#STRask - Does the Bible Teach That Elijah Was Reincarnated as John the Baptist?

Episode Date: May 9, 2024

Questions about responding to someone who says the Bible teaches reincarnation when it says John the Baptist “is Elijah who was to come” in Matthew 11:14 and whether Matthew 24:36–44 is referring to the rapture. How should I respond to someone who says the Bible teaches reincarnation in the verse about John the Baptist being Elijah (Matt. 11:14)? Is Matthew 24:36–44 referring to the rapture, and if not, what’s the best way to convince someone it isn’t about the rapture?

Welcome to the show, friends. Greg Kokel here, hashtag STRS, and I just preempted Amy with the introduction, but I'm here with Amy answering your questions. So let her rip, Amy. All right. Thank you, Greg. Over to you, Amy. Okay. So last time, Greg, we talked about the Bible, the perspicuity of the Bible, meaning our ability to understand its clarity. So today we're going to talk about a few different places where people misinterpret the Bible, and you're going to make your case from the text, because the text is everything we need to understand it, unless it's some sort of historical thing. Okay, I hope they give the textual reference so I can get there. Go ahead.

Okay, so this first one comes from M.B. Bennett. How do we respond to one who says the Bible teaches reincarnation in the verses on John the Baptist as Elijah? Well, that's where I don't have the verses here in front of me, but that's okay, because I remember the basic context. Reincarnation, okay, this is what's really important to think of. Reincarnation is a piece of a puzzle of a different story of reality. All right? The idea of reincarnation in those Eastern religions that teach it, which would be Buddhism and Hinduism, is that one life is not enough to accomplish what the individual needs to accomplish to reach the higher stage.

What we would call heaven,, the loss of identity, and we're lost into the divine essence, which is the only reality. That's classical monism, which simply means one-ism, that there's only one thing that exists, and that one thing, that one reality is God. And Atman, man, is Brahman, God, okay? And Brahman is Atman. And we just think we are separate. That's part of the illusion, and it's the process of going through various reincarnations, life after life after life, where we finally attain to the level of realizing we're God, and we are absorbed then back into the Godhead. Our apparent self-identity is now lost into the fullness of the Godhead. And Buddhism has something similar.

Now, I just want you to see that this concept of reincarnation plays a theological role in these other religions in which it makes absolutely no sense in Christianity or Judaism. Reincarnation does no work for us, okay? And it does—although I think there might have been one church father who was enamored with it, Origen, possibly, but he's wrong, But he's wrong, because there's no place for that puzzle piece to fit in our worldview puzzle. It is appointed to man to die once, and then comes the judgment. This is in Hebrews. It's very clear. Paul's emphasis on the gospel going out and people turning to Christ and trusting them in this life,

it presumes that there's only one life to live. And after this, that's it. The die is cast, okay? That's completely inconsistent with reincarnation. Now, what this means then is this is a classic case of understanding what reincarnation is. Let me back up. It's a classic case of people isolating a verse and reading something out of it, an idea that because they don't have a foundation in the Christian story, the richness of it, the fullness, how does this Christian thing work together? How

does the biblical story all fit together in different parts that it's so easy for them to confuse some part of another story as being part of the Christian story, all right? And I actually make this point when I talk about the story of reality, and it's in the book, that Christians' picture of reality, if it's like a puzzle box, all their pieces are laying on the floor in a pile. They've never put them together to see the big picture, and therefore they're victimized by error. They get other pieces to the puzzle, like the reincarnation piece, part of a different religious view of reality mixed in. But if they try to put their puzzle together, there would be no place to fit this piece.

It doesn't do any work for us. It's like trying to put a carburetor on a computer. So the way to solve this problem is first to understand that's part of a different religion, and it does certain work in that religion, but as such, it does no work in our religion. In fact, it's contrary to our religion. Now, if it's contrary to our religion, and then we read a text like the text about John the Baptist and Elijah, which would be Matthew 11, all right? 13 through 15.

Matthew 11, 13 through 15. And try to infer from that passage that the passage is teaching reincarnation. We've got it wrong. We've got it completely wrong, because reincarnation plays no part in the system of biblical theology the way it plays a part in the system of, say, Hindu or Buddhist theology. So, I'm looking at the verses in question, chapter 11, 13 through 15, and I'll just read those verses. For all the prophets of the law prophesied until John, and if you are willing to accept it, John himself is Elijah who is to come. He who has ears to hear, let him hear. I'm just looking at something here to see if there's anything else. This is where he's talking

about the greatness of John the Baptist. Now, there was a sense of Elijah returning, okay? Now, if you recall, Elijah never died. He was taken up on a chariot. And so there's not going to be a reincarnation of Elijah because Elijah didn't die. But there is something about John the Baptist that is similar to Elijah. And when we read about John being characterized, he wears a horsehair clothing or whatever it is, and he's eating locusts and honey, and he's living in the deserts, and, God, he's kind of a lot like Elijah. He's similar to Elijah.

And he is bringing a message. But then there's another Elijah appearance in the book of Revelation. And so, since reincarnation is not a part of the Christian worldview, it's a mistake, and it doesn't play a part. It has no place in it. It doesn't fit. It's a mistake to read one line and try to infer from it reincarnation. Something else is going on. What's going on? What Jesus is saying is that John the Baptist is a type of Elijah. He is similar to Elijah. He's an Elijah-type person.

When the Old Testament says, I will send you Elijah, they don't mean literally Elijah, at least not in this particular issue with John the Baptist, because we know John the Baptist is not Elijah. And there's a hint at this in Jesus' comment. He says, if you are willing to accept it, John himself is Elijah who was to come. He who has ears to hear, let him hear. In other words, there's a riddle here, is what Jesus is saying. And see if you can figure out the riddle.

It's the role of Elijah, not the person of Elijah. Now, I'm looking at a cross-reference here. Are you looking at the Luke passage? That's one of them. So let me, I can just read this because I have the Luke 1, this is talking about John the Baptist. 1.17, yes. It is he who will go

as a forerunner before him, meaning before Christ, in the spirit and power of Elijah, to turn the hearts of the fathers back to the children and the disobedient to the attitude of the righteous, so as to make ready a people prepared for the Lord. Yeah. So there it gives us, it fleshes out the point that I'm making. And there's a cross reference here to Mark 9, 11. I'm just going to look and see if it gives us more information.

By the way, this is why the marginal cross references are helpful, because you see what the other writers have to say about the same circumstance. And in Mark 9, 11, it simply says, oops, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, they asked him, why is it that the scribes say that Elijah must come first? And he said to them, Elijah does first come and restore all things, and yet how is it written that the Son of Man, that he will suffer many things and be treated with contempt? But I say to you that Elijah being John the Baptist, Elijah in type, and they killed John the Baptist. They killed John the Baptist. So I think it's fair to read these verses when we look at all of them in the sense that it seems that they are given that John is Elijah in a type or the role of Elijah and similar, not a reincarnated Elijah. So when we consider what we said in the last episode about reading the Bible and the clarity of the Bible, someone comes and says this, it's clear that they have some other authority.

You talked about how it belongs to another religion altogether. They have some other authority in mind. They want reincarnation to be in the Bible, so they're looking for it, and they're taking this one passage all alone apart from other passages that explain what happens at the end and has nothing to do with reincarnation. So, that doesn't mean the Bible's not clear. It just means that they're not reading it in a way that they can find out what it actually says. That's right.

They're reporting information. And I guarantee you, when Jesus said this, nobody that was listening to him thought he was referring to reincarnation. This was a completely foreign concept to them. The idea that Elijah of some sort and in some way would appear again and also will appear in the future, I think there's another passage that says that. There's a sense in which obviously that's true, but not in the reincarnation sense. Let's go on to a question from John D. Regarding Matthew 24, 36 through 44, am I correct in believing that this is not a passage referring to the rapture? And if I am correct, what is the best way to dissuade a person who fervently believes this is an example of and reference to the rapture? John what? Matthew 24, 36 through 44. Oh, okay. Matthew 24, Matthew, Mark, Luke.

You didn't give me an advance warning here. Matthew 24. Well, of course, Matthew 24 is the Olivet Discourse. It's the third major discourse that Jesus gave. He gave the Sermon on the Mount, he gave the Bread of Life discourse, he gave the Olivet Discourse here in the Passion Week, and then he gave the Upper Room Discourse. Okay? So Matthew 24 is Matthew's account of that. Luke has his, and Luke 21 and Mark has his in Mark 13. They overlap. But what is the verse in question? 36 through 44. But of that day and hour, no one knows, not even the angel of heaven, nor the Son and the Father alone.

Okay, so we have this rule, don't we, Amy? Never read a Bible verse. never read a Bible verse. So, what is it that the that in verse 36 refers to? All right. And that's actually not too difficult. And notice in the passage that the disciples asked a couple of questions. And one of the questions was, and this is in verse 3, he was sitting in the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to him privately saying, tell us what? First thing, when will these things happen? Okay, and two, what will be the sign of your coming? Three, and of the end of the age. All right, when will these things happen? Well, he starts with the sign, and by the way, that's in verse 30, and then the sign of the Son of Man will appear

in the sky, and all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky with power and great glory. And he will send forth his angels with a great trumpet. They will gather together as elect from the four winds and from one end of the sky to the other. Then he tells the parable of the fig tree. When you see certain things happening, you know these things are near right at the door. happening, you know, these things are near right at the door. And then he says, verse 36, of that day and hour, no one knows. So now he's answering the question about when will these things be, verse 3, and what will be the sign? He said, here's the sign. Everybody's going to see them. It'll be visible, powerful, and conclusive are the three adjectives I use to describe this event. Visible, powerful, and conclusive.

This is it. This is the end. And the sign will be the Son of Man appearing in the sky. Well, when will this happen? No one knows. So he answers the first by giving the sign, but he answers the second by saying no one knows. Now, I want to make an observation here I have never heard anybody else make, but I think it's a completely legitimate observation.

But let me ask a question, though, before I make this point. Do you think—this is rhetorical,, Amy, anybody listening, do you think that Jesus, now in his glory, sitting at the right hand of the Father, undiminished deity, no emptying of his divine prerogatives anymore, do you think Jesus knows when he's going to return? Now, most people, actually, when they think about that, they say, yeah, I think he probably knows now. Okay, so then the point that Jesus was making in Matthew 24 about the day wasn't that no one will ever know, including him. He's speaking in the present tense. They said, what will be the sign? He said, here's the sign. When will that happen? No one knows, not the angels, not even me, only the Father. In other

words, at this point in time, I can't tell you the answer to that question. The way this verse is almost universally quoted, no one will ever know, which is not what Jesus says. Now, I'm not promoting, you know, telling the future about what time the second coming or specifically the rapture is going to happen. I don't think there is a rapture in this passage. In fact, I don't think there's a rapture in the New Testament. What you have is you have a first coming and a second coming. And at the second coming, you have a resurrection. And the resurrection happens at the second coming. And that says in 1 Thessalonians chapter 4, those who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord will not

those who have fallen asleep, but will be caught up in the heavens with him. In 1 Corinthians 15, it says the same thing. It says, first Jesus, Jesus is the firstfruits, then those who are his at his coming, and then comes the end. There's no intimation of a secret disappearance of the church there. In both passages, it's called the resurrection, And then comes the end. There's no intimation of a secret disappearance of the church there. In both passages, it's called the resurrection, and it says the resurrection will happen when he returns. And that's just the way we see it here in Matthew 24.

The visible return of Christ, okay? And Jesus just says, I don't know that time right now. Doesn't mean nobody will ever know, or certainly he would never know. It just means he doesn't know now. It doesn't mean nobody will ever know, or certainly He would never know. It just means He doesn't know now. So, I'm not sure what the confusion is here. Jesus is answering a very specific question in Matthew that the disciples ask. He answers at that time part of the question, what is the sign? And He describes it, visible, powerful, conclusive, verse 30. And then they ask when, and he said, I don't know. I don't know. Just be ready. Just be ready.

Well, he's definitely connecting what is happening here with this back in verse 30. They will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky with power and great glory. So, Jesus is, this is the return, as you said. This is connected to that. But I'll add one more thing to this that also means that it's not describing the rapture as people understand it. It says down here, For the coming of the Son of Man will be just like the days of Noah. For as in those days before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage,

until the day that Noah entered the ark. And they did not understand until the flood came and took them all away. So will the coming of the Son of Man be. Remember, it said the flood took them all away. So will the coming of the Son of Man be. Remember, it said the flood took them all away. Then there will be two men in the field. One will be taken and one will be left. Two women will be grinding at the mill. One will be taken and one will be left.

The one taken is the one being judged. That's right. That's the parallelism. Yeah. So it can't possibly be that, you know, people understand it to mean people will disappear, they'll be taken to Jesus. No, the people being taken are the ones being judged, so it cannot be referring to any sort of rapture in that verse. Yeah, and there's a whole other series of problems with the so-called rapture, pre-trib, mid-trib, post-trib. I think we're better to get rid of the Word and

just read the text. The text calls these events the resurrection, and both of those passages that are rapture passages, I mentioned 1 Thess 4 and 1 Corinthians 15, say exactly, they both call it a resurrection, and they both tell us when it's going to happen. It's going to happen at the coming of the Lord. Jesus came once, now He's coming again. He's not going to come in a one-and-a-half time, or he's not going to come a second time for the church and a third time in the heavens, you know, with a blazing sword. It's very interesting. I was reading this the other day in 1 Thessalonians, Paul is trying to encourage the Thessalonians about the suffering they're encouraging, that they're experiencing. And he says that those who are persecuting them are going to get their comeuppance.

And here's what he says in verse 6, For after all, it is only just for God to repay with affliction those who afflict you, okay, got that, and to give relief to you who are afflicted, and watch this, and to us as well, when the Lord Jesus will be revealed from heaven with his mighty angels in flaming fire. In other words, you can't miss it, and this perfectly dovetails with the passage we read, verse 30, I think it was, in Matthew 24.

But notice how Paul says, they will give relief to you when Jesus returns. So the believers are being given relief when Jesus returns, and Paul, at least rhetorically, includes himself, and to us also. In other words, if I am alive when Jesus returns, that's when I'm going to get relief, when he appears in the heavens with, how does he put it here, he's revealed from heaven with his mighty angels in flaming fire. So, this to me, that one verse there seems to make the concept of a pre-trib rapture completely impossible, because even Paul thinks if he were alive, his rescue is going to come with the visible, powerful, conclusive return of Christ and not a secret coming. But that's just another point that people can chew on.

And I'm sure many of you out there have not considered this before, because maybe you've only heard the idea of a rapture. So I just invite you to look at the text. That is how we decide who is correct on this. You look at the text, think about what you've heard, think about it as you read through the New Testament, and look for places. Maybe you'll disagree with us. Maybe you won't. Just look and see what you find there and be willing to submit to what you find there. And that's how we determine what the text actually says. Well, thank you so much for your questions, M.B. Bennett and John D. We appreciate hearing from you.

Send us your question on X with the hashtag STRASK, or you can go to our website at str.org. We look forward to hearing from you. This is Amy Hall and Greg Kokel for Stand to Reason.