Revived Roman Empire
Paul Wilson
Table of Contents
Revived Roman Empire
Christians who have any knowledge of dispensational truth have heard of "the revived Roman Empire," but many of them could not give an explanation of what it means. It is our purpose here to look a little into what God has said about the Roman Empire of the past, and at His pronouncements concerning its future. Our aim is to see where we are today in relation to that future.
For a thing to be revived, it must have at one time existed, then for some reason ceased to exist. This is exactly what is said of the Roman Empire: "The beast that thou sawest was, and is not; and shall ascend out of the bottomless pit [or, abyss; that is, with diabolic power], and go into perdition... the beast that was, and is not, and yet is [or rather, shall be present]." Rev. 17:8. God often uses the word "beast" to describe earthly governmental powers. Here is one which existed, then would disappear, and later will reappear in an altered form before its complete and final overthrow at the hand of Him who will come to seize the reins of power in this world.
When God spoke to Nebuchadnezzar and to Daniel about the Roman Empire that was then to come, He first named the other world empires which would precede it from the day in which He turned His earthly people over to Gentile dominion. He removed His throne from Jerusalem and the earth when He permitted Nebuchadnezzar to subjugate the Jews, about 606 B. C. The course of history from that point on is described in Daniel, chapters 2 and 7. In the former chapter, Gentile supremacy is depicted in an image resembling a man, and in the latter, as four wild beasts; the image began with gold and ended with a mixture of iron and clay. In other words, dominion received from God in Nebuchadnezzar deteriorated. The image was of gold, silver, brass (or copper), iron, and the iron mixed with miry clay. We are not left to our own imagination to understand this, for Nebuchadnezzar was the "head of gold," and after him would arise a "kingdom inferior" to his. The city of Babylon in Nebuchadnezzar's day exceeded in glory any city that had as yet existed. Nebuchadnezzar could boast, "Is not this great Babylon, that I have built...?" Chap. 4:30. He left God out of his considerations, but he had built a great city and a great empire.
After God's allotted time, the Babylonians were conquered (Jer. 27:6), and succeeded by the Medes and the Persians—the latter predominating. They in turn were decisively defeated, according to prophecy, by the Greeks under Alexander of Macedonia. He became king at the age of 20, and died at 33, after having conquered practically all of the known world of that day. God also foretold the breakup of his kingdom into four parts, and went into detail about the struggles between two of those parts, which occupied territories on opposite ends of Israel (Dan. 11:1-35).
But the tide of world progress was running westward, and the loose tribes in Italy were forged into a formidable power. This new power reached out farther and farther until at its zenith it occupied twice as much territory as Alexander's kingdom had. Furthermore, the Romans dominated the world scene for a longer period than any other nation ever has—about 600 years. They conquered northern Africa, the Middle East, the Balkan area, and extended their control of Europe into England.
Now how does God describe the Roman Empire of the past? "And the fourth kingdom shall be strong as iron: forasmuch as iron breaketh in pieces and subdueth all things: and as iron that breaketh all these, shall it break in pieces and bruise." Chap. 2:40. Also, "behold a fourth beast, dreadful and terrible, and strong exceedingly; and it had great iron teeth: it devoured and break in pieces, and stamped the residue with the feet of it." Chap. 7:7. Could anyone give a better description of the great Roman power as it existed?
But perhaps God overruled in the kingdoms of men so that the Greeks, who spread their culture and beautifully descriptive language in the world, were permitted to do so in order that He might use that language as a vehicle for spreading the written Word, and the Romans permitted to maintain a measure of peace by force so that the gospel could be spread in all the world during the early days of Christianity.
There is, however, this solemn side to it, that the Greeks spread mythology and many kindred errors which have more or less plagued the world ever since; and the Romans who boasted of laws of justice and equity, officially put the Son of God on the cross. Thousands upon thousands of God's dear children were martyred by the Roman Empire. God has not forgotten what it did to His Son and to His children. A terrible time of reckoning is coming for the Western world.
We noticed that God described a future state of the Roman Empire in a verse of Rev. 17 Now let us inquire, Did God give in the Old Testament a still future picture of the Roman Empire? Yes, He did. In the image of "the times of the Gentiles" (Luke 21:24) in Dan. 2, we find its now past history depicted in the legs of iron; and in Dan. 7, as a ferocious wild beast which could not be likened to any beast of the earth. But in both chapters its future state is also given; in the image, there were feet and ten toes composed of iron and miry clay; in the beast of Dan. 7, its future is described as "and it had ten horns." Here we have ten toes and ten horns. In Rev. 17, the beast that "was, and is not, and shall be present" is seen in the future with "ten horns." Is not the story one, though given in many parts? We are not left to our imagination here, for we read: "The ten horns which thou sawest are ten kings, which have received no kingdom as yet; but receive power as kings one hour with the beast." v. 12. And again, "And I... saw a beast rise up out of the sea [sea is sometimes used in Scripture to describe the restlessness and commotion of the nations], having seven heads and ten horns, and upon his horns ten crowns, and upon his heads the name of blasphemy." Rev. 13:1. The seven heads represent seven forms of government of the Roman Empire. A study of its history will reveal the many forms of government it had. When. John the Apostle wrote, he could write of these, "five are fallen [ceased to exist], and one is, and the other (or seventh) is not yet come; and when he cometh, he must continue a short space." Chap. 17:10. The beast, or future dominating power of the beast, will be an eighth form, but partake of previous forms (v. 11). In Dan. 7, an eleventh horn, a little one, comes up among the ten, and takes control of the ten, even to plucking up three of the ten by the roots. The little horn of Dan. 7 seems to merge in the beast himself in Rev. 17
Now is it not plainly evident that the Roman Empire, which was very great at one time, and then fell apart, will come back to life in a far greater way in the future? Men thought in the days of its past glory that it was an eternal, or never ending, empire; but God said otherwise. Then when it was all broken to pieces (the Western part of the Empire ended in 476 A. D., and the Eastern part continued for a time with the capital at Constantinople), man scoffed at its resuscitation, although Charlemagne (748-814) attempted it. Napoleon and others, including Mussolini, have tried it. The Italian Facist dictator went on to seize Ethiopia and Albania and revive the name Roman Empire. So far, all attempts to reunite the broken fragments of the Roman Empire, and so to remake it, have failed. Nor has any other nation ever achieved world sovereignty. We are living in a great gap between the empire that was and yet will be again. We are living in the time between the legs of iron and the ten toes of the feet; between the beast without the ten horns, and the beast with ten horns.
There never has been a stage of the Roman world when ten distinct kingdoms were united to form one new empire. Man cannot precipitate this, nor can he prevent it when God's time comes. Its future existence, and the character of its make-up its Satanic support, and its ultimate and final doom are as certain as if they had already taken place. When God has said, "I will," the thing will surely come.
Revived Roman Empire: Editor's Column
Coming events do cast their shadows, and it seemed to many Christians who were living during World War I, that everything was shaping for the end of this age then. Germany was defeated, only to rise again for another world war within a quarter century. But Russia fell into the hands of able and ruthless communist dictators, and this changed the whole course of world history.
One thing that happened during the first World War was that the intensely individualistic nations of Western Europe found it expedient to sacrifice enough national sovereignty to put their armed forces under a single military head and council. With the coming of the armistice in November, 1918, however, the joint endeavor fell apart. The allied Western nations could not even agree on a peace treaty. Soon each was going its separate way, and the old rivalries and economic wars were resumed. Hitler was permitted to rearm Germany against her pledge not to do so. This was no doubt allowed by wise men who thought it well to have a strong force between the West and Russia; but they soon found themselves fighting Germany alongside of Russia, thus helping to build an intractable power bent on world supremacy.
World War II also presented the specter of European rivals fighting together under a joint command, but still it was no Roman Empire. It was only a temporary alignment of convenience for self-preservation. At the close of the great war, the Western nations started to disarm as they had done eighteen years before. But Russia's disregard of her contractural obligations revealed her real aims. Her leaders broke their pledges with impunity; agreements were worthless whenever she decided to abrogate them. During this time Russia gained control over a much larger portion of the world, and there was no comparable power ready and willing to halt her expansion.
This situation caused the Western powers to draw closer together in an attempt to offset Russia's great and growing might. Various expedients were tried to give some unity of purpose to Western opposition to the communist world expansion. This was a new experience to have nations seeking a basis of unity in a time of absence of war—we will not call it a time of peace. A new phrase was coined to express the present impasse, a "cold war," which means it is war but not yet actual combat. Russia has been the chief gainer in this kind of warfare.
The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) came into being in 1949 to consolidate military planning, stockpiling, and preparations for a hot war. All of these steps are forerunners of the coming Roman Empire; it takes much time to condition the thinking of the individual nations to be ready to submit their forces to a super-national force in time of peace, even in view of war. But it became evident that if the Western nations did not stand together they would fall singly before Russia's master-minded treachery. At times the NATO organization seemed about to fall apart through inner dissension, but then Russia would come forward with some bold new move or adventure, and thus arouse the Western nations to activity again. In one way or another, this emergency has not been allowed to die out, nor the general framework of NATO been allowed to dissolve. God who knows the end from the beginning, and who orders all things according to the counsel of His own will, has been making things grow surely into a pattern of those that are to come. Christians of a century ago, who understood much of the prophetic word, would be astonished to see the strides that have been made by Russia and her satellites, Palestine, the Western world, the religious world, both in and out of the Catholic camp. One reason Christians are not living more in the realization of the imminence of the Lord's coming is that they have been snared by unparalleled prosperity. This obscures our vision of the things to come, and we fail to see how close the end is.
Now to have a really united Western Europe, composed of ten nations under the strong federation which probably will center in Rome, more than a military union is required. One of the reasons the NATO military union often has rough going is that something more is needed. The first thing that must be added, is an economic union. One of the big Russian offensives of the cold war is economic warfare, where she can play in the big markets of the world. Manipulation in this field can depress currencies, cut commodity prices, undercut a nation's credit, dry up the market for their essential marketable products, and many other fair and unfair means of competition. Now it is evident that no single nation on earth could stand against such tactics in a world where margins are narrow, and often given to wild fluctuations. Therefore, an economic union seems to be not only feasible, but of absolute necessity. If such were in operation, no common foe could pit one nation against another, and then break first one and then another until each falls into Russia's grasp. A nation without products to sell, without markets in which to sell them, without credits for purchases, would soon decay within and then fall like a ripe apple into the hands of the one who shakes the tree.
Without economic union, military union cannot be supported; and without them both, political union is impossible. But the revived Roman Empire will have all the prerequisites of the greatest power on earth. And all the earth shall wonder after the great Roman beast, when they behold that behemoth which had so recently ceased to exist as an entity.
And what is growing now? The economic union—the so-called "common market." It is known as the European Economic Community (EEC). This European Economic Community was born on March 25, 1957, when six nations, formerly of the Roman Empire domain, signed a treaty at ROME. The signatory powers were Belgium, France, West Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands. They are sometimes referred to as the "inner six." Its primary purpose was a customs union that would eventually dispense with all tariff duties between these nations. It is envisaged as a means to the flow of free labor between the nations involved. It is also to change national laws to make them conform to the general over-all pattern, so that there may be a wide economic and commercial exchange with a free flow of capital, all of which will eventually lead to a political union.
Does this sound like a blueprint for the revived Roman Empire? Yes, but it is more than a blueprint; it is far advanced from the planning stage, and its initial success is astounding England remained aloof from the plan in its early stages, but now is being forced by economic laws and the desire for self-preservation to seek admittance in the EEC. England had attached itself to an "outer seven" known as the European Free Trade Association (EFTA). Its members were Austria, Denmark, Norway, Portugal, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom. But realignments can be made, as the case of England has demonstrated.
The members of the EEC are bound more closely by the Rome treaty obligations than are members of the EFTA. True, there are some obstacles to be overcome in such matters as member nations who have overseas countries and territories; but these are less formidable than they once were, for many foreign possessions have disappeared from the scene. Then also, there is a determination of the framers and backers of EEC to make it work, yes, even to enlarge its scope. Some are looking forward to a May meeting of the heads of state of the member nations for clues as to how its political evolution may work.
With reference to England's long reluctance to join the EEC, and now seeking to do so, it was freely stated last year by one of their own men that they would either join or go broke within five years. Things are moving at a rapid pace in the international arena. The President of The International Nickel Company said in the company magazine that he visited five of the six EEC member nations to get certain answers, and that what he "heard and learned was startling and sobering. In a word, we are now playing in a much faster international league than most of us realize." The pace is truly quickening, and the very leaders are being swept along by the swift currents which they are powerless to stay or reverse.
While considering the events that are surely leading up to the formation of the revived Roman Empire, we might quote from The Morning News of Alameda County, California: "The European Common Market, though it seems a new thing to most people, actually is only the revival of what once existed in Europe for three centuries or so about 1900 years ago.
"For when the Roman Empire was at its peak, the area of all the countries now in the Common Market plus that of several others, together with the millions of people who inhabited the land, formed one single immense market that had no boundaries internally and no internal tariffs. Its people enjoyed a period of unrivaled prosperity."
Comments of some leading world figures may indicate the seriousness with which this EEC and related union is considered. President Kennedy said: "The Atlantic Community is no longer concerned with purely military aims... We are, and increasingly will be, partners in aid, trade, defense, diplomacy and monetary affairs." And former Secretary of State under President Eisenhower, Christian A. Herter, said: "Must we wait for some great catastrophe to produce the necessary compression of our sovereignties, the critical mass from which great new political energies should emerge?... Now we together must seek between inertia and utopia a practical common course to harness our several national strengths."—Newsweek, Jan. 22, 1962. And Newsweek expressed the aims of EEC thus: "The founding fathers of the Common Market clearly intended that the Treaty of Rome should be the beginning of a United States of Europe." July 17, 1961.
Walter Hallstein, the president of the EEC's nine-man executive commission, which really runs the new union, said: "Make no mistake about it, we are not in business, we are in politics. We are building the United States of Europe."—Time, Oct. 6, 1961.
As to how EEC's initial success is coming, we quote from Inco Magazine: "EEC became, in four short years after the signing of the Treaty of Rome, the free world's largest trading unit. In percentages of world trade, EEC was in the lead 17.5; the United States was next with 16.9; and the United Kingdom was third with 10.8 percent. EEC had likewise become the world's largest buyer-importer of raw materials." He further reported that the estimated 12 to 15 years for the transition stage, it now seemed would be completed in eight years from the 1957 date of the Rome Treaty.
EEC's achievement in lowering trade barriers among the members, in increasing trade and prosperity, is great; there is also an underlying and implicit objective of political union, and has been from the start. It is just what we might expect in the revival of the Roman Empire. Christians, we are witnessing the preparations for the revived Roman Empire and the end of this age.
Revived Roman Empire
The Christian who holds fast to God's Word and has the proper focus of prophetic events, through the means of dispensational truth held in affection, has a better understanding of coming events than the most brilliant statesman on earth apart from that truth. But the great progress of Communist penetration in such a large portion of Europe, Asia, and other strategic places caused some to doubt the reliability of the believers' Biblical knowledge and heritage. Perhaps never since the dissolution of the Old Roman Empire did things look more hopeless for the revival of the Roman Empire than just after World War II. Much of Europe's young manhood was either gone or broken, its cities were destroyed, its countryside unkempt or worse, and communications broken down. That was only 17 years ago.
God who rules in the kingdoms of men allowed the very belligerence of Russia to spur the West to joint efforts at the restoration of Europe. So today Europe has had a veritable renaissance, and all west of the Iron Curtain has sustained a real rejuvenation. The very tactics of Russia helped to force men to work together in Western Europe as never before. Now we stand on the very threshold of the greatest world event of modern times—the revival of the Roman Empire. Only a few of the nations of that old sphere have failed to reach success never before known.
With just six nations of Europe in the European Economic Community (EEC), there is a surging and throbbing community of 170,000,000 people who have attained a higher standard of living than they ever before knew. And one striking point to notice is that in the very forefront of this thriving renaissance is the nation of Italy. This nation has been backward compared with other European nations, but today it is booming. Its businessmen have become giants of industry who are confident and self-assured. One great help to such success was the finding of a big source of methane fuel in the Po Valley.
For an example of the drive and initiative of the new Italian business executive, look at Adriano Olivetti who changed a family company making office machines into an international concern which then took over the Underwood Corporation in the United States. ENI, the huge state-run oil and gasoline combine is spreading out in Europe to the dismay of old-time oil companies. There are many other manufactured products of excellence that are helping to make Italy the fastest growing country on the European Continent—and all of this when the treaty of the EEC is called the Rome Treaty. Everything today points not only to a revived Roman Empire in the offing, but to a certain place of importance for the city of Rome which for many years was the headquarters of the old Roman Empire.
All of this is taking place now when the Church of Rome is showing new resurgence and spawning an international urge of religions to draw closer to her; in other words, ecclesiastical Rome is also in step with the new tempo and will be ready to ride the beast of the revived Roman Empire (according to Rev. 13 and 17) as soon as the beast is ready to ride. Fellow Christians, the moment of our home call, "Come up hither" (Rev. 4:1), is almost here. We must be gone before the developing events mature, and surely it will not be long until they reach maturity.
As we mentioned last month, England sees that it is important that she join the "Common Market" and not remain an isolated island just out of reach of all the rapidly expanding continental growth. She has made application for admittance to this exclusive European club along with the other six nations. We also learn that she is working now toward adopting a new currency which will be based on the decimal system, the same as is in use on the Continent and in the United States and Canada. It will take some time and considerable expense to make the currency change-over, but it would seem an inevitable thing in the Common Market, or perhaps even more so in the subsequent political union. The new pound would be worth 100 cents, the half pound, 50 cents, and so on down to 25 cents, 20 cents, 10 cents, 5 cents, 21/2 cents, 1 cent, and 1/2 cent. These are all isolated events which add up to a general picture of the coming Roman Empire. Spain also wants admittance, as well as Ireland and other nations; but in the final arrangement there will be ten nations, as the ten toes of Dan. 2, or the ten horns of Dan. 7, and Rev. 13, and 17.
One other nation which is rather insistent on gaining admission to the Common Market is Israel. Now while Israel is at the other end of the Mediterranean, the territory was in the Roman Empire at the time of our Lord's coming and death. And at the time of the great revived Roman beast, Israel will be under the wing of that power. The Roman power will make a league with the false prophet in Jerusalem for a seven-year term. Therefore, it would not be at all amiss to suppose that Israel will be at least a minor power in the great league.
In all likelihood, the United States, Canada, and other American powers will be in some sort of league with the great ten. The United States has from the beginning endorsed the EEC, and even now is in the process of preparing legislation to make reciprocal trade and tariff agreements with the EEC. The United States has no thought of abandoning the Western European alliance, for it is but a part of a larger plan to restrain Russia and China from further encroachments. It is none too soon in power politics to build such a defense, for it is but a matter of time when China and even smaller nations will have nuclear weapons; and small nations might be more reckless in using them than Russia would be.
Mr. McGeorge Bundy, Special Assistant to the President of the United States said: "We cannot suppose that the Soviet Union has now suddenly abandoned its 15-year-old preoccupation with the dividing and weakening of the Atlantic community. But, in the end, our confidence in Europe rests on deeper and more solid political ground.
"These people are our cousins by history and culture, by language and religion. We are cousins, too, in our current sense of human and social purpose." Yes, the peoples of the American Continents are connected with the old Roman Empire by a direct line.
Mr. Bundy went on to say: "It is in Western Europe and in North America that the true opportunities of the modern world are now being opened for the first time. These societies are moving together into the age of every man.... But there is required, also, something harder, deeper, and decisive—a conviction, throughout the civil society, that its end is man and his possibilities. It is because we have this inherited commitment, in common with Europe, that we can be confident of the wisdom of our purpose that Europe shall gain in strength." (Italics ours.) U.S. News and World Report, Jan. 15, 1962.
In all this worldly wisdom we discern not a spark of the wisdom that "cometh from above." There is no "Thus saith the Lord." Man is the aim and end. Well may Scripture say, "Cease ye from man, whose breath is in his nostrils: for wherein is he to be accounted of?" Isa. 2:22.
The present age will end in "man's day," that day wherein man will divorce himself from God and all that is worshiped. Sin came into the world by man's sin, and will climax with "the man of sin." While church membership remains high in this nation, and the Church of Rome is making great strides, the time is not far distant when plain, bold, unvarnished atheism will throw off even the name of God. The peoples of this Western world have received a tremendous brain-washing by the atheistic jumble of evolution. All will be in readiness, after the true Church is gone to be with Christ, for the world to cast off the restraint that comes from even the name of God. Atheism and the deification and worship of man and of Satan will end this age at the coming of the Son of man with His saints and holy angels to execute judgment and reign gloriously.
There is still another important development indicating our close proximity to the end of the Church's sojourn on earth and of the day of grace. It may not seem so directly related as other points afore mentioned; it is coming world-wide television transmission. So far, such a feat has not been accomplished.
For many years prophetic students have wondered how the whole world was to see the beast of the revived Roman Empire; for Scripture says: "The beast which thou rawest was, and is not, and is about to come up out of the abyss and go into destruction: and they who dwell on the earth, whose
names are not written from the founding of the world in the book of life, shall wonder, seeing the beast, that it was, and is not, and shall be present." Rev. 17:8; J.N.D. Trans. Now it seems that in another year or two, the people of the world will be able to see the fulmination of wickedness as the beast struts across the scene blaspheming God and making the world tremble.
Satan is the "prince of the power of the air," and he is actively engaged in preparing the world to accept the man whom he will back with all his powers. The world populace will worship his man, himself, and the apostate head of the Jewish state in Jerusalem. It will be a trinity of wickedness opposed to God's King whom He has destined to "rule all nations with a rod of iron" (Rev. 12:5). Man is being readied to cast out the very name of God; moral degradation is increasing; all the implements of destruction are being readied. Today, only the finishing touches to a few details remain to be accomplished. Truly, "the time is at hand."
The Treaty of Rome is no child's play; it is a document of 248 sections covering just about every conceivable phase. It will have teeth in it too, for it will have "some authority to compel adherence by the national governments." (From a letter by Chase Manhattan Bank, March April, 1961.) As we noted previously, the coming Roman beast will pull up three of the first ten horns by the roots (Dan. 7). He will have power to compel compliance and he will use it.
We are not following some imaginary story when we speak these things; they are according to the Word of God. They are the words of truth and soberness (Acts 26:25), and will be fulfilled to the least and smallest letter. Man speaks of the EEC as a milestone of human progress; it is a milestone all right, but a milestone along the road that will bring down the wrath of God on the world that cast out His Son after spitting in His face.
Christians, let us bestir ourselves. Let us look up with joyful expectation, for we will soon see our Savior face to face.
"That bright and blessed morn is near
When He, the Bridegroom, shall appear,
And call His bride away.
Her blessing then shall be complete,
When with her Lord she takes her seat
In everlasting day."
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