Missives

Historically, Malachi (c.465-420 BC) speaks to the third wave of expatriate Jews returning to Judah and Jerusalem after 70-years of exile in Babylon, and after Zerubbabel completed rebuilding the temple in Jerusalem in 516 BC. Just as the Jews’ first entrance into Canaan was quite miraculous by the hand of God working in Joshua and his armies, so was their second re-entrance.  They received a royal edict from the newly dominant world super-power, the Persian empire, and its God-empowered king named Cyrus.  It fulfilled Isaiah’s prophecy (45:1-3) during Hezekiah’s reign:  Thus saith the LORD to his anointed, to Cyrus, whose right hand I have holden, to subdue nations before him; and I will loose the loins of kings, to open before him the two leaved gates; and the gates shall not be shut; I will go before thee, and make the crooked places straight: I will break in pieces the gates of brass, and cut in sunder the bars of iron: And I will give thee the treasures of darkness, and hidden riches of secret places, that thou mayest know that I, the LORD, which call thee by thy name, am the God of Israel.  That was penned 150 years before Cyrus was born! [1]

Such a prophecy was quite bold, since the most feared nations were the Assyrians, who were later sub-jugated by the neo-Babylonians.  Persia was oh-so-far to the east; yet, true to God’s Word, Cyrus the Great began a conquering sweep counterclock-wise across the region and dominated the Medes, the Lydians and the Babylonians – and thus ruling over Judah and Jerusalem in the process. [2]

Cyrus the Great’s conquests are not questioned, but his edict of 538 AD as recorded in 2 Chronicles 36:22-23 is:  Now in the first year of Cyrus king of Persia, that the word of the LORD spoken by the mouth of Jeremiah might be accomplished, the LORD stirred up the spirit of Cyrus king of Persia, that he made a proclamation throughout all his kingdom, and put it also in writing, saying, Thus saith Cyrus king of Persia, All the kingdoms of the earth hath the LORD God of heaven given me; and he hath charged me to build him an house in Jerusalem, which is in Judah. Who is there among you of all his people? The LORD his God be with him, and let him go up. Throughout the 19^th century, sceptics mocked the Bible’s claim that a king would allow such a thing.

The sceptics were silenced in 1879 when evangelical Christian and archaeologist Hormuzd Rassam discovered the Cyrus Cylinder in Babylonian ruins in Iraq.  The baked clay cylinder, approx. 9” x 4”, was  written in Akkadian cuneiform script with 36 lines of preserved text. “The Cyrus Cylinder establishes beyond doubt that it was Cyrus’ policy to return ‘them [exiles] to their settlements,’ and make ‘permanent sanctuaries’ for the gods of the exiled peoples. Moreover, he returned captured idols ‘unharmed to their cells, in the sanctuaries that make them happy.’ In the case of the Jews, however, since they had no idols, the gold and silver articles taken from the Temple were returned. The specific proclamation pertaining to the Jews is documented in Ezra 6:3–5.” [3]  Hailed as the first declaration of human rights (hah!), a copy resides at the UN headquarters.  Isaiah and God were right after all!