p. 427 | Foolish Perplexity by Uriah Smith

Seventh-day Adventist Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Sep 21, 1882

Foolish Perplexity.

By Uriah Smith

The blank bewilderment into which grave doctors of divinity run whenever they are obliged to touch upon the doctrine of the second coming of Christ, would be amusing, if it were not so serious and important a subject. The international Sunday-school lesson was recently upon this question as brought to view in Mark 13, and the S. S. Times of Sept. 2, 1882, reports the difficulties in which President Woolsey finds himself involved, as this subject comes in his way. In the course of the prophecy Christ says, "This generation shall not pass, till all these things be done," verse 30; and forthwith expositors begin to stagger helplessly over the declaration. This means, they say, that all that Christ had previously said in reference to his coming, etc., was to take place while those then present were still living; but yet no such coming as predicted did take place in their day. What, then, can be done with the passage?

President Woolsey gives up the difficulty as insoluble. If it was left to the future to correct misapprehensions, this would imply, he thinks that the "imperfect apprehensions of the disciples have entered into the gospels." If they were inspired to write the gospels, we imagine all their misapprehensions would have been corrected.

The Independent says: "The passage is surrounded with very grave difficulties which the Sunday-school expositor had better look boldly in the face and then pass on."

Would it not rather be better for a person when he finds himself following a principle of exegesis, which, when applied to certain passages of Scripture, obliges him to stare at them awhile as "insoluble difficulties," and then pass them by—would it not be better for him under these circumstances to conclude that there is something wrong with his principle of interpretation, and seek a better one, knowing that when the right one is found, what would otherwise be insoluble difficulties in the Scriptures, will be found to be but consistent parts of one harmonious whole.

There is said to be in the city of Rome a room whose walls are covered with tracings, which, to the beholder as he enters, appear to be only a mass of inextricable confusion. But when he reaches a certain point in the room, immediately all lines fall into their proper places; well-defined and shapely figures appear in due order and proportion; unity of design is seen throughout the whole; and a series of entrancing views and fairy forms greets the eye, and fills the beholder with delight.

So with the Scriptures. When the true point of perspective is reached in a correct system of interpretation, those parts which appeared like inharmonies and insoluble difficulties, assume their proper place and proportion in the prophetic scheme, and all is consistent and clear.

That which gives these expositors trouble in our Lord's prophecy concerning his coming, especially, is the declaration, "This generation shall not pass till all these things be fulfilled;" the phrase, "these things," including his second coming with his holy angels in power and great glory. They assume that the words, "this generation," mean those then living whom Christ personally addressed, and no such coming as described

took place in their day. Then Christ uttered a false prediction, or their system of interpretation is wrong. Think of a Christian's looking the first of these positions boldly in the face and then passing on—yes, passing on with the conviction in his heart, it must be, either that the record of Christ's words is incorrect, or that his words themselves are not to be trusted, and that the New Testament is not an inspired book. What a splendid chance for the infidel to help these men out of their dilemma on this wise: "You are right, Mr. Woolsey, the difficulty is insoluble. The record is incorrect. The prediction was false. The disciples were full of misapprehensions, and these appear as fatal defects in their writings. You might as well take your stand with us openly, as you do virtually, that the New Testament is not inspired, and is hence not only no better than any other book, but not half as good as most other books."

But we inquire. Do the words, "this generation," mean those then living, to whom Christ spoke? We venture to affirm that they do not, but that Christ referred in this language to those who would be alive far in the future from his day, when the events predicted were to occur, and who would witness their fulfillment. And in support of this position we offer this law of prophetic language: that in prophecies of consecutive events, concerning long periods of time, the writer passes down with the events as though himself present when they occur, using the present tense for the future, and speaking of the people at different stages in the line of the prophecy by using pronouns of the first and second persons, instead of pronouns of the third person. Examples: "Unto us a child is born." Isa. 9:6. This was a prophecy of the first advent of Christ, uttered over seven hundred years before the event occurred; and here the present tense is used for the future—"is born" instead of "shall be born." Again, "The people that walked in darkness have seen a great light; they that dwell in the land of the shadow of death, upon them hath the light shined." Isa. 9:2. This was fulfilled by the preaching of Christ more than seven hundred years afterward, in the borders of Zabulon and Nephthalim, according to Matt. 4:12-16. But here both the present and past tenses are used for the future. In Isa. 61:1, we read: "The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord hath anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek," etc. Over seven centuries afterward, Christ, preaching in Nazareth, quoted this very prophecy, and said, "This day is this scripture fulfilled in your ears." Yet Isaiah in the prediction uses verbs in the present and past tenses, and a personal pronoun in the first person: "The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord hath anointed me," etc. Here it is evident that Isaiah goes forward to the time of Christ when this would be fulfilled, and putting himself in the place of Christ, writes as though Christ himself were speaking. So Paul, addressing the church just before the coming of the Lord, uses a pronoun in the second person: "Ye, brethren, are not in darkness that that day should overtake you as a thief." 1 Thess. 5:4. Again he uses the first person: "We which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord." 1 Thess. 4:15. But he did not mean himself and associates; for when some of his Thessalonian brethren gathered from this that the day of Christ was imminent, he assured them in the second epistle that the day of Christ was not then at hand, but was far distant from their day, after the development and long career of the great papal apostasy. 2 Thess. 2:1-5. Again he uses similar language in 1 Cor. 15:51, 52: "We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump." In this he refers not to himself and his personal associates, but to those who would be living when the time should come for the trump of God to announce the revelation of his Son from Heaven.

Just in this sense we believe the Lord uses the expression, "this generation;" and then all is easy and plain. He simply goes forward to the time when the great signs of his coming which he foretold should take place, and addresses the generation which should witness them by using a pronoun in the second person: "When ye shall see all these things, know that he [margin] is near, even at the doors. Verily I say unto you, this generation [which shall see these things] shall not pass till all these things be fulfilled." Matt. 24:33, 34.

Why do not our divinity physicians fall into trouble over the prophecies quoted above from Isaiah? They cannot, because the fulfillment is plainly recorded in the New Testament. But the very same principle is involved in our Lord's prophecy of his second coming, which now becomes to them such an "insoluble difficulty."

It does not fall within the scope of this article to prove, as might easily be done, that the generation is now living to which the language applies, and which is not to pass till the great consummation is witnessed. But is it not deplorable that those who are set for the defense of the gospel, to whom the people look for light and instruction, take a prophecy which applies to our own time, and give it a false application to a time now eighteen hundred years in the past, and, by so doing, involve the Scriptures in a fatal contradiction, to the scandal of Christians and the joy of infidelity? U. S.