Dear John & Doves,
 
  Will the new Sanhedrin receive a false Messiah (a false Moshiach - the anointed one who calls himself the Christ who is really the Antichrist or false Christ)?  As I previous pointed out, the article called "Israel And The Sanhedrin" at http://www.hopefortoday.org/blog/index.cfm?mode=entry&entry=6CCDE938-B0D0-AA39-4838D3DB4C2E305A states, "Religious Jews believe that the restoration of the Sanhedrin will precede the coming of the Jewish Messiah, who will be the King of Israel, and as such, can only be recognized by a duly ordained Sanhedrin court. Jewish tradition also believes that Elijah the prophet will announce the coming of the Messiah to this Sanhedrin."
 
  According to John 5:43 Jesus said, " I am come in my Father's name, and ye receive me not: if another shall come in his own name, him will ye receive."  Who was Jesus speaking to in this Bible passage?  If you go back to John 5:16 and continue reading through the chapter, you will see that Jesus was speaking to the Jews that were persecuting him and sought to slay him because he had healed a man of his 38 yr. infirmity on a Sabbath day which was the Feast of the Jews.  Verse 18 also says, "Therefore the Jews sought the more to kill him, because he not only had broken the sabbath, but said also that God was his Father, making himself equal with God."  Who were these Jews who were concerned with Jesus breaking the law? They would have been members of the Sanhedrin who were the judges of the Jewish law.   So Jesus made the statement to Jewish members of the Sanhedrin, " I am come in my Father's name, and ye receive me not: if another shall come in his own name, him will ye receive."  Doesn't this verse sound very much like the new Sanhedrin receiving a false Messiah?   The Jewish people were expecting the Messiah, and they considered it blasphemy that Jesus called himself the Son of God which is one of the reasons why they wouldn't receive him as the Messiah.
 
  In regards to the statement "Jewish tradition also believes that Elijah the prophet will announce the coming of the Messiah to this Sanhedrin," I also read recently on another website that that one of the reasons why the Jewish people did not accept Jesus as the Messiah was due to the fact that Elijah had not returned in the flesh before the day of the Lord which was based on Malachi 4:5, "Behold I send you Elijah the prophet before the great and dreadful day of the Lord;"  As you know, the Jewish people have a custom at Passover of reserving a cup of wine for Elijah whom they are expecting.  ( I also read that Islam also expects Elijah to return.)  So this made me wonder if the False Prophet in the book of Revelation could possibly be a false Elijah as the False Prophet who the new Sanhedrin might think is the real Elijah.  If this False Prophet as a fake Elijah announces the coming of the Messiah, then he would be announcing the coming of the Antichrist who is the False Christ and the False Messiah.  Don't forget that the False Prophet "doeth great wonders, so that he maketh fire come down from heaven on the earth in sight of men" according to Rev. 13:13, and the real Elijah according to 2 Kings 1:10,12 said, "If I be a man of God, then let fire come down from heaven, and consume thee, and thy fifty.  And there came down fire from heaven, and consumed him and his fifty."  The real Elijah also revived the widow's son who was dead according to 1 Kings 17:17-24 so if the False Prophet heals the head of the beast as it were wounded unto death (Rev. 13:3), this would make the False Prophet look even more like the real Elijah.  Also if the new Sanhedrin is expecting Elijah to return in a chariot of fire, couldn't this possibly be done through a holograph as a "lying wonder" through something similiar as Project Blue Beam?  These are just some possibilities to consider. 
 
 To answer the question how could the new Sanhedrin receive a False Messiah (the Antichrist) and then later say to the Lord Jesus at this Second Coming, "Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord" (Matthew 23:39), they would later on have to recognize that the Antichrist was a False Messiah rather than the real Messiah and that the False Prophet was not a true Prophet of the Lord when the False Prophet requires worship of the image of the Beast, and the mark of the Beast to be taken in the right hand or in the forehead in order to buy or sell. As long as they don't worship the Beast and don't take his mark in the forehead or in the right hand, they would not be breaking the commandments of "Thou shalt have no other gods before me. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth:; Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me; and shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments." They would also be keeping the Lord's commandment in the book of Revelation not to take the mark of the beast.  It also looks like they might have to flee into the wilderness for 3 1/2 years to escape the persecution of the Antichrist.
 
  In any case, Daniel 9:24 says, "Seventy weeks are determined upon thy people and upon thy holy city, to finish the transgression, and to make an end of sins, and to make reconciliation for iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteousness, and to seal up the vision and prophecy, and to anoint the most Holy."  As you know Jesus was anointed with the Holy Spirit and power by God the Father according to Acts. 10:38, but he has never been anointed by the Sanhedrin since they would not receive him as their Messiah back at that time.  So time will tell as to whether the new Sanhedrin actually receives a false Messiah first, and later on anoints the true Messiah, Jesus Christ, the Son of God.
 
  God bless,
 Donna