The founding fathers of modern-day Premillennialism were heretics.

Paul Malcomson said:

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It seems like everyone is angry if they opose you. You can taunt us about being blind and idolatrous and that is cool. But when we call out your insults we are angry.

You lost the debate a long time ago. Now you are back to avoidance and derailing.

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Randy Kluth said:

Brother, you must be spiritually blind because I suffer no bitterness at all in this discussion! I'm arguing with someone who has no sense of discernment!

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Spiritual Israelite said:

Exactly. Somehow, him disagreeing with us and throwing insults at us is somehow just him being friendly, but if we disagree with him we are being angry and making Amil our idol. He believes in Premil and spends a lot of time defending it, so does that mean we can accuse him of having Premil as his idol? I would never do that.

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Ronald Nolette said:

That is what amil does! takes a passage and symbolizes it. that is why they are amil- they reject a literal 1,000 years and Jesus reigning on earth over a physical kingdom.

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Paul Malcomson said:

When have I called you a heretic? Nowhere! I will repeat: it is the origins of your doctrine that is find among the heretics.

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Ronald Nolette said:

If you said earlier, I have forgotten, but I wish to ask an honest question of you (though all I ask are honest).

As you take the 1,000 years as symbolic, has it started already?

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If so when did it do so? It can be approximate, that is fine.

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Or do you believe it begins in some future time as I do as a literalist in viewing the 1,000 years.

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Spiritual Israelite said:

Why not? Should I not interpret Revelation 20 in such a way that agrees with the rest of scripture?

Says you. This is the problem with the approach of many Premils. They want everything to be spelled out to them and not have to make any effort to discern what scripture is saying. But, that's not how it works.

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Spiritual Israelite said:

So, based on these comments, it looks to me that you are perfectly fine with insults, but you believe we just need to do it in a friendly way like you. Otherwise, we come across as angry. Do I have this right, Randy?

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Randy Kluth said:

Actually, that's exactly how it works. Walter Martin used to say, "God doesn't have a speech impediment. When He wants you to know something, He spells it out so there is no confusion."

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You don't make doctrines out of guesswork, or from outlying passages, or debatable subjects. Get your doctrine straight from the horse's mouth, ie from God Himself, by precisely what He says and by the Spirit of His love and justice.

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Interpreting passages is the science of hermeneutics. So, you do have to look at how the words are being used in context. Comparing with other Scriptures helps, but does not determine, in advance, how the words are to be used.

If we look at a passage that indicates people will rule for a thousand years, we do have choices. Is this just a saying, indicating like "forever?" Or, is this literal? There are arguments on both sides.

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As to calling you an advocate of Replacement Theology, I already told you. I mean no offence by this.

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It is just a statement regarding what I believe--not what you believe.

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You don't think you hold to that belief system. I believe you do. So we differ on how to define the term "Replacement Theology."

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Sorry about that, but that's the way it is. I don't dislike anybody for holding to Replacement Theology. And I accept that you think you don't adhere to that system.

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RT does not mean that Christianity has displaced the Jewish People. Rather, it means that Christianity, Jew and Gentile, represents the true People of God, whereas the Jewish People, outside of Christianity, are not the true People of God.

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This is controversial perhaps because we would all agree that non-Christians are not the People of God, including non-Christian Jews. However, I believe the Bible teaches that the Jewish People, even non-Christians, remain God's People in the sense that there is still the hope of their recovery.

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Spiritual Israelite said:

This is your man-made rules. Can you show me any scripture which supports this approach?

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Spiritual Israelite said:

And, as I've made clear multiple times, it does offend me. Why can't you just respect that and stop using that term, at least when you're talking to me?

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Spiritual Israelite said:

How does what you described there result in the term "replacement theology"? I don't believe anyone is replaced. So, the word "replacement" is not appropriate to describe my belief.

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Spiritual Israelite said:

There has always been the hope of the recovery of all non-Christian Jews for the past 2,000 years. That's what you don't understand.

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Ronald Nolette said:

We focus on Rev. 20 because it is the only passage in Scripture that gives the length of time Jesus physically reigns on earth after His physical return

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Ronald Nolette said:

We focus on Rev. 20 because it is the only passage in Scripture that gives the length of time Jesus physically reigns on earth after His physical return

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Paul Malcomson said:

Op Note

The earliest Chiliasts believed that man is not fully delivered from the consequences of sin, and punishment for the performance of sin in this life, until 1,000 years after the second coming at the new heaven and new earth. They believed in a peculiar 3-stage preparation framework for the eternal state – life, the intermediate state and a future 1000 years after Jesus return. Most modern Premils would reject this outline, considering life as the sole testing ground of the soul.

These early Millennialists assumed that the disembodied souls of all men (saved and lost) would be kept in a common place of waiting during the intermediate state, albeit separated until that great and glorious day according to their spiritual status. That place was Hades. Tertullian succinctly describes the standard early Chiliast views on the afterlife in A Treatise on the Soul, (Chapter 55): “every soul is detained in safe keeping in Hades until the day of the Lord.”

Even though the earliest Chiliasts considered the fate of the body intertwined with the soul, they believed that the soul had to go through its own individual reparation for the sins it committed whilst living during the afterlife. They believed that the body was not essential for the dead to experience the sorrows and joys of the soul. In Hades, and during the intermediate state, both the righteous and the wicked were expected to go through further change according to their behavior in life, until they received their deserved reward when Jesus comes. To facilitate this teaching, these same early writers formulated an elaborate view of continued purging of the soul of the elect until it was reunited with its resurrected body.

They also held that when the soul was finally reunited with its respective body at the resurrection/judgment it would then have to go through further training and improvement during a future millennium which would prepare the redeemed for the eternal state.

This conviction was held by some of the very early leading Chiliasts like Irenaeus and Tertullian. They believed that there was an unfolding “pre-arranged plan for the exaltation of the just” following death. This was described in varying ways as “the methods by which they [the righteous] are disciplined beforehand for incorruption,” “the gradation and arrangement of those who are saved” or “God’s dispensations.” They also called this theory “the law of the dead.” These particular dispensations were believed to occur in stages. Believers were said to “advance through steps of this nature.”

The first test for man was seen as his natural life on earth. After death, these early Chiliasts believed that the elect would enter subterranean Hades to undergo further spiritual refinement in a disembodied state to prepare them for a future millennial kingdom on earth. This, they believed, was a proportionate and needed recompense for previous sins in life and a disciplining of the soul in preparation for the age to come. Following this (at the second coming), they understood believers would receive their resurrected bodies and join Christ on a renovated earth to enjoy a millennial Sabbath. But this too, they assumed, involved a further probationary period lasting 1,000 years, where the elect would become “accustomed gradually to partake of the divine nature.” The result of these three examination periods would then determine the eternal home of God’s people. As a result of man’s examination in life, in Hades in the intermediate state, and on a future millennial earth, these early influential Chiliasts believed that the elect would be divided up into 3 groups according to their worthiness after the millennium and then ushered accordingly into 3 separate eternal abodes – (1) heaven, (2) paradise or (3) the new Jerusalem.

But where did the Chiliast proponents of this doctrine get their idea of three stages of discipline, reparation and gradation? After all, orthodox Christians typically believe that man is tested in life, and the result of that life will determine both his eternal home and his eternal reward after a suitable judgment. Hebrews 9:27 supports this saying: “it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment.”

Evangelicals generally believe there are two eternal abodes. Eternity is either enjoyed by the elect on a renewed earth (either millennial or a perfected new earth) or by the wicked in the lake of fire. Notwithstanding, most commentators recognize a pattern of 3 distinct reward meted out for the righteous on judgment day (Mark 4:20, Luke 19:12-21, 1 Corinthians 3:11-15, 15:41-42, Hebrews 8:5, 9:24 and 1 John 2:12-13. Similar distinctions exist in regard to the punishment of the wicked (Matthew 10:15, 11:22-24, Mark 6:11, Luke 10:12). But this life is universally accepted by Bible-believing Christians to be the exclusive testing time and sole decision time for the redeemed. The Roman Catholic Church holds different beliefs.

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Paul Malcomson said:

Apollinarius of Laodicea

Apollinarius took up the ancient Premillennial baton from these early heretics. Notably, he too was a prominent heretic who was strongly opposed and renounced by the universal Church of his day. Very little of what he wrote has been passed down to us. Most of it was destroyed as heretical. Most of what we have comes from his theological opponents who were strong in their renunciations.

Gregory, Bishop of Nyssa said of Apollinarius of Laodicea, that his theology taught that “the Jewish animal-sacrifices shall be restored” (Dogmatic Treatises, Etc.; Letter XVII – To Eustathia).

Basil the Great describes what Apollinarius believed

Apollinarius [of Laodicea], who is no less a cause of sorrow to the Churches. With his facility of writing, and a tongue ready to argue on any subject, he has filled the world with his works ... What he writes on theology is not founded on Scripture, but on human reasonings. He has written about the resurrection, from a mythical, or rather Jewish, point of view; urging that we shall return again to the worship of the Law, be circumcised, keep the Sabbath, abstain from meats, offer sacrifices to God, worship in the Temple at Jerusalem, and be altogether turned from Christians into Jews. What could be more ridiculous? Or, rather, what could be more contrary to the doctrines of the Gospel? (Letters and Select Works: Letter 263, 4 - To the Westerns).​

Here is an outline of classic Premillennial teaching. Again, noticeably, this was held by an early heretic who was strongly resisted by the orthodox Christian Church. This was foreign teaching to them in the light of what Christ ushered in through the new covenant. Apollinarius taught that Israel would be restored to her previous old covenant place for preference over all other nations.

But, most troubling to the early writers, was the early Premillennial promotion of the full reinstitution of the redundant old covenant arrangement with its multiple additional sin offerings to atone for the sins of man in the future. This was despite the well-established beliefs of the Patristic writers that the New Testament Scripture makes clear that Christ was the final sacrifice for sin (Romans 6:10, Hebrews 7:27, 9:12, 28, 10:10, 12, 14 and 1 Peter 3:18) and that there are no more offerings for sin (Hebrews 9:26, 10:18, 26 and 1 John 3:5).

Apollinarianism was condemned by a council at Alexandria in 362 A.D. at Roman councils in 377 A.D. and 378 A.D. In the second Ecumenical Council and the First Council of Constantinople in 381 AD the Church leaders renounced Apollinarius as a heretic. He is actually repudiated by name in Canon 1 and Canon 7. Along with his other fellow heretics he was to be “anathematized.”

Gregory the Theologian also criticized Apollinarius in his letter to Cledonius the Priest Against Apollinarius (Epistle CI. (101), highlighting his Premillennial beliefs.

I would they were even cut off that trouble you, and would reintroduce a second Judaism, and a second circumcision, and a second system of sacrifices. For if this be done, what hinders Christ also being born again to set them aside, and again being betrayed by Judas, and crucified and buried, and rising again, that all may be fulfilled in the same order, like the Greek system of cycles, in which the same revolutions of the stars bring round the same events.​

Jerome targets the theology of the early Premillennial heretics, mentioning Apollinaris in particular in his renunciation:

Dionysius the bishop of the church of Alexandria, wrote a fine book mocking the tale of the millennium, as well as the golden and bejeweled earthly Jerusalem, the restoration of the temple, the blood of sacrifices, the idleness of the sabbath, the injury of circumcision, nuptials, child birth, child-rearing, the delights of feasting, and the servitude of all nations, and once again wars, armies, and triumphs, and the slaughter of the vanquished, and the death of the hundred-year-old sinner. Apollinaris responded to him in two volumes, and he is followed not only by men of his own sect, but also by a great multitude of our own, at least in this matter, so that I already perceive with foreboding that the anger of many will be aroused against me (Commentary to Isaiah, Preface to Book 18).​

For Jerome, the Premillennial scheme was “a tale.” Others would similarly call it “a fable.” The idea of a future age in-between “this age” and “the age to come” was quite fanciful to many of the early Amil writers. When the detail of the heretical Premillennialist heretics were threw into the mix, with their expectation of more ongoing sin, more decay, more sickness, more death, more sin offerings, etc, etc, it was hardly surprising that many found this far-fetched. When you add all the religious actors that populate the millennium and give their feigned allegiance to Christ and then turn on Him when Satan appears 1000 years after the second coming, then you are looking at a doctrine that seems beyond the pale of reality and truth. When they then argued that a future earth will see the mortal wicked interact with the glorified saints for a thousand years then you are looking at a clear non-corroborative doctrine.

In an article Jerome’s Judaizers, Hillel I. Newman argues: “So far as we know, none of these authors maintained hopefully that in the millennial kingdom all would offer sacrifices and keep the sabbath and that all men would be circumcised.”

Premil Lyford Paterson Edwards even concedes: “we see the unfortunate fate of Chiliasm in getting mixed up with heresies with which it, as such, had nothing to do. The extraordinary detestation which overtook Apollinaris as arch-heretic par excellence seems to have finally discouraged Chiliasm in the Eastern Church. It was reckoned as a heresy thereafter and though it appears sporadically down to our own day it is of no more interest for our purpose” (The Transformation of Early Christianity from an Eschatological to a Socialized Movement).

The later Jacobite bishop of Dara, in Mesopotamia (d. 845), John of Dara exposes Apollonarius for his millennialist teaching:

Apollonarius the heretic, with his companions, abandoned the glorious illumination of the living words and became blind to the faith like the Jews. He dared to speak, like the Pharisees, that after the resurrection of the dead, we shall live again for a thousand years in Jerusalem with the Messiah, with bodily pleasures, and childish sacrifices, and earthly libations before him [the Messiah?]. After these things are fulfilled, at that time we shall be taken up into heaven. And he was not shamed by the voice of Paul who said, “The kingdom of God is not of eating or drinking. But of righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.” Also in like manner Irenaeus bishop of Lyon in Gaul wandered in these matters, which are in the book of Papias as Eusebius narrates (On the Resurrection of Bodies 2.13).​

John of Dara likens Apollonarius’ Premillennialism to Phariseeism. He rubbishes the idea of Judaic temple ceremonial in Jerusalem for a thousand years in front of the Messiah.

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