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The Millennial Hope in the Early Church1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 February 2009

Hans Bietenhard
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Extract

The first post-Apostolic3 Chiliast known to us is Papias of Hierapolis. From the oral tradition of presbyters who saw the disciple John he adduces a saying of Jesus referring to the miraculous fruitfulness of corn and wine during the millennium. There is an exact parallel to this tradition—perhaps its source— in Syr. Baruch 29.5: ‘The earth also will yield its fruit 10,000 fold, and on one vine there will be 1000 branches, and each branch will produce 1000 clusters, and each cluster will produce 1000 grapes, and each grape will produce a cor of wine.’ In this context we cannot discuss the priority and interdependence of the two traditions. We can only maintain that there existed in the Early Church a saying of Jesus which the presbyters and authorities cited by Papias referred at once to the millennium. We may also notice how closely the Christian and Judaistic traditions approximated and even merged into each other at this point. This is true even in the case of the Epistle of Barnabas, which is normally so anti-Jewish. Speaking of the Sabbath which was instituted at creation, Barn. 15.3–9 argues that the Genesis narrative points prophetically to the final consummation. God created the world in six days, and He will bring it to its consummation in 6000 years, for one day is with the Lord as a 1000 years (Ps. 90.4; Barn. 15.4)4 ‘And God rested the seventh day’ means for Barnabas that when His Son comes He will destroy the age (kaipóy) of the lawless one (i.e. the Antichrist, cf. Isa. 11.4; 2 Thess. 2.8), judge the ungodly, and refashion the sun and the moon and the stars.

Type
Research Article
Information
Scottish Journal of Theology , Volume 6 , Issue 1 , March 1953 , pp. 12 - 30
Copyright
Copyright © Scottish Journal of Theology Ltd 1953

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References

page 12 note 3 According to Jerome (comm. ad Isa. 66.20) the Ebionites were Chiliasts as well as the Jews.

page 12 note 4 It may be noted that the saying in Ps. 90.4 is here reversed (cf. 2 Pet. 3.8), and also made future. How and when this took place is not known. Almost all Fathers who looked for a millennium fitted it into the scheme of a universal week of 7000 years–for detailed evidence cf. Wikenhauser, A.: ‘Die Herkunft der Idee des tausendjährigen Reiches in der Johannesapokalypse’ (1937) in Römische Quartalschrift, 45Google Scholar; and ‘Weltwoche und tausendjähriges Reich’ (1947) in Tübinger theologische Quartalschrift, 127.Google Scholar

page 13 note 1 Cf. slav. Enoch 33.1–2. (Forbes, and Charles, , The Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha of the Old Testament, II (1913), p. 451.)Google Scholar

page 13 note 2 Haereses, V. 28, 3.

page 13 note 3 Cf. Justin, dial, cum Tryph. Iudaeo, 81.

page 14 note 1 Riessler, P., Altjüdisckes Scrifttum ausserhalb der Bibel (1928), p. 1145 f; Test, of Isaac, 8.10.Google Scholar

page 14 note 2 The idea of the reward derives from Luke 14.12 f. It is paralleled in Irenaeus.

page 15 note 1 Tertullian, adv. Marcionem III.24.

page 15 note 2 ibid. IV.31.

page 16 note 1 De resurrectione carnis 19.

page 16 note 2 Cf. Tert. de res. carn. 25.

page 17 note 1 Cf. Tert. adv. Marc. IV.24; Epiphanius, Haereses XIL.I, which contains a relevant prophecy of Priscilla.

page 17 note 2 Historia ecclesiastica III.28.

page 18 note 1 Dionysius later found that Papias spoke of two Johns, the ‘disciple’ and the ‘elder’. He concluded that the disciple wrote the Gospel and the elder the Apocalypse, thus making both canonical, but relieving John the son of Zebedee of responsibility for the Apocalypse.

page 18 note 2 Fragment VII of Hippolytus' chapter against Gaius. According to Theodoret (hatret. fab. II, 3) Hippolytus wrote a work against Cerinthus.

page 19 note 1 Cf. John 14.30.

page 20 note 1 Origenes, de principiis II, 11.2.

page 21 note 1 Cf. Symposion IX. Cf. Staehelin, E., Die Verkündigung der Der Retches Gottes in der Kirche Jesu Christi, p. 208 f.Google Scholar

page 22 note 1 Haeresis LXXVII 36–38.

page 23 note 1 Haereses LXXVII 36–38.

page 23 note 2 Epistula CCLXIII, 4.

page 23 note 3 Epistula CII ad Cleodonium.

page 24 note 1 Instructionum II.39; Carmen apologeticum 45.791.

page 24 note 2 Instr. II.3.

page 24 note 3 Cf. the exact parallel in Or. Sibyll. V.420 f, 433, of which the source is Jewish. The 12,000 paces naturally derive from Rev. 21.16.

page 24 note 4 Instr. I.29.

page 24 note 5 ibid. II. 1.

page 24 note 6 ibid. II.2.

page 24 note 7 Carm. apol. 941–946.

page 24 note 8 It is impossible in this context to show how the return of the ten tribes came to be connected with the Antichrist and Gog-Magog traditions and the Alexandersaga. On these points see Bousset, W., Der Antichrist (1895), P. 64 f.Google Scholar

page 25 note 1 Victorini Petavionensis opera, ed. Haussleiter, J. (1916), cf. Theologisches Literaturblatt 1895, p. 194 f.Google Scholar; cf. Staehelin, op. cit., p. 206 f.

page 25 note 2 Divinarum institutionum VIII.24.

page 25 note 3 Cf. Isa. 30.36—a passage which constantly recurs in descriptions of the millennium.

page 26 note 1 Norden, Eduard, Das göttliche Kind (1926).Google Scholar

page 26 note 2 In Isaiam, proph. lib. XVIII, prooem.

page 26 note 3 Jerome, in Hieremiam, proph. lib. IV, ad Jer. 19.10 f.

page 27 note 1 Cf. Bousset, W., Die Offenbarung Johannis (1896) in, Meyer's, Kommentar 16.5, p. 66.Google Scholar

page 28 note 1 Cf. Hahn, Traugott, Tyconius-Studien (1900).Google Scholar

page 28 note 2 op. cit., p. 7, 13.

page 29 note 1 Cf. Sermo CCLIX.2.