There will be no Rapture!!!

@FollowerofShiloh 's Post #1938,

So what word do you see in those three verse I had provided, instead? John 4:21, John 4:23 and 1 John 2:18 (2x)?

In John 4 Jesus is talking to the Samaritan woman about His Hour when worship won't be in the mountain or Temple because we know it's in our hearts.

But 1 John in the 2nd century Greek has no mention of hour.
18 Little children, it is the last time, and as you heard that antichrist comes, even now many antichrists have risen: whence we know that it is the last time.

Considering that Revelation's Prologue begins with an address to the 7 churches in Turkey, what significance might the current condition of those have upon our understanding of the rest of the book? I tried wiki to get a lead on exactly what happened with each of the churches but am only going on the general trend not being any sort of expert in regard to those original churches. Where these considered of the Byzantine order seeing that most of those are either in ruins or have been converted to mosques?

Interesting and thought provoking question by You because it's extremely important to understand that these 7 Churches are specific to John in his time and not connected at all to future prophecy. I have also done research and even followed the writings of both the Church Fathers and Historians of the immediate decades following 100 A.D. concerning these Churches and the remnants have well ended by the 5th century.

Just like we will never see the true example of the Acts Church from the leadership of the Apostles, we will no longer see examples of these 7 Churches but the """sins""" that God shows us can apply to even today's Pastor + congregations.

So I agree, if I read you correctly, those Churches came and now gone and are no more and never will be again. They literally have no connection to the Prophecies within Revelation at all.

John wrote what is very telling about the book of Revelation:

Revelation 1:19 Write the things which thou hast seen [past tense], and the things which are [present tense], and the things which shall be hereafter [future tense];

This is the divisional outline of the entire book, given that it all divides out nicely into three distinct sections of timelines, with the churches being what was (Rev. 1-3, and are not ruins for archaeologists to study), also in that they had already been in the state the Lord addressed to each one by the time John wrote the book. Then it goes to things which are in the present Church age unto its very end (Rev 4-5). Then on to things to come (Rev 6-22). Amillennialists will disagree with this, but the text and reality both defy that system of thought, as nonsensical as it is.

MM

I disagree on the basis knowing in Mishnah we studied the fall of the Adversary that took place either before or just after Creation. We see them attack God's Plan in the Garden (chapter 3), the Nephilim (chapter 6), Tower of Babel (chapter 12).

But Revelation makes no mention of this until chapter 12 as we see the Dragon and fallen stars on Earth prior to the BIRTH of the child (Jesus).
4 His tail swept down a third of the stars of heaven and cast them to the earth. And the dragon stood before the woman who was about to give birth, so that when she bore her child he might devour it.


So Revelation is not all in line as you claim.

Do you see any similarities between Deuteronomy and Revelation?

I don't give a rat's petoot about the oral traditions of our ancients. If you can prove Revelation doesn't mean what it states, then prove it! It's just that simple. The Church, which was inclusive of both believing Israelis and Gentiles was fully integrated into a living body before John was given those visions of three different timelines, so throwing the Mishnah into the mix is pure nonsense!

If you choose to gauge the caliber of my Israeli roots on the basis of my rejection of Mishnah, then so be it. Again, your opinion on that has no bearing upon anything whatsoever apart from your own inner thought processes. One must separate the meaningful history that can be gleaned from Mishnah of the people's and their thought processes back then, and throw out the rest that has no place in our life in Yahshuah and has no bearing upon John's record of what He was shown.

Mishnah is earthly in tenor and foundation given that it's about traditions, not inspired writing from the very Lord we serve. Revelation, on the other hand, touches upon Heaven and earth, and shows the wrath of the Lord out of which we as the Church will be delivered out from because He did not "appoint" us into that. If you want to remain here, then that's on you, not anyone else. Stay if you like. Pray the Lord will leave you here if you so desire. I really don't care because I care more about your freedom to choose than to try and force you into seeking to be where you don't want to be.

MM

I know you don't care and it reflects on your answers you provide. They are as horrendous reading as it was watching my son when he played t-ball baseball and kept hitting the T-Stand instead of the ball.

At least my not caring is on the basis of your freedom to choose rather than upon the sinful lack of love, or a tyrannical desire to control you. There's a difference. One is noble, the others are sin. I chose the noble path rather than the paths of sin.

MM

I love debating with you because you debate like a Jew even though you denounce it every step of the way. I am at fault for pushing the buttons to set you off but in all fairness, knowing the Tanakh testifies who the Coming Messiah (Jesus) was and seems vital to understand the connection. I hardly say my people but rather state the Old Covenant Book, Chapter, and Verse. Any ways, you are breathe of fresh air and I cherish our bickering.

What I denounce, in reality, is anything that is not inspired writing, but only by comparison.

The traditions of our people varied from tribe to tribe, with the priesthood at the higher tier than tribal, and ultimately the Torah at the top, but not always revered as the one and only defining authority. The tendency to try and "fill in the gaps" with specifics for those who routinely demand answers to such things as "How many steps can I take on Shabbat before it becomes 'work' as a violation of Torah?" All of that stems from a lack of vision for the spirit of Torah.

As is written, the letter "killeth," but the Spirit "giveth life."

The traditions tended to be so deeply steeped in much of what we see within the RCC, historically speaking. A progressive building upon the heap of traditions always leads to inconsistencies, contradictions, along with lots and lots of interpretations from our contemporary rabbis. My lineage of rabbis, some secular and some overly religious, and everything in between, but almost always legalistic, have been somewhat of a thorn in my flesh upon reflection throughout my past.

Being a "Messianic Jew" (and I lay claim to that label very reservedly given that I don't subscribe to ALL the beliefs within ALL groupings who lay claim to that label), I'm forced to look toward inspired writing as being vastly more authoritative than anything else written by men who had not seen Yahshuah.

MM

For me what you speak about would be the Talmud and its doctrines based off of Rabbi interpretation and ancient wise tales. But the Torah and Tanakh is 100% Inspired of God. And Mishnah only deals with the Torah and Tanakh. Most Talmudic teaching doesn't happen until well after the understanding of what we know in Christianity as the Old Testament.

Way back when I studied those second century manuscripts of which you spoke, I recall how the early churches spanned across the much of the Roman empire, including Carthage, Antioch, Cappadocia, Rome and even what is now Spain. The Egyptian churches did not receive ANY of the original autographs from the Apostles, so far as we know.

When it comes to the Greek New Testament texts, it's blatantly erroneous to focus only on the Egyptian manuscripts by the virtue of them being the "oldest." Persecution forced considerable isolation and so it's questionable to assume that the second to the fourth century Egyptian manuscripts were unilaterally accepted manuscripts by all the churches in those centuries. Those churches couldn't even agree on the a canon of books, so what basis is there to presume that they had textual uniformity, or that the Alexandrian manuscripts were more authoritative?

Even Origen himself wrote:

“…the differences among the manuscripts [of the Gospels] have become great, either through the negligence of some copyists or through the perverse audacity of others; they either neglect to check over what they have transcribed, or, in the process of checking, they lengthen or shorten, as they please.”

This casts considerable doubts, therefore, upon those "older" texts of which you seem to rely so heavily. Antiquity is not at all an absolute acid test for authenticity nor conformity, given that a prominent church father in Alexandria testified that manuscripts were already corrupt by the third century.

The manuscripts in question likely include:

• Codex Sinaiticus (Mount Sinai, Egypt)
• Codex Alexandrinus (Alexandria, Egypt)
• Codex Vaticanus (Alexandria, Egypt)
• Uncial 0220 (Cairo, Egypt)
• Uncial 0162 (Oxyrhynchus, Egypt)
• Uncial 0206 (Oxyrhynchus, Egypt)
• Amherst Papyri (Egypt)
• Bodmer papyri (Pabau, Egypt)
• Chester Beatty papyri (Fayum or Aphroditopolis, Egypt)
• Michigan papyri (Egypt)
• Oxyrhynchus papyri (Oxyrhynchus, Egypt)
• Rylands papyri (Egypt)
• Miscellaneous papyri
  • P2 (Egypt), P4 (Coptos, Egypt) P6 (Egypt), P7 (Egypt), P8 (Egypt), P12 (Egypt), P14 (Mount Sinai, Egypt), P25 (Egypt), P33=58 (Egypt), P34 (Egypt), P35 (Egypt), P36 (Egypt), P40 (Egypt), P41 (Egypt), P43 (Egypt), P44 (Egypt), P48 (Egypt), P49 (Egypt), P50 (Egypt), P52 (Egypt), P53 (Egypt), P54 (Egypt), P55 (Egypt), P56 (Egypt), P57 (Egypt), P59 (Egypt), P60 (Egypt), P61 (Egypt), P62 (Egypt), P63 (Egypt), P64=67 (Coptos, Egypt), P65 (Egypt), P68 (Egypt), P76 (Egypt), P79 (Egypt), P80 (Egypt), P81 (Egypt), P82 (Egypt), P83 (Egypt), P84 (Egypt), P85 (Egypt), P86 (Egypt), P88 (Egypt), P89 (Egypt), P92 (Faiyum, Egypt)

Just ensuring I have my critical thinking cap is on correctly...because Alexandria is also known to have been the main capital of the Gnostics, who are worthy of the doubts for their credibility that they have so glowingly earned through the centuries.

MM

Don't forget that when Domitian became Emperor and had his lengthy rule, boiled the Apostle John in oil and sent him to Patmos, he made every effort to destroy all Christian written materials. So there's no assurance that anything we have pertaining to the New Testament is completed or accurate. Might be why we are still finding scripts and scrolls hidden in caves and odd spaces to this day like the dead sea scrolls in 1947 ironically 1 year before Israel was restored as a Nation.

Actually, no. That is not entirely accurate, as confirmed by a number of scholars with whom I have conversed over this within the BAR publication society.

Where it's true that Domitian confiscated pretty much all the known COMPLETE copies, the multitudes of pieces that were intentionally distributed across the empire, all to keep him from successfully destroying any and all fragmented copies of the letters written by the apostles, and given that they agree with each other more than 95% of the time, with the differences being so minor as to not affect doctrinal foundations, that clearly outweighs the claims of authenticity on the mere basis of antiquity alone, especially, as mentioned before, the source of those older documents also known to have been Gnostics with an agenda, and that disagree with each other on significant levels.

MM

Possibly. But the fact is we can properly date papyrus parchment river materials within 20 years and most of the Gospels/New Testament are dated on papyrus from around late 2nd/early 3rd century. That shows us it's very possible some of the New Testament is from memory, not fragments alone.

Granted, that the dating can be somewhat precise, but we still have to consider lots of other factors, and given that the list of manuscripts I listed above, and that disagree with each other on a significant level of percentage, and that they were in the hands of Gnostics, that's more than enough for me to reject the newer translations, and even the NKJV notes about the NU texts. The antiquity argument, then, is moot.

It is good, however, to study sourcing so that each one can make his own mind up, and we also have Holy Spirit Who gives to us what is of necessity for us to accept as truth.

MM

I actually will refer to the early English Bibles before the kjv for better accuracy because the TR is corrupted and Erasmus even noted as such which the kjv writers in 1611 alluded to having access to with help in some translating. I truly only believe Revelation is the most truest and original Book in the NT knowing John penned it after the death of Domitian and we know that Trajen and the other Roman Emperors did not make it their task to destroy Christian materials.

I would like to also point out that when I say maybe the Books are 98% completed or less, I don't believe it refers to salvation or commands or structural principles God instructs us to abide by. I am alluding to that we are getting the full intended complete original truth in every verse but maybe every verses is not written as it was originally.

But I will also add, because I have discovered this, maybe the original word meaning is not being used.

There's some verses where a doctrine says this means this but when searching the Greek it's actually a different word with like meaning but completely changes the specific meaning.

It's like saying throwing the ball but the word for throwing that's used actually means under hand toss. That's a completely different meaning even though both actions deal with throwing.