p. 484 | THE SPIRIT LAND by C. W. Ward

Seventh-day Adventist Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Nov 4, 1880

THE SPIRIT LAND.

By C. W. Ward

BY C. W. WARD.

THERE are many assumptions, vagaries, and curiosities in modern theological literature; and among the rest we wish to call attention to some contained in an article entitled "Christ in Paradise," from The Churchman’s Companion. The writer, speaking of man’s creation, and his being placed in paradise, where he "talked face to face with God," partaking of the luscious fruits of the garden, etc., observes: "But God knew that man would sin, be expelled, and die; and he provided a heavenly paradise, where Satan cannot enter, nor man sin, nor die, while he is educating for Heaven." From this we learn that God made another paradise, distinct from the one in Eden, to which the souls of men go when released from the body. As to the character of paradise No. 2, we learn more in the following remarks: "But it was not until Christ came that the nature of those abodes was revealed: that Hades is the general name for the prison of the righteous and the wicked—one division called Paradise, the other Tartarus; and both knowing what will be their fate when Christ comes to judge them; the righteous growing in righteousness, and the wicked in wickedness and hopeless despair." Such is paradise theologically considered.

But further on in the article we obtain more light upon this realm of the departed. Please notice the use of personal pronouns in the following quotations: "Christ told the Jews and his disciples that he should be absent from them for three days after his death; he did not tell them where, but on the cross he said to the penitent, 'To-day thou shalt be with me in paradise.' Friday evening he was buried; Saturday he lay in the tomb; Sunday morning he returned and raised his body." We cannot understand from where he returned (as he was buried on Friday, and lay in the grave on Saturday) unless there were two personalities. And if there were, which was the real Christ?

Speaking of the saints confined in this prison, he says: "And the saints know what goes on all over our world better than we do with our steam and telegraphic mediums, because there is a continual influx of departing spirits into those intermediate abodes, from every part of our globe." It is very natural to suppose if the soul—or the real persons themselves—go to this Paradise, that they would frequently hear from the earth; hear from those incoming spirits all about their friends, relatives, neighbors, etc.; who of their friends had accepted Christ as their Saviour, and who had rejected him; how the church was prospering; if the same pastor was there that they used to listen to when upon earth; how much money was realized at the last fair and festival; and who among their enemies had died and gone to the Tartarus division of this Hades. But it is rather singular that Lazarus, the widow’s son, and the maid—whom Christ, according to this theory brought back from Paradise—had no revelation to make of the things they saw, felt, and enjoyed, in this wonderful vestibule of spirits. As to the condition of man in death, we are inclined to take the words of Solomon rather than these vagaries and speculations of the Companion. Says Solomon: "The living know that they shall die; but the dead know not anything, neither have they [the dead, or man in death] any more a reward; for the memory of them is forgotten." Eccl. 9:5. Here we are "working out our salvation": there, they are "praising God."

Hezekiah thought differently about his condition, should he die; for when the Lord ordered him to set his house in order and make preparation for death, which was sure to overtake him, he felt quite disappointed, and in great bitterness cried: "The grave (sheol) cannot praise thee; death cannot celebrate thee." Isa. 38:18. In harmony with this, David says: "In death there is no remembrance of thee; in the grave (sheol) who shall give thee thanks?" Ps. 6:5. How the writer in the Companion obtained the following information we know not. Hear it: "He joins in the same chants and doxologies to Christ and the most Holy Trinity, the same prayers and praises which he had learned on earth." At the conclusion of the article we read this interesting nonsense: "The saints in paradise are still a part of Christ’s kingdom; they are the great van of the army of the redeemed of our race, who have finished their course on earth, in faith, and have gone so far on their way to Heaven—because Christ went there before his ascension into Heaven—and are waiting for the rear of the army, yet fighting in the church militant, to come up and join them, before the resurrection, when they will go with Him in his triumphal entry into his kingdom in heaven. . . . Such is the marvelous lesson we have learned from the revelations made by our divine Lord respecting the departed into the interval between death and the resurrection."

From what part of revelation he gained such a full account of this spirit world he does not tell us. We have read the Bible through from Genesis to Revelation, and we have never yet found one passage from which to draw such a conclusion, that the dead are still alive, singing, praying, etc. This looks very much like ghostology. It has some resemblance of Mahomet's theory of seven heavens and seven hells; in his spirit-land there were fourteen heavens and hells, but only one of each in this modern theological ghostland.—Bible Banner.