The Prophecy Moronic Complex: Dime Store Armageddon

Jonathan Cahn and Dinesh D'Souza have been selected to take the mantle from Hal Lindsey as Satan moves his headquarters 1,740 miles in half a century

Every decade or so, someone tries to convince Christians that the Book of Revelation is a geopolitical Rubik’s Cube; if you know how to twist and turn it just so, you, too, will see everything clearly. In the 1970s, Hal Lindsey was conscripted to develop the first puzzle solution in his book, The Late Great Planet Earth, which became a more widely appreciated version of the Book of Revelation than the actual Book of Revelation. Now, author and “pastor” Rabbi Jonathan Cahn and bad amateur filmmaker Dinesh D’Souza have asked Lindsey to hold their beer as they replace failed Cold War prophecies with an overwrought and puerile “prophecy documentary” about the October 7, 2023, attack in Israel, The Dragon’s Prophecy.

The book and film are obviously hasbara (Israeli propaganda), but they are also theologically dangerous and predatory, hoping to beguile Dispensationalist dreamers further.

Cahn admits that he was channeling like Joseph Smith to come up with the fiction book, “I was working on the sequel to The Return of the Gods, the Lord interrupted me and said, ‘No’. I actually saw a dragon in my head, and that was the beginning of The Dragon’s Prophecy.” Apparently, the Holy Spirit has a high-speed Ethernet connection to Cahn’s brain.

“The Holy Spirit just downloads these incredible books…”

“That download is usually about a few months and it produces thousands of pages of notes… then I put it in the book… God just said, ‘I’m interrupting you, this is the word for my people.’”

Cahn also claims, with a straight face and a very earnest voice, that he called the exact month, day, and liturgical configuration for the Hamas attack - the day before it happened. You’d think our new Daniel would have picked up the holy hotline to warn Netanyahu, but that would have put a dent in the book sales and media appearances. Have to protect the royalty stream!

“Revelation says the dragon… launched a flood out of his mouth to flood away the woman… he’s been trying to flood away the Jewish people…”

“This was also a flood that came on the land… and what happened on October 7th had a code word. Hamas had a name for it: ‘Operation Al-Aqsa Flood’… literally ‘the Flood.’”

Amazing. Cahn belongs at a three-letter agency cipher coffee clatch, not some tawdry publishing office.

Unfortunately for Cahn, Revelation 12:15’s woman is spiritual Israel, the Holy Christian Chuch. There is no blasphemy too great for this man, and he went full numerologist:

“The Yom Kippur War… was a calamity… so what happens if the devil makes his own Jubilee? Count 50 years from that day… means there’s going to be another invasion… on a Sabbath… on a holy day… on the first Saturday of October…”

“The timing between the start of the Six-Day War and the Yom Kippur War is 2,315 days… count the same days forward… it takes you to October 7th. That is the exact day.”

The Devil had a jubilee!? Hold on, Rabbi, did you consider mining Strong’s Concordance for a 2315 confirmation?

Dragooning the Dragon

D’Souza’s Prager U version of the film opens with:

“Then another sign appeared in heaven. An enormous red dragon.” (00:19–00:22)

The associated imagery is as subtle as waterboarding - you will know that this dragon is an insidious Islamic force hovering over the Middle East and the whole world (if we don’t fight them there, we will have to fight them here [as we welcome Al Qaeda to the White House]!).

Sorry, Delish Dinesh, Saint John told us a long time ago that the Dragon is Satan:

“So the great dragon was cast out, that serpent of old, called the Devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world; he was cast to the earth, and his angels were cast out with him.” (Rev. 12:9)

Israel’s Multiple Personalities

A clip in the documentary features a Christian influencer proclaiming:

16:23 Where does my support for Israel come from? Number one, because biblically we are commanded to support Israel. But we’re commanded as Christians to support the government of Israel. We are commanded to support Israel. And we’re told those who bless Israel will be blessed. But what? Hold on. Define Israel. Could Do you not know what Israel is? That’s what God is talking about. The nation of Israel. Yes. So is that the current borders, the current leadership? He’s talking about the political entity called Israel. He’s talking about the nation of Israel. Yeah. nations exist and he is discussing a nation. A nation was the people of Israel. The nation referring to in Genesis is that the same as the country run by Benjamin Netanyahu right now. Yes. Yes. 16:59

It might be true if the Bible didn’t exist. However, Saint Paul, an Apostle of Christ, had a different inspiration and revelation than Cahn and D’Souza:

• “A person is not a Jew who is one only outwardly, nor is circumcision merely outward and physical. No, a person is a Jew who is one inwardly; and circumcision is circumcision of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the written code. Such a person’s praise is not from other people, but from God.” (Romans 2:28-29).

• “...and to make him the father of the circumcised who are not only circumcised but who also follow in the footsteps of the faith that our father Abraham had before he was circumcised. The promise comes by faith, so that it may be by grace and may be guaranteed to all Abraham’s offspring—not only to those who are of the law but also to those who have the faith of Abraham. He is the father of us all.” (Romans 4:12-16)

• “Not all who are descended from Israel belong to Israel.” (Rom. 9:6)

• “If you are in Christ, you are Abraham’s offspring.” (Gal. 3:29)

• “Peace and mercy to all who follow this rule—to the Israel of God.” (Galatians 6:16)

The theological category “Israel” is fulfilled in Christ and His Church; it has nothing to do with a Near East country founded in 1948. You can support Israel morally, politically, and financially if you choose. Just don’t pretend the Bible commands support for modern-day Israel. It doesn’t. At all. Not once.

Jerusalem, Jerusalem

The film’s narrator intones:

“Jerusalem is the holiest place on earth… What do the Scriptures tell us about this place?” (17:07–17:30)

Here’s what Jesus tells us:

“The hour is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem.” (John 4:21)

Goliath Does a Lazarus

The documentary tells viewers:

“The Philistines’ hatred has been revived.” (18:01–18:22)

Cahn lays it on thicker than treacle,

“The enemy is going to have his own resurrection… He has resurrected this people… the ancient enemies of Israel… called the Philistines…”

“We call them the Palestinians. Palestinian means Philistine literally means that.”

“So when Israel came back in 1948… there’s this other resurrection… the Philistines to their ancient homeland… this is part of the dragon’s war.”

Sorry, you professors of pointlessness, the Philistines are linked, by DNA evidence, to Crete and the Aegean region. On the other hand, Palestinians are half-brothers to the Jews since they are the descendants of Ishmael (the half-brother of Isaac by the same father, Abraham, with different mothers), with zero connection to the Sea Peoples of a bygone age.

Ezekiel didn’t foresee Hamas any more than Jeremiah foresaw Idi Amin, or any more than Jonathan Cahn heard the voice of God while downloading a new book from the Holy Spirit. But Cahn wasn’t finished.

“Hamas… becomes [an] Arabic word that means zeal and fervor… but it’s also a [Hebrew] word… that means evil, violence and destruction.”

“When you look in the Bible under Hamas you will see things like ‘save me from the man of Hamas’… ‘Hamas has risen up as a rod of evil’… ‘Hamas dwells in the dark places of the earth’… ‘in that day Hamas shall no longer be heard in your land.’

It’s all there. There are no coincidences.”

Doesn’t the lexical wizard from New Jersey blow you away with his erudition and insight? Where was this man when the Church Fathers needed him most? But wait, there’s more.

“They found the red heifers… taken from Texas… to Israel… part of the restoration of the Temple… for the dragon this is a threat.”

“Hamas even mentioned it… said those red cows were part of what happened.”

If you cannot see rouged bovines as a casus belli, then you have backslidden or were never really saved in the first place, dear Christian.

Mogging Magog Mad Gog

Hal Lindsey placed Satan’s HQ somewhere in Moscow (not Doug Wilson’s home in Idaho; the other, colder Moscow with the funny alphabet). Cahn, the Latter Day Revelator, has deciphered that the Liar of Liars packed up after the Berlin Wall came down, and is now snow-birding 1,740 miles to the southwest.

“Sudan… Libya… Turkey… Iran… All these nations align with Bible prophecy.” (19:12–19:59)

In the 1970s, Lindsey said Gog and Magog were the Soviet Union with a little Chinese side dish. Now it’s Iran and whoever else jigsaws into the 24-hour news cycle.

However, the Revelation to Saint John is clear, if a little abstract:

“Satan will gather Gog and Magog—the nations at the four corners of the earth.” (Rev. 20:8)

Gog and Magog symbolize global rebellion. Sorry, Rabbi Jonathan, Iran is not the incarnation of the demon Prince of Persia¹:

“The Bible speaks of an entity called the Sar Paras… [its] mission [is]… to stop prophetic purposes of God for Israel concerning the last days.”

“Entities don’t die… when Israel comes back… this entity activates… You’re not dealing with a nation, you’re dealing with an entity.”

Oddly, the Farsi phantom can be opposed by F-35s and B-2 bombers, and shoots missiles at Tel Aviv.

The Apocalypse Color Wheel

One of the most surreal moments in the documentary is:

“The colors of the horsemen match the flag of Palestine… white, red, black, and green.” (20:10–20:38)

Whoa! Y’all, them Mosleeems have a very fancy apocalypse flag hiding in plain sight!

It’s infinitely more stupid than Lindsey declaring the “locusts” of Revelation to be helicopters. It’s not just the Pallys, according to Cahn:

“If you look at all the nations that have those colors… they’re all enemies of Israel or waiting to be.”

Kenyans had better watch out: Cahn’s color-astrology puts them in Israel’s crosshairs for a deep cleansing. Vanuatu and Zimbabwe are treading awfully close to danger, too.

Speaking of helicopters, Cahn outdid himself pulling Ezekiel 38 out of a rabbit’s hat:

“Ibrahim Raisi… the only president who oversaw an attack on Israel… about 30 days later he was struck down dead.”

“He threatened Israel with total destruction… 30 days later there was nothing left of him.”

“Ezekiel says, ‘I will bring them against the mountains’… Raisi was struck down on the mountains… as a sign of what is yet to come.”

From the River to the Slop

The film claims:

“God gave Abraham the land from the river to the sea… Now the enemy takes God’s word and inverts it.” (20:48–21:19)

Ugh, lads… Genesis 12 is not Israel’s eternal title deed. Saint Paul to the rescue again:

• “The promise… was made to Christ.” (Gal. 3:16)

• “The blessing of Abraham comes to the Gentiles.” (Gal. 3:14)

The land promise is fulfilled in Christ and given to all nations. Our Cinema Super Apostles are batting 0/1000.

Are We the Baddies?

At one point the documentary narrator asks:

“It’s a battle between good and evil. But who is good and who is evil?” (19:03–19:07)

Saint Paul shows up again:

• “There is none righteous, no not one.” (Rom. 3:10)

• “Our struggle is not against flesh and blood.” (Eph. 6:12)

Cahn, however, sets the mere Apostle Paul well aside to make a very explicit threat:

“You need to vote for people who will do God’s will… with Israel…”

“I’ve never met somebody in my life who hated Israel and wasn’t cursed. I’ve never met anybody who loved Israel and wasn’t blessed.”

The End

This one ridiculous book and one shoddy documentary will spawn a whole new cottage industry of contemporaneous prophecy schlock. Hal Lindsey at least could make Cold War kitsch entertaining. Cahn and D’Souza have managed to make Revelation tackier, dumber, and genocidal.

They want your Bible not to be about Christ and His Church, but about now, and about you, and about someone else’s enemies.

Israel is fulfilled in Jesus and extended to all who believe. The other Israel is a flag, a peculiar Eastern European ideology, and a government in the Levant that got going in 1948 after a brutal terror campaign. The Philistines have not been resurrected as Palestinians, “Hamas” is not hiding in your Strong’s Concordance, red heifers from Tejas are not eschatological tripwires, and the Holy Spirit doesn’t moonlight with Q-style drops to Jonathan Cahn.

Let the hasbara hucksters and dragon-whisperers keep churning out their hate-mongering. Let them chase their jubilees, color wheels, and resurrected Philistines. The Church has better things to do. We have a crucified and risen Lord, a sure Word, and a clear mandate: preach repentance and forgiveness of sins through Christ’s atoning sacrifice. Take it to all nations, including Jews, including Palestinians, including Americans enthralled by prophecy porn. The real war is not between Israel and Hamas, or D.C. and Venezuela, but between the Dragon and the Lamb who takes away the sin of the world. That war was prosecuted and settled on a cross two thousand years ago, with no help from Jonathan Cahn’s “downloads” or Dinesh D’Souza’s B-roll. Someone evangelize those men.

1. The Persian Empire during Daniel’s time, specifically from the 6th to 4th centuries BC, was one of the largest empires in ancient history, stretching from the Indus River in the east to the Nile River in the west, and from the Aegean Sea in the north to the Persian Gulf in the south. It was established by Cyrus the Great after he conquered Babylon in 539 BC, marking the end of the Babylonian Empire and the beginning of Persian rule. The empire was ruled by the Achaemenid Dynasty, which began with Cyrus in 550 BC and lasted for approximately 200 years until its conquest by Alexander the Great in 330 BC.