The Trump of God at the End of the World

Gday all :)

I just read in the King James Bible this shocking passage about the end of world according to Paul -

" For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and The TRUMP of God, and the dead in Christ shall rise first. " (Paul, 1 Thess. 4:16, KJV)

Does that mean the end of the world will start with the Trump of God ? Along with the 'dead in Christ' ?

Roman Lucan, a contemporary of Paul, left this possible allusion in his epic Pharsalia (The Civil War) -

" And scarcely armed for war, a dissonant crowd Barbaric, that will start to hear our TRUMP, Nay, their own clamour. Not in civil strife Your blows shall fall -- the battle of to-day Sweeps from the earth the enemies of Rome. Dash through these cowards and their vaunted kings: One stroke of sword and all the world is yours. " (Book 7, 320)

Seneca too, another Roman contemporary of Paul, left a strange allusion -

" Any man, even if he does not stain, asperses the reputation of a superior by complaining of him; and no one is content to TRUMP up light accusations, since he seeks to win belief by the very magnitude of his lie. " (On Benefits, VII)

Notably, the 2nd C. Christian author Hippolytus, in his book 'The AntiChrist' refers back to Paul's comment about the Trump of God at the end of the world -

" For the Lord Himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, and the voice and TRUMP of God, and the dead in Christ shall rise first. " (The Antichrist, 66)

This passage drew the attention of Christian writers from the 3rd C. such as Methodius in 'The Banquet of the Ten Virgins', as well as critics such as Celsus attacking Origen, and Porphyry's 'Against The Christians' (in which he calls it an 'astounding and perverted ' remark.)

So too the influential 2nd C. Roman Christian writer Tertullian (the first to write in Latin) who had even more to say -

" It is the transformation these shall undergo which he explains to the Corinthians, when he writes: ' We shall all indeed rise again (though we shall not all undergo the transformation) in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last TRUMP ' - for none shall experience this change but those only who shall be found in the flesh. " (The Resurrection of the Flesh, Ch. XLII.)

He even compares the Trump of God to the word of the gospel -
" For, allowing that the word of the gospel may be called ' the TRUMP of God,' ... " (Ch. XXIV.)

Augustine and the Trump of God

By the fourth century, the Trump of God (aka the last Trump) was standard Catholic doctrine, preached by Ambrose of Milan, Cyril of Jerusalem, Gregory of Nyssa, Macarius Magnes, Rufinus Tyrannius and John Chrysostom. The great Augustine the Hippo has much to say about the end of the world and the last Trump, e.g. -

" ... because this hour shall be hereafter, because this hour shall be at the end of the world, because this shall be the last hour, shall be at the last TRUMP. " (Sermon LXXVII, 14)

" What afterward? What in the end? How conquereth the Body of Christ? By heavenly aid. ' For the Lord Himself shall come with the voice of the Archangel, and with the TRUMP of God shall He descend from heaven' " (Exposition on the Psalms, (Psalm CXLIV, 10)

Aurelius Prudentius of the 5th C. had a darker view of the Trump - around Christmas time too -

" Vain all thy tears, when loud shall sound The TRUMP, when flames shall scorch the ground, When from its hinge the cloven world is loosed, in horrid tumult hurled. " (Hymns, XI. Hymn For Christmas-Day)

John Cassian mentioned the Trump, and Severus of Antioch quotes Gregory the Theologian as saying -

" I await the voice of the archangel, the last TRUMP, the transformation of heaven, the changing of the earth, the emancipation of the elements, the renovation of the whole world. " (Severus, Letter XXVII, 203)

Even the strange work Barlaam & Ioasaph mentions the Trump.
This book started as a life of Buddha in Sanskrit in the 2nd - 4th C. then went through a Manichean version, then became the Arabic Kitab Bilawhar wa-Yudasaf (Book of Bilawhar and Yudasaf) of the 8th C. which spread to Middle Eastern Christians. The first Christian version was in Georgian called Balavariani around the 10th C. then a Georgian monk, Euthymius of Athos, translated the story into Greek, which was translated into Latin in 1048 to become Barlaam & Ioasaph. This helps to explain how Sanskrit Boddhisattva became Latin Josaphat (through Persian Bodisav, Arabic Budhasaf or Yudasaf, Georgian Iodasaph, Greek Ioasaph to Latin Iosaphat or Josaphat) -

" Then, after long seasons, Christ our God shall come to judge the world in awful glory, beyond words to tell; and for fear of him the powers of heaven shall be shaken, and all the angel hosts stand beside him in dread. Then, at the voice of the archangel, and at the TRUMP of God, shall the dead arise and stand before his awful throne. " (VIII)

Will the dead really arise and stand before Trump's awful throne ?

Is this Augustine's "end of the world" ?

Is it really "the transformation of heaven, the changing of the earth, the emancipation of the elements, the renovation of the whole world " ?



Kapyong

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