2.7. The Importance of Historical Perspective

Notes

¹ Edward Hindson, Revelation: Unlocking the Future (Chattanooga, TN: AMG Publishers, 2002), 2.

² Thomas Ice, “Harold L. Lindsey,” in Mal Couch, ed., Dictionary of Premillennial Theology (Grand Rapids, MI: Kregel Publications, 1996), 242.

³ E. W. Bullinger, Commentary On Revelation (Grand Rapids, MI: Kregel Publications, 1984, 1935), 1-2.

⁴ Matthew Mat. 24:1 serves as an excellent illustration. The primary audience of this passage will live during a time when there will be a holy place —a temple standing in Jerusalem (Mtt. Mat. 24:15), will be living in Judea (Mtt. Mat. 24:16), and living under conditions of the Mosaic Law (Mtt. Mat. 24:20).

⁵ “If we count up the number of Old Testament passages quoted or alluded to in the New Testament, we find that the gospel of Matthew has a very large number, amounting in all to 92. The Epistle to the Hebrews comes higher still with 102. . . . when we turn to the Apocalypse, what do we find? . . . No less than 285 references to the Old Testament. More than three times as many as Matthew, and nearly three times as many as the Epistle to the Hebrews. We ask whether this does not give the book of Revelation a very special connection with the Old Testament, and with Israel? It is undoubtedly written about the people of the Old Testament who are the subjects of its history.” [emphasis added]—Bullinger, Commentary On Revelation, 6-7.

⁶ Ibid., 111-112.

⁷ The extreme of historical and geographical limitation is represented by the preterist interpretation which sees the entire book written to 1st-Century readers and concerning events localized in either the fall of Jerusalem or the fall of Rome.

⁸ Robert Anderson, The Coming Prince (Grand Rapids, MI: Kregel Publications, 1957), 171*.

⁹ Bullinger, Commentary On Revelation, 123-134.