Although these two chapters do not contain all the relevant apocalypticism which is for to come, they seem the most compact and chronological . A great deal of the book of John ben Kathryn surrounds events that are to happen shortly in their primary fulfillment, but like with all prophecy could have long term and repeating inspiration. Any look at chapter 45, must take into consideration chapter 44 and the implication that the events draw nigh by the statement the prophet is to set a caldron by Damascus Gate at the appropriate time.

The pesher (prophetic commentary) will be in blue between the paragraphs. It must be said that no pesher holds equality with the written word. The entire book of ben Kathryn can and should be read here:

Chapter

44

O FOOLISH people, hearken unto your God. Ye of the seacoasts, prepare! Ye of the mountains, look afar off to the east, to the north and to the south. Place your hand upon your brow and squint. Set a watch. Set a watch for a sandstorm, for a wall of destruction, and a bitter overthrow. Sound a trumpet at the sight. Ring the bell of warning. Let him sink in the valley of decision, and cover himself with the LORD.

Obviously, it is speaking from the point of view of the nation of Israel concerning danger coming from the Arab borders. Despite the political situation, the danger seems to be one that Israel is not expecting. The language indicates that it is sudden and massive. A sandstorm can be seen only if one looks for it, though the wind is readily apparent,which means Israel knows of all the problems right now but it is really not expecting the ultimate repercussions that are being warned of here. The solution, of course, is the LORD. The warning is encouraging Jews to take spiritual preparations.

If ye believe upon the LORD would his scorn be injurious to you? Why suffer it?! Why endure ye in the dry and desert place, only to come to the darkness of your ways?

If thou believest that I am, O seed of Jacob, why dost thou tempt me? Why dost thou walk a desert place? My water is for thee to drink. Why then hast thou poured it upon a desert weed that it may grow? Shall a weed give thee shade from my wrath?

The preceding chapters are really needed to fully understand what is being referred to with the above statements. But in a nutshell God is referring to the way the land is regarded as the ultimate blessing. Israel has put its energy into the land and not in seeking God.

Thy potsherd hath committed sore abomination because of the wickedness of thy soul. Thou hast poured it as magical potion, thy magicians declaring “Make a curse into a blessing, and rejuvenate this land.” Thou hast poured out thy soul as blood in the doing, and wherewith will thy soul now be rejuvenated? Is my law a riddle? When I gave thee plain riddles, thou understoodest them not. When I speak plain, thou sayest “eh?” Your captivity languisheth; its feet laggard, its heel a lead ball. But ye masters of foolishness snatched away my words lest my people should consider and repent.

The reference speaks of Jewish regard for the land as the ultimate blessing and not walking with God in righteousness. These teachings corrupt the purpose of the covenant. God swore by his classical prophets that there would be no peace in the land until the people turned unto him with a right heart. The leadership may spew out their teachings of Jewishness, their interpretations of God, they may use schtik to give the Gentiles guilt over the holocaust, but the curse remains: the land is not at peace because the people do not believe that he came and walked among them and suffered for their sins. Captivity always refers to the lack of the temple and the symbol of God amongst his people. The people don’t consider, for the curse and the captivity aren’t taught. 80% are secular Jews, with no real conviction of God as real. Yet Jews are taught they were persecuted for their righteousness. Teachers of such convoluted rubbish are nothing more than magicians using slight of hand and constructing doctrines to justify their corrupt outlooks and keep the people at ease. A primitive appeasement of the people that will not change the curse and rejuvenate the land.

Ye are scattered about the Earth, to the four winds. Jerusalem is in desolation. Ye are in captivity. Was it sin or righteousness that caused this to come upon you? But ye say my words are of no moment anymore. We shall hearken unto the Elders. Let them tell us we are beautiful and that our souls are clean.

Therefore, thus saith the LORD of hosts, hear, O Israel, the hard way that thou hast chosen. This last time I shall afflict thee. Affliction is a hard tool, and a rod from Syria shall I bring upon thee, and the Egyptian from the south. I shall lift up thy filthy skirt so that the American no longer adoreth thee and plieth for thine hand. He shall not deliver thee from the affliction that I shall bring.

The coming chastisement is made plain enough: because the people do not recognize their sin and backsliding. This is not the only time it is stated the American will not deliver Israel.

Go call him the eagle if thou wish. But he shall have a woman’s head and a man’s desires; a scepter she carrieth to tilt the scales of justice. The LORD is a mighty archer, and I have brought me down many a swift bird of prey, and lured many a chicken hawk from the nest of its neighbour.

Specifics now begin. Is America in general being referred to as a feminine controlled nation or will a woman, such as Hillary Clinton, be president?

And the LORD instructed me, Go place a caldron at Damascus Gate, for out of the north I will bring tumult on this land and on this city Jerusalem. It shall be a river. The American shall pass through this gate to Joppa way, as a river also, and he shall no more return. For I make Jerusalem a caldron and the Syrian as the boiling water seeking its stony hearth.

The caldron plainly indicates that the enemy shall boil in from the northern and eastern area into Israel and head for Jerusalem. Instead of standing and fighting, the Americans will actually leave and head for the coast through Jerusalem’s gates.

For they have provoked me in all that they have provoked, saying, The American will deliver us. I am angry with Jerusalem and discontent with Tel Aviv. I shall make Jerusalem as the handle of the caldron, and Tel Aviv a morsel in the seething therein. I moreover shall make your walls as the potsherd and Tel Aviv as the shards of its residue. Hear this word that I have spoken, O Jerusalem, and turn and repent that I shall relent. Cast ye off all the malnourishment of the dispersion, wherein ye hearkened to foolishness in the poverty and famine of your souls, for I did not speak unto you then, nor did I counsel your fathers, nor would I hear their prayers and guide their dreams. None came into my presence and sought my counsel, nor instructed I them in anything. But you have sought the American, and you have desired the nations. Even now do you desire them to deliver you from hard times; but ye know not the LORD your God.

This might be contrasting some strange kabbalistic beliefs that men have been taken to hear the counsel of God. The irony of these views is contrasted with the fact that when real trouble comes Israel seeks a Gentle nation and puts its faith there rather than God. It also highlights how false the old “Polish mysticism” is in Jewish spiritualism.

Yea, surely all they that walk within the desert walk alone. They seek a companion; they look for footprints to guide them. Yet they who come to the night seek to be alone; fear of footsteps in the darkness, a companion coming through the unknown. Before the dawn breaketh upon thee, O Israel, that companion shall afflict thee. In the darkness before dawn, the terror cometh upon a drowsy slumber.

This refers back to earlier chapters of the sojourn and fearing a companion. America seems to be in view in this last paragraph; at the darkest hour— betrayal. The most apocalyptic chapter now follows.

Chapter

45

THE word of the LORD that came unto me, saying, Speak unto Israel, even Judaea and Jerusalem, and reserve a word against that day that cometh, and say: O ye scattered captivity and thou entire Palestina— Ye have chosen a hard way. A fool’s ears are on his back, and with a rod must he be taught. Ye that pass through these gates, that have made Dung Gate a highway and Valley Gate a river, say not “We come nigh unto the temple of the LORD” while ye betimes do business. “By the hand of the LORD, by the hand of the LORD, the nations preserve us.” Thus saith the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: Pass no more through Dung Gate, for I shall make the nations a heap and a stench in Hinnom by my fury. I pour out my fury on them, and I upset, and make them to bewail; and ye shall enter Sheep Gate for the stench thereof shall be great and the heap thereof a source of scattering.

Several symbolisms seem evident. One, Dung Gate and Valley Gate represent a modern gate and an ancient gate (Dung Gate can represent both), both almost as far as you can get to entering a gate near the temple and the worship of God. Israel is obvious taking the long and slow route to repentance. Believing that the nations will preserve them because they are chosen. They do not come quickly to God for repentance but stop and do business along the way, choosing to enter the farthest gates to lengthen their time. This is a common deception amongst Americans. Israel’s attitude is certainly expressed that the LORD is preserving them. But God is saying that he isn’t going to preserve them through the nations. He will remove their faith on the nations by how he will break the nations in Israel. Sheep Gate is, of course, a gate close to the temple area (ancient Gate). Israel will hasten to rely on God and repent when seeing they cannot rely on the nations and that God’s displeasure is evident. They will turn to God rather than deceive themselves that they can take their time because no matter what the nations will preserve them. Dung Gate is frequently used today to access the Western Wall.

O ye muddled and wearisome, ye make long your avenue of repentance and short your avenue of pain; long distant your place of confession. Each one flattereth himself and expandeth the chest in boast. By ignorance ye boast of the nations, and by foolishness ye set no watchmen upon the walls, that ye may make long your deception of surety within. Hear ye these words, for the LORD God of Israel is he who lifteth up his voice in the gates, and his cry from the walls. It is just that I should make an utter end of you for your arrogance, saith the LORD, but it is not just that I should cause sudden wound unto mine own heart. Therefore I will not see you cut off as a people, saith the LORD, though schlunder ye make your pace and laggard your heel. Thus saith the LORD, It is I who did scatter the Ishmaelite and the Palestinians around about you that I might bring this day to birth, even the day that I wipe away your pride and blot out your transgression.

Long indeed has Israel deceived itself instead of realizing that it has gone astray in not hearkening unto “that prophet,” even denying that one such is to come. Now that Israel is back in the land, little has gotten better. They enter the far gates from the temple and make long their avenue of repentance instead of coming quickly to the LORD. The attitude is “if you don’t use it you lose it,” and Israel, especially Tel Aviv is a secular center. Israel continues to deny God’s wrath. They don’t wish to hear, so they do not want to look for it and hear any prophet. (Schlunder is a Yiddish word for a laggard type of stroll). Despite the sore judgment that is coming, God honours his word (as into Jeremiah) and will not cut off Israel. Indeed, he will use the coming tragedy and horror to turn them.

I have waited for the day, and now I speak it. I form it with my words, and I prepare your hearts to hold it. Even while your fathers sinned I preserved them, even while ye sinned I wiped your enemies from you these last 55 years. Do ye think it was your own power which dissembled them? I set in store for this moment. Ye shall never perish before me as a people, nor shall I make an utter end of you from the land. I speak it now forever: it was not to preserve thy flesh that thou shouldest be preserved before me, O Israel, but it was for this generation to see my great namesake justified in all the Earth; that they might be raised up, and that Israel should bear its place, a nation of believers in the LORD their God. I shall get me honour in all my creation that day when all the Earth knoweth I have prepared this day from the beginning, and now I speak it.

This particular prophecy obviously came in 2001. The magnitude of what God is about to do is underlined. Israel, though scattered and persecuted, was not preserved merely to honour his word to Jeremiah. There is an ultimate revelation: that Israel should finally repent. The whole earth would be astounded after 2000 years of hardness. The severity and graciousness of God is highlighted: severity in that Israel has been vexed for so long because of their sin, so grievous that it was. This underscores how great a moment it was that God walked among us. This is not an event to be forgotten easily or passed up with quick forgiveness. God intended to gather the nations for 2000 years while Israel wandered under a curse. God has done a great thing. Its gravity will not be forgotten. It is severe. . .but salvation will now come from it to all again.

Hearken unto me, for I will not part from my purpose. For surely, saith the LORD, I make an end of thy surety on the nations. Thy rest upon the Gentiles is vanity, and thy embassies to America to deliver thee pointless. The Lion of the Isles will not come to thy rescue. But I say, Nay, go thou not up, whole Britain, nor send thou the Scot with the American, lest thou sufferest a greater wound from thine ally. They shall not thwart my purpose nor douse my hot sword from the smithy’s furnace, for I set over the East Gate a two-edged sword is in mine hand, against thy rest and against the nations it shall burn.

Kedar shall not be a safe exile for you in that day. It shall be a gathering of armies, and into every wilderness ye flee ye shall be within the scope and not be hidden. For my sword shall swiftly streak over Jerusalem in that day, toward the West, and it shall cause the great sea to boil, and the strength of the occidental lands to fail. It shall cut in pieces the priests of Baal-America who bestride Valley Gate in Charisma-Hinnom, saying, “By the temple,” but denying I am He, and it shall dash even the armies that come not hither, in every wilderness yon. Because of the nations and their priests of Charisma and their lying tongues is my wrath sore upon this place.

The wilderness, typified by Kedar, in other words the whole diaspora, will not be safe. There is no place to flee and find safety. It will be found only in God. This could mean widespread persecution during the war. Judgment is also coming on the nations, especially in the West. It comes from the East Gate (ancient name) so that it will cover Jerusalem and continue on to the West. It will wipe out all the religious rubbish that “Christian false prophet groups” continue to preach, declaring Israel’s chosen position just because of their flesh. Charisma is a gratuitous addition highlighting the Pentecostal movement and all its Israel centricity while at the same time teaching patently false doctrines about Christ. They are being equated with the old priests of Baal here. So unexpected will be the coming upheaval, and the outcome, all these Christian spiritual groups will be revealed as false and pagan organizations.

Have a dull ear, shake the head, pull away the shoulder. Ah, think thyself the wiser for thy implacability. Let the cynic be raised as a standard; every tiller of the ground and plowman think himself a prophet in that day. But I shall bring my word to pass, saith the LORD, though ye say, “God cannot speak;” and though the guardian of customs maketh himself bold: “Let us hear him then, if so he speaketh. Was he not the invention of our fathers?” Do they not provoke me to anger, saith the LORD, though I will not be provoked? “Speak not a word against our customs that set us apart. Say not God is not, but speak thou not in the name of the LORD.” Though it is a provoking, have I provoked me that my soul should lash out?

The true prophets in general, in this case John ben Kathryn, are ignored for the message that God is bringing through him. Each person is convinced his own personal standard is right. Rabbis take comfort in all the customs and gezeirah they have made. It is a complete “Club Jew” reaction to the word of the LORD. The prophet is to go along with them and condone; he is not to speak in the name of the LORD.indicating a higher and disapproving authority exists. Despite all the hierarchy’s claims of authority and God’s sanction of their acts, none dare to prophesy but (at this time) John ben Kathryn in the name of the LORD and to rebuke them to show God is not with them and their customs.

Stand ye aside from the gate! What aileth thee, watchman of the LORD? Have we not called thee our brother? Wail not in the name of the LORD, thou Nazarene. We hear no marshaling of troops. Shalt thou, my servant, be provoked, if I am not provoked? saith the LORD. The voice of Hananiah from America doth magnify himself as Hananeel, and declare the LORD hath not spoken unto me harsh tidings, to thwart thy people that they should repent. Behold, they say let all worship what he will; the LORD causeth this peace, and he is found in whatsoever causeth contentment.

Interesting declaration indicates that corporate Israel will regard Nazarenes (Messianic Jews) as still legitimate Jews by this time. But the culture kings in Jewry are completely ecumenical. Religion and God is for all to make up for themselves. As such, they can’t hear nor see any wrath coming from God. The prophet has relayed this to God, who now responds:

Behold, saith the LORD, do they not make a mockery of me, saying this is my peace, these whoredoms they have pronounced? Therefore thus saith the LORD, though they provoke, it is their contentment that shall cause sore pain upon them. For this I will deal terribly with them, for my people are corrupted as unto the Americans without, and thus they hear not the marshaling of troops. Though troops marshal not, I shall destroy them; them that marshal I bring unto this place. Ye shall flee via Dung Gate, and cast behind you Hinnom and its baalim. Content therein is every man in his valley. Everyone seeketh distinction, rewards, and power. The most judgmental are called liberal; the searcher of iniquity is called tolerant; and he who defendeth himself is called hateful. As the kingdom of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, are they any different than the Canaanite about them, and any less venal than the Phoenicians in their day?

A terrible appraisal of modern Israel is given: like the ancient Israelite kingdom that went into captivity, the Jews of today are so like the luxury seeking Americans (as were the venal Canaanites of old) that they are no different. Indeed, people joke that Israel is like the 51st State. God will completely break Israel of its cultural corruption based on America. It is also a judgment on the church, for Hinnom and its baalim are referred to again, the corrupt Pentecostal and charismatic Christianity that continues to adore Israel because of its desire to see prophetic signs (as they have preconceived them) to take place in the land. They believe that prosperity is a sign of God’s pleasure.

Thus saith the LORD, O ye foolish custodians of vanity, ye that say God is our expedience: Behold I, even I, saith the LORD, bring convulsions upon your gates, and grave fear the nations; even from the Dung Gate south unto the Sheep Gate, from the Horse Gate east unto Jeshanah, even as the world as upon Jerusalem; and ye shall be as enchanters who have lost their arts and flatterers who have lost their guile. I shall pour out my fury and mine anger as bitter wind upon the nations; the horse shall lose his rider and the oxen their yoke; and thy yoke off Israel I shall take. And it shall come to pass that they who be left shall tread my courts with gladness, and lift their song in the house of the LORD, where there will be no more enchanter and no more gainsayer.

Because of the terrible destruction (and no doubt war) that is coming God will openly expose all the corrupt Christianity and the wealth seeking Americans. God swears judgment upon the whole earth outside the walls of Jerusalem and also within the walls. (In order to go from Dung Gate to Sheep Gate via the south means to go around the world; the same for Horse Gate unto Jeshanah Gate). Yet when it is all over the people shall rejoice in God, in the true blessings that come from him. No more shall we have the top-heavy, self-righteous politically correct carping of today’s society and its lust for luxury and power.

In that day my mountain of fury shall fill the Earth, and it shall rise forth as a smoke and a thunderous mounting upwards. And there shall be no place wherein a man may run and say he hath excuse, for my wrath shall scorch even the hinter forests wherein dwelleth the reindeer.

Search ye now for the fox’s roost, or for the place of the dwelling of the unicorn, for surely if ye repent not now at my words ye shall flee and hide from me. No scorner shall remain in all my holy mountain. For my wrath shall not be quenched upon the nations, saith the LORD; my fury not made short until I have sunk the heart of every man, and removed the adder’s tail from every mouth; the prophets of Charisma from Hinnom’s gates.

This sore humbling shall come upon the world: upheaval, cultural, natural, economic and no doubt war. Not least of which is to have one’s faith in their past ways of life totally altered by the fact God has forsaken the earth to this reproach. The old excesses of corrupt 20th century Christianity will be lost and not an influence upon a new Israel anymore.

Flee unto the multitude of cities, but a flood shall overtake you all. Flee unto the sea, but upheavals shall upset you. Flee not and stand haughtily in your place, but the green fire of heaven shall descend upon you, and ye shall lose your hard eyes. Thus saith the LORD, seethe your meat in the caldron, and draw the flesh upon a seething fork, that ye may know the LORD’s intention upon you in that day. For thus saith the LORD of hosts, I shall cause great fear to come upon all the northlands; and bodies shall make their homes their tomb. The American shall walk on foot. I shall bring up they from the south for fear of what shall befall. The seething shall take them; it shall consume their tongues first; their eyes shall be consumed, beast and man, great and small. Yet for all this I shall not speak peace upon the earth, nor stay mine hand until I make an utter end from the Old Gate westward, and a wind to cleanse upon the East Gate to the islands afar off, until the houses of their god’s are bare and their gold an abomination.

The upheavals continue. This can be taken “spiritually” in some respects, but the physical and natural upsets will probably be very real. The “American shall walk on foot” may refer to the loss of oil and gas because of a massive terrorist war. The loss of fuel may mean many will die of cold while others come north from the heat of the south. In other words, there will be a complete breakdown for which civilization is not prepared mentally or physically. The image of the caldron and the seething meat gives an idea of the intensity of God’s wrath. There will be no place for safety. Although East Gate may be referring to the ancient eastern gate figuratively it may also be interchangeable with the Lion’s Gate, the major gate in the eastern wall. Both in its modern and ancient referral it would be symbolic.

I shall speak unto the deep, my voice shall reach unto her lowest abodes: Bring up Leviathan, that king of the sea, that coiled armored serpent, to be discovered from the place of his myth, into the harbours, for too long hath the LORD been declared myth; and as he breatheth fire so shall the LORD declare his vengeance upon this generation; and they shall no more say, “He is a myth.” See your stars crash down, they which ye have placed in orbit. Who can turn the moon, and who is he that bringeth the heavens upon us? Who can change man’s speech by waves ye know nought of? It is I, the LORD. Glory is my going forth. Justice is my burning fire about me.

This is now giving us a clue that it will involve the entire earth, perhaps even its rotation. Our satellites would crash down on in this case. The moon’s orbit would be upset. Meteor showers might be “the heavens come upon us.” It may simply be symbolic language for the intensity of coming upheaval. A warning may either be that a Leviathan will be found. These sea creatures were known to exist, and one was reported of Gloucester in 1818. They are described by the ancients as the giant king of the sea, a sea serpent with armoured scales and the ability to breath fire. The Phoenicians regularly hunted them. This may also be symbolic. However, the discovering of this ancient and now mythicized beast could be a clue as to when the tragedies will soon begin. The green fire mentioned earlier would also suggest waves of charged particles hitting the earth. Such events have happened, and one is recorded in the 14th century (as I recall) in Russia in which many people were made sick. Russian clerical records speak of the symptoms which can only be described as radiation.

And astonied I prayed against the dread which was to come, saying, “Lord, have mercy upon this Earth and turn thy face from thy fierce wrath.” And the word of the LORD came unto me, saying, I shall have mercy upon the Earth by my fierce wrath. Thus saith the LORD, as the Ishmaelite burneth his own wealth to spite the nations, so hath this generation burned its own mercy before me and halted its own rise. I shall plunge it low and utterly purge it before me; I shall utterly bleach it in the depths of its iniquity, and that which escapeth shall be escaped in mine hand, for an upward thrust maketh the LORD, and a sudden deliverance. No more shall they kill and eat their children; no more shall the meek be a prey and the speaker of justice a target. They shall pray unto me, but I shall harden their hearts that they reprove, even reprove the LORD God, that I may bring upon these nations the wrath they have courted for generations. For too long did they raise their bloody hands to me in piety and praise.

The unrelenting wrath of God in this instance is clear and dreadful to behold, in that the prophet (in a rare instance) actually records his reaction to a prophecy and refers to himself. As a backdrop we know that upheavals will be going on in the Middle East. Terrorists may be burning their own oil fields as revenge to America and the West because of the war with Israel. In other words, there is upheaval all over: mankind has run rampant in a war it cannot control in which fuel becomes scarce and now actual global natural upheavals are being brought about. God, however, will be make it plain and sudden that he brings the deliverance. Our society is one of abortions and bigotry masked “politically correct” accusations. No more will this type of society exist and no more will such a society be left to even hypocritically praise the LORD.

And ye shall set watchmen upon your walls in that day, in the day wherein ye need them not for the desolation that I shall bring upon the face of the earth. And they shall look for men, and they shall not find them; but they shall find the unyoked oxen; and the place where the horse was tamed, lo, there shall he be wild.

Referring back now to Jerusalem and, by extension, all Jewry we see that God has delivered us and spared us, though the earth lies in terrible desolation. An age has passed and is to be left behind. Civilization has been terribly affected by one interpretation. By a more “spiritual” or symbolic interpretation the old ways and ideas of the past age are also gone and no more to come forward.

Say not the LORD will not do this thing. I have made it long, that ye may know the prophecy cometh and tarrieth not, cometh even unto your gates and unto your desolate mount, and extendeth even beyond the days of your rejoicing and recovery, that ye may take warning from the bitter overthrow I have brought upon the nations which cast me off, and ye shall trust in the LORD your God, and ye may have peace because he cut off all they who would not walk circumspect upon the earth.

Your desolate mount means Moriah, of course. Thus this all begins before the Temple is built and continues long passed its completion. There is a long recovery for the earth during this age to come. But we rejoice because God is with us. Israel has turned unto God again, and we know that the Lord has walked amongst us. The prophecy is long (detailed), to make it certain this is coming and the LORD’s hand is bringing it. Considering other paragraphs in the Book of ben Kathryn, we should regard much of this as beginning soon and substantially continuing within the next 40 years