Talk:Dispensationalism

Peak and decline section merely reports a blip

(1) The Peak and decline section contradicts the rest of the article, which in the lead begins by identifying the "establishment of Bible Institutes" (not "acceptance by seminaries") as a major factor of the spread of Dispensationalism. The fact that Dispensationalism was not being taught in seminaries is the raison d'être of Dallas Theological Seminary; it was necessary to found a seminary from the Fundamentalist grass-roots up. Dispensationalism only spread to other seminaries when graduates from DTS were hired. To say that Dispensationalism as a whole is "in decline" because professors in seminaries prefer covenant theology--what is this? Wishful thinking by the enemies of Dispensationalism? Totally lacks NPOV! If author Daniel G. Hummel fails to understand the grass-roots nature of Dispensationalism to begin with, he is not a reliable source about anything other than the groves of academe. (2) The history of Dispensationalism is still playing out; it's too early to say that it has "peaked" or "is in decline". (3) A proper title for this section would be Recent decline in academic circles; that, and no more. Wikipedia should not be a playground for seminary professors who are worried about Dispensationalism. The "decline" may be due to graduates of DTS only being given seminary jobs only on the condition that they agree to renounce Dispensationalism. Weasels, weasels everywhere! We are not told the reasons why these seminary professors changed views. (The "pop" of Pop prophecy is also a weasel word, but at least it alliterates well.) Vagabond nanoda (talk) 17:54, 26 October 2023 (UTC)

Well we need solid sources that the theology is declining amongst evangelicals who aren't academics. —Confession0791 ^talk 01:13, 1 December 2024 (UTC)

One might add a topic to the article on the historical change in meaning of "Dispensation"

The one could show how the consensus on the meaning has changed over time, including, for example, the definition in the New Scofield Reference Bible. (Appletonclack (talk) 18:28, 21 September 2024 (UTC))

The most dangerous quote

There seems to be significant disagreement over whether this sourced and cited quote should be included.

Any thoughts? Augmented Seventh (talk) 21:57, 17 March 2025 (UTC)

Actually, I don't think it serves the lead well. The source of the quote is John Bowman as noted by Charles Ryrie in his book, Dispensationalism. The quote is already in the body article under criticism, where it is stated in context. In the lead, it's kind of undue weight because it is not attributed, and it is not in full context. What is in the lead should be a more general summary of the article, not out-of-context quotes. (I'm not sure if I'm the one who put it in the lead, but I'm fairly certain I put it in the article) ButlerBlog (talk) 22:04, 17 March 2025 (UTC)

my error. I thought I was looking at the body, because I saw the citation.

human fallibility.

it does bookend the lead in an unnecessary way. Augmented Seventh (talk) 22:43, 17 March 2025 (UTC)

Darby section probably needs to be reworked

Crawford Gribben has recently published J.N. Darby and the Roots of Dispensationalism, which can be easily cited to show that Darby likely isn't the "father of dispensationalism" or even really dispensationalist. I would just do this but this article would suffer without a real replacement to answer the question "who else came up with the modern idea. ?"—it was Thomas Tweedy but citing this gets a bit more tricky as Crawford Gribben has William Kelly's copy of The Hope of Christ's Second Coming by Samuel Prideaux Tregelles and mentions in a bunch of interviews that Kelly (Darby's editor) just straight up mentions that Tweedy came up with the idea of the secret rapture and a lot of what in this article is described as Darby's thought but which Gribben's research at least argues isn't actually what Darby believed.

My problem is that Gribben didn't put the Tweedy stuff into the book itself but just talks about it in interviews. Donald Harman Akenson has written a little about Tweedy which can probably be cited but I really lament that Gribben just put that Darby isn't the father of modern dispensationalism into the book and not that Tweedy properly is.

Interviews in Question

https://albertmohler.com/2024/07/10/crawford-gribben-2/ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vqzmx9SbPyU

Books in question

https://academic-oup-com.wikipedialibrary.idm.oclc.org/book/55926 https://books.google.com/books?id=HCfCDAAAQBAJ&pg=PA453&dq=Thomas+Tweedy+Darby&hl=en&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjP9vWfo-iPAxUiQvEDHZvcOUkQ6AF6BAgNEAM#v=onepage&q=Thomas%20Tweedy%20Darby&f=false Bari' bin Farangi (talk) 21:31, 20 September 2025 (UTC)

Gribben is certainly a reliable source and I respect his work. However, we also have to consider due weight (which is not to be confused with "equal weight"). You're talking about a small number of sources, and that has a bearing on weight. Also, keep in mind that the article doesn't say "Darby is the father of dispensationalism", but rather that he is "considered by many to be".

a lot of what in this article is described as Darby's thought - Actually, considering the length and depth of the article, it says very little about Darby. One solid paragraph and a couple of marginal ones. Around 200 words of a 4800 word article.

I'd recommend not getting too far into the weeds on rapture discussion - that's more suited to the rapture article and/or premillennialism. Dispensationalism is more than just eschatology and this article tends to focus the system as a whole, and not just the differing ideas around its eschatological views, which is covered in other articles. ButlerBlog (talk) 22:05, 20 September 2025 (UTC)

I'd argue this graphic massively distorts some of the nuance built into the article text.

History of dispensationalism (updated2)

Undue is of course always a consideration but if we have newer and more thoroughly researched sources saying "yeah this stuff came from the circle of the Brethren (Tweedy is after all one of them) but not Darby in particular." that should be good enough to consider rewriting sections based on older research that (as Gribben would argue falsely) attributes the views to Darby directly. So instead of saying something like "Darby's eschatology" the article could say something like "the Brethren's eschatology" or "Darby's Bretheren's eschatology" which would solve the problem of attributing the views directly to Darby. I too respect Gribben but I am honestly quite frustrated that he didn't write about Tweedy in the book directly... I hope he's saving it for an article or something bc we cannot in good conscience cite interviews I think. Bari' bin Farangi (talk) 22:28, 20 September 2025 (UTC)