Do You Really Understand What The Bible Is About? – Michael Heiser | Part 3

Video from John 14:6

Do You Really Understand What The Bible Is About? – Michael Heiser | Part 3

"Michael Heiser says Daniel 10’s picture of spiritual princes over Persia and Greece is not a random late-biblical idea but part of a much larger biblical worldview that begins with Babel and the Deuteronomy 32 tradition, where God divided the nations and allotted them to other members of the heavenly host. He argues that the world’s chaos is not explained by Genesis 3 alone, but by a sequence of rebellions: the fall, the supernatural-human corruption of Genesis 6, and the scattering and disinheritance of the nations at Babel, which is the key event that frames the rest of the Old Testament. In Genesis 11, humanity refuses God’s command to spread out, gathers at Babel, and builds a ziggurat-like temple complex to pull deity down to them, so God judges them by confusing their language and dispersing them; Deuteronomy 32:8–9, especially in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Septuagint reading “sons of God,” explains that this division happened according to the number of the sons of God, with Yahweh reserving Israel as His own portion while assigning the other nations to subordinate spiritual rulers. He says this is why idolatry spreads among the nations: after Babel, they are left under other gods, while God begins a new people through Abraham and Sarah, preserving a relationship with humanity through Israel as a kingdom of priests that will ultimately bless the nations and reverse the Babel judgment. Psalm 82 then becomes the prophetic announcement that these gods of the nations will be judged and die like men, and the whole Old Testament becomes a struggle of Israel against the nations and Yahweh against their gods, which Paul later picks up in his language of principalities, powers, rulers, and dominions. Heiser also connects Acts 2 to this framework: Pentecost reverses Babel by scattering the gospel outward through the nations in their own languages, beginning with Jews and moving to Gentiles, while the geographic spread in Acts mirrors the nations of Genesis 10 and ends with Paul’s drive to reach Spain, which he sees as Tarshish, the last untouched node in that map. For Heiser, this means spiritual warfare is not demon-chasing theatrics but participating in the Great Commission, because the powers of darkness know their authority is being dismantled by Christ’s resurrection and ascension, which delegitimized their rule and began the process of reclaiming the nations. He concludes that believers are the new sons and daughters of God, destined to replace the rebellious powers, judge angels, and inherit rule over the nations in the new Eden, so the strange passages about divine beings, nations, and heavenly conflict are not side issues but essential to understanding the Bible’s full story." from the video introduction

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