IN A MANGER
The rising sun pushed through a bank of purple cloud and touched with
long rosy beams the roof of Samuel the weaver's house. On the narrow
parapet that bordered the roof walked a number of snowy pigeons,
stepping delicately with heads raised and thrown back as if to enjoy the
splendor and freshness of the early morning.
In one corner of the roof lay a dark heap, heedless of sunlight, morning
breeze, or bird, conscious only of the blackest misery, the deepest
hopelessness that an eight-year-old heart can know.
It was Naomi, who lay with hands clenched and face pressed against the
cold stone, too heartsick for tears, wishing only in her wretchedness
to creep away where she might be alone.
Presently she stirred and lifted her head.
Quite a different Naomi was this from the happy, generous child who had
sacrificed her flower garden for the sake of an ailing lamb; not at all
like the little girl who had set forth so joyfully for a day's pleasure
in Jerusalem. Her little robe was wrinkled, her curls were tangled and
rough, her face was pinched and pitiful. With her soft little fist she
beat upon the roof in time with the rhythm of her words.
"Did they think I could not hear?" she asked, speaking aloud in her
fullness of heart. "Did Elisabeth, the wife of Amos, think that I was
deaf as well as blind that she should say aloud, 'The child Naomi will
never see again. There is no hope.'"
"No hope! No hope! And perhaps I shall live to be as old as lame
Enoch's grandmother lived to be. Who will care for me then? Who will
give me shelter and food? Amos of Nazareth thought of that, too. I heard
him, though he whispered low. 'She will be always a burden. It were
better that she should die.' I heard him. He said those words. 'She will
be always a burden. It were better that she should die.'"
"Die? Die? I cannot die. I am well and strong. I shall live and live and
live. My mother and father will die and leave me, and Ezra and Jonas
will weary of me. I shall be a beggar by the roadside. No hope! No
hope!"
Naomi sank down again in a little heap and rocked to and fro. Her
misfortune seemed too dreadful to be borne. It was incredible that such
a fate should overtake her. It might happen to Rachel, or Rebekah, or
to stout Solomon across the road, but not to Naomi, the daughter of
Samuel the weaver.
As she swayed back and forth, torn by her misery, there came to her,
like balm upon a wound, the familiar, comforting words that her mother
and father had used over and over of late, to soothe the little girl's
pain and to encourage hope in the sad hearts of them all.
"I had fainted unless I had believed to see the goodness of Jehovah
In the land of the living.
Wait for Jehovah:
Be strong, and let thy heart take courage;
Yea, wait thou for Jehovah."
Naomi rose to her feet. The startled pigeons withdrew a short way and
stood watching her curiously with their hard, bright eyes. About her was
the soft sunlight, over her head the deep blue sky.
She turned her sightless face toward Jerusalem and spoke as if to a
friend present.
"Yea, Lord," said the little Jewish girl in simple faith, "I will wait
for Thee, and for Thy Messiah who will open the eyes of the blind.
Surely when Messiah cometh I shall see. And until then, I will wait and
pray for His coming. I will wait."
On the outer stairway that led from the ground to the roof stood Ezra,
breathless, his hand pressed against his side. He had run all the way,
without stopping, up the steep lanes from the Bethlehem stable, and now,
pausing to rest an instant before speaking to Naomi, he could not help
overhearing the last words she said.
"So thou wilt wait?" he whispered, his breath coming in gasps. "Thou
wilt wait for His coming? Nay, my little sister, thy time of waiting is
over. The Messiah is here! The Christ is born! O that I might shout it
from the housetop, that my father and mother and all the world may know
that the Lord hath kept His promise and the Messiah hath come!"
Ezra's whole heart and soul were full of a great new hope, and the sight
of Naomi's tear-stained face and groping, outstretched hands made him
long to tell her the good tidings at once.
But the boy's love for his unhappy little sister made him wise beyond
his years.
"If I tell her, and it does not come to pass as she wishes, it will
break her heart," he argued. "The Messiah is but a tiny Baby now, weak
and helpless. It may be He must grow to manhood before He can heal the
blind, the deaf, and the sick. Who knows? Not I. I will not tell her
yet."
So Ezra clattered noisily up the remaining steps of the stairway,
calling out:
"Naomi! Naomi! Where art thou? Oh, here thou art! Are thy sandals well
tied? For I have come to take thee down to the inn stable to show thee
something there. And what it is, thou couldst never guess if thou didst
guess a hundred years."
Naomi shook her head.
"Show me? What could I see? Nay, I will go nowhere, Ezra," she answered
sadly. "If I went, I could not see thy wondrous sight. I would far
rather stay at home."
"But this is something to feel," said Ezra coaxingly, putting his arm
about Naomi and leading her gently toward the stairway. "Tell me, dost
thou remember when young Deborah, the vine-dresser's wife, laid
something soft and warm in thine arms?"
"A baby, Ezra?" asked Naomi, stopping short. "A baby at the inn stable?"
"Aye," said Ezra firmly, "a Baby! A Baby born in a stable and lying in
a manger because there was no room last night at the inn."
"But I cannot see it, Ezra," said Naomi mournfully. "Why should I go? I
cannot see."
"Dost thou remember, too, how Deborah's baby clung to thy finger?" said
the crafty Ezra, guiding her tenderly down the steps as he talked. "And
did ye not find it pleasant to hold? You rocked it to and fro all day
long, Naomi. You said that you wished that Jonas might be put back in
swaddling clothes again."
"Aye, it was pleasant," admitted Naomi. "But Deborah brought the baby to
me. I will not go to the khan, Ezra. I do not wish to meet any one. My
heart is heavy. There will be people to stare at me and to talk in the
lanes and at the stable. I will not go."
"Naomi," said Ezra desperately, "dost thou love me?"
"Aye, thou knowest that I love thee," answered Naomi in surprise.
"Then, to please me, come to the inn stable," was Ezra's quick response.
"Ask me no questions and delay not, but come. It is early, Naomi. We
will meet no one, I hope and trust. Give me thy hand and come."
Naomi instantly slipped a thin little hand into her brother's
outstretched palm.
"For love of thee, Ezra," said she sweetly. "For love of thee."
Down the quiet road, deserted in the winter season at this early hour,
Ezra led Naomi, carefully guiding her over the stones and ruts in the
rough highway. Unobserved, they slipped quietly through the town gate,
and when a turn in the road brought the khan into view Ezra threw his
arm about his sister and quickened their steps.
He spoke but once.
"One of thy pigeons flies before us, Naomi," said he, "as if to lead us
on. It glistens in the sun like silver."
Naomi only nodded and clung the tighter to Ezra's arm.
Past the inn and round to the stable door he led her, and there they
halted.
"Naomi," said Ezra, his voice trembling with hope and fear, "thou
knowest the stable well. Enter, and walk forward until thy feet touch
the straw before the manger. There lies the Babe!"
With a gentle push Ezra started Naomi toward the Mother and Child, whose
figures he could dimly see on a heap of straw at the back of the cave.
Then in the shadow of the doorway Ezra fell upon his knees.
"O Lord," he prayed, "I know that this is Thy Messiah. I believe that
Thou hast sent Him. Thou hast promised of old that when Messiah cometh
He shall open the eyes of the blind. I would that He might open my
sister Naomi's eyes. If Thou wilt answer this prayer, Lord, I will
promise Thee anything. I will be Thy faithful servant, I will be an
obedient son, I will learn my lessons well at school and never shirk. I
will no more throw stones at stout Solomon nor even call him names. I
will promise anything Thou mayst ask of me, if Thy Messiah will only
open my sister Naomi's eyes. Hear my prayer, O Lord, hear my prayer."
Within the stable Naomi crept cautiously forward. Her footsteps lagged,
for she had no heart in this undertaking.
What pleasure could there be for her in visiting a stranger's baby which
she could not even see? A short time ago, to hold the soft little body
close and to feel the tiny clinging hands might have given her a
moment's happiness; but to-day her heart was so full of misery that
there was no room in it for joy to enter. She longed to sink down on the
stable floor. Only her love for Ezra kept her moving.
She felt the straw before the manger beneath her feet, and she dropped
to her knees and stretched out a timid hand.
Yes, the Mother and Child were before her.
She fingered the hem of the cloak wrapped about the young Mother, but
she could not bring herself to touch the little Child.
"I care not! I care not!" thought Naomi hopelessly. "What to me is this
Baby? Why should Ezra wish me to visit this Child?"
As if in answer to her unspoken question, with a sudden lovely gesture,
the Child leaned forward. His tiny fingers touched Naomi's forehead and
His hands rested for an instant upon her darkened eyes.
* * * * *
Naomi opened and closed her eyes rapidly. She rose to her feet and
stared about her. Was it a dream, the same kind of a dream with which
she had so often lightened the weary hours of darkness, the long watches
of the night, when she had called to mind some old familiar scene--her
mother at the well, the country road, Ezra hastening home from school?
Now the inn stable rose before her. Did she really see the nose of an ox
thrusting itself over the stall? Or did she only dream the mound of hay,
and on it the young Mother wrapped in a wide blue cloak and in her arms
a Child, at the velvet touch of Whose tiny hands the black curtain had
dropped from before her eyes?
Naomi rubbed her hands together and looked down at them. Yes, they were
her own hands. There was the familiar little brown spot on the inside of
her third finger. Her dress? Yes, that was an old friend, the yellow and
red striped robe. She had worn it the day in the garden that she had
given her four scarlet poppies in exchange for little Three Legs.
Then it was true! She did see. But how had it happened? Why at the touch
of this Baby hand had her sight been restored?
"Ezra!" she called, not daring to stir. "Ezra!"
Ezra's face, white under the tan, showed itself round the stable door.
"Ezra," cried Naomi, "I can see! I can see! I know not how it is, but I
was blind and now I see! O Ezra, the Baby touched me and I can see!"
Ezra came swiftly forward. His eyes were full of tears, but his face was
radiant. He knelt before the Mother, who was watching the scene with
wondering eyes, and the Child, Who slept now in His Mother's arms. He
pulled Naomi down beside him.
"Naomi, it is the Christ Child," he whispered. "The Messiah has come!
Our Saviour lies before us! O Naomi, the Messiah hath opened the eyes of
the blind! The Lord hath heard my prayer!"
And bending low before Him, they worshiped at the Christ Child's feet.