Obadiah 1:17,18 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

But upon mount Zion shall be deliverance Literally taken, this refers to the Jews; mystically, to the gospel church. By deliverance here may be first meant an asylum, or place of refuge, to escape the evil; and it may be spoken with a reference to the invasion of Judea by Sennacherib, and his being prevented by God from taking Jerusalem, (though he took all the other fenced cities of Judah,) so that all persons of the neighbouring places found a deliverance, or an asylum, there; and so escaped falling into the enemies' hands. It may also, perhaps, chiefly refer to the restoration of the Jews from the captivity of Babylon. But yet this promise was more remarkably verified in the time of the first preaching of the gospel, when God's law went forth out of Zion, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem, Psalms 100:2; Isaiah 2:3; and when, through believing in Christ, and embracing the gospel, the Christians escaped the destruction that came upon the Jewish nation, concerning which see note on Joel 2:32. And there shall be another and more glorious completion of it at the restoration of the Jewish nation, which is foretold in this and the following verses, as it is in many other places. And there shall be holiness So far as this refers to the Jews returned from captivity, it signifies that the temple, the city, and the people should be holy to the Lord. But the words more especially refer to gospel days; and are intended to express the holiness of the Christian Church, particularly after the conversion of the Jews, and during the millennium. The house of Jacob shall possess their possessions Shall remain in possession of their own land or territories. The house of Jacob shall be a fire, &c. This was fulfilled in part by the Jews under Hyrcanus and the Maccabees, who made great slaughter of the Idumeans; here expressed by the strong image of their being the fire and flame, and the Idumeans stubble. But the passage will be more fully accomplished when the Lord shall make his church as a fire to all its enemies.