Irenaeus' whole interpretation of Revelation and prophecy he claims were handed down are false. If you're trying to say someone changed what they've written, I doubt it. What I do know and see is this conspiracy has tampered with scripture, placing false doctrines of a celibate lifestyle and priesthood that points to the RCC, which seems to be it's foundation.
How can you do that? There's no way to prove that fact.
I'm still searching, and since I don't have a computer word search engine for the book, it might take a while. If you have a online site or link, I would appreciate it.
Also, one thing I have noticed while searching is Satan and the Antichrist are classed under the titles "Apostate" and "Apostasy." Try them.
The Antichrist is not from the tribe of Dan, and that's not the reason why Dan's not listed among the 144,000 Israelites in Revelation.
Care to explain why the tribes of Dan and Ephraim aren't listed, and why the Levites and a tribe of Joseph are?
First, I never even suggested that there are no errors in the writings of Irenaeus, or of any other man.
I think his reasoning for saying that the Antichrist will be from the tribe of Dan will be very weak. The Jews know that their Messiah was to have been a sin of David. That makes it absolutely necessary for him to at least be able to persuade the Jews that he is from the tribe of Judah.
Second, I
insist that the fact that Irenaeus made errors does not make him a liar if he says he got his doctrine from Polycarp,who got it from John himself. This makes what he says third hand at best, and everyone knows that even second hand information always contains errors.
Third, I also
insist that no non-inspired person has ever produced an error-free document (of any significant length) about spiritual matters.
And you will notice that
I dd not call you a liar. I said that
if I applied the same test to you that you applied to the early church writers, I would conclude that you are a liar. For what you said about Irenaeus was clearly incorrect.
As we progress through the early writings of the church, we see a progressive departure from the truth. This departure was small at first, and grew steadily larger and larger as things went from bad to worse.
Finally, at about the same time that the church even gave up the essential doctrine of salvation by faith alone, its great bulk also gave up even the beginnings of an understanding of Bible prophecy.
The first man to openly teach Amillennism was condemned as an heretic. But afterwards, that doctrine became established church doctrine.
I am not sure exactly when Preterism first raised its ugly head, but I do know that it did not appear (in any document that has been preserved) before centuries after the events in question had taken place, when there were very few that knew how far these events had to be wrested to fit the scriptural prophecies, even after the prophecies had been wrested to fit them.
For instance, some early writers made Nero the antichrist, but they did not say he
was the antichrist, but that
he would be resurrected as the coming antichrist.
I also know that preterism was not developed as a formal doctrine until after the dark ages.
As to my computer search of the writings of Irenaeus, many Bible programs contain many reference books and commentaries that can be accessed with the same program. I use Quickverse, which is no longer available, and sometimes its replacement, which is Wordsearch. Bth of them contain the entire set of the early "church fathers," as they are (in my opinion inappropriately) called.
You need to remember that the great and most famous work of Irenaeus was "Against Heresies," which was an exposure of all the seriously heretical doctrines that were currant in his day. So he repeatedly said that certain doctrines were Satanic, or that certain "teachers" had been sent by Satan.
He clearly taught that the Antichrist would be working under the influence of Satan, but he never even so much as suggested that he would be anything other than an evil man.
But just to make you happy, I will also do a word search on "apostate" and "apostasy," and will tell you what I find.
edit:
I have now made the search you requested, and found that Irenaeus applied both the words "apostate" and "apostasy" to Satan, to Satan's angels (those now known as demons,) to the heretics of his own day, to evil mankind in general, and to the Antichrist.
But nowhere did he even imply that the Antichrist would be Satan incarnate.
Thank you again for your feedback.
