Why is James Stuart Russell's The Parousia not considered orthodox Evangelical?

[Geoffrey]

The Parousia was written by Congregationalist minister James Stuart Russell and published anonymously in 1878. It was later published with Russell's authorship acknowledged in 1887, eight years before his death in 1895.

Russell was never disciplined or excommunicated for The Parousia.

Russell was active in the Evangelical Alliance ( http://www.eauk.org/about/ ) from its inception in 1846 to his death in 1895. The Evangelical Alliance never thought that Russell had placed himself outside Evangelicalism with The Parousia.

The Parousia teaches that Christ's Second Coming took place in A. D. 70, at which time the dead saints were resurrected and caught-up to Heaven, and the living saints were bodily caught-up to Heaven.

The Parousia also teaches that Revelation 20:5-10 (unlike the rest of Revelation) is still unfulfilled.

In short, The Parousia does not deny the Second Coming or the physical reality of the general resurrection. It simply claims that those wonders (like Christ's resurrection and the parting of the Red Sea, for example) actually happened in biblical days.

Neither does The Parousia teach that evil and suffering will last forever. Revelation 20:5-10 still hasn't happened.

Granted, some (perhaps many) "full preterists" are outside the bounds of Evangelicalism, but then again so are some Christians who believe that the Second Coming and the general resurrection are still future.

But Russell's The Parousia is within the bounds of Evangelicalism.

[Kelp]

Interesting question. I'd like to hear the answer as well.

[Geoffrey]

Kelp, thank you for reminding me of this thread. :)

My question still stands. Many contemporary full preterists fall into one or both of the following heretical errors:

1. They deny the physicality of the resurrection body.

2. They deny that sin and suffering will one day come to an end.

James Stuart Russell's The Parousia makes neither of those heretical errors.

The book clearly teaches the physicality of the resurrection body (whether Christ's body or the body of a resurrected saint).

The book also teaches that Revelation 20:5-10 still hasn't been fulfilled. Therefore, The Parousia isn't stuck with teaching that our sinful and suffering Earth will always remain full of sin and suffering.

In short, I think we need to distinguish between Evangelical full preterism (as taught by Russell in The Parousia) on the one hand, and heretical full preterism (as taught by those denying a physical resurrection body and/or who deny that sin and suffering will someday cease) on the other.

[Dee Dee Warren]

Guys, don't get lost in the heretical preterism gooblegook. Read this one sentence and don't choke on your biscuits when you realize that all of the people who lived through AD70 were "caught up into heaven" and "raptured" but didn't realize it.

The Parousia teaches that Christ's Second Coming took place in A. D. 70, at which time the dead saints were resurrected and caught-up to Heaven, and the living saints were bodily caught-up to Heaven.

In short, The Parousia does not deny the Second Coming or the physical reality of the general resurrection. It simply claims that those wonders (like Christ's resurrection and the parting of the Red Sea, for example) actually happened in biblical days.

You should be a politician. You almost made a pile of crap smell sweet.

[Dee Dee Warren]

I would describe the effect of reading Russell's text as 'epiphanic.'

I would describe the effect of reading any hyperpreterist text nauseating.

For examples of how hyperpreterists have dishonestly tried to paint Russell as receiving unqualified commendations from Spurgeon, I invite the reader here:

http://www.preteristsite.com/wordpress/?p=109

[Dee Dee Warren]

I don't feel like going through the trash right now. Geoffrey offered a good gastro-intestinal disturbing summary above, as I did in my post responding to him.

I have no desire to wade through crap on this Christmas. I feel dirty for months after reading hyperpreterist twaddle.

[Geoffrey]

Guys, don't get lost in the heretical preterism gooblegook. Read this one sentence and don't choke on your biscuits when you realize that all of the people who lived through AD70 were "caught up into heaven" and "raptured" but didn't realize it.







You should be a politician. You almost made a pile of crap smell sweet.

Darth Xena, it sounds like you are responding to many contemporary full preterists rather than to Russell's The Parousia. According to Russell, all the believers caught up to Heaven in A. D. 70 were taken physically to Heaven, and ever since then they have been living, body and soul, in the direct presence of the Holy Trinity in Heaven.

That is a distinctly different claim than those contemporary full preterists who teach that believers were "caught up to Heaven" and "raptured" and "resurrected" in A. D. 70 but didn't realize it. Russell did not teach that sort of nonsense. Instead, he taught that what happened to Elijah (i. e., being transformed into an immortal body and physically ascending into Heaven) happened to all true believers who were living in A. D. 70, and he taught that what happened to Jesus (i. e., being resurrected in an immortal body and physically ascending into Heaven) happened to all true believers who were dead in A. D. 70.

In short, I agree with you, Darth Xena, that such contemporary full preterists are heretical. But I think it inaccurate and therefore unfair to paint Russell with that same brush. He did not believe in the heresies of contemporary full preterism.

[Geoffrey]

Darth Xena, in the afterword of The Parousia, Russell is most explicit that a literal resurrection and rapture of the saints took place in A. D. 70:

What evidence, for example, may be reasonably required that the most seemingly incredible event predicted in Matt. 24:31, and in 1 Thess. 4:17, commonly denominated "the rapture of the saints," actually took place? The principal, if not the only, portion that seems to come within the cognizance of human sense, is the removal of a great multitude of the disciples of Christ from this earthly scene. We might expect, therefore, that there should be some trace in history of this sudden disappearance of so vast a body of believers. It surely must have made a blank in history; a failure, at the least, in the continuity of the records of Christianity. Admitting that the predictions do not require an absolute and universal removal of the whole body of the faithful (for it is manifest that there is a clear distinction made between the watchful and the unwatchful, the ready and the unready, and that as many might be shut out of the kingdom as those who went in), yet the language of the prophecy certainly implies the sudden and simultaneous removal of a very great number of the faithful. Is there, then, any vestige in history of such a blank? Most certainly there is, and just such an indication as we might expect. A silence which is expressive. Silence where, a moment before, all was life and activity. The ecclesiastical historian will tell you that the light suddenly fails him. The Christian Church of Jerusalem, of which an apostle could say, "Thou seest, brother, how many myriads there are among the Jews which have believed," suddenly dwindles into two wretched sects of Ebionites and Nazarenes. Where are the many myriads of St. James? Where are the hundred and forty and four thousand" whom St. John saw, with the seal of God on their foreheads, and standing with the Lamb on the Mount Zion? Did they perish in the siege of Jerusalem? Certainly not; for it is universally agreed that, forewarned by their Divine Master, they retired from the doomed city to a place of safety. Yet they seem to disappear and leave no trace behind. Ask the ecclesiastical historian to put his finger on the spot where the records of early Christianity are most obscure, and he will unhesitatingly point to the period when the Acts of the Apostles end. Of this period the learned Neander says that, "We have no information, nor can the total want of sources for this part of Church history be at all surprising." And, again, he speaks of "the age immediately succeeding the Apostolic," of which we have unfortunately so few authentic memorials ("Planting and Training," chaps. v. and x.). Hiudekoper, a Dutch theologian, in his work entitled, "Christ's Descent to the Under-world," remarks that

"On leaving the Apostolic age we almost lose sight of the Christians in a historical chasm of sixty or eighty years."

...
It remains for the reader to consider, whether the causes suggested in the preceding quotations furnish an adequate explanation of this singular phenomenon; or whether the solution of the problem is not to be found in the actual occurrence of the events predicted by our Lord and His apostles. There, in the written record of Inspiration, stand the ineffaceable words which foretell the speedy return of the Son of Man to judge the guilty nation and avenge His own elect. His coming was indissolubly connected with that same generation. The attendant circumstances of His coming are set forth with marked precision. Everything points to a sudden, swift, far-reaching catastrophe, analogous to that which took place "in the days of Noah when the flood came, and took them all away," or in the days of Lot, when the tempest of wrath overwhelmed Sodom and Gomorrah. These are the very images used by our Lord to describe the suddenness and swiftness of His appearing. No wonder that there should be a "total blank" in contemporary history; that there should be a solution of continuity in the records of the Christian Church; that the pen of St. Mark should be arrested in the midst of an unfinished sentence; that St. Luke should abruptly break off his narrative of the life and labors of St. Paul. Grant that there is no failure in the predictions of Christ; that His words had a veritable accomplishment; and all is explained. There is an adequate cause for the otherwise unaccountable hiatus which occurs in the Christian history of the time, and for the total obscuration of the Church, and all its greatest luminaries. Is it unreasonable to ask that the plainest declarations of the Lord Himself, and of His inspired witnesses should obtain a candid hearing, and a cordial belief, from all who own Him as Lord and Master? Surely that robust faith is not utterly extinct, which once could say, "Let God be true, and every man a liar."

(link: http://www.preteristarchive.com/Book...afterword.html )

[All bolding is my own emphasis.]

In short, Russell teaches that the literal, physical Rapture of the saints took place in A. D. 70. All true Christians suddenly disappeared from the Earth. Indeed, the Rapture took place at the very moment that St. Mark was writing the unfinished 16th chapter of his gospel.

This is completely and utterly different than the non-literal "resurrection" and "rapture" taught by some contemporary full preterists.

Further, Russell teaches that there is still prophecy that remains unfulfilled: Revelation 20: 5-10.:

1. It is evident that this passage is direct prophecy, and not a visionary representation taking place before the eyes of the Seer. It is not introduced by the usual formula in such cases, ‘And I saw,’ but in the style of prophetic prediction.

2. It is evident that the prediction of what is to take place at the close of a thousand years does not come within what we have ventured to call ‘apocalyptic limits.’ These limits, as we are again and again warned in the book itself, are rigidly confined within a very narrow compass; the things shown are ‘shortly to come to pass.’ It would have been an abuse of language to say that the events at the distance of a thousand years were to come to pass shortly; we are therefore compelled to regard this prediction as lying outside the apocalyptic limits altogether.

3. We must consequently regard this prediction of the loosing of Satan, and the events that follow, as still future, and therefore unfulfilled. We know of nothing recorded in history which can be adduced as in any way a probably fulfillment of this prophecy. Westein has hazarded the hypothesis that possibly it may symbolise the Jewish revolt under Barcochebas, in the reign of Hadrian; but the suggestion is too extravagant to be entertained for a moment.

4. There is an evident connection between this prophecy and the vision in Ezekiel concerning Gog and Magog (chaps. xxxviii. xxxix.), which is equally mysterious and obscure. In both the scene of conflict is laid in the same place, the land of Israel; and in both the enemies of God meet with a signal and disastrous overthrow.

5. The result of the whole is, that we must consider the passage which treats of the thousand years, from ver. 5 to ver. 10, as an intercalation or parenthesis. The Seer, having begun to relate the judgment of the dragon, passes in ver. 7 out of the apocalyptic limits to conclude what he had to say respecting the final punishment of ‘the old serpent,’ and the fate that awaited him at the close of a lengthened period called ‘a thousand years.’ This we believe to be the sole instance in the whole book of an excursion into distant futurity; and we are disposed to regard the whole parenthesis as relating to matters still future and unfilfilled. The broken continuity of the narration is joined again at ver. 11, where the Seer resumes the account of what he beheld in vision, introducing it by the familiar formula ‘And I saw.’

(link: http://www.preteristarchive.com/Book...ousia_03g.html )

[All bolding is my own emphasis.]

This is in utter contrast to many contemporary full preterists who teach that there will never, ever be an end to sin and suffering, and who teach that the present order of the world will just go on, and on, and on...

Instead Russell taught that a major prophetic event still lies in our future: namely, the final victory over Satan and his hordes.

Darth Xena, I am in accord with you that typical contemporary full preterism is a negation of the gospel hope. If we are not to be physically resurrected, and if evil and suffering are not to be one day eradicated, then Christianity would be a most gloomy creed. Thank God that these full preterists are wrong. But we should not misrepresent Russell as teaching these heresies. Thank God that Russell does not teach these gloomy errors that strike at the very heart of Christianity.

[Theolog]

Russell's book merely is an exegesis of every "return of Christ" verse in the New Covenant without the binding presuppositions that those who adhere to the mindless parroting of tradition. It is very excellent reading for those who are interested in "BIBLICAL THEOLOGY" and seeking the truth. It is consistent Biblical hermeneutic and most certainly puts all futurists to shame.

Our hope is "Christ in us". and it is not some earthly physical trip. It's spiritual.

I just love it when you guys talk about something that you really know nothing about, and are completely incapable of understanding. You take a Preterist statement and cram it in your paradigm then conclude that it does not work without the feeblest idea of what full Preterism is about and never realizing that your basic paradigm is out to lunch.

The whole idea that Christ and the Apostles was talking to a group of people 2000 years later is pure Looney tunes. Christ and the Apostles were talking to those people in that generation and addressing the events that were going happen in that generation. How egotistical to think it was talking about this generation thousands of years later.

Then to think that the New Covenant age is not here is tantamount to blasphemy. Denying that the Kingdom of God is here, yes, two thousand years later is surely a false gospel if ever there was one. Jesus Christ is King of creation. His throne is in heaven not under some rubble pile in that hellhole of the middle east. Heaven is in heaven.,,, duhhhhhh not earth. Heaven is heavenly , not earthly.

Hello everybody. Christ died for your sins so when this body dies you can go and live there, with Him, in heaven. It’s a done deal. The only thing you need to do is repent and believe in Jesus/God.

[Teresias]

Dog Brother,

Well put! And a great synopsis of a much vilified text.

I would go a step further and suggest that Russell put an end to "doublethink" which he calls the double sense theory.

For those unaquainted with the concept, doublethink is mental cheating. "Doublethink means the power of holding two contradictory beliefs in one’s mind simultaneously, and accepting both of them." Nineteen Eighty-Four p.223 An example of doublethink is the "immediately" phrase used by Jesus in Matthew Chapter 24. 'Christians' routinely subject the word to doublethink by making "immediately" mean "eventually."

I would go a step further and suggest that Russell clearly saw the Bible as The Book of the Jews. It was written by them and for them. Russell calls the Revelation "The Last Days of the Jews." How enlightening. Bela Banathy, a systems thinker said that the beginning of wisdom is to call things by their right names. Russell attempted just that by reading the sacred texts with an objectivity and clarity rarely witnessed.

Dog Brother, my Nebuchadnezzar's Dream owes its anachronistic lens to Russell. Have a look at my attempt at meaning-making and give your opinion if you have time.

All the best,

Teresias

[Theolog]

Dog Brother,

Well put! And a great synopsis of a much vilified text.

I would go a step further and suggest that Russell put an end to "doublethink" which he calls the double sense theory.

For those unaquainted with the concept, doublethink is mental cheating. "Doublethink means the power of holding two contradictory beliefs in one’s mind simultaneously, and accepting both of them." Nineteen Eighty-Four p.223 An example of doublethink is the "immediately" phrase used by Jesus in Matthew Chapter 24. 'Christians' routinely subject the word to doublethink by making "immediately" mean "eventually."

I would go a step further and suggest that Russell clearly saw the Bible as The Book of the Jews. It was written by them and for them. Russell calls the Revelation "The Last Days of the Jews." How enlightening. Bela Banathy, a systems thinker said that the beginning of wisdom is to call things by their right names. Russell attempted just that by reading the sacred texts with an objectivity and clarity rarely witnessed.

Dog Brother, my Nebuchadnezzar's Dream owes its anachronistic lens to Russell. Have a look at my attempt at meaning-making and give your opinion if you have time.

All the best,

Teresias

Hey Teresias Thanks for the positive reply. Your comments are right on. Yes double think is the problem.

Clearly scripture is talking about first century events. Although double meanings may have a place in hermunitics somewhere it is hard to believe this is the case in "The Parousia".

Somehow the logic of simi-Preterist or partial-Preterist smells in a very stinky way. I suspect emotionalism is their problem. It seems to be their gut feeling that the God of Grace and mercy is coming back to distroy the New covenant world. "The Parousia" lists all the verses concerning the return of Christ and if the Bible is true then it happened as predicted in "THAT GENERATION".

[Teresias]

Hey Teresias Thanks for the positive reply. Your comments are right on. Yes double think is the problem.

Clearly scripture is talking about first century events. Although double meanings may have a place in hermunitics somewhere it is hard to believe this is the case in "The Parousia".

Hello Again Dog Brother,

I culled the following excerpt from James Stuart Russell's much maligned text, "The Parousia." Russell's quote bespeaks profound respect for the authors of the sacred Jewish texts:

"'I hold that the words of Scripture were intended to have one definite sense, and that our first object should be to discover that sense, and adhere rigidly to it. I believe that, as a general rule, the words of Scripture are intended to have, like all other language, one plain definite meaning, and that to say that words do mean a thing merely because they can be tortured into meaning it, is a most dishonourable and dangerous way of handling Scripture.'"- -Canon Ryle, Expository Thoughts on St. Luke, vol. i. P. 383.

Bye for now!

[Christian><>]

Thanks for this post. I recently listened to episodes 30 and 31, both of which Dee Dee was a guest on another show, and in one of them, I don't remember which, she mentioned the Parousia and Russell as heretical hyper preterist. I had read The Parousia a few years ago, when I was first investigating full preterism, as I was first embracing the truth of Orthodox Preterism. I had a hard time buying the idea that there was a division, so I wanted to read the full preterist arguments. I read Russell's book thinking that it was full, but was surprised by the above statements to find that he wasn't...

I was going to send Dee a question about it and found this. I wish she'd respond.

[Theolog]

Never kick a sleeping dog.