CRITICS CHARGE THAT the blood moon phenomenon isn’t overtly spelled out in the Bible and that the celestial event is relatively common and benign, but others are intrigued, believing that a specific pattern and frequency of the blood moons could have prophetic significance. The theological proposal, which was discovered and crafted in 2008 by Mark Biltz, founder of El Shaddai Ministries, has attracted both widespread support and debate since its inception.
The blood moons theory is based on the idea that a tetrad—a rare series of four total lunar eclipses—occurring only on Jewish holidays over a two-year period—could indicate that something profound is about to happen involving the state of Israel.
Astronomers and blood-moon enthusiasts alike note that a tetrad includes four total lunar eclipses with no partial lunar eclipses between them; six lunar, or full moons, separate each, according to EarthSky.1 Total lunar eclipses are known as blood moons, as they are named for the reddish color that results when the earth comes between the sun and moon.2
While a blood moon isn’t an uncommon occurrence, it’s when four of them fall consecutively on Passover and Sukkot—also known as Feast of Tabernacles—that prophetic minds take notice, believing that the tetrad could be a sign of a major, impending event that will impact Israel.
“God is trying to tell us something!” Texas pastor John Hagee, an advocate of the theory and the author of the 2013 book Four Blood Moons: Something Is About to Change, said in a press release leading up to the fourth and final blood moon in a tetrad that ended on September 28, 2015.3 The other dates in the tetrad were April 15, 2014; October 8, 2014; and April 4, 2015.4 This fourth blood moon was part of the final tetrad of this kind in the twenty-first century. As for Hagee, he, among others, contends that purported messages from God are coming through those tetrads.
“It is rare that Scripture, science, and history align with each other, yet the last three series of Four Blood Moons have done exactly that,” reads a description of Hagee’s Four Blood Moons book. “Just as in biblical times, God is controlling the sun, the moon, and the stars to send our generation a signal that something big is about to happen.”5
Biltz, who told me that he founded the blood moons phenomenon after examining NASA data and observing the aforementioned pattern, pushed back against claims that his ideas constitute a “theory,” and, instead, used the Bible to try and frame the blood moons phenomenon as an undeniable reality.
“In Genesis 1, God literally—in verse 14—says He created the sun and the moon for signs, signals, so that’s not a theory, unless you don’t believe in the Bible, I guess,” he said in an interview for this book. “But for anyone who believes in the Bible is the fact that that’s why He created the sun and the moon. The very first reason he says for signs or signals.”6
Biltz continued, “Then when it says seasons, days, and years, that doesn’t mean winter, spring, summer, fall; it means for the biblical Jewish calendar that they used.”7
Genesis 1:14 reads, “And God said, ‘Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night, and let them be signs to indicate seasons, and days, and years.’”
Additionally, Biltz points to Luke 21:25 to corroborate the notion that the moon and sun will provide signs of what’s to come. That verse reads, “There will be signs in the sun and the moon and the stars; and on the earth distress of nations, with perplexity, the sea and the waves roaring.”
Biltz, who said that his blood moons construct has been spread and further popularized by Hagee, explained that he first discovered it in March of 2008 after he observed a total lunar eclipse over the Temple Mount. The celestial event struck his interest, leading him to explore NASA data to see if he could find anything of substance.
“I went to their ten-year table, and I saw that there were these four total lunar eclipses in a row, and I thought, from the mathematical standpoint, how rare is that?” Biltz recalled. “I started researching it, and then as I was praying about it, I all of a sudden realized, ‘Oh my goodness, I [have] to put these on the biblical calendar.’”8
That’s when he realized that the moons were falling on the Jewish holidays and, after further research, he said, “The rest is history.”9
“Now there are a lot of books and people theorizing what might happen, and that’s theory, but the facts are that God did create them for signs on the feast days,” Biltz said. “They have occurred on those feast days, and biblically, historically things have happened.”10
In a 2013 interview with TheBlaze, Hagee also said that the premise of the blood moons theory is “confirmed by NASA” data. He argued that a series of four blood moons have appeared on Passover and Sukkot during the period of two consecutive years only a few times in history. And each time, Hagee said, something significant has happened concerning the Jewish people.11
Passover celebrates the Jews’ liberation from Egyptian slavery, and Sukkot commemorates the Jews’ forty-year wandering in the desert before reaching the Promised Land.
“This has happened only three times in over 500 years, so it’s a very rare thing,” Hagee said, adding that the dates during which the tetrads fell always began with “tears” and ended in “triumph” for the Jewish people.12
Some have, no doubt, scoffed at these ideas, but Hagee has a historical narrative that he said corroborates the theory.
Consider that in 1492, King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella “issued an edict of expulsion” kicking the Jews out of Spain. This happened during the Spanish Inquisition, which began in 1478, to rid the region of Jews and Muslims. According to NASA data, there was a tetrad from 1493 to 1494; there were three preceding tetrads that century as well, but they did not fall on Jewish holidays.13
There are other tetrads that Hagee links to Israel as well, as NASA data shows that yet another tetrad unfolded between 1949 and 1950, a key time for Israel’s modern-day manifestation.14
“In 1948, that’s the year Israel became a state,” he explained. “The thing that happened prior to that was the tragedy of the Holocaust, which ended in the rejoicing of statehood.”15
Another tetrad happened between 1967 and 1968, a period which saw the Six-Day War—a moment of “triumph” when Jerusalem was reunified and became “the eternal capital of the Jewish people once again,” Hagee said.16
NASA data also shows that four blood moons emerged between the years 1909–1910, 1927–1928, and 1985–1986, but these also did not fall on the Jewish holidays and would, thus, not be counted among those with potential prophetic impact.17
Speaking more generally, the last tetrad to take place before the most recent 2014 and 2015 set of blood moons unfolded between 2003 and 2004, though the moons also did not fall on Jewish holidays as the most recent ones did.18
Hagee said that there would “not be anymore four blood moons in the future” that fall on these holidays—at least in the near-term—so he says the current tetrad could indicate the start of some major, earth-shattering events.19
NASA data does appear to show six others will happen this century, but none appear to have all four blood moons fall on both Passover and Sukkot.20
“I think the thing that people will take away from this is that it means, based on past history, that something is about to change in the Middle East concerning Israel that will affect the nations of [the] world and everyone on planet Earth,” he said. “No one knows for sure what it will be, but based on the pattern of the past it will involve Israel. It will begin with tears and end in triumph and change the course of history forever.”21
Hagee also appeals to Scriptures to corroborate the notion that God has traditionally communicated with mankind through celestial means and “is sending planet Earth signals from the heavens.”22 He cited Joel 2, Acts 2, and Luke 21. Here’s the list of associated verses, including those found in Luke 21, which Biltz also cited:
• “The sun will be turned to darkness, and the moon to blood, before the great and awe-inspiring day of the LORD comes” (Joel 2:31).
• “There will be signs in the sun and the moon and the stars; and on the earth distress of nations, with perplexity, the sea and the waves roaring; men fainting from fear and expectation of what is coming on the inhabited earth. For the powers of heaven will be shaken. Then they will see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with power and great glory. When these things begin to happen, look up and lift your heads, for your redemption is drawing near” (Luke 21:25–28).
• “And I will show wonders in heaven above and signs on the earth below: blood, and fire, and vapor of smoke. The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before that great and glorious day of the Lord comes” (Acts 2:19–20).
Like other issues pertaining to prophecy or the end times, the blood moons phenomenon carries with it a great deal of controversy. Hank Hanegraaff is among the many critics of this theology, telling me in a 2014 interview for TheBlaze that the theory is both “appalling” and “deplorable.”23
“What these purveyors of blood moon theology [are doing] is taking the natural use of the stars, which God ordains, and perverting it with superstitiousness which God disdains,” Hanegraaff said. “The heavenly bodies are used for separating the night from the day . . . [for] marking seasons, from giving light on the Earth and so forth.”24
Hanegraaff examined the verses Hagee cited, noting that he believes that there’s no evidence that these scriptures are to be taken as future predictions in the modern era.
“Peter talks about the ultimate day of judgment . . . it pertains to the coming of the Lord . . . coming in judgment on Jerusalem and ultimately it pertains to a second coming as well, but there’s no word whatsoever for taking the language of Joel and suggesting that somehow or other you can read from that language what is going to happen in the modern epic,” Hanegraaff said.25
He also noted that, as stated, the Spanish Inquisition began fifteen years before the 1493 tetrad, though it is true that it wasn’t until 1492 that the Jews were expelled from the region.26
Hanegraaff also pointed to some one-year differences as gaps in time that he said didn’t make the tetrads reliable in terms of connecting them to biblical prophecy. Consider, for instance, that Israel was founded in May 1948, but the tetrad didn’t start until 1949.
“Lunar eclipses are associated with Jewish events anyway,” Hanegraaff said. “There should be no real surprise that you find these kinds of events happening.”27
Kenneth L. Waters, associate dean and a New Testament professor at California’s Azusa Pacific University, agreed that it’s not entirely surprising that these dates would fall on Passover and Sukkot.
“[There] is nothing particularly extraordinary about these holy days coinciding with a full moon,” he wrote in a 2014 CNN op-ed. “Jewish holy days are based upon a lunar calendar. Passover is always celebrated the first full moon after the vernal equinox and the Feast of Tabernacles is always the first full moon after the autumnal equinox.”28
Ken Ham’s Answers in Genesis provided an overview of how the calendar works, agreeing that there’s nothing astounding about the dates lining up with Jewish holidays. The group even provided tables to show that it’s not unique that eclipses sometimes fall on Jewish holidays, considering the Jewish calendar follows the moon.29
Dr. Danny Faulkner, an astronomer with Answers in Genesis, also noted that there are some limitations concerning where these blood moons were visible from during the 2014–2015 season.
“There also is a question of from what portion of the earth one ought to view these eclipses for them to constitute a sign,” he wrote. “One might think that Jerusalem would be a key site, but the first three total lunar eclipses in 2014–2015 won’t be visible from there, and only the beginning of the final eclipse will be. One must ask whether a sign that few people notice is much of a sign.”30
EarthSky’s Bruce McClure and Deborah Byrd explained in a blog post that the Jewish calendar is lunar and that in any given year “it’s inevitable that a full moon should fall on or near the feasts of Passover . . . and Tabernacles,” as they fall in the first and seventh months of the Jewish calendar.31
That said, the two confirm that, while full moons are common near the holidays, there have been only eight tetrads that meet the specifications that Hagee detailed over the course of the past twenty-one centuries. They fell in the following years (all AD): 162–163, 795–796, 842–843, 860–861, 1493–1494, 1949–1950, 1967–1968, and 2014–2015.32
Considering the critiques surrounding the blood moons, Biltz sought to make a few clarifications in an interview for this book. Among them, he pushed back against the critique that a tetrad started in 1949 after Israel’s founding the previous year.
“In May 1948 [Israel] declared independence, but they kept battling until 1949 when everything was actually solidified,” he said. “Regardless of that, now all we can say is, what does it mean looking back? I think looking back, I look at it as here the UN thinks they discovered the state of Israel, and I think that God is saying, ‘No, I’m the one who did this. This is My handiwork.’” Biltz continued, “I think He’s just putting His handprints on it after the fact.”33
And while he said that many people have attempted to forecast what’s to come or have tied the blood moons phenomenon to the end of the world, he has not done so.
“A lot of people were saying things that I was saying that I wasn’t saying, and other people were saying things were going to happen that were attributed to me that I never said,” Biltz explained. “As far as theories go, I wasn’t making a theory as much as looking at patterns. I said, ‘Let’s look [at] what happened in the past. Historically you see war with Israel.’ That was the number one thing that I saw: something biblical with Israel.”34
As for the biggest misconception surrounding his blood moons ideology, Biltz said that it’s the mistaken notion that he argued that something would happen on the days that the blood moons in question took place. That said, he does believe that something could happen in relation to those moons in the near future.
As for another tetrad that matches the requirements to be part of the blood moons phenomenon, Biltz said that people will be in for quite a wait.
“The next time you have four blood moons in a row that also fall on Passover and Tabernacles isn’t for about five hundred years,” he said.35
In an interview for this book, Hagee mirrored these comments, saying that he believes that one of the major misconceptions about the four blood moons theory is that he was “predicting the date of the Messiah’s return or some other specific ‘end of days’ event during the 2014–2015 triad of blood moons.”36
This, he said, is patently false, as Hagee cited Matthew 24:36 to note that we cannot know the day or hour of Christ’s return. Pointing back to the Old Testament story of Noah and his ark, Hagee said that though we cannot and do not know the day and hour, it is quite possible for us to know the “season.”37
“We can know the season of Christ’s return. The Bible says, ‘But as the days of Noah were, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be’ [NKJV],” Hagee said, citing Matthew 24:37. “Noah did not know the day or the hour that the floods of the deep would be released to destroy the world through the flood.” He continued, “But he did know that when the boat was completely finished, that the animals were on the boat, and Noah and his family walked up the gangplank as God closed the door to the ark; there was no doubt the flood was near.”38
Hagee said that prophecy provides certain signals that will unfold before Jesus’s return, with the return of the Jews being cited among them.
“The return of the Jewish people from the nations of the world to form the nation of Israel is on that checklist,” he said. “The four blood moons is on that checklist. The knowledge explosion of Daniel 12:4 is on that checklist. Something is about to change.”39