Think Wink.

Beginning my first post in my series on preterism, it is critical to give this some historical context. The whole reason why Sproul wrote the book The Last Days According to Jesus* is to defend the Scripture and Jesus from liberal and non-Christian attacks. So I want to begin my discussion where he does as well, especially if one wants to understand the primary issues addressed by preterism.

Bertrand Russell wrote his famous book, Why I am not a Christian, in which he outlines his arguments against religion as a whole and Christianity specifically. In this book, one of his arguments is that Jesus was a false prophet in that he predicted something that did not come to pass in the time frame he for it. He points to texts like Matthew 16:28, which says, “Truly, I say to you, there are some standing here who will not taste death until they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom.” Or he points to texts like Mark 13:30, which says, “Truly, I say to you, this generation will not pass away until all these things take place.” He assumes that the time frame in these texts, and their parallels, is one forty-year generation. Russell is not alone in this critique but many who want to disprove the Bible’s trustworthiness and Jesus’ claims to deity turn to these passages and say “See, none of this has happened yet!” Instead they point to an ethical kingdom (consistent with their rejection of the supernatural and the miraculous) that was immanent and breaking in through evolutionary means, viewing the Bible through a Hegelian philosophy.

Albert Schweitzer began to combat these charges with his views of an unrealized eschatology (eschatology is not here referring to an “end times” event but rather a breaking in of the earth in a violent and catastrophic manner) in which Jesus kept hoping to move God into entering into the scene but God never obliged Jesus. The Kingdom, which is not some immanent kingdom but rather a transcendent and other worldly kingdom of God that does not arise from wholly naturalistic means (i.e. evolution), was never realized in Jesus’ lifetime. From here he to formulate what he called the parousia-delay. He notes that the church began to shift its views of Christ’s return from immanent to some far off and unexpected time; Christ’s return was to be delayed.

Schweitzer’s conclusions were rejected but his questions of the timing of the parousia of Christ and his Kingdom were now on the forefront of many scholars’ minds. C. H. Dodd formulated what is known as realized eschatology in which he says the Kingdom is a spiritual reality that was realized in the past. Herman Ridderbos popularized the “already (als) but not yet (nog niet) eschatology. The kingdom in one sense was very much here and thus called for radical action by the people to be ready for it; at the same time it is not fully here. Jesus reigns right here and right now, but it is invisible and not yet fully realized until his a future event. Osacar Cullmann popularized the D-Day analogy of the eschatology. D-Day, the Normandy Invasion, basically won the war against Nazi Germany, all they had to do was to go to Berlin (Battle of the Bugle not yet withstanding). In the same way, the Cross basically won the war, all that has to be done now is march towards the Kingdom and Christ’s return. Then there is also Dispensationalism, popularized by John Darby and the Scofield Reference Bible, in which the Kingdom is wholly future and will not be ushered in until the parousia (I will come back to Dispensationalism in a later post).

The final school of thought that I will cover is that of preterism. Preterism argues that the parousia historically occurred and that the kingdom is a present reality. Preterism sees a primary fulfillment of prophecy in destruction of the Temple by Titus and the Roman Legions and a secondary fulfillment in the yet-to-see future. This school of thought seeks to answer the question of time frame and take a high and keen interest in the fall of Jerusalem in AD. 70. There are two main divides within this school of thought on eschatology. First there is full or radical preterism which teaches that all future prophecies of the New Testament as already totally fulfilled in the past (i.e. the resurrection, rapture, and judgment). Then there is partial or moderate preterism which says most of the future prophecies are already fulfilled but there are still some yet to be (i.e. the resurrection).

I follow Dr. Sproul in the school of thought of moderate preterism; I hold that the Olivet Discourse was mostly fulfilled in the first century historically, as well as much of John’s Apocalypse. However I do still believe that many prophecies are yet to come. My next posts in this series will begin to unpack the timing of Matthew 24, Mark 13, and Luke 21. But before I get into that I will try to give a brief summary of the events that are covered by these texts. Until then, I echo the blessing of Numbers 6:24-26, “The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you; the Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace.”

*Almost all of the material, unless otherwise noted, in this series on the Olivet Discourse and Preterism will come from The Last Days According to Jesus.

Related posts:

Israel, John Hagee, and Eschatology

The Second Coming Debate

Newspaper Eschatology