Faithless Heart, A Love Story

By Cliff Keller

Faithless Heart, a love story, is an imaginative account of the Prophet Hosea’s dramatic calling... When the Lord first spoke through Hosea, the Lord said to Hosea, “Go, take to yourself a wife of harlotry and have children of harlotry; for the land commits flagrant harlotry, forsaking the Lord.” (Hos 1:2) More importantly, it is an exploration of God’s enduring love for his chosen people as demonstrated in the miraculous return of the once thoroughly scattered Jews from the ends of earth to their land, the modern state of Israel.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Cliff Keller
• Release date: Apr 1, 2017
• ISBN: 9781370586523

Cliff Keller

Cliff Keller was born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. After multiple migrations between Florida and Wisconsin, Cliff attended Florida State University to pursue a degree in Engineering Science, paying his way by working as an engineering coop student for NASA at Cape Canaveral. Somehow aware of Cliff's progress, President Richard Nixon designed to send Cliff to the war in Vietnam by ending the educational draft deferment. By graduating, then receiving an occupational deferment while working for then defense contractor, Texas Instruments, in Dallas, Cliff avoided conscription and bested the president, who soon afterward became distracted by the Watergate scandal and lost interest in Cliff’s status.After eight years in Dallas (and earning a Master's Degree in Electrical Engineering from Southern Methodist University), Cliff spent the next 18 years in Florida in the construction business before selling the company to devote more time to writing.Cliff and his wife, Marcia, now live in Jerusalem, Israel, having made Aliyah in 2011, where they are slowly improving at speaking Hebrew and loving their time in the land.

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Acknowledgments

As is the case with the two previously published novels in this series, Faithless Heart could not have been written without the encouragement, love, enthusiasm and occasional good-natured prodding of my sweet wife, Marcia, who inspired me to create the Three Prophets series then devoted tremendous time, effort, patience, faith and criticism toward its completion.

My sincere thanks to dear friends Joy and Russ Carroll who have very graciously, thoughtfully, patiently and meticulously participated in the proofing and critiquing of all three novels in the series which are, as a result, no doubt cleaner and, I believe, more readable and accurate as a result of their kind efforts.

Carolyn Hyde, another dear friend and a gifted singer and musician, has also proven herself to be an amazing proofreader and critic as well. Having seen her at work on the manuscript of Faithless Heart I now understand why her music is so very good.

Rabbi Todd Lesser of the Adon Olam Messianic Congregation in Greenville, South Carolina provided numerous suggestions and improvements.

Thanks also to Diana Flegal of the Hartline Literary Agency and Aleta Daley Okolicsanyi, formerly with the Maximilian Becker Agency, for their friendship, encouragement and support.

Any errors, inaccuracies or other shortcomings that managed to survive and appear in this final manuscript arise either from mistakes I have made or my refusal to take sound advice.

Introduction

Faithless Heart is the second novel chronologically (third and last published) of the Three Prophets series which spans a historical period of roughly 335 years beginning in about 875 BCE. The Ivory House, first in the series chronologically, dramatizes the decline of the northern kingdom of Israel through the life of the prophet, Elijah. This novel, Faithless Heart, follows chronologically and dramatizes Israel’s ultimate collapse through the life of the prophet, Hosea. For the Sake of His Name, last in the series, dramatizes the end of the southern kingdom through the life of the prophet, Daniel—the end of ancient Israel’s sovereignty and the beginning, in the minds of those who believe the ancient Hebrew prophets, of the Jewish nation's promised latter-day restoration.

Faithless Heart is a fictional account of Hosea’s dramatic calling…

When the Lord first spoke through Hosea, the Lord said to Hosea, Go, take to yourself a wife of harlotry and have children of harlotry; for the land commits flagrant harlotry, forsaking the Lord. (Hos 1:2)

It is also, more importantly, an exploration of God’s enduring love for his people as demonstrated in the miraculous return of the once thoroughly scattered Jews from the ends of earth to their land, the modern state of Israel.

Chronology, Accuracy and Characters

There seems to be no generally accepted chronology regarding the successions and deaths of the last seven kings of Israel beginning with Jeroboam II and ending with Hoshea (the last king of Israel, not to be confused with Hosea, the prophet). This narrative attempts to conform to Edwin R. Thiele’s well-known chronology…

Thiele’s chronological reconstruction has not been accepted by all of the scholarly consensus. Yet the work of Thiele and those who followed in his steps has achieved acceptance across a wider spectrum than that of any comparable chronology, so that Assyriologist D. J. Wiseman wrote, The chronology most widely accepted today is one based on the meticulous study by Thiele, and, more recently, Leslie McFall: Thiele’s chronology is fast becoming the consensus view among Old Testament scholars, if it has not already reached that point. (http://tinyurl.com/wikiThiele)

Scholars also disagree upon exactly where, when and how the kings Menachem, Pekah and Pekahiah sorted out control of Israel preceding the final reign of King Hoshea. Faithless Heart places Pekah in Gilead while he vied with his rival, Menachem, abiding in Samaria, thus giving Israel two concurrent kings, one on either side of the Jordan, for about ten years.

Based on current archaeological understanding and textual evidence, the great, historic earthquake mentioned specifically by the prophet Amos (and referred to obliquely by several other prophets in the Tanach) almost certainly occurred within a five-year span about 750 BCE but, in this narrative, the quake falls slightly outside of that period in hopes of enhancing its dramatic affect.

While most scriptural time-lines distinctly separate Amos and Hosea’s ministries, it seems unlikely that the two did not know about the other’s existence and calling. It seems not only possible but likely that they prophesied concurrently for at least a short time. Such is the case in this fiction.

With no justification to do so except to improve the story, I have placed young Hosea in attendance at the pagan sanctuary at Beth-el as a witness to the prophet, Amos’s confrontation with Amaziah, the pagan sanctuary’s High Priest (Amos 7:10-14). While the text of Amos places the confrontation "two years before the earthquake" (during Jeroboam II’s reign as Israel’s king), more than two years separate the events in the narrative of Faithless Heart.

Also in the interest of improving the narrative, I have made available to the novel’s character, Hosea, several of Isaiah’s prophecies and one of Micah’s that, in all likelihood, were delivered a handful of years later than they are rendered in this account.

Many of the spoken words of Hosea and other characters in this narrative are lifted as found in the Tanach and are italicized. In other cases, dialogue between characters sometimes closely parallels biblical verses. Though these instances are not differentiated in the text by italics, those familiar with the words of the prophets will almost certainly recognize them.

Experts differ upon whether Tiglath-Pileser III, the Assyrian king who ended the northern kingdom’s run as a sovereign nation, was the same historical person as the character referred to as Pul in the Tanach (as well as in extra-biblical resources). Regardless, Pul, in Faithless Heart, is one and the same as Tiglath-Pileser III.

The fall of the village of Iyon and the northern territory of Dan occurs several years earlier in this narrative than in actuality, according to most experts.

While some modern archaeological evidence supports the theory that the fortified city of Hazor in ancient northern Israel had been restored to its former glory during the reign of King Solomon, its role in this fiction as the focal point of refuge for Israelites during the nation’s latter days is, apparently, unsupported.

Unlike the two previously published novels in this series, the narrative in Faithless Heart relies upon the biblical record for little more than an earthquake, Hosea and Gomer’s marriage, the birth of their three children, growing Assyrian aggression against Israel and the violent successions of Israel’s last six kings after the death of Jeroboam II.

Gomer’s father was named Diblaim, Hosea’s father, Beeri. Beyond these small landmarks provided by scripture, virtually all of the characters and events depicted in this novel are products of the author’s imagination, devised in hopes of illuminating and amplifying the Book of Hosea’s magnificent message, God’s enduring love for his undeserving and rebellious people.

Faithless Heart

I. Hosea

"I will rejoice over them to do them good and will faithfully plant them in this land with all my heart and with all my soul. For thus says the Lord, Just as I brought all this great disaster on this people, so I am going to bring on them all the good that I am promising them."

Jeremiah 32:41-42

1. Things eternal

Long before the great quake, in the days of the second Jeroboam (when all shined bright in Israel except for its past and future), Hosea fell in love. As a very young man, well before God first spoke to him, Hosea saw Diblaim’s daughter in a dream, standing alone and lovely upon the crest of a tranquil knoll—a confusing vision streaked with sunlight yet also shrouded in mists.

Hosea called out to her. She smiled then danced away.

Though she should have been a stranger, Hosea knew her name.

*

To describe Hosea’s eventual marriage to Gomer as rocky would be like conceding that fire is warm. Theirs was a doomed and sordid match before it began. Yaron, as Hosea’s longest, best and only friend, had begged Hosea not to do it.

You cannot make that soiled woman your wife, he had insisted.

It is God’s will, Hosea answered and so, to him, there was nothing more to discuss.

To his credit, Hosea never failed in his duty. Full of faith, strong in his belief that a day would come when God’s will would be explained, he carried on. But five years and three children after what seemed like an awful decision, Hosea and Gomer’s ugly marriage had run its course.

In the shade of sycamores at the pagan sanctuary atop Beth-el, a place Hosea loathed, Yaron sat with the frowning couple as a kind of common agent, directing their final moments together after years of Gomer’s betrayal and Hosea’s pain. None of them spoke while the local priests lit bowls of incense and hundreds of Baal-worshiping Israelites flocked toward the base of a huge golden calf.

I’m done with you, Hosea told Gomer afterward. I will turn my face from you and, when you long for my comfort, when you cry out begging to return to me I will no longer hear your voice.

It was late in the day, darkening sky, full moon rising. Gomer arched a brow, ready to laugh, it seemed, or spit. (She remained handsome even then, if not as stunning as she once was, though she behaved as if she held the evening star in her right hand.) Good, she said, tossing her head to cast her curls aside, I do not need you now, sir. In fact, I never did.

We shall see, Hosea said with a very odd smile.

Not inclined to promote a reconciliation, Yaron stood and said, Then it’s settled, is it not? A long journey after which we reach a short, neat understanding. Let’s agree quickly upon terms and leave this place at once.

But some moments have wills of their own, it seems, unbent by men’s desires; it was the sighing earth that ended their day at the moment of its choice, not Yaron’s glib summary.

A roar came up from the valley as treetops along the ridge line, east, tossed in silhouette beneath the oddly throbbing moon. Adults screamed like children as a running furrow of earth raised and lowered them in place like tethered ships. Quickly up on all fours after the groundswell passed, Yaron watched the metal cow in the courtyard shake then collapse and break. The main building splintered open before his eyes and the High Priest, Amaziah, shot out a window then tumbled across the grass. When the would-be holy man finally stopped, he rushed to scoop the broken icon’s head into his arms, moaning its loss as if the dark, cold thing had been his only child.

Posts and pillars shook like withered sticks. The sanctuary’s stone outer wall split with a thunderous noise along its length, its base falling outward; the upper half, in. While they watched, the earth groaned open and swallowed the virgins’ quarters whole (listing at an angle before easing out of sight, like a great, hulking ship foundering at sea).

Only after the wanton lodge disappeared completely did the earth’s upheaval cease.

We all could have been crushed, Gomer shrieked as dust sparks spun above their heads.

Except for the actual crushing, Hosea said, it is already so…

Even as the anguished wailing of others continued to obscure their thoughts, Yaron and Gomer stopped to blink at their sullen prophet—for it was clear that he had been called of God by then—confused by his words.

…for surely this great shaking marks the beginning of the end of Israel, Hosea finished.

Gomer stood and patted herself top to bottom, front to back, no modesty to her probing, as if to convince herself that all her parts had survived. I should have never married you, she said. (Even as heaven and earth rocked with aftershocks, the moment remained about her.) You are a cold, narrow, unforgiving man.

How does one forgive the unrepentant? Hosea asked, not bothering to find her eyes.

Too hardened by life to consider the question, Gomer cursed aloud, having discovered that her backside had been muddied. With or without you, sir, she told Hosea, as God lives, you know I shall survive, an odd oath to hear from the lips of a godless woman.

She began away then, stepping gingerly around debris, grunting like a plow-ox and with her skirts raised much too high. Yaron heard none of the last words Hosea spoke to her (for the earth had continued rumbling) but Gomer, having heard it all, stopped, faced him and said, You cannot be serious.

O, yes! Hosea answered. Every word of it shall be so.

Gomer laughed as she slipped outside through a cleft in the broken wall into deepening shadow, seemingly unaware that her life—like all of Israel—would never be the same.

*

On their way back to Samaria that evening, Yaron and Hosea observed collapsed homes by moonlight, canted wine presses, tumbled mills, ruptured bridges and diverted streams. In the pass near the road to Jeshanah they found a sudden, spectacular offset in the highway reaching half the height of a man. Though the devastation only increased as they continued north, Hosea passed it blandly, as if reality meant nothing to him.

They camped that evening near the base of Mount Gerizim. When, before bedding down, Yaron asked about the quake they had survived—seeking its meaning from his friend with respect to the days to come—Hosea chided him with the almost forgotten words of Amos…

"I saw the Lord standing upon the altar and he said, Smite the lintel of the door that the posts may shake and cut them in the head, all of them and I will slay the last of them with the sword. He that flees them shall not flee away and he that escapes them shall not be delivered."

To his shame, Yaron had once mocked Amos. Are you saying, he asked, that today’s calamity is the very shaking your friend, the prophet, Amos foretold?

You saw the bleeding brow of the so-called priest, Hosea said.

Yaron pressed Hosea to tell him more, but remained unsatisfied.

Tell me, Yaron, Hosea answered instead, why has it taken an earthquake for you to incline your ear toward our god, the God of Israel?

Isn’t that always the way with ordinary people? Yaron countered in his defense. Every man is not a prophet.

A mild aftershock shook them. (They had jarred the earth all night.) Hosea lowered himself onto a bed of grass and closed his eyes to sleep, not bothering to respond.

Ordinary people had never interested him.

*

In the morning, Yaron and Hosea ate berries, drank fresh water from a nearby stream then hiked past the road leading to the ancient city of Shechem. There Joshua, at his end, assembled the tribes of Israel to warn them to serve the Lord in sincerity.

Shechem too was in a shambles.

Later that day they found the foothills about Samaria in worse condition. The little home Hosea had shared with Gomer had been shattered roof and post. (Gomer had apparently arrived earlier, having charmed some horseman for a ride, Yaron suspected, and recovered those possessions she had failed to take with her when she first abandoned her husband.) In the city, they found Hosea’s parents and their modest home intact. Hosea’s children were relieved to see him though only Jezreel, the oldest, seemed to grasp what had occurred.

Let’s go up the hill and inspect the palace, Yaron said. I’ll bet it too is wrecked.

It is, Hosea said, I’ve seen it.

So it was with prophets, all difficult men to distract, entertain or surprise.

*

Nothing further to do, Yaron embraced Chana and Beeri, Hosea’s mom and dad, then kissed the cheeks of Jezreel, Lo-ruchama and Lo-ammi. I’m off to Hazor to learn how my family has fared, he said while untethering his horse. But I say to you again, friend, he told Hosea, I am pleased beyond words that you are finally done with that woman. You have certainly, through all your efforts, fulfilled your commitment to your god.

Even now, Hosea told his pagan friend, our story is incomplete.

But only yesterday I heard you promise Gomer you would forever turn your face.

A too familiar light shined in Hosea’s pale blue eyes. Not forever, Yaron, he said, but only for a while.

Yaron’s shoulders drooped. After all she has done to offend you? After all her willfulness and faithlessness, you do not declare an end? I cannot begin to comprehend such unearned mercy.

Such is always the case, Hosea answered, when man confronts things eternal. How can I surrender Gomer and make her like earth? All my compassions remain kindled. Despite all that has happened I cannot fully execute my anger against her.

Yaron sighed, there being no benefit to contending with a man who hears the voice of God.

Do not concern yourself, Hosea said, with what you perceive to be my inconsistencies. They are but an illusion. Hasten north to join your family but be at ease, good friend. In my spirit I know that they are safe.

Yaron smiled. Sometimes it was extremely comforting to have a prophet for a friend…

And mind my past cautions, Hosea added. Flee Hazor. Abandon your pagan ways. For you and yours shall not always be safe in that city.

…and, sometimes, it was not.

*

The hike from Beth-el to Samaria had been thirty miles. The distance from Samaria to Hazor was easily twice that. Upon his horse, it would take Yaron two days to reach the city provided that the way, following the earth’s upheaval, remained passable.

On his way, walking the newly furrowed earth and fording suddenly crooked streams, Yaron’s thoughts turned back to his friend, Hosea. How simple his life had been before his god, the Lord of Hosts, had burdened him with a strange summons.

Gomer had not always been a harlot.

Hosea had not always seemed a fool.

2. Find a real woman

When, precisely, Hosea had met Gomer could be argued depending on one’s point of view. Long before the two came face to face in the flesh, Hosea claimed to have seen Gomer countless times in dreams. The notion seemed bizarre to Yaron; Gomer was well known. By what uncanny mechanism, then, does a tall, slightly infamous and exceptionally attractive creature regularly invade the mind of a short, plain man? And for what purpose? But then, one bright morning in Samaria—King Jeroboam reigned and Amos, from Tekoa, was the principle thorn in Israel’s flesh—young Hosea seemed to prove his point. While Yaron and he stood together on the crowded, stone-paved plaza atop Omri’s hill, luscious Gomer strode past them and Hosea seemed to blink awake.

It’s her, he gasped convincingly.

Not her, Yaron said, nodding toward the beauty. Surely you have dreamed of someone else. She is, Gomer, daughter of…

Yes, that’s the name! Hosea interrupted. I had not shared it with you before because it seemed so strange… You did say, Gomer, right?

Yaron blinked at him. She had walked past by then, striding with the confidence of a man, a step behind her famous father, headed toward the palace gates. You claim to not know, by reputation, who she is? he asked.

I know nothing about her save for her appearance and, of course, her disappointing name.

She is the merchant, Diblaim’s, daughter, Yaron said, nearly as notorious as he. You are cruelly served by your imagination, my friend, if it prompts you to pursue her. That perfect creature is well beyond your scope.

Perfect?

Never dream of girls like her, Hosea, Yaron said, it will only break your heart. Did you sniff the air as she passed? Those were the dual, intoxicating scents of wealth and rare perfume. Have you ever beheld anyone quite so stunning?

Many times, as I’ve explained, Hosea said, in my several visions.

It was a figure of speech, not a question, Yaron said. I am well aware of your boast. He shouldered into the crowd that had formed in Gomer’s wake to gain a better view of her and her party. Look, he said, your imaginary sweetheart’s father must have business with the king. Hopeless as it seems, Hosea, I myself would run and fall upon my knees to propose something to her… A rendezvous, a conversation, anything. But I am intimidated by her beauty, to my shame.

It is shameful to speak so coarsely, Hosea said. You are betrothed to a woman…

Without my consent.

…and you know nothing about the lady at whom you stare.

I know at least as much as you’ve learned through your odd dreams, Yaron said. And I know what I have heard about her manners, riches and misapplication of her beauty. At least some of what everyone whispers must be true.

You find rumors and innuendo appealing?

What I’ve heard? Oh, yes! Yaron playfully hugged Hosea, clamping his two burly arms around him in plain view. Find yourself a woman too, my correct and sullen pal, he whispered, a modest gal to divert you from your immodest fantasy. Companionship is not difficult to arrange these days, Hosea. Do not struggle vainly against what is fresh and new in Israel.

Fresh, Hosea spat, as if the old men and ancient texts he honored were more important than life itself. He freed himself from Yaron’s clutches, pointed toward the heavens and said…

"Woe to them that are at ease in Zion and trust in the mountain of Samaria which are named chief of the nations to whom the house of Israel came."

Yaron stepped back. That is exactly the lunatic thinking I just urged you to abandon, he explained. You quote the southern herdsman, Amos, am I right? Who is he to anyone in Samaria?

Undeniably, Hosea said, Amos is a holy man and a prophet of the Lord.

You say, Yaron said, but he’s threatened this city with destruction since before you and I were born. And he has, every time, been wrong. Isn’t truth the proper measure of a prophet?

Hosea nodded.

Look about you, then, Yaron said. While your old, backward mentor warns of chaos, Israel oversees Damascus. We no longer war with Judah but extend our mercy toward them, southward. When an honest man looks at Israel he does not see what Amos sees. He sees wealth, Hosea. He sees celebration and prosperity.

I’m an honest man, Hosea said, and I see idols, child sacrifice and countless obscene poles.

You remain naive, like a boy, my friend, Yaron told him, yet you somehow manage to be sour.

King Jeroboam is healthy for the moment, Hosea said, "but he is old. Who will succeed him, Yaron? Who will appease the nation’s