Purim, Prophecy, And The Powers Of The Air
Now in the twelfth month, which is the month of Adar, on the thirteenth day of the same, when the king’s command and edict were about to be carried out, on the very day when the enemies of the Jews hoped to gain the mastery over them, the reverse occurred: the Jews gained mastery over those who hated them. - Esther 9:1
Throughout the annals of history, the countless attempts by the principalities and powers to thwart the advancement of God's prophetic narrative have had a track record of backfiring against them, and in a big way. This is most clearly evidenced in the book of Esther, where Haman's attempt to frame Mordecai and annihilate the Jewish people inadvertently results in his own execution on the very gallows designed for Mordecai's demise. And instead of the Jewish people's annihilation, it was their oppressors who were turned over to the sword.
Thus, the holiday of Purim was born, commemorating Jewish survival and their triumph over their enemies. And for those who would like to highlight that Esther is the only book of the Bible that doesn't mention God, they'd do well to remember that God is everywhere in this story. The preservation of the Jewish people is central to God's plan of redemption, so much so that if the Jewish people were to cease to exist, God's plan would fail - which is why the powers of the air have continually sought to destroy them.
“But how would God's plan fail?” you might ask. The answer is simple, yet controversial: God's outstanding promises to the Jewish people remain unfulfilled. And while these promises have been secured by the cross, they won't ultimately be fulfilled until the Day of the Lord, when Jesus returns to save and redeem His people. Therefore, the powers of the air will continue their attempts to annihilate the Jewish people in hopes to thwart God's plan, thereby preventing their own demise. But just like in Esther, these attempts will always serve to advance the prophetic narrative. What Satan intends for evil, God always uses for good.
As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good…
- Genesis 50:20
The Holocaust And The Formation Of The Modern State Of Israel
In 1917, on the heels of the first World War, the British government issued a statement calling on the Jewish people to return to their ancestral homeland to establish a national home for the Jewish people. Waves of Jewish immigrants would answer the call over the next decade. But because the land of Palestine had fallen under British control after the war, it was the British government who had to deal with the frequent Arab/Jewish skirmishes that would follow. And it wouldn't be long before the British - as well as the rest of Europe - had grown tired of dealing with the issue, and support for a national Jewish homeland would begin to wane.
It was during this time that Arab leaders such as Amin al-Husseini, the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, began calling on the Muslim world to rise up and protect the Haram ash-Sharif (The Temple Mount), which he believed was under threat of Jewish takeover. Believing the Jews would rebuild their Temple, al-Husseini began a renovation campaign of grand proportions, collecting funds from numerous Arab countries in order to restore the entire Temple Mount complex, including the Dome of the Rock and Al Aqsa mosque, which had fallen into extreme disrepair over the last several centuries.
But why was the radical Muslim world only now interested in the Temple Mount? And why was there no concern for the neglected complex until waves of Jewish migrants had returned to the land? Could it be that the powers of the air, feeling threatened by the suspected advancement of prophetic events, had gotten spooked? And was it a coincidence that the rise of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi party - having eyes on the annihilation of the Jewish people - was occuring at this exact same time? Considering that Hitler would personally meet with the Grand Mufti in 1941 to discuss Nazi-Arab cooperation, it would appear not.
When compared to the Holocaust, the attempt at Jewish annihilation in Esther was a blip on the radar. To this day, the six million-plus Jewish lives lost in the Holocaust remains the largest travesty in the history of the Jewish people. But what Satan intended for evil, God would use for good. The outpouring of sympathy from the nations following the Holocaust would become the catalyst that would lead directly to the reestablishment of the state of Israel in 1948, just three years after the end of the second World War. One could almost say that, in the big picture, the central - yet somehow behind the scenes - issue of both World Wars was the advancement of God's prophetic narrative.
That’s why the nations raged.
Why do the nations rage and the peoples plot in vain? The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the Lord and against his Anointed…
- Psalm 2:1-2
The Six Day War And The Green Line
In 1967, realizing an attack by their surrounding Arab neighbors was imminent, Israel decided to launch a preemptive strike against Egypt, hurling them into a war against a coalition of Arab nations that would include Syria and Jordan. Now known as the Six Day War, this conflict would become a massive victory for the fledgling Jewish state. In just six short days, not only had the Israeli Defense Forces thwarted an Arab invasion, but they had also gained a significant amount of territory, including the Biblical heartland of Judea and Samaria (commonly referred to as the West Bank) and most importantly, East Jerusalem - with its hotly contested Temple Mount.
But in order to keep the peace, Israel decided to cede jurisdiction of the platform to the Jerusalem Islamic Waqf, an organization that oversees maintenance of Islamic holy sites. Israel would maintain responsibility for security on the site, but Jews would only be allowed to visit during certain hours of the day, and no forms of Jewish prayer or worship would be permitted. This is what would become known as the status quo. Further, the remaining land that Israel gained during the war, including the Golan Heights and West Bank, continues to remain disputed territory today.
Over the past several decades, a strong push has been made for a two state solution, which is to say a division of the land of Israel into a Jewish state and a Palestinian state. The Palestinians have remained firm with their demands. Any future Palestinian state, they say, must be along the pre-1967 borders - the so called Green Line - with East Jerusalem as its capital. In other words, the Palestinians refuse to live with the territorial gains Israel made during the Six Day War. And the demand of East Jerusalem specifically? Simple. That's the location of the contested Temple Mount platform. The powers of the air want to control what goes on - and what doesn't go on - on that piece of real estate.
So it would appear that as Israel advances closer and closer to full control of Jerusalem and the Temple Mount, those same principalities and powers continue to dig their heels in in order to keep territory with prophetic significance out of Jewish control. Nonetheless, the fact remains that if their neighbors had not sought to wipe them out in 1967, Israel never would have made those territorial gains in the first place. Once again, Israel's enemies had inadvertently hanged themselves on their own gallows.
They say, “Come, let us wipe them out as a nation; let the name of Israel be remembered no more!”
- Psalm 83:4
October 7th And The Red Heifers
October 7, 2023 saw the largest loss of Jewish life in a single day since the Holocaust. But why did it happen? Prior to the brutal attack on Israel, the Jewish state had been inching closer to finalizing a normalization deal with Saudi Arabia, who are widely recognized as the representatives of the Islamic world and spokesperson for the Palestinian people. After all, it was Saudi Arabia who had put forth the Arab Peace Initiative in 2002, a two state proposal which sought the creation of a Palestinian state along the pre-1967 (Green Line) borders.
And over the past twenty years, Saudi Arabia has maintained their position that normalization with Israel is contingent upon the recognition of a Palestinian state along those borders. But things have slowly begun to change since 2017, when Mohammed Bin Salman (MBS) assumed office as Crown Prince. A visionary and a millennial, MBS is not your typical Saudi ruler. His aspirations to turn the Kingdom into an economic and tourist powerhouse, moving away from relying solely on oil exports, have caused him to modernize the nation while simultaneously move away from the traditional ways of his predecessors - something not lost on the greater Islamic world.
So as the Saudis began to pivot closer and closer to Israel over the last decade, they've put themselves in the cross hairs of the radical Islamic world, including Iran and their stable of proxies, such as the Houthis, Hezbollah, and Hamas. And over the last several years, Saudi Arabia has further enraged jihadists everywhere, as several of the Kingdom’s imams have been teaching that Jerusalem, including Haram ash-Sharif (The Temple Mount), is not actually important to Islam, and that all of the Islamic holy sites are located within Saudi Arabia. In other words, the radical Islamic world could no longer rely on the Saudis to protect the Temple Mount from Jewish access.
And while the Saudis have continued to demand the creation of a Palestinian state along the pre- 1967 borders in their negotiations with Israel, rumors are swirling they’ve softened their stance, asking Israel to simply make a political commitment towards the creation of a Palestinian state. This, combined with the Saudi’s stance on the Temple Mount, was simply too much for the powers of darkness to tolerate. In fact, just this past January, a spokesperson for Hamas explicitly stated the reason behind their October 7th assault was because of the red heifers that had recently been brought to Israel.
What?! Cows? What in the world do cows have to do with anything? For those who are unaware, the ashes of an unblemished red heifer are required by Levitical law in order to purify the priests responsible for offering the tamid, the twice daily sacrifice performed in the Jewish Temple, one that orthodox Jews hope to see rebuilt in their lifetime. Further, the reinstatement of the tamid is the sign event that signals the beginning of the final seven years of this present age - and the final countdown before the principalities and powers are chained in darkness for a thousand years before being thrown into the lake of fire forever. And the threat of Jewish access to the Temple Mount due to a softened stance by the Saudis, combined with the arrival of these five unblemished red heifers in Israel (for the first time in almost two thousand years no less) was the final straw for the powers and principalities.
In other words, the October 7th assault on Israel by Hamas was a blatant attempt by the powers of darkness to prevent the inevitable fulfillment of Biblical prophecy. But again, I must remind you: What Satan intends for evil, God always uses for good. And while Hamas had hoped to throw a wrench into Israeli-Saudi normalization, the reverse occurred; the Jews gained mastery over those who hated them. Not only has Israel's campaign in Gaza not derailed normalization between Israel and Saudi Arabia, it's actually expedited it, and in a much grander scope than originally intended. Now, rumors are swirling of a “Grand Bargain” in the Middle East involving numerous Arab nations who are willing to integrate Israel into the region and make concessions they’d previously been unwilling to give in return for a lasting ceasefire.
So what will the history books say regarding the events of this present decade? And what concessions will Israel get from this potential “Deal of the Century?” Only time will tell. But one thing we can be sure of: Those same history books tell us that each time the powers of the air attempt to thwart prophetic events from happening, they inevitably end up expediting them instead. And I don't think we should expect anything less from the events unfolding in our day. The only question is, are you prepared to face them? Who knows, maybe you’ve come into the kingdom for such a time as this.
Happy Purim, friends. Am Yisrael Chai!
Therefore they called these days Purim, after the term Pur. Therefore, because of all that was written in this letter, and of what they had faced in this matter, and of what had happened to them, the Jews firmly obligated themselves and their offspring and all who joined them, that without fail they would keep these two days according to what was written and at the time appointed every year, that these days should be remembered and kept throughout every generation, in every clan, province, and city, and that these days of Purim should never fall into disuse among the Jews, nor should the commemoration of these days cease among their descendants.
- Esther 9:26-28
Great read!