19: World News & Prophecy - Daniel 11:21-32

[Darris McNeely] We're ready to get into our next class as we go through Daniel 11. In the last class, we began going through the verses and looking at the detail of the story that God lays down through the prophet delivered by the hand of an angelic messenger, but seeming to show God's power, His authority, the fact that He controls history. We'll see when we come into the book of Acts, a statement that Paul makes in Acts when he's in Athens on Mars Hill talking to the Greeks there. He says that it is God who sets the bounds of nations and men. And God is, I use the term “God as the God of history.” He does control it according to His purpose. Does He control every detail of it? I don't think He does the whole story of all of history, but in this detail, as given in Daniel 11, He does. And it works out and it begins to move toward His plan and toward His purpose. Now, we've talked about the Ptolemaic Empire in what country? What country? 

[Audience] Egypt. 

[Darris McNeely] Egypt. And the Seleucid Empire in what country? 

[Audience] Asia Minor. 

[Darris McNeely] Asia Minor. And the Ptolemies are the…

[Audience] South.

[Darris McNeely] King of the South and Seleucids are the…

[Audience] North.

[Darris McNeely] King of the North. Now, in the story of Daniel and in the history that unfolds here over a couple hundred years or so, there are many Ptolemies. There's at least four or five. And there are many Seleucids, one, two, three, and four. Within the dynasty of the Seleucids, there's also a dynasty that begins called the Antiochines.

And there are several of those. And the one that's most important is Antiochus we call it Antiochus here. The fourth, also known as Epiphanes. He's the one we'll focus on today. And he's the most important. But I'm just showing you that there are multiple Ptolemies and there are multiple Seleucids and they take the name Seleucid and Antioch. Now, a little sidebar here, Antiochus, look at what derives from that. These people, the Antiochines, they thought so much of themselves that they named a lot of cities after themselves. There's at least six or more Antiochs in ancient history, in the ancient world. And they're called Antioch. Now, two of them figure in the biblical story. This Antioch right here, when we come to Acts, we'll see that a lot in the early Church takes place in this Antioch. And there's another Antioch up here called Antioch in Pisidia. And that figures in the story of the book of Acts 2, which we'll talk about. But there are two, but there were many, many more. And they're named after this dynasty of the Antiochines, they're all Greek, both of them are Greek. But this descends from the general Seleucis, multiple ones, and multiple Antiochines as well. 

Another little sidebar. The last of the Ptolemies dies out in the first century BC. And the last of that dynasty is a woman named Cleopatra. Anybody heard that name, Cleopatra? So the last king of the South is actually a queen. She's the queen of the South. And with her death, that dynasty essentially comes to a close. And the story of Cleopatra is quite interesting in connection with the Roman Empire, her liaison with Julius Caesar, and then Mark Antony, and in the battles and struggles that take place in that period of time leading up to the empire. But that's kind of how it all winds out. And of course, it became a very famous movie made in the early 1960s with Elizabeth Taylor and…

[Woman] Richard Burton.

Darris McNeely] Richard Burton, yes, her soon-to-be husband that began on the set of Cleopatra, which is one of those big, they call it sandals in toga blockbuster movies from the golden era of Hollywood filmmaking, and was made in like 1962. But it told the story of Cleopatra and Mark Antony. Anyway, this is what develops. Until we come down to verse 21. So let's go to verse 21. This is where we're going to pick up the story here. And again, I'm skipping over a lot of the history, but it's in your notes. And I think to go into it is important biblically, but we'll have to, you know, we'll save that for Bible study sometime later on at any rate. So in verse 21, we have a transition and we have a statement that is made here. So when we come to verse 21, there's a change. Let's read it. In His place shall arise a vile person. Now, the His place of verse 21, as your notes show you, is a king called Seleucus IV from that family. Well, he's the brother of Antiochus, who is Antiochus IV and the one we're going to focus on here, right here. And Antiochus IV comes in. There's a lot of intrigue there that's taking place, family intrigue, dynastic shenanigans that goes on. But the Scripture calls him a “vile person or a contemptible person, a contemptible person.” He is the—the family is devolved into squabbles here, to whom they will not give the honor of royalty. 

Daniel 11:21 “But he,” Antiochus IV, “shall come in peaceably, seize the kingdom by intrigue.” 

Now, Antiochus IV had been raised in Rome, and he had certain skill sets. He had certain mannerisms and manners, Roman manners. He was a great flatterer. He could get along with people. He could charm people. And he comes in at a particular time. 

Daniel 11:22 It says, “with a force of a flood, they shall be swept away before him, and be broken, and also the prince of the covenant.” 

Now, this prince of the covenant reference is referring to the covenant of God, the law of God, and the situation and the story as the Jews are brought into it. And here in the flow of Daniel 11 is where the Jewish people are now brought into it. And what is going on in Jerusalem? And it is connected with Antiochus. Jerusalem, the Jews, down in Judea, down here, they've been going along, living their life. The king of the south, the king of the north, they've been battling back and forth. The control of this area will switch during those years. They're caught in the middle. The Jews are. They remember the Jews, the descendants of the ones who came back from Babylon. They rebuilt the temple during the time of Ezra and Nehemiah. That has passed. And they are generations into their new existence in the land. And they're now having problems that begin to develop. They're having internal strife within among the Jewish community. And the reference here to a prince of the covenant is to a literal high priest.

The priesthood, the temple, the sacrifices, they're all going on. They manage to continue their culture, their religion, while all of this is going on during the time the Jews do. But generations come and go. And as generations of faith progress, manners change, ethics change. There's a certain degradation in their commitment to the covenant. You even begin to see that in the story of Nehemiah. The Nehemiah had to chastise them because some of the Jews were neglecting the Sabbath. Remember that story in the book of Nehemiah. And he said, close your gates on the Sabbath. You're going to keep the Sabbath.

But look, as time went on, the temple, the priest, that all continued sacrifices, but things got progressive or watered down. Liberal, shall I say. And within the Jewish community begin to develop various factions. Conservatives, liberals, progressives, traditionalists, whatever term you want to use. What do we use today as we describe ourselves at times in the Church and our Church community? We've always had this, liberals and conservatives, heretics and traditionalists or whatever it might be. You've heard the conversations and that's happened in the Church. It was happening within the Jewish community in Jerusalem. But as we come to this time of the story with Antiochus IV Epiphanes, he is controlling this area. Now keep in mind, again, all of these are Greek. They are inheritors of the Greek culture. And as I've said in the past, in the world at this time, one of the Greek culture was the dominant culture, the language, the architecture, the arts, the sports and everything. 

And wherever they went, they brought that with them. And they imposed it. They imposed their religion in many ways where they could. Now they had not been able to do that in Jerusalem. You still had the temple without any idols in there. But the Greeks were coming in. The Greek influence was coming in. And we see a statement here that is made by the prince of the covenant here is involved. 

Daniel 11:23 Says, “And after the league is made with him,” and that is a league or an agreement is made with Antiochus by certain Jews, they shall act he, Antiochus, “shall act deceitfully, for he shall come up and become strong with a small number of people.”

Daniel 11:24 “He will enter peaceably into the richest places of the province.” That's interpreted to be Galilee, the northern area of the land of Israel, which is the agricultural and kind of the richest. It's the breadbasket of Israel at that time. It still is even to this day. And it says, “He shall do what his fathers have not done, nor his forefathers. He shall disperse among them the plunder, spoil, and riches, and shall devise his plans against the strongholds, but only for a time.”

Antiochus kind of did a redistribution of wealth. He took from the rich and gave to the poor. And he was playing a game to extend his influence as the monarch among the masses among the Jews. And this is where the focus is here in verse 24. Now, let me read just a little bit about this Antiochus to give you a little flavor of his character, why he's called a vile or a contemptible man. I'm going to read a little bit from the historian, Will Durant, whose history is a little old, not too old, but he, writing on this period, he has some very good insight. And he writes about Antiochus IV of Epiphanes. 

He says, “He was both the most interesting and the most erratic of his line, a rare mixture of intellect, insanity, and charm.” Quite a guy. “He governed his kingdom ably despite a thousand injustices and absurdities. He allowed his delegates to abuse their power and gave his mistress authority over three cities. He was generous and cruel without judgment, often forgiving or condemning by whim, surprising simple folk with costly gifts.” That's what we just read here. “He devises plans for a time. He disperses among them the plunder and spoil and riches.” 

So Durant is actually backing up, and I don't think he read Daniel 11, but he's describing Antiochus Epiphanes as a man and what he did to gain the support of the masses. 

He says, “He loved wine, women, and art. He drank to excess and left his royal seat at banquets to dance naked with the entertainers or to carouse with wastrels.” You don't want to be a wastrel. So he liked to party. He was a frat guy. “He was a bohemian,” he says, “whose dream of power had come true. He despised the solemnity and trappings of the court, played practical jokes, played practical jokes upon his dignitaries, and disguised himself to know the luxury of anonymity. He felt a sincere enthusiasm for Greek art, literature, and thought. He made Antioch,” which was his capital, and it's this Antioch right here called Antioch on the Orantes, which was the river that goes through. And this is the Antioch where they are first called Christians in the book of Acts. “He made Antioch for a century the art center of the Greek world. He paid artists handsomely to set up statuary and temples. He redecorated the shrine of Apollo, built a theater, financed the completion of the Olympium at Athens. Having lived 14 impressionable years in Rome, he had imbibed his taste for Republican institutions, and as if to foreshadow Augustus, it pleased his humor and policy to clothe his monarchial power in the forms of Republican freedom.” 

In other words, he posed as a person of the people, but he really loved his power, and he used that. He adopted the name Antiochus Theos Epiphanes, which means the God made manifest. Now that's a pretty bold name, and that plays into what he will do, because he is going to take over the temple and sacrifice a pig in the temple, what we call the abomination of desolation. But this is how he thinks about himself. This is what he put on these coins. Antiochus Theos Epiphanes, the God revealed. And so this is what he does. 

Now, a little bit of the backstory of what is going on with the Jews in Jerusalem as Antiochus comes in, because this is part of the story as well. I mentioned that everybody really wanted to be a Greek, and the Greek hairstyles, the Greek dress, the Greek culture, language, arts, everything was the rage of the day. And where the Greeks went, they built their gymnasiums.

And they actually called it that. It's a Greek word. We have player basketball games, volleyball games, and a gymnasium as part of our school, high school, school complexes, comes from the Greek. And it was not necessarily a place where you went and watched the basketball game or volleyball game and ate popcorn and hung out with your friends. A gymnasium in the Greek world was built as a kind of a sports workout area, but in the Greek culture, you worked out naked.

Yeah, you ever see this Greek statues of a guy with a javelin or throwing a discus? They don't have any clothes on. That's how they practiced. Well, what happened? Antiacus comes into Jerusalem, and what does he build? He builds a gymnasium. He redecorates according to the Greek. Well, that gymnasium is pretty popular, but they've also, he brings in the Greek gods and goddesses and the idols and everything. And, you know, everybody wants a Greek idol, and you've got artisans in Jerusalem that are Jews. You can well imagine that some of the Jews who were silversmiths, metalworkers, having a little shop, a Greek businessman comes from Antioch into Jerusalem. I'd like 10,000 images of Zeus. Can you do it here? Now, if you're a good Jew, what are you going to say? No. But if you're a good Jew that's wanting to make a dime, what might you say? Well, that's what happened. They compromised. And that sets up tension. 

Here's another thing they did. You've got a gymnasium down the street from your Jewish academy, or you're a Jew and you work in a shop, or you work in a business, you're the accountant for a small business firm. You go to work at eight in the morning, get a half hour for lunch, five o'clock, you're out, right? What are you going to do? What? I need to work out. I need to go to the gym. Where do we go? Planet Fitness? I go to the YMCA. Okay, lift weights, do whatever. Wait, you're a Jew in Jerusalem, you know, in the 160s, 170s BC. Hey, they got a gym, but it's a Greek gym. And you know what's down there? Statues of Apollo, Artemis, or the Greek equivalent, Diana, Zeus. They're throwing the javelin, they're throwing the discus, but they're throwing it without any clothes on. You're a Jewish 18-year-old, you're going to go down there, you got a membership, you're going to dress like them, or in this case, not dress like them. You're going to adopt their culture. That's what you're going to do. But you're a Jew, 18-year-old Jewish boy. You know what makes you different from that Greek 18-year-old that's in there? Any of the girls want to volunteer? No. You know what makes you different? You're circumcised.

And your Greek workout mate on the treadmill next to you, he's not. You know what some of them did? Yeah. They tried to reverse their circumcision. Yeah, they did. To look Greek. That's the extent that they went to. I hope this survives the editing room here. But that's what they did. And that's only a part of the story, or the artisan who takes the contract to make 10,000 shields or garden baubles that have a pagan depiction upon them. That's good money. That'll pay for an addition. That'll put his kids through school. That'll pay for a holiday on the Mediterranean, maybe even a timeshare down there. Compromise sets in, but there are Jews that don't go that far. They don't go to the gym. Why? It's Greek. It's pagan. They don't go that far. They still observe Torah. They still don't eat pig. Can you imagine all the compromising that's going on, but all the tension that begins to develop among the Jews? And that's what happens.

And then there's the politics of the hierarchy of the Jews that we've already encountered in the book of Acts as they engineered the death of Jesus, persecute the apostles, the early chapters, and the intrigue among themselves. That was going on at this time. That wasn't anything new when we read that in the book of Acts. And the Jews begin to quarrel and fight among themselves. And Antiochus loves it because he's wanting, he sees that as an opportunity to continue to move in and to stir up. 

Daniel 11:25 Here says, “He,” Antiochus, “shall stir up his power and his courage against the king of the south now.” 

So the story then moves back to the intrigue between king of the north and Antiochus, king of the south, who actually is totally the fourth, and with a great army. And the king of the south stirs up a battle with a very great mighty army. And so Antiochus goes down into Egypt, and this is about the year 171 BC, with a big army, and he meets Ptolemy IV, and they kind of work out in agreement. They hate each other. There's a story that they have a banquet. “They eat a portion of the delicacies” it mentions in verse 25. “And his army shall be swept away, and many shall fall down slain.” They actually then come to a battle, and Antiochus is victorious. He takes Ptolemy captive, marches continuing down into Memphis there in Egypt, and uses him as a tool in his efforts to take over in Egypt. These are kind of like gang wars. Look at them as, you know, gang bosses, whether it's Italian, Polish, Irish, or whatever it might be. And they come to an agreement.

Daniel 11:27 It says that, “Hearts shall be bent on evil, and they shall speak lies at the same table.” That may be describing a banquet that we know that they did have among themselves to kind of work out an agreement, “but shall not prosper, for the end will still be at an appointed time.” 

Daniel 11:28 Says, Antiochus, “While returning to his land with great riches, his heart will be moved against the Holy Covenant.” 

This is the worship system surrounding the temple that the Jews are doing, and he will do damage. So he actually loots the temple at that time, kills a few Jews just to be on the safe side to assert himself. He's coming back from Egypt and going back up to his own land, it says at the end of verse 28. So as he comes back through, in order to just continue to degrade the religious, political, and moral situation among the Jews, he plunders a bit, kills a few, then he goes on back up, but he's not done. He's not done. He returns to his land, verse 28, with great riches, and he does damage.

Daniel 11:29 “At the appointed time,” and this is in the year 168, BC, “he shall return and go toward the south.” He learns of intrigue there that Ptolemies are forming against him. There's no honor among thieves. “And it says at the appointed time, he shall return and go toward the south.” So this is being predicted, and this is what exactly happened. “But it shall not be like the former or the latter. For ships from Kittim,” it says Cyprus, and your margins in your Bible may show that it's referring to Kittim. This is a picture of a Greek soldier, much like what had been at the time of Antiochus and his soldiers, kind of keeping in mind. But there are ships from Kittim, it says, that come against him. All right? 

Now, this area of Kittim, the histories, the commentators, generally, they all agree as interpreting this. This is speaking of the areas largely to the west. From Kittim can include North Africa, and it can include Italy. And in this particular case, it is speaking of ships from Italy that come down into Egypt while Antiochus is there. And they come against him, and that ends verse 29. Now, here's what happens. This doesn't go into it all here in the Scripture. But Rome is now developing its, inflexing its muscle. They have come into this area, they have captured this area, they've already fought Hannibal and his elephants. That story has come and gone. They've defeated everything here. And why are ships from Kittim or from Rome coming down here to Egypt when Antiochus is here at the same time? They know what's going on. They have intelligence gathering abilities, and they know that there's warring between these. 

They understand Antiochus. Remember, Antiochus had been schooled in Rome, so he's got contacts there. They don't want Antiochus or Syria, the king of the north, to completely take over Egypt because Egypt is the breadbasket. It's the granary. It's where they make the wonder bread or the Panera bread of the whole world with all they grow there. And the ships are coming out of there, and this is what keeps everybody fed. Rome wants to control that. There's money here, but there's also, you've got to keep people fed. And they're not going to let this happen. And so there is a story, okay, of a meeting between Antiochus and the Roman general who comes here. His name is Linnaeus Popelius.

All right. And he knows Antiochus. They worked together in Rome for years. Okay. They're buds. But this guy's the Roman general. This is the Greek king. And he's got an army with him, and he's got to mandate orders stop Antiochus. Antiochus has designs himself, and he's got an army as well. There's something that happens at this point. All right. If I could get my two designated actors to come up, we're going to show you something that happens. Now, I like to always refer to this Antiochus Epiphanes as the Darth Vader of the story. 

So we have Darth Vader right here, aka Antiochus IV or Antiochus Epiphanes. This guy with the plume on his hat, Logan, this is Linnaeus Popelius, the Roman general sent down here to stop Darth Vader from completely taking over everything. Okay. Antiochus doesn't want to retreat. He's got a safe face. Behind him, he's got an army. And he can't stand down. These guys, they literally meet on the sand on the waterfront, and they have a show down, they have a discussion. And Popelius says, “You're not taking it over.” Antiochus says, “Yeah, I am. I've got rights. I've got an army.” “Well, I've got an army too,” Roman general says, “And I've got my orders. You're not taking it over.” 

Now, the Romans, as I've told you several times, they don't back down. They are the original competitive heartbreakers. They don't back down. All right. Even when they are beaten almost to a pulp, they somehow always have managed in their battles to get enough strength to keep going, and they don't get beaten. And then they beat up everybody and enslave them and do everything else. Linnaeus Popelius is not going to back down to Antiochus, but Antiochus has got to save face. 

So Popelius comes up with a plan. He takes his sword, and he points it on the sand, and he begins to walk around Antiochus and draw a circle in the sand around him. And what does he say? “Get out of Egypt! Go home!” What else does he say? He says, “You die there, or you go home.” And he says, “Make up your mind before you step out of that circle.” 

That's what he says. So Antiochus cannot make one step without having his mind made up what he's going to do. What does he do? He steps out, but he steps back, and he goes home. 

All right, so thanks, guys. We'll pay you union wage for that little bit there. And this sets up what happens next back in Jerusalem, because Antiochus has to go back. He's humiliated, and he's going to go buy Jerusalem and pesky Jews again. And I've already told you that the Jews are squabbling among themselves, and that's another story. They have installed a corrupt high priest, thrown him out, put another one in that's better, but they're squabbling among themselves, progressives against traditionalists. And they're vulnerable. Now, if Antiochus is a type, which he is, of this figure of a man of sin that you've read about in 2 Thessalonians 2, a character called the beast in Revelation that we will meet, chapter 13 and chapter 17. Antiochus is a type of those end time figures that are described by Paul and John in those New Testament books. He is an inheritor of all of this that has gone before him. He's a Greek king, but Persia, and all the way back to Babylon, he's in that line of what we've been studying, and it is a line of a system that is against God.

And now he has the power, he's got the army, and the people of the covenant are there. They're weak, they're disorganized, they're squabbling among themselves. He can at least take out his fury and his anger over being humiliated down in Egypt on them, which is what he does. And so, as we look at this, beginning then in verse 30.

Daniel 11:30 “Therefore,” it says, “he,” and its Antiochus, “shall be grieved and return in rage against the holy covenant.” This is the entire system that the Jews have maintained in large part with the temple, sacrifices, the priesthood, the law, the way of God, and do damage. “He shall return and shall regard for those who forsake the holy covenant.” 

The compromises, the ones who have worked out in the gym, denying their heritage, their faith, because the workout by itself is nothing wrong. But they have then taken part in the whole culture of the Greek culture. They have denied their faith. And the men who've taken jobs that forced them to compromise with the law of God, they are the ones who have forsaken the holy covenant and rejected that. And so, he comes back, for and, verse 31.

Daniel 11:31 “Forces shall be mustered against him, and they shall defile the sanctuary fortress. Then they shall take away the daily sacrifices.” 

This is what is called the abomination of desolation. We have articles on that. I think I brought, I didn't bring that in with me this particular time, but we have that well described. We've talked about it already from chapter 8. The fortress is described. The daily sacrifices are ended. “And he places there the abomination of desolation.” What it probably was, most feel, was an image of the Greek God Zeus. And He puts it into the holy of holies of the temple, a complete sacrilege along with sacrificing a pig on the altar, completely desecrating it. He went further. He forbade the worship of the Sabbath. He forbade mothers to circumcise their children. Anything dealing with the law, the Word of God was outlawed and banned. And His army enforced that. This is all a type of, this is a trial and a tribulation and a type of the end time tribulation against those who would keep the commandments of God that we'll read about in Revelation and of a system that will arise. 

Daniel 11:32 “Those who do wickedly,” verse 32 says, “against the covenant, He shall corrupt with flattery.” There are some that go over to Him, some Jews that go over to Him. “But those who know their God,” in verse 32, “shall be strong and carry out great exploits.” 

Those who know their God refer to those who are known in history as the Maccabees. Their leader is a man named Judas Maccabeus. He's a minor priest and he has a family of sons. And the story is that they're living in a village out from Jerusalem and the Greek soldiers' detachment go out there to enforce all these decrees of not circumcising, not keeping the Sabbath. And Judas Maccabeus takes his sword, probably a lot smaller than the one that we had up here a while ago, and he runs the Greek general through with it. And he says, “To the hills, boys.” And he and his followers and his family, they go off to the hills. They hide in caves in the Judean area. And we have for about three years then a war of the Jews against the Greeks that has fought. Antiochus goes on back home. He leaves his army to mop up and to deal with it.

Daniel 11:32 Says, “Those who know their God shall be strong and carry out great exploits.” 

They fight a battle and they fight against it. It's a gorilla warfare. It's an insurgency uprising. They gather people around them in these hills, much kind of like David did when he was out, when he was having to run from Saul. And they fight against the Greeks. And it goes on for about three years. And that is what is being described here in verse 32, “those who are strong and carry out great exploits.” Now this story is told by Josephus in his history. It's also told in the apocryphal books of 1st and 2nd Maccabees. They're not part of the Bible, but they are part of what is called the Apocrypha. And it's a fascinating story. I had this particular slide here that shows there was an oratorial written by George Frederick Handel a long time later called Judas Maccabeus. It has some very nice music in it, but it tells the story of this Jewish revolt against the Greeks, Judas Maccabeus here by George Handel. And they eventually prevail. They push the Greeks back and out where they have to retreat. And they come in to Jerusalem, and they retake the city of Jerusalem. 

In 1967, the Jews fought a war against their Arab enemies, and they recaptured all of Jerusalem and reunited it. And they recaptured what is called the Western Wall today, and that whole holy area where the mosques are. And it was a great event in the modern Jewish history. The soldiers were praying at the Western Wall. They called it the Wailing Wall then. Jerusalem was reunited, and it was a historic modern event. And it's still united, even despite all the political wrangling over Jerusalem and with the story there today, but it's still a united city. Well, these Jews eventually retook it. And if Darth Vader is the, or Antiochus Epiphanes is the Darth Vader of the story, then Judas Maccabeus and his army, they're the rebel force. All right? They retake it all. And they come in in December of the year 164 BC and retake Jerusalem. Okay? After a lot of intrigue and a lot of battles. Now, here's an interesting sidebar. We're going to conclude with this today. December 164, cold. There have been no ceremonies, sacrifices, nothing at the temple for three years or more. The Jews retake it. And these are good pious Jews. What do you think they want to do? They want to restart, get it started again. They want to sacrifice and honor God and thank God. But it's December. Now, how many of you have heard of the story of Hanukkah?

What is Hanukkah? Some say it's a Jewish Christmas. Hanukkah always occurs in December. It's a Jewish festival, and it is a festival that commemorates the story. All right? So in a few weeks, the Jews, I don't know the dates here as I'm talking when it will be, but it'll be in December, and it runs for about eight days. And in the Bible, we have a time when Jesus is in the temple at that time at the Feast of Dedication. And it's at that time. He's in Jerusalem at the temple during the observance of the Jews at that time in the first century of this event that took place less than 200 years earlier. And what they did was they came in and they reinstated sacrifices. Now, the story of Hanukkah kind of has this as they found oil in the temple to light the candles of the menorah. Here's a picture of that Jewish menorah that is very famous and a priest.

But the story is there was only enough oil for like one or two days. Well, they put it in and lit everything up and a miracle occurred. There was enough oil miraculously for eight days. Okay, how'd that happen? Well, that's the story. Out of that comes this Feast of Dedication, Festival of Lights, and it's developed into today where you've got little dreidels and gifts and the whole customs that is called Hanukkah today. But the centerpiece is the story of the miracle of the oil that was extended. And they were so joyous and happy and it becomes Hanukkah. It's a nice story. Guess what? It's not true.

Now, what is true is the Maccabees and the Jewish armies retook the temple. That's true. And they did reinstitute sacrifices and the worship there and kind of tried to put it all back together, which would take some time. But the miracle of the oil, that didn't really happen. In fact, that doesn't appear in the story of Hanukkah until about 100 to 200 years after the time of Christ, which is about 300 more years after the event that we're talking about here. And all the other trappings and customs that are part of what is today Hanukkah, they developed through the generations among Jews scattered really throughout the world, Europe, and all over to what is today this great festival called Hanukkah. And it bears no resemblance to what happened in 164 in December when the Jewish armies came back in. 

But that's not the whole story. What do you think they were doing? Remember I told you that Hanukkah is what, eight days? It's December. What are they doing? They're reinstituting sacrifices. What happened about two months earlier on the calendar? Had they been able to do it, Sarah? 

[Sarah] The Feast of Tabernacles.

[Darris McNeely] The Feast of Tabernacles and…

[Sarah] Eighth Day.

[Darris McNeelt] The 8th Day. An eight-day festival, which they couldn't do because they didn't control the temple. They were still fighting their way to Jerusalem. But a few weeks later, do the math, we're what? Two weeks out of our own feast this year was later. We're not too far from December right now. Less than two months distance between them as it is now.

The Jews come in, they control everything now, and they're pious, they're religious, they want to give God thanks. What would you do? Well, the only thing you could do, you don't invent something new. You take what you've got and you're maybe a few weeks late, but hey, guys, let's build a temporary shelter. Let's do some sacrifices according to the law. Let's keep an eight-day festival. Where would they have gotten the idea that they could do it two months late or six weeks later? Anybody know? Where would they have gotten the idea? Well, we missed the date, but God knows, so we'll do it six weeks, seven weeks later. Where would they have gotten that idea? Leah? 

[Leah] Does it have to do with the second Passover?

[Darris McNeely] Yeah, out of the book of numbers that they knew, the book of numbers, something called the second Passover. Have you studied that yet? You haven't got there yet? Everybody know what the second Passover is? If you miss the first, you could take the second a month later. They knew their law, likely what they were doing. I can't prove this with chapter and verse, but likely what they were doing was, hey, they had a meeting.

Numbers says we can keep the Passover a month later if circumstances prevent us from keeping it on the day that it's supposed to be. Why don't we keep the Feast of Tabernacles and the eighth day now? Look, their whole culture has been turned upside down. They're trying to rebuild it. It's kind of year one. You can imagine the conversations. Yeah, I think that's okay. We can do that. And so they keep a late Feast of Tabernacles. That's how Hanukkah probably got started. And generations later, they add all this other stuff, a false miracle and whatever else. 

What might we take away from this? Among the people of God, we have to be strong for our faith. We have to not compromise. The Jews compromise, got them in trouble with Antiochus. They were weakened. If we compromise Satan through his forces and agents, it can get to us today.

It's important that the people of God not only hold to the faith, but learn to work together. Compromise is not good. Watering down teaching is not good. But there's always going to be issues and factions and matters between us. And it's how we deal with those among ourselves, the differences. Not that we have different interpretations. I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about how we live day to day with our liberty before God. It's how we deal with all of that. And we come together to be knit together as one body that's important. All keeping God's word, God's law faithfully, not compromising, not adding to, not taking away, but learning to work together. The Jews of this period got so broken down they couldn't work together and they were vulnerable to Antiochus. In the future, God's people are going to have to be united, working together, not letting anything divide them. And I mean anything. Because Satan and his agents of politics and government that are prophesied for the future will come against the people of God. We have to be strong. We have to be together. That's a big takeaway from this. Now, in the next class, we're going to pick up from here and we're going to bring this story fast forward into the modern age and what this means prophetically for us. So we'll do that in the next class.