* * * * *

Original.

THE MOTHERS OF THE BIBLE

RIZPAH.

In order fully to understand the subject of our present study, we must return upon the track, to the days of Joshua, before Israel had wholly entered upon the possession of the promised land.  The tribes were encamped at Gilgal to keep the passover, and from there, by the direction of Jehovah, they made incursions upon the surrounding inhabitants.  Jericho and Ai had been taken, and the fear of these formidable Hebrews and their mighty God had fallen upon the hearts of the nations and stricken them almost to hopelessness.  Feeling that a last effort to save themselves and their homes must be made, they banded together and resolved to defend their rights, and to put to proof the combined power of their deities.  One clan, however, despairing of success by any such means, having heard that the utter extirpation of the Canaanites was determined upon, resorted to stratagem, and thus secured their safety in the midst of the general ruin.  “They did work wilily,” says the sacred record, “and made as if they had been ambassadors, and took old sacks upon their asses, and wine bottles old, and rent, and bound up; and old shoes and clouted upon their feet, and old garments upon them; and all the bread of their provision was dry and mouldy.  And they went to Joshua unto the camp at Gilgal, and said unto him, and to the men of Israel, We be come from a far country, now therefore make ye a league with us.”  At first the Israelites seem to have suspected trickery, but when the supposed ambassadors produced their mouldy bread, and declared that it was taken hot from the oven on the morning of their departure from their own country, and that their wine bottles were new, now so shrunk and torn, and pointed to their shoes and garments quite worn out by the length of the journey; and told their pitiful story, and in their humility stooped to any terms if they might only be permitted to make a covenant, Joshua and his elders were completely deceived, and without stopping to ask counsel of the Lord, “they made peace with them, and made a league with them to let them live.”

The Lord abhors treachery, and although his people had greatly erred in this act, and although these Hivites were among the nations whom he had commanded them to destroy, yet since a covenant had been made with them, it must be kept on peril of his stern displeasure and severe judgments.  Only three days elapsed before the Israelites discovered that the crafty ambassadors were their near neighbors, and were called upon to come to their defense against the other inhabitants of the land, who having heard of the transaction at Gilgal, had gathered together to smite their principal city, Gibeon, and destroy them because they had made peace with Joshua.  Before the walls of that mighty city, and in behalf of these idolaters, because Jehovah