Gerald Flurry and the
King of the East
By
Miller Jones/Lonnie C. Hendrix
From time to time, I force myself to check in on what the
various WCG splinter groups are doing. I recently subjected myself to an
installment of Gerald Flurry’s Key of
David program, and I must say that I was impressed by “that prophet’s”
ability to warp and twist prophetic Scripture. The program focused on events in
the Middle East, specifically Lebanon, and explored how events there would lead
to the fulfillment of prophecies in Psalm 83 and Daniel (Chapters 11 and 12).
However, a more general word about Flurry’s interpretations
of prophecy is appropriate before I explore the problems with this particular
utterance. Mr. Flurry frequently makes the mistake of applying specific
prophecies to himself, his Philadelphia Church of God or groups that he doesn’t
like. He is also fond of transferring the identities of ancient peoples and
nations to modern nations – especially with regard to the United States and
Britain as Israel (which many folks, including yours truly, have debunked here
and elsewhere). Finally, “that prophet” has a propensity for seeing almost
every prophetic utterance in the Bible as applying to the “end time.”
Unfortunately, these predispositions have led Mr. Flurry (not unlike Mr.
Herbert Armstrong before him) to make some erroneous predictions about what the
future holds.
In this latest example of his prophetic malpractice, Flurry
pointed to Lebanon as being the catalyst for a future confrontation between the
King of the North and the King of the South. He went on to identify Germany and
her allies as constituting the modern manifestation of the King of the North,
and Iran and her surrogates as the King of the South (Daniel 11). Based on this
dubious interpretation, Mr. Flurry went on to predict that Germany and her
allies would eventually triumph over the Iranian led forces.
Never mind that history and most biblical scholars have
linked the King of the North with the Seleucid kings of Syria, and that those
same sources have equated the King of the South with the Ptolemaic kings of
Egypt. Never mind that these designations also make sense when one looks at
their respective geographical locations relative the Holy Land (Egypt is South
of Jerusalem and Syria is North of there). Iran, on the other hand, is due EAST
of Jerusalem (it would be more appropriate to tag Iran as the King of the
East). To be fair, Germany is located to the northwest of the Holy Land. So I
guess it wouldn’t be too big of a stretch to ignore the western drift of this
kingdom – we shouldn’t be too picky!
Even more interesting is Flurry’s justification for these
designations. In his booklet entitled “The King of the South,” Flurry writes
that “In 65 B.C., Syria was swallowed up by
the ROMAN EMPIRE, and became a Roman province. The Roman emperor
now controlled Judaea, and therefore the king of the north, here
referred to, is, at this time, the emperor of the ROMAN EMPIRE.”
Mr. Flurry conveniently failed to mention that Ptolemaic Egypt also became a part
of the Roman Empire in 31 BC. So, according to this line of reasoning,
shouldn’t we conclude that the Roman emperor also became the King of the South?
Hmmm, I have a prediction of my own to make: Those folks who choose to swallow Gerald
Flurry’s interpretations of Bible prophecy are going to be disappointed in the
near future. His offerings may titillate a few of the aging and uniformed
former adherents of Armstrongism, but I don’t think that they will get much
attention from serious students of the Bible.
