THE BISHOP’S PASTORAL LETTER

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22779, 15 January 1936, Page 4

THE BISHOP’S PASTORAL LETTER

TO THE EDITOR Sib, —As I stood at the foot of Mount Talbot in the majestic greatness of the mountains surrounding me, the words of Job stole into mv soul: “I know that Thou can’st do all things, and that no purpose of Thine can be restrained! ” Returning to the busy haunts of men I am at once confronted with the perplexing difficulties of men which are being discussed, the echoing.? of which find their way into newspapers and pastoral messages that are to such an alarming extent councils without knowledge. The greatest of all questions which are weighing heavily upon the minds of men everywhere, at the present time, whether they are able so to define it or not, is the predetermined purpose of God to govern all the nations of the earth righteously, per the medium of a chosen nation. _ In a letter dated January 2, 1936, I commented on the bishop’s pastoral. /It was forwarded for publication but it did not appear. Since my return to town I find that many letters have been written in comment. I have said, and I repeat, that the bishop’s pastoral is a neurosis difficult to diagnose, for it is a psychotherapy which is full of inconsistencies, revealing that the bishops fail in understanding British Israel teaching, which syllogistically states: (1) God Almighty gave to Abraham and his seed for ever, certain special and peculiar blessings, exclusively; (2) Those same blessings the British people throughout the world enjoy to-day, exclusively; (3) Therefore, the British people, since God cannot lie, must be of the seed of Abraham; (4) Since these peculiar blessings do not belong to Judah, the British must be EphraimIsrael.

The prophets foretold that in the latter days certain signs would be “ Waymarks” signifying who they are. The marks are nineteen in number: (1) “A great and mighty nation.” (Gen. xii, 2, and xviii, 18.) (2) Possessing “ the ‘gates ’ of his enemies.” (Gen. xxii, 17, and xxiv, 60. Readers will find the word which is rendered “gate” is given in the plural number, and should therefore be “gates.”) For space reasons seeing that a good concordance will supply places of reference I will give the marks only !_ (3) “A nation and a company of nations (4) " Under the New Covenant, and therefore Christians (5) “ The chief of the nations ‘ Ephraim-Israel.’ ” (6) Manasseh-Israel to be “great people”; (7) “Both to be as the stars for multitude.” (8) “The House of Israel to be planted in a place of their own “Dwelling alone”; “Gathered out from among the nations”; (9) “In the islands of the sea”; (10) “Pushing the people to the end of the earth”; (11) “A great maritime people,” “ Their seed_ being in many waters,” “And chief navigators of the world”; (12) “Unconquerable as a military people, their emblem being the lion and the unicorn”; (13) “A means of blessing to all other nations“ Filling the face of the world with fruit”; (14) “ God’s witnesses and messengers of salvation (15) “Possessing a great nonChristian empire”; (16) “Possessed of enormous wealth”; (17) “Possessing the ship of Tarshish”; (18) “Observing the Sabbath ”'(the sign of the Sabbath was only given to Israel); (19) “As the seed whom the Lord has blessed.” These “ way marks ” have been the means of converting Atheists and Agnostics, British-Israel truths supplying the masterkey to the Bible, missed by Charles Bradlaugh but found by his friend Reader Harris, who declared, “If my friend Charles Bradlaugh had found the key to the Scriptures, as I have, he would never have charged God with being a liar.” The bishop,’s pastoral claims that the “ acid tests ” which they have applied to Scripture, ethnology, history and language prove that British-Israel teaching is false, whereas ethnological history, as contained in the first eleven chapters of Genesis, proves that the “ acid ” tests of modernism have cast a fog over their physchotheraputic tests. In regard to languages some philologists go so far as to say that language is no test of race. —I am, etc., W. T. Kingston.^ Ternuka, January 13.

[The letter dated January 2, to which our correspondent refers, was not addressed to us.—Ed. O.D.T.]