''And when these things begin to come to pass, the look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh.'' (Luke 21:28)
Chapter 6 – The Diaspora of the Crescent (From ''The Coming Judment of Islam'')
by
John Wiertzema
As the Jews around the world continue to return to Israel in fulfillment of many Old Testament Prophecies, there is another prophecy surrounding yet another Diaspora. However, this time it is not going to be the dispersion of the Jews as in times past. This other remarkable prophecy is found tightly woven into the elaborately detailed, symbolic description of the beast carrying the great whore. This prophecy has been unfolding upon the world’s scene for many years now, but today it is more evident than ever. In an earlier chapter we learned about the beast and its seven heads and 10 horns. We also learned that the beast represents the satanic angel that will rule over the Antichrist from behind the scenes during the first three and one-half years of the tribulation period.
The beast that was, and is not, is himself also the eighth…. (Rev. 17:11)
Well, according to this verse, if he is the eighth, then there are seven other kingdoms before his, otherwise why would it say, he is the eighth? Let’s take another close look at those seven kingdoms.
9 Here is the mind which has wisdom: The seven heads are seven mountains on which the woman sits.
10 There are also seven kings. Five have fallen, one is, and the other has not yet come. (Rev. 17:9-10)
If you remember, we already identified these seven kingdoms, six of which have already come and gone. In John’s day, at the time he received this vision, the sixth kingdom was still around, which we know was the Roman Empire. However, it is not what this scripture says, but rather what it does not say that we need to see
here. This verse does not say that the seven heads are seven kingdoms. I know it may look like that is what it says, but it is not. There certainly are seven kingdoms, but it does not say the seven heads are those seven kingdoms. If you read it carefully, you will see that it says,
…the seven heads are seven mountains….(Rev. 17:9 )
The reason it is critical to make the distinction between the seven mountains and the seven kings is because these seven mountains are what the woman is sitting on. The seven heads are not the seven kings and the woman is not seen sitting on the kings. She sits on the seven mountains. This is a very important aspect of John’s vision, and it will make more sense as we continue. When I was considering this distinction, I kept asking myself, why didn’t the angel just tell John that the seven heads are seven kings? Why did the angel interject that the seven heads are seven mountains? After all, later on in John’s vision when the angel described the ten horns, he said, the ten horns are ten kings! What was the reason for it being described this way? Let’s look at it again, shall we?
9 Here is the mind which has wisdom: The seven heads are seven mountains on which the woman sits.
10 There are also seven kings. Five have fallen, one is, and the other has not yet come. And when he comes, he must continue a short time. (Revelation 17:9-10)
There is one thing that is undeniably clear. There is a notable difference between the seven mountains and the seven kings. Otherwise, what is the reason for the word also, if not but to say, in addition to the seven mountains? The seven mountains are definitely connected with the seven kings, but they are not one in the same. If you recall, in addition to the symbolic picture of the great whore sitting on the seven mountains, we were also given another symbolic picture of where she sits. When we look at both of these symbolic pictures together, we will see that they agree with each other. When the angel first started to show John this part of the vision, he said,
…Come here, I will show you the judgment of the great harlot who sits on many waters. (Rev. 17:1 NASB)
The great whore was seen sitting on the seven mountains, and also on many waters. The waters and the mountains both give us a symbolic picture of the great whore’s influence. We do not have to try very hard to find out what the waters represent, because a little later in the vision the angel explained to John what the waters were.
…The waters which you saw where the harlot sits, are peoples and multitudes and nations and tongues. (Rev. 17:15 NASB)
The waters that the whore sits on are large populations of people in various nations of the world. This describes the extent of her influence. Since the people mentioned here are people who are alive on the earth during the days of her judgment, then the other picture of her sitting on the seven mountains helps us understand exactly what nations these multitudes of people will be from. The seven mountains represent the total land territory that the seven kings had under their kingdoms during the time of their reign. In contrast, the seven mountains do not represent those actual empires of the past. This is why the woman is seen sitting on the seven mountains, but not on the seven kings themselves. The notion that the great whore represents all false religions of all time, or any false religion during the previous world empires of those kings, for that matter, is inaccurate. The people that are under the great whore’s influence, are the same people who will be alive to witness her judgment during the tribulation period. Therefore, the seven mountains are symbolic of the nations where these people live. For argument’s sake, if the great whore were seen sitting on the seven kings and not the seven mountains, we could justify that the great whore would have had influence over the people who were under those past kingdoms. However, since the seven mountains only represent the territories of those past kingdoms, and not the kingdoms themselves, then we must conclude that the great whore cannot represent a religion that co-existed with any of those past kingdoms.
The previous six world empires have come and gone, as well as those who governed over those empires, but the lands that they controlled are still here. A king’s life is …a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away (James 4:14), but the earth outlasts them all.
One generation passes away, and another generation comes; But the earth abides forever. (Ecclesiastes 1:4)
Islam and the Seven Mountains
The great whore will have religious influence over the total territory that is represented by the seven mountains. That is the reason why she is found sitting on the seven mountains. She is not seen sitting on the seven kings because she does not have influence over the previous six kings or those past kingdoms. However, she will have influence over, and dominate the seventh kingdom, which is made up of the ten kings. These are the same ten kings that will eventually hand their kingdoms over to the Antichrist, who will be the leader of the eighth kingdom.
If you were to look at a map of all the land that was under the control of the past six kingdoms combined, which include the Egyptian, Assyrian, Babylonian, Medo-Persian, Grecian, and the Roman Empires, you would see a picture of where the great whore will sit. That picture will be where she will have her greatest influence in the last days. Since we have already concluded in this book thus far, that the great whore is Islam, we have to answer some very important questions. What influence does Islam have today in relation to the total land territory under the past six world empires? Does Islam objectively fit the picture that was shown to us in the scriptures, as the woman sitting on the previous six mountain kingdoms? It most certainly does! Let’s consider the following.
By the time of Mohammed’s death in 632 AD, Islam had spread throughout most of current day Saudi Arabia, Yemen, and portions of Jordan and Iraq. By the year 750 AD, just over one hundred years later, Islam had flourished with unprecedented swiftness throughout the Middle East, the northern tip of Africa, and parts of Europe. Modern day countries of the Middle East, including Iran, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Syria, Turkey, and Lebanon, all bowed down under the symbol of the crescent. By the same time, the violent march of the Muslim Religion had also made its way westward, engulfing the current day territories of Egypt, Libya, Algeria, Tunisia, Morocco, and even Spain. Muslim rulers eventually lost control of Spain in 1492 when King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella re-conquered Spain with the fall of the last Muslim stronghold, Granada. In 846 AD Muslim forces sacked Rome, and later almost captured France as well. In spite of this, they never gained a strong, lasting foothold throughout Western Europe.
All of the territories that came under Muslim control by the eighth-century fit within the boundaries of all of the past six world empires. Even to this day, Islam has maintained its influence over most of these countries and is continuing to expand even more. However, as widespread as Islam had become throughout the region, it had only enlarged its reach far enough to “maintain” influence over five of the six past world empire territories (the key word being “maintain”). The heart of the Old Roman Empire territory, Western Europe, had escaped Islam’s long-term grasp and relentless control. Nevertheless, if the great whore is seen sitting on the territories of the past six world empires in the last days, then her influence must be prevalent in today’s countries of Western Europe as well as the Middle East and North Africa. Only this would complete the picture given to us in the scriptures. Islam must spread, at least to some degree of significance, throughout today’s Western European countries in order to complete and fulfill the symbolic picture of the great whore sitting on the seven mountains.
Islam and Europe
Today, there is an amazing trend that has many Western European leaders on the highest alert. The continuing phenomena I call the Diaspora of the crescent, which simply means the spread of Islam, has decided to finally advance into these evasive territories of the Old Roman Empire. For the last several decades Muslim presence has steadily increased throughout Western Europe, causing a major stir in the region. It has become such a controversial issue in Europe, that several committees have been formed in recent years, bringing together some of the most brilliant minds studying cultural stability, to discuss the challenges of Islamic integration into western civilizations. Some people have rejected the possibility of Muslims being content with, and entirely submitted to, democratically ruled countries, calling it the “Clash of Civilizations.” The following is a list of current day European countries (with their approximate Muslim populations), that reside within the boundaries of the Old Roman Empire:
Spain (500,000), France (4,000,000), Great Britain (1,500,000), Italy (700,000), Greece (370,000), Germany (3,500,000), Switzerland (311,000), Netherlands (700,000), Albania (2,500,000), Austria (200,000), Belgium (400,000), Macedonia (682,000), Bosnia and Herzegovina (1,800,000), Croatia (58,000), and Slovenia (48,000).
Today, there are some seventeen million Muslims living in these particular countries, and their presence has not gone unnoticed. Adding to the trend of the Diaspora of the crescent, the European birth rate continues to plummet, causing non-Muslim Europeans to become a dying breed as their populations dwindle without replacement. In contrast, Muslim immigrants keep flowing into Europe, and European Muslim families are reproducing at a record rate. As Dr. Omer Taspinar, adjunct professor at Johns Hopkins University, wrote in 2003:
“During the postwar labor shortage in the 1950s and 1960s, Turks, Algerians, Moroccans, Tunisians, and Pakistanis were called to help spur Europe’s economic recovery. No host country expected these ‘guestworkers,’ as the Germans called them with characteristic frankness, to overstay their welcome. Like all good guests, they were supposed to leave, preferably when the recession hit and the party was over in the 1970s. They didn’t. Instead, their families joined them, and new generations of European Turks, Algerians, Moroccans, Tunisians, and Pakistanis were born.”
“More are on the way. Today, the Muslim birth rate in Europe is three times higher than the non- Muslim one. If current trends continue, the Muslim population of Europe will nearly double by 2015, while the non-Muslim population will shrink by 3.5 percent.”
It will not be long before France, followed by the rest of Europe, being inundated with these swelling Muslim population trends, will eventually find itself under radical Muslim domination. The Diaspora of the crescent is another one of the most significant signs that we are living in the last days. I know that sometimes it may look like the world is in a big mess, and the governments around the world are not sure how to deal with the issues at hand, but the outcome has already been revealed.
Islam Singled Out For Judgment
The fact is that Islam is already in position right now, as the great whore sitting on seven mountains. Islam is the only religion that perfectly fits the symbolism of the Bible concerning the great whore. As I stated earlier, some people have mistakenly asserted that the great whore represents all false religions, including those of the past that are no longer in existence. This cannot be the case because we are given a description of what the great whore will look like at the time of her judgment, and not what she may or may not have looked like in the past. It is abundantly clear that the great whore represents a false religion that will exist at the time just before the Second Coming.
Others may have the tendency to view the great whore as all false religions of the last days, and not specifically Islam. Even though this would seem to be a credible argument, it also does not fit the picture of the great whore given to us in John’s vision. So far, from this chapter, we have seen that the extent of the great whore’s influence, as enormous as it is, only reaches to the territories of the six previous world empires that have oppressed Israel during the times of the Gentiles. (Important note: the great whore will not have influence in those previous empires, but over the cumulative land territory of those past empires.) Her influence is not described as reaching beyond those boundaries. Even though the whole earth will be affected by the terrorism that the great whore produces, there are many regions that will not follow after the deceptiveness of her false doctrines. The description we are given of the great whore shows us both the far reach of her influence, and also, the limited reach of her influence.
Another important aspect that we need to address is why God does not seemingly deal with the other false religions in the same manner as Islam. Why would Islam be singled out and judged while Hinduism, for example, is not dealt with? Well, I believe that all false religions will be judged in the same manner and at the same time as Islam because they are all part of Satan’s vast system of deception in the world. The judgment of Islam will result in a ripple effect in the spirit realm over all the other false religions, which are also the works of Satan. But there is a very specific reason why Islam was singled out in the scriptures for judgment while all of the other religions of the world are not mentioned. If you recall, the Bible mentions certain empires that co- existed with Israel, such as the Roman Empire. However, did you know that for approximately four hundred years the massive Han Dynasty in China co-existed with the Roman Empire? In fact, there were many other empires that existed in history at the same time of the six empires that were singled out in God’s Word. Why weren’t the Han Dynasty, Carthage, or Parthian Empire mentioned in the scriptures? The reason these six world empires were included in the scriptures, while others were left out, is because those particular six empires were the ones who, to a great degree, were guilty of, and involved in, the oppression of Israel. (Remember that Satan has a history of using certain earthly kingdoms to promote his agenda of eliminating the Jewish people in order to stop God’s overall plan revealed in the scriptures.) With that in mind, we can understand why some religions of the world would not be mentioned in the prophetic scriptures. It is because they are not directly involved in the oppression of Israel. Islam is the main thrust in the world today of the oppression of Israel. Satan is trying his best to wipe the Jews off the map through the religion of Islam. That is why God takes it personal, and deals with Islam specifically in the scriptures. God’s promise to Abraham still holds true, and always will.
I will bless those who bless you, And I will curse him who curses you…. (Gen. 12:3)
The prophecy of the Diaspora of the Crescent may have caught us all off guard because we did not see it coming, but now that we do see it, it is all the more sobering. The following chapters will continue to be even more revealing, as we take a look at the great whore’s judgment.
The Coming Judgment of Islam
Does the Bible predict the rise and fall of Islam? How will Islam's coming judgment affect the world as we know it? If you have ever wondered where Islam fits into the scope of end-time prophecy - YOU MUST READ THIS BOOK! The Coming Judgment of Islam is a serious and in-depth look at one of the most significant and yet misunderstood prophecies in the Bible. This timely and provocative exposition of the Book of Revelation chapters seventeen and eighteen will guide you through some of the most vexing questions as to where we currently are on God's prophetic timetable. Written in a scripturally balanced and practical teaching style, John Wiertzema takes us on a fascinating journey into the near future in this captivating account. This sobering study will open your eyes and change the way you look at our world forever!
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