THE FUTURE OF PALESTINE

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22963, 19 August 1936, Page 14

THE FUTURE OF PALESTINE

TO THE EDITOR.

Sir,—Mr Ward says in his letter in last Saturday’s paper that “the idea behind the futurist school of prophetic thought appears to have been first suggested in 1585 by a Jesuit, Ribera of Salamanca.” That statement is refuted by facts. Six illustrious fathers of the early Church—and others might be added to the list, who belonged to what your correspondent calls “the futurist school of prophetic thought”—were Archbishop Cyprian and Bishops Irenseus, Hippolytus, Victorinus, Appolinarius, and Primasius. In his “ Computus de Pascha,” Archbishop Cyprian explained this seventieth week in Daniel ix, 27, as follows: “ This is one week which the angel has divided of! from the seventy weeks, and placed it at the latest period of this dispensation (or age). And this hebdomad or week we recognise as containing seven years, in which Enoch and Elias are to come. And in the midst of the week, he says, the sacrifice and oblation shall be taken away. But half of the week is shown to be a time, times, and half a time, which is three years and six months; which become a thousand, two hundred, and three score days, according to the Apocalypse (or the book of Revelation) in which days that Antichrist shall commit great devastation, and will begin to sit in the temple of God. and to assert himself to the ignorant to be God; whom Jesus, our Lord and Saviour, must destroy by the spirit of His mouth and by the brightness of His coming (St. Cyprian, as he was sometimes called, is here quoting from II Thessalonians ii, verses 3,4, and 8) and bring the world to its consummation, as it is written, ‘even unto the consummation, and that determined, shall be poured upon the desolate.’ ” Towards the end of his letter your correspondent says that I “ must now recognise that the Gentile parenthesis has no logical basis in Bible or profane histox - y.” But what saith the Scripture?

And He came to Nazareth, where lie had been brought up; and, as His custom was, He went into the synagogue on the Sabbath Day. and stood up for to read. And there was delivered unto Him the book of the prophet Esaias. And when He had opened the book. He found the place where it was written. The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He hath anointed Me to preach the gospel to the poor; He hath sent Me to heal the broken-hearted to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, to preach the acceptable year of the Lord. And He closed the book, and He gave it again to the minister, and sat down. And the eyes of all them that were in the synagogue were fastened on Him. And He began to say unto them, This day is this scripture fulfilled in your cars.

By turning back to Isaiah Ixi. verses 1 and 2, we see that our Saviour stopped reading at a comma. Why did He do so? It was because of what follows: “ and the day of vengeance of our God.” Therefore we have been at that comma for 1900 years for “ the day of vengeance ” has not come yet, though it may be very near. Surely it is not difficult to see from the above verses that this present age is a parenthesis and that it begins and ends just at that comma. What is this acceptable year of the Lord that has run on for so long? “ It is 4 the accepted time,’ the time in which God is sending forth His messengers of peace, making known the method of a free acceptance. It is 4 the day of salvation ’ —the day in which God is presenting salvation to the sinner through Him Who came to seek and to save that which was lost. It is the era of grace.” But it is certainly not the kingdom

age for there can be no outward visible kingdom until Christ returns to reign. Paul also understood and preached this parenthesis or interval in which your correspondent does not believe. Hosca knew, too, that there was to be a break in the national life of his people. This is what he says: “ For the children of Israel shall abide many days without a king, and without a prince, and without a sacrifice. . . . Afterward shall the children of Israel return, and seek the Lord their God, and David their king; and shall fear the Lord and His goodness in the latter days.” Dr Pascoe Goard has not got the right key, so he jumbles up the 70 weeks of Daniel (ix, 24-27). These weeks of years relate to Daniel’s people, the Jews, and to Daniel’s city, Jerusalem. Therefore, they have nothing whatever to do with the Church or the Gospel as Dr Pascoe Goard teaches.

Dr A. Bonar was a very fine Presbyterian minister in Scotland in the nineteenth century. Here follows an extract from his explanation: “ The break in the prophetic history of the Jews may be seen in the 70 weeks of Daniel. Is it not evident that that prophecy must reach to the end of this dispensation (or age) from the mention of its terminating in the everlasting righteousness and anointing of the Most Holy (or the holy of holies), which are yet to be seen in times as unlike the present as prevailing evil is to prevailing righteousness? It is true the price was paid on the Cross, but the redemption of the purchased inheritance is still future, and until it is completed the prophecy cannot be said to have been accomplished in all its parts. Yet as so large a portion has without contradiction been already fulfilled how is it possible, without admitting the break spoken of, that the 70 weeks with the cutting off of Messiah occurring at the close of the sixty-ninth (verse 25) could reach to the times of everlasting righteousness which are to be only when the kingdom is set up which shall never bo moved? ” —I am, etc., Maran-atha.

TO THE EDITOR. Sir,-—“ Maran-atha ” must feel extremely gratified at the laudatory remarks of L. Cook in last Saturday’s issue. May I be permitted to say that neither his nor “ Maran-atha’s ” statements arc worth anything unless supported by Scripture references, which I notice are entirely lacking in Friday’s and Saturday’s letters. Keeping in mind your foolhote, I confine myself to one of “Maranatha’s” “490 years.” He stales that “The period from Exodus to the dedication of Solomon’s temple was 490 years, plus the 131 years in the time of the Judges, which are not counted.” Now, St. Paul, at Acts xiii, 17-22 reads thus:— The God of this people of Israel chose our fathers, and exalted the people when they dwelt as strangers in the land of Egypt, and with an high arm brought He them out of it. And about the time of 40 years suffered He their manners in the wilderness. And when He had destroyed seven nations in the land of Channan, He divided their land to them by lot. And after that He gave unto them judges about the space of 450 years. And afterward they desired a king: and God gave unto them Saul, the son of Cis, a man of the tribe of Benjamin, by the space of 40 years. And when He had removed him. He raised up unto them David to be their king, to whom also He gave testimony, and said, I have found David the son of Jesse, a man after My own heart, which shall fulfill all my will. Now clearly all these lived and ruled between the exodus and the fourth of Solomon. In the time in the wilderness, 40 years, the time not given when God was destroying the seven nations —which was not done in a day, nor for many years; the .ime of the “judges, 450 years,” of Saul, 40 years, and David, 40 years; and four years to the fourth of Solomon. We have three periods of 40 years each, making 120 years, and 450 years of thejudges, without considering the time God was destroying the seven nations, and this leaves 574. Will “ Maran-atha ” briefly explain where he gets his “131 years of judges,” and how he deducts 450 from 574 and leaves 490? Was St. Paul wrong?—l am, etc., Iconoclast. August 15. TO THE EDITOR. Sir,—l think it due to your intelligent readers to state that the various views on prophecy expressed by ‘ Maran-atha” and the others are not the general views of the churches. Each of your correspondents has, in his opinion, an accurate chronological scheme, worked out of the numbers in the Book of Daniel, yet none agrees with the other. If God intended us to know the dates of various occurrences, surely He would give us clear, uncontroversial information I think, however, that most Christian people prefer the view of Jesus to that of your correspondents. He told His disciples: ‘lt is not ;r you to know times or seasons, which the Father hath set in (or appointed by) His own authority.” That is definite, and the fact that every generation down the centuries of the Christian era has worked out chronological schemes based on Daniel and all have been proved false by the progress of time proves the truth of ou- Lord’s words and the folly of trying to get round them—l am. etc., Presbyter, [We have accorded a good deal of space to this discussion, and, as it is reasonably apparent that only the wholly unlikely exhaustion of the controversialists would bring about finality, the correspondence must now be closed. —Ed., 0.D.T.l