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Heh!

It's time to review the definition of "petard" again.

Ed Brayton links to WingNutDaily's publicizing of an anonymous YouTuber who claims Biblical evidence that Barack Obama is the Antichrist:

His 4-minute video focuses on the direct quote: "I beheld Satan as lightning fall from heaven." (Luke 10:18)

"When I started doing a little research, I found the Greek word for 'lightning' is 'astrape', and the Hebrew equivalent is 'Baraq,'" said YouTube contributor "ppsimmons," a self-described Christian with a theological education and many years in the ministry, who spoke to WND under condition of anonymity out of concern for members of his local church. "I thought that was fascinating."

As he continued looking into the rest of the words in the phrase, he focused on "heaven," and found that it can refer not just to God's dwelling place, but also "the heights" or "high places."

He then recalled Isaiah 14:14, where Lucifer, another name for Satan, is quoted as saying, "I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be like the most High."

"I wondered what the word 'heights' is," said ppsimmons, "and I looked it up in the dictionary, and it's 'Bamah.'"

Thus, on the video, the announcer notes, "If spoken by a Jewish rabbi today, influenced by the poetry of Isaiah, He (Jesus) would say these words in Hebrew ... 'I saw Satan as Baraq Ubamah.'"

"Gosh, was Jesus giving us a clue or was this just a freak coincidence?" thought the filmmaker at the time of his research.

But as James McGrath, who we know is a Biblical scholar, points out:

... Jesus compared himself to Barack Obama when he said that "For the Son of Man in his day will be like the lightning (baraq), which flashes and lights up the sky from one end to the other" (Luke 17:24). And in Luke 9:29 we are told that Jesus' clothes shone like lightning - i.e. his clothes in the transfiguration were as fine as Barack Obama's.

If Jesus compared himself to Barack Obama, then we can be sure that Barack Obama is not the antichrist. But if you are not convinced, note as well that Revelation 4:5 says lightning (presumably still Barack Obama) came from God's throne, while both Jeremiah 10:13 and Jeremiah 51:16 say that God himself sent Barack, and Psalm 148:8 says Barack does God's bidding. You can't just pick and choose, people!

Do note as well that the person claiming that Jesus said "lightning and high place", wrong. And so it would be absolutely incoherent for anyone who believes in the Bible's inerrancy to buy into this sort of claim.

It also goes to show that anyone who claims to believe in the inerrancy of the Bible probably doesn't know the meaning of that word either.
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