Stephen Jones — Prolegomena
b1 — Creation’s Jubilee
Hermeneutical Method: Feast Days as Interpretive Key
Jones presents Israel’s three great feast days as the indispensable key to understanding Scripture:
“The first door can be unlocked only with the key of understanding the three main feast days of Israel.” (Creation’s Jubilee, Ch. 1)
“These three feasts are prophetic in many ways. They speak of three stages of development in the Kingdom of God upon the earth. They speak of three anointings or manifestations of the Spirit that are associated with each stage of Kingdom development.” (Ch. 1)
Interpretation: Jones’ method is typological-historical — the Mosaic institutions (Passover, Pentecost, Tabernacles) form a prophetic grid for understanding redemptive history. Biblical interpretation begins with the Mosaic law as a typological system.
Law as Hermeneutical and Definitional Key
Jones defines sin through Hebrew word study and establishes the law as the standard:
“The Hebrew word for ‘sin’ is khawtaw. It is translated ‘sin’ in over 400 Bible passages. Yet the word literally means ‘to miss the mark,’ or ‘to fail to reach a goal.‘” (Ch. 13)
“In the moral sense, the target, goal, or standard is the divine Law (1 John 3:4). Any transgression of the Law is ‘sin,’ because the Law is God’s standard of righteousness.” (Ch. 13)
Interpretation: the law functions as an interpretive foundation — both for defining human reality (sin, goal, failure) and for understanding God’s acts in history.
Divine Sovereignty as Epistemological Starting Point
Jones’ foundational thesis is that the absolute sovereignty of God is the epistemological ground of biblical theology:
“Nothing took Him by surprise, for He foreknew all things. Nothing was out of control, even for a split second, for God is all-powerful.” (Ch. 13)
“God always assumes full responsibility for all of His actions.” (Ch. 13)
“We must align ourselves with His plan, rather than attempt to alter His plan to fit what we think He should have done.” (Ch. 13)
Interpretation: sovereignty is for Jones not merely a locus within dogmatics but the starting point of theological reasoning — to compromise sovereignty is to abandon biblical thinking.
Greek Philosophy versus Biblical Teaching: Epistemological Contrast
Jones contrasts the Greek philosophical framework with the biblical (Hebrew) starting point:
“The Greek philosophers believed that spirit was good and matter was evil. From this basic assumption, they decided that a good God could never create evil matter. So they postulated that an evil god, called the Demiurge, created matter.” (Ch. 12)
“In trying to separate God from any and all responsibility for evil, it was necessary to give all evil or sinful beings a totally free will. While this seemed to justify God, it did so at the expense of His sovereignty.” (Ch. 12)
“it seems to me to be a belief that was more apt to be accepted in a Greek culture, and the early Church leaders were unable to break free of their cultural mindset in this matter.” (Ch. 12)
Interpretation: Jones argues that the early church was prevented by Greek cultural thinking from fully defending the biblical doctrine of God’s sovereignty. The dualism (spirit good / matter evil) underlies the free-will theology that erodes sovereignty.
Methodological Critique of Doctrinal Formation in Church History
Jones applies a methodological principle: character and fruit as the criterion for doctrinal reliability:
“it is surprisingly easy to pick out the wolves among the sheep just by the testimony of their lives. Jesus said, ‘Ye shall know them by their fruits (Matt. 7:16),’ and it is true.” (Ch. 12)
“Jerome was one of the foremost scholars of his day, but he chose to use that scholarship like a lawyer paid to argue his client’s case, not as an honest truth seeker.” (Ch. 12)
“when confronted with the question of Arianism, instead of searching the Scriptures for truth, he simply wrote to the bishop of Rome, asking what position he should adopt.” (Ch. 12 — on Jerome)
Interpretation: Jones introduces an epistemological criterion: not scholarship or institutional position, but genuine love of truth and character determine the reliability of a theologian.
Critique of the Augustinian End-Scenario
Jones critiques the Augustinian model as epistemologically untenable — it implicitly makes God a failure:
“This was essentially the position of Augustine in his City of God, where history ends with a final separation of light and darkness, with Satan being a success (and punished for it!), while God is viewed as the sore loser — thus, the sinner, the helpless Giant who failed.” (Ch. 13)
Interpretation: for Jones the Augustinian scheme contradicts the biblical doctrine of sovereignty. The doctrine of history’s final goal (eschatology) stands or falls with the theological starting point (divine sovereignty).
Book Description (Author’s Own Summary)
“This book deals with the sovereignty of God and the Restoration of All Things, which is God’s overall purpose in history. It also gives little known Church history showing how these vital teachings were lost in the fifth century.” (Book description for Creation’s Jubilee)
Interpretation: Jones presents his work as both exegetical and historiographical — demonstrating how doctrines were lost through church politics, not through biblical argument.