by Jerry
Huerta
copyright
2020
As far as the discipline of
Reformation historicism, the Adventists took the lead in the middle of the
nineteenth-century in maintaining the historicist’s interpretation that the sea
beast is the papacy and the two-horned beast represents America. Others, like
the fractured Church of God, also hold the papacy is the antichrist but
maintain the sea beast represents pagan Rome and the two-horned beast papal
Rome. Such disparities have diminished the preeminence of historicism amongst
the Protestants and fractured them into accepting the Papacy’s interpretations
of Preterism and Futurism. It also led to the inordinate acceptance of
Amillennialism.
The criticism concerning
disparities is a failure to comprehend that one of the principles of
historicism is progressive revelation. As expositor Sanford Calvin Yoder
affirmed, “In the light of everything that has happened to the interpreters,
who so minutely interpret the predictive elements of Scripture, the old adage
of the fathers still stands—that prophecies are best interpreted after they are
fulfilled.”[1] The object of historicism is to correlate history with
apocalyptic prophecy and as history unremittingly advances it follows that
revision must occur, which justifies the disparities. So long as the sine
qua non that the papacy is the antichrist is not abandoned, historicism is
maintained but revision will occur right up to entering the time of the
antitypes of the Hebraic autumnal festivals of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur.
This is why the interpretations of Elliott and Guinness are no longer held with
the same regard by many in Protestantism; their foundational perceptions are
still viable but they failed to account for reconciling the antitypes of the
autumnal festivals in rendering Daniel and especially the Revelation.
Elliott held the first seal
represented the “triumph, prosperity, and health of the Roman empire,”[2] while
Guinness held it as “the view of the early Church.”[3] These views are
inflexibly held by many historicists today, but they have ultimately led to
untenable interpretations such as holding that the two witnesses (Revelation
11:7-11) are the Old and New Testaments that were killed at the French
Revolution and etcetera. The huge disparity with this is that the phenomenon is
perceived as having the beast from the abyss suffering its deadly wound and
commence its “is not” stage (Revelation 17:10-11) at the same time it rises
from the abyss to kill the two witnesses. The inflexibility of these views has
led to the untenable interpretation that the Ottoman Turks as the locust of the
fifth trumpet that relented in persecuting Christians with the seal of God,
those who held the 7th-day Sabbath as sacred, which has no weight in history.
Yet, in all this inflexibility
there are some contemporary historicists that are breaking with tradition to
move toward a greater consistency with history and maintain Yoder’s principle
that “prophecies are best interpreted after they are fulfilled.” One such
example of progressive historicism concerns the reevaluation of the throne
scene in Revelation 4–5, which the contemporary historicists Frank W. Hardy,
Ph.D., creator of Historicism.org, and R. Dean Davis, Professor of Religion at
Atlantic Union College in South Lancaster, Massachusetts, have proposed.
Historicist’s of the past, like H. Grattan Guinness, held that the throne scene
depicted in Revelation 4–5 occurred at Christ’s ascension, at the first advent.
Lo!
The Lamb advances and takes the seven scaled book.… As He opens the seven
seals, successive visions appear.… The first seal being opened he saw a white
horse and a crowned horseman bearing a bow.… A comparison of this opening
vision with that in the nineteenth chapter, of the rider on the while horse,
whose name was “King of Kings and Lord of Lords,” justified in the view of the
early Church the application of the first seal.[4]
Perceiving the first seal as a
first-century phenomenon maintains the throne scene in Revelation 4-5 occurred
when Christ was caught up at the first advent. Davis and Hardy have reevaluated
the traditional interpretation with the sound proposal that the throne scene is
the same one depicted in Daniel 7 and that it is concurrent with the Laodicean
church era.
The
throne scene takes place in the timeframe to which the seven letters have
brought us, i.e., the timeframe of the letter to Laodicea, in and after 1844.[5]
In
Rev 5 the portrayal is that of a traditional divine council in session … an
investigative-type judgment.… Contrary to the views of most modern interpreters,
there is evidence for interpreting the seven-sealed scroll as the Lamb’s book
of life. The evidence includes: (1) the occurrences of the phrase (or
equivalent) “Lamb’s book of life” (13:8; 20:12), (2) the reaction of those who
have a definite stake in the contents of the scroll, (3) the corporate
solidarity between the Lamb as Redeemer and the righteous saints as the
redeemed, and (4) the parallel passage of Daniel 7, which describes the same
corporate solidarity between the saints of the Most High and one like a son of
man who receives the saints of the Most High as his covenant inheritance.[6]
Note that the phrase
“investigative-type judgment” appears in the quote from Dean so there is no
mistake he and Hardy are referring to the same time “the time of the end” which
they perceive as the final church era. Their re-evaluation of the traditional
interpretation of Revelation 4–5 actually furthers a linear progression
starting in chapter 1 up until the time of the seventh trumpet in chapter 11,
inasmuch as historicism has already reevaluated the seven vials as a break in
the pattern of their severe view of recapitulation. My work concerns the
in-depth analysis of the symbolism of the seven seals and the seven trumpets as
well as the in-depth look at the patterns in the Hebraic cultus that warrants a
departure from the extreme use of recapitulation for a greater linear narration
in the book of Revelation, while still adhering to the historicist’s sine
qua non of a year-for-a-day principle and the recognition of the papacy as
the antichrist. Under this new interpretation, John's use of recapitulation was
modest as compared with the traditionalist's view. The new view correlates the
prophecies and illustrations of the seven seals with our modern-day
market-driven society, the prophetic era of the Laodicean church, the autumnal
festivals, and the "the time of the end" in Daniel 8:17. The
correspondence of the apocalyptic horsemen of the seven seals with the
historical accounts of the Protestant's rise to prominence and their
termination of the churches' influence in our modern-day commerce is
incendiary. Moreover, the correspondence pertaining to autumnal festivals
regarding the final judgment and the apocalyptic horsemen of the seven seals is
no less provocative. As is the case of all such correlations that come to light
through progressive revelation, they become a blessing for the sons and
daughters of God and reproof for those who walk in darkness (Revelation 1:3).
[1] Sanford Calvin Yoder, He Gave
Some Prophets (Wipf & Stock Pub., October 1, 1998), 73.
[2] Tucker, Brief historical
explanation of the Revelation of St. John, Accordingto the ‘Hora Apocalyptica’
of the Rev. E.B. Elliott, 11, 103.
[3] Henry Grattan Guinness, History
unveiling prophecy; or, Time as an interpreter (F.H. Revell, 1905), 29.
[4] Ibid.
[5] Frank W. Hardy, Ph.D.,
“Historicism and the Judgment A Study of Revelation 4-5 and 19a,”
Historicism.org, (August 8, 2006, Modified April 15, 2010), 1,
http://www.historicism.org/Documents/Lecture1Rev4-5.pdf
[6] R. Dean Davis, “The Heavenly
Court Scene of Revelation 4-5” (Andrews University Dissertations, Paper 31,
1986), 243-244,
https://digitalcommons.andrews.edu/...tpsredir=1&article=1030&context=dissertations
This post is a postscript to the book above, which is available here.
