Prophecy That Cyrus Would Defeat Babylon

Year of Prophecy: ©689 BC (Isaiah 45:1)

Year of Fulfillment: 539 BC (2 Chronicles 36:20-23; Daniel 5:30-31)

Time until fulfillment: ~150 years

The prophecy that Cyrus would defeat Babylon is an example of fulfilled Biblical Prophecy. To show how the amount of time passing between prophecy and fulfillment doesn’t matter, we will cover ten of such prophecies. This is the seventh of ten.

Cyrus II (also known as Cyrus the Great) was the founder of the Achaemenid Persian Empire that continued for two centuries until the time of Alexander the Great. He inherited the throne at his father’s death, Cambyses I, in 559 BC and soon managed to unify the Median and Persian kingdoms into a single nation. Then, in 539 BC, he went after the kingdom of Babylon. Over the previous 14 years, Babylon had not had strong leadership, for its king Nabonidus had not been in the city during this time and he had left his son, Belshazzar, in charge of affairs in Babylon (Dn 5). Nabonidus had also fallen into disfavor with the Babylonian priesthood. Cyrus attacked Opis on the Tigris River defeating the Babylonians and causing Nabonidus to flee and later return to Babylon.  This gave Cyrus control of Babylon’s vast canal system. According to Herodotus, Cyrus had the Euphrates River, upriver from Babylon, diverted enough to cause the water level flowing through Babylon to drop to the height of one’s thigh and enabled the Persian army to march through the riverbed into Babylon during the night and capture the city. Cyrus himself entered Babylon shortly thereafter and proclaimed himself “king of Babylon.”

The prophet Isaiah predicted this long before it ever occurred. Isaiah was a prophet during the reigns of the Judean kings Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz and Hezekiah (Is 1:1). He began his ministry around 740 BC and may have lived into the first part of the reign of Manasseh.  Isaiah prophesied to both Israel and Judah. The main world influence during the time of Isaiah was the Assyrian Empire. The main subject of the first 12 chapters of the book of Isaiah is the prophecy of the demise of Israel by Assyria in three stages.  Although Isaiah warned, Israel did not heed. Then, starting in chapter 13, Isaiah turns to Judah and predicts the punishment of Judah for the same reasons God allowed the destruction of Israel by Assyria. The interesting thing about the prophecy against Judah is that Isaiah prophesied the overtaking of Judah by Babylon and the demise of Babylon long before Babylon was anything to write home about. It was another century before Babylon came onto the world scene as a nation with which to be reckoned. Not only did Isaiah predict the invasion of Judah by Babylon almost a century before it occurred, but he then predicted that Judah would return to their homeland and by whom it would occur. This definitely shows that God is in control of all situations. The prophet Jeremiah would later prophesy that Babylon would take Israel captive for 70 years under the leadership of Nebuchadnezzar (Jr 25). However, Jeremiah was not very specific in what would happen to Israel at the end of this 70-year period. He states that Babylon will be punished and enslaved by other nations, but not specifically about Israel’s return. By Isaiah giving specific prophesy about Israel’s return and under whose reign it would happen, it gave the people hope and assured them that it would occur—especially to those who were keeping track of the years of captivity. This must have been very exciting to Daniel when he realized that he was living during the time of fulfillment of these prophesies by Jeremiah and Isaiah (Dn 9:1-2).

This should be exciting to us as well. Why? It means whatever God has recorded in His Scripture will come to pass and we can be sure of it. Do you know what promises you can claim? Maybe it’s time to read and find out.

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Visit Books & Words to Inspire by Randy C. Dockens