Europe - The eighth kingdom of the dragon

1. world history and history of salvation
   The Scriptures point to a kingdom that will exist immediately before the second coming of Jesus Christ and will be destroyed by the returning Lord. Then God's kingdom will visibly break through in the history of salvation and end the present world age (Rev 17:14,19).

By "beast" the seer John refers to both a kingdom and a person who represents that kingdom.
By "beast", the visionary John refers to both a kingdom and a person who represents that kingdom. The beast (the kingdom and its leader) receives its power from the dragon, who is also called Satan (Rev 13:2; 12:3). Therefore, this kingdom is ultimately a kingdom of the dragon.

The beast has seven heads (Rev 17:7). The heads have a double meaning. On the one hand they represent 7 mountains on which the woman1 sits, on the other hand the 7 heads are also to be understood as 7 kings and thus as a state or kingdom. The 7th king is followed by an eighth (Rev 17:11). They are all dragon kingdoms in different times.

1. the fallen 5 heads
   In Rev 13,2 the characteristics of the beast are compared with predators, namely with a leopard, a bear and a lion. With these beasts of prey also three of the four kingdoms are described, of which we can read in chapter 72 of the prophet Daniel. For the fourth kingdom after Daniel 7 a comparison with a beast of prey is missing. It is said of Him that it is dreadful and terrible and very strong and also much different from the former and has ten horns (Dan 7:7). Rev 17 repeats and completes the prophecy of Dan 7.3 about the kingdoms.

The five empires that had already fallen at the time of John the seer can be identified as the following empires in world history: 1 Egypt, 2 Assyria, 3 Babylon, 4 Medo-Persia, 5 Greece. Each of these empires had a special relationship with Israel:

Which empires Rev 17 refers to can be seen in the history of Israel.
In Egypt, Israel lived in captivity. The 10 tribes of the northern kingdom of Israel were captured by the Assyrians. The two tribes of the southern kingdom, Judah and Benjamin, were imprisoned in Babylon. The Medo-Persian Empire retained the supremacy over Judah after the fall of Babylon. The Greek commander Alexander the Great conquered Jerusalem and Palestine in 333 B.C., shortly after the famous battle of Issus, because this was necessary to support his further advance into India.

The connection with Israel can be explained by the fact that the prophetic word does not report on profane world history, but on the history of the Kingdom of God. But the latter is inseparably connected with Israel. Which kingdoms are meant in Rev 17 can therefore be seen in the history of Israel.

God had separated and isolated the people of Israel so that they might serve as witnesses of the revelation of salvation to all nations. Israel was therefore to stand above all peoples as the state of God. Therefore, God led them out of the bondage in which they lived at the time of their coming into being in Egypt and into freedom. However, because Israel disobeyed its God, God put it among the nations (Exodus 19:5f.; Exodus 28:25, 64-68). Israel lost its political freedom again. As a political community, it came under the rule of certain kingdoms of this world. These are empires two to eight, which Rev 17 (except the first) lists in numbers.

1. the sixth head

From the sixth head (king) it says: "... and one is". This was the kingdom of Rome that existed in John's day. Satan tried to give Jesus in the desert "all the kingdoms of the whole world" if he fell down and worshipped him (Luke 4:5 and 6). Luther translated the Greek word "oikumene" of the original text as "all the kingdoms of this world". The word "oikumene" is also translated in Lk 2,1 as "all the world". There it says:

"It came to pass that a commandment came from Caesar Augustus, that 'all the world' should be cherished."

The Greek word "oikumene" refers throughout the New Testament to the Roman Empire or the Roman world. The account of the temptation of Jesus thus shows that Satan, also called the dragon, was the fallen angel prince of the Roman Empire.5 Jesus resisted the satanic temptation. In contrast to Adam, he did not submit to the satanic will. In 395, the Roman Empire was divided into West Rome and East Rome. West Rome - the original and actual Rome - went down in 476 with the last emperor Romulus in a battle against the Heruls prince Odoacer. The ever diminishing Ostrom remained until 1453, when the Turks conquered Constantinople. Like the previous five empires, Rome was in a special position to Israel. Judea belonged to the Roman Empire. Jesus of Nazareth, a Jew according to his human origin, was crucified under the Roman governor Pontius Pilate.

1. the seventh head
   Of the seventh head it says in Rev 17:10:

Since Israel had rejected its Messiah, it was scattered throughout the world by Roman soldiers in 70 AD. The history of the kingdom of God in Israel is not yet finished, however, but only interrupted (Rom 11). Since there has not been a Jewish state since that time, there could not be a single secular empire to which it could have been subordinated. The seventh kingdom according to Rev 17 is therefore not to be sought in the time of dispersion, when the Jews lived among many peoples to whom it was more or less subordinated. But when the dispersion was nearing its end and many Jews had already returned to the land of their fathers, a single empire emerged, which set itself the goal of exterminating all Jews it could get hold of.

Thus the adversary succeeded in gaining a man who made it his business to kill all Jews
The Austrian journalist Theodor Herzl founded modern Zionism in 1896 with his book "Der Judenstaat" (The Jewish State). The Zionist movement strove to re-establish a publicly secured national home for the Jews in Palestine. As a result, the return of the Jews to the land of the fathers gradually began. This triggered the counteraction of the dragon. He obviously wanted to prevent the state of Israel from coming into being anew and God from continuing his history of the kingdom with his people. Thus the adversary succeeded in winning over a man who made it his mission to kill all the Jews. This was Adolf Hitler, a Catholic who was also - like Herzl - Austrian. He succeeded in becoming the leader of the German Reich and - equipped with the fullness of state power - was able to put most of his anti-Jewish plans into practice. He persecuted the Jews not only in Germany but also in foreign countries over which he exercised military power. The Hitler Empire must therefore be regarded as the 7th Reich of the Dragon. There is no other state that acted in a comparable way against Israel when it was in the process of gathering and becoming a state again.

This understanding of history is confirmed in the book of Daniel. The prophet Daniel sees an insolent and treacherous king rising (Dan 8:23-25).

This king agrees with the seventh head in Rev 17, but the Stuttgart Jubilee Bible says that the prophecy in Daniel 8:23-25 is that of Antiochus Epiphanes, who reigned in Syria from 175-164 B.C. But this interpretation cannot be correct. The verses 9-12 already prophesy of Antiochus Epiphanes6 who in 168 B.C. transformed the temple in Jerusalem into a temple of Zeus (Dan 8,11). Antiochus Epiphanes was king of one of the Diadochian empires into which the Greek empire of Alexander was divided. His empire is therefore to be assigned to the 5th head, namely the Greek world empire.

All these characteristics apply to Adolf Hitler
Daniel looks beyond the time of Alexander's successors (ch. 8,22f.) to a time that was then far away (ch. 8,26). It belongs to the time of the end (Dan 8,17). In this time of the end, which precedes the coming of the Messiah, Daniel sees a bold and treacherous king emerging. Of this king it is said:

→ He will be powerful, but not by his power. He will wreak havoc. He will destroy the strong with the holy people - Dan 8,24 (a)

→ He will rise in his heart and in the midst of peace he will destroy many (b)

→ and rebel against the prince of all princes (c)

→ and be broken without a hand - Dan 8,25 (d)

All these characteristics apply to Adolf Hitler:

a) Hitler called himself the "greatest magician of all time". These were decidedly occult political forces that had broken through when he came to power in 1933. The former president of the senate of Danzig, Hermann Rauschning, confirmed in his book "Talks with Hitler" that Hitler had been under a strong demonic, occult influence. Even educated people had declared at that time that 'the Führer is a demigod'.

Germany, which had largely fallen away from the Reformation confession, fell at the feet of the person whose name had previously been mentioned in the official files: "antisocial, work-shy". During the war Hitler had only made it as far as corporal. He did not possess any natural leadership qualities, as Rauschning describes in the above-mentioned book in an enlightening way. When the adjutant of Hitler's unit heard him speak in Munich in 1923, he felt that he had a completely different person in front of him. Hitler's election had been broken through. "And the dragon gave him his power" (Rev 13:1).

Hermann Rauschning writes as a contemporary witness that Hitler was 'drunk with megalomania' and 'not only the party leadership, but also his conservative opponents and the Reichswehr leadership were very superior in insight and foresight'.

b) Hitler disturbed the "Holy People". He let many Jews perish. He did this in the midst of peace; for he was not at war with the Jews. Hitler had millions of peaceful and defenceless Jews put into concentration camps and gassed like vermin. This is without precedent in history. The Syrian king Antiochus Epiphanes also harassed the Jews, but in warlike conflicts. The Jews finally won their freedom under the leadership of the Maccabees.

c) The Hitler salute meant that in Hitler lay salvation. This was obvious rebellion against the prince of all princes, the Son of God.

d) Hitler was broken without a hand. He ended by suicide. Antiochus Epiphanes, however, died a natural death.

For all these reasons, it may be assumed that Hitler was the seventh head of the beast according to Rev 17:7
For all these reasons it may be assumed that Hitler was the seventh head of the beast according to Rev 17:7, which had to remain for a short time, 12 years.

1. the eighth head:
   According to the wording of Rev 17:11, the 8th kingdom is the renewal of one of the preceding seven kingdoms. Which kingdom it is, results when Dan 7,7f. and Rev 17,11 are compared with each other. The fourth kingdom according to Dan 7,7f. and the eighth kingdom (head) according to Rev 17,11 is followed by the kingdom of God in visible form (Dan 7,27; Rev 19,6). The fourth kingdom according to Daniel and the eighth kingdom (head) according to Rev 17 is thus to be understood as one and the same kingdom. Rev 17 declares the eighth kingdom (head) to be the reappearance of one of the preceding kingdoms. Daniel does not see this particularity of the last world empire. But the fourth and last kingdom according to Daniel 7 and the sixth kingdom according to Rev 17 is clearly Rome. Consequently the 8th and last empire after Rev 17 must be the new form of the 6th empire, namely Rome, which we call the European Union. This understanding corresponds with the historical development.

After the downfall of Western Rome, the idea arose to let the Roman Empire come into being again in the form of a European empire. However, despite some attempts, this idea could not be realized at first. The Roman idea of an empire had to give way to emerging national thinking.

The idea of a united Europe in succession to the Roman Empire reawakened
On 25 December 800, the Frankish King Charlemagne was crowned Roman Emperor in Rome by Pope Leo III. But already in the year 817 Charlemagne decided to divide his Frankish empire among his sons Lothar, Phillip and Ludwig. This was the birth of Germany and France. As a result of the division of the Frankish Empire, nation states were created in Europe. From then on, Germans and French claimed to be heirs to the Roman Empire. Hence the centuries-long hereditary enmity between the two peoples. In France, the Latin language of the Romans, mixed with Gaelic, lived on in French, as did the Roman administrative system. In contrast to Germany, France was always a central state according to the Roman model. The Germanic tribes, however, also saw themselves as the successors of Rome. That is why the Saxon King Otto I had himself crowned Roman Emperor by Pope John XII in 962. This is how the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation came into being in the High Middle Ages. It was considered the continuation of the Roman Empire and was called holy because of its connection with the Roman Church. It existed until the year 1806, when Emperor Franz II of Austria laid down the German imperial crown. However, the idea of a united Europe in succession to the Roman Empire later reawakened.

The seventh empire, the Hitler Empire, did not yet have Roman dimensions, although some beginnings were visible in the Berlin-Rome axis. It did not lead to the unification of Europe, but it prepared it decisively.

In the meantime, the European Union has come into being. It may - although it has not yet received its final form - for the reasons mentioned above be regarded as the newly created 6th Reich, the 8th Empire of the Dragon.

The resurgence of Rome in European and anti-Christian form was initially opposed by the following obstacles, which were still considered insurmountable until the Second World War:

The Gospel and biblical standards of morality, marriage and family. They shaped the culture of the peoples of Europe despite many a sinful behaviour of the people and led to the Christian Occident. As long as the Bible is the general guideline for the life of a people, the dragon can do nothing (a).

Organizationally independent nation states (b).

An ancestral normal national consciousness and a natural love of the fatherland (c).

The dragon can only overcome these obstacles with the help of humans by seducing them. In the history of the Occident, especially in Germany, the seductive power of Satan is clearly visible, with whose help he tackles the obstacles shown:

a) The dragon fought the Gospel since Paul had brought it to Europe. At first by bloody persecution of Christians. Since this did not lead to success, he changed his method. He took and still takes influence on the biblical teaching. In particular, he achieved that the early church changed the teaching of the Holy Scriptures about the justification of the sinner and pushed Jesus Christ back in its meaning through an unbiblical teaching of Mary. The Reformation led the way back to the biblical gospel. It is certainly no coincidence that in times of spiritual awakening, which began at that time, the formation of a new European empire was a long way off.

Bible-critical theologies led to a different gospel as well as to a different ethics
The Protestant-church area was now exposed to special seduction. Bible-critical theologies emerged which led to a different gospel as well as to a different ethics. The large-scale attack against the Bible began with the Age of Enlightenment and the associated French Revolution. This attack was supported by Darwin's theory of evolution, which replaced the Creator God with long periods of time and chance. Eventually, ideological ideas, especially the teachings of Karl Marx, the God of the Bible, were ousted from political life. The man of today wants to rule without God. This inevitably leads to a decline in morality and morals. It is worth remembering the state's approval of the killing of unborn children, the legitimisation of homosexual activity and the release of pornography.

This, in turn, leads to the decline of the family, which is further encouraged by the equality of men and women, which is contrary to creation.

Although the state closes itself to the will of God, it opens itself to the supernatural, the occult, which flows from satanic sources. In public schools, pupils are forced to indulge in occult practices8 . Thus, even young people come under the rule of the same dark forces that were able to develop in the Hitler Empire, albeit in a different way. The goal of this occult awakening is "the new world". But this new world is the future empire of the dragon, who is already at work preparing his subjects.

b) A new Rome, the eighth empire of the dragon, could not come into being if the European states wanted to remain independent. In particular, strong countries in Europe fighting for supremacy would stand in the way of a resurgent Roman Empire. From the point of view of the dragon, the last two world wars therefore seem to have been necessary for the sole purpose of giving the participating European peoples reason to never fight against each other again in the future, but to be friends from now on and to walk together as one. This rethinking began when Germany and France decided to bury their old hereditary enmity.

The son of a Bohemian-Austrian diplomat and a Japanese woman paved the way to the European Union as early as 1922: Richard Graf Coudenhove-Kalergi9 At that time he published his first political draft, the essay 'Pan-Europe - a Proposal', in the Neue Freie Presse in Vienna. After the last world war, leading statesmen took up Coudenhove-Kalergi's ideas.

The German Konrad Adenauer, the Frenchman Robert Schuman and the Italian Alcide De Gasperi - all Catholic politicians - were the three founding fathers of the initial European community of six, which was created step by step between 1952 and 1957. On 25 March 1957, in a solemn ceremony, the Treaties of Rome - the Treaty establishing the European Economic Community and the Treaty establishing the European Atomic Energy Community - were signed. They entered into force on 1 January 1958. That was the beginning. Later, the former Bavarian Prime Minister Alfons Goppel was instrumental in bringing the parliamentary groups together in the Council of Europe to form a community capable of acting. It wanted to transfer the law in its unifying form from the Holy Roman Empire to the democratic community of European peoples10 . European unification was sealed in the Maastricht 'Treaty on European Union' of 7.12.92. This Treaty entered into force on 1 November 1993. A united Europe cannot, of course, be without a single currency. That is why Germany is giving up its good, stable DM currency and combining it with the weak currencies of other Member States to form the euro.

Last but not least, the German state is giving up itself as a nation state, having released our country, against the majority will of its own people, for settlement by foreign peoples to the extent we know. The nation state of Germany is becoming a multi-ethnic state as other states in europe followed till we become the satanic One-World-Government which was prophesied in the Bible.

No state can do without a head of state. In the European Union, therefore, we can still expect a common representative, the person who will rule the eighth kingdom of the dragon.

c) National thinking is opposed to a united Europe. Apparently, due to the influence of the media, today those of extreme right-wing, reprehensible disposition are suspected of representing national interests. In this way, resistance to the dismantling of the nation state and the Europeanisation of Germany is suppressed and educated to pan-European thinking.

The detachment from the divine moral law, the neglect of marriage and family, and the new multicultural and multinational society lead more and more to chaotic conditions. Remember...

→ to the consistently high number of unemployed,

→ to the admission of a steady stream of asylum seekers,

→ to the disturbance of internal peace caused by the acceptance of a very high proportion of foreigners, which is manifest

→ in the disproportionately high crime rate among foreigners and the invasion of Islam,

→ to the decline in morals that has occurred as a result of the relaxation of the moral penal code,

→ to the efforts to facilitate the use of drugs,
to the high national debt and other things.

Governing our country is becoming increasingly difficult. Is this chaos deliberate? 'Ordo ab Chao', "Order springs from disorder", is a Masonic motto. Although it is pretended to have found the disorder, in fact the Lodge created the chaos through its influence on the state11 In the book "Europa als Auftrag", the co-editor Prof. Dr. Rinsche, who is a member of the European Parliament, writes with regard to the fragmentation of world politics:

"The question of the new world order is being asked, but not yet answered. It is necessary to create order out of chaos "12

There is the suspicion that in Europe, but especially in Germany, chaotic powers were given space so that a new empire could arise on the ruins of the Christian West. The "beast" wants to save from chaos with the help of the dragon's powers, so that it can then be worshipped as saviour (Rev 13:15).

It has not yet been forgotten that the seventh head of the beast was also received as the savior of the fatherland in 1933 and worshiped like a god.

Since May 14, 1948, Israel is once again an independent state and no longer subordinated to the peoples. But it is still disobedient to its God as it was 2000 years ago, and has still not accepted its Messiah. This explains why Israel is coming under increasing pressure from the peoples the longer it is in existence. Prehistory speaks for the fact that Israel will become dependent on the 8th kingdom of the dragon, as it did with the preceding kingdoms. The present political situation already gives an idea of this development. For example, the EU is supporting the creation of a Palestinian state in areas that Israel reclaimed in the Six Day War as its God-given land and where there has never been a Palestinian state. Furthermore, the European Union does not recognise Jerusalem - especially the Old City - as the undivided capital of Israel. It wants a special status for this city.

At his second coming, the Lord Jesus will find conditions similar to those at his first arrival. Israel is back in the land of the fathers after a long time, but it is still under some pressure from a major European power. At that time this was Rome. Before Jesus' Second Coming, Israel will once again be curtailed in its sovereignty by a European empire, the European Union, probably in favour of the Palestinians. Israel will not be able to free itself from the constraints of this empire, the empire of the Antichrist. In a time of greatest need, it will cry out for its Messiah and experience and receive him as Savior and Redeemer (cf. Zech 8-10).

The European Union will be the core kingdom of the Antichrist

Who the 10 kings will be who will receive power for a time with the beast (Antichrist), I am not yet able to recognize. However, there will be globally interconnected power structures over which the Antichrist will rule. But the European Union will be the core kingdom of Antichrist.
6 The Ninth Kingdom

The eighth kingdom of the dragon is his last. Who will defeat it? A realm comparable to an invincible predator? No, one lamb will overcome the eighth kingdom and the ten kings allied with it! A lamb is a symbol of weakness, defencelessness and sacrifice. The powerless Lamb of God has already defeated the Dragon on Golgotha. Now, at the end of this eon, Satan must leave the field. One breath from the mouth of the Son of God is enough. The impotence of God is stronger than all the power of the Devil.

Great crowds in heaven rejoice: Hallelujah! For the Almighty God has taken over His kingdom (Rev 19:6). Blessed are those who have been called to the Lord's Supper - one may well also say victory supper - of the Lamb.