Hank Hanegraaff’s false theology and questionable character
Hank Hanegraaff of CRI has a staff that gets him answers. That makes him credible on many biblical topics but when Hank Hanegraaff himself steps out in certain areas of theology he displays a basic lack of biblical understanding. We should not be surprised that mockers like Hank Hanegraaff would come against those who declare the soon coming of Jesus, Bible prophecy declares they will. The questionable character issues are well known and they can easily be found with any keyword search on his name on Google.
Here is an except of an article by Jan Markel of Olivetreeviews.org about Hank Hanegraaff’s attack on Dispensational Premillennial Theology
ANSWERING “THE BIBLE ANSWERMAN” Three years ago Hank decided to get on the eschatology bandwagon for himself. He began a series of fiction on his eschatology: Preterism. That belief says that all or most of end-time events transpired in 70 AD. Nero was the Antichrist. The Tribulation was the persecution of Christians. Hank and most “partial Preterists” still believe in the Second Coming. “Full Preterists” believe Christ returned “in spirit” in 70 AD. Not much fanfare for the King of Kings back then!
Now many are taking Hanegraaff to task for not only false theology but for outrageous comments on air and in his newest book, “Apocalypse Countdown” as well as his fiction series with co-author Sigmund Brouwer. Dr. Thomas Ice, who serves on this ministry’s “board of reference” says, “The great majority of the book (Apocalypse Code) is a rant against Hanegraaff’s distorted view of Dispensationalism in general and Tim LaHaye in particular. There is precious little actual exegesis, if any at all, to support his Preterist/idealist eschatology; however, there are great quantities of some of the most vicious tirades against LaHaye and many other Bible prophecy teachers that I have ever read in print.” This can be found on the Web site of the Pre-Trib Research Institute, www.pre-trib.org.”
Don Koenig founded www.thepropheticyears.com website in 1999 after almost thirty years of independent study on the Bible and learning from many astute teachers within Christendom. Don created his website to write about Bible prophecy, biblical discernment and his Christian worldviews. Don wrote a free Revelation commentary ebook in 2004 named "The Revelation of Jesus Christ Through The Ages". The World and Church and Bible Prophecy section of this website was started in 2007. 
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15 Responses to “Hank Hanegraaff’s false theology and questionable character”
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I am a former Full Preterist and have recently published an article to my blog on why I can no longer accept that position. This may be something you may want to check out.
http://www.shadowsofthecross.com/
Glad to hear of your conversion. God be with you.
Obviously you’ve never read the fantastic book, “The Apocalypse Code” by Hank Hanegraaff. The irony is that Tommy Ice who believes heresy; specifically he believes in re-instituted temple sacrifices during Christ’s supposed millennial reign.
Obviously you have never read why Tommy Ice believes there will be temple sacrifice during the millennial reign. It is because Ezekiel chapters 40 through 48 clearly indicates that there will be temple sacrifice in the millennial reign. You might do some research as to why there is temple sacrifice in the millennium before you throw stones and imply something that Ice never says. It is not heresy to tell the truth but to redefine what God said through His prophets to subjective allegory like Hanegraaff does in order to make it comply with his Preterist Theology can only be defined as heresy.
Glad I stumbled onto your blog. I have tried plowing my way through HH”s The Apocalypse Code” and some of it almost makes sense, in a distorted sort of way. But his excoriation of Tim LaHaye I find unaccepable in a Christian. I am pretrib and will probably remain so. I’ve listened to many of Hanks’s programs and have found his delivery and some of his doctrine a little strange even though I agree with him on the Mormon issue. Thank you for your ministry. God bless.
Hank Hanegraaff has said that it would be very wrong if GOD punished people if all they were doing is acting on the free will that he gave them.First of all he says I THINK or I FEEL. The scriptures are not subject to mans opinion but the will of GOD. If a person had a freewill choice to do right or do wrong,and doing wrong (under these circumstances) has no consequences then why did CHRIST die.If you use his logic then nobody should ever be punished and everyone is going to heaven. This reasoning even contradicts itself in his critisizm of universalism.Do not fall for his lies because he is well spoken of and articulate.Satan too can do the same things and mix falsehood with truth to ensnare the masses as he will in the end times.
Yeah, many national Christians leaders are speaking out of both sides of their mouth about many things these days. It is hard for leaders to be consistent on biblical concepts when they incorporate various heresies as their foundation to interpret scripture and embrace world views that contract what God said.
I used to listen to “The Bible Answer Man” until he finally revealed his escatology. Now when I hear him he is peddling one of HIS resources. I find it best to study the Bible for myself. Anyone can read and understand the Word of God with the leading of the Holy Spirit. Yes there are some very difficult to understand passages so stick with what you do understand and trust the Lord to give wisdom for the rest in time.
What is so hard to understand the statements made by John as ” what must soon take place “(REV. 1:1)or ” because the time is near”(REV. 1:2). The first verse in Revelation isn’t talking to some future distant audience some 100 or 2000 years from the statements being made by John. He is surly taking to a first century audience. Im so glad I moved on from dispensationalism. Even then so, Please come Lord!!!
Have you seen the things written in Revelation literally come to pass at all? Obviously you are making most of it allegory if you think the book is talking about spiritual events. So since that is the case, why do you then just take the one passage you want literally? Let’s be consistent.
I guess you meant Rev 1:3 but that actually says the time is at hand.
The first versus in Revelation are obviously talking to the whole Church which you and I are still part of. Unless you want to deny that God wrote that for you and I and the rest of the Church to know, you have to accept that fact.
What God was showing John would happen quickly and it was at hand because the whole book is the Revelation of Jesus Christ through the ages. The first prophecy is the letters to the seven churches which actually happened shortly after John died even though it also has a prophetic meaning to the Church throughout the church age. After the church age the seals are opened showing the judgments on evil people on earth before the restoration described by the OT prophets. This whole church age is nothing but a very brief time in eternity.
Too bad you gave up the grammatical historical contextual literal exegesis of Bible prophecy (Dispensationalism) for concepts that theologians pulled out of a hat. At least you still think the Lord is coming, so you still have that right.
Also the word used for ‘soon’, carries the meaning of ‘speedily’ -as in that when they occur, it will be all at once, or as Daniel put it “in a flood”.
When it occurs, there will be no time to react as all types and manners of events will be taking place globally. I suppose that is why the hearts of men will fail.
It is an interesting point regarding Hank Hanegraff. It pertains to the fact that my wife and I were members of the Armgstrong cult the Worldwide Church of God of which Hanegraff was one of the first people to welcome into “mainstream Christianity.” This was in spite of the fact, that WCG never publicly repented of following a man above God’s Word (which is idolatry). In fact, WCG leadership covered up many of Armstrong’s sins as well as his crimes and heresies. Hanegraff never demanded that they repent or that its hierarchy reimburse the people from whom they had taken so much in the way of tithes and offerings, &c., and often actually impoverished.
How different from the Lord and the apostles and the Reformers who CONTENDED for the faith once delivered and who were hated of all men. WCG, to give them their due, in many ways did stand up for what they believed–though, sadly, their beliefs were usually wrong. But they did know that to believe in something you have to reject other things. That no longer applies to their leadership as it is now well and truly ecumenist.
I often think on the point that the Bible does tell us of Pharisees who were saved. One thing that the Pharisees could not be accused of was ecumenism. However, the Sadducees were ecumenists. If any of them ever were saved, the New Testament makes no mention of it. Ecumenists could do themselves a favour by thinking on that, Hank Hanegraff for one.
Hank has no theological degree, has never studied Hebrew or Greek, and makes egregious errors in his theological opinions. When he does not know the answer to a question, he goes into a long, rambling, cliche ridden explanation that obfuscates the issue the caller had brought up. On one program, a caller asked how to pronounce a particular Greek word, and Hank just blew by that and went off topic to something that was not even implied by the caller in the question. i have had six years of Hebrew and a year of Greek, and i can tell you that Hank’s lack of understanding of both languages are causing horrendous mistakes in his answers to those type of question. Yes, the “soon/quickly” in Revelation does not mean “soon” as in time, but it means “rapid when it begins” and that is confusing to many people. It is often hard to give a direct translation of the Hebrew or the Greek, but Hank does not know either. i was troubled at his rage against D. James Kennedy over the Y2K problem, and to this day, he claims to be the only one who got it right. He claims Dr. Kennedy (who could parse Greek in his sleep and quote nearly the whole NT in Greek, btw)warned people to get ready for disaster. Dr. Kennedy did no such thing! It was actually the computer geeks who were worried about what might happen to computer systems which all run on a binary math equation – so Dr. Kennedy, and some other ministers, suggested we be prepared with food, cash, candles or flashlights and enough batteries to get us through a potential computer problem, but he certainly was not hysterical about it. i prepared for the new century, wisely because i’ve been using computers since 1979 and knew there was the possibility of some glitches – but i was not hysterical over it and actually, i fell asleep at my normal time with no anxious thoughts at all. Yet, here it is 2012 and Hank still claims to be the only sane voice at that time and continues to mock Dr. Kennedy – and yes, he is beyond belief in his hatred of Tim LeHaye and Jerry Jenkins! Hank is not worth the millions he receives in pay and benefits (and combined with his wife’s salary) and i believe the IRS should audit him and his wife. He has been caught in many lies – the post office scandal is only one of them – he has lost all the lawsuits he brought against Dr. Kennedy, and yet he persists, even after DJK’s death to mock him. Hank is an embarrassment to true Biblical eschatology and discourse. His fabrication of financial disaster is a ploy to drain the listener’s dry – someone needs to put this fraud away – he has no verifiable credentials to do what he is doing. His former employees tell tales of his mismanagement, his foul language and work place abuses that ought to make the EEOC investigate the “ministry” – i am fed up with him – we DO need a reliable “cult watch” on the air to ferret out the new ones popping up, but he as aligned himself with cults and claimed on air that they’ve done the research and all is well with the group and they are just “misunderstood” (ie Watchman Nee’s organization, Local Church). What will it take to get this fraud where he belongs?
Jayleigh,
Thanks for your input. I just might add,
The Y2K thing would have been much worse had there not been those warning about the dangers. The warning is what made government and corporations take the threat seriously and fix the problem before it became reality.
HI Don.
It would be interesting to know how the governments did take the threat seriously to fix the problem. I wasn’t aware that any of them did.
I remember being slightly worried about catching a plane to Malaga, in Southren Spain, from Manchester, England on New Year’s day 2000. A friend of my wife’s and mine wasn’t in the slightest bit worried as he told me long before the flight, on which he and his wife were also booked to fly, that the whole Y2K thing was nonsense.
His whole background, like his father’s, is in science and he lectured, and still does, in computing at our local university and explained to me why he thought it was logically and scientifically nonsense. having respect for his scientific and computer knowledge I was encouraged by his indifference to the Y2K warnings.
I later read Dave Hunt’s book on Y2K–written before January 2000–giving a totally biblical view stating why it couldn’t happen.
Actually, my flight to Malaga was one of the most pleasant I’ve ever had.