A wise explanation of the soundness of a renewed (i.e. critical) inquiry into AD70 Dispensationalism is given by Sam Frost - "Since I have left the movement, after being Full Preterist for 19 years, and teaching, lecturing and writing for 9 years, and having received from my peers the title of “leader” among other “leaders” within the movement, I have seen these tendencies from the outside; while inside, I buried my head, or smoothed over the rough patches.  After all, we gotta keep this movement alive at all costs.  To turn back now would damage the credibility of what we have taught and sacrificed for so long.  We would look like fools, wouldn’t we (one Full Preterist has called me this publically since I left).  Rather than admit error, we proceed.  It can’t be wrong!  Such thinking will secure the firm conviction that a movement of this caliber will not survive."

Spotlighting How Many Theologies Currently Self-Labeled "Full Preterism" Really Aren't

This new classification is also holding pen for reconsideration of works previously labeled as "Hyper Preterism".  Includes the works of nominal Full Preterists who have in actuality do not hold to the heretical dispensationalism of the teaching that "ALL Bible prophecy was fulfilled by AD70" -- Most mistakenly self-apply the label "Full Preterists" (Including "Postmillennial Paradise Preterists" such as David Chilton; or, "Immortal Body at Death" Preterists such as Arthur Melanson and Idealist/Eclectic Preterists such as Patrick Stone)

Any theology that goes beyond teaching that "All Bible Prophecy Was Fulfilled by AD70" is not really full preterism.   Sam pointed this out while discussing the theology of David Chilton:

"What (Chilton) understood “full” Preterism to be, and what it is today, are virtually two different things." (Pt. 2)

John L. Bray is another example of a man who, though calling himself a full preterist, teaches theology that in no way qualifies as such.   If the line between Orthodox Preterism and Hyper Preterism wasn't one of heresy, the distinction wouldn't matter so much.

Full Preterism will always mean the limitation of all prophetic events to no later than AD70.. we can thank R.C. Sproul for cementing that definition.  Either Full Preterism must embrace the fulfillment of prophecy post AD70 - which it will never do - or a different classification is in order for those preteristic theologies which do.  that is what this page tries to offer.

IdealisticPreterism.jpg by Patrick Stone

GENERAL IDEAS PROGRESSING ESCHATOLOGY...
..PAST THE DEAD-END OF AD70.

Can God's Grand Redemptive Plan Really Be Reduced to the a single generation and a single city?   Would you do that with the Cross of Christ, likewise a historical event in a particular generation and city ? Here are compelling reasons why the simplistic approach to time texts and revelations may be pointing in the wrong direction

• Scott Hahn "I was originally attracted by Max King and J. S. Russell, but subsequently rejected their view that 70 AD exhaustively fulfills NT prophecy. Personally, I have come to conclude that the main error of "hyper-preterism" is based on the common failure to recognize the theological significance of the biblical (and ancient Jewish) view of Israel's temple as a "microcosm" (i.e., the cosmos in miniature), which implies that the cosmos itself was seen as a "macro-temple" (see Ps 104, Job 38).  Accordingly, the divinely decreed destruction of the Jerusalem (microcosmic) temple was itself a typological event, one that foreshadows the future destruction of the cosmos (i.e., as macro-temple). The destruction of the Jerusalem temple is thus a true -- but partial -- fulfillment, which implies a partial non-fulfillment, thus pointing to a still greater fulfillment in the future, when the cosmos undergoes the same divinely decreed destruction as the Jerusalem temple. An integral interpretation of NT prophetic texts is rooted in the scriptural view of creation, set forth in terms of temple typology (see Hebrews 9:1-12). What happens to the temple must eventually happen to the cosmos; the resurrected body of Christ is the New Temple, which will be fully manifested in glory only when the old cosmos undergoes the same transformative judgement of God, thus bringing forth a New Creation -- which the Apocalypse rightly describes as the Divine Temple (Rev. 11:18ff) of the New Jerusalem (Rev. 21:22)." (comments, ca-anathema, 2003)

• Jake Magee (2008) "I believe that this value for chronological fidelity is one that should be taken seriously and would do much to dispel much extravagant thinking within eschatology, as well as to enrich our understanding of history. However, I think many who support it have adopted an unfortunate and unnatural prophetic reductionism that makes the prophetic portraits of Scripture feel like wearing one’s high school pants – too tight and too restrictive. I contend that genre of language found in places like the Olivet Discourse and the book of Revelation allows for a more flexible reading of chronological markers (e.g., “this generation” “the time is near”), and in fact requires a qualified exception of the interpretive rule which says that the right interpretation is the one the audience would have understood." (Cautioning Preterism)

• Joseph Wood (1906) "Inspiration is that which is of universal application. If any utterance is only for an age, and local in its interpretation, we do not regard it as inspired. The Psalms, for instance, were mostly suggested by local considerations, the trials, the joys, the experiences of David and others, under peculiar circumstances. But, nevertheless, we feel as we read them that they pass beyond the limits of the local and the individual— they belong to humanity—they are true of human nature and life everywhere. Or take Christ's prophecy of the destruction of Jerusalem. It was spoken at Jerusalem about Jerusalem, and in a manner which seemed limited to Jerusalem. But had the prophecy been true only of that city of sorrows, it would never have been regarded as inspired. Whereas Christ's principle was this : that the doom pronounced on Jerusalem was universally applicable, and that it was but a style and specimen of God's judgment everywhere. The judgment comes wherever there is evil grown ripe for judgment, wherever corruption is complete. And the gathering of the Roman eagles to the carcase is but a specimen of the way in which judgment at last overtakes any city, any country, and any man in whom evil has reached the point where there is no possibility of cure. We who have lived through the last fifty years have seen the eagles gathered together in Naples, in America, in France, in Bulgaria. The Lord's judgment on Jerusalem has been fulfilled many times—it was not simply of local but of universal application." (The Bible, what it is and is not [lects.], p. 97)

• Charles Homer Giblin "In effect, Luke's lesson apropos of his account of Jerusalem's destruction is to be construed as a question prompted in the typed reader's mind: If this is what happened to Jerusalem because of the way Jesus and those who represent him, his disciples, were treated, what will happen to my city/nation/society if he (and his followers, who stand for him) are treated similarly? What am I, as a respected man with some influence, expected to do?"

• Peter J. Leithart: ""[T]ropologically, the history of Jerusalem can be understood as a model for the history of the soul (secundum tropologiam).  Just as David conquered Jerusalem and set up the Lord's throne there, so Jesus, His Son, conquers the inner city of the sinner and consecrates him as a saint, a holy one." (Peter Leithart, Ascent to Love, pp. 22)

• Jonathan Edwards : Folly of Looking Back in Fleeing Out of Sodom "Jerusalem was like Sodom, in that it was devoted to destruction by special divine wrath; and indeed to a more terrible destruction than that of Sodom. Therefore the like direction is given concerning fleeing out of it with the utmost haste, without looking behind, as the angel gave to Lot, when he bid him flee out of Sodom.  If it be inquired why Christ gave this direction to his people to flee out of Jerusalem, in such exceeding haste, at the first notice of the signal of her approaching destruction; I answer, it seems to be, because fleeing out of Jerusalem was a type of fleeing out of a state of sin. Escaping out of that unbelieving city typified an escape out of a state of unbelief. Therefore they were directed to flee without staying to take anything out of their houses, to signify with what haste and concern we should flee out of a natural condition, that no respect to any worldly enjoyment should prevent us one moment, and that we should flee to Jesus Christ, the refuge of souls, our strong rock, and the mount of our defense, so as, in fleeing to him, to leave and forsake heartily all earthly things."

• "Tropological Sense" of Jerusalem