Historicist Only isaac newton on the apocalypse

[victorinus]

"There have been since the writing of the Apocalyps but two notable new fals religions of large extent & long duration, the Roman & the Mahometan."
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perhaps this is where you might find the two beasts

 

[victorinus]

"Wherefore since the Beast is the Roman state (as shall be further explained hereafter,) it remains that the Locusts be the Mahometan."
islam replaces roman paganism which was mortally wounded

 

[victorinus]

"2. The Mahometan is the religion which arose at the end of the 4th Trumpet. For the darkness of the Sun Moon & stars in that Trumpet continued till the year 609,"
who can deny the significance of islam?

 

[victorinus]

" . And in the year 609 the Mahometan religion began to be hatched; as is manifest out of Elmacinus who in the beginning of his history records that <35r> [88] Mahomet was born in the year of {illeg} called to the office of a Prophet in the Month Rabie prior in the end of the 40th year of his age, which was in the 922dyear of Alexander the great, & that in the 44th year of his age he began to manifest his vocationhaving before invited only privatly to Islamism (as they call their religion,) & in the 14th year of his vocation & 54th year of his age (namely in the very beginning of those years) he fled to Medinaentring the City on the 12t day of the same month Rabie prior: from which flight the Æra of the Hegira begins the first year thereof being the same with the 54 of Mahomet. Wherefore both by the 922 year of Alexander which began in september A.C. 609 & in whose first month the month Rabie prior began & by the Æra of the Hegira, which by the common consent of Chronologers began Iuly 17 A.C. 622, the Mahometan religion took its beginning in autumn in the year of our Lord 609."
don't understand the significance of the year 609

 

[victorinus]

the strange, secret history of isaac newton's papers
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the newton project
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Newton's Religious Writings

this is the source of the newton writings
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his specific writing on islam can be found here

 

[victorinus]

"** ** The same is also evident out of Abul Pharajius history who writes that Mahomet was born in the year of Alexander 882 & died in the beginning of the 11th year of the Hegira having lived 63 years whereof 40 were spent before he arrogated to himself his prophetique function, 13 years more whilst he was at Mecha & the last 10 years at Medina after the Hegira . Sic et in Tractatu ejus de origine et moribus gentium Arabum scribit Mahometeum post com{illeg}"
mohammed was born in 570 and would have been 52 the year of the hegira

 

[victorinus]

"Supposing therefore Mahomet (the Angel of the bottomless pit) to be the star which fell from heaven to the Earth & opened the pit; we may reccon that he fell from heaven in the year 609 when he first began to contrive his doctrine, & consequently from thence date this Trumpet; & that in the year 612 when he first manifested his pretended vocation, he began to open the pit & let out the smoke; & that in the years 622 & 623, when (as the same Elmacinus writes) he first armed his followers, the Locusts began to come out of the smoke.

3. The great multitude of these Locusts is notoriously conspicuous; their kingdom being as large as the Roman Empire in its greatest extent & their armies far more numerous."

I don't believe mohammed is the angel of the bottomless pit
-but-
I do believe he is the antichrist
-and-
the rider of the red horse

 

[victorinus]

"4 & 5. Also the qualities of their king, that he should be both angel of the bottomless pit & king of the Locusts do singularly agree to Mahomet & the succeeding race of Califas, who founded & propagated as well their religion as their Empire, being Princes both spirituall & temporall in the strictest sence. Nor hath there been, that I know, any other considerable Prince to whom this character so well agrees. The Pope indeed comes nearest to it, being such another spirituall Prince among Christians as the Califa was among Mahometans, but in temporall power he falls thus far short, that although he claims & exercises superiority over kings yet he never had the absolute command of their armies. He never appeared in the head of an army like Mahomet & the Califas & therefore cannot be called King of Locusts."
and it was diverse from all the beasts that were before it

 

[victorinus]

"6. As for this Kings name Abaddon it seems to allude to the common name of the ancient Kings of that tract of Arabia from whence the Saracenical Kingdom I conceive took its beginning: which tract from an ancient king Obodas (deified by his posterity) was called Oboda, & the Kings thereofObodas, after the same manner that the Kings of Egypt were called Pharaoh & Ptolome, of the Romans Cæsars, of the Parthians Arsacæ, & of the people bordering upon Arabia petrea Arstæ."
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And they had a king over them, which is the angel of the bottomless pit, whose name in the Hebrew tongue is Abaddon - rev 9:11

 

[victorinus]

" And him the Iews might well by a slight mutation have called Abaddon, that is, the Destroyer. The other b[90] Obodas was in the time of Herod the great, in whom the line ended for after his death the neighbouring King Aretas by the favour of Augustus united his Kingdom to his own. Of this Obodas Strabo also in the Arabic expedition of Ætius Gallus makes mention; out of whom it may be collected that the Kingdom Oboda bordered upon the red Sea southward of Aretas's territories, where I suppose Mahometism took its rise."
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the rider of the red horse?

 

[victorinus]

"7. Moreover the shape of these Locusts, in that they had hair like weomen & crowns of gold, points out the Arabians who, as Pliny writes, intonso utuntur crine & (mulierum more) mitrati degunt. Plin. l 6. c 28. & with whom it is at present a custome as travellers affirm, for those that go into battel (ex proprijs capillis sibi cornua et cincinnos nectere) to adorn their heads with their own hair tied up. Camerar. operum subcis. Tom 1. c 93. Herodotus indeed mentions that they cut their hair round underneath, but I suppose he means only upon their foreheads becaus he adds thatthey did it shaving their temples. However it is not to be doubted but Pliny had seen Arabians at Rome."
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looks like a beast to me

 

[victorinus]

"8. Again the Saracens Empire is further characterised by their wars upon the Romans, in that theTrumpets denote so many plagues inflicted upon the Roman territories by war whereof the 5t is one of the three greatest & accordingly the wars of the Saracens upon them hath been one of the most universal & lasting plagues which the Christian world hath hitherto felt. As for the universality there is scarce any Roman territory which hath not felt them, Syria, Egypt, Afric,Spain, France, Italy, Illyricum, Grece, Thrace Asia & Armenia. And the duration was much greater then of any former plague."
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looks like a beast to me

 

[victorinus]

"
9. The precise duration of this plague, exprest to be five months, & that repated, I limit thus.

In the 13th year of the Hegira (which began March 7th A.C. 634) the Saracens first entred Syria & began to make war upon the Romans as Elmacinus writes, & the next year in the month Regjebo (which was in our September A.C. 635) they took Damascus & made it the seat of their Empire. And from the taking of this City I date the beginning of their Empire as well becaus it laid the foundation to their conquests (all Syria & Egypt together with the whole world like a flood following thereupon,) as becaus the holy spirit usually measures the duration of Empires by that of the Metropolis."
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this would be one of the ten dynasties of islam
one of the ten horns as described in the apocalypse thread

 

[victorinus]

"10. In the last place whereas it is said that the Locusts should torment men but not kill them, I suppose it is spoken to distinguish them from the Euphratean horsmen who in the next Trumpet killed the 3d part of men, that is overthrew the Constantinopolitan Empire as I shall explain in its place: whereas these Locusts though they often harassed the whole Empire with fire & sword, & beseiged Constantinople no less then 8 times, & that sometimes for two or three years together, reducing the inhabitants to so great straits that they came even to man's flesh, yet they could not take the city,"
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constantinople has fallen 18:2
-and-
can be found no more 18:21

 

[victorinus]

"And Abul-Pharajius, who divides his history into so many dynasties as there had been supreme Empires since the creation & reccons the Empire of the Saracens in the 9th place, extends this from their Prophet Mahomet to the taking of Bagdad by the Tartars & there concludes it making the shortliv'd Empire of the Tattars then founded upon the ruins of the Saracens & Turks by Hulacu to be the 10th Dynasty or supreme Empire & the year 1258 their common period."
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ten horns

 

[victorinus]

"2. The affinity between the Saracens & Turks is sufficiently conspicuous, the last having been interwoven with the Empire of the former, (sometimes as subjects, sometimes as fellow Princes) for some hundreds of years together so as to be esteemed almost one people: & both being also of the same religion."
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here newton is tying together a couple of the ten islamic dynasties

 

[victorinus]

"Now the killing the third part of men being, as I explained, the dissolution of the Constantinopolitan Empire, we are to date this time from the taking of Constantinople whereby the Empire was dissolved & this happened May 29th, A.C. 1453; from which if we therefore count the afforesaid time, recconning (according <66r> to Saint Iohn's computation ch 12.6, 14 & 11.2, 3) thirty days to a month & twelve months to a year, the Turkish Empire & there be not a further mystery in the trumpet then I am aware of may be expected to loose Constantinople its imperial seat in the year 1844, & perhaps the Emperors may then seat themselves for a time in Iudæa according to what Daniel seems to intend when he saith of this monarch in the conclusion that he shall plant the Tabernacle of his Palace between the seas in the glorious holy mountain Dan 11.45."
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here newton is tying together a lot
-but-
does not seem to see islam as the beast like no other as I do

 

[victorinus]

"Historians indeed date this Empire from the reign of Ottoman rather then from the taking of Constantinople, but the rise & fall of Imperial cities being changes of the greatest note, the holy Ghost, as I signified, measures Empires rather by the standing of them then by the dominion of single persons."
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here newton points out that we need to count dynasties
-and-
not kings

 

[victorinus]

"The first king therefore is to be interpreted of our Saviour a single person: but as he is equivalent to a series of many so the other three Kings must be applyed each to a series of many; for this the great number of Emperors to be distributed among them requires."
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at the beginning of the next section, 1.8, newton refers to the riders of the four horsemen as kings
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Jesus as the rider of the white horse
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I don't agree

 

[victorinus]

"To this Horsman it was given to take peace from the earth (i.e. from his neighbours by invading them,) & that they (he & his neighbours, or his own subjects by civil wars) should kill one another. This killing one another you have expressed by the Ox which is a beast appointed to the slaughter, & represents his armies & other people of his kingdom; but yet the great sword which was given is an emblem of his victoriousnes, as the Bow was of the first Rider's."
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he should know that a bow could mean rainbow or a covenant as it does in gen 9:13
-this helps to identify the rider of the white horse