The Preterist View of Revelation
The most serious problem for the historicist position is that none of the historical identifications could be proven, most would be considered obscure and anachronistic in the light of the 21st century. By the early nineteenth century, historicism was running out of new ideas. There were two reactions to the historicist position among some Protestant writers – preterism and futurism.
Because both of these reactionary movements had precursors in Catholic theology, many Protestants who began to view Revelation as either entirely past or entirely future were viewed as giving aid and comfort to the “Papists” and were accused of not holding firmly to reformation truth. Both preterism and futurism are found in Catholicism, although the motivation for both futurism and preterism seems to have been to avoid the identification of the Pope as the Antichrist. For example, in James Durham’s A Commentarie Upon the Book of the Revelation (1658) 496, he states his belief that a futurist interpretation of Revelation is a “…conceit or dream of the Papists expounding all so literally of an Antichrist who shall come from the tribe of Dan, and that shall reign just three and a half years, sitting in Jerusalem … This dream [was] invented by them to keep their Pope from being apprehended as the true Antichrist.”
Preterism argues the Book of Revelation was written to describe the events of the first century and there was little if anything that referred to the history of the church beyond that period. One of the earliest representatives of this view among Protestants was Moses Stuart. Moses Stuart, Commentary on the Apocalypse, 2 Volumes (Andover: Allen, Morrill and Ward, 1845). Stuart blames Joseph Mede for universal application of the year-to-day theory in prophetic studies and popularizing the 1260 year reign of papal-antichrist. Stuart is willing to accept the year-to-day interpretation in Ezekiel 4 and even Daniel 9, but argues that these two passages do not require every day mentioned in prophecy to be a year. For example, he notes that if the year-to-day principle were applied to Daniel 4:32, then Nebuchadnezzar ate grass for 2520 years!
Preterists argue that Revelation is a highly figurative book which cannot be approached with a straightforward, simple, literalism. For preterists, literalism will only confuse the meaning of the book. The meaning of the book is to be found in its rather bold use of symbolism to describe the fall of Jerusalem, not modern-era warfare, etc. For example, Literalism is impossible with bizarre figures of speech such as the three frogs in chapter 16. Ken Gentry surveys a few literalist commentaries and notes these “frogs” are normally interpreted as demons, but with frog-like features. Do the two witnesses in chapter 11 really “spew fire” from their mouths? Is that what John meant for us to understand?
Secondly, Revelation claims to be describing what will happen soon (1:1-3). Soon cannot mean some 2000 years in John’s future. The Greek word in 1:1 tachos means “a very brief period of time, with focus on speed of an activity or event, speed, quickness, swiftness, haste” A preterist like Gentry cannot understand why a literalist (like Robert Thomas) chooses to take the plain meaning of the text “soon” and “allegorize” it into a meaning of 2000 years in the future.
Preterists like Gentry and Chilton apply everything in Revelation to the fall of Jerusalem. This is not, however, the only way of handling the book as a preterist. Their view requires a date for Revelation before A. D. 70, a difficult position to defend.
A number of commentaries on Revelation interpret the books as describing the situation of the church in the first century under Roman rule. The conflict in the book is not God’s judgment on the Jews for crucifying Christ, but rather then persecution of Christians by the Roman empire for refusing to worship the Emperor / Empire (see the commentaries by R. H. Charles, Sweet, Roloff, for example).
A growing number of scholars deny Rome was persecuting Christians during Domitian’s reign, therefore the crisis in Revelation is an “internal spiritual crisis.” (See commentaries by Yarbo Collins, L. Thompson, Krodel, Barr, for example). The church is struggling with mixing Christianity with the worship of local gods in order to mix in Roman society; the problem of the book is compromise with false teachers such as the Nicolatians.
I do agree. I do not think that we should take the year-to-date theory as serious as they say. I do not think that it really can apply. How do you know when to apply it, and when to not apply it? How can you just pick and choose. It is almost saying that you are going to pick and choose what part of the Bible is true and what part is not. How can you say that some of the Bible is true and some is false? To me, if I know that some of it was false, then I would not have faith in any of it.
Knowing what to take literal and figurative is very hard in the Bible. There are a lot of figurative language, but how do you know what it is? I think a lot of it that we do not know if it is figurative or literal, we just need to say that we do not understand and one day God will reveal it and then we will know. I do not think that we should argue about this. I heard the other day that Christians take so much time to fight about stuff like this and spend so much money on this, that we are missing the big picture. We should be spending all of that time money on trying to bring others to Christ. That is so much more important and arguing if the devil has 1 head or 20.
John could have been talking about soon in the term of Jesus’ soon. Jesus’ soon could take a billion years and that would still be soon for Jesus. His time is eternal. He knows His perfect time and when He wants it to happen, He will bring it to pass.
Preterists argue that Revelation is a highly figurative book which cannot be approached with a straightforward, simple, literalism. For preterists, literalism will only confuse the meaning of the book. The meaning of the book is to be found in its rather bold use of symbolism to describe the fall of Jerusalem, not modern-era warfare, etc. For example, Literalism is impossible with bizarre figures of speech such as the three frogs in chapter 16. Ken Gentry surveys a few literalist commentaries and notes these “frogs” are normally interpreted as demons, but with frog-like features. Do the two witnesses in chapter 11 really “spew fire” from their mouths? Is that what John meant for us to understand? – Plong.
It seems as if they have a very rigid view of literalism. That’s exactly what the whole class was for last Monday – to argue/make the case for a “literal interpretation of the book.” It seems that what we were talking about is extremely elementary, but it is when it’s put into practice is when the “literal” interpretation starts to become a bit unclear. A lot of nuances in any writers writings is subject to interpretation, and it will always be a “guess” to try and figure out if the writer was using a metaphor, or if in some weird way he actually meant what he said, and did NOT have a deeper meaning.
A couple new things to mention here. First, I had completely forgotten about Daniel and his ‘weeks’ which have almost universally been interpreted as groups of seven years, and not seven days. This statement effectively nullifies my point in my post on ‘Part 1,’ because we are again to the point of trying to determine what causes different interpretations to be used in which way, specifically the type of biblical literature that is being interpreted.
Secondly, I would agree that literal interpretation is in fact the way we are to interpret Revelation, and possibly everything will be completely literal. However, it is important to recognize the point that P. Long has made in that much, if not all of biblical prophecy was fulfilled literally, but not in the way that people expected it, i.e. the crushing of the serpent’s head in Gen. To follow up on this point, it is basic to think that John probably did not have the modern words to describe what it was he was seeing. If he was seeing into the future, he could have been seeing things that we see everyday, and describing them using the only words he had for them. For example, many people have heard the analogy that the ‘locusts’ with the heads of the lion and tails of a scorpion could be helicopters. Because they are not actually locusts does not mean that this is not fulfilled literally if John was using words that he had to describe something that he couldn’t even have begun to imagine. It is still a literal fulfillment, but not at all in the way we are thinking.
Overall, I think I come down on the side with Jessica in saying that Revelation is way to complex for us to say we have it all figured out. If anyone says that, beware of anything else they have to say about, well, anything. However, also beware of people that say things like, ‘there is no way that could mean that literally’ because there is a way, and His name is God. God can do anything, including causing fire to come out of the witnesses mouths and consume those who oppose them.
Both preterism and futurism are found in Catholicism, although the motivation for both futurism and preterism seems to have been to avoid the identification of the Pope as the Antichrist (P. Long). This is interesting to think that the most common view of the book of Revelation was that of Historicism. This is the view that I would attribute the least of the book to. That is considering the fact that I do not choose to settle on just one view. It is almost ironic to think that these views were in a sense creative as a defense of the Catholic leadership. It seems that throughout the history of Christianity, the most important truths come from some type of controversy. There is always a new movement created when the old way of things is seriously challenged.