In the third year of the reign of Jehoiakim, Daniel and his friends Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah are taken to Babylon by Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon. The four have caught the eye of the king and are chosen for their intellect and beauty to be trained in the Babylonian court, and are given new names. Their home, Jerusalem, has been demolished by the conquering armies of Babylon and amongst those who have remained in the rubble is one who has become known as the weeping prophet, Jeremiah. Credited with writing the book of Lamentations – a pretty self explanatory title – he had prophesied the fall of Jerusalem, witnessed its destruction and now was living in its ruin, while Daniel and his friends are in the high courts of Nebuchadnezzar.
All are in exile.
Around 597 BCE, there was a second wave of deportations designed to assimilate Judah’s royalty and high class citizenry into Babylonian society which included King Jeconiah, the son and successor of Jehoiakim who was assassinated at the hands of the initial invading army. This proved to be a significant step in the Babylonian exile as skilled laborers and intellectuals were also swept along in this expatriation and the fires of rebellion amongst the people of Judah was pretty much snuffed out and a puppet king put in place over the Judahites still lingering in the land.
Thousands of Judahites have now been relocated across the Babylonian empire as exiles. A minority surrounded by a new culture with new gods. Under duress and discouragement the pull to give into the unrelenting currents of assimilation was palpable. Give in, adopt the Babylonian way of life and accept these new gods as their own. Others though, either withdraw or subversively foment plots and plans of insurrection hidden in the shadows and alleyways of their land of expulsion.
Not really much choice. It’s either one or the other.
Or is it?
Through his tears, sitting amidst the debris of his once glorious city, Jeremiah writes a letter to his compatriots living in the glory – and guise – of the city of Babylon, who are just as much in exile as he.
The NIV rendering of the letter is this:
“This is what the Lord Almighty, the God of Israel, says to all those I carried into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon: ‘Build houses and settle down; plant gardens and eat what they produce. Marry and have sons and daughters; find wives for your sons and give your daughters in marriage, so that they too may have sons and daughters. Increase in number there; do not decrease. Also, seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile. Pray to the Lord for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper.’ Yes, this is what the Lord Almighty, the God of Israel, says: “Do not let the prophets and diviners among you deceive you. Do not listen to the dreams you encourage them to have.They are prophesying lies to you in my name. I have not sent them,” declares the Lord.” (Jeremiah 29:4-9)
The letter goes on to challenge those who hear its contents that this is not a call to compromise nor complicity – nor is it about revolt or revenge. The appeal is to not heed any prophetic and influential voices that would proclaim either extremes or a blurring of the two. In the liminal reality exile creates, we crave certainty – something concrete to hang onto – a word, a rule, a doctrine, a movement – and before we even realize it, we’ve made an idol. The invitation of Jeremiah is to avoid stabilizing oneself with an idolatrous false security and becoming complicit with the powers of the age. “For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Then you will call on me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. I will be found by you,” declares the Lord, “and will bring you back from captivity.” (Jeremiah 29:11-14)
The Word of the Lord is clear. The destruction of Babylon is assured and although there will be many empires to rise and fall after its demise, as Daniel would be shown through a series of subsequent dreams, the Kingdom of Heaven will not be thwarted. God will not be mocked. All that Babylon is, and would from this time forward represent – a symbol describing any human institution that demands allegiance to its idolatrous redefinitions of good and evil – will not stand. Trust Yahweh.
A radical middle begins to appear.
Seek and serve the well being of even your oppressor while remaining loyal to God. It is in seeking the welfare of others – even the most vile of our enemy – that we actually seek first the Lord, who will be “found” when we seek for Him with all our heart.
So Daniel and his companions – who would have heard Jeremiah’s letter – take Babylonian names. They wear Babylonian clothes. Daniel heads into the office each day as Belteshazzar and works amongst warlocks, witches and necromancers. He serves Nebuchadnezzar and his court.
And.
Three times a day he would go to the upper room of his home, swing wide the window shutters which faced the direction of Jerusalem, fall to his knees and pray in full view for anyone passing by to see and hear.
Daniel.
An exile longing for home, praying for the peace of Jerusalem and the restoration of his people. His tears of lament mingling with those of a weeping prophet some 900 miles away.
Living out and in this tension a red line would emerge.
In seeking first God and His kingdom it was inevitable there would be a collision with Babylon’s idolatry of power, its hubris and its injustice at all levels. Daniel would face the inevitable pounce of a jealous and corrupt political culture and eventually even breach the shifting sands of Babylonian laws and customs by staying true to his worship of Yahweh. As a result, Daniel must lay down his life, not only in a literal fiery furnace and in the den of a lion’s aggravated inanition, but by putting it fully into the hands of God come what may.
And the people of Yahweh would live this exilic tension through the many and new versions of Babylon that would come along. Seeking the welfare of their land of exile while longing for their true home to come to them.
In the time of Jesus, Rome was the new Babylon. There were Jews who wanted to resist and many who would adopt Roman culture and even its gods. Yet the way of exile heralded by Jeremiah and modeled by Daniel more than 500 years earlier is embraced by Jesus as he pays taxes to Caesar while making it clear that one must not conflate Caesar with God as it is the Lord who alone deserves one’s total life and allegiance. He calls his followers to bless their enemies while knowing that he would be arrested for speaking out against the corrupt leaders of Jerusalem and Rome, a critique of their abuses of power and embracing of idolatry that would, just like Daniel, put his very life on the line.
Yet, it was on the cross, yes the cross, where Jesus publicly disarmed the power of Babylon and the allurement of idols that its plethora of powers, arguments and pretensions brings. And God raised Him to life, eternally breaking the power of death – the wage Babylon demands from all under its oppression and rule. Jesus is lifted up as the true King of the nations and the One whom Daniel himself prophesied and longed for. The King of the Kingdom that will prevail. Forever.
And so, we too who follow Jesus are living into the tension of the way of exile. Peter sums it up this way in the second chapter of his first epistle:
“Dear friends, I urge you, as foreigners and exiles, to abstain from sinful desires, which wage war against your soul. Live such good lives among the pagans that, though they accuse you of doing wrong, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day he visits us. Submit yourselves for the Lord’s sake to every human authority: whether to the emperor, as the supreme authority, or to governors, who are sent by him to punish those who do wrong and to commend those who do right. For it is God’s will that by doing good you should silence the ignorant talk of foolish people. Live as free people, but do not use your freedom as a cover-up for evil; live as God’s slaves. Show proper respect to everyone, love the family of believers, fear God, honor the emperor.”
And the red line? Well, John captures it well in the concluding remarks of his first epistle, and take note, it’s the same one that Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah would not cross.
“Dear children, keep yourselves from idols.”
Now that thought is one worthy of further study and reflection.