Tags
Alexander the Great, Antiochus Epiphanies, Bible history, diaspora, Egypt, fullness of the times, Greek, Hellenism, intertestamental history, kingdom of God, koine Greek, Maccabees, Pax Romana, Persian empire, Pharisee, Philip of Macedon, Ptolemy, rabbis, Roman Empire, Sadducees, Samaritan, Seleucus, synagogue, Syria, temple
We’re now entering, time-wise, a 400 year period of biblical silence known as the Intertestamental Period. You may well wonder why I would want to spend any time here, since this blog is entitled Bible 101. It’s a fair question, and I think I have a good answer. To understand many of the things in the New Testament, you need to understand what happened historically between the time of Esther and the time of Jesus’ birth. You would, perhaps find yourself wondering how we got from the Persian Empire to the Roman Empire, where did the Pharisees and Sadducees come from, who are the Samaritans that none of the Jews seem to like, why is everyone speaking Greek, and how did the Jews go from being sort of wishy-washy about worshipping God to zealous for God? These are the sorts of things that a study of the Intertestamental Period can answer for us.
We won’t spend long here, but hang with me a few paragraphs, while we do a quick survey of history as it connects with the New Testament times that we’ll be jumping into next time.
A broad sweep of history
We left the Old Testament with the Jews under Persian rule at approximately the mid-400s BC. Some of them had decided to return to Judea, rebuild the Temple, and rebuild the walls of Jerusalem; and some of them had chosen to stay scattered across the region of the middle-east known as the Fertile Crescent—Syria, Assyria, Babylon, and Persia. Persia ruled from the Indus River in the east to Egypt and eastern Greece in the west.
In the mid-300s BC, however, a young conqueror, Alexander the Great, built upon his father’s military accomplishments (Philip of Macedon, Philip II). He conquered the whole of Greece, swept eastward into modern Turkey (the eastern empire of Persian), southward across Palestine and into Egypt, then eastward again to conquer the old Assyrian and Babylonian territories (central Persian empire), and finally across Persia itself to the Indus River—all in a matter 12 years! Not only did Alexander bring a new king to these regions, he also brought significant cultural change. Alexander was a dyed-in-the-wool believer in Hellenism: Greek traditions, Greek philosophy and education, Greek city planning, Greek democracy, Greek religion, Greek language, and the Greek love for athleticism (the gymnasium). This is the reason why the New Testament is written in Greek; it was the language that everyone in the known world knew how to speak and read.
Alexander died in 323 BC, however, while continuing to expand his empire. His death caused his generals to divide the empire up. The two generals that impacted Bible history are Seleucus (who ruled Syria) and Ptolemy (who ruled Egypt). Judea was between these two generals and became a pretty constant battlefield. One of these Greek ruling families, the Seleucus family, produced a ruler by the name of Antiochus Epiphanes who took the throne in 170 BC, who deeply resented Judea’s resistance to his attempts to Hellenize (Greek-ize) them. He outlawed Judaism, demanded that the Jews worship the Greek gods, and even went so far as to desecrate the Temple in Jerusalem. These actions only served to provoke a full-blown, successful rebellion against Antiochus, led by the a family known as the Maccabbees. After pushing the Greeks out of Jerusalem, the Jews led by the Maccabbees reconsecrated the Temple for the worship of the true God that is memorialized even to this day as the celebration of Chanukah (or Hanukah). Judea remained semi-independent for a number of years,
The Roman Empire began to influence Judea by the middle of the 1st century BC. It was more a political process than a military one. Herod the Great, through political processes, became king over Palestine, and because of his Roman ties and alliances Judea eventually became a Roman province. On the positive side of things, they brought political stability, peace, broader travel (better roads, patrolled by legionnaires), and wide trade opportunities (pirate-less seas); on the con side, they brought a constant irritation to Jewish religious sensitivities, taxes to a foreign government, and crucifixion for those foolish enough to defy them.
Synagogues
When the Temple was destroyed and the Jews were scattered, a system and tradition of assembly to sing, pray, and read the Law developed. It became known as the synagogue and along with it developed the idea of teachers of the Law, rabbis, and rabbinic traditions (teachings from the rabbis about how the Law was to be implemented in daily life). These traditions later were later collected into the Mishnah (c. AD 200) and Talmud (c.AD 500).
Pharisees and Sadducees
These were the two major sects or denominations of Judaism, and they both had their roots in the days of the Maccabees. The Pharisees could be considered more conservative in their religion. They believed in the inspiration of all of what we would call the Old Testament, from Genesis to Malachi. They believed in angels, miracles, the resurrection of the body, and spirits. They also took the traditions of the rabbis quite seriously, almost as if they were inspired words of God. The Sadducees, on the other hand, only took the Torah (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, and Deuteronomy) as something to be obeyed. They were what we might term “sophisticates”, very influenced by Hellenism (Greek culture), and very skeptical about miracles, angels, spirits, and the notion of the resurrection of the body. The Sadducees tended to be in positions of power in Jesus’ day, because they were willing to work with the Roman Gentiles—and the Roman Gentiles were the ones who appointed even religious leaders like the high priests.
Samaritans
The Samaritans were various peoples who had been resettled in Palestine in the days of the Assyrians and Babylonians. When they were resettled, they sought to know about and worship the God of Israel (so that the God of Israel wouldn’t bring them harm). When Jews returned they found non-Jewish people worshipping the God of Israel—alongside their own gods. When the Samaritans offered to help rebuild the Temple, the Jews refused the help of these half-pagan foreigners and made themselves some permanent enemies. They were settled primarily near the city of Samaria (therefore the name), and by the time of Jesus ministry, their mutual disdain for each other had only grown.
Putting it all together
From the viewpoint of 20/20 hindsight, it becomes clear that God was clearly working providentially to “set the table” for the Messiah and His great Kingdom. Coming out of the exile, the Jews had learned in spades the terrible and certain consequences of unfaithfulness to God; and whether they had returned to Judea or stayed in the “diaspora”, they were now a much more religiously sober people. And the Jews who did stay scattered all across the known world gave God’s Kingdom a “beachhead” in the form of synagogues and a God-fearing population in cities, towns, and villages stretching from Spain to India. God had brought the Greek empire into His equation to give the known world a more uniform culture, a more cohesive identity, and a common language, the easier to spread the Gospel of the Kingdom to the whole world. And He added the Roman empire into the mix, right on schedule, to provide 1) an unique empire-wide (the-known-world-wide) peace known as Pax Romana and 2) unprecedented ease of travel by road and sea. This gave the saving message of the Gospel the opportunity to spread and grow on a true fast-track. Paul refers to God’s preparation for the Gospel in both Galatians 4:4 and Ephesians 1:10, when he speaks of the “fullness of the times”—the perfect moment for Christ to enter into history.
We may not always recognize God at work, but we must never doubt that in the shifts of politics and culture, in the wake of disasters and tragedies, and among the multitudes of nobodies in the world there are the seeds of the fulfillment of God’s great plans and ultimate purposes.