Question Corner by Editor

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Jan 22, 1894

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 20, No. 12.

Question Corner.

By Editor

"If ye will inquire, inquire ye." "But avoid foolish questions."

[From time to time we will reply under this head, if deemed advisable, to such candid inquiries as may be sent us. Correspondents wishing a reply to their questions must give their full name and address, not for publication unless they wish, but as an evidence of good faith on their part, and to give us opportunity to reply by letter if deemed best. It is always well to inclose stamp. Let the questions be short and pointed, and such as may be answered in limited space. The questions will be numbered continuously.]

130. THE LITERAL RESURRECTION.

Do Adventists, preachers, missionaries, and editors, believe that the resurrection taught by Christ, his apostles, or anywhere in Holy Scriptures, refers to a literal resurrection of the material body at a long period of time after death? Do the following Scripture quotations refer to such material, literal, and general resurrection of mankind or the redeemed: John 11: 24-26; John 20: 27; Acts 24: 14, 15; Rev. 1: 16, 17, last part; two first sentences of the eighteenth verse; 1 Cor. 15: 20-22; Dan. 12: 2; Job 14: 13, 14? Answer as fully as is convenient in the Question Department of the Signs of THE TIMES.

Yes; Seventh-day Adventists believe in the resurrection of the body. The body returns to dust, in death and decay; God will call it back from dust. "Thy dead men shall live, together with my dead body shall they arise." Isa. 26: 19; see also Hosea 13: 14. Jesus rose again, so did Lazarus, and others. Have we any reason to believe that the resurrection of all others will be less literal? Some of the above texts refer to a general resurrection, some to special resurrections, but all to a literal resurrection. John 20: 27 and Rev. 1: 18 refer to Jesus after he was raised from the dead. The whole hope of the future life is based by Paul on the fact of Christ's literal resurrection, and the resurrection at the last day.

But all will not be raised from the dead at the same time. There is first the resurrection of the righteous, and one thousand years after the resurrection of the wicked. Rev. 20: 4-6. But the righteous do not rise from the grave with their corrupt, mortal bodies, but with glorious, immortal bodies like Christ's. See 1 Cor. 15: 51-55; Phil. 3: 21. The wicked, raised one thousand years after, come up from the grave with the same mortal body which all men possess. The resurrection of the dead is one of the great elements in the Christian's hope. Take the word of God as it reads.

131. SELLING IT UNTO THE STRANGER.

EDITOR "SIGNS OF THE TIMES:" I do not understand the following. Will you kindly explain it in your Question Corner? "Ye shall not eat of anything that dieth of itself; thou shalt give it unto the stranger that is in thy gates, that he may eat it; or thou mayest sell it unto an alien; for thou art an holy people unto the Lord thy God." Deut. 14: 21.

The Lord means just what he says. He told his people not to eat anything which died of itself, but gave them permission to give it to the stranger within their gates, or to sell it to the foreigner. See Revised Version. "But was not this inconsistent?"—Not at all. The stranger believed that such food was good and ate such food continually. It was given or sold to him without any deceit, as flesh of an animal which had died of itself. We recall the fact of a German's asking to buy the bloated carcass of a yearling bovine for food. The farmer told him that it was unfit for food, but the German wanted it anyway. It was therefore given him at the price of the hide. The Israelites were forbidden to eat blood, but that which died of itself of course contained the blood; but the other nations around them did not consider it wrong in any way to eat the blood. In all cases they evidently bought and sold such flesh for just what it was, while many times, if reports are to be believed, meat is sold nowadays for fresh, healthy meat when it is the flesh of animals which died of disease. And few are the flesh eaters indeed but what eat fish and shellfish which die of themselves by slow, lingering deaths, and they find no fault with the dealer for selling such. In fact, the great majority of all fish, lobsters, clams, crabs, oysters, shrimps, etc., die of themselves, and are eaten with gusto by those who criticise the Lord's directions in Deut. 14: 21.