What a remarkable people! How unlike any other! Wandering everywhere, permanently settling nowhere, their identity rarely lost anywhere! Who can deny that Scripture has spoken this concerning them: "They shall be wanderers" (Hos. 9:1717My God will cast them away, because they did not hearken unto him: and they shall be wanderers among the nations. (Hosea 9:17)), but "not... reckoned among the nations" (Num. 23:99For from the top of the rocks I see him, and from the hills I behold him: lo, the people shall dwell alone, and shall not be reckoned among the nations. (Numbers 23:9))? If they have been kept out of their own land, and more bitterly persecuted than any other nation on the face of earth, it is only another fulfillment of what they were told would be the result of their disobedience more than 1400 years before Christ, and while still on their way to the Promised Land. "I will scatter you among the heathen, and will draw out a sword after you: and your land shall be desolate and your cities waste." But they were also told that the day would come when they would be brought to own their iniquity. "Then will I remember my covenant with Jacob... and I will remember the land." "The land also shall be left of them, and shall enjoy her sabbaths, while she lieth desolate without them" (Lev. 26:33,42,4333And I will scatter you among the heathen, and will draw out a sword after you: and your land shall be desolate, and your cities waste. (Leviticus 26:33)
42Then will I remember my covenant with Jacob, and also my covenant with Isaac, and also my covenant with Abraham will I remember; and I will remember the land. 43The land also shall be left of them, and shall enjoy her sabbaths, while she lieth desolate without them: and they shall accept of the punishment of their iniquity: because, even because they despised my judgments, and because their soul abhorred my statutes. (Leviticus 26:42‑43)). Who can deny that the land has been left desolate without them? Who can deny that thousands of Jews (though still in unbelief as to their Messiah) are now returning, and nearly all engaged in agriculture? clear indication that the land's rest from cultivation is well-nigh over, and God's promise, "I will remember the land," not forgotten.
But to this day as a nation they are without a king or prince to reign over them; without civil government to legislate for them; without army or navy to defend them. Yet they still exist as one distinct nationality. Religiously they are without an image or false god, and without a priest to offer sacrifice to the true God. Yet they abide; and "shall abide" until God's end is reached. What shall that end be? The righteous remnant shall be brought to welcome their rightful King whom once they "pierced," though just before His second advent the mass who claim to be the nation will be deceived by the "false prophet," "the man of sin," the "antichrist," and for a short space will receive him.
Nearly 780 years before Christ-that is, more than 2600 years ago-the prophet Hosea thus wrote: "The children of Israel shall abide many days without a king, and without a prince, and without a sacrifice, and without an image, and without an ephod, and without teraphim." (Where is the caviler today that can deny its fulfillment?) Then the prophet adds, "Afterward shall the children of Israel return, and seek the Lord their God, and David their king; and shall fear the Lord and his goodness in the latter days" (Hos. 3:4,54For the children of Israel shall abide many days without a king, and without a prince, and without a sacrifice, and without an image, and without an ephod, and without teraphim: 5Afterward shall the children of Israel return, and seek the Lord their God, and David their king; and shall fear the Lord and his goodness in the latter days. (Hosea 3:4‑5)).
But beside many foretellings, God has recorded most striking foreshadowings of the end of Israel's dispersion. In Joseph's two dreams we have a lovely type of Him to whom every knee in heaven and earth shall bow. The "sheaves" (things on earth), and "the sun, and the moon and the eleven stars" (things in heaven) all do obeisance to him. To be rejected by his brethren and sold as a slave did not look much like the fulfillment of such dreams. But the interpretation of Pharaoh's dream is made the means of giving effect to Joseph's own dreams. Joseph is made lord of "all the land of Egypt;" and before him they cry, "Bow the knee." He is appointed chief administrator of Egypt's plenty for all the nations round about!
What a beautiful foreshadowing of the fulfillment of God's promise to Abraham-"In thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed." But before this time-"before the years of famine came"-Joseph was given Asenath as his Gentile bride. Another kind of picture is here-a foreshadowing of the Church's union with Christ which precedes Israel's discovery of His exaltation (Gen. 41:4545And Pharaoh called Joseph's name Zaphnath-paaneah; and he gave him to wife Asenath the daughter of Poti-pherah priest of On. And Joseph went out over all the land of Egypt. (Genesis 41:45); Jer. 30:77Alas! for that day is great, so that none is like it: it is even the time of Jacob's trouble; but he shall be saved out of it. (Jeremiah 30:7).) How perfect is Scripture, and blind the eye that cannot see it.