The Oracle

by Jonathan Cahn

  Return to the land of your birth, to your ancestral land, to your homeland.”

  “And when did Israel actually come into existence?”

  “Just over five months after that vote. It would be ushered into existence by a declaration. The first words of that declaration were ‘The Land of Israel was the birthplace of the Jewish people.’ 3 But the Hebrew word used in that declaration for birthplace was moledet, the exact word that appeared in the appointed Scripture.”

  “What about Esau? What did he have to do with Israel’s rebirth?”

  “Jacob’s return to the land revived an old conflict. When the two brothers were young, Jacob managed to obtain their father’s blessing, the birthright. The birthright had to do with the inheritance and the right to the land. Esau believed it belonged to him and vowed vengeance. So as Jacob returned to the land, he prepared for the worst.

  “The conflict between the two brothers was also part of the Scripture appointed for the day of the United Nations vote and would be prophetic. The return of the Jewish people to the land would likewise revive an ancient conflict of two brothers, the Jews and the Arabs. And the United Nations vote involved them both. As for Esau, his bloodline ran through the Arab nations, the nations that would wage war on the day of Israel’s return. And as did Esau, so they vowed the death of their brothers and the destruction of Israel. And as did Jacob, the Jewish people began preparing for the attack to be launched against them on the day of their return. And it was all set in motion on the day of the appointed Scripture that spoke of Jacob’s return and the conflict of the two brothers.”

  “And what happened to Jacob and Esau?”

  “They would be reconciled. But it was prophesied that the children of Esau and the children of Jacob would be in conflict down through the ages. And so the war would continue into the time of Israel’s return. But on the day when the world assigned a homeland for the children of Jacob, the appointed word contained an ancient prophecy given to Jacob and specifically concerning his descendants:

  To your descendants, I will assign this land.” 4

  “What about the angel in my vision?”

  “That,” said the Oracle, “is another mystery. In the Partition Plan, voted on at the United Nations, there was no name given to the future Jewish state. The name would only come on the eve of the nation’s rebirth the following year. Several different names were proposed, among them Judah and Zion. But it was another name that would be chosen. And on the day of the nation’s birth the name would be announced to the world. The new nation would be called Israel.

  “In the ancient account, at the end of his wrestling, Jacob pleads with the angel for a blessing. The angel blesses him with a new name: Israel. He only received that name as he returned to the land. So too it was only when the children of Jacob were returning to the land that they received the name Israel.

  “The angel’s blessing constitutes the very first appearance of the name Israel in the Bible. On the day the United Nations voted the Jewish nation back into existence without a name, do you know what the Scripture appointed for the day contained?”

  “What?”

  “The name Israel. . . the very first appearance of the name Israel.”

  “How does it appear?”

  “It appears in the words,

  You shall be called “Israel.” 5

  “So on the day that the United Nations gathered to vote the Jewish nation back into the world, the appointed Scripture was ‘You shall be called “Israel”’?”

  “Yes.”

  “Amazing.”

  “Now, Jacob’s birth was recorded in an earlier portion of the Bible. But the angel’s words represent the birth of Israel. So on the day the United Nations voted for the birth of Israel, the Scripture appointed for that day was that which recorded . . . the birth of Israel. Therefore, when the nations of the world gathered together to vote on the birth of Israel, all throughout the world the birth of Israel was being proclaimed and chanted from the scrolls of the appointed word. And as the account spoke of the changing of Jacob into Israel, so the resolution passed on that day would lead to the changing of the children of Jacob into the nation of Israel.”

  “When I next saw the Oracle, he would open up the mystery of an appointed word of a very different nature, one hidden away for two thousand years to be revealed at the exact moment when an ancient prophecy was to be fulfilled.”

  “And through what vision would it be revealed?”

  “The vision of the goat.”

  Chapter 27

  THE DAY OF THE SCROLLS

  I RETURNED TO the cave to find the Oracle sitting in a chamber of clay vessels, cylindrical jars of reddish, brown, and white clay, taller than they were wide, ancient, and crowned with cylindrical lids. I sat down beside him and asked him to tell me the meaning of what I had seen in the cave at the end of the vision.”

  “The swirling stars and galaxies,” I said, “what was that about?”

  “The universe,” he said.

  “But what did it mean?”

  “You threw a rock into the darkness,” said the Oracle. “On the rock was a word. From the rock came a universe. Before the world . . . was the word. It was the word that brought the creation into existence. So when God creates, He begins with the word. He spoke to Abraham of a nation that would become as numerous as the stars. He spoke of it before it existed. First the word, then the reality, the nation.

  “And before that nation could be established in the Promised Land, the children of Israel were brought to Mount Sinai to be given the word—again, first the word, then the kingdom. Centuries later, when the Jewish people mourned in exile in Babylon, they were given visions and prophecies of their nation’s restoration. Seventy years later the word would be fulfilled. And when the remnant of that exile returned to the land, a man called Ezra would gather them together to read to them the Scriptures . . . Again, the word and then the restoration.”

  “And with the rebirth of Israel in modern times . . . ”

  “Over two thousand years before it happened, it was foretold in the word, in vision and prophecy. As it was for the creation, so it was for the creation of Israel. Before God creates, He sends forth the word. And so the restoration of the word is linked to the restoration of the nation. And when God restores the nation, He always restores the word.”

  “But what does this have to do with the vision?”

  “A bedouin shepherd was searching for a stray goat.”

  “The goat in my vision.”

  “The shepherd climbed up the side of a small mountain and noticed the opening of a cave. He threw a stone into it.”

  “As I did.”

  “And as you did in your vision,” said the Oracle, “so too he heard the crashing of pottery. He would enter the cave with a friend, and they would explore it together. Inside they found clay jars. They removed the lids that covered the openings. Inside the jars were rolls of parchment with writing on them. They brought the parchments to a merchant in Bethlehem.

  “At that time the Hebrew University’s head archaeologist was Eliezer Sukenik. Upon being told of the existence of the parchments, Sukenik decided to go to Bethlehem to see for himself. The Bethlehem merchant allowed him to take the scrolls and examine them in the privacy of his home.

  “Upon arriving home, Sukenik began unrolling the parchments, his fingers trembling at the prospect that what he was about to see was unprecedented. The words on the parchments were in Hebrew. The writing was ancient, going back thousands of years. It would represent the beginning of what has been called the greatest archaeological discovery of modern times . . . the Dead Sea Scrolls. The scrolls had remained hidden and miraculously preserved for two thousand years.

  “But it was not only that ancient texts lay hidden in the caves. Hidden as well was the word of God. The Dead Sea Scrolls contained the Hebrew Scriptures. Up to their discovery, the oldest surviving copy of the Hebrew Scriptures, or most of the Bible, came from the Middl
e Ages. Any biblical manuscript from before that time had either been lost, destroyed, or unable to survive the passage of time.

  “But with the uncovering of the Dead Sea Scrolls, the world was now in possession of a Bible penned a thousand years earlier, from ancient times, from the time of Jesus. The discovery was momentous. The scrolls not only confirmed, in ink and parchment, the ancient origins of the Bible but also its accuracy. The text of the ancient parchments amazingly matched the modern text of the Bible. In two thousand years the word of God remained unchanged. Contained in the scrolls themselves was the ancient prophecy ‘The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God endures forever.’” 1

  “When did all this happen?”

  “The Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered in the year 1947.”

  “1947! The same year everything else happened . . . the fifty-year prophecy, the Partition Plan, and the UN resolution that would bring forth the rebirth of Israel.”

  “In the year of restoration comes the restoration of the word.”

  “So the people of Israel came back to the land, and God restored the word to them.”

  “Yes,” said the Oracle. “And when did the nation of Israel actually come back into the world?”

  “The following year.”

  “First the word and then the creation.”

  “So first the scrolls and then the nation.”

  “And the scrolls themselves would speak of the nation’s restoration. The most celebrated of the Dead Sea Scrolls was the scroll of Isaiah. It was there in that very first cave and was preserved in its entirety. Israel would build an entire sanctuary to house it, the Shrine of the Book. It was that scroll that contained some of the most powerful words of comfort ever given to Israel and some of the most beautiful prophecies of its future restoration. Several of these would come true in the twentieth century with the gathering of the Jewish people back to the land:

  He will . . . assemble the outcasts of Israel, and gather together the dispersed of Judah from the four corners of the earth. 2

  “But the mystery joining together the nation and the word would go even deeper. On the first night when Sukenik sat in his study deciphering the Dead Sea Scrolls, when after two thousand years their ancient secrets would for the first time be revealed, something else was happening. In the next room Sukenik’s youngest son, Mati, was listening to the radio. Mati would rush back and forth to tell his father what he was hearing.”

  “Why?”

  “The day that Sukenik brought the Dead Sea Scrolls back to his home, the day he unrolled them, and the day their words first came to light was November 29, 1947. November 29, 1947, was the day that the United Nations was assembled in New York to vote on the resolution that would bring Israel back into existence.”

  “The word and the nation on the same day!”

  “When Sukenik’s son rushed into his office that night to give him the last report, his father was deeply absorbed in the ancient words coming to life before his eyes. His son shouted the news: the United Nations resolution had passed. Israel would again become a nation.”

  “The lost possession,” I said, “the word that was lost for two thousand years, was now restored, and the nation that was lost for two thousand years was now restored . . . at the same time.”

  “Yes,” said the Oracle, “in the very same year, on the very same day, on the very same night—at the very same moment.”

  “The next mystery would come from a vision that startled me more than any of the others I had seen up to that point. And it was in that vision that I learned the meaning of the letter on the third door and on the ram.”

  “Which vision was that?”

  “The skeleton lady.”

  Chapter 28

  RESURRECTION LAND

  I FOUND THE Oracle sitting in the same chamber as before, surrounded by the clay vessels. He lifted up one of them, opened its lid, reached inside, and removed a rolled-up piece of paper.”

  “This is the declaration,” he said, “that proclaimed to the world that the nation of Israel had returned.”

  He handed it to me. I noticed the date, May 14, 1948.

  “The declaration?” I said.

  “This is what was published by the Provisional Government at the moment of Israel’s return. But there’s something strange about it.”

  “What?”

  “Words you would not expect to appear on any such document and that have never appeared on the founding document of any other nation. Look at the bottom, the bottom left. Read it.”

  “‘Prophesy over these bones.’ What on earth does that mean?”

  “What you saw on the ram and on the third door is the Hebrew letter tav. It stands for the word tikumah. It was the year of tikumah. Tikumah is the Hebrew word for resurrection and in this case for the year of resurrection. So it was the year of the tikumah.”

  “What does resurrection have to do with the Jubilee?”

  “Everything,” he said. “What is it that the Jubilee brings?”

  “Return and restoration.”

  “And what is resurrection but the ultimate restoration and the ultimate return, the return to what once was . . . but was lost. The words on the declaration are ancient. They come from a vision given to the prophet Ezekiel. He was taken to a valley of dry bones. There he heard the Lord say to him, ‘Prophesy over these bones.’ 1 So he did. The bones started moving together until they formed skeletons, a great multitude of skeletons. Then sinews came upon them, then flesh . . . And then they came alive.”

  “Which is what I saw in the vision. What did it mean?”

  “The dry bones were Israel, the ruins and hopelessness of a destroyed nation. But it was a prophecy of hope. God would gather them back together and raise them from the dead. He would resurrect them.”

  “But in my vision there was only one resurrection. Why?”

  “Ezekiel saw the resurrection of the people that made up the nation. But what you saw was the resurrection of the nation as a whole. The woman you saw lying on the ground wasn’t a person but the nation itself. You see, it wasn’t only that the people of Israel would be resurrected; it was that the entire nation would follow the pattern of resurrection. The nation itself would rise according to the template of the dry bones.”

  “So that’s why she was so big,” I said.

  “Yes. Nations,” he said, “follow the course of nature. They’re born. They grow; they become larger, stronger, and more complex. But a resurrection is the reversal of nature, the reversal of death, just as the Jubilee is the reversal of loss. The birth of nations is a natural phenomenon. But what happened to Israel was not natural. It appeared to be a birth. But it was ultimately a resurrection.

  “A resurrection brings back, restores, and raises up what was dead. In AD 70 the nation or kingdom of Israel died. Death brings disintegration, the scattering of elements. So ancient Israel disintegrated, so much so that its remnants, its culture, its citizens, and its people were scattered in pieces throughout the earth. To disintegrate is natural. But to come back together is not. But against the laws of nature and history, the scattered pieces of ancient Israel began gathering back together again . . . the scattered bones of your vision, assembling piece by piece. So from the ends of the earth, the remnants of the ancient nation, the scattered people of Israel, began coming together: resurrection.”

  “And then the bones began to form skeletons.”

  “So too in the resurrection of Israel, the bones began to form a skeleton. The nation was first manifested in skeletal form, a skeletal culture, a skeletal government, a skeletal army, the framework of what was yet to come.

  “With birth,” said the Oracle, “one grows into what one has not yet been. One develops from childhood to maturity. But a resurrection is different. One doesn’t begin from one’s beginning; one begins from one’s end, from the fully formed state of that which had once been. One becomes what one once was. So Israel wasn’t born as other nations but resurrecte
d into the fully formed pattern of what it had once been in ancient times, an ancient nation coming back into the modern world.”

  “And the sinews and skin that formed around the skeleton?”

  “The skeletal nation began taking on flesh and blood. The pattern and framework took on flesh-and-blood reality. Israel was becoming a fully formed nation. So it all happened in reverse, as in a resurrection, as in a Jubilee.”

  “How exactly did it happen in reverse?”

  “In the world,” he said, “nations give birth to national anthems. But in Israel the anthem appeared when the nation was nothing more than a dream. The nation didn’t give birth to the anthem—the anthem gave birth to the nation. In the world a settlement becomes a town and then a city and is given a name. But in Israel the names of the cities came first, before the city existed. And then they came into existence or back into existence . . . as it was written, ‘And the city will be rebuilt on its ruin.’ 2

  “In the world,” said the Oracle, “languages develop over time. But with Israel its native language, Hebrew, had been dead for ages. Then a young Jewish man from eastern Europe heard a voice saying, ‘the resurrection of Israel on its ancestral soil.’ 3 A resurrected nation would need a resurrected language. So he made his life’s mission the resurrection of the Hebrew language. The rest of his years would be spent creating a massive dictionary of a language that had been dead since ancient times. In the world languages give birth to dictionaries. But with Israel and with Hebrew it was the dictionary that gave birth to the language. And in the world it is the parents who teach the children the native language. But in Israel it was the children who taught the native language to the parents . . . everything in reverse . . . resurrection.