I'm retiring this blog since I've converted to something other then Futurism.

 I could revive it if I change my mind back.  But here is the Link to my new Blog.

https://materialisteschatology.blogspot.com/2023/10/launching-my-new-prophecy-blog.html

Update December 4th 2023: it's also worth noting that I'm slowly redoing some posts that were never strictly about Prophecy to begin with on my main Bible Blog.

https://solascripturachristianliberty.blogspot.com/

Soul Sleep and Premillennialism

So I recently learned of the existence of a book called Regnum Caelorum: Patterns of Millennial Thought in Early Christianity by Charles E. Hill.  The main thesis of the book is that in the early centuries of the Church there tended to be a correlation between believing that believers are also in Hades between death and Resurrection (which Soul Sleep is a form of, Hades simply means The Grave not the modern understanding of "Hell") and Premillennialism (or Chillialism).

Now the thing is the author intends this to discredit Premilennialism, because yeah the popular Prmeillenialism of modern Evangelicalism tends to be taught by theologically uniformed Christians who absolutely do not want to be associated with something like Soul Sleep.  But for me it has the exact opposite effect, my openness to Post-Millennialism/Partrial Preterism was increased recently as I recorded on this blog in the Baptism of The Beast post.  However for reasons that extend well beyond my Eschatology I firmly believe in Soul Sleep, Paul's most vivid account of The Resurrection clearly states that the physically dead are "asleep".  The idea that we go to Heaven immediately when we die is a product of Platonist Corruption of true Biblical Teaching, as verified by his earliest list of people who taught this, Clement of Alexandria and Origen and then their influence on Cyprian.

Another annoyance I have at this book is contributing to confusing people on the difference between Post-Mill and Amillenialism.  The eschatology he is attributing to Cyprian is Post-Mill not Amill, Amill means you reject the Bodily Resurrection entirely, the chief of all heresies.

But that's the thing, teaching you go to Heaven when you die is essentially the Gateway drug to deemphasizing the Bodily Resurrection and then abandoning it entirely.  What separates Christianity from Paganism is that we do not teach an "Afterlife" we teach the inevitable reversal of Death entirely.  Just read my Do We have a promise to be with God when we Die.

Now this book is often wrong on who it places where.  He wants to argue Polycarp wasn't with Ireneaus and Papias but an Amazon reviewer of the book going by Dakota Sorenson has already argued against that.

"The most significant name on that list is Polycarp. Polycarp is the link between the apostle John and Irenaeus—between the apostle whose writing contains the key New Testament millennial text (Rev. 20), and the chief early defender of premillennialism. The fullest and most systematic early expression of premillennial eschatology occurs in Irenaeus, Against Heresies 5.31–36. Irenaeus’s expository discourse on the earthly millennial reign is “by far the most extensive and best reasoned in Christian literature to date” (p. 12). If Polycarp held to an amillennial position, how did his student Irenaeus come to hold a premillennial position? Hill argues that Irenaeus changed to the premillennialist position in the course of writing Against Heresies. Hill says we have “every reason to believe” that Irenaeus’ millennial eschatology “was not received from Polycarp” (p. 254). I would beg to differ. First off, Polycarp hints at the premillennial belief in an asynchronous resurrection of the just and the unjust (Phil. 2.2–3). He states that Christians can be resurrected only “if” (ἐὰν) they fulfill certain conditions, such as doing God’s will and loving the things he loved. This implies that those who fail to meet these conditions will not be resurrected. Yet, Scripture teaches that even the unjust will rise from the dead for judgment (John 5:29; Acts 24:15), which is indicated in Phil. 7:1. Thus the only way to make sense of Phil. 2.2–3 is that the just will be resurrected at a different time than the unjust. Lo-and-behold, this is precisely what the premillennial reading of Rev. 20:4–6 says! This is why Irenaeus taught that the resurrection of the just (“the first resurrection,” Rev. 20:5) chronologically precedes the resurrection of the unjust, with an earthly kingdom phase in between. Polycarp seems to have been a premillennialist who believed in a heavenly intermediate state.

Secondly, Brian C. Collins has demonstrated that there is no evidence Irenaeus changed his mind on the Millennium. He writes, “One of [Irenaeus’] chief arguments against Gnosticism was that he stood in line with the tradition of the elders that reached back to the apostles. But on Hill’s reading, at a fundamental point of debate (a point important enough to provoke a “momentous” change), the Gnostics stand in the traditional position, and Irenaeus outside it. It is difficult to believe that Irenaeus would undercut a major part of his argument from book 3 in this way. In addition, the claim that Irenaeus changed millennial positions and departed from the teaching of Clement of Rome, Polycarp, and others is inconsistent with Irenaeus’ own statements. In Proof 61 Irenaeus attributed the millennial reading of Isaiah 11 to the elders. 

...."

But I would argue his placement of Hippolytus with the Post-Millennialists is also wrong, his Against Plato right from the start makes his belief in Souls Sleeping in Hades clear, and his eschatology which he wrote more about then anyone else pre-Nicaea is clearly Premillennial with him predicting the Millennium to start 500 years after the time of Christ.

Another common Strawman authors like Hill engage in is calling the Millennial Kingdom "temporary", that's not what Revelation 20 implies, what ends the Thousand Years is Satan being let lose, The Kingdom is saved from Satan's attempt to end it and does in my view have continuity with New Jerusalem.  I'm sure I differ with a lot of mainstream Premillenialists on this but to me the New Heavens and New Earth are just as Carnal as the Millennium, it's the Spiritual being added to it that is the distinction.

In a separate article Hill argues agaisnt the assumption that the Montanists were Premillennial, and I think he might be right there, at the very least Tertullian's weird Eschatology is not as identical to theirs as people assume.  But that's the thing, they are another Pythagorean/Platonist influence on Early Church History being among the first Christian Ascetics.  Ultimately though I think the Montanists simply had a weird Eschatology that doesn't easily fit into any modern classification boxes.  However this article argues that the alleged New Jerusalem in Phyrgia idea came form a later offshoot group not the original Montanists.

People talking about this also sometimes say it like "the Chilialists were just a loud minority in Asia" but isn't Asian Christianity exactly who we'd expect people to get Revelation right?  In fact this lineage is specifically tied to Smyrna one of the two flawless Churches, and to Ephesus the Church most praised for Doctrinal Purity.  

At any rate Athenagoras of Athens taught Soul Sleep in-spite of his apparent Platonism and he was independent of this lineage.

Now one could reconcile the Biblical basis for Soul Sleep with Partial Preterist Post-Millennialism by arguing Soul Sleep was true up until the Millennium starts or a little before. But if you take literally Revelation's seeming account of Bodyless Souls in Heaven they seem to have always been there, at least the Martyrs who are were who Tertullian thinks are treated differently.

There is also a lot of debating about "why the Church rejected Chilialism" as if there is no dispute that it did.  The mainstream Hierarchy of the Church seems to have slowly distanced itself from it (though even Gregory of Nysa was clearly still a Futurist in what he says about the Antichrist). But it was never formally condemned by a Council and the common people remained broadly Futurist as shown by popular literature like Pseudo-Methodius.  

Vespasian as The Beast of Revelation

 I’m writing this as still primarily a Futurist but simply as a thought experiment.  I decided it would be fun to see if I could argue for a 70 AD Fulfillment of Revelation better than actual Preterists do.  But perhaps also elements of how I make this argument could prove Typologically useful to Futurists and other more niche forms of Preterism that are less focused on the 1st Century (I mostly wrote this before the Epiphany that inspired the prior on this blog, but I wanted to share my work anyway).

First of all I have come to take the language of Revelation 17:11 as saying that the 8th King is the Individual person The Beast passages are about even when still during the reigns of the first 7.  

Caesarea Maritima means Caesarea “by the sea”, and it was also a very sandy location.  It was always the Roman Provincial Capital of Judea and as such played an important role in the 66-73 AD War including as a location Vespasian used as a base of operations.  

The Seven Heads are further explained in Revelation 17 as being Seven Kings.  Roman Emperors didn’t like to admit they were Kings but we see in John 19:15 that Jews in Judea didn’t care about their semantics.  Why Kings would be represented as Heads is perhaps explained by the language of Bible Verses like 1 Corinthians 11:3, Ephesians 5:23 and Colossians 1:18 where Christ is The Head of The Church and God The Father is the Head of Christ, but there's also Hebrew Bible precedent for Kings as Heads in 1 Samuel 15:17 and Isaiah 7:8-9.  Your Head is a person who holds authority over you, hence why the 8th King which is The Beast isn’t an 8th Head.

Vitellius from the year of the 4 Emperors was never recognized in the East, the Roman Armies of the East chose Vespasian as soon as Otho was dead.  So for example when looking at the Archaeological record of the Roman Pharaohs we see that Vespasian was the 8th and the first 7 were Augustus, Tiberius, Calgiula, Claudius, Nero, Galba and Otho who did indeed have the shortest reign.  Vespasian was born during the reign of Augustus so each of those 7 had also personally been Vespasian’s Head.

I no longer believe the 6th King being associated with the present is meant to be a clue to when Revelation was written, rather for this theory I think it has to do with Revelation 17’s point in the narrative following the 7th Bowl of Wrath.  There was a major Earthquake during the reign of Galda which Suetonius refers to having been considered an Omen of his coming demise, that could be identified with the Earthquake of the 7th Bowl.  

Back to where we left off in chapter 13.  The 10 Horns, Leopard, Bear and Lion imagery are evoking Daniel 7.  Daniel 7 was primarily fulfilled by Intertestamental History, Revelation is picking up later with a Rome that has annexed most of the Greek Empire and portions of Babylon and Persia.  The 10 Horns we also know represent lesser kings allied with the Beast, these are likely various local Client Kings and Tribal Leaders who assisted Vespasian in the Conquest of Judea like Antiochus IV Epiphanes of Commagene.

The Mortal Wound being Healed could have multiple meanings.  Vespasian did suffer a serious wound during the Siege of Yodfat that Josephus makes a big deal out of.  But it’s seemingly associated with one of the specific Seven Heads, most of them died violently but Vespasian presented himself as the Heir of Otho.

For Revelation 13:5 the YLT says “Make War” where the KJV says “Continue” and I think that is more accurate to the Greek.  This is about the Authority Vespasian was given to carry out the War against Judea.  There are two ways we could count the 42 months, we could begin them with when Vespasian was first formally placed in charge of the Campaign on September 22nd 66 AD ending it in March of 70 AD.  In April of 70 the War continued but now with Vespain fully established as sole Emperor and his son the one actively carrying out the Campaign in Judea.  Or we could say the 42 months started when Vespasian actually arrived in Judea seemingly in Spring of 67 then continued to September of 70 AD when the Siege of Jerusalem was fully completed.

Vespasian was in Alexandria when he was proclaimed Emperor, and as such was the only Roman Pharoah ever consecrated by proper Egyptian Ceremonies, much of which symbolically Deified him.

Verse 7 of chapter 13 repeats language from chapter 11 verse 7.  If you watch Historia civillis YouTube video on The Roman Triumph and then read Josephus’s description of Titus and Vespasian’s Triumph in celebration of Conquering Judea in Wars of The Jews Book 7 Chapter 5 Section 5, the possibility that Revelation 11:7-10 could be describing that Triumph with the Two Witness representing executed leaders of the Jewish Revolt will be become quite compelling.

Revelation 13:10 is about Captivity which is obviously relevant to 70 AD.

The Beast out of The Earth called elsewhere The False Prophet I think could have been Tiberius Julius Alexander.  Many have argued “out of the Earth” in contrast to “out of the Sea” implies a Jewish background for the second Beast as opposed to the Gentile Background of the First, and Alexander fits that even though he was considered an Apostate.  He had formerly been a Governor of Judea but was Prefect of Egypt when the War started and was vital to Vespasian becoming Emperor due to the control that position gave him over the Empire’s Food Supply.  And he was involved in that Ceremonial Deification of Vespasian as Pharaoh as well which did include performing false Miracles.

When the Image of The Beast is introduced in verse 14 many translations wrongly say the Image was “made”, but the Greek doesn’t use a word for Create here, it should read that they Set Up the Image, meaning the Image could be something that already existed.

In Genesis 5:3 Seth is called the Image and Likeness of Adam as his son.  Multiple New Testament passages further connect Jesus as the Image of God to Him being The Son of God, like Romans 8:29 and Colossians 1:15.  So there is Biblical Precedent for a person’s Image being their Son.

The Image of The Beast in this model would be Titus the Son of Vespasian who had the same full name and was also elevated by Tiberius Julius Alexander who joined him in the Conquest of Judea where he was proclaimed Imperator after destroying Jerusalem.

The name identified by the number 666 can’t be Nero because that’s based on Aramaic/Hebrew Gematria and Revelation is in Greek with this number clearly echoing 888 as the Isopsephy value of Iesous.  Nero in Greek has an Omega in it so Nero can never work, the same goes for trying to make Nero fit the 616 variant.  It is also verified by Chapter 39 of Suetonius Life of Nero that the Isopsephy associated with the name of Nero was 1005.

If the 616 Variant is correct (which I consider unlikely) that probably points to Theos Caesar and/or Dios Caesar which were used for the Deified Roman Emperors in the Eastern Provinces, but in that context it doesn’t apply to only one.  Revelation 13:1 and 17:3 do seem to imply the Blasphemous Name associated with this Beast is on each of the heads and not merely an individual name.

I don’t know how to make 666 fit Vespasian, but I also have come to doubt it literally refers to the actual name.  I still think Iapetos is the best name for 666, ways to make that poetically fit Vespasian are possible.  

Some even question the practice of using Isopsephy/Gematria entirely and suggest like other symbols in Revelation the key is its Hebrew Bible precedent.  666 as a number has two notable appearances, being associated with Solomon in 1 Kings 10:14 and 2 Chronicles 9:13 but also with Nebuchadnezzar's Image in Daniel 3.  The Builder of The Temple and its destroyers, and one could also call Solomon spiritually a destroyer based on his moral failures the next chapter records.  Daniel seems more directly the source material of Revelation then Kings or Chronicles.  Nero was Emperor when the Rebellion started but wasn’t personally involved.  Nebuchadnezzar was personally involved in all his Sieges of Jerusalem and the first one was while still serving under a prior King.

That leads us to the matter of Jerusalem as Babylon.  The arguments for it are well known but in the past my issue with holding that view at the same time as The Beast being Rome was that I misunderstood Revelation 17 as implying Babylon held power over The Beast, but I now know the text doesn’t describe her as Riding the Beast.  Berenice in her affair with Titus seems frankly like a good personification of the Harlot.  The word “kill” isn’t actually used in Revelation 17 or 18 (and with Jezebel in chapter 2 only her children are killed), the City is destroyed by the people represented by The Harlot still live on to, in my view, eventually become the Bride of chapter 19 and Lamb’s Wife of Chapter 21.

Revelation 17 also strictly speaking says the Ten Horns hate Babylon and destroy her with fire not the Beast himself.  This could be relevant to how Vespasian was in Rome when the final Siege happened but also Titus himself did not want to Destroy the Temple, his troops and allies got out of control.  I also have considered that because of how the word “Wilderness” is used in Revelation this final destruction of Babylon refers to the fall of Masada.

The Baptism of The Beast

Back in 2018 I argued on my other blog that The Lake of Fire is the Baptism of Fire.  It is chiefly part of how I argue for Universal Salvation.  But one implication of that I failed to focus on, The Beast and False Prophet are cast into The Lake of Fire without being killed first.  In other words the chief villains of this narrative become Christians in the context of my Lake of Fire view.  And the significance of that didn't hit me till today, the same day I'm posting this.

Now when I wrote that I wasn't as open to Partial-Preterism/Post-Millenialism as I have been the last couple years.  This Epiphany has increased my openness even more.

But there are still things to work out, it can be compatible with Futurism but it means the "Antichrist" isn't the irredeemable Demon-Man popular fiction based on the End Times likes to Imagine.

The thing is most legitimate Eschatology scholars whether Futurist, Historicist or Preterist do see The beast as in some capacity being Rome.  So I just opened the door to seeing the Christianization of Rome as part of Bible Prophecy.

But I am still not open to Full Preterism and my Post-Millennialism would still have to be Revivalist not Reconstructionist, since The Beast and False prophet are still in The Lake over a Thousand years later the purging of whatever they represent into truly Christ Like Kingdoms is a process that is still ongoing.

One could also consider Ticonius, he is considered the founder of Post-Millennialism yet his version of it went hand in hand with a basically Historicist view of II Thessalonians 2.

The most recent post on that blog about the Edict of Toleration may be relevant to my now developing ideas, but I have lots of details to work out.

As I said before I'll basically retire this Blog and start a new one if I fully leave Futurism, but for now I'm still thinking.

Revelation isn't Gnostic

The YouTuber TIK has recently done a video on Gnosticism.  TIK is a frustrating YouTuber, he says some things I agree with and has provided me with lots of useful information, I like that he acknowledges the differences between Fascism and Nazism.  But he is also clearly a weird type of Classical Liberal and that renders incomprehensible his understanding of what Socialism is.  

In this case he's correct that certain Nazis had ideas related to Ancient Gnosticism, but Hitler himself didn't take that stuff seriously and even found Himmler's obsessions kind of annoying.  And I agree that Gnostic or at least Platonist ideas have become a part of Mainstream Christianity, but I wouldn't frame how that happened in such Conspiratorial terms.

The idea that Revelation specifically is a Gnostic text, especially the way TIK is defining Gnosticism, is absurd.  There is no conventional conception of the Afterlife in Revelation, the Utopia we are looking forward to is this world perfected, and it anticipates a literal Bodily Resurrection of The Dead.

The truth is many Gnostics, especially Marcionites, eventually become hostile to Revelation.  You see once you fall for a Marcionite rejection of the Old Testament you will eventually realize that, in terms how we often use the term colloquially, Revelation is more Old Testament then the Old Testament.  For a contemporary example of that see the Good God YouTube channel.

It is true that some rejectors of Revelation propose that it was written by Cerinthus or someone with similar ideas and that Cerinthus is sometimes labeled a Gnostic by websites like Wikipedia  However the main Gnostic like belief associated with Cerinthus is believing the material world was created by a lesser Angel not the Supreme God and that that lesser Angel was the YWHW who gave The Torah.  But he didn't believe that Creator was Evil and thus didn't view the physical world as evil and was in fact the exact opposite of Marcion in his view of the Old Testament, he actually felt Christians should continue keeping The Torah.  Now I don't believe Revelation agrees with Cerinthian theology either, but the point is most Anti-Revelation people see it as having the opposite problem to Gnosticism.

There is a Podcast on YouTube of some modern Gnostics talking about Revelation with a title that may imply they're going to argue it is Gnostic, but in fact they agree on everything I just explained about how materialist and Anti-Gnostic it is, though will try to from their POV find positive traits within it.

TIK uses Augustine as one of his sources talking about Augustine as a former Gnostic.  But the thing is Augustine was a former Gnostic who brought Gnostic baggage with him, He was a Gnostic first because he was uncomfortable with the Old Testament's depiction of an Emotional Changeable God, he didn't leave Gnosticism for the mainstream Church because he rejected that hostility but because Ambrose convinced him all that stuff could be allegorized away.  Augustine's hostility towards Revelation, or at least to interpreting Revelation literally/Premillennially was a product of how still Gnostic he was.  Augustine openly defended taking ideas from Plato, Gnosticism is really just Hyper Platonism.

TIK goes on to claim that the "Dialectical Materialism" of Marxists and other Leftists isn't real Materialism because they use terms that sound weird to him.  I also feel that Leftist Dialectal Materialism should separate itself from Hegelian terms, but everything that sounds Mystical or whatever in Hegel is an allegory, it's still meant to be Materialist.

Another part of the problem is how Immanuel Kant kind of changed what it means to be an "Idealist" because for him the Ideas came from the Mind.  Kantian Idealism would have been considered at least Semi-Materialist in the Ancient Greek world because they considered part of the material world even Supernatural things like Spirits and lower case g gods.  And that goes even more so for how Kantianism evolved in different directions under Schopenhauer and Hegel.

But also Marx is someone who changed over the source of his life, some of his very early stuff was Hegelian before Marxism was actually a thing, but many have argued he was effectively Anti-Hegelian by the end.

No Premillennialists do not believe the Great Commission will fail.

As InspiringPhilosophy claimed in his latest End Times Video.

His understanding of the Great Commission is based on the bad "Make disciples of all nations" reading of the last two verses of Matthew 28, but that is not supported by the KJV or the Young's Literal Translation where it says to teach all nations (the Peshitta also supports this reading).

I believe The Great Commission has already succeeded because I don't view it as requiring the entire earth to become Christian, there are Christians in every country now, The Bible can be read in pretty much every Language.  The Gospel has indeed been published in all the world.

While IP is different from Victorious Eschatology, once again he repeats the trope that Partial Preterism is a more "Positive" view then Futurism.  And again I believe in Universal Salvation, if you do not then you can't claim your eschatology is more optimistic then mine.

"The Night is Darkest just before The Dawn" that's a quote from the last episode of the Canadian English Dub of Futari wa Pretty Cure season 1.  Bad things happening before the end does not make our view inherently nihilistic.  

That said I'm far from a standard Pre-Mil Futurist and have not made up my mind actually how much of the traditional view of The Beast I still hold to, there is plenty of room within Pre-Mil and Futurism to debate just how bad things will get.

Thing is we've reached the point where it's pretty secularly undeniable that things are gonna get pretty Bad if Jesus doesn't return soon.  We have little hope right now of solving Climate Change before it become irreversible.  "Lest those days be shortened there will be no flesh left".

I have already made a point on this blog out of how what actually is defined as being exactly a Thousand years is Satan being bound in The Abyss.  The Kingdom doesn't end when the Thousand Years ends, and I place the Parousia some amount of time before it begins as well (at the 7th Trumpet and thus before the Bowls).  The sense in which The Kingdom began at Pentecost and/or with Jesus's Ministry is not in conflict with Premilenialism, not how I understand it anyway.

Revelation isn't the only Book to mention a time period between the Parousia when Believes are Resurrected and the final General Resurrection, it is in fact also in 1 Corinthians 15:23-26.  Revelation 20 is simply the only place this time period is given a specific number of years.

The difference between Revelation and other Prophecies isn't a matter of how "clear" or "cryptic" they are, even the Olivet Discourse uses figures of speech you can't take hyper literally, before it even gets to the Parables.  

Revelation needs to be interpreted Chronologically because it's opening defines itself as Jesus revealing to us what God has revealed to Him that previously even He didn't know.  In Matthew 24 that is explicitly the timing of everything.  The book clearly presents itself as a sequence of evens being revealed to John as a sequence of causes and effects, the only reason the book has ever been confusing is because even most Futurists now insist on garbling the Chronology to suit their pet theories.

Eventually the video delves into the usual Preterist memes I've already talked about on this blog like making everything about 70 AD (most Prophecies I do interpret preteristically I see as about the reign of Hadrian) or the 666=Nero lunacy.

InspiringPhilosophy finally made a video about his Eschatology views.

He'd been mentioning casually in Tweets being a Partial Preterist and Post Millenialist for awhile now.  So I can't agree with everything in this video but as someone who's become more open to those views it is interesting, certainly closer to something I could accept then the Partial Preterism of Victorious Eschatology.