Possible Hasmonean ancestry of The Virgin Mary

I've already explained why Heli is the Father of Mary.  That combined with my hunch that the solution to the Kenen issue is that Kenen was Selah's older brother by some 15 or so years and Selah married Kenen's daughter.  Leads me to conclude that Luke 3's genealogy sometimes records the descent through a woman, but keeps it patriarchally expressed by listing the woman's husband as the son in law of her father.  Joseph is distinct because he is the only one who is NOT a biological ancestor of Jesus, thus he alone lacks the Greek definite article.

This can also explain the issue regarding the father of Shealtiel.  I think a daughter of Neri married Shealtiel son of Jechoniah, then he died without an heir and so she married his brother Pedaiah and had Zerubbabel.  There is also the issue that neither New Testament son of Zerubbabel is named in his Old Testament genealogy in 1 Chronicles 3:19.   Matthew is definitely skipping generations sometimes, so Abiud could be a grandson or great grandson or further (the possibility that Abiud is a weird Greek form of Akkub of 1 Chronicles 3:24 has entered my mind).  And in the context of what I'm arguing here about Luke's genealogy, 1 Chronicles 3:19 does say Zerubbabel had a daughter, Shelomith, so I think she married Resha.

So my theory is when Heli is called a Son of Matthat it could mean son in law, and so on, but not always of course.

An interesting name in Luke 3:24 is Janna.  Janna is a very rare Hebrew name, and the only recorded example of the name around the time this Janna would have lived is the Hasmonean King Alexander Jannaeus.  Again I suspect the Joseph he's described as the son of could be his wife's father.

The only known wife of Alexander Jannaeus was Queen Salome Alexandra (Shelomtzion or Shlom Tzion).  Josephus tells us nothing about her family, but rabbinic traditions recorded in the Talmud say she was the sister of Simeon bar Shetah, Simeon's father was Shetah bar Yossei.  Since the Talmud is oral traditions written down at least 300 years after Salome's time it could be the nature of her relation to this family had slipped by a generation, making Simeon her nephew and Shetah her brother.  Since Yossei is a different form of Joseph, that would make Alexander Jannaeus a son in law of a Joseph.  Actually I can't help but suspect the Shetah generation is made up entirely since no Shetah was ever Nasi of the Sanhedrin but a Jose ben Joezer was, (however another candidate for the Joseph Luke 3:24 is Jose ben Jochanan).

Epiphanius of Salamis in Panarion Book 1 in the section discussing the Nazoreans seems to identify the marriage of Alexander and Salome as uniting the Aaronic and Davidic lines.

This family was one of the leading families of the Sanhedrin, from what I know about other leading families of the Sanhedrin (like the House of Hilel which came later), they often had Davidic ancestry.  And once the Hasmoneans started ruling as Kings it would make sense they'd want to marry into the House of David.  And the two Husbands of Alexandra were the first two to rule as Kings.  So Yossei being a descendant of Nathan Ben David is reasonably plausible.  But I have a hunch the mother Alexander & Aristobolus and wise of Hyrcanus I was also of Davidic descent.

Actually another good reason for Hasmonean leaders to marry daughters of David was perhaps simply because they were the High Priests.  Aaron's wife was Elisheba, the sister of Nashon who was a prince of Judah and direct ancestor of Boaz and thus David.  Much later Jehosheba was a daughter Jehoram and sister of Ahaziah, king of Judah of the House of David, who married the Priest Jehoiada.

Salome and Jannaeus had two sons, Hyrcanus II and Aristoblus II.  From then on with few exceptions all the Hasmoneans are known only by Greek names, but I suspect most also had Hebrew names that Josephus simply neglected to record.

But Melchi may not even be the main Hebrew name of whoever is meant, it derives from the Hebrew word for King.  Both sons had been Kings, though I feel Aristobulus II was more likely to have used Melek as an alternate name.

Aristobulus II had two sons and two daughters one of whom was named Alexandra (not to be confused with the Alexandra who married her brother Alexander).  Himself, his son Matthias Antigonus II, and his daughters are recorded as being taken to Rome by Pompey after he captured Jerusalem in 63 BC according to Josephus (Antiquities of The Jews Book 14 Chapter 4, at the end of the chapter).  They later returned to Judea, after the death of Aristobulus II in 48 BC they were protected by Ptolemy Bar Mennaeus according to (Antiquities Book 14 Chapter 7, at the very end).  Phillipon the son of Ptolemy married Alexandra, but later Ptolemy killed him and married Alexandra himself.  The unnamed daughter after Antigonus died held the Hyrcania Fortress till just before Actium in 31 BC.

I suspect the unnamed sister is more likely to have possibly been married to a Levi, (or perhaps that name just signified marrying a Levite or a Levitical priest).

Robert Graves started a fringe theory that involved Matthias Antigonus II as the Matthat of Luke 3:24 (a theory defended in a book called Herodian Messiah).  His scheme however did not match a strict literal interpretation of Scripture and so I do not intend to support it specifically at all.

Janna was a rare name which is why I think it could be significant.  Matthat/Matthias/Matthew was very common however, so that's not as significant.  Still hypothetically if this Matthat was Antigonus II, we know pater-lineally only one generation comes between him and Jannaeus, so it would mean he married either his niece or a first cousin once removed.  Neither of which are included in The Bible's incest restrictions, so it would be perfectly legal.

In John 8:48 Jesus is accused of being both a Samaritan and Demon Possessed, he denies being Demon Possessed but not being a Samaritan.

I talked in the Heli post about why Heli could be an alternate name for a Jehoiakim, and how Jehoiakim was in some traditions the father of Mary.  Jehoiakim is also a fairly rare name, so it's interesting that the Samaritan records claim a Jehoiakim was their High-Priest at about this very time period, (number 38).

That connection is a tenuous one however.  But Matthias Antigonus is known to have had at least one daughter.

The Herodian Messiah theory alluded to above is dependent on confusing the two wives of Antipater.  Mariamne III who was a daughter of Aristobulus IV, and an unnamed wife who was a daughter of Matthias Antigonus.  The Herodian Messiah theory makes Antipater the husband of Mary and father of Jesus.  My theory makes a daughter of Antigonus possibly Mary's mother, not Mary herself.

I've actually expressed elsewhere my suspicion that the claims of Herod being an Idumean may have been propaganda against him.  Though his official claim to Exilarch descent is also very likely to be propaganda.  I certainly reject the assumption that the Idumeans were Edomite, I view them as Ishmaelite (with a possible Simeonite element), and Antipater did have Idumean descent through his mother. The relationship between Herod and Costobarus suggests to me that Herod didn't think of himself as Idumean at all.

Antipater is a Greek name, so Antipater son of Herod could have had an additional Hebrew or Aramaic name that history hasn't recorded.

It's possible this woman wasn't the only daughter of Antigonus II.  And it's also possible she was already a widow when she was married to Antipater, if Antigonus himself had ever arranged a marriage for her it wouldn't be likely to have been to a Herodian.

I think one factor in why Luke laid out this genealogy how he did was because of the potential significance in the numbers.  Luke's genealogy has Jesus as the 77th from Adam and 70th from Enoch.

UFO Activity and Israel

In 2 Kings 6:17 Elisha prayed to God and He briefly allowed his servant to see beyond our normal 3 dimensional perception and glimpse the Heavenly armies that were there to fight for Israel.  Note that Israel was not in obedience at this time, this was the Northern Kingdom.

Daniel 10 likewise shows us that political upheavals in the Terrestrial realm seem to have corresponding conflicts in the Heavenly realm.  And tells us Michael fights to defend Israel.  See also Ephesians 6.

In the Apocryphal Second Maccabees Chapter 5 we are told that before Antiochus Epiphanes attacked Jerusalem, chariots were seen for 40 days fighting in the heavens above the City. Daniel 8 does seem to also imply heavenly warfare going on at this time.  But 2 Maccabees is less reliable then 1 Maccabees, for example I don't know if this was before his first or second sacking of Jerusalem since 2 Maccabees seems to merge the two together.  The second one is what resulted in the Abomination of Desolation in Kislev 167 BC.  1 Maccabees 1 and Josephus Antiquities of The Jews Book 15 Chapter 5 makes clear there were two attacks but the first was over 2 years earlier and was relevantly bloodless.

In Wars of The Jews Book 6 Chapter 5 Section 3, Josephus informs us of similar visions seen in the heavens before the War started in 66 AD.

Besides these, a few days after that feast, on the one and twentieth day of the month Artemisius, [Jyar,] a certain prodigious and incredible phenomenon appeared: I suppose the account of it would seem to be a fable, were it not related by those that saw it, and were not the events that followed it of so considerable a nature as to deserve such signals; for, before sun-setting, chariots and troops of soldiers in their armor were seen running about among the clouds, and surrounding of cities. 

Thing is the events he describes both before and after this I have reasons for suspecting actually happened in 30 AD the year of the Crucifixion/Resurrection and Birth of The Church.  Either way important dates in Israel's History. 

If you look at a Time-Line of Early modern UFO Sightings, and a Time-Line of the development of modern Israel, you'll see a lot of correlations between key milestone events.  A third Timeline to consider is the biography of Aleister Crowley.

The decade of the first Zionist Congress was the 1890s, same decade when people were seeing Jules Verne style Airships.  1909 in which Airship sightings occurred in New Zealand was the same year Tel-Aviv, the secular Capital of modern Israel was founded.

1917 was the year the Sun Miracle was performed in Fatima, and of the Balfur Declaration.  In occult History that is the year Aleister Crowley performed the Alamantra Working.  And in the following year he conjured Lam, the entity that resembled the Greys.

Crowley also performed some key rituals in 1923, same year as the British Mandate for Palestine.

1933 was the year of the Transfer Agreement, and the year of some key UFO sightings also.  There were also a lot of interesting UFO occurrences during WWII.

1947 was the year of the Babalon Working, and right after that was Roswell and the other events that are considered the full beginning of the modern UFO craze.  1947-49 also marks the birth of modern Israel.

"Those UFOs weren't seen in Israel" you might object.  We're dealing with a conflict that is actually going on beyond our 4 Dimensional perception, but spilling over into it.  At any-rate there have been UFO sightings in Israel, I remember just last year or the year before there was a big buzz about one sighted just over the Temple Mount.

Prophecy in The News had done an episode years ago on correlations between UFO Flaps and Israel's Wars.  They didn't cover much of what I laid out above, but did cover stuff about later wars I don't feel like getting into myself.

Hopefully those stay up on Youtube.  It was called Israel's Wars and UFO Flaps.

Nothing anyone predicted happened during the September 2015 Blood Moon.  But my brother did catch a UFO taking pictures of it.  And moves were made towards dividing Israel during September's UN Meetings.

In the study I did on This Generation Shall Not Pass, I mentioned 120 years as a potential number to use, with one Biblical reason for it being Genesis 6.  Now one may object "the context of this is about the Nephilim Activity and The Flood".  Well Jesus said "as the days of Noah were" so shall His return be.  And many have seen that as among their reasons for connecting the modern UFO Phenomenon with Fallen Angels.

Right now I'm leaning towards, though am by no means predicting, a 2030-2037 End Times model, with a 2033 Rapture.  2037 is 120 years from 1917, and 70 years from the Six Days War.  And 2030 would be Two Thousand Years from The Crucifixion.

But remember the Generation is a maximum time limit, not an exact calculation.

Jesus was the 70th Generation from Enoch

I've expressed my opposition to the Book of Enoch.  There is however one thing about it I find interesting that I felt I should talk about here.

The Book Enoch has a prophetic reference to 70 generations from the time of Enoch.  Rob Skiba seems to have done math that he feels justifies saying our time, or the time the modern UFO craze started was about 70 generations from the time of Enoch.  However he should study the Genealogy of Jesus in Luke 3, it makes Jesus the 77th from Adam, and thus the 70th from Enoch because as Jude reminds us Enoch is the 7th from Adam.

What the book claims will happen 70 generations from Enoch is that the Fallen Angels sealed in the Abyss/Tartaros will begin to be let loose.

I find it interesting how Demonic Possessions are not nearly as big of an issue in the Old Testament, in fact the few times something like it comes up it's defined as being an Evil Spirit from YHWH, like with Saul.

But in The New Testament we have an epidemic of Demonic activity going on.

Romans 10:7 says the Abyss (Deep in the KJV) is one of the places Jesus went when he was in the Earth between his Death and Resurrection.  We know he went to Sheol to awaken the Old Testament Saints, but I suspect that was all handled on the 15th of Nisan.  The only reason I can think of for him to then go to the Abyss would be to reseal it, thus it is now firmly sealed up again until Revelation 9.  But plenty of the Demons that got out before are still roaming around.

I used to be adamant that Demons weren't Fallen Angels but were the spirits of Angel-Human hybrids who died in The Flood.  But I'm not as convinced on that anymore.  Yes we know Good Angels have physical forms and don't need to posses people.  But Jude says those that sinned in Genesis 6 lost their Oketerion.

But I'm not intrigued by this enough to endorse the Book of Enoch which has endless problems.  It could be this 70 Generations from Enoch correlation is further evidence that Enoch as we know it has been altered by Christian copiers.

Update: Upon further reading the passage of Enoch in question, in Chapter 10, verses 11 through 15.  It's language does pretend to be about the End Times, and it confuses the Abyss with the Lake of Fire.  Just further proving Enoch is not a Biblically accurate text.

Likewise Enoch doesn't describe them as being in the Abyss currently (at the time it was written) but that they wouldn't be sent there till after the 70 Generations.

So this post was a pointless diversion.

The Month of Iyar and Second Passover

Zif is the month Solomon began building The Temple according to 1 Kings 6 and II Chronicles 3.  Zif being the Month now known as Iyar.

The Ascension which was 40 days after the Resurrection was in Iyar, most likely the 27th or 28th.

Pesach Sheini (Second Passover) on the 14th of Iyar, the month following Passover, I find interesting. It's there to allow a second chance at Passover if for some reason you couldn't observe it when it actually happened (as explained in Numbers 9:6-12).  It's the only major Feast day for which this second chance is allotted in The Torah, it is also thematically affiliated with second chances.

At least twice in the History of Ancient Israel, the entire nation collectively had to use it. During the reigns of Hezekiah and Josiah. It was during this special Passover of Josiah that many survivors of the Northern Kingdom returned South, the narrative specifically singles out many of Asher being among those. I think the Ancestors of Anna The Prophetess of Luke 2 are among those.

In Ezra 3:8-9 the Second Month is linked to Zerubbabel and Jeshua beginning their work.  They are considered types of the Two Witnesses because of Zachariah 4.

You should Study Stephen's sermon in Acts 7 remembering that he didn't get to finish.  What he'd repeatably demonstrated was that Israel constantly failed to obey God the first time but got it right the second time. It's pretty clear his intended climax was going to be that they would accept Jesus as their Messiah when he came the second time. Romans 11 makes it clear Israel's current spiritual blindness isn't permanent, Hosea 5:15 I believe makes Israel's salvation the trigger of the Second Coming. Luke 13 also backs this up.

 So, I think Second Passover is linked to this point of Stephen's sermon. Now I'd already come to this hypothesis before I looked up the History and noticed that ALL the major national Holidays of modern Israel are in the month of Iyar, the same month as the 2nd Passover. The 5th of Iyar is their Independence day (The previous day being their Veteran's memorial day). The Battle at Degania was the 11th. The surrender of Nazi Germany, Suicide of Adolf Hitler, and the Liberation of various Concentration Camps where all in this month. But best of all of the Unification of Jerusalem during the Six Day War is the 28th.

Everything above I'd originally said in different places a long time ago.  Recently I've come to strongly suspect the Two Witnesses may begin their ministry in Iyar.

That Solomon began building his Temple in Iyar, could also be reason to suspect Ezekiel's Temple will be built in Iyar.

It is the proper Biblical Rekconing of Iyar not the Rabbinic one we should pay attention to however.

There could be a dark-side to Iyar's significance as well (maybe already has if you're someone critical of the modern state of Israel).  Iyar could also be when construction of The Temple the Antichrist will desecrate begins construction.  Solomon can in some ways be a type of the Antichrist as much as Jesus.  And if something is being done specifically to device mainstream modern Judaism, the Rabbinic calendar would likely be used.  The Rabbinic Jewish festival of Lag B'Omer falls on the 18th of Iyar, the 33rd day of the Omer (as the Rabbis incorrectly reckon it).

Romans 8 tells us all things work together for good.  So bad things happening at this time could be linked to good happening.

Occult Holidays like Walpurgisnacht and Beltaine frequently fall during Iyar.  As does the secular May Day.  I mentioned the day Hitler died above, Hitler killed himself on May 1st because it (and May 5th somewhat less well known) are occult holidays.  I believe I'd checked once before and May 1st 1776 on which the Bavarian Illuminati was founded also fell in Iyar.

I've also already mentioned on this Blog how May 6th was originally Apollo's birthday in Ancient Greece (and May 7th Artemis) it was Augustus who made his Birthday September 23rd the day to celebrate Apollo.  And Apollyon is a name for Apollo.

I oppose the Blood Moon theory for a few reasons.  One being that I think The Bible avoids referencing Full Moons directly because Full Moons are important to the occult.  So the occultists could find it significant when a Lunar Eclipse is the Full Moon closest to Belltaine.  Which interestingly happens in 2032-2033.

I now think the Abomination of Desolation could start the Seven Years

Allow me to clarify what I mean.  The Man of Sin proclaiming himself God while sitting in The Temple in II Thessalonians 2, which I believe connects to events in Revelation 13, is certainly at the Midway Point of the Seven Years.

But I'm no longer convinced of the assumption that what Jesus meant by the "Abomination of Desolation" is the same as that event.  Jesus called it "The Abomination of Desolation spoken of by Daniel The Prophet".

Actually that they're distinct events is grammatically justified by that Paul's Man of Sin is sitting in The Temple while Jesus' Abomination is standing in it.  It know it might seem silly to quibble about that but I believe the details of God's Word are important.

Daniel never used that phrase of what Paul describes (a Man deifying himself), he used it of an Idol of Zeus Olympus being set up in The Temple.  And Upon reading Maccabees more closely I realized it wasn't even in the Holy of Holies, it was on the Brazen Altar.  Now one could argue Antiochus Epiphanes did deify himself, but that's not what the "Abomination the maketh Desolate" refers to in Daniel 11.

Revelation 13 does refer to an Image of The Beast, but I don't think that is what most people think it is.

In past studies on this Blog I've come to the conclusion that if Jerusalem is captured by a Gentile army during the end times, it marks the beginning of the Week, not the middle like people assume.  And I've talked about the possibility of a decoy Antichrist doing a decoy Abomination event.

I did a post where I argued the 1290 days ends with the Abomination of Desolation.  I'm no longer convinced of that argument, I'm having trouble clearly getting it from the Hebrew, and I've noticed the Preterists making that argument appeal to the Septuagint, which I object to.

That assumption remained in mind when I did my Calculations on the 70th Week post.  I'm also no longer convinced the 7 years of Revelation necessarily has anything to do with Daniel 9.

I do still believe that if those numbers in Daniel 12 are relevant to the End Times at all (I believe that can apply to Antiochus's Abomination, I just don't know how, but it most likely involved history beyond the first Hanukkah and Antiochus' death).  That the 1290 days are the first half and the 1335 days the second half.  With the point where they meet being the Yom Teruah on which The Rapture will happen.  The 1290 days would begin in Nisan if the first half has a Second Adar, and the 1335 days would end on or near Pentacost, which I think will formally begin the Millennium a couple months after The Beast is defeated.

That would put the beginning of the ministry of the Two Witnesses in Iyar rather then Nisan as I thought before.  But I have reason to see Iyar as prophetically significant.

I think this Abomination of Desolation will be performed by a Decoy Antichrist.  And later the actual Antichrist and False Prophet will present themselves as saving the world (or at least Israel) from him.

The "Great Tribulation" I still think refers to all Christian persecution, but now I can argue the escalation of it Matthew 24 describes applies to the first half of the 7 years, not the second.

Now it's also possibly it could be distinct but still happen at broadly the Mid-Way point.  I'm continually revising my theories as I study the Word.

I've decided the 2018-2025 theory is unlikely

I blogged last month on how my standards for it were pretty high and specific.  And now I've decided the odds of the Temple being up and ready in less then two and a half years is a stretch.  So I'm abandoning that theory for now, but if suddenly big news happens with The Temple I will consider returning to it.

My mind has again returned to the 2030-2037 theory.  And not for the reasons I had mentioned that theory a few times in my last 2018-2025 post, including a recent update of it.

I don't like how my first post on that theory put the Blood Moon connection right in the title.  That's something I mentioned only as a hook to get people with a Blood Moon fixation interested.  I included in that post Chris White's video debunking the Blood Moon theory.  The Lunar eclipses are useful because it helps me be certain when the Full Moons of those months are, and thus to deduce the Lunar Cycles from there.

I had also made that post back when I more or less trusted the Rabbinic Calendar, and before I decided to agree with the Karaites.

What happened was earlier today, October 10th 2015, I was thinking about observations I made in my Pagan Holidays and Christmas posts.  And Developed a hunch that Maybe the Resurrection of the Witnesses, and soon after The Church might happen on September 25th, which would put their Execution at about Sunrise on the 22nd, the Autumnal Equinox.  Because they will be dead for three and a half days.

And the next day the Beast may declare a Global Holiday celebrating his defeat of them, like how Augustus made his Birthday September 23rd a new Holiday dedicated to Apollo(Apollyon).

And I had firmly already determined that their Resurrection, and the Seventh Trumpet, revolves around the Sunset that starts Yom Teruah.  At the midway point of the Finale Week.  Backed up by timelines suggested here.

So I decided to look using Stellarium for a year when the Sunset the begins Yom Teruah could likely be the Sunset of September 25th.  And the best date in the near future I found just so happened to be 2033, the Yom Teruah that would mark the midway point in the 2030-2037 model I'd thought of before.

A Solar Eclipse is supposed to happen on the 23rd of September 2033.  And the Rabbinic Calendar likely has Yom Teruah either that day or the 24th.  But I've concluded using Stellarium that when the Crescent of the New Moon will likely first be visible in Israel is most likely Sunset of September 25th.

Now if that New Moon is Biblically Yom Teruah or not depends on when the Barley Harvest happens in Spring of 2033.  But when it's that late already I doubt the Harvest could be late enough to delay it, in fact the Rabbis already expect 2033 to have a second Adar. The Kariate reckoning usually only has everything a month later in years there isn't a Second Adar for the Rabbis.

The Lunar Eclipse in October happens on what would if this is correct be the 14th of Tishrei.  I have realized lately that it's not even true Full Moons happen on the 15th of Hebrew Months, the Biblical New Moon is the Crescent not when the moon is completely hidden.  The Full Moon more likely falls on the 14th, there was a Full Moon probably when Jesus was in Gethsemane.

I have pointed out before how only the Resurrection happens "In the Twinkling of an Eye", at the Last Trump.  I think we may very well walk the Earth Resurrected briefly before the actual Rapture, like those Resurrected soon after Jesus in 30 AD.

The Moon will be under the Feet of Virgo within 24 hours, by Sunset of September 26th 2033.  The Rapture of the Man-Child happens either while the Moon is under The Woman's Feet, (but if that Woman is Virgo or not is uncertain), or sometime soon after based on Revelation 12.

Revelation 14 I have a feeling is Yom Kippur, it's certainly before Tabernacles.  I believe the Zion in Revelation 14 is the Heavenly Zion, and that the 144,000, and thus the whole Church are Raptured when this happens.

Once again, a link for the people who think Date Setting is inherently wrong.

Tying in Rob Skiba's theory about 20 years of Jacob's Trouble, would begin that time in 2017 AD.

What is the Mystery of Babylon?

I've noticed some people feel that the whole point of Babylon being called a "Mystery" (Mysterion in the Greek) proves it can't be as simple as being just Babylon of Mesopotamia.

First of all some mysteries are good because they're so simple.  The original Scream was a great mystery film because the killer does wind up being the first person anyone had suspected, the twist was simply that he had a partner.  Now I'm not going to argue there are two Babylons (though I have argued there are two cities called the "Great City").  

But I do feel a great deal of Eschatological confusion comes from people assuming Babylon is the Beast's capital.  Chris White tying his Jerusalem as Mystery Babylon into his Antichrist as a Jewish False Messiah theory is dependent on that assumption.  Same with the Pope as the Antichrist and/or False Prophet views.

Mystery Babylon wields power over the Beast, hence riding it, but the Beast later turns on her.  I actually feel that makes little sense if that city is his political capital.  I in fact feel there is no guarantee the Beast or False Prophet will ever set foot in Babylon personally, though they certainly could.  The events of the Sixth and Seventh Bowls imply to me that the Beast is West of the Euphrates while Babylon is East of it.

This is also a good time for me to remind people that while I feel based on the importance of the Euphrates in Revelation as well as Zechariah 5, that Revelation's Babylon must be in Mesopotamia.  I do not feel it needs to be the Babylon of Hammurabi and Nebuchadnezzar.  Because I've already argued Eridu was the Babel of Genesis 10 and 11.  And I find it interesting how H. G. Wells chose Basra for his Things To Come.  Other cities that have rivaled Babylon as the regional capital include Nineveh (Nahum uses Whore of Babylon like terminology), Seleucia and Baghdad.

Ultimately though, the reason it's a "Mystery" is because while it is a very Specific City in Shinar it is also more then that, it is a Religious and Socio-Economic System.  That has ties to other cities, but Zechariah 5 makes clear for the end She will return home.  She is in a sense all False Religion.

I have responded before to Chris White's View.  I agreed with White's point about how the Mountains are clearly linked to the Heads/Kings, and are not a separate symbol.  But disagreed with how he used that as an excuse to render the Mountains irrelevant.  I didn't know how to answer the Mountains issue then, but I do now since I have come to my finale conclusion on the Seven Heads and how they connect to Daniel 7.  It could be we are dealing with not Seven Mountains physically near each other, but 7 Sacred Mountains or Hills for each of the relevant 7 Kingdoms, or all 7 of their spiritual capitals.  Babylon, Persepolis, Alexandria, Antioch, Byzantium/Constantinople, Ctesiphon and Rome.

So Rome can indeed be relevant to understanding the full story of the Mystery.  But she both begins and ends in Shinar.

The idea of removing Literal Babylon altogether and making Babylon a code for something else begins with Rome, other such views have been possible only because of long held attachment to doing it with Rome made the idea seem acceptable.  But none other then Rome started being seriously suggested till within the last two hundred years, three hundred tops.  While the Early Church Fathers were often Anti-Semtic and held Jewish Antichrist views, you won't see among them a single example of a Jerusalem as Babylon view being suggested.

I myself have even flirted with allegorical Babylon ideas, mainly here.  The main points of that post I still stand by.  But any past confusion I had on Babylon has been cleared up.

The origin of viewing Babylon as code for Rome lies entirely in Catholics wanting to use it to make 1 Peter support their Peter was in Rome nonsense.  The claim that Peter came to Rome I view as false, but it has ancient roots going back even to the second century.  And Catholics are Ok with seeing Babylon in Revelation as Rome, they just insist it's Pagan Rome not Papal Rome (they will sometimes point out Vatican Hill is not one of the original 7 hills meant when Rome is called a City on 7 hills).

So that's why Protestants using a Babylon as Rome view against the Vatican is so annoying to me, they are actually using a Catholic lie as the foundation of their anti-Catholic Eschatology.  If you can find a single example of a Catholic apologist disagreeing with Revelation's Babylon being Rome, I will be genuinely shocked, but one or two isolated examples would not undermine my point here.  I was raised Catholic and the Family Catholic Bible has Babylon being Rome all over it's footnotes for Revelation.

And then we have Historicists saying that denying Babylon is Rome is a Jesuit deception (along with Futurism in general).  Because Peter being in Rome is needed for the very foundation of Cahotlicism, the Catholics NEED Babylon to mean Rome at least once in The Bible, far more then they ever cared about Protestants calling the Pope the Antichrist.

So if you really want to hurt the Vatican, just accept that Babylon is Babylon.

The Great City, can there be only one?

In my study where I refuted Chris White's Mystery Babylon theory, I didn't go in depth on the fact that Jerusalem and Babylon are both called the "Great City".  I just repeated what Chuck Missler likes to say about "The Bible being a tale of two cities" and left it at that.

That is the main weakness of that study, that the main direct technical argument I just sort of brushed off.  So today I want to get into that more.  Then I will go back and edit that older post to include a link to this one.

In the Greek this term is "Megale Polis".  This phrase isn't used in any other books of The Bible, only Revelation.  But it's general Greek usage does not at all suggest it is a term that can apply to only one single city.  In fact in Greece there were 40 places called "Megale Polis".  The only time it's used in a sense of being unique to only one city was the city that was actually named that, (Megalopolis, founded in 371 BC) rather then it being only a title of a city.  And I don't think anyone thinks Revelation is talking about Megalopolis.

In Chapter 11 the term is used of current terrestrial Jerusalem, and in 21 is used for New Jerusalem.  In Chapters 14, 17 and 18 it is indisputably used of Babylon.

Proof that the book intends to apply that term to more then one city is in chapter 16 starting in verse 17, when the Seventh Bowl of God's Wrath is poured out.

And the seventh angel poured out his vial into the air; and there came a great voice out of the temple of heaven, from the throne, saying, It is done.  And there were voices, and thunders, and lightnings; and there was a great earthquake, such as was not since men were upon the earth, so mighty an earthquake, and so great.

 And the great city was divided into three parts, and the cities of the nations fell: and great Babylon came in remembrance before God, to give unto her the cup of the wine of the fierceness of his wrath.  

 And every island fled away, and the mountains were not found.  And there fell upon men a great hail out of heaven, every stone about the weight of a talent: and men blasphemed God because of the plague of the hail; for the plague thereof was exceeding great.

The middle Paragraph above is verse 19.  It makes little grammatical and no narrative sense for the Great City and Babylon to be the same city in that context.  The Great City was just judged, and now after that is done God is turning his attention to Babylon, setting the stage for the next two chapters.

People who play fast and lose with the Chronology of Revelation may try to argue that chapters 17 and 18 are merely describing in more detail what happened in 16:19.  Besides that simply not fitting the grammar of what the text says, Revelation 18 foretells Babylon ceasing to be a City at all, that land to never be inhabited again.  Not at all the same thing as being divided into three parts, but rather mutually exclusive.

I think the Great City being divided into three parts is Jerusalem, it fits Jerusalem's history perfectly.

I'd bet that there are Historicists saying this was fulfilled already by modern Jerusalem's division into "Quarters" because calling them "quarters" is silly when the Armenian quarter is so small and the Armenians are Christians.  What it was was a dividing of Jerusalem between the 3 major Religions that consider it sacred.  But that would not be a truly literal fulfillment of the prophecy, Revelation is talking about a physical division, not man made borders.

The Seventh Bowl Earthquake is ultimately a World Wide event, but it's relevance to Jerusalem I think corresponds to Zechariah 14:4.  As that Earthquake like this one follows the reference to Armageddon.

The River that will flow from Ezekiel's Temple will at some point split into two rivers, one emptying into the Mediterranean and the other into the Dead Sea.  It could be the same cracks in the Earth that divide Jerusalem in three are also what causes the River to become two rivers.

Thus Revelation 16:19 is proof that Mystery Babylon is NOT Jerusalem. More evidence against Babylon being anything but a City in Mesopotamia can be found Here and Here.

Isaiah on Babylon

I want to address the absurdity of thinking Isaiah 13 has already been fulfilled.

It's most annoying when I see people who think Isaiah's prophecies are about the fall to Cyrus, where no Battle even happened, nothing happened in the 530s BC that can remotely fit any Bible passages about Babylon besides Daniel who wrote about that history contemporary with it.  And defending the accuracy of Daniel on this is something I have done and may continue to do in other posts on this blog.

The informed intelligent people arguing for a Preterist interpretation of Isaiah's Prophecies about Babylon focus on the earlier destruction the city faced in Isaiah's own time, during the reign of Merodach-Baladan.

I indeed do think Isaiah 21 is about that piece of Babylonian History.  Chris White makes an argument for that, starting about 8 or 9 minutes into that podcast.  He expresses plenty else here I don't agree with concerning the 7 heads and so forth, and I've addressed his own Mystery Babylon view elsewhere.

The problem with applying any of these purely military falls of Babylon to Isaiah 13-14 or Jeremiah 50-51 is that while those include many military and political aspects, ultimately they are also divine Judgments comparable to what happened to Sodom and Gomorrah.

Isaiah 13 includes a statement that the Sun, Moon and Stars will not give their light.  That did not happen in the days of Merodach-Baladan, or Belshazzar.  But it fits Isaiah 13 being the same as Revelation 17-18 since the effect of the Fifth Bowl of God's Wrath (Revelation 16) will probably not have been undone yet.

And I've talked about Isaiah 14 and the Fall of Lucifer extensively elsewhere, that happens in Revelation 12, at the midway point of the final Seven year period.

There is not a near and far fulfillment issue here, Isaiah 13 does not perfectly or even vaguely fit any past events.  All anyone can do is say "hey look, Babylon fell, that must be what Isaiah meant" but an analysis of the details will never hold up.

And for all the "there are no modern Medes" nonsense, I have earlier posts on the Medes and the Kurds.  But in Isaiah 21 the Medes (and Elam) are on Babylon's side, not enemies as they are in other prophecies.

People who want to make Isaiah 21 about the fall to Cyrus in addition to ignoring that the Medes are Babylon's ally here, want to make Elam a reference to Persia.  The Persians were not the same people as Elam, in fact the Persians were probably Japhetic like the Medes were, they may even be Medes themselves once traced all the way back to Genesis 10.

As far as Isaiah's additional Babylon references in chapters 43, 47 and 48.  Well I haven't delved into those too deeply yet.

Isaiah 17, past or future?

I've been on the Isaiah 17 is about modern Syria's political turmoil bandwagon since before it was a Bandwagon, as far back as at least 2004 saying it on IMDB message boards.  I was with it before it was popular.

But I've read an article that makes important points arguing that it is already fulfilled.  The people behind this article might be Preterist in general which I would disagree with, I'm not very familiar with the site.

What's important is how the "it can't be already fulfilled" arguments are strongly linked to a Translation error that has it's origin in the Septuagint.  Because I've argued that the Septuagint is a problem before.  [And now I would argue Aion doesn't mean forever either.]

I certainly agree that Damascus won't cease to be a City "forever" since Ezekiel 47&48 clearly has Damascus existing in the New Heaven and New Earth.  Babylon is the only City permanently destroyed forever, and Edom the only entire nation.

And what is pointed out here about the "Day of the LORD" terminology can be good for weakening the flawed logic of Post-Tirbbers and Pre-Wrathers and others who want to garble the chronology of Revelation.  And those who insist that day must be a literal 24 Hour day.

That Isaiah 13 is in the future is something I will not be shaken on however.

What I don't get is this article not addressing how the end of the Chapter describes a FAILED invasion of Israel by the nations, not the Northern Kingdom's fall.

Indeed the second half of the Chapter has everything sounding rather Millennial to me.  I've talked before about how I don't view the Millennium as a Utopia.  Also my view that there is more time between the end of the Millennium and the Gog and Magog invasion then most people assume.