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All Part of Satan’s Plan
I’ll grant that this article deals with a tense subject, given how many date-setters for Christ’s return have already been and gone with nothing to show for it but disappointment and mockery in the best cases and suicides {Facebook post; the article cited by the source where I heard about this wasn’t archived} in the worst cases. But ironically, all these previous attempts actually tell us something about Satan’s tactics.
You see, date-setting for Jesus’ return is hardly a modern concept; the Church Fathers and even the Bible itself told us how to determine the year in which Jesus would return: the doctrine of chiliasm (Hebrews 4:1-11; 2 Peter 3:5-8, cf. Genesis 6:3 & Leviticus 25:8-10; Revelation 20:2-7). The earliest attempt I’m aware of to set out a Biblical chronology that could conceivably have been used for this purpose was by Clement of Alexandria, who used a mixture of the Septuagint and secular sources to determine how much time had passed from Adam to the death of the Roman emperor Commodus (which occurred on December 31, A.D. 192): “from Adam to the death of Commodus, five thousand seven hundred and eighty-four years, two months, twelve days.” {Clement of Alexandria. “Stromata”. Book I, Chapter 21.} Feeding this figure into the doctrine of chiliasm would’ve implied that the year in which Jesus would return would end (6000 years – 5784 years, 2 months, 12 days) = 215 years, 9 months, 17 or 18 days after Commodus’ death–a.k.a. October 18th, A.D. 408 (disregarding the two extra leap days of A.D. 200 & 300, which the Gregorian Calendar wouldn’t have; this would have only been about a month off from Tishri 10 of that year). Of course, as many little mistakes as Clement makes in that chapter, his biggest mistake was following the Septuagint’s numbers for Genesis 5 & 11 (“From Adam to the deluge are comprised two thousand one hundred and forty-eight years, four days. From Shem to Abraham, a thousand two hundred and fifty years.” {Ibid.}); we know with the benefit of hindsight that the Masoretic Text must have the correct numbers (see Endnote 3 of this post). Julius Africanus, who published a five-volume history of the world up until the third year of Eliogabalus (A.D. 221) made the same mistake, placing the creation in the year we would call 5499 B.C.–feeding this into the doctrine of chiliasm would’ve implied that Jesus was to return in A.D. 502.
Of course, most date-setters since have disregarded the doctrine of chiliasm (and understandably so, since it was largely forgotten with the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox churches promoting amillennialism with an iron fist) in favor of messing around with other numbers in the Bible, or even disregarding the Bible in favor of their own alleged revelation from God. Major examples down through history have included the Protestant Reformation of the 1500s (when some tried to interpret the 1,260 days of Revelation 11 & 12, the 1,290 days of Daniel 12:11, or the 1,335 days of Daniel 12:12 as representing years from the Roman Catholic church’s founding in A.D. 325 until its judgment); the Great Disappointment of 1844 (when William Miller tried to interpret the 2,300 days of Daniel 8:13-14 as referring to the time from when Daniel was given this prophecy until the world would end); the several predictions of the Jehovah’s Witnesses over the last century-and-a-half (1878, 1881, 1914, 1918, 1925, & 1975)1; Jim Jones’ (instigator of the infamous Jonestown mass suicide in 1978) prediction of a nuclear holocaust on July 15, 1967; Edgar C. Whisenant’s book “88 Reasons Why the Rapture Will Be in 1988”; the Y2K scare of the late ’90s (the first of these I personally lived to see the failure of); the late Harold Camping’s well-publicized predictions of a rapture on May 21, 2011 (which fortunately didn’t interrupt my flight back to the U.S. following my grandmother’s funeral 2 days earlier!) and the world being destroyed on October 21, 2011; the Mayan Calendar ending on December 21, 2012; the “four blood moons” of 2014-15; and plenty of people on social media believing that the apocalypse was already beginning in 2020 (okay, I don’t recall seeing anyone explicitly claiming that, but they certainly gave that impression!). In fact, there’s an entire list on Wikipedia for predictions of dates for apocalyptic events!
But if you look at that list and the examples I present here, you may notice a trend they have in common: the closer you get to the 21st century, the more often these predictions were made. I don’t think that’s just a matter of how much documentation has survived of each attempt: I think the demonic forces have actually been ramping up their efforts with encouraging people to set dates. The reason is simple: if there’s one person outside the Godhead who could possibly not have lost track of how long it’s been since Adam’s first sin, it’s Satan. He knows exactly how close we are to the 6000th year since Adam’s first sin; not just because he’s been around since before Adam sinned, but because he knows the Bible inside-out, upside-down and sideways (after all, the better you know the real deal, the better you can be at making convincing counterfeits!). So as we’ve gotten increasingly closer to that time, Satan has raised up an increasing supply of unwitting “boys who cried wolf”, in order to minimize the number of people who will take it seriously when God finally does disclose the date of Jesus’ return!
1 Timothy 6:14-15 — And Attempts to Explain it Away
You see, in my upcoming book I used 1 Timothy 6:14-15 to make the point that Paul said God would disclose the date of Jesus’ return to select wise elders and ministers once the beginning of the apocalypse was close enough in the future {HIDMF, p. 753-754}. The title of this post is the critical phrase, with 3 key words: “manifestation”, “times”, and “disclose”. At a Bible study I pointed out that in the Greek, “manifestation” is singular, “times” is plural, and the verb for “disclose” (G1166) refers to something presented or disclosed to a select person or group of people everywhere else it’s used in the NT; the correct understanding of this passage must cohere with all three of those facts. You can watch a recording of that Bible study at this link {our discussion about this particular passage starts at the 29:39 mark, but feel free to watch the whole thing!}–if you’re wondering why I felt comfortable hogging so much air time, it’s because the pastor and I were two of the only four people present that night (the other two being another elder and his wife); plus, he did tell me when I first started attending his Bible studies to correct him if he gets something wrong! You’ll see that his initial attempt at explaining away what I concluded from the Greek phrasing of this verse — that Paul was referring to multiple future occasions when nations would fall under God’s judgment before Jesus returns — accounts for “times” being plural & “disclose” indicating a subset of people (rather than everyone), but would require “manifestation” to be plural instead of singular.
A week later, the pastor spent an entire Bible study class addressing this passage (I didn’t attend that week, but he told me afterward that he wanted feedback on it–so here it is! Sure, it’s a year late, but I had to set up the website first!). You’ll see that he conceded that the word for “manifestation” here refers to Jesus’ second coming (or, as I would clarify, at least some aspect of it). In fact, he has just about everything right until his claim at the 26:56 mark that Jesus’ second coming is “the day that time, space, world, elements, cease to exist” {for my explanation of the passage he’s alluding to, 2 Peter 3:10-12, see HIDMF p. 731,734-735; or just click here and scroll to item 3 in the list, for now.}. But he completely overlooked the point that the verb for “disclose” rules out this statement from referring to the second coming itself (because everyone will see that!). However, he does spend the last few minutes attempting to address the fact that “times” is plural. The thrust of his argument is summarized in his remark that “in many instances a plural word can be referencing a singular event”. Of course, I never denied that “the manifestation” refers to something singular; but my point was that “times” being plural indicates that the disclosure(s) being referred to would happen over a period of time, rather than at a single point in time (as I mention in my book {HIDMF p. 754}, but admittedly failed to bring up in these Bible studies, the text doesn’t tell us the means by which God would disclose “the manifestation”; this leaves open the possibility that He would disclose it in more than one way, depending on who it’s being disclosed to; e.g., many disclosures could come, not from God talking to them in a dream or vision, but from the Holy Breath guiding them to the “a-ha moments” that enable them to properly interpret the relevant Scriptural passages and piece everything together).
But Doesn’t the Bible Teach That Jesus’ Return Is Imminent?
As an aside, watching both videos will show that he fixates (as amillennialists and pretribulationists alike often do; this guy told me after an earlier Bible study that he’s a “semi-preterist”, which would class him as an amillennialist–after all, have you ever met a preterist who takes the 1,000 years of Revelation 20 literally?) on the use of the phrase “like a thief” to refer to Jesus’ second coming (indeed, the Apostles used this term to direct their original audiences back to the Olivet Discourse — where Jesus himself first used it of his own return — as a foundation for understanding the statements they were quoting it in the course of). As amillennialists and pretribulationists alike point out, this phrase is a simile for being caught totally by surprise. They then use the presence of this phrase in passages about Jesus’ second coming to argue that there will be no signs (of Jesus’ return, for amillennialists; of the rapture, for pretribulationists) to watch for beforehand, so it can happen at any time–WHILE IGNORING statements in the immediate contexts indicating that it won’t be “like a thief” for some people!
If you watch the first video from start to finish, you’ll see that I used his point about the NT comparing Jesus’ second coming to the Flood of Noah’s day as support for my view by pointing out that God gave Noah advanced warning of the exact day the Flood would begin, relatively shortly before it arrived: “For after seven more days I will cause it to rain on the earth forty days and forty nights, and I will destroy from the face of the earth all living things that I have made.” (Genesis 7:4 NKJV, boldface added).2 I went on to point out {jump to the 26:52 mark in the first video} that this ties in with the fact that in all the “no one knows” passages regarding when Jesus would return (Matthew 24:36,42, 25:13, & Mark 13:32,33,35), the word usually rendered “knows” (present-tense) actually means “has perceived” (perfect-tense); if this statement was meant to be a timeless truth, he would’ve used the present tense (as most English translations render it, thereby perpetuating the misunderstanding), so the fact that the perfect tense was used shows that this statement was only meant to sweepingly cover everyone living up until Jesus said it. I also pointed out that Matthew 24:43 (“But know this, that if the master of the house had known in what watch the thief was coming, he would have watched, and would not have suffered his house to be broken through.” — ASV) constitutes an “if-then” statement: if believers know the approximate time (note the phrase “in what watch”, a “watch” being a 3-hour shift of a night guard), then they will watch for the signs of his impending parousia (discussed elsewhere in the Olivet Discourse) and not be taken by surprise.
This lines up perfectly with one of the passages quoted in the second video: 1 Thessalonians 4:13-5:11. Notice that they overlooked the fact that this passage clearly teaches that most will be caught by surprise as if a thief breaks into their house unexpectedly, but some will not be: “for yourselves have known thoroughly that the day of the Lord as a thief in the night doth so come, for when [literally, “whenever”; note that this allows for more than one occasion when people “may say, Peace and safety”] they may say, Peace and surety, then sudden destruction doth stand by them, as the travail doth her who is with child, and they shall not escape; and ye, brethren, are not in darkness, that the day may catch you as a thief” (1 Thessalonians 5:2-4 YLT, boldface and underlining added). In other words, Paul was admonishing the Christians in Thessalonica to be among those that the day wouldn’t catch as a thief!3 This lines up with my point about Matthew 24:43–not everyone will be caught by surprise; only those who are ignorant of the warnings (whether willfully, or through no fault of their own) and/or haven’t learned the approximate time.
It’s also worth noting the comparison to childbirth, which is also drawn from the Olivet Discourse: after the predictions of Matthew 24:5-7, Jesus said “But all these things are merely the beginning of birth pains.” (Matthew 24:8 2020 NASB, boldface added) Anyone remotely familiar with childbirth will tell you that a mother doesn’t have her child the instant her birth pains start (as much as she might wish that was the case)! Jesus was saying that the events of verses 5-7 are merely a prelude to the apocalypse (the birth pains are just starting); the events of verses 9-14 would occur in the first half of the apocalypse (the birth pains are coming closer together and becoming harder to bear); the events of verses 15-26 refer to the second half of the apocalypse, the Great Tribulation (when the birth pains are at their most intense because the baby’s almost out); and the events of verses 27-31 occur after the Tribulation, culminating in his parousia (when the birth pains have finally subsided and the mother gets to hold her baby in her arms). And just in case his disciples still didn’t get it somehow, Jesus explicitly said, right after mentioning his parousia and the rapture accompanying it (after all, the Greek text of 2 Thessalonians 2:1-2 not only portrays the two events as occurring together just like Matthew 24:30-31 does, but identifies them as two components of “the day of the Lord” {I’ll link specifically to the discussion of 2 Thessalonians 2 when my article on all the “Day of the Lord” passages is ready}!), that his parousia would have signs preceding it that Christians can watch for: “Now learn a parable of the fig tree; When his branch is yet tender, and putteth forth leaves, ye know that summer is nigh: So likewise ye, when ye shall see all these things, know that it is near, even at the doors.” (Matthew 24:32-33 KJV, boldface and underlining added)
But the most explicit passage of all in this regard was given by Jesus’ brother, James: “Be patient, therefore, brothers, until the coming [parousia] of the Lord. See how the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the earth, being patient about it, until it receives the early and the late rains. You also, be patient. Establish your hearts, for the coming [parousia] of the Lord is at hand [literally, “has neared”; perfect active indicative form of ἐγγίζω (G1448), the verb form of engus (G1451)].” (James 5:7-8 ESV, boldface and underlining added) This is a crystal-clear statement that Jesus’ return (his parousia) will have signs preceding it that can be recognized as such, just as a farmer knows that the harvest won’t arrive until the rainy seasons have been and gone.
A fuller demonstration that the Bible doesn’t teach imminence for the rapture or the second coming, but in fact disproves it for both (since 1 Thessalonians 4:15-17 has Jesus’ parousia — the Greek word for “coming” in verse 15 — occurring at the same time as the rapture), is available here.
Does the Plural “Times” Sometimes Refer to a Single Point in Time?
Returning to the second video I linked to, the pastor cites Gerhard Delling’s article on the word for “time” (καιρός, G2540) in the Theological Dictionary of the New Testament {Volume 3, p. 401} (which, of course, was produced by German Protestant theologians, and thus has somewhat of an amillennial bias that we should be conscious of when consulting it) as presenting some passages where the plural form of the word is used with reference to a singular event. It may not have been Delling’s intent, but he opened a door here for Bible students to overlook nuances of the Greek grammar when the implications don’t cohere with their preconceived notions. So I’d like to focus on the examples Delling cited when making his case (Titus 1:3, 1 Timothy 2:6, 1 Timothy 6:15, & Galatians 6:9) for the rest of this post, since they present an excellent opportunity to showcase how the nuances of the Greek text of a Biblical passage can guide us toward a richer understanding of it. But if anyone else comes up with other aspects of 1 Timothy 6:14-15 that they think challenge my understanding of it, you know I’ll update this post to discuss them!
It’s simple enough to lead off with Galatians 6:9. “And let us not be weary in well doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not.” (KJV, underlining added) Delling simply made a mistake by including this as an example where a plural form of καιρός is used for a singular event, since the form of καιρός being translated as “season” here is καιρῷ, which is dative masculine singular! All the other passages he cited as examples do have plural forms of καιρός, but we’ll see that in all 3 passages, there is a valid reason for the noun to be plural instead of singular–and it does indeed carry the import of more than one moment in time in all 3 cases. Significantly, in all 3 instances, the Greek text has καιροῖς (the dative masculine plural form of καιρός) immediately followed by ἰδίοις, making the full phrase the dative form of “his own times” (where the dative-case preposition to attach to it depends on the context).
“In hope of eternal life, which God, that cannot lie, promised before the world began; But hath in due times manifested his word through preaching, which is committed unto me according to the commandment of God our Saviour;” (Titus 1:2-3 KJV, boldface and underlining added). Note that starting at the 40:27 mark of the second video I linked to above, the pastor followed Delling in interpreting “his word” (λόγον αὐτοῦ) as referring to Jesus, as the word “logos” sometimes does. Indeed, this wouldn’t be the first time chronologically that the NT calls Jesus Logos, since Titus was written after Hebrews (4:12). However, the qualifier “through [literally, “in”] preaching [a noun, not a verb]” makes it clear that “word” was meant in its ordinary sense here (feel free to click here to check the Greek phrasing). So, what Paul was actually referring to — what he said was “committed unto me according to the commandment of God our Saviour” — was the full body of doctrine that God had revealed in the course of the Apostles’ ministry–which, as noted in Endnote 3, wasn’t given all at one time, but over a span of more than 3 decades! Hence, the use of the plural καιροῖς is indeed appropriate in this context.
“Who gave himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time.” (1 Timothy 2:6 KJV, underlining added) Young’s Literal Translation sheds some light on what’s going on here: “who did give himself a ransom for all — the testimony in its own times”. Note that the KJV incorrectly rendered μαρτύριον as a verb (“to be testified”), while Young correctly rendered it as the noun that it is (“testimony”); indeed, the KJV also omitted the definite article before this word! Young’s rendering suggests that the intended meaning was that Jesus’ atonement was a testimony to all his contemporaries as long as they lived. Unfortunately, this understanding clashes with the fact that Paul linked it with when Jesus acted as “a ransom”, in which case “the testimony” should be referred to as “in its own time” (singular; i.e., Jesus’ crucifixion). However, Warner resolves this tension by rendering the verse as follows {scroll to p. 3 in the PDF}: “the one having given Himself a substitute ransom over all, the testimony until [God’s] own appointed times. (1 Timothy 2:6 LGV, boldface and underlining added) Note that Warner inferred the dative-case preposition for the dative-case phrase καιροῖς ἰδίοις to be “until” instead of “in” (the Greek text has no preposition here, so which one to infer is a judgment call on the translator’s part). He also interpreted “his” in “his own appointed times” as referring to the Father rather than the Son; after all, verse 5 (“For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus” — KJV) mentions “God” distinctly from Jesus–the Greek text for the underlined phrase (εἷς γὰρ θεός εἷς καὶ μεσίτης) contains no definite article, so Sharp’s 5th Rule indicates that the “one God” and “one mediator” are two different persons. And as Delling correctly observed, καιρός was generally used with reference to fixed times (feasts, harvest times, etc.); hence, Warner’s addition of the word “appointed”. Jesus himself had told his disciples just before his ascension that the arrival of his kingdom (Acts 1:6) would be associated with multiple fixed times: “It is not for [literally, “from”; “you” is genitive, not dative] you to know periods of time or appointed times [καιροὺς, the accusative masculine plural form of καιρός] which the Father has set by His own authority” (Acts 1:7c 2020 NASB, underlining and boldface added).
Consistent with this, Hebrews 10:22-39 (which was written before 1 Timothy) talks about believers persevering through those very times {I hope to write a post on Hebrews 10:22-39 at some point, and will give a link to it here when it’s ready}. We can tell that passage is eschatological because:
- verse 27 paraphrases Isaiah 26:11c LXX (which occurs in the middle of Isaiah 26, a passage about the apocalypse and the judgment by fire4);
- the Greek phrase for “a little while” in verse 37 KJV is μικρὸν ὅσον ὅσον (whose only other Biblical occurrence is in Isaiah 26:20 LXX — rendered “a little season” in the BLXX — referring to the faithful hiding during the Tribulation); and
- the rest of verses 37-38 quote from Habakkuk 2:2-4 LXX (the quotation of Habakkuk 2:4a in Hebrews 10:38c agrees with the Septuagint rather than the Masoretic Text), with the phrase “He who is coming” (verse 37b YLT) referring to the Antichrist, as shown by the earlier context of the Habakkuk passage (Habakkuk 1:5-11 LXX; note the sudden shift from plural masculine terms for the Chaldeans and singular neuter terms for their nation in verse 6 to singular masculine terms for the person being talked about in verse 7).
So when Hebrews 10:26-27 warns believers, “For if we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a fearful expectation of judgment, and a fury of fire that will consume the adversaries” (ESV), the context tells us that the boldfaced warning applies during the Tribulation. In light of all this, it’s completely appropriate for Warner to infer the intended preposition to be “until” in the phrase “a substitute ransom over all, the testimony until [God’s] own appointed times”–repentance will no longer be permitted during the Tribulation (i.e., once the Antichrist shows up), so the offer of “a substitute ransom” is only extended “over all” until the Tribulation. Hence, this understanding of 1 Timothy 2:6c coheres with earlier Biblical teaching and warrants the use of a plural (rather than singular) form of “times”.
Conclusion
Thus, we are left with no exegetical reason to think that 1 Timothy 6:15, the one remaining verse Delling gave where a plural form of καιρός is seemingly used with reference to a singular event, isn’t also using it to connote a time period for something in the context. Whenever the NT writers used a plural form of a word where its singular counterpart would’ve sufficed at first glance, we should investigate why the plural was used instead; there must be a reason why the singular wouldn’t have sufficed for their purposes. As explained earlier, I hold that the intent of the plural “times” with the singular “manifestation” was to indicate that the disclosure(s) of “the manifestation” (in contrast to “the manifestation” itself) would occur over a period of time. It feels appropriate to close this post with Warner’s translation of the passage I quote Young’s Literal Translation of in my book {HIDMF p. 753}:
I charge you before the God who sustains life in all things, and Anointed Jesus, the one who testified over Pontius Pilate the good profession. You are to keep this commandment, unblemished, blamelessly, until the Advent of our Master Jesus Anointed, which [God] will disclose in His own appointed times – the King of kings and Master of masters, the Blessed and Sole Sovereign, who alone holds immortality, housing unapproachable light, whom no man has seen nor is capable of seeing, to whom be honor and age-enduring dominion, Amen! (1 Timothy 6:13-16 LGV, content in brackets in original, boldface mine) {Scroll to p. 10 in the PDF at this hyperlink.}
- Many things the Jehovah’s Witnesses still teach about eschatology are rooted in their belief that Daniel 4:16’s mention of “seven times” refers to twice the “1,260 days” of Revelation 11 & 12, which they interpret as 2,520 years from the supposed first destruction of Jerusalem in 607 B.C. and A.D. 1914. However, not only does mainstream chronology prefer 586 B.C. for the first destruction of Jerusalem, but the chronology in Appendix D of my upcoming book places it in 534 B.C. (assuming Jesus was crucified in A.D. 30; if it turns out that Jesus was crucified in A.D. 33, it would’ve been 531 B.C. instead). So as I mentioned to a friend of mine who’s studying the JW’s doctrines in order to reach out to them, my chronology won’t help them, “unless they’re willing to replace their ‘1914 doctrine’ with a ‘1987 doctrine’!” ↩︎
- A similar parallel can be seen in the “120 years” announcement of Genesis 6:3. As I explain in my upcoming book {HIDMF p. 735-736}, Peter claimed that this one statement pinned down the timing of not only the global judgment by water, but also the global judgment by fire (2 Peter 3:5-8). Just as the judgment by water came 120 years (Hebrew שָׁנָה, H8141; derived from a verb meaning “to repeat” or “to duplicate”, implying that the noun’s most basic meaning is “cycle”) after God made this declaration, so the judgment by fire will come 120 Jubilee Cycles (6,000 years) after Adam’s first sin. Yet I’ve only pinned the starting time of the latter down to a 5-hour & 55-minute window {HIDMF, p. 757}, so there will still be a need for watching when the day arrives. Likewise, Noah knew when the 120th year after God made this announcement began (and thus, when the Ark needed to be completely prepared by), but until God’s pronouncement to him in Genesis 7:4 (which would parallel my understanding of the disclosure(s) of 1 Timothy 6:14-15), he didn’t know which day of that year the Flood would begin (and note that the Bible never tells us the time on the 17th day of the 2nd month of that year when “all the fountains of the great deep burst forth, and the windows of the heavens were opened” — Genesis 7:11c ESV). ↩︎
- Many preterists like to ask: “Why would Paul have treated the Thessalonians as if they might live to see the Day of the Lord unless it was supposed to be fulfilled in the second destruction of Jerusalem?”, thinking this implies it was guaranteed to happen in their lifetimes. But two statements of Jesus shed light on this issue. First, Mark’s account of the Olivet Discourse shows that at the time Jesus gave it, he himself hadn’t perceived when he would return: “And concerning that day and the hour no one hath known [literally, “has perceived”, as already noted; nevertheless, Young rendered the verb in the perfect tense!] — not even the messengers who are in the heaven, not even the Son — except the Father.” (Mark 13:32 YLT, boldface added); hence, Jesus left open the possibility that he would return in their lifetimes, because he wasn’t yet in a position to honestly deny it (after all, he was so close to accomplishing his atoning work; he couldn’t afford to lie about something now!). Second, he told his disciples that the Holy Breath would guide them into all truth (John 16:13)–implying a journey of learning additional divine revelation over time after Jesus’ ascension. 1 Thessalonians was one of the first epistles Paul wrote, with only Galatians being written earlier, so it would be understandable that Paul believed at that time that Jesus’ return could occur within their lifetimes. Evidently, God allowed Paul to believe this so he would have reason to include instructions for Christians regarding the second coming in his earlier epistles. But by the time Hebrews was written, the doctrine of chiliasm had been revealed to the Apostles {HIDMF p. 725-728}, requiring that Jesus’ return would be a minimum of 450 years or so away (because that’s how many years remained until the 6,000th year since creation, if you follow the chronological information in the Septuagint–as most early Christians did, being able to read Greek, but not Hebrew; we saw above that Clement of Alexandria placed the time only about a century sooner). With the benefit of hindsight, we can appreciate that the correct numbers for Genesis 5 & 11 were the ones in the Masoretic Text, which place Jesus’ crucifixion in the 3,993rd year since creation (so if Jesus was crucified in A.D. 30, then the month of May 2025 — when I published this post — would be a little over halfway through the 5,988th year since creation). In essence, God allowed the Apostles to hold the “possibly within my readers’ lifetimes” assumption just long enough to allow both sets of information to make their way into the written NT for the benefit of those who would need them all those centuries later! ↩︎
- We can tell this because the opening phrase of the chapter, “In that day” (verse 1a BLXX) refers back to the phrase “And in that day” in Isaiah 25:9a (BLXX). Which day is that? The one that was summarized in the previous major train of thought (Isaiah 25:8 has the solitary letter פ at the end of it in the Masoretic Text), which contains a statement Paul referenced in 1 Corinthians 15:54c: Paul quotes the phrase as Κατεπόθη ὁ θάνατος εἰς νῖκος (TR, boldface added) – “The Death was swallowed up — to victory” (YLT, boldface added). While the LXX of Isaiah 25:8a has κατέπιεν ὁ θάνατος ἰσχύσας (“The Death which had strength swallowed men up”–seeming to contradict the point Paul was making!), Paul’s phrasing is a legitimate Greek translation of what we see in the Masoretic Text: בִּלַּע הַמָּוֶת לָנֶצַח (“He will have swallowed up the death unto a goal”). This tells us that Paul linked Isaiah 25:8 (and by implication, the following major train of thought, which the petuha-cetuma test tells us doesn’t end until Isaiah 28:13!) with the resurrection of the righteous (which 1 Thessalonians 4:15-16 places at the time of Jesus’ parousia)! Also note that verses 20-21 are talking about faithful Israelites surviving the Tribulation by going into hiding: “Go, my people, enter into thy closets, shut thy door, hide thyself for a little season, until the anger of the Lord have passed away. For, behold, the Lord is bringing wrath from his holy place upon the dwellers on the earth: the earth also shall disclose her blood, and shall not cover her slain.” (Isaiah 26:20-21 BLXX) Indeed, a sermon in the Apocalypse of Pseudo-Ephraem (a sermon collection dating to the 600s A.D.) references this very passage when talking about people fleeing from the Antichrist’s wrath; see p. 4 of this PDF. ↩︎