Obadiah Messenger
Of Judgment

1.Denunciation of Edom.

The historical narratives of the Bible mention eleven men who bore the name "Obadiah", out of at least six tribes, but it is quite certain that the Obadiah whose prophecy is the shortest book of the Old Testament was not any one of them. This Obadiah must have lived at the time of the destruction of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar in 586 B.C., and it would appear that he was one of the few who remained in the land after the Babylonian king had carried the greater part of the people into captivity. The account of this disastrous episode in Israel's history tells us that the Babylonians left some of the poor of the land to be vine-dressers and husbandmen, and appointed Gedaliah their governor (2 Kings 25.12 & 22). Very possibly Obadiah remained with this little community of peasants, in which case he must undoubtedly have been in contact with the prophet Jeremiah, who also remained in Judea after the captives had been taken to Babylon. Following the murder of Gedaliah, a few months later, Jeremiah was forcibly taken into Egypt by the panic-stricken peasantry. Whether Obadiah went with them or remained by himself in Judea and died there, we have no means of knowing. Jeremiah must have had a copy of Obadiah's prophecy in his possession when writing his own book, for Jer.49.7-22 is quite evidently a paraphrase of the greater part of the book of Obadiah.

From this evidence, then, we can say with some certainty that Obadiah lived at the time of the destruction of Jerusalem and penned his prophecy at about the same time, so that Jeremiah could have possessed and copied it some years later when writing his own.

The Book of Obadiah is the shortest book in the Old Testament, consisting of one chapter, of twenty-one verses only. The prophecy is concerned with the judgment of God upon the nation and land of Edom for its enmity against Judah at the time of the Captivity. The Edomites were the descendants of Esau, the twin brother of Jacob and were therefore viewed by Israel in a rather different light than the rest of the nations. Even although there was often unfriendliness and enmity between the two peoples, there was always the injunction of the Law of Moses in Deut.23.7 "Thou shalt not abhor an Edomite; for he is thy brother". It was all the more reprehensible, therefore, that when the Babylonians were ravaging Judea the Edomites should have gone out of their way to assist them in their work of destruction. The children of Israel regarded this action as a base betrayal of the—admittedly rather flimsy—blood relationship between them, and Obadiah's passionate denunciation, predicting the irretrievable ruin of Edom at the hands of God, is the outcome.

Edom was a little country about the size of Cornwall, lying to the south-east of Judea, on the way to the Red Sea. It is an extremely mountainous country; its one-time capital city, Petra, has been described as a "rose-red city, half as old as Time", alluding to its extreme antiquity and the fact that it was built in a well-nigh inaccessible gorge flanked by precipitous red granite cliffs which made the city virtually impregnable against enemies. The original name of the district was Mount Seir, derived from the first settler known to have occupied the mountain gorge, Seir the Horite. It used to be thought that the Horites were merely an insignificant tribe of cave-dwellers, but within the last eighty years it has been discovered that they were, in fact, a wide-spread civilised people which had attained a high degree of culture. The Hurrian civilisation, as it is called today, covered a large part of what is now known as Syria and Jordan. By a comparison of genealogies it would seem that Seir lived at about the same time as Terah the father of Abraham, so that when Abraham entered Canaan the Hurrian civilisation was already well established there. One of Esau's wives was Aholibamah the great-granddaughter of Seir. It is easy then to understand that when Canaan became unable to support the flocks and herds of both Jacob and Esau, the latter moved out and when to Mount Seir to his father-in law (Gen.36.6-8). That in turn is how Mount Seir became known as Edom, for the name Edom (meaning "Red") was another name for Esau. From that time onward the land was known by either name, Seir or Edom, or as the "Mount of Esau". It is evident from the extended history of Esau given in Gen.36 that the Horites and the sons of Esau intermarried and eventually became one race, the "Edomites". That race continued in possession of the land of Edom throughout the periods of Israel in Egypt, the Judges and the Kings, and were in possession when Obadiah uttered his prophecy of coming judgment.

The prophecy of Obadiah was fulfilled. Not many more years were to pass before another people, the Nabatheans, were to drive the Edomites out of the last recesses into which Nebuchadnezzar had pursued them soon after the fall of Jerusalem, to occupy the whole land themselves until they in turn were overrun by Arab hordes from the desert. The dispossessed Edomites migrated to the desert regions south of Judea and were gradually absorbed in the Jewish nation. It is said that the last true Edomites perished in the siege of Jerusalem in A.D.70.

So the prophecy of Obadiah has proved to be true history. There is no doubt about the time that he lived and no doubt about the events that marked the passage of the years after his death, events which proved him to be a true prophet. The Book of Obadiah would have served a great purpose had it been intended to do no more than that, to record the coming of Divine Judgment upon a nation that by reason of ancestry and associations was intimately connected with the people of God's covenant but chose instead to repudiate their kinship and betray those to whom they should have been as brothers, in order to curry favour with the godless power which at the time was ruling in the world.

But that was not the only purpose of the Book of Obadiah. All these kinships and events fit so marvellously an even greater betrayal of God's people in this Age by those who should have been their spiritual brethren, for the sake of an unholy alliance, with the powers of this world, that it is impossible not to see in the preservation of this short book in the canon of Scripture a record of Divine judgment pertaining to our own day and time. Rightly to understand that record it is necessary to go through the book in detail.

The primary object of the prophecy was to declare Divine judgement on Edom for its betrayal of its brother nation, Israel. The prophecy was fulfilled, so far as that object was concerned, during the century following the destruction of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar. By the year 135 B.C., when John Hyrcanus, priest-king of the temporarily independent Jewish state, compelled the remaining Edomites to become proselytes to Judaism and crushed their last claims to separate nationhood, the last words of Obadiah had been literally fulfilled to the letter. Those who had escaped from Babylonian captivity ruled again from Mount Zion, and ruled what was left of the Mount of Esau. It is true that the kingdom was not the Lord's in the sense that we expect it to be when He has taken to himself his great power to reign, but within the limited scope of the prophecy it was true enough. Judea was free from the foreign yoke, the Temple worship went on unmolested, and every true Jew looked with heightened expectation for the coming of Messiah. It requires only a moderate knowledge of the history of the years between Nehemiah and John the Baptist to realise that Obadiah's prophecy enjoyed an outward fulfilment during that period.

What then of its preservation into Christian times? There is surely something more in this dramatic denunciation than a mere recapitulation of the doom which came upon an ungodly people, a doom which we can read about in secular history books anyway. There must be some instruction appropriate to those who live in this latter day of Divine judgment, whose conditions match so closely those of Israel in the days of Obadiah.

Strangely enough, it is the Rabbinical school of interpretation which gives the clue. The Edomites, said the Rabbis of the First Century, prefigured all Christians everywhere. Edom prefigured Rome. The doom described in such bitter terms in the Book of Obadiah was to be fulfilled upon the followers of Jesus of Nazareth, and Rome was to fall before Judaism, never to rise again.

The Rabbis said this of all who named the name of Christ, whether true or professors. In that they were not right. Nothing of the denunciations in the

Book of Obadiah can fittingly be applied to anyone who is in covenant relationship with God. None of those sweeping condemnations can relate to any true-hearted Christian any more than in Obadiah's own time they could be applied to any true son of Israel. But just as the Edomites were guilty of allying themselves with the nations of the world against their own blood-brothers the Jews, so have professors of Christianity who have taken the name of Christ without partaking of his spirit allied themselves with the nations of the world against their own blood-brothers the true disciples of Christ, members of the Church in the flesh. These apostate, worldly-minded ones, are the spiritual Edomites against whom the secondary fulfilment of this prophecy is directed.

During the greater part of this Age the true Disciples of Christ have been in a condition which could properly be called a "Babylonian captivity". The powers of this world have persecuted, oppressed and martyred, or have ignored, slighted and humiliated, the Christians in their midst as they have from time to time seen fit. During all that time, except for the early centuries when Paganism was in the saddle, there has always been a so-called Christian power which was allied with the world against the true Church. They are the Edomites upon whom the spiritual counter-parts of Obadiah's judgments have descended and will yet descend.

Viewed in this light the book becomes charged with new meaning. It is the record of God's judgement upon "nominal Christendom", expressed in terms directly applicable to those who in an earlier age behaved in exactly the same way. And in order that there shall be no misunderstanding it is necessary at this point clearly to define terms and explain exactly what is intended to be conveyed by the Expression "Nominal Christendom".

It is not a name to be applied to the organisations and sects which constitute what is known as the Christian world. It is not any one or other of the great denominational groups. Nominal Christendom is the aggregate of nominal Christians everywhere, just as the true Church on earth is the aggregate of all true disciples of Jesus wherever they may be found. It is an admitted fact that no single sect contains all the members of the true Church. Their "names are written in Heaven" and only the Master knows just where they are to be found on earth, but we do know that they are likely to be in every sect and group and sometimes outside of all sects and groups. In like manner "nominal" Christians are also to be found in every sect and group, even in those which enjoy the clearest light on the Divine Plan. But just as it is true that the smallest and most insignificant of Christian groups usually contain the highest proportion of true disciples of Christ, chiefly because such groups have nothing of material advantage to offer the "nominal" professors, so it is equally true that the largest and most powerful sects usually contain the highest proportion of nominal Christians, because it is in such circles that there can be obtained the worldly advantages which they seek.

These two classes, true Christians and nominal Christians, have existed side by side throughout the Age, just as the wheat and the tares in the parable of Matt.13 grew together until the harvest. Typical characteristics distinguish the respective individuals. "By their fruits ye shall know them." The Christianity of a true Christian is usually fairly obvious to his neighbours and companions. It is certainly obvious to his fellow-believers. The worldliness of a nominal Christian is more or less equally obvious—at least to one whose own life is devoted to Christ. Because the darkness hateth the light, because it is reproved by it, because its deeds are evil, nominal Christians usually display a thinly-concealed resentment, or on occasion open enmity, against true Christians. That resentment leads such to take sides with the powers of this world against the Disciples of Christ when conditions are such that conflict of some sort is inevitable. In that attitude they become spiritual Edomites.

An ecclesiastic who places the glory and power of his position above his duties as a pastor, and uses it to obtain material advantage, is an Edomite. There were many such in past ages and there are some today. Worthless shepherds, who leave the flock, they are called by the prophet Zechariah. A man who takes the name of Christ upon his lips but in his heart is far from him, is an Edomite. The unfaithful steward of Matt.24 (vs 45-51), who beats his fellow-servants, and eats and drinks with the drunken, is an Edomite. The false teachers and seducers of the Pauline epistles are Edomites. Those who malign and vilify their fellow-brethren for supposed errors of doctrine or practice, and manifest anything but the spirit of Christ in their dealings with their fellows whom God has also received, these too are Edomites, for this thing goes very deep. Like Paul, who knew that even if he understood all mysteries, and all knowledge, if he was without love, he was nothing, so we must keep very near to the spirit and teaching of our Master if we too are not to fall under this condemnation.

So the Book of Obadiah has a strong but very necessary message. It reveals the Divine attitude toward all who have taken his name upon their lips unworthily. It shows how He will vindicate his own people in due time and bring retribution upon their oppressors. It declares in no uncertain terms that God is guiding his people's destiny and that in his own due time deliverance will be their portion and judgment that of their enemies.

That does not mean eternal damnation for the judged. More than one sect today proclaims a message of no hope for all who do not accept the peculiar tenets of the particular sect. That is quite in line with the spirit of the old creeds. "This is the Catholick faith, which unless a man believe, without doubt he shall perish everlastingly" says one of them. That is not God's design. The vindication of true Christian discipleship at the end of this Age ("Then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun in the Kingdom of their father". Matt.13.43) is to be followed by the Millennial reign of Christ in which all who have never heard of him or have never had his claims properly presented or have ignored him or, like the Edomites, have fought against him, will be subjected to the full force of the persuasive power of Divine love, and only then, as Dr. Paterson Smyth says in his "Gospel of the Hereafter" will God, after having put his arms around the sinner and looked into his eyes with his own eyes of unutterable love, and been rejected, will He turn sorrowfully away and leave the sinner to the consequences of his sin.

It is in this light that we must read the prophecy. The doom of the Edomites is complete and final, but the House of Israel is at the last to rule over the House of Esau. The Edomites die as subjects of Esau but they reappear as subjects of Jacob. Edom shall be no more but its citizens shall know another and better rule. "The kingdom shall be the Lord's." In that there is promise for all, for in that kingdom there is to be Sodom, Gomorrah, Nineveh, all restored to their former estate and having part in the opportunity for salvation. That lies outside the scope of Obadiah's prophecy; he is concerned only with the immediate picture of judgment, and it is with that picture we are concerned also. And now we will look at Obadiah's message in detail.

(To be continued)

AOH