p. 122 | RETURN OF THE JEWS

Publishing Committee · Rochester, N. Y. · May 9, 1854

RETURN OF THE JEWS.

My object will be to show that the dispersion of the Jews by the Romans, is to be continued till they are consumed and destroyed; and that as Jews they are never to return. The texts which are supposed to prove their return are the 12th, 15th, 23d-25th verses of the 11th of Romans; viz., "Now if the fall of them be the riches of this world, and the diminishing of them the riches of the Gentiles, how much more their fullness?" "For if the casting away of them be the reconciling of the world, what shall the receiving of them be but life from the dead?" "And they also, if they abide not still in unbelief, shall be grafted in, for God is able to graft them in again. For if thou wert cut out of the olive tree which is wild by nature, and wert grafted contrary to nature into a good olive tree, how much more shall these which be the natural branches, be grafted into their own olive tree? For I would not, brethren, that ye should be ignorant of this mystery, (lest ye should

be wise in your own conceits,) that blindness in part is happened to Israel, until the fullness of the Gentiles be come in; and so all Israel shall be saved, as it is written, There shall come out of Zion the Deliverer, and shall turn away ungodliness from Jacob; for this is my covenant unto them when I shall take away their sins."

We argue first, that the Israel of whom all will be saved, is the true Israel of God; otherwise every individual Jew will be saved; which none will claim. That the Israel spoken of is not the Jewish nation, is clear from the fact that some of that nation will be cast out; and in that case all Israel could not be saved. The Apostle also assures us that, "he is not a Jew who is one outwardly; neither is that circumcision which is outward in the flesh: but he is a Jew which is one inwardly; and circumcision is that of the heart in the spirit, and not in the letter; whose praise is not of men, but of God." "For there is no difference between the Jew and Greek, for the same Lord over all is rich unto all that call upon him." "For they are not all Israel that are of Israel, neither because they are of the seed of Abraham, are they all children." "They which are the children of the flesh, these are not the children of God, but the children of the promise, and counted for the seed." "For if the inheritance be of the law, it is no more of promise; but God gave it to Abraham by promise. Wherefore then serveth the law? It was added because of transgression, till the seed should come to whom the promise was made." "There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female, for ye are all one in Christ Jesus. And if ye be Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise."

The above most conclusively proves, that as a nation, the Jews will hereafter receive no peculiar favors.

Again, "the fall" and the "diminishing of them," and "the casting away of them," could not be their dispersion as a nation, for it was spoken of as something already taken place before the nation was dispersed; so that their "fullness" and the receiving of them, could not be their restoration as a nation to Judea.

Again, their "fullness," (pleroma,) is not to be "until the fullness of the Gentiles be come in;" for till then, blindness in part had happened to Israel. And as all the Gentiles are not to be converted, the fullness of the Gentiles must be the full number of them who are to be saved, and which will not be till the end of the world; at which time also the fullness of the Jews, or the full number of them who are to be saved, will have come in; so that all Israel, in the most literal sense, according to Paul's definition, will be saved, and Paul might well ask, "What shall the receiving of them be but life from the dead?" and in the very manner as described in Eze. xxxvii, 12-14, "Behold, O my people, I will open your graves, and cause you to come up out of your graves, and bring you into the land of Israel. And ye shall know that I am the Lord when I have opened your graves, O my people, and brought you up out of your graves; and shall put my Spirit in you, and ye shall live, and I shall place you in your own land, then shall ye know that I the Lord have spoken it, and performed it, saith the Lord." Neither is there any proof that the Jews are to be converted as a nation. It is no where expressly asserted, but only conditionally, for "IF they abide not still in unbelief, they shall be grafted in;" and it also follows that if they do abide in unbelief, they will not be grafted in—the if being as much a condition as when Christ said, "if I will that he tarry till I come, what is that to thee?" Those of the Jews who believe, will not become a new olive tree; but will be grafted into the old olive tree: so that they will cease to be Jews. There is therefore nothing in the restoration of the true Israel, which can in any way delay the coming of our Lord.

In addition to the above argument, the question is most conclusively settled by Deut. xxviii, that after the dispersion of the Jews by the Romans, they were never again as a nation, to receive

either civil or religious privileges. The covenant which God made with that nation was a conditional covenant. If they should serve their God with all their heart, to do all his commandments, and should diligently hearken unto him, they were to be blessed above every nation, and were to be forever the chosen people of God; but if they would not hearken unto the voice of the Lord their God, to observe and to do all his commandments, and his statutes, they were to be cursed above every nation, until they should be finally destroyed. In the other predictions of their various dispersions, they were promised that if they would return unto the Lord their God, that the Lord would have compassion upon them, and would turn their captivity, and gather them from all nations whither he should scatter them. And we accordingly find that he was faithful who promised; for as often as they repented in their various captivities, he restored them to their own land. But in the chapter referred to, Moses evidently looked forward to the time when their waywardness and their folly would be fully proved, when all the mercies and judgments of God should be found to be of no avail in restraining them from utterly rejecting the Lord their God, and walking after the evil imaginations of their own perverse hearts; and when it would seem that there was nothing more which God could do for his vineyard, which he had not done for it, so that he should cast them off forever and leave them to their own hardness of heart and blindness of minds, until they should perish.

That the dispersion here predicted was their dispersion by the Romans, is evident from the nation that was to be brought against them, and from the complete fulfillment of that prediction, in the destruction of Jerusalem by that nation. "The Lord shall bring a nation against thee from far, from the end of the earth, as swift as the eagle flieth; a nation whose tongue men shall not understand, a nation fierce of countenance, which shall not regard the person of the old, nor show favor to the young." This could be no other than the Roman nation. "And he shall besiege thee in all thy gates until thy high and fenced walls come down, wherein thou trustest throughout all thy land." "And thou shalt eat the fruit of thine own body, the flesh of thy sons and of thy daughters which the Lord thy God hath given thee, in the siege and in the straitness wherewith thine enemies shall distress thee; so that the man that is tender among you, and very delicate, his eye shall be evil towards his brother, and toward the wife of his bosom, and toward the remnant of his children, which he shall leave, so that he will not give to any of them of the flesh of his children whom he shall eat; because he hath nothing left him in the siege and in the straitness wherewith thine enemies shall distress thee, in all thy gates. The tender and delicate woman among you which would not adventure to set the sole of her foot upon the ground, for delicateness and tenderness, her eye shall be evil toward the husband of her bosom, and toward her son, and toward her daughter," "and toward her children which she shall bear; for she shall eat them for want of all things, secretly, in the siege and in the straitness wherewith thy enemies shall distress thee in thy gates."

Josephus shows a literal fulfillment of all this, in the affecting description which he gives of the misery and distress to which the Jews were reduced in the destruction of their city.

From this dispersion there is no promise of a return, as though all their restorations having been of no avail, they were now to be entirely forsaken. Moses also expressly says that the "Lord shall send upon thee cursing, vexation, and rebuke, in all that thou settest thy hand to do, until thou be destroyed; and until thou perish quickly." "And they shall pursue thee until thou perish." "It shall come down upon thee, until thou be destroyed." "And thou shalt be oppressed and spoiled evermore; and no man shall save thee." "And thou shalt be only oppressed and crushed alway."

"Thou shalt become an astonishment, a proverb and a by-word among all nations, whither the Lord shall lead thee." "And shalt be removed into all the kingdoms of the earth." "The stranger that is within thee shall get up above thee very high, and thou shalt come down very low." "Moreover-all these curses shall come upon thee, and shall pursue thee and overtake thee, till thou be destroyed." "And they shall be upon thee for a sign, and a wonder, and upon thy seed forever." "And he shall put a yoke of iron upon thy neck until he shall have destroyed thee." "And the Lord shall scatter thee among all people, from the one end of the earth, even unto the other." "And among all these nations thou shalt find no ease, neither shall the sole of thy foot have rest, but the Lord shall give thee there a trembling heart and failing of eyes, and sorrow of mind, and thy life shall hang in doubt before thee; and thou shalt fear day and night; and shalt have none assurance of thy life." "And ye shall be sold unto your enemies for bond-men, and bond-women, and no man shall buy you." The duration of these evils is given in plain and positive language, and in the whole of this, [Moses' fifth discourse,] there is no intimation of any further mercies till they are finally destroyed. It therefore follows that in Moses' other discourses, and in the various predictions where a restoration to their own land was promised, that there could be no allusion to their dispersion by the Romans; but only predictions of other dispersions and restorations, all of which must have been fulfilled previous to the dispersion here spoken of.

That Jerusalem is never to be rebuilt, is plain from Dan. ix, 26, 27, where the angel informs Daniel that after our Saviour's crucifixion, "the people of the prince that shall come, shall destroy the city and sanctuary;" "and for the overspreading of abominations he shall make it desolate, even until the consummation; and that determined shall be poured upon the desolate,"—on "the desolation," as it reads in the margin; which must be to the end of time. Our Saviour, also, declares, [Luke xxi, 24,] that the Jews "shall fall by the edge of the sword, and shall be led away captive into all nations; and Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled." The times of the Gentiles will not be fulfilled till the end of time; so that the express declaration of our Saviour, with all the other evidence which has been presented upon this question, it would seem, must forever settle the question, that the Jews, as Jews, have nothing farther to hope for in this world: and that those only of them can be saved, who renounce their Judaism, and by faith as individuals, like the Gentiles, are grafted into the original olive tree, from whence through unbelief they have been broken off.—Signs Times—1842.