22 major reasons to abandon the Premil doctrine
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Ronald Nolette
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So when were they beheaded for the testimony of jesus?
who was the beast they refused to worship?
What was the mark they didn't wear?
You said death and sin are now defeated-- So this verse has come to pass at jesus resurrection:
1 Corinthians 15:24-28
King James Version
24 Then cometh the end, when he shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father; when he shall have put down all rule and all authority and power.
25 For he must reign, till he hath put all enemies under his feet.
26 The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death.
27 For he hath put all things under his feet. But when he saith all things are put under him, it is manifest that he is excepted, which did put all things under him.
28 And when all things shall be subdued unto him, then shall the Son also himself be subject unto him that put all things under him, that God may be all in all.
So seeing as you declare above that death is defeated and it is the last enemy, Jesus has turned the kingdom back over to the Father- at His resurrection according to you.
Please stop avoiding the issue. Furnish us with one single New Testament Scripture that outlines a land promise to ethnic Israel today?
Marcion was actually a Premil. Through his distorted view of the Hebrew Scriptures, Marcion also advanced the idea of the full recovery of the Jewish tradition in the future. He saw the nation retaking its favored Old Testament position above all nations again in the future. He absurdly believed that Israel, according to Old Testament prophecies, has its own unique Messiah, who is distinct to the Jesus of the New Testament.
Listen to Tertullian, a well-known Chiliast, of Carthage, Africa, (now Tunisia), (160 – 220 AD) in Against Marcion Book III, Chapter XXI:
So you cannot get out of this notion of yours a basis for your difference between the two Christs, as if the Jewish Christ were ordained by the Creator for the restoration of the people alone from its dispersion, whilst yours was appointed by the supremely good God for the liberation of the whole human race. Because, after all, the earliest Christians are found on the side of the Creator, not of Marcion, all nations being called to His kingdom, from the fact that God set up that kingdom from the tree (of the cross).
Here you have the seeds of modern-day Premillennialism. To Marcion, the whole idea of the “restoration” of the “Jewish … people” to their land involved the full return of the old covenant scheme, something rejected by early Chiliasts but anticipated on the millennial earth by most Premils today. Marcion also believed that there were two peoples of God, a doctrine unknown to ancient Chiliasm, but prevalent with Dispensationalism today. He made a clear distinction between Israel and the Church, although this arch heretic imagined two different God’s and two different Messiahs overseeing each company.
Tertullian explains in Chapter VI:
Marcion has laid down the position, that Christ who in the days of Tiberius was, by a previously unknown god, revealed for the salvation of all nations, is a different being from Him who was ordained by God the Creator for the restoration of the Jewish state, and who is yet to come.
It seems from the early censures of Marcion by both early Chiliasts and early Amillennialists that the restoration of the Jewish state was at the center and forefront of his eschatological hope. This was not found in any of the orthodox early writers. The Church was God’s only spiritual elect and the true people of God.
Tertullian continues in Chapter XXIV (Christ’s Millennial and Heavenly Glory in Company with His Saints),
God’s kingdom in an everlasting and heavenly possession. Besides, your Christ promises to the Jews their primitive condition, with the recovery of their country; and after this life’s course is over, repose in Hades in Abraham’s bosom.
Tertullian takes Marcion to task over his view that the Jewish Messiah (who was said to be different from Jesus Christ) would give “the Jews their primitive condition, with the recovery of their country.” Here he was advocating the legitimacy of, and the Jewish return to, the old covenant ceremonial system. It is important to say at this juncture, not one of the orthodox early Chiliasts promoted this theology. This was a belief that was outside of the pale of orthodoxy – both Amillennial and Chiliast. It was a Jewish heresy advocated by the neo-Gnostics like Cerinthus and Marcion.
In Marcion’s theology, we see how there was a strong prevailing view among the early heretics that God would bring Israel back to their previous theocratic place of favor. This was strongly rejected by ancients Amils and Premils.
Tertullian (an early Chiliast) refutes Marcion’s error, stating:
As for the restoration of Judæa, however, which even the Jews themselves, induced by the names of places and countries, hope for just as it is described, it would be tedious to state at length how the figurative interpretation is spiritually applicable to Christ and His church, and to the character and fruits thereof (Against Marcion Book III, Chapter 24).
Orthodox early Chiliast, Tertullian represents the prevailing thought among his peers on national Israel here, demonstrating that the people of God can only be found in the Church of Jesus Christ. There is no second group. There is no alternative place of favor. There is no other plan of salvation.
Marcion's invented Christ would meet all the faulty hyper-literal expectations that the apostate Christ-rejecting Jews desired - including restoring them back to their former land and elevating them to their former glory as God's chosen people and an elite race lording over all the Gentile nations. Whilst orthodox Premils reject the "2 Messiahs heresy" they run with Marcion's future millennial expectancy of a temporary carnal earthly kingdom focused mainly upon the Jews, Jerusalem and the old covenant practice. This is classic Premil!
Hill argued: “Marcion conceded to the Jews the reality of a full chiliastic hope, complete with a messianic deliverer, restoration to the land of promise, and refreshment in the infernal realms for the faithful dead! (The lack of any mention of resurrection is, however, to be noted.) He agreed with the Jews, and against catholic Christians, that the Christ promised in the Old Testament had not yet come. Marcion taught that the Creator’s Christ, when at last he came, would indeed restore the fortunes of the Jewish nation just as the Jews were convinced he would. Marcion of course wanted nothing to do with this Creator, his Christ, or the benefits they would lavish upon the Jews; to him they all savored of the same earthly and fleshly stench which his heavenly Savior had come to dispel. But part of his polemical program against orthodox Christianity was to insist that the Jews were right and the Christians were wrong about the interpretation of the prophets. The Jewish, nationalistic Messiah predicted in the Old Testament bore no likeness to the Christ of the higher God who came to earth during the reign of Tiberius to effect the salvation of mankind.”
The heretical dualists were Premil literalists who opposed the more-figurative Amillennialist position. Origen in his Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew 15.3, explained how Marcion "prohibited allegorical interpretations of the scripture."
As a Premil, Marcion was a literalist and took the thousand years as a literal period of time after the second coming that involved the continuation of this physical age and all its pleasures and afflictions.
Origen actually summed up the ethos of those that held to a future millennium saturated in mortals (including the wicked) and who promoted the return of the old covenant arrangement as “understand the divine Scriptures in a sort of Jewish sense” (De Principiis, Book 2, Chapter XI).
This is the classic MO of modern-day Premils. They hurl the same charges at Amillennialists as these ancient heretics through at ancient orthodox Church generally. It comes up continually in discussions with Premils.
Randy Kluth
Well-Known Member
The promise of Israel's restoration in the Olivet Discourse, Acts 1 and the book of Revelation is, in fact, the promise of restoration to the *land!*
Randy Kluth
Well-Known Member
I'm kind of busy right now. Marcion held to the right eschatology with respect to his being Premil. But he was a heretic. His views may have had some similarity to Dispensationalism, but Dispensationalists are not heretical, whereas Marcion was. This is guilt by association, and I don't indulge in it. I wouldn't say you're a Mormon because Mormons hold to beliefs like your beliefs.
But thanks for the quotes. It's always good to have them in front of us to look at the details. I genuinely appreciate it. I'll check them out a little later when I have more than a minute.
That is a total cop out. We are talking about the founders of modern Premil. None of the early ECFs espoused modern Premil. This is damning to Premil. Mormonism is a relatively recent aberration from orthodox Christianity. You are comparing apples to giraffes.
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Timtofly
Well-Known Member
You know it is not there. That is why you refuse to quote the text. It is a figment of your imagine. Your teachers have taught you wrong.
Timtofly
Well-Known Member
Then remove all the points that don't use Scripture outside the word: Revelation 20. Saying Revelation 20 does not count as including Scripture to back up your point. Otherwise the point is just your opinion. According to your own criteria a post without Scripture is nothing. So your points void of Scripture mean nothing.
Revelation 20 does count, but not what your force upon it. You force events and experiences upon it that are nor else taught in the Scriptures. You force your opinion of Revelation 22 contradicts multiple climactic passages track the Word of God.
Randy Kluth
Well-Known Member
Will you quit saying I "know" things that aren't true. You're a very bad mind-reader! I didn't quote the text to save time because I've quoted these texts enough times already. You know them (I believe), and I know them. And I wouldn't reference them if I didn't believe they were perfectly valid.
I know that very, very well, and you should too. The Olivet Discourse speaks of the gathering of Israel at the return of the Son of Man. Acts 1 speaks specifically to the restoration of national Israel, indicating it will happen in God's time. And Rom 9-11 is all about the fact God has not forgotten His promises to Israel even though they are presently under punishment.
Timtofly
Well-Known Member
I don't think you have Marcion's stance correct. He taught about two God's, not a false Christ. He separated the OT from the NT like Amil attempt to do covenant wise. But his error was stating there was a creator God for Judaism, and a benevolent God of Jesus Christ. All this did was pit the Jews against the Christians.
Obviously Judaism does not accept Jesus as God, and still hold to a creator God who will send a Messiah one day.
This literally has nothing to do with a Millennium nor Revelation 20. Marcion agreed with the Jews and was branded a heretic, but not accepted by the Jews, because he rejected the creator God, for the God of Jesus Christ. That hardly made him a pre-mill forefather. He was just mixed up about Scripture dealing with God, like Amil are mixed up about Scripture dealing with time.
Timtofly
Well-Known Member
No because your whole point is fixated with one chapter. You force the whole chapter into a time slot that John never intended. You already acknowledge parallel views is only human opinion. So if you drop your opinion, then Revelation 20:1 happens right after Revelation 19:21. John did not put in the chapter breaks. That is human opinion.
You have to force your opinion onto the text. I don't. There is no new angle view between the aftermath of Armageddon when Satan is dealt with and every one else there on that day.
Randy Kluth
Well-Known Member
No, you're the one comparing applies to giraffes! It matters not if Cerinthus and Marcion held to Millennialist beliefs.
Cerinthus was a legalist, separating those under the Law from the evils of the material world. Marcion separated the God of NT Grace from the God of the Law. In both cases, a separation is being made away from the substance of Christ, denying that God had come in the flesh.
These heretics were Gnostics, who elevated a kind of Gnostic spirituality over true Christian spirituality. To compare Premillennialists with these heretics simply because they advocated for a form of Premillennialism is absurd since the heretics did not adhere to the orthodoxy of Premillennialism. It's like saying you're a Mormon because you have in common with Mormons the acceptance of the Christian Bible.
If anything, these early Christian heretics confirmed the authenticity of the early embrace of the Jewish Hope. They were just affirming, though in a heretical way, the fact that the Jewish restoration would one day take place, good or bad.
Randy Kluth
Well-Known Member
As long as I've heard WPM rail against Premil he's made this insane claim that there is nothing outside of Rev 20 that supports Premil. The entire sense in the OT of the final restoration of Israel confirms that a Messianic Age is coming. It matters not if the time frame of a thousand years is given. It is, in fact, confirmed by many references in the Prophets to the coming of the Messianic Kingdom.
Randy Kluth
Well-Known Member
You can sometimes tell that someone is off track and not aligned with the word of God. Their rage is evidence of that fact. Their obsessive idolization of their doctrines indicate that somewhere along the way they've gotten off track, gotten lost, and now find themselves groping in the dark filled with anger and accusation.
Such are those who rail against Premillennialists, who simply wish to abide by Jesus' warning not to tamper with the word of the book of Revelation. In ch. 20 we are told there will be a thousand years. If we wish to believe that blatant statement we shouldn't be made to be scoundrels and heretics for believing it!
And so, we Premills should not be called followers of the heretics Cerinthus and Marcion simply because we believe in a literal Millennium as they did and in the fact Israel will be restored in that time frame as they did. Not any more than we should be confused with unbelieving Jews who held to the same beliefs!
Christianity is built upon acceptance of the God of the Law and of Israel. To divorce Christianity from the God of the OT is the very thing non-believing Jews did and precisely what these heretics did!
Such are those who rail against Premillennialists, who simply wish to abide by Jesus' warning not to tamper with the word of the book of Revelation. In ch. 20 we are told there will be a thousand years. If we wish to believe that blatant statement we shouldn't be made to be scoundrels and heretics for believing it!
And so, we Premills should not be called followers of the heretics Cerinthus and Marcion simply because we believe in a literal Millennium as they did and in the fact Israel will be restored in that time frame as they did. Not any more than we should be confused with unbelieving Jews who held to the same beliefs!
Christianity is built upon acceptance of the God of the Law and of Israel. To divorce Christianity from the God of the OT is the very thing non-believing Jews did and precisely what these heretics did!
Timtofly
Well-Known Member
I just counted again. Only 4 points are allegedly based on and use other Scripture. By his own high standards, he can toss out 18 points as merely his own opinion.
Did they really teach a future millennium where God would restore Israel? Was the ancient Hebrew God going to attack the NT God of Jesus the Christ?
How can you have a future about Jews when your current God replaced the ancient Hebrew God? Sounds like some poster is fabricating information. Marcion held to two Gods. That was his heretical error. There is only one God, and Marcion rejected the Trinity as well.
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Randy Kluth
Well-Known Member
WPM is identifying heretics Cerinthus and Marcion as the fathers of modern Premillennialism. Of course that's absurd because the Apostle John originated the doctrine of Millennialism. And belief in the restoration of Israel existed in the Jewish Prophets.
The heretics Cerinthus and Marcion may not be so easy to nail down as they were heretics and their works possibly destroyed. We read about their beliefs from some of the Church Fathers, and their beliefs seem in line with other Gnostic teachings that advocate for a kind of dualism, creating a novel spirituality, distinct from genuine Christian spirituality.
I believe 1 John addressed this kind of Gnosticism and possibly Cerinthus' teaching itself. John did not discard Jewish teaching for NT teaching. He referred to truth as both "old and new." And he did not advocate for a new, alien spirituality but for the original spirituality now revealed "in the flesh."
The heretics wanted to get around the requirement of genuine displays of Christ's righteousness by requiring attendance to doctrines that side-stepped it. Cerinthus emphasized adherence to the Law as a way of avoiding sin. Marcion emphasized adherence to the doctrine of grace completely distinct from any sense of the OT Law.
But true Christianity requires that we actually obtain the spirituality of Christ in order to display divine righteousness. It does not originate from the Law except as a temporary practice leading to its eternal form in Christ. So Cerinthus was completely off base.
Marcion rejected the Law as a legitimate testimony to the need for Christian Grace. As such, his sense of Grace fell short of the display of Christian righteousness that Christ required when he said, "abide in me."
Though these heretics did seem to "replace the Hebrew God" for some new, alien form of Deity, they continued to acknowledge the reality of what the Law and the Prophets testified to, namely the final restoration of Israel.
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