The Bible As History

Written by Jack Kinsella

The Palestinian Authority's chief Islamic judge issued an official ruling recently saying that essentially everything in the Bible is wrong. The Jews didn't settle Jerusalem. David didn't buy the land upon which the Temple was constructed from Ornan three thousand years ago.

David didn't found Jerusalem. Jerusalem wasn't sacked by Nebuchadnezzar. The Jews weren't taken captive for seventy years. King Artaxerxes did not issue an order to restore the city and the Temple.

In fact, according to Sheikh Tayseer Rajab Tamimi, "Jerusalem is an Arab and Islamic city and it always has been so."

Of course, for that to be true, more than half of Jerusalem's history would have to be erased, since Islam is less than fifteen hundred years old.

Tamimi claimed that all excavation work conducted by Israel after 1967 have "failed to prove that Jews had a history or presence in Jerusalem or that their ostensible temple had ever existed."

That statement is so ridiculous as to be laughable. But nobody laughed.

Tamimi accused Israel of distorting the facts and forging history "with the aim of erasing the Arab and Islamic character of Jerusalem." He also accused Israel of launching an "ethnic cleansing" campaign to squeeze Arabs out of the city.

Again, nobody laughed, despite the PA's insistence that the West Bank be ethnically cleansed of Jews as a condition of 'peace.'

"By desecrating its holy sites, expelling its Arab residents and demolishing their homes and confiscating their lands and building settlements in Jerusalem, Israel is seeking, through the use of weapons, to turn it into a Jewish city," he said. "This is a flagrant violation of all religious, legal, moral and human values."

The mere mention of those values in the same breath as his statement about Jerusalem's history is stomach-turning.

As noted, if Tamimi's statement is true, the Bible is a work of total fiction. None of it can be true. Jesus was not a Jew. Pontius Pilate wasn't the Roman procurator of Judea. Jesus was not Crucified. There was no Resurrection.

The destruction of the Temple in AD 70 by Titus and the Romans could not have happened. There was no Temple.

The Jews were not banished from the Holy Land. There were no Jews living there. The thousands of historically-verified anti-Jewish pogroms never took place. The Holocaust is a myth.

Christianity is a myth, since it is founded on the belief that a Jewish carpenter named Jesus was crucified on a hill just outside the walls of Jewish Jerusalem six hundred years before Mohammed.

Worst of all, you are dead in your sins and you have no hope of salvation.

Unless you convert to Islam and are killed in the act of murdering as many unsuspecting infidels as possible.

When asked of the signs of His coming, the very first thing the Lord said in reply was, "Take heed that no man deceive you." Deception is one of the hallmarks of the last days -- it is the single most important factor in the coming of the antichrist. Everything about him is rooted in deception. The antichrist is like a con-man.

Everybody knows you can't con an honest man. None of these get-rich emails from Africa offering to make you a millionaire if you'll help some rich Christian steal millions from some war-torn African country could work without first finding somebody else willing to steal millions from a war-torn African country.

The same applies to the dying Christian from Ubangi who wants to leave his millions to a worthy ministry -- if the worthy ministry doesn't mind breaking a few banking laws. For a con game to be successful, the victim has to be as crooked as the con man. (That's why so many go unreported.)

Once the 'mark' justifies in his mind that everybody else is dishonest, he has crossed a threshold. If you expect everybody to deceive you, you become more tolerant of it. It is the principle of the Big Lie.

For example, the UN regularly condemns Israel for human rights abuses on "Occupied Palestinian Territory." The charges against Israeli 'occupation' are made so often that it MUST be true. Even when it can't be, as in the case of Tamimi's pronouncement.

Why CAN'T it be true? Well, for one thing, if Israel is occupying Palestinian territory, where is it? What are the borders of Palestine and what parts of it are being occupied by Israel? Hamas runs the Gaza Strip. The West Bank territories are a de-facto Palestinian state -- the PA even has its own president and prime minister. The only part under Israeli control is Israel. Which, according to the Chief Islamic Judge of the Palestinian Authority, is occupied Palestinian territory.

It is so lopsided as to make one dizzy. Even the United States is beginning to use words like 'occupied Palestinian territory' to describe Israel.

It is more than coincidental that, with all the international problems facing the UN, it cannot tear its focus away from Israel.

It couldn't if it tried. They aren't even sure why they are so obsessed about it. They just are -- to the exclusion of all the rest of the world's problems combined.

We've talked about Hitler's principle of the Big Lie before. One could summarize it by saying if one repeats a lie enough times, it eventually becomes the accepted 'truth'.

It is almost like mass hypnosis; "Israel is the Occupier. . . Israel is the Occupier . . . Israel is the Occupier. . ." and before you know it, WHAT Israel is 'occupying' is secondary to the need to 'end the occupation' -- which is all Hamas is after, so why blame them?

It's insanity. It makes absolutely no sense in the natural. But it fits perfectly with Bible prophecy.

The Bible predicted that, in the last days, the whole world would be focused on Jerusalem, to the exclusion of almost anything else. According to the Prophet Zechariah, "in that day will I make Jerusalem a burdensome stone for all people: all that burden themselves with it shall be cut in pieces, though all the people of the earth be gathered together against it." (Zechariah 12:2-3)

Until this year, it was hard to imagine a scenario in which Israel would stand alone against the entire world. Israel's protector and international guardian has always been the United States. But that's changing, too.

According to a new poll, only four percent of Israeli Jews believe that the Obama administration is pro-Israel. A majority of Israelis believe he's biased in favor of the Palestinians.

The poll has a margin of error of plus or minus 4.5% so the four percent that actually have faith in the Obama administration may not even exist. In any case, they are statistically meaningless.

A year ago, it was a mystery to me how the US could ever abandon Israel. Only a year ago, the same poll found 88% of Israelis considered the US administration to pro-Israel, 7% said it was neutral and just 2% labeled it pro-Palestinian.

Only three months ago, 31% labeled Obama pro-Israel, 14% considered him pro-Palestinian, 40% said he was neutral, and 15% declined to give an opinion.

This most recent poll essentially says that pretty much every Jew in Israel believes there is good reason NOT to trust the President of the United States or any member of his administration.

Leaving Islam's religious duty to hate the Jews aside for a moment, what excuse works for the civilized world? Israel is the only working democracy in the Middle East.

It is the only nation in the region that affords its citizens basic human rights, full representation in government, freedom of speech and religion and is, by far, the powerful and most prosperous nation in the entire Middle East.

So why is it the most hated government on earth? Why is it the most often-censured by that bastion of democracy, the United Nations? Why is it the recipient of global criticism, while its dictatorial neighbors, like Jordan, are feted as strong allies of the West?

How can it be that more resolutions of censure have been aimed at Israel by the UN than all the Islamic countries of the world combined? Why would the world side with an openly terrorist organization against the only legitimate, western-style democracy in the Middle East?

Why is it that when Israel puts up a fence to protect itself from bombers, the world condemns Israel's fence without saying A SINGLE WORD about the reasons that make it necessary?

There can be only one answer possible. The world hates the Jews more than it hates totalitarianism, Islamo-facism or terrorism. No other answer explains why Israel consistently ranks in global polls as 'the most dangerous nation on earth'.

What makes Israel's continued existence so dangerous? Israel has the population of New York City and has spent all of its existence since 1948 fighting a war FOR its existence against those repressive Islamic dictatorships.

Bible prophecy for the last days goes beyond the Church Age and outlines how God's plan for the national redemption of Israel will be accomplished. According to Bible prophecy, in the last days, the most hated nation on earth with be Israel, and the most contested piece of real estate on earth in the last days will be the city of Jerusalem.

According to the prophet Zechariah, "Behold, I will make Jerusalem a cup of trembling unto ALL THE PEOPLE round about, when they shall be IN THE SEIGE both against Judah and against Jerusalem. And in that day will I make Jerusalem a burdensome stone for ALL people: ALL that burden themselves with it shall be cut in pieces, though ALL THE PEOPLE OF THE EARTH be gathered together against it." (Zechariah 12:2-3)

Until about the end of the 19th century, few people could point to Jerusalem on a map -- most believed it was a lost city from the ancient world. Today, it is the focal point of global attention to the exclusion of all else. What happens in Jerusalem is more important to world peace that what happens in Baghdad, Kabul or even Moscow.

But most people could not tell you why they hate Israel. Neither can the leaders of the western democratic countries can identify why Israel is more of a pariah nation in their eyes than Syria or Iran. They just know that every bad thing that happens is somehow related to their level of support for Israel.

The Bible says that, in the last days, Israel will stand alone, without a champion, against the combined armies of the world, for a twofold reason; for God to reveal Himself to a lost and dying world, and to reveal Himself to Israel.

"Thus will I magnify myself, and sanctify myself; and I will be known in the eyes of many nations, and they shall know that I am the LORD." [Ezekiel 38:23]

"So the house of Israel shall know that I am the LORD their God from that day and forward." (Ezekiel 39:22)

Israel is the only western democracy in the Middle East. It is desperately seeking allies from among the western nations without success. The world is focused instead on creating an ally out of Israel's most implacable enemy. The fact that they are terrorists dedicated to Israel's destruction is strangely irrelevant.

Absent the Bible's outline for the last days, can you find any way to make any of it make sense to you? Me neither. Bring in the Bible's scenario, and it fits like a glove.

"We have also a more sure word of prophecy; whereunto ye do well that ye take heed, as unto a light that shineth in a dark place, until the day dawn, and the day star arise in your hearts." (2nd Peter 1:19)

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