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The Day-Star Extra Saturday, February 7, 1846. The Sanctuary by O. R. L. Crosier Part Four of Four The Scape-goat The next event of that day after the Sanctuary was cleansed, was putting all the iniquities and transgressions of the children of Israel upon the head of the scape-goat and sending him away into a land not inhabited, or of separation. It is supposed by almost every one that this goat typified Christ in some of his offices, and that the type was fulfilled at the first Advent. From this opinion I must differ; because, 1st, That goat was not sent away till after the High Priest had made an end of cleansing the Sanctuary, Leviticus 16:20,21; hence that event cannot meet its antitype till after the end of the 2300 days. 2nd, It was sent away from Israel into the wilderness, a land not inhabited, to receive them. If our blessed Saviour is its antitype, He also must be sent away, not his body alone, but soul and body, for the goat was sent away alive, from, not to nor into this people; neither into heaven, for that is not a wilderness or land not inhabited. 3rd, It received and retained all the iniquities of Israel; but when Christ appears the second time He will be "without sin." 4th, The goat received the iniquities from the hands of the priest and he sent it away. As Christ is the priest the goat must be something else besides himself, and which he can send away. 5th, This was one of two goats chosen for that day, one was the Lord's and offered for a sin-offering; but the other was not called the Lord's neither offered as a sacrifice. Its only office was to receive the iniquities from the priest after he had cleansed the Sanctuary from them, and bear them into a land not inhabited, leaving the Sanctuary, priest and people behind and free from their iniquities. Leviticus 16:7-10, 22. 6th, The Hebrew name of the scape-goat, as will be seen from the margin of verse 8, is "Azazel." On this verse, Wm. Jenks, in his Comp[rehensive] Com[mentary]. has the following remarks;
7th, At the appearing of Christ, as taught from Revelation 20, Satan is to be bound and cast into the bottomless pit, which act and place are significantly symbolized by the ancient High Priest sending the scape-goat into a separate and uninhabited wilderness. 8th, Thus we have the Scripture, the definition of the name in two ancient languages both spoken at the same time, and oldest opinion of the Christians in favour of regarding the scape-goat as a type of Satan. In the common use of the term, men always associate it with something mean, calling the greatest villains and refugees from justice scape-goats. Ignorance of the law and its meaning is the only possible origin that can be assigned for the opinion that the scape-goat was a type of Christ. Because it is said, "The goat shall bear upon him all their iniquities into a land not inhabited." Leviticus 16:22; And John said, "Behold the Lamb of God, that taketh (margin, beareth) away the sin of the world," it is concluded without further thought that the former was the type of the latter. But a little attention to the law will show that the sins were borne from the people by the priest, and from the priest by the goat. 1st, They are imparted to the victim. 2nd, The priest bore them in its blood to the Sanctuary. 3rd, After cleansing them from it on the tenth day of the seventh month, he bore them to the scape-goat. And 4th, The goat finally bore them away beyond the camp of Israel to the wilderness. This was the legal process, and when fulfilled the author of sins will have received them back again, (but the ungodly will bear their own sins), and his head will have been bruised by the seed of the woman; the "strong man armed" will have been bound by a stronger than he, "and his house (the grave) spoiled of its goods (the saints)." Matthew 12:29; Leviticus 11:21,22 [see Leviticus 16:21,22]. The thousand years imprisonment of Satan will have begun, and the saints will have entered upon their millennial reign with Christ. The antitype of the legal tenth day, the Dispensation of the fulness of times, must begin long enough before the 1000 years of Revelation 20: to give time for the cleansing of the Sanctuary, the antitype of confessing and putting the sins on the head of the scape-goat; which antitype covers the time occupied by the "last end of indignation;" the cry of God's elect to be avenged. Luke 18:1-8, the travail of Zion, (Ezekiel in the valley of dry bones), the loud cry of the 5th angel, Revelation 14:15, the Laodicean church, Revelation 3:14, and the 7 last plagues Revelation 15: & 16. Our limits will not admit of particulars here. The first resurrection is fixed at the appearing of Christ. 1 Thessalonians 4:16, and the beginning of the 1000 at the first resurrection. Revelation 20:4,5.
The Sanctuary must be cleansed before Christ appears; because, 1. He "was once offered to bear the sins of many; and unto them that look for him shall he appear the second time without sin unto salvation." - Now as his last act in bearing the sins of many is to bear them from the Sanctuary after he has cleansed it, and as he does not appear till after having borne the sins of many, and then without sin; it is manifest that the Sanctuary must be cleansed before he appears. 2. The host are still under the indignation after the Sanctuary is cleansed, Daniel 8. Both the Sanctuary and the host were trodden under foot. "Unto 2300 days then shall the Sanctuary be cleansed," or justified (margin). This is the first point in the explanation, and after this Daniel still "sought for the meaning of the vision," and Gabriel came "to make him know what should be in the last end of the indignation." In the explanation which follows he says nothing about the Sanctuary, because that had been explained by the Wonderful Numberer. He now tells him about the host upon whom the last end of the indignation still rests after the Sanctuary is cleansed. This indignation is the Lord's staff - in the hands of the wicked to chastise his people. It was first put into the hands of the Assyrian and has been inherited by each of his successors, which have in turn been sent "against an hypocritical nation, to take the prey and to take the spoil and to tread them down like the mire of the streets." Isaiah 10. The last end of the indignation is evidently the bitter persecutions, and the severe and searching trial of God's people, after the Sanctuary is cleansed, and before the indignation is made to cease in the destruction of the little Horn, the fruit and the successor of the Assyrian, Daniel. 8:25; Isaiah 10:12, 25. 3. The Sanctuary must be cleansed before the
resurrection, for the Lord has provided a comforting message for his people,
telling them that it is done. "Comfort ye, comfort ye my people, saith your
God. Speak ye comfortably to Jerusalem, and cry unto her that her warfare
(margin, appointed time) is accomplished, that her iniquity is pardoned:
for she Jerusalem and the Lord's people are here spoken of, as the Sanctuary and host are in Daniel 8. His people, when Jerusalem's appointed time is accomplished, are affected and are to be comforted by telling them that her iniquity is pardoned. This must be New Jerusalem, for there was never any time set for pardoning the iniquity of Old Jerusalem, which must have had iniquity of some kind and from some source, else she could not be pardoned of it. The fact that the Lord has commanded to comfort his people by telling them that Jerusalem's iniquity is pardoned, is proof positive that she had iniquity, and that it will be removed before his people are delivered and enter her with songs and everlasting joy. This message is similar to that in Isaiah 52:9. After the good and peaceful tidings have been published, saying unto Zion, Thy God reigneth, it is declared, "The Lord has comforted his people, he hath redeemed Jerusalem." - Jerusalem was in a state from which she had to be redeemed, and that before the resurrection; for the next verse says, "All the ends of the earth shall see the salvation of our God." The Transition. The opinion generally obtains that the seventh trumpet ushers in the Age to come. The first thing upon its sounding are "great voices saying, The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ." These voices must be heard in the world in which those kingdoms are. It is also evident that the kingdoms sustain a different relation to God at the time these voices are heard, from what they did before the 7th trumpet sounded. The declaration, "He shall reign forever and ever;" and the humble expression of thanks from the four and twenty elders, (a symbol of the whole church,) "Because thou hast taken to thee thy great power and hast reigned, " shows that at that time he began to reign in a special sense. Such voices have been heard since the 7th month 1844, and produced the effects here described, deep humiliation and profound gratitude. This change of the relation of the kingdoms of this world to Christ, is the same as making his enemies his footstool, (Hebrews 10:13) which event was expected by him while he set at the right hand of the Father fulfilling the daily ministration. [Hebrews] verses 11,12. Revelation 10 gives in part the character and circumstances of the transition from the Gospel to the following Dispensation. The angel that declares, "There should be time no longer," is not the Lord at his appearing, for after uttering that oath he told John, "Thou must prophesy again." Whatever the nature of this prophesying may be, it certainly follows the oath of verses 6,7. I think we have misunderstood the 7th verse. We have understood or explained the 6th verse as the language of the angel, but the 7th as a declaration of John; whereas both verses are the language of the angel, the 7th being a qualification or explanation of the 6th, showing the manner in which time should close. The angel of the Philadelphia church having "an open door", gave the Midnight Cry with the solemn assurance of this oath. He swore, or positively declared, "That there should be time no longer, but in the days of the voice of the 7th angel, when he shall begin to sound, the mystery of God should be finished, as he hath declared to his servants the prophets." There are "days" (plural) in which the 7th angel begins to sound. Whether these days are literal or symbolic, which is most in accordance with the character of this book, they denote a short period of time, in which not only the 7th angel begins to sound, but the mystery of God is finished also. Thus we see that the mystery is finished, not in a point, but in a period, and while the mystery is finishing, the 7th angel is beginning to sound. What is the mystery to be finished? "The mystery of the Gospel." Ephesians 6:19. "The mystery which was kept secret since the world began, but is now made manifest." The riches of the glory of this mystery is Christ in you, the hope of glory, Colossians 1:27. "The mystery of Christ, which in other ages was not made known unto the sons of men, as it is now revealed unto his holy apostles and prophets by the spirit; that the Gentiles should be fellow heirs, and of the same body, and partakers of his promise in Christ by the gospel;" Ephesians 2:4-6. It is the dispensation of the grace of God; verse 2. These texts show that the mystery of God or Christ is the Gospel Dispensation. It is the period of hope and heirship. While we hope we pray for the object of hope, and that is glory - as exhibited on the Holy Mount, immortality, the Kingdom and society of Jesus. Until these are obtained we hope; and while we hope the mystery is not finished. - Again, we are heirs during the mystery of God, and when that is finished, we shall become inheritors. We must therefore conclude that the mystery of God will end with the mysterious change from mortal to immortality; 1 Corinthians 15:51-54. Then, as the Dispensation of the fulness of times begins with the 7th trumpet, and the Gospel Dispensation reaches to the resurrection, it is manifest that the Dispensation of the fulness of times, begins before the Gospel Dispensation ends. - There is a short period of overlapping or running together of the two Dispensations, in which the peculiarities of both mingle like the twilight, minglings of light and darkness. This was also the manner of change from the Dispensation of the Law to the Gospel. Gabriel said to Daniel, "seventy weeks are determined upon thy people and upon the holy city." It is presumed that all agree that these 70 weeks reached to the end of the legal dispensation and no further. The Messiah came at the end of the 69 weeks and began to preach the gospel, (Mark 1:14,15; Matthew 4:23) which Paul calls the New Covenant. And he confirmed this covenant with many for one week, the last one of the 70. Hence, the legal Dispensation ended seven years after the Gospel Dispensation began; and the last symbolic week of one was the first of the other; and while one was being finished, the other was being introduced and confirmed or established. Whether that period is an express type of the crisis period between the Gos[pel] Dis[pensation] and the Dispensation of the fulness of times or not, it furnishes a strong argument from analogy, corroborating the plain testimony of the Word, that there must be such a period. I see no evidences that the latter must be of the same length of the former: To learn its length we must have recourse to other sources of evidence. Yet there is a striking similarity between them. At that time the world and the mass of God's professed people were unbelieving, and greatly indifferent about the transpiring events in the Providence of God, momentous as they were. The adherents to the new era were a sect everywhere spoken against. They had little or no reverence for the old and commandment-nullifying traditions of Judaism. They were called movers of seditions, endangering the place and nation; drunken, because filled with the Holy Ghost; and mad, because mighty in the truth. They had peculiar faith; and their preaching and conduct were such as to cause the professors to accuse them of breaking the law; and finally they denounced and excluded the whole Jewish nation of religionists en mass for their infidelity.- The teaching and practice even of our Saviour and the apostles appeared to them contradictory - at times they seemed to recognize the authority of the law, and then again totally to disregard it, and insist upon the new order of things. He resolved their ten commandments into two, dismissed the woman without being stoned according to the law, forgave sins without the legal sacrifices, healed without requiring to offer according to the law, and that even on the Sabbath day and yet declared that he came not to destroy the law, but to fulfil it. Again, when he had healed a leper, he charged him to go and show himself to the Priest and offer for his cleansing those things which Moses commanded. He also ate the Passover according to law. Both he and his apostles, on some occasions excluded, and on others admitted the Gentiles to privileges, which according to the law could be enjoyed only by the Jews. Thus they recognized the presence and claims of both dispensations at the same time; one entering and displacing the other, not instantly, but gradually, by a succession of events, each distinct in itself, but all connected in harmony, transpiring in fulfilment of prophesy, and forming the circumstances of the Advent, which was one distinct event, and the nucleus of all the rest. A little before his crucifixion Jesus came as King to Jerusalem, the Metropolis and Capitol of that Dispensation; the City was under his absolute authority for a time; he had declared its house desolate and now entered and cleansed the temple. As then, so now, according to the Scriptures, a series of events constitute the circumstances of our Lord's appearing, and form the crisis of the two Dispensations. In that period his crucifixion and resurrection were the principle events to which all others are subservient. But there are other events connected with these, and which must of necessity precede them. One of these events as we have already seen is the cleansing of the Sanctuary. Another is the marriage. That Christ ever was or ever will be married as human beings are, no one pretends; but that there is a divine transaction, illustrated for our understanding under the figure of a marriage, it is infidelity to deny. Christ is the Bridegroom and New Jerusalem the Bride. The marriage then signifies their union in a special sense, and of course must take place where the bride is, in the heavens. The heavens must receive Jesus till the times of restitution, then the Father will send him from the heavens. He went to his Father's House in New Jerusalem, and when he has prepared it he will come again from it to receive us. True the word Gaines, which is rendered marriage or wedding, signifies "the nuptial ceremony, including the banquet"; but not the banquet alone, as some would have us believe. Where is the place of these transactions? With the Bride of course. When the Bridegroom came to the marriage then, he could not have come to the earth from heaven, for then he would have come from instead of to the marriage, but he must have come to the place of marriage, in New Jerusalem. But says one, How could he come where he was already? We must remember that the Bride is not a person, but a City, 12,000 furlongs or 1,500 miles square. The central point and fountain of all its glory is the Ancient of days. - Christ doubtless has been personally within the limits of that City ever since his ascension, and when the cry in 1844 was given he came to the Ancient of Days and the scenes of marriage, which in their amplitude will occupy a great part, if not all, of the Dispensation of the fulness of times, then began. And, as when Christ comes again he will come from New Jerusalem after the scenes of marriage have there begun, every one will see that he will return to earth from the wedding, and we, waiting, will meet him and return with him to the bridal City to share in the festive joys. Dear Brethren, I must close for the present and leave the subject with you. May the Lord correct and enlarge our conceptions of himself and his Plan, and direct our hearts into the patient waiting for Jesus. Let us in humble obedience follow the Lamb in the expanding developments of His Word and Providence. Canandaigua, N.Y. Jan. 17, 1846, O. R. L. CROSIER. A further letter from O. R. L. Crosier Published in the Day Star 11 May 1846 * * * * * East Hamilton Mad. Co., April 13, 1846. Dear Bro Jacobs, If there is room in your little sheet, I wish to lay before the brethren a few thoughts on the anti-types of the autumnal types. They were the memorial of blowing of trumpets on the first day of the Seventh month, the day of Atonement and Jubilee trumpet on the tenth, and the feast of tabernacles on the fifteenth of the Seventh month. Some evidences have been presented in the "Day-Star Extra" to show that the vernal [or spring] types receive their anti-types during the Gospel dispensation and in connection with the anti-typical daily ministration. So far as I know, it has always been conceded that the fall types were to receive their fulfilment at the Second Advent; until of late, to escape the consequences of abiding by this obviously scriptural view of those types, some deny it and explain them away or as fulfilled during the Gospel dispensation; thus furnishing another example of prospective faith, but present infidelity - faith in unfilled, and infidelity in fulfilling prophecies. THE MEMORIAL OF TRUMPETS. Trumpets were blown, and burnt offerings, and sin offerings offered on the first day of every month in the year; Numbers 28:11-15; but the first day of the 7th month was one of special importance, on which was "an holy convocation", "no servile work" was done, they afflicted their souls, and offered an offering made by fire unto the Lord; and kept the day as a Sabbath; Numbers 29:1-6. Leviticus 23:23,25. Their time being lunar, watchmen were stationed on the hills to watch the appearance of the moon. The first who saw it blew his trumpet, and the rest heard and swelled its sound till the hills of Judea resounded with peals of trumpets. In this way the approach of the great day of Atonement was announced. The fulfilment of this memorial of blowing trumpets must be the proclamation of the coming of the anti-typical day of atonement, which is the dispensation of the fulness of times. The object in either case was to make ready for the atonement. This was the office of the Advent movement (or Elias) up the tenth day of the seventh month 1844. The 2300 days ending on that day, the Bridegroom came to the marriage and began the cleansing of the sanctuary which is the first event in the day of atonement. the trumpet of the jubilee was sounded "on the tenth day of the Seventh month, in the day of atonement", Leviticus 25:9. Hence, we could not have the Jubilee trumpet till the anti-typical day of atonement began, which was in the autumn of ‘44. The midnight cry was not the Jubilee trumpet, because it did not occur "on the tenth day of the seventh month, in the day of Atonement". That was the last blast in the anti-type of the "memorial of blowing trumpets" "in the new moon" "to make ready" for the day of atonement "in" which the trumpet of the Jubilee should sound throughout all the land. This corroborates the view, published by yourself in the "Star" several months since, as to the identity of the Jubilee trumpet with the Seventh trumpet. Revelation 11:15-19. This trumpet would only interest those who were to be benefited by the release; hence, would be sounded to Israel only. Our shut-door position since the 10th of the 7th month ‘44 has been peculiarly adapted to the Jubilee trumpet. The jubilee year. "And ye shall hallow the fifteenth [fiftieth or 50th] year, and proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof: it shall be a jubilee unto you; and ye shall return every man unto his possession, and ye shall return every man unto his family". Leviticus 25:10. The captives were not only released, but they also returned to their possessions in that year. The period of this release and restoration was not a day; but a year. - "A jubilee shall that fiftieth year be unto you", verse 11. It was the great Sabbatic year, in which the land, as well as the people, was redeemed, verses 24,28. The Hebrew servants were only to serve "unto the year of Jubilee", verse 40; hence, they were free the moment that year began, and the year was occupied in returning to (or taking) and securing their possessions. According to the revealed purposes of God, the events to occur in fulfilment of that year are not confined to the limits of one literal year; but the period of their occurrence is the thousand years’ Day of the Lord. 2 Peter 3: - the year of the Lord’s redeemed - the Sabbath that remaineth to the people of God, Hebrews 4:9 (margin). Revelation 20. The binding of Satan and loosing of the "captive exiles" from the "prison house" - the "better resurrection" obtained by all the "heirs of promise" mark the beginning of the great and final Jubilee; Isaiah 42:6-16; 49:8-12; 51:12-23; Hebrews [6:17] 12. Then the Redeemer of Israel will "establish the earth" and "cause to inherit the desolate heritages" [Isaiah 49:8] and "they shall build up the desolation of many generations". The purchased possessions will be redeemed unto the praise of His glory, Ephesians 1:14. - "Jerusalem shall be inhabited in her own place", and the Saints released from suffering, shall reign with Christ in possession of the kingdom under the whole heaven. the feast of tabernacles was kept seven days, 15th to 22d of the Seventh month, during which all that were Israelites born, dwelt in booths [tents] which were made of the branches of trees. (Nehemiah 8:14-15), and they rejoiced before the Lord. Leviticus 23:33-45. It was called also the "feast of ingathering" and was celebrated after they had "gathered in their laborers [corn & wine] out of the field", Exodus 23:16, Deuteronomy 16:13-15. This feast then must meet its anti-type after the harvest of the earth is gathered. We are yet in the reaping time, [nay]? rather the severing of the tares from the wheat; when this is done the wheat will be gathered. As to the time and circumstances of the gathering the words of our Saviour are explicit and satisfactory. Matthew 24:30-31. "They shall see the Son of man coming, in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And he shall send his angels with a great sound of a trumpet and they shall gather together his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other." These words are too plain to be misunderstood and too important to be overlooked. If the personal and visible Second Advent of Jesus in his distinctive character is spoken of in this discourse, it is in the 30th verse. No mere spiritual coming or manifestation answer this prophecy. It is the coming of the Son of Man. If Christ is only Spirit He is not the Son of Man. After the coming of the Son of Man the harvest of the earth is to be gathered in, and that will begin the anti-type of the feast of tabernacles; which, in its completion, it is evident, will extend through the millennial joyous reign of the Saints with Christ. Your unworthy brother waiting for Jesus, O. R. L. Crosier. |