When the Whipping Boy is Right

The Christian Post again tried to smear Joel Webbon. But that's really hard to do when he's right.

The recent smear job on Joel Webbon by the Christian Post was clumsy, embarrassing, and revealing. The author, with dramatic flair and theological amnesia, labeled Joel a heretic for two supposedly scandalous claims: that Ashkenazi Jews aren’t ethnically descended from Abraham and that God’s promises to Israel are fulfilled in Christ and extended to the church. For that, Webbon was likened to some kind of theological arsonist dragging Nazi conspiracies into mainstream discourse. But what he actually did was mention basic historical and biological facts that most serious historians and scholars, Jewish and Christian alike, have affirmed for generations.

The problem isn’t that Joel Webbon said something dangerous. The problem is that he said something true, and for an entire wing of evangelical thought propped up by sentimentalism and Dispensational folklore, that truth is fatal. The reaction wasn’t really about Joel. It was about preserving a fragile system that begins with the Scofield Bible and ends with unquestioning loyalty to the modern state of Israel.

So while Joel deserves a defense, this issue is bigger than Joel. It gets to the root of a theological error that’s become a sacred cow in American evangelicalism: the belief that the return of Jews to Israel in 1948 was the literal, biological fulfillment of God’s covenant with Abraham. This belief is the central pillar of Dispensational eschatology. Without it, the prophecy charts collapse, the rapture timelines shatter, and the entire system lies in ruins. That’s why even a mild correction of the facts is treated like blasphemy.

Let’s walk through the facts, because the facts are stubborn. The Ashkenazi Jews, who make up the majority of Jews in Israel today, are not ethnically descended from the ancient Israelites. They are the descendants of Gentiles who converted to Judaism many centuries ago, long before the modern era and even before the time of Christ.

These conversions took place in regions like Persia and Asia Minor, where diasporic Jewish communities had already taken root following the Assyrian and Babylonian exiles. Over time, non-Jewish peoples encountered these communities and, for a variety of religious, political, and economic reasons, adopted the Jewish religion. The most well-known mass conversion occurred in the medieval kingdom of Khazaria, where the ruling class and much of the population converted to Judaism. While some scholars debate the size and influence of this conversion, what isn’t debated is that the Ashkenazi Jews of Europe are the product of centuries of assimilation, intermarriage, and cultural fusion, primarily in Eastern Europe.

Their genetics reflect that story. Modern DNA studies have shown that Ashkenazi Jews have significant European and Iranian ancestry, with virtually no Semitic DNA. This doesn’t mean they’re not religiously Jewish. It means they aren’t biologically connected to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in any meaningful way. Their lineage is traced not to Judea, but to places like Poland, Germany, and the Caucasus.

Even Israeli geneticists and scholars have admitted as much. These aren’t the ravings of white supremacist websites. They’re published in peer-reviewed journals, in Jewish encyclopedias, and in reputable research institutions. It’s not controversial to say that Ashkenazi Jews are a religious group rather than an ethnic one, except to those who are emotionally or theologically invested in pretending otherwise.

And yet the Christian Post author, in his attempt to “fact-check” Joel Webbon, cited a Wikipedia article that mentioned “Middle Eastern ancestry,” and then acted as if that clinched the case. Apparently he believes all of the Middle East is Israel, and that Iranian DNA is proof of Hebrew descent. That would be like saying someone from Turkey is ethnically Babylonian because both regions are somewhere east of Italy. The same article he cited goes on to confirm that Ashkenazi Jews have significant ancestry from Iran and the Mediterranean, not from ancient Judea.

This mistake would be funny if it weren’t so widespread. The assumption that Jews returning to Israel in 1948 were the literal sons of Jacob is so ingrained in American evangelical imagination that almost no one stops to question whether it’s actually true. But it isn’t. And the implications are enormous.

Dispensationalism depends on the idea that the Jews who returned to the land were fulfilling a covenantal promise. That’s the hook in every John Hagee sermon, every late-night TBN prophecy special, and every conference PowerPoint with color-coded timelines. If the people who returned in 1948 were not the biological descendants of Abraham, then the return was not a fulfillment of the Abrahamic covenant. If they were simply European converts and their children, then the event may have been geopolitically important, but it wasn’t prophetically decisive.

This isn’t just about splitting hairs. This is about the foundation of an entire theological system. If the modern state of Israel isn’t populated by the covenantal people of God, then the entire prophetic scheme collapses. The clock didn’t restart in 1948. The countdown to Armageddon didn’t begin. The rapture wasn’t “just around the corner.” And most of what Dispensationalist preachers have said for the last seventy-five years is based on a false premise.

Benjamin Netanyahu’s own family confirms this. His brother, Yoni Netanyahu, was part of a DNA study that revealed overwhelmingly European ancestry. That’s not an outlier. That’s representative of most Ashkenazi Jews today. The average Israeli Jew is not descended from Moses. He’s descended from Polish or Russian converts to Judaism who have no genetic tie to the land they now occupy.

This matters. It matters because if the return isn’t genealogically real, then the promises being “fulfilled” aren’t the promises made to Abraham. That has enormous implications for how we understand God’s faithfulness, covenant theology, and the church’s role in redemptive history.

And yet when someone like Joel Webbon dares to say what is widely known and easily proven, the entire machine reacts with hysteria. He’s accused of antisemitism, compared to Nazis, and treated like a threat to the gospel. But what he actually threatens is the mythology that props up modern Dispensationalism. That’s why they’re angry. That’s why they resort to slander. They can’t win the argument, so they try to silence the messenger

SMITE CLUB ARTICLES, HIGHLIGHTING COURAGEOUS CHRISTIAN MEN THROUGHOUT HISTORY, ARE AVAILABLE ONLY TO PAID SUBSCRIBERS OF INSIGHT TO INCITE.

.This ignorance isn’t harmless. It distorts the way evangelicals view the world. It leads them to believe that modern geopolitical events are the direct fulfillment of ancient prophecy, when in fact they’re the result of complex historical developments, immigration policies, and military interventions. It leads them to excuse all manner of evil so long as it flies the right flag. It leads them to turn a blind eye to persecuted Christians in Gaza and the West Bank because their presence interferes with the narrative.

Even worse, it fosters a shallow, tribal loyalty to a secular state, while diminishing the church’s role in God’s plan. Dispensationalism has, in many cases, replaced the church with Israel and replaced Christ with a map. The gospel becomes an afterthought to politics, and biblical prophecy becomes a tool to manipulate people into supporting whatever the Israeli government happens to be doing this month.

The church needs to wake up. We were not called to be cheerleaders for modern political states. We were called to be ambassadors for Christ. Our loyalty is to His kingdom, not to prophetic speculation wrapped in national flags.

The idea that God is still waiting to fulfill His promises to a biological people living in a particular piece of land is a rejection of everything the New Testament teaches about Christ as the fulfillment of the covenant. It is a denial of Galatians 3, where Paul says that those who belong to Christ are the true heirs of Abraham. It is a rejection of Ephesians 2, where Jew and Gentile are made one in Christ. It is ignorance dressed up in theological packaging.

So yes, Joel Webbon was unfairly attacked. He was smeared for telling the truth. But more importantly, he exposed the theological laziness and historical ignorance that now masquerades as orthodoxy in much of the church. He pulled the pin on a grenade most were too polite to touch.

The question now isn’t whether Joel went too far. The question is whether the church is finally ready to tell the truth about modern Israel, genetic mythologies, and the collapsing empire of Dispensationalism.

COVENANT THEOLOGY 101

The Christian Post article didn’t just object to Joel's statements about the ancestry of Ashkenazi Jews. He took aim at the very heart of covenant theology itself, as though it were some fringe doctrine cooked up in an online chatroom rather than the historic and biblical framework embraced by the Reformers, the Puritans, and generations of serious Bible expositors.

The author seemed genuinely unaware that covenant theology has stood at the center of Protestant orthodoxy for over 1800 years. In truth, it stretches back far earlier. While the term "covenant theology" became formalized during the Reformation, the basic structure of God's single redemptive plan in Christ can be found throughout the writings of Augustine, Irenaeus, and even in the epistles of Paul. This is not some Reformed novelty. It is the backbone of biblical theology.

Covenant theology teaches that God has always related to His people through covenants. There is one plan of salvation, centered on Christ, progressively revealed throughout redemptive history. From the covenant of works in the garden, to the covenant of grace unfolding through Abraham, Moses, and David, every step points toward the fulfillment of all promises in Jesus. He is the true Seed of Abraham, the fulfillment of the law, and the heir of David's throne. This framework unites the entire Bible into one coherent story with one Savior, one people, and one gospel.

By contrast, Dispensationalism is a theological newcomer. It did not exist in any formal way until the nineteenth century. John Nelson Darby and the Plymouth Brethren popularized it, and it was later spread in the United States primarily by Zionists at Oxford who paid for, published, and owned a Bible that they sold and attached C.I. Scofield’s name to. It was foreign to the early church. It was unknown to the Reformers. It is absent from the great confessions of the faith. And yet, many Dispensationalists today treat their system as though it were the gold standard of orthodoxy, with all other views being dangerous deviations.

That is what made the Christian Post article so absurd. The author treated covenant theology like it was a bizarre new innovation, when in fact, it is Dispensationalism that is the innovation. The idea that God has two peoples, with two plans, and two redemptive trajectories was unheard of in the first 1800 years of the church. The Reformers taught that the church is the continuation of Israel, not a detour. The Puritans believed the covenants of Scripture all pointed to Christ. The Westminster Confession, the London Baptist Confession, and virtually every historic Protestant catechism echo these same themes.

It is the Dispensationalist who must explain why their system is absent from church history. It is they who must defend the idea that no major church father, no council, and no confessional body ever articulated their view. Their scheme came into popularity not through careful exegesis or theological consensus, but through revivalist preaching, prophecy conferences, and a heavy dose of American exceptionalism, all bankrolled by European Jewry.

If you appreciate my work, grab a paid subscription to access exclusive content (like the podcast, Protestia behind-the-paywall material, our Telegram chat links, and more). This is one of the things I do to provide for my small farm and big family, so I sure appreciate it.

If you don’t do subscriptions, consider a one-time gift of your choosing by clicking the coffee link below.

Covenant theology starts with the gospel and works outward. It reads Scripture through the lens of Christ crucified and risen, and it lets that clarity govern how we interpret harder things, like eschatology. Dispensationalism does the opposite. It starts with a rigid framework of end times predictions, and then forces every other doctrine to align with it. This is why it struggles to articulate a consistent doctrine of salvation across time. Some (although not all) even suggest that Jews in the Old Testament were saved differently than Christians are today. Others imagine a future era where the Mosaic law returns and the church fades into the background. The whole thing becomes a theological juggling act.

The beauty of covenant theology is in its simplicity and its fidelity to the biblical narrative. It sees Christ in all of Scripture. It recognizes the types and shadows of the Old Testament as pointers to the substance that is found in Christ. It affirms that God's people have always been defined by faith, not ethnicity. Abraham believed, and it was credited to him as righteousness. We believe in the same promise, now revealed in fullness, and are likewise justified.

Romans 4, Galatians 3, Ephesians 2, and Hebrews 11 all reinforce this continuity. The dividing wall has been broken down. There is no longer Jew nor Greek. We are all one in Christ Jesus. The true children of Abraham are those who share his faith, not merely his bloodline.

To say that Joel Webbon is dangerous for affirming covenant theology is like saying Augustine, Calvin, and Spurgeon were dangerous too. It reveals not only confusion, but arrogance. The Dispensationalist author does not merely disagree with covenant theology. He seems unaware of what it actually is. He has no sense of its depth, its pedigree, or its rich doctrinal heritage.

This is not just bad journalism. It is bad stewardship of the truth. It leaves young Christians (if any still read the Christian Post) thinking that covenant theology is some recent, radical reinterpretation of Scripture, rather than the classic view of the Reformers and the church fathers. It teaches them to be suspicious of the historic confessions while embracing a system of doctrine that was unheard of until the ink was dry on the Declaration of Independence.

Covenant theology calls us to see Christ as the center of all things. It calls us to see ourselves as heirs of the promises, not because of race or ritual, but because we are in Christ. It unifies the Scriptures and magnifies the gospel. And it is not new. It is ancient. It is proven. And it remains the clearest way to understand God's plan of redemption from Genesis to Revelation.

If you have never been taught it, that is not because it is fringe. That is because the modern church has drifted. But recovering covenant theology is not a novelty. It is a return to the deep waters of Christian tradition, where Christ is preeminent and the story of redemption is one unbroken line leading to His throne.