On Tue, 22 Jan 2008 16:16:17 -0500,
"John R" <clergy> said the following:
Re: When Revelation was written...
Pastor Dave, I did read your posts and I must say,
you drew some interesting conclusions. However,
I didn't see anything that would cause me to change
my position on the date of authorship.
May I ask why not? Can you please give me
some examples of what you read that caused
you to decide this way?
However, as you know I have decided to re-examine
the facts on the dating of the book of Revelation.
Mainly because Preterism stands or falls on this issue.
Actually, it doesn't. Even if it were written in 95 AD,
Futurists still need to show that it happened within
that same generation and explain the "soon" factor.
I started doing some dating research and stumbled
across this. This guy was a Preterist for 15 years.
However, he doesn't claim to be a Futurist. I just
thought you might be interested:
http://thekingdomcome.com/truth_about_preterism
What this man wrote had nothing to do with honestly
seeking anything, except how to best attack Preterists
on a personal level and his comments are based on a
high level of ignorance. That is quite obvious, as I will
indeed absolutely prove below!
The Unpreterest blogspot:
http://unpreterist.blogspot.com/2008/01/skinning-cat-concluding-comments.html
In just a quick skim, I found many statements about
Preterism that simply aren't true! It is apparent that
this man was never actually a Preterist and quite
frankly, never really understood what it is, John.
As one example, he completely misapplied what
"hyperbole" is, in Scripture!
No offense, but this man is not too bright! He simply
does not grasp basic Biblical principles, whether one
is a Preterist or not! Either that or, he is just plain
hateful!
Now so you understand, hyperbole, basically, is simply
overstating something to make a point. For example,
if you were to say that; "The whole world just saw you!",
that is an obvious exaggeration and would be hyperbole.
*****************************************************
Hyperbole:
1) An obvious and intentional exaggeration.
2) An extravagant statement or figure of speech
not intended to be taken literally, such as,
“to wait an eternity”.
- American Heritage Dictionary
*****************************************************
But hey, don't take my word for it. Let me give you
an example of what I'm saying, John. He applies
this passage to the discussion ABOUT HYPERBOLE...
"And it came to pass in those days that a decree
went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world
should be registered." - Luke 2:1
And so he comments by saying...
"We must ask, did Caesar Augustus tax/register
'all the world'? Did Elijah (who Jesus reveals as
John the Baptist in Mt 17:12-13) 'restore all things'?
Did 'all things' accomplish concerning the Son of
Man as Jesus went up to Jerusalem? Did those early
Christians share 'all things' ...including their wives?
So three mistakes are made here, by this man,
at this point. For the sake of brevity, I will discuss
two of them, as the other one would require too
much quoting, to make my point.
1) The discussion about "all the world" being taxed
has zero to do with hyperbole. Rather, it would
not be considered to be all people on planet Earth,
because of the Koine Greek word used in that verse.
You see, there are three Koine Greek words that
translate into the words "world" and "earth" and
21st century Gentiles assume that every time
they see either of those English words, that it
means, "the planet". But that is not true!
The three words are:
a) Ge = soil (dirt), or by extension, a region.
And this was typically used by Jews to
mean their land.
b) Oikoumene = Land, or by extension,
the known world and was specifically
used to refer to the Roman Empire.
c) Kosmos = Orderly arrangement and this word
definitely meant the planet and was used to
state that. See Mat 13:35 & John 1:9 as proof
("kosmos" is the Greek word used in both).
The word used in Luke 2:1, was "oikoumene", which
was mostly used to refer to the Roman Empire at that
time and therefore, when the statement, "tax the world"
was made in Luke 2:1, all Luke was saying, was that
Caesar sent out a decree that all of the subjects of
the Roman Empire must return to their city of origin
to register and be taxed. It had nothing to do with
him saying, "the planet" and so, was not at all, nor
in any way, "hyperbole"! And so, this man does not
know what he is talking about and is on a personal
mission to trash the Preterist view, which would be
bad enough, but he's doing it based on ignorance!
2) The statement about "sharing all things", has nothing
to do with hyperbole either and this man abused not
only the Greek language above, but the English language
here, because he is so dedicated to trashing a doctrine
he obviously never understood in the first place, that
he just doesn't care how he gets there, even if it's in
a dishonest/deceptive way!
Very simply, it says that they "shared all THINGS".
People, as I would think everyone would know,
especially to born again Christians, are NOT "things"!
But hey, you did prove my point about you Futurists! :)
And frankly, I told you John, that I believed that this is
what you would do and is why I didn't answer your first
question to me, remember???
When they do any "research", it isn't actually honest
research. It is an attempt to find anything they can
to attack Preterism with and they'll treat it as if it's
above and beyond questioning, because their goal
is not to find out the truth, but to protect their doctrine
at all costs even that of honestly, Godliness and integrity!
This is proved further, by the fact that this web page
has absolutely nothing to do with the dating of Revelation
and so, was just an attempt on your part to distract,
rather than discuss and learn what Preterism actually
does mean, even though you said that was your goal!
So instead of asking me directly, you choose to try to
convince people that going to web sites that dishonestly
misrepresent the Preterist view, is actual research!
And even further than that, you are treating me as if
I do not know anything about Preterism, nor Futurism,
when indeed, I know both of them extremely well,
which is why so many people here hate me! It has
nothing to do with the language I use, since they
have always fired the first shots and their has been
just as bad as mine! It is quite simply about them
hating me, because they cannot refute one single
thing that I say to them about this. And no John,
that's not ego. That's just history here!
Now look at us. While my statements to you here
were very direct, we had discussed this before and
we are not attacking each other personally, since
you yourself admitted that you would probably
proceed this way and so, I'm just saying that
you did as you said you would do, amen?
So there are no "attacks" here and we are getting
along fine! Yet the others attack me, whenever
I prove what I have said to be true and they can't
stand it, realize that they don't know a damn thing
about the Scriptures, especially the Old Testament
and so, then they go on a vendetta to personally
trash me at every turn! But hey, they're the ones
who are the "good Christians", right? <chuckle>
But it will be interesting John, to see how you respond
to this response. I would ask one thing of you though.
Please do not think me stupid, in that I would fall for
some lame attempt to pacify me into thinking you're
considering something you're not. Please do not
insult my intelligence that way! At first, you did this,
but it was only for a heart beat and then after my
response to you, you agreed to be direct. So please
do not forget that, okay? :)
--
Don't put a question mark where God put a period.
.
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