Pre-Millennialists, Or Post-Millennialists ?

    A recent area of evaluation on millennial groups has to do with whether they are pre-millennialist or post- millennialist. The difference is that pre-millennialist groups believe that the end will be destructive and only the chosen few will remain to live with God in a better world. Post-millennialists are more optimistic about the future and believe that the Lord will come after the millennium. This would be a progressive change and will have a more harmonious and evolved humankind.
     Actually understanding where Mormons fall is in some ways a controversy. It has been shown that , "Mormon eschatology consistently exhibits its closer conceptual correspondance with pre-millennialism."(Underwood,1993) That is they believe in apocalyptic end of time. Mormons are Christian, so therefore they have the Bible as one of their main texts. They believe strongly in the Old Testement as well as the book of Revelation, which truly falls along the lines of pre-millennialism.

    Regardless of the previous facts, some argue that Mormons have qualities of post-millennialism. Post-millennialists are supposed to be optimistic about human possiblities, which is contrary to pre-millennialism. "They become actively involved in missionary work and social reform, convinced that Christ could work only through them or other natural disasters to establish a millennium."(Underwood,1993) One strong belief has to do with the creation and worshipping in temples. The Mormons feel that they must live as those in the Old Testement did, and they have created temples for worship. It is to these temples that the Second Coming will occur. "When commentators on Mormonism noticed the Saint’s kingdom-building rhetoric, they felt compelled to label it post-millennial."(Underwood,1993) For this aspect seems to fall along the lines of progressivism.

     But Mormons and scholars well educated in the Mormon cause all agree that the religious group is in fact  Pre-millenialist. “Mormons did not expect to change the world, only to warn it. The Saints have always believed that they were called to bring to pass the gathering of the elect, not connected to the rest of humankind.”(Underwood,1993) The Mormons will tell the non believers that the end will come and only believers will be saved, but they are not looking for humankind to progress into a more harmonious people. “The point is that even though the Saints urged human efforts to build the kingdom, or were mission-minded, or occasionalyy waned in their enthusiasm for the immenence of "paradisiacal glory", these attitudes do not warrant changing the classification of Mormons as pre-millennialists."(Alexander,1986)
     

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