That I may Know HIM - A Devotional

Day 8: Invasion From the Past

Inherited Liabilities

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David, in later years, began to battle with some of those remnant Amalekites (1 Samuel 27:8), but even this anointed, mighty king and warrior could no more exterminate them, because the best person to have done that, who was anointed to have done it, was Saul; and  the best time to have done it was in the days of Saul.  Sadly, all that was an opportunity wasted.

Years before, the tribe of Simeon, during the time of the judges, had also made attempts at the Amalekites, but they had not totally wiped them out, because that was a breakthrough awaiting the anointing upon Saul  (1 Chronicles 4:42-43).  The limitations of the     Simeonites looked hopefully ahead to Saul’s manifestation; the limitations of David looked sadly back to Saul’s failure.

Many years after Saul, a surviving seed of the Amalekites grew into a great monster that threatened the whole Jewish race.  That seed was called “Haman the Agagite,” alias “the great enemy of all the Jews” (Esther 8:3; 9:24). 

 Haman the Agagite Who was this Haman?

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According to Smith’s Bible Dictionary, “the Jews considered him as a descendant of Agag the Amalekite” (“Agag” 22).  According to the same Bible dictionary, “Agag” was the title of the kings of  Amalek, just as “Pharaoh” was the royal designation of the kings of Egypt.

As far back as in Numbers 24:7, about 250 years before King Saul, an Agag, a king, was cited in the prophecy of Balaam.  Then in 1 Samuel 15, Saul spares an Agag, a king of the Amalekites.  We may conclude therefore, firstly, that “Agag” was a title for the kings of Amalek, and secondly, that Haman the Agagite was a surviving royal seed,  a prince, of Amalek. 

The Rich Terrorist Politician

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Haman the Agagite was a shrewd Machiavellian, a political strategist.  He was a prominent pillar in the corridors of power.  He had unhindered access to the courts of the king, even at odd hours when decent men kept their beds (Esther 6:4-6).  He wielded enormous wealth by which he easily bought the death of those whose philosophy fortified them against his notorious intimidations; those whose faith forbad them to bow before the god that was Himself and his growing influence.

For his project of genocide against the Jews, he lobbied the king with as much as 10,000 talents of silver which, according to the Living Bible, was about two million dollars in contemporary terms (3:9). 

Haman; his name  meant “magnificent,” or “the well disposed”;  and so he was: the magnificently affluent well connected and well disposed patron of officialized terrorism against God’s people.

Forex

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In the currency of the United States, Canada, and a few other countries, 100 cents make a dollar.  In Nigeria, a hundred kobo make one naira.  One hundred Ghanaian pasewas make a cedi.  In Bible-time currency, 3,000 shekels made one talent.

When one considers that a person’s modest annual wage, as far back as in Judges 17:10, was only 10 shekels of silver, and that 3,000 shekels made one talent, the ‘aid’ of 10,000 talents of silver, which Haman offered to give into the nation’s treasury for his pet project of genocide against the Jews, would be 10,000 (talents) x 3,000 (shekels) = 30,000,000 (shekels) ÷ 10 (shekels, the annual wage) = 3,000,000.  In other words, Haman’s 10,000 talents of silver represented somebody’s wages for 3,000,000 (three million) years, or, the other way round, a whole year’s wages for  three million people.  How much would that be? Let’s find out.