Aunty, can we explain the investigative judgment from just the Bible alone?
13 May 2024 |
Dear Aunt Sevvy,
Can one explain the investigative judgment from just the Bible, with no outside sources?
Signed, Asking for a Friend
Dear Asking,
Adventist preachers say they can explain the investigative judgment, and all its supportive prophecies, by using only the Bible. That’s only partially true. The doctrine uses biblical ingredients, but the recipe comes from the church pioneers and Ellen White, seasoned with some extra-biblical history.
Even Adventist scholars admit that this teaching is not without problems:
- The Bible doesn’t tell us the date of the command to restore and rebuild Jerusalem that starts the 2300-day prophecy. For that, we resort to outside sources—whose calculation of such an ancient date may or may not be accurate.
- That Jesus didn’t enter the Most Holy Place until 1844 is contradicted in multiple places in the New Testament, where Jesus is said to be at the right hand of his Father after his ascension to heaven. The book of Hebrews makes this case in some detail.
- The year-day principle is found in only two rather doubtful texts. Many scholars think the 2300 day prophecy of Daniel 8:14 refers to actual days (literally, “evenings and mornings”), describing the purifying of the Jerusalem temple after a pagan king offered a pig as a sacrifice there.
- 1844 as the date for Jesus’ return was admitted by everyone, including William Miller himself, to have been a mistaken prophetic interpretation. As of 2024, it has been 180 years since 1844, which makes even the doctrine’s prediction of a “soon” return hard to defend.
- At this point, what practical difference does it make? How is your relationship with Jesus affected if you believe something happened on this date, or if you don’t? Aunty finds it hard to believe that a date in the 19th century is a salvation issue.
So while it draws on Bible texts, the doctrine most likely wouldn’t have survived without Ellen White’s authoritative endorsement. Though it remains official Adventist dogma, we hear it preached less than we used to—and the reasons listed above may be why.
Aunt Sevvy
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