This video contains allegorical interpretation or spiritualizing hermeneutics started by Origen(184-253 AD)and popularized by Saint Aurelius Augustine(354-430 AD) which has been discredited by biblical scholars. It led the church into supersessionism and antisemitism. According to the author, the two candlesticks represent the two olive trees which are the two kingdoms of Israel and Judah. Israel of today is one kingdom. And the Church is the second. The scripture says Israel and Judah will become one stick(Ezek.36). Fair enough. Now the church has become the other olive tree. Some allegorical interpreters would interpret the two candlesticks as the law and the prophets or grace and law or the OT and the NT. If we follow this line of reasoning and interpretation what do we get? When the two witnesses who now symbolize Israel and the Church are killed, then all Jews and Christians on Earth are wiped out. The two witnesses are killed on the last day of the 70th week. That means all Jews and Christians will be killed on the last day of the 70th week. The two witnesses resurrect on the fourth day of the 30-day Reclamation of the kingdom. That means the Rapture will take place on the fourth day of the 30-day Reclamation of the kingdom after all believers and Jews are martyred. No believer would be translated, i.e., raptured alive.
According to our Lord Jesus the Christ, this knowledge of the day and hour of the Rapture is beyond any angels let alone mortal man. It is the exclusive preserve of the Father only(Matt.24:36). [If the Father knows, then Jesus as God knows, but as man He does not know. Never mind; it is an aside]. It also would mean that the Rapture would include all Jews. That means also no believer will be raptured alive, all believers and Jews would be killed(for the elects sake, the Great Tribulation would be cut short or better still, amputated; Matt.24:22), and the Rapture will be posttribulational inasmuch as it will occur on the fourth day of the 30-day Reclamation Period Of The Kingdom. It also means that the believers will go through the wrath of God which the scriptures forbid(1 Thess.1:10; 2 Thess.5:9). It also means that no Jew would be left alive on Earth to repopulate the Earth in the Millennium inasmuch as all those Jews and Gentiles who took the mark of allegiance to the Beast shall be liquidated at Armageddon. Baldadash! But the author is very selective. He interprets some symbols and leaves out the others. This kind of selective spiritualizing is theological gimmickry.
The two witnesses shall be anointed extraordinarily and no one would be able to harm them till the expiry of their ministry. That means the antiChrist and his minions will not be able to kill believers and Jews till the end of the 70th week. All believers will be performing outstanding miracles. All these are false. There is no guarantee that all believers and Jews will be performing outstanding miracles and remain immune to death till the end of the 70th week. This kind of teaching exposes believers and Jews who receive it to immeasurable danger as it gives them a false sense of invincibility and security. Some believers as well as Jews will certainly receive some outstanding miracles, signs, and wonders, and may in fact perform the same. But this will depend on individual calling and faith in the God of Israel. It will not be a blanket thing, common and general to all believers and Jews. Some believers and Jews who have been deceived and deluded by this sort of teaching may not seek refuge during the Great Tribulation and expose themselves to untold danger, with an air of invincibility blowing hot air from the mouth to pulverize their enemies, and surprisingly nothing happens.
The scriptures make it clear that believers and Jews, even unbelievers who refuse the mark of the beast shall be hounded, hunted down and killed if apprehended. This killing spree by the antiChrist and his acolytes will be terminated by the cosmic and celestial disturbances and the Rapture of the saints when they are evacuated from the Earth, the scene of antiChrist’s persecution.
The speaker in the video did not tell us what Jerusalem would mean. May be it would be the church or synagogue or both or the individual believer’s or Jew’s city of residence. [But the scripture is explicit that the Sodom and Gomorrah where our Lord was crucified is Jerusalem]. But which church and which synagogue? There is no end to this method of interpretation. It brings a lot confusion to the hermeneutical table. Nothing is concrete; everything is quicksand. It leads to a theological and hermeneutical abyss of confusion. We must do well to heed Cooper’s hermanuetical maxim: “when the plain sense of scripture makes sense, seek no other sense.”
The two witnesses are individuals. They are anointed ones who stand before the Lord of the whole Earth. They are not Israel and the Church. The olive tree may be the symbol of Israel, but it will be hermeneutical jingoism to make them stand for the two kingdoms of Israel and Judah in the OT or Israel and the Church in the NT. They are Jews not Christians. Their ministry will begin at the midpoint of the 70th week at the Gentile takeover of the Third Temple, and terminate at the end of the 70th week. Their ministry will center at the Temple Mount in Jerusalem. Will all Jews and Christians then congregate to the Temple Mount in Jerusalem at the midpoint of the 70th week to minister for three and one-half years? Will it contain them all? I wonder!
Avraham Shallom.
Mt Zion Heritage Ministries 