Silencing the Witnesses

Jerusalem & the Ascent of Secularism

Graeme Carle

• Publisher: Emmaus Road Publishing
• eBook ISBN: 9780473519940
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Christian Theology

Moses and Elijah back from the dead?

The most popular interpretation of Revelation 11 today is literal– that Moses and Elijah are soon to reappear in the streets ofJerusalem as witnesses, to preach for three and a half years, thenbe killed by a metaphorical beast (a man called the Antichrist)before being resurrected again after three and a half days.

The most common academic view today, however, is thatthese are all metaphorical images, referring to the church beingpersecuted initially by the Romans, today by the whole world, but ultimately vindicated.

In this book, Graeme Carlé takes the metaphorical approachbut from a Jewish perspective. The Early Church was, after all, led by Jewish disciples and/or Gentiles taught by Jewish disciples.He shows how the two witnesses would have been understoodby John’s 1st Century audience to be the Law and the Prophets, making essential connections with Jesus’ parable of the rich manand Lazarus, and with Paul’s two Jerusalems in Galatians 4.

In doing so, Graeme surveys the effects of the Law over 4, 000years of Jewish history, how it still applies to every Jew not underthe New Covenant, and how it is relevant for all of us today.

1

‘A Measuring Rod’
To Comprehend

The vision begins with a command:

1. Then there was given me a measuring rod like a staff; and someone said, “Get up and measure the temple of God and the altar, and those who worship in it.”

When I first read this passage, it raised several questions for me. I could understand John measuring a building but what was the point when he did not record any results? And why would God want him to ‘measure… those who worship in it’? Not to count, but to measure with ‘a measuring rod’. Does it matter if they were tall or short, or stout or thin? The expression has to be metaphorical but what does the metaphor mean?

As we established in Book 3,²⁷ ‘calculating’, ‘marking off’, ‘weighing’ and ‘measuring’ doubled as Hebrew metaphors for comprehending, understanding, and judging. For example, Job asked his friends:

7. “Can you discover the depths of God?

Can you discover the limits of the Almighty?

8. “They are high as the heavens, what can you do?

Deeper than Sheol, what can you know?

9. “Its measure is longer than the earth

And broader than the sea”. (Job 11:7-9)

Paul prayed for the Ephesians:

17. …that you, being rooted and grounded in love, 18. may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth… (Eph 3:17-18)

This is why, when Jesus taught on judging, He added measuring:

“For in the way you judge, you will be judged; and by your standard of measure, it will be measured to you.” (Matt 7:2)

Today we readily understand He means that if we judge carelessly or harshly, we will ourselves be judged carelessly or harshly; if we are discerning and merciful, we too will receive due care and mercy. God judges, having ‘measured’ properly, and He wants us to do likewise:

“Do not judge according to appearance, but judge with righteous judgement.” (John 7:24)

What then is the meaning of John’s measuring? What was he to discern and understand about ‘the temple of God and the altar, and those who worship in it’?

Happily, there is no need for guesswork because two Jewish prophets of old, Ezekiel and Zechariah, had earlier received similar visions. We need to understand these if we want to catch up with what would have been already understood by John’s original 1st Century Jewish hearers, and Gentiles taught by them.

Ezekiel’s Temple

In 573 BC (Ezek 40:1)²⁸, Ezekiel was in exile in Babylon when ‘the hand of the Lord’ took him back to Jerusalem where he saw a man ‘with a line of flax and a measuring rod in his hand’ (Ezek 40:3). The man then measured the temple and the altar, and the results are recorded in chapters 40-43.

While these can be read as literal measurements, there is also an implicit metaphorical meaning in Ezekiel’s measuring because he then prophesied God’s judgement regarding all those worshipping in it – God would no longer allow to come near Him “the rebellious ones,…all the foreigners…[and] the Levites who went far from Me” (Ezek 44:6-14); only “the Levitical priests, the sons of Zadok… shall come near” (Ezek 44:15-16). The measuring of the temple and the altar was followed by God’s judgement on all who wanted to worship there, whether to welcome or forbid them. John’s measuring of ‘the temple of God and the altar, and those who worship in it’ therefore had a clear precedent in Ezekiel.

There is another similarity. Although separated by almost seven hundred years, both Ezekiel and John were taken in vision to Jerusalem when there was no Temple or altar there to be measured. Like John, Ezekiel knew that; he knew that thirteen years earlier, in 586 BC, the Babylonians had demolished Jerusalem and the First Temple (Ezek 33:21).

What then did Ezekiel actually see being measured? A future Temple.

His vision in 573 BC would have comforted the exiles, promising restoration and confirming Jeremiah’s prophecy that they would return from Babylon (Jer 29:10). Thirty-seven years later, in 536 BC, the returnees began to rebuild the Temple on Solomon’s foundations (Ezra 2:68), completing it in 516 BC (Ezra 6:15).²⁹ However, this was not Ezekiel’s temple.³⁰ The Second Temple was so puny, ‘the old men who had seen the first temple wept with a loud voice’ (Ezra 3:12). It only became magnificent after Herod reconstructed it between 20 BC and 27 AD (Mark 13:1-2, John 2:20).

This Temple was razed to the ground by the Romans in 70 AD so by the time John saw the Temple Mount in 95-96 AD, the site was again lying desolate, following the fifth ‘abomination of desolation’.³¹

What then did John measure? The Third Temple, a literal building, made of stone? Many Christians today believe so, based on their understanding of 2 Thessalonians 2:4 that the Antichrist will enthrone himself there before the Second Coming of Jesus. However, while this is possible, I believe there is a more satisfying answer to be found after we have looked at Zechariah.

Zechariah’s Jerusalem

In 519 BC (Zech 1:7),³² i.e. when the puny temple was almost finished, Zechariah had a vision but this was not about measuring the Temple but the city of Jerusalem:

1. Then I lifted up my eyes and looked, and behold, there was a man with a measuring line in his hand.

2. So I said, “Where are you going?” And he said to me, “To measure Jerusalem, to see how wide it is and how long it is.” (Zech 2:1-2)

At that time, although the temple was almost finished, the city was still in ruins. It was not until 444 BC that Nehemiah’s builders finished its walls (Neh 6:15).³³

Zechariah’s vision gave no results of the measuring – it was simply to confirm that Jerusalem would soon be rebuilt successfully.

In John’s vision, however, he is specifically commanded to “not measure” the outer court, i.e. “the court of the Gentiles”, or the city:

1. Then there was given me a measuring rod like a staff; and someone said, “Get up and measure the temple of God and the altar, and those who worship in it.

2. “Leave out the court which is outside the temple and do not measure it, for it has been given to the nations [i.e. Gentiles]; and they will tread underfoot the holy city for forty-two months.” (Rev 11:1-2, emphasis added)

John was to measure the temple, the altar and the worshippers but not Jerusalem because the city would remain desolate, trodden underfoot by Gentiles, i.e. under Gentile domination, for “forty two months”.

It is here we can apply the key we obtained in Book 1 when Jesus used the same expression:

“…and they [Israel] will fall by the edge of the sword, and will be led captive into all the nations; and Jerusalem will be trampled underfoot by the Gentiles until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled.” (Luke 21:24, emphasis added)

From this parallel use of the trampling underfoot being for “forty-two months” and “the times of the Gentiles”, I established that this time period of “a time, times and half a time” is not literal but metaphorical, its ‘real’ time being defined by the status of Jerusalem. From that, I concluded it seemed to end with Israel’s regaining sovereignty over Jerusalem in the Six Day War of June, 1967.³⁴ I also established that it is the second half of Daniel’s 70th Week, and the period between Elijah’s two metaphorical comings.

John was therefore called to make a careful distinction: he was to measure the Temple, its altar and those who worship in it in the 1st Century; he was not to measure the city of Jerusalem because that would not be regained by Israel until the 20th Century.

‘A Spiritual House’

What then did John measure? What was he to discern and comprehend? He ‘measured’ the real Temple, the one that all the others only foreshadowed. As Peter wrote, also in the 1st Century, all who believe in Jesus are to come to Him…:

4. …as to a living stone which has been rejected by men, but is choice and precious in the sight of God,

5. you also, as living stones, are being built up as a spiritual house for a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. (1 Pet 2:4-5)

So, if all of us who believe are ‘living stones’ being ‘built up as a spiritual house’, who is actually doing the building? Jesus as Messiah.

12. …“Thus says the LORD of hosts, ‘Behold, a man whose name is Branch, for He will branch out from where He is; and He will build the temple of the LORD.

13. ‘Yes, it is He who will build the temple of the LORD, and He who will bear the honor and sit and rule on His throne. Thus, He will be a priest on His throne, and the counsel of peace will be between the two offices.’ ” (Zech 6:12-13)

The New American Standard Study Bible comments:

According to the Aramaic T...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Dedication
• Thanks
• Foreword
• Introduction
• 1. ‘A Measuring Rod’
• 2. “My Two Witnesses”
• 3. Olive Trees and Lampstands
• 4. Dead Men Speaking
• 5. Irresistible Testimony
• 6. The Law and Christians
• 7. Obsolete and Disappearing?
• 8. The Law’s Curse
• 9. 20th Century Jewish Leaders
• 10. In Sackcloth in Jerusalem
• 11. Conclusions
• 12. David’s Legacy
• 13. Dead in the Street
• 14. Gentiles Rejoicing
• 15. Israel’s Restoration
• 16. The Late Rain
• Conclusions
• Epilogue
• Appendix A – God’s Covenants
• Appendix B - Grown from ‘Missionary Roots’
• Bibliography
• Index
• Other books by Graeme Carlé