I sincerely appreciate your candor.I am not able to accept that idea.
2 Thess. 2:4.....
"who opposes and exalts himself above all that is called God or that is worshiped, so that he sits as God in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God."
The Greek word you refer to....naos does not require some large Solomaic-like structure. Instead, it can refer to a small tent-like structure or inner sanctuary.
The Tabernacle was in fact a tent that was put up and taken down as the Jews moved.
As a Historicists, and it seems to me probably a Preterist, you must understand that at the end of the day you are required import a foreign meaning into 2 Thess 2:4 to maintain the figurative-church interpretation of naos.
Just so that you will understand my position and why I say the things I say, allow me to tell you that I believe when all the Biblical prophecies are taken as a whole, they cannot be spiritualized away. I am just not smart enough to explain away the literal written words of the Scriptures. To me, they are what they are and do not require my explanation of them or in any way to make them fit what I think.
To me, when the Bible speaks of a wicked man entering into the Temple, I take that to mean that a third Temple will be rebuilt and the Antichrist will enter into it.
When Paul writes about the followers of Jesus Christ being snatched off the earth I take it literally.
When the Bible says that there is a place were the lost of all ages will be tormented forever, I take that literally and I believe that there is just such a place just as well as there is a Heaven where the saved of all the ages will be blessed and stay eternally.
When the Bible says that Jesus walked on water, I take that to mean that He put His feet on WET liquid, water and He did not sink.
When Jesus and the prophet Daniel say that one day the world is going to experience a time of trouble unlike any other time in history, I believe it is going to happen (Matthew 24:15-21; Daniel 12:1-3).
Was the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple in 70 A.D. unlike any other time in history? No, the Jews had a similar experience almost seven hundred years earlier when the Babylonians besieged Jerusalem and destroyed the Temple. I believe that just as Jesus fulfilled the Old Testament prophecies concerning a suffering Messiah, so too will He fulfill the Old and New Testament prophecies concerning a conquering and victorious Messiah.
May the Lord bless you and help your understanding my friend and if you do not think like I do, that is OK as well.
I think you may have missed my point, though.
The Greek word you refer to....naos does not require some large Solomaic-like structure. Instead, it can refer to a small tent-like structure or inner sanctuary.
My point is that naos as Paul uses it in his epistles is not a physical structure of any type, but a spiritual one, in this case, the Church.
That is how the Reformers, with the advantage of 20/20 hindsight, understood it. Calvin's notes on 2 Thess. 2:4 in his Geneva Study Bible assert:
"He foretelleth that Antichrist, (that is, whosoever he be that shall occupy that seat that falleth away from God) shall not reign without the Church, but in the very bosom of the Church."
Regarding prophetic interpretation, there is no doubt that scores of prophecies are literal, and I understand and believe them as such. But scores are spiritual and symbolic as well, which I'm sure you acknowlege. The challenge is understanding how to differentiate them.
For example, the first prophecy in Scripture, Genesis 3:15:
"And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel."
Is this literal, symbolic/spiritual, or some combination of both?
Thank you for your blessings, and I pray the same in return for you and yours.
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