The Shape of Obadiah

Obadiah’s terrifying prophecy against Edom consists of twin spirals of literary DNA: Esau and then Jacob. Close analysis reveals allusions that highlight further fearful ironies.

As it was with Edom, the brief book of Obadiah is small and despised (verse 2), yet it is a naphtha-flash glimpse into the smouldering family feud between the descendants of twin brothers Esau and Jacob that spans from Genesis to Revelation.¹For more discussion, see Everlasting Arms.

In 587BC, Jerusalem fell to the Babylonians, fulfilling the words of the prophet Jeremiah. Solomon’s Temple was completely destroyed. The devastation was made even more bitter by the Edomites, descendants of Esau, who not only refused to come to the aid of their brothers but also gloated over their suffering, looted their possessions and even handed over survivors to the Babylonian invaders. Obadiah is a prophecy of judgment against these spiteful brothers, neighbours to the Jews who behaved like sworn enemies and rejoiced in their downfall.

The prophecy works through the Bible Matrix pattern twice, using the Covenant/Creation/Tabernacle sequence to make some ironic and terrifying jokes based upon previous history. But the covenant-literary structure also highlights the fact that from the very beginning, it was Esau, the firstborn of Isaac, who had despised the Abrahamic Covenant (Genesis 25:34), and thus it would always be Jacob, despite necessary judgments for sin, that was irrevocably God’s firstborn (Genesis 25:23, Romans 11:29). Even though Edom was Jacob’s national twin, he had put himself among those who would be cursed for cursing the children of Abraham (Genesis 12:3). The literary structure makes Edom a bloodthirsty hunter like Nimrod, ensconced in his red mountain as a tower to heaven like Babel.

Historical Background

David Baker succinctly summarises the main data concerning Edom:

The land of Edom, also called Seir (Gn.32:3; 36:20-21, 30; Nu 24:18), lay south and east of the Dead Sea from the Wadi Zered to the Gulf of Aqabah. Straddling the Arabah rift valley running south from the Sea of Galilee to the Gulf of Aqabah, on the east it was rocky and mountainous, at times reaching c. 1,070 metres in elevation. Through it passed two major traffic routes, the King’s Highway and the road along the Arabah. Its control over much of the north-south trade fed its coffers and made it a target for attack.

The Bible portrays the Edomites as descendants of Esau (Gn 36, esp. vv.1, 9). …After the Exodus, Israel was denied passage through Edom (Nu 20, Jg 11:17-18) and shortly thereafter Balaam predicted Edom’s conquest (Nu 24.18). Battle was joined with Edom under Saul (I Sam 14:47) and the area was conquered under David (2 Sam 8:13-14 with RSV, NIV margin; I Kings 11:15-16) and exploited under Solomon (I Kings 9.26-8), though not without Edomite opposition ( I Kings 11:14-22). In the ninth century, Edomites, in confederation with Moabites and Ammonites, raided Judah during Jehoshaphat’s reign ( 2 Chron 20:1-2). Edom more successfully rebelled against Jehoram (Joram) and enjoyed relative [p.22 begins] freedom from Israelite domination for about forty years (2 Kings 8:20-22 2 Chron 21:8-10).

Early in the next century, Judah under Amaziah retook Edom with great slaughter (2 King 14:7, 2 Chron 25:11-12), advancing as far as Sela. Some time later, when Judah was itself under pressure during Ahaz’s reign, Edom raided Judah, taking captives (2 Chron 28:17), and shook herself loose from Israel, never to be subjugated to her again.

During the Assyrian period, from at least 734BC, Edom was a vassal of Assyria and subsequently also of Babylon. At times they at least planned rebellion (Jer 27) though there is no evidence of trying to realize these plans. The situation at the time of the fall of Jerusalem (587 BC) is not clear from either biblical or extra-biblical sources. 1 Esdras 4:45 blames the Edomites for burning the Jerusalem Temple, but this is unconfirmed. (cf La 4:21-22)

In the sixth century, Edomite power waned, as indicated by archaeological remains, with an apparent abandonment of some towns and migration of population (cf 1 Macc 5:65). From the late sixth to the fourth centuries BC, Arab influence in the region was predominant (for indications of their presence in this period, cf Ne 2:19; 4:6; 6:1) This was brought to bear especially by the Nabataeans. Edomites were displaced. Some Edomites settled in the Negev in southern Judah, which became known by the related name Idumaea (1 Macc 4:29).

Much of this reconstruction is based on conjecture and secondary sources, since documentation and archaeological evidence from the area itself is sparse and ambiguous. ²David Baker & T D Alexander, Tyndale OT Commentary: Obadiah, Jonah and Micah, 21-22.

Cycle One: Esau

TRANSCENDENCE
(Creation / Initiation / Sabbath)

• The combination of title and introduction subtly works through the fivefold covenant pattern, beginning with transcendent “light” via Obadiah whose name, obed-yah means “servant (or worshiper) of the Lord.”

HIERARCHY
(Division / Delegation / Passover)

• Stanza 2 employs the sacrificial/festal pattern of Israel in its description of the mission of this prophecy. It subtly makes Edom the “Egyptian” brother who will be cast out at Division, opens the sealed scroll at Ascension, and also refers to the purpose of Trumpets as a legal witness and warning against the peoples who defy God. Edom has placed itself among the Canaanites to be conquered (Conquest). The word for tidings or rumor at Ascension is related to the Hebrew shema, the “Hear, O Israel” of Deuteronomy 6:4, and thus corresponds to the human “trumpet” at Maturity.
• Edom is placed at the Hierarchy/Division Line of the Stanza, highlighting the fact that Esau had despised his circumcision and married Canaanite women. Instead of a token of blood, he gave himself to bloodshed, and would thus be cut off in the Land (culture) rather than merely in the Garden (cultus). The Hebrew word for red is edom, a cognate to the Hausa word odum, meaning red-brown. Both are related to the word dam, meaning blood, and to the name of the first man, Adam.

ETHICS: Priesthood
(Ascension / Presentation / Firstfruits)

• Stanza 3 seems to highlight the Tabernacle sequence, alluding to the rivalry of brothers at the altar: priesthood versus kingdom (Genesis 4:5; Matthew 5:23-42) . Cain and Esau were firstborn sons who refused to submit to God.
• The call to “arise” at Ascension means that this battle is Levitical, that is, it is a holy war. Here, the Lord and His hosts are the priestly head awakened from slumber (Genesis 9:24; Psalm 35:23; 44:23) and Edom in this case is the false bridal body, an image reprised in the Revelation.

• In both Cycles of Obadiah, the Ethics: Priesthood Stanza is split into Altar and Table, or Dry Land and Fruit Bearers, or Land and Womb. Esau is the red man “standing” in rebellion on the Altar (Exodus 20:26), alluding to the “standing” morning and evening offering, but a wolf in sheep’s clothing, a red dragon, the hunter in the field who intends to slay his brother rather than submit to God’s mercy offered in substitutionary sacrifice. Here, the mountain of Esau is presented as a false Altar, like Babel, founded by an Abrahamic “Nimrod” who intended to usurp the covenant from within.³For more discussion, see Nimrod in the Court of God.

ETHICS: Kingdom
(Testing / Purification / Pentecost)

• Eagles and stars are kingly symbols, both related to the Lampstand in the Tabernacle with its seven heavenly lights and the “eagle face” of the cherubim. In Israel’s fourfold history, the “Eagle” era was that of the Gentile kings. Edom considered himself to be “a king like the Gentiles.”
• Genesis 25:27 places Esau outside the tent as the Bronze Altar and Jacob (the “blameless” man) inside the tent as the Incense Altar. At Ascension the priest humbles himself by offering a sacrifice whose fragrant smoke ascends at Maturity (Matthew 23:12). Here, it is Edom who exalts himself at Ascension (the Bronze Altar) and is debased by God at Maturity (the Incense Altar).

ETHICS: Prophecy
(Maturity / Transformation / Trumpets)

• Trumpets concerns plagues and plunder as the “clouds” resulting from obedience or disobedience to the Ethics or stipulations of the covenant. Judah was plundered by Babylon for her sin but Edom placed himself among the plunderers. The prophet highlights the greed of Edom as being more extreme than that of thieves who steal only until they are satisfied. There was a deep-seated vein of hatred running beneath this external expression of mercilessness. This is related to the position of the prohibitions against “Adamic” theft and false witness as a literary dyad or twin in the Ten Commandments. Their true motive was the usurping of their birthright, a poisonous undercurrent that reached its conclusion in the tyranny of the Herods as “Pharaohs” over the people of Jerusalem.
• Similar architectural allusions are made in the prophets and in Revelation, where the true sons are placed as meat on the table and the bridal lampstand is ultimately removed from the covenant breakers.
• Grapes and wine are symbols of historical continuity, kingly rule, and rest from holy war (Numbers 6:1-4; 13:23). The final harvest of the year was comprised of gathering the grapes and olives, corresponding to the Feast of Booths (Ingathering) and Succession. The prophet notes that Israel as God’s anointed would not be completely cut off, yet Edom maintained a scorched earth policy towards Jacob over the inheritance of Canaan. For Edom, Jacob was “under the ban” like Jericho, but according to the promises of Jeremiah, Israel’s possession of the vineyards and cities of Canaan was only on a temporary hiatus. Jacob would not be uncovered forever before the unclean scavengers of the air. Israel always rises from the dead.

OATH/SANCTIONS
(Conquest / Vindication / Atonement)

• The Atonement/Day 6 Stanza removes all of the blessings of God — like the rain that God sends upon the just and the unjust — from the Edomites. The sequence here is the Creation week, although its use is subtle.

SUCCESSION
(Glorification / Representation / Booths)

• While each Line in Stanza 6 seems to consist of two parts, a blessing turned into a curse in each case, the final Stanza apparently works through the Triune Office in each of its Lines: Priesthood, Kingdom, and Prophecy. This would be because Step 7 in the pattern speaks of the “Great Prophet” who combines all three roles as a qualified representative of God, an elohim. These allusions are extremely subtle, so we cannot be dogmatic about it, yet what may be read into the structure is far more verifiable than the pontifications of professors of English in our academic institutions. A prime example would be the reference to the “mighty men” (a reference to kingdom that is consistent throughout the Scriptures) at the center of the central Line.

Cycle Two: Jacob

TRANSCENDENCE
(Creation / Initiation / Sabbath)

• As it was with the Esau Cycle, the Jacob Cycle begins with a fivefold covenant structure. This “Genesis” Stanza alludes to the literal-physical nakedness of Adam (Garden), the legal-social nakedness of Cain (Land), and the ultimate judgment upon and “covering” of the primeval World. Circumcision’s purpose was to avoid another Physical deluge, but the various Social deluges (Assyria and Babylon) served as substitutionary reminders. Those who had called for the “uncovering” of Jerusalem would be left naked and childless (Psalm 137:7-9).

HIERARCHY
(Division / Delegation / Passover)

• Stanza two (Division) highlights Edom’s betrayal of Israel, standing in judgment at the gate of the city, approving of what was taking place. Of course, this ought to remind us of Herod’s betrayal of the Christ as Roman soldiers cast lots for the seamless priestly garment of the true King of the Jews.

ETHICS: Priesthood
(Ascension / Presentation / Firstfruits)

• The Edomites treated strangers as brothers and their brothers as strangers. The phrase “enlarged your mouth” relates to the act of giving false testimony in court in order to curse and devour those over whom one was invested as a “keeper.” Even the kingly brother has a priestly responsibility to guard his brethren.

• As in Eden, the “open eyes” are at the center of the construct, the “seven eyes” of the Lampstnad. The reference here is to the command that an Israelite not regard the misfortune of his brother as an opportunity for gain. The KJV maintains the literal reading:

Beware that there be not a thought in thy wicked heart, saying, The seventh year, the year of release, is at hand; and thine eye be evil against thy poor brother, and thou givest him nought; and he cry unto the Lord against thee, and it be sin unto thee. Thou shalt surely give him, and thine heart shall not be grieved when thou givest unto him: because that for this thing the Lord thy God shall bless thee in all thy works, and in all that thou puttest thine hand unto. For the poor shall never cease out of the land: therefore I command thee, saying, Thou shalt open thine hand wide unto thy brother, to thy poor, and to thy needy, in thy land. (Deuteronomy 15:9-11)

• This explains Jesus’ reference to the “evil eye” in Matthew 6:23:

The light of the body is the eye: if therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light. But if thine eye be evil, thy whole body shall be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness, how great is that darkness!

• The phrase also occurs in the Deuteronomic curses upon Israel for disobedience, events that were ultimately fulfilled upon first century Jerusalem for rejecting the testimony of Christ and His apostles:

And he shall besiege thee in all thy gates, until thy high and fenced walls come down, wherein thou trustedst, throughout all thy land: and he shall besiege thee in all thy gates throughout all thy land, which the Lord thy God hath given thee. And thou shalt eat the fruit of thine own body, the flesh of thy sons and of thy daughters, which the Lord thy God hath given thee, in the siege, and in the straitness, wherewith thine enemies shall distress thee: So that the man that is tender among you, and very delicate, his eye shall be evil toward his brother, and toward the wife of his bosom, and toward the remnant of his children which he shall leave: So that he will not give to any of them of the flesh of his children whom he shall eat: because he hath nothing left him in the siege, and in the straitness, wherewith thine enemies shall distress thee in all thy gates. The tender and delicate woman among you, which would not adventure to set the sole of her foot upon the ground for delicateness and tenderness, her eye shall be evil toward the husband of her bosom, and toward her son, and toward her daughter, And toward her young one that cometh out from between her feet, and toward her children which she shall bear: for she shall eat them for want of all things secretly in the siege and straitness, wherewith thine enemy shall distress thee in thy gates. (Deuteronomy 28:52-57, KJV)

• The phrase “in the day of their calamity” appears at the positions of the two altars, Bronze and Golden, and also at the final “judgment” step. The meaning is that Edom avoided every opportunity to show mercy to his brother who suffered under the just hand of God.

ETHICS: Kingdom
(Testing / Purification / Pentecost)

• In the kingly Stanza, Edom now stands in judgment against even the survivors, delivering them to their conquerors. The structure makes this an allusion to the rite of sacrifice, referring once again to Cain’s slaughter of his brother as a rejection of substitutionary atonement. However, this was “purification” in the sense understood by tyrants and those who practice genocide — not a purification from sin in the Garden but a purge of hated brothers in the Land. Transformation is the smoke of testimony, or the cry of the blood of the martyrs, as seen in Genesis 4:10 and also in Revelation 6:9-11.
• The reference in Line 2 to the crossroads perhaps refers to Testing as the point in any historical event that decides the future.

ETHICS: Prophecy
(Maturity / Transformation / Trumpets)

• The domain of the Prophet is not merely Garden or Land but also World. The prophets not only testified to the nations surrounding Israel but also gathered them against Israel. Whereas the Priest guards the trees in the Garden and the King preside over the fruits of the Land, the Prophet enjoys “bread and wine” fellowship with God, that is, access to the heavenly court.
• The reference to wine and drinking speaks of alcohol as a symbol of power: like the Tree of Judicial Knowledge, it must be matstered or it will master you. Yet God does call us to drink that we may become wise. Those who drink the cup to the dregs in their lust for kingly power without the discipline of priesthood will stagger and fall (Jeremiah 51:7; Revelation 18:3-6).

OATH/SANCTIONS
(Conquest / Vindication / Atonement)

• The judgment of Edom is presented in covenantal terms, dividing between Jacob and Esau as the two goats on the Day of Atonement, and thus alluding to Jacob’s deception of Isaac. The destruction of Jerusalem not only disciplined Israel but also exposed the state of Edom’s heart.
• Most fascinating here is the fractal expansion of the Kingdom Line into three lines, and its use by Paul to condemn the carnal, futile ministry of the Judaizers and their Temple. The take home value here is that God never contemplates anything outside of its significance as sacred architecture.

For other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ. Now if any man build upon this foundation gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble; Every man’s work shall be made manifest: for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire; and the fire shall try every man’s work of what sort it is. If any man’s work abide which he hath built thereupon, he shall receive a reward. If any man’s work shall be burned, he shall suffer loss: but he himself shall be saved; yet so as by fire. (1 Corinthians 3:11-15 KJV)

SUCCESSION
(Glorification / Representation / Booths)

• The final Stanza is a masterpiece all on its own. The land is redivided among the faithful after the exile, with each line once again implying the Triune Office to indicate a process of hearing, acting, and speaking, dominion over Garden, Land, and World.
• The mountain of Esau is placed in the Genesis Line, and the Philistines (descendants of the Egyptians) are placed in the Exodus Line.
• Notice the placement of Joseph (Ephraim) and Benjamin at Day 3 as the Fruit Bearers (bread and cup) of Rachel’s womb. This corresponds to the placement of the return of the exiles to the bridal city as a host at Day 5.
• Like the previous Stanza, the one also sees an expansion of its central Line, but this time it is fivefold. Like the Ten Words, it works from above, to beside, to below. The sons of Israel would possess the Land right down to the border of the Sea, an image that found its ultimate fulfilment in the Christ who walks on water, and stands as a might angel with one foot on the Land and the other on the Sea (Revelation 10:2), speaking of His authority over both the Jew and the Gentile, reuniting these divided brothers as saints in a new Jerusalem.

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