Kittim as Rome Study Archive

The next line, however, begins, “Its interpretation concerns the Kittim….” The modern theory had already been propounded by interpretation by the ancient community two thousand years earlier!

Kittim as Rome
PROOF OF THE PRETERIST THEORY

“And the Romans Will Come” – Daniel 11:30 (LXX) | New Oxford NRSV – “Daniel 11:30, Kittim here represents Rome (cf. Gen 10.4), which forced Antiochus to withdraw from Egypt in 168 B.C.E. during his second campaign.  This same year, Antiochus desecrated the Jerusalem temple.”

RELEVANT WORKS:

• Dead Sea Scrolls Study Archive
• Dead Sea Scrolls: Reference Materials – It has also been hypothesized that the Qumran scrolls are the secreted library of a community, perhaps Essene, that lived at Qumran, and thus survived the destruction of the settlement in c.A.D. 68. Startling parallels in expression and thought between the Qumran materials and the New Testament have led to speculation as to their influence on early Christianity.” (Kittim: “Term appearing in the Dead Sea Scrolls, used of the Romans. The Kittim are referred to as warriors from the west, who capture Jerusalem.
• 1959: F.F. Bruce, The Dead Sea Habakkuk Scroll (pdf) – By one means or another, then, the words of Habakkuk are made to refer to a new situation―to the last generation of the ‘epoch of wickedness’
• 2003: Jewish Religious Parties: Essenes – Dupont-Sommer has the correct interpretation of the Kittim being the Romans, Cf. Daniel 11:30 where LXX renders the term correctly, and Vulgate: Romani. One particular detail stands out which can only apply to the Romans and that is they worshipped their military standards. On Hab 1,16 DSH says “Its interpretation is that they offer sacrifices to their standards and their weapons of war are their religion.” This points only to the Romans as the Roman worship of the signa, a practice not known among the Greeks.
• 2013: Kurt Simmons, The Dead Sea Scrolls and Preterism – The Kittim are identified in scripture as the end-time enemy of God’s people. This identification is implicit in their rise to dominion as the fourth world empire following the decline of the dominion of the Greeks. The Kittim are named by Balaam, who said a Star and Sceptre would come out of Jacob who would visit wrath upon his enemies, and destroy “Heber” by the hands of the Chittim (Kittim).

MAIN ARTICLE COLLECTION
Typically Organized by Author’ First Name

2 Peter 3:10 Study Archive

the ELEMENTS shall melt with fervent heat

A&E “The Last Revolt” (2010 Video)

Though preterism is not specifically mentioned in this video, I’m adding it to help build up a video archive for the website.   I hope you enjoy this interesting documentary narrated by Leonard Nimoy.  Feel free to add your comments at the bottom of the page.

Adam Maarschalk: The Two Witnesses Killed by the Beast (2014)

Having seen that it was the Zealots and the Idumeans who trampled Jerusalem for 3.5 years (42 months), we also see in Revelation 11:3 that God gave power to His two witnesses to prophesy for 3.5 years (1260 days). These time periods were identical in length, but did they begin and end at the same time?

Alexander Brown: The Great Day of the Lord (1890)

To sum the whole into a sentence — with the fall of Jerusalem, the then existing age was ended, the dead were judged, the saints were raised to heaven, and a new dispensation of a world-wide order instituted, of which Christ is everlasting King, and ever present with His people, whether living here or dead beyond.

Allen Baily: Clouds of Judgment and Glory (2003)

The elements of the previous dispensation must give way for a more transcending and glorious kingdom of the Son of God Himself where He now indwells His people by His Own Spirit, and walks in them and dwells in them

Ariel David: Second Monumental Arch of Titus Celebrating Victory Over Jews Found in Rome (2017)

Arch unearthed at the entrance of the Circus Maximus was built by Titus’ brother Domitian, boasting of how the Romans had done the undoable and ‘subdued the Jews’

Augustine: Letters on Matthew 24 and “The End of the World” (400-430)

I think that the one about the weeks of Daniel in particular should be understood in terms of time that is already past. He was correct to tell the Jews that the times were completed, because their times came to an end thirty-five or forty years after he preached.

Avraham Zuroff: Jews to Recite Rare Sun Blessing at Masada’s Ancient Synagogue (2009)

For the first time in two thousand years, the ancient synagogue atop the Judean desert fortress of Masada will ring out at dawn with the rare blessing of the sun.

Benjamin Blayney: Inquiry into Daniel’s Seventy Weeks (1774)

Thus the year of our Lord LXX, “when the city was destroyed, and the sacrifice ceased, “was the middle year of the week.”

Benjamin Marshall: A Chronological Treatise on Daniel’s Seventy Weeks (1725)

the Romans meant this to be a FINAL DESTRUCTION, such as was foretold in this Prophecy

Brian Abshire: Why I Believe We Are Not Living in “The Last Days” (1999)

But if the destruction of Jerusalem was about to occur, if the land was invaded and the city about to be surrounded, how much clearer could he make it? The 70 AD scenario is the only one that really does justice to John’s sense of expectancy

Brian Schwertly: The Premillennial Deception: Chiliasm Examined in the Light of Scripture (1996)

When dealing with the book of Revelation, which is filled with symbolic imagery, one must define this imagery not by the morning newspaper or CNN but by examining the clearer portions of Scripture where many of John’s pictures are clearly defined.

C.H. Mackintosh: The Lord’s Coming – A Great Gap in Daniel 9 (1858)

Messiah was rejected, cut off, and had nothing. What then? God signified His sense of this act, by suspending for a time His dispensational dealings with Israel. The course of time is interrupted.

Cardinal Brandmüller: Persecuted in very recent times (2011)

The First Epistle of Clement to the Corinthians, which speaks of the persecution suffered by Christians “out of envy and jealousy”, was written not long after the death of Nero, and therefore very few years after the martyrdom of Saints Peter and Paul in Rome.

Carlos Gonzalez: 7 Differences Between Partial Preterist and Historicist Postmillennialism (2015)

Historicists believe Revelation is about progressive history starting from the Apostle John’s time until the eternal state, just like the prophecies in the book of Daniel.

Charlotte Elizabeth: Judea Capta (1845)

Titus certainly never dreamed of mercy to the Jews ; but of course he wished to capture the city in all its proud beauty ; and to enshrine some of his demon-gods within the magnificent courts of the LORD’S house.

Charlotte Elizabeth: The Fall of Jerusalem and The Roman Conquest of Judea (1870)

One of the most stirring episodes in the history of the world is furnished by the siege of Jerusalem by the Romans under Titus, its capture, and its destruction .

Clement of Rome Study Archive

Most modern critics suppose him to have been the Titus Flavius Clemens, brother of the Emperor Vespasian, and first cousin to the Emperor Domitian

Colin Rickets: Five Important Roman Siege Engines (2015)

The Romans were also masters of smashing down any defenses that got in their way. Forget siege as a passive process of starving out an enemy, the Romans were more proactive than that, armed with a plethora of impressive machines to prize open recalcitrant cities.

Daniel 12:2 Study Archive

And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt

Daniel 12:7 Study Archive

a time, times, and half a time

Daniel 9:24-27 Study Archive

The weeks of years, also, which the prophet Daniel had predicted, extending to the leadership of Christ, have been fulfilled

David Chilton: Judgment from the Sanctuary (1987)

St. John abandons the language and imagery of warning, concentrating wholly on the message of Jerusalem’s impending destruction. As he describes the City’s doom, he extends and intensifies the Exodus imagery that has already been so pervasive throughout the prophecy.

David Smith: Reporter ventures out to Pella to find evidence of first century church (2008)

Jpost on Pella: A revelation came to Christians reminding them of Jesus’ words: “When you see Jerusalem surrounded,

DeMar and Chilton: 2 Peter 3 – The Passing Away of Heaven and Earth (2010)

They scoffed at the claims made by Jesus that the temple would be destroyed and Jesus Himself would be the one to make it happen before their generation passed away. Since more than 30 years had passed since Jesus made this prediction, and the temple was still standing with no indication that it would be destroyed in less than a decade, they began to mock the words of Jesus.

Deuteronomy 28:49 Study Archive

Vespasian and his son Titus came from Rome to conquer the Land of Israel and destroy Jerusalem and the Second Temple.  The awful conditions described though verse 57 took place during the siege of Jerusalem.

Dominic Selwood: Two millennia after the sack of Jerusalem (2014)

Joseph, or Josephus as be became known, lived through the most turbulent period of the Jewish-Roman wars, and — to the joy of later historians — loved writing as much as he enjoyed talking about himself… his boastful personality is inextricably linked to the extraordinary life he led, and to his unique closeness to the decision makers on both sides of the war. Whatever one thinks of his character or actions, his eye for detail and his fascination with the politics driving Rome and Jerusalem make him one of the most immediate and exciting writers of the first century.

Don Walker: The Beast of Revelation (1998)

It is significant that ‘all the earliest Christian writers on the Apocalypse, from Irenaeus down to Victorinus of Pettau and Commodian in the fourth, and Andreas in the fifth, and St. Beatus in the eighth century, connect Nero, or some Roman emperor, with the Apocalyptic Beast’

DSS Fragment: 7Q5 (Pre-AD68, in Greek)

I do not think that there can be any doubt about the identification of 7Q5 – “7Q5 = Mark 6:52-53”

Duncan McKenzie: The Covenant Judgments of Revelation (2006)

This pattern of Israel’s covenant punishments, four sets of punishments, each having a sevenfold fulfillment, provides the structure the plagues and punishments found in the book of Revelation.

Eusebius of Caesarea, De Laudibus Constantini, “Oration in Praise of Constantine” (July 25, 335)

I am filled with wonder at the intellectual greatness of the emperor, who as if by divine inspiration thus expressed what the prophets had foretold concerning this monster.

Evan Minton: The Case For Nero Caesar Being The Beast Of Revelation (2018)

Nero had an imperial cult in which he required people to worship him. He required people to sacrifice to him or at least on behalf of him. Christians wouldn’t do this so they were not allowed to buy or sell anything, depriving them socially and economically.

F.W. Farrar: Darkness and dawn, or, Scenes in the days of Nero (1891)

Nero was barely seventeen at the beginning of his reign, and that Britannicus was nearly fifteen when he was murdered

F.W. Farrar: The Early Days of Christianity (1882)

And besides all this it is precious as furnishing the earliest insight into the mind of the Beloved Disciple, in a stage of his career before the mighty lessons involved in the Fall of Jerusalem and the close of the old Mon had emancipated him from the last fetters of Judaic bondage.

Francis Gumerlock: Revelation and the First Century (2009)

John wrote Revelation before A.D. 70; “The hour of testing” (Rev 3:10) occurred immediately after the death of Nero; The Emperor Titus was one of the horsemen of the Apocalypse; The seal and trumpet judgments were fulfilled in the first century Roman-Judean war; The Roman Emperor Nero was the beast of Revelation 13; Nero’s name was used in calculation of the number of the beast, 666

Frank Daniels: Days of Future Passed: You Missed It (2016)

Gentry claims to provide “a brief introduction, summary, and critique of the system.” This is something that he truly does not do. Nowhere in the book does he lay out in detail the support for the Full Preterist viewpoint

G.M. Paul: The Presentation of Titus in the Jewish War of Josephus (1993)

Josephus’ claim that the springs miraculously flowed more freely at Titus’ parousia would be to suggest that Titus was at least accompanied by divine favour, and this effect is made explicit by the statement that “the Deity has fled from the holy places and taken His stand on the side of those with whom you are now at war”

Gabor Gombor: More on the Man of Sin (2003)

If the iniquity refers to the Jewish priesthood and the Man of Lawlessness was probably a leader of a rebellious Jewish party how the two are connected?

Gary DeMar: Beware of End-Time Prophets who Keep Crying Prophetic Wolf (2018)

Jesus is answering a question put to Him by the Pharisees about the coming of the kingdom of God. To their surprise, Jesus said, “the kingdom of God is in your midst”, implying the kingdom was linked to the first coming of Jesus.

Gonzalo Rojas-Flores: The Book of Revelation and the First Years of Nero’s Reign (2004)

In this article I try to demonstrate that the Book of Revelation was written in the first years of Nero’s reign, because (a) there is an important patristic tradition in favor of Nero and (b) the internal evidence shows that the text was redacted after Nero’s ascension to the throne in 54 and before the earthquake of Laodicea in 60.

Greg Kiser: Here is why I believe… Peter was referring to Jerusalem as Babylon in 1 Peter 5:13 (2001)

Fourteen years after his conversion, Paul again returns to Jerusalem with Barnabas and Titus. Peter is there again and even named as a “pillar” in the church at Jerusalem

H.L. Nigro: Response to the Preterist Position as Outlined by Sproul (2001)

The gospel was not preached to all nations at the time Jerusalem was destroyed. It had been preached only to the known world.

J. Marcellus Kik: The Appearance of the Sign (1971)

Many commentators cannot see how this was fulfilled before the year 70 A. D. Yet the New Testament itself reveals that this prophecy was fulfilled, and for those who regard the New Testament as authoritative, this should be convincing enough.

J. Nelson Kraybill, for Christianity Today: Apocalypse Now (1999)

Don’t get trapped with wooden literalism-unless you really expect to get to heaven and find that Jesus is a sheep.

J.E. Lendon: The Roman Siege of Jerusalem (2005)

This article was written by J.E. Lendon and originally published in the Summer 2005 edition of MHQ. J.E. Lendon is an associate professor of history at the University of Virginia. This article is excerpted from his book Soldiers and Ghosts: A History of Battle in Classical Antiquity

Jack Kelley: Idealists, Preterists, and Futurists (2012)

Preterists believe the day of the Lord took place in 68-70 AD with the Roman conquest of Israel. The Millennium was actually only 40 years long and took place from 30-70 AD. The Earth will last forever and there will be no coming judgment and no rapture of the Church.

James Glasgow: The Apocalypse: Translated and Expounded (1872)

If Jesus came spiritually, invisibly, but personally and potentially, on the day of Pentecost, and judicially as King of Nations and Head of the Church, to judge Jerusalem and terminate the Jewish kingdom, all the intimations of His coming quickly are plain, easy, instructive, and accordant with the grammatical and scriptural use of language.

James Jordan: Bridging the Last Gap: Daniel’s Seventy Weeks Revisited (1992)

The assumption is that Christ confirms the Covenant during His 3-year ministry, and then dies in A.D. 30 in the middle of the 70th week.

James Stuart Russell: Old Jerusalem is the City Identified with “Mystery Babylon” (1878)

The well-known commentator, John David Michaelis, shrewdly conjectured that Babylon is identical with Jerusalem. Speaking of the place from which the First Epistle of Peter was written, he says:

James Stuart Russell: The Parousia in the Vision of the Seven Mystic Figures (1878)

In all this the prophecy and the history fit each other like lock and key; and if we had not the testimony of an eyewitness, who certainly could have no interest in exaggerating the ruin of his people or defaming their character, it would scarcely be possible to believe that these symbols were not overcharged.

James Swann: Charles Spurgeon, Full-Preterism, and Figurative Language

Those involved with Preterism appear to look for anything written by anybody in regard to A.D. 70 and the fall of Jerusalem (simply skim through the pages at the Preterist Archive).

Jarrod Drawbaugh, Reflections of a Former Full Preterist: Part 1 – The Book of Revelation (2018)

By this point it was apparent that A.D. 70 was a far more significant event and played a far more significant role in scripture than I had realized. Previously obscure passages were coming to light, and with it the Bible was coming alive in a whole new and exciting way.

Jarrod Drawbaugh: Reflections of a Former Full Preterist, Part 4 – 1 Thes.4, 2 Thes.2, & 2 Pet.3

The entirety of New Testament eschatology seemed to be a unified whole. Splitting between A.D. 70 and a yet future return seemed to be a false dichotomy.  But there was one huge problem: the resurrection.

Joel McDurmon: The Tale of the Long Toes (2012)

Of particular note for today is Clarence Larkin’s 1920 rendition of “Daniel and Revelation Compared” which includes a masterfully drafted version of the fourfold-metal image from Nebuchadnezzar’s (Neb) dream (Dan. 2), complete with a mind-numbing dispensational distortion to the picture forced by Larkin’s dispensationalism. 

John Denton: Prophetic Day or Year – Jerusalem’s Destruction and the Seventy Weeks (1998)

Everything that God had given this nation had been stripped away. The model of God’s Kingdom project had now been destroyed. The real thing was now under construction its foundations already laid.

John Evans: The 1,290 and 1,335 Days of Daniel 12 (2004)

The factional fighting among Zealot groups that occurred in the early months of 70 turned the Temple into a battleground where genuine worshipers risked being killed if they entered the grounds. The fighting made a mockery of the religion that the combatants supposedly embraced. By any reasonable standard, it constituted an abomination against the Jewish faith.

John Gill: The Prophecies of the Old Testament, Respecting Messiah Considered ; and Proved to be Literally Fulfilled in Jesus

I hope my account of prophecies will make appear. It is undeniable matter of fact, that ever since the times of Jesus, prophecy has ceased among the Jews; nor can they themselves deny it

John Noē: What about Paul’s “Man of Sin”? (2002)

He was that 1st-century man who had to be revealed before the day of Christ in A.D. 70, and who was destroyed when it came. No future “man of sin” need come and fulfill this prophecy; it has already been fulfilled.

John Owen: ΟURΑΝΩΝ ΟURΑΝΙΑ, The Shaking and Translating of Heaven and Earth (1649)

Understanding, as I suppose, that the things here said to be shaken were the Jewish ordinances, they translated their disposition a “removal;” as the truth is they were removed. 

John Reilly: Book Review: Beyond the End Times (1999)

The fact is that the sack of Jerusalem by the Romans just was not big enough to be the fulfillment of the prophecies of the Book of Revelation, or even of the Olivet Discourse. To try to limit the “end times” to that single event smacks of the complacent surmise by Tacitus that the whole of Jewish messianic prophecy was fulfilled by the ascension of Vespasian to the imperial title in Rome.

Josephus, Wars, Book 6, Chapter 5, Section 3

before sun-setting, chariots and troops of soldiers in their armour were seen running about among the clouds, and surrounding of cities.

Judea Capta Coins (71)

Struck in Rome beginning in the year 71 to commemorate the triumph of Vespasian & Titus

Julius Scott: Did Jerusalem Christians Flee to Pella? (1998)

This paper summarizes the major arguments in the discussion and evaluates them against a restudy of the evidence presently available. It concludes that the ancient writers are more likely than modern doubters to be essentially correct.

Julius Scott: The Effects of the Fall of Jerusalem on Christianity (1983)

Jewish Christians groups were more closely tied to the national institutions of Judaism, than we should expect the 70 C.E. catastrophe to impact them more severely than others.

Karl August Auberlen Study Archive

.Christ Himself represents the destruction of Jerusalem as His Messianic coming

Ken Gentry: As Lightning Comes From the East (2001)

The specter of A.D. 70 haunts the New Testament record (being frequently and vigorously prophesied). Its occurrence dramatically impacts first-century history (being one of its more datable and catastrophic events).

Ken Gentry: The Beast of Revelation (1989)

Now it is almost universally agreed that Nero was one who was possessed of a “bestial nature.” Nero was even feared and hated by his own countrymen. A perusal of the ancient literature demonstrates that Nero “was of a cruel and unrestrained  brutality.”

Kermit Zarley: Tom Wright’s Faulty Eschatology (2016)

Tom can be pretty harsh against those who adhere to the traditional view of the second coming of Christ, as I do, that it means in the yet future Jesus will literally appear in the sky on clouds

M.F. Blume: What Do Preterists Believe About “The Prince” in the 70 Weeks of Daniel? (2001)

Reference to the gentiles being given the opportunity to tread the holy city beneath their feet is directly connected to Jesus’ words concerning the times of the Gentiles.

Marcus Booker: Peter’s Epistles: Short Summaries (2003)

His concluding message is for them to “stand firm” in the grace of God. He thus encourages his brethren on the basis of the promises that would soon be fulfilled among them.

Martyn McGeown: Preterist Gangrene: Its Diagnosis, Prognosis and Cure (2008)

Given that most of the eschatological texts have been devoured by the preterist gangrene, what is there to stop the men of Postmillennial Reconstructionism from adopting full-blown preterism? We appreciate the fact that a future Second Advent still occupies a place in their theology, but after “preterizing” most of the New Testament, where will they find Biblical evidence to support this eschatology?

Matthew Gwinne: Nero, a new tragedy (1603)

if a subject is to be sought for tragedy fraught with piteous evils, dire and doleful, has the earth ever sustained, has nature ever begotten, has the sun ever seen, has history ever published Nero’s equal or an equivalent evil?

Michael Bull: Cosmic Language, or, Ethnic Cleansing as Mercy (2012)

In representative terms, the people of God are no longer the Land but the heavenly Sea. The Church herself is the oncoming storm.

Michael Bull: Rescuing Revelation (2017)

The event commonly referred to as Jesus’ ‘second coming’ is history. He came ‘without delay’ in 70AD, just as He said He would. He now rules the nations with a rod of iron, but the final judgment is yet to come.

Michael Shover: Luke 21:20-21 – The Flight to Pella (2018 Audio)

This our Lord indicated in Matthew 24:13 when He said, ‘he that endures to the end shall be saved.’  The end that He had spoken of was the end of Jerusalem.

Milton Terry: Apocalyptic Elements in Hebrew Song (1883)

It borders on folly to ask, in the study of such a psalm, when and where God actually bent down the visible heaven and made a pathway of clouds on which David or anyone else saw him descend. But we do see, in all such emo­tional word-pictures, how vividly the Hebrew poets apprehended the presence of God in human experience, and also in the phenomena of the natural world.

Milton Terry: The Apocalypse of the Gospels (1898)

The teaching of Jesus concerning “the end of the age,” and the Son of man coming in the clouds,” appears to have been given in the latter days of his ministry, in connection with the overthrow of the Jewish temple at Jerusalem.

Nathan DuBois: Remember Pella (2005)

I can think of no more encouraging phrase to say to one of my brothers or sisters than to “remember Pella

Pella Flight Tradition Study Archive

But when you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies.. Then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains

Pete Stoller: Renewed Creation: Preterism and 2 Peter 3 (2007)

All of the discussion above hinges on an understanding of ‘the day of the Lord’ in 2 Peter being about the end of history judgment rather than AD70 judgment.

Peter J. Leithart: The Promise of His Appearing (2004)

preterism is not merely a way of interpreting New Testament prophecy but also provides a framework for understanding New Testament theology as a whole.

Peter Leithart: Decreation in Jeremiah 4 (2010)

Jeremiah is using this image to convey the idea of a dramatic decreation: God is going to unmake the world. This kind of catastrophic language is often used when talking about the death of a king or the fall of a city.

Peter the Rock Study Archive

For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God.

Philip Mauro: The Seventy Weeks and the Great Tribulation (1921)

repudiates the “parenthesis theory” that has been perpetuated even in our own day by modern Dispensational writers on prophecy, and lays the foundation of what the biblical teaching concerning the destiny of the nation of Israel.

Philip Mauro: The Seventy Weeks of Daniel 9 – When do they Begin and End? (1922)

the 483-year period of Daniel 9:25, reaching “unto the Messiah, the Prince,” ended at the baptism of our Lord, in the 15th year of Tiberius Caesar, when He was thirty years of age.

Rabbi Applies Deuteronomy 28 to Post-AD70 Era (2010)

Kohen saw the cataclysm as a miraculous fulfillment of prophecy found in the book of Deuteronomy – especially chapter 28:23-24.

Ralph Woodrow: Daniel’s 70 Weeks – Future or Fulfilled? (1971)

We believe the fulfilled interpretation is the correct view; that the 69 weeks measured “unto Messiah”; that in the midst of the 70th week after three and a half years of ministry—he was cut off in death; that this sacrifice, being the perfect sacrifice, caused other sacrifices to cease in God’ s plan.

Revelation 13:18 Study Archive

It’s a number puzzle — the majority opinion seems to be that it refers to [the Roman emperor] Nero.

Richard Anthony: The Mark of the Beast (2003)

Nero’s persecution, which was initiated in A.D.64, was the first ever Roman assault on Christianity. Roman historian Tacitus (A.D. 56-117) spoke of Nero’s “cruel nature” that “put to death so many innocent men.”

Rick Chromey: A Student’s Research Paper on 2 Peter 3 (2002)

Too many futuristic views have placed the church as some intermediate substitute until Christ can finish the work He started. He said He was going to come back in their generation and set up His kingdom, but He got delayed.

Robert Brow: Advent – Comings of the Lord Among the Nations (1998)

The coming that the New Testament writers referred to occurred in AD 70 when the temple was destroyed, Jerusalem was devastated, and the religious establishment of the city was decimated. The signs of that day of the Lord, and the metaphorical portents Jesus used to describe it, all happened in that generation exactly as Jesus had prophesied.

Romans 13:11 Study Archive

Salvation is nearer to us than when we believed.

Samuel Dawson: II Peter 3: Destruction of the Universe or Destruction of Jerusalem? (1997)

The false teachers were denying the coming of Christ, and it is about this coming we now concern ourselves. Was Jesus coming in the person of the Roman army to destroy Jerusalem in 70 A.D., or was he coming at the end of time?

Sean Harris: Is Preterism Biblical? (2016 Audio)

Sean Harris, Pastor of Berean Baptist Church in Fayetteville, North Carolina

SGF Brandon: The Fall of Jerusalem and the Christian Church (1951)

A Study of the Consequences of the Jewish Catastrophe in the Year 70

Simon Yap: So you want to know who the beast is (2016)

The “mark” symbolized the spiritual condition of the inhabitants of Jerusalem. The ones with the “mark” were in allegiance with God. However, in Revelation, the mark is reversed. That is to say, the mark was on those who were against God and had allegiance to the “beast.”

Stone Tablet Celebrating Masada’s Destroyer discovered (2007)

Now the Israeli newspaper Haaretz reports the discovery and the first imaging of an ancient Roman stone tablet honoring Flavius Silva, the Roman general and governor of the Judean province at the time, for conquering the Masada complex and putting an end to the Jewish revolt.

Tertullian: An Answer to the Jews (198)

Tertullian calculates the seventy weeks of Daniel’s prophecy (Daniel 9. 24) as ending with the destruction of the Temple in the first year of the reign of Vespasian.

The Amillennial Preterism of Clement of Alexandria [A.D. 162]

Clement did hold to a future advent of Christ, and like many throughout history, supposed that it would be within his own lifetime. Thus, while Dispensationalists like Thomas Ice use the “immanence” argument to support a “pre-trib” rapture, the only real conclusion that we can draw from this statement is that Clement was wrong.

The Arch of Titus (81)

It is a triple arch erected by the east end of the Circus Maximus by the Senate in 81 AD, in honour of Titus and his capture of Jerusalem in the First Jewish-Roman War.

Titus Flavius Vespasianus Study Archive

God co-operates with us. — Their miseries, by your valor and God’s assistance, are multiplied. Their factions, famine, siege, and the falling of their walls without a battery, do they not manifest that God is angry with them, and assists us? – Titus

Todd Dennis: Were the Seventy Weeks Fulfilled in the First Century? (1995)

Interestingly, Christ, in response to the question of how many times a man should forgive his brother, responded by saying, “until seventy times seven,” which is the exact amount of time in Daniel’s seventy weeks.

Tony Keen: Claudius, Nero, and the Imperial succession (2005)

 This short paper intends to examine some issues relating to the emperor Claudius’ apparently strange decision in AD 49 to marry his niece Agrippina, and advance her son Nero towards the imperial throne, at the expense of his own son Britannicus.

Video: Dead Sea Scrolls prove most of the New Testament Predate 70 AD

17 of the 19 fragments were unread.  The reason was that they were looking in the Old Testament.

Virgil Vaduva: Progressive Accuracy in Dating of 70 Weeks (2002)

Spreading the 70 weeks from Cyrus to the time of Christ, Eusebius separated the component parts and introduced a gap, but he placed the crucifixion in the midst of the 70th week

Pesher Habakkuk (1QPHAB): “This means the Kittim, who cause many to perish by the sword – youths, men, and old men; women and little children – and on the fruit of the womb have no mercy.” (Burrows, p. 367) War Scroll: And the dominion of the Kittim shall come to an end, so that wickedness shall be laid low without any remnant; and there shall be no survivor of the sons of darkness.” (Burrows, p. 390)

Pesher Nahum (4Q169): 1:1-4 Where the lion went, a lion’s cub to come there [with none to disturb] (Nahum 2:11) [Its pesher refers to Deme]trius king of Greece who sought to enter Jerusalem on the counsel of the seekers-of-smooth-things. [And he did not enter, for God did not give Jerusalem] into the hand of the kings of Greece, from Antiochus until the appearance of the rulers of the Kittim. And afterwards the city shall be trampled …

1Q16 Fragment 9: “Kittim” ; As “Swamp Beast” [“From Your temple overlooking Jerusalem, kings bring You] tribute” (68:29). This refers to all the rul[ers] of [the Kittim . . . ] before him in Jerusalem. “You have rebuked [the swamp beast,] that herd of bulls, the Gentile heifers; he tramples on bars of silver” (68:30). The “swamp beast” refers to 4[ . . . the] Kittim [ . . . ]

1QM – The War Scroll: And the dominion of the Kittim shall come to an end, so that wickedness shall be laid low without any remnant; and there shall be no survivor of the sons of darkness.

4QMMT: VanderKam has already mentioned the other group that appears as a threat in this Pesher, the Romans (under the guise of the name “Kittim”), although they are primarily a threat to the leaders of Judea, not to the Qumran community specifically.

The Book of Jubilees: Cursed be the Philistines unto the day of wrath and indignation from the midst of all nations; may God make them a derision and a curse and an object of wrath and indignation in the hands of the sinners the 29 Gentiles and in the hands of the Kittim.

“One particular detail stands out which can only apply to the Romans and that is they worshipped their military standards. On Hab 1,16 DSH says “Its interpretation is that they offer sacrifices to their standards and their weapons of war are their religion.” This points only to the Romans as the Roman worship of the signa, a practice not known among the Greeks.”

Lawrence Schiffman (2001)
“For many years, the Dead Sea sect had expected the Roman conquest of Palestine.  The Dead Sea sectarians felt confident that the coming of the Kittim – as they called the Romans – would trigger the great eschatological battle.  But this final, expected war failed to materialize after the Romans easily defeated the divided Hasmonaean state in 63 B.C.E.  By the time Jewish resistance developed into the full-scale revolt of 66-73 C.E., the Dead Sea sect had stabilized and had completed the gathering – with some possible exception – of its manuscript collection at Qumran.”  (Reclaiming the Dead Sea Scroll, p. 395)

Kittim – A place-name in the Aegean Islands, perhaps Kition in Cyprus, that in Dead Sea Scrolls texts serves as a code word for “Romans” (Glossary)

Neil Silberman (1993)
“All these manuscripts, taken together, might be read as the recorded faith of a community of alienated, dispossessed Jewish priests and their followers who remained true to the strictest possible interpretation of the biblical laws.  They also remained true to the hope for national redemption from the yoke of the people they called the Kittim — and we call the Romans — idolatrous invaders from across the sea “who trample the earth with their horses and beasts.” (The Hidden Scrolls, p. 3)

F.F. Bruce (1959)
“They believed that the iniquities of the Wicked Priest and his associates would bring the judgement of God upon them.  As time went on, they came to see clearly who would be the instruments of God’s judgement.  God was raising up the ‘Kittim’ for this purpose, and by the ‘Kittim’, as has been said above, they probably meant the Romans.  It was indeed the Romans who, by their occupation of Judaea in 63 B.C., put an end to Hasmonaean domination; but the Qumran community could see the shape of things to come before that date.  They also saw that the Romans would exceed the terms of their commission and incur the divine judgement themselves because of their impiety and rapacity.”

“By one means or another, then, the words of Habakkuk are made to refer to a new situation―to the last generation of the ‘epoch of wickedness’” (The Habakkuk Scroll, p. 11)

Matthew Henry (1662-1714)
Habakkuk 1:4-6: “It shall be a punishment in which much of the hand of God shall appear; it shall be a work of his own working, so that all who see it shall say, This is the Lord’s doing;and it will be found a fearful thing to fall into his hands; woe to those whom he takes to task! 5. It shall be such a punishment as will typify the destruction to be brought upon the despisers of Christ and his gospel, for to that these words are applied Acts 13:41, Behold, you despisers, and wonder, and perish. The ruin of Jerusalem by the Chaldeans for their idolatry was a figure of their ruin by the Romans for rejecting Christ and his gospel, and it is a very marvellous thing, and almost incredible. Is there not a strange punishment to the workers of iniquity? II. The sentence itself is very dreadful and particular (v. 6): Lo, I raise up the Chaldeans. There were those that raised up a great deal of strife and contention among them, which was their sin; and now God will raise up the Chaldeans against them, who shall strive and contend with them, which shall be their punishment. Note, When God’s professing people quarrel among themselves, snarl at, and devour one another, it is just with God to bring the common enemy upon them, that shall make peace by making a universal devastation. The contending parties in Jerusalem were inveterate one against another, when the Romans came and took away their place and nation.” (Complete Commentary, in loc.)

Daniel 11:30 “the ships of Chittim shall come against him, that is, the navy of the Romans, or only ambassadors from the Roman senate, who came in ships. Ptolemaeus Philometer, king of Egypt, being now in a strict alliance with the Romans, craved their aid against Antiochus, who had besieged him and his mother Cleopatra in the city of Alexandria. The Roman senate thereupon sent an embassy to Antiochus, to command him to raise the siege, and, when he desired some time to consider of it and consult with his friends about it, Popilius, one of the ambassadors, with his staff drew a circle about him, and told him, as one having authority, he should give a positive answer before he came out of that circle; whereupon, fearing the Roman power, he was forced immediately to give orders for the raising of the siege and the retreat of his army out of Egypt. So Livy and others relate the story which this prophecy refers to.” (Complete Commentary, in loc.)

Adam Clarke
“Verse 30. For the ships of Chittim shall come against him. Chittim is well known to mean the Roman empire. Antiochus, being now in full march to besiege Alexandria, and within seven miles that city, heard that ships were arrived there from Rome, with legates from the senate. He went to salute them. They delivered to him the letters of the senate, in which he was commanded, on pain of the displeasure of the Roman people, to put an end to the war against his nephews. Antiochus said he would go and consult his friends; on which Popilius, one of the legates, took his staff, and instantly drew a circle round Antiochus on the sand where he stood and, commanded him not to pass that circle till he had given a definitive answer. Antiochus, intimidated, said, he would do whatever the senate enjoined; and in a few days after began his march, and returned to Syria. This confirmed by Polybius, Livy, Velleius, Paterculus, Valerius Maximus, and Justin.” (Adam Clarke’s Commentary, Dan. 11:30)

John Lightfoot
“A Decree of Augustus given out at Rome, becomes an occasion of accomplishing a Decree of the Lords, namely of the Birth of the Messias at Bethlehem.  He is born under a Roman taxation, and now that Prophecie of Chittim or Italy afflicting Heber, Numb. 24.24. beginneth livelily to take place.” (Works, 1st. Ed., Vol. 1; Harmony, p. 4)

Kurt Simmons
“Forty-year Eschatological War – The Essenes looked for a final, eschatological crisis in which the “sons of light” under the command of the “Prince of the Congregation” would defeat the “company of darkness,” consisting of the “ungodly of the covenant” (apostate mainstream Jews) allied with Edom, Moab, Ammon, the Philistines, and the Kittim. The Prince of the Congregation is identified elsewhere with the “Branch,” or Messiah: “The Prince of the Congregation, the Branch of David, will kill him [the king of the Kittim] by strokes and by wounds.”[25] According to the War Scroll, the “exiled sons of light” would return from the “desert of the peoples” and encamp in the desert of Jerusalem. After battling the army of Belial embodied in the “ungodly of the Covenant” and their foreign allies, including the Kittimoccupying Judea, the “Sons of Light” would move to Jerusalem and rededicate the temple. These events would occupy the space of seven years, with the restoration of the temple service occurring in the seventh sabbatical year. Of the remaining thirty-three years, four would be sabbatical years, leaving the war to be waged for twenty-nine years: Nine years against the sons of Shem; ten years against the sons of Ham; ten years against the sons of Japheth.[26] The conflict would climax with the complete defeat of the “King of the Kittim” by the assistance of heaven and the angels of God, led by the Prince of Light, who elsewhere is equated with Michael.[27] “On the day when the Kittim fall, there shall be battle and terrible carnage before the God of Israel, for that shall be the day appointed from ancient times for the battle of destruction of the sons of darkness.”[28] Scripture teaches, and the Jews understood, that the Messiah would continue forever (Ps. 89:4; Isa. 9:7; Jn. 12:34). The forty-year war seems thus to be the period during which Messiah would defeat his enemies, inaugurating his reign, and may be derived from the probable time Joshua spent conquering the land of Canaan, and the reign of David, who ruled in Hebron seven years, and thirty-three in Jerusalem (I Kng. 2:11).” (The Dead Sea Scrolls and Preterism)

John Dominic Crosson
“The Romans were not singled out as much in their secterian documents, although against them, in their so-called War Scroll, they were preparing to fight the ultimate apocalyptic battle.  This was to take place at the end time, when Sons of Light, the members of the group, were to clash with the Sons of Darkness, the Romans, code-named the Kittim.  A battle against Rome did take place eventually, when the Roman general and soon-to-be emperor Vespasian marched through the area on his way to Jerusalem in the early summer of 68 C.E.  But the Qumran Essenes’ final battle did not end as the War Scroll imagined.  What de Vaux labeled and archeologists still call Phase II of the site ended in fiery destruction, with Roman arrowheads scattered around the site.  In their final desperate act, the members took and hid their sacred scrolls in nearby caves, rolled up in storage jars with bowls and lids, and they were not discovered again until a Bedouin shepherd stumbled upon them in 1947.” (Excavating Jesus, p. 158)

Michael Baigent (1991)
“The ‘War Scroll’ imparts a metaphysical and theological dimension to the struggle against the ‘Kittim’ by depicting it as a clash between the ‘Sons of Light’ and the ‘Sons of Darkness’.  More importantly still, however, the scroll contains a vital clue to its own dating and chronology.  When speaking of the ‘Kittim’, the text refers quite explicitly to their ‘king’.  The ‘Kittim’ concerned cannot, therefore, be the soldiers of republican Rome, who invaded Palestine in 63 B.C. and who had no monarch.  On the contrary, they would have to be the soldiers of imperial Rome, who invaded in the wake of the revolt of AD66.. It is thus clear that the ‘War Scroll’ must be seen in the context not of pre-Christian times, but of the 1st century. (Dead Sea Scrolls Deception, p. 142)

“The `Habakkuk Commentary’, for example, alludes to a specific practice – victorious Roman troops making sacrificial offerings to their standards.  Josephus provides written evidence for this practice at the time of the fall of the Temple in AD70.  And it is, in fact, a practice that would make no sense under the republic, when victorious troops would have offered sacrifices to their gods.  Only with the creation of the empire, when the emperor himself was accorded the status of divinity, becoming the supreme god for his subjects, would his image, or token, or monogram, be emblazoned on the standards of his soldiers.  The ‘Habakkuk Commentary’, therefore, like the ‘War Scroll’, the ‘Temple Scroll’ and the Damascus Document’, points specifically to the Herodian epoch.” (p. 150)

Ida Froehlich (1999)
“The rule for the use of t he typological name Kittim –and most probably for other terms as well– is that the name has a collective, general meaning (in the case of the Kittim: “strangers arriving from the sea, from the direction of Cyprus”). The actual meaning of the name in a given instance is always determined by the characteristics of the term, that is, those events which the text mentions as a reference in connection with the name (sometimes, as in the case of Acco in the aforementioned text, one key word is the determining factor).

The kittim mentioned in pHab are to be identified with the Romans. Pesher Habakkuq IX.4-10 interprets the conquest of the kittim as divine punishment, in the course of which “the riches and booty of the last priests (_____ _¿______) of Jerusalem shall l be delivered into the hands of the army of the Kittim”, “at the end of the days (_¿____ _____)”. This reference most likely concerns the fight for the throne between the sons of Alexandros Jannaios, in the course of which both pretenders gave handsome sums and gifts to Aemilius Scaurus, the Roman general, and Pompeius, who was the arbiter in their dispute (cf. Jos. Ant. XIV.2-3; 3.1).” (History as seen from Qumran)

Peter Schafer (2003)
“One thing both movements (Qumran and Bar Kochba) would have had in common was the fight against Rome, for it is almost certain that the term “Kittim” in the Qumran texts stemming from the final phase of the Qumran community is a reference to the Romans.” (The History of the Jews in the Greco-Roman World, p. 152)

Kerry Shirts
“Dupont-Sommer has the correct interpretation of the Kittim being the Romans, Cf. Daniel 11:30 where LXX renders the term correctly, and Vulgate: Romani. One particular detail stands out which can only apply to the Romans and that is they worshipped their military standards. On Hab 1,16 DSH says “Its interpretation is that they offer sacrifices to their standards and their weapons of war are their religion.” This points only to the Romans as the Roman worship of the signa, a practice not known among the Greeks.” “(“Wounded, pierced”) in Isa. 53:3, derives from the same Hebrew root (HLL) as the phrase hlly (the slain i.e. “fatally wounded”) of the Kittim [the final foe].” (Kerry Shirts)

Nosson Scherman (1994)
(On Daniel 11:30) “Kittim is another name for the Romans.  Rome will ignore its prior pact with the Hasmoneans (v. 23), and nullify the treaty.   It will realize that Jewish disunity, brought about by their forsaking the Torah, “the Covenant of Sanctity,” provides Rome the opportunity to conquer.” (Tanach, p. 1808)

Thomas Slater
“In Jewish literature, the enemy Rome is designated Edom, Kittim, and Egypt, as well as Babylon. For the most part, however, the identity with Babylon occurs after 70 CE” (Dating the Apocalypse)

John R.W. Stott
“Discussion about the nature of glossolalia must not distract our attention from Luke’s understanding of its significance on the Day of Pentecost.  It symbolized a new unity in the Spirit transcending racial, national and linguistic barriers.  So Luke is at pains to emphasize the cosmopolitan character of the crowd, not least by “from every nation under heaven’ (5).  Although all nations of the world were not present literally, they were representatively… Luke is careful also to add Egypt and Libya which come under the heading of the Hamites, and Cretans (Kittim) and dwellers in Rome who belong to the section under Japeth… Luke does not draw attention to what he is doing; but in his own subtle way he is saying to us on that Day of Pentecost the whole world was there in the representatives of the various nations.” (The Message of Acts, p. 68)

John C. Trever (1965)
“The new leather fragment now provided a first-century B.C.-A.D. testimony to the accuracy of the text as it has been preserved – Kasidim was clearly in the text used by the copyist.  The next line, however, begins, “Its interpretation concerns the Kittim….” The modern theory had already been propounded by interpretation by the ancient community two thousand years earlier!” (The Untold Story of Qumran, p. 97)

Marcus Wood (2000)
“Nevertheless, my main point of concern would relate to your suggestion that in 1QpHab the Kittim are clearly the Romans. This is the very point I am attempting to cast some doubt upon. On studying the Habakkuk pesher I am still in some doubt as to what the ‘telling’ points of this identification are. My research into the standards debate as a whole suggests that the pesherist’s argument is contrived from the biblical prophecy itself, combined with a more general reverent attitude to worship of standards that might be applied to any number of ancient groups. In other words it is not entirely necessary to apply this to any specific historical event. Another aspect of the argument often cited concerns the reference to the ‘eagle’. Obviously the eagle is well associated with Rome, but again this aspect is drawn directly from the prophecy itself. Instead I come to the uneasy conclusion that the general feeling portrayed in the pesher better fits the Roman advances during the broad historical period than any other nation, though precise identifications are difficult to tie down. That said, however, I agree that the reference to the Kittim in pNah clearly represents the Romans.”

Ed Youngblood (1986)
“Kittim [KIT im] – A Hebrew name for part or all of Cyprus (Jer. 2:10) and named after a son of Java (Gen. 10:4).  Kittim also became a symbol of Rome (Dan 10:30).  The Israelites must have been familiar with Kittim, or Cyrpus.  From the oracle of Balaam (Num 24:24), it is evident that the Israelites associated Cyprus with ships.  The prophet Jeremiah saw Kittim as the western boundary of the known world (Jer. 2:10), and Ezekiel reported that Cyprus supplied Phoenicia with pines for Phoenician ships (Ezek. 27:6).” (Nelson’s Illustrated Bible Dictionary, p. 736)

ROME AS EDOM

Babylonian Talmud
“When Nero came to the Holy Land, he tried his fortune by belemnomancy thus:—He shot an arrow eastward, and it fell upon Jerusalem; he discharged his shafts towards the four points of the compass, and every time they fell upon Jerusalem. After this he met a Jewish boy, and said unto him, “Repeat to me the text thou hast learned to-day.” The boy repeated, “I will lay my vengeance upon Edom (i.e., Rome) by the hand of my people Israel” (Ezek. xxv. 14). Then said Nero, “The Holy One—blessed be He!—has determined to destroy His Temple and then avenge Himself on the agent by whom its ruin is wrought.” Thereupon Nero fled and became a Jewish proselyte, and Rabbi Meir is of his race.” (Gittin, fol. 56, col. 1.) (source)

Earnest Renan
“Never was a people so sadly undeceived as was the Jewish race on the morrow of the day when, contrary to the most formal assurances of the Divine oracles, the Temple which they had supposed to be indestructible collapsed before the assault of the soldiers of Titus. To have been near the realisation of the grandest of visions and to be forced to renounce them, at the very moment when the destroying angel had already partially withdrawn the cloud, to see everything vanish into space; to be committed through having prophesied the Divine apparition, and to receive from the harshness of facts the most cruel contradiction—were not these reasons for doubting the Temple, nay, for doubting God himself? Thus the first years which followed the catastrophe of the year 70 were characterised by an intense feverishness—perhaps the most intense which the Jewish conscience had ever experienced. Edom (the name by which 2the Jews already distinguished the Roman Empire), the impious Edom, the eternal enemy of God, triumphed. Ideas which had appeared to be unimpeachable were now argued against. Jehovah appeared to have broken his covenant with the sons of Abraham. It was even a question if the faith of Israel—assuredly the most ardent that ever existed—would succeed in executing a complete right-about-face against evidence, and by an unheard-of display of strength continue to hope against all hope. ” (Origins of Christianity, Book 5, Chapter One: The Jews after the Destruction of the Temple)

ROME AS IRON

Thomas Newton
“The four different metals must signify four different nations: and as the gold signified the Babylonians, and the silver the Persians, and the brass the Macedonians; so the iron cannot signify the Macedonians again, but must necessarily denote some other nation: and we will venture to say that there is not a nation upon earth, to which this description is applicable, but the Romans.” (Dissertations on the Prophecies, Vol. I, p. 240. )

Date: 06 Nov 2004
Time: 04:00:28

…which proves that the fourth kingdom in Daniel cannot be Rome! — Augustin –

Date: 24 Nov 2004
Time: 14:10:16

The Fourth Kingdom of Daniel was definitely the Greeks as any reasonable commentary will tell you. The other three were the Babylonians, the Medes, and the Persians – all these were genetically and culturally related. The Greeks were totally different to the first Three, but Roman culture has deep Greek roots and hence couldn’t be described as different in essence to it. Afterall that’s why we say “Greco-Roman” – same gods, same myths, even the same language in the early days. Italy in those days was built out of Greek colonies. The ships of Kittim were very clearly the Romans sent to oppose Antiochus, hence Rome is the Kittim. Premillennialist nonsense that projects a revived Roman Empire onto the ten kingdoms is misinformed historically.

Date: 14 Oct 2005
Time: 12:40:26

Dear Sirs,
I read with interest the point that is made concerning Kittim being the Romans in the Dead Sea Scrolls. I was aware of the fact that in their commentary on Habakkuk, this identification was made. But what is the source for the comment concerning the identification of the Kittim being Romans involving the text of Daniel? If you could help me, I would be most grateful.
Sincerely, Charles D. Provan

[Charles, thanks for writing.  Daniel 10:30 is the passage that was rendered “Romans”   You can find this still existing in most Catholic Bibles, which are based on Greek texts: “And the Romans Will Come..” – Daniel 10:30 (LXX) – Todd]

Date: 11 Dec 2005
Time: 19:45:40

Augustin,
the introduction of Rome into the 11th chapter of Daniel is set by Sir Isaac Newton, as well as Ibn Yachya (and the earlier Jews quoted in Saint Jerome’s Daniel Commentary) at verse 31, “and arms [Romans, who came against Antiochus in the preceding verse] shall stand on his [Antiochus Epiphanes’] part, and pollute the sanctuary of strength.”

However, Rashi makes the “vile person” of verse 21 as Rome, and makes the Kittim rebel soldiers who angered the Emperors, and then makes verse 36 a reference to Vespasian.

Date: 22 Jan 2011
Time: 18:40:29

The Kittim a.k.a the Anti Christ a.k.a Roman Catholic a.k.a Son of Darkness a.k.a Epicenter of Evil a.k.a Master of Deciever Deception Deceit a.k.a the Jesuit will be destroyed by the Son of Light.

Date: 19 Feb 2011
Time: 17:21:08

First, Sodom Gommorah are peoples of ancients Macedonia in Aegean (Greek), then lesbian term are derived from ancent island of Lesbos in Aegean Sea, it’s the locations of Lud or Lot. The peoples are called Kittim. Kittim are Sons of Darkness in the Dead Sea Scroll, Romans are Kittim descendants. Christianity are religion from Macedonia and then Rome Vatican. So Christianity is nothing to do with the real Jesus (Issya).