Picture: The destruction of Jerusalem 70AD.Like most theological disputes, the divide between Preterism and its opposite, Futurism, is over how certain passages of Scripture should be interpreted. Futurists assert that Preterists have ignored prophecy recently fulfilled and spiritualized prophecies they interpret as describing literal, visible events, whereas Preterists believe that Futurists do not take certain passages such as Matthew 16:28 literally enough and do not give sufficient weight to scriptures that seem to show that the first century Church believed that a major eschatological event would certainly take place in their lifetime. Many "time texts" in the New Testament appear to indicate this, e.g., Matthew 10:23, Matthew 16:27-28, Matthew 24:34, Matthew 26:64, and Rev. 1:1-3. Full Preterists would assert that there are passages which also place the Second Coming and Resurrection at that time (Dan. 7:18; 12:1-7). Partial Preterists, however, assert that there are additional long-term indicators and futuristic goals of the Consummation that include the complete eradication of sin and the restoration of the Earth from its fallen state. ~ Wikipedia on Preterism
My Comment: Eschatology is the study of the eschaton or "last days." One is not required to understand these things to be justified by faith. Therefore this is a department of theology, of the study of God, but not a reason to reject the various beliefs as heresies. The reason for this is that, realistically, none of us knows absolutely the full meaning of prophecy.
There are two ways, apparently, to view the event we often call the Return of Christ. There is a school of thought called Preterism that says it already happened in that all biblical prophecy was fulfilled in the destruction of Jerusalem in 70AD. This belief basically makes the return of Jesus figurative and the rest of history a kind of progressive subjection of the world to that revelation (amillennialism or postmillennialism). That is, the destruction of the Temple by the Romans signifies the paradigm shift from the Jew to the Church as the carriers of God's revelation. History is then viewed as subservient to that event and is interpreted in that light.
The other way to view the eschaton is called Futurism. This view says that much or most of end-of-the-age prophecies ~ by Jesus, the Jewish prophets, and the apostles ~ are still pending. The expectation in this interpretation is that our Messiah is still going to return physically in the future to set up the Kingdom. That is, it is not just in the hearts of people, it is going to be universal and material. Futurists tend to approach biblical prophecy as literal, trying to interpret the ancient words at face-value, while Preterists tend to more figurative readings.
Below is a comment I made on a Preterist website after reading a detailed apologetic disecting a Futurist critique:
My Comment: Eschatology is the study of the eschaton or "last days." One is not required to understand these things to be justified by faith. Therefore this is a department of theology, of the study of God, but not a reason to reject the various beliefs as heresies. The reason for this is that, realistically, none of us knows absolutely the full meaning of prophecy.
There are two ways, apparently, to view the event we often call the Return of Christ. There is a school of thought called Preterism that says it already happened in that all biblical prophecy was fulfilled in the destruction of Jerusalem in 70AD. This belief basically makes the return of Jesus figurative and the rest of history a kind of progressive subjection of the world to that revelation (amillennialism or postmillennialism). That is, the destruction of the Temple by the Romans signifies the paradigm shift from the Jew to the Church as the carriers of God's revelation. History is then viewed as subservient to that event and is interpreted in that light.
The other way to view the eschaton is called Futurism. This view says that much or most of end-of-the-age prophecies ~ by Jesus, the Jewish prophets, and the apostles ~ are still pending. The expectation in this interpretation is that our Messiah is still going to return physically in the future to set up the Kingdom. That is, it is not just in the hearts of people, it is going to be universal and material. Futurists tend to approach biblical prophecy as literal, trying to interpret the ancient words at face-value, while Preterists tend to more figurative readings.
Below is a comment I made on a Preterist website after reading a detailed apologetic disecting a Futurist critique:
Your handling of this controversy was exhaustive. Thank you. I appreciate your thorough exegesis on a very difficult subject.While I have not been shaken from all things futurist, the preterist argument seems to have expanded my eschaton pallet.
I have a friend who is full-preterist/universalist and we have played exegetical badminton over these things for years. The dialogue has, I think, expanded both of us.
My point is that, regarding the mysteries of the eschaton, futurists often do fall into absurd and highly imaginative scenarios. It all has to do with our two guiding authorities in any of these arguments: the scriptures and our favorite interpretational grids that we use to understand them with. We tack scriptures and historical arguments onto the corkboard we call "preterism" or "futurism."
What usually happens to me, after viewing these structures, is that I conclude all of us are dealing with truth from limited perspectives. With this argument, I came to see the best answer involves both viewpoints: after all, Jesus is the same yesterday (past), today, and tomorrow (future). And the prophetic rhema seems to have that same expansive capability.
In the ecclesia of believers in Christ we have that centuries-old divisiveness based on we-they, modernist arguments. The church is always weakened by it and, of course, God is not the author of division. The only way I have found to transcend division is humility: "Hey, I don't see it your way, but so what. There is still only one faith, one Lord, and one baptism."
The rapture concept, so beloved in Evangelical circles, is a case-in-point. Who is really affected much by when and if it happens, or whether it happened figuratively long ago and far away? "Your time is always ready," Jesus said. I could die at any moment. That much is imminent, in that sense.
8 comments:
So much for inclusion. The Harlot has spoken.
Pope: Other Christian Denominations Not True Churches
Tuesday, July 10, 2007
LORENZAGO DI CADORE, Italy — For the second time in a week, Pope Benedict XVI has corrected what he says are erroneous interpretations of the Second Vatican Council, reasserting the primacy of the Roman Catholic Church and saying other Christian communities were either defective or not true churches.
Benedict approved a document released Tuesday from his old office, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, which repeated church teaching on Catholic relations with other Christians.
While there was nothing doctrinally new in the document, it nevertheless prompted swift criticism from Protestants, Lutherans and other Christian denominations spawned by the 16th century reformation.
"It makes us question the seriousness with which the Roman Catholic Church takes its dialogues with the Reformed family and other families of the church," said the World Alliance of Reformed Churches, which groups 75 million Reformed Christians in 214 churches in 107 countries.
"It makes us question whether we are indeed praying together for Christian unity," the alliance said in a letter to the Vatican's key ecumenical official, Cardinal Walter Kasper, charging that the document took ecumenical dialogue back to the pre-Vatican II era.
One of the key developments from Vatican II, the 1962-65 meetings that modernized the church, was its ecumenical outreach.
Another key change was the development of the New Mass in the vernacular, which essentially replaced the old Latin Mass. On Saturday, Benedict revived the old Latin Mass, saying it was wrong for bishops to deny it to the faithful because it had never been abolished. Traditional Catholics cheered the move, but more liberal ones called it a step back from Vatican II.
Benedict, who attended Vatican II as a young theologian, has long complained about what he considers the erroneous interpretation of the council by liberals, saying it was not a break from the past but rather a renewal of church tradition.
The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith said it was issuing the new document on ecumenism because some contemporary theological interpretations of Vatican II's ecumenical intent had been "erroneous or ambiguous" and had prompted confusion and doubt.
The new document -- formulated as five questions and answers -- restates key sections of a 2000 text the pope wrote when he was prefect of the congregation, "Dominus Iesus," which riled Protestant, Lutheran and other Christian denominations because it said they were not true churches but merely ecclesial communities and therefore did not have the "means of salvation."
"Christ 'established here on earth' only one Church," said the document released as the pope vacations at a villa in Lorenzago di Cadore, in Italy's Dolomite mountains.
The other communities "cannot be called 'churches' in the proper sense" because they do not have apostolic succession -- the ability to trace their bishops back to Christ's original apostles -- and therefore their priestly ordinations are not valid, it said.
The Rev. Sara MacVane, of the Anglican Centre in Rome, said there was nothing new in the document.
"I don't know what motivated it at this time," she said. "But it's important always to point out that there's the official position and there's the huge amount of friendship and fellowship and worshipping together that goes on at all levels, certainly between Anglican and Catholics and all the other groups and Catholics."
The document said Orthodox churches were indeed "churches" because they have apostolic succession and that they enjoyed "many elements of sanctification and of truth." But it said they lack something because they do not recognize the primacy of the pope -- a defect, or a "wound" that harmed them, it said.
"This is obviously not compatible with the doctrine of Primacy which, according to the Catholic faith, is an 'internal constitutive principle' of the very existence of a particular Church," said a commentary from the congregation which accompanied the text.
Despite the harsh tone of the documents, they stressed that Benedict remains committed to ecumenical dialogue.
"However, if such dialogue is to be truly constructive it must involve not just the mutual openness of the participants but also fidelity to the identity of the Catholic faith," the commentary said.
The top Protestant cleric in Benedict's homeland, Germany, complained that the Vatican apparently did not consider that "mutual respect for the church status" was required for any ecumenical progress.
In a statement headlined "Lost Chance," Lutheran Bishop Wolfgang Huber argued that "it would also be completely sufficient if it were to be said that the reforming churches are 'not churches in the sense required here' or that they are 'churches of another type' -- but none of these bridges is used in the 'answers."'
The document, signed by the congregation prefect, American Cardinal William Levada, was approved by Benedict on June 29, the feast of Saints Peter and Paul -- a major ecumenical feast day.
There was no indication why the pope felt it necessary to release the document, particularly since his 2000 document summed up the same principles. Some analysts suggested it could be a question of internal church politics, or that the Congregation was sending a message to certain theologians it did not want to single out. Or, it could be an indication of Benedict using his office as pope to again stress key doctrinal issues from his time at the Congregation.
In fact, the only theologian cited by name in the document for having spawned erroneous interpretations of ecumenism was Leonardo Boff, the Brazilian who was a target of the former Cardinal Ratzinger's crackdown on liberation theology in the 1980s.
Interesting. I have followed this a little, not because of my interest in ecumenism, but because I really believe God is going to bring the church to a new unity, much like that which was in the primitive church. I don't believe it can come through human effort, but by revelation. I see a compression coming among believers globally, which will literally drive us toward the holy kiss of fellowship. It will be less about extraneous religious trappings and more about the unity of the one faith. The Internet will play a big part in this transformation.
You can't mix salt water with sweet. The Roman Catholic Church is not of God. There many believers in it but they must come out and be not partakers of her sins. God is going to Judge the Whore of Babylon religion. As far as all the good works they do. If that was the currency of heaven then welcome the Buddhist, Muslims and krisnas.The real elect will be one with Him and it probably won't have a name more than disciple. I don't want to sound judging or condeming but If the Roman Church has anything they lost it a long time ago. When I see the pope get baptised in Jesus name ,I may then start to think they are one of us.
A number of things changed my mind about this. The main one was reading the history of the church. You know, the Old Testament was the story of the Jews. Church history is the story of the church. I wish I had studied it back in the early days: I would have never taken the route I did (DT that is).
Funny we can read the same story (above)and come to very different conclusions. What I see is an effort being made to be "peacemakers", something I think pleases God.
The Catholic Church is, of course, far from perfect; but she also has a great legacy. If you were European and came to Christ, there was no other option than to be Catholic. That was the church of Jesus Christ, basically, until the Reformation. And it wasn't only Protestants who reformed. The Catholics also reformed in the late 1500's. They thoroughly repented of their abuses.
While that church made many blunders (like the Crusades and the inquisitions)and harbored some corrupt popes, some of the greatest and most influential Christians of all time also stayed within her walls. It is a myth and a fantasy invented by some early Protestants that she is "the Great Whore." It is a fundamentalist error, I think, of some arrogance, to carry on that idea. It is divisive and destructive.
On the other hand, the Catholic Church today is also arrogant in believing, as the article suggests, that they are the "true church." What they point to is their great history and the "apostolic succession." So their ecumenism seems to also have an agenda, to bring all wayward Christians back to the fold. I think this is why they have been under the chastisement of recent decades. God wants arrogance out of the church, and pride, more than goofy doctrines, which all Christians propogate. Goofy doctrines will ultimately fade in the light of truth.
Christ is not divided. He is one Lord and His faith is one. What the world sees is a bickering Christianity that causes them to often miss the point. We pronounce the name of Christ and in actions deny Him, because we despise our own brethren: and that condemnation fits all sides in the conversation. We want to be right more than we want to love, which is really what is right.
The end of the divided church is within sight. This generation is already rejecting the old model: be it Catholic, Orthodox, Protestant, or Fundamentalist/Modern. The Latter Rainers understood this, but their vision was murky. They were still prone to the same error. The day of Christian sectarianism will no longer be tolerated by the Holy Spirit, in any form. It's time to grow up, for all of us, and to lay aside our bitterness and church prejudices. We/they is dead. Whenever I hear it, I cringe. The gospel is not we/they.
I'll put this in letter, since this debate is too long for this blog-space. It's a very important dialogue.
Cringe all you want my brother, The Unity you are speaking is true but it won't come from apostasy. The good you speak of was grace over-coming the evil of religious people in spite of them selves. Jesus came to divide and separate sheep from goats, a man's family will be divided. He purges his church of sin and sinners if there is no breaking but rebellion remains. The pope is the divider; I am just stating the obvious. It may be a wheel with in the wheel we shall see. I predict that the Roman Church will be like the Eastern Church of Russia and ride the beast. But I could be wrong. Lord knows I am no prophet nor the son of one. By the way I speak of institutions not people
Hello, your comment was in response to the unpublished book I wrote: Conversing with Controversy but it not so much that upon which I want to comment. You seem to have a desire for Christian unity, for "ecumenicalism" as it is often called.
This would seem to be a noble goal, but we must determine HOW to get to this point? Does the Bible give us any clue?
I believe it does. 1 Cor 11:19 says:
No doubt there have to be differences among you to show which of you have God's approval.
So, we see that when people desire unity simply for the sake of unity they are attempting to circumvent how God plans to show "approval" -- by differences...more specifically, by theological & doctrinal differences.
It is only via strong (maybe even contentious) interaction of believers with Scripture that eventually God's "approval" will be manifested/evident/recognized. Without this needed interaction, we will only have "unity in error" & not unity in Truth.
Ecumenicalism simply for the sake of being united & peaceful is NOT a good goal. Let us instead work out salvation in fear & trembling.
Thanks --
Roderick
Thank you, Roderick. As I stated, I don't have much interest in ecumenism. I tend to think of it as a human method of trying to achieve organizational unity, and I am skeptical it will accomplish much.
I'm speaking more of what I would call something happening globally in the Christian conscience, and it is not about compromising. I believe we should be fully convinced about our convictions and defend them, ect. If that is what is meant by finding "approval", and, of course, we all want the favor of the Lord.
After decades of combativeness with Christians I was convicted, I believe of the Holy Spirit, to seek to love the whole organic body, if not the institutional one.
By that I mean I went from thinking it was my way or the highway to a more generous recognition that our essential faith, what we all share, is belief in Christ as very God, as the only savior, ect. That is essential. But, by all means, build with what you have and purchase the best materials you can; which is what I believe you are doing.
But when we run into doctrinal snags, they aren't all as earth-shaking as we sometimes make them. So I am convinced the church is coming into a love she is not expecting: it will be an act of God.
We are not that much divided, most of us, about the identity and divinity of Christ. That is our common bond and matrimony. But I think God is going to deal with His squabbling family. It muddies the picture the world is getting about us and our king. The Holy Spirit is tugging us back to our roots, as in 1John. Unfeigned love of the brethren (believers in Christ) is what I try to practice, and I'm learning wonderful things doing it. I'm learning more about where I hook up with believers than where I differ. And I'm learning more about what is really important. Thanks for the URL, I'll check it out.
Post a Comment