WHAT TIME DO YOU HAVE?

[iamlamad]

1 hour ago, Josheb said:

Don't care. Greek trumps English every time. 100% 

Have you translated the NT as those have that I counted?

[iamlamad]

1 hour ago, Josheb said:

Keep the posts about the posts, not the posters. 

Either you imagine we are still under law, meaning there ARE dispensations, or you call it something different.
Do you imagine you are still under Jewish law?

If not, explain what you call the change.

[iamlamad]

1 hour ago, Josheb said:

You are not answering my question. You are instead going off on various tangents to avoid saying one single simple plain word. 

 

Are you dispensationalist? 

Answered. But those were not tangents. 

Edited March 19, 2022 by iamlamad

[iamlamad]

54 minutes ago, Josheb said:

Yes, I have. Have you?

No, I resort to studying Strong's and Thayer's. And I often see how other translators have translated. But more than that, I mediate on scriptures I don't understand, pray much in the Spirit, and bug God about them until He answers. He always does.

Edited March 20, 2022 by iamlamad

[iamlamad]

48 minutes ago, Josheb said:

That's absurd. That's Dispensationalism, not the Bible.

Dispensational Premillennialism was being asserted. I don't know whether you're a subscriber to that theology, so it is valid for me to ask. It is not valid to lose your mind over it. I just wanted to know if you're DP. No harm intended. Now that I know I have a few more op-relevant questions, such as...

Why, of all the other possibilities are you a Dispensationalist? 

has this always been the case, or was there a time when a different theological/eschatological pov was held?

You did not answer the Question. Are you still under the Law? Of do you believe this verse?

Luke 16:16 The law and the prophets were until John: since that time the kingdom of God is preached, and every man presseth into it.

[iamlamad]

50 minutes ago, Josheb said:

What is the topic of this op?

What time do you have? Questioning the time on God's clock. 

[Diaste]

On 3/18/2022 at 7:24 AM, Josheb said:

Well, if you don't know then maybe it is not illogical. 

Never said it was. 

Yes, and not only did they use what we call the Old Testament, but they used it in very specific ways, and they used it much differently than their Jewish predecessors. I am simply saying we are Christians and not Jews and we should use the whole word of God as the apostles used it. Many don't even know that's a thing. In other words, despite the undeniable fact the NT writers used the OT in very specific ways, they are either oblivious to or willfully ignore the apostles' practice. 

 

For the record: yes, it is true there was no New Testament in the first century, the epistles were considered scripture. 

2 Peter 3:14-16 
Therefore, beloved, since you look for these things, be diligent to be found by Him in peace, spotless and blameless, and regard the patience of our Lord as salvation; just as also our beloved brother Paul, according to the wisdom given him, wrote to you, as also in all his letters, speaking in them of these things, in which are some things hard to understand, which the untaught and unstable distort, as they do also the rest of the Scriptures, to their own destruction. 

According to Peter, Paul's letters were part of "the rest of the scriptures." 

 

 

The point is we Christians should use the scriptures as the Christian apostles used the scriptures. Many hermeneutics have been developed post-canon over the centuries. Any of them that depart from the example set by the apostles are going to be problematic and those that openly deny or ignore the apostles' practices are thoroughly misguided at best. You and I should do as the apostles did. One very important example from the apostles applicable to this discussion is the occasions when the apostles cited an OT prophecy to inform their audience that the OT prophecy they were citing was coming true in the lives of their readers. This limits a modern reader's options. Either the prophecy was completely fulfilled in the lives of the first century Christians or its fulfillment occurred in the first century and continues on thereafter. The option saying it did not or has not yet happened is untenable if the apostles said it was fulfilled. 

If God said it happened then it happened. 

If God said it was going to happen during the lives of the apostles then it happened during the lives of the apostles. 

If God said it was going to happen to some group of Christians long after the apostles died, then it happened to that group of Christians living long after the apostles died. 

 

It's not that hard to figure out. 

Okay. I guess we'll see. 

[Diaste]

On 3/16/2022 at 2:17 PM, Josheb said:

This is incorrect. 

The person pronoun "his" is used in verse 6. "And now that which is restraining you know for to be revealed him in his time." It is his being revealed that is being restrained. He is not doing the restraining. It is not the day of the Lord that is being restrained.

If that is true then the order is changed and the normal reading of the passage is put aside.  And yes it's a personal pronoun. The entire passage hinges on the thesis which is, "Concerning the Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ..."

On 3/16/2022 at 2:17 PM, Josheb said:

According to verse 3 the day of the Lord wasn't going to come unless the apostacy occurred.

Yes. The Lord isn't coming before the apostasy. But Paul said, "Let no one deceive you in any way, for it will not come until the rebellion occurs AND the man of lawlessness—the son of destruction—is revealed."

Paul forever links the two events as occurring before the Day. Both have to occur so it's not just the one, it's both rebellion and revealing. And when this is taken as the immutable fact it it, then what's restrained is the Day and it's held back by the revealing and rebellion.

This order must remain intact throughout as there is no indication of a change in the order; and if there was we would be faced with a mighty contradiction in just a few sentences.

On 3/16/2022 at 2:17 PM, Josheb said:

Furthermore, the Greek used for "now" in verse 7 is "arti," which literally means at present or at this moment. Its conjugation cannot be made to mean 2000 years from now. The term is used 36 times in the NT and it is always used to mean a present tense now, a now occurring at the time of report. It is that way in all the Greek manuscripts of the Thessalonian verse. The same holds true for the "already" (Gk.: ede). 

Sure. He was addressing the issue with the Thessalonian congregation. Instead of them fretting about the Day having already come Paul exhorts them to stand strong now. That doesn't change the order of things.

Paul gives the order of events to assure them the Day has not come and to inform what the nearness or arrival if that Day will look like. 

Paul wasn't saying the Day was 'now', he is telling the people to 'merely stand fast now'. Which I agree is in the moment of space/time existence of the group in Thessaloniki.

I don't believe I argued 'arti' is a time future. My argument was the odd sentence in the KJV, the better rendering in the BSB, and the grasping at 'he who now letteth will let' as if it's the Holy Spirit, Michael, Jesus, or some other made up whatever, by a doctrine and the followers of that doctrine. 

[Diaste]

On 3/18/2022 at 6:56 AM, Josheb said:

No, it's not tedious and the appeal to ridicule is fallacious. Throughout scripture distinctions are made between the day of the Lord and God or Jesus physically coming to earth. When God sent judgment upon Israel by means of an enemy army that day of the Lord did not entail Jesus leaving heaven and living on earth. There are many of these examples like this in scripture and the "it" is an indication of one such example. Stick to the text; do not assume "it" and "he" are interchangeable. 

I didn't interchange anything. "He" refers to the person, 'it' refers to the day. That's just normal reading. He is coming on a day. That day will not come, "it", or the day, will not come prior to the rebellion and revealing, then He will come. 

I don't want to get into 'day of the Lord' and any past 'days'. I'm discussing that in "Joel's Prophecies and the Day of the Lord". It's messy enough in just one discussion.

 

 

[Diaste]

On 3/18/2022 at 6:51 AM, Josheb said:

We know because of the audience affiliations. 

I would agree with this if it were a Ted Talk, or a high school, or it was the FOE. This is divine prophecy and as such is not relatable to what we learned at university about dissertations. 

For example, the prophecies of Jesus. Some predated His 1st advent by 1000 years. This had an audience at the time the prophecy was given and recorded but it didn't have anything to do with that generation in regards to His birth or work. Of course there are eternal implications for every soul who ever lived but His physical manifestation did not occur in that generation when the prophecy was spoken, but in a much later one.

There are said to be about 300 such prophecies in the OT concerning Jesus, one is quite fascinating;

Luke 4

And when He stood up to read, 17the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was handed to Him. Unrolling it, He found the place where it was written:

18“The Spirit of the Lord is on Me,

because He has anointed Me

to preach good news to the poor.

He has sent Me to proclaim liberty to the captivesf

and recovery of sight to the blind,

to release the oppressed,

19to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”g

20Then He rolled up the scroll, returned it to the attendant, and sat down. The eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fixed on Him, 21and He began by saying, “Today this Scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.”

This was written more than 700 years earlier. It had nothing to do with audience. I bet there were plenty of people who thought the prophecy was of Isaiah or a host of others. But no.

I imagine the flack Daniel had to put up with when it was prophesied Macedonia would defeat the mighty and vast Persian Empire when he said it 200 years before it happened. 

In Daniel 2 the prophecy covered many generations.

Interesting also is Dan 4. There was no time stamp here even though the prophecy of the dream happened quickly, 12 months later. It's the act of the King that brought the fulfillment on his head. 

"“Is this not Babylon the Great, which I myself have built by the might of my power as a royal residence and for the glory of my majesty?”

While the words were still in the king’s mouth, a voice came from heaven: “It is decreed to you, King Nebuchadnezzar, that the kingdom has departed from you."

Oops! But again, condition, acts, behavior, not a time stamp.

In Dan 9 even though we see a duration it's sandwiched between events. No time and date is ever given in regards to prophecy, neither does the audience matter except in those cases where the prophecy specifies the person, group or country.

In 2 Thess 2 there is a audience I'll grant, but in the matter of the Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and the gathering of us to Him, the coming and gathering is predicated on the rebellion and revealing, that's not audience.

It could be if the rebellion and revealing occurred and the Coming and Gathering occurred and the man of sin who is revealed was destroyed thus; "And then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus will slay with the breath of His mouth and annihilate by the majesty of His arrival."

And that in the mortal lifespan of the lawless one. 

There is no historian that records such a thing. It's also true that just because we don't have a record isn't evidence of non occurrence. But with the Coming of Jesus and the gathering the age of mankind's admin is over and all daily life is changed. We are still in the same mess as always. So it hasn't happened.