Redirectionalism Revisited: A Reprise

In November 2013 I was contacted by a gentleman named Donald Perry. He wanted to interact with me about Full/Hyperpreterism. He supposedly left it and wanted to talk about where he had landed after he left. Now, I try to be gracious and extra gentle toward former full preterists since there is often lots of latent hostility. Perry had written a book about his personalized "ism" he was calling "Redirectionalism". I agreed to read and review the book. (see here: http://unpreterist.blogspot.com/2013/11/redirectionalism-alternative-to-full.html) In everything I do, I attempt to be honest, fair yet forthright and it was no different with this review. However, Perry has become very hostile since the review and has made some rather puzzling and dishonest statements. First, let us look at the title of my initial review. Notice it is called: Redirectionalism: An Alternative to Full Preterism? This is how Perry promoted it to me.

Again, I'm always leery when some former full preterist espouses some "alternative". Why not simply embrace historic Christianity. Why create some new "ism". Anyhow, Perry so much didn't like my review that he immediately went and published a response to it...oddly enough on a Full/Hyperpreterist website. Now, part of my review stated that I believe Perry's Redirectionalism is still too much like Full/Hyperpreterism. He disagrees yet publishes his response on a Full/Hyperpreterist website...HUH??? Doesn't that kind of prove the point. I would have been willing to either publish his response in full here or link to his response IF he had published it any place other than a Full/Hyperpreterist website. Not only that, but shortly after my review, Perry signed up on yet another Full/Hyperpreterist website; called "Sovereign Grace Preterist". He isn't too convincing in trying to show his personal "ism" isn't akin to Full/Hyperpreterism.

DETAILS

Let's get into more of the details from Perry's response (which I'd be happy to publish here in full if he requests). First, Perry takes issue with me saying Full and Hyperpreterism are the same thing. Quote:

"There is big difference between Full Preterism and Hyper Preterism. They are not the same thing by any means."

Really? So when books are written against Hyperpreterism by men like Kenneth Gentry, Keith Mathison and others (ref) what is the distinction that Perry thinks they should make? They consider Full and Hyperpreterism synonymous. Perry goes on to make false distinctions as if there is a difference, saying:

"One view holds that they are no longer being sanctified while the other holds a view that they are still being sanctified. One view implies that Jesus is not coming again consistently, while the other inconsistently implies Jesus is coming again in their soteriology. The difference in these forms of Preterism is so strong that at this point anyone studying eschatology must conclude that Roderick has disqualified himself as any kind of scholarly critic because he does not know where he is going. The implications of his criticisms do not mean the same thing in relation to the two separate groups. Roderick has made himself incoherent."

It sounds more like Perry hasn't done his homework since every offensive against Hyperpreterism lumps these into one. Just because some hyperpreterists are more consistent than others doesn't make them two groups. Their common factor is they believe Jesus already came back -- in complete contrast to historic Christian doctrine. The disqualification is of Perry in his refusal to see that historically, Full Preterism and Hyperpreterism have been considered the same thing. Those people who write books about/against Full Preterism would say so and use the labels interchangeably. I wonder who Perry considers a Full vs Hyperpreterist. After that personal assault, Perry's "review" of my review goes dramatically downhill. Perry continues to question my intelligence -- personal attack when I never did such a thing during my review. He also continues to say I claim he is a Full/Hyperpreterist. Um, even the title of my review shows that I am distinguishing his personal "ism" as a possible alternative. I do however believe as Perry himself stated in his book that his Redirectionalism is built on his former Full/Hyperpreterist views and does in fact still contain many of the pillars such as Perry saying on page 49 that the physical world will remain forever, however he attempts to walk that back in his review by saying:

"Perhaps I should have left that *speculation* out of my book. And it is a speculation..."

Hmm... perhaps he should also be more careful with attacking people who he asks to review his book. I think he didn't really want an honest review.

DEAL BREAKER

But I'm a big boy. I can handle a bit of push back. I get it. What breaks the deal...causes me to stop communicating with people is when they reveal themselves to be duplicitous or liars. I had enough of that from men like Sam Frost and Kenneth Talbot who would say one thing on the phone and another thing in an email or publicly. It became so bad that people would catch these men in lies and then have to publish their emails to prove they were liars. Frost took to claiming you couldn't quote his "private" emails to you without his authorization. Right! I don't know if Perry is specifically trying to lie, but he is duplicitous. For example, he says in his review; and I quote verbatim:

"What I say privately is not the same thing that I say publically."

What ever happened to Matthew 5:37? I don't interact with people who say one thing privately and another thing publicly. Nor did Perry ever tell me to keep anything he was saying privately anyhow. He is just outraged that I pointed out that on the phone he told me he deleted entire sections of his book and then put them back in. Again, he tries in his review to claim he was merely cleaning up duplication. This is not what he said on the phone. Why would a person purposely reinsert duplication?

CONCLUSION

In conclusion, despite Perry's personal attacks and hostility, I STILL praise God for moving him away from Full/Hyperpreterism. I hope he is even moved further, but seeing him posting on and signing up on their sites looks like my review may have bruised his ego a bit and thus he looks for their validation. On another note, Perry in his review told us a little about his and his son's rock climbing. That was the most enjoyable and coherent part of his review. I think he'd done better to drop the book on his personal "ism" and instead write a book about rock climbing. I ask God to bless and keep Mr. Perry and look over and guide him in years to come.