The 390 years and 40 years of Ezekiel.

 Ezekiel 4:4-6.

 Lie thou also upon thy left side, and lay the iniquity of the house of Israel upon it: according to the number of the days that thou shalt lie upon it thou shalt bear their iniquity.  For I have laid upon thee the years of their iniquity, according to the number of the days, three hundred and ninety days: so shalt thou bear the iniquity of the house of Israel.  And when thou hast accomplished them, lie again on thy right side, and thou shalt bear the iniquity of the house of Judah forty days: I have appointed thee each day for a year.

I've talked on another blog about how I feel these time-periods make most sense as ending with the Captivity of Judah, rather then beginning with a Captivity.  And I've mentioned on this blog before how this does NOT support the Historicist Day=Year theory logic because a period of Days did still happen.

Still, it remains popular for variations of both Zionism and British Israelism & Two House theology to insist the 390 years points to some relatively modern event.  This is done by misusing Leviticus 26.  Problem is Leviticus 26 is about the Jubilee, and it uses Times as a synonym for Years like Daniel and Revelation do for certain prophecies.  If Leviticus 26 has any eschatological significance, it is in terms of expanding the "Tribulation period" from the usual expected seven years to a full Jubilee.  Or perhaps a Jubilee separating the end of the Millennium and descent of New Jerusalem.  And that is something I may talk about more in the future.

But for now, I want to talk about how these time periods were fulfilled if they indeed began rather then ended with their captivities.  Perhaps as a second fulfillment.

The Babylonian captivity is commonly refereed to as 70 years.  Chuck Missler has talked about how there were really two overlapping periods of 70 years, 608-538 BC and 588-518 BC.  The Captivity and the Desolation of Jerusalem.  From that however, I notice it becomes possible also to say that there were 40 years from the final Captivity of Judah, to the initial decree to rebuild it issued by Cyrus and return from Captivity under Zerubabel and Jeshua.  So Ezekiel's 40 years for Judah was fulfilled without needing to multiply anything by 70.

 [Update January 23rd 2017:  Well my generally solid math skills totally betrayed when I made this and allowed me to think 588-538 BC was 40 rather then 50 years.  That puts a hole in this premise. But given that later then the Temple's destruction many Judeans fled to Egypt as Jeremiah records.   And Ezekiel also talks about a 40 year Captivity of Egypt.  Maybe that's how the 40 years for Judah can fit?]

722 BC being the usual date for the final fall of Samaria, makes 390 years later the year 332 BC.

That is the year Alexander The Great first came to the land of Israel and Judah.  Early in that year he finished besieging Tyre, and by the end he'd entered Egypt.  So anything he is recorded as doing in the lands of the 12 Tribes before going to Egypt would have happened in 332 BC.

Much is made about Josephus account of Alexander's activities in this year in Antiquities of The Jews Book 11 Chapter 8.  Many say Josephus made it all up, but I believe the account is true.  And I certainly believe Josephus over The Talmud which gets the High Priest wrong.  Alexander was shown Daniel's Prophecies of him like how Cyrus was shown Isaiah 44 and 45.  And he honored Yahuah in The Temple in Jerusalem.

Less talked about however is what Josephus tells us about Alexander and the Samaritans, chiefly in section 6.  Josephus does so from a perspective of hostility towards the Samaritans.  It was a bit more complicated then his relationship with The Jews.  But most importantly the building of the Samaritan Temple was sanctioned by Alexander, that happened earlier in Section 4.

Jesus of course agreed with the account in 2 Kings 17 that the Samaritans descended from Gentiles, when he called them not Israelites.  But some remnants of Ephraim and Manasseh may have intermingled with them.

Could Macedon have been another nation descended form the Lost Tribes?  Dan is linked to Greece in Ezekiel 27, and I've argued that possibly is backed up by Daniel 8.  I've also argued for linking Asher, Western Manesseh, and Zebulun & Isshacar to Celtic tribes, and Macedon had a Celtic element.  The Slavic elements of modern Macedonia come from Slavs migrating south during medieval times and later.

Joel 3 also refereed to Judeans being sold into slavery to Greeks.  And God says that from there God shall raise them up to bring Judgment to Tyre and Sidon and Philista.  Alexander besieged Tye and Gaza, and totally destroyed the latter.

Most historians and archeologists think the earliest Macedonian King likely to be historical was Perdiccas I.  Dates for him vary but he seems to emerge around 700 BC.  After the fall of the Northern Kingdom.

Whether the ancient Macedonians counted as fellow Greeks was a mater of controversy, it seems most Greeks didn't want to claim them till after Alexander became so important to Greek History.  Yet The Bible agrees with calling them Greeks at least in the context of Daniel 8.

Zechariah 9-11 is like 12-14, three Chapters that are all one Prophesy.  It's perhaps even more confusing to interpret, many isolated verses are important and well known, but how they all fit together is difficult.

Zechariah 9 also alluded to The Resurrection in verses 11 and 12.  And I have argued Alexander was among those Resurrected in Matthew 27:52-53, without mentioning Zechariah 9. 

Chuck Missler has argued much of Zechariah 9 could be about Alexander The Great, Greece is mentioned.  But Ephraim is mentioned as well, and others have seen this Prophecy as being important to figuring out how Joseph and Judah will finally be reunited.  Britam sees the later part as a double fulfillment Prophecy about both the Maccabean revolt and a future Messiah Ben Joseph.

Zechariah 9:13

 When I have bent Judah for me, filled the bow with Ephraim, and raised up thy sons, O Zion, against thy sons, O Greece, and made thee as the sword of a mighty man.

Could this be poetically linking Greece to Ephraim similarly to how Zion is to Judah?

John R. Salverda has attempted to argue legends about Sisphus in Greek mythology are partly inspired by Joseph of Genesis.  He and Britam in general make lots of Arguments I would not support.  But his argument that Ephyra, the name of a couple of ancient Greek cities, could be linked to Ephraim is interesting, given how Ephraim is technically a plural or dual form, the singular would be close to Ephyra or Ephrya.  Ephrath was the feminine plural.  One Ephyra was a city of Epirus, the homeland of Alexander's mother Olympias.

Salverda's arguments also bring up the possible Salmoneus and Solomon connection, which I mentioned in my last Song of Solomon post.

But just as Cyrus decree was only the beginning of Judah's return from Captivity, so 332 BC was only the beginning of Ephraim's.

Isaac Newton's Historicism connected the End TImes to 2016

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religious_views_of_Isaac_Newton#2016_vs_2060

2016 vs 2060

However, between the time he wrote his 2060 prediction (about 1704) until his death in 1727 Newton conversed, both first hand and by correspondence, with other famous theologians of his time. Those contemporaries who knew him during the remaining 23 years of his life appear to be in agreement that Newton, and the "best interpreters" including Jonathan Edwards, Robert Fleming, Moses Lowman, Phillip Doddridge, and Bishop Thomas Newton, were eventually "pretty well agreed" that the 1,260-year timeline should be calculated from the year 756 AD.^[48]
F.A. Cox also confirmed that this was the view of Newton and others, including himself:

“The author adopts the hypothesis of Fleming, Sir Isaac Newton, and Lowman, that the 1260 years commenced in A.d. 756; and consequently that the millennium will not begin till the year 2016.”^[49]

Thomas Williams stated that this timeline had become the predominant view among the leading Protestant theologians of his time:

“Mr. Lowman, though an earlier commentator, is (we believe) far more generally followed ; and he commences the 1260 days from about 756, when, by aid of Pepin, King of France, the Pope obtained considerable temporalities. This carries on the reign of Popery to 2016, or sixteen years into the commencement of the Millennium, as it is generally reckoned.”^[50]

In April of 756 AD, Pepin, King of France, accompanied by Pope Stephen II entered northern Italy, forcing the Lombard King Aistulf to lift his siege of Rome, and return to Pavia. Following Aistulf's capitulation, Pepin gave the newly conquered territories to the Papacy by means of the Donation of Pepin, thereby elevating the Pope from being a subject of the Byzantine Empire to head of state, with temporal power over the newly constituted Papal States.
The end of the timeline is based on Daniel 8:25 which reads "...but he shall be broken without hand" and is understood to mean that the end of the Papacy with not be caused by any human action.^[51] Volcanic activity is described as the means by which Rome will be overthrown.^[52]

"Antichrist will retain some part of his dominion over the nations till about the year 2016." "And when the 1260 years are expired, Rome itself, with all its magnificence, will be absorbed in a lake of fire, sink into the sea, and rise no more at all for ever*."^[53]

In 1870 the newly formed Kingdom of Italy annexed the remaining Papal States, depriving the Popes of any temporal rule for the next 59 years. Unaware that Papal rule would be restored, (albeit on a greatly diminished scale) in 1929 as head of the Vatican City state, the historicist view that the Papacy is the Antichrist, and the associated timelines delineating his rule rapidly declined in popularity as one of the defining characteristics of the Antichrist (i.e. that he would also be a political temporal power at the time of the return of Jesus) were no longer met.
Eventually, the prediction was largely forgotten and no major Protestant denomination currently subscribes to this timeline.
Despite the dramatic nature of a prediction of the end of the world, Newton may not have been referring to the 2060 date as a destructive act resulting in the annihilation of the earth and its inhabitants, but rather one in which he believed the world was to be replaced with a new one based upon a transition to an era of divinely inspired peace. In Christian theology, this concept is often referred to as The Second Coming of Jesus Christ and the establishment of Paradise by The Kingdom of God on Earth.^[43]

I reject the Day=Year theory this was dependent on.  But it's amusing given how many feel about 2016 now that someone Predicted it to be Apocalyptic Centuries ago.

The Day-Year theory

This theory is pretty much vital to Historicism as traditionally understood, that model largely can't work without it.

The cited Biblical precedent comes from Numbers 14:34 and Ezekiel 4:6.  In both cases a literal period of days did happen.  Numbers connected the 40 days of spying to the 40 years in the wilderness.  And Ezekiel is told to do something for a period of days to represent a period of years.

This is not consistent with how the theory gets applied to the numbers in Daniel and Revelation.  Neither verse justifies saying when God predicts a period of days will happen it really means years.

Even IF I conceded that flawed argument, that doesn't change the verses that refer to 42 months or a "time times and half a time".  You don't get to just say "a month is 30 days" because it actually isn't universally.

In both Hebrew and Greek the words used for month were also forms of their words for Moon.  While I believe the 42 months and 1260 days are referring to roughly the same periods, I don't believe what's specifically said of the months (one of which is the time period of the Beast's reign) has to be calculated to the day, it just means 42 New Moons will happen.  The Bible would not have used this terminology if it didn't want us keeping the Moon in mind for deciphering it.

What I'm saying is, unless you can find a way to make 30 years or about that also relevant to The Moon, the Historicist position on 42 months simply can't work.

And it is 42 Months that Revelation 13 defines the reign of The Beast as lasting, as well as the Holy City trodden under foot of The Gentiles in Revelation11.

Of the three ways this time frame is described in Revelation/Daniel, I think the "time times and half a time" is the easiest to interpret differently.  But Daniel 4 uses a similar concept where if the "seven times" aren't years they are probably shorter periods rather then longer ones.

And even if I conceded all that.  It doesn't change that the clear chronology of Revelation does not allow the 1260 days of Revelation 11 to be the same as the 1260 days of Revelation 12, the latter can't begin till the former ends, and that transition point is where The Rapture happens.

But even following all of that flawed logic.  Every model I've seen (which are all The Papacy is the Antichrist models) has the mortal wounding of the Beast ending the 42 months (usually with Napoleon's conquest of the Papal States).  While I feel the logical reading of Revelation 13 is that 42 months is the time the Beast is allowed to continue following the Wound being healed.  As well as that the wounding was specifically to one of the Heads.

This Historicist argument tends to be the only time when the fraudulent Donation of Constantine is actually treated as real by Anti-Catholics, as it is sometimes used to determine the start date.

Interestingly enough though, the Day-Year theory doesn't remove Three and a Half years from Bible Prophecy altogether, because Revelation 11 gives us Three and a Half days from the Deaths of the Two Witnesses till their Resurrection and Rapture.

Has any Historicist ever addressed the Five Months affiliated with the 5th Trumpet in Revelation 9?  I believe their purpose is partly to echo the timeline of The Flood narrative.

I can't entirely condemn their desire to see the 6th head as not actually contemporary with when John wrote Revelation since I've argued for that myself in the past though it's not my current main view on the Seven Heads.  But I've never seen a strong Papal View argument for why this was expressed to the John from that viewpoint.  Mostly it seems to be expressed now days with Pope John Paul II as the 6th head, the contemporary Pope while many modern Day-Year theorists defined their views.

I feel if we accept that 6th Head as not actually when Revelation was written it must be either a time already in the Past when John wrote, something contemporary readers could have seen as significant.  Or the 6th is during the Eschatological Week, perhaps reigning as it starts.  As far as an already past modern historical time goes, only the founding of Israel in 1947-1949 is a remotely viable option.

The Papal fixation is dependent on the "Temple in II Thessalonians 2 is really The Church" error.

It's interesting how Historicism seems to have the least variety in it's Antichrist views.  Even Preterism occasionally has options besides being a Roman Emperor.

I could hypothetically devise a Non-Papal view that can be just about as consistent with all the flawed arguments made above.  It focuses on the Eastern Roman Empire rather then Western, and thus on Eastern Orthodox Christianity as the Harlot.

It begins with arguing that the Split of the Empire really happens in 193 AD in April when Pescennius Niger was proclaimed Emperor in Syria.  Then the 1260 days ends with the fall of Constantinople in 1453 AD.  Then, since Modern Greece views itself as a successor to that state, it's Seven Kings were the Seven Heads, and in that case the 6th was reigning in 1948.  I considered that idea from my purely Futurist perspective here.

But again, that view would have mostly the same problems.

Historicists tend to share the bias Futurists have for wanting to believe the Millennium will start within our lifetime.  And since they tend to feel the start of these periods needs to be after Revelation was written.  It'll be awhile before any are willing to suggest there are two 1260 years periods, with the second starting about where the first will end.  To me the plain reading of Revelation does not allow the two periods to be happening at the same time.

Historicism is not as inherently objectionable to me as Full Preterism, or Amillenialism.  Since it does not require denying a literal Bodily Resurrection of believers.

And I am kind of rejecting the Individual Antichrist as it's usually defined.  But the Abomination of Desolation I will always see as a specific event three and a half or seven years before the Millennium starts.

If you want to convince me of an Historicist model, you need to find a way to make it work without the Day-Year Theory.

Mid-Trib possibly predates Pre-Trib

As I said before, I believe a view popping up late is not an argument against it, which is why I disagree with trying to use that logic to refute Pre-Trib.  At any rate only Post-Tribers can use that argument consistently because only that view existed among the Pre-Nicean fathers. 

But Mid-Trib (which my view vaguely qualifies as, but isn't traditional Mid-Trib as defined by Wikipedia) has to deal with a perception that clearly Pre-Trib and Post-Trib both came first and it was merely created as a compromise.  (But the undeniably far younger Pre-Wrathers can't accept that argument so they focus on calling us "a Defunct view").

Pre-Tribulationism along with Dispensationalism are traditionally attributed to Darby in the early 19th Century.  Though the truth is Darby was just copying and repackaging the views of Edward Irving who lived about the same time.

The attempts of Pre-Tribbers to give their view a greater antiquity include Ephraim the Syrian which claim I've already debunked.  A statement in the Apocalypse of Peter which is ambiguous but at the very least is clearly predicting The Church to face Tribulation first.  And attempts to read it into any reference to "Imminence" among the Church Fathers same as they do The New Testament itself.

Also Increase and Cotton Mather of the Seventeenth Century are claimed, but from what I have been able to read they seem pretty post-Trib to me, but Increase was adamant about a future conversion of the Jews which modern Post-Trib tends to reject.

Another name thrown out is Manuel Lacunza who died in 1801.  He was a Jesuit Priest who's eschatological work was published under a false name.  His book can be read online and I've seen nothing Pre-Trib in it and have seen others say outright that those labeling him Pre-Trib are lying.

However there is one claim of a Pre Irving and Darby teacher teaching a Rapture separate from the Revelation 19 event that holds up under scrutiny.  And that is Morgan Edwards a Baptist preacher who lived from 1722-1795.  However his timeline placed the Second Coming and Resurrection and Gathering of Believers not Seven but Three and a Half years before the start of the Millennium.

"The distance between the first and second resurrection will be somewhat more than a thousand years. I say, somewhat more—, because the dead saints will be raised, and the living changed at Christ's "appearing in the air" (I Thes. iv. 17); and this will be about three years and a half before the millennium, as we shall see hereafter: but will he and they abide in the air all that time? No: they will ascend to paradise, or to some one of those many "mansions in the father's house" (John xiv. 2), and disappear during the foresaid period of time. The design of this retreat and disappearing will be to judge the risen and changed saints; for "now the time is come that judgment must begin," and that will be "at the house of God" (I Pet. iv. 17)."-Two Academical Exercises on Subjects Bearing the following Titles; Millennium, Last-Novelties.

His model is different then my view still based on how he defined Tribulation and when he places the time of the Two Witnesses.  Here is a Pre-Trib site talking about him.

So the best evidence for a Pre-Darby separate Rapture is clearly a Mid-Trib one.

The only Medieval example that can be found of a Futurist view other then Post-Trib was a cult leader trying to give a special Last Prophet status to himself.  His timeline is complicated and confusing but clearly allows no more then Three and a Half years.

"Again, [Dolcino believed and preached and taught] that within those three years Dolcino himself and his followers will preach the coming of the Antichrist. And that the Antichrist was coming into this world within the bounds of the said three and a half years; and after he had come, then he [Dolcino] and his followers would be transferred into Paradise, in which are Enoch and Elijah. And in this way they will be preserved unharmed from the persecution of Antichrist. And that then Enoch and Elijah themselves would descend on the earth for the purpose of preaching [against] Antichrist. Then they would be killed by him or by his servants, and thus Antichrist would reign for a long time. But when the Antichrist is dead, Dolcino himself, who then would be the holy pope, and his preserved followers, will descend on the earth, and will preach the right faith of Christ to all, and will convert those who will be living then to the true faith of Jesus Christ."

Source [Gumerlock's translation of the Latin text in Gumerlock, "A Rapture Citation," pp. 354-55.].

Mid-Trib is often accused of not popping up till the early or mid 20th Century.

But between Edwards and that point is a book predicated on claiming Louise-Napoleon III was the Antichrist (written while he was still Emperor) that predicts the Rapture to happen during the third year of the seven years, which is discussed in Chapter V (pages 77-81).  So a weird view, but shows that alternatives to Pre or Post Trib were always being considered.

Going back to Pre-Darby, other 17th and 18th Century references cited are all vague, some do sound like they view the Rapture and the start of the Millennium as separate, but the exact timing is not made clear.  They may not have picked a side in Pre-Trib vs Mid-Trib at all.  These include Peter Jurieu, and Thomas Collier.

Peter Jurieu clearly did not teach a Secret Rapture, he refereed to it as a Glorious Apparition.  Some criticisms of attempts to find early examples of Pre-Trib are discussed here.  But it's unaware of Morgan Edwards.

Update February 7th 2018:  I've read now some critics of seeing Edwards as Pre-Trib.

Some will respond that Morgan Edwards seems to have been a Historicist and not Futurist at all.  He seems to have had some Hsitoricsts elements (it being ingrained in Protestant tradition has Futurists to this day saying things that sound Historicist).  But his limiting the ministry of the Witnesses to the three and a half years between the Resurrection and the Millennium makes him clearly not a pure Historicist.

The only basis for three and a half years in a pure Historicist Day=Year theory model would be the three and a half days between the Death and Resurrection of the Two Witnesses.  That makes it pretty difficult to have exactly three and a half years between the Rapture and the start of the Millennium.

Historicism inherently has more in common with Mid-Trib then Post-Trib because it's more open to accepting the Chronology of Revelation at face value.

This Morgan Edwards was a Historicist argument takes this quote. "there are no more than about 204 years between now and their death: I should therefore expect that their appearance is not far off." as supporting him being a Historicist.  If their death was 204 years away at most, then the Hisotricist model should have had them appear over a Thousand Years before Edwards' own time.  The fact is Edwards took the Witnesses far to literally for proper Historicism.

The Hisotricist elements in what he taught involved stuff about the Ottoman Turks being a Beast and the Papacy being the Man of Sin of 2 Thesselonians 2.  Stuff I've seen plenty of Futurists incorporate into Futurist models.  For the former I myself believe the Beast Empire will emerge out of Geo-political entities that already exist, and what role Turkey might play in that my mind has changed on a few times.  And for the latter, there is no shortage of Futurist Papal-Antichrist views within Protestant circles.  In fact I was encountering it long time before I even learned it was traditionally associated with a non-Futurist model.

Here is another quote from Edwards on the Subject.

Another event previous to the Millennium will be the appearing of the son of man in the clouds, coming to raise the dead saints and change the living, and to catch them up to himself, and then withdrawing with them, and observed before, This event will come to pass when Antichrist be arrived at Jerusalem in his conquest of the world; and about three years and a half before his killing the witnesses, and assumption of godhead.

It certainly shows he was not teaching a Historicist view on the Two Witnesses.  In a sense it hurts reading him as Mid-Trib in that it places the Abomination of Desolation three and a half years after The Rapture.  Some tend to place when  he conquers Jerusalem as about the same time as the Abomination.  I personally am not sure he'll "conquer" Jerusalem at all.

So I may now have to retract what was the central example of this post.  It seems he may well effectively fit the proper definition of Pre-Trib, but simply sees the total time-frame in mind as only three and a half years.  It's weird that he doesn't place the Abomination of Desolation at the halfway point, but about a month before the Millennium starts.

Pre-Tribbers aren't trying to keep his quotes out of context, as the RaptureReady website posts the whole work.   http://www.raptureready.com/morgan-edwards/.  Though I had trouble getting the first part to load.  The third part contains the quotes used to make him seem Historicist. However he goes on to say.

"The abomination intentioned by Daniel is supposed to be that which Antiochus Epiphanes set up in the temple; but that was before Christ time many hundred years; the Romans set up no abomination in the temple; for it was destroyed before they could gain possession of it; therefore Christ refers to a thing that is yet to come; and to a temple that is not yet extant."

Something that is inherently Futurist.

The context of the 204 years quote was him saying he thinks the Witnesses will appear in some sense before they begin the proper 1260 day Ministry.   He also argued for the Witnesses being Elijah and John who wrote Revelation.  So no he was not supporting any Day=Year theory here.

He also clarified the Antichrist will be the last Pope.  He was not saying All Popes are collectively The Antichrist.

At the end of section 3 he clearly separates the Second Coming from the Rapture, which is a fairly inherently Pre-Trib thing to do.

I get really frustrated reading on, as he clearly anticipates a lot of conventional Dispensational memes.  Like separating the Gog and Magog of Revelation 20 from Ezekiel 38.  He also teaches the Zionism typical of Darby inspired Dispensationalism.

And I've found a PDF link where you can read all of it.
http://www.pre-trib.org/data/pdf/Edwards-TwoAcademicalExercis.pdf

Morgan Edwards may very well qualify as the first Futurist of the English Speaking world, and maybe also the Protestant world.  Everything else I've studied about 16th-18th Century Eschatology debates pretty much treats Premillenialism as synonymous with Historicism.

Update April 9th 2019:

 The PDF Link I provided for reading Morgan Edwards online doesn't work anymore, however the Rapture Ready website seems to have fixed the problem they had for Section 1.

The Apocalypse of Elijah is another text I've seen Pre-Tribbers throw around as Ancient Precedent for a Pre-Trib Rapture.  But again this text clearly fits Mid-Trib far better, as it clearly has The Antichrist persecuting Christians and martyring Enoch and Elijah in chapter 4, before the Rapture in chapter 5.

I can't be certain what Methodius of Olympus over all chronology for Revelation was.  But his teaching that The Man-Child is the Saints rather then Jesus is pretty hard to reconcile with Post-Trib.

The Seven Millenniums of Human History Theory

It's a very popular hypothesis, it makes sense in light of the thematic importance of the number 7 in Scripture.  But I feel the foundation of it is rather shaky.  Yet most people who aren't entirely against Date Setting base their calculations almost solely on this theory, or some variant of the This Generation shall not pass theory, or some contrived view of Revelation 12.

2 Peter 3 draws on a statement from one of the Psalms to say "A day is like a Thousand years and a Thousand years like a day".  The intent of this statement is merely a poetic idiom of God's Timelessness.

But it's popular from there to build a doctrine of the 7 days of Creation representing 7 Millennium of Human History.

It is interesting that this 7 Millenniums theory is expressed in The Talmud and other Rabbinic sources, and Christian supporters of these views keep pointing to the Rabbinic and Kabbalistic support of the idea to prop it up, since it lacks direct Biblical support.  Still Christian support for the idea goes back to Ireaneus.  But the Church Fathers who held this view believed Jesus first advent was around 5500 AM because they used the Septuagint, so they predicted about 500-5030 AD for the Millennium to start.

The core thing that makes it seem credible to Christians is the doctrine of The Millennium from Revelation 20., which becomes viewed as the Sabbath millennium.

One problem is the Revelation 20 Millennium is never Biblically defined as a period of rest or even of peace.  1 Corinthians 15, the only place outside Revelation that clearly addresses there being a period between the Second Coming and the full New Creation, says in verses 24-28.

"Then cometh the end, when he shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father; when he shall have put down all rule and all authority and power.  For he must reign, till he hath put all enemies under his feet.  The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death.  For he hath put all things under his feet. But when he saith all things are put under him, it is manifest that he is excepted, which did put all things under him.  And when all things shall be subdued unto him, then shall the Son also himself be subject unto him that put all things under him, that God may be all in all."

It's defined sort of as a period of Conquest.  Zechariah 14 also seems to show it as a time when Jesus is ruling, but people are obeying him out of fear not love.  I've explained elsewhere how lots of passages people think are The Millennium are really the New Heaven and New Earth.  Those include Isaiah 65, Ezekiel 40-48 and Psalm 48.

But the greater death nail to the theory is that in fact there is more then a Thousand years between the destruction of The Beast and the Descent of New Jerusalem..

Revelation 20 has many conditions, but only one is defined as ending "when the Thousand years are over", Satan being bound in The Abyss.  The Beheaded Saints reign with Christ a thousand years, but it doesn't say their reign ends then.  The "rest of the dead" are not raised till after the Thousand years, but it doesn't say that happens immediately either.

Satan has to deceive the Nations before the Gog and Magog invasion can happen.  We have no idea how long he'll do that, it certainly could be very quickly, but maybe it could be a long time, years, centuries, maybe even another thousand years.

More important then that however is that I do agree with Chris White that the Gog and Magog invasion of Revelation 20 is the same as Ezekiel 38-39.  In which case we know their dead bodies will be buried for 7 years before being raised for the White Throne Judgment.  And the burying will take 7 months.

So I certainly think roughly 7 Thousand years is possible.  But I would highly advise against making needing exactly 6000 years pivotal to your chronology.  Though I have suggested one such theory in the past, but I had other reasons for that theory also, and now no longer support that chronology at all.

A stronger Biblical argument can be made for using the "Day like a Thousand years" idea with Hosea 5:15-6:2 for Two Thousand years from the Ascension.  Which refers to YHWH returning to His place for two days and coming back on the third day when Israel acknowledges their offense.  Hosea 5:15 is God talking.  Chapter 6 records what Israel will pray in their repentance, 6:2 has the time reference in mind.

Which based on my 30 AD date for the Crucifixion can back up a 2030-2037 model with a 2033 Rapture.

Because Hosea's statement was a Prophecy, that works better then looking at 7 literal days that did literally happen and saying that tells how long history will be when no Bible passage directly tells us that.

But it could be Hosea is also talking about literal 24 hour days.  Perhaps events that will transpire during the end times.

So I see Hosea as possibly implying about 2000 years from the Ascension to the Second Coming, but not necessarily exactly to the day or even exact year.

But I'm not gonna be dogmatic on that either, since I hate the Day=Year theory of historicists, I feel considering Day=Millennium definitive when the scriptural support for both is about equal is quite hypocritical.  The Day=Year theory does have a precedent in Ezekiel 4, but that is Ezekiel doing something for days he's told represents years, it does not justify saying every reference to days in Daniel and Revelation is really years.

Many people arguing for the 7 Millenniums theory incorporate the Hosea reference into it.  They argue Jesus was Crucified in the 4000th year from Adam, they provide no proper chronology to back that up, only asserting symbolic reasons it would make sense.  Then cite Hosea to support 2000 years from the first advent to the second.

Another argument for 6000 years is trying to say the 120 years of Genesis 6 refers to 120 Jubilees and 50x120=6000.  1. That is clearly about 120 years before the Flood, no mention of Jubilees, a second application to human life spans/what a generation is possible but not solid.  2. A Jubilee is actually 49 years, the 50th year is the first year of the next cycle.  3. The Jubliee was given to Moses to be instituted by Joshua, it's not relevant to any pre-Mosaic history.

I lay out a possible opinion on when the year 6000 was here.

Genesis 5-6 don't have anything happen on exactly the year 1000, Genesis 11-12 has nothing happen on exactly the year 2000 though there is a rabbinic tradition based on the wrong 1948 AM birth-date for Abraham that he first became a Believer at 52.  Ussher had the completion of The Temple in the year 3000 AM but if he was wrong on anything then that doesn't work.  Ussher's Creation date could also be used to make the proposed 3 BC Birth of Jesus date 4000 AM, but I no longer consider that date valid.

So I see no reason to think the year 6000 was or will be important.

Messiah The Prince of Daniel 9

The 70 weeks Prophecy four times refers to an awaited personage at the the end of the 69 weeks and/or the 70th week.

Messiah The Prince in verse 25
The Messiah in verse 26
The Prince that shall come in verse 26
He in verse 27

The standard view among Christians who are Premillennial Futurists (and even some Preterists) has been that the first two are Jesus Christ and the last two the person we commonly call The Antichrist.  Chris White however promotes a theory he didn't invent himself that makes each of the four something different. predicating it largely on how unclear it is which of the earlier personages the He in verse 27 appears to be.

However most people reading this Prophecy without a Christian starting point, as well as many Christians who are Preterist, see the clear grammatical logic as saying all four are the same person.

When verse 25 says to await the coming of a Messiah The Prince and then verse 26 says The Prince that shall come logic dictates that it's the same Prince.  And if there aren't two or three different people refereed to earlier, figuring out who He is, isn't that complicated.

It's also pretty much unique to Christians to see a Villain in any of the four references.  Because you see the "he" after "Abominations" in the KJV of verse 27 isn't in the Hebrew.  So the first He is not the one who sets it/them up.  That can agree with seeing him as The Antichrist however, because in Revelation while The Image is of The Beast, it's the second beast (False Prophet) that sets it up and enforces it's worship.

I'm going to suggest that the traditional Christian view, and this "only one person is mentioned" view can both be right, via the principle of Double Fulfillment.  I've already documented that there are Jews without a Christian bias who see the 70th Week as yet future and separated from the first 69.  But I've also argued that seeing the 70th Week as being entirely fulfilled from 30-37 AD is more plausible then my fellow Futurists realize.  Recently I've argued that some of our assumptions about how the End Times 70th Week will play out are wrong.

The suggestion that there is a Prophecy which is fulfilled by both Jesus and the Antichrist is certainly controversial.  But Solomon was a type of both Jesus and The Antichrist.  When doing well he was the near fulfillment of the Messianic Kingdom.  But when he backslid, the number 666 was directly linked to him.  Samson likewise has been argued to prefigure both, especially by those who see Genesis 49 as implying a Danite Antichrist.  Saul could also be viewed this way.

The word "Antichrist" means, false Christ, or counterfeit Christ, or opposing Christ, or replacement Christ, or enemy of Christ. or antithesis of Christ, or opposite of Christ.  I've seen several different meanings argued for it, but they all involve Christ, which is Greek for Messiah.  Many Old Testament types of The Antichrist were anointed by true Prophets of God (Jeroboam and Jehu, also Solomon and Saul I already mentioned).  Jesus refereed to Judas as someone He Choose, and Judas could perform divine Miracles by Jesus authority.  Yet he was a Devil and the Son of Perdition.

And at any-rate, he'll need to be able to make Messianic Prophecies apply to him if he'll be a credible Messiah Ben-Joseph.

Given what I argued on those posts I linked to.  This would mean his Mortal Wounding is at the beginning of the 70th week.  We tend to assume that his Resurrection happens soon after his death.  But I notice that there is no reference in Revelation to The Beast being active during the first half of The Week.  The first undisputed appearance of The Beast is when he kills The Two Witnesses, and hes' already ascended out of The Pit by then.

I do agree that The First Horseman is likely the man who'll become The Beast.  But I've become inclined to view all of the first 6 Seals as being right at the start of The Week, due to my Sixth Seal view and other things.

Maybe the opening of the First Seal has him doing his own Triumphal Entry into Jerusalem, after winning many wars.  Doing it maybe even on the same day Jesus did his, the 10th of Nisan.  Then he is Crowned Messiah Ben-Joseph.  But the next thing to happen is the Red Horseman.  Who I argued in that same Four Horseman study could be The Antichrist's killer because of his Sword.  And many Christians and Jews will assume that that killer is The Antichrist/Armillus.

My main False Prophet theory wouldn't have it be possible for him to have The False Prophet with him already at this point.  But I could be wrong, he could also have a Prophet with him all through those Wars.  They could together claim to Christians to be The Two Witnesses, and to Jews that they're Messiah Ben-Joseph and/or Elijah and/or The Prophet like unto Moses and/or the Priest of the order of Melchizedek and/or Enoch.  And then people might selectively use the day=year theory to say that The Witnesses being dead three and a half days really means three and a half years.

This deception could fit what Perry Stone (who I respect and consider truly Saved) is predicting.  He's saying that The Temple will be under construction during the first half of the week, after Elijah/Witnesses conquers the Muslims.  Then The Mahdi will conquer Jerusalem and kill them and stop the sacrifice sin The Temple right after it was just finished being constructed.