Before Jerusalem Fell

418 Pages·1996·4.74 MB·English

BEFORE
JERUSALEM
FELL
Other books by Kenneth L. Gentry, Jr., Th.D.
The Christian Case Agaimt Abortion, 1982
Th Christian and Alcoholic Beoerages, 1986
The Owi.smatic Gij of Prophev: A Reformed Ana@sis, 1986
Tb Beast of Rmelation, 1989
BEFORE
JERUSALEM
FELL
Dating the Book of Revelation
An Exegetical and Historical Argument
@r a Pre-A.D. 70 Composition
Kenneth L. Gentry, Jr., Th.D.
Institute for Christian Economics
Tyler, Texas
Copyright 01989 by Kenneth L. Gentry, Jr., Th.D.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication maybe reproduced, stored
in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, except
for brief quotations in critical reviews or articles, without the prior, written
permission of the publisher. For information, address Dominion Press,
Publishers, Post Office Box 8204, Fort Worth, Texas 76124.
Unless otherwise noted, Scripture references are taken tl-om the New
American Standard Bible, G 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973,
1975, 1977 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission.
The following publishers have generously given permission to use extended
quotations from copyrighted works:
Redating the New Testanwzt, by John A. T. Robinson ‘SCM Press Ltd.
l
1976. Published in the U.S.A. by The Westminster Press. Reprinted and
used by permission.
771z Book of Revelation, by Robert Mounce 01977 by Wm. B. Eerdmans
l
Publishing Co. Published in the U.S.A. by Wm. B. Eerdmans. Re-
printed and used by permission.
ThE Revelata”on of St. John, by Leon Morris Q 1969 by The Tyndale Press.
l
Published in the U.S.A. by Wm. B. Eerdmans. Reprinted and used by
permission.
T/w Old Testament Pseua@igrapha, by James H. Charlesworth. Copyright
l
G 1983, 1985 by James H. Charlesworth. Reprinted by permission of
Doubleday, a division of Bantam, Doubleday, Dell Publishing Group,
Inc.
New Testamt Histq, by F. F. Bruce. Copyright 01969 by F. F. Bruce.
l
Reprinted by permission of Doubleday, a division of Bantam, Doubleday,
Dell Publishing Group, Inc.
“ Tb Birth of the New i%tament by C. F. D. Moule. Copyright Q 1981 by
Charles Francis Digby Moule. Reprinted by permission of Harper &
Row, Publishers, Inc.
Published by the Institute for Christian Economics
Distributed by Dominion Press, Fort Worth, Texas
~fiesetting @ Nhung Pham Nguyen
Printed in the United States of America
ISBN 0-930464-20-6
Dedicated to
Dr. Greg L. Bahnsen
who first startled me with his commitment
to and then convinced me of
the early date of Revelation
Testimonials Regarding
The Dating of Revekdion
66Here is a book somM of us have been awaiting for years! Now that it 5 here
we can rejoue. Mr. Genty convim”ng~ demonstrates the fut the book of Revelation
was written, as it in so many ways declares, prior to the destruction of Jem.salem in
A.D. 70. It should receive a wide reading and ought to rattle many windows.99
–Jay E. Adams, Ph. D.,
Author of The Time Is at Hand and Professor,
Westminster Theological Seminary West,
Escondido, California.
66A thorough and outstanding statement of the case for the ear~ dati of Revela-
tion. The book makes one aware of the m“dence j?om within the book and from ear~
church sources, and surveys the arguments of Nt-w Testament scholars of this century and
previous centuries conarn.ing the questwn. No stone is l~t unturned to resolve the
question.99
– George W. Knight III, Th.D.,
Professor of New Testament,
Covenant Theological Seminary,
St. Louis, Missouri.
66 The REV. Kennzth Gentry has presented a power=l and conviming case for a
pre-A.D. 70 writing cfthe book of Revelation. He has demonstrated this jom both the
internal and extanal witnesses. Hopeji@ this dissertation will be published and wide~
read within Christian circles.99
– W. Gary Crampton, Th.D., Ph. D.,
Professor of Theology,
Whitefield Theological Seminary,
Lakeland, Florida.
661t would be an unhappy mistake to assume this work is a tedious, technical
treatrmmt of the date of Revelation. Th ahting questwn affects the interpretation of
many passages. Genty3 thorough treatment is thus not on~ valuable, but it leads the
reader through substantive passages of Rmelation with illuminating insights. 99
– Carl W. Bogue, Th.D.,
Visiting Professor of Theology,
WhitefieId Theological Seminary,
Lakeland, Florida.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Publisher’s Preface by Gary North . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ... ix
Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ...xvii
PART I: PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS
l. Revelation Studies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ...3
2. The Approach to the Question of Dating . . . . . . . . 17
PART II: THE EXTERNAL EVIDENCE
3. Introduction to the External Evidence . . . . . . . . . 41
4. Irenaeus, Bishop of Lyons. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
5. Clement of Alexandria . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ...68
6. Additional External Witnesses . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86
PART III: THE INTERNAL EVIDENCE
7. The Role of Internal Evidence . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
8. The Theme of Revelation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
9. The Temporal Expectation of the Author . . . . . . . . 133
10. The Identity of the Sixth King . . . . . . . . . . . . . 146
11. The Contemporary Integrity of the Temple . . . . . . . 165
12. The Role of Nero Caesar.. . . . . . . . . . . . ...193
13. The Role of Jewish Christianity . . . . . . . . . . . . . 220
14. The Looming Jewish War... . . . . . . . . . . . . . 232
PART IV: ALLEGED DOMITIANIC EVIDENCES EXAMINED
15. Introduction to Domitianic Evidences . . . . . . . . . . 259
16. The Role of Emperor Worship . . . . . . . . . . . . . 261
17. The Persecution of Christianity . . . . . . . . . . . . . 285
18. The Nero Redivivus Myth . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ...300
19. The Condition of the Seven Churches . . . . . . . . . . 318
vii
. . .
VII1 BEFORE JERUSALEM FELL
PART V: CONCLUSION
20. Concluding Remarks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ...333
Appendix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ...339
SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY
Select Bibliography I: Modern Writings . . . . . . . . . . . . 355
Select Bibliography II: Ancient Writings . . . . . . . . . . . . 374
Ancient Sources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ...375
INDICES
Scripture Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ...379
Modern Authors Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ...387
Ancient Authors Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ...395
Subject Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ...397
PUBLISHER’S PREFACE
by Gary North
I have several reasons for wanting to see this book in print. The
first reason is my technical interest in the methods of dating primary
source documents on the basis of their internal evidence and external
evidence from other sources. The accurate dating of historical docu-
ments is crucial to our knowledge of the events of any period of
history. If we do not date our primary source documents accurately,
we cannot expect to gain an accurate understanding of history. There
have been too many ill-fated attempts to compare “contemporary”
events in different ancient societies based on inaccurate chronologies.
The pieces of the chronological jigsaw puzzle do not match, and
therefore must be damaged by the historian in order to jam them
together. My theory of chronology is simple: “If we don’t know when
something happened, we don’t know how or why it happened.”
The Bible is self-consciously an historical book. More than any
other foundational religious text in the man’s history, it claims to be
an historical book. Thus, Christians need to treat it as the historical
document it claims to be. Modern scholarship, even Christian schol-
arship, has too often refused to do this, especially with regard to the
Old Testament. For example, scholars prefer to accept as chronologi-
cal standards the various attempted modern reconstructions of the
historical texts of the non-historically minded Egyptians. They then
rewrite the events of Scripture, especially the events of the Exodus,
in terms of modern interpretations of pagan Egyptian texts. 1
My second reason for publishing this book is that as a Bible
student, I want to know when a biblical book or epistle was written,
so that I can better understand the ethical message of the document.
1, Gary North, Moses and Pharaoh: Dommton Relip”on vs. Power Relig”on (Tyler, Texas:
Institute for Christian Economics, 1985), Appendix A: “The Reconstruction of Biblical
Chronology.”
ix
x BEFORE JERUSALEM FELL
Ifwedonot understand the historical context (“withtext”), we will
have trouble understanding the text itself. If we fail to understand
both text and context, we risk misapplying the text’s message in our
lives. In the case of no other book of the New Testament has an error
in dating led to more misinterpretations and misapplications than the
Book of Revelation.
Third, there is no doubt that the intellectual attack on the
integrity of the Bible’s manuscripts has been the most important
single strategy of covenant-breaking modern Bible scholars.2 I refer
here to the academic specialty known as higher criticism of the
Bible.3 A large part of this attack involves the dating of the Bible’s
original texts. The presupposition of all higher critics of the Bible is
that the biblical texts, especially the prophetic texts, could not possi-
bly have been written at the time that the texts insist that they were
written. To admit that they were written when the texts say that they
were written would be to admit that- mortals, under the inspiration
of the Holy Spirit, can accurately predict the iiture. This would
destroy the most cherished assumption of the humanist: the sover-
eignty of man. If this ability to forecast the future actually exists, the
future is not only known to the revealer, it is foreordained by some-
thing beyond man’s power to alter. This points clearly to the absolute
sovereignty of God, and the humanist rejects this doctrine with all
his heart.4
Prophecy Fulfilled
In 1987, my publishing company, Dominion Press, published
David Chilton’s book, Th Days of V2ngeance: An Exposition of the Book
2. Writes Old Testament theologian Walter Kaise~ “For many it is too much to
assume that there is consistency within one book or even a series of books alleged to
have been written by the same author, for many contend that various forms of literary
criticism have suggested composite documents often traditionally posing under one single
author. This argument, more than any other argument in the last two hundred years,
has been responsible for cutting the main nerve of the case for the unity and authority
of the biblical message.” Walter Kaiser, Jr., 7bwurd Old Testarnmd Ethics (Grand Rapids,
Michigan: Zondervan Academie, 1983), p. 26.
3. See Oswald T. Allis, The Fiw lloob of Mows (2nd cd.; Phillipsburg, New Jersey:
presbyterian & Reformed, [1949]); Allis, Thz Old Testanwzt: Zt.s Claim.r and Its CritiJs
(Nutley, New Jersey: Presbyterian & Reformed, 1972).
4. Very few Arminians (“free-will Christians”) discuss the topic of biblical prophecy
in terms of God’s absolute sovereignty. They may enjoy discussing Bible prophecy; they
do not enjoy discussing the predestinarian implications of Bible prophecy.