Posted on 06/21/2005 4:27:46 PM PDT by Buggman
But actually, they should have been!
Failing to discern the time of their visitation, (the coming of Christ) is what led to all of the nation of Israel's trouble. It proves that the correct interpretation of the scriptures is not a hit and miss affair, and not a thing to be dabbled in,( like the occult) saying, oh maybe this is right, or maybe it's not! It is of vital importance to get it correct. Not only were the shepherds of Israel punished but so were the sheep, and it continues to this day.
Only a true prophet of the Lord can discern His word correctly and relate its meaning to the flock. It is therefore interesting, and yet somehow not surprising, to know that you do not claim that ability, yet you still feel that you can interpret the book of Revelation. Good luck!
I never claimed to be mainstream. :-)
Tell me, when Sha'ul writes, "What advantage then has the Jew, or what is the profit of circumcision? Much in every way! Chiefly because to them were committed the oracles of God" (Rom. 3:1-2), what does he mean? Simply put, the Jews were given the oracles of God in their own language and to their own culture, a culture that God Himself ordained and shaped at Mt. Sinai and for 1500 after, so they have an advantage in understanding them. Not more than a Gentile with the Holy Spirit, true. But how much more could a Jew filled with the Spirit understand His own people's Scriptures, both the Tanakh and the NT (for the NT is truely just as Jewish as the so-called Old)?
Thus Yeshua told His disciples, after teaching them His parables, "Therefore every scribe"--that is, every Torah teacher, as this is how the term is used throughout the Gospel accounts--"instructed concerning the Kingdom of Heaven is like a householder who brings out of his treasure things new and old" (Mt. 13:52).
There are many Scriptures that the early Church did indeed understand better than the bulk of Israel. On the other hand, there are those which they did not. For example, since the second or third century, the Lord's Supper has been divorced from what it originally was: Part of the Pesach (Passover) meal. By doing so, and by not observing Pesach according to the Scriptures and traditions that Yeshua observed it under (instead integrating Pesach and Firstfruits into the traditions of a pagan holiday known as the Feast of Ishtar, or Easter, and into the Mass), the Church lost much of its meaning.
There are other passages that we lost the meaning to because we didn't recognize them for 1st Century Jewish slang. For example, can you tell me what Yeshua meant when He spoke of having a good eye or a bad eye in Mt. 6:22-23? It means simply to be generous or to be stingy. Do you know what He meant by "bind and loose" in Mt. 16:19 and 18:18? It's nothing mystical; the Lord was giving His Apostles the right to make rabbinical rulings on how to apply (not change) the Torah.
Likewise in Revelation, where the Church has gone wrong in interpreting it, it has largely done so by not first interpreting all of its idioms and symbols by the light of the Tanakh. In eschatology as a whole, the Church has erred by simply assuming that all of Israel's promises had been stripped away and handed to the Gentiles instead. That's not the case, and a good part of my book is dedicated to demonstrating that.
I do not claim perfect understanding by any stretch, but there are a great many mysteries that are resolved simply by comparing Scripture to Scripture and understanding the Jewish culture which delivered them to us.
No where in my posts have I said that end times issues should never be studied. I have said that such things should be handled only by the spiritually and theologically mature and the history of "crazies" in this arena is proof enough of that.
As I stated in the original article, if the Church at large refuses to teach properly on the Revelation (and you've admitted that this is indeed the case in Eastern Orthodox circles), then it can hardly complain about the "lone wolves" like myself.
In doing this we are not trying to avoid issues or shield our faithful from something but in fact are following the path laid down before us by those very Fathers whose thoughts and words still live in us and whose icons still call the faithful to their memory.
Not true. Irenaeus, Hippolytus, Justin Martyr, Victoranius, and others commented rather extensively on the Apocalypse, not to the exclusion of all else, but as a part of presenting the whole counsel of God. They were all very clearly premillennial, though not pretrib (and I spend most of a chapter hammering away on the idea that pretrib existed as a belief before 1830 in my work).
As with most things, there are two extremes that are to be avoided. The first is to put prophetic study and speculation above all else, and forget prayer and worship, holy living, going about our Master's work, and so on. I agree with you that this is completely wrong and amounts to playing games with God's Word instead of submitting to it. As Yeshua said, "But everyone who hears these sayings of Mine, and does not do them, will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand: and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it fell. And great was its fall."
But it is equally wrong to ignore what God's Word has to say to us about the End Times, especially since we are living in the days in which He has demonstrated His faithfulness to Israel by restoring them to their own land, exactly as He foretold through the prophets.
Go in peace, and God bless.
Thanks A-G!
Certainly there is only one true interpretation of prophesy (and parables) - which is known to the Author and revealed according to His will in the appropriate time and place:
If anyone on this forum believes he has insight to a particular passage, I could not think of a better place to come and present that insight and ask for advise than here, among known members of the body of Christ.
You would have been hard press to find anyone who believed the Messiah was to suffer and die. The disciples didn't even believe when our Lord Jesus told them straight out. There are no indications the Magi thought anything else.
I do agree that there is potential danger of an escapist mentality in the pretrib view, though I certainly know some pre-tribbers who have a more "proper" mentality about it. I do know from personal experience though that when I held the pretrib view I tended towards a more escapist/alarmist view.
Ultimately, while I do recognize the importance of eschatology I tend to spend more of my time on other subjects. I don't think it's a trivial matter...it's obvious that one's eschatological views can have a huge impact on the rest of their behavior and mindset.
My disagreements with Buggman's theology aside, aren't you assuming then the role of "true prophet" in judging that Buggman's positions are not correct?
I think it's probable that the 70th Week will occur in my lifetime--I also think it'll be a few more years down the road, and we've all got work to do in the meantime.
Then we are in agreement on that front. Nothing I write is proposed as dogma beyond the absolute basics, and even those I wouldn't part company with any brother or sister in Christ over save the fact of the Lord's return.
It appears that you are coming from a "Messianic Jewish" background? Have you ever been to an Eastern Orthodox worship service? I think you would find that the continuity between temple, synagogue, and Church has been maintained within Orthodoxy to a fairly high degree.
I have not had the opportunity, but I have overall been very impressed with the Eastern Orthodox that I've met on this forum.
We will disagree about the prophetic nature of the return of Jews to the Holy Land.
That would, unfortunately, be one of those areas of dogma that I mentioned, and one of those reasons that I could never be Eastern Orthodox. The prophets are too clear on this point for me to consider it to be a point of compromise (see Ezk. 36-37 and Isa. 11:10-16 for just two examples). I'm sorry some of your spiritual kin have suffered in the crossfire, but bear in mind that the Jews suffered much in both western and eastern Europe at the hands of the Church--including forcing those who wanted to believe that Yeshua was the Messiah to cease keeping the very Torah that Yeshua Himself confirmed!
I would venture to say that Orthodoxy is on the whole, if you can use a Protestant term to describe it, "amillenial".
To be honest, most of the Church, whether Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, or Protestant, is amillennial. This is, however, a departure from the teachings of the early Church fathers, as well as from the plain meaning of Scripture.
Every Sunday liturgy of the Church is begun with the call of the Priest "Blessed is the kingdom of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit" so while we look forward to a consumated Kingdom of God we also believe that we are, by God's grace, already part of it and realize that most completely when we are in worship.
Amen. There are again two opposite extremes that we must walk between. The first is to say that since we are the Kingdom of God, we've seen the fulness of all of His promises, and to forget (or worse, teach against) His Second Coming. The second is to look so forward to the visible manifestation of the Kingdom of God in Messiah Yeshua's return that we forget that we are called to be His Kingdom now.
I agree that we should not date-set, as I said before, but given that the Lord did give us some very specific signs that would precede His Second Coming, I think we owe it to Him to not despise those signs and to know what they are--what they really are, not simply expecting His return every time something bad happens. Remember that Yeshua chided the Pharisees for not understanding the signs of His First Coming--how much greater responsibility do we who have the Holy Spirit dwelling in us then have?
Your points about having already endured tribulation are well taken. My own spiritual ancestors shared in many of those which you described, as well as suffering persecution at the hands of the papacy and even the protestant denominations in Yeshua's Name! I can trace my lineage back to the pilgrims who came over on the Mayflower just so that they could worship in a non-approved manner according to the call of the Spirit and their concience.
But, and this is the important part, Yeshua said, quoting Daniel, that in the days just before His Coming, there "shall be great tribulation, such as has not been since the beginning of the world to this time; no, nor ever shall be" (Mt. 24:21). He wasn't just talking about the last two millennia (which to be blunt, weren't any different from the four or more that preceded it in terms of violence and tribulation against God's people), but about a very specific period that would start with the Abomination of Desolation and end with His Coming.
Sha'ul tells us what that AoD is: "Let not anyone deceive you by any means. For that Day shall not come unless there first comes a falling away, and the Man of Sin shall be revealed, the Son of Perdition, who opposes and exalts himself above all that is called God, or that is worshiped, so that he sits as God in the Temple of God, setting himself forth, that he is God" (2 Th. 2:3-4).
This has never happened in history, and could not have happened since 70 AD because of the lack of a Temple. (Incidentally, that means that one of the signs we should look for is the rebuilding of God's Temple in Jerusalem.) While one might apply Yeshua and Sha'ul's words to other times, they have not been fulfilled yet (see the Introduction that started this thread, where I get into the difference).
Some day, we'll have these answers but it probably won't matter because we'll see Jesus and everything else will be something less.
Amen. Go in God's peace and blessing. It was a pleasure crossing "swords" with you.
"Only a true prophet of the Lord can discern His word correctly and relate its meaning to the flock"
No, actually the Scriptures say, "And from a child thou hast known the holy scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus. All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: that the man/woman of God may perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works." (2 Tim. 3:15-17)
There is one reservation found in Deut. 29:29, "The secret things belong unto the Lord our God: but those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children for ever, that we may do all the words of the law."
However God covered that eventuality with James 1:5, "If any lack wisdom, let him/her ask of God, that giveth to all men/women liberally, an upbraideth not;and it shall be given him/her."
And then there is this great promise, John 16:13-15, "Howbeit when he, the Spirit of Truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth: for he shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear, that shall he speak: and he will shew you THINGS TO COME. He shall glorify me: for he shall receive of mine, and shall shew it unto you. All things that the Father hath are mine: therefore said I, that he shall take of mine and shall shew it unto you."
The scriptures are perspicuous and available to be read and understood by all who believe. 1 John tells us he has given us an anointing and we need no one to teach us, however, some of us are dense and lazy or just don't have the time to pour over the scriptures, "searching what, or what manner of time the Spirit of Christ which was in them did signify," and God in his mercy and grace gave us teachers like Buggman and Alamo-Girl, for whom we are greatful, even if we don't agree with all of their interpretations or the fact that their charts don't have enough lines and arrows to be legitimate prophetic charts.
That's one thing that's always bothered me about Premillenialism. Why do you think that the 70th Week of Daniel will occur nearly 2000 years after the 69th week? According to the Amillenial/Postmillenial view, each week in Daniel's prophecy was equivalent to 7 years--and thus, was about the First Coming rather than the Second Coming, since 490 years (70 x 7) from Daniel places us at the time of Christ's Incarnation.
1) There is no mention of a making or confirming a covenant specifically for 7 years (the 70th Week) in the NT.
2) There is no mention that sacrifice and offering were brought to an end at the time of the Crucifixion; they went on for 40 more years--in fact, it can be demonstrated that Sha'ul himself paid for the sacrifices for four Messianic Jews and possibly for himself as well in Ac. 21.
3) As a corallary, in both of the other occassions that Daniel speaks of the sacrifices being brought to an end (in chapters 8 and 11), he describes it as an evil thing done by the enemy of God (Antiochus and/or the Antichrist), so it doesn't make sense to assume that the ending of sacrifice in Dan. 9:27 is a good thing done by Yeshua.
4) The time between the order to rebuild Jerusalem (Neh. 1) and the coming of the Messiah King was not 490 years, but 483, which leaves us a week.
5) The six promises made to Israel (Daniel's people) and Jerusalem (Daniel's holy city) in v. 24 were not completed. The interpretation that turns them into a threat ("You have 490 years to shape up, or else!") is untennable for other reasons, not the least of which is that it would turn all of God's promises to Israel in the Tanakh into a lie.
6) The first 69 weeks have a starting point (the order to rebuild Jerusalem) and an ending point (the comming of the Messiah King). The 70th Week likewise has an independant starting point (the 7 year covenant) and an ending point (the fulfillment of the promises to Israel and Jerusalem), which suggests a gap.
7) Likewise, the prophecy puts two events--the Crucifixion and the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple--in between the 69th Week and the 70th. This again implies a gap of at 40 years at the very least.
8) Many of the ante-Nicean Church fathers recognized the gap:
This “gap theory” of the Seventieth Week is by no means a new interpretation, as some have contended. Irenaeus alludes to a future Seventieth Week when he says, “Now three years and six months constitute the half-week.”[1] A sometimes contested quote from Hippolytus expands on this as follows:Now, there are scholars who disagree and we can argue about some of the details of chronology, like the exact year and so forth, but that's the basis for believing in a gap between the two periods.For he says, “I shall make a covenant of one week, and in the midst of the week my sacrifice and libation will be removed.” For by one week he indicates the showing forth of the seven years which shall be in the last times. And the half of the week the two prophets, along with John, will take for the purpose of proclaiming to all the world the advent of Antichrist, that is to say, for a “thousand two hundred and sixty days clothed in sackcloth.”[2]Victoranus also indicated that the Seventieth Week was yet future when he wrote,“They shall tread the holy city down for forty and two months; and I will give to my two witnesses, and they shall predict a thousand two hundred and threescore days clothed in sackcloth.” That is, three years and six months: these make forty-two months. Therefore their preaching is three years and six months, and the kingdom of Antichrist as much again.[3]Admittedly, other church fathers like Tertullian, a contemporary of Hippolytus, believed that all Seventy Weeks had been fulfilled, so the above quotes should not be taken as universal agreement among the Ante-Nicean church fathers on this matter. However, they do show that the expectation of a future Seventieth Week did not begin only in the 1800s with the rise of Dispensationalism, as many amillennialists charge. And since Hippolytus was Irenaeus’ student, Irenaeus Polycarp’s, and Polycarp an original student of the same Yochanan the Emissary who penned the Apocalypse, it would not be too far of a stretch to say that the idea of a future Seventieth Week was almost certainly taught by the Emissary to his students as well.References:
[1] Irenaeus, Against Heresies, Book V, chapter 25.3
[2] Appendix to the Works of Hippolytus, 21.
[3] Victoranus, ibid. chapter 11.3
But to consider it history is to make the book so allegorical as to be unintelligible. The book is written as if the events actually happen as they are described. Numbers of days, numbers of years, numbers of casualties, amounts of world wide destruction, plagues, famines, weather disasters, comets, giant locusts and freaks of nature.... yet no reading of history (even in the most allegorical sense) will coincide with the predictions in the Book of Revelation. If, in fact, the book of Revelation is supposedly complete, then it would appear to me that whoever wrote it just got it wrong. IMO, it would not simply not pass the test of a prophet in Deuteronomy.
IMO either the book of Revelation is for the most part yet future, or it is not an inspired work. Since I believe every word of it to be the inspired words of God, the historical option is simply not tenable.
Well said.
Perspicuous.
For those of you in Rio Linda:
"Clearly expressed or presented; easy to understand."
Synonyms:
apparent, clear, clear-cut, comprehensible, crystal, crystal-clear, distinct, easily understood, explicit, intelligible, limpid, lucent, lucid, luminous, pellucid, plain, self-evident, straightforward, transparent, unambiguous, unblurred, understandable.
Um, but they didn't. They very distinctly regarded it as prophecy. The preterist point of view while found in its infancy in some of the pre-Nicean writers, didn't really take hold until the time of Origen and Augustine.
That's a Baptist term that goes along with "Priesthood of all Believers". A distinctive. That's why when three Baptists have a discussion on the Bible you have 5 opinions, a couple of them are double minded.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.