There is nothing in this prophecy to fix its date. The whole of it relates to Edom or the Edomites. Edom (Esau) is characterised in scripture by his deadly hatred to his ’brother Jacob,’ Oba 1:10. His pride is spoken of, exalting himself as the eagle, setting his nest in the firmament of heaven, and seeking his safety in the high caves of the rocks, which well answers to their habitations in Idumea.
Part of the prophecy may refer to the time when Jerusalem was destroyed by Babylon. In Psa 137:7-8, Edom is associated with Babylon as against Jerusalem. Oba 1:12-14 of the prophecy exactly describe the manner of a people like the Arabs when a city was captured. There are seven reproaches against them: they helped to pillage the place, stood in by-places to cut off any that escaped, and delivered them up to their enemies. These intimations of their assisting in the destruction of Jerusalem have led to the prophecy being usually dated B.C. 587, the year following the destruction.
The prophecy, however, probably looks onward to the last days, when Israel, restored to their land, will be attacked by Edom, and kindred nations. Psa 83. Idumea will be their rendezvous, and the sword of the Lord will be filled with blood. Isa 34:5-6. Obadiah depicts the Jews themselves as God’s instruments for the destruction of Esau; which agrees with Isa 11:14; Dan 11:41. "Upon mount Zion shall be deliverance . . . . the house of Jacob shall be a fire, and the house of Joseph a flame, and the house of Esau for stubble." Oba 1:17-18. The destruction shall be complete: "every one of the mount of Esau" shall be cut off by slaughter; "there shall not be any remaining of the house of Esau." Oba 1:9; Oba 1:18. Their land shall be possessed by Israel, for God’s ways are retributive. The prophecy ends with "the kingdom shall be Jehovah’s."
By: Emil G. Hirsch, George A. Barton
—Biblical Data:
This book, which bears the title "The Vision of Obadiah," consists of but twenty-one verses, which are devoted to a prophecy against Edom. The prophecy is usually divided into two parts: verses 1-9 and 10-21. In the first section Edom is pictured as sore pressed by foes. She has become "small among the nations," and Yhwh is to bring her down from "the clefts of the rock" where she dwells. Edom is further said to be overrun with thieves; and her own allies are destroying her.
In the second part it is declared that because of violence done by Edom to his brother Jacob, and especially because of the part taken by Edom on the day when "foreigners entered into his gates, and cast lots upon Jerusalem" (verse 11), "the house of Jacob shall be a fire, and the house of Joseph a flame, and the house of Esau for stubble, and they shall burn among [A. V. "kindle in"] them, and devour them" (verse 18). The prophecy concludes with the declaration that Israelitish captives shall return from Sepharad and possess the cities of the South (Negeb), that saviors shall return to Mount Zion to judge Esau, and the kingdom shall be Yhwh's.
It should be noted that verses 1 to 6 closely resemble a number of verses in Jeremiah (xlix. 7-22), which also consist of a prophecy against Edom.
—Critical View:
The resemblance to Jeremiah, referred to above, may mean that Jeremiah borrowed from Obadiah, or that the latter borrowed from the former, or that both borrowed from a still earlier prophet.
Relation to Jeremiah.
Arguments of much force have been presented for the priority of Obadiah. In Obadiah the opening of the prophecy seems to be in a more fitting place, the language is terser and more forcible than in Jeremiah; and parallels to the language of these passages appear in other parts of Obadiah, while they do not appear in Jeremiah. For these reasons most scholars, except Hitzig and Vatke, believe that the passage appears in Obadiah in its more original form. As the passage in Jeremiah dates from the fourth year of the reign of Jehoiakim (604 B.C.), and as Ob. 11-14 seems clearly to refer to the destruction of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar (586 B.C.), it is evident that the Book of Obadiah did not lie before Jeremiah in its present form. This appears also from the fact that in Ob. 10-21 there is much material which Jeremiah does not quote, and which, had he known it, would have suited his purpose admirably. It is true that Wellhausen finds no difficulty in the date, believing with Stade, Smend, and Schwally that Jer. xlvi.-li. is not the work of Jeremiah. Nowack holds with Giesebrecht that these chapters of Jeremiah contain many interpolations, one of which is xlix. 7-22. These scholars are, therefore, able to hold that the Jeremiah passage is dependent upon Obadiah, and also to hold that Obadiah is post-exilic. On the whole the view of Ewald, G. A. Smith, and Selbie, that both Jeremiah and the present Obadiah have quoted an older oracle, and that Obadiah has quoted it with least change, seems the most probable.
As verse 7 is not quoted in Jeremiah, and as it seems difficult to refer it to any time prior to the Exile, G. A. Smith with much probability makes the post-exilic portion begin with verse 7.
Most critics hold that verses 11-14 refer to thedestruction of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar. As the Assyrians and Babylonians are not referred to, it is probable that the "nations" who were plundering Edom were Arabic tribes. Winckler (in "Altorientalische Forschungen," ii. 455, and in Schrader, "K. A. T." 3d ed., pp. 294 et seq.) places the episode in the reign of Darius. Wellhausen is probably right in believing that reference is made in verses 1-15 to the same epoch of Edom's history as that referred to in Mal. i. 2-5, and that the inroads of these "nations" were the beginning of the northern movement of the Nabatæans. If this be correct, this part of the prophecy comes from the early post-exilic period.
Cheyne ("Encyc. Bibl.") holds that the references to the Negeb in the concluding verses of the prophecy indicate for the latter part of the book a date considerably later than the Exile, after the Edomites had been pushed out into the Negeb and southern Judah. This view, which had been previously expressed by Nowack and has since been adopted independently by Marti, is confirmed by the eschatological character of the contents of verses 16-21. Marti is probably right in regarding these verses as a later appendix to the prophecy. The position of the Edomites would indicate that the verses date from the Greek period; and the approaching conquest of the Idumean Negeb points to a Hasmonean date.
Three Parts to the Prophecy.
There thus appear to be three parts to this short prophecy: (1) a pre-exilic portion, verses 1-6, quoted by Jeremiah and also readapted, with (2) additions, by another Obadiah in the early post-exilic days; and (3) an appendix, which probably dates from Maccabean times. As to the exact date of the pre-exilic portion, it is difficult to speak. Some have dated it as early as the reign of Jehoshaphat; others, in the reign of Joram of Judah. The circumstances appear to be too little known now to enable one to fix a date. Arabs have surged up from central Arabia from time immemorial. The Nabatæan invasion of Edom was probably not the first time that Edom had been overrun with plunderers from that direction. Verses 1-6 probably refer to an earlier experience of a similar character, the circumstances of which can not now be traced.
Sepharad.
The captivity in Sepharad (verse 20) has occasioned much discussion. In ancient times "Sepharad" was believed to be a name for Spain. The Targum of Onḳelos renders it 
, i.e., Hispania. Schrader (l.c. 2d ed., p. 445) identifies it with Saparda, a town in Media mentioned in the inscriptions of Sargon. If there was a Jewish colony of captives here, however, nothing is otherwise known of it; nor are any circumstances evident which would render probable the existence at this point of a colony of sufficient importance to be referred to in the terms used by Obadiah.
W. R. Smith and many recent writers have identified it with the Saparda which Darius in his inscriptions mentions between Cappadocia and Ionia as though it were, like them, a province. It is mentioned again in an inscription of the thirty-seventh year of the kings Antiochus and Seleucus, i.e., 275 B.C. This region was somewhere in the neighborhood of Phrygia, Galatia, or Bithynia. When it is remembered that Joel (Joel iii. 6) had complained that Hebrews were being sold to Greeks, it does not seem improbable that the late writer who added the appendix to Obadiah predicted the return of these captives and foretold the Israelitish conquest of Idumea which John Hyrcanus (c. 130 B.C.) accomplished. Cheyne's view that "Sepharad" is dittography for 
, another name of Jerahmeel, is hardly convincing.
Bibliography:
In addition to the introductions of Driver, Cornill, König, Strack, and others, compare Wellhausen, Die Kleinen Propheten, 1893;
Nowack, Die Kleinen Propheten, 1897;
G. A. Smith, Book of the Twelve Prophets, 1898, ii.;
and Marti, Dodekapropheton, 1903, i.
OBADIAH, BOOK OF.—The questions as to the origin and Interpretation of this, the shortest book of the OT, are numerous and difficult. The title describes the book as ‘a vision’ (cf. Isa 1:1, Nah 1:1) and ascribes it to Obadiah. Obadiah is one of the commonest of Hebrew names, and occurs both before and after the Exile: see preceding article. Some fruitless attempts have been made to identify the author of the book with one or other of the persons of the same name mentioned in the OT.
The book of Obadiah stands fourth in order (in the Greek version, fifth) of the prophets whose works were collected and edited in (probably) the 3rd cent. b.c.; the collection since the beginning of the 2nd cent. b.c. has been known as ‘The Twelve’ (see Canon of OT; cf. Micah [Bk. of], ad init.). By the place which he gave this small book in his collection the editor perhaps intended to indicate his belief that it was of early, i.e. pre-exilic, origin. But the belief of an editor of the 3rd cent. b.c. is not good evidence that a book was written earlier than the 6th century. The relative probabilities of the different theories of its origin must be judged by internal evidence; this, unfortunately, is itself uncertain on account of ambiguities of expression.
It will be convenient to state first what appears on the whole the most probable theory, and then to mention more briefly one or two others.
The book contains two themes: (1) a prophetic Interpretation of an overwhelming disaster which has already befallen Edom (Oba 1:1-7; Oba 1:10-14; Oba 1:16 b); (2) a prediction of a universal judgment and specifically of judgment on Edom which is now imminent (Oba 1:8-9; Oba 1:16 a, Oba 1:16-21).
1. The prophetic interpretation of Edom’s fall.—The prophet describes the complete conquest of the Edomites and their expulsion from their land (Oba 1:7) by a number of nations (Oba 1:1) once their friends and allies (Oba 1:7). In this calamity the writer sees Jahweh’s judgment on Edom for gloating over the fall of the Jews—described as Edom’s brother (Oba 1:12)—and participating with foreign and alien enemies (Oba 1:11) in the infliction of injuries on them. This interpretation is stated in simple and direct terms in Oba 1:10-11, and dramatically in Oba 1:12-14, where the writer, throwing himself back to the time of the Edomites’ ill-treatment of the Jews, adjures them not to do the things they actually did. The section closes with the effective assertion of the retributive character of the disasters that had befallen Edom and still affect it—‘As thou hast done, is it done unto thee; thy dealing returns upon thine own head’ (Oba 1:15 b).
The verses thus summarized have these points in common: (a) the tenses are historical except in Oba 1:10 (‘shame doth cover thee, and thou art cut off for ever’) and Oba 1:15 b, which may be rendered as presents, and interpreted as at the end of the preceding paragraph; and (b) after Oba 1:1, where Edom, in the present text, is spoken of in the 3rd person, Edom is throughout addressed in the 2nd pers. sing. Among these verses are now interspersed others,—Oba 1:6, which speaks of Esau (=Edom) in the 3rd person (pl. in clause a, sing, in b) and which may be an aside in the midst of the address, but is more probably an Interpolation; and Oba 1:8-9 (together with the last clause of Oba 1:7), which speak of Edom in the 3rd person and unmistakably regard the disaster as still future: these verses are best regarded as an addition by an editor who wished the prophetic interpretation of past fact to be read as a prophetic description of the future.
If now Oba 1:1-7 (or Oba 1:1-5; Oba 1:7) Oba 1:10-15 b, which are held together by the common features just noticed, be a unity; the prophecy is later than b.c. 586; for Oba 1:11 cannot well be interpreted by any other disaster than the destruction of Jerusalem in that year. The prophecy also appears in Oba 1:5; Oba 1:7 to allude to the extrusion of the Edomites from ancient Edom owing to the northward movement of Arabs—people who had often satisfied themselves with plundering expeditions (cf. Oba 1:5), but now permanently evicted settled populations from their lands (cf. Oba 1:7). This northward movement was already threatening at the beginning of the 6th cent. b.c. (Eze 25:4-5; Eze 25:10); before b.c. 312, as we learn from Diodorus Siculus, Arabs had occupied Petra, the ancient capital of Edom. Between those two dates, perhaps in the first half of the 5th cent. b.c. (cf. Mal 1:2-5), the prophecy appears to have been written.
2. The prediction of universal judgment.—In contrast with Oba 1:1-7; Oba 1:10-14, the tenses in Oba 1:15-21, are consistently imperfects (naturally suggesting the future), the persons addressed (2nd pl.) are Israelites, not Edomites, and Edom is referred to in the 3rd person. The prophecy predicts as imminent: (a) a universal judgment (Oba 1:15 a, 15, in which the annihilation of Edom by the Jews (not [nomadic] nations as in Oba 1:1; Oba 1:5; Oba 1:7) and Israelites forms an episode which is specially described (Oba 1:18), and (b) the restoration of the exiles alike of the Northern and of the Southern Kingdom (Oba 1:18, cf. Oba 1:17), who are to re-occupy the whole of their ancient territory—the Negeb in the S., the Shephçlah in the W., Ephraim to the N., Gilead in the E. (Oba 1:19, which after elimination of glosses reads, ‘And they shall possess the Negeb and the Shephçlah, and the field of Ephraim and Gilead’); in particular, the Israelites will re-occupy as far N. as Zarephath (near Tyre), and the Jews as far south as the Negeb (Oba 1:20). The prophecy closes with the announcement of Jahweh’s reign from Zion (Oba 1:21).
The prediction (Oba 1:15-21) scarcely appears to be the original and immediate continuation of the former part of the chapter, but is, like Oba 1:8-9, a subsequent addition. The theory of the origin and interpretation of the book just described is substantially that of Wellhausen; it has been adopted in the main by Nowack and Marti; and, so far as the separation of Oba 1:15-21 (with Oba 1:15 b) from the rest of the chapter is concerned, and the assignment of the whole to a date after the Exile, by Cheyne (EBi
One fact has appeared to many scholars an insuperable difficulty in the way of assigning the whole book to a date after 586. It is admitted by all that the resemblances between Oba 1:1-5; Oba 1:5; Oba 1:8 and Jer 49:14-15; Jer 49:9-10 a, 7 are so close as to imply the literary dependence of one of the two passages on the other; it is further admitted by most, and should be admitted, that the common matter is in its more original form in Obadiah, and that therefore so much at least of Obadiah is prior to Jer 49:14-16; Jer 49:9-10 a, 7, and therefore prior to the year b.c. 604, if the theory that was commonly held with regard to the date of Jer 46:1-28; Jer 47:1-7; Jer 48:1-47; Jer 49:1-39 be admitted. But of recent years many have questioned whether Jer 46:1-28; Jer 47:1-7; Jer 48:1-47; Jer 49:1-39, at least in its present form, is the work of Jeremiah at all, and consequently whether it was necessarily written before 586.
If the argument that Oba 1:1; Oba 1:6; Oba 1:8 is pre-exilic be accepted, it is necessary to account for what are now generally admitted to be the allusions to the events of 586 in Oba 1:10-14. This has been done by assuming that Ob. and Jer. alike quote from a pre-exilic prophecy, but that Obadiah himself prophesied after b.c. 586. As to the amount of matter cited by Obadiah, scholars differ: e.g. Driver considers that Oba 1:1-9 is derived from the old prophecy; G. A. Smith, that Oba 1:1-5; Oba 1:8-10 are quotations, but that Oba 1:7, which he admits presupposes later conditions, is by Obadiah himself. The weakness of these theories lies in the fact that the distribution of the parts to the two authors does not follow the concrete differences of style indicated above, and that Oba 1:7 either receives no adequate interpretation, or is torn away from Oba 1:5, with which it certainly seems closely connected. As to the more precise date of Oba 1:1-9 (Oba 1:10) or so much of the verses as may be pre-exilic, no agreement has been reached among those who hold them to be pre-exilic; no known circumstances explain the allusions. It is also very uncertain whether any inference can safely be drawn from the allusion to Sepharad (wh. see) in Oba 1:20.
For further discussion of many details, some of which have of necessity been left unmentioned here, and for an account of other theories as well as those described above, the English reader will best consult Driver, LOT
G. B. Gray.
Obadiah is the shortest book in the Old Testament. The theme of the book is the destruction of Edom. Consequent upon the overthrow of Edom is the enlargement of the borders of Judah and the establishment of the kingship of Yahweh. Thus far all scholars are agreed; but on questions of authorship and date there is wide divergence of opinion.
1. Contents of the Book:
(1) Yahweh summons the nations to the overthrow of proud Edom. The men of Esau will be brought down from their lofty strongholds; their hidden treasures will be rifled; their confederates will turn against them; nor will the wise and the mighty men in Edom be able to avert the crushing calamity (Oba 1:1-9). (2) The overthrow of Edom is due to the violence and cruelty shown toward his brother Jacob. The prophet describes the cruelty and shameless gloating over a brother’s calamity, in the form of earnest appeals to Edom not to do the selfish and heartless deeds of which he had been guilty when Jerusalem was sacked by foreign foes (Oba 1:10-14). (3) The day of the display of Yahweh’s retributive righteousness upon the nations is near. Edom shall be completely destroyed by the people whom he has tried to uproot, while Israel’s captives shall return to take possession of their own land and also to seize and rule the mount of Esau. Thus the kingship of Yahweh shall be established (Oba 1:15-21).
2. Unity of the Book:
The unity of Obadiah was first challenged by Eichhorn in 1824, Oba 1:17-21 being regarded by him as an appendix attached to the original exilic prophecy in the time of Alexander Janneus (104-78 BC). Ewald thought that an exilic prophet, to whom he ascribed Oba 1:11-14 and Oba 1:19-21, had made use of an older prophecy by Obadiah in Oba 1:1-10, and in Oba 1:15-18 of material from another older prophet who was contemporary, like Obadiah, with Isaiah. As the years went on, the material assigned to the older oracle was limited by some to Isa 1:1-9 and by others to Isa 1:1-6. Wellhausen assigned to Oba 1:1-5, Oba 1:7, Oba 1:10, Oba 1:11, Oba 1:13, Oba 1:14, Oba 1:15, while all else was regarded as a later appendix. Barton’s theory of the composition of Obadiah is thus summed up by Bewer: “Oba 1:1-6 are a pre-exilic oracle of Obadiah, which was quoted by Jeremiah, and readapted with additions (Oba 1:7-15) by another Obadiah in the early post-exilic days; Oba 1:16-21 form an appendix, probably from Maccabean times” (ICC, 5). Bewer’s own view is closely akin to Barton’s. He thinks that Obadiah, writing in the 5th century BC, “quoted Oba 1:1-4 almost, though not quite, literally; that he commented on the older oracle in Oba 1:5-7, partly in the words of the older prophet, partly in his own words, in order to show that it had been fulfilled in his own day; and that in Oba 1:8, Oba 1:9 he quoted once more from the older oracle without any show of literalness.” He ascribes to Oba 1:10-14 and Oba 1:15. The appendix consists of two sections, Oba 1:15, Oba 1:16-18 and Oba 1:19-21, possibly by different authors, Oba 1:18 being a quotation from some older prophecy. To the average Bible student all this minute analysis of a brief prophecy must seem hypercritical. He will prefer to read the book as a unity; and in doing so will get the essence of the message it has for the present day.
3. Date of the Book:
Certain preliminary problems require solution before the question of date can be settled.
(1) Relation of Obadiah and Jeremiah 49.
(a) Did Obadiah quote from Jeremiah? Pusey thus sets forth the impossibility of such a solution: “Out of 16 verses of which the prophecy of Jeremiah against Edom consists, four are identical with those of Obadiah; a fifth embodies a verse of Obadiah’s; of the eleven which remain, ten have some turns of expression or idioms, more or fewer, which recur in Jer, either in these prophecies against foreign nations, or in his prophecies generally. Now it would be wholly improbable that a prophet, selecting verses out of the prophecy of Jeremiah, should have selected precisely those which contain none of Jeremiah’s characteristic expressions; whereas it perfectly fits in with the supposition that Jeremiah interwove verses of Obadiah with his own prophecy, that in verses so interwoven there is not one expression which occurs elsewhere in Jer” (Minor Prophets, I, 347). (b) Did Jeremiah quote from Obadiah? It is almost incredible that the vigorous and well-articulated prophecy in Obadiah could have been made by piecing together detached quotations from Jer; but Jeremiah may well have taken from Obadiah many expressions that fell in with his general purpose. There are difficulties in applying this view to one or two verses, but it has not been disproved by the arguments from meter advanced by Bewer and others. (c) Did both Obadiah and Jeremiah quote from an older oracle? This is the favorite solution among recent scholars, most of whom think that Obadiah preserves the vigor of the original, while Jeremiah quotes with more freedom; but Bewer in ICC, after a detailed comparison, thus sums up: “Our conclusion is that Obadiah quoted in Oba 1:1-9 an older oracle, the original of which is better preserved in Jer 49.” The student will do well to get his own first-hand impression from a careful comparison of the two passages. With Oba 1:1-4 compare Jer 49:14-16; with Oba 1:5, Oba 1:6 compare Jer 49:9, Jer 49:10; with Oba 1:8 compare Jer 49:7; with Oba 1:9 compare Jer 49:22. On the whole, the view that Jeremiah, who often quotes from earlier prophets, draws directly from Obadiah, with free working over of the older prophets, seems still tenable.
(2) Relation of Obadiah and Joel.
There seems to be in Joe 2:32 (Hebrew 3:5) a direct allusion to Oba 1:17. If Joel prophesied during the minority of the boy king Joash (circa 830 BC), Obadiah would be, on this hypothesis, the earliest of the writing prophets.
(3) What Capture of Jerusalem Is Described in Oba 1:10-14?
The disaster seems to have been great enough to be called “destruction” (Oba 1:12). Hence, most scholars identify the calamity described by Obadiah with the capture and destruction of Jerusalem by the Chaldeans in 587 BC. But it is remarkable, on this hypothesis, that no allusion is made either in Obadiah or Jer 49:7-22 to the Chaldeans or to the destruction of the temple or to the wholesale transportation of the inhabitants of Jerusalem to Babylonia. We know, however, from Eze 35:1-15 and Psa 137:7 that Edom rejoiced over the final destruction of Jerusalem by the Chaldeans in 587 BC, and that they encouraged the destroyers to blot out the holy city. Certain it is that the events of 587 accord remarkably with the language of Oba 1:10-14. Pusey indeed argues from the use of the form of the direct prohibition in Oba 1:12-14 that Edom had not yet committed the sins against which the prophet warns him, and so Jerusalem was not yet destroyed, when Obadiah wrote. But almost all modern scholars interpret the language of Oba 1:12-14 as referring to what was already past; the prophet “speaks of what the Edomites had actually done as of what they ought not to do.” The scholars who regard Obadiah as the first of the writing prophets locate his ministry in Judah during the reign of Jehoram (circa 845 BC). Both 2 Kings and 2 Chronicles tell of the war of rebellion in the days of Jehoram when Edom, after a fierce struggle, threw off the yoke of Judah (2Ki 8:20-22; 2Ch 21:8-10). Shortly after the revolt of Edom, according to 2Ch 21:16 f, the Philistines and Arabians broke into Judah, “and carried away all the substance that was found in the king’s house, and his sons also, and his wives; so that there was never a son left him, save Jehoahaz, the youngest of his sons.” Evidently the capital city fell into the hands of the invaders. It was a calamity of no mean proportions.
The advocates of a late date call attention to three points that weaken the case for an early date for Obadiah: (a) The silence of 2 Kings as to the invasion of the Philistines and Arabians. But what motive could the author of Chronicles have had for inventing the story? (b) The absence of any mention of the destruction of the city by the Philistines and Arabians. It must be acknowledged that the events of 587 BC accord more fully with the description in Oba 1:10-14, though the disaster in the days of Jehoram must have been terrible. (c) The silence as to Edom in 2Ch 21:16 f. But so also are the historic books silent as to the part that Edom took in the destruction of Jerusalem in 587. It is true that exilic and post-exilic prophets and psalmists speak in bitter denunciation of the unbrotherly conduct of Edom (Lam 4:21, Lam 4:22; Eze 25:12-14; Eze 35:1-15; Psa 137:7; Mal 1:1-5; compare also Isa 34 and Isa 63:1-6); but it is also true that the earliest Hebrew literature bears witness to the keen rivalry between Esau and Jacob (Gen 25:22 f; Gen 27:41; Num 20:14-21), and one of the earliest of the writing prophets denounces Edom for unnatural cruelty toward his brother (Amo 1:11 f; compare Joe 3:19 (Hebrew 4:19)).
(4) The Style of Obadiah.
Most early critics praise the style. Some of the more recent critics argue for different authors on the basis of a marked difference in style within the compass of the twenty-one verses in the little roll. Thus Selbie writes in HDB: “There is a difference in style between the two halves of the book, the first being terse, animated, and full of striking figures, while the second is diffuse and marked by poverty of ideas and trite figures.” The criticism of the latter part of the book is somewhat exaggerated, though it may be freely granted that the first half is more original and vigorous. The Hebrew of the book is classic, with scarcely any admixture of Aramaic words or constructions. The author may well have lived in the golden age of the Hebrew language and literature.
(5) Geographical and Historical Allusions.
The references to the different sections and cities in the land of Israel and in the land of Edom are quite intelligible. As to Sepharad (Oba 1:20) there is considerable difference of opinion. Schrader and some others identify it with a Shaparda in Media, mentioned in the annals of Sargon (722-705 BC). Many think of Asia Minor, or a region in Asia Minor mentioned in Persian inscriptions, perhaps Bithynia or Galatia (Sayce). Some think that the mention of “the captives of this host of the children of Israel” and “the captives of Jerusalem” (Oba 1:20) proves that both the Assyrian captivity and the Babylonian exile were already past. This argument has considerable force; but it is well to remember that Amos, in the first half of the 8th century, describes wholesale deportations from the land of Israel by men engaged in the slave trade (Amo 1:6-10). The problem of the date of Obadiah has not been solved to the satisfaction of Biblical students. Our choice must be between a very early date (circa 845) and a date shortly after 587, with the scales almost evenly balanced.
4. Interpretation of the Book:
Obadiah is to be interpreted as prediction rather than history. In Oba 1:11-14 there are elements of historic description, but Oba 1:1-10 and Oba 1:15-21 are predictive.
Literature.
Comms.: Caspari, Der Prophet Obadjah ausgelegt, 1842; Pusey, The Minor Prophets, 1860; Ewald, Commentary on the Prophets of the Old Testament (English translation), II, 277 ff, 1875; Keil (ET), 1880; T.T. Perowne (in Cambridge Bible), 1889; von Orelli (English translation), The Minor Prophets, 1893; Wellhausen, Die kleinen Propheten, 1898; G.A. Smith, The Book of the Twelve Prophets, II, 163 ff, 1898; Nowack, Die kleinen Propheten, 1903; Marti, Dodekapropheton, 1903; Eiselen, The Minor Prophets, 1907; Bewer, ICC, 1911. Miscellaneous: Kirkpatrick, Doctrine of the Prophets, 33 ff; Intros of Driver, Wildeboer, etc.; Selbie in HDB, III, 577-80; Barton in JE, IX, 369-70; Cheyne in EB, III, 3455-62; Peckham, An Introduction to the Study of Obadiah, 1910; Kent, Students’ Old Testament, III, 1910.
The book of Obadiah is largely an announcement of judgment upon Edom for its part in helping Babylon in the destruction of Jerusalem in 587 BC (Oba 1:10-14; cf. Psa 137:7; Eze 35:5; Eze 35:12; Eze 35:15). Edom, being descended from Esau, was a brother nation to Israel-Judah, and therefore should have helped Jerusalem in its final hour (cf. Gen 25:23-26; Gen 32:28; Gen 36:1; Gen 36:8-9). Instead the Edomites took the opportunity to plunder the helpless city (Oba 1:11; Oba 1:13). They even captured the fleeing Jerusalemites and sold them to the Babylonian conquerors (Oba 1:14; for map and other details see EDOM).
Contents of the book
Edom prided itself in the strength of its mountain defences and the cleverness of its political dealings. Neither, however, would save it from the divine judgment that would fall upon it because of its active cooperation in the destruction of Jerusalem (Oba 1:1-16).
But whereas God would destroy Edom totally, he would bring Judah out of captivity and back to its land, where it would rebuild its national life. It would even spread its power into former Edomite territory (Oba 1:17-21).