{"id":81,"date":"2019-12-10T22:06:54","date_gmt":"2019-12-10T22:06:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nazarenespace.com\/blog\/?p=81"},"modified":"2024-12-09T11:14:29","modified_gmt":"2024-12-09T17:14:29","slug":"judith-channukah-and-the-last-days","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/nazarenespace.com\/blog\/2019\/12\/10\/judith-channukah-and-the-last-days\/","title":{"rendered":"Judith, Channukah and the Last Days"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Judith, Channukah and the Last Days<\/strong>
By James Scott Trimm<\/strong>
An excerpt from Channukah and the Last Days
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The Apocryphal book of Judith is about a beautiful and devout Jewish widow who saves her city from an invading army. The Elders of her city decide to surrender unless help arrives within five days. Judith leaves and enters the camp of the opposing general. She beguiles him by her beauty but ultimately returns to her city with his head in a bag. This inspires her city to route the invading army. In the end the High Priest comes to her city an honors Judith for her valor. Many modern critics have accused the Book of Judith of anachronisms and historical inaccuracies. On the surface the book claims to be set \u201cIn the twelfth year of the reign of Nebuchadnezzar, who ruled over the Assyrians in the great city of Nineveh, in the days of Arphaxad who ruled over the Medes in Ecbatana\u201d. In fact Nebuchadnezzar was actually the King of Babylon, not the King of Assyria. In actuality these are all Euphemisms and the book is actually set in the Maccabean era. For example the book of Judith uses Nebuchadnezzar as a euphemism for Antiochus Epiphanies, because both names have a gematria (numerical value) of 423. <\/p>\n\n\n\n


There are other reasons to associate Antiochus Epiphanies with Nebuchadnezzar the King of Babylon.  The call to \u201ccome out of Babylon\u201d is phrased in Zechariah as coming out of \u201cThe Land of the North\u201d and Antiochus Epiphanies was the \u201cKing of the North\u201d in Daniel 11. Also as we discovered in the last chapter, Antiochus Epiphanies parallels the first \u201cBeast\u201d of Revelation 13. This \u201cBeast\u201d of Revelation 13 is described as follows:

1 And I stood on the sand of the sea. And I saw a beast coming<\/em>
up from the sea that had ten horns and seven heads: and upon<\/em>
his horns, ten diadems, and upon his head, the name of<\/em>
blasphemy.<\/em>
2 And the beast that I saw was like a leopard, and his feet like<\/em>
those of a bear, and his mouth [was] like that of lions. And the<\/em>
dragon gave to him his power, and his throne, and great<\/em>
authority.<\/em>
(Rev. 1:1-2)<\/em>

This is a composite of the four beasts Daniel sees in his vision in Daniel 7. Students of Biblical Prophecy will be well aware that Daniel\u2019s prophecy in Chapter 7 parallels the dream of the image made up of various substances in Daniel 2 and that the \u201cimage\u201d of Daniel 2 is a composite of the kingdoms laid out as \u201cBeast\u201d in Daniel 7. In other words, the \u201cimage\u201d of Daniel 2 parallels the \u201cBeast\u201d of Revelation 13. This is significant because in Daniel 2, Nebuchadnezzar is told that the \u201chead\u201d of this image represents him as the King of Babylon. This is because Nebuchadnezzar was symbolizing Antiochus Epiphanies who was to come. This is further substantiated by the parallel between the abomination of desolation and the arrogant proclamation attributed to the last days \u201cKing of Babylon\u201d in Isaiah 14 and the fact that the account of Antiochus Epiphanies death in 2nd Maccabees recalls language from this portion of Isaiah 14.

In reality the book takes place during the rule of Antiochus Epiphanies over the Selucid Empire of Syria and of Ptolemy VI over Egypt. The story appears in several Midrashim in Jewish literature in which it is set in the Maccabean era. 2Maccabees recounts the death of Antiochus Epiphanies (9:1-29) just before it recounts the purification of the Temple (10:1-9).  This appears to contradict 1Maccabees which places his death (6:1-17) after the cleaning of the Temple (4:36-61) in agreement with the account of Josephus.  Having examined it, I believe that the historical chronology is to be found in 1Maccabees and Josephus.

The account in 2Maccabees is not intended to relay the chronology (which was already well known) but to cover one subject at a time. 2Maccabees 9:1 begins with \u201cAbout that time came Antiochus out of the country of Persia.\u201d Which is the event that took place shortly before the cleaning of the Temple in chapter 10. But in the next verse the book backtracks to an event which had occurred while he was in Persia, and in recounting that event, he follows through to the death of Antiochus before returning to the \u201cpresent\u201d in 2Maccabees 10:1 with \u201cNow Maccabee and his company, YHWH guiding them, recovered the Temple and the city\u2026\u201d. 2Maccabees 9:2-29 is a parenthetical which is not intended to be placed in chronological order.

This helps us to place Judith in context. Judith takes place shortly after the purification of the Temple (Judith 4:3) and before the death of Antiochus Epiphanies (i.e. \u201cNebuchadeznar\u201d) during the gap between 1Macc. 4:36-61 and 1Macc. 6:1-17. It is commonly recognized in Judaism as a Channukah story. And like the books of the Maccabees, the Book of Judith has much to teach us about last days events. The Book of Judith features two primary villains Nebuchadnezzar who is called \u201cKing of Assyria\u201d and one of his generals named Holofernes. As discussed above, Nebuchadnezzar is used as a euphemism for Antiochus Epiphanies and Holoferenes represents one of his generals. Just as Antiochus Epiphanies is a type and shadow of the first \u201cBeast\u201d of Revelation 13, Holofernes is a type and shadow of the second \u201cBeast\u201d of Revelation 13.

Holofernes enacts an edict from \u201cNebuchadnezzar\u201d (Antiochus Epiphanies) to abolish all other forms of worship in favor of the worship of \u201cNebuchadnezzar\u201d (Antiochus Epiphanies):

\u2026he [Holofernes] did cast down their frontiers, and cut down<\/em>
their groves: for he had decreed to destroy all the gods of the<\/em>
land, that all nations should worship Nabuchodonosor only,<\/em>
and that all tongues and tribes should call upon him as god.<\/em>
(Judith 3:8)<\/em>

3: He will send his power, and will destroy them from the face<\/em>
of the earth, and their God shall not deliver them: but we his<\/em>
servants will destroy them as one man; for they are not able to<\/em>
sustain the power of our horses.<\/em>
4: For with them we will tread them under foot, and their<\/em>
mountains shall be drunken with their blood, and their fields<\/em>
shall be filled with their dead bodies, and their footsteps shall<\/em>
not be able to stand before us, for they shall utterly perish, saith<\/em>
king Nabuchodonosor, lord of all the earth: for he said, None<\/em>
of my words shall be in vain.<\/em>
(Judith 6:3-4)<\/em>

Holofernes prefigures the second beast of Revelation 13, which causes people to worship the first beast:

11 And I saw another beast coming up from the earth, and he<\/em>
had two horns, even like a lamb, and he was speaking as a<\/em>
dragon.<\/em>
12 And he will exercise all the authority of the first beast<\/em>
before him, and he will cause the earth and those who dwell in<\/em>
it to worship the first beast, whose deadly wound was healed.<\/em>
13 And he will do great signs in such a manner, that he will<\/em>
make fire to descend from heaven upon the earth, before the<\/em>
sons of men.<\/em>
14 And he will seduce, those who are dwelling on the earth: by<\/em>
the signs that are given to him to work in the presence of the<\/em>
beast; saying to those who are dwelling on the earth [that they<\/em>
should] make an image for the beast, who had the wound of the<\/em>
sword and lived.<\/em>
15 And it was given to him to give breath to the image of the<\/em>
beast: and he will cause all who will not worship the image of<\/em>
the beast, to be killed.<\/em>
(Rev. 13:11-15 HRV)<\/em>

Judith 2:20 speaks of the army of Holofernes as \u201clike a swarm of locusts\u201d recalling the army of locusts in Joel and Revelation 9. The main character Y\u2019hudit (Judith) represents the remnant of House of Judah which overcomes the false prophet. Her name means simply \u201cJewess\u201d (this may also be a euphemism and not her actual name). She parallels the \u201cwoman\u201d in Revelation 12 who dwells in the wilderness for forty-two months. In parallel Judith had been a widow for three years and four months (about 1,200 days) (Judith 8:4). Her husband had dies at the time of the barely harvest (around Passover) and had been named \u201cManasseh\u201d (Judith 8:1-3). Her bridegroom parallels Messiah, the bridegroom of Judah, Messiah was impaled at Passover (at the barley harvest) when he died in the role of Messiah \u201cben Yosef\u201d.

Channukah is not just a Jewish holiday, it is a key to prophetic events of the last days. Embedded within the Channukah story are elements foreshadowing the apostasy, the abomination of desolation, the Great Tribulation the Anti-Messiah, the martyrs of the tribulation, the false prophet, the remnant, the return of Messiah and the Messianic Kingdom to come.<\/p>\n\n\n

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