Now, travel-weary Israel had crossed the Red Sea and were now passing through the dreadful, waterless desert wastes of the Sinai peninsula. They were on their way to Canaan, the Land of Promise. Then, as they came to Rephidim, quite unexpectedly, they were attacked by a warlike desert people, the Amalekites!

For one whole day, the battle raged. Moshe, Aaron and Hur strategically took position atop a nearby hill overlooking the field of battle. Under Elohim's instructions, Moshe's hands remained raised in steadfast intercessory prayer, and so long as that was the case, the fighting went in Israel's favour. However, whenever his strength flagged and he lowered his hands, Israel took a bad shellacking from their adversaries. So Aaron and Hur found a huge stone on which Moshe could sit and they stood beside him propping up his hands. Here  is a fine example of how believers should support their leaders in prayer, and otherwise, in the unrelenting spiritual warfare that Elohim's people must face in this life. Thus, Israel emerged victorious.

It should have all ended there, after all, in any armed altercation, there are bound to be victors and the vanquished. But no, Elohim solemnly charges Israel to ensure that Amalek was totally obliterated from among the nations (Deuteronomy 25:19). This they had to do, once Israel had settled into their inheritance.

So what was Amalek's crime to warrant such a harsh judgment from Adonai, the God of Israel?
In their sudden, unwarranted attack on Israel, Amalek had breached all the known protocols of war. He had waylaid the stragglers among Israel's tired company and mercilessly massacred them. They had absolutely no regard for the aged, the infirm, the crippled, the frail, the young. They showed not a shred of humanity. Amalek had no respect for the universal conventions of warfare. In the words of scripture: "...he had no fear of God." (Deuteronomy 25:18). In today's language, he had trampled on the "Geneva Convention" and was therefore guilty of war crimes. God therefore solemnly adjured  Israel to ensure that this callous crime was punished, no matter how long it took!

But first, just who was Amalek?
In Genesis 36:12 and 15, we learn that Esau's firstborn, Eliphaz, had a son by a concubine named Timna. It was this son that was named Amalek. In other words, this warlike desert tribe was numbered among Esau's descendants. And, just like their forefather, they lived in deserts and by the sword (cf Genesis 27:39-41). And it would appear that, just as their father had hated and bore a longstanding grudge against Jacob, Amalek was only too willing to continue down that treacherous, vengeful path.

The onerous responsibility of  carrying out this divine judgment on Amalek fell on Israel's first king, Shaul son of Kish, of the tribe of Benjamin. By that time, Israel had fully settled into their allotted tribal territories. We read of this divine commission in 1Samuel 15:2-3. In obedience to God's word, Saul's army marched out against Israel's godless foe, and since Elohim was with them, they were victorious. Most of Amalek was destroyed. However, Israel's avaricious king deigned  not to destroy fine Amalekite livestock as God had expressly ordered through the prophet Samuel (1Samuel 15:9). In fact, Saul even spared Agag, the Amalekite king too! Thus we see Elohim rejecting Saul as Israel's king, and the task of killing Agag had to be carried out by the prophet himself. So the total annihilation of Amalek was not achieved, and the matter lay forgotten (at least among humans) for a long, long time.

It was centuries later, during Israel's involuntary sojourn in the Medo-Persian empire, that we see the issue coming to the fore once again. It so happened that one of Agag's scions, a certain Haman son of Hammedatha rose to prominence in Emperor Ahasuerus' court. With the exaltation and recognition, came pride and arrogance. Lofty Haman simply could not understand why an insignificant Jew named Mordecai would not bow down in obeisance in his august presence. The issue rankled, and boy, wasn't the lordly Haman furious! A little spade work revealed that the offending Mordecai was of Jewish extraction. The vengeful Haman resolved that it was not satisfactory that he only dealt with Mordecai as an individual! No, why not exterminate the entire Jewish race?! Sounds familiar, huh? So he set out to lay down a diabolically devious scheme to eradicate God's people. Haman sought an audience with the Persian monarch himself. He fabricated the story of a troublesome, irksome, rabble-rousing people living within the king's domains. These malcontents, so said Haman, were different in culture, language and religion. In fact, they were not like other people at all! Furthermore, they did not even obey the king's laws! It would not, therefore, be in the king's best interests to continue to tolerate their insolent presence in polite Persian society. Patriotic Haman was even ready to pay huge amounts of silver into royal coffers, if only his royal majesty would sanction their extermination! (Esther 3:8-9).

Wow! Genocide on intercontinental proportions! And all on account of some swollen Amalekite head! Intercontinental, I say, because the vast Medo-Persian empire stretched from the foothills of the Himalayas in India, all across the Middle East, covering parts of Europe and deep into the African continent (cf Esther 1:1)! But wait a moment! What myopic Haman had failed to take into consideration was that Mordecai was no random Jew. No! He was Mordecai son of Jair, son of Shimei, the son of Kish, of the tribe of Benjamin! Here was a direct, if distant, relative of King Saul! And had not the said Saul been divinely commissioned to eliminate Haman's forebearers?! But the plot thickens! The Persian queen, Esther (Hadassah was her Hebrew name) was also descended from the same royal lineage! She was Mordecai's cousin! Were these two divinely ordained instruments for the destruction of Israel's archetypal enemies, Amalek?
Had Adonai arranged matters in such a manner as to ensure that what Saul had failed to do, so many years ago, would now be accomplished by someone from the same Saul's family?! The subsequent events would seem to corroborate this thesis.

In short thrift, Haman discovered that the tables had turned. The hunter had become the hunted!
And because Haman had borne false testimony about the Jews before the king (Esther 3:8-9), the Torah's verdict on such tale bearers fell on him: "...whatever the false witness had sought to be done on his neighbour, should be done unto him..." (Deuteronomy 19:16-19). 
The gallows that he had erected (on the bad advice of his wife Zeresh and some confidants) for Mordecai's execution, were now used to despatch him to the land of no return!
His family too were summarily executed and his vast  estate was turned over to Mordecai! In fact, even the signet ring that the king had placed on Haman's finger was also retrieved and instead given to Mordecai, his hated Jewish nemesis (Esther 8:2)! How fitting!

In the altercation that followed, the Jews (under Mordecai and Queen Esther), were now able to wreak vengeance on God's enemies in such a manner and fashion that many people proclaimed themselves Jewish for fear of the Jews! (Esther 8:18). We then see  Elohim's wrath against Amalek subsiding. What is still not clear, however, is whether the Haman-Mordecai incident completely obliterated the Amalekites. If not, we will, be assured, in the near future, still witness Amalek finally perishing, just as Baalam had foretold (Numbers 24:20, last part).

In a way, Amalek is a type of Anti-Messiah. A people actuated by a bloodthirsty spirit of violence, murder and undying vengeance. A people whose character is totally opposed to what the God of Israel stands for. A God that the Good Book characterizes  as a God of order and peace (1Corinthians 14:33; Hebrews 13:29). What happened to the Amalekites is therefore a picture of what will eventually happen to the hostile and implacable house of Ishmael and Esau at the end of the Age (Obadiah 18, Joel 3:19, Isaiah 34:5 etc).

The prophet Baalam described them (Ishmael and Esau, including Amalek) as "...the children of Sheth." (Numbers 24: 17, NIV). But then, who is Sheth? The NKJV renders that name "tumult", while the Kiswahili (Union Version) renders it "wana wa ghasia" (literally, 'the children of chaos'). So, again, who is this god of chaos? Some sources call him Set (a variant of Sheth) and describe him as the "...god of deserts, war, chaos and storms." Other names for this god of destruction are Apollyon, Abbadon, Typhon, or Suetekh (among the ancient Hyksos) etc. I also suspect that he is synonymous with the shaggy Greek goat-god Pan. It is from this name "Pan", that such English words as "PANic" and "PANdemonium" are derived. Panic and pandemonium are, in my opinion, equivalent to "tumult" and "chaos."

Furthermore, according to Michael Aquino, who founded the modern Temple of Set in 1975, the deity they worship is Satan. The same god is revealed to be the object of homage in the highest echelons of Freemasonry. One, therefore, comes to understand the Masonic mantra "ab ad chao" (literally, "order out of chaos"). The god of Freemasonry is a god of chaos. They worship Set. They worship Satan.

Is it not telling therefore, that Esau's descendants, including Amalek, are also described as desert dwellers (Genesis 21:20-21; Genesis 27:39-40)?! These inhospitable wastes being the very haunts of the desert satyr Set! So the story of Amalek must be understood to be a  microcosm of the struggle between good and evil. It is a pointer to the fact that God will eventually totally destroy the forces of evil at Armageddon.

The book of Esther does not overtly mention God's name, just as in our everyday lives Elohim may sometimes seem aloof and far removed from our struggles. However, just as that book demonstrates that Elohim did not abandon his people, so it is the case with the present. Israel and God's people in general, may face many Hamans (seemingly insurmountable challenges) in the current dispensation. Eventually, however, the victory will always belong to the people of God. This, as the Hamans of this life and their devious schemes, are exposed and then destroyed. HalleluYah. Maranatha. Blessings.

Pastor Kennedy Chang'andu