Connecting the Bible to Today Part 4: Founding of Israel

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Well, you know, the founding of the state of Israel is a miracle. Now you may have heard

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otherwise and you may have heard controversial things about the state and her founding. But

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I want you to understand what a miracle it was, so stay with me.

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Welcome to Out of Zion with Susan Michael, an exploration of the Bible and the land of

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Israel. From ancient biblical sites to the story behind the stories, join Susan on a

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journey through the most exciting book on the planet. Hit the subscribe button for future

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episodes which will deepen your faith and bring the Bible to life. And now here's our host, Susan Michael.

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Well, welcome to today's Israel Answer episode. We are on part four of connecting the Bible to

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today. We have so far discussed the development of Judaism since the Bible, the development of

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Christianity since the Bible, that persistent evil of anti-Semitism. And today we're going to talk

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about the founding of the modern state of Israel. I believe you will agree with me what a miracle it

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is and it reflects a great God who can turn the heart of the King as the Bible tells us whenever

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he wants to to fulfill his purposes. So there's lots of history I could tell, but I'm going to

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start with the birth of the Zionist movement about 200 years ago. You know, it was started by a

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Jewish journalist living in Austria. He was a totally assimilated Jew. He didn't celebrate any of

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the Jewish holidays or didn't go to synagogue. And he thought really that the future of the Jewish

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people was to be assimilated. And then he went to France where he covered a court case that was taking

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place. And it was a totally anti-Semitic court case on trumped-up charges against a Jewish soldier

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in the French forces. And this journalist sat there and listened to this. And he came to the

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realization there was only one hope for the Jewish people. And that was that they had their own state.

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The journalist's name was Theodor Herzl. He went back to Austria and he wrote a book called

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The Jewish State. And he laid out his proposal for the creation of one. Now he was just a journalist.

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He didn't have any movement behind him. No political following, no political influence,

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really. But he had the idea. He saw the need for it and wrote this book. And he said that if the

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Jewish people had their own nation, not only could they defend themselves and secure their own future,

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but that from there they could combine their power, their willpower, their intellect,

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and be a blessing to the world. That's the vision of Zionism. It's to be a blessing to the world.

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Now at the same time this was happening, something else had happened that I described last two weeks

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ago on our episode about the growth of Christianity. That was that the Bible had been translated into

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the everyday language through the printing press. It had been distributed in mass quantities. And now

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there were a whole new segment of Christianity that was growing. And it was the Bible-based segment,

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or the evangelical segment of Christianity. And it became so strong in England that, and this

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movement taught from the scriptures, they saw in the scriptures that God had made all these promises

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to the Jewish people and that one day they would be restored to their ancient homeland. And so these

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early evangelical Christians in the UK were called restorationists. They prayed for and they advocated

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for the restoration of the Jewish people to their homeland. While it just so happens there was one

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of these Bible-believing Christians in Austria where Theodor Herzl lived, who had done a complete

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study of the book of Daniel and he had come to the conclusion that 1897 was a key year in the

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return of the Jews to their ancient homeland. Well, it was in the late 1800s that Theodor Herzl

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had just written his book. And this evangelical Christian who was a serving in the British Foreign

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Service, he was a chaplain in the British Embassy in Vienna, Austria. He's walking down the street

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and he looks in the storefront of a bookstore and he sees this new book by this Jewish journalist

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called The Jewish State. He buys a copy, goes straight home, reads it cover to cover, and then

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he goes to look for and find Theodor Herzl. When he does, he knocks on his door. Theodor Herzl

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opens the door and this British chaplain says to him, I have been waiting for you. You are the

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Moses that are going to lead the Jewish people home. And this is the beginning of the story of a

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really amazing friendship between this totally assimilated and secular Jewish journalist

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and this Bible-believing evangelical restorationist Christian chaplain of the British Foreign Service.

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And together they beat the drums and they got before world leaders and they started a movement

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in support of the Jewish return to the homeland. And yes, in 1897 Theodor Herzl organized the very

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first Zionist Congress. And at that Congress he referred to the few Christians that were in the

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audience, referred to them as Christian Zionists. Now while all of this is taking place within

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Judaism and within Christianity, there was something else amazing taking place that honestly,

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I don't think the state of Israel would have ever been born had this not happened.

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That was that the great and the final Islamic Empire called the Ottoman Empire was beginning to

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weaken and to decline and they made the fatal mistake of siding with the Germans in World War

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I and they lost. And so the Ottoman Empire then was broken up. It was over. It had all come to an end.

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And the Allied forces, which were the British, the French and the Italians,

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with some support from the Russians, but they broke up the Ottoman Empire and they came up with a

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plan to divide it up into smaller nation states to serve the indigenous peoples of those various

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areas of the old Ottoman Empire. So what does this mean? This means that before World War I,

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the entire North Africa, Middle East, up into Turkey and even into Asia Minor was all one

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empire and in the very middle of it was the ancient land of Canaan, the land of Judea and Samaria,

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the land that Jesus had lived in, the land we call today Israel, was right there in the heart of

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this huge empire. If you had been a Christian in the late 1700s, 1800s, would you have believed

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that the Ottoman Empire would be broken up? That after 1300 years of Islamic rule in that area,

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that it would be free for a Jewish state to be set up? That would take a lot of faith if you ask me.

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But there were Christians that were praying for just that to happen. And for hundreds of years,

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Christians were praying for, preaching about, and advocating for the restoration of the Jewish

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people to their homeland. And the breakup of the Ottoman Empire not only set into place the legal

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context for the state of Israel to be formed, but actually it formed every nation state we have in

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the Middle East today. Every single one of them, they did not exist before World War I. So not only

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is Israel's founding legal and legitimate, it's the same legal founding that every other country

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in the Middle East is based on. Just name it. Whether it's Iraq, Kuwait, Oman, United Arab

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Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, name it. It all has the same legal foundation. So you have to

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understand the battle against Israel today is not really about Palestinian homes or Palestinian

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homeland. That's all kind of a recent invention to fight against Israel. Israel has several things

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against it in this story. Number one is there was something else that happened after the breakup of

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the Ottoman Empire you must understand. That was that there became an Islamic reaction to it,

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a fight against it, and a fight to reestablish the Islamic Empire. And that is called the caliphate.

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And that movement started by the Muslim Brotherhood. They were formed in Egypt in 1928. And that was to

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react against this breakup. And so before you know it, as soon as Israel is founded Jewish

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sovereignty over land that had been Islamic, there was an Islamic push against it. But today,

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moving forward 70 years, I mean Israel is over 70 years old now. What's the big deal? Because our

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world is moving away from nationalism to globalism. So Israel was formed because of a wave of nationalism.

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You know, not only did that nationalism break up the Ottoman Empire into all these little nation

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states, it broke up the great British Empire. Today it's about national sovereignty. And there's a

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push against it now by a whole movement of globalism. Also today, there is a movement of secularism.

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And Israel was set up to be a Jewish state. It was for the Jewish people. And it's Jewish sovereignty

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over this land. And a secular world hates that. They hate to think that America could be a Christian

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nation. And they hate to think that Israel could be a Jewish nation. The other thing against Israel

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is the whole move today of moral relativism. And let me tell you, the moral relativists do not like

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knowing that there are 10 commandments. And they don't like the people that gave us the 10 commandments.

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So this just is a little snippet today to help you understand some of the forces that were taking

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place that helped bring about the founding of the state of Israel. And to understand it was totally

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a legal founding carried on by the nations. And it was approved by the United Nations even. But the

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fight against Israel is because of these other movements of Islamic movements or global secularism

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and moral relativism that do not like Israel and continually fight against her. So I hope that this

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little summary of many, many years of history and maybe a little oversimplification of it helps you

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understand, though, the big picture in Israel's founding. We're going to talk next week with you

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about the modern state of Israel. So I'll see you back here. And until then, God bless.