Page 29 - Watchman- What of the Night

Chapter VII: The Parousia, the Epiphaneia, the

Apokalupsis, the Day, the End

The note on the word ―coming‖ as it appears in 1 Cor. 1:7, in the Scofield
Reference Bible, page 1212, speaks of the three Greek words that are used in

connection with the return of the Lord―parousia, apokalupsis, and epiphaneia. The
meanings and connotations of these words given by Dr. Scofield, are found to be
correct. Will every reader read carefully this note, in an available copy of the Scofield
Reference Bible.
We feel that in his comments on these words, Dr. Scofield has inadvertently given

away the case for the theory of a pre-tribulation rapture, of which he is an advocate.
The theory to support a theory, as enunciated by Dr. Scofield‘s predecessors of the
Darby school, is that the word parousia in the epistles relates strictly to the rapture,

which allegedly occurs from three and one-half to seven to a thousand years before
His appearing in glory. These writers ask to be excused from an application of their
theory in connection with parousia in the gospels, because the gospels are Jewish and
not Christian (except when they want them to be) and parousia there applies to the
Jewish remnant. The ―Jewish remnant‖ has been aptly called by the late Dr. Rowland

V. Bingham the ―clutter closet‖ into which all the embarrassing difficulties of the
pre-tribulation rapture theory are cast.
We do not for a moment concede the abomination of Judaizing the gospels, and

insist that parousia in the gospels and parousia in the epistles is logically identical,
and is the regal word that speaks of Christ‘s personal presence in the world as King.
However, on the basis of their own claim, it can easily be shown from the epistles that
any distinction in the use of the words is impossible to sustain, but that they all point
to ―the last day,‖ when transition from Satanic dominion of this earth to Christ‘s

dominion will occur.
In order to accommodate the false idea of a split-stage second advent (which really
makes three advents), it demands a splitting of the various words used to express the

second coming, a splitting of the first resurrection, a splitting of the ―day of Christ‖
from the ―day of the Lord‖ and others. It becomes necessary for the faithful steward
of the divine mysteries, to reassemble the split fragments into the relatively simple
pattern that the scriptures draw. The parousia, the apokalupsis, the epiphaneia, the
day and the end are one. The first resurrection is one event: the ―day of the Christ‖

and ―the day of the Lord‖ are one day. This is simple, the other is complicated.
In the note referred to in the foregoing, Dr. Scofield says the parousia is the word

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