And they took from before Moses all the donation that the Israelites had brought for the task of the holy work to do it, and they on their part brought more freewill gifts morning after morning. And all the wise people…said to Moses, saying, “The people are bringing too much for the work of the task that the Lord charged to do.”

Vayakhel Exodus 35:1

In the early days of the place that we now call California, all of the animals were not getting along with each other very well.  Raccoons were bullying the rats.  They would find a group of rats playing with each other, or hunting for grains. Then they would find rocks and throw them at the rats and scatter their food all around.  The bobcats would torment the opossums.  They would find a lonely opossum walking along the dirt, shaking his fat body from side to side as he walked.

“Hey, opossum – don’t you look stupid when you walk!  You look like my grandmother after she became old and feeble, and she stumbled everywhere, barely able to hold herself up on her spindly legs!  Do you know that all the other animals laugh at you?”

And then the bobcat would run up to the opossum, grab him by the tail with his teeth, and spin him around in the air.  When the bobcat decided he’d made the opossum sufficiently dizzy, he’d let the poor little grey ball go flying until he rolled over helplessly and landed in a ditch.  The opossum would slowly crawl out of the ditch, after falling back several times, and then go running away, shaking and bobbing worse than ever as the bobcat and his friends laughed hysterically.

Now you may feel angry at the bobcat, but perhaps he was just trying to protect his pride because he had his enemies too.  Today, if a rattlesnake feels that she is in danger, she will coil up and shake her rattle and stare at you, hoping you will leave her alone.  But back then, the rattlesnake was especially mean to the bobcat.  She would not warn anyone before she would strike with her venomous fangs.  She would hide behind rocks and bushes, blending in.  Then when a bobcat would pass, she would quickly uncoil and lurch, and bite the bobcat in the behind just for fun.  Sometimes the bobcat would die.  Other times he would just become very weak and have to lie out in the sun, crying in pain, hoping that he would find enough strength to get away back to his friends.  Many of the animals, the bobcats, the skunks, and even the racoons and the opossums would all live in fear.  They would check every bush and every rock knowing that at any second the rattlesnake might launch herself unexpectedly.

The black bear saw what was happening and was upset that all of her fellow animals were so cruel to each other.  When she was a young cub, her momma had told her that the bears were the kings and queens of the west, and that they must grow up to rule over the animal domain.  But she knew that she had not been doing a good job.  Until now, she was happy to fish and to run, and to let the other animals do what they wanted to.  Today, she realized that this was not enough.

So, the black bear climbed up to the highest hill that she could and she let out a growl that could be heard from the Klamath mountains to the Mojave Desert.  Her growl rippled the waters of Lake Tahoe and sent shivers across the bellies of the otters in Monterey Bay.  Eagles flying high near the clouds knew it was time to swoop down to earth and listen.

“I am your queen, and I demand respect,” she announced to all the animals.  “You have all been bad to one another, causing pain and fear and humiliation, when you should be free to play and hunt and eat.  Beginning today, you will all be protected.  I will send my family out to the farthest corners to watch over you.  We bears are strong.  Our claws are sharp.  Those who cause pain will feel pain.  Those who cause fear will feel fear.  But those who respect the honor and power of the black bear will now feel safe.

“I will remain here on this hill to watch and report.  What do you say to me?”

The other animals were too shocked to say anything.  They looked at each other in confusion. Finally, one of the mice at the bottom of the hill squeaked.  “All hail our Bear Queen!”

And from the smallest animal, gradually to the larger ones, they all came into agreement.  “All hail our Bear Queen!” screeched the rat.  “Praise for the Bear Queen!” growled the skunk.  The rattlesnake stood up, hissed, and shook her rattle in agreement.  Eventually, even the racoons, and bobcats, and mountain lions, and the coyotes and especially the tired tormented opossums stood up on their hind legs and they yipped and howled and roared in support of their new protector.

“To show your respect, I would like you to all build me a beautiful home here, so that I may reside comfortably on my hill.  Will you honor me in this way?”

The animals all roared in a beautiful song that soared to Yosemite and echoed against the cliffs of El Capitan and Half Dome. 

That night, the racoons ran into their forests and discussed how they could honor their Bear Queen. 

“Let’s gather berries and acorns and reward our queen with some of our favorite foods!” said one of the elder racoons.

“No, the bear doesn’t want food!  She can catch all the food she wants.  She asked for us to build her a beautiful home!”

Then one of the female racoons spoke up.  “You guys are good at finding rocks to throw at the opossums.  Let’s turn that meanness around and show how peaceful we can be.  Let’s scour the coasts and forests for rocks and bring them to the hill of the Bear Queen.  We can give her everything needed for the most beautiful house of rocks.”

The word spread across all the forests, from hundreds to thousands to tens of thousands to millions of racoons.  The searched the ocean coasts; they searched the forest floor; they ran up into the mountains.  They each ran to the throne of the Bear Queen, deposited a rock gently on the hill and then returned to their habitat to find more rocks.  It took just a few days before the bear’s hill was entirely covered with rocks.

The duke of the racoons found the bear lying in a field, her body covered in rocks.  As he scampered down to speak with her, a little avalanche began to roll down the hill, knocking the racoon so that he rolled onto his nose, and then over on his ears, and then onto his tail and back on his nose again until he was lying in his own pile of rocks right next to the Bear Queen.

“We racoons really did a great job for you, didn’t we?  You asked us to help build you a house, but we gave you enough rocks to build a palace!”

“Instead of bringing me more rocks, how about getting me out from under this huge pile?” moaned the Bear Queen.

After the duke of the racoons cleared away the rocks, the bear continued.

“What am I going to do with all these rocks?  Please tell your racoons to stop this.  I can’t build anything with these!  They don’t stack, and they’re covered in bugs!  I don’t have a home or a palace.  I just have a pile of useless rocks!”

“I know what you need!” the racoon offered.  “I will find some beavers and have them bring you mud that you can use to bind the rocks together!”

The duke of the racoons returned to his forest and spread the word.  Every racoon ran out to the coast to tell every beaver to bring mud for the queen bear.  By the next day, tens, and then hundreds, and then thousands, and then tens of thousands, and finally millions of beavers ran up and down the coast to gather mud on their tails.  They all ran to the hill where the queen bear lived and flung their mud up to the top.  They turned it into a game.  Each beaver would compete with each of the others to see how high they could fling the mud, or how far from the hill they could be and still reach the top.

The baron of beavers waded through all the mud to see how the Bear Queen was doing.  She was not doing too well, because she looked more like a giant ball of hair and mud than a bear, and not very royal at all. 

“How ya doing, our royal highness?  Muddy enough for ya?” The Bear Queen growled and groaned until her voice could be heard throughout every forest and bay.  Even the redwood trees began to sway and crackle from the power of her voice.

“I thought you were going to use the mud as a mortar to patch all these rocks together and build me a palace!  All you did was cover me and my hill in slime!  I can’t even use all this mud.  Tell your beavers to stop bringing me mud, and to start building a palace!”

“Sorry for the misunderstanding,” said the baron of beavers.  We beavers generally work in wood, ya see.  A rock palace?  We just don’t have the tools or the plans for anything like that.  But I think it’s a great idea if you can figure out a way.  If you want my advice, well, don’t try it.  The mud will just ooze out and your palace will fall in.  Get some straw to mix with the mud.  That oughta make a nice mortar.  Then ya patch it all together, with the right plans of course, and you will have a palace that will withstand the ages.

“Let me send for a robin,” continued the baron of beavers.  “Those chicks are masters at building houses of straw and mud.”

By the next morning, the queen bear’s hill was covered in a pile of straw so big, that her hill became double and then triple and then quadruple its original size.  It could be seen all the way to the coast and all the way to the forests, and even in Death Valley, a family of scorpions noticed a hill of straw that seemed to appear over the horizon.  Unfortunately, the Bear Queen was somewhere in the bottom of the hill of straw.

The two regents of robins flitted overhead and looked down at the marvelous job that her subjects had performed.  They had never seen such a beautiful gigantic pile of straw.

“Oh, great Bear Queen, we hope you feel we have honored you properly!  All our lives we feared the hawks and racoons and foxes and snakes, but for the first time in our lives, all the robins feel safe!

“Please honor me by getting all this straw off of me!” the Bear Queen yelled.  Unfortunately, she could not be heard from the coast to the deserts because her voice was muffled by the mountain of straw covering her.

“Did you hear what she said?” said one robin to the other?

“I think she said “Get your paw off of me!’”

“We don’t have paws!  We have claws.  Are you sure she didn’t say ‘get your claws off of me?’”

“But our claws aren’t on her.  And no robin could survive under all that straw!  Wait!  Straw! Maybe she said ‘get this STRAW off of me!’”

“That’s right! I said STRAW!” howled the bear.

So, the robins called upon all their friends to move the mountain of straw off of the bear.  She stood up and shook her fur and a cloud of straw went flying into the sky, so high that the scorpions in Death Valley thought there was a fire somewhere near that hill.

The Bear Queen climbed up to the top of her hill and looked all around at the mess.  There were piles of useless rocks covering all the land.  Most had rolled off but enough remained so that there was not even a place where she could lie down and have a comfortable nap.  She ran across looking for someplace where she could at least sit, but the few places that didn’t have rocks were crusted in mud and straw, and they were slimy and sticky.  She thought to herself: This is worse than anything I started with.  I offered the animals protection if they would help build me a home, and instead they have made my hill unlivable.  In fact, it’s unBEARable.

For a moment she laughed at her unintentional joke, but when she saw the mess all around she began to cry.  The Bear Queen stood up on the top of her hill and called out.  “I would like a representative from each of the animals to come here at once.  I must tell them of this disappointing situation.”

The word went out everywhere.  From Tula Lake to the San Diego Bay, leaders of the animals came to visit the Bear Queen on her hill.  In a week’s time, the opossums and bobcats, the beavers and racoons, all took their place at the foot of the hill.  Bees and wasps and beetles flew overhead, joined with every bird from the robin and hummingbird, to the crow and the turkey vulture.  In their lakes, the salmon and lamprey and trout all leapt up so they could hear the Bear Queen’s announcement.

“Once I saw that all around me was chaos and I offered to protect you in return for your respect.  I asked for you to show me respect by building me a house.  You all ran around and brought me much material to build with.  But does any of you see a house here?”

Just like when she first asked for respect, there was a silence all around.  Many of the animals hoped that perhaps again one of the mice might squeak up.  Finally, the prince of opossums stepped forward.

“Dear Bear Queen, we are in such desperate need of your protection.  I am so sorry that we failed in our efforts.  I for one just do not know how to build, or I would have built you the most beautiful bear palace.  We beg that you will not destroy us or leave us again to our chaos.”

The Bear Queen went running down the hill toward the opossum, her mouth wide open.  The opossum could have run away, but he remained frozen, ready to accept his fate.  Then, the Bear Queen suddenly stopped short and put her paw around the prince of opossums.

“You did not fail me, my friend,” she said.  “I know that every one of you has honored me in their own way.  You brought what you thought would make me happy.  You spread the word among all your fellow animals.  You stayed off from your fighting and teasing to be as productive as any of you are able.  I feel humbled by all the love you have shown me.”

She ran into the forest to address the deer, and the bobcat, and the elk. “From this day,” she continued, “I and my fellow bears will rule the land and we shall do everything in our power so that you do not unduly torment each other.  We shall all create a beautiful place for ourselves here.”

She ran into the desert to speak with the scorpion and snake.  “I know you are dangerous, but I am going to watch over all the creatures of the land so that we may get along and live without fear.”

The Bear Queen ran up from the desert to the edge of the Sacramento River.  She looked out across the gushing foam of the running waters, and down to the shoreline.

“As you honored me, I shall honor each of you.  But there is one thing you must always remember.”

As she said that she looked into the river at one of the salmon that was earnestly listening to her glorious pronouncement.  She swiped her paw down into the waters, revealed her claws, and hurled the salmon up into the air.  As it came flapping back down to earth, she opened her mouth, caught the salmon in her jaws and felt it slide down her throat into her belly.  The Bear Queen gave a burp that could be heard across every bay and lake and river.

“I am still a bear,”

Real California folk tales

More on the biblical portion Vayakhel