Why is Jeremiah out of order?

By Mark Morgan | Jeremiah

The book of Jeremiah is not in chronological order.

Many books of the Bible tell us of events that happened during certain years, and sometimes this is refined to the month and day or even the time of day. Other events, however, are reported with very little to locate them in time. The book of Jeremiah includes some passages that are anchored to particular days, while others are not located in time at all. By itself, this would make it hard enough to work out exactly when things happened in Jeremiah’s life, but the situation is worse than that: even the passages with dates are not in order! Continue reading

Nebuchadnezzar destroys Jerusalem

By Mark Morgan | Jeremiah

The end of the siege

Putting the events of the final siege in chronological order can be done with reasonable confidence from the time the Chaldean army surrounds the city until Nebuchadnezzar destroys Jerusalem. The list of events in descriptive point form in chronological order follows. For some of these, we know exact dates, but for most we do not, we only know the order:

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Nebuchadnezzar’s third attack on Jerusalem brought utter destruction

By Mark Morgan | Jeremiah

Nebuchadnezzar’s third attack on Jerusalem – the final siege

In our previous article, we listed the three times when King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon laid siege to Jerusalem and then looked in some detail at the second siege. In this article, we look at Nebuchadnezzar’s third attack on Jerusalem, the best known and the most devastating attack, that resulted in the complete destruction of the city.[1] By that time, Nebuchadnezzar was reigning over a large empire, yet he dedicated almost two years to the conquest of Judah (during the 17th-19th years of his reign[2]). Continue reading

Nebuchadnezzar’s second attack on Jerusalem

By Mark Morgan | Jeremiah

Nebuchadnezzar’s Attacks on Jerusalem

Before we look specifically at Nebuchadnezzar’s second attack on Jerusalem, let’s remember that King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon attacked Jerusalem three times:

1. In the 3rd/4th year of Jehoiakim/Eliakim (the 1st year of Nebuchadnezzar).[1]
2. From the 11th year of Jehoiakim/Eliakim until the 3rd month of Jeconiah/Jehoiachin (the 8th year of Nebuchadnezzar).[2]
3. In the 9th-11th year of Zedekiah/Mattaniah[3] (17th-19th year of Nebuchadnezzar[4]).  This is the most well-known attack by Nebuchadnezzar and resulted in the complete destruction of Jerusalem.[5]

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Habakkuk’s Questions – Prayer and Violence

By Mark Morgan | Jeremiah , Minor prophets

Habakkuk’s questions (Complaints!)

One of Habakkuk’s questions was a simple question we might often have asked ourselves: did God listen to his prayers? But that wasn’t the end if it. Would God answer him? And did Habakkuk want to hear the answers anyway? You see, Habakkuk’s questions weren’t just questions, they were more like complaints.

Habakkuk’s first complaint to God

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Polluting the land – spiritual pollution

By Mark Morgan | Jeremiah

Can a land be unclean?

When I was growing up, my family followed a Bible reading chart to make sure that we read all of God’s word and not just the parts that seem initially to be more interesting.  After a while I started to recognise that there were some fascinating details in unexpected places – including God’s opinion of what moral or spiritual pollution is.

As a teenager, I noticed that there were several times during the year when we read of various things that made the land of Israel unclean. But was it the physical earth of the land that was meant or did it mean something else?

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The prophet Habakkuk

By Mark Morgan | Jeremiah , Minor prophets

Habakkuk the prophet

Habakkuk was a prophet in ancient Judah.  We do not know exactly when his visions took place, but in some ways it doesn’t matter, since his questions are universal and the answers can be easily applied to any time.

God chose people to be his prophets and they delivered his messages.  False prophets chose themselves and delivered whatever messages they wanted – probably often whatever would get them the most popularity and power.  God criticises them often (Lamentations 2:14; Ezekiel 13:9, 22:28; Jeremiah 5:31), particularly towards the end of the life of the nation of Judah.

This was the time when Habakkuk prophesied.

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Were prophets and priests meant to fight?

By Mark Morgan | Jeremiah

Many of God’s prophets predicted God’s judgement on Israel would come through attacking nations.  Jeremiah predicted that Nebuchadnezzar would attack Judah from the north.  He was also a priest.  Were prophets and priests meant to fight?

Are there any examples we can learn from?

Elisha the prophet was with the army of Israel when Jehoshaphat king of Judah, Jehoram king of Israel and the king of Edom went to attack Mesha the king of Moab (2 Kings 3:9-12). We don’t know if he was there to fight or just sent by God to make sure that a prophet was available when one was needed.

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Joseph: maps

By Mark Morgan | Joseph , Maps

Map of Mesopotamia

Both of these maps come from the book “Joseph, Rachel’s son” which was released on 4 December 2018.

The first of the maps is a map of Mesopotamia that was derived from a map by Yiyi of the Middle East with a CC BY 3.0 licence.Continue reading

Joseph’s timeline and family tree

By Mark Morgan | Family trees , Joseph , Timelines

Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and then Joseph: here are Joseph’s timeline and family tree in multiple languages.

Joseph’s life – timeline

Joseph lived for 110 years – which seems like a long time to us, but was significantly shorter than the lives of his ancestors, including his father Jacob, who died at the age of 147.

Only a small part – just 11 years – of Joseph’s life was spent in the land of Canaan. About 93 years were spent in Egypt.Continue reading

Babylonian or Chaldean?

By Mark Morgan | Jeremiah

Babylonian or Chaldean – what is the difference?

While reading some parts of the Bible I have always wondered about the names “Chaldea” and “Babylon”.  In the past I have always let my uncertainties drift along, while my questions remained unanswered.  Were the two just different names for the same place; did the names change with time?  Why were the differences there?  This time, I decided that I needed to know properly! Continue reading

Where was Joseph’s prison?

By Mark Morgan | Joseph

Where was Joseph’s prison?

Joseph was sold by his brothers and taken to Egypt where he was sold as a slave to an Egyptian called Potiphar. After some time, Joseph was falsely accused of attempting to rape his master’s wife and thrown into prison.

It may not seem a very interesting question to you, but: Where was Joseph’s prison?Continue reading