AKA – Orthodox Preterism, Traditional Preterism

While there is no clearly defined or developed ”preterist framework” in history to turn to, the term “historic preterism” refers to the many historic preteristic statements made by the church fathers from the early Christian Church until now.  Just as there have been numerous variations, contradictions, alterations, and interpretations of futurist views throughout church history, so too has there been numerous preterist interpretations throughout church history as well.  Although less popular or known in the modern church, preterism in the history of the church is rampant among many Christian historians or church fathers, in one form or another.  While most of these men were undeniably partial preterist in their general view of eschatology, many of them believed in certain eschatological passages to have found complete fulfillment in the events prior to or during AD70, while others did not.  The overall collection of “preterist” (past fulfillment) statements by these men concerning passages that are today commonly pointed to as “futurist” statements (passages still unfulfilled) lends credence to the historic nature of the preterist framework as a plausible and potentialy true interpretation of eschatological beliefs in it’s fullest form. While certain claims have been offered up among some staunch preterist opponents, stating that “full preterism” is not historical within the church, this claim is entirely false and can be easily refuted.  Preterism has many forms throughout church history, and the combination of the many historical preterist interpretations allows for a Full Preterist framework of a wide variety since those many variations were proposed by the Orthodox Christian Fathers of the faith.