Jericho, Rahab, and the Rope of Hope

Here’s the thing about that rope in verse 15. In Hebrew, it’s the word “chevel” (חבל).


Chevel in Hebrew, even till today, means a rope or cord, but in the Bible it also pertains to territory because you can mark out territory with lines and cords. It can mean measured portion, lot, part or region, but it can also mean pain, sorrow or travail. We can be bound up with “chevelim”, with sorrows and pains – its a word that crops up in the book of Job a number of times. It can also refer to a noose or a snare, and can even be translated as destruction. It has connotations of birth pangs, and in the sister Semitic language, Arabic, the link between the umbilical cord and this same linguistic root for travail is clear.[1]


So Rahab lets them down on this rope, this chevel.

Then she said to them: “Go to the hill country, lest the pursuers meet you, and hide yourselves there for three days, until the pursuers return. Afterward, you may go your way.”

Three days you say? That sounds like a typological bell ringing in my ear.


Then the men said to her: “We will be released from this oath that you have made us swear, unless when we come into the land, you tie this line of scarlet thread in the window through which you lowered us down.”


Now here in verse 18, after the three days, she is to let down that same rope to let them back up again.

But this time, the Hebrew word is different. And it’s scarlet now too.

It is not a rope (chevel חבל) anymore. It is a cord (tikva תקוה).



Here is what the Hebrew word “tikva” means [2]:

Cord

hope, expectation

ground of hope,

things hoped for,

outcome.


See if any of the following paragraph sets off any echoes in your head:

“Gather to yourself in the house your father, your mother, your brothers and all your father’s household— whoever goes out of the doors of your house into the street, his blood will be on his head and we will be innocent, but whoever is with you in the house, his blood will be on our head if any hand is laid on him. But if you divulge this business of ours, then we will be released from your oath you have made us swear.”


So she said: “According to your words, so be it.” Then she sent them away. After they had gone, she tied the scarlet cord to the window. Then they departed and came to the hill country. They stayed there for three days until the pursuers returned.


It’s rather reminiscent of the blood on the doorframes excercise the Israelites had just had to do to escape death as the Lord passed over the houses. The scarlet color of the cord is symbolic of the lamb’s blood that caused death to pass-over the Israelites, and the family all had to be inside to be safe. If they failed to obey the instructions, then they would die along with everyone else. This, of course, also applies to the blood of the Lamb of God, Yeshua the Messiah. If we fail to accept his salvation (offered to us at the cost of his own life) we will perish.


First there was a chevel: marked out, bound-up pain and destruction, then after three days, a life-line of hope, tikva. Not unlike the Grand Story of Salvation that the Passover was pointing to: the death and resurrection of the Messiah.