A Strong delusion

... insomuch that, if [it were] possible, they shall deceive the very elect. Matthew 24:24

Deceive?

And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie: 2 Thessalonians 2:11

What lie?

...for by thy sorceries were all nations deceived. Revelation 18:23

Deceive all nations?

And shall go out to deceive the nations ... Re 20:8

How could all the Nations be deceived? Deceived about what?

For many deceivers are entered into the world, who confess not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh. This is a deceiver and an antichrist. 2 John 1:7

In the garden we are told that Eve was deceived by the serpent but who deceived Adam? Adam imagined that he could eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and profit from it. He imagined that he could decide what was good and what was evil by his own efforts. He chose to no longer walk with God and His ways but to walk in his own ways according to his own will. He believed he could establish the law. He was self deceived.

How doth the city sit solitary, [that was] full of people! [how] is she become as a widow! she [that was] great among the nations, [and] princess among the provinces, [how] is she become tributary ! (La 1:1)

Here tributary was translated from the Hebrew word "mac {mas}" meaning "gang/body of forced labourers, task-workers, labour band/gang, forced service, task-work, serfdom, tributary, tribute, levy, taskmasters, discomfited ... forced service, serfdom, tribute, enforced payment."¹

"Of the twenty-three uses of this term, all but three (Isa 31:8; Lam1:1; Est 10:1) occur early in the literature. The institution of tribute or corvee ² involves involuntary, unpaid labour or other service for superior power-a feudal lord, a king, or a foreign ruler (Ex 1:11; Est 10:1; Lam 1:1)." ³

"The corvée⁴ was different from other forced labor arrangements because it was labor performed for the government, involuntarily, on large public works projects. (The word corvée meant 'contribution,' signifying one's obligation to the state.) In some cases the corvée meant a specified amount of time given to the state every year, as prescribed by law. Another name for it was, therefore, statute labor. It was used by the Romans for the upkeep of roads, bridges, and dikes but got its name in France early in the 18th century."⁵

"The same dealt subtilly with our kindred, and evil entreated our fathers, so that they cast out their young children, to the end they might not live." (Acts 7: 19)

"Servitude. A term which indicates the subjection of one person to another person, or of a person to a thing, or of a thing to a person, or of a thing to a thing." Bouvier's 8th 1859

In Pharaoh's Egypt in the days of their captivity the tribute tax paid by his subjects was equivalent to two and a half months. This was a corvee or statutory system of bondage. All the gold and silver was in the government treasury instead of the hands of the people. The people used government issued script whose value was inflationary and dependent upon the government and its banks. Also, everyone only had a legal title to their land, their stock and their lives. (Genesis 47:15,26.)

To pay off the average corvée tax liability in 1995 for those with employee identification numbers in the United States required four months and five days. The gold and silver is in other hands and everyone uses notes issued by government or its institutions as if it were money of present value. All citizens of the United States who have legal title to what appears to be their property (land, vehicles, labor etc.) has no right to its beneficial interest or use of that property.

Law vs. Legal
http://www.hisholychurch.info/study/gods/lvl.htm

"...and ye shall be plucked from off the land whither thou goest to possess it....and there thou shalt serve other gods,.. shalt thou find no ease...shalt have none assurance of thy life:" (Deuteronomy 28:63, 66)

Have the American people been dealt with subtly? Does subtly mean fraud or does it mean, as it does with Arab camel dealers or horse traders. The rule of thumb is caveat emptor, let the buyer beware?

"Many a man thinks he is buying pleasure, when he is really selling himself a slave to it." Ben Franklin.

"If men, through fear, fraud, or mistake, should in terms renounce or give up any natural right, the eternal law of reason and the grand end of society would absolutely vacate such renunciation. The right to freedom being a gift of ALMIGHTY GOD, it is not in the power of man to alienate this gift and voluntarily become a slave." Samuel Adams, 1772

Was it fraud alone or a measure of our own vanity that brought us under tribute?

Proverbs 12:24 "The hand of the diligent shall bear rule: but the slothful shall be under tribute."

Has our deception been the result of their lies alone or our apathetic ignorance and/or our covetous appetite?

Was the fear created by their threats or our own cowardliness, avarice or lack of faith? Was their fraud due to lies or were we the fraud in proclaiming Christianity and then participating in a system that by its nature coveted our neighbors sweat to sustain itself.

Are we fooled or are we foolish? Is it the lie or our comfortable ignorance that brought this upon us? Were we gullible because our own covetousness has swayed our wise judgment?

Why couldn't we see that these entitlements required our neighbors subjection to pay for our desire? Was the appeal so inviting because we had lost site of the love of God and His ways?

If we truly loved our neighbor would we, could we have been enticed by a scheme that compelled their contributions and service? Were we conditioned by pride to imagine that we could not be deceived and now instead of admitting our own folly we cry out only against the sin of others in our defense? What blame do we take? There must be some.

If we take no responsibility then we will gain no right. Humility will open our eyes not more pride.If we do not change and grow we will remain vulnerable to the next deception.

For when they speak great swelling words of vanity, they allure through the lusts of the flesh, through much wantonness, those that were clean escaped from them who live in error. While they promise them liberty, they themselves are the servants of corruption: for of whom a man is overcome, of the same is he brought in bondage.

For having overcome the pollutions of the world through the knowledge of the Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, they are again entangled therein, and overcome, the latter end is worse with them than beginning. For it had been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than, after they have known it, to turn from the holy commandment delivered unto them. But it is happened unto them according to the true proverb,

'The dog is turned to his own vomit again;
and the sow that was washed to her wallowing in the mire.' (II Peter 2, 18-22).

I will not deny that some men have been cunningly coerced into waiving their rights out of a genuine desire to do what is right but still I cannot believe we could not have seen more clearly had we ourselves been purer in heart. Mistake is the most desired of defense if not the most reasonable assumption. Yet, to avoid the same ascent in the future a change of heart and understanding are essential to guard against a repetition of error.

We must be as concerned with our neighbors rights, property and needs as we are concerned with our own if we are to be a nation of freemen. No bounties, donations and benefits is bestowed by government unless they or the funds that pay for them have first been seized from others.

"The real destroyers of the liberties of the people is he who spreads among them bounties, donations and benefits." Plutarch, 2000 years ago.

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Footnotes:

¹ On line Bible & Concordance. Woodside Bible Fellowship.

² "I (i.e., the suffering servant) gave my back to the smiters and my cheeks to them that 'tore' at my beard." In connection with these passages we may note the use of the same verb to describe the condition of baldness (Lev 13, 4041) in the context of leprosy diagnosis. Ezekiel 29:18 says that the heads of the people of Tyre were "made bald" by Nebuchadnezzar. This does not mean he tore out their hair; rather, the baldness was the result of carrying loads on their heads as corvee labor gangs. From R. Laird Harris' 'Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament'

³ From R. Laird Harris' 'Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament'

⁴ CORVEE' In French Law. Gratuitouslabor exacted from villages or communities, esppecially for repairing roads, constructing bridges, etc. Black's 3rd p445. In Latin it would be covata from corrogare meaning "to gather by request". Webster says it is an "obligation on the inhabitants of a district to perform services" or "forced labor exacted by government". The Romans had a Corvee system in their provinces and eventually throughout the empire. The Jews opposed this because they had been taken out of Egypt and were to serve the Lord only. They were granted exemption because of the religious freedom clause of Roman law and specifically because they would not work on the Sabbath. Early Christians being "a viable republic in the heart of the Roman Empire" were also exempt. This encouraged laws that would make men criminals and then criminals were required to work in forced work gangs.

⁵ SLAVERY AND SERFDOM Compton's Encyclopedia