Did Judah Remain Desolate?

THE Bible foretold that the land of the kingdom of Judah would be devastated by the Babylonians and would remain desolate until the return of the Jewish exiles. (Jeremiah 25:8-11) The strongest reason to believe that this prophecy came true is the inspired historical account recorded some 75 years after the first group of exiles returned to their homeland. It states that the king of Babylon “carried off those remaining from the sword captive to Babylon, and they came to be servants to him and his sons until the royalty of Persia began to reign.” And regarding the land, it is reported: “All the days of lying desolated it kept sabbath.” (2 Chronicles 36:20, 21) Is there any archaeological evidence to support this?

In the journal Biblical Archaeology Review, Ephraim Stern, professor of Palestinian archaeology at Hebrew University, points out: “The Assyrians and Babylonians both ravaged large parts of ancient Israel, yet the archaeological evidence from the aftermath of their respective conquests tells two very different stories.” He explains: “While the Assyrians left a clear imprint of their presence in Palestine, there is a strange gap after the Babylonian destruction. . . . We find no evidence of occupation until the Persian period . . . There is a complete gap in evidence suggesting occupation. In all that time, not a single town destroyed by the Babylonians was resettled.”

Professor Lawrence E. Stager of Harvard University agrees. “Throughout Philistia, and later throughout Judah,” he says, the Babylonian king’s “scorched-earth policy created a veritable wasteland west of the Jordan River.” Stager adds: “Only with Cyrus the Great, the Persian successor to the Babylonians, does the archaeological record begin again . . . in Jerusalem and in Judah, where many Jewish exiles returned to their homeland.”

Yes, Jehovah’s word concerning Judah’s lying desolate was fulfilled. What Jehovah God foretells always comes true. (Isaiah 55: 10, 11) We can put our complete confidence in Jehovah and in the promises recorded in his Word, the Bible.​—2 Timothy 3:16.