By Louis Rushmore

Could you give me a little information on the doctrine of Kingism (70 A D)? ~ Norma Preston

On the surface, the A.D. 70 Theory hardly appears believable.  It appears absurd that anyone would seriously consider such a doctrine.  Especially religious people who usually exhibit a high regard for the authority of God’s Word and have intense familiarity with it would hardly be expected to be duped by such a thing.  However, the A.D. 70 Theory has been embraced by many anyway.  Part of the reason several have been susceptible to the persuasion of its proponents may be attributable to laxity in personal Bible study before hand.

The A.D. 70 Theory portrays all end-of-time events about which the Bible speaks as having already occurred at the destruction of Jerusalem in A.D. 70.  For the proponents of this doctrine, all biblical prophecy is fulfilled.  To accomplish this hermeneutically, its proponents have authored an entirely new vocabulary with which to replace biblical vocabulary.  Any doctrine can seem plausible if one has the liberty to redefine the words of his choosing.

A.D. 70 Theory proponents believe that Jesus Christ and his apostles taught the imminent (then soon to occur) second coming of Jesus Christ.  Yet, Jesus professed while on earth that he did not know when his second coming would occur (Matthew 24:36; Mark 13:32).  The apostles Paul and Peter taught that our Lord’s second coming would be as unexpected and at an unknown time as a thief in the night (1 Thessalonians 5:1-2; 2 Peter 3:10).

Those who advance the A.D. 70 Theory claim that remission of sins were not available in actuality following the sacrificial death of Jesus Christ on the cross.  They, instead, argue that remission of sins was not proffered until the A.D. 70 destruction of the city of Jerusalem by the Romans.  Of course, Scripture says differently.  “And you, being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh, hath he quickened together with him, having forgiven you all trespasses; Blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way, nailing it to his cross” (Colossians 2:14).  The death of Christ (wherein he shed his divine blood), not the destruction of Jerusalem, was efficacious in taking away sins and redeeming souls (Hebrews 9:14; Ephesians 1:7; Acts 20:28; Revelation 1:5).

Adherents to the A.D. 70 Theory do not believe that Jesus Christ will return bodily.  They imagine that our Lord’s birth represents our Lord’s only bodily coming and that his second coming was accomplished representatively by the Roman destruction of Jerusalem in A.D. 70.  They do not believe that Jesus is coming again!  All prophetic promises are a matter of history—nothing is left to come.

Further, A.D. 70 Theory advocates do not believe in a bodily resurrection from the dead.  They also claim that the final judgment and the end of the world occurred in A.D. 70 at Jerusalem’s destruction.  Every Scripture that pertains to end-of-time events has been recalibrated to correspond exclusively to A.D. 70 in Jerusalem at the horrific destruction of that city.

Several resources are available for a more thorough investigation of the A.D. 70 Theory.  These include: “Has the Second Coming Occurred?” (tract) by W. Terry Varner and Studies in Biblical Eschatology by W. Terry Varner.