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The Immortal Possessor of the “Eternal Purpose”God’s “Eternal Purpose” Now Triumphing for Man’s Good
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26. In letting Babylon succeed Assyria to world domination, what was Jehovah purposely doing?
26 The “counsel” that the Almighty, All-Wise God, of his own self, counsels cannot be broken up either by men or by devils. This was true of His counsel against the Assyrian World Power. It also proved to be true of the next succeeding world power, the new Babylonian World Power, the third world power in Bible history. This was the world power that destroyed Jerusalem, for the first time, in the year 607 B.C.E. In doing so, this world power showed itself to be “wicked.” So Jehovah reserved it also for an “evil day” at his own decreed time. Before He permitted Babylon to destroy Jerusalem and thereby take on special wickedness before Him, God inspired his prophet Jeremiah to say: “Therefore hear, O men, the counsel of Jehovah that he has formulated against Babylon and his thoughts that he has thought out against the land of the Chaldeans.”—Jeremiah 50:1, 45.
27. In Bible study, what did Jeremiah and Daniel find written in Isaiah’s prophecy about Babylon’s downfall?
27 This prophet Jeremiah lived on under God’s protection through the destruction of Jerusalem and its temple by the armies of Babylon in the year 607 B.C.E. But he did not live long enough to see his prophecies against “wicked” Babylon confirmed. However, secular history as well as Bible history record the overthrow of the Babylonian World Power, which occurred in the year 539 B.C.E., in the days of the prophet Daniel. (Daniel, chapter 5) This also confirmed the prophecies of the much earlier prophet, Isaiah, who, not only pointed forward to the downfall of the Babylonian World Power, but also foretold the name of the Persian conqueror whom God would use to accomplish Babylon’s downfall. When, in their personal Bible study, the prophets Jeremiah and Daniel took up the recorded prophecy of Isaiah of the eighth century B.C.E., they found written these words of their God, Jehovah:
“‘The One saying of Cyrus, “He is my shepherd, and all that I delight in he will completely carry out”; even in my saying of Jerusalem, “She will be rebuilt,” and of the temple, “You will have your foundation laid.”’
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The Immortal Possessor of the “Eternal Purpose”God’s “Eternal Purpose” Now Triumphing for Man’s Good
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28. In the succeeding chapter of Isaiah, what does Jehovah say regarding Cyrus the Persian?
28 Those marvelous words can today be seen in the Dead Sea Scroll of Isaiah as found in the year 1947 and dating back to the second century B.C.E. The words are found at what is commonly marked in Isaiah 44:28–45:6 as from chapter forty-four, verse twenty-eight, through chapter forty-five, verse six.
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