Hi Fay, John and Doves,

Re: Holocaust - Reply to EAR (Fay (2 April 2023)

https://www.fivedoves.com/letters/feb2023/fay219-11.htm

https://www.fivedoves.com/letters/apr2023/fay42-5.htm

Fay, I have read your comments (above);  I fear if you are searching scripture for a detailed account for every deteriorating act of persecution and destruction suffered by the Jews during the Holocaust—committed by the Nazi regime—you will be disappointed.  It seems that you have developed a theory and come to a conclusion about the Holocaust shortening the days of the so-called ‘the great tribulation,’ and now you are searching the Bible for its confirmation…  My own process is to take scripture verses  at their face-value and search history for their confirmation. You say:

FAY (19 Feb 2023) - "Nothing is for Nothing. The Holocaust"

Although the Bible mentions nothing about it - the only conclusion I can come to is that the Holocaust served to cut short the days of the great tribulation.

Try and ponder Matthew 24:22 and think about HOW Almighty God 'cuts those days short'. I remain convinced that the Holocaust was part and parcel of cutting short the tribulation.

As far as tribulation is concerned: that started long, long ago for both Jews and persecuted Christians who were, and are, scattered throughout the world (cf. Matt. 24:8–9); but in these latter days we are seeing intensifying persecution, and more rapid and stronger ‘birth pangs’ occurring in various places, (cf. Romans 8:18–23 also the signs for the coming Day of the Lord in 2 Thess. 2:1–4). Thus, in recent years, the growing evidence of climate change, the COVID pandemic, world-wide criminal lawlessness and anti-government riots, the growth of Islamism, and Christians falling away from the faith, etc., etc., seems to indicate that the whole New Testament period of ‘tribulation’ (sorrows/birth pangs) is entering its final stages.

As far as ‘the’ great tribulation is concerned, there is no ‘the’ in the passage.

The words ‘great tribulation’ are only used together once—in Matt. 24:21. (Strong’s Greek word for great is No.  3173, megas, meaning… spatially: large — of quantity or degree: loud, intense, violent — of time: long [time]— of position: great, important).  However, in Luke 21:23 Jesus’ words—uttered on the same occasion, about the same situation—are recorded and translated as great [megas] ‘distress’ [thlipsis]. Thus, in both translation of these verses, Jesus is warning his disciples about seeing armies surrounding Jerusalem, and it’s pending destruction in the near future (i.e., the First Jewish-Roman War in AD 66–73, when Jerusalem was destroyed and the Temple was burned). 

Incidentally, the word ‘great’ megas is the same word used for the great stone that was rolled away from the tomb, and it is used freely in the New Testament for other things. Also, (Strong’s Greek word for ‘tribulation’ is No. 2347, thlipsis [which is used 21 times in the New Testament] meaning:  trouble, distress, oppression, tribulation. It is also used for affliction (11 times), afflictions (6), trouble (3), anguish (1), burdened (1), and persecution (1).

There is no scriptural confirmation for a seven-year period of time called ‘The great tribulation.’  This expectation has been wrongfully taught because of the Dispensational view that Daniel’s 70^th week has not happened yet.  Daniel’s 70^th week did happen between AD 26/27–34 as set out in my book The Curse and the Covenant posted on 5 Doves on April 2, 2023. Jesus fully completed His Messianic tasks, as set out in Daniel 9:24, and conclusively confirmed in Hebrews chapters 8–10.

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Regarding evidence for the Holocaust: In Daniel’s report of his dream (below), he used a rather unusual word for war (Strong’s Hebrew word No. 7129 q^erāb)! This Hebrew word (No. 7129) is only used once in the Old Testament, and it has its roots in No. 7127 q^erēb, which means: to come near, approach—to offer (a sacrifice)—to bring near, offer (a sacrifice); and in No. 7128 q^erāb meaning war, battle.

I was watching; and the same horn was making war (q^erāb) against the saints of the Most High…  Dan. 7:21

He shall speak pompous words against the Most High, and shall intend to change times and laws. Then the saints shall be given into his hand for a time and times and half a time… Dan. 7:25

It is obvious from these verses that the ‘saints of the Most High’ (Daniel’s people), were the target of the little horn’s intensifying persecution (i.e., making war (NKJV), made war (KJV). In the early 1940’s the Jews had no national identity, sovereign territory, or any military ability to fight back. Some escaped, but those who could not, were well and truly within Hitler’s grasp/hands! Because the rest of the world didn’t want to know about it and rejected the Jews’ pleas for sanctuary, the Holocaust happened.  The question, ‘Did it need to happen?’ might be connected to prophecy and the guilt of the western nations, who decided to offer them territory in Palestine!

We sometimes refer to people in such a situation as, ‘sitting ducks’ but whether the word used by Daniel was intended to portray the saints of the Most High as a ‘sacrifice… given into his hand during the Holocaust’, would have to be answered by a scholar who understands Hebrew.     

As I said in my book, Daniel 7 provides the time-frame for the Holocaust.

Fay, I had no “perspective that the real Holocaust only started in 1941 and ended in 1945,” as you seem to think I said! This is what I actually wrote in my reply to you on 5 March 2023:

Notably, I have identified the period in which the saints ‘shall be given into his hand for a time and times and half a time (Dan. 7:25) as the core/crux of the Holocaust, because of the group-gassings that began on December 8, 1941 until Germany surrendered on May 7 1945. This period covered 1,247 days (inclusive), or three years and five months (solar years) just inside a time and times and half a time! 

As pointed out in The Little Horn of Daniel’s 4^th Empire, and the Kingdom of the Jews, by blaming the Jews for Germany’s troubles, the Nazi’s ‘staged’ events, their twisted historical perspective on the German- speaking people living in neighbouring states, and through changes made to laws in the German Parliament, Hitler gradually implemented his ‘master plan.’ The seeds of the Holocaust were first sown in Hitler’s Book ‘Mein Kampf’ (1925) and his ‘evil intent’ grew stronger and more public from the day that Germany withdrew from the League of Nations in 1933 to prepare for war, until the end of WWII in 1945.

But, Daniel’s use of the phrase: the saints shall be given into his hand, speaks of a ‘helplessness’ or ‘hopelessness’ during a diabolical period of captivity, persecution, death and annihilation for the Jews, when no one was able to deliver them ‘out of his hand.’  But when the prophesied intense period of ‘a time and times and half a time’ had been fulfilled, God did deliver them, and then He gave them a kingdom!

‘The unconditional surrender of the German Third Reich [to the Allies] was signed in the early morning hours of Monday, May 7, 1945.’ ———At midnight on May 14, 1948, [just three years later] the Provisional Government of Israel proclaimed a new State of Israel. 

On that same date, the United States recognized the provisional Jewish government as de facto authority of the Jewish state (de jure recognition was extended on January 31, 1949).

The United States was the first country to recognize Israel as an independent state… when President Harry Truman issued a statement of recognition following Israel’s proclamation of independence on the same date.

However, the UK recognised Israel de facto on 13 May 1949, and de jure on 28 April 1950.’ (Per Google)

 

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If you are unaware of the incremental progress Hitler and the Nazis made toward their ultimate goal, of ‘solving the Jewish question’ by distorting and changing history (times) for the purposes of propaganda, and changing the laws-of-the land to entrap and convict their targeted prey, then you only need to look at what Putin is doing in Russia today!  He is following Hitler’s play-book to the letter! Putin has been at war for just over a year, but the ‘seeds’ of what he is doing in Ukraine during his so-called ‘special operation’ were planted long ago in the Russian psyche, due to his propaganda (e.g., that Ukraine is run by Nazis), and his perverted view of Russian history!  His restrictive laws, passed by the Kremlin, criminalizing anyone from publishing truthful statements or opinion about what is really happening in Ukraine, have immediately been applied. The Russian people have been brain-washed; they haven’t a clue about what is actually going on in Ukraine, and they will be ashamed when they eventually find out.

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Since I first replied to you, I have posted my book – The Curse and the Covenant – on Five Doves (2 April 2023), I hope you have read it regarding the ‘7 times’ punishment (Deut. 26:16, 21, 24, 28) forecast by Moses to be suffered by the Jewish people if they broke the Law.

Whether this means seven punishments, i.e., from Wars; or as I have calculated in my book: their punishment would be multiplied seven times (for not listening to Jeremiah’s warnings for 10 years), to become the 70 years of captivity in Babylon, could be debated. There are many sevens in scripture, and either interpretation could be right.

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However, within Daniel’s prophetic writing he recorded details about two particularly severe persecutions with ‘lengths of time’ periods attached to them, which added together almost cover a seven year period. These persecutions would be meted out by two individual ‘little horns’ against God’s people; one occurred in Old Testament times 169–165 BC (thereabouts), and the other was ‘warned about’ in the Old Testament for Jewish people in dispersion throughout the world, who would be living in New Testament times during the tenure of the second ‘little horn’ during WWII.  (N.B. Daniel’s prophecy about the Holocaust is not in the New Testament, because most Jews don’t read it; but the time frame for their persecution by the ‘little horn’ from the 4^th Kingdom, Rome, occurs during the New Testament period!)

 

The first severe persecution recorded by Daniel was caused by the first ‘little horn’ that descended from the Greek Seleucid’s dynasty, i.e., a ruler called Antiochus Epiphanes IV , who visited Jerusalem in 169 BC and entered the Holy of Holies; he carried away some gold and silver vessels. The temple’s daily sacrifice ceased (date unknown), but a Greek altar was erected in its place on December 25, 167 BC. The interim period for this ‘Abomination of Desolation’ to continue was expressed in two places in differing terms: in Daniel  8:13–14 it was described as two thousand three hundred days; (i.e., literally evening-mornings = 1,150 days = 3.14 solar years). However, history tells us the Maccabees were able to cleanse the altar and restore the daily sacrifice on 25 Kislev in 165 BC, which event is commemorated in the Hanukkah festival each November/December. So, in fact, it took about 3 years for the temple to be cleansed from the pagan sacrifices made on the Greek Altar!

 

The second severe persecution, was committed by the second ‘little horn,’ Hitler and the Nazis. This period is described in Daniel 7:25 (KJV) as until a time, times and half a time, i.e., up to 3.5 years  As Daniel’s vision showed, the people of the Saints of the Most High would afterward receive a kingdom. They did in 1948!

[Note: I’m well aware that dispensational scholars like to use so-called ‘Biblical years’ to calculate dates, but when Daniel recorded his dreams and visions, he was living in Babylonia where they also inserted an extra intercalary month into their calendar every few years to keep the seasons in order, thus the Babylonians used a lunar/solar calendar.]

It may be that these two historic periods of severe persecutions suffered by the Jews at the hands of two ‘little horn’ rulers —when combined, add up to roughly seven years—and thereby constitute yet another ‘7 times’ punishment that Moses had warned about in Leviticus 26:18–28, but I have no evidence to support that view.

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Fay (2 April; 2023) Reply to EAR

I know Almighty God has good reason for everything. Otherwise He would not allow it. I would like to know the reason for the Holocaust. The violence and murder. The horror of it all…  It simply must account for some big reason. 

Fay, do you not think that the Jewish peoples’ denial, and rejection of their Messiah, together with the scheming of the Sanhedrin/Council of the Jews to get rid of Him, who demanded that the Romans crucify Him, also who said ‘His blood be upon us and our children’— is a big enough reason for the Holocaust?

God had prophetically set aside Daniel’s 70^th week far into the future (AD 27–34) especially for the ‘time of His visitation’ and the confirmation of Jeremiah’s promised covenant (Jer. 31:31–34) to forgive their sin through the New Covenant in Jesus’ blood, and to restore their fellowship with Him via God’s Holy Spirit on the Day of Pentecost; but the ‘unbelieving Jews’ refused it all!

Matthew 23 explains God/Jesus’ view of the ‘religious’ Jews and their leadership at that time. I can count eight ‘Woe to you…’ phrases in that chapter. Jesus knew what was in their hearts, and what they would do!

As a contrast:  for their disobedience to the Laws of Moses and their idolatry, the Jews were sent into exile: i.e., they broke the Mosaic covenant, they failed to rest the land, and they ignored Jeremiah’s warnings. For those transgressions their punishment had been inflexibly and grievously set out in Deuteronomy 28:15–68, which makes for terrifying reading!  What more egregious punishment should be inflicted on them and their descendants for the crucifixion of their Messiah? 

However, I do believe that the First Jewish-Roman war was a direct consequence of Israel’s refusal to recognise their Messiah.  The war was started by rebellious Jews, and the historian Josephus has recorded a realistic, gruesome and full report of what happened in Judea during the years AD 66–73. The Jews that did not escape, when the opportunity arose, were either killed or enslaved by the Romans. It was Jesus who announced the coming ‘days of vengeance’ to his disciples, and told them what to watch out for, so that they could escape from Jerusalem and Judea in those days.

I hope my book The Curse and the Covenant might give you plenty of ‘food for thought’ on the topics you are troubled about. 

However, I am rather staggered by your dramatic statements:

“Even if we buy into this prophecy having been fulfilled already, with Hitler of Nazi Germany being the little horn—that kingdom has not been destroyed. In fact the 4^th Reich shows signs of having resurrected in our time.”

Really? What happened in 1945? Where’s the 4^th Reich’s territory?

“…although Israel was declared a nation again in May 1948, the Jewish people are still not free…”  Israel is a police state… etc., etc.  The modern day nation of Israel is STILL under captivity. Really?

Then you denigrate Israel’s relationship with USA!  If it was not for the protection of USA over Israel for the last 75 years, the Arabs would have destroyed the Jewish State long ago!

Finally, I see you count the years for the Jewish Diaspora from AD 70 until 2023, as 1,953 years.

Why not count the years from Jesus’ Crucifixion at Passover in AD 30 until 2023, as 1,993 years, with only seven more years to go before the 2,000 year anniversary of His sacrifice for me and for you? 

Maranatha