But if you believe that such things as praying to created beings in Heaven validly finds its origin (it's "seeds") in the earlier thoughts and beliefs of the Scriptures, then you should have little problem with developing the PTR (which i do not subscribe to as a futurist) out of futurism, though i do.
Fair enough. Though the "Rapture" has always existed as a teaching within a future event (the Parousia). It's the separation of the "Rapture" and the Parousia by a period of years that's the novelty. The argument would need to be developed as to how anything Ribera wrote was more of a "seed" for the PTR than the original futurist view of the Parousia.
But if you believe that such things as praying to created beings in Heaven validly finds its origin (it's "seeds") in the earlier thoughts and beliefs of the Scriptures,
Intercessory prayer is rooted principally in the faith and practice of the early church. (The faith and practice of the same generations of early Christians from which we take our acceptance of the Bible canon in the first place). It finds inferential support in the Scriptures. Though it's not like someone was reading the scriptures and then around the 1800's decided there was this other new facet as to how one might pray. That would be suspect.
, then you should have little problem with developing the PTR (which i do not subscribe to as a futurist) out of futurism, though i do.
Doctrine can develop, but it has to develop consistently within the context of what's already known and accepted as true. The PTR with its dispensationalist foundation is too much of a departure from historic, confessing Christianity for it to be a legitimately developed doctrine.
I've yet to see a PTR supporter claim what Darby did in the 1800's was a development of any prior "seed" existing before Ms. MacDonald. They (for the most part) eschew history, and for good reason. How does one claim the PTR is taught in the Scriptures and explain that near total absence of anyone "seeing" that in the scriptures for a Millennium and a half, while at the same time (being the good Protestant progeny they are) claiming the Scriptures are "perspicacious" (i.e., self-illuminating and self-teaching without any need for repair to Tradition or a notion of a "Magisterium)?
Pre-Darby American rapture belief is found in the thought of Morgan Edwards (1722-1795), a Welsh-born Baptist pastor and educator who emigrated to America, and in May 1761, became pastor of the Baptist Church in Philadelphia.9 After the Revolutionary War, Edwards became an educator and the premier Baptist historian of his day. His major work Materials Toward A History of the Baptists (1770) is an important work outlining early American Baptist history. Edwards along with other Rhode Island clerics such as Ezra Stiles (1727-1795) was one of the original trustees in the founding of what would become known today as Brown University.In an essay written by Edwards between 1742-1744, before he emigrated, there is clear belief in a rapture event. In the essay, published in Philadelphia in 1788 entitled Two Academical Exercises on Subjects Bearing the following Titles; Millennium, Last Novelties Edwards argues for a rapture event that he identifies with 1 Thessalonians 4:17 followed by a 3 ½ year tribulation.10 The only distinction between Edwards and later pretribulationists is the duration of the tribulation that he sets at 3 ½ years rather than 7.
Part of the historical significance of Edwards is that it diminishes the charge of novelty in the thought of Darby with respect to his eschatology.