Recently Bojidar Marinov has spoken
“I only said that pagan religions taught in the name of Christianity got the death penalty in the OT. And cessationism is a pagan religion taught in the name of Christianity.”
Clearly what Mr. Marinov is saying here is that if we had been operating under a Christian framework all those who taught the discontinuation of the signs and wonders gifts of the Scriptures should have been visited with the death penalty.
Here are some of those from Church History that Marinov would have had visited with capital punishment.
“[The] gift of healing, like the rest of the miracles, which the Lord willed to be brought forth for a time, has vanished away in order to make the preaching of the gospel marvelous forever… [Healing] now has nothing to do with us, to whom the administering of such powers has not been committed.”
John Calvin
Institutes of the Christian Religion, Bk IV:19, 18
Bojidar pronounces death upon Calvin.
“Gifts which in their own nature exceed the whole power of all our faculties, that dispensation of the Spirit is long since ceased and where it is now pretended unto by any, it may justly be suspected as an enthusiastic delusion.”
John Owen (1616-1683)
Works IV, 518
Bojidar pronounces death on John Owen
“Sure, there is as much need of ordination now as in Christ’s time and in the time of the apostles, there being then extraordinary gifts in the church which are now ceased.”
Thomas Watson (c 1620-1686):
The Beatitudes, 140
Bojidar pronounces death on Thomas Watson
Speaking of the “gift of tongues,” he said, “These and other gifts of prophecy, being a sign, have long since ceased and been laid aside, and we have no encouragement to expect the revival of them; but, on the contrary, are directed to call the Scriptures the more sure word of prophecy, more sure than voices from Heaven; and to them we are directed to take heed, to search them, and to hold them fast…”
Matthew Henry (1662-1714):
Preface to Vol IV of his Exposition of the OT & NT, vii
Bojidar pronounces death on Matthew Henry
Of the extraordinary gifts, they were given “in order to the founding and establishing of the church in the world. But since the canon of Scriptures has been completed, and the Christian church fully founded and established, these extraordinary gifts have ceased.”
Jonathan Edwards (1703-1758):
Charity and its Fruits, 29
Jonathan Edwards
“…the karismata, the miraculous gifts conferred on the primitive church…have long ceased…”
George Whitefield (1714-1770):
Second Letter to the Bishop of London, Works, Vol. IV, 167
Bojidar pronounces death on George Whitfield
“The miraculous gifts of the Spirit have long since been withdrawn. They were used for a temporary purpose.”
James Buchanan (1804-1870):
The Office and Work of the Holy Spirit, 34
James Buchanan
“After the early church had been established, the same necessity for supernatural signs now no longer existed, and God, Who is never wasteful in His expedients, withdrew them…miracles, if they became ordinary, would cease to be miracles, and would be referred by men to customary law.”
Robert L. Dabney (1820-1898):
“Prelacy a Blunder,” Discussions: Evangelical and Theological, Vol. 2, 236-237
Bojidar pronounces death on R. L. Dabney
“These gifts were…distinctively the authentication of the apostles. They were part of the credentials of the apostles as the authoritative agents of God in founding the church. Their function thus confirmed them distinctively to the apostolic church and they necessarily passed away with it.”
Benjamin B. Warfield (1851-1921)
Counterfeit Miracles, 6
Either Mr. Marinov, according to his own words, believed these men should have received the death penalty or else he is just plain ignorant.
You decide.
Hat Tip — Clive Sanguis
Marinov seems to be spinning out of control. I actually remember a time when he seemed to be a somewhat reasonable character.
This following Facebook comment shows Marinov’s fundamental Leftist orientation – he clearly argues that the universalist forms of paganism spawned by the Enlightenment (like Communism, presumably) are somehow inherently more “Christian” than the forms of paganism inspired by pre-Christian tribalism (like Nazism, presumably):
“You and your buddies are quite ignorant, Darrell. Tribalism and the Enlightenment are both part of the same pagan worldview. The Biblical position is covenantalism, which is a CREEDAL society, based on FAITH, as Rushdoony taught, not on genetics (like dogs) nor on economic egalitarianism. A tribalist is a pagan, and he is a pagan worse than anything that the Enlightenment can produce, for the Enlightenment at least operated in a Christian context and could not escape it, as much as it wanted to escape it, while tribalism is paganism of the earlier times BEFORE Christianity made its impact.”
There are so many objections one could make to this tripe, like for example this: you could turn this scheme upside down and claim that post-Christians are actually WORSE than pre-Christians, because they have become hardened towards truth. The Bible teaches that “dogs returning to their vomit” are worse off than if they had not ever known the Gospel at all.
The ancient Christians often showed more patience for pagans pure and simple than for Arian heretics.