The Exile and Return

The nations of Israel and Judah both sinned against God. In fact, they broke the Covenant that God made with them at Mount Sinai. God sent His prophets to warn them to repent and worship Him again, but they refused to listen. So God punished both nations by allowing them to be destroyed.

Israel was destroyed by the army of the Assyrian Empire. The Assyrians attacked Israel and conquered it. They killed many people and burned much of the country.

The Assyrians completely destroyed the whole Kingdom of Israel. They took everything of value away from Israel.

Then they gathered all the leaders, the rich people, and the people with skills and took them to Assyria. Only the very poor Israelites who had not been killed remained in Israel.

Then the Assyrians brought some foreigners to live in Israel. The foreigners married the Israelites who were left there, and their descendants were called Samaritans.

The people in the Kingdom of Judah saw how God had punished the Kingdom of Israel for not believing and obeying Him, but they still worshiped idols and the gods of the Canaanites. God sent prophets to warn them, but they refused to listen.

So about 100 years after the Assyrians destroyed Israel, God sent Nebuchadnezzar, king of the Babylonian Empire, with his army to attack Judah. At first, the people of Judah paid him a lot of money and he left them alone.

But then they broke their promise to Nebuchadnezzar and he came back with his army and attacked them and destroyed them. They captured the city of Jerusalem and destroyed the Temple and took away all the treasures.

To punish Israel's king for rebelling, Nebuchadnezzar's men killed the king's sons right in front of him, and then they made him blind. After that, they sent the king away to die in prison in Babylon.

Nebuchanezzar and his army took all the people of Judah to Babylon. Only the poorest people remained to plant the fields. This is called the Exile.

Even though the Exile was a punishment for their sin, God did not forget His people or His covenants with Abraham and David. God continued to watch over His people and speak to them through His prophets. He promised that after seventy years in Exile, they would return to the Promised Land again.

After seventy years in Babylon, a lot had changed. Babylon had been conquered by the army of Cyrus, king of the Medes and the Persians. Most of the Jews who had been taken captive from Judah had died in Babylon; only a few very old Jews remembered Judah. The Jews had houses and businesses and friends in Babylon.

Shortly after Cyrus came to power, he gave an order that any Jew who wanted to return to Judah could go. He even gave them permission to rebuild the Temple! After seventy years in Exile, a small group of Jews returned to Jerusalem.

When they got to Jerusalem, they rebuilt the Temple. Later they rebuilt the wall around the city of Jerusalem. They were still ruled by other people, but they could live in the Promised Land again, and worship at the Temple. The Jews learned their lesson - they never worshiped idols again.