I am not convinced that this is an account of a pre-trib rapture. It certainly states that the saints shall be gathered and taken to the Lord but beyond that it lacks essential details to conclusively determine if said quote truly describes an account of a pre-trib rapture. It speaks nothing of the resurrection of the dead nor specify to where the saints are gathered. One could assume that given that they are to be taken to the Lord, one could conclude heaven. However, not conclusively because if you read the quoted section carefully it never claims to say that the saints will be saved from tribulation but merely from the confusion of the world. One could easily translate the quote to mean that Christ shall gather his saints to prepare them in the manner of righteousness and sound christian judgement such that they will not be deceived nor fall into confussion during the time of the great tribulation.
This article does not even suggest that the saints would be "saved" from the coming confusion. It says they will be gathered and taken to the lord, lest they "see" the confusion.
It should also be noted that there is a bit of controversy over the translation of this manuscript from the late latin text which may support a pre-trib rapture, while the translation of the earlier Syriac text does not support a pre-trib rapture. Is the translation of the manuscript authentic, I don't know but we should have numerous writings from the time of the early church to make a claim that pre-trib rapture was provenly a doctrine espoused by the early church. That is not the case, if we look at historic pre-millenailism taught by the early church, it is evident by reading their writings within their full context that they believed in a post tribulation rapture.
In this light it would be helpful to consider some of the comments of Eusebius, made in his famous fourth century history of the church. Speaking of Papias, who is the earliest known non- Biblical Christian commentator of prophecy, he said,
"11. The same writer gives also other accounts which he says came to him through unwritten tradition, certain strange
parables and teachings of the
Saviour, and some other more mythical things. 12. To these belong his statement that there will be a period of some thousand years after the resurrection of the dead, and that the kingdom of Christ will be set up in material form on this very earth. I suppose he got these ideas through a misunderstanding of the
apostolic accounts, not perceiving that the things said by them were spoken
mystically in figures.
13. For he appears to have been of very limited understanding, as one can see from his discourses. But it was due to him that so many of the Church Fathers after him adopted a like opinion, urging in their own support the antiquity of the man; as for instance
Irenæus and any one else that may have proclaimed similar views."
When Eusebius wrote this in the waning years of the third century, the church as a whole had rejected Chiliasm, of a belief in a literal millennium. So Eusebius felt that he had "been of very little understanding."
But his last sentace on this subject is very telling. "But it was due to him that so many of the Church Fathers after him adopted a like opinion, urging in their own support the antiquity of the man; as for instance
Irenæus and any one else that may have proclaimed similar views."
Eusebius explicitly complained that "many" erly church writers had followed the (as he considered) bad lead of Papias. But where are the writings of these "many" early teachers? They were not preserved. In medieval times it became unacceptable to preserve writings that did not agree with accepted standards of the day. So the writings of the followers of Papias were, for the most part, purged from church libraries, or at the very least, not copied out by medieval copyists.
This distorts the written history of the church, making it seem that the doctrine commonly accepted in medieval times had always been the standard doctrine of the church. But this stand-alone comment by the church's earliest historian proves that there were "many" such teachers.
Then why were the writings of Irenaeus preserved? Because his famous work brought about a final end to the advance of Gnosticism in the early church, and because some of his comments at least seemed to endorse the concept of the primacy of the Bishop of Rome, and thus to endorse the papacy.
Inn this respect it is important to realize that this comment by Eusebius establishes Irenaeus as the sole surviving example of a whole genera of early Christian writing.
But in the quotation I have already made, we see that Irenaeus explicitly taught that the church would be "suddenly caught up" before the great tribulation. But in the articleI linked to before, I pointed out that Irenaeus also had the church suffering under the Antichrist. From this I have concluded that his position was what would today be called a mid-trib rapture, not a pre-trib rapture. But this is indeed the earliest surviving comment on the subject.
As the subject of this thread is the history of a particular doctrine, I have not responded to the off-subject comments about whether or not that doctrine is correct.
