First, what is Preterism?
Wikipedia says that “Preterism is a Christian eschatological view or belief that interprets some or all prophecies of the Bible as events which have already been fulfilled in history.”
Surprising to me, this is a topic that has been brought up by at least a handful of friends and acquaintances, and so I decided that I should read up about it. My first thought was that this was not an idea that has benefited from a whole knowledge of the Word of Elohim. I searched for when this idea came into the church and found a good article here. Another helpful article I read, included the following points:
1) “The “consistent preterist” believes that all prophecy is fulfilled in the A. D. 70 destruction of the Temple, including the Second Advent, the resurrection of the dead, the great Judgment, and so forth.”
2) “If all prophecy was fulfilled in the first-century events, then who is to say it is the will of God for the gospel to exercise world-wide victory? There is no remaining word of prophecy to inform us of such.”
3) “No creed allows any other type of resurrection than a bodily one. Historic creeds speak of the universal, personal judgment of all men, not of a representative judgment in A. D. 70. It would be most remarkable if the entire church that came through A. D. 70 missed the proper understanding of the eschaton and did not realize its members had been resurrected! And that the next generations had no inkling of the great transformation that took place!” (Note: eschaton means the conclusion of all history.)
4) “The hyper-preterist view has serious and embarrassing implications for the perspicuity of Scripture — and despite the fact that we are now (supposedly) in our resurrected states and have the outpoured Holy Spirit and his gift of teachers who were to protect us from every wind of doctrine (Ephesians 4)!” (Note: perspicuity means clarity of what was written.)
5) “…we must distinguish sense and referent; there are several types of “resurrection” in Scripture: the dry bones of Ezekiel 37; spiritual redemption in John 5:24; physical redemption at the grave in John 5:28; Israel’s renewal in Christ in Romans 11:15; and of the Beast in Revelation 13:3. I hold that passages specifically delimiting the time-frame by temporal indicators (such as “this generation,” “shortly,” “at hand,” “near,” and similar wording) are to be applied to A. D. 70, but similar-sounding passages may or may not be so applied.” (Note: referent means what is being referred to.)
6) “…there is a serious problem with the removal of the physical resurrection from systematic theology. Christ’s resurrection is expressly declared to be the paradigm of our own (1 Corinthians 15:20). Yet we know that his was a physical, tangible resurrection (Luke 24:39), whereas ours is (supposedly) spiritual. What happens to the Biblically defined analogy between Christ’s resurrection and ours in the hyper-preterist system?”
7) “Adam’s sin had physical effects, as well as judicial and spiritual effects; where are these taken care of in the hyper-preterist system? Death’s implications are not just judicial and spiritual, but also physical (Genesis 3:14, 19; Romans 6:23).”
8) “If Christians now are fulfilling the resurrection expectation of Scripture, then the Gnostics of the early Christian centuries were correct! The physical world seems to be superfluous, in the hyper-preterist viewpoint.”
9) “We must wonder why we Christians still marry and are given in marriage, since Christ said in the resurrection we will not marry (Luke 20:35). We must wonder why the apostles never corrected the widespread notion of a physical resurrection, which was so current in Judaism (cf. Josephus, Talmud, etc.). …Furthermore, where and what is the resurrection of the lost (John 5; Revelation 20)? Paul considered Hymenæus and Philetus as having made ship-wreck of men’s faith by saying the resurrection is past (2 Timothy 2:17-18).”
10) “Acts 1 clearly defines Christ’s second Advent in terms of his ascension, which was physical and visible. For example, in Acts 1:8-11 Luke is careful to say the disciples were “beholding” him as he ascended; he was received “from the eyes of them” (v. 9b); they were “gazing” as he was “going” ( v. 10); they were “looking” (v. 11); they “beheld” (v. 11). Clearly his ascension was a visible and glorious phenomenon involving his tangible resurrected body. And there was an actual visible cloud associated with it (v. 10). The angelic messengers resolutely declare “this same Jesus” (i.e., the Jesus they knew for over three years, who is now in a tangible resurrected body) will “so come in like manner as you saw him go into heaven” (v. 11).
11) “…hyper-preterists eternalize time, by allowing history to continue forever. This not only goes against express statements of Scripture, but also has God dealing with a universe in which sin will dwell forever and ever and ever. There is no final conclusion to the matter of man’s rebellion; there is no final reckoning with sin.”
12) “Is the Great Commission delimited to the pre-A. D. 70 era, due to the interpretation of “the end” by hyper-preterists (Matthew 28:20)? Is the Lord’s Supper superfluous today, having been fulfilled in Christ’s (alleged) Second Advent in A.D. 70 (1 Corinthians 11:26)…?”