The Mystery of the Shemitah: The 3,000-Year-Old Mystery That Holds the Secret of America's Future, the World's Future, and Your Future!

by Jonathan Cahn

  The Testament and the Fall

  What happened in America in 1973 was as critical as that which happened in 1917 and 1945. The ramifications of a nation, founded and blessed by God, so dramatically turning against the Word of God in making legal the killing of its unborn children, are immense. For a similar sin of violence against its children, an ancient nation was brought into judgment and destroyed.

  It was the same year in which America legalized the killing of its unborn that the nation would suffer its first military defeat in modern history. That same year would begin a long-term financial collapse that would combine with one of the most severe economic recessions in its history. And that same year the global economic order that had been founded with America as its pillar suffered its final collapse.

  And then there were the towers, conceived in America’s crowning moment, to stand as monuments of the nation’s new global supremacy. But they did not stand at the time of America’s pinnacle but twenty-eight years later in 1973, a turning point of a very different nature.

  It was the year of the soaring towers that testified of the nation’s ascendancy. But it was also the year that America began legally killing its unborn children. The World Trade Center was a symbol, on one hand, of a nation’s ascending and, on the other, of its moral and spiritual descent. It was a monument to a nation’s glory on one hand and a testament to its sin and shame on the other. It was a memorial of a nation’s fall, marking the year America began killing its most defenseless. The towers would bear witness of two glaringly different realities, each in deep conflict with the other. And the days of their coexistence would be numbered.

  The Last Cycle

  What happens now if we move forward one last cycle, twenty-eight years, to the fourth Shemitah? Where will it bring us?

  It will bring us to 2001—to the Shemitah of 9/11—in which the monument to America’s ascendant glory and unmatched powers would be destroyed. The testament of the American-led world order would be cast down. In 2001 the cycles that had begun in 1945 would come full circle:

  • The towers had been conceived in the Shemitah of 1945 at America’s apogee. On the fourth Shemitah, twenty-eight years later in 1973, they were completed. For twenty-eight years they stood. On the fourth Shemitah after their completion, in the year 2001, they were destroyed.

  • In the Shemitah of 1945 America had defeated all of its enemies and emerged from the ruins of other nations victorious and unrivaled in military power. On the fourth Shemitah, twenty-eight years later, it suffered its first military defeat in modern history, on enemy soil, in 1973, on the same date of its apogee. Twenty-eight years after that, on the fourth Shemitah, in 2001, the enemy would come to America, and the nation would suffer destruction on its own soil.

  • In the Shemitah of 1945 a new world order based on American economic and financial power was inaugurated. On the fourth Shemitah, twenty-eight years later in 1973, that order would suffer collapse. Twenty-eight years after that, on the fourth Shemitah, in 2001, the symbol of the American-led global economy would also collapse.

  The same Shemitah that brings collapse to one power, nation, or kingdom may bring the rise of another. As far as America is concerned, for much of its history and over the long-term, it had appeared to be largely on the rising side of this equation. But in recent times it has appeared to be much more on the falling side—paralleling its moral and spiritual fall from God.

  What lies ahead? What does the future hold for America and the nations? And what might the mystery of the Shemitah reveal about that future? To these questions we now turn.

  Chapter 23

  The LAST TOWER

  The Other Tower

  THE DESTRUCTION OF the twin towers was not the end in the mystery of the towers. There would be another. It would rise up from the site on which the twin towers had been stuck down—Ground Zero. It would become a symbol of the rebuilding of America in the wake of 9/11. American leaders would speak of it even before it came into existence and then, as it rose, hail its rising as a symbol of the nation’s pride and resilience. The tower would stand as the embodiment of America itself.

  And yet behind its rising lay an ancient mystery.

  The Defiant Ascent

  In the face of the enemy attack that involved the destruction of buildings and the first warning of national judgment—the people of Israel responded with defiance. They issued their fateful vow:

  The bricks have fallen down, but we will rebuild with hewn stones . . .

  —ISAIAH 9:10

  They would defy the warning given them. They would rebuild that which had collapsed into ruins on the day of terror. The rebuilding would be an act of defiance. They would rebuild their fallen buildings bigger, stronger, better, and higher than before. It wasn’t the rebuilding that was wrong, but the intent behind it. They would not listen to God’s warning but would defy it. And that which they would erect would stand as a monument, not of their resurgence, but of their defiance—a defiance that would ultimately lead to their destruction.

  The Defiant Rising Revisited

  In the wake of 9/11, America’s leaders responded, as did those of ancient Israel—not with repentance, but with defiance. Soon after the attack they began vowing to rebuild what had been struck down and to build it bigger and stronger than before. More than one spoke of the rebuilding of Ground Zero as an act of defiance. The nation would not be humbled or repent, but it would vow to rise again stronger than before.

  The Hebrew Tower

  But where does a tower come in? The ancient vow in Isaiah makes no mention of what exactly is to be rebuilt. The vow does speak of rebuilding what had fallen. This must have involved buildings and, in view of ancient warfare, would have involved towers. But we have another clue. The Hebrew behind Isaiah’s prophecy, as we have seen, carries deeper meaning than the English translation conveys. We have seen this in the verse that introduces the ancient vow:

  Who say in pride and arrogance of heart: “The bricks have fallen down, but we will rebuild with hewn stones . . . ”

  —ISAIAH 9:9–10,

  emphasis added

  The vow is spoken in pride and arrogance. The Hebrew word for “arrogance,” as we have seen, is gadal, which is linked to the word for “tower.” So we have a Hebrew word meaning “rebuild” and another linked to the word tower. The rebuilding would embody the nation’s defiant pride—and no structure better embodies pride than a tower.

  The Greek Tower

  The earliest translation ever made of the Bible is called the Septuagint. The Septuagint is the translation of the Hebrew Scriptures into Greek. It is this translation that is extensively quoted in the New Testament. When the Septuagint comes to Isaiah 9:10, something striking happens:

  The bricks are fallen down, but come . . . and let us build for ourselves a tower.”

  The ancient translation specifically speaks of the building of a tower. In other words, after the attack, on the same ground on which the bricks had fallen, there would rise a tower.

  And that is exactly what happened in America. At Ground Zero, where the nation had been attacked, where the bricks had fallen, a tower began to rise.

  The Tower of Defiance

  Even before the tower existed, it had been spoken of by American leaders. One of the nine prophetic signs of judgment recorded in The Harbinger is called “The Prophecy.” It manifested on the day after 9/11 when the United States Congress gathered on Capitol Hill to issue America’s response to the calamity. There, from the floor of the House of Representatives, the vow of defiance that brought judgment and destruction to ancient Israel was now proclaimed in America.

  In that prophetic moment an American leader vowed that the nation would rebuild that which had fallen. Implicit in those words was the rebuilding of the World Trade Center. This was the first official proclamation of the rebuilding. Thus the tower at Ground Zero was actually brought into existence with the ancient words of Israel’s judgment, through the ancient words of
Isaiah 9:10.

  This would be followed by more declarations issued by other American leaders, each one echoing another aspect of the ancient vow. One declared that the tower had to be built to show the world that America was defiant. Another charged that the tower had to be built higher than the towers it replaced—bigger, taller, and greater.

  The tower would be more than a building; it would be the most colossal American symbol ever constructed. At a planned height of 1,776 feet, a number chosen to mirror America’s year of independence, it was clear that the tower was a representation of the nation itself, rising up from the ruins, proud, unbowed, and defiant. But as much as it was an embodiment of America, it was also an embodiment of the ancient vow of judgment in Isaiah 9:10.

  The Spirit of Babel

  From where did the ancient Jewish scholars of the Septuagint get the phrase “Come . . . let us build for ourselves a tower” to use as the translation of Isaiah 9:10? They got it from Genesis 11, from the account of the Tower of Babel.

  And they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city, and a tower whose top is in the heavens; let us make a name for ourselves . . . ”

  —GENESIS 11:4,

  emphasis added

  Why did the translators use the words of Babel to translate Isaiah 9:10 in the first place? It was because they saw a direct connection between the building project of Genesis 11 and that of Isaiah 9:10. Both were based on pride and arrogance. Both were executed in defiance of God.

  So, now, America too embarked on the building of a tower at Ground Zero. It would first be known as the “Freedom Tower” and then “One World Trade Center.” The tower was conceived and executed in the spirit of pride and defiance. It had even been planned from the outset that the new tower would become the tallest building on the earth. But before it could be completed, other towers had ascended to greater heights. But the spirit of Babel infused the project from the beginning.

  The Shemitah and the Last Tower

  We have earlier seen that the mystery of the Shemitah and the mystery of the towers converge. What about the rising tower at Ground Zero? Is there anything linking it to the mystery of the Shemitah? There is.

  First is its origin. It replaced the World Trade Center, which, as we have seen, was conceived, started, finished, and destroyed in the Year of the Shemitah. That building, in turn, had replaced, as the world’s tallest building, the Empire State Building, which, in turn, had been completed in the Year of the Shemitah.

  When and where was the tower of Ground Zero conceived? The tower was publicly conceived the day after 9/11 on Capitol Hill, when the ancient vow was spoken and it was proclaimed that America would rebuild that which had been destroyed. The proclamation took place on September 12, 2001, in the last days of the Shemitah. Thus, even by a matter of days, the tower of defiance was conceived in the Year of the Shemitah.

  The construction of the new tower would be mired in controversy, obstructions, and setbacks. It would take years before the building actually began. At the end of 2006 the ground was cleared to begin the foundation. In 2007 came the preparing of the foundation. At the beginning of 2008 the building’s core began rising, ultimately to reach street level. The Shemitah was 2007–2008. Though the foundation and preparatory work began earlier, the rising of the tower began in the Year of the Shemitah.

  Omens

  In the spring of 2012 the tower had finally surpassed the height of the Empire State Building to become the tallest building in the New York skyline. The date on which it happened had already appeared in The Harbinger four months before it occurred. It was the date linked to the mystery of Ground Zero.

  In the summer of 2012, six months after The Harbinger’s release, the president of the United States made a visit to Ground Zero. There he took part in a ceremony that comprised an ominous prophetic act in accordance with the mystery. It was one of the continuing manifestations of The Harbinger mentioned earlier. He would unwittingly seal the connection between the tower and the ancient vow, a connection foretelling the coming of judgment.

  At the president’s second inauguration in January 2013, the chosen poet laureate recited a poem to the thousands gathered and the millions watching by television. In it he spoke of giving thanks, not to God, but to “the work of our hands.”1 Then as part of “the work of our hands,” he spoke of the future completion of the tower at Ground Zero:

  . . . the last floor on the Freedom Tower

  Jutting into a sky

  That yields to our resilience . . . 2

  It is nearly impossible not to hear in those words the echoing of the ancient vow of Isaiah 9:10—a nation praising its own powers, placing its trust in the works of its hands, its building of an edifice to defiantly jut into the sky, a tower to make the heavens yield in the face of its collective resilience. It was hard as well not to hear the echo of Babel.

  Less than four months later the giant spire was placed on the tower’s pinnacle, to complete its height. In the rabbinical writings it is said that a solar eclipse is a sign of judgment upon the nations. It is not known from where the idea comes, if not derived from the scriptural references to the darkening of the sun on the Day of Judgment. But as something to note, the day they set the spire on top of the tower the sun was darkened. The tower reached its highest elevation on the day of a solar eclipse.

  At the time of this writing, the tower still awaits its completion.

  The Towering Harbinger

  If the tower at Ground Zero is a harbinger, what is it a harbinger of? Of what does it portend?

  The rising of America’s high towers have marked and paralleled America’s rising to the heights of world power and prosperity. But if the rising of a tower can bear witness of the rising of a nation, then of what does the fall of a tower bear witness? The unavoidable answer is this: it bears witness of the fall of a nation.

  The same nation that was once marked by the rise of the world’s highest towers is no longer marked by them. It is now marked by their falling. And it has all taken place at the same time in that nation’s history, when the signs grow increasingly evident of the decline of its powers. And even more telling, it has all taken place when the signs of that nation’s spiritual and moral descent have grown overwhelmingly stark.

  Towers, by nature, carry symbolic meaning. But rarely has a tower been vested with so much symbolic meaning as that which rose from the pavement of Ground Zero. But beyond any meaning assigned to it by its builders, the tower’s significance is prophetic. In this case the nation’s foremost tower is not simply a tower—but a harbinger—the fourth harbinger in an ancient biblical template of judgment. It speaks of a nation attempting to scale the heavens while, at the same time, descending from God—a physical rising and a spiritual fall—two conflicting realities.

  The rising tower at Ground Zero was not only birthed by the ancient vow of Isaiah 9:10, but it is also its embodiment. The tower is the vow in concrete. It shouts of defiance. It tells of a nation that had once known God but then, in its blessings, turned against Him and warred against His ways. And it testifies of a people warned, shaken, and called by God to return, but who ignore the warning, who reject the call, and who attempt to beat back the effects of that shaking and rise higher than before, by virtue of their own powers, and against the ways of God.

  Can such a nation again ascend to its former heights of glory while, at the same time, warring against the God of its foundation? The case of ancient Israel is a warning against such a nation’s attempt to rebuild itself stronger than before. For the tower it builds, as it was with the first tower ever recorded in Scripture, will be a harbinger of coming judgment.

  Chapter 24

  THAT WHICH LIES AHEAD

  The Eyes of the Prophet

  THE PROPHET GAZED into the smoldering ruins of the holy city. He had been given warning by God and had, in turn, given warning to his nation. But they didn’t listen. They cast him into prison and continued on their course of defiance until the judgment fina
lly came.

  The year 586 BC was one of history’s turning points. Jeremiah was there to see it firsthand just as he was there to foretell it. As he now beheld the desolation of the holy city, he could not escape grappling with a mystery begun many centuries earlier in the wilderness of Sinai. The Law of Moses had foretold the day of destruction. According to the ancient words, the people would be sent into exile and the land would rest. And the time of that rest and desolation would be determined by the number of Sabbath years, the Shemitahs, the nation had broken.

  As he surveyed the city of God now lying still and silent—desolate and devoid of its inhabitants—the prophet wept and pondered the mystery of the covenant. He knew that the word shemitah meant “the release.” And now the land had been released. He knew also that it signified “the letting fall.” And now God had allowed the holy city to fall and the kingdom of Judah itself to collapse. The prophet could now only wonder how the ancient mystery of the Shemitah could have so determined the fate of his nation.

  The Mystery of the Shemitah

  We now stand two and a half thousand years later, pondering the same mystery as pondered by the prophet in the ruins. We also may wonder how such an ancient mystery has so determined the course of nations, world markets, empires, and history. And as the prophet saw the mystery become flesh- and-blood reality in his own life and time when the cataclysm fell upon the land, it is now for us as well to bring the mystery home to our day and age, to see what it may hold and reveal concerning the future of America and the world.