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Dispensationalism is a theological framework for interpreting the Bible which maintains that history is divided into multiple ages called "dispensations" in which God interacts with his chosen people in different ways.[1]: 19  It is often distinguished from covenant theology.[2][3] These are two competing frameworks of Biblical theology that attempt to explain overall continuity in the Bible. Coining of the term "dispensationalism" has been attributed to Philip Mauro, a critic of the system's teachings, in his 1928 book The Gospel of the Kingdom.[4][5]

Dispensationalists use a literal interpretation of the Bible and believe that divine revelation unfolds throughout the Bible. They believe that there is a distinction between Israel and the Church, and that Christians are not bound by Mosaic law. They maintain beliefs in premillennialism, Christian Zionism, and a rapture of the Church that will happen before the Second Coming of Christ, generally seen as happening before a period of tribulation.[6]

Dispensationalism was systematized and promoted by John Nelson Darby and the Plymouth Brethren in the mid-19th century.[7]: 67  It began its spread in the United States during the late 19th century through the efforts of evangelists such as James Inglis, James Hall Brookes and Dwight L. Moody, the programs of the Niagara Bible Conference, and the establishment of Bible institutes. With the dawn of the 20th century, Cyrus Scofield introduced the Scofield Reference Bible, which crystalized dispensationalism in the United States.

Dispensationalism has become popular within American evangelicalism. It is commonly found in nondenominational Bible churches, as well as Baptist, Pentecostal, and Charismatic groups.[8][9] Protestant denominations that embrace covenant theology tend to reject dispensationalism. According to the system's critics, most theologians acknowledge that there is no specific sequence of end-times events defined in the Bible. The Scofield Bible has been called "the most dangerous heresy currently to be found within Christian circles".[7]: 13 

Overview

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Dispensationalism is a theological framework that views history as divided into distinct periods in which God interacts with mankind in specific ways. Scofield, in his Scofield Reference Bible, defined a dispensation as "a period of time during which man is tested in respect of obedience to some specific revelation of the will of God".[7]: 23 [4][1]: 19 

Charles Ryrie took issue with Scofield's definition as too simple, stating that such a definition opened the system to attack from nondispensationalists.[7]: 23  Ryrie separates the term age from dispensation, stating that the two terms are not synonymous in meaning while defining a dispensation as "a distinguishable economy in the outworking of God's purpose".[7]: 28  He further suggests that the defining characteristics of a dispensation are the distinct governing relationship in which God interacts with mankind during that period, and the resulting responsibility placed upon mankind in that period.[7]: 33 

Evangelical Christians generally agree that there are distinct periods in God's plan for humanity.[10] Dispensationalist theologians tend to hold "a particular view of the parallel-but-separate roles and destinies of Israel and the [Christian] church", with a "careful separation ... between what is addressed to Israel and what is addressed to the church. What is addressed to Israel is 'earthly' in character and is to be interpreted 'literally'."[3][2]

This view is distinct from covenant theology, which holds that rather than having separate plans, "God has one people, one people of God throughout redemptive history, called 'Israel' under the Old Testament, and called 'the church' under the New."[2]

Philip Mauro, a critic of the system's teachings in his 1928 book The Gospel of the Kingdom, is considered to be the first to coin the term "dispensationalism" to describe the theological framework that had made inroads into fundamentalism, calling it "a subtle form of modernism".[4][5]

Typical divisions

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The number of dispensations may vary from three to eight, but the typical seven-dispensation scheme is as follows:[7]: 51–57 

  • Innocence – Adam under probation prior to the Fall of Man. Ends with expulsion from the Garden of Eden in Genesis 3. Some refer to this period as the Adamic period or the dispensation of the Adamic covenant or Adamic law.
  • Conscience – From the Fall to the Great Flood. Ends with the worldwide deluge.
  • Human or Civil Government – After the Great Flood, humanity is responsible to enact the death penalty, and has the authority to govern. Ends with the dispersion at the Tower of Babel. Some use the term "Noahide law" in reference to this period of dispensation.
  • Promise or Patriarchal Rule – From Abraham to Moses. Ends with the refusal to enter Canaan and the 40 years of unbelief in the wilderness. Some use the terms "Abrahamic law" or "Abrahamic covenant" in reference to this period of dispensation.
  • Law – From Moses to the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. Ends with the scattering of Israel in AD 70. Some use the term "Mosaic law" in reference to this period of dispensation.
  • Grace – From the cross to the rapture of the church seen by some groups as being described in 1 Thessalonians and the Book of Revelation. The rapture is followed by the wrath of God, constituting the Great Tribulation. Some use the term "Age of Grace" or "the Church Age" for this dispensation.
  • Millennial Kingdom – A literal 1000 year reign of Christ on earth (Revelation 20:1–6), centered in Jerusalem, ending with God's judgment on the final rebellion.
Dispensational schemes Bible chapters
Genesis 1–3 Genesis 3–8 Genesis 9–11 Genesis 12 – Exodus 19 Exodus 20 – Birth of the Church Church Age – Rapture Revelation 20:4–6 Revelation 20–22
7 or 8 step Innocence
or Edenic 		Conscience
or Antediluvian 		Civil Government Patriarchal
or Promise 		Mosaic
or Law 		Grace
or Church 		Millennial Kingdom Eternal State
or Final
4 step Patriarchal Mosaic Ecclesial Zionic
3 step (minimalist) Law Grace Kingdom

Variants

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Theology

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Purpose of God in the world

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According to John Walvoord, God's purpose in the world is to manifest his glory.[11]: 92  Charles Ryrie writes that dispensational soteriology focuses on man's salvation as the means God uses to glorify himself.[7]: 40 

Biblical literalism

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Main article: Historical-grammatical method

A key element of dispensationalism is its use of the historical-grammatical hermeneutic to obtain a consistent, literal interpretation of the text.[12] In this method, scripture is to be interpreted according to the normal rules of human language in its entirety.[7]: 80  This leads dispensationalists to take eschatological passages in the Bible literally. Charles Ryrie suggests that a non-literal hermeneutic is the reason amillennialists apply Old Testament promises made to Israel "spiritually" to the church, and covenant premillennialists see some prophecies as fulfilled and others as not.[7]: 90 

Progressive revelation

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Main article: Progressive revelation (Christianity)

Progressive revelation is the doctrine that each successive book of the Bible provides further revelation of God and his program. Theologian Charles Hodge wrote that the progressive character of divine revelation is gradually unfolded until the fullness of truth is revealed.[13] Charles Ryrie wrote that the Bible is not viewed as a textbook on theology, but rather as a continually unfolding revelation of God through successive ages where there are distinguishable stages in which God introduces mankind to new responsibilities.[7]: 33 

Covenant theology and dispensationalist theology disagree regarding the meaning of revelation. Covenant theology views the New Testament as the key to interpreting the Old Testament.[7]: 32  For dispensationalists, the Old Testament is interpreted on its own and the New Testament contains new information which can build on the Old Testament but cannot change its meaning.[14] Each stands alone, rather than the Old Testament being reread through the lens of the New Testament.[12]

Distinction between Israel and the Church

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Dispensationalists see a historic and demographic distinction between Israel and the Christian Church. For them, Israel is an ethnic nation consisting of Hebrews (Israelites), beginning with Abraham.[7]: 127  The Church, on the other hand, consists of all saved individuals from the "birth of the Church" in the book of Acts until the time of the rapture.[15] Classic dispensationalists refer to this period as a "parenthesis", a temporary interlude in the progress of Israel's prophesied history when God has paused his dealing with Israel and is dealing with his Church.[16][7]: 134,177 [17]: 410 

There are differing views within dispensationalism as to when the church age began. Classic dispensationalism considers Pentecost in Acts 2 to be the beginning of the Church as distinct from Israel.[18] Charles Finney wrote in 1839 that Pentecost was "the commencement of a new dispensation", emphasizing the role of the Holy Spirit as a distinction.[19]: 87  Cyrus Scofield did not make Pentecost itself the turning point, but did emphasize its role in dividing the dispensations of "Law" and "Grace".[19]: 88  In contrast, hyperdispensationalists suggest that the church started later in Acts ("Mid-Acts") with the ministry of Paul, identifying the start of the church as occurring between the salvation of Saul in Acts 9 and the Holy Spirit's commissioning of Paul in Acts 13.[20][21] E. W. Bullinger and the ultradispensationalists taught that the church began in Acts 28.[21] According to progressive dispensationalism, the distinction between Israel and the Church is not mutually exclusive, as there is a recognized overlap between the two.[22]: 295  The overlap includes Jewish Christians like James, brother of Jesus, who integrated Jesus's teachings into the Jewish faith, and Christians of Jewish ethnicity who held varying opinions on compliance with Mosaic law, like Saint Peter and Paul the Apostle. Progressive dispensationalism "softens" the Church/Israel distinction by seeing some Old Testament promises as expanded by the New Testament to include the Church without replacing the promises to its original audience, Israel.[23]

The Law

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Dispensationalists believe that Christ abolished the Mosaic law, and thus it does not apply to the Christian. Instead, the Christian is under the Law of Christ, which embodies moral principles from God that are in both codes.[24][25]: 71  In this view, although many commandments of the Old Testament are re-established in the New Testament, only the commandments explicitly affirmed there are to be kept; this excludes the ceremonial and civil aspects of the Mosaic law.[25]: 71 

Eschatology

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Further information: Premillennialism and Rapture

Dispensationalism teaches an eschatology that is explicitly premillennial, in that it affirms the return of Christ prior to a literal 1,000-year reign of Jesus Christ on earth as the fulfillment of Old Testament prophecies.[7]: 147–148  This millennial kingdom will be theocratic in nature, and not mainly soteriological in the way George Eldon Ladd and others with a non-dispensational form of premillennialism have viewed it.[6] It will be distinctly Jewish, with the throne of David restored.[1]: 31 

The majority of dispensationalists profess a pretribulation rapture. Mid-tribulation and post-tribulation rapture are minority views.[26][27] Pre-tribulational rapture doctrine is what separates dispensationalism from other forms of premillennialism and other millennial views.[17]: 409 

Dispensational eschatology was popularized in Hal Lindsey's book, The Late Great Planet Earth (1970). In Lindsey's version, the unfolding of events includes the establishment of modern Israel in 1948, Jews regaining control of Jerusalem's sacred sites in the 1967 Arab-Israeli War, a rebuilding of the Temple which has yet to occur, an Antichrist who will come to power, Christians to be removed from the earth in a rapture of the Church, and seven years of tribulation (Daniel's seventieth week) culminating in a great battle of Armageddon in which Christ will triumph over evil and establish a literal 1,000 year reign of his kingdom on earth.[28] Israel and the Church being distinct in this view, the rapture must remove the Church before remnant Israel can be gathered.[1]: 42 

History

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Timeline of the history of dispensationalism, showing the development of various streams of thought

Proto-Dispensationalism

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Advocates of dispensationalism have sought to find similar views of dispensations in Church history, referencing theologians or groups such as Francisco Ribera, the Taborites, Joachim of Fiore, Denis the Carthusian and others.[29][30] Joachim's theory of three stages of human history has been argued to have anticipated the later dispensationalist view of organizing history into different dispensations.[7]: 65  Joachim's stages were divided into the "Age of the Father" which was under the Law, the "Age of the Son" which was a period of tribulation, and the "Age of the Spirit" which was a period of bliss on earth.[31]: 155 

Pierre Poiret is seen as a forerunner of Dispensationalism.
Scofield followed Isaac Watts's (1674–1748) divisions of the dispensations.[7]: 67 

Fra Dolcino (c. 1250 – 1307) taught Fiore's theory of the stages of history, and dispensationalists Mark Hitchcock and Thomas Ice have suggested that Dolcino's teaching was of a pretribulational rapture.[31]: 157  The relevant teaching was that when Antichrist appears, Dolcino and his followers would be taken away and preserved from Antichrist, and that following the death of Antichrist, Dolcino and his followers would return to Earth to convert those then living to the true faith.[31] However, the source is an anonymous 1316 Latin text titled The History of Brother Dolcino, so it is uncertain whether Dolcino actually taught it.[31]: 158-159 

William C. Watson has argued that multiple 17th century Puritan theologians anticipated dispensational views. In his book Dispensationalism Before Darby (2015), he argues that Ephraim Huit (1595–1644) and John Birchensa (in his book The History of Scripture published in 1660) taught that God has differing plans for Jews and Gentiles. Watson also argues that Nathaniel Holmes (1599–1678) taught a pretribulational rapture.[29]

Christian mystic and philosopher Pierre Poiret (1646–1719) is said by some to have been the first theologian to develop a dispensationalist system, writing a book titled The Divine Economy. Poiret taught that history should be organized into multiple dispensations in which God works with humans in different ways, including the millennium as a future dispensation.[32] Poiret's eschatology includes a belief in two resurrections, the rise of the Antichrist, and the nation of Israel being regathered, restored and converted.[6][29] Poiret divided history into seven dispensations: early childhood (ended in the Flood), childhood (ended in Moses's ministry), boyhood (ended in Malachi), youth (ended in Christ), manhood (most of the Church era), old age ("human decay", meaning the last hour of the Church), and the restoration of all things (the Millennium, including a literal earthly reign of Christ with Israel restored).[7]: 65 

Isaac Watts (1674–1748) presented a dispensational view in a forty-page essay titled "The Harmony of All the Religions Which God Ever Prescribed to Men and All His Dispensations Towards Them".[33] Charles Ryrie states that Scofield's outline of dispensationalism, with the exception of the millennium, is exactly that of Watts, and not Darby.[7]: 67 

Edward Irving (1792–1834) in some ways anticipated dispensationalism. He used a literal approach to prophetic interpretation, he believed in a restoration of Israel as a nation, and he believed there would be a great apostasy and Christ would return to establish a literal earthly kingdom.[6] But he also preached that Christ had a fallen nature, which led to him being defrocked by the Scots Presbyterians.[6][34]

Formalization by Darby

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John Nelson Darby systematized and promoted dispensationalism.

Dispensationalism developed as a system from the teachings of John Nelson Darby (1800–1882), considered by many to be the father of dispensationalism.[22]: 10, 293  Darby strongly influenced the Plymouth Brethren of the 1830s in Ireland and England. The original concept came when Darby considered the implications of Isaiah 32 for Israel. He concluded that prophecy required a future fulfillment and realization of Israel's kingdom. He saw the New Testament church as a separate program not related to that kingdom. Thus arose a prophetic earthly kingdom program for Israel and a separate "mystery" heavenly program for the church. In order to not conflate the two programs, the prophetic program had to be put on hold to allow for the church to come into existence. Then the church would need to be raptured away before prophecy could resume its earthly program for Israel.[35]

In Darby's conception, dispensations relate exclusively to the divine government of the earth. The Mosaic dispensation continues as a divine administration over Earth up until the return of Christ, and the church, being a heavenly designated assembly, is not associated with any dispensations.[36]

Darby's Brethren ecclesiology failed to catch on in America, but his eschatological doctrine became widely popular, especially among Baptists and Old School Presbyterians.[37]: 317 

Expansion and growth

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James Inglis (1813–1872) introduced dispensationalism to North America through the monthly magazine Waymarks in the Wilderness, published intermittently between 1854 and 1872.[38]: 100–102  In 1866, Inglis organized the Believers' Meeting for Bible Study, which introduced dispensationalist ideas to a small but influential circle of American evangelicals.[38]: 132–133  They were disturbed by the growth of religious liberalism and saw premillennialism as an answer. Dispensationalism was introduced as a premillennial position, and it took over the evangelical movement in the course of several decades. The American church denominations rejected Darby's ecclesiology but accepted his eschatology.[38]: 101  Many of these churches were Baptist and Old School Presbyterian; they retained Darby's Calvinistic soteriology.[37]: 317 

After Inglis's death, James H. Brookes (1830–1898), pastor of Walnut Street Presbyterian Church in St. Louis, Missouri, organized the Niagara Bible Conference (1876–1897) to continue dissemination of dispensationalist ideas. Brookes was well known within millenarian circles, both as a prominent speaker at the Believers' Meeting for Bible Study conferences and for having written articles published in Inglis's Waymarks in the Wilderness.[38]: 134 

D. L. Moody

Brethren theologian C. H. Mackintosh (1820–1896) had a profound influence on American evangelist Dwight L. Moody (1837–1899),[39][40]: 49  who reached very large audiences with his powerful preaching in the latter half of the 19th century.[41] Moody worked with Brookes and other dispensationalists, and encouraged the spread of dispensationalism.[40]: 46–47  It was during this time that dispensational doctrine became widely accepted among American evangelicals.[42]: vi  It also marked a shift in dispensational theology under evangelists like Moody, from Darby's Calvinism and doctrinal rigor to a non-Calvinist view of human freedom in personal salvation.[19]: 46 

Other prominent dispensationalists in this period include Reuben Archer Torrey (1856–1928), James M. Gray (1851–1925), William J. Erdman (1833–1923), A. C. Dixon (1854–1925), A. J. Gordon (1836–1895), and William Eugene Blackstone (1841–1935). These men were active evangelists who promoted a host of Bible conferences and other missionary and evangelistic efforts. They also gave the dispensationalist philosophy institutional permanence by assuming leadership of new independent Bible institutes, such as the Moody Bible Institute in 1886, the Bible Institute of Los Angeles (now Biola University) in 1908, and Philadelphia College of Bible (now Cairn University, formerly Philadelphia Biblical University) in 1913. The network of related institutes that soon developed became the nucleus for the spread of American dispensationalism. When the Bible Institute of the Chicago Evangelization Society (now Moody Bible Institute) formally opened in 1889, Torrey served as its first superintendent.[43]

Revivalist evangelicals such as Moody and Torrey did not believe the gift of tongues continued past the Apostolic age, but their emphasis on the baptism of the Holy Spirit merged well with holiness ideas. This encouraged the spread of dispensationalism within the Pentecostal movement.[19]: 94 

During this time, Anglican clergyman E. W. Bullinger (1837–1913) began teaching what became known as "ultradispensationalism" or "Bullingerism". Bullinger taught that the Church did not begin until Acts 28, that the Lord's Supper and water baptism were for Jewish believers, and that Paul's epistles were written to the Jews.[21]

Scofield and his influence

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Cyrus Scofield

A disciple of James Brookes, Cyrus Scofield (1843–1921) began attending the Niagara conferences and became an advocate of premillennialism, specifically pre-tribulationism.[38]: 223  After several years of work, Scofield introduced dispensationalism to a wider audience in America through his Scofield Reference Bible. Published in 1909 by the Oxford University Press, the Scofield Reference Bible was the first Bible to display overtly dispensationalist notes on the same pages as the biblical text. Use of the Scofield Bible became popular among independent Evangelicals in the United States.[38]: 222–224  Its premillennialism led to a pessimistic social view within evangelicalism, to "not polish the brass rails on the sinking social ship", so that evangelism came to be focused on saving the lost rather than expanding Christendom.[42]: 5 

The Scofield Reference Bible came out at the peak of Bullinger's influence. Scofield's Bible confronted some of the ultradispensationalists' (Bullingerites') positions, including their divisions of dispensational time. As the Scofield Bible became popular among dispensationalists, it marginalized the hyperdispensationalist position in the United States.[5]

Influenced by Scofield, evangelist and Bible teacher Lewis Sperry Chafer (1871–1952) and his brother Rollin Chafer founded Evangelical Theological College in 1924. The school would eventually become Dallas Theological Seminary, the main dispensationalist institution in America.[44]

The Baptist Bible Seminary now located in Clarks Summit, Pennsylvania became another dispensationalist school.

The Fundamentals

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Lyman Stewart, co-founder of Union Oil

In the 1910s, another publication took hold within American evangelicalism. Known as The Fundamentals, its twelve volumes were published in quarterly installments between 1910 and 1915 by the Testimony Publishing Company. Funded by Union Oil co-founder Lyman Stewart (1840–1923)[45] and managed by an executive committee of dispensationalists that included Clarence Dixon and Reuben Torrey, The Fundamentals helped solidify dispensationalist views within American Christian fundamentalism and the evangelical movement.[5]

The Scopes trial in 1925 served to unify fundamentalists, but the movement began to decline soon after the trial. Scopes trial prosecutor and public face of the fundamentalist movement William Jennings Bryan died a week after the verdict, and journalist H. L. Mencken portrayed supporters of that anti-evolution verdict as uneducated and ignorant. The fundamentalist movement began to decentralize after it lost Bryan. Dispensationalism's fate was tied to that breakdown.[5]

In 1928, Philip Mauro, seeking to re-invigorate the fundamentalist movement, pointed a finger at dispensationalism and in the process coined the term. Singling it out as the source of division within the larger fundamentalist movement, he wrote that the dispensationalist view was more recent than Darwinism and it eroded fundamental truths of scripture.[5]

In 1934, Evangelical Theological College acquired the venerable theological journal Bibliotheca Sacra (first published in 1844). Lewis Chafer's first public declaration that he was a dispensationalist appeared in that journal's pages. In 1936, he published a 60-page response to criticism from Mauro and other fundamentalists, entitled "Dispensationalism". That same year, Chafer renamed his school Dallas Theological Seminary.[5]

The conflict between dispensationalists and covenantalists continued through the 1930s and 1940s, leading to permanent divisions that shaped the fundamentalist movement.[5]

Influence of Dallas Theological Seminary

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By the mid 20th century, evangelicals such as Charles Feinberg, J. Dwight Pentecost, Herman Hoyt, Charles Ryrie, and John Walvoord were promoting dispensationalism.[5][46]: 269  All five of these men either studied or taught at Dallas Theological Seminary (DTS).[5] Pentecost taught there for more than 60 years, and published an influential work on dispensational eschatology, Things to Come (1956). A decade later, Ryrie published Dispensationalism Today (1965), which has become the primary introduction to dispensational theology.[5]

Furthering the rift with covenant theology, Ryrie wrote in Bibliotheca Sacra in 1957 that dispensationalism is "the only valid system of Biblical interpretation". In 1959, Walvoord stated that no non-dispensationalists (including Catholics and mainline Protestants) offered any defense against modernism, and that they were all under the influence of hermeneutical and theological errors.[5]

Dallas Theological Seminary's influence grew as other schools and seminaries hired its graduates as faculty. In 1970, DTS graduate Hal Lindsey published The Late Great Planet Earth, which launched dispensationalist eschatology into pop culture. His book sold 10 million copies and made "rapture" and "the tribulation" household words.[5]

Pop prophecy

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The commercial success of The Late Great Planet Earth triggered a flood of books that featured dispensationalism's rapture theology. Lindsey published Satan is Alive and Well on Planet Earth (1972), There's a New World Coming (1973), and The Liberation of Planet Earth (1974). Other books included The Beginning of the End (1972) by Tim LaHaye, and DTS graduate Thomas McCall's Satan in the Sanctuary (1973) and Raptured (1975).[5] In 1972, Iowa filmmakers Russell Doughten and Donald W. Thompson released A Thief in the Night, a fictional film about the aftermath of the rapture that has been seen by an estimated 300 million people.[47] Televangelist Jack Van Impe covered current events in light of Bible prophecy with a dispensational premillennialist spin.[48]

Emergence of the Christian Right

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The late 20th century marked a shift from the separatism practiced earlier in the century to more political engagement. This era saw emergence of the Christian Right, rooted in the dispensational theology that places Israel at the center of God's purpose in the world.[46]: 270 

In 1978, dispensationalist television evangelist Jerry Falwell began making trips to Israel that were sponsored by the Israeli government. He became the first major American political figure to insist that the U.S. must support Israel for the fate of the nation.[49] Falwell listed Feinberg, Pentecost, Hoyt, and Walvoord as his most important influences.[46]: 269  Jerry Falwell and Tim LaHaye founded the Moral Majority in 1979, with its objective to get people saved, baptized, and registered to vote.[50]: 354  The Moral Majority also provided a platform for political activism.

Influenced by dispensational premillennialism, the Moral Majority lobbied for pro-Israel U.S. foreign policy positions, including protection of the Jewish people in Israel and continuing U.S. aid to the state of Israel.[51][52] Opposed to Jimmy Carter's affirmation of a Palestinian homeland, the Moral Majority endorsed Ronald Reagan for President in 1980.[53] In Reagan, they found a candidate who shared their apocalypticism. Reagan had read Hal Lindsey's The Late Great Planet Earth, and it has been suggested that this eschatological view drove his Middle East policies.[49]: 43 [54]: 177  In an interview with televangelist Jim Bakker, Reagan said "[w]e may be the generation that sees Armageddon."[55]: 355  Dispensational theology affected more than the Reagan administration's Middle East foreign policy. James G. Watt, a member of the Assemblies of God and Reagan's first Secretary of the Interior, told Congress that preservation of the environment was made irrelevant by the imminent return of Christ.[56]: 148 

In 1980, Hal Lindsey wrote a follow-up to his book The Late Great Planet Earth. Lindsey had not previously drawn a connection from a Christian's personal obligations to a responsibility for social change, but this changed with his new book, The 1980s: Countdown to Armageddon. He began encouraging his readers to elect moral leaders who would reflect that morality within government, an agenda closely aligned with Ronald Reagan's administration.[5]

Lifelong fundamentalist and dispensationalist Tim LaHaye also became a prominent figure in the Christian Right.[5] He served as head of the Moral Majority for a time, and in the mid-eighties he created the American Coalition for Traditional Values. In 1987, he served as co-chairman of Republican Jack Kemp's presidential campaign, until it was reported that he had called Catholicism "a false religion".[57]

The megachurch movement

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The growth of suburbs through the 1960s led to the megachurch movement that began in the 1970s. DTS-trained pastors pioneered the movement, including Chuck Swindoll, Erwin Lutzer, David Jeremiah, Robert Jeffress, Tony Evans, and Andy Stanley.[5] Other megachurches, such as John Hagee's Cornerstone Church in San Antonio, Texas, blended teachings of dispensationalism with the prosperity gospel and New Christian Right activism. Hagee's Christians United for Israel included six Pentecostal megachurch pastors and an executive from the Christian Broadcasting Network, including Jerry Falwell. This group became an example of how megachurch dispensationalism was able to find national influence in US politics and diplomacy.[5]

Despite success through growing megachurches, the movement revealed limits when leaders of two of the United States' largest megachurches, Bill Hybels and Rick Warren, disassociated from the theology of dispensationalism. The revival of reformed theology in the emergence of New Calvinism began in the 1980s. Led by pastors such as John Piper, Tim Keller, Mark Driscoll, Matt Chandler, and Albert Mohler, this spawned a megachurch movement of its own, whose leaders became outspoken critics of dispensationalism.[5]

Peak and decline

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By the 1990s, a younger generation of academics emerged as "progressive dispensationalists", opening a rift within the united front Ryrie had pushed for in Dispensationalism Today (1965). Leaders in this school of thought were Craig A. Blaising, Darrell Bock, Kenneth Barker, and Robert L. Saucy.[5]

Dispensationalism's influence within the New Christian Right grew stronger in the 1990s. Building on the success of Hal Lindsey's The Late Great Planet Earth, the 1995 novel Left Behind pushed pop prophecy to further commercial success.[5][58]: 3  Conceived by Tim LaHaye and written by Jerry B. Jenkins, the book spawned a multimedia franchise of 16 books, plus multiple movies, video games, and other spinoff works. The series brought dispensational premillennialism and its "rapture culture" into plain view.[58]: 3 

As with Reagan in the 1980s, the New Christian Right helped elect another 'born again' president, George W. Bush. Like Reagan, Bush spoke in terms of prophecies being fulfilled in a way that had meaning to dispensationalists.[5] He referred to Gog and Magog in the War on Terror, and said the confrontation was "willed by God, who wants to use this conflict to erase His people's enemies".[59]

Dispensational ideas were experiencing political and commercial success, but Hal Lindsey and Tim LaHaye, who had become the public standard-bearers of dispensationalism, were different from their academic predecessors John Walvoord, Dwight Pentecost, and Charles Ryrie.[5] By the 2010s, support for dispensational theology had peaked in academia and was largely in decline within academic settings.[5] A 2009 survey of Southern Baptist seminaries showed that the majority view was covenantal, and flagship Southern Baptist Theological Seminary had no dispensationalists on its faculty.[5][60]

Although dispensationalism had collapsed in academic areas, its cultural influence remained. Dispensationalist ideas have persisted in popular culture. A 2004 Newsweek poll indicated that 55 percent of Americans believe Christians will be taken up in the Rapture.[61] By the turn of the 21st century, the term "dispensationalism" had become synonymous with "sectarian fundamentalism", and had come to be more of a political identity than a theological doctrine.[5]

Dispensationalism however remains strong within theological circles which espouse Free Grace theology.[62] The majority of those associated with the Free Grace Alliance support dispensationalism[63] and it is taught by the Grace Evangelical Society.[64]

Criticism

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The term "dispensationalism" originated with Philip Mauro. His critique of the system is found in his 1928 book The Gospel of the Kingdom, in which he wrote that "evangelical Christianity must purge itself of this leaven of dispensationalism". He used the term to group the new premillennialism, the idea of dispensational time, and the Israel–Church distinction into a single bundled idea.[5]

Protestant denominations and movements that embrace covenant theology tend to reject dispensationalism. For example, Presbyterian minister John Wick Bowman has called the Scofield Bible "the most dangerous heresy currently to be found within Christian circles".[7]: 13  Dispensational theology ultimately led the Presbyterian Church of America (later the Orthodox Presbyterian Church) to split from Bible Presbyterian Synod, which taught dispensationalism.[65] The Churches of Christ became divided in the 1930s as Robert Henry Boll (who taught a variant of dispensationalism) and Foy E. Wallace (representing the amillennial position) disputed severely over eschatology.

Soteriology

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Some dispensational Christian Zionists, such as John Hagee, reject the need for Christians to pursue the conversion of the Jews.[5] Presupposing a difference between law and grace leads to the idea that there are multiple forms of salvation.[1]: 34–35 

In what is known as the Lordship salvation controversy, there are criticisms of a lack of understanding what was necessary to be "born again". John MacArthur called the problem "easy-believism", in which the basis of salvation is that one merely needs to claim to follow Jesus. MacArthur identified Dallas Theological Seminary founder Lewis Sperry Chafer as the source of the free grace error. Defense of the dispensational position was led primarily by Charles Ryrie and Zane Hodges.[5]

Eschatology

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The pessimism of premillennial eschatology led dispensationalists to see social reform as wasted effort, so that they focused on converting the lost, with no effort toward the kingdom-building social reform of postmillennialism.[66]: 35–36 

Political influence

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In American Theocracy (2006), political commentator Kevin Phillips wrote that dispensationalist and other fundamentalist Christians, together with the oil lobby, provided political support for the invasion of Iraq in 2003.[67]: 87  He wrote that most theologians acknowledge there is no specific sequence of end-times events in the Bible, and that such a belief is the result of a century of "amplified Darbyism". He quoted theologian Barbara Rossing that such hyper-literalism is a "dangerous and false view".[67]: 253–254 [68]

See also

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References

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  1. ^ a b c d e Bass, Clarence B. (3 February 2005). Backgrounds to Dispensationalism: Its Historical Genesis and Ecclesiastical Implications. Wipf and Stock. ISBN 978-1-59752-081-2.
  2. ^ a b c Waters, Guy (2 November 2021). "What are the differences between covenant theology and dispensationalism?". Reformed Theological Seminary. Retrieved 9 December 2023.
  3. ^ a b Poythress, Vern Sheridan (1986). "1 Getting Dispensationalists and Nondispensationalists to Listen to Each Other. The Term 'Dispensationalist'". Understanding Dispensationalists. Chestnut Hill, Pennsylvania: Westminster Theological Seminary. Retrieved 9 December 2023.
  4. ^ a b c Mauro, Philip (1928). The Gospel of the Kingdom: With an Examination of Modern Dispensationalism. Hamilton Brothers. p. 17.
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z aa ab ac Hummel, Daniel G. (4 May 2023). The Rise and Fall of Dispensationalism: How the Evangelical Battle over the End Times Shaped a Nation. Wm. B. Eerdmans. ISBN 978-1-4674-6220-4.
  6. ^ a b c d e Blomberg, Craig L.; Chung, Sung Wook (1 February 2009). A Case for Historic Premillennialism: An Alternative to "Left Behind" Eschatology. Baker Academic. ISBN 978-1-4412-1056-2.
  7. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t Ryrie, Charles C. (2007). Dispensationalism. Moody. ISBN 978-0-8024-2189-0.
  8. ^ Dearing, Karen Lynn (2001). "A History of the Independent Bible Church". Ouachita Baptist University. p. 20. Retrieved 12 December 2019.
  9. ^ Crenshaw, Curtis I.; Gunn, Grover (1985). Dispensationalism Today, Yesterday, and Tomorrow. Footstool. p. 117. ISBN 978-1-877818-01-1.
  10. ^ poythress, Vern (13 March 2009). "Understanding Dispensationalism". Westminister Theological Seminary. Retrieved 9 December 2023. Now, the problem is that almost anyone who is an evangelical will recognize that there are distinct periods. For instance, there was a period before the fall of Adam when things were very different because there was no sin and there was no need for redemption, animal sacrifice or any of those things.
  11. ^ Walvoord, John F. (1983). The Millennial Kingdom. Zondervan. ISBN 978-0-310-34091-1.
  12. ^ a b Buschart, W. David (20 September 2009). Exploring Protestant Traditions: An Invitation to Theological Hospitality. InterVarsity Press. pp. 216, 218. ISBN 978-0-8308-7514-6.
  13. ^ Hodge, Charles (2003). Systematic Theology. Vol. 1. Peabody: Hendrickson. p. 446. ISBN 1-56563-459-4. Also available as Hodge (May 1997). Gross, Edward N. (ed.). Systematic Theology (abridged ed.). P & R. ISBN 0-87552-224-6.
  14. ^ Toussaint, Stanley D.; Burns, J. Lanier. Three Central Issues in Contemporary Dispensationalism: A Comparison of Traditional and Progressive Views. Kregel Academic. p. 124. ISBN 978-0-8254-9881-7.
  15. ^ Ironside, Harry A. "Not Wrath, but Rapture". Archived from the original on 3 February 2016. The prophetic clock stopped at Calvary; it will not start again until 'the fullness of the Gentiles be come in'.
  16. ^ Ironside, Harry A. (1943). The Great Parenthesis. Zondervan. p. 4. It is the author's fervent conviction that the failure to understand what is revealed in Scripture concerning the Great Parenthesis between Messiah's rejection, with the consequent setting aside of Israel nationally, and the regathering of God's earthly people and recognition by the Lord in the last days, is the fundamental cause for many conflicting and unscriptural prophetic teachings. Once this parenthetical period is understood and the present work of God during this age is apprehended, the whole prophetic program unfolds with amazing clearness.
  17. ^ a b DeMar, Gary (1999). Last Days Madness: Obsession of the Modern Church. American Vision. ISBN 978-0-915815-35-7.
  18. ^ Enns, Paul (27 March 2014). The Moody Handbook of Theology. Moody. ISBN 978-0-8024-9115-2.
  19. ^ a b c d Marsden, George M. (1982). Fundamentalism and American Culture: The Shaping of Twentieth Century Evangelicalism, 1870–1925. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-503083-9.
  20. ^ Brock, Robert C. "The Teachings of Christ". The ministry of Christ did not stop with His ascension in the first chapter of the book of Acts. Christians have failed to realize that when Saul is saved in Acts 9, a NEW ministry of the Lord Jesus Christ is begun by God, and this NEW ministry ushers in this present age of grace. Saul's name is changed to Paul, and he is designated as the Apostle of the Gentiles (Romans 11:13). He is given revelations from the risen Christ, and these are the revelations embracing Christianity.
  21. ^ a b c Couch, Mal (1996). Dictionary of Premillennial Theology. Kregel. p. 98. ISBN 978-0-8254-9464-2.
  22. ^ a b Blaising, Craig A.; Bock, Darrell L. (1993). Progressive Dispensationalism. Wheaton, Illinois: BridgePoint. ISBN 1-56476-138-X.
  23. ^ Stallard, Mike. "Progressive Dispensationalism" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 19 July 2011. some OT promises can be expanded by the NT. However, this expansion is never viewed as replacing or undoing the implications of that OT promise to its original audience, Israel. For example, the Church's participation in the New Covenant taught in the NT can add the Church to the list of recipients of the New Covenant promises made in the OT. However, such participation does not rule out the future fulfillment of the OT New Covenant promises to Israel at the beginning of the Millennium. Thus, the promise can have a coinciding or overlapping fulfillment through NT expansions of the promise.
  24. ^ Blaising, Craig A.; Bock, Darrell L. (10 August 2010). Dispensationalism, Israel and the Church: The Search for Definition. Zondervan Academic. p. 116. ISBN 978-0-310-87740-0.
  25. ^ a b Johnson, S. Lewis; Feinberg, John S. (1988). Continuity and Discontinuity: Perspectives on the Relationship Between the Old and New Testaments: Essays in Honor of S. Lewis Johnson, Jr. Crossway. ISBN 978-0-89107-468-7.
  26. ^ Hoekema, Anthony A. (1994) [1979]. The Bible and the Future (revised ed.). Grand Rapids, Michigan: Eerdmans. p. 164. ISBN 0-85364-624-4.
  27. ^ Walvoord, John F. (1990). Blessed hope and the tribulation. Contemporary Evangelical. p. 13. ISBN 978-0-310-34041-6.
  28. ^ Smith, Erin A. (Winter 2017). "The Late Great Planet Earth Made the Apocalypse a Popular Concern". The National Endowment for the Humanities. Retrieved 25 June 2023.
  29. ^ a b c Watson, William C. (2015). Dispensationalism Before Darby: Seventeenth-century and Eighteenth-century English Apocalypticism. Lampion Press. ISBN 978-1-942614-03-6.
  30. ^ Pietsch, B. M. (6 July 2015). Dispensational Modernism. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-027307-1.
  31. ^ a b c d Bennett, David Malcolm (30 April 2008). "Raptured or not raptured? That is the question". Evangelical Quarterly: An International Review of Bible and Theology. 80 (2): 143–161. doi:10.1163/27725472-08002004. ISSN 0014-3367.
  32. ^ "Pierre Poiret's Sober Mysticism". Christianity.com. Retrieved 5 September 2022.
  33. ^ Watts, Isaac (1812). The Harmony of all the Religions which God ever Prescribed to Men and all his Dispensations towards them. The kingdom of Christ, therefore, or the christian dispensation was not properly set up in all its forms, doctrines and duties, till the following day of Pentecost, and the pouring down of the Spirit upon the Apostles
  34. ^ Bennett, David Malcolm (4 November 2014). Edward Irving Reconsidered: The Man, His Controversies, and the Pentecostal Movement. Wipf and Stock. p. 176. ISBN 978-1-62564-865-5.
  35. ^ Ryrie, Charles C. "Update On Dispensationalism". In Willis, Wesley R.; Master, John R. (eds.). Issues In Dispensationalism. p. 17.
  36. ^ Huebner, Roy A. (1993). J. N. Darby's Teaching Regarding Dispensations, Ages, Administrations, and The Two Parenthesis (PDF). Jackson, New Jersey: Present Truth. pp. iii–iv.
  37. ^ a b Elwell, Walter A. (2001). Evangelical Dictionary of Theology. Baker Academic. ISBN 978-0-8010-2075-9.
  38. ^ a b c d e f Sandeen, Ernest Robert (2008). The Roots of Fundamentalism: British and American Millenarianism, 1800–1930. University of Chicago Press. ISBN 978-0-226-73468-2.
  39. ^ Moody, Paul Dwight (1938). My Father: An Intimate Portrait of Dwight Moody. Little, Brown. pp. 188–189.
  40. ^ a b Kraus, Clyde Norman (1985). Dispensationalism in America: Its Rise and Development. John Knox Press.
  41. ^ Gloege, Timothy E. W. (2015). Guaranteed Pure: The Moody Bible Institute, Business, and the Making of Modern Evangelicalism. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press. p. 3. ISBN 978-1-4696-3343-5.
  42. ^ a b Georgianna, Sharon Linzey (1989). The Moral Majority and Fundamentalism: Plausibility and Dissonance. E. Mellen Press. ISBN 978-0-88946-851-1.
  43. ^ Moody, William Revell (1900). The Life of Dwight L. Moody. Fleming H. Revell. p. 340.
  44. ^ Reisinger, Ernest. "A History of Dispensationalism in America". Founders Ministries. Archived from the original on 17 May 2008. Retrieved 5 July 2023. Bible-believing people turned to Dallas Seminary, the mecca of Dispensationalism, for teaching on God's Word.
  45. ^ Grem, Darren E. (2016). The Blessings of Business: How Corporations Shaped Conservative Christianity. Oxford University Press. p. 21. ISBN 978-0-19-992797-5.
  46. ^ a b c Clouse, Robert G. (16 April 2010). "Fundamentalist Theology". In Walls, Jerry (ed.). The Oxford Handbook of Eschatology. Oxford University Press, USA. ISBN 978-0-19-973588-4.
  47. ^ Anderson, Dean A. (7 March 2012). "The original 'Left Behind'". Christianity Today. Archived from the original on 16 April 2012. Retrieved 8 February 2021.
  48. ^ Dias, Elizabeth (22 January 2020). "Jack Van Impe, End Times Preacher on TV, Is Dead at 88". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 18 July 2023.
  49. ^ a b Halsell, Grace (1986). Prophecy and Politics: Militant Evangelists on the Road to Nuclear War. Lawrence Hill. pp. 74–75. ISBN 978-0-88208-210-3.
  50. ^ Sutton, Matthew Avery (15 December 2014). American Apocalypse: A History of Modern Evangelicalism. Harvard University Press. ISBN 978-0-674-74479-0.
  51. ^ Greene, Richard Allen (19 July 2006). "Evangelical Christians plead for Israel". BBC News. Retrieved 20 March 2007.
  52. ^ Kirkpatrick, David (14 November 2006). "For Evangelicals, Supporting Israel Is 'God's Foreign Policy'". The New York Times. New York City. Retrieved 6 May 2018.
  53. ^ Chapman, Robert, ed. (17 March 2015). Culture Wars: An Encyclopedia of Issues, Viewpoints and Voices. Routledge. p. 433. ISBN 978-1-317-47351-0.
  54. ^ McAlister, Melani (5 July 2005). Epic Encounters: Culture, Media, and U.S. Interests in the Middle East Since 1945. University of California Press. ISBN 978-0-520-24499-3.
  55. ^ Sutton, Matthew Avery (2017). American Apocalypse: A History of Modern Evangelicalism. Harvard University Press. ISBN 978-0-674-74479-0.
  56. ^ Balmer, Randall Herbert (3 July 2006). Thy Kingdom Come: How the Religious Right Distorts the Faith and Threatens America, an Evangelical's Lament. Basic Books. ISBN 978-0-465-00519-2.
  57. ^ Gorenberg, Gershom (2002). The End of Days: Fundamentalism and the Struggle for the Temple Mount. Oxford University Press. p. 31. ISBN 978-0-19-515205-0.
  58. ^ a b Frykholm, Amy Johnson (4 March 2004). Rapture Culture: Left Behind in Evangelical America. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-803622-7.
  59. ^ Spector, Stephen (September 2014). "Gog and Magog in the White House: Did Biblical Prophecy Inspire the Invasion of Iraq?". Journal of Church and State. 56 (3): 545. doi:10.1093/jcs/cst003.
  60. ^ David, Roach (5 January 2012). "End Times: Scholars differ on what Bible says about subject". Baptist Press. Archived from the original on 5 January 2012. Retrieved 30 July 2023.
  61. ^ Gates, David (23 May 2004). "Religion: The Pop Prophets". Newsweek. Retrieved 6 January 2024.
  62. ^ "Dispensationalism and Free Grace: Intimately Linked". Dispensational Publishing. Retrieved 10 July 2024.
  63. ^ "The Free Grace Alliance Within the Free Grace Movement: It is What it is!". GraceLife Ministries. Retrieved 10 July 2024.
  64. ^ "Dispensationalism". Grace Evangelical Society. 19 January 2024. Retrieved 10 July 2024.
  65. ^ Gerstner, John Henry (2000). Wrongly Dividing the Word of Truth: A Critique of Dispensationalism. Soli Deo Gloria. p. 61. ISBN 978-1-57358-068-7.
  66. ^ Balmer, Randall (2017). The Making of Evangelicalism: From Revivalism to Politics and Beyond. Baylor University Press. ISBN 978-1-4813-0488-7.
  67. ^ a b Phillips, Kevin (21 March 2006). American Theocracy: The Peril and Politics of Radical Religion, Oil, and Borrowed Money in the 21st Century. Penguin. ISBN 9781101218846.
  68. ^ Rossing, Barbara R. (30 March 2007). The Rapture Exposed: The Message of Hope in the Book of Revelation. Basic Books. pp. 173–174. ISBN 978-0-465-00496-6.

Further reading

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