How did we lose the rest of the story?

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If in this life only we have hope in Christ,
we are of all men most miserable.

1 Cor. 15:19

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The "going-up-in-the-air," "earn-my-way," "going-to-meet-God," vague concept of the afterlife came from the ancient pagan Babylonians.

The "coming-down-to-earth," "promises-made-to-Abraham," "God-returning-to-meet-us," specific and traditional view of the afterlife came from Israel, God's people. This traditional view was maintained through the prophets, Jesus Christ, the apostles, and the early church.

How did the two get mixed up?

You can trace the confusion back to a man named Philo.

Philo was a first century Jew. He lived in Alexandria, Egypt. Like a number of Jews in Egypt at this time, he was a devout admirer of Greek culture, and especially Plato. But he was also proud of his Jewish heritage. So proud, in fact, he felt he had a high calling to represent and convey the nobility of the Jewish religion to the educated Greek world, and to show the Jewish and divine origins of Greek philosophy.

A magnanimous enough ambition on the surface, to be sure, but to blend the Greek and Hebrew thought, Philo had to resort to an allegorizing method of interpreting scripture. He chose not to interpret Scripture literally, as Ezra did when the forgotten "book of the law" was found by Hilkiah during the reign of Josiah, 513 B.C. The Jewish rabbis had been literal to a zealous degree, even to a fault. But now Philo interpreted the old covenant allegorically: It didn't really mean what it said, in other words. It was just a figurative way of espousing morality.

Philo, without citing him, drew upon the teachings of the Greek Aristobulus. Aristobulus believed the Greek philosophy was borrowed from the Old Testament and the law. He also believed that all the significant tenets of Greek philosophy, especially those tenets of the greatest Greek philosopher, Aristotle, could be found in Moses and the Prophets.

So, taking Philo's thinking a little further, one might believe that the old covenant wasn't really so much a set of iron-clad, specific promises made to the nation Israel about land, prosperity, spiritual blessings, and an eternal future, it was a moral code . . . a guide for all men of all cultures. More how men should live, than a covenant, or contract with one particular nation. And since, as wise Aristobulus knew, it came from the Jews, shouldn't the Jews get the credit?

This was something new. In fact, within the Alexandrian Jewish community, Philo defended this allegorical system of interpretation against traditional, literal-minded opponents by saying that the only reason these opposed it was that it was new, not that the system itself had any fault.

Nothing could have been further from the truth.

My guess is that Philo, being an Egyptian Jew, removed from the land of the Temple and all the holy ordinances, probably wasn't that familiar with the covenant himself, and so he didn't know any better. A high-minded, humanistic sort of individual, he probably thought he was doing God, his fellow Jews and the world at large, a tremendous service.

But what he really did was to effectively bury knowledge about the destiny of man for generations of Christians and non-Christians alike.

His ideas caught on in a big way. Alexandria became the seat of a theological school. As with any sort of school of thought, the ideas of the founders are worked with, kneaded, developed. So it was with the theological school of Alexandria.

Clement of Alexandria (150 AD - 215 AD) was the next major figure after Philo. He, too, believed in the divine origin of Greek philosophy. He openly propounded the principle that all Scripture must be understood allegorically.

(Perhaps, as is the custom today with scholarly masters and doctoral theses, he ended his dissertations with a call for more research.) In any case, if all Scripture was to be allegorically understood, that invited a kind of scientific-minded scholar to develop a system of understanding.

That's what Origen (185 - 254 AD) contributed -- a system of allegorizing Scripture. Also of the theological school of Alexandria, Origen had tradition behind him now. He made the most of it. He was industrious and ingenious, writing a long series of works on just how the Scripture could be understood. He regarded the Bible as a tripartite living organism, its three elements corresponding to the Platonic model of the three parts of man: body, soul, and spirit.

The body part of the Bible furnished the immediate, literal, or historical sense. But these actual meanings really only served as a veil for a higher idea.

The soul part of the Bible was the psychic or moral sense. This gave life to the body sense. It provided edification on how to live.

The spirit part of the Bible, then, was the mystic or ideal sense that the body and soul parts were really pointing to. This was for those who could grasp and live in the rarefied atmosphere of philosophical knowledge.

Origen, like Philo, in applying this system to the Bible, capriciously and with a sort of airy wave of the hand, dismisssed the literal, actual meanings. Instead, he replaced these with foreign ideas, irrelevant fancies. This was, at that time, very modern, very exciting. It suited the taste of the intellectual front-runners. Learned, quick, prolific, Origen was the darling of the avant-garde. Heaven became theology, not reality. So, everyone "thought" what seemed right in his own mind, paraphrasing Judges. And the Bible had no more absolute authority to these men.

But was this the way the early Church thought?

Absolutely not. All scholars agree that the early Church (29-325 A.D.) believed in the literal, actual, physical reign of Jesus Christ on this earth. While some think that this is a new idea, originating with revivalism in l9th and 20th century America, or even more recently, with television evangelists on Christian media, just the opposite is true. The idea of the kingdom of heaven on this earth was held by the early Church itself. They had received it from the apostles, who had received it from Christ, who had confirmed the teachings of the prophets, who were expressing their visions about the fulfillment of God's promises to Abraham.

Here are some notable proofs:

The Didache. Dated from about the year l00 A.D., this early Christian document says about the resurrection: "And then shall appear the signs of the truth; first, the sign of an outspreading in heaven; then the sign of the sound of the trumpet; and the third, the resurrection of the dead; yet not of all."

This quote doesn't directly address the kingdom of heaven on the earth, but it does indicate more than one resurrection -- a key point in understanding the kingdom and salvation.

Clement of Rome. In 96 or 97 A.D., this man writes to the church at Corinth: "Of a truth, soon and suddenly shall His will be accomplished, as the Scriptures also bear witness, saying, 'Speedily will He come, and will not tarry:' and 'The LORD shall suddenly come to his temple, even the Holy One, for whom you look.'"

The Shepherd of Hermas. Between l40 and l50 A.D., he writes: "You have escaped from great tribulation on account of your faith, and because you did not doubt the presence of such a beast. Go, therefore, and tell the elect of the Lord His mighty deeds, and say to them that this beast is a type of the great tribulation that is coming."

Barnabas. He preached that God had a seven thousand year plan for the world modeled after the seven days of the week. The first six thousand years would consummate the age of man. The next l,000 years would begin with the return of Christ to the earth to set up his kingdom for a seventh day sabbath rest. The eighth day, then, would begin the new world.

Ignatius of Antioch. He died somewhere between 50 and ll5 A.D. He says little about prophecy in his writings, but he does refer to the "last times" and urges Christians to have the attitude of expectancy.

Papias. This bishop of Hierapolis (80-l63 A.D.), on the other hand, had lots to say about the millennium, and "the personal reign of Christ . . . established on the earth." And: "The days will come in which vines shall grow, having each ten thousand branches, and in each branch ten thousand twigs, and in each true twig ten thousand shoots, and in every one of the shoots ten thousand clusters, and on every one of the clusters ten thousand grapes, and every grape when pressed will give five-and-twenty metres of wine."

Justin Martyr. Born about l00 A.D., this man was a lion of kingdom teaching and preaching. He put tremendous importance on this hope and regarded the expectation of the earthly perfection of Christ's kingdom as the cornerstone, the starting place, the beginning of pure doctrine. He said the second coming of Jesus Christ would be preceded by the appearance of the man of sin who would speak blasphemies against the most high God and would rule on the earth for three and one-half years. Quoting from his Dialogus cum Tryphone: "But I and whoever are on all points right-minded Christians know that there will be a resurrection of the dead and a thousand years in Jerusalem, which will then be built, adorned, and enlarged as the prophets Ezekiel and Isaiah and the others declare. . . . And further, a certain man with us, named John, one of the Apostles of Christ, predicted by a revelation that was made to him that those who believed in our Christ would spend a thousand years in Jerusalem, and thereafter the general, or to speak briefly, the eternal resurrection and judgment of all men would likewise take place."

Irenaeus. Another lion of kingdom preaching and teaching. This man was bishop of Lyons. He died in 200 A.D. He was a student of Polycarp, who in turn, was a student of the apostle John. He writes: "But when this antichrist shall have devastated all things in this world, he will reign for three years and six months, and sit in the temple at Jerusalem; and then the Lord will come from heaven in the clouds, in the glory of the Father, sending this man and those who followed him into the lake of fire; but bringing in for the righteous the times of the kingdom, that is, the rest, the hallowed seventh day; and restoring to Abraham the promised inheritance, in which kingdom the Lord declared, that 'many coming from the east and from the west should sit down with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. . . .'"

The predicted blessing, therefore, belongs unquestionably to the times of the kingdom, when the righteous shall bear rule upon their rising from the dead.

Tertullian. A Christian leader who lived from l50 to 225 A.D., he wrote: "But we do confess that a kingdom is promised to us upon this earth, although before heaven, only in another state of existence; inasmuch as it will be after the resurrection for a thousand years in the divinely-built city of Jerusalem."

Cyprian. He lived from 195 to 258 A.D. A millennialist of strong persuasion, he wrote graphically of the imminence of the kingdom of God and the surety of the reign of Christ. For example: "Why with frequently repeated prayers do we entreat and beg that the day of his kingdom may hasten, if our greater desires and stronger wishes are to obey the devil here, rather than to reign with Christ?"

Commodianus. Writing about 250 A.D., this bishop of North Africa said: "They shall come also who overcame cruel martyrdom under Antichrist, and they themselves live for the whole time. But from the thousand years God will destroy all those evils."

Nepos. Bishop of Egypt, an eminent and spiritual man, wrote around 230 to 250 A.D. a defense of the earthly kingdom of Jesus Christ after Origen had attacked the idea. Excerpt: "After this first resurrection the kingdom of Christ was to be upon earth for a thousand years, and the saints were to reign with him."

Lactantius. A learned man who lived from 240 to 330 A.D. He wrote: "About the same time also the prince of the devils, who is the contriver of all evils shall be bound with chains, and shall be imprisoned during the thousand years of the heavenly rule in which righteousness shall reign in the world, so that he may contrive no evil against the people of God."

The School of Antioch. Standing in sharp contradistinction to the allegorical School of Alexandria was the literal method School of Antioch. This group of men made it their goal to determine the original meaning of Scripture. They kept this end in view at all times, and this was their great achievement. Their interpretations were extremely plain and simple by comparison to the florid, flamboyant, arbitrary "intellectual" interpretations of the Alexandrians.

Diodorus of Tarsus was the founder of the School of Antioch. His books were devoted to the explication of Scripture in its plain literal sense. His magnum opus, unfortunately lost to us, was "on the difference between allegory and spiritual insight." A man of erudition and piety, he was the teacher of noted saints Chrysostom and Theodore of Mopsuestia.

In contrast to the self-styled intellectual giants like Origen, Theodore was a real giant of interpretation.

As Farrar1 writes: "That clear-minded and original thinker, (Theodore) stands out like a 'rock in the morass of ancient exegesis.' He was a Voice not an Echo; a Voice amid thousands of echoes which repeated only the emptiest sounds. He rejected the theories of Origen, but he had learnt from him the indispensable importance of attention to linguistic details especially in commenting on the New Testament. He pays close attention to particles, moods, prepositions, and to terminology in general. He points out the idiosyncrasies . . . of St. Paul's style . . . . He is almost the earliest writer who gives much attention to hermeneutic (prophetic) matter, as for instance in his Introductions to the Epistles to Ephesus and Colossae . . . . His highest merit is his constant endeavor to study each passage as a whole and not as 'an isolated congeries of separate texts.' He first considers the sequence of thought, then examines the phraseology and the separate clauses, and finally furnishes us with an exegesis which is often brilliantly characteristic and profoundly suggestive."

So during the approximate period 50-325 A.D., we have pitted in intellectual and spiritual conflict the School of Alexandria and the School of Antioch. The allegorists versus the literalists. The ones who wanted to make their own interpretation of Scriptures against the ones who aimed to determine the original and inspired meaning.

Who won?

The School of Alexandria.

It happened when the church became an official institution. The edict of Constantine (325 A.D.) made Christianity the official religion of the Roman Empire. He stopped the persecution of the church by uniting church and state.

It was now, as we say in the common parlance, "a new ball game." Now the church was no longer poor and persecuted. It was "official." It was o.k. It was accorded wealth and worldly honors. The church, seeing that this new status was not all bad, did not want to offend Constantine by hoping for and looking forward to a coming King and a new kingdom on this earth. So to put it simply, when the church gained official status, she let slide the hope of the soon coming of her Lord.

Up to this time, the Scriptures had supported the Church in a walk with the Lord, separated, called-out from the world. Her interpretation of the scriptures would now have to change.

Augustine (354-430 A.D.), the famous bishop of Hippo and revered church father, was the man for the job. In brief, here's what he believed and taught, all of it absolutely unscriptural: the first resurrection is the rising of dead souls into spiritual life beginning with the ministry of Christ, from which time the millennium dates; the devil is bound and expelled from the hearts of Christ's disciples and not from the earth itself at the beginning of Christ's reign; the reign of the saints is their personal victory over sin and the devil; the beast is this wicked world and his image is hypocrisy; the millennium will end in 650 A.D., terminating the 6,000 year period and introducing the rise of Antichrist.

By the time of Augustine, the tradition of allegorical interpretation was commonly accepted and because the church had "official" status, his views were readily accepted. The ground-breaking had been done by Philo, the development by men like Clement and Origen. Now the meaning-depleted Scriptures were ready to be put into the service of the Roman state church.

Augustine was a company man all the way. He taught that the Bible must be interpreted with reference to Church Orthodoxy, not the other way around. Working from the old Philonic rule that everything in Scripture that appeared to be 'unorthodox,' or strange had to be interpreted mystically, he opened the floodgates of his arbitrary fancy. He just "made up" doctrine.

There are still people like that today. You can also spot them because they always lead off their thoughts in a spiritual discussion with the words: "Well, I think . . . "

So did Philo, Clement, Origen, and Augustine.

And so the curtain falls, in the fourth century, the door clanks shut on the knowledge of the kingdom.

Through the next 1,000 years or more, we know only of two groups -- the Waldensians and the Paulicians -- who had hope of the return of Christ or any knowledge of the kingdom whatsoever.

The Reformation (1500 - 1650) produced a partial return to the knowledge of the kingdom, but prophecy was not a major area of work for Wycliffe, Calvin, Luther, Zwingli and Melanchthon; they basically accepted the Roman teaching on things of the end, and readily admitted that many parts of the Bible were still obscure to them.

In subsequent years, dissemination of information on the kingdom was the work of various ministers, at times a large number of them, but was far from uniformly accepted. In recent years, more and more Christians have turned with interest to the doctrine of the kingdom of God on this earth, with roots of this movement in books such as Maranantha (1870) by James H. Brookes, Jesus Is Coming (1878) by W.E. Blackstone and the Scofield Reference Bible, (1909). This movement continues to gather steam, powered by the rise of the electronic ministry, and Christian contemporary music, not only in America, but throughout the whole world.

Indeed, this is a fulfilment of the prophecy to Daniel: "Go now, Daniel, for what I have said is not to be understood until the time of the end."2

And Christ's own words: "And the good news about the kingdom will be preached throughout the whole world, so that all nations will hear it, and then, finally, the end will come."3

End of this age.

And beginning of that great kingdom.

 

FOOTNOTES
Chapter 9
HOW DID WE LOSE THE REST OF THE STORY?
1. Farrar, F.W., History of Interpretation, pp. 47-48
2. Dan 12:9
3. Matt. 24:14 LB