Many Israelites would have wondered the same thing—or thought that God had forsaken his covenant promises e. Prophets like Ezekiel, Daniel, and Habakkuk, raised up by God during the exile, had a different perspective.
Yahweh had summoned foreign armies who served other gods to punish his own people. Yahweh was in control. Spiritual disloyalty was what had led to the situation. It refers to one of the common directional points. But because of what Israelites believed lurked in the north, the word came to signify something otherworldly. The most obvious example is Bashan, which was also associated with Mount Hermon. In Jewish theology, this is where the rebellious sons of God of Genesis 6 infamy descended to commit their act of treason.
But there was something beyond Bashan—farther north—that every Israelite associated with other gods hostile to Yahweh. The worship of Baal was central in these places. The fact that the center of Baal worship was just across the border was a contributing factor in the apostasy of the northern kingdom of Israel.
It was a divine mountain, the place where Baal was believed to hold council as he ruled the gods of the Canaanite pantheon. Baal was outranked only by El in Canaanite religion. This connection to the realm of the dead of course dovetails with our discussion of the themes associated with the serpent figure from Genesis 3. In short, when an Israelite thought of the north in theological terms, he or she thought of Bashan, Mount Hermon, and Baal. Later Jews would have made connections to the serpent, the great adversary of Genesis 3.
But for that we need to start with the concept of exile. One of the great misconceptions of biblical study is that the return of the Jews from Babylon in BC and the years following solved the problem of Israelite exile.
The prophets had envisioned the return of all twelve tribes from where they had been dispersed. Verse 3 is explicit—Yahweh promises to bring back his people from all the places where they have been scattered. Both kingdoms, Judah and Israel, will one day be brought back to the land v. Other passages are clear in this regard as well.
In Ezekiel 37, the famous vision of the dry bones, Yahweh says,. And I will join with it the stick of Judah, and make them one stick, that they may be one in my hand. What this means is that Jews living in the time of Jesus saw the nation as still being in exile.
Ten of the tribes had not yet returned and many Jews had stayed in Babylon when given the chance. Was Yahweh going to deliver them? And the three Rosh, Meshech and Tubal were called by the ancients Scythians. They roamed as nomads in the country around and north of the Black and the Caspian Seas, and were known as the wildest barbarians. The mountain Scythians extended hence from the river Araxes to the Caucasus, and those of the plain to the Do, the Sea of Azof, and the Northern Ocean. It is credible that from the Rosh and Meshech nations dwelling about the Araxes, are descended the Russians and Moscovites.
Professor G Rawlinson wrote a definite study of the ancient tribes and empires that ruled the Middle East, called Five Great Monarchies. This land of Magog is the same with Cathaia or Scythia. Gog is further described as the chief prince of Meshech and Tubal: some render it, prince of Rosh, Meshech, and Tubal taking Rosh, as the rest, for the name of a place, a part of Scythia, from whence the Russians came, and had their name. So it is rendered by the Septuagint, Symmachus and Theodotion; and some later Greek writers [Zonaras, Cedrenus] make mention of a country called Ros, which they say, is a Scythian nation, situated between the Euxine Pontus Black Sea and the whole maritime coast to the north of Taurus, a people fierce and wild.
This book is a major authority on the precise meaning of Hebrew and Chaldee words found in the original manuscripts of the Old Testament. We are to understand just the same nations as the Greeks comprised, under the name of Scythian Josephus Antiquities of the Jews 1. The prophecies in Ezekiel 38 were studied for thousands of years by Jewish sages. Consequently, the conclusions drawn by these scholars illuminate the true meaning of the Hebrew words Gog and Magog.
The prophet Ezekiel named Magog along with other specific allied nations, such as Libya, Persia, and Ethiopia. This strongly suggests that Ezekiel expected the name Magog to be understood by his Jewish readers as a real nation, not as an abstract symbol of evil. This agrees with Yerushalmi Megillah which renders Magog as the Goths a group of nomadic tribes who destroyed the Scythians and made their homes in Scythian territory.
Note: these nations will basically align with Russia in battles against the King of the South and later on the Antichrist. Sometime before the beginning of the seven-year tribulation, the King of the South an African-Arab coalition described in Daniel 11 moves to invade Israel.
The African-Arab coalition initially has the upper hand, but is ultimately defeated by the King of the North Russia. After a short time of peace, seeing an opportunity to enhance their domination, Gog and Magog Russia and its Leader proceed with their own invasion of Israel.
However, God has no intention of allowing Russia to take over the land of Israel. The Antichrist intercepts Gog and Magog and defeats them. Note that two battles are described here, separated by at least 2, years. Ezekiel is what is known in biblical hermeneutics interpretation as a double fulfillment. The events of the first battle foreshadow the second battle describing the same movements predicted by Ezekiel which will occur in the latter days just before the seven-year tribulation begins.
Speaking with hyperbole a literary tool that exaggerates to make a point God describes the devastating events of the battle between Magog, Gog and the Antichrist. I will turn you around, put hooks in your jaws and bring you out with your whole army.
When Gog attacks the land of Israel, my hot anger will be aroused. In my zeal and fiery wrath,. I will execute judgment upon him with plague and bloodshed. The fish of the sea, the birds of the air, and the piece of the field, every creature, and all the people in the face of the earth will tremble at his presence.
I will pour out torrents of rain, hail stones, and burning sulfur on him and on his troops. On that day, I give will give Gog the burial place in the Valley of those who travel east toward the sea it will block the way of travelers, because Gog and all his hordes will be buried there.
So it will be called the Valley of Haman Gog. We see in these verses what seems to describe a nuclear holocaust. Fire and brimstone fall from the sky. The earth shakes. The faces of the invading soldiers melt like hot wax. It takes Israel seven years to decontaminate the land. Is it so farfetched to imagine the axis between Hizbullah, Iran and Syria, especially after the second war in Lebanon when these three forces overtly united and continue to support each other's goal to destroy Israel?
In his book, Rosenberg notes a conspicuous absence of Egypt and Iraq in the original prophecy, which also makes a lot of sense at this point in time. Egypt signed a peace treaty with Israel in and Iraq is embroiled in its own war of survival and both are unlikely to join a coalition against Israel.
According to the prophecy Magog "will build a military coalition and prepare a strike against Israel. And his coalition will "come like a storm…like a cloud covering the land.
According to the prophecy, there is no need for Israel to become alarmed, "as the Lord God will bring judgment upon the enemies of Israel beginning with Gog the tyrant.
The next step, which prophesizes God subjecting the enemy to "pestilence, blood, torrential rains, hailstones and fire from heaven," is unclear and sounds like someone pressed the nuclear button, and if so, then who, and who in the region would survive it?
0コメント