TL:DR: The Genesis Question part thirty-seven

Hi, Everybody!

Sunday:

12 October 14

Dear Troy & Mia; David and Marie:

Ezekiel 38

And the word of the YHWH came unto me, saying:

Son of man, set thy face against Gog, the land of Magog [the chief prince/the prince of the chief] of Meshech and Tubal, and prophecie against him

According to my NEW BIBLE DICTIONARY: 

"In Ezekiel 38:2 we are introduced to 'Gog, of the land of Magog, the chief prince of Meschech and Tubal.  The Septuagint understood Magog as a people, not a country.  The only reasonable identification of Gog is with Gyges, king of Lydia (c.660 BC)--Assyrian: Gugu: Magog could be Assyrian ma(t) gugu "land of Gog".  The linkage with peoples at the extremities of the then known world (Ezk. 38:5-6; cf. Rev. 20:8) suggests that we are to regard them as eschatological figures rather than as historically identifiable king [sic], etc….Since we need not interpret Ezekiel 38-39 as earlier in time than Ezk. 40-48, and rabbinic tradition places Gog after the days of the Messiah, we need see no contradiction between Ezekiel and Revelation, provided we understand the millennium in the sense the rabbis gave to "the days of the Messiah"

Which strikes me as one of those "we have no idea who Gog and Magog are" explanations.  Gog and Magog also occur in The Koran at the end of Sura 18 "The Cave" (which, as I read it, is all or mostly YHWHistic in form and content).

Essentially, I think Gog and Magog are God and YHWH, but erring on the side of YHWHistic inferences insofar as God's name is God so giving God a different but similar name is the same as inferring that YHWH God is the same as God (which is the YHWH's long-term point: YHWH is either the actual God, YHWH is the same as God or God is a mistaken term for the YHWH or all three). 

The fact that "Gog" is a palindrome seems significant to me, a kind of distillation/compression of the YHWHistic argument itself -- which seems to me the larger point of Ezekiel in toto: creating a consensus between God and YHWH at the apex of the Jewish Revelation.  What could better establish that consensus than merging the two theologies/deities into a single name?  If my inference is correct, this is, in fact, what happened, in microcosm, with the Synoptic Jesus and the Johannine Jesus.

"Ma" being a maternal distillation ("mama") seems to me to cover the single bolt hole left by "Gog":  an inferred female/maternal "Gog": "Magog"  -- while also providing an inversion inference in its explanation:  "the chief prince and the prince of the chief" following along with God's assertion of David's eschatological role: not as king, but as prince mirroring the ultimate fate of the YHWH: subordinate to that of God.

If I'm right, then they ARE, indeed, eschatological figures, signifying that this is of what the end times will be composed: the further along we go in this epoch, the more the dynamic will be towards merging God and His adversary, which we already see in our own age with the unrelenting push to make men and women interchangeable.

I, for one, certainly don't see a contradiction between Ezekiel and Revelation.  On the contrary, I think they represent the "scaled up" enactment of the God/YHWH conflict.  The reference to Meschech and Tubal seems to me to point in that same direction, since Meschech and Tubal are cited as descendants of Japheth and Shem and as warlike northern peoples -- immediately to the north of Israel, in this case:  Assyria.  Unbeknownst to the YHWH, as I see this overview, Assyria versus Israel proves to be only the first incarnation of the prophecy, to be followed by Babylon versus Israel and Rome versus Israel.  All devastating conflicts leaving a mere remnant of Israelis, but in which Israel ultimately prevails, the messianic fulfillment through the Johannine Jesus ultimately collapsing the Roman Empire as then conceived and converting it to Christianity.

Not knowing that this is, ultimately, what is under discussion by God in Ezekiel 38, the YHWH could be forgiven for thinking his/her/its self completely secure and at ease with what is being promised and cited as the God/YHWH consensus view:

And say, Thus saith the Lord GOD; behold, I against thee, O Gog, the chief prince of Meshech and Tubal.

And I will turn thee back, and put hooks into thy chawes and I will bring thee forth, and all thine army, horses and horsemen, all of them clothed with all sorts, a great company with bucklers and shields, all of them handling swords.

Persia, Ethiopia and Libya with them; all of them with shield and helmet

Gomer and all his bands, the house of Togarmah of the North quarters, and all his bands, many people with thee.

Be thou prepared, and prepare for thy self, thou and all thy company, that are assembled unto thee, and be thou a guard unto them.

This being the regional, Assyrian prophecy, there wouldn't be anything here that the YHWH wouldn't see as imminent  (as well as seeing that there would be a successive conflict on a larger scale arriving from Babylon).  Since the YHWH viewed his/her/its self, always, contextually -- Israel, Assyria and Babylon all having personalized deistic names for the earth and the mountains, the season of spring, fertility, birth, etc. -- there would be a perceived immunity.  The YHWH (TO the YHWH) was God spelled forward and backwards:  Gog. The YHWH could wage war against his/her/itself and always be assured that the YHWH would prevail because the YHWH was on both sides of the conflict.  

After many days thou shalt be visited: in the latter years thou shalt come into the land, that is brought back from the sword, is gathered out of many people against the mountains of Israel, which have been always waste: but it is brought forth out of the nations, and they shall dwell safely all of them.

This, I think, would have sounded an ominous note for the YHWH since "they shall dwell safely all of them" doesn't conform to the YHWHistic model of destruction.  The YHWHistic notion is that there will be widespread, wide scale destruction and that the YHWH will prevail because the YHWH is implicit in all contexts.  It would be like betting that a Major League Baseball team will win the pennant this year.  A Major League Baseball team, presumably, HAS to.  That's quite a bit different from God, metaphorically, saying ALL Major League Baseball teams will win the pennant "after many days".  While confirming both the present and imminent context:

Thou shalt ascend and come like a storm, thou shalt be like a cloud to cover the land, thou and all thy bands, and many people with thee.

God cites His own omniscient awareness of what actually WILL happen as opposed to what seems, inevitably, to BE happening, omniscient awareness that extends to the innermost recesses of the YHWH's conscious awareness:

Thus saith the Lord GOD; it shall also come to pass, at the same time shall things come into thy mind, and thou shalt [think an evil thought/conceive a mischievous purpose]

And thou shalt say, I will go up to the land of unwalled villages; I will go to them that are at rest, that dwell [safely/confidently] all of them dwelling without walls, and neither bars nor gates. 

To spoil the spoil and to prey the prey, to turn thy hand upon the desolate places that are inhabited, and upon the people that are gathered out of the nations which have gotten cattle and goods, that dwell in the navel of the land.

Sheba and Dedan, and the merchants of Tarshish, with all the young lions thereof, shall say unto thee, Art thou come to take a spoil?  Hast thou gathered thy company to take a prey?  To carry away silver and gold, to take away cattle and goods, to take a great spoil?

This is, certainly, how the YHWH, in the time of Ezekiel, would conceive of eschatology itself:  nations and armies are proxies of…and incarnations of…theological constructs.  That, for the YHWH, is how you determine whose theology is correct.  If you're correct, you spoil the spoil and prey the prey.  If you're not correct, you ARE the spoil and you ARE the prey.  That keeps happening throughout human history until, finally, A theology becomes preeminent and destroys all other theologies.  There is no shortage of failed theologies in Ezekiel's time, thrown onto the ash heap of history.  Virtually all of them would have had fertility and earth goddesses at their centres.  But: 

Therefore, son of man, prophecie and say unto Gog, Thus saith the Lord GOD: in that day when my people of Israel dwelleth safely, shalt thou not know it?

For the YHWH, another ominous note.  The entire history of this epoch to the time of Ezekiel consisted of -- and in -- Israel being in grave jeopardy.  But, then, dwelling safely for a time until being placed in grave jeopardy again. 

In Israel, the central reality wasn't of a fertility goddess or an earth goddess, but rather, as God has just asserted:  "the mountains of Israel which have been always waste", an assertion that, in tandem with God as the Ultimate Reality, is, for the YHWH ominously irrefutable. 

What God is staking the end times upon and the fate of Israel upon is the theological reality that Israel isn't just another fertility goddess or earth goddess construct among many.  Those elements are grafted on by the YHWH and (God's Larger Point, as I read it) it is only the YHWH's self-identification with monotheism that gives the YHWH -- Gog and Magog -- the illusion (and that's ALL it is, is an illusion) of theological longevity.

And thou shalt come from thy place of the North parts, thou and many people with thee, all of them riding upon horses, a great company and a mighty army.

And thou shalt come up against my people Israel, as a cloud to cover the land; it shall be in the latter days, and I will bring thee against my land, that the heathen may know me, when I shall be sanctified in thee, O Gog, before their eyes.

A seriously ominous note for the YHWH.  "That the heathen may know me" is a new wrinkle, a new way of viewing the history of this epoch.  That's the net effect of conquest based all or mostly in theology:  the most theologically accurate construct will ultimately prevail even (and often especially) when it fails militarily. 

And that is what happened and is happening. 

Gradually heathen and pagan culture wilts before monotheism.  Military conquest and sacking and wholesale destruction are distinctly unpleasant and extremely, anecdotally traumatic, but they're temporal in nature.  The Assyrians -- and the Babylonians and the Romans -- although unaware of that truth, therefore can only eradicate their own construct by indulging in the appearance/facade of conquest.  All that happens is a kind of inoculation, impregnation or infection (or all three) by monotheism which is exemplified by the Torah in Ezekiel's time. 

Thus saith the Lord GOD, Thou he of whom I have spoken in old time by the hand of my servants the prophets of Israel, which prophecied in those days; years, that I would bring thee against them.

"Art" is interpolated into the KJV text -- which attempts, thereby, to turn (what I read as) a definitive statement by God into a question:  "Art thou he…?"  Which I think results from the translators really having no idea what is being discussed. 

What God, it seems to me, is saying to the YHWH -- or Gog, if YHWH prefers a palindrome form -- is that, whatever the YHWH calls his/her/its self, everything is enacting itself in God's context. The entire Torah consists of prophecies and theology endorsed by God.  Everything that the YHWH has said in the Torah -- which is a substantial portion of it -- is there either because it reflects God's own theology -- that is, Reality -- or it is something that needs to be enacted to demonstrate to the YHWH where the YHWH is misapprehended.  Or both.

To say that the YHWH isn't pleased by the assertion of this self-evident truth would be a radical understatement:

And it shall come to pass at the same time, when Gog shall come against the land of Israel, saith the Lord GOD, my fury shall come up in my face.

Which isn't true, I don't think. 

God doesn't have "fury". 

God has nothing to be furious about. 

Fury results from the unexpected imposition or unexpected assault or unexpected and unavoidable impediment.  For an omniscient being, nothing is unexpected.  What God is doing, as I read it, is further emphasizing the extent to which God KNOWS the YHWH and the YHWH's innermost responses and awarenesses.  It's all part of making God and YHWH one here at the apex of the Judaic Revelation.  Another way of saying "YOUR fury, YHWH -- the fury you are experiencing right now as you recognize, in spite of yourself,  Actual Reality --  will, ultimately, come up in YOUR face.  And it will do so multiple times." 

For in my jealousy, in the fire of my wrath have I spoken: surely in that day, there shall be a great shaking in the land of Israel. 

So that the fishes of the sea, and the fowls of the heaven, and the beasts of the field, and all creeping things that creep upon the earth, and all the men that are upon the face of the earth, shall shake at my presence, and the mountains shall be thrown down, and the towers shall fall and every wall shall fall to the ground.

And I will call for a sword against him throughout all my mountains, saith the Lord GOD: every man's sword shall be against his brother.

What God is saying is that the enactment will take place. This is how the YHWH's fury will enact itself in lesser contexts. 

The human context is very prone to fury because, like the YHWH, so much of what human beings experience is a) unexpected and b) self-created.  Fury will come back to bite you.  Fury, on the scale of the Roman sacking of Jerusalem and the Temple in 70 AD, is subject to the same entropy everything else is.  It isn't there forever.  But, at the time that it's taking place, it's Roman fury against Jewish fury. 

Roman fury that this provincial outpost is holding out against the greatest Empire the world has ever seen. 

Jewish fury because they are about to -- again -- lose their Temple to the unclean goyim. 

Fury directed against the heathen but also redirected from God.  You can't be furious with God and be a good Jew, a good monotheist, but your fury -- as the Babyonian Conquest seeks to reiterate itself -- would be almost a tangible thing, knowing how the Babylonian Conquest had enacted itself and here it is happening again. 

"God, how can you let this HAPPEN?"

The Larger Answer to that, it seems to me, is the Torah has always existed in its same word-perfect form since the times that it documents.  The evidence was always there that God and YHWH were two different beings: that worship of God is right and worship of YHWH is wrong.  If you attempt to merge right and wrong and declare them right, you are basically asking to unleash monumental destruction upon your own head and upon your society.  The choice to go through that, as I read it, was made when each successive generation chose to believe that God was YHWH and YHWH was God.  And that the Synoptic Jesus was the Johannine Jesus and the Johannine Jesus was the Synoptic Jesus:

And I will plead against him with pestilence and with blood, and I will rain upon him and upon his bands and upon many people that with him, an overflowing rain, and great hailstones, fire and brimstone.

The "God and YHWH" consensus-building effect, at least, benefits from this as the YHWH gives the eschatological prophecy his/her/its…self-aggrandizing and self-exalting… stamp of approval:

Thus will I magnify myself, and sanctify myself, and I will be known in the eyes of many nations, and they shall know that I, the YHWH.

Next week:  God willing, Ezekiel 39.

Best,

Dave

Next Time: All Astoria. And not just the rape stuff... -"Past" Matt