“Abomination” is from the Hebrew shikkoots , meaning filthy, detestable, disgusting, idolatrous. Something that God will loathe and abhor, and all God’s children will follow suit and hate it with Him. Those who continue to believe that all of God is about being in a “good mood”, will have second thoughts when they see His reaction to the abomination of desolation mentioned by Daniel and Jesus, and referenced by the apostle Paul.

At the beginning of the final seven years of Jewish history, [and world history] before the millennium kicks in, a world leader will make a covenant with the Jewish people, allowing them to build a Temple and revert back to their ancient ritual of animal sacrifice.

But a mere three and one-half years into the treaty, another leader will usurp the authority of the new Empire. This man will have arrived on earth miraculously. Though Christians for centuries will have tried to portray him as one of the many political leaders living on earth, the fact is he is not identifiable until his appearance. Then it will be clear that he is no ordinary man.

He will in fact have risen from the dead to finish the work he started many centuries before, namely the destruction of the Israelite menace and thence to world conquest. His solution to the “Jewish problem”, as it has been known since Hitler and before, will not be peace treaty, but annihilation.

His rise to power, per Daniel and Paul, is meteoric. And then he takes his new authority to cancel the treaty made by his vanquished foe. No more sacrifices. Rather, the “transgression” of desolation. The abominable thing that God hates is placed in the Temple. This is the order in Daniel 8,9, 11 and 12. An army given, the sanctuary defiled, the sacrifices taken away, the abomination set up.

But what is this abomination?

Whatever it is, Jesus points His disciples, and thus modern disciples, to look at it very carefully. For this is the sign his disciples asked for. This is the signal of the beginning of world chaos. Jesus ties this abomination to the very end of the world in Matthew 24 and Luke 21. Between those two passages we gather that Daniel’s army, Daniel’s man, Daniel’s sacrifices, and Daniel’s abomination will take place.

Readers of Daniel used to think that historic Antiochus Epiphanes in his ancient days fulfilled the prophecy. But Jesus said, no, this Daniel event is still future. Then modern scholars figured that the Roman Titus in A.D. 70 fulfilled the prophecy. No, again. Both of these men placed abominable things in a Jewish Temple. But Matthew and Luke say that immediately after the Tribulation that this abomination triggers, shall come the end of the world! Jesus was looking far past A.D. 70!

Thus the picture that unfolds before us. A new world order. A world leader/emperor. A treaty with Israel. The treaty broken. Sacrifices begun, sacrifices ended. Abomination placed, trouble begun. Trouble ended by the return of Jesus Christ. [Conspicuous in its absence is the mention of a catching up of the saints before all this trouble. Why would Jesus have not suggested such a thing to these earnest disciples, soon to be the first church?]

But wait, what is that abomination? What happens in connection with the taking away of Jewish sacrifices?

Why, the statement. The Statement? Yes, both Antiochus and Titus were making a statement to their world about Israel’s God. The God of Israel is nothing. Worship the true God of the Greeks, or the Romans. A statue of Zeus/Juppiter will do. Thus abomination, thus God’s anger aroused.

But there is a worse statement coming. Paul tells us what it is. II Thessalonians 2. Worse than a statue, worse than a pig, as was also placed in the ancient temple. Worse than anything imaginable. A Satan-filled man walks into that Temple and claims to be God Almighty before a watching world.

How long the Enemy has waited for this moment, finally to proclaim to all of earth’s residents that he is number one! That he, Lucifer, shall reign forever and ever. His “forever” is only the final half of the seven year period, a mere 42 months wherein the Holy City is given to the Gentiles that they might “trample” it ( Revelation 11:2).

Satan here demonstrates that all the promises he has made to earthlings are similarly delusionary and lead only to dead-end streets.