Prophecy already fulfilled? (fwd)

• Messages sorted by:[ date ][ thread ][ subject ][ author ]

I am forwarding this from Jan, since he wanted to comment the 
Prophecy-fulfilled discussion.

OEystein
---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Tue, 3 Oct 1995 12:37:21 +0100
From: Jan S Haugland <jansh@telepost.no>
To: oeystein@nvg.unit.no
Subject: Re: Prophecy already fulfilled? (fwd)

>That would not be Charles Taze Russel? would it?  The one who began
>the JW's?  The JW's take Parousia as being the second coming in
>the 1914.  I certainly don't buy CT Russel's ideas!  :-)

Heavens, no! It's J. Stuart Russell, a pastor in an English
congregational church 1862-88, who also had an MA and a DD from King's
College in Aberdeen.

The book is _The Parousia -- A Study of the New Testament Doctrine of
Our Lord's Second Coming_, published in London in 1878. The copy I have
been able to borrow is reprinted by Baker Book House, MI, 1983. It's
now out of print again.

Russell is going through every scripture in the NT related to the
parousia, in chronological order. The exegetic work is very impressive,
and those who want to debunk preterism will have some work getting
around the clear facts Russell is pointing out.

>> I can also reccomend another book that is especially
>>detailed about "the signs of his coming". It is called "The Sign of
>>the Last Days - When?", written by Carl Olof Jonsson.

For reasons having to do with his co-author, Jonsson avoided arguing
>from a preteristic point of view. But in his research he read among
other things _The Parousia_, so he *is* a preterist.

>The two witnesses that stand by us are the Spirit and the Word (Rev.
>11).

I will not deny this. But these two witnesses can't be killed. The real
witnesses in Jerusalem prior to the destruction in 70AD was killed. One
of them was certainly James. The other, Russell argues, was Peter, who
never was in Rome but lived in Jerusalem until he was killed.

I will certainly not disagree with the idea that fulfilled prophecy is
eternally valid. What is dangerous is when people start expecting some
*real*, literal fulfillment in their own lifetime, and start looking at
imagined signs that this is true. Talking about an "imminent return"
for 2000 years cannot help the credibility of Christianity.


Cheers,
- Jan