One of the main intentions behind this survey of certain aspects of Bible prophecy is to make an appeal to readers to start afresh in their studies in this field. It therefore becomes desirable to save the reader from false assumptions by indicating briefly what the author’s stance is.

Born in 190S, I was reared almost from birth in the Christadelphian Faith. My maternal grandmother was a personal friend of R. R. She did not hesitate to take that great man on in discussion (in private, of course). So, interpretation of Bible prophecy was a much-savoured item of diet in my early days. My first reading of Eureka 1, 2, ~ (under a very capable mentor) was achieved before the age of 17. Thereafter other Christadelphian classics featured largely in my reading, with constant copious annotations.

As the years went by, and Biblical experience was consolidated, the realisation dawned that there were plenty of questions, which that early reading left unanswered. And quite a few familiar ideas, which I had been taught to believe, were rock-solid actually had a fair element of assumption or speculation about them. A good deal of critical but not unsympathetic re-searching took place. Many discussions, held with brethren of widely differing understanding, also helped forward the process of unremitting re-assessment. Thus, imperceptibly, over long period ideas changed. Blanks were filled out, and some conclusions simply had to be modified. One of the biggest shocks was the realisation that not a few Last Day prophecies seemed to have been bypassed altogether in our inherited understanding.

Yet, over against this, was the outcome of a similar process of reinvestigation of what we rightly call First Principles. There was a short period of uncertainty round about the age of 2-22, but this was effectively laid to rest by (a) much college encounter with unbelief, and (b) a rigorous re-read of “Christendom Astray”. As the years have gone by, the solid truth of the Christadelphian Faith has become the sheet anchor of my Bible understanding. Lots of encounters with other points of view have left me in no doubt about this. Our Christadelphian Faith is the best in the world. If only we all stand firmly together on such a basis, and leave less important matters as “options”, because having a less solid Biblical base, how much more effective the Truth of Christ would be in these present evil times.

It is necessary, then, to assert here very firmly that most of the field of Bible study which we think of as being specially concerned with the End Time (eschatology, for those who enjoy big words), should be regarded as in this “optional” category. The man who looks down on those disagreeing with his dogmatic interpretation of these, as yet unfulfilled, prophecies actually deserves the pity of those whom he despises. Only a fool would insist that there must be complete unanimity in this field of prophetic interpretation. Such an attitude springs from the conviction, which has been fostered in some quarters that our early mentors in Bible understanding were incapable of error (a terrible, if unwitting, blasphemy!).

A wholesome story has come down from the 1860’s about Dr. Thomas. A young friend of his, R. C. Bingley (author of “index Rerum”), went to the great man on one occasion with the remonstration:

“I have caught you out contradicting yourself in Eureka! Here in volume one you say one thing; but here in volume three, commenting on the same Scripture, you say something quite different.”

In response to this, the doughty veteran merely picked up that volume one and pointed to the date of publication: 1861. Then he did the same for volume three: 1868. Then, with a finger on the earlier detail cited, he said quietly: “Scratch it out”-the plain implication being: ‘In the years between the writing of those two volumes, I had time to mature in my insight regarding that question.’

This willingness to adjust in the light of fuller understanding shows also in the modifications which the author of ‘Elpis Israel’ made to his second edition, a pr~ cess which C.C.W, editing, took quite a bit further in the early years of this century; and now, sixty years on, C. C. W.’s interpretation needs a further overhaul.

So, I say again, in the realm of unfulfilled prophecy, let there be a humbly undogmatic spirit. To be sure, certain main ideas, even though still future, are in a firm category to themselves- such items as the truth of the Second Coming, the Day of Judgment, the invasion of Israel from the north; these seem to stand out clearly. But when the Second Coming will transpire, or where the Judgment will take place, or precisely how that Gogian invasion will work out are matters certainly for assiduous research and maybe for cherished opinion, but not for exclusive dogmatism.

It is hoped that the reader, concluding this chapter, will now appreciate the spirit, which I would fain bespeak in my readers. Later chapters will renew this appeal for honest handling of Scripture and for a willingness, when the evidence warrants it, for a change of mind.

If there are any blatant errors in these pages, it would be a kindness if my attention were steered to them.

It is desirable at the outset to underline the importance of a few general principles, which it would be unwise to overlook.

First, Bible prophecy is not human history written in advance; it is Israel’s history written in advance. Israel is the very centre of God’s developing purpose. Bible prophecy centres on God’s People. Of course there are remarkable events foretold concerning other nations, but these come only when such nations as Egypt, Babylon, Edom, Russia make significant impact on Israel. Even in such a familiar prophecy as Nebuchadnezzar’s image this stands true. Why should the revelation of great empires stop short with Babylon, Persia’ Greece, and Rome? Why not Genghiz Khan, Napoleon, Philipi ll of Spain? And, far and away the greatest of them all, the British Empire?

But once it is realised that a Hebrew prophet wrote Daniel 2, about nations, which oppressed his people in their own, Land, there is no difficulty.

Various details chime in with this view.

The Fourth Empire was to “break in pieces and crush”. But is it not true that all empires do this? No! Rome took the blessings of peace and settled government to every people it conquered but could not achieve this with the turbulent Jews; so in AD 70 and 135 the only answer to such insurgence was to smash and scatter. Then the sequence of empires in the prophetic vision came to an end until, today, Jews are back in their own Land, and appropriately at that point the vision resumes with details about ten nations which will yet overpower the State of Israel, themselves being smashed by the Stone: “they (the Jews) shall mingle (Aram: shall arab) themselves with the seed of men.”

The history of interpretation of these ten nations is interesting:

1848, in Elpis Israel (p. 326):

1. Belgium; 2. France; 3. Spain; 4. Portugal; 5. Naples; 6. Sardinia; 7. Greece; 8. Hungary; 9. Lombardy; 10. Bavaria.

1924, C. C. W.’s correction of this list (p. 327):

1. Belgium; 2. France; 3.Spain; 4. Portugal; 5. Switzerland; 6. Germany; 7. Italy; 8. Austria-Hungary; 9. Serbia; 10. Greece.

1868: The ten toe-kingdoms (and the ten horns) “have yet (in 1868!) to be formed out of the existing elements” (Exposition of Daniel, J. T. p.13).

Here is another interesting example of great men re-adjusting their prophetic perspective (it does not happen regarding doctrine nor can it).

Second, the temptation to interpret prophecies by finding resemblances to current events and newspaper comments thereon is to be resisted. Always there must be first of all a well established Biblical foundation for the main line of interpretation, and then the excitement of matching Bible detail with recent history, or current events, may proceed. To equate the Sixth Seal with the times of Constantine or the Two Witnesses with the Huguenots because such identifications help to fill out attractive historical theory is perilous going. Let the student first find the copious Biblical allusions squandered through those passages and gratefully use the hints, which they supply, and there is then no need to depend on a ruthless and highly subjective plundering of the history books.

Let it be noted also that much of this European history was first suggested by Protestant commentators, who were themselves reared on the errors of the “harlot daughters”. This is a fact readily substantiated.

Thirdly, and in harmony with what has just been said, it needs to be remembered that practically all Old Testament (and N. T.?) prophecy has the same kind of tidy framework, thus: The prophecy you are interested in had a primary reference contemporary with or immediately after the prophet’s own day; but after this there is a duty to look for a Messianic reference to either the First or the Second Coming of the Lord. Furthermore, these two facets should harmonize; e.g. God’s great Promise to David was fulfilled in Solomon and in Christ – there is Bible evidence for both; that matchless prophecy in Isaiah 53 was written about good king Hezekiah and about the sufferings of our Lord-and again there is Bible evidence for both.

In the chapters, which follow from here, only the Messianic eschatological phase of each prophecy will be taken into account.

Those readers whose minds are set irrevocably on a continuous historical exposition of Revelation and who leave no room for any other reading of that elaborate symbolism may choose to give themselves the luxury of omitting this chapter.

But even as they do so, it might not be amiss for such to ask themselves whether this ‘received’ interpretation really is “continuous”:

Just how ‘continuous’ is the foregoing? Does not that key word have to be applied in a somewhat elastic sense?

Also, just how historical are the ‘fulfilments’ traditionally pinned on to some of the chapters in the above list? Regarding Revelation 6, 8, 9, 11, 12, just how close and how satisfying is the correspondence between prophecy and history? In quite a few places the proposed ‘fulfilment’ is anything but convincing, and is altogether too trivial. A considerable sequence of decidedly awkward questions needs to be answered

But there is no intention here to press inquiries of this sort, but only to suggest that, even if the continuous historic scheme be considered satisfactory, there is also room for more than one interpretation of the Apocalypse. There are literally scores of prophecies and typical histories in the O.T. where students of the Word are accustomed, almost as a matter of course, to look for more than one meaning. It would be a straightforward job, an easy task, to fill a volume with examples of this dual fulfilment, this foreshadowing of one set of events by another earlier set.

One feature of the Apocalypse almost shouts for this kind of approach. It is this: Omitting from present consideration Revelation 1-5 and 21-22, it is still a relatively easy matter to compile a list of well over 500 allusions or quotations from Holy Scripture in the other 17 chapters. In other fields of N.T. study such quotations from and allusions to the O.T. are, almost always, automatically assumed to be strictly relevant. They are never assumed to be casual similarities. Rather, they are picked up eagerly as God-sent clues to a fuller understanding of the text in both places, both the original and the quotation. Yet in Revelation the continuous historic method of interpretation is unable to make any worthwhile use of this vast accumulation of interpretative hints. Instead, they go virtually (but not virtuously) ignored, and instead the great stand-by is: “History tells us…” What has come over “the People of the Book” that they so readily abandon the well-proven principle of interpreting Scripture by Scripture, and instead choose to be known as “the people of the history book”?

The foregoing words are written with much sadness, but they are written because they have to be.

Continuous historic fulfilment there may be, but for real progress in understanding this method cannot hold a candle to the Biblical approach.

The six Seals of Revelation 6 provide plenty of illustrations of the relative power of the two methods:

1. Verses 4-6, 12, clearly foretell war, famine, pestilence and earthquake. The same dreadful combination of horrors comes into the Olivet prophecy (Mt. 24: 6,7). And every student of that pronouncement by Jesus knows what it is about. This item by itself may be just a coincidence of judgment language. But such an explanation loses its force when a regiment of other examples ranges itself alongside.
2. Verse 8 repeats the sequence of troubles: “Power over the fourth part of the earth (the Land), to kill with sword, and with hunger, and with death (i.e. pestilence), and with the beasts of the earth”. Here the Greek text uses the very words to be found in Ezekiel 14: 21 (LXX), where the immediate context sums them up as “my four sore judgments on Jerusalem”. Then, why the dogmatic insistence that when the words are quoted in Rev. 6: 8 they refer to the history of a by-no means-important segment of the third century Roman Empire?
3. In the Sixth Seal the interpretative references proliferate. Frightening signs in sun, moon, and stars (v.12, 13) positively shout for reference to Israel (e.g. Gen. 37: 9, 10; Jer. 31: 35, 36; and for copious other evidence, see “Bible Studies”, H.A.W. ch.6.01). This conclusion is strongly underlined by:
4. “as a fig tree casteth her untimely figs” (v.13). Again, if evidence is needed that this also points to Israel, see ” Bible Studies” ch.6.02. Here the identification of Seal Six with Israel’s tribulation (when?) could rest; the case has been made. But there is plenty more evidence.
5. “And the heaven departed as a scroll when it is rolled together”. This quotes Is. 51: 6; Heb. 1: 11, 12, which speaks of the end of the Mosaic order.
6. Verse 15 has a long catalogue of mighty men hiding from the Glory of the Lord “in the dens and the rocks of the mountains”. This passage is derived from Isaiah 2: 19; 3: 2, a Scripture that is cited by Paul in 2 Th.1: 9 with reference to the Second Coming. The context in Isaiah is clearly judgment on Israel.
7. And these scared fugitives say “to the mountains, and rocks, Fall on us, and hide us from the face of him that sits on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb” (v. 16). It is inconceivable that this language was intended to describe a power struggle in obscure parts of the Roman Empire, a civil war that nobody remembers today (except the few Christadelphians who read Gibbon), when the identical words were first spoken by Hosea (10: 8) in a mighty prophecy against his own people (see “Gospels”, H.A.W., p.764f.) – words which were quoted verbatim by the Lord Jesus with reference to inevitable judgment on his apostate nation (Lk.23: 30).
8. “For the great day of his wrath (the wrath of him that sits on the throne) is come, and who shall be able to stand?” (v. 17). Did the great day of God’s wrath really take place just before Constantine came to the throne? And when the question is asked: “Who shall be able to stand?” (Jesus quoting his own words about the Second Coming; Lk. 21: 36), does the answer “Of course Constantine will” sound at all convincing?

Clearly all the Bible evidence in this chapter of Revelation calls for reference to a dramatic accumulation of divine judgments against wayward Israel in the end of this age. And with the little state of Israel in the precarious situation it at present finds itself in, how long before the thunderclouds of God’s wrath burst over the Holy Land? After all, the entire corpus of Bible prophecy centres on Israel and the New age. Prophecies about Gentile nations are there in the Book only because of their intimate relation with the people of God. Then is it likely that the Apocalypse was designed and intended to go off in a completely different direction, concerning itself with Rome, Imperial and Papal, European wars and Communism and the E.E.C.?

Those students who have been impressed with the dual fulfilment of almost all Bible prophecy- a near and also remote (Messianic) fulfilment – may like to consider the possibility that the Apocalypse has a good deal to say, also, about God’s 3½ years judgments on His people in the 1st century. But that is another story not strictly relevant to the present enquiry.

Trumpets

On very similar lines to what has been explored regarding the Seals, it is possible to trace copious Biblical directives concerning the seven Trumpet visions. What follows here is a very brief summary.

1. It was first pointed out by Sir Isaac Newton that the introduction to the Trumpets (8: 1-5) makes at least five separate allusions to the Day of Atonement ceremony as it was practised in the time of the apostles. A strange anomaly, surely, if these visions refer to the barbarous hordes of Europe in the centuries of darkness! Ought not this feature to steer attention immediately to Israel? It is worth noting also that on the Day of Atonement the seven angels sounded together and not one after the other. Does not this suggest a simultaneous fulfilment of all the trumpets?
2. There is one dramatic difference from the Biblical Day of Atonement. Instead of a high-priestly blessing on the multitude waiting in silence and prayer, there is a sensational outpouring of coals of fire on “the Land”. Compare Ezekiel 10: 2: coals of fire on the city of Jerusalem.
3. The Biblical allusions scattered throughout Trumpets 1-4, when followed up with care and patience, prove to be so many interpretative leads to earlier prophecies about God’s rejection of Israel.
4. Trumpets 5 and 6 employ the vivid figure of a locust invasion swarming through the Holy Land. The similarity between Hebrew words for “locust” and “Arab” may be accidental. But what can be no accident is the long series of verbal contacts (at least 15 of them) between Revelation 8, 9 and the Prophecy of Joel. Why has this interpretative directive gone ignored? That Joel is a prophecy with both 1st century and 20th century fulfilments is a commonplace conclusion with students of prophecy. Then ought not the same to be considered for Revelation 9? That there is Messianic reference almost shouts from the facts that Trumpets 5, 6, immediately lead on to Trumpet 7 (Rev. 11:14ff) – note the phrase “cometh quickly”); and this Trumpet 7 is about the kingdom established, the Last Day Resurrection and Judgment.
5. the specific period of “five months” (9: 5,10) links very easily and exactly with the 1st century reference-the A.D. 70 siege of Jerusalem lasted precisely this length of time. And in the Messianic reference it turns out to be, equally exactly, the equivalent of Daniel’s 2300 evening – mornings (on this, see “Bible Studies”, H.A.W., ch. 4.08).

Various other Biblical clues, when followed up instead of being quietly ignored, lead all the time to conclusions harmonizing beautifully with the general pattern sketched out here.

When will the people of the Book waken up to the fact that in O.T. and N.T. prophecy there is still a vast field of revelation waiting to be explored? And there is not much time left. What deters? – laziness? or fear? or ingrained conservatism?

It is desirable here to introduce a reminder about the character of the two outstanding visions in Daniel chapters 2 and 7. The parallel between the two is readily perceptible. But strict chronological sequence has been so much insisted on (tidy 20th century thinking!?) that a serious distortion has taken place in the interpretation.

Let it be remembered that these prophecies are not about European history or about world history but about Jewish history. This is their raison d’etre. Here, twice over, is a sequence of Gentile power oppressing Jewry in its own Land. When Israel is scattered from the Holy Land, this divine history-in-advance shuts down. Here also is the explanation of the sudden dislocations which appear in certain end-time prophecies; e.g. Lk. 21: 24.

So it is right to look for the Ten Toe Kingdom in the Last Days when the stone smites- Messiah’s second coming – and not before then. Attempts to identify ten powers filling the hiatus caused by the break-up of the Roman Empire before 1000 AD and continuing up to 2000 AD are time wasted – apart from the amusement they create.

In this century the state of Israel exists once again, and as a result, almost automatically, ten Arab powers hostile to Israel came into existence and will not rest content until Israel is demolished.

But in the greater detail of Daniel 7 a leader of those hostile powers arises, uprooting three of the ten horns. Identification was once proposed, in all seriousness, of the Little Horn as the temporal power of the Papacy taking over three paltry Italian provinces of Lombardy, the Exarchate of Ravenna, and the Ostrogoths. (As obscure a corner of ancient history as one could possibly put a finger on!) Such interpretation borrowed from Protestant anti-papal commentators, today has only amusement value.

In the Book of Revelation this Little Horn becomes a beast in its own right, the Beast of Rev. 13 and 17. Three considerations show this to be a dependable conclusion:

1. Crowns no longer on the heads but upon the ten horns (13: 1).
2. This Beast has the characteristics of the four empires represented in Daniel 7 (v.2); i.e. an oppressor of Israel.
3. The very details of Daniel 7 applied to the Little Horn are repeated here, but with reference to the Beast:
   1. A mouth speaking great things and blasphemies.
   2. Continuing forty and two months.
   3. Making war with the saints (not with the true believers, but with the holy people: Israel).

This Beast and its ten supporters – ten kings- make war with the Lamb, and the Lamb overcomes them. Therefore (is it possible to escape this conclusion?) identification of the Beast and ten kings is to be sought in the Last Days, and not at any period in preceding history.

Another feature of the Beast prophecies is the co-operation and support which is received from another symbolic power, the two horned lamb-like beast coming up out of the earth, that is, out of the Land (Rev.13: 11-18). This beast, called elsewhere (Rev.19: 20) the False Prophet, promotes a religion associated with the first Beast, and organises a persecuting boycott against those who do not conform.

Fitting these impressive details into a scenario no later in its reference than the present day, one has to choose between equation with the papacy and its priesthood (this is the long-standing Protestant, and apostate, interpretation dating back to at least Martin Luther), and the Arab and Muslim hatred of Israel. The arguments against the first of these two are too stubborn:

1. The time-period of 42 months (= 1260), which with very dubious authority, is turned into 1260 years, the most ingenious chronological papal fit ends in 1868. Not wonderfully precise!
2. Today, the papacy is steadily losing power and influence, and this in spite of the intense propagandising by the most vigorous pope there has been for centuries.
3. The prospect of ten European powers handing over their power and resources to papal direction is less serious than Alice-in-Wonderland. It bears no resemblance at all to the modern scene. And those who talk blithely about an alliance between the pope and communism can only be described as believing what they want to believe. The Biblical and political evidence are both conspicuous by their non-existence. Also, the notion that was fairly popular (undeservedly) some years ago that the 10 kings = 10 members of the E.E.C. has no Biblical support whatever and is already in limbo.
4. When was the papacy last a persecuting power? Certainly not since long before 1868, which is supposed to be the significant termination of papal temporal power. But does any case need to be made about the persecuting character of modern aggressive Muslim Fundamentalism? The thing is too obvious.
5. The “papal” reference of Revelation 13,17 has to be propped up by the Man of Sin (2 Th. 2). It has to be, for it cannot stand on its own two feet. But, alas, the “papal” interpretation of that Scripture is just as insecure, as will be further demonstrated in the next chanter.

The Beast Identified?

Who, then, is this beast that fills the stage so threateningly in Daniel and Revelation? It is useful to look for some power or individual who in the Last Days heads a confederacy against Christ after having already persecuted the “saints”, and who is associated with a powerful religion exercising considerable strength, an organisation which sustains a deadly wound and yet survives.

The equation of this Beast with the P.L.O. (Palestine Liberation Organisation) needs to be considered in a tentative, undogmatic fashion. From the year when the P.L.O. came into existence (1964) the writer of these words has insisted that here is the most likely candidate for the role under consideration.

The quarrelsome Arabs, always bickering among themselves, can never be united except under a flag emblazoned: “Down with Israel!” The film-star leader of the P.L.O. who should have disappeared into shame and obscurity long ago still survives with increasing influence and without serious rival to focus Arab hatred of Israel into an effective campaign. The days are gone when Israel, “the world’s fourth super-power” can afford to treat with disdain the relentlessness and invective of the P.L.O. It is a phenomenon, which has not received the attention it deserves, that neither Hussein in Jordan (1971) nor Israel in the Lebanon war has been able to snuff out this astonishing political movement. Commentators have declared with confidence: “One thing is certain: The P.L.O. is now finished”. Yet, with a virility none could have prophesied, there has been a resurrection; the “deadly wound” has been healed, and ten Arab kings meet together to pledge the support of their oil-dollars for sustained reinforcement of riotous Arabs in the Gaza strip and the West Bank. And so well is publicity handled that world attention is adroitly diverted away from the cold-blooded beastliness of hard-boiled Muslim nations, to be focused instead on the blunders of Jewish administration in their attempts to smother an incipient war now orchestrated by the P.L.O. With miraculous spontaneity riots break out for no special reason. Teams of stone-throwing youths out-match Test match fieldsmen with their returns from cover-point. Soon it will be Kalashnikoffs. Small boys need only a box of matches and some quiet intifada encouragement to fire thousands of acres of Israeli forest.

And just outside the borders of Israel, Arab sympathizers stand ready with their power and strength to help the Beast in a heroic righteous war. Syria has more tanks than any western power, to operate north or east or south-which? Iraq, made unquenchably bloodthirsty by Iranian example in now skilled and well equipped for the use of ground-to-ground missiles against Haifa and Tel Aviv. And an abominable unanswerable chemical warfare is now in the hands of well-practised Iraqi forces, which still resent the way the Israeli air force bombed out of existence their brand-new nuclear plant. But now the Saudis can cope with any further threat of that sort, for Britain and U.S. have been competing with each other in extensive deals which swap petro-dollars by the billion in return for the very latest in fighter and rocket aircraft. There are not enough aspirins in Israel to cope with the insistent engine throb of the headaches besetting the Knesset and their military machine. How far away is that Six Hour War?

What might be called the traditional interpretation of Paul’s unique prophecy in 2 Thessalonians 2 goes something like this. The Man of Sin is the pope, revealed as head of a mighty corrupt system of religious apostasy. He calls himself God on earth, and makes many other comparable claims, the spiritual despot over the lives of many millions. Development in this direction was already under way, as Paul wrote (it is asserted), but as yet real progress was slow because restrained by a greater power (that of imperial Rome?) which would brook no rival. When this apostasy flowered it would be accompanied by a wide variety of signs and wonders designed to bolster up its authority, so that men unwilling to accept the spiritual authority of the gospel would find this a titillating alternative, until the great day of the manifestation of Christ in glory who will sweep away the Man of Sin and all his system with an exercise of divine power.

In some respects this interpretation seems to answer to the details in Paul’s prophecy extraordinarily well. But there are also other considerations, which should cause the modern student of the Word to pause and question.

For instance, it should be recognized honestly that as soon as Martin Luther’s Reformation (which was less than half a reformation) took place, this Scripture and Daniel 7 and the Babylon prophecies in Revelation were immediately and for the first time given papal applications. They were all splendid rods with which to beat the back of the pope. And of course the Catholic experts were not slow to assert – and demonstrate- that the boot was on the other foot, Martin Luther was the Man of Sin! From the dispassionate viewpoint of the Truth in Christ all this now looks very much like Satan rebuking Sin.

This “traditional” interpretation, then, should be seen for what it is-an inheritance from men who themselves were a long, long way from the Truth concerning many fundamental principles – principles which the young Christadelphian takes in his stride today, and should thank God fervently for. The question has to be asked in all solemnity: What likelihood is there that Protestant divines who blithely and erroneously dogmatised about the trinity, and the devil, and the nature of Christ, and the immortal soul, and hell-fire, a present kingdom of God, and episcopacy, and baptism, and a good many more teachings, should be given a marvellous insight into the most intricate mysteries of Bible prophecy such as to make them the authorities, guides and instructors of the faithful remnant who hold to the Truth in the Last Days? Any decently instructed class of Christadelphian teenagers could explain the real truth regarding these errors still held in Protestantism, and could provide the simple Bible evidence! But come to the prophecies of Daniel and Revelation – and Thessalonians – and the tables are turned: the learned fool becomes the instructor of those blessed with rich insight into God’s purpose in Christ! Is there not something rather odd about these paradoxical circumstances?

Further, when examined in greater detail this conventional Man of Sin exposition begins to look a trifle threadbare. Why should Paul spend so much time and effort (2 Th. 2: 5) warning his new converts about the corruption of their new-found faith, long centuries later?

Why should he speak of this Man of Sin as “sitting in the temple of God”? Without exception the apostles used this expression only regarding the Household of Christ. Would any believer of the Truth accept the Vatican or St. Peter’s as being “the temple of God”? But the received exposition requires this! These Thessalonian converts had learned that “the most High dwelleth not in temples made with hands.” But by the time the popes had reached the point where their fantastic claims to divine authority began to be plausible (is not A.D. 608 the classic date?), the Truth had as good as disappeared from sight, and the pope was sitting enthroned not in the temple of God but over a system which was already rotten right through.

Again, with very obvious intention to call Judas to mind, Paul described the Man of Sin as “the son of perdition” (John 17: 12). What appropriateness, at all, is there in this? Judas was close to Christ, an able and trusted helper, “the one of the twelve” (Mark 14: 10 Gk.). No pope has ever been within a thousand spiritual miles of being a true disciple, later turned false (Psalm 55: 13,14). Then did Paul’s marvellous aptness of phrase desert him here?

Another expression lines up with this: ´´whose coming is after the working of Satan, with all power and signs and lying wonders.” It is impossible not to be reminded of Paul’s description elsewhere of his own ministry: “Truly the signs of an apostle were wrought among you in all patience, in signs, and wonders and mighty deeds” (2 Cor. 12: 12). In the Greek text the words are identical except for the inclusion, in Thessalonians, of the word “lying”, and the substitution there for “in-working” in place of Paul’s “thorough working”. So again the most obvious explanation would appear to be that Paul was describing the personal activity of one who claimed apostolic status, but only in order to undermine the whole fabric of the Ecclesia, the true temple of God, from within.

The verb tenses in this prophecy have been given but scant attention, have even been man-handled. Most of the way, Paul wrote in the future tense. Then why the exceptions in verses 9, 10, 12?: “they received not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness. . . for this cause God is sending them an in-working of error. ” A worthwhile explanation of this prophecy will find room for remarkable features of this kind. The most natural conclusion to draw is that Paul had his eye on some movement of stubborn refusal to accept the truth in Christ, which was current in his own time and had already shown its hostile attitude in very effective fashion.

From this point it is now possible to proceed more positively:

That phrase “an in-working of error” (compare v.7, 9) provides significant help. It certainly has a marvellous aptness as allusion to the Lord’s parable of the leaven (Matthew 13: 33). This is made all the more likely by the fact that there are at least six or seven other references to that gospel elsewhere in 2 Thessalonians – and a great many more than that in 1 Thessalonians! The sequence in Matthew 13 should be pondered. First, a parable about the preaching of the gospel; then another about the malicious sowing of tares – a deliberate attempt to wreck the good work by secret internal hostile activity; then a parable about leaven spreading its corrupting influence till “the whole is leavened.” Without exception every allusion in the Bible to leaven makes it a symbol of that which is evil.

This sequence, which continues through the chapter, is a prophecy of the fate of the gospel. At the time Paul wrote, the sinister process of defeating Christianity from within was already being carried through with Judaist hypocritical efficiency and devilish success.

A year or two earlier Paul had warned about “false brethren unawares brought in to spy out our liberty which we have in Christ Jesus, that they might bring us into bondage” (Gal. 2: 4). Men of this kidney had deliberately followed Paul and Barnabas round the newly-formed Galatian churches in order to undo all their work, skilfully persuading inexperienced Gentile converts that they must not only believe the gospel of Christ but also accept all the obligations of the Law of Moses.

The same influential unscrupulous set had practically won over Peter and Barnabas at Antioch to their gospel of salvation by works of the Law (Gal. 2: 11-14). A year or two later the same clique were to attempt identical subversive tactics at Corinth, with almost complete success. The ecclesia there was ultimately saved to the Truth, but only after many a heartache for Paul and his helpers.

At the back of Paul’s amazing and uncharacteristic self-vindication in 2 Corinthians 11, was the need to assert himself against his detractors who had travelled to Corinth in his steps. “Such are false apostles, deceitful workers, fashioning themselves into apostles of Christ (“all power and signs and lying wonders”!). And no marvel; for Satan himself (their leader) fashioneth himself into a messenger of light” (11: 13,14). Their derogation of Paul was clever and quite unprincipled: “his bodily presence is weak, and his speech contemptible… he terrifies you by letters… rude in speech” (10: 9,10; 11: 6). The tactics are familiar. They have even been known in the ecclesias of the twentieth century: damn a healthy movement by besmirching the character of its protagonists. The method is as old as human nature.

Even though Paul had only been a few months in Thessalonica, and a few more away from it, the efficient machine of the opposition had already gone into action, creating a minor crisis among the new brethren by means of a forged letter, purporting to have come from Paul himself: “We beseech you…that ye be not soon shaken in mind (the same Greek word as in Acts 17: 13) or be troubled, neither by spirit (i.e. one claiming to speak by Holy Spirit guidance; cp. the usage in 1 John 4: 1-3; 1 Tim. 4: 1), nor by word, nor by letter as from us” (2 Th. 2: 2). For this reason it became necessary for Paul to provide undeniable authentication to his own epistles: “The salutation of me Paul with mine own hand, which is the token in every epistle: so I write” (3 : 17). Having had bitter samples of the opposition’s tactics before, Paul had forewarned his new converts: “Remember ye not, that, when I was yet with you, I told you these things?” (2: 5). Their very existence in Christ was at stake. No wonder, then, that he gave them this rather bitter forecast of yet greater evil impending. (For more details of this sort: “Acts” H.A.W. App. 3).

Thus the picture emerges of a devilish influence at work in the early church deliberately seeking to bring to ruin the preaching of the gospel to the Gentiles. The evidence for this is hardly to be contested. Then was this movement, and more particularly its leader, the Man of Sin whom Paul warned against?

There is no single phrase in the prophecy, which does not answer to this hypothesis.

Obviously the leader, whom Paul calls “Satan, transforming himself into an angel of light” (2 Cor. 11: 14) was a man of great personality and impressive qualifications, or how could he have undermined so quickly and easily Paul’s standing in that ecclesia? Obviously he was able to parade such qualifications as would at least rival those of Paul. (It is tempting to make guesses as to his identity. There is one N.T. character who is a good candidate). He was of near apostolic status. If not actually having Holy Spirit powers of his own (2 Th.2: 2-9; Heb. 6: 4-6), his cleverness and unscrupulous methods enabled him to match the “signs of the apostle” which had been seen in Paul. He dwelt in “the temple of God’, being accepted in many ecclesias as a believer of good standing.

But how would it be possible for even such a man to “shew himself that he is God” (verse 4)? Here the Greek word occurs without the definite article, as at the end of John 1:1. This rules out any claim to divinity, of the kind that has been made for the popes, and brings the claim to a lower level of divine authority, such as would be natural in anyone claiming Holy Spirit power and such as Paul himself normally claimed for his own work.

“The mystery of iniquity doth already work,” Paul warned; that is, the wicked secret movement is already busy among you Thessalonians as, earlier, in so many other places. But at present its influence and effectiveness were kept in check by Paul himself-“he that letteth, hindereth”. Who but Paul, would have dared to withstand Peter to the face? Before many years he was to be ‘taken out of the midst.” And then the malevolent hostility, already evident enough to Paul, though not to his apostolic colleagues in far-off Jerusalem, would show itself in its true colours.

Those Greek tenses mentioned earlier now present no difficulty whatever. Al1 the other details in this short prophecy will now be seen to chime in readily with the exposition set out here.

But, it may be objected, all these suggestions fall to the ground before one big fact- the prophecy describes a power which will be in existence till the coming of the Lord: “whom the Lord will consume with the spirit of his mouth, and destroy with the brightness of his coming” (v.8).

It is agreed that the words do require this Man of Sin to meet with dramatic judgment from the Lord in person. But the idea that therefore he must have a continuous existence right up to the Last Days is pure (sic) assumption. The words mean no more than this – that this man, thoroughly responsible to the Lord of Glory, will certainly be raised in the Last Day, and condemned for his cynically evil work among the inexperienced saints whom he misled in the first century. In an earlier passage in the same epistle (1: 6-10) the same idea is readily traceable: “It is a righteous thing with God to recompense tribulation to them that trouble you; and to you who are troubled rest with us, when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with his mighty angels, in flaming fire taking vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ: who shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power.”

Here it is time to pause. There is possible (so it is submitted here) a detailed exposition of the Man of Sin prophecy with reference to a Jewish conspiracy to wreck the early church, and especially its Gentile extensions, from within. It is a fulfilment, which has strong New Testament pointers to support it, which was marvellously relevant both to the man who wrote it and those who received its warnings, and it fits into its context as a hand into a glove.

Yet even now there are other facets of the prophecy, which give it a yet greater fascination and instruction for saints in Christ today.

Since the Letters to Thessalonica are shot through with a strong emphasis on the Second Coming, it does not seem unreasonable to look for a further fulfilment of the Man of Sin prophecy in the present era, on similar lines to that already suggested.

How far does one have to look i n order to identify a movement of the kind Paul had to contend against? – one which is strongly Judaist in its emphasis, exclusive in its concept of fellowship, aggressive in its conversionism, lopsided in its enthusiasm for sacrifices rather than the Sacrifice, more at home with Moses and the Law than with Jesus and the Gospels, incomparably zealous for the pronouncements of the “rabbis”, and better at interpreting Scripture by tradition rather than by Scripture.

Those who live in “the uttermost parts of the earth” are best fitted to judge whether or not Paul’s searing prophecy about the Man of Sin has relevance to their own circumstances. And having made their assessment, they will be at least able to thank God for this fulfilment, however depressing it may be, of another sign of the nearness of their Lord’s coming.

Paul, you should have been with us in this hour also.

The chapter before this ended on an important note: Even with Israel, His own special people God will not, cannot, do anything except there be first of all some sign of a change of heart in His people.

Time and again this is the lesson, which the history of the Judges harps on. In those stormy chequered days it was when, and only when, the people cried unto their God for deliverance that He raised up a saviour. An astonishing number of Scriptures, all of them with a marked Last-Day flavour, make this principle inescapable: First, repentance in Israel, and then the Messianic salvation, which will inaugurate God’s kingdom.

Many readers of these words will not even trouble to refer to those passages i n order to check their validity for the present purpose, because they, and several generations before them, have been reared on one particular passage which has been much miss-read and miss-used:

“And I will pour upon the house of David, and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the spirit of grace and of supplications: and they shall look upon me whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for him, as one mourneth for his only son, and shall be in bitterness for him, as one that is in bitterness for his firstborn” (Zech. 12:10).

From these words the inference has often been made that it will be only when Messiah comes in person to his nation and they look up to him in person, that repentance will sweep through the whole of Jewry. This view depends entirely on the phrase: “look upon him” and on no other supporting passage. But more exactly the Hebrew reading is: “they shall look unto him”. This reading conveys a very different idea – that of dependence in time of need. The preposition and meaning are the same as at the end of Numbers 21:9.

It is important, however, to avoid the assumption that this impressive Scripture requires that there must be universal repentance in Jewry. If we must wait for that, Messiah will never come. Does not Zechariah 13:9 foretell that “I (God) will bring the third part (i.e. the minority) through the fire, and will refine them as silver is refined… they shall call on my name, and I will hear them: I will say, It is my people, and they shall say, The Lord is my (not: our) God”?

Is it not a fact that right through history the majority of Israel have been unworthy of their name? The prophets’ – Isaiah and Amos especially- were constantly driven to make appeal to the faithful remnant of the nation.

It is surely one of the most eloquent signs one could wish to see that, whereas through long centuries conversion of Jews to any form of Christian faith has been virtually impossible, today there exist in the Land small scattered communities of practising Jews who believe Jesus to be the Messiah. True, a big majority of these have come under the aegis of pentecostals and other trinitarians. It is a well-earned reproach that the New Israel, willing to spend any amount of money on sun-bathing and tourism in the Holy Land have not bestirred themselves to find and help these Messianic Jews to a fuller faith.

It is well known that in the United States and in not a few other countries this belief in Jesus as Messiah has taken root amongst Jewish communities. One is reliably informed that in London and other U.K. cities, there are synagogues where practising Jews unobtrusively graft on to their Judaism a belief that when Messiah comes he will be none other than Jesus of Nazareth.

In the U.S.A. Messianic Jews regularly advertise in the newspapers.

In Cleveland, Ohio, there exists a synagogue, which has broken away from Jewish orthodoxy, all its members’ happi1y believing in Jesus as their Messiah.

When it is considered that for generations Christian societies for the conversion of Jews have had virtually no success to report, this modem development is striking indeed.

It will, of course, be urged, as it already has been, that this belief in Jesus is mostly a very fragmentary and inaccurate affair, really worth very little. There is no doubt some truth in this. But nothing can be more certain than that there is joy in heaven over even a partial conversion of those whose hardness of heart regarding Jesus has hitherto been phenomenal, and even heart-breaking, to those who would fain see stony hearts change. Even in the days when Jesus and the apostles were among men, it might be questioned just how fully those publicans and sinners and Samaritans would assent to the thirty searching paragraphs in the B.A.S.F.!

And when some were preaching Christ even of envy and strife, of contention and not sincerely, being intent on adding affliction to Paul’s bonds, that amazing man responded with “Notwithstanding . . . Christ is preached, and I therein do rejoice” (Phil. 1:1-18).

In such barren ground as this, an austere demand for perfection is out of place.

Every year an annual march takes place in Jerusalem. It includes all kinds of Jewish organisations. Every shade of political and religious opinion in Israel is represented. In 1987 it was heartening to hear the broadcaster announce: “And now, here come the Messianic Jews!”

In 1988 there was a conference in Jerusalem of several hundred Messianic Jews

Such developments as these are at best straws in the wind, but they do show that there is a breeze.

It will be seen by and by, that this chapter is almost certainly out of place chronologically. But it becomes necessary to deal with it here because of certain mistaken assumptions of a serious character which are very commonly made about Ezekiel 38, and which tend to cloud understanding of other Scriptures.

All students of Bible prophecy are aware that Ezekiel 38, 39 describe in vivid fashion an invasion of the Land of Israel in the Last Days. This invasion, headed by Russia (“the uttermost parts of the north” RV is halted by a dramatic outpouring of divine judgment. Thus the whole world is made to recognise this assertion of the authority of God; and Israel, exalted as never before to be God’s favoured nation, sighs with relief and thankfulness that at last all their tribulations are at an end. The kingdom of God has arrived.

The serious error, which has crept into the understanding of this terrific prophecy, is in the assumption that this northern invasion will inaugurate the great crisis of the end-time and will culminate in the coming of the Messiah and the establishing of his Kingdom.

In fact, all the details in these chapters, save one (to be examined in due course) point to a different conclusion, namely, that Ezekiel 38, 39 will be fulfilled after Christ has returned and begun his reign as King of the Holy Land.

1. It was the late Peter Watkins who pointed out very incisively that Ezekiel 37, 38, 39 are to be read as one prophecy. It cannot be accident that ch. 37 begins with the dry bones of Israel scattered in Gentile lands (Ez. 37: 21), and ch. 39: 11 speaks of Gentile bones scattered in Israel’s Land. If this is accepted, then what of the fine picture presented in ch. 37 of God’s tabernacle planted in the midst of a sanctified Israel, and “my servant David being their prince for ever” (37: 25,27)? The northern invasion follows on after this.
2. Repeatedly Israel is described as “dwelling safely” or “securely” (38: 8,11; 39: 26). This is a phrase which, in the prophets, is always associated with the Kingdom; e.g. Ez. 34: 25,27,28; Hos. 2: 18; Zec.14: 11.

   Then ought not the same meaning to dominate these passages in ch.38, 39 also? On the other hand, can it be said, with any stretch of imagination, in 1989, or in any succeeding year before Messiah’s coming, that Israel dwells safely? In July of 1988 the Jewish Chronicle carried a especially prominent leading article headed: “The Six Hour War”. Its purpose was to draw attention to the fact that the Arab nations round Israel are now in a position to bring Israel to its knees in such a sensational fashion as will make the 1967 Six Day War look like a boy-scout exercise. More on this in chapter 8.

3. “Dwelling without walls, and having neither bars nor gates” (38:11) is a strange way of describing a people, which spends a higher percentage of its national income on armaments than any other nation on the face of the earth. But, apply the words to Israel dwelling in peace under its Messiah (“first that which is natural, then that which is spiritual”), and there is no difficulty. On the other hand Zechariah 2:4,5 uses very similar language about Jerusalem in its Kingdom Glory
4. The invader is intent on carrying away “silver and gold, cattle and goods- a great spoil” (38: 13). But with Israel as it is today, what nation would risk an international conflagration for the sake of appropriating little Israel’s dubious wealth? Those enthusiasts intent on making this prophecy pre-Messianic skate round the difficulty here by turning “spoil” into OIL- a most un– Biblical conclusion, for, the gross misapplication of Deuteronomy 33: 24 notwithstanding, only the tiniest trickle of oil has ever been found in Israel. Israel is the only Middle East country without oil. Of course, for did not God burn up all the oil of that Land when He destroyed the cities of the plain?
5. Some readers will also appreciate this point. The only other Gog-Magog prophecy is in Revelation 20: 8. Normally these two Scriptures – Ez. 38; Rev. 20 -would be used to interpret each other, according to the well established method of Bible study. In “The Last Days” ch.13 and in ” Revelation – a Biblical Approach” ch. 38, identification of these two passages has been argued for, and difficulties cleared, thus leaving the way to refer Ezekiel 38 to an international rebellion against Messiah in the early days of his reign, for certainly Revelation 20 describes what happens after Messiah’s coming.
6. It can now be readily perceived that Ezekiel 38 is a parallel prophecy to Psalm 2: “The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the Lord, and against His Anointed… Yet have I set my king upon my holy hill of Zion” (2,6). The experience of David after his capture of Jerusalem (2 Sam. 8) makes an impressive prototype.

Over against this accumulation of details all pointing to the same conclusion there is (so it is believed) only one passage which might be read as pointing to the alternative conclusion:

“After that they have borne their shame. . . when they dwelt safely in their land, and none made them afraid” (Ez. 39: 26).

These words have been read as meaning that the deliverance of Israel comes before their repentance, and before their Messiah appears.

However, this turns out to be a very unsure prop for such an interpretation:

1. There is a double textual doubt about the reading of the Hebrew word translated “bear”. Tanakh 1985 J.P.S. has a special footnote at this verse, reading ´´bear”, or “forget”. (Technicalities omitted here for simplicity’s sake).
2. There is an elided consonant, which may be supplied in more than one way, leading possibly to a different double meaning Hebrew word.
3. The A.V. reading is inexact here.
4. Thus an equally possible reading could be: “and they shall forget their shame. . .” – a very different idea from what has just been mentioned.
5. “When they dwelt safely. . .” is, more exactly: “in their dwelling safely”. What has been advanced earlier about this phrase also needs to be borne in mind here.

This 39: 26 AV reading is surely too precarious to lean on, especially when contrasted with the contrary evidence already set out.

Thus the overwhelming evidence is that this prophecy will be fulfilled after the coming of the Lord and not before it.

In a familiar prophecy about the coming of Christ, there is this explicit detail: “I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and terrible day of the Lord” (Mal. 4:5 RV).

There are those who maintain that this prophecy was fulfilled in John the Baptist. In this they are right. Luke 1: 17, Mt.17: 12 say so. But they are not wholly right, for Jesus also said: “Elias truly shall first come, and restore (Gk. future tense) all things” (Mt. 17:11). John had certainly been beheaded when these words were spoken. So the conclusion is hardly to be avoided that the Lord looked for a further and more complete fulfilment of the Malachi prophecy. This is the more certain since John did not “turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers”, for more than once Jesus declared John’s mission to be a failure, Lk. 7: 33; Mt. 11: 12. Also, ghastly as were the experiences of A.D. 70 that was not “the great and terrible day of the Lord”, for, as later chapters here will establish, there are much worse sufferings in store for the holy Land and its holy City.

This Last-Day fulfilment of the Elijah prophecy (not necessarily by Elijah himself or by John the Baptist, but by an Elijah-like prophet) helps towards a solution of a somewhat distressing problem.

A good deal of intense expectancy has centred round the year of 1988. The chain of reasoning goes thus:

1. “This generation (which witnesses the blossoming of the fig tree) shall not pass till all these things be fulfilled” (Mt.24:34).
2. The N.T. speaks of a generation as a period of forty years (Heb. 3:9,10; Mt. 23:36).
3. The beginning of this end-time generation can be fairly confidently identified with 1948, the inauguration of the independent state of Israel.
4. Then ought not the Lord’s coming to be expected in 1988?

This may seem water-tight, but it isn’t – for two very good reasons:

1. Chapter 4 here has provided copious Bible evidence for believing that a necessary pre-condition for the Lord’s return is that there be repentance in Israel – some sign of “fruit” on the Israeli fig-tree; it was because he found no fruit on it that he abandoned it to its fate (Mt. 21:19,20). Yet in spite of what that chapter has added, can it be said that the year of grace 1988 has manifested real fruit for God?
2. The repentance, which God seeks in His Israel, He also seeks with at least equal eagerness in His New Israel – and here the same doubt exists. True, prayers are endlessly offered for the Second Coming. A certain academic interest persists. But if the “servants” were eager and watchful, would they show such enthusiasm for the affluent life in which this decadent twentieth century so readily schools them? Would they be content with studies in Bible prophecy which have advanced their understanding hardly at all since 1870? Now, in ancient days when natural Israel displayed no enthusiasm for their Land of Promise, with brusque divine indignation they were packed off back into the wilderness for a further forty (39?) years. There are lots of examples of this divine reaction to human faithlessness. It would be strange, surely, if the New Israel of today were to be immune from the same kind of deserved disappointment. Our Lord said concerning the horrors of A.D. 70: “For the elect’s sake those days shall be shortened (made shorter)” (Mt. 24: 22). Could it be that now, for the unfaithfuls’ sake (Num. 14: 33,34) these days will be lengthened instead of shortened?

There is also this consideration, Jesus said quite specifically that the tribulation period in Elijah’s ministry was precisely “three years and six months” (Lk. 4: 25; Jas. 5: 17), yet this exact period is not to be found in the Books of Kings. Then where did Jesus get it from?

The only place in the O.T. where this precise period is to be found is in the Book of Daniel, and of the three occurrences there, one is outstandingly clear as to its reference: “when he shall have accomplished to scatter the power of the holy people, all these things shall be finished” (12: 7).

If Jesus quarried his 3½ years from Daniel (and used it over again in Rev. 12: 14; 13: 5; 11: 3,11) in a very similar context, then may it not be inferred that the Last Day Elijah (who may be even now living quietly in some obscure kibbutz in Israel) will be raised up in the last imminent years of Israel’s tribulation to turn the heart of the fathers of the nation to be as receptive as children, and to turn the heart of the children (wayward heedless Israel) to their Fathers (Abraham, Isaac and Jacob)?

If so, is it possible to pin-point the beginning of this climactic 3½ years? For suggestion regarding this, see chapter 9.

One of the most familiar prophecies made concerning the Jewish nation is to be found in Ezekiel 21: 27. It appears to speak with grim repetition of a triple overturning of a state and nation of unmatched privilege, which has turned its back on the God of its Fathers.

The first overturning came in Ezekiel’s own day. The kingship ceased, the temple of Solomon was destroyed, and the cream of the nation was dragged away to ignominious captivity in Babylon. In the first century AD the Romans laid on a repeat performance. The sign of the prophet Jonah had a more harrowing fulfilment: “Yet forty years, and Jerusalem shall be overthrown”. Temple and city, priesthood and people all became a shambles. Once again the Holy Land became Canaan. God seemed to have washed His hands of His vineyard.

But the righteous God of Israel cannot cast off forever. Always they must be given another chance. But that unclean spirit of self-reliance is still not exorcized.

“Is not this great Babylon that I have built?” is what those able industrious Jews mean, even though they never say it out loud.

So once again there will come an even more shattering overturning, the last and worst. Jesus foretold “wars, famines, pestilences, earthquakes” (Mt. 24: 7), and recent years have given horrifying advance notice of what it will mean when these judgments swing away from pitiable third world countries and focus on little Israel. Perhaps those plurals are again meant to be intensives: one big war, one big famine, one big pestilence, one big earthquake, and people and country alike will be a pathetic wilderness.

Not a few who read these words will recoil in horror and protest from what these words suggest, for they have long encouraged themselves to think of modern Israel as the first instalment of Messiah’s kingdom. They have so doted on the undeniably fine qualities of these children of Abraham as to forget that what the prophets and apostles and Jesus himself reprobated in them is still there, as reprehensible as ever: “Children in whom is no faith”.

The writing of these words bites deep into the soul of the writer. But who else among the New Israel of today has yet taken on himself to publish an anticipation of these frightening truths? Jesus wept over Jerusalem, knowing what lay ahead, and he, the Son of God, powerless to stop it. And today the honest-to-God disciple of Jesus, who is not an ostrich, knows what lies ahead, and he too weeps over Jerusalem.

One possible outcome of this third overturning may be a cataclysm of a different sort – the faith of thousands who should be clear-eyed about these things, but are not, will crack! With a sublime confidence that all the details of the divine programme have been known for generations right down to the last detail, or nearly so, minds which have accepted dogmatic assertion instead of unambiguous Scripture, will find that they cannot readjust overnight to the overturning of their cherished preconceived ideas. They will stagger like a drunken man.

And that is why these words are being put into print. No doubt some errors of judgment have crept in. What modern writer has the right to claim the infallibility, which has been so dogmatically attributed to better-known teachers? But the kind of Scriptures cited in these chapters- and there are plenty more – ought to merit at least a second consideration before being shrugged off by those in love with inherited conventional notions. The poor contrite spirit will tremble at God’s word’ and will turn again to ponder afresh the copious prophecies which have had only scant attention because it has not been obvious how to reconcile them with the traditions of the rabbis.

Here is a list of prophetic passages which all bear on this rather frightening theme of the final tribulation of Israel:

Not all readers will readily agree that the foregoing chapters all have the same theme-the final overturning of Israel. But the reasons for their inclusion here are not utterly negligible.

How long will this fiery trial last? It took Hitler more than six years to dispose of six million Jews, even when using the fiendish efficiency of German concentration camps, firing squads, and gas chambers. Then even if Arab hatred makes up for Arab inefficiency in this field of benevolent activity, how long will it take to deal with the problem of 3½ million Jews?

There is a 3½-year period which is repeatedly associated with the end of “the time of Jacob’s trouble” (quite specifically in Daniel 12: 7), and which has been made such a mess of by the “year for a day” theorists. One detail which has been systematically overlooked is that in the pregnant phrase: “time, times, and a half” the Hebrew text uses the word “mo’ed” (e.g. Ex.13: 10; 23: 15; Lev. 23: 2,4,37,44; Dt.16: 6) which always refers to a Jewish feast or holy day. Which holy day? (Dan. 8: 19, same word). The expression: “and a half” makes the identification almost specific, for the feasts of Tabernacles and Passover are exactly half a year apart. Then does not this point to a 3½-year period beginning at Passover and ending at Tabernacles, or vice versa? (The 1290 and 1335 also chime in with this chronological fit, as has been explained in “The Last Days”, ch.6).

A period ending on the Day of Atonement (Tabernacles) when the High Priest comes from the presence of God to bless his people (Heb. 9: 28), seems appropriate.

But, then, so also does the alternative ending at Passover, for not a few Scriptures seem to suggest that feast as the time of the Lord’s return (see “Passover” ch.14); and is not Passover the time of deliverance of God’s nation from bondage?

In the circumstances, it would be unwise to be dogmatic beforehand, especially since there is at present no means of identifying the year when this special period might begin. Did not our Lord himself warn: “Of that day and hour knoweth no man. . . neither the Son, but the Father”?

It is a strange thing that there has been such neglect of the fact that this recurring 3½-year period is always associated with Israel’s last and worst tribulation:

1. “It shall be for a time, times, and an half; and when he shall have accomplished to scatter the power of the holy people, all these things shall be finished” (Dan. 12: 7).
2. ” He shall wear out the saints (= Israel, 8: 24) and they shall be given into his hand until a time and times and the dividing of time” (7: 25).
3. In the seventy sevens prophecy, the half of the last seven is not accounted for, but it seems to belong to “the overspreading of the abomination” (9: 27)
4. In Rev. 11: 2 the holy city is down trodden “forty and two months”.
5. The woman (certainly Israel: Rev. 12: 1) flees into the wilderness in a time of persecution (12: 14), “a time and times and half a time”.
6. The Beast makes war with “the saints” (God’s holy people) forty and two months; Rev. 13: 5.
7. The slain witnesses (“Ye are my witnesses, saith the Lord”) lie in the street of the city “three days and a half” (11: 9) whilst their enemies “that dwell in the Land shall rejoice over them, and make merry, and shall send gifts- one to another, because these two prophets tormented the dwellers in the Land” (Rev. 11: 10 Gk).

There is also (see Mal. 4: 3-5; Jas. 5: 17 Lk. 4: 25) the indication of a 3½-year Elijah ministry in Israel in the time of their own down-treading. All the indications are that the ministry of Jesus and also the Roman war each lasted 3½ years. This suggests that the needful repentance among God’s people (of which already there are some small signs) will be brought about by the pressure of an Arab “final solution” together with the ministry of an Elijah prophet calling the oppressed remnant back to faith in the God of their Fathers. When persecuted, harassed Jews are brought, in desperation, to say “Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord”, then they will see him, the Messiah on whom they have hitherto stubbornly turned their back (Mt. 23: 39).

It would be foolish to be dogmatic about the programming of the last act in which the tragedy of Israel turns to Messianic triumph. But certainly there are here a fair number of prophetic details that seem to suggest a scenario of this character.

If it should be that events work out in this fashion-an Arab conquest of the Land, a terrible persecution of the Israelis through 3½ years, what will happen to the faith of those in the New Israel who hitherto have had no room in their vision of the future for God-controlled disasters of this kind?

The reader is reminded once again that it is the possibility of such bewilderment, which has led to the writing of this book. Traditional expectations may prove to be well-founded. But they may not! Far too many Last Day prophecies have gone unexplained.

Not a few readers will feel like coming back with a tu quoque: what about the other highly important events that we look for? The northern confederacy? The coming of the Lord in glory- when and where? The gathering of the saints to meet him? The resurrection and judgment? And so on.

An attempt will be made to put these together, with proper Biblical support, in the next chapter. But before he begins it, the reader is asked to come to it with a critical but open and unprejudiced mind. The writer knows his own weakness in this field, and is constantly trying to make allowances for it.

Sixty years ago lectures on “Britain in Prophecy” were commonplace, even as often as once a month. Not so, now. In the past ten years this writer has heard only one discourse on this topic, and that not because of apathy or addiction to the aural alcohol of T.V. Then, why? Just a change in “fashion”? Or because of dwindling conviction about that part of the message?

Russia will be the leader of the northern confederacy, won’t she? Yes, to be sure. All the evidence, Biblical and political, points that way.

But what about the challenge from “Sheba, and Dedan, and the merchants of Tarshish with all the Young lions thereof” (38: 13)?

That’s another story. Time was that piling up of auxiliary evidence was so impressive as to warrant a dogmatic identification with the British Empire-very suitable, truly, as a challenger to Russian expansion southwards. But today those great splashes of red, or at least pink spread across the map of the world are gone, with only Falkland (and Fiji?) Islands resisting the evaporation. The majestic British lion is mangy, the bulldog is toothless.

Then, what of the impressive array of evidence pointing to Britain? Alas, it has become needful to confess that our enthusiasm ran away with us. Consider Sheba and Dedan were identified with the two southern corners of the Arabian Peninsula. One of them – Aden – was firmly but inconspicuously British. The other, now the Emirate of Oman, was under friendly British direction. Today the former of these is strongly pro. Russian, and the latter is just about as friendly with Britain as any other Arab power-certainly not a centre of impressive British strength. Even in the old days, before the Empire had shuffled off this mortal coil, at least one schoolboy used to wonder why such tudgy remote blobs of pink should represent massive British power.

Tarshish was identified with Britain on the grounds that the Phoenicians used to come to Britain for tin and lead (and perhaps even for gold). But today we know that Spain was much more prolific in these metals. Then why sail the extra two thousand miles for these commodities?

But there was another Tarshish whence adventurous merchantmen brought “gold… ivory, apes, and peacocks” (1 Kgs. 10: 22). Where could this be, but India? Wasn’t India the brightest jewel in the imperial crown? To be sure, it was. But now India goes its own happy road paved with corruption, and not caring a fig for the pukka sahibs of former days.

So there goes another piece of evidence.

But consider again: “the merchants of Tarshish”. Does not that identify Britain? Well, it might have done, in the palmy days when the mercantile fleet of Britain outnumbered all that the rest of the world could muster; but today unions and strikes, lethargy and loss of colonies have brought Britain near to the bottom of that league also.

Again, “the young lions thereof” was another phrase to stir the patriotic blood of not a few Christadelphian youngsters. In World War I, did not the young lions come to the aid of the mother Lion in time of dire need? Thankfully, yes. But now all are more and more independent; and if a new-style modern war comes they will have little inclination and less ability to help.

In any case, how came earlier generations to overlook that Ezekiel uses “young lions” about the princes of Israel (Ez. 19: 5-6; 22: 25) and of Egypt (32: 2)? So, “young lions” equals ‘colonies’ seems decidedly unsure, the more so since LXX reads ‘villages’ in place of ‘young lions’.

Another question mark hanging over the received interpretation of Ezekiel 38 concerns the character as well as the geographical details of verse 13. The assumption has always been made that “Art thou come to take a spoil? hast thou gathered thy company to take a prey?. . .” expresses a challenge to the invader, as though Sheba, Dedan, and the merchants of Tarshish are springing to the defence of little Israel.

It is not suggested here that this way of reading the words is not valid. But why has the alternative possibility never been considered, that they might be read in the sense: “You are going to invade and plunder Israel? Fine! We’ll come and help you!”?

Just now the point will not be pressed. But the possibility, or even the probability, of such an interpretation being correct is surely underlined by the fact that in all their Bible history, whenever Israel was in danger, neighbouring Arab nations gleefully joined forces with the invader. The most obvious, but not the only, examples of this were in the reigns of David, Hezekiah, and Zedekiah, and in A.D. 70.

Then, since the available Bible evidence points to Sheba, Dedan, and Tarshish as being neighbouring Arab peoples (Edom and Lebanon- see “Bible Studies” 4.07), and since there is no Arab power today which does not hate Israel like poison, ought not this alternative reading of Ezekiel 38: 13 to be given more serious consideration?