Coker (1998) compares Hodge with Plymouth Brethren founder [[John Nelson Darby]] (1800-82) to test Sandeen's notion that American fundamentalism was an alliance between dispensationalism and Princeton theology against modernism. Hodge embraced the regnant [[postmillennialism]] of American Protestantism, which asserted that Christ would return after the world had been evangelized by the church, after which he would judge those who refused to embrace him and then rule forever on a regenerated earth. Darby's premillennialism offered a more pessimistic view in which evil would be overcome only through judgment of those opposing Christ. Darby also introduced the doctrine of the [[rapture]] as a means of rescuing believers from the tribulation that would occur just prior to the return of Christ. Hodge's and Darby's differing interpretations of Scripture were central to their contrasting eschatologies. Whereas Hodge considered prophetic and apocalyptic texts to be unclear and insisted that they be interpreted spiritually rather than literally, Darby put the prophetic texts, interpreted literally, at the center of his doctrinal system. These incompatible eschatologies and interpretations of Scripture prevented any united front, even in the face of encroaching of modernism.<ref> Joe L. Coker, "Exploring the Roots of the Dispensationalist /Princetonian 'Alliance': Charles Hodge And John Nelson Darby on Eschatology and Interpretation of Scripture." ''Fides et Historia'' 1998 30(1): 41-56. 0884-5379 </ref> | Coker (1998) compares Hodge with Plymouth Brethren founder [[John Nelson Darby]] (1800-82) to test Sandeen's notion that American fundamentalism was an alliance between dispensationalism and Princeton theology against modernism. Hodge embraced the regnant [[postmillennialism]] of American Protestantism, which asserted that Christ would return after the world had been evangelized by the church, after which he would judge those who refused to embrace him and then rule forever on a regenerated earth. Darby's premillennialism offered a more pessimistic view in which evil would be overcome only through judgment of those opposing Christ. Darby also introduced the doctrine of the [[rapture]] as a means of rescuing believers from the tribulation that would occur just prior to the return of Christ. Hodge's and Darby's differing interpretations of Scripture were central to their contrasting eschatologies. Whereas Hodge considered prophetic and apocalyptic texts to be unclear and insisted that they be interpreted spiritually rather than literally, Darby put the prophetic texts, interpreted literally, at the center of his doctrinal system. These incompatible eschatologies and interpretations of Scripture prevented any united front, even in the face of encroaching of modernism.<ref> Joe L. Coker, "Exploring the Roots of the Dispensationalist /Princetonian 'Alliance': Charles Hodge And John Nelson Darby on Eschatology and Interpretation of Scripture." ''Fides et Historia'' 1998 30(1): 41-56. 0884-5379 </ref> |