Eschatology views Tier Ranking

I'm going to rank various positions on Eschatology in terms of how I personally feel about them at the time of my writing this post on Saturday November 13th of 2021.

S Tier: The Position(s) I currently favor.

I'm currently a Pre-Millennial Futurist with a Rapture Position that can be called "Mid-Trib", but not what many assume Mid-Trib means in that what The Rapture is I view mostly the same as Post-Tribbers, it is the Second Coming, and from my position's own POV the Tribulation by definition ends at The Rapture.  And The Last Trump is the Seventh Trumpet.

I also consider some Idealist readings of Revelation also true, it is also a symbolic summery of The Entire Biblical Meta narrative, but that doesn't conflict with it also being future events, because that's what every good final episode of a saga should be.

A Tier: Positions I'm currently very open to being converted to.

Historicism in it's Pre-Millennial form, Partial-Preterism and Revivalist post-Millennialism, or something that combines elements of those. 

I kind of want to be convinced of something like that now given other things I believe.  But it wouldn't be likely to be any in their current most well known forms, since my hypothetical Preterism wouldn't be 70 AD focused (not for Matthew, Mark or Revelation anyway) and my Historicism would be less fixated on The Vatican viewing Christian Monarchy in general as the Abomination of Desolation.

If I did abandon Futurism I would probably retire this blog and start a new one.

B Tier: Views I consider firmly wrong but not in any way heretical.

Middleism, only in that separating Matthew's Olivette Discourse from Revelation I view as untenable, whichever time period one is about so is the other.

Also any views where my only or main objections come down to not interpreting Revelation as Chronologically as I do.  But thus far everyone I've seen doing that is also guilty of something down below, (It's mainly associated with Post-Trib, Chris White's Pre-Wrath and Preterism).

C Tier: Views I consider tied to Heresy but merely minor ones

Dispensationalism (Pre-Trib, some forms of Mid-Trib, the Pre-Wrath view of Chris White), Supersecessionism (Most forms of Post-Trib, probably some hypothetical forms of Mid-Trib, and also today most Non Futurists).

And also Domminionism which mainly manifests as Reconstructionist Post-Millennialism but can be made compatible with other views.

D Tier: Views heretical in their rejections of core doctrines of the Faith.

Any view that denies a literal bodily Resurrection of The Dead.  Which is firmly required for Full Preterism and Amillenialism.

F Tier: Basically not even really Christian at all anymore.

Any view that identifies the Satan of The New Testament with YHWH The God of The Hebrew Bible.  Like Marcionism and the most well known forms of Gnosticism.

Often goes hand in hand with throwing out Revelation altogether as a False Prophecy.  But they may also selectively use stuff from Revelation.  Also these people are generally also doing the D Tier Heresy.

Pre-Trib Imminence is argued for the same way Endless Torment is argued for

This hit me as I was listening to this Podcast from Chris White arguing agaisnt Imminence.
https://bibleprophecytalk.com/a-hopefully-more-clear-refutation-of-an-imminent-rapture/

I'm listening to how baffled he is at the way a verse just being about The Parusia at all is enough to make Pre-Tribbers label it a proof text for Imminence, when in fact there are passages that that refer to certain things clearly happening first.

I'm ironically sympathetic because Endless Torment is defended the same way.  When some traditional Christian just lists verses that "prove" the doctrine in a context where they won't be challenged on them.  What they give are mostly a list of verses showing that God will judge sinners, a couple where it might be necessary to argue what a certain Greek word means, but most of them don't even include that word.

There are Bible verses that show God's Punishments/Chastisements are for Correction, from Habakkuk 1:12 to Job 37:13 to Proverbs 3:11.  Jesus affirms in Matthew 5, Luke 12 and Matthew 18 that the punishment is till the price is paid.  Deuteronomy 29-30 to Hosea to Ezekiel 16 all show that God's judgments on Israel are to bring her to repentance and that even Sodom will be restored.  Malachi 3 says the fire of God is for purging and purification and promises the children of Jacob they will not be consumed.

To them that proof texting is what's inappropriately picking and choosing in ignorance of the grander context.  And again like how Pre-Tribbers approach their Imminence passages feeling like anything less then their most extreme interpretation is tantamount to rejecting the passage entirely.  And both groups apply the same tactic to how they struggle to claim as much support as they can from the Pre-Nicene fathers

Endless Torment is only more respectable then Pre-Trib because it's been around longer.  But Pre-Trib won't go away and so if the Age of Grace lasts long enough we'll reach a point where Pre-Trib has more antiquity then Endless Torment has now.  Endless Torment was not unambiguously taught by anyone not later condemned as a heretic before Augustine of Hippo who couldn't read Greek at all.

Chris White's Pre-Wrath view does believe in a very similar kind of Imminence, just that it doesn't become Imminent till after the Abomination of Desolation.  I believe it's Imminent after that but not in a "nothing specific happens first" sense but in a it happens immediately sense, 10 days at the absolute most and that is being generous.  The Pre-Wrath position is functionally the same as Partial Preterism and Historicism, they just think we are already in that point on the timeline between what must happen first and the Rapture.

An Argument for Zion of Revelation 14 being Earthly Zion

First of all if you're seeing this as a complete reversal of a certain post I made earlier this month, that was a post directed at Preterists rhetorically assuming certain Preterist presuppositions.

In Revelation 14 I definitely believe the Parousia is already in progress.  And the only apparent smoking gun that this Zion must be in Heaven not on Earth is the 144 Thousand being "Before The Throne".  But remember Daniel 7:9-14 is the foundational Hebrew Bible source material for how Jesus defined the Parousia, and that passage seems to involve YHWH's flying Chariot-Throne.  It could be The Throne is The Cloud or on it.

Hebrews 12:22 is the other major New Testament basis for a "Heavenly Zion", though it's actually Jerusalem Paul calls Heavenly there.  Paul does sometimes use Heavenly as a synonym for Spiritual.  That passage is about how we are Citizens of The Kingdom regardless of where we dwell or who controls any Earthly location.  And also about how the architectural final form of the City is currently under construction in Heaven.  It doesn't contradict the connection to a Terrestrial location.

Psalm 48 can be seen as the Old Testament basis for a Heavenly Zion since it links Zion to the "sides of the north" a term also used in Isaiah 14 about Satan's yet future fall from heaven.  But I think the relation of geographical terms in both these passages may be complicated.  If The Tabernacle of David were located where I currently hypothesize it was then it was indeed on a slope north of The Mountain's Summit.  And "Sides of the north" is used in some translations of where Beth-Togarmah is located in Ezekiel 38.  Since I believe Isaiah 14 is about End Times events it could refer to Satan and The Beast wanting to set up their own Throne on Mt Zion which will ultimately fail.

I should perhaps mention here how I don't think Zion was the location most people think it was.  I have argued on this Blog that Bethlehem is the City of David.  My current theory is that the Summit of Mt Zion is where the Mar Elias Monastery currently sits which is the highest elevated summit in the region, and I have a hunch that the Tabernacle of David stood where the fifth century Church of Mary's Seat was located to the north of the summit.  But even if that theory is wrong my position on this chapter doesn't change.

And thus this view can be compatible no matter what city you think Babylon and/or The Great City is.

It is frequently assumed that the Mount of Olives is where Jesus will Return to.  Now it could be involved in how all this plays out.  But the Biblical basis for it is weak in my view.  In Acts 1 what the Angel says is about Jesus Returning the same way He Ascended, it's not meant to be about the location of a landing spot.  And I think a strong argument can be made that the Zechariah 12-14 was fulfilled in 30 AD.  Still it could be He returns first to the Mount of Olives to begin the Resurrection there and then sets up His Throne on Zion.

It is often assumed the reference to "Heaven Opened" in Revelation 19 means a door opening in heaven and that the Rider on the White Horse and His Army are traveling from heaven to earth at that moment.  But that's not necessarily borne out by the text either.

Earlier in Revelation 11 a reference to Heaven being "shut up" is agreed by all to be a reference to it not raining, showing how the Witnesses echo the ministry of Elijah and using language from 1 Kings 8:35, 2 Chronicles 6:26 and 7:17.  In Genesis 7-8 the Windows of Heaven being Opened is terminology linked to the flood waters.  So this Terminology in Revelation 19 could be linked to the "latter rain" of Joel 2, or 2 Peter 3 talking about how the End Times Judgment will echo The Flood but with Fire instead of Water.  But I also now believe the ministry of the Witnesses is the same 1260 days as the Woman hiding in the Wilderness, so Heaven being Opened in Revelation 19 is the end of their shutting up of heaven.

This further proves the point that both Pre-Tribers and Post-Tribers are wrong on Revelation 19 being in any way the Second Coming, this is happening after He's already Returned.

My belief in The Man-Child being The Church means I see The Rapture as a second fulfillment of many Prophecies that were also about the Birth of Christ, like Micah 4 and 5.

The Sign of The Son of Man in Heaven

One of the arguments Pre-Tribbers have for separating Matthew 24's Parusia from the Parusia of Paul in I Thessalonians 4, I Corinthians 15 and II Thessalonians 2 is that the Resurrection isn't in Matthew 24.

Now my main response to this in the past had been that none of the Rapture passages include everything that happens at that time.  1 Corinthians 15 is agreed to be a Rapture passage by most Pre-Tribbers and yet it technically doesn't mention the Rapture (us being gathered in the clouds) at all.

However a chief argument of those of us who definitely see them as the same Parusia is that Matthew 24 is the focal point of this doctrine.  Jesus here brings together Hebrew Bible themes that weren't obviously directly connected before, and then Paul and Revelation are building on Jesus when they are referring to these same ideas.

Separately I've been unsure what to think of "The Sign of the Son of Man in Heaven".  Does it correlate to the Ark being seen in the Temple in heaven after the Seventh Trumpet?  Is it the Wonders that open Revelation 12 which I also connect to the Signs in the Sun, Moon and Stars of Luke 21?  I'm willing to bet someone in history has tried to apply to it Constantine's claimed Milvian Bridge vision.

Then I decided to see if studying how Jesus spoke of signs elsewhere could be helpful.  And indeed earlier in this same Gospel in chapter 12 Jesus makes clear the ONLY sign that will be given to a wicked and adulteress generation is the Sign of the Prophet Jonah.  For as Jonah was in the Ketos three days and three nights so shall the Son of Man be in the Heart of The Earth three days and three nights.

Now every Christian agrees the Resurrection is implicitly the point here, someone being dead for three days isn't unusual, it's them not being dead anymore that is the Sign.  Jesus' Resurrection was the Sign given to that generation.  But the generation that sees the Parousia will also be a wicked and adulteress generation.

It should also be understood that no Jews see the Son of Man in Daniel 7 as a specifically Messianic Title, they see Him as being Humanity as a whole in our restored state.  In my view this does not contradict the New Testament's usage of it as a title for Jesus, it is in Jesus that Humanity's Redemption from the fall is achieved, it is in Him that The Resurrection began, The Parousia is when it expands to include all of The Church after the Millennium it will expand further to include all of Humanity.

So The Sign of The Son of Man in Heaven is the Bodily Risen Saints ascending into Heaven/The Sky.

Victorious Eschatology

My past posts on preterism have typically had Full Preterism in mind.  Patrial Preterism I assume comes in a variety of forms, in theory so could Full Preterism.  I had been struggling to even find information on Partial Preterism even though one Futurist website I visited said most preterists are partial preterists.

Then I heard about the book Victorious Eschatology and found some YouTube videos from one of it's authors.  This form of Partial Preterism is, as I expected, basically Post Millennialism in terms of Revelation, but with an odd detail I'll get to later.

On Matthew 24, verse 34 is his cut off point, by 70 AD the first 34 verses are fulfilled and what's after is yet future.  This is a nonsensical cut off point, it is obvious to any unbiased observer that what follows this verse is about the same thing that proceeded it.  In fact after verse 34 it's mostly poetic idioms and parables.

When talking about "this generation shall not pass" he mentioned some futurists argue "generation" means "race" or "tribe".  I kind of assumed that was a straw man especially as he refuted it with how this Greek word is never used that way.  I've generally gone with how the Greek Grammar of "this" is clearly meant to be understood in the context of those who see the signs he just talked about.  But then I noticed how the Aramaic Peshita says Sharbtha, a word that absolutely means tribe or family and only very rarely means "generation".  I am possibly going to make a post on my other blog where I'll argue for Peshita Primacy for Matthew.  But what Jesus was actually speaking was certainly a Semitic language not Greek.  Now the ecclesialogical implications of what "tribe" is meant I don't wanna get into here, but either way it hasn't passed away yet.

Back on topic.  Preterists and Futurists both like to talk about the "three fold question" of Matthew 24:3.  Thing is the grammatical structure of that verse is clearly presenting it as only two questions, so yes the Disciples may have had what Jesus recently said about The Temple in their mind when they said "Tell us when these things will be", but when they said "and what is the sign of Your coming, and the end of the age", the Parusia and the end of the age are clearly the same thing, the expression is one sign or set of signs that herald both.  The Parusia is by definition the end of the Age of Grace.  The Age of the Law had already ended with John The Baptist.

So if you're going to hinge your "partial" Preterism on saying two of these happen at the same time but the other is separated, those two are the inseparable ones.

Now what I think in regards to Matthew's Olvite Discourse is that the Disciples were assuming all of this will happen at the same time when they asked this question, or at least hoping they will.  The "beginning of sorrows" comment is not in Luke 21's discourse (which wasn't on the mount of olives) even though it describes the circumstances associated with that term.

So the Beginnings of Sorrows are events that can be associated with 66-73 AD (though not unique to then), but Jesus is saying that when that happens the end is not yet.  Matthew 24 talks about persecutions that are not Jewish in origin and clearly says not till The Gospel is proclaimed to the whole world.  This author abuses verses from Romans and Colossians to say Paul was saying the Gospel had reached the entire world, Paul's intent in each of those (however flawed the translation) is about this being a process he is a part of.

They have a tendency to act like Futurists don't think 70 AD was predicted at all.  I indeed see 70 AD in more Prophecies then most Futurists do, Luke in particular records multiple prophecies Jesus made on that destruction.

Now we get to the clincher, which is the real divergence from Full Preterism.  He says Matthew 24 isn't about the Second Coming, as in it isn't the same thing as the Parusia of 1 Corinthians 15 and 1 Thessalonians 4.  This is the Pre-Tribulationist argument all over again.  Everything Paul says about eschatology in the Thessalonian Epistles is his commentary on the Olivite Discourse, Matthew's Gospel was the first written down and I believe it and Mark's were both written down before the events of Acts 13.

When Paul is talking about Him Coming in the Clouds and Gathering His people after a heavenly Trumpet sounds, he is referring back to this teaching of Jesus that every Christian knew about whether it was written down already or not.  Matthew 24 seemingly doesn't explicitly refer to the Resurrection of the dead, but Jesus is basically quoting Old Testament passages about the in-gathering of the Tribes of Israel and Ezekiel 37 already told us to associate that with the Bodily Resurrection of dead Israelites, and Isaiah 26 told us to associate The Resurrection with The Rapture.

I then watched another Partial Preterist talk about Revelation 20.  He says that John didn't mention The Rapture, but if he did it would have to happen before fire comes down from Heaven.  He believes we're currently between verses 6 and 7 and that what first starts happening in verse 7 is mostly spiritual realm stuff not noticeable on Earth.  This makes them functionally the same as the Pre-Trib Imminence Doctrine, no prophesied events between now and The Rapture.

A Post Millennial Rapture is just as incompatible with that nonsense as a Pre Millennial one.  If it's in Revelation 20 but Post-Mil then it obviously happens at the Bodily Resurrection of The Dead.  I made a post before about how Full Preterists are like Pre-Trib in terms of it being a Secret Rapture.  But this Patrial Preterism is what's truly teaching literally the same idea in terms of what The Church should expect to happen next.

Now back to the Author of Victorious Eschatology, the title of the book reflects how he really wants to promote this as an Optimistic view.  Yes all Christians think Jesus wins in the end but since he isn't predicting things to get worse before Jesus comes back he's telling believers to stop being so fearful.  He seems to not know Pre-Trib exists and that most American Futurists are Pre-Trib.

I don't want Christians to live in constant fear, but Jesus warns us to be prepared for tribulation, we still live a fallen world and sometimes things will go bad whether it's a specific fulfillment of Bible Prophecy or not.  What I as a Mid-Tirbber think must happen before the Parousia/Rapture may not from a secular material point of view need to even be that much worse then right now, the point is something very specific has to happen first.  Great Tribulation as a technical term I view as referring to what's been going on since Stephen was stoned, most of the Body of Christ is living in countries where they are not the mainstream majority religion.  And the "Falling away" is arguably similarly already covered.

The "Antichrist" will become the worst tyrant ever, but the phase of his career that precedes the Abomination will I think possibly be beneficial to "The Church" from terrestrial eyes.  And what happens in Revelation 9 believers are promised protection from.

I'm promising neither the worst or the best in terms of what will happen between now and the Parousia, my advice is to prepare for the worst and hope for the best.

Believe it or not I try not to get into my Soterology too much on this blog, I want what I talk about here to be potentially appealing to people who will never agree with it.  I mentioned it perhaps unnecessarily in "why was Jesus rejected" and on one Facebook group that indeed became a distraction from the post's main point.

But if the Optimism of your view is the selling point, and you're repeatedly criticizing Futurism as inherently Pessimistic.  Then with me you don't have a leg to stand on if in your view Death and Hades win even one single soul.

The Rapture still hasn't happened at the end of Revelation Chapter 7

This argument is applicable to refuting Pre-Trib and maybe some forms of Mid-Trib and Post-Trib.  But I'm mainly making it with the "Pre-Wrath" model of Chris White in mind, the view that should be called the Sixth Seal Rapture view, in fact I think it's possibly the true final nail in the coffin of that view.

I've already deconstructed most layers of their argument, how silly it is to use the least unique characteristics of Matthew 24's Parusia account to decide where it happens in Revelation and choose a place with no truly uniquely Parusia characteristics.  And how there is no Wrath during the Trumpets.  But there is one issue I keep forgetting to really get into, and I only just recently realized the full implication of what Revelation chapter 7 says.

So Chris White's position is that the Multitude in Heaven in Revelation 7:9-17 is the post Rapture Resurrected Church .

Now I and Chris White agree that this Multitude is clearly the same people under the Altar when the Fifth Seal is opened back in chapter 6.  And we both agree that back then they had not been Raptured/Resurrected yet since they are explicitly described as just souls there.

I guess White feels like their state being different at all must be proof they are resurrected now, because there is really no other reason to think that.

You can't argue the Robes represent their bodies since they already possessed them in the Fifth Seal. I'm not sure what exactly the Robes are.but to argue they are their Resurrected Bodies would require arguing our Resurrected bodies have no continuity with our current bodies which would be functionally the same as making the Resurrection merely spiritual.

The key detail I only recently noticed however is that the last verse of the chapter is clearly describing the Rapture as yet Future, when the Lamb "shall lead them unto living fountains of waters" is The Rapture.  And you can't say I'm misusing the word "shall" by treating it as inherently future tense because the part about God wiping away all tears is definitely yet future, that happens in Chapter 21.

So that kills the Rapture view of Chris White, Revelation 7 explicitly tells us the Rapture is still yet future.  The scope of the Chapter is showing us Church Age saints on Earth and the souls of martyrs in heaven.

In Chapter 14 it's the 144 Thousand who are described in ways that are unambiguously telling us they are Resurrected now, by being "Redeemed from the Earth" and the "Firstfruits".  And in the first part of Revelation 7 they are still on Earth, as they are in the Fifth Trumpet later.  And in Paul being Sealed is a Church specific promise, tied to our promise that the Holy Spirit will not leave us which the Old Testament Saints didn't have.

So I feel like I can now firmly declare "Pre-Wrath" to be dead.

The Timing of The Rapture is not The Point of the Olivte discourse Parables

In Matthew 24's Olivite Discourse Verse 31 is the end of the straight forwards description of future events  Then verse 32 onto the end of chapter 25 is a series of figures of speech and parables, some have parallels in the others Gospels but most do not.

Pre-Tribbers and Post-Tribers and Pre-Wrathers all talk about MOST of these parables as if the timing of the Rapture is their point, and both sides of the "Imminence" debate will try to argue these parables support their position.

I don't believe the timing of the Rapture is the point.  I do believe they are about the Parusia in a sense, but whether the people involved were or should be expecting prior events or not isn't the point.

I should remind everyone that building doctrine on Parables is always sketchy.

Here is the thing, I'm Anti Pre-Trib, early in this blog's history I made a trilogy of posts debunking Imminence (both Pre-Trib and Pre-Wrath versions of it).  But if the timing of the Rapture was the point of these parables I'd have to agree they support Pre-Trib more.  I know Chris White keeps saying "what's the point of watching if there is nothing to watch for" but Pre-Tribbers view it as you're not watching for the return if you're instead watching for prior events.

In these parables the narratives in question have no prior events, the Bridegroom or Thief or whoever just shows up.  If the point is about timing then the point is the bad servants and foolish virgins seemed to think they had more time then they actually did.

And these are warnings given specifically to believers, most appear only in Matthew who's version was a speech given ONLY to the 12.  So the common Post-Trib and Pre-Wrath explanation that it's the World who it comes on like a Thief doesn't hold up in this context, maybe when 1 Thessalonians 5 uses that idiom but not here.

The problem with applying the Pre-Trib interpretations of the Parrables to the actual Doctrine of the Rapture is that they imply you won't be Raptured if you weren't properly watching for it.  And that's not how the Rapture will actually work. when it's directly described all believers regardless of what they are doing get Raptured.

I said most up above, but you see the Sheeps and Goats parable that ends chapter 25 is treated differently, no one thinks that one's point is the timing of The Rapture, it's usually viewed as either a Post-Armageddon judgment Revelation doesn't mention or as the White Throne Judgment.  But the opening of the parable is just as explicitly about the coming of the Son of Man as all the others, so separating it so it's about something different isn't justified.  Revelation 11 refers to a Judgment of the Saints after the Seventh Trumpet.

The moral point of the Sheeps and Goats Judgment is that we should act as if Jesus is already here regardless.  And I think the other parables are the same.

I think the best modern expositor on the Parables is Peter Hiett, even though I don't agree with his basic views on Revelation and Genesis.

Who is speaking in Revelation 16:15?

What's said here includes some terminology used a few times elsewhere in Scripture.  At least once by Jesus himself.  But most importantly it is phraseology assumed to be associated with the Parusia, the "Second Coming" and the Rapture.  And therefore Post-Tribbers and others may use this as evidence that the Parusia hasn't happened yet when the 6th Bowl of God's Wrath is poured out.

"Behold, I come as a thief. Blessed is he that watcheth, and keepeth his garments, lest he walk naked, and they see his shame."

Some Bibles have put this verse in Red, but not all.  So what is the context?

Before this verse it talks about the Dragon, Beast and False Prophet using Frog like messengers to gather the Kings of the East for the coming Battle.  Then verse 16 says "And he gathered them together into a place called in the Hebrew tongue Armageddon."  It sounds like the one doing the gathering is maybe the one who said that, and that was clearly defined as what some have dubbed the "Satanic Trinity".

And don't many interpretations of Revelation presume one of these three personages is pretending to be Jesus?

But even if it is Jesus speaking, there are still a few assumptions involved.

Parusia is not the word for "come" used in the "come as a thief" verses, it's usually either Heko or Ercomai.

The only time Paul uses this kind of phrase it is of the Day of the Lord not of the Parusia/Rapture.  He used it in 1 Thessalonians 5:2-4, when he's already talked about the Rapture in the prior chapter.  Same with 2 Peter 3:10.

Also at least once I've seen this verse cited specifically as evidence there are Believers on Earth at this time.  The subject of Post Rapture believers in my model is something I will make a separate post on eventually.  But this verse I don't think proves anything one way or the other on that, even if it is Jesus who is talking, I don't see it being worded as something addressed only to Believers.  In other "come as a thief" verses the point is that it is to Unbelievers he'll be coming as a thief.

But ya know what's interesting, this is the only of these thief verses to directly lead people to think the Thief is Jesus, and only because of an assumption it's Jesus talking.   But Jesus said in John 10:7-14 that He does NOT come as a Thief to steal kill and destroy, He is the Good Shepherd and the Hireling is the Thief.  The Hireling here could be the same as the Idol Shepherd of Zechariah 11, which many have taken to be the Antichrist and I've considered could be the False Prophet.

The only time Jesus own words are cited as part of this 'He comes as a Thief at the Second Coming' theme is in Matthew 24:42-50.  It's easy to see why the Lord and the Thief are presumed to be synonymous here.  But remember this passage also gets used by Pre-Tribbers to support their imminence doctrine, even though others clearly see the moral of the story as saying the opposite.

And a core teaching of Pre-Trib is their insistence that The Antichrist doesn't appear till after The Rapture.  While we know that II Thessalonians 2 clearly teaches the opposite.

 Meanwhile to many Post-Tribbers the Rapture is the same thing as the regathering of Israel.  While a theme of my Blog has been that this very part of Revelation 16 is the Beast gathering the Lost Tribes as a counterfeit Messiah-Ben Joseph.  And the true regathering of Israel is not completed till the end of or after the Millennium.

Update August 2018: So I'd somehow completely forgotten to consider the Thief imagery being brought in the letter to Sardis. So that weakens an aspect of this argument.

A view being New is not an argument against it being True.

Daniel 12:4 foretells that in the End Times knowledge shall be increased.  That is often taken to be about Knowledge in general, the explosion of knowledge that has happened since the Industrial Revolution.  But some have taken it to be about specifically knowledge of God's Word.

I say those two naturally go together.  We today have lots of advantages in studying God's Word that didn't always exist.  Today in debates people often get mad at you if you neglect to cite the exact Chapter and Verse, when Jesus didn't have that luxury, He just named the Prophet He was quoting and that had to be enough.  Not to mention how the Internet and Computer Programs have made it easier then ever to do word searches and to check the original Greek and Hebrew, and compare variant manuscripts.

But even before all of that.  The New Testament interprets some parts of The Hebrew Bible in ways that seemingly no Israelite ever thought of in the B.C. Era.

The Canon was closed I believe with the publication of The Book of Revelation. So it's a part of The Bible that never gets interpreted by other parts of The Bible, instead it is a key to helping us interpret other parts.

But I'm a Continuationist, I believe God does still inspire people, but those revelations have to be scrutinized against Scripture.  Sometimes I think even the person who receives the revelation might mis-interpret it.

This has become a vital part of the Rapture Dispute.  With people wondering why it took till the 19th Century for The Pre-Trib view (and by extension anything like Mid-Trib or Pre-Wrath) to be popularized, however many debatable hints at it before you might find.

This tactic conveniently ignores how Futurism in general was not popular in the Protestant world till the late 19th Century, their default Eschatology was Historicism.

For over a Thousand Years the Catholic Church kept most people from reading The Bible in their own language.  After the Reformation started it still took awhile for Translations to be made, and arguably the first ones made weren't the best.  So that's why it makes perfect sense that lots of valid interpretations of Scripture wouldn't be discovered or re-discovered till the 1600s or later.

Now there is a lot of mis-information about Darby.  He first wrote out the basics of his Pre-Trib Rapture view in early 1827, before Margaret MacDonald had her vision in 1830, and also before Irving published his translation of Manuel Lucanza.

Still neither of those sources teach a Pre-Trib Rapture.  MacDonald's account of her revelation has certain things left out of it when people make it seem like it could have inspired Darby's Pre-Trib view, like how she did say The Church would be persecuted by The Antichrist.  Her vision does not lay out a clear chronology however, I feel it could be compatible with either Post-Trib or Mid-Trib, but certainly not Pre-Trib.  Plus Darby said he thought her visions were Satanically inspired.

This whole "The Rapture must be false since it started with Darby" rhetoric definitely has an Anti-Continuationist tone to it.  Darby's own account of how he first came to the idea makes it seem slightly like a divine revelation.  And then they add the association with a controversial proto-Charismatic.

I think it's possible that Darby did receive a legit Revelation about Christ gathering His People before His Wrath is poured out.  But then made many mistakes when trying to figure out how that fit into Scripture.  In a way making the same key mistake Post-Tribbers make.

Because in my opinion, no amount of precedent for Post-Trib makes up for the fact that Post-Trib (in both it's Futurist and Historcist varieties) is based on an inherently wrong assumption, that Revelation 19 is the Second Coming.  Pre-Tribers make the same mistake however when they say The Rapture is distinct from the Second Coming.

But I understand why this mistake would be so common.  If you start your study of Bible Prophecy with Revelation, which many do, it's easy to see why one would make that mistake.  I myself did originally which is why I used to be Post-Trib, though I was always distinct from most Post-Tribbers.

Morgan Edwards taught a form of Pre-Trib in the mid 18th Century, while also being one of the earliest Futurists of the English Speaking world.

So I still haven't given up on finding some obscure little known Ancient or Reformation era precedent for something similar to my Midway-Point view.  But regardless it is not necessary.

My view on The Rapture is the one that correctly identifies where to find The Parusia in Revelation using Scripture to Interpret Scripture.

Pre-Tribbers mis-quoting old Historicists

A lot of the attempts of Pre-Tribbers to claim there were Pre-Tribbers before Darby involve a lot of mis-quoteing old Historicists, people who weren't even Futurists.

All these quotes tend to involve references to a "Great-Conflagration", that old Historicists like Joseph Mede, John Gill and Cotton Mather tended to place between the fulfillment of 1 Thessalonians 4 and the start of the Millenial Kingdom.

This "Great-Conflagration" is probably based on 2 Peter 3's talk of a coming destruction of the Earth by fire.  One thing I've been struggling with is how this particular prophecy of Peter's does not at face value have an obvious place where it happens in Revelation.

Morgan Edwards was not a Historcist however, there are a couple sites out there trying to claim he was but that is easily refutable. I wanted to believe Edwards might have been Mid-Trib, but was forced to admit he was Pre-Trib, just not giving the Trib a full Seven Years.

It would be absurd to suggest any Historcist view on the timing of the Rapture is analogous to Pre-Trib, since they definitely place the Seals and Trumpets before the Rapture, and from examples I've seen also the Bowls of God's Wrath.

That of course is why a Post-Tribber might feel inclined to say that these Historicists were essentially Post-Trib.  Well it's complicated, since not all these Puritan Historicists were even Pre-Millenial, at least a few flirted with Post-Millenialism.

But even when they are Pre-Millenial.  Based on how I've defined my Midway Point Rapture model.  It can be fair to say this "Great-Conflagration" equates to the idea of the Wrath not happening until we are taken out.  Plus there is my past arguments (I'm now less sure on but kind of still lean towards) that the Church remains in Heaven until the descent of New Jerusalem.

A doctrine being new is not an argument against it being valid. Strangely enough I thought I'd already done a post specifically on that, but I guess I didn't.  I'm gonna have to get to that.  Update: Here it is.

Additional Update April 2020:  Imminence

What I failed to get at the time is how being Hisotricist can allow you to be functionally exactly like Pre-Tribbers on Imminence.  They technically agree with what Post-Tribbers and Pre-Wrath and my view says must come first, but to them those things have already happened.

Were Increase and Cotton Mather Pre-Trib?

This isn't me asking only to then answer myself, I honestly don't know.  The easy to find online for free versions of their writings have not had their texts modernized and so are difficult to read.  I tried once and gave up.

I've seen a number of websites cite Cotton Mather as being a Pre-Darby Pre-Tribber.  Some may also mention his father Increase Mather, but not always.  And I've never seen Increase mentioned without Cotton.  So there is always Cotton and sometimes there is Increase.

However they have never actually quoted them, or even said what book of theirs they said it in.  The only person I've seen actually quote them talking about The Rapture is a commentator on an article that didn't mention them at all citing them among people who they say were clearly not Pre-Trib.

Increase Mather (1639-1723): “That part of the world [Europe] was to be principally the Seat of the CHURCH of Christ during the Reign of Antichrist” (Ichabod, p. 64).

Cotton Mather (1663-1728): “…that New Jerusalem, whereto the Church is to be advanced, when the Mystical Babylon shall be fallen” (The Wonders of the Invisible World, p. 3).

The quote from Cotton there I don't see how it'd be Rapture relevant at all.  The Increase quote is definitely not compatible with Pre-Trib but it could fit Mid-Trib or Pre-Wrath.

The thing is, it's mainly people who are opposing Pre-Trib (and I would assume implicitly any other non Post-Trib view) who are citing them as such.  It used to be the Post-Tribbers clung strongly to the not before Darby narrative, but there is a trend now of people willing to push it back to the Puritan era.

A lot of views on The Bible began or arguably were revived in the English Speaking world in the 17th Century.  England was the largest and most prosperous nation where Protestantism had become the mainstream religion.  It took a while for that issue to be settled, but by the Reign of King James England finally found peace, and early in his reign finally settled on what would for awhile be the default English Bible.

The Levelers and Diggers and others were the source of a lot of modern Biblical Based political theories that I'm certain many of these Post-Tribbers revere.  Not to mention Roger Williams inventing the modern notion of Religious Liberty.  So only if you're Catholic would you reject the idea that that is naturally a time to expect new Biblical ideas to be discovered or rediscovered.  Back  before the 19th Century, Historicism was the standard Eschatology of the Protestant world, though some early Protestants followed Augustinian Amillenialism.

The agenda behind associating Pre-Trib with Cotton Mather is to then engage in a guilt by association smear campaign against Pre-Trib.  Because both father and son Mathers were involved with and sometimes partly blamed for the Salem Witch Trials.  Only a few of these sites mentioned that association, but I suspect they all know that a Wikipedia search for their names will lead to that coming up.  Especially since some even say outright they were the first Pre-Tribbers.

The thing is every doctrine has some guilt by association with it.  If you hold the Calcedonian position of how Christ's Divinity and Humanity relate to each other (which is the presumed position of all major Western Denominations, I personally am undecided), or the Miaphsyte one.  Then you subscribe to a doctrine that was popularized by Cyril of Alexandria, Emperor Theodosius II and his sister Pulcheria.  Who were involved in persecuting Jews and other non-Christians including the murder of Hypatia.

But on the subject of the Salem Witch Trails, the Mathers believed in the supernatural and thought what was going on was supernatural, which was hardly rare.  But they actually felt things got out of hand and opposed using "Spectral Evidence" as the sole basis for convictions.  Increase said something that reminds me of a quote of Voltaire I used to cite a lot, "It were better that ten suspected witches should escape, than that one innocent person should be condemned".

Still I do not approve of what they did.

But returning to the subject at hand.  I don't know when they placed the Parusia.  I do vaguely remember them being Zionists from when I tried to read them before, which post-Darby has been strongly linked to Pre-Trib and least popular among Post-Trib.  But I don't know for certain.

Update: Well I have found a link to read Cotton Mather's The Threefold Paradise. For one thing their views were rather Historicist, but Cotton wound up developing something rather unique.

Without even getting to the book itself yet, the Introduction makes clear where the basis for a Pre-Trib accusation lies.  It's actually quite interesting reading it's analysis of how Mather's views changed over time.

Ironically he developed his belief that the Saints would be taken to Heaven to escape a "Great Conflagration" at the same time he abandoned his long held belief in a coming mass conversation of The Jews.  Making him certainly not compatible with modern Pre-Tribulationism, if it's accurate to call it Pre-Trib or even Pre-Wrath at all.

It seems one of the issues he struggled with was a basis for a popular hypothesis that a Supernatural Appearance of Christ would trigger their mass conversion.  He should have considered the option that when Jesus comes to take the Saints to Heaven, is that appearance.

Indeed I feel like maybe if I could have explained my basic Midway Point Rapture view argument to him, that it could have solved this confusion and made this rather contrived "Golden Key" of Bible Prophecy he developed unnecessary.

I was also surprised to learn there was a time when the Duel Fulfillment argument was considered insufficiently literal, and something that supposedly existed only to help the New Testament.  Judaism has it in some contexts as well, in fact if you reject it there is no basis for a coming Messiah Ben-David at all, cause Nathan's Prophecy in II Samuel 7 was clearly first fulfilled by Solomon.

Dispensations and Dispensationalism

Dispensationalism has become a name for a very particular view on Biblical History/Prophecy in terms of God's Covenants with humanity, that is virtually inseparable from the Pre-Trib Rapture (and to an extent political Zionism).

I ultimately am not a Dispensationalist, even though I may agree with them on a few things over those who insist NOTHING changed at The Cross or Pentecost.

The word Dispensation does appear in the Bible, in Ephesians 3:2 for example.  But often words like Age, Eon, Aion, or Olam might better fit what people mean by Dispensation.

Other Eschatological models involve God dividing history into different Ages as well.  All of them to some degree really.

Conventional Preterism's problem is that it's largely based on saying the Age of the Old Testament, the Law and the Prophets, didn't end till 70 AD.  So they can make the "Church Age" synonymous with the Millennium and/or New Jerusalem. But Paul taught in places like Ephesians 3 and Galatians 3 that the age of The Law was already past and we were already in the next Age, the Age of Grace, and did so in letters known to be written well before 66 AD.

Likewise Jesus said the Law and the Prophets were until John (The Baptist).  Now I've seen some Preterists respond to that by acting like the Old Covenant can't end till the Blood of the New Covenant was shed, but that is silly.  The age of the Israelites being slaves in Egypt ended a few months before the Mosaic Covenant was made at Sinai.  A new Covenant can't be made till the old one is severed.  And I believe John died six or seven months before Jesus, probably in Tishri, around the same time of year he was conceived.  Just as John's birth and conception were six months before Jesus.

The Temple rituals were still being carried out for 40 years after the deaths of Jesus and John.  But the Talmud records that those offerings were no longer being accepted for 40 years before The Temple was destroyed.

We read in the Jerusalem Talmud:

"Forty years before the destruction of the Temple, the western light went out, the crimson thread remained crimson, and the lot for the Lord always came up in the left hand. They would close the gates of the Temple by night and get up in the morning and find them wide open" (Jacob Neusner, The Yerushalmi, p.156-157). [the Temple was destroyed in 70 CE]
A similar passage in the Babylonian Talmud states:
"Our rabbis taught: During the last forty years before the destruction of the Temple the lot ['For the Lord'] did not come up in the right hand; nor did the crimson-colored strap become white; nor did the western most light shine; and the doors of the Hekel [Temple] would open by themselves" (Soncino version, Yoma 39b).

And I know the Talmud gives it's own reason for this not making it about Jesus, but it's still there, exactly the right time frame. 

Josephus in Wars of the Jews also records the Divine Presence leaving The Temple before 70 AD, but I think it was longer before then Josephus and his interpreters realized, Josephus didn't witness it directly.  Some of what Josephus describes happening in the Nisan before that fit what the above Talmud passage places 40 years before, mainly the not being able to keep doors shut.  Something similar is also placed on the day Jesus died in one of those alternate Hebrew versions of Matthew the early church fathers quoted.

Now for those Torah centric Hebrew Roots people who are offended by suggesting The Law will end. The Torah never said it would be forever, that is a translation error.

The word translated "Everlasting" or "Forever' or "Eternal" when referring to things like the Levitical Priesthood, The Sabbath and the Holy Days is Olam, which means age or eon, it does not actually mean forever. Whether it's Exodus 40:15, or Leviticus 16:34, or Leviticus 24:8, or Numbers 25:13.  Same with Exo 21:6, Exo 27:21, Exo 28:43, Exo 29:28, Lev 6:18, Lev 6:22.

In Deuteronomy 33:27, Olam is used of the "everlasting arms" but a different word is used to directly call God Eternal.

 Likewise the phrase "all the days", which is introduced about time periods that have an end in Genesis 3:14-17.  And again in Genesis 5.  And it's also used of the Nazarite vow in Numbers 6.  If "all the days" is being used of something that is also defined as an Olam, an Age, then it clearly means all the days of that age, just as it can also mean all the days of someone's life.  Taking the phrase to inherently mean all the days of eternity, it completely illogical.

Exodus 19:5-6 foretells there will be a time when all of the Nation will be Yahuah's Priests. The temporariness of The Torah is implied in The Torah.

The Seals, Trumpets and Bowls.

I didn't grow up being taught any particular view of the End Times, I'm one of those who never knew what the Rapture (or really Secret Rapture) was until the Left Behind books became a pop culture phenomenon.

In my first memories of reading the Book of Revelation, I was admittedly skimming it over and not digesting most of the details.  But while much I didn't understand, it's chronology never confused me.  It seemed clearly like John was being shown a sequence of events, mostly in Heaven but to varying degrees correlating to events on Earth.

I never bought Pre-Trib.  For a long time, until not long before I created  this blog, I was essentially Post-Trib.  But what caused me to become alienated from mainstream Post-Trib was how they scrambled the Chronology of Revelation.  But at least they're not like Pre-Wrath saying their view is Chronological when it clearly is not.

But my personal perspective aside, there are clear textual reasons why the Seals, Trumpets and Bowls are clearly threes sequences that follow each other and can't in any way be happening at the same time.

Revelation 8 begins with the Seventh Seal being opened and then clearly depicts the Seven Trumpets being given to their angels as a result of the Seventh Seal being opened.

Revelation 11:15-18 begins to describe what happens when the Seventh Trumpet is sounded.  And one statement is "Thy Wrath is Come".  In context what the grammar and meanings of these words is saying in both Greek and King James English is NOW his Wrath is Come at the sounding of the Seventh Trumpet, Biblically trumpets are warnings and this was the last warning.

Pre-Tribbers and Pre-Wrathers (and also Post-Tribbers) want to insist we were already in God's Wrath at least in the Trumpets because "obviously that's God's Wrath".  But that isn't sound doctrine.  Releasing demonic entities in Revelation 9 isn't God's Wrath.

The Bowls are defined as God's Wrath, so not even one could have been poured out before the Seventh Trumpet.

The only time Wrath is mentioned before the Seventh Trumpet is sounded is in Chapter 6, after the Sixth Seal is opened.  And it's not the narrative voice, or God, or anyone in Heaven, or any Prophet saying it.  It was said by the kings and other powerful men of the Earth.  They think this is God's Wrath.

In Anime analysis videos much is made of how things in early episodes are meant to take on a new meaning when re-watched.  Well this part of Revelation chapter 6 I think has a similar effect.  That these worldly people think they are already in God's Wrath is hilarious when you know what's coming, they have no idea.

And I have another post on that it's perfectly fine to view some plagues as happening more then once.

How many Second Comings are there?

My take on this has kinda changed since I last did a post on this subject, so I'm making this new post.

Post-Tribbers like to mock mainly Pre-Tribbers, but the Mid-Trib view would fit into this as well, for believing in "Two Second Comings".

My first response to that, as someone who's view can be considered a variation of Mid-Trib, is that the term "Second Coming" is not Biblical at all.  There are various references to His Parousia, translated Coming, but never with a numerical designation.

However the big problem here is that Pre-Tribbers like to call the Rapture and the Second Coming distinct.  And on that I strongly disagree with them.  They are correct that 1 Thessalonians 4 and Revelation 19 are not about the same event.  But 1 Thessalonians 4, and 1 Corinthians 15 both clearly refer to the event in question as the Parousia.

Here is the big perhaps shocking point of this post.

Revelation 19 is NOT the Second Coming.

It does not use the word Parousia, in fact Parousia isn't used in Revelation at all.  And chapter 19 has nothing of any real substance in common with the passages that do.  At the Parousia He comes on a Cloud or Clouds, in Revelation 19 He's riding on a White Horse.  At the Parousia his feet never touch The Earth, He gathers His Church and takes them to Heaven (Mark 13:27).  In Revelation 19 His Saints are already in Heaven and follow Him as He leaves (though The Bride as New Jerusalem doesn't descend till the New Heaven and New Earth).

So yes it's technically an event where Jesus "comes" to a certain location.  But when it comes to The New Testament using the Greek word Parusia as a technical term for a specific Biblical Event, it is not that Parusia.

Jude 1:14 may be about the same event as Revelation 19, and uses Cometh, a form of the word, but still ultimately not the same word.  But in the Greek it's not even that similar, it's not a form of Parusia, it's elquen, and actually means Apeareth.

Isaiah 63 also uses Cometh and is seemingly in close proximity to Revelation 19, but that Hebrew word seems more similar in meaning to elquen then Parousia.  And there He "Cometh" from Edom, not Heaven..

The Parousia is about Revelation 14 not 19.

Revelation chapter 14 is where The Son of Man is riding on a Cloud.  The Seven Bowls of God's Wrath are poured out between that event and the Revelation 19 event.

 I'd made before the observation that you can technically say he had more then one "coming" at his first Advent.  In fact it's only the Triumphal Entry that is refereed to with a form of the word "come", in Daniel 9, and that wasn't even the first time he came to Jerusalem.  But that is in light of all this a very minor point.

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.

A Pre-Tribber on interpreting Revelation Chronologically

They and various forms of "Mid-Trib" like me seem to be the only ones inclined to take it Chronologically.

https://gracethrufaith.com/ask-a-bible-teacher/reading-revelation-chronologically/

Reading Revelation Chronologically

Wednesday, May 25th, 2016

• End Times
• Prophecy

Q. John’s gospel is the least chronological of the four gospels. Events are out of order and a very unequal amount of verses are applied to certain events versus other events in Jesus’ life. So it would seem unlikely then that John’s book of Revelation would be completely in time order. Perhaps some parts of the Revelation are chronological, and others are placed thematically. This is a critical issue, since from reading your material it appears the primary basis of your belief in pre-Trib is because Rev 4 & 5 in chapter order precede the rest of the book. Can you please enlighten me as to how you see it and why?

A. I’ve read lots of opinions about whether the Revelation is chronological or not, and the only exceptions to a chronological reading that makes sense to me are;

1) John could only write about one thing at a time so there are places where multiple things are happening together and he could only describe them one at a time,

2) where he brought a particular subject to its conclusion before back tracking to pick up another train of thought, or

3) where he’s providing some background to help us understand something. These are all obvious. Otherwise, I don’t think it makes sense to depart from a chronological reading.

It’s not fair to compare the Revelation with John’s gospel. In the Revelation John was essentially “taking dictation” from the Lord, and the writing style is so different that some scholars debate whether he even wrote it.

Finally, there are several much stronger proofs for a pre-trib rapture that make a chronological reading of Revelation unnecessary to support the case for one.

My first objection is that taking it chronologically inherently helps Pre-Trib, Pre-Trib sees The Rapture not in Revelation at all so really it's chronology should be irrelevant to them.  I see it clearly in the middle of the book, from the latter part of Chapter 11 through chapter 14, with the key moment being The Rapture of the Man-Child.

1), His intent was clearly to try as much as possible to write things down as he saw them.

2), Certain subjects ARE clearly scattered about, the book is clearly not organized by subject, even The Beast gets a reference before his formal introduction.

3), This I assume is mainly about the mystery of the Seven heads, and maybe the various time statements.

The reason Revelation's Authorship confuses people is indeed because it was really written by Jesus with John as his stenographer.  It's actually wrong to say Jesus wrote none of The Bible.

Since Jack Kelly knows John's Gospel is the least Chronological, I wonder if he is wiling to admit Jesus ministry wasn't three years but only one tops.

What did Peter mean by Paul being hard to understand?

2 Peter 3:15-16

And account that the longsuffering of our Lord is salvation; even as our beloved brother Paul also according to the wisdom given unto him hath written unto you; As also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things; in which are some things hard to be understood, which they that are unlearned and unstable wrest, as they do also the other scriptures, unto their own destruction.

This is used by enemies of Eternal Security and of Faith Alone, and by people saying we are still under the Law to say basically that you shouldn't take those most commonly cited Paul passages at face value.

Peter said "some things", he did not say the main point that most of Paul's Epistles are all about.

 Some people will translate 2 Peter 3:17 in a way to make it seem like it uses the word Amonia or Lawless.  But this is a completely different word that I feel the KJV was correct in rendering Wickedness. So no, it doesn't help us determine what he meant by Paul being misunderstood in the prior verses.

My first instinct as a historian was to think of how the earliest Christian Gnostic, Marcion, used Paul as the basis for most of his heresy.  But Marcion lived well after Peter's time.  And think Marcion has been misrepresented by the Church Fathers.

I also think about how Paul is the most misunderstood NT writer when it comes to sexuality.  With people for hyper prudish attitudes quoting Paul the most, and those who don't believe The Bible agrees with itself often saying Paul and Paul alone of NT writers supports Plato's sexual morality.  All of the NT clobber passages are form Paul.  Yet I feel I have shown elsewhere that Paul isn't the prude people think he is.

But..... Let's use Scripture to interpret Scripture, and keep our personal biases out of this.

Acts deals with Paul being accused of saying things he didn't say, but those are accusations of unbeleivers, Peter is alluding to misunderstandings within The Church.

This is from 2nd Peter not 1st Peter.  This is Peter's eschatological epistle, especially chapter 3 which this ends.  He's warning of deceptions in the end days that we need to be prepared for.

I agree with those scholars who say contrary to the titles we've given them that 2nd Peter was actually written well before first Peter.  That best explains why First Peter is more polished in it's use of Greek (something skeptics use to assert they can't have same author).

1 Thessalonians is generally believed to be among Paul's earliest Epistles, so could it be 2nd Peter was written between the Thessalonians Epistles?

Because in II Thessalonians 2 is where Paul himself refers to people misusing what he had to say.  Now I often see it claimed verse 2 refers to a letter forged in Paul's name.  But I disagree, the context here is clearly about a misunderstanding on what he said in I Thessalonians 4.

You see I find Pre-Trib commentaries on II Thessalonians 2 hilarious because that chapter is all about refuting Pre-Trib's imminence doctrine.  I had covered this in the very first post of this blog.  (Disclaimer however, since that first post I've changed my position on Dispensationalism.)  But this is also why I don't agree with attacking Pre-Trib by saying it didn't exist before Darby, because this misunderstanding was one Paula addressed while he lived.

And today many Pre-Tribbers will argue only Paul talks abut the Rapture, they'll misuse his Mystery statement to assert that you won't find it taught in the Olvite Discourses or Revelation or any of the Prophets of the Hebrew Bible.  And 1 Corinthians 15 is the sole basis for the Secret Rapture doctrine.

So that is most likely the issue Peter had in mind.

Did only Paul talk about The Rapture?

Pre-Tribbers make an important argument for their model that only Paul talks about the Rapture, and so nothing in what Jesus or John recorded can be the same thing.  I've dealt with the main argument for that elsewhere.

Here I want to point out that if only one Bible author recorded something, they don't have a second confirming witness and therefore can't build doctrine on it, at all.  That Paul mentioned it more then once doesn't change that he's still only one witness.

I believe The Rapture was refereed to by Jesus on (at least) three occasions recorded by all three Synoptic Gospels.  In Matthew 24:27-31, Mark 13:26-27, and Luke 21:27&36.

And by John in Revelation in chapters 11-14 when you study them carefully.

I also see glimpses of it in the Old Testament, in Isaiah 26 and Joel 2.

So Paul's references to it in I Thessalonians 4 and II Thessalonians 2, and to an extent I Corinthians 15 are only a piece of the picture.

The Revealing, The Rapture and The Abomination of Desolation

In the inaugural post of this Blog I argued that the Abomination of Desolation must happen before The Rapture.  Latter I argued that maybe not, then I did another post going back to my original position but without really refuting the reasons I gave previously.

I have changed my mind again, I think this is my last change on this subject because I now feel I've unraveled the mysteries that confused me before.

Let me clarify, the way II Thessalonian 2 refutes Pre-Tribe remains fully in tact.  The Abomination incident is mentioned there but it's strictly only his Revealing that must happen before The Rapture.  And before that the restrainer must be removed.

I Believe as the new name for this Blog declares, but I've always felt this way, that the events in Revelation will happen in the order they are described, with few exceptions like referencing time periods that span 3.5 years.  And Revelation does include examples of God speaking past tense of this yet to happen like Babylon's fall in chapter 14.  But I firmly reject the idea of it starting once or multiple times.

Other Bible Prophecies are snap shots of the End Times that unless they contain clear timing statements are not chronological, but Revelation's Purpose is to tell us how it all fits together.

Only other single visions even close to being large enough to consider worth taking as strictly chronologically as Revelation, and that are irrefutably End Times.  Are the last 2 visions that make up Ezekiel.  34-39 and 40-48.  Those don't conflict with Revelation's chronology in my view, I see 40-48 as correlating to Revelation 21-22.  And I see 37-39 as Revelation 20.  What's before that can fit the Day of Wrath.

Revelation 9 is when the Restrainer is removed.

When The Beast kills the Witnesses is when he's irrefutably revealed.  That is the first time Revelation irrefutably mentions The Beast, identifying him with earlier personages is valid speculation but still ultimately speculation.  Now I'm unsure if the Beast that does is the first or second, I believe both Ascend out of the Bottomless Pit.  That's a minor issue however, since I now think the second beast may be the more important one anyway.

Three and a half days latter they are resurrected, then they ascend into Heaven and the Gentile Population of Jerusalem repents and believes.

Then the Seventh Trumpet sounds, and then Revelation 12 depicts The Rapture.  Then Revelation 13 depicts The Abomination of Desolation.

I'm still open the possibility of it happening first, my point here is there is room for interpretation on it.  If it does happen first it happens very close, the same day the Witnesses were killed would be the longest before that it could happen.  The chronology I suggested in this post remains compelling to me.

Here is the thing however.  When we get to Revelation depiction of The Abomination of Desolation incident in Chapter 13 Verse 6.

"And he opened his mouth in blasphemy against God, to blaspheme his name, and his tabernacle, and them that dwell in heaven."

"Them that dwell in heaven" can only make sense to be as the already Raptured Church.  Blaspheming Angels wouldn't be such a big deal.

Which wrong view on The Rapture is the most dangerous?

The popular answer is the Pre-Trib view, the one thing all non Pre-Tribbers seem to agree on.

I really don't understand how the people who are now not believers or believers who are uninterested in Prophecy talk about being raised on the Pre-Tirb Rapture and being constantly terrified by it.  They clearly did not truly understand what The Rapture is if they found it frightening.

But what I'm going to discus here is how most of my fellow non Pre-Trib Futurists seem to think, simply by virtue of it being currently the mainstream view, that Pre-Trib is the most dangerous view.  That once we're clearly in the 70th Week and no Rapture happens countless formally faithful Pre-Tribbers will lose their faith and fall away.

Post-Tribbers particularly then see the dangers of Pre-Trib as innate in any more obscure view that has the Rapture as distinct from Revelation 19, even though I am adamant Christians will face Great Tribulation.  They are unwilling to listen to anything I have to say on Prophecy so long as I'm not Post-Trib like them.

I don't think so low of Pre-Tribbers, or anyone else who disagrees with me.  But especially Pre-Tribbers because I've grown a lot in the Spirit listening to other issues talked about by Pre-Tirbbers like Chuck Missler.  Pre-Tribbers are often the most likely to agree with me on Eternal Security, it seems the Pre-Wrath camp has a lot of Calvinism in it.

I've listened to a lot of Pre-Tribbers, many do believe American Christians will face persecution first.  I'm confident they will simply get over it and rework their understanding once Pre-Trib is proven wrong.

I don't think there is any risk of truly Saved people being "deceived" by the II Thessalonians 2 event.  I certainly don't think it's possible for a saved person to take the Mark, if you think that 100% of people who take The Mark are damned, but also believe in Eternal Security, then you have to believe no Saved person could take the Mark.  I think the Mark is instituted after The Rapture has just happened, and the awakening Israelites are fleeing to the wilderness.  So no one already saved will be presented with that dilemma.

Rob Skiba likes to say that the warning to Believers to not be deceived clearly means it's possible for us to be deceived.  That is true but it's not about the II Thessalonians 2 event, that event isn't a deception at all, that's when the Deception ends and the enemy just comes right out and says what he means, he will not claim to be Jesus or The God of The Bible he will claim to be better then The God of The Bible.

Before that, during the first half of the Week it might, MIGHT, be possible for Believers to wind up being tricked into helping/supporting the Man of Sin.

Pre-Trib will be proven wrong pretty much as soon as the 70th Week starts.  I believe The Temple will be standing before we enter it, and all of the first Six Seals will be opened before the Nisan that starts it is over.

So I'm more concerned that the default position among people is that IF Pre-Trib is wrong Post-Trib must be the only other option.  Then after that is the trendy Pre-Wrath view.  And also that movie from the Pastor I do not like to name that is presenting a model technically Mid-Trib in form but is really a hybridization of Post-Trib and Pre-Wrath ideas.  Pre-Wrathers especially love to brag about Mid-Trib being a "defunct view".  Well they should remember that it'd suit Satan well if the correct view is the least popular.

All three of those models place the Seventh Trumpet at the end of the 70th Week rather then The Mid-Way point as a plain reading of Revelation clearly shows.  Post-Trib sometimes sees the sixth or seventh Seal as the same event but not always.  Pre-Wrath places the Sixth Seal some indeterminate amount of time after the Mid-Way point.

Meanwhile there are also people arguing that there is no 70th Week, that the entire period is only 3.5 years and so every 3.5 year period referenced is the same.  And most who do believe in a 70th Week have this wrong idea that those years will begin and end on Yom Teruah, when Yom Teruah should Biblically mark the midway point.

I've talked to Pre-Wrathers who think it's possible we're already in the 70th Week now and aren't aware of it.  I firmly believe it can't start till The Temple (it could be just a Tabernacle) is standing in Jerusalem.  Pre-Wrathers also tend to think the Persecution only starts at the Abomination of Desolation.

Basically what I'm saying is I fear once Pre-Trib is firmly debunked people may be deceived into thinking we're already at or past the Mid-Way point when the 70th Week has really only just started.

The only issue there is how can people be tricked into thinking The Abomination of Desolation has happened already when it really hasn't?  Paul certainly makes what it is unmistakable in II Thessalonians 2.  But lots of people are already trying to alegorize or twist that.

I think there will be plenty of Christians who won't fall for this deception, even if their current views make them vulnerable to aspects of it.  But we need to be aware of how that deception could work.

1. Thanks to how the 1290 days reference from Daniel 12 is commonly misunderstood, most people assume the Sacrifice and Oblation is made to cease at the same time as the Abomination of Desolation when it's really 1290 days before it.

2. The Anti-Semites of the world may well think the Temple being rebuilt itself is the Abomination of Desolation.  That's what some of Texe Marrs logic seems to imply.  And since many other Dispensationalist and Zionsit Christians think it's possible The Temple won't be rebuilt till very soon before it happens, they are not prepared to refute that argument timing wise.

3. Then there are the people who allegorize what The Temple means in II Thessalonians to being The Church.  Don't assume that view will lose credibility once a Third Temple is standing, many of them are clarifying they do think The Jews might get their Temple rebuilt, but that Christians should not be tricked into thinking that is prophetically relevant.

4. Rob Skiba has gone and wrongly defined what The Abomination of Desolation of Antiochus Epiphanes was, saying it refers to when he offered the Pig on the Altar (a legend that is apocryphal to begin with) not the Idol.  So imagine if it's Nisan, perhaps on Passover, someone invades Jerusalem, enters the Temple and kills a Pig on the Brazen Altar.  Rob Skiba is set up to be deceived, especially if that same Decoy Antichrist claims to be Nimrod.

5. I've also seen someone argue (with the intent of supporting a Prestist view however) that when Jesus said "The Holy Place" really means "A Holy Place" and that the Abomination need not happen in specifically the Inner Sanctuary at all.  This is especially tempting to fall for once you notice Antiochus Epiphanes lesser Abomination Idol wasn't in the Holy Place but on the Brazen Altar.  That's probably why Rob Skiba got confused.  But II Thessalonians 2:4 says he sits in The Temple, the only sitting Place in The Temple was the Ark itself which lid was the mercy Seat, this Temple I don't think will have the real Ark.

6. I also think some might get confused by a person deifying himself or giving Messianic status to himself and forget that The Beast will also speak AGAINST the True God.

All of these could be relevant, since Satan will probably try to have multiple deceptions going on with multiple Decoy Antichrists.  Maybe even relevant in ways that sometimes overlap.