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Immediately after starting Francine Rivers' Unashamed, I found myself comparing this narrative with Tessa Afshar's Pearl in the Sand. Both titles cover the story of Rahab, the Canaanite prostitute, who saves the Israelite spies and later marries into the tribe of Israel.

Pearl in the Sand, Afshar, 2010
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Pearl in the Sand is a full novel, which takes more time to develop Rahab and a cast of characters around her, whereas Unashamed is a novella seeking to give a sketch of Rahab's life. The two characters centered on the same Rahab are presented with slightly different backstory (there are various routes to entering the oldest profession in the world) and different personality. I found myself 'liking' Afshar's Rahab better � which caused me a great deal of discomfort.

A pitfall of all historical fiction that is especially important in regard to Biblical Historical Fiction is: we have to continually remind ourselves the author is filling in the facts with their own imagination, which is often colored by their worldview. There *is* a real Rahab, who has a unique personality and a storyline full of experiences that took place offscreen from the Biblical narrative. Reading two perspectives on her story highlights different portrayals of the same person. The likelihood that either of these presentations of the Biblical heroine are:
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...realistic?
…is slim.

I enjoy Biblical historical fiction because it stimulates my research and understanding of Scripture, but I found myself asking: Is it slanderous to write Biblical Historical fiction?

Slander (verb)
slan·der | \ ˈslan-dər \
Definition of slander (Entry 1 of 2)
transitive verb
: to utter slander against : DEFAME

Slander (noun)
Definition of slander (Entry 2 of 2)
1: the utterance of false charges or misrepresentations which defame and damage another's reputation
2: a false and defamatory oral statement about a person
� compare LIBEL


Is it a misrepresentation of Rahab the person to seek to tell how her story might have happened, who she might have been, or what she might have done? If so, is the problem with the author, who writes it a certain way, assuming negative personality traits, or the reader, who becomes too locked into one creative’s perspective on chapters in the Greatest Story Ever Told.

The same questions plague historical fiction. Would it be better to just write fiction and leave the real-life people out of it? Perhaps reading historical fiction is too shaping of my perceptions. Who am I to say I like *this* Rahab or Peter or Paul better than the other? Interestingly, I ran into the same questions when I read a fictionalized historical narrative of Agatha Christie’s disappearance. You can read about my struggles and conclusions here:

The Mystery of Mrs. Christie, Benedict
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After finishing the novella, I can say Unashamed gives an alternate perspective that helps to break away the character shell constructed by both Ms. Rivers (here) and Ms. Afshar (referenced above), to focus on the facts of Rahab’s story as revealed in Scripture. Both authors imagine Salmon (Rahab’s eventual Israelite bridegroom) as one of the spies she hides, though we have no Biblical documentation that Rahab met Salmon in Jericho as a spy. Afshar seems more generous in her assignment of personality and action to Rahab. Rivers seems a bit more exacting in her depiction of Rahab’s life as a harlot, shrill disposition, desperate rescue by Israel, and a transactional union with Salmon. Rivers ends her account with the marriage of Salmon and Rahab, while Afshar extends the timeline to some of the difficulties they may have faced as a couple. Afshar articulates challenges that may have arisen from Rahab’s experience of trauma in paganism, while speculating about difficulties in Rahab’s integration into the people of Israel; topics that are not even mentioned by Rivers in Unashamed. Rivers� devotes a good deal more time to relationships within Rahab’s family and how they would be strained by not knowing what was going to happen as they anticipated Israel crossing the Jordan river, waited for Israel to attack, and endured the seven days of Israelites marching around Jericho before the LORD finally destroyed the city. The two authors also resolve the storyline of Rahab’s family in different ways.

In the end, I think reading an alternate view was helpful in releasing me from the myopia of a single author’s perspective on the Biblical account. It makes me wonder which other Biblical stories I’m too closely reading with a perspective developed from Biblical historical fiction. Once again, I was driven to the Scripture to try to see Rahab, Salmon, Israel and, above all, God Himself, more clearly. This title, like all others in the Lineage of Grace series, finishes with a helpful Bible Study that points out the key passages and provides interactive questions that could be completed independently or in a group. As such, it would make a good book club selection.

There’s more!
Unshaken: Ruth (Lineage of Grace #3), Rivers, 2001
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