EARTHQUAKES

September 2006 article by Jonathan Thompson

The Red Sea is parting again, but this time Moses doesn’t have a hand in it.  Modern science, more capable than before in monitoring the earth’s movements, is witnessing the sure and perpetual purpose of God unfold towards the epoch event of all time, the return of his Son to the earth that will trigger a massive landscape change around Israel and to the east of Jerusalem in particular.

Satellite images show that the Arabian tectonic plate and the African plate are moving away from each other, stretching the Earth's crust and widening the southern end of the Red Sea, scientists reported in a recent issue of the journal Nature. Last September, a series of earthquakes started splitting the planet's surface along a 37-mile section of the East African Rift in Afar, Ethiopia.

Using the images gathered by the European Space Agency's Envisat radar satellite, researchers looked at satellite data before and after these activities. This rift valley is directly connected in a northerly direction through the Gulf of Aqaba to the Jordan Valley also connecting through the Dead Sea, directly east of Jerusalem. The Great Rift Valley, a geological fault system of SW Asia and E Africa extends c 3,000 miles (4,830 km) from N Syria to central Mozambique. The northernmost extension runs south through Syria and Lebanon, the Jordan valley, the Dead Sea, and the Gulf of Aqaba. It continues into the trough of the Red Sea and at the southern end branches into the Gulf of Aden, where it continues as part of the Mid-Oceanic Ridge of the Indian Ocean. The main section of the valley in Africa continues from the Red Sea south-west across Ethiopia and south across Kenya, Tanzania, and Malawi to the lower Zambezi River valley in Mozambique. Many small lakes in Ethiopia and several long narrow lakes, notably lakes Turkana and Nyasa, lie on its course. Just north of Lake Nyasa there is a western branch, which runs north, chiefly along the eastern border of Congo (Kinshasa); this branch is marked by a chain of lakes, including lakes Tanganyika, Kivu, Edward, and Albert (Mobutu). Lake Victoria does not lie in the Great Rift Valley but between its main and western branches. The Great Rift Valley ranges in elevation from c 1,300 ft (395 m) below sea level (the Dead Sea) to c 6,000 ft (1,830 m) above sea level in S Kenya. Erosion has concealed some sections, but in places, notably in Kenya, there are sheer cliffs several thousand feet high. The present configuration of the rift, which dates from the mid-Pleistocene epoch, is probably a result of a rifting process associated with thermal currents in the earth's mantle.

Earth-shattering shift

Over a period of three weeks, the crust on the sides of the rift moved apart by 26 feet and magma - enough to fill a football stadium more than 2,000 times - was injected along a vertical crack, forming a new crust.

"We think that the crust and mantle melt slowly at depths greater than 10 kilometers [6 miles], where it is hotter, forming magma (molten rock)," said Tim J Wright, study co-author, a Royal Society University Research Fellow. "This magma rises through the crust because it is less dense than the surrounding rock.”

The magma collects in magma chambers at depths of 3 to 5 kilometers (1.9 to 3 miles) where the density is the same as the crustal rocks, Wright explained.  "Slowly, the pressure has been building up in these chambers until last September when it finally cracked, breaking the crust along a vertical crack. The magma was then injected into this crack." The intrusion of magma into the gap, rather than the cracking of the crust, is responsible for segmentation of continental drifts. This is the first rifting episode to have occurred since 1970 and the largest single rip in the Earth's continental crust during the satellite-monitoring era.

"We knew about the steady rifting process in Afar, as Arabia moves away from Africa across the rift," Wright said. "And we knew that occasionally the strain that builds up slowly over centuries is released suddenly in rifting episodes.  We did not know how big the deformation could be."

"The ground is continually moving - much more rapidly now than before the rifting episode," Wright told LiveScience. "On average, the two sides move apart at about 2 centimeters per year. But, as this event demonstrates, the motion is episodic and jerky.  This poses considerable hazard to the local inhabitants, which is higher for the next few years."

This latest split, added to the long-term rifting process, which is tearing the northeast of Ethiopia and Eritrea from the rest of Africa, could eventually create a huge new sea. Although such processes could take millions of years to occur, this event has given scientists an unprecedented opportunity to monitor the rupture in real time.

This, another “sign of our times” is of great interest to Bible students who are aware of the prophecies of great topographical changes – Zechariah 14:1-11 God through his servant foretells of the landscape upheavals at the return of his Son (v4), promised for so long, to establish the Kingdom of God and end the dominion of mankind.

Zechariah 14

1. Behold, the day of the LORD cometh, and thy spoil shall be divided in the midst of thee.

2. For I will gather all nations against Jerusalem to battle; and the city shall be taken, and the houses rifled, and the women ravished; and half of the city shall go forth into captivity, and the residue of the people shall not be cut off from the city.

3. Then shall the LORD go forth, and fight against those nations, as when he fought in the day of battle.

4. And his feet shall stand in that day upon the mount of Olives, which is before Jerusalem on the east, and the mount of Olives shall cleave in the midst thereof toward the east and toward the west, and there shall be a very great valley; and half of the mountain shall remove toward the north, and half of it toward the south.

5. And ye shall flee to the valley of the mountains; for the valley of the mountains shall reach unto Azal: yea, ye shall flee, like as ye fled from before the earthquake in the days of Uzziah king of Judah: and the LORD my God shall come, and all the saints with thee.

6. And it shall come to pass in that day, that the light shall not be clear, nor dark:

7. But it shall be one day which shall be known to the LORD, not day, nor night: but it shall come to pass, that at evening time it shall be light.

8. And it shall be in that day, that living waters shall go out from Jerusalem; half of them toward the former sea, and half of them toward the hinder sea: in summer and in winter shall it be.

9. And the LORD shall be king over all the earth: in that day shall there be one LORD, and his name one.

10. All the land shall be turned as a plain from Geba to Rimmon south of Jerusalem: and it shall be lifted up, and inhabited in her place, from Benjamin's gate unto the place of the first gate, unto the corner gate, and from the tower of Hananeel unto the king's winepresses.

11. And men shall dwell in it, and there shall be no more utter destruction; but Jerusalem shall be safely inhabited.

This prophecy has not gone unnoticed by geologist, Dr. Amos Nur, a Stanford University professor, who has studied earthquakes in Israel. Dr. Nur notes that the direction of the predicted earthquake follows the natural fault line, "The most remarkable thing about this quotation from Zechariah is the clear description of a strike slip fault in which the part to the east moved to the north and the part to the west ... moved to the south. This is exactly the kind of motion that we know happens on the Dead Sea transform during earthquakes"

Neither should this prophecy go unnoticed by us. God has left this fault line as a sign to remind us of the truthfulness of his word. Although there will be a massive multinational attack against Jerusalem in the last days, God will come to her rescue and "make Jerusalem an immovable rock for all the nations. ... never again will it be destroyed. Jerusalem will be secure." (Zechariah 12:3; 14:11)

"Therefore, the Lord says, ‘In my zeal and fiery wrath I declare that at that time there shall be a great earthquake in the land of Israel ... every creature and all people on the face of the earth will tremble at my presence." (Ezekiel 38:19 & 20)

If this article has been of interest to you, then you may consider a special presentation we are holding in our meeting room on Saturday November 25^th specifically on this subject, of earthquakes and volcanoes and how the increased activity of these natural events is a direct indication of the ultimate fulfillment of God’s prophecies. Look out for details on the web site shortly.