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Noah's Ark: The Novelization
by Eric Elfman
Based on the NBC-TV mini-series
Start at the Beginning | Start at Chapter Seven
Chapter 8
The years flew swiftly past.
Two years...
With the Lord’s help, Noah and his sons built a fine and sturdy house. They learned to plow their fields and plant and harvest crops. They erected a barn some distance downwind from the main house so Naamah wouldn’t have to smell the animals.
...four years...
They didn’t socialize much with their neighbors. The people of Gerar were clannish and suspicious of outsiders. When Noah and his family brought their crops to market, the people of the town barely acknowledged them.
...six years...
To be sure, Noah was put off by the local people’s beliefs in hundreds of gods--there was a god of the sun and a god of the moon, a god for day and a god for night, a god of good times and a god of bad times. And for their part, the people of Gerar were fearful of Noah’s belief in one God.
...eight years...
The continuing drought had been making things difficult in the region--although Noah’s fields next to the river always had plenty of water with which to irrigate the thirsty crops. The locals were jealous of Noah’s good fortune. And although the dry weather had been going on long before Noah and his family arrived in the region, that didn’t stop many of the locals, including the priests, from blaming Noah for their problems. His belief in only one god, the local priests said, were angering Mole, their rain god.
...finally ten years passed.
Ham, Shem and Japheth were now fine young men. Noah and Naamah knew that it was time for their sons to begin thinking about taking wives.
Even though they hadn’t spent much time mingling with the villagers, each of their sons had noticed young ladies who had caught their fancies...
# # #
The very first year that Noah’s farm produced a crop, Ham had gone with his father to the marketplace to try to sell their extra vegetables. As Noah haggled with the other villagers over the price of yams, Ham noticed a young girl standing near a tree.
Trying to impress her, Ham walked over to where she was standing, put his hands on the tree, and climbed up to the lowest branch. He stood on it and looked down--but the girl had disappeared.
"Up here," a female voice said. Ham looked up--the girl was on the branch above him. Somehow she had snuck past him.
Furious, Ham put his hands on the higher branch and shook it, but the girl just giggled and climbed to the next higher branch. "Race you to the top," she shouted down to him.
I’ll show her, Ham thought. And he began to climb. The two of them raced up the sides of the tree, Ham always one or two branches below.
As they neared the top, the branches got thinner and thinner. Suddenly, the branch Ham was standing on snapped, and he began to fall. Branches and leaves hit him on the face as he fell through them. Finally he landed on a thick branch that held under his weight. Ham grabbed it and stayed there, dizzy.
"Are you all right?" the girl asked from the branch above.
Ham nodded weakly. "You beat me," he said.
The girl nodded, satisfied. "My name’s Ruth," she said. "What’s yours?"
# # #
During their first summer on the farm, Shem decided to draw a map of the river that flowed past their property.
He carefully laid out a piece of parchment, sharpened the ends of several goose feathers to use as quills, and mixed some soot from the fireplace with some melted fat to make ink. Then, early one morning, he followed the contours of the river, sketching them with care. As he rounded an embankment at the north edge of their property, he nearly tripped over a girl who staring at some frogs in a small pool at the banks.
"Careful," the girl scolded him. "You almost stepped on them."
"What are you doing?" Shem asked her, suddenly forgetting all about his map.
"I’m studying these frogs," she said, returning her attention to the small green animals.
"Why?" Shem asked.
"You can learn a lot from studying nature," she explained patiently, as if to a much younger child. "I think the entire story of people could be understood if we only paid more attention to the natural world."
Shem was speechless. He had been convinced that he was the only person in the world who felt this way.
"My name is Shem," he said when at last he could speak.
"I’m Miriam," said the girl.
# # #
It took Japheth a good deal longer to meet the girl of his dreams. This was due to the fact that Japheth often spent hours lost in the thoughts running through his head, completely shutting himself off from the world around him.
Japheth could wonder for miles, seeing nothing, hearing no one, as inside his head he worked through complex ideas, told himself long and involved adventure stories, speculated on the origins of natural phenomena, imagined new and exciting music, conjured up stunning works of art. He was convinced his thoughts were far more stimulating than anything the mere physical world could provide.
That was until he met Esther.
During their fourth year on the farm, as Japheth was wondering through the fields on the outskirts of town, he nearly tripped over a girl who was laying in the thick, deep grass, staring unblinking into the blue afternoon sky.
"What are you doing there?" he asked.
"Shhh," answered the girl. "I’m trying to see them."
"See what?" asked Japheth.
"The stars," she said. "They must be out there. If we can see them so clearly at night, why can’t we see them during the day?"
Japheth lay down in the grass next to her, and together they remained until the sun began to set and they could finally see the stars.
# # #
So it was that in their tenth year on the farm, near the end of the planting season, Ham, Shem and Japheth approached their parents. It was time, they said, to ask their young ladies for their hands in marriage.
Naamah cried, and Noah sighed, but both agreed that it was time.
One night, after dinner, the boys put on their best smocks and jerkins. The boys endured a brief inspection from Naamah, who examined their hands and fingernails, and smoothed down Shem’s hair.
Noah chuckled at the attention she was giving to these tiny details.
"They’re going courting," Naamah said. "I want them to look their best."
"They are who they are, Naamah," Noah countered.
The boys kissed their mother and headed out the door.
"Take care, boys," Noah called after them. "and watch out for trouble. Our neighbors--"
"We don’t want any trouble, father," Japheth called back, cutting him off.
"But if they start any--" Shem began.
"--we’ll finish it!" Ham finished.
Noah shook his head and waved as they disappeared down the road.
# # #
The sun was close to setting as the three young men approached the village.
As they passed a small clearing by the side of the road, they heard a tinkling of bells in the trees.
"Look," said Ham.
An elaborate shrine had been set up in the clearing. More than a dozen dead animals, their throats slashed, were laid at the feet of a monstrous, grinning idol. Strips of cloth, dipped in the blood of the dead creatures, had been attached to bells and hung on the nearby trees, where they were fluttering in the gentle breeze.
Ham, Shem and Japheth recognized the local idol. It was Mole, the god of rain.
"They’re getting desperate," Ham observed. The last time they had came by this clearing there had only been a few animals before the idol and there had been no blood stained rags or bells.
"Well it hasn’t rained for years," Shem pointed out.
"Well they’re not going to get it praying to a mole!" Japheth remarked.
The boys laughed and walked on.
"Thank God for our God," Shem said.
"Amen!" the others answered.
But they grew quiet as they entered the village.
It was deserted.
The village wasn’t large. There was a small marketplace with a few stalls, a few small houses, and a large temple at the end of the street. At this time of day there should have been many people about--villagers buying and selling in the market, squabbling over the prices of the few remaining heads of cabbage and bunches of carrots, families enjoying the last rays of sunlight, the village officer patrolling the street.
"Where is everybody?" Ham asked, as much to himself as to his brothers. They exchanged worried looks, then quickly went their separate ways.
While Japheth strode to Esther’s house, and Shem trotted to Miriam’s, Ham ran all the way to Ruth’s house and began knocking loudly on the door.
"Open up," he cried, "where’s Ruth" What’s going on?"
Ham discovered that the door was ajar and pushed it open.
The living room was a shambles. Ruth’s mother was sitting in the broken remains of a chair, moaning to herself.
"What happened?" Ham shouted, striding quickly to the moaning woman and kneeling down by her side. "Where’s Ruth!"
"Oh Ham," she said, focusing her teary eyes on him. "Ham, they took her--they took my baby girl!"
Ham was bursting inside, but he had to force himself to think clearly, and speak calmly. "Who took her," he asked.
"The Priests. To the Temple," the woman said, then wailed, "I’ll never see her again!"
Ham turned and ran from the house.
He arrived in the square at the same time as his brothers, who had obviously gotten similar news.
The three young men turned toward the Temple and began marching forward.
"We’ll have to fight," said Ham, his mouth tight, his fists ready.
"There’s only three of us," said Shem. "If Father were here..."
"I’m not waiting," said Ham.
Japheth cocked his head, his eyes gazing into the distance. "We don’t have to wait," he said. "He’ll know we need him"
# # #
Noah reclined in his chair and poured himself a glass of wine.
"I thought the Lord didn’t like drinking," Naamah said.
They were sitting out on the porch, enjoying the cool evening breeze.
Noah shook his head. "Only in large quantities," he said. "The Lord once told me that most things taken in large quantities are bad, while the same things taken in small quantities are good."
Noah suddenly sat up straight in his chair.
Although he hadn’t heard from God since that day ten years earlier when they had arrived at Gerar, Noah still felt the Lord’s presence burning within him--a constant, comforting, ever present fire. And even if God didn’t speak to Noah, that didn’t keep Noah from speaking to God.
But now he felt an urgency, a gentle throbbing to the fire inside, a kind of prodding.
"What is it?" Naamah asked.
"The boys need my help," Noah said, standing.
Naamah rushed into the house and came out with a big iron frying pan. "I’m coming with you," she announced.
Together they headed toward the village.
# # #
The Temple was filled to overflowing. Torches burned in their sconces along the walls. The flickering of the light seemed to animate the hideous stone idols at the front of the large room, the pantheon of the gods of Gerar. The statues’ eyes seemed to move this way and that, as if estimating the size of the crowd.
This was to be an important ceremony. The priests were going to offer a great sacrifice to the rain god Mole.
According to ritual, Mole demanded his sacrifices in threes. Usually three chickens sufficed to bring rainfall for the season. But when years had passed without this working, the priests had advanced to three sheep. When this didn’t work they tried three goats, then three cows. But no animal sacrifice had yet pleased their aloof and capricious god.
There was talk in Gerar that the people were losing faith in the priests. The priests knew they had only one last chance to find an offering that would please the god. So they had decided to sacrifice three young women.
Ruth, Miriam and Esther.
The great stone altar had been polished. The ceremonial knives had been sharpened. The silver receptacles had been prepared to receive their blood.
The only problem the priests encountered was an odd reluctance on part of their victims to be sacrificed.
Earlier in the day, Ruth had been at home helping her mother with the household chores, when the priests arrived.
Ruth knew there was something wrong the instant they walked in. With their insincere smiles and formulaic phrases, Ruth found them more amusing than sinister. But as they explained what they were going to do with her, she felt her blood run cold.
"You want to sacrifice me"" Ruth asked, incredulously.
The priests nodded, and explained that it was for the good of the community. They told her that the god Mole required it of her. They described in glowing terms the glory and honor she would receive in the afterlife.
"I won't do it," Ruth said, her voice rising.
"You dont have a choice," the first Priest said, leaning forward, his smile hardening.
"Oh yes I do," said Ruth.
She fought tooth and nail, and in the end had to be bound and gagged and dragged to the Temple, still struggling to free herself.
It was the same story with Esther and Miriam.
Now, in the privacy of an anteroom off the main hall of the Temple, the three priests commiserated with each other as they nursed their wounds.
"It's the influence of those foreigners!" said the First Priest, tying a bandage where Ruth had cut him.
"And their talk of one God," agreed the Second Priest, holding a piece of raw meat to his eye, where Esther had hit him with a piece of firewood.
"It's just as well we sacrifice them," said the High Priest, gingerly wrapping a bandage around his foot, which Miriam had stomped on and possibly broken. "They're troublemakers."
The other two Priests nodded in agreement.
Out in the great hall, the people were growing impatient.
The priests glanced at each other, and then proceeded to the great hall. A hush fell over the crowd as and they priests approached the stone altar, which had been draped with a ceremonial cloth.
The crowd gasped as the priests whipped the cloth off the altar, revealing the three young women bound together on the cold stone surface.
Even trussed up and gagged the girls fury was unmistakable. The priests tried not to look down at the girls as they addressed the crowd.
"These young woman," intoned the High Priest, "have gallantly agreed to make the supreme sacrifice to save us."
The three women vigorously shook their heads, but the people in the hall werent watching them. Instead, all eyes in the room were focused on the glinting steel blade of the large knife in the priests hand.
"With all our reverence we dedicate their deaths to the great god Mole," the priest intoned, raising the knife, "that he may provide his followers with the life-giving waters of heaven..."
The priests voice trailed off as the front door of the Temple was hurled open and Noahs three sons stormed into the hall.
"Who invited you"" the High Priest shouted, pointing the knife at the three young men. "You don't worship here!"
Ham, Shem and Japheth ignored the question, and without a word pushed their way through the crowd. Too surprised to resist, the villagers parted and let them through.
Shem pushed the High Priest back as Japheth took away the knife. Ham grabbed Ruth and pulled her off the altar. He grasped the gag and yanked it out of her mouth.
"Are you okay"" Ham asked. "Did they touch you""
"I'm fine," said Ruth. "You got here just in time."
Japheth handed Ham the knife, and he sliced through the ropes holding Ruths arms and legs.
Then Ham turned to Esther and Miriam, still on the alter, and cut the ropes holding them as well. Shem and Japheth helped the girls to their feet.
But by this time the crowd had gotten over the shock of their unexpected intrusion. "Kill them!" someone in the crowd yelled. Others began to shout, "Kill the foreigners! Kill the girls and kill the foreigners!"
The crowd surged forward. There were too many of them to fight. Someone knocked the knife out of Ham’s hand, and rough hands were laid on the rebels.
Ham felt someone grab his throat. His air was cut off, he was being shaken, the world was growing dark, when--
"Stop."
The single word was not spoken loudly, but was said with such assurance everyone in the crowd had to obey. Faces turned toward the door, where the voice had come from.
Noah stood there, glowering at the crowd.
Behind him stood Naamah.
"Release them," Noah continued, "and let us go our way."
The crowd shrank back. Something in the way he spoke, something in his voice, terrified them.
But the priests resisted.
"Or else what?" the High Priest sneered. "What can you do?"
This seemed to break Noah’s hold on the crowd. They surged toward him, all speaking at once, letting out ten years of pent up rage and frustration.
"You came here to take our land!"
"And take our women!"
"Your crops grow while ours fail!"
"You’re a sorcerer!"
"Kill him too!"
"And his wife!"
The frenzied crowd surged forward.
"You can’t harm me, or my family," said Noah, again undercutting the energy of the crowd. They stopped and looked at him.
"Why not," shrieked the Priest, sensing that he was losing the advantage.
"I have God on my side," Noah answered.
"So what?" the Priest laughed, gesturing at the pantheon of idols behind him. "You have only one--we have a dozen dozen!"
The villagers again moved toward Noah.
Noah looked at them levelly, then said, very simply, "Lord, show them."
"Don’t listen to him," cried the Priest, "he’s--"
But the rest of his sentence was drowned out by a deafening, screaming groan--the enormous, bone-rattling moan of the heavy timbers of the Temple’s roof being peeled off the structure above them. Nails and joists screamed in protest as the roof lifted off, pulled by some invisible hand and was sent twirling away into the night sky.
Every head in the crowd looked up. All the villagers were surprised to see the stars where moments before had been a solid roof. The roof itself was a now just barely visible dot, spinning higher and higher into the bright, moonlit sky.
"That’s only for starters," Noah noted.
The crowd shrank back terrified. The Priests were aware that their power was about to slip away altogether.
"What else can he do, this invisible God of yours," the High Priest taunted, more for the benefit of the crowd than through any real conviction.
As if in answer, three lightning bolts shot down from heaven, striking each of the three priests, knocking them to the floor, unconscious.
That was enough for the crowd. They shouted in terror and began stampeding toward the door. Noah pulled Naamah out of the way of the on-rushing villagers, so she wouldn’t be crushed as they passed.
When the crowd had gone, Ham, Shem and Japheth escorted Ruth, Esther and Miriam over to Noah and Naamah. The three young women fell to their knees before him.
"Don’t thank me," Noah insisted, helping them to their feet, "for I did nothing. Give thanks to the Lord."
They left the Temple together, then Noah’s sons took the young women home, after first being assured by Noah that the villagers would henceforth leave them alone.
But as Noah and Naamah headed for home, something was bothering Noah. He couldn’t put his finger on it, but something had changed. Something was different.
They had almost reached home before he realized what it was.
The smell was back.
The rot. The corruption. The terrible smell of man doing evil.
Noah faltered. It couldn’t be. How could it be"
"What is it," Naamah asked, but Noah just waved her on home.
"Go," Noah said hoarsely. "I’ll join you shortly."
Naamah wanted to stay with him, but he insisted.
When she had gone, Noah sat down on a flat rock, and began to weep.
Go to Chapter Nine | Go to Current Installment
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