? Make up history all you like. The church fathers works remain. unbiased reading is scholarship done right. Am I going to be a little kid and argue back and forth and copy paste the text again and again? No. if your bias fordbids you from seeing what they actually state, then your problem is beyond my repair.
Do I really care that you have stubborn bias either? Nope. I will continue to be unbiased about the issue.
Toooodles
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You see, that's the thing, Jope. I don't know why you are taking a partial quote here and a partial quote there to claim these guys were pre-trib. History proves that they were not, but that does not really matter. Their belief does not dictate ours. And just because a belief comes from antiquity does not affirm it is correct. Read the church fathers and you will quickly see this to be true (consider Origen and his explanation of the atonement, for example).
But people need to stop tinkering with history to make it fit their views. I disagree with the early church fathers on some things, and I agree with them on others. Take them for what they really are instead of the historical fiction you would make them out to be. Much of their writings exist today. Read them instead of little bits that you think may support your theology (your quote from Cyprian, for example, was in a chapter dealing with not holding on to this world through the persecutions even to death in this period of tribulation, but leaving it for a far better home).
As you continue to remain ignorant of the entire quotes, I will again post your partial quotes within their own context (with references from whence they came). Consider this a test of your scholarship.
Here is the fuller context (what you corrupted either intentionally or out of ignorance):
Justin Martyr
“
O unreasoning men!
Understanding not what has been proved by all these passages, that two advents of Christ have been announced: the one, in which He is set forth as suffering, inglorious, dishonored, and crucified;
but the other, in which He shall come from heaven with glory,
when the man of apostasy, who speaks strange things against the Most High, shall venture to do unlawful deeds on the earth against us the Christians, who, having learned the true worship of God from the law, and the word which went forth from Jerusalem by means of the apostles of Jesus, have fled for safety to the God of Jacob and God of Israel.” – (Justin Martyr, Dialogue with Trypho)
Irenaeus
“But he indicates the number of the name now, that
when this man comes we may avoid him,
being aware who he is. The name, however, is suppressed, because it is not worthy of being proclaimed.” (Irenaeus, The Writings of Irenaeus Book III)
“And therefore, when in the end the church shall suddenly be caught up from this, it is said, ‘There shall be tribulation as has not been since the beginning, neither shall be,’
For this is the last context of the righteous, in which, when they overcome, they are crowned with incorruption.” (Irenaeus, Against Heresies…..and you are reading into the text “caught up” and ignoring the remainder of Irenaeus’ words….which is poor scholarship on your part).
Cyprian
“And this, as it ought always to be done by God’s servants, much more out to be done now –
now that the world is collapsing and is oppressed with the tempest of mischievous ills; in order that we who see that terrible things have begun, and know that still more terrible things are imminent, may regard it as the greatest advantage to depart from it as quickly as possible. If in your dwelling the walls were shaking with age, the roofs above you were trembling, and the house, now worn out and wearied, were threatening an immediate destruction to its structure crumbling with age, would you not with all speed depart? If, when you were on a voyage, an angry and raging tempest, by the waves violently aroused, foretold the coming shipwreck, would you not quickly seek the harbor? Lo, the world is changing and passing away, and witnesses to its ruin not now by its age, but by the end of things. And do you not give God thanks, do you not congratulate yourself, that by an earlier departure you are taken away, and delivered from the shipwrecks and disasters that are imminent
? We should consider, dearly beloved brethren – we should ever and anon reflect that we have renounced the world, and are in the meantime living here as guests and strangers. Let us greet the day which assigns each of us to his own home, which snatches us hence, and sets us free from the snares of the world, and restores us to paradise and the kingdom. ( Cyprian, Treatise VII: On the Mortality)
“If, therefore, we also live as dedicated and devoted to God – if we make our way over the ancient and sacred footsteps of the righteous,
let us go through the same proofs of sufferings, the same testimonies of passion, considering the glory of our time the greater on this account, that while ancient examples may be numbered, yet that subsequently, when the abundance of virtue and faith was in excess, the Christian martyrs cannot be numbered, as the Apocalypse testifies and says: “After these things I beheld a great multitude, which no man could number, of every nation…And he said unto me, These are they who have come out of the great tribulation and have washed their robes…” but if the assembly of the Christian martyrs is shown and proved to be so great, let no one think it a hard or difficult thing to become a martyr, when he sees that the crowd of martyrs cannot be numbered…
In persecutions, earth is shut up, but heaven is opened; Anti-Christ is threatening, but Christ is protecting; death is brought in, but immortality follows; the world is taken away from him that is slain, but paradise is set forth to him restored; the life of time is extinguished, but the life of eternity is realized. What a dignity it is, and what a security, to go gladly from hence, to depart gloriously in the midst of afflictions and tribulations; in a moment to close the eyes with which men and the world are looked upon, and at once to open them to look upon God and Christ! Of such a blessed departure how great is the swiftness! You shall be suddenly taken away from earth, to be placed in the heavenly kingdoms.” (Cyprian, The Treatises of Cyprian)
