“When a foreigner resides among you in your land, do not mistreat them. The foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-born. Love them as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt. I am the Lord your God.” Leviticus 19:33-34
The world is in crisis. According to the UN, one person is forcibly displaced from their home every three seconds; as a result of persecution, conflict or war. By 2016, there were 65.6 million people worldwide who were displaced. Of these people, 40.3 million are displaced in their own country. Most of them are based in war-torn Syria and Iraq, alongside those uprooted by conflict in Colombia. Refugees who have fled to another country make up the next biggest group of 22.5 million people (over half of whom are under 18 years of age), and is the highest number ever recorded. Finally, there are 2.8 million asylum seekers, refugees that have fled their own country and are seeking protection elsewhere. These numbers are sobering…and the refugees are suffering.
The Jewish nation knows all too well what it means to be refugees. For almost as long as the Jewish nation has existed, it has been persecuted and forced to wander from land to land: From slavery in Egypt, to the destruction of both temples in Jerusalem, to the Crusades, the pogroms, the Holocaust, and finally, modern day anti-Semitism. These times of national displacement are known as exile.
The very first exile of the Jewish nation was from Egypt. The Jews (Hebrews) had settled, prospered and began to grow in numbers. Fearing the growth of this nation, Pharaoh enslaved the children of Israel. Hundreds of years went by before salvation came through God’s servant Moses. He pleaded with the Pharaoh to let his people go, and it finally came to pass, but at a very high price; complete exile. Pharaoh drove every Jew out of the land of Egypt, “There were about six hundred thousand men on foot, besides women and children.” Exodus 12:37. This is an astounding number when we understand that the biblical reference only refers to men, not women and children. If there were only four people to a household, that would equal 2.4 million refugees!
Biblical portrayal of the Jewish refugees being exiled to Babylon.
The first biblical reference of a major exile of the Jewish nation from the Land of Israel came in 586 BCE, during the reign of King Zedekiah (II Kings 24 & 25). The Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar came and invaded the land. He made his way to Jerusalem and set fire to the Temple of the Lord, and the royal palace and all of the houses. Every important building was burned down. The Babylonian army broke down the walls around Jerusalem and carried the people who remained in the city into exile, leaving behind some of the poorest of the people to work the vineyards and fields. “So Judah went into captivity, away from her land. This is the number of the people Nebuchadnezzar carried into exile: in the seventh year, 3,023 Jews; in Nebuchadnezzar’s eighteenth year, 832 people from Jerusalem; in his twenty-third year, 745 Jews taken into exile by Nebuzaradan the commander of the imperial guard. There were 4,600 people in all.” Jeremiah 52:27-30. Counting women and children the number of refugees was at least four to ten times that.
However, the Babylonians were soon thereafter conquered by the Persians and in 537 BCE, the Persian King Cyrus, decreed that the Jews could return to rebuild their Temple in Jerusalem. Some did not return simply because they were too old to make the journey. But there was also whole generation of Jews, living in the land of Babylon, who grew up there and knew it as their home. They merely did not want to return to the Land of Israel.
Persia, once the strongest empire in the world, then fell to the mighty hands of Alexander the Great in the year 332 BCE. This meant that Israel was now under Greek rule. The rulers of Greece did not displace the Jewish people or destroy the Temple. However, many Jews were influenced by the Greek lifestyle and began to assimilate and conform to the Greek way of life. But there were many Jews who would not bow down to their pagan gods and they started a rebellion against the Greeks. The Jews ultimately regained control of Israel and lived in sovereignty for the second time in history.
Mosaic depicting Romans using Jewish slaves (quora.com)
Only one hundred years went by, though, before the Roman Empire brought the second blow to Jewish sovereignty in Israel, in the year 70 CE. The Romans destroyed the Second Temple and burned down the city of Jerusalem and began the final exile of the Jews from the Land of Israel, one that lasted for nearly 2,000 years.
In the 12th century, the Crusaders destroyed Jewish communities and massacred Jews across Europe and Israel. In 1290, all Jews were expelled from England. In 1478, The Spanish Inquisition resulted in the expulsion of Jews from Spain. In 1918, over 60,000 Jews were killed during the Russian revolution. Finally, during the Holocaust: six million Jews were slaughtered and the survivors were displaced all over the world. In the 20th century alone, 850,000 Jews were forced out of Arab countries.
In the words of Mark Twain:
The Egyptians, the Babylonians and the Persians rose, filled the planet with sound and splendor, then faded to dream-stuff and passed away; the Greeks and Romans followed and made a vast noise, and they were gone…The Jew saw them all, survived them all.
Jews, Now and Then
Yes, the Jewish nation has known exile. They could be described as the ultimate refugees. But in all their experiences with expulsion, and the hatred that causes it, the Jews have been able to thrive in the places they have found refuge. They go with an attitude of survival and live to make a better life for the future. Since the modern State of Israel came into existence in 1948, all Jewish people have a legal right of return to the land. But there are many Jews, living around the world, who do not want to “return” or live in their ancestral homeland. They were born in other lands, into other cultures, and are comfortable where they are. They have lived for generations in other countries and have made good lives for themselves. Thank God for the countries they were allowed to enter!
May the plight of the Jews be an instrument of hope for the multitudes of refugees struggling to survive in new lands. May the God of Israel continue to watch over the “foreigner residing among you.”