In the thirty-seventh year of the exile of Jehoiachin king of Judah, in the year Awel-Marduk became king of Babylon, on the twenty-fifth day of the twelfth month, he released Jehoiachin king of Judah and freed him from prison. – Jeremiah 52:31

Today’s Scripture Reading (March 26, 2014): Jeremiah 52

I am convinced that some people simply like to argue. If you pick a position, they will choose the opposing side. (And if I am real honest, I have been accused of that very thing.) Sometimes it is because the discussion is fun (my reason for arguing the opposing opinion.) But other times it is because the personalities of the people themselves are in conflict. And to agree with the person is somehow validate their stance on a whole range of issues. This is the political saga – groups of people who seem to take opposite sides on an issue for no other reason than they oppose each other on a political level.

Sometimes history is shrouded – there are just too many things that we don’t know. And this is the case with the story of Awel-Marduk (or the man from Marduk.) As far as we can tell, Awel-Marduk is the son of Nebuchadnezzar. And indications are that Father and Son did not get along well. Nebuchadnezzar and Awel-Marduk actually shared the throne for a while before Nebuchadnezzar died. According to most reports, Awel-Marduk did not necessarily agree with the policies of his father, although the reasons for the disagreements are varied. Some say that Awel-Marduk let Jehoiachin out of prison for humanitarian reasons. He just thought that his father was wrong for imprisoning the King of Judah for such a long period of time. But there is very little evidence that Awel-Marduk was a humanitarian. Most describe him as evil egotist. It would be more in keeping with what little we know of Awel-Marduk to argue that he overturned his father’s decision for no other reason than that he opposed his dad – Nebuchadnezzar.

So in some of the stories Awel-Marduk releases Jehoiachin from prison and is thrown into prison himself for the action by his father as a further stage of their conflict. But there are problems with this theory. One of them arises right out of the biblical record itself. The question is, if this is true, would Nebuchadnezzar allow Jehoiachin to stay free and pay him an allowance for the rest of his life. The logic would be that Nebuchadnezzar would most likely just throw Jehoiachin back into prison.

A more colorful possibility, but one that has a ring of truth to it, places this event after the death of Nebuchadnezzar. In this story, the evil son digs up the bones of his god-fearing father and parades them through the streets of Babylon as he reverses all of his father’s decrees. Jehoiachin, rather than being freed for humanitarian reasons, is freed only because it was Nebuchadnezzar that imprisoned him.

The story stands as a weird example of what can happen when we make decisions for no better reason than we personally oppose another person. Our reality is that history records Nebuchadnezzar as an extremely successful king, while Awel-Marduk has almost disappeared from the pages of history, and it was probably his son (Nebuchanezzar’s grandson) that presided over the downfall of the Babylonian Empire. Opposing someone without good reason can never take us to a good place, and will never carry us to success.     

Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: Jeremiah 40

Note: The VantagePoint Community Church (Edmonton) Message "The Sermon on the Mount" from the series "The Path of Suffering" is now available on the VantagePoint Website. You can find it here - http://www.vantagepointcc.org/the-path-of-suffering-1.html