Observations©

By Donald S. Conkey

Date: June 5, 2008 - # 8823 - Title: More on Israel (816)

On May 16 Tribune readers were treated to an insightful essay on modern-day Israel titled “Israel’s Crime…is its insistence on living.” It was written by Charles Krauthammer and with an exception or two I agree with it fully. It is one of those rare essays that should be read intently by those who believe every Word of the Lord will indeed come to pass.

And His Words are indeed involved in this ongoing Israel/Arab saga, at least for those biblical scholars watching the fulfillment of biblical prophesies in this ongoing confrontation. Did He not say he would ‘scatter’ Israel if they were not obedient to his commandments and statutes? But He also said he would, in the latter-days, ‘gather’ them back. These scholars strongly believe they are seeing His Words regarding the literal ‘gathering” of Israel being fulfilled.

This ongoing conflict between the direct descendants of Abraham, Isaac (the twelve tribes), and Ishmael (Arab nations), began thousands of years ago and has been festering ever since. The biblical record tells us it began because of a jealous mother in a wife/concubine family (Gen 21). The record states that all nations would be blessed by Abraham’s seed and Hagar, Ishmael’s mother, was told her son would become a mighty nation. And today the descendents of Ishmael have become powerful, not always free, but mighty nations, and as we see today, controlling much of the world’s energy reserves.

But once Ishmael is told he would become ‘a nation’ the record becomes almost exclusively a record of the descendents of Isaac, his son, and better known as Jacob’s twelve sons or the Twelve Tribes of Israel. These tribes were ‘scattered” for their disobedience to the commandments and statutes of the Lord.  

Krauthammer contends that 10 of these tribes were lost to the world’s history forever just as other nations have come and gone but that two, Judah and Benjamin, were ‘miraculously restored’ from their long dispersions. He should have indicated there were three tribes restored: the Tribe of Levi, the priests, went with Judah and Benjamin to Jerusalem and were incorporated into the Jewish community.

And it was truly a miracle, as Krauthammer implied, but a miracle few would have believed a century ago. Yet it did happen. And the ‘lost Ten Tribes’ will also be restored, in the Lord’s due time, and in the same way, miraculously.   

Dr. W. Cleon Skousen wrote two clarifying books regarding the events we see unfolding today. His 1967 Fantastic Victory provides a review of how modern Israel came into being after years of wandering.  It also tells how the Arabs themselves were the ones who created the refuge camps we hear so much about today. And it reviews all of the biblical prophesies leading up to the restoration of modern day Israel. It is important, as Krauthammer implies, to understand that modern day Israel is not the Israel of the Old Testament – and that the Ten Tribes were indeed scattered and are still waiting to be restored as was Judah and Benjamin just 60 years ago.

            Skousen’s second book, his 1995 ‘The Miracle of God’s Law,’ is a scholarly review of  God’s Laws and of the events leading up to the ‘scattering’ of the Ten Tribes, of where they likely went, and of the prophesies and evidence supporting his treatise.

            Both of Skousen’s books strongly support those believers in biblical prophesy and are written in a manner most readers will find easy to read, comprehend and relate to the issues of our day.

            Krauthammer’s words regarding the questions Jefferson asked Lewis and Clark regarding the Indian’s religious Ceremonies that could link the Indians to the lost Ten Tribes was of great interest to me. Interesting because it reinforced my well documented beliefs the Founding Fathers, especially Jefferson, felt they, the Founders, had been inspired to break ties with England, to write two foundational freedom documents, to win an ‘unwinnable’ war to ‘restore’ freedom to a world enslaved by tyrants, and to set up a nation patterned after the government established by Moses; a government ‘of the people, by the people, and for the people’ from the commandments and statutes provided by the Lord to Moses.

            Krauthammer was right – Israel’s creation was a miracle and Israel is not going to fold up and go away with out one heck-of-a-fight, and two, that the Lord’s hand in Israel’s ‘unwinnable’ wars was as apparent as was God’s hand in the final outcome of America’s ‘unwinnable’ Revolutionary War.   

             that seems to be at the forefront of our nation’s foreign affairs, almost on a daily basis, and could be, as some have suggested, be behind the current run up on gas prices.

            The theory behind this suggestion is that if the Arabs couldn’t defeat Israel during the past 60 years they can bring the nation behind Israel to its knees via the gas pump. It certainly has heated up the debate.