Comics and the Bible | The Seraph in "Dry Earth... Stolen Waters" | Super Friends #41

The Seraph in "Dry Earth... Stolen Waters" from Super Friends #41

Chaim Lavon arrives with children from the U.S.--Richard, Laurie, Tommy, and Julie--at a desalinization plant on the Red Sea where college students are helping change salty sea water into fresh water for irrigation.  The are notified by a shady looking student in dark sunglasses that their tour has been cancelled.  Chaim Lavon senses something is fishy, and before the group departs he calls up to the

watchtower in Hebrew (so as not to alarm the English-speaking children).  The reply comes in Hebrew as well, however with a "metallic" sounding automated response.  Ducking into the school bus, Chaim Lavon emerges as the Seraph!  He orders the children to hide behind the bus as gunshots come from the watchtower.  The Seraph contemplates the Ring of Solomon to gain wisdom about the situation.  He realizes the watchtower resembles a giant metal Goliath, so he fashions a super sling out of cable to take out the tower with a giant boulder.  He then uses the Staff of Moses to pole vault over the tall barbed-wire fence surrounding the plant.  He finds the missing college students locked inside the dining hall, however they urge him to protect the plant instead of rescuing them.  Entering the plant, the Seraph triggers an electronic booby-trap.  When Seraph awakens from his electrocution, he sees the shady-looking student pointing a gun toward him.  He's not a student at all, but rather a dealer in industrial secrets, who is threatening to blow up the plant! 

Seraph swings the Staff of Moses like a baseball bat, taking out a couple of the henchmen.  As the Seraph attempts to disarm the bomb, another henchman reveals that he is holding the American children hostage.  Faced with the choice of disarming the bomb or saving the children, Seraph prays to the "Holy One who stopped the sun at Gibeon and halted the moon in the Valley of Aijalon" that once again time would stop*.  With bullets slowly emerging from the gun as time slows and then stops, Seraph disarms the bomb and throws the impregnable Mantle of Elijah over the children.  The flow of time resumes, and the bullets bounce off the mantle as the Seraph whacks the remaining bad guys with the Staff of Moses.  Seraph also chastises the would-be water plant destroyers with the word of the Lord, saying "Stolen waters are sweet, but the way of transgressors is hard.**"  The police arrive to wrap things up, and Chaim busses the children back to their school.  On the way, the children ask if they witnessed a miracle.  Chaim says, "Kids, almost 2000 years ago, a Jewish historian said, 'On the matter of miracles, everyone is welcome to his own opinion'  What do you think happened?***"   

One of the fun things about these Seraph back-up stories is the footnotes, usually containing scripture references.  The foot-noter uses an odd combination of Roman and Arabic numerals, that may have been the style at the time.  I've updated them to reflect the more modern practices:

*Joshua 10:12

**Proverbs 9:17, 13:15

***Josephus, Jewish Antiquities, 2.16.5