Looks like Josephus was a preterist!!!

[Guest]

I am reading your posts. And I never said you said he was a Jew. I was, in effect, asking you why, Josephus as a Jew and a non-Christian, was quoting Christian scripture as you seem to believe.

Now you are saying that you are trying to figure out why he was quoting it. First, it is necessary to determine that he was in fact quoting it. So far, you have not offered a shred of evidence that he was quoting it at all..

You think he saw what Revelation said would happen (in spite of the evidence that Revelation was written after those events).

PMike, many of us do not see the events of 70 A.D. as a fulfillment of the end-time scriptures. No matter how convinced you are that they are the fulfillment, your repeated efforts in trying to establish such a link, is not convincing. There are too many aspects of the end-time prophecies which did not take place in 70 A.D. But there's no point in rehashing the details.
I know you can explain away these aspects by affirming that they cannot be taken at face value, but are Jewish hyperbole, or are figurative in some other sense.

[Guest]

PMike, many of us do not see the events of 70 A.D. as a fulfillment of the end-time scriptures. No matter how convinced you are that they are the fulfillment, your repeated efforts in trying to establish such a link, is not convincing.

Pai...you are more than welcome to believe what you want. If you can't admit that my post from 5:29a.m. was compelling...Well that is alright too. All though it's a shame. The fact that Josephus used the exact same words as was used in Revelation 16, is compelling whether you believe that it is or not.

He used the EXACT same words.

He recorded them in the EXACT same order as in Revelation 16.

It is what it is...

Pmike

[Guest]

Is it just because he saw the events of 70 A.D. as having been predicted in the Hebrew prophets.

Once again Pai...Can you show me where exactly in the Hebrew prophets that they speak of a second sacking of Jerusalem in 70AD?

[Guest]

All though it's a shame. The fact that Josephus used the exact same words as was used in Revelation 16, is compelling whether you believe that it is or not.

He used the EXACT same words.

He recorded them in the EXACT same order as in Revelation 16.

Give the reference from Josephus of these "EXACT same words" and the reference to these same words in Revelation 16.

Your initial post quoted Rev 14:15, and your quote from Wars of the Jews certainly weren't "the EXACT same words".

I want to see the reference from Josephus, and the reference from Rev 16 which you claim are "the EXACT same words" and in the "EXACT same order."

[Guest]

I thought you said you read my posts Pai...Look up above at my post from Tue Apr 01, 2008 5:29 am.

It's all right there.

Pmike

All though it's a shame. The fact that Josephus used the exact same words as was used in Revelation 16, is compelling whether you believe that it is or not.

He used the EXACT same words.

He recorded them in the EXACT same order as in Revelation 16.

Give the reference from Josephus of these "EXACT same words" and the reference to these same words in Revelation 16.

Your initial post quoted Rev 14:15, and your quote from Wars of the Jews certainly weren't "the EXACT same words".

I want to see the reference from Josephus, and the reference from Rev 16 which you claim are "the EXACT same words" and in the "EXACT same order."

[Guest]

Paidion,

What evidence do you think supports a later date for Revelation?

[Guest]

Steve Gregg answered this one...

Irenaeus' Quote (Used as Grounds for Late Revelation Date Theory)
"We will not, however, incur the risk of pronouncing positively as to the name of Antichrist; for if it were necessary that his name should be distinctly revealed in this present time, it would have been announced by him who beheld the Revelation. For ‘he’ [John?] or ‘it’ [Revelation?] was seen . . . towards the end of Domitian’s reign." (Irenaeus, Against Heresies 5:30:3)

"And then earlier in the passage, Irenaeus refers to "all the.. ancient copies" of Revelation. This presupposes that that the book had been around a good long while before this statement was written. If there were "ancient copies," was not the original more ancient still? Yet, in Irenaeus estimation, the time of Domition's reign was not considered to have been very ancient history, for he speaks of it as "almost in our day." How could Irenaeus speak of ancient copies" of a work the original of which has been written "almost" in his own time?"

[Guest]

That's the only evidence I knew of for a later date. I am curious if Paidion knows of other evidence since he seems pretty confident of a later date.

I personally don't have a position yet, I'm still trying to weigh all of the evidence for this whole subject.

[Guest]

Thanks for the question, Rachel.

This quotation is doubtless the strongest evidence. After quoting Eusebius' rendering of the passage, Psychomike dismisses it as hopelessly self-contractictory. Let me show you that it isn't:

Here is the passage as translated from Irenaeus, in the Ante-Nicene Fathers pp.558:

We will not, however, incur the risk of pronouncing positively as to the name of Antichrist; for if it were necessary that his name should be distinctly revealed in this present time, it would have been announced by him who beheld the apocalyptic vision. For that was seen no very long time since, but almost in our day, toward the end of Domitian's reign.

When we read the text without bringing any theological presuppositions into it, it seems obvious what it was that was seen toward the end of Domitian's reign.

"him who beheld the apocalyptic vision. For that was seen..."

God's people sometimes see visions. The words immediately follow "apocalyptic vision". So why suppose anything other than "apocalyptic vision" to be the referent of the word "that"?

By the way there is no valid reason to presume that the word is not "that" but "he" or "it". This idea seems to spring from the fact that it better fits the possibility that "John" is the referent, (which would invalidate the argument for a later date), and so the conjecture is made that the text may be corrupt at this point.

PMike's argument that this is inconsistent with with Irenaeus's reference to "ancient copies" in part 1, is invalid. For the word which the Ante-Nicene-Father translators translated as "ancient" does not necessarily have that connotation. Sometimes it simply means "old" as opposed to "new". Here is an example from the New Testament:

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new. 2 Corinthians 5:17 NKJV

Sometimes it has the meaning of "early" as opposed to "late":

Also some of the disciples from Caesarea went with us and brought with them a certain Mnason of Cyprus, an early disciple, with whom we were to lodge. Acts 21:16 NKJV

Other translations which translate the word as "early" in this passage are:
ASV, ESV, NIV, RSV, NRSV, Rotherham, Rwebster

I think "early" is exactly what Irenaeus meant in section 1. He referred to "early copies" (of the apocalypse)

The following footnote on the passage is given in The Ante-Nicene Fathers:

This passage is interesting, as showing how very soon the autographs of the New Testament must have perished, and various readings crept into the MSS. of the canonical books.

The footnote is referring to the fact that some of the manuscripts of Revelation had 616 as the number of the beast's name rather than 666. Irenaeus was dealing with this discrepancy in the context of the passage.

This evidence may be and has been questioned. But ironically, (as far as I know) it is the only book in the New Testament for which there is any external evidence for its approximate date. For example, the dating of the gospels, by comparison rests on shaky ground.

"The days at the end of Domitian's reign" would place the dating of Revelation at about A.D. 96.

In his book Revelation: Four Views, Steve Gregg mentions another argument for a later date. Obviously the church in Smyrna existed when Revelation was written (internal evidence). But Polycarp, bishop of Smyrna in the second century wote in a letter to the church at Philippi: "...among you the blessed Paul laboured, who are praised in the beginning of his letter. For concerning you he boasts in all the churhces who then alone had known the Lord, for we had not yet known him."

Thr statement that the Christians at Smyrna had not known the Lord in the days which Paul wrote his letter, suggests that there was no church in Smyrna in those days. The statement is not proof, but it is a reasonable inference. For if there had been a church in Smyrna at that time, then surely some of the Christians within it would still be a part of the "we" at Smyrna to whom Polyarp refers.

[Guest]

Another thing to consider is the Syriac translation of the Apocalypse that has this superscription:

“The Revelation which was made by God to John the Evangelist in the Island of Patmos to which he was banished by Nero the Emperor.”

This testimony seems pretty solid to me.

Pmike