Bible Questions with Michael Pearl
Episode 018: In Daniel 11:37, why is the word "God" capitalized?

Episode Transcription:

Mike Pearl:  All right. Mike Pearl here again with the old black book and Jared sitting behind the camera. We're going to try to answer some of your Bible questions. My Bible's falling apart here. I've had this one about 15‑20 years, I guess. What's your question there, Jared?

Jared:  In Daniel 11:37, why is God capitalized?

Mike:  OK. The whole context here is a description of the antichrist and you can just read it. It's quite a long list, and quite thorough, and it's pretty good. He says, "And the King shall do according to his will," that's what the antichrist is going to be, "and he shall exalt himself, and magnify himself above every god, and shall speak marvelous things against the God of gods, " capital G, little G, "and shall prosper till the indignation be accomplished: for that is determined shall be done. Neither shall he regard the God of his fathers, nor the desire of women, nor regard any god, for he shall magnify himself, and in his estate shall he honor the God of forces." See, the Bible ‑‑ you will notice in the King James Bible ‑‑ capitalizes proper nouns. You take Genesis 1, one, two, three, four, going through the first chapter, he said, "And God called the firmament Heaven." and it's capital letters. Quite often, you will see a word capitalized simply because it is a proper noun. It's used like we would use quotation marks. You know how we will put something in quotation marks? Or, if we refer to a book, we will put it in all capital letters to indicate that it stands out from the rest of the text?

So, a proper noun that is addressing an individual, be it God or Gods, would be a capital G, where as a reference generally to gods would not be a capital G. So he says two times here, verse 37, "Neither shall he regard the God of his fathers."

I think the antichrist is going to be Jewish. Half Jewish. I think he's going to parallel Christ. He's going to be virgin born, appear to be. He's going to have a gentile father and a Jewish mother, like the Virgin Mary was Jewish. So, he won't honor the God of his fathers. In other words, he won't worship Yahweh. He won't worship Jehovah. Instead, he will honor the God ‑‑ capital G ‑‑ of forces.

Now, that is the most up‑to‑date passage, the God of forces. I saw that old movie years ago, "Star Wars." Let the force be with you. That's taken from some of the Eastern religions. It's taken from some of the transcendental stuff. It's taken from witchcraft. There is this belief that there is an unnamed force in the Universe of which we're all a part. Pantheism follows this concept. Your Chinese religions follow this concept.

So, when it said he will honor the God of forces, that's a very up‑to‑date way of describing the antichrist who will be this universal man with the universal religion, non‑offensive, accepting the force that's in the Universe as deity. So, he'll honor the God, proper noun, of forces.

A god. It's a small G there, see, because it's not speaking of a name. God of forces is a name. And he'll honor a god whom his fathers knew not. So, then it's a little G. And, it says in verse 30, we're going to have this strange god. So, it's not a proper noun there. So, it's capitalized simply because it's the name of someone.

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