Bush, God, Iraq and Gog

[mexika]

Biblical Prophesy and the Iraq War

Bush, God, Iraq and Gog

By Clive Hamilton

May 23, 2009 "Counterpunch" -- The revelation this month in GQ magazine that Donald Rumsfeld as Defense Secretary embellished top-secret wartime memos with quotations from the Bible prompts a question. Why did he believe he could influence President Bush by that means?

The answer may lie in an alarming story about George Bush’s Christian millenarian beliefs that has yet to come to light.

In 2003 while lobbying leaders to put together the Coalition of the Willing, President Bush spoke to France’s President Jacques Chirac. Bush wove a story about how the Biblical creatures Gog and Magog were at work in the Middle East and how they must be defeated.

In Genesis and Ezekiel Gog and Magog are forces of the Apocalypse who are prophesied to come out of the north and destroy Israel unless stopped. The Book of Revelation took up the Old Testament prophesy:

“And when the thousand years are expired, Satan shall be loosed out of his prison, And shall go out to deceive the nations which are in the four quarters of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them together to battle … and fire came down from God out of heaven, and devoured them.”

Bush believed the time had now come for that battle, telling Chirac:

“This confrontation is willed by God, who wants to use this conflict to erase his people’s enemies before a New Age begins”.

The story of the conversation emerged only because the Elysée Palace, baffled by Bush’s words, sought advice from Thomas Römer, a professor of theology at the University of Lausanne. Four years later, Römer gave an account in the September 2007 issue of the university’s review, Allez savoir. The article apparently went unnoticed, although it was referred to in a French newspaper.

The story has now been confirmed by Chirac himself in a new book, published in France in March, by journalist Jean Claude Maurice. Chirac is said to have been stupefied and disturbed by Bush’s invocation of Biblical prophesy to justify the war in Iraq and “wondered how someone could be so superficial and fanatical in their beliefs”.

In the same year he spoke to Chirac, Bush had reportedly said to the Palestinian foreign minister that he was on “a mission from God” in launching the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan and was receiving commands from the Lord.

There can be little doubt now that President Bush’s reason for launching the war in Iraq was, for him, fundamentally religious. He was driven by his belief that the attack on Saddam’s Iraq was the fulfilment of a Biblical prophesy in which he had been chosen to serve as the instrument of the Lord.

Many thousands of Americans and Iraqis have died in the campaign to defeat Gog and Magog. That the US President saw himself as the vehicle of God whose duty was to prevent the Apocalypse can only inflame suspicions across the Middle East that the United States is on a crusade against Islam.

There is a curious coda to this story. While a senior at Yale University George W. Bush was a member of the exclusive and secretive Skull & Bones society. His father, George H.W. Bush had also been a “Bonesman”, as indeed had his father. Skull & Bones’ initiates are assigned or take on nicknames. And what was George Bush Senior’s nickname? “Magog”.

Clive Hamilton is a Visiting Professor at Yale University He can be reached at: mail@clivehamilton.net.au.

source:
http://www.counterpunch.org/hamilton05222009.html

video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3g2iVbTI6r0

[seatis4flotation]

I have read hundreds of theories about who Gog and Magog are and I think they are a few 1000 miles off. It is my opinion. I knowow everyone has ther on idea. I did however always have the feeling that Bush "The Baby" felt he was part of biblical prophecy and that is why he was in Iraq. It really never made much sense. I was very involved in the "Desert Storm" and I never once questioned why we were there but I was sucking the blue pill. Now that I have been on the Rd pill dfor about 15 years I can say that looking back I was working for somethnig very evil. So Bush if Bush thought GO and Magog were in the MIddle east then he is the bonehead we all thought. It seems his predessor is much closer. How ever I believe that the beginning Of the Gog and Mago search should begin in Russia. This war will go on for a long time and it will drain every resource for the USA before it is over. I am going to be sick.

[hilly7]

I don't know a whole lot about it but either Gog or Magog I thought was Russia. Wasn't Bush trying to rebuild a temple or something in the middle east. Some kind of prophesy or something? There's a site though I seen a while back that ealks something about Gog & Magog. I'll see if I can find it.

[hilly7]

Found this:

Question: "What are Gog and Magog?"

Answer: Historically speaking, Magog was a grandson of Noah (Genesis 10:2). The descendants of Magog settled to the far north of Israel, likely in Europe and northern Asia (Ezekiel 38:2). Magog seems to be used to refer to "northern barbarians" in general, but likely also has a connection to Magog the person. The people of Magog are described as skilled warriors (Ezekiel 38:15; 39:3-9).

Gog and Magog are referred to in Ezekiel 38-39 and in Revelation 20:7-8. While these two instances carry the same names, a close study of Scripture clearly demonstrates they do not refer to the same people and events. In Ezekiel’s prophecy, Gog will be the leader of a great army that attacks the land of Israel. Gog is described as “of the land of Magog, the prince of Rosh, Meshech, and Tubal” (Ezekiel 38:2-3). Ezekiel's battle of Gog and Magog occurs in the tribulation period, more specifically in the first 3 1/2 years. The strongest evidence for this view is that the attack will come when Israel is at peace (Ezekiel 38:8, 11). The description from Ezekiel is that of a nation that has security and has laid down its defenses. Israel is definitely not at peace now, and it is inconceivable that the nation would lay down its defenses apart from some major event. When Israel's covenant with the Beast/Antichrist is in effect at the beginning of Daniel's 70th Week (also known as the 7-year tribulation, Daniel 9:27a), Israel will be at peace. Possibly the battle will occur just before the midpoint of the seven-year period. According to Ezekiel, Gog will be defeated by God Himself on the mountains of Israel. The slaughter will be so great it will take seven months to bury all of the dead (Ezekiel 39:11-12).

Gog and Magog are mentioned again in Revelation is found in 20:7-8. The duplicated use of the names Gog and Magog in Revelation 20:8-9 is to show that these people demonstrate the same rebellion against God and antagonism toward God as those in Ezekiel 38-39. It is similar to someone today calling a person "the devil" because he or she is sinful and evil. We know that person is not really Satan, but because that person shares similar characteristics, he or she might be referred to as "the devil."

The book of Revelation uses Ezekiel's prophecy about Magog to portray a final end-times attack on the nation of Israel (Revelation 20:8-9). The result of this battle is that all are destroyed, and Satan will find his final place in the lake of fire (Revelation 20:10).

It is important to recognize that the Gog and Magog of Ezekiel 38-39 is quite different from the one in Revelation 20:7-8. Below are some of the more obvious reasons why these refer to different people and battles.

1. In the battle of Ezekiel 38-39, the armies come primarily from the north and involve only a few nations of the earth (Ezekiel 38:6, 15; 39:2). The battle in Revelation 20:7-9 will involve all nations, so armies will come from all directions, not just from the north.

2. There is no mention of Satan in the context of Ezekiel 38-39. In Revelation 20:7 the context clearly places the battle at the end of the millennium with Satan as the primary character.

3. Ezekiel 39:11-12 states that the dead will be buried for seven months. There would be no need to bury the dead if the battle in Ezekiel 38-39 is the one described in Revelation 20:8-9, for immediately following Revelation 20:8-9 is the Great White Throne judgment (20:11-15) and then the current or present heaven and earth are destroyed, replaced by a new heaven and earth (Revelation 21:1). There obviously will be a need to bury the dead if the battle takes place in the early part of the tribulation, for the land of Israel will be occupied for another 1,000 years, the length of the millennial kingdom (Revelation 20:4-6).

4. The battle in Ezekiel 38-39 is used by God to bring Israel back to Him (Ezekiel 39:21-29). In Revelation 20, Israel has been faithful to God for 1,000 years (the millennial kingdom). Those in Revelation 20:7-10 who are rebellious are destroyed without any more opportunity for repentance.

Recommended Resource: Understanding End Times Prophecy by Paul Benware.

[plasticfan]

Many books and cults were promoted by Britain labeling Russia as "Gog" when these two countries were carving up Asia in the 19th and 20th century as part of the "great game".

Dispensational Zionist Protestant thinking infected with British Imperialism and drunk for Empire and a Kindgom of God on Earth saw their great enemies of Imperial Russia and the Ottoman Caliphate as the mythic end times kingdoms in the middle east - standing against the "sons of Israel" in the "last days".

Cyrus Scofield was promoted with his Bible version in the early part of the 20th century to give credence that Israel would be reborn and oppose Czarist Russia and her allies before the second coming.

The script was adapted after World War II to fit a "cold war" paradigm - Gog became the Soviet Union - the "evil empire" that would sweep down and lay waste to the newly born Israeli state before the messiah returns. This type of thinking was promoted by Christian organizations such as the Dallas Theological Seminary and authors such as Hal Lindsay.

After the cold war ended - the mysterious Gog and Magog figure has been applied to Russia allied to Islamic Countries, the EU, even the United States of America. Basically any enemy of Israel du jour fitting the bill now.

[hilly7]

Good find, thanks. So basically anybody that opposes Israel could be Gog and/or Magog?