The Parousia: A Critical Inquiry into the New Testament Doctrine of Our Lord's Second Coming

The more one learns about the Jewishness of Christ, Paul, and the Apostles, the easier it becomes to understand their mindset when writing the New Testament. Situations, idioms, cultural knowledge, and history are different now than they were in the first century A.D. Russel's proposition is this: if the Bible predicted a series of events, and if a part of history can be found in which those events were fulfilled to the letter, why presume that they haven't yet been fulfilled? He uses Hebrew and Greek culture, historical writings, and language to map all of the predictions of the "End Time," one for one, to events and persons prominent in the Roman siege of Jerusalem in A.D. 70. The Bible predicts an end of the old world and the creation of a new world in which Christ reigns. In A.D. 70, Biblical Judaism was wiped out. The Temple was destroyed; there have been no more blood sacrifices since then; the Priesthood was abolished. The old world was destroyed. Christ returned as predicted. He rescued the believers by getting them out of the city and up into the mountains (clouds). From this point on there could be no doubts that God had abolished Judaism and given the Kingdom over to the Church. A new world was created in which Christ reigns. I hope this will whet your appetite for a deeper understanding of what took place in A.D. 70, and how it fulfilled all remaining Biblical prophecy.

First of all, the "interview" with J.S. Russell presented is a different J.S. Russell from the author of this book, which was written in the 1890's and is reprinted by Kingdom Council. The Parousia is a classical and thorough, well-written example of Biblical exegesis which argues the case for full Pretorism, the view that all of the prophecies written about in the Book of Revelation were fufilled during the Roman destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD. This view, which is recently regaining theological popularity, was the majority view until premillenial dispensationalism took over the theological thinking of evangelical Christians in the early 1900's. Since that time we've had endless speculations about "the Last Days" or the "End Times" which have bordered on the ridiculous ("Last Days Madness") and which have discredited Christians in the eyes of non-Christians all over the globe. If you are interested in an understanding of Revelation which does not make silly claims and reduce Christian theology to the level of Action comic books, then I most highly recommend you take the time to read this book. The only downside to the book is that it is written in a highly literate, pre-television fashion that requires real thought and attention to digest. It is well worth the effort, however, both in terms of challenging your ideas and also in terms of introducing you to a mannor of civilized thinking that is unfortunately becomming lost in our increasingly barbaric culture