With Our Inquirers by Editor

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Mountain View, California · May 15, 1907

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 33, No. 20.

With Our Inquirers

By Editor

"If ye will inquire, inquire ye." Isa. 21:12

[All questions to this department will be answered which to the editors will minister to the general good of the readers and to the mission of the paper. The same question can not be answered repeatedly in the same volume. The name and address must accompany question, not for publication, but as an evidence of good faith, and that answer may be made by letter if deemed advisable. It is well always to enclose a stamp for reply.]

2073.—Character of a Witch.

Does the idea of one's being a witch mean that she is a mean person? Does 1 Sam. 15:23 indicate that witchcraft is the same as rebellion? R. F. C.

A wizard (feminine, witch), was one who had a "familiar spirit," one who, generally speaking, was controlled and influenced by that spirit. If he truly had a familiar spirit and was not shamming, as many pretended spiritualistic mediums are at the present time, he was under the control and influence of Satan's minions, or demons. Outwardly it is possible for one to be pleasing in manner, so as not to be considered a "mean person," but utterly without moral principle. It was for that reason that God prohibited their very existence among His people. They would lead to destruction all who heeded their teachings or who fell under the mysterious, baleful influence of those thus possessed. Better indeed under God's guidance that the one person should die than that thousands should be corrupted. As to the text 1 Sam. 15:23, "Rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft," it is not implied that rebellion is witchcraft, or identical, but that rebellion is opposition to God just as witchcraft is opposition to God. Both of them are the same in result, an utter turning away from God to the great original enemy of God. Saul was rebellious against God in that he did not follow the Lord's command concerning Amalek. That is the lesson of the chapter. He ended his career by seeking unto one who had a familiar spirit. 1 Chron. 10:13, 14. See also Lev. 19:31; 20:6, 27; 1 Sam. 28:3-10.

2074.—Divorce and Marriage.

If a man (or woman) puts away his wife (or husband) for fornication, does that free him (or her) so that he (or she) is at liberty to marry again? M. J. M.

This is our understanding of the teaching of the word, according to Matt. 5:32. The innocent party has the Scriptural right to remarry.

2075.—A Mixed Case of Marriage.

If a man had been married three times and his first wife was living when he married the second time, but was dead when he married the third time, which of the two living would be the true wife, the second or the third?

The question is not clear. Was he divorced from the first wife when he married the second? Was the divorce obtained on Scriptural grounds? The question implies that the second wife is still alive. How did he separate from her before he married the third time? If there was no true separation from the first wife when he married the second, the second marriage is certainly null and void, the man was guilty of bigamy, or the second wife is not a legal wife. In some States a man may have more than one legal wife. When the first wife died the duty of the man without any question would be to legally marry the second wife, if he had not done so before. If he forsook the second wife, which was not a legal wife, and married the third, the third would be the legal wife, after the death of the first. It seems to us that the question is not so much a question of the true wife as it is a true husband. With one so mixed in his marriages as that, it would be quite a question whether he could have been a true husband.

It is almost utterly impossible to give a satisfactory answer in such cases as this. We would advise these parties, and all others, if they want to know just what the Lord teaches in this respect to seek the counsel of some good minister, one who will give them the teachings of the word and not answer the desire of their hearts. If the Lord says, remain single, remain single. If there had been regular legal divorces and new family ties formed, and new fruit of the families, it certainly is a question that ought to be wisely and faithfully deliberated before families are broken up and children disgraced before the world. These are questions that can not be settled by a categorical answer to some question asked thru the mails. Our loose marriage and divorce laws are responsible for not a little of this trouble. The things that Christians ought to follow, however, are God's word and a true conscience.

2076.—A Living Soul. Gen. 2:7.

Gen. 2:7 declares that "the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul." Will you please tells us, was that soul mortal or immortal? If neither, what kind of a soul did Adam possess? L. D. W.

Our inquirer ought to have read the text more carefully. It does not say that the Lord breathed into the man a living soul, or breathed into him a soul, a man within a man. It declares that when that breath of life came into the man, the man became a living soul; Adam was the living soul or living creature. If he was a living soul after the breath of life was breathed into him, he was a lifeless soul before; and so the term soul is used to mean persons. Take, for instance, Joshua 10, over and over again we are told that so many souls were slain. In the original we have the term "dead soul." Adam was a living being possessing eternal life, a life which God breathed into him, possessing it conditionally by faith. He was not mortal or he would then have been subject to death. He was not immortal, for then he could not have died. He was a candidate for immortality. If by faith he had held to the eternal life of God by living righteously, he would have developed an incorruptible character upon which God would have placed the stamp of immortality.

2077.—The Wicked and the One Thousand Years.

Will the wicked dead live during the one thousand years? G. P.

The wicked dead will not live during the thousand years. This is clearly stated in Rev. 20:5: "The rest of the dead lived not again until the thousand years were finished." All who were not of Christ perished in the glory of His second coming. 2 Thess. 2:8, and other passages.

2078.—Isa. 65:20.

Do you know any translation of this text that is better than King James? If so, will you please give it? A. L. M.

There are other versions that give slightly different shades of meaning, but none that are materially different from that of King James.

2079.—Spirit of Man. Eccl. 3:21.

Does not Eccl. 3:21 imply that the soul of man ascends upward at death? D. E. O.

The text does not use the term soul but spirit, and it does not make any statement as to that. "Who knoweth the spirit of man, whether it goeth upward, and the spirit of the beast, whether it goeth downward to the earth?" So reads the American Standard Revised Version, and that is the thought of the text. Moreover the word translated spirit, ruwach, is the same that in verse 19 is translated breath, "they have all one breath." It comes from a word meaning to blow, to breathe. It is translated air, anger, blast, breath, courage, mind, spirit, wind, etc. It simply means their breath or breath of life. It came from God as breath of life; it goes again as breath of life. It is not an intelligent entity of itself. If it ascends to God it simply ascends to Him as life, not as a personality. Eccl. 12:7.

2080.—The Ribbon of Blue. Num. 15:38.

What is meant by the ribbon of blue in ancient Israel? E. V. W.

The passage of Scripture in question, with its context, tells us very clearly why the Lord asked Israel to wear the ribbon of blue. We quote from the Revised Version: "Speak unto the children of Israel, and bid them that they make them fringes in the borders of their garments throuout their generations, and that they put upon the fringe of each border a cord of blue; and it shall be unto you for a fringe, that ye may look upon it, and remember all the commandments of Jehovah, and do them; and that ye follow not after your own heart and your own eyes." It was to be to them a constant reminder that they were separated from the world and separated unto God.

2081.—In Heaven While on Earth. John 3:13.

Please explain this text. Was Christ in heaven when He was talking? Is the Authorized Version a good translation of the text? A. L. M.

Yes, it is a fair translation of the Greek that is there. The American Revised Version has this note, "Many ancient authorities omit 'who is in heaven.'" The sense of it seems to be very clear that Jesus was as truly one with the Father as tho He were literally, physically in heaven. Compare with Eph. 2:6, "And raised us up with Him, and made us to sit with Him in the heavenly places, in Christ Jesus." Christians, therefore, while physically in this world, yet literally are citizens of the heavenly kingdom and are as truly represented there as tho they were physically present. Even so the place of our Lord Jesus Christ in heaven was not forfeited when He came to this earth. While physically He was here, yet in God's great plan and system, He was in perfect oneness with the Heavenly Government.

2082.—Prince of Tyrus.

Please explain Ezekiel 28, as regards the prince of Tyrus. W. H. D.

Back of all the evil perverted kingdoms of earth is Satan. He is therefore sometimes called "King of Babylon," as in Isa. 14:4. Later on in that same chapter "Lucifer." In the 28th chapter of Ezekiel he is represented as the "king of Tyrus," or Tyre, while the real king of Tyre is called the prince of Tyre. Verses 2 to 10 refer to the earthly king of Tyre as the prince of Tyre, and show his selfish exaltation; so much so that he makes himself as God, calls himself God. This overweening ambition is inspired by Satan, who is referred as the king of Tyre in verses 11-19. This language clearly shows that he was once an angel of God; for this language could be spoken of no mortal man. Verse 14: "Thou wast the anointed cherub that covereth;" verse 15: "Thou wast perfect in thy ways from the day that thou wast created, till unrighteousness was found in thee." All those things were true of Lucifer before he fell, and the doom pronounced upon him will be true of Satan when it is fulfilled.

2083.—"Thy Seed." Gen. 3:15.

Do not the words "thy seed" in Gen. 3:15 refer to fallen angels and not to the seed of the snake? A Subscriber.

They refer to all of Satan's followers. Jesus said to the Jews, "Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do." It is a common thing in the Scriptures to call persons sons of the one they follow. The fallen angels are not the seed of Satan in the sense of generation, but only in the sense in which wicked men are; they are led by him and infused with his spirit. It is a curious fact, however, that there probably is no animal in all the creation which has aroused the enmity of man as has the snake. Yet the prophecy is not primarily as regards the snake, but as regards the followers of Satan and the followers of Christ.