May 21, 1981

In The Foot Steps Of Moses

(Second Of A Series)

AMMAN, JORDAN - Here in the shadow of Mt.  Nebo - where Moses looked over to the Promised Land and died at age 120, according to local tradition, wrapped in a blanket with two naked virgins to keep him warm - King Hussein must ponder the exploits of that ancient biblical hero.

Moses welded a "mixed multitude" of Hebrews into a nation through a covenant of law and religion.  King Hussein walks a political tight-rope in hopes of accomplishing the same thing.  

We begin retracing the footsteps of Moses in Egypt where he escaped a general execution of Hebrew baby boys.  Three thousand years ago he was set adrift on the Nile in an ark of bulrushes.  Today a dank mud hole under a Cairo synagogue marks an old bed of the Nile where this event is said to have occurred.  

Rescued by Miri, one of Pharaoh Rameses' 59 daughters, Moses was reared as a noble.  We know he reached high military rank because he won a princess of Ethiopia for wife during a campaign there.  

Moses murdered an Egyptian official who was abusing a Hebrew slave and then fled to Midian (Sinai) to avoid the Pharaoh's death sentence.  There he took another wife and for many years shepherded his father-in-law's flock.  

God's voice from a burning bush commanded Moses to return to Egypt and lead the Hebrews out of bondage.  Moses confronted Pharaoh Merneptah, successor to Rameses, with plagues of vermin and disease until he was allowed to "go three days in the wilderness to make sacrifice to our God."  

When Moses did not return on time, the pharaoh sent troops to fetch them.  The Egyptians caught up with the tardy slaves on the shore of a vast marsh called Reed Sea - not the Red Sea in the King James mis-translation.  

A vestige of this shallow lake still exists near the Suez Canal.  Perhaps it covers the remains of Egyptian chariots that pursued Moses' band into waters parted by a "mighty east wind."

Of Moses' 40-year sojourn in the Wilderness of Zin and the Oasis of Kadesh, casual tourists must content themselves with serial views from passenger planes.  It is enough.  The land appears rugged and totally lifeless.  In addition, the vicissitudes of modern war require a complicated three-nation visa arrangement to visit Mt.  Sinai where God gave Moses the Ten Commandments.  

The original Hebrews of the Exodus were relegated by God to die in the wilderness for lack of faith - they had "murmured" against his will, erected an Egyptian idol and failed to fight effectively a force of Amalekites barring the war.  

When a new generation had come of age the trek resumed.  This time ageing Moses tried diplomacy towards opponents.  He sent emissaries to the King of Edom seeking permission to pass through the land on the well traveled road to Damascus in Syria.  

Moses promised to "go by the King's Highway and not turn to the right hand nor the left."  But the King wanted no part of the horde of hungry and thirsty nomads.  He sent soldiers from the fortress of Ela (renamed Petra by the Romans) to bar the way.  

Disappointed, Moses turned northwest into a no-man's land today called Wadi Al Mawjib.  This forbidding canyon, leading from the Gulf of Akaba to the Dead Sea, now is the border with Israel.  

A trip to the cave ruins of Petra reveals the reason for Moses' submission.  The King's Highway - still so named - winds through narrow mountain passes which take a fearful toll of modern trucks.  The citadel of Petra occupies an impregnable position approachable only by horse and camel through a "sik," a narrow slit between towering cliffs.  

Upon reaching the Dead Sea, Moses again sought permission to pass through a foreign land.  The King of Moab also refused.  The Hebrews were forced to thread their way up a wadi that was the border with Edom and swing northeast.  

At Karak, chief city of the Mabites, travelers now stop for Coca-Cola, trinkets or a lunch of liver and onions.  Along the road they pause to pick up pieces of black brimstone which destroyed the sin cities of Sodom and Gomorrah once located somewhere nearby.  

North of Moah, the Hebrews approached the land of the Amorites where Moses must turn west again toward Caanan.  This time he ordered an attack and was victorious.  He took Madaba where John the Baptist centuries later would lose his head, and pitched camp at Amman where lustful King David only day would send the husband of Bathsheba to certain death.  

Today, Bedouin shepherds in black tents, unchanged since Moses' day, camp outside Madaba and pose for photographs in hope of a small reward.  

Amman, only a mud-walled village when the British mandate of Palestine was established after World War I, now is a modern city.  Peace and prosperity prevail.  The U.S. embassy across the street from our hotel attests to Amman's new found importance.  One can understand why two-and-a-half Hebrew tribes chose to stay here rather than cross over to the Promised Land.  

Great Britain in 1921 detached its mandate of Trans-Jordan territory east of the Jordan River as a semi-autonomous kingdom under the nominal leadership of Prince Abdullah, son of the king of Arabia.  Hussein succeeded to the throne in 1946 and, with approval of the British, proclaimed an independent state.  

Jews were allowed to immigrate into Palestine in accordance with the Balfour Agreement promulgated by the Allied Powers aiming toward an eventual homeland.  British withdrawal was speeded by the Nazi persecutions and terrorism by Zionists - including the present prime minister Menachem Begin.  The United Nations in 1948 sanctioned partition of Palestine and formation of the Israel state.  

Bordering Arab nations invaded Israel the next day, and Hussein annexed the West Bank of the Jordan River constituting the remainder of Palestine.  The UN accepted the new borders, but sporadic fighting continued until 1967.  

At that time Egyptian President Nasser occupied the Gaza Strip.  Israel's other Arab neighbors began massing troops on the frontiers.  An alarmed Israel launched a pre-emptive Six-Day War, driving back the Arabs and taking the Sinai, Jerusalem, the Palestinian West Bank and the Golan Heights.  

Thus, Jordan lost its briefly held West Bank and had to make room at home for about a million Palestinians who fled from or were displaced by, the Israeli.  

These refugees became a potent political force that threatened to take over Jordan.  Hussein mobilized his army and drove the Palestine Liberation Organization out of the country, despite threats of retaliation from Saudi Arabia and Syria.  The PLO moved to Lebanon and Syria where it continues to harass Israel with terrorist raids and bombings.  

Hussein, like Moses, threads his way between the interests of jealous Mideast nations and a concerned U.S. which supplies him with arms and technology.  He has survived palace coups and pan-Arab pressures.  He manages to stay neutral about the Israel-Egypt peace accord.  He and Moses are akin - "survivors" in the game of politics.  

Our guide, in a private moment over the national drink of sugary tea, commends his king.  "Everyone knows the final solution to the controversy between Israel and the PLO," he asserts.  "The refugees, both here and in Israel, are better off than they ever were.  Those unwilling to live in Israel will be given homes in Jordan.  Israel is here to stay and will keep the West Bank.  No one really cares except the PLO.  Eventually it, too, will have to accept reality.  Then we will have peace."

Author: Lindsey Williams