Theodicy

[psimmond]

Psimmond wrote:

We know the fall of Jerusalem in 70AD was God's judgment.

Paidion asked,

How do we know that?

Unless I'm mistaken, the passages below explain why God used the Romans to punish his people:

Mat 23:29 "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you build the tombs of the prophets and decorate the monuments of the righteous,
Mat 23:30 saying, 'If we had lived in the days of our fathers, we would not have taken part with them in shedding the blood of the prophets.'
Mat 23:31 Thus you witness against yourselves that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets.
Mat 23:32 Fill up, then, the measure of your fathers.
Mat 23:33 You serpents, you brood of vipers, how are you to escape being sentenced to hell?
Mat 23:34 Therefore I send you prophets and wise men and scribes, some of whom you will kill and crucify, and some you will flog in your synagogues and persecute from town to town,
Mat 23:35 so that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on earth, from the blood of innocent Abel to the blood of Zechariah the son of Barachiah, whom you murdered between the sanctuary and the altar.
Mat 23:36 Truly, I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation.
Mat 23:37 "O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you would not!
Mat 23:38 See, your house is left to you desolate.

Luk 19:41 And when he drew near and saw the city, he wept over it,
Luk 19:42 saying, "Would that you, even you, had known on this day the things that make for peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes.
Luk 19:43 For the days will come upon you, when your enemies will set up a barricade around you and surround you and hem you in on every side
Luk 19:44 and tear you down to the ground, you and your children within you. And they will not leave one stone upon another in you, because you did not know the time of your visitation." [italics added]

Luk 21:22 for these are days of vengeance, to fulfill all that is written.

Heb 10:28 If two or three witnesses accused someone of rejecting Moses' Teachings, that person was shown no mercy as he was executed.
Heb 10:29 What do you think a person who shows no respect for the Son of God deserves? That person looks at the blood of the promise (the blood that made him holy) as no different from other people's blood, and he insults the Spirit that God gave us out of his kindness. He deserves a much worse punishment.
Heb 10:30 We know the God who said, "I alone have the right to take revenge. I will pay back." God also said, "The Lord will judge his people."
Heb 10:31 Falling into the hands of the living God is a terrifying thing.

*And probably Mat 22:7

[jriccitelli]

‘We know the fall of Jerusalem in 70AD was God's judgment. How do we know that?’

Because God keeps His promises.

“The LORD said to Moses, “Whoever has sinned against Me, I will blot him out of My book. 34“But go now, lead the people where I told you. Behold, My angel shall go before you; nevertheless in the day when I punish, I will punish them for their sin” (Ex.32:32-33)

“See, I am setting before you today a blessing and a curse: 27 the blessing, if you listen to the commandments of the LORD your God, which I am commanding you today; 28 and the curse, if you do not listen to the commandments of the LORD your God” (Deut.11:26-28)

“But it shall come about, if you do not obey the LORD your God, to observe to do all His commandments and His statutes with which I charge you today, that all these curses will come upon you and overtake you:
16“Cursed shall you be in the city, and cursed shall you be in the country...
20“The LORD will send upon you curses, confusion, and rebuke, in all you undertake to do, until you are destroyed and until you perish quickly, on account of the evil of your deeds, because you have forsaken Me. 21“The LORD will make the pestilence cling to you until He has consumed you from the land where you are entering to possess it. 22“The LORD will smite you with consumption and with fever and with inflammation and with fiery heat and with the sword and with blight and with mildew, and they will pursue you until you perish. 23“The heaven which is over your head shall be bronze, and the earth which is under you, iron. 24“The LORD will make the rain of your land powder and dust; from heaven it shall come down on you until you are destroyed.
25“The LORD shall cause you to be defeated before your enemies; you will go out one way against them, but you will flee seven ways before them, and you will be an example of terror to all the kingdoms of the earth. 26“Your carcasses will be food to all birds of the sky and to the beasts of the earth, and there will be no one to frighten them away.
27“The LORD will smite you with the boils of Egypt and with tumors and with the scab and with the itch, from which you cannot be healed. 28“The LORD will smite you with madness and with blindness and with bewilderment of heart; 29 and you will grope at noon, as the blind man gropes in darkness, and you will not prosper in your ways; but you shall only be oppressed and robbed continually, with none to save you. (Duet.8:15-Malachi 4:6)

“Behold, I am going to send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and terrible day of the LORD. 6“He will restore the hearts of the fathers to their children and the hearts of the children to their fathers, so that I will not come and smite the land with a curse.” (Malachi 4:6)

‘For they have shed the blood of saints and prophets, and thou hast given them blood to drink; for they are worthy’ (Rev.16:6)

His disciples remembered that it was written, “ZEAL FOR YOUR HOUSE WILL CONSUME ME.” 18 The Jews then said to Him, “What sign do You show us as your authority for doing these things?” 19 Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” (John 2:17-19)

[dwilkins]

You might also add,

Luk 21:20 "But when you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies, then know that its desolation has come near.
Luk 21:21 Then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains, and let those who are inside the city depart, and let not those who are out in the country enter it,
Luk 21:22 for these are days of vengeance, to fulfill all that is written.

Anyone who can't see this dynamic is still at step 1 in understanding the narrative of the NT and theology in general.

Doug

[Paidion]

NONE of the scriptures quoted indicate that the fall of Jerusalem in 70AD was GOD's judgment.

The ones quoted by Mr. Wilkins in the most recent post PREDICT an attack on Jerusalem. However, nothing in them indicate that the armies that were to surround Jerusalem were sent by GOD.

Furthermore, we don't know that they even refer to the attack of the Romans on Jerusalem in 70 A.D. The succeeding verses seem to indicate that events are predicted which will occur just previous to Christ's second coming:

But when you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies, then know that its desolation has come near. Then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains, and let those who are inside the city depart, and let not those who are out in the country enter it, for these are days of vengeance, to fulfill all that is written. Alas for women who are pregnant and for those who are nursing infants in those days! For there will be great distress upon the earth and wrath against this people. They will fall by the edge of the sword and be led captive among all nations, and Jerusalem will be trampled underfoot by the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled. And there will be signs in sun and moon and stars, and on the earth distress of nations in perplexity because of the roaring of the sea and the waves, people fainting with fear and with foreboding of what is coming on the world. For the powers of the heavens will be shaken. And then they will see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with power and great glory. (Luke 21:20-27)

[dwilkins]

Paidion,

Obviously, you don't consider the majority of the preterist work on the Olivet Discourse to be substantive. I think that Chilton (http://freebooks.entrewave.com/freebook ... s/dcdv.pdf), Bray (http://www.amazon.com/Matthew-24-Fulfil ... +fulfilled), and others have done a good job of explaining why that disaster accomplished God's judgment. But, either you haven't bothered to read any of the preterist works on the topic or you don't consider them persuasive. Since they are more capable of making the point than I won't try to convince you.

Doug

[psimmond]

We don't have to wonder or guess. Jesus himself tells us why they would be destroyed and I italicized the reason in my earlier comment.

[mattrose]

For me, the issue isn't whether or not God judged Jerusalem (clearly God did). The issue is HOW. Did God inspire the Romans to attack the city? Did God manipulate their feet to march that direction? Or did God simply remove his restraints? Did God simply stop protecting the city? Did God simply let Rome be Rome?

If God wanted to judge Jerusalem directly... let's face it... He wouldn't need Rome at all. The very fact that Rome was the active force responsible for its destruction hints in the direction of God's allowance/withdrawal rather than his direct attack. Identifying verses that attribute such things to God directly are not so much evidence of God's direct activity as they are evidence of God's overarching sovereignty (nothing happens without his awareness or ability to have caused it not to happen) and his willingness to take responsibility.

[psimmond]

Mattrose said, "For me, the issue isn't whether or not God judged Jerusalem (clearly God did). The issue is HOW."

There are very few places in scripture where God tells us "how" he does what he does. Quite honestly, I don't think our minds are capable of understanding the intricacies of God's providence. God's foreknowledge and omniscience allows him to "[call] into existence the things that do not exist." God can say that Jesus was slain before the foundation (creation) of the world; we were chosen before the foundation of the world, etc. We can say Rome destroyed Jerusalem before the foundation of the world.

I choose to do the things that I do today because of God's providences in the lives of my great great grandparents. None of us operates in a vacuum.

God has created a world that is ordered in such a way that free-will agents unknowingly fulfill parts of God's great plan every day--and the timing is perfect!

Have you seen the Nicolas Cage movie "Gone In 60 Seconds"? Although he has limited knowledge, it's amazing what Nicolas can do with 60 seconds of foreknowledge!

[mattrose]

Fair enough

But my point wasn't that HOW was un-answerable in the case we are talking about. My point was that the HOW was obvious. God judged Jerusalem via the Roman army. The questions I asked weren't, I don't think, very mysterious and difficult to answer. I suggest that the answers are pretty simple: No, No, Yes, Yes, Yes. The most 'active' thing he might have done is cement the decision they were already about to make, or cemented their passion to do it thoroughly. But even that is just allowing people's true motivations to come to their logical conclusions.

I will add the movie to my Netflix!

[jriccitelli]

(First I have to agree with Matt and others, God allows, withdraws, and yet sometimes God can act directly, like with Elijah on Mt. Carmel, Ananias and Safira. 'When' maybe the issue)

You can’t ‘prove’ God did ‘anything’, because God is invisible. You cant prove a prediction that God would do something if you didn’t ‘see’ Him actually do it. Did God actually rain fire down on Mt.Carmel or was it just a freak coincidence? Did Jesus raise Lazarus from the dead, or was it the weather, we’ll never know, or will we ?

Yet, Paidion you are actually arguing ‘for’ my disagreements with Preterism, because, much like you I don’t fit into a box very well.

I don’t know when I started or stopped being preterist (I think simultaneously) but the first time I heard about it (Hank Hanegraff?) I disagreed not because I didn’t believe Revelation was about Jerusalem (I have shared with Mormons already that it could be, they will make an argument of it) but when I read up on Preterism I did not see anything that spoke of what I saw happening.

I saw God fulfilling His ‘promises of the Law’, and just like Sodom and Egypt, God will eventually Judge ‘all’ sin – and these are ‘all’ examples! – I saw God punishing Israel and Rome (and Babylon, and Tyre, Edom, Sodom, etc) (as predicted) as an ‘example’ of what will be eventually happen to ‘all’ the evil and Godless in the world. All these judgments will be fully known when God eventually Judges the whole world on ‘that’ last day.

That’s were Preterism (yet, I am not fully sure if an all inclusive Preterism exists) seems to get off track.
A partial (warning) fulfillment does not mean the full-fulfillment will not happen; rather it warns that ‘it will’ certainly happen – fully. If the prophecy specifically sets a parameter of time or such, then it must fit the parameters, so all I can say is that it seems that prophecies are conditional and God routinely delayed punishments over and over. So it seems He is delaying for a purpose. Numerous fanciful arguments are made to why Jesus did (or did) not return in 70ad (He did not), I simply see Jerusalem and Rome as an example – clearly of Gods Judgment – of what will sooner or later happen Fully on ‘That Great and Terrible Day’ + .

So yes God fulfilled Deuteronomy, but Jesus and Revelation seem to describe something much bigger, two fold maybe, a warning and example – for sure.

Never the less I am out of time, as many people will be on that last day.