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Particulars
of Christianity:
310
Pentecostalism, the Charismatic
and Faith Movements
Preliminary
Proof: Counterargument 4
Preliminary
Proof: When the Gifts Would Cease
Preliminary Proof: Counterargument
1
Preliminary Proof: Counterargument
2
Preliminary Proof: Counterargument
3
Preliminary Proof: Counterargument
4
Preliminary Proof: Conclusions
Preliminary Proof: Additional Commentary
Section 1 | Section
2 | Section 3 | Section
4
| Section 5
No.
4 - If Paul taught that the gifts would continue until Jesus'
return then Paul was a False Prophet.
Finally, some might assert that Paul could not have been promising
the Corinthians that the gifts would continue in them until
Christ's return because that would make Paul a false prophet.
For, the gifts have indeed disappeared, which historical record
documents. And the Corinthians certainly did not live to see
Christ's return.
But this charge is unfounded for 3 reasons.
First, while the entire early Church thought it was possible
that Christ might return in their lifetimes, they also understood
the possibility that Christ might NOT return in their lifetimes.
So long as the Corinthians understood that Christ might not
return in their lifetimes, they would not have taken Paul's
words here as a promise that they would live to see Christ's
return. Instead, understanding that they might die before
Christ's return, the Corinthians would have simply understood
that Paul was reassuring them that they would not lose the
gifts because, as a general rule, the gifts were supposed
to continue until the end of the Age.
Second, the fact that the gifts disappeared before the end
of the Age would not make Paul a false prophet if ancient
Christians, such as the Corinthians, understood Paul's words
in 1 Corinthians 1:6-8 transcended to the Church as a whole
and not just to those particular Corinthians to whom Paul
was writing. And this is not an unfounded assumption. We can
sufficiently demonstrate that early Christians did indeed
take Paul's words to the Corinthians to transcend to the entire
Church. Consider the words of the Ante-Nicene Church writer
Asterius Urbanus, who wrote in refutation of the Montanist
heretics before the close of the second century AD.
"For if, after Quadratus and the woman Ammia in Philadelphia,
as they say, the women who attached themselves to Montanus
succeeded to the gift of prophecy, let them show us which
of them thus succeeded Montanus and his women. For the apostle
deems that the gift of prophecy should abide in all the Church
up to the time of the final advent. But they will not
be able to show the gift to be in their possession even at
the present time, which is the fourteenth year only from the
death of Maximilla." (THE EXTANT WRITINGS OF ASTERIUS URBANUS.
Book I. Chapter X.)
Notice 2 things from this passage from Asterius Urbanus. First,
Asterius is using the presence of the gifts among the orthodox
and the absence of the gifts among the heretics as proof for
which of the two had the true testimony of God (this is similar
to Justin Martyr's argument which we looked at earlier). Those
with the sound doctrine of God had the gifts. Those without
the gifts did not have the testimony of God. Thus, in the
lifetimes of the apostles and afterward, the gifts were supposed
to confirm who had sound doctrine and who did not. The gifts
were always to act as confirmation of the teaching of Christ
Jesus. The articulation of this view is evidence that this
is an ancient belief among the Christians.
Second, and more to the point, notice that Asterius interprets
Paul as teaching that "the gift of prophecy should abide in
all the Church up to the time of" Christ's return. Compare
Asterius and Paul's words side by side.
1 Corinthians 1:6 Even as the testimony of Christ
was confirmed in you: 7 So that ye come behind in no
gift; waiting for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ:
8 Who shall also confirm you unto the end, that ye
may be blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ.
"For the apostle deems that the gift of prophecy should
abide in all the Church up to the time of the final advent."
(THE EXTANT WRITINGS OF ASTERIUS URBANUS. Book I. Chapter
X.)
Compare this to Justin Martyr also. As we saw earlier, like
Asterius, Justin Martyr also applied these words from Paul
in 1 Corinthians transcendantly to the Church of his own day.
"For the prophetical gifts remain with us, even to the
present time...so that in no respect are we deficient..."
(Justin, Dialogue with Trypho, CHAP. LXXXII.)
The only way that Asterius could have made this conclusion
was if early Christians such as himself understood that Paul's
words to the Corinthians in 1 Corinthians 1:6-8 transcended
to "all the Church" rather than just those particular Corinthians.
So, we have demonstrated also that the idea of transcendence
in 1 Corinthains 1:6-8 is not a modern, novel contrivance.
Rather, it is an ancient and orthodox understanding of the
early Church employed by both Asterius Urbanus and Justin
Martyr. This gives us 2 ancient and orthodox witnesses who
testify to this ancient and orthodox nature of such an interpretation
of 1 Corinthians 1:6-8. Likewise, it is no stretch to understand
that the Corinthians themselves who first received this epistle
from Paul also understood that he was not only referring to
them when he spoke of the confirmation by the gifts continuing
until the end when Christ returned. Even Paul's words indicate
that the gifts served to prevent the Christians from deviating
into error so that they would remain blameless on the day
of Christ, which is just the way that Asterius is using the
gifts to expose the heretics.
We should also note that Asterius' interpretation of 1 Corinthians
1:6-8 is not simply an ancient interpretation, given that
Asterius lived toward the end of second century AD. Asterius
is also an Ante-Nicene interpretation of 1 Corinthians 1,
which means it was written before the Council of Nicaea (325
AD), which marked the major formal turning point away from
apostolic doctrine. In contrast, we should also note that
the very first mention of any theory asserting that the gifts
were supposed to pass away does not come until the Post-Nicene
era, after this major doctrinal shift. For, the first appearances
of doctrine asserting that the gifts were supposed to have
passed away prior to the return of Christ comes with Augustine
(354-430 AD), John Chrysostom (347-407 AD), and Gregory the
Great (600 AD), which we demonstrated in our previous survey
sections. So, this is also a clear case of Ante-Nicene
doctrine from an orthodox writer of the second century versus
Post-Nicene doctrine.
This brings us to our last point. And that is, why did the
gifts disappear before the return of Christ? The answer is
simple. As the Church moved away from Apostolic teaching into
the teaching of the Gnostics and other heretics in the third
and fourth century, the gifts disappeared because their purpose
was to confirm the orthodox teaching. When the Church deviated
too much from orthodox teaching, then the gifts disappeared
because God could not confirm the new teaching, which was
heretical.
And as long as the Church, including the Corinthians, understood
that the continuation of the gifts was dependent upon whether
or not the Church remained in the orthodox, sound teaching
given by Jesus to the apostles, then the disappearance of
the gifts would not make Paul's words in 1 Corinthians 1:6-8
a false prophecy or false promise. Instead, if the early Church,
including the Corinthians, understood that the continuation
of the Church was contingent, then the loss of the gifts would
simply mean that the dependent variable had not occurred.
For a more thorough demonstration that the early Church would
have indeed understood that the gifts were contingent upon
retaining sound, orthodox doctrine of the apostles, please
visit our articles entitle, "What
Happened to the Gifts: Scriptural Indications" Parts 1
and 2.
And, we have already thoroughly demonstrated in our article
entitled, "Preterism Part 2: Olivet
and the Transcendent You" that the early Christians had
a built in awareness of transcendence that was inherited from
Judaism with regard to such prophetic events as the return
of Christ at the end of the Age.
So, neither the historic disappearance of the gifts nor Paul's
reassurance to the Corinthians that the gifts would remain
until the end would make Paul a false prophet. Therefore,
this fourth counterclaim is also disproved and the original
proof still stands.
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