Question Corner

Pacific Press Publishing Association · Mountain View, California · Mar 3, 1909

[All proper questions on Bible and history will be answered on this page as soon as possible after receiving them. This will sometimes mean a month or more. We can not promise to reply to the same question often. Let those who ask read other answers; they may find reply to their own. Always enclose stamp if answer is required. Those outside our Bible Band, please enclose ten cents. This does not begin to meet expenses oftentimes. “Foolish . . . questions avoid.”]

2751.— Ezekiel 39: 9-12.

Is this scripture before the seven last plagues, or is it in the past? A. J. H.

To our mind, the last chapters of Ezekiel, from chapters 36 to 48, are prophecies and promises of what God would have done for Israel when they came up out of Babylon. He was prepared to do all that; He would have restored them to their own land; the temple would have been rebuilt more glorious than ever before; all the nations that menaced them in any way, Gog and Magog, would have been slain; the land would have been cleansed; it would have been redivided among the twelve tribes, and from that glorious city the children of Israel would have gone out to convert the nations. All that the Lord asked of them was that they be “ashamed” of their iniquities, chapter 43:10, 11; but they were not, consequently that sanctuary was never rebuilt, nor did the glory of God rest upon His children, nor did that resurrection of chapter 37 take place; and yet all these chapters are faintly typical of what God will do for His children, not in detail, but in the great general promises when He shall come the second time. The type is never the perfect antitype. So we could say that Ezekiel 39 is not fulfilled, nor will it ever be in detail, but only in general, when God shall punish forever those who would destroy His people. The antitype is found in Revelation 20 and 21.

2752.— What Jesus Thought.

Was Jesus not under the impression that He would come back in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory during the lifetime of His disciples? Compare Matt. 24:34; 16:28; 23:36; Mark 13:30; Luke 21:32. Matt. 16:27, 28 can not refer to His transfiguration because He says in verse 27 that He shall come back with His angels and that then He shall reward every man according to his works. E. W.

There are certain great general truths that it is always well to consider. When God in His goodness delivered Israel out of Egypt, He would then have set up His everlasting kingdom and made the days of the children of Israel like the days of heaven upon earth; but Israel would not believe, consequently they did not enter into His rest. When He brought the children of Israel from Babylon under the decree of Cyrus and the prophesying of Jeremiah and Ezekiel, He would again have completely restored the kingdom, completely regenerated that nation, and the sanctuary predicted by Ezekiel in the last eight chapters of his prophecy would have been built and Israel would have been a praise and glory in the earth; but they were not “ashamed of their iniquities,” and consequently the Lord had to pass them by again. When the Lord Jesus Christ Himself came it was again Israel’s privilege to receive Him, and the glory which would have followed that reception would have been greater than anything which the earth had ever witnessed, but that they refused. The last part of Matthew 23 gives us the sad record. He would have saved Jerusalem, but they “would not.” No doubt He did everything in His power to prepare His disciples for the sad disappointment which was to come, and to show also the future glorious triumph of the Son of God. We can therefore see no intimation in the Gospels ourselves that He expected that the coming would be in His day; in fact Matthew 24 and Luke 21, Mark 13, and other scriptures, also the parables of Matthew 13, clearly point out that the coming was future. While, therefore, He predicted that second glorious coming, He knew that it would be in the times indeterminate, and yet which would be seemingly long deferred; but that His disciples might not be discouraged, they were given a vision of His glory and of the two classes which would be represented at His coming, the translated immortalized of which Elijah was a type, and the resurrected immortalized of which Moses was a type. So Peter uses this very vision to prove the second coming of Christ. “For we have not followed cunningly devised fables when we made known unto you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of His majesty.” 2 Peter 1:16. And then he tells us that he saw His glory and heard His voice when on the holy mount.

2753.— Time in Egypt.

In November 18, I notice that it is said that the length of time the Israelites were in Egypt was 215 years, but the Bible plainly says they were there 430 years. Ex. 12:40. C. B.

We were perfectly aware that Ex. 12:40 speaks of 430 years, but read also Gal. 3:17, which puts the giving of the law 430 years after the Lord made the covenant with Abraham. Presumably the apostle Paul had the best of authority besides Inspiration in the statement which he made. The most ancient of Old Testament versions, the Samaritan and the Septuagint, of Ex. 12:40, read as follows: “Now the time of the sojourning of the children of Israel and of their fathers which they had dwelt in the land of Canaan and in Egypt, was 430 years.” This seems to have been omitted from the present Hebrew text. The Samaritan and the Septuagint are supported by Josephus and the best Jewish expositors, according to Boothroyd, and also of Gal. 3:17.

2754.— Man or Angel. Rev. 22: 9.

Please explain Rev. 22:9. Was that man always an angel? L. L.

The narrative is that John fell at the feet of the angel which showed him those things, to worship him. The angel said: “See thou do it not, for I am thy fellow servant, and of thy brethren the prophets, and of them which keep the sayings of this book. Worship God.” This being was always an angel and never a man. This verse does not mean that he was a man. It can not properly be read to mean that he was one of the prophets, it simply means this: “I am thy fellow servant, and a fellow servant of thy brethren the prophets, and the fellow servant of them which keep the sayings of this book.” It was through that angel that God revealed Himself to His prophets of old; doubtless the angel Gabriel. See Daniel 8: 9, 10. The Lord sent that same angel to John. He is the same angel that abides with God’s people down in the last days as well. The Revised Version reads: “I am a fellow servant with thee and with thy brethren the prophets, and with them that keep the words of this book. Worship God.” God’s angels are His servants just as truly as His children among men are, and they all work together to the one great end of God’s glory and triumph.

2755.— “These,” in John 21: 15.

To what does the word “these” refer? To the temporal things of life represented by the fishes, or to the disciples? B. F. R.

“Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou Me more than these?” Our correspondent says that some refer “these” to the disciples, and some to the fishes. The SIGNS OF THE TIMES would like to suggest another meaning. “Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou Me more than these do?” That is, “more than these disciples love Me!” Our querist will recall just a little while before this Simon had said: “Altho all shall be offended, yet will not I.” Jesus then told him that he would deny Him, but Peter averred again vehemently: “If I shall die with Thee, I will not deny Thee in any wise.” His stout boasting was in the past; he had denied his Lord. He was ready to say at one time, Tho all the others might fall, his love transcended theirs. Now Jesus simply asks him the question: “Simon, son of Jonas, do you love Me more than the other disciples do?” Peter’s boasting is gone. He can only say: “Yea, Lord, Thou knowest that I love Thee.” Not that “I love Thee more than the others;” the “yea” does not imply that; that was simply that he loved Him, and nothing more. The Syriac reads: “Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou Me more than these do?”

2756.— Three Unclean Spirits. Rev. 16: 14.

What three phases of false doctrine or evil, do the three unclean spirits of Rev. 16:14 represent? OLD READER.

These spirits come out of the mouth of the dragon, Satan, and of the beast, the great apostasies of the Old World; and of the false prophet, the apostasies of the New. The originator of the theory of the immortality of the soul was Satan, Gen. 3:4, 5. This has been carried on through Paganism and Papacy and from that over into Protestantism. Satan is at the head of all these things, and is sending out his demons into all the world to stir up all the world to battle. That seems to be the special feature emphasized in this prophecy. They are the spirits of demons working miracles, false signs, counterfeiting the work of the true; and they go forth to the nations or governments of the earth to stir up within them all the evil and malice which culminate in the great war of Armageddon.

2757.— Sin unto Death.

J. S.— Regarding 1 John 5:16, the carrying out of this text, of course, must be left with the individual and God. Sometimes our brother sins ignorantly; sometimes he sins through weakness, not wilfully; pray for him. Sometimes he flatly rebels against God; truly a sin unto death. The apostle says: “I do not say that ye shall pray for it,” neither does he say that we shall not pray for it. These are things that the soul must decide for himself. We do know this that sinning against God is wrong, but that if we repent of our wrong and come to the Lord Jesus Christ, there is pardon.

2758.— Trouble in Italy.

J. W. M.— No, we do not understand that the trouble in Italy is that spoken of in Rev. 8:7-9. That prophecy refers to historical events in connection with the breaking up of the Roman kingdom which we have not time to explain here. The barbarians in the north and the Vandals in the south, and the consequent wars which followed, are symbolized by these figures of hail and fire, and burning mountain, and so on, which resulted in the complete demoralization of the Roman Empire. Nor does the prophecy, nor do the difficulties in Italy, refer to the falling of the city Babylon. That is a future event of much different and of much vaster extent than anything which has occurred in Italy recently.

2759.— Baptized for the Dead.

C. B. C.— Regarding 1 Cor. 15:29, we have answered this question so many times in the past year or so that we can not give space to anything like a detailed explanation. See upon this text Dr. Adam Clarke. To our mind there is no reference to the living being baptized for the dead, but the meaning of the text is that we are baptized in view of the resurrection of the dead. Man is doomed to death; he must die; his only hope of a resurrection is through our Lord Jesus Christ; he is baptized in that faith.

2760.— Rich Man and Lazarus.

J. H. W.— Regarding Luke 16:19-31, we would say that without question the passage is a parable, and does not necessarily prove that any such thing as that ever did occur or might occur. It does not in any wise prove the immortality of the soul. See tract on the “Rich Man and Lazarus,” Bible Students’ Library, No. 146; price, one cent. This office.