What did the Dead Sea Scrolls say about Armageddon?
In the history of Hebrew theology, the principle of a final war between good and evil where good achieves victory, existed before the Apostle John s vision in A.D. 96. A last great battle was a common belief that was taken literally before the coming of the Messiah. The Jews viewed the Gentile nations, especially the Roman Empire, as evil. The Dead Sea Scrolls, which were found in 1945 in a cave in the Middle East, revealed that the Jewish Essene sect believed in a final war between the Sons of the Light and the Sons of Darkness. Quoting from the War Scroll of the Dead Sea Scrolls, it states the following. “The first attack of the Sons of Light shall be undertaken against the forces of the Sons of Darkness, the army of Belial (1QM,4Q491-491)” Scholars dated these scrolls between 100 and 200 years before the birth of the Yahshua the Messiah. This shows that the principle of Armageddon, the war to end all wars, was in existence two to three hundred years before the Apostle John s vision.
