copyright 2023
by Jerry Huerta
History shows that liberal Protestantism fostered the rise of secularism, which enriched the merchants, exposing it as the Mystery Babylon in Revelation. The research of Michael Tigar, George M. Thomas, Davide Cantoni, Jeremiah Dittmar, Noam Yuchtman, E. J. Hobsbawm, Bernard Bailyn, Mark A. Noll, and Nancy R. Pearcey agree that Protestant liberalism fostered secularism by consorting with the kings of the earth. The Protestants’ part in taking the legitimization of civil government away from Roman Catholicism to establish secular civil institutions is a fact that triggers many because it affirms Historicism. Protestant liberalism intoxicated society with autonomy and individualism, which forcefully supplanted the feudal ecumenical community.
For all nations have drunk of the
wine of the wrath of her fornication, and the kings of the earth have committed
fornication with her, and the merchants of the earth are waxed rich through the
abundance of her delicacies. (Revelation 18:3)
Futurists and preterists often disregard irrefutable evidence and promote false narratives.
The actual narrative deems it impossible to interpret
Revelation through a preterist lens, with their misrepresentations of temporal
indicators, because ancient Jerusalem did not contribute to the prosperity of
the merchants of the earth. The pagan Romans, Daniel’s fourth beast, enriched
the merchants, and pagans cannot be construed as a harlot from a covenant
perspective. Only God’s people are condemned for such covenant violations, and
Jeremiah is the precedent.
For the house of Israel and the
house of Judah have dealt very treacherously against me, saith the LORD… As a
cage is full of birds, so are their houses full of deceit: therefore they are
become great, and waxen rich. They are waxen fat, they shine: yea, they
overpass the deeds of the wicked: they judge not the cause, the cause of the
fatherless, yet they prosper; and the right of the needy do they not judge.
(Jeremiah 5:11, 27-28)
Such evidence also deems it impossible to interpret
Revelation through a futurist’s lens because the merchants of the earth have
gained significant influence and riches for nearly two centuries from the
impact of Protestantism, not some future phenomenon by the Jews. This reality
regarding the two antagonists in Revelation - Babylon and the merchants -
confirms Historicism. Futurists and preterists must make up alternate
realities.
Before the rise of Protestantism, the papacy played a role
in legitimizing civil government in the West, and history shows that it
bestowed kings with their crowns. This is seen in the shift of crowns to horns
in Revelation 13:1. In modern times, the power given the beast to “overcome the
saints” in Chapter 13 has been taken away by Protestantism, as shown by the
missing crowns in Chapter 17. These details confirm that Revelation 13 is a
historical account of the past.
Furthermore, Daniel 2:44 states that Christ returns in the
days of the ten kings, not the Roman Empire. Rome ends, and the little horn
rises amongst the ten horns in Daniel 7:8, corresponding to the beast rising
from the sea in Revelation. This affirms we are to look for the little horn
after the Roman empire ends, not some made-up neo-Rome as futurists surmise.
The beast is wounded when the sixth king reigns, as shown by the phrase “was,
and is not” in Revelation 17:9-11. The sixth king rises from the earth, and its
image is the seventh.
Based on the Hebrew cultus, the seven typical feasts in the
Hebrew calendar, Revelation Chapter 1 begins a linear narration that leads up
to Christ’s return in Chapter 11, illustrating Christ’s mediation during the
inter-advent age. Chapters 1-11 describe Christ’s intercession typified by the Aaronic
high priest starting “between the porch and the altar” and ending at the Holy
of Holies, before “the ark of his testament” (Revelation 1:13, 11:19).
Developmental guidelines and historical evidence affirm
John’s recap from the beginning of the first advent in Chapter 12 until the
second in 19, followed by Christ’s millennial reign. Revelation 12 recaps the
first advent to reveal the judgment upon Satan and the wicked; Chapters 13 and
17 follow a linear narrative. The accurate structuring of Revelation maintains
the principle affirmed by Peter that judgment begins with the house of God in
Chapters 1-11 and concludes with those “that obey not the gospel of God” in
Chapters 12-19 (1 Peter 4:17). Prolepses, like the sixth seal and the vials in
Chapter 16, occur intermittently in the texts.
In returning to the merchants’ narrative, history affirms
that war accompanied the rise of the merchants, which secularist, lawyer, law
professor, and author Michael Tigar verifies,
The rapid rise of manufactures,
particularly in England, gradually absorbed the vagrants and dispossessed. With
the advent of manufacture, the various nations entered into a competitive
relationship. The struggle for trade was fought by war, protective duties and
prohibitions, whereas earlier the nations, in so far as they were connected at
all, had carried on an inoffensive exchange with each other. Trade from now on
had a political significance. To begin the march to industrial capitalism, to
impose new economic forms, to share by right or conquest or theft in the wealth
of the New World, to maintain a balance of trade such that more wealth flowed
into a country than left it— all of these things were accomplished at a great
price.1
Tigar referred to the vagrants and dispossessed who resulted
from the English Enclosure Laws. These laws evicted many peasants from their
land so that feudal lords could commercialize it and benefit from the expanding
trade that came with the discovery of the New World. The displaced individuals
were then absorbed by the manufacturing industry as cheap labor, which is
another ramification of the rise of the merchants. Copious evidence confirms
that the rise of merchants led to wars over trade, protective duties, and
prohibitions. The most well-known examples of such conflicts were the two world
wars. At Yale and Princeton's trade and war conference, Ronald Findlay of
Columbia University and Kevin O'Rourke of Trinity College Dublin presented a
thesis on the link between trade and war during the time of rising merchants,
The Industrial Revolution enabled
the European powers to extend their sway from the coastal regions of Asia and
Africa deep into the interiors, using armed steamboats to sail up the rivers
and breech-loading rifles and later machine guns to sweep aside native
resistance… As the Industrial Revolution proceeded in Europe and later in the
United States and Japan the rising demand for primary products saw the
emergence of export economies in Southeast Asia, Africa and Latin America
during the era from 1870 to1914… The First World War was at least partly due to
imperial rivalry between Britain and France on the one hand and Germany on the
other. In the Second World War both Germany and Japan were to a large extent
motivated by pressure to relieve perceived shortages and lack of access to
industrial raw materials and fuel supplies…
The attack on the Soviet Union was
also calculated to give Japan a free hand in the East against the British,
French and Dutch colonies in Southeast Asia with their rich oil and other
natural resources. Japan, always acutely conscious of her deficiency in natural
resources, had already occupied Manchuria in 1932 to exploit its iron ore and
to develop heavy industry, and provoked war with China in 1937… The stage was
thus set for a global conflict between the “Heartland” and the “Rimland”, the
land powers of Eurasia versus the sea powers of the Atlantic and Pacific, which
had long been anticipated by the geopolitical theorists Halford Mackinder
(1904) and Alfred Thayer Mahan (1890). War, trade and natural resources were
once again fatefully intertwined, on a global scale.2
According to Tigar, the emergence of merchants also resulted
in a displacement of people from their land. This phenomenon is a
well-documented part of modern history, fueling the Industrial Revolution. The
shift from rural to urban living resulted from treating food and labor as
commodities for commercial gain. This practice started in England with the
exploitation of factory workers. Still, it quickly became a global trend,
driven by the desire for cheap food. John Hodges, a scientist, testified about the
first attempt at globalization, which aligns with the consequences of the rise
of merchants and the dispossessing of impoverished people from their farms,
Globally, food production per
person has been increasing, but 840 million people (13%) suffer from
under-nutrition, malnutrition or famine because socioeconomic systems inhibit
equitable distribution (FAO, 2004).… The long-term answer to feeding the world
sustainably does not lie in shipping food from the West. Any economic system
which separates the poor from their land or takes away their market for selling
food inevitably perpetuates poverty, increases hunger and adds to the threat of
famine. Globalizing agriculture and food on the basis of free trade runs that
risk.… Western governments know from their own experience over the last 200
years that food cannot be treated simply as a tradable commodity subject to
unrestrained capitalism without sooner or later running into socio-economic
imbalances: hunger, rationing, famine, lost capacity to feed a nation, negative
effects with hidden costs, obesity, mass movements of people off the land,
unemployment etc.—all of these are Western socio-economic experiences.3
Finally, it is essential to acknowledge the role of
Protestant missionary imperialism (PMI) in the growth of merchant culture and
trade expansion. It cannot be ignored that after more than twelve centuries of
the papal system, the "spirit of Protestantism" gave rise to
capitalism and a market-focused society that benefited merchants and liberal
Protestants. Theologian and professor emeritus of pastoral theology Michael
Sievernich supports the link between PMI and the initial push toward globalization,
Christianity had spread throughout
the European continent during a thousand year process that extended from Late
Antiquity to the Late Middle Ages. With its variety of missionary methods (e.g.
peaceful mission, mission by coercion and the conversion of tribes by first
converting the ruler), Christianity had reached all European peoples. It
extended from Greece to Scandinavia and Iceland; it stretched from Ireland in
the far west to Eastern Europe’s West Slavic and Baltic peoples. This process
had brought forth European Christianity which, in turn and by stages, initiated
missionary activity beyond Europe’s borders. The religious missionary
enterprise was generally tied to the economically driven power politics
involved in European overseas expansion, a process of globalization.4
Professor of Contemporary History at the University of
Marburg, Benedikt Stuchtey, also affirms the ramifications of PMI,
colonial rule caused complex
competitions among Europeans just as much as among the indigenous population in
the colonies, that it was able to simultaneously create cooperation and close
webs of relationships between conquerors and the conquered, and that it was
never at any time free of violence and war, despotism, arbitrariness and
lawlessness.5
Here we have the completion of all the elements that
comprise the illustration of the four horsemen of the seven seals. PMI “went
forth conquering, and to conquer” that took “peace from the earth, and that
they should kill one another,” while calling out the price of a “measure of
wheat” and “three measures of barley,” which led to “hunger” and “death” of the
dispossessed and impoverished.
PMI and its consequence are illustrated by the prophetic era
of the Laodicean church, which overlaps with the seventh-month autumnal
festivals, and “the time of the end” in Daniel 8:17. The Laodicean epoch
maintains terminological and thematic correspondence with the seven trumpets,
the sealing in Revelation 7, and the last-days proclamations in Revelation 14.
In continuing to substantiate this correspondence, it must be noted that a
symbolic theological connection exists between PMI and the symbolism of the
archer on the white horse. Scripturally, white is associated with righteousness
(Daniel 7:9; Matthew 17:2; Mark 9:3; Luke 9:29; Revelation 1:12–14, 6:11, 19:8,
20:11). While horses predominantly represent apostasy for reliance upon their
illicit power (Isaiah 2:6–7, 30:15–17; Amos 2:15), which is indicative of the
end day covenant apostasy prophesied of in the NT (Matthew 5:13, 24:12; 2
Thessalonians 2:1–12; 1 Timothy 4:1–3; Romans 14:10; 2 Corinthians 5:10). In
Jeremiah, “horsemen and bowmen” represent God’s agent Babylon in judging
Jerusalem because “as a cage is full of birds, so are their houses full of
deceit: therefore, they are become great, and waxen rich” (Jeremiah 4:29,
5:27).
Two great wars, market-driven exploitation of the poor and
death, are the legacy of PMI, which is easily seen in the illustrations
accompanying the red, black, and pale horses. And, most importantly, we cannot
forget that the judgments illustrated by the trumpets must commence with God’s
house, in agreement with 1 Peter 4:17. Peter’s principle substantiates that the
exploitation described by the four horsemen—the oppression the souls lamenting
in the fifth seal—develops from within God’s house in correspondence with OT
precedent and NT prophecy (Isaiah 5:8–9, 10:2, 33:15; Jeremiah 34:8–17; Ezekiel
22:29, 45:9; Amos 8:2–7; Micah 2:2; Matthew 23:4; James 5:1–6). God’s people
will be judged before the judgment that falls on the little horn, according to
1 John 4:17.
1-Michael Tigar, Law and the Rise of Capitalism, Monthly
Review Press (June 1, 2000) 173
2-Ronald Findlay, Kevin O’Rourke, War, Trade and Natural
Resources: A Historical Perspective, paper was presented at the Yale- Princeton
Conference on Trade and War, April, 2010,
https://sites.socsci.uci.edu/~mrgarfin/OUP/papers/Findlay.pdf
3-John Hodges, “Cheap Food and Feeding the World
Sustainably,” Livestock Production, Science 92 (2005), 1 –16, accessed October
27, 2018,
http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.554.8233&rep=rep1&type=pdf
4-Michael Sievernich, “Christian Mission,” European History
Online (EGO), Institute of European History (IEG), 2011-05-19, 3, accessed
October 27, 2018,
http://ieg-ego.eu/en/threads/europe-and-the-world/mission/michael-sievernich-christian-mission
5-Benedikt Stuchtey, “Colonialism and Imperialism,
1450–1950,” European History Online (EGO), Institute of European History (IEG),
Mainz 2011-01-24, 2, accessed October 27, 2018,
http://ieg-ego.eu/en/threads/backgrounds/colonialism-and-imperialism
This post is a postscript to the book above, which is available here.
