This prepublication book is an  updated version of my Master of Arts (Studies in Philosophy and Religion) dissertation which obtained a Distinction at the University of Bangor in North Wales in 2016.  My supervisor for the dissertation, now Emeritus Professor Eryl Davies,[1] said that it would be “an absolute tragedy” if it was to remain gathering dust on the library shelves and encouraged me to publish it.  That has remained frustratingly out of reach until now but post my doctoral studies and the successful publication of a book based on those studies,[2] I am pleased I have been able to revisit, update and prepare it for publication, receiving further encouragement and assistance from Professor Davies to do so.  As such it is an academic work, but it is accessible enough so that anyone with an interest in this controversial subject can engage with it effectively in these pages.

It examines “dominion theology” (sometimes known as “Reconstructionism,” “Kingdom Now” or “Dominionism”) from its roots in eschatological thinking regarding the triumph of Christ throughout the world, through the Reformation and into the late modern period.  Particular attention is then paid to the sociological, political and theological upheavals of the 19^th and 20^th century with its rise of secular humanism and the work of one man, R.J. Rushdoony, in creating a coherent Christian critique and his subsequent development of a sociological programme of reform.   He was applying the seminal thought of Reformed apologist Cornelius Van Til who had himself been influenced by Kuyper’s Neo Calvinist philosophy of sphere sovereignty.  Kuyper, an enormous and underappreciated intellect[3] of the second part of the 19^th century, had offered a searching critique of modernism whilst embracing the tools of modernity,[4] and had argued for distinct modal spheres of human culture, in which the church had an ethical regulatory role but to which it was not to dictate or censor.  This concept was itself a recapitulation and modernisation of the Reformation emphasis on the legitimacy of and the equal value between the different “vocations” of human culture in opposition to the strict division between the religious and the secular, the priesthood and the laity, and the belief in the pre-eminence of the former.  This tyrannising over culture and the separation of laity and priesthood had been the cornerstone of the domination of culture by the Roman Catholic hegemony for almost a thousand years, with the absolute authority of the papacy in matters of cultural and scientific disputes.  This book stands firmly in the Reformation tradition.

This book extends and develops substantially the content of the thesis upon which it is based, partly because of the passage of time and improvements in my own understanding, but chiefly because the thesis was subject to a strict word limit,[5] providing little opportunity to develop the argument beyond the narrow principal theme of establishing the orthodoxy of the position in response to its persistent portrayal as an extreme, fanatical form of Christianity both from outside and within Christianity.  I believe it provided and still provides an emphatic and coherent answer to that important historical question but this constraint on its content was reflected in a question posed by a reviewer at the time who had made the comment, “so what are you going to do now you have established this orthodoxy, what practical use is it?” [6] The additional material represents the broad contours of an answer to that question, and the book subsequently differs most substantively from the original thesis by:

1. Adding in what might be called the sociological and political application of the position by outlining what I call a “philosophy of Christian involvement.”[7]
2. Updating the content to include recent literature, developments and innovations within the Christian community.
3. Where my thought and understanding have matured, particularly on those philosophical issues covered in depth within my doctoral studies, and I can better express what I was sometimes struggling to express in the thesis, I have added new material, rewritten sentences or paragraphs or added an explanatory footnote to direct to my further discussions of the issues in question.

Finally, I believed and still believe Dominion theology is the most coherent form of Christian cultural thinking, and I commend careful consideration by the reader of what is written here.  It represents a measured and critically thought through response to those who for whatever reason, be it fear, genuine ignorance, misunderstanding or maliciousness, have sought to misrepresent the position.  It is very much a sister volume to my doctoral work[8] and in this updated form, it is every bit as intellectually rigorous.  It will provide substantive apologetic material for the believer seeking an intellectual defence of their faith beyond the pop-apologetics and cowardly dispensationalist eschatologies of our time.

Michael Macneil, August 10^th, 2025.

[1] When I graduated for my Master’s Professor Davies, was a distinguished Old Testament scholar and Head of the School, he was made Emeritus a year later.

[2] Macneil, “Epistemological Self-Consciousness.”  The book has significant overlap and represents the development of some of the philosophical themes of this book, which were introduced but were not fully developed as they were not central to the emphasis here where we undergo an extended historical and theological analysis of the Dominionist movement. However, it will be of great interest to the reader interested in exploring the philosophical assumptions of Dominion theology, which in turn govern its application in sociological and political contexts.

[3] I consider his remarkable cultural and political achievements in Macneil, Abraham Kuyper, Culture and Art, where I also offer an explanation as to why he is a figure that has been generally ignored outside the parochial boundaries of the Reformed world.

[4] Such as the scientific and technological advances of the period.  Kuyper was at his most impatient with the religious conservatives suspicious of the innovations of modernity, founding the Free University of Amsterdam, two broadsheet papers, founded a political party, and served as Primeminister of the Netherlands between 1901 to 1905.

[5] The Masters was a “taught Masters,” with 4 x 10000-word essays on a range of subjects and a dissertation of 20000 words (as opposed to a “Research Masters” which had a single 60000-word dissertation). All of my coursework essays were also marked at ‘Distinction,’ and I was encouraged to publish those also but owing to working fulltime alongside my studies as well as remarrying in 2015 with all the responsibilities that brings, it is almost a decade later that I am finally getting round to getting those submissions ready, but they can be found in their original form on my blog, https://planetmacneil.org/blog/ .

[6] The questioner was the principal of a Bible college in Hungary, so it was worthy of consideration.

[7] Stated most fully in Macneil, “Politics.”

[8] I recommend reading this book alongside my book Foundations of Philosophy based on my doctoral studies for those scholars seeking a deeper understanding of some of those philosophical issues. As I noted previously, in this book they were often only introduced here as adjuncts or background to the main ‘theological’ arguments and purpose of this book.