Review by Joel_Schorn -- Roadmap to the End of Days

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Joel_Schorn
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Latest Review: Roadmap to the End of Days by Daniel Friedmann

Review by Joel_Schorn -- Roadmap to the End of Days

Post by Joel_Schorn »

[Following is a volunteer review of "Roadmap to the End of Days" by Daniel Friedmann.]
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2 out of 4 stars
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Daniel Friedmann’s Roadmap to the End of Days: Demystifying Biblical Eschatology to Explain the Past, the Secret to the Apocalypse and the End of the World (Inspired Books, 2017) is part 3 of a series of “Inspired Studies,” the first two in the series being Book 1: The Genesis One Code and Book 2: The Broken Gift. These two offer the chronological precursors to the present volume, although I don’t think it’s absolutely necessary to have read them before reading this book.

The first thing to be said about the book is that the author is coming out of the world of Jewish biblical interpretation and particularly the horizon of the Orthodox Jewish Hasidic movement. While this point of view is not required to understand the book, the reader, especially the non-Jewish one, should be aware the author makes certain assumptions about divine providence, history, and Jewish scripture.

Friedmann’s basic idea is that while human beings have free will, God is in ultimate control of history, which is a process heading toward the fulfillment of God’s plan for creation. The Bible, meaning the Hebrew scriptures or what many Christians call the Old Testament, holds the key to the unfolding of history; it is a “blueprint” for the “controlled” process of history. Friedmann makes close and detailed connections between biblical events and events in non-biblical history to show the Bible foretells how history will unfold. He writes, “The premise of this book is that there is information in scripture and history . . . to place history in context with the Divine Plan (i.e., God’s plan for history and humanity), especially in reference to the End of Days, the final chapters in human history.”

Since the time of Adam human beings have had the opportunity to complete the divine place but have squandered it. But the task is still “to reveal God’s essence, ‘transforming the world’s superficial obscurity into an environment in which God’s Presence is felt, and in which He feels (so to speak) at home.’”

To make this “dwelling place for the Divine Presence in this world,” God has given all humanity—the “children of Noah”—a set of binding moral imperatives or laws, the Seven Noahide Laws: the prohibition of idolatry, murder, theft, sexual immorality, blasphemy, eating flesh taken from an animal while it is still alive. “According to Judaism,” Friedmann says, “any non-Jew who adheres to these laws is regarded as a righteous gentile and is assured of a place in the World to Come after the Messianic Era. . . . Thus, the Messianic era will also be a period of improving ourselves and the world continued growth in wisdom and perfection.”

While the author’s arguments are in and of themselves clear, I had a number of questions about their implications.

On the one hand Friedmann writes, “The Bible is not a history book.” By this I think he means, as he says, “it contains a chronology from Creation through the first several thousand years. Beyond that we follow the chronicle of the nation of Israel to modern times to obtain a ‘biblical timeline of history.’” To me what’s he really saying is that the Bible is not a history book for all of history, but it is one for the biblical era of history. The author has no problem seeing the Bible as an accurate literal history of humanity and the Israelite people in which biblical events can be correlated with actual dates in history. With the exception of fundamentalists, most mainstream readers and biblical scholars do not see scripture this way. Not only that, the book argues, the Bible is also a predictor of future events in a similarly literal way. Again, many people do not see God controlling history in this way. I also do not think the book adequately works out how human beings can work against the divine plan and yet not ultimately defeat it.

Finally, Friedmann’s conclusion that “the Messiah . . . will be a human being, the prophesied descendant of King David, who, thanks to his leadership ability and knowledge of Torah, will inspire the whole world to believe in one God and usher in an era of all human beings living together in peace and brotherhood” is a challenge for non-Jews, especially Christians who see Jesus as the Messiah to return but who has also already come.

Friedmann’s writing is solid and he has a good grasp of the subject matter. The book has linked endnotes, and terms throughout are linked to a very helpful glossary at the end. There are also three appendices: Overview Historical Timeline [biblical and Gregorian]; The Specific Pattern of History–Elaboration; and Ramban on World History.

Whoever proofread the book did not make sure the endorsers at the beginning of the book spelled the author’s name consistently. Beyond that, however, the text was very clear of typos. The layout, however, despite the tables, was very “gray” and could have used some illustrations or more creative type treatments.

2 out of 4

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Roadmap to the End of Days
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