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The Euphrates is a
familiar river to us today; Baghdad,
the capital of Saddam Hussein, is still on its banks. A glance at the map will assist us.
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Note first that the
angels are “bound” at the Euphrates.
This would seem to imply that these forces are being held back until
the time arrives (we’ll discuss the time on a later slide). The Euphrates is an historic boundary
marker:
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• Abraham’s land
(Gen. 18:15) was said to be bounded by it -- though the ancient Israelites
were given less than this.
(Interesting possibilities in that!)
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• It was considered
the eastern boundary of the Roman Empire.
Beyond it, barbarians.
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• It is mentioned
again in Revelation 16; indeed, some
scholars view this as merely a preliminary to that.
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How do we interpret
this?
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• Four angels ===
four kingdoms (see Daniel’s discussion of how the angel was held by the
“Prince of Persia”).
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• These kingdoms were
held in check at the Euphrates river, heading toward the land John knows --
the Roman Empire.
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The historicist view
is that the empire in question is that of the Turks, held at the Euphrates in
the person of Malek Shah, for 60 years until his four sons, in their four
kingdoms, launched a campaign of conquest in January of 1057. This would follow along after the
interpretation of the fifth trumpet in sequence.
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