There were no huge hail stones mixed with blood, nor was there a beast system that confronted two preternatural witnesses (who had the power of deep heaven that could shut off the rain or consume men with fire who should attempt to kill them) during the time period in which you speak. Mt Vesuvius was to blow up in 79 AD but that was the only real historic cataclysm of the time period. No instances where the day /night period was shortened by 6 hours and that the moon no longer showed her light. The mountains of the world have not been flattened and there is no river of fresh water flowing east AND west out of the Holy land...all of these things of which were to be seen during the tribulation and afterwards. Revelation speaks of the entire WORLD(not just Israel of the 70 ad time period) as going thru a tribulation such that, had never happened before nor would again. Had the tribulation occurred as you suggested...then Christ would have set up his 1000 year kingdom...the great final rebellion would have occurred and God’s white throne judgment would have happened. We would all be living now in God’s new heaven and new Earth.
While Revelation uses symbolic language in part, it is black and white about specific key events that mark the tribulation period as well as final 3.5 years often known as “the days of wrath”, marked by a final blood bath at Armageddon. The time period you cite with its historic events just doesn’t fit with Biblical prophecy which describes the days of the coming of the Son of Man.
Unless you are prepared to set the book of Revelation entirely at naught, you can’t show me any period in history marked by 7 years of world wide earth shattering judgments, plagues, or an economic system that forces all men of all classes to take a mark and worship an image, a false prophet, and the beast, the son of perdition as described in Thessalonians. Are you prepared to deny the coming two witnesses?
This also did not happen "literally:"
"The burden of Egypt. Behold, the Lord rideth upon a swift cloud, and shall come into Egypt: and the idols of Egypt shall be moved at his presence, and the heart of Egypt shall melt in the midst of it." (Isa 19:1)
It turns out the "Lord riding upon a swift cloud" was the Assyrian Army. LOL!
The following events also did not happen literally:
"For the stars of heaven and the constellations thereof shall not give their light: the sun shall be darkened in his going forth, and the moon shall not cause her light to shine . . . Therefore I will shake the heavens, and the earth shall remove out of her place, in the wrath of the Lord of hosts, and in the day of his fierce anger." (Isa 13:10,13 KJV)
That was the Lord's way of saying that the old nation of Babylon, that had held Israel captive at one time, had seen its last days. LOL!
And this also did not happen literally:
"Their slain also shall be cast out, and their stink shall come up out of their carcases, and the mountains shall be melted with their blood. And all the host of heaven shall be dissolved, and the heavens shall be rolled together as a scroll: and all their host shall fall down, as the leaf falleth off from the vine, and as a falling fig from the fig tree. For my sword shall be bathed in heaven: behold, it shall come down upon Idumea, and upon the people of my curse, to judgment." (Isa 34:3-5 KJV)
That was God's judgement against Idumea. LOL!
In light of all that imagery, which is similar to that in the Revelation, would it not be prudent to reconsider literalism as a viable interpretive method for the Revelation?
>>>>While Revelation uses symbolic language in part, it is black and white about specific key events that mark the tribulation period as well as final 3.5 years often known as “the days of wrath”, marked by a final blood bath at Armageddon. The time period you cite with its historic events just doesn’t fit with Biblical prophecy which describes the days of the coming of the Son of Man.<<<<
Everything I cite fits perfectly. There are tons of evidence, internal and external, that the Revelation was referring to the destruction of old Jerusalem, called Babylon the Great, and to the reign of Nero: old 666 himself. The most compelling evidence, to me, is the fact that Jesus said the great tribulation would occur in the generation of his disciples; that the blood of all the prophets would be required of the generation of Jews living during his ministry; and the fact that in Babylon the Great was found the blood of all the prophets. We have been fresh out of prophets since about 70 A.D.
>>>Unless you are prepared to set the book of Revelation entirely at naught, you can’t show me any period in history marked by 7 years of world wide earth shattering judgments, plagues, or an economic system that forces all men of all classes to take a mark and worship an image, a false prophet, and the beast, the son of perdition as described in Thessalonians. Are you prepared to deny the coming two witnesses?<<<
I believe every word of the book of Revelation; and, unlike dispensationalists, I have have neither added to it, nor taken anything away from it. Where did you get the seven years of "earth shattering judgements" in the book of the Revelation? I don't recall that. I do seem to recall history recording forty and two months of the Gentiles (the Roman Army) treading under foot the holy city (old Jerusalem) from 67 to 70 AD as prophesied in Rev 11:2.
Philip
A most astute post. Indeed one would have to stuff 7 years worth of woes in a two year bag to make 70 AD be the tell all. Not to mention more Jews and Romans died in the AD 132 rebellion.
The external evidence as you pointed out would have to be ignored as well. John would need to be exiled on Patmos around 62 AD and back and circulating Revelation no later than 65 AD for it to be prophecy.
I also notice these threads end up being more about Darby and how wrong he was and how wrong dispensationalism is. The prederist presentation is about “proving” others wrong without presenting an independent theory standing on its own internal and external evidence.
When you eliminate a literal physical Israel from prophecy fulfillment there are a lot of holes to fill. A convenient way for replacement theology to do so is to pronounce said prophecies already fulfilled. It is a tidy operation.
I will state I am not a “rabid” dispensationalist.” There are theories within dispensationalism which have thin internal evidence but make the most sense Biblically at the macro level. I guess if someone had to pin me down the best I could offer is I am a futurist who believes in a literal 7 year tribulation and after the second coming of Christ a literal 1,000 year physical reign of Christ on earth. I guess that makes me pre-millennial in my thinking and literal futurist.