I pulled this book out of the library shelf by chance, read the blurb, thought it was interesting and took it home. I was expecting something intriguing and exciting, something like Dan Brown’s The DaVinci Code taking place in Israel… Oh boy, was I wrong…
I have to admit I had no idea who Jonathan Cahn was. If I had known his background, I probably wouldn’t have picked this book…
The book is about the Jewish exile, restoration and return to Israel, in a mix of fiction, History and scriptures citations.
The story is about a man who started having visions and went in search of another man (the Oracle) who would help him decipher them. He finds the Oracle in the desert and starts having “visions inside the visions”, where he would see himself in a hall with seven doors, and behind each door he would learn about prophecies made about Israel and the events that occurred in the jubilees.
Overall, the book was very repetitive. It was written in a predictable structure as well, where the main character always opened a door, described his vision, then met with the Oracle and then their dialogue went on, like in an interview. This goes on the same way for all the 7 doors.
I also think the author overdid making connections and attaching meaning to all sorts of events that happened either certain years before or after the facts. It sounded just like in those TV commercials that want to sell you a bunch of stuff you don’t need and keep saying in that enthusiastic tone: “You get all that for $19.99!… But wait! There’s more! You get two of each for the price of one!…But wait! There is more!”.
Throughout the book there were a few connections that made me cringe, but the worst was a connection was made between Cyrus The Great (the king of Persia), former President Harry Truman and Donald Trump (whose name literally means “World Ruler Trumpet”, therefore he must be the king and the trumpet mentioned in the prophecies…) implying they were, in a way, the same embodiment, Godsend, with the same role in restoring Israel in different times… And then, sure enough - I should have seen that coming - a few pages later came the mention to the prophecy being currently fulfilled with the world going back to what the Anti-Christ society that the Roman Empire used to be, where “children were killed in their mothers’ wombs” (abortion rights?), and “pagan views and practices concerning sexuality, gender and marriage (LGBTQIA rights? Women’s rights?)… Yeah, that’s what this book boiled down to…
Even realizing that I’m not the right audience and this book was not what I was looking for, I read it until the end with an open mind. I did not enjoy it, not because I don’t share the same political views and religious beliefs, but because I thought the fiction part was weak and the historical part could have been deeper and better described. The references to the dates and the scriptures citations were somewhat interesting, but the interpretations and the connections made between them were biased. And, I personally think that mixing fiction and facts in this level, subtly blurring political views and religion beliefs, particularly in the times we are in (this book was written in 2019), in America, is just unfortunate.