What Ever Happened to the ....

[ktn4eg]

..... local church at Jerusalem?

Did the local church at Jerusalem continue to exist as a vibrant, growing body of born again, baptized believers as detailed in the early chapters of the book of Acts (and, to some extent, in some of the Apostle Paul's writings) beyond the early years of the 2d century AD?

The few reference works that I've read do not seem to give much detail about the continuation of the local church at Jerusalem.

While my reference works do mention about what happened to the Jewish people after AD 70 and subsequent years, for some reason they give little or no information about what happened to the local church at Jerusalem.

Do any of you have any detailed information on this?

 

[ktn4eg]

I am bumping this thread because no one has responded to the OP in two weeks.

 

[Archie the Preacher]

Who Knows?

When the Romans essentially exiled all the Jews from the Levant, I rather imagine the church in Jerusalem suffered a severe loss of membership. So it probably - as a congregation - moved elsewhere.

I would rather expect the Romans didn't take the time to move them all together, so the congregation probably moved to several 'elsewheres'.

Following that, the Roman occupied the area for a good while, fading out in the 5th Century or so. However, after Constantine, the 'official' church (what is now the RCC) were in charge of anything 'religious' in the area. At some point in the 8th Century the Muslims took over. Then the Crusades went on from the 9th Century to the 11th or 12th Century (I don't have any references with me right now). The Ottoman Empire (also Muslim) ran it from some point in the middle ages to just after WW One.

1947 - after WWII - the lands were divided up and several 'old' nations were re-instituted; Syria in 1946 or so, Israel and the mistake called 'Palestine' in 1948 and Iran in that same era, as I recall.

So I doubt the church in Jerusalem still had descendants of the original church in attendance. I suppose it is possible, but rather unlikely - barring a miracle.

 

[SolaSaint]

:thumbsup:They are today what we call the Southern Baptists and every biblically sound body of believers. At least that is what I would like to think.

 

[Archie the Preacher]

SolaSaint

:thumbsup:They are today what we call the Southern Baptists and every biblically sound body of believers. At least that is what I would like to think.

Yes, and I'm glad you added the '...every Biblically sound body of believers...' part.

 

[kyredneck]

When the Romans essentially exiled all the Jews from the Levant, I rather imagine the church in Jerusalem suffered a severe loss of membership. So it probably - as a congregation - moved elsewhere. .....

"...“But when ye see Jerusalem compassed with armies, then know that her desolation is at hand. Then let them that are in Judaea flee unto the mountains; and let them that are in the midst of her depart out; and let not them that are in the country enter therein. For these are days of vengeance, that all things which are written may be fulfilled. Woe unto them that are with child and to them that give suck in those days! for there shall be great distress upon the land, and wrath unto this people.” Lu 21:20-23
[the corresponding passages in Mt & Mk reads ' the abomination of desolation' in lieu of 'armies']

To paraphrase: “When Jerusalem gets surrounded by armies, run for the hills. Leave the country, get out of the city, and don't go back.”

How do you get out of a city that's surrounded by armies?

By divine providence, that's how......"



"...Note by translator of the history, William Whiston:

"There may be another very important and very providential reason assigned for this strange and foolish retreat of Cestius, which, if Josephus had been at the time of writing his history a Christian, he might probably have taken notice of also; and that is the opportunity afforded the Jewish Christians in the city, of calling to mind the prediction and caution given them by Christ that 'when they should see the abomination of desolation' (the idolatrous Roman armies, with the images of their idols in their ensigns) ready to lay Jerusalem desolate, 'stand where it ought not,' or 'in the holy place'; or 'when they should see Jerusalem encompassed with armies,' they should then 'flee to the mountains.' By complying with which, those Jewish Christians fled to the mountains of Perea, and escaped this destruction. Nor was there perhaps any one instance of a more unpolitic, but more providential conduct, than this retreat of Cestius visible during this whole siege of Jerusalem, which (siege) was providentially such a 'great tribulation as has not been from the beginning of the world to that time; no, nor ever should be'.”

John Gill, on Matthew 24:16:

"...it is remarked by several interpreters, and which Josephus takes notice of with surprise, that Cestius Gallus having advanced with his army to Jerusalem, and besieged it, on a sudden without any cause, raised the siege, and withdrew his army, when the city might have been easily taken; by which means a signal was made, and an opportunity given to the Christians, to make their escape: which they accordingly did, and went over to Jordan, as Eusebius says, to a place called Pella; so that when Titus came a few months after, there was not a Christian in the city . . "...."

When You See Jerusalem Surrounded.....

When you look at the type pointed to in Rev 11:8, the exodus of the righteous from Sodom doesn't seem to have ended well, with his daughters committing incest with Lot from which sprang forth Moab and Ammon.

 

[ktn4eg]

I could be mistaken (wouldn't be the first time! :smilewinkgrin, or maybe I'm just confused (wouldn't be the first time for that either! :thumbsup about just when (i.e., the year) the so-called "Jerusalem Council" that is recorded in Acts 15 took place.

Evidently the Acts 15 council occurred prior to 70 A. D. since the Apostle Paul did confer with the Apostles that were in Jerusalem.

I am aware that different sources sometimes give different A. D. dates for some of the events that are mentioned in the New Testament (e.g., the actual year when Jesus Christ was born).

If any of you have any other source material concerning the OP, I'd appreciate your posting it on this thread.

Thanks.

 

[kyredneck]

What happened to the Church at Jerusalem?

 

[ktn4eg]

What happened to the Church at Jerusalem?

Kyredneck--

I am assuming that you wanted to direct me to the article that F. F. Bruce wrote concerning the church at Jerusalem.

I looked over it, but I didn't find anything in Bruce's article concerning anything about the church at Jerusalem beyond the times of the New Testament.

What I was really looking for in my OP was documented source material about the church at Jerusalem from at least the time period of second century A. D.

(If you had some other source material in mind please be so kind to indicate which one you wanted me to look at.)

 

[kyredneck]

Kyredneck--

I am assuming that you wanted to direct me to the article that F. F. Bruce wrote concerning the church at Jerusalem.

Yes, I'm not familiar enough with Windows 8.0 to link to a pdf document, for some reason it doesn't allow me.

I looked over it, but I didn't find anything in Bruce's article concerning anything about the church at Jerusalem beyond the times of the New Testament.

Well, actually it does:

"...When the Jewish revolt against Rome broke out four years later, the Jerusalem church left the city and went into dispersion. According to the fourth century historian Eusebius, they received an oracle some time before the fighting began charging them to leave the doomed city of Jerusalem and migrate to Pella. Pella beyond the Jordan was one of the cities of the Decapolis it was probably not to the city of Pella itself that the Jerusalem church migrated, but to the surrounding countryside which belonged to that city, as well as to other parts of Transjordan especially less frequented parts. The flight of the mother church to the wilderness and her preservation there may be reflected in the language of Rev. 12:14.

In dispersion these believers continued to call themselves the church of Jerusalem, and their successive leaders were drawn for several decades from relatives of James, members of the holy family. They were disowned as apostates by orthodox Jews, and increasingly disowned as heretics by orthodox Christians, although they thought of themselves as forming a bridge between these two bodies, conserving all that was best in both. They lingered on in Transjordan and Egypt until the seventh century, when those who had not already been absorbed by Jewish or Christian orthodoxy lost their identity in the overflowing tide of Islam....."

 

[ktn4eg]

Kyredneck --

Let's try this again.

What my OP asked was whether or not there is/are reliable, documented source material(s) that indicate(s) that there was, in fact, an actual body of scripturally baptized believers in Jesus Christ that regularly met within the "city limits" (or within the city's "greater metropolitan area") in the second century A. D.

While Transjordan (i.e., "across the Jordan [River]") and Egypt may have had scripturally baptized believers who came FROM Jerusalem, that is not the exact same thing as having scripturally baptized believers who physically lived IN Jerusalem.

Please accept my sincerest apologies for not making my OP clear.