Futurist ideas are just eschatological stargazing.
They cannot prove it because they say it hasnt happened yet, even though most of it has.
They make the wonderful prophecy of the Messiah in Daniel 9 to be a prophecy of Antichrist.
They make the last few verses of Daniel 11 to be of Antichrist, rather than the whole chapter being continuous history, (although I have an historicist book that teaches that those verses refer to the papal antchrist.) Both are incorrect.
They say that jesus is "coming to the air" and then returning to heaven, but scripture says he is descending.
Early Futurists - Jesuits.
Francisco Ribera (1537-1591) was a Jesuit doctor of theology, born in Spain, who began writing a lengthy commentary in 1585 on the book of Revelation (Apocalypse) titled In Sacrum Beati Ioannis Apostoli, & Evangelistiae Apocalypsin Commentarij, and published it about the year 1590. He died in 1591 at the age of fifty-four, so he was not able to expand on his work or write any other commentaries on Revelation. In order to remove the Catholic Church from consideration as the antichrist power, Ribera proposed that the first few chapters of the Apocalypse applied to ancient pagan Rome, and the rest he limited to a yet future period of 3 1/2 literal years, immediately prior to the second coming. During that time, the Roman Catholic Church would have fallen away from the pope into apostasy. Then, he proposed, the antichrist, a single individual, would:
Cardinal Robert Bellarmine, one of the best known Jesuit apologists, published a work between 1581 and 1593 entitled Disputationum Roberti Bellarmini De controversiis Christian fidei adversus hujus temporis haereticos, (Polemic Lectures Concerning the Disputed Points of the Christian Belief Against the Heretics of This Time), in which he also denied the day = year principle in prophecy and pushed the reign of antichrist into a future period of 3 1/2 literal years. (See Froom, Prophetic Faith, Vol. 2, pgs. 495 - 502).
Michael Walpole
Available Online: A Treatise of Antichrist. Conteyning the defence of Cardinall Bellarmines arguments, which inuincibly demonstrate, that the pope is not Antichrist. Against George Downam by Michael Christopherson priest ..., Volume 1 of 2 by the English Jesuit, Michael Walpole (1570-1624?), 1613 edition. Christopherson is a pseudonym for Walpole.
The third chapter, titled "Wherein it is shewed, that Antichrist is not yet come", (pages 49-51) discusses the protestant (Lutheran) Matthias Flacius Illyricus(1520-1575) and his Catalogue of Witnesses to the Truth who before our day cried out against the Pope (Catalogus Testium Veritatis - Basel, 1556), his Magdeburg Centuries (Ecclesiastica Historia, 1559 - 1574), an ecclesiastical history of 13 volumes (1 volume per century) to 1298 A.D. which established from that history that the Bishop of Rome was the Antichrist, and a 1260 year spiritual reign of the papal Antichrist, proposed to be from 606 - 1866 A.D., with the Lord's judgment commencing in 1866!
Manuel De Lacunza (1731–1801), a Jesuit from Chile, wrote a manuscript in Spanish titled La Venida del Mesias en Gloria y Magestad ("The Coming of the Messiah in Glory and Majesty"), under the pen name of Juan Josafa [Rabbi] Ben-Ezra about 1791. Lacunza wrote under an assumed Jewish name to obscure the fact that he was a Catholic, in order to give his book better acceptance in Protestantism, his intended audience. Also an advocate of Futurism, Lacunza was deliberately attempting to take the pressure off the papacy by proposing that the Antichrist was still off in the future. His manuscript was published in London, Spain, Mexico and Paris between 1811 and 1826. Volume 1 Volume II Volume III
La Venida del Mesias en Gloria y Magestad online at the National Library of Chile (in Spanish).
Edward Irving (1792-1834), a Scottish Presbyterian and forerunner of the Pentecostal and Charismatic movements, translated Lacunza's work from Spanish into English in a book titled The Coming of Messiah in Glory and Majesty with a Preliminary Discourse, published in London in 1827 by L.B. Seeley & Sons, which included Irving's own lengthy preface. Here are excerpts from Irving's translation:
Lacunza asserts that Antichrist would appear near the end of time:
That there shall be an Antichrist; that he shall be revealed, and publicly declared, towards the last times; and that he shall commit in the world the greatest evils, making formal war against Christ, and all that pertains to him; —these are three certain things, of which no Christian can doubt. -- Vol. I, Part II, Phenomenon III, pg. 195.
Antichrist, Lacunza concludes, would not be just one man:
ACCORDING to all the signs given in the Holy Scriptures, and others, not equivocal, offered to us by time, which is wont to be the best interpreter of the prophecies, the antichrist, or the contrachrist, with whom we stand threatened in the times immediate upon the coming of the Lord, is nothing but a moral body, composed of innumerable individuals, diverse in themselves, but all morally united and animated with one common spirit, against the Lord and against his Christ; -- Vol. I, Part II, Phenomenon III, pg. 196.
As to the harlot woman riding the beast in Revelation 17, Lacunza acknowledges it is indeed referring to Rome:
... the doctors do all agree, that the woman here spoken of is the city of Rome, in other times the capital of the greatest empire in the world, and now the capital and centre of unity of the true Christian church. On this first point, which is not called in question, there is no occasion to tarry. -- Vol. I, Part II, Phenomenon III, pg. 240.
... it is not present Rome which is at all spoken of here, but future Rome alone to which the prophecy hath its determinate application. -- Vol. I, Part II, Phenomenon III, pg. 251.
Rome yes, Lacunza agrees, but not the Roman Catholic Church of his day, which he calls the true church, rather he pushes this prophecy in Revelation 17 off into the future:
Rome, not idolatrous but Christian, not the head of the Roman empire but the head of Christendom, and centre of unity of the true church of the living God, may very well, without ceasing from this dignity, at some time or other incur the guilt, and before God be held guilty of fornication with the kings of the earth, and amenable to all its consequences. And in this there is not any inconsistency, however much her defenders may shake the head. And this same Rome, in that same state, may receive upon herself the horrible chastisement spoken of in the prophecy; -- Vol. I, Part II, Phenomenon III, pg. 252.
This apostate Christian group termed Antichrist would be:
... slain and destroyed by Christ himself in the great day of his coming in glory and majesty.
Note that Lacunza wrote under a false name to hide the fact that he was Catholic. His book was banned by the Vatican agin as a subterfuge.
Irving was a Church of Scotland minister who was excommunicated for his heretic views on whether Crist would be able to sin. He was also leader of the heretical Charismatic tongues, prophecy , signs movement. Each of their churches had an angel and 12 prophets. Irving, as far as can ascertain, was also the first preach on dispensationalism on Christmas day 1825.
The teaching of his church was that the rapture would occur in the summer of 1833, and on the named day they all assembled to await the event.
The Albury meetings on prophecy
Annual meetings to discuss the new ideas on prophecy were held at Albury, the home of Henry Drummond a notable Irvingite. One of those attending was Lady Powerscourt.
Lady Powerscourt then held similar meetings in Powercourts, Ireland. Amongst those attending these meetings were Edward Irving and John Nelson Darby. This appears to be where Darby got his dispy ideas from, although he didn't seem to develop them until later.
Ouside the Plymouth Brethren and the rmaining Irvingites churches, now named The Catholic Apostolic Church, his teaching on prophecy was widely considered a herecy till the late 19th century.
Darby and other Brethen seemed to visit the US during the civil war, and the rot started.
They cannot prove it because they say it hasnt happened yet, even though most of it has.
They make the wonderful prophecy of the Messiah in Daniel 9 to be a prophecy of Antichrist.
They make the last few verses of Daniel 11 to be of Antichrist, rather than the whole chapter being continuous history, (although I have an historicist book that teaches that those verses refer to the papal antchrist.) Both are incorrect.
They say that jesus is "coming to the air" and then returning to heaven, but scripture says he is descending.
Early Futurists - Jesuits.
Francisco Ribera (1537-1591) was a Jesuit doctor of theology, born in Spain, who began writing a lengthy commentary in 1585 on the book of Revelation (Apocalypse) titled In Sacrum Beati Ioannis Apostoli, & Evangelistiae Apocalypsin Commentarij, and published it about the year 1590. He died in 1591 at the age of fifty-four, so he was not able to expand on his work or write any other commentaries on Revelation. In order to remove the Catholic Church from consideration as the antichrist power, Ribera proposed that the first few chapters of the Apocalypse applied to ancient pagan Rome, and the rest he limited to a yet future period of 3 1/2 literal years, immediately prior to the second coming. During that time, the Roman Catholic Church would have fallen away from the pope into apostasy. Then, he proposed, the antichrist, a single individual, would:
- Persecute and blaspheme the saints of God.
- Rebuild the temple in Jerusalem.
- Abolish the Christian religion.
- Deny Jesus Christ.
- Be received by the Jews.
- Pretend to be God.
- Kill the two witnesses of God.
- Conquer the world.
Cardinal Robert Bellarmine, one of the best known Jesuit apologists, published a work between 1581 and 1593 entitled Disputationum Roberti Bellarmini De controversiis Christian fidei adversus hujus temporis haereticos, (Polemic Lectures Concerning the Disputed Points of the Christian Belief Against the Heretics of This Time), in which he also denied the day = year principle in prophecy and pushed the reign of antichrist into a future period of 3 1/2 literal years. (See Froom, Prophetic Faith, Vol. 2, pgs. 495 - 502).
Michael Walpole
Available Online: A Treatise of Antichrist. Conteyning the defence of Cardinall Bellarmines arguments, which inuincibly demonstrate, that the pope is not Antichrist. Against George Downam by Michael Christopherson priest ..., Volume 1 of 2 by the English Jesuit, Michael Walpole (1570-1624?), 1613 edition. Christopherson is a pseudonym for Walpole.
The third chapter, titled "Wherein it is shewed, that Antichrist is not yet come", (pages 49-51) discusses the protestant (Lutheran) Matthias Flacius Illyricus(1520-1575) and his Catalogue of Witnesses to the Truth who before our day cried out against the Pope (Catalogus Testium Veritatis - Basel, 1556), his Magdeburg Centuries (Ecclesiastica Historia, 1559 - 1574), an ecclesiastical history of 13 volumes (1 volume per century) to 1298 A.D. which established from that history that the Bishop of Rome was the Antichrist, and a 1260 year spiritual reign of the papal Antichrist, proposed to be from 606 - 1866 A.D., with the Lord's judgment commencing in 1866!
Manuel De Lacunza (1731–1801), a Jesuit from Chile, wrote a manuscript in Spanish titled La Venida del Mesias en Gloria y Magestad ("The Coming of the Messiah in Glory and Majesty"), under the pen name of Juan Josafa [Rabbi] Ben-Ezra about 1791. Lacunza wrote under an assumed Jewish name to obscure the fact that he was a Catholic, in order to give his book better acceptance in Protestantism, his intended audience. Also an advocate of Futurism, Lacunza was deliberately attempting to take the pressure off the papacy by proposing that the Antichrist was still off in the future. His manuscript was published in London, Spain, Mexico and Paris between 1811 and 1826. Volume 1 Volume II Volume III
Edward Irving (1792-1834), a Scottish Presbyterian and forerunner of the Pentecostal and Charismatic movements, translated Lacunza's work from Spanish into English in a book titled The Coming of Messiah in Glory and Majesty with a Preliminary Discourse, published in London in 1827 by L.B. Seeley & Sons, which included Irving's own lengthy preface. Here are excerpts from Irving's translation:
Lacunza asserts that Antichrist would appear near the end of time:
That there shall be an Antichrist; that he shall be revealed, and publicly declared, towards the last times; and that he shall commit in the world the greatest evils, making formal war against Christ, and all that pertains to him; —these are three certain things, of which no Christian can doubt. -- Vol. I, Part II, Phenomenon III, pg. 195.
Antichrist, Lacunza concludes, would not be just one man:
ACCORDING to all the signs given in the Holy Scriptures, and others, not equivocal, offered to us by time, which is wont to be the best interpreter of the prophecies, the antichrist, or the contrachrist, with whom we stand threatened in the times immediate upon the coming of the Lord, is nothing but a moral body, composed of innumerable individuals, diverse in themselves, but all morally united and animated with one common spirit, against the Lord and against his Christ; -- Vol. I, Part II, Phenomenon III, pg. 196.
As to the harlot woman riding the beast in Revelation 17, Lacunza acknowledges it is indeed referring to Rome:
... the doctors do all agree, that the woman here spoken of is the city of Rome, in other times the capital of the greatest empire in the world, and now the capital and centre of unity of the true Christian church. On this first point, which is not called in question, there is no occasion to tarry. -- Vol. I, Part II, Phenomenon III, pg. 240.
... it is not present Rome which is at all spoken of here, but future Rome alone to which the prophecy hath its determinate application. -- Vol. I, Part II, Phenomenon III, pg. 251.
Rome yes, Lacunza agrees, but not the Roman Catholic Church of his day, which he calls the true church, rather he pushes this prophecy in Revelation 17 off into the future:
Rome, not idolatrous but Christian, not the head of the Roman empire but the head of Christendom, and centre of unity of the true church of the living God, may very well, without ceasing from this dignity, at some time or other incur the guilt, and before God be held guilty of fornication with the kings of the earth, and amenable to all its consequences. And in this there is not any inconsistency, however much her defenders may shake the head. And this same Rome, in that same state, may receive upon herself the horrible chastisement spoken of in the prophecy; -- Vol. I, Part II, Phenomenon III, pg. 252.
This apostate Christian group termed Antichrist would be:
... slain and destroyed by Christ himself in the great day of his coming in glory and majesty.
Note that Lacunza wrote under a false name to hide the fact that he was Catholic. His book was banned by the Vatican agin as a subterfuge.
Irving was a Church of Scotland minister who was excommunicated for his heretic views on whether Crist would be able to sin. He was also leader of the heretical Charismatic tongues, prophecy , signs movement. Each of their churches had an angel and 12 prophets. Irving, as far as can ascertain, was also the first preach on dispensationalism on Christmas day 1825.
The teaching of his church was that the rapture would occur in the summer of 1833, and on the named day they all assembled to await the event.
The Albury meetings on prophecy
Annual meetings to discuss the new ideas on prophecy were held at Albury, the home of Henry Drummond a notable Irvingite. One of those attending was Lady Powerscourt.
Lady Powerscourt then held similar meetings in Powercourts, Ireland. Amongst those attending these meetings were Edward Irving and John Nelson Darby. This appears to be where Darby got his dispy ideas from, although he didn't seem to develop them until later.
Ouside the Plymouth Brethren and the rmaining Irvingites churches, now named The Catholic Apostolic Church, his teaching on prophecy was widely considered a herecy till the late 19th century.
Darby and other Brethen seemed to visit the US during the civil war, and the rot started.
. Probably a silly question (as if I'd let that stop me), but from your comment, I am guessing you are NOT a futurist. (You may have told me once before, but my memory ain't what it used to be. Actually, my memory is more of a "never was" than "not what it used to be.)
