Jonathan Cahn: A 2,000-Year-Old Warning About a House of Spirits—and What it Foretells Today

Read Time: 7 Minutes 15 Seconds

Is it possible that the entities we have known as “gods of the ancient world” have come back and are affecting your life right now?

Could their existence explain everything that is now transforming our culture, our families, our children, our businesses, our government and our technology?

If so, which gods have returned? What does the future hold? What is the most critical thing you need to know?

In his latest blockbuster bestseller, “The Return of the Gods,” Rabbi Jonathan Cahn asks and answers these chilling questions—and many more. The book is published by Charisma Media and released in Sept. 2022.

Cahn’s last chart-topping book, “The Harbinger II,” caused a worldwide stir, and yet those who have seen advance copies of “The Return of the Gods” are calling it his most important book ever. “It is so explosive that I have no idea what will happen when it goes forth,” says Cahn. “But we must speak the truth regardless and let the chips fall where they may.”

A House of Spirits

Cahn says that the mystery of “The Return of the Gods” opens up an entirely different dimension—a dimension that lies behind everything now taking place in our culture, from current events, news and the movements of our time, to what we see on our TV and computer screens and what our children are being taught in their classrooms.

The book begins by describing the ancient entities known as the shedim, where Cahn uncovers the first and most important revelation underlying the mystery of the gods. He explains the ancient transformation concerning the gods that changed world history and opens up a two-thousand-year-old warning involving a house of spirits and what it foretells concerning the modern world.

Cahn reveals how the gods of the ancient mystery have come into our world. He outlines the dark trinity—three specific gods—and how they have changed our culture; how the gods are working and moving in all that is taking place around us; how they are initiating social upheavals and cultural revolutions, maneuvering politics and transforming our world—and even our lives.

Finally, Cahn opens up the meaning and significance of it all, what it will lead to and what we need to know and do.

The Shedim

Cahn writes that in the ancient world, the gods were everywhere.

Wherever there were people, there were gods. They reigned over nations, cities, cultures, nature, the underworld and the heavenlies. Their presence permeated the lives of their subjects. The people were bound to them.

The Bible reveals that behind the “gods” of the nations were spirits. In Hebrew they were called the shedim. In the Book of Deuteronomy, Moses speaks of these spirits: “They sacrificed to demons [shedim], not to God, to gods they did not know, to new gods, new arrivals that your fathers did not fear” (Deut. 32:17, NKJV). When Israel turned away from God, they turned to other gods and idols, behind which were spirits—entities.

The word appears again in the book of Psalms: “They served their idols, which became a snare to them. They even sacrificed their sons and their daughters to demons [shedim]” (Ps. 106:36–37, NKJV). In ancient Babylonian writings the word shedim or shedu speaks of spirits, protective or malevolent. These entities also appear in many other places in Scripture.

But, Cahn writes, in the fourth decade of the first century, the message of forgiveness, salvation and eternal life in the death and resurrection of the Messiah, Yeshua or Jesus, went forth from Jerusalem. The gospel and the Word of God crossed into the pagan world. That crossing would change the course of world history.

“The message of God now entered the lands of many gods and idols—the Word of God now touched the realm of mythology,” he writes. “The Spirit of God now moved through the world of spirits. When the two worlds met, there was intense conflict. The rage of the pagan world against the gospel would grow so fierce that, in time, believers would be imprisoned, crucified, burned and sent into the arenas to be killed as entertainment before cheering spectators. The fury of the gods and the ferocity of the spirits were now deadly.”

But in the end, it was not the gods that prevailed, says Cahn, or the might of the Roman Empire. Against all odds, the overwhelmingly powerless followers of Jesus overcame the fires of persecution. And the message of the gospel, of God’s love and forgiveness, overcame the reign of the gods. Their spell was broken, and they were exiled.

A Warning

The worship of gods may have come to an end, but principalities and spirits do not die. They go on. So Cahn asks and answers the chilling questions: What then became of the gods and spirits? If they still exist, though exiled, could they not one day return? And if they did return, what would happen?

To bring the mystery into modern times, Cahn uncovers one more ancient puzzle piece, which lies in an ancient passage recorded in the New Testament, the words of Yeshua, Jesus, given to His disciples:

“When an unclean spirit goes out of a man, he goes through dry places, seeking rest, and finds none. Then he says, ‘I will return to my house from which I came.’ And when he comes, he finds it empty, swept, and put in order. Then he goes and takes with him seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter and dwell there; and the last state of that man is worse than the first. So shall it also be with this wicked generation” (Matt. 12:43–45, NKJV).

Cahn says this parable is a profound warning. The house that is cleansed and put in order but remains empty will be repossessed. And then it will end up in a worse state than if it had never been cleansed. Cahn asks: What happens if we apply this to an entire civilization?

He says it would translate to this: “Should a culture, a society, a nation or a civilization be cleansed, exorcised of the gods and spirits—but then remain empty—it will be repossessed by the gods and spirits that once possessed it, and more. And it will end up in a far worse state than if it had never been cleansed or exorcised at all. It will, according to the parable, end up many times more possessed and evil than before.”

Cahn recalls that when the Roman Empire and Western civilization were delivered from the spirits and gods, it happened the same way, by the word and power of God and by the name and authority of Jesus.

So how would the spirits reenter the house today? How would the gods return? “Only one way,” says Cahn. “If that civilization should ever turn away from God, from His Word, from the gospel, from Christianity, from Jesus. If it should do so, then that which drove out the spirits will no longer be present to protect it against their return. And the civilization that had been delivered of the spirits will become repossessed by them. The gods will return, and the repossessed house will end up far worse than at the beginning.”

Taken into the realm of world history, Cahn says it means this: A post-Christian civilization will end up in a far darker state than a pre-Christian civilization. If Western civilization turns away from God, what will come of it will be much darker and far more dangerous than what it was in its days of paganism.

For a nation or civilization that had once known God, that was once delivered of the gods and spirits, to then turn away from God is a most dangerous thing. The gods will return to it. The ancient spirits will come back to repossess the house—or, in this case, Western civilization. America. And that is exactly what has happened.

The Answer

Thankfully, Cahn ends “The Return of the Gods” with answers for today’s world. “Modern culture, having turned away from God and to the gods, is now marked by the same signs that once marked the ancient pagan world: purposelessness, emptiness and hopelessness. And the answer to the modern world is the same as to the ancient, and all the more so—God.”

He reminds us that when the pagan world was set free from its bondage to the gods, it was set free through a specific name, the name of Yeshua, Jesus. In Hebrew it means “The Lord is salvation.” For the pagan world it meant that there was one God and only one who could actually bring freedom and bring redemption. The same is true today.

One only has to say yes to receive Him. It is as simple as opening your heart and life to the love of God, to give Him your sins and burdens, your all, to receive Him into your life. {eoa}

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The preceding was excerpted from Jonathan Cahn’s New York Times best-selling book, “The Return of the Gods” (Frontline, 2022). For more information, or to order the book, visit BooksByJonathanCahn.com.