Light on the Prophecies.
By R. F. Cottrell
SOME go in search of light on Bible truth back toward the Dark Ages. They go to commentaries written some hundreds of years in the past for an exposition of prophecies relating to the closing events of time. I do not speak disparagingly of these commentators. Much light and truth may be elicited from them. But those who would cite us to them on prophecies that are now being fulfilled, which relate to the last days in the most emphatic sense, seem to forget the testimony of the prophets themselves to whom these things were revealed. Speaking of these things, said the angel to Daniel, "Shut up the words, and seal the book, even to the time of the end; many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased." "Go thy way, Daniel; for the words are closed up and sealed till the time of the end. Many shall be purified, and made white, and tried; but the wicked shall do wickedly; and none of the wicked shall understand; but the wise shall understand." Dan. 12:4, 9, 10. This testimony is equivalent to asserting that these prophecies of Daniel could not be fully understood till the time of the end; and that when that point is reached, knowledge on them should be increased, and the wise should understand them. Then no one that lived and died before the time of the end had the clear light on these prophecies. The further we go back toward the Dark Ages, the further we are from the light. Those who thus go back to the wisdom of the past, would do well to heed such testimonies as that of Prideaux, one of their chosen expositors. After giving the best light he had on the profanation and the cleansing of the sanctuary of Daniel’s prophecy, supposing that it had a primary and typical fulfillment in the times of Antiochus Epiphanes and of the Maccabees, he gives his opinion that in its full and complete sense it refers to the defilement of antichrist, during the 1260 years of its supremacy, and he very wisely remarks, "Those that shall live to see the extirpation of antichrist, which will be at the end of those years, will best be able to unfold this matter, it being of the nature of such prophecies not thoroughly to be understood, till they are thoroughly fulfilled." He refers us to the time of the end, beginning with the expiration of the 1260 years, for more light than was then had. He points us in the right direction. But those who live to see these prophecies "thoroughly fulfilled," and the "extirpation of antichrist," will live to see the coming of Christ; for of this wicked power Paul says, "Whom the Lord will consume with the spirit of his mouth, and destroy with the brightness of his coming." 2 Thess. 2:8.