Posted on 05/11/2014 1:50:36 PM PDT by wmfights
Justin Martyr (A.D. 100–165) is important in the history of supersessionism because he was the first Christian writer to explicitly identify the church as “Israel.”[1] Justin declared, “For the true spiritual Israel, and descendants of Judah, Jacob, Isaac, and Abraham . . . are we who have been led to God through this crucified Christ.”[2] He also said, “Since then God blesses this people [i.e., Christians], and calls them Israel, and declares them to be His inheritance, how is it that you [Jews] repent not of the deception you practise on yourselves, as if you alone were the Israel?”[3] Justin also announced that, “We, who have been quarried out from the bowels of Christ, are the true Israelite race.”[4]
For Jeffrey S. Siker, “Justin is a transitional figure”[5] in the development of supersessionism. Justin does not mark the beginning of supersessionism, but he does openly advocate a replacement approach concerning Israel and the church that had been forming for nearly a century: “Justin marks the end of an era, the culmination of a process in formative Christianity that had begun much earlier.”[6] Justin’s hermeneutical approach to the Old Testament was also important in the development of supersessionism. He reapplied Old Testament promises so that the church, not Israel, was viewed as the beneficiary of its promised blessings. Justin declared to Trypho: “And along with Abraham we [Christians] shall inherit the holy land, when we shall receive the inheritance for an endless eternity, being children of Abraham through the like faith. . . . Accordingly, He promises to him a nation of similar faith, God fearing, righteous . . . but it is not you, ‘in whom is no faith.’”[7] Siker adds, “According to Justin, the patriarchal promises do not apply to the Jews; rather, God has transferred these promises to the Christians and . . . to Gentile Christians in particular.”[8]
[1] Justin Martyr, Dialogue with Trypho 11, The Ante-Nicene Fathers, eds. Alexander Roberts and James Donaldson (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1950–51), 1:200. See also, 1:261, 267. Peter Richardson has observed that the first explicit identification of the church as “Israel” was made by Justin Martyr in A.D. 160. See Peter Richardson, Israel in the Apostolic Church (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), 1.
[2] Justin Martyr, Dialogue With Trypho 11, ANF 1:200.
[3] Justin Martyr, Dialogue With Trypho 123, ANF 1:261. He also says, “Those who were selected out of every nation have obeyed His will through Christ . . . must be Jacob and Israel.” (1:265).
[4] Justin Martyr, Dialogue With Trypho 135, ANF 1:267.
[5] Jeffrey S. Siker, Disinheriting the Jews: Abraham in Early Christian Controversy (Louisville, KY: Westminster/John Knox, 1991), 15.
[6] Ibid., 16.
[7] Justin, Dialogue With Trypho 119, ANF 1:259.
[8] Siker, 14. Diprose asserts that Justin “adopts a typically Greek attitude” toward the characters in the Old Testament, referring to Abraham, Elijah, and Daniel’s three friends as “barbarians.” Ronald E. Diprose,Israel in the Development of Christian Thought (Istituto Biblico Evangelico Italiano, 2000), 79.
It's hard not to notice that this radical view emerged after the Apostolic Era ended.
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We are saved by grace through faith just like our father Abraham. We will dine with our father Abraham. We were aliens from God's chosen nation but now we are made part of that chosen nation through Christ. As Paul writes:
Our nation is not here.
Here is what the Apostle Paul had to say:
“For he is not a Jew, which is one outwardly; neither is that circumcision, which is outward in the flesh: But he is a Jew, which is one inwardly; and circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit, and not in the letter; whose praise is not of men, but of God.”
—Romans 2:28-29
Indeed. We’ve been grafted in.
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I think “supersession” is the wrong term.
The Church did not replace or supersede the Jews. The Church fulfilled God’s covenant with the Jews, and fulfilled many of the signs and prophecies in the Old Testament.
Numerous times in the Old Testament, God says that His Covenant with Israel is forever. And St. Paul repeats that same promise in one of his Epistles.
Many early Christians thought that the Jews would just fade away, after God made his new Covenant with His Church. But they did not, and I think a fair consideration of history reveals that God still keeps His first Covenant with those Jews who keep the faith.
Many of the Jews Jesus referred to did say “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord” before they died, and they were counted as remnant - the 144,000 present at the wedding feast.
Justin Martyr was not the first Christian writer to identify the Church as Israel, that honor belongs to Paul:
Galatians 6:16 “peace and mercy be upon all who walk by this rule, upon the Israel of God”
earlier in Galatians 3:29, we find “and if you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to the promise”.
Justin Martyr (A.D. 100–165) is important in the history of supersessionism because he was the first Christian writer to explicitly identify the church as “Israel.”[1] Justin declared, “For the true spiritual Israel, and descendants of Judah, Jacob, Isaac, and Abraham . . . are we who have been led to God through this crucified Christ.”
There's Paul, too.
see post #10
This view is put forth by non-Catholics.http://www.theologicalstudies.org/about/statement-of-faith
Not news.
Theological Studies.org appears to be the personal site of the author, who is associated with John McArthur's Master's Seminary. American Protestant, conservative, Baptist, and apropos to this thread, dispensationalist.
Just glancing over it, he appears to have an obsession with "supersessionism".
Many early Christians thought that the Jews would just fade away, after God made his new Covenant with His Church. But they did not, and I think a fair consideration of history reveals that God still keeps His first Covenant with those Jews who keep the faith.
The covenant with Abraham, that Christians are explicitly part of.
Apart from Christ there is no salvation. In Christ, the old barriers are done away with.
Many early Christians thought that the Jews would just fade away, after God made his new Covenant with His Church. But they did not, and I think a fair consideration of history reveals that God still keeps His first Covenant with those Jews who keep the faith.
Check the time stamps. Your post is 1.25 minutes ahead of mine.
The saint who was one of the earliest Fathers of the Church
Justin Martyr: 1st apology: Sacraments, Eucharist {Catholic/Orthodox caucus}
Justin Martyr Walks a Tightrope
Church History, Justin Martyr, Preeminent Apologist
The First Apology of St. Justin Martyr, Early Church Father (long)
St. Justin Martyr: He Considered Christianity the “True Philosophy” (March 21, 2007)
Justin Martyr on Christian worship - (the earliest record of Christian worship)
Orthodox Feast of Martyr Justin the Philosopher and those with him at Rome
St. Justin Martyr
Not quite; the Church is the Church, and Israel is Israel, until the end when all Israel shall be saved. The Israel of God are the foundation of the Church, those Jews (apostles, prophets, and disciples) who were redeemed by the LORD and believed in the Messiah, the Holy One of Israel. But if one really feels strongly he is Israel he can always take the slings and arrows directed against actual Israel. It's too late to go back to the 1930s but there are millions of moslems in the world waiting to kill you. There is an adversary intent on annihilating Israel and thwarting God's divine mercy.
Check the time stamps. Your post is 1.25 minutes ahead of mine
I did, I guess great minds think alike. :)
As far as Israel taking the slings and arrows, one should examine what our dear Christian brothers and sisters are going through today and their persecution.
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