Israeli Flowers

 Robbing God

For I am the LORD, I change not; therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed. Even from the days of your fathers ye are gone away from mine ordinances, and have not kept them. Return unto me, and I will return unto you, saith the LORD of hosts. But ye said, Wherein shall we return? Will a man rob God? Yet ye have robbed me. But ye say, Wherein have we robbed thee? In tithes and offerings.

Ye are cursed with a curse: for ye have robbed me, even this whole nation. Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be meat in mine house, and prove me now herewith, saith the LORD of hosts, if I will not open you the windows of heaven, and pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it.

And I will rebuke the devourer for your sakes, and he shall not destroy the fruits of your ground; neither shall your vine cast her fruit before the time in the field, saith the LORD of hosts. And all nations shall call you blessed: for ye shall be a delightsome land, saith the LORD of hosts. Your words have been stout against me, saith the LORD.

Yet ye say, What have we spoken so much against thee? Ye have said, It is vain to serve God: and what profit is it that we have kept his ordinance, and that we have walked mournfully before the LORD of hosts? And now we call the proud happy; yea, they that work wickedness are set up; yea, they that tempt God are even delivered.

Then they that feared the LORD spake often one to another: and the LORD hearkened, and heard it, and a book of remembrance was written before him for them that feared the LORD, and that thought upon his name. And they shall be mine, saith the LORD of hosts, in that day when I make up my jewels; and I will spare them, as a man spareth his own son that serveth him. Then shall ye return, and discern between the righteous and the wicked, between him that serveth God and him that serveth him not. (Malachi 3:6-18)

The Book of MALACHI Malachi either means "my messenger" or is an abbreviated form of "the messenger of the Lord." Many critics suggest the book is anonymous, and that the title is a symbolic expression, or following the Targums, that it is a "pen name" for Ezra. The name should be seen as a proper name; as all of the books of the Major and Minor Prophets are named, and one would have to assume that a unique exception would be clearly identified. This prophecy is clearly later than those of Haggai and Zechariah. The reconstruction of the temple had been complete long enough for abuses to creep into the sacrificial system (Mal. 1:7 -10; 3:8). Moreover, the overall spiritual state of the people seems to have been in decline; divorce was widespread (Mal. 2:14), mixed marriages were being contracted (Mal, 2:10 -12), and tithes had been neglected (Mal. 3:8 -10). The book therefore must be dated sometime after Nehemiah's return to the Persian court in 433 B.C., probably before 400 B.C.   Malachi's dialectic style is unique among the prophets. He first makes an assertion, then follows a question from his subjects, and a response proving the original assertion, This style of argumentation or rhetoric became very popular in Judaism, and is seen in the Talmud and Mishnah. The Book of Malachi ends with a prophetic statement regarding John the Baptist, a forerunner of the Messiah (Mal. 3:1 -6). The Jews in the intertestamental period recognized that the prophets had ceased from Israel. When they cleansed the temple following Antiochus (IV) Epiphanes' abomination in 165 B.C. (Dan. 8:13; 11:31; see note on Ezek. 43:13 -27), they set the polluted stones aside "until a prophet should arise" to tell them what to do with them (1 Maccabees 4:46). [Source for Introduction of chapter: Hebrew Greek Key Study Bible KJV edited by Spiros Zodhiates, Th.D. AMG Publishers, Chattanooga, TN 37422]