Ehud’s circular calculations: Left is Right

This painting is about Ehud, the second Judge and savior of Israel, and in particular, his very colorful and Machiavellian victory over Eglon, the king of Moab, and his army. This saga begins after Othniel’s demise, when the Israelites once again revert back to their very predictable bad behavior. God takes revenge on the erring, thankless Israelites by strengthening the hand of their enemy, Eglon, king of Moab, who allies himself with yet two other arch enemies of Israel, the Ammonites and Amelekites. With divine permission, if not assistance, this triumvirate axis of evil subdues Israel and recaptures Jericho, city of the date palms, pointedly and symbolically, the first city which not so long ago was dramatically captured by Joshua as a sign to Israel by God of his selective mercy and providence.

After eighteen years of subjugation, the Israelites cry out to God whose mercy is once again rekindled, and sees it fit to send them a savior in the form of Ehud, the son of Gera, the Benjamite, a physically disabled man with a shriveled right hand. This may be a sign by God of perhaps his half-hearted intentions. In this painting Ehud is the figure on the left holding the Shofar and thrusting a double edged sword into King Eglon, the figure on the right (story details below).

Ehud here is portrayed as an anthropomorphized wolf, the totem animal of the Benjamite tribe. Also, as you shall see below by his premeditated and calculated actions, he is the proverbial wolf in sheep’s clothing.

The text here (Judges III) plays with puns on the Hebrew word “Hyemini”, “the Benjamite”. In the Book of Genesis when Benjamin is born to the dying Rachel, she names him “Ben-oni”, “son of my affliction”. However Jacob, his father, renames him, “Ben-yamini” shortened to “Ben-yamin” (Benjamin), meaning “son of my right hand”. Tribal descendants of Benjamin are therefore named, as in this story, “the Yamini’s”, “the right-handers” i.e. “the Benjamites”. Ehud is most likely a direct descendant of Benjamin, because his father’s name is Gera, the name of one of Benjamin’s sons. Based on the timeline, Ehud couldn’t possibly be his grandson. The punny irony here is that Ehud “the Yamini”, “the right handed one”, is in fact, a very ostensible “left handed one”. His “right hand” according to the text is shriveled and useless. I suspect that he either sustained a brachial plexus palsy at birth rendering his right hand useless, or perhaps he suffered from a thalidomide-type birth defect.

In this painting Ehud’s right arm is proportionally atrophied, his forearm is considerably shortened, and his hand only has two fingers. He is barely balancing the Shofar between his two fingers. Written in yellow on his blue shirt collar are the Hebrew words “Ehud the Lefty”. Written in red characters on his right sleeve are the words “atrophied right hand”. His right handed defect is crucial to the arc of this story. Because of this defect he is not feared by Eglon or any other Moabite. If anything he is pitied, and was therefore probably pre-selected by them to hand -deliver the Israelites’ tribute. In fact the name “Ehud” in Hebrew means “sympathy”. When most people gazed upon him, they most likely sympathized with him. His self acknowledged capacity to elicit Moabite sympathy (perhaps ridicule) based on his disability is critical to his well thought out military calculations when confronting Eglon.

The entire geometric and somewhat mathematical theme of this painting is based on the varied definitions of the name “Eglon”. The Hebrew and Moabite root of his name is “eygel”, which means “calf”, as well as “eglah”, which means chariot or circle. In fact, Eglon, according to the text is morbidly obese, which is probably why he was named “a fat circular calf”. Taking these definitions into consideration, he is portrayed in this painting as an anthropomorphized fat calf, with calf horns, and bovine spots. His name is spelled on his royal miter in ancient Moabite, which is virtually identical to ancient Hebrew. The first letter of his name “Eyin”, is actually a circle (originally illustrating a round eye) consistent with the circular theme of the text and this painting.

The meaning of Eglon thus sets the geometric tone of this painting which is essentially a study of circles, their radii and an attempted visual calculation of pi. The circular sun in the background with a Greek letter pi at its epicenter emanates multiple colored rays (radii), which also look like multiple spokes of a chariot’s wheel. Ehud and Eglon are on a circular staircase above a circular body of water (with its own radii), the Jordan. The staircase has multiple bricks with centrally located circular spirals. The opposing left Israelite and right Moabite armies are also arranged in radial patterns. Pi represents the ratio of a circle’s area to the area of a square whose side is the radius. It also represents the ratio of a circle’s circumference to its diameter which as early as Kings I is approximated to be 3. The exact value of pi has an infinite decimal expansion which never ends, and repeats. It is an irrational and hence transcendental number, and therefore representative of the underlying divine pattern in this painted story. If you look closely, the infinite number of circular patterns painted throughout the painting is meant to reflect the infinite pi decimal expansion, and hence convey a sensation of never ending transcendence. One could also say that the arc (circumference) of this story and indeed all stories and histories repeat themselves ad infinitum, and that the stories’ circles can never be squared.

Back to the story- Ehud taking advantage of his congenital sympathetic defective right arm comes up with a brilliant plan. He fashions himself a double-edged sword which is a cubit long. He keeps this in a sword holster hidden over his right thigh which is covered by a cape. He comes to Eglon’s palace, and into his private chamber to deliver Israel’s tribute, which he probably has been customarily and routinely doing for the past eighteen years. As mentioned above, the reason he was so trusted by the Moabites was probably because he looked so totally ineffective and nebbishy with his shriveled right arm.

After the tribute is accepted by Eglon, Ehud appears about to leave. At this point, Ehud abruptly turns around and proclaims to Eglon, “I have a secret to tell you, Oh king”. These words are written in this painting on the upper circular arc between Ehud and Eglon. These words grab Eglon’s attention who in return utters a single word in Hebrew “Hahs”, or “silence”, (written in green Hebrew on red arc background next to Eglon’s mouth) a word which signifies that all his guards should leave, so they should not be privy to the secret he is about to hear.

When the guards exit, Ehud draws near, and again entices Eglon with similar but not identical words, saying, “I have a thing of God (instead of a secret} to tell you”. Hearing these words Eglon stands up from his chair. At this point Ehud, with his left hand grabs his sword from the holster of his right thigh, and thrusts it deep into his belly. Eglon is so obese that his abdominal fat surrounds the hilt of the sword. The text now in scatological detail describes that, “his excrement exited”.

In the painting, Eglon is illustrated in a transitional position somewhere between sitting and standing reflecting his alternation between both these positions before and after he was stabbed. In the spirit of scripture his “throne” is constructed with scatological double entendre. Eglon’s tender leaning on and grasping onto Ehud, demonstrates that he was taken completely by surprise, that he had truly trusted Ehud, perhaps even considered him a friend ( a subjugated one), and must have been convinced that Ehud was both physically and emotionally incapable of inflicting any kind of harm.

In the painting, two humanoid masses of excrement in the form of King Amalek and King Ammon, Moab’s two allies are exiting out of Eglon. Hence the first thing Ehud does militarily is to separate (The root of the Hebrew word for excrement, “Pirsha” means that which is “separate”) Moab from his two powerful allies, and thus weaken him. The king of Ammon, seen falling over and into the Jordan River is wearing typical Ammonite headgear (archeologically inspired). Written on his arms in Hebrew are the words “and the excrement exited”. Above Ammon exiting straight out of Eglon is the king of Amalek. Written on his legs also are the words “and the excrement exited”. His name Amalek is written on his back.

Written in red Hebrew characters swirling around the outer circular currents of Eglon’s belly are the names Balak, Ruth and David. According to Medrash, Eglon’s ancestor was Balak, the king of Moab who hired Balaam the prophet to curse the Israelites. Much to Balak’s consternation the curses divinely turned into blessings. Ruth is Eglon’s descendant who marries into Israel and ultimately gives birth to King David. This swirling ancestral circular pattern of names thus closes the circle between the tribes of Israel and Moab both of whom descend from the same Abrahamic grandparents, whose future descendants become arch enemies, whose even more future descendants unite in marriage ultimately leading to the birth of David, and hence a united Israelite monarchy. The area of this space- time circle is = to pi x r (radius) squared (Israel = r1, Moab =r2).

Ehud proclaims to Eglon that he has a secret to tell him. The word for secret in Hebrew is “sayser”, spelled “SSR”. If you spell this backwards you get “RSS” or “Ruis” i.e. Ruth. Seen coming out of Eglon’s mouth in the painting is his last dying word, “Ruth”, the secret that perhaps was revealed to him. Ruth metaphorically is bloodily birthed from Eglon’s dying mouth .Ultimately it is she who in the future reconciles with the descendant of her ancestor’s murderer in a sense uniting Moab and Israel ,closing the circle as mentioned above. The Midrash states that because Eglon arose from his throne showing respect at the mention of God’s name is why he was blessed with being the chosen progenitor of Ruth and David.

Eglon is described as a very healthy i.e. fat man. Later on, the text describes how the Moabite soldiers were full of “shemen”, meaning “oil”, a descriptive word for health and strength. Thus written underneath the penetrating sword in Eglon’s belly, in Yiddish, is the word “azaftiger”, “a fat oily person”, combining the above two Hebrew words for fat and healthy.

After Ehud kills Eglon, he locks the door behind him, calmly walks out, and then runs to the hills of Ephraim. The guards notice the locked doors and assume Eglon is cooling his feet i.e., relieving himself, and therefore don’t disturb him until a considerable amount of time lapses. They then open the door, and it’s too late, Eglon is dead, and Ehud has escaped.

When Ehud reaches the Ephramite hills he blows the shofar, the ram’s horn, and assembles the troops. Written on the shofar in Hebrew are two statements. “And he thrust it (the sword) into his belly”, and “he blew the shofar” .The same Hebrew root “TKA” is used in both cases of blowing and thrusting. Hence the word TKA means a forceful excursion of breath or physical energy.

Upon Ehud’s command, The Israelite troops descend the Ephraimite Mountain running after him. Portrayed in this painting is Ehud walking down the stairs, symbolizing descending down the mountain, with his troops following close behind him, in the lower left of the painting. Written in Hebrew on the shields of his army are the words “sons of Israel”.

Ehud and his army then seize the fords of the Jordan River (written in Hebrew on the mid-right of the painting on an orange sun spike), and they do not allow one Moabite to pass. They then kill ten thousand Moabite soldiers. Not one escaped. The Moabite army is illustrated to the far right behind the penetrating sword thrust into Eglon. Written on their shields in Moabite are the words “sons of Moab”. Their mouths are agape, aghast at both the assault on their king, and the frontal assault of the Israelite army who had been so happily and placidly subdued for eighteen years.

The colored rays of the sun are sequentially arranged in increasing order of their distinct wavelengths: violet indigo, blue, green, yellow, orange and red. Likewise, segments of sky in between these rays have self-contained colored clouds which are sequentially arranged in increasing colored wavelengths. This pattern is meant to emphasize the starkness of the events and the underlying transcendent divine pi guided mathematical calculations.

In the painting, arrows fired and projected from the far left to the far right, can be tracked throughout the arcs of the sky, from left to right, toward their destination, the Moabite army. The arrows upon their arrival hit, pierce, and kill the Moabite soldiers. As scripture states “And Moab was subdued that day under the hand of Israel”.

As a result of Ehud’s heroic actions “the land was quiet for eighty years” (written in Hebrew in the mid left yellow sun spike).

In order to achieve victory Ehud took a page out of Sun Tzu’s military manual “The art of war”, approximately six centuries prior to its writing in 700BCE. According to Sun Tzu, military victory can only be achieved by the crafted art of deception. Ehud could only achieve victory by becoming the proverbial wolf in sheep’s clothing, as well as the Trojan horse.

At the bottom of the painting is the Jordan River, which is the geographic divider between the Israelite and Moabite armies. Its water is reflecting the radii of light from the sun above. Circular Eglonian motifs are drawn on the stairs’ bricks, Eglon’s throne, his attire, Ehud’s sword hilt, and Amalek’s head. The swirls also denote cosmic galaxies atop and within which this ethereal scatological military tale floats.