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YHWH chose the
seed of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob (Israel) to be his
chosen people, a holy nation. He brought them out of
slavery in Egypt where they were oppressed so hard their
cry reached up to high heaven (Exod. 1). They were to
be an example to all the other nations, but they never
lived up to their part of the agreement (Covenant).
Instead, the Hebrew
Israelites (12 Tribes of Israel) chose to be like the
other nations.
They drifted away from YHWH and served and worshipped
all of the false gods set up by the surrounding nations.
For this, YHWH allowed them to be oppressed by the other
nations.The book of Judges makes somber reading. It
ends on this sad note: “Everyone did that which
was right in his own eyes” (Jdg. 21:25). |
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It seems they had already begun to live up to the words of
YHWH when he told Moses:
“Behold, you shall sleep with your fathers, and this
people will rise up and go a whoring after the gods of the
strangers of the land, whither they go to be among them, and
will forsake me and break my covenant which I have made with
them.
Then my anger shall be kindled against them, and I will hide
my face from them, and they shall be devoured, and many evils
and troubles shall befall them; so that they will say in that
day, Are not these evils come upon us because our God is not
among us? And I will surely hide my face in that day for all
the evils which they shall have wrought in that they are turned
to other gods.” (Deut. 31:16-19)
Time and time again YHWH sends deliverers to save his people
from their oppressions. But their repentance was always short-lived
because they really didn’t have the heart to serve the
true and living YHWH in truth and
in righteousness.
Under the leaderships of King David and his son Solomon, the
nation of Israel feared very well and was established as a
major power in the ancient
world. David was even said to be “A man after YHWH’s
own heart.” He did what was right in the sight of YHWH
and instructed the people in the
way of righteousness. Under the reign of Solomon’s son
Rehoboam, the Kingdom of Israel was split into two separate
kingdoms — the Northern
kingdom of Samaria, known as the House of Israel — and
the Southern Kingdom of Jerusalem, known as the House of Judah.
This was the beginning of the end of the ancient Hebrew Israelite
nation.
By the time of the Messiah in the first Century A.D., many
evils had fell the Children of Israel just as YHWH had foretold.
They had undergone several major captivities in foreign lands
that included the deportation of the House of Israel by the
Assyrians in 721 B.C; and the 70-year captivity of the House
of Judah by the Babylonians in 607 B.C. During the reign of
Cyrus The Great of the Medo-Persian empire in 539 B.C., Judah
was allowed to return to Jerusalem and rebuild their city
and temple to YHWH.
(End)
Next Page: By The Rivers of Babylon |
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Therefore shalt thou serve thine enemies
which the LORD shall send against thee,
in hunger, and in thirst, and in nakedness,
and in want of all [things]: and he shall
put a yoke of iron upon thy neck, until
he have destroyed thee.
Deut. 28:48 |
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