Tanak Foundations-Concepts in Ezra-Part 3

Ezra 4.1-24 tells us that the Samaritan enemies of Judah and Benjamin make an offer to help the Jews build the Temple. These are the people that King Sennacherib of Assyria brought into the land about 200 years earlier. They were known as “Cuthites” and also known as “Samaritans.” We will look at this in more detail later. These are enemies and they are like Ha Satan who will try to get involved in God’s work in order to stop it.

They approached Zerubbabel (Seed of Babylon) who was the civil ruler at the time. They did not go to the religious leaders. Ha Satan and the enemies of God still try to use government against God’s people, too. They told Zerubbabel that they, too, “Seek your God and we have been sacrificing to him since the days of Esarhaddon, king of Assyria, who brought us here.” This was not true, they worshiped others gods. But, this alludes to another verse in John 4.18 where Yeshua is talking to a Samaritan woman. So we are going to take a look at this verse and what it is saying.

Yeshua goes to Jacob’s well in Sychar (Shechem) and a Samaritan woman comes to the well. Because there was no rope or bucket to draw water with, Yeshua asks the woman to give him a drink. They have a polite discourse about living water and wells. Then Yeshua says that that anyone who drinks out of this well will thirst again, but whoever drinks of the water he has to give will never thirst again. So the woman says, “Sir, give me this water, so I will not be thirsty, nor come all the way here to draw” (John 4.5-15). Yeshua tells her in v 16 to go get her husband, and she says that she does not have a husband. Then Yeshua tells that she has answered well because she (who represents the Samaritans) has had five husbands, and the one she has now is not her husband (v 17-18).

Now, many interpret this verse to mean she has been married five times, and she is living with someone now. But, a closer look at these verses tell us there is something else going on. After he says this she immediately goes to the subject of worship in v 19-20. She is not changing the subject as some say, she understood exactly what Yeshua meant about the five husbands. He is talking about what happened when Assyria brought in others to Samaria.

The king of Assyria brought pagan people into Samaria (northern kingdom). In 2 Kings 17.24 it says he brought in five alien tribes with all their false gods into the land. The conversation in John is about the true God and true worship. Yeshua is referring to the five false gods named in 2 Kings 17.24 that ruled as a “Baal” (husband) over the Samaritans in John 4.18, not literal husbands. And the one she is living with now (the false religious system) is the worship that she was engaged in at the present time that claimed to be the true worship of God. For example, in the Jerusalem Post, April, 1995, it says a replica of the Second Temple was found on Mount Gerizim, following an account by Josephus that said that a high priest who flaunted Jewish law married a Samaritan woman. Jews said, “Either leave the Temple or your wife.” So he stayed with his wife. The Samaritans promised to build the high priest an exact copy of the Temple in Jerusalem, making him the high priest. The ruins are under a fifth century Byzantine church. It had the gates, walls and altar and it stood until 113 B.C. This concept of replacement theology was referred to in their conversation in John 4.19-24. Yeshua said that salvation was of the Jews (4.22).

So Zerubbabel refused their help knowing what they were going to do, and this made the Samaritans angry. They wrote a letter to Artaxerxes that was full of false accusations (fake news-Ezra 4.7), and the king gave orders for the Jews to stop building the Temple (Ezra 4.17-24). The politics back then is not much different than today. The world is against Israel and they try to provoke civil authorities against her. There is an antisemitic spirit that is trying to stop the Temple from being built.

The work of the Temple was interrupted for several years, and two other kings are mentioned in this chapter. We have Ahasuerus, the king in the book of Esther who married Esther, who was also known as Xerxes. He is the king who defeated the Greeks at the battle of Thermopylae. He reigned from 485 B.C. to 465 B.C. The other king is Artaxerxes, who reigned between 464 B.C. and 424 B.C.

The context in which Ahasuerus (Esther’s husband) is mentioned here gives us some background for the book of Esther. He has heard that these early returnees will rebel and are plotting to overthrow the Persian yoke (Ezra 4.7-13). Now, it isn’t true but Ahasuerus has heard it and believed it. So when Haman says that the Jews are a people dispersed among the nation, and have different laws, and they do not observe the kings laws, and that they should not be allowed to live, Ahasuerus knows he has heard that before and agrees with Haman. The ears of the Persians were already poisoned against the Jews before Haman ever said what he said in Est 3.8. The bottom line is, the work has been stopped until the second year of the reign of Darius, king of Persia. He is the son of Ahasuerus and Esther according to some commentaries (Artscroll Tanach Series, Mesorah Publications, “Ezra”, p.129).

Ezra 5.1-17 tells us that work on the Temple resumed and Haggai the prophet gave direct encouragement to build (Hag 1.2-10). Zechariah also had a word that was spiritually directed to the exiles, notably Zerubbabel and Ezra. So, we see the prophets were with them in this work and that is a very important concept to understand. However, Tattenai, the governor over the regions beyond the River (Euphrates), Shethar-bozenai and some colleagues wanted to know why the work had resumed (v 3). He was told that they were not in rebellion but that “the eye of God” was upon the elders of the Jews (v 5) and they were not going to stop till a report went to Darius. They were not going to be intimidated by what the governor and these leaders said.

A copy of this report is found in Ezra 5.7-17 and it asked the king to search the records. He would find that the Jews were given permission to build the Temple by King Cyrus. In the meantime, they were going to keep building because the government worked slow (like today) and they could also pray to God that he would guide Darius in his decision.

So, in Ezra 6.10-12 we learn that Darius issued a decree to search for the decree of Cyrus. A scroll was found and the text is found in Ezra 6.3-5. Darius replies to Tattenai in Ezra 6.6-12 and he backs up the intentions of Cyrus to allow the Jews to build the Temple, and says that no one is to hinder or violate the edict or a timber will be taken from his house and they will be impaled on it, and his house will become a refuse dump. In all of this we see the hand of Yehovah. We see that the greatest and strongest empire on earth at the time commanded that the Temple of God be finished (v 12).

In Ezra 6.13-18 we learn that the Temple was indeed finished and dedicated through the “prophesying” of Haggai the prophet and Zechariah the son of Iddo. It was completed on the third day of Adar, and it was the sixth year of the reign of Darius (four years from Hag 1 and Zech 1). Then Israel, the priests and the Levites and the rest of the exiles celebrated and dedicated the Beit Ha Mikdash (House of Kedusha) with joy (v 16). They offered 100 bulls, 200 rams, 400 lambs, and as a Korban Chata (sin offering) 12 male goats were offered corresponding to the twelve tribes of Israel. They appointed the priests and the Levites according to the mishmarot (divisions, courses) for the avodah (services) as it is “written in the book of Moses (Lev 21.8; Num 3.16, 18.23…note it was not according to an “oral” law).”

Ezra 6.19-22 says that the priests and the Levites purified themselves, and this would have been through the ashes of the Red Heifer. Then they slaughtered the Passover for all the exiles. There were some from the ten tribes that had returned also and they joined in the festival. It also says that there were those “who had separated themselves from the impurity of the nations of the land to join them” to eat the Passover. These were possibly non-Jews who believed (v 21). This verse is important because it corrects an impression one might get from Ezra 4.1-3 that the Jewish people excluded non-Jews. A non-Jewish believer was always given an open door to worship Yehovah, like Rahab, Ruth and Cornelius found out.

They also observed the festival of Unleavened Bread with joy and the heart of the king of “Assyria” was turned toward them by Yehovah. His name is Darius Artaxerxes and he is king of the Persians but he is called the king of Assyria because he had conquered the Assyrians. This is one of his many titles.

So, let’s deal with the phrase “impurity of the nations.” Jer 10.2 talks about the “way of the nations” involving idolatry. These practices included bestiality, Baal/Asherah worship and sexual perversions among other things (Mic 1.13; 2 Chr 33.6-7). We know that Judah had fallen into idolatry before they were exiled. It was like God was saying, “You want idols? I will give you idols. I am going to send you to the center of idolatry” and off they went to Babylon. While there they were exposed to all sorts of perversions, harlotry and idol worship. Israel got so sick of it that after the return from Babylon, this type of idolatry and idols were never a problem.

But, does the “impurity of the nations” still apply today? Yes, it does. Believers today are still confronted with the same issues they were, and we are surrounded by idolatry. The “harlot” (false religion) is portraying herself as the “virtuous woman” (a Torah-based faith in Yeshua). We have the birth of Yeshua perverted into Christmas with all its pagan roots (Deut 16.21; Jer 10.1-5; Isa 65.11). The festival of Bikkurim (First Fruits of the Barley) has been replaced by Easter with all its pagan roots. We also have Valentine’s Day which descends from the worship of Aphrodite and Venus, and has sexual “love” as the theme. These deities are related to the worship of Asherah. Cupid is the illegitimate son of Aphrodite and he is the god of lust. New Year’s Day was an ancient pagan day of worship and has nothing to do with the biblical new year’s day called Rosh Ha Shanah (and there were four). The days of Lent are taken from the practice of “weeping for Tammuz” as seen in Jer 44.15-19. We haven’t even touched on Halloween or Sunday (Sol Invictus or the “invincible sun” is worshiped on the “day of the sun”) and how Christianity is more related to Mithraism than Judaism.

But people will say, “We don’t worship like the pagans. We turned these pagan festivals into God’s festivals and gave them biblical themes. Well, all that is a smoke screen. A rose by any other name is still a rose. Job 14.4 says, “Who can bring a clean thing out of the unclean? No one!” Jer 10.1-5 may not be talking about a Christmas tree literally, but it carries the same idea. It is a tree cut down, decorated and used in idolatry. God has his “tree of life” which is the Torah (Gen 2.8-9; 3.22-24; Prov 3.13-18, 11.30) and idolatry has its tree of life. The biggest problem in the faith today is we’ve learned the ways of the nations and merged the true worship of God with the Baalim and the Asherim, and false religions have given them new names. Yehovah would rather have us worship Satan outright than to falter between two opinions (Rev 3.16; Zeph 1.12; Luke 18.21; Matt 6.24).  We also have the same issues in Judaism today.

We can’t tell you what was or was not allowed by God. What we can tell you is that which was given to pagan worship was not allowed, and that was the deciding factor. If we are not to learn the ways of the nations or Gentiles, then what were we to learn? We are to learn the ways of Yehovah given to Israel (Rom 9.1-5; 1 Cor 11.1-2).

We will pick up in Ezra 7.1-5 in Part 4.

Posted in All Teachings, Articles, Idioms, Phrases and Concepts, Prophecy/Eschatology, The Festivals of the Lord, The Tanak, Tying into the New Testament

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