Restraint in II Thessalonians 2

When I was a Futurist my position on the removal of Restraint in II Thessalonians 2:6-7 was that it corresponds to Revelation 9.  

Now in the context of my Post-Millennial Partial Preterism I’m thinking it refers to Revelation 20:7. Views that argue Revelation Chronologically starts over at least could make both these Abyss releases the same event, but I don’t want to get into the complexity of something like that right now.

The assumption of Futurists and sometimes Full Preterists that II Thessalonians 2’s “Man of Sin” is the same as the Abomination of Desolation of Matthew 24:15 and Mark 13:14 is refuted by the observation that the Abomination of the Olivet Discourse passages Stands where it ought not while in II Thessalonians 2 the Man of Sin “sits” in the Temple of God.

I have for a while now come to agree with the Historicist reading that this “Temple of God” is The Church, The Body of Christ.  I have however resisted making that specifically about the Papacy tendency to instead make it more broadly all Episcopal Polity and Christian Monarchy.  But for this post I shall be different.

In Paul’s Epistles “Naos of God” is only used of The Church.  Other places where English Bibles use the exact three word phrase “Temple of God” are Matthew 21:12 where the word for Temple is Hieron, Matthew 26:61 where it’s Jesus’ false accusers misquoting what he said in John 2. And Revelation 11 where it appears twice and its Revelation 10 context verifies the Temple in Heaven is the Temple being referred to, which is thematically tied to the Church-Temple in my view.

A particular Sub-Doctrine of Papism is Papal Infallibility, and a concept heavily tied to that is Ex Cathedra (From the Chair) referring to the so-called Chair of St Peter in St Peter’s Basilica.

This doctrine first truly begins to form with a document attributed to Pope Gregory VII 1073-1085.  Then came some ideas of Peter John Olivi in the late 1200s. And controversies from the time of Pope John XXII 1316-1334 who himself opposed the doctrine actually as well as the Beatific Vision.

In 1336 Pope Benedict XII affirmed the Beatific Vision in a pronouncement considered to be Ex Cathedra.

The Romanus Pontifex of 1455 is perhaps also worth noting.

However the Doctrine really took on its current form during the 17th Century Post-Counter-Reformation, largely from Dominican Scholars at the University of St Thomas Aquinas. They made arguments that because Jesus said He would Pray for Peter that this Authority was uniquely for Peter not all the Apostles or Church, which is silly because Jesus also clearly Prays for all of us.

This Doctrine makes the person of the Pope effectively equivalent with Jesus and God.  And it looks like over a thousand years after when I think the Millennium started is when it really takes off. 

As far as how this ties into my last post on Revelation 20, it could make verses 8 and 9 the later phase of the 30 years war, and maybe extend into the 7 years war and Napoleonic Wars or even WWI.

Optimistic Eschatology

A lot of other Post Millennial Partial Preterists are really invested in branding our eschatology as more Optimistic than any other, especially Premillennialism.

All Christians have an ultimately Optimistic worldview, we all believe Jesus wins in the end, in fact I’d dare say Optimism is an inherently Christian invention.  In my view how Optimistic a Christian is has more to do with Soteriology than Eschatology.  I believe in Universal Salvation and that is objectively the most Optimistic Soteriology, a Premillennial Futurist who agrees with me on that shares my Optimism more than a fellow Post Millennial who’s an infernalist or annihilationist.

The gist of the idea that Partial Preterist Postmillennialism is the most Optimistic Eschatology is believing that there is no inherent expectation that things will from where we are now get worse before they get better, that could happen but it’s not Biblically required to.

But that really depends on where exactly in Revelation Chapter 20 you think we currently are.

The first 6 verses are what definitely all Post Millennial Partial Preterists believe has already happened.  But a belief that nothing Bad has to happen between now and the Parousia would require believing even verse 10 is already in the past, or at least verse 9. 

I still favor a fairly literal interpretation of what a Thousand Years means, even though some of how I view other details of this same chapter can be considered less than strictly literal.  So if we entered the Millennium at any point in the first 1024 years of the Gregorian Calendar then verse 7 has already happened.  And currently the latest point I have considered for starting the Millennium in during the reign of Heraclius in the first half of the 7th Century.  But I’ve also considered as early as the Crisis of the Third Century and am preparing to consider even a Second Century model. 

It is tempting in that context to look at the Turks and/or Mongols of the late middle ages as Gog and Magog.  But as someone who’s a Revivalist not Reconstructionist I prefer not to look at the conflict in view here in Ethno-National terms. 

I view the Camp of the Saints and Beloved City as all Separatist Congregational Polity Christians not a specific Geographical Location.  While my Baptism of The Beast view has me viewing High Church Christianity as the Beast and False Prophet currently in the Lake of Fire.

So basically whether or not verses 8-10 have fully already happened I am undecided on.  But when trying to favor the most Optimistic view possible I tend to view real world evidence of the loosing of Satan as the rise of modern Capitalism which is Atheistic in Nature.  But I've also bene speculating on a connection between all this and a Historicist reading of II Thessalonians 2.

There is nothing Unoptimistic about being prepared for bad things to come.  As the last episode of the English Dub of Futari Wa Pretty Cure said "The Night is Darkest just before The Dawn".

Babylon in Egypt

The existence of a place called Babylon in Ancient Egypt, not poetically or spiritually but as it's literal official name, is a pretty fascinating subject.  Babylon in Egypt was also the embryo of the city now known as Cairo, the Capital of Modern Egypt and religiously important to both Muslims in Egypt and Coptic Christianity.

Speculation that this could be relevant to Biblical uses of the name Babylon mostly focus on 1 Peter 5:13's usage, since Marcus/Mark is said to be with him in the same verse and tradition says Mark went to Egypt.  But I'm as skeptical of the Mark in Egypt traditions as I am the Peter in Rome and John in Ephesus traditions.  My theory is the Christian Community of Alexandria was largely founded in the late 1st or early 2d century by Christians from Cyprus and their particular interest in Mark and Barnabas comes from their connection to Cyprus.  I think Peter and Mark were in Seleucia on the Tigris when that Epistle was written.

For New Testament relevance I've actually become very interested in Babylon in Egypt possibly explaining the use of the name in Revelation.

The main argument against this that isn't more an argument for Babylon being somewhere else would be that the only explicit reference to Egypt in Revelation is calling the "Great City" Spiritually Sodom and Egypt in chapter 11, with "Spiritually" in a context like this being presumed to be mutually exclusive to literally or geographically, and elsewhere The Great City is explicitly Babylon.  I have two responses to that.

1st from a certain POV you could almsot argue actual Egypt was only still Egyptian Spiritually by this point, the land had been increasingly colonized by the various Empires of Daniel 2&7 and their native languages were on the decline being largely only still used for Religious purposes, yet Egyptian Paganism still thrived both in Egypt and throughout the Empire.

2nd is that I feel the relationships between certain key terms in Revelation are not as geographically synonymous as a casual reading assumes, and that some relate to each other more abstractly.  The Babylon Fortress was from 30 BC onwards a Roman Military fortress, it was central to how Rome enforced it's military might in the region.  The fact is a significant number of the Roman troops involved in the 66-73 AD Jewish-Roman War were probably troops who had been stationed in the Babylon Fortress before it started.

So this view need not conflict with arguments for Babylon being Rome, the Seven Hilled City of Revelation 17 I still believe refers to the Seven Hills of Rome.  I stand by my argument for how the Great City of Revelation 11 could be Rome and for the Roma Cult argument that the Woman of Revelation 17 is the people of Rome no matter where they dwell.  The Beast is definitely still the Roman Empire.  Or "Great City" could refer to different cities in different contexts, sometimes Jerusalem, sometimes Rome and sometimes Babylon in Egypt.

But before I return to Revelation I want to speculate on how even some Hebrew Bible references to Babylon could be this Babylon in Egypt.  

The origins of there being a settlement in Egypt called Babylon do predate the Roman Fortress and possibly go back to Babylonian Refugees in Egypt during the time of Assyria's Conquests contemporary with King Hezekiah of Judah and thus also the Prophets Micah and Isaiah.  Based on the conclusions of my Languages of the Table of Nations theories the language of the Babylonians was a Canaanite Language, so Babylon in Egypt could be one of those Five Cities from Isaiah 19.

The Biblical chapter divisions we're used to aren't in the original text, the famous Bethlehem Prophecy of Micah 5 is actually in the context of Micah 4 which refers to the Migdal Eder and Zion.  Micah 4:10 has the Daughter of Zion after giving birth go to Babylon, well Christians know this was actually fulfilled by going to Egypt, both with Mary in Matthew 2 and then the people as a whole after being conquered by Titus, Josephus says Titus stopped at Alexandria with his Captives on the way to Rome and then once at Rome started his Triumph in the Temple of Isis.  Latter after the Fall of Masada the surviving Zealots go to Egypt to rile things up there.  This arguably also fulfills the prophecy of Israel returning to Egypt in Hosea 8:13-9:3.

In the time of Isaiah this Babylon in Egypt was possibly a settlement of ethnic Babylonians (like a little Italy or a Chinatown) so Isaiah could have referred to them in Ethnic terms, he could have called them the Daughter of Babylon for the same reason he called Tyre the daughter of Sidon.

Ezekiel 20:36 justifies calling the land of Egypt a wilderness fitting the third verse of Revelation 17.  And Ezekiel 23 associated Egypt with the theme of Israel's Idolatry as Spiritual Whoredom/Adulatory which is another theme Revelation 17 is drawing on.

What really compels me though is the possibly of the Babylon of Isaiah 13-14 being a Babylon in Egypt thus justifying placing the Seat/Throne of Satan in Egypt.  I've already talked on this blog about how I now view the King of Babylon of Isaiah 14 as having never been a mortal ruler but always a title of Heylel ben Shachar.

Sobek was often depicted as with Isis healing the murdered Osiris.  Sobek's association with Ra which became his main form during Ptolemaic and Roman times could explain why The Dragon of Revelation 12 is Red since Ra is usually depicted as a Red Sun rather then Yellow.  And that association with The Sun also provides relevance to the Babylon fortress being in the area of Heliopolis.

When people say the reason Rome is called Babylon in Revelation was to try and hide what they were talking about from Romans who might happen to read it I get annoyed.  What makes Babylon in some sense Rome is entirely Rome's own self identification, no Patriotic Roman reading the text would see chapter 17 refer to a City on Seven Hills with Seven Kings and fail to recognize that. It is attempts to find an alternate Sola Scriptura explanation for those symbols that leads one away from Rome and to Daniel 7 and other prophecies referencing the same animals or symbolic Harlots.  It is studying the Hebrew Bible references being drawn on that points one to Egypt as the secret actual focus of the narrative, if it's not as straight forward as simply being Babylon or more broadly Iraq.

And then there is how this could back up my Last Pharoah Theory.

https://materialisteschatology.blogspot.com/2023/10/the-last-pharoah-of-egypt.html

Laodicea’s Sin was their faith in worldly success

There are three different types of Eternal Security based on how one deals with the question of backslidden or apostate Believers.

Those who say the backslidden or apostates simply never were “Truly Saved”, Calvinists are among those.  This to me isn’t actually Eternal Security at all because it offers no Assurance of Salvation, a Believer who thinks this is how it works ultimately has the same fear that believing Salvation can be lost carries.

Free Grace Eternal Security is based on a belief that believers will face a post Resurrection Corrective Punishment for our Sin, but are Saved regardless as seen in 1 Corinthians 3.  This was my soteriology before I became a Universal Salvation believer, and the gist of it is very much what I still believe, I now simply recognize that ALL Punishments God meets out are for Correction or Purification and never retributive.  I in fact now more then ever believe people can feel Eternally Secure in their Salvation.

Hyper Grace is the form of Eternal Security that rejects any type of Afterlife or Eschatological punishment for believers and insists any consequences a believer faces for their sins are limited to during this life.  A Free Grace believer does not entirely rule out facing consequences during this life playing a role, but Jesus warned against assuming bad things happening to a believer are always a punishment, as does The Book of Job.

Hyper Grace is most popular in the Charismatic Movement which is also where Prosperity Theology originated, and it’s easy to see how those two ideas can go together.  These are Christians who feel how much wealth they have proves they have God’s favor.

And that way of thinking is exactly what Laodicea was rebuked for.

Revelation 3:17-18 Because thou sayest, "I am rich, and increased with goods, and have need of nothing," and knowest not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked: I counsel thee to buy of me gold tried in the fire, that thou mayest be rich; and white raiment, that thou mayest be clothed, and that the shame of thy nakedness do not appear; and anoint thine eyes with eyesalve, that thou mayest see.

This is in contrast to the Smyrnaean Christians who were Poor by Earthly Standards but in Truth Rich.

However the correct conclusion that a type of Eternal Security is a factor in Laodiceanism will be used by some against all forms of Eternal Security. Assurance of Salvation is what’s promised to the Overcomer in each of these messages.  But there are also consequences.

Limne refers to a Body of Water

This is a follow up of sorts to the post on my main theology Blog about how The Lake of Fire is the Baptism of Fire, which was also relevant on this Blog to the Baptism of The Beast.

A fellow believer in Universal Salvation on YouTube who’s channel is titled Total Victory of Christ has made a big deal of arguing that Lake is an inaccurate translation of Limne, and in terms of what the word Lake implies about size to a modern English reader he may be correct.  However the word definitely inherently refers to a Body of Water.

Its number in the Strongs Concordance is G3041 and the only other NT author to use it is Luke where it’s always tied to the Lake of Galilee.  His theory that this refers to a specific Harbor rather than the Sea as a whole seemed plausible to me at first, but Luke 8:22-23 is a big problem for that.  But ultimately even if that theory is true it’s still a body of water.. 

Limne appears in the LXX three times, in Psalm 107:35 and 114:8 where it’s used for what the KJV calls Standing Water, and in Song of Songs 7:4 where it’s “Fishpools” in the KJV.  The Hebrew words behind them are different but both are words always used of bodies of water and get translated into English words like “pool” and “pond”.

Luke also uses the closely related word Limen G3040 in Acts 27:8-12 for harbors on Crete which the KJV translates Haven. Limen’s one appearance is the LXX was in Psalm 107:30 which is also Haven in the KJV. 

I agree that the metal refining imagery of Isaiah 48:10, Zechariah 13:9, Malachi 3:2-3 and Proverbs 17:3 & 27:21 has a role to play in understanding The Lake of Fire, but we can’t use symbolism to justify a translation decision when we know there were actual Greek words for refining pot or crucible that John could have used.  

In response to the argument that no one translated it “lake” before Tyndale, well no one wrote a Modern English Bible before Tyndale so there’s a lot of words no Bibles used before him.  But the Vulgate uses stagnum which means pool or pond so still a body of water. Researching what exactly was used in the Wycliffe Bible isn’t proving easy but it seems he too used Middle English synonyms for pond or pool.

The Greek word Baptize means to immerse or wash typically in water.  So I believe a word for a body of water is used here to guide readers to conclude this is the Baptism of Fire spoken of by John The Baptist.  It’s conveying the idea of Baptism without using the word.

Now I could likewise try to translate the verse in a way that would bias readers towards my interpretation by rendering it Baptistry or Mikveh to appeal to the Hebrew Roots people, but I’ve ultimately decided not to.  I could let my Weeb tendencies take over and suggest Chozuya.

My only issue with Pool is there is a different Greek word translated Pool in the KJV used in John 5 for the Pool of Bethesda and John 9 for the Pool of Siloam. That word has an etymology that could more specifically be translated Siwmingpool, though both these Pools were notably used for ritual bathing.  These two words do seem synonymous enough to justify translating into the same English word. 

However the traditional view that the 4th Gospel and The Apocalypse have the same author makes it hard for some to accept they’re using different words for the same kind of thing.  However I’ve become convinced that the Beloved Disciple can’t be a son of Zebede and is either Lazarus or his sister Mary Magdalene. Using Limne over Kolumbertha isn’t the only way I’ve observed Revelation to be more inline with Luke then the 4th Gospel in terms of vocabulary.

The size of this body of water isn’t the reason infernalists think these passages support them, lots of people being in it clearly makes it larger than a normal “refining pot”.  You could translate it as Lake or Sea or Ocean it doesn’t matter, what matters is getting people to understand that the fire is God’s Purging Fire.

So the more I think about it the more I come back to thinking Tyndale had it right.  Lake is perfectly fine.  God is using this Lake as a giant refining pot.

The Churches of Asia

 In verses 4 and 11 of the first chapter of The Book of Revelation the phraseology can be interpreted as saying these Seven Congregations account for all the Congregations in the Roman Province of Asia.

“John to the seven churches which are in Asia”

“and send it unto the seven churches which are in Asia”

But some others are seemingly known to have existed very early.  How do we explain this?

Well first of all not every place Paul visited in Acts (in Asia or elsewhere) was a place a Church was planted.  Some may have produced converts but they likely joined Churches elsewhere or became traveling companions of Paul.

For example the only reference to Miletus in Acts is 20:15-17 where Paul met with the Elders of the Church of Ephesus. So when you break it down Acts doesn’t definitively plant any Church in Asia other than Ephesus. 

Colossians is actually the only solid Biblical Evidence for other Churches in Asia besides those named in Revelation, the audience of the letter itself in Colosse and Hierapolis is mentioned in 4:13.  Both of these cities are very near Laodicea, in a subregion of the province that Laodicea was the regional capital of. 

All three of those cities are often referred to as part of Phrygia but there is some confusion with Phrygia as a geographical term.  The part of the Province of Asia sometimes called Phrygia is a smaller lesser Phrygia, every appearance of that name in Acts seem to be to the larger greater Phrygia that was in the same Roman Province as Galatia not Asia.

Colosse is referred to by Paul as a place he hasn’t personally visited yet, and the same may be implied about Hierapolis and Laodicea.  So that explains their absence from Acts.

I want now to point out something about how the Churches are addressed in their letters.  For Smyrna through Philadelphia each is called the Church in (name of city).  However for Ephesus it’s the Church of Ephesus and for Laodicea it’s the Church of the Laodiceans. The Church of the Laodiceans is also used in Colossians 4:16.  

The only other Church referred to by Paul in such a manner is The Church of the Thessalonians in the first verses of both those Epistles.  And when going back to the origin story of that Church in Acts 17 most of Paul’s missionary success wasn’t in Thessalonica itself but in nearby Berea, so the people addressed by those Epistles are likely to include sounding cities like Berea.  Meaning the Laodiceans could be the same, they could include Hierapolis and Colosse in how Jesus addressed them.  Though Paul in Colossians 4:16 is seemingly distinguishing Colosse from the Laodiceans but that could be a matter of context.

There are two other Asian Churches that seem to pop up pretty early but aren’t mentioned in The Bible.  Tralles and Magnesia which both received letters from Ignatius of Antioch. Now in my view the earliest possible date for the Ignatian letters is the mid 140s so these Churches could have been brand new and non-existent yet when Revelation was written during the reign of Hadrian.

However if these did exist longer it’s worth noting that both are very near Ephesus, closer to Ephesus even then Miletus, and since Ephesus is the other Church addressed with an “of” rather then an “in” maybe it too could include the Christians of some smaller nearby cities.

Were there Jews in Smyrna and Philadelphia?

The two references in Revelation 2-3 to “them which say they are Jews, and are not, but are the synagogue of Satan” is commonly interpreted as referring to Non Christian Jews partly on the authority of John 8:44.

If that theory is true the way it’s used by Antisemitic Christians is still invalid.  In the 1st and 2nd Centuries AD Judaism was still a more privileged Religion then Christianity.  Jews were exempted from the legally mandated worship of the Imperial Cult because the Romans considered them an Ancient Religion.  Christians were included in that exception when they were perceived by outsiders as a sect of Judaism which they almost always were before the Bar Kochba Revolt and even often for a while after.  

The only thing that may have prevented them from being so exempted is if the prominent Jews told the Roman authorities they don’t count as Jews.  So the theory is some Jews (probably a minority of them) in Asia were doing that and so Jesus is simply responding to that by saying no you are the ones who’ve forfeited your Jewishness.

Today it's the Christians who have the political Privilege and need to learn to see Jews as brethren, fellow children of Abraham, regardless of where we diverge.

But moving on, the problem with that assumption about the Synagogue of Satan is the two cities whose Messages to their Churches include this reference are ones with a severe lack of any evidence of any Ancient Jewish presence independent of this interpretation of Revelation.

For Smyrna even the Encyclopedia Judaica has only Revelation and the Martyrdom of Polycarp to go on for any claim of an Ancient Jewish presence in the City, otherwise they have no records of Jews in Smyrna till 1605.

And the Martyrdom of Polycarp is not a reliable source, it was written long after the events it depicts and depicts an event almost always dated later than even my very late date for Revelation.  And it wouldn’t be an independent source, the authority may well be imagining Jews to have been involved because of what they assumed about Revelation. Polycarp’s own Epistle makes no reference to Jews.  

With Philadelphia also we only have this possible Revelation reference. If you Google it the AI Review will say they’re also referenced in Ignatius of Antioch’s letter to the Philadelphians, but no he’s just talking about Christian who still observe Jewish Laws, and is arguably only warning about the theoretical possibility of his readers encountering them not really confirming there already are any in Philadelphia.

And it’s not as if the entirety of Jewish presence in Greco-Roman Asia was undocumented. We have a lot of references to the affairs of Jews in Ephesus from Josephus to The Book of Acts and same with Miletus.  It’s also well documented how Antiochus III Megas settled Jews in both Laodicea and Hierapolis.  Josephus also records the existence of a Jewish community in Sardis.  Pergamon and Thyatira however do seem to share Smyrna and Philadelphia lack of Ancient Jews, though the Lydian woman of Thyatira in Acts 16:12-15 seems to be implied to be Jewish or at least a Proselyte.

Philadelphia was a pretty small city today viewed as important only because of its Revelation significance, the message to Philadelphia in Revelation 3 arguably alluded to this being a small insignificant church in a small insignificant town.  So the idea that the affairs of its Jewish population would be overlooked even by Josephus I could consider plausible. (But it's possible no Jews even settled there because it was so small and insignificant they never heard of it.)

But Smyrna was important, it was the birthplace of the Roma Cult and thus equal to Pergamon as a provincial center of the Imperial Cult.  There’s no way if they had a Jewish Population they did nothing  worth noting by Josephus.  Maybe they avoided settling in Smyrna and Pergamon precisely because of their cult center status?  

What Alternative interpretation of the Synagogue of Satan is there then?  Well early forms of Supersessionism were popping up shockingly early.  

I’m not Dispensationalist but I still reject the notion that Jews are completely abandoned.  Saying “All Israel shall be Saved” in Romans 11:25-26 is a meaningless statement if you define Israel as only being the Saved.  It's not about whether The Church and Israel are separate Tents, it's about how big the Tent is.