The Prophetic Faith of Our Fathers, vol. 2

APPENDIX B - Inconsistencies and Inadequacies of Preterist System

As with Futurism, the far-reaching effects of Preterism upon the fortunes of Protestantism similarly call for a summarization of its basic weaknesses. PFF2 803.2

1. AN EXPEDIENT DESIGNED TO SHIELD ROME

Preterist interpretation,like its Futurist companion, was conceived and brought forth to deflectapplication of the prophetic symbols concerning Antichrist away from papalRome. This was attempted by arbitrarily ending the prophetic outline before the Papacy developed into the powerful system that became dominantduring the Middle Ages. This is of itself questionable. No exposition deliberately designed to remove a stigma and to divert an uncomfortableapplication is without suspicion. Sound exegesis is a search for truth, not adeliberate attempt to counter an embarrassing exposition. The motive iswrong, and unavoidably raises question as to its sincerity and soundness. PFF2 803.3

2. PRETERISM AND FUTURISM CANNOT BOTH BE RIGHT

Preterism andFuturism present conflicting concepts that are mutually destructive. Obviously, both cannot be right. If Antichrist be Nero, he cannot at the sametime be a malign superman yet to come; if he be a pagan Roman emperorof the past, he cannot be a sinister Jew to appear at the end of the age. Onecontention neutralizes the other, and the one disproves and nullifies theother. The Jesuit apologists for Romanism went too far in projecting two antagonistic solutions, and brought all exposition with which they had to do under grave suspicion. PFF2 803.4

3. VIOLATES PRINCIPLE OF CONSISTENT SYMBOLISM

Preterism, like Futurism (already noted), violates the principle of consistent symbolism bydenying its obviously symbolic character, and mixing it with literalism. PFF2 804.1

4. GLORIFIES PAPACY BY IGNORING ACTUALITIES

Preterism gets rid of the prophetic indictments against papal Rome by applying them to early pagan Rome, then glorifying the church as the benevolent reign of the saints for a thousand years. It thus ignores her unhappy apostasies and corruptions, her arrogant assumptions, and her persecution of dissenters through the long centuries of her dominance. It glosses over the ugly facts by glamorizing the Roman church as the New Jerusalem, which will abide forever. But that theory is taken over bodily from fallacious Augustinian reasoning (treated in Volume I), with its spiritualization of the resurrection, its carnalization of the church, and its throwback of the millennium to the early centuries. It cannot be squared with the facts. The great gulf between the spiritual reign of the saints and the all too earthly rule of the medieval church is obvious. PFF2 804.2

5. DENIES ELEMENTAL PRINCIPLE OF BIBLE PROPHECY

Preterism, inending the seals and trumpets by the fifth or sixth century, neglects thegreater period of the church and denies that prophecy is a revelation of thedivine plan of all the ages. Yet the panorama of the great conflict betweenright and wrong, truth and error, Christ and Satan here on earth, carriesthrough to the ultimate triumph of Christ and right, and the deliveranceof the saints through the second coming of Christ and the destruction ofsinners at the end of the age. It is impossible to eliminate from apocalypticprophecy the final judgment and the second advent. Preterism substitutesan aborted story of redemption; it presents a stunted picture that endsbefore the tremendous conflicts of the church actually began. PFF2 804.3

The seals lead past the vicissitudes of the centuries to the triumph of the saints of God. (Revelation 7:15-17; 8:1.) Preterism leaves the church without a guide through the greater part of her history, and nullifies the very purpose and provisions of prophecy. The prophecies obviously extend past the judgments and calamities on pagan Rome to the finishing of the mystery of God, when the kingdoms of this world become the kingdoms of Christ the Lord—with the attendant resurrection, rewarding of the saints, and destruction of the sinners. (Revelation 11:15-18.) The dominant theme of Revelation is obviously the Christian church, not Judaism. Revelation 18 is clearly a picture of the destruction of spiritual Babylon, not the conversion of paganism. PFF2 804.4

6. LIKE FUTURISM IT LEAVES AN UNEXPLAINED GAP

Preterism, then,like Futurism, has a fatal gap. It jumps from the events of the sixth centurypast the alleged thousand-year reign of the Catholic Church to the finalpersecution and day of judgment, thus violating the principle of the progressive sequence of prophecy, with an unexplained gap that leaves the church at large without any prophetic guide. PFF2 804.5

7. OFFERS NO ADEQUATE FULFILLMENTS

Preterism places the Two Witnesses back in pagan Rome’s day and makes the forty-two months literal time. But it presents no historical evidence of time, place, and events that adequately meets the specifications. It ignores the three and a half days of the Witnesses’ death, after they had been slain and were then resurrected. Such vagueness is utterly inadequate. The specifications have to be trimmed, and history juggled to make them fit such a proposal. And if these specifications were fulfilled in early Roman history, then Futurism is wrong; and if Futurism’s positions are right, then Preterism is wrong. One neutralizes the other, an indication that both are wrong. PFF2 805.1

Preterism was obviously an expedient, for it never commended itself to the Roman church as a whole. There have been relatively few Catholic Preterists. That is not the case, however, with Protestantism. Preterist principles have been adopted and adapted by those of rationalistic mind as the easiest way to compass the problem of prophecy, throwing it into the past, where it does not affect life today. It has had a sizable following among rationalists, of which Modernism is the modern counterpart. PFF2 805.2

This much, however, can be said of both Preterism and Futurism: Despite their defects and their inadequate and inconsistent teachings, they succeeded individually and jointly in their objective—that of splitting and confusing Protestant interpretation, and diverting the incriminating finger of prophecy either to the distant past or to the remote future, away from the uncomfortable facts of papal history throughout the Middle Ages and early modern history. That is the serious side. PFF2 805.3