Sad to say, the history of Christianity has been beset with Christians persecuting other Christians. But how should one begin a heresy defense? I suggest it should be with conciliatory words such as, “Come now, let us reason together” (Isa. 1:18).

Klein, Blomberg, and Hubbard, Jr. in their hermeneutical textbook, Introduction to Biblical Interpretation (also cited by Richard L Pratt, Jr., p. 123, footnote 4) raise two appropriate questions in this regard: “What are we to do when interpreters disagree? How do we proceed when well-intentioned Christians come to different interpretations about the meaning of a text or passage?” Their answer is twofold: First, we should set out precisely the nature of the difference . . . . Second . . . . did either interpreter misconstrue some evidence or engage in shoddy reasoning, or were there other flaws in the process that indicate one of the positions must be relinquished.[4]

Accordingly, this response will address the three major foundational flaws, along with numerous examples of misconstrued “evidence” and engagement in “shoddy reasoning,” that prevents partial preterists from accepting a full preterist understanding. Others will no doubt speak to other flaws contained in Mathison’s book. The three foundational flaws of partial preterism to be covered herein are:

1) “How could anyone possibly believe this?”

2) A false dichotomizing hermeneutic.

3) The deception of the elect.

Before proceeding, however, I must respond to one personal item raised by Kenneth L. Gentry, Jr. Critically and rightly, he pointed out that when I wrote my book Beyond the End Times in 1999, I had “had no formal seminary training.” He then characterized my scholarly deficiency as an “(all too typical) problem” (p. 4) which, in the (full) preterist movement, has produced “a small band of untrained theological innovators” (p. 45) who “feign[s] ‘scholarship’” (p. 61), “are largely unschooled in the standard theological disciplines,” and are “disoriented by theological naivetй” (p. 61). Next, he associated me with classic dispensationalists, “popularizers: Dave Hunt . . . and Tim LaHaye,” with whom I apparently share this similar deficiency (p.4, footnote 14).

Perhaps, Dr. Gentry will be pleased to discover that this has all changed. After the release of Beyond the End Times, I began work on a Ph.D. in Theology from an institution for which he serves as an adjunct professor. In 2003, I finished my courses, successfully defended by dissertation (before three premillennialist professors), and completed my degree. What Dr. Gentry may not be so pleased to discover is that in my now “formally trained” status there is only one thing that I have written previously that I would retract or change. [For more on this, click on “He Never Left” on this site’s home page.[ With that said, let’s begin, as we expose the three foundational flaws of partial preterism.