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Christian Reconstructionism is a religious and political movement within Protestant Christianity. It calls for Christian dominion over government and the enforcement of the general principles of Old Testament moral law, as expounded in the case laws and summarized in the Decalogue.
It is best known in the United States of America, where its most vocal advocate was Rousas John (R. J.) Rushdoony.
Christian Reconstructionism is opposed to some forms of religious tolerance, but it is equally opposed to Erastianism, so it seeks for denominational tolerance within the bounds of Yahwistic Christianity. Christian Reconstructionism claims to not be seeking to establish laws to regulate beliefs, only actions, thus religious tolerance is not absolutely shunned, only those forms of tolerance in which actions that are contrary to the general principles of the moral law (e.g., blasphemy, public dissemination of idolatry) are encouraged or left unsanctioned.
Critics are skeptical of this claim, and fear a more authoritarian civil society would be the end result. They argue that Christian Reconstructionism is a theocratic form of Dominionism, and is based on the ideas of Theonomy (the establishment of "God's law" in the civil order), and is a version of Dominion Theology.
Christian Reconstructionists generally hold to a form of Postmillennial Eschatology, though the distinctive tenets of the movement (generally referred to as Theonomic Ethics or Theonomy) are purported to be compatible with other eschatological viewpoints.
It is unrelated to Reconstructionist Judaism.
See also
External links
References
- Barron, Bruce. 1992. Heaven on Earth? The Social & Political Agendas of Dominion Theology. Grand Rapids, Mich.: Zondervan. ISBN: 0310536111
- Clarkson, Frederick. 1997. Eternal Hostility: The Struggle Between Theocracy and Democracy. Monroe, Maine: Common Courage. ISBN: 1567510884
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