Written during Israel’s Babylonian captivity, Daniel 7 reveals the kingdoms that would rule ancient Israel, and the great controversy between God and Satan and how it will end. The revealed future was not a prediction. It was a revelation from the omniscient God.
Four kingdoms ruled ancient Israel: Babylon, Medi-Persia, Greece, and Rome. Rome was the last kingdom to rule ancient Israel and its western empire ended during 476 AD. The eastern empire ended during 1453 AD. History documents that this future became a reality. Also, in the midst of this reality, Jesus Christ the Messiah walked among people and ministered to their needs. He also died for the sins of human beings and rose from the dead to return to heaven. During His tenure, He said: “I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it” (Matt. 16:18). In John 17, Jesus prayed for the members of His church as He prepared to leave them in the world. He knew the future that was going to become their reality! Another kingdom would arise amidst the ten kingdoms that survived the collapse of the Western Roman Empire and would displace three of the ten kingdoms.
This kingdom would speak pompous words against God, persecute the church members that Jesus left on the earth, and change times and laws (Dan. 7:25). This power would dominate the world for 1,260 years. The Roman Catholic Church is the only world-wide power that meets this description! The current article will highlight the daming impact of this rule.
The Roman Catholic Church placed the bible beyond the reach of common people and placed religious leaders between God and them. These spiritual leaders instructed the people in doctrines that were not biblically based. During “the 1260 year rule”, the Roman Catholic Church attempted to replace the church Jesus built on the rock. How and when did it start? The Western Roman Empire fell in 476 AD but the leader of the Christian Church in Rome remained a dominant figure; a dominant figure but he did not have world-wide rule. However in 538 AD, Emperior Justinian declared himself to be a theologian and no longer a soldier. He crossed the barrier of his mandate between what is purely civil obligation and what is religious obligation, similarly to Constantine before him, and entered in competition with the papal function and this role is evidence of Justinian’s ongoing caesaro-papism. The quest for unification of the empire by unification of the church, the fever for church-building projects with his wife Theodora, the persecution of enemies of the church and heretics, his disdain with the Sabbath although his second name was Sabbatini, his support for suppressing any eschatological fever in line with the church fathers and Oecumenius (the name under which are transmitted several commentaries in Greek on the New Testament) and yet trying to build the ‘Kingdom of God’ on earth. All this indicates the problem 538 AD was for the Roman Empire and the Catholic Church.
Archaeological and historical original sources of Justinian and contemporaries of popes, biographer of Justinian and a commentator on Revelation (Oecumenius) are very revealing of these times and the shift or transition of what belonged to the Roman Empire handed over since 538 A.D. to the church and the papal function. The Code of Justinian was a persecuting instrument. Justinian upheld the supremacy of the papacy. He permitted through the Council of Orleans actions to be done on Sunday that Constantine prohibited like travel and preparation of food and cleaning the house. In Novellae CXLIV Justinian instituted a Seventh-day Sabbath persecution. He changed the times and laws ad hoc as his Novellae XLVI and coins of 538 A.D. (XII year) indicate. Private gatherings were persecuted. He had church-manual laws. He studied Systematic Theology on the nature of Christ and wrote homiletical rules for preachers. He gave text critical advice to Jews and condemned their doctrinal deviations. However, this theological hobby of the ruler of the once mighty Roman Empire was to be taken over by a more theological competent power that would eventually lead to papal-caesarism until the unsettling of this new aggrandizing paradigm in 1798 by Napoleon. The prophetic embedding of the 1260 days as “years” prophecies in both Daniel 7 and Revelation 12 definitely started in 538 AD.[1]
The impact of the 1260 year rule is illustrated through the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church. Tradition holds that Ethiopia was first evangelized by Matthew and Bartholomew in the 1st century AD. Philip, an apostle, baptized an Ethiopian eunuch who was in charge of Candance’s, the Queen of Ethiopians, treasury. The eunuch had come to worship in Jerusalem (Acts 8:27). This fact suggests that a knowledge of the Creator God was in Ethiopia before the eunuch came to Jerusalem.
The Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church is one of the oldest Christian churches in the world. It traces its roots back to the 4th Century AD with Saint Frumentius. He was a Phoenician Christian missionary and the first bishop of Axum. As a boy, he was captured with his brother on a voyage, and they became slaves to the King of Axum. The king freed them shortly before his death, and they were invited to educate his young heir. They also began to teach Christianity (after the Catholic tradition) in the region. Later, Frumentius traveled to Alexandria, Egypt, where he appealed to have a bishop appointed and missionary priests sent south to Axum. Thereafter, he was appointed bishop and established the Church in Ethiopia, converting many local people, as well as the king. His appointment began a tradition that the Patriarch of Alexandria appoint the bishops of Ethiopia.[2]
Christianity, after Jesus’ tradition, began in Ethiopia with Matthew and Bartholomew’s evangelism in the 1st century AD and Phillip’s baptism of the Ethiopian eunuch. However, after the “1260 rule” made Frumentius the first Bishop of the Ethiopian Church, King Ezana converted to Christianity (after the Roman Catholic Tradition), and Christianity became the favored religion of the country. Ethiopian people have held onto their Christian faith, and Ethiopia has one of the strongest Orthodox churches in the world. Notwithstanding, their Christian faith reflects the impact of the “1260 year rule”! The Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church of Ethiopia is closer to the Roman Catholic Church than it is to the Church that Jesus built on the rock (Matt. 16:18).
The impact of the 1260 year-rule was not limited to Ethiopia. With very few exceptions, Christian Churches today worship God on the first day of the week, Sunday. However, before the Council of Laodicea (Roman Catholic Church) made Sunday a holy day, Sunday was used by non-Christians to worship the sun. Holy scriptures do not declare that Sunday is a holy day. Rather, the seventh day was blessed by God and made holy (Gen. 2:3) because on it He rested from all the work of creating that he had done.
Satan’s game plan is to replace the church that Jesus built on the rock. He claims ownership of this world (Matt. 4:9), and persons comprising Jesus’ Church are intruders. Consequently, during the 1260 year-rule, Satan attempted to stamp out the church Jesus built on the rock. He attempted this when Ahab and Jezebel ruled ancient Israel. After the threat from Queen Jezebel, Elijah ran 40 days thinking he was the only member of God’s church left. God told him that 7,000 in Israel had not bowed their knee to babel or kissed him. (1 King 19). Jesus declared that the gates of hell would not prevail against His church (Matt. 16:18).
In these last days, Satan has done a new thing. He has blurred the lines between himself and Jesus. Many think they are worshipping God, but they are worshipping Satan. And the “1260 year rule” played a critical role in this outcome. Will modern day Christendom move beyond this delusion? Time will tell!
Revelation 14-15 affirms that Jesus will declare “checkmate” on Satan. The mortal wound which was afflicted on the Roman Catholic Church in 1798 when the Pope died in prison will be healed (Rev. 13:3), and a nation (the beast rising from the land) will enact laws to force everyone to worship the beast and his image. Members of the church Jesus built on the rock will be persecuted and threatened with death if they do not worship the image. Revelation 14 – 18 documents Jesus’ response to these attempts to destroy the Church He build on the rock. The outcome is certain! THE CREATOR WILL WIN! As the world moves quickly towards this endpoint, its inhabitants are making their eternal decision. Some (hopefully many) will make the decision to submit to God and be recreated to inhabit heaven, and some will choose to remain as they are and be consumed with Satan and his angels. There will be no middle ground! There will be no second chances! Our present moment is very critical!
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Dr. Davis graduated from the University of South Carolina in 1976 with a Ph.D. in Experimental Psychology. He and his wife have five grand-children, and two son-n-laws. His career journey has included the University of South Carolina at Spartanburg, Alabama A. & M. University, Oakwood University, Alabama Center for Higher Education, the Educational Testing Service, Alcorn State University,and Jackson State University. His most memorable event was speaking to Alabama Senator Shelby’s Panel on “The Plight of the African American Male”. Retiring in 2002, Dr. Davis and his wife established A Natural Way Family Health Clinic in Byram, which uses lifestyle and traditional medicine to control and sometimes reverse diseases. They have witnessed diabetes being reversed, and hypertension and cholesterol being controlled without pharmaceuticals.
[1] Young, K. et al (2017). 538 A.D. and the transition from Pagan Roman Empire to Holy Roman Empire: Justinian’s metamorphosis from chief of staffs to theologian. International Journal of Humanities and Social Science. 7(1), 44-85.