Mike does some eschatology (and next week, too). Kind of like a Bigfoot sighting. Get it while supplies last!
Naked Bible Podcast Episode 101: Jesus, the Exile, and the Tribulation
16 Comments
Trackbacks/Pingbacks
- Naked Bible Podcast Episode 101: Jesus, the Exile, and the Tribulation | Very Top Secret Information - […] Naked Bible Podcast Episode 101: Jesus, the Exile, and the Tribulation was first posted on May 21, 2016 at…
Support Miqlat
Great podcast!! I appreciate your ideas of “already but not yet” view of the scripture and prophesy. A certain amount of uncertainty is evident in the text, and it has helped me to back away from some of my former eschatological determinism.
I will quibble with the Olivet Discourse as presented. Your presentation of it makes the strong attempt to harmonize the accounts. But there are hints that these were similar yet different discussions, with small but powerful differences that indicate different potential audiences. I would prefer these were identified as the Olivet Discourses, emphasis on the plural.
Both speak of dramatic events, but there are key differences. They are mainly harmonious until Matthew 24:9 and Luke 21;12, where Matthew says, ““Then they will deliver you to tribulation, and will kill you, and you will be hated by all nations because of My name.”
Luke in 21:12 says, ““But before all these things, they will lay their hands on you and will persecute you, delivering you to the synagogues and prisons, bringing you before kings and governors for My name’s sake.” These subtle deviations are already clues that they are moving in different directions speaking of different elements of similar events, the :”before” and “then” being significant, and subtle differences in the nature of persecution. Matthew suggesting a more global hatred, the Luke account speaking to more individual responses to tribulation.
The distance between the accounts widens in Matthew 24:15 when he states: ““Therefore when you SEE the ABOMINATION OF DESOLATION which was spoken of through Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place (let the reader understand), then those who are in Judea must flee to the mountains…” whereas Luke writes: ““But when you SEE Jerusalem SURROUNDED BY ARMIES, then recognize that her desolation is near. “Then those who are in Judea must flee to the mountains, and those who are in the midst of the city must leave, and those who are in the country must not enter the city…”
These are appear to be speaking of very different events, Matthew speaking to the very last days, and Luke to the near term. I do not know if this is true, but I have understood Luke to be warning those in Jerusalem to flee when the city was besieged. And as we know, there is a peculiar history surrounding the siege of Jerusalem. when Nero died, chaos reigned, and they wintered the year of the 4 emperors. Vespasian and Titus stepped back and relaxed the siege, allowing those willing to flee Jerusalem. I regard therefore Luke’s account here as a more immediate prophesy and Matthew as a later prophesy. It seems that while the abomination of desolation could be the destruction and violation of the Temple in AD 70, the Daniel remark would seem to sharpen the focus to what local commentators of the time would know to be the abomination of Antiochus Epiphanes. Further, I can accept the idea of Luke and Matthew harmonized, but with Matthew still speaking to a much later time.
The upshot is that by reading literally into Luke, the story goes that no Christian (an exaggeration?) died in the siege which consumed the Israelite defenders once Titus resumed the siege with Vespasian firmly in control of the empire.
I do not know the language well enough to be sure of the grammar here, but it seems fairly clear that these versions of the Olivet Discourse are not meant to be 100% harmonized. They are similar, overlap and diverge, and I would suspect delivered in slightly different settings as well. I don’t know if this is valid, but the statement in Matthew “when you SEE…” may even be a hint of technology, since no one can see what is in the Holy of Holies. But I will grant that this is also possibly a manner of expression, not necessarily meant to be literal. Or…maybe it can be a colloquial expression AND literal! God is able to do marvelous things!
But overall I find your views refreshing, and pertinent. Keep it up!
You wrote: “Matthew suggesting a more global hatred, the Luke account speaking to more individual responses to tribulation.”
How do you know?
It’s this sort of massaging that has to be done to make one view prominent (or not). The flow of the passages obviously cover the same ground.
Could you do a podcast on the idea of “already but not yet”?
Just did one (#101) that features this. But I suppose you mean something that traces the idea on multiple fronts – ?
Just did one (#101) that features this. But I suppose you mean something that traces the idea on multiple fronts – ?
You wrote: “Matthew suggesting a more global hatred, the Luke account speaking to more individual responses to tribulation.”
How do you know?
It’s this sort of massaging that has to be done to make one view prominent (or not). The flow of the passages obviously cover the same ground.
My view isn’t the modern state of Israel isn’t connected at all to the Bible. Israel as a land is Israel as a land. The geography doesn’t change. Ethnic Jewishness also is what it is. I don’t believe that the founding of Israel was specifically a fulfillment of prophecy — I don’t know any OT prophecy that would specifically call for that. The “gathering” and “regathering” passages predominantly refer to (my view) what happened at Pentecost and the progressive spread of the embracing of Jesus as messiah among Jews). But the ultimate war between good and evil (Armageddon) takes place in Jerusalem, so it certainly factors into end times prophecy. What I say likely isn’t clear because I don’t use the same buckets to put things into. Israel as a land has a prophetic destiny, but I don’t see that attached to events in 1948; I see that attached to future events.
email me
Not sure who came up with the phrase; it applies to other areas of biblical theology as well.
Dr. Heiser,
I am currently reading and thoroughly enjoying “Unseen Realm”. It is all eye-opening to say the least. For people like me, Christian non-academics who are doing our best to make sense of end times prophecy, Scripture and the tumultuous times in which we live … after hearing your perspective on the tribulation and that which is “already but not yet”, I am feeling a little bit lost on where to turn next. After listening to this podcast SEVERAL times, I feel the need for what would seem a requisite “Pt. 2 – the next step/resources for incorporating this Biblical view into end times prophecy (etc…)”.
I KNOW God wants His people to “understand” and Jesus specifically warned us to no be deceived but… after listening to you it would seem that someone lacking the academic rigor and wealth of resource materials that you likely traverse daily can only grasp at little straws here and there as given out by the great minds of our times (you, Missler and a few others come to mind).
Do you have any suggestions for resource material(s) for the average Christian who is not necessarily tied down by the modern orthodoxy (vs. Biblical supernatural worldview) but needs a way to pull it all into focus and in its proper context.
What is the counterpoint to all of the popular end times prophecy books, movies, articles…..? Is there anyone out there making the case for the perspective to which you subscribe, and doing so in a way for the average believer to grasp?
I am hungry for Truth and I am prayerfully seeking it.
Thank you for your work and your time.
Try episode 102 and the two episodes on Obadiah, 106-107 (yes, you read that correctly)!
Totally tracking with you on the idea and the reality of the “‘already’ and the ‘not yet'”. However I am totally perplexed at your statement that there is no scriptural basis for a future seventieth seven. Daniel 12:1 clearly ties Jeremiah’s “time of Jacob’s trouble” to the resurrection of the dead with very similar language of its unequaled nature. Then later in the chapter Daniel again ties in the abomination that causes desolation to specific periods of time: 1290 days, 1335 days; not to mention the “time, times and half a time.” The resurrection of Daniel will not let you put the ultimate fulfillment of this in the past though we may certainly acknowledge partial, “already” fulfillment there. THEN, Michael ties Daniel 12 to Revelation 12 where we get the 1260 days thrown into the mix and another mention of the “time, times and half a time”. This may not be a mention of seven years, but you can’t have a 3 1/2 years of trouble centering around Jerusalem without a context that requires additional time. And Daniel 9:27 ties in perfectly with its “middle of the seven” language that ends with nothing less than the consummation.
If you insist on ambiguity over this, you can have it, but I believe that by doing so, you are giving away the Church’s much needed preparatory constraints of the first half of the seven.
The original language words for “tribulation” is never modified by the original language term for “week” or “seven”. Many assume that the tribulation is the 70th week, but there’s no verse that says that. Same for any part of the 70th week. You can make all the assumptions that you do here — that’s not new, as I’m sure you know. But someone else can make a different set of assumptions that excludes all that (and they do).
The 1260 days in Rev 12 depends entirely on the assumption that either (a) what is described is a future event, or (b) what is described is an event relative to the same time as the birth of the messiah.
Thank you for dignifying my comment with a response. 🙂
Regarding our tying “tribulation” to the “seventieth seven” my thoughts flew to the words of Jesus in Matthew 24. HE sends us to the book of Daniel to find the context of the abomination that causes desolation (v15). But THEN… AFTER the abomination (v 21) there shall be “‘tribulation’ such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be.” How is that not only an iron clad tie in to the unequaled tribulation of Daniel 12:1 and Jeremiah 30:7, but also a fixing of the time as immediately preceding His return since He says “immediately after the ‘tribulation’ of those days (v 29)? He has now nailed into place the times, times and half a time, 1290 and 1335 days of Daniel 12:7-12 with the “tribulation” of those days.
Other people can make their assumptions, but the connecting of all the textual dots constrains us into making this a future tribulation of roughly three and a half years followed immediately by resurrection, rapture, return of Christ, and restoration of the surviving remnant of Israel.
Maybe you can blow a little academic smoke in here to bring some haze into this otherwise clear picture. 😉
You’re welcome.
Wouldn’t it be nice if Daniel 9 (or anywhere in Daniel) had the word for tribulation in it? Sure, there are weeks there, but no description of those weeks (or just one of them) as a tribulation period.
Marrying those two ideas is nothing but an assumption. Might be right, might be wrong.
For, lo, the days come, saith the Lord, that I will bring again the captivity of my people Israel and Judah, saith the Lord: and I will cause them to return to the land that I gave to their fathers, and they shall possess it. [not fulfilled yet] – – – Alas! for that day is great, so that **none is like it**: it is even the time of Jacob’s TROUBLE (Strongs: adversity, affliction, anguish, distress, TRIBULATION, trouble); but he shall be saved out of it. – Jeremiah 30:3,7
And at that time shall Michael stand up, the great prince which standeth for the children of THY people: and there shall be a time of TROUBLE (Strongs: adversity, affliction, anguish, distress, TRIBULATION, trouble), such as **never was since there was a nation even to that same time**: and at that time THY people shall be delivered, every one that shall be found written in the book. And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake [resurrection]. – Daniel 12:1-2a
For then shall be great TRIBULATION, **such as was not since the beginning of the world** to this time, no, nor ever shall be. – Matthew 24:21
These three passages are joined together not only by trouble and tribulation, but by UNEQUALED trouble and tribulation. There can only be one unequaled time. What God has joined together, let no man separate.
The modern state of Israel may not be a fulfillment of the above passages, but its presence is a necessary precursor to this final, ultimate purging of the natural branches that takes place *in* the land. It seems to me that the mystery we need to search out is how the Jerusalem question for nations ties into the Jesus question for individuals.