Liberal And Always Liberalizing

Liberal and always liberalizing should perhaps be the motto of the hyperpreterist movement.  When Mike Bennett and company first started their hyperpreterist SGP website as a direct alternative to the liberal Planet Preterist website of Virgil Vaduva, the admins of SGP specifically wanted to avoid the junk-theology that was rampant on Planet Preterist.  SGP even says SGP is for “well tested theology”.  Yet, I once had a rare civil email discussion with Bennett and I told him no matter how much they attempt to ban the liberals from SGP, all hyperpreterist community sites always end up liberal — why? because hyperpreterism itself is NOT “well tested theology”.  Hyperpreterism attracts and coddles arm-chair wannabe “theologians”.  It celebrates private interpretation and encourages “new” and “fresh” perspectives.

Former hyperpreterist, Dorothy Anderson is known for the phrase that hyperpreterists tend to cozy up to every “whore of doctrine” and SGP is beginning to really reflect that.


One fellow recently submitted a 20+ page paper to SGP wherein he is trying to argue that women should be elders. He claims that the Bible contains “passages with the male dominant/masculine biased translations”.  What’s next, claiming that all the places where the Bible refers to God as “He” and as “Father” should be changed to “it” to rid the Bible of those meany “male dominant/masculine biased” passages???
Further, another article on SGP was posted where a hyperpreterist was trying to defend the traditional view that women are not to be elders/pastors.  But even on this thread, other initial members of SGP (not new guys) say things like, “I’m a feminist” and posted graphics stating, “Girl Power!”  And then follows that up with this outrageous statement:

“…the world of male chauvinists in which the jews of the first century lived could not handle such a concept (equality/mutual submission). To this day this cursed concept of a phallocrat domineering the women is hard to repeal. Read on the subject with an opened mind and you’ll get it.
Power to the girls!!!! :-)”  — hyperpreterist Jean-Pierre, long standing member of SGP

So much for “well tested theology” — give it a few more months and SGP will be as liberal as Virgil’s emergent playground.
In all fairness, Kelly Birks and a few others over on SGP tried to reel in the liberalism but we saw what happened to Birks when he tried to confront Sam Frost’s “agenda” (source).  Jason Bradfield basically told Birks to shut up.
And let no hyperpreterists claim, “Well, look at all the junk theology within ‘orthodoxy’” — First, it’s the hyperpreterists that are going around claiming their theology is the end all of theology, as if it is the pinnacle of what Christianity should be.  It is the hyperpreterists that go around claiming what horrible Christians they were before they found hyperpreterism.  It is the hyperpreterists that talk about how “being a [hyper]preterists should make a difference how they live” yet it is the hyperpreterists who at a higher ratio than Christianity have drunkards, multiple-marriage/divorcees, violent-acting men, lonely single individuals, hateful, smarmy individuals running the show.  No, they cannot out of one side of their mouths claim a superior life-altering theology and then out of the other claim they are no better off than general Christianity (or in actuality they are worse off).
Hyperpreterism will ALWAYS liberalize an individual, first by telling them they are their own private interpreteters and to hell with creeds and confessions and all of historic Christian interpretation.  Then by breaking down bit by bit every ounce of orthodox, conservative Christianity remaining.  It is like a cancer that preys upon the host, eventally transforming them into something so repugnant that the only people who can stand to be around them are others who are infected and whom apparently can no longer discern any error from truth.  This is the reason I believe the root problem with hyperpreterism is NOT doctrinal, but character — it requires a huge amount of arrogance to proffer hyperpreterism and a huge amount of self-deluding “fellowship” to keep a person tied to the movement.  Once a person starts to question the mantra of hyperpreterism, perhaps first they will claim they are no longer a “full preterist” and perhaps eventually break completely free of that disease.  Yes indeed, hyperpreterism is liberal and always liberalizing.  Uprooting and always uprooting historic Christianity in an attempt to replace it with some radically different “paradigm”.  — Hey you honest hyperpreterists, am I wrong???