Why didn't all the Jews want to return to Jerusalem (Ezra 1:5-6)?

There was at once a response from the heads of the fathers of Judah and Benjamin, and the priests and Levites. What joy must have filled their hearts when they read the proclamation of Cyrus. What they had longed and prayed for had come at last. God was acting in their behalf and His promises were about to come to pass. It was the LORD who stirred them to action and to turn their faces towards Jerusalem. But not all were ready to go back; only a small remnant was willing. The great majority preferred to remain in Babylon. There was nothing to attract them to Jerusalem --the city of ruins, with the once magnificent temple in ruins. Those who returned, loved Jerusalem, the place the LORD had chosen, where alone the appointed offerings and sacrifices could be brought. They belonged to those who sat by the rivers of Babylon and wept when they remembered Zion and said, "If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cunning; if I do not remember thee, let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth, if I prefer not Jerusalem above my chief joy" (Ps. 137:5-6). And the Jews who remained helped them generously in every way.

"We are settled in Babylon. We have been brought up here and, for some of us, our parents have been brought up here. We have got used to things. How can we leave everything behind, just to go to what is a strange place to us?"

This proclamation became a test of the moral condition of the people of God. On the one hand, it raised the question, were their affections so set upon their land, their God, and the house of God, that in simple faith they were prepared to face trials and difficulties, opposition and reproach, in order to answer to the mind of God and carry out His will? Or on the other hand, Did they prefer to remain in Babylon with its ease and material comforts? Alas! the vast majority of God's people preferred to remain in the easy circumstances of a humiliating captivity, rather than face the trials and reproaches entailed by carrying out God's will.

This proclamation became a test of the moral condition of the people of God. On the one hand, it raised the question, were their affections so set upon their land, their God, and the house of God, that in simple faith they were prepared to face trials and difficulties, opposition and reproach, in order to answer to the mind of God and carry out His will? Or on the other hand, Did they prefer to remain in Babylon with its ease and material comforts? Alas! the vast majority of God's people preferred to remain in the easy circumstances of a humiliating captivity, rather than face the trials and reproaches entailed by carrying out God's will.

The proclamation did not name any person or persons who were to go to Jerusalem and build the house, but rather threw the door open for any Jew to go, whose heart stirred him up to do so, giving him the assurance that he was to be liberally helped in the project before him. Being thus worded it meant that those who responded would be in the main men of piety, whose hearts were alive to the glory of God and to the place of His Name, while the more worldly-minded and selfish would be inclined to remain in their comfortable homes, established during the seventy years of captivity, and leave the task to others who were prepared to face the difficulties and privations.

The story unfolded in Esther is well known to all our readers. It concerns itself with the fortunes of the Jews who remained behind in the lands of their captivity after a remnant had returned to the land of their fathers under Zerubabel, Ezra and Nehemiah. These latter were evidently the pick of the people, for the idea of returning to Jerusalem, and facing the privations and troubles and reproach which that entailed, would only appeal to those who feared the Lord and thought upon His Name and purposes. Those of a more worldly-minded type, who had comfortably settled down and acquired possessions and wealth in the lands of their dispersion during the seventy years, would be much less likely to face the sacrifices involved in such an uprooting.

At the time of the decree issued by Cyrus, which came at the end of 60 years of captivity, a considerable number of Jews, who saw in this decree the fulfillment of the word of God, returned to the land, under the leadership of Zerubbabel. Ezra lead others back at a later time. This emigration included 42,360 persons. No doubt, more than once, individuals returned to Jerusalem from Babylon or other areas of the empire, in order to worship, or to bring gifts (see, for example, Zechariah 6:9-10). But, in a general way, whether out of indifference for Jerusalem and the temple, or whether out of love for comfort, self-interest, or any other reason, a great part of Judah and Benjamin remained in the Persian provinces where they had established themselves. The emigrants answered to the mind of God by returning to Jerusalem, but the others did not seem to appreciate the humiliation of their servile condition, and remained there where they were. It goes without saying that we exempt from this category of personalities those like Daniel, Ezra, Nehemiah, and Mordecai, whose official functions retained them under direct dependence on the Persian monarchy. Those who returned, without being acknowledged by God as a nation (for the sentence which had declared them to be Lo-Ammi* had not been recalled) had relations with the Lord individually and even collectively, despite the complete absence of national relations with Him. And it pleased Him to support them, bringing them into the understanding of His thoughts through their leaders, teachers and prophets, so as to maintain their faith and encourage them. God's purpose was to prepare them to receive the Messiah, and, if they would receive Him, to re-establish them as a nation and once again call them my people. We know how all these plans of grace toward Israel were interrupted by the rejection of Christ. We know how, after this rejection, the Church was formed by the Holy Spirit and how finally the restoration of Israel was postponed to a time yet future, as described by the prophets. Despite everything, the beginnings of the restoration of Judah and Benjamin were particularly blessed, as Ezra, Nehemiah, and the prophets Haggai, Zechariah and Malachi testify.

The condition of the people who had preferred to remain in the land of their captivity, was, on the contrary, most unfortunate. Although they enjoyed an outward prosperity, they were not only Lo-Ammi, like their brothers restored to the land of Palestine, but they were deprived of any communication whatsoever between themselves and God. God was hidden from them; He had turned His face away from them. A heavy veil of sorrow and abandon weighed upon this people. They had neither the energy of faith (since that energy had not manifested itself at the time of the decree issued by Cyrus), nor even the enjoyment of individual relationships with God. Israel's sun had set. There was no longer even a lamp to guide their feet in the night which had enveloped them. Whereas other had gone up toward the light, or rather had drawn near the light by returning to Jerusalem, these people had remained seated in the darkness of the shadow of death. Not a single ray of light from the face of God came to pierce through the darkness at this moment. This explains why, religiously, in the book of Esther, everything is plunged into a mysterious shadow. Daily life continues, but the spring of this life is weakened, and more than that: it is destroyed.

Jews, living in affluence and wealth are not attracted to leave their comfortable homes in such countries as Great Britain, her colonies, and U.S.A. At the beginning of the movement the Palestinian colonists were largely recruited from Russia, Poland and Romania, where they were ill-treated and poor in the main. Note how the North country bulks in this, for these countries are to the North and North West of Palestine.

But in grace God remembered the faithful remnant and moved the heart of Cyrus, the king of Persia, to allow the Jewish people to return to Jerusalem after the seventy years' captivity, as Isaiah had prophesied 150-200 years before (Isa. 45). Only a small part of Judah and Benjamin made use of this opportunity. According to Ezra 2:64 there were some 42000 who returned with Zerubbabel. If we take into consideration that there were times when Judah and Israel together had an army of 1 200 000 men (2 Chron. 13:3), we can see how small the returning remnant was. The majority had no longing for the God-given land nor for Jerusalem where the temple had stood. Others (like Daniel) were hindered by their position or age from going along. But God was with the small remnant. He encouraged and strengthened them. He protected them from their enemies and bestowed His help and favour upon them. Not that God restored them to the same position that Israel had taken before: God is not indifferent to any unfaithfulness and does not operate any restoration to a situation that man through his sin and unfaithfulness has lost. God did not restore Adam to the paradise of Eden. Even Christians to whom the value of Christ's work is imputed: a work through which God is infinitely more glorified than Adam and all his descendants have dishonoured Him, even they will not be transplanted into the paradise of Eden again, although their place is infinitely higher and more glorious. This remnant must do without the visible presence of the Lord. The throne of God is no longer in Jerusalem. A Zerubbabel, the prince coming from the kingly race of David does ascend the throne, but is only a governor for the Persian world-rulers. God has withdrawn His glory from Jerusalem, and given the direct government of the world to the Gentile nations (see Joshua 3:11; 1 Chron. 29:23; Dan. 2:28; Isaiah 45:1). God recognizes the sovereign rights of the heathen empires. The dates in the prophecies of Haggai and Zechariah are indicated according to the reigning years of the heathen kings. God works in favour of His people, not in destroying their masters, but in that He instills in the hearts of these kings a good disposition toward the Jews.

Had not God Himself abandoned Jerusalem and permitted the temple and city to be burnt? Had He not blessed the Jews who lived in Babylon and other lands? Let us think only of Daniel and his friends, of Esther and Mordecai. Was that not proof that those who stayed in Babylon were on the right way? And should they now return to Palestine, devastated and inhabited mostly by enemies; to Jerusalem, where no liveable house stood any more, where there was no alter for the sacrifices, no temple for worship, and no wall of defence against the enemies; and for the exclusion of evil? It was utterly impossible to reinstate the old situation.

Was it not necessary to take consideration the teachings of history? Throughout the centuries actually only two tribes had served God in Jerusalem. In the last seventy years everything had changed, and under God's government a completely different situation had come about. And now only a handful from Judah and Benjamin, with a few priests and Levites were going back. Was this little group the only one to know it? Did the more than 90% who were not returning, among who were people like Daniel, all act wrongly?

Without a shadow of doubt many must have spoken that way. In no other way can it be explained that the Scriptures tell us that only 42000 men, hardly 5% of the total, returned to Jerusalem.