Today’s article starts a collection of articles from four short books of the Bible. I don’t intend to try and tie all of these books together (although who knows – we might be surprised at how they relate to each other). Instead, though each book’s study is intended to mainly stand on its own.
These books are part of the Bible, so they must be worth our time, but – at least in my experience – they aren’t frequently taught from.
The first of these books is Obadiah, from the Old Testament. The book of Obadiah is considered to be one of the minor prophets; however, as has been mentioned elsewhere, “minor” doesn’t mean unimportant; it just means that it – like many of the books near the end of the Old Testament – is short.
Now, I often start out lesson series on new books with some background, but today, let’s allow the Scripture to speak a little more directly, revealing its context as we go study it.
The vision of Obadiah.
This is what the Sovereign LORD says about Edom—
We have heard a message from the LORD:
An envoy was sent to the nations to say,
“Rise, let us go against her for battle”—Obadiah 1:1 NIV
https://bible.com/bible/111/oba.1.1.NIV
So, there was a guy named Obadiah, and he received a vision. Based upon, 1) the inclusion of this book in the Bible, 2) the citation that it was a message from God Himself, and 3) the fact that the prophecy contained within it came to fruition, we can consider Obadiah to be a prophet of God.
Obadiah had a message from God, but this time it wasn’t about Israel or Judah. It was about a country called Edom.
As a result, we probably need to know what Edom was. Going back to Genesis 36:1-9, we find that Edom was associated with Esau and his descendants. Even this short book of Obadiah uses Edom and Esau interchangeably. The descendants of Esau lived in the land of Edom. Furthermore, Genesis 25:24-26 says that Edom was red when he was born, and apparently the land of Edom was also red (perhaps like the red dirt of the American southeast, or red rocks out west).
Esau was the twin brother (a fraternal twin, it would seem) of Jacob. This same Jacob was also named Israel, and it was from him that the Israelites were descended. So, the Israelites and the Edomites were related (although it had been centuries since Jacob and Esau squabbled as brothers).
Geographically, the land of Edom was located to the south of Judah. If we think of Judah as being to the west of the Dead Sea, with the country of Moab to the east of the Dead Sea, Edom (at its largest) was located to the south of both of them.
Back in this first verse of Obadiah, we learn that others were called to war against Edom. Although there are other theories [ref. Shank, p.303-304], this book seems to fit into the time after Jerusalem had been sacked by Nebuchadnezzar. (Because this timeframe seems probable, when compared against various other theories, the NIV Introduction even presents it as a fact.) This period would also be what was described in the book of Lamentations, for instance.
If this time is correct, war had already been waged against the nation of Judah, and Judah lost that war to Babylon. Although there were multiple battles that Judah lost, the worst was probably when Nebuchadnezzar’s armies came into Jerusalem and destroyed it, killing and exiling many of its people.
Now, a war is about to be waged against Edom. This should all start to fit together as we continue studying this book over the next few articles. In the meantime, though, I encourage you to read all of Obadiah. It is pretty short!
From Sunday School lesson prepared for August 3, 2025
References:
- Scripture taken from the Holy Bible, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.
- The College Press NIV Commentary – Minor Prophets Volume 1 (Hosea-Micah), by Harold Shank. © 2001 College Press Publishing Co.
- Who were the Edomites? | GotQuestions.org
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