The DAWN, Issue of October 1, 193 2

CONTENT S

SALUTATORYComes "the Dawn" 1

Scope of Departments 2

Some Scientists See the Fight

Present Truth 3

THE CHRISTIAN LIF EOne Is Your Master 4

Scriptural Unity 4C ooperation, Not Bondage 5

Growth in Grace 6How the Christian Grows 7

SCIENCE AND THE BIBL EScience Must Swallow Jonah's Fish Story 8

An Experience Not Impossible 8*Why the Ninevites Believed

OUR BIBLICAL DIALO GThieves in Paradise 1 6

THE EVERLASTING GOSPE LThe Truth About Hell 13

Hell in the Old Testament

Hell in the New Testament 1 7

The Rich Man and Lazarus 22Dives' "Five Brethren" 2 1

Everlasting Punishment 25Sheep and Goats 25,Thy Kingdom Come 27

The Lake of Fire 28The Second Death 2 9

The Wicked Turned into Hell 31

INTERNATIONAL SUNDAY SCHOOL LESSO NThe Christian and Law Observance 32

MISCELLANEOU S"Can I Do More to Serve the Truth?" 33WM

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Formerly The Bible Students Radio Echo, entered as second class mail mattelr at Brooklyn Post Office Aug . 17, 1932 .Act of March 3, 1879 . Published the 1st and 15th of each month by Associated Bible Students Radio Committee ,

251 Washington Street, Brooklyn, N . Y .

Vol . 1, No. 1 .

October 1, 1932

One Dollar a Year

Comes "The . Dawn" -

IN PRESENTING to the subscribers of the

Radio Echo, this, our first issue of The Dawnmagazine, we feel confident that all readers willappreciate the enlarged field of thought and effortwhich it represents . The name The Dawn remindsus of the fact that the world, for six thousandyears, has been passing through a time of darknes s—a night-time experience of sin and death—bu tthat a glad New Day is at hand.

This nighttime of darkness was begun by th eoriginal disobedient act of our first parents 'backin the Garden of Eden. From this experience wecan see that there can be no real joy, peace, no rlife apart from obedience to Jehovah, the Creator .All down 'through the ages man has been lookin gfor a respite from the afflictions with which he ha sbeen' oppressed, but no' deliverance has come .

Man, by his own efforts, has utterly failed toextricate himself from the consequences of his ow nwrongdoing . From the Bible, however, we learn ofGod's beneficent purpose to bring deliverance .The Bible even sets the time for the accomplish-ment of this divine purpose, and tells us aboutthe "dawning " of the New Day, which will beushered in by the rising of "the Sun of Righteous-ness" ; and which "with healing in His beams, "will bring life and happiness to all who shall thenaccept the proffered blessings .

First Gleam of Hope

The first divine promise of this coming` deliv-erance from the darkness and thraldom of sin wa sgiven to our _first parents when God said to themthat "the Seed of the woman shall bruise the ser -.pent's head". This promise . was reiterated an damplified when God said to Abraham : "In theeand thy. seed shall all the families of the earth beblessed". All of God's prophets waxed eloquent in

their description o: the blessings coming to mankind with the ushering in of this New Day.

A very definite step toward the dispelling o fdarkness, sin, and death; was taken when God sentHis beloved Son into the world to be man's re-deemer . The angels announced the birth of earth'sNew King, with a message of glad tidings, whic hthey assured the shepherds shall . yet be " unto allpeople . "

The Divine Word tells us of Jesus, that in Himis life, and that this life is' the light of men . Againwe are told that He is "the ' true light, tha tlighteth every man that eometh into the world" .The light of the gospel, as it is centered in ChristJesus, as yet has penetrated into but a compara-tively few of the hearts and minds of fallen human-ity. But with "the dawn" of the New Day, ushere din by the establishment of Christ 's Kingdom, willcome a worldwide dissemination of that "tru elight" which will dispel all darkness . And ulti-mately the knowledge of the glory of God shal lfill the whole earth, "as , the waters cover the sea ".

Darkness Before Dawn

It is our privilege now to hail the coming, yea ,the immediate approach, of the dawn! Tt is inorder to avail' ourselves of the privileges of th epresent hour that we now are enlarging our ef-forts — not with the thought of accomplishing any" great and wonderful works" for God, but mere-ly to demonstrate (1) an unselfish devotion to thegreat principle , of love, which all true Christian smust possess and which is represented in everyfeature of God's great plan; and (2) to endeavorto bring joy and comfort into . the hearts of "allthat mourn," even as He has commanded .

If God so . loved the world that He gave thedearest treasure of His heart in order to rescu ethe disobedient race from sin and death, surely we,

THE D AW N

His children, can do no less than to manifest thatsame unselfish, Godlike interest in our fellowmen,by telling them of the glorious prospects that ar eahead — prospects of life, liberty, and happiness ,promised and guaranteed by the God of love .

The plunging of the world into darkness isotherwise represented in the Bible under the figur eof a paradise lost, and the extrication of the worldfrom its baneful condition of sin and death int oa glorious perfection, i s aptly symbolized a s" paradise restored." This restoration work is

PARADIS ELOST

third shall beno more curseRev.' 22 :1- 3

In order to serve as wide a field as possible thesubject matter of The Dawn magazine will be di-vided into various departments . First, there willbe a "News and Views" department, in whic hcurrent events will be considered in the light o fBible prophecy—omitted, however, from this issue .

Then there will be a department on "Scienc eand the Bible," which will serve a wide and fas-cinating field, and, we trust, will help to interestand recover many whose faith in the Bible is wan-ing. At the beginning of this twentieth century theworld 's leading scientists were prone to countGod out of the entire scheme of things . If theyever used the term God at all they meant merel y" nature" or "natural law." They regarded theuniverse as a natural consequence of accidentalcombinations of various atoms of matter. Theysaid this cosmos is merely an automatic mechanis m—a creature of chance, perpetuated by "nature"—and that they could see no need for an intelli-gent Creator or Governor .

But today a remarkable change is taking plac ein scientific circles . Many of our greatest scientist snow are coming t,o see that they have followe dtheir " mechanical universe" philosophy to a blindend, and that God can not be counted out of th epicture after all . Jeans, Einstein, and others freelyadmit their belief in God ; and Millikan, one ofAmerica 's leading scientists, last year publicly de-clared that his study of physics has led him to afirm belief in a personal Creator .

Then there is Dr. Michael I . Pupin of Columbi aUniversity, who, in 1927 was elected President o fthe American Association for the Advancement o fScience, who also avows his belief that thereis a personal, intelligent Creator and Governor ofthe universe. When such men as these now mak esuch pronouncements, their colleagues no longe rblush for, shame nor even think of ridiculing thethought, but readily listen to their reasoning an dgive most respectful attention .

Some Scientists Seeing the Light

"Why should I deny a directing Intelligenceof all cosmic phenomena? To me as a scientist it i sobvious . It was obvious to the prophets thre ethousand years ago . From the crudest savage tothe highest prophet it has always seemed obviou sthat there is a definite Intelligence back of every-thing. There is nothing that science has ever found

PARADIS ERESTORED

sent forth--totill the groundGen.3:17.23 24

consider it a high _honor now to continue the pro-clamation of God 's holy prophets concerning these"times of restitution," which are actually at hand i

Scope of Departments

Albert Edward Wiggam, popular scientific wri-ter, in his interview with Prof . Pupin, beforementioned, quotes him as making the followin gilluminating statement :

"Wherever science has explored the universe i thas found it to be 'a manifestation of a coordinat-

described by the Apostle Peter as the "times of mg principle ; and that coordinating, directin g

restitution of all things, which God hath spoken principle I call Divine Intelligence . It leaves usby the mouth of all His holy prophets since the no escape from the conclusion that back of every -

world began". Surely every sincere Christian will thing there is a definite guiding principle whic hleads-from chaos to cosmos . We are faced withtwo alternatives : We either can believe that cos-mos, beautiful law and order, is simply the resultof haphazard happenings ; oar, that it is the re-sult of definite Intelligence . Personally, I choos eto believe in the coordinating principle, the Di-vine Intelligence. Why? Because it is simpler. Itis more intelligent . It harmonizes with my wholeexperience .

"The theory that intelligent beings like our -selves, or intelligent processes like the movementof the stars, are the outcome of unintelligent hap-penings, is beyond my understanding. And whyshould I accept such a theory, when I observe theevidence of a directing Intelligence every day ?When you see the stars, each moving in its ownpathway, or see a seed grow up after a definiteplan into a tree, or see a baby develop into a fullgrown self-directing human individuality, can yo uconceive of all that taking place as the result o fhaphazard happenings? Well, I cannot :

TH E

out that contradicts this . . . Indeed, the more deeplyscience penetrates into the laws of the universe ,the more it leads us to a belief in an IntelligentDivinity " .

Others grope On

Of course, not all present day scientists have a syet seen this light which has begun to dawn uponsome of the leaders . But we need not criticise themunduly—perhaps the dawn for them also is not sovery far away . We may, however, allow a memberof the scientific fraternity to voice his opinion o fthese "little scientists" whom he causes to stan dback in contrast to greater scientific minds, such a sbefore mentioned. Prof. Dinsmore in his " Age ofScience" sets forth this rather stinging indictmentof some of his scientific colleagues . He says :

"The narrowest, the most opinionated, the mostsupercilious persons one finds in our seats of learn-ing are the little scientists, who have sunk sodeep into their constricted specialty that they can -not see beyond its confines . They burrow so longin their little mole runs that their eyes grow dim ;they lose all sense of the vastness of the universe ;they think the cackle of their laboratory is themurmur of the world . "

It is our hope that from time to time The Dawnwill be able to present to its readers the resultsof noble efforts being made by scientists alon gvarious lines — results which, when properly un-derstood, are tending to prove not only the ex-istence of a supreme, intelligent Creator, but alsothe authenticity of the Bible as His inspired Word .Our forthcoming articles on "Science and theBible", of course, will not be presented in anydogmatic spirit, but rather with a view to stim-ulating and generally advancing the cause oftruth ; and especially with a desire to help thosereaders whose faith may have been undermined bythe false teachings of some who, in times past ,thought they were presenting scientific facts butwere really fostering unscientific theories .

Present Truth

The doctrinal articles appearing in The Dawnwill be either taken from or based upon the soundsubject matter presented in those illuminatingworks long known as the Millennial Dawn seriesof "Studies in the Scriptures ." Fundamentals,rather than nonessentials, will be stressed. Our poi-

V !icy is : "In essentials unity ; in nonessentials !charity."

We believe that a present-truth treatment of th eInternational Sunday School lessons, as in forme rdays, will prove a valuable asset to many in thei refforts to know the way of the Lord more per-fectly . Later, if it seems to be the wish of ourreaders, we also will introduce a Children's De-partment, in which we would endeavor to present

D AW N

the divine plan in language that may be compre-hended even by the little ones .

From time to time many readers of the RadioEcho have urged a more generous use of the dia-log form in presenting the truth. This was not s opractical in the limited space available in the Echo,but for the present we will try it out in THEDAWN, presenting one short Biblical dialog in eachmonthly edition.

The Christian LifeIn these days when the standards of moral up -

rightness and Christian character are being under -mined ; and when, as indicated by the Apostle Paul ,"men are lovers of pleasure more than lovers ofGod," it is important, as an aid to the Christian,that the high spiritual standards of God 's Wordbe held aloft . Especially is this true in connectio nwith those who have presented their bodies as a"living sacrifice" to do the Heavenly Father' swill. These know the truth—they are appreciativeof the hope that is set before them—and the apos-tle declares that he who has this hope purifiethhimself even as He (God) is pure.

Hence, in each issue of THE DAWN there wil lappear at least one article especially designed t obe of help and encouragement to the consecrated .In this connection we wish to emphasize the obvi-ous fact that in this "evil day" the standard ofChristian character cannot be held too high, norshould any allow themselves to relax their effortsin pressing forward in the narrow way .

Our Christian Life department in this issue willbe devoted- mainly to a consideration of what w eunderstand to be the proper basis for Christia nfellowship .

s.s r

And so, dear reader, with these few introductoryremarks, we commit THE DAWN into your hands,hoping indeed that you will experience as muchjoy in its study and use as we have in its prep-paration and publication. If this proves to be tru ewe will feel that our efforts have been duly re -warded and not in vain in the Lord .

A NEW MANNA . BOOKTypesetting has now begun on the new Manna Book,

previously announced in the Radio Echo. Copyright lawsprevent the exact reproduction of the original MannaBook, so new comments have been selected from the writ-ings of the same author . The same Bible texts will be re-tained, however, so there will be no confusion when th enew and old books are used together for testimony meet -ings .

The new books will be ready for delivery sometime i nNovember, and orders are now being taken. The price i s25 cents . Address all orders to :

THE DAW N251 Washington Street, Brooklyn, N. Y.

THE CHRISTIAN LIFE

' One is yourMaster "

FOR years the winds of strife have been beat-

ing heavily upon the saints throughout theentire earth ; and as a result they have been scat-

tered and divided into many groups and divisions ,contrary to the express command of the Masterwhen He said : "All ye are brethren ; and one isyour Master, even Christ. "

We believe that the time has come for all trut hbrethren to recognize that the spirit of division i sthe spirit of carnality. Even as the Apostle Paulcensured the Church at Corinth because it showe da tendency to become factional, so also now w eshould realize ,that there is no Scriptural excusefor any who are fully consecrated to the Lord tobe segregated into special groups or cliques and toinsist upon special tests of faith and fellowship ,that are not authorized in the Lord 's Word.

We are convinced that the responsibility for th emany separations and divisions among the saint sshould be placed upon the one to whom it belongs ,which is Satan the Devil . Satan has always beenthe great enemy of the church, and doubtless h enow believes that he has achieved a great victoryover the Lord 's people in that he has been success-ful' in forcing upon them the spirit of rivalry ,doubt, envy and division .

Scriptural UnityWe shall herein set forth briefly, what we be-

lieve to be the broad scriptural basis for unityamong the Lord's people—and with which we feelconfident that all true Christians agree . The policyof the DAWN magazine will be carried out in strictaccord with this Scriptural basis of unity as here -in stated .

Shortly before Jesus was glorified He offered upa sincere petition to His Heavenly Father, in whichHe requested the necessary divine grace to makepossible a complete one-ness of heart and purpos eamong His followers . Looking over the history ofthe Gospel Age, it might at first appear that thi sinspired prayer has gone unanswered ; but such i snot tfie case. God has always had individual rep-resentatives upon the earth who have been in ful lheart harmony and union with Him and with Hi sbeloved Son, Christ Jesus, who is the head of th echurch .

The hundreds of divisions represented in themany denominations that have long masquerade dunder the name of Christ, and also the more mod-ern appearance of factions among those who pro-fess belief in present truth, do not necessarily rep-resent divisions of spirit in the true Church . Rath-er, they are mainly divisions on carnal lines, gen-erally caused by those who have selfishly soughtto establish complex organizations and "channels "apart from or beyond that simple arrangement fo rthe Church that is so clearly outlined in the Lord ' s

Word. While it would be a foolish waste cf timeto try to amalgamate as such, the various factions ,or organizations, now existing among the saints ,yet this does not minimize the responsibility on th epart of each of us to work for that true union ofspirit and fellowship for which Christ so earnestl yprayed.

Unity, Not Confederacy

Nor could such a Scriptural unity of spiri tamong the various groups of consecrated brethre nbe considered a "federation" as some have mis-takenly suggested. The uniting of divers group sand factions as such, doubtless would amount toan unscriptural confederacy, but to encourage in-dividual Christians everywhere to recognize Chris tonly as their head, and to meet together in accord-ance with the spirit of Christ 's prayer for spirit-ual unity, most assuredly would meet with divineapproval and blessing.

No true Christ}an should wish to insist upon thefurtherance of the spirit of carnality by advocat-ing that the various groups, each hold themselvesaloof and each selfishly seek fellowship and serv-ice, entirely independent of all other consecratedbrethren of our one true Head . .

True Christian unity can be possible only so longas Christ is recognized as the sole head over allHis people and so long as the ransom sacrifice o fChrist is regarded as the true basis of Christianfaith and hope : `,` Other (Scriptural) foundatio ncan no man lay". It also must be recognized b yall brethren in Present Truth that in this end. ofthe age the Lord has revealed to His people thebeauties of His Divine Plan of redemption throug hChrist, whereby both the church and the world areto receive in God's due time the blessings of lifeeverlasting .

We believe that the great but simple fundamen-tal truths of the Divine Plan, which have beenmade known to us all, will be gladly recognize dby all Bible Students, in addition to the ransom it-self, as a necessary basis for true Christian fellow-ship and service at this time. There may be detailsof interpretation concerning the fulfillment ofprophecy, or other items of minor import, upo nwhich some of us may have reached different con-clusions ; but there is no scriptural authority formaking matters of this kind a test of Christian fel-lowship .

Organization

Looking back over the history of the GospelAge, " it becomes apparent that many division samong the saints have been brought about by th eunscriptural endeavor of certain leaders to"force" upon the Church some scheme of organi-

THE D AWN

5

zation that God's Word has not authorized . A care-ful reading of the New Testament history concern-ing the organization of the `early church reveal sthis most important fact—that every . congregationof the Lord's disciples at -that' time was entirely _independent of every other congregation ; andthat there was no central organization, group o rcommittee which these independent • congregation swere supposed to look to as in any sense of theword their headquarters .

Even among the apostles themselves no centralauthority was recognized. The Apostle Paul, forexample, after his conversion, went forth in theministry without so much as communicating wit hthe other apostles concerning his activities . Hesays, "I conferred not with flesh and blood ; nei-ther went I up to Jerusalem to them that wer eApostles before me ." Later he talked with Peter,"hut other of the apostles saw I none, sav eJames". As Paul went forth preaching he wa sunknown by face unto the churches of Jude awhich were in Christ, but they had " heard onlythat he which persecuted us in. times past nowpreached the faith which once he destroyed"—Gal. 1 : 16-23.

Although the early Church had no central or-ganization, and no head except the invisible Christ ,yet the organization of the various independentcongregations of the saints back there was as effi-cient as it was simple—the various servants beingelected by the Scriptural manner of stretchin gforth the hand. It is our conviction that trueChristian unity can obtain only where this simpleapostolic method prevails . In harmony with thisconviction we wish it known that the settled policyof this magazine rests upon this scriptural basis .

Let us recognize only Christ as our Head—whichmeans that no organization, group or committee ,outside of your own congregation, should be recog-nized as having authority in, or being the "head -quarters" of your congregation.

In seeking fellowship with others of "like pre-cious faith" it is not our purpose to ascertain withwhom they may be co-operating in the work of th eministry. Rather, we are happy to accept into ourfellowship all believers in God's great plan whoare desirous of exalting the cross of Christ andare recognizing only Jesus as their head .

Tt, is our thought that when Jesus prayed fo runity among ,His brethren He prayed for thatunity of spirit which should exist in each localcongregation of the saints . He was not praying fora complex, visible, humanly devised organizationthat would centrally control all local ecclesias inmatters of faith and works. There is no indicationanywhere in the New Testament that God expect sthe various congregations of His people to b eunited in the exclusive support of some centralcommittee or organization . „Contrariwise, the Scrip-tures make it clear that those who insist upon th erecognition of outside influence in the Ecclesia are

guilty of engendering the, spirit . of "carnality".If it was a carnal spirit that prompted some in theearly church to say, "I am of, Paul", or "I am ofApollos", surely then it is still the spirit of car-nality for any to say, either by word or by ex-ample, that they cannot fellowship with or recog-nize any consecrated Christians, who are not af- 'filiated with a particular group or organization_and who are not bound with them by a certain sys-tem of private interpretation which they unscrip-tura'lly have set up as a test of fellowship .

Cooperation, Npt BondageIn setting forth the foregoing outline of what we

believe to be the true basis of Christian fellowshipwhich is obtainable only by the full recognition ofChrist, as Head, and by upholding at all times thesovereign rights of the . local Ecelesia, we do notwish to be understood as opposed in any degree tohearty co-operation with any of the various serviceorganizations for spreading the Truth that arescripturally operating in the field . Rather, we areseeking to emphasize the fact that as one of them

we believe it unscriptural and carnal to be so com-mitted to a union with any one outside group orinfluence that anyone would be prevented from re-cognizing and aiding the good work that is beingaccomplished by other truth brethren .

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We recognize fully that to accomplish an ef-fective general presentation of the gospel message,which calls for cooperative service among all thebrethren, none can be entirely isolated from theirbrethren in other parts of the field . It would bevery inefficient and expensive for each local Eecle-sia to publish its own literature for disseminatio nof the truth—it is far cheaper to have it prepare dand shipped from some central point . But we alsoclaim that it would be very unwise, as well as un-scriptural to insist that some one particular com-mittee or organization be given the exclusive rightof publication, thus becoming a 'one and only 'channel.

Our policy is to grant every one in any Ecclesiafull liberty as to the truth literature they may de-sire to use in their work of the ministry and to letthem be free to cooperate or not to cooperate , withany one or more of the service organizations thatmay be doing a general publishing work for th espreading of the truth . The interest and prayersof this committee goes out in behalf of all th e

saints everywhere who are in any way' endeavor-ing to. exalt the cross of Christ and to make knownthe glad tidings of the Kingdom .

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Service OrganizationAs above stated, this magazine holds that the

only Church organization which God recognizes ashaving special right in its own territory is the lo-cal Ecclesia organization . The New Testament re-veals that such organizations alone were recog-

THE DAW N

nized in apostolic times and they alone are honoredin the Scriptures by being called the "church ofGod." Service organizations therefore must berecognized as, at the most, mere auxiliaries—busi-ness expedients, through which to make possiblea more economical, effective, and general dis-semination of the gospel. But there is no Scriptu-ral authority to sanction the thought that any suchorganization should be considered an " exclusiv echannel" of service for the Church.

We believe that the Apostle Paul expressed theproper Christian principle concerning coope„ativeservice when he said, of a certain family in Cor-inth, that had become active in their service of thebrethren : "Let all your deeds be done in Love .And I entreat you, brethren, as you know the fam-ily of Stephanas, that it is a first-fruit of Achaia ,and that they devoted themselves to Service forthe Saints, that you also be submissive to such ,and to every one who cooperates and labors . "(1 Cor . 16 :14-16. Diaglott.) There isso much tobe done in the way of serving the friends and mak-ing known the glad tidings to others that ther eseems no need for rivalry among God 's peopleand so we desire to encourage and cooperate wit hall who, as the Apostle declares, `have devotedthemselves to service for the saints."

All Invited to Cooperate

We have endeavored herein to set forth brieflythat which we understand to be the Scriptural basisof Christian unity ; and we believe that it is upo nthis basis that many of the congregations of God' speople are organized. It is upon this same basi sthat we extend to you the invitation to cooperat ewith and' support this and all similar efforts t ospread the glad tidings of the incoming Kingdom"while it is called day ."

While it . is true that individual Christiansthroughout the age have been united with Christ ,and thus in spirit united with each other regard-less of their denominational . surroundings, yet mayit not be that in answer to the inspired prayer o fJesus, the Heavenly Father may now permit allHis saints as a church, before they are finallygathered home, to be victorious in the matter ofunity as well as in every- other respect? But irre-spective of the extent to which this true basis o funity and fellowship may yet be recognized b ythe various local congregations of the saints, w efeel certain that it is our duty to work toward th eend of such an ideal, for which Christ prayed,and not to . foster the carnal spirit of division .

During the time of the harvest thousands of theLord's people received a knowledge of the truthand came out of bondage. But in order that everyindividual saint in the closing days of the agemight recognize fully the necessity of union withand dependence upon Christ as their sole head, i twas necessary that the church be subjected to thefiery trials that have assailed it, especially duringthe last sixteen years. Yet, if through these ex-periences we have learned nothing more than thatChrist is our Head and that no human instrument-ality, whether individual Christian or organization ,should have been recognized in any way as havingauthority over the church, have not all our trialsbeen well worth while ?

We ask especially an interest in your prayers onbehalf of the spiritual success of this publication-that its pages may ever be to His honor, that eac hsucceeding issue may result in rich spiritual bless-ings for all who read it, and that its influence to -ward Christian unity, fellowship and service migh textend out for the blessing of many more thanthose who actually become subscribers and ma-terial supporters in carrying this work forward .

Growth in Grace"Ye therefore, seeing ye know these things before, beware lest ye also, being led away with the error of thet wicked ,

fall from your own steadfastness, But grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ.To Him be glory both now and forever. Amen-''—2 Pet. 3:17,18.

T HERE is a touching tenderness in the epis-tles of the aged Apostle Peter to the house -

hold of faith, showing that, while he realized tha tthe time of his departure was drawing nigh (2 Pet .1 :14; John 21 :18, 19), his solicitude for the growthand development of the Church was increasing .Accordingly, he writes two general epistles, no tso much to advance new truth, as to call to remembrance truths already learned and fully receive d(2 Pet . 1 :12-15), and to counsel . all to faithfulnessand to growth in grace and in- the knowledge -o four Lord and Savior Jesus Christ .

In the preceding verses he has been calling t omind some of these truths, and he recognizes the

fact - that those addressed are already establishe din them ; but, in view of his knowledge that fals eteachers would arise to pervert the truth, he coun-sels special watchfulness against being led awayfrom their present steadfastness by the error o fthe wicked . That this counsel of the Apostle has aspecial fitness to the Church in the last days, ourdays, and was evidently so designed by the Spiri tof God, is clear from verse 3 : "There shall come inthe last days scoffers," etc .

Let us observe the manner in which the Apostl ewould have us' guard against being led away bythe error of the wicked . Is it by a careful investi-gation of all the claims which every new false pro-

phet that arises may intrude upon the attention ,thus giving heed to every seducing spirit (1 Tim.4 :1)'1 No : that would be quite contrary to theteaching of "our beloved brother Paul, to who mPeter so affectionately refers, and whom he s ofully endorses ; for Paul had given no uncertaincounsel on this subject ; saying, " Shun profaneand vain babblings ; for they will increase untomore ungodliness, and their word will eat as dotha canker" ; and, "II entreat you, brethren, to markthose wno are making factions and laying snare scontrary to the teaching which you have learned ,and turn away from them ; for they that are suchare not in subjection to our anointed Lord, but t otheir own appetite (for honor and praise amon gmen, as great teachers) ; and by kind and compli-mentary words they deceive the hearts of the un-suspecting . . . I wish you to be wise with respec tto that which is good, and harmless with respectto that which is evil . "—2 Tim. 2 :16. 17 ; Rom.16 :17-19 .

With these sentiments of "our beloved brotherPaul," Peter's counsel is in fullest harmony, hi sadvice being, not to waste valuable time in inves-tigating " the errors of the wicked" ; but, on thecontrary, to endeavor the more earnestly to "growin grace and in the knowledge of our Lord andSavior, Jesus Christ," who is the way, the . truthand the life . The more thorough our knowledge o fthe Lord and the more intimate our acquaintanc ewith Him, the more secure we are in our own.

How the Christian GrowsTo grow in grace is to grow in favor with th e

Lord through an intimate personal acquaintanc eand fellowship of spirit with Him . It implies, first ,a knowledge and recognition on our part of ourredemption through His precious blood and a per-sonal faith in and dependence upon all the prom-ises of the Father made to us through Him, andthen an intimate communion with Him in our dail ylives of prayer, and of observation of His will andobedience to it.

If such be our constant attitude of mind andheart, there must be a constant ripening of th efruits of the spirit, rendering us more and morepleasing and acceptable to our Lord . A sense of thedivine acceptance and favor is given from day t oday in increasing measure, in fulfilment of thatblessed promise of our Lord, If a man love Me he !will keep My words ; and My Father will love himand We will come unto him, and make Our abod ewith him."—John 14 :23 .

To grow thus in grace and not in knowledge isimpossible ; for the very object of such communionis to build us up in a more perfect knowledge an dacquaintance with the Lord—to bring us into clos-er fellowship with the divine plan, and to give u sthe privilege of being "workers .together withHim" in executing that plan . If, therefore, we love

and obey the Lord and desire to grow in His favor,His written Word must be our daily meditationand study ; and thus we grow in knowledge ; not,however, by finding out each year that what w elearned last year was wrong, but by putting o nmore of the armor of God until we realize it scompleteness in the full discernment of the divin eplan of the ages . We are then ready to do valiantservice for the cause of truth in withstanding th eencroachment of error (Eph. 6 :10-13), being es-tablished,: strengthened and settled in the faith .(1 Pet . 5 :10.) But even to those thus establishedin the faith there is abundant opportunity to gro win knowledge ; for while they see nothing . newor different in outline or design, they will be con-tinually charmed and cheered with newly dis-covered lines of harmony and beauty in the divin edrawings of the wonderful plan of the ages.

As pupils in the school of Christ we may everstudy the master workmanship of the Divine Ar-chitect, and, not only make progress in a hea dknowledge of the gospel, but also, and more im-portant, will be the inereased richness of our per-sonal acquaintance with Christ and the HeavenlyFather. In both respects it should be true, that :

" . • still new beauties shall we see,

And still increasing light ."

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Science now swallowingJonah's Fish Story

OF ALL the Biblical narra-tives which have come be-

neath the *approving eye ofmodern critics, none has receiv-ed more scornful attention thanhas that of Jonah and the fam-ous whale. That story has beenthe chief target and propheticstorm centre against which skep-tics have railed and heapedblatant ridicule ever since th ebeginning of the nineteenth cen-tury. Scientists had said that itwas utterly childish ; hence itwas relegated to the realm ofAesop 's Fables, and even place dupon a par with the silly juvenil etales of Mother Goose.

But shadows of night are pass-ing. Streaks of gray dawn hav emade their appearance upon th eeastern horizon. And by the lightof those foregleams of the Su nof Righteousness many apparent-ly ghostly aspects of ancien tmyth and fable now begin t otake on a new and meaningfu lform . Events that were long mis-understood and seemingly dis -torted out of all reason by thepranks of time are now foun dto have a clear historical back-ground . Atheists are being dis-armed, and skeptics are losingmany of their stock arguments ,as matters about which they hadso loudly laughed are now be-ing confirmed by the scrutiny ofserious scientists .

One by one the characters o fthe Old Testament are beingvindicated by the discoveries ofmodern science . Those ancientstories which are so briefly andquaintly narrated in the Bibl eare gradually resolving them-selves into demonstrable histor-ical truths, under continuin gscientific research and the pene-trating probe of the archeolo-gist's spade in these "last days . "And now even the much malignedJonah is having his long-awaite dClay in court, and is emergingtriumphant from his tempestuoustrial before the bar of scientifi cscrutiny, historical study and

common sense . Science now atlast is finding much justificationfor this anciently celebrated fishstory.

Jonah's Commission

The Jonah narrative probablyis quite familiar to most readersof this magazine. Jonah was aminor prophet of Israel whomthe Lord commissioned to gointo the heart of Assyria an dprophesy against it in its grea tcapital city of Nineveh . Thiscalled for courage ; for the As-syrian Empire was then mighty ,and the Ninevites were proud ,haughty and godless . They hadlittle use for the Israelites, al -though they were distantly re-lated to them. Assyria was found-ed by Asshur, who was a des-cendant of Shem. Heber, fromwhose line sprang "Abrahamthe Hebrew," was also a descen-dant of Shem. Hence both na-tions were Semites and spake arelated language .

We do not know the exac tperiod in which Jonah lived, bu tit is believed that he was a pro-phet during the time of Kin gJosiah of Judah, in the ninthcentury B. C. Nineveh at tha ttime "was a city of about 120,000population, and this . is confirmedby Jonah 4 :11. Assyria was proudof its great capital, which wa sthen wielding a tremendous in-fluence over the earth. Ninevehwas coming into the forefront aa great world power. Its wicked-ness also was exceedingly great .The Lord told Jonah that "theirwickedness is come up beforeMe," and commanded that theprophet go and tell the Assyriansthat Nineveh would be destroyedin forty days unless they repent .

Jonah was hesitant about go-ing forth and delivering the mes-sage of God 's vengeance againstthat mighty world power . Heprobably convinced himself thatit would do no good, that it wasa clear waste of consecrate dtime. Hence, instead of going

eastward to Nineveh, he wentwestward to the Mediterraneanseaboard and embarked on a shipthat was sailing out of the portof Joppa for Tartessus, in south-ern Spain. Soon a terrific stormarose ; and the superstitious crew ,doubtless all Phoenicians, bega nto pray to their various god's fo rdeliverance . They asked Jonahto pray to his God also . Then hetold them that he was fleein gfrom his God, that the Lor dJehovah had commanded him togo elsewhere but that he had re -fused ; hence he doubted if Go dwould hear him. He then wantedto die, and asked the crew tothrow him overboard'. They finally granted his wish ; and there-after the sea became calm .

An Experience Not Impossibl e

"Now the Lord had prepare da great fish to swallow up Jonah .And Jonah was in the belly ofthe fish three days and thre enights." (Jo . 1 :17.) No ' less anauthority than Jesus Christ at-tested to the truthfulness of thisnarrative. He said, " For asJonas was three days and threenights in the whale 's belly ; soshall the Son of man be threedays and three nights in the heartof the earth ." (Mt. 12 :40.) Yetthe skeptics have doubted. Theyhave insisted that a whale's throatis so constructed that it could notswallow a man, that it wouldchoke even on a good-size grape-fruit.

But science now comes t oJonah 's rescue. It is now knownthat there are some sea monstersthat could easily swallow a man ;and that if he went in feet firsthis head might protrude in such away as to enable him to get suf-ficient air to breathe . Whales ar eair-breathing animals, and regu-larlycome to the surface for oxy-gen. Jonah's living body, doubt-less covered by clothing, wouldeasily resist the digestive juicesof the monster 's stomach, even as

THE DAWN

9

the living tissue of an animal'sstomach-walls is self-resisting togastric fluids . And this was noordinary whale, with a gullet rel-atively small ; it was a " greatfish" monster which, accordingto the account, "the Lord hadprepared" to be on hand for theoccasion.

" Then Jonah prayed unto ,theLord his God out of the fish ' sbelly. . . and He heard me ; outof the belly of hell cried I, an dThou heardest my voice . . . Andthe Lord spake unto the fish ,and it vomited out Jonah uponthe dry land." (Jo. 2 :1, 2, 10. )The point at which he was castout upon the Mediterranean shor eis not named, but probably it wason the Asia Minor coast, inAssyrian territory. Perhaps someof the natives witnessed thestrange phenomenon—a man eastout of the mouth of a great fish,and alive !

That would be exceedingly sen-sational news . And as the "pro-phet walked forth, the supersti-tious inhabitants would be great-ly impressed. They would holdhim in awe as he prophesied.

Jonah's Preaching Was Effective

Jonah's fame must have spreadbefore him as he marched towar dNineveh to deliver the divin emessage of the hour, which pre-viously he had spurned : `,Yetforty days, and Nineveh shall b edestroyed .

"So the people of Nineveh be-lieved God, and proclaimed afast, and put on sackcloth, fromthe greatest of them even to th eleast of them. For the word cameunto the king of Nineveh, and h earose from his throne, and he laidhis robes from him, and covered'him with sackcloth, and sat inashes. And he caused it to beproclaimed . . Let man andbeast be covered with sackcloth ,and cry mightly unto God :' yea ,let them turn every one from hi sevil way, and from the violencethat is in their hands. Who cantell if God will turn and repent,and turn away from His fierceanger, that we perish not? "

The fact that the wicked, god-less, carefree people of Nineveh

believed Jonah's preaching seemssingular. In fact, that has beenlong considered one of the "fish-iest" parts of his entire story .

Why should all those worldly ,irreverent, haughty Assyriansbelieve the utterances of astrange itinerant Jewish preach-er? The sinful world has neve rbelieved any of the other pro-phets of God, from Noah ondown ; they have only scoffedat their repeated warnings ofimpending doom. Imagine theseNinevites believing, from thegreatest of them even to the leas tof them, and the mighty Assyria nking himself leading his wicke dsubjects in humble prayefa toGod, simply l ecanse' a roaming ,bedraggled stranger stood on thestreet ' corner and said, "Repent ,or you are doomed!" Yet that iswhat the story plainly implies .

Why the Ninevites Believed

After much scoffing at thisJonah story for decades, scient-ists are now having to admit tha tit all seems quite reasonable andprobable . At Nineveh the exca-vators recently have found e-nough evidence to give us a fairpicture of the Ninevites ofJonah's day. They have foun dthat the Assyrians at that time ,with all their wickedness, wer every superstitious ; that " theyworshipped God in a formal way ;and that they habitually picture dHim under the guise of a grea tsea monster .

The Assyrian conception ofdeity was a being all-powerfulif not all-loving ; and they pro-ceeded to represent Him by th emost powerful creature theyknew—a monster of the mightydeep. Limestone reliefs of thatperiod portray the kings of Nine- .veh clothed with "divine power "—and this they symbolized by aregal cloak made from the skinof a great fish, which reache dfrom the monarch 's head down t ohis ankles .

This throws new light upon th eeffect of Jonah's preaching . TheNinevites believed him, evidentl ybecause they had heard that h ehad come out of the mouth of agreat fish. They had been aeons -

tomed to representing God as apowerful sea monster ; and herewas a prophet whom the mightyGod had sent to them from thevery jaws of the great deep, witha special message for them. Theydared not turn a deaf ear to sucha prophet. They heard Him re-spectfully . They even trembledas he reminded them of their sinsand warned them of impendingdestruction. Even as St. Paul, inlater days, took advantage of thesuperstition of the idolatrousGreeks, suggesting to them thathe represented their "unknownGod," and thereby secured` anaudience ; so it seems that Jonahwas able to make use of the pre-vailing beliefs of the Assyriansof his day, and thus attract theiratten t̀ion and bring conviction totheir hearts .

Anyhow the Ninevites believed ;and God heard their cries andspared them . Evidently their re-pentanee was sincere ; not formal,but genuine . And Jonah, who hadhesitated to trust God when firstHe commanded him to go andpreach to the Ninevites, foundthat the Lord is equal to any sit-uation ; and that He is fully ableto prepare the way for the gener-alreception of His message whenthe time comes. And that calam-ity that had come upon Jonah inthe Mediterranean proved to bdthe best thing that could havehappened.

Let no servant of the Lord fur-ther hesitate to go forth and de-liver Jehovah 's message, even themessage of this "day of venge-ance." (Isaiah 61 :2.) Althoughour experiences may be crushingones, so that we may feel thatwe are undone, that we are weakand unable to convince anyoneconcerning God's great plan ; yetlet us trust that He who has givenus His message is also able t oprepare the way for its effectivedelivery in due time . Perhaps thattime is now here ; and possibl yGod is waiting, as in Jonah'scase, for us to become_ thorough-ly pliable, ready and meet forthe. Master 's use. We should bein that condition at all times,even on this side the vail ofdeath .

OUR BIBLICAL DIALO G

Thieves in ParadiseErnest : Frank, do you know that according to

the Bible there are even thieves in paradise ?When it contains such conundrums as that, ho wcan you say the Bible is easy to understand ?

Frank : Ernest, the Bible is easily understood i fwe allow our minds to broaden out and take in theentire scope of God ' s expressed purposes . Our dif-ficulty has been in the fact that our vision of th egreat plan of human redemption heretofore hasbeen entirely too narrow . We have supposed tha tGod has been doing the best He could to save a fewpeople and take them to heaven, and that all thewhile the Devil hasbeen outwitting Hi mand dragging nearl yall mankind down t oa place of eternaltorment. 0 u r studyof the Bible necessari-ly has been crampe dby this childish mis-conception of God ' swork, hence we hav ebeen hindered fro mappreciating the beau-ties of Divine revela-tion. But now we arecoming out of t h enight into the dawn .

Ernest : All that maybe true. But how didthose thieves happen toget into paradise?

promised a certain thief that He would take himto paradise .

Frank : You have reference, I suppose, to one o fthose two thieves on the cross .

Ernest : Yes, I was just reading the account :" And Jesus said unto him, Verily I say unto thee ,today thou shalt be with Me in paradise." Justtake notice of that, Frank ; Jesus said " today thoushalt be with Me in paradise ."—Luke 23 :43 .

Frank : Ernest, what is your understanding o fthose words of Jesus ?

Ernest : Well, if I were to express a thought atall, it would be whatwe might call the or-thodox thought ; viz . ,that paradise an dheaven are the sameplace ; and that thisthief, having repente dof his sin, was consid-ered worthy of goingimmediately t o hea-ven at the time of hi sdeath.

Frank With thisview i n mind, then,you would understandthat the thief, togeth-er with Jesus, wentimmediately t o hea-ven and into the pres-ence of God and theholy angels ?

"I say' unto thee today," in this hour o fMy Kingdom shall come, and "thou . shalt

that paradise."

defeat,Me i n

seeming ,be with

Frank : Ernest, the only two human beings whom

Ernest : Why, yes, Isuppose so! He said, " Todaythe Bible speaks of as ever having been in para- thou shalt be with Me in paradise . "dise are Adam and Eve when they were in Eden . Frank : Very well . Now turn to the 20th chapterBoth of these did become sinners ; but neither of of John and read the first part of the 17th verse .them were thieves, so far as the record goes. And These are the words of Jesus following His resur -Adam and Eve both were driven out of paradise rection, three days after His conversation withbecause of their sin. Then the Lord effectively that thief.barred the way to prevent the possibility of anyof the sinful human race returning to paradise, s oI don 't know just what you mean by thieves bein gin paradise . The fact of the matter is, there reall yhas been no paradise for the past six thousan dyears.

Ernest : Well, that 's what you say, but Jesus

Ernest : Now lets see-the 20th chapter of John,verse 17, I have it : "Jesus said unto her, TouchMe not, for I have not yet ascended to My Father ."Well, Frank, if paradise is the same as heaven, an dheaven is God's home, then Jesus didn't go to par-adise the day He died ; because in this text Hetells Mary that He had not yet ascended to HisFather—and this was the third day after His death.

Frank : And from that you must conclude thatparadise is not the same as heaven .

Ernest : There is no other conclusion one ca nreach. But that does not help matters very much,at least not from your standpoint ; for you claimthat Eden was paradise, but that it became "para-dise lost," and that paradise has never yet bee n

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reestablished anywhere . But remember, Jesus said :"Today, thou shalt be with Me in paradise, andthat proves that paradise was in existence in Hisday, and that it was not here on the earth.

Frank : Well, at least we are making some pro-gress. And now, if you will, please read anothe rtext—one which I think will help us to get a bet -ter understanding of this entire matter . This timeit will be in the 2nd chapter of Acts, the 31st verse .These are the words of the Apostle Peter,' in whic hhe comments on one of the prophecies of the OldTestament which tells of the whereabouts of Jesu sduring the time between His death and resurrec-tion. That is what we want to know !

Ernest : If it really gives us that information itought to be a help . Acts 2, verse 31, It reads : "He ,seeing this before, spake of the resurrection o fChrist, that His soul was not left in hell, neitherdid His flesh see corruption ." What is this? Jesus 'soul in hell ?

Frank : Yes, that 's the point . Even the so-called"Apostles' Creed" tells us.,that Jesus ' soul des-cended into hell and rose again the third day .

Ernest : Frank, it doesn't seem right—a thief inparadise and Jesus in hell !

Frank : But Ernest, how does that harmonizewith your thought that Jesus was to go with th ethief to paradise that same day ?

Ernest : Well, for the life of me, I can't under -stand it at all . But just the same, Jesus said Hewould be in paradise that very day . Maybe Heonly stopped off there on His way to hades ." Butanyway, it proves that paradise was in existenc eat that time. I would like to know, though, why i twas necessary for Jesus to go to hell .

Frank : In the first place, Ernest, let us alway skeep in mind that hell is the condition of death ,the tomb ; and that it has no reference at all to aplace of torment . The Bible hell is the conditioninto which all mankind go at death. Jesus wentinto the hell condition in order to redeem mankin dfrom death . By His death He paid the penalty im-posed upon all humanity because of sin . A veryforceful passage in proof of this is found in th e53rd chapter of Isaiah, verses 9 and 10, whichreads : " And He made His grave with the wicked,and with the rich in His death ; because He haddone no violence, neither was any deceit in Hismouth. Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise Him ; Hehath put Him to grief ; when thou shalt make Hi ssoul an offering for sin. "

Ernest : Frank, do you know that all my life Ihave heard different ones talk about Jesus dyin gfor us, but never, before have I realized the sig-nificance of His ransom sacrifice . I have been toldthat Jesus paid the full penalty for our sins, bu tat the same time I have wondered how He couldpay that penalty unless He suffered in the eternalfires of hell—for I thought that hellfire was theultimate penalty for sinners . But now I see it : The

penalty was death, and Jesus died to pay th epenalty, and now there is an opportunity foreveryone to go to heaven. Fine !

Frank : Hold a minute ! That last statement isnot exactly in harmony with the facts. God did notcreate man to enjoy a home in heaven . He wascreated, rather, to live on the earth . When our firstparents were sentenced to death they lost th eprivilege of living upon the earth ; the death ofJesus, which pays this penalty, merely assures anopportunity for all mankind to live again on theearth, not in heaven. Jesus did not purchase ahome. in heaven for anyone .

Ernest: Do you mean to say that no one will g oto heaven?

Frank : No, I don't mean that at all. The hope ofthe Church is indeed a heavenly hope ; not becaus ea heavenly home was purchased for them, but be-cause they are invited to it as a special reward .But only a few have been called to a heavenly hope .The entire period from the first to the second ad -vents of Jesus has been devoted to the selection ofthis Church class ; and, because this has been theonly work to be accomplished until the establish-ment of the Kingdom, many of God's people seemto have lost sight of the general blessings of lif eupon the earth which He has promised for allmankind .

Ernest : But hew about that thief in paradise ?Are we to understand that paradise is this place o fspecial reward for tie Christian, and that the thief,accepting Christ at the last moment before death,became a Christian and entered into a heavenlyreward ?

Frank : Indeed not ! A Christian is one wh ofollows in the footsteps of Christ, one who is con-formed to His image. Last-minute repentances donot accomplish these things in anyone . And besides ,paradise is not the home of the Christian . Paradiseis the Biblical word used to describe the eart hwhen brought to perfection. The Garden of Edenwas a miniature paradise, and the Bible tells usthat the whole earth is to be made like the Gardenof. Eden eventually .

Ernest : Are we to understand, then, that th ethief went to the Garden of Eden at the time o fhis death? According to your explanation tha tmust be what Jesus meant : "And Jesus said untohim, verily I say unto thee, today shalt thou b ewith Me in paradise" .

Frank : Please read the preceding verse .Ernest : All right. "And the thief said unto

Jesus : Lord, remember me when Thou comest intoThy Kingdom . "

Frank : Now I want you to notice that whatJesus said to the thief is in direct answer to th erequest made by the thief, which was : "Lord, re -member me when Thou comest into Thy Kingdom".In answer to this Jesus said : "Verily", whichmeans, very well, I will remember you when I come

12

THE DAW N

into My Kingdom ; you shall indeed be with Mein that paradise.

Ernest : What did that thief know about Christ' sKingdom? How could he know anything about it ?

Frank : Why, nearly everything that Jesus eve rsaid and did was in proclamation of His comin gKingdom. Everybody in all Judea knew of Hi spreacumg on this suoject. He right then was beingput to cteath by the 16oman Government becaus eHe was accused of being a King. A superscriptionstating the crime for which He was being crucifie dwas put up over His cross, which read :

"This is the King of the Jews"

So you see, the thief had ample opportunity t oknow that Jesus had made claims to being a King ;hence his request to be remembered in Jesus 'Kingdom was a natural "grasping at a straw " ina time of great distress . Jesus assured the thie fhe would be remembered in Nis Kingdom - thathe would be with Him in paradise when it is re -stored . And, Ernest, the Kingdom of God is to b eestablished right here on the earth . That is whyJesus taught us to pray : "Thy Kingdom come ,Thy will be done on earth as it is done in heaven ."

Ernest : All that sounds very logical, yet . Hesaid, "Today thou shalt be with me in paradise ."That shows that paradise was then existing, notsomething that was yet to be established.

r'rank: Now Ernest, let 's do a little thinking .We have already learned from –the Scriptures thatJesus went to hades at the time of His death . Threedays later He told Mary that He had not yet as-cended to heaven, to His Father . He promised thethief that he would be remembered when He cam eInto His Kingdom ; and the entire testimony of th eBible, as well as existing sinfulness here, show sthat the Kingdom of Christ is not yet establishedon the earth. As for paradise, the Bible tells us ofonly one that as yet has ever actually existed, an dthat was the miniature paradise of Eden . As forthe coming real paradise of prophecy, the Bibl eassures us that it will be none other than the per-fected earth, when it will be made to "blossom asthe rose, " under the administration of Christ'sKingdom. From all this, therefore, we must surelyagree that it was impossible for the thief to goto paradise the day he died.

Ernest : I see —then you think that Jesus madea mistake ! Well, that's' a nice way, to get out of it.

Frank : No, Ernest, Jesus made no mistake . Butthere is one thing about this text that many haveoverlooked . Now let me read the text : "And Jesussaid unto the thief, Verily. I say unto thee, today,thou shalt be with Me in paradise. "

Ernest : But Frank, you changed the position o fthe comma ; and you don't have any right to dothat ! No one has a right to change the Bible .

Frank : That 's not changing the Bible, becaus epunctuation marks were not in use at all when theBible was written. ' In 1611 A. D. the translator sof our English Bible . placed punctuation marks in

the text wherever they thought they would servethe best purpose, and in most instances they place dthem correctly ; but in this one case the misplace-ment of the comma has warped the meaning of th etext entirely, and has made it support that ol doriginal lie of Satan, "Thou shalt not sui eiy die . "

Ernest : But, .U 'rank, why did Jesus use the wor d" today" at ail, if He didn 't mean that the thiefwould be in paradise that day ?

Frank : The reason is very apparent . As we al -ready have noted, Jesus claimed to be a King ; Heconstantly preached of His coming Kingdom . Hepromised This followers a share in that Kingdom .All the prophecies of the Old Testament in oneway or another foretold the coming of Christ' sKingdom-paradise restored—and showed that 1! ewould rule "from sea to sea, and from the river sunto. the ends of the earth." Jesus claimed to b ethe one who would fulfil these prophecies . Becaus eof this claim He was then being put to death. Hisclaim of being the Son of God, the Messiah ,earth's rightful King, was called in question, an dHe was mocked even by those who watched Hissuffering on the cross . . '1'hey told Him that if Il ewere the Messianic King He claimed to be, H eshould be able to come down from the cross, an dthereby give a demonstration of His Heavenlypower and authority. With all this scene befor ehis eyes, the thief asked Jesus to remember him . i nHis Kingdom. Now if Jesus were not the Mes-siah He might have said to the thief, `Well, Iwould like to do something for you, and if it wer enot for, the fact that My plans are all fallingthrough, I would reward you in some way or other ;however, as it is, I can do no more for you thanyou can do for yourself . But Jesus did not say this .Instead, He acknowledged that the request was aproper one . Then, in spite of the fact that on thatdark day everything seemed to indicate a complet efailure of all His claims, yet He said to the thief :I can say unto you even today, "Thou shalt b ewith Me in paradise . "

Ernest : As I understand it, then, the use of theword " today" was Jesus ' method of emphasizingHis abiding confidence in the outworking of theHeavenly Father's purposes .

Frank : Yes, I believe that is the right thought ;and when you view the text in this way, all isclear. Instead of our having confusion of though tas to how Jesus could be both in hades and in par-adise at the same time, we now can see that Hi spromise of paradise is still future that it will comewhen His Kingdom is fully established, and the nthe blessings of life everlasting here upon eart hwill be flowing out to the people, as in the day sof Adam and Eve before they sinned. We can see ,in fact, that the death of Jesus opens up the wayfor these blessings to be realized by "whosoeverwill"—not only by the thief, but by all mankind .In the meantime, the Church is being selected an dprepared for her share with Jesus in this grea twork of blessing " all the families of the earth ."

THE EVERLASTING GOSPE L

The Truth about HellA Critical Analysis of every Bible Text in which the

word 'Hell" appears.

ACORRECT understandin gof this subject has become

almost a necessity to Christiansteadfastness, For centuries' ithas been the teaching of "ortho-doxy," of all shades, that God,before creating man, had creat-ed a great abyss of fire and ter-rors, capable of containing al lthe billions of the human familywhich he purposed to bring intobeing ; that this abyss He hadnamed "hell ;" and that all o fthe promises of the Bible weredesigned to d'eter as many as pos-sible (a "little flock" ) fromsuch wrongdoing as would makethis awful place their perpetualhome .

As knowledge increases an dsuperstitions fade, this monstrousview of the divine arrangemen tand character is losing its force ;and thinking .people cannot bu tdisbelieve the legend, whichused, to be illustrated on thechurch walls in the highest de-gree of art and realism, sample sof which are still to be seen inEurope. Some now claim thatthe place is literal, but the fir esymbolic, etc., while others re-pudiate the doctrine of " hell "in every sense of the word .

While glad to see superstitio nfall, and truer ideas of the great ,wise, just, and loving Creatorprevail, we are alarmed to notic ethat the tendency with all wh oabandon this long revered doc-trine is toward doubt, skepti-cism, infidelity .

Why should this be the case ,when the mind is merely bein gdelivered from an error? Be -cause Christian people have s olong been taught that the foun-dation for this awful blasphemyagainst God 's character and gov-ernment is deep-laid and firmlyfixed, in the Word of God—the

Bible—and consequently to what-ever degree that belief in "hell"is shaken, to that extent theirfaith in the Bible, as the reve-lation of the true God, is shake nalso ; so that those who hav edropped their belief in a "hell, "of some kind of endless torment ,are often open infidels, and scof-fers at God 's Word .

God has been slandered

Guided by the Lord 's provi-dence to . a realization that theBible has been slandered, as wel las its divine Author, and that,rightly understood, it teache snothing on this subject deroga-tory to God 's character nor toan intelligent reason, we willattempt to lay bare the Scriptire teaching on this subject ,that thereby faith in God and inHis Word may be re-establishe din the hearts of those who havedoubted.

Indeed, it is our opinion thatwhoever shall hereby find thathis false view rested upon hu-man misconceptions and misin-terpretations, will, at the sam etime, learn to trust hereafterless to his own and other men'simaginings, and, by faith, t ograsp more firmly the Word o fGod, which is able to make wis eunto salvation.

The doctrine of eternal tor-ment of the wicked was intro-duced by Papacy to induce pa-gans to join her and support hersystem. It flourished at the sam etime that bull fights and gladia-toral contests were the publicamusements most enjoyed ; whenthe Crusades were called "hol ywars, " and when men and wo-men were called "heretics" an dwere often slaughtered fo rtheir failure to subscribe fully

to the teachings of the Papacy ;at a time when the sun of th egospel truth was obscure ; whenthe Word of God had fallen int odisuse and was prohibited to b eread by any but the clergy,whose love of their neighborswas often shown in torturing"heretics" to induce them to re- -cant and deny their faith an dtheir Bibles—to save them, ifpossible, they explained, fromthe more awful future awaitin g"heretics"—eternal torment .

This doctrine was not borrowe dfrom the heathen, for no heathe npeople in the world have a doc-trine so cruel, so fiendish and s ounjust. Find it, whoever can,and show it up in all its black-ness, that, if possible, it may b eshown that the essence of bar-barism, malice, hate and ungod-liness has not been exclusivelyappropriated by those whom Godhas most highly favored withlight from every quarter, and t owhom He has committed theonly oracle—His Word .

Oh! the shame that surely willcover the faces of many, eve ngood men, who verily though tthat they did God service whil epropagating this blasphemou sdoctrine, when they awake inthe resurrection to learn of thelove and justice of God, andwhen they come to know thatthe Bible does not teach this God-dishonori n g, truth-beclouding,sinner-hardening theory of eter-nal torment .

But we repeat that, in th elight and moral development ofthis day, sensible people do no tbelieve this doctrine . However,since they think that the Bibl eteaches it, every step they pro-gress in real intelligence andbrotherly kindness, which hin-ders belief in the torment theory ,is in most cases a step away from

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God 's Word, which is falsely ac-cused of being the authority fo rthis teaching. The thinking pub-lic, as represented in the accom-panying illustration, while en-deavoring to make progress to -ward the light, are thus neglect-ing the true source of spirituallight and knowledge . Hence thesecond crop of evil fruit, whichthe devil's engraftment of thiserror is producing, is skepticism .The intelligent, honest thinkersare thus driven from the Bibleinto vain philosophies and sci-ences, falsely so-called, and int oinfidelity.

Hell as an English WordIn the first place bear in mind

that the Old Testament was writ-ten in the Hebrew language, an dthe New Testament in the Greek .The word "hell" is an Englishword sometimes selected by thetranslators of the English Bibleto express the sense of the He-brew word sheol and the Greekwords hades, tartaroo and gehen-na,—so metimes r e n d e r e d"grave" and "pit . "

The word " hell " in old Eng-lish usage, before Papal theolo-gians picked it up and gave it anew and special significance t osuit their own purposes, simplymeant to conceal, to hide, to cov-er ; hence the concealed, hiddenor covered place . In old Englishliterature records may be foun dof the helling of potatoes-put-ting potatoes into pits ; and ofthe helling _of a house—coverin gor thatching it . The word hellwas therefore properly used syn-onymously with the word s" grave" and "pit," to translatethe word's sheol and hades as sig-nifying the secret or hidden con -dition of death . However, thesame spirit which was willing t otwist the word to terrorize theignorant is willing still to per-petuate the error ;—presumablysaying—"Let us do evil thatgood may follow. "

If the translators of the Re-vised Version Bible had beenthoroughly disentangled from th ePapal error, and thoroughlyhonest, they would have done

more to help the English studen tthan merely to substitute theHebrew word sheol and theGreek word hades as they havedone. They should have translat-ed the words . But they were evi-dently afraid to tell the truth ,and ashamed to tell the lie ; andso gave us sheol and hades un-translated, and permitted the in-ference that these words mea nthe same as the word "hell" hasbecome perverted to mean. Theircourse, while it for a time shield sthemselves, dishonors God an d

the Bible, which the commo npeople still suppose teaches a•"hell" of torment in the wordssheol and hades . Yet anyone cansee that if it was proper to trans-late the word sheol thirty-onetimes "grave" and three time s"pit," it could not have been im-proper to have so translated it inevery other instance .

A peculiarity to be observedin comparing these cases, as w ewill do shortly, is that in thos etexts where the torment ideawould be an absurdity the trans-lators of the King James versionhave used the words "grave"or "pit" ; while in all other case sthey have used the word "hell ; "and the reader, long schooled in

the Papal idea of torment, readsthe word "hell" and thinks of i tas signifying a place of torment,instead of the grave, the hiddenor covered place or condition.For example, compare Job 14 :13with Psa. 86 :13. The formerreads,—"Oh, that thou wouldathide me in the grave (sheol)etc.," while the latter reads,—" Thou hast delivered my soulfrom the lowest hell (sheol) . "The Hebrew word being the samein both cases, there is no reasonwhy the same word " grave"should not be used in both . Buthow absurd it would have bee nfor Job to have prayed to God tohide him in a hell of eternal tor-ture ! The English reader wouldhave asked questions and th esecret would have gotten outspeedly, if they had properlytranslated sheol and hades ."Hell" in the Old Testament

The word " hell occurs thirty-one times in the Old Testament ,and in every instance it is sheolin the Hebrew. It does not mea na lake of fire and brimstone, noranything at all resembling thatthought : not in the slightest de-gree! Quite the reverse : insteadof a place of blazing fire it is de -scribed in the context as a stat eof "darkness" (Job 10 : 21) ; in-stead of a place where shrieksan4_ groans are heard, it is de -scribed in the context as a placeof "silence" (Psa . 115 :17) ; in-stead of representing in anysense pain and suffering, or re-morse, the context describes it asa place or condition of forgetful-ness: (Psa. 88 :11,12.) `There i sno work, nor device, nor knowl-edge, in the grave (sheol) whith-er thou goest . "—Eccles . 9 : 10 .

The meaning of sheol is " thehidden state," as applied t oman's condition in death, in an dbeyond which all is hidden, ex-cept to the eye of faith ; hence ,by proper and close association ,the word was often used in the ,sense of grave-the tomb, the •hidden place, or place beyondwhich only those who have th eenlightened eye of the under -standing can see a resurrection ,restitution of being. And be it

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particularly noted that this iden-tical word sheol is translated"grave" thirty-one times an d" pit" three times in our commonversion by the same translators—more times than it is translated" hell" ; and twice, where it istranslated "hell," it seemed s oabsurd, according to the presen taccepted meaning of the Englishword "hell," that scholars hav efelt it necessary to explain in th emargin of modern Bibles, that i tmeans grave . (Isa. 14 :9 andJonah 2 :2) In the latter case ,the hidden state, or grave, wasthe belly of the fish in whichJonah was buried alive, and fromwhich he cried to God .

All Texts in Which "Sheol" isTranslated "Hell"

(1) Amos 9 :2—"Though theydig into hell, thence shall min ehand take them." (A figurativeexpression ; but certainly pits ofthe earth are the only hells me ncan dig into .)

-(2) Psa. 16 : 10—" Thou wil t

not leave my soul in hell ; neitherwilt thou suffer thine Holy Oneto see corruption" . (This refersto our Lord's three days in thetomb.—Acts 2 :31 ; 3 :15) .

(3,4) Psa. 18 :5 and 2 Sam . 22 :6—Margin.— "The cords of hellcompassed me about" . (A figurein which trouble is represente das hastening one to the tomb) .

(5) Psa. 55 :15.— "Let themgo down quick into hell—margin"the grave".

(6) Psa. 9 :17 .— "The wickedshall be turned into hell, and allthe nations that forget God' .This text will be treated later ,under a separate heading.

(7) Psa . 86 :13 .— "Thou hastdelivered my soul from th elowest hell" — margin, "th egrave" .

(8) Psa. 116 :3. — "The sor-rows of death compassed me ,and the pains of hell gat holdupon me ." (Sickness and troubl eare the figurative hands of the

there." (God 's power is unlim-ited : even over those in the tombHe can and will exert i ti andbring forth all that are in th egraves.- John 5 :28) .

(10) Deut. 32 :22. — "For afire is kindled in mine anger ,and shall burn into the lowesthell". (A figurative representa-tion of the destruction, the utterruin, of Israel as a nation —"wrath to the uttermost", as theApostle called it—God's: angerburning that nation to the "low-est hell", as Leeser here trans-lates the word sheol . — 1 Thes .2 : 16) .

(11) Job 11 :8 .— "It (God'swisdom) is as high as heaven ;what canst thou do? deeper thanhell (than any pit) ; what canstthou know?"

(12) Job 26 :6 .— "Hell (thetomb) is naked before him, anddestruction hath no covering . "

(13) Prov. 5 :5.— "Hier feetgo down to death ; her steps tak ehold on hell (i . e., lead to thegrave)"

(14) Prov . 7 :27.- "Her hous eis the way to hell` (the grave) ,going down to the chambers o fdeath."

(15) Prov. 9 :18.— "He know-eth . not the dead are there, an dthat her guests are in the depth sof hell". (Here the harlot'sguests are represented as dead,diseased or dying, and many o fthe victims of sensuality in pre-mature graves from diseaseswhich also hurry off their pos-terity to the tomb . )

(16) Prov. 15 :11 .— "Hell anddestruction are before th eLord". (Here the grave is as-sociated with destruction andnot with a life of torment . )

(17) Prov. 15 :24.— "The pathof life (leadeth) upward for th ewise, that he may depart fromhell beneath" . (This illustrate sthe hope of resurrection from th etomb.)

(18) Prov. 23 :14. — "Thoushalt beat him with the rod, an dshall deliver his soul from hell"(i . e., wise correction will save achild from vicious ways whic hlead to premature death, and

may also possibly prepare himto escape the "Second death" . )

(19) Prov. 27 :20 .— "Hell (thegrave) and destruction are neverfull : so -the eyes of man are.never satisfied" .

(20) Isa. 5 :14.—"Therefor ehell hath enlarged herself an dopened her mouth without mea-sure." (Here the grave is a sym-bol of destruction . )

(21, 22) Isa . 14 :9, 15.—"Hell(margin, grave) from beneath ismoved for thee, to meet thee a tthy coming." . . . "Thou shalt b ebrought down to hell" (the grave—so rendered in verse 11) .

(23) Isa. 57 : 9.-"And didstdebase thyself even unto hell .(Here figurative of deep degra-dation. )

(24, 25) Ezek . 31 :15-17.-"Inthe day when he went down t othe grave, . . . I made the na-tions to shake at the sound of hisfall, when I cast him down t ohell with them that descend int othe pit. . . . They also went downinto hell with him, unto the mthat be slain with the sword."(Figurative and prophetic de-cription of the fall of Babylo n

into destruction, silence, t h egrave . )

(26) Ezek. 32 :21.—"Th estrong among the mighty shal lspeak to him out of the midst o fhell with them that help him . "(A - continuation of the same fig-ure representing Egypt's over-throw as a nation to join Baby -lon in destruction—buried. )

. 407) Ezek. 32 : 27 .—"And theyshall not lie with the mighty thatare fallen of the uncircumcised ,which are gone down to hellwith their weapons of war : andthey have laid their swords un-der their heads ; but their iniq-uities shall be upon their bones,though they were the terror ofthe mighty in the land of th eliving." (The grave is the only"hell" where fallen ones ar eburied and lie with their weap-ons of war under their heads. )

(28) Hab. 2 5.—"W h o en-largeth his desire as hell (thegrave) and as death, and canno tbe satisfied. "

grave to grasp us) .(9) Psa. 139 :8.— "If I make

my bed in hell, behold, thou art

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(29) Jonah 2 : 1, 2."T h e nJonah prayed unto the Lord hisGod, out of the fish's belly, andsaid, I cried by reason of min eaffliction unto the Lord, and heheard me ; out of the belly ofhell cried I, and thou heardes tmy ,voice ." (The belly of the fishwas for a time his grave—seemargin . )

(30, 31) Isa. 28 :15-I8 .—"Be-cause ye have said, We havemade a covenant with death, andwith hell (the grave) are we atagreement ; when the overflow-ing scourge shall pass through,it shall not come unto us, for wehave made lies our refuge, an dunder falsehood have we hi dourselves : Therefore, saith theLord, . Your covenant withdeath shall be disannulled, andyour agreement with hell (thegrave) shall not stand." (Godthus declares that the presen tprevalent idea, by which deat hand the grave are represented asfriends, rather than enemies ,shall cease ; and men shall learnthat death is the wages of sin,now and that it is in Satan' spower (Rom. 6 :23 ; Heb. 2 :14, 1and not an angel sent by God. )

Al Other Texts Where "Sheol "Occurs—Rendered "Grave" and"Pit"

Gen. 37 :35 .—"I will go downinto the grave unto my son ."

Gen. 42 : 38.-"Then shall yebring down my gray hairs withsorrow to the grave . " (See alsothe same expression in 44 : 29, 31.The translators did not like t osend God's servant, Jacob, t ohell simply because his sons wer eevil. )

1 Sam. 2 : 6 .—"The Lord kill-eth, and maketh alive : he bring-eth down to the grave, a n dbringeth up . "

1 Kings 2 : 6, 9.-"Let not hishoar head go down to the gravewith peace. . . . His hoar headbring thou down to the gravewith blood . "

Job 7 :9."He that goet hdown to the grave . "

Job 14 :13." Oh, that t h o uwouldst hide me in the grave,

that thou wouldst keep me secretuntil thy wrath be past, tha tthou wouldst appoint me a se ttime, and remember me (resur-rect me) !"

Job 17 :13.—"If I wait, thegrave is mine house : I h a v emade my bed in the darkness . "(Job waits for resurrection—``inthe morning." )

Job 17 :16.--"They shall godown to the bars of the 'pi t(grave), when our rest togethe ris in the dust . "

Job 21 :13 .-"They spen dtheir days in mirth, and in amoment go down to the grave . "

Job 24 :19, 20.—"Drought andheat consume the snow waters :so doth the grave those whichhave sinned." (All have sinned,hence "Death passed upon allmen," and all go down to th egrave. But all have been re -deemed by " the precious bloodof Christ" ; hence all shall b eawakened and come forth againin God's due time—2 'in the morn-ing."—Rom. 5 :12, 18, 19 .

Psa. 6 : 5 .—"In death there isno remembrance of thee ; in thegrave who shall give the ethanks?"

Psa. 30 : 3 .—"O Lord, t h o uhast brought up my soul fromthe grave : thou hast kept mealive, that I should not go dow nto the pit ." (This passage ex-presses gratitude for recoveryfrom danger of death . )

Psa. 31 :17 .—"Let the wicke dbe ashamed ; let them be silent inthe grave . "

Psa. 49 : 14, 15, margin .—"Likesheep they are laid in the grave :death shall feed on them ; an dthe upright (the saints—Dan. 7 :27) shall have dominion overthem in the morning (the Millen-nial morning) ; and their beautyshall consume, the grave beingan habitation to every one o fthem. But God will redeem mysoul from the power of thegrave . "

Psa. 88 :3 . —" My life drawethnigh unto the grave. "

Psa . 89 : 48 .—" Shall he deliverhis soul from the hand of thegrave?"

Psa . 141 : 7 .—"Our bones are

scattered at the grave 's mouth."Prov. 1 : 12.—"Let us swallo w

them up alive as the grave : andwhole, as those that go down in-to the pit" (i . e ., as of an earth-quake, as in Num . 16 : 30-33) .

Prov. 30 :15, 16.-"Fou rthings say not, it is enough : thegrave," etc .

Eccl . 9 : 10 .-"Whatsoever thyhand findeth to do, do it withthy might ; for there is no work,nor device, nor knowledge, norwisdom, in the grave, whitherthou goest . "

Song of Solomon 8 : 6 .—" Jeal-ousy is cruel as the grave . "

Isa. 14 : 11.—" Thy pomp isbrought down to the grave. "

Isa . 38 : 10 .—"I shall go to th egates of the grave : I am de-prived of the residue of myyears ."

Isa. 38 : 18 .—" The grave can -not praise thee, death cannotcelebrate thee : they that go downinto the pit cannot hope for thytruth."

Num . 16 : 30-33.—"If . theygo down quick into the pit, the nshall ye understand . . . . Theground claw asunder that wasunder them, and the earth opene dher mouth and swallowed the mup, and their houses, and all themen that appertained unt oKorah, and all their goods . Theyand all that appertained to themwent down alive into the pit, andthe earth closed upon them : andthey perished from among th econgregation."

Ezek . 31 :15 ." In the d a ywhen he went down to th egrave. "

Hosea 13 : 14 .—"l will ransomthem from the power of th egrave; I will redeem them fro mdeath. 0 death, I will be thyplagues ; 0 grave, I will be thydestruction . Repentance shall behid from mine eyes ." (The 'Lorddid -not ransom any from a plac eof fire and torment, for there isno such place ; but he did ranso mall mankind from the grave ,from death, the penalty brough tupon all by Adam 's sin, as thisverse declares . )

The above list includes ever yinstance of the use of the English

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word "hell" and the H e b r e wword sheol in the Old Testament .From this examination it mustbe evident to all readers tha tGod's revelations for four thous -and years contain not a singl ehint of a " hell," such as theword is now understood to sig-nify.

"Hell" in the New Testament

In the New Testament, th eGreek word hades correspondsexactly to the Hebrew w o r dsheol . As proof see the quota-tions of the Apostles from theOld Testament, in which theyrender it hades . For instance ,Acts 2 : 27, "Thou wilt not leavemy soul in hades, " is a quotationfrom Psa . 16 : 10, "Thou wilt no tleave my soul in sheol ." And in1 Cor . 15 : 54, 55, "Death is swal-lowed up in victory . 0 death ,where is thy sting? 0 grav e(hades), where is thy victory?"is an allusion to Isa. 25 ; 8, "H ewill swallow up death in vic-tory," and to Hos. 13 :14, " 0death, I will be thy . plagues ; 0sheol, I will be * thy destruction . "

"Hell" From the Greek word"Hades "

Matt. 11 : 23.—"And t h o u.Caperiiaum, which art exalte dunto heaven, shalt be broughtdown to hell ; " Luke 10 :15 :'"Shall be thrust down to hell . "(In privileges of knowledge an d(opportunity the city was highlyfavored, or, figuratively, "ex-alted unto heaven ;" but becauseof misuse of God 's favors, itwould be debased, or, figurative-ly, cast down to hades, o v e r -thrown, destroyed. It is . now s othoroughly buried in oblivion,that even the site where it stoodis a matter of dispute . Caper -n a u m is certainly destroyed,thrust down to hades . )

Luke 16 :23.—"In h e 1 1 helifted up his eyes, being in tor-ments." (A parabolic figure ex-plained further along, under aseparate heading . )

Rev. 6 : 8 .—"And behold a

pale horse : and his name that sa ton him was Death, and Hell fol-lowed with him." (Symbol of de-struction or the grave . )

Matt . 16 :18.—"Upon this rockI will build my church ;' and thegates 'bf hell shall not prevailagainst 'it . " (Although bitter an drelentless persecution, even unt odeath, should afflict the Churchduring the Gospel age, it shouldnever prevail . to. her utter ex-termination ; and eventually, b yh e r resurrection, accomplishe dby her Lord, the Church willprevail over hades—the tomb. )

Christ in "Hell" (Hades) andResurrected from"Hell "(Hades) .—Acts 2 :1, 14, 22-31 .

"And when the day of Pente-cost was fully come, . . . Peter

. lifted up his voice and said ,. Ye men of Israel, hear thes ewords : Jesus of Nazareth, a ma napproved of God among you, . . .being delivered by the determi-nate counsel and foreknowledg eof God ('He was delivered fo rour offenses'), ye have takenand by wicked hands have cruci-fied and slain : whom God bathraised up, having loosed t h epains (or bands) of death, be -cause it was not possible that h eshould be holden of it (for th eWord of Jehovah had previouslydeclared his resurrection) ; forDavid speaketh concerning hi m(personating or speaking 'f o rhim), `I (Christ) foresaw th eLord (Jehovah) , always befor emy face ; for he is on my righth a n d, that I should not b emoved .

" "Therefore did m y heartrejoice, and my tongue was glad ;moreover also my flesh shall res tin hope, because thou wilt notleave my soul in hell (hades, thethe state of death), neither wil tthou suffer thine Holy One tosee corruption. Thou (Jehovah )hast made known to me (Christ )the ways of life.'" Here ourLord, as personified by the pro-phet David, expresses His faithin Jehovah 's promise of a resur-rection and in the full and glor-ious accomplishment of Jehovah ' s

plan through Him, and rejoicesin the prospect .

Peter then proceeds, saying :" Men and brethren, let me freelyspeak unto you of the patriarc hDavid, that he is both dead andburied, and his sepulcher is wit hus unto this day (so that thisprophecy could not have referredto himself personally ; becauseDavid's soul was left in "hell'"—the tomb) . Therefore, being aprophet, and knowing that Go dhad sworn with an oath to him ,that of the fruit of his loinsaccording to the flesh, He woul draise up Christ to sit on hi sthrone ; he, seeing this before(prophetically) spake of the res-urrection of Christ (out o fhades, the tomb), that His sou lwas not left in hell neither didHis flesh see corruption . "

Thus Peter presents a strongargument, based on the wordsof the prophet David—showingfirst, that Christ, who was deliv-ered by God for our offenses,went to "hell," the grave, thecondition of death, destruction(Psa. 16 :10) ; and, second, thataccording to promise He hadbeen delivered from hell, t h egrave, death, destruction, by aresurrection—a raising up t olife ; being created again, thesame identical being, yet mor eglorious, and exalted even to"the express image of the Fa-ther's person ." (Heb . 1 :3) Andnow . "this same Jesus" ,(Acts 2 :36), in his subsequent revelationto the Church, declares

Rev. 1 : 18 .—" I am he that liv-eth, and was dead, and behold, Iam alive forevermore, A m e n ;and have the keys of hell (hades,the grave) and of death. "

Amen ! Amen! our hearts re-spond ; for in His resurrection w esee the glorious outcome of th ewhole plan of Jehovah to be accomplished through the power ofthe Resurrected One who no wholds the keys of the tomb an dof death and in due time will re -lease all the prisoners who are,therefore, called the "prisonersof hope." (Zech. 9 :12 ; Luke 4 :18.) No craft or cunning can byany possible device wrest these

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Scriptures entire and p e r v e r tthem to the support of that mon-strous and blasphemous Papaltradition of eternal torment . Hadthat been our penalty, Christ, tobe our vicarious sacrifice, muststill, and to all eternity, endur esuch torment, which no one willclaim. But death was our penal-ty, and "Christ died for oursins," and "also for the sins ofthe whole world."—1 Cor. 15 :3 ;1 John 2 : 2 .

Rev. 20 : 13, 14.—"And the seagave up the dead which were i nit ; and death and h e l l (t h egrave) delivered up the d e a dwhich were in them : and theywere judged, every man, accord-ing to their works . And deathand hell (the grave) were cas tinto the lake of fire : this is theSecond Death ." (The lake of fireis the symbol of final and ever-lasting destruction. Death a n Ahell (the grave) both go into it .There shall be no more death ;" the last enemy that shall be de-stroyed is death . "—1 Cor. 15 :26 ; Rev. 21 :4. )

Other Occurrences of the Word"Hell "

Having examined the w o r dsheol, the only word in the OldTestament rendered "hell," andthe word hades, most frequentlyin the New Testament rendere d"hell," we now notice every re-maining instance in Scripture o fthe English word "hell." In theNew Testament two other word sare rendered "hell ;" namely, ge-henna and tartaroo, which wewill consider in the order named.

"Gehenna" Rendered "Hell "

This word occurs in the fol-lowing passages—in all twelvetimes :—Matt . 5 : 22, 29, 30 10 :28 ; 18 :9 ; 23 :15, 33 ; Mark 9 : 43-47 ; Luke 12 :5 ; Jas. 3 : 6. It isthe Grecian mode of spelling th eHebrew words which are trans-lated "Valley of Hinnom." Thisvalley lay just outside the cityof Jerusalem, and served thepurpose of sewer and garbageburner to the city. The offal, gar-

(bage, etc., were emptied there ,and fires were kept continuallyburning to consume utterly all ,things deposited therein, brim -stone being added to assist com-bustion and insure complete de-struction. But no living thing wasever permitted to be cast into ,Gehenna. The Jews were no tallowed to torture any creature .

When we consider that i,' thepeople of Israel God was givingus object lessons illustrating hisdealings and plans, present an dfuture, we should expect that

Gehenna-the Valley of Hinnom ,

this Valley of Hinnom, or Gehen-na, would also play its part inillustrating things f u t u r e . Weknow that Israel's priesthoo dand temple illustrated the Roy-a 1 Priesthood, t h e Christia nChurch as it will be, the templeof God ; and we know, that theirchief city was a figure of theNew Jerusalem, the seat of king-dom power and regal authority—the city (government) of theGreat King, Immanuel .

Remember, too, Christ 's gov-ernment is represented in th ebook of Revelation (Rev. 21 :10-27) under the figure of a cit y—the New Jerusalem . There ,after describing the class permit-ted to enter the privileges andblessings of that Kingdom—thehonorable and glorious, and al lwho have right to the trees o flife—we find it also declare dthat there shall not enter into it

anything that defileth, or thatwerketh abomination, or maketha lie ; but only such as the lam bshall write as worthy of life .

This city, which thus will rep-resent the entire saved world inthe end of the Millennium, wa stypified in the earthly city, Je-rusalem ; and the defiling, theabominable, etc .,, the class un-worthy of life everlasting, who-do not enter in, were represente dby the refuse and the filthy, life-less carcasses cast into Gehennaoutside the city—whose utter de -

Symbol of the Second Death.

struction was thus symbolized—Senond Death . Accordingly, we.find it stated that those no tfound worthy of life are to b ecast into the "lake, of fire" . (Rev.20 :15)—fire here, as everywhere, .being used as a symbol, and th elake of fire being from this sam eplace of destruction, Gehenna .

Therefore, while Gehenna serv-ed - a useful purpose to the cityof Jerusalem as a place for gar-page burning, it, like the city it-self, was typical, and illustratedthe future dealings of God in re -fusing and committing to de-struction all the impure elementsthus preventing them from de-filing the holy city, the NewJerusalem, after the trial of theMillennial age of judgment shal lhave fully proved them and sep-arated with unerring accurac ythe "sheep" from the "goats."'

So, then, Gehenna was a type

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or illustration of the S e c o n dDeath—final and complete de-struction, from which there canhe no recovery ; for after that,"there remaineth no more sacri-flee for sins," but only "fiery in-dignation which shall d e v o u rt h e adversaries ."—Heb. 10 :26.

Let us remember that Israel,.for the purpose of being used astypes of God's future dealin gwith the race, was typicallytreated as though the ransomhad been given before they leftEgypt, though only a typicallamb had been slain. When Jer-usalem was built, and. the Tem-ple-representative of the tru etemple, the Church, and the tru ekingdom as it will be establishe dby Christ in the Millennium—that people typified the world inthe Millennial age . Their priestsrepresented the glorified RoyalPriesthood, and their Law andits demands of perfect obedienc erepresented the law and condi-tions under the New Covenant,to be brought into operation forthe blessing of all the obedient,-and for the condemnation of al lwho, when granted fullest op-portunity, will not heartily sub-mit to the righteous ruling andlaws of the Great King.

Seeing then, that Israel 's poli-ty, its condition, etc., prefigured,those of the world in the comin g-a g e, how appropriate that weshould' find the valley or abyss,Gehenna, a figure of the Secon dDeath, the utter destruction inthe coining age of all that is un-worthy of preservation ; and how-aptly, too, is the symbol, "lakeof fire burning with brimstone "(Rev. 19 :20), drawn from thi ssame Gehenna, or Valley of Hin-nom, burning continually wit hbrimstone. The e x p r e s s i o n ,"burning with brimstone," adds_force to the symbol, "fire," to-express the utter and irrevocabledestructiveness of the S e c o n dDeath ; for burning brimstone isthe most deadly agent known.

How reasonable, too, to expec tthat Israel would have courtsand judges resembling or pre-figuring the judgments of -th enext age ; and that the sentence

of those (figurative) courts ofthat (figurative) people underthose (figurative) laws to that(figurative) abyss, outside that(figurative) city, would largel ycorrespond to the (real) sen-tences of the (real) court an djudges in the next age. If thesepoints are kept in mind, theywill greatly assist us in under -standing the words of our Lor din reference to Gehenna; forthough the literal valley just athand was named and referredto, yet His words carry with themlessons concerning the f u t u r eage and the antitypical Gehenn a—the Second Death .

Shall Be In Danger of GehennaMatthew 5 :21,22,27-29.

"Ye have heard that it wassaid by them of old time, ` Thoushalt not kill ; and whosoevershall kill shall be amenable t othe judges :' but I say unto you,that whosoever is angry with hi sbrother without a cause shall(future—under the regulationsor the real Kingdom) be amen-ab:e to the judges ; and whoso-ever shall say to his brother ,`Baca' (villain), shall be in dan-ger of the high council ; but who-soever shall say, `Thou f o o l, 'shall be in danger of hell (Ge-henna) fire ."

To understand these r e f e r-ences to council and judges an dGehenna, all should know some-thing of Jewish regulations . The"Court of Judges" consisted ofseven men (or twenty-three, —the number is in dispute), an dhad power to judge some classesof crimes . The High Council, orSahendrin, consisted of seventy -one men of recognized learnin gand ability. This constituted the'highest court of the Jews, andits supervision was over t h egravest offences . The most seri-ous sentence was death ; butcertain very obnoxious criminalswere subjected to an indignityafter death, being refused burialand cast with the carcasses ofdogs, the city refuse, etc ., intoGehenna, there to be consumed.

The object of this burning i nGehenna was to make the crime

and the criminal detestable inthe eyes of the people, and signi-fied that the culprit was a hope -less case . It must be remembere dthat Israel hoped for a resurrec-tion from the tomb, and henc ethey were particular in caringfor the corpses of their dead .

Not realizing fully God's power,they apparently thought this : Heneeded their assistance to thatextent. (Exod. 13 :19 ; Heb. 11 :22 ; Acts 7 :15,16.) Hence thedestruction of the body in Ge-henna after death (figurative-ly) implied the loss of hope offuture life by a resurrection.Thus to such Gehenna repre-sented the Second Death, in th esame figurative way that theyas a people represented or illus-trated a future order of thingsunder the New Covenant.

"Ye have heard," etc ., "but Isay unto you . . it is better forthee to lose one of thy membersthan that the whole body shoul dbe cast into Gehenna."—Matt . 5 .

Here again the operation ofGod's Law under the New Cove-nant is contrasted with its oper-ation under the Old J e w i s hCovenant, and the lesson of self-control is urged by the statementthat it is far more profitable tha tmen should refuse to gratify de-praved desires (though they bedear to them as a right eye, andapparently as indispensable as aright hand) than that the yshould gratify these, and lose, i nthe Second Death, the f u t u r elife provided through the atone-ment for all who will return toperfection, holiness and God .

Able to Destroy Both Soul andBody in Gehenna

"Fear not them which kill thebody, but are not able to kill thesoul : but rather fear him whic his able to destroy both soul andbody in hell (Gehenna) ." See al -so another account of the samediscourse by Luke—12 : 4, 5 .

Here our Lord pointed out toHis followers the great reasonthey had for courage a n dbravery under the most tryingcircumstances . They were to ex-

20

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pect persecution, and to have al lmanner of evil spoken againstthem falsely, for His sake, andfor the sake of the " good tid-ings " of which he made them theministers and heralds ; yea, th etime would come, that whosoeverwould kill them would think thathe did God a service . Their con-solation or reward for this wa sto be received, not in the presen tlife, but in the life to come .

Assurance w a s given the mthat He had come to give His lif ea ransom for many, and that allin their graves must in conse-quence, in due time, hear th eDeliverer's voice and come forth ,either to reward (if their trialhad been passed in this life suc-cessfully), future trial, or judg-ment, as must be the case withthe great majority who do not ,in this present life, come to th enecessary knowledge and oppor-tunity essential to a complet etrial .

Undying Worms and QuenchlessFiresMatthew "18 : 8, 9 ; Mark 9 : 43-48

Here it is conclusively shownthat Gehenna as a figure repre-sented the Second Death—t h eutter destruction which must en-sue in the case of all who, afterhaving fully received the oppor-tunities of a future being or ex-istence through our Lord's sac-rifice, prove t h e in selves un-worthy of God's gift, and refuseto accept it, by refusing obedi-ence to His just requirements .For it does not say that God wil lpreserve soul or body in Gehen-na, but that in it He can and wil l" d e s t r o y" both. Thus we aretaught that any who are con .-demned to the Second death ar ehope lessly and forever blotte dout of existence .

(Since these two passages re-fer to the same discourse, wequote from Mark—r e m a r k in gthat verses 44 and 46, and partof 45, are not found in the oldestGreek MSS., though verse 48 ,which reads the same, is in al lmanuscripts . We quote the textas found in these ancient andreliable MSS.) "If thy h a n d

offend thee, cut it off ; it is bet-ter for thee to enter into lifemaimed, than having two handsto go into Gehenna, into the firethat never shall be quenched .And if thy foot offend thee, cu tit off : it is better for thee to en -ter halt into life, than havingtwo feet to be cast into Gehenna.And if thine eye offend thee ,pluck it out : it is better for the eto enter into the Kingdom ofGod with one eye than havingtwo eyes to be cast into Gehenna,where the worm dies not and th efire is not quenched ."

After reading the above, allmust agree with the prophet thatour Lord opened His mouth i nfigures and obscure saying s .(Psa. 78 : 2 ; Matt. 13 : 35) No on efor a moment supposes that ou rLord advised the people to muti-late their bodies .by cutting offtheir limbs, or gouging out theireyes: Nor does He wish us to un-derstand that the injuries an ddisfigurements of the p r e s e n tl i f e will continue beyond thegrave, when we shall "enter intolife ." The Jews, whom the Lordaddressed, having no conceptio nof a place of everlasting torment ,and who knew the word Gehen-na to refer to the valley outsidetheir city, which was not a plac eof torment, nor a place whereany living thing was cast, ,but aplace for the utter destructionof whatever might be cast int oit, recognizing the Lord 's ex-pression regarding limbs a n deyes to be figurative, knew tha tGehenna also was used in th esame figurative sense,_ to symbol-ize utter destruction .

Preaching in Parable s

The Lord meant simply this :The future life, which God hasprovided for redeemed man, isof inestimable value, and it wil lrichly pay you to make any sac-rifice to receive and enjoy thatlife. Should it even cost an eye ,a hand or a foot, so that to al leternity you would be obliged t oendure the loss of these, yet lif ewould be cheap at even such acost. That would be better farthan to retain your members and

lose all in Gehenna . Doubtless ,too, the hearers drew the lessonas applicable to all the affairs o flife, and understood the Masterto mean that it would richly re-pay them to deny t h e mselvesmany comforts, pleasures a n d

• tastes, dear to them as a righthand, precious as an eye, andserviceable as a foot, rather thanby- gratification to forfeit th elife to-come and be utterly de-stroyed in Gehenna—the SecondDeath .

But what about the undyin gworms and the unquenchabl efire ?

We answer, In the literal Ge-henna, which is the basis of ou rLord 's illustration, the bodies ofanimals, etc ., frequently fell up -on , ledges of rocks and not intothe fire kept burning b e 1 o w .Thus exposed, these would bree dworms and be destroyed by them ,as completely and as surely as.those which burned . No one wasallowed to disturb the . content sof this valley ; hence the wormand the fire together complete dthe work of destruction—t h efire was not quenched and th eworms died not .

This Scripture text would notInfer that in Gehenna there ar eeverlasting worms. The thoughtis that the worms did not die offand leave the carcasses there ,but continued and completed th ework of destruction . So with thef i r e : it was not quenched, itburned on until all was con-sumed. Just so if a house wereablaze and the fire could not hecontro11ed or quenched, bu tburned' until the building wasdestroyed, we might properl ycall i -t an unquenchable fire .

Our Lord wished to impressthe thought of the completenes sand finality of the Second Death ,symbolized in Gehenna . All whogo into the Second' Death will b ethoroughly and completely an dforever destroyed ; no r a n s o mwill ever again be given for any(Rom. 6 :9) ; for none worthy o flife will be cast into the SecondDeath, or lake of fire, but onl ythose who love unrighteousness.

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21

after coming to the knowledgeof the truth .

Not only in the above instance sis the Second Death pointedly il-lustrated by Gehenna, but it i sevident that the same Teache rused the same figure to represen tthe same thing in the symbols ofRevelation,though there it i snot called Gehenna, but trans-lated "lake of fire . "

The same valley was once be-fore used as the basis of a dis-course — by the Prophet Isaiah .(Isa. 66 :24) Though he gives i tno name, he describes it ; and allshould notice that he speaks, no tas some with false ideas migh texpect, of billions alive in flame sand torture, but of the carcasse sof those who transgressed agains tthe Lord, who are thus repre-sented as utterly destroyed in theSecond Death .

The two preceding verses sho wthe time when this prophecy wil lbe fulfilled, and it is in perfectharmony with the symbols ofRevelation : it appertains to thenew dispensation, the M i l l e n-nium, the "new heavens and ne wearth" condition of things . Thenall the righteous will see t h ejustice as well as the wisdom o fthe utter destruction of the in -corrigible, wilful enemies ofrighteousness, as it is written :" They shall be an abhorring un-to all flesh . "

Matthew 23 :15, 33

The class here addressed wasn o t the heathen who had noknowledge of the truth, nor th elowest and most ignorant of theJewish nation, but the Scribesand Pharisees, outwardly th emost religious, and the leadersand teachers of the people. Tothese our Lord said, "How canye escape the judgment of Ge-henna?" These men were hypo-critical : they were not true totheir convictions. Abundant testi-mony of the truth had beenborne to them, but they refuse dto accept it, and endeavored tocounteract its influence and t odiscourage the people from ac-cepting it . And in thus resisting

the holy spirit of light andtruth, they were hardening theirhearts against the very agencywhich God designed for theirb 1 e s s i n g. Hence they werewickedly resisting His grace, an dsuch a course, if pursued, mus teventually end in condemnationto the Second Death, Gehenna .

Every step in the direction ofwilful blindness and oppositionto the truth makes return mor edifficult, and makes the wrong-doer more and more of the char-acter which God abhors, a n dwhich the Second Death is in -tended to utterly destroy . TheScribes and Pharisees were pro-gressing rapidly in that course ;hence the warning inquiry of ourLord, "How can ye escape? "etc. The sense is this,-Althoughyou boast of your piety, you willsurely be destroyed in Gehenna,unless you change your course .

Set On Fire of Gehenn aJames 3 : 6

" So `(important) is the tongueamong our members, that it de -Meth the whole body, and settethon fire the course of nature, and(or when) it is set on fire of Ge-

henna. "Here, in strong, symbolic lang-

uage, the Apostle points out th egreat and bad influence of an eviltongue—a tongue set on fire (fig-uratively) o f Gehenna (figura-tively) . For a tongue to be se ton fire of Gehenna signifies thatit is set going in evil by a per -verse disposition, self-willed, self-ish, hateful, malicious, the sor tof disposition which,' in spite ofknowledge and opportunity

, l e ss e s s controlled and reformed ,will be counted worthy to be de-stroyed—the class for whom the"Second Death," the real "lak eof fire," Gehenna, is intented .

Anyone in that attitude ma yby his tongue kindle a great fire, ,a destructive disturbance, which ,wherever it has contact, w i l lwork evil in the entire course ofnature. A few malicious wordsoften arouse all the evil passion sof the speaker, engender t h e

same in others and react upo nthe first . And continuance in suchan evil course finally corruptsthe entire man, and brings himunder sentence as utterly un-worthy of life .

"Tartaroo" Rendered "Hell"

The Greek word tartaroo oc-curs but once in the Scriptures,and is translated hell. It is foundin 2 Pet. 2 :4, which reads thus :

" God spared not the angelswho sinned, but cast (t h e m )down to hell (tartaroo), and de -livered them into chains of dark-ness, to be reserved unto judg-ment ."

Having examined all o t h e rwords rendered "hell," in theBible, and all the texts in whichthey occur, we conclude the ex-amination with this text, whic his the only one in which the wordtartaroo occurs . In the a .b o v equotation, all the words show nin bold, type are translated fromthe one Greek word tartaroo .Evidently the translators wer eat a loss to know how to trans -1 a t e the word, but conclude dthey knew where the evil angelsought to be, and so they madebold to put them into "hell, "though it took six words to twistthe idea into the shape they hadpre-determined it must take .

The word tartaroo, used byPeter, very closely resembles tar-tarns, a word used in Grecianmythology as the name for adark abyss or prison . But tartarroo_seems to refer more to anact than to a place . The fall o fthe angels who sinned was fromhonor and dignity, into dishonorand condemnation, and t h ethought seems to be — " Godspared not the angels who sinne dbut degraded them, and delivere dthem into chains of darkness" .

This certainly agrees with th efacts known to us through othe rScriptures ; for these fallen spir-its frequented the earth in th edays of our Lord "and the A-postles . Hence they were notdown in some place, but "down "in the sense of being degrade dfrom former honor and liberty,

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and restrained under darkness ,as by a chain. Whenever thes efallen spirits, in spiritualisti cseances, manifest their powersthrough mediums, pretending tobe certain dead human beings,they must always d'o their workin the dark, because darkness isthe chain by which they arebound until the great Millennialday of judgment . Whether thisimplies that in the immediate fu-ture they will be able to mater-ialize in daylight is difficult t odetermine . If so, it would great-ly increase Satan's power t oblind and deceive for a. shortseason—until the Sun of Right-eousness has fully risen a n dSatan is fully bound .

Thus we close our investiga-tion of the Bible use of the wor d"hell." Thank God, we find nosuch place of everlasting tor-ture as the creeds and hymn -books, and many pulpits erron-

Luke

T HE principal difficulty withmany who read this account

is that, though they regard it a sa parable, they reason on it, an ddraw conclusions from it, asthough it were a literal state-ment. But to regard it as suchinvolves several absurdities ; forinstance, that the rich man wentto hell because he had enjoye dmany earthly blessings and gavenothing but crumbs to Lazarus .Not a word is said about hiswickedness . Again, Lazarus wa sblessed, not because he was asincere child of God, full of fait hand trust ; not because he wasgood, but simply because he waspoor and sick .

Now if this parable be inter-preted literally, the only logicallesson to be drawn from it is ,that unless we are poor beggar sfull of sores, we will never enterinto future bliss ; and that if wewear any fine linen and purple,and have plenty to eat everyday, we are sure of future tor-ment. Again, the coveted place

eously teach. Yet we have founda "hell," sheol, hades, to whic hall our race were condemned o naccount of Adam 's sin, and fromwhich all are redeemed by ourLord's death ; and that hell isthe tomb—the death condition .

And we found another "hell" –brought to our attention as thefinal penalty upon all who, afterbeing redeemed and brought t othe full knowledge of the truth,and to full ability to obey it ,shall yet choose death by choos-ing a course of opposition toGod and righteousness . And tothis our hearts can say, Amen !True and righteous are thy waysthou King of nations ! Who shal lvenerate thee, 0 Lord, and glor-ify thy 'name ? For thou art en-tirely holy. And all nations shallcome and worship before thee,when all thy righteous waysare made manifest .—Rev. 15 :3,4.

Bosom .16 :19-3 1

of favor is "Abraham's bosom ; "and if the whole statement b eliteral, the bosom must also b eliteral, and it surely would no thold very many of earth's mil-lions of sick and poor .

But why consider absurdities ?As a parable it is easy of inter-pretation. In a parable the thin gsaid is never the thing meant .We know this from our Lord'sown explanations of His ow nparables . When He said "wheat, "He meant "children of the King-dom ;" when He said "tares,"He meant "the children of theDevil ;" when He said " reapers "His servants in the end of th eage were signified . The sameclasses were represented by diff-erent symbols in different par-ables. Thus the wheat of one par -able corresponds to the "faith-ful servants," and the "wise vir-gins" of others . So, in this par -able, the "rich man" represent sa class, and Lazarus representsanother class .

In attempting to expound a

parable such as this, an expla-nation of which the Lord doe snot furnish us, modesty in ex-pressing our opinion regarding iti s certainly appropriate. Wetherefore offer the following ex-planation without any attemp tto force our view upon the read-er, except so far as his owntruth-enlightened judgment maycommend it as in accord withGod's Word and plan . To ourunderstanding, Abraham repre-sented God, and the "rich man "represented the Jewish nation .

At the time of the utterance o fthe parable, and for a long timepreviously, the Jews had "fare dsumptuously every day"—bein gthe special recipients of God'sfavors. As Paul says : " What ad-vantage, then, hath the Jew ?Much every way : chiefly, be-cause to them were committedthe oracles of God (Law an dProphecy ) ." The promises t oAbraham and David, and theirorganization as a typical King-dom of God, invested that peo-ple with royalty, as represente dby the rich man's "purple ." Thetypical sacrifices of the Law con-stituted them, in a typical sense ,

`a holy nation, represented b ythe rich man's " fine linen,"—symbolic of righteousness .

Lazarus represented the out-casts from divine favor unde r

-t=he Law, who, sin-sick, hungere dand thirsted after righteousness ."Publicans and sinners" of Is-rael, seeking a better life, andtruth-hungry Gentiles who were"feeling after God," constitutedthe Lazarus class . These, at thetime of the utterance of thisparable, were entirely destituteof those special divine bless-ings which Israel enjoyed . Theylay- at the gate of the rich man .No rich promises: of royalty wer etheirs ; not even typically wer ethey cleansed ; but, in moral sickness, pollution and sin, they werecompanions of "dogs ." Dogs, inthose days, even as today, weresymbolical of detestabl ecreatures, andthetyp-ically clean Jew cared the out-siders "heathen" and "dogs, "and would never eat with them ,nor marry, nor have any deal -

The Rich Man in 'HellLazarus in Abraham's

THE DAWN

2 3

ings at all with them.—John 4 :9 .As to how these ate of the

" crumbs" of divine favor whic hfell from Israel's table of boun-ties, the Lord's words to theSyro-Phoenician woman give u sa key. He said to this Gentil ewoman—"It is not meet (prop-er) to take the children's (Is-raelites') bread and to cast it t odogs (Gentiles) ;" and she an-swered, "Truth, Lord, but th edogs eat of the crumbs that fallfrom their master 's table ." (Matt .15 :26, 27) Jesus healed herdaughter, thus giving the de -sired crumb of favor .

The "Rich Man" diesSo Does the "Beggar"

But there came a great dispen-sational change in Israel's his-tory when as a nation they re-jected and crucified the Son o fGod. Then their typical right-eousness ceased—then the prom-ise of royalty ceased to be theirs,and the kingdom was taken fromthem to be given to a nationbringing forth the fruits there-of—the Gospel Church, "a holynation, a peculiar people ." (Titus2 :14 ; 1 Pet. 2 :7, 9 ; Matt. 21 :43) Thus the "rich man" diedto all these special advantages ,and soon he (the Jewish nation )found himself in a east-off con-dition,—in tribulation and afflic-tion. In such condition that na-tion has suffered from that dayto this .

Lazarus also died : the condi-tion of the humble Gentiles an dthe God-seeking " outcasts" of Is-rael underwent a great change ,being carried by the angels (mes-sengers—apostles, etc .) to Abra-ham 's bosom. Abraham is rep-resented as the father of t h efaithful, and receives all the chil-dren of faith, who are thus rec-ognized' as the heirs of all thepromises made to Abraham ; forthe children of the flesh are notthe children of God, "but thec h i l d r en of the promise ar ecounted for the seed" (childrenof Abraham) ; "which seed isChrist ;"—and "if ye be Christ' s ,then are ye (believers) Abra-ham's seed (children), and heirs

according to the (Abrahamic )promise ."—Gal. 3 :29 .

Yes, the termination of t h econdition of things then existin gwas well illustrated by the fig-ure, death—the dissolution of theJewish polity and the w i t h-drawal of the favors which Is-rael had so long enjoyed . Therethey were cast off and havesince been shown "no favor, "while the poor Gentiles, who be -fore had been "aliens from th ecommonwealth (the polity) o fIsrael and strangers from thecovenant of promise (up to thi stime given to Israel only) havingno hope and without God in th eworld," were then "made nig hby the blood of Christ" an dreconciled to God.—Eph. 2 :12 ,13.

In Hell He Lifted Up His Eyes

To the symbolisms of deathand' burial used to illustrate thedissolution of . Israel and theirburial or hiding among the othernations, our Lord added a fur-ther figure—"In hell (hades, thegrave) he lifted up his eyes, be-ing in torments, and seeth Abra-ham afar off," etc. The deadcannot lift up their eyes, nor se eeither near or far, nor converse ;for it is distinctly stated, "Ther eis no work, nor device, n o rknowledge, nor wisdom, in th egrave ; " and the dead are de-scribed as those who "go dow ninto silence. " (Eccl. 9 :10 ; Psa .115 :17) But the Lord wished toshow that great sufferings or" torments'' would be added tothe Jews as a nation after thei rnational dissolution and burialamongst the other peoples deadin trespasses and sins ; and thatthey would plead in vain for re -lease and comfort at the hand o fthe formerly despised Lazarusclass .

And history has borne out thisparabolic prophecy. F o r eigh-teen hundred years the Jews hav enot only been in distress of mindover their casting out from thefavor of God and the loss o ftheir temple and other necessa-ries to the offering of their sacri-fices, but they have been relent -

lessly persecuted by all classes ,including professed Christians .

It was from the latter that theJews have expected mercy, a sexpressed in the parable—"SendLazarus, that he may dip the ti pof his finger in water and coolmy tongue ;" but the great gulffixed between them hinders that .Nevertheless, God still r e c o g-nizes the relationship establishedin His covenant with them, an daddresses them as children of th ecovenant. (Verse 25) These "tor-ments" have been the penaltiesattached to the violation of theircovenant, and were as certain tobe visited upon them as t'h eblessings promised for obedience .—See Lev. 26.

The "Great Gulf"The "great gulf fixed" repre-

sents the wide difference be-tween the -Gospel Church andthe Jew—the former enjoyin gfree grace, joy, comfort andpeace, as true sons of God, andthe latter holding to the Law,which condemns and torments .Prejudice, pride and error, fro mthe Jewish side, form the bul-warks of this gulf which hinde rthe Jew from coming into thecondition of true sons of God byaccepting Christ and the gospe lof His grace . The bulwark o fthis gulf which hinders true son sof God from going to the Jew-under the bondage of the Law—is their knowledge that by thedeeds of the Law none can b ejustified before God, and that i fany man keep the Law (put him-self under it to try to commendhimself to God by reason ofobedience to it), Christ s h a l lprofit him nothing . (Gal. 5 :2-4 )

So then, we who are of the Laz-arus class should not attempt tomix the Law and the Gospel ,knowing that they cannot b emixed, and that we can do n ogood to those who still cling t othe Law and reject the sacrificefor sins given by our Lord . Andthey, not seeing the change o fdispensation which took place ,argue that to deny the Law asthe power to save would be todeny all the past history of theirrace, and to deny all of God's

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.special dealings with the " fa-thers," (promises and dealing swhich through pride and selfish-ness they failed rightly to appre-hend and use) ; hence they can -not come over to the bosom o fAbraham, into the true rest andpeace—the portion of all t h etrue children of faith.—John 8 :39 ; Rom. 4 : 16 ; Gal . 3 : 29 .

True, a few Jews probablycame into the Christian faith al lthe way down the Gospel age ,but so few as to be ignored' in a'parable which represented theJewish people as a whole. As atthe first, Dives represented th eorthodox Jews, and not the "out-casts of Israel," so down to th eclose of the parable he continue sto represent a similar class, andhence does not represent suchJews as have renounced the LawCovenant and embraced the Ne wCovenant, or such as have be-come infidels .Dives' Five Brethren

The plea of the "rich man "for the sending of "Lazarus" t ohis five brethren we interpret asfollows :

The people of Judea, at th etime of our Lord 's utterance ofthis parable, were repeatedly re-ferred to as " Israel,'' "the lostsheep of the house of Israel, "" cities of Israel," etc ., becaus eall of the tribes were represente dthere; but actually the majorit yof the people were of the tw otribes, Judah and Benjamin, butfew of the ten tribes having re -turned from Babylon under Cy-rus' general permission . If thenation of the Jews (chiefly twotribes) were represented in th eone "rich man," it would be aharmony of numbers to under-stand the " five brethren" to rep -resent the ten tribes chiefly scat-tered abroad .

The rich man's request rela-tive to them was doubtless intro-duced to show that all specialfavor of God ceased to all Israel(the ten tribes, as well as to th etwo more directly addressed) . I tseems to us evident that Israe lonly was meant, for no other na-tion than Israel had "Moses an dthe prophets " as instructors.

(Verse 29) The majority of th eten tribes had so far disregardedMoses and the prophets that theydid not return to the land o fpromise, but preferred to • dwellamong idolaters ; and hence i twould be useless to attempt fur-ther communication with them ,even by one from the dead—th efiguratively dead, but now fig-uratively risen, Lazarus class .—Eph. 2 : 5 .

Though the parable mentionsno bridging of this " great gulf,"other portions of Scripture indi-cate that it was to be " fixed "only throughout the Gospel , age ,and that at its close the "ric hman," having received the meas-urement of punishment for hissins, will walk out of his fier ytroubles over the bridge of God'spromises yet unfulfilled to tha tnation.A Dawn For Israe l

And For All MankindThough for centuries the Jews

have been bitterly persecuted bypagans, Mohammedans and pro-fessed Christians, they are nowgradually rising to political free-dom and influence ; and althoughmuch of "Jacob's trouble" isjust at hand, yet as a peoplethey will be very prominentamong the nations in the begin -n i n g of the Millennium . The"vail" (2 Cor. 3 :13-16) of prej-udice still exists, but it will b egradually taken away as thelight of the Millennial mornin gdawns ; nor should we be sur-prised to hear of great awaken-ings among the Jews, and manycoming to acknowledge Christ .

They will thus leave the hadeanstate (national death) and tor-ment, and` come, the first of thenations, to be blessed by thetrue seed of Abraham, which i sChrist, Head and body . Theirbulwark of race prejudice andpride is falling in some places ,and the humble, the poor i nspirit, are beginning already t oinquire, Is not this the Christ ?And as they look the Lord poursupon them the spirit of favo rand supplication . (Zech. 12 :10 . )Therefore, "Speak ye comfort-ably to Jerusalem, and cry unto

her that her appointed time is,accomplished ."—Isa. 40 :1, 2 .

In a word, this parable seemsto teach precisely what Paul ex-plained in Romans 11:19-30 . Be -cause of unbelief the natura lbranches were' broken off, andthe wild branches grafted int othe Abrahamic root-promise .

The parable leaves the Jew sin their trouble, and does notrefer to their final restoration tofavor—doubtless because it wasnot pertinent to the feature ofthe subject treated ; but Paul as-suresus that when the fulnessof the Gentiles—the full numberfrom among the Gentiles neces-sary to make up the bride o fChrist—is come in . "they (nat-ural Israel) shall obtain mercythrough your (the Church 's)mercy . "

He thus assures us that thisis God's covenant with fleshl yIsrael (who lost the higher ,spiritual promises, but are stillthe possessors of certain earthlypromises), to become the chie fnation of earth, etc . In proof o fthis statement, he quotes fromthe prophets, saying : "The de-liverer shall come out of Zio n(i . e . the glorified Church), andfrom Jacob (the fleshly seed) . ""As concerning the Gospel (highcalling), they are enemies (castoff) for your sakes ; but as touch-ing the election, they_ are belove dfor the fathers ' sake." "For Godhath concluded them all in un-belief, that He might have mercyupon all . 0 the depth of the rich-es both of the wisdom and knowl-edge of God ! "—Roma 11 :26-33 . -

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the Millennial reign the decisionof some individual cases will b ereached long before the end ofthe age (Isa . 65 : 20) ; but in eachage there is a "harvest" or gen-eral separating time in the endof the age.

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EVERLASTING PUNISHMEN T

The "Sheep and Goat" Parableof Jesus Considere d

"These shall go away into everlasting punishment, b u t

righteous into life eternal ."— Matthew 25 : 31-46 .

th e

WHILE the Scriptures, as w ehave shown, do not teach

t h e blasphemous doctrine ofeverlasting torment, they d omost emphatically teach theeverlasting punishment of t h ewicked, the class represented inthe parable as "goats ." Let usexamine the parable, and thenthe sentence pronounced at itsclose .

It has been truly said that" Order is Heaven 's first law ;"yet few, we think, have realize dhow emphatically this is true . Inglancing back over the plan o fthe ages, there is nothing whic hgives such conclusive evidence ofa Divine Director as the orderobserved in all its parts.

God has had definite a n dstated times and seasons forevery part of His work ; and inthe end of each of these season sthere has been a finishing -up ofits work and a clearing off of therubbish, preparatory to the be-ginning of the new work of thedispensation to follow. Thus inthe end of the Jewish age orderis observed—a harvesting andc o m p l e t e separation of the"wheat " class from the " chaff,"and an entire rejection of thelatter class from God's favor .

With the few judged worthy in.the end of that age, a new age—the Gospel age—began . And nowwe find ourselves amidst t h eclosing scenes, the "harvest," o fthis age : the "wheat'' and th e"tares" which have grown to-gether during this age are bein gseparated. With the former class ,of which our Lord Jesus is theHead, a new age is about to beinaugurated, and these "wheat "are to reign as kings and priests

in that new dispensation, whil ethe "tare" element is judged asutterly unworthy of that favor.

While observing this o r d e rwith reference to the Jewish ag eand the one just closing, ourLord informs us through theparable under consideration tha tthe same order will be observe dwith reference to the age to fol-low this Gospel age .

The harvest of the Jewish agewas likened to the separation ofwheat from chaff ; the harvest o fthis age to the separation o fwheat from tares ; and the harv-est of the Millennial age to theseparation of sheep from goats .

Application Still FutureBut Now, Very Near

That the parable of the shee pand the goats refers to the Mil-lennial age is clearly indicate din verses 31 and 32—" When theson of man shall come in hi sglory, and all the holy angel swith him, then shall he sit uponthe throne of his glory, and be-fore him shall be gathered all na-tions ; and he shall separate the mone from another, as a shepherdd i v i d e t h his sheep from th egoats ."

As in the present Gospel ag eevery act of those on trial (th eChurch) goes to make a part o fthat character which, in du etime, will determine the final de-cision of the Judge in our case ,so will it be with the world (th e"nations") in the age to come.As in the present age the trialof the majority of the individualmembers of the Church ends, an dthe decision of their case i sreached, long before the end o fthe age (2 Tim. 4 : 7, 8), so under

Dawn After Darkness

In the dawn of the Millennialage, after the "time of trouble, "there will be a gathering of th eliving nations before Christ, and, .in their appointed time and or-der, the dead of all nations shallbe called to appear before thejudgment seat of Christ—not t oreceive an immediate sentence ,but to receive a fair and impart-ial, individual trial (Ezek . 18 :.24, 19, 20) under the most fav-orable circumstances, the resul tof which trial will be a final sen-tence, as worthy or unworthy o feverlasting life . ,

The scene of this parable,.therefore,- is laid after the timeof trouble, when the nations shal lhave-'been subdued, Satan bound(Rev. 20 : 1, 2) and the authorityof Christ's kingdom established .Ere this, the bride of Christ (theovercoming Church) will h a v ebeen seated with Him in Histhrone of spiritual power an dwill have taken part in execut-ing the judgments of the greatday of wrath . Then the Son ofman and his bride, the glorifie dChurch, will be revealed and b eseen by men, with the. eyes oftheir understanding and s h a 1 1"shine forth as the sun in th ekingdom of 'their Father ."—'Matt. 13 : 43 .

Here is the New Jerusalem a sJohn saw it (Rev. 21), "t h a th o 1 y city (symbol of govern-ment) . . . coming down fromGod out of heaven ." During th etime of trouble it will be comingdown, and before the end of it ,it will have touched the earth .This is the stone cut out of themountains without hands (bu tby the power of God), and it willthen have become a great moun-tain (kingdom), filling the whol eearth (Dan. 2 :35), its cominghaving broken to pieces the evil

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kingdoms of the prince of dark-ness .—Dan. 2 : 34, 35 .

Here is that glorious city(government), prepared as abride adorned for her husband(Rev. 21 :2), and early in thedawn of the Millennium the na-tions will begin to walk in thelight of it . (Verse 24) These maybring their glory and honor int oit, but "there shall in no wis eenter into it (or become a partof it) anything that defileth,"etc. (Verse 27) Here, from th emidst of the throne, proceeds apure river of water of life (truthunmixed with error), and theSpirit and the Bride say, Come ,and take it freely . (Rev. 22 :17)Here begins the world's proba-tion, the world 's great judgmentday—a thousand years .

Two Classes Among Men

But even in this favored tim eof blessing and healing of th enations, when Satan is bound,evil restrained, mankind in pro-cess of release from the grasp ofdeath, and when the knowledgeof the Lord fills the earth, twoclasses will be developed, whichour Lord here likens to sheepand goats. These, He tells us, Hewill separate . The sheep class—those who are meek, teachableand willing to be led, shall, dur-ing the Millennial age, be gath-ered at the Judge's right hand—symbol of His approval and fav-or ; but the goat class, self-willedand stubborn, always climbin gon the rocks—seeking promi-nence and approval among me n—and feeding on miserabe re .fuse, while the sheep graze i nthe rich pastures of the truthfurnished by the Good Shepher d—t h e s e are gathered to th eJudge's left hand, the oppositeof the position of favor—as sub-jects of His disfavor and con-demnation .

This work of separating shee pand goats will require all of theMillennial age for its accom .plishment . During that age, eachindividual, as he comes gradual-ly to a knowledge of God an dHis will, takes his place at th eright hand of favor or the left

hand of disfavor, according as dation of the world ." — Mat.he improves or misimproves the 25 :34 .opportunities of that golden age . It is manifest that the "sheep "By the end of the age, all the here addressed, at the close o fworld of mankind will have ar- the Millennium, are not theranged themselves, as shown in " sheep" of the Gospel Church ,the parable, into two classes.

but those "other sheep" to who mthe Lord referred in John 10 :16 .

Reward and Punishment

And the Kingdom prepared fo r

The end . of that age will be them in the divine plan, fro m

the end of the world's trial or the foundation of the world, is

judgment, and then a final dis- not the Kingdom. prepared for

position will be made of the two the Gospel Church. The Church

classes. The reward of this will receive her Kingdom at the

" sheep class will be granted beginning of the Millennium ;

them because, during the age of but this is the " kingdom pre -trial and discipline, they culti_ pared for the

sheep

of thevoted and manifested the beauti- Millennial age . Their kingdom

ful character of love, which Paul will be the dominion of earthdescribes as fulfilling the law of which was originally given to

God. (Rom. 13 :10.) They will Adam, but which was losthave manifested it to each other through sin, and which is again

in their times of sorest need ; and to be restored when man i swhat they will have done for brought to perfection, and so

one another the Lord will count as fit to receive and enjoy it .as done unto Him, counting them Paradise Restoredall a s His brethren—childrenof God, though they will be of

That dominion will not be athe human nature, while He is of dominion of some of the racethe divine .

over others, but a joint do-The condemnation of t h e minign, in which every man will

"goat " class is shown to be for be a king, and all will have equa lthe lack of this spirit of love . rights and privileges in appro-Under the same favorable cir- priating and enjoying ever ycumstances as the "sheep", they earthly good. It will be a cover-wilfully resist the moulding eign people—a great and gran dinfluence of the Lord 's disci- republic on a basis of perfectpline, and harden their hearts, righteousness, wherein the rightsThe goodness of God does not ef every man will be conserved ;lead them to true repentance ; because the golden rule will h ebut, like Pharaoh, they take ad- inscribed on every heart, an dvantage of His goodness and do every man will love his neighbo revil .

as himself . The dominion of allThe "goats," who will not will be over the whole earth,

have developed the element of and all its rich and bountifullove, the law of God's being and stores of blessing.—Gen. 1 :28.Kingdom, will be counted un- The kingdom of earth to beworthy of everlasting life, and given to the perfected ones o fwill be destroyed ; while the the redeemed race at the close o f"sheep", who will have devel- the millennium, is clearly dis-oped God-likeness (love), and tinguished from all others by b ewho will have exhibited it in their ing called the kingdom prepare dcharacters, are to be installed as for them "from the foundatio nthe subordinate rulers of earth of the world," the earth havin gfor future ages. '

been made to be the everlastin gIn the end of the Millennial home and kingdom of perfec t

age, in the final adjustment of men . But the kingdom bestowe dhuman affairs, Christ thus ad- upon Christ, of which the Churchdresses His sheep : "Come, ye becomes joint-heir, is a spiritua lblessed . . . . inherit the Kingdom kingdom, "far above angels ,prepared for you from the foun- principalities and powers," and

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27

it also shall "have no end"—unlike the Millennial Kingdomwhich will end, being merely abeginning of Christ's power an drule. (1 Cor . 15 :25-28.) This end-less heavenly, spiritual kingdomwas prepared long before theearth was founded—its inceptionbeing recognized in Christ, "th ebeginning of the creation o fGod." It was intended for ChristJesus, the First Begotten ; buteven the Church, His bride an djoint-heir, was chosen or design-ed also, in Him, before t h efoundation of the world .—Eph .1 :4.

Thy Kingdom Come

The kingdom or rule of earth ,is -the kingdom that has bee nin preparation for mankind fro mthe foundation of the world . Itwas expedient that man shoul dsuffer six thousand years underthe dominion of evil, to learn itsinevitable results of misery ;anddeath, in order by contrast toprove the justice, wisdom an dgoodness of God's law of love.Then it will require the sevenththousand-years, under the reignof Christ, to restore him fro mruin and death, to the perfectcondition, thereby fitting him to"inherit the kingdom prepare dfor him: from the foundation ofthe world.' '

That kingdom, in which allwill be kings, will be one grand ,universal republic, whose stabil-ity and blessed influence will b eassured by the perfection of itsevery citizen, a result now muchdesired, but an impossibility be -cause of sin . The Kingdom of Godwill be, on the contrary, a the-ocracy, which will rule the world(during the period of its imper-fection and restoration) withoutregard to the consent or appro-val of any .

The brethren of the GospelChurch are not the only brethrenof Christ. All who at that timewill have been restored to perfec-tion will be recognized as sons ofGod in the same sense thatAdam was a son of God—humansons. And all of God's sons, whe-ther on the human, the angelic

or the divine plane, are brethren .Our Lord's love for these, Hishuman brethren, is here express-ed. As the world now has the op-portunity to minister to thos ewho are shortly to be the divin esons of God, and brethren o fChrist, so they will have abun-dant opportunity during the ageto come to minister to (eachother) the human brethren.

Serving His Brethren

The dead nations when againbrought into existence will nee dfood, raiment and shelter, How-ever great may have been theirpossessions in this life, deathwill have brought all to a com-mon level-the infant and th eman of mature years, the mill-ionaire and the pauper, t h elearned and the unlearned, thecultured and the ignorant-al l

,will have an abundant oppor-tunity for the exercise of benev-olence, and thus they will b eprivileged to be co-workers withGod. We are here reminded ofthe illustration given in the cas eof Lazarus : Jesus only awak-ened him from death, and thenwere the rejoicing friends per-mitted to loose him from hisgrave clothes and to clothe an dfeed him.

Further, these are said to be"sick and in prison" (more pro-perly, under ward or watch) .The grave is the great prisonwhere the millions of humanityhave been held in unconsciou scaptivity ; but when releasedfrom the grave, the restoratio nto perfection is not to be an in-stantaneous work. Being not yetperfect, they may be properlytermed sick, and under ward :not dead, neither are they yetperfected in life : and any con-dition between those two may b eproperly symbolized by sickness .And they will continue to be un-der watch or ward until mademorally perfect. During thattime there will be abundant op-portunity for mutual helpful-ness, sympathy, instruction andencouragement, and any failur eto assist will mark a lack of theLord's spirit of love.

Since all mankind will not b eresurrected at once, but in groupsduring the thousand years, eachnew group will find an army o fhelpers in those who will hav epreceded it . The love and benev-olence which men will then showto each other (the brethren o fChrist) the King will count asshown to Him. No great deedsare assigned as the ground fo rthe honors and favors conferredupon the righteous : they w i 1 1have simply come into harmonywith God's law of love a n dproved it by their works. "Loveis the fulfilling of the law"(Rom. 13 :10), and "God i slove ." So, when man is restore dagain to the image of God—"very good"—man also will b ea living expression of love .

"Inherit the kingdom prepare dfor you from the foundation of-the world," does not signify a .rule independent of the divine -law and supremacy : for althoughGod gave earth's dominion te.man at first, and designs restor-ing it to him when He has pre-_pared him for the great trust, weare not_to suppose that God in -tends man to rule it, otherwisethan as under, or in harmonywith, His supreme law . "Thy willbe done in earth as in heaven, "must forever be the principle of-government.

Accordingly, man thenceforth _will rule his dominion in har-mony with the law of heaven—,delighting continually to do his .will in whose favor is life, an dat whose "right hand' (c o n d i- -tion of favor) there are pleas-ures forevermore." (Psa. 16 : 11)Oh! who would not say, "Haste -ye along, ages of glory!" andgive glory and honor to him._whose loving plans are blossom-ing g into such fulness of blessing ?

YLet us now examine the mes-sage to those on the left—"De-part from me, ye cursed" (con-demned)—condemned as unfi tvessels for the glory and honor-of life, who would not yield to ,the moulding and shaping influ-ences of divine love. When these ," brethren," were hungry a n dthirsty, or naked, sick, and in_

THE D AW N2 8

prison, ye ministered not to theirnecessities, thus continuallyproving yourselves out of har-mony with the heavenly c i t y(Kingdom) ; for " there shall inno case enter into it anythingthat defileth ." The decision orsentence regarding this class is—"Depart from me into ever-lasting fire (symbol of destruc-tion), prepared for the devil andhis angels." Elsewhere (Heb . 2 :

THE lake of "fire and brim -stone" is many times men-

ed in the book of Revelation,which all Christians admit to b ea book of symbols . However,they generally think and speakof this particular symbol as aliteral statement giving strongsupport to the torment doctrine ,notwithstanding' the fact tb.a tthe symbol is clearly defined a smeaning the Second death : "Anddeath and hell were cast into thelake of fire . This is the SecondDeath," etc. (Rev. 20 :14) It i ssometimes spoken of as "a lakeof fire burning with brimstone"(Rev. 19 :20), the element brim-stone being mentioned to inten-sify the symbol of destruction ,the Second death : brimstone be-ing one of the most deadly ele-ments known. It is destructiveto all forms of life .

The symbolism of this lake offire is further shown by the factthat the symbolic "beast" andthe symbolic "false prophet, "and death and hell '(hades), aswell as the devil and his follow-ers, are destroyed in it .—Rev .19 :20 ; 20 : 10, 14, 15 ; 21 :8 .

This destruction or death iscalled the Second death in con-tradistinction to the First orAdamic death, and not to signifythat everything which goes intoit dies a second time . For in-stance, death (the first or Adam-ic death), and hades, the grave,

14) we read without symbol thatChrist "will destroy . . himthat had the power of death ,that is, the devil . "

"And these (the " g o a t s" )shall go away into everlastin g(Greek, aionios—lasting) punish-ment, but the righteous into lif eeternal (Greek, aionios —1 a s t-ing) ." The punishment will b eas lasting as the reward . Bothwill be everlasting .

are to be cast into it,;—this workwill require the entire . Millen-nium to accomplish ; and in n osense will they ever have beendestroyed before . So also " thedevil," "the beast," and " thefalse prophet," will never hav ebeen destroyed before .

From the first, or Adamicdeath, a resurrection has bee nprovided. All that are in theirgraves shall therefore c o m eforth. The Revelator prophetical-ly declares : "The sea gave upthe dead which were in it, anddeath and hell (hades, the grave)gave up the dead which were inthem . . . . And I saw the dead ,small and great, stand beforeGod, and the books were open-ed." (Rev. 20 : 13, 12) It was in-view of God 's plan for redeem-ing the race from Adamic deaththat in both the Old and NewTestaments it is called a " sleep . "

In Israel 's history of the goodand the wicked it is repeatedlystated: that they "slept wit htheir fathers ." The Apostles use dthe same symbol, and our Lordalso. But no such symbol is use din reference to the Second death .On the contrary, the stronges tfigures of total and ,utter.destruc-tion are used to symbolize it ;viz ., "fire and brimstone ;" be-cause that will be a destructionfrom which there will be no re-covery.'Blessed thought ! the- Adamic

death (which claimed the wholerace for the sin of their progeni-tor) shall be forever swallowe dup, and shall cease in this Sec-ond death into which it is to becast by the great Redeemer whobought the whole world with thesacrifice of Himself . Thus Godtells us through the Prophet, " Iwill ransom them from the pow-er of the grave (sheol) . I will re -deem them from death. . . . 0grave (sheol) I will be thy de-struction ." — Hos . .13 :14.

The Adamic death shall n olonger have liberty or powerover men, as it has had for thepast six thousand years ; no long-er shall any die for Adam's sin .(Rom. 5 :12 ; Jer. 31 :29, 30 ;E z e k . 18 :2) Thenceforth theNew Covenant, sealed with th eprecious blood', shall be in force,and only wilful transgression swill be counted as sin and pun-ished with the _ wages of . sin-death—the ' Second death. Thuswill the Adamic death be cast in -to and swallowed up by the Sec-ond death .

And hades and sheol—t h edark, secret condition, the grave ,which in the present time speak sto us of a hope of future life byGod's resurrection power i nChrist—shall be no more ; forthb{Second death will devour nobeing fit for life—none for whomthere remains a shadow ' of hope ,but such only as, by the unerrin gJudge, have been fully, impar-tially and individually f o u n dworthy of destruction. And Sa-tan, that lying tempter who de-ceived and ruined the race, an dwho, with persistent energy andcanning, has sought continuallyto thwart the purpose of God forour salvation through Chris t,and with him all-who are of hisspirit, "his angels," shall be de-stroyed, and shall never awakefrom death to trouble the worl dagain .

Here Satan is said to be castinto "the lake of fire,"—the Sec-ond death ; - and Paul in Heb . 2 :14, referring to the same thing ,calls it destruction—"that h emight , destroy death, and him

The Lake of Fire"The -Lake of Fire and Brim stone, which i s the S e c o n d

Death. "—Rev. 19 :20 ; 20:10,14,15 .

that hath the . power of death,that is the devil ." And "thebeast and—the false prophet, "the great false systems whic hhave long oppressed and misle dnominal Christendom, shall neverescape from it . These systems ar esaid to be cast "alive" (that is ,while they are still organize dand operative) into the lake offire burning with brimstone .--Rev. 19 : 20 .

Death Throes of this Old Order

The great time of trouble, theLord's judgment, which will ut-terly destroy these systems, willundoubtedly cause great social,financial and religious difficult yand pain to- all those identifie dwith these deceived and deceiv-ing systems, before they are ut-terly destroyed. These system swill be cast in, destroyed, at th ebeginning of the Millennium,while: Satan's destruction is re -served until its close, when allthe "goats" shall have been sep-arated from the "sheep," andthey shall perish with Satan inthe Second death, as " his an-gels, " messengers or servants .

None of those abominable char-acters among men, who, knowingthe truth, yet 'love unrighteous-ness—none of "the fearful an dunbelieving"—those who will nottrust God after all the manifest :ations' of His grace afforded dur ii n g the Millennial reign ofChrist ; nor the abominable, who ,at heart are murderers a n dwhoremongers. and sorcerers andidolaters and liars : none of thes eshall escape from the Secon ddeath, to defile the earth again .All such, after a full and abund-ant opportunity for reformation,will be judged unworthy of life ,and will be forever cut off in theSecond death, symbolized by thelake of fire and brimstone.

Several prophetic pen picture sof the Millennial age and itswork, in chapters 20 and 21 o fRevelation, clearly show the ob-ject and result of that age o ftrial, in harmony with the re-mainder of the Scriptures alreadynoted .

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Beast and False Prophet

past and present, which have a lways recognizedr-man's , freedom

Chapter 20, verses 2, 4, 11, with , of will to choose good or evil, lifeverses 1, 2, 10, 11 of chapter 21, or , death .show the beginning of -that Ag eof Judgment, .and the restrainin gof blinding errors and misleadin gsystems. The "beast" and the"false prophet" are th9 chie fsymbols, and represent the or-ganizations or systems of errorwhich, together, constitute "Ba-bylon." This judgment againstthe "thrones" of the presenttime, and against " the beast andthe false prophet" systems followsspeedily upon the introduction ofthis Millennial- judgment reign .

The thrones of the present do -minion of earth will be " castdown," and the dominion trans-ferred to t h`e great - Prophet,Priest, King and Judge, "whos eright it is." (Compare Dan. 7 :14,22 ; Ezek. 21 :27.) Then the sys-tems of error will be - speedilyjudged worthy of destruction,"the lake of fire," "the Seconddeath. "—Rev 19 :20 .

Thus the second destruction (ordeath) begins quite early in thenew judgment ; it begins with thefalse systems symbolized by th ebeast, false prophet, etc., but itwill not reach the world of man- suppose.kind, as individuals, until they However, when God's Word .have first had full trial, with full does not tell . us either the num-opportunity to choose life and ber or the proportion of those t olive forever. Chapters - 20 :12, 13, _ be found worthy, of life, and thos eand 21 :3, 7, indicate the blessed, to be judged worthy . of deathfavorable trial in which all, both (the Second death), we may no tdead and living (except t h-e dogmatize . Of one thing we mayChurch, who, with Jesus Christ, be confident, God willeth not th eare kings, priests, joint-heirs and death of the wicked, but wouldjudges), will be brought to a full that all shall turn to Him an dknowledge of the truth, relieved live ; and no one will be destroye dfrom sorrow and pain, and freed in that "lake of fire and brim -from , every blinding error and stone" . (figurative of utter des -prejudice, and tried "according . truction,—'Gehenna) who is wor -to their works . "

thy . of life, whose living longe rThe grand outcome of that trial would be a blessing to himself o r

will be a clean universe . As the to others in harmony with right -Revelator expresses it, "Every eousness .creature which is in heaven and

That utter and hopeless des-on the earth heard I saying, truction is intended only for wit -Blessing and honor and glory ful evildoers, who, like Satan, i nand power be unto him that sit- pride of heart, and . r e b e 11i o nteth upon the throne, and unto against God, will love and d othe Lamb forever ." But this re- evil notwithstanding the . math-suit will be accomplished in har- . festations of God 's disapproval,moray with all God 's dealings and notwithstanding their exper -

The Final Test of Mankin d

We cannot doubt then that inthe close of the Millennial age ,God will again for a` "little sea-son" permit evil to triumph, inorder thereby to test His creat-ures (who will by that time hav ebecome thoroughly acquainte dwith both good and evil, and th econsequences of each, and wil lhave had His justice and lovedemonstrated to them), that thos ewho finally prefer and choos eevil may b'e cut off—destroyed .Thus God will for all eternity re -move all who do not love righ teousness and hate iniquity .

We read, regarding that test-ing, that Satan will endeavor tolead astray all mankind, whosenumbers will then be as sands o fthe sea for multitude ; but thatmany of them will follow Satan' sevil example and choose evil an ddisobedience, with past experi-ence before them, and unhamp-ered by' present weaknesses an dblinding influences, we need not'

30

THE D AW N

iences with its penalties. Seem-ingly the goodness and love ofGod in the provision of a ransom,a restitution, and another oppor-tunity of life for man, instead o fleading all to an abhorrence ofsin, will lead some to supposethat God is too loving to cutthem off in the second death, orthat if He did so He would . givethem other, and yet other futur eopportunities .

Because of building thus up-on a supposed weakness in th edivine character, these may b eled to try to take advantage o fthe grace (favor) of God, as alicense for wilful sin. But theyshall go no further, for theirfolly shall be made manifest .T h e it utter destruction willprove to the righteous the har-m o n y and perfect balance o fJustice, Wisdom, Love and Pow-er in the Divine Ruler.

Revelation 21 : 8

The true character of the goa tclass is portrayed. "The fearfuland unbelieving (who will no ttrust God), the abominable, mur-derers . (brother-haters), whore -monger s, sorcerers, idolaters(such as misappropriate and mis-use divine favors, who give tos e l f or any other creature o rthing that service and h o n o rwhich belong to God), and al lliars"—''whosoever loveth andmaketh a lie" (in a word, allwho do not love the truth andat any cost defend and hold it )"shall have their part in the lakewhich burneth with fire a n dbrimstone (Gehenna, symbol ofutter destruction), which is theSecond death ." Such companywould be repulsive to any hon-est, upright being. It is hard totolerate them now, when we cansympathize with them, knowin gthat such dispositions are nowin great measure the result of in-herited weakness of the flesh.

We are moved to a measure o fsympathy by the remembrancethat in our own cases, often ,when we would do good, evil ispresent with us. But in the clos eof the Millennial judgment, when

the Lord, the righteous Judge ,shall have given every advant-age and opportunity of knowl-edge and ability, this class willbe an abhorrence and detesta-tion to all who are in harmonywith the King of Glory. And th erighteous will be glad when, th etrial being ended, the gift of lif eof which these shall have prove dthemselves unworthy, shall b etaken from them, and when thecorrupters of the earth, and alltheir work and influence, shallbe destroyed .

The Devil, the Beast and theFalse Prophet Tormente d

Rev. 20 : 9 tells of the destruc-tion of those individuals w h ojoin with Satan in the cast re-bellion ; and verse 15 tells of thatsame destruction in other words ,using the symbol "lake of fire . "They are devoured or consumedin fire. This being the case, th etorment of verse 10, cannot referto these human beings who ar econsumed, destroyed . Hence thequestion narrows down to this ,Will Satan and a false prophetand a beast be tortured forever ?and does this verse so teach ?

We answer in God's o w nwords, "All the wicked will hedestroy." Concerning Satan, thearch enemy of God and man,God expressly informs us that hewill be destroyed, and not pre-served in any sense or condition .—Heb . 2 : 14 .

The beast and false prophe tsystems, which during the Gos-pel age have deceived and le dastray, will be cast into a great,consuming trouble in the close ofthis Gospel age . The torment ofthose systems will be aionion,i. e ., lasting. It will continue aslong as they last, until they areutterly consumed . So also thesystem of error, which will sud-denly manifest itself at the endof the Millennial age and lea dthe " goats" to destruction, willbe consumed,—Rev. 20 :7-10 .

That false system (not spec-i fi e d as to kind, but merelycalled Satan, after its instiga-tor) will be cast into the same

sort of trouble and destruction,in the end of the Millennial age ,as the beast and false prophetsystems are now being cast into,in the end of the Gospel age.

Her Smoke Ascends Foreve r

Rev. 19 :3, speaking of one o fthese systems, says, "Her smokerose up forever and ever." - Thatis to say, the remembranc e("smoke") of the destruction ofthese systems of deception an derror will be lasting, the lessonw ill- never be forgotten—assmoke, which continues to ascen dafter a destructive fire, is testi-mony that the fire has done it swork.—See also Isa . 34 : 8-10 .

Of Rev. 14 :9-11 we remark ,incidentally, that all will at onc econcede that if a literal worship-ing of a beast and image weremeant in verse 9, then few, ifany, in civilized lands are liableto the penalty of verse 11 ; andif the beast and his image an dworship and wine and cup aresymbols, so also are the torments

and smoke and fire.The casting of death and th e

grave into utter destruction, th eSecond death, during the Millen-nial, age, is a part of the utterdestruction which will includ eevery improper, injurious a n duseless thing. . (Isa. 11 :9 ; Psa .101 :5-8) The Second death, thesentence of that individual trial,will be final : it will never be de-stroyed.

And to this let all the lover sof righteousness say, Amen ; forto destroy the Second Death, t orelease all incorrigible afteran impartial trial, would be tolet loose again not only Satan ,but all who love and practicewrong and deception, and wh odishonor the Lord with their evi linstitutions—to oppose, o ff e n dand endeavor to overthrow thosewho love and desire to serve Hi mand enjoy His favor. We rejoicethat there is no danger of this,but that divine justice unite swith divine wisdom, love and.power, to bring in everlastin grighteousness on a permanentbasis .

J

THE D AW N

The Wicked Turned Into Hel lWhen? Where? How ?

`The wicked shall be turned into hell, and all the nations thatforget God. —Psa. 9 :17 .

THIS statement of the Lord, be slow to realize the truth of`

recorded by David we find the hitherto seemingly idle tale ,without any qualification what- that "Jesus Christ, by the grac eever, and we must accept it as a of God, tasted death for every

man. "We have also seen that the

gradual ascent of the King' spositive fact. If the claims of"Orthodoxy" respecting h e 1 1were true, this would be, indeed ,a fearful message.

Highway of Holiness in that ageBut let us substitute the true will be possible to all, and cons -

meaning of the word sheol, and paratively easy, because all th eour text will read : " The wicked stones—stumbling-blocks, errors ,shall be turned into the condition etc.—will ; have been gathere d

out, and straight paths made fortheir feet . It is in that age tha tthis text applies. Those w h o

In one sense all men are wicked, ignore the favoring c i r c u m-in that all are violators of God's stances of that age, and will no tlaw ; but in the fullest sense the be obedient to the righteouswicked are those who, with full Judge or Ruler—Christ—willknowledge of the exceeding sin- truly be the wicked. And everyfulness of sin, and the remedy loyal subject of the Kingdom o fprovided for their recovery from God will approve the righteousits baneful effects, wilfully per- judgment which turns such a nsist in sin .

one again into sheol—the condi-As yet few—only consecrated tion of death. Such an one woul d

believers—have come to a true ,be unworthy of life ; and, wereknowledge of God. The world he permitted to live, his 1 i f eknows Him not, and the nations would be a curse to himself an dcannot forget God until they are to the rest of mankind, and afirst brought to a knowledge of blemish on the work of God .Him. The consecrated have been This will be the Second Death,enlightened, led of the S p i ;g,i t from which there will be no res-through faith to understand the urrection. Having been ransom-deep and hidden things of God, ed from the grave (sheol) by thewhich reveal the glory of God 's sacrifice of Christ, if they die .character, but which, though ex- again on account of their ownpressed in His Word, appear only sin, "there remaineth no moreas foolishness to the world . --

sacrifice for sin." (Heb. 10 :26) .As we have hitherto seen, this "Christ dieth no more ; death

will not be so in the age to come, hath no more dominion ove rfor then "The earth shall be full Him." (Romans 6 :9.) The Secof the knowledge of the Lord as and death should be dreaded andthe waters cover the sea." (Isa . shunned by all, since it is to b e11 : 9) Much that we now receive the end of existence to all thos eby faith will then be demon- deemed unworthy of life . But instrated to the world. When He it there can be no suffering . Likewho has ransomed man from the Adamic death, it is the extinc-power of the grave (Hos . 13 :14)' tion of life .begins to gather His purchased It is because through sin man -possessions back from the prison- kind had become subject to deathhouse of death (Isa. 61 :1), (sheol, hades) that Christ Jesuswhen the sleepers are awakened came to deliver us and save u sunder the genial rays of the Sun from death . (1 John 3 :8 ; Heb •of Righteousness, they will not 2 :14.) Death is a cessation of

3 1

existence, the absence of life.There is no difference between

the conditions in the Adamic an dSecond deaths, but there is hopeof a release from the first, whil efrom the second there will be norelease, no return to life . Thefirst death sentence passed upo nall on account of Adam's sin,while the Second death can beincurred only by wilful, individ-ual sin .

That the application of ourtext belongs to the coming ageis evident, for both saints an dsinners go to sheol or hades now .This Scripture indicates that, inthe time when it applies, onlythe wicked shall go ' there. Andthe nations that forget God mustbe nations that have known Him,else they could not forget Him;and never yet have the nationsbeen brought to that knowledge,nor will they be until the' com-ing time, when the knowledg eof the Lord shall fill the wholeearth, and none shall need tosay unto his neighbor, Know th eLord, for all shall know Him,from .the least to the greatest o fthem,—Isa . 11 :9 ; Jer . 31 :34.

The Hebrew word Goi, rend-ered "nations" in this verse, iselsewhere used by the same writ-er and rendered "heathen, "" Gentiles" and "people ." Thethought seems to be : any whodo not become God's covenantpeople, even though they be no topenly wicked . T h e nations(Gentiles) who are . forgetful ornegligent of God's favors enjoy-ed, and of their duties and obli-gations to Him, shall share thefate of the wilfully wicked, an dbe cast into the Second death.

In further proof of this, wefind that the Hebrew word shub,which in our text is translated"turned," signifies turned back, ,as to a previous place or con-dition. Those referred to in thi stext have been either in sheol orliable to enter it, but being re-deemed by the precious blood ofChrist, will be brought out o fsheol . If then they are wicked ,they, and all who forget God ,shall be turned back or returne dto sheol.

of death, and all the nations thatforget God." This we believe ;but . next, who are the wicked?

INTERNATIONAL SUNDAY SCHOOL LESSO N

The Christian and Law ObservanceLesson For October 30, 193 2

Rom. 15: 1-7: We then that are strong ought to bear theinfirmities of the weak, and not to please ourselve' .

Let every one of us please his neighbor for his good toedification.

For even Christ pleased not Himself ; but, as it is writ-ten, The reproaches of them that reproached thee fellon me.

For whatsoever things were written aforetime werewritten for our learning, that we through patience an dcomfort of the Scriptures might have hope ,

Now the God of patience and consolation grant yo uto be likeminded, one toward another, according to JesusChrist.

Wherefore receive ye one another, as Christ also re-ceived us, to the glory of God.

Gal . 6:7-10 : Be not deceived, God is not mocked; forwhatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap .

For he that soweth to his flesh, shall of the fleshreap corruption ; but he that soweth to the spirit, shallof the spirit reap life everlasing.

THE: passage quoted from Romans contains an

exhortation to unselfishness in our conduct .Without doubt, selfishness has to a large extenttaken possession of the world . The profiteeringsystem has made it possible for a comparative fewto become exorbitantly rich at the expense o fmillions of their fellow men. This fact is referredto in the 5th chapter of James, which reads asfollows :

"Go to now, ye • rich men, weep and howl fo ryour miseries that shall come upon you. Yourriches are corrupted and your garments are motheaten. Your gold and silver is cankered ; and , therust of them shall be a witness against you, andshall -eat your flesh as it were fire . . Ye have heapedtreasure together for the last days . Behold thehire of the .laborers who have reaped down yourfields, which is of you kept back by fraud, crieth :and the cries of them that have reaped, have enter-ed into the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth . Be pa-tient, therefore, brethren, unto the coming of theLord. Behold, the husbandman ,waiteth for th eprecious fruit of the earth, and hath long patienc efor it, until he receive the early and latter rain."

Here the Apostle indicates that the Kingdom ofChrist will be the great cure . for the world 's self-ishness. The coming of the Lord as the rightfulruler of earth will mean the emancipation of mil-lions from the oppression mentioned in the forego-ing paragraph . For those who now persist in be-ing selfish, however, a just and proper retribution

is in store ; for the Apostle says : "Whatsoever aman soweth, that shall he also reap ." Accordingto this statement, the seed of wrong =habits no wsown must bring forth their crop of unrighteouscharacter, and this character will be the possessio nof all those of the world who come forth to the res-urrection . They will then be called upon. to cor-rect all evil tendencies and to rise up to the height sor virtue that God will require as essential to theobtaining of everlasting life . Anent this matter ,we read in Ezek . 18 :20 ; "The soul that sinneth, itshall die. The son shall not bear the iniquity of thefather, neither shall the father bear the iniquity ofthe son ; the righteousness of the righteous shall b eupon him, and the wickedness of the wicked shal lbe upon him. But if the wicked shall turn from .,allhis sins that he hath committed and keep my stat-utes, and do that which is lawful .and:right, He shallsurely live, he shall not die . "

Thus the scriptures teach that sin in every phas eand form will have - to be overcome . A simple ex-planation of the matter is as follows. If we placethe required per centage of good character as 10 0per cent, those of the world who now gain 75 pe rcent of this, will have only 25 per cent to gain i nthe Millennial Age ; whereas those who enter tha tage with only 25 per cent of • character gained wil lhave to gt;in 75 per' cent more . In this just wayevery- one wil lbe required. to "give an account ofhiiiiself to ' God, " and to reap what he has sown.Iff'aftei a fair trial, with every possible assistanc efrom the Lord, he .fails to win perfection, he wil lbe destroyed in the second death .

While the Christian does not keep God 's law per-fectly, He is reckoned as doing so, . because he i sdevoted to the Lord, and his heart and mind ar esanctified by the Holy Spirit . Hence the Apostlesays that the Christian is justified by faith (Rom .5 :1), and that there is no condemnation to the mthat are in Christ Jesus . (Rom. 8 :1) All others wil lhave to keep the divine law perfectly in the com-ing age .

Questions :

State the great law of sowing and reaping, and pointout the practical value of this to humanity .

The world is in much trouble today. Name some of th ecauses of this. Has it anything to do with the breakingof divine law ?

With regard to His laws, what will God require of th eworld in the age to comet

"Can you do more to serve the Truth? "

T HE above caption is copied from the May 1 ,1897, edition of Zion's Watch Tower, In the

article which appeared under that heading the edit-or of the Tower said that because of the economicdepression then existing in America, a great man yfriends who had been engaged in the colporteurwork had been obliged to take up other occu-pations in order to make a living, thereby cur=tailing to a large extent the circulation of the vol-umes of Dawn. And then he added :

"It occurs to us that if this fact were realized b ythe friends of the truth generally, it would lea dthem each and all to say, `In that event I must stepinto the breach ; I must be that much more activ ein the service ; I must devote that much more tim ein letting the light shine out to others.' "

Then the editor further pointed out that the Bi-ble House would make a special effort to cooperat ewith all who should desire to avail themselves o fthe wonderful opportunities for service then avail -able . He mentioned a special price reduction for th eDawn series when sold by colporteurs . He also em-phasized the fact that much free literature wasavailable for distribution by volunteers . Then hisbrief but candid call to service was concluded withthe following pointed paragraph :

" Let us, dear Brothers and Sisters, by the Lord ' shelp, take a fresh hold of His work. The peoplenever needed the truth more ! It is the only thin gthat will keep them from infidelity ! People neverwere more ready to receive the truth ! They realiz ethat some great changes are at hand, and manywant to understand them. `When the judgment sof the Lord are abroad in the land, the inhabitant sof the world will learn righteousness (truth—justice ) .' If we are anxious to serve, the Lord willgive us an opportunity. Here it is! "

A Paralle l

Dear readers, are we not now living in a tim estrikingly similar to the one in which the preced-ing words were penned? Indeed, the circulationof the present truth message has been curtailed ,not only by the present industrial depression, bu teven more so by the recent wicked onslaughts o fSatan against those who have held the truth as a

sacred trust from God, yet in whose minds the sim-plicity of the truth has been lost . So now, all whoare anxious to serve the Lord may have the oppor-tunity .

We are very happy to announce that free liter-ature is again available for volunteers. We areglad to say that in the Lord's providence TheDivine Plan of the Ages is once more available incloth and paper binding, and at a very specia lprice to those who wish to loan or sell them ; alsoin magazine form soon for loaning or as gifts .Furthermore colporteuring for The Dawn mag-azine in combination with The Divine Plan of theAges is now possible, either by full or part-tim eworkers. Those desiring to re-enter the Lord' sservice through this arrangement may write to u sfor details and special prices .

Also the work familiarly called "sharp-shooting "is a most effective means of witnessing to others .In this every willing heart may have some share .Many of our readers will doubtless find that withlittle effort they may be able to place each monthtwo, three, five, ten or more copies of The Daw nmagazine with their neighbors — their butcher,their baker, their grocer, or others with who mthey previously may have discussed the truth .

Let us all ask ourselves the same importan tquestion today that is set forth in the above head-ing written in 1897 :"Can I do More to Serve The Truth? "

Certainly it is still true, as then, that the peopl enever were more ready to receive the truth ! Sure-ly it is now true more than ever, that the peoplerealize that some momentous change is at hand—and they desire to understand it . And who knowsbut that among them there may be many grains o fwheat still waiting to be gleaned and garnered ?Let us continue to reap until the plowman fullyovertakes us — until the night comes in which noman can work. Let all the anointed remember :• • "The Lord hath anointed me to preach good tid-ings unto the meek: . . to bind up the brokenhearted ,to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the openingof the prison to them that are bound ; to proclaimthe acceptable year of the Lord, and the .day ofvengeance of our God ; to comfort all that mourn . . .that He might be glorified ."—Isaiah 61 :1-3 .

DO YOU LIKE THIS MAGAZINE? OTHERS NEED ITS VISITS TOO !The Bible commands us,"Preach the Word . . . instant in season and out of season ." Let's do it . It willhelp others. Especially will it help us . We will need wholesome Christian activity . Here is an oppor-tunity to hold forth the Word of life .SPECIAL OFFER : For every $1.00 subscription to The Dawn that you send us during September andOctober we will send to you, or to the subscriber, a copy of The Divine Plan of the Ages, in bookform free . Let's sow beside all waters . Address : THE DAWN, 251 Washington St., Brooklyn, N. Y .

THE MORNING DAWNS

P OOR, fainting spirit, still hold on thy way-The dawn is near !

True, thou art weary ; but yon brighter rayBecomes more clear .

Bear up a little longer ; 1%ait for rest ;Yield ; not to sl,mber, though with toil oppressed-The night of life is mournful, but, look on—

The dawn is near !

Soon will earth's shadowy scenes and forms b egone ;

Yield not to fear !The mountains' summit will, ere long be gained, `And the bright world of joy and peace attained."Joyful through _hope," thy motto still must be

The dawn is near !

That glories will that dawn unfold to thee ?Be of good cltr !

Gird up thy loins ; bind adals on thy feet ;The way seems dark and£ rear ; the end is sweet .

—Poems of Dawn .