If God foretold “the end from the beginning” and commanded the prophet Isaiah to “write it in a book for the end-time,” then where in his prophecies does he talk about America? It is more than an assumption that America will play a huge role in any end-of-the-world scenarios just as it did in the first and second world wars, both of which changed the world. There is a key that unseals this and other mysteries in the book of Isaiah that makes America's end-time role plain to our understanding.
While the "Egypt as America" interpretation is common in certain Christian and Jewish prophecy circles, it is not the consensus view among most academic biblical scholars, who tend to emphasize the original historical context and meaning of Isaiah's words.
But Christ said "And all things that he (Isaiah) spake have been and shall be, even according to the words which he spake" (3 Nephi 23:3 emphasis added). Christ also confirms in the New Testament that many prophecies from Isaiah about Jehovah’s day of judgment still await their final fulfillment before Christ comes again.
To the Hebrew prophets human history wasn’t linear but cyclical. In other words, history repeats itself but on an ever-bigger scale as the human race multiplies. What happens at the end of the world must therefore have had a precedent or series of precedents in the past. The writer of Ecclesiastes concurs with the Lord when he says:
“What has been, it is what shall be; that which has been done, it is what shall be done. There’s nothing new under the sun.” (Ecclesiastes 1:9).
Isaiah’s and the prophecies of other Old Testament prophets like Ezekiel, Jeremiah, and Daniel, are at the same time both historical and end-time. They combine events of the past to describe events that will happen again, and they also use historical entities and people as composites to more clearly describe end-time entities and people.
For example Isaiah uses both Egypt and Ephraim to more clearly identify America. He also uses both Assyria and Babylon to describe the latter-day world power that will destroy both people and countries before Christ's second coming.
Inevitably, America participates in all end-time events. But which nation in the past do we suppose set a precedent for America’s role in the world’s coming countdown to destruction on the one hand and deliverance on the other? Was there a world superpower in the past that typifies end-time America?
Yes, there’s one nation in the Book of Isaiah that matches America—Egypt. As the great superpower of the ancient world, Egypt set a perfect precedent for America today.
Isaiah’s depiction of ancient Egypt as a type of America, however, doesn’t bode well for people expecting only good news—those who live in self-deception, unwilling or no longer capable of discerning the truth. Isaiah has a habit of giving the bad news first and then the good news. So it is with America under its codename “Egypt.” To make it easier, try superimposing “America,” its capital "Washington" and its "President" on Isaiah’s Egypt and their equivalent and you be the judge.
The Isaiah verses quoted here are from Gileadi's Isaiah Translation. I have also linked the KJV Isaiah chapters for your reference.
The ministers of Zoan* (Washington DC) are utter fools; the wisest of Pharaoh’s (the President's) advisers give absurd counsel.
How can you say to Pharaoh (the President), We ourselves are as wise as the first rulers?
Where are your wise men indeed?
Let them please tell you, if they can discern it, what the Lord of Hosts has in mind for Egypt (America)!
The ministers of Zoan* (Washington DC) have been foolish, the officials of Noph* (Washington DC) deluded; the heads of state have led Egypt America) astray.
The Lord has permeated them with a spirit of confusion; they have misled Egypt (America) in all that it does, causing it to stagger like a drunkard into his vomit.
And there shall be nothing the Egyptians (Americans) can do about it, neither head nor tail, palm top or reed.
Political ineptitude by Egypt’s (America's) heads of state brings the nation into anarchy and civil war:
I will stir up the Egyptians (Americans) against the Egyptians (Americans); they will fight brother against brother and neighbor against neighbor, city against city and state against state.
Egypt’s (America's) spirit shall be drained from within; I will frustrate their plans, and they will resort to the idols and to spiritists, to mediums and witchcraft.
A dictatorial ruler or kingman will take the reins of government and oppress the nation:
Then will I deliver the Egyptians (Americans) into the hand of a cruel master; a harsh ruler will subject them, says the Lord, the Lord of Hosts.
Collapsing within, Egypt (America) faces an end-time king of Assyria (China, Russia or a coalition of nations?)—God’s hand of punishment:
In that day the Egyptians (Americans) will be as women, fearful and afraid at the brandishing hand the Lord of Hosts wields over them.
Still unrepentant, the nation of Egypt (America) suffers destruction from the sky that is God’s doing:
When the Lord enters Egypt (America) riding on swift clouds, the idols of Egypt (America) will rock at his presence and the Egyptians’ (Americans') hearts melt within them.
Once relied upon for its military might, in the end Egypt (America) proves to be of no help to others:
Woe to those who go down to Egypt (America) for help, relying on horses putting their trust in immense numbers of chariots and vast forces of horsemen, but who do not look to the Holy One of Israel, nor inquire of the Lord!
Yet he too is shrewd and will bring disaster [upon them], and not retract his words.
He will rise up against the brood of miscreants and allies of evildoers.
The Egyptians (Americans) are human, not divine; their horses are flesh, not spirit: when the Lord stretches out his hand, those who help them will stumble and those helped will fall; both shall come to an end together.
They are bent on going down to Egypt (America), but have not inquired at my mouth on seeking protection in Pharaoh’s (the President's) forces, on taking shelter in Egypt’s (America's) shadow.
But Pharaoh’s (the President's) protection shall turn to your shame, shelter in Egypt’s (America's) shadow to embarrassment.
For all their officials at Zoan (Washington DC), and their envoys’ travels to Hanes, they shall be utterly disgusted with a people who will avail them nothing;
[they shall be] of no help or benefit, but a humiliation and disgrace.
But there’s a redeeming side to the story. To his people (a minority who repent) who call on him, God sends help:
When they (those who are repenting) cry out to the Lord because of the oppressors, he will send them a savior, who will take up their cause and deliver them.
To those who offer an acceptable sacrifice by covenant, he shows himself, healing them:
The Lord will make himself known to the Egyptians (Americans), and the Egyptians (Americans) shall know the Lord in that day.
They (who are repenting) will worship by sacrifice and offerings, and make vows to the Lord and fulfill them.
The Lord will smite Egypt (America), and by smiting heal [it]: they will turn back to the Lord, and he will respond to their pleas and heal them.
In the end, Egypt’s (America's) covenanters succeed in converting many to the Lord, the God of Israel:
In that day there shall be a highway from Egypt to Assyria.
Assyrians shall come to Egypt and Egyptians go to Assyria, and the Egyptians shall labor with the Assyrians.
In that day Israel shall be the third party to Egypt and to Assyria, a blessing in the midst of the earth.
The Lord of Hosts will bless them, saying,
Blessed be Egypt my people, Assyria the work of my hands, and Israel my inheritance.
Zion will be established by remnants of Israel, which are gathered in a great exodus, to both the old Jerusalem (Jews and 10 Tribes), and in America to the new Jerusalem (Lehi’s descendants). Those Gentiles who repent will be numbered among the House of Israel.
*Zoan and Noph were governing capitals of ancient Egypt.
Next: Assyria in Isaiah's Prophecy


