Dispensationalism – history and critique #1

I am currently writing and will produce a pdf of around 10,000 words on Dispensationalism and so over the next days (hopefully not weeks!) I will post in bite-size pieces as I write. I will try to take on board any comments into it and who knows… might just affect what I write… though as will become clear I consider the whole framework to be something that is without biblical foundations. I am aware of ‘Progressive Dispensationalism’ (Craig Blaising and Darrell Block) but have never read what they have written. As I understand it they are bringing an adjustment to the hard lines between the ‘dispensations’ and allow for an overlap. They still hold to a ‘rapture’ a ‘millennial rule’ and the ongoing nature of the former covenant with Israel (maybe read what I wrote on ‘all Israel will be saved’ to get my take on that). Anyway here is the first part of what I have written – probably with some spelling mistakes that I hope to pick up… and some grammatical mistakes that will probably remain!).

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‘Dispensationalism’: a big word that describes a recent approach to eschatology (by ‘recent’ I mean in the theological scheme of things, dating only from around 1830). For those unfamiliar with this term, please do not be put off by the word. Let me first greatly simplify it so that we know what lies at its core. At the core is the belief that the church will escape an end-time persecution through what is called the ‘Rapture’, often called the ‘Secret Rapture’.This core element holds that the the church of true believers will be taken from the earth to heaven while everyone else is ‘left behind’ and suffer great tribulation. There is much more to Dispensationalism than this one core belief and in due course I will seek to explain other elements. We can also note that there are those who believe in a Rapture who are not Dispensationalists, but virtually all who believe in a Rapture have been influenced by Dispensationalism.

The overall popularity of this viewpoint in the Western evangelical / pentecostal churches and inevitably the spread of this viewpoint around the world wherever missionaries have travelled means it is not simply a fringe view but deeply influential. The view is also popular because of the sheer amount of popularist literature, such as the ‘Left Behind’ series of books and DVDs, that has been published. And as we will cover later the publishing of the Scofield Bible greatly furthered the cause. It is worth noting that it is not at all popular though at an academic level (perhaps the ‘Progressive Dispensationalist’ school can be seen as having academic credibility)..

I consider the presence of this view is such that it can obscure the centre of eschatology, namely that of the return of Christ and the inauguration of ‘a new heaven and a new earth’. In Dispensationalism that central event gives way to a series of ‘end-time’ events. Dispensationalism is a relative newcomer to the field of theology – this does not make it intrinsically wrong; but it does mean that it should be viewed with the right level of suspicion. This claim that it is only found as far back as 1830, has been challenged in the recent years, with a number of more ancient writings being presented in order to claim that the rapture was taught previously in history.

I will look at three of those writings in what follows but perhaps two aspects, if noted, will weaken this claim to the greater level of historical credibility:

• If (and I will disagree with this claim) the rapture has a level of historical credibility it still remains clear that Dispensationalism as taught from the 1830s has no prior place in theology. The ‘escape’ of the saints can be read into the ancient texts but Dispensationalism cannot be.
• And a major second point is that there is no mention of a rapture or anything alluding to it in any of what might be considered foundational creeds and historical statements of faith. Not to be found in the Nicene Creed (325), the Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed (381), nor the Chalcedonian Creed (451), and the Athanasian Creed (500). It cannot be found in the Augsburg Confession (1530), the Canons of Dort (1618-1619), the Baptist Confession of Faith (1644), the Westminster Confession (1646), nor the Methodist Articles of Religion (1784). It is not recorded in any document that shaped Christian understanding.

Irenaeus (bishop of Lyon, 130-202)

Tradition holds that he was a ‘disciple’ of Polycarp who was a ‘disciple of John, the disciple of Jesus. He wrote,

And therefore, in the end when the Church is suddenly caught up from this, it is said, ‘There shall be tribulation such as has not been since the beginning, neither shall be.’ For this is the last contest of the righteous, in which, when they overcome, they are crowned with incorruption (Against Heresies, 5:29).

The church is ‘suddenly caught up from this’ (tribulation) sounds as if he could be propounding an escape, a rapture of the church prior to the tribulation. If he did mean a rapture, such a view is in distinct contrast to what he wrote three chapters earlier in the same writing. There he wrote,

And they shall lay Babylon waste, and burn her with fire, and shall give their kingdom to the beast, and put the Church to flight.

In that passage, commenting on his understanding of Daniel and Revelation, he clearly indicates that the church is present in and through what he understands to be the tribulation. Perhaps he contradicted himself, but more likely (in the first passage quoted above) he sees the church present through the tribulation for he calls it the last contest and that they overcome, not that the Lord ‘rescues’ them! The ‘caught up’ is not something that occurs before the tribulation but takes place, as he writes, ‘in the end’.

His language in that isolated text could be colonised to suggest he believes in a rapture, but a wider reading of Irenaeus shows that he held to the historic pre-millennial understanding of eschatology. (This is not my position but one that has historical credibility.)

Cyprian (200-258, bishop of Carthage)

Here are two quotes that have been registered as Cyprian’s support for a rapture,

We who see that terrible things have begun, and know that still more terrible things are imminent, may regard it as the greatest advantage to depart from it as quickly as possible. … Do you not give God thanks, do you not congratulate yourself, that by an earlier departure you are taken away, and delivered from the shipwrecks and disasters that are imminent?

Let us greet the day which assigns each of us to his own home, which snatches us hence, and sets us free from the snares of the world, and restores us to paradise and the kingdom (Treatise 7: On the Mortality).

These, I consider, are easily refuted when placed in the historical context. He is writing during a time of plague and persecution. He comforts Christians who feared death; in that context dying in Christ was a blessing, sparing them from the various hardships. Far from being rapture-affirming statements they are affirming that the last enemy, death, has been overcome.

Ephraem the Syrian (4th Century)

The writing that is quoted is in different forms and is now held to be pseudepigrapha and dating from the 6th or 8th century, hence now often referred to as being the work of Pseudo-Ephraem.

The report of these things does not disturb us, nor the spectacle itself. For the elect shall be gathered prior to the tribulation, so they shall not see the confusion and the great tribulation coming upon the unrighteous world.

Again the isolated text could be taken to support a rapturist interpretation, but when read in the wider context of this writing it is clear that the escape is through death, not rapture! Here are quotations from the wider work (emphases added – any comments inside square brackets:

Nation will rise up against nation, And kingdom against kingdom. Lawlessness will be sovereign on earth. And the defiled will pursue after the saints. People will openly apostatize and augment the left side; the righteous ones will suffer indignities from those who belong to the side of the sinners [no escape].

Here we have death as an escape from the persecution; that saints are not raptured away but they suffer while the devil is active on earth persecuting and killing Christians during tribulation is clear in the writings. The writing as a whole and not an isolated text needs to be considered. Here are a few quotes that indicate the presence of believers during the tribulation.

Pronouncing the good fortune of the deceased who had avoided the calamity: ‘Blessed are you for you were borne away [evidently to the grave]) And hence you escaped [by death] from the afflictions!

Then the Evil One will become enraged with the saints at that time; he will draw his terrible sword and sever the necks of the righteous ones {no escape and the saints are persecuted and killed]..

In those days [during the tribulation] people shall not be buried, neither Christian, nor heretic, neither Jew, nor pagan, because of fear and dread there is not one who buries them; because all people, while they are fleeing, ignore them.

There of course could have been writers who believed in some form of rapture (they might have been influenced by texts reflating to Enoch, Elijah or Moses) but there are no mainline writers who held those views and there is no Dispensationalist structure prior to the one developed by J.N. Darby (1800-1882).

Scripture is not focused on an escape but on resurrection:

Everything that the Father gives me will come to me, and anyone who comes to me I will never drive away, for I have come down from heaven not to do my own will but the will of him who sent me. And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me but raise it up on the last day. This is indeed the will of my Father, that all who see the Son and believe in him may have eternal life, and I will raise them up on the last day (John 7:37-40).

No one can come to me unless drawn by the Father who sent me, and I will raise that person up on the last day (John 6:44).

Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood have eternal life, and I will raise them up on the last day (John 6:54).

Resurrection – the hope that is within us. Resurrection was the theological answer to how God will be faithful. If the restoration of all things is the bringing of created things and persons to their fitted conclusion (not their destruction) then a question remains. That question was related to the destiny of those who had departed but were righteous – how will they be rewarded? The belief of the restoration of creation raised the issue of ‘but what about those who have died’ (the very same question that Paul answers in the supposedly core-passage on the rapture!). The resounding answer was that God is faithful and those departed saints will be raised on the last day. Resurrection, not rapture, was and is the hope.