America and Great Britain in Prophecy
(The above pictures are a depiction of the vision seen in Daniel 7:4 "The first was like a lion, and had eagle's wings: I beheld till the wings thereof were plucked, and it was lifted up from the earth, and made stand upon the feet as a man, and a man's heart was given to it." National symbols picture Great Britain as a Lion and the United States as an Eagle.)
Biblical Prophecy of the Inheritance
1) More than a quarter of Bible Prophecy is directed for our day and beyond.
a) Nations such as Egypt and Ethiopia are mentioned but what about modern nations such as Britain and the United States?
b) The Master Key to understanding Biblical Prophecy is understanding to whom it is directed.
c) Most Bible scholars think that prophecy is directed at the Jewish people and the country in the middle east, they do play an important part, but it is not, it is directed to the House of Israel.
d) Then to understand Bible Prophecy we must understand who the House of Israel is. Jacob had 12 sons of which Judah is the father of the Jews, but where are the descendants of the other sons?
2) In Gen. 11:26-32 we are introduced to Abram who's name was later changed to Abraham. The rest of the Bible is an outgrowth of God's dealings with him and the promises He made to Abraham and to his descendants.
a) In Genesis 12:1-3 we have record of the first promises that God made to Abram.
i) God would make of him a great nation.
ii) Through him all nations would be blessed
iii) God would bless them that blessed him and curse those who cursed him.
b) In Genesis 17:4-6 God told him
i) God would make him exceedingly fruitful
ii) Nations would come out from him
iii) Kings or national rulers would come from him
iv) His name was changed to Abraham (father of many nations)
c) In Genesis 22:2 God told him to sacrifice Isaac
i) Because of his obedience God said, "blessings I will bless you..." Genesis 22:15-18
ii) Because of his obedience, future blessings were not contingent upon further action for he had passed the supreme test
iii) Also he would possess the gates of his enemies. So, not only would his descendants become many nations but he would control the ways his enemies would pass.
3) Abraham had two sons, Esau and Isaac.
a) God said that the elder would serve the younger (Genesis 25:23)
b) Isaac conferred the blessings upon his son Jacob (Genesis 27:28-29)
i) Agricultural wealth
ii) Rule over other nations
iii) They would spread to the four corners of the earth (Genesis 28:13-14)
iv) All the nations of the earth will be blessed (Genesis 28:13-14)
4) Isaac had 12 sons, six by Leah, two by Rachel, two by Bilhah, and two by Zilpah.
a) The eldest son Ruben should have received the birthright but didn't because he defiled his father's bed, so it went to Joseph (1Chr 5:1-2)
b) Because Judah was the strongest of his brothers, he was given the kingly line
c) The birthright promises of national greatness went not to the Jews but to Israel through Joseph
d) Isaac adopts Joseph's two sons Ephraim and Manasseh and informs Joseph that they would be counted with the children of Israel (Genesis 48:5)
5) Ephraim and Manasseh were to inherit the birthright blessings of national greatness by switching hands Genesis 48:19)
a) Manasseh would be a great nation
b) Ephraim would be a multitude of nations
c) Together they would have agricultural and mineral wealth, they would possess check points where other nations would have to pass, they would possess dominance over other nations.
d) For centuries they lived in the middle east without any of these things coming to pass for Ephraim and Manasseh. WHY?
e) Jacob-Israel called of his sons together and said these things were for the end time (Genesis 49:1)
6) When the twelve tribes returned to Israel they settled into two distinct groups. Judah and Dan and most of the Levites (Judah) settled in the south with Jerusalem as their capital while the other ten tribes (Israel) settled in the north with Samaria as their capital.
a) Judah chose Rehoboam, son of Solomon, as their king
b) Israel chose Jeroboam, son of Nephat, as their king
7) God warns what will happen if they disobey (Leviticus 26:1-2)
a) Rehoboam wanted to re-unite the two kingdoms but Israel laughed (1Kings 12:19)
b) Jeroboam was jealous and put shrines in Dan and Beth El (1ki 12:29-32)
c) For centuries the people of Israel refused the laws of God
d) In 721 bc The Assyrians came into Israel, took over their capital Samaria, and hauled them off captive to the area around the Black and Caspian Seas. Joh.
e) In 701 bc The Assyrians came back to take Judah captive, but Hezekiah the king pled to God and He sent an angel to repel the attack
f) In 604 bc Nebuchadnezzar invaded Judah and they were made a tributary state
i) Nebuchadnezzar replaced King Jehoiachim with Zedekiah.
ii) Unhappy with Zedekiah's rule, Nebuchadnezzar returned in 597 bc totally destroy Jerusalem and the temple there.
8) (Exodus 31:12-17 God told Moses that the Sabbaths are for a sign between His people and the heathen.
a) Under Jeroboam the people forgot the ways of God and started looking like the world. Israel had lost their identity!
b) We find Micah in Judah at the time of the Assyrian captivity. He states that the Israelites are following the statutes of Omri (Micah 6:16).
i) In (1Kings 16:25-28) Omri, the father of Ahab, only ruled for 12 years but was so evil that 150 years later Micah mentions him.
ii) The Assyrians called the Israelites by his name Bit Omri (Khumri)
iii) On Assyrian monuments they don't use the name Israel but Khumri In the Babylonian language they were known as Gimmirra (or Gimiri). The Greek geographer Herodotus called them Cimmerians.
To summarize, it is a well-proven fact that the people known in Assyrian as Khumri (which is phonetically the same as Gimiri or Cimmerian) were the House of Israel. The Behistun Rock further proves that these ‘Gimiri' were the same people as the ‘Saka' (which is phonetically the same as both ‘Isaac' and ‘Scythians'). Therefore, all five of these ancient tribal names, Saka, Scythian, Cimmerian, Gimiri, and Khumri are identified as Israelites, as they were known in other languages.
The Mesha Stele (popularized in the 19th century as the "Moabite Stone") is a black basalt stone, bearing an inscription by the 9th century BC Moabite King Mesha, discovered in 1868 at Dhiban (biblical "Dibon," capital of Moab). The inscription of 34 lines is written in the Moabite language. It is the most extensive inscription ever recovered that refers to ancient Israel. It was set up by Mesha, about 850 BC, as a record and memorial of his victories in his revolt against the Kingdom of Israel, undertaken after the death of his overlord, Ahab.
Children of Israel Lose Their Identity
9) In 539bc Babylon fell to the Persian army of Cyrus the Great.
a) Cyrus freed the children of Judah and Israel to return to their homeland but Israel never went back! They were now what scholars call "THE LOST TEN TRIBES".
10) Ezekiel's vision in Babylon (Ezekiel 1:28; 2:3)
a) He was to be a watchman, not to his own house Judah, but to the house of Israel! (Ezekiel 33:7)
b) This was not a warning to Israel for that day for they had already been in captivity for over a century, besides, Hezekiah had warned them over a hundred years before and they wouldn't listen (2Chr 30:1-12).
c) The events that would occur in Jerusalem and Judah were to be a "sign" to the House of Israel (Eze. 4:3)
d) In fact, we are told that the warnings are to be heard near the time of the day of the Lord (Eze. 7:19; 13:5; 30:1-3),
e) Since the warnings are for today's House of Israel, we need to find out who they are and where they are so they may be warned!
f) Ezekiel's message is a message of indictment for sin, a call to repentance, and a promise of future deliverance and restoration. While on the one hand it is a message of dire warning of God's impending judgment, it is on the other hand a message of glorious hope for the future
11) Seven times punishment for sin (Leviticus 26:1-2 and 26:18) What is the Bible definition of seven times?
a) In (Daniel 4) King Nebuchadnezzar had a dream and seven times would pass before he would be restored (Daniel 4:25; 32). We see that it was seven years before he was restored.
b) What about the seven times of (Leviticus 26:18)?
c) In (Revelations 11:2-3) it is 42 months or 1,260 days.
d) In (Revelations 12:6) we see another 1,260 days, but this time it is paralleled in (Revelations 12:14) by "time, times, and half a time".
e) Seven times would be twice Revelations 12:14 or 2,520 days.
i) How long would these 2,520 days represent in Bible Prophecy?
(1) In (Numbers 13-14) we see God punishing the people for one year for a day that they spied out the land (Numbers 14:34)
(2) In (Ezekiel 4:3-6) He is told to lie on his left side 390 days and turn to his right side for 40 more days. "Each day for a year"
f) Israelites become known as Cimmerians
i) Notice (Amos 9:8-9) Israel shall be sifted among all nations as grain in a sieve.
12) Israel's migrations
a) (2kings 17:6) says that the ten tribes settled near the river Gozan in the cities of the Medes. This would place them between the Black and Caspian seas.
b) (2 Esdras 13:40-43 states, "Those are the ten tribes, which were carried away prisoners out of their own land in the time of Osea the king (2Kings 18:1), whom Salmanasar the king of Assyria led away captive, and he carried them over the waters, and so came they into another land. 41 But they took this counsel among themselves, that they would leave the multitude of the heathen, and go forth into a further country, where never mankind dwelt, 42 That they might there keep their statutes, which they never kept in their own land. 43 And they entered into Euphrates by the narrow places of the river." This took them north of the Caucasus mountains on to the northern shore of the Black Sea. This is exactly where history places the Cimmerians, who later traveled up the Danube and Rhine River basins into northwestern Europe.
c) Lempriere's Classical Dictionary locates the Cimmerii "near the Palus Maeotis" (p. 149). Palus Maeotis was the large lake at the northern tip of the Black Sea, now called the Sea of Azov. From this area some of the Cimmerians migrated directly up the river system into northwestern Europe, while others invaded Asia Minor, and after being pushed out also went up into northern Europe.
d) Regarding the Cimmerii-Israelites' entrance into northwestern Europe, M. Guizot in The History of France from Earliest Times to 1848 states: "From the seventh to the fourth century B.C., a new population spread over Gaul, not at once, but by a series of invasions, of which the two principal took place at the two extremes of that epoch. They called themselves Kymrians or Kimrians... the name of a people whom the Greeks placed on the western bank of the Black Sea and in the Cimmerian peninsula, called to this day Crimea" (p. 16). Called Gauls or Celts by the Romans, these people spread through what is modern France and into the British Isles.
e) So here we have people from the "land of the house of Omri" (Israel) called Ombri, Ghomri, Khumri, Humri, Gimiri, Gimarrai, Kimmerioi, Cimmerians and Cimbri. As we've learned, the British people who today inhabit Wales still call themselves the Cymry or Kymry! Appian, we know, linked the Cimmerian people with the Celts.
f) The heaviest periods of this migration into northwestern Europe were shortly after the original Assyrian invasions, and again almost 400 years later. In 331Bc, Alexander the Great defeated the Medes and the Persians. Those Israelites who were still in the ancient area of the Medes were now free to leave. Interestingly, this marks 390 years from the fall of Samaria to the overthrow of the Medes (721Bc-331Bc)-the exact period that Ezekiel had prophesied for the House of Israel in Ezekiel 4:5.
Children of Israel Today
13) Israelites today
a) America's Ethnicity: Of what ethnicity are most Americans? A July 7, 1986, article in U.S. News & World Report revealed that, based on 1980 census figures, nearly 80 percent of Americans polled claimed descent from Northwest Europe: "The government found out that there were 134 different ethnic groups living in the United States. The largest number--nearly 50 million, or 22 percent of the population [at the time]--claimedEnglish lineage. Americans of German ancestry are almost as numerous. Just behind them are people with Irish ancestors."
b) Scots are Sythians: Another ancient name by which the exiled Israelites were known is "Scythian" mentioned in Col 3:11. A vast area of what is today the Eurasian plain of Russia was anciently called Scythia. Various peoples inhabited this huge area, including many tribes of exiled Israelites. According to the Greek historian Herodotus, "the Persians called them Sacae, since that is the name they give to all Scythians" (The Persian Wars, VII, 64). The word Sacae or Sakae is ultimately derived from Isaac, ancestor of the Israelites. This is the true origin of the names Scotland, Saxon and Scandinavia.
i) The Scots preserve the story of their Scythian origins in the most famous document in Scottish history, the Declaration of Arbroath. This declaration was written in 1320 and signed by Robert the Bruce and his nobles. In it is the statement that the Scots "journeyed from Greater Scythia by way of the Tyrrhenian Sea (Mediterranean)... they came twelve hundred years after the people of Israel crossed the Red Sea [ca. 250BC], to their home in the west where they still live today." The original of this ancient letter, called by many "Scotland's most precious possession," is on display in a glass case in the Register House in Edinburgh. To the parchment is attached the seals of the 25 subscribing Scottish nobles.
c) Thus we see that the ten tribes of Northern Israel were uprooted from their homeland in the eighth century before Christ, and transported to a different area by their captors. Losing their identity, they became known to history by a variety of names. Cymri, Celts and Scyths are but a few. Today, guided by ancient records, we can trace the migrations of these peoples from the Black Sea to the British Isles and northwestern Europe. How does all of this fit in with the prophecies of your Bible?
Birthright Promises Fulfilled
14) The birthright promises of Jacob are fulfilled. Look at how God remarkably intervened to accomplish His purpose and to fulfill His word.
a) Seven prophetic times: -2,520 years-went by from the time of Samaria's fall and Israel's captivity in 721BC. This brings us to 1800AD and the time when, according to scripture, Abraham's descendants would begin coming into possession of the birthright promises. The remarkable story that unfolded in the history of the English-speaking people after 1800 is astounding.
b) The History of Europe: To fully understand what happened and to put it into perspective, let us briefly look at the history of Europe. By the close of the 11th century after Christ, most of the European migrations were completed and nations were mostly in the areas in which we find them today. The Israelites had arrived, in waves of migration extending over centuries, in the new lands that they were destined to inherit. After all, God had anciently told Jacob that his descendants would spread abroad to the north, the west, the east, and the south (Genesis 28:14).
c) The Dark Ages: Throughout the ten centuries from Rome's collapse until the 15th century, Europe was totally dominated by the Catholic Church and was in the throes of poverty, ignorance and warfare. Much of this period has traditionally been called the "Dark Ages" by historians. In the last half of the 15th century, three milestone events took place. The first was the fall of Constantinople to the Turks in 1453. This brought an influx of scholars and Greek manuscripts of the New Testament into Western Europe. Secondly, in 1456, Johannes Gutenberg perfected the use of moveable type and the printing industry was born. This made possible the widespread diffusion of knowledge. In 1492, Christopher Columbus sighted land, thus beginning the unbroken connection between Europe and the new world of the Americas.
d) Catholic Control Overthrown: At this same time, England finally emerged from the internal strife of the War of the Roses. At last a stable government emerged, under the Tudor dynasty of Henry VII. Over the next century a remarkable transformation began to occur in England. Literacy spread, Catholic control was overthrown, and the tiny island nation began to develop into a sea-power.
e) Spanish Armada Destroyed: The year 1588 was a benchmark in England's history. Spain had set out to conquer England and restore it to the fold of the Catholic Church. In pursuance of this goal, a vast Armada set sail from Spain. Shattered by storm winds off the coast of England, the Armada was defeated and little England was saved. This miraculous victory guaranteed that England would not come back under the domination of the Papacy, and it set the stage for future religious freedom in England. An awareness of God's role in English history fueled a newfound interest in the Bible, resulting in the translation and widespread dissemination of the Bible during the reign of Queen Elizabeth's successor, King James I.
f) England Becomes a Sea Power: Throughout the 16th and 17thcenturies, English sailors and explorers set out across the globe. This marked the beginnings of England as a sea power and set the stage for future commercial and economic greatness. Still, when 1800 came, England and her former American colonies, the fledgling United States, possessed only a small portion of the world's land and wealth. In Europe, Napoleon was attempting to put together a vast continental empire with France at its head. Instead of that effort being successful, however, something altogether different occurred.
g) British Empire Expands: Over the following decades, England emerged in possession of the vast British Empire. It was the largest that the world had ever seen. Over one quarter of the world's land and people were under the British flag by the end of the 19th century. The United States, in 1800 still clinging to the eastern seacoast, had completely spanned the North American continent within five decades. The most powerful company of nations, the British Empire, and the greatest single nation, the United States, emerged right on schedule. The year 1800 marked the time when the 2,520 years of withholding the birthright concluded.
The British Empire Emerges
15) God Blesses Britain (Ephraim): "How had the British done it? How, in the first place, did a peripheral island rise from primitive squalor to world domination? And how did they, between the [world] wars, still manage to keep their rickety empire together with little visible effort?" (The Europeans, p. 47). This was the question posed by author Luigi Barzini and it has been echoed by many. While other nations set out with a cohesive plan to conquer vast stretches of territory and to build an empire, the British, it has been said, stumbled into theirs in a fit of absentmindedness. How did such a remarkable transformation come about?
a) Canada Given: Canada, a vast trove of agricultural and mineral wealth, came almost unbidden into the British Empire. After England's victory over France in the Seven Years War (1756-63), many in Parliament argued against even accepting Canada from France, warning that "its scanty trade in beaver skins would not offset the burden of defense and administration..." (A History of England and the British Empire, by Hall &: Albion, p. 463). In fact, "Halifax [Nova Scotia] was the only community in America founded by direct action of the British government" (p. 456).
b) Australia and New Zealand: Australia and New Zealand were no less thrust upon Britain as part of the empire. Of Australia, it has been said that the 1851 discovery of gold "precipitated a colony into a nation" (p. 664). The population jumped from 250,000 to almost a million in a little over a decade. As for New Zealand: "The home government long resisted the efforts to bring New Zealand under the British flag... So New Zealand went its lawless way until the actual planting of regular English settlers necessitated more definite control" (p. 664).
c) She Covered the Earth: Over the course of the 19th century, Great Britain came into the possession of territory in every far-flung corner of the earth. Among these possessions were virtually all of the strategic sea gates. Possessing the "gates of their enemies" was one of the blessings that God had promised to Abraham on behalf of his descendants. These narrow passages, through which sea traffic had to pass, were of inestimable value, both in terms of commercial value of trade and for security purposes during the two world wars of the 20th century. British control of the Suez Canal and the Straits of Gibraltar as well as of the strategic Isle of Malta was crucial to Allied control of the Mediterranean during World War II.
d) Abraham's Promise Fulfilled: With Australia, New Zealand and Canada, Great Britain came into possession of some of the richest agricultural land on earth. The vast fields of grain and the innumerable herds of sheep and cattle represented a fulfillment of God's ancient promises to Abraham. In addition, there was the vast mineral wealth of Canada, Australia, and South Africa. Britain itself came to control much of the Middle Eastern oil reserves. Her possessions and pipelines there helped provide the Allies the oil that was needed to fight World War II. Overall, British influence was beneficial for the whole world, just as God anciently prophesied that it would be. It was the British Navy that wiped out the international slave trade in the early 19th century. The British and Foreign Bible Society, headquartered in London, was responsible for the Bible being translated into virtually every language and made available for the first time to peoples all over the earth.
e) The Thin Red Line: Throughout the empire itself, British rule was not enforced by huge occupying armies. In fact, during the 19th century, the British army was quite small. It was called "the thin red line." In vast India, inhabited by scores of millions even in the 19th century, it was the British civil service, never more than several hundred, that ruled. They administered justice, collected taxes, and enforced the laws. "They alone came into direct contact with the native population... they worked hard and efficiently... corruption was unknown among them, and they had triumphantly upheld justice, peace, and order for several decades" (p. 738).
f) Tiny little England emerged, practically overnight, to rule the greatest, most extensive empire that the world had ever seen. That empire developed into a great company of nations held together by allegiance to a common crown. Where else can anyone point to the fulfillment of the ancient promise that Jacob claimed for his grandson Ephraim? Clearly, God had kept His word to Abraham!
The United States and the Blessings of Manasseh
- What of the United States of America? Are the American people also truly descended from ancient Israel? Look at the plain record of history.
- The first permanent English settlement in what is now the United States was Jamestown, Virginia in 1607. A few years later the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock in Massachusetts. Throughout the 17th and 18th centuries settlers from the British Isles flowed into what became the United States. Professor David Fischer points out in his important book,Albian's Seed, there were four main waves of immigration to the United States during those two centuries. These waves of migration had their origin in specific parts of the British Isles and came to particular areas of the American colonies.
- Called New England: New England, for instance, was settled primarily by immigrants from an area of south-eastern Great Britain called East Anglia. Certain parishes of this area were almost emptied of population between 1629 and 1641. In the early 17th century, it was the most densely settled and highly urbanized part of England and had been for centuries.
- Most came from Northwest Europe: Overwhelmingly, the immigrants who the United States before the Civil War came from northwestern Europe. Most were from either the British Isles or certain parts of northern Germany. Even some whose ancestors immigrated later from other parts of Europe may well have Israelitish background.
- Louisiana Purchase: Beginning in 1803 with the Louisiana Purchase, the United States began a rapid territorial expansion that led to its spanning the continent within one generation. This land included the richest farmland on earth-the American Midwest.
- Agricultural and Mineral Wealth: Because of its combination of agricultural and mineral wealth, America was destined to lead the world in per capita wealth. Whether in grain and cattle, or in its coal, iron, and petroleum production (Atlantic Richfield discovered one of the largest oil pools in the world at Gull Island, Prudhoe Bay on the North Slope of Alaska. It has enough oil to keep us in oil for the next 200 years), America has had matchless bounty. The prophecy of aged Israel to his grandson Manasseh, that his descendants would become the greatest single nation, has certainly been fulfilled in the United States of America.
- The Panama Canal: Additionally, with the acquisition of the Panama Canal and various island dependencies gained in the latter 19th century, the United States has also possessed the gates of its enemies.
- Manasseh's Abundant Blessings: The United States in combination with Great Britain, controlled virtually every strategic passageway on earth through most of the 19th and 20th centuries. At their pinnacles, the American and British nations have possessed or controlled an overwhelming share of the world's wealth. There are simply no other nations that can even compare with the wealth and power that has been exercised by the English-speaking peoples.
The Dangers of Wealth and Plenty
- One of the great dangers of wealth and plenty is a self-centered, materialistic outlook. Instead of being the most thankful of peoples, we have become the most self-indulgent. Our national greatness was not achieved because of innate superiority. Rather, our possession of the fairest portions of the earth is the direct result of faithful Abraham's obedience and God's promises to him. Moses reminded our ancestors: "The Lord did not set His love on you nor choose you because you were more n number than any other people, for you were the least of all peoples; but because the Lord loves you, and because He would keep the oath which He swore to your fathers" (Deu 7:7-8).
- The first permanent English settlement in what is now the United States was Jamestown, Virginia in 1607. A few years later the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock in Massachusetts. Throughout the 17th and 18th centuries settlers from the British Isles flowed into what became the United States. Professor David Fischer points out in his important book,Albian's Seed, there were four main waves of immigration to the United States during those two centuries. These waves of migration had their origin in specific parts of the British Isles and came to particular areas of the American colonies.
- Called New England: New England, for instance, was settled primarily by immigrants from an area of south-eastern Great Britain called East Anglia. Certain parishes of this area were almost emptied of population between 1629 and 1641. In the early 17th century, it was the most densely settled and highly urbanized part of England and had been for centuries.
- Most came from Northwest Europe: Overwhelmingly, the immigrants who the United States before the Civil War came from northwestern Europe. Most were from either the British Isles or certain parts of northern Germany. Even some whose ancestors immigrated later from other parts of Europe may well have Israelitish background.
- Agricultural and Mineral Wealth: Because of its combination of agricultural and mineral wealth, America was destined to lead the world in per capita wealth. Whether in grain and cattle, or in its coal, iron, and petroleum production (Atlantic Richfield discovered one of the largest oil pools in the world at Gull Island, Prudhoe Bay on the North Slope of Alaska. It has enough oil to keep us in oil for the next 200 years), America has had matchless bounty. The prophecy of aged Israel to his grandson Manasseh, that his descendants would become the greatest single nation, has certainly been fulfilled in the United States of America.
- The Panama Canal: Additionally, with the acquisition of the Panama Canal and various island dependencies gained in the latter 19th century, the United States has also possessed the gates of its enemies.
- Manasseh's Abundant Blessings: The United States in combination with Great Britain, controlled virtually every strategic passageway on earth through most of the 19th and 20th centuries. At their pinnacles, the American and British nations have possessed or controlled an overwhelming share of the world's wealth. There are simply no other nations that can even compare with the wealth and power that has been exercised by the English-speaking peoples.