The shortest book of Prophecy in the Bible

Obad-Yah, Obadiah, or archaically, Abdias, meaning the Servant of the Lord. His prophecy is the shortest in the Bible. Its theme is the destruction of Eklom (Esau, Seir, Idumea), a destruction which shall come upon them with appalling completeness as a punishment for their rejoicings over the destruction of Jacob.

Divisions

Verses 1-9

Edom shall be destroyed in spite of the lofty and apparently impregnable position of their city Petra; a graphic description of the eyrie whence the Edomites looked down in fancied security. Note that in verse 9, the south should be Theman, a district of Arabia, this rendering completes the parallelism; cf. Jeremiah 25:13, 49:20, Isaiah 21:14, Job 6:19.

Verses 10-16.

The Edomites rejoiced in the destruction of Jacob in the day of thy brother: so also shall it be done to Edom, for the day of the Lord is at hand upon all nations.

Verses 17-21.

When the captivity is over, Jacob shall consume Esau, and the kingdom shall be the Lord's. The startling reference in verse 20 to Bosphorus is due to a misreading of the Hebrew in Sepharad, the Hebrew preposition be being taken as part of the name Sepharad.

Date and Occasion

It is usual to refer the destruction of Jerusalem mentioned in verses 10-16 to the destruction of the city by Nabuchodonosor in 588 B.C., and this might seem to be confirmed by the reference to the captivity in verse 20. But it seems clear that in verses 10-16 two distinct destructions of the Holy City are mentioned: verses 10-12 refer to one that is already past; verses 12-16 to a future one. It will then be necessary to find traces in Biblical history of a previous destruction of Jerusalem when Edom can be described as taking part in it, and rejoicing over it. It is possible that in II Paralipomenon 21:16-17, we have a reference to some such act on the part of the Edomites; there the Philistines and the Arabians are said to have carried away all the substance that was in the king's house, his sons also, and his wives; so that there was no son left him (Joram) but Joachaz who was the youngest. It is true that the Edomites are not mentioned in the text, but it is quite legitimate to see them in the Arabians, or more in accordance with the prophecy to suppose that Edom rejoiced over Jacob's discomfiture. Joram reigned B.C. 893-835, but since Obadiah has in view a "Day of Jacob," which can hardly be any other than its destruction by Nabuchodonosor, we cannot well attribute the prophecy to an earlier period than the time when the Chaldeans were an imminent peril to Palestine, i.e., the latter part of the seventh century B.C. The illusion in verse 20 to the "captivity of Jerusalem in Sepharad" would then seem to refer to the captivity of Joachin son of Joachim c. 597 B.C.

On the other hand, there are certain difficulties incident to this date for the Prophecy. It seems certain that Jeremiah 49:7, 9, 10, 14-17, 22, embodies Obadiah 1:1-9; for it is hardly conceivable that Obadiah gathered together these verses from Jeremiah and formed them into a consecutive whole. And that Jeremiah is not merely quoting a contemporary prophecy may be argued from the apparent quotation of Obadiah 1:17 by Joel 2:32. The place assigned to the prophecy of Obadiah in the Massoretic text seems to point to an early date such as this would involve, for in that text Obadiah follows upon Amos, and it is tolerably certain that this order is due to the tradition that Obadiah comes next to Amos in chronological order. But here once more we are baffled by the reference to the captivity in verse 20. It is possible that in Psalm 136:7, "Remember, O Lord, the children of Edom in the day of Jerusalem, who say: rase it, rase it, even to the foundations thereof," we have a proof that the rejoicing of Edom referred to by Obadiah actually took place at the time of Nabuchodonosor's destruction of the city, but here again we are baffled by the apparent reference to a "previous day of Jacob" which gave occasion to these rejoicings, rejoicings which were not to be repeated at the actual capture of the city by Nabuchodonosor.

It is impossible to decide this question; if we accept the view that the prophecy of Obadiah was known to Jeremiah and Joel, and that Amos quotes Joel, cf. s.v. Amos, then we shall have to refer Obadiah to the eighth century B.C.; if, on the other hand, we prefer to be governed by the quotation given above from Psalm 136 and by the allusion to the captivity of Jerusalem in Sepharad, in verse 20, we shall have to refer the prophecy to a much later period, viz. to about the close of the seventh or the opening of the sixth century B.C.


by
Very Rev. Hugh Pope, O.P., S.T.M.
Doctor in Sacred Scripture,
Member of the Society of Biblical Archaeology, and
late Professor of New Testament Exegesis at the Collegio Angelico, Rome.