CORRESPONDENCE

Southland Times, Issue 20016, 2 November 1926, Page 4

CORRESPONDENCE

Letters roast be written in ink and on one side of the paper. Unless a signature, not necessarily for publication, accompanies a letter as a guarantee of good faith it will >ot be considered. An asterisk attached to the signature to a pwbtisbcd letter denotes that swaa pertlcn has been deleted by ths Editor, a right which is exercised la questkma of pvMAc policy. HM. good taste and fair play.

BRITISH ISRAEUSM.

To the Editor. Sir, —I am sorry that Mr Sampson has taken his present attitude toward British Israel truth. The flippancy with which he is i treating a serious discussion is to say the least rather disconcerting when coming from a clergyman. In his own Jeremiad he quite overlooks the fact that the prophet .Jeremiah was commissioned to “uproot and destroy” and afterwards to “build and to plant.” The Bible gives a faithful record of his having performed the first part of his commission. Can Mr Sampson inform us when he fulfilled the second part? God caused His predicted punishments to fall upon the House of Judah and the House of David, and after a period of captivity a remnant of the House of Judah were permitted to return to Jerusalem. What happened to the remnant of the House of David; that is, the two daughters of King Zedekiah, who were under Jeremiah’s special protection? The “building up and planting” was just as much a vital factor in the completion of the commission as the “uprooting and destroying.” The case for British Israel truth rests on a solid foundation. Its upholders in obeying Christ’s injunction to “Search the Scriptures” are in advance of the accepted theology of the day, having a fuller knowledge and broader religious outlook. They are cognisant of the fact that the Bible is concerned with the physical and earthly as well as with the spiritual conditions of human life. God has used His earthly instrument, that is, the British nation, for the betterment of the physical condition of humanity at large. This is recognised by all who, having eyes, can use them. Britain is filling in her national life the role of service that God had placed on His people Israel. “This people have I formal for myself. They shall show forth ’My praise.” God did not appoint Israel for the work, and then allow another nation to take over the service. This would be to admit failure of God’s ordained purposes. In British Israel standards there is no question of another church or of the particular denomination to which an adherent shall be attached; that being a matter of individual choice. Mr Sampson claims to have “bowled out” the British Israel case in what he terms the “language test,” but Mr Sampson Is mistaken. There is no language test. The identity Is complete without any help whatever from language. And Mr Sampson has been wasting his time and much of your valuable space over his socalled test. The American negro, for instance, has lost all trace of his native language and customs in the short space of two hundred years. Would Mr Sampson argue that they were not originally from South Africa because of this? If not: Then why should he say that after the lapse of 2,500 years, mark you, loss of language is a proof against British Israel identity. To argue so is simply absurd. All that British Israel advocates say is that in very many British words there is a strong affinity to the Hebrew. That, and nothing more.—l am, etc., SAXON.