I was studying the Book of Ezra recently in preparation for my next book – and something hit me right between the eyes.
Ezra, of course, is a historical book of the Bible written about four and a half centuries before the birth of Messiah Jesus, chronicling events in Persia and Israel during the return of the Jews to the Holy Land from their 70 years of captivity following the Babylonian invasion.
It had been prophesied by Jeremiah that Israel would be held captive for 70 years.
Ezra knew it. Daniel, too, had read Jeremiah. He was aware. The prophet Jeremiah had written it under the inspiration of God, and they didn’t have any doubts it would be so.
Next year, significantly, Israel will be celebrating its 70th year back in the land as a nation after a much longer dispersion – nearly 2,000 years.
Think about that. It has never happened to any other nation in the history of the world. Imagine being conquered, cast out of your homeland, scattered to the four corners of the Earth. What people could go through that for nearly two millennia and still hold out hope of returning? Yet, every year, in every country the children of Israel found themselves in, they continued to pray, “Next year in Jerusalem.”
Don’t get me wrong. Many Jews continued to live in Jerusalem throughout the Diaspora. In fact, Jews represented the majority of the population there at the turn of the 20th century. Some 40,000 Jews lived there then, with the second-largest population being Christians, with a population of 13,000. Only about 7,000 of Jerusalem’s residents at that point were Muslims – a fact I first reported in 2002 and unchallenged since.
But most of the world’s Jews lived outside Israel. Only recently have we reached the point at which most Jews live inside the Jewish state.
This year, significantly, marked the 50th year of the liberation of Jerusalem by the Jews, restoring it as the nation’s capital. And, seemingly, in 2018, we could see President Trump move the U.S Embassy to Jerusalem decades after the Congress of the United States voted overwhelming to do so.
But there’s much more to this unique story of Israel’s dispersions, captivities and returns.
It’s a state of existence the children of Israel, of all the people of the Earth alone, knew from the beginning. Have you ever considered that? The nation itself was born in captivity in Egypt. Before Jacob’s extended family moved to Egypt to escape a famine in the land, they were hardly yet a nation – just a family of 70 people. Was it a punishment for the sins of Joseph’s brothers for casting him into slavery? Or was it by God’s design to bring His chosen people to reconciliation? Was it an opportunity to incubate the birth of the nation, according to God’s plan from the beginning?
Learn more about the Coming Kingdom of Heaven on Earth in Joseph Farah’s “The Restitution of All Things: Israel, Christians and the End of the Age” – the very Good News too many believers have forgotten or overlooked.
Perhaps it was all three. Certainly, it was an egregious sin for Joseph’s brothers to consider killing him and then deciding to sell him into slavery. But the act resulted in the complete reconciliation of the brothers, not to mention peace and blessing for patriarch Jacob, who had since been renamed “Israel.” And, after all, in Genesis 15:3, God tells Abraham: “Know of a surety that thy seed shall be a stranger in a land that is not theirs, and shall serve them; and they shall afflict them four hundred years;”
Has any other nation in the history of the world been born this way? Of course not.
Later, as prophesied again by Moses, the children of Israel would face exile and captivity again and again – and they did. First the Northern Kingdom of Israel was conquered by the Assyrians and removed from the land and later the Babylonians would conquer Judah, again as specifically prophesied, remaining in captivity for precisely 70 years. Again, beginning in A.D. 70, with the destruction of the Temple, the Jews, once again, were conquered and mostly scattered throughout the world, with the exception of a small remnant who remained waiting faithfully and prayerfully for their brethren.
It was a fate no other nation in the history of the world has endured or survived. Yet, miraculously, and, again, as prophesied, after nearly 2,000 years, the Children of Israel are back in the land in numbers greater than ever before.
I don’t believe today’s Christians and Jews appreciate enough the uniqueness of this history. It should be considered proof, not just evidence, of the Divine hand that has been on the Children of Israel from the time before Jacob was born. And thus Israel would serve as the set-apart nation through which the Messiah, the Redeemer of the world, would come forth.
The Book of Ezra begins with a lengthy recitation and count of the booty captured by the Babylonians and stored by Nebuchadnezzar during the Jewish captivity, but also a census of the people returning to their land at the order of Cyrus the Great – with the specific goal of rebuilding their Temple. In other words, not only were their needs for the future provided by God, but the heritage of Jacob was protected while in exile. And what is the heritage of Jacob, referenced in Isaiah 58:14? It was the Torah – the teachings of the law.
And who was Ezra? He was the scholar of the law God provided to ensure the children of Israel would turn to when they got back to the Holy Land.
The entire history is too neat to consider simply a matter of “coincidence.” The most common definition of the English word “coincidence” is “a striking occurrence of two or more events at one time apparently by mere chance.” Sometimes, though, we rightly determine that mere chance cannot explain such striking occurrences. And the history of Israel, more than any other nation the world has ever known, is literally “against all odds.”
Mere chance? No way.
It’s worth mentioning that in Egypt, too, the exodus and re-entry by the children of Israel to the Promised Land was financed by their captors. Exodus 12:36 tells us: “And the Lord gave the people favour in the sight of the Egyptians, so that they lent unto them such things as they required. And they spoiled the Egyptians.”
Yes, we think about punishment and discipline when we consider Israel’s long history of dispersions and captivities. But there’s much more there. Because, throughout that history, God had His hand on the children of Israel at all times. Because, just as He revealed the dispersions if His laws were not obeyed, He also promised the miraculous returns.
Israel holds a special place still in the future of the world.
It will be the place to which the Messiah will return and be recognized not just as the King of Israel, but the King of Kings.
Learn more about the Coming Kingdom of Heaven on Earth in Joseph Farah’s “The Restitution of All Things: Israel, Christians and the End of the Age” – the very Good News too many believers have forgotten or overlooked.
