Mountains

Gerizim and Ebal

For what ends
were we brought into this land?

Mountains, we look to you
who oversee our holiness
guardians of the pact that made the land sacred
altar of Abraham when he was promised the land

But crimes gather around the crack between your rises
thefts and violations—
its shelter city was not a haven for all who came
the woman who helped women
and was raped and then avenged by men in sanctimonious terror
the youth stripped of his identity and rank by
his brothers and consigned to a far-off servitude

Blessing and curse reside on your slopes
The curses that attend Ebal glisten in the bright sun
sickness, dust
insanity, defeat

The blessings only repose on Gerizim in shadow
the plunder of nations
prosperity and health

 

The voice of God was not heard the day
that Joshua read the roster of consequences, both good and evil,
in the valley
the very day he put a city to the torch and committed atrocities
against its soldiers and women and king

 

The people did not say, “Amen”

Yishai

Who would sign on to the fate of a fugitive?
(Even a wily fugitive
feigning loyalty one day and imbecility the next)

Common wisdom: the dodderers in their meeting halls
endure and prevail
But convention does not always choose winners
when youth confronts disenchantment
dynamism against reaction
agility matched to complacency

 

And so one night in the wilds of Ein Gedi
pillars of authority trembled, were toppled
fact and future met around a scrap of cloak

Sensing the tiller of history
the fugitive quelled an urge to regicide
while the rescued monarch dubbed him heir
A frayed, fraught entente poised
in the profound folds of a cave

 

The greatest faith is to hold one’s hands out to the churning rush
to bow to cataclysm
and how it chooses whom to sweep into the abyss

Moriah

Had we not gone to the mountain

We could have raised our goats and children in the lush valleys

We would have lived peaceably with other pastorals
relocating only when there was contention over wells

The land would not have been our destiny
and we might have moved on forever when the cisterns ran dry

But we went to the mountain
and I can’t imagine our lives now any other way

 

A land that is granted
must always be defended

 

Now our destinies stream toward the future like pillars of smoke

The engine of feverishly stoked expectations roars to life

and the stone that crowns the mountain erupts

Sinai/Horeb

Rains, streams, soil, and shrines had we
to express out thanks
Yes, we had everything

and suddenly they were gone

Just like
the prophet
champion of his people, who ended
fleeing from them—from his traitorous companions
from city and fertile fields
from the land itself
desperately waiting for a message

 

What would I now have in order to know my family
my cohort
myself
in a foreign nation

Someone define us!
even though we were never united
never sure who our people were

But so long as every choice we make
every day, every hour
proceeds from a single instant…
a clash of thunder…
a command we did not even hear

We’ll survive

 

 

The twin mountains of Gerizim and Ebal are prominent in the part of ancient Israel that was later called Semaria and now the West Bank: Gerizim on the south side of a valley and Ebal on the north side. Between them lay the ancient town of Shechem, where Abraham was promised the land by God (Genesis 12:6-7), where Dinah was raped and avenged (Genesis 34), and where Joseph passed through on his way to meet his brothers and become enslaved (Genesis 27:14). Shechem became a shelter city for people unjustly accused of murder (Joshua 20:7). Moses issued detailed instructions to the Israelites (Deuteronomy 27:12-28:26) to recite blessings at Gerizim and curses at Ebal, finishing each blessing and curse with the word “Amen”. When the Israelites actually reached the mountains, however, Joshua recited the blessings and curses (Joshua 8:33-34), and the people did not say “Amen”. This occurred right after the Israelites massacred an entire town (Joshua 8:19-29).

Mount Yishai is a tall mountain in Ein Gedi, a wild and inaccessible region that is now an Israeli nature reserve, and so the mountain is speculated by modern commenters to be the site of a key event in the relationship between Saul and David (I Samuel 24). Saul was the incompetent and increasingly unbalanced king of Israel. David was the pre-eminent soldier among Israelites and the future king who would unite the country and give rise to a royal succession to last several hundred years. But at the time of the story, David was a fugitive hiding from Saul’s troops in a cave in Ein Gedi. Saul enters the cave, where David could easily have killed him, but David chose instead to cut off a scrap of Saul’s cloak. When David produces the scrap later as proof that he had held back from regicide, Saul weeps and predicts that David will rule the country.

Moriah is the mountain where God instructed Abraham to sacrifice his son Isaac (Genesis 22:1-19). When Abraham shows his willingness to follow through with the killing, God praises him and guarantees the future of his offspring. A much later text (II Chronicles 3:1) claimed Moriah as the site where the Temples were built.

Sinai and Horeb appear repeatedly in the Bible, apparently reflecting two traditions for the unknown location that is considered the basis of Jewish religion and identity. On that mountain, God gave Moses the laws that have defined Judaism (Exodus 19). God intended to address the Israelites directly, but they fled from the apparition of God and asked Moses to hear the laws in their stead (Exodus 20:18). Later, Elijah the prophet returns to that mountain (I Kings 19:6) for a revelation from God when persecution forces him to leave Israel.

 

Andy Oram
August 14, 2026

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