Other than the Antichrist himself (and his mark, of course), perhaps no other apocalyptic reference has been been given so many different possible interpretations by fundamentalists as the threatening specters of Gog and Magog.
Who could these amassed radical anti-Israel forces be? A Revived Communist Russia? A Fascist Nuclear Iran? An Uzbekistan Buzkashi Team? And it’s only fair to assume that the Catholics will be involved somehow or another.
Whatever Gog and Magog are or were they’re absolutely perfect for fundamentalist sermons. Just about any news of military maneuvering somewhere vaguely northish of Israel can be turned into an angel getting ready to blast out the end of the world. And since somebody over there is inevitably flexing their military muscles at any given point in time, it’s pretty easy to keep the eschatological ball rolling.
As for me, my money is on Switzerland. It’s always the quiet ones you have to watch the closest.
I still think the urim and thummim are more interesting.
I KNEW those dang swiss seemed awfully fishy all these years of claiming nuetrality! Great find! I’m changing into my rapture clothes now.
Let’s not rule out Venezuela, either. In the 80’s as a kid, it was the USSR, in the 90’s, after the cold war was over, we needed somebody else, so Bill Clinton was a good scapegoat, now its Islamic terrorists that are Gog and Magog.
My three-year-old daughter loves “gogs.” I wonder if she may be a closet fundy. . .
The Swiss are a pretty god idea. I on the other hand would look for the greatest concentration of Calvinist. Those people hate the Jews.
There’s still the Mayan calendar, the Prophecy of the Popes and so on, and there are fundies who believe in these…
There may have been a typo, It may suppose to be Pa Gog and Ma Gog. I got 42 hits for people with the Gog last name. They must have lots of relatives in Europe/Asia.
I remember when it was the Soviet Union, then the European Union, the a revived Russia, now it is the Muslim exteremists. Yes, the Catholics are always in on it though.
I agree. We need to watch the Swiss. They have been suspiciously quiet throughout history.
@IFB No More
I have had some fundy friends ask me about the Mayan calendar. My question has always been, how come the Mayans could predict the end of the world but could not predict the Spaniards?
I’ve had one person try to convince me that the antichrist would be a king of Spain. He gave me such a long string of stupidity to justify that claim that I have purged it from my memory, so don’t ask me why he thought this. He was also of the “UFOs and aliens are actually demons” conspiracy theory mindset. He could absolutely prove this one, though, because he had a video with a fundamentalist scholar telling everyone that UFOs and aliens are actually demons.
I will also note that I don’t think the Swiss are up to anything. We KNOW they have a ton of weapons. I think they’re just getting ready to defend themselves during Armageddon when it happens, not cause it.
However, I’m much more leery of the Belgians. Everyone knows they don’t have any weapons to speak of, and that’s the problem: that’s exactly what the Belgians want everyone to think. They could be putting mind control drugs in the chocolate they export, and they’re just waiting for the right moment to call their mind-numbed armies into action.
ROFL! Best post in a long time. Gog and Magog were among the major reasons I gave up on eschatology in college.
Hmmm with the Swiss you have a nice tie in with the Catholic Church(WOB). Since its the Swiss that provide the elite Vatican guard. Good catch Darrell
Not just the Swiss. Lichtenstein looks pretty scary too!
I don’t know, but that looks a lot like the cowboy off the Wyoming license plate. Lots of horses, guns and ammo in that state. Just sayin’.
Heard LOTS of sermons growing up on the great Russian bear. And of course the huge army from China that was coming in from the east to crush Israel.
Think of the rich symbolism the Swiss Army Knife provides!
Ah, yes, Russia is going to invade. Led by Mikhail Gorbachev – or at least that’s what the book said….
http://www.amazon.com/Gorbachev-Has-Real-Antichrist-Come/dp/0932081193
There’s no author review, or editor note…. sad.
This is why you never want to discuss eschatology with a Fundy. Everything is connected to some point, word, allusion, etc. with Revelation.
I learned everything I needed to know about this from Salem Kirban.
Perhaps I’m wrong, but I don’t hear as much prophecy/end times sermons in fundamental circles as, say, 10-20 years ago. But I do remember how dogmatic the preachers were when identifying, Gog, Magog, Gomer, etc. Identifying an end-time place name was usually preceded by “Almost all Bible scholars agree that ______ refers to what is now ______. I remember how certain one preacher was when he said that one of these names must refer to East Germany. Not Germany as a whole, but East Germany specifically. Then the Berlin Wall fell, and I have to give the guy some credit because he then admitted he was wrong.
I’ve heard so many sermons on this that I almost cringe when the subject is mentioned. Gog and Magog, and the Bear (Russia) marching South. Then there’s Armageddon, Hamingog, and Megiddo. Oh yeah, the revised Roman Empire. Heard that one too. No one seems to have noticed that the beast with ten horns has a few extra horns. I know that prophecy was put in the Bible for a reason, but I don’t think that God intended for people to become obsessed with it. Most (if not all) of what I hear about it is pure speculation. I remember during the First Gulf War many preachers were declaring that the end was upon us. I also remember when that war ended, there were a lot of prophecy books that had to be taken off the shelf and be thrown away because they could not be sold. Of course, several prophecy preachers tried to say that the knew all along that it would end. Apparently, that was prophesied as well. Almost forgot, I remember several saying the Jesus had to return by the year two thousand. THere was a a booklet in the 8os called 88 reasons that the lord would return in 1988.
Oops missed that one too
Then there were the 10 toes. Never mind that they were all on one foot or that there are no more than 10……and then there was “the Beast” in Belgium.
Some people people are so busy looking for signs that they’re going to miss the exit.
AMEN!! to that.
HA! What a severe waste of time! I’m so thoroughly embarassed believing that bunch of rubbish. This stuff is only popular because Americans are so bored with life or things are going well enough that SOMETHING must be wrong. For the love of Pete, MOST fundies can’t love their neighbors as themselves and they want everyone to believe ____________ is going to “take over the world”?
Let’s see: Stalin, Hitler, Mao, Reagan, “Gorby”, Pee Wee Herman and “W” didn’t work out as the Anti-Christ…but there’s always hope for Obama…good thing I had my “Rapture Hatch” installed.
This is one of the reasons I left dispensationalism and became an Amillennialist. My brain got tried of the mental gymnastics.
“You’ve gotta tell them! Nestles chocolate…is people! We’ve gotta stop them somehow!”
Like many other ideas that they have, when you don’t believe their prophecies the will write you off. They will tell everyone that you can’t “see” or “believe” the truth they just presented because, 1. your in league with Satan, 2. your a catholic (see 1.) 3. You’ve been reading corrupted texts (also written by Catholics and homosexuals) which have given you the false impression that literary style or historical setting or anything else except their teaching matters, (see 2 )… See how this works? So when they tell you that person A is now the Antichrist or that Nation B is Gog, it really doesn’t matter. Smile and say “Hmmm” or “oh” and end it with a big “that’s nice”. Because we all know that no one will ever know except God! If Jesus was not concerned with it, why should we? Quit the obsessing and spread the kingdom!
@Bassenco
LOL! That’s a soylent green reference isn’t it?
I think that some preachers just can’t grasp the concept that they are not actually God himself, and they therefore do not know everything that is going to happen.
Every Christmas we get a new calendar with beautiful pictures of Israel from my father-in-law. Unfortuanately, it is usually accompanied by several pages of printed out e-mails in which the authors attempt to prove that the attempted destruction of Israel is imminent, the rapture is soon, and all God’s people better be on their best behavior.
I actually find it amusing since I don’t have to listen to it every Sunday anymore.
On a related note, has anyone been with Fundies who are into the hidden Bible code stuff? That is rather unique as well.
@Trapped Pentecostal
You may be onto something there. I have been to Belgium and can vouch for the fact that mindnumbing drugs are for sale rather openly in downtown Brussels. It was kind of weird to see people sitting around the main square passing their bongs back and forth.
FWIW How do you know the Pope has a lot of money? Because the Swiss guard him for free!
There’s a town in Quebec, Canada called Magog but somehow I can’t seem to imagine a bunch of “Magogers” attacking Israel……unless it’s because the french language isn’t spoken enough. The author of “Gog and Magog” must have been a francophobe!
“Chuck Norris has volunteered to remain on earth after the Rapture; he will spend his time fighting the Anti-Christ.”
My last C.N. joke…they just make me giggle.
Darrell, I clicked the ad. You just made $.12.
um…I’ll try to be a good steward of it?
Tim LaHaye has made a ton of money from his interpretation of Revelation.
Unfortunately, he has deceived a ton of people as well.
@Darrell try not to spend it all on 1 fundy social event.
I’ve noticed the same thing. There’s still a lot of very dogmatic “We are living in the End Times, amen?” type preaching, but in my experience they dwell on fewer particulars and more on a general Chicken Little notion. They do love them some Joel Rosenberg, though.
Win.
I’m kind of new here, have you done the Proctor and Gamble/ jackels in the ice cubes of liquor ads/Subliminal Seduction stuff yet?
“Gog” and “Magog” are the two china dogs that sit on either end of Anne of Green Gables’ fireplace.
Susan, that’s the exact same thing I thought when I read this post!
@maybe gray – the pictures in ice cubes of liquor ads thing was shown to me by a teacher at PCC. LOL.
I like it when fundies say that America isn’t mentioned in the Bible. I ask them what countries are mentioned, and (inevitably) they are Russia and some other country. When I ask them how they know it’s Russia, they ask “what else could it be?”
Susan and Jessica, me too! Do you remember where she originally got them? (Anne of the Islands – Patty’s Place.)
RobM, I like the idea of rapture clothes. What type of clothes should one wear for the rapture? Is this going to give me an excuse to go shopping? I guess I should get them pretty soon just in case Harold Camping is right!
But on the other hand, I can remember when Henry Kissinger was supposed to be the Antichrist. If I had put on my rapture clothes back then, they would be pretty old now.
@Donna I know for sure the timeless rapture clothes for guys is make sure the undies don’t have skid marks. 🙂
Beyond that, probably stuff pockets w/ chick tracts, and wear some cross jewelry (for women only that is – fundy men jewelry is obv a no-no). Am thinking a way short tie (no longer than the navel). Any other suggestions appreciated. I want anyone finding my pile of clothes to realize I’ve been raptured, not off streaking somewhere! 🙂
“…I don’t hear as much prophecy/end times sermons in fundamental circles as, say, 10-20 years ago.”
Nope, now it’s being preached at Calvary Chapel! Praise the Lord.
*sigh*
@Lizzy F: Who knew that Harry Harrison, who wrote the story on which the movie was based, merely replaced “Nestle Chocolate” with “Soylent Green” (???)
The Seventh Day Adventists are pretty hot on End Times Prophecies. Theses folks are virulently anti-Catholic, too.
You’d think that they would be embarassed when the whole “Jesus is coming in 1848” thing taught by their founder didn’t work out.
@ Lizzy F and Bassenco Hey, Moses / Ben Hur couldn’t stop them… we don’t have a chance! 🙂
You may get a kick out of this about m&m’s…
http://bl.net/forwards/mnms.html
What is also interesting is this is for the most part an American thing. Apart from those churches that are the result of fundamentalist missions…most Christians on the international scene have never heard of this stuff.
Our church had a video series by Dr. David Jeremiah which went through the whole sad story of a pretrib rapture, followed by a Second Coming and His literal 1000 year reign which comes to an apex at Armageddon (he relied almost exclusively on Fox news for his “facts” that is to say Palestinians somehow snuck into Palestine after 1948 and are on subhumans who are trying to steal God’s land from God’s people and therefore, are worthy of any abuse that Israel can heap on them, right up to good old Old Testament genocide).
Despite this series, I have to agree that prophecy is less popular than when I was a kid and many evangelical Baptist churches in Canada are becoming less dogmatic in their dispensationalism and don’t want to make it a life or death doctrine.
Check out The Pocket Guide to the Apocalypse sometime. It’s hysterically funny and has a timeline of failed attempts to predict the end of the world. The Seventh Day Adventists appear in that timeline quite regularly.
I’d keep an eye on the Swiss. They’re tough. They banned minarets on mosques in Switzerland and it got voted into their constitution…
Now call me crazy, but you’d think that documents written thousands of years ago would be referring to things understandable to the people living at the time of its composition and not about things thousands of years in the future that the author would have no physical way of knowing about, but that’s just me.