With the completion of the Empire State Building in 1931, the days of the high towers would come to a close—until the rise of the World Trade Center. So too the Shemitah, in which the final and tallest of America’s high towers rose, would also come to an end. Its end came, of course, on Elul 29. But on the Western calendar—the Shemitah that ended the time of the high towers was September 11.
As America assumed the mantle of “head of nations,” the mystery of the towers would carry even more critical and prophetic consequence. There would arise another building, made up of two towers. It would take the crown away from the Empire State Building. In its rising, the mystery of the Shemitah and the mystery of the towers would converge. And its fall would signal the beginning of the harbingers and the warning days of national judgment.
Chapter 18
The TOWERS of HEGEMON
The American Apogee
THE YEAR WAS 1945. America had emerged from the Second World War having attained a unique position described in the Scriptures over three thousand years earlier as “the head of nations.” Its navies patrolled the world’s waters, its currency undergirded the world’s financial system, the fruit of its commerce and culture saturated the earth, and its military carried out America’s assumed role as the “world’s policeman.” It had achieved a level of relative power and global hegemony unprecedented in world history.
The ancient connection between a nation’s greatness and the building of towers would now argue for the erection of a new edifice that would embody America’s role as the head of nations and the central pillar of the new global order. Could there now arise a tower or towers linked to America’s new apogee of world power?
The Conception
In July 1944, anticipating the end of the Second World War, representatives of forty-four nations gathered in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, to lay the foundation for a new global economic order based on the American dollar and for the reconstruction of national economies devastated by the war. The answer, they believed, was to expand international trade. And America would be the world trade center of the new era.
In 1945, the year of the war’s end and America’s rise to superpower, David Scholz, former governor of Florida and real estate developer, first proposed the concept of “a world trade center” in Lower Manhattan near Wall Street to encourage trade and port activity in the city. The plan was part of a series of projects aimed at encouraging world trade and solidifying America’s role in the new world order.
In 1946 the New York State legislature authorized the creation of the World Trade Corporation to develop the World Trade Center. That same year funds were given to purchase land along the East River on which to build the United Nations Headquarters, also in New York City. Both projects would affirm America’s new position as world center.
The World Trade Center was conceived in 1945 at America’s apogee of power—1945 was also the Year of the Shemitah.
The Construction
In 1958 David Rockefeller produced a master plan for the transformation of Lower Manhattan. The plan included an office complex dedicated to world trade. In November of that same year Nelson Rockefeller was elected governor of New York. In 1961 the World Trade Center bill was signed by Governor Rockefeller and New Jersey governor Richard Hughes. A new site was proposed for the trade center, a sixteen-acre lot of land along the Hudson River.
In March 1966 the New York State Court of Appeals dismissed the last legal challenge to the World Trade Center. This cleared the way for the construction to start. According to the plans, the World Trade Center would consist of two central towers. On March 21, 1966, demolition began to clear the thirteen square blocks of low-rise buildings in Radio Row. On August 5, 1966, a giant concrete wall was sunk into the ground as part of the groundbreaking—1966 was also the Year of the Shemitah.
The Shemitah began on September 27, 1965, and reached its conclusion on September 14, 1966. In the middle of the Shemitah the work commences on what will be the ground of construction. And before the Shemitah draws to its end, the building begins.
Thus the construction of the World Trade Center is begun in the Year of the Shemitah.
The Completion
Steel work began on the center’s North Tower in August 1968 and on the South Tower in January 1969. On December 23, 1970, the final columns of the North Tower were set into place on the 110th floor. In July 1971 a topping-off ceremony was held on the South Tower.
In 1972, with the upper stories of the North Tower now completed, the Empire State Building’s forty-year reign came to an end. The World Trade Center became the tallest building on the earth.
The World Trade Center and its twin towers were officially finished and inaugurated in a dedication and ribbon-cutting ceremony held by the Port Authority on April 4, 1973—1973 was also the Year of the Shemitah.
The Shemitah had commenced on September 9, 1972. It would conclude on September 26, 1973. That same year the World Trade Center surpassed the Empire State Building to become the tallest building on the earth. As for 1973, it was the year the twin towers were officially completed and dedicated, in April, in the center of the Shemitah.
Thus the World Trade Center was finished and dedicated in the Year of the Shemitah.
The Destruction
On a warm and nearly cloudless day in September 2001 at 8:46 in the morning, American Airlines Flight 11, a Boeing 767, struck the North Tower of the World Trade Center. Nearly seventeen minutes later, at 9:03 a.m., United Airlines Flight 175, another Boeing 767, struck the South Tower. At 9:59 a.m. the South Tower collapsed into a vast rolling cloud of dust, and at 10:28 a.m. the North Tower collapsed.
That which had once stood as the tallest building on earth was no more. That which had been conceived at the same moment in history in which America assumed its mantle of world superpower now had vanished in a cloud of white dust. And that which had stood as a monument to America’s global preeminence and to the American-led world order now lay in ruins. The year 2001 marked the fall of the World Trade Center—2001 was also the Year of the Shemitah.
The Shemitah had begun on September 30, 2000. It would conclude on September 17, 2001. September 11 took place on Elul 23 on the ancient calendar, in the last climactic week of the Shemitah. Thus the World Trade Center was destroyed in the Year of the Shemitah.
The Two Mysteries
We have the mystery of the Shemitah and the mystery of the towers converging in the World Trade Center and leading up to the day on which the towers fell in September 2001. The connections linking the World Trade Center to the ancient mystery are remarkable in their consistency. The World Trade Center was:
• Conceived in the Shemitah of 1945
• Begun in the Shemitah of 1966
• Built in a seven-year period beginning and ending in the Year of the Shemitah
• Finished and dedicated in the Shemitah of 1973
• Destroyed in the Shemitah of 2001
But what is behind this phenomenon? And what is its meaning and its message—or its warning—to America and the world?
Chapter 19
The MYSTERY of the TOWERS
The Vow
WHAT IS THE connection between the mystery of the Shemitah and that of the towers—and what is its meaning?
For the answer we must return to the ancient vow spoken after the attack on the land, Israel’s first massive warning of coming judgment. Here now is the context of that vow:
The LORD sent a word against Jacob, and it has fallen on Israel. All the people will know—Ephraim and the inhabitant of Samaria—who say in pride and arrogance of heart: “The bricks have fallen down, but we will rebuild with hewn stones . . . ”
—ISAIAH 9:8–10
The vow is introduced with the words: “Who say in pride and arrogance of heart. . . ” What does this have to do with the mystery of the towers? The connection isn’t visible in English. But it appears in the original Hebrew.
The Godel Connection
In the original language the word translated as “arrogance” is the Hebrew godel. Godel can be translated either as “greatness” or “arrogance.” It comes from the root word gadal. We have seen this word before. Gadal is the same word from which we get migdal, the Hebrew word for tower. Likewise, the word gadal not only speaks of magnitude, enlargement, and greatness, but also of arrogance, boasting, and pride. So a tower can symbolize a civilization’s magnitude, enlargement, and greatness—but it can also symbolize its arrogance, its boasting, and its pride.
This is doubly striking since the mystery of The Harbinger connects the ancient vow of Isaiah 9:10, spoken in the wake of the ancient attack, with the destruction of the towers in the attack on 9/11. And in the original Hebrew the word describing the arrogance in which this vow is spoken is linked to the Hebrew word for tower—the very object destroyed on 9/11.
The Spirit of Babel
The connection between towers and pride was there in the very first tower recorded in Scripture and in the words by which its rising began:
Come, let us build ourselves a city, and a tower whose top is in the heavens; let us make a name for ourselves . . .
—GENESIS 11:4
This is the third theme embodied by towers—the theme of pride. The Tower of Babel’s purpose was to enable its builders to “make a name” for themselves. How? By erecting “a tower whose top is in the heavens.” The Tower of Babel was man’s endeavor to ascend to heaven by his own will and powers, his striving to equal God. Babel was man’s attempt at godhood. It was built in the same spirit of defiance as that which infused the rebuilding in Isaiah 9:10.
But this brings up another theme. The building of the Tower of Babel brings judgment. The rebuilding of Isaiah 9:10 will also bring judgment. A tower may become the embodiment of pride and arrogance. And in such a case a tower may become the focal point of judgment.
The Tower and the Shemitah: The Meaning of the Mysteries
What is the connection between the mystery of the Shemitah and that of the towers?
Towers are symbols of greatness and often of pride.
The Shemitah acts to break man’s pride, humble a nation, and bring humility.
Towers stand as monuments to the power and glory of man or of a civilization.
The Shemitah reminds man of his weakness or a nation of its total dependence on God.
Towers stand as testaments of a nation’s prosperity and wealth.
The Shemitah reminds that nation that the source of its blessings come from God, and without Him those blessings cannot remain.
Towers boast of man’s claims of dominion and sovereignty.
The Shemitah calls man to relinquish his claims of dominion and sovereignty before the sovereignty and dominion of God.
A tower rises.
The Shemitah is about letting. . . fall.
A tower may embody a nation’s rise to power.
The Shemitah in the form of judgment is linked to the fall of such a nation.
A tower represents a building up.
The Shemitah brings about the wiping away of what has been built up.
A tower manifests the pursuit of height, the goal of rising higher and higher away from the foundation.
The Shemitah manifests a return to the foundation.
When the judgment of God fell on the land of Israel, that which the nation built up was wiped away, and its buildings were leveled.
When the Shemitah comes, that which the nation has built up in its financial and economic realms is wiped away. It levels accounts and brings back to ground level all that has been built up in the years before its coming.
A fall of a tower may come in the form of a crash or collapse.
The impact of the Shemitah on the financial realm brings about that which, in effect, constitutes a fall, a collapse, and a crash.
The Shamat
The word shemitah comes from the Hebrew root word shamat. Shamat can be translated as “to release” and “to remit,” as in the release or remission of debts in the Year of the Shemitah. It can also mean “to let alone,” as in no longer watching over or maintaining that which had been watched over and maintained. It can signify the releasing of one’s grip to allow the natural course of things to progress and the natural consequences to fall. It can also mean “to detach” and “to pull away.” It can also mean “to loosen.” And it can mean “to shake,” “to overthrow,” “to cast down,” “to discontinue,” “to let fall,” or “collapse.”
All these things can be applied to the ordinance of the Shemitah. The people were to release and let go of their claims of ownership, to let fall their accounts of credit and debts, and to detach from their land and leave it to its natural course.
But when the Shemitah manifests in the form of judgment, all these things take on new meaning and new manifestations. In 586 BC the Shemitah manifested in the form of judgment. God “released His grip” on the nation; He “pulled away” and withdrew His protection. The armies of Babylon then overran its borders. The nation was shaken to its foundation. It was allowed to fall. It was overthrown, cast down. The kingdom collapsed. It was discontinued. This was the Shemitah, or the shamat, in the form of judgment.
“Upon Every High Tower”
It is striking that one of the biblical signs of judgment is the striking down of that which is lifted up and the casting down of that which is high and lofty:
For the day of the LORD of hosts shall come upon everything proud and lofty, upon everything lifted up—and it shall be brought low . . . upon every high tower. . .
—ISAIAH 2:12–15,
emphasis added
From ancient times to the modern world, that which is most “lifted up” and that which is most “proud and lofty” is the tower. Therefore one of the clearest biblical signs of a nation under judgment is the casting down of its “high towers.”
The Days of Glory’s End
We have seen the ancient connection between towers and greatness, and between the first high tower of the modern age and the rising of America as a world power. The year in which the two converged, 1870, was the beginning of a new era. The highest towers on the earth continued to rise on American soil just as America itself continued to rise on the world stage. From 1870 and through most of the twentieth century, every building holding the title of being the tallest in the world had been erected on American soil. The majority of these had risen in the nation’s Empire City: New York.
But as the twentieth century drew to its close, a change took place; the age of America as the land of the highest towers on the earth came to an end. The world’s tallest buildings were now being built on other lands. In 1998 the Petronas Towers in Malaysia surpassed the height of the highest American tower to become the tallest building on earth. In 2003 the Taipei World Financial Center in China surpassed the Petronas Towers to become the world’s highest tower. And in 2010 the Burj Khalifa in the United Arab Emirates surpassed the Taipei World Financial Center to become the tallest building on earth. The age when America’s towers soared above every other was over. What had begun in the nineteenth century was now over. The tallest buildings of the new millennium were now ascending on Asian soil.
What about the ancient link of towers and greatness? If the rise of the world’s first skyscraper marked America’s rise, if the continuous ascent of the world’s tallest buildings on American land marked America’s continuous rise to unprecedented heights of world power—then what did it now mean that America’s highest towers were now being eclipsed by those of other lands and nations? What did it portend?
The above citing of the world’s tallest buildings is based on the height of the highest architectural element in each building. If one uses a different criterion, that of the height of the building’s tip, including its antenna, then the World Trade Center remained the tallest building in America to the end of the century. In fact, it remained the tallest building in the world. Its reign then only ended in the year 2000. It was a si
gnificant year in which to end. For 2000 was the year in which began the Shemitah.
The Mystery of the Shemitah and the Fall of the Towers
To the nation that has driven the God it had once known out of its life, rejected His ways, defied His will, and hardened itself to His calling, the Shemitah manifests in the form of judgment. As it entered the third millennium, America was such a nation. The Shemitah began in September 2000 and reached its climactic conclusion in September of 2001. If the Shemitah were to manifest in America as a sign of judgment, how would that sign of judgment manifest in September of 2001?
In view of what Shemitah can mean, what if, in the Year of the Shemitah 2001, God “let alone” the nation that had so driven Him out of its life, out of its culture, and out of its public squares? What if God “released His grip” on the United States, if He “pulled away” His protection from that nation, even for a moment? What if He allowed a nation, which had so hardened and deafened itself to the calling of His voice, to now be “shaken”?
The September Mysteries
The events of September 11, 2001, took place in the last climactic week of the Shemitah. In that week it all came together, the mystery of the towers and the mystery of the Shemitah. The twin towers would collapse as the Shemitah moved to its climatic end. What happens when the two mysteries converge? We have the tower, that which stands as a symbol of a nation’s greatness and the embodiment of its pride. And we have the Shemitah, that which humbles the pride of a nation and that which reminds a nation that without God, all its blessings and powers must fail. The tower speaks of rising. The Shemitah speaks of falling and wiping away that which has been built up. The tower rises far from its foundation. The Shemitah brings all things back to the foundation. According to the ancient mystery and the words of the prophets, on the Day of Judgment, that which is “proud and lofty” is humbled, that which is “lifted up” is brought low, and that which is “exalted” is cast down. The day of calamity specifically comes against “the high towers” of the land. On that day of a nation’s judgment its high towers fall. On September 11, 2001, in the days of the Shemitah’s climax, America’s high towers were cast down.
The Mystery of the Shemitah: The 3,000-Year-Old Mystery That Holds the Secret of America's Future, the World's Future, and Your Future! Page 12
