Jeremiah 47:1-7. We have been reading in a new section of Jeremiah that relates to messages given to foreign nations. The message to Egypt (really two messages) ended with a note to the Jewish people. That’s ok because there were notes to foreign nations in the messages earlier to the people of Judah, too. Although God had the person who put Jeremiah’s book together do it in a certain way we see by these little side notes that God is interested in all of us all the time. Jeremiah started his book by telling us that God had chosen him before he was born to be a prophet (messenger) to the “nations”. Here at the end we see that that was fulfilled in Jeremiah’s life. Also as we saw yesterday and the day before these messages weren’t necessarily given at the end of Jeremiah’s life while he was in Egypt. That is probably when they were collected together but at least some of the messages were from an earlier time. That seems to be the case here in today’s reading.
Today’s reading is a message to an area known as Philistia. In the book of Genesis God showed some land to Abraham and promised that his descendants would live and thrive there (Genesis 12:7, 17:8). That land is where modern day Israel is, plus parts of Jordan, Syria, and the Gaza Strip. In the Old Testament the part of the land west of the Jordan River was called the land of the Canaan (after a group of people who lived there in those days, the Canaanites. Some Hebrew experts believe the name Canaan is related to the name Hurrian which is related to the words red and purple. A red-purple die was an important product produced in the area.) The same territory was also called Philistia. That name was from another group of people who lived there near the coast called Philistines. If you have read through Judges with us you know that the Philistines were a major foe for the Israelites when they entered the land. The most popular name for the land in our times is Palestine, which we borrow from the name of the people, Philistines. That name was also used in ancient history. It is interesting that we still use that name because the Philistines disappeared from history long before the time of Christ. Modern day people who call themselves Palestinians have no relation to the earlier settlers, the Philistines.
In verse 1 we see that this message is to those Philistines living in the land “before Pharaoh conquered Gaza”. A reference like this is designed to give the readers a sense of time. Before can really means any time before but we need to understand that a reference like this means some time close to the event. We might say this message was given “right before” or “shortly before” Pharaoh conquered Gaza. That could include a few years but not decades. It is unfortunate for us that Jeremiah didn’t tell us which Pharaoh since we don’t have a lot of history to go on. Psammetichus I was Pharaoh of Egypt from 664 BC to 609 BC. Very near the end of his reign he attacked Gaza, about 610 BC. He was followed by his son, Necho who was Pharaoh from 609 BC to 593 BC. Necho was involved in a battle with Josiah (King of Judah) in the town of Megiddo in 609 BC. Josiah was killed but managed to turn Necho back from assisting the Assyrians against Nebuchadnezzar. An ancient historian, Herodotus, tells us that at that time Necho conquered a city called Kadytis which some scholars believe was Gaza. We know Necho fought with Nebuchadnezzar up north in Carchemish in 605 BC. Necho was defeated there and retreated south. He was defeated again during his retreat in Syene and retreated further back home. He was not killed in these battles with Nebuchadnezzar and probably had some soldiers with him during his trip home. It is quite possible that he and his troops attacked Gaza on this return journey (armies would have to steal supplies during such long campaigns, especially if they were under pressure to retreat). In 601 BC Necho and Nebuchadnezzar fought again and the battle ended in a stalemate or tie near the border of Egypt. That border was close to Gaza. Notice in verse 1 that Pharaoh only “attacked” Gaza, there is no mention of a “defeat”.
In verses 2-3 we see another threat, “from the north”. That has been a consistent reference in Jeremiah to Babylonians and Nebuchadnezzar. We know from history that Nebuchadnezzar turned back from pursuing Necho in 605 BC because his father had died back home. After securing his right to rule in Babylon he returned to the battle for the land of Canaan (Philistia, Israel, what ever you want to call it). In 604 BC he conquered Ashkelon. The Philistines were not a wide spread group of people. They had five main cities in the area: Gaza, Ashdod, Ashkelon, Ekron, and Gath. In verse 4 we see that this threat form the north destroys the Philistines. The refrence to Caphtor in that verse is to the island of Crete. When the Philistines came to the area it was either from Crete or Crete was one of the stopping points on their journey. Some think that the Philistines originally came from the islands near Greece. One thing we need to keep in mind is that these people spent many, many years traveling, settling down, and traveling again. The Israelites spent 40 years moving around the Arabian Peninsula before settling in Canaan. Nebuchadnezzar spent 40 years going back and forth to Babylon and fighting battles in the region of Canaan. So it is not surprising that the Philistines wuld have been associated with Crete even if they came from somewhere else before that.
A second effect of the destruction of the Philistine people was that Tyre and Sidon would lose their allies. Tyre and Sidon were Phoenician cities (another people group) further north on the coast, but were evidently allies with the Philistines. Tyre was evidently a problem for Nebuchadnezzar for many years on after the destruction of Jerusalem in 586 BC he spent 13 years trying to overthrow it. Tyre had an island fortress and Nebuchadnezzar had no navy so he was unable to win. Eventually the people of Tyre gave in and a peace treaty was agreed to.
In verse 5 two of the cities of the Philistines are mentioned. Gaza would save their head or be bald and Ashkelon would be ruined. Shaving the head was a sign of mourning in the ancient world. Either the people would be mourning because of their defeat or Gaza itself would be leveled and it’s site made bare like a shaved head. The word translated “destroyed” can mean either “silent” or “destroyed”. If a city is silent after a war it’s pretty certain that the destruction was severe. At the end of verse 5 there must have been a few that survived because they are asked how long they will “cut themselves”. Cutting was an extreme way of mourning. It was a way of showing your gods how serious you were about them, trying to get them to help out. Here God is asking why they keep trying to impress “gods” who have clearly failed them.
In verses 6-7 we see that the destruction was actually from Yahweh. Nebuchadnezzar may have been the man but God was behind him. In verse 6 the question is asked how long Yahweh’s sword will keep making noise (not be quiet and out of it’s sheath or covering). The answer is it cannot be quiet because Yahweh (LORD) has given it an order to attack Ashkelon and the coast (referring to the place where the Philistines lived and worked). This was an “assignment” from God. Nebuchadnezzar has been called the servant of Yahweh in other places in Jeremiah. Here he was serving God by destroying the Philistine people.
It may seem harsh that God would destroy a whole people group but more harsh is their devotion to false gods who could not care for them. It is very clear form the Old Testament that God loves people and Jeremiah was even appointed form the womb to be a prophet or messenger to the nations. His purpose wasn’t to bring bad news but good news and hope. All over the world people look for meaning in life. Solomon tells us that we have “eternity in our hearts” (Ecclesiastes 3:11). We all have a built in sense that we are important, that death is wrong, and that we should have more. Through out the centuries there have been myths and legends about a fountain of youth, people look for immortality. That is because we were made for eternity and we know it in our hearts. The problem is we separated ourselves from that immortality when we disobeyed God. That happened with the first man and woman, Adam and Eve, in the Garden of Eden (Genesis 3). Ever since that time mankind has tried to regain eternity one way or another. Making up fake gods and trying to make them happy has been one of the failed ways we have tried to get eternity back. But God promised Adam and Eve a fix for the problem, one of her descendants would solve the problem. That descendant is Jesus (see yesterday’s post and “The Old Testament Connection” for more about this). In the Old Testament when a people group is destroyed it is because they have become so distracted by their false gods and so much of distraction to those around them that God removes them; he ends their bad influence.
The interesting flip side to all of this is this message. This message is to the Philistines. God is appealing to them, “How long will you cut yourselves for a useless god? This active sword that is causing you so much trouble is from Yahweh.” It’s like God is saying come over to the winning team. When God destroyed Jericho he allowed Rahab to escape. In the history of Israel they destroyed cities and people groups more than once, it is clear that the destruction wasn’t complete, but the influence was destroyed, at least for a time. There was mourning after the destruction, cutting after the destruction, clearly there were survivors, they would no longer be a major distraction to the people around them. It would be clear from the destruction that their gods had no power. But God appeals to them. That is what we need to see, God removes the cancer from our spiritual lives and invites us to live. Hopefully we will turn to him and not re-infect ourselves with false religion.
God thank you for caring about us. Thank you for helping us see the weakness of our solutions to the broke relationship we have with you. Thank you for showing us the way to eternity. Thank you for Jesus. I am sorry for my contribution to the pain and suffering in my world. I am sorry anything I have done that has made you have to take such drastic actions. I know you love and do not want to destroy. You are a God of mercy, not giving us what we deserve, and grace, giving us what we don’t deserve; a second chance to spend eternity with you. Thank you for Jesus and thank you for eternity.