitals destroyed. Water poisoned. Babies shot. Aid ships attacked. White phosphorous dropped. Prisoners raped. Children targeted. Nothing can make them question the truth of Rahab’s premise: “The LORD your God is God in heaven above and on the earth below.”
But Rahab must have been correct, they argue. Yahweh must be the one true God. The New Testament confirms it. Rahab is to be honored. After all, Hebrews 11:31 honors Rahab for her faith. James 2:25 honors Rahab for her works. And Matthew 1:5 honors Rahab for her progeny — most notably David, Solomon and yes, Jesus.
There are many stories and passages in both the Old and New Testaments that are euphemistically deemed “troubling.” All sorts of theological gymnastics are performed to explain them away. Or to understand their context. Sometimes that’s not enough. Sometimes these stories and passages are irredeemable. Sometimes they should be repudiated altogether.
David Haddad is a playwright who lives in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico. His provocative plays include Yahweh the Floorwalker, Somebody Named Shaw, and The Scope of William Jennings Bryan. He is currently writing a new play, Rahab.