What is preterism?

When believers dig into Matthew 24 or the book of Revelation, they quickly discover that faithful Christians do not all read the timing of these prophecies the same way. One of the main positions you will run into is called preterism, and understanding it will help you make sense of debates about the end times without losing your footing on what Scripture actually promises.

The word itself sounds technical, but the core idea is simple enough to grasp in a sentence: preterism holds that a significant portion of what the Bible calls the last days and the coming of the Son of Man was already fulfilled in the first century, primarily through the Roman destruction of Jerusalem and its temple in AD 70.

Preterism comes from the Latin word praeter, meaning past. A preterist is someone who reads certain prophetic texts, especially the Olivet Discourse of Matthew 24 and Mark 13, and much of Revelation, as describing events that have already happened rather than events still waiting in our future. This stands in contrast to futurism, which places most of these prophecies ahead of us, still to come.

Preterists build their case largely on statements about timing within the text itself. Jesus told His disciples, “Verily I say unto you, This generation shall not pass, till all these things be fulfilled” (Matthew 24:34). To a preterist, this means the audience standing in front of Jesus, not some future generation two thousand years later, would live to see the events He described.

The historical hinge for preterism is the Roman siege and destruction of Jerusalem in AD 70, when Titus's legions leveled the temple, fulfilling Jesus's own words that there would not be one stone left upon another (Matthew 24:2). Luke's version of the discourse adds a detail preterists lean on heavily: “when ye shall see Jerusalem compassed with armies, then know that the desolation thereof is nigh” (Luke 21:20). Roman armies literally surrounded the city in that generation.

Because that specific warning matches actual first-century history so closely, preterists argue that at least this portion of Jesus's prophecy was pointing to AD 70, not to some far-future tribulation. Many conservative scholars who are not preterists agree that Luke 21:20-24 describes AD 70, even while holding that other verses in the same discourse look further ahead.

It is important to know that preterism is not one uniform position; it names a spectrum. Partial preterism keeps every essential Christian doctrine intact, including a future bodily return of Christ, a final resurrection, and a last judgment, while assigning many judgment prophecies to AD 70. Full preterism goes much further, claiming that Christ's second coming, the resurrection, and the final judgment already occurred spiritually in AD 70, with no future event left to anticipate.

That difference matters enormously. Partial preterism sits within the boundaries of historic Christian orthodoxy as one interpretive option among several. Full preterism steps outside those boundaries and has been treated as heretical because it denies the visible, bodily return of Christ that the New Testament repeatedly promises (Acts 1:11; 1 Thessalonians 4:16-17).

Preterism's strength is that it takes the original audience seriously. Jesus was speaking to real disciples with real questions about the temple in front of them, and much of what He said clearly had first-century relevance. Ignoring that context can lead to reading Bible prophecy as if it floats free of any historical moment, which is its own mistake.

The limit of a fully preterist reading is that some of the language in Matthew 24 and Revelation reaches beyond a localized Judean event, describing every eye seeing Him, the dead being raised, and a final new heavens and new earth (Revelation 1:7; Revelation 21:1). A responsible reading holds the first-century fulfillment and the still-future hope together rather than collapsing everything into the past.

You do not have to settle every detail of prophetic timing to walk faithfully with Christ. What Scripture insists on, no matter which timeline view you land on, is that Jesus is coming again visibly and bodily, that He will judge the living and the dead, and that everyone who trusts Him is secure in that hope.

So hold your view on preterism with humility, keep studying the text carefully, and let the settled truths, the cross, the empty tomb, and Christ's promised return, steady you more than any timeline chart ever could.