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I’m doing a quick blog update on President Biden’s decision to withdraw US weapons aid to Israel following Prime Minister Netanyahu’s attack on the last Hamas base in Rafah, southern Gaza. Even if this action does not have a major impact on Israel’s military advance to achieve its goal of destroying Hamas and releasing hostages, it sends a strong signal to Hamas that the world’s most powerful military power is no longer standing by Israel, thereby emboldening the terrorists (or other enemies of the West) in their aggression against democratic nations. In the same way, the shameful US surrender to the Taliban on the 20th anniversary of September 11 terror attack when Biden withdrew from Afghanistan encouraged Putin to invade Ukraine just a few months later. A key question is also how it will affect the November presidential election in the US.

We can examine this from a completely secular perspective, as many Democrats who voted for Biden are still part of the more traditional older generation of Democrats who see Israel as the US’s most important ally in the Middle East and are appalled by the growing anti-Semitism on US college campuses. A good example of this crowd is the rabble-rousing Jewish actor Michael Rapaport, who used to slander Trump and his supporters with very vulgar language, but who has today turned against Biden over his Israel policy and says he is now ready to vote for Trump. Rapaport has admitted to being duped by the mainstream media in incidents like Charlottesville where Trump allegedly called neo-Nazis “very fine people”, which he didn’t.

In my blog in August 2017, I told how the Jewish leftist billionaire George Soros was funding both Marxist “anti-fascists” and the anti-Jewish far right in their riots and clashes in Charlottesville in the summer of 2017 . Today, the same man is now funding anti-Semitic protests in US universities in support of Hamas. Soros is not very loyal to his own people, as he admitted back in 1998 that in his youth in Hungary where he was born he helped the Nazis confiscate the property of his Jewish brothers and felt no remorse for it . It is therefore quite ironic that left-wing journalists in the media often label right-wing criticism of Soros as an anti-Semitic, even though the same man is now promoting a new anti-Semitism.

But regardless of how much Biden’s Israel policy will swing the votes of, for example, American Jews, who have traditionally been loyal to Democratic Party, towards Trump, I believe that President Biden’s Israel policy will affect the continuation of his presidency on a deeper level. I am an unapologetic Christian Zionist who subscribes to the Christian Zionist “creed” that God curses those who curse Israel and blesses those who bless Israel. This passage is found in Genesis 12 where God said to Abraham:

And I will bless those who bless you, And the one who curses you I will curse. And in you all the families of the earth will be blessed.

Here God was speaking not only of Abraham but of his heirs, those descended through Isaac and Jacob, through whom God was preparing salvation and blessing for all nations, as the whole Old Testament narrative tells us. Although Paul explained that God spoke of Christ Himself at that passage (Galatians 3:16), Paul was not a replacement theologian who believed that Christ or the church had replaced Israel and taken away its rightful inheritance. On the contrary, he said in Romans 11: ‘God has not rejected His people [Israel] whom He foreknew…  In relation to the gospel they are enemies on your account, but in relation to God’s choice they are beloved on account of the fathers; for the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable.” So, according to Paul, the Jews were still a chosen people and God did not regret His choice even after they crucified their own Messiah on the cross and persecuted His followers.

God is blessing all nations through Israel and their messiah and therefore they will only receive these blessings if they bless Israel themselves, whereas by cursing Israel they will also curse themselves. Blessing and cursing in this context means any action or speech that is sympathetic or hostile to Israel. It does not mean that criticising individual Jews like George Soros or an individual prime minister of the Israeli government is cursing the chosen people. I would define cursing as an action or speech that denies the Jews the right to exist as a nation, the right to live on their historic land as a sovereign nation, and the right to defend the security of their citizens from those who seek their destruction. This includes the protesters’ slogans “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free!”

We could say that President Biden is guilty of the latter when he denies Israel the right to defend its own country against terrorists whose ultimate aim is the destruction of all Jews. President Biden does this because he is essentially a coward who bows down to anti-Semitic left-wing protesters and believes that pandering to them will help him politically in the November presidential elections. But if we believe Genesis. 12:3 is also true for individual leaders, then Biden’s anti-Israel policies should not give him the spiritual blessing that would ensure his continued power next year. Of course, to counter this idea, one might say, why then did President Trump lose to Biden in November 2020, when he was perhaps the most pro-Israel president in American history?

First of all, I would reply that I have never believed that Trump lost the election to Biden, just as Trump himself still claims to have been the legitimate winner of the election. I have been writing, presenting evidence, and sharing documentaries on this subject for well over three years. I was wrong, however, about the 2020 election result being overturned and Trump being returned to office before the November 2024 presidential election. I presented various scenarios whereby that could have happened in a fully constitutional way without the need for some kind of military coup, which Trump has been (falsely) accused of in connection with the events of 6 January. I publicly apologised for being wrong in January 2023.

But at the same time, I do acknowledge that Trump lost to Biden in the sense that Biden was elected to office in January 2021 as the 46th President of the United States. One theory as to why God allowed Trump to “lose” (i.e. the enemy to steal the election), despite his strong support for Israel, has been, for example, that Trump also sought to divide the land of Israel, which God forbids in Joel 3:2:

I will gather all the nations And bring them down to the valley of Jehoshaphat. Then I will enter into judgment with them there On behalf of My people and My inheritance, Israel, Whom they have scattered among the nations; And they have divided up My land.

Trump is known to have a big ego, which is why it was important for him to reach some kind of peace agreement between Israel and Palestine before the end of his first term (to be the “president Clinton of our time”). In January 2020, he presented the so-called “deal of the century”, which was also based on a two-state model where Israel would hand over the territories captured in the 1967 Six-Day War to the future Palestinian state. Trump’s peace model was, however, more favourable to Israel than the Oslo peace agreement of 1993 and did not require the handover of East Jerusalem as the capital of the Palestinian state since Trump recognised Jerusalem as the undivided capital of Israel in December 2017. Its conditions also included the disarmament of Hamas and Islamic Jihad in Gaza and the recognition of the state of Israel by the Palestinians. The Palestinian side rejected Trump’s peace initiative.

To return to Christian Zionism, as Christians we must not be against peace, of course, because as Jesus said, “Blessed are the peacemakers” (Matthew 5:9). But a Christian with a biblical worldview cannot support a false peace either, for as the prophet Isaiah said, “Your covenant with death will be canceled, And your pact with Sheol will not stand” (Isaiah 28:18). The two-state peace proposals have been just that, because it requires Israel to make a covenant with a country that loves death more than life – for whom martyrdom is the highest ideal of life – and which would not under any circumstances agree to live in brotherly peace with Israel. The events of 7 October have been the ultimate proof of this. It is mainly the West’s blindness to Islam and Islamist ideology that has led it to promote this false two-state model, which will never work unless the ‘Palestinians’ start following Christ and His teachings instead of the ‘prophet’ Muhammad.

An Israeli re-occupied Gaza will be a much better option for both Israelis and Gaza Arabs. But this will also require an ideological war where Israel will change the entire educational system in Gaza from one that incites hatred of Jews and glorifies death to one that loves life. It will require a similar process of “denazification” that took place in Germany after World War II. An Israeli occupation of the West Bank too, or Judea and Samaria, would bring so much economic opportunity to the Arabs of the region that, in time, it would remove their antipathy to the Jewish State and make them happy citizens of Israel. The problem for the Palestinians is therefore not the ‘occupation’ of Israel, but rather the lack of it. Below is an excellent argument on this subject by Yishai Fleisher, a Jew living in Israel. This man’s videos are worth watching on YouTube.

Even Trump himself is now waking up to the fact that the two-state model will never work. Jewish News Syndicate reported on 2 May:

Former U.S. President Donald Trump told TIME magazine in a wide-ranging interview published this week that he was no longer sure a two-state solution is viable.

“Most people thought it was going to be a two-state solution. I’m not sure a two-state solution anymore is gonna work,” the former president said.

“There was a time when I thought two states could work. Now I think two states is going to be very, very tough. I think it’s going to be much tougher to get. I also think you have fewer people that liked the idea. You had a lot of people that liked the idea four years ago. Today, you have far fewer people that like that idea,” he added.

Israeli Finance Minister Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, an ardent opponent of Palestinian statehood, tweeted in response to the interview, “I congratulate the former U.S. president and presidential candidate, a clear supporter of Israel, Donald Trump, for his clear words and his return from his support for the establishment of a Palestinian state.

“A Palestinian state would be a terrorist state that would endanger the existence of Israel and the international pressure to establish it is an injustice on a historical scale of the Western countries who are willing to endanger the only Jewish state due to internal political interests.”

He went on to state that, “I hope and pray that more leaders in the world will discover the courage and integrity shown by presidential candidate Trump to change their position, will withdraw from turning their backs on the State of Israel and will resolutely join hands with us in the fight we are leading in the name of the free world against radical Islam that threatens the peace of the entire world.”

In the same interview, Trump strongly criticized Benjamin Netanyahu and indirectly blamed him for the October 7 terrorist attack, but also said that in his position he would act the same way as Netanyahu is now acting to destroy Hamas. As I said, cursing Israel does not mean criticising any individual Israeli Prime Minister (although I have always held Netanyahu in high regard). Netanyahu and Trump are, after all, very similar unrelenting leaders who do not bow down to their enemies. Despite his personal criticism, Netanyahu would much rather have Trump than Biden in power, because Trump is a much better option for the security of the Jewish state than Biden, who panders to the anti-Semitic far-left.

Conclusion

Perhaps Trump also needs to return to power because Israel would have then the support of its strongest ally if the Jews start to build their prophecied third temple soon. The Third Temple could only be built at such a time when Jerusalem is ruled by the most right-wing government in its history. But at the same time, Biden’s anti-Israel government now stands in the way of such a project. Another reason why I believe in Trump’s return to the White House is that I still hold in high regard some of the Trump prophecies I used to promote on my blog in 2020-22. In particular, the Kim Clement prophecies I still hold in high regard. Clement predicted in 2008 that America would elect Donald Trump as president for two terms. I shared this in my July 2020 video: “Did Kim Clement predict President Donald Trump’s first and second terms?

Of course, I thought at the time that Trump would be elected for a second term in November 2020, which was one of the reasons why I so relentlessly promoted my claims that the 2020 election would be annulled and Biden would be removed from office before his first term ends. But Clement’s prophecy only said that Trump would be elected to two terms, it did not claim they would be consecutive terms. Trump would not in fact be the first US president to serve two terms as president after four years out of the White House. His historical predecessor would be Grover Cleveland, who served as both the 22nd and 24th US president in 1885-89 and 1893-97.

Perhaps President Trump also had to experience a humiliating defeat and eviction from the White House – followed by numerous legal battles by America’s politicised judiciary – in order for God to humble him through this. Since humility and modesty have not been his best traits. So if I were asked at the moment who I think America will elect as the 47th President of the United States in the November elections, I would lean strongly towards President Trump. But the past few years have also taught me to be a little more humble and cautious in my predictions, and so I could be as wrong this time as I was in October 2020 when I said I was more than 99% sure of Trump’s re-election and Biden’s defeat.

After November 7, when the media had declared Biden the winner of the election, my confidence in continuation of Trump’s presidency was still 97%. After the January 6, 2021 Capitol debacle, I had to bow to the fact that Biden would become the 46th president of the country, but I still held out hope and belief that his term would be suspended until the end of 2022, and I also promoted false prophecies up to that point that did not come true. But some of the Trump prophecies I promoted also came true, such as Kevin Zadai’s prediction in 2020 of Trump’s second impeachment, which came true two months later, and the overturning of Roe v. Wade by the US Supreme Court, which came true two years later.

Many people tend to focus only on criticizing false prophecies, while ignoring all the prophecies that have come true, including all of those things that Kim Clement predicted correctly on Trump’s first term as the president of the United States. I myself was very much criticised and mocked by some people, without any attempt being made to challenge the prophecies that have come true. But I certainly regret for promoting the “prophecies” that didn’t come to pass and have already apologised to my readers for doing so.

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I wrote about King Charles’ cancer on my blog in January and also wrote my partly sarcastic and self-ironic apology to His Majesty. I have said from the beginning of my vocation that I am not infallible and therefore I could be wrong about Charles. But because the biblical evidence for him has been so strong, I have felt it my moral duty to warn the world and the Church about him. At the same time, I have sought to refute the doctrinal errors that lead many Christians to believe that it would not even be possible to identify a man of lawlessness by me or any other Christian before the rapture has taken place. Indeed, such a premise prevents Christians from looking at the whole subject objectively and without prejudice.

But despite all the biblical and historical evidence that I presented in my English-language book, in 424 pages and 760 footnotes, and on which I have written over a million words, I myself have also been at times the biggest skeptic of my own research. And as someone who has spent so much time researching and publicly promoting such a subject, it makes perfect sense to try to look at it from all angles, to consider all possible objections and circumstances where the logic used to support my ideas would have been flawed and misleading. Indeed, the truth-loving mind seeks truth even when it means questioning our own beliefs.

Content

1. Grandpa
2. Zombie Apocalypse
3. Re-examining of my own writings
4. The ecclesiastical and historical origins of the doctrine
5. Emperor Nero as an archetype for the Antichrist
6. Preterism, Historicism and Futurism
7. A beast that was, and is not, and will come.
8. Why is the whole world wondering the beast?
9. “Death has been swallowed up in victory”.
10. Conclusion
11. Footnotes

Grandpa

For this reason, I have always appreciated well thought-out rebuttals where the reader is also aware of the content of my arguments and can respond to them accordingly. Although the Bible nowhere states the age of the Antichrist at the time of his accession, Charles’ advanced age is one factor that makes skepticism perfectly justified. Charles’ unpopularity is again more a confirmation of his prophecied role, since this is the explicit criterion of the prophecies about this person according to Daniel 11:21, on which the title of my book is based.

This is not to say that the Antichrist has to be young and handsome to attract the masses, because a person’s magnetism has nothing to do with his age or appearance. Most of the most prominent world leaders of our time are also in the same age group as King Charles. But at Charles’ age (75), many people’s physical and cognitive condition may begin to deteriorate, as is already evident with 81-year-old President Joe Biden, who stumbles around on his own and babbles nonsense about men living on the moon. On the other hand, some of us may still have a perfectly clear mind at age of 100. But not all of us will live to 100 either, because the average lifespan of a person living in the West is about 80 years, as the Psalmist says:

“As for the days of our life, they contain seventy years, Or if due to strength, eighty years, Yet their pride is but labor and sorrow; For soon it is gone and we fly away.¹

Zombie Apocalypse

If Charles were to die soon of cancer, he would have died at about the same age as most other UK citizens. His heavy-smoking grandfather George VI died of lung cancer at the age of 56, while his mother Elizabeth II lived to be 95 and his father Prince Philip 99. But Charles’ grandmother Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon was the longest-lived of them all, dying in March 2002 at the age of 101. But can a person die and rise again into the living? I believe this has happened at least once in history in the case of one crucified man. But generally speaking, people don’t rise from the grave once they’ve been buried in the ground. At least I haven’t had the chance to witness it myself… except maybe in a low-budged horror movies.

More common, of course, are cases where a person’s heart has stopped for a while and they have been declared dead, but they have been revived at the last minute. These cases also often constitute so-called “near-death experiences” where those who have returned from the dead claim to have already had a foretaste of either the joys of heaven or the horrors of hell. But other than in the case of Lazarus and Jesus, the dead who have been in the grave for a few days do not usually come back to life. At least I don’t happen to know any living dead, but feel free to comment on the article if you’ve ever come across a zombie.

Re-examining of my own writings

Since the dead do not, in most cases, return from the underworld back to the world of the living, I have been somewhat sceptical about claims that the Antichrist will receive a mortal wound from which he will be resurrected back into the realm of the living. However, I went to research what I had written earlier about the mortal wound of the beast using a word search (I have written about a million and a half words of text, so I can’t memorise all of my own teaching on eschatology). In my first book, Muhammad, Charles the Great and the Antichrist, written between 2012 and 2014, I stated the following on page 610:

Some believe that this passage [Revelation 13:3] refers to the Antichrist literally receiving a mortal wound to the head, but coming back to life as a result of power given to Satan or a great deception. According to Paul, the appearance of the Child of Perdition would be “in accord with the activity of Satan, with all power and false signs and wonders, and with all the deception of wickedness.”² To imitate Christ in all things, the Antichrist would also die and come back to life again.

On page 318 you will also find the following interesting historical background:

C. A. Patrides, in a book The Apocalypse in English Reneissance thought and literature, says that during the [English] Civil War and the subsequent interregnum years, it was commonly taught that Charles I was the Antichrist – one of the seven heads of the beast, which John saw “as it were wounded to death (i.e. the beheading of Charles I), but its mortal wound was healed.” (Revelation 13:3). The rise of his son Charles II in 1660 was interpreted as a healing of this mortal wound. Royalists, on the other hand, saw him as “a messianic king whose miraculous return heralded the coming of the golden age.” Particularly great fear and hope were attached to the year 1666 because it reflected the number of the beast, 666.

In my first print book, published in 2019, Who Was Not Regarded Worthy of a King – The Antichrist Revealed? (Books on Demand), I wrote along the same lines on pages 208-209:

In Chapter 8 we saw how in medieval Europe the Antichrist was often associated with the post-apocalyptic prophecy of the Last Roman Emperor, who was believed to rise from Western Europe, descend from Charlemagne and to be a prince named Charles. Of course, as Bible-centred Christians, we cannot hang our image of the beast on such extra-biblical prophecies, unless he also fits the Bible’s own predictions about this man’s characteristics.

I will now leave it to everyone’s speculation as to whether the “mortal wound of the beast that was healed” refers to the revival of the Roman Empire and its imperial office in this person, or whether the Antichrist returns to life through literal death and resurrection to imitate our Lord Jesus Christ. If this latter theory is correct, it would explain why verse 3 says, “And the whole earth was amazed and followed after the beast” After all, according to Paul, the appearance of the Antichrist would be followed by satanic miracles and signs (2 Thessalonians 2:9).

In my English book I also referred to this when I quoted Arthur W. Pink’s 1923 treatise on the Antichrist prophecies of the Bible:

[In Ezekiel 28:10] it says of him, “You shall die as the uncircumcised”, which is a strong hint that he should not die the death of the “uncircumcised” because he was one of the circumcised [note: Charles was circumcised as a child by a Jewish mohel]! If it is said that this verse could not apply to the Antichrist because Christ himself will destroy him at his coming, the objection can easily be dismissed by reference to Revelation 13:14, which tells us that the Antichrist will be wounded to death and will rise from the dead – which is before his final destruction at the hands of our Saviour.³

The ecclesiastical and historical origins of the doctrine

So this is what Arthur W. Pink taught over a hundred years ago, that the Antichrist will die and come back to life before his final judgment. How far back does this teaching go? The one who popularized this doctrine in modern times is Hal Lindsey in his bestselling books such as The Late Great Planet Earth published in 1970. On pages 107-108 he wrote:

We are told in Revelation 13:3 that this great world leader will have a fatal head wound which will be miraculously healed. Many people have not known just what to make of this statement. Some have thought that what this means is that one of the empires of the ancient Roman Empire would be miraculously revived and brought back to existence. That is one possible interpretation. However, I do not believe that is the right interpretation. Here is why, . , .

Look for a moment at Revelation 13:14, This is speaking of the False Prophet, who will be an associate of the Great Roman Dictator. The verse says: “And he deceives those who dwell on the earth because of the signs which it was given him to perform in the presence of the beast, telling those who dwell on the earth to make an image to the beast who had the wound of the sword and has come to life’ Whoever this person is with this fatal wound will have a statue made of himself, and men are going to worship this idol. You do not make an idol of an empire. You make an idol of a person.

The way in which this dictator is going to step onto the stage of history will be dramatic. Overnight he will become the byword of the world, He is going to be distinguished as supernatural; this will be done by an act which will be a Satanic counterfeit of the resurrection. This writer does not believe it will be an actual resurrection, but it will be a situation in which this person has a mortal wound. Before he has actually lost life, however, he will be brought back from this critical wounded state. This is something which will cause tremendous amazement throughout the world.

We could draw a comparison to the tragic death of John F, Kennedy. Imagine what would have happened if the President of the United States, after being shot and declared dead, had come to life again! The impact of an event like that would shake the world. It is not difficult to imagine what will happen when this coming world leader makes his miraculous recovery. This man, the Antichrist, will probably not be known as a great leader until the time of his revival from the fatal wound. After that the whole world will follow him.

The doctrine is still popular in many dispensationalist and futurist interpretations of prophecy and can also be found in Tim LaHaye’s and Jerry B. Jenkins’ fictional book series Left Behind, where the Antichrist is a Romanian politician named Nicolae Carpathia, who is murdered by the Israeli head of state Chaim Rosenzweig, but miraculously resurrected three days later when Satan takes full control of his body. In LaHaye and Jenkins’ series of books, this death and resurrection of the Antichrist takes place midway through the seven-year Tribulation. However, this plot twist was not invented for Hollywood films, but can be dated back to the eschatological reflections of the early Church Fathers.

I riffled every biblical scholar’s treasure trove, the website Bible Hub (nowdays I also use the “all-knowing” ChatGPT in my research), for English Bible commentaries from the 1800’s about a mortal wound of the beast that was healed. Many commentaries advocated the Historicist prophecy interpretation of the time, according to which the papacy fulfilled the Daniel prophecies of the Little Horn of the beast (an interpretation with which I agree) and the Revelation prophecies of the First Beast, its seven heads and ten horns (an interpretation with which I do not agree).

Thus, the mortal wound of the the one head of the beast was also interpreted not as the death and resurrection of an individual, but rather as the death of the pagan Roman Empire and the rise of the Roman Catholic papacy as its successor in the Holy Roman Empire of the 800s-1800s. That is, the beast was struck dead by the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 AD, but was revived and resurrected by the coronation of Charles the Great as Roman Emperor by Pope Leo III in 800 AD. Other commentaries of the 19th century, on the other hand, advocated a Preterist interpretation of the vision, according to which the beast of Revelation referred to the Emperor Nero and his supposed resurrection at the end of time.

Emperor Nero as an archetype for the Antichrist

Emperor Nero, who ruled from 54 to 68, was the first Roman emperor to persecute Christians and one of the most brutal. There is no evidence that early church teachers linked him more generally to the Beast of the Revelation, although some did, mainly Victorinus and Augustine. The idea of Nero as the beast of Revelation only became more widespread in the writings of the Preterist prophecy teachers of the 1800s. This idea is supported, among other things, by the fact that the transliterated Hebrew form of his Greek title counts the number of the beast 666 . Secondly, Nero is also associated with the prophecy of Revelation 17:8-11 about the seven heads and ten horns of the beast.

Both Preterist and Historicist prophecy teachers have agreed that the Beast and the Harlot are linked in the vision to ancient Rome; that the harlot riding on the seven heads of the beast referred to the city founded on the seven hills of Rome, because “the seven heads are the seven mountains on which the woman sits” and that “The woman whom you saw is the great city, which reigns over the kings of the earth.” This harlot was “drunk with the blood of the saints and the blood of the witnesses of Jesus”, as Rome was the greatest persecutor of Christians in John’s lifetime.

But John was told that “The seven heads are… [also] seven kings; five have fallen, one is, the other has not yet come; and when he comes, he must remain a little while. The beast which was, and is not, is himself also an eighth and is one of the seven, and he goes to destruction.⁴ In the Preterist interpretation of the vision, these seven kings are thought to have referred to the early Roman emperors, of whom Nero would have been among the first five. And so “the beast which was, and is not, is himself also an eighth and is one of the seven” would be the emperor Nero, who rises from the dead before the second coming of Jesus.

This was also linked to the ‘Nero Redivivus myth’ that spread in ancient Rome after the suicide of Emperor Nero, that he was not dead but would return from Parthia, from nowadays Iran, to become Emperor of Rome. The myth was so well known for hundreds of years after Nero’s death that Christian writers such as Victorinus and Augustine referred to it in their interpretations of the Book of Revelation. Victorinus, who lived during the persecutions of Emperor Diocletian (284-305), wrote in his commentary on the Book of Revelation:

Now that one of the heads was, as it were, slain to death, and that the stroke of his death was directed, he speaks of Nero. For it is plain that when the cavalry sent by the senate was pursuing him, he himself cut his throat. Him therefore, when raised up, God will send as a worthy king, but worthy in such a way as the Jews merited. And since he is to have another name, He shall also appoint another name, that so the Jews may receive him as if he were the Christ. [i.e. the prophesied Messiah of the Jews].”

This is perhaps the first time Nero was associated with the beast of Revelation. Augustine, considered as the most important church father in the Western Church, also referred to this view in a slightly more sceptical way in his work on the City of God, written in the first half of the 400s :

Some think that the Apostle Paul referred to the Roman empire [in 2 Thessalonians 2:7], and that he was unwilling to use language more explicit, lest he should incur the calumnious charge of wishing ill to the empire which it was hoped would be eternal; so that in saying, For the mystery of iniquity does already work, he alluded to Nero, whose deeds already seemed to be as the deeds of Antichrist. And hence some suppose that he shall rise again and be Antichrist. Others, again, suppose that he is not even dead, but that he was concealed that he might be supposed to have been killed, and that he now lives in concealment in the vigor of that same age which he had reached when he was believed to have perished, and will live until he is revealed in his own time and restored to his kingdom. But I wonder that men can be so audacious in their conjectures. However, it is not absurd to believe that these words of the apostle, Only he who now holds, let him hold until he be taken out of the way, refer to the Roman empire, as if it were said, Only he who now reigns, let him reign until he be taken out of the way. And then shall the wicked be revealed: no one doubts that this means Antichrist.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges, published in 1882, echoes the views of these early church writers on the Emperor Nero: “It is possible that he [the Apostle John in Revelation 17] means to tell us, that the Antichrist who is to come will actually be Nero risen from the dead (we notice, that in the words of the text his death, the reality of which is historically certain, is not denied, but affirmed): more probably, Antichrist will be a new Nero in the same way as he will be a new Antiochus, an enemy of God as they were, typified by them inasmuch as they were actuated by his spirit.”

Preterism, Historicism and Futurism

I have often said that I am in favour of a kind of integrated interpretation of prophecy where I have integrated together a preterist, historicist and futurist interpretation of prophecy. That is, while I do not agree with all aspects of preterist, historicist or futurist prophecy interpretation, I do agree with each in their main lines and do not see them as contradictory or mutually exclusive views of end-time biblical prophecy. I can also agree with the view of the Bible commentary quoted above that the Emperor Nero was one of many Antichrists (1 John 2:18) and the final example of that one, like Antiochus Epiphanes. Some of these historical examples of the Antichrist were also very accurately predicted in Bible prophecy, such as Antiochus Epiphanes, the Papal States and the Ottoman Caliphate (as I have already argued in my writings).

The seven-headed beast of Revelation may well have some prefigurative reference to Emperor Nero or the papacy, as partial preterism and partial historicism already teach, but in general I interpret the prophecies of Revelation mainly in the light of their futuristic understanding. My point in quoting the interpretations of the early teachers of the Church now is mainly that the idea of the death (or perhaps a faked death) of the Antichrist and a satanic resurrection goes back at least 1700 years. And in the days of the early church this was understood to refer – as in the teaching of the futurists of the 1900s – to the literal death and resurrection of some world ruler through whom this person would seek to imitate Jesus Christ. In fact, even the church father Irenaeus, a disciple of Polycarp, a disciple of the apostle John the Apostle, referred to this idea a few decades after the Revelation was written :

We will not, however, incur the risk of pronouncing positively as to the name of Antichrist; for if it were necessary that his name should be distinctly revealed in this present time, it would have been announced by him who beheld the apocalyptic vision. For that was seen no very long time since, but almost in our day, towards the end of Domitian’s reign. But he indicates the number of the name now, that when this man comes we may avoid him, being aware who he is: the name, however, is suppressed, because it is not worthy of being proclaimed by the Holy Spirit.

For if it had been declared by Him, he (Antichrist) might perhaps continue for a long period. But now as he was, and is not, and shall ascend out of the abyss, and goes into perdition, Revelation 17:8 as one who has no existence; so neither has his name been declared, for the name of that which does not exist is not proclaimed. But when this Antichrist shall have devastated all things in this world, he will reign for three years and six months, and sit in the temple at Jerusalem; and then the Lord will come from heaven in the clouds, in the glory of the Father, sending this man and those who follow him into the lake of fire

A beast that was, and is not, and will come.

It is important to note now that one of the earliest teachers of the church here connects the beast of Revelation to the coming world ruler, whose name could be counted as 666 in Greek Hebrew gematria (as Charles’ name counts in English and Hebrew) and who will visit the rebuilt temple in Jerusalem, as foretold in Matthew 24:15 and 2 Thessalonians 2:4. Furthermore, though he does not say so directly, he alludes to this person’s death and resurrection by quoting Revelation 17:8:

The beast that you saw was, and is not, and is about to come up out of the abyss and go to destruction. And those who live on the earth, whose names have not been written in the book of life from the foundation of the world, will wonder when they see the beast, that he was, and is not, and will come.

We can equate this verse with Revelation 1:8, 17-18 where Jesus speaks of Himself:

“I am the Alpha and the Omega,” says the Lord God, “who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty”… I am the first and the last, and the living One; and I was dead, and behold, I am alive forevermore, and I have the keys of death and of Hades.

Just as Jesus is said to have given his life and “went and made proclamation to the spirits in prison [in Hades],”⁵, so too the beast is said to rise from the “abyss” or underworld. But unlike Jesus, he is also returning to the abyss. And just as John saw Jesus as a Lamb who was “as it were slain “⁶, so also with the beast he sees “one of his heads as if it had been fatally wounded, and his fatal wound was healed. “⁷ Revelation 13:12-14 tells of a False Prophet:

He exercises all the authority of the first beast in his presence. And he makes the earth and those who live on it worship the first beast, whose fatal wound was healed. He performs great signs, so that he even makes fire come down out of the sky to the earth in the presence of people. And he deceives those who live on the earth because of the signs which it was given him to perform in the presence of the beast, telling those who live on the earth to make an image to the beast who had the wound of the sword and has come to life.

In these passages, the resurrection of the beast from his fatal wound is thus linked to satanic miracles performed by another beast, the false prophet. This is also the context of Paul’s teaching to the church at Thessalonica:

….the one whose coming is in accord with the activity of Satan, with all power and false signs and wonders, and with all the deception of wickedness for those who perish, because they did not accept the love of the truth so as to be saved. For this reason God will send upon them [n]a deluding influence so that they will believe what is false, in order that they all may be judged who did not believe the truth, but took pleasure in wickedness.⁸

Why is the whole world wondering the beast?

While I have often been more inclined to think that the healing of the deadly wound of the beast would indicate the revival of his kingdom or the Roman emperorship in the office of The Last Roman Emperor that this person will hold, the idea of his literal death and resurrection would be more consistent with the idea that “the whole earth was amazed and followed after the beast” as his deadly wound was healed. If the Pope would crown a ruler named Charles as Emperor of Rome [or Emperor of Europe]- the last time being under Charles V in the 1500s, and the first time in the 800s marking the birth of Western civilisation – it would indeed be an event of great interest and wonder, but would it be such a spectacle as to draw the whole world to marvel at him with their mouth agape?

Secondly, does the Antichrist have to die and rise again to really fulfill the anti prefix of his name, which comes from the Greek and means the opponent, the opposite and the substitute of Christ? He is therefore not only the enemy of Christ, but also His imitator and antithesis. Is he then also to be one ‘who is and who was and who is to come’? At least this is what the 1871 Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible⁹ suggests, noting Revelation 1:8 and 17:8. The idea of the literal death and resurrection of the Antichrist is therefore not new and is also supported by the precise textual exegesis of the biblical texts (as opposed to eisegesis, which means reading our own assumptions and preconceptions into the text).

But if I have expressed scepticism about this interpretation, I am not the first person. Even Augustine wondered about the “conspiracy theories of the Fifth Century” and the gullibility of the people of his time, when the Emperor Nero, who had been in the tomb for over 200 years, was believed to be alive and would return as Emperor of Rome. In the 1970s, Hal Lindsey said that he did not believe in a literal return of the Antichrist from death to life, but in “a situation in which this person has a mortal wound. Before he has actually lost life, however, he will be brought back from this critical wounded state.”

King Charles’ cancer could be just such a situation where he now has a “mortal wound”, but “before he has actually lost life, however, he will be brought back from this critical wounded state.” But what if he not only has a “fatal wound” but is actually going to die of cancer? Even in this situation, I should logically have no problem believing in his resurrection. After all, I also believe in the resurrection of my own relatives who died in Christ in the rapture of the church.¹⁰ Paul taught:

Now if Christ is preached, that He has been raised from the dead, how do some among you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? But if there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised; and if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain, your faith also is in vain. Moreover, we are even found to be false witnesses of God, because we testified against God that He raised Christ, whom He did not raise, if in fact the dead are not raised. For if the dead are not raised, then not even Christ has been raised; and if Christ has not been raised, your faith is worthless; you are still in your sins. Then also those who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. If we have hoped in Christ only in this life, we are of all people most to be pitied.¹¹

It is not consistent to say that as a Christian I believe in the bodily resurrection of all people – saints and wicked alike – but at the same time I find it impossible that an individual person will rise from the dead before Christ’s second coming. In the same way, it is somewhat inconsistent to say that I cannot believe that Charles could rise from the dead, but I do believe that he would fight with his tanks and ballistic missiles against a heavenly army from outer space that would defeat him with flying horses.¹² Or that I could not possibly believe in the bodily resurrection of Charles, but I do believe in the bodily resurrection of two witnesses at the end of the beast’s reign.¹³

“Death has been swallowed up in victory”.

I have sometimes said that I am an “eschatological realist”, by which I mean that I try to understand and interpret prophecy in the most realistic light possible, rooted in the real world. As scientists and technologists today are already on the threshold of being able to give the blind their sight, the deaf their hearing and the crippled their mobility, I see this as part of the historical trajectory predicted in the Bible prophecy ¹⁴ rather than seeking to scare and demonise such a trajectory, which many Christians may now fall into in the age of Elon Musk’s brain chips and artificial intelligence.

My eschatological realism does not mean that I deny the existence of the supernatural or the power of God. But often the two are mistakenly contrasted, because we can explain, for example, the return of the Jews to their land and the rebirth of the State of Israel in the light of a completely secular history (Zionism was, after all, a secular nationalistic ideology founded by atheistic Jews) without the need to see the supernatural hand of God behind the events. But such a view is a mistake, because the Bible says that God is guiding our history according to His good will to liberate all creation from the “corruption into the freedom of the glory of the children of God.”¹⁵

We can also see erroneously God and medicine as enemies of each other, or we can see them as allies. I speculated on my blog already in September 2018 that Charles might die before he rises to his status as the Biblical Antichrist and that he would be resurrected by some scientific miracle of modern medicine.

So I don’t think it’s impossible that the Antichrist could be over 80 years old when he came to power. If you think of the patriarchs of the Old Testament, for example, many of them did not begin their vocation until they were 70 or 80 years old. The Antichrist, moreover, can begin to play a significant public role years before the beginning of the Tribulation period [Nowhere does the Bible say that the rise of the Antichrist and the beginning of the tribulation period are simultaneous events]. In addition, some prophecies about him seem to suggest that he will undergo some kind of satanic counterpart to Christ’s death and resurrection…

Since many of these “miracles” performed by the false prophet – the image of the beast and the mark of the beast – can also be explained in the light of today’s advanced technology, is the healing of the first beast’s mortal wound also a scientific breakthrough brought about by modern technology? Consider the news headlines quoted earlier about how scientists are now planning to defeat even death and they believe it could be possible in the coming decades. Already with today’s medicine, a person can be revived from the dead even if their heart has been stopped for more than an hour. The Daily Mail reports on a patient who was revived after being dead for 70 minutes: “Previously, doctors believed that after 20 minutes of resuscitation the chances of survival were very low, but last year they received new information suggesting that the survival rate increased beyond the 20-minute mark.” But scientists are now investigating whether it is possible to revive people even after a much longer period of death. In the article Can the dead be brought back to life? Scientists believe so!

New Delhi: Soon the brain dead can be brought back to life – if the Multi-Modality Approach or ReAnima Project is successful. A team of doctors from India to the US, led by Indian scientist Dr Himanshu Bansal, are working on an ambitious project to bring life to those considered brain dead. As part of the project, the team has been granted ethical clearance to recruit 20 patients who have been declared clinically dead from brain injury.

The team will conduct the first phase of the trial, called ‘First In Human Neuro-Regeneration and Neuro-Reanimation’ at Anupam Hospital in Rudrapur, Uttarakhand, India. In the trial, the scientists will incorporate a series of procedures and therapies that include injecting the brain with stem cells and experimenting with peptides in an attempt to regenerate the brain and bring it back to life.

Bansal, who works with biotech companies Revita Life Sciences and Bioquark Inc, claimed he already had some success with two patients in the Gulf and Europe. “We are now trying to do a definitive study with 20 subjects and prove that brain death is reversible.

This opens the door for future research and especially for people who lose a loved one suddenly,” Dr Bansal told the Telegraph. Peptides are administered into the spinal cord – of those kept alive by life support alone – daily by pump, and stem cells are given every two weeks for six weeks. This ground-breaking project is the first of its kind and also a step towards the possible reversal of death in our lifetime.

Conclusion

So while the idea of the literal death and resurrection of the Antichrist is biblically justified and goes back to the eschatological texts of the earliest teachers of the Church, I admit that it would also give me a convenient escape from facing reality and admitting error in the event of Charles dying of cancer. For I could believe, as the early Church eschatologists did about Emperor Nero, that King Charles would rise from the grave weeks, months, years, or decades after his death.

In reality, it might be more honest to admit it after three days and three nights that if the king has not risen from the grave, then I was wrong about him as the beast of Revelation and a man of lawlessness. After all, the most important thing in our faith is not to believe in the resurrection of Charles but in resurrection and ascension of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To conclude with the words of our Saviour, “I am the resurrection and the life; the one who believes in Me will live, even if he dies, and everyone who lives and believes in Me will never die. Do you believe this?”¹⁶

Footnotes

1. Psalm 90:10 ↩︎
2. 2 Thessalonians 2:9 ↩︎
3. To Whom the Majesty of Kingship Has Not Been Conferred – The Antichrist Revealed? (Books on Demand, 2022, page 119) ︎ ↩︎
4. Revelation 17:9-11 ↩︎
5. 1 Peter 3:19 ↩︎
6. Revelation 5:6 ︎ ↩︎
7. Revelation 13:3 ↩︎
8. 2 Thessalonians 2:9-12 ↩︎
9. Although the comment promote a historicist interpretation of the papacy – not a person – as that beast risen from the dead ︎ ↩︎
10. 1 Thessalonians 4:16 ︎ ↩︎
11. 1 Cor. 15:12-19 ︎ ↩︎
12. 2. Tess. 2:8, llm. 19:11-21 ︎ ↩︎
13. Ilm. 11:11 ︎ ↩︎
14. Isa. 35:5-6, Matt. 11:5 ︎ ↩︎
15. Romans 8:21 ↩︎
16. John 11:25-26 ↩︎

Listen to the article.

A long-time reader of my blog and books commented to me on Facebook: “I think that Christians should not support the Temple Institute financially or in any other way, because the building of a third temple by the Jews shows rebellion against God, because they still do not accept Jesus as their Messiah, but are trying to build their own way of salvation to God through the temple and sacrifice.“ I now respectfully disagree with this brother in Christ. I wrote on this subject back in November 2022, but I will expand my thoughts a little. The comment was related to my FB post in which I wondered a bit about a video update by Amir Tsarfat, a Messianic Jew living in Israel, in which he claimed the fuss of the Red Heifer sacrifice was a fake news story initiated by the enemy to justify Hamas’ terrorist attack against Israel on October 7, 2023.

I did my first FB update on red heifers about a year ago, before they started to get more attention in the secular media. At the time I shared an interview on the excellent The Israel Guys YouTube channel run by Christian Zionists living in Israel where Temple Institute representative Moriel Barelli said they had brought the red heifers from Texas to Israel on September 15, 2022 and hoped the political situation would allow the cow to be sacrificed as early as the fall of 2023. The most important annual festivals in the Hebrew calendar fall in autumn and spring, and therefore the Jewish Passover (Pesach) of the current week has also been reported by many to be the time when the ritual could have been performed.

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The only fake news about the ceremony has been that it had already been performed or that the sacrifice was to be performed on the Temple Mount, although Jewish law requires it to be performed on the Mount of Olives. Such fake news is often spread by those who are hostile to Zionism and the Temple project and claim that the Israeli government has a conspiracy to destroy Al-Aqsa and the Dome of the Rock and build the Third Temple (a conspiracy narrative that has been repeated by Islamists for almost a hundred years). In fact, the Israeli government is very reluctant to authorise such ceremonies, which could provoke further violence in the region, since the mere import of red heifers from Texas to Jerusalem provoked Hamas to the October massacre.

If the ceremony has not yet taken place, it is not because it was fake news, but because its planners have not yet received the blessing of the Israeli government. The only reason many people are now aware of these Red Cows is that on 100th day of the Gaza war, Hamas spokesman Abu Obeida cited the cows as the reason for their October terror attack (or rather attempted genocide), which the organization dubbed “theAl-Aqsa flood.”

But if we now say that Christians should not support the establishment of the Third Temple because the enemy justified his violence against innocent Jewish civilians with it, then we could just as well say that Christians should not have supported the return of the Jews to their land and the re-establishment of the State of Israel either, because the Arabs justified their violence against the Jews with it and the wars of 1948, ’67 and ’73 to destroy the Jewish State. Nor should Christians have supported President Trump’s decision to recognise Jerusalem as the undivided capital of Israel in December 2017, because it could have sparked a third world war.

However, World War III did not break out in December 2017, and instead a historic peace treaty between Israel and the Arab peoples of the Gulf was signed in the region during the Trump administration. Peace does not come from submitting to the demands of terrorists. If that were the case, peace would have come about already after the 1993 Oslo peace agreement or the 2005 withdrawal from Gaza. Nor will there be peace today unless Israel succeeds in completely eradicating Hamas from Gaza and transforming the entire Palestinian culture from one that glorifies death and incites hatred of Jews to one that loves peace and life.

So I do not believe that the red cows themselves were the cause of the October violence, but rather the weak foreign policy of President Biden’s administration, which encouraged Iran and Hamas to commit violence against Jews. If Israeli or American leaders stood strong enough against the enemies of civilisation, the Israeli government could even blow up Al-Aqsa without much resistance or violence from the Palestinians. It is the continued Muslim complicity that brings about this violence, not the other way around.

However, the point of the fellow believer who commented on my Facebook update was based on Christian theology: “The building of the third temple by the Jews shows rebellion against God, because they still do not accept Jesus as their Messiah, but try to build their own way of salvation to God through the temple and sacrifice .” I also partly disagree on this point. Orthodox Jews who dream of a third temple believe, like Christians, in the messianic prophecies of the Old Testament, the Hebrew Tanakh, and believe that the establishment of a temple is the way to world peace, not chaos and violence. The prophet Isaiah prophesied:

The word which Isaiah the son of Amoz saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem. Now it will come about that in the last days the mountain of the house of the LORD will be established as the chief of the mountains, and will be raised above the hills; and all the nations will stream to it; and many peoples will come and say, “Come, let’s go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of Jacob; so that He may teach us about His ways, and that we may walk in His paths.” For the law will go out from Zion and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem. And He will judge between the nations, and will mediate for many peoples; and they will beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning knives. Nation will not lift up a sword against nation, and never again will they learn war.¹

Isaiah thus prophesies that a Jewish temple would one day stand on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, and its existence is linked in prophecy to an era of global peace, prosperity and justice, of which that temple stands in Jerusalem as the centre and symbol. This prophecy was not yet fulfilled in the first or second temple era, when nations fought against each other and against Jerusalem. The Orthodox Jews, therefore, do not seek to build a third temple simply because they ‘seek to establish their own way of salvation to God through the temple and sacrifice’, and because they ‘still do not accept Jesus as their Messiah’. The background is also the eschatological idea, of which Christian Zionists share too, that Jerusalem would one day become the centre of an era of global peace and justice, and in which the temple would play a central role. Jesus himself confirmed these prophecies of Isaiah and pointed to their future fulfillment at His Second Coming:

Then they came to Jerusalem. And He entered the temple and began to drive out those who were buying and selling in the temple, and overturned the tables of the money changers and the seats of those who were selling doves; and He would not permit anyone to carry merchandise through the temple. And He began to teach and say to them, “Is it not written: ‘My house will be called a house of prayer for all the nations’? But you have made it a den of robbers.”²

The Second Temple in Jerusalem, from which Jesus drove out the Jewish money changers, was not a place of prayer for all nations, as access was restricted only to ritually cleansed Jews (although there was also an area on the Temple Mount known as the “court of the Gentiles” where Gentiles were also allowed to pray and worship the God of Israel). However, Jesus prophesied that there would come a time when all nations would worship the God of Israel in the Temple in Jerusalem. Now, some might say that this Messianic Temple would be a different temple from the Third Temple sought by orthodox Jews, which is the “Temple of the Antichrist.”

This too is a distortion of Bible prophecies that has often related to the view of the “Jewish Antichrist”, which is still a common view in Islamic anti-Jewish eschatology where the Antichrist is known as Dajjal. The Antichrist indeed does manage to deceive some Jews and make them believe that he is their prophesied messiah (there is a whole chapter in my books on the subject on how Charles III is able to meet that criteria too). But linking the personality of the Antichrist exclusively to the Jews and the Jewish Temple is often used as a tool for inciting Jew-hatred in both Christian and Islamic antisemitism. Especially when conspiracy theories about the ‘elders of Zion’ and the secret world power of the Jews are linked to this topic.

For example, while Christian Zionists see the return of the Jews to their land and the re-establishment of the Jewish state as an important part of God’s universal plan of salvation for all peoples, Islamic eschatology sees the existence of Israel as merely a tool of Satan, through which he can bring the “Jewish messiah”, the Dajjal of Islam, into the world, against whom Jesus and the Mahdi will fight in the Muslim end-time scenario (and after winning the battle, “Jesus” will slaughter all Christians and Jews and prepare the world for a Muslim world domination led by the Mahdi). But nowhere in the Bible does it talk about any “Temple of the Antichrist”. The future Third Temple in Jerusalem is called “a place holy” to the God of Israel and “the temple of God” even after the Antichrist has desecrated it with his abomination of desolation. I quote a few verses:

• “It [the Antichrist] even magnified itself to be equal with the Commander of the host; and it removed the regular sacrifice from Him, and the place of His sanctuary was thrown down.”³
• “Forces from him will arise, desecrate the sanctuary fortress, and do away with the regular sacrifice. And they will set up the abomination of desolation.”⁴
• “Therefore when you see the abomination of desolation which was spoken of through Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place (let the reader understand),”⁵
• …who [The Antichrist] opposes and exalts himself above every so-called god or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, displaying himself as being God.⁶

You can only desecrate something that is already holy to God. We cannot say the same today about the Muslim Al-Aqsa Mosque or the Dome of the Rock. No Christian, Jew, or Muslim can desecrate them as they are not holy places in the first place. From a Christian perspective, they already represent the abomination of desolation on the Temple Mount, because the inscription on the wall of the Dome of the Rock quotes a passage from the Koran that denies that Jesus was the Son of God:

In the name of Allah, the Entirely Merciful, the Especially Merciful. “Peace upon me the day I was born, and the day I will die, and the day I am raised alive.” That is Jesus, the son of Mary – the word of truth about which they are in dispute. It is not [befitting] for Allah to take a son; exalted is He! When He decrees an affair, He only says to it, “Be,” and it is.⁷

The Apostle John said:

Who is the liar but the one who denies that Jesus is the Christ? This is the antichrist, the one who denies the Father and the Son.⁸

It is therefore not consistent to teach that it is wrong for Christians to support the third temple, which Jesus himself called a holy place for his Father, and which will one day become a house of prayer for all nations. Nor does the Bible support the idea that the Messianic Temple is a different temple from the Tribulation temple, since Daniel 8:14 tells us that that same temple will be “properly restored” or cleansed after 2,300 days of defilement or abuse where “the daily sacrifice of the sanctuary and the host will be given for a trample.” The Third Temple will not therefore be destroyed in the same way as the First and Second Temples. If Christians make the Third Temple itself an “abomination of desolation” – even though Scripture calls it a place holy to God – then we run the risk of actually supporting the abomination of desolation imposed by the Antichrist (although I believe the church will be raptured before the mid-point of the tribulation period) , because he will abolish the Old Testament sacrifices of the Temple and apparently place some syncretistic worship there to bring the three monotheistic religions together on Temple Mount.

I do understand that the main theological objection to my view is now that the New Testament says that Jesus’ death on the cross made the animal sacrifices of the temple obsolete, which only served as a model for Christ’s future sacrificial death:

For the Law, since it has only a shadow of the good things to come and not the very form of things, can never, by the same sacrifices which they offer continually year by year, make perfect those who draw near. Otherwise, would they not have ceased to be offered, because the worshipers, having once been cleansed, would no longer have had consciousness of sins? But in those sacrifices there is a reminder of sins year by year. For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins. Therefore, when He comes into the world, He says, “Sacrifice and offering You have not desired, But a body You have prepared for Me; In whole burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin You have taken no pleasure…

By this will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. Every priest stands daily ministering and offering time after time the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins; but He, having offered one sacrifice for sins for all time, sat down at the right hand of God, waiting from that time onward until His enemies are made a footstool for His feet. For by one offering He has perfected for all time those who are sanctified.⁹

But I am not suggesting that the Jews can be forgiven of their sins and reconciled before God by sacrificing bulls and goats. I am not arguing that Jews have a different path to salvation than Gentiles. God is not pleased with those animal sacrifices, as Paul taught in Hebrews, and that is why He also allows the Antichrist to abolish these sacrifices that the Jews will perform in the rebuilt temple because of their unbelief. As Christians, we can support the Temple itself without supporting its Old Covenant sacrifices. Even if we do not directly support rituals such as the sacrifice of the red heifer on the Mount of Olives, we can also use it as an opportunity to preach the gospel to the Jewish people and tell them about Jesus Christ, of whom those sacrifices were just the shadow and reminder.

However, we must remember that animal sacrifices were also originally appointed and ordained by God Himself. They were not a sacrilege before Him, because they were sacrificed for the glory of His name and to atone for the sins of the people. The animal sacrifices offered in honour of the pagan gods, on the other hand, were an abomination and a sacrilege on His holy mountain. But as long as the Jews deny the Son, they deny the Father, for “Whoever denies the Son does not have the Father; the one who confesses the Son has the Father also. “¹⁰

One of the points Amir Tsarfati made in his video was that the task of Christians is not to hasten the end times or the coming of Jesus, but to focus on evangelising people. Here too I disagree, because the apostle Peter gave us the very task of hastening the second coming of Jesus:

Since all these things are to be destroyed in this way, what sort of people ought you to be in holy conduct and godliness, looking for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be destroyed by burning, and the elements will melt with intense heat! But according to His promise we are looking for new heavens and a new earth, in which righteousness dwells.¹¹

Now, of course, hastening the coming of Jesus does not mean that we are going to fly planes into skyscrapers or otherwise cause global chaos that would somehow accelerate the coming of Armageddon. This would be more in line with the Islamic expectation of the end times. For it is not the role of Christians to act as agents of God’s judgments, for we believe that God himself will judge the world according to his own righteous will. But our task is to hasten the coming of His kingdom on earth by evangelising the nations and fighting moral evil in society by peaceful and legal means.

This belief in hastening the coming of the Kingdom of God led Christians to fight in the 1800s, among other things, for the abolition of slavery (as part of their belief in postmillenial eschatology). Evangelism also hastens His coming, for “the gospel of the kingdom must be preached in all the world as a witness to all nations; and then the end will come.”¹² Or as Peter said: ” The Lord is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance.”¹³

Some might say that by supporting the Third Temple, Christians are hastening the end times in a negative sense, because we are only fuelling violence and inter-religious tensions that could erupt into a global nuclear war. But this again goes back to the theme of the beginning of my article; that it is the weakness of the West in the face of Islamic terrorism that is fuelling violence and wars. Christians and Jews support the Temple precisely because they believe that blessing of Israel and Jerusalem is the key to world peace and global prosperity, while cursing Jews tends to lead to ever greater chaos, misery and violence.

For example, “the Son of Hamas”, Mosab Hassan Yousef, who was a Mossad agent during the second Palestinian Intifada in the 2000s and saved countless lives on both the Israeli and Palestinian sides, has often said that Hamas is at war not only against Israel but against the entire peace-loving civilisation. Having destroyed Israel, they would continue their hatred, violence and chaos against each other because they love death more than life. Isaiah 2’s prophecy of a time of global peace is thus linked to the nations’ recognition not only of the Jews as God’s Chosen people and the Land of Israel as their rightful inheritance, but also of the Crucified Messiah of this nation, the Prince of Peace, Yeshua HaMashiach, and superiority His teachings. Lies (of which Islam is the greatest) and the people who spread them are the root cause of the world’s wars and violence. It is the truth that makes us free and brings peace to the world.

Conclusion

I already said on Facebook that my intention was not to attack Amir Tsarfat or his ministry. Tsarfati is doing important work for the Kingdom of God together with other servants of God and I can recommend his teaching to others. But often Christians can get too one-sided a picture if they listen to the views of only one influential teacher. This is especially true when it comes to Christian eschatology. Tsarfat’s views seem to be partly influenced by the end-time chronology that familiar to many from the Left Behind series of books and films, and in which the rapture of the church occurs first, followed by the revelation of the Antichrist to the remnant and his seven-year covenant with Israel, including the building of the third temple.

According to my own end-time chronology, the rapture of the church occurs before or at the same time as this seven-year covenant (While they are saying, “Peace and safety!” then…¹⁴ ). The identity of the Antichrist will, however, be revealed to the church even earlier than this, as Paul taught in 2 Thessalonians 2:3. Again, we are not told anything about the date of the temple’s foundation. We can, of course, assume that it is part of the terms of the Antichrist’s covenant, but this is a mere assumption which is not further supported by Scripture.

We should not read too much into the chronologies of the end time when the Scriptures are silent of the topic. If the third temple were to be erected 100 years before the seven-year tribulation, it would not contradict much other than the “fig tree prophecy” in Matthew 24, which suggests that events related to Jesus’ second coming will occur within one generation of the rebirth of the state of Israel in 1948. If construction of the third temple were to begin this year, many Christians might think that the church had been left behind in the Tribulation period or that the pre-tribulationists were wrong. From such a scenario we cannot conclude neither in the light of Bible prophecy.

In his video, Amir Tsarfati labelled the premature talk about the sacrificial heifers and the Third Temple as “sensationalism”, but it is only sensationalism if the assumption is that the building of the temple will take place only after the rapture of the church. In the same way, he has branded the “speculation” about the Antichrist candidates – including King Charles – as sensationalism. But even in that case, it is sensationalism only if the assumption is that the Antichrist will be revealed after the rapture of the church (a doctrine I don’t see Paul supporting in 2 Thessalonians 2:3) . On May 15, 2023, Tsarfati wrote the following in the Telegram:

Videos are circulating online showing the newly crowned King Charles as the Antichrist. This kind of unbiblical and very hysterical sensationalism is exactly the reason why I wrote my new book “Has the Tribulation period begun?”. You can find hundreds or thousands of “signs” that seem to suggest that he is the Antichrist, and yet you are completely wrong. Born-again, Spirit-filled Christians are not supposed to experience the Tribulation or see the rise of the Antichrist, which Daniel 9 marks the beginning of that period. The events of Revelation 13 and the coronation in May 2023 are not even related! The existence of the beast rising from the sea is an appearance out of nowhere on the world stage. It will not be some grumpy old prince, unpopular not only around the world but also with many in his own country. It is time for Christians to stop looking for the Antichrist and start looking for Jesus Christ!

As I said, this is not a personal attack on Tsarfati for slandering my own ministry as “hysterical sensationalism”. I have not been in the habit of turn against my fellow servants in Christ even if they do not subscribe to my eschatological views. I can also subscribe to the end of Tsarfat’s Telegram message that seeking Christ is far more important than seeking the Antichrist. Yet his other conclusions in this message are quite strange: “You can find hundreds or thousands of ‘signs’ that seem to suggest that he is the Antichrist, and still be dead wrong.”

So even if a person like Charles – or anyone else – fulfilled a thousand Bible prophecies about this man, I would still be wrong about him, because one prophecy would be against that idea in his mind. His only Scriptural objection here is that “Born-again, Spirit-filled Christians are not to experience tribulation or see the rise of the Antichrist, which Daniel 9 marks the beginning of that age.” I agree with Tsarfat that Christians are not to experience the great tribulation period as Paul taught in 1 Thessalonians 5:9.

But he makes a mere assumption – which the Scriptures do not support – when he says that the rise of the Antichrist and the beginning of the Great Tribulation would be simultaneous events. Or that the Antichrist would become the focus of the world’s attention only after the rapture of the church. And even if this assumption were then correct, what would prevent the Holy Spirit from revealing his identity when he is still a relatively unknown or insignificant person (“the little horn” as Daniel 7 and 8 describe him). Finally, in his own wisdom, he also states something that completely contradicts the Bible’s own revelation: [He] “not be some grumpy old prince, unpopular not only around the world but also with many in his own country.” Tsarfati should take his Bible to read again Daniel 11:21, which says the exact opposite:

In his place a despicable [or despised] person will arise, on whom the honor of kingship has not been conferred, but he will come in a time of tranquility and seize the kingdom by intrigue.

It is from this verse that I have derived the title of my book and the detailed biblical and historical arguments for the biblical validity of this Charles-theory, not from some “hysterical sensationalism”.

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Footnotes

1. Isaiah 2:1-4 ︎ ↩︎
2. Mark 11:15-17 ︎ ↩︎
3. Daniel 8:11 ↩︎
4. Daniel 11:31 ↩︎
5. Matthew 24:15 ↩︎
6. 2 Thessalonians 2:4 ↩︎
7. Surah 19:33-35 ︎ ↩︎
8. 1 John 2:22
   ↩︎
9. Hebrews 10:1-6, 10-14 ︎ ↩︎
10. 1 John 2:23 ︎ ↩︎
11. 2 Peter 3:11-13 ↩︎
12. Matthew 24:14 ︎ ↩︎
13. 2 Peter 3:9 ↩︎
14. 1 Thessalonians 5:3 ↩︎

Did you know that the brutal terrorist attack in Israel on October 7, which triggered the biggest conflict in the Middle East since the 1973 Yom Kippur War, and which is now threatening to escalate into a wider Middle East war between Iran and Israel after Iran sent hundreds of missiles and drones into Israel on April 13, was also Vladimir Putin’s birthday? Coincidence? Perhaps, but the outbreak of the Gaza war calls for a closer look at the geopolitics of the region and at the possible bigger players who may have been behind the conflict or who may have at least benefited from its outbreak. Geopolitics and the historical and strategic context in which conflicts arise has been one of my interests, as it helps us to understand the thinking of the leaders of the major powers in the East or the West when they justify their military actions, regardless of the cost of these wars.

I am not a historian, but my interest in history and the connections between historical events is linked to my interest in Bible prophecies – especially the visions of Daniel. You see, you have to understand history before you can say that prophecies predicted this or that event in history. In Chapter 13 of my book, for example, I systematically review Middle Eastern history over the last 15 centuries to show that Daniel Chapter 11, verses 1-20, predicted Middle Eastern history from the rise of Islam to the re-emergence of the state of Israel in 1948.

Prophetic imagery is often very general and symbolic, and therefore a certain amount of big picture thinking is required to make such a point. This historical overview is also important for understanding the contemporary tensions (and the prophetic connections between these events) that have brought the world to the brink of World War 3. For this reason, I will first take the reader ahead of World War 1 and into the colonialist competition for world power in the 19th Century called the Great Game.

Content

1. Why the Middle East has been a playground for the Great Powers?
2. Trade routes as shapers of historical breakpoints
3. Indian Silk Road versus Chinese Silk Road
4. Who benefited from the Gaza war?
5. The role of Iran
6. The role of Turkey
7. Did the Bible predict Vladimir Putin’s rule?
8. Who was to blame for the war in Ukraine?
9. The impact of Russia’s energy monopoly on the war in Ukraine
10. The New Great Game, Prince Andrew, and King Charles III
11. Conclusion
12. A prophetic perspective

Why the Middle East has been a playground for the Great Powers?

If you read history as an isolated individual events, dates and battles, you might learn that in World War I, the central powers – Germany, Austria-Hungary and Ottoman Turkey – fought the allies of the WWI – Britain, France, Russia and Serbia – and the allies won the war, which resulted in the Middle East being divided between the British and the French, with the victorious powers dividing the lands of the defeated Ottoman Sultanate among themselves. But you will have no idea what interests the UK had in going to war with Turkey or occupying Palestine, thousands of miles from the British Isles. This is where geopolitics comes in and helps us better understand the historical context of such strategic decisions.

After the Napoleonic Wars, Britain became Europe’s leading colonial power, an empire “where the sun never set”, and by the end of the 19th century had grown into the greatest world power in history, controlling a quarter of the world’s land area. British India, of which Empress Queen Victoria was proclaimed in 1876, was known as the crown jewel of the empire because it was its most strategically important and economically productive overseas dominion, serving as a tangible and symbolic trophy for British colonial hegemony. For this reason, British foreign policy throughout the 19th Century was guided by the need to protect India’s integrity, mainly from the threat posed by the expansion of the Russian Empire, but also from other colonial rivals such as France and, in the early 20th Century, especially from Emperor Wilhelm II’s Germany.

Russia’s expansion in Central Asia towards India led to a historic episode called the Great Game where Britain and Russia eventually divided Persia, Afghanistan and Tibet into districts to protect their own geopolitical interests. Although the term “Great Game” is mainly associated with these Central Asian tensions, the same objective of protecting the Indian colony and its trade routes led the British to intervene in the wars of independence of the Greek Orthodox peoples in the Balkans from Ottoman rule (in which Russia also intervened to extend its own power) or to occupy Egypt in 1882. By the 1800s, the Ottoman Sultanate, which had fallen behind the times, had weakened to the point where its collapse – and its impact on the ‘balance of power’ – was constantly feared by the major European powers.

The British strategy was to protect the Ottoman Empire from collapse, fearing that Russia would take over the Turkish-controlled lands in Asia Minor and the Middle East (which would have given Russia power in the Mediterranean and prevented British ships from reaching British India via the Suez Canal, completed in 1869). Thus the British tried to keep the already dying ‘sick man of Europe’ (as European leaders derisively called Turkey) on a ‘respirator’ by guaranteeing loans and supporting the Istanbul sultans militarily against the expanding Russian Empire. But while the British thus often fought on the Ottoman side, mainly against France or Russia, in the First World War they fought against each other. Why this U-turn? Because the Turkish Sultan allied himself in the run-up to the First World War with Germany’s power-hungry Emperor Wilhelm II – the cousin of Britain’s George V – who planned the railway linking Berlin and Baghdad, a project that created worldwide tensions between Britain, France, Germany and the Ottomans. According to Wikipedia:

The financing, design and construction were mainly the responsibility of the German Empire through the Deutsche Bank and Philipp Holzmann, who had built the Anatolian Railway (Anatolische Eisenbahn) in the 1890s, linking Istanbul, Ankara and Konya… If the railway had been completed, the Germans would have gained access to suspected oil fields in Mesopotamia and a link to the port of Basra in the Persian Gulf. The latter would have provided access to the eastern parts of the German colonial empire and avoided the Suez Canal, which was controlled by British and French interests.

The railway became a source of international controversy in the years immediately preceding the First World War. Although it has been argued that they were settled in 1914 before the war began, it has also been suggested that the railway was a manifestation of the imperial rivalry that was the main cause of the First World War… A recent history of this railway in the specific context of the First World War outlines the global interest of Germany in opposing the British Empire and the territorial interest of Ottoman Turkey in opposing its Russian, French and British rivals on all sides. As Morris Jastrow, a contemporary “on the ground” at the time, wrote:

“In England it was considered that if, as Napoleon is said to have pointed out, Antwerp in the hands of a great continental power was a pistol aimed at the English coast, Baghdad and the Persian Gulf in the hands of Germany (or any other strong power) would be a 42-centimetre gun aimed at India.”

Trade routes as shapers of historical breakpoints

This was not the first or the last time that a railway or a major commercial route linking civilisations sparked an international conflict. Indeed, these routes have played a surprisingly central role in shaping some of the most significant events in history. And perhaps it is not so surprising if we think of them as a kind of economic lifeline for which great powers fight for their existence and their world power. For example, many people may remember from their primary school history lessons the Silk Road linking Asia and Europe, a major global trade route connecting East and West from antiquity to the Middle Ages. This trade route collapsed when the Ottoman Empire closed it to European traders after the siege of Constantinople in 1453.

This forced the European states that had become dependent on trade with the East – especially Portugal and Spain – to seek alternative sea routes to Asia, which in turn led to an Age of Discovery and colonialism, when Columbus sailed west to reach Asia by circumnavigating the globe (note: in the Middle Ages, there was no belief in a flat earth with ships falling off the edges), but stumbled upon the American continent, unknown to Europeans, in 1492. The Portuguese Vasco de Gama was the first European to sail around Africa to India in 1498, creating a commercial sea route through the Cape of Good Hope to Asia (see previous image). This route was used by European sailing ships for trade with the East until the construction of the Suez Canal in 1869, which shortened it by several thousand kilometres. China, in partnership with several other Asian countries, is now planning a massive multi-trillion dollar project called the Belt and Road, which has also been dubbed the ‘New Silk Road’. This ‘road’ (or network of trade routes) would follow almost the same route as the original Silk Road and include railways, ports and other infrastructure designed for global trade in 65 countries.

Indian Silk Road versus Chinese Silk Road

The trade routes of a bygone era are now being brought back to life. And it’s not just China’s new Silk Road project. At the G20 meeting last September, Israel, India and a number of European countries presented a new transport route project called the India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor, which would link India to the Gulf countries and from there to Israel and Europe. It is part of ongoing negotiations between the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and Israel to normalise relations between the two countries. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in a speech to the UN in September, hailed the historic importance of both the Saudi-Israel peace and the economic corridor linking India to Israel and Europe, which could bring peace and economic prosperity to the whole region.

India’s historic colonial corridors to the Middle East and Eurasia were severed with the partition and independence of India in 1947 . So Netanyahu and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi are now aiming to revive these former trade relations. Such a corridor would at the same time strengthen the security state relations between India, Saudi Arabia, Israel and the European Union, as any national threat to Israel would also be a threat to the commercial interests of its partners. Dominika Urhová wrote on 16 November 2023 what the India-Middle-East Economic Corridor (IMEC) could mean for the EU’s international role.

With the intensifying superpower competition between the US and China and the global shift towards a more multipolar world, IMEC can serve as a platform for the EU to strengthen its position on the international stage, reinforce its ties with India and increase its influence in the Middle East. Strengthening EU-India relations has been on the EU agenda for some time and many European countries have made significant efforts to revitalise their relations with New Delhi. This has been particularly evident in recent efforts by France, Germany and Italy to bring their countries and India closer together.

Those who predict future events from Bible prophecy – including the author – have been teaching for decades that a united Europe should emerge as a force in international relations, overtaking the US as the sole world power, and move closer to Israel and the Middle East as the Antichrist, who will take over Europe, makes a seven-year covenant with Israel and re-establishes the Roman Empire on its former borders. Perhaps it is IMEC that will enable the EU to play such a role. Miryousef Alavi wrote:

One of the main beneficiaries of IMEC is Israel, which, in addition to contributing to the normalisation of relations with Arab and Islamic countries, is making the port of Haifa one of the main transit and maritime hubs through major investments by the Indian Adani Co. Greece, the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Italy, Jordan and other countries along the route will significantly increase their importance and strategic weight by participating in the IMEC.

However, it must be remembered that not all nations are quite as enthusiastic about this project as Prime Minister Modi or Benjamin Netanyahu, because it will only further strengthen and legitimise Israel’s position. This would be unacceptable to regimes such as Iran, Syria or Turkey, which do not recognise the legitimacy of the Jewish State. The supporters of these regimes, such as Russia and China, will also suffer economically because it threatens the economic interests of the Chinese Belt and Road project in this anti-Western Eastern bloc. Alavi continues:

The confrontation between the opponents (China, Egypt, Russia, Turkey, Iraq, Pakistan, Iran, Syria and Qatar) and supporters (India, the United States, Israel, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Greece and Italy) of the India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor (IMEC) could influence the fate of the Gaza war. This configuration reflects the longevity of unrest in the resistance to the emergence of a new geopolitical environment in West Asia and beyond…

The IMEC is primarily an anti-China plan, directly or indirectly affecting not only China but also countries such as Egypt, Russia, Turkey, Iraq, Pakistan, Iran, Syria and Qatar, and its official or unofficial partners are a second group of countries, including America, India, Israel, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Greece, Italy, France, Germany and the European Union.

This corridor is primarily a competitor to the Chinese Road and Belt (RB) initiative, whose maritime route runs through the Suez Canal and the land route follows almost the same historic route as the Silk Road. The US is seen as the main opponent of the Road and Belt (RB) initiative because of strategic competition and India because of deep border and political differences with China, and the IMEC is a joint initiative to contain China’s plan.

Moreover, over the past two decades, the United States has tried to encourage countries in the Middle East, Central Asia and other regions to expand their relations with India instead of China by presenting India as an emerging Asian power. Other corridors affected by IMEC include the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (a route from China to the Pakistani port of Gwadar), the Kuwait Canal (linking the Iraqi port of Al-Fawi via Turkey and possibly Syria to Europe), the North and Central China-Europe Corridors and, to some extent, the International North-South Transport Corridor.

Miryousef Alavi does not suggest in this article that these anti-IMEC powers had anything to do with the October 7 terrorist attack and believes it was an independent act by Hamas. But he believes that the clash of these alliances and economic interests will go a long way to determining which side they take in the war between Israel and Hamas. Still, it is legitimate to ask whether Hamas really planned the October 7 terrorist attack itself, or whether it was an act against Israeli civilians planned by Hamas’s state sponsors, Iran, Qatar or Turkey. The question could be taken even further: did Iran’s ally, Vladimir Putin’s Russia or Xi Jinping’s China have anything to do with the terrorist attack?

Who benefited from the Gaza war?

This is the question that conspiracy theorists love, although they often look for answers in the wrong place. Indeed, many conspiracy theorists have a very anti-Western mindset where Western leaders are thought to be the root cause of all the chaos and instability in the world. In such thinking, for example, the war in Ukraine is solely the fault of the West or Zelensky and the war in Gaza is also the fault of the Israelis, while Russia, Iran and Hamas are merely innocent victims of the aggression of Western powers. My own worldview has always been pro-Israel and pro-West and that is why I have not gone out of my way to promote the propaganda of the enemies of the West.

At the same time, however, I have tried to understand the world as fairly as possible, and also to highlight the injustices committed by the West and its complicity in the origins of conflicts. Indeed, many in the West may live under the illusion of the virtue of our own civilisation and of our own leaders, who are concerned only with democracy and human rights. But as the theme of my latest YouTube video makes clear, my own understanding is that the cause of the wars in the world is not so much the aggression of Western powers, but the lack of it. By this I mean the weak foreign policy of Western leaders where it has tended to go along with the West’s enemies like Russia, Iran and China, without a credible deterrence policy to keep these undemocratic regimes in check.

Did the Biden government benefit from the Gaza war? We can approach the question with common sense. The war in Gaza has not boosted Biden’s approval ratings, but has made him look like a weaker world leader who lacks the ability to keep both US enemies and friends in check. Moreover, he has been caught between a rock and a hard place, trying to please the more traditional Democratic voters who see Israel as the main US ally in the Middle East on the one hand, and the younger and more radical Woke Left, allied with Hamas sympathisers, who are calling for the “liberation of Palestine from the river to the sea” on the other.

And did Benjamin Netanyahu’s government benefit from the war in Gaza? While criticising the Israeli government or its individual prime minister is not in itself anti-Semitism, such insinuation can easily lead to anti-Semitic images and medieval “blood libel” myths of Jews thirsting for the blood of Palestinian children to further their own geopolitical interests. But even such a theory is contrary to common sense in the light of the historical background to the Gaza war. The only thing we can say that the events of October 7 and the Gaza war benefited Netanyahu was the year-long mass protests of the Israeli left, which were interrupted by the events of October 7 and caused the people to unite briefly behind the Netanyahu government.

But this idea ignores the fact that the war in Gaza also interrupted the peace talks between Israel and Saudi Arabia, which Netanyahu had glorified at the UN just a few weeks before the October 7 terrorist attack. Before the war, Netanyahu mentioned in interviews and speeches how the Abrahamic peace agreement of 2020 was the result of his and Trump’s policies and how he had succeeded in bringing peace to the Middle East on the same “peace through strength” principle that President Trump followed.

Netanyahu thus hoped to unite the Israeli people with his historic peace agreement with Saudi Arabia, not with a new war against Hamas. With the October 7 massacre, the accusing fingers of many are now pointing in Netanyahu’s direction and the people are calling for his head on a pike for failing to prevent the worst terrorist attack in Israel’s history. Few people who know Netanyahu a little better would also believe that he is some kind of psychopath who would allow Hamas to slaughter over thousand members of his own people and take hundreds hostage just because it would somehow benefit his political aims.

So when evaluating conspiracy theories, it is always worth considering first whether they really make common sense. On the other hand, many people cannot understand why Hamas would have attacked Israel, knowing that a much stronger and technologically more advanced Israeli army would respond to a terrorist attack with such force that it would mean the end of Hamas’ power in the Gaza Strip. However, Hamas may have made such a risk assessment in the belief that international pressure against Israel, combined with the weakness of the Biden administration and the support of Hamas’ Middle East allies, would make the strike worthwhile. Hamas perhaps hoped to provoke a wider Middle East war in which Israel would find it harder to fight Hamas, which controls Gaza, while at the same time other Iranian proxies such as Lebanon’s Hezbollah would attack it from the north and Syria and Iran would also come to the aid of their proxy fighters against Israel.

The role of Iran

Iran is Hamas’s main financier, making it one of the main suspects in the events of October 7. Initially, Iran sought to deny that it had any role in the Hamas terrorist attack, despite the public praise of Iran’s religious dictator Ayatollah Khamenei on his X account. In December, however, a spokesman for Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps admitted Iran’s involvement, claiming that the October 7 attack was Iran’s revenge for the 2020 killing of General Qassam Soleiman. However, this claim makes little sense, since Qassam Soleiman was killed by the United States under President Trump and Trump has publicly slandered Netanyahu for not wanting to participate in his plans, even though Soleiman was the leading destabilising terrorist leader in the region.

Similarly, Hamas denied Iran’s allegations and said the events of October 7 were in response to provocations against the Al-Aqsa Mosque on the Temple Mount (including recent visits to the Temple Mount by Security Minister Ben-Gvir and attempts by certain Jewish groups to sacrifice a red heifer near the Temple Mount in preparation for the Third Temple). On April 13, Iran struck directly at Israel for the first time with hundreds of drones and ballistic missiles, most of which were successfully shot down by Israel’s Iron Dome missile defence system before they could harm the Israeli civilian population.

This was Iran’s response to Israel’s early April air strike in the city of Damascus, in which it killed several members of the Iranian government, among them General Mohammad Reza Zahedi, who was involved in the planning and execution of the October 7 terrorist attack . This claim did not come from Israel, but the Coalition Council of Islamic Revolutionary Forces, which has close ties to Iranian leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, praised General Mohammad Reza Zahedi after his death for his “strategic role in forming and strengthening the resistance front and in planning and executing the Al-Aqsa storm”, the October massacre, the Jerusalem Post reported.

In my latest video, I explain how the Biden administration’s policy of appeasement with Iran and the $10 billion bribe to the mullahs has encouraged the Iranian Islamic theocracy to aggression against Israel. Indeed, Iran – like Hamas – does not want peace or coexistence with Israel, but its death, since its official foreign policy is ‘death to America and death to Israel’. Ayatollah Khamenei, who has often called the Jewish state the “cancer” of the Middle East, tweeted in Hebrew:

Al-Quds [the Muslim name for Jerusalem] will be in Muslim hands, and the Muslim world will celebrate the liberation of Palestine.

If Iran were strong enough militarily, it would wipe Israel off the map today. It has also been argued that once the Ayatollah has a nuclear weapon, he would not be afraid to start a nuclear war with Israel, because the principle of mutual destruction (the MAD doctrine) would not restrain the aggression of the mullahs, who believe their mission is to hasten the end of the world in order to open the door to the coming of the Messiah Mahdi, the Muslims are waiting for.

The role of Turkey

But Iran is not the only Islamist state in the region seeking the destruction of the Jewish state. Turkish Islamist President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s rhetoric in recent years has also been increasingly hostile to the existence of Israel. General Mustafa Kemal Atatürk – whose role was also foretold in Daniel 11 – founded the secular Turkish Republic in 1923 after the collapse of the Ottoman Sultanate. Turkey has been an ally of the West and a member of NATO, but Erdogan, who became Turkey’s prime minister in 2003 and president in 2014, has taken his country further from west and closer to US enemies Russia, Iran and China under the leadership of the Islamist AKP party.

Erdogan’s relations between Turkey and Israel began on friendly terms, but deteriorated significantly during the first Gaza war (2009) and after the Gaza aid convoy incident in 2010. Erdogan has repeatedly accused Israel of “genocide” against Palestinians and called Zionism “a crime against humanity.” President Erdogan would have little room to criticize his neighbors for “crimes against humanity” when his regime is known to have assisted the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria in burning Christians and Muslims alive and other atrocities. The New York Post reported on September 31 2019:

Since 2012, the Turkish intelligence service MIT, under Erdogan’s leadership, has provided resources and material assistance to ISIS, and Turkish customs authorities have turned a blind eye to ISIS recruits who have flowed across Turkish borders into Syria and Iraq. A number of ISIS fighters captured by pro-US Kurdish forces in northern Syria had Turkish exit stamps on their passports and boasted of receiving direct assistance from Turkish authorities.

“Turkish intelligence knows everything,” a captured ISIS fighter recently told his captors. Many former ISIS fighters have now joined the Turkish-backed forces that have occupied the Syrian Kurdish city of Afrin, where they have been carrying out ethnic cleansing. Two Turkish intelligence officers captured by Kurdish militants in northern Iraq in 2017 gave insider accounts of Turkish government assistance to ISIS and other jihadist groups operating in Syria and Iraq.

I blogged about Erdogan’s links to ISIS back in July 2016. I also reported that then US Vice President Joe Biden had accused Turkey of funding ISIS. Biden later apologised for these truthful comments, under pressure from his allies. If Erdogan had no compunction about aiding the beasts of ISIS who, according to one report, killed 250 children with an industrial dough machine and roasted six men alive in an oven, then he would hardly have had any compunction about aiding barbarism such as that of October 7.

Under Erdogan, Turkey and Iran have seen a warming of state relations. Turkey opposed President Trump’s Iran sanctions and condemned the killing of General Qassam Soleiman. Iran’s Shiite clerics do not seem to be concerned by the fact that Turkey-backed ISIS was a Sunni terrorist organisation which, alongside Christians, also killed Shiite Muslims in Iraq and Syria. In April 2023, Erdogan told Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi in a telephone conversation that “the Islamic world should unite against Israel” in response to unrest near the Al-Aqsa Mosque on the Temple Mount between Israeli police and Palestinian rioters.

A few days after the October 7 massacre, President Erdogan was the first to call Iranian President Raisi, and they discussed “possible steps that the countries can take to end the fighting between Israeli and Palestinian forces.” Sinan Ciddi writes:

This is visible in how Ankara openly supports Hamas. Since the attacks, the Turkish government has welcomed, and Erdogan personally encouraged, vitriol-filled pro-Hamas rallies in Turkey. The Israeli Consulate was surrounded by an angry mob of protestors, shooting a barrage of fireworks, with little attempt by Turkish law enforcement officials to ensure the security of the diplomatic outpost. Additionally, Huda-Par— a radical Islamist party and a partner in Erdogan’s governing coalition—also held a celebratory rally outside the Israeli Consulate in Istanbul, chanting “Israel be damned!”… As a leader schooled in Turkey’s Islamist movement, Erdogan is at his very core an anti-Semite and does not believe in the right of Israel to exist. Instead of standing with Israel in its darkest hour, along with Turkey’s Western allies, Erdogan is choosing to bandwagon with members of the Muslim world, who want to see Israel harmed.

So alongside Iran’s Ayatollah Khamenei, we also have another prime suspect in provoking the Gaza war, Turkish President Erdogan. I said in my blog back in October that the Israel-Hamas war was motivated by a peace agreement between Saudi Arabia and Israel, which Hamas and Iran were trying to prevent (or at least delay) because it would have meant a greater consolidation and legitimisation of Israel in the Muslim world, something that the Islamists leading Iran did not want to see happen.

I also explained that the events of October 7 were not so much the fault of the agreement itself, but that the violence was also facilitated by President Biden’s weak foreign policy in favour of Iran and the fact that the Biden government, Prime Minister Netanyahu as well as the Saudi Crown Prince MBS made a public spectacle of this agreement, which was praised months in advance, instead of the negotiations being conducted in secret and announced to the world only at the time of the agreement. According to Jared Kushner, Trump’s Jewish son-in-law and special envoy to the Middle East, this was one reason for the events of October 7, because the public spectacle surrounding the agreement gave Israel’s enemies time to think of ways to torpedo it before it came into being.

Turkish leaders would also have had an economic interest in fomenting the war in Gaza. This returns to an earlier theme in the article about the new Silk Road to the East planned by Israel, India, the UAE and the EU, which the Gaza war has now made a less desirable option for investors. This ‘Silk Road’ threatens China and its partners’ own trillion-dollar Silk Road, the Belt and Road project, which would guarantee Chinese global hegemony until the end of the century. Sinan Tavsan wrote in October 2023:

ISTANBUL — At a logistics forum in Istanbul in mid-September, Alper Ozel, executive committee chairman at the International Transporters’ Association in the Turkish commercial hub, gave a stark warning. “We see others coming out and naming new corridors, so we need to move fast. One of the reasons for the Ottoman Empire’s downfall was the Silk Road route being forsaken after the opening of the Suez Canal,” which weakened its economy, he said. He called for a further strengthening of connectivity along what Turkey calls the Middle Corridor — a route aligned with China’s Belt and Road Initiative, passing through Turkic states between Europe in the West and China in the East.

Turkey, seen as a natural bridge between Asia and Europe, is perhaps one of the most sensitive countries to changes in trade routes, as Ottomans bitterly experienced during the Age of Discovery. Ozel’s alarm, and developments since, highlight Turkish discomfort with new plans like the India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor (IMEC) announced on the sidelines of the Group of 20 last month, and Ankara’s determination to strengthen routes that place Turkey in an integral position. The proposed IMEC would run from India to the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Israel to reach Europe — bypassing Turkey.

The alliance of the German Emperor Wilhelm II – who, like Hitler, was at war with the God of the Bible and planned the genocide for the Jewish people – with Ottoman Turkey, who carried out the first genocide against Armenian Christians in the early 20th Century, and their plan to build a railroad linking Europe and Asia from Berlin to Baghdad, served as the spark for the First World War. Today, the same anti-Semitic and anti-Christian forces are united in Iran and Turkey against Israel. And likewise today, these competing trade routes now threaten to ignite the World War 3. And all its key players – India, China, Israel, Russia, France, Britain and the United States – are also nuclear powers and Iran is a nuclear power aspirant. Next, I will focus a little on Iran’s ally, Vladimir Putin’s Russia.

Did the Bible predict Vladimir Putin’s rule?

Vladimir Putin’s Russia now publicly presents itself as a Christian country defending Christian values against the West’s anti-Christian liberalism and LGBTQ ideology. For this reason, some conservatives in the West may be much more sympathetic to Putin than, say, Canada’s “woke prime minister” Justin Trudeau. This “Christian” facade of Putin may also contribute to why many Christian conservatives are very suspicious of the Western mainstream media narrative on the war in Ukraine and President Volodymyr Zelensky. Personally, I have seen Putin in a very critical light since the beginning of his rule. I have never promoted a positive view of Putin on my blog, although I have also openly criticised the foreign policy of Western leaders, which has contributed to provoking Russia into an increasingly militant direction.

I have also shared the interpretation, supported by many evangelical Christians, of Russia as the land of the prince of Gog and Magog, prophesied in Ezekiel 38-39, “from the remote parts of the north”, who will attack the land of Israel, which “is restored from the sword, whose inhabitants have been gathered from many”. The Dispensationalist writer Hal Lindsey, who advocated this interpretation, predicted Putin’s rise in his 1998 book Planet Earth: The Final Chapter, on page 180:

There is every probability that the next president of Russia will be a military strongman who will be bent upon re-establishing Russia’s former super-power status. He will appeal to the people’s patriotism and love for Mother Russia in order to get their votes. He will promise to rid Russia of the Russian Mafia. He will raise up the demoralized military and rebuild it into a proud, combat-ready armed force. This will fit into the predicted role for the Russians. The cryptic name of the coming Russian strongman is Gog. He is probably a general whose name you have heard on CNN. I believe that this military strongman must come before the events of Ezekiel take place.

Who was to blame for the war in Ukraine?

Putin’s military action in Ukraine, which has destabilised global stability, has brought the world to the brink of World War 3, and future historians may see the war in Ukraine as the starting point for the World War III. But the war has a very complex history behind it. And again, the commercial corridors – the gas pipelines to be precise – played a central role in the outbreak of this conflict (I will come back to them later). The Ukrainian war did not actually start in February 2022, nor even eight years earlier with the occupation of Crimea, nor with the 2014 Ukrainian revolution that preceded it, but its beginning goes back to the Orange Revolution of 2004. Ukraine, a former Soviet republic, became the scene of a clash of forces between East and West at that time, with the disputed presidential elections.

Outgoing pro-Russian President Leonid Kuchman was accused of corruption, and Kuchman’s champion, presidential candidate Viktor Yanukovych, had the backing of Russian President Vladimir Putin, who campaigned for him in Kiev and meddled in the internal politics of the post-Cold War Soviet republic. Opposition candidate Viktor Yushchenko, on the other hand, had the backing of the Western powers for pursuing policies more favourable to European values and for Ukraine’s accession to the EU and NATO. Yanukovych had the support of a stronger state apparatus and Yushchenko was the subject of attempts to poison him by the country’s secret service, which left a permanent mark on his face.

After the first round of elections, Yanukovych declared himself the winner, but the results were considered fraudulent and after widespread protests and a rerun, Yushchenko won the election and was elected Ukraine’s third president. The whole of Ukraine was divided between the pro-Russian and pro-Western populations, with the western part of the country voting more for Yushchenko and the eastern part for Yanukovych, who was pro-Russian. These events infuriated Vladimir Putin, who then began to turn increasingly anti-Western in his rhetoric because, according to Putin, this Orange Revolution was a project orchestrated by the West against Russia.

Ten years later, in the Maidan Revolution, the people overthrew Putin’s minion Viktor Yanukovych, who had been elected in 2010, and for response to this “coup” – as Putin saw it – Putin occupied the Crimean peninsula from Ukraine and annexed it to the Russian Federation. In the same year, Ukraine’s war against Russian-backed separatists in eastern Ukraine began, which in turn escalated into a war between the Russian military and Ukraine when Putin invaded Ukraine in February 2022. The war in Ukraine was thus motivated by Putin’s attempts to interfere and influence the internal politics of an independent state in an attempt to keep it as a vassal state close to Russian interests and to prevent Ukraine from joining NATO and the EU.

I have said in my previous blogs that the revolutions in Ukraine have been financed by the left-wing stock market speculator George Soros, who has openly disclosed his involvement on CNN. Soros has certainly meddled on many revolutions in the world, but history is also too complex for us to attribute these events solely to Soros. There is also the background of Russia’s long history of oppression and colonialism in its neighbouring countries, Ukraine and Eastern Europe, first under the Russian Tsars and then under the Soviet Union. In Ukraine, for example, Stalin committed a crime known as the Holodomor, in which millions of Ukrainians were killed by starvation and which has been recognised as genocide by 20 nations.

However, Russia has never apologised or even acknowledged this crime. Genocide deniers include Putin and his ally Dmitry Medvedev, who claim that the West and Ukraine are using the genocide narrative for political ends against Russia. Vladimir Putin is now promoting the revisionist history that the Ukrainian nation is an artificial Slavic nation created after the collapse of the Soviet Union, even though Ukraine’s national identity, separate from the Russians, can be traced back to the Middle Ages (and by Putin’s logic, the United States could also be seen as an artificial country that should still belong to its former occupier, the United Kingdom). In a two-hour interview with American journalist Tucker Carlson, Putin defended his actions in Ukraine and also implied that Poland was to blame for World War II, rather than Hitler or Stalin, whose invasion of Poland in September 1939 triggered World War II.

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72 years old Putin, compared to President Biden, has an excellent memory, I have to admit. The first 30 minutes of the interview, Putin is lecturing to Tucker about the 1000 years history of Eastern Europe, mentioning the names of ancient rulers and the dates of battles like a “living encyclopaedia”.

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In Carlson’s interview, Putin explains his actions in Ukraine in the light of NATO expansion to the East, the “CIA-backed” Ukrainian “coups”, its trade relations that have negatively affected Russia, its failure to honour treaties, and by many other complex historical events, which he begins with the history of Eastern Europe a thousand years ago. Even if Putin’s defence of his actions would be partly one-sided and propagandistic, his account is a good illustration of the fact that tensions leading to conflict often arise as a chain reaction of very complex historical events.

Russia has considered the former Soviet republics of Eastern Europe as its “backyard” and has sought to influence their internal politics to keep these nations close to Russia in order to secure its economic or security interests (to keep the East Europe as a neutral buffer zone between Russia and NATO). Russia’s neighbours to the west, which Russia has oppressed for the last 200 years, have in turn looked westwards to seek refuge in the EU and NATO against the ‘big bad bear’. This equation has fuelled confrontation and the escalation of relations between East and West, among many other factors. Of course, Putin’s nostalgic view of Russia’s lost days of greatness and the denial of the whole Ukrainian national identity have also contributed to Russian aggression.

While the post-Cold War expansion of NATO to Eastern European countries and the West’s support for the Maidan revolution and its openness to Ukraine’s NATO membership has been provocative for Russia against Ukraine, in my view, the problem has been rather that Ukraine was not accepted as a NATO member in time, as the country started actively applying for NATO membership already in 2017, when 69% of the citizens also supported membership in the defence alliance .

Putin would not have launched a war against a NATO country because it would have meant a Third World War and possible nuclear war. Putin often threatens the West with nuclear weapons, but he is not self-destructive. He would not have launched a war of aggression against a NATO country if it risked a mutually destructive global nuclear war. An attack on Ukraine was a much smaller risk because the nuclear-armed US is under no obligation to send its army onto non-NATO Ukrainian soil, even if it were to assist it militarily. It is possible, though, that Ukraine’s NATO membership would have provoked Russia to attack Finland, which was not a NATO member until 2023.

Although Putin mentions in his Tucker interview a number of historical factors that he believes contributed to the war in Ukraine, he fails to mention President Biden’s spineless foreign policy role. That is, the Biden administration’s disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan on the 20th anniversary of the September 11 terrorist attacks, which encouraged other enemies of the United States to pursue their own geopolitical interests more boldly. Putin would not have dared to take such action under President Trump, who had threatened to bomb Moscow if Putin invaded Ukraine and often backed up his half-insane threats with bold actions such as the killing of Iran’s Qassam Soleiman. President Trump said of nuclear weapons:

I don’t want to exclude anything. I’m the last person who would use nuclear weapons. The use of nuclear weapons is an abomination. The power of weapons is the single biggest problem facing our world today. I am the last person to use them. I’m not going to be a happy launcher, as some people might be. I will be the last person, but I will never rule it out.

In other words, why should a rapist be afraid of a gun in a woman’s hand if he knows she will never dare pull the trigger. The best use of nuclear weapons is their deterrent power, which makes criminals back off from their evil intentions. Israel, for example, should have used this deterrent more to restrain Palestinian terrorists.

The impact of Russia’s energy monopoly on the war in Ukraine

In my new YouTube video President Trump’s peace through strength versus President Biden’s war through weakness, Senator Ted Cruz talks about the role of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline across the Gulf of Finland from Russia to Germany in the Ukraine war. President Trump had imposed sanctions on the construction of this pipeline because it was seen as a threat to Ukraine’s security. Biden lifted the sanctions to restore good US relations with Angela Merkel’s Germany and the EU. At the same time, the Polish and Ukrainian governments warned the Biden administration that lifting the sanctions would endanger Ukraine’s security and soon Russian troops were on the Ukrainian border. Why did Nord Stream 2 make Ukraine more vulnerable to Russian aggression? Because Russia had until then been dependent on the Druhzba pipeline through Ukraine to Europe for its gas supplies. Thus, the control of Druhzba gas supplies to Europe by a Ukrainian government hostile to Russia posed a security risk to Russia’s energy supremacy.

For Ukraine, the Nord Stream 2 pipeline was a security threat because, once completed, Russia would no longer be dependent on gas supplies from Druhzba, making Ukraine more vulnerable to Russian aggression because the Kiev government could no longer use its control of Druhzba as leverage. For the same reason, the Ukrainian government would also have had the strongest motive to blow up Nord Stream 2. The Washington Post confirmed in November 2023 that Ukrainian Colonel Roman Chervinsky coordinated the sabotage of the pipeline and that the US government was aware of this plan by the Ukrainian regime. However, Russia was initially accused of environmental terrorism, even if Putin had the least motive to sabotage his own pipeline. Paola De Fraia wrote in April 2022:

Gazprom’s predominance on the gas market and its interests have been, since the beginning, a priority for Putin’s policy and diplomacy – that is finding profitable routes to export its natural gas into Europe, despite the opposition it might encounter from the former Soviet republics in the Caucasus.

With Soviet-era infrastructure, Ukraine has been one of the most important entry points for Russian gas into the European market. The Druhzba pipeline (also known as “The Friendship Pipeline”) that runs through Ukraine with its 40 billion cubic meters of gas per year, has important hubs in Crimea, in the port city of Odessa, in Kharkiv and in Western Ukraine near Poland. It is one of the longest gas pipelines, extending from Ukraine to Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Austria and Germany. While the old Yamal pipeline brings Russian gas to Europe mainly through Belarus.

Since the fall of the Soviet Union, Ukraine has been at odds with Russia over the contract for gas transit and consumption rates: gas prices in post-Soviet Ukraine were still subsidised and below market value. According to Russia, Ukraine was already benefiting from years of major discounts in its domestic market and negotiations for new tariffs brought the two countries to war in the early 2000s, when the first major attempt by a government in Kyiv to openly oppose to Moscow’s wishes led to the so-called Orange Revolution.

Then it happened again in 2014, but the war turned into Russia’s unilateral annexation of Crimea and parts of the Donbass region. At the same time, from a mere geopolitical point of view, Moscow, at least initially, did not seem to consider the eastward enlargement of the European Union, that started in 2004, as such a threat to its interests as a NATO possible expansion in the same region. Russia has always seen a military presence of NATO, however big or small, at its eastern borders as an undue influence of the United States into its own backyard…

Nord Stream became operational in 2018 with a capacity of 55 billion cubic meters of gas per year, thus surpassing the export capacity of the Druhzba pipeline through Ukraine. Nord Stream 2, completed in September 2021, still needed regulatory approvals from the European Union and Germany. Once operational, with its adjoining 55 billion cubic meters per annum, Nord Stream 2 could have cancelled out any threat from Ukraine to block Russian gas transit over its territory.

The certification process suddenly came to a halt on February 22, 2022, just a few days before the invasion of Ukraine. Suddenly, Germany reversed its traditional favourable policy towards Russian gas and the Nord Stream projects. If Europe has had different views on this matter, the US and the UK have always pushed the argument that Nord Stream 2 would have further increased Europe’s dependence on Russian gas and denied Ukraine of transit revenues: thus “making it more vulnerable to a Russian invasion”, according to a Reuters agency report. This is where Putin might have escalated all his frustration towards Ukraine, and the NATO barrage that, in his view, Gazprom encounters on its way to the European market from the Baltic to the Bosporus.

The New Great Game, Prince Andrew, and King Charles III

Most wars in history have ultimately been about natural resources and the clash of commercial interests between nations. Wars do not arise because nations want to move their borders just for the fun of it. The war in Gaza is probably one of the few exceptions to this, as Hamas’ sole objective is the destruction of the Jewish state for religious reasons rooted in the end-time teachings of Islam. The 2011 Arab Spring and the Syrian civil war also have their roots in the clash between East and West in their competing oil and gas pipeline projects. Here is the response of the AI program ChatGPT on the subject:

There are many reasons behind the civil war in Syria, but one dimension that has attracted international attention has to do with energy resources, in particular gas pipeline projects. Here are a few key points:

1. Gas pipeline projects: before the start of the civil war, two major gas pipeline projects were planned in Syria, which would have crossed the country. The first was a pipeline agreed between Iran, Iraq and Syria that would have transported gas from Iran to the Mediterranean. The second, backed by Saudi Arabia, would have carried gas from the Gulf countries through Syria and Turkey to Europe. The two projects were competing and were motivated by both economic and geopolitical interests.
2. Geopolitical tensions: an Iranian-backed gas pipeline would have strengthened the position of Iran and its allies, such as the Syrian government and Hezbollah, in the region. A Saudi-backed project, on the other hand, would have promoted the Sunni-Muslim axis and increased their influence. Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s decision to support the Iranian-proposed pipeline sparked discontent in Saudi Arabia and other Sunni states.
3. Deepening conflict: this energy dimension is one factor that has deepened regional tensions and drawn several foreign powers with their own economic and strategic interests into the Syrian conflict. For example, Russia’s support for the Assad regime is not only limited to political and military interests, but also to Russia’s desire to maintain its control over the European energy market.
4. Control of energy resources: in addition, Syria has its own oil and gas resources, particularly in the east of the country, and their control has been a major factor during the civil war. Both ISIS and other rebel groups, the Syrian government and foreign-backed forces have been fighting for control of these resources.

This was a key reason why Vladimir Putin supported his ally Bashar Al-Assad and the West in turn supported the Syrian rebels, some of them radical Islamists allied with ISIS, who were funded by Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar with the tacit blessing of the West, until President Trump exposed the issue and stopped that support. What’s the Great Game? It is a struggle between the super powers for control of the Middle East and Central Asia for the resources of the region. Noble principles such as democracy and human rights are being used by these powers only as a tool for geopolitical interests. So Turkey may accuse Israel of crimes against humanity, but at the same time it pours money into ISIS fighters.

Putin says he is at war with the “neo-Nazis in Ukraine”, but at the same time he supports the Islamic Republic of Iran, whose anti-Semitic rhetoric is not very different from that of the neo-Nazis. The West is at war in the Middle East to bring democracy and human rights to Iraq or Syria, but is not nearly as concerned about the human rights of its allies in the Gulf countries. And the West also loudly condemns Iran’s state support for Islamic terrorism, but when it comes to Qatar or Turkey, their support for terrorism may be mentioned in passing, but it will soon be apologised for, as Vice-President Biden did under pressure from his Middle Eastern allies.

This inconsistency is simply because Western leaders are not interested in democracy and human rights, but in promoting their own economic and geopolitical interests under the pretext of these noble principles. At least it is not their first priority. In 2008, King Charles III’s younger brother Prince Andrew told the American ambassador to Kyrgyzstan: “The United Kingdom, Western Europe (and by extension you Americans) are back to play the Great Game now and this time we are going to win!”

According to the ambassador, the prince said this with great arrogance and rudeness, while raging about British anti-corruption investigators who had “idiotically” almost scuppered the Al-Yamama deal for British arms sales to Saudi Arabia. Both Prince Andrew and Charles III have had close links with some of the worst human rights abusers in the region. Although the collapse of the Ottoman Empire was ultimately due to the British Empire, the British ruling class of the 19th Century had no moral quandary in militarily supporting the sultans of Istanbul, who slaughtered hundreds of thousands of Christians in the Balkans while the ‘defenders of the faith’ Queen Victoria and Edward VII turned a blind eye.

Britain’s commercial interests in controlling India took precedence over the interests of Christians in the Balkans. Britain lost India in 1947, but the oil deposits in the Middle East and the Persian Gulf made the strategic and economic importance of the region all the more important for the post-World War II oil-dependent superpowers. This is why Britain became involved in the Suez crisis in 1956, when the Egyptian Arab nationalist Gamal Abdel Nasser tried to nationalise the Suez Canal, threatening British ships’ access to Gulf oil supplies through the canal. At the same time, Britain also began to support the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood, which opposed Nasser’s rule and from which Hamas, Al-Qaeda and other Islamist organisations later descended, as Mark Curtis explains in his 2010 book Secret Affairs: Britain’s Collusion With Radical Islam.

Elizabeth II never visited Israel during her entire 70-year reign. Perhaps because her father George VI’s secret service incited Arab countries to attack the country in the 1948 Israeli War of Independence “to liberate Palestine from the river to the sea”, as the King’s thousands of Muslim subjects are now demanding in London demonstrations and attacking Jews who defend Israel. Elizabeth II’s successor Charles III has certainly pretended to be a great friend of the Jews, and made an official state visit to Israel in 2020. But at the same time, he has cultivated close ties with Arab dictators in the region, including the Al-Than royal family, which rules Qatar and funds Hamas and the Arabic-language Al-Jazeera news channel, which incites hatred of Jews in the region . Phil Miller writes:

Research by Declassified UK has found that King Charles held 120 meetings with ruling families from eight Middle Eastern monarchies since popular protests rocked the region in 2011. The number of meetings has increased from 95 since our research was first published in 2021 and now average ten a year. More are expected to occur around the coronation, with invitations being sent to every head of state. Norman Baker, who served as a minister in David Cameron’s coalition government, told Declassified: “Charles’s obsession with meeting unelected monarchs from frequently dodgy regimes which show contempt for democracy and human rights is embarrassing and a stain on this country. But you can judge a man by the company he keeps.”

Qatar’s unelected deputy prime minister watched the cadets graduate, whose ranks included a member of Doha’s Al-Thani ruling family. Charles has previously received millions of pounds in cash from a Qatari royal. Another Arab autocracy to engage with Charles at Sandhurst was the Al Khalifa royal dynasty of Bahrain, a country where the largest opposition party is banned and critical newspapers shuttered.

Sayed Ahmed Al Wadaei, director of the Bahrain Institute for Rights and Democracy (BIRD) said it was “shocking” that “King Charles continues to maintain cosy relationships with autocratic Gulf monarchies, including King Hamad Al Khalifa.” BIRD’s director, who was tortured for taking part in the 2011 Arab Spring uprising, added: “This is despite the fact he has been one of the most repressive rulers in Bahrain’s history… including the murder of peaceful protestors, killing detainees under torture and executing his opponents.”

Charles’ brother Prince Andew is best known today for his friendship with the late paedophile and human trafficker Jeffrey Epstein, but Andrew has had many other questionable friendships over the years. The website declassifieduk.com, which investigates the corruption of Britain’s rulers, reports that he and British government ministers have close links to Turkish autocrat Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who supports Hamas and threatens Jerusalem with holy war along with the Ayatollah of Iran.

In the YouTube video Prince Andrew has ALWAYS Been Terrible, Andrew talks about his past friendship with Libya’s slain dictator Muammar Gaddafi and how he lobbied the British government on behalf of Gaddafi’s family in attempts to free Libyan intelligence officer Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi, arrested in the Lockerbie bombing. The Gaddafi-engineered Lockerbie terror attack killed 270 people when a plane exploded and crashed into the village of Lockerbie in Scotland in 1988. Until the September 11 attacks in 2001, it was the second most devastating terrorist attack on civilians in an aircraft.

Conclusion

So when it comes to the October 7 terrorist attack in which 1,200 civilians were brutally killed and 250 taken hostage in the Gaza tunnel networks, and the ensuing Gaza war, we have both obvious suspects for provoking the war and less obvious ones. The obvious suspects are Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei and Turkey’s autocratic President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who dreams of re-establishing the Ottoman Empire. Less obvious suspects are Russia’s equally autocratic President Putin and Charles III who wears the disguise of a ‘constitutional monarch’, or his brother Andrew. October 7 happened to be President Putin’s birthday. The war in Gaza has also conveniently diverted the world’s attention from Ukraine to the Middle East. “This was probably the best birthday present for Putin. A strike against Israel divides attention because the US naturally focuses on Israel,” an EU diplomat said, according to Politico . The same article states:

Does this mean that Russia was directly involved in the attacks? That seems unlikely. Russia is not nearly as important as Iran in terms of arms and funding for Hamas. Norman Roule, a former senior US intelligence official, claimed that Moscow’s political support for Hamas encouraged the group’s violence, but said any other role Russia might have played was likely to be modest. “This strategy allows the Russians to claim support for the peace process, but the ensuing violence will disrupt the region, distract policymakers from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and draw U.S. naval assets from the Black Sea to the eastern Mediterranean,” he told POLITICO.

In this light, one can understand why Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyi has suggested that Putin had a hand in the events of October 7. CNN reported on October 12, 2023:

In an evening speech posted on social media on Monday, Zelensky also hinted that Moscow sees an advantage in the Israel-Gaza war. “Russia has an interest in starting a war in the Middle East so that a new source of pain and suffering could undermine world unity, increase discord and conflict and thus help Russia to destroy freedom in Europe,” he said.

According to Anna Borschevskaya, an expert on Russia-Middle East relations at the Washington Institute , “there is no evidence that Moscow knew about the October 7 attack, but it has given support to Hamas and is exploiting attacks against US interests.” Borshevskaya also describes decades of Soviet and Russian Federation support for Israel’s enemies, including Iran, Hezbollah and Hamas. At the same time, the Gaza war has also benefited China and Turkey by making the Road and Belt project, which they support, a more viable option for investors than the Israeli-Indian-Western-backed India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor, which Benjamin Netanyahu touted in his September UN speech a couple of weeks before the October 7 attacks. With their own ‘Silk Road’ to the East, China, Turkey and their partners can ensure their own geopolitical domination of the world, rather than that of Israel, India or Europe.

See the image at the top of the article for a picture of the two competing “silk roads”. You will see that the Chinese Silk Road leads all the way to London, while the Indian Silk Road leads to EU countries. This would argue why the UK would also benefit from sabotaging the Indian Silk Road along with Turkey and China. So the Gaza war would also benefit UK economic interests. While linking King Charles III and his government to the October 7 terrorist attacks may be too far-fetched a conclusion, we know of the King’s long-standing relationship with the rulers of Qatar, who are the main financiers of Hamas, along with Iran and Turkey. Britain’s ruling elite have played a dirty game before to preserve their own economic interests and the current King is known for his sympathy with Islam and the Arab rulers of the Gulf, who once wrote to his friend and spiritual guru Laurens Van Der Post that he understood their anti-Semitic views on Israel.

A prophetic perspective

Without going into the interpretation of Bible prophecies in depth, I have derived the following understanding of end-time events in the Middle East from the vision in Daniel 11: In the War of Armageddon, the “kings of the east”, i.e. China and its allies, will gather at the Megiddo in northern Israel as described in the Book of Revelation, Chapter 16. This plateau has been the site of decisive battles since the dawn of history, and the Middle East front of the First World War also culminated in the Battle of Megiddo. However, this Chinese invasion is going to be preceded by the wars of the Antichrist in the Middle East, which arose out of the British monarchy, as I have explained in my book in the light of Daniel’s prophecy. Daniel 11:24, 41-44 prophesy about those wars:

In a time of tranquility he will enter the richest parts of the realm, and he will accomplish what his fathers did not, nor his ancestors; he will distribute plunder, spoils, and possessions among them, and he will devise his schemes against strongholds, but only for a time… He will also enter the Beautiful Land [i.e. the land of Israel/Palestine], and many countries will fall; but these will be rescued out of his hand: Edom, Moab, and the foremost of the sons of Ammon [i.e. the land of modern Jordan]. Then he will reach out with his hand against other countries, and the land of Egypt will not escape. But he will gain control over the hidden treasures of gold and silver, and over all the precious things of Egypt; and Libyans and Ethiopians [means rather modern Libya and Sudan] will follow at his heels. But rumors from the East and from the North will terrify him, and he will go out with great wrath to eliminate and annihilate many.

In verse 30, the “ships of Kittim” are said to turn against him on one of their campaigns to the Holy Land. The “ships of Kittim” referred to Roman ships and so in today’s context would refer to the Italian navy. Why would Italian warships turn against the Antichrist’s forces if Italy is to be part of his European alliance of revived Roman Empire? Britain’s alliance with the Chinese-Turkish sponsored Road and Belt project and Italy’s alliance with the Israeli-Indian sponsored trade route could explain this.

According to Daniel’s prophecy, King Charles III would thus continue the colonial policy of his fathers in the Middle East and conquer Egypt and the land of Israel, just as the British Empire conquered Egypt in 1882 and Palestine in 1917 (which was also foretold in verses 6-20). This new British invasion of the Middle East would in turn provoke a backlash from China and Russia, and therefore these “rumors from the East and from the North will terrify him, and he will go out with great wrath to eliminate and annihilate many.”

A film starring Christian actor Kevin Sorbo about the post-rapture world and the rise of the Antichrist. The film is based on Tim LaHaye’s and Jerry B. Jenkins’s popular Left Behind book series, which were adapted into an older film versions in early 2000s. The book series and the film present a pre-millennialist futurist/dispensationalist and pre-tribulationist view of end-times events. Readers familiar with my eschatology already know that I have a slightly more complex view of eschatology where I have reconciled different schools of thought such as historicism and futurism. I also subscribe to pre-tribulationist view on rapture, although not quite in the form in which it became mainstream with C.I. Scofield’s reference Bible in the early 1900s. You can read more about my views on rapture here.

The film presents Scofield’s Reference Bible’s doctrine, that the Antichrist is revealed to Christians only after the rapture (i.e. to those Christians who are left behind or who come to faith after the rapture). This is based on an erroneous interpretation of the second chapter of 2 Thessalonians, which I do not agree with (the second chapter of my book is devoted to refuting it). But for the most part, my own interpretation of the chronology of end-time events is still closer to the chronology presented in the movies than, say, a mid- or post-tribulationist chronology. I also think the film makes assumptions that cannot be derived directly from biblical prophecy, such as the time of the beginning of the construction of the third temple.

The establishment of the temple is linked in the film to the seven-year covenant made by the Antichrist with Israel, but that treaty need not be linked to the temple, although the Bible predicts a third temple and a seven-year treaty. Indeed, I personally do not find it likely that the Antichrist would publicly support the establishment of a temple on the Temple Mount. This is because he has to present himself from the outset as a peacemaker promoting interfaith coexistence, and therefore support for a third temple would be too controversial and explosive an issue that would infuriate the world’s two billion Muslims. And if he supported the establishment of the temple, he would not stop its offerings in the middle of the seven-year period of Tribulation, as Daniel 9:27, 11:31 and Matthew 24:15 predict.

Even if I don’t agree with every detail of the film’s chronology, I am not among those who vilify the film and claim it promotes the “satanic delusion” about the end times and rapture. There are many Christians who are inclined to see satanic deception everywhere and their whole life’s work is based on looking for deception here and there. Jesus did indeed warn us about the deceptions when he said, “Take heed that no man deceive you.” (Matthew 24:4). But sometimes those “vigilants” may themselves be also the greatest deceivers of all.

My own view is that the Holy Spirit of God has also been involved in the production and direction of films like this. It may be just entertainment to many Christians, but who knows what effect such films will have on people living in a time of tribulation who do not know what to believe when millions of people have “vanished into thin air” (1 Thessalonians 4:17) and the secular media and secular governments will spread disinformation about it (e.g. the idea of a worldwide UFO abduction) while labeling believers in the “rapture theory” as dis-informers and fake news spreaders (as described in the film).

Already at the moment, social media shows how various alternative news sources (which also serve as platforms for disinfo alongside the mainstream media) are also promoting conspiracy theories about how governments are preparing for some kind of “fake rapture”. Under the name “Project Bluebeam” you can find all kinds of wild conspiracy theories about the second coming of Jesus. After the rapture, those who are left behind may have hard time to accept that those “crazy” evangelical right-wing Christians were right all along about the coming disappearance of millions of people. And therefore – rather than humble themselves and begin to examine with an open mind what the Bible prophecies predicted of our time – they will prefer to believe the lies, and put their trust in the Antichrist, who will give them a false sense of security. That is why Paul said of him:

The one whose coming is in accord with the activity of Satan, with all power and false signs and wonders, and with all the deception of wickedness for those who perish, because they did not accept the love of the truth so as to be saved. For this reason God will send upon them a deluding influence so that they will believe what is false, in order that they all may be judged who did not believe the truth, but took pleasure in wickedness.

2 Thess. 2:9-12

But if even one truth-seeker remembers what Christians told them would happen in their sermons, books and movies, and humbles himself before God, he will save his soul from eternal damnation and avoid the mark of the beast. At the end of Left Behind, the narrator of the film says something that resonates with my own feelings about my own mission. I will just replace the name of the movie character in the film with my own name:

When Samuel’s word went out to the world, it felt like a great victory. But the Bible warned us that it would not be as easy as just telling the truth to everyone. But I have always thought, and now believe, that even if only one soul is saved, your efforts have not been wasted. Right now, the impact of Samuel’s message will have to be analysed later. He knew that many people would disagree with what he had to say.

Jesus told us that these last years would be worse than anything the world has ever seen. God gave us the chance to escape it if we wanted to. But for those who chose not to take it, for those who were left behind… well, we’ll just have to see what happens. I know there’s nothing we can do to stop what’s prophesied to happen. But that doesn’t mean we should just give up, not even close. Our mission is to save souls, and as long as that is the case, our goal is clear.

This is a expresses well why I write about the kind of subject I write about in the first place. Even though I know that only a few people will listen and agree with my views, my work is not in vain if at least one soul can be saved through it. My sense of the calling I believe God has entrusted to me has always been somewhat conflicted. While I feel it to be solely God’s mercy and goodness to me that a sinner like myself should serve Him in so responsible a task, I have often felt that I am a wrong person to warn the world of its coming deceiver.

If I’m not that person, I’m just making a mockery of myself and the Word of God. If I am that person, why didn’t God choose a well-known TV preacher, or YouTube personality, who could reach a much larger audience with his message. Why am I not like the film’s favorite journalist Cameron (“Buck”) Williams, who God uses to warn millions about the film’s fictional Antichrist character Nicolae Carpathia? But at the same time, I never thought God would elevate just one man into “star” above the rest. God uses and will use many different personalities from very different starting points and He has a unique ministry for each of us.

Perhaps in a time of tribulation, God will raise up that real-life Cameron Williams to warn those who are left behind of the Antichrist and his lies. Perhaps my own work can be an inspiration for the calling of this charismatic TV face. Perhaps my books will be dropped from the sky over cities (that’s why I haven’t published a hardcover edition), like the actors dropping leaflets at the end of a film. Or maybe I’m just as crazy as the writers of the film, when I believe that this fictional film will eventually come true, literally, and that Charles III is the real-life Nicolae Carpathia. Incidentally, the film’s fictional Antichrist is linked to The Great Reset, a project launched by the World Economic Forum in 2020, in which Prince Charles and Forum founder Klaus Schwab played a leading role. The film thus suggests, intentionally or not, that Charles III could be that real-life Nicolae Carpathia.

I have always been very open about the fact that I was a bullied truant, who received such poor grades in elementary school that I wasn’t even accepted into secondary education, meaning high school in Finland. After elementary school, I became ostracized from society, and the resulting shame and feeling of purposelessness that could have led me to prematurely end my own life. It is only by the grace of God that I am alive today. I received the worst possible grades from my elementary school teachers 20 years ago, but today I receive the best possible grades from a former university professor (at least when it comes to my eschatological writings).

Ramón Núñez is a former mathematics and physics professor living in Spain who understands much better than me complex topics such as quantum physics. He has also written an interesting book published last year titled Revelation The Second Coming Of The Messiah A Scientific Demonstration Based On Two Conjectures And Corroborated By Astronomical Events, which I cited a bit in my blog post published in March. Below, I include both Ramón’s five-star review of my book and my own review of Ramón’s book.

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Note: To Whom The Majesty of Kingship Has Not Been Conferred – The Antichrist Revealed? is the English version I wrote in 2022 of the Finnish book Joka ei ollut saapa kuninkaan arvoa – Antikristus paljastettu? from 2019. The English book covers the same topics as my Finnish book, but I rewrote each chapter, resulting in 150,000 words and 424 pages, whereas the Finnish version only has 90,000 words and 354 pages. I might consider publishing a new edition in both English and Finnish at some point, as AI programs now assist in writing and translation work.

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Samuel Tuominen has written a comprehensive book (420 pages) on the identity of the Antichrist. The book offers a wealth of information in various areas: from his personality to the history and prophecies that confirm his identity. The description of this end-times figure by those close to him, including his former wife, leaves no doubt that he meets many of the requirements that would allow a reasonable person to say that he is the Antichrist.

He fulfils nearly thirty prophecies. And he was even born in the same year as the foundation of Israel. So he is clearly a copycat of Christ, born six months after the establishment of the Hebrew state, just as Jesus was born six months after his cousin John. Writers like Newton or Luther talked about the fulfillment of Daniel’s prophecies until about the 1500s, but Samuel has “fulfilled” masterfully by revealing a great knowledge of historical facts, from the confirmation of Daniel’s prophecies to the present day. He shows great insight in explaining the apotheosis principle (multiple fulfillments of the same prophecy).

I really liked the numerical treatment of the prophecies, both the number of the beast and the correlation of the prophetic periods 1260, 1290 and 1335 “days” with historical facts (some of which are surprisingly accurate). The author is not only a person inspired by the Holy Spirit, but above all he has to be credited with being cautious and humble in his conclusions and acknowledging that he may be wrong.

When Samuel Tuominen wrote the book, Charles was a prince. But now he is king. And he suffers from a disease that is in many cases fatal. His kingdom and his family are in danger right now, having raised many doubts among his subjects. But he will surely recover from this ‘mortal wound’. The impression we have of him, who is not usually a very charismatic man, will change in an unexpected way.

Congratulations on all your hard work, Samuel. And much can be learned from the book by any open-minded and objective reader, believer or not.

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My 5-star review of Ramon’s book, which I was supposed to send to Amazon, but it didn’t work because I hadn’t purchased enough items from Amazon in the last 12 months.

An extremely fascinating and engaging book written by a former professor of mathematics and physics, presenting a defense of the 6000-year history of the Bible. The author, while believing that the universe itself is likely billions of years old, argues for the literal 6000 years history depicted in the Bible Chronology. This position has been defended over the centuries by first-century Christians like Barnabas, second-century church father Irenaeus, the Jewish Talmud, Protestant reformers of the 16th century, and others.

Early Greek church fathers, such as Irenaeus, relied on the Greek translation of the Old Testament, the Septuagint, which contains inaccuracies in the lifespans of the early patriarchs. Consequently, they deduced that the creation of Adam occurred around 5500 BCE. However, most Bible translations published after the 11th century are based on the manuscripts of the Hebrew Masoretic tradition, which date the creation of Adam to around 4000 B.C.

The specific timing, however, has been hotly debated over the centuries, as the chronology in the Bible is not always clear. In his book, Ramón Núñez presents strong historical and scientific evidence for why the creation of (Adam) occurred in the year 3961 B.C., offering a different perspective than the more famous calculations of the 16th-century bishop Ussher, who even specified the exact month, day, and time of creation. According to Ramón’s calculations, Ussher’s computations were off by 43 years, and the 6000 years of biblical history would reach completion in the year 2040.

It is intriguing that Martin Luther also arrived at the exact same date in his 1541 chronology. According to Barnabas, Irenaeus, the Jewish Talmud, and the Protestant Reformators, the advent of the (second coming of the) Jewish Messiah and the commencement of a millennial reign of peace and prosperity on Earth would occur 6000 years after Adam’s creation. Will the “Lion of Judah” Jesus Christ return to Earth in 2040? This is a compelling theory, supported by credible evidence, although we cannot know the exact date or time of his coming, as Jesus taught in Matthew 24:36.

Or perhaps as Jesus taught in Matthew 24:22, the days have been shortened. In any case, all signs of our time point to his imminent return. Ramón’s book does not present sensational speculations, but rather grounds his arguments in strong scientifically verifiable data, including the latest astronomical information aligned with ancient sources, through which we can ascertain the precise timing of the birth of the father of the three monotheistic religions, Abraham, and thus the exact year of Adam’s creation. As an eschatological writer myself, I did not agree with all of Ramón’s views, but I still warmly recommend his book to all who are interested in Christian eschatology and are willing to explore the topic with an open mind and understanding of its rational basis. Ramón Núñez follows in the footsteps of Isaac Newton and other scientific giants who also delved into biblical eschatology with the same fervor as they studied the scientific mysteries of our natural universe.

P.S. It was an honor to receive a five-star book review from the author for my own eschatological book, which addresses my theory on the possible and likely identity of the Antichrist in the Bible. Predicting the future is always a high-risk endeavor, and the Bible teaches us that “we know in part and prophesy in part; but when the perfect comes, the partial will be done away with.” (1 Corinthians 13:9). And, “For we all stumble in many ways. If anyone does not stumble in what he says, he is a perfect man, able to rein in the whole body as well.” (James 3:2). A biblically humble student of prophecy does not claim to know everything and be infallible in his studies. However, the Scriptures also teach that in the last days “knowledge will increase” (Daniel 12:4). It is thus better to speak and be wrong than to stay silent and be right. The prophecies are given to warn us, to warn the sleeping world that the prince of this world will deceive and fight against the Savior of humanity and lead his followers to eternal damnation.

Author Samuel Tuominen

Readers of my books and blog may be familiar with this topic, but I found more light on a question I’ve been pondering for the last 9 years regarding Charles’ Hebrew name. In Revelation 13, there is one key criterion mentioned that any serious candidate for the Antichrist should be able to meet: ‘Here is wisdom. He that hath understanding, let him count the number of the [name of the] beast: for it is the number of man. And his number is six hundred and sixty-six.” In the context of this verse, the beast refers to both the future antichristian world leader and his kingdom, for the beast had “ten horns and seven heads” (the meaning of which is explained in chapter 17) and “opened his mouth to blaspheme God, to mock his name and his tabernacle, those who dwell in heaven.” In chapter 19 we see how this same beast has gathered his army in the battlefield of Armageddon to wage war against Jesus Christ returning from heaven along with the false prophet (the 2nd beast) and they are both thrown alive into the lake of fire.

The first scholar to find Charles’ English and Hebrew name in 666, using the Hebrew-Greek gematria referred to in Revelation 13:18, was an American Messianic Jew named Monte Judah. In the 1980s, Monte Judah built a computer program that adapted the decimal system of the ancient Hebrew and Greek alphabets to the English alphabet and delimited the numerical values according to the 22 Hebrew alphabets, with the smallest value being 1 (א, alef, English A) and the largest value being 400 (ת, tav, English V). Even today, Hebrew can still use Hebrew letters to denote numbers and ancient Hebrew did not use Arabic numerals at all. Another Messianic Jew named Tim Cohen expanded on these Monte Judah studies in his 1998 book The AntiChrist and a Cup of Tea. Cohen’s book stressed, among other things, the connection between the symbolism of the heraldic beasts on Charles’ royal coat of arms (which he wore as Prince of Wales) and the beast symbolism of Revelation 13.

Content

1. Eschatological interpretation of heraldry
2. The name that counts the number of the beast
3. Has the Hebrew name been manipulated?
4. Transliteration of foreign names
5. A strange dream about the Hebrew name of Charles
6. A name that no longer counts the number of the beast
7. Probability calculus
8. Conclusion

Eschatological interpretation of heraldry

I must point out here that I am not a person who uncritically believes everything that is written on the internet. In my youth, I read articles both in favour of and against the theories in Cohen’s book. And when I finally read his book myself in 2008, I was not entirely convinced by all his interpretations of, for example, royal heraldry, or found them too subjective, although on the whole I found Cohen’s book very interesting, providing a broad basis for his Antichrist theory. But I learned early on not to believe everything I read on the internet. For example, many websites claimed that Queen Elizabeth II had quoted Revelation 13 when she consecrated Charles as Prince of Wales in 1969 at Caernarfon Castle in North Wales.

I was able to easily “fact-check” the falsity of this claim from the transcripts of the liturgy of that 1969 investiture ceremony. The claim was probably based on the fact that Caernarfon Castle was decorated on that day with the banners of the Welsh red dragon and Charles knelt in the ceremony in front of a throne which also had the Welsh dragon emblem engraved on the backrest. However, no passage from the Book of Revelation was quoted during the ceremony, although in Cohen’s book the symbolism of that medieval ceremony was associated with Revelation 13:2:

And the beast that I saw was like a leopard, and his feet like the feet of a bear, and his mouth like the mouth of a lion. And the dragon gave him his power, and his throne, and great authority.

Wales is described by the symbol of the red dragon, and in Revelation that red dragon is the symbol of Satan (Revelation 12:3, 9). The only difference is that the dragon of Revelation had ‘seven heads and ten horns, and seven crowns on his heads’. Interestingly, Charles’ royal coat of arms, which he wore as a mark of his rank as Prince of Wales, also bore seven crowns alongside the red dragon. According to Cohen’s book, Charles’ coat of arms would also have contained a beast that was “like a leopard, and his feet like a bear, and his mouth like the mouth of a lion.” The only problem was that Cohen did not provide proper source data for this claim and based it partly on his subjective interpretation of what he thought the stylised lion-beast on the coat of arms, symbolising England, looked like.

Cohen’s book contained many other rather ambiguous claims, associating the symbolism of the coat of arms with the Antichrist prophecies of the Bible. For example, he associated the unicorn horn, symbolizing Scotland, with the vision of the fourth beast’s little horn in Daniel 7, and claimed that the unicorn had “eyes like the eyes of man” (Daniel 7:8). In my own research, I could only confirm that among historical heraldic scholars and interpreters, the lion-beast of Charles’ coat of arms could also be called the leopard-lion or lion-leopard. In heraldry, lions and leopards do not differ much in appearance and therefore the posture of the beast is the main determinant of whether it is a lion, a leopard or a lion-leopard. But I was unable to find confirmation from neutral sources that the beast of Charles’ coat of arms could be described as a leopard-lion-bear beast as Tim Cohen claimed in his 1998 book.

The name that counts the number of the beast

In the same way, I have also sought to critically examine Monte Judah’s initial claims about the 666 numerical value of Charles’ name. Incidentally, whatever your believe on any matter, it is always very healthy to engage in self-criticism, as it is the only way you can not only better weigh the veracity of your own beliefs, but also respond to counter-arguments before your opponents have even had a chance to utter them. And it also lets you know how well your ideas stand up to criticism. Monte Judah claimed in its articles that Hebrew newspapers had written Charles’ Hebrew name as נסיך צרלס מוילס. This is pronounced “Nasich Charles Me Wales”. Its numerical value in Hebrew gematria, where each letter also stands for a number, can be calculated using the following table:

Arvo	Letter	The mark
1	Alef	א
2	Beit	ב
3	Gimel	ג
4	Dalet	ד
5	Hey	ה
6	Vav	ו
7	Zajin	ז
8	Chet	ח
9	Tet	ט
10	Jod	י
20	Kaf	כ, ך
30	Lamed	ל
40	Mem	מ, ם
50	Nun	נ, ן
60	Samekh	ס
70	Ajin	ע
80	Pe	פ, ף
90	Tsade	צ, ץ
100	Quf	ק
200	Resh	ר
300	Shin	ש
400	Tav	ת

Hebrew is read from right to left, so the first letter is nun (נ), which has a numerical value of 50. The next letter is samekh (ס), which is 60. Then follow yod, (י) and kaf (כ, ך), with numerical values of 10 and 20, respectively. This gives the Hebrew word for “prince”, “נסיך”, with a total numerical value of 50+60+10+20 =140. Following the same rule, the whole title “נסיך צרלס מוילס” (Prince Charles of Wales) adds up to 666:

The mark	Letter	Value
נ	Well	50
ס	Samekh	60
י	Iodine	10
ך	Kaf	20
צ	Tsade	90
ר	Resh	200
ל	Lamed	30
ס	Samekh	60
מ	Mem	40
ו	Vav	6
י	Iodine	10
ל	Lamed	30
ס	Samekh	60
		= 666

The same name also adds up to 666 in English, when the 26 letters of the English alphabet are matched to this same Greek Hebrew gematria, with the 23rd-26th letter counting as 0.

Value	English alphabet	Hebrew alphabet	Value of the name
1	A	א	P = 70
2	B	ב	R = 90
3	C	ג	I = 9
4	D	ד	N = 50
5	E	ה	C = 3
6	F	ו	E = 5
7	G	ז	C = 3
8	H	ח	H = 8
9	I	ט	A = 1
10	J	י	R = 90
20	K	כ, ך	L = 30
30	L	ל	E = 5
40	M	מ, ם	S = 100
50	N	נ, ן	O = 60
60	O	ס	F = 6
70	P	ע	W = 0
80	Q	פ, ף	A = 1
90	R	צ, ץ	L = 30
100	S	ק	E = 5
200	T	ר	S = 100
300	U	ש	= 666
400	V	ת
0	W
0	X
0	Y
0	Z

The Hebrew alphabet ends in 22 letters and in value 400, therefore the English letters W, X, Y and Z have a numerical value of zero.

Has the Hebrew name been manipulated?

However, as a layman who does not speak Hebrew, I have been a little suspicious for about 10 years about the correctness of the spelling of Charles’ Hebrew name. This spelling was found both in Tim Cohen’s book and in online articles by Monte Judah. This suspicion came over me because in the title of the Hebrew Wikipedia article on Charles (when he was still Prince of Wales), his official title was spelled slightly differently: צ’ארלס ,נסיך וייילס (Charles, Prince of Wales). You will notice the spelling of “prince” (נסיך) is the same as in the Monte Judah version, but the name “Charles” (צ’ארלס) has an extra alef(א) and the name Wales (ויילס) has an extra yod(י) and at the same time lacks the letter mem(מ). In this case, the number value of that name would drop to 637. If you put the name “נסיך צרלס מוילס” in the Hebrew Google search box, a message appears above the search box saying “Did you mean צ’ארלס ,נסיך ויילס?”

I have never doubted or accused Monte Judah of dishonesty, but rather suspected that he made a careless error in his investigations. That is why I sent him a personal letter in 2015 asking him whether, as a Hebrew, he knew something I did not know or whether he had made a mistake. I did not receive a reply to that letter, but Tim Cohen replied to me and said he would address the issue in the second edition of his book The AntiChrist and a Cup of Tea. He swore that the 666 version of the name was correct and the Wikipedia version was incorrect, but never gave any further substantiation of his claim.

So, with no knowledge of the language, I set out to do some research on my own and learnt Hebrew at the same time (just kidding). Here’s what I found out: Monte Judah’s version of that name is not grammatically incorrect and has not been deliberately manipulated to fit in with the number of the beast. But it is an obsolete spelling of that name that is no longer in widespread use. In Hebrew, vowel sounds are not usually marked and it is therefore perfectly normal not to mark the a-sound in the name “Charles”. Therefore, the name can be spelled either צ’רלס, צ’ארלס or צרלס. Nowadays, the two former are more commonly used where the letter tsade (צ), which corresponds to the English sound Ch, is followed by either a niqqud notation above the letter (‘צ) or by a niqqud notation plus the letter alef (צ’א) to better match Charles’ English pronunciation. However, the spelling צ’רלס is just as valid and just as commonly used and does not change the gematrical numerical value of the name.

The Wikipedia version of the title “Prince of Wales”, נסיך וייילס, would most literally translate as “Prince Wales” (without the English of preposition). This is apparently the grammatically correct way to express titles in Hebrew. But if we add the letter mem (מ), מוילס, to the beginning of the name Wales, it then means “Prince from Wales.” Again, this is a perfectly normal and common way in Hebrew of expressing titles such as Prince of Wales. And whether one or two yods are added to the name Wales, or one or two vavs, also varies between Hebrew speakers. In scouring Hebrew language websites, I found it spelled mainly four different ways: ויילס ,ווילס ,וויילס and וילס.

Transliteration of foreign names

It should be noted that both “Charles” and “Wales” are foreign names to the Hebrew speaker, whose pronunciation differs from that of the Hebrew speaker. Therefore, their conversion into another language, i.e. the process called transliteration, is always approximate and not necessarily letter-exact. In Finnish (mother tongue of the writer), we spell foreign names such as Wales according to their original spelling and pronounce them correctly, depending only on the speaker’s level of knowledge of English. If we pronounce the name “Wales” as it is spelt in Finnish, no foreigner would understand what on earth we are talking about. The conversion of nouns into another language in linguistics requires either transliteration or transcription.

This has also been done when Bible translators have converted Hebrew names of persons or places into English. “Yeshua” would be an example of a transliteration of the name of our Lord where the pronunciation of the Hebrew name of Jesus (ישוע) has been tried to be as close as possible to the English spelling and even then the pronunciation does not perfectly match the Hebrew pronunciation of the name. The English form of the name “Jesus” (in Finnish “Jeesus”) would be a better example of a transcription of the name, converting it to a more natural pronunciation of the indigenous language.

One example of this is the now obsolete practice of converting the difficult-to-pronounce names (for us Finnish speakers) of English monarchs, such as Charles, James and George, into the Finnish forms Kaarle, Jaakko and Yrjö. Their pronunciation is far from the English pronunciation of the names, but at least they flow much more easily in the tongues of Finns. The transliterated spelling of those English names would be something like Chaals, Tzeims and Tzoost (I’m open to suggestions if my fellow Finns have better ideas). In this light, you may be able to better understand why Hebrew speakers may spell the name of Wales in Hebrew in slightly different ways.

A strange dream about the Hebrew name of Charles

I happened to find a linguistics forum on the subject, and I was almost going to join in the discussion, but I found that its terms of rules forbid the dissemination and advertising of religious material. On the forum, DonDonDon starts the discussion by asking what the Hebrew letters נסיכצרלסמוילס mean. Another asks why he wants to know and where they come from, to which DonDonDon replies by saying they came to him in a dream. Other German-speaking forum members insist that they mean nothing, but a Hebrew-speaking member soon joins the conversation and replies:

I don’t speak German, sorry. But נסיכצרלסמוילס is actually three Hebrew words spelled out in one word: נסיך צרלס מוילס, or in correct Hebrew הנסיך צ׳רלס מוויילס = Prince Charles of Wales.

Then another asks, “Just out of curiosity (I don’t speak Hebrew), what is the difference between the previous version and ‘correct Hebrew’?”, to which the Hebrew speaker replies, “The previous one was missing the definite article (נסיך = prince, הנסיך = the prince). The letter צ was also not followed by a geresh (apostrophe), which would change its pronunciation from /ts/ to /tʃ/, and מוילס was written according to the old spelling rules (before the spelling reform of the 1960s).” When DonDonDon goes on to ask if the form he is writing is correct according to the older Hebrew grammar rules, another Hebrew-speaking member replies:

This is the spelling used before the reform. Like mußte and daß instead of muss and dass in German. The modern Israeli Hebrew spelling is simplified. The letters ו and י can be vowel or consonant (ו=o, u or v and י=i or y). According to the recommendations of the Hebrew Academy, o, u and i should always be spelled orthographically (in traditional spelling, these vowels were only written when they were etymologically consonants) and the consonants ו and י should be geminate (with a few exceptions). There are a few older people who still use the traditional spelling.

Finally, one of the forum members wonders: “So you saw [the letters] in a dream, and although you are not familiar with Hebrew scripture, you were able to reproduce this text without error. That amazes me.” DonDonDon replies:

I’ve had the image in my head all night. A friend of a friend just told me its value is 666 in Hebrew?????.

This conversation took place in March 2023, a couple of months before Charles’ coronation. Did this person receive a warning in his dream about who the UK would crown as king even though he didn’t know any Hebrew letters? It is of course possible that DonDonDon was already aware of the writings by Monte Judah, Tim Cohen or myself and the Hebrew form of Charles’ name found in them then “haunted” his dreams. But if he was an outsider with no prior knowledge of the subject, then perhaps God is also giving people warning foreknowledge through dreams, so that they will start looking for the right clues. If DonDonDon happens to be reading this post, I would love to hear more about his strange dreams.

A name that no longer counts the number of the beast

If Monte Judah’s version of Charles’ Hebrew name is grammatically correct but out of date, I don’t see it as problematic for the reason that Charles was born in 1948 and in 1958 Elizabeth II gave him his title of Prince of Wales. This was before the spelling reform of the Hebrew language in the 1960s. And this older spelling still appears in some Hebrew news and online publications. However, I would add two main criticisms that a reader might make against this idea: (1) “Prince Charles of Wales” is a title and not a proper name, (2) Charles has a different title today because the title “Prince of Wales” passed to his son William when Charles became King. The first objection is now easily refuted by the fact that the Greek word onoma, used in Revelation 13:17 for the name of the beast, refers equally to royal titles as well. And Royals are not usually known by their first and last names, but by their first name followed by a royal title. Few people would know who Charles Windsor is even though this is effectively Charles’ surname.

The second objection is better than the first, but it is still not enough to argue that Charles is not the beast 666 predicted in Revelation 13. This is because Charles was known for most of his life as the Prince of Wales (from 1958 to 2022). The call in Revelation 13:18 to count the number of the name of the beast is clearly intended for that time, when this person had not yet risen to the anti-Christian position where the beast “was given power to make war against the saints and to overcome them, and all tribes and nations and languages and people were given over to him” (v. 7),

After all, why would anyone need to search for riddles about the names of world leaders anymore in those days, when all God’s saints already know with 100% certainty who the beast is? The task of solving this riddle was clearly given to those saints who did not yet have full certainty of this person’s identity, but who, by following various biblical clues, could obtain more and more corroborating evidence about his biblical identity. Nor have these riddles been given out so that prophetically aware Christians can play detective Sherlock Holmes with them. The omens were given to us so that we could warn the unbelievers who are falling prey to satanic deception – so that we could save at least a few from damnation before they commit the unpardonable sin of worshipping the beast and taking his mark on their right hand or forehead.

What good is it if MacGyver figures out the code to neutralize the bomb at the same moment it explodes in his hands, killing thousands of others in the process? Isn’t that bomb supposed to be defused before it explodes? In the same way, what good would it do for Christians to discover the identity of the Antichrist only at the moment when he has already deceived the whole world at his feet? “Eureka! His name counts to 666!” one “Nostradamus” shouts, and at the same moment agents of the beast break into the home of this “genius” and put a bullet in his skull. It’s too late to start playing Sherlock Holmes at this stage, when the Beast 666 already has absolute power.

Probability calculus

Before I finish, I will briefly explain how I have calculated the mathematical probability of these two coincidences (the 666 of Charles’ name in two different languages). My new friend Ramón Núñez from Spain commented a little on the probability calculations in my English book and suggested that my calculations did not accurately reflect the complexity of the probability calculations. The man is a former professor of mathematics and physics, so his ability to understand complex mathematical equations is light-years beyond my own bird-brain. But I’ll leave rocket science to those wiser than me and explain a fairly simple calculation for readers.

Charles has 20 letters in the English name and 13 letters in the Hebrew name. How do we calculate the probability of 666 for the Hebrew or English name? If you roll the dice and guess the mesh number correctly, the probability of guessing correctly is one in six, because there are six possibilities and only one is correct. Similarly, if your task is to choose a particular letter from the 26 letters of the English alphabet, and pick it out of a mixed box of letters with your eyes closed, the probability of picking the correct letter is one in 26. But what if on the other side of the letter is also written a number corresponding to the numerical values of the Hebrew/English alphabet, and your task was to blindly pick the letters that make up a person’s name, with a total numerical value of 666.

We could think about the question this way: if it is a person’s name consisting of 13 or 20 letters, how many different possible numerical values could they form to know how unusual it is for that name to add up to 666. For example, my first and last name of 14 letters would add up to 1190 in this Hebrew-Greek-English gematria system. Since names can contain the same letter more than once, in probability calculations this task should be performed by the following mathematical equation:

P stands for permutations, n refers to the number of elements (such as letters) that can be selected and r refers to the number of elements selected. That is, if we have 26 letters of the English alphabet to choose from and we have to blindly select 20 letters (so that you can select the same letters more than once), then 26 is only raised to the power of 20, i.e. the number 26 is multiplied by itself 20 times:

26²⁰ = 19928148895209E+28.

Thus, the probability that you will write the name “Charles, Prince of Wales” on a piece of paper and then blindly pull these letters out of the letter box in that order (and return the previous letter to the box again before pulling out the new letter) is one in 19928148895209E+28 (a one followed by 28 other digits). The number 19928148895209E+28 refers to the number of different possibilities you could get by blindly picking up 20 letters from the letter box. What if you pick the right 20 letters, but in the wrong order? For example, you lift the letters “A wolf Charles creeps in”, which is an anagram of the name “Charles, Prince of Wales” and thus also counts as 666. How many different ways can the letters in Charles’ name be rearranged? This is calculated using the following equation:

20! : (2! 1! 2! 2! 2! 3! 2! 1! 1! 1! 1! 1! 1! )

Factorial number 20! in mathematics, refers to the multiplication of positive integers from 20 downwards. So 20! = 20x19x18x17x16x15x14x13x12x11x10x9x8x7x6x5x4x3x2x1 = 2 432 902 008 176 640 000. The factor numbers in brackets are derived from the fact that the name “Charles, Prince of Wales” has 2 C’s, 1 H, 2 A’s, etc. Thus the number (2! 1! 2! 2! 2! 2! 3! 2! 2! 1! 1! 1! 1! 1! 1! 1! ) is calculated as (2×1 = 2) x (1) x (2 x 1 = 2) x (2 x 1 = 2) (2 x 1 = 2) x (3 x 2 x 1 = 6) x (2 x 1 = 2) x (1) x (1) x (1) x (1) x (1) x (1) x (1) = 192. Thus 2,432,902,008,176,640,000 divided by 192 equals 12,671,364,625,920,000. There are so many different ways to rearrange the letters in the name “Charles, Prince of Wales” (and they all add up to 666, since the order of the letters/numbers does not affect the result of the addition). So, if your task is to blindly select 20 English letters with a total value of 666, the probability of success could be calculated as follows:

1 992 814 889 520E+28 : 12 671 364 625 920 000 = 1 572 691 614 796

Thus, the answer to the question of how likely you are to blindly pick 20 letters whose numerical value adds up to 666 is one in 1 572 691 614 796 (about one and a half trillion or one and a half million million). Winning the lottery would be about a million times more likely. You can think of it this way: of the 20 letter combinations, only one combination would count as 666, and of the remaining ones a half trillion possibilities would count as something else entirely (i.e. when all other 666 combinations would be proportional to all the other number possibilities). It would be more likely to get the same number of dice 15 times in a row (the probability of this is calculated by multiplying the number 6 by itself 15 times).

Since the Hebrew alphabet had only 22 letters, of which 13 had to be chosen, the probability of getting 666 is slightly higher. The probability of choosing 13 letters in right order is one in 28281005788308E+17 (= 22¹³). Whereas the probability of picking up those same letters in any order (but whose total value would be 666) out of 22 Hebrew letters is about one in a billion (you can calculate this in the same way as the previous calculation using factor numbers). Thus, the probability of getting the same number from the same name in two different languages and alphabets is calculated by multiplying the number 1 572 691 614 796 by one billion. This would be equal to 1572691614796E+21, i.e. a probability of 1 in 1500 quintillion (10¹⁸). It would be more likely to roll the dice with the same number 27 times in a row (6²⁷). Or equivalently: it would be more likely to win the lottery jackpot three times in a row.

To understand the magnitude of these numbers, here is an example of observation: since the estimated birth of our Universe 13.8 billion years ago, just under half a trillion seconds have passed in the history of the world. So it would be more likely to make a computer pick a particular second in those 13.8 billion years and then guess it correctly by chance. Or it would be more likely to divide the distance between the most distant star in the universe and Earth into millimetres and guess the correct distance to the accuracy of millimetre, which the computer would randomly select from those billions of light years.

Conclusion

Revelation 13:8 is just one example of at least 23 individual prophecies in which the characteristics of Charles III match those of the Biblical Antichrist. Determining and calculating the probability of these other coincidences would be so a complicated process that I have not even attempted to calculate it. How do you calculate the probability of, say, the coincidences of Charles being born in the same year as the State of Israel from the same kingdom that ruled Palestine during the reign of his grandfather George VI (as predicted by Daniel in chapter 11 and verses 16-20), or Charles being able to trace his family tree back to both King David and the Prophet Muhammad to fulfill the conditions of the Messiah figure expected by both Muslims and Jews?

Some might argue that in order to be the beast prophesied in Revelation, Charles’ name would have to count as 666 in Greek as well, since Revelation was originally written in Greek for Greek-speaking Christians in Asia Minor. This is not the case, however, because Revelation (and the New Testament) was written in Greek for the sole reason that Greek was to first century Jews what English is to us today. It was the best-known world language of the gentile world at that time, in the same way that English is the most spoken world language in the world today, spoken by at least one and a half billion people as their first or second mother tongue.

For the same reason, it makes sense why the Antichrist should rise from England, the birthplace of the English language, and the country that conquered about a quarter of the world’s continents in the British Empire, the largest gentile empire in history, and the country that published the most widely read and widely distributed Bible translation in history, the King James Bible, which James’ descendant Charles reads to us in the video below.

The devil can cite Scripture for his purpose.
An evil soul producing holy witness
Is like a villain with a smiling cheek,
A goodly apple rotten at the heart.
O, what a goodly outside falsehood hath!

William Shakespeare