“Historicism’s Antichrist” Feedback

In regard to my post on Historicism Ian Myerscough commented:

Hi Tim,

I’m writing cos I normally just smile at your contributions on Fivedoves – but your teenage style dismissal of Historicism is more breathtaking than usual. The foremost writer of the last 2 centuries on historicism was Dr Grattan Guiness, the Maths and Astronomy chair of Dublin University, and the outstanding Bible teacher and preacher of evangelical Christianity of his day in Ireland. He also started one of today’s largest Missionary societies out of his own tireless evangelistic efforts. He wrote literally dozens of now standard scholarly texts on Church History etc. Try reading some of his works like ‘Light for the Last days’ before you rush into cyberspace again with a few trivial paragraphs. NB You’ll need a few weeks for each book – he’s not a 21st century soundbite peddlar!

Hi Ian, thanks for introducing yourself as another smiling reader of mine =). Seriously, I agree there is much more I could have written in my last post to debunk Historicism, but time did not permit it. But really, it ought to be enough to point out it breaks the plain reading of scripture. If we could all read the Bible properly and learn to not entertain theories that break the consensus of the face value meaning of plain scripture, there would be no one subscribing to Historicism, or many, many other things taught by the myriad contradictory flavors of Christianity.

As for your appeal to the authority of Dr. Guinness, this is a falacious argument given the high amount of expert contradiction in the area of eschatology. To whit:

If there is a significant amount of legitimate dispute among the experts within a subject, then it will be fallacious to make an Appeal to Authority using the disputing experts. This is because for almost any claim being made and “supported” by one expert there will be a counterclaim that is made and “supported” by another expert. In such cases an Appeal to Authority would tend to be futile. In such cases, the dispute has to be settled by consideration of the actual issues under dispute. Since either side in such a dispute can invoke experts, the dispute cannot be rationally settled by Appeals to Authority.”

The chief consideration of the actual issues in this case I would submit is whether a theory breaks plain scripture, something that Jesus emphasized in his theological debate with the pharisees (John 10:35).

I will also point out that Bible prophecy was sealed until the End Times so that people like Dr Guinness or Sir Isaac Newton, as great as they may have been, just like the great Daniel, were at a supreme disadvantage in understanding End Times Bible Prophecy because they were not of the proper generation when these things would be unsealed and “righteous” “wise men” would understand them (Daniel 12:9-10).

Finally, I cover the Biblical definition of the wisdom needed to understand prophecy in my book Planet X in Bible Prophecy, but I will state that it’s clear that neither Guinness or Newton fulfill that requirement, as well. If this assessment is true, then it would be scripturally impossible for them to properly understand Bible Prophecy, disqualifying them as experts all the more.