Michael Baigent - Racing Toward Armageddon: The Three Great Religions and the Plot to End the World

Taking the Temple

The Red Heifer

Destroying the Mosques

Armageddon

John of Patmos

Revelation

The Day of the Beast

Carried Away by the Rapture

Fighting for God

Planet Rushdoony

The Caliphate

Jerusalem

Welcome to the Gods

T his book explores the power of ideas to both create and change the beliefs that define people and nations. Bad ideas lead to bad outcomes. And as bad outcomes go, the belief in Armageddon is one of the worst.

I am grateful for the constant support and encouragement of my wife, Jane, and my family, as they know only too well the dangers of those who act with the certainty of god burning in their eyes. I am grateful, too, for all the encouragement from my longtime friend and literary agent Ann Evans of Jonathan Clowes Ltd., London.

I owe a huge debt to my editor, Hope Innelli, vice president and associate publisher, HarperPaperbacks, New York, and guest editor for HarperOne, San Francisco. Most important, she had the intuitive ability to sense where things deeper and darker lay.

I should also like to thank Mark Tauber, senior vice president and publisher; Michael Maudlin, vice president and editorial director; and Gideon Weil, executive editor, all at HarperOne, for their interest in exploring what is a controversial and treacherous region littered with vested interests. I am particularly grateful to Michael Maudlin for suggestions as to the focus of my research.

Writing any book like this is useless unless it is put into a position where it can communicate, where its ideas can be mixed into popular culture, which, in a kind of modern alchemy, is endlessly transmuting itself. For this I am grateful to Claudia Riemer Boutote, vice president and associate publisher at HarperOne.

Finally, during the writing of this book, I was fortunate enough to have a liver transplant. I found myself overwhelmed with gratitude for the skill of the surgeons, doctors, and nurses and, above all, for the gift from my anonymous donor.

I have some extra years; I intend to do my best with them.

ISRAEL AND MIDDLE EAST TO THE END OF THE CRUSADES

4 MILLENNIUM B.C. ____

Era of the garden of Eden with Adam and Eve according to biblical chronology.

1479 B.C. _________

Egyptian pharaoh Thutmosis III fights the Canaanites at Megiddo and captures the city.

722628 B.C. _________

Assyrian rule of Israel.

597 B.C. _________

Jewish king Jehoiachin, besieged in Jerusalem by the Babylonians, surrenders to Nebuchadnezzar and is taken, along with leading citizens, to Babylon. Babylonians crown Zedekiah king of Judah; he was to be the last.

586 B.C. _________

King Zedekiah rebels against the Babylonians who captured and destroyed Jerusalem and its Temple. Nebuchadnezzar has Zedekiah blinded and his sons executed. Zedekiah and many Jews taken in exile to Babylonthe Babylonian Captivity.

538 B.C. _________

Edict of Cyrus, return of Jews from exile.

537 B.C. _________

Foundation of the Second Temple.

520515 B.C ._________

Building of the Second Temple.

333 B.C ._________

Alexander the Great conquers Syria.

319197 B.C. _________

Judaea ruled by the Ptolemaic pharaohs of Egypt.

197142 B.C ._________

Judaea ruled by Syrian Seleucid kings.

167 B.C. _________

Massacres in Jerusalem; Syrian king sets up an altar to Zeus in the Holy of Holies in the Temple.

166 B.C. _________

Judas Maccabaeus emerges as the leader of a revolt against the Syrians and their supporters.

63 B.C. _________

Judaea placed under Roman rule.

37 B.C.-A.D. 4_________

Rule of King Herod.

27 B.C ._________

Roman emperor Octavian (Augustus) declared divine. Sacrifices offered to himand subsequent emperorsin temples throughout the Empire, including that of Jerusalem.

A.D . 6_________

Birth of Jesus according to information in Luke 2:17. Census of Quirinius, governor of Syria.

A.D . 2728_________

Traditional date of the baptism of Jesus by John the Baptist (Luke 3:123); beginning of Jesus ministry.

A.D . 3435_________

Execution of John the Baptist following the marriage of Herod Antipas and Herodiasaccording to evidence in Josephus; Jesus is still alive at this point.

A.D. 36_________

Crucifixion of Jesus at Passoveraccording to Matthews timetable.

A.D. 5051_________

Paul, resident in Corinth, writes his letter to the Christians of Thessalonika.

A.D. 61_________

Paul in Rome under house arrest.

A.D. 62_________

Roman army defeated on the banks of the Euphrates River by the Parthians.

A.D . 64_________

Fire of Rome and persecution of Christians by Nero.

A.D. 6674_________

The Jewish War against the Romans and their Herodian supporters; destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple in A.D . 70. Fall of Masada in A.D . 74.

A.D. 68_________

Suicide of Nero followed by political chaos.

A.D. 79_________

Eruption of Vesuvius and destruction of Pompeii.

A.D. 8196_________

Reign of Roman emperor Domitian; Book of Revelation written by a Christian convert, John, on the island of Patmos toward the end of this reign.

A.D. 92_________

Significant shortage of grain in the Roman Empire.

A.D. 115_________

Wealthy and influential Jewish community in Alexandria rises in revolt against the Romans and is destroyed.

A.D. 132135_________

Second revolt against the Romans in Judaea under the leadership of Simon bar Kochba; Temple brought back into use; ends with final destruction of Jewish resistance.

A.D. 391_________

Emperor Theodosius bans pagan religions in the Empire.

A.D. 397_________

Council of Carthage; final agreement on books to be in the New Testament.

A.D. 632_________

Death of Mohammed.

A.D. 638_________

Muslim caliph Omar ibn al-Khattab takes Jerusalem from the Byzantine Christians.

A.D. 691_________

Dome of the Rock built on the Temple Mount by Muslim caliph Abd al-Malik ibn Marwan. He or his son built the first al-Aqsa Mosque early in the eighth century.