ABSTRACT
Before Azarias and his party set out on the road they set the Ark they had stolen upon a wagon, together with a mass of stores and dirty clothes heaped about it so that the people might not recognize it. Immediately before their departure Solomon, remem bering the petition of Makeda that a portion of the fringe of the covering of the Ark might be sent to her, told Zadok the priest to go and bring to him the covering that was on the Ark, and to lay on the Ark instead a new covering which he gave him. Zadok went and brought the covering to Solomon, and he gave it to his son, who rejoiced exceedingly. Then the wagons and beasts were loaded up, and ’Ebna Hakim and his party set out on their journey under divine auspices. Michael the Archangel marched in front, and made a way for them by land and by sea, and his wings screened them from the fierce heat of the sun. Neither man nor beast touched the ground as they travelled, for they and the loaded wagons were lifted bodily into the air, some a span and some a cubit, and through the might of Michael no one suffered from fatigue or from the discomfort which usually accompanies travelling. The party halted at Gaza, which Solomon had given to Makeda when she visited him, and a day later they arrived in Egypt, having travelled in one day the distance which caravans took thirteen days to cover. There Azarias and his fellow-conspirators revealed to ’Ebna Hakim the fact that they had stolen the Ark of the Covenant and had it with them there. They told him that it could not be sent back, and that Solomon could not seize it, for the Ark had come of its own free will, which was the Will of God. Then they dressed the Ark for him to see, and thanking God for His mercies he stood up before it, and he capered about before it like a young sheep and a
kid of the goats, and his men clapped their hands and pranced about and smote the ground with their feet like “ young bulls.” Then he saluted the Ark and made obeisance to it, and prophesied before it, and rejoiced greatly. Then Azarias and his men dressed the Ark in purple, and set it upon a wagon, and the trumpeters and drummers and players on pipes made great music, and the people shouted and cried out, and even the Brook of Egypt was astonished at their rejoicings. The cat-headed and dog-headed idols, and the statues of the gods, and the pylons and obelisks fell down and were broken in pieces when Zion, i.e. the Ark, approached them.
