LETTERS by Isaac Sanborn

Publishing Committee · Battle Creek, Mich. · Nov 18, 1858

LETTERS.

By Isaac Sanborn

"Then they that feared the Lord spake often one to another."

From Bro. Sanborn.

BRO. SMITH: The word of the Lord is onward in the West. According to appointment, I commenced meetings at Avon, Rock Co., Wis., Oct. 22d, and continued ten days. Sabbath 30th, some of the brethren from other places came in, and the Lord met with us. I spoke from Heb. x, 26, after which seven testified that from that time forth they would by the help of God keep all his commandments and the faith of his Son. Two others said they would as soon as they had a little more light, and still others are investigating. First-day morning I spoke to the people in the school-house; after which we all went to the close-communion Baptist house, and heard the pastor, Eld. Pool, preach from Ps. viii, 4, "What is man that thou art mindful of him? or the son of man that thou visitest him?"

In his introductory remarks he said, close communion Baptists originated with John the Baptist, and were not therefore one of the daughters of the Mother of harlots, as we were informed by Bro. Sanborn at the school-house the night before. This, said he, you will find true if you will read Roger Williams. We thought if he had proved it by Christ or his apostles we would certainly believe.

He then commenced with his text, and after telling how many bones, nerves, muscles, and pores a man had, and proving it by Dr. Dick, he said that God made the body of man of the dust of the ground. But the Lord says he made man of the dust of the ground.

Again, said he, The soul is the human mind, that which possesses life, which reasons, loves, envies, hates, and moves you; therefore Eve's soul willed that she should take the forbidden fruit and eat it, and consequently her soul was the offender or transgressor. It was also the same with Adam. Another attribute of the soul was reason; he called the soul the reasonable man. But what did God say to reasonable Adam? "Because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife and hast eaten of the tree of which I commanded thee saying, Thou shalt not eat of it, cursed is the ground for thy sake. In sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life. In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread till thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken; for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return." Gen. iii, 17-19. Now according to this word where does intelligent Adam go when he dies?

Again, said he, Cut off my hands and feet, and can I not reason? Certainly; but if the instrument by which the hands and feet were severed were thrust into the brain, could you reason? I think not. You said the brain was the locality of the soul. You see that the soul cannot think without brains in an active, healthy condition. What brains will those souls inhabit between death and the resurrection? I think according to your own showing they will surely die. God says, Their love and their hatred and their envy is now perished.

He next commenced upon the Sabbath, and if ever the Sabbath was overthrown by assertions without any evidence, I thought it was then. Here are some of them: The Jewish Sabbath is not binding. Well I never taught that it was; you need not fight such a Sabbath until somebody teaches it. But why is not the Jewish Sabbath binding? Because, says the Eld., God worked four days before the sun was made; therefore we have strong reason to believe that the creation week was prophetic time, and that he was many thousand years in creating the world. The Apostle says, Let God be true. What does God say on this point? "Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labor and do all thy work; but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God; (not the Jewish Sabbath;) in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy man-servant, nor thy maid-servant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day; wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day." He does not say that it was because he was thousands of years creating the world; but six days.

Now if the first week of time was prophetic, how long was that Sabbath of which the fourth commandment speaks, the day on which God rested from his work? Eld. P. said there were eleven commandments, and told us what the eleventh was. Will he please to tell us next time what the ten are? Supposing, said he, you were on the opposite side of the earth, could you keep the Sabbath? Of course you could not. Well, if you were there, could you keep the first day of the week? O yes. Then if you could one day we could the other, of course; but I suggest that as you and I can unquestionably keep the holy Sabbath on this side of the earth, we should both do so.

ISAAC SANBORN. Rock Co., Wis., Nov. 1st, 1858.