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Previous Article | · | copyright notice | · | Next Article |
Last "Left Behind" Novel Debuts Today
Copyright 2004 by Gretchen Passantino
Thursday, April 01 2004 @ 12:03 AM ESTThe 12th and last novel, Glorious Appearing, in the best-selling Christian fiction series, Left Behind, was released today with expectations that this volume will join the other 11 and their more than 40 million copies in making this series the best-selling contemporary Christian fiction series, outselling even general novelist John Grisham and the popular Harry Potter series by J. K. Rowling in some markets. In this 12th installment readers get to read about the Second Coming of Jesus Christ. The Left Behind series is written by prophecy teacher Tim LaHaye and Christian fiction author Jerry Jenkins.
The books take the end times position advocated by their authors, which is knwon theologically as dispensational pre-tribulational pre-millennialism. Although this view is the predominant view among Americans who identify themselves as "evangelical" and "born again," it is not the view of the majority of Christians world wide, nor has it ever been the majority view of the Christian Church in history. Dispensationalism became a popular view in the early 19th century, first among the Plymouth Brethren movement in the UK (under the teachings of John Nelson Darby) and then later in America, largely through its popularization by C. I. Scofield in his Scofield Study Bible. The series has also been criticized by some who are offended by its insistence that the majority of Jews will convert to Christ before the end and for its casting of the Anti-Christ in the figure of a man who leads the United Nations into accomplishing the devil's agenda.
Joseph Hough, Jr., president of Union Theological Seminary in New York, warned that the books' focus on future events and fulfillments of biblical prophecy "leads people to think that Christianity is about cosmic fire insurance."
LaHaye commented about the popularity of his stories, "If I invented the story, I'd be terribly arrogant. . . But I didn't invent the story."
© Copyright 2004 by Gretchen Passantino
For the full story: Climax of Christian Serial Soon on Shelves. See also this article on end times on the Answers In Action web site: The Dangers of the Eschatological Gospel.
UPDATE APRIL 1: Regent College, a conservative Christian institution in Vancouver, British Columbia won't run out of the new Left Behind book in its bookstore: it won't even carry the controversial The Glorious Appearing. According to bookstore manager Ian Panth, he decided not to stock a book that mixes "dangerous theology with politics" and that promotes an "American-centric view" that acts as though America is beyond criticism. Gordon Fee, a professor at Regent, was outspoken in his criticism of dispensational pre-tribulational pre-millennialism in a video series on the end times produced in 1999.
For the full story: Bookshop Bans Christian Best Seller.
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