rather than a bunch of heretics attempting to reinvent the wheel and going off in wild tangents, inventing interpretations of scripture as they go, without much regard for logic, history, tradition, or common sense.I always try to avoid these things as much as possible...Logic and common sense are for people that don't know anything...Tradition is meaningless and there is always more than one side to History...
But you forgot the main ones you guys rely on...Philosophy and intellectualism...
But yes, that is your religion...Logic, common sense, (your) history, (your) tradition, philosophy and a superior intellect, with very little regard for scripture...
I try to stick 100% with scripture...That's why you guys and I agree on nothing...
Something similar happens when Jermiah and Daniel discuss the prediction of a 70 year captivity of the Jews -- in Jeremiah 29:10 and Daniel 9:2, "the desolation of Jerusalem would last 70 years." Even literal premillenialists such as Walvoord, in Daniel, the Key to Prophetic Revelation, admit that those 70 years were not literally 70 years. The closest anyone seems able to get is 68 years or 71 years.
Before you start trashing God's prophets, perhaps you should pay more attention to what they say...
Dan 9:2 In the first year of his reign I Daniel understood by books the number of the years, whereof the word of the LORD came to Jeremiah the prophet, that he would accomplish seventy years in the desolations of Jerusalem.
70 years in the desolation of Israel...
Jer 29:10 For thus saith the LORD, That after seventy years be accomplished at Babylon I will visit you, and perform my good word toward you, in causing you to return to this place.
After 70 years...Jeremiah is quoting what God told him...After 70 years...Maybe 70 years and 4 months...Maybe 11 months...
Daniel is remembering what he read in the books of Jeremiah...So he doesn't quote word for word...He's going by memory...He's pretty darn close...
And who give a flip about the opinion of someone named Walvoord??? God says after 70 years...If Walvoord doesn't agree with God, Walvoord is wrong...
Daniel is a perfect example to use, because it contains two of only a few examples in the Bible where very clear and specific prophecies about time in the Bible can be independently and accurately verified to determine whether they literally occurred.
Hogwash...The coming of Jesus and his death, burial and resurrection was prophesied in the OT and was witnessed by over 500 eyewitnesses and recorded in scripture...That's more than sufficient proof of fulfilled prophecy and there are over two hundred of those...
In Daniel 8:14, a period of "twenty-three hundred days" is foretold. No serious scholars of Scripture pretent that history fulfills this prophecy in exatly 2300 days.
When the numbers of understood in this way, it is consistent with the Catholic, amillennial view. It means there will be a very long time until the end of time. That's it. Not a literal 1000 years until the end of time, just as much as there is neither a literal reference to 1000 hills in Psalm 50:10--just a lot of them.
So you guys pick 4 or 5 verses out of over 30,000 to prove that A millenialism is true, God doesn't mean what He says when He says it...
Real bible students have located hundreds of scripture in the OT that show there will be a physical reign of Jesus Christ on this earth for a real 1000 years with the Throne being in the City of Jerusalem...And all you have is one verse in Psalms and a lot of logic...
You think you know scripture, but you don't, because you do not avail yourself of history and the early fathers, who understood its cultural and historical context better than we do. If you did, you'd be Catholic.
But YOU DO rely on tradition -- the tradition of evangelical Protestantism, and you adhere to all of its dogmas without question. You buy into every single of it's suppositions. So much so it's actually very predictable how you will respond to any given question. I used to be like you, following the same man-made tradition you are following, and I also thought it was grounded purely in Scripture, but that frankly is false. I've been conversing with you long enough to make this fairly obvious. So please don't pretend you have a reading of the Bible that is without suppositions. No one buys it.
Basically you admit this when you call tradition "YOUR tradition" (meaning "MY tradition"). No, it's not MY tradition. Remember, I was an Evangelical. I left the Protestant tradition, and returned in full communion with the Church that Chirst established, because I came to reject the blind faith of Protestants to their own suppositions (based on very recent TRADITION) that not only are not grounded in early Christianity and a deep understanding of Jewish custom, but in many cases contains doctrines that are relatively recent aberrations that have ABSOLUTELY NO precendence in Christian history until the last couple hundred years. PREMILLENIALISM is a perfect example of a cultish belief system that has no precendence in Christian history and, as of now, is primarily confined to a relatively small group of fundamentalist Protestants in the United States -- and EVEN THEY CAN'T SEEM TO AGREE about what they are talking about. So it is deeply ironic when you speak as if you are interpreting the Bible without suppositions when you follow the party line of YOUR tradition, your RECENT tradition, and completely reject the tradition of CHRIST and the EARLY CHURCH that he founded, well before Trent was ever thought of.
Indeed, it is obvious, as you state, that logic and common sense means nothing to you. I'm glad you are at least honest about it.
With that said, your argument falls flat, because I already demonstrated, aside from the "1000 years" argument, that premillenialism does not fit with Scripture and cited three verses that demolish it. That is the earlier post I referred to. And no, the 1000 years must not literally refer to a millenium, any more than the seven days in Genesis refers to a literal seven days, or the Psalm literally refers to 1000 hills -- and it can't, because the other verses do not fit a literal interpretation, and scripture does not contradict itself. Numbers in the Bible are often used for their symbolic import. This is something I don't expect you to accept or understand, because that would require an understanding of some history and common sense, and you've already rejected those resources as valid sources for Biblical hermeneutics. So, this is just for those who happen to be reading over our shoulder, who might be tempted to believe YOUR heretical tradition and reject THE tradition.