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Loading...One section of new book Armageddon: What the Bible Really Says About the End explains some of the socio-political consequences of the belief that “the end is near. Here’s a consequence that I bet is not widely known: U.S. Foreign Policy on Israel.
In my book I emphatically state that I am not taking a stand on U.S. policy per se and certainly not on the Israeli-Palestinian issue itself. I am interested purely in the historical question: why has the U.S. been (and still is) so invested in supporting Israel in particular?
This is how I explain it in the book (this will take two posts).
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Modern Israel in Ancient Prophecy?
Many people – possibly most – hold some beliefs without knowing quite why. Because of our upbringing, environment, and news sources, certain ideas just seem like common sense. Those raised in families, communities, and churches that believe the United States needs to provide substantial support for Israel usually know some of the reasons: we need to promote stability in the Middle East, protect American oil interests in the region, and help those who have suffered centuries of oppression. It is important to realize, however, that America’s concerns for Middle Eastern stability and oil are relatively recent. American support of Israel was originally, and widely still is, in a certain way of reading the Bible, starting with Genesis “In the Beginning” and continuing to Revelation “At the End.”
Readers of the Bible have always
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I find it much easier to understand prophetic views when seen through the lens of Jewish (Jacob becomes Israel), jewish mystical interpretation, such as that found for example in Kabbalistic traditions (and other) where the concept of Israel can be understood as ‘Israel is the human being, and the human being is Israel.’ Additionally, the concept of the “temple” is associated with spiritual ideas. Similar views can be found in various Gnostic texts, and non-canonical christian views such as in the Gospel of Thomas with its message of the ‘kingdom within’ etc etc.
When viewed in this way, “the return of Christ “and the “coming Apocalypse” take on a different meaning than when read as literal history or as a comforting, and/or future-predictive, and/or political texts, which seems to have repeatedly failed over thousands of years.
These spiritual paradigms make much more sense to me and provide a deeper understanding of these concepts.
I have scores of passages in my Bible highlighted that refer to a very long exile of Israel from her land, scattered among all nations, and a return in the latter days–a return in unbelief (in Ezek 37, she has flesh on the dry bones, but no “breath” in them). Then it says, “I will put my Spirit in you and you will live, and I will settle you in your own land. Then you will know that I the Lord have spoken.” The very fact that Israel is back in her land (albeit in unbelief) is MONUMENTAL. How could such a thing occur?- Never has happened to any nation before. As Isaiah prophesied in chp 66, ““Who has heard such a thing? Who has seen such things? Can a land be born in ONE DAY? Can a nation be brought forth all at once? As SOON AS ZION TRAVAILED, she also brought forth her sons.”
Israel was born in a day–Nov 29, 1947 at the U.N.
And I would say that Zion certainly travailed during WWII, which led directly to her rebirth. Not too mystical.
I would say it’s important to read the entire book of Ezekiel to see what he is referring to.
A little off this topic but still related to your book Armageddon and that is your comments on Climate Change. Your comment was that if the end near “who cares” or words to that effect explains why there are still climate skeptics. A better approach might be found in the path followed by Hal Lindsey and “The Late Great Planet Earth.” Just like Hal Lindsey, climate apocalypticists have repeatedly predicted any number of world ending events. Recall in the 1980’s we were told how the world as we know it was going to end in 2000? It is 2023 and we are still here. When dates come and pass with no demonstrable effect, true believers in the Climate Apocalypse double down and set new dates, just like Hal Lindsey did. As best can be determined none or at best very few of the climate predictions of the last 40 years have come to pass. So maybe believers in the Climate Apocalypse are the secular followers of John of Patmos casting his story of the end into the metaphor of our times and culture.
There certainly have been false predictions of imminent catastrophe in roughly forever! But I’d say there’s a rather significant difference between predictions based on religoius belief and scientific evidence. If you subject an ice cube to warm temperatures it’s gonna melt. It’s not a “belief” if you see what I mean.
Well said Bart
There certainly have been false predictions of imminent catastrophe in roughly forever! But I’d say there’s a rather significant difference between predictions based on religoius belief and scientific evidence. If you subject an ice cube to warm temperatures it’s gonna melt. It’s not a “belief” if you see what I mean.
I agree. The environmental movement has done itself an enormous disservice with hysterical doom-mongering. As someone in medicine doing research, i see the science echoed by politicians and environmental evangelists to be about as reliable and reproducible as most studies in biology (funny that the retort is so often a variation of Pascal’s Wager: the subject is too important not to believe). See Ioannidis’ 2005 paper “Why most published research findings are false.” Claims that opponents of any “consensus” (for the history of consensus and its pernicious danger, see Crichton’s 2003 Cal Poly lecture ‘Aliens Cause Global Warming’) do not care about the environment are unreasonable. It is partisanism that drives so much of this sort of discussion (if one’s party claims X, the lay person repeats X, then claims it is based on “science”, and that the other party is immoral, etc etc etc… so religion-esque).
Patrick Moore, the founder of Greenpeace, has a much more reasonable perspective in my opinion; he certainly cares about the environment but argues against trying to force “anti-human” and speculative developmental policies on poor countries, especially those in Africa. No simplistic melting ice cube analogies here: https://www.epw.senate.gov/public/_cache/files/4/1/415b9cde-e664-4628-8fb5-ae3951197d03/01AFD79733D77F24A71FEF9DAFCCB056.22514hearingwitnesstestimonymoore.pdf
“hysterical doom-mongering”
Right out of the gate and you expose your ideological bias, made all the worse by ridiculing consensus and denying the science behind climate change and calling those trying to avoid catastrophe ‘evangelists’. The ‘doom-mongering’ is echoed by oil company research that they hid from public view, it’s obvious to anyone who pays attention to the weather and the increasing frequency of devastating weather events, the loss of N polar ice, or the rise in sea level. And your facts are just wrong, the ongoing and continuously improving modeling and predictions have done pretty well and keep getting better. I agree with Moore that we shouldn’t be “force[ing] “anti-human” and speculative developmental policies on poor countries”, they didn’t cause the problems, the rich countries did and they should bear the costs. You might ask someone from Vanuatu what they think of ‘doom mongering’. It’s folks like you that help justify the way they keep making decisions that accelerate the temperature rise like approving more and more development. If we’re heading towards apocalypse, is it really ‘doom mongering’?
LOL.
Hysterical indeed, but you’re not convincing.
I do not share the convictions of you or the climate clerics.
Heretics who do not share your thinking are dangerous though, because authorities have said so under the banner of “Science”… fortunately, burning at the stake is no longer carbon conscious.
Don’t evangelicals read John 2:19-21? Jesus himself is the rebuilt temple. And in Mark 13:1,2 he predicts the destruction of the temple, not its rebuilding. Seems like this would be more appealing to evangelicals than a temple rebuilt by people who don’t even worship Jesus.
Thanks so much for this post.From inside Israel,I would like to clarify one point.
Just as there is a deep chasm between the Israeli secular majority and the Ultra-Orthodox -now dominating- less than 20% minority,there is a major difference between them regarding”the Third Temple”.
Modern,secular Israelis consider the entire State of Israel to be”the Third Temple”.
During the Yom Kippur war in 1973, Israel was on the verge of been annihilated,having refused to preemptively attack.The famous Moshe Dayan,then Minister of Defence,spoke of what Mossadniks call “the Samson Option”. This “option”means that Israel would perish together with its enemies, as the Biblical Samson did, by using, for the first time, its “Third Temple” weapons. The “Samson Option” ,then,is the Third Temple’s nuclear option. Today,with Israel put in serious security danger by its new fascist government,the “destruction of the Temple” – also called “the House”- is back in public parlance.
The Temple,for all secular Israelis, already exists. Its feared third destruction means Armageddon.
On the other hand, the now ruling Ultra-Orthodox and fundamentalist ultra-nationalists have established an institute for the literal recreation of the Third Temple, complete with Priestly ancient robes,red heiffer and sacrifices.
May the Almighty they believe in save us from them.
This is very interesting. I’d like to hear more about it! Espectially the Institute…
The Temple Institute has trained priests, built all the implements, sewn the priestly garments, and have begun practicing sacrifices. They have formed a Levitical Choir and five red heifers were flown to Israel last year. The Sahnedrin appointed a high priest a few years ago.
https://templeinstitute.org/
“The Temple has created a registry of kohanim; established a school for educating men of the priestly class in the details of the Temple service; and performed reenactments on all the holidays, including the especially significant Passover sacrifice.” — Israel365
thanks!
Bart, I sent you info by email. No need to reply! You’ll probably look at it when Kingdom comes. Nothing will change till then.
Got it. Haven’t been able to lookthorugh it all yet. BIG quesiton: do you know of Xn fundamentalist groups cooperating with the ultra-orthodox? Some of them too have been stockpiling supplies and working on that red heifer….
For those interested in the meaning of 666 , the number of the Beast in Revelation, which by consensus is read ” Nero Caesar ” in the sum of its Hebrew letters by gematria,a practice derived from Jewish mystic numerology ,here is a new , also politically inspired, gematria of apocalyptic meaning:
In Hebrew letters, the sum of
“Benjamin Netanyahu”, the Prime Minister of Israel driving the nation to destruction, is the same as ” the destruction of the Temple”.
בנימין נתניהו= 683. Binyamin Netanyahu
חורבן הבית=683. Khurban Habayit, the Destruction of the (House)Temple.
Ancient practices still bear meaning in modern Israel. Not ” seriously” as literal truth- they are always greeted with smiles of knowing and amusement- but they count symbolically, tying Israel eras of history and belief across centuries and millennia.
In almost every traditional wedding, the officiator will bring out each of the bride and groom’s names in gematria values to show, symbolically , how the couple is deeply and cosmically related.
I did the same when my older son married.
So all the troubles and friction between the Palestinians and the Israelis can be traced to a millenia old myth?
Well, certainly to the promise to Abraham and then the (much later) conquest of Canaan, yes. It’s not a new thing….
No,they cannot be traced,unless we always remember that “Palestine” was the Land of Israel, after it was named Canaan.
The troubles begin with Jew hatred in the Qur’an.
In the 1900’s,before any State of Israel or Six Day War,the Arabs living there,led by the Hitlerite Mufti of Jerusalem,wanted a Judenrein land (Nazi term,meaning a land cleansed of Jews).This policy carries to this day,as the Palestinians are equally intent in expelling or killing every Jew in their midst.
When the League of Nations partitioned Palestine(1947)-Britain returned its Mandate-the Palestinians (meaning simply the Arab inhabitants of Palestine, the other part of Palestine inhabited by Jewish Palestinians),refused the Partition and their own state,expecting that in the 1948 war,the Jews would be annihilated.
The Arab genocidal desire failed.Israel was established and the Arabs inhabiting Palestine remained refugees,rejecting since every single offer by Israel,including the extremely generous proposal negotiated by President Clinton at Camp David.Arafat preferred to mount an “intifada”.
The “Palestinian people” was created by Yassir Arafat in the early 70’s.He himself was an Egyptian,and the Arabs living in Palestine considered themselves Syrian originating in Egypt and Saudi Arabia.
So no, ancient history isn’t relevant.Islam didn’t exist until the 7th century. Shortly after,they began world conquest.They built the Dome of the Rock because this was the place of the Second Temple,their own version of Super-sessionism.
PS: by the way, Canaan wasn’t conquered. Archaeology is very strong on this issue. It is now widely accepted that Israel emerged from within Canaan, peacefully. The first Israelites were Canaanites. What ultimately cemented the creation of Judaism as a monotheistic ( albeit henotheistic) religion, the creation of the nation of Israel with an Israelite religion, however fragmented,was the Levites immigration from Egypt.
I disagree. The Zionist narrative is not an accurate reflection of the history of Israel/Palestine.
I”m allowing both these comments, but I’m not going to be able to post future comments on the policital situation in Israel/Palestinian territories. Otherwise Armageddon will break out on the blog.
Good idea Bart. I will keep my comments non-political from now on!
I can understand why you don’t want to take a stance Bart. There is so much censorship these days!
Of all of the things you point on in this book, I fear this section is the one thing that your conservative Christian critics will latch on to.
Maybe. But as I say, I don’t take a stand on U.S. foreign policy on Israel or the Israeli-Palestinian issue generally. I’m just interested in knowing why evangelicals historically have been such strong supporters of Israel (LONG before there was any concern for oil in the region, etc.)
This is exactly the subject of my DMin project!!
Whoa.
Bart or the other Messianic scholars,
Where can I find an authoritative and relatively brief summary of:
1. The Jewish belief in the Messiah before Jesus, including the prophecies about the Messiah’s attributes.
2. The Jewish perspective on the “Son of Man” before Jesus.
Thanks in advance.
Well I talk a good bit about both in my books, starting with Jesus: Apocalyptic Prophet of the New Millennium.
Thank you.
I have many of your books including your New Testament textbook.
I simply want to be able to reference an authoritative source for an article I’m writing.
I’m assuming that you would consider your trade books and your New Testament textbook as authoritative sources.
I certainly do. (!) “Authoritative source” normally means a source that is by an expert based on research that has been done. An academic monograph by a scholar for scholars would not quote textbooks or tradebooks (well, they shouldn’t), but that’s mainly because sdcholars want scholars to quote scholarship, not books for non-scholars.
Bart,
Prof Robert Eisenman at Cal State Long Beach says in one of his recorded lectures to his class on the historical Jesus that he would like to see the anti-Semitic material in the NT excised from the text and has had conversations with his Christian colleagues about this, and though they thought it would undermine all of Christianity to do so, he doesnt agree that is the case. He believes it should be done and that Christianity would survive it.
What are your overall thoughts on this – could/would this ever gain real momentum?
Thank you,
SC
My view is that that New Testament is a historical document and to pretend that it is not anti-Jewish would do more harm than good. Christians need to recognize the anti-Jewish character of the founding documents. Morever, excising those portions would have zero affect on current anti-semitic actions since no one who is opposed ot jews and Judsin would read that translation.