“Time Will Never be a Test Again”

Comments: 76

1. 

   William Noel

   08 April 2014 at 1:04 pm

   Jack,

   You wrote: "If “Time will never be a test again,” why are we trying to make the time of creation and the age of the earth a test for Adventists?"

   It is an issue simply because the people who believe in a specific time for creation see your argument as weakening their faith.  Thus we have the proverbial paradox where those of one view see the view of the other as irreconcilable and opposed, yet inextricably linked and inseparable because of other topics surrounding them and joining them together.  Since your past discussions on the topic produced plentiful argument sans persuasion, why do you imagine pursuing the same worn-out topic will produce different results?
   1. 

      Jack Hoehn

      15 April 2014 at 3:18 am

      William, because not every reader of Atoday is as faithful and kind as you in reading my blogs.  For some this will be the first time they meet this issue.  For others approaching it from a different angle may give an "ah-ha" experience of , OK now I see what you are getting at.   The Adventist Review repeats an article on a short age chronology of the earth as important many times every year for year after year.  The weakness of that position and its dangers to faith, will sadly need to be repeated many times, until we stop imposing human limits on God's actions, in prophecies or in the history of earth. 
      1. 

         Bob Pickle

         15 April 2014 at 3:51 am

         Jack,

         "The weakness of that position and its dangers to faith, …."

         Your statement seems incomprehensible. Do you not recall that the idea that the days of creation aren't days is "infidelity in its most insidious and hence most dangerous form" (PP 111)? How then do articles repudiating infidelity pose "dangers to faith"? Articles that promote faith actually undermine faith? But articles promoting infidelity would strengthen faith? What strange logic!

         Shall we similarly conclude that articles promoting polytheism lead to monotheism, articles promoting atheism lead to theism, articles promoting pornography lead to greater purity, articles promoting revolutionary communism lead to peaceful demoscracy, etc.? Just how far are you willing to push such logic?
2. 

   Yudelis

   08 April 2014 at 11:23 pm

   Interesting article…
    
   It brings a few questions to mind: What, according to the Bible record, was created by God on the 4^th day (year/years???) of creation? If so, then how could God’s creation on the 3^rd day (year/years???) could have possible survived without the very essential element needed for its growth?? How did that particular creation on the 3^rd day manage to survive for perhaps a year, if several years more….??? I wonder….
    
   Another interesting thing that came to mind is that water, as well as the platform of the earth, were already present in Genesis 1:1… Water is not mentioned as being brought forth during the days of creation.  It had already been created, it was present.  Water is mentioned in Revelation 22:1 and is mentioned in a context that’s very near God’s throne.  God is eternal, according to His Word; with no beginning, with no end.  It stands to reason that an eternal God who is also a King of Kings will need a throne to sit on… This throne has been located somewhere in the universe eternally, and if that is so, then the water that gushes out of that throne, which God’s Word’s says it proceeds out of that throne, all that water must have been there eternally…
    
   The same thing goes for the light seen and known today as daylight and nightlight.  Light and water were created by God before the creation account given on Genesis 1.  I could be wrong, but as I understand it, vegetation is most apt to flourish under sunlight…. Did God sustain the vegetation He created for a long period of time before He created the sun? Well, He is Omnipotent, so He could have done that very easily, but I just wonder; if God was going to sustain the vegetation with His light before He created the sun, then why not make the sun appear on the last day of creation?  That way when God was finished creating life on this planet, it would have been more logical to rationalize that He was substituting His light for sunlight because His presence wouldn’t be here on planet earth to light up the vegetation, as He had rested on the seventh day and moved on with His busy schedule…

   I know.  My thoughts are all over the place.  Interesting article. 
    
3. 

   Bill Garber

   09 April 2014 at 4:59 am

   Jack,

   There is now no doubt that the Holy Spirit is at work across the membership, rather than primarily let alone exclusively through the General Conference in session.  

   The Holy Spirit is clearly moving against the will of General Conference leadership with regard to women's ordination in that it seems beyond question now that 9 out of 13 church divisions are willing to accept women's ordination so long as it is a local union option, rather a church-wide decision.

   Women's ordination is playing out in such a way that it has given divisions a sense of the Holy Spirit's endorseent of their independence utterly unexpected by Elder Wilson.  

   This is profound, and unprecedented in the memory of any commenting in this columns.

   Divisions realize that English is not the language of the church, if the percentage of the church speaking English as their native language is a measure.  It is not even the first language among many.  
   More importantly, divisions are increasingly financially supportive of rather than dependent on the General Conference.

   Anything that appears to be further empowering the leadership at world church headquarters is not likely to be supported in 2015 when the church again meets in the U.S.  

   Into this denominational milieu will arrive any proposed changes to the statement of fundamental beliefs, stated in English.  

   It is quite possible that on principle, rather than over detail, any changes to the fundamental belief statement will be tabled like women's ordination has historically met its fate at these sessions.  And for the same reason.

   The days when a committee of the General Conference will be the sole source of proposals put before the General Conference in session are numbered.  The days when such proposals are are in effect rubber stamped is definately over.

   This is not the church of Elder Wilson's father, let alone his grand father.  The methods common to those days and even of Elder Wilson's younger years no longer have currency.

   Elder Wilson may well recognize the work of the Holy Spirit and its ways and seek to follow that path.  Either way, the General Conference president is very much being carried by the current of the Holy Spirit in the church.

   You have reason to be encouraged, as do we all, including Elder Wilson.

    
4. 

   Philip Law

   10 April 2014 at 2:57 am

   Faith in literal interpretation of the Genesis creation account gives rise to Young Earth believers. But it is not universally accepted in Christendom.  There are Christians who believe in an Old Earth yet they can accommodate the Genesis creation account into their system of faith.  Being a faith tradition the Genesis creation account is as true as the Plan of Salvation. On the other hand there are those who swallowed Macroevolution whole attributing all live forms to chance without admitting that it is just a faith tradition.  The ‘billion and billion’ of our Universe with a current estimated age of around 14 billion years and our earth around 4.6 billion years would make many assertions of Macroevolution a Fantasy described by Philip Johnson.  Timing of events seems to be a favorite human endeavor.  Both the Creation camp and the Evolution camp are equally vulnerable to that temptation and many are consummate time telling practitioners. 
5. 

   Steve Ferguson

   10 April 2014 at 6:20 am

   'According to Gerard Damsteegt, our 19^th century Adventist forerunners repeated the error of setting times for the second coming of Christ at least four times before they largely gave up on time-setting.'

   True Jack, but let us not just recall that they were wrong in setting the time, but also the place! It was only after the Great Disappointment that the SDA Pioneers clicked that they were reading the Bible too narrowly, in thinking the reference to the Sanctuary must have mean the tent on earth, forgetting the Bible also talks about a Sanctuary in heaven.

   So why do we assume the creation account is an account of 6 "earth days" of creation – from an earth terrestial perception?  The question matters because even if we assume Gen promotes a literal 144 hours of creation, those 144 hours don't actually pass at the same rate everywhere from every perspective in the universe.  

   Eistein's theory of evolution itself teaches, and experiments with atomic clocks have 100% proven as fact, that a clock ticking on earth passes time at a different rate from say a clock in a satelite orbiting earth in outerspace.

   So even if we assume Gen promotes a literal 144 hours of creation, who says it was 144 hours of "earth" time?
   1. 

      Jack Hoehn

      15 April 2014 at 3:37 am

      Steve, Genesis 1 is entirely about God's work, there is no human participation in it.  So to time God's Creation Days as human work days is the same error as to say that the Heavenly Sanctuary is the same size as the little tent Moses made in the wilderness!  Our work week is patterned after God's Creation Week, as the worship tent of Israel was patterned after a Heavenly Sanctuary.  But to insist that all are identical is not necessary and likely very short sighted of us humans. 
      1. 

         Bob Pickle

         15 April 2014 at 12:19 pm

         Jack,

         Yet creation week is explicitly referred to in Ex. 20:8-11 and elsewhere, and in these passages creation week is most definitely equated to today's weekly cycle.

         So are you now accusing Jesus and the Holy Spirit of being short sighted when they inspired PP 111 and other passages?
6. 

   Bob Pickle

   11 April 2014 at 11:04 pm

   Excellent example of an extreme case of cherry picking: Use Ellen White's statement against setting dates for the second coming to promote the evolutionary theories of infidels and skeptics, while ignoring Ellen White's explicit and unequivocal statements that the idea that the days of Gen. 1 and Ex. 20:11 aren't days is a most dangerous and insidious form of infidelity.

   Jack writes, "The Bible history of creation, that geology suggests took many years, …." He can only make this statement if he ignores the "suggestions" of geology to the contrary. If he had said "that many geologists suggest," then he would have been accurate. But he says it in such a way that the reader is left to conclude that geology as a whole, stripped of all religious and philosophical presuppositions, suggests such a thing, and that certainly is not true.

   If one takes the flatness of the layers at the Grand Canyon, and the similar and way too high U/Pb ratios of U-238 halo centers from Triassic, Jurassic, and Eocene strata as geologic evidence that at least the fossiliferous strata were laid down too rapidly for significant erosion to occur between layers, were laid down about the same time, then there really isn't much that geology can say about creation taking "many years," since creation would occur prior to the nearly simultaneous deposition of these various layers. One has to assume that the layers were laid down over long ages, and were laid before creation was complete, despite the lack of erosion between layers, depsite the anomalous U/Pb ratios, before one can infer anything about the length of creation. But ignoring such scientific evidence does not qualify as being an objective investigation of geology.
   1. 

      Jack Hoehn

      15 April 2014 at 3:45 am

      Bob you start with accusation of infidelity because I listen to scientific evidence as valid commentary on the ancient texts written in languages you and I don't know.
      Then you cherry pick science to show a few mysteries that contradict the huge number of nature's evidences of old age and deep time as God's Creation Week. 

       I've just returned from a day in the Grand Canyon.  I don't know how long a God Day is, but it surely was much longer than a human day.  Those layers in the canyon were not created in a 7 day week or a 40 day flood.  We can study and argue over how long, just as long as we can agree that God did it in His time, not likely in our time.  I'm not insisting on 4.6 Billion years, I just want to leave it open to study and worship, not closed by dogmatic assertion that it had to be 6,000 years because Ellen White didn't have the evidence you and I now have to know better.

       

      
      
       
      1. 

         Bob Pickle

         15 April 2014 at 4:09 am

         Jack,

         You have that wrong. I'm not the one who "started" with the accusation of infidelity. The testimony of Jesus is pretty clear in PP 111. If you think I'm misunderstanding that passage, or if you think I'm manifesting unbelief rather than faith in that revelation from Christ, then by all means, correct me.

         Perhaps the problem, Jack, is that you have never really investigated or thought through the scientific evidence for creation and the Flood.  If that is the case, then you can't really say that you are "listening" to scientific evidence, and you aren't yet qualified to compare the number of evidences for young age with the number of evidences for old age. I suggest this because you speak of how the layers of the Grand Canyon couldn't be laid down in 40 days, as if you think that the Flood event only lasted 40 days, when the biblical record is quite clear that it lasted longer. Don't standard Flood models take this into account?

         It would be far better if you would directly address the scientific evidence I raised. For example, tell us where today in the Grand Canyon you found significant erosion between layers that would demonstrate that the fossiliferous layers were laid down over millions of years. Merely asserting that the layers weren't laid down quickly doesn't explain the lack of eroison, and the lack of erosion negates your assertion.
7. 

   Ranald McLeish

   12 April 2014 at 2:10 am

   Hi Jack,

   May I suggest you are not really comparing apples with apples when you attempt to draw a parallel between setting a time for the fulfilment of time prophecies such as found in Daniel, and  Creation. For example the great disappointment was prophesied by John, cf. Rev.10:9-10, and it appears your example also applies to the ages of the Patriarchs, and the various generations of the Bible.

   Thus I suggest the answer may lie in considering a two phase creation based on  the interpretation of Gen 1:1  "in the beginning" God created the heaven and the earth, and  the earth was without form and was void until the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. Then in verse 2 the second phase of the creation of this world commenced, and was completed in six literal days, verse 31.

   This appears to be a logical application of Genesis 1 that fits with Satan's counterfeit, as both positions, creation, and evolution, would have an old earth aspect. However while a two phase fulfilment of Genesis 1:1 may satisfy some of the points raised by the scientific community, it would not, I suspect, satisfy those who are pushing a specific religious agenda.  

   While you are correct in saying, "The Bible does not come with dates," Christians from most if not all denominations accept various dates that are based on the historical fulfilment of prophecy. Consequently your highlighted quote from Ellen Harmon, while correct, was not, I suggest,  intended to be used in the manner applied.
    
   Regarding your statement, "I hope the General Conference realizes this should also be true about being dogmatic about the Biblical time of history as it is about the Biblical time of prophecy. If “Time will never be a test again,”."

   As many in the church do not hold this view, that may  explain why the GC is not prepared to declare which of the current interpretations of Daniel, or various Fundamental Beliefs such as numbers 6 and 24, are the preferred teaching of the SDA Church today. While many believe the 28 Fundamental beliefs only have one interpretation, it is very clear this is not the case. 

   Consequently it will be interesting to see whether the revised wording of the 28 Statements of Belief  allow alternative interpretations, and if so, what is the point of voting the statements unless the accompanying book, "Adventists Believe 28," is deemed to be the Official interpretation of the voted statements, and by definition,  creedal?       
   1. 

      Jack Hoehn

      15 April 2014 at 3:50 am

      I agree with what you say, Prophetic dating and Earth History dating are not the same, but the temptation to loudly proclaim that "I know and you fools don't" is the same in both fields.  Humans draw conclusions, in science they are called theories.  In Adventism they quickly become "Fundamental Beliefs" and the spirit of false religion raises its head when Adventist schools and teachers are told, teach Young Earth Creationism or get out.  I am just asking for alternative interpretations of prophecy and alternative interpretations of history to be permitted in my church.
      1. 

         Bob Pickle

         15 April 2014 at 12:15 pm

         Jack,

         You aren't asking for mere alternative interpretations of history to be permitted. You're asking for the most insidious and dangerous infidelity (PP 111) to be permitted. There is a stark difference between the two.

         Are you being facetious when you declare simple Bible verses to be but "theories" and "false religion," or are you really being serious? "For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it" (Ex. 20:11). That's a theory? That's false religion? Are you serious?

         So how much of the Bible do you believe is false religion? How much of the Bible do you reject? And in what way is this not infidelity?
         1. 

            Jack Hoehn

            15 April 2014 at 8:23 pm

            Bob, you wrap your interpretation of the Bible as THE BIBLE.  I don't reject any of the Bible, I reject one interpretation of the Bible.   I reject the interpretation that God's Creation YOM means 24 hours.  My Bible gives many evidences that YOM, like the English day, can refer to Daylight–12 hours, 24 hours, an indefinite period in the past, like "back in the Day",  the YOM in Genesis 2:4 refers to the whole CreationWeek as the YOM/day.  It is not the Bible at question it is your interpretation that it must be "simple"  when the facts show it was not "simple" but complex, long, and interesting.

            False Religion?   All religions from the Apostolic Church to Adventism have made errors, they become "false religions"  when they refuse to give up their errors as the truth unfolds.  Adventism will become a "false religion" if we refuse to give up our past errors, in deference to present truth.
            1. 

               Bob Pickle

               16 April 2014 at 1:00 pm

               Jack,

               Please explain how yom in Ex. 20:8-11 can be understood as anything but normal days. Note that above I referred to Ex. 20:11, and you did not address that verse.

               Let's not try to muddy the issue by declaring it all to be "my interpretation." PP 111 says what it says. It isn't an issue of my interpretation.
8. 

   arlin

   12 April 2014 at 6:37 am

   The quoted statement, "Time will never be a test again," begs the question, "why was time-setting Christ's Second Advent ever a test?"  Mark 13:32-33 clearly says "…knoweth no man, no, not the angels which are in heaven, neither the Son, but the Father. Take ye heed, watch and pray: for ye know not when the time is."  This warning is repeated over and over again by Christ Himself in many other N.T. texts, including Acts 1:7 just before His ascension. See even Christ's warning in Luke 21:8 (RSV), "Take heed that you are not led astray: for many will come in my name, saying, 'I am he!' and, 'The time is at hand!'  Do not go after them."

   Christian history for around 1800 years prior to William Miller witnessed hundreds of failed Second Advent time-setting movements!  So why was time-setting Christ's Second Advent ever right? Even at the first "disappointment" in 1843?  In other words, if time-setting Christ's Second Advent was unbiblical and wrong from Christ's ascension until 1843-1844, and also wrong after 1844, then why was it not wrong during 1843-1844?
    
   1. 

      Bob Pickle

      12 April 2014 at 12:27 pm

      Arlin,

      "So why was time-setting Christ's Second Advent ever right?"

      The predicted time was correct. The predicted event was, in part, wrong. The Millerites were correct when they said that the 2300 days extend to the judgment. They were incorrect when they said that the day of judgment and the second coming occurred at the same time.
9. 

   Kevin H

   12 April 2014 at 7:07 am

   As a student at AUC, Loma Linda and the Seminary at Andrews, there are a few points brought up by my professors that I am surprised does not appear in the discussions and articles such as this one.
    
   First of all, the relationship between Creation and the issues of the Great Controversy. God had created the universe, angels and beings on other planets. They loved God, but had the premature love of a child. They needed to develop into a mature love. The questions Lucifer asked were very good questions. They mystery of iniquity is why, instead of looking for answers to his questions, he only congratulated himself on being clever enough to come up with these questions.
    
   This earth was created to help answer these questions. Thus we already have an old universe with life that has been growing and not at a rapid pace. One of these questions was if God was really the creator or just pretending to be. In history, Columbus was captured and demanded to be let go or else he would make the sun disappear. His captors laughed at him and he made the sun disappear, or so it looked. Columbus happened to know that there would be a solar eclipse and had his timing correspond with the natural events of the eclipse. Did God really create, or was it mother nature with God knowing what was going to happen when and grandstanding to take the glory to himself. Well, if he was to call forth not a brand new planet, but to create an OLD one, that would put more credence to him actually creating rather than knowing when mother nature was going to make a brand new planet.
    
   Second; this planet was to help the created beings build faith on evidence to decide whether they were going to stay faithful to God or join the rebellion. We do not have a record over what happened over that time and how long God worked with them. Look how long he has been bearing with us. Should we not give him time to bear with those who were here before we were? All we know is that Genesis says that the world was formless and void and there are studies on the Hebrew words that indicate that there was something here before God started the 6 days of creation. It was not until the universe made their choice over which side that they were going to be on before we have the faith/evidence meet proof, seeing the 6 days of creation. While they did not close their probation until the cross, they had chosen sides before the creation. As Seventh-day Adventists, with Mrs. White's philosophy of the Great Controversy, we should be more open to this. However if you have Mrs. White on one side and Tradition on the other, we tend to choose tradition.
    
   Third, the Bible does NOT say that God created the sun and moon and stars on the fourth day. Only that the sun and moon appeared in our sky that day. And there is a "By the way" statement that by the way, this God who created earth also created the stars. Again something in the text that supports something going on before creation week.
    
    Fourth; we come up with the "About" 6,000 years based on adding up the ages we find in the Bible genealogy. However there are problems with how WE are reading the genealogies.
    
   A.) The texts that we translate the numbers on are hard to translate. They are so ancient and have needed updating in the language and so what we have are estimates as to what the text is giving for the age. Apparently the ages that we get from the possible translations give us a total from 6,000 to 10,000 years old. We use the translations from the Masoretic text, however we do not know the history about why they picked how to translate the ages that they did. Apparently the popular Bible in Jesus' day had the world turning 7,000 years old around the time he came. About a century or so before he came, a Rabbi adding up the dates made a correlation between the days of creation and the thousands of years that he added up the world to be, and said that the 7000th year would be the time of the Messiah. When that time came and nothing happened except for the trouble maker Jesus, those who rejected Jesus liked the translation that was making the world only 4,000 years old thus distancing the 7,000th year from Jesus. But all these translations are "The Bible" and we must be fair to the different possible translations and not just pick the translation that was specifically picked to distance Jesus from the 7,000th year and saying that this against Jesus Bible is the only correct translation.
    
   B. We automatically assume that the genealogy is father and son relationship. While this could be, ancient genealogies use the same language for any type of relationship, such as people holding an office. In other words, if we were to go back to the ancient world and tell them about the Presidents of the United States, we would say "George Washington begat John Adams. John Adams begat Thomas Jefferson." While the genealogies we use are probably what we are assuming, we still have to be aware of the other possibility that may be there.
    
   C. We assume that the list is complete. This is much more troublesome because if it is, we would have in the Bible the first modern, western, Greek genealogy list which does not fit the genealogies of its culture and time in history.  Comparing the lists both inside and outside of the Bible, we find that it was only the most important that made the lists.
    
   D. At times through history it becomes a custom to name the first born after the paternal grandfather. Thus you tend to get two names repeating themselves through a number of generations, but only one mention of the two names make the genealogy lists
    
   Therefore when we read "Enosh was 90 years old when he had his first son Kenan" assuming that it is a father-son genealogy and not some other type of relationship like a list of leaders, possibilities we have to face are that Enosh had a son named Kenan. Or at age 90 Enosh had a son who was not remarkable except that he was the direct ancestor of the next important person, Kenan. Or that there were unknown generations where a man named Enosh had a son named Kenan, who would name his first born son Enosh after his father, then that son had a son named Kenan after his father and so on until either they stopped using the father's name, or the eldest son died and another son took over being the head of the family or something.
    
   I wish someone would bring this up and reprint this. I am so sorry that I do not remember the reference. In the summer of 1984, when I was at Andrews taking the Bible and Archaeology class from Dr. Geraty, he had an article by Mrs. White. He did not read the article to us until after he made us go over to the White Estate Vault at the James White library and read the article for ourselves. You know that it is going to be something shocking when you had to go and read it for yourself before the professor would address the topic. In this article Mrs. White down plays the strict 6,000 years. She supports a fairly short time between creation and our day, but says that it may be more than 6,000 years and that her council was that whatever age we pick for the age of the world, just make sure that it is fair to scripture. Outside that class I have only heard that article quoted once. The Adventist Theological Society was having a conference in Loma Linda and advertising an upcoming conference on the "about" 6,000 years. I was talking to, I forgot just what his name was, but it was a name I grew up reading his articles and seeing his name in our publications and a good Scandinavian name. Something like Olsen or Anderson, but anyway I asked him about this article and he quoted to me a long passage that he memorized from the article. Then he said "This is why we say 'ABOUT' 6,000 years old, I interpret this article to be that the Lord showed her that the Septutatant was more correct than the Masoretic Text and the most common reading of the Septutant has us a thousand years older than the Masoretic Text, and since 7,000 years is a lot closer to 6,000 years than it is to the Billions, we just simply say 'about' 6,000" Also while I was at Andrews in the years just before the formation of the Adventist Theological Society. Several of its founding members were there and teaching the views that developed into the ATS. While they would unify on the "About" 6,000 years, as individuals, for the above reasons I pointed out, they had an age range from 7,000 years old to 20something thousand years old. There were some of our scholars who placed creation week as far back as 60,000 but the ATS people felt that was too old a world for ATS, but that while most believed that the earth was younger than 10,000 they would welcome in fellowship those who went up to 20something thousand.
    
10. 

    Bob Pickle

    12 April 2014 at 12:44 pm

    Kevin,

    "Third, the Bible does NOT say that God created the sun and moon and stars on the fourth day. Only that the sun and moon appeared in our sky that day."

    I don't see how you can say that in light of what Gen. 1:14-19 actually say. If you set aside all preconceived opinions of every sort, what indication do you see in vss. 14-19 that the sun, moon, and planets weren't created on Day 4? I personally don't see any.

    Regarding the LXX vs. Masoretic text, it has been said that since the LXX chronology is about 1000 years longer, we can push Abraham's time back a 1000 years. This is false. Since it was in Peleg's day that the Tower of Babel occurred, it is only the differing ages of the patriarchs beginning with Peleg that would allow some wiggle room regarding chronology, and it isn't much.

    Did Geraty agree with Ellen White that the idea that the days of creation weren't days was a most dangerous and insidious form of infidelity?
11. 

    Kevin H

    12 April 2014 at 2:51 pm

    Bob, the comments that I gave has come from some of our top and most conservative leadership, people who believe in Mrs. White, and a litteral 7 day creation week with a "fairly" young earth. Some with the 7,000 to 20something thousand to later be accepted by the Adventist Theological Societie's "About" 6000 years. Others of them who still sees God's act of the literal creation week, still with in the thousands and not millions or billions, but still outside of the 20some thousand that was the cut off for membership to the ATS.
    1. 

       Ranald McLeish

       12 April 2014 at 11:26 pm

       Hi Kevin,

       The information that ATS and the conservative scholars have set a cut off for membership on the basis of a young earth policy of 6,000 to 20,000 years explains a lot regarding the conservative view that includes an escape clause. 

       A position that on one hand that does not allow for the possibility that verses 1 and 2 apply in the context of " in the beginning," a time with no beginning. and that " Creation week" actually begins in verse 3-5, that God said — was the first day."

       But on the other hand we have the escape clause, a "By the way statement that by the way, this God who created earth also created the stars. Again something in the text that supports something going on before creation week."
        

       If something was going on before creation week, what else could that entail other than verses 1 and 2, the creation of the heaven and the earth, sometime before Creation week?

       The third point appears to put creation at risk. "Third, the Bible does NOT say that God created the sun and moon and stars on the fourth day. Only that the sun and moon appeared in our sky that day." emphasis added.

       If the "And God said" regarding day four, verses 14-19, does not mean the same as "And God said," regarding the other five days, and the sun, moon, and stars were not created on day four, but only appeared on day four, then the door is opened to apply the same application to the other five days, when something preexisting, appeared. e.g. thiestic evolution.

        But then there is the escape clause, a "By the way statement that by the way, this God who created earth also created the stars. Again something in the text that supports something going on before creation week."

       If "something was going on before creation week," what else could that entail other than verses 1 and 2, the creation of the heaven and the earth, "in the beginning," or sometime before Cheation week?
        
12. 

    Elaine Nelson

    12 April 2014 at 4:02 pm

    The "top leadership" has been wrong before.  They are not infallible nor inerrant.  To look for leaders to tell you what to think is exactly the place they wish to be.  This is as equally true in religion as in politics, as they both operate similarly:  control the thinking of the masses and they will follow your orders.
13. 

    arlin

    12 April 2014 at 6:31 pm

    Response to Bob Pickle's comments reinterpreting the meaning of the Millerite seventh month movement's "Great Disappointment" on Oct. 22, 1844. Miller himself later frankly admitted it was wrong, and he said it was "dishonest" to claim otherwise. He said it was not a "fulfillment of prophecy in any sense." The following statement is quoted from William Miller's own pamphlet entitled Mr. Miller's Apology and Defence, published by Joshua V. Himes, Boston, Aug. 1, 1845, p. 28: 
         "Some are disposed to lay a stress on the seventh month  movement which is not warranted by the Word. There was then a dedication of heart in view of the Lord's Coming that was well pleasing in the sight of God. Desire for the Lord's coming and a preparation for that event are acceptable to him. But because we then ardently desired his coming, and sought that preparation that was necessary, it does not follow that our expectations were then realized. For we were certainly disappointed. We expected the personal coming of Christ at that time , and now to contend that we were not mistaken, is dishonest. We should never be ashamed to frankly confess all our errors.
       " I have no confidence in any of the new theories that have grown out of that movement, viz. that Christ then came to the Bridgroom, that the door of mercy was then closed, that there is no salvation for sinners, that the seventh trumpet then sounded, or that it was a fulfillment of prophecy in any sense."
    1. 

       Jack Hoehn

       15 April 2014 at 4:12 am

       Ellen G. Harmon/White seems to have listened to the spiritual wisdom of the man she referred to as "Father Miller,"  for like Miller's honest and open statenment "We should never be ashamed to frankly confess all our errors," she later wrote,  "The fact that certain doctrines have been held as truth for many years by our people, is not a proof that our ideas are infallible. Age will not make error into truth, and truth can afford to be fair. No true doctrine will lose anything by close investigation." {RH, Dec 20, 1892 –CW 35.2} 
       1. 

          Bob Pickle

          15 April 2014 at 4:19 am

          Jack,

          Since you don't believe Ellen White's writings on the topic of creation have any weight or authority, why are you quoting from her writings? It doesn't make any sense.

          But let us assume that you really are serious in quoting the above. What does it say? "No true doctrine will lose anything by close investigation." Are you yourself willing to do this in the manner she meant it? Are you willing to submit your evolutionary assumptions and predispositions to the Word of God, and if they don't line up with the Word, change your doctrinal beliefs regarding creation and the Flood?

          If you aren't willing to do this, then what is the point in quoting the above statement?
          1. 

             Jack Hoehn

             15 April 2014 at 8:11 pm

             First I believe Ellen White was a propetess and spoke by inspiration.  Second I believe that prophets are not infallible and make errors.  Ellen White taught me that.  Thirdly I am not and never have been an evolutionist.  I am closely investigating the true doctrine of Creation, and find that holding to a short term chronology is faith destroying, so I am asking my Church to not make the Young Earth chronology a fundamental belief.    I have no problem with Ellen White's writings and no problem with my Bible.  I have a problem with your interpretation that it all happened in 144 hours, about 6,000 years ago, and that if Ellen White said it, we should ignore the evidence.
             1. 

                Bob Pickle

                16 April 2014 at 2:59 pm

                Jack,

                So, if you really believe that Ellen White was a prophetess and spoke by inspiration, as you state above, then why are you pushing an idea that PP 111 and elsewhere declare to be infidelity in its most insidious and most dangerous form?

                You have proposed that we interpret the days of Gen. 1 to be other than days, but have you provided any textual reasons in support of that idea? Is there anything in the Bible that tells us that the days aren't days? You claim that you are not an evolutionist, and note that I didn't say above that you were, but you do have evolutionary assumptions and presuppositions. If you set all of these aside, you cannot conclude form the Bible alone that the 6 days weren't 6 days.

                Lastly, you speak against ignoring the evidence. And yet when you tried to discount the lack of erosion between the layers at the Grand Canyon by calling it a mystery, were you not (a) acknowledging that this evidence exists, (b) expressing faith that evolutionists and skeptics will somehow eventually account for this obvious geologic anomaly, and (c) thus somewhat ignoring the evidence by avoiding discussing its implications now?
             2. 

                Jack Hoehn

                16 April 2014 at 9:52 pm

                Bob,  there is really nothing I can say to convince you is there?  So I am writing for my reading public, not for you now:
                Bob's system works fine "in the Bible."  If you only look for truth "in the Bible" then a 6 day creation, 6,000 years ago works.  But none of us live "in the Bible" we live in Arizona or Colorado or the Cascades surrounded by realities that "the Bible" never saw in Palestine or Turkey or Italy.  If you are satisfied to live your life "in the Bible" and don't care about how the Bible interfaces with the material real world you do live in, then none of this need bother you. 
                Jack is interested not in what makes sense just "in the Bible" but what also makes sense in the real world outside of the Bible.  He wants to know what is true in the Grand Canyon he just visited, and in the Hawaiian Islands, and in the fossil from the Green River beds he has in his library. 

                He wants to have the Bible in this present world, and not try to cram the whole world into the Bible.  He wants to explore the interface of the Bible with the real world. 

                For that reason if Bob's "just the Bible alone (by which he means the Bible as interpreted by Ellen White)" doesn't fit the world outside of the Bible, then I want to make them match, I want to reinterpret the Bible story I thought, with the real world we live in. 

                This is not damaging the Bible, this is how the Bible always has been, an honest report of how God worked with real people in their real worlds.  Therefore today the Bible has to be an honest report of how God is working in my real world.  The Books of Moses were a different world from Ezra-Nehemiah-Ester's Babylonian/Persian world.  And they are different from the Roman Empire of  the New Testament.  Jesus had to edit the Books of Moses, he preached, "Ye have heard it said (by Moses), but I say unto you….."  Jesus took how the Bible impacted Moses world, and reinterpreted it to fit the Roman Empire world.

                It was Adventisms job to reinterpret and reapply Bible truths to the 19th century world of James and Ellen White.  So Sister White said, "every girl should be taught how to saddle a horse."   That was women's liberation for then.  Women's liberation for today would be that every girls should be taught how to become financially independent of a man.  That's not "in the Bible"  but that is bringing the Bible back into our world. 

                If Bob wants to live his life entirely inside his Bible, then all his arguments and theories are sound, within those sacred pages. But they don't work in the real world outside of his Bible.   It appears to me he feels his job is to defend the Bible from reapplication to the realities of today's world.  He fears that truth from outside the Bible shold not be permitted to help us reinterpret the Bible and reapply it differently.  He must feel like a valiant warrior for the Lord, but I fear he and others clinging to past understandings of the19th century prophet (even if she admitted she was not error free),  is harming the 21st century Adventist church, and the chance for the Bible to continue to be of use in the real world of today that I, my children, and my grandchildren live in.   The Bible is true.  This real world is also true.  Unless we permit the two to explain each other, we will remain in spiritual poverty, or spiritual fantasy.
14. 

    Ranald McLeish

    12 April 2014 at 11:41 pm

     The information that ATS and the conservative scholars have set a cut off for membership on the basis of a young earth policy of 6,000 to 20,000 years explains a lot regarding the conservative view that includes an escape clause.
     

     A position that on one hand does not allow for the possibility that verses 1 and 2 apply in the context of  "in the beginning," a time with no beginning, or that " Creation week" actually begins in verse 3-5, that "God said — was the first day."
     

    On the other hand we have the escape clause, a "By the way statement that by the way, this God who created earth also created the stars. Again something in the text that supports something going on before creation week."
      
    If something was going on before creation week, what else could that entail other than verses 1 and 2, the creation of the heaven and the earth. before Creation week?
     

     The third point appears to put creation at risk. If the "And God said" regarding day four, verses 14-19, does not mean the same as "And God said," regarding the other five days of creation, and the sun, moon, and stars were not created on day four, but only appeared on day four, then the door is opened to apply the same application to the other five days, when something preexisting, appeared. e.g. thiestic evolution.
     

     

     
15. 

    Bob Pickle

    13 April 2014 at 12:45 pm

    Kevin,

    You did not address the points or answer the question that I raised. Simply saying that certain scholars think so is inadequate.
16. 

    Bob Pickle

    13 April 2014 at 12:53 pm

    Arlin,

    "Response to Bob Pickle's comments reinterpreting the meaning of the Millerite seventh month movement's 'Great Disappointment' on Oct. 22, 1844."

    In what way did I reinterpret the meaning when I stated that Millerites believed all along that the 2300 days ended with the judgment? That's not a reinterpretation. It's either a true or false statement. If you think it's false, then provide pre-1844 statements denying that the 2300 days would end with the judgment, or denying that judgment day and the second coming would occur at the same time.

    However, we do have statements by Miller from around 1822 and 1842 supporting what I said. So good luck trying to prove that the majority of Millerites held a different view.

    If Miller's Apology only repudiated the date and the chronology that led to it, and not the concept that the 2300 days would end with the second coming and Judgment Day, then citing Miller's Apology doesn't really help you. All one has to do, then, is prove that the chronology and date were correct, which they were.
17. 

    Darrel Lindensmith

    13 April 2014 at 1:19 pm

    Speaking of chronologies and generations for mankind on Earth it can be argued  from Biblical evidence for ‘about’ 40,000 years
    Deut. 7:9, 1 Chronicles 16:15, Ps. 105:8 and others.
    1000 generations × 40yr/gen = 40,000 yr
    “He has remembered His Covenant forever,
    The word which He commanded to a thousand
    generations,  (Psalms 105:8)
     
18. 

    Bob Pickle

    13 April 2014 at 3:22 pm

    If Judah, Er., and Pharez each fathered children at an average age of about 14, what basis could we give for a figure of 40 years per generation?

    Is it possible that these three passages refer to a figure intended to reach far beyond the history of mankind on earth? Otherwise, what would be the point of these three passages?
    1. 

       Jack Hoehn

       15 April 2014 at 4:19 am

       So now Bob is in a Pickle!  To protect  his 6,000 years chronology from a Biblical suggestion of 40,000 years he now suggests that after we leave earth, we will have generations of children in heaven?  Bob, your new theology of sex and reproduction after second coming is startling!   Have you been teaching this in your Sabbath School class?   Welcome to the innovative thinkers club, you secret infidel you!  🙂
       1. 

          Bob Pickle

          15 April 2014 at 12:05 pm

          Jack,

          I said no such thing. Was it not clear that I was saying that 1000 generations is a far greater number of generations than mankind will ever experience, and that the 1000 generations relate to mankind's existence on this earth, not anywhere else?
          1. 

             Jack Hoehn

             15 April 2014 at 8:01 pm

             Sorry Bob, this was a poke in your ribs, and meant to be jovial. I appologize for lowering the tone of the conversation.  I don't know the time of creation, you don't know the time of creation, Ellen White didn't know the time of creation, just exactly as we don't know the date of the second coming.  We all know God created.  We all know Jesus is coming again.  We don't know when.  To claim that our feeble attempts at making up a chronology by counting birthdays of the Patriarchs is Bible truth, only destroys faith in the Bible when it is proven to any unbiased mind that it can not be so.  That may not be infidelity, but it is faith destroying, so please stop it.
             1. 

                Bob Pickle

                16 April 2014 at 3:10 pm

                Jack,

                We do know the approximate time of creation: It's about 6000 years ago. More importantly, we do know the length of time creation took: 6 literal days.

                It seems to me that you are combining these two different issues into one. You said above that you reject the idea that the 6 days were days, and thus you affirm that you embrace what PP 111 declares to be a most dangerous and most insidious form of infidelity.

                But that's a different issue than how long it's been since creation week. You refer to adding up the birthdates of the patriarch, and that doing so "is faith destroying," another rather radical and extreme statement. Okay, how about Jude 14, where it declares that Enoch was the 7th from Adam. Do you think Jude got it wrong too, or do you accept as truth that Enoch was the 7th generation from Adam? Let's get specific: Tell us exactly where you find wiggle room in the genealogies, and what you think the outer limits of wiggle room in those places are?
19. 

    Darrel Lindensmith

    13 April 2014 at 6:31 pm

     Hi Bob,  According to my Encarta a generation is the time taken to produce new generation: the period of time that it takes for people, animals or plants to grow up and produce their own offspring, in humans held to be between 30 and 35 years • after three generations of war and conflict
       Encarta® World English Dictionary 1999 Microsoft

    Many researchers feel that a generation is 40 years in general in Scripture.  But other reckonings are found as well.  The lowest possible number used in scripture or the culture was around 25 years. Job lived an hundred and forty years, and saw his sons, and his sons' sons, even four generations. 140 yrs divided by 6 generations = 23+ yrs

    Job 42:16  After this lived Job an hundred and forty years, and saw his sons, and his sons' sons-four generations.

    You are correct that 14 might or could be, the marrying age for a young lady, but not the man.  He would most likely be in his late 20s.

    The average age of each generation from David to Jesus according to Luke was twenty-five years, but according to Matthew it it is forty years.  The average age from David to the captivity according to Matthew was thirty-seven years. The average age from the captivity to Jesus Luke was twenty-eight years, but according to Matthew fifty years. 

    So as one may see the purpose of counting the generations for Bible writers was not to give an exact time scale.

    So Deut. 7:9, 1 Chronicles 16:15, Ps. 105:8 Psalms 105:8 would be placing mankind on the earth between 20,000 to 40,000 years.

     
20. 

    Bob Pickle

    13 April 2014 at 7:21 pm

    Hi Darrel.

    Since Judah was about 42 when he moved to Egypt, and since Pharez was already a father by that time, and since Pharez was sort of a second generation for Judah, born after Er had already married and died, Judah, Er, and Pharez must have gotten married by an average age of 13 or 14, quite different from Jacob's age of 84.

    But I still think that Deut. 7:9; 1 Chr. 16:15; and Ps. 105:8 are putting out a figure of 1000 generations not to limit the length of time man has been/will be on the earth, but to extend God's promises far beyond the maximum length of time man will be on this earth.  Note that Ps. 105:9 and 1 Chr. 16:16 limit the preceding verses to the Abrahamic covenant, and thus, unless we want to say that Christ will not return until 20,000 to 40,000 years after Abraham's time, these verses must be talking about a period of time far exceeding man's time on earth.
21. 

    Darrel Lindensmith

    13 April 2014 at 7:35 pm

    Yes, you could be correct.  My larger purpose in this was to illustrate that it is not wise to be dogmatic in Biblical time calculation be,  it in Gen. 1 or the chronologies 
22. 

    arlin

    14 April 2014 at 6:32 am

      Response to Bob Pickle
    William Miller and his Millerite movement expected a literal earthly Second Advent, Resurrection, and Judgment, and when these predicted literal earthly events did not happen on Oct. 22, 1844, the heavenly "reinterpretation" of the "Great Disappointment" was initially made by Hiram Edson in his "vision" on the morning of Oct. 23, 1844. Miller's following statement in his 1845 Apology and Defence (that I quoted earlier in full context, which see) speaks to this very point: "But because we then ardently desired his coming, and sought that preparation that was necessary, it does not follow that our expectations were then realized. For we were certainly disappointed. We expected the personal coming of Christ at that time, and now to contend that we were not mistaken, is dishonest."  The full context makes it clear Miller was referring to the heavenly reinterpretation of the earthly coming and its attendant events, the resurrection and Judgment. Historians have described this process as the "spiritualization" of predicted literal earthly events that fail to be fulfilled. Hiram Edson's "vision" "spiritualized" the "Great Disappointment" by reinterpreting it from a literal earthly event into a spiritual heavenly event— where it could not be disconfirmed by the normal process of historical disconfirmation of literal earthly prophetic predictions.
23. 

    Bob Pickle

    14 April 2014 at 1:00 pm

    arlin,

    If you think that Edson "reinterpreted" the 2300 days to mean a heavenly judgment instead of an earthly judgment, then please cite where Edson so stated. The way Elon Everts' December 1856 letter speaks of an "investigative judgment," it's as if the investigative judgment was a new idea in 1856, so I doubt you'll find such language in Edson's writings prior to 1856 (though I could be wrong).

    Much more importantly, I think you're avoiding the bigger question: Did the 2300 days end in 1844? The chronology is as sound as it gets. If you question whether the heavenly sanctuary was to be cleansed at the end of the 2300 days, then what event are you proposing to occur in 1844?

    Lastly, your final sentence seems to deny that there is any event at all on earth that confirms the Millerite understanding of the 2300 days, but such a conclusion goes too far. We have the Millerite Movement itself, which fulfills Rev. 10 and Rev. 14:6-7. We also have the supernatural phenomena of children preaching in Sweden, and claiming as their reason for preaching Rev. 14:7. So unquestionably there are earthly events that we can point to as marking the ending of the 2300 days.
24. 

    Trevor Hammond [22oct1844]

    15 April 2014 at 4:32 am

    RE: "So now Bob is in a Pickle!" [Dr Hoehn]
    ——
    I guess 'time will be a test again' to find out if taking pot shots at others surnames by intentional ridicule is allowed on these boards.  But I guess some people of certain persuasions are more equal then others.
    1. 

       Jack Hoehn

       15 April 2014 at 7:24 pm

       Trevor is right.  I am tired of being called an infidel by Mr. Pickle, and I replied in kind.  I am sorry.  Truth is too important to be lowered by tit for tat.  Culpa mea.
       1. 

          Bob Pickle

          16 April 2014 at 3:29 pm

          Jack, I never called you an infidel.

          Above you wrote: "First I believe Ellen White was a propetess and spoke by inspiration.  Second I believe that prophets are not infallible and make errors." Seems like you are taking a smorgasboard approach: She was wrong when she called your ideas infidelity, but she wasn't wrong when she said time will never again be a test.

          But let's explore this further. I cited PP 111, but let's take a look at 3SG 90 instead, from the chapter "Disguised Infidelity": "I was then carried back to the creation and was shown that the first week, in which God performed the work of creation in six days and rested on the seventh day, was just like every other week" (3SG 90). Are you not really saying: (a) Rather than Ellen White being wrong, it was the vision she was given by the Holy Spirit that got it wrong about the length of creation week. Or: (b) Ellen White misunderstood the vision so drastically that when she was shown that the 6 days weren't days, she thought she was shown that they were literal days and only literal days, and that to believe otherwise was to believe an "infidel assumption" (3SG 91), and God never corrected her misunderstanding.

          Please read 3SG 90 ff, and then tell us whether you are selecting (a) or (b). (I see no other possible choices, given your position.) Please defend your selection in such a way that we can tell you really do believe Ellen White was a prophetess and spoke by inspiration.
25. 

    Jack Hoehn

    16 April 2014 at 9:57 pm

    I'm reposting a reply from above so it doesn't get lost in the flow.

    Jack Hoehn

    ReplyApproveDelete

    0 seconds ago

     

    Bob, there is really nothing I can say to convince you is there? So I am writing for my reading public, not for you now:
    Bob's system works fine "in the Bible." If you only look for truth "in the Bible" then a 6 day creation, 6,000 years ago works. But none of us live "in the Bible" we live in Arizona or Colorado or the Cascades surrounded by realities that "the Bible" never saw in Palestine or Turkey or Italy. If you are satisfied to live your life "in the Bible" and don't care about how the Bible interfaces with the material real world you do live in, then none of this need bother you.
    Jack is interested not in what makes sense just "in the Bible" but what also makes sense in the real world outside of the Bible. He wants to know what is true in the Grand Canyon he just visited, and in the Hawaiian Islands, and in the fossil from the Green River beds he has in his library.

    He wants to have the Bible in this present world, and not try to cram the whole world into the Bible. He wants to explore the interface of the Bible with the real world.

    For that reason if Bob's "just the Bible alone (by which he means the Bible as interpreted by Ellen White)" doesn't fit the world outside of the Bible, then I want to make them match, I want to reinterpret the Bible story I thought, with the real world we live in.

    This is not damaging the Bible, this is how the Bible always has been, an honest report of how God worked with real people in their real worlds. Therefore today the Bible has to be an honest report of how God is working in my real world. The Books of Moses were a different world from Ezra-Nehemiah-Ester's Babylonian/Persian world. And they are different from the Roman Empire of the New Testament. Jesus had to edit the Books of Moses, he preached, "Ye have heard it said (by Moses), but I say unto you….." Jesus took how the Bible impacted Moses world, and reinterpreted it to fit the Roman Empire world.

    It was Adventisms job to reinterpret and reapply Bible truths to the 19th century world of James and Ellen White. So Sister White said, "every girl should be taught how to saddle a horse." That was women's liberation for then. Women's liberation for today would be that every girls should be taught how to become financially independent of a man. That's not "in the Bible" but that is bringing the Bible back into our world.

    If Bob wants to live his life entirely inside his Bible, then all his arguments and theories are sound, within those sacred pages. But they don't work in the real world outside of his Bible. It appears to me he feels his job is to defend the Bible from reapplication to the realities of today's world. He fears that truth from outside the Bible shold not be permitted to help us reinterpret the Bible and reapply it differently. He must feel like a valiant warrior for the Lord, but I fear he and others clinging to past understandings of the19th century prophet (even if she admitted she was not error free), is harming the 21st century Adventist church, and the chance for the Bible to continue to be of use in the real world of today that I, my children, and my grandchildren live in. The Bible is true. This real world is also true. Unless we permit the two to explain each other, we will remain in spiritual poverty, or spiritual fantasy.
    1. 

       Bob Pickle

       16 April 2014 at 10:42 pm

       Jack,

       I think you are in danger of your readers concluding that you don't really mean what you say. You assert above that you take into consideration "truth from outside the Bible," including "what is true in the Grand Canyon" you "just visited," and yet you still didn't address the lack of erosion between the Grand Canyon layers when making your reply. Why be so reluctant to accept this clear, easy-to-recognize evidence of rapid deposition of the geologic column, especially since it vindicates Scripture, such as Exodus 20:8-11? Why continue to accuse others of refusing to consider geologic evidence when you are doing that very thing?

       As for Ellen White, you appealed to a SoP statement as the basis for your article, yet when it came down to it, you appear to reject, not Ellen White's understanding, but the vision itself that she described in 3SG 90 ff. Yet you also asserted above that you believe she was a prophetess and was inspired. How can you have it both ways? How can you reject her visions and still believe she was a prophet, real world or not?

       "But they don't work in the real world outside of his Bible." I dare you to try to prove it. Prove that a young earth and flood model do not work in the real world when explaining the anomalous lack of erosion between layers at the Grand Canyon, some consecutive layers of which skeptics and infidels assert differ by 12 or 100+ million years in age. Explain how a layer can sit around that long without significant erosion occurring at some point in time, and in so doing, justify for us the rejection of PP 111; 3SG 90 ff; Ex. 20:8-11 so that we have some sort of reason to engage in the "reinterpretation" you want us to do.
       1. 

          Darrel Lindensmith

          16 April 2014 at 11:34 pm

          Bob, I understand where you are coming from, however we must be careful to not hold the writing of Ellen White to the same level with or give them equal authority to Scripture itself.  You remember she herself asked for this differientiation when being pushed to answer the issue of "the daily."

          I feel that Intelligent Design proponents are somewhat wrong on the millions and millions of years of life on earth.  I think Young Earth proponents are equally wrong regarding the 6000 to 10000 years;  even the most conservative interpretation of the evidence points to well well beyond that.

          I am from 'middle earth' myself.    But forget dates and dating, Jack is rightfully concerned that if we demand that others see a very young earth, we will loose them spiritually, because we will have created a wall of strata too high (and too young) for them to honestly pass over.

          There is nothing to get angry about.  These are "interpretations" of evidence.  We all agree on the core issue.  We all agree that evolutionary interpretations fail to explain the origin and complexity of life.  This fact is not evidence in and of itself for The Creator, but this does open up the mind to consider where the evidence does actually point.  

          As John says, "In the beginning was the Logic, and the Logic was with God and the Logic was God,"  The logic of life's mathmatical complexity and the language and the codes of genetic complexity of life show direct evidence of a Mind, a mind beyond the comprehension of human reason to fully grasp.  Let's not forget that we agree on this central central point! 

           
          1. 

             Bob Pickle

             17 April 2014 at 1:42 am

             Hi Darrel.

             You might be missing my point. Jack said above, "I reject the interpretation that God's Creation YOM means 24 hours." That's not the same question as the age of the earth. It pertains specifically to the length of Creation week. Lots of people believe in an old earth and a literal Creation week. But that's not what Jack is promoting here.

             Jack also said above, "First I believe Ellen White was a propetess and spoke by inspiration." And that very same Ellen White described a vision she had in the following manner, "I was then carried back to the creation and was shown that the first week, in which God performed the work of creation in six days and rested on the seventh day, was just like every other week" (3SG 90). Jack appears to reject this vision, but makes no attempt whatsoever to explain how he can still claim to believe that Ellen White was an inspired prophet.

             He also has made no attempt to explain how he sees Ex. 20:8-11 talking about anything other than literal days. And if he really thinks the strata is too high to honestly pass over, he certainly is free to propose some sort of plausible explanation as to why there is no significant erosion between the layers of the Grand Canyon. Calling it a mystery while accusing others of ignoring evidence simply doesn't cut it.

             My opinion: Proper biblical interpretation, consideration of geological evidence, these aren't really Jack's issues. Jack has embraced philosophical presuppositions that for some reason he feels must be preserved at all costs, regardless of what the geological evidence is, regardless of what the Bible says, regardless of what Ellen White's visions said. I don't know how else to explain the lack of response.
    2. 

       Bob Pickle

       17 April 2014 at 2:33 pm

       Jack, in pondering what you wrote above, I wonder if you are really responding to my words below:

       "You have proposed that we interpret the days of Gen. 1 to be other than days, but have you provided any textual reasons in support of that idea? Is there anything in the Bible that tells us that the days aren't days? You claim that you are not an evolutionist, and note that I didn't say above that you were, but you do have evolutionary assumptions and presuppositions. If you set all of these aside, you cannot conclude form the Bible alone that the 6 days weren't 6 days."

       I now wonder if you are telling us we should ignore what the biblical passages clearly mean. But certainly you would find that approach unpalatable if it were applied to your own writings: "I reject the interpretation that God's Creation YOM means 24 hours." Shall we conclude that these words of yours mean that you heartily accept the idea that the days of creation were 24-hour days, since geologic evidence has already falsified other possible views?

       If you indeed feel inclined to protest this approach, then you have no logical basis for proposing a different meaning than what the original Bible writers clearly intended in Gen. 1; Ex. 20:8-11, etc. It would be hypocrisy once again.
26. 

    Trevor Hammond [22oct1844]

    16 April 2014 at 10:30 pm

    Dear Dr Hoehn
     
    I only mentioned your swipe at Mr Pickle because I was previously accused by some of the liberals of intentionally misspelling someone's surname – I think it was Mr Ferguson (I hope I got it right this time) – and was accused of trying to insult him in so doing.  Although Mr Ferguson wasn't peeved by it, my accusers tried to use it to have me banned by making these false assumptions, even though it was just an inadvertent typo. 
     
    With that being said, and with all due respect sir, your response isn’t quite the same as your trying to get back at him for referring to you as an infidel in my opinion.  If he intended to describe your unbelief in the Bible account of Creation, which strongly suggests a seven literal twenty four hour earth day week for Creation, then I see no reason for being upset.  I for one have no qualms about being called an 'infidel' when it come to evolution theory, whether it be the 'death before sin' kind that you propagate or the 'we come from cabbages kind' – or any other of the many variations for that matter – that believers of evolution theory faith preach, especially in terms of origins.
     
    Those who hold such way out opposing views on our key doctrinal positions which we as a church body fundamentally subscribe to, (such as in the case of evolution theory being cleverly incorporated into an unbiblical ‘death before sin’ belief system, and further offering it as a credible optional belief), should accept that what they believe is non-Adventist belief and one that lies outside of the parameters of sound biblically based Christian doctrine.
     
27. 

    Bob Pickle

    17 April 2014 at 1:50 am

    Jack is promoting death before sin, despite the biblical statements to the contrary? What other biblical passages and SoP statements is he trying to rewrite? Where is he trying to lead his readers with his contradictory statements and propositions? Full disclosure would be much better, in my opinion.
28. 

    arlin

    17 April 2014 at 6:41 am

    Response to Bob Pickle. I hope this helps show how Edson's "vision" the day after the Great Disappointment reinterpreted their "Great Disappointment," and spiritualized Miller's prediction of Christ's earthly Second Advent into a heavenly "coming to His Father" in the Second Apartment of the heavenly sanctuary.
    But, Bob (or others), I would still like to have an answer to the question I raised in my first post:  why was time-setting Christ's 2nd Advent wrong from Christ's ascension until 1843, and wrong again after Oct. 22, 1844, but not wrong for Miller and the Millerites to do it in 1843 and 1844?

         After Edson’s visionary experience the morning after the “Great Disappointment,” he held a series of studies with Dr. Hahn and O.R.L. Crosier, who wrote up a preliminary report of their findings, published by Edson in the DayDawn in the spring of 1845 (cited in Review and Herald, May 5, 1851). No copy was known of this publication until Burt found a copy in 1995, verifying it and revealing what it contained. 
        Crosier’s later fuller exposition was published in the Day Star Extra, Feb. 7, 1846. Paul Gordon says an article by Joseph Turner and Apollos Hale in the Advent Mirror, January, 1845, “also contributed to an early understanding of the subject.” (Gordon, The Sanctuary, 1844 and the Pioneers, 2000, p. 24.) Ellen White's critics’ claimed she heard this idea orally from Turner or read his article in 1845, but she denied this claim, saying she saw it in her own early visions. In her (& James White’s) pamphlet “A Word to the Little Flock,” (1847), she “recommended” Crosier’s 1846 article “to every saint” as “the true light” on the sanctuary. (Crosier soon abandonded his belief in this view.) 

    Miller shows in his Aug. 1, 1845 Apology he already then knew about the “new theories” Edson claimed he saw in his Oct. 23, 1844 “vision.” Compare Edson’s excerpt quoted below, with this statement Miller wrote Aug. 1, 1845: “I have no confidence in any of the new theories that have grown out of that [seventh month, Oct. 22, 1844] movement, viz. that Christ then came to the Bridegroom, that the door of mercy was then closed, that there is no salvation for sinners [“shut door” theory], that the seventh trumpet then sounded, or that it was a fulfillment of prophecy in any sense.” William Miller, Mr. Miller’s Apology and Defence, Boston, Aug. 1, 1845, p. 28, 

         The first typical earthly Sanctuary was the portable sanctuary established by the God of Israel as “a figure [Gr. parabǒlē, “parable”] for the time then present” (Heb. 9:9), “that I may dwell among them.” Ex. 25:8. Moses was given detailed instructions about its construction and cultic rituals according to the earthly “Aaronic Order,” but Christ's heavenly antitypical Sanctuary Ministry as our Great High Priest “after the order of Melchezedek” is only explained in the New Testament book of Hebrews.

    The SDA traditional “sanctuary truth” grew out of the “unique” reinterpretation of  the meaning of the “Great Disappointment” of Oct. 22, 1844 that evolved among the small “Sabbath and shut door” Millerite Sabbatarian group as a result of the new “light with regard to our disappointment” that “explained”  and “made [it] clear and satisfactory.” Hiram Edson claimed this “new light” first came to him in a field the morning of Oct. 23, 1844, the day after the “Great Disappointment”.  Edson explained this “vision” in his Undated Manuscript (reprinted in The Disappointed…, Numbers & Butler, et. al., pp. 213-216). Here is the relevant excerpt: “…while passing through a large field I was stopped about midway of the field. Heaven seemed open to my view, and I saw distinctly, and clearly, that instead of our High Priest coming out of the Most Holy of the heavenly sanctuary to come to this earth on the tenth day of the seventh month, at the end of the 2300 days, that he for the first time entered on that day the second apartment of that sanctuary; and that he had a work to perform in the Most Holy before coming to this earth. That he came to the marriage at that time; in other words, to the Ancient of days, to receive a kingdom, dominion, and glory; and we must wait for his return from the wedding ; and my mind was directed to the tenth ch. of Rev. where I could see the vision had spoken and did not lie; the seventh angel had begun [sic] to sound; we had eaten the little [sic] book; it had been sweet in our mouth, and it had now become bitter in our belly, embittering our whole being. That we must prophecy again, etc., and that when the seventh angel began to sound, the temple of God was opened in heaven, and there was seen in his temple the ark of his testament, etc.” (Underlining added for emphasis).

        “Spiritualization is a process of reinterpreting events, first believed to be of a material visible and generally available nature, so that they are seen to be of an esoteric psychical nature, available only to the ‘psychically’ or ‘spiritually’ aware. It is a process frequently encountered among those who have lived with a prophecy that proved untrue.”  J. Gordon Melton, The Encyclopedia of American Religions (1978), Vol. 1, p. 465, footnote 9; Vol. 2, p. 500, chap. 16, footnote 100. (See Footnote 93, p. 30) See also Lawrence Foster, “Had Prophecy Failed?” (Chapter Ten, in Numbers & Butler, et al, The Disappointed: Millerism and Millenialism in the Nineteenth Century, p. 188 (note 48). 

     
    1. 

       Bob Pickle

       17 April 2014 at 12:58 pm

       Arlin,

       I think I already addressed your question: The date is correct, and thus the proclamation of the approaching end of the 2300 days was most certainly appropriate. Additionally, Rev. 10 foretold that it would be preached. We also have the disciples on Palm Sunday terribly mistaken about what was really about to happen, but that didn't make their proclamation that day any less a fulfillment of prophecy.

       I don't see you coming to grips with these facts. Instead, you're dwelling exclusively on a translation of one text, and using that translation to say that the proclamation was not of God, despite the mound of evidence that it was.

       I also think you are misapplying the word "spiritualization." Edson and other Adventists believed that Jesus literally came to a literal Ancient of days in a literal Most Holy Place in a literal heaven. Where's the spiritualization? In stark contrast, when Christ did not come as expected in 1874, Charles Taze Russell taught that He came after all. That date was moved to 1914 by Judge Rutherford, and today JW's teach that that is when the "second coming" occurred. By Christ literally arriving anywhere? No. They've spiritualized away the second coming. That's not what Edson or Crosier did, and Ellen Harmon actively opposed such a teaching.
29. 

    Philip Law

    17 April 2014 at 7:23 am

    Had the Bible been 100% in agreement with contemporary sciences 100 years ago then the Bible is hopelessly outdated today.  When one says  the Bible is not in line with reality one needs to specify what reality or at least qualify the time of that reality.  Before Pasteur Spontaneous Generation was scientific reality the Bible’s life begets life was just fairy tale. While decrying certain interpretation of Biblical creation account to be dogmatic and not in line with reality one needs to be careful not to fall into the dogma of regarding contemporary sciences as the ultimate yardsticks of reality.  It may just be ‘present truth’ like Spontaneous Generation.  
30. 

    Darrel Lindensmith

    17 April 2014 at 2:27 pm

    Death before sin was the result of the Creator allowing freedom and moral development in Man.

    ~~Different from the blog next door, I think we all agree here that Free will is the qualia that makes us real.  My understanding is that the Creator, to preserve free will, would not coerce man’s moral development.  Mankind must freely choose the good and reject evil.  God could not directly intervene least free will be suspended. 

    I believe that Scripture teaches that the Creator, before he created, he took responsibility for “all” the effects of freedom and randomness (see definition below) that ‘free creation’ would unleash in human society.  God took the responsibility for the misuse of freedom by punishing himself on the Cross, taking the responsibility for our sin.  God did this from the beginning.  “Foreordained before the foundation of the world, but manifested at the end of time for your sake." I Pet. 1:20  
    "The Lamb . . . was slain from the foundation of the world." Rev. 13:8    
    We see from these verses that The Creator, from his eternity, saw and re-acted to the sin situation before it actually ‘happened’ in the stream of earth-based time!  
    If this were not so then when mankind first sinned, mankind would have died “that very day.”  Gen. 2:17. 
    Symbols of the Cross were placed on mankind before the event the symbols pointed to happened. “Unto Adam also and to his wife did the LORD God make coats of skins, and clothed them.” Gen. 3:21  
     The need for Calvary was “foreknown” and the benefits of the Cross proactively applied.   “Who saved us according to his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ before the world began.”      II Tim. 1:9
    The reality of the death of Christ on Calvary was pro-actively applied to mankind in the garden, thousands of years before the event.  In the same way, the effects of sin (death) were applied to nature before creation.
    The Creator, before He created, would foreknow perfectly the negative outcomes due to free choice, and from the beginning He would design nature with the ability to adapt and maintain balance.   
    This is Paul’s teaching in Romans; nature was “made subject to vanity, not of its own [God’s] will . . .” Rom. 8:20 is referring to Adam but to God.
    Death and predation–“Vanity” according to Paul, (the results of sin) would be a reality until the “restoration of all things.” Acts 3:21 
    The Creator, in the final day, would free nature from this “bondage and corruption.”  Paul again reminds us, “The creature was made subject to vanity, not of its own will, but by reason of him [God] who subjected the same in hope.”  Rom. 8:20
    “In Hope!” There is an inner sense in human hearts that something is wrong with this world, and a desire or hope for a “better country.”  Our desire and hope for a ‘better world’ resonates with Scripture’s promises that   “. . . the creature itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God.”  Rom. 8:21
    * “Freedom” and randomness in nature—-“Without some degree of randomness, all events and all choices in the universe would be totally predetermined by unyielding laws of nature, the physics and chemistry of all reactions. We would be mere robots. Our every thought and action would be fixed by the immediately preceding chemistry of our bodies and the conditions of our environment. The future would be controlled by the past.”  “The Science of God,” p. 170.
31. 

    Bob Pickle

    17 April 2014 at 2:43 pm

    "Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin" (Rom. 5:12)

    There is no hint anywhere in Scripture to the contrary. There was no death before sin.
32. 

    arlin

    17 April 2014 at 5:24 pm

    Bob, I agree with your last post that the Bible teaches there was no death before Adam's sin.

    But I can't agree with your idea that "literal" means a heavenly event. Miller was honest to admit both his date and his prediction of Christ's literal earthly 2nd Advent would occur on Oct. 22, 1844 were wrong. And he was right when he said to claim otherwise was "dishonest."

    Nor can I agree with you that it was OK for Miller to time-set the 2nd Advent because after his prediction failed at the Great Disappointment, his prediction of a literal 2nd Advent was reinterpreted and spiritualized as a heavenly event. This is not an accurate use of the term "literal", and most people reject this as illogical reasoning and special pleading to support an unbiblical failed time-setting prediction. As far as I know, no Christian group in the last 2,000 years has ever "seen" an Investigative judgment commencing on Oct. 22, 1844, except the little group of early Seventh-day Adventists who accepted Edson's "vision" on Oct. 23, 1844.   

     
33. 

    Bob Pickle

    17 April 2014 at 6:40 pm

    Arlin, it's great we agree on something.

    "Miller was honest to admit both his date and his prediction of Christ's literal earthly 2nd Advent would occur on Oct. 22, 1844 were wrong."

    You are incorrect on several points. First of all, the evidence shows that Miller never accepted the date of Oct. 22, much less "predicted" it. Much more importantly, Miller never renounced the idea that the 2300 days would end around the time he said they would. The thing he admitted to being wrong in was the chronology he used. I think I already pointed this out.

    So you don't believe that heaven is literal, or that events in heaven are literal? When Scripture says that Jesus in heaven said, "Lo I come, in the volume of the book it is written of me," you believe He never really, literally said that?

    Rev. 11:1 portrays an investigative measuring judgment occurring after referring to the unsealed 2300 days of Daniel. I wouldn't call John a Christian group, but he still saw what he saw. But more importantly, you don't seem to want to deal with the fact that the 2300 days did end in the 1840's, regardless of what Miller, Edson, or anyone else did or did not teach. If you oppose a heavenly investigative judgment as the event marking the end of the 2300 days, pray tell, what event do you propose as happening instead?
34. 

    Darrel Lindensmith

    17 April 2014 at 7:52 pm

    when we read the story and its symbols we read it through the eyes of our “received interpretation” and are unaware that we are missing so much.  
    For example the Bible suggests immortality comes through eating the Tree of Life.  What about animals then? How did they maintain their immortality.  The implication is they did not have immortality. 
    The story does suggest that the whole world wasn’t perfect before the Fall.  Perfection was in the Garden in Eden; outside of Eden, the wilderness unto which Adam and Eve were eventually expelled, had much the same fallen state as we have now.  This is fairly clear from the story of the explosion.
    The world was “very good” but not yet perfect.  It was not yet ‘finished.’  God commands that the animals, birds and sea creatures, as well as mankind, multiply to fill the earth. This suggests a process of completion—speciation. 
    The fact that God asks Adam to ‘subdue’ the earth suggests the world was somehow imperfect and unfinished, and Adam was to be God’s instrument bring the world to perfection as its stewards
    Romans 5:12  teaches that Adam brought sin and death NOT into the world, but he brought sin and death into the human race – to all people.   Adam was spiritually and metaphorically the representative of the whole human race.   
    Foreknowing sin, God before time began, created the entire world to accommodate the reality of sin and freedom.   So death and predation are the results of sin, but God did not need to wait until it happened to react to it.   
    The need for Salvation was foreknown and Grace (Jesus' death) was proactively applied before creation.  "Christ saved us according to his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ before the world began." 2 Timothy 1:9
35. 

    Bob Pickle

    17 April 2014 at 8:57 pm

    Darrel,

    Do you believe the story occurred as witten?

    Rom. 5:12 seems to clearly say that sin and death entered the world, not just mankind.

    "He looked upon a perfect world, in which there was no trace of sin, no imperfection" (AUCR 4-15-03). I don't see any biblical or SoP basis for suggesting that there was death or predation before sin. The only reason to go down that road is to somehow attempt to merge the suppositions of skeptics and infidels with Scripture, and why would we want to do that?
36. 

    Darrel Lindensmith

    17 April 2014 at 9:50 pm

    Hi Bob, yes as reay do–as written!
37. 

    earl calahan

    18 April 2014 at 12:29 am

    Thank you Darrel for your above submission. Although the outer limits of Eden's borders were protected from outside influences of human life, in its degraded environment of sinful beings, where death was a daily event, the interior of Edenwas not free of evil. Lucifer, now called Satan, the devil, was there in the form of a Serpent, aluring, enticing, lying, speaking prevarifications against the MOST HIGH ALMIGHTY GOD OF ALL THINGS, in "THIS WORLD".The plan was for God's surrogate, ADAM, whose DNA was of Earthly origin, was
    created with FREE WILL, to be able to withstand the wiles of the Devil, defeat SATAN, and then leave EDEN, to the outer wild and deadly environment of Earth, proving to the lost heathen that SATAN was a devil, and GOD is LOVE.
    We know much of the rest of the story of mankind's sorry history, and the need for a Godly Emissary from HEAVEN, God  Himself, to come down amonst His Creation, if they were to be saved. Mankind finds it most difficult to understand that Godly LOVE, even today, when we have a partly clear view of the plan of man's salvation, yet, seeing blurred visions of its entirety, because to see with clarity the whole picture, mankind must be led spiritually as GOD IS SPIRIT. This is the reason non-belivers, athetists, evolutionists, find it so hard to come to the TRUTH. They want to prove, with Earthly science, whether GOD is the its TRUTH, or just of a false religion. This can never be achieved without the SPIRITUALITY of GOD BEING ACCEPTED. Man and man's knowledge is of Earthly science, but GOD'S IS UNIVERSAL and ETERNAL, all of the spacial reaches forever and ever is GOD'S REALM, and operates under HIS perfect SPACE SCIENCE. God is an enigma to most of Earthlings. Only by the Holy Spirit can we begin to  perceive knowledge, understanding and TRUTH, and wisdom  of GOD'S AWESOME MAJESTY. This MAJESTIC ALMIGHTY ONENESS, who in HIS DIGINITY, lowered HIS AWESOMENESS, to save this tiny little colony of His CREATION, this little infinitesimal planet of human creatures. We are HIS. Because HE is LOVE, HE cannot and will not forsake us. Look around you, what do you see on Earth? You see teeming Humanity in many different shapes, colors, cultures, etnicities, tongues, haves, havenots. All creatures of varied environments, competing, creating massive towers of exclusiveness, reaching high into the atmosphere, both of physical building designs, and mental towers of seperation. The Beautiful Elite attempting to escape the squalidness and misery of the lower classes of Earth's creatures, for fear of being contaminated of their dismal lot.
    This Earth, this world, as noted, is but one of billions of GOD'S worlds (universe- es). HE oversees and rules it ALL. We begrudge the seeming lack of His attention, timewise, some thinking we have been forsaken, left to fend for ourselves, until we destroy it all. Not true. Although we live with Earth time and associate all with Earth time, our CREATOR is ETERNAL and operates on HIS time. His plan for Earth's humanity was preordained and GOD is not slack, and will bring our Eternal destiny to fruition. Accept the LORD GOD JESUS CHRIST as your SAVIOUR, KEEP THIS SWEET KNOWLEDGE TO YOUR HEART. HIS RETURN IS IMMINENT.

    MAKE A JOYFUL NOISE UNTO THE ALMIGHTY, ALL YE LANDS
    SERVE THE LORD WITH GLADNESS
    COME BEFORE HIS PRESENCE WITH SINGING
    KNOW YE THE LORD, HE IS GOD
    IT IS HE WHO HAS MADE US, NOT WE OURSELVES
    ENTER INTO HIS GATES WITH THANKSGIVING
    AND INTO HIS COURTS WITH PRAISE
    BE THANKFUL UNTO HIM, AND BLESS HIS NAME
    FOR THE LORD IS GOOD AND HIS MERCY IS EVERLASTING
    AND HIS TRUTH ENDURETH TO ALL GENERATIONS, ALL!!!!
    AMEN.
     
38. 

    arlin

    18 April 2014 at 8:40 am

    Bob, you need to check your Millerite history!
    Miller, Himes and other leaders DID accept the Oct. 22, 1844 date about two weeks prior to it, after they returned from preaching tours in the West, and they saw what they felt was the Holy Spirit working in the Seventh month movement in the East. This is well documented history.  
    It is also well-documented that it was actually Miller's earlier suggestion to focus on the fall feasts rather the the spring feasts that influenced Snow to set that fall date.
     Yes I believe the Ultimate Realities are in Heaven!  But in the context of earthly history –which we are here discussing –"literal"  vs. "spiritual" have opposite earthly meanings!
    Yes, the JW 1914 date was one form of "spiritualization," but Edson's reinterpretation of the Great Disappointment from a "literal" earthly event to a heavenly "spiritual" event was another form of "spiritualization", and as I stated earlier, it removed the date Oct. 22, 1844 from the literal earthly realm to the heavenly spiritual realm where the predicted earthly literal event (2nd Advent) could no longer be historically disconfirmed by the normal earthly historical process by which the fulfillment of all literal earthly prophetic predictions must be confirmed or disconfirmed.      
39. 

    Bob Pickle

    18 April 2014 at 1:21 pm

    Arlin,

    Apparently you've never read Miller's April 6, 1844 letter, which is what "documented history" cites as evidence that Miller accepted the date of Oct. 22. The fact is that the letter shows Miller accepted the idea that Christ would come in the Jewish 7th month, not necessarily on Oct. 22. (He cites a number of different dates in that letter, but fails to mention Oct. 22.) In fact, in a Dec. 1844 letter, Miller states that on the evening of Oct. 21, he told the brethren he didn't think Christ was coming on the morrow, since then He wouldn't come in an hour in which they thought not.

    I do not understand why you are insisting that a literal coming of Christ to a literal Most Holy Place in a literal heaven is a spiritualization. You certainly wouldn't insist that my saying that the Son of man literally came to the Ancient of Days in Dan. 7 in heaven is spiritualizing away that text. Again, Ellen Harmon repeatedly rebuked spiritualizers who said things like what the JW's say. So how can you say that she in reality was doing the same thing? The Sabbath keeping Adventists did not say that the second coming had really occurred after all, only spiritually, not literally. They simply did not teach such a thing. If Dan. 8:14 declared, "Unto 2300 days, then shall the Messiah come," you would have a good point. But the text doesn't say that.

    Lastly, I already pointed out that the end of the 2300 days can be historically confirmed by such earthly events as the child preachers in Sweden, and the Millerite Movement itself since it fulfilled Rev. 10. Why then insist that the end of the 2300 days cannot be historically confirmed when it clearly can be? Besides, you have yet to propose any flaws in either the chronology or reasoning that leads to the conclusion that the 2300 days end in 1844, and thus Oct. 22 still stands unimpeached, regardless of what did or did not happen on that date.
40. 

    arlin

    20 April 2014 at 7:57 am

    Bob, I will quote this excerpt from Miller' own last published work, Apology and Defence, Aug. 1, 1845, pp. 25-26, four years before his death, and nearly a year after the Great Disappointment:

       "On the passing of my published time, I frankly acknowledged my disappointment in reference to the exact period; but my faith was unchanged in any essential feature.  I therefore continued my labors, principally at the West during the summer of ’44, until “the seventh month movement,” as it is called.  I had had no participation in this, only as I wrote a letter eighteen months previously, presenting the observances under the Mosaic law, which pointed to that month as a probable time when the Advent might be expected.  This was written because some were looking to definite days in the Spring. I had, however, no expectation that so unwarranted a use would be made of those types, that any should regard a belief in such mere inferential evidence a test of salvation.  I therefore had no fellowship with that movement until about two or three weeks previous to the 22d of October, when seeing it had obtained such prevalence, and considering it was at a probable point of time, I was persuaded that it was a work of God, and felt that if it should pass by I should be more disappointed than I was in my first published time.
        "But that time passed; and I was again disappointed.  The movement was of such a character, [page 26] that for a time it was very mysterious to me, and the results following it were so unaccountable that I supposed our work might be completed, and that a few weeks only might elapse between that time and the appearing of Christ.  However that might be, I regarded my own work as completed; and that what was to be done for the extension of these views, must be done by younger brethren, except an occasional discourse from myself."
     
41. 

    arlin

    20 April 2014 at 8:36 am

    Bob,
    on the question of what would historically confirm the fulfillment of the seventh month movement's historical prediction of  the literal 2nd Advent of Christ on Oct. 22, 1844, the only logical answer is that this prediction could only be historically fulfilled and confirmed by the literal earthly 2nd Advent of Christ actually occuring on that date as predicted! Certainly child preachers in Swden could not historically fullfill or confirm it, or any other earthly or heavenly event! Why is this self-evident truth so difficult to understand?

    "And if you say in your heart, 'How may we know the word which the Lord has not spoken?' when a prophet speaks in the name of the Lord, if the word does not come to pass or come true, that is a word which the Lord has not spoken. That prophet has spoken it presumptuously." Deut. 18:21-22 RSV.

     
42. 

    Bob Pickle

    20 April 2014 at 2:26 pm

    Arlin,

    Miller's October 6, 1844 letter stated:

    "When did the 2300 days end? Last spring."

    ". . . Christ will come in the seventh month . . . ."

    "If he does not come within 20 or 25 days, I shall feel twice the disappointment I did this spring."

    ". . . it must and will come this fall. . . . I see no reason why we may not expect him within twenty days. . . . just so true will redemption be completed by the fifteenth day of the seventh month . . . ."
     

    "I am strong in my opinion that the next [Sunday, Oct. 13,] will be the last Lord's day sinners will ever have in probation; and within ten or fifteen days from thence, they will see Him . . . ."

    ". . . in twenty days or less I shall see all that love Jesus."

    There is simply no way to say that Miller's Oct. 6 letter shows that he believed that Christ was coming on Oct. 22. And Miller's Dec. 13, 1844, letter to J. O. Orr of Toronto, Canada West said:

    "The ninth day [of the seventh month (October 21)] was very remarkable. . . . In the evening I told some of my [brethren] Christ would not come on the morrow. Why not? said they. Because he cannot come in an hour they think not, nor as a snare."

    Miller's first letter to Himes after Oct. 22 is dated Nov. 10, and expresses his disappointment (Bliss, p. 277). This was the date of the astronomical new moon, which in Miller's mind could have marked the end of the seventh Jewish month according to the Karaite calendar. The fact that Miller waited until the new moon before expressing his disappointment is further confirmation that he felt Christ would come in the seventh Jewish month, but not necessarily on the tenth day of that seventh month.
43. 

    Bob Pickle

    20 April 2014 at 2:33 pm

    Arlin,

    "Why is this self-evident truth so difficult to understand?"

    I ask you the same question. Nowhere in Dan. 8 does it say that the 2300 days have to end with the second coming, so why are you insisting that only the second coming can affirm the correctness of the 2300 days ending on Oct. 22, 1844? The simple fact is that the chronology and calculations are correct, regardless of what did or did not happen that day.

    "Certainly child preachers in Swden could not historically fullfill or confirm it …."

    Then explain for us why these child preachers were supernaturally proclaiming the judgment near, citing Rev. 14:7, near the end of the 2300 days, but stopped doing so around the end of the 2300 days. Please explain this if you really believe that this supernatural phenomena wasn't confirmation in any sense of the word of the fulfillment of Rev. 14:7 and Dan. 8:14.

    Rev. 10's fulfillment in the Millerite Movement is another issue you really need to address.
44. 

    arlin

    22 April 2014 at 3:55 pm

    Bob, as I have read over your responses to my earlier posts, it is clear that you fail to understand the principles of Historical Confirmation or Disconfirmation of Prophecies. But William Miller understood these principles, and this is why he wrote in his 1845 Apology and Defence that he had "no confidence in any of the new theories" that were being put forth after the Great Disappointment. I already quoted to you Deut. 18:21-22. Now compare that with Miller's own 13th "Rule of Interpretation" that he had formulated and written down many years before 1844.
    It reads as follows:
    "XIII. To know if we have the true historical event for the fulfillment of prophecy. If you find every word of the prophecy (after the figures are understood),is literally fulfilled, then you may know thay your history is the true event, or wait for its future development. But if one word lacks fulfillment, then you must look for another event. For God takes care that history and prophecy doth agree, so that the true believing children of God may never be ashamed."

    When Miller wrote in his 1845 Apology and Defence, p. 28,  that he had "no confidence in any of the new theories" that were already then being proposed–such as Edson's theory, that Christ's 2nd Advent that had failed to be fulfilled at the Great Disappointment, had really been fulfilled in heaven on Oct. 22, 1844– Miller was not rejecting these "new theories" because he was being "influenced" by Himes and others, as some people charged, but Miller was actually very logically applying his own Rules of Interpretation that he had written down many years before!  He was actually simply applying Deut. 18:21-22 and other Scriptures he had studied years earlier!  It is very important that we understand these "self evident" historical facts, and the Biblical principles of the historical confirmation or disconfirmation of prophecy. Otherwise, we will fail to understand why Miller rejected "all the new theories" that were being put forth right after the Great Disappointment–including Edson's theory. 

     
45. 

    Bob Pickle

    22 April 2014 at 4:40 pm

    Arlin,

    Using the Rule XIII as you quoted it, we can unequivocally say that the 2300 days ended in 1844 with the Great Disappointment (Rev. 10) and the cleansing of the heavenly sanctuary. "If you find every word of the prophecy (after the figures are understood),is literally fulfilled, then you may know thay your history is the true event, or wait for its future development." You haven't stated one word of the prophecy of Dan. 8:14 or Rev. 10 that you think hasn't yet been fulfilled. Not one. Instead, you're trying to apply Rule XIII, not to a prophecy of Scripture, but to a prediction made by Millerites, Millerites who did not understand some of the figures of these biblical prophecies.

    Perhaps Himes wasn't the one who misled Miller. But then, please tell us, who did Ellen White see in vision in EW 257-258 who did mislead Miller? You write as if no one did, but EW 257-258 is pretty clear.

    Are you working from the assumption that Miller was correct that the cleansing of the sanctuary would take place at the second coming? Otherwise, if you allow him to err on this point, then I'm uncertain how you can make the assertions that you do in your last post.
46. 

    arlin

    23 April 2014 at 12:21 am

    Bob, history shows that Miller and the vast majority of Millerites did not interpret Miller's Rule XIII as you did in your last post. Miller and his followers expected a literal 2nd Advent of Christ to the earth  that "every eye could see," and they did not believe Edson's theory that instead, Christ moved from the Holy Place to the Most Holy Place in heaven, a "coming to his Father" that no human eye could see!  How much clearer can this historical fact be stated? Let me again quote from Miller's Aug. 1, 1845 Apology and Defence the pertinent excerpt I quoted in a previous post:

    "Some are disposed to lay a stress on the seventh month movement which is not warranted by the Word. There was then a dedication of heart in view of the Lord's Coming that was well pleasing in the sight of God. Desire for the Lord's coming and a preparation for that event are acceptable to him. But because we then ardently desired his coming, and sought that preparation that was necessary, it does not follow that our expectations were then realized. For we were certainly disappointed. We expected the personal coming of Christ at that time, and now to contend that we were not mistaken, is dishonest. We should never be ashamed to frankly confess all our errors.

        "I have no confidence in any of the new theories that have grown out of that movement, viz., that Christ then came to the Bridegroom, that the door  of mercy was then closed, that there is no salvation for sinners, that the seventh trumpet then sounded, or that it was a fulfillment of prophecy in any sense."

    Bob, I don't know how Miller could have expressed his view in any clearer words! He certainly did not believe that his Rule XIII had been fulfilled!

    As to the question you raised about whether Miller had been influenced by Himes and his other associates. This claim had been made, and Miller had personally and publically rejected it in a published statement, years before Ellen White published the statement you quoted.

    Bob, you raise many other side issues, but I will not go there, but I will focus on the central issues, and I will leave it there, on the historical facts I have already clearly stated.
47. 

    Bob Pickle

    23 April 2014 at 1:42 am

    Arlin,

    In what way did I "interpret" Rule XIII? I simply took it as it read, as you quoted it. Of course most Millerites would have not applied that Rule in the way that I did, because they failed to realize that they had misunderstood the symbols, and thus failed to realize that they were breaking that rule. But obviously they were wrong for two reasons you have yet to try to refute: (a) The chronology and interpretations that establish 1844 as the end of the 2300 days are unassailable. (b) One of the events (the second coming) Miller expected to occur at the end of the 2300 days did not occur.

    Why don't you quote Miller's statement that you think contradicts the vision Ellen White received, as described in EW 257-258.

    If by side issues you refer to the various reasons why Dan. 8:14 must point to 1844, including Rev. 10 and the chronology behind the Adventist understanding of Dan. 8 & 9, those aren't side issues to the point you are trying to establish. And if you are declining to comment on such key issues, I would call that pretty much a capitulation.
48. 

    Trevor Hammond [22oct1844]

    23 April 2014 at 11:07 pm

    The Creation Week in genesis is not a time prophecy nor a prophecy per se.  The 2300 year prophecy is.  [Dan 8:17, 19; 12:4, 9].  Making it sound like they are similar is sketchy.

    Those who teach and hold alternative views contrary to our beliefs regarding our fundamental teachings of prophecy (and creation) have departed from the Adventist faith.  They will reap what they sow.

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