Cairene woman caught in the cross-fire

Mr. X:

August 18th, 2013 at 3:24 am

Isaiah 19 (KJV) The burden of Egypt. Behold, the Lord rideth upon a swift cloud, and shall come into Egypt: and the idols of Egypt shall be moved at his presence, and the heart of Egypt shall melt in the midst of it.
2 And I will set the Egyptians against the Egyptians: and they shall fight every one against his brother, and every one against his neighbour; city against city, and kingdom against kingdom.
3 And the spirit of Egypt shall fail in the midst thereof; and I will destroy the counsel thereof: and they shall seek to the idols, and to the charmers, and to them that have familiar spirits, and to the wizards. (God will make fools of the policy wonks)
4 And the Egyptians will I give over into the hand of a cruel lord; and a fierce king shall rule over them, saith the Lord, the Lord of hosts.
5 And the waters shall fail from the sea, and the river shall be wasted and dried up. (Drought = famine)
6 And they shall turn the rivers far away; and the brooks of defence shall be emptied and dried up: the reeds and flags shall wither.
7 The paper reeds by the brooks, by the mouth of the brooks, and every thing sown by the brooks, shall wither, be driven away, and be no more.
8 The fishers also shall mourn, and all they that cast angle into the brooks shall lament, and they that spread nets upon the waters shall languish.
9 Moreover they that work in fine flax, and they that weave networks, shall be confounded.
10 And they shall be broken in the purposes thereof, all that make sluices and ponds for fish.
11 Surely the princes of Zoan are fools, the counsel of the wise counsellors of Pharaoh is become brutish: how say ye unto Pharaoh, I am the son of the wise, the son of ancient kings?
12 Where are they? where are thy wise men? and let them tell thee now, and let them know what the Lord of hosts hath purposed upon Egypt.
13 The princes of Zoan are become fools, the princes of Noph are deceived; they have also seduced Egypt, even they that are the stay of the tribes thereof.
14 The Lord hath mingled a perverse spirit in the midst thereof: and they have caused Egypt to err in every work thereof, as a drunken man staggereth in his vomit.

Grurray:

August 18th, 2013 at 5:54 am

Good find X
Isaiah dates to the 8th century BC just before the Assyrians and then Persians ran roughshod
over the near east.
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There were some beautiful passages like the messianic prophecies and the angels in ch 6
and there was also some rough apocalypse like 24

Charles Cameron:

August 18th, 2013 at 4:52 pm

I knew that in the KJV there’s a verse in Job that reads: 

He saith among the trumpets, Ha, ha; and he smelleth the battle afar off, the thunder of the captains, and the shouting…

— but I’d never seen that quote 

God will make fools of the policy wonks

attributed to Isaiah before ; )
.
**
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Tell me, though — do you see that whole passage from Isaiah as prophetically predicting this particular moment in Egypt’s history, or as a visionary or poetic passage that happens to resonate with current events?
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For myself, I’m interested in the views of believers and unbelievers, literalists and metaphoricians alike. 

Mr. X:

August 19th, 2013 at 12:30 am

Charles,

Thank you as always for your courtesy. As I’ve said, I will not mention the fraudulent, anti-Semitic tweets (attributed to me) of certain individuals Zen follows or question certain D.C. Arabists’ credentials as ‘legends’ constructed by someone or some agency to be parachuted into U.S. conservative media at this forum …not ever again.

My frustration over constant suspensions while others tweet and aggressively follow with arrogant impunity has boiled over into bad language on my part too many times. I accept my exile from Twitter as a relief and God’s will to focus on ‘prepping’ and prayer.

Since apocalyptic literature as it relates to warfare is your scholarly interest, here’s another passage getting wide ‘airplay’ among Evangelicals and Biblical Prophecy enthusiasts since the Syrian Civil War began:

Isaiah 17:1 (KJV) The burden of Damascus. Behold, Damascus is taken away from being a city, and it shall be a ruinous heap.

http://www.biblegateway.com/audio/mclean/kjv/Isa.17.1
Audio by Max McLean (a regular segment on Rick Wiles TruNews radio program)

Mr. X:

August 19th, 2013 at 12:38 am

“Tell me, though — do you see that whole passage from Isaiah as prophetically predicting this particular moment in Egypt’s history, or as a visionary or poetic passage that happens to resonate with current events?” Of course history tells us Egypt has been in civil war many times in the 2,700 years since that passage was written down — most famously perhaps during the Anthony and Cleopatra war with Rome.

I would agree with the latter part of Charles’ statement. Biblical prophecy is not always meant to be taken literally (for example the Eastern Orthodox Church in contrast with the former Bob Dylan position favored by Evangelicals does not take the Millenial reign of Christ on Earth to be a literal 1,000 years, but more like a 1,000 years is unto a day and a day is like unto a 1,000 years unto the LORD). And prophecy, since by definition it comes from God for Whom there is only an eternal NOW and time lacks meaning, can be multifaceted and apply to multiple epochs.

Again my apologies for bad language and allowing myself to be provoked into ‘Twitter fights’ by individuals who may very well be paid by the taxpayer for their tweeting and who seem to specialize in provocations, with the full knowledge they’ll never be suspended by Twitter. I have no such luxury nor amount of free time. Being outraged over the conduct and willful blindness of certain public members of the Orthodox Church does not give me license to bring reproach on Orthodox laity. The question of provocation and trying to poke America’s ‘bitter clingers’ into doing something stupid or violent has crossed my mind again this weekend with a TIME magazine ‘journalist’s’ tweet calling for a drone strike on Julian Assange. I can’t help but feel like the evil forces not flesh and blood behind the fleshly Powers that Be have stepped up their bloodlust and desire to provoke Americans into killing each other.

Grurray:

August 19th, 2013 at 1:24 pm

If we’re going to take Isaiah literally, how about chapter 45 and an Israeli-Persian alliance?
With nations imploding and borders being redrawn it may be a good time for new alignments

Mr. X:

August 19th, 2013 at 5:14 pm

https://mobile.twitter.com/schmittpaula/status/369474647420461056

Ironic tweet comparing Hezbollah’s ‘hospitality’ and returning electronic devices to the UK authorities confiscation of such.

Question: at what point ate defenders of government action rather than critics guilty of ‘conspiracy theorizing’ in support of their position? And is it possible they ate simply lodging a charge while tacitly admitting cracking the crypto on the laptop of Mr. Greenwald’s partner is beyond their capabilities? The desire to lodge the accusation while avoiding the embarrassment of detaining a Brazilian national in the UK for weeks necessary to crack those super top secret encrypted files he was ‘smuggling’ seems to have motivated his release after nine hours rather than ongoing detention, yes? Because those who insist the man is guilty of being a classified drug mule on only the NYT’s say so are either implying the crypto cannot be cracked in sufficient time to warrant further detention or the UK authorities are incompetent and let a guilty Greenwald associate go due to the awesome pressure the mighty Greenwald can muster?

Neither possibility is so flattering, but logical questions posed above ate only for anti rather than pro government conspiracy theorists. EOT for me

Mr. X:

August 19th, 2013 at 5:16 pm

Sic are for ate silly dumb phone typos