Yahweh is the cause (Am 3:6-3:8)

“Is a trumpet

Blown in a city,

With the people not afraid?

Does disaster befall a city,

Unless Yahweh has done it?

Surely Yahweh God

Does nothing,

Without revealing

His secret

To his servants,

The prophets.

The lion has roared,

Who will not fear?

Yahweh God

Has spoken.

Who can but prophesy?”

It turns out that the cause of everything is Yahweh. If a trumpet blows in a city, the people are afraid. No disaster comes to a city, unless Yahweh had decided to make it happen. However, Yahweh God revealed his secrets to his servants, the prophets. When the lion roared, people were afraid. Thus, when Yahweh speaks, the prophets must prophesize.

Description of the devastation (Ps 74:4-74:8)

“Your foes have roared

Within your holy place.

They set up their emblems there.

At the upper entrance

They hacked the wooden trellis with axes.

Then they smashed all its carved work

With hatchets and hammers.

They set your sanctuary on fire.

They desecrated the dwelling place of your name.

They said to themselves.

‘We will utterly subdue them.’

They burned

All the meeting places of God

In the land.”

Asaph then presented a detailed description of the destruction that took place. The enemies of God roared in God’s holy place. They set up their own emblems within the Temple. At the entrance to the Temple they hacked down the wooden trellis with axes. They smashed all the carved works with hatchets and hammers. Then they set the sanctuary on fire. They manually smashed and hacked away until they set it ablaze. They said to themselves that they had subdued the Israelites because they had burned their Temple and all the other meeting places of God. This might be later since originally there was only one Temple.

The dream of Mordecai (Greek text only)

