Now we're getting details on what living in Jerusalem and Judah will be like in the "Day of the Lord" a.k.a. the Tribulation. One of the characteristics will be famine—widespread food shortages due to drought.
And the Lord of armies (hosts) is deliberately making it worse, inspiring the removal of what the Jews have stored up. God is permitting the plundering of their stores by hostile armies. This makes the prophecy pertinent to around the halfway point in the Tribulation, after they are betrayed by the Antichrist and are pursued by him.
1 For behold, the Lord, the LORD of hosts,
Takes away from Jerusalem and from Judah
The stock and the store,
The whole supply of bread and the whole supply of water;
Three and a half years after this, Jesus will return, and the stored plunder will be distributed to the remnant of Judah and all who are rescued. Perhaps that is why this theft is permitted to occur: Israel’s foes meant it for evil, but God meant it for good. It wouldn’t be the first time.
Then we have a description of the people who will also be taken away as POWs or in slavery, or killed, or who have heeded Jesus’ warning to run for the hills: in other words, all the Jewish men capable of leadership.
2 The mighty man and the man of war,
The judge and the prophet,
And the diviner [prudent] and the elder;
3 The captain of fifty and the honorable man,
The counselor and the skillful artisan,
And the expert enchanter [workman].
4 "I will give children [to be] their princes,
And babes shall rule over them.
Note: the NKJV translations of qasam and heres make no logical sense in the context of good male leaders found in Israel today, so I have provided alternate translations from Gensenius (see links) that make more sense.
It seems the only people left to run Israel are the young, and apparently most of the people left to be ruled are women (according to Isaiah 32:9-11) and the elderly (Isaiah 47:6, and Lamentations 1:19, below).
Lamentations 1:19 "I called for my lovers,
[But] they deceived me;
My priests and my elders
Breathed their last in the city,
While they sought food To restore their life.
5 The people will be oppressed,
Every one by another and every one by his neighbor;
The child will be insolent toward the elder,
And the base toward the honorable."
Conditions will rapidly deteriorate. Whatever supplies do exist will be unwisely and unfairly distributed, since the elderly have perspective and wisdom but teens have the strength and hunger. The elderly will be seen as expendable, and prior status won't excuse any line-jumping. The fear of starvation will cause most people to be only for him or herself.
6 When a man takes hold of his brother
In the house of his father, [saying],
"You have clothing; You be our ruler,
And [let] these ruins [be] under your power,"
They will realize they need a leader, and it seems that in some household formerly of importance, one brother will try to force the other to step into the role no one wants to take. Interestingly, in the Septuagint there is a word in the Greek that doesn't appear in the Masoretic text: Broma. It means smell, specifically the aroma of food. Apparently the one brother will smell food on the other’s clothing, suspect he has a secret stash or source, and insist that the one who knows where the food is hidden is the one who should lead.
7 In that day he will protest, saying,
"I cannot cure [your] ills,
For in my house [is] neither food nor clothing;
Do not make me a ruler of the people."
And thus he will deny that he has any food, or the clothing that would make him fit for leadership (military uniform?), and turn the job down. This seems to be a specific prophecy about a specific family. Bibi Netanyahu has two sons who are presently 31 and 28. I wonder…?
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