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You don't have a god in you, you are one.
-- Kenneth Copeland, "The Force Of Love" tape # 02-0028
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Preterism: The Dispensational Kook Factor
Posted on Wednesday, September 21 @ 16:43:14 PDT by Virgil |
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By Gary DeMar
Some dispensationalists are dangerous. When Jews were being exterminated under Adolf Hitler’s anti-Jewish policy, a number of prominent dispensational writers believed that prophecy had set the course of inevitability for the Jews. According to dispensationalism, two-thirds of the Jews will be killed during a future “great tribulation” (Zech. 13:8). This led some to advocate a “hands off” approach when millions of Jews were being taken to concentration camps and marched into gas ovens. Bible prophecy had made it so.
A new dangerous kook book has been published: Eye to Eye: Facing the Consequences of Dividing Israel. The advertisement for this book states that the author “provides undeniable facts and conclusive evidence showing that indeed the leaders of the United States and the world are on a collision course with God over Israel’s covenant land.” The author’s argument is that the recent spate of “major catastrophes transpired on the very same day or within 24-hours of U.S. presidents Bush, Clinton and Bush applying pressure on Israel to trade her land for promises of ‘peace and security,’ sponsoring major ‘land for peace’ meetings, making major public statements pertaining to Israel's covenant land and/or calling for a Palestinian state.”
If God is so concerned about Israel and her land, then why didn’t He send an earthquake to swallow up the Palestinians who were given the land by Ariel Sharon, a Jew? Why send a hurricane to punish New Orleans when the real culprits are those who are calling for Israel’s extermination? Why punish the United States when we have been Israel’s greatest defender? What nation protected Israel during the first Gulf War and continues to send billions of dollars in aid?
The advertisement for the book claims that the several catastrophic disasters that have hit the United States are a fulfillment of Zechariah 12:9: “And it shall come to pass in that day, that I will seek to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem.” It seems to me that the nations coming against Israel are not being destroyed. Notice that Zechariah 12 uses the phrase “all the nations.” For a dispensationalist, this must mean every nation in the world today. So why punish just the United States? As I point out in my book Zechariah 12 and the “Esther Connection,” Zechariah 12 is a description of events that happen soon after the prophecy was given. The events described in Esther are a perfect fit to what Zechariah 12 predicts. “All the nations” were those under the domain of the Persian empire throughout its “127 provinces” from “India to Ethiopia” (Esther 1:1) that Haman had called on “to destroy all the Jews, the people of Mordecai, who were throughout the whole kingdom of Ahasuerus” (3:6). “All nations” is used this way throughout the Bible (e.g., Dan. 4:1; 1 Chron. 14:17; 2 Chron. 32:23; Jer. 28:11; Ps. 118:10; Acts 2:5).
The author of Eye to Eye is selective in the disasters he picks. How do the following fit his scenario?:1
1. Galveston (Texas) Hurricane, 1900, estimated 8,000 deaths
2. Great Okeechobee Hurricane in Florida, 1928, estimated 2,500-plus
3. Johnstown, Pa., Flood, 1889, estimated 2,200-plus
4. Louisiana Hurricane, 1893, 2,000-plus
5. South Carolina-Georgia Hurricane, 1893, 1,000–2,000
6. Great New England Hurricane, 1938, 720
7. San Francisco Earthquake, 1906, 700
8. Georgia-South Carolina Hurricane, 1881, 700
9. Tri-State Tornado in Missouri, Illinois and Indiana, 1925, 695
10. Labor Day Hurricane that hit the Florida Keys, 1935, 405
Then there’s World War I and World War II, Pearl Harbor, the Korean War, and the Vietnam War. What is their prophetic significance? The nation of Israel has no prophetic significance today.
(Order Zechariah 12 and the "Esther Connection" by Gary DeMar)
Footnotes:
1. http://www.breitbart.com/news/na/D8CK94T07.html
Gary DeMar is president of American Vision and the author of more than 20 books. His latest is Myths, Lies, and Half Truths.
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Re: The Dispensational Kook Factor (Score: 2, Interesting)
 by Virgil on Wednesday, September 21 @ 16:48:12 PDT
(User Info | Send a Message) | Gary beat me to writing a column about this book. WorldNet Daily is carrying the book (Eye to Eye: Facing the Consequences of Dividing Israel), but this is hardly news since they are a hardcore dispensational outfit.
Excellent analysis Gary! |
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- by coderguy on Wednesday, September 21 @ 22:34:05 PDT
- by Virgil on Thursday, September 22 @ 05:43:25 PDT
- by coderguy on Thursday, September 22 @ 07:49:41 PDT
- by leslie on Thursday, September 22 @ 09:10:02 PDT
- by coderguy on Thursday, September 22 @ 07:50:04 PDT
- by Virgil on Thursday, September 22 @ 07:57:24 PDT
- by coderguy on Thursday, September 22 @ 13:36:03 PDT
- by EWMI on Friday, September 23 @ 05:55:10 PDT
- by zerubbabel on Friday, September 23 @ 06:38:02 PDT
- by EWMI on Friday, September 23 @ 06:46:46 PDT
- by coderguy on Friday, September 23 @ 13:06:41 PDT
- by EWMI on Friday, September 23 @ 17:48:23 PDT
- by Jer on Friday, September 23 @ 06:19:47 PDT
Re: The Dispensational Kook Factor (Score: 1)
 by Slippery on Thursday, September 22 @ 07:15:54 PDT
(User Info | Send a Message) | | What's funny about our Dispy brethren is that God only judges America for abortion, homosexuality, and not being offacious towards Israel. All other national sins such as racism, pornography etc are granted immunity. |
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- by Virgil on Thursday, September 22 @ 07:43:05 PDT
- by coderguy on Friday, September 23 @ 13:48:01 PDT
Re: The Dispensational Kook Factor (Score: 1)
by Virgil on Thursday, September 22 @ 18:31:50 PDT
(User Info | Send a Message) | | "stupid" and "idiotic" are not comments worthy of this website, so if you will use these words, don't expect your comments to be tolerated. You guys are better than that. |
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- by zerubbabel on Thursday, September 22 @ 21:48:03 PDT
- by daveedwards on Friday, September 23 @ 07:34:31 PDT
Re: The Dispensational Kook Factor (Score: 1)
by zerubbabel on Thursday, September 22 @ 18:57:21 PDT
(User Info | Send a Message) | The same absurd logic can be used against preterism. Preterists believe that Jesus taught that Jerusalem would be destroyed within one generation (dispensationalists agree based on Luke’s Gospel but also look for a future eschatological judgment.)
According to this absurd logic therefore, the first century Christians WANTED Jews to be slaughtered simply because they KNEW it was coming!
That’s the ridiculous accusation being made against dispensationalists!
As for Esther being the fulfillment of Zechariah, this is a novel idea and demonstrates the serious trouble preterists have in dealing with Zechariah. DeMar used to go to great lengths to try to show Zechariah fulfilled in A.D. 70. He couldn’t do it! What are all the preterists going to do now…jump on this new bandwagon?
BTW, what were all the German preterists doing to help the Jews during WWII?
Zerub
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- by Virgil on Thursday, September 22 @ 19:04:10 PDT
- by demario on Thursday, September 22 @ 20:19:54 PDT
- by zerubbabel on Thursday, September 22 @ 21:06:53 PDT
- by Virgil on Friday, September 23 @ 06:29:15 PDT
- by zerubbabel on Friday, September 23 @ 06:58:02 PDT
- by coderguy on Friday, September 23 @ 13:14:21 PDT
- by NB9M on Monday, September 26 @ 10:48:28 PDT
Re: The Dispensational Kook Factor (Score: 2, Informative)
by demario on Thursday, September 22 @ 20:00:00 PDT
(User Info | Send a Message) | In response to "Coderguy":
"[DeMar] makes it sound as if dispensationalists were out there helping Hitler because of their beliefs."
This is nonsense. The issue is the logical implications of dispensationalism. Dispensationalsists teach that two-thirds of the Jews living in Israel during a future Great Tribulation will be slaughtered, an event that Ryrie describes as "Israel's greatest bloodbath." While preterests teach that Zechariah 13:8 has been fulfilled, and Jesus warned the Jews to leave Judea, dispensationalists are thrilled when Jews return to the land where they know "the people of Israel . . . are placing themselves within the vortex of this future whirlwind which will destroy the majority of those living in the land of Palestine" (Walvoord, Israel in Prophecy, 113). The documentation on this is extensive. Walvoord wrote that "Israel is destined to have a particular time of suffering which will eclipse any thing that it has known in the past" (Israel in Prophecy, 107). Notice the word "destined." The first-century church spent 40 years warning the inhabitants of Judea to flee the coming judgment (Matt. 24:15-22). Why aren't dispensationalists warning Jews to flee the land of Israel today since they know what is "destined" to take place? For some, there is no escape. Sid Roth, host of "Messianic Vision," on the September 18, 1991, edition of the "700 Club," stated that "two-thirds of the Jewish people [living in Israel] will be exterminated." Pat Robertson asked Roth: "You don't forsee some kind of persecution against Jews in America, do you?" Roth responded: "Unfortunately, I believe God forsees this."
"DeMar provides no documentation of this. I know, he believes that Dwight Wilson's book provides such information. However, DeMar continues to stretch the truth in order to continue his trashing of dispensationalism."
The article Virgil posted on PP was an editorial. I've documented the material elswhere. You even mention one of the sources: Dwight Wilson's Armageddon Now! There is also Timothy P. Weber's On the Road to Armageddon. I suggest you read chapter 5: "Dispensationalism's Dark Side." It supports everything Wilson writes and more. Weber notes that "Dispensationalism was not inherently anti-Semitic any more than it was por-Hitler, though it could appear to be both thanks to extremism of certain Bible teachers" (152). It's the fact that these "certain Bible teachers" were so popular that makes their arguments so troubling. I find it interesting that you mention David Rausch. It was Rausch who edited an expurgated edition of Arno C. Gaebelein's anti-semitic tract The Conflict of the Ages, removing all the references to The Protocols of the Elders of Zion so as not to leave the impression that Gaebelein might have had anti-semitic tendencies. The Conflict of the Ages remained in print through 1953. If you don't have a copy of this book, I would be happy to send you one. I have several. For an exchange between Rausch and Weber, I suggest that you pick up the March 1981 issue of the Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society.
"Not only have scholars like David Rausch and more recently Jim Owen of The Master's College in his book "The Hidden History of the Historic Fundamentalists" disputed claims like those of DeMar, they have shown the essential falsehood that he keeps repeating."
I have not read Jim Owen's book, but I will get a copy even though it will cost me $50.00! I noticed that the title of his book is about "fundamentalism," a very broad category, not necessarily dispensationalism. I will read it carefully to see if he deals with this present topic and how he answers the extensive research of original source material presented by Wilson and Weber. Of course, if you read Weber, you will notice that he does mention that a "few dispensationalists believed that the Protocols was a crude, anti-semitic forgery" (131), but their voice of opposition was d
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- by zerubbabel on Thursday, September 22 @ 20:58:16 PDT
- by demario on Friday, September 23 @ 08:33:12 PDT
- by zerubbabel on Friday, September 23 @ 11:44:21 PDT
- by coderguy on Friday, September 23 @ 13:38:55 PDT
- by demario on Monday, September 26 @ 07:14:15 PDT
- by coderguy on Monday, September 26 @ 10:41:59 PDT
- by demario on Tuesday, September 27 @ 08:57:01 PDT
- by zerubbabel on Tuesday, September 27 @ 09:58:36 PDT
- by coderguy on Wednesday, September 28 @ 22:17:57 PDT
Some dispensationalists are dangerous (Score: 1)
by EWMI on Friday, September 23 @ 06:03:50 PDT
(User Info | Send a Message) | In late 2002 I preached a message called: "Why American Preachers Want War" in it I spoke about the high power Dispy's who demanded action against "The Butcher of Baghdad". I quoted a Deutche Welle article that stated that Jordan asked Israel if it could govern the Hashemite peoples of Iraq after Iraq had broken up.
I told my congregation that the West would invade and then foment a civil war in Iraq. Recently we have read of 2 British soldiers who were caught by Iraqi's as they attempted to plant a car bomb.
Recently I preached a similar message about American Dispys who are pushing for war against Syria and Iran.
I was right then and it looks like I am right now.
Some dispensationalists are dangerous! |
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- by Slippery on Thursday, September 29 @ 13:27:43 PDT
- by EWMI on Thursday, September 29 @ 13:49:31 PDT
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