What your teachers never told you about Daniel 7 & 2 Thessalonians 2

well, hmmm...that IS interesting...

Amen!!!

BibSac Volume 157 Number 628 October-December 2000

Author - Robert L. Thomas

Referring to 2 Thess 2:2 & 3-

"Some writers have supposed that in 2 Thessalonians 2:1–3 Paul named recognizable events that will precede the Day of the Lord. In fact Gundry apparently looks to this passage for the title of his recent book, First the Antichrist: Why Christ Won’t Come before the Antichrist Does. That view is oblivious to what the passage teaches, being based on the way most English translations have rendered 2 Thessalonians 2:3. Three features related to the verse deserve emphasis."
"First, in the preceding verse (v. 2) the verb e˙ne÷sthken is present in meaning, even though its form is the perfect tense. It combines the prepositional prefix e˙n with the frequent verb iºsthmi, which in all of its New Testament usages in the perfect tense is instransitive and intensive in emphasizing existing results. That the perfect tense of iºsthmi means “is present” is confirmed by its usage elsewhere (Rom. 8:38; 1 Cor. 3:22; 7:26; Gal. 1:4; Heb. 9:9). Recognition of this fact indicates that the false information among the Thessalonians that Paul was combating was the teaching that “the Day of the Lord is present,” not that it “has already come” (RSV), that it “is at hand” (KJV), that it “is just at hand” (ASV), that it “has come” (NASB, NIV), or that it “had come” (NKJV). I have found only three versions that render the verb correctly. Darby renders it, “the day of the Lord is present”; Weymouth has “the Day of the Lord is now here”; and the New Revised Standard Version has “the Day of the Lord is already here.” These capture the intensive force of the perfect tense of e˙ne÷sthken."
"Second, a feature in verse 3 to be noted is the suppressed apodosis that must be supplied with the conditional clause begun by e˙a»n. Clearly the apodosis to be supplied comes from the end of verse 2. Translations that have missed the sense of the end of verse 2 supply the wrong apodosis: “that day shall not come” (KJV), “it will not be” (ASV), “it will not come” (NASB), “that day will not come” (NIV, RSV), “that Day will not come” (NKJV). But even the three versions that render verse 2 correctly supply the wrong apodosis: “that day cannot come” (Weymouth), “that day will not come” (NRSV), “it will not be” (Darby). Some versions indicate the absence of an explicit apodosis, but others do not."
"To be faithful to the context, the understood apodosis should be “the Day of the Lord is not present.” Complying with the context in this manner yields grammatical criteria for labeling the last half of verse 3 as a present general condition. Most clauses with e˙a»n and the subjunctive in the New Testament are more probable future conditions, but when the verb of the apodosis has the force of a present indicative, that makes it a present general condition. Such a construction often expresses a maxim, a generic condition in the present time. It expresses a principle or a proverb. In such cases the protasis makes an assumption in the present time, and the apodosis gives a conclusion in the form of a general rule. Therefore the sense of Paul’s statement in verse 3 is as follows: “If the apostasy does not come first and the man of lawlessness is not revealed, the Day of the Lord is not present. That is a principle you can count on.”

So, the correct reading should be “If the apostasy does not come first and the man of lawlessness is not revealed, the Day of the Lord is not present. "

Repeat in plain English.

“If the apostasy does not come first and the man of lawlessness is not revealed, the Day of the Lord is not present. "

As opposed to almost every translation available today which typically reads:

2Th 2:2 that you not be quickly shaken from your composure or be disturbed either by a spirit or a message or a letter as if from us, to the effect that the day of the Lord has come.
2Th 2:3 Let no one in any way deceive you, for {it will not come} unless the apostasy comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the son of destruction,

See the difference? It's not that the apostasy or the antichrist must be revealed first before the day of the Lord can come. It's that if they were in the day of the Lord (it's an ongoing timeframe), then the apostasy and antichrist would have already been revealed. That is how it should read.

So those who say that there cannot be a pretrib rapture due to the fact that the antichrist and apostasy has to be revealed before it are wrong in using this verse as a proof. That isn't what the verse is saying. Actually, it is a support for the pretrib rapture, because it is obvious that those who were worried were obviously worried that they had missed the rapture and were going to have to endure judgement. Otherwise they were expecting it.

This premise is based on the assumption that the “decree of Emperor Justinian”was a document that made the bishop of Rome “head over all the churches, the definer of doctrine, and the corrector of heretics”, and that the supremacy of the pope was only recognized after the siege of Rome ended in 538AD. I believe that this assumption is demonstrably false.

The supremacy of the papacy as head over all the churches was already established before 538AD and was not dependent on Justinian’s Code. The headship was based on “the rules of the Fathers and the decrees of the Emperors”, not on Justinian's law. Justinian’s letter to Pope John II (the one that was later incorporated into the second edition of the Code) revealed that the Roman See’s headship over all the Holy Churches was established prior to the Goth War. Pope John II replied by stating in his letter that he was indeed the head of all Churches, and that Justinian had already “subjected all things” to the Roman See’s authority, and had “given it unity”. This was long before 538AD and during Ostrogoth occupation of Rome.

Now I have read thru the Codex, the Pandects, and the Novellae (not just the snippets found on sites like Michael Scheifler’s), and I have not found any law that made the bishop of Rome the “corrector of heretics”. I have found laws that restricted the rights of heretics, that stripped them of their places of worship and caused them to forfeit their property rights to the Church, but none of the laws discussed the Roman See’s participation in any of it. In every case that I’ve seen, enforcement was left to provincial, orthodox bishops to carry out, not the Roman See. The decrees dealing with heretics that are most commonly pointed out by Adventists were actually preexisting laws enacted in the 4th-5th Centuries; Justinian simply incorporated them into his Code.

And I’ve found no law in the Codex, the Pandects, or the Novellae that declared the Pope as the “definer of doctrine”. If any Adventist would care to point out where the law is found I would be happy to read it for myself. If people think that Title I of the Codex is where the Pope’s ecclesiastical authority lies, I would remind them that the law was originally enacted by emperors Theodosius, Gratian, and Valentinian well over a hundred years before Justinian’s Code.

So, Justinian’s Code did not make the bishop of Rome head over all the churches - the letters incorporated into the Codex expressed that this authority was already a reality prior to the Code’s publishing. I know of no law within the Code that made the Pope the definer of doctrine or the corrector of heretics, and I doubt that most Adventists who make these claims have even taken the time to locate these laws for themselves. But again, if these laws do in fact exist within the Codex, Pandects, or Novellae, by all means point them out to me.

In Christ,

Acts6:5

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Don't strain at gnats and swallow camels. Not every word on a link I post gets my blessing. Take issue with Daniel 7 or the quoted words of the ECF, instead.

The Historicist/Adventist application of Daniel 7:25 to the year 538AD and Justinian's Code is not a minor issue.

So you don't agree with the link, that a decree from Justinian went into effect in 538AD that made the Roman See head of all Churches and thus began the fulfillment of Daniel 7:25? Wonderful, we're in agreement then.

I can choose to take issue with anything you post on this thread, whether it's the ECF's or a link that deals with the year 538AD and Justinian's Code. But I will respond to your ECF quotes soon.

In Christ,

Acts6:5

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So, is this thread implying that the Day of Jesus Christ has already come..?

I have started a thread titled "The Purpose of Prophecy" as a starting point to unwind the mysteries of prophecy. Here is the link:
http://christianforums.com/t7054728-...-prophecy.html

I will be back a little later with links for two additional new threads that should answer the questions raised.

Respectfully, your brother in Christ,
Doc