I have not read Barber’s book so I don’t know his view. But that is not Hahn’s view. Hahn mainly focus’ on the book of Revelation in respect to the age of the Church. He focus’ on it in reference to the liturgy or Mass. I had him for biblical studies this year and he made no mention of any idea of it beginning with David. His book (The Lamb’s Supper) doesn’t mention it either.
He does believe that it was written before AD70 and that it refers to the destruction of Jerusalem as well as to an end event.
How is that a problem? The only way that is a problem with an early dating is if prophecy is rejected as a possibility.
John wrote for an audience living in his time. He used the Apocalyptic style so his audience (the “ins”) would understand and the authorities (the “outs”) would not.
That assumes “prophesy” means “predicting the future” as opposed to “transmitting the Word of God.”
He stabbed himself in the throat, and his personal servant finished him off.
Which is about as reliable as the National Enquirer.
Well, yeah, on one layer of meaning of course. I did not intend to say that preterism is itself invalid, nor as a parable of the Mass. What I’m talking about is, most Catholics today are LEAST interested in the ultimate and primary meaning that the book actually has, namely, the spiritual and mystical meaning of the Redemption of the human race: i.e., ALL of Salvation History, and what concerns the great spiritual epochs thereof, and the meaning and purpose of why salvation history has gone the way it has gone (and will), that is, to contemplate the Divine Intellect’s Plan from the foundation of the world, how, in the beginning sin reigns, then for all of history it is progressively redeemed, and that at the end, sin reigns in an incurable manifestation. How does one understand these? What will enable the Church to discover the ultimate meaning and purpose of the Plan, and how they will thereby recognize dogmatically when the final manifestation of sin is upon humanity, how the Jews will come to recognize the Messiah, etc. I have yet to come into contact with a modern orthodox Catholic who wishes to probe these questions. Scott Hahn doesn’t. Michael Barber doesn’t. Carl Olson doesn’t.
This is exactly the point.What never ceases to amaze me with the pro-preterists is that they would rather the Book of Revelation be about arbitrary temporal issues of the Early Church, instead of a mystical meaning of how the spiritual process of the Redemption of humanity shall complete itself over the whole course of the age of the Church in terms of the spiritual epochs and the meaning of these epochs in light of the mystery of grace and sin.
I see this to. I was just on another forum, and someone linked in a “well balanced” article on the Apocalype by Jimmy Akin. It was based on the same Hahnian/Corsini view! Wherever I go this is treated as though this is what the Church always taught.
Maybe you should, but there is a book available that does get into all that, and it is Robert Sungenis’ The Apocalypse of St. John Study Bible. It really opened my eyes as to what the Apocalypse is all about and how it relates to the Church today.
This is a partial preterist view. Most of the Apocalypse takes place up to the destruction of the temple with a literal 1000 years, then it jumps forward to the second coming. I guess the way he captures the present is by invoking the Mass. I think it also maintains amillennialism (no 1000 year temporal eign of Christ on earth).
The History channel is reliable on secular things. As long as religion is not brought into the issue they are reliable. I was wrong though. I was actually thinking of Caligula I think.John wrote for an audience living in his time. He used the Apocalyptic style so his audience (the “ins”) would understand and the authorities (the “outs”) would not.
If the events so central to the book had not yet occurred, how could his audience understand him?
That assumes “prophesy” means “predicting the future” as opposed to “transmitting the Word of God.”
He stabbed himself in the throat, and his personal servant finished him off.
Which is about as reliable as the National Enquirer.
Remember, this is the same History Channel that assures us the Shroud of Turin is “the most sacred relic of the Catholic Church” (the Church has never awarded it the status of a relic) and we “take it out and worship it.”
Dear Mark,
We could point the greatest threat Chrisianity has faced is Islam, which overran the Holy Land, all of Christian North Africa, overthrew the East Roman Empire, and made adivances in Europe.
If we want to start talking literal 1000 years, how about the death of Christ to the schism of the Orthodox Church? I am sure there are many Millennial examples. I think that is why the Church wisely has chosen to interpret it symbolically.
I think if we define prophesy as “a prediction of the future” we must apply two rules:
It is true that he affirms the Church Age. He says so in his book- in one paragraph. But then he puts it aside and teaches a novel view. So, though he says the Davidic Millennium view compliments the Church Age Millenium view (that of Augustine and all the Fathers since him), in reality he has replaced it.
I don’t think so. The early Christians were Chilliasts. They were waiting for Christ to come to rule on earth for a milennium (i.e., they were millennialists).
The book was well written and entertaining, perhaps. It is trying to teach good Catholic principles, true. But it is teaching a novel view. I mainly object to teaching a novel view in a book which is targetted at beginning studiers of Apocalypse. Before teaching novel views that do not have support of the Church and Fathers, I believe beginning students should learn what the Church affirmed for 1600 years.
I have come pretty close by this point.
Yes, to be frank it is. Have we totally abondaned tradition?
Barber is not the pope! When popes say new things it potentially can lead to new views on theology being developed.
Had he written a book which claimed to investigate a new and speculative view on the Apocalypse, I may agree. But teaching beginner Catholics about the Apocalypse should start with the Church view on the matter (at least in my opinion). The book was written as a primer on the Apocalypse, not an academic study on alternate views of the Apocalypse. It is the context that is an issue here.
I never claimed he did not stand with the Church. That does not make the view he puts forth any less novel. The imprimatur is not a guarantee of accuracy. The only teaching on the Apocalypse that should be rejected for imprimatur is chilliasm. This is the only one the Church has definitively rejected (Pius XII).
I don’t question that.
It sounds like you are the one pitting Barber to spurious charges against Sungenis. Note that in my book review I did not attack Barber’s character nor presume to know his intent. I guess once you realized that you could not win the argument with facts, the only thing to do was attack Sungenis’ character; though Sungenis is not the one who wrote the book reviews.
You have a right to your opinion, also.
Herein one of the biggest difficulty with the view. Saying that Satan was loosed at the time of Christ means that he was bound during the OT. There is no Scriptural evidence for this. Sungenis makes an exegetical point of detrmining when Satan was bound using Scriptural references outside the Apocalypse. He finds substantial support for Satan being bound in the NT, but not in the OT.