Customer Reviews

Sign of the Last Days When

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

The Sign of the Last Days deals with the belief taught in many denominations that the prophecies in Matthew 24, Mark 13, and Luke 21 refer to our generation. The most well known of these groups are the Jehovah's Witnesses. This belief includes the idea that pestilences, famine, earthquakes, war and most social problems took a drastic turn for the worst at about the turn of the last century. The belief implies that things were pretty good until recently, and now things are rapidly going downhill in a handbasket. In some ways this is true, but is this the complete story? After reading this book the reader will be thankful to be alive today, and will count his or her blessings. The authors, both active Christians, do a masterful job evaluating historical trends as related to the concerns usually included in the "Last Days" teaching. For those who love history this book is a fascinating read. And for all Christians it will help you place your faith on an historical basis. For anyone interested in eschatology, the book is a must. The book is also a must for anyone interested in the Jehovah's Witnesses.

The author, Carl Olof Jonsson, sees Billy Graham, Hal Lindsey ("The Late Great Planet Earth"), Jehovah's Witnesses, the Worldwide Church of God, and others as misrepresenting Jesus's eschatalogical discourse in a similar way.

This is surprisingly good reading material for anybody interested in New Testament eschatology.

Jonsson devotes most of the first 200 pages of the book to historical analysis of famines,wars, pestilences, crime, and earthquakes to present a strong case that we live in one of the safest times in history. So, if Jesus really meant that he would return during a particularly dangerous time, we could be sure that he wouldn't come now.

The copious references, charts, and quotations inspire confidence in the material.

Jonsson shifts gears by doing scriptural analysis in a chapter called the "Myth of the Composite Sign" to show a different way Jesus's words can be read without taking liberties with the text. This frees the reader from the assumption he needs to look for a particularly troublesome time.

The last 30 pages or so include interesting appendices, including correspondence with seismologists and a detailed analysis of the Greek word "parousia" to present the case that it has the idiomatic meaning of "coming" in Matthew 24. So students of the Bible are confusing themselves when they insist on the basic meaning of "presence."

The book is underpriced and you will probably want to read it two or three times.

Jonsson cites some authors with unusual views. I was motivated to track down and buy at least one book just from reading his footnotes.

a very interesting history book, with a twist.

it beats up the beleif that this century is unique, which makes it unpopular with jehovahs witnesses.

the information is quite easy to follow, but the style lets it down a bit.

a book well worth the effort though. a must for SERIOUS jehovahs witnesses.

I must stress, this is an important book to read, even though I only gave it 3 stars! Read the Gentile Times Reconsidered (by the same author) and then read this, to give a "full scope" of what's going on. First you have to get rid of the notion that 1914 AD (CE for JW's) is the the "end of the world." He proves it in the Gentiles book. Then, read this book, which proves that this is not so... there has always been wars, famines and pestilences! World War 1 (as he points out for example) was largely a European war! Most other countries outside Europe were minor players.

Theses are the issues NOT ADDRESSED!!! (all asterics)

*The author fails to talk about the 100's of millions of Chinese that were slaughtered AFTER 1914 (in Communist China in the 1950's), nuclear weapons as being unique in our time! And there is a fear that it could happen again, with so many countries that are willing to whipe us out!

*What about the fear of robotics? How come he did not address this? These things are in some ways very interesting, but they could also take our jobs! There are already car manufacturing plants in Italy that needs very little workers (only repairers) the rest is done by robots! This is something unique from the 20th century onwards.

*I know the book was written in 1987, but now that the Israeli's are have largely pulled out of Gaza, I wonder what impact this is going to have on the world? He could have at least commented on that, because a lot of Christians in general "doomsday" about this issue all the time! He should have shut them up too!

*I still think (some time in the future) this very large human population we have today is going to have a major impact in the future. Never before (since 1850) as the world's population reached into the billions! It was much, much lower before hand. So I am greatful Carl allerted this to our attention!

*There are other serious issues that affect us GLOBALLY whether it's environmental or commerically.




It goes on a bit towards the end particularly the chapter about the myth of the composite sign. There seems to be too much statistics in this book for it to be enjoyable. So I thought to myself, it's good as a reference book to look at if someone preaches and bashes to you it's the end as we know it.


Read this along with The Gentile Times and you'll have a much clearer understanding of the "end of the age" or "system of things."

Your eyes will open and you'll have GREATER RESPECT for the Bible You'll be surprised how much the Watchtower distorts facts and figures by only giving you "half the story." Often the statistics given for earthquakes are wrong!!! Terrible! Also, when you read the original sources, you can tell they misunderstood or misrepresented what they were saying about how many men women and children were killed in earthquakes!

I've said this before about Crisis of Conscience, this is not an apostate point! It simply presenting facts of history as it happened without using confusing and complicated composite signs and staying true to the simple statements made by Jesus himself!