GRAND BIBLE CLASS by Editor

Seventh-day Adventist Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Nov 3, 1881

GRAND BIBLE CLASS.

By Editor

THE Congregationalist publishes an account of a Bible class held in Tremont Temple, Boston, under the leadership of Rev. R. R. Meredith. The class is composed of over 1,500 persons, of different denominations, meeting every Saturday evening. On a lesson review Mr. Meredith answered a written question, as follows:—

Question. "Would you teach from the parable of the rich man and Lazarus that the departed can see and hold converse with one another, though separated by an impassable gulf?"

Mr. Meredith. "No, I think not. I insist, in the teaching of that parable, that any attempt to make it literal would make it nonsense. You cannot make anything out of it. You have simply got to say, there were certain ideas about these things resting in the minds of the Jews, and our Lord seized on just those ideas. He does not take pains to rectify them where they are wrong, or to indorse them where they are right; he simply takes what lies in their minds about the departed to bring out certain truths, namely, that there is a relation between a man's life in this world and his life beyond, that this is a scene of probation, and that beyond there is a scene of retribution and reward."

That is a sensible answer, considering that Mr. M. is a believer in the Platonic theory of the consciousness of man's soul while man is dead. But in that answer he has cut off the right arm of the argument which is professedly based on the Bible in favor of that theory. And he was amazingly inconsistent in further answers. To the question, "What is the probable condition of the soul between the death of the body and the final Judgment?" after several answers from the class, Mr. M. said:—

"And Jesus says, 'God is not the God of the dead, but the God of the living!'"

But he forgot that Jesus spoke those words concerning a quotation from the book of Exodus to prove the resurrection of the dead, not the continuous living of the soul. If he had been as considerate of the facts in this case as he was in that of the parable, he must have given a different answer. In connection with this came up the location of Paradise, and Mr. M. spoke as follows:—

"Death has no effect upon man's immortal spirit but to liberate it from this house of clay. It goes to where Christ is. Now the further question is raised: Where is Christ? He is at the right hand of the Majesty on High. That is the simple teaching of the Bible. So I am unable, in view of these passages, to accept the idea of an intermediate place, while I have not the slightest doubt that there is an intermediate state—that the soul without the body is not a whole man, and is not capable of all the joy and blessedness that a complete man is capable of. The bliss of the redeemed and the misery of the lost is not complete; it never will be until the whole man is in it. Now, I don't know whether that is true or not. That is the best thinking I am capable of doing on the subject. Other people who have thought more about it than I have, perhaps, will tell you there is an intermediate place as well as an intermediate state. They think the Jews were right on that point in their eschatology. May be that is true; I am not able to think so myself. I believe profoundly in an intermediate state, in which the soul is absent from the body, waiting for the full redemption, to wit, the resurrection body; but not in an intermediate place."

If this be so, then God and Christ and the soul are nonentities; it is impossible to conceive of an entity of a being—without conceiving of its location. A nonentity cannot have a location; a being must have. Jesus ascended, in his glorified, resurrected body, to the right hand of his Father in Heaven, and his disciples saw him. And "every eye shall see him" on his return. He "came from" the Father, to this earth, and "returned to" the Father, when he left this earth. If Mr. Meredith were correct, this language of the Saviour is as truly "nonsense" as Mr. M. claims the Saviour's parable would be if taken literally. This idea of Paradise being a state merely, and not a place, is inconsistent with the Bible teachings concerning it. Can anybody believe that "the Paradise" in which Adam and Eve were put was only a condition, and not a locality? The tree of life was there, which man lost by disobedience. The tree of life will be restored to man when Paradise itself is restored. This will not be until man himself—"the whole man"—is redeemed.

But, again, "the soul without the body is not a whole man." So we think; we have no doubt on that subject. But then comes up the question: If God is not the God of that which is dead, as the Saviour is generally understood to mean, then he is not the God of the soul of man between death and the resurrection. Nay, was not the God of Christ while he was in the tomb, for the Scriptures plainly declare that "Christ died." See 1 Cor. 15:1, 2, and many other places. And Mr. Meredith says that death "liberates" the soul from the house of clay. This is the idea generally received, that the house of clay, the body, is a clog to the soul, and that the liberation of the soul is, to it, a joyful event. But the soul "is not a whole man;" its happiness is not full and complete until the resurrection. This also is quite largely believed. Without the body it is so destitute of the qualities of manhood, so nearly a nonentity, that it needs no place in which to reside; more rare than the atmosphere, or any thing of which we can conceive.

If Mr. Meredith had applied his remark—"Now I don't know whether that is true or not"—to the whole paragraph which we last quoted, that would have been more consistent with the modesty for which he plead at the close. Theology among the learned of the land is nothing less than a muddle; and it is as true to-day as it ever was, that the wisdom of the wise is perished, and the truth of God is covered up with human traditions.