p. 1 | The Mark of the Beast by J. H. Waggoner

The Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Nov 15, 1864

The Mark of the Beast.

By J. H. Waggoner

To THE (FIRST-DAY) ADVENTISTS OF NEW ENGLAND.

BY ELD. J. H. WAGGONER.

WISHING to make some remarks on an article in a late number of the World's Crisis, as that is somewhat specially a New-England paper, I make my address to you.

The article is entitled, "The Mark of the Beast," and is signed, I. C. Wellcome.

The first sentence of that article is so strikingly truthful that it should secure the interest of the reader to the whole subject. It is: "There is fearful judgment awaiting all who have the mark of the beast."

But does it not appear to you that the writer has not done the subject and his readers the justice demanded under these solemn circumstances? Had you not a right to expect that he, a professed "teacher in Israel," would give you some idea of who were or are in danger of this fearful judgment? Is a mere negative position a safe one—will you be satisfied with it, on such an important subject? This is not the way you have been accustomed to treat Bible truths, else you had never held the name of Adventists.

Before examining the position of Eld. Wellcome let me call your attention to a few plain facts of prophecy.

1. There are three messages in Rev. xiv, 6–12.

2. The Son of Man comes on the white cloud to reap the harvest of the earth, just after these messages are given. The great wine-press of the wrath of God is trodden at that time.

3. Some of the facts of the third message of that chapter are developed under the influence of Spiritualism, now raging in the land. See chap. xiii.

4. The first message—"the hour of his judgment is come"—was given by William Miller and others; declared to be "the leading Advent proclamation—the main branch of our [their] specific work."

5. The second message was believed, obeyed, and thus fulfilled by tens of thousands of conscientious, God-fearing Adventists in New England and elsewhere; and the power of God witnessed to the cry of "Babylon is fallen."

6. By comparing Rev. xiv, 9–12, (the third message), with chap. xiv, 1, 2, it will be seen that the seven last plagues are poured out after the third message is given, and therefore they constitute the "wine of the wrath of God" "without mixture," of that message.

These facts are sufficient to show that the subject of, and warning against, the mark of the beast, are not only weighty and important, but they are "present truth," as certainly as that our Saviour's advent is "now nigh at hand." The events connected with the second advent all cluster around this message warning against this mark.

Again I ask, Can you, as Adventists, take a merely passive and negative position on that which is so manifestly present truth? Are you willing to meet your Lord in a position so well becoming a slothful, or at least a careless, servant?

But you will reply (for I perceive this to be the opinion of some), allowing it to be "present truth," and the relation of facts and events to be as stated, you Seventh-day people are mistaken in some of your views on this subject; you are visionary and fanatical.

Allow me to reply, that I think your reasoning is not good; your argument, if you term it such, does not meet the question. William Miller was mistaken in some things: did that justify the world and a world-loving church in taking a negative position on the great doctrine of the second advent? Because he did not know all, were they justified in resting contented with knowing nothing? Can you answer this question to your own consciences before God, and not condemn yourselves on the subject now being considered?

Do you have that knowledge of what the mark of the beast is that you can confidently judge of our errors? Does Mr. Wellcome, in his article, give you direction how to escape this "fearful judgment?" Do any of your teachers show you how to avoid this great danger? No! they do not know what it is; they only pretend to know in part what it is not. Are they not then blind in respect to this part of present truth? Dare you follow them on to the judgment in this condition?

But having shown the fallacy of your objection, I now say that I, in all honesty and sincerity, differ with you right there. I think we are not mistaken, I think we are not visionary and fanatical. I believe we are able to give a good Bible reason for our faith on this subject.

Thus thinking, and with confidence in your willingness to examine it with candor, I ask you to note the following facts:—

1. In Rom. iv, 11, circumcision is called a sign and a seal. These terms are used interchangeably—they mean the same thing.

2. In Rev. vii, the servants of God are said to be sealed in their foreheads. (Some translations say signed.)

3. In Ezek. ix, they are said to receive a mark in their foreheads. As Ezekiel's vision is of a time when utter destruction without mercy is impending, and John's when the four winds are about to blow on the earth, which denotes the battle of the great day, they evidently refer to the same time and the same work; and thus mark and seal are shown to be synonymous also.

4. The mark of the beast is enforced, in the forehead or in the hand, just before the coming of the Son of Man. Rev. xiii, xiv. But we have seen that the seal of God is placed in the foreheads of his servants at that same time. Therefore they stand over against one another; one marking the position of those who are saved when the Lord comes; the other of those who suffer the seven last plagues.

5. In the third angel's message of Rev. xiv, which warns against the mark of the beast, and denounces the "fearful judgment" against all who receive it, the opposite is presented in the "commandments of God and the faith of Jesus." This furnishes us with the only clue to be found in the Bible as to what the mark of the beast is.

6. Though this message embraces the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus, yet as it is the seal of the living God, and Father, we naturally conclude that this sign will be found in his commandments, rather than in the faith of his Son.

7. In Ex. xxxi, and Eze. xx, the Lord says his Sabbath is his sign because he made all things in six days and rested the seventh day. And, as shown above, it may, with all propriety, be called his sign, seal, or mark.

Now as God's Sabbath is his sign or mark, expressive of his power and authority as Creator of all things, and as the message referred to calls attention to both the mark of the beast, and the commandments of God wherein his mark is found, we are necessarily led to conclude that, when the mark of the beast is enforced

it will stand in exact opposition to God's mark, that is to say, that as God's sign of power is his Sabbath, which commemorates his creative work, the sign or mark of the beast will be an opposition or counterfeit Sabbath, resting on Papal authority, and offered as an evidence of Papal power and rule.

In giving the evidence of God's sign, we have offered his own words—produced only his own direct claim. In like manner we let the beast power produce his own testimony as to his sign or evidence of authority. The following from the Douay Catechism is both direct and decisive on this point:

"Question. How prove you that the church hath power to command feasts and holy days?"

"Ans. By the very act of changing the Sabbath into Sunday."

We have now before our minds, God, the Creator, with his Sabbath, an important part of his commandments, as his sign or mark of power; and the beast as a rival power, sitting in the temple of God showing himself that he is God, with his rival or counterfeit Sabbath as the sign or mark of his power. These are the burden of the third angel's message. Here is an important element of present truth, when the Son of Man is preparing to take his place on the white cloud to reap the harvest of the earth. Happy the man who learns herein his duty and his danger; who obeys the one and shuns the other.

I now come to notice the argument of Mr. Wellcome, which is, indeed, only an objection thrown out against the plain, undeniable facts I have presented. It is this:

1. The beast did not come into existence earlier than three hundred years after Christ; and 2. All Christians kept the first day of the week during that three hundred years, before there was any beast, or any mark to receive.

This he puts forth with all seeming confidence, as taking the mask off from our position! Now I think if he had examined the subject more thoroughly he would have had less confidence in the effort he has put forth. I want you carefully to note the following questions:

1. Did the earliest first-day keepers profess to keep that day on any scripture authority?

2. Did they keep it as the Sabbath?

On the first question I affirm, and fear no contradiction, that no early writer ever based the observance of the first day on the authority of the scripture, either of the Old or New Testaments. Now Paul says to Timothy, as you have often quoted, that the Scriptures thoroughly furnish the man of God to all good works. Here is our test; and by this test we denounce Sunday-keeping as not a good work.

What if it was kept within the first three centuries? Were no errors in the churches in those days? Will you take the practice of the churches of that age as your rule, rather than the Scriptures? If the "mystery of iniquity," by which the man of sin was exalted, was already working in Paul's day, is it any marvel that "iniquity" was exalted soon after his day? But I will give good testimony on this point. And if anybody ever found a commandment in the Scriptures to keep the first day, we can find it; all Bible readers can. Read the following admission:

Buck, in his Theol. Dict. Art. Sabbath, says: "It must be confessed that there is no law in the New Testament concerning the first day."

Remember, here, that Paul says, "By the law is the knowledge of sin;" but in regard to first-day keeping there is no law; hence there is no duty.

Dr. Scott, in his commentary, says: "The change from the seventh to the first appears to have been gradually and silently introduced."

And in that manner have all other errors been introduced into the church, while for truth and duty we appeal "to the law and to the testimony."

Neander says: "The festival of Sunday, like all other festivals, was always only a human ordinance."

Alex. Campbell, Lect. in Beth. College, said: "Was the first day set apart by public authority in the apostolic age? No. By whom was it set apart, and when? Constantine, who lived about the beginning of the fourth century."

Melancthon said: "We find not the same commanded by any apostolic law."

Challoner, D. D., (Catholic) says: "Sundays and holy days all stand upon the same foundation, viz. the ordinance of the church."

Sir Wm. Domville says: "Not any ecclesiastical writer of the first three centuries attributed the origin of Sunday observance either to Christ or to his apostles."

There is scarcely any limit to the testimony which might be produced on this point, but this is sufficient to show that first-day observance was gradually introduced without scripture authority, and therefore is on a level with Easter, Good Friday, &c., or any dogma peculiar to the dark ages of the church.

But the second question is more immediately related to this subject, and this point Eld. Wellcome's testimony does not touch. I will only remark on his history, that some of it is indefinite without its connection, some of it apocryphal, and some of it untrue, as will presently be shown. But to the question. Did the early first-day keepers observe that day as the Sabbath? Here is ample proof that they did not.

J. W. Morton, in his excellent Vindication of the Sabbath, says: "The first day of the week was not observed by any of the children of men as a Sabbath for three hundred years after the birth of Christ. Do you ask for proof? I refer you to Theodore de Beza, who plainly says so. If you are not satisfied with the witness, will you have the goodness to prove the affirmative of the proposition?"

Bishop Jeremy Taylor said: "It was not introduced by virtue of the fourth commandment, because they for almost three hundred years together kept that day which was in that commandment."

Dr. Heylyn, in his History of the Sabbath, of early Sunday keeping says: "For three hundred years there was neither law to bind them to it, nor any rest from labor or from worldly business required upon it."

And again: "Tertullian tells us that they did devote the Sunday partly unto mirth and recreation, not to devotion altogether; when in a hundred years after Tertullian's time, there was no law or constitution to restrain men from labor on this day, in the Christian churches."

Prof. Stuart said: "More or less of Seventh-day observance was practiced in nearly all the Greek and Latin churches."

He also mentions the well-known fact that the council of Laodicea anathematized those Christians who kept the seventh day. This was in 350. How can Mr. Wellcome's statement be true in the sight of such facts?

But let us examine the first "laws," "constitution," or "public authority" for Sunday keeping. Campbell says it was given by Constantine. Dr. Heylyn says no such law existed for a hundred years after Tertullian's time, who died A. D. 216. Constantine's decree was in 321, and was as follows:

"Let all the judges and town people, and the occupation of all trades, rest on the venerable day of the sun; but let those who are situated in the country, freely and at full liberty attend to the business of agriculture; because it often happens that no other day is so fit for sowing corn and planting vines; lest the critical moment being let slip, men should lose the commodities granted by heaven."

All authority points to this as the first law or decree for resting on the first day; but you note that this was limited to the town's people, and it was only regarded as the venerable day of the sun; not as a Christian institution, or as the Sabbath. To take this heathen festival of the sun, and make a Sabbath or Christian festival of it, was an after work, accomplished only after the church of Rome was brought under government patronage, or became a State church. And I would invite Mr. Wellcome, or any other, who pretends to take the mask off from our position, to examine this subject, at least till he knows what our position is. We have evidence that Friday and Sunday were early regarded as peculiar days, because of the crucifixion and resurrection, but neither of them was regarded as the Sabbath. Constantine's decree fixed no peculiarity of the Sabbath to the first day; nor did it tend to degrade the Sabbath or exalt the first day to its place. This was the work of the Romish church. This is what constitutes the Sunday a rival or counterfeit of the Lord's sign or Sabbath. This is what makes it the mark of the Beast. Any other festival or holy day of the Catholic church cannot be that mark or sign, because no other stands as a rival to the Lord's sign; and this rivalry or counterfeit character did not exist till after the rise of Papacy, and by its authority. Surely, the subject is plain enough for any who wish to have any position on it.

Now I have presented to you the evidence that the third angel's message of Rev. xiv is present truth; that the present and future special danger is in having the mark of the Beast; that the present test duty is in the commandments of God, in order that God's sign or seal may be upon us; that the Sunday-Sabbath is a creature of the Papal power, offered by it as a sign of its power; that it is a counterfeit of God's sign, and is therefore the mark or sign of the Beast referred to in the third angel's message. Here is a plain, direct chain of testimony, leading to a plain conclusion.

You object to it. Will you be so kind as to give us a better? Will you take the same facts of Revelation, in which every Adventist who examines them must feel interested, and tell us what they mean, and to what conclusion they tend? In the fear of God we have examined this subject; with the near coming of our Lord before our eyes we have adopted our faith; if we are wrong, pray help us. But remember, that to close your eyes against the facts, the reasons, the argument we present, and cry "fanaticism," will never give you the truth, nor correct our errors, if we are in error.

Brethren and friends, we have given evidence of our sincerity; we have borne a heavy cross to adopt and live out our faith. We trust we are not deluded; we think our heavenly Father has smiled upon us and prospered us according to our devotion to this cause; that he has heard our prayers and condescended to grant us his Holy Spirit. Count us not, then, as enemies because we try to tell you the truth. "Bring forth your strong reasons;" we will examine them with care and candor. But, until something better, and more conclusive is offered (which we certainly do not expect), we shall cling to our present faith, not only as an essential part of, but as itself, present truth. And we pray you to examine this subject anew; lay aside prejudice. And may the Lord sanctify you through the truth, and enable you to stand when it shall be proclaimed by gathering angels, "Here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus."

Burlington, Mich., Nov. 2, 1864.