Is the prophecy of Israel a Catholic belief

[SeanF1989]

I saw a documentry on the history about Bible prophecies and it mentioned that the Bible says something along the lines of “the Jewish people returning to their homeland” and Israel became a country on May 14th 1948.

So is this belief in prophecy a Catholic belief or a Protestant?

 

[bmullins]

It’s supposed to be referring to Ezekiel 4:4-6

And thou shalt sleep upon thy left side, and shalt lay the iniquities of the house of Israel upon it, according to the number of the days that thou shalt sleep upon it, and thou shalt take upon thee their iniquity.

And I have laid upon thee the years of their iniquity, according to the number of the days three hundred and ninety days: and thou shalt bear the iniquity of the house of Israel.

And when thou hast accomplished this, thou shalt sleep again upon thy right side, and thou shalt take upon thee the iniquity of the house of Juda forty days: a day for it year, yea, a day for a year I have appointed to thee.

There are a lot of theories that this is about the ‘end times’ and a lot of people have done some fuzzy math to come up with the dates based on Babylonian exile etc. It’s interesting, but I’m not sure it’s exactly a Catholic only or Protestant only belief.

 

[Catholic1954]

It’s protestant and not worthy of your attention or concern.

 

[Robbinson]

It’s protestant and not worthy of your attention or concern.

I’m not into date setting and I agree that too much energy and argument is spent over this issue- but as to whether the nation of Israel will return to the “land of Israel” (literally) or whether it will be fulfilled in the New Jerusalem, there is no official Catholic teaching either way.

Personally - I believe it is both - that God has supernaturally brought back the Israelites, in part, to Israel - but as foretold in Ezekiel, this is physically only - a spiritual rebirth is yet to come. I surmise that the fulfillment of spiritual return will coincide with the New Jerusalem - but that is a “surmise”.

But to the question - there is no official Catholic position on this. Some evangelical Christians believe or feel very strongly that there will be a literal return of the Israelites to the promised land and some go further to believe that there will be a 1,000 (millennial) rule of Christ on earth in Israel (that is not a Catholic belief and the Church has disavowed the idea of a 1,000 year millennial rule on earth - teaching rather that when Jesus does return it will be to judge and to usher in the New Jerusalem).

Blessings,

Brian