PROPOSITION 136

THE THEOCRATIC KINGDOM

IN AGREEMENT WITH THE DOCTRINE

OF THE INTERMEDIATE STATE*

[* Note: PROPOSITION 137 and PROPOSITION 138 are included.]

BY GEORGE N. H. PETERS

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1

The intermediate state between death and the Second Advent is such as to confirm our doctrinal position, because, the Scripture statements clearly and unmistakably teach a detention of the saints from the promised inheritance and reward.

Our argument is not concerned in the location or description of this intermediate state. Whether it be in the third heaven, or in some place specially set apart for the purpose, or in the grave, etc.; whether it be a conscious state of high enjoyment, or a pleasurable dream state, or one of unconsciousness, etc. - these things however interesting, do not fall within our line of reasoning. Whatever view may be held respecting the place or the actual state does not affect our doctrinal position, provided such a view places the period of recompensing, rewarding at the future resurrection of the just. Works specially devoted to this subject are accessible, in which these points are discussed by their respective advocates. Our concern is only with one aspect of the subject. For we hold that the principle announced by Calvin (Insti., b. 3, Ch. 25, s. 6), of incompleteness of redemption, must be maintained: “Since, Scripture uniformly enjoins us to look with expectation to the Advent of Christ, and delays the Crown of glory till that period, let us be contented with the limits divinely prescribed to us, viz., that the souls of the righteous, after their warfare is ended, obtain blessed rest, where in joy they wait for the fruition of promised glory, and that thus the final result is suspended till Christ the Redeemer appear.” So again he says: “Christ is our Head, whose Kingdom and glory have not yet appeared. If the members were to go before their Head, the order of things would be inverted and preposterous; but we shall follow our Prince then, when He shall come in the glory of His Father, and sit upon the throne of His majesty,” (Compare Tyndale’s remarks, p. 324; Works by Fox, and his Reply to Moore, and the references by Brooks in his El. of Proph. Interp., and in Abidiel’s Essays.)

OBSERVATION 1. The Propositions that have preceded show that any view which unduly exalts the intermediate state or condition after death must correspondingly depreciate the Second Advent as “The Blessed Hope,” the resurrection as completed Redemption, the covenant as still to be verified, and the prophecies as [yet to be] realized on earth. The prominence heaped upon the condition of saints after death (so different from the Scriptural position, which says so little respecting it), and the extravagant eulogies attached to it, are practically leading multitudes to make little, or nothing of the Advent, the resurrection, the covenant, and the prophecies. If we are to credit the many statements made, then the latter can make no improvement in the condition of believers, for after death such (we are informed) are crowned, rewarded, inherit, etc. Our doctrinal position enters a protest against this perversion, and to sustain such in averment confidently appeals to the Scriptural teaching and that of the Early Church. The postponement of the Kingdom to the Second Coming, the inheriting only at its manifestation, the design of the present dispensation, the Pre-millennial resurrection and its recompense, the rewards connected with a restored glorious Theocratic [and millennial] Kingdom here on the earth, the time for the ample fulfilment of the Abrahamic and Davidic covenants, and other [Page 395] related points, only find a unity in supporting the same, if the condition of saints during this intermediate period is one in which they are represented as not crowned, as not rewarded, and as not inheriting, but that (whatever their actual state as to conscious happiness) they are still imperfect as to realized Redemption and waiting for the [Second] Advent and [subsequent] resurrection for a completed restoration to forfeited blessings and exaltation to Kingship and priesthood. The reader can readily see that this is an important feature in the argument, and that if the Scriptures sustain us in the affirmation that they are imperfect and waiting, we add another link to our chain of evidence.

How perverted this doctrine in the hands of multitudes has become, so that death itself is transmuted into “the Prince of Peace,” and the resurrection is associated with death itself (entire bodies of professing Christians holding to the same); how profuse the eulogies heaped upon the saints fallen asleep in Jesus, so that their blessedness is completed, not requiring a Coming of Jesus unto salvation - all this has been pointed out (see e.g. Proposition 121, Obs. 7, and 124, Obs, 2, and 125, Obs. 2 and 5, etc.). Our obituary notices in religious papers are full of untruthful sentences, and many works (like “Heaven our Home,” etc.) are replete with unscriptural statements concerning the reward of the righteous. Things which exclusively belong to the period of the Second Advent - and so expressly stated by the [Holy] Spirit - are misquoted and applied to the deceased in order to comfort the bereaved. Popery and Protestantism, professed Orthodoxy and Heterodoxy, are alike prodigal of exalting the present state of the dead. Very recently a prominent minister eulogized the death of a brother minister, and made, without reflection, the condition of the latter immensely superior to Paul’s, for he had him “crowned,” etc., when Paul still awaits his crown (2 Tim. 4: 8). Rev. Dr. - likewise had occasion to describe the blessedness of a brother divine deceased, as follows: “Yes! our brother is saved and crowned forever.” “And to the bereaved family, the words of the pitying Saviour to weeping Mary are addressed in all their tenderness and sympathy: ‘Why weep ye? He is not here, but risen.’ He has already entered the everlasting rest.” Thousands of assertions similar to Thomas Gibbon’s (Sermon Noticed in Critical Review, vol. 1, p. 566) might be produced as illustrations: “The moment a saint dies, or rather the moment that his veil of flesh drops off, that moment begins his blissful era of perfect life and glory.” Victor Hugo’s picture of the reception of Louis XVII. into heaven (poem on - Van Laun’s His. Fr. Liter., vol. 3. p. 326), is matched (Luth. Obs., March 1^st. 1878) by Beecher’s saying in a sermon that Pius IX. was carried by angels direct to heaven into Christ’s presence, etc. (which Romanists must doubt, seeing that in many churches prayers and masses were said on his behalf). Our hymnology is overflowing with this perversion of promise, and the pulpits aid it on by quoting promise after promise without the least regard to its order of realization. The strong faith and hope, the anticipated triumph over death, the blessed and glorious consciousness of forgiveness, acceptance and peace, the precious removal of the sting of death, the foretaste and earnest of joy, graciously given by God to many saints in the dying hour, is at once elevated to the standard by which measure the intermediate state, and deductions are drawn so extravagant a nature that it is amazing that any believer in the Word - which alone is capable of throwing light on the future - can accept of them.

OBSERVATION 2. The Scriptures bearing on this subject are decided. Thus e.g. the glory with Christ is thus expressed: Col. 3: 4, “When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye appear with Him in glory.” (So “praise, honour, and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ.” 1 Pet. 1: 7; “grace that shall be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ,” 1 Pet. 1: 13; “glad also with exceeding joy.” “when His glory shall be revealed,” 1 Pet. 4: 13, etc.) The being fashioned like unto Christ is thus declared: “Beloved, now are we the sons of God; and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that when He shall appear we shall be like Him; for we shall see Him as He is,” 1 John 3: 2 (compare Phil. 3: 21; Rom. 8: 17-23, etc.). The time of inheriting is thus specified: [Page 396] Matt. 25: 31-34, Col. 3: 4, 24; 1 Pet. 1: 3-7, 13, when the Son of man is revealed in His glory. The rest is thus given: 2 Thess. 1: 7, “God will give you rest, when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven” (compare Proposition 143). The mansions are given, John 14: 2, 3, when “I will come again and receive you unto myself, that where I am, there ye may be also” (comp. Proposition 170). The “new heavens and new earth” are still future, and linked with the Second Advent, e.g. 2 Pet. 3: 13; Rev. 21: 1 (Compare Propositions 148-151). While perseverance unto death secures a crown (Rev. 2: 10), yet the time when the crown itself is given is thus stated: 1 Pet. 5: 4, - “When the Chief Shepherd shall appear, ye shall receive a crown of glory that fadeth not away” (comp. when Paul, and all others, receive their crown, 2 Tim. 4: 8). The period of rewarding is thus explicitly described: Matt. 16: 27, “For the Son of man shall come in the glory of His Father with His angels; and then He shall reward every man according to his works” (Compare Rom. 2: 6, 16; Rev. 22: 12, and 11: 18; Luke 14:14, etc.). Thus the entire tenor of the Scripture is, as our position demands, an overleaping of the intermediate state, as if it were not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed at the Corning again of Jesus; and a positive asserting of rewarding, crowning, inheriting, etc., at that time. We dare not reverse the order thus laid down, and any theory which requires such a transposition is most certainly defective.

Hence so very little is said concerning the intermediate state, because it is an imperfect state, i.e., with incompleted redemption. Dr. Poor in Lange’s Commentary, 1 Cor., p. 349, refers to Paul’s passing by the intermediate state and linking the hope (as e.g. in 1 Cor. 15) of salvation with the resurrection of the saint. He correctly argues that “the world to come” is not the state after death, but a definite fixed age or period in the future associated with the Second Advent and resurrection. Therefore there would be an impropriety to say that at death a soul entered into “the world to come,” for, he adds: “That future world or age has not yet come in, and no one can be said to enter it until Christ appears to set up His Kingdom. It is then only that the earth will be in readiness for the reception of the risen saints. And inasmuch as the glory which they are waiting for is to be found here, it will be seen why a resurrection is necessary - why they want a body at all, and a glorified [and immortal] body, since it is in this as their organ that they will be fitted to dwell in a glorified earth and enjoy the felicity of that age. According to Paul’s theory, man is not to be separated from this lower creation, of which he forms a part, and of which he is the lord,” etc.

OBERVATION 3. Other Scriptures confirm the imperfect and waiting condition of the saints. Thus e.g. in Heb. 11: 39, 40 - after the apostle had enumerated a long list of ancient worthies, some deceased for many centuries and others more recent, but all in this intermediate state - he says of them: “And these all, having obtained a good report through faith, received not the promise; God having provided some better thing for us, that they without us should not be made perfect.” Here it is positively asserted: (1) that not having received the promise (which refers to the promised inheritance, as shown e.g. verse 13, comp. with Gal. 3: 18, etc. - compare Proposition 49), it is still future to them; (2) that in their present condition they are not “perfect,” i.e. enjoy the blessings of a full Redemption as promised; (3) that this perfectness or completeness of realization of faith in God’s promises is to be attained in connection with believers in Christ (who also receive, the promise by faith, but under increased light, divine teaching, etc.); (4) that all believers, ancient and modern, Pre. and Post-Christian, are to be made perfect or complete at the same time, i.e. experience the [Page 397] completeness of salvation. (Some, as Barnes, apply this “perfect” to the completion of Revelation as a system, but this is not the subject discussed; the reference to the non-reception of the promise demands an interpretation of the “perfect” in a realization of the promise by themselves personally.) The saints after death are represented as hoping and waiting for greater blessings (Rev. 6: 9, 10, 11, compare with, 20: 4-6), and it is in view of this that the apostles, when comforting the bereaved, do not dwell on the intermediate state, but refer such for consolation to the period when Redemption is completed, as e.g. 1 Thess. 4 : 13-18. And it is because of this still imperfect and waiting nature of the period between death and the Advent, that the apostles, in the midst of trials and sufferings overleap the intermediate, and exhort to patience unto the Coming of the Lord, e.g. James 5: 7.

Nast (Compare Matt. 22: 31, 32) justly observes: “That the Scriptures attach more importance to the resurrection of the body than to the mere self conscious existence of the soul in its disembodied state, arises from the fact that the disembodied state of the soul is considered in the Scriptures as something imperfect, abnormal, so much so that even the souls of the just look forward with intense desire to their reunion (Rom. 8: 11-23) with their bodies.” We have only to contrast the Scripture statements respecting death and its results with those of the resurrection and its results, to see that Nast, and many others who make similar declarations, are correct in affirming such an “imperfect, abnormal” condition.

OBSERVATION 4. In the very nature of the case there must be an incompleted salvation during this period, because both soul and body constitute the person redeemed, and so long as “the redemption of the body,” Rom. 8: 23, is not experienced, an imperfect state must exist. Besides this, the forfeited blessings, such as the restored earthly Paradise, the dominion over the earth, the absolute victory over death, are not realized in it. And in the promised blessings of glorification, rulership on the earth, association with Jesus in His inheritance and glory, none of these are experienced, being, as we have seen, always combined, as a resultant, with the Second Advent.

Dr. Niven (Mystical Presence, p. 171) says: “The whole argument in the 15^th. ch. of 1^st. Cor, as well the representation in 1 Thess. 4: 13-18, proceeds on the assumption that the life of the body, as well as that of the soul, is indispensable to the perfect state of our nature as human. The soul, then, during the intermediate state, cannot possibly constitute, in the biblical view, a complete man, and the case requires, besides, that we should conceive of its relation to the body as still in force; not absolutely destroyed, but only suspended. The whole condition is interimistic, and by no possibility of conception capable of being thought of as complete and final.” Dr. Brown (Ch. Sec. Commentary, p. 24) concedes that death, or the condition after death, is not to be put in the place of Christ’s Second Advent, and that the state of “the just is not only incomplete, but, in some sense, private and fragmentary, if I may so express myself. But at the Redeemer’s appearing all His redeemed will be collected together, and perfectly and publicly glorified.” (Compare Proposition 121, Obs. 7 (4), and note, and Proposition 120, Obs. 4.)

OBSERVATION 5. Another distinctive and remarkable feature corroborates our position. Every writer on the subject of the intermediate state confesses that no attempt is made in any place whatever to describe it. The various theories and descriptions respecting it are drawn from inferences, and the admission is fully made by writers of all classes (who hold to a future personal Second Advent), that the eye of faith and the heart of hope is fixed, not so much on the condition after death as to the condition after the Advent. Now why a procedure? The key lies in this simple fact, viz., that [Page 398] the intermediate state (whatever it may be) has no relationship whatever to the fulfilment of covenant and prophecy pertaining to Redemption, and consequently is not portrayed.

Thus to illustrate the utterances of many theologians, take e.g. Knapp (Ch. Theology, p. 518), who says: “Before this time (i.e. the resurrection of the body) shall arrive, the disembodied spirit will be in a certain intermediate state. The exact nature of this state is not, indeed, particularly described to us, and we are unable even to conceive of it distinctly; but so much the Bible plainly teaches, that immediately after death the soul passes into that state for which, from the nature of its previous life, it is prepared.” “In what the rewards and punishments of this intermediate state will consist cannot be determined, nor whether, in addition to those which are natural - the necessary consequences of action and feeling - there will also be, even then, those which are positive and result from the free appointment of God.”

OBSERVATION 6. The Early Church doctrine, established under the direct auspices of the apostles, and the elders appointed by them, was, over against Gnosticism and other errors, universally held is follows: that the hope of the believer was in the Second Advent (expected speedy), at which period the inheriting of the Kingdom, the crowning and rewarding was located. In the intermediate state it was held that there was a non-fulfilment of covenant promises, the realization of which was allied with the Second Coming of Jesus. Much was made of the Second Advent, the resurrection of the saints, and the resultant glory, so that in Eschatology these things were pre-eminently prominent - a prominence unfortunately undermined by the Alexandrian school and overthrown by the Papacy. Now how can we possibly account for the Early Church view, given under divine auspices, on so important a matter, unless it be the correct one, sustained as it is by a consistent appeal to Scripture?

Compare Brooks’ Essays (Ahdiel’s), and El. Proph. Interpretation, Bish. Taylor’s Liberty of Prophesying, s. 8. We quote Taylor, charging the Romish Church with contradicting early Church doctrine, as follows: “That is a plain secession from antiquity, which was determined by the Council of Florence, ‘that the souls of the pious, being purified, are immediately at death received into heaven, and behold clearly the triune God, just as He is;’ - for those who please to try may see it dogmatically resolved to the contrary by Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Origen, Chrysostom, Theodoret, Arethas Caesariensis, Enthymius, who may answer for the Greek Church. And it is plain that it was the opinion of the Greek Church, by that great difficulty the Romans had of bringing the Greeks to subscribe to the Florentine Council, where, the Latins acted as their masterpiece to wit, and stratagem, the greatest that hath been till the famous and super-politic Council of Trent. And for the Latin Church, Tertullian, Ambrose, Austin, Hilary, Prndentius, Lactantius, Victorinus, and Bernard, are known to be of opinion that the souls of the saints are in abditis receptaculis et exterioribus atris (in private receptacles and in more outward courts), where they expect the resurrection of their bodies and the glorification of their souls; and though they all believe them to be happy, yet that they enjoy not the beatific vision before the resurrection.” Some writers feel the incubus of the early Church view upon their modern conceptions, and try to make the impression that the fathers entertained the modern engrafted notions. Thus e,g. Pressense (Early Years of Christianity; The Martyrs, etc., p. 250) attributes to Justin at his martyrdom the expressed belief of an immediate ascension to heaven when his head was cut off, saving, “I know it, yes, beyond all power to doubt, I know it.” Now, when we ask for the authority of a belief which flatly contradicts Justin’s own published faith, we are referred to Rinault’s Acta Martyeum Sincera, a work, like similar ones, which largely draws on the imagination for professed details. When Pressense declares, “The details of the narrative correspond with all that is known of Justin,” we beg to differ, and assert from Justin’s own writings - the contrary. In reference to this substitution of death for “the blessed hope,” etc., the reader will find some excellent remarks by Gordon in his Essay on the First Resurrection.

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OBSERVATION 7. The Jewish view must be considered by the student. This, as stated by numerous authorities, was decided, viz., that the Patriarchs and their deceased descendants, that all who had died true Israelites, were only to be raised to glory and covenanted promises at the Coming of the Messiah. Whatever differences of opinion existed as the actual condition of dead ones, all were united in the common view that at the Advent of the promised David’s Son, then, and then only, would the promises of God respecting a glorious Salvation be completed. The abundance of quotations already given under previous Propositions fully show this faith. But now observe that this identical Jewish faith is incorporated in the New Testament and in the Early Church, with this difference, that what the Jews attributed to the First Advent of the Messiah, the New Testament and Early Church to the Second Advent of Jesus the Messiah.

Take e.g. such a writer as Knapp, who endeavours to make as much as possible out of death, yet (Ch. Theol., Lects. 149 and 150) he very fairly gives the Jewish view as materially different from the modern one of immediate entrance into heaven, and admits that an intermediate state was held “by many of the Church Fathers - e.g. Justin the Martyr, Irenaeus, and Tertullian.” The student need only refer to our Biblical Cyclops. and Dicts., in Acts, on “Sheol” and “Hades,” as well as those on Jewish belief, and he will find abundant material in behalf of our position. Those who press the parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus to a delineation of the bliss and suffering of the righteous and wicked after death, gain nothing after all but an intermediate state separate and distinct from the third heaven or from the rewards, etc., at the Second Advent. Whatever view we take of its teaching, this is the result. Thus e.g. Hudson (Debt and Grace, p. 257) remarks: “The Parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus, also, will not sustain the modern expectation of entering heaven at death. Borrowed from the Jews themselves, it simply illustrates their dramatic conceptions of the under world.” So Van Oosterzee (Lange’s Commentary, Luke, p. 256) on the same, says: “Paradise, which is here spoken of as the destined place of the blessed, must be carefully distinguished from the third heaven, 2 Cor. 12: 4, the dwelling-place of the perfected righteous. The paradise is, on the other hand, in the intermediate state a place of incipient, although refreshing, rest, in which the Jews conceived all the saints of the Old Testament as united in joy.” Some Jews, however, as Hudson (above), notices, “did not consider the Patriarchs as living until the resurrection.” But all united in the idea of a detention, an intermediate state.

OBSERVATION 8. While it is true that our argument is not affected one way or the other, no matter what theory of the intermediate state is held (provided only that the non-fulfilment of the covenant promises, the inheriting, crowning, and rewarding, is conceded) - the third heaven theory of the multitude, the spheres of Origen, the intermediate statc of Stilling, Hahn, etc, the underground of Storrs, etc. - yet, it may be proper, in this connection, to point out that if this intermediate state is one of detention, if it is intermistic and incomplete, a certain incongruity exists in locating it in the third heaven. Rejecting Romish Purgatory and Cameron’s (Future State) prayer for the dead as unscriptural; without attempting to explain the actual place and condition of the saints which the Bible leaves indefinite and unexplained (saving in general terms expressive of security, of Redemption and blessedness), it may be sufficient to direct attention to the Primitive Church view as presented by Justin Martyr (Dial. Tryp. c. 80): “If you meet with some who are called Christians” (i.e. Gnostics) “who … dare calumniate the God of Abraham and of Isaac and Jacob, and who say that there is no resurrection of the dead, but, that at death their souls are received up into heaven, do not regard them as Christians.” This, as Hudson (Debt. and Grace, p. 254) has well observed, is “the more remarkable because he had been a Platonist.” Irenaeus [Page 400] (Contra Haeres. 1. 5, c.31, § 2), thus opposes the Gnostics: “How shall not they be confounded who say that the Underworld (inferos) is this world of ours, and their inner man leaving the body here, ascends the supercelestial place?” “The souls of His (Christ’s) disciples also, for whom the Lord did these things, go away into an unseen place appointed them by God, and there abide until the resurrection which they await. Then receiving bodies and rising entire, that is, bodily, as the Lord also arose, they come thus to the vision of God.” Others, as Polycarp (Epis. Phil.), speak of “the place due and promised,” and Tertullian (On the Soul, On Paradise, and On the Resurrection) asserts that the souls are “detained in safe keeping in Hades until the day of the Lord,” “that all souls are compelled into the Underworld” (although the love of martyrdom and its eulogy made an exception as stated by Tertullian: “No one, on leaving the body, dwells immediately with the Lord, except he who, by the prerogative of martyrdom, shall go to Paradise instead of the Underworld.” (“The only key to Paradise is your blood”). Such a doctrine of detention and of non-introduction to heaven itself, in view of the prevailing philosophy and the earnest desire of believers to secure Redemption, could not have arisen and become so extended unless it were derived from apostolic teaching. It is, therefore, the most prudent to avoid a dogmatic expression as to place, seeing how largely the Early Church, which one should suppose, owing to nearness to the apostles, ought to know the truth, if revealed, differs from modern conceptions.

Origen (compare Proposition 169, Obs. 1) could not spiritualize this intermediate state away, and although somewhat contradictory (showing the change of view progressing) he postively (De Priticipilis b. 2, ch. 11) places the saints after death “in some place suited on the earth, which Holy Scripture calls Paradise, as in some place of instruction,” etc., but afterward, with his peculiar doctrine of progression added, has them when qualified to “ascend to a place in the air and reach the Kingdom of heaven, through those mansions, so to speak, in the various places which the Greeks have termed spheres, i.e. globes, but which Holy Scripture has called heaven,” etc. The intermediate state was one always allied, more or less, with Millenarianism, and so e. g. Neander (Genl. Ch. His., vol.2, sec. on Mill.) notices how it was specially connected with our doctrine. Prof. Bush (Anastasis) quotes Justin, and remarks that the notion opposed by Justin is regarded by him as “a heresy,” viz., “that immediately on death the soul is received up to heaven,” but Bush (who denies a bodily resurrection, having a resurrection to accompany, or immediately follow, death, and making such an ascension to heaven a contingent proof of it) explains Justin’s view to be owing to “the prevalence of the Millenarian doctrine,” and then adds: “That doctrine (Millenarian) has been from that day to this the grand support of the crass conceptions which have been entertained on the subject of the resurrection.” This we accept as the highest possible praise (compare Propositions 125-28), seeing that our doctrine thus opposes the Gnostic corruption introduced which make Redemption incomplete, and Christ’s bodily resurrection unnecessary (if not a farce), especially when Prof. Bush has to turn away from the early Fathers and seek consolation in Cicero, praising the “evangelical tone of Cicero,” because the latter says in his Tusculan Questions: “that souls when they have forsaken their bodies, come into heaven as into their own domicile.” Gnosticism, as a reference to Church history (Neander, Kurtz, Mosheim, etc.) clearly shows, had a wonderful moulding influence on the doctrine of the intermediate state: The Papacy incorporated Origen’s view, attaching to it the doctrine of purgatory, making the detention, the process of release, and final ascension to heaven a source of power and profit to the church. In the case of eminent or distinguished persons an immediate ascension to the third heaven was predicted (as e.g. when Louis XVI, was beheaded, his confessor exclaimed, “Son of Louis, ascended to heaven”), but of lesser ones a purgatorial requisition was in place. This exaltation of the saints to the third heaven is really the foundation of the invocation and intercession of saints, who (according to the creed of Pope Pius IV.) are now “reigning together with Christ,” having either been delivered from purgatory or directly ascended to heaven. This is seen e.g. in the difficulty of Pope John XXII. (Draper’s Intel. His. of Europe, p. 394), who raised the [Page 401] question of “the beatific vision,” declaring that none of the dead saints would enjoy it until after the Judgment Day. He was accused of heresy, and of taking a course opposed to the interests of the church; for the question was at once raised: “If the saints stand not in the presence of God, of what use is their intercession? What is the use of addressing prayers to them?” It may be that owing to this usage of the Papacy (as well as to its former reception in the Church, and Scriptural support), it (Thompson’s Theol. of Christ, ch. 13) “obtains especially in the Lutheran communion, but has able advocates as well in other communions.” It is held by many, as can be seen in articles on “Intermediate State” Herzog, and other Cyclopaedias, in “Eschatology,” in various Systems of Theology, etc. Thus e.g. comp. art. on M’Clintock and Strong’s Cyclop., which rejects the interval between the saints immediately after death entering heaven, and declares that the long interval between the decease of Christians and the resurrection “is sufficient to prove that they do not instantly pass from the Church Militant to the New Jerusalem above.” Rejecting the state of unconsciousness and of purgatory, the idea of locality, and passage of time, it maintains strictly “an intermediate state.” It cites various Authorities and quarterlies containing articles. Hudson’s “Debt and Grace” has some valuable considerations, referring to the Fathers, Tyndale, Luther, etc., and explaining the passages (2 Cor. 5: 8; Phil. 1: 21-23) supposed to teach the contrary - holding that “those addressed in the Epistle to the Hebrews did not consider ‘the general assembly of the Church of the first-born’ as being already in heaven; their names only were written there” (to which we add that the distinctive mention of “first-born” is indicative of a still future resurrection - with which it is allied - not yet experienced). G. S. Fither in The Many Mansions has the spirits of men, good and bad, in Hades, where thy are detained, neither entering heaven nor hell, until the resurrection. “Greybeard,” in his Lay Sermons, No. 104, makes “the being with Christ,” Phil. 1: 23, 24, “present with the Lord.” 2 Cor. 5: 8, etc., a state of blessed repose with Christ in sleep, as though a night, preparatory to an awakening at the resurrection (Hudson, above, explains such passages as an overleaping the intermediate state by anticipation, and seizing the ultimate result at the resurrection). Dr. Smeltzer advocates “The Intermediate State” in The Quarterly Review, April, 1873, and so many who have no sympathy whatever with Millenarianism hold to the same. Even Macnight on Heb. 11: 40-43 (Commentary) is forced to lay down the doctrine that the righteous are only rewarded at the Second Advent, giving as proof John 14: 3, Matt. 13: 40, 43, 1 Pet. 4: 13 and 5: 4, 1 John 3: 2. Van Oosterzee (Dog., vol. 2, sec. 142) makes the departed saint “only blessed in hope,” awaiting the Second Advent (with which compare Martensen’s - Ch, Dog., s. 276 - advocacy of an intermediate state, and Hagenbach’s History of Doctrine, vol. 1, s. 77). Works having a discussion of the subject or references to the same are numerous, including such as Bickersteth’s Hades and Heaven, Huidekoper’s Belief in the First Three Centuries Concerning Christ’s Mission to the Underworld, Sear’s Foregleams of Immortality, Whatley’s Future State, Copland’s Mortal Life, Alger’s Cit. His. Doct. Future Life, Fiddes’ Doctrine & Future State, Humphery’s Translation of Athanagoras on State and Death, Blackburn’s Historical View of the Controversy from Reformation to 1772,” etc.

It is only necessary to say to the critical student that whatever differences may exist respecting the meaning of “Sheol” and “Hades” (see Bible Lexicons, etc.), whether it be taken in a most comprehensive or in a limited sense, one thing is self-evident, that neither Sheol nor Hades ever stands for the third heaven, and yet all the departed, both good and bad, enter there; and the simple fact that both classes enter the same designated place ought of itself to be amply sufficient to cause the current third heaven application to be seriously questioned. Every definition of these terms (e.g. by Stuart, Campbell, etc.) including the under-world, the region of the dead, state of the dead, grave, etc., forbids its being connected with heaven, and it was evidently this usage, that influenced Luther (Table Talk, “On God’s Word,” ch. 29) to say, as both the rich man and Lazarus entered Hades, the same place: “Abraham’s bosom is the promise and assurance of salvation, and the expectation of Jesus Christ; not heaven itself, but the expectation of heaven.” (So Trench on Parables: “‘Abraham’s bosom’ is not heaven, though it will issue in heaven; so neither ‘Hades’ hell, though it will issue in it, when death and Hades shall be cast into the lake of fire, which is the proper hell;” comp. Knapp, Ch. Theology, p. 126, saying of the early Fathers who held to “a state which is neither heaven or hell;” “This intermediate state they call, taking the appellation from Luke 16, Sinum Abraham.”) A simple comparison of these terms and usage will alone decide the cautious student to avoid the popular application, especially when the few texts supposed to conflict must be controlled in interpretation by the general analogy on the subject. Nothing can be made out decisive by the usage of the word “Paradise,” for the student well knows that is was employed to designate both a heavenly and an earthly Paradise - that it means [Page 412] a pleasure or delightful garden, a blissful abode either in heaven or on earth, and that, therefore, the early and later Fathers used it simply to designate a place where the saints were happy. Another subject often blended with this one, viz. the natural or acquired immortality, or the intermediate nature of man, does not require any notice from us for the reason that whatever view is held (and all these are most ably represented in works specially devoted to them) none of them demands, as a necessary sequence, the rewarding of the saints after death and before the Advent, or the rejection of a detention, imperfect state, or the elevation of the saints to the third heaven. Writers who hold to these several theories unite with us in asserting the incompleteness of Redemption in this intermediate state, the non-exaltation of the saints to heaven, and the necessity of the Second Advent to complete salvation. From those who advocate the highest blissful, active consciousness in a Paradise, located in Hades, down through those who have gradations of bliss to it pleasant sleep, down to utter unconsciousness - all, whatever they may make out of this intermediate state, insist upon an imperfect state, outside of heaven, which imperfection is removed at the Second Coining of Jesus.

To illustrate how men hastily infer a doctrine and dogmatically assert it respecting the intermediate state, we refer to Dr. Clark’s Man all Immortal. He correctly encounters various errors on the subject, as e.g. “that the saints of God enter upon the full realization of their everlasting felicity immediately at death, and independently of their resurrection bodies;” and he shows this to be unscriptural because “everywhere do the Scriptures teach us that it is in connection with his body man is to attain his highest destiny.” But instead of leaving “Sheol” or “Hades” represent an intermediate place aside from the third heaven, he insists upon it that the intermediate place embraces for the saints the third heaven. The proof given for this positive declaration is the following: Jesus Christ is in the third heaven, and as dead saints are represented to be with Christ or Christ with them, they must also be in the third heaven. Unfortunately this is pure inference formed by combining two classes of passages, which combination is not given by the [Holy] Spirit, for no passage exists which describes the intermediate state as located in the third heaven. We admit that Christ is there, but while there He is also here in the believer, in the sacraments, in the closet of prayer, in the Church, etc. God is everywhere parted in this intermediate state is affirmed. Dr. Clark’s agreement proceeds on the assumption that if Jesus is in the third heaven He cannot specially be in the intermediate state if one of consciousness and blessedness, and if a place separate and distinct from the former. If Jesus specially appeared to Paul, etc., He can specially manifest Himself to others, wherever they may be located. Harbanger in “Heaven” etc., takes the same view that Clark does, based on the same assumption, ignoring totally the meaning attached to the Scriptures respecting “Sheol” and “Hades,” into which all [after death immediately] enter, and into which Jesus Himself entered during the short period of His detention, and in which David (Acts 2: 34) is still detained. We conclude by saying: our view of the intermediate state as an imperfect one, the saint still unclothed and waiting, answers the question so often put to us, viz., how we can reasonably expect the saints who have been ages in heaven, enjoying its bliss, clothed upon with a spiritual or semi-spiritual body, glorified or semi-glorified, to come here to this earth to reign, etc., after such a blessed experience? Our answer is plain: No two stages of glorification, embodiment, completed Redemption after death are described in the Scriptures. The glorification, the Christ-like embodiment, the perfected Redemption, are all attached to the Second Advent and the resurrection of the just.

OBSERVATION 9. We insist upon it that the intermediate state, expressed by the term Hades and Sheol, continues down not only to the Second Advent, but to the end of the Millennial age. For it is only (Rev. 20: 13, 14) after the close of the thousand years and little season that the realm of the dead, through the power of Jesus, is utterly removed. (Comp. Revision, Variorum, etc.) While some - [‘accounted worthy’ (Luke 20: 35. cf. Philippians 3: 11; Hebrews 11: 35b)] - are removed from it, and reign with Christ, etc., others are kept in it until this final period. Hence, we cannot, without violence, allow a change to have been introduced at the First Advent, viz., that saints then are directly taken to heaven, and therefore do not now enter Hades. Such a view is opposed to the general analogy of the Scriptures, which makes every believer to follow the humiliation of the Master, and like Him enter Hades; it multiplies the prayer of faith given to every [Page 403] believer (e.g. in Ps.) for deliverance from Hades; it makes the distinguishing characteristic of Jesus at His Coming, as having “the keys of Hades,” of no personal interest to the [regenerate and obedient] believer. One passage alone is decisive of two truths, viz., that the saints in Hades are not in heaven, and that believers at the future resurrection of the saints are still in Hades, and that is, 1 Cor. 15: 54, 55, “I will redeem them from the hand of Hades, I will ransom them from death. O death, I will be thy plagues; O Hades, I will be thy destruction.”

Let the student keep in view the following points, viz., (1) Hades (so Sheol) is “in opposition to heaven” (so Lange, Matt. ch. 11: 23, and see the references to Owen, Alexander, etc., who concede it); (2) the Scriptural representations that all believers, like their Head, enter Hades; (3) that Jesus, at His Coming, having the keys of Hades, delivers His people: (4) that others remain in Hades until the thousand years are ended; (5) that in Hades there is incompleteness of redemption; (6) that those in Hades are represented as waiting for the glorious redemption. The reception of these points - all clearly taught - preserves Scriptural unity. We direct attention to Dr. Craven’s Excurses on Hades in Lange’s Com. on Rev., pp. 364-378, which will repay perusal. Much that he says is confirmatory of our view, and can be cordially received. He makes Hades an intermediate place in the Unseen World, distinct from heaven and hell, having before the resurrection of Jesus two compartments, one of comfort and the other of misery, one for being delivered from Hades the other for the wicked; but after the resurrection of Jesus, the righteous being delivered from Hades and having ascended to heaven with Him, only the wicked are taken to Hades (reserved in misery against the day of general judgment), while the righteous are taken to heaven. While serious objections can be urged against several of the points taken by him, we are only concerned in this alleged change which takes it as a fact that one compartment of Hades, employed for the retention of the righteous, has been vacated and unused since the ascension of Jesus. However ably urged we cannot receive this view, because the deliverance of the saints from Hades (e.g. Hos. 13: 14, comp. with 1 Cor. 15) is directly associated with the Pre-Millennial Advent of Jesus and the resurrection distinctive of believers. His proof (as e.g. John 14: 2, 3, see Proposition 170) is considered and explained under various propositions, and requires no special repetition. We object not to a partial removal of captives delivered from Hades [see Rev. ch. 11.] until the Coming of Jesus, of captives delivered from Hades if that be insisted upon, but we insist on the continuance as the state or abode of all men until the Coming of Jesus, who says: “I have the keys of death and of Hades.” (Comp. Dr. Seiss in The Apocalypse, p. 99.) When He comes then, according to Paul’s testimony, Death and Hades will be conquered by Him, and give up to the Conqueror those accounted worthy of the better, pre-eminent resurrection.

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2

PROPOSITION 137

THE DOCTRINE OF THE KINGDOM

SUSTAINED BY THE PHRASE

“THE WORLD TO COME.”

If we find this phrase employed by the Jews to designate a particular period of time, and if it is adopted by the apostles, without the slightest hint as to a change in its meaning, it is fair and just to conclude that in the Apostles’ estimation it continued to retain the meaning ascribed to it by the Jews.

OBSERVATION 1. Let us briefly consider in what sense the phrase, “the world to come” was used by the Jews. Prof. Bush (Answers p. 136) says: “‘The judgment of the great day,’ the period of ‘the world to come,’ is that period which in the Jewish Christology was identical with the reigning and judging supremacy of the Messiah.” He quotes Lightfoot in confirmation, and adds from the Sohar, fol. 81, “In the world to come the holy blessed God will vivify the dead and raise them from their dust,” etc., and then refers to Pococke (Porta Mosis, Not. Miscel. p. 166) who says, that R. Saadias maintains that “the resurrection is to take place during the Messiah’s reign on the earth, and so that the promise of the dead Israelites being brought out of their sepulchres is to be accomplished in this world or age, and that we are not to suppose that it pertains to another; consequently the prediction of Daniel respecting the many that sleep in the dust, with various other Scriptures, is to be fulfilled in the time of salvation, a phrase entirely equivalent to the days of the Messiah.” “So it is said in Toreth Adain, fol. 105, that the day of judgment will commence, sub initium dierum dierum resurrectionis, at the beginning of the days of the resurrection.” (Compare Proposition 133.) According to Buxtorf, as quoted by Barnes on Heb. 2: 5, it was employed by the Jews to denote “the world which is to exist after this world is destroyed, and after the resurrection of the dead, when souls shall be again united to their bodies,” or “the days of the Messiah, when He shall reign on the earth.” The Targum of Palestine (Dr. Etheridge’s Transls.) on Balaam’s prophecy has: “If the house of Israel kill me with the sword, then, it is made known to me, I shall have no portion in the world to come; nevertheless, if I may but die the death of the true! O that my last end may be as the least among them.” The student will find additional references to the opinion that “the world to come” referred to the reign of Messiah after the resurrection in Lightfoot’s works, Wetstein, Schoettgen (Bloomfield, Heb. 2: 5), Clarke’s, Lange’s, and other Commentaries. See Propsitions 138 and 139).

The Talmud frequently speaks of Israelites receiving “a portion of the world to come,” “a part in the world to come,” and asserts: “He who denies that the Scriptures are from heaven has no part in the world to come,” “the generation of the deluge have no part in the world to come,” “the generation of the dispersion (at the building of the tower of Babel) have no part in the world to come,” “the people of Sodom have no part in the world to come,” etc., speaking also of “this world and that to come,” etc. Hence [Page 405] Barnes, Com. Heb. 6: 5 on the phrase “the world to come,” says: “Or, of ‘the Coming age.’ ‘The age to come’ was a phrase in common use among the Hebrews, to denote the future dispensation, the times of the Messiah,” etc. Littell’s Living Age, July 26th, 1879, in an art. on the “Talmud,” quotes as follows : R. Simeon on Prov. 6: 22 says: “When it (the law) shall lead thee, that is, in this world. When thou sleepest, it shall keep thee, in the grave, and when thou awakest, it shall talk to thee in the world to come.” Another utterance. on Ps. 23: 5 is thus given: “In this world ye (Israel) offer me (God) the shew-bread and oblations. In the world to come, I will spread for you a great table, and the nations of the world shall behold and be confounded; for it is said, ‘Thou wilt prepare a table before me in the presence of mine enemies.’”

OBSERVATION 2. The effort made by Barnes, Bloomfield, etc., to make this expression used by the Jews, and adopted without dissent or change, in the New Testament to mean the present dispensation, age, or world under the Messiah fails, because it does not meet the conditions attached to it in that day, viz., it included the reign of the Messiah after the resurrection of the dead. Thus will appear evident if notice is taken of the distinctive usage accorded to the phraseology in Matt. 12: 32, “neither in this world (age) nor in the world to come.” Critics, Lightfoot, Wetstein, etc., refer the latter to Christ’s Kingdom, and according to Wetstein (Lange, loci) it was a proverbial expression referring to the Advent of the Messiah. Jesus adopts it, and links it therefore, as we maintain, with His future personal Advent. And this is conceded (unwillingly) by our opponents, in the simple statement that the sin or guilt alluded to remains unpardoned after the Second Advent of Christ, and therefore this world or age to come is included in the period after the Advent. The language being addressed to Jews, without any of those modern explanations attached, is a virtual endorsement of the phrase as understood by them. So Paul, [or the Writer (i.e., the Holy Spirit) of] Heb. 2: 5, “for unto the angels hath He not put in subjection the world to come, whereof we speak,” argues that this subjection is not witnessed, as many passages prove, down to the Second Advent of the Messiah, and hence necessarily locates it in the future after that Advent. Therefore his use of the word corresponding with that of the Jews he intimates no change in its usage, as fairness would have required if it referred to another period. It is never employed to designate heaven or the state after death (as our opponents, Barnes, etc., loci. frankly admit.* but to point out this very earth, regarded as “inhabited” or “inhabitable.” The choice of the phrase directly refers us to the covenant and its promises, which, if fulfilled, require under the Messiah such a world. The only period when all things, as this predicted world demands, are brought into subjection, is after Christ’s Second Coming, for down to this Pre-Millennial Advent Gentile domination is existing, and even preceding its confederations of wickedness are witnessed. This world to come is given to Jesus as man, thus corresponding with His future coming as the Son of man, etc. But this expression receives its fair and honest interpretation only by regarding the general analogy of the Word; and for a proper and full understanding must be viewed in the light thrown upon it by “the day of Jesus Christ,” “the end of the age,” and “the coming age,” as given in Propositions following. Therefore the reader, before deciding, will await the additional evidence to be placed before him. In regard to the phrase in Heb. 6: 5, however much some may make the tasting of “the powers of the world to come” the enjoyment of religion, etc., in this present dispensation, or the gospel period (thus making the world to come equivalent to “the gospel dispensation”), yet numerous [Page 406] commentators and others, who have no sympathy with our views, tell us that there is a reference to the future, making it to refer to the future, heavenly state, so e.g. Bloomfield, Scott, etc. That it has reference to the future, and to the future as understood at that period by the Hebrews addressed, must be apparent to the scholar from the occurrence of no proposed change by the apostle to its usual significance.**

* We have found one exception, which charity will attribute to ignorance and not to design, as follows: Winthrop (Lec., p. 197) justly says, after many able critics and writers, that, as Barnes etc., loci, the word translated “world” should have been rendered “the habitable, earth,” because the word oikumenen is a participle meaning inhabited or habitable, the word earth being understood. A reviewer of Winthrop in The Kingdom of Grace, produces the following remarkable and critical rejoinder: (1) That we are not at liberty to “supply Greek terms when they seem wanting,” and (2) that “all plain readers of the Bible suppose this expression to refer only to the future state of men after death.” The readers must then be very “plain” and addicted to mere “suppositions,” and all versionists are guilty of undue liberty, in supplying the terms that the Greek idiom requires. We can respect infidel attacks by ascribing some honesty to them, but such criticisms are simply contemptible, made to subserve an unscholarly purpose. Such a writer evidently has never seen the statement given in our elementary books, as e.g. Horne’s Introduction vol. 2, p. 13, etc. He also fails to notice that this phrase is identified with the Second Adamic dominion restored in the person of Jesus, and which restoration is invariably linked with the Second Advent (compare Proposition 82). H. Dana Ward (Prophetic Times, vol. 12, p. 33, etc.) gives an interesting statement of the usage of the three words (aion, kosmos, oikoumene) translated “world” in our version, and he makes “aion” the equivalent to “a period of time,” or “the age” “kosmos” to order, arrangement, the present order of things, the universe; and “oikoumene” to “the inhabited earth,” it meaning “inhabited” and as “a passive participle agrees with ge, i.e. earth, understood.” So Matt. 24: 14; Luke 2: 1, 4, 5; 21: 26; Acts 11: 28; 17: 6, 31; 19: 27; 24: 5; Rom. 10: 18; Heb. 1: 6; 11: 5; Rev. 3: 10; 12: 9; 16: 14. Macnight (Com. loci) “the inhabitable world to come,” which is correct, The Comp. Commentary makes it “the state of the Gospel Church,” for which there is no proof. Many make it “the coming world,” i.e. the Messianic, which we can receive. The Revision has as marg. reading, “the inhabited earth.”

** To make the phrase “world to come” equivalent to the present dispensation, “the Christian dispensation” (so Stuart, ete.), “the times of the New Testament (so Bloomfield, etc.), involves its advocates in self-contradiction. Thus e.g. such a dispensation has been running for some time, about thirty years, and yet if it is thus referred to; it is spoken of as not present but still future - as something to come. If the endeavour (as Scott, Doddrige, etc.) to unite with the idea of a present dispensation that of heavenly blessedness, thus including the future, they only incrcase the difficulty: (1) for then the writer still ignores the present by leading us to contemplate that which is to come, and (2) he chooses a phrase which all anciently applied to this earth, this inhabited earth in the future under the Messiah, to describe heaven; but how it consistently describe the latter these writers fail to inform us. Pliilo-Basilcus (Judge Jones, Essays, p. 42) says: “Dr. Owen observes ‘that it denotes a certain state or condition of things in this world,’ that is on this globe, ‘for the apostle does not treat directly of heaven,’ and to call heaven ‘the world to come’ because we are to go into it, says Beza, ‘rather harsh.’” We only add, that it is a period of time following the resurrection, which Polycarp (Epis. Phil., ch. 5) notices: “If we please (the Lord) in this present world, we shall also be made partakers of that which is to come, according as He hath promised us, that He will raise us from the dead; and that if we walk worthy of Him, we shall also reign together with Him.” This is only repeating what Barnabas previously stated, viz., that when the Lord comes to renew this world, making “all things new, then shall be the beginning of another world.” This has been reiterated by a multitude, who link it with the time of restitution, as e.g. Dr. Goodwin (Ecttr. Proph., p. 181), advocating, the renovation, remarks: “As God takes the same substance of man’s nature and engrafteth the new creature upon it, the same man still; so He takes the same world and makes it a new world to come for the Second Adam. For the substance of the same world shall be restored to a glory which Adam could never have raised it unto. And this God will do before He hath done with it, and this restitution is ‘the world to come,’ Heb. 2: 5.” So also the reader’s attention may be called to Luke 20: 35. Although in the Greek another word is used (meaning age or [Page 407] dispensation), yet the translators evidently employed it as synonymous (which it is to some extent) with the other. It reads: “But they which are accounted worthy to obtain that world (or age) and the resurrection from the dead.” etc., thus showing how the obtaining of the future age or world is linked - not with Hades, or Sheol, or Heaven, or this dispensation, or the Gospel, but with the resurrection of the dead - just as the Jews believed, as the covenants demand, as the promises of God require. Hence Van Onsterzee (Lange’s Com. Luke, p. 305, on ch. 25: 35) says: “To obtain that world. The Messianic aion (age) is conceived as coinciding with the resurrection of the righteous, ch. 14: 14, which is here exclusively spoken of. It is a privilege which is not communicated to all, but only to the eklektois (the called [out] or elect), while those who at the moment of the Parousia have not died but are found yet living are here not further spoken of.” In his comment to ch. 14: 14, to which he refers, he remarks: “He (Christ), like Paul (1 Thess. 4: 16; 1 Cor. 15: 23) and John (Rev. 20: 6), between a first and second resurrection, compare also Luke 20: 34-36,” etc, (Comp. Dr. Poor’s note to Lange’s Com. 1 Cor., p. 349.)

OBSERVATION 3. The Bible clearly teaches a dispensation to succeed our present one. This is done in a variety of ways, and is confirmatory of our position. Leaving the intimations of a new ordering or arrangement given by “restitution,” “regeneration,” “new heavens and new earth,” etc., this is virtually admitted by Fairbairn, Brown, and others, in that they inform us that the Millennial age can only be introduced and realized as predicted by the bestowal of new and extraordinary measures, agencies, etc., thus showing marked and distinguishing changes in the order then established. The “harvest” at the end of the age bounds the closing of this and the commencement of the new dispensation. This “harvest” is predicted, as we have shown, Rev. 14: 14-20; Joel 3: 13, etc., to be Pre-Millennial. The Millennium itself, including the resurrection and events which require the exertion of supernatural power, etc., is indicative of a new era or age. The dispensation that follows is one of Redemption, perfected Salvation, and it is a low estimate to confine the redemptive period to this age or dispensation, in which it remains incompleted down to the Second Advent. This is the preparative stage of Redemption; that which follows is Redemption fully realized. Consequently such declarations as Eph. 1: 10, “that in the dispensation of the fulness of times he might gather together in one all things,” etc., must be understood of that dispensation still future which shall be ushered in when the times preceding it have been completed. The proof that Eph. 1: 10 thus refers to such a dispensation is found in the context, for (1) as numerous passages plainly state, this gathering of all things into one is only witnessed when this dispensation or age closes; (2) in this gathering “all things,” in the Greek the neuter form, evidently also embraces the creation then redeemed from the curse, which only is done in the re-creation after this dispensation has ended; (3) all things are under Christ in this dispensation mentioned, which is not realized until after the Second Advent; (4) the connection of the “inheritance,” “the redemption of the purchased possession” with this dispensation indicates the same; (5) the adopting the exact phraseology of the Jews respecting an incoming [millennial] age, with the sole change of applying it to Jesus Christ, David’s Son and Lord.* It seems to us strange that some theologians, seeing the gathering and oneness ascribed to the Millennial period, seeing that the churches under the direct teaching of the apostles all believed in a future and incoming dispensation - Millennial - should so persistently, to defend a theory, apply this to the present dispensation, and yet acknowledge, as many of them do, that its realization will only be witnessed fully when Christ comes. Such arguments as are derived from the Pre-Millennial Advent, [Page 408] resurrection, judgment, etc., form the introduction of the coming Kingdom by the power of Christ - indeed all the varied propositions derived directly or indirectly from the Covenant, the foundation of all that is future, converge in a dispensation succeeding this one.**

* On this important passage may be added: (1) A gathering is predicated at Second Advent, which occurs at the close of this age, as e.g. 2 Thess. 2: 1; 1 Thess. 4: 17, etc. (2) This gathering is at the end of the age, includes the harvest, as in parable of tares and wheat, Rev. 14: 19, etc. (3) This gathering includes that from the heavens, as e.g. angels, saints, New Jerusalem, and even dominions, etc. (4) This gathering embraces all on earth, as e.g. saints, the Jewish nation, Gentile nations, restoration of foretold blessings, removal of curse. In brief, as Olshausen, etc., it includes “the restoration of all things.” Comp. Lange’s Com. on Matt. 13: 41. Barnes Com. on Eph. 3: 11 explains “the eternal purpose” to be literally rendered “the purpose of the ages,” i.e. the plan or arrangement of the incoming ages, thus indicating that others follow. Barnes with his theory of a final age or dispensation insists that this - “the purpose of ages” means “the purpose formed in past ages.” Admitting that this purpose or plan originated in past ages, yet the line of argument connects the saints with the completion of the arrangement in actual realization, and, therefore, relates to the present and future. Locke, Chandler, and others render this: “according to that disposition or arrangement of the ages which He made in Jesus Christ, or through Him.” Two things are self-evident, (1) that this Plan or Purpose has reference to Jesus Christ, and (2) that it includes all pertaining to Jesus, and hence of necessity what pertains to Jesus after His Second Advent. It includes, consequently, the time following His Coming, or what, Eph. 2: 7, is specifically denominated as still future “the ages to come.” This is one of the revealed “mysteries,” in which we should be personally concerned, and so clearly stated that the assertions (e.g. of Dr, Rice, in Signs of the Times) of those who declare that this dispensation is the last or final one, remains without the slightest Scriptural foundation. If this is “a Gospel dispensation,” the one Coming is only a far greater one, seeing that the goodness of the Kingdom and of salvation is realized in all its preciousness to a far greater extent in the Coming one. Take the characteristics of the Millennial age, and while they indicate great changes (showing a new ordering or arrangement), yet they all are embraced in the Gospel of the Kingdom; all are a fulfilment of Gospel promise.

** Having sufficiently shown that the Millennial period is an era, a definite age, or dispensation, introduced by Jesus Christ at His Coming, we cannot receive the claims and pretensions of many, who in the past and present, pretend that they or the founders of their sect, introduce a new dispensation (as e. g. in Swedenborgianisin, Shakerism, Mormonism, Curryism, Spiritualism, “The Eclectic Church,” etc.). This coming dispensation is not dependent on human instrumentality; it is directly inaugurated by Jesus Himself, and in so marked a manner - by the works performed, the results attained, etc. - that no one can fail to see it. We only now notice that as there have been past ages or eras (some divide them into Adamic, Patriarchal, Jewish, and Christian; others into Adamic, Noahic, Abrahamic, Mosaic, and Christian; others again into Adamic, Antediluvian, Noahic, Abrahamic, Mosaic, and Christian; and still others, making the Mosaic Theocratic, introduce another era from the captivity to Christ as Mosaic in part lacking the civil element), so there will be others, as the Millennial and the Eternal ages following. Hence it is, as Barnes, Com., Heb. 1: 2, has observed, that if the word “age” is used to designate this world or that to come, it does so because “made up of ages.” This age or dispensation to follow pertains to the glory of Christ, and is now, i.e. a new ordering, because it embraces a restored Theocracy, a renewal of the earth, resurrected and glorified saints, etc. It introduces the Theocratic reign of Jesus and His associated rulers bringing in the restitution of all things; it enforces and exhibits in living realization Redemption through Christ; it practically illustrates and enlarges Christ’s Redemptive work until it envelopes the world in its inestimable blessings. Great and important changes are indeed introduced, but all in the purposed line of Redemption through Christ, which only serve to exalt Him as the Saviour and King; to magnify His sacrifice, love, mercy, and power; to honour Him as the combined Prophet, Priest, and King; and to elevate Him in the hearts of the glorified and of the nations of the earth. Hence Bh. South’s rendering of Isa. 65: 18 (with whom agrees Dr. Clarke, etc.), “Exult in the age to come which I create,” and there is force in his rendering Isa. 9: 6, “The Father of the age to come” (with which comp. - Bh. Chandler’s “Defence of Christianity” and Lange’s (Commentary, etc.).

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3

PROPOSITION 138

THIS DOCTRINE OF THE KINGDOM FULLY

CORROBORATED BY “THE DAY OF

THE LORD JESUS CHRIST.”

This Kingdom is after the Second Advent, and in a period, dispensation, age, day, or time, which, owing to the public, personal manifestation of Jesus Christ, is by way of pre-eminence entitled “His day,” etc. Now, if it can be shown that the Jews believed that the day or age of the Messiah was thus identified with the period of the reign of the Messiah on David’s throne, and that the Apostles, without any change or transformation, apply this phraseology to Jesus after His Advent, it at once powerfully confirms our doctrine of the [Millennial] Kingdom. For, if our interpretation of the Covenant, and promises, is correct, then such, a day or time of Christ must be still future.

OBSERVATION 1. The Jewish view is given by many writers. Thus e. g. Mede quotes R. Saadias Gaom, who indorses the ancient opinion on Dan. 7: 18 by saying: “Because Israel have rebelled against the Lord, their Kingdom shall be taken from them, and shall he given to those our monarchies which shall possess the Kingdom in this age, and shall lead captive and subdue Israel to themselves in this age until the age to come, until the Messiah shall reign.” The ancient opinion of the Jews previous to and at the First Advent are given in Commentaries, Systamatic Theologies. etc., viz., that the times or reign of the Messiah was frequently denominated “the day or days of the Messiah,” originating from the prophetic announcements of “the day of the Lord,” etc. Knapp, Barnes, Bloomfield, and many others, show how the Jews regarded “the day of the Lord” as equivalent to “the times of Messiah.” Indeed, as stated in previous Propositions, it was fully identified with both the resurrection and the judgment, which it was believed the Messiah would bring to pass. How later Jews continued to hold this notion of the day thus linked with these adjuncts is evidenced by the following extract from R. Menassah Ben Israel (in Resurrection of the Dead, p. 245). who, commenting on Isa. 2: 12-17, “For the day of the Lord of hosts,” etc., remarks: “It is not to be doubted, as we shall demonstrate in the sequel, that by ‘the day of the Lord’ the prophet intends ‘the day of judgment,’ which is otherwise called ‘the day of the resurrection of the dead.’” Again (B. 3, c. 2), he says, on Mal. 4: 5, “That great and terrible day of the Lord is the day of judgment, which shall be conjoined with the resurrection.” The day of Messiah, the day of judgment, the day of resurrection, the day of the Lord, etc., were all associated in the Jewish mind with the predicted coming and reign of the Messiah.

Gill, Commentary on 2 Pet. 3: 8, gives several Rabbinical citations in which is specified that “the day of the holy blessed God is a thousand years.” Lange, Commentaty Matt. 22: 2, notices [Page 410] how the Jews thought the feast, the marriage festival, would be held at the end of the age. Many such references are found in the various commentaries, and the critical student will not fail to observe how these views, after the commencement of this dispensation or age, are repeated in the Apocalypse, but always as related to the future, the Second Advent of Jesus, and the [first] resurrection of the saints. The reign of the Messiah on David’s throne was “the day of Redemption,” “the day of salvation,” etc., and was even claimed by impostors, as e.g. Milman (History of the Jews, vol. 2, p, 435) informs us that R. Akiba addressed the Jews in behalf of the impostor Bar-cochab, “Behold the Star that is come out of Jacob; the days of the Redemption are at hand.”

OBSERVATION 2. Next, it is important to notice, (1) how the inspired apostles adopted this phraseology, applying it to Jesus, and (2) locating this “day” that the Jews expected, in the future. (1) A period of time, separate and distinct from previous ones, is called “the day of the Lord Jesus,” 2 Cor. 1: 14; “the day of Christ,” 2 Cor. 2: 2; “the day of the Lord,” 1 Thess. 5: 2, etc.. This is so apparent that it needs no additional mention. (2) That this day of Christ is not in the present dispensation (compare e.g. John Wesley’s remarks, Proposition 133, obs. 5), but in the future one, is evident by reference to the general tenor of Scripture concerning it, and by then giving the opinion of our opponents as indicative of its relation to the future. Thus e.g. 1 Cor. 5: 5, “that the Spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus,” Barnes, Com. loci, “the day of judgment when the Lord Jesus shall come,” etc. 1 Cor. 1: 8, “blameless in the day of the Lord Jesus Christ,” Barnes, loci, “in the day when the Lord Jesus shall come to judge the world; and which will be called His day, because it will be the day in which He will be the great and conspicuous object, and which is especially appointed to glorify Him.” 2 Cor. 1: 14, “ye also are ours in the day of the Lord Jesus;” Barnes, loci, “in the day when the Lord Jesus shall come to gather His people to Himself.” 2 Thess. 2: 2, “that the day of Christ is at hand;” Barnes, loci, “the time when He should appear, called ‘the day of Christ,’ because it would be appointed especially for the manifestation of His glory.” 1 Thess. 5: 2, “the day of the Lord so cometh as a thief in the night:” Barnes, loci, “Of the Lord Jesus,” etc., “‘the day of the Lord’ means the day in which He will be manifested,” etc. So also 2 Pet. 3: 10; Phil. 2: 16, etc., and Barnes, loci, gives the same. Barnes even indorses the Jewish view on John 8: 56, when he says, “the day of judgment is also called the day of the Son of man because it will be a remarkable time of His manifestation.” (Compare also Knapp, Ch. Theol., s. 155 (4).) Jesus Himself employes the phrase, as e.g. Luke 17: 24, 30:* “So also shall the Son of man be in His day;” “even thus shall it be in the day when, the Son of man is revealed,” with which compare Matt. 24: 30, 31, 37, etc., and then notice the concessions of Barnes, etc., that its ultimate reference must be to the time when He personally comes to judgment, etc. We have thus a distinctive “day of Christ” ushered in at the Second Advent; and with the predictions relating to “that day” by the prophets; with the Scriptural usage of the word “day;” with the events connected with it and the guards thrown around it to prevent, if possible, misconception of its duration, etc., it is simply to be faithless not to identify this “Lord’s day” this “day of the Messiah,” with the promised exalted Millennial times of the Word with which it is blended. That this “day of Christ” embraces a long period of time is apparent from the examples already given, but the [Holy] Spirit multiplies evidence; for believers, being “the children of the day,” see on every side [Page 411] “the day” linked with the Advent, with Millennial blessedness, with entering into (compare Matt. 7: 21, 22), and realizing the Kingdom, and with Barnabas they look for a “holy age” to come, believing Him to be “King of the ages” (1 Tim. 1: 17; Heb. 1: 2, Vulgate), who will manifest Himself int the day that significantly and appropriately is called after Himself. And when the Spirit to whom a thousand years are as a day, pronounces it, we are very slow in limiting it.**

* It may be proper to notice the attempt Fairbairn (On Prophecy, p. 443) makes to refer this to the day of Pentecost. But this fails (1) because there was no Coming of the Son of Man (humanity) at that time; (2) it violates the context which contrasts this Coming with that of other false Christs; (3) if fulfilled on the day of Pentecost, then the disciples would see one of the days of the Son of Man which Jesus positively declares, verse 22, they shall not see, owing to His departure ; (4) it is opposed to the Jewish view entertained, whose exact phraseology Jesus adopts without any intimation of change; (5) it is condemned by the usage we refer to in the text.

** Hence we cannot accept of Martensen’s (Ch. Dog., s. 287) language “The final Advent of Christ is to be the end, not only of this present time and this one term of history, but of all time and of all history.” Against this, the covenants and prophecy all unite in proclaiming the opposite, viz., that then a glorious period of time, is ushered in when the history foreshown and outlined in covenant and prophecy shall be realized. This extreme must, therefore, be rejected as untenable. The other extreme, adopted by a few, that this present and existing age shall be eternally perpetuated, is likewise, as we abundantly show, unscriptural. One of Dr. Arnold’s admirers (Westin. Review, Jan. 1852, p.120) says that Arnold’s Theology is based on the assumed perpetuity of the age, and that he admits (although c1aiming it as correct) that “it is the least apostolic in appearance.” This admission is amply sufficient, and we rest content in those “times” (1 Tim. 6: 15, and which Paul in 2 Timothy calls “that day” comp. Crit, Eng. Test. lici.) still future and connected with “the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ.”

OBSERVATION 3. To satisfy some objections, it is necessary to allude to Waggoner (Ref. of Age to Come), who refuses to acknowledge an “age to come” to follow this age, on the ground that that which succeeds this is called “an everlasting age” or “the eternal age.” But this is a mere play on words so far as the phrase is concerned, for (1) he thus professes his belief in an age to come, although “everlasting;” (2) he divides this “everlasting age” arbitrarily into two periods, the first part of one thousand years in the third heaven, the second part, or remainder, after the thousand years here on the earth. While we do not even thus limit it by the thousand years (which years do not limit the reign, but the binding of Satan and non-resurrection of the wicked), extending it through and beyond them into the future (Proposition 159). When the characteristic duration, etc., of the age are to be determined, we find it extending to, merging into, and embracing perpetuity.* To build up his theory, Waggoner contends that “the end,” “Christ’s Coming,” and “the termination of Salvation,” are synonymous terms, and taking this for granted (without the least proof), he proceeds to erect his argument upon it. This is a sad mixture, seeing that Christ’s Coming is not to “terminate Salvation,” or to make an “end” of all things, but is for purposes of salvation and to gather all things into oneness, etc. Again, a favourite phrase is quoted, and paraded even as a title of sermons and an equivalent for “the time of the End.” In tracing the matter somewhat, it seems to be founded on Rev. 10: 6 in our English Version, which unguardedly reads “that there should be time no longer.” That this is a misapprehension of the passage is evident, for (1) critics and commentators pronounce it incorrect. (See Barnes, Stuart, Elliott, Lord etc., loci.) (2) It [Page 412] is inconsistent with fact: (a) as to the text, seeing that instead of a closing of time, time is represented as continuing on, and events occurring during its progress; (b) as to the creation, for while time may be regarded as unmeasured, eternal, yet no creature or event can be duly considered apart of time. Time cannot end; a day, year, age, cycle may close, but not time, eternity itself embraces endless time. The arguments erected upon this phrase, therefore, can well be dismissed without more attention, seeing that “times” are connected with, 1 Tim. 6: 15, “the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ.”**

* Time, even eternity, is marked necessarily by cycles, ages, etc.. and we cannot conceive of it without some measure. The Spirit accommodates Himself to this to give us a proper conception, and hence speaks of “the ages to come,” and refers to Christ as “King of the ages,” indicating such grand divisions - while on the other hand expressions are found which, without distinguishing between those ages speak by reduplication of the entire future as one everlasting age. Our idea simply is that this Millennial age merges into the others unchanged as to blessedness, glory, etc., and is thus continued on, although the doom of Satan and the wicked, etc. properly marks an epoch in it.

** The reader is referred back to Proposition 133, Obs. 5, and requested to notice how John Wesley speaks of this day of Christ; also how the Thessalonians regarded this day “as present” (so Alford, Olshausen, Lange, etc.) and the apostle, in order to reassure them, locates it in the future. Multitudes affirm that this dispensation is “the day of Christ,” but they do this in opposition to the passages quoted, to the analogy adduced, and to the direct affirmation of Jesus, Luke 17 : 22, that during His absence “the days will come when ye shall desire to see one of the days of the Son of Man, and ye shall not see it.” The student will notice, what our argument has persistently urged, that “the day of the Lord Christ” is, to be such, identified with a personal presence; it is this presence that constitutes it “His day.” Turning to 1 Cor. 4: 3, 4, 5, and instead of “man’s judgment” the Greek is, as stated in the Marginal reading, “man’s day” (so numerous critics and versions; compare e.g. Luther’s).*** This accords with the analogy on the subject. The time when this was written, and the time from thence down to the Coming of the Lord is “man’s day,” and not the Lord’s day. The direct contrast in the passage is amply sufficient, and what was true in Paul’s time, that the world was controlled by “man’s day” (i.e. was largely under the power of his opinions, wisdom, self-will, sway, etc.), is true to-day, being - as history testifies - a fact constantly witnessed from that time down to the present, and - as prophecy attests - will continue a sad fact down to the Second Advent, culminating in its exhibition of wilful power and sway just before the open Parousia. This, then, is “man’s day,” - a day in which the absence of the Lord is self-evident, and in which man’s attachment to the word is disregarded of God and His dear Son makes it “man’s day,” and not the Lord’s day, in which the Church is struggling and fighting, is eulogized by hosts of writers; as “the Lord’s day,” although the bridegroom is absent and the marriage postponed to His Coming. To indicate how perversely men will employ this phraseology, a few more illustrations are presented. Scott (Com. Zechariah 14) makes “the day of the Lord” to be “the time when the Romans marched their armies, composed of many nations, to besiege Jerusalem, was ‘the day of the Lord Jesus,’ on which He came to ‘destroy those that would not that He should reign over them.” Alas! Rev. Robison, in a sermon at Springfield, on November, 1878, made “the day of Christ” in 1 Cor. 1: 9 and Phil. 1: 6, 10, to refer to the death of the saint! Egbert (The Chron. of Henry of Huntington) is said to have, seen “the day of the Lord” in the conversion, of the monks of Hii or Iona, which has been repeated again and again at accessions to the Church. It is wonderful how flexible and full of numerous meanings the phrase becomes in the hands, of spiritualizers, denoting almost everything but that really intended. In connection it may be said that we earnestly protest against the theories of those who would locate “the day of the Lord” as already present in any form, as the things connected with such a day have [Page 413] never yet been realized. Hence we reject as utterly untenable the theory of Barbour and others (as seen e.g. in Herald of the Morning, Aug. 1^st. 1877), who, basing their view on some unproven chronological positions, declare that “‘the day of the Lord’ commenced in the autumn of 1874.” Aside from the reasons presented in this work against it, it is sufficient to say that the misleading view of “the harvest” incorporated with it (which harvest is to last three and a half years) alone shows the incorrectness of the chronological position so positively asserted, When the tares are gathered, and Christ and His angels begin the work of the harvest, we will see - as a comparison of the prophecies relating to the harvest conclusively shows - a very different kind of work than the one described by them. One especial lack in this view of Barbour’s is, that in his harvest interpretation he utterly fails to discriminate between “the first-fruits” previously gathered, and the harvest which follows, but adopts an opinion which he thinks is favourable to his groundwork, viz., chronological position.

** The American Bible Union has the following comment: “Man’s day: namely, the present, in contrast with the coming of the ‘day of the Lord’.” So e.g. Fausset (Com. loci), “literally, man’s day, contrasted with the day (ch. 3: 13) of the Lord (verse 5), 1 Thess. 5: 4. All days previous to the day of the Lord are man’s days.”

To be continued, D.V.