Howdy moxy,
Quote from above site:
"Even more detailed predictions concerning the League of Nations were made by the two Bible commentators, C.F. Hogg and W.E. Vine, in their book, Touching the Coming of the Lord, published in London in 1919, shortly before the League was formed. They explained that the failure of the League of Nations was predicted in the Bible, at Revelation 17:12, 13:
Such a League of Nations, for instance, as is proposed to-day as a panacea for national wrongs, not only has been foretold in Scripture as the last resource of international politics, but its failure has likewise been predicted. 8
Vine who wrote these lines,
then quotes Daniel 7:23, 24 and continues:A corresponding vision was given to the Apostle John. He also saw a beast with ten horns, and the symbolism is again explained, but in greater detail: "The ten horns that thou sawest are ten kings, which have received no kingdom as yet; but they receive authority as kings, with the beast, for one hour (i.e. for a brief time). These have one mind, and they give their power and authority unto the beast," Rev. xvii.12,13. Obviously these ten kingdoms are contemporaneous. The potentates ruling over them agree to a certain policy in handing over their authority to a superior ruler. No such league has existed in human history as yet.
It is manifest, too, from this Scripture that the existence of the League will provide the opportunity for a man sufficiently strong to dominate the situation. 9
Further on in the book, Vine explains:
Clearly, therefore, a league of nations is in view, and this is apparently to be the new form of the old empire.... We are not justified, however, in concluding that the territories of the League of Nations, indicated by the passages related to the ten horns of the beast, will necessarily be confined to the area which has just been under consideration [i.e. the areas of the earlier world empires]. Whatever the arrangement may be, the fact of the League will prepare the way for the government of the final and all-controlling despot. 10
It is very interesting to note that the Bible interpretations which the Watch Tower Society many years later began to attach to the League of Nations are practically identical to those published by Vine in 1919. It seems rather obvious that President Rutherford and some of his co-workers were well aware of the interpretations different millenarians tied to the League of Nations at an early stage. Vine and Hogg were both well known commentators on Bible prophecy. Besides, Vine's Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words is often quoted in the Watch Tower publications.
Watch Tower leaders picked up his application of Revelation 17:11-13 early in the 1930s, without mentioning the source or sources of it. A later generation of Witnesses is now given the impression that the leaders of the Watch Tower Society, under the influence of God's holy spirit, originated these predictions and interpretations, and this in turn is used as evidence of their claim to be Jehovah's modern-day prophet!" (bold changed by me)
waiting
ps: Mr. Moxy Canadian......are you still up for bidding?