Understanding Classical Dispensationalism And Its Attraction

Dispensationalism¹ began at the time of John Nelson Darby (1800-1882) in the 1820s into the 1830s, a well-educated Anglican clergyman who became its chief systematiser. Darby had a life-changing experience in which he realised profoundly the importance of the scripture's teaching of being in union with Christ in 'heavenly places'. He concluded that the true Church was 'heavenly' in character.



On the other hand, based on his studies of Isaiah 33 he came to believe that Israel, at a future time, would enjoy earthly blessings separate from those enjoyed by the Church in heaven. In this belief lay his conviction of the radical difference between Church and Israel.

Of course, other Bible readers, students and scholars had read the same verses over the centuries. But the reason Darby came to such a different conclusion was that he took it as axiomatic that the Bible's language should be interpreted² 'literally' for Israel. For example, he averred that passages referring to 'Israel' always meant just that: the physical descendants of the patriarchs (Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob).

Darby also believed that the Church would be secretly 'raptured' in the future before a 7-year period of Tribulation preceding the Coming of Christ to the earth to set up the 1000-year, Millennial Kingdom. This 7-year period of Tribulation Darby took from Daniel 9.24 with its famous declaration about 'seventy weeks ["of years" -RSV] being determined for your people and for your holy city' (see Dan 9.24-27).

During the Tribulation the Jews would suffer badly for their hardness of heart and infidelity but that 'those who endured to the end would be saved'. The accompanying diagram sets out the end-time events as understood by the classical position.

Acknowledgement for the attached diagram is given to Conservapedia's article,  'Eschatology' at www.conservapedia.com

According to Darby, a time-line related to Israel and the Church began with Abram (later Abraham) and what is known as the Abrahamic Covenant (Gen 12.1-3; 15.13-20; 17.9-14; 22.15-19), with Isaac (Gen 26.2-5) and with Jacob (Gen 27.29; 28.12-17; 35.9-15). 

This covenant had the provision of God's blessing: many descendants ('stars' and 'sand' metaphors in the scriptures cited above); a place to live (Canaan); the blessing³ of those blessing Abram and the cursing³ of those who cursed him; and his being a blessing to all nations (e.g., Gen 12.2-3).

Attractions

Many Bible-believers undeniably felt attracted to classical dispensationalism (as I once did). It had what appeared to be commonsense principles of Bible interpretation. It appeared to have a comprehensive system with everything worked out so that the Bible's grand scheme of how history will play out was laid bare. 

One could also purchase a Bible that mapped this prophetic viewpoint, for example, the Scofield Reference Bible (1907, rev. 1917). This most well-known Christian publication of the 20th century taught dispensationalism through its extensive notes and made it easy to learn and be taught the viewpoint.  

However, even within classical dispensationalism shortcomings became evident leading to changes so that two more recent new forms have emerged. First, modified dispensationalism (1950s) and second, progressive dispensationalism (1980s). We will study these different frameworks in coming posts. 

1. Of course, all Bible readers in one way or another acknowledge the presence of 'dispensations' because even to recognise the two Testaments or Covenants of the Old and the New is to do this. However, dispensationalism takes the idea of dispensations to the point of making it an 'ism'.
2. The question of Biblical interpretation is very important and constitutes a major reason why various differences have emerged and created different eschatological schools. We can't deal with the issue now but I want to highlight both its importance and my wish to deal with it in coming posts.
3. Some dispute exists as to whether the blessing is to be attached to all Abraham's physical descendants or to his spiritual descendants alone. (Others even contend that the blessing/cursing provision is meant for only Abraham as an individual but that seems difficult to support.)

Different Eschatological Schools

Eschatology, What Is That?

Eschatology¹ is a branch of theology that investigates how 'end' time events will occur.

Why Is It Relevant To This Subject?

To examine the question of The One People of God, we have to look at a number of competing schools of eschatology which hold different views about 'end' events. This activity on our part is necessary because views about the Church, cultural Israel, their relationship and their present status before God tend to be correlated with different views about end-time events (eschatologies).

What Different Eschatological Schools Exist?

To simplify matters we could say three main groupings exist: Preterism, Historicism, and Futurism (with variations within each).

Preterism claims that most of the book of The Revelation has already been fulfilled. Some within this group would even claim that Jesus returned in the judgement upon Jerusalem in AD 70. Doubtless, many will find Preterism to be an odd² view because most evangelicals at least, are steeped in some form of Futurism (see below).

Historicism, as the name might suggest, believes that much of Revelation was fulfilled over the centuries until the present time. Jesus is yet to come (as in Rev 21). Many of these folk are post-millennialists, that is, they believe that Jesus will come after the millennium (Rev 20.2, 4, 5, 6).

Futurism is probably better known than the other two and more popular (IMO). Futurists believe (as the name suggests) that most of The Revelation is yet to happen in a time future to our own. Jesus will return before  the millennium (hence, premillennialists) to set up a millennial kingdom.

Futurism is important for our study because it contains a strong faction within the tradition who can be called classical dispensationalists.

Classical Dispensationalism

Classical³ dispensationalism gets its name from its characteristic dividing of redemptive history into seven⁴ divine administrations (or 'dispensations'). 

Within dispensationalism is the conviction that a clear, demarcation line exists between the Church and ethnic Israel, and that God is pursuing two different agendas with each of these two distinct peoples.


That God in Christ came to redeem Israel but He was rejected at the national level by the people of Israel (Acts 2.22-23; 3.12-15; 4.10-11; 7.51-53; etc).

That God then put his plans for Israel 'on hold' and took up a new redemptive undertaking with any who would receive his Son, the Lord Jesus as King. Hence, a 'church age' ensued and continues to this day. 

However, most importantly, this 'church age' does not suggest that God has finished with national Israel: He has made unconditional promises to Abram/Abraham and his descendants (Gen 12.1-3; 15. 5-6, 7-11, 12-16, 17-21) and as surely as God is true to His Word He will keep these promises. Most importantly for us, classical dispensationalism is going to occupy our attention because it has a specific eschatology that drives a wedge between the Church and Israel while calling both of them 'the people of God'. We will have to examine whether classical dispensationalism can maintain this position in the face of the biblical evidence.

1. Eschatology is defined as 'the study of the end'. Eschaton in Greek means 'end' or 'last things'.
2. To gain a better understanding of Preterism we have to imagine being disciples of Christ before the overthrown and sacking of Jerusalem and see how many scriptures we now take to be yet future might have been understood by those then living.
3. More recent types of dispensationalism include: modified, and progressive dispensationalism which are to be distinguished from the classical dispensationalism which began in the 19th century.
4. Typically listed as: Innocence (pre-Fall), Conscience (Fall to Flood), Human Government (Flood to Abraham), Promise (Abram's call to Exodus), Law (Moses to Christ), Grace (the Church era), and the Kingdom (the Millennial period of 1,000 years).

Genius, Grief and Grace

I have been perusing a book lent to me with the above intriguing title (2008). It has been authored by an English senior psychiatrist, Dr Gaius Davies.

He has done detailed studies on Christians well-known to most who although highly gifted in certain areas suffered from moderate to more extreme cases of what we would call mental-emotional disorders. 


To carry out this task Davies examines the lives of Martin Luther (Protestant Reformer), John Bunyan (prolific writer), William Cowper (hymn writer), Lord Shaftesbury (social reformer), Christina Rossetti (poet), Frances R. Havergal (hymn writer), Gerard Manley Hopkins (poet), Amy Carmichael (missionary to India), C.S. Lewis (literary academic, apologist, extraordinary writer and poet), J.B. Philips (New Testament paraphraser), and Dr D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones (preacher).

 The treatment of Lewis' life by Davies is enlightening but I was particularly struck by the description given of Lewis in arguing against Naturalism opposed to Elizabeth Anscombe in 1948 at Oxford University at the Socratic Club of which Lewis was then President.

After this debate in which Anscombe (a Roman Catholic) appeared¹ to show a significant defect in Lewis' argument against naturalism as presented in his book Miracles (1947, 1960), Lewis wrote an instructive poem.

The Apologist’s Evening Prayer
From all my lame defeats and oh! much more
From all the victories that I seemed to score;
From cleverness shot forth on Thy behalf
At which, while angels weep, the audience laugh;
From all my proofs of Thy divinity,
Thou, who wouldst give no sign, deliver me.

Thoughts are but coins. Let me not trust, instead
of Thee, their thin-worn image of Thy head.
From all my thoughts, even from my thoughts of Thee,
O thou fair Silence, fall, and set me free.
Lord of the narrow gate and the needle’s eye,
Take from me all my trumpery lest I die.

C.S. Lewis, Poems (1964).

Years ago I was in a Christian denomination that did not favour intellectual pursuits, particularly in respect to the Faith. Its watchwords were the Holy Spirit's power along with an unquestioning acceptance of signs of 'divine healing'.

One person warned me that 'thinking too much' would 'get me into trouble'. Now looking back I think that was good advice in the same respect that Lewis implies above. 

Anything² that we produce including our thoughts, arguments and ideas can so easily become the 'coins' we trust in rather than than the God who stands behind all that has been created.

1. It is still highly contested to this day whether Anscombe plausibly showed a weakness in Lewis' original argument. In any case, he revised his work and a new 1960 revision of Miracles was published.
2. Of course, it should be noted that even our feelings, and other 'experiences' are often in the same class as our thinking so let us not be fooled into believing that trusting our experiences means that we are trusting God.

An Introduction

The People of God as One People

These posts in this series are an attempt to deal with some of the complicated issues surrounding the identity of the people of God as the one people of God.

They examine how the Church and cultural Israel are related within the broader scope of the several types of eschatology (end-time study). For the complexity of the issues has led to a multiplicity of differing viewpoints that can be confusing without some road map: using some type of classification of views is one way to create order in an otherwise tangled scene.  



First the question of whether the Church superseded the earthly Jewish nation and its religious practices is a major issue. Some use the language of 'replacement' although 'fulfilment' is currently thought to be a better term within this framework.

Others, of course, believe that God has a plan with cultural Israel as well as with the Church; that He postponed his work with Israel only until the 'time of the Gentiles' would be fulfilled. Then his work with Israel will be taken up again.

These Christians believe that cultural Israelites because of their race will receive grace to believe in the future: these Christians will reject any suggestion that God has abandoned Israel as a nation. Other Christians, just as fervently believe contradictorily, that the Jews have no special place in the economy of salvation but must come by way of the Cross of Christ as do all who would be saved in this age of opportunity. 

Some believe that present-day national Israel is part of a fulfilment of God's 'unconditional' promises to it of greatness, land, and many descendants. Others believe that all such promises to Israel were fulfilled in Joshua's time or that elements of the promises have 'spiritual' fulfilment.

These Differences Have Consequences

The questions raised about Israel above raise individual and even nation-changing consequences. For example, the present US government supports the State of Israel to the tune of 6 million dollars per day (8 billion dollars per year) at present. 

At least some of this support can be explained in terms of Christians who believe that Israel is entitled to the 'Holy Land' because of the Abrahamic Covenant.

Hence the question arises, should the Church or Christians support the present Israeli government in its conflict with the Palestinians on the basis that God has promised the 'Holy Land' to the Jews?

Not An Easy Topic In General

In the reading I've done so far in preparation for blogging I've discovered that this field of inquiry is by no means simple. Many earnest Christians hold widely differing opinions and appear to have solid biblical reasons for so doing. 

Hence, my aim is to approach the area with some caution even though I have already developed what I think is a general sense of the place of the Church vis a vis Israel. (That doesn't of course mean it is correct in all respects and I realise I have much to learn!) Nevertheless, my quest is to acquaint myself more fully with some of the extensive discourse on this theme and hopefully learn much so that my views become better founded.    

Dying In An Entertainment-Saturated Culture

Often an author's main contentions, premises or lines of argument are laid down in the introductory pages which include any prefaces, forewords or introductions. Neil Postman ably displays this feature in his famous work:

Amusing Ourselves To Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business (1985)


In the Foreword of his prophetic analysis of present-day Western society, Postman contrasts the famous novel 1984 by George Orwell (1949) with Brave New World (BNW: 1932) by Alduous Huxley.

Both these novels are about controlling the masses: in 1984 it is done by pain, but in BNW by pleasure.

Postman believed that BNW had got it right. According to Postman, people won't need Orwell's totalitarian 'Big Brother' to keep them in line; rather they 'will come to love their oppression, to adore the technologies that undo their capacities to think' (p. vii) as in Huxley's BNW.

In Orwell's nightmarish 1984 the truth is hidden by adapting it to fit 'the party line' (p. vii); in Huxley 'the truth [is] . . . drowned in a sea of irrelevance' (p. vii).

The first sketches a scared population; the second, a stoned one.

Postman's important book sets out to demonstrate that Huxley's prophesies are right and that Orwell was wrong.¹ That we are part of an anaethetised culture (rather than a terrified one).

He aims to establish that entertainment in its various forms (particularly, television) has become the 'opiate' of the masses. So where once political leaders were known by their words and were virtually unknown to the populace by sight, now leaders are known for their television image² and not so much for famous speeches.

Formal human interaction today such as marriage, parenting, schooling, church worship, sport, even psychotherapy tend to be entertainment or fun-focussed; today's people are more influenced by the form of communication than by content. A good-looking showman will tend to be better received than a person with average looks and little 'charisma' even if his/her content is sound and edifying.

Worship and Television (ch. 8)

Postman watched 42 hours of television's version of 'religion' (mainly Christianity but he mentions Judaism) in preparation for this chapter. He realised at the end of this stint he needed only to have watched five hours to develop two major conclusions about it.

• TV preaching becomes entertainment 

Postman fixes unerringly on matters that many Christians don't discern. The very nature of the act of the Christian worship is radically altered by the medium through which it is enacted.

Everything that makes religion an historic, profound and sacred human activity is stripped away; there is no ritual, no dogma, no tradition, no theology, and above all, no spiritual transcendence. On these shows, the preacher is tops. God comes out as second banana (p. 119).

One could also add that the television age is so powerful in its effects that today's preaching in consecrated spaces has been shaped by the presence of television outside churches and syngogues.

The only way out of this impasse is to instruct congregations about the nature of preaching as a preaching of the word of God (e.g., Acts 4.31; 8.4, 14;11.1; 2 Tim 4.1-4). 

• Preaching does not transfer well to television

The major assumption behind the use of television with church-like events is that the latter are televisible; that is, it is naively assumed that they are capable of being televised without losing their particular character.

And yet, as Postman points out, we don't assume that poetry in one language can be transferred without significant lose to any other language. We also know that a sympathy card is quite different from actually visiting someone who is bereaved. Simply put, 'not all forms of discourse can be converted from one medium to another' (p. 119).

Amusing-Ourselves-To-Death as a Title

Postman's title is cleverly devised with about three allusions in it for readers to note. Firstly, the expression of 'doing something to death' may mean overdoing something as in the expression 'it's been done to death'; secondly, the phrase may be used in a more sinister way with the meaning that 'You are doing this [amusing yourself] and this has become your life's work until the day you finally physically die. Thirdly, the phrase may mean that lives built on amusements and diversions run the risk of spiritual death/deadening.

It's not necessary to choose among these three because all three (and others) may be meant but I would incline to the idea that Postman is emphasising the real danger of spiritual death³.
 
1. However, each writer's outlook is more applicable perhaps to specific countries of the 20th and 21st century history in different areas of the world.
2. In the US, for example, a man who had originally been an actor in some 53 movies became governor of California for eight years (1967-1975) before being a successful Republican president of the US (1981-1989)!
3. Postman was a non-observant Jew and in this book reflects on the wisdom of the Second Commandment in proscribing the making of images of God (p. 9). Unlike others of his generation, Postman respected organised 'religion' without it seems being a participant.

The Body In The Library

Although 'the-body-found-in-the-library' detective story is a cliche - and Agatha Christie knew that well - she creates her novel so that the body dead in the library remains a mystery throughout. 

The victim just doesn't fit within the library's surrounding or within the house in which the library is situated. Her dress, her manner of being murdered, her class mean she is out of place, discordant. This anomalous crime and the failure of the police to make much headway provide much of the tension in this novel.

Characters

The characters and the plot of fiction stories are interwoven so it is hard to separate them as is done below. However, thought it would help understanding if this were done. I have grouped characters for clarity.

 

Jane Marple, amateur sleuth, who lives in the village of St Mary Mead;

The Bantrys: Mrs Dolly and Colonel Arthur who reside at Gossington Hall;
and the servants (of the Bantrys').

Police investigators who seem unable to solve the case of the strangled young woman found in the Bantrys' library;

Basil Blake, an unpleasant art-world personality and his girl-friend Dinah Lee;

Ruby Keene a dancer, reported as missing from the Majestic Hotel in the town of Danemouth;
Josephine Turner, professional dancer and cousin of Ruby Keene;
Raymond Starr, the male professional dancer at the Majestic Hotel.

Conway Jefferson, a wealthy, invalid though dynamic in personality;
Adelaide Jefferson, Conway's widowed daughter-in-law;
Mark Gaskell, Conway's son-in-law, ruthless and frank;
Peter Carmody, Conway's 'grandson' from Adelaide's first marriage.

Plot Synopsis

The story opens with Mrs Dolly Bantry of Gossington Hall in the village of St Mary Mead being awakened from a pleasant dream in her bedroom by her maid's announcement of a dead, unknown body being found in the library.

Jane Marple, a resident of the St Mary Mead and Dolly Bantry's good friend, is called for her support because Dolly fears her husband, Colonel Bantry is going to be blamed for the murder.

Meanwhile, in another connected sphere, a small drama is being played out between Conway Jefferson, Ruby Keene, Adelaide Jefferson and Mark Gaskell. Conway is rather sweet on young Ruby and intends to formally adopt her as his daughter and leave all his wealth to her.

Adelaide and Mark don't feel too happy about this but realise that they are not owed anything by Jefferson because they are in-laws not blood relatives. Adelaide also feels for her son who has been well-accepted by Conway might have expected to receive something in his will.

Themes

Comments About Marple's Abilties

Probably the key to Marple's abilities is found in this comment in the novelist's words: 'For Miss Marple had attained fame for her ability to link up trivial village happening with graver problems in such a way as to throw light upon the latter' (p. 17).

The importance of local knowledge is something the Miss Marple character uses to great effect. And she also uses her feminine knowledge of women's clothes and makeup as well.

For example, she knows that the murdered young woman is clearly not a local because no one nearby has reported her missing. She dresses in a tarty way and yet is a virgin (from the autopsy). Her nails have been broken through her biting them which is not usually the behaviour of a dancer.

Even though it appears that her death was first thought to be part of a burglary gone wrong she was hardly dressed for burglary given her clothing.

All these points become vital clues for discerning the whole picture which is revealed at the end of the novel.

Comments By Others And Marple About Human Condition

Character and theme are often illumined by comments made about others about the protagonist and by the protagonist herself.
 
Colonel Bantry calls in a close friend of his, a Sir Henry Clithering who has worked in detection work himself. Sir Henry says of Marple,

Downstairs in the lounge, by the third pillar from the left, there sits an old lady with a sweet, placid, spinsterish face and a mind that has plumbed the depths of human iniquity and taken it all in the day's work. Her name is Miss Marple." Sir Henry to Col. Bantry (p. 91).

Jane Marple says: "Human nature is pretty much the same anywhere, Sir Henry" (p. 97) which is an allusion to the ubiquity of sin.

In a conversation between Dolly Bantry and Adelaide Jefferson, Jane Marple is discussed and the opinion by some that she is 'just a scandalmonger' (p. 124) is raised by Dolly. Adelaide, who appreciates Jane says, "Just a low opinion of human nature?" and then adds, "It's rather refreshing after having had too much of the other thing" [idealization of an unworthy object] (p. 124).

In the last chapter, Marple is asked by an expert Sir Henry Clithering about her methods. She replies that most people, 'are too trusting for this wicked world' because they assume that what they're told is true; whereas, says Marple, 'I never do'. She likes to confirm the truth or otherwise for herself.

She later confesses that a nephew tells her good-naturedly, 'she has a mind like a sink' (p. 184), a Victorian mind.

'All I can say [says Marple] is that the Victorians knew a good deal about human nature'.

As expected, Jane solves the perplexing crime with revolving around Marple's seeing things that don't fit properly and why that would be; but she does it within the framework of doubt about ready acceptance of the testimony of others. This ready doubt proceeds, I believe, from her belief in 'original sin'.

Agatha Christie's detective fiction can be found in most Municipal libraries. If you wish to find out who killed the young woman in the library then visit Wikipedia. 

Agatha Christie: Detective Writer Extraordinaire

Agatha Christie (1890-1976) was an prodigious writer with around 80 detective novels and other collections of stories published, giving us sleuths of the calibre of Jane Marple and Hercule Poirot.  

She also wrote, The Mousetrap which holds the record for the longest-running play ever (60 years and 25,000 performances in 2012).

Her works have sold an astonishing four billion items with her sales eclipsed only by the Bible and Shakespeare's works.

What is usually not so well known is that Christie was a Christian (Church of England) who took her faith seriously enough for a reader to detect it within her works. However, her writing is not evangelical for her vocation was detective novel-writing for the glory of God.

One of her major theme-ideas was the often hidden but nevertheless real sinfulness of men and women.¹This sinfulness was also to be found in English villages which romantic writers liked to think pristine and wholesome.

Next time we will look at Christie's The Body In The Library and see how the above theme of the novelist is expressed in her great creation, the sleuthhound Jane Marple.

1. This theme is one of whom Christie would have been reminded at every Holy Communion service in the opening Collect: 'Almighty God, unto whom all hears are open, all desires known, and from whom no secrets are hid; Cleanse the thoughts of our hearts by the inspiration of thy Holy Spirit, that we may perfectly love thee, and worthily magnify thy holy Name; through Christ our Lord. Amen.' (1662 BCP)

Theme-Ideas

I confess that I went through school being largely unaffected by books and the reading of them. Perhaps Shakespeare's, A Midsummer Night's Dream and Macbeth; and a few pieces from the Victorian Education Department's justly famous 'readers'¹ stayed with me but only just.


In secondary school, I was earmarked for the 'science' stream which further cut me off from reading literature. After school, I worked as a trainee industrial chemist for three years but then left to train as a primary (elementary school) teacher.

In second-year teachers' college, we were taught English Literature by a grumpy, bitter, 'old' lecturer who transformed my indifferent outlook on literature and reading to one of excitement. (Although a scarey man in class, Mr D. was a kind and gentle man on a one-to-one basis.)

As I write this now, I hear the thunder of his first lecture from 45 years ago: 'Art is not Nature; Nature is not Art'. He scorned the supposition that 'natural' heaps of dirt and weeds around our college could be construed as 'art' just because they looked somehow 'artful' to the eye.²

I am grateful to Mr D. for his teaching that literary works contain theme-ideas (with setting, plot, characters, and a 'point-of-view' - [third-person or first-person viewpoint]): with this discovery, books became more intellectually robust adventures for me.

Of course, it may be that everyone else at school had understood this and I had missed it completely. But whatever the reason for the gap in my schooling, I am thankful for my time at College and for the teaching of this lecturer. 

Today though, it's amazing how little people read; how few books people take time to read given the great privilege we all have. Perhaps it has always been that way but my suspicion, borne out by some studies of this question, is that since the advent of television, the general populace does less and less reading. It might even be said that we are gradually losing the ability to read, and to read critically.

What we also don't realise at times is that the large issues of our Western lives have been shaped by print. Just think of the King James Version of the Bible and the influence this one mighty text empowered by God's Spirit has had across the entire world. To this we could add, The Pilgrim's Progress and the works of William Shakespeare.

And print, even a murder mystery by Agatha Christie³ is molded by theme-ideas intentionally and sometimes less intentionally with artfulness.⁴ And these theme-ideas emerge from heart-held religious⁵ convictions about the meaning of life.

Some of these considerations above I will be pursuing in this blog by highlighting certain works on my bookshelves.

1. These readers were the basic reading material for each year so if a pupil got through his reader in a short time but wanted more to read then tough! Books and especially children's books were in short supply in the 50s to early 60s when I was at school. No one complained because our parents had had it worse. Most of my peers were not interested in reading anyway.
2. A view that is still being prosecuted in the art-world today and costing art-investors millions.
3. In fact, it's interesting to note how AG's stories are taken by modern film-makers and rewritten to present a different worldview from the one Christie espoused.
4. Even more so with television because this medium does not easily enable the watcher to replay what has caught his attention.
5. By 'religious' I don't mean necessarily following a recognisable or traditional religion but I believe that man is incurably religious.