History Beyond Heresy

[Justin Adams]

12 minutes ago, Alive said:

There is the possibility that what they said has been misunderstood--rather than them being wrong.

It is quite possible that 'chinese whispers' were also happening since Irenaeus did not for sure say what the translators want it to say. It was translated twice as far as I know and he only mentioned he 'saw' John and did not imply he saw his manuscript. The earliest of which is in Aramaic. It was then translated poorly into Greek. They mostly conversed in Aramaic in those days and some claim the earliest gospels were also in Aramaic. However, the 'modern' narrative does not seem to like this very much. The contemporary comments of that era  are that John was bedridden in his 90s and not able to do very much and had to be carried everywhere.

Another note is that very few even knew Hebrew let alone Aramaic. It was not 'kosher' in those days to be associated with the Jews.

Edited June 22, 2021 by Justin Adams

[Alive]

I think the Domitian mistake is very plausible as is the Confusion over Nero's name.

Much of what Simmons and Gentry discuss is very good argument, but from where I stand, the internal evidence is most compelling--if a person can remove themselves from what they have heard all their lives.

The Olivet discourse and  Rev together.

[Justin Adams]

20 minutes ago, Alive said:

The Olivet discourse and  Rev together.

And also with Josephus' account open with them.

@Alive: do you not think the OP title is divisive and pejorative?? Most every believer I know is a partial preterist (if they have a pulse). To just imply preterists are heretical is unnecessary in my mind. One has to take care with words since they have meanings beyond what we sometimes think.

Edited June 22, 2021 by Justin Adams

[Alive]

1 hour ago, Justin Adams said:

And also with Josephus' account open with them.

@Alive: do you not think the OP title is divisive and pejorative?? Most every believer I know is a partial preterist (if they have a pulse). To just imply preterists are heretical is unnecessary in my mind. One has to take care with words since they have meanings beyond what we sometimes think.

I agree that it may go too far. After all, it is eschatology. My position on these things is best communicated by repeating what I have written numerous times on this forum. Many well meaning and honest brothers are absolutely convinced that God has unveiled the truth to them and are steadfast and unmovable in their respective positions---and yet they differ widely from each other.

They can't all be right, but they may all be wrong. IMO, this reality needs to be faced squarely before each other and our Lord.

[Montana Marv]

Just a few of the many things that have yet to be fulfilled.

Matt 24:15 - So when you see standing in the holy place, the A/D that causes desolation, spoken of through the prophet Daniel.  Let the reader understand, then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains where? (Edom, Moab, Ammon - Dan 11:41 - all of which the king v.36 is unable to occupy.)  Not just Petra.  For Israel.  Dan 12:1 - At that time Michael, the great prince who protects your people (same as 9:24) will arise.  The Holy Spirit is the Churches guardian.

Dan 9:24 - Seventy Sevens are decreed for you people, and your holy city (Jerusalem) to fulfill six tasks.  Not for the Church, but for the Jews.

Rev - None of the S,T,B judgements have begun.  Stilled reserved for the future.

Prophecies about the Apocalypse, specifically those in Rev have never happened.

Now Preterists will gladly substitute others in place of Daniels People.

In Christ

Montana Marv

[Diaste]

17 hours ago, Alive said:

 

They can't all be right, but they may all be wrong. IMO, this reality needs to be faced squarely before each other and our Lord.

And as early as possible considering the self first.

[Diaste]

7 hours ago, Montana Marv said:

Just a few of the many things that have yet to be fulfilled.

Matt 24:15 - So when you see standing in the holy place, the A/D that causes desolation, spoken of through the prophet Daniel.  Let the reader understand, then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains where? (Edom, Moab, Ammon - Dan 11:41 - all of which the king v.36 is unable to occupy.)  Not just Petra.  For Israel.  Dan 12:1 - At that time Michael, the great prince who protects your people (same as 9:24) will arise.  The Holy Spirit is the Churches guardian.

Dan 9:24 - Seventy Sevens are decreed for you people, and your holy city (Jerusalem) to fulfill six tasks.  Not for the Church, but for the Jews.

Rev - None of the S,T,B judgements have begun.  Stilled reserved for the future.

Prophecies about the Apocalypse, specifically those in Rev have never happened.

Now Preterists will gladly substitute others in place of Daniels People.

In Christ

Montana Marv

And the two best eyewitnesses didn't record any event as spoken by the Lord in Matt 24:13-31.

A glaring omission is the cosmic changes immediately after GT and at that time the appearance of the Lord. There is probably a hundred conditions that have have not yet come to pass in regards to the end of the age. We have no archeological evidence, no written works, no historical evidence or oral traditions; just a big blank in time past since 70 AD for the fulfilment of many utterances of the prophetic kind. 

What Josephus and Tactius did record is not in any way a reflection of Matt 24:15-31 much less a proper fulfillment.

[Montana Marv]

Another thing about Matt 24:15 is that the Preterist believe that all the Christians got out safely.  They have it backwards.  The city Jerusalem was under siege for many years. Roman troop throughout Judea. There was no exit available from Jerusalem, no roof top experience, no one working in there field. IF Titus was to set up an a/d as described in Matt 24:11 no one could move about freely, no one could leave, the country was locked up.  They all went into captivity into many nations.  Yet to return to their home land.  Soon we will see a yearning in the Jews hearts throughout the world to return.  When; sometime after the Ezk 38-39 war, when the Third Temple is being rebuilt, when there is peace in their Land.  All this before the A/D can be setup, making what is written in Matt 24 for the Jews a done deal, the needed environment.  The roof top experience, those working in the fields.

In Christ

Montana Marv

[Justin Adams]

In 66 A.D., approximately 35 years after Jesus’ crucifixion, the Jews revolted against their Roman rulers, a revolt that ended in 70 A.D. with the burning of Jerusalem and the destruction of the Temple.

On the eve of its destruction, the followers of Jesus, later to be known as Christians, fled from Jerusalem to Pella on the other side of the Jordan River, according to the fourth-century church historian Eusebius of Caesarea:

“When the people of the church in Jerusalem were instructed by an oracular revelation delivered to worthy men there to move away from the city and to live in a city of Peraea called Pella, the believers in Christ migrated from Jerusalem to that place.”

In 1967 Robert Houston (“Bob”) Smith of the College of Wooster, Ohio, initiated an archaeological excavation at Pella in the hope of finding evidence for this early Christian presence. Of course he also had many other questions about the site.

In addition to the 20-acre principal mound of Pella, a Civic Complex was constructed near the foot of the mound that extends into the Wadi Jirm. On the other side of the wadi rises Tell el-Husn, a natural hill that contains mostly cemeteries but also a fortress wall.
__________

If you’ve studied first century history, you’re probably familiar with the story about the followers of Christ who fled from Judea to Pella just before the Jewish-Roman War began in AD 66. The story of their flight was told by early church leaders including Eusebius (AD 263-339), Epiphanius (AD 315-403), and Remigius (AD 437-533) – and perhaps also by Josephus (Wars 2.14.2, 2.20.1). They obeyed the words of Jesus (Matthew 24:15-21, Mark 13:14-19, Luke 21:20-23) and were protected in the wilderness for 3.5 years (Revelation 12:14). 
I think the story of what happened to those believers after the war is even better. Jeffrey Butz, professor of World Religions at Penn State University, documents in his book, “The Secret Legacy of Jesus” (2009), that many of them returned to Jerusalem and built a Christian meeting place where the Upper Room (Acts 1:12-14) had been (p. 146). According to Eusebius and Hegesippus (AD 110-180), the person who led them to Pella and then back to Jerusalem was Symeon the son of Clopas.

Who was Symeon? He was the first cousin of Jesus (John 19:25). He was also the second bishop of Jerusalem, who was appointed to that position when the first bishop, James (Acts 15:13), was martyred in AD 62 (Antiquities 20:9.1). Eusebius wrote the following about Symeon’s appointment:

“After the martyrdom of James and the conquest of Jerusalem which immediately followed, it is said that those of the apostles and disciples of the Lord that were still living came together from all directions with those that were related to the Lord according to the flesh (for the majority of them also were still alive) to take counsel as to who was worthy to succeed James. They all with one consent pronounced Symeon, the son of Clopas, of whom the Gospel also makes mention; to be worthy of the episcopal throne of that parish. He was a cousin, as they say, of the Saviour. For Hegesippus records that Clopas was a brother of Joseph” (Church History, Book III, Chapter 11).

Symeon is mentioned in Matthew 13:55 and Mark 6:3 as one of Christ’s brothers (and also referred to in I Corinthians 9:5). However, The Pulpit Commentary explains why he was believed to be Jesus’ cousin rather than His brother:

“Some have thought that these were literally brethren of our Lord, sons of Joseph and Mary… But, on the whole, the most probable opinion is that they were cousins of our Lord… There is evidence that there were four sons of Clopas and Mary, whose names were James, and Joses, and Simon (or Symeon), and Judas. Mary the wife of Clopas is mentioned by St. Matthew (Matthew 27:56) as the mother of James the less and of Joses. Jude describes himself (Jude 1:5) as the brother of James; and Simon, or Symeon, is mentioned in Eusebius as the son of Clopas. It must be remembered also that the word ἀδελφός, like the Hebrew word which it expresses, means not only ‘a brother,’ but generally ‘a near kinsman.’”

Symeon was the Bishop of Jerusalem until he was crucified in AD 107. He lived a long life, having been born about a decade before Christ. Hegesippus wrote this about Symeon’s death:

“Certain of these heretics brought accusation against Symeon, the son of Clopas, on the ground that he was a descendant of David and a Christian; and thus he suffered martyrdom, at the age of one hundred and twenty years, while Trajan was emperor and Atticus governor” (Eusebius, Church History, Book III, Chapter 32).

Including Symeon, there were 14 bishops of the church in Jerusalem between the First Great Revolt (AD 66-73) and the Second Great Revolt (AD 132-135). That final revolt resulted in the leveling of Jerusalem, a new Roman city, the renaming of Judea, and all Jews being banished from the area. Those 14 Jewish bishops, along with their non-Jewish successors after AD 135, are listed here and also here.

Edited June 23, 2021 by Justin Adams

[Justin Adams]

In AD 130, the Roman emperor, Hadrian, took notice of the church in Jerusalem when he visited the city. The Jewish historian, Gedaliah Alon, wrote the following about Hadrian’s visit:

“Another early Christian chronicler, Alexander the Monk, writing probably around the middle of the ninth century, says: ‘When (Hadrian) went to the Holy City and saw it in ruins, except for one small Christian church, he gave orders that the whole city be rebuilt, save for the temple. When the Jews heard of this they streamed thither from every direction, and before long the whole city was rebuilt’” (“The Jews in Their Land in the Talmudic Age [AD 70-640], 1980, p. 446; quoting from Alexander Monachus, De Inventione Sanctae Crucis, p. 87, III, 4044-4045, published in 1620).

Soon after his own visit to Jerusalem, Hadrian sent a representative to oversee “the work of building the city,” and this is what he witnessed:

“So Aquila [an envoy of Hadrian], while he was in Jerusalem, also saw the disciples of the disciples of the apostles flourishing in the faith and working great signs, healings, and other miracles. For they were such as had come back from the city of Pella to Jerusalem and were living there and teaching” (Epiphanius, AD 310-403).

It’s encouraging to read that the top officials of Rome witnessed those early believers “flourishing in the faith.” Despite the upheaval of the Jewish-Roman War, life in Christ continued without interruption after Jerusalem fell in AD 70, even in the region where that tragic war took place. The body of believers in Pella, and later among the ruins of Jerusalem, is just one example of the growth of God’s kingdom beyond the record that we have in the New Testament. The following testimony was given by Eusebius concerning the legacy of those who immediately succeeded the apostles, and it’s a beautiful legacy:

“Among those that were celebrated at that time was Quadratus, who, report says, was renowned along with the daughters of Philip for his prophetical gifts. And there were many others besides these who were known in those days, and who occupied the first place among the successors of the apostles. And they also, being illustrious disciples of such great men, built up the foundations of the churches which had been laid by the apostles in every place, and preached the Gospel more and more widely and scattered the saving seeds of the kingdom of heaven far and near throughout the whole world” (Eusebius, Church History, Book III, Chapter 37).

The kingdom which could be shaken was shaken and removed, but the kingdom “which cannot be shaken” remained (Hebrews 12:25-28). The Jerusalem below was cast out, but “the Jerusalem above” is the mother of us all (Galatians 4:21-31). God’s vineyard was indeed leased to “other vinedressers who will render to Him the fruits in their seasons” (Matthew 21:41). May we also be faithful in bearing spiritual fruit to the glory of God.