Jesus was clearly a dispensationalist!

[Mayflower]

William Perkins, 1579, Christ´s College, Cambridge, "œThe Lord saith, All the nations shall be blessed in Abraham: Hence I gather that the nation of the Jews shall be called, and converted to the participation of this blessing: when, and how, God knows: but that it shall be done before the end of the world we know." (42)


"œFrom the first quarter of the seventeenth century, belief in a future conversion of the Jews became commonplace among the English Puritans." (43)


William Gouge, The Calling of the Jews, book published in 1621 (44)


Moses Wall, Some Discourses upon the Point of the Conversion of the Jews, published in 1650 (44)


Increase Mather, The Mystery of Israel´s Salvation Explained and Applied, 1669, "œthat there shall be a general conversion of the Tribes of Israel is a truth which in some measure hath been known and believed in all ages of the Church of God, since the Apostles´ days"¦ Only in these late days, these things have obtained credit much more universally than heretofore." (45)


"œThomas Brightman (1562-1607) seems to have been one of the first divines of the Puritan school to reject the argument that the Jews´ conversion must be placed at the very end of history"¦ Paul himself, Brightman argues, implies the contrary in verse 15 of Romans 11. The Jews´ calling, he believed, would be part of a new and brighter era of history, and not the end." (45,46)


Elnathan Parr, Plain Exposition (Romans commentary), published 1620, "œThe casting off of the Jews, was our Calling; but the Calling of the Jews shall not be our casting off, but our greater enriching in grace"¦ in regard of the company of believers, when thousands of Israel shall come in, which shall doubtless cause many Gentiles which now lie in ignorance, error and doubt, to receive the Gospel and join with them. (46)


Samuel Rutherford, 1635, "œO to see the sight, next to Christ´s Coming in the clouds, the most joyful! Our elder brethren the Jews and Christ fall upon one another´s necks and kiss each other! They have been long asunder; they will be kind to one another when they meet. O day! O longed-for and lovely day-dawn! O sweet Jesus, let me see that sight which will be life from the dead, thee and thy ancient people in mutual embraces." (98)


Robert Leighton, in a sermon "œChrist the Light and Lustre of the Church, 1642, "œUndoubtedly, that people of the Jews shall once more be commanded to arise and shine, [based on Isa. 60:1] and their return shall be the riches of the Gentiles (Rom. 11:12), and that shall be a more glorious time than ever the Church of God did yet behold"¦ They forget a main point of the Church´s glory, who pray not daily for the conversion of the Jews." (75)


John Brown, Exposition of Romans, 1666, "œGentiles need not fear that the conversion of the Jews shall any way prejudice them; but they may expect to reap advantage thereby." (67)


James Durham, Scot, 1680, "œWhatever may be doubted of their restoring to their land, yet they shall be brought to a visible Church-state. Not only in particular persons here and there in congregations; but that multitudes, yea, the whole body of them shall be brought, in a common way with the Gentiles, to profess Christ, which cannot be denied, as Romans 11 is clear." (61)


John Albert Bengel (1687-1752), comments on Rom. 11:12 and 25, "œthe full conversion of Israel will then led to the wider blessing of the world." (132)


Jonathan Edwards, 18th century, "œThough we do not know the time in which this conversion of Israel will come to pass, yet this much we may determine by Scripture, that it will be before the glory of the Gentile part of the church shall be fully accomplished, because it is said that their coming in shall be life from the dead to the Gentiles (Rom. 11:12,15). (154)


Charles H. Spurgeon, 1855, in a volume of sermons, "œI think we do not attach sufficient importance to the restoration of the Jews. We do not think enough of it. But certainly, if there is anything promised in the Bible, it is this"¦. The day shall yet come when the Jews, who were the first apostles to the Gentiles, the first missionaries to us who were afar off, shall be gathered in again. Until that shall be, the fullness of the church´s glory can never come. Matchless benefits to the world are bound up with the restoration of Israel; their gathering in shall be as life from the dead." (256)

 

[Mayflower]

ROBERT MURRAY M'CHEYNE
"To the Jew first. Converted Israel, he declared, will give life to the dead world....just as we have found, among the parched hills of Judah, that the evening dew, coming silently down, gave life to every plant, making the grass to spring and the flowers to put forth their sweetest fragrance, so shall converted Israel be when they come as dew upon a dead, dry world. The remnant of Jacob shall be in the midst of many people as a dew from the Lord, as the showers upon the grass, that tarrieth not for man, nor waiteth for the sons of men." Micah 5:7. Memoir and Remains of R. M. M'Cheyne - 1966 reprint pg 489. In 1840 M'Cheyne went to Ulster to plead for the interest of the Jews. This stirred up great interest. The following year the Irish General Assembly resolved to establish work among the Jews. They established missions in Syria and Germany, believing "missionary enterprise is one of the means to bring about the restoration of Israel in accordance with the Scriptures." * Minutes of the General Assembly. 1840-1850 .

JOHN MURRAY
"To the Jew first, and also to the Greek...it does not appear sufficient to regard this priority as that merely of time. In this text there is no suggestion to the effect that the priority is merely that of time. the implication appears to be rather that the power of God unto salvation through faith has primary relevance to the Jew, and the analogy of Scripture would indicate that this peculiar relevance to the Jew arises from the fact that the Jew had been chosen by God to be the recipient of the promise of the gospel and that to him were committed the oracles of God...
While it is true that in respect of the privileges accruing from Christ's accomplishments there is now no longer Jew or Gentile and the Gentiles "are fellow-heirs, and fellow-members of the body, and fellow-partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus throughout the gospel"(Eph. 3:6), yet it does not follow that Israel no longer fulfills any particular design in the realization of God; worldwide saving purpose...
Israel are both "enemies" and "beloved" at the same time, enemies as regards the gospel, beloved as regards the election..."Beloved" thus means that God has not suspended or rescinded his relation to Israel as his chosen people in terms of the covenants made with their fathers.
Unfaithful as Israel has been and broken off for that reason, yet God still sustains his peculiar relation of love to them, a relation that will be demonstrated and vindicated in the restoration."*The Epistles to the Romans, John Murray, Wm B Eerdmans Publishing Col, 1984, Vol 1 pg 28 and Vol. II pp. 14-15 and 76-101, passim.

JOHN "RABBI" DUNCAN
"Our hands now became so full of work that frequently we had not time so much as to eat bread; from early morning until late at night we were occupied guiding, counselling and instructing those who were inquiring earnestly what they must do to be saved....for a time the whole Jewish community was deeply moved wondering where unto these things would grow. * The Life of John Duncan, David Brown pg 334.

RICHARD SIBBES
"The Jews are not yet come in under Christ's banner; but God, that hath persuaded Japhet to come to the tents of Shem, will persuade Shem to come into the tents of Japhet, Gen. 9:27.. the fullness of the Gentiles is not yet come in Rom 11:25...but God will gather all the sheep His father hath given Him into one fold that there may be one sheepfold and one shepherd John 10:16.... the faithful Jews rejoiced to think of the calling of the Gentiles; and why should not we joy to think of the calling of the Jews..*The Complete Works of Richard Sibbes by A.B. Grosart Vol 1 pg 99. And when the fullness of the Gentiles is come in, then comes the conversion of the Jews. Why may we not expect it? they were the people of God. We see Christ believed on in the world. We may therefor expect that they will also be called, there being many of them, and keeping their nation distinct from others. Richard Sibbs vol 5 pg 517

INCREASE MATHER
In his work the Mystery of Israel's Salvation Explained and Applied says the following : "That there shall be a general conversion of the tribes of Israel, is a truth which in some measure hath been known and believed in all ages of the church of God, since the Apostles' days....only in these late days these things have obtained credit much more universally than herefore."
"There is a veil of miserable blindness upon their hearts that they cannot, they will not, see the truth ; but, sayeth the Apostle, "this shall be taken away". And (sayeth he) "it shall turn". What is this? I answer; "it", there may note the body of the Jewish nation, or the words may be read, "they shall turn" (i.e. the blinded minds of the Jews shall turn) "unto the Lord".

RICHARD CAMERON
"The Lion of the Covenant" Cameron preached on May 30, 1680 from the text "and ye will not come to me, that ye might have life". In the midst of this sermon which has been described as one of the most remarkable blessed of the Lord preached in Scotland, Cameron fell into a "rap of calm weeping", and his hearers wept with him. Compelled for the moment to stop, he "prayed for the restoration of the Jews". John Herkless tells us that 200 years later, the memory of those services, had not died out among the people of the districts where Cameron spoke. Richard Cameron, John Herkless, 1896, pg 109

THOMAS GOODWIN
"There will come a time when the generality of mankind both Jew and Gentile, will come to Jesus Christ. He hath had but little takings of the world yet, but he will have before he hath done. " Sermon 34 Vol 1 pg 520. "There may be some prayers which you must be content never yourselves to see answered in this world, the accomplishment of them not falling out in your time; such as those you haply make for the calling of the Jews, the utter downfall of God's enemies and the flourishing of the Gospel...all which prayers are not yet lost, but will be answered."* Works of Thomas Goodwin Vol 3 pg 365,366.

JONATHAN EDWARDS
"Jewish infidelity shall be overthrown...the Jews in all their dispersions shall cast away their old infidelity, and shall have their hearts wonderfully changed, and abhor themselves for their past unbelief and obstinacy.
They shall flow together to the blessed Jesus, penitently, humbly, and joyfully owning him as their glorious King and only Savior, and shall with all their hearts, as one heart and voice, declare his praised unto other nations.. Nothing is more certainly foretold than this national conversion of the Jews in Rom 11.
Besides the prophecies of the calling of the Jews, we have a remarkable providential seal of the fulfillment of this great event, by a kind of continual miracle, viz. their being preserved a distinct nation...the world affords nothing else like it. There is undoubtedly a remarkable hand of providence in it. When they shall be called, that ancient people, who alone were so long God's people for so long a time, shall be his people again, never to be rejected more. They shall be gathered together into one fold, together with the Gentiles..." *The Works of Jonathan Edwards, Vol 1 Banner of Truth Trust, 1976, pg 607.

JOHN BRAIDWOOD
A Scottish missionary to the Gentiles in India he also remembered Israel's place in the unfulfilled promises of Scripture. He spoke on The Conversion of the Jews; and Its Bearing on the Conversion of the Gentiles. His address was published posthumously in Edinburgh in 1853. In a Preface, Braidwood writes, "We could not but express our conviction that the circulation of it was fitted to edify the body of Christ generally; while it would prove to all how strongly the missionaries to the Gentiles sympathize in efforts for the conversion of the Jews." And he closes his Preface with these considerations "to stir up our hearts to faith and prayer for Israel":
1. The national restoration of the Jews, and its blessed effects on the world. For what have they been preserved, but for some wondrous end? If their lapse is the world's wealth, and their loss the wealth of the Gentiles, how much more shall their replenishment be all this? Rom 11.12.
2. "The Jews are the whole world's benefactors. Through Jewish hands and eyes God has sent his lively oracles of truth to us. They penned, and they preserved the Bible.
3." Our Redeemer - the God-man- who has all power in heaven and earth, is their kinsman. "He took on Him the seed of Abraham."
4."Viewed nationally, the Jews are the most miserable of all nations. The Messiah wept over Jerusalem, their capital, before the curse fell on it: ought not we to weep over the accumulated progressive woe springing from the curse, and drinking up the nation's spirit for eighteen centuries?
5." Their covenant prospects are bright beyond all conception. On the grand day of their realization, will anyone of us all regret that we pitied Israel apostate and outcast?"

CHARLES HODGE
"The second great event, which, according to the common faith of the Church, is to precede the second advent of Christ, is the national conversion of the Jews ...that there is to be such a national conversion may be argued from the original call and destination of that people. God called Abraham and promised that through him, and in his seed, all the nations of the earth should be blessed...A presumptive argument is drawn from the strange preservation of the Jews through so many centuries as a distinct people.
As the rejection of the Jews was not total, so neither is it final. First, God did not design to cast away his people entirely, but by their rejection, in the first place to facilitate the progress of the gospel among the Gentiles, and ultimately to make the conversion of the Gentiles the means of converting the Jews...Because if the rejection of the Jews has been a source of blessing, much more will their restoration be the means of good...The restoration of the Jews to the privileges of God's people is included in the ancient predictions and promises made respecting them...The plan of God, therefore, contemplated the calling of the Gentiles, the temporary rejection and final restoration of the Jews...
He shows that the rejection of the Jews was not intended to result in their being finally cast away, but to secure the more rapid progress of the gospel among the heathen, in order that their conversion might react upon the Jews, and be the means of bringing all, at last, within the fold of the Redeemer...
The future restoration of the Jews is, in itself, a more probable event than the introduction of the Gentiles into the church of God. This, of course, supposes that God regarded the Jews, on account of their relation to him, with peculiar favor, and that there is still something in their relation to the ancient servants of God and his covenant with them, which causes them to be regarded with special interest. As men look upon the
children of their early friends with kinder feelings than on the children of strangers, God refers to this fact to make us sensible that he still retains purposes of peculiar mercy towards his ancient people.
As the restoration of the Jews is not only a most desirable event, but one which God has determined to accomplish, Christians should keep it constantly in view even in their labors for the conversion of the Gentiles."**Systematic Theology V3,James Clark & Co. 1906, p 805 and A Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans, Presbyterian Board of Publication, 1836, pp 270-285 passim. Now Published by Banner of Truth Trust.)

MATTHEW HENRY
"Now two things he exhorts the Gentiles to, with reference to the rejected Jews: - to have a respect for the Jews, notwithstanding, and to desire their conversion. This is intimated in the prospect he gives them of the advantage that would accrue to the church by their conversion, Rom. 11:12, 15. It would be as life from the dead; and therefore, they must not insult or triumph over those poor Jews, but rather pity them, and desire their welfare, and long for the receiving of them in again.
Another thing that qualifies this doctrine of the Jews rejection is that though for the present they are cast off, yet the rejection is not final; but, when the fullness of time is come, they will be taken in again. They are not cast off for ever, but mercy is remembered in the midst of wrath.

The Jews are in a sense a holy nation (Ex. 14:6) being descended from holy parents. Now it cannot be imagined that such a holy nation should be totally and finally cast off. This proves that the seed of believers, as such, are within the pale of the visible church, and within the verge of the covenant, till they do, by their unbelief, throw themselves out; for, if the root be holy, so are the branches...though grace does not run in the blood, yet external privileges do (till they are forfeited), even to a thousand generations...The Jewish branches are reckoned holy, because the root was so. This is expressed more plainly (Rom. 11:28)
Though particular persons and generations wear off in belief, yet there having been a national church membership, though for the present suspended, we may expect that it will be revived...It is called a mystery (Rom 11:25), that which was not obvious, and which one would not expect upon the view of the present state of that people, who appeared generally so obstinate against Christ and Christianity that it was a riddle, to talk of their unanimous conversion. Alas! who shall live when God doeth this?"
*Matthew Henry's Commentary, V 6, MacDonald Publishing Company, pp 448-453.

CHARLES SIMEON
Once at a missionary meeting Simeon had seemed so carried away with the future of the Jews that a friend passed him a slip of paper with a question, "Six millions of Jews and six hundred millions of Gentiles - which is the most important?" Simeon at once scribbled back, "If the conversion of the six is to be life from the dead to the six hundred what then? W. T. Gidney The History of The London Society For Promoting Christianity Among The Jews. 1908 pg 273

ELNATHION PARR
The casting off of the Jews, was our calling; but the calling of the Jews shall not be our casting off, but our greater enriching in grace, and that two ways: First in the regard of the company of believers, when the thousands of Israel shall come in, which shall doubtless cause many Gentiles which now lie in ignorance, error and doubt, to receive the gospel and join in with them. The world shall then be a golden world, rich in golden men. Secondly, in respect of the graces, which shall then in more abundance be rained down upon the church." The Works of Elnathan Parr, 3rd ed. 1633 pg 175

SAMUEL RUTHERFORD
"O to see the sight, next to Christ's Coming in the clouds, the most joyful! Our elder brethren the Jews fall
upon one another's necks and kiss each other! They have been long asunder; they will be kind to one
another when they meet. O day! O longed for and lovely day - dawn! O sweet Jesus let me see that sight
which will be as life from the dead, thee and thy ancient people in mutual embraces."
O that there were nations, kindreds, tongues, and all the people of Christ's habitable world, encompassing
his throne with cries and tears for the spirit of supplication to be poured down
on the inhabitants of Judah for that effect.
Letters of Samuel Rutherford Bonar's edition, pg 122-3 and early letters of Samuel Rutherford

THOMAS BOSTON
" There is a day coming when there shall be a national conversion of the Jews or Israelites. The now blinded and rejected Jews shall at length be converted into the faith of Christ, and join themselves to the christian Church," Have you any love to, or concern for the church, for the work of reformation, the reformation of our country, the reformation of our world? Any longing desire for the revival of that work now at a stand; for a flourishing state of the Church, that is now under a decay? then pray for the conversion of the Jews." Sermon in 1716 "Encouragement to Pray for the Conversion of the Jews."

JAMES ROBE
" Methinks I hear the nation of the Jews ( for such is the cry of their case) crying aloud to you from their dispersion, We were once the Church of God, beloved, while you were not; we have now been rejected of God for more than sixteen hundred years, because of our unbelief, and for this long, very long while, wrath to the uttermost hath been lying upon us! There are many promises and predictions that we shall be grafted in again...Pray therefore, and wrestle with God, that he may, according to his promise, pour forth upon the Spirit of grace and supplication, that we may look upon him whom we have pierced, and mourn"... Help us with your prayers." A Second Volume of Sermons 1750 xvi-xvii

 

[Mayflower]

From : Ian Murray - " The puritan hope (Chapter 3) " :

This central hope, then, the Reformers clearly asserted. It was in regard to other subjects bearing on unfulfilled prophecy that they left no united testimony. Several of these subjects received little attention from the first generation of Reformers and, with one exception, they were left for their successors to take up. The exception was the unanimous belief that the Papal system is both the "˜man of sin´ and the Babylonian whore of which Scripture forewarns (2 Thess. Rev. 19)." In the conviction of sixteenth-century Protestants Rome was the great Anti-Christ, and so firmly did this belief become established that it was not until the nineteenth century that it was seriously questioned by evangelicals.

One of the first developments in thought on prophecy came as further attention was given to the Scriptures bearing on the future of the Jews. Neither Luther nor Calvin saw a future general conversion of the Jews promised in Scripture; some of their contemporaries, however, notably Martin Bucer and Peter Martyr, who taught at Cambridge and Oxford respectively in the reign of Edward VI, did understand the Bible to teach a future calling of the Jews. In this view they were followed by Theodore Beza, Calvin´s successor at Geneva. As early as 1560 four years before Calvin´s death, the English and Scots refugee Protestant leaders who produced the Geneva Bible, express this belief in their marginal notes on Romans chapter 11, verses 15 and 26. On the latter verse they comment, "˜He sheweth that the time shall come that the whole. nation of the Jews, though not every one particularly, shall be joined to the church of Christ.´ .

The first volume in English to expound this conviction at some length was the translation of Peter Martyr´s Commentary upon Romans, published in London in 1568.The probability is strong that Martyr´s careful exposition of the eleventh chapter prepared the way for a general adoption amongst the English Puritans of a belief in the future conversion of the Jews. Closely linked as English Puritanism was to John Calvin it was the view contained in Martyr´s commentary which was received by the rising generation of students at Cambridge.

Among those students was Hugh Broughton (1549-1612) who had the distinction of being the first Englishman to propose going as a missionary to the Jews in the Near East, and also the first to propose the idea of translating the New Testament into Hebrew for the sake of the Jews. Broughton´s ardour for the conversion of the Jews found no sympathy, however, with the English bishops whom he had early offended by his Puritan leanings. Though given no preferment in the English Church he was so well known in the East on account of his learning that the Chief Rabbi of Constantinople wrote to him in 1599 and subsequently invited him to become a public teacher there! This early possibility of a mission to the Jews was thwarted by the Church authorities, but Broughton´s writings "” of which the best known was probably his Commentary on Daniel, 1596 "”stimulated further study of the whole question.

Broughton was too much an individualist ever to become a leader of the Puritan movement. Two years before he was ejected from his fellowship at Christ´s College, Cambridge, in 1579, William Perkins had entered the same college, a man whom we noted earlier as doing so much to influence the thinking of many who were to preach all over England. Perkins speaks plainly of a future conversion of the Jews: "˜The Lord saith, All the nations shall be blessed in Abraham: Hence I gather that the nation of the Jews shall be called, and converted to the participation of this blessing: when, and how, God knows: but that it shall be done before the end of the world we know.´ The same truth was opened by the succession of Puritan leaders at Cambridge who followed Perkins, including Richard Sibbes and Thomas Goodwin. In his famous book, The Bruised Reed, mentioned earlier in connection with Baxter´s conversion, Sibbes writes:

"˜The Jews are not yet come in under Christ´s banner; but God, that hath persuaded Japhet to come into the tents of Shem, will persuade Shem to come into the tents of Japhet, Gen. 9.27. The "œfulness of the Gentiles is not yet come in", Rom. 11.25, but Christ, that hath the "œutmost parts of the earth given him for his possession", Psa. 2.8, will gather all the sheep his Father hath given him into one fold, that there may be one sheepfold and one shepherd, John 10. 16.

"˜The faithful Jews rejoiced to think of the calling of the Gentiles; and why should not we joy to think of the calling of the Jews?´

This note of joy is significant. It had already been struck by Peter Martyr. If a widespread conversion of the Jews was yet to occur in the earth then the horizons of history were not, as Luther feared, wholly dark. Maintaining the truth that the great day for the Church would be the day of Christ´s appearing at the end of time, Sibbes nevertheless saw warrant for expecting what he calls "˜lesser days before that great day´. He continues:

"˜As at the first coming of Christ, so at the overthrow of Anti-Christ, the conversion of the Jews, there will be much joy.... These days make way for that day. Whensoever prophecies shall end in performances, then shall be a day of joying and glorying in the God of our salvation for ever. And therefore in the Revelation where this Scripture is cited, Rev. 21.4, is meant the conversion of the Jews, and the glorious estate they shall enjoy before the end of the world. "œWe have waited for our God," and now we enjoy him. Aye, but what saith the church there? "œCome, Lord Jesus, come quickly." There is yet another, "œCome, Lord", till we be in heaven.´

From the first quarter of the seventeenth century, belief in a future conversion of the Jews became commonplace among the English Puritans. In the late 1630´s, and in the national upheavals of the 1640´s "” the period of the Civil Wars "” the subject not infrequently was mentioned by Puritan leaders.

As a ground for hopefulness in regard to the prospects of Christ´s kingdom it was introduced in sermons before Parliament or on other public occasions by William Strong, William Bridge, George Gillespie and Robert Baillie, to name but a few. The fact that the two last-named were commissioners from the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland at the Westminster Assembly, which was convened by the English Parliament in 1643, is indicative of the agreement on this point between English and Scottish divines. Some of the rich doctrinal formularies which that Assembly produced, bear the same witness. The Larger Catechism, after the question, "˜What do we pray for in the second petition of the Lord´s Prayer?´ (Thy Kingdom come), answers: "˜We pray that the kingdom of sin and Satan may be destroyed, the gospel propagated throughout the world, the Jews called, the fulness of the Gentiles brought in ... that Christ would rule in our hearts here, and hasten the time of his second coming.´ The Directory for the Public Worship of God (section on Public Prayer before Sermon) stipulates in similar language that prayer be made "˜for the conversion of the Jews´.

This same belief concerning the future of the Jews is to be found very widely in seventeenth-century Puritan literature. It appears in the works of such well-known Puritans as John Owen, Thomas Manton and John Flavel, though the indices of nineteenth-century reprints of their works do not always indicate this. It is also handled in a rich array of commentaries, both folios and quartos "” David Dickson on the Psalms, George Hutcheson on the Minor Prophets, Jeremiah Burroughs on Hosea, William Greenhill on Ezekiel, Elnathan Parr on Romans and James Durham on Revelation: a list which could be greatly extended.

Occasionally the subject became the main theme of a volume. Perhaps the first in order among these was The Calling of the Jews, published in 1621 by William Gouge, the eminent Puritan minister of Blackfriars, London; the author was a barrister, Sir Henry Finch. A slender work, Some Discourses upon the Point of the Conversion of the Jews, by Moses Wall, appeared in 1650, and nineteen years later Increase Mather, the New England divine of Boston, issued his work, The Mystery of Israel´s Salvation Explained and Applied. "˜That there shall be a general conversion of the Tribes of Israel is a truth which in some measure hath been known and believed in all ages of the Church of God, since the Apostles´ days"¦.. Only in these late days, these things have obtained credit much more universally than heretofore.´ So Mather wrote in 1669.

By this latter date, however, divergencies of view had also become established within Puritan thought on prophecy, and to these we must now turn. They centre around those scriptural prophecies which appear to speak of a general conversion of the nations. The first expositors of a future conversion of Israel, Peter Martyr and William Perkins for instance, had placed that event very close to the end of time. Martyr interpreted the word "˜fulness´ in Paul´s statement, "˜blindness in part is happened to Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in´ (Rom. 11.25) to mean that Christ´s kingdom among the Gentiles will have reached its fullest development, indeed its consummation, by the time that Israel is called. By the conversion of the Jews, he says, the churches will "˜be stirred and confirmed´, but the thought that thereafter many more Gentiles will be converted is not possible, Martyr argues, for "˜it is said, that the Jews shall then be saved and enter in, when the fulness of the Gentiles hath entered in. And if the calling of the Gentiles shall be complete, what other Gentiles shall there be remaining to be by the conversion of the Jews brought unto Christ?´

Thomas Brightman (1562"”1607) seems to have been one of the first divines of the Puritan school to reject the argument that the Jews´ conversion must be placed at the very end of history. Brightman was a contemporary of Perkins at Cambridge and a fellow of Queens´ College before his appointment to the living of Hawnes, Bedfordshire, in 1592. With his Commentary on the Revelation of St. John, A Revelation of the Apocalypse (first published in Latin in the year of his death and later in English) he stands at the head of the long line of subsequent English commentators on that book. For Brightman the Revelation gives a chronological outline of church history: events up to the 14th chapter he considered were already fulfilled; the 15th commences to deal with things yet to come; while the 20th gives a summary in which "˜the whole history is repeated´. In the course of this exposition the Elizabethan Puritan gives considerable attention to the future prospects of the Jews: "˜I have set down these things with more store of words, because I would give our Divines an occasion of thinking more seriously of these things.´

Brightman´s work confirmed the view that the Jews would be called, but in addition it brought forward considerations concerning the time of their conversion which tended to show that the matter was not so conclusively settled as Martyr had considered. Though there would be a certain fulness of the Gentiles made up before the salvation of Israel, this does not necessitate the belief that no more Gentiles can be added; Paul himself Brightman argues, implies the contrary in verse 15 of Romans 11.15 The Jews´ calling, he believed, would be part of a new and brighter era of history, and not the end.

In the earliest and most popular Puritan exposition of Romans, the Plain Exposition of Elnathan Parr, published in 1620, it is interesting to note a development in the same direction. Parr was educated at Eton, graduated B.A. at Cambridge in 1597 and exercised a powerful ministry at Palgrave, Suffolk, dying about the year 1632. In handling chapter eleven he is in major agreement with Martyr and refers to his work. But over the prospects for the world at the time of Israel´s future calling he does not accept the Continental divine´s interpretation that the "˜fulness of the Gentiles´, preceding the Jews´ call, means that God´s saving work among the Gentiles will then be complete:

"˜The casting off of the Jews, was our Calling; but the Calling of the Jews shall not be our casting off, but our greater enriching grace, and that two ways: First, in regard of the company of believers, when the thousands of Israel shall come in, which shall doubtless cause many Gentiles which now lie in ignorance, error and doubt, to receive the Gospel and join with them. The world shall then be a golden world, rich in golden men, saith Ambrose. Secondly, in respect of the graces, which shall then in more abundance be rained down upon the Church." In 1627, seven years after Parr´s commentary appeared, further impetus was given to the expectation of world-wide blessing connected with the calling of the Jews, by the appearance of a Latin work by John Henry Alsted, The Beloved City. Alsted poses his main question in these words, "˜Whether there shall be any happiness of the Church here upon earth before the last day; and of what kind it shall be?´ From a consideration of some sixty-six places in the Scriptures he resolves this question in the affirmative and gives the following outline of the Church´s history during the course of the Christian era:

1.From Christ´s birth to the Council of Jerusalem, A.D. 50.

2.The second period is of the Church spread over the whole world and contains the calling and conversion of most nations.

3.From the beginning of the thousand years to the end thereof and it shall contain, as well as the martyrs that shall then rise, the nations not yet converted, and the Jews; and it shall be free from persecutions.

4.From the end of the thousand years to the last judgment. In which the estate of the Church shall be very miserable"¦..

It will be seen immediately that Alsted identifies the period of the Church´s highest development on earth, when the Jews will be called, with the millennium of Revelation 20. The most prevalent view hitherto was that the thousand years´ reign of Christ was his spiritual rule over the Church in this world "”a symbolic picture of the whole period between Christ´s first and second advents. According to this traditional view, Christians of every generation share in Christ´s spiritual reign; they have "˜part in the first resurrection´ (Rev. 20.5), that is to say, they are people who have been quickened in regeneration. This spiritualization of the word "˜resurrection´ is not without support from other Scriptures. For instance, Christ, speaking of the present gospel era, says, "˜The hour is coming, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God: and they that hear shall live´ (John 5.25).

This interpretation, popularized by Augustine, was now being challenged. In Alsted´s view the thousand years was literal not simply a symbolic figure "” and the resurrection to mark its commencement was likewise to be literal. This new position on Revelation 20 soon gained influence in England, particularly through the writings of Joseph Mede (1586"”1638), a learned Fellow of Christ´s College, Cambridge. Mede, like Alsted who influenced him, argued that the millennium is a future period of time, and he went further with the suggestion that it would be ushered in by a personal appearing of Christ "”a "˜pre-millennial´ coming.´

Despite the general cautiousness of these two scholars, they both encouraged the practice of date-fixing and in the general excitement of the 1640´s "” the Civil War period "” the question whether Christ´s coming to establish a "˜millennial kingdom´ was near at hand was agitated by men of considerably less competence than Mede and Alsted. The end product was "˜the Fifth Monarchy´ party, so called because they believed that Christ´s monarchy, succeeding the four spoken of by Daniel, was shortly to be set up, with the Jews converted and the millennium brought in. Thomas Fuller, in his Worthies of England, published in 1662 when this party was thoroughly discredited, comments pithily: "˜I dare boldly say that the furious factors for the Fifth Monarchy hath driven that nail which Master Mede did first enter, farther than he ever intended it; and doing it with such violence that they split the truths round about it. Thus, when ignorance begins to build on that foundation which learning hath laid, no wonder if there be no uniformity in such a mongrel fabric."

* * *

We have traced in these last few pages a sequence and development of ideas which may be enumerated as follows: (1) the Jews to be converted; (2) their calling to be associated with a further expansion of the Church and therefore not to be at the end; (3) a fuller development and future prosperity of the Church to be identified with the thousand years´ peace of Revelation 20 and (4) Christ himself to inaugurate this future reign and raise his saints.

It is important now to notice that these beliefs are not so necessarily related as to stand or fall together. The majority of Puritan divines believed that the scriptural evidence was broad enough to warrant an acceptance of points one and two above. Some considered that point three was correct, but that the "˜resurrection´ to usher in the millennium was not to be taken literally; it refers, they thought, to the spiritual resurrection of the Church´s influence in the world which will then be witnessed. This identification of the Church´s time of highest development with a spiritual millennium was to command very wide support in eighteenth and early nineteenth-century Protestantism. Whether right or wrong, no major difference exists between those who accepted this refinement of point three and those who only went as far as point two. Sometimes those who accepted point three, in the sense just given, have been termed "˜millenaries´ or "˜chiliasts´, but Millenarianism proper is the view represented by point four and it is here that a radical difference is involved. According to this teaching the Church´s brightest era is to differ from the present not simply in terms of degree but in kind. That is to say, it will be more than a larger measure of the spiritual blessings already given to the church; by Christ´s personal appearing and the resurrection of saints an altogether new order of things is to be established. Christ will then reign in a manner not now seen or known. To this conclusion Mede´s teaching pointed and from it Puritanism, generally, diverged.

The reason for this divergence was the unwillingness of the majority to be committed to a prophetic scheme which virtually made Revelation 20, a notoriously difficult chapter; the axis of interpretation. Thus Elnathan Parr, while speaking of the future blessing promised in Romans 11 declines to employ Revelation 20 on account of its obscurity, though he notes that some have done so. Likewise John Owen with characteristic caution writes:

"˜The coming of Christ to reign here on earth a thousand years is, if not a groundless opinion, yet so dubious and uncertain as not to be admitted a place in the analogy of faith to regulate our interpretation of Scripture in places that may fairly admit of another application.´

We must therefore note that it was not upon a Millenarian basis that the Puritan movement in general believed in the conversion of the Jews and a period of world-wide blessing. The belief was already common long before the challenge of Millenarianism became noticeable in the 1640´s, and, while the two sides held common ground in that both believed there are various passages in the Old and New Testaments warranting the expectation of future blessing for the world, men of the main Puritan school were quick to assert in answer to that challenge that those scriptures needed no pre-millennial interpretation of Revelation 20 to make their sense clear. Thus Robert Baillie answers a pre-millennial writer who had appealed to Romans 11.12 (where Paul writes of the Jews, "˜If the fall of them be the riches of the world, and the diminishing of them the riches of the Gentiles; how much more their fulness?) in this way:

"˜There is nothing here for the point in hand: we grant willingly that the nation of the Jews shall be converted to the faith of Christ; and that the fulness of the Gentiles is to come in with them to the Christian Church; also that the quickening of that dead and rotten member, shall be a matter of exceeding joy to the whole Church. But that the converted Jews shall return to Canaan to build Jerusalem, that Christ shall come from heaven to reign among them for a thousand years, there is no such thing intimated in the Scriptures in hand.´

Thomas Hall in his pungent little book, A Confutation of the Millenarian Opinion, 1657, makes this same point in dealing with a certain Dr. Homes whose argument he summarizes and answers in the following terms:

"˜Those things which are prophesied in the Word of God and are not yet come to pass, must be fulfilled, (very true.) But the great sensible and visible happiness of the Church on earth before the Ultimate Day of judgment is prophesied in the Word of God, which is the Old and New Testament (very true,) ergo, it shall come to pass; who ever denied it? But what is this to the point in hand? Or what Logick is this? Because in the last dayes the Jews shall be called, and because the Glorious Spiritual Priviledges of the Church shall then be advanced, Ergo, Christ and the saints alone shall reign on earth a thousand years. This is the Drs Logick you see from first to last.´

* * *


We are now in a position to see how this somewhat prolonged discussion of Puritan thought on prophecy relates to the subject of revival. If the calling of the Jews and a wider conversion work in the world is to occur without such cataclysmic acts as personal descent of Christ and the resurrection of saints, by what means will these blessings be brought to pass? The answer of the main Puritan school became a most important part of the heritage which they left to posterity. It was that the kingdom of Christ would spread and triumph through the powerful operations of the Holy Spirit poured out upon the Church in revivals. Such periods would come at the command of Christ, for new Pentecosts would show him still to be "˜both Lord and Christ´. Their whole Calvinistic theology of the gospel, with its emphasis on the power given to Christ as Mediator for the sure ingathering of the vast number of his elect, and on the person of the Holy Spirit as the One by whom the dead are quickened, dovetails in here. They rejected altogether a naturalistic view of inevitable progress in history "”so common in the nineteenth century "” but asserted that the sovereign purpose of God in the gospel, as indicated by the promises of Scripture yet unfulfilled, points to the sure hope of great outpourings of the Spirit in the future. It was upon such central beliefs as these that the Puritans based their expectations. John Howe, for instance, exemplifies their common attitude when he dealt with unfulfilled prophecy in a series of fifteen sermons on Ezekiel 39.29: "˜Neither will I hide my face any more from them: for I have poured out my Spirit upon the house of Israel, saith the Lord God.´ The series was posthumously published under the title, The Prosperous State of the Christian Interest before the End of Time by a Plentiful Effusion of the Holy Spirit. As Howe´s emphasis on the work of the Spirit is so characteristic of Puritan thought I have included a lengthy extract from these sermons at the end of this book, though it may help the reader to appreciate what follows if it is read after this present chapter.

Throughout Puritan literature, embracing authors who followed "˜the independent way´ in church government and those who were of Presbyterian convictions, and as common in Scotland as in England, there is this emphasis upon the kingdom of Christ advancing through revivals. We shall later seek to show how the transmission of this belief to the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries became one of the most powerful influences in the spiritual history of Britain and America.

In conclusion, it may be helpful to attempt a summary of the different views on unfulfilled prophecy which were current among the main-line Puritans:

1. A small number continued the view current among the early Reformers that the Scriptures predict no future conversion of the Jews and that the idea of a "˜golden age´ in history is without biblical foundation. The most able spokesmen for this position were Alexander Petrie and Richard Baxter.

2. A larger number appear to have held the belief of Martyr and Perkins that the conversion of the Jews would be close to the end of the world. This was probably the dominant view at least until the 1640´s.

3. The attention drawn by such writers as Mede and Alsted to the millennium of Revelation 20, and to the Old Testament prophecies which appear to speak of a general conversion of the nations, led to a revived expectation of a pre-millerinial appearing of Christ, when Israel would be converted and Christ´s kingdom established in the earth for at least a thousand years before the day of judgment. Stated in its more moderate form this belief commanded the support of some of the Westminster divines (notably, William Twisse, Thomas Goodwin, William Bridge and Jeremiah Burroughs) ; in its wilder form it became identified with the Fifth Monarchy party. In all its forms, however, its influence seems to have been short-lived in the seventeenth century, and pre-millennial belief gained no general recognition in Protestantism until its revival two years later.

The fourth group, like the second, believed in a future conversion of Israel and opposed the idea of a millennium to be introduced by Christ´s appearing and a resurrection of saints. But, like the third group, they regarded Romans 11 and portions of Old Testament prophecy as indicating a period of widespread blessing both attending and following the calling of the Jews. The Confession of the Independents, The Savoy Declaration of 1658, summarizes this in its chapter "˜Of the Church´:

"˜We expect that in the later days, Antichrist being destroyed, the Jews called, and the adversaries of the Kingdom of his dear Son broken, the Churches of Christ being inlarged, and edified through a free and plentiful communication of light and grace, shall enjoy in this world a more quiet, peaceable and glorious condition than they have enjoyed.´

This statement has been attributed to the millenarianism current among Independents in the late 1640´s, but it should be noted that the Savoy divines, among whom was John Owen, declined to identify this period of the Church´s highest development with the millennium. Moreover, this same belief was maintained by staunch Presbyterians as, for instance, Thomas Manton (author of the "˜Epistle to the Reader´ in the Westminster Confession), David Dickson and Samuel Rutherford. Before Rutherford met any of the English Independents he wrote from St. Andrews in 1640: "˜I shall be glad to be a witness, to behold the kingdoms of the world become Christ´s. I could stay out of heaven many years to see that victorious triumphing Lord act that prophesied part of his soul-conquering love, in taking into his kingdom the greater sister, that kirk of the Jews, who sometime courted our Well-beloved for her little sister (Cant. 8.8); to behold him set up as an ensign and banner of love, to the ends of the world.´ This was no millennialism as Rutherford was careful elsewhere to say, "˜I mean not any such visible reign of Christ on earth, as the Millenaries fancy.´

Forty years later this same belief was the common testimony of the Covenanting field-preachers who upheld the confession of the Church of Scotland in its purity during "˜the killing times´. Richard Cameron preached on July 18, 1680 just three days before his violent death on the moors at Ayrsmoss, from the text, "˜Be still, and know that I am God: I will be exalted among the heathen: I will be exalted in the earth.´ (Psa. 46.10). To his hearers, gathered with him under the shadow of eternity, Cameron declared:

"˜You that are in hazard for the truth, be not troubled: our Lord will be exalted among the heathen. But many will say, "œWe know He will be exalted at the last and great day when He shall have all the wicked on His left hand." Yes but says He, "œI will be exalted in the earth." He has been exalted on the earth; but the most wonderfully exalting of His works we have not yet seen. The people of God have been right high already. Oh, but the Church of the Jews was sometimes very high, and sometimes the Christian Church! In the time of Constantine she was high. Yea, the Church of Scotland has been very high, "œFair as the moon, clear as the sun; and terrible as an army with banners." The day has been when Zion was stately in Scotland. The terror of the Church of Scotland once took hold of all the kings and great men that passed by. Yea; the terror of it took hold on Popish princes; nay, on the Pope himself. But all this exalting that we have yet seen is nothing to what is to come. The Church was high, but it shall be yet much higher. "œThere is none like the God of Jeshurun." The Church of Christ is to be so exalted that its members shall be made to ride upon the high places of the earth. Let us not be judged to be of the opinion of some men in England called the Fifth-Monarchy men, who say that, before the great day, Christ shall come in person from heaven with all the saints and martyrs and reign a thousand years on earth. But we are of the opinion that the Church shall yet be more high and glorious, as appears from the book of Revelation, and the Church shall have more power than ever she had before.´

The above four classifications cannot be taken as exact; they are an approximation. The Puritans, apart from the Fifth Monarchists "” if they can be classed as Puritan at all "” had no party divisions determined by prophetic beliefs. Yet the seventeenth century was the formative period of the differing schools of thought on prophecy which at a later date are more sharply identifiable. The fact that a present-day classification of evangelical prophetical belief would prove very similar seems to show that few new considerations have entered into the debate in the last three hundred years.

 

[VirginiaHuguenot]

This is good stuff, Mayflower. I didn't realize Hulse had written on this topic. These citations on the future conversion of the Jews from the historicist Postmil Puritan perspective are very helpful.

 

[Mayflower]

Dear VirginiaHuguenot,

Here on the baord, you almost don't read anything about Gods plan with the Jews, because most related it with dispensalism. Here in the Netherlands alot of orthodox reformed churches, who hold to the 3 form of unity, and who are absolute not disp. (who are amill or post mill.), are believing in a conversion of the Jews, there are even reformed organisations and they even have send missionaries (so reformed who hold to the covenant view) to Israel.