Posted on 12/08/2004 11:08:38 PM PST by Mike10542
Hey fellow freepers, having been swept up in the battle of conservatives first liberals and believers in God vs. non-beleivers I clearly have chosen the right side here (hence me writing on Free Republic). The alignment of Jews like myself and many fellow Christians is one that I feel is very necesary to win the war against evil and have peace in our time. Although I choose to ignore all the leftists and others who try to break up this loving partnership by saying "They are only on your side becuase they want the Jews in control of Jerusalem so Christ returns," I am looking to explore what the Bible really teaches about the Jewish fate from the Christian perspective. It is hard to find what the majority opinion is because the internet is, well, the internet. What I have made out so far is that during rapture I beleive 2/3's of Jews are killed, but one third survive. So my questions are:
1) What do the 2/3's of Jews die from (war, just happens????)
2) What happens to the remaning 1/3 of Jews after they survive?
3) Do any of this remaining 1/3 of Jews make it past the final judgement of God (some interpertations say no, others say the remaining Jews are allowed to pass once accepting God and I think Christ)
I truly beleive in my Jewish fate as I have been raised Jewish, but my mom is Christian. So each religion I respect and believe are good. Ultimately, I hope us Jews and Christians both make it together to the promised land (and only the Muslims are sent to hell!)
Thanks for all your answers. Also, feel free to direct me to anywhere where I can learn more about this subject.
bookmark for latter
Interesting.......
What do you have to say about the Hebrew Prophet Jonah, and The Book of Jonah?
:-)
With respect to part B), your reference to Christ's statement is totally yanked out of context. John 4:22 is part of Jesus' discourse with the Samaritan woman at the well (John 4:6-30). The salient point of John 4:21,22 is Christ's dealing with the Samaritan's attempt at going off on a rabbit trail.
Jacob's Well is at the foot of Mount Gerizim toward which she pointed. Sanballat erected a temple on this mountain which was destroyed by John Hyrcanus B.C. 129. Abraham (Ge 12:7) and Jacob (Ge 33:20) set up altars at Shechem. On Gerizim were proclaimed the blessings recorded in De 28:1-68. The Samaritan Pentateuch records an altar set up on Gerizim that is on Ebal (over 200 feet higher than Gerizim) in the Hebrew (De 27:4). The Samaritans held that Abraham offered up Isaac on Gerizim. The Samaritans kept up this worship on this mountain and a handful do it still. The woman felt that by raising this theological wrangle she would turn the attention of Jesus away from herself and perhaps get some light on the famous controversy.
Christ had just shocked and embaressed the living crap out of the woman in v18 (so as usually is done today by people who can't argue the facts, they attempt to change the subject). This is also an excellent example of how to deal with people like that when one is witnessing to them.
Anyways, Christ's response in v21 intimated that the worship of God will be emancipated from bondage to place (the temple). Both Jews and Samaritans are wrong as to the "necessity" for that. Jesus told this sinful woman one of his greatest truths with that statement.
In v22 Jesus answers her attempt at diversion directly. The Samaritans rejected the prophets and the Psalms and so cut themselves off from the fuller knowledge of God. Jesus is a Jew as he fully recognizes (Mt 15:24). The Jews, as the chosen people, had fuller revelations of God (Ps 147:19; Ro 9:3-5). But even so the Jews as a whole failed to recognize God in Christ (Josh 1:11,18; 7:26). For salvation is from the Jews (hoti hê sôtêria ek tôn Ioudaiôn estin). "The salvation," the Messianic salvation which had long been the hope and guiding star of the chosen people (Lk 1:69,71,77; Ac 13:26,47). It was for the whole world (Jn 3:17), but it comes "out of" (ek) the Jews. This tremendous fact should never be forgotten, however unworthy the Jews may have proved of their privilege. The Messiah, God's Son, was a Jew.
And with respect to part C), "The glorious Messiah's coming is suspended at every moment of history until his recognition by "all Israel", for "a hardening has come upon part of Israel" in their "unbelief" toward Jesus" (#674 of the Catechism of the Catholic Church), I'm absolutely baffled and flabbergasted how the Roman Catholic Church derives that doctrine cited in #647 from the scripture cited in the footnotes. The first footnote to #647 (569) refers to Romans 11:20-26. Romans 11:20-26 is Paul's warning to the Gentile's in Rome, not to boast because of their privleges, lest they fall under condemnation. The condemnation that he was referencing was God's treatment of Israel (Rm 10:19-11:12), specifically with respect to the Jews stiff-neckedness and rejection of the Gospel. And so since God's chosen people were passed over, and salvation is come unto Gentiles (v11,12).
In Rm 11:26 Paul refers to "the Deliverer", making reference to something that was written in the Old Testament: Ps 14:7 and Isa 59:20,21. The footnote to the latter part of #637 of the Roman Catholic Catechism that drives this point home: Romans 11:12, 25. Paul is telling the Romans that the Jews would be blind until the "fullness of the Gentiles came." Cross references to this time are found in Lk 21:24 and Re 7:9. Clearly what scripture is intimating, that the Jews would remain blind until Christ comes again, but when he does return, they'll see the error of their ways and be saved (just like the Gentiles until then).
Your entire point is demonstrative of fundementaly unsound doctrine premised upon exremely sloppy hermeneutic.
"#647 from the scripture cited in the footnotes. The first footnote to #647" - substitute #647 with #674.
"The footnote to the latter part of #637 of the Roman Catholic Catechism" - substitute #637 with #674. Furthermore, the footnote for the last part of #674 is 572 (Rm 11:12,25).
Bump!
I like that prayer.
Will have to copy it off and print it out.
Are you Russian Orthodox?
So according to you, what gives more weight to an argument aren't contents but the length of one's membership to FR.
Do you believe that there is any human being on Earth that acts with primary agape love, and in any way not consistent with his conception of what is necessary for the survival of things important to him as a first consideration, and the good of another as a secondary consideration?
If you do, what would be the example(s)?
Look, most of your acquaintances might believe in that rapture crap, but there are over a billion Christians on the planet and it is the case that only a minority of American Christians believe it. The rest don't.
As for being intolerant, you bet your sweet bippie I am intolerant. I can't stand idiots, fools or liars. Anyone espousing the rapture ranks in one of those categories at least.
I'm not going to write a novel to rebut you since it's already been done. Read Paul Thigpen's The Rapture Trap, for instance. There are many other books rebutting your understanding of "rapture" Scriptures precisely because no one believed this crap prior to about two centuries ago.
If you care to refute THAT statement, all you have to do is find a Christian in the first millenium of Christianity who bought into it.
There aren't any. And there are precious few in the second millenium - none prior to the 1800's.
Do not embrace "The Rapture" as settled Christian doctrine. It originated with a handful of marginal 19th Century Protestant ministers but has been recently taken up and popularized by evangelicals and amplified by their vigorous publishing and entertainment media.
There is a great deal of exegesis and commentary behind "The Rapture," but thin support in the text of the Bible. Indeed, "The Rapture" is rejected by the Roman Catholic Church and its putative source, the Apocalypse, is not regarded as canonical and hence is seen as unreliable as a guide in matters of faith.
You're using fallacious reasoning and a straw man argument. Pretribulationalism is not apostolic; pretribulationalism is dispensationalism; therefore, dispensationalism is not apostolic. No dispansationalist claims that dispensationalism to be developed in the first century; nor is it necessary to be able to do so. Many other doctrines were not developed in the early centuries - including covenant theology which originated in the seventeenth century. Doctrinal development is perfectly normal process that has occured throughout church history.
In fact its the improper use of church history that creates the second fallacy. The fact that something was taught in the first century doesn't makes it right (unless its taught in the canonical Scriptures), and the fact that something was not taught until the 19th century doesn't make it wrong, unless of course it is unscriptural.
That the systematizing of dispensationalism is recent should not be suprising. It would not be unexpected that a subject whose primary distinctions have to with eschatology should not have been systematized until eschatology began to be refined seriously by the church. Most agree that history of dogma has followed a certain pattern of unfolding development and discussion. Orr, in his classic work The Progress of Dogma shows how the doctrines taken up for theological study by the church throughout history chronologically correspond with the general order followed in most systematic theologies. In chronological order the doctrinal discussions were on apologetics, theology proper, anthropology, Christology, soteriolgy, and after the Reformation, eschatology. Undoubtedly the recency of systematic eschatology partly accounts for the relative recency of systematic dispensationalism. This is not to say that eschatology or even a primitive dispensationalism was not considered prior to the Reformation, but it is to say that systematic developemnt of doctrine in these areas did not come on the scene until then.
The fact of the matter, Paul broached the subject concerning the rapture to the Thessalonians. The Thessalonian Christians were concerned for fear that the rapture had already happened and that they were living in the day of the Lord (the end times). Their view was reasonable based on the degree of persecution they were experiencing (as referred to in the first chapter of 2 Thessalonians). Paul pooh-poohs that idea, writing in chapter 2 that such a thing was impossible. In v.3 he shows that the day of the Lord could not occur without some kind of departure. Whether this departure is from faith, or of the saints from the earth (as mentioned in v.1) is beside the point. He reveals that there is to be a manifestation of a man of sin, or the lawless one (this is further described in Revelation 13). Paul makes the argument in v.7 that although the lawless system that was to culminate itself in the manifestation of the lawless one, was in existence in his day, the lawless one could not be manifested until the Restrainer was taken out of the way. Explanations of who the Restrainer was such as human government, law, the visible church, are insufficient, for they will all continue in a measure after the manifestation of the lawless one. While this is essentially an exegetical problem, it would seem then that the only plausible explanation for the One who could perform such restraining ministry would be the Holy Spirit. The indication here by Paul is, that as long as the Holy Spirit is resident within the church, which is His temple, the restraining work will continue and the man of sin cannot be revealed. In accordance to the prophecy of Daniel 9:27, the church must be raptured before the tribulation period, as the lawless one will be manifested at the beginning of the week.
The first sentance of your second paragraph is absolute madness, and casts doubt concerning your understanding of what exegesis is. Perhaps you believe it to wax eloquent and deriving doctrine out of thin air? And finally, not that the doctrine of the rapture is predicated on the book, but to intimate that The Book of Revelation is not cononical is the height of absurdity.
You just earned the ignore list. Bye.
The poster you mentioned was banned because he was too confrontational, consistantly forced his topic on threads having nothing to do with that topic, tended to be rude and first to anger in his debate, and picked fights whenever possible. Much the same reason that poster, Whiskey Papa, that haunted the southern/civil war threads was banned.
I debated on the side of the notion that the remnants of the 10 tribes of Israel make up a large part of the world today, and I'm not banned.
BTW, I agree with you about the Rapture. All I have read about it's Biblical support can also be interpreted to mean that God will cleanse the Earth of deadwood so He could bring the Millennium age.
I just finished reading an outstanding book entitled "Salvation is From the Jews". The purpose of the book is:
The purpose of the book is to give the Christian reader a deeper understanding of Judaism, both as a religion in itself and as a central component of Christian salvation, and to reveal to the Jewish reader the incomprehensible importance and glory which Jews and Judaism most truly have; a glory and importance which is only revealed in the light of the Catholic faith. It traces the role of Judaism and the Jewish people in Gods plan for the salvation of all mankind from Abraham through the Second Coming, as revealed by the Catholic faith and by a thoughtful examination of history, showing the infinite nobility and importance which Judaism has as Gods own religion, and the unique and central role it has in the destiny of all of creation. Repeatedly it demonstrates that rather than debasing Judaism or Jews, true Christianity ennobles them to a far greater degree than even Judaism itself does. It documents that throughout history attacks on Jews and Judaism have been rooted not in Christianity, but in the most anti-Christian of forces.
The structure of the book is chronological, tracing the interaction between God and man which takes place through Judaism and the Jewish people. The analysis is woven around the interplay of God, the Jewish people, the Messiah, the Gentiles, and the adversary of mans salvation. Central themes include the Messianic expectation in Jewish theology, anti-Semitism and the Holocaust in the economy of salvation, and the roles played by the State of Israel, Islam, and Arab anti-Semitism in the Second Coming.
The author, Roy Schoeman, has set up an informative web site with links to online resources for his book.
To whit I am familiar with all the differing eschatological arguments and even differing dispensational systems, however, I'll go toe to toe categorically with any argument and anyone who wants to refute pre-trib pre-mill rapture, post-trib pre-mill second advent of Christ. I'll show why any other hermeneutic is wrong and how its inconsistent and essentially unsound doctrine.
As far as refuting what you asked me to, see my response to Rockingham above. Its a straw man argument and needs no further refuting.
That's a problem. "Literal" isn't something too many agree on.
The bible is full of metaphors and other literary devices. Jesus taught in parables many times.
You won't get easy answers, they don't exist.
Look into this and study for yourself and don't listen to people like Bandaneira. There is actual proof in scripture about the Rapture.
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