Will Durant and New Testament Eschatology
By Ward Fenley

Studying the writings of historians, even secular historians, continues to provide substantiation and validation for the framework within which we as believers in fulfilled eschatology understand the writings of the apostles and prophets. One such historian is Will Durant. Lauded by many as the greatest historian of the twentieth century, Durant wrote extensively concerning history and philosophy. His massive The Story of Civilization contains multiple volumes ranging from Our Oriental Heritage (Volume I) and The Life of Greece (Volume II); to Rousseau and Revolution (Volume X) and The Age of Napoleon (Volume XI). His series was praised by the New York Times as “magnificent and monumental.” His wife, Ariel, co-wrote the volumes The Age of Reason Begins, The Age of Louis XIV, Rousseau and Revolution, and The Age of Napoleon. Each volume of Durant’s work ranges from three to eight hundred pages. There have been many historians in the twentieth century, but none has contributed such exhaustive and penetrating works as Will Durant. Rather than a simple mechanical recitation of history, Durant infuses personality and even humor with his mighty intellect to convey history in an accurate (albeit non-Christian) way. It is to Volume III, Caesar and Christ, that we turn to gain insight into the first-century expectation of the second advent of Jesus. Many of Durant’s perceptions are precise concerning the anticipation of the early church. Though Durant seems to be non-(and sometimes anti-) Christian, he nevertheless sheds enormous light on the period surrounding the first century, and particularly in this case, the expectation of the first-century church. The chapters relevant to this are XXVII, The Apostles, A.D. 30-95; and XXVIII, The Growth of the Church, A.D.96-305. 

Toward the end of chapter XXVII, Durant writes of the Apostle John: “Besides three epistles, two major works have come down to us under his name. Criticism tentatively assigns the Book of Revelation to the year 69-70.…the author [John] describes the principate of Nero as precisely this Satanic age. Satan and his followers, having revolted against God, are defeated by Michael’s angelic hosts, are cast down upon the earth, and there lead the pagan world in the attack upon Christianity. Nero is the Beast and Antichrist of the book, a Messiah from Satan as Jesus was from God. Rome is described as ‘the harlot who sits on the great waters, with whom the kings of the earth have committed fornication’; she is the ‘whore of Babylon,’ the source and center and summit of all iniquity, immorality, perversion, idolatry; there the blasphemous and bloodstained Caesars demand the worship that Christians must reserve for Christ.” 

Importantly, Durant is correct in pinpointing the era to which Revelation applies, namely, the first century. However, his designation of Rome as the whore of Babylon is probably incorrect. When the apocalyptic language of the major prophets is examined, Israel and Jerusalem clearly stand out as the historical whore which would ultimately receive the judgment of God. She is regarded as “Sodom” and “Gomorrah,” in Isaiah (1:10), and conspicuously, even in Revelation, “that great city, which is spiritually called, Sodom and Egypt, where also our Lord was crucified.” (11:8)  

On page 594, Durant states as incredible that the book of Revelation and the Fourth Gospel should have come from the same hand. His reasoning: “The Apocalypse is Jewish poetry; the Fourth Gospel is Greek philosophy.” His first statement is correct. John draws continually from Old Testament apocalyptic. But Durant fails to see that the Gospel of John also draws from Jewish poetry, whether speaking of everlasting life (John 3:16 cf. Daniel 12:2), damnation (Matthew 23:33 cf. John 5:29 and Isaiah 33:14) or the eradication of hunger and thirst (John 6:35 cf. Isaiah 35:7; 49:10). Though his observations are inconsistent, his identification of the Apocalypse as Jewish poetry is very keen in comparison to the detestable scholarship and enormous wresting of the language by many 20^th century fundamentalists and evangelicals. But Durant uses the prelude in the Gospel of John to defend his position that it is a book rooted in Greek philosophy rather than Jewish apocalyptic and poetry when he (Durant) says: “we perceive at once that John has joined the philosophers: ’In the beginning was the Logos; the Logos was with God, and the Logos was God…all things were made by the Logos: without him nothing was made that was made. It was by Him that all things came into existence….So the Logos became flesh and blood, and dwelt amongst us.’” Here again, we may turn to the pages of Old Testament poetry to defend John’s Gospel. Rather than depending on Greek Philosophy for his presentation of the Logos, which can be translated “message,” John uses the term to describe that which was in the beginning and also took part in creation. We find similar language in the words of Solomon: 

Proverbs 8:1  Doth not wisdom cry? and understanding put forth her voice?

Proverbs 8:22-30  The LORD possessed me in the beginning of his way, before his works of old.  (23)  I was set up from everlasting, from the beginning, or ever the earth was.  (24)  When there were no depths, I was brought forth; when there were no fountains abounding with water.  (25)  Before the mountains were settled, before the hills was I brought forth:  (26) While as yet he had not made the earth, nor the fields, nor the highest part of the dust of the world.  (27)  When he prepared the heavens, I was there: when he set a compass upon the face of the depth:  (28)  When he established the clouds above: when he strengthened the fountains of the deep:  (29)  When he gave to the sea his decree, that the waters should not pass his commandment: when he appointed the foundations of the earth:  (30)  Then I was by him, as one brought up with him: and I was daily his delight, rejoicing always before him; 

The similarities should not be overlooked. Durant deviates greatly from apostolic intent when he writes: “Christianity did not destroy paganism; it adopted it. The Greek mind, dying, came to a transmigrated life in the theology and liturgy of the Church;” and more boldly, “Christianity was the last great creation of the ancient pagan world” (pg. 595). Rather, when one reexamines Old Testament imagery, Israelite reference and poetic style, and makes the parallels with Paul’s and John’s writings, it is evident they are primarily addressing a Jewish audience familiar with Mosaic law and Old Testament prophetic utterance. Durant continues to appeal to post-first century apologetics and theology to defend his perception. But there was strong deviation from apostolic theology among the second-fourth century church fathers, not the least of which was a re-creation and futuristic application of eschatology which no longer applied to the Old Testament economy. This same approach to eschatology continues to this day. It is likely that Durant, though vocally anti-Christian, was unconsciously guided by 20^th century theology and misconceptions about the eschatology of Paul and John. 

Yet, we must not dismiss his adroit statements regarding the first-century mindset toward the second advent. On page 603, Durant writes: “But Christians differed as to the date of the second advent. When Nero died and Titus demolished the Temple, and again when Hadrian destroyed Jerusalem, many Christians hailed these calamities as signs of the second coming.” But then he refers to Tertullian and others who “thought that the end of the world was at hand,” which of course was out of due time. And like many skeptics and liberals, Durant concurs, “As all signs failed, and Christ did not come, wiser Christians sought to soften the disappointment by reinterpreting the date of His return. He would come in a thousand years, said an epistle ascribed to Barnabas; He would come, said the most cautious, when the ‘generation’ or race of the Jews was quite extinct, or when the Gospel had been preached to all gentiles; or, said the Gospel of John, He would send in His stead the Holy Spirit or Paraclete.” He reminds us of Montanus who “prophesied with such eloquent ecstasy that his Phrygian followers—with the same religious enthusiasm that had once begotten Dionysus—hailed him as the Paraclete promised by Christ. He announced that the Kingdom of Heaven was at hand, and that the New Jerusalem of the Apocalypse would soon descend from heaven upon a neighboring plain. To the predestined spot he led so large a host that some towns were depopulated.” 

Earlier, in chapter XXV, on Rome and Judea, Durant writes of the Great Expectation: “This hope of salvation from Rome and earthly suffering through the coming of a divine Redeemer rings through nearly all the Jewish literature of this age. Many productions took the form of apocalypses or revelations, whose aim was to make the past intelligible and forgivable by presenting it as a prelude to a triumphant future revealed to some seer by God. The Book of Enoch, probably the work of several authors between 170 and 66 B.C., took the form of visions vouchsafed to the patriarch who, in Genesis (v, 24), had ‘walked with God.’ It recounted the fall of Satan and his cohorts, the consequent intrusion of evil and suffering into human life, the redemption of mankind by a Messiah, and the coming of the Kingdom of Heaven. About 150 B.C. Jewish writers began to publish Sibylline Oracles, in which various sibyls or prophetesses were represented as defending Judaism against paganism and foretelling the final victory of the Jews over their enemies.” Then, Durant makes a keen observation: “Many Jews agreed with Isaiah (XI,1) in describing the Messiah as an earthly king who would be born of the royal house of David; others, like the authors of Enoch and Daniel, called Him the Son of Man, and picture Him as coming down from heaven…nearly all the apocalyptic authors thought that the Messiah would triumph speedily; but Isaiah in a remarkable passage had conceived Him as ‘despised and rejected of men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief…. Surely He hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows///He was wounded for our transgressions, bruised for our iniquities/// and with His stripes we are healed. The Lord hath laid upon him the iniquity of us all…He was taken from prison and from judgment, and was cut off out of the land of the living…He bare the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors.’ All, however, agreed that in the end the Messiah would subdue the heathen, free Israel, make Jerusalem his capital, and win all men to accept yahveh and the Mosaic Law. Thereafter a ‘ Good Time’ would come of happiness for the whole world: all the earth would be fertile, every sea would bear a thousand fold, wine would be plentiful, poverty would disappear, all men would be healthy and virtuous, and justice, good fellowship, and peace would reign over the earth." 

The author then goes on to tell about the Roman-Jewish war. He makes a statement remarkably similar to Zechariah 12:10: “The old or well-to-do Hebrews counseled patience, arguing that revolt against so powerful and empire (Rome) would be national suicide; the young or poor accused them of connivance and cowardice. The two factions divided the city and nearly every family.” Compare this with the prophet: 

Zechariah 12:12 And the land shall mourn, every family apart; the family of the house of David apart, and their wives apart; the family of the house of Nathan apart, and their wives apart; 

These statements from Durant seem to echo the assertions of many secular historians who recognize the obvious statements of imminence pertaining to the kingdom of God. But misunderstandings of John, Jesus, and Paul have led Durant and others to overlook the strong Jewish connection with the Old Testament prophets; thus these historians continue to affirm a supposed “reinvention” of eschatology rather than affirming a completion of eschatology through the destruction of the Jewish Temple and state. 

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