Featured A Curious Omission

Welcome to the Baptist Forum.

To partly answer your question, most English translations of the Holy Bible seem to indicate that Rev. ch 19 and proceeding chapters is the fall of Babylon. Since Babylon (and Neo-Babylon) was not a major force in the first century, the reader of Holy Writ has to look a bit deeper into the identity of this Babylon.

I don't mean to sound mean but could you not answer your own question?

 

Interesting coming from an individual that thinks he is in a covenant relationship with God.

On another note, I took my bound copy of Phillip Schaff History of the Christian Church vol. 1 and was disappointed to see that page 653 is a discussion on Luke. Just at random I found this on page 853 (102) and I quote Schaff "There is no necessary conflict between faith and criticism any more than between revelation and reason or between faith and philosophy."

I personally think Schaff is useful and I have the 8 volume history and 3 volume work on creeds both hardbound. But Schaff was a liberal and his liberal bias is found all through the 8 volumes. Why a smart guy like you would use him to support your (conservative) theology is a bit of a mystery.

 

One could take offense at the insinuation that Preterists do not take the actual words of the Bible seriously. However, I'm not looking for an argument, and I'm sure you didn't mean that the way it came out. I assure you that Preterists do indeed take every word of Scripture quite seriously, as I'm sure you do. It comes down to how we interpret those words, doesn't it?

Of course grace is a free gift. Not sure what point you were trying to make there. Our views of the "end times" do not affect our views of grace. What does this have to do with works?

What is your understanding of "Reformed/Replacement Theology", and why do you believe it is essential to Preterism? Do you believe there are two "peoples" of God - Israel and the Church (Christians)? Rather than "Replacement Theology", I believe that the True Jew is Spiritual Israel according to Romans 2:28-29, 9:6-9, 10:12-13, 11:1-6, and 11:25-27. Other proof texts for spiritual Israel include Galatians 2:14-16, 3:27, and 6:15-16. What proof texts have been offered that causes the Preterist view to evaporate?

 

If I were trying to communicate that I''m doubtful your salvation I would have plainly said so.

Schaff is a historian, true, but he puts forth his liberal theological views quite often. This you know, at least I hope you know this.

 

The article in BibSac simply enabled me to focus my attention on preterism, reconstructionalism and so forth. I actually didn't re-read the article. However, I'm not ashamed to admit that I read Bib Sac, nor am I ashamed to admit that I find it instructional. There are times when I scratch my head wondering why they publish articles from non-dispensationailsts such as a series about 10 years ago on the ECFs by Thomas Oden. I also have Oden's 3 volume dogmatics on my shelf. Oden is no closer to dispensationalism than Berkhoff or Hodge which I also have. In fact I would be happy to give you a tour of my personal library which contains books from a wide variety of theologies (DeMar, Hanegrraf, Sproul and others). Perhaps even this well uninformed theological amateur is better read than you imagine?

 

What we do here and I'm guilty of it myself is we debate around the fine points out on the edge of a particular position. We do this while forgetting the real issue at hand. In the case of preterism, it matters little if Camp A thinks Christians should observe the Law of Moses as opposed to Camp B who thinks that the big issue of the faith is is Babylon of Rev 19 Jerusalem or Rome or Iran or simply free market commercialism? None of this matters if at the core of the dispute is replacement theology or exactly who are the legal parties of the New Covenant. In other words we argue the outer frontier not the main issue.

We scratch our heads in wonder how a highly intelligent individual who knows the Bible still prefers paganism. Or New Age or Islam. In my view the absolute hardest thing God asks us to do is to simply trust and believe in His word, the Bible and yes the details matter. They matter. There is a reason why there is detail in the Bible, because the details really matter. And just because there is some allegory or passages difficult to understand we must pay attention to the details. It is true that Jesus accused the leaders of the Jews of searching the Law to find to find eternal life but His point being that they missed the main point of Moses (and OT) and that is the many details of who the Savior is and what the savior will offer.

And that is the problem preterism cannot overcome. It doesn't matter many believe it, how sincere those believers are or their collective IQ, how many books they have published or how well they are received at the faculty lounge, there are simply too many details in the Bible that describe the Second Coming and the resulting Kingdom and those details have not been realized yet.

I'm not accusing you Tom of anything but to simply write off entire passages of Scripture calling them allegory or spiritual head lessons without any kind of literal or even practical meaning is in my view a rehash of the "Battle for the Bible". As a general statement post mills think the church will eventually overcome all and usher in the kingdom but the Bible does not teach this. I personally don't know when the end of this age will take place but I know that when it happens it will not be pleasant and it will be literally impossible to miss. The only misunderstanding will be those who deny God in the face of God's wrath and judgement. It will be like it was in Egypt during the Exodus, some denied the source and ignored the solution but no one missed the reality. The end of this age will make the Exodus look like a picnic.

With that in mind, the most important thing in my view is the Bible and what it teaches about Jesus and His resurrection and God's grace. When it come down to it many here fall back to one of the historic confessions or the teachings of their favorite theologians to make their case and if someone here dares to take a firm stance on faith (in Christ and Him crucified) + absolutely nothing else = salvation, heads explode.

 

There are those who understand the plural pronoun can also refer to persons beyond the immediate audiance, such as in Matthew 3:11 or John 3:7. In the case of Matthew 24, Matthew 24:32-34, ". . . Now learn a parable of the fig tree; When his branch is yet tender, and putteth forth leaves, ye know that summer is nigh: So likewise ye, when ye shall see all these things, know that it is near, even at the doors. Verily I say unto you, This generation shall not pass, till all these things be fulfilled. . . ." Refering to Matthew 24:29-30, ". . . shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken: And then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven: and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. . . ." Which of course has not yet happened.

 

If all the eschatological indicators were to have happened during the lifetimes of those addressed, how come we still have false prophets today (Matthew 24:5, 11)? How come we still have wars (v.6), famines, pestilences and earthquakes (v.7), persecution of Christians (v.9), lawlessness and cold-heatedness (v.12) and the continuing need to preach the Gospel to all the nations? Unless we understand that the Lord Jesus is answering more than one question (which, of course, He is), we have to conclude that He got it wrong. We also have to conclude that His command to 'Take heed, watch and pray' (Mark 13:33) has not applied to Christians for 1,950 years.

If it were a literal 'last hour,' John would scarcely have had time to finish the rest of his letter. But whether you like it or not, 2,000 years have rolled by in John's 'Last hour.' So what did he mean? He means that there is only one appointment in God's diary that He has to keep. There may be others like sending revival to this country or that, but only one that He is utterly committed to: the physical return of the Lord Jesus Christ to the earth in power and glory.

It is generally believed that John ended his days on earth at Ephesus. Imagine him saying the the Christians there, "Well that's it, folks! History is over! There will be no more antichrists or false teachers, no more wars, persecutions, earthquakes, pandemics or famines! No need to watch and pray any more! We are in the new heavens and new earth where righteousness reigns. Didn't you see the stars falling and the signs in the sun, moon and stars? Didn't you see the sign of the Son of Man appear in heaven, and all the tribes of the earth mourning?" And they would say, "No. John. We didn't see any of these things," and in a few years time they would have seen more persecution than they had ever seen before, along with earthquakes, disease and famines, and false teaching from Marcion and others would have been worse than ever.

Hyper-preterism is, as someone else might say, as phony as a Ford Corvette.

 

You have to really stretch Josephus words and also narrow Jesus words in order to hold your position.
In Matthew 24 it is clear that the entire earth in all areas will know beyond a shadow of a doubt that Jesus has come to destroy the unredeemed and to secure the earth for his elect. Yet, you downplay it and make it a nearly insignificant thing that makes Jesus seem weak and impotent.
Meanwhile, Josephus is referring to the call to flee Jerusalem as God is about to annihilate it via the Roman army. In Joshua 5 we see the Commander of the Lord's Army tell Joshua that he is neither for or against Israel, but is for justice. The chariots Josephus reports would be the army of God going before the Roman army to ensure Jerusalem is destroyed and the temple eradicated.
For more on this we read of the Lord's Army going before Judah into battle when it was reported of the chariots going through the trees to defeat Judah's enemies before Judah even fought the battle.
The hermeneutical juggling act you attempt is bad. Yet, it's your one trick in order to make your system seem plausible.

 

Oh, please don't you start saying that. He poats that on a number of different boards.

 

Why would christians need to refer to the destruction of the temple whenPaul said more than once: "You are the temple of the Living God." The ECF as thr=ey are called, I prefer to call them ECWriters, said that in the book of Revelation the temple referred to the church, completely in line with the scriptures.

 

Too much argument. Did not address my argument on the use of the plural pronoun. Matthew 16:28 is Jesus speaking regarding His transfigration, Matthew 17:1-9.

 

Jesus never said that there would not be any more false prophets, wars, etc. after the events He was discussing. He did warn that those signs would precede the events He described, which they did.

John's use of "last hour" is the same as other "time indicators" in the NT. Of course these writers had plenty of time, as they were pointing to the nearness of the coming judgment on Israel.

Your imagination is not based on sound Biblical exegesis. Jesus and the NT writers were not talking about the end of the world or the end of time. They were writing about the coming end of the old covenant Jewish religious system.

 

See bold above.
Matthew 25 is a continuation of Matthew 24, which means that Jesus is indeed talking about the end of the world and the end of time. We see then that while partial fulfillment is in 70CE, that is clearly not the entire fulfillment as preterism contends.