PRETERIST BIBLE COMMENTARY › Forums › Reply To: If the 1000 Year Reign is in the Past, is all hope lost?
Hi John, No worries. I appreciate your comments. I encourage feedback because it helps me know and understand my audience better–like having a free focus group. Soon I will put a blog on this site so that there may be a more suitable forum for these discussions. I just wish to make this quick point for the sake of my full preterist audience: In my commentaries on Revelation, you may recall that I often make the point that earth represents Israel, while sea represents the Gentile nations (i.e. Rome) throughout Revelation. I understand the “four corners of the earth” in this interpretive framework. The four corners are the four corners of the province of Israel (Israel is and was roughly rectangular in shape hence the four corner reference). As is the case today, Israel at the time of the first crusade was surrounded my Muslim territory at each of its boundaries. Recall that in the final battle of the first crusade, the soldiers of al-Afdal Shahanshah’s army consisted of Seljuk Turks (Meshek, Tubal and Gomer), Arabs (Sheba and Dedan), Persians (Persia), Armenians, Kurds, and Ethiopians (Cush). This unified assault consisted of Muslims from all four points of the compass from Israel’s point of reference–four corners of the earth, Israel. You are certainly most welcome to preserve your partial preterist leanings. It is not my desire to push full preterism on people. Even if it is true that all prophecies have been fulfilled, as I do believe strongly, this does not disprove future fulfillments. One can still point to these past events as types of future events to come. Thus even if full preterism can be found to be entirely true, this does not disprove partial-preterism. –Daniel ]]>