A Commentary on Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, and Habakkuk [Audio Version]

In this second part of this study of the Minor Prophets, the writings of Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, and Habakkuk are examined. With Obadiah, one can see the land of Edom and why the Edomites had thought that they were safe from outside attackers. Their land was very mountainous and easy to defend. Nevertheless, in about 583 BC, they did fall to the Babylonians. With Jonah, one can see the viciousness of the Assyrians in the Eighth Century BC. Everyone was afraid of them because of their brutality against their enemies. Nevertheless, at the preaching of Jonah, they had repented, and the Lord did not destroy them. Then in a complete ironic twist, the Assyrians overthrew the northern kingdom about fifty years or so after Jonah had gone to Nineveh. After the book of Jonah was the book of Micah. In Micah's prophecies, he wrote three oracles. The first was to wake up the heathen nations around Israel. The second was to condemn the evil practices of the wealthy against the poor. The third was to have a mock public trial against Israel.In the book of Nahum, the Lord through Nahum had next indicated His judgment against Nineveh and had then described its fall in four different ways. Nineveh became a violent, bloody city. Nineveh was destroyed by debauchery and sin. Nineveh was destroyed when the men became like women. Nineveh was destroyed by fire, the sword, and locusts. Then in the book of Habakkuk, which was written at some time before the southern kingdom fell to Babylon, the Lord through Habakkuk had written about the rise and fall of Babylon. So what was apparent in the book of Nahum and then in the book of Habakkuk was that the Lord had used Babylon in 612 BC to punish Assyria for having been so cruel to the northern kingdom. The northern kingdom never existed again after falling to the Assyrians in 722 BC. The Lord had then used the Medes and Persians in 539 BC to punish Babylon for having been so cruel to the southern kingdom and for destroying the temple in 586 BC. The southern kingdom was then in captivity i