Steve at Undeception has written another cogent argument for full preterism, this time focusing on the Great White Throne judgment. Most people have assumed this is a reference to the judgment at the end of all history, the end of the world, but Steve finds further evidence of its fulfillment in the first century. He ties together Revelation 20, the Mt. Olivet discourse (Matthew 24) and the Parable of the Sheep and the Goats:
“When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on the throne of his glory. All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats, and he will put the sheep at his right hand and the goats at the left. [...] And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.” (Matthew 25:31-33, 46 – NRSV)
Compare the highlighted language with Jesus’ words in Matthew 24; especially note the separation of sheep and goats with the gathering of “the elect” in Matthew 24:31.
Steve’s argument continues that because this judgment is in the past, Sheol is destroyed. The implications are that everyone who dies now (and who has died since 70AD) “receives [their] reward or judgment immediately upon death.” He finds consistency in Revelation 14:
“And I heard a voice from heaven saying, ‘Write this: Blessed are the dead who from now on die in the Lord.’ ‘Yes,’ says the Spirit, ‘they will rest from their labours, for their deeds follow them.’” (Revelation 14:13 – NRSV)
If I may tangent away from Steve’s text for moment: for “their deeds”, go back to the Parable of the Sheep and Goats:
“Then the king will say to those at his right hand, ‘Come, you that are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world; for I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me.’ Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry and gave you food, or thirsty and gave you something to drink? And when was it that we saw you a stranger and welcomed you, or naked and gave you clothing? And when was it that we saw you sick or in prison and visited you?’ And the king will answer them, ‘Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me.’”
“Then he will say to those at his left hand, ‘You that are accursed, depart from me into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels; for I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did not give me clothing, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.’ Then they also will answer, ‘Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not take care of you?’ Then he will answer them, ‘Truly I tell you, just as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.’” (Matthew 25:34-45 – NRSV)
Live according to the Kingdom now and you will be added to the righteous in Heaven. Live in yourself and you will be added to the goats, eternally separated from the presence of God.
Steve concludes:
“Chiefly, this parable is yet another proclamation of the irrelevance of race in the New Covenant. It is remarkably parallel to the parables of the Wedding Banquet and the Ten Virgins (the latter which Jesus recounted immediately prior to the Sheep and the Goats parable), in which the importance of ethnic Israel is shown to pass away with the Old Covenant. This story was meant to rankle the Jewish leaders of the time. For them, the only imaginable outcome of this judgment was that the division of sheep and goats would go straight down the line: Law-keeping Israel as the sheep, all other nations as the goats. Yet shockingly, in what I think is probably the primary point of the parable, Jesus puts all nations on equal footing, scandalously lumps Jew and Gentile together, and determines who are wicked and who are righteous based on His own standard, a right He has as the King Who came (cf. Daniel 7:13, “He was given authority, glory and sovereign power; all peoples, nations and men of every language worshiped him.”). The discerning Shepherd distinguished acts of compassion prompted and empowered by regenerate believers from rote implementation of a particular race’s rules and regulations, discriminated behavior from ethnicity, and this is how the Shepherd determined who was who.”
Be sure to read the entire article if you’re even the least bit interested in understanding a preterist view of things.
6 Comments
If the Son of Man came in his glory, and all the angels with him, and he sat on the throne of his glory, and all the nations were gathered before him, all in AD70, how come there is no record of this great event in church or secular history?
Well, Peter, check out Isaiah 13. This was a prophecy of judgment on Babylon. Note especially verses 10 and 13.
“For the stars of heaven and their constellations will not flash forth their light. The sun will be dark when it rises, and the moon will not shed its light.”
Similarly, Isaiah 19:1 has God coming on a cloud in judgment of Egypt. No historical records of that, either. Ezekiel 32, Amos 8, etc. use the same sort of apocalyptic language that Jesus used, yet we have been conditioned to view Jesus’ diction in isolation from that of the Old Testament.
In short, you are taking the language of the Olivet Discourse as a prophecy of literal, observable events. Yet look at what Jesus said in Luke 17:20-25:
“The coming of the kingdom of God cannot be observed, and no one will announce, ‘Look, here it is,’ or, ‘There it is.’ For behold, the kingdom of God is among you.” Then he said to his disciples, “The days will come when you will long to see one of the days of the Son of Man, but you will not see it. There will be those who will say to you, ‘Look, there he is,’ (or) ‘Look, here he is.’ Do not go off, do not run in pursuit. For just as lightning flashes and lights up the sky from one side to the other, so will the Son of Man be (in his day). But first he must suffer greatly and be rejected by this generation.”
Some latch on to the “lightning” imagery and say, “See! It’s an observable event!” Rather I think He’s saying that His coming would not be geographically bound to one single location as a literal “coming on the clouds” demands, but that the effects of the Kingdom would be worldwide in effect (think of how lightning starts in one spot and flashes around the whole sky). But whatever the meaning you take from this imagery, remember that Jesus seemed to think that this imagery did not contradict His claim a few verses before that the establishment of the Kingdom would not be observable.
I’m curious, Steve. The first part of the Mt. Olivet discourse (Matthew 24:4-22) does refer to actual physical observable events. The Christians’ escape from Jerusalem in 70AD is seen to be rooted in Jesus’ warning here. How do you reconcile a change from these literal, observable events to what you’re reading as the non-literal apocalyptic language in the second part of Matthew 24?
Interesting question, ElShaddai. Consider these points.
1) “The first part” you mention actually extends through verse 28. This is all instruction (don’t be alarmed, flee, don’t believe false prophets, etc.), aimed, as you suggested, at Jesus’ immediate audience, the disciples. They had just asked for the sign of His coming, and He was answering their question.
2) Then in verse 29, as even the NIV’s footnotes point out, Jesus basically starts re-capitulating Isaiah’s imagery from Isa 13:10 and 34:4. Having divulged the signs of His coming that, incidentally, definitely occurred in the disciples’ lifetime, and having given instructions on how to abide this time, He then goes on to describe the meaning and significance of the events He’s been predicting by situating it in the familiar language of the prophets. He returns to instruction, this time parabolic, in verse 32 and again in 42ff through chapter 25. Jesus is using a wide range of genre here.
3) I do not mean to suggest that there were no observable, physical events surrounding the Second Coming. Clearly, the Roman siege (which lasted close to four years) was observable. What was not observable was what was going on behind those physical events, i.e. in the realm of the spirit. Plenty of modern students of history read about the destruction of Jerusalem under Titus and “observe” it, but they don’t know what God was accomplishing through those physical events. Apocalyptic imagery is revelatory: it reveals what’s going on behind the veil of the physical and observable. Thus these physical events with spiritual significance transpired in the very same way that God’s holding the right hand of Cyrus (Isa 45:1) was observable insofar as God’s will was accomplished through Cyrus’ conquests.
Steve, I deliberately didn’t mention cosmic signs like darkened sun, moon and stars. I asked about the coming of the Son of Man with the angels (or messengers), and about the gathering of the nations. These are apparently observable events. How were they fulfilled in AD70? Was Vespasian or Titus the Son of Man (as I think Josephus implied) and their armies the angels? Or did Jesus come again in some secret and unobservable way and hide in a cave, like the Shia Muslims’ hidden Mahdi? You have to have some kind of answer to this question, not just say that it was unobservable.
I just can’t see how they are even apparently observable, Peter. For one thing, Isaiah 19:1 supplies the terminology of the Lord coming on a cloud in what must be an unobservable, non-literal event. When, in Daniel’s vision, the Son of Man went before the Ancient of Days “on the clouds”, do you think that was literal and observable? Coming on the clouds with a heavenly host is language pulled from the same source as the “cosmic signs” you referred to that were obviously not literal events: that source is OT prophetic literature. Every Jew of the time would have seen it.
Another thing people don’t think about is how “every eye” that is supposed to be able to see Him coming physically can do so without a flat earth and some extraordinary high-powered telescopes. The “broadcast live on television” argument doesn’t cut it, since plenty of homes the world over are still, and will be for quite some time, without televisions.
Again, I just can’t see how one can dichotomize the “coming on the clouds” language and the cosmic signs language. We’ve got to be better-versed in the literature of the Old Testament when we read the New Testament.