My Reviewers have made no greater mistake in all the long list of severe
indictments in their lengthy document than that I have cast
"aspersion" and "intolerable odium" upon Sister White
and on all who use the Revised Version. I have made no criticism, whatever,
of Sister White or her use of the Revised Version; or anyone who uses it as
she did. The preface of my book substantially states that some texts may be
clearer in the Revised than in the Authorized; for the Authorized is 320
years old. The English language has somewhat changed in that time. The ERV
is only 50 years old; the ARV but 30. I, myself, prefer the Revised on such
texts as John 7:17, "If any man willeth to do his will, he shall know
of the teaching, whether it is of God, or whether I speak from myself."
Also "Righteousness and justice are the foundation of his throne."
(Ps. 97:2). I often quote Daniel 7:25 from the Revised or Douay Versions,
but I never quote them as authority; only as books of reference in which an
occasional text may be clearer than in the Authorized. There are many verses
or part of verses that are omitted in the Revised Version that the Spirit of
Prophecy quotes from the AV as the inspired, indestructable word of the
eternal God.(AV... Authorized Version)
My Reviewers say, (Section I, p. 5) "That our standard pbulications
in English, since 1901, use the two versions with impartiality, and as
equally authoritative." I must say to you brethren, that this is not
well-known, neither is it the truth. Many of our ministers do not
regard the Revised Version as of equal authority with the King James. I have
read our standard publications very thoroughly since 1901 and can safely say
that the number of scripture quotations from the Revised Version in our
books, and in our church paper, "The Review and Herald," are many
from the AV, to 1 from the Revised Version. (Leaves-of-Autumn Note: In
the 1980s we are seeing almost everything but KJV quotes in our Periodicals
and books. The NIV seems to be leading the pack for number of times used.
but we also see quotes from many other perversions.) Note that the author.
uses "AV" for "KJV" in his text. Both mean Authorized
Version or King James Version.
In my book, I have occasion to present in a particular way the death of
Christ. Mere my Reviewers think that they have found an example of my
conflict with the spirit of Prophecy. I will show emphatically that it is
not the truth (as stated in Section I, p. 31), that I am in conflict with
the Spirit of Prophecy by statements made on pages 158,217,218, and 219, of
my book relating to Christ's death.I show that in the theology of Romanism
and and of Westcott and of other leading Revisers, that death of Christ is
not considered as the complete payment for our debt of sin. But that the
incarnation, that is, the re-birth of Christ in the flesh as transmitted in
the sacraments, is regarded as the all-potent means of salvation.
It is unreasonable for my Reviewers to tell you that I am in conflict
with Sister White as that would place her in agreement with this Catholic
theology. I have proof in my book that Westcott was at heart a Spiritualist,
and thus taught that the real Christ must have never died, but that while
his body was dead his soul lived on; and he thus, while dead preached to the
spirits of the departed.
Whereas the Bible teaches that "the soul that sinneth, it shall
die"; and that, therefore, when Christ paid our debt of sin his soul
must have died. "His soul was made an offering for sin." He hath
poured out his soul unto death." (Isa. 55:10,12). Thou wilt not leave
my soul in hell" (Hades, the grave). Acts 2:27.
The Reviewers ( Sec. I, p. 31) quote from an unpublished statement of
Sister White, thus:
"When Christ was crucified, it was his human nature that died. Diety
did not sink and die; that would have been impossible."
I would reply that I have never said in my book or anywhere else or
thought at any time, that Diety died, or that Divinity died. The scripture
tells us that men, when converted, become partakers of the divine nature.
Does this divine nature of Christians survive death and live as an
independent personality after death? Do my Reviewers believe that any part
of Christ was conscious in death? I have the word of Sister White in one of
her standard publications on this point:
"Then he closed his eyes in death upon the cross, the soul of
Christ did not go to heaven as many believe, or how could His words be
true,... ' I am not yet ascended to my Father'? The Spirit of Jesus
slept in the tomb with his body, and did not wing its way to Heaven,
there to maintain in a separate existence, and to look down upon the
mourning disciples embalming the body of which it had taken flight. All
that comprised the life and intelligence of Jesus remained with his body
in the sepulchre (Emphasis mine); and when he came forth it was as a
whole being; he did not have to summon his spirit from Heaven ."
Spirit of Prophecy, Vol. 3, p. 203. (Old Edition)
Christ died for us. all that comprised his life and intelligence along
with his body. Thus his divine sacrifice payed the debt for the sin of our
soul. This was what I meant and there is not the slightest conflict between
my fiews and the statements of Sister White. I will guarantee that 999 out
of every 1,000 of Seventh-day--Adventist ministers, in teaching from the
fifty third chapter of Isaiah, would say, with me that Christ poured out his
soul unto death. All who believe the Bible and the Spirit of Prophecy
believe this and teach it. With them, on this question, I am in perfect
harmony.
Whatever I wrote in my book about Christ's death, I intended to refer to
His divine sacrifice. I tried to convey the idea that His sacrifice was more
than. a human sacrifice, it was a divine sacrifice.
Sr. White says: "In consequence of limited ideas of the
sufferings cf Christ, many place a low estimate upon the great work of
the atonement." Vol. 11, pa. 200.
Next the Reviewers, (Sec. I, P. 31), criticize my statement on page 246
of my book: "The new theology taught that Christianity was not 'A
system of truth divinely revealed, recorded in the Scriptures in a definite
and complete form for all ages, 'but that CHRISTIANITY IS CHRIST."
Then the Reviewers quote from "Gospel Workers," pages 282,283,
"CHRIST IS CHRISTIANITY". It is surprising to me that they did not
see at once that the two statements are not the same but reversed. One says,
"Christianity is Christ", and the other that "Christ is
Christianity" but I deny the false theology of modernism that
Christianity is Christ."
Christian science teaches that "God is all", and then reverses
the statement and says that therefore "All is God". The first
statement is a great truth, the second is a pantheistic error. They ring the
changes also on "God is life" and therefore "Life is
God." The first is true, the second is not. The Scriptures teach that
God is love but never that love is God. If that were so then God would be a
mere sentiment, a principle, but not a person.
God is light, but light is not God. This is pantheism again.
Most emphatically, "Christ is Christianity" as taught by Sister
White, but is Christianity therefore Christ? Is Christianity, the righteous
living of men, all there is of Christ? This is a subtle error. Christ
is a person from whose mighty influence Christianity flows; but
Christianity is not Christ. On this the Princeton Review says: "Making
Christianity a life- the divine-human life of Christ - has far reaching
consequences. It confounds and contradicts the scripture and church
doctrines as to the Person of Christ" (Jan. 1854) In section I, page 32
my Reviewers accuse me of using the expression in my book (Page 246) that
Christ is Christianity." No such statement is found on page 246 of the
book under review. How could my Reviewers so misrepresent me? All I did say
on page 246 was that the new theology taught the untruth that Christianity
is Christ. This is different from the divine truth as stated by Sister
White that Christ is Christianity. My critics should be accurate and avoid
such misrepresantation.
The following statement is quoted by the Reviewers from Sister White
(Page 33, of Section 1) :
"I saw that God bad especially guarded the Bible, yet when
copies of it were few, learned men had in some instances changed the
words, thinking that they were making it more plain, when in reality
they were mystifying that which was plain, by causing it to lean to
their established views, which were governed by tradition. But I saw
that the word of God, as a whole, is a perfect chain, one portion
linking into and explaining another. True seekers for truth need not
err; for not only is the word of God plain and simple in declaring the
way of life, but the Holy Spirit is given as a guide in understanding
the way of life therein revealed." "Early Writings", pp.
220, 221.
And then the Reviewers say, "The quotation has no bearing
whatsoever, upon versions, but deals with the Bible as a whole in any
language or Version." (Emphasis mine.) I think that all here will admit
that the Bible Sister White had in mind when she wrote this was her own
Bible, the King James. No modern version had yet appeared.
Will my Reviewers maintain that "ANY VERSION," EVERY VERSION is
the true word of God? This is impossible. When the authors of the books of
the Bible wrote by inspiration of the Holy Spirit, the first writing was, of
course, the true word of God. A true copy, or a true translation would be a
true manuscript, or a true version of the word of God, but if one thought
was changed that would, to that extent, not be a true manuscript or a true
version.
The most dangerous place that an error can be found is in a manuscript or
version of the Bible. A falsehood in history or science would do infinitely
less harm than an untruth in a book that passes for a Bible. A hypocrite,
though he may do some excellent things, is the worst person in the world. A
corrupted manuscript or version of the Bible is dangerous in the degree that
the people trust it to be the true word of God. It may be almost wholly
true, but one specious untruth may Poison and counteract much of the good.
When my Reviewers say "any version", surely they cannot mean
the Douay Version is the true word of God that teaches the worship of Mary
in Genesis 3:15, "I will put enmities between thee and the woman, and
thy seed and her seed: She shall crush thy head, and thou shalt lie in wait
for her heel." Or image worship, in Hebrews 11:21, "By faith Jacob
dying, blessed each of the sons of Joseph, and adored the top of his
rod." Neither can my Reviewers mean the Bordeaux Version of the New
Testament. This Version, published in 1686,translates Acts 13:2, " They
ministered to the Lord" (KJ), as " They rendered unto the Lord the
sacrifice of the mass." Can all of this version be the word of the
Lord? Further, where the apostle writes " He himself shall be saved;
yet so as by fire". 1 Cor. 3:15, this version has it, "by the fire
of purgatory." This is a version of the Scriptures, is this Version
altogether the word of the Lord?
Neither can my Reviewers mean the Unitarian-Version of the New Testament
by Gilbert Wakefield. (1795). This version translates Hebrews 1:2, "by
whom he made the worlds", as "through whom he also settled the
ages." It also translates John 1:1,2 as follows: "In the beginning
was wisdom, and wisdom was with God, and Wisdom was God. The same was in the
beginning with God. All things were made by it and without it was nothing
made." Is this irreverent use of the pronoun "it" to
designate our Lord Jesus Christ the true word of God? Yet this is a version
of the New Testament.
My Reviewers may say that they do not mean any version, although
it is here plainly stated in their document, but that they mean any standard
version. What is the standard, we would ask? A standard of the word of God
must be the truth. The Authorized Version, although the language may not be
modern, contains no false doctrine. One scripture in the AV explains
another. The Revised Version contains things which cannot be the truth. For
instance, Matt. 14:30 reads, " And when he saw the wind he was
afraid." We do not wonder that he was afraid, for he was the first
and the last man that ever saw the wind. Is this absurdity the truth?
Do we not judge all Versions unconsciously by the Authorized? Are not the
dangers of other versions less keenly felt because we have with us the AV to
protect us and to which we can flee as a standard? In our reasoning,
however, just visualize the King James blotted out of existence or utterly
discredited, could we then find the third angel's message in other
discordant or corrupted versions?
Note the following seven absurdities as a few illustrations of many
similar cases found in the Revised Version:
(1) "The seven angels that had the seven plagues, arrayed with
precious stones" Rev. 15:6;
(2) "She (Mary) turneth herself, and saith unto him in Hebrew".
John 20:16;
(3) "The sun eclipsed at the time of a full moon. Luke 23:44,45
(Greek text);
(4) "This he (Jesus) said, making all meats clean". Mark 7:19.
Thus accusing Jesus of abolishing the distinction, which nature never yet
has abolished, between clean and unclean animals.
(5) "That ye be not quickly shaken from your mind." 2 Thess
2:2;
(6) "But when he (Peter) saw the wind, he was afraid."
(7) "And the third part of the earth was burnt up." Rev.8:7
It is strange that geographers and geologists have not discovered that
one third of the earth has been burnt up. Yet this strange fact is found in
the Vulgate, in the Jesuit Bible of 1582, and in the Revised. Was the fear
of the sailors of Columbus, which led them more than once to threaten mutiny
as they sailed westward, due to fear of sailing into a great gap in the
earth?
Are these evidences of accuracy? Are these scientific? Sister White said
(Great Controversy, p. 245) that the Textus Receptus brought out by Erasmus
corrected many errors of former versions and gave the sense more clearly.
In 2 Peter 2:9 it is stated that "the Lord knoweth how... to keep
the unrighteous under punishment unto the day of
Judgment." That is the direct teaching of purgatory. My Reviewers,
themselves, acknowledge that the views of the Revisers colored this text
with the tincture of Romanism. Is the rendering of this verse the truth?
Does the Revised Version then meet the standard of truth? Because it is called
a standard version does not prove that it is.
The Spirit of Prophecy says on page 245 of "Great Controversy"
that "Wycliffe's Bible had been translated from the Latin text, which contained
many errors." And that Erasmus corrected many of these errors. The
Spirit of Prophecy thus teaches that all versions are not alike, the true
word of God. These false versions may contain many truths, and Sister White
quoted from the true passages they contain, but this would not
endorse the falsehoods as truth, and could not mean that the whole Version
was the authoritative Word of God.
In the same book, "Great Controversy", (page 65), it is stated
that the Waldenses "possessed the Bible in manuscript in their native
tongue. They had the truth unadulterated ", and (page 69) "In a
most wonderful manner it (the word of truth) was preserved uncorrupted
through all the ages of darkness." We have evidence that a text like
the Received Text was thus preserved until translated by Luther into German
and by Tyndale into English, and by the translators of 1611 into the
Authorized Version.
We are indebted to the Waldenses and not to the Church of Rome for our
Bible. When I saw the gigantic bulwarks of rock with sharp ravines and
mountain caves of the Northern Italian Alps, I was profoundly impressed with
the statement that the church "fled into the wilderness where she had a
place prepared of God that He should feed her there" with the living
Word of Cod while Rome fiercely fought the Bible and sought in vain during
the world's midnight to destroy the Waldenses, the guardians of the Word,
and the very Word itself.
On the other hand, can we not truthfully say that there are two
foundation MSS of the Revised Version, (the Vaticanus and Sinaticus), early
corrupted and changed in more than a thousand places by the mystery of
iniquity, which slept through centuries, unused and perhaps forgotten, only
to be brought out again, once when the Reformers forced the papacy to it for
refuge, and the other later. (LOA note: The second time was when the
Revisers resurrected it)
The philosophy of the Revisers and the Reviewers seems to be that the
church of Rome was the real guardian of the true Word of God; while the
Waldenses held only inferior manuscripts. This is squarely contradictory to
the Spirit of Prophecy. I quote from the "Great
Controversy"(p.64),
"The church in the wilderness, and not the proud hierarchy
enthroned in the world's great capital, was the true church of Christ,
the guardian of the treasures of truth which God has committed to His
people to be given to the world."
The Vaticanus MS was preserved in the Vatican Library; the Sinaiticus was
preserved in a Catholic monastery. Both of these MSS were thus kept and
guarded by "the proud hierarchy enthroned in the world's great
capital." But Sister White says the church in the Wilderness,
and not this proud hierarchy was "the guardian of the treasures of
truth", or as she states above, "the written Word of God".
What is this but equivalent to saying that the Vaticanus and the Sinaiticus
are not the treasures of truth, the written Word of God. The church in the
wilderness did not preserve the Vatican and Sinaitic MSS, but those which
agreed with the Received Text.
The Sinaiticus and the Vatican MSS kept by the Roman Catholic Church then
could not be the true word of God, if Great Controversy states the truth.
The Spirit of Prophecy is God's last word to His Church in this final
crisis, when Rome has regained temporal sovereignty and is fast climbing
into the throne of world dominion again, determined to use her fearful power
to destroy the truth and reign triumphant just before the coming of Christ.
I raise my voice, in my book, in protest against this teaching that the
Waldenses kept only inferior manuscripts; and that the church of Rome
"who wore out the saints of the most high," the great destroyer,
that this power controlled by Satan preserved the true word of God.
My Reviewers, in their defense of the Vaticanus and Sinaiticus and the
Revised Version built on these Catholic manuscripts, seem to be driven to
depreciate the Waldenses and their Bible and to defend Rome.
My Reviewers take exception to my position on the Waldenses and their
Bible, while my position is in harmony with both the Bible and the Spirit of
Prophecy, that the Waldenses had the true Word of God. They argue throughout
for the MSS of Rome. Has it come to this pass that I must plead for this
fact established by the spirit of Prophecy before a representative body of
Seventh-day Adventists?
In the Index to the Writings of Mrs. E.G. White, I find that in the 28
volumes of her works that are there listed, that she is credited with making
15,117 references to the Bible. Of there, more than 95 out of every 100 are
from the AV (KJV), and therefore less than 5 in 100 are from the Revised
Version and all other versions combined. Less that 14 are from the Noyes',
Leesers', and Rotherhams's Versions. The RV was issued in 1881, and more
than three fourths of the works of Sister White, listed in the Index were
published after that date, so that the RV was accessible while more than
three-fourths of her books were being written. In one of her books she gives
406 references to the AV (KJV) and 65 to other versions. This is the largest
departure from the AV in any of her works. In another she gives 940
references to the AV, to 59 in the RV and ARV. In Volume 8 of the
Testimonies she quotes the AV 666 times, the ARV 53 times, and the RV 3
times. In this volume she refers 45 times to the O.T., in the ARV, only 8
times to the New Testament. She quotes the poetical Psalms sometimes entire
and other Old Testament scriptures where the change is largely verbal and
slight. In another large book she makes 865 quotations from the AV and 4
from the Revised Version. In several she makes only one quotation from the
RV to several hundred in the AV. With this mathematically exact evidence
before you, no one can truthfully say that she showed any preference
for the Revised Version, or by any means regarded it as on an equality
with the AV, but the very opposite. It is a most significant fact that she
made no reference whatever, so far as the Index indicates, quoted not one
verse in the Revised Version in Volume 9 of the "Testimonies", the
last Testimony of the Spirit of Prophecy to the Church. This is also true of
13 other books listed in the index, nearly all of them written after the
Revised Version was published, the prophet of the Lord began with the AV alone;
she closed with the AV alone. It was to her evidently the supreme
authority.
Of the historical quotations in "Great Controversy", Sister
White says in her introduction, page XII, "The quotations are not given
for the purpose of citing that writer as authority." It is common
knowledge that Darwin got his foundation in evolution form Lyell, when
Sister White quoted from Sir Charles Lyell, (Great Controversy), p. 305) did
she therefore indorse evolution or uphold Lyell as a scientific and true
authority? The answer is plain that she simply took from him a specific
statement of some single fact just as she quoted the Revised Version in
certain texts where it rendered the text more clearly then the Authorized
Version. Therefore, as in other quotations, she uses it as a reference book.
If to quote an author makes that author an authority, then Paul indorsed the
heathen poets as authority, for at Athens he quoted the following words from
a Greek poet:
"For in him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also
of also your own poets have said, For we are his offspring." Acts.
17:28
Will my Reviewers kindly note this fact; if quoting from the Revised
Version proves that Sister White recognized it as the true Word of God
equally with the Authorized Version, then by the same logic, Noyes',
Leeser's and Rotherham's Versions are of equal authority with the AV. But
this is impossible. For Sister White quotes in "Mount of Blessing"
the closing part of Matt. as a part of the Lord's prayer. All this glorious
close to the model prayer is omitted by both Noyes and Rotherham without
even a margin to indicate the human amputation of these divine words.
If these inspired words are not a part of the Word of God, then the Holy
Spirit, writing through God's prophet, was mistaken. That is impossible;
therefore Noyes' and Rotherham's translation are not authority and neither
is the ARV. Noyes also preaches purgatory in its rendering of 2 Peter 2:9,
which states: "The Lord knoweth how to reserve the righteous under
punishment to the day of judgment."
Rotherham, who built his version on the text of Tregelles omits Acts 8:37
as does also Noyes, but this precious spiritual statement is quoted by the
Spirit of Prophecy as a part of the word of God. (See Testimonies, Vol 8,
page 58). Therefore, if the Holy Spirit is authority, the translations of
Noyes and Rotherham are not. As for Leeser's translation, I would say that
he translates Job 19:26,"Then freed from my body shall I behold
God." This is in direct agreement with the ARV, which reads: "Then
without my flesh shall I see God." Both are in square contradiction to
the AV and the Spirit of Prophecy, which reads, "Yet in my flesh shall
I see God." (Great Controversy p. 299, and is thus quoted in four other
places.) Leeser also translates Haggai,2:7, "The precious things of all
the nations shall come." While the AV and the Spirit of Prophecy agree
in applying this prophecy not to national riches, as in Leeser's
translation, but to Christ, himself. Sister White says: "The promise of
God given to Haggal has been fulfilled; yet in the advent of Jesus of
Nazareth, the "desire of all nations"', etc, Prophets and Kings.
p. 597. So by the authority of the Spirit of God, we know that the Leeser
translation is untrue in this passage and therefore not divine authority.
But if those three translations are thus proven unauthoritative, by the same
evidence over and over again, at least to the Seventh-day-Adventists, the
Revised Version is as a whole eliminated as authority. After careful
examination of every text listed in the Index of Sister White's writings, I
ask: When did Sister White ever weaken the great Scripture fortification on
the law by saying, "Blessed are they that wash their robes" as
rendered in the Revised Version? In the AV and in Great Controversy, (page
541), and 12 other places, the Holy Spirit thunders down to us front the
farewell chapter of the Bible, "Blessed are they that do His
Commandments." Where does the Spirit of Prophecy endorse, instead
of the mighty statement of 1 Tim. 3.16, "God was manifested in the
flesh", the weak Unitarian change, "He who was manifested in the
flesh"? This text is quoted as in the AV, in Testimonies, Vol. 5 (page
746) and in several other places in the books inspired by the Spirit of God.
When does Sister White permit the cutting out of Acts 8:37? The RV omits
it. The RV is therefore not complete and therefore imperfect and not an
authority.
My Reviewers have stated that Sister White quoted the Revised Version as
the Word of God. I answer that when the Revised Version or any other
version translates a particular text clearly without error or untruth, that
that ONE special reference is surely the Word of God, wherever it is found
in any version. Many statements may be quoted from the Douay Version that
express the same truth as the Authorized Version, which agrees with the text
which came through the uncorrupted manuscripts kept by the Waldenses and
endorsed by the Spirit of Prophecy as the true Word of God. But a text in
the Douay Version which teaches the worship of images or the worship of
Mary, cannot be the true Word of God. Therefore she could never quote the
Douay Version as the authoritive, complete Word of God. The same with the
omissions and changes of the Unitarian Version or the Revised Version.
She quoted scripture as the Word of God. from any Version that is
entirely endorsed under the inspiration of the Holy spirit, but any text or
translation that is not entirely in harmony with that which she has
accepted, cannot be the entire and authoritative Word of God. These
references in the Revised Version previously indicated, cannot be quoted as
the Word of God, therefore, all versions, including the Revised, which hold
serious errors and omissions must be quoted by her, not as the complete
authoritative word of God, but as the statements of scientists, historians,
simply as books of reference.
Certainly Sister White quoted the Revised and several other versions. The
question is not, did she quote the Revised Version but what part of it did
she quote? Did she ever quote any text from the Revised Version, which is
entirely omitted in the Authorized Version? There is no true scripture which
is not found in the Authorized Version. It is a complete, perfect,
authoritative Bible. But did she ever quote any scripture as the true Word
of God from the Authorized Version which is not found in the Revised:
Certainly she did. Then which is the complete authoritative word of God?
Mathematically, we must say "YES", the Authorized and NOT the
Revised. In other words the Revised Version is not the complete,
authoritative WORD of God because, first, it is not all there, and secondly,
because it is not all there straight.
When Sister White quotes as the Word of God texts which the Reviewers
regard as spurious, to that extent, to that degree, they teach that the
writings of Sister White are spurious. This is the logic of the Revised
Version and those who accept it as authority. The omissions and many of the
changes in the Revised are spurious or many of the AV quotations of Sister
white are spurious. There is no middle ground.
When does the holy Spirit in the works of Sister White intimate., by so
much as a marginal note, the foolish proclamation if 616 instead of 666 as
the number of the beast? When does the Holy Ghost, through God's appointed
prophet in this last solemn message ever endorse the elimination of the
glorious finale of the Lord's Prayer or relegate it to the uncertainty of a
marginal note? The revised Version is guilty of adding to, changing and
omitting the precious words of God. The Vatican and the Sinatic MSS, with
more than 1,000 omissions and changes each, the Westcott and Hort text, the
foundation of the Revised Version, are thus each and all weighed in the
balances and found wanting. All this I say while reminding my hearers that
full liberty to use this or any Version is granted, even as I, in the
beginning of this chapter, said I use them myself.
The men who are responsible for the 1,000 omissions must come under the
solemn denunciation:
"For I testify unto every man that heareth the word of the
prophecy of this book, If any man shall add unto these things Cod will
add unto him the plaques that are written in this book: And if any man
shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall
take away his part out of the book of life, and out of the holy city,
and from the things which are written in this book." Rev. 22:18,19.
It is riot possible that there can be any higher witness as to what is
and what is not the Word of God than the Holy Spirit. For all the Word of
God came by the Spirit, and the Lord has honoured us above all other people
by giving us his Holy Spirit in the wonderful gift of prophecy.
God foresaw that the last glorious third angel's message would originate
in the United States. He knew that it would first be proclaimed in the
English language. He foresaw that the pioneers would use as there supreme
authority the King James Version of 1611. Would the all-wise, all-foreseeing
Author and Planner of the last appeal to fallen man, permit the translators
of the Authorized Version of 1611 to give us an inferior version? Was the
message which was endorsed and sealed by the Spirit of Prophecy, ever based
upon and crystallized around a faulty translation?
Was not the great last message preached as fully in its purity by Elder
James White and other pioneers from 1844 to 1881, (or 1901, when the
American Revised edition appeared), as it has been since those dates? Did
the Message start wrong? Did the Message have to wait until the Revised
Version appeared before it could be perfect? To every Seventh-day Adventist,
the divine foreknowledge of God in this matter is an unanswerable argument
for the truly superior authority of the Authorized Version. Of Course, we do
not claim that the translators of the King James Version were actually
inspired, but they were the greatest scholars of the greatest literary age
in the history of the world. They had the correct copies of the divinely
written manuscripts of the Word of God. And God, foreseeing the tremendous
structure of saving, testing truth that would be built upon their
translation, must have guarded them from making serious mistakes in
translating from the original work into the English language in which the
last message was to originate and be first published to a lost world.
We must never lose sight of the fact that of all the boasted MSS to which
the Revisers had access, it matters little how many they had, since they
used only one out of 100 and brushed the 99 aside, because they did not
agree with their two prized manuscripts, the Vaticanus and Sinaiticus.
While Sister White quoted from a number of texts with slight verbal
changes in translation in the English and American Revised, the Noyes, the
Rotherham, and the Leeser Version, yet she never quoted the contradictory
changes brought in by the Vatican and Sinaitic MSS, the Westcott and Hort
text based on them, or the Revised readings that widely change or omit so
many important scriptures.
She never endorses those changes or omissions, but quoting them, as in
the AV and quoting texts omitted or discarded in the Revised, she thus
absolutely denies and contradicts the authority of the Revised Version, and
demonstrates that it is not the complete and authorized word of God.
She states that the manuscripts and texts that the Waldenses preserved as
the Word of God were "uncorrupted" and-"Unadulterated."
Then how can we need a new revised text? The Received Text was the text from
which Luther translated his Bible into German, which was the heart of the
Reformation power; the text from which Tyndale translated his English Bible,
the divine truth for which he died a martyr's death; the text from which our
Authorized Version came to bless and build up the most enlightened nations
from whence liberty and truth have gone out to all the world, and to be the
foundation, the source of power of this last great Message.
How can you reconcile the fact that Sister White quotes verses of
Scripture as the Word of God which the Revisers reject as spurious; and that
she quotes verses from the Authorized Version which the ARV changes so as to
entirely alter the sense? And how can you justify the Reviewers aligning
themselves uniformily on the side of the Revisers on these very passages
rather than with Sister White? Whenever you find me defending a body of
Revisers and bolstering up their revised readings against the plain usage of
Sister White, I will accept the charge. I reject this charge and appeal to
the field for vindication. Because every Seventh-day Adventist who has ever
known me in Europe or America for these past forty years knows that no one
amongst us has held up Sister White and her writings in higher esteem than I
do.
When the Holy Spirit, through God's appointed prophet, endorses the MSS
of the Waldenses as uncorrupted and unadulterated, then they are the
"BEST ATTESTED MANUSCRIPTS", and not the Vaticanus and Sinaiticus
as my Reviewers told you. On this authority I rest, as final and decisive.
To a Seventh-day Adventist, there is no appeal from this authority. On this
rock, brethren, we may all build for eternity and "the gates of
hell" shall not prevail against it.
