Daniel (Pt 13): Destroying the Prophecies of Christ

Its worth underlining the whole point of all this effort by critics.

Its actually a bit of shuffling and handwaving when they say:

"deciding on one [interpretation] doesn't actually matter too much...
Whichever scenario one deems best, the final message is the same: God's eternal kingdom will break down and outlast any and every human kingdom."

This is just some reassuring nonsense to put your defences off.

When they say "it doesn't matter", they really mean it doesn't matter
whether you choose "Emperor No-Pants" or "Emperor Dwarf-Boy".

The main thing is NOT to select the obvious traditional Christian and Jewish
interpretation, because:

...the Roman Empire is outside the historical scope of Daniel. ... equating the legs, feet, and toes with Rome and the ecclesiastical divisions that follow is an attempt to make Daniel fit with Revelation. This reads Revelation back into Daniel."

We'll get to whether Daniel and Revelation connect later.

The point is, Rome must not be identified in any part of Daniel (according to critics).

Why?

Look again at the chart:



Two Separate Prophecies in Daniel involve ROME:

(1) The Advent of the Messiah in the 490 years (70 'weeks') of Daniel 9:24.

(2) The Destruction of the Four Empires by the Kingdom made without Hands in Daniel 2:44.

Thus, eliminating Rome and stunting "the scope of Daniel"
completely removes the prophecy of Jesus the Christ's coming (30 A.D.),
and the equally remarkable Victory of Christ's Kingdom in
the Edict of Emperor Constantine (313 A.D.) legalizing Christianity,
and the founding of the Holy Byzantine Empire.

As long as you elminate the support of Daniel for these
two FUNDAMENTAL Events in the history of Christianity,
you can have any interpretation of Daniel you want.

Just remember that according to critics,

its a 'pious forgery' by a lying Jew from 167 B.C.,
a stupendous monument of wishful thinking and fraud for God.

This is what the commentators, critics, scholars, professors, philosophers,
atheists, and secular historians want to sell you, 

the Jewish and Christian public, on the topic of Daniel.

- Or you can accept the traditional Jewish and Christian understanding of the Book of Daniel as a historical and prophetic book by Daniel the Prophet, preserved in the courts of Babylon, cherished by Jews awaiting
the fulfillment of its prophecies, written around 538 B.C.,
and accepted as Holy Scripture by the two major religions of the world.

These two incredible and accurately timed prophecies
make the real authentic Daniel the Prophet,
the last and greatest Prophet of the Hebrew Bible.

Daniel (Pt 12): Dwarf - Boy

In our previous examination, we noted Four obvious 'kingdoms' (Empires),
Each distinguishable from the last, because each introduces a new nation
and a new 'king' (Emperor) with new cultural values.

The Kingdoms are easily demarcated because each is brought in by
a world-size (Empire-size) Conqueror who vanquishes the previous one.

Thus,
Nechabudnazzar ushers in the Babylonian Empire:
Cyrus ushers in the Mede/Persian Empire,
Alexander ushers in the Greek Empire, and
Pompey ushers in the Roman Empire and rule over Palestine (Israel).

Each respectively heralds the beginning of a cultural invasion into the area .

In place of this we have Porphyry's lame attempt to get rid of the Roman Empire 
by making the Greek become (in his mind) TWO Empires.
This is hardly credible however, since Alexander's reign is not
at all conquered, but simply divided into provinces,
while extending the very same influence and cultural invasion.
Furthermore, Daniel does not allow Alexander to be a whole "Kingdom",
and his successors a separate "Kingdom".   Daniel 8 is clear on the point that both Alexander and his successors are ONE Greek Empire with several kings (horns).

The modern critics, in adopting Porphyry's general plan to dump Rome,
attempt to extend the Medio-Persian Empire into TWO Empires,
i.e., the Median Empire and the Persian Empire.
The problem with this new solution is that its hardly any more plausible
than Porphyry's original schema, and only gives a surface-appearance
of a solution.  Daniel 2 (the main image) plainly describes SUCCESSIVE Empires,
and the Medes and Persians CO-ruled at the same time, pretty much as
ONE Empire as far as anyone can tell.

The modern adjustment, while restoring the statue's pants,
leaves him a midget.

Now "modern" Critical Commentaries on Daniel
invoke yet another level of sophistication and obfuscation into the process,
all in order to confuse Christian readers and erode their confidence in Daniel.

They don't openly push the 'critical viewpoint' anymore,
as it is too obvously anti-prophecy and ant-Christian in its impact.
Never mind the impact on commentary sales.

So they instead they present "three views", obscurantizing the flaws,
and also smokescreening the real differences.
Then they 'recommend' the critical view as the 'most reasonable',
without proper evaluation or comparison.

Here is a perfect example of this smoke-screening obfuscation:

Westark Church of Christ on Daniel
http://www.westarkchurchofchrist.org...7/070603pm.htm

First, the lecturer tells the reader that it doesn't matter which interpretation
of Daniel's vision we adopt (even though only ONE points to Christ).

Then the lecturer presents each as having a 'small problem' or flaw,
making them 'equally plausible'.

Next the lecturer 'helps' the reader by recommending the one
endorsed by "experts" (who are really heretical and skeptical infiltrators).

Finally, the lecturer presents three charts which are made to look
virtually identical, giving more support to the idea that it "doesn't matter",
its all the same.

The Perversions and Deformities of the alternate "interpretations" are completely hidden.

The Perverse doctrines that inspired the alternate "interpretations" are also omitted.

The Three Stooges

One final point must be made regarding the new fadish 'interpretations' of Daniel's Vision.

(1) No Jew has ever or ever will accept these modern interpretations of Daniel.

(2) No historical Christian has ever knowingly embraced these radical schemes of "interpretation" until after the late 18th century, and those who do believe them today have never been told who inspired them and what must be sacrificed to embrace them.


But there is more:

(3) The real (pseudo)Author of Daniel is a complete FAILURE according to critics, because, all Jews and Christians who believed him to be the real Daniel believed the wrong interpretation of his visions.
Thus Daniel succeeded by being unanimously misunderstood for 2,000 years.  The story of the real author becomes a tragedy-comedy of errors.



But the story is even more incredible that one can imagine:

(4) The pseudo-author of Daniel was such a deep, and incredibly sophisticated forger that he anticipated and survived  the harshest and most meticulous examination and analysis, and still left the world's experts in history and linguistics divided,  unable to reconcile their views about this fraud into a single coherent picture.



And the critics expect us to consider that on the one hand

(5) The author of Daniel was a criminal GENIUS of forgery,
yet wrote for the lame and short-sighted purpose of "inspiring Jews during the Maccabean Revolt" to not lose hope.
How can the author be so subtle and sophisticated a linguistic genius, and such a hillbilly provincial simultaneously?
How could such a forger, such a jaded secular humanist even half-heartedly encourage fellow believing Jews to sacrifice themselves and die for what he himself as a crook and a forger must have regarded as the stupidest ideology in history, just as his neo-platonic critics also must also think?



"If only He had used his power for niceness, instead of evil." - Maxwell Smart (Agent 86, C.O.N.T.R.O.L.)



This means that every Christian who ever lived from the time of Christ until the Reformation believed in Daniel and Christ on a mistaken premise, by adopting the spurious writing of a pseudo-prophet who impersonated an ancient hero, and Christ Himself must have been mistaken to quote him as an authority, if we accept the modern view of the book of Daniel.

This is the Trojan Horse these perverts are offering to unsuspecting Christians.

These are easily proven "doctrines of satan" infilterated into the Church by unbelieving moderns.

Daniel (Pt 11): The Joke of German Scholarship

As previously noted, Porphyry (c. 300 A.D.) was a non-Jew, a neo-Platonist philosopher,
who decided to write fifteen volumes against Christianity,
called lamely, "Against the Christians".

Up until this point, no one had seriously doubted the historicity of Daniel.

Christian apologists defended Daniel and shredded Porphyry's arguments and claims,
for the next two centuries, and by about 500 A.D. things were back to normal.

A comprehensive response to Porphyry was made by Jerome (c. 400 A.D.)
in his Commentary on Daniel, who quoted him several times.

There was no serious subsequent challenge over the book of Daniel until 1771:

 Beginning in 1771, influenced by the Enlightenment, academics began to revive the old Maccabean date theory about the Book of Daniel. They all agreed that every accurate prediction in Daniel was written after the events took place.
                  - David Guzik Commentary on the Bible

Thus for nearly 1,400 years, neither Christians, nor Jews, nor critics
had challenged the basic authenticity and dating of the Book of Daniel.

It should be noted that even during the most heated
and violent disputes between Christians and Jews (i.e., over the question of Jesus as Messiah),
Jewish opponents did not discredit the book of Daniel itself
in order to dispute with Christians, but rather rejected the interpretation
of Daniel on a couple of points.

If identifying the book of Daniel as a 'pseudonomous late forgery'
had been an option for Jews, they as experts on their own national literature
would have been in the best position to make this claim.

However, right up until at least 300 A.D., both Christians and Jews
openly accepted the book of Daniel as authentic and Canonical,
and the book of Daniel remains in the Jewish (Hebrew) Canon to this day.

The Hebrew Canon has not been changed or reopened to debate since 90 A.D.,
and this is true for pretty much all denominations and sects of Judaism.

The Canon is believed to have been permanently closed before the Greek period (c. 331 B.C.)

The Jews unilaterally had rejected all manor and types of books which were written
in the Maccabean period, including those accepted by early Jewish Christians
who used the ancient Greek translations of the O.T.

This alone makes the theory that a Jew forged the book of Daniel
as late as 167 B.C. and somehow got it accepted into the Hebrew Canon
one of the most implausible ideas in the history of (German) Biblical criticism. *

These observations did not however, stop 18th and 19th century critics from
re-opening the case and reviving Porphyry's claims about the book of Daniel.

They chose to continue building on this edifice of sand,
because the rejection of tradition, and the rise of skepticism and materialism was simply too attractive to abandon.

Porphyry's original arguments had obvious weaknesses,
so 'modern' critics from 'the Enlightenment' attempted to repair, modify,
and bolster the theory with many more supplemental arguments.

These viewpoints became popular in the 19th century,
and took over the universities of Europe and the USA.

As a result, many commentaries on the book of Daniel
began to be published which covertly or openly took the position
that the book of Daniel was a late forgery, and useless as an
example of Biblical prophecy for the Christian Messiah.

Naturally, conservative Christian scholars who held the traditional view
of the authenticity of Daniel got little useful help from Jewish scholarship
on either the integrity or the interpretation of Daniel.
The Jewish intellectual world was an entity which remained largely to itself.

__________________________________________

* the question arises, what are some even more implausible theories
spawned by 19th century critics?



A great example is the paranoid Conspiracy Theory that
'the Massoretic Jewish copyists had tampered extensively with the Hebrew Text.'

Up until 1960 the oldest copy of the Hebrew Bible was from the Middle Ages,
and it was easy to claim that a lot could have happened between
the time of Jesus and the 19th century.

However, in the late 1950s the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered:
10 or 11 caves full of scrolls dating from about 200 B.C. to 100 A.D.
Manuscripts and fragments were found of just about every book in the Bible,
and two whole copies of Isaiah showed that the text hadn't changed significantly
during copying for at least 1,500 years, from the time of Jesus
until the invention of the printing press.



All the exaggerated speculations about Hebrew Bible tampering
had to be quietly abandoned by sensible scholars.

Nobody in academia however apologized,
for having slandered Jewish copyists for centuries.