When we think and pray for revival, it is important to understand what revival is and to identify its conditions. Since the Bible is the primary source of information of the Jewish revival movements, let’s list main conditions of revival according to the Tanakh.  

When did revival movements typically begin?

1. At the end of a deep spiritual decadence (most of the time).

2. At the end of the time of external oppression and persecution.

3. At the time of natural disasters including droughts that caused famines, epidemies, etc.

These items are closely interrelated – most of the time, Israel’s inner spiritual decay allowed external enemies to obtain access to the people of God and power over them, which they abused. Israel’s situation would get more dire as time went by. At last, people would get desperate and call upon their God realizing that other people’s gods would not save them.    

The first vivid example is Israel in Egypt (Exodus 3). Exodus 3:8 (NKJV) says: “..for I know their ^[a]sorrows. ⁸ So I have come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians, and to bring them up from that land to a good and large land, to a land flowing with milk and honey, to the place of the Canaanites and the Hittites and the Amorites and the Perizzites and the Hivites and the Jebusites”. Here is this principle: when the people of God became desperate and called upon God, God, having prepared Moses by that time, took prompt action. We see especially many similar stories in the books of Judges, Chronicles, Samuel, and Kings. There we notice a kind of cycle that repeated over and over again. What would bring Israel to their spiritual decay?    

Reasons of Israel’s spiritual decay

1. Growing of material prosperity, mainly among the ruling class – first, judges, second, kings, then nobility, elders, and priests.

Prosperity of priests was especially important, because it was playing bigger and bigger role over time. Sometimes, they were joined by prophets or so-called prophets, some of which started as true prophets and became false prophets after a while. Others were false prophets from the very beginning and served the interests of those in power.  

When Israel’s elite became rich, didn’t need God anymore, and forgot about their responsibility before Him and the people, they would begin to serve their own interests and other gods. This apostacy was spreading from the top down, involving the majority of the nation. We see the most serious warning about this danger in Deuteronomy 8:12-19.  

2. Sins of Israel’s leaders.

Sins of the top leadership had particularly strong influence on the fate of the whole nation – first, judges, second, kings, then, a separate category, the high priests, including their families, and at a certain point, the Jerusalem priests and prophets. In some instances, even the sin of main elders and tribe leaders could have a direct impact on the whole nation. In the era of the Second Temple, some informal spiritual authorities, such as scribes and later pharisees, were increasing their influence more and more. It is their sins that played the decisive role in the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple, and later, the final catastrophe of the Bar Kokhba revolt.      

Little has changed since then, and almost every nation on earth has been repeating Israel’s ways. To my great regret, so-called Christian nations are repeating these ways, even though they are such in name only, having kept certain formal signs of Christian religion.  

3. Emulation of pagan peoples that surrounded Israel and among which Jews lived at certain times in history.

They included the great ancient civilizations, such as Egypt, Assyria, Phoenicia, Babylon, Persia, etc.  Another vivid example is the Hellenistic civilization in the history of Hannukah. Jews trembled in awe, fear, and admiration, partaking in the trappings of wealth and developed culture. When they saw the external might and the colorful religion of these great ancient civilizations, God’s people felt very poor, weak, and provincial against their background. And the ancient Jewish people began to think that they could join the mainstream of the world progress only by adopting all this gentile splendor, emulating, and even copying their pagan patterns.  

We can see that the same happens nowadays, even though there are great differences. At that time, only one little nation believed in the One God, and all other nations were polytheistic and idol worshippers. Today, the situation is different, but I think, that external signs of Christianity, in no way, mean that the nations, that call themselves Christian, are truly faithful to Christ. That is why the problem of such slavish copying and subservience to the patterns that are far from the image of God and God’s Word, to put it mildly, is an extremely relevant danger to our country and people.  

4. Division and struggle for power.

5. Corruption in government, courts, priests, and prophets.

Who did revival start with?

Typically, an ancient Israel revival would start from the top. It was initiated either by a God-chosen hero, anointed by the Holy Spirit, who would become a judge, a military commander, a prophet, or a king of Judea, or by a prophet who rebuked both the people and their king. If it were a prophet, he had no military, political or economic power, but because of the great spiritual power, calling, and commission, given to him by the very God of Israel, his conviction made a turnaround in the minds and hearts of ancient Jews, and a revival would break out. Just as frequently, such prophets would rebuke corrupt priesthood and false prophets as well.  

What did revival start with?

1.  When the downtrodden with oppression, wars, and natural disasters people would begin to realize the cause of their woes and turn to God in prayer.

We have already mentioned this in the section titled “When did revivals begin?”. For example, the book of Judges gives many stories of revivals, such as the one during the reign of king Jehoshaphat, and more. There it describes how and why, on rare occasions, but still occurring situations, the people lamented, pressed against the throne of mercy realizing the cause of the tragedy, performed the true teshuva, and God began to act.  

2. With the lament and cry for help of one person.

At other times, one person’s lament and cry for help to God was literally enough. The most vivid example is Gideon, who started teshuva in his father’s family, and then the revival captured the masses.  

3. With a deep teshuva, a deep and conscious repentance of one person who represented the whole Israel.

First of all, it applies to Daniel.

4. After the call of a judge, a prophet, and then a king to teshuva.

A good example of it is the revival in the remnant of Israel, that returned from the Babylonian captivity, through Ezra the scribe and Nehemiah the courtier of the Persian king. Also, God used prophets Zachariah and Haggai as participants and ignitors of revivals.  

What was the beginning of revival accompanied with, other than prayer and repentance?

1. Rejection of idol worshipping, destruction of idols, termination of false spiritual practices, such as sorcery, magic, divination, etc.  

2. Cessation of sins of different kinds.

3. The nation would begin to serve God by restoring worship services commanded by the Torah, material activities, such as tithes and offerings, and also Jews would start treating each other better. (They would stop their godless actions toward their neighbor and started doing good works.)

4. Restoration of reading and listening to the Word of God.

A number of revivals took place after a long time of decadence and destruction, precisely when someone would find a Torah scroll, and then a king would read it with other people, lament, and strive to perform what was written.  

5. Restoration of God’s festivals.

6. Sometimes they had to renew the covenant.

In 2 Chronicles 15, we see an interesting example of the covenant renewal. It was as if they did it all over again, but they had already had it at the same time. During the renewal ceremony, the Spirit of God filled all the people in such as a powerful way that they were happy to take the solemn covenant oath binding all people, great and small, to be faithful to the renewed covenant. This is only one of many examples of a great gradual revival.    

The role of the Holy Spirit during revival  

In order for a nation to realize their sins, guilt and inner root of the problem, and not to blame God or nature around them, they need a direct interference of the Holy Spirit. And God sent His Holy Spirit, who convicted and broke certain people, and then the whole nation of Israel.

As a result, the broken, humbled, and repentant nation would open up to further action of the Ruach HaKodesh. And God could distribute the gifts of the Holy Spirit among those who He was going to use to ignite revival. They were supposed to raise up the people and deliver them from the external enemies, and give them victory over inner invisible enemies.  

The Lord presented these gifts to the truly chosen servants, who led the nation. However, in some cases, this process was just the opposite – first, the Lord marked His special people, anointed them, raised them, gave them His gifts, and awakened in them those gifts that they had from birth, and only then the work of the Holy Spirit followed and brought the rest of Israel to conviction, contrition, and deep teshuva.  

Conclusion

When we analyze these qualities of revival, the question arises: Why was this even necessary? Couldn’t God’s people live with constant piety, with faithfulness to God, in His constant search, and full devotion to the King of Israel? Couldn’t they serve Him with joy, experiencing true bliss, receiving all visible blessing and even more abundantly than God promised in the Torah? Why did the same thing happen over and over again?  

Either way, the examples of the Tanakh show us that every time when Israel repented and turned away from false gods and ran toward God, He would forgive them every time because He loves to show mercy. This is the amazing faithfulness of God.  And those qualities of revivals in ancient Israel that are depicted in the Tanakh lead us to very serious and useful reflections about the situation in our time among the people of Ukraine, the people of Israel, the Jews in the diaspora, and the Ukrainians of the diaspora.

Boris Grisenko, the senior rabbi of KJMC

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