Whistle-stop tour of the bible (Part II)

Exile and Restoration

In the last post, we traced the story of the Bible (very briefly) until about 586 BC when Judah was sent into exile in the city of Babylon. This period was an all-time low for the people of God and gave rise to some serious speculation as to whether God had abandoned them – read Psalm 137 for example (you may know it better in another form in the song “by the rivers of Babylon”). Judah had sinned and God had punished them, but despite what many of the exiles thought, God had not given up on his people! He had not forgotten his promises to Abraham and to David.

During the time of the exile, Prophetic voices spoke comfort to Judah. The most relevant voices are those of Jeremiah, Ezekiel and Isaiah 40-55. These three all spoke a message of restoration after judgement; God had not forgotten Israel, but would actually bring them back to their land. Not only that, but God would restore the kingdom of Israel in an unprecedented way. Those who heard these prophets promising restoration would not have been able to contain their excitement.

Sure enough, in about 540 BC the Babylonian empire fell into the hands of the Persian empire. King Cyrus of Persia started to send waves of exiles back to the land of Judah, which was now a Persian province. Under the leadership of Zerubbabel and later Nehemiah, the exiles returned to Jerusalem and rebuilt the destroyed Temple and the broken city walls (Ezra-Nehemiah; c.f also Haggai and Zechariah). Restoration had started, but those who had heard the prophecies of Isaiah, Ezekiel and Jeremiah could not help but be severely disappointed – it looked nothing like it used to be, let alone what the prophets had promised and Judah was not a great kingdom any more, but a province within a greater pagan empire. In a sense, God's people still felt like they were in exile, but this time within their own land.

Between the Testaments

This takes us to the end of the Old Testament history. Judah, God's chosen people were a small and insignificant province within the mighty Persian empire. So much for blessing the nations, Judah could not even bless itself! During the 400 years between the end of the Old Testament story and the beginning of the new, things go from bad to worse to slightly better to even worse.

In the 4^th century BC, the Persian empire was taken over by Alexander the great, which meant that Judah came under Greek control at the time. One branch of Alexander the Great's descendants, the Seleucids controlled Judah and Jerusalem for the next century and a half. In 167 BC, however, the inhabitants of Jerusalem revolted against the Seleucid rule, which prompted the Seleucid king Antiochus IV to reassert his authority. He crushed the revolt and installed a reign of terror in Judah and horrified the Jews by desecrating the Jerusalem temple, forbidding Jewish worship and sacrificing a pig on the altar (the “abomination of desolation” which Daniel speaks of in Daniel 9.27). This was too much for the Jews who under the leadership of Judas Maccabeus (read 1-2 Maccabbees in the apocrypha if you're interested) drove the Seleucids out of Judah for the next hundred years.

In 63 BC, however, with the rise of the mighty Roman empire, the Romans invaded Jerusalem and Judea and established their control of Jerusalem. Judah was again in the hands of a larger and more powerful empire. Many revolts took place (many of them with so-called Messiahs), but they were firmly crushed by the military might of the Romans. Things looked bleak!

Jesus – the climax of the covenant!

In about 6BC, in a small town of Judah, the descendant of David who would sit on the throne of king David forever was born. About 30 years later, this Jesus came announcing to Israel that God was coming back to his people! As the ultimate Israelite, he embodied what it was to live as God's people, but he also came proclaiming judgement on Israel and calling them to repent and to fulfil their calling of being the light of the world (c.f Isaiah 49). He chose 12 disciples to show that he would be the head and ruler of the true Israel and called people to follow him!

The Jerusalem authorities did not like Jesus' message. For one, he was claiming to be the king of Israel (risky business when every single previous kingly pretender had been crushed by the Romans along with all their followers) and secondly he was proclaiming judgement on Israel for forsaking their calling and he claimed that those who were at the head of the nation (the elders and priests) were corrupt. He had to go! They convinced the Roman authorities to crucify him in order to get rid of him (in their opinion dangerous influence).

Now here's the greatest irony I can think of in the Bible. Jesus had a titulus above his cross with the sarcastic words “king of the Jews” written on it. The irony is this: the titulus was completely true and the cross which meant to convey the image of Rome's victory actually now has become the very symbol of Christ's victory as he defeated every evil power at the cross and rose again three days later, kickstarting God's new creation and validating his claim to be the promised king! Interestingly in the ancient world a favourite refrain was "Caesar is Lord". The early Christians responded with the cry "Jesus is Lord!"

The rest of the story if probably better known to most people. After rising from the dead, Jesus commissioned his disciples to preach the good news of Jesus crucified and risen in the whole world. The time had come. Through Jesus' death and resurrection, the blessing which was promised to Abraham 2000 years earlier could finally fully go to the nations (c.f Galatians 3.13-14) carried by witnesses who were full of the Spirit in order that every nation might be blessed by the God of Abraham through Jesus Christ and until Christ returns and makes all things new, we are called to be that blessing!

There you go, there's a very very brief overview of the whole Bible for you. In the next few posts I want to take a couple of well known passages and show how they take on a completely new dynamic when they are interpreted in the light of this grand narrative!