The first thing to notice is that what Haman says is correct. The Jews do have different laws and customs. The word here is dat, which is a general word for laws and customs and mores. This much is quite true, and has been no problem in the Persian empire.

I shall make the point here that there is absolutely no reason to think that there was any prejudice against Jews for this. Other people had their customs also. We have no evidence and no reasons to think that the Jews were held in contempt by other people.

The second thing to notice is that Haman is correct in accusing the Jews of being rebellious and disobedient to the Great King. The Jews rebelled against Nebuchadnezzar for twenty years until finally that king destroyed their city completely. Haman can point to plenty of historical records to show that the Jews cannot be trusted.

This matter is central to the book of Esther. The Jews rebelled against the king God put over them (Nebuchadnezzar) and were exiled as a result. Now the Chief Jew, who is on the Supreme Court of Persia, openly defies the king God has put in charge. So, what will go do now in the face of this even greater rebellion? Perhaps He will raise up Haman to wipe out the Jews and start over with a new Abraham! Twice God had told Moses that he would wipe out Israel and start over with him (Ex. 32:10; Num. 14:12). On both occasions Moses interceded with God, and that is what Esther will do in this instance.

Excerpt from Biblical Horizons No. 227, April 2012. Subscribe at www.biblicalhorizons.com

Of course, God’s new golden-haired boy got things wrong, as all Adams do when given the opportunity of glorious kingdom. The metal man in his dream (the new “empire-Tabernacle”) only had gold at the head, but King Nebuchadnezzar’s obelisk was gold from head to foot. This new king, under whom Israel was now a “Covenant vassal,” would be taught by God that he, too, was subject to a higher authority.

James Jordan observes that the four “animal” empires correspond to the four cherubim guarding God’s throne. The animals do not match exactly, because symbols are relationships. The animals describe the relationship of each empire to the people of God.

A couple of years ago, I heard Al Stewart at the Katoomba Men’s Convention give a good summary of the first part of the book of Daniel. Unlike liberal scholars, he corresponded the four beasts with the empires beginning with Babylon, not the Medes (the liberals can’t believe that Daniel wrote about Rome because it didn’t exist at that time in history, so they have to make Greece number 4. They split Medo-Persia into two empires, which doesn’t work at all since they were contemporaneous.) When Al got to Rome, he told us that Daniel’s prophecy doesn’t match history. He didn’t do what dispensationalists do and tell us that God’s Jewish clock stopped, but he didn’t have an explanation.

The explanation is one you will only find in Jordan’s work. The Roman empire did continue to exist after AD70, but Daniel, and all the prophets, view the world as God’s Tabernacle. The characters on the stage are viewed by their respective Covenant callings as they contribute to the plan of God in history. They are priestly or kingly ministers in His court.

This is a crucial factor to understand. It solves the mystery of the identity of the sons of God in Genesis 6. It explains why the Revelation describes the destruction of the Roman “Sea beast” in AD70. And it also explains why, in God’s economy, there are no more Jews. Their calling as “sons of God” was terminated with the Temple. Or rather, it was transformed through death and resurrection into a new calling. As John says, “Beloved, now are we the sons of God…”

Just like Judah, King Nebuchadnezzar came to a full understanding his calling as a vassal king through a process of death and resurrection. He was exiled by God as a Gentile beast into the wilderness and returned as a Man, an Adam, a Covenant head. Just as Joseph converted Pharaoh through his faithful service, Daniel converted Nebuchadnezzar.

The fact that these four Gentile empires were under God’s throne, vassal subjects in the kingdom of God, explains why their authority was transferred over the 500 year Restoration period. It was a form of “Covenant succession.” If the emperor cursed the people of God, the empire would be cursed, the kingdom handed over to another who would bring forth the fruit desired from their delegated authority, their Covenant calling. Belshazzar lost his kingdom overnight. Esther and Mordecai saved Persia from an unspeakable fate at the hands of God through the intentions of the serpent Haman. But Persia eventually fell to Greece, and Greece to Rome. The Revelation describes Rome’s “de-conversion” from a metal man back into a beast. The guardian put in place by God to provide a framework of law, protection, infrastructure and civilisation for the spread of the gospel was manipulated by Satan against the people of God. The family dog was turned against the children it was called to guard.

Rome did not cease to be an empire in AD70. Just as the calling of the Jews passed to the Christian church, Rome ceased to be a guardian for the people of God when the fifth empire arrived. Adam succeeded the animal kingdom on Day 6 and was supposed to be enthroned over it, rule over it, on Day 7. Jesus as Adam succeeded the animal kingdom—the Gentile empire—and took on the calling of the vassal emperors as guardian of the church. In these last days of the Old Covenant, God shook the world one more time, and the “times of the Gentiles” came to an end. [2]

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[1] Have you got The Handwriting on the Wall yet? You will find all this and much more in Jordan’s groundbreaking work.
[2] This is actually the context of the “sheep and goats” judgment of the nations in Matthew 25. It is history, although it was most certainly a microcosm of the final judgment at the end of the Revelation.

“The restoration period is the last era of Israel’s history as the people of God and the climactic period of old covenant. The kingdom of God has grown beyond Israel and spread to the nations, who are the God-appointed protectors of His priestly people. Israel’s loss of independence and submission to Gentile powers was not a backward movement in the kingdom program of God. Abraham had been chosen by God so that through him all the nations of the world could be blessed (Gen. 12:3). In the restoration era, this was fulfilled more than at any other time in Israel’s history. Through the dispersion Jews had spread all over the world and they brought with them the knowledge of the true God.

Though Daniel spent most of his life serving the king of Babylon during the time of captivity, he is still a good picture of what the restoration era is about, for he served “Darius the Mede” also. Daniel’s job was that of an advisor, the supreme advisor, to the king of Babylon and then head over the satraps and presidents in the kingdom of Persia (Dan. 6:1-3). Essentially the king intended to designate Daniel as the actual ruler in Persia, as Joseph had been in Egypt: “the king planned to appoint him over the whole kingdom” (Dan. 6:3). This was not a “secular” calling. To advise the king and aid him and the daily affairs of rule was one of the functions of a prophet, as, for example, the prophet Nathan did for David (cf. 2 Sam. 7).

In other words, during the restoration era, Israel as a nation would no longer have civil power, but she was appointed by God to serve as a prophetic witness to the world. It was Israel’s prophetic task to give godly counsel to the leaders of the Babylonian, Persian, Greek, and Roman empires who protected her and, through her position in the empire, spread the knowledge of the true God. The final era of Israel’s history, thus, was a prophetic era in which the word of God went forth more broadly than at any time in Israel’ history.

Her new temple in Jerusalem lacked the glory of the temple of Solomon (cf. Hag. 2:3), but, as was appropriate for a prophetic people in an international age, her real new temple was the “heavenly” temple that was revealed to Ezekiel (40-48). Jews in this era were given a glorious vision of Israel’s worship and its global significance that made explicit the purpose of the tabernacle and temple. Through the worship of the true God, the priestly nation was to bring blessing to all men.”

 

from Introduction to the Bible by Ralph Smith.