The Silent Years Between The Old Testament And The New Testament. Series

Have you ever stopped to wonder what happened during the 400 years between the Old Testament and the New Testament? During those 400 years, there were no visions, no angelic messages, and no prophetic voices reminding the people, of God's promises.

The Old Testament closes with Malachi, a prophet foretelling the arrival of both a messenger and a Messiah. Malachi 3:1 speaks of the coming of John the Baptist, “Behold, I send My messenger, and he will prepare the way before Me. And the Lord, whom you seek, Will suddenly comes to His temple, Even the Messenger of the covenant, In whom you delight. Behold, He is coming,” Says the Lord of hosts.” After Malachi, then suddenly, 400 years of silence!

The 400 silent years begins with the end of the Persian rule and the rise of the Greeks. Here is the story: From 336BC to 323 BC, Alexander's conquered the Persians empire and expanded from Greece to India.

Jewish tradition holds that Alexander the Great interacted favourably with the Jewish people. According to the Jewish historian Josephus, when Alexander approached Jerusalem, the Jewish priests showed him the prophecies of Daniel eight, which symbolically predicted his conquest of Persia.

Impressed by this recognition, Alexander is said to have granted the Jews religious freedom, allowing them to maintain their worship practices.

Alexander’s legacy extended beyond military conquests to cultural influence known as Hellenization. Through Hellenization, the Greek replaced many local languages becoming the lingua franca of commerce, governance and education for many, including the Jewish communities scattered across the diaspora.

Even after the Empire of the Greeks were overtaken by the Roman Empire, Greek language remained the official and most common language in most of the Roman Empire. Latin was strong in the western side of the Roman empire, while the rest of the empire mainly spoke Greek. This common Greek Language ensured that Jesus's teachings and the writings of the apostles could reach diverse audiences across the Roman Empire.

Following Alexander's death in 323 BC, his Greek empire plunged into turmoil with no clear successor, his generals divided the Empire, forming smaller kingdoms. The Ptolemaic kingdom in Egypt and the Seleucid kingdom in Syria became the dominant powers vying for control of Israel and Jerusalem.

The Ptolemies were the first to rule over the Jews, and they were kind to the Jews. They allowed the Jews to govern themselves according to their own laws. As a matter of a fact of History, Ptolemy II (285BC to 246 BC) facilitated the translation of the Hebrew Scriptures (The Torah) into Greek, resulting in the Septuagint. This translation made God's word accessible to Greek speaking Jews and Gentiles alike.

Isn’t it strange, that God used Ptolemy II, another ruler of Egypt, a country that enslaved Israel for about 400 years, to bring His word to the known world via the Greek Septuagint, during the 400 silent years? We owe our Bible to Ptolemy II, an Egyptian ruler. That is just the fact of history.

Later, the Septuagint would become a cornerstone of early Christianity, serving as the primary version of the scriptures for Greek speaking believers, for the Apostles of Christ, and for the early Christians who operated in a predominantly Hellenistic environment.

The New Testament writers frequently quoted from the Septuagint, demonstrating its widespread use and authority. For example, Matthew 1:23 cites the Septuagint rendering of Isaiah 7:14, interpreting the prophecy of a virgin birth as fulfilled in Jesus. “The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and they will call him Emmanuel”.

Similarly, the apostle Paul relied on the Septuagint in his letters, such as Romans 15:12, where he quotes Isaiah 11:10. The apostles used it to explain how Jesus fulfilled the promises of the Old Testament, talking about Jesus, the root of Jesse.

Most importantly, the Septuagint provided a bridge between cultures and prepared the world for the coming of Christ. Through it, the truth of God's covenant promises, and salvation, became accessible to those outside the Hebrew speaking community, paving the way for the Global Mission of the gospel.

Because of what Ptolemies did, God allowed the Ptolemies to rule Egypt for over 300 years, and Israel for approximately 100 years, from 301BCE to 198 BCE until the Seleucids wrested control of Israel from the Ptolemies.

Unfortunately, unlike Ptolemies who were from Egypt, the Seleucids felt they were more Greek. So, they exerted a lot of pressure on the Jews to conform to Greek culture, culminating in the brutal reign of Seleucid king Antiochus IV Epiphanes.

Antiochus the 4th, in enforcing Hellenization, was determined to eliminate Jewish religious practices. He outlawed circumcision; he outlawed Sabbath observance; and he outlawed the Jewish dietary laws. He went further by defiling the Jewish temple in Jerusalem by erecting an altar to Zeus in the Holy of Holies and sacrificing pigs on it.