The Three Main Divisions of “Last Days” Thinking (Eschatology) and Their Relation to Dominion Theology

Overview and Scope

In this chapter, eschatology is defined as the theological discipline of the thought regarding the “last days” and the three main divisions within it are outlined. It is not intended in this chapter to give a thorough review of the variations of eschatology within each broad category as they are vexed and nuanced but, rather, it is to identify some high-level philosophical and theological distinctives for each division, which are relevant to the closing discussion of the chapter and the wider analytical theme of the book. We are not concerned with these vexatious nuances held with searing passion by their advocates because this is not a book about the “last days” per se but, that said, you cannot avoid a discussion of the “last days” when analyzing and seeking to understand.[1] This is because each eschatological viewpoint implies a particular philosophy of history governing the significance of the text of Scripture regarding not just the final destination of creation but also how the church should exist on Earth. By understanding this dynamic, it becomes clear as to why dominion theology has been predicated upon and historically associated with a particular set of eschatological views.

Definition

“Eschatology” from the Koine Greek eschaton is the doctrine of the “last things” or “last days.”[2] Eschatological discourse has centered on the one thousand years (“the millennium”) referred to six times in Rev 20. However, this is immediately subject to a hermeneutical caveat—what the millennium is and when it occurs or even whether it is “realized” (and not just a literary symbol) in the present age is a function of the eschatological view. In this respect, there are three basic divisions of eschatological thinking: premillennial, amillennial, and postmillennial. For the premillennial and postmillennial viewpoints, the millennium is normally viewed as a definite historical event that will occur at some point in the future.[3] In contrast, the amillennial view posits one, more, or even all of the following:

It has already been “realized”[4] in a mystical or symbolic way, fully in the present church age.
It is the growing presence of eternity in the present.[5]
It pertains only to the saints in heaven.

Thus, the millennial concept shapes the arguments regarding the significance and role of the church in the present with respect to the world. This is why it becomes so significant in the understanding of dominion theology, and it is appropriate to examine these perspectives more closely.

Amillennialism

Amillennialism is the largest of the eschatological groupings.[6] Various forms of amillennialism have enjoyed a continuing and serious presence up to and including the contemporary period, becoming firmly established in the third century AD but with earlier pre-Christian historical precursors that we discuss shortly.[7] The Western Catholic church adopted Augustinian amillennialism and, subsequently, Reformed denominations were institutionally amillennial at their foundation, varying little from the Augustinian position as they sought to return to Augustinianism more generally in their understanding of the Christian church.[8]

That is, Luther, Calvin, and Melanchthon were traditionally thought of as amillennialist; Price noted an apparent oddness that the Reformers jettisoned almost everything of Roman Catholicism except its eschatological perspective.[9] However, this is readily mitigated in that the Catholic church had largely departed in many matters of theology and philosophy from Augustine to Aquinas’s appropriation of Aristotle but had retained Augustine’s eschatology; the Reformers sought to return to Augustine more generally and purge the scholastic incorporation of Aristotle in matters of theology and philosophy.

The Allegorical Method

Amillennialism, in all its forms, is founded on an allegorical view of Scripture—what is intended to be communicated by Scripture is something other than its “plain (literal) sense.” In other words, there is some “hidden” or “eternal,” “timeless,” “deep meaning,” or symbology employed in the text by the author to communicate beyond the limitations of the text itself. Although this might sound elaborate and sophisticated, it has been and remains very common as a literary device employed as long as there has been literature, occurring across people groups and eras, spanning various genres of literature (including, very definitely, some biblical books such as Proverbs), and other Jewish literature of the same period. Indeed, some Jewish midrashic commentaries on the biblical Hebrew text argue that the most significant “meaning” of a biblical text is often one beyond the “literal” one.[10]

Thus, as a school, it cannot be summarily dismissed prima facie as some fundamentalists and other conservative evangelicals have done, and are still prone to do, when discussing it. The Bible is, after all, also literature, with a human as well as a divine history. It is also an important philosophical point that even if you accept allegory, it does not necessarily, in the logical sense, commit you to the amillennial eschatological view. Most commentators would accept that the book of Revelation uses allegory in some passages, regardless of their governing eschatological perspective or approach to scriptural interpretation.[11] However, the point remains that allegory is central to the amillennialist view and is applied most comprehensively within it.

Historically, Philo (30 BC–AD 40) was first to develop the foundational allegorical hermeneutic and Origen (AD 185–254) was the first church father to apply it to eschatology in preference to Jewish premillennialism (considered later). This permitted his Hellenization of the biblical texts to reflect the primarily Hellenic context of the church after AD 100.[12] It permitted the spiritualization of potentially problematic prophetic passages regarding the future deliverance of Israel or the progress of the people of God as applicable to the church only.

That is, amillennialism allegorizes the church as the “kingdom of God” and it is the church that has become the putative heirs to all the promises made to Israel within the Hebrew Scriptures. The physical nation of Israel and the ethnic Jews have passed entirely from the purposes of God; the reformation in the twentieth century of a political nation-state called Israel was of no prophetic or spiritual significance. The church, in this dispensation of the kingdom, has inherited all the blessings of Abraham. Price, in discussing this view, offered this Scripture as the “proof text”:

For neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything; the only thing that matters is a new creation! And all who will behave in accordance with this rule, peace and mercy be on them, and on the Israel of God. (Gal 6:15–16 NET; emphasis added)[13]

With such a long history, there have been variations and important developments within amillennialism that we consider now, but they all share this basic identification of “Israel” with the church; that is, a “replacement theology.”

Classical Amillennialism

In the classical amillennial system, the final judgment and eternity is viewed to begin with the second coming of Christ (the parousia).[14]

Importantly, it is not preceded by a literal thousand-year earthly reign of the Jewish Messiah, but the Church age itself is viewed as symbolized by the millennial concept. For Augustine and the early Latin church that followed him, this numerus perfectus (10 × 10 × 10) was a symbolic, indefinite period of time in which there is a perfection of God’s law; it was the unfolding of the kingdom government of God in the Church Age.[15] Christ’s reign is expressed through the church in the progression of historia sacra (sacred history) in which “radical regeneration takes place.”[16] It is with his City of God (c. 412) that the view received its fullest expression.[17] Augustinian amillennialism envisaged increasing glory within the church (“the City of God”) set against the increasing wickedness in the world but viewed the church as ultimately victorious.[18]

Augustine showed an astute awareness of previous “date setting” for the return of Christ in the early church (particularly amongst the chiliasts, the primitive premillennialists) and stated that, in principle, the Church Age is of indefinite duration:

The sixth is now passing, and cannot be measured by any number of generations, as it has been said, “It is not for you to know the times, which the Father hath put in His own power.”[19]

However, it is also clear that he did expect the return of Christ before AD 1000, perhaps as early as AD 650,[20] and it is this “failure” of his predictions that is believed by some twentieth-century commentators to have led to the changes within modern amillennialism: “It is the failure of amillennialism . . . to meet the facts of history.”[21] The nineteenth and twentieth centuries were times of transition and change for amillennialism. There were conservative and liberal versions of modern amillennialism that took a very different approach in their allegorizing of Scripture.

Modern Conservative Amillennialism

As indicated above, it is often proposed that it was the perceived failure of Augustinianism that precipitated the changes in amillennialism. I believe this is only half of a half-truth, for the Reformation had reaffirmed the essentials of the Augustinian view despite these “failures,” it was rather that the pressure for change came from a wider cultural crisis in late modernity, which is examined more specifically in the next chapter. For now, it is sufficient to say that for Western theologians, there was a crisis of orthodox faith generally in response to Darwinism and a crisis of confidence in the power of humankind to reform itself as political liberalism collapsed in response to the outbreak of major and brutal conflicts amongst the “civilized” Europeans.

Faced with this challenge, amillennialism generally became increasingly pietistic and pessimistic regarding modern culture. Though some like Masselink and Hamilton remained exponents of the traditional Calvinistic view of increasing victory within the church, by the end of the nineteenth century, Düsterdieck and Kliefoth had spiritualized the millennium as a “heavenly reality” to accommodate the perceived negative track of history.[22] Warfield also incorporated this idea of the triumph of the church as a heavenly event into his eschatology.[23] It was a solution that allowed the earth to atrophy yet maintained a glorious end for the saint, “a state of blessedness of the saints in heaven.”[24]

Modern Liberal Amillennialism

Liberal amillennialism was the second modern response to the failure of classical amillennialism. In general, it is known for its secularization of the biblical texts, such that the resurrection and the second advent are not considered actual events but spiritual pictures to be realized within the life of the church or by individuals alone. It, like conservative amillennialism, had both theologically optimistic and pessimistic forms:

The “social gospel” movement of Rauschenbusch was a positive, optimistic view with the emphasis on the church as salt and light within “the world.”[25] Here, “the world” is taken to mean the social structures and sociopolitical processes. Salvation and kingdom-building was the salvation of society through both church and state rather than the individual. The socialistic emphasis of the model led to its discrediting as the practice of socialism in the twentieth-century Communist states became totalitarian.[26]
Dodd, Schweitzer, and Bultmann, to various degrees, represented the “liberal historicist” school. They maintained, in varying emphases and senses, a “realized” eschatologyof the timeless and eternal manifested in the current age in space and time rather than in any future age.[27] This historicism waned with the twentieth century as logical positivism came to dominate many academic fields.[28]
Niebuhr, though arguably neo-orthodox in his general approach to Christianity, was a major exponent of the liberal method of secularization of the biblical narrative and possessed a pessimistic view of human progress.[29] This pessimism became the dominant mode of thinking for the post-liberal theologian.

Contemporary Amillennialism

Thus, in brief, a cultural pessimism, particularly regarding the present age and an extended theological piety had become the de facto amillennial position in both its conservative and liberal forms during the 20th century.

Premillennialism

Premillennialism as Apostolic

Premillennialism was, according to the compendium of Peters (which cites a consensus of historical work), the exclusive position (though in a primitive form known as “chiliasm”[30]) of both Judaism and the early church fathers for the first 250 years of the church.[31] This is because the early believers, as predominantly Jewish, adopted the Jewish eschatology with some Christian reinterpretation. Jewish eschatology held, in an uneasy tension, the ideas of the coming Messiah as both the suffering servant of Isa 53 and the glorious coming of the King with power and glory.[32] Which view prevailed at a particular point in history was very much subject to the conditions in the nation; during times of great prosperity and military strength, the conqueror was preferred; during occupation and subjugation, the suffering servant was thought to symbolize the nation, but there was still the hope that the deliverer would arise. This conquering Messiah vanquished Israel’s enemies, oversaw a restoration of the Davidic kingdom, and the establishment of his earthly reign throughout all the world.[33] This was also clearly the expectation of Jesus’ early disciples:

So when they had gathered together, they began to ask him, “Lord, is this the time when you are restoring the kingdom to Israel?”⁷ He told them, “You are not permitted to know the times or periods that the Father has set by his own authority.” (Acts 4:19–7 NET)

So, Christian premillennialism interpreted Jesus’ first advent as the suffering servant, and for classical premillennialism, his second advent was to be as triumphant king and judge in contrast to his “meek and lowly” first advent. This represented a distinct solution to the tension present in the Jewish eschatology and became the apostolic position, viewing the struggle of the church against the Roman Empire as an extension of the “sufferings of Christ”[34] but on the path to final victory.

The Decline of Premillennialism

Premillennialism waned with the “accommodation of Constantine” (AD 313), which fundamentally changed the way the church related to the Roman Empire as it effectively became the favored state religion.[35] The rationale of suffering and the Roman emperor as the antichrist beast of Revelation underpinning the premillennial eschatological formulation collapsed, with the result that it was virtually absent from the church from the sixth century to the early nineteenth century. It was also one of the few areas of thought not revised as part of the Reformation tradition, which had generally followed the amillennial Augustinian position, with Calvin dismissing premillennialism with the few, curt words: “This fiction is too puerile to need or to deserve refutation.”[36] Similarly, Luther had also explicitly rejected the “triumphalism” associated with some medieval scholars, viewing it as a “trick of the devil.”[37]

Dispensationalism

However, premillennialism reemerged in the 1820s in a modern and radically distinctive form with, first, Irving and then Darby (the founder of the Plymouth brethren), which became known as dispensationalism.[38] Irving divided the age of the church into distinctive ages corresponding to the characteristics of the churches as described in the first three chapters of Revelation.[39] The final age, which Irving considered the church had entered, was the Laodicean or “lukewarm” era in which the church apostatized.[40] Darby developed Irving and formalized the rapture doctrine—a removal and rescue of the persecuted remnant church just before its final defeat. This is, at once, the most controversial and cherished doctrine of dispensationalism:

[The] idea of a mass Rapture is considered by many to be the most preposterous belief held by Christians. At the same time, it is the Blessed Hope of many Christians today.[41]

Popular dispensationalist narratives of the twentieth century became progressively dominated with the imminence of the rapture, captured by Hal Lindsey’s bestsellers during the 1970s and the 1980s.[42]

The second distinctive feature of dispensationalism is the church age as a parenthesis of history between the sixty-ninth and seventieth week of Dan 9:27, which was considered an interlude between the histories of Israel.[43] Dispensationalism is known for its support of the current state of Israel as fulfillment of biblical prophecy and a pessimistic belief in the increasing lawlessness of the age until the sudden appearance of Christ to rescue the chosen remnant who have not apostatized or succumbed to the antichrist’s kingdom. The dispensationalist view was popularized in the Scofield Reference Bibles of 1909 and 1917, where it has since enjoyed substantial support within fundamentalist scholarship during the twentieth century. Indeed, for early fundamentalists, it was considered a test of orthodoxy, alongside explicit support for the reformation of the state of Israel as a prerequisite to Christ’s return.[44] From there, its support was maintained in various movements influenced by fundamentalism, such as the main Pentecostal denominations and the later Word of Faith movement.[45] The later charismatic and “house” churches, originating within the mainline Protestant and Catholic denominations, tended to remain amillennial and rejected any support for the state of Israel during the periodic conflicts since its reformation.[46]

Premillennial Hermeneutics

The premillennial approach to Scripture and interpretation was one of its most attractive, cohering, and distinctive features. Premillennial dispensationalism employed a “plain meaning,” “grammatical-historical method,” which strongly emphasized a “literal” textual hermeneutic.[47] The overwhelming logic and self-confidence of premillennialism enjoyed by dispensationalists up until the late 1980s was summarized by Price:

Most independent Bible scholars are premillennial [dispensationalists] . . . 80% of Bible prophecy has been fulfilled literally. It is illogical to view that the remaining 20% be allegorized and is not fulfilled literally.[48]

Dispensationalism as Heterodox

Yet, it should be clear that this dispensationalist view bears little resemblance to classical premillennialism, which had emphasized the corporate eschatology of the victorious messianic king, even if there was conflict and apostasy before his appearing.[49] In effect, the second advent is seen as a rescue from the kingdom of the antichrist rather than a triumphant return.[50] It is extremely culturally pessimistic, and its rapture escapism has been the source of criticism from within those who prefer a classical premillennialism.[51] Though successful and well established within the modern evangelical movement, it has been profoundly challenged as a clearly modern and previously unknown innovation in the history of the church.[52]

However, with the dramatic changes in human civilization in the last two hundred years, some consider the advent of novel doctrines in the “last days” as a fulfillment of Daniel’s “increase in knowledge” (Dan 12:4) and so something “previously unknown” in the history of the church is not a priori dismissed. Even if we were to accept that, to be theologically responsible, the evidence for the inference would need to be overwhelming. That does not seem to be the case with the rapture doctrine; it is seldom argued in a systematic or rigorous fashion but is frequently sloganized, with any Scriptures speaking of the return of the Lord (which is not the issue) called in support of a rapture. However, those Scriptures are talking about the return of the Lord, additional strong scriptural evidence needs to be produced for the secret rapture, otherwise you are just assuming that which is supposed to be proved. Missler probably comes the closest there, but his reasoning is elaborate and granular; the previous perspicuity of the premillennial view is lost in his reinterpretation of it.

It is also a worthwhile theological observation that Paul also spoke to Timothy of “doctrines of demons” (1 Tim 4:1) manifesting as innovation of doctrine in the last days. Such a radical innovation of thought without precedent in the history of the church should be viewed as unsafe, without overwhelming evidence to the contrary.

Postmillennialism

In essence, postmillennialism is the belief that the church on Earth becomes more glorious as time passes and its influence grows until the entire Earth is Christianized; the government and rulership of God through the church is established throughout every domain of culture. The Earth then transitions into the millennial period and the Lord returns at the end of that period:

They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain: for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the LORD, as the waters cover the sea. . . . Cry aloud and shout for joy, O inhabitant of Zion, for great [exalted, enthroned] in your midst is the Holy One of Israel. (Isaiah 11:9; 12:6; amplification mine)[53]

Thus, the postmillennial view has an optimistic and triumphant view of the church and is militant regarding its outreach to the world. It expects evangelism to succeed and nations to be discipled.

The Scholarly Rejection of Postmillennialism

With that brief synopsis, some introductory remarks are immediately necessary before we consider the details, owing to the scholarly prejudice against postmillennialism. The prevalence of amillennialism within the Reformed denominational churches and the domination of premillennial dispensationalism within the modern evangelical movement has meant that postmillennialism has been largely ignored and dismissed by many biblical scholars in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Subsequently, there is a problem with accurately understanding and assessing postmillennialism because of its misrepresentation within the pietistic and pessimistic eschatology so prevalent during this recent period, Rushdoony describing the problem thus:

Although postmillennialism has a long history as a major, and perhaps a central, interpretation, it is summarily read out of court by many on non-Biblical grounds.[54]

That is, just because it has had this minority status and was effectively excommunicated from scholarly discourse does not mean it is without merit or is illegitimate in principle. Just because a doctrine or experience was missing from the general Christian consciousness for centuries does not disqualify it from being legitimately Christian. We need only consider the Pentecostal experience of speaking in tongues, which was virtually absent for centuries of the church but reemerged in the closing years of the nineteenth century within the Holiness movement.[55]

So, our first observation is that the optimism and practical program of the postmillennial view is the exact conceptual opposite of the pietistic emphasis and the pessimism of the modern iterations of the alternative positions. This explains its marginalization and absence from many scholarly discussions rather than any implicit intellectual deficit or incoherence. Some have attempted to argue postmillennialism is fundamentally incoherent in response to the worsening of societal and cultural conditions, but such an argument is logically fallacious and reflects their own subjective biases and prejudices.[56] Just because a society is in a state of decay does not mean the church cannot become radical and militant, leading to a restored and prosperous world, fit for the King to inherit. You may not believe that, but that is not a matter of logic; it is a matter of belief and faith in God to change the world.

However, the decay of our society and culture is necessary to put in a proper context to build a reform program as dominion theology seeks to do, and the underlying cultural reasons for this malaise I engage within the next chapter. In this section, we want to give special attention to the theology of the view. The purpose is to describe how postmillennialism has been conceived and then to reveal what I think really characterizes the view so that it becomes useful for the closing discussion of the chapter.

Postmillennialism as Modified Amillennialism

For proponents of this view, postmillennialism was generated from the problem posed for medieval amillennialists by the perceived failure of Augustinian eschatology. As we saw, for neo-Augustinians, the problem of cultural decay is solved by reimagining Augustine’s dualism. The cycle of falling away is matched by a greater cycle of revival. There is increasing victory in the church. Eventually, the City of God prevails throughout the whole earth. So, for example, Walvoord asserts that for the most literal of the postmillennialists, “[they differ] only from the amillennial concept [of the millennium] in the idea of growing triumph and final victory before the Second Advent.” [57] Similarly, the influential amillennial systematic theologian Berkhof identified a group of scholars in the Netherlands during the sixteenth and seventeenth century that he considered the first to be postmillennial on the basis of their envisaging of an eventual earthly triumph of the church in a far future.[58]

It must also be noted in opposition to this that the converse is also posited by both Walvoord and Riddlebarger.[59] That is, postmillennialism reverts to amillennialism under the weight of cultural decay. For Riddlebarger, it is seen as an innovation from the historical postmillennialism within the old Princeton school.[60] She then identifies Warfield as the transitionary figure representing its reversion into amillennialism by his supernaturalization of the glorious state of the saints to simply a heavenly, rather than earthly, reality. This seems the more plausible view, particularly with the parallel decay of triumphant classical premillennialism into culturally pessimistic dispensationalism.

Postmillennialism as Heterodox and a Product of Philosophical Modernism

For proponents of this view, the radical optimism that is said to characterize postmillennialism is viewed as rooted in the Enlightenment view of the inevitability of progress and the “early modern” confidence of man to solve his own problems with the application of the faculty of reason. So, for example, Price gives only a two-hundred-year window for its history and suggests Daniel Whitby as the founder.[61] Similarly, Walvoord identifies Whitby as the Unitarian founder and enumerates Snowden and Brown as embracing and incorporating the evolutionism of nineteenth-century science with its view of the inevitability human progress.[62] Both Price and Walvoord argue that the tendency of postmillennialism is towards theological liberalism and Price asserts that the postmillennialist sentiment is the precursor of both fascist and communist conceptions of a golden age.

Assessing Postmillennialism

To be theologically responsible, the question to be answered is whether the salient features of postmillennialism are seen throughout the history of the church or whether it was simply, as suggested in the models above, generated by theological pressures and responses to the zeitgeist of the middle and late modern age. The latter is clearly a far weaker theological position than the former position. However, I believe the criticisms presented above are weak and inconclusive, and we can safely assert that postmillennialism has a solid, continuous presence in the great theologians of the church. Let us consider the weakness of these arguments and the refutations in detail.

Firstly, Whitby was not an orthodox Christian in any respect but was first a Unitarian and his liberal postmillennialism, which converged easily with classical political liberalism and the reforming priorities of amillennialism, reflected a general cultural optimism rather than a view arrived at through theological analysis and reconstruction.[63] It must also be said that from a logical point of view, even if the secularization or dechristianization of the millennial concept was applied within utopian fascist or liberal theological thought, that does not invalidate the authentic postmillennial position.

So, for example, in what was the twilight of British classical liberalism at the close of the nineteenth and the beginning of the twentieth centuries, it was not unusual to hold the political ideal that the “kingdom of God” could be legislated into existence by the “Mother of all Parliaments”; the British Empire would indeed “endure for a thousand years.”[64] This figure was a deliberate biblical allusion, and it was no coincidence that the Balfour Declaration, indicating the British support for a Jewish homeland, belonged to this period.[65] Thus, the clear distinction between the two is exemplified succinctly by Boettner:

This [authentic postmillennialist] view is . . . to be distinguished from that optimistic but false view of human betterment and progress held by Modernists and Liberals which teaches that the Kingdom of God on earth will be achieved through a natural process by which mankind will be improved and social institutions will be reformed and brought to a higher level of culture and efficiency. This latter view presents a spurious or pseudoPostmillennialism and regards the Kingdom of God as the product of natural laws in an evolutionary process, whereas orthodox Postmillennialism regards the Kingdom of God as the product of the supernatural working of the Holy Spirit in connection with the preaching of the Gospel.[66]

This failure to be granular in the treatment of postmillennial thought is surely sufficient to justify the proposition that so-called liberal “postmillennialism” is radically different from theologically conservative postmillennialism, and the former cannot be applied as an effective argument in rapidly dismissing postmillennialism generally. Similarly, Berkhof’s remarkable brevity regarding the nature of theological nineteenth-century and pre-WWI postmillennialism and his equation of “modern” postmillennialism with the “social gospel” seems to be committing, and satisfied with, the same category error.[67] This is a serious omission as this period had been described as the previous height of its popularity by both Walvoord and Price.

Secondly, the general support for the thesis that the failure of Augustinianism generated postmillennialism seems very weak for the following reasons:

There seems little evidence of an immediate reaction to the failure of Augustinianexpectations. To assert that Joachim of Fiore (b. 1132) was postmillennial seems to be another example of improper use of the designation. His eschatologywas radically heterodox and is viewed by some postmillennialists as radically dispensationalist because of his conception of the ages of the Father (Law), Son, and Spirit (grace).[68]
Although suggested as a “post-Reformation” movement, history seems to show that the Reformation thinkers were content to adopt the view that they could resume the building of the kingdomas envisaged by Augustinenow that a correct foundation had been restored.[69] Both Luther and Calvin believed that the progress of the gospel was inevitable once the proper ministration had been restored, which, of course, is well documented as the origin of Luther’s polemic in the failure to convert the Jews.[70]

However, Riddlebarger’s view of Warfield’s position in proposing amillennialism was simply an aberration of postmillennialism is, at first appearance, stronger. Her assertion is accurate that though Warfield considered himself a postmillennialist, he certainly spiritualized postmillennial concepts, allowing some of his immediate heirs to move straightforwardly to an amillennial position.[71] Nevertheless, she neglects to mention that Warfield was also important to the developing fundamentalist movement and, in contrast, his putative heirs in that movement were dispensationalist premillennialists.[72] Thus, it would be contradictory to assert that his eschatology inevitably collapsed into amillennialism. Rather, it appears that with postmillennialism, we are dealing with a distinctive category, and it is to the analysis of this category that we now turn.

Postmillennialism on Its Own Terms

The counterarguments presented above are not considered to be definitive or exhaustive. They are simply posited to demonstrate that the original arguments were not sufficient to dismiss postmillennialism in the arbitrary manner it has been dismissed. Postmillennialism is at least possible to posit as a distinct analytic category. However, it is now expedient to advance the positive argument in and of itself to establish the strong case for postmillennialism as a distinct theological category. As part of our argument, we identify that modern iterations of eschatological thought have tended to obscure previous historical similarities and attitudes towards the “last things.” Eschatological orthodoxies have become more like ideological prejudices to which allegiance is demanded; this prevents a recognition of there being far more in common between the positions than is often admitted in contemporary dogma.

At the most basic level, postmillennialism is the chronologically opposite position to premillennialism. It believes in the return of Christ after the millennial period. The millennial period is that in which the church had previously established the fullness of the kingdom on Earth, considering the Great Commission of Matt 28 as literally fulfilled. Disciples have been made of all nations in their entirety. Jesus then returns and is welcomed to take his place in the kingdom on earth, with the final judgment at that point and eternity beginning. There is no concept of a remnant or a rapture, for

The LORD owns the earth and all it contains, the world and all who live in it. (Ps 24:1 NET)

For there will be universal submission to the LORD’s sovereignty, just as the waters completely cover the sea. (Isa 11:9 NET)

Gentry summarizes the postmillennial view in this way:

[Postmillennialism is] the view that Christ will return to the earth after the Spirit-blessed Gospel has had overwhelming success in bringing the world to the adoption of Christianity.[73]

I would concur with Gentry here, but I would add that the evidence supports the view that the distinct and authentic contemporary postmillennial position reasserts the primitive triumphalism of both the early premillennialists and augments it with the kingdom-building spirit of the amillennialist Reformers. It is the recapturing of a common radical optimism, an engagement with the world to convert and reclaim it rather than retreat or separate from it. It is, in this important sense, part of the apostolic vision of the church at its foundation to “go into the world and make disciples of all nations.”[74] Discipling is taken to mean a distinctive “Christian culture”:

If we believe that the main and final goal of the Christian life is heaven, or the salvation of our souls, we will be indifferent to history and the world around us. . . . The goal is God’s Kingdom, His purpose for humanity and the world.[75]

Although allegory and spiritualization are widely applied in postmillennial hermeneutics, in contrast to the early period of the church, which we have already seen was premillennial in outlook, the task or responsibility of the church in Matt 28 is probably taken in the most literal and emphatic manner by the modern postmillennialists, in contrast to the cultural pessimism and cynicism of dispensationalism and modern amillennialism.

Postmillennialism is a presuppositional position of victory in every realm, not just the “City of God” as in Augustine. It is a much stronger hermeneutic than simply a general parallel progress of history the of world and a church eventually triumphant, as might be seen in Augustinian theology. Augustine was dualistic and this important philosophical distinction, I believe, classifies his theology as predominantly amillennial.[76] In contrast, postmillennialism uses the perceived triumph of Christ as a present reality within the life of the church on Earth, not deferred to heaven or considered as a spiritual picture as we saw in some of the modern Augustinians, such as Warfield. The church is not the ark of the Catholic church, the chosen remnant of the Protestant dispensationalists, or the mystical kingdom of the saints in heaven of modern amillennialists:

If I believe that Christ will soon rapture me from this evil world, this will have a practical effect on my life very different from a belief that I shall see the world get worse and worse, and live through a fearful tribulation. Again, if I believe that the world will see the progressive triumph of Christ’s people until the whole world is Christian and a glorious material and spiritual era unfolds, I shall be motivated very much differently from either a premillennial or an amillennial believer.[77]

Rather, it is the entirety of human culture that is to be redeemed and converted by Christian action in every sphere, not just the church:

[It] is also an error to make the church central to God’s plan and purpose . . . and therefore [see] the church as the sphere of victory. This led to a very high doctrine of the church, both in Rome and Protestantism. If our hope for the futures of man and Christ’s world is only in the church, then we will stress the church as man’s hope. The church will be over-stressed because it is man’s only hope. Neither the state, the Christian family, nor the school, nor any other institution offers hope, and none are seen as therefore central or important.[78]

Postmillennialism argues for the complete and total victory of Christ in the current world:

[P]ostmillennialism is the eschatology of victory. . . . The notion of defeat does not go well with the fact of an omnipotent God and a conquering Christ. [Postmillennialism] takes with total seriousness and a totality of meaning the validity of Romans 8:28, “And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are called according to his purpose.”[79]

It rejects, in its entirety, the apocalyptic dualism of Hellenistic Western Christianity:

[T]here is an Implicit Manichaeanism in premillennialism and in amillennialism. The material world is surrendered to Satan, and the spiritual world is reserved to God.[80]

Postmillennialism, in common with amillennialism on this point, rejects the biblical literalism of premillennialism as inapplicable to prophecy as a matter of interpretative principle:

[I]t must be noted that premillennialism violates one of the most basic principles of sound biblical hermeneutics. . . . The fact that so many other scriptures are interpreted to fit in with a particular [literal] understanding of Revelation 20 indicates that far too much weight is being placed on a single text [and] requires the book as a whole be interpreted futuristically. . . .The truth or falsity of amillennialism or postmillennialism does not [require] the futuristic approach.[81]

In this respect, Postmillennialists generally favor a partial-preterist view of the book of Revelation and of prophecy in general. It should be noted that preterism is not limited to postmillennialism but is a general view of prophecy. The full preterist view holds that “the tribulation” of Revelation occurred in our distant past, in the first century, and the millennium has already passed.[82] The former is accepted but the latter is rejected by postmillennialists. Postmillennialists view prophecy as progressively fulfilled or prefigured in previous ages and generally favor covenant theology, which posits a single continuing intratrinitarian covenant of redemption that structures history from the creation mandate of Adam to eternity.[83] However, postmillennialists agree with the preterists that a literalistic approach to prophecy is naïve and immature: “literalism leads to absurdity in Revelation.”[84]

Thus, being also covenant theologians, postmillennialists are hostile to any form of dispensationalism that divides history up into distinct ages in which God deals with man according to a distinct set of principles in each:

Dispensationalism limits the Bible and its relevance; it wrongly divides the word of truth. It denies the wholeness of Scripture, and the fact that God does not change, nor does His law, nor His plan of salvation, change from age to age. [85]

Postmillennialism also takes issue with the amillennial view about the nature of the interadvental period. It objects to both forms of contemporary amillennialism that either internalizes the “kingdom” as a spiritual entity or limits it to the heavenly state of saints in heaven:

Scripture makes it abundantly clear that this earth . . . is a part of the kingdom. Christ’s messianic authority and reign extend over all of heaven and earth. . . . Every nation on earth is presently under the dominion of Christ. . . .Amillennialism fails to deal with these scriptural truths satisfactorily. . . . [It] fails to deal with the many passages that tell us about the progressive growth of the messianic kingdom . . . that grows to fill the whole earth.”[86]

In contrast to the mysticism that finds its way into premillennial dispensationalism (particularly within the charismatic churches) and the spiritualization embedded in Old Princetonian amillennialism, postmillennialists who adopt the Calvinistic Reformation position tend to emphasize Christian humanism rather than supernaturalism:

We don’t have God-ordained prophets anymore. Jesus Christ was the final prophet, priest and king. . . . Yet all men have a prophetic task . . . [the] successful proclamation of the word [into] every sphere of life.[87]

Summary

So, we can see, even in our brief exploration of postmillennialism, that it stands on a far more robust theological and scriptural foundation than its opponents have been prepared to admit. We have written far more in our brief treatment above than some of the most influential systematic theologies of the twentieth century. It is of little surprise, then, that so little understanding of the tenor and the approach to Scripture of postmillennialism has been demonstrated in those works. Importantly, we also identified that the attitudinal orientation to and presumption of Christian triumph was historically common to most eschatological thought; it is a modern aberration that it descended into mysticism and pessimism.

Eschatology and Dominionism

The purpose of this section is to focus the previous explanations and to establish which of the eschatological viewpoints has served as the historical antecedent to the dominion theology of the twentieth century. It is only necessary to briefly examine the attitude of the modern form of each eschatological position to the concept of societal reconstruction within the twentieth century for it to become obvious which viewpoint was the historical antecedent to the modern form of dominion theology, which began to emerge during the 1960s.

Premillennialism

In the previous section, it was seen that dispensationalist premillennialism viewed the closure of the age in apostasy and the time of the antichrist. This historical pessimism was seen most strongly in the early fundamentalists of the 1920s, who effectively withdrew from social engagement in American public life after the intellectual humiliation of the Scopes “evolution” trial.[88] Their radical dispensationalism created a “holy remnant” mentality that they were the holy faithful at the end of the age that would be raptured away.

Culture was considered apostate; the only hope was revivalism to save as many souls as possible before the imminent coming of the Lord.[89] Social action was considered a distraction from the real task of evangelism and the social gospel of Rauschenbusch as liberal-modernist apostasy.[90] Thus, during the 1950s, the premillennial dispensationalist and prominent radio preacher Rev. J. Vernon McGee declared, “You don’t polish brass on a sinking ship.”[91] The implication was clear—civilization was sinking, so social action was meaningless—the Christian should be concerned with revivalism alone.[92] Thus, it should be obvious at this point that twentieth-century dispensational premillennialism would be philosophically opposed to the cultural optimism of dominion theology and would consider it theologically heretical.

Amillennialism

Amillennialism, with its emphasis on the kingdom hermeneutic and its adoption by the Reformation churches, might be considered more amenable to the reformist program of dominion theology. However, during the twentieth century, the failure of classical messianic liberalism and the cultural pessimism regarding the possibility of human progress meant the direct heirs of Princeton moved from postmillennialism to emphasizing the pietistic aspect of Warfield’s transitional eschatology.[93] This perceived cultural decay and lawlessness of the century favored the view of the “other worldliness” of the kingdom and the escape to the inner life of a believer, a pietistic rumination on the “kingdom” of the saints in heaven. During the 1930s, the pietistic emphasis gained almost complete ascendancy in modern amillennialism. Rushdoony characterized modern amillennialism thus:

In reality, amillennialism holds that the major area of growth and power is in Satan’s Kingdom, because the world is seen as progressively falling away to Satan, the church’s trials and tribulations increasing, and the end of the world finding the church lonely and sorely beset. There is no such thing as a millennium or a triumph of Christ and His Kingdom in history. The role of the saints is at best to grin and bear it, and more likely to be victims and martyrs. The world will go from bad to worse. . . . The Christian must retreat from the world of action in the realization that there is no hope for this world, no world-wide victory of Christ’s cause, nor world peace and righteousness. . . . The material world is surrendered to Satan, and the spiritual world is reserved to God.[94]

Hence, it should also be clear that though amillennialists may have once spoken the language of modern dominion theology with its emphasis on kingdom-building in the present Church age, it has retreated into mysticism and pietism. Its new emphasis is the kingdom within and among believers.

Postmillennialism

Thus, by default, we must look to postmillennialism as the true historical antecedent to dominion theology, and it is possible to establish, without question, that the burden of evidence supports this view. I proposed in an earlier section that distilled down to what it represents in attitudinal and theological terms, it is the recapturing of the primitive triumphalism of both the early premillennialists and the kingdom-building spirit of the amillennialist Reformers. This has been elaborated during its revival in the second part of the twentieth century in the work of Rousas Rushdoony. Rushdoony, considered the father of the modern dominionist movement, had an obvious postmillennial eschatology. He summarizes the interpretation of postmillennialism as the call to fulfill the creation mandate of Genesis by redeeming the nations and institutions of the world:

[P]ostmillennialism . . . sees salvation as victory and health in time and eternity, it sees therefore a responsibility of the man of God for the whole of life. . . . People out of every tongue, tribe, and nation shall be converted, and the word of God shall prevail and rule in every part of the earth. There is therefore a necessity for [social and political] action, and an assurance of victory.[95]

A single qualification is worth mentioning here as reflected in our discussion so far. Though most dominionists are postmillennial in operational terms and in theology, there is no logical necessity that they be so; it is rather that postmillennialism remains the only modern position that encourages a positive psychological disposition to and faith for the future. We shall see as we progress in our discussion that there were and are dominionists who are operationally postmillennial but are not theologically postmillennial.

Summary and Concluding Remarks

We began this chapter by considering the definition and history of the three main eschatological views: premillennialism, amillennialism, and postmillennialism. We noted that postmillennialism had been dismissed as simplistic, naïve, mystical, and guilty of ignoring the realities of history because of its radical optimism.[96] I then asserted that those many critiques miss the salient point that postmillennialism is recovering the triumphal emphasis of both the classical forms of amillennialism and premillennialism. Hence, it is possible to understand why Rushdoony and Mathison, both scathing critics of premillennial dispensationalism, can illustrate that the early historical creeds, including those of the classical premillennialists, viewed a triumphant king coming in glory and not, as in modern iterations of the positions, on a rescue mission to the remnant.[97]

Consequently, it was possible for Bahnsen to argue extensively for John Calvin holding a postmillennial, rather than the amillennial, view commonly ascribed to him. He cited recent scholarly research that emphasized his reforming role, both within the civic culture and within theology, was based upon a conviction of Christian progress and victory within history.[98] Mathison was similarly emphatic in this unwavering belief in the Christian triumph in history: “Today’s newspaper is then [not] an excuse for anxiety or apathy.”[99] Finally, owing to the mysticism and pessimism incorporated into the dispensationalist and amillennial view, it was possible for Rushdoony to argue that they have succumbed to the principle of reason and contemporary experience as the arbiter of all things, adopting the philosophical position from the Enlightenment rather than one rooted in a Christian philosophy of history.[100] In contrast, the proper use of reason by the Christian is to elevate the promises of Scripture as our expectation.

Thus, my key argument in concluding this chapter is that postmillennialism alone in its conservative form retains the historic vision of Christian victory as its central hermeneutic, that was once held far more generally within the Christian church. The concept of Christian victory is not a modern aberration peculiar to postmillennialism but had historical expression in premillennialism and amillennialism. However, it is the absolute opposite intellectual position to both in their modern forms, premillennial dispensationalism and amillennial mysticism. Though postmillennialism is conceptually distinct from dominion theology, it finds natural expression through the militant language of dominion theology because of the practical implications of the viewpoint. The next chapter examines how the humanistic component of the cultural equation emerged before considering, in the following chapter, how it combined with the postmillennial viewpoint to mark the emergence of dominionism.

[1] For example, questions within the premillennial view of “are you pre, post, or mid-tribulation rapture?” are not of interest to us as they do not help us move the main argument regarding dominionism along, but they are certainly interesting questions if a full understanding of “last days” is your interest.

[2] “Koine” or “common Greek” is the name given to the composite Greek dialect associated first with the conquest of Alexander the Great. As his army was drawn from throughout the Greek provinces, the nuances of the provincial languages tended to get lost in the name of military efficiency and the language became more explicit.

[3] Walvoord, Millennial Kingdom, 4.

[4] The term “realized eschatology” is associated with the work of C. H. Dodd, who first published his ideas in The Parables of the Kingdom (1935). Additional comments on this term are found in his revised 1961 edition, especially viii, 164.

[5] Bultmann, “Problem of Eschatology (A),” in History and Eschatology, 38–55.

[6] Price, “Millennial Issue,” 7–10.

[7] Notable modern amillennialists have been Bishop Christopher Wordsworth (b. 1807), Abraham Kuyper (b. 1837), Louis Berkhof (b. 1873), Albert Schweitzer (b. 1875), C. H. Dodd (b. 1884), William Hendriksen (b. 1900), and Malcolm Smith (b. 1940). Berkhof’s amillennial Systematic Theology (1932 and 1949) was highly influential within modern Calvinism. A snapshot of this continuing influence can be found in this review of a digitization of his work: https://www.logos.com/product/5084/louis-berkhofcollection. William Hendriksen’s Israel and the Bible (1968) is considered the “classic representation of replacement theology” (Horner, “Reformed Eschatology,” 4); Malcolm is still living: his website is https://unconditionallovefellowship.com/.

[8] Walvoord, Millennial Kingdom, 49–55.

[9] Calvin was historically thought of as amillennial (Price, “Three Views”) but has also been cited as foundational for postmillennialists (Bahnsen, “Calvin and Postmillennialism”). As noted shortly, some view the amillennial position as derived from the postmillennial position, with the millennium pushed into the distant future.

[10] To the philosophically minded reader, this might sound like “postmodernism.” However, many postmodern approaches to texts, such as found in the deconstructionist movements, deny that a text holds any objective (or “inherent,” or fixed) meaning. This approach to a text is clearly a far more extreme position and the logical consequence of this is that God could not use a text (in this case, the Bible) to teach the people his law or communicate spiritual truths. Though there were attempts to bring such “postmodern hermeneutics” into biblical interpretation, the weaknesses and limitations of the postmodern school is exegeted by philosophical theologians such as Thiselton, Hermeneutics, §§15–17 and postmodernism generally is comprehensively critiqued by Blackburn, both from an ethical perspective, Practical Reason, §9, and as a matter of epistemology (the possibility of knowing anything at all), Truth, 250.

Though such extreme views were very popular in the heyday of postmodernism (1980–2010) and will still find defenders today, few will argue that a text has such a “plasticity” of meaning that it must always fail to communicate what the author is saying. As Blackburn pointed out, the irony of postmodernists arguing about translations of their works exposes the ridiculousness of their own claims. The very reason why you write as an author is because you believe you can communicate meaning within your prose.

The secondary absurdity of the position is that it otherwise makes nonsense of not just religious literature claiming to be the word of God but all kinds of technical and instructional materials also. That is not to deny there is ambiguity; your skill as a writer constantly works to overcome it as you understand where your readers have misunderstood you. As the philosopher Wittgenstein noted, if we do our philosophy in the real world rather than in the abstract of the ivory tower of the academy, we avoid such indulgent and ridiculous excesses of belief.

[11] Though there are many disputes as to how many passages are allegorical, the critical passages are Rev 18–20 (and perhaps 21); see Price, “Three Views” and “Premillennialism.”

[12] The first one hundred years of the church saw it move from a predominantly ethnically Jewish composition to a predominantly Gentile (non-Jewish) composition. This track is already seen in the narrative of the book of Acts, when Paul and Barnabas declare “they go now to the Gentiles” (Acts 18:6). The cultural separation from Judaism was accelerated when the Roman Emperor Nero understood “Christians” were not just another Jewish sect and removed from them the protection afforded to the “official” religions (of which Judaism was one).

[13] Price, “Three Views.”

[14] Parousia is a direct borrowing from the original Greek word, with the literal meaning of “being present” in the sense of “arrival,” and used in Christian theology for the return of Christ.

[15] O’Daly, Augustine’s City of God, 168. O’Daly speculates that ten is the number of the law.

[16] Van Oort, “End Is Now,” 3–5.

[17] Date of composition is given as 412–426/7 in van Oort.

[18] It is this eventual triumph of the church that connects it with postmillennialism in the mind of some commentators and why some see it fundamentally as a degeneration from the postmillennial position in response to a collapse in cultural optimism and humanity’s ability to reform itself. The reciprocal view is also held, that some view postmillennialism as modified amillennialism; we consider the reasons for both positions in the subsequent discussion of postmillennialism.

[19] Augustine, Complete Works, loc. 23756 [1699].

[20] Walvoord (1959) alleges 650, 1,000, and 1,044 in the iterations of post-Augustinian thought in response to the “failures” of Christ to return.

[21] Pentecost, Things to Come, 384.

[22] Masselink, Why a Thousand Years?; Hamilton, Millennial Faith; Düsterdieck, Kritisch exegetisches Handbuch; Kliefoth, Offenbarung des Johannes.

[23] Warfield was often understood as having a postmillennial orientation in his theology that emphasized the triumph of Christianity in history, which is why some consider amillennialism as a degraded form of postmillennialism, spiritualizing events traditionally viewed by the postmillennialists as realized on Earth. We examine this in more detail shortly.

[24] Walvoord, “Millennium Issue,” 430.

[25] Rauschenbusch, Theology for the Social Gospel and Social Principles of Jesus, both published in 1917.

[26] Rauschenbusch, in his early work, enthusiastically endorses and defends a communist version of socialism, with private property viewed as a “transitional phase” of human organization. In his later work, this was far more muted, but it remains a fact of history that many subsequent advocates of the social gospel were socialist progressives politically. It is also notable, though, that he personally remained relatively orthodox in his view of the redemptive work of Christ and the need for personal salvation, in stark contrast to some of his successors that viewed “sin” as societal against the individual, rather than something the individual commits in offense to God. In our modern parlance, this is expressed when someone argues that many “criminals” are in fact “victims” of a society that has wronged them.

[27] Schweitzer, Historical Jesus, 478–87; Bultmann, Presence of Eternity, 138–55; Dodd, Parables, 163–69.

[28] “Historicism,” more generally, was the view that there were deterministic “laws” that governed the course of history. History was moving towards an inevitable consummation. This view of history was associated most vividly with the “left wing,” revolutionary Hegelians and was highly influential on Marx and his successors, who believed the destination of history was the communist utopia. As communism failed and philosophical positivism came to dominate mid-twentieth century science and thought, the historicist theses, with their metaphysical underpinnings, were viewed as fundamentally flawed and “nonsensical.” See Macneil, Foundations, 62–67.

[29] Niebuhr, Nature and Destiny. This was the archetypal post-liberal synthesis of Reformation and Renaissance ideas.

[30] Peters, Theocratic Kingdom, 482–83 (this is a public domain work, and there are digitized versions out there of various quality but no official versions; the version I have is a scanned version of the book itself from a university of library). Chilias is Latin for “one thousand.” The Latin word “mille” also means one thousand, hence the term “millennium” in modern parlance. The central belief of the chiliasts was a belief in a period of a thousand years known as the millennium. In contrast, modern premillennialism is a system of theology and is far more comprehensive, but chiliasts are still considered as representative of early premillennialism.

[31] See Andrew, Peter, Philip, Thomas, John, James, Matthew, Aristio, and John the

Presbyter (all these named as such by ancient historian Papias). In the period AD 100– 200, the list includes Clement of Rome, Barnabus, Ignatius, Polycarp, and Papias (both disciples of John). In the period AD 200–300, Pothinus, Justin Martyr, Melito, Tatian, Irenaeus, Tertullian, Hippolytus, and Apollinaris. See Pentecost, Things to Come, 373–80.

[32] Price, in “Premillennialism,” argued that the tension was so strong that sometimes there was a split into two different events, or perhaps a Jewish and a Gentile messiah.

[33] See, for example, Isa 2:1–5.

[34] 1 Pet 4:13; suffering as a believer and the response to it is a recurrent feature of 1 Peter.

[35] Wright, “Edict of Milan,” 313.

[36] Calvin, Institutes, loc. 20132.

[37] Joachim of Fiore (1135–1202) was the most important example of what is argued by some, such as Price, as the precursor for modern postmillennialism. We discuss this in more detail shortly.

[38] Boettner, Postmillennialism, loc. 67 (this Kindle edition is an abridged form of the original print book The Millennium).

[39] There is clearly some spiritual insight demonstrated by Irving here. You can even accept these passages as demonstrating features of the Christian and the Christian life without accepting they are a linear, historical sequence as he asserted.

[40] MacPherson, Rapture Plot, 74; 124.

[41] Missler, Rapture, loc. 28.

[42] These are listed in the bibliography.

[43] Dispensationalists argue that the book of Revelation reflects this structure literally and sequentially—the first three chapters are the church age, followed by the rapture event of 4:1 (“come up here”), the resumption of the history of Israel paused in Daniel (the period of the antichrist being the “70th week”), a second coming in Rev 19, and final judgment in Rev 20. As we note immediately below, its most attractive, cohering, and distinctive feature is the straightforward mapping to scriptural events. It is of note in Daniel that the word “week” is often an interpretation by the translator of an unqualified Hebrew “seven,” leading some, like Price, “Premillennialism,” to argue that both years and weeks are intended—there were two distinct fulfillments of the passages, one using “weeks” that was fulfilled shortly after the book was written, and another viewed in terms of “years” after the prophetic clock had restarted.

[44] Marsden, Reforming Fundamentalism, 198–200.

[45] The early history of Pentecostalism is slightly contested, with many marking the beginning of the movement as the Azusa street outpouring of 1906–9, out of which many of the large Pentecostal denominations mark as their beginning. However, some Holiness churches had previously added the “third blessing” of speaking in tongues, the Church of God in Christ (COGIC) was founded in 1897, and the Pentecostal Holiness Church (PHC) was founded in 1898. The earliest Pentecostals were known as “Holiness Pentecostals” because of their connection with the Holiness movement.

The Word of Faith movement was most immediately associated with the ministry of Kenneth E. Hagin, who effectively founded it as an independent movement with the establishment of Rhema Bible Training Center in 1963. Though Rhema continues today with multinational campuses, many would consider Kenneth Copeland Ministries (founded 1967) as the “second wave” of the Word of Faith movement, though Copeland himself maintains strong, personal connections with the Rhema movement. However, importantly, the designation is not really denominational in the traditional governmental sense but rather reflects a networked association of autonomous organizations.

This lack of central authority has been both the strength and weakness of the movement, with some of the most egregious scandals originating in its ranks; but owing to this loose, voluntary model, they did not prove fatal to the movement. It should be emphasized that this model of decentralized organization is not confined to just religious organizations in the modern world but is now found widely in business and political contexts.

[46] On occasions, the issue of the status of the modern state of Israel was an explosive controversy within these movements, with some influential magazines strongly arguing against the premillennial view and dismissing the need for support for the modern Jews of the state of Israel. Price, an influential member of the British House church movement, discussed this at length in his “Premillennialism” series, arguing that the shuttering of these publications was a direct result of their refusal to support the modern state of Israel.

It is of note that the issue is once again extremely politically sensitive amongst the Christian right because of the war in Gaza, with a clear separation between those that support Israel and those who do not. Having listened to many discussions on this subject, it is evident that even if the scriptural injunctions to “bless the Jews” are acknowledged, they seem to be sidestepped, either by

citing replacement theology, which, as we have already seen, recasts the church as Israel, thus granting no significance to a political state in the Middle East now known as Israel; or

separating the support for the government of the modern secular state of “Israel” from the support for the Jewish people.

I examine the Israel-Gaza war in detail here: Macneil, “HAMAS vs Israel.”

[47] Walvoord, Millennial Kingdom, 129. Here, Walvoord admits the necessity of permitting fundamentally symbolic language in the apocalyptic genre. Some other premillennialists, such as Price, reject this, insisting on a strict literalism.

[48] Price, “Premillennialism,” pt. 1, 02:00.

[49] Rushdoony, “Postmillennialism 1 and 2.”

[50] The IHOP Church holds uniquely that it is the church that orchestrates the tribulation via a worldwide prayer movement and so remains closest to this victorious coming of the King Jesus after the pattern of the classical premillennialists. Although now “disgraced” because of historical sexual abuse allegations, the founder Mike Bickle spent an enormous amount of time in the book of Revelation and in expounding it.

[51] Bahnsen and Gentry, House Divided, 365–66.

[52] Gary North, “Publishers Forward,” in Bahnsen and Gentry, House Divided, ix–lii.

Planet M Blog

The blog of Dr Michael Pòl Macneil PhD

The Three Main Divisions of “Last Days” Thinking (Eschatology) and Their Relation to Dominion Theology