by Hal Lindsey
“BY YOUR SWORD YOU SHALL LIVE”
Like his uncle Ishmael, Esau would live by the sword. He would war and pillage to sustain his people. In this regard, consider a couple of observations from Keil and Delitzsch. First, commenting on, “Behold, away from the fertility of the earth shall be your dwelling, and away from the dew of heaven from above,” they write, “This is generally the condition of the mountainous country of Edom, which although not without its fertile slopes and valleys, especially in the eastern portion, is thoroughly waste and barren in the western; so that Seetzen says it consists of ‘the most desolate and barren mountains probably in the world.’”
Second, regarding, “And by your sword you shall live,” they write, “The mode of life and occupation of the inhabitants were adapted to the country… His maintenance would be by the sword, i.e., he will live by war, rapine and freebooting [piracy].”87
Most important, these verses reveal that Esau was already holding a grudge against Jacob. “Is he not rightly named Jacob,” Esau said, “for he has cheated me these two times?” This shows Esau was keeping count of the wrongs he considered Jacob had done to him.
HATE BECOMES “EVERLASTING ENMITY”
Once Esau realized that the inheritance and blessing had permanently been given to Jacob, he said, “So Esau hated Jacob because of the blessing with which his father blessed him, and Esau said in his heart, ‘The days of mourning for my father are at hand; then I will kill my brother Jacob.’”88
This hatred became an enmity that permeated his descendants. They became primarily called the sons of Edom or the Edomites. They later became known as the Idumaens that produced the Herod dynasty spoken of in the New Testament. King Herod the Great, who ordered the slaughter of the infants in Bethlehem in order to kill the Messiah, was a descendant of Esau.
His son, Herod the tetrarch of Galilee, beheaded John the Baptist. They were a cunning and vicious clan. The New Testament records how they gained control over Israel for a short time under Roman sponsorship.
But perhaps the most important factor is this—there is evidence that Esau’s descendants not only became part of the Ishmael/Arab race but also joined with them against Israel. They were certainly prominent among the warriors who first converted to Islam and helped spread it across the Mediterranean world.
The Bible records how Esau became part of the Arabs. When Esau observed that his father gave strict orders for Jacob not to marry any of the Canaanite women, and that the two Canaanite wives he had already married grieved Isaac, he sought to please his father. So we read, “Esau then realized how displeasing the Canaanite women were to his father Isaac; so he went to Ishmael and married Mahalath, the sister of Nebaioth and daughter of Ishmael son of Abraham, in addition to the wives he already had.”89
A HISTORY OF EXPANDING HATE
Throughout the history of Israel, the Edomites seized every opportunity to vent their hatred against them. This is briefly illustrated by the following Biblical accounts of the Edomites’ actions.
When Israel came out of captivity from Egypt, the Edomites would not even let them pass through their land. “Thus Edom refused to give Israel passage through his territory; so Israel turned away from him.”90 God graciously spared Edom despite the fact that this brought great hardship upon Israel.
God Warns Amalek
Amalek, one of the chiefs descended from Esau, has been a persistent enemy of Israel. When he fought against Israel as they came from Egypt, God made this prediction:
Then the Lord said to Moses, “Write this in a book as a memorial, and recite it to Joshua, that I will utterly blot out the memory of Amalek from under heaven.” And Moses built an altar, and named it The Lord is My Banner; and he said, “The Lord has sworn; the Lord will have war against Amalek from generation to generation.”91
Edom Becomes a Dominant Symbol of Arabs
Ezekiel predicts that God will judge “all Edom” (referring here to all Arabs) for appropriating Israel’s land. This judgment comes in the last days when God miraculously returns the Israelites from all the countries where He scattered them. This prophecy refers to our time. God warns, “This is what the Sovereign LORD says: In my burning zeal I have spoken against the rest of the nations, and against all Edom, for with glee and with malice in their hearts they made my land their own possession so that they might plunder its pastureland.”92
God warns Edom again about the judgment that will fall on all his descendants at the coming of the Messiah. The reason is clearly given here:
This is what the LORD says: “For three sins of Edom, even for four, I will not turn back my wrath. Because he pursued his brother [Israel] with a sword, stifling all compassion, because his anger raged continually and his fury flamed unchecked, I will send fire upon Teman that will consume the fortresses of Bozrah.”93
A prophecy in the Psalms concerning the final mad attempt of the ancient descendants of Abraham’s other sons to destroy Israel shows that Edom and Ishmael linked together and leading the confederacy to wipe Israel off the earth. Just look at the list of Israel’s enemies in the “Last Days.” It reads like a “Who’s Who” of their ancient enemies.
Do not keep silent, O God! Do not hold Your peace, And do not be still, O God! For behold, Your enemies make a tumult; And those who hate You have lifted up their head. They have taken crafty counsel against Your people, And consulted together against Your sheltered ones. They have said, “Come, and let us cut them off from being a nation, That the name of Israel may be remembered no more.” For they have consulted together with one consent; they form a confederacy against You: The tents of Edom and the Ishmaelites; Moab and the Hagrites; Gebal, Ammon, and Amalek; Philistia with the inhabitants of Tyre; Assyria also has joined with them; They have helped the children of Lot… . Who said, “Let us take for ourselves The pastures of God for a possession.”94
All the usual suspects are in this predicted line up of bad guys. Edom and the Ishmaelites are the primary Arab people. The descendants of Moab, the Hagrites, Gebal, Ammon, Amalek, and Philistia melted in the mixed group that were absorbed by the Arab culture and then later became converted to Islam. Today, these people make up the nations of Jordan, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Oman, Kuwait, and Qatar. The other places named are:
Tyre, which is now Lebanon
Assyria, which is modern Syria
Persia, which is modern Iran
All of these people are linked together by their common continuous enmity toward Israel.
The battle cry of all these people in five previous wars with Israel has been to wipe Israel off the map and to slaughter its people. God enabled Israel to defeat them in 1947, 1948, 1956, 1967, 1973, and 1982. But now Iran (Persia) is on the verge of producing nuclear weapons. The Ayatollah Khomeini and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad have both declared that they will soon obliterate the state of Israel.
In the next chapter, we will examine how this ancient enmity became woven into a religion founded by a direct descendant of Ishmael. We will see how the spread of hatred toward Israel became co-extensive with the spread of this religion—Islam.
[ SIX ]
THE MUSLIM GENESIS
“From the beginning, its [Islam’s] spread was accomplished through physical violence, bloodshed and war. Violence not only against non-Muslim infidels, but also against fellow Muslims. Much of Islam’s spread in the world was the result of traders and Sufi missionaries, this is true. Yet the weaponry—scimitars and sabers—all through the art and symbolism of Islam, makes violence and war a central theme of Islam… . Mohammad both taught and practiced violence from the beginning. The phenomenal and almost unparalleled efflorescence (exponential growth) of early Islam was due in no small measure to the latent powers of the Bedouins, who, in the words of the Caliph Omar, ‘furnished Islam with its raw material.’”
—ABDUL HOUSSAIN ZARIN KOUB95
ARAB PRE-ISLAMIC HISTORY
There is very little recorded history of the sons of Ishmael a
nd Edom, outside of the Biblical record, prior to the birth of Mohammad and Islam. We know the names of the twelve sons of Ishmael from whom the Arabs primarily descended, but not all twelve tribal lines can be clearly traced. However, in the following passage from Genesis 25, the Bible does give a careful genealogy of Ishmael, to demonstrate that God kept His promise to him:
This is the account of Abraham’s son Ishmael, whom Sarah’s maidservant, Hagar the Egyptian, bore to Abraham. These are the names of the sons of Ishmael, listed in the order of their birth: Nebaioth the firstborn of Ishmael, Kedar, Adbeel, Mibsam, Mishma, Dumah, Massa, Hadad, Tema, Jetur, Naphish and Kedemah. These were the sons of Ishmael, and these are the names of the twelve tribal rulers according to their settlements and camps. Altogether, Ishmael lived a hundred and thirty-seven years. He breathed his last and died, and he was gathered to his people. His descendants settled in the area from Havilah to Shur, near the border of Egypt, as you go toward Asshur. And they lived [to the east] in hostility toward all their brothers.96
The second son, Kedar, is the most frequently mentioned son of Ishmael. He became the most powerful and wealthy of all his brothers.
Ezekiel confirms the sons of Ishmael as wealthy merchants who traded with the great seafaring Empire of Tyre in the fifth and fourth centuries B.C. before God destroyed it for its wickedness. Ezekiel writes, “Arabia and all the princes of Kedar were your customers; they did business with you in lambs, rams and goats.”97 This report is part of a prophecy about Tyre’s destruction, which was fulfilled by Alexander the Great.
We also find some of the descendants of Abraham’s other sons through his aforementioned concubine Keturah. They are mentioned in this same prophecy regarding Tyre as being part of the Arab peoples. They lived in the port cities on the southern tip of the Arabian Peninsula in what is now Yemen and Oman. Ezekiel writes, “Dedan traded in saddle blankets with you… . The merchants of Sheba and Raamah traded with you; for your merchandise they exchanged the finest of all kinds of spices and precious stones, and gold.”98 Sheba and Dedan are grandsons of Abraham through Keturah’s second son, Jokshan.99 Much is written about the spices produced in the southern part of Arabia. Such sought after spices as frankincense and myrrh were produced there.
Isaiah predicts that the wealth of Nebaioth (Ishmael’s firstborn) and Kedar will be offered to the Lord at His Second Coming when He sets up His Kingdom in Israel. In Isaiah 60:7 we read, “All Kedar’s flocks will be gathered to you, the rams of Nebaioth will serve you; they will be accepted as offerings on my altar, and I will adorn my glorious temple.”100 This prophecy is very important because it indicates that descendants of Kedar and Nebaioth will continue to exist and prosper until the end of future Kingdom age. This means that a remnant of these people will repent and believe in the Messiah Jesus during the Tribulation and go into the thousand-year kingdom.
THE KORAN’S VIEW OF THIS HISTORY
According to Islamic teaching, Abraham (in Arabic, Ibrahim) did not stay in Canaan with Isaac and send his other seven halfbrothers to the land of the East.
Muslims teach that Abraham went to Mecca, where he raised all eight sons together. Muslims also believe that it was Ishmael— not Isaac—that Abraham offered as a sacrifice on Mount Moriah until the angel stopped him. They absolutely believe that Ishmael was the chosen one of God, not Isaac. This is the basis of their denial of the Biblical covenants that are specifically confirmed to Abraham through his line of descendants from Isaac, Jacob, and Jacob’s twelve sons. It is on this basis that Muslims claim all the land of Israel and Jerusalem. Christians view this as a great error because it is contrary to the specific testimony of the Lord Jesus Christ. He taught that the God of the Bible is the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob—not Abraham, Ishmael, Esau, and Mohammad. The Lord Jesus confirmed this when He taught, “But regarding the resurrection of the dead, have you not read that which was spoken to you by God saying, ‘I AM the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.’ He is not the God of the dead but of the living.”101 Jesus leaves no question about both the source of the Old Testament and just who are the heirs of His promise to Abraham. The continuous action of verb tense for I AM is the basis of why Jesus said that even though Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob died, they are still alive with God. He thus showed that He considers even the tense of verbs inspired by God in the Scriptures.
THE ARAB’S WARRING NATURE
The writer of Psalm 120 gives insight into the violent nature of the descendants of Kedar, “Woe to me … that I live among the tents of Kedar! Too long have I lived among those who hate peace. I am a man of peace; but when I speak, they are for war.”102 Both secular and Biblical sources describe the Arabs, especially the sons of Kedar, as a people who continuously fought. This certainly fulfills God’s prophecy about the sons of Ishmael: “His hand shall be against everyone, and everyone’s hand against him.”
The prophet Isaiah has a number of prophetic visions of judgment concerning the nations surrounding Israel who afflicted the Jewish people. These visions are called “Oracles.” The following oracle gives an insight into the character of the Arabians—particularly Kedar—in the eighth-century B.C. This oracle actually predicted the invasion of Arabia in 716 B.C. by King Sargon of Assyria. In Isaiah 21, we read:
An oracle concerning Arabia: You caravans of Dedanites, who camp in the thickets of Arabia, bring water for the thirsty; you who live in Tema, bring food for the fugitives. They flee from the sword, from the drawn sword, from the bent bow and from the heat of battle. This is what the Lord says to me: “Within one year, as a servant bound by contract would count it, all the pomp of Kedar will come to an end. The survivors of the bowmen, the warriors of Kedar, will be few.” The LORD, the God of Israel, has spoken.103
As indicated above, the sons of Kedar were known for being expert archers. Kedar must have learned his skill with the bow and arrow from his father Ishmael, for it is written of him, “God was with the boy [Ishmael] as he grew up. He lived in the desert and became an [expert] archer.”104 The northern Arabians fled to the south and were weakened for over a century after this invasion.
THE EXTENT OF ARAB TERRITORY
Keil and Delitzsch link the descendants of Kedar to the wealthy and powerful merchants known as the Nabateans.105 They ruled the region known by the Chaldeans and Romans as Arabia Petra. Petra, the capital, was a famous banking city that was built into a natural fortress in the mountains of Edom. During the Greco-Roman times, this kingdom covered the northern part of the Arabian Peninsula.
Petra later became known as the “Lost City” until archeologists rediscovered it in the nineteenth century A.D. The way it was constructed made it one of the wonders of the ancient world.
Ishmael and his descendants began in the desert of Shur and Havilah, which was in the northwest part of the Arabian Peninsula. From there they continued to expand southward and eastward to extend their borders to where the peninsula touched ancient Assyria and Babylon. As I said earlier, there is no doubt that the Ishmaelites absorbed other people, such as the descendants of Esau/Edom and of Abraham’s sons through Keturah. But Biblical history, supported by secular history, presents the Ishmaelites as the dominant people called “the Arabs.”
Smith’s Bible Dictionary makes this observation:
The Ishmaelites appear to have entered the peninsula from the northwest. That they spread over the whole of it, and that the modern nation is predominately Ishmaelite, is asserted by the Arabs … they mixed with other Abrahamic peoples; and expanded westwards to Idumaea, where they mixed with Edomites, etc. The tribes sprung from Ishmael have always been governed by petty chiefs or heads of families (sheiks and emirs) … though they have in some instances succeeded to those of the Joktanites.106
By the first century A.D., Josephus wrote that the Arabs were “dwelling from the Euphrates to the Red Sea.”107 The climate and terrain were so difficult that no foreign invader ever totally conquered the Arabs. The only people to ever thrive in the
vast desert of Arabia are Arab Bedouin. And as predicted, the Arab has prevailed in defiance of all his brothers to his west. As predicted, Ishmael has dwelt to the east.
SEVENTH-CENTURY ARABIAN CULTURE
It is impossible to understand the Muslim religion apart from an understanding of the Arabian culture out of which it was born. By the time of the sixth and seventh centuries A.D., the culture, customs, and religion of Arabia had become well established. The culture was particularly concentrated in Mecca, a key city on the great Arabian caravan route. Virtually everything Mohammad included in the Koran and the Muslim religion can be traced to the existing culture and traditions of that time and place.
ORGANIZATION OF ARABIAN SOCIETY AND GOVERNMENT
The Arabians all began as nomadic tribes or clans in the deserts. They were known as Bedouins. The clan organization is the basis of the Arab Bedouin society, from its earliest days and up to modern times. The clan is led by a supreme chief called a sheik, and it is composed of many families, each of them dwelling in their own tent (or other modern-day dwelling). All members of the same clan consider each other as of one blood, submit to the authority of the sheik, and use one battle cry. Blood relationship—real or fictitious (clan kinship may be acquired by sucking a few drops of a member’s blood)—furnishes the cohesive element in tribal organization.
The tent, household goods, and all personal items such as camels, horses, livestock, and weapons are individual property. But water sources, pasturage, and tillable land are the common property of the tribe.
There is a certain amount of freedom and individuality within the clan, but in all corporate clan decisions and actions, the sheik has the final word. The highest hope of a clan member is that the sheik is a “benevolent dictator.”
