p. 3 | Under Another Name

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Dec 12, 1907

Under Another Name

The spirit of the papacy is self-exaltation. This is plainly indicated in the prophecies which deal with this remarkable power. Daniel declared concerning the little horn, one symbol of the papacy: “He shall speak words against the Most High, and shall wear out the saints of the Most High; and he shall think to change the times and the law.” The apostle Paul wrote of “the man of sin,” the general title of the headship of the papacy: “He that opposeth and exalteth himself against all that is called God or that is worshiped; so that he sitteth in the temple of God, setting himself forth as God.” In foretelling the career of the beast from the sea, the apostle John says that there was given to the beast “a mouth speaking great things and blasphemies; . . . and he opened his mouth for blasphemies against God, to blaspheme his name, and his tabernacle, even them that dwell in the heaven. . . . And all that dwell on the earth shall worship him, every one whose name hath not been written from the foundation of the world in the book of life of the Lamb that hath been slain.”

These outline sketches, when brought together, make up a vivid picture of “the mystery of iniquity,” the counterfeit of Christianity, the papacy. In two of these prophecies symbols are used of whose application there can be no reasonable doubt, but in the third prophecy the language is literal, and in this last case the real spirit of the papacy is set forth in plain terms; the man of sin assumes that he is God, and attempts to take the place of God. This is the climax of self-exaltation, the attempt to dethrone God and to put self in his place. The outworking of this principle is described in the other prophecies in which blasphemies and persecutions are accompanied by false worship, while all the world wondered.

In the papacy we find the most perfect representation of the outworking of the papal principle in an organized form. It is not simply concrete iniquity, but it is the mystery of iniquity—a system mysterious and complex, the product of a superhuman intellect, a pretense of exalting and glorifying God, which casts him down from his rightful place, and treads under foot the Son of God by giving divine honors to his pretended vicegerent.

But the papacy is simply the religion of human nature. It substitutes man for God, and preaches the gospel according to man in the place of the gospel according to God. It puts the word of man, tradition, for the Word of God, and demands submission to the so-called holy father on earth, instead of to the Father in heaven. To those who know the truth it is a hideous perversion of the gospel, in which darkness is put for light and light for darkness. But in all this it is in accord with the deceitful and desperately wicked heart, which prefers the forms of godliness without the power which transforms, which loves iniquity and hates righteousness, and which seeks salvation in sin rather than salvation from sin,—that heart which is willing to talk like God, provided it is permitted to live like Satan, and which, under the guise of humility and dependence upon God, lifts itself up in rejection of God.

And, strange as it may seem, this spirit of self-exaltation is not incompatible with the works of humanitarianism and a display of philanthropy. It is a system of self-salvation, of works of self-righteousness which are made to satisfy the demand for godliness, and in this system there is a large place for that advertised humility which loves to announce itself on the street corners and in the marketplaces. While there may be, and doubtless are, many honest and self-sacrificing agents connected with this system, yet the totality of all effort is molded, manipulated, and directed to the one end of glorifying mortal man instead of the incorruptible God.

There is nothing more repugnant to the natural heart than humbly to acknowledge sin against God, and to accept the righteousness of Christ as the only hope of salvation. To do the most

rigorous penance, to give liberal donations of money, and to put forth the most wearing effort in outward works will be gladly accepted conditions of deliverance from condemnation, since they do not interfere with that independence of self which thus pays for what it receives, and becomes debtor to no one.

But there is another way, quite independent from, and apparently opposed to, the papacy, in which the same spirit of the supremacy of self is revealed. It is that false interpretation of liberty which changes it into license, the rejection of the divine plan of the interdependence of the members of the body of Christ which would attempt to join every member directly with the Head without a necessary connection with other members, that undue estimate of the value of the unit which renders unity of action impossible, and which, in effect, makes each individual a pope over the church of which he is the sole and singular member. This system of disorganization has been extolled under the name of individualism, but it is really the papacy reduced to its lowest terms—a papacy of one. It professes to make Christ the head of each person, but in actual practise it shuts out Christ from his place, and makes each person his own head, by rejecting the divine plan for the relation of all the parts of the body to one another. It rejects the papal counterfeit of the voice of God speaking in his church, the doctrine of papal infallibility, but it also rejects the genuine manifestation of the gift of the spirit of prophecy whenever the message does not harmonize with the so-called divine voice within the individual, or in other words, whenever it interferes with self-exaltation. It admits of a “formation” which does not hamper the kingship of self, but discards that “organization” which admits of only one Head to which all the members are joined in a mutual relation of dependence one upon the other.

This idea of individualism seems to commend itself to those who have found it difficult to yield their own opinions in favor of any counsel, either human or divine, as it leaves them free to follow their own plans and their own interpretations of the Scriptures, while at the same time they profess to be led wholly and directly by the Holy Spirit. This is one of the most subtle and most dangerous forms of that self-exaltation which is the very essence of the papacy. While it decries the papacy, it really puts self in the place of God—simply a different revelation of the same papal principle.

Individualism is not the legitimate successor of a divinely appointed organization. Individualism will not strengthen the ability of the church to accomplish the work of giving the last gospel message to all the world in this generation. Individualism begins in self-assertion and ends in self-destruction, and it can never be the vital principle nor the rallying cry for a great and homogeneous movement. Individualism sounds its own death-knell as a movement as soon as it secures enough adherents to make united action either possible or necessary. Individualism is the equivalent of disorganization.

“For as the body is one, and hath many members, and all the members of the body, being many, are one body; so also is Christ. For in one Spirit were we all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Greeks, whether bond or free; and were all made to drink of one Spirit. For the body is not one member, but many. If the foot shall say, Because I am not the hand, I am not of the body; it is not therefore not of the body. And if the ear shall say, Because I am not the eye, I am not of the body; it is not therefore not of the body. If the whole body were an eye, where were the hearing? If the whole were hearing, where were the smelling? But now hath God set the members each one of them in the body, even as it pleased him. And if they were all one member, where were the body? But now they are many members, but one body.” 1 Cor. 12: 12-20, A. R. V. “For I say, through the grace that was given me, to every man that is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think; but so to think as to think soberly, according as God hath dealt to each man a measure of faith. For even as we have many members in one body, and all the members have not the same office: so we, who are many, are one body in Christ, and severally members one of another.” Rom. 12: 3-5, A. R. V.