Stop Calling Postmillennials "Judaizers” - Part 2

Part 2: How the postmillennial reading of the OT is the reformed not “Jewish” reading of the OT.

Another fundamental issue in Dr. Clark’s logic can be seen in this quote, “The postmillennial hermeneutic typically requires us to read the Old Testament either in isolation from the New or in a way that the New Testament writers do not. In either case, it is not a tenable way of reading the Old Testament. Certainly the Old Testament is replete with promises of a future earthly glory. The question is: What did the New Testament do with those promises and how should we understand them now?” From my conversations with Dr. Clark and his various writings (including this article), it seems that he has a narrow back-to-front reading of the Scriptures which means that he understands the Old Testament primarily (almost exclusively) through reading the New Testament. The Reformed hermeneutic, however, has always been about reading the Bible front-to-back and back-to-front. Which is to say that you understand the new in light of the old AND the old in light of the new. This is where Dr. Clark begins to sound like someone who elevates the New Testament over the Old, as well as someone who reads the Old Testament with a level of heightened discontinuity. You can see this by the way Dr. Clark will shut down an Old Testament reference to the Kingdom by saying that it is not stated verbatim in the New Testament. This position somewhat reminds me of the way Baptists shut down Old Testament texts about Sacraments due to the New Testament not stating such things with identical language. Dr. Clark’s responses to Old Testament texts about the Kingdom remind me of James White shutting down Old Testament texts about ecclesiology in his debates with Presbyterians (most ironic as Scott is the champion of explaining New Testament concepts of Sacraments with Old Testament texts). Reformed thinkers have always understood New Testament concepts in light of the Old and Old Testament concepts in light of the New, while Clark seems to want us to see the Old entirely and exclusively in light of the New. Whatever the Old Testament says can only be said if it is understood verbatim in light of New Testament words. However, this front-to-back and back-to-front reading of scripture can be seen regularly from the reformed throughout history.

George Gillespie (one of the Westminster Divines) helped the church understand New Testament ecclesiology from the Torah (understanding the new in light of the old). Gillespie did not have a Judaistic hermeneutic. In the WLC, Question 54, the Divines explain the New Testament reality of Christ’s ascension rule in light of Psalms 16:11 and 110:1. In the WLC, Question 191, the Divines explain the Kingdom of sin and Satan being destroyed in light of Psalms 68:1. When the Divines explain the church being furnished with gospel offices and ordinances they do so in light of Psalm 67. Would you like me to remind you what that Psalm says in verse 4? “Let the nations be glad and sing for joy, for you judge the peoples with equity and guide the nations upon earth. Selah. Let the peoples praise you, O God; let all the peoples praise you!” Did you see that? The Divines explain the New Testament concept of the Kingdom through the Lord's conquest over the nations in the Psalm. In Question 191, the civil magistrate's role (1229) in the New Covenant era is also understood in light of the Old Testament. Which implies that the Divines understood Romans 13 in light of Malachi 1:11 which says, “For from the rising of the sun to its setting my name will be great among the nations, and in every place incense will be offered to my name, and a pure offering. For my name will be great among the nations, says the LORD of hosts.” The Divines did not have a Judaistic hermeneutic.

Furthermore, in Calvin’s Institutes, he explains the role and nature of civil government through the book of Daniel and Jeremiah (Institutes 4:26-29). In his commentaries, Calvin explains the civil sphere and how it is to function post-Pentecost through expositions of Exodus 18 and 1 Samuel 8. Calvin used the book of Deuteronomy to give clarity to what Paul meant in Romans 13 concerning the civil sphere (See his commentary on Deuteronomy). Calvin did NOT use Romans 13 to read over Deuteronomy but read them both together and both in light of each other; he did not have a Judaistic hermeneutic. Samuel Rutherford in his book Lex, Rex, Or The Law And The Prince: A Dispute For The Just Prerogative Of King And People, explained how to understand Romans 13 in light of the books of Moses and the prophetic books. Rutherford did not have a Judaistic hermeneutic. The Divines explain the administration of new covenant signs through Old Testament texts like Genesis 17:7 and Exodus 4:24. What is my point? My point is simply that the Reformed interpretation of New Testament revelation is through the Old and the Old through the New. Dr. Clark wants all of us to understand all Old Testament concepts purely through the New Testament and not understand concepts such as the Kingdom through the Old. That radical discontinuity which purely leaves us reading back-to-front is not the way the historic-Reformers worked out their theology. It is not Premillennial to understand the Kingship of Christ post-Pentecost through the lens of Moses, the Prophets, and Psalms, unless you have a view of covenant and Kingdom that stresses radical discontinuity. Calvin did not have a Judaistic view of Christ’s Kingship because he understood the role of the magistrate in light of 1 Samuel 8 and the divines did not have a Judaistic way of understanding the Kingship of Christ because they understood the magistrate in light of Malachi 1:11! Therefore, Reformed theologians read Old Testament and New Testament together in complimentary symbiosis but not at the expense of the Old Testament, neither in the dispensational elevation nor of the New Testament over the Old. Furthermore, I am a covenant theologian who can talk about baptism in the New Testament through Old Testament circumcision texts and I can talk about circumcision in the Old Testament through New Testament baptism texts. I am a covenant theologian who can speak about New Testament Kingdom and eschatology through Old Testament Kingdom and eschatology texts and vice versa. If Dr. Clark cannot agree with this then I am suspicious that a part of his theology has capitulated to the radical discontinuity of the dispensational paradigms.