Eschatology in Sixteenth and Seventeenth Century England

Abstract

This essay examines the eschatological thought of seventeenth-century England. In the introduction a brief background study of sixteenth-century Continental and English Protestant eschatology is given. The rest of the essay is a comparative study looking at the eschatological thought of a variety of seventeenth-century commentators from different denominations. In particular, it examines: their thought on the nearness and nature Christ’s Return; their interpretations of the Book of Revelation; their views on the signs of the end, the Papacy, the Jews, the Turks, the Millennium; their date setting; and their practical application of Christ’s Return to believers. In the conclusion of the essay some practical lessons from this study are made. The historical value of this essay is that it concisely presents the details of seventeenth-century English eschatology that so dominated the thoug.ht of a wide range of people. The practical value is that it helps twentieth-century evangelicals see that eschatology has been a dominate theme of the church in the past from which we can draw lessons for the present.