Chapter 5: The IS Flag: The Mark of the Beast?
The black flags carried by ISIS have a roughly drawn circle with a brief summary of the Moslem creed: 'There is none other God than Allah and Mohammed is His messenger'. The circle is roughly drawn because it is a replica of Mohammed's seal which he attached to his decrees and communications. To receive the mark of the beast may well refer to receiving such a stamp or carrying such an insignia, perhaps literally on the forehead. Because pictures of ISIS fighters show them with this symbol on their foreheads. The seal of Muhammad was held to have magic qualities, and the loss of the seal amounted to the loss of the caliphate and the loss of unity among Muslims. Now, the IS are popularizing the seal again, announcing a caliphate and urging Moslem unity- a unity which will ultimately be focused against Israel. The false prophet and beast are Biblically associated with false miracles, so something to look for would be the claims of false miracles or magic, as was once associated with the seal. Muhammad Zafrulla Khan, Muhammad: Seal of the Prophets, Routledge & Kegan Paul, London, 1980 (chapter 12). The IS flag has a name, just as the British flag is called 'the Union Jack'. It is called The Black Banner or Black Standard, also known as راية العقاب rāyat al-`uqāb "the banner of the eagle". The final enemies of Israel are described as coming upon her "as swift as the eagle flies" (Dt. 28:49). Babylon is spoken of as an eagle in Jer. 48:40; Dan. 7:4; Hab. 1:8 and Ez. 17:3,12, as is Assyria (Hos. 8:1) and as are the Ammonites (Jer. 49:16) and Edom (Obadiah 4). The IS flying the banner of the eagle therefore associates them with being a reincarnation of Israel's historical enemies.
The mark of the beast is to be worn on the hand, yet the Greek word for "hand" is the same as for "arm". Jihadist fighters are wearing the IS symbol, the seal of Mohammed, on rings and armbands- and we can expect this to become what the IS demands of their subject peoples too. Here's a ring with the insignia on it; and we could expect the coinage and banknotes of any IS to include it too, so that literally one could not buy or sell without it, in the earth / land under their control:
The Biblical data concerning the mark of the beast suggests that this will be used by "the beast" and will be enforced upon those who "dwell upon the earth" (Rev. 13:14,17). "The earth" Biblically refers to either the whole planet, or the land- the land promised to Abraham, from the Nile to the Euphrates. This promised land is the focus of the Bible. The beast of Revelation is another take on the beast of Daniel 7, which in turn is an amplification of the fourth empire of the image of Daniel 2. The empires or kings of Daniel 2 all refer to those entitites who reigned over "the whole earth / land"- of Israel, as discussed further in my exposition of Daniel 2. The same earth / land is in view here in Revelation. The IS can therefore be expected to gain control over that territory and to enforce the acceptance of Islam there. The mark is specifically the mark of a man (Rev. 13:18)- and that man is clearly Mohammed, seeing that the ensign of the IS is the seal of Mohammed. And according to some usages of Gematria [whereby each letter in the Hebrew or Arabic alphabet has a numerical value], Mohammed in Greek, Mahomet, (Μαομετιςhas) has a value of 666:
Mu Alpha Omicron Mu Epsilon Tau Iota Sigma TOTAL
40 1 70 40 5 300 10 200 666
Don't dismiss gematria too quickly. The Bible itself uses it here in Rev. 13:18. There, the number 666 is not written as it would normally have been, as a number, but rather as three Greek letters, chi xi stigma; which between them add up to 666 by gematria. So it would seem that we are being invited to work out the riddle through the use of gematria. There are some connections in form between the letters of the Greek and Arabic alphabets, just as there are between the letters of the Cyrillic and Latin alphabets (e.g. 'R' in the Latin alphabet is the inverse of 'я' in the Cyrillic). When those three Greek letters are turned on their side, they read exactly as the Arabic letters which spell Bis'm Allah- "In the name of Allah", which is the credo of Islam and the jihadists. This appears to be another connection between Islam and the mark of the beast.
We note too from Rev. 13:14 that the beast system does apparent 'miracles'; and the seal of Mohammed was historically supposed to be able to perform miracles. We could expect such false claims to be made within the IS also. The IS has already demonstrated how they deal with areas they conquer- all economic life is controlled by them and people are forced into submission to the new system. Nobody will be able to buy and sell in the territory of the earth / land promised to Abraham without displaying the mark of loyalty to the IS- the seal of Mohammed.
The book of Revelation, like all Bible prophecy, will have particular and acute relevance to those who live in the very last days before Christ comes. There is a particular blessing repeated for those who refuse to accept the mark of the beast. That brave and tiny minority will be comprised of those Jews who refuse to convert, and instead convert to Jesus Christ in their desperation. And for them, the book of Revelation holds out particular blessing (Rev. 14:9-11; 15:2; 20:4).
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Saturday 10 January 2015
Chapter 4: The Significance of the Euphrates
Chapter 4: The Significance of the Euphrates
The drying up of the Euphrates spoken of in Rev. 16:12 is what enables the seventh trumpet and seventh seal to come to pass- and they refer to the coming of Christ. It cannot be insignificant that the Islamic State are battling for control of the dams on the Euphrates. The control of rivers, dams, and water installations is a major weapon in the ISIS tactical armoury. This was indeed how it was in the time of Saddam Hussein. For more information on this, see Vidal, John (The Guardian 2 July 2014). "Water supply key to outcome of conflicts in Iraq and Syria, experts warn".
The waters of a river are symbolic of nations (Is. 23:10), specifically the Assyrians in Is. 8:7, Zech. 10:11 and Jer. 2:18- it could be that the reference is to the drying up or destruction [as the metaphor of ‘drying up’ means] of the nations and tribes of the fertile crescent. And these are the very areas where the Islamic State is so active. The Assyrian armies were those “beyond the river [Euphrates]” which were unleashed by God upon Judah (Is. 7:20). This is the basis for the language of Rev. 9:14, where four Angels are bound by the river Euphrates and unleashed in the sense that a huge army is let loose from beyond that river in order to judge an impenitent Israel. We recall that it was an Angel which stood upon the river in Dan. 12:6. We note that Greece likewise was likened to a ram held back by a river, which it jumped over (Dan. 8:3). The latter day power restrained by the Euphrates is therefore to be based upon the historical Assyria and Greece. Again we see how the image of Daniel 2 stands complete in the last days, because the final entity which dominates Israel will incorporate elements of the previous dominators, such as Assyria and Greece.
Euphrates was the boundary of the land promised to Abraham. Israel were thrown out of their land by being taken 'beyond the river [Euphrates]', just as Adam was cast out of Eden, which appears to have been bounded by the Euphrates. The 200,000 (or RV "twice ten thousand times ten thousand") horsemen were bound at [RV; Gk. epi] the Euphrates (Rev. 9:14), which is the northern border of the land promised to Abraham (Gen. 15:18; Ex. 23:31; Dt. 1:7; Josh. 1:4; 2 Sam. 8:3). The idea is clearly that these hordes will come and invade Israel. The Islamic State is already using pictures of horesemen as symbolic of their mission. The Greek text speaks of "twice ten thousand times ten thousand", recalling the way that the image of Daniel 2 and the beasts of Daniel 7 will be destroyed when "ten thousand times ten thousand" stand before the judgment seat of Christ (Dan. 7:10). Once the Euphrates is no longer allowed to restrain these hordes, they will race towards Israel- and judgment by the returned Lord Jesus. Hence the huge significance of the fact that the IS now controls the Eurphrates river and is looking towards Israel. The significance of "twice ten thousand times ten thousand" may be in that the latter day dominators of Israel are split into two broad camps, represented by the two feet of the image of Daniel. It may be a reference to the Sunni - Shia division within Islam, or to the two centers of domination of Israel which will appear based in Gaza and the West Bank. Dan. 7:10 contrasts these "ten thousand times ten thousand" who are to be judged with the thousands who minister unto the judge, the Lord Jesus; the thousands of the Lord Jesus will stand in opposition to the thousands of the latter day invaders, just as the true Christ will face off against the anti-Christ.
"The river" was Biblically the language of Euphrates; the Assyrian invasion is described as the River [i.e. Euphrates] bursting upon Israel (Is. 8:5-8). This invasion is described as the loosing of four Angels (Rev. 9:15,16). It could be that four Angels are involved in the work of arranging this geopolitical situation; or it could be that each Angel represents a particular subdivision of the IS. Note how "the Angel of the bottomless pit" refers both to a Heavenly Angel and to a human leader on earth, in that the princes of the earth have their Angelic representative in the court of Heaven. These are surely the same four Angels of Rev. 7:1,2 who had been holding the winds from blowing on the land of Israel; restraining the nations around Israel from destroying it from 1948 onwards. But they will no longer hold back the winds; they will loose the horsemen previously restrained by the Euphrates. This may happen in practice by the restraining power of America and the West being no longer permitted to operate by the four Angels. At the time of writing, it's highly significant that most of the cities, towns and areas now controlled by the IS are on the East bank of the Euphrates; the river is as it were holding back IS from advancing Westwards into the land promised to Israel. But that restraint is now being lifted.
The four Angels holding winds surely alludes to the Angels gathering the elect from the four winds (Mt. 24:31; Mk. 13:27). The process of gathering the elect at the last day is part of the same process as gathering the nations to judgment. It could be that the final gathering of the nations against Israel therefore occurs at the same time as the gathering of the believers to judgment. It would seem that now all is in place for such a gathering of the nations from beyond the Euphrates- and therefore the Lord's coming could be really very near. The whole scene surely consciously recalls that of Daniel 12, where Daniel sees Angels standing on the banks of "the river", announcing that there must be a time of terrible trouble for Israel lasting "time, times and a half" (three and a half years?) and then the whole suffering of Israel would be "finished" by the return of Messiah and establishment of the Kingdom of God (Dan. 12:5-10). "The river" is not defined, but the term is usually used in the prophets for the Euphrates; at the very least it must refer to one of the rivers in the Tigris-Euphrates basin. Note the significance of the river Ulai, a tributary of the Euphrates, in Daniel 8. Revelation expands upon this by saying that the Angels cease restraining the jihadist hordes and then release them in the last days, when the Euphrates dries up. Biblically, the drying up of water is so that armies can pass over (we think of the Red Sea and Jordan being dried up for this intent). The final time of trouble is brought about by Angels standing upon "the river"- and the fact the Euphrates is now in the hands of the IS is therefore highly significant.
It is also surely no coincidence that there are four nations located to the East of the Euphrates, bound by her- Turkey, Syria, Iraq and what is now effectively the nation of Kurdistan. Kurdish independence and the development of a de facto state of Kurdistan is something we can expect to develop. It could just about be argued that Iran is also effectively held back from the promised land by the Euphrates, but Iran doesn't in fact border the river. It could be argued that the part of Turkey which is bound by the Euphrates is Kurdish territory, and may form part of a future state of Kurdistan if it is declared. In this case, the four nations could be Kurdistan, Syria, Iraq and Iran- or perhaps the IS.
Let's be encouraged by the fact that the sixth Angel releases the hordes from behind the Euphrates because of "a voice from the four horns of the golden altar which is before God" (Rev. 9:13). This is the incense altar, and earlier in the scene we have seen the prayers of the faithful ascending from that altar, eliciting Divine action from Heaven upon the earth (Rev. 8:3-5). The releasing of the peoples beyond the Euphrates which we are seeing before our eyes is actually a response to our prayers. We pray and pray for the second coming, and it seems as if nothing very concrete is happening. But it is. The IS were raised up and given control of the Euphrates and are being propelled on their mission to fulfil end time prophecies, so that the culmination may come in the return of the Lord Jesus to earth. In this context we can note that the language of loosing the bound was used by the Lord in His teaching that we can bind and loose things in Heaven (Mt. 16:19; 18:18)- in this case, the Angels. This is the huge significance of human prayer and action for God.
A Literal Drying Up of the Euphrates?
The drying up of the Euphrates in Rev. 16:12 is parallel with the four Angels being released. Angels can represent nations, as we find in Daniel- in that each nation has a representative Angel in the court of Heaven. The Euphrates is literally drying up- waterflows are at their lowest ever in recorded history, and it may be that the predicted water crisis in the Tigris-Euphrates ecoregion is what drives the peoples of that area to look westwards towards Israel, and to seek to resolve their problems by a united jihad against Israel. The problem of water is acute in the region: "There are thousands of new “water refugees” in Southern Iraq: people displaced by the changes to their natural environment. “Many villages are depopulated because of that. It has a terrible economic impact upon the population”"(Bakhtiar Amin, Human Rights Minister of Iraq from 2004 to 2005, as quoted at http://thoughtfulwander.blogspot.co.uk/2014/07/marsh-arabs.html ). Historically, the literal drying up, or diversion, of the Euphrates was what led to the fall of Babylon. It may well be that we are intended to make this connection when we read in Rev. 16:12 of the drying up of the Euphrates. The logical deduction is: 'So Babylon is about to fall'. And the fall of Babylon is spoken of in Revelation as coming about at the return of Christ to earth.
But it may not be simply that the Euphrates dries up of its own accord. Now that the key dams are in the hands of the IS, it could be that they like Saddam Hussein before them, dry up the river in order to exert their power over others. And this will bring about the required fulfilment of the prophecy. We recall how the King of Assyria, another prototype of the latter day invader of Israel, boasted that he had dried up rivers and manipulated water sources, and therefore Jerusalem too would fall into his hands: "I have digged and drunk strange waters, and with the sole of my feet will I dry up all the rivers" (2 Kings 19:24).
The drying up of the Euphrates leads to unclean spirits like frogs going out to deceive the nations and gather them to Armageddon (Rev. 16:13). No particularly convincing explanation of the figure of frogs has yet been come up with. The suggestion that it refers to the spirit of the French revolution is desperate; the passage clearly demands a latter day fulfilment, and it would be hard to demonstrate that liberty, equality and fraternity came from dragon, beast and false prophet. It would be impossible to argue that e.g. the spirit of liberty came from the dragon, equality from the beast, etc. The idea is surely that as a frog jumps, so the spirit or teaching / influence of these entities spreads in leaps and bounds. But the appropriacy of the symbol becomes apparent when we realize that the Euphrates is fed by tributaries which feed into the Euphrates through vast marshes. The marshes around the Euphrates are so vast that they have given rise to the description of the locals there as 'the marsh Arabs'. Saddam Hussein drained some of these marsh areas and cut off water to others in his attempt to persecute the very groups which later fought against him and radicalized into the Islamic State. In a literal sense, the hordes pouring forth against Israel are the result of the Euphrates being literally dried up. Wikipedia claims that "According to the United Nations Environmental Program and the AMAR Charitable Foundation, between 84% and 90% of the marshes have been destroyed since the 1970s. In 1994, 60 percent of the wetlands were destroyed by Hussein's regime – drained to permit military access and greater political control of the native Marsh Arabs... After the 1991 Gulf War, Shia Muslims in southern Iraq rebelled against Saddam Hussein who in turned crushed the rebellion and further accelerated the draining of the Central and Hammar marshes in order to evict Shias that have taken refuge in the marshes" [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tigris%E2%80%93Euphrates_river_system and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mesopotamian_Marshes accessed 12.08.2014].
These huge marshlands are full of frogs! The drying up of the Euphrates would be bad news for the frogs, who will have to leap and bound further afield in desperation. And so the idea seems to be that the Angel dries up the Euphrates, the hordes burst forth over that border towards the earth / land promised to Abraham; and the teaching of jihad against Israel, anti-semitism in its final term, is spread by leaps and bounds out of the Euphrates basin, leading people from throughout the region and indeed the whole world, to come up against Israel. We note that there are even jihadist fighters from Australia fighting for the IS at the moment. Joel 3:9 speaks of huge multitudes of people being 'awoken' and going up to Jerusalem. The postmodern daze in which many people now live has created a desire for reality, for action, for escape from the virtual world into something truly exciting and passionate. And this is why well heeled young white Australians are getting caught up in Islamic extremism and heading off to fight for the IS. Young unemployed males are now seeing the opportunity to play their violent online games in reality... they are awaking from the postmodernist haze of indifference. But sadly to the wrong reality. This awakening is likely to continue and become ever more attractive, likely fuelled by the media's hatred of Israel and desire to portray her as a situation needing radical resolution.
The Way to Armageddon
The sixth trumpet in Rev. 9:14 and the sixth vial in Rev. 16:12,13 both refer to the Euphrates and are therefore referring to the same events. We needn't get too fazed by issues of chronological sequence in fulfilment. The trumpets and vials aren't necessarily events which follow each other chronologically. This is the assumption of a Greek-Latin mindset; but in the Hebrew thought which underpins the New Testament, events can be described without attention to sequence. The Old Testament prophecies therefore often appear to 'jump around' in fulfilment, with no clear sequence in mind. Each vial or trumpet can be a description of events which happen around the time of the Lord's coming, but not necessarily in sequence chronologically. The 'continuous historic' school of interpretation is driven by this insistence upon chronological sequence, but this results in seeking unrealistic fulfilments of the earlier phases of the sequence. These suggested fulfilments often do not hold true to actual history, and are out of context with the main thrust of the prophecies, which concern the situation in the land of Israel in the last days. The masses of aggressive horsemen in Rev. 9 are the "kings of the east" of Rev. 16:12- rulers who come from the East of Israel. This would easily refer to the way in which the IS and its fighters originated in Afghanistan, have now controlled and breached the Euphrates, and are marching towards Israel. The allusion is to how God allowed Cyrus to dry up [or divert] the Euphrates, and Babylon fell as the Medes and Persians under Cyrus approached from the East. The kings of the East are therefore not believers, but the unbelieving enemies of Israel. I have elsewhere pointed out that the IS see themselves as warriors coming from the East to destroy Israel: “The final battle will be waged by Muslim faithful coming on the backs of horses…carrying black banners. They will stand on the East side of the Jordan River and will wage war that the earth has never seen before... The black flags will come from the East, led by mighty men, with long hair and beards". These "kings of the east" who are released from the Euphrates are matched in Rev. 9:17-19 by John's description in first century language of the most terrifying technology and aggression of the hordes of horsemen who will be released upon Israel from the Euphrates: "They wore breastplates the color of fire and of sapphire and of sulfur, and the heads of the horses were like lions' heads, and fire and smoke and sulfur came out of their mouths. By these three plagues a third of mankind was killed, by the fire and smoke and sulfur coming out of their mouths. For the power of the horses is in their mouths and in their tails, for their tails are like serpents with heads, and by means of them they wound". The killing of a third of those in the earth / land surely connects with the prediction of Zech. 13:8 that when Jerusalem briefly falls, two thirds of the Jews will be killed. Presumably the other third are killed by other methods- there is repeated teaching in Rev. 8 of how the 'thirds' of those in the land will suffer in the final tribulation.
Dan. 11:40 speaks of the latter day "king of the north" coming with horsemen and entering into the eretz, the land, like a restrained mighty river that is now gushing and overflowing its banks. This is absolutely the picture of Revelation 16: hordes of horsemen surging from the Euphrates river towards Israel. For the "king of the north" [historically this was Babylon or Assyria] to enter into the eretz, the land promised to Abraham, he would have to cross the boundary of that land at the Euphrates anyway. He firstly enters the general eretz and then enters specifically the eretz of glory (Dan. 11:41)- the land inhabited by the Jews. This is described in Ez. 20:6 using the same Hebrew words- "a land... flowing with milk and honey, which is the glory of all the eretz". The land flowing with milk and honey hardly referred to the entire land promised to Abraham up to the Euphrates, much of which is barren desert. The glory of the eretz was and is Canaan. We can see the process starting- the IS is taking over the wider eretz, and will then proceed to focus upon entering into the glory of the eretz, the current territory of Israel.
Focus on Jerusalem
The unclean spirits or teachings released from the Euphrates gather the nations together to Armageddon. “Armageddon” (Rev. 16:16) is from the Hebrew har-magedon. Har means ‘mountain’. The assumption has been made that magedon´is the same as ‘Megiddo’; but the problem is, Megiddo is a plain and there is no mountain there. Also, the word magedon would be spelt slightly differently if it were simply the place name Megiddo. The suggestion has been made and well argued that magedon is a form of the Hebrew mo’ed, and would literally mean “the mount of assembly / gathering”- the title of Jerusalem in Is. 14:13 [see Meredith Kline, ‘Har Magedon’, Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 39/2 (June 1996) pp. 207-222, available online. He explains the presence of the ‘g’ on the basis that the Hebrew consonant ayin is often represented by the Greek gamma]. Rev. 16 says that all nations are gathered to Armageddon, but elsewhere we read of all nations being gathered to Jerusalem. The two localities are surely identical, quite apart from the linguistic arguments. We can expect, therefore, far more focus specifically upon Jerusalem. For this is to be the center to which all are gathered. This makes perfect sense if we see magedon as a Greek rendering of the Hebrew mo’ed- the nations are gathered to the mount of gathering. The king of Babylon / Assyria so wished to come to the “mount of assembly / gathering” (Is. 14:13), and it was that desire, and executing it, which was effectively his gathering to judgment. And so it will be with the Islamist obsession with Jerusalem- their gathering there will effectively be their gathering to judgment.
The drying up of the Euphrates spoken of in Rev. 16:12 is what enables the seventh trumpet and seventh seal to come to pass- and they refer to the coming of Christ. It cannot be insignificant that the Islamic State are battling for control of the dams on the Euphrates. The control of rivers, dams, and water installations is a major weapon in the ISIS tactical armoury. This was indeed how it was in the time of Saddam Hussein. For more information on this, see Vidal, John (The Guardian 2 July 2014). "Water supply key to outcome of conflicts in Iraq and Syria, experts warn".
The waters of a river are symbolic of nations (Is. 23:10), specifically the Assyrians in Is. 8:7, Zech. 10:11 and Jer. 2:18- it could be that the reference is to the drying up or destruction [as the metaphor of ‘drying up’ means] of the nations and tribes of the fertile crescent. And these are the very areas where the Islamic State is so active. The Assyrian armies were those “beyond the river [Euphrates]” which were unleashed by God upon Judah (Is. 7:20). This is the basis for the language of Rev. 9:14, where four Angels are bound by the river Euphrates and unleashed in the sense that a huge army is let loose from beyond that river in order to judge an impenitent Israel. We recall that it was an Angel which stood upon the river in Dan. 12:6. We note that Greece likewise was likened to a ram held back by a river, which it jumped over (Dan. 8:3). The latter day power restrained by the Euphrates is therefore to be based upon the historical Assyria and Greece. Again we see how the image of Daniel 2 stands complete in the last days, because the final entity which dominates Israel will incorporate elements of the previous dominators, such as Assyria and Greece.
Euphrates was the boundary of the land promised to Abraham. Israel were thrown out of their land by being taken 'beyond the river [Euphrates]', just as Adam was cast out of Eden, which appears to have been bounded by the Euphrates. The 200,000 (or RV "twice ten thousand times ten thousand") horsemen were bound at [RV; Gk. epi] the Euphrates (Rev. 9:14), which is the northern border of the land promised to Abraham (Gen. 15:18; Ex. 23:31; Dt. 1:7; Josh. 1:4; 2 Sam. 8:3). The idea is clearly that these hordes will come and invade Israel. The Islamic State is already using pictures of horesemen as symbolic of their mission. The Greek text speaks of "twice ten thousand times ten thousand", recalling the way that the image of Daniel 2 and the beasts of Daniel 7 will be destroyed when "ten thousand times ten thousand" stand before the judgment seat of Christ (Dan. 7:10). Once the Euphrates is no longer allowed to restrain these hordes, they will race towards Israel- and judgment by the returned Lord Jesus. Hence the huge significance of the fact that the IS now controls the Eurphrates river and is looking towards Israel. The significance of "twice ten thousand times ten thousand" may be in that the latter day dominators of Israel are split into two broad camps, represented by the two feet of the image of Daniel. It may be a reference to the Sunni - Shia division within Islam, or to the two centers of domination of Israel which will appear based in Gaza and the West Bank. Dan. 7:10 contrasts these "ten thousand times ten thousand" who are to be judged with the thousands who minister unto the judge, the Lord Jesus; the thousands of the Lord Jesus will stand in opposition to the thousands of the latter day invaders, just as the true Christ will face off against the anti-Christ.
"The river" was Biblically the language of Euphrates; the Assyrian invasion is described as the River [i.e. Euphrates] bursting upon Israel (Is. 8:5-8). This invasion is described as the loosing of four Angels (Rev. 9:15,16). It could be that four Angels are involved in the work of arranging this geopolitical situation; or it could be that each Angel represents a particular subdivision of the IS. Note how "the Angel of the bottomless pit" refers both to a Heavenly Angel and to a human leader on earth, in that the princes of the earth have their Angelic representative in the court of Heaven. These are surely the same four Angels of Rev. 7:1,2 who had been holding the winds from blowing on the land of Israel; restraining the nations around Israel from destroying it from 1948 onwards. But they will no longer hold back the winds; they will loose the horsemen previously restrained by the Euphrates. This may happen in practice by the restraining power of America and the West being no longer permitted to operate by the four Angels. At the time of writing, it's highly significant that most of the cities, towns and areas now controlled by the IS are on the East bank of the Euphrates; the river is as it were holding back IS from advancing Westwards into the land promised to Israel. But that restraint is now being lifted.
The four Angels holding winds surely alludes to the Angels gathering the elect from the four winds (Mt. 24:31; Mk. 13:27). The process of gathering the elect at the last day is part of the same process as gathering the nations to judgment. It could be that the final gathering of the nations against Israel therefore occurs at the same time as the gathering of the believers to judgment. It would seem that now all is in place for such a gathering of the nations from beyond the Euphrates- and therefore the Lord's coming could be really very near. The whole scene surely consciously recalls that of Daniel 12, where Daniel sees Angels standing on the banks of "the river", announcing that there must be a time of terrible trouble for Israel lasting "time, times and a half" (three and a half years?) and then the whole suffering of Israel would be "finished" by the return of Messiah and establishment of the Kingdom of God (Dan. 12:5-10). "The river" is not defined, but the term is usually used in the prophets for the Euphrates; at the very least it must refer to one of the rivers in the Tigris-Euphrates basin. Note the significance of the river Ulai, a tributary of the Euphrates, in Daniel 8. Revelation expands upon this by saying that the Angels cease restraining the jihadist hordes and then release them in the last days, when the Euphrates dries up. Biblically, the drying up of water is so that armies can pass over (we think of the Red Sea and Jordan being dried up for this intent). The final time of trouble is brought about by Angels standing upon "the river"- and the fact the Euphrates is now in the hands of the IS is therefore highly significant.
It is also surely no coincidence that there are four nations located to the East of the Euphrates, bound by her- Turkey, Syria, Iraq and what is now effectively the nation of Kurdistan. Kurdish independence and the development of a de facto state of Kurdistan is something we can expect to develop. It could just about be argued that Iran is also effectively held back from the promised land by the Euphrates, but Iran doesn't in fact border the river. It could be argued that the part of Turkey which is bound by the Euphrates is Kurdish territory, and may form part of a future state of Kurdistan if it is declared. In this case, the four nations could be Kurdistan, Syria, Iraq and Iran- or perhaps the IS.
Let's be encouraged by the fact that the sixth Angel releases the hordes from behind the Euphrates because of "a voice from the four horns of the golden altar which is before God" (Rev. 9:13). This is the incense altar, and earlier in the scene we have seen the prayers of the faithful ascending from that altar, eliciting Divine action from Heaven upon the earth (Rev. 8:3-5). The releasing of the peoples beyond the Euphrates which we are seeing before our eyes is actually a response to our prayers. We pray and pray for the second coming, and it seems as if nothing very concrete is happening. But it is. The IS were raised up and given control of the Euphrates and are being propelled on their mission to fulfil end time prophecies, so that the culmination may come in the return of the Lord Jesus to earth. In this context we can note that the language of loosing the bound was used by the Lord in His teaching that we can bind and loose things in Heaven (Mt. 16:19; 18:18)- in this case, the Angels. This is the huge significance of human prayer and action for God.
A Literal Drying Up of the Euphrates?
The drying up of the Euphrates in Rev. 16:12 is parallel with the four Angels being released. Angels can represent nations, as we find in Daniel- in that each nation has a representative Angel in the court of Heaven. The Euphrates is literally drying up- waterflows are at their lowest ever in recorded history, and it may be that the predicted water crisis in the Tigris-Euphrates ecoregion is what drives the peoples of that area to look westwards towards Israel, and to seek to resolve their problems by a united jihad against Israel. The problem of water is acute in the region: "There are thousands of new “water refugees” in Southern Iraq: people displaced by the changes to their natural environment. “Many villages are depopulated because of that. It has a terrible economic impact upon the population”"(Bakhtiar Amin, Human Rights Minister of Iraq from 2004 to 2005, as quoted at http://thoughtfulwander.blogspot.co.uk/2014/07/marsh-arabs.html ). Historically, the literal drying up, or diversion, of the Euphrates was what led to the fall of Babylon. It may well be that we are intended to make this connection when we read in Rev. 16:12 of the drying up of the Euphrates. The logical deduction is: 'So Babylon is about to fall'. And the fall of Babylon is spoken of in Revelation as coming about at the return of Christ to earth.
But it may not be simply that the Euphrates dries up of its own accord. Now that the key dams are in the hands of the IS, it could be that they like Saddam Hussein before them, dry up the river in order to exert their power over others. And this will bring about the required fulfilment of the prophecy. We recall how the King of Assyria, another prototype of the latter day invader of Israel, boasted that he had dried up rivers and manipulated water sources, and therefore Jerusalem too would fall into his hands: "I have digged and drunk strange waters, and with the sole of my feet will I dry up all the rivers" (2 Kings 19:24).
The drying up of the Euphrates leads to unclean spirits like frogs going out to deceive the nations and gather them to Armageddon (Rev. 16:13). No particularly convincing explanation of the figure of frogs has yet been come up with. The suggestion that it refers to the spirit of the French revolution is desperate; the passage clearly demands a latter day fulfilment, and it would be hard to demonstrate that liberty, equality and fraternity came from dragon, beast and false prophet. It would be impossible to argue that e.g. the spirit of liberty came from the dragon, equality from the beast, etc. The idea is surely that as a frog jumps, so the spirit or teaching / influence of these entities spreads in leaps and bounds. But the appropriacy of the symbol becomes apparent when we realize that the Euphrates is fed by tributaries which feed into the Euphrates through vast marshes. The marshes around the Euphrates are so vast that they have given rise to the description of the locals there as 'the marsh Arabs'. Saddam Hussein drained some of these marsh areas and cut off water to others in his attempt to persecute the very groups which later fought against him and radicalized into the Islamic State. In a literal sense, the hordes pouring forth against Israel are the result of the Euphrates being literally dried up. Wikipedia claims that "According to the United Nations Environmental Program and the AMAR Charitable Foundation, between 84% and 90% of the marshes have been destroyed since the 1970s. In 1994, 60 percent of the wetlands were destroyed by Hussein's regime – drained to permit military access and greater political control of the native Marsh Arabs... After the 1991 Gulf War, Shia Muslims in southern Iraq rebelled against Saddam Hussein who in turned crushed the rebellion and further accelerated the draining of the Central and Hammar marshes in order to evict Shias that have taken refuge in the marshes" [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tigris%E2%80%93Euphrates_river_system and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mesopotamian_Marshes accessed 12.08.2014].
These huge marshlands are full of frogs! The drying up of the Euphrates would be bad news for the frogs, who will have to leap and bound further afield in desperation. And so the idea seems to be that the Angel dries up the Euphrates, the hordes burst forth over that border towards the earth / land promised to Abraham; and the teaching of jihad against Israel, anti-semitism in its final term, is spread by leaps and bounds out of the Euphrates basin, leading people from throughout the region and indeed the whole world, to come up against Israel. We note that there are even jihadist fighters from Australia fighting for the IS at the moment. Joel 3:9 speaks of huge multitudes of people being 'awoken' and going up to Jerusalem. The postmodern daze in which many people now live has created a desire for reality, for action, for escape from the virtual world into something truly exciting and passionate. And this is why well heeled young white Australians are getting caught up in Islamic extremism and heading off to fight for the IS. Young unemployed males are now seeing the opportunity to play their violent online games in reality... they are awaking from the postmodernist haze of indifference. But sadly to the wrong reality. This awakening is likely to continue and become ever more attractive, likely fuelled by the media's hatred of Israel and desire to portray her as a situation needing radical resolution.
The Way to Armageddon
The sixth trumpet in Rev. 9:14 and the sixth vial in Rev. 16:12,13 both refer to the Euphrates and are therefore referring to the same events. We needn't get too fazed by issues of chronological sequence in fulfilment. The trumpets and vials aren't necessarily events which follow each other chronologically. This is the assumption of a Greek-Latin mindset; but in the Hebrew thought which underpins the New Testament, events can be described without attention to sequence. The Old Testament prophecies therefore often appear to 'jump around' in fulfilment, with no clear sequence in mind. Each vial or trumpet can be a description of events which happen around the time of the Lord's coming, but not necessarily in sequence chronologically. The 'continuous historic' school of interpretation is driven by this insistence upon chronological sequence, but this results in seeking unrealistic fulfilments of the earlier phases of the sequence. These suggested fulfilments often do not hold true to actual history, and are out of context with the main thrust of the prophecies, which concern the situation in the land of Israel in the last days. The masses of aggressive horsemen in Rev. 9 are the "kings of the east" of Rev. 16:12- rulers who come from the East of Israel. This would easily refer to the way in which the IS and its fighters originated in Afghanistan, have now controlled and breached the Euphrates, and are marching towards Israel. The allusion is to how God allowed Cyrus to dry up [or divert] the Euphrates, and Babylon fell as the Medes and Persians under Cyrus approached from the East. The kings of the East are therefore not believers, but the unbelieving enemies of Israel. I have elsewhere pointed out that the IS see themselves as warriors coming from the East to destroy Israel: “The final battle will be waged by Muslim faithful coming on the backs of horses…carrying black banners. They will stand on the East side of the Jordan River and will wage war that the earth has never seen before... The black flags will come from the East, led by mighty men, with long hair and beards". These "kings of the east" who are released from the Euphrates are matched in Rev. 9:17-19 by John's description in first century language of the most terrifying technology and aggression of the hordes of horsemen who will be released upon Israel from the Euphrates: "They wore breastplates the color of fire and of sapphire and of sulfur, and the heads of the horses were like lions' heads, and fire and smoke and sulfur came out of their mouths. By these three plagues a third of mankind was killed, by the fire and smoke and sulfur coming out of their mouths. For the power of the horses is in their mouths and in their tails, for their tails are like serpents with heads, and by means of them they wound". The killing of a third of those in the earth / land surely connects with the prediction of Zech. 13:8 that when Jerusalem briefly falls, two thirds of the Jews will be killed. Presumably the other third are killed by other methods- there is repeated teaching in Rev. 8 of how the 'thirds' of those in the land will suffer in the final tribulation.
Dan. 11:40 speaks of the latter day "king of the north" coming with horsemen and entering into the eretz, the land, like a restrained mighty river that is now gushing and overflowing its banks. This is absolutely the picture of Revelation 16: hordes of horsemen surging from the Euphrates river towards Israel. For the "king of the north" [historically this was Babylon or Assyria] to enter into the eretz, the land promised to Abraham, he would have to cross the boundary of that land at the Euphrates anyway. He firstly enters the general eretz and then enters specifically the eretz of glory (Dan. 11:41)- the land inhabited by the Jews. This is described in Ez. 20:6 using the same Hebrew words- "a land... flowing with milk and honey, which is the glory of all the eretz". The land flowing with milk and honey hardly referred to the entire land promised to Abraham up to the Euphrates, much of which is barren desert. The glory of the eretz was and is Canaan. We can see the process starting- the IS is taking over the wider eretz, and will then proceed to focus upon entering into the glory of the eretz, the current territory of Israel.
Focus on Jerusalem
The unclean spirits or teachings released from the Euphrates gather the nations together to Armageddon. “Armageddon” (Rev. 16:16) is from the Hebrew har-magedon. Har means ‘mountain’. The assumption has been made that magedon´is the same as ‘Megiddo’; but the problem is, Megiddo is a plain and there is no mountain there. Also, the word magedon would be spelt slightly differently if it were simply the place name Megiddo. The suggestion has been made and well argued that magedon is a form of the Hebrew mo’ed, and would literally mean “the mount of assembly / gathering”- the title of Jerusalem in Is. 14:13 [see Meredith Kline, ‘Har Magedon’, Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 39/2 (June 1996) pp. 207-222, available online. He explains the presence of the ‘g’ on the basis that the Hebrew consonant ayin is often represented by the Greek gamma]. Rev. 16 says that all nations are gathered to Armageddon, but elsewhere we read of all nations being gathered to Jerusalem. The two localities are surely identical, quite apart from the linguistic arguments. We can expect, therefore, far more focus specifically upon Jerusalem. For this is to be the center to which all are gathered. This makes perfect sense if we see magedon as a Greek rendering of the Hebrew mo’ed- the nations are gathered to the mount of gathering. The king of Babylon / Assyria so wished to come to the “mount of assembly / gathering” (Is. 14:13), and it was that desire, and executing it, which was effectively his gathering to judgment. And so it will be with the Islamist obsession with Jerusalem- their gathering there will effectively be their gathering to judgment.
Chapter 3: Black Flags from Khurasan
Chapter 3: Black Flags from Khurasan
I have made the point earlier that the latter day invasion of the eretz / land / earth of Israel will be distinctly religiously motivated. There will be a conscious attempt to fulfil the words of the Koran and Hadith. Islamic prophetic tradition in the Hadith predicts:
“Armies carrying black flags will come from Khurasan (This could refer to Afghanistan, the home of Al-Qaeda; or to Kurdistan- the area where the Islamic State currently is developing). No power will be able to stop them and they will finally reach Eela (Baitul Maqdas in Jerusalem) where they will erect their flags.” Baitul Maqdas or “the holy house” is referring to the Temple Mount in Jerusalem. Source: http://musliminsuffer.wordpress.com/2008/10/14/victorious-army-of-black-banners . Abdul Rahman al-Wahabi in The Day of Wrath states:
“The final battle will be waged by Muslim faithful coming on the backs of horses… carrying black banners. They will stand on the East side of the Jordan River and will wage war that the earth has never seen before. The true Messiah who is the Islamic Mahdi will defeat Europe, will lead this army of Seljuks [Turks]. He will preside over the world from Jerusalem because Mecca would have been destroyed”. Other parts of the Hadith claim:
“The black flags will come from the East, led by mighty men, with long hair and beards, their surnames are taken from the names of their home towns (i.e. Khosti or from Khost etc.) and their first names are from a “Kunya”(Asmal Masalik Lieyyam Mahdiyy Maliki Li Kull-id Dunya Biemrillah-il Malik, Qalda bin Zayd) . We note that the Islamic State is insisting that all men must grow beards in the areas they occupy.
“If you see the Black Banners coming from Khurasan go to them immediately, even if you must crawl over ice, because indeed amongst them is the Caliph, Al Mahdi.” [Narrated on authority of Ibn Majah, Al-Hakim, Ahmad]. All the talk of following the Caliph, the leader of the IS, fits in with the Biblical picture of a specific antiChrist figure developing in the last days. There has been no Caliph in the Moslem world since 1924- until Al-Baghdadi, leader of the IS, was declared Caliph in 2014.
“Surely Black Flags will appear from the Khorasan until the people (under the leadership of this flag) will tie their horses with the Olive Trees between Bait-e-Lahya and Harasta. We asked are there any Olive trees between these places. He said, ‘If there isn’t then soon it will grow so that those people(of Khorasan) will come and tie their horses there’”. Beit Lahia is a town under Palestinian Authority of about 40,000 people in the northern Gaza Strip. Harasta, also known as Harasta al-Basal, is a Syrian city administratively belonging to Rif Dimashq. This is the situation foretold in Is. 9:12 “The Syrians before and the Philistines behind … shall devour Israel with open mouth”. Beit Lahia is a center of Hamas terrorist activity against Israel, and has frequently been the focus of Israeli raids and bombardment- http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-28290018 . The uprising in the Gaza Strip is clearly orchestrated and funded by ISIS.
“If you see the black (meaning war) flags coming from Khurasan (Afghanistan), join that army, even if you have to crawl over ice, for this is the army of the Caliph, the Mahdi and no one can stop that army until it reaches Jerusalem.”
“They will defeat the companions of The Sufyaani until he comes to the House of Jerusalem where he will establish his power for the Mahdi, and he will be supplied with three hundred (men) from Syria after his arrival and the matter will be settled for the Mahdi. The eminent saints (Al-Abdal) of Syria and the best people of Iraq will come to him and swear allegiance to him
he will send an army to Iraq and kill a hundred thousand in Az-Zawra. So join him in Mecca — he is the Mahdi!” Then, Hudhayfah asked: ‘O Messenger of Allah, how shall we know him?’ He replied: “He is a man from my children, he looks like the men from the children of Israel, upon him are two white cloaks with frayed edges”. His face is like a colourful, glittering star”.
“The Prophet said: “The Mahdi is a man from my children. His face is like a glittering star, his skin is the colour of an Arab, and his body is like that of Israel. He will fill the earth with justice just as it will have been filled by injustice, and the dwellers of Heaven and Earth will be pleased with his Caliphate”.
There is a conscious attempt by the IS to fulfil these predictions. The black flag has been observed amidst the protests and riots in Egypt, Libya, Sudan, Nigeria, Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq, Syria, Kuwait, Bahrain, Iran, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Afghanistan, Indonesia, India, Turkey, Jerusalem, Gaza and even Germany, Australia and England. Across the world, Muslims of every race, tribe and nation are marching under the same black banner. Another name for the flag in Arabic is al-Ùqāb, and is sometimes referred to as “the Eagle”; just as the British flag is called ‘The Union Jack’ and the American flag ‘The stars and stripes’. And the eagle is a symbol of Israel’s historical enemies.
IS Aims for Jerusalem
“Armies carrying black flags will come from Khurasan. No power will be able to stop them and they will finally reach Eela, (Baitul Maqdas, “The Holy House” in Jerusalem) where they will erect their flags”.
Without doubt, the taking of Jerusalem is high on the agenda of the Islamic State. It is also high on the agenda of the Palestinians within the land of Israel. The Hamas Covenant again refers to the idea of the black flags. Article 6 states of their movement: “It strives to raise the banner of Allah over every inch of Palestine”. This is the significance of the black flags of the Islamic State being raised over the surrounding territories. The intended next placement for them is clearly in Israel. They also see the assault on Israel and the Jews as hastening the last day. Article 7 of the Hamas Covenant states: “The Prophet, Allah bless him and grant him salvation, has said: "The Day of Judgement will not come about until Moslems fight the Jews (killing the Jews), when the Jew will hide behind stones and trees. The stones and trees will say O Moslems, O Abdulla, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him””. In their desire for the last day to come, they will surely invade Israel and try to kill the Jews there. The theological basis of the Islamic State is likewise that the last day will be hastened by armed conflict with the Jews. Such an invasion of Israel is required by Bible prophecy before the return of Christ and the day of judgment. The Moslems will seek to bring this about by invading Israel and killing as many Jews as they can; this is the basis of their invasion of Israel.
I have made the point earlier that the latter day invasion of the eretz / land / earth of Israel will be distinctly religiously motivated. There will be a conscious attempt to fulfil the words of the Koran and Hadith. Islamic prophetic tradition in the Hadith predicts:
“Armies carrying black flags will come from Khurasan (This could refer to Afghanistan, the home of Al-Qaeda; or to Kurdistan- the area where the Islamic State currently is developing). No power will be able to stop them and they will finally reach Eela (Baitul Maqdas in Jerusalem) where they will erect their flags.” Baitul Maqdas or “the holy house” is referring to the Temple Mount in Jerusalem. Source: http://musliminsuffer.wordpress.com/2008/10/14/victorious-army-of-black-banners . Abdul Rahman al-Wahabi in The Day of Wrath states:
“The final battle will be waged by Muslim faithful coming on the backs of horses… carrying black banners. They will stand on the East side of the Jordan River and will wage war that the earth has never seen before. The true Messiah who is the Islamic Mahdi will defeat Europe, will lead this army of Seljuks [Turks]. He will preside over the world from Jerusalem because Mecca would have been destroyed”. Other parts of the Hadith claim:
“The black flags will come from the East, led by mighty men, with long hair and beards, their surnames are taken from the names of their home towns (i.e. Khosti or from Khost etc.) and their first names are from a “Kunya”(Asmal Masalik Lieyyam Mahdiyy Maliki Li Kull-id Dunya Biemrillah-il Malik, Qalda bin Zayd) . We note that the Islamic State is insisting that all men must grow beards in the areas they occupy.
“If you see the Black Banners coming from Khurasan go to them immediately, even if you must crawl over ice, because indeed amongst them is the Caliph, Al Mahdi.” [Narrated on authority of Ibn Majah, Al-Hakim, Ahmad]. All the talk of following the Caliph, the leader of the IS, fits in with the Biblical picture of a specific antiChrist figure developing in the last days. There has been no Caliph in the Moslem world since 1924- until Al-Baghdadi, leader of the IS, was declared Caliph in 2014.
“Surely Black Flags will appear from the Khorasan until the people (under the leadership of this flag) will tie their horses with the Olive Trees between Bait-e-Lahya and Harasta. We asked are there any Olive trees between these places. He said, ‘If there isn’t then soon it will grow so that those people(of Khorasan) will come and tie their horses there’”. Beit Lahia is a town under Palestinian Authority of about 40,000 people in the northern Gaza Strip. Harasta, also known as Harasta al-Basal, is a Syrian city administratively belonging to Rif Dimashq. This is the situation foretold in Is. 9:12 “The Syrians before and the Philistines behind … shall devour Israel with open mouth”. Beit Lahia is a center of Hamas terrorist activity against Israel, and has frequently been the focus of Israeli raids and bombardment- http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-28290018 . The uprising in the Gaza Strip is clearly orchestrated and funded by ISIS.
“If you see the black (meaning war) flags coming from Khurasan (Afghanistan), join that army, even if you have to crawl over ice, for this is the army of the Caliph, the Mahdi and no one can stop that army until it reaches Jerusalem.”
“They will defeat the companions of The Sufyaani until he comes to the House of Jerusalem where he will establish his power for the Mahdi, and he will be supplied with three hundred (men) from Syria after his arrival and the matter will be settled for the Mahdi. The eminent saints (Al-Abdal) of Syria and the best people of Iraq will come to him and swear allegiance to him
he will send an army to Iraq and kill a hundred thousand in Az-Zawra. So join him in Mecca — he is the Mahdi!” Then, Hudhayfah asked: ‘O Messenger of Allah, how shall we know him?’ He replied: “He is a man from my children, he looks like the men from the children of Israel, upon him are two white cloaks with frayed edges”. His face is like a colourful, glittering star”.
“The Prophet said: “The Mahdi is a man from my children. His face is like a glittering star, his skin is the colour of an Arab, and his body is like that of Israel. He will fill the earth with justice just as it will have been filled by injustice, and the dwellers of Heaven and Earth will be pleased with his Caliphate”.
There is a conscious attempt by the IS to fulfil these predictions. The black flag has been observed amidst the protests and riots in Egypt, Libya, Sudan, Nigeria, Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq, Syria, Kuwait, Bahrain, Iran, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Afghanistan, Indonesia, India, Turkey, Jerusalem, Gaza and even Germany, Australia and England. Across the world, Muslims of every race, tribe and nation are marching under the same black banner. Another name for the flag in Arabic is al-Ùqāb, and is sometimes referred to as “the Eagle”; just as the British flag is called ‘The Union Jack’ and the American flag ‘The stars and stripes’. And the eagle is a symbol of Israel’s historical enemies.
IS Aims for Jerusalem
“Armies carrying black flags will come from Khurasan. No power will be able to stop them and they will finally reach Eela, (Baitul Maqdas, “The Holy House” in Jerusalem) where they will erect their flags”.
Without doubt, the taking of Jerusalem is high on the agenda of the Islamic State. It is also high on the agenda of the Palestinians within the land of Israel. The Hamas Covenant again refers to the idea of the black flags. Article 6 states of their movement: “It strives to raise the banner of Allah over every inch of Palestine”. This is the significance of the black flags of the Islamic State being raised over the surrounding territories. The intended next placement for them is clearly in Israel. They also see the assault on Israel and the Jews as hastening the last day. Article 7 of the Hamas Covenant states: “The Prophet, Allah bless him and grant him salvation, has said: "The Day of Judgement will not come about until Moslems fight the Jews (killing the Jews), when the Jew will hide behind stones and trees. The stones and trees will say O Moslems, O Abdulla, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him””. In their desire for the last day to come, they will surely invade Israel and try to kill the Jews there. The theological basis of the Islamic State is likewise that the last day will be hastened by armed conflict with the Jews. Such an invasion of Israel is required by Bible prophecy before the return of Christ and the day of judgment. The Moslems will seek to bring this about by invading Israel and killing as many Jews as they can; this is the basis of their invasion of Israel.
Chapter 2.3: Micah 5
Chapter 2.3: Micah 5
2.3 Micah 5
Micah 5 speaks of how “the Assyrian” will be in conflict with the Lord Jesus, the one born in Bethlehem who will become “great unto the ends of the earth” at His return to earth when His brethren ‘return’ to Him (Mic. 5:1-4). The establishment of the Kingdom on earth and repentance of Israel will occur “when the Assyrian shall come into our land” and the Lord Jesus saves them from the invasion. This latter day Assyrian will “tread down our palaces” (Mic. 5:5). This is likely an intensive plural for the great palace of Israel, the temple. The Lord Jesus uses this language in predicting that Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles until “the times of the Gentiles” are fulfilled (Lk. 21:24). These times of Gentile treading down of Jerusalem likely refer to the 1260 days / three and a half years of the final tribulation. The treading down of Jerusalem will therefore be by “the Assyrian”, and capturing Jerusalem is the great goal of militant Islam and the Islamic State. This is the treading down of God’s people to be done by the little horn of Dan. 8:10. The little horn is therefore “the Assyrian”; and a charismatic leader of the Islamic State would fit the job description exactly.
2.3 Micah 5
Micah 5 speaks of how “the Assyrian” will be in conflict with the Lord Jesus, the one born in Bethlehem who will become “great unto the ends of the earth” at His return to earth when His brethren ‘return’ to Him (Mic. 5:1-4). The establishment of the Kingdom on earth and repentance of Israel will occur “when the Assyrian shall come into our land” and the Lord Jesus saves them from the invasion. This latter day Assyrian will “tread down our palaces” (Mic. 5:5). This is likely an intensive plural for the great palace of Israel, the temple. The Lord Jesus uses this language in predicting that Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles until “the times of the Gentiles” are fulfilled (Lk. 21:24). These times of Gentile treading down of Jerusalem likely refer to the 1260 days / three and a half years of the final tribulation. The treading down of Jerusalem will therefore be by “the Assyrian”, and capturing Jerusalem is the great goal of militant Islam and the Islamic State. This is the treading down of God’s people to be done by the little horn of Dan. 8:10. The little horn is therefore “the Assyrian”; and a charismatic leader of the Islamic State would fit the job description exactly.
Chapter 2.2: Daniel 11
Chapter 2.2: Daniel 11
2.2 Daniel 11
Daniel 11 speaks of an invasion of Israel by “the king of the north” which results in a time of trouble for Israel such as never was, and the standing up of ‘Michael’ and the resurrection of the dead. The period of history between Dan. 11:39 and :40 is not described because it is irrelevant to the Jews in Israel, just as there is a gap in fulfilment between the iron legs and the feet in the historical outworking of the image in Daniel 2. The section speaking of the last days begins by saying that the king of the north hears “tidings” (Dan. 11:44). The same word is used of Assyria at the time of her invasion of Israel and siege of Jerusalem: " I will send a blast upon him, and he shall hear a rumour, and shall return to his own land" (2 Kings 19:7). Thus at the very time of Assyria's destruction by God, her previous allies turned against her, exemplifying how Arab in-fighting will be one of the means which God will use to finally destroy them (Zech. 14:13, etc.). "A blast" (Heb. 'ruach', a spirit/angel?) being sent upon Sennacherib is the same term used about Pharaoh's destruction (Ex. 15:8) and that of Babylon (Jer. 51:1), both of which are typical of the final Islamic defeat. Babylon also hears 'rumours' at the time of her destruction (Jer. 51:46). It is to these 'rumours' of wars within the land / earth promised to Abraham which Christ may allude in Mt. 24:6, speaking of "rumours of wars" in the very last days. The smaller nations associated with Babylon/Assyria also hear "tidings" (same word translated "rumour") in Jer. 49:23, showing that they meet the same judgment as 'Assyria' to some extent.
Close analysis of Dan. 11:40-44 reveals that it is couched in terms of the Ez. 38 invasion, which is based upon that of Assyria. However, it is also full of direct allusions to the Assyrian invasion:
"The king of the north" (Dan. 11:40) - Assyria (cp. Zeph.2:13).
"Shall come against him like a whirlwind" (Dan. 11:40), as God will against the invaders in response to this (Zech. 9:14; Is. 28:2). God comes up "like a storm... a cloud to cover the land" in a similar way (Ez. 38:9). A whirlwind attacks from all sides. The combined typology of the previous invasions has shown them coming from all points of the compass. The final combined 'Assyrian' invasion will also have this feature, as it did in Hezekiah's time.
"With chariots, and with horsemen" (Dan. 11:40), for which the Assyrians were famous, and Gog likewise (Ez. 38:4).
"He shall enter into the countries" (Dan. 11:40) as Assyria did en route to Israel; "and shall overflow and pass over" (Dan. 11:40), as Assyria under Sennacherib (Is. 8:8; 43:2) and Babylon (Jer. 47:2) are said to have done. The Hebrew root for "overflow" means "to cleanse", occurring in Ez. 16:19 concerning God 'thoroughly washing away' Israel's sins in the last days, as a result of their final tribulations. Thus the 'Assyrian' 'overflowing' of the land in the last days will result in Israel's spiritual cleansing. "The consumption decreed (the final invasion) shall overflow in righteousness" (Is. 10:22). "He shall enter also into the land of delight" (Dan 11:41 A.V. mg.). At the time of Sennacherib's destruction, God termed the land 'delight' (Is. 62:4).
This could indicate that this invasion comes after the return of Christ and the establishment of the Kingdom. The ambiguity is because of the 'variable' timing of Christ's return, seeing this is related to Israel's spiritual reformation - at least it appears this is how God wishes us to see it.
"Many countries shall be overthrown" (Dan. 11:41). 2 Kings 18:34 lists these countries in the Sennacherib context. This confirms that there will be conflict throughout the land / earth immediately prior to the final 'Assyrian' attack on Israel. We are seeing this before our eyes.
"But these shall escape out of his hand, even Edom, and Moab, and the chief ('rosh') of the children of Ammon (Dan. 11:41). These areas were not meddled with by Sennacherib. There is a triple emphasis on how the other nations fell into his "hand" in 2 Kings 18:33-35.
"He shall stretch forth his hand also upon the countries” continues this "hand" connection, "and the land of Egypt shall not escape" (Dan. 11:42). There is a possible allusion here to Moses stretching out his hand upon Egypt (Ex. 9:15), which would show that the latter-day "king of the North" will claim that he has received Divine guidance to judge Israel. Assyria's invasion of Egypt was associated with that of Israel, further demonstrating that the invasion of Dan. 11:40-43 is alluding to Sennacherib's battle plan.
"He shall have power over the treasures of gold and silver" (Dan. 11:43). We are seeing the IS fulfil this by taking over oil wealth as well as billions of dollars of gold reserves.
"The Libyans and the Ethiopians shall be at his steps" (Dan. 11:43) may appear to contradict Ethiopia suddenly becoming opposed to Assyria during the final attack on Jerusalem (2 Kings 19:9). This can be reconciled by realizing that Dan. 11 speaks of two phases in this final invasion. Ethiopia is with Assyria during the blitzkrieg towards and through Israel, but is not necessarily with her in the final 'going forth with great fury' against Jerusalem (Dan. 11:44).
There were these same two phases in the Assyrian prototype - the "great fury" of the king of the north is modelled upon Sennacherib's rage of 2 Kings 19:27,28. The fact that Ethiopia is described as being with Gog in the Ezek. 38 invasion may be an indication that this prophecy is not concerning the final push on Jerusalem, but rather the Assyrian/Arab pillaging of the land for "a spoil and a prey... cattle and goods" (Ez. 38:12) after the pattern of the neighbouring peoples raiding the land in the Judges period. Ethiopia being mentioned in tandem with Libya in both Ez. 38:5 and Dan. 11:43 could suggest that the North African Arabs break ranks with those of 'Assyria' during the attack on Jerusalem, as evidently occurred in Hezekiah's time (2 Kings 19:9).
"He shall plant the tabernacles of his palace... in the glorious holy mountain" of Zion (Dan. 11:45) is the language of Is. 14:13,14 concerning both Sennacherib and Nebuchadnezzar desiring to take Jerusalem. Thus Dan. 11:45 is saying that the latter-day Assyria/Babylon will do this, seeing that Jerusalem will be taken by their final invasion (Zech. 14:2). Dan. 12:1 says that it is at this time of the latter-day Assyrian/ "king of the north" being in Jerusalem, that Israel will suffer "a time of trouble such as never was", out of which the righteous remnant will be delivered ("every one that shall be found written in the book") by God's intervention, which will be associated with the resurrection (Dan. 12:2).
2.2 Daniel 11
Daniel 11 speaks of an invasion of Israel by “the king of the north” which results in a time of trouble for Israel such as never was, and the standing up of ‘Michael’ and the resurrection of the dead. The period of history between Dan. 11:39 and :40 is not described because it is irrelevant to the Jews in Israel, just as there is a gap in fulfilment between the iron legs and the feet in the historical outworking of the image in Daniel 2. The section speaking of the last days begins by saying that the king of the north hears “tidings” (Dan. 11:44). The same word is used of Assyria at the time of her invasion of Israel and siege of Jerusalem: " I will send a blast upon him, and he shall hear a rumour, and shall return to his own land" (2 Kings 19:7). Thus at the very time of Assyria's destruction by God, her previous allies turned against her, exemplifying how Arab in-fighting will be one of the means which God will use to finally destroy them (Zech. 14:13, etc.). "A blast" (Heb. 'ruach', a spirit/angel?) being sent upon Sennacherib is the same term used about Pharaoh's destruction (Ex. 15:8) and that of Babylon (Jer. 51:1), both of which are typical of the final Islamic defeat. Babylon also hears 'rumours' at the time of her destruction (Jer. 51:46). It is to these 'rumours' of wars within the land / earth promised to Abraham which Christ may allude in Mt. 24:6, speaking of "rumours of wars" in the very last days. The smaller nations associated with Babylon/Assyria also hear "tidings" (same word translated "rumour") in Jer. 49:23, showing that they meet the same judgment as 'Assyria' to some extent.
Close analysis of Dan. 11:40-44 reveals that it is couched in terms of the Ez. 38 invasion, which is based upon that of Assyria. However, it is also full of direct allusions to the Assyrian invasion:
"The king of the north" (Dan. 11:40) - Assyria (cp. Zeph.2:13).
"Shall come against him like a whirlwind" (Dan. 11:40), as God will against the invaders in response to this (Zech. 9:14; Is. 28:2). God comes up "like a storm... a cloud to cover the land" in a similar way (Ez. 38:9). A whirlwind attacks from all sides. The combined typology of the previous invasions has shown them coming from all points of the compass. The final combined 'Assyrian' invasion will also have this feature, as it did in Hezekiah's time.
"With chariots, and with horsemen" (Dan. 11:40), for which the Assyrians were famous, and Gog likewise (Ez. 38:4).
"He shall enter into the countries" (Dan. 11:40) as Assyria did en route to Israel; "and shall overflow and pass over" (Dan. 11:40), as Assyria under Sennacherib (Is. 8:8; 43:2) and Babylon (Jer. 47:2) are said to have done. The Hebrew root for "overflow" means "to cleanse", occurring in Ez. 16:19 concerning God 'thoroughly washing away' Israel's sins in the last days, as a result of their final tribulations. Thus the 'Assyrian' 'overflowing' of the land in the last days will result in Israel's spiritual cleansing. "The consumption decreed (the final invasion) shall overflow in righteousness" (Is. 10:22). "He shall enter also into the land of delight" (Dan 11:41 A.V. mg.). At the time of Sennacherib's destruction, God termed the land 'delight' (Is. 62:4).
This could indicate that this invasion comes after the return of Christ and the establishment of the Kingdom. The ambiguity is because of the 'variable' timing of Christ's return, seeing this is related to Israel's spiritual reformation - at least it appears this is how God wishes us to see it.
"Many countries shall be overthrown" (Dan. 11:41). 2 Kings 18:34 lists these countries in the Sennacherib context. This confirms that there will be conflict throughout the land / earth immediately prior to the final 'Assyrian' attack on Israel. We are seeing this before our eyes.
"But these shall escape out of his hand, even Edom, and Moab, and the chief ('rosh') of the children of Ammon (Dan. 11:41). These areas were not meddled with by Sennacherib. There is a triple emphasis on how the other nations fell into his "hand" in 2 Kings 18:33-35.
"He shall stretch forth his hand also upon the countries” continues this "hand" connection, "and the land of Egypt shall not escape" (Dan. 11:42). There is a possible allusion here to Moses stretching out his hand upon Egypt (Ex. 9:15), which would show that the latter-day "king of the North" will claim that he has received Divine guidance to judge Israel. Assyria's invasion of Egypt was associated with that of Israel, further demonstrating that the invasion of Dan. 11:40-43 is alluding to Sennacherib's battle plan.
"He shall have power over the treasures of gold and silver" (Dan. 11:43). We are seeing the IS fulfil this by taking over oil wealth as well as billions of dollars of gold reserves.
"The Libyans and the Ethiopians shall be at his steps" (Dan. 11:43) may appear to contradict Ethiopia suddenly becoming opposed to Assyria during the final attack on Jerusalem (2 Kings 19:9). This can be reconciled by realizing that Dan. 11 speaks of two phases in this final invasion. Ethiopia is with Assyria during the blitzkrieg towards and through Israel, but is not necessarily with her in the final 'going forth with great fury' against Jerusalem (Dan. 11:44).
There were these same two phases in the Assyrian prototype - the "great fury" of the king of the north is modelled upon Sennacherib's rage of 2 Kings 19:27,28. The fact that Ethiopia is described as being with Gog in the Ezek. 38 invasion may be an indication that this prophecy is not concerning the final push on Jerusalem, but rather the Assyrian/Arab pillaging of the land for "a spoil and a prey... cattle and goods" (Ez. 38:12) after the pattern of the neighbouring peoples raiding the land in the Judges period. Ethiopia being mentioned in tandem with Libya in both Ez. 38:5 and Dan. 11:43 could suggest that the North African Arabs break ranks with those of 'Assyria' during the attack on Jerusalem, as evidently occurred in Hezekiah's time (2 Kings 19:9).
"He shall plant the tabernacles of his palace... in the glorious holy mountain" of Zion (Dan. 11:45) is the language of Is. 14:13,14 concerning both Sennacherib and Nebuchadnezzar desiring to take Jerusalem. Thus Dan. 11:45 is saying that the latter-day Assyria/Babylon will do this, seeing that Jerusalem will be taken by their final invasion (Zech. 14:2). Dan. 12:1 says that it is at this time of the latter-day Assyrian/ "king of the north" being in Jerusalem, that Israel will suffer "a time of trouble such as never was", out of which the righteous remnant will be delivered ("every one that shall be found written in the book") by God's intervention, which will be associated with the resurrection (Dan. 12:2).
Chapter 2-1-2: The Nations of Ezekiel 38
Chapter 2-1-2: The Nations of Ezekiel 38
Assyrian Horsemen
Rev. 9:14-18 describes how 200,000,000 horsemen came from just beyond the Euphrates (exactly where the IS hordes are now massed, i.e. historical Babylon/Assyria), using "fire and smoke and brimstone" to punish God's apostate people. This was John in the first century struggling under ‘the tyranny of words’ to describe 21st century warfare. "By these three was the third part of men killed", suggesting that this invading army has three aspects to its work. The huge number of horsemen must allude to the "great company" of horsemen of Ez. 38:4, which we have shown to be rooted in the Assyrian invasion. The 200,000,000 horsemen of Rev. 9:16 may correspond to the fact that history records the strength of the Assyrian army which came against Jerusalem as being 200,000 men. The jihadist culture is full of allusion to horsemen, seeing themselves as the revival of previous horse-mounted Islamic warriors. The motif is common in IS promotional videos:
Jerusalem was truly “compassed with armies” by the Assyrian siege of Jerusalem, and perhaps the Lord has this in mind when He predicted that Jerusalem would again be like this in the last days.
The Context of Ezekiel 38
Ezekiel 38 must be understood within its context. Ezekiel was a captive in Babylon, and the book bearing his name records series of prophecies which he gave. Ez. 33:21 – 39:29 is a complete section within the book. I understand Ez. 33:21,22 to mean that Ezekiel opened his mouth and gave the six prophetic utterances in this section on the night before the exiles received the news that Jerusalem had fallen. It was on the fifth day of the tenth month of the 12th year of the exile (Ez. 33:21). Ezekiel’s mouth was opened by Divine inspiration that evening, and he gave these messages through the night until the messenger arrived in the morning with the news that Jerusalem had fallen. Each of the six messages begin with the rubric “Then the word of the Lord came to me, saying…”. The message has been that Judah shall enter a new covenant, although there will be terrible times of trouble and judgment for both her and her enemies. Jerusalem fell to the Babylonians, and so it is understandable that the invasion described in chapter 38 alludes to the Babylonian invasion, but climaxing in the good news that Messiah’s coming will save Judah and all Israel. The message was that the tragedy of losing Jerusalem was to be repeated again, on an even grander scale, in the last days- and yet it was to be but a prelude to Messiah’s triumphal coming and the permanent establishment of God’s Kingdom based in Israel. The various nations listed in Ez. 38 may well have been those who were confederate with Babylon in the historical invasion of Judah- this would have been their relevance to Ezekiel’s initial audience of captives in Babylon. Ten nations from within the land are listed in total, plus Persia- and Revelation speaks of an entity, a “beast”, dominated by Babylon but having ten horns, or powers, associated with it. These would correspond to the ten toes of the image of Daniel 2. The significance of the nations listed is that they are from every point of the compass around Jerusalem: Gomer and Togarmah from the North, Persia from the East, Cush from the South and Put / Tarshish from the West. The common description of the invasion of Judah by ‘all the nations round about’ thus comes to term in the prophecy of Ez. 38.
The Nations of Ezekiel 38
We naturally want to know who precisely the specific nations refer to. But readers of Ezekiel will have been struck by the fact that a number of the nations listed have already been mentioned in Ezekiel- in prophecies which predict or describe their destruction. Tyre (Tarshish), Meshech and Tubal have all been described as having come to their end (Ez. 27:13; 32:5,26,27; . The impression, therefore, is that there will be a latter day revival of these nations. And that is what we are seeing happening in the lands around Israel, whose peoples and geographical areas were dormant and insignificant for centuries- until their revival in recent times. And now the IS includes many of those territories or ethnic groups. They have arisen out of the barren deserts of the Middle East to become a major player in the geopolitical situation of today. And their intention is clearly and ultimately to invade Israel and destroy the Jews. Indeed, they have already taken much of the eretz / land promised to Abraham. Indeed, Ez. 38:4 opens the prophecy by saying that God will ‘return’ Gog [AV “turn thee back”], and the Hebraism is well translated elsewhere as ‘restore the fortunes of…’. A revived Gog means a revived Assyria / Babylon. The question is, why does Ezekiel not specifically mention Assyria / Babylon as the leader of this group of nations? Why refer obliquely to them as 'Gog'? The answer may be that because Ezekiel was a captive in Babylon at the time, he referred to them under this code name. Peter does the same in referring to Rome under the code name of Babylon (1 Pet. 5:13). It may be that some of the other nations mentioned in Ez. 38 are likewise code names- because it is very hard to conclusively demonstrate that some of the nations or peoples bearing exactly those same names existed in Ezekiel’s time. The description of Gog’s destruction in Ez. 39 is likewise hard to take literally, and this may mesh well with ‘Gog’ being used as a codename. See the later notes on Ezekiel 39.
Sheba, Dedan and the merchants of Tyre / Tarshish (Ez. 38:13) are the nations of the extreme East and West of the land promised to Abraham. The picture is of Israel's enemies coming at her like a whirlwind from all points of the compass. There may not, therefore, be undue significance in the actual names of the nations- rather is the picture being created of all the surrounding nations, from every point of the compass, coming against Israel under the leadership of Gog. The "young lions" of Tyre could refer to "all her kings" [as in the Jewish Targum on this phrase], "all her traders" or "all her villages". The idea that these three nations will join in with the invasion, rather than challenge it, is the implication of the Hebrew. See Jacob Milgrom and Daniel Israel Block, Ezekiel's Hope: A Commentary on Ezekiel 38-48 (Wipf & Stock, 2012) p. 12. The nations with Gog are defined in Ez. 39:18 as “the princes / kings of the earth”- the leaders of the peoples within the earth / eretz promised to Abraham. These are the same “kings of the earth / land” which are so often mentioned in Revelation as coming against God’s people as part of the beast entity (Rev. 6:15; 16:14; 17:2,18; 18:3,9). This alludes to the kings of the earth who are raised up from the borders of the earth / land and come with Babylon to invade Israel (Jer. 50:41). The very idea of ‘the borders of the earth’ suggests that ‘the earth’ doesn’t refer to a sphere like the globe, but rather to a specifically defined territory. That territory is the land promised to Abraham. When we read that all “the kings of the earth” came from the very ends of the earth to hear Solomon’s wisdom, we likewise are to understand “the earth” as the land promised to Abraham. The Queen of Sheba was at the end of that earth / land; but the kings of New Zealand or Hawaii didn’t come.
The manner of Gog’s destruction also hints at the origin of Gog and those with him. They will be destroyed by every man’s sword turning against his brother (Ez. 38:21). But this is the very language of the curse upon Ishmael, the forefather of so many of the Moslem people who now live in the territory of the land promised to Abraham (Gen. 16:12).
The Number of Nations
I have explained elsewhere that the latter day beast with ten horns is to dominate the eretz / land of Israel, the area promised to Abraham from Egypt to the Euphrates. The ten toes of Daniel’s image are rooted in the earth / land, and these are the basis for the ten horns in the later development of that vision in Daniel 7 and Revelation. This entity is dominated by a charismatic leader, the little horn; also expressed in Revelation as the whore riding the beast. In Ezekiel 38, we have ten nations plus Persia, led by an individual called Gog [reading rosh not as a nation but as “chief prince”, as it is always elsewhere translated]. Those ten nations are all from within the land promised to Abraham, because they are extracted from the list of nations in the land in Genesis 10. The picture presented is of ten nations or leaders [horns, toes] from within the land promised to Abraham- perhaps to be fulfilled in an Islamic State dominating that area, with ten leaders or factions or peoples under its control. Plus Persia- Iran. It’s unthinkable given current geopolitics that such an invasion would happen and Iran would not get involved. They will- according to Ezekiel 38. It’s also worth noting that Sheba, Dedan and Tarshish appear to join in the invasion as a separate entity. We are left wondering whether this has relevance to the three horns mentioned separately in Dan. 7:8,20,24.
The Table of Nations in Genesis 10
Another approach is suggested by the way that nearly all of the nations mentioned occur in the table of nations in Genesis 10. Magog, Meshech, Tubal, Cush [AV “Ethiopia”], Put [AV “Libya”], Gomer, Togarmah, Dedan, Tarshish and Sheba are all mentioned there- in fact, all of them apart from Persia (Iran is beyond the land promised to Abraham). The connection between Ezekiel 38 and the Genesis 10 table of nations must therefore be highly significant. That table of nations served as an explanation to ancient Israel of the origins of the nations in the eretz / land promised to Abraham. They wondered why they were attacked and opposed by the peoples of the land- and Moses was given Genesis to explain to them the context of geography and history in which they were situated. Genesis and the Pentateuch are God’s version of history, geography and geopolitics for His people. Given this relevance to the situation in the land promised to Abraham, it is foolhardy to speculate that Shem, Ham or Japheth refer to Africans, Europeans etc. Ham refers specifically to “Canaan”, and his servitude under Shem [Israel]; the predicted tension between Shem and Ham refers to the Jew-Arab tension, and not any other tension such as between black people and white European colonialists. This is just wishful thinking, and reflects the cavalier, opportunistic usage of Bible verses for which 19th century Western European theologians have become famous.
The names of the peoples mentioned are solely relevant to the land promised to Abraham. Thus when we read that Togarmah comes from “the north border [AV”quarters”]” (Ez. 38:6), this refers to the northern limit of the land / eretz promised to Abraham. The allusion to the Genesis 10 list of nations in Ez. 38 would therefore be to signal that the peoples of the land, the kings of the land, would come up against Israel in the last days- and the only outside nation who joins in is Persia / Iran. And that is absolutely imaginable today!. The numerical value in the Hebrew for the term Gog and Magog is seventy- and there are 70 peoples listed in the table of nations in Gen. 10. There is no need to become fixated by issues of historical geography in trying to locate where these peoples may have once lived- they are all within the land promised to Abraham. Any reference to Russia, Turkey, Europe etc. is thereby made inappropriate.
Rev. 20:8 parallels all the nations in the earth / land with Gog: “To deceive the nations which are in the four quarters / borders of the land / earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them together to battle”. The language of deceit is also picking up that of Ezekiel 38 about Gog. "I will drive you forward" (Ez. 39:2, AV "leave the sixth part of thee") appears to be a Hebraism meaning 'I will deceive you' ; see See Jacob Milgrom and Daniel Israel Block, Ezekiel's Hope: A Commentary on Ezekiel 38-48 (Wipf & Stock, 2012) p. 20. Gog is led into the conflict by God, and the entire showdown is not so much between Gog and Israel as between God and Gog. The events in the Middle East are not, therefore, running out of control. All is carefully planned and executed by God, just as the historical Assyrian was a rod in Yahweh's hand, manipulated by Him.
Focus on Jerusalem
The invasion comes against "the navel of the land" (Ez. 38:12). This could be a reference to the ultimate 'high place', Jerusalem. Both the Bible and Judaism speak of ‘going up’ to Jerusalem or ‘coming down’ from there. The Greeks wrote of their sanctuaries at Dydima, Miletus and Delphi as being 'the navel of the land'; so there could be a reference to the temple mount. Or it could allude to how the land currently inhabited by Israel is the highest point in the land promised to Abraham, from the Euphrates to the river of Egypt. Just as Assyria’s focus was upon Jerusalem, so the latter day Assyrian will have the same interest. And that fits an Islamic Assyrian, for Jerusalem is the burning issue for Islam. The many allusions to the Assyrian invasion which we find in Ezekiel 38 are specifically alluding to how Assyria came up against Jerusalem. Gog ‘ascends’ against the once wasted mountains [an intensive plural for the great mountain- Zion?], he ‘comes up’ against the land (Ez. 38:9,11,16; 39:2- quite some emphasis). The language of ‘ascent’ is relevant specifically to ‘going up’ to Jerusalem specifically. And Rev. 20:9 has Gog’s armies specifically coming up against Jerusalem.
Chapter 2-1-3: Israel Dwelling in Peace and Safely
I should sidetrack to explain that Israel dwelling in ‘peace and safety’ in Ez. 38 could refer to the conditions of the Messianic Kingdom; or it could refer to a sense of security which arises in literally the very last days before the Lord’s return, as a result of some peace agreement being reached. Whenever the invasion happens chronologically is not our immediate concern; what is significant is the preparation of the geopolitical situation to enable such a situation. And that is what we are seeing now developing. Further, I calculate ten nations in Ez. 38 on the basis that rosh is a proper noun meaning ‘chief prince’ and doesn’t refer to any nation bearing the name rosh. There was no such nation. All attempts to force this word into equivalence with the Kievan rus, from whence ‘Russia’, are opportunistic and cavalier in the extreme. Because two words contain two identical letters when transliterated doesn’t mean they are one and the same word. Further, I understand “Are you come to take a spoil?” in Ez. 38:13 to not be a challenge, but rather said with the implication ‘Are you going to spoil them? We will come too!’.
The destruction of the Ezekiel 38 invasion is described in Ezekiel 39:17-20 in terms of a great supper, and the language is the basis for the description of the final destruction of "the beast and the kings of the earth and their armies" at the 'bird supper' in Rev. 19:17,18. The nations listed in Ez. 38 are therefore the kings of the earth / land. They cannot, therefore, refer to nations outside of the land promised to Abraham (e.g. England and Russia). The emphasis upon horses in Ez. 38:4-7,9,15,22; 39:4,11 and the destruction / 'eating' of their flesh is matched by the horse mounted nations of Rev. 19:15-21 being destroyed and their flesh likewise 'eaten'. The calling for a sword against Gog is matched by the sword proceeding out of Christ's mouth in Rev. 19. It isn't therefore incidental that Revelation 20:8 goes on to use the terms Gog and Magog in describing the final enemies of God. The nations with Gog and Magog come from "the four corners of the earth / land" (Rev. 20:8), and this is alluding to how the nations with Gog in Ez. 38 are from the four compass points around Israel. This is incidental proof that the ten nations of Ez. 38 are all with Gog; "Are you come to take a spoil?" of Ez. 38:13 is therefore not a protest but rather a joining in with the group spoiling of Israel. The destruction of the Gog invasion by fire (Rev. 20:9) is exactly as in Ez. 38:22; 39:6. I would go with Harry Whittaker's suggestion that this invasion of Rev. 20:8 is when the 1000 year reign is established [not "expired" as in AV]; this would fit with the beast / Gog coming against Christ once He has returned and Israel are dwelling confidently and safely. The beast is destroyed at Christ's return, and yet has a revival. This is very much the theme of the various prophecies about the beast receiving a deadly wound but reviving. Yet the chronological issues should not overly concern us. I have elsewhere explained that Bible prophecy is conditional, and therefore there are various possible outcomes and sequences of events. And further, it seems likely that the nature of time will be compressed or changed around the time of the Lord's return.
The invasion occurs when Israel dwell safely, without bars and gates. This is indeed the language of the Kingdom of God on earth, and the idea of Israel dwelling safely has been used in Ezekiel to describe the situation for Israel after they have repented and accepted Christ (Ez. 34:25,27,28). It could be that the invasion happens after Christ has returned and the little stone has begun to establish Kingdom conditions in the land of Israel. This would then fit with Psalm 2, which describes the kings of the earth [a term used by the IS about themselves] attacking Jerusalem with Christ enthroned there. But this need not make us think that therefore Ezekiel 38 is irrelevant to present conditions. Because Christ could return today and establish His Kingdom in Jerusalem. But the enemies of Israel, Gog and his followers, would have been moved into a position whereby they could immediately then attack Him. Or it could be that in line with predictions in Daniel 8 and 11, Israel make a covenant with their enemies which appears successful, and then when all are saying "peace and safety, then sudden destruction comes". But the very same words are used about Hazor's confident state just before the Babylonian invasion: "Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon has made a plan against you and formed a purpose against you. Rise up, advance against a nation at ease, that dwells securely, declares the LORD, that has no gates or bars, that dwells alone. Their camels shall become plunder, their herds of livestock a spoil" (Jer. 49:30,31). As Babylon invaded Hazor, so the latter day Gog, as a revived Babylon-Assyria, will invade Israel. Hazor was not then in the Kingdom of God; the language rather speaks of self confidence and assurance. This is indeed how the Hebrew word translated "safely" in Ez. 38:14 is elsewhere used (Jud. 8:11; 18:7 "they lived carelessly"; Job 11:18; Prov. 3:29; Is. 32:17 "assuredness"; Is. 47:8 "carelessly"; Ez. 28:26 "with confidence"; 30:9 "careless"; 39:6 "carelessly"; Mic. 2:8 "securely"). Such a position could be brought about by an Israeli military victory against her enemies, or by a peace agreement which appears to hold.
It could be argued that because Ezekiel 38 doesn’t specifically describe any success of the invasion or suffering of Israel, that it therefore describes a futile attack on the Lord Jesus once He is established in Jerusalem. However, the absence of such language doesn’t mean that the invasion will not be successful. It could be that the focus of Ezekiel 38 and 39 is upon the final destruction of the invader, and therefore the suffering of Israel is not mentioned- because that is not the burden of these oracles about Gog. The perspective is not so much upon Gog’s conflict with Israel, but rather upon Gog’s conflict with God. The prophecy is elevating the issue far higher- Gog is to have a showdown with God through making this invasion. Gog comes to take spoil (Ez. 38:12,13). But Zech. 14:1 uses the same word in predicting that Jerusalem will indeed be captured by the final invaders, the women raped, and “your spoil shall be divided in the midst of you”. We must also give due weight to Ez. 39:22: “The house of Israel shall know that I am the LORD their God, from that day forward”. It is their salvation from Gog and the process of Gog’s destruction which persuades Israel that Yahweh is their God “from that day forward”. That reads very awkwardly if they have already repented and are sitting happily in God’s Kingdom when the Ezekiel 38 invasion happens.
Ezekiel 39
The punishment of Gog will include the punishment of those living in "the coastal lands" of the land (Ez. 39:6). This is surely the Gaza Strip. The latter day Assyrian will therefore have connection with the Palestinians in Gaza- which is exactly what we are seeing in the connection between the IS and the Palestinians. We can note that they are described as living peaceably, like Israel in Ez. 38; this might support the suggestion that the peace and safety in the land is brought about by an Israeli-Arab peace accord that appears to last.
Understandable concern has been raised concerning the seven months of burning Gog's corpses, and the rather unreal feel of the punishments of Gog and the cleansing of the land in Ezekiel 39. Notice the usage of the number seven. There are seven enemies of Israel listed in the opening part of Ezekiel 38, joined in later by another three. The enemies have seven weapons (Ez. 39:9), seven years’ worth of fuel is provided by burning them (Ez. 39:9), and it takes seven months to burn the corpses (Ez. 39:12). One wonders whether we are intended to read the 'sevens' literally, or whether this is a device to indicate completeness. If indeed the language here is figurative, then we are the more encouraged to read ‘Gog’ as a codename rather than seek for a literal historico-geographical reference for him.
A Final Comfort
"And My holy Name I will make known in the midst of My people Israel, and I will not let My holy Name be profaned anymore" (Ez. 39:7) surely alludes to the similar language used in Lev. 22:31,32 about the sanctification of God's Name in Israel as a result of their obedience to Him. We can therefore see in this a hint that the invasion leads to Israel's repentance.
Assyrian Horsemen
Rev. 9:14-18 describes how 200,000,000 horsemen came from just beyond the Euphrates (exactly where the IS hordes are now massed, i.e. historical Babylon/Assyria), using "fire and smoke and brimstone" to punish God's apostate people. This was John in the first century struggling under ‘the tyranny of words’ to describe 21st century warfare. "By these three was the third part of men killed", suggesting that this invading army has three aspects to its work. The huge number of horsemen must allude to the "great company" of horsemen of Ez. 38:4, which we have shown to be rooted in the Assyrian invasion. The 200,000,000 horsemen of Rev. 9:16 may correspond to the fact that history records the strength of the Assyrian army which came against Jerusalem as being 200,000 men. The jihadist culture is full of allusion to horsemen, seeing themselves as the revival of previous horse-mounted Islamic warriors. The motif is common in IS promotional videos:
Jerusalem was truly “compassed with armies” by the Assyrian siege of Jerusalem, and perhaps the Lord has this in mind when He predicted that Jerusalem would again be like this in the last days.
The Context of Ezekiel 38
Ezekiel 38 must be understood within its context. Ezekiel was a captive in Babylon, and the book bearing his name records series of prophecies which he gave. Ez. 33:21 – 39:29 is a complete section within the book. I understand Ez. 33:21,22 to mean that Ezekiel opened his mouth and gave the six prophetic utterances in this section on the night before the exiles received the news that Jerusalem had fallen. It was on the fifth day of the tenth month of the 12th year of the exile (Ez. 33:21). Ezekiel’s mouth was opened by Divine inspiration that evening, and he gave these messages through the night until the messenger arrived in the morning with the news that Jerusalem had fallen. Each of the six messages begin with the rubric “Then the word of the Lord came to me, saying…”. The message has been that Judah shall enter a new covenant, although there will be terrible times of trouble and judgment for both her and her enemies. Jerusalem fell to the Babylonians, and so it is understandable that the invasion described in chapter 38 alludes to the Babylonian invasion, but climaxing in the good news that Messiah’s coming will save Judah and all Israel. The message was that the tragedy of losing Jerusalem was to be repeated again, on an even grander scale, in the last days- and yet it was to be but a prelude to Messiah’s triumphal coming and the permanent establishment of God’s Kingdom based in Israel. The various nations listed in Ez. 38 may well have been those who were confederate with Babylon in the historical invasion of Judah- this would have been their relevance to Ezekiel’s initial audience of captives in Babylon. Ten nations from within the land are listed in total, plus Persia- and Revelation speaks of an entity, a “beast”, dominated by Babylon but having ten horns, or powers, associated with it. These would correspond to the ten toes of the image of Daniel 2. The significance of the nations listed is that they are from every point of the compass around Jerusalem: Gomer and Togarmah from the North, Persia from the East, Cush from the South and Put / Tarshish from the West. The common description of the invasion of Judah by ‘all the nations round about’ thus comes to term in the prophecy of Ez. 38.
The Nations of Ezekiel 38
We naturally want to know who precisely the specific nations refer to. But readers of Ezekiel will have been struck by the fact that a number of the nations listed have already been mentioned in Ezekiel- in prophecies which predict or describe their destruction. Tyre (Tarshish), Meshech and Tubal have all been described as having come to their end (Ez. 27:13; 32:5,26,27; . The impression, therefore, is that there will be a latter day revival of these nations. And that is what we are seeing happening in the lands around Israel, whose peoples and geographical areas were dormant and insignificant for centuries- until their revival in recent times. And now the IS includes many of those territories or ethnic groups. They have arisen out of the barren deserts of the Middle East to become a major player in the geopolitical situation of today. And their intention is clearly and ultimately to invade Israel and destroy the Jews. Indeed, they have already taken much of the eretz / land promised to Abraham. Indeed, Ez. 38:4 opens the prophecy by saying that God will ‘return’ Gog [AV “turn thee back”], and the Hebraism is well translated elsewhere as ‘restore the fortunes of…’. A revived Gog means a revived Assyria / Babylon. The question is, why does Ezekiel not specifically mention Assyria / Babylon as the leader of this group of nations? Why refer obliquely to them as 'Gog'? The answer may be that because Ezekiel was a captive in Babylon at the time, he referred to them under this code name. Peter does the same in referring to Rome under the code name of Babylon (1 Pet. 5:13). It may be that some of the other nations mentioned in Ez. 38 are likewise code names- because it is very hard to conclusively demonstrate that some of the nations or peoples bearing exactly those same names existed in Ezekiel’s time. The description of Gog’s destruction in Ez. 39 is likewise hard to take literally, and this may mesh well with ‘Gog’ being used as a codename. See the later notes on Ezekiel 39.
Sheba, Dedan and the merchants of Tyre / Tarshish (Ez. 38:13) are the nations of the extreme East and West of the land promised to Abraham. The picture is of Israel's enemies coming at her like a whirlwind from all points of the compass. There may not, therefore, be undue significance in the actual names of the nations- rather is the picture being created of all the surrounding nations, from every point of the compass, coming against Israel under the leadership of Gog. The "young lions" of Tyre could refer to "all her kings" [as in the Jewish Targum on this phrase], "all her traders" or "all her villages". The idea that these three nations will join in with the invasion, rather than challenge it, is the implication of the Hebrew. See Jacob Milgrom and Daniel Israel Block, Ezekiel's Hope: A Commentary on Ezekiel 38-48 (Wipf & Stock, 2012) p. 12. The nations with Gog are defined in Ez. 39:18 as “the princes / kings of the earth”- the leaders of the peoples within the earth / eretz promised to Abraham. These are the same “kings of the earth / land” which are so often mentioned in Revelation as coming against God’s people as part of the beast entity (Rev. 6:15; 16:14; 17:2,18; 18:3,9). This alludes to the kings of the earth who are raised up from the borders of the earth / land and come with Babylon to invade Israel (Jer. 50:41). The very idea of ‘the borders of the earth’ suggests that ‘the earth’ doesn’t refer to a sphere like the globe, but rather to a specifically defined territory. That territory is the land promised to Abraham. When we read that all “the kings of the earth” came from the very ends of the earth to hear Solomon’s wisdom, we likewise are to understand “the earth” as the land promised to Abraham. The Queen of Sheba was at the end of that earth / land; but the kings of New Zealand or Hawaii didn’t come.
The manner of Gog’s destruction also hints at the origin of Gog and those with him. They will be destroyed by every man’s sword turning against his brother (Ez. 38:21). But this is the very language of the curse upon Ishmael, the forefather of so many of the Moslem people who now live in the territory of the land promised to Abraham (Gen. 16:12).
The Number of Nations
I have explained elsewhere that the latter day beast with ten horns is to dominate the eretz / land of Israel, the area promised to Abraham from Egypt to the Euphrates. The ten toes of Daniel’s image are rooted in the earth / land, and these are the basis for the ten horns in the later development of that vision in Daniel 7 and Revelation. This entity is dominated by a charismatic leader, the little horn; also expressed in Revelation as the whore riding the beast. In Ezekiel 38, we have ten nations plus Persia, led by an individual called Gog [reading rosh not as a nation but as “chief prince”, as it is always elsewhere translated]. Those ten nations are all from within the land promised to Abraham, because they are extracted from the list of nations in the land in Genesis 10. The picture presented is of ten nations or leaders [horns, toes] from within the land promised to Abraham- perhaps to be fulfilled in an Islamic State dominating that area, with ten leaders or factions or peoples under its control. Plus Persia- Iran. It’s unthinkable given current geopolitics that such an invasion would happen and Iran would not get involved. They will- according to Ezekiel 38. It’s also worth noting that Sheba, Dedan and Tarshish appear to join in the invasion as a separate entity. We are left wondering whether this has relevance to the three horns mentioned separately in Dan. 7:8,20,24.
The Table of Nations in Genesis 10
Another approach is suggested by the way that nearly all of the nations mentioned occur in the table of nations in Genesis 10. Magog, Meshech, Tubal, Cush [AV “Ethiopia”], Put [AV “Libya”], Gomer, Togarmah, Dedan, Tarshish and Sheba are all mentioned there- in fact, all of them apart from Persia (Iran is beyond the land promised to Abraham). The connection between Ezekiel 38 and the Genesis 10 table of nations must therefore be highly significant. That table of nations served as an explanation to ancient Israel of the origins of the nations in the eretz / land promised to Abraham. They wondered why they were attacked and opposed by the peoples of the land- and Moses was given Genesis to explain to them the context of geography and history in which they were situated. Genesis and the Pentateuch are God’s version of history, geography and geopolitics for His people. Given this relevance to the situation in the land promised to Abraham, it is foolhardy to speculate that Shem, Ham or Japheth refer to Africans, Europeans etc. Ham refers specifically to “Canaan”, and his servitude under Shem [Israel]; the predicted tension between Shem and Ham refers to the Jew-Arab tension, and not any other tension such as between black people and white European colonialists. This is just wishful thinking, and reflects the cavalier, opportunistic usage of Bible verses for which 19th century Western European theologians have become famous.
The names of the peoples mentioned are solely relevant to the land promised to Abraham. Thus when we read that Togarmah comes from “the north border [AV”quarters”]” (Ez. 38:6), this refers to the northern limit of the land / eretz promised to Abraham. The allusion to the Genesis 10 list of nations in Ez. 38 would therefore be to signal that the peoples of the land, the kings of the land, would come up against Israel in the last days- and the only outside nation who joins in is Persia / Iran. And that is absolutely imaginable today!. The numerical value in the Hebrew for the term Gog and Magog is seventy- and there are 70 peoples listed in the table of nations in Gen. 10. There is no need to become fixated by issues of historical geography in trying to locate where these peoples may have once lived- they are all within the land promised to Abraham. Any reference to Russia, Turkey, Europe etc. is thereby made inappropriate.
Rev. 20:8 parallels all the nations in the earth / land with Gog: “To deceive the nations which are in the four quarters / borders of the land / earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them together to battle”. The language of deceit is also picking up that of Ezekiel 38 about Gog. "I will drive you forward" (Ez. 39:2, AV "leave the sixth part of thee") appears to be a Hebraism meaning 'I will deceive you' ; see See Jacob Milgrom and Daniel Israel Block, Ezekiel's Hope: A Commentary on Ezekiel 38-48 (Wipf & Stock, 2012) p. 20. Gog is led into the conflict by God, and the entire showdown is not so much between Gog and Israel as between God and Gog. The events in the Middle East are not, therefore, running out of control. All is carefully planned and executed by God, just as the historical Assyrian was a rod in Yahweh's hand, manipulated by Him.
Focus on Jerusalem
The invasion comes against "the navel of the land" (Ez. 38:12). This could be a reference to the ultimate 'high place', Jerusalem. Both the Bible and Judaism speak of ‘going up’ to Jerusalem or ‘coming down’ from there. The Greeks wrote of their sanctuaries at Dydima, Miletus and Delphi as being 'the navel of the land'; so there could be a reference to the temple mount. Or it could allude to how the land currently inhabited by Israel is the highest point in the land promised to Abraham, from the Euphrates to the river of Egypt. Just as Assyria’s focus was upon Jerusalem, so the latter day Assyrian will have the same interest. And that fits an Islamic Assyrian, for Jerusalem is the burning issue for Islam. The many allusions to the Assyrian invasion which we find in Ezekiel 38 are specifically alluding to how Assyria came up against Jerusalem. Gog ‘ascends’ against the once wasted mountains [an intensive plural for the great mountain- Zion?], he ‘comes up’ against the land (Ez. 38:9,11,16; 39:2- quite some emphasis). The language of ‘ascent’ is relevant specifically to ‘going up’ to Jerusalem specifically. And Rev. 20:9 has Gog’s armies specifically coming up against Jerusalem.
Chapter 2-1-3: Israel Dwelling in Peace and Safely
I should sidetrack to explain that Israel dwelling in ‘peace and safety’ in Ez. 38 could refer to the conditions of the Messianic Kingdom; or it could refer to a sense of security which arises in literally the very last days before the Lord’s return, as a result of some peace agreement being reached. Whenever the invasion happens chronologically is not our immediate concern; what is significant is the preparation of the geopolitical situation to enable such a situation. And that is what we are seeing now developing. Further, I calculate ten nations in Ez. 38 on the basis that rosh is a proper noun meaning ‘chief prince’ and doesn’t refer to any nation bearing the name rosh. There was no such nation. All attempts to force this word into equivalence with the Kievan rus, from whence ‘Russia’, are opportunistic and cavalier in the extreme. Because two words contain two identical letters when transliterated doesn’t mean they are one and the same word. Further, I understand “Are you come to take a spoil?” in Ez. 38:13 to not be a challenge, but rather said with the implication ‘Are you going to spoil them? We will come too!’.
The destruction of the Ezekiel 38 invasion is described in Ezekiel 39:17-20 in terms of a great supper, and the language is the basis for the description of the final destruction of "the beast and the kings of the earth and their armies" at the 'bird supper' in Rev. 19:17,18. The nations listed in Ez. 38 are therefore the kings of the earth / land. They cannot, therefore, refer to nations outside of the land promised to Abraham (e.g. England and Russia). The emphasis upon horses in Ez. 38:4-7,9,15,22; 39:4,11 and the destruction / 'eating' of their flesh is matched by the horse mounted nations of Rev. 19:15-21 being destroyed and their flesh likewise 'eaten'. The calling for a sword against Gog is matched by the sword proceeding out of Christ's mouth in Rev. 19. It isn't therefore incidental that Revelation 20:8 goes on to use the terms Gog and Magog in describing the final enemies of God. The nations with Gog and Magog come from "the four corners of the earth / land" (Rev. 20:8), and this is alluding to how the nations with Gog in Ez. 38 are from the four compass points around Israel. This is incidental proof that the ten nations of Ez. 38 are all with Gog; "Are you come to take a spoil?" of Ez. 38:13 is therefore not a protest but rather a joining in with the group spoiling of Israel. The destruction of the Gog invasion by fire (Rev. 20:9) is exactly as in Ez. 38:22; 39:6. I would go with Harry Whittaker's suggestion that this invasion of Rev. 20:8 is when the 1000 year reign is established [not "expired" as in AV]; this would fit with the beast / Gog coming against Christ once He has returned and Israel are dwelling confidently and safely. The beast is destroyed at Christ's return, and yet has a revival. This is very much the theme of the various prophecies about the beast receiving a deadly wound but reviving. Yet the chronological issues should not overly concern us. I have elsewhere explained that Bible prophecy is conditional, and therefore there are various possible outcomes and sequences of events. And further, it seems likely that the nature of time will be compressed or changed around the time of the Lord's return.
The invasion occurs when Israel dwell safely, without bars and gates. This is indeed the language of the Kingdom of God on earth, and the idea of Israel dwelling safely has been used in Ezekiel to describe the situation for Israel after they have repented and accepted Christ (Ez. 34:25,27,28). It could be that the invasion happens after Christ has returned and the little stone has begun to establish Kingdom conditions in the land of Israel. This would then fit with Psalm 2, which describes the kings of the earth [a term used by the IS about themselves] attacking Jerusalem with Christ enthroned there. But this need not make us think that therefore Ezekiel 38 is irrelevant to present conditions. Because Christ could return today and establish His Kingdom in Jerusalem. But the enemies of Israel, Gog and his followers, would have been moved into a position whereby they could immediately then attack Him. Or it could be that in line with predictions in Daniel 8 and 11, Israel make a covenant with their enemies which appears successful, and then when all are saying "peace and safety, then sudden destruction comes". But the very same words are used about Hazor's confident state just before the Babylonian invasion: "Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon has made a plan against you and formed a purpose against you. Rise up, advance against a nation at ease, that dwells securely, declares the LORD, that has no gates or bars, that dwells alone. Their camels shall become plunder, their herds of livestock a spoil" (Jer. 49:30,31). As Babylon invaded Hazor, so the latter day Gog, as a revived Babylon-Assyria, will invade Israel. Hazor was not then in the Kingdom of God; the language rather speaks of self confidence and assurance. This is indeed how the Hebrew word translated "safely" in Ez. 38:14 is elsewhere used (Jud. 8:11; 18:7 "they lived carelessly"; Job 11:18; Prov. 3:29; Is. 32:17 "assuredness"; Is. 47:8 "carelessly"; Ez. 28:26 "with confidence"; 30:9 "careless"; 39:6 "carelessly"; Mic. 2:8 "securely"). Such a position could be brought about by an Israeli military victory against her enemies, or by a peace agreement which appears to hold.
It could be argued that because Ezekiel 38 doesn’t specifically describe any success of the invasion or suffering of Israel, that it therefore describes a futile attack on the Lord Jesus once He is established in Jerusalem. However, the absence of such language doesn’t mean that the invasion will not be successful. It could be that the focus of Ezekiel 38 and 39 is upon the final destruction of the invader, and therefore the suffering of Israel is not mentioned- because that is not the burden of these oracles about Gog. The perspective is not so much upon Gog’s conflict with Israel, but rather upon Gog’s conflict with God. The prophecy is elevating the issue far higher- Gog is to have a showdown with God through making this invasion. Gog comes to take spoil (Ez. 38:12,13). But Zech. 14:1 uses the same word in predicting that Jerusalem will indeed be captured by the final invaders, the women raped, and “your spoil shall be divided in the midst of you”. We must also give due weight to Ez. 39:22: “The house of Israel shall know that I am the LORD their God, from that day forward”. It is their salvation from Gog and the process of Gog’s destruction which persuades Israel that Yahweh is their God “from that day forward”. That reads very awkwardly if they have already repented and are sitting happily in God’s Kingdom when the Ezekiel 38 invasion happens.
Ezekiel 39
The punishment of Gog will include the punishment of those living in "the coastal lands" of the land (Ez. 39:6). This is surely the Gaza Strip. The latter day Assyrian will therefore have connection with the Palestinians in Gaza- which is exactly what we are seeing in the connection between the IS and the Palestinians. We can note that they are described as living peaceably, like Israel in Ez. 38; this might support the suggestion that the peace and safety in the land is brought about by an Israeli-Arab peace accord that appears to last.
Understandable concern has been raised concerning the seven months of burning Gog's corpses, and the rather unreal feel of the punishments of Gog and the cleansing of the land in Ezekiel 39. Notice the usage of the number seven. There are seven enemies of Israel listed in the opening part of Ezekiel 38, joined in later by another three. The enemies have seven weapons (Ez. 39:9), seven years’ worth of fuel is provided by burning them (Ez. 39:9), and it takes seven months to burn the corpses (Ez. 39:12). One wonders whether we are intended to read the 'sevens' literally, or whether this is a device to indicate completeness. If indeed the language here is figurative, then we are the more encouraged to read ‘Gog’ as a codename rather than seek for a literal historico-geographical reference for him.
A Final Comfort
"And My holy Name I will make known in the midst of My people Israel, and I will not let My holy Name be profaned anymore" (Ez. 39:7) surely alludes to the similar language used in Lev. 22:31,32 about the sanctification of God's Name in Israel as a result of their obedience to Him. We can therefore see in this a hint that the invasion leads to Israel's repentance.
Chapter 2-1: Gog as Antichrist
Chapter 2-1: Gog as Antichrist
Gog is a personal name, he will be the rosh or prince / caliph of the invading group of nations. The only Biblical Gog was an Israelite who went away from the core of Israelite worship and lived on the East of Jordan, and later assimilated into the Assyrian territories and lived on the banks of the Euphrates (1 Chron. 5:4-9,25,26). The Biblical Gog is therefore from the far northern boundary of the land promised to Abraham, the ends of the eretz / earth. Gog is described as coming from his homeland in the uttermost parts of the north (Ez. 38:15). His origin will be on the northern edge of the land promised to Abraham- which is the Euphrates River. This, then, is the location of Magog; which would explain why there are no cuneiform inscriptions bearing this name. It is simply the land of Gog, and its exact location is irrelevant- it’s simply presented as a territory on the far northern border of the land promised to Abraham. And this is the birthplace of the current leader of the IS. We can look for the latter day Gog to be born somewhere along the Euphrates River.
The usage of the term Gog suggests that this invasion is being made and led by a false Israel. And we find that idea continued when the invaders are described as “a great company” (Ez. 38:4,7,13,15); yet the qahal is a term usually used about the congregation of Israel (Ps. 22:26; 35:18; 40:10,11; Ezra 10:1). Gog is “the chief prince” (Ez. 38:2), but this term is elsewhere used only of the chief princes of the tribes of Israel (Num. 10:4; 36:1). The invaders “come to a land”, Israel (Ez. 38:8)- using the very expression used of how Israel were to “come to a land”, that of Israel (Lev. 14:34; Num. 15:2; 34:2; Dt. 8:7; 17:14; 18:9; 26:1; 32:52). Likewise the beast / whore in Revelation is described in terms of Solomon’s Kingdom, trading in the same goods, and associated with the number 666 as Solomon was (1 Kings 10:14). The point may be that the beast / whore system is a fake Israel, a mock Kingdom of God. Which fits ISIS and Islam. The anti-Christ doesn't mean so much 'against Christ' as 'that which appears as Christ', in the place of Christ. And likewise there is a fake Kingdom of God, a pseudo-Israel... which is what Islam created when Mohammed in the Quran twisted the Genesis record to make the Arab peoples 'Isaac' and the Jews from Jacob as 'Ishmael'. And this would explain why the codename for the leader of the invasion is Gog, an apostate Israelite who likewise lived on the Euphrates.
Other References to Gog
It’s worth noting that some versions of the LXX in the apocryphal book of Sirach 48:17 speak of Gog coming to Jerusalem at the time of the Assyrian invasion at Hezekiah’s time. This would definitely associate Gog with the leader of an Assyrian invasion. It’s also interesting that the LXX of Dt. 3:1,13; 4:47 speaks of “Og king of Bashan” as “Gog”. Bashan refers to the area of the Golan Heights- the northern entrance to Israel, on the border with Syria. This is exactly where the IS are building up their forces and this would be the logical invasion point into Israel.
Haman “the Agagite” is surely another prototype for Gog; Agag and Gog are very similar original words. The similarity is not simply in the similarity of the names. The “wicked device” or plan of Haman to destroy the Jews (Esther 8:3,5; 9:25) is described with the very same word used of how Gog thinks up an evil plan against Israel (Ez. 38:10).
We should note that “Gog” occurs in another place in the LXX, but not in the Masoretic Text: “Thus has the Lord God shewed me; and, behold, a swarm of locusts coming from the east; and, behold, one caterpillar, king Gog” (Am. 7:1). Israel’s enemies are typically described as coming from the north, because armies from Babylon and Assyria [to the East of Israel] would follow the transport routes along the Euphrates and then come down from the north into Israel- rather than marching across the trackless desert. But Gog is described as coming “from the east”. This makes sense if Gog is a person, rather than a nation or army. His origin was to the east of Israel. The “locusts” whom he leads connect with the Assyrians being called locusts (Is. 33:4), and the locusts of Rev. 9:3,7 being paralleled with thousands of horsemen coming against Israel from the Euphrates. Before dismissing the LXX too quickly, remember that the vast majority of Old Testament quotations found in the New Testament are from the LXX, and that version is often preferred over the Hebrew [Masoretic] Text.
Gog is a personal name, he will be the rosh or prince / caliph of the invading group of nations. The only Biblical Gog was an Israelite who went away from the core of Israelite worship and lived on the East of Jordan, and later assimilated into the Assyrian territories and lived on the banks of the Euphrates (1 Chron. 5:4-9,25,26). The Biblical Gog is therefore from the far northern boundary of the land promised to Abraham, the ends of the eretz / earth. Gog is described as coming from his homeland in the uttermost parts of the north (Ez. 38:15). His origin will be on the northern edge of the land promised to Abraham- which is the Euphrates River. This, then, is the location of Magog; which would explain why there are no cuneiform inscriptions bearing this name. It is simply the land of Gog, and its exact location is irrelevant- it’s simply presented as a territory on the far northern border of the land promised to Abraham. And this is the birthplace of the current leader of the IS. We can look for the latter day Gog to be born somewhere along the Euphrates River.
The usage of the term Gog suggests that this invasion is being made and led by a false Israel. And we find that idea continued when the invaders are described as “a great company” (Ez. 38:4,7,13,15); yet the qahal is a term usually used about the congregation of Israel (Ps. 22:26; 35:18; 40:10,11; Ezra 10:1). Gog is “the chief prince” (Ez. 38:2), but this term is elsewhere used only of the chief princes of the tribes of Israel (Num. 10:4; 36:1). The invaders “come to a land”, Israel (Ez. 38:8)- using the very expression used of how Israel were to “come to a land”, that of Israel (Lev. 14:34; Num. 15:2; 34:2; Dt. 8:7; 17:14; 18:9; 26:1; 32:52). Likewise the beast / whore in Revelation is described in terms of Solomon’s Kingdom, trading in the same goods, and associated with the number 666 as Solomon was (1 Kings 10:14). The point may be that the beast / whore system is a fake Israel, a mock Kingdom of God. Which fits ISIS and Islam. The anti-Christ doesn't mean so much 'against Christ' as 'that which appears as Christ', in the place of Christ. And likewise there is a fake Kingdom of God, a pseudo-Israel... which is what Islam created when Mohammed in the Quran twisted the Genesis record to make the Arab peoples 'Isaac' and the Jews from Jacob as 'Ishmael'. And this would explain why the codename for the leader of the invasion is Gog, an apostate Israelite who likewise lived on the Euphrates.
Other References to Gog
It’s worth noting that some versions of the LXX in the apocryphal book of Sirach 48:17 speak of Gog coming to Jerusalem at the time of the Assyrian invasion at Hezekiah’s time. This would definitely associate Gog with the leader of an Assyrian invasion. It’s also interesting that the LXX of Dt. 3:1,13; 4:47 speaks of “Og king of Bashan” as “Gog”. Bashan refers to the area of the Golan Heights- the northern entrance to Israel, on the border with Syria. This is exactly where the IS are building up their forces and this would be the logical invasion point into Israel.
Haman “the Agagite” is surely another prototype for Gog; Agag and Gog are very similar original words. The similarity is not simply in the similarity of the names. The “wicked device” or plan of Haman to destroy the Jews (Esther 8:3,5; 9:25) is described with the very same word used of how Gog thinks up an evil plan against Israel (Ez. 38:10).
We should note that “Gog” occurs in another place in the LXX, but not in the Masoretic Text: “Thus has the Lord God shewed me; and, behold, a swarm of locusts coming from the east; and, behold, one caterpillar, king Gog” (Am. 7:1). Israel’s enemies are typically described as coming from the north, because armies from Babylon and Assyria [to the East of Israel] would follow the transport routes along the Euphrates and then come down from the north into Israel- rather than marching across the trackless desert. But Gog is described as coming “from the east”. This makes sense if Gog is a person, rather than a nation or army. His origin was to the east of Israel. The “locusts” whom he leads connect with the Assyrians being called locusts (Is. 33:4), and the locusts of Rev. 9:3,7 being paralleled with thousands of horsemen coming against Israel from the Euphrates. Before dismissing the LXX too quickly, remember that the vast majority of Old Testament quotations found in the New Testament are from the LXX, and that version is often preferred over the Hebrew [Masoretic] Text.
Chapter 2-1: Ezekiel 38
Chapter 2-1: Ezekiel 38
2.1 Ezekiel 38: Gog as Assyria
This chapter speaks of an invasion of Israel at some point after the Jews have returned to their land (Ezekiel 37) and before the establishment of God’s kingdom on earth (Ezekiel 39,40). This latter day invader will be destroyed by Divine intervention. The language is clearly based upon the historical Assyrian:
Ez. 38 / Gog
Assyria (Isaiah)
:4 I will turn you around, put hooks into your jaws, and will bring you out with all your army, horses and horsemen, all of them clothed in full armour, a great company with buckler and shield, all of them handling swords;
37:29 Because of your raging against Me, and because your arrogance has come up into My ears, therefore will I put My hook in your nose and My bridle in your lips, and I will turn you back by the way by which you came.
:7 Be prepared, yes, prepare yourself, you, and all your companies who are assembled to you, and be a guard to them.
8:7
:8 After many days you shall be visited. In the latter years you shall come into the land that is brought back from the sword, that is gathered out of many peoples, on the mountains of Israel, which have been a continual waste; but it is brought forth out of the peoples, and they shall dwell securely all of them.
8:8; 10:3 “the day of visitation” upon Assyria.
:9 You shall ascend, you shall come like a storm, you shall be like a cloud to cover the land, you, and all your hordes, and many peoples with you.
:10 You shall consider / it will come into your mind
28:2; 8:9,21; the Assyrian “strong one” of Is. 28:2 is the ‘Gog’ figure “Behold, the Lord has a mighty and strong one; like a storm of hail, a destroying storm, and like a storm of mighty waters overflowing, He will cast them down to the earth with His hand”. The Assyrian invasion was a “storm” covering the land (10:3).
Is. 10:7
:11 You shall say, I will go up to the land of unwalled villages; I will go to those who are at rest, who dwell securely, all of them dwelling without walls and having neither bars nor gates;
37:24 With the multitude of my chariots I have come up to the height of the mountains, to the innermost parts of Lebanon. I will cut down its tall cedars and its choice fir trees. I will enter into its farthest height, the forest of its fruitful field.
:12 to take the spoil and to take the wealth; to turn your hand against the waste places that are now inhabited, and against the people who are gathered out of the nations, who have gotten livestock and goods, who dwell in the middle of the land.
Is. 10:6 I will send him against a profane nation, and against the people who anger Me will I give him a command to take the spoil and to take the prey, and to tread them down like the mire of the streets”. Prey and spoil are mentioned repeatedly as being taken from Judah by Assyria (Is. 8:4; 10:6; 33:4).
:19 For in My anger and in the fire of My wrath have I spoken, Surely in that day there shall be a great shaking in the land of Israel;
30:27 Behold, the name of Yahweh comes from far away, burning with His anger, and in thick rising smoke. His lips are full of indignation, and His tongue is as a devouring fire.
:22 With pestilence and with blood will I enter into judgment with him; and I will rain on him and on his hordes and on the many peoples who are with him, an overflowing shower, and great hailstones, fire, and sulphur.
29:6 RV; 30:30 Yahweh will cause His glorious voice to be heard, and will show the descent of His arm, with the indignation of His anger, and the flame of a devouring fire, with a blast, storm, and hailstones… She will be visited by Yahweh of Armies with thunder, with earthquake, with great noise, with whirlwind and storm, and with the flame of a devouring fire.
:19,20 For in My anger and in the fire of My wrath have I spoken, Surely in that day there shall be a great shaking in the land of Israel;
Eze 38:20 so that the fish of the sea, the birds of the sky, the animals of the field and all creeping things which creep on the earth, and all the men who are on the surface of the earth, shall shake at My presence. The mountains shall be thrown down, the steep places shall fall and every wall shall fall to the ground.
:23 I will magnify Myself [against Gog]
29:6; 30:25 There shall be brooks and streams of water on every lofty mountain and on every high hill in the day of the great slaughter, when the towers fall.
10:15 I will magnify Myself [against Assyria]
39:10 They shall take no wood out of the field, neither cut down any out of the forests; for they shall make fires of the weapons; and they shall plunder those who plundered them, and rob those who robbed them, says the Lord Yahweh.
33:1 Woe to you who destroy, but you weren’t destroyed; and who betray, but nobody betrayed you. When you have finished destroying, you will be destroyed; and when you have made an end of betrayal, you will be betrayed.
Ez. 39:3 stresses how Gog will rely on his archery to terrorize Israel in the last days: "I will smite thy bow out of thy left hand, and will cause thine arrows to fall out of thy right hand". Assyrian bas-reliefs frequently show them posing with their bows. This is another Assyrian allusion. Ez. 38:17 says that this invader was repeatedly spoken of by the prophets- it can’t refer therefore to Russia but to Assyria / Babylon, of whom the prophets repeatedly speak. And yet the invasion is clearly in the last days. Assyria, therefore, must be revived in some way.
Ez. 38:9 says that Gog comes as a storm to cover the land. This is the very language and Hebrew word shoa used of the Assyrian invasion in Is. 10:3. And of course the shoa is the term used by Jews today to describe the Nazi holocaust. That is to come again- but in "the land" promised to Abraham.
Hooks in the Jaws
Gog is manipulated with hooks in his jaws (Ez. 38:4-6). This alludes to how the Assyrians presented themselves in steles and other art forms as putting hooks in the mouths of those they conquered. The Zincirli Stele pictures Esarhaddon holding Egypt and Tyre by hooks in their jaws; Assyria "took Manasseh captive in hooks" (2 Chron. 33:11 Heb.). The point is, that what Assyria did to others is effectively being done to the latter day Assyrian by God. This is the very picture of Rev. 13:10- the beast who led God’s people into captivity shall be taken into captivity by God at the last day, and hooks being put in the jaw is the very picture of captivity. Gog and his entity is the beast of Revelation. Indeed, the whole language of putting hooks in the jaws is based upon God’s word to Assyria, that He would put hooks in their jaws and a bridle in their mouth (Is. 37:29)- as if they were an aggressive beast.
The idea is found far back in Gen. 27:40, where Jacob made a promise about the relationship between Jacob (Israel) and Esau (forefather of many of the nations living in the land promised to Abraham). Jacob predicted that although Esau would be beneath Jacob, there would come a time “when you shall have dominion [Heb. ‘to trample down’, which will happen when Israel and Jerusalem are trodden down by Esau’s invasion of the last days, and will rule or have dominion over Jacob]; and you [Esau] shall break his [Jacob’s] yoke from off your neck”. This suggests that the families of Esau are again presented as a beast that must be controlled. Jacob’s words have so far had no significant fulfilment; but they will do, however briefly, when the beast of Esau takes over Israel and dominates the Jews.
2.1 Ezekiel 38: Gog as Assyria
This chapter speaks of an invasion of Israel at some point after the Jews have returned to their land (Ezekiel 37) and before the establishment of God’s kingdom on earth (Ezekiel 39,40). This latter day invader will be destroyed by Divine intervention. The language is clearly based upon the historical Assyrian:
Ez. 38 / Gog
Assyria (Isaiah)
:4 I will turn you around, put hooks into your jaws, and will bring you out with all your army, horses and horsemen, all of them clothed in full armour, a great company with buckler and shield, all of them handling swords;
37:29 Because of your raging against Me, and because your arrogance has come up into My ears, therefore will I put My hook in your nose and My bridle in your lips, and I will turn you back by the way by which you came.
:7 Be prepared, yes, prepare yourself, you, and all your companies who are assembled to you, and be a guard to them.
8:7
:8 After many days you shall be visited. In the latter years you shall come into the land that is brought back from the sword, that is gathered out of many peoples, on the mountains of Israel, which have been a continual waste; but it is brought forth out of the peoples, and they shall dwell securely all of them.
8:8; 10:3 “the day of visitation” upon Assyria.
:9 You shall ascend, you shall come like a storm, you shall be like a cloud to cover the land, you, and all your hordes, and many peoples with you.
:10 You shall consider / it will come into your mind
28:2; 8:9,21; the Assyrian “strong one” of Is. 28:2 is the ‘Gog’ figure “Behold, the Lord has a mighty and strong one; like a storm of hail, a destroying storm, and like a storm of mighty waters overflowing, He will cast them down to the earth with His hand”. The Assyrian invasion was a “storm” covering the land (10:3).
Is. 10:7
:11 You shall say, I will go up to the land of unwalled villages; I will go to those who are at rest, who dwell securely, all of them dwelling without walls and having neither bars nor gates;
37:24 With the multitude of my chariots I have come up to the height of the mountains, to the innermost parts of Lebanon. I will cut down its tall cedars and its choice fir trees. I will enter into its farthest height, the forest of its fruitful field.
:12 to take the spoil and to take the wealth; to turn your hand against the waste places that are now inhabited, and against the people who are gathered out of the nations, who have gotten livestock and goods, who dwell in the middle of the land.
Is. 10:6 I will send him against a profane nation, and against the people who anger Me will I give him a command to take the spoil and to take the prey, and to tread them down like the mire of the streets”. Prey and spoil are mentioned repeatedly as being taken from Judah by Assyria (Is. 8:4; 10:6; 33:4).
:19 For in My anger and in the fire of My wrath have I spoken, Surely in that day there shall be a great shaking in the land of Israel;
30:27 Behold, the name of Yahweh comes from far away, burning with His anger, and in thick rising smoke. His lips are full of indignation, and His tongue is as a devouring fire.
:22 With pestilence and with blood will I enter into judgment with him; and I will rain on him and on his hordes and on the many peoples who are with him, an overflowing shower, and great hailstones, fire, and sulphur.
29:6 RV; 30:30 Yahweh will cause His glorious voice to be heard, and will show the descent of His arm, with the indignation of His anger, and the flame of a devouring fire, with a blast, storm, and hailstones… She will be visited by Yahweh of Armies with thunder, with earthquake, with great noise, with whirlwind and storm, and with the flame of a devouring fire.
:19,20 For in My anger and in the fire of My wrath have I spoken, Surely in that day there shall be a great shaking in the land of Israel;
Eze 38:20 so that the fish of the sea, the birds of the sky, the animals of the field and all creeping things which creep on the earth, and all the men who are on the surface of the earth, shall shake at My presence. The mountains shall be thrown down, the steep places shall fall and every wall shall fall to the ground.
:23 I will magnify Myself [against Gog]
29:6; 30:25 There shall be brooks and streams of water on every lofty mountain and on every high hill in the day of the great slaughter, when the towers fall.
10:15 I will magnify Myself [against Assyria]
39:10 They shall take no wood out of the field, neither cut down any out of the forests; for they shall make fires of the weapons; and they shall plunder those who plundered them, and rob those who robbed them, says the Lord Yahweh.
33:1 Woe to you who destroy, but you weren’t destroyed; and who betray, but nobody betrayed you. When you have finished destroying, you will be destroyed; and when you have made an end of betrayal, you will be betrayed.
Ez. 39:3 stresses how Gog will rely on his archery to terrorize Israel in the last days: "I will smite thy bow out of thy left hand, and will cause thine arrows to fall out of thy right hand". Assyrian bas-reliefs frequently show them posing with their bows. This is another Assyrian allusion. Ez. 38:17 says that this invader was repeatedly spoken of by the prophets- it can’t refer therefore to Russia but to Assyria / Babylon, of whom the prophets repeatedly speak. And yet the invasion is clearly in the last days. Assyria, therefore, must be revived in some way.
Ez. 38:9 says that Gog comes as a storm to cover the land. This is the very language and Hebrew word shoa used of the Assyrian invasion in Is. 10:3. And of course the shoa is the term used by Jews today to describe the Nazi holocaust. That is to come again- but in "the land" promised to Abraham.
Hooks in the Jaws
Gog is manipulated with hooks in his jaws (Ez. 38:4-6). This alludes to how the Assyrians presented themselves in steles and other art forms as putting hooks in the mouths of those they conquered. The Zincirli Stele pictures Esarhaddon holding Egypt and Tyre by hooks in their jaws; Assyria "took Manasseh captive in hooks" (2 Chron. 33:11 Heb.). The point is, that what Assyria did to others is effectively being done to the latter day Assyrian by God. This is the very picture of Rev. 13:10- the beast who led God’s people into captivity shall be taken into captivity by God at the last day, and hooks being put in the jaw is the very picture of captivity. Gog and his entity is the beast of Revelation. Indeed, the whole language of putting hooks in the jaws is based upon God’s word to Assyria, that He would put hooks in their jaws and a bridle in their mouth (Is. 37:29)- as if they were an aggressive beast.
The idea is found far back in Gen. 27:40, where Jacob made a promise about the relationship between Jacob (Israel) and Esau (forefather of many of the nations living in the land promised to Abraham). Jacob predicted that although Esau would be beneath Jacob, there would come a time “when you shall have dominion [Heb. ‘to trample down’, which will happen when Israel and Jerusalem are trodden down by Esau’s invasion of the last days, and will rule or have dominion over Jacob]; and you [Esau] shall break his [Jacob’s] yoke from off your neck”. This suggests that the families of Esau are again presented as a beast that must be controlled. Jacob’s words have so far had no significant fulfilment; but they will do, however briefly, when the beast of Esau takes over Israel and dominates the Jews.
Chapter 1: Assyria Revived
Chapter 1: Assyria Revived
Assyria was one of the great historical enemies of Israel. Their brutal takeover of the lands within the land, the land promised to Abraham, forms the basis of many prophecies of the latter day invasion of Israel. Just as Assyria conquered the lands around Israel, so the latter day Assyrian will do. Assyria took the ten tribes into captivity, and then came to take Jerusalem. Due to Judah’s last minute repentance before their God, Jerusalem did not then fall. But out of Assyria came Babylon (Is. 23:13 “Behold the land of the Chaldeans; this people was not, till the Assyrian founded it”). And Babylon did come and destroy Jerusalem and take the Jews [the remaining two and a half tribes of Israel known as ‘Judah’] into captivity. This is why Assyria and Babylon are at times used interchangeably in the Old Testament.
Our expectation of a revived latter day Assyria is being realized before our eyes. The Islamic State are led by theologians, deeply aware of the historical context in which they stand, seeking to be the reincarnation of such historical forces who have dominated the land promised to Abraham, or Al-Sham as they call it. Staring at maps of ancient empires and current nations, we can get the impression that all states and empires have clearly defined boundaries. But the ancient empires weren’t really like that. When you enter the European Union, there’s a sign up which says ‘Welcome in the European Union’, and a flag next to it. But the Assyrian empire wasn’t like that. And neither is the Islamic State which is developing. The nature of boundaries in our global village have changed. It’s who your friends are on Facebook, which chat groups you frequent, which news portal you read… which defines who you are, rather than which geographical area you live in. And so it is with the entity known as the IS. The entity is defined by ideology and common enemies, rather than hard lines drawn in the literal sand with entry posts. The Islamic State have internet sites and ample media channels through which to explain to us their intentions. One of the battle songs of the IS fighters goes like this [when translated into English]:
Oh soldiers of Truth, let's go.
Repeat the tune of endurance.
A light has illuminated Shaam [the Levant, the Assyrian empire, the land promised to Abraham],
so rally all the soldiers.
The Islamic state has been established,
so wipe out all the borders.
Break the crosses [of the Christians] and destroy the lineage of the grandsons of monkeys [the Jews].
The state of monotheism will remain in spite of the lies of the hateful people.
[Commentary is mine].
You can see it being sung in Arabic at http://www.memritv.org/clip/en/4296.htm , with English transcript at http://www.memritv.org/clip_transcript/en/4296.htm . Notice: “The Islamic state has been established, so wipe out all the borders”. This feature of the IS has struck commentators. Ben Hubbard writing in the New York Times, August 22, 2014 (‘Progress of ISIS puts Obama to test’) is an example: “The brutality of ISIS… has seized the world’s attention… ISIS has erased borders and upended alliances across the region… its vision of a stateless Middle East under the black flag of jihad terrifies the region’s governments… ISIS is one creature with two heads that can see here and see there”. Note the Biblical language of a beast with heads. Indeed, media reports and official statements about the IS often use Biblical and apocalyptic language.
Under its vision of an Islamic Middle East "the land of Israel would be incorporated as part of Greater Syria," as it once was considered during its time under Muslim occupation. And the IS has been very open about its final intentions; in areas under its control, the group has erected billboards saying 'our eyes are on Al Quds (Jerusalem)' [as reported at http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/180622#.U7gANrHAA5s accessed August 2014].
Consider another battle song of the IS jihadist fighters, publicized by the group’s media officer, Abu Hamza al-Muhajir, who believes that the current fighting of the IS is towards the final struggle “in the battle on the day of resurrection with al-Dajjal” (“the false Messiah,” roughly in the role of the Anti-Christ of Christian eschatology):
“So rush O Muslims and gather around your khalīfah [Caliph], so that you may return as you once were for ages, kings of the earth and knights of war.
soldiers that do not see
hardship as being difficult,
And lions [ frequent symbols of Assyria] that are thirsty in battle,
Having greedily drunk the blood of kufr [apostates]”.
The Bible uses the word eretz in the Old Testament to refer either to the entire planet, or specifically to the land / earth promised to Abraham, from the Euphrates to the river of Egypt. The “kings of the earth” therefore refer to the kings or ‘knights’ within the boundaries of the land promised to Abraham, making them "kings of the earth (land)". This term is used in the Bible to describe those who will finally come up against Jerusalem, to be destroyed by the second coming of Christ (Ps. 2:2; 76:12; Is. 24:21; Jer. 50:41 kings from the borders of the earth / land- which fits the IS; Lam. 4:12 the nations who assisted Babylon take Jerusalem; Dan. 7:17 the beasts represent the kings of the earth; Rev. 16:14; 17:2,18; 18:3,9; 19:19). So we cannot but be excited when an Islamic state acts like Assyria and calls its fighters “the kings of the earth”!
The despiteful, aggressive attitude of the latter day Assyrian matches the behaviour of the IS. And there are stern prophecies predicting their end:
"Woe to Assyria, the rod of My anger And the staff in whose hand is My indignation. I will send him against an ungodly nation, And against the people of My wrath I will give him charge, To seize the spoil, to take the prey, And to tread them down like the mire of the streets. Yet he does not mean so, Nor does his heart think so; But it is in his heart to destroy, And cut off not a few nations… Therefore thus says the Lord GOD of hosts: “O my people, who dwell in Zion, be not afraid of the Assyrians when they strike with the rod and lift up their staff against you as the Egyptians did” (Is. 10:5-7,24).
“And He (the Lord Jesus) will arise and shepherd His flock in the strength of the LORD, in the majesty of the name of the LORD His God. And they will remain, because at that time He will be great to the ends of the earth. This One will be our peace when the Assyrian invades our land, when he tramples on our citadels… And He will deliver us from the Assyrian when he attacks our land and when he tramples our territory” (Mic. 5:4-6). The visible manifestation of Israel’s Messiah is thus associated with ‘the Assyrian’ invading the land of Israel.
Geographically, Assyria was located in what is now parts of modern Iran and Iraq, although in reality both Assyria and Babylon coerced, or operated in tandem with, a number of the other smaller powers around Israel (Is. 29:7,8; 30:28; 33:3; 34:1,2; 2 Chron. 22:22; Ps. 83). Thus Herodotus called Sennacharib "king of the Arabians and the Assyrians". We are seeing this scenario develop as various smaller powers are either coerced by or willingly cooperate with the IS.
The Assyrian is to be “broken in pieces” (Is. 30:31 RV), just as the whole image of Daniel 2 is to be, by the return of Christ as the little stone. The Assyrian confederacy which came against Jerusalem is described as being the foes of Israel who will be swept away as chaff (Is. 29:5 RV). This was fulfilled in Sennacherib’s destruction outside Jerusalem. And yet the language of being swept away as chaff refers without doubt to the image of Dan. 2 being swept away as chaff. The conclusion surely is that the Assyrian attack against Jerusalem, comprised as it was of a confederacy of local nations from within the land promised to Abraham, is typical of the final destruction of a similar confederacy by the Lord’s return.
Assyria took power over what is now known as Syria. And in the last days, “the riches of Damascus... shall be taken away before (by) the king of Assyria" (Is. 8:4). We can see Syria being either taken over by or forced into submission to the IS. Is. 9:12 speaks of the Syrians and Philistines [Palestinians] as being the mouth of a huge beast, closing around Israel: "The Syrians before, and the Philistines behind; and they shall devour Israel with open mouth". In this lies the connection between the growing intifada against Israel on one side, and the uprise of the latter day Assyria, the IS, on Israel’s other side. This image of an Arab beast devouring Israel is repeated in Joel 1:6 concerning the later day Assyrian invader.
The Assyrian Style Revived
Assyria was renowned for taking captives and abusing and selling them into captivity. Such a fate is predicted for latter day Israel: "You shall be sold unto your enemies for bondmen and bondwomen, and no man shall buy you" (Dt. 28:68). Until recently there was no entity likely to do this to Israel. But now, with the emergence of the IS, there is. Here's a picture of Yezidi girls captured by the IS being sold for $10 each:
Assyria and Babylon had a policy of taking away local conquered people into exile, and using people from other parts of the conquered territories to then govern or police the conquered areas. One IS defector said it was a deliberate ISIS strategy to use outsiders to police the towns it took over: "The Islamic State have brought in people from other countries, different nationalities who are quite young in age so that they can brainwash or indoctrinate them with their Isis ideology… And so they control the areas, not through the local people but with their own forces and their own men whom they prepare for this task"- quotes from Paul Wood, ‘Isis defector speaks of life inside brutal jihadist group’, first published at http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-28269596
The IS will be a strictly religious entity, keen to take the predictions and commands of the Koran and Hadith as literally as possible- including “When you meet the unbelievers in the battlefield, strike off their heads until you have crushed them completely; then bind the prisoners tightly,” (Sura Chapter 47). The world today is indeed shocked at reports of ISIS' gruesome sweep into northern Iraq. The UK Daily Mail reported of ISIS: “They lined the streets with the decapitated heads of police and soldiers”. Beheading is now a well-known method used by the IS, popularized by their YouTube videos of beheading Western hostages. We note that it is the fate of those who do not worship the beast or accept his mark in Rev. 20:4.
The IS has seized billions of dollars worth of gold kept in the banks in the cities they have overrun, especially in Mosul; again in keeping with Assyria seizing gold and precious stones from its occupied territories. That certainly sounds like the behaviour of the aggressive King of the North during his invasion of eretz Israel in Dan. 11:43: "He shall have power over the treasures of gold and of silver, and over all the precious things".
The Religious Dimension
The religious dimension of the invasion is also to be found in Dan. 11:44, albeit masked by translation. The King of the North will invade eretz Israel "to destroy and utterly to make away many" (AV). The Hebrew word charam translated 'to utterly make away' specifically means to consecrate, to make something over to another, specifically their god or religion. And this is the stated motive of the IS and other jihadist groups- to sanctify Israel as a spoil of war to Allah and the Prophet. This is the predicted call found in Joel 2, to sanctify war against Israel- the very language of jihad, holy war. The King of Assyria “came up” throughout the land promised to Abraham (2 Kings 17:5). The Hebrew word used is alah, meaning to ascend up- and this is the very battle cry of the Islamic State, Allah ahbar. The Assyrians were persuaded that the one true God, Yahweh, had sent them against Israel (2 Kings 18:25)- just as the Islamic State are today. “Hear [shama] the word of the great King, the King of Assyria” (2 Kings 18:28) is a conscious imitation of the shema to Israel from their King, Yahweh. “The great king” is a title of Yahweh. The king of Assyria was parodying the giving of the Law to Israel, implying his commandments were a new Torah for Israel; and the leadership of the Islamic State has spoken of producing a new Torah, making him the one mentioned in Daniel as changing laws.
The historical Assyria ‘destroyed utterly’ the nations around Israel (2 Kings 19:11); but the Hebrew word used specifically means to consecrate or dedicate. It has a distinctly religious sense. And this is precisely the idea of jihad- taking land in a holy war in order to dedicate that land to Allah. In practice, the Assyrians did this by ‘destroying’ or ‘drying up’ these lands. Charab¸ ‘to dry up’, is used about their scorched earth policies (2 Kings 19:17), and Assyria threatened to ‘dry up’ Judah (2 Chron. 32:11), just as he boasted “with the sole of my feet have I dried up all the rivers of besieged places” (2 Kings 19:24); and the metaphor continues with the idea of Assyria being like a river gushing forth over the land they had dried up (Is. 8:7). This is why God’s answer to the Assyrian threat to Judah is expressed in terms of His reminding Judah that it is He who has ultimate power to dry up rivers and nations (Is. 44:27; 50:2; 51:10- every time, the same Hebrew word charab is used).
Assyria was one of the great historical enemies of Israel. Their brutal takeover of the lands within the land, the land promised to Abraham, forms the basis of many prophecies of the latter day invasion of Israel. Just as Assyria conquered the lands around Israel, so the latter day Assyrian will do. Assyria took the ten tribes into captivity, and then came to take Jerusalem. Due to Judah’s last minute repentance before their God, Jerusalem did not then fall. But out of Assyria came Babylon (Is. 23:13 “Behold the land of the Chaldeans; this people was not, till the Assyrian founded it”). And Babylon did come and destroy Jerusalem and take the Jews [the remaining two and a half tribes of Israel known as ‘Judah’] into captivity. This is why Assyria and Babylon are at times used interchangeably in the Old Testament.
Our expectation of a revived latter day Assyria is being realized before our eyes. The Islamic State are led by theologians, deeply aware of the historical context in which they stand, seeking to be the reincarnation of such historical forces who have dominated the land promised to Abraham, or Al-Sham as they call it. Staring at maps of ancient empires and current nations, we can get the impression that all states and empires have clearly defined boundaries. But the ancient empires weren’t really like that. When you enter the European Union, there’s a sign up which says ‘Welcome in the European Union’, and a flag next to it. But the Assyrian empire wasn’t like that. And neither is the Islamic State which is developing. The nature of boundaries in our global village have changed. It’s who your friends are on Facebook, which chat groups you frequent, which news portal you read… which defines who you are, rather than which geographical area you live in. And so it is with the entity known as the IS. The entity is defined by ideology and common enemies, rather than hard lines drawn in the literal sand with entry posts. The Islamic State have internet sites and ample media channels through which to explain to us their intentions. One of the battle songs of the IS fighters goes like this [when translated into English]:
Oh soldiers of Truth, let's go.
Repeat the tune of endurance.
A light has illuminated Shaam [the Levant, the Assyrian empire, the land promised to Abraham],
so rally all the soldiers.
The Islamic state has been established,
so wipe out all the borders.
Break the crosses [of the Christians] and destroy the lineage of the grandsons of monkeys [the Jews].
The state of monotheism will remain in spite of the lies of the hateful people.
[Commentary is mine].
You can see it being sung in Arabic at http://www.memritv.org/clip/en/4296.htm , with English transcript at http://www.memritv.org/clip_transcript/en/4296.htm . Notice: “The Islamic state has been established, so wipe out all the borders”. This feature of the IS has struck commentators. Ben Hubbard writing in the New York Times, August 22, 2014 (‘Progress of ISIS puts Obama to test’) is an example: “The brutality of ISIS… has seized the world’s attention… ISIS has erased borders and upended alliances across the region… its vision of a stateless Middle East under the black flag of jihad terrifies the region’s governments… ISIS is one creature with two heads that can see here and see there”. Note the Biblical language of a beast with heads. Indeed, media reports and official statements about the IS often use Biblical and apocalyptic language.
Under its vision of an Islamic Middle East "the land of Israel would be incorporated as part of Greater Syria," as it once was considered during its time under Muslim occupation. And the IS has been very open about its final intentions; in areas under its control, the group has erected billboards saying 'our eyes are on Al Quds (Jerusalem)' [as reported at http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/180622#.U7gANrHAA5s accessed August 2014].
Consider another battle song of the IS jihadist fighters, publicized by the group’s media officer, Abu Hamza al-Muhajir, who believes that the current fighting of the IS is towards the final struggle “in the battle on the day of resurrection with al-Dajjal” (“the false Messiah,” roughly in the role of the Anti-Christ of Christian eschatology):
“So rush O Muslims and gather around your khalīfah [Caliph], so that you may return as you once were for ages, kings of the earth and knights of war.
soldiers that do not see
hardship as being difficult,
And lions [ frequent symbols of Assyria] that are thirsty in battle,
Having greedily drunk the blood of kufr [apostates]”.
The Bible uses the word eretz in the Old Testament to refer either to the entire planet, or specifically to the land / earth promised to Abraham, from the Euphrates to the river of Egypt. The “kings of the earth” therefore refer to the kings or ‘knights’ within the boundaries of the land promised to Abraham, making them "kings of the earth (land)". This term is used in the Bible to describe those who will finally come up against Jerusalem, to be destroyed by the second coming of Christ (Ps. 2:2; 76:12; Is. 24:21; Jer. 50:41 kings from the borders of the earth / land- which fits the IS; Lam. 4:12 the nations who assisted Babylon take Jerusalem; Dan. 7:17 the beasts represent the kings of the earth; Rev. 16:14; 17:2,18; 18:3,9; 19:19). So we cannot but be excited when an Islamic state acts like Assyria and calls its fighters “the kings of the earth”!
The despiteful, aggressive attitude of the latter day Assyrian matches the behaviour of the IS. And there are stern prophecies predicting their end:
"Woe to Assyria, the rod of My anger And the staff in whose hand is My indignation. I will send him against an ungodly nation, And against the people of My wrath I will give him charge, To seize the spoil, to take the prey, And to tread them down like the mire of the streets. Yet he does not mean so, Nor does his heart think so; But it is in his heart to destroy, And cut off not a few nations… Therefore thus says the Lord GOD of hosts: “O my people, who dwell in Zion, be not afraid of the Assyrians when they strike with the rod and lift up their staff against you as the Egyptians did” (Is. 10:5-7,24).
“And He (the Lord Jesus) will arise and shepherd His flock in the strength of the LORD, in the majesty of the name of the LORD His God. And they will remain, because at that time He will be great to the ends of the earth. This One will be our peace when the Assyrian invades our land, when he tramples on our citadels… And He will deliver us from the Assyrian when he attacks our land and when he tramples our territory” (Mic. 5:4-6). The visible manifestation of Israel’s Messiah is thus associated with ‘the Assyrian’ invading the land of Israel.
Geographically, Assyria was located in what is now parts of modern Iran and Iraq, although in reality both Assyria and Babylon coerced, or operated in tandem with, a number of the other smaller powers around Israel (Is. 29:7,8; 30:28; 33:3; 34:1,2; 2 Chron. 22:22; Ps. 83). Thus Herodotus called Sennacharib "king of the Arabians and the Assyrians". We are seeing this scenario develop as various smaller powers are either coerced by or willingly cooperate with the IS.
The Assyrian is to be “broken in pieces” (Is. 30:31 RV), just as the whole image of Daniel 2 is to be, by the return of Christ as the little stone. The Assyrian confederacy which came against Jerusalem is described as being the foes of Israel who will be swept away as chaff (Is. 29:5 RV). This was fulfilled in Sennacherib’s destruction outside Jerusalem. And yet the language of being swept away as chaff refers without doubt to the image of Dan. 2 being swept away as chaff. The conclusion surely is that the Assyrian attack against Jerusalem, comprised as it was of a confederacy of local nations from within the land promised to Abraham, is typical of the final destruction of a similar confederacy by the Lord’s return.
Assyria took power over what is now known as Syria. And in the last days, “the riches of Damascus... shall be taken away before (by) the king of Assyria" (Is. 8:4). We can see Syria being either taken over by or forced into submission to the IS. Is. 9:12 speaks of the Syrians and Philistines [Palestinians] as being the mouth of a huge beast, closing around Israel: "The Syrians before, and the Philistines behind; and they shall devour Israel with open mouth". In this lies the connection between the growing intifada against Israel on one side, and the uprise of the latter day Assyria, the IS, on Israel’s other side. This image of an Arab beast devouring Israel is repeated in Joel 1:6 concerning the later day Assyrian invader.
The Assyrian Style Revived
Assyria was renowned for taking captives and abusing and selling them into captivity. Such a fate is predicted for latter day Israel: "You shall be sold unto your enemies for bondmen and bondwomen, and no man shall buy you" (Dt. 28:68). Until recently there was no entity likely to do this to Israel. But now, with the emergence of the IS, there is. Here's a picture of Yezidi girls captured by the IS being sold for $10 each:
Assyria and Babylon had a policy of taking away local conquered people into exile, and using people from other parts of the conquered territories to then govern or police the conquered areas. One IS defector said it was a deliberate ISIS strategy to use outsiders to police the towns it took over: "The Islamic State have brought in people from other countries, different nationalities who are quite young in age so that they can brainwash or indoctrinate them with their Isis ideology… And so they control the areas, not through the local people but with their own forces and their own men whom they prepare for this task"- quotes from Paul Wood, ‘Isis defector speaks of life inside brutal jihadist group’, first published at http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-28269596
The IS will be a strictly religious entity, keen to take the predictions and commands of the Koran and Hadith as literally as possible- including “When you meet the unbelievers in the battlefield, strike off their heads until you have crushed them completely; then bind the prisoners tightly,” (Sura Chapter 47). The world today is indeed shocked at reports of ISIS' gruesome sweep into northern Iraq. The UK Daily Mail reported of ISIS: “They lined the streets with the decapitated heads of police and soldiers”. Beheading is now a well-known method used by the IS, popularized by their YouTube videos of beheading Western hostages. We note that it is the fate of those who do not worship the beast or accept his mark in Rev. 20:4.
The IS has seized billions of dollars worth of gold kept in the banks in the cities they have overrun, especially in Mosul; again in keeping with Assyria seizing gold and precious stones from its occupied territories. That certainly sounds like the behaviour of the aggressive King of the North during his invasion of eretz Israel in Dan. 11:43: "He shall have power over the treasures of gold and of silver, and over all the precious things".
The Religious Dimension
The religious dimension of the invasion is also to be found in Dan. 11:44, albeit masked by translation. The King of the North will invade eretz Israel "to destroy and utterly to make away many" (AV). The Hebrew word charam translated 'to utterly make away' specifically means to consecrate, to make something over to another, specifically their god or religion. And this is the stated motive of the IS and other jihadist groups- to sanctify Israel as a spoil of war to Allah and the Prophet. This is the predicted call found in Joel 2, to sanctify war against Israel- the very language of jihad, holy war. The King of Assyria “came up” throughout the land promised to Abraham (2 Kings 17:5). The Hebrew word used is alah, meaning to ascend up- and this is the very battle cry of the Islamic State, Allah ahbar. The Assyrians were persuaded that the one true God, Yahweh, had sent them against Israel (2 Kings 18:25)- just as the Islamic State are today. “Hear [shama] the word of the great King, the King of Assyria” (2 Kings 18:28) is a conscious imitation of the shema to Israel from their King, Yahweh. “The great king” is a title of Yahweh. The king of Assyria was parodying the giving of the Law to Israel, implying his commandments were a new Torah for Israel; and the leadership of the Islamic State has spoken of producing a new Torah, making him the one mentioned in Daniel as changing laws.
The historical Assyria ‘destroyed utterly’ the nations around Israel (2 Kings 19:11); but the Hebrew word used specifically means to consecrate or dedicate. It has a distinctly religious sense. And this is precisely the idea of jihad- taking land in a holy war in order to dedicate that land to Allah. In practice, the Assyrians did this by ‘destroying’ or ‘drying up’ these lands. Charab¸ ‘to dry up’, is used about their scorched earth policies (2 Kings 19:17), and Assyria threatened to ‘dry up’ Judah (2 Chron. 32:11), just as he boasted “with the sole of my feet have I dried up all the rivers of besieged places” (2 Kings 19:24); and the metaphor continues with the idea of Assyria being like a river gushing forth over the land they had dried up (Is. 8:7). This is why God’s answer to the Assyrian threat to Judah is expressed in terms of His reminding Judah that it is He who has ultimate power to dry up rivers and nations (Is. 44:27; 50:2; 51:10- every time, the same Hebrew word charab is used).
Chapter 1: Al Sham
Chapter 1: Al Sham
The entity now known as the Islamic State was earlier known as ISIS, the Islamic State in Iraq and al-Sham. The concept of Al-Sham is crucial to understanding the significance of what’s going on in jihadist thinking. This area includes the historical Assyrian empire, the land promised to Abraham [which is the focus of Bible prophecy]… including the land of Israel.
What’s Happening in Syria
There’s a complex civil war going on in Syria, as various factions seek to overthrow the Assad regime. It must be viewed in the wider context of the ‘Arab Spring’ throughout the Arab world, whereby established regimes were overthrown and replaced with populist leadership. But in every case, from Tunisia to Egypt, the new leadership was more radically Islamic and more determined than the previous regimes to exterminate Israel. Israel is now more than ever before surrounded by an Arab world united by one common theme- to overthrow Israel and establish an Islamic state in Palestine. And that’s where the whole scene becomes so significant in terms of Bible prophecy, which predicts an invasion of Israel from her neighbours which will lead to a minority turning to Jesus Christ in repentance- and then, He will return. At no other time since the feet of the Lord Jesus were upon this earth has His return looked more imminent. Because there was no previous time in the last 2000 years when Israel existed as a nation and was surrounded by such well armed and capable enemies.
The West clearly doesn’t know what to do about Syria. They can’t support the undemocratic and abusive Assad regime. But the opposition is radically Islamic. If they support them, then they will make the same fool of themselves as they did when they backed, armed and trained the muhajedeen groups in Afghanistan against the USSR in the 1980s- and now those same groups have morphed into Al Qaeda and now the IS, and become the West’s greatest enemies. Clearly, the Assad regime will not hold out much longer. A new king must arise in Syria, known in Daniel 11 as “the king of the north”. And Syria has powerful weapons, located right on Israel’s northern border.
One feature of the civil war is the bitter disparity between the various Islamic groups opposed to Assad. And the same is true in much of the Arab world. The only factor which can unite them is their joint hatred of Israel and desire to destroy her. The bitter disunity between the Arab factions is great indeed- tens of thousands of deaths in Syria bear witness to it. They are aware of their problem- and the classical resolution of such a situation is to focus upon an agreed external enemy and unite in a military endeavour based around religious and ideological principles that all factions are totally agreed upon. And there is indeed such a solution, right on their doorstep- an invasion of Israel.
Al-Sham- Greater Syria
The significance of what’s happening in Syria is that this solution is becoming the more obvious. And further, there is much talk amongst the opposition groups about the concept of Al-Sham, the formation of a ‘greater Syria’, incorporating not only Syria but the territories formerly in the Assyrian empire- including Israel. This is not a new idea; it is one of the tenets of faith of the Syrian Social Nationalist Party (SSNP), who were the largest opposition party to the ruling Ba’ath party even before the current civil war broke out. The Wikipedia article about this party gives a good overview of their vision of a ‘Greater Syria’. In continuity with this, one major body of factions fighting against Assad in Syria have given themselves the official title of الدولة الإسلامية في العراق والشام - “The Islamic state of Iraq and Greater Syria”. Or to quote the aims of another group: “On the goal of Katībat al-Muhājirīn the spokesman is quite frank: the defeat of the al-Assad regime and the establishment of an Islamic state in the Levant (Greater Syria; the medieval Bilād as-Shām)” [source: http://pietervanostaeyen.wordpress.com/category/syria/]. Further, “On January 31st 2013, Syrian Islamist groups announced they would unite in one single group; known as Harakat Ahrar al-Sham al-Islamiyya (The Islamic Movement of Freemen of Greater Syria)” [Source: http://pietervanostaeyen.wordpress.com/2013/02/02/ahrar-al-sham-the-greater-islamist-union-in-syria/]. From the same source we read: “’We thank Allah for the affection between the believers ...Here are your brothers from the Islamic Groups, who are fighting the criminal Nasiri ['Alawi] regime to overthrow and remove it from our beloved Levant and to form a Muslim society under Shari’a Law... [we] were united completely under the name of Harakat Ahrar al-Sham.[This organization] belongs to the same group in obedience to Allah’s order to the believers to unite and reject to be divided. As Allah says “hold fast, all together, by the rope which Allah (stretches out for you) and be not divided among yourselves” and “obey Allah and His Messenger; and do not fall into dispute, lest ye lose heart and your power depart”. Your brothers of Harakat Ahrar al-Sham al-Islamiyya want to announce to all the Muslims in Levant their unity. [They] give them the glad tiding (that will please them) and will establish the moral strength of the believers’. In its first audio address, Ahrar al-Sham stated its goal to replace the Assad regime with an Islamic state governed by the Shari’a".
Al-Sham, ‘Greater Syria’, ‘the Levant’, refers to an area including Syria, Iraq, Israel and Lebanon. Here’s how it’s envisaged:
SadheeSYRIA.jpg
This map is taken from Wikipedia, and as of April 2013 the comment is attached: “Antun Saadeh's and the SSNP's vision of a unified "natural Syria", corresponding closely to the maximum extent of the Neo-Assyrian Empire”. Notice in the declaration from Harakat Ahrar al-Sham the rhetoric of unity amongst the disparate, the religious appeal, and the intention to unite Iraq into this ‘greater Syria’. Syria and Assyria, despite their similarity as words, referred to different entities in Bible times. Syria was part of Assyria, but was then better known as Aram. But what is envisaged within the new Al-Sham is the creation of a latter day Assyria. Compare the map of the envisaged Al-Sham with this map of the Assyrian empire in Biblical times:
Map_of_Assyria.png
What’s happening before our eyes is the preparation of a restored Biblical Assyria- even if the significance is lost to Western observers because they generally don’t know Arabic or appreciate the significance of the Al-Sham rhetoric.
Shaun Waterman in the Washington Times of April 9th 2013 in his article, “Al-Nusra comments: "the Syrian extremist militia Jabhat al-Nusra admitted to being a branch force of al-Qaeda's coalition in Iraq – and has been all along!This was acknowledged by the Islamic State (not the Democratic State) of Iraq early in April. No less a personage than the Emir of the Iraqi coalition group, Abu Bakr al-Hussayni al-Qurayshi al-Baghdadi, issued an audio message avowing this heretofore hidden fact: “It's now time to declare in front of the people of the Levant and world that Jabhat al-Nusrah is but an extension of the Islamic State of Iraq and part of it... Iraqi intelligence officials... [said] that the border between Iraq and Syria is not even a real thing" (Quoted in Harold Lafferty, Present Day Events April 2013).
The Biblical Perspective
Daniel 2
Daniel chapter 2 contains an outline of the powers who were to dominate the people of Israel within the land of Israel. It begins with a head of gold (Babylon), then breast and arms of silver (Persia), thighs of brass (Greece), two legs of iron (the two halves of the Roman empire) and then feet part of iron, part of clay. Each part of the image corresponds in proportion to how long each empire dominated the land of Israel and the Jewish people- thus the legs were longest because the Romans dominated the land for longest. After AD70, the Jewish state ceased to be a nation. But now, it is once again, for the first time in nearly 2000 years. The final part of the image therefore represents a group of nations (perhaps divided into two groups, symbolized by the two feet) who will dominate Israel in the last days. A stone cut out of a mountain without hands (representing the Lord Jesus Christ) then hits the image on its feet, growing into a mountain which fills the earth. The interpretation is given, and it clearly refers to the second coming of Christ to destroy the kingdoms of men who have dominated His land and His people, and to establish God’s Kingdom on earth: “In the days of those kings shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom which shall never be destroyed, nor shall its sovereignty be left to another people; it shall crush to powder and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand forever” (Dan. 2:44).
nebim.gif
Arab Unity and Disunity
Who, then, are these nations who were represented by the feet partly of iron and partly of clay? Some will be strong, others weak. “Then you saw the feet and toes, part of potters’ clay, and part of iron, that shall be a divided kingdom; but there shall be in it of the strength of the iron, because you saw the iron mixed with miry clay. As the toes of the feet were part of iron, and part of clay, so the kingdom shall be partly strong, and partly broken. Whereas you saw the iron mixed with miry clay, they shall mingle themselves with the seed of men; but they shall not cling to one another, even as iron does not mingle with clay” (Dan. 2:41-43). One only has to look at the various groups currently fighting Assad in Syria to see how deeply divided is the Islamist group. Most of the names of the factions would be unfamiliar to Western readers, but the following at least are almost general knowledge to any who read Middle East news:
Palestine Liberation Front
Palestinian Islamic Jihad
The Muslim Brotherhood
Hamas
Hezbollah
Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine
Fatah
Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades
Abu Nidal
The situation in Syria could actually lead to a fragmentation of the country into a group of smaller states, all united under the Al-Sham concept and a desire to drive Jews out of Israel. The same is true for Iraq and other Moslem states bordering Israel. Writing on the Al Jazeera website in May 2013, Murtaza Hussain wrote a penetrating article "Iraq, Syria and the death of the modern Middle East" (at http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2013/05/2013567200437919.html ). The following sounds exactly like the ten toes of Daniel's image, formed out of larger powers but now weak and yet united against Israel:
"The countries of Syria and Iraq, formerly unified Arab states formed after the defeat of their former Ottoman rulers, exist today only in name. In their place what appears most likely to come into existence -
after the bloodshed subsides - are small, ethnically and religiously homogenous statelets: weak and easily manipulated, where their progenitors at their peaks were robustly independent powers".
We of course are reading the Bible through translation. But take a closer look at the original Hebrew and Chaldee translated “they shall mingle themselves” (Dan. 2:43). They were to be a mingled people- and that’s exactly who Syria and the nations of ‘Greater Syria’ are. The original word translated ‘mingle’ is arab. One easy way to check that is to use an online concordance to poke under the surface of Dan. 2:43. And you will see it- Strong’s number H6151. Arab. Surely there is a reference here to the Arab peoples! Here’s what you see in Strong’s concordance:
H6151
ערב
‛ărab
ar-ab'
(Chaldee); corresponding to H6148; to commingle: - mingle (self), mix.
The ‘feet and toes’ section of the image is proportionally not a very long part of the body. The domination of Israel by this group will not be for long- perhaps the three and a half year period which occurs in several latter day prophecies.
Psalm 83
The way the Islamists will seek to bind together their divided state is made clear in Psalm 83, where we have ten Arab nations, mostly in Al-Sham, Greater Syria, who unite themselves with a common aim of capturing the holy places in Jerusalem and blotting out the name of Israel:
“They conspire with cunning against Your people, they plot against Your cherished ones. Come, they say, and let’s destroy them as a nation, that the name of Israel may be remembered no more. For they have conspired together with one mind, they form an alliance against You. The tents of Edom and the Ishmaelites; Moab, and the Hagrites; Gebal, Ammon, and Amalek; Philistia with the inhabitants of Tyre; Assyria also is joined with them” (Ps. 83:3-8). Note that ‘Philistine’ and ‘Palestinian’ are the same word…
This ‘conspiring together with one mind’ and ‘forming an alliance’ is exactly what we see coming out of the uniting of the disparate Islamist factions in Syria and elsewhere. “Form an alliance” translates a Hebrew phrase more commonly translated ‘to cut a covenant’ (Ps. 83:5). The Palestinian Covenant unites these groups, and that covenant emphasizes the aim of overrunning Israel. Psalm 83 mentions ten nations- perhaps corresponding with the ten toes of Daniel’s image, and the ten horns on the beast which will dominate God’s people in the last days (Daniel 7, Revelation 13). Joel 3:9 is another prophecy of the invasion which happens just before Christ’s return, and it speaks of how the invaders will make a ‘proclamation’ to “sanctify war”- a jihad, a holy war. And that is exactly the rhetoric of the groups now calling for Islamist unity based around a jihad against Israel in order to establish Al-Sham.
Syria, then known as Aram, frequently invaded Israel in Bible times. The invasions under the Syrian king Rezin were a result of 'taking evil counsel against' Israel (Is. 7:5), just as Assyria and her Arab supporters are to do in Ps. 83:3: "They have taken crafty counsel against Your people”. The double emphasis on "Damascus" as being the nerve centre of Rezin's operations (Is. 7:8), may also be significant in that this very city is now a centre for Arab terrorism against Israel.
I’ve written more about Psalm 83and the Palestinian Covenant in Unrest In The Arab World: The Perspective of Biblical Prophecy [an appendix to chapter 8 of The Last Days]; and in the same book, Digression 7: The Palestinian Movement In Bible Prophecy. You can get a free PDF from www.heaster.org/ld.pdf .
Ezekiel 38
Ezekiel 37 and 38 predict that when the Jews have returned to their land, then there will be a ten nation invasion by a group of surrounding nations, headed up by ‘Gog’- which is to be destroyed by the direct intervention of God to establish His Kingdom. This invasion is to be after the Jews have returned to their land, and will begin with an incursion onto “the mountains of Israel”- which are bordering Syria, the Golan heights:
“In the latter years you shall come into the land that is brought back from the sword, that is gathered out of many peoples, on the mountains of Israel, which have been a continual waste; but it is brought forth out of the nations” (Ez. 38:8).
Only since 1948 and the uprise of serious Arab powers around Israel could this prophecy come true. All we’re waiting for is the Arab confederacy to push into the Golan Heights. And we could view the news on the internet or turn on the telly- and find it’s happening. Any moment now. And the next step will be the actual return of Christ to earth.
Al-Sham- A Reborn Assyria
Zechariah 9 is clearly a prophecy of the return of Christ to earth and the establishment of His Kingdom (see Zech. 9:1,9-11 especially). But this worldwide Kingdom will be established after judgments are executed upon Damascus, Hamath, Tyre, Sidon, Ashkelon, Ekron, Ashdod and Gaza- a collection of peoples likened to a beast with a mouth and teeth which have enclosed Israel (9:7). These areas are geographically exactly where the 'greater Syria' is envisaged as being. They surround present day Israel, from the Gaza Strip to Lebanon. And they are likened to some latter day beast descending upon Israel, which must be destroyed before God's Kingdom can be established. This encourages us to see the beast of Daniel and Revelation as referring in its final form to Israel’s Islamist neighbours who now surround her. Is. 9:12 uses ‘beast’ imagery when it speaks of the Syrians and Philistines [same word as ‘Palestinians’] as being the mouth of a huge beast, closing around Israel: "The Syrians before, and the Philistines behind; and they shall devour Israel with open mouth". This image of an Arab beast devouring Israel is repeated in Joel 1:6 concerning the later Assyrian invader.
The great invasions of Israel by the Assyrians are prototypes of the latter day invasion. Micah 5 is specific that the Lord Jesus will appear to save Israel when "the Assyrian" invades them in the last days. Balaam's prophecy about Israel's final destiny speaks of how finally both Assyria and Eber ['the other side', a similar meaning as the words 'Syria' and 'Aram' in Hebrew, and effectively referring to Syria] will be judged for their abuse of Israel in the last days. They are mentioned together because they will be operating together- and now we see that they actually are coming together (Num. 24:24). Whilst we must remember that Syria and Assyria were historically different, the current talk of a ‘Greater Syria’ and ‘The Islamic state of Iraq and Greater Syria’ is nothing less than Biblical ‘Assyria’ born again. Assyria invaded Israel in waves, initially just attacking the Northern part of Israel (2 Kings 15:29), commented upon in Is. 9:1 as a 'light affliction' compared to the fury of the main invasion. And it is the northern part of Israel which borders with modern day Syria. This is where any land invasion from Syria would naturally begin.
At least four waves of Assyrian invasions are recorded:
- under Menahem (2 Kings 15:19) - bought off
- under Pekah (2 Kings 15:29) - northern Israel affected
- under Hoshea (2 Kings 17:3) - Israel carried captive
- under Hezekiah (2 Kings 18:9) - took fenced cities of Judah and destroyed by God’s direct intervention.
The gap between the third and fourth invasions was around six months. The third invasion took three years: "Then the king of Assyria came up throughout all the land, and went up to Samaria, and besieged it three years" (2 Kings 17:5). This three-year period of domination followed by six months rings bells with the three and a half years of the (latter-day?) Elijah ministry, and the same period spoken of in the 1,260 days, the 42 months and " a time, times, and an half" (Dan. 7:25; 12:7; Rev. 11:2,3; 12:6).
The final Assyrian invasion is the seedbed from which the language of Gog in Ezekiel 38 is taken. Look up these Bible passages at your leisure:
Ezekiel 38 / Gog
Assyria (Isaiah)
:4
37:29
:7
8:7
:8
8:8
:9
28:2; 8:9,21; the Assyrian “strong one” of Is. 28:2 is the ‘Gog’ figure
:11
37:24
:12
10:6
:19
30:27
:22
29:6 RV; 30:30
:19,20
29:6; 30:25
39:10
33:1
The Assyrian is to be “broken in pieces” (Is. 30:31 RV), just as the whole image of Daniel 2 is to be. That image symbolizes a latter day confederacy of nations under the leadership of Babylon / Assyria, which will dominate the land / earth of Israel in the last days.
And so I repeat my basic point: The historical Assyrian invasions of Israel form the prototypes of the latter day invasions which the Bible prophesies, and which will immediately precipitate the return of Christ to the earth. The re-formation of ‘Assyria’ which is being called for by the groups coming to power in Syria today, along with the clear demand for a jihad to destroy Israel and Islamize Palestine, means that the Bible prophecies of the last days are being fulfilled before our eyes. It would seem that the return of Christ will be soon. Jerusalem is truly “compassed with armies”, exactly as the Lord Jesus said it would be just prior to His return in glory has this in mind when He predicted that Jerusalem would again be like this in the last days:
“But when you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies, then know that her desolation is at hand... For these are days of vengeance, that all things which are written may be fulfilled... Jerusalem shall be trodden under foot by the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles [three and a half years of Gentile domination?] be fulfilled... And then shall they see the Son of Man coming in a cloud, with power and great glory. But when these things begin to happen, look up, lift up your heads, because your redemption draws near” (Lk. 21:20-28).
For most of the last 2000 years, Jerusalem has been surrounded by Bedouin tribes- not nations with armies and oil wealth behind them. Only in our times has the whole jigsaw started to come together.
The Faithful Remnant
Isaiah opens his prophecy by stating that once all Israel has fallen to the Assyrian invaders, only Jerusalem will be left- and will only be saved because of a "remnant" within the city (Is. 1:7-9). But the rest of Isaiah chapter 1 goes on to state that Jerusalem as a whole is as sinful and far from the true God as the rest of Judah. The size of this faithful remnant may have been very small indeed. They were " I (Isaiah) and the children (prophets - Is. 8:16) whom the Lord has given me" (Is. 8:18); and this is quoted in Heb. 2:13 as referring to Christian believers. That small group centered around Isaiah perhaps point forward to a small remnant of faithful Jewish believers in Jerusalem, for whose sake the whole race is not destroyed completely. And it seems that this part of the latter day jigsaw is already in place, thanks to a number of baptisms there recently.
We’ll now look in more detail at the emergence of Assyria redivivus.
The entity now known as the Islamic State was earlier known as ISIS, the Islamic State in Iraq and al-Sham. The concept of Al-Sham is crucial to understanding the significance of what’s going on in jihadist thinking. This area includes the historical Assyrian empire, the land promised to Abraham [which is the focus of Bible prophecy]… including the land of Israel.
What’s Happening in Syria
There’s a complex civil war going on in Syria, as various factions seek to overthrow the Assad regime. It must be viewed in the wider context of the ‘Arab Spring’ throughout the Arab world, whereby established regimes were overthrown and replaced with populist leadership. But in every case, from Tunisia to Egypt, the new leadership was more radically Islamic and more determined than the previous regimes to exterminate Israel. Israel is now more than ever before surrounded by an Arab world united by one common theme- to overthrow Israel and establish an Islamic state in Palestine. And that’s where the whole scene becomes so significant in terms of Bible prophecy, which predicts an invasion of Israel from her neighbours which will lead to a minority turning to Jesus Christ in repentance- and then, He will return. At no other time since the feet of the Lord Jesus were upon this earth has His return looked more imminent. Because there was no previous time in the last 2000 years when Israel existed as a nation and was surrounded by such well armed and capable enemies.
The West clearly doesn’t know what to do about Syria. They can’t support the undemocratic and abusive Assad regime. But the opposition is radically Islamic. If they support them, then they will make the same fool of themselves as they did when they backed, armed and trained the muhajedeen groups in Afghanistan against the USSR in the 1980s- and now those same groups have morphed into Al Qaeda and now the IS, and become the West’s greatest enemies. Clearly, the Assad regime will not hold out much longer. A new king must arise in Syria, known in Daniel 11 as “the king of the north”. And Syria has powerful weapons, located right on Israel’s northern border.
One feature of the civil war is the bitter disparity between the various Islamic groups opposed to Assad. And the same is true in much of the Arab world. The only factor which can unite them is their joint hatred of Israel and desire to destroy her. The bitter disunity between the Arab factions is great indeed- tens of thousands of deaths in Syria bear witness to it. They are aware of their problem- and the classical resolution of such a situation is to focus upon an agreed external enemy and unite in a military endeavour based around religious and ideological principles that all factions are totally agreed upon. And there is indeed such a solution, right on their doorstep- an invasion of Israel.
Al-Sham- Greater Syria
The significance of what’s happening in Syria is that this solution is becoming the more obvious. And further, there is much talk amongst the opposition groups about the concept of Al-Sham, the formation of a ‘greater Syria’, incorporating not only Syria but the territories formerly in the Assyrian empire- including Israel. This is not a new idea; it is one of the tenets of faith of the Syrian Social Nationalist Party (SSNP), who were the largest opposition party to the ruling Ba’ath party even before the current civil war broke out. The Wikipedia article about this party gives a good overview of their vision of a ‘Greater Syria’. In continuity with this, one major body of factions fighting against Assad in Syria have given themselves the official title of الدولة الإسلامية في العراق والشام - “The Islamic state of Iraq and Greater Syria”. Or to quote the aims of another group: “On the goal of Katībat al-Muhājirīn the spokesman is quite frank: the defeat of the al-Assad regime and the establishment of an Islamic state in the Levant (Greater Syria; the medieval Bilād as-Shām)” [source: http://pietervanostaeyen.wordpress.com/category/syria/]. Further, “On January 31st 2013, Syrian Islamist groups announced they would unite in one single group; known as Harakat Ahrar al-Sham al-Islamiyya (The Islamic Movement of Freemen of Greater Syria)” [Source: http://pietervanostaeyen.wordpress.com/2013/02/02/ahrar-al-sham-the-greater-islamist-union-in-syria/]. From the same source we read: “’We thank Allah for the affection between the believers ...Here are your brothers from the Islamic Groups, who are fighting the criminal Nasiri ['Alawi] regime to overthrow and remove it from our beloved Levant and to form a Muslim society under Shari’a Law... [we] were united completely under the name of Harakat Ahrar al-Sham.[This organization] belongs to the same group in obedience to Allah’s order to the believers to unite and reject to be divided. As Allah says “hold fast, all together, by the rope which Allah (stretches out for you) and be not divided among yourselves” and “obey Allah and His Messenger; and do not fall into dispute, lest ye lose heart and your power depart”. Your brothers of Harakat Ahrar al-Sham al-Islamiyya want to announce to all the Muslims in Levant their unity. [They] give them the glad tiding (that will please them) and will establish the moral strength of the believers’. In its first audio address, Ahrar al-Sham stated its goal to replace the Assad regime with an Islamic state governed by the Shari’a".
Al-Sham, ‘Greater Syria’, ‘the Levant’, refers to an area including Syria, Iraq, Israel and Lebanon. Here’s how it’s envisaged:
SadheeSYRIA.jpg
This map is taken from Wikipedia, and as of April 2013 the comment is attached: “Antun Saadeh's and the SSNP's vision of a unified "natural Syria", corresponding closely to the maximum extent of the Neo-Assyrian Empire”. Notice in the declaration from Harakat Ahrar al-Sham the rhetoric of unity amongst the disparate, the religious appeal, and the intention to unite Iraq into this ‘greater Syria’. Syria and Assyria, despite their similarity as words, referred to different entities in Bible times. Syria was part of Assyria, but was then better known as Aram. But what is envisaged within the new Al-Sham is the creation of a latter day Assyria. Compare the map of the envisaged Al-Sham with this map of the Assyrian empire in Biblical times:
Map_of_Assyria.png
What’s happening before our eyes is the preparation of a restored Biblical Assyria- even if the significance is lost to Western observers because they generally don’t know Arabic or appreciate the significance of the Al-Sham rhetoric.
Shaun Waterman in the Washington Times of April 9th 2013 in his article, “Al-Nusra comments: "the Syrian extremist militia Jabhat al-Nusra admitted to being a branch force of al-Qaeda's coalition in Iraq – and has been all along!This was acknowledged by the Islamic State (not the Democratic State) of Iraq early in April. No less a personage than the Emir of the Iraqi coalition group, Abu Bakr al-Hussayni al-Qurayshi al-Baghdadi, issued an audio message avowing this heretofore hidden fact: “It's now time to declare in front of the people of the Levant and world that Jabhat al-Nusrah is but an extension of the Islamic State of Iraq and part of it... Iraqi intelligence officials... [said] that the border between Iraq and Syria is not even a real thing" (Quoted in Harold Lafferty, Present Day Events April 2013).
The Biblical Perspective
Daniel 2
Daniel chapter 2 contains an outline of the powers who were to dominate the people of Israel within the land of Israel. It begins with a head of gold (Babylon), then breast and arms of silver (Persia), thighs of brass (Greece), two legs of iron (the two halves of the Roman empire) and then feet part of iron, part of clay. Each part of the image corresponds in proportion to how long each empire dominated the land of Israel and the Jewish people- thus the legs were longest because the Romans dominated the land for longest. After AD70, the Jewish state ceased to be a nation. But now, it is once again, for the first time in nearly 2000 years. The final part of the image therefore represents a group of nations (perhaps divided into two groups, symbolized by the two feet) who will dominate Israel in the last days. A stone cut out of a mountain without hands (representing the Lord Jesus Christ) then hits the image on its feet, growing into a mountain which fills the earth. The interpretation is given, and it clearly refers to the second coming of Christ to destroy the kingdoms of men who have dominated His land and His people, and to establish God’s Kingdom on earth: “In the days of those kings shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom which shall never be destroyed, nor shall its sovereignty be left to another people; it shall crush to powder and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand forever” (Dan. 2:44).
nebim.gif
Arab Unity and Disunity
Who, then, are these nations who were represented by the feet partly of iron and partly of clay? Some will be strong, others weak. “Then you saw the feet and toes, part of potters’ clay, and part of iron, that shall be a divided kingdom; but there shall be in it of the strength of the iron, because you saw the iron mixed with miry clay. As the toes of the feet were part of iron, and part of clay, so the kingdom shall be partly strong, and partly broken. Whereas you saw the iron mixed with miry clay, they shall mingle themselves with the seed of men; but they shall not cling to one another, even as iron does not mingle with clay” (Dan. 2:41-43). One only has to look at the various groups currently fighting Assad in Syria to see how deeply divided is the Islamist group. Most of the names of the factions would be unfamiliar to Western readers, but the following at least are almost general knowledge to any who read Middle East news:
Palestine Liberation Front
Palestinian Islamic Jihad
The Muslim Brotherhood
Hamas
Hezbollah
Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine
Fatah
Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades
Abu Nidal
The situation in Syria could actually lead to a fragmentation of the country into a group of smaller states, all united under the Al-Sham concept and a desire to drive Jews out of Israel. The same is true for Iraq and other Moslem states bordering Israel. Writing on the Al Jazeera website in May 2013, Murtaza Hussain wrote a penetrating article "Iraq, Syria and the death of the modern Middle East" (at http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2013/05/2013567200437919.html ). The following sounds exactly like the ten toes of Daniel's image, formed out of larger powers but now weak and yet united against Israel:
"The countries of Syria and Iraq, formerly unified Arab states formed after the defeat of their former Ottoman rulers, exist today only in name. In their place what appears most likely to come into existence -
after the bloodshed subsides - are small, ethnically and religiously homogenous statelets: weak and easily manipulated, where their progenitors at their peaks were robustly independent powers".
We of course are reading the Bible through translation. But take a closer look at the original Hebrew and Chaldee translated “they shall mingle themselves” (Dan. 2:43). They were to be a mingled people- and that’s exactly who Syria and the nations of ‘Greater Syria’ are. The original word translated ‘mingle’ is arab. One easy way to check that is to use an online concordance to poke under the surface of Dan. 2:43. And you will see it- Strong’s number H6151. Arab. Surely there is a reference here to the Arab peoples! Here’s what you see in Strong’s concordance:
H6151
ערב
‛ărab
ar-ab'
(Chaldee); corresponding to H6148; to commingle: - mingle (self), mix.
The ‘feet and toes’ section of the image is proportionally not a very long part of the body. The domination of Israel by this group will not be for long- perhaps the three and a half year period which occurs in several latter day prophecies.
Psalm 83
The way the Islamists will seek to bind together their divided state is made clear in Psalm 83, where we have ten Arab nations, mostly in Al-Sham, Greater Syria, who unite themselves with a common aim of capturing the holy places in Jerusalem and blotting out the name of Israel:
“They conspire with cunning against Your people, they plot against Your cherished ones. Come, they say, and let’s destroy them as a nation, that the name of Israel may be remembered no more. For they have conspired together with one mind, they form an alliance against You. The tents of Edom and the Ishmaelites; Moab, and the Hagrites; Gebal, Ammon, and Amalek; Philistia with the inhabitants of Tyre; Assyria also is joined with them” (Ps. 83:3-8). Note that ‘Philistine’ and ‘Palestinian’ are the same word…
This ‘conspiring together with one mind’ and ‘forming an alliance’ is exactly what we see coming out of the uniting of the disparate Islamist factions in Syria and elsewhere. “Form an alliance” translates a Hebrew phrase more commonly translated ‘to cut a covenant’ (Ps. 83:5). The Palestinian Covenant unites these groups, and that covenant emphasizes the aim of overrunning Israel. Psalm 83 mentions ten nations- perhaps corresponding with the ten toes of Daniel’s image, and the ten horns on the beast which will dominate God’s people in the last days (Daniel 7, Revelation 13). Joel 3:9 is another prophecy of the invasion which happens just before Christ’s return, and it speaks of how the invaders will make a ‘proclamation’ to “sanctify war”- a jihad, a holy war. And that is exactly the rhetoric of the groups now calling for Islamist unity based around a jihad against Israel in order to establish Al-Sham.
Syria, then known as Aram, frequently invaded Israel in Bible times. The invasions under the Syrian king Rezin were a result of 'taking evil counsel against' Israel (Is. 7:5), just as Assyria and her Arab supporters are to do in Ps. 83:3: "They have taken crafty counsel against Your people”. The double emphasis on "Damascus" as being the nerve centre of Rezin's operations (Is. 7:8), may also be significant in that this very city is now a centre for Arab terrorism against Israel.
I’ve written more about Psalm 83and the Palestinian Covenant in Unrest In The Arab World: The Perspective of Biblical Prophecy [an appendix to chapter 8 of The Last Days]; and in the same book, Digression 7: The Palestinian Movement In Bible Prophecy. You can get a free PDF from www.heaster.org/ld.pdf .
Ezekiel 38
Ezekiel 37 and 38 predict that when the Jews have returned to their land, then there will be a ten nation invasion by a group of surrounding nations, headed up by ‘Gog’- which is to be destroyed by the direct intervention of God to establish His Kingdom. This invasion is to be after the Jews have returned to their land, and will begin with an incursion onto “the mountains of Israel”- which are bordering Syria, the Golan heights:
“In the latter years you shall come into the land that is brought back from the sword, that is gathered out of many peoples, on the mountains of Israel, which have been a continual waste; but it is brought forth out of the nations” (Ez. 38:8).
Only since 1948 and the uprise of serious Arab powers around Israel could this prophecy come true. All we’re waiting for is the Arab confederacy to push into the Golan Heights. And we could view the news on the internet or turn on the telly- and find it’s happening. Any moment now. And the next step will be the actual return of Christ to earth.
Al-Sham- A Reborn Assyria
Zechariah 9 is clearly a prophecy of the return of Christ to earth and the establishment of His Kingdom (see Zech. 9:1,9-11 especially). But this worldwide Kingdom will be established after judgments are executed upon Damascus, Hamath, Tyre, Sidon, Ashkelon, Ekron, Ashdod and Gaza- a collection of peoples likened to a beast with a mouth and teeth which have enclosed Israel (9:7). These areas are geographically exactly where the 'greater Syria' is envisaged as being. They surround present day Israel, from the Gaza Strip to Lebanon. And they are likened to some latter day beast descending upon Israel, which must be destroyed before God's Kingdom can be established. This encourages us to see the beast of Daniel and Revelation as referring in its final form to Israel’s Islamist neighbours who now surround her. Is. 9:12 uses ‘beast’ imagery when it speaks of the Syrians and Philistines [same word as ‘Palestinians’] as being the mouth of a huge beast, closing around Israel: "The Syrians before, and the Philistines behind; and they shall devour Israel with open mouth". This image of an Arab beast devouring Israel is repeated in Joel 1:6 concerning the later Assyrian invader.
The great invasions of Israel by the Assyrians are prototypes of the latter day invasion. Micah 5 is specific that the Lord Jesus will appear to save Israel when "the Assyrian" invades them in the last days. Balaam's prophecy about Israel's final destiny speaks of how finally both Assyria and Eber ['the other side', a similar meaning as the words 'Syria' and 'Aram' in Hebrew, and effectively referring to Syria] will be judged for their abuse of Israel in the last days. They are mentioned together because they will be operating together- and now we see that they actually are coming together (Num. 24:24). Whilst we must remember that Syria and Assyria were historically different, the current talk of a ‘Greater Syria’ and ‘The Islamic state of Iraq and Greater Syria’ is nothing less than Biblical ‘Assyria’ born again. Assyria invaded Israel in waves, initially just attacking the Northern part of Israel (2 Kings 15:29), commented upon in Is. 9:1 as a 'light affliction' compared to the fury of the main invasion. And it is the northern part of Israel which borders with modern day Syria. This is where any land invasion from Syria would naturally begin.
At least four waves of Assyrian invasions are recorded:
- under Menahem (2 Kings 15:19) - bought off
- under Pekah (2 Kings 15:29) - northern Israel affected
- under Hoshea (2 Kings 17:3) - Israel carried captive
- under Hezekiah (2 Kings 18:9) - took fenced cities of Judah and destroyed by God’s direct intervention.
The gap between the third and fourth invasions was around six months. The third invasion took three years: "Then the king of Assyria came up throughout all the land, and went up to Samaria, and besieged it three years" (2 Kings 17:5). This three-year period of domination followed by six months rings bells with the three and a half years of the (latter-day?) Elijah ministry, and the same period spoken of in the 1,260 days, the 42 months and " a time, times, and an half" (Dan. 7:25; 12:7; Rev. 11:2,3; 12:6).
The final Assyrian invasion is the seedbed from which the language of Gog in Ezekiel 38 is taken. Look up these Bible passages at your leisure:
Ezekiel 38 / Gog
Assyria (Isaiah)
:4
37:29
:7
8:7
:8
8:8
:9
28:2; 8:9,21; the Assyrian “strong one” of Is. 28:2 is the ‘Gog’ figure
:11
37:24
:12
10:6
:19
30:27
:22
29:6 RV; 30:30
:19,20
29:6; 30:25
39:10
33:1
The Assyrian is to be “broken in pieces” (Is. 30:31 RV), just as the whole image of Daniel 2 is to be. That image symbolizes a latter day confederacy of nations under the leadership of Babylon / Assyria, which will dominate the land / earth of Israel in the last days.
And so I repeat my basic point: The historical Assyrian invasions of Israel form the prototypes of the latter day invasions which the Bible prophesies, and which will immediately precipitate the return of Christ to the earth. The re-formation of ‘Assyria’ which is being called for by the groups coming to power in Syria today, along with the clear demand for a jihad to destroy Israel and Islamize Palestine, means that the Bible prophecies of the last days are being fulfilled before our eyes. It would seem that the return of Christ will be soon. Jerusalem is truly “compassed with armies”, exactly as the Lord Jesus said it would be just prior to His return in glory has this in mind when He predicted that Jerusalem would again be like this in the last days:
“But when you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies, then know that her desolation is at hand... For these are days of vengeance, that all things which are written may be fulfilled... Jerusalem shall be trodden under foot by the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles [three and a half years of Gentile domination?] be fulfilled... And then shall they see the Son of Man coming in a cloud, with power and great glory. But when these things begin to happen, look up, lift up your heads, because your redemption draws near” (Lk. 21:20-28).
For most of the last 2000 years, Jerusalem has been surrounded by Bedouin tribes- not nations with armies and oil wealth behind them. Only in our times has the whole jigsaw started to come together.
The Faithful Remnant
Isaiah opens his prophecy by stating that once all Israel has fallen to the Assyrian invaders, only Jerusalem will be left- and will only be saved because of a "remnant" within the city (Is. 1:7-9). But the rest of Isaiah chapter 1 goes on to state that Jerusalem as a whole is as sinful and far from the true God as the rest of Judah. The size of this faithful remnant may have been very small indeed. They were " I (Isaiah) and the children (prophets - Is. 8:16) whom the Lord has given me" (Is. 8:18); and this is quoted in Heb. 2:13 as referring to Christian believers. That small group centered around Isaiah perhaps point forward to a small remnant of faithful Jewish believers in Jerusalem, for whose sake the whole race is not destroyed completely. And it seems that this part of the latter day jigsaw is already in place, thanks to a number of baptisms there recently.
We’ll now look in more detail at the emergence of Assyria redivivus.
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