I want you to see a belligirent commentary I received and how I responded.

 

This is the original comment.

“Greetings in the name of Jesus and I hope you are covered by his blood. The mouth that roared is never the muslim movement in the singular .because throughout history they had never truly had world dominance Or conquered as much as the Pagan Roman Empire. Nor persecuted so many of God’s people during their rule . Even during our Christ’s human present on earth they were firmly in power and ruled the holy land of Israel . Pagan Rome in this passage is the dragon symbol gave its power to Christendom papacy Rome around 476 AD. Around the middle ages They had brought christianity in to the dark ages of a prophetical period of 1260 years or 42 months . Where bible abiding Christians were denied the right to read the bible and many persecuted for defying the papacy rule that was enforced by the state. Such as the long like of Sunday worship., paying indulgence, and purgatory and all the other laws of a man ‘mouth of a lion.’ Of course inDaniel 7 Daniel’s dream was of a-lion that was symbolic of Babylon the kingdom of King Nebuchadnezzar."

My response goes as follows:

Wow, greetings in the name of Jesus to you also.

I also hope you are covered by his blood because your hostile attitude doesn't demonstrate His love. I said it in this manner because, while it may be important to have a lively discussion, attacking people for stating their opinion – based on facts is not what I deem a lively discussion. 

I have a leftist living in my home, and this time of Presidential transition has been impossible in terms of conversation, as she bases her arguments on emotion and not facts, just as you have. 

It would seem that raising your voice to an angry level is supposed to help win your argument, but you are wrong, and I need you to know that you have NOT gained any sense of respect from me by the tone I perceive in your comments. Strangely, I am prone to allow remarks in opposition to remain as comments on my blog so that others can comprehend the type of garbage that many of us have been dealing with for most of our Christian lives. Surely you did not think I would let your attack just slide by.

You said, "The mouth that roared is never the muslim movement in the singular."

Let's tackle this for a moment. First, I do not and cannot understand your statement. It is certainly not a question, nor is it a respectable argument in rebuttal to anything I may have said in my post. In Daniel chapter seven, we are given two examples of a mouth. One is the description, and the other is the explanation – a fourth beast, out of which comes a little horn (another kingdom,) and out of this kingdom comes its spokesperson.

Daniel 7:7-8 NASB "After this I kept looking in the night visions, and behold, a fourth beast, dreadful and terrifying and extremely strong; and it had large iron teeth. It devoured and crushed and trampled down the remainder with its feet; and it was different from all the beasts that were before it, and it had ten horns. (8) "While I was contemplating the horns, behold, another horn, a little one, came up among them, and three of the first horns were pulled out by the roots before it; and behold, this horn possessed eyes like the eyes of a man and a mouth uttering great boasts."

We are NEVER given a firm definition of who the fourth empire is like we are with the first three. 

So arbitrarily assigning Rome as the fourth empire does not work scripturally.

Historically, we know that the third empire was the Grecian under Alexander, but few pay attention to the fact that upon Alexander's death, the empire fell under the rule of two remaining generals – Seleucid in the North and Ptolemy in the South. After the demise of these final two sub-empires, there were the Parthians and the Sassanids. 

In Joel Richardson's book, The Mideast Beast, he states: “Because of their Persian ethnicity and identity, the Parthians and Sassanids were not treated as distinct empires within Nebuchadnezzar’s dream;” and yet, we ignore them as the potential fourth empire; this is an interesting and yet confusing way to handle the interpretation of the iron legs of a statue.

The next passage conveys Daniel's desire to know the exact meaning of the fourth beast. Why? Because it was different from all the others, as it had a mouth and it was significantly larger in appearance than the others. You can look this up in Daniel 7:19-20.

We see this mouth one more time in Revelation.

Revelation 13:5-7 NASB There was given to him a mouth speaking arrogant words and blasphemies, and authority to act for forty-two months was given to him. (6) And he opened his mouth in blasphemies against God, to blaspheme His name and His tabernacle, that is, those who dwell in heaven. (7) It was also given to him to make war with the saints and to overcome them, and authority over every tribe and people and tongue and nation was given to him.

Notice that here that “the mouth” speaks blasphemies. There should be an immediate association with the ministry of Christ when He told the Pharisees that they were blaspheming – as they were attributing His actions of casting out a demon to the work and power of Satan/Beelzebub. With that information, you can make a logical assessment as to what this “mouth” is saying.

You said: “because throughout history they had never truly had world dominance Or conquered as much as the Pagan Roman Empire.”

Again I refer to Joel Richardson and the Mideast Beast, where he states, “The three other kingdoms that would be trampled and crushed, as we already know, are Babylon, Medo-Persia, and Greece. The text is clear that the fourth kingdom would “crush” or conquer all three of these empires. The three empires never co-existed of course, and thus we must ask what the text means when it says that the fourth empire would “crush” all of the others.”

Richardson goes on to say, “the Roman Empire only conquered roughly one-third of the regions controlled by Babylon, Medo-Persia, and Greece. But roughly two-thirds of the regions controlled by these empires were left entirely untouched by the Roman Empire. In fact, the Roman Empire never even reached the two Persian capital cities of Ecbatana and Persepolis.”

According to this information, you can see that the Roman Empire NEVER obtained “world dominance,” as you suggested.

You continued your denunciation of the pagan Roman Empire by saying, “Nor persecuted so many of God’s people during their rule.”

If you could segregate the actions of the Roman military from the governing body in Italy, you might be able to say that God's people were not persecuted so frequently, but historically we cannot do that. We have at least a couple of examples of Rome's (Nero) persecution. When Paul writes to the church in Rome, it has barely been reestablished since the followers of Christ were driven out of Rome. 

In saying followers of Christ, our gentile minds only picture evangelical non-Jewish believers, when the majority of this body was just the opposite and gentile followers were in the minority. So when you say “God's people,” you must be talking about Jewish followers of Christ. 

In Romans 16:3, Paul tells the church in Rome to greet Prisca and Aquila, my fellow workers in Christ Jesus. We can learn that “They had come to Corinth from Rome because of Claudius’ decree that all Jews must leave Rome” The Bible Knowledge Commentary adds: “Suetonius (a.d. 69? -140), a biographer of Roman emperors, described what may have been the occasion for such a decree. In his Life of Claudius (25.4) he referred to the constant riots of the Jews at the instigation of Chrestus. Possibly the name Chrestus is a reference to Christ.” Our strong assumption is that these followers of Christ were doing everything possible to stand against unjust laws and therefore deemed troublemakers, just like today.

It is obvious that persecution under the Roman Empire was quite common for Jews and followers of Christ.

Allow me to show one more example. As we fling about our traditional and fearful language about eschatology, we denounce anyone who suggests a potential timing of the Lord's return. The blasting argument usually comes from Matthew 24:36, where Jesus was speaking to a Jewish audience about Jewish things in a language they understood, but we Gentiles, because of a lack of teaching, do not understand said,
“but of that day and hour, no one knows, not even the Son,...” 

A dive into the surrounding events (context) might help us to understand, so we go to Daniel's prophecies, and there we find a reference to the people of the prince.

Daniel 9:26 NASB "Then after the sixty-two weeks the Messiah will be cut off and have nothing, and the people of the prince who is to come will destroy the city and the sanctuary. And its end will come with a flood; even to the end, there will be war; desolations are determined.

Preterists will argue that this scenario has been fulfilled. I suppose to them, that means we are living in the time of God's wrath; that is NOT the case, and the events will have a second fulfillment. 

The point I want to make is that the people of the prince is an established historical event, fulfilled initially during the rule of Titus Vespasian in 70 AD.

You added: “Even during our Christ’s human presence on earth, Rome was firmly in power and ruled the holy land of Israel.”

Rome comes into the picture only because: 

First, Rome conquered Jerusalem;

Secondly, Herod’s temple was destroyed in 70 A.D. under the Roman rule of Titus, just as Jesus said it would. 

Sadly, few take this study of the destruction of the temple to the next step, as that is where we find Josephus and Tacitus. Both of these historians recorded that the destruction of the temple can be directly attributed to Assyrian conscript troops, who refused to follow orders to quench the fires that they had started because they had an open hatred of the Jews. 

Since we choose to read Daniel 9:26, which says, the people of the prince that is to come, as Titus – the Roman, instead of what the historians provided – Assyrians. With such skewed information, we only have one logical conclusion, we must be looking for the Catholic Pope as the Antichrist, and that does not work. Therefore, our entire concept of eschatology is tainted by the false narrative of a final Roman world leader/Antichrist.

Here, in this next set of run-on sentences, you have run together multiple topics and ideas to fuel some twisted theology.

• “Pagan Rome in this passage is the dragon symbol”

  What passage? You have not once referred to scripture - merely conjecture.

  If you did a search for “the dragon,” references that are significant primarily come out of Revelation; there is, however, one found in Isaiah.

  Isaiah 27:1 ESV In that day the LORD with his hard and great and strong sword will punish Leviathan the fleeing serpent, Leviathan the twisting serpent, and he will slay the dragon that is in the sea.

  
  

  While in the next verse, the dragon is referred to as a sign; it is well understood to be Satan.

  Revelation 12:3-4 ESV And another sign appeared in heaven: behold, a great red dragon, with seven heads and ten horns, and on his heads seven diadems. (4) His tail swept down a third of the stars of heaven and cast them to the earth. And the dragon stood before the woman who was about to give birth so that when she bore her child, he might devour it.

  We understand the woman to be Israel and the child to be Yahshua/Jesus.

  
  

• I must assume, in your narrative, that Rome would have “gave its power to Christendom papacy Rome around 476 AD.”

  There is a semblance of clarity only because you initiated this barrage with “ Pagan Rome … is the dragon symbol.” 

  The assumption that this is between two “Christians,” means that you, by your twisted theological inferences, are that you are including yourself in one of those groups. 

  Ideally, we should be having this discussion based on the Word of God. So, let's get back to scriptural associations found in the Revelation.

  
  

  Revelation 13:1-2 NASB And the dragon stood on the sand of the seashore. Then I saw a beast coming up out of the sea, having ten horns and seven heads, and on his horns were ten diadems, and on his heads were blasphemous names. (2) And the beast which I saw was like a leopard, and his feet were like those of a bear, and his mouth like the mouth of a lion. And the dragon gave him his power and his throne and great authority.

  
  

  This says NOTHING about Rome, pagans – although we, outside of Judaism, are thought of as pagans, and it does not say anything about the papacy. So here, you have Rome playing the role of Satan and giving its power to the papacy. Much too far of a stretch for me.

• Your next dip into darkness rears its ugly head as you refer to “they.” Since you have talked about your distaste for Romans and the papacy, I am NOT sure who you are referring to when you say, “Around the middle ages, They had brought christianity in to the dark ages of a prophetical period of 1260 years or 42 months .”

  Since nothing happens outside of God's plans and ordination, perhaps you should rethink much of this statement. I am not an expert on church history and, therefore, am not equipped to argue about who brought Christianity into the middle ages. I do not see how it is relevant to your life either.

  I did note that you had to drag numbers that are integrally associated with eschatology, but you did not put them into that setting. We find an association of this person with a mouth in the Revelation.

  Revelation 13:5 NASB There was given to him a mouth speaking arrogant words and blasphemies, and authority to act for forty-two months was given to him.

  I suspect you played with the numbers and found that 42 months on a 30-day Jewish calendar equals 1260 days. Bizarre and yet fascinating that you would tie these numbers into Christianity coming into the middle ages.

  
  

• “Where bible abiding Christians were denied the right to read the bible and many persecuted for defying the papacy rule that was enforced by the state.”

  I think many of us are aware that the Catholic church was the state church. Their abuses, then, just as now, are, I am sure, an offense to God. I recently learned that it was the state church that changed the wording of 2 Thessalonians 2:3, where, in Greek, the word apostasia was used. One of the earliest Bibles – the Geneva Bible, properly translated apostasia as the departure – refers to the gathering of the church back to Jesus. The Catholic church ordered a rewrite that reflected their angst over people leaving the Catholic church for Protestantism, and hence the word apostasia was read as apostasy – a falling away from, at the least, religion proper.

  If the Congress of the United States can be opened in prayer, by a Methodist minister, in “the name of the monotheistic god Brahman,” we are deeply entrenched in apostasy.

  
  

• “Such as the long like of Sunday worship., paying indulgence, and purgatory and all the other laws of a man ‘mouth of a lion.’ Of course, in Daniel 7, Daniel’s dream was of a-lion that was symbolic of Babylon, the kingdom of King Nebuchadnezzar.”

I am done with this commentary, as it makes little to no sense, and I am exhausted trying to respond to you. It is quite obvious to me that you came here to pick a fight. I strongly suggest that you save a few dollars, stop buying Starbucks, and buy yourself a grammar checker like Grammarly. I say this because you have tried to come across as a learned scholar, but a quick glance at your commentary proved otherwise. I would have never let something like this out to public view.

I will have no further conversations with you about this, and any continued belligerent hostility will result in your getting blocked.

I close this with all the love you expressed to me.

“I hope you are covered by his blood.”