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54. Fall of the
Kingdom of Judah.
In these evil and
perilous times, the faithful God of Israel sent his people many prophets
to warn the wicked and to comfort the pious, who remained faithful to
their God in the midst of the wicked world and wept over the misfortunes
of their homeland. As living voices of God, they tirelessly admonished
their contemporaries to reform their hearts. The warning voice of God
was not heard. When all exhortations remained fruitless, they proclaimed
the approaching doom ever more earnestly and terribly.
Where the fear of God and righteousness have disappeared, doom is not
far away.
On the other hand, the same prophets proclaim for the consolation of the
pious and a better posterity that after all tribulations happy times and
a blessed reunion of men with God will return.
“The Lord will visit his people. He will give a king from the house of
David, who will rule well and establish justice and righteousness on
earth. In all lands the knowledge of God will be spread and God will be
praised and honored, no longer with sacrifices and offerings, but with a
pure and faithful heart and with pious deeds. God will cleanse them from
all iniquity. He will forgive them all iniquity in which they have
sinned against him.”
The men of God, the prophets, gave such comfort and hope to the mourners
and their descendants as a parting blessing in the long, long misery
they were facing.
Then came the Chaldeans who ruled in Babylon, the savage, cruel people
of war. At first they captured the land of the Jews and carried off ten
thousand captives, all the nobles and rich men, including King Jechonias
and his mother, all the men of war, a thousand blacksmiths and
carpenters. But the enemies gave the land another king. King Zedekiah
went wrong and sought refuge with the Egyptians. That was their last.
Faithlessness is the last. The Chaldeans came again, besieged and
conquered Jerusalem and destroyed it along with the beautiful temple;
and to add to the misery, many Edomites were also in the army of the
Chaldeans, hereditary enemies of the Jews. They took terrible revenge by
plundering, destroying and murdering, and were the descendants of Esau,
from whom Jacob, his brother, had once taken away his father's blessing
and the right of possession of Canaan. Time does not forget such things.
But after the conquest, the Chaldeans carried away the Jewish people and
all their plunder, the gold and silver vessels of the temple, into
captivity. The Ark of the Covenant was lost. No one knows where it went.
A few who had initially been left behind by the enemy fled back to the
land of slavery of their forefathers in Egypt, from which God had
redeemed their fathers, so that what the Eternal had said through Moses
might be fulfilled. So now Israel's numerous descendants, the holy
people of God, are blown away and scattered as chaff is blown away by
the wind, and the Holy One is yet to come, in whom all the families of
the earth are to be blessed, and the angels will not come to proclaim
his birth. But: What does the Unknown say to Abraham?
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