The word "preterism" comes from the Latin word for "past." It is the opposite of "futurism."

The difference between a "Full Preterist" and a "Partial Preterist" is that

• The Full Preterist believes that all verses related to eschatology refer to events during the generation that witnessed the incarnation of Christ, AD30 - AD70.
• The Partial Preterist believes that some or even most of those relevant Bible verses may have been intended by their author to point to an event in the past, but not all. There is at least one verse of Scripture which speaks of an event or events in our future.

If you are a "partial preterist," my question for you is this:

Which verse of Scripture
cannot rationally be interpreted
as having been intended by its author
to point the original audience to an event in their generation?

If there is a verse that cannot refer to the past, it must refer to the [our] future. This verse would disprove Full Preterism.

There are more than 100 verses in the New Testament concerning "eschatology."

A "partial preterist" believes that many or most of these verses -- but not all -- have already been fulfilled in the past.

A full preterist believes that all of those verses were fulfilled in the past.

If you're a Partial Preterist, which verse is the Full Preterist misinterpreting?

I would say that the percentage of verses which have a past fulfillment is so predominant, and the energy in those verses is so strong, that the "default" assumption should be "preterist." We should assume preterism unless there is clear and convincing evidence of futurism -- evidence from the text of Scripture itself.

Maybe your verse is not on that list. That's fine. Please tell me which verse that is, and why no rational person could claim that verse was intended by its author to describe something in the years AD30 - AD70, or why no rational person could deny that the verse was intended by its author to point to our future.

I asked this question on Doug Wilson's blog. Didn't get an answer.

There is, however, another variety of "partial preterist." More accurately, there is another position which is not exactly "full preterist" -- in the sense that this third position still upholds a belief in a yet-future eschatological event, even though this position grants the claim of the "full preterist" that there are no verses of Scripture which teach that yet-future event.

In the last conversation I had with David Chilton on the phone, he said he had concluded (exegetically) that there are no verses in the New Testament which were intended by their author to predict events which were thousands of years in the future of the original audience. In his words, there are no verses which predict a future (for us) Second Coming.

But at that point David Chilton was not a "full preterist." Or at least he was not condemned as a "full preterist." That's because he went on to say that although no verses teach the doctrine of a "Second Coming,"

I believe the doctrine anyway because Holy Mother the Church has taught that doctrine for two thousand years.

I remember his words well. "Holy Mother the Church."

If you are a "partial preterist," or if you are not a "full preterist," is it because the Bible teaches a future Second Coming, or is it because the Church and her creeds teach that doctrine?

Is it God's Truth or merely man's claim that someone who believes all the eschatological verses in the Bible were fulfilled by AD70 is not a genuine believer in Christ?

I've heard that claim.

I've heard it said that if someone embraces "full preterism," that person has "denied the orthodox faith" and is no longer a Christian.

Not a Christian.

Damned to hell for eternity.

Even if that person affirms the deity of Christ and His substitutionary atonement.

He's not a Christian.

Even if he's a six-day creationist and a five-point Calvinist.

Not a true Christian.

Even if that person affirms and defends the first 30 chapters of the Westminster Confession of Faith.

Dammed to hell.

Even if his behavior is characterized by moral purity and the spirit of Christ.

He denies one of the teachings of "the Church," and has therefore denied the "orthodox faith," and is therefore not a genuine believer.

He's not a real Christian because he's a "full preterist."

I'm not making this up.

I strenuously disagree with the claim.

Matthew 24:30 says,

"And then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven; and then shall all the tribes of the land lament, and they shall see the Son of man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory."

A "preterist" interpretation of this verse says it predicts events surrounding the destruction of Jerusalem in AD 70.
A "futurist" interpretation says this verse concerns events to take place thousands of years after Matthew recorded these words.

Leading Christian Reconstructionists take a "preterist" interpretation of Matthew 24. In fact, this way of viewing the verse is now considered "Eschatology 101." Failure to interpret this verse in a preterist manner is a gateway drug to becoming a dispensational premillennialist.

I exaggerate slightly, but I'm being serious.

A few Reconstructionists, like Ken Gentry, have said that the second part of Matthew 24 is about a future second coming, but the first part (including verse 30) is talking about the fall of Jerusalem, and hence is to be understood preteristically. Everyone in the Reconstructionist camp agrees that verse 30 is a preterist verse.

But . . .

The Westminster Confession of Faith takes a "futurist" interpretation of this verse.

This is an exegetical error, according to nearly every Christian Reconstructionist.

In fact, all of the credal statements about the "Second Coming" (in our future) are based on this exegetical error.

The formulations of eschatology in the creeds are hermeneutically premillennial.

Against a Premillennial Hermeneutic

Premillennialism is a fundamental error.

It is based on statism. defeatism, and escapism.

• Statism: worship of the State in the place of God.
  • Socialism rather than a Freed Market (anarcho-capitalism)
  • The desire for a visible, earthly king is a rejection of God as King
    • 1 Samuel 8
    • Isaiah 33:22
  • The State brings the eschaton
  • Premillennialism's Faith in A Police State, by Gary North
• Defeatism
  • Efforts to bring in the millennium are doomed.
  • Jesus will hand the millennium to us on a silver platter. Hence
• Escapism
  • We do not have to exercise dominion and work to build the New Jerusalem, the City of God.
  • Entertainment and feelings are more important than work and law.

The premillennial (futurist) hermeneutic is profoundly significant and influential.

It poisons one's entire Biblical Worldview.

Watch here for a link defending those claims.

Consistently Purging Premillennialism

Nobody in his right mind would say that Gary DeMar or Gary North are not Christians because they take a preterist interpretation of Matthew 24:30, even though they disagree with "the creeds" by doing so.

But there are many futurists who say that "Full Preterists" have denied the Christian faith and are not real Christians.

This is because "the faith" is defined for futurists by ecclesiastical promulgations, and not the Bible.

They believe that the Holy Spirit has guided "the institutional church," and even if the Bible doesn't teach a future (for us) Second Coming, Holy Mother the Church does.

Let's just say for now there are 13 verses related to "the Second Coming." "Full Preterists" believe they all came to pass in the years leading up to AD70. "Partial Preterists" believe at least one is referring to an event that is still in our future.

But here's the interesting thing: partial preterists disagree among themselves as to which verse is which: is this verse AD70 or yet-future?

Let's consider a dozen or so great Christian commentators, whom all would regard as genuine Christians.

Let's map out their interpretations of the various passages that are up for grabs in this debate.
  

  
Though these commentators may differ (contradict) on their interpretations of the relevant texts, we would still grant that they are "rational," even though contradiction violates the laws of rational thought.

In addition to being "rational," we would agree that they are "faithful." Nobody would say that John Calvin was not a real Christian because he took a "preterist" interpretation of some of those passages. Nobody would say that R.J. Rushdoony was not a Christian because he took a "preterist" interpretation of some of those verses.

(A scholar may take a preterist position on all the verses, but may also take the position that at least one prophecy will have a "double fulfillment." That is, the original author intended to convey an imminent first-century event, but the prophecy will nevertheless have a second fulfillment thousands of years in his future, some time in our future, which the original author may not have even contemplated when he wrote the words to a generation he believed would see the fulfillment of his prophecy. Such a past-and-present interpretation is listed in the chart above as "both." As long as you believe at least one verse teaches a future (for us) second coming, you're OK with the anti-full-preterist crowd, even if you believe that all of the verses were originally preterist [prophesying events in the immediate future {"this generation"}] in the mind of the New Testament author.

Ultimately, such a person is relying on church authority rather than being strictly limited to the text. If you say that Paul (for example) intended his original audience to interpret his words as referring to an event in their generation, but that his words will have a "double fulfillment" -- even if there is no textual evidence that Paul intended his original audience to make that inference, and no other Scripture speaks of Paul's words with reference to events thousands of years after Paul wrote his words, you are relying on church authority to impose that meaning on Paul's words.)

But when it comes to exegeting the Bible, if you just happen to agree with Godly Christian scholars on just the right combination of verses (in the chart above, the interpretations indicated by bold brown typeface), there are some who will boldly say that you are not a Christian at all and are going to hell.

If you agree with Calvin's interpretation of verse #1, DeMar on verse #2, Rushdoony on verse #3, etc., you are a "Full Preterist" and you are not a real Christian.

Because you disagree with the teaching of "the church."

I think this is insane. 

The phrase "Holy Mother the Church" refers to interpreters of Scripture which I would place at the very bottom of an expanded version of the chart above. This would include the names of Popes and Bishops you've probably never heard of. Many of them were "premillennial," which I would regard as a Jewish heresy. But they are called "the Church Fathers."

The "church fathers" were infected with Jewish premillennialism and Greco-Roman statism. Premillennialists (and most amillennialists and post-millennialists are infected with the basic error of premillennialism) deny that building the City of God, the New Jerusalem, is the responsibility of the Body of Christ in this age -- not something that Christ will hand to the saints on a silver platter in the future. And this work of building is accomplished by living and preaching the Gospel, not by the sword. The "good news" is that the entire planet will increasingly "obey the Gospel" and be blessed (Galatians 3:8).

Cornelius Van Til dissected "the Church Fathers," and found them deeply compromised philosophically and Biblically. These men, despite great faith and accomplishments in some areas, should be called "the Church Babies" because they lived in the infancy of Christendom. That's the conclusion of James B. Jordan, who writes:

The true Fathers of the Church are Noah, Abraham, Joseph, Moses, Jeremiah, Jesus, Paul, Peter, and John, and the other Fathers in the Bible. These men, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, created the apostolic deposit from which the Church always grows.

The men who came after them, in the first and second and third centuries, are not Church Fathers but Church Babies. This is how we should regard Ignatius, Irenaeus, Basil, the Gregories, and yes, even Augustine. [I]n terms of the corporate biography of the Church, they lived in the infant stage and their great accomplishments were only the beginning of that corporate biography. We appreciate what the Holy Spirit did with them, and the theological accomplishments they made, but to say that they understood everything and laid everything out definitively would be grotesque, ludicrous, and idiotic.

We actually have a better understanding of the Christian faith today than "the Church Fathers" did. Jordan continues:

We may think that because these men lived right after the apostles, they must have known a lot. Remarkably, this is not the case. Anyone who reads the Bible, climaxing in the New Testament, and then turns to the "apostolic fathers" of the second century, is amazed at how little these men seem to have known. The Epistle of Barnabas, for instance, comments on the laws in Leviticus, but completely misinterprets them, following not Paul but the Jewish Letter of Aristeas. It is clear that there is some significant break in continuity between the apostles and these men. What accounts for this? I can only suggest that the harvest of the first-fruit saints in the years before AD 70, which seems to be spoken of in Revelation 14, created this historical discontinuity.

But didn't some of the earliest church fathers study at the feet of the Apostles?

Maybe. But at what point in time? And what did they learn from the Apostles as the Apostles spoke outside of Scripture (which, unlike everything else the Apostles said, was "breathed out" by God [2 Timothy 3:16])? Even the Apostles, like Peter, were, at one time, in grave error:

But Jesus turned and said to Peter, “Get behind Me, Satan! You are an offense to Me, for you are not mindful of the things of God, but the things of men.”
Matthew 16:23

Even after Christ's resurrection, the Apostle Paul said of Peter:

¹¹ Now when Peter had come to Antioch, I withstood him to his face, because he was to be blamed;
¹³ And the rest of the Jews also played the hypocrite with him, so that even Barnabas was carried away with their hypocrisy.
¹⁴ they were not straightforward about the truth of the gospel
Galatians 2

Wow, that's a heavy charge against "the first Pope." Not an auspicious beginning for "church authority."

The "church fathers" are, at many points, an offense to King Jesus.

Opponents of Full Preterism put their loyalty and allegiance to the "church" fathers ahead of the Bible fathers, whose canonical writings were breathed out by God. I would say that condemning a preterist who believes in the deity and substitutionary atonement of Christ, but denies that the New Testament predicts any eschatological events thousands of years in the future, is the height of authoritarian arrogance.

And it is "authoritarian," because it seeks to subsume the authority of the Scriptures under the authority of "Holy Mother the Church." Such authoritarians likely have created an institution of their own ("the local church") which they seek to buttress. They are saying a person is not a genuine Christian because he puts the Bible ahead of Popes and Bishops and "the local church."

Excommunicating full preterists is the eschatological authoritarianism of the Westboro Baptist Church.

Is it the authoritarianism of your church?