From then on, any pollutants of their spiritual estate that were discovered were purged away. But as regards the worldly nations, they went on polluting the earthly globe as never before. In spite of this world pollution, behold! a spiritual paradise has been cultivated by Jehovah’s Christian witnesses, under His blessing and to the honor of His name.

Chapter 9

The “Way of Holiness” to the Spiritual Paradise

1. What grand prospect lay ahead of the Jewish exiles when they left Babylon in 537 B.C.E.?

A LAND like a paradise in a literal sense! This is what the Jewish exiles hoped to make out of their long-desolate homeland, as they departed from Babylon in the year 537 B.C.E. Before them lay the prospect of realizing the fulfillment of the glowing words that the prophet Isaiah had spoken regarding their homeland: “The wilderness and the waterless region will exult, and the desert plain will be joyful and blossom as the saffron. Without fail it will blossom, and it will really be joyful with joyousness and with glad crying out. The glory of Lebanon itself must be given to it, the splendor of Carmel and of Sharon. There will be those who will see the glory of Jehovah, the splendor of our God.”​—Isaiah 35:1, 2.

2. How had God given them assurance of a safe, successful return to their homeland?

² With such a grand prospect before them, how heart-satisfying it must have felt to the liberated Jewish remnant and their loyal companions when they got on the march out of Babylon and were really