Injuries by EPSILON

Seventh-day Adventist Missionary Society · Oakland, Cal. · Oct 18, 1883

Injuries.

By EPSILON

A MAN, wishing to pass through a pasture, tore off a picket to get into the inclosure and another picket to get out. What commandment did he violate? He violated the spirit of the second table of the law, Honor parents, Do not kill, etc. For the intent of this table is, do not injure others, but try to benefit them. “Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.”

But did not Christ give the two great commandments to supercede the ten? No; the two great commandments were given long before the Christian dispensation. Deut. 6 : 5 reads : “And thou shait love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might.” Lev. 19 : 18 reads : “Thou shalt not avenge nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself; I am the Lord.” Many precepts are given in Lev. 19. These two great laws give the spirit of the two tables of the ten commandments. If they do away with the ten commandments now, they did the same in the Jewish dispensation. That law of the Levitical priesthood is abolished, no Bible reader doubts; but to abolish the ten commandments would be to abolish sin. It would puzzle any one to tell how to keep the spirit of a law and violate its letter. As Paul says, We should serve in newness of spirit and not in oldness of letter. But it is a great mistake to suppose that the spirit of the law leads us to violate the letter. EPSILON.