Different Views of Eschatology

“If you would be a real seeker after truth, it is necessary that at least once in your life you doubt, as far as possible, all things.”

—Rene Descartes

There are primarily four different views of eschatology:

Futurism. The futurist believes that most eschatological events of the Bible still lie in our future.

Historicism. The historicist view seeks parallels between Bible prophecy and major events or people in history, especially those in church history. Various characters or events prophesied in the Bible are seen as parallels to historical people or events. For example, some of the protestant Reformers saw the papacy or the Pope as the Antichrist. As crazy as this idea seems to most of us today, this was a popular view among even very learned scholars such as Calvin, Luther, and Wesley. This view is still around in some circles today.

Idealism. The idealist views prophecies as timeless promises of hope, equally applicable to all generations. The idealist tends to see themes and concepts in biblical prophecy, rather than actual people and events. Thus, prophecies do not have specific one-time fulfillments in history, but rather multiple fulfillments throughout the ages as God delivers his people and judges his enemies. This view sees in Revelation an allegorical struggle between good and evil. For example, the beasts in Revelation may represent various modern social injustices, which may be defined in liberal political terms such as exploitation of workers, the wealthy elite, materialism, etc. Idealism, at least in its purest form, is different from all the other views in that it does not see any of the biblical prophecies (with the possible exceptions of the Second Coming and final judgment) as being literally fulfilled either in the past or in the future.

Historicism and Idealism have both fallen out of favor. One reason for this is that one can read anything into the Bible by means of these schools of thought. Certainly, the writers of the Bible (or the speakers whose thoughts were recorded by the writers) did not intend for their words to be understood in such a manner. They had specific events in mind when they wrote and spoke.

Historicist and idealist interpretations often violate a cardinal principle of biblical interpretation—the importance of audience relevance. These eschatological concepts would have had little or no meaning to the original readers. For these reasons, we find relatively few people who claim to hold to them now, even though they have been popular at various times in church history.

However, we do see many futurists, especially dispensationalists (see below), incorporating some similarly fanciful interpretive methods. They see the end of the world lurking behind every world event. But they have proven themselves to be wrong repeatedly. Yet dispensationalism is quite popular in American evangelical circles.

Preterism. Preterism is essentially a time perspective, the opposite of futurism. The preterist view is that most, if not all, prophetic events have already been fulfilled. The preterist believes that the Bible offers numerous time-reference statements that definitively tie fulfillment of prophesied events to the first century, in particular to the events surrounding the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple in AD 70. This is the view that we will argue as having the strongest biblical foundation.

The four eschatological views listed above have variously waxed and waned in popularity over the centuries. Today, the majority view is futurism. However, there is great disagreement even among futurists on the details. There are three primary camps within futurism:

• Premillennialism
• Postmillennialism
• Amillennialism

The “millennialism” aspect of futurism comes from Revelation, chapter 20, where we see mentioned a thousand-year period. Here are the first few verses of the chapter:

“Then I saw an angel coming down from heaven, having the key to the bottomless pit and a great chain in his hand. He laid hold of the dragon, that serpent of old, who is the Devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years; and he cast him into the bottomless pit, and shut him up, and set a seal on him, so that he should deceive the nations no more till the thousand years were finished. But after these things he must be released for a little while. And I saw thrones, and they sat on them, and judgment was committed to them. Then I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded for their witness to Jesus and for the word of God, who had not worshiped the beast or his image, and had not received his mark on their foreheads or on their hands. And they lived and reigned with Christ for a thousand years. But the rest of the dead did not live again until the thousand years were finished. This is the first resurrection. Blessed and holy is he who has part in the first resurrection. Over such the second death has no power, but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with Him a thousand years. Now when the thousand years have expired, Satan will be released from his prison and will go out to deceive the nations which are in the four corners of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them together to battle, whose number is as the sand of the sea.” (Revelation 20:1-8)

As you will note, the word millennium is not mentioned here, nor is it used anywhere in the Bible. It is a term used to refer to the thousand-year period mentioned in Revelation 20. We will cover aspects of this spectacular passage in detail in future chapters, but here are the basic systems of thought regarding the millennium:

Premillennialism. This is the view that takes Revelation 20 literally. Thus, premillennialists believe that the millennium is a literal thousand-year period. They believe that a Great Tribulation will occur just prior to the start of the millennium. The tribulation is a period of vast upheaval which is mentioned in the Olivet Discourse and discussed similarly in Revelation. Such upheaval would include worldwide hardships, disasters, famine, and war. But Christ will literally and physically return to rule the earth in a worldwide kingdom of peace and righteousness, that is, in a utopian theocratic political kingdom on earth. Like other futurists, they call on such passages as Isaiah 2:1-5 (an expected time of peace in the latter days), Isaiah 11:1-10 (a time when “the wolf shall dwell with the lamb”), Isaiah 65:17-25 (“new heavens and new earth”), and Revelation 21:1-27 (new heaven/new earth/new Jerusalem) to support this position. They note that a Second Coming passage (Revelation 19) comes before the millennium passage (Revelation 20). They also put a lot of weight on 1 1 Thessalonians 4:16-17 (the rapture, which takes Christians off the planet temporarily to avoid part or all of the Tribulation).

An important twist to premillennialism is dispensationalism—or dispensational premillennialism. Dispensationalists hold that Israel and the church are distinct entities having different covenants. So, Jews and Christians have distinct avenues to heaven. Dispensationalists put great weight in the idea that Israel will be restored and that the temple will be rebuilt. They think that when the modern state of Israel came into being in 1948 this was the beginning of these things.

Premillennialists who are not also dispensationalists call themselves “historic pre-millennialists.” They do so to call attention to the fact that some Christians all the way back to the early church fathers held to variations of their ideas. They thus distinguish between their view and dispensationalism, which is a relatively recent addition to premillennial theories.

Amillennialism. The amillennialist considers the millennium to be figurative. Amillennialists note that the Bible often uses numbers in figurative ways. The number 1,000 is a figurative number for completeness. They hold that the millennium began with Christ’s first coming (or at Pentecost which marked the beginning of the church) and that we are in it now. The millennium is not viewed as a future political order, but as the spiritual kingdom of Christ’s rule in the church. So, the millennium is the church age, also sometimes equated to the kingdom of God.

There is not much in particular to look forward to this side of heaven in the view of amillennialists, as they tend to view mankind’s sinfulness and rebellion against God as impossible to overcome to a great degree. However, the end of time holds the promise of restoration and heaven for believers. The Second Coming and final judgment also come at the end of the millennium, that is, at the end of time. They call on such passages Matthew 12:28 (Jesus driving out demons as evidence of the arrival of the kingdom), and Luke 17:20-21 and John 18:36 (the kingdom is spiritual).

Postmillennialism. This view is something of a hybrid of premillennialism and amillennialism. Postmillennialists, like amillennialists, see Christ’s Second Coming occurring at the end of the millennium, coincident with the end of the world. Some postmillennialists hold to a literal 1,000-year millennium, and understand that the beginning of the millennium is still in our future. Others see the millennium figuratively as a long period of time, and like amillennialists, understand that we are in the millennium now. Postmillennialists hold to a rather optimistic view of the future, believing that the world will tend to get better and better as more and more people come to Christ. In other words, the millennial age, while never reaching absolute perfection, will become beautifully Christianized.

So, like premillennialists they believe that a time will come on earth when peace and righteousness reign, but unlike premillennialists they believe this period will come before Christ returns, as a result of the worldwide preaching of the gospel. They call on several verses that seem to suggest that life on the planet will tend to get better because of the influence of Jesus. These include Psalms 72:8; 110:1; Isaiah 11:6-9, Matthew 13:31-33, and 1 Corinthians 15:24-26, as well as Isaiah 65 and Revelation 21 in support of the idea of a literal worldwide golden age of peace and righteousness on earth. They also call on such passages as Luke 1:33 and Isaiah 9:6-7 (Christ’s reign is forever).

There is not always a clear line of distinction among the various views. For example, a premillennialist can theoretically also be either an historicist or a futurist. A postmillennialist or an amillennialist may hold to certain aspects of preterism. The term millennialism is usually synonymous with premillennialism. But it could also refer to the version of postmillennialism which holds to a literal millennium.

Preterism. This is the view that we will present for your consideration. The term preterism comes from the Latin word praeter, which means past. Preterists hold that most if not all prophetic events have already been fulfilled with the events of the first century. While this is a minority view within Christianity, we believe that this is the only view that seriously considers the time-reference limitations given in Scripture for eschatological fulfillment. We will demonstrate why preterism is the view that best ties together all of the passages in the Bible about prophecy and is thus the most consistent.

Preterists teach that this view not only honors the Bible’s time frame references but also the manner in which the Bible teaches prophecy being fulfilled. It is the only view that adequately considers the meaning of biblical apocalyptic language. We will carefully examine why we believe that an unbiased view of Scripture demands this conclusion. We will also discuss the objections to preterism, and let you be the judge as we attempt to make our case.

There are two distinct groups of preterists: partial preterists and full preterists. Full preterism goes by different names, including “realized eschatology,” “covenant eschatology,” “biblical preterism,” “consistent preterism,” or “fulfilled prophecy.” As we get into the details, the reader will see why the term covenant eschatology is perhaps the best theological description, but full preterism is the most commonly used term. Fulfilled prophecy is probably the most descriptive term. We will demonstrate how eschatological passages do not refer to the end of time or the physical universe, but to the end of the Old Covenant Age. Eschatology is not about the end of the “world,” but rather its rebirth, instituted by Jesus in the New Covenant order.

Full preterists believe that what most people think of as a future literal-physical coming of Christ to earth a second time has been misunderstood. We are of the studied opinion that the “Second Coming” of Christ was not to be a physical body appearance on earth, but rather a coming in judgment against the unbelieving Jews who perverted God’s commandments and rejected Jesus and his church. Jesus discussed this over and over in his teaching, as we shall see. And as we will explore, a lot more happened at Christ’s Second Coming than merely the judgment upon Israel.

His Second Coming in judgment and consummate completion of eschatological promises were fulfilled in AD 70. The apostles thought Jesus would return in their generation, and they were right. While this may seem foreign to you, we believe that numerous passages in both the Old Testament and New Testament prove the preterist view to be worthy of your consideration—so bear with us as we work through these passages.

To understand eschatology, it is important to understand the pattern repeated throughout the Bible in regard to God’s “coming.” The Old Testament teaches that God the Father came down to earth on multiple occasions. Though no one ever actually saw God, they definitely saw what He did. These “comings” were usually in judgment against the wayward Jews or their enemies. In the same way, Jesus came to judge the Jews in AD 70. We will demonstrate that Jesus discusses his future coming in precisely the same language that the Bible uses for God’s comings in judgment in the Old Testament.

Full preterists disagree among themselves, however, on certain points. One of these is the millennium. While all full preterists believe that the millennium is figurative, some preterists believe (like amillennialists and some postmillennialists) that we are now in the millennium—that is, the church age. However, others believe that the millennium was symbolically the interim period between Christ’s ascension and his coming in judgment in AD 70.

Unlike full preterists, partial preterists hold that in addition to the “metaphorical coming” of Christ in judgment in AD 70, there will be a literal-physical “consummate coming” of Christ at the end of time. Full preterists believe that the New Testament speaks only of one Second Coming, and that while some texts concerning the Second Coming have no clear time-reference associated with them, they must be interpreted in light of the texts that do have a time-reference constraint to the first century. Partial preterists argue on the basis of inference that because God came in judgment on multiple occasions in the Old Testament, it would be consistent for Jesus to have two “second” comings—one in AD 70 and one at the end of time. We will consider these things in more detail.

Preterists call on the dozens of passages in the New Testament about the imminence of the prophesied events. These passages include Matthew 10:23; 16:27-28; 24:34; Hebrews 10:37; 1 Peter 1:4, and Revelation 1:1-3; 22:6-20.

(This is Chapter 3 of Christian Hope through Fulfilled Prophecy, pages 41-48.)