Editorial Opinion: Israel's Last Defeat by Russia not Arabs (Part 5 of 0)

Ezekiel 35,36 – Part five

Passages used to Prove the Arabs will Defeat Israel

Ezekiel 35, 36

In the two preceding articles (“Tidings,” May, pg. 140, June, pg. 171), principles were set out which must be remembered in reading these chapters. Those principles are:

  1. Edom (also called Esau, Idu­mea or mount Seir) disappeared as a people, being absorbed into Jewry about B.C. 50.
  2. “Edom” is a term used by scripture to represent the Gentiles as a whole.
  3. The phrase, “Thou shalt know that I am the LORD” is not unique to latter-day prophecies but is used any time a divine judgment occurs in fulfillment of the prophetic word.
  4. Likewise, statements that God will directly execute a judgment (“I will do it”) are not unique to latter-day prophecies. They are used any time He uses any means, including Gentile nations, to accomplish His will.
  5. Sins cast long shadows. Na­tional sins can affect a nation’s his­tory for centuries.
  6. Places suffer for people’s sins. Divine judgments are carried out on geographic areas that generations to come might recognize God means what He says.
  7. Time gaps of centuries can occur between sentences in prophetic writings. This can be identified by knowing the facts of the case.

Principles applied to Ezekiel 35, 36:1-7

With the foregoing points in mind, Ezekiel 35 is readily understood. The prophecy against Edom was fulfilled by the Babylonians, Greeks and Jewish Maccabees as they desolated the land and people. The land area itself will remain a desolate wilderness even into the millennium as a continual reminder of the consequences of disdaining God’s covenant people.

Ezk. 36:5 is seen as a Hebrew parallelism: “Surely in the fire of my jealousy have I spoken against the residue of the heathen, [is parallel to] and against all Idumea…”

As a biblical term for the Gentiles, Idumea is set in parallel to “the heathen.” This is confirmed by Ezk. 36:6,7 where all of Israel’s protagonists are summarized under the one phrase, “the heathen:”

v.6 “…because ye have borne the shame of the heathen:”

v.7 “…Surely the heathen that are about you, they shall bear their shame.”

Therefore, upon careful consideration, Ezekiel 35 and 36 cannot be taken as proof passages that Israel’s final defeat will be by the Arabs. We reach such a conclusion by knowing the facts of Edom’s (mount Seir’s) fate and by understanding the divine phrasing commonly used in Bible prophecies.

Joel 3

In the latter days, Tyre, Zidon, the Philistines (the coasts of Palestine), Egypt and Edom are to be punished for their sins (Joel 3:4-8,19). Some people argue that since the punishment is latter-day, wouldn’t the sins be latter-day as well?

Old sins

As a point of fact, all of the divine charges against these nations are biblically documented to have occurred over 2,500 years ago. During the reign of Ahaz, Edom and the Philistines sacked many Jewish cities of their wealth and carried away captives (II Chron. 28:17-18, cp. Joel 3:5,6,19). When Israel and Judah were desolated by Assyria and Babylon, Tyre and the Philistines sold Jews into slavery and pillaged what they could (Ezk. 25:15; 26:2; Amos 1:6,9, cp. Joel 3:5,6). Egypt overran Judah in the time of Rehoboam, “and he took the fenced cities which pertained to Judah…and took away the treasures of the house of the LORD, and the treasures of the king’s house; he took all…”. Hundreds of years later, Egypt “condemned the land in an hundred talents of silver and a talent of gold” and controlled who would be king (II Chron. 12:4,9; 36:3-4, cp. Joel 3:5,19).

These are old sins, that is true, but so are the sins laid against the other nations gathered into the valley of Jehoshaphat in the latter days. God charges “they have scattered [Israel] among the nations, and parted my land. And they have cast lots for my people; and have given a boy for an harlot…” (Joel 3:2-3). There is nothing new about those crimes, they were committed centuries ago.

Is this reasonable?

God’s charges would not be reasonable or fair if the Gentiles had repented of their conduct and had treated the Jews with favor over the years. But they have not. They have not learned from the sins of their forefathers but have repeated them in perpetuating the old hostility toward Jewry. Jewish persecution during the brutal Inquisition and the recent holocaust bear painful testimony to the fact. And this very day Israel’s neighbors conspire for her destruction and Jewish people flee from Russia and Ethiopia because of persistent anti-Semitism.

Today’s inhabitants of the na­tions surrounding Jerusalem deserve divine judgment as much as their parents ever did. At every opportunity, they commit “violence against the children of Judah…and shed innocent blood in their land” (Joel 3:19) as witness the Scud missile attacks upon Israel. Surely it is a classic case of God “visiting the in­iquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of those who hate me” (Exo. 20:5).

In no way, however, does this prove that the Arabs rather than Russia will be Israel’s last invader. The charges of Joel 3 are laid against “all nations…all ye heathen” (Joel 3:2,11) not just Arab states.

In this regard, some have claimed the phrase “round about” in Joel 3:11,12 limits the scope of the prophecy to Israel’s immediate neighbors. That is simply an unsupported assertion which flies in the face of the sweeping terms of the chapter. Certainly the nations in mind are “round about” Jerusalem as they are from every area of the globe. They are “all nations” and all are called to face the charges of the LORD God Almighty.