Full Preterism

[Hitch]

"The Allurement of Hymenaen Preterism" by Jim West

A refutation of hyper-Preterism.

www.the-highway.com

Paul’s Assessment of Hymenaen Theology​

How then should we treat those who embrace Hymennism and yet claim to wear the badge of Christianity? We must look to Paul’s charge to Timothy. Paul tells us that the Hymenns have “erred with respect to the truth” (2 Tim. 2:18). Erring with regard to the truth means that we have erred about the “truth of the Gospel.” His description of the Hymenns is not that they have erred with respect to one truth among many Gospel truths. On the contrary, their error is a capital error; the whole truth has been denied.​

Their preterist resurrection theology has overthrown the faith of some. This is a powerful indictment. Not merely the faith by which we believe, but The Faith that we believe is defeated, destroyed.​

The teachings of the Hymenns are labeled a “canker,” a gangrene, perhaps a cancer. The Greek word could be a medical word or a word describing oxidation. If the former, then, the church is compared to a living organism. A malignancy or a gangrene can only destroy this organism! Hymenn theology is a cancer in the living organism of the church.​

Hymenns also make “shipwreck” of the Faith (1 Tim. 1:19). The shipwreck is a religious shipwreck. Hymennism is not a mere pinhole in the hull of the good ship salvation.​

The upshot is that we should not be referring to the disciples of Hymenus as “beloved brethren,” as “good friends,” as “dear Christian brethren.” They are the enemies of Christ and the enemies of the church. The “sons of the resurrection” should not be taken unawares. Hymenns who are members in Christian churches should be disciplined for their error, even delivered over to Satan so that they would not blaspheme (1 Tim. 1:20).​

If a church unwittingly carries Hymenn books (such as the Leonards’ The Promise of His Coming, or J. Stuart Russell’s The Parousia), these books should be torched or removed immediately. No church should pray God’s speed on the disciples of Hymenaeus. If a church has Hymenn members, let her admonish or rebuke these subverters at once. We dare not give them the Lord’s Supper. We must not let them get away with calling themselves “preterists” or “consistent preterists,” or believers in “fulfilled eschatology.” The word “preterist” is a good word. The disciples of Hymenus are not preterists; their “dispensable eschatology” makes them heretics. What is more, they are antichrists; for only the spirit of antichrist says that Jesus Christ did not come in the flesh (1 Jn. 4 ff). When we interview new members, we need to question them about Christ’s resurrection and ours. Hymenns are not our friends; they are the enemies of the cross. If we deny the future resurrection of the body then we deny the resurrection of Christ. And if we deny the resurrection of Christ’s flesh, then we deny his accomplishment on the cross. The design of Christ’s bodily resurrection was to implement His sacrifice on the cross, when He suffered the wrath of God in his body and in his soul. He came to redeem us in body and in soul (Rom. 8:23; 1 Cor. 6:20).


This is about 1/5 of the article.​

 

[Hitch]

A fine borrowed post on the subject:

Arjun Kandasamy

Few more issues with full preterism can be added to the list of problems.
They have a different ontology of men. biblically and historically in the church humans are a soul body composite. and the separation after death was the problem, even in the time of Paul. the intermediate state was what was mysterious not the end Resurrection where we have our bodies back. also this is not a novel view even the Egyptians believed in physical resurrection in some traditions in the time or before Moses. the full preterist view is actually more Plato's view, that we're merely souls with temporal bodies.
so they reject human ontology as the Bible describes it. we're not fully human if we do not have a body that is why the resurrection is so important that is why Christ himself is resurrected to redeemed mankind body and soul.
second the time text if you take it as literal as full preterism it is more consistent with scripture if you concluded post mill. I'm not there yet with post mill even though I see it's merits. but also you don't have to take the time text literally or even talking about one event I.e the fall of Jerusalem.
it is never wise to take a doctrine that is universally held to and clearly taught by scripture namely the physical Resurrection and modify that to a non-universally held to and confusing doctrine the timing of the second coming.
but also historically this wasn't an issue for the early church. if this is what the church was expecting in Christ didn't return after the destruction this would have been the first controversy splits would have occurred where some said Christ has already returned but there's no record in the church history. and you can't just respond well you're arguing based on absence of evidence. not only is it a nuanced discussion of when and how evidence of absence can be a part of a case for an event it sometimes becomes the most important thing. if the claim is made, X murdered Y but there was no evidence that X ever met why ever in his life nor ever in the same country that actually proves a lot.
The hope for Christians is not heaven the hope for Christians is the resurrection.
and yes it is a problem for 2,000 years church history full preterism was never taught. I'm reformed Protestant, that doesn't mean solo scriptura, it's sola. and also doesn't mean that the creeds and church teaching in history is irrelevant.
the Bible is our only infallible rule of Faith but it is not our only rule of Faith there are secondary ones. church tradition does matter.
that is why when the Reformation happened they didn't just say this is my interpretation. They proved their exegesis and quoted Church fathers to prove that this was in church history all along.
Christ never left his church he guided it through the Holy Spirit it would be impossible for the church for 2000 years to get the main thing wrong, namely the second coming of Christ. that would be like the Jews who rejected the Messiah in his first coming, that is if the church rejected the second coming of Christ after it occurred. and if that was the case there would have been a third movement promoted by the apostles who were still alive and the members of the true church. but arguing that something like this occurred is a conspiracy theory, and the problem with conspiracy theories are their non falsifiable which removes it from being empirical based.
so for full preterism to be true there had to be a full-on rejection of the second coming more severe than the rejection of Christ in its first coming from the church.
also if that was the case that true church died out without any records. and that would also mean it was the false church that collected the New testament scriptures. i.e not guided by the Holy Spirit. and therefore the New testament we're reading was not sovereignly gathered by God through his church it would have been gathered by men through a false church and therefore the legitimacy of the New testament itself become suspect.
and of course there will be a contradiction of what the Bible says mankind is body soul and what the full preterist say merely souls with bodies for temporal use only.
all this plus all the other issues with full preterism, death still being present and so on makes this the unattendable position. that is why full preterism that end up questioning the Trinity, Christ two natures, the church at large are more consistent with their novel view because they have to reject all these things because all these things were built after the second coming where the true Christians already met their judgment and already had "spiritually resurrected bodies", whatever that means.
to me full preterism has the similar hermeneutic issue as those Christians who argue the Bible teaches a flat earth and believes the world is flat. it is a hermeneutic that believes hyper literal is how the Bible ought to be interpreted. and therefore anything when it comes to the resurrection that's all spiritual and not seen in physical life needs to be spiritualized outside this realm.
Sadducees had this issue they rejected Resurrection spirits angels and so on and only focused on this world being the only reality and therefore anything that sounds supernatural is merely spiritual metaphorical and not related to this reality.
full preterism destroys historical Orthodox Christianity. to me it's more akin to an offshoot like Islam then a conversation within the Christian tradition. but if full preterism is true Orthodox Christianity is false and ultimately they're asking us to convert to a different religion similar to Jehovah witnesses and Mormonism. it sounds Christian on the outside but when you look in depth it is very much not Christian but merely uses the language.
this is not what I'm saying all full preterists are claiming what I'm saying is this is what it logically leads to.