By: Obed Pineda
It is undeniable that one of Israel’s darkest periods in history ran from 606 B.C. to 536 B.C. This obsidian mark on Israel’s timeline is remembered as the years of captivity, or the period of exile. During this time frame of uncertainty and sorrow, the questions haunting the minds of the exiled Jews were how and why. The reality, however, is that they had no right to ask either of those questions because Jehovah God had already warned them of these consequences after He delivered them from the Egyptian hand of Pharaoh, several centuries prior (cf. Deuteronomy 28:43-57). It is only right to acknowledge that this was not the only time the Lord spoke these words of caution to His children. Jeremiah (one of the prophets of the captivity) reminded the house of Israel, right before King Nebuchadnezzar would commence his conquest of Jerusalem, that “from the thirteenth year of Josiah the son of Amon, king of Judah, even to this day, this is the twenty-third year in which the word of the Lord has come to me; and I have spoken to you, rising early and speaking, but you have not listened. And the Lord has sent to you all His servants the prophets, rising early and sending them, but you have not listened nor inclined your ear to hear” (Jeremiah 25:3-4). Jeremiah mirrored the prophetic account penned by the unidentified scribe who tells of Assyria’s conquest of the northern kingdom of Israel, similarly declaring that “the Lord testified against Israel and against Judah, by all of His prophets, every seer, saying, ‘Turn from your evil ways, and keep My commandments and My statues, according to all the law which I commanded your fathers, and which I sent to you by My servants the prophets.’ Nevertheless they would not hear, but stiffened their necks, like the necks of their fathers, who did not believe in the Lord their God” (2nd Kings 17:13-14). Keep in mind that the Assyrian Empire vanquished Samaria (cf. 2nd Kings 17:5) approximately one hundred and fifteen years before the Babylonian Empire would do the same to the southern kingdom of Judah. Thus, reading the prophet Jeremiah’s words to those at Jerusalem, as they echo the unknown prophet who spoke similar words a little over a century earlier about the fallen tribes of Israel, verifies that God truly is “a gracious and merciful God, slow to anger and abundant in lovingkindness, One who relents from doing harm” (Jonah 4:2c). Yet, this also confirms Jehovah God’s judicious appraisal of Israel as He declared to Moses, “I have seen this people, and indeed it is a stiff-necked people” (Exodus 32:9)! Putting these two pieces of the metaphorical puzzle together enlightens why the house of Judah did not have the right to question God’s motive for their exile in Babylon. It also reveals the righteousness of God’s punishment, since Judah could neither claim that He did not give them sufficient time to repent, nor enough warning that their demise was at the gates. Their attempt to want to proclaim that they “did not see this coming” is lunacy since Isaiah announced to King Hezekiah, after he showed the Babylonian envoys all that his kingdom possessed, “Hear the word of the Lord of hosts: ‘Behold, the days are coming when all that is in your house, and what your fathers have accumulated until this day, shall be carried to Babylon; nothing shall be left,’ says the Lord. ‘And they shall take away some of your sons who will descend from you, whom you will beget; and they shall be eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon’” (Isaiah 39:5-7). The visit of the Babylonian envoys to Hezekiah is deduced to have happened on 701 B.C. by Biblical historians because Judah’s king died in 686 B.C. Remember that the envoys had been sent to visit Hezekiah because they “heard that he had been sick and had recovered” (Isaiah 39:1). The king of Judah had fallen terribly ill and was supposed to die, but God mercifully extended his life by fifteen years in response to Hezekiah’s plea (cf. Isaiah 38:1-5, 2nd Kings 20:1-6). Knowing that the reason Merodach-Baladan sent a gift via his envoys was because he learned of Hezekiah’s recovery, and that Judah’s king died fifteen years later, corroborates the date of 701 B.C.; twenty years after the fall of Israel to Assyria. Therefore Isaiah’s prophecy to Hezekiah took place almost one hundred years before Judah fell, as foretold by God’s servant. Furthermore, two decades earlier they had witnessed the Lord’s just wrath pour upon their northern brethren because of their refusal to repent and turn away from their wickedness, which should have motivated them to repent of their sins to avoid a similar fate. Behold the loving kindness of God displayed yet again! Indeed, there is no justifiable way for the Babylonian captives to claim that God’s punishment was unexpected. On the contrary, this attests the inspired words of the Hebrew scribe who boldly states of the fathers who perished in the wilderness, “So we see that they could not enter because of unbelief” (Hebrews 3:19). It is lamentable to learn that Israel suffered from unbelief their entire history, despite the insurmountable and undeniable amount of proof that God had provided for them aiming to diffuse this threat. Before God unleashed His servant Nebuchadnezzar (cf. Jeremiah 25:8-9) on Jerusalem to obliterate it, and the temple built by Solomon, the Father patiently endured His children’s relentless refusal to believe in Him for over eight centuries. This astounding fact verily supplies a deeper insight of Holy Writ’s declaration that the Almighty “had compassion on His people and on His dwelling place. But they mocked the messengers of God, despised His words, and scoffed at His prophets, until the wrath of the Lord arose against His people, till there was no remedy. Therefore He brought against them the king of the Chaldeans, who killed their young men with the sword in the house of their sanctuary, and had no compassion on young man or virgin, on the aged or the weak; He gave them all into his hand” (2nd Chronicles 36:15b-17). It is incredible to discover that even though the house of Judah had exceeded past God’s level of patience, the Lord would still call in to service “a watchman for the house of Israel” who was in exile with them so that “they will know that a prophet has been among them” six years prior to the utter destruction of Jerusalem (Ezekiel 3:17,2:5b). Judah had no reason to wonder why their fall had happened, and still God selected Ezekiel to remind His people that He keeps all His promises. To be continued…