ELIJAH and ELISHA
LAST RELATED ACTS OF ELIJAH AND ELISHA
2 Kings 2:8-14
SMITING JORDAN. DIVISION OF THE WATERS. SOME OBJECTIONS CONSIDERED. WALKING AND TALKING BEYOND JORDAN. ELIJAH'S SUGGESTION AND ELISHA'S REPLY. THE SEPARATION. THE CHARIOT. THE HORSES AND HORSEMEN. THE DIVIDING AGENT. CHRONOLOGICAL SUCCESSION OF THE EVENTS OF 2 KINGS 2:12-14 DIFFERENT FROM THAT OF THEIR ANTITYPES. ELISHA'S SEVENFOLD ACTIVITIES: FELLOWSHIP GIVEN; ELISHA'S THREEFOLD CRY; FELLOWSHIP WITHDRAWN; RENDING HIS MANTLE; SEIZING ELIJAH'S MANTLE; JORDAN'S SECOND SMITING; CROSSING THE RIVER. FIRST UNANSWERABLE PROOF THAT THE SOCIETY'S PARTISANS ARE ANTITYPICAL ELISHA. SECOND OF SUCH PROOFS. A CAUTION AGAINST AN EASY MISUNDERSTANDING. SEPARATION NOT YET COMPLETE. "JUDGING." PARENTHESIS DEMONSTRATED BY NINE ARGUMENTS. CONCLUDING THOUGHTS. BEREAN QUESTIONS.
"Elijah … smote the waters … As they still went on and talked, … a Chariot of Fire and Horses of Fire … parted them … And Elisha … took the mantle of Elijah, … and smote the waters"—2 Kings 2:8, 11, 12, 14.
THE LORD'S people have been hearing much the last few years regarding the closing associated experiences of the Prophets, Elijah and Elisha. "That Servant" wrote and spoke as much on this as on any other subject during his last sixteen months. Both before and since his passing away, the Lord's people have been discussing it. As one of these the writer also has taken part in this discussion. Two notable attempts have in print been made to refute our understanding of this subject, one of these by J.F. Rutherford, in the February 15th "Tower" of 1918, the other by F.H. McGee in what is entitled, "A Letter of Importance to all the Brethren," circulated by the Pastoral Bible Institute Committee with its endorsement, and enclosed in its Sept., 1918, "Committee Bulletin." His views, therefore, though given personally, are the Committee's views against the writer's interpretation.
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These two public attacks from two viewpoints fully justify and call for a discussion of the subject in print; accordingly, there will follow a detailed exposition of the subject, with replies to their objections and refutations of their positions, written in the spirit of love for the blessing of all the Lord's people.
(2) Before going into details a few introductory remarks would be appropriate. Inasmuch as the subject is one of a Scriptural, typical and prophetical character, it would be profitable for us in its study, to remember certain principles.
(3) First—No Scripture can be understood until due; for no matter how learned, consecrated, or richly used by the Lord one may be, it is impossible for him to understand any Scripture until in due time the Lord has broken the seals from the passage (Rev. 5:2-7; 6:1, etc.).
(4) Second—Prophecies and types usually are not clearly understood before fulfillment.
(5) Third—A prophecy or type connected with a trial of character cannot be understood until the trial is met.
(6) The reason for all this is very apparent: To give in advance of fulfillment a clear understanding of such a prophecy or type would defeat the Lord's purpose in making the experience indicated by it testful. It is for this reason that the Lord did not permit "that Servant" clearly to see the antitypical details of the last related experiences of Elijah and Elisha. That he did not clearly understand these is manifest from his writings and sermons on the subject; for example, Z. 1915, beginning page 285; Z. 1916, beginning pages 3, 38, 263. In all of these articles he expresses himself diffidently, tentatively and suppositionally on a number of phases of the subject, because of his oft-expressed conviction that the details could not be understood until fulfilled; but the Lord used him to shed much light on the general subject. What he has given
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us, therefore, on this subject is sufficiently clear for us to decipher the fulfilled details that were undecipherable before the trial connected with the fulfillment. It is not to our beloved Pastor's disparagement that he was unable to see all these unfulfilled details; rather we are amazed that he saw enough, before the trial connected with the fulfillment, to enable humble recipients of his thoughts, principles and definitions to see the details clearly since their fulfillment. With the assistance given us by "that Servant," we believe we have been favored by the Lord with clearness on these now fulfilled details, and therefore take pleasure in laying them before the brethren, feeling that the many requests coming to us for them, and that the attacks launched on them by J.F. Rutherford and F.H. McGee, as respective representatives of two sets of brethren, are Providential indications that these views be now spread in print before the Church.
(7) We begin with the smiting of Jordan: According to our understanding the antitypical first smiting of Jordan—that typed by Elijah's smiting—occurred between the Fall of 1914 and the Fall of 1916. This is in harmony with "that Servant's" statement in Z. 1916, page 39, col. 2, last paragraph, as follows: "'Do you think that this (the smiting of Jordan) has not yet taken place?' may be a question in your mind. We think it has not as yet fully taken place. 'Do you think that the Photo-Drama of Creation has had a part in this?' It may be. 'Will there be something more?' We do not know, we rather think there is something more; we do not state this positively." From this quotation we see that about the New Year, 1916, "that Servant" believed and wrote that the smiting of Jordan was then going on, and thought there may be more of it. That the first smiting of Jordan had been going on from the Fall of 1914 is clearly implied in Z. 1915, page 286, col. 2, par. 4, compared with par. 3: "Not disconcerted, Bible Students are going on, even
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as Elijah and Elisha went on after crossing the Jordan. They are not headed for any particular date, even as Elijah was not directed to go to any other place." Let us compare carefully the picture and the events of this period and see if they do not harmoniously correspond with this thought.
(8) In harmony with "that Servant's" thought the Jordan typifies the peoples undergoing a condemnatory sentence; for Jordan means "judged down," condemned; and waters in the symbols of the Scriptures are used to represent peoples in their organized capacities (Rev. 17:15). We say "peoples in their organized capacities" designedly because that is exactly what the word "peoples" in the plural indicates; and hence, we understand the passage to refer to the nations, viewed from the standpoint of their political, ecclesiastical, financial and industrial organizational aspects; hence, by Jordan are meant the rulers, the clergy, the aristocrats, the labor leaders and their supporters. Thus, then, the nations, as organized in these four relations, would be severely censured and given a condemnatory sentence by the antitypical Elijah, and this censure is the first and this sentence the second and last part of what is implied in the Smiting of Jordan.
(9) In corroboration of "that Servant's" thought that the mantle of Elijah was an emblem of his power as God's Prophet to Israel, we cite the fact that the word translated mantle (adareth, a different word from that which means robe), carries with it the idea of an insignia of honor, power, splendor. Accordingly, our Pastor's definition of the antitype—that the mantle represents God's power in antitypical Elijah to be the Lord's mouthpiece to nominal Spiritual Israel—is correct. In analyzing some of the ingredients of this power he has shown us that, among other things, it embraced authorization, the Truth and financial power. As we study the expression, "power to be God's Prophet," and as we see it in fulfillment, we
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learn that this power consisted of the following seven things: First, the Divine authorization; i.e., the anointing of the Spirit; Second, the Church's authorization, i.e., its approval of the service and its agents; Third, the Truth itself; Fourth, the controllership of the Truth work, which the Church exercised in its representative, "that Servant"; Fifth, the controllership of the Truth literature, through which the message was sent forth; Sixth, the controllership of the channels of service, that is, the Colporteur, Pilgrim, Volunteer, Photo-Drama and Newspaper work; and, Seventh, controllership of financial sinews for the furtherance of the work. A little consideration will satisfy us that it is in these seven things that the power of the Church to act as God's mouthpiece to nominal Spiritual Israel consisted. The matter is so apparent that it needs no further discussion for those well acquainted with the Lord's Word and the Harvest movement.
(10) Just as the mantle was symbolic, so also was its wrapping. This would represent the combination and concentration of all these seven things in use for the purpose at hand; that is, it would mean that the Lord's people, as New Creatures, approving of the service and its agents, would use all of the truths, controllership of the work, pieces of Truth literature, branches of service and financial sinews necessary and applicable to the public work implied in the Smiting of Jordan; but it would exclude the use of all features of the powers in the hands of the Lord's people not necessary nor applicable to such work. On this point we quote: Z. 1916, page 5, col. 1, par. 5: "It may be a financial power that was represented by Elijah's mantle in this case, or it may be something else. We are waiting to see. Meanwhile we are endeavoring to keep all the branches in all lines of the work well in hand, so as to be ready to smite when the opportune moment shall come," and from Z. 1916, page 263, col. 2, par. 4:
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"What will be the antitype of the folding up of Elijah's mantle, symbolizing his power, and how long it may require to thus ["the folding up of Elijah's mantle"] concentrate the forces for the smiting, we do not know."
(11) When we look at the service performed toward the public during the years above-mentioned, we find that it was performed by New Creatures, approved by the Church, using the truths that exposed the evils of the various nations of Christendom in their fourfold organizational condition above-mentioned. We find that all of the necessary and applicable controllership of the work in its public aspects, as directed by "that Servant," was concentrated and combined in this work, as represented in the wrapping up of Elijah's mantle. All of the literature suitable to exposing the evils of those claiming to exercise powers by Divine right, and all the branches of service circulating this literature were used: For example, Vol. IV was specialized on, in the hands of the Colporteurs; in the hands of the Volunteers, tracts like "The World on Fire," "Distress of Nations Preceding Armageddon," "Clergy Ordination Proved Fraudulent," "Why Financiers Tremble," "Social Conditions Beyond Human Remedy," etc., were distributed; in the hands of its workers, the Photo-Drama, which by the World War was given a smiting setting, was exhibited; and finally the sermons were published in thousands of newspapers. Additionally, public lectures and private conversations on subjects like "The Battle of Armageddon," "The World on Fire," "After the War, What?" "The Overthrow of Satan's Empire," "The War in Prophecy," etc., were held. Finally, all the money that could be spared for the public work was poured into that branch of the service. Thus, the combination and concentration of the Church's seven powers for the smiting seem to have occurred from the Fall of 1914 to the Fall of 1916. For the correspondence between
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the wrapping of the mantle for smiting and such combination and concentration of these seven powers for the rebuke and sentence of the antitypical Jordan is complete; and, therefore, seems to show that we are right in our understanding of the antitype of the wrapping of the mantle as above given. The reader will notice from this explanation how in a number of essential respects the writer's view on the wrapping of the mantle differs from F.H. McGee's statement of it. The writer never taught that the "organizations" were "a part" and "the means of the wrappings."
(12) The smiting of Jordan involves several things: First, a truthful and irrefutable presentation of the evils, violative of the Golden Rule, committed by the rulers claiming to govern by Divine right, by the clergy claiming to exercise office by Divine right, by the aristocrats claiming positions, titles, possessions, and special privileges by Divine right, and by the labor leaders claiming certain powers by Divine right; Second, a passing of the sentence of destruction upon all present institutions claiming Divine right; Third, the announcement of dismissal from office of, and the sentence of punishment upon, all officials who claimed to possess and exercise their authority by such right. This smiting by the saints is accurately, literally and figuratively described in Ps. 149:5-9: "Let the saints be joyful in glory; let them sing aloud upon their beds; let the high praises of God be in their mouth, and a two-edged sword in their hand; to execute vengeance upon the nations, and punishments upon the people; to bind their kings with chains and their nobles with fetters of iron; to execute upon them the judgment written: this honor have all His saints." Certainly the work that the Lord's servants did during those two years was the "Glory"; i.e., the special honor accorded the faithful at the extreme end of the Age. This passage by the expression, "this honor have all His saints," shows that this honor would be shared
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in, even by the last member of the Little Flock to be called. Certainly the truths that they then taught held up the high praises, attributes of God; they were indeed a double-edged sword cutting right and left the vitals of evil-doers. Their exposures of the people's evils proved to be a sore punishment to the latter; and by those stern, reproving and irrefutable exposures, the political, ecclesiastical, financial and industrial kings and princes were bound hand and foot—that is, unanswerably proven to be evil-doers and were measurably restrained. It was proven beyond gainsaying that the doctrine of the Divine right of kings, clergy, aristocrats and labor leaders was largely responsible for the wrongs that they committed, whose horrible result was the plunging of the world into the awful World War. The Kaiser's claims and deeds along these lines are examples well known to the world.
(13) That which is symbolized by the smiting of Jordan is pictured forth from another standpoint in Lev. 16:20, 21, where we are told that the high priest while in robes of sacrifice, hence before the last members go beyond the veil, confessed over the live goat's head all of entire Israel's iniquities and transgressions "in all their sins." The peculiar expression, "all the iniquities and transgressions in all their sins," seems to imply willful sins. The antitypical Israelites are Christendom's rulers, clergy, aristocrats, labor leaders and their supporters. The wrongs here referred to are their willful violations of God's law, the Golden Rule, especially against The Christ. In the Volumes, especially Vol. IV, and in the above-mentioned tracts, sermons, lectures, conversations and Photo-Drama exhibitions, these were confessed by the High Priest through His members in the flesh during those years; and it was mainly the Great Company Class, both in and outside the Truth, who, interested in the prophetic aspects of the war, gave attention to these exposures, from the Fall of 1914 to that of 1916. Thus was fulfilled
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the antitype of the high priest's confession of Israel's special sins over Azazel's goat. Hence, it is apparent that we have from another viewpoint a description and a fulfillment of what is symbolized by the smiting of Jordan.
(14) Elijah, not Elisha, smote Jordan the first time. This type, like all others, gives us the finished picture only. Elijah, therefore, would represent those only who would in harmony with the Lord's spirit do the first smiting until its completion. Thus, it would be reasonable to assume that whoever did not persevere in the smiting to the end of this period, even though he may have smitten for a little while, or that whoever did not in harmony with the Lord's spirit persevere in the smiting to its end, would not be represented in the finished picture, and, therefore, would not be a part of the antitypical Elijah. It is very marked how during the smiting period the Lord designedly allowed subtle trials to test the Truth people with respect to zeal for, and faithfullness to, the work of smiting. Shortness of finances and abridgement of the work and consequently of opportunities for service proved searching tests, and those Spirit-begotten ones who allowed these or other conditions to demonstrate them to lack zeal, or to cool their ardor to the extent of stopping them from smiting before it was finished, thereby, unconsciously to themselves, demonstrated that they were not of Elijah, but of Elisha, in the antitype, the type omitting mention of their insufficient smiting, as it does of those who perseveringly smote with a wrong spirit, since it gives the finished picture only. That many succumbed under these tests is proven by the fact that not a few, shut off from their former, did not zealously seek other avenues of smiting. Of course, those who were active in non-smiting branches of the work alone did not smite at all; and are, therefore, not of the antitypical Elijah. And those who smote but indifferently without zeal or
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energy or in a wrong spirit likewise are not counted as smiters. During this period under more or less financial and other stress many Pilgrims gave up their office. Colporteurs decreased from about 900 in 1914, to about 400 in 1915, and to about 300 in 1916. Members of the Bethel family were decreased by about 100, and not a few of these Pilgrim, Colporteur, Volunteer, Photo-Drama and Tabernacle workers failed zealously to seek new avenues of smiting. Where zeal and love were sufficiently warm, the subtle test was overcome. Those who lacked zeal were unconsciously led into an inactivity or energylessness as respects smiting, which proved them to be of the antitypical Elisha. Thus we see that ultimately those only are counted smiters who in harmony with the Lord's spirit continued the smiting to the end. All others are left out of the finished picture, and if consecrated, are represented in Elisha, even though they may have done some temporary or zealless smiting. By this we are not to understand that Elisha represents enemies of the Truth; rather a class in the Truth sympathetic with the work of smiting, indicated by Elisha walking with Elijah through the river bed and beyond; but of insufficient zeal to continue faithfully and lovingly the smiting to the end.
(15) The waters, representing the "peoples" organized as rulers, clergy, aristocrats, labor leaders and their supporters, may be grouped into two classes: (1) the conservative elements of society, consisting of the rulers, clergy, aristocrats and their supporters, and (2) the radical elements of society, consisting of the labor leaders and their supporters, embracing trade unionists, socialists, anarchists, etc. The division of the waters into two parts symbolizes the separation of the peoples into these two classes. The truths used in the smiting, that is, those censuring the evils of Christendom in its present organized condition, reopened the division between these two classes, which had been healed at the opening of the war on account
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of its menace. As these two classes discussed these matters they became more and more set against one another, and that by what these exposing truths brought to their attention. Thus before long worldwide movements on a small scale began, in which each class strove for its own view, gotten from these truths, as against the other's; and thus Christendom was again divided increasingly into two warring camps on these questions; and the renewal of this division, which the dangers of the war had temporarily healed, was initiated by the antitypical Elijah preaching the stern truths that disproved alike the Divine right of kings, clergy and aristocrats, on the one hand, and the Divine right of labor leaders, on the other hand. Thus the truths on these subjects announced from a religious standpoint effected a gradually increasing division of the peoples, each division accepting truths condemnatory of the other, though the radicals were the more responsive to pertinent truths. History proves that this division in its renewal began during the period between the Fall of 1914 and that of 1916, and thus demonstrates the antitype of the first division of the Jordan as then taking place.
(16) The final feature of this picture now calls for a few remarks—Elijah and Elisha crossing dry shod. The waters on both sides of them represent the two contending classes of Christendom. Elijah and Elisha walking dry shod through the bed of the river represent that their antitypes were not injured as New Creatures by and during the Little Flock's reproving, sentencing and dividing the peoples. The fact that they were separate from the waters pictures forth the thought that their antitypes did not take sides with either of the contending classes. Their walking together symbolizes agreement in, and sympathy with, the work that the antitypical Elijah did. Their reaching the other side was antityped in the antitypical Elijah's work above outlined coming to an end.
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(17) A comparison of the picture and of the events that occurred from the Fall of 1914 to that of 1916 confirms us in the conviction that then the antitypical first smiting of Jordan was performed. Nor should we lose sight of the thought that the key to the fact that the smiting occurred at this time is furnished in former quotations cited here again as follows: (one from Z. 1916, p. 39, col. 2, last par.; the other from Z. 1915, p. 286, col. 2, par. 4): "'Do you think that this has not yet taken place?' may be a question in your minds. We think it has not as yet fully taken place. 'Do you not think that the Photo-Drama of Creation has had a part in this?' It may be. 'Will there be something more?' We do not know; we rather think there is something more. We do not state this positively." "Not discouraged, Bible students are going on even as Elijah and Elisha went on after crossing Jordan. They are not headed for any particular date, even as Elijah was not directed to any other place."
(18) Accordingly, we would say that, since there was a radical change in the work toward the public, following Brother Russell's death, the first smiting of Jordan ceased about that time; and how fitting it was that he, whom God selected to lead the Truth work for the Little Flock in the end of the Age, should have had the privilege of leading and sharing in this special feature of the work, the "glory" that was given to the "fullness" of the saints to enjoy this side the veil: "This honor have all His saints!" We rejoice with him in this, his part in the "honor"!
(19) But some may object that the work done toward the public between the Fall of 1914 and the Fall of 1916 was on too small a scale to be the first smiting of Jordan. Our answer to this objection is that this comparatively small-scaled work is exactly what the type indicates. A remark that "that Servant" made in the Summer of 1915 in answer to the following question from the writer, "Will the majority of the people
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in the Truth be in the Great Company when it is formed?" will help us to understand why the first smiting of Jordan was to be on a small scale. His answer was: "Decidedly the majority of the Truth people will find themselves in the Great Company; because the majority are not zealous in self-sacrifice." Since, therefore, the Elisha class represents the majority, and Elijah the minority, of the Truth people, of course the work of this minority would be on a smaller scale than the work that both classes combined had done previously. All who were in the Truth from January, 1914, onward remember that our work in 1914, participated in by a large majority of the Truth people, was on a very large scale; but they will also remember that toward the end of the year the work began to decrease, and before the early months of 1915 had passed it was very greatly reduced. This was due to the withdrawal of many of the Elisha class from the work. Such withdrawal steadfastly continued until the Elisha class as a whole some considerable time before the Fall of 1916 had ceased smiting; that is, ceased announcing and spreading such truths as chastised the evils of those who claimed to exercise authority and privileges by Divine right, and as sentenced them to dismissal from office and to other punishments, and their institutions to destruction. Accordingly, instead of the objection that the smiting described above was on too small a scale being a valid one, the small scale of the work is a corroborative evidence of the truthfulness of the claim that the work above described was the first smiting of Jordan. Compared with the previous large work, it had to be small, because of being done by a minority of the laborers engaged in the larger work.
(20) Some have sought to offset our claim, based on the quotations made above, to the effect that Brother Russell about the New Year of 1916 taught that the first smiting of Jordan was then going on, and
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implied that it began in the Fall of 1914, by referring to an expression, in which he states that the smiting would be future: Z. 1916, p. 263, col. 2, par. 4, "More and more we are impressed that Elijah's smiting of the River Jordan, the waters thereof being thus divided, pictures a mighty work yet to be accomplished, and apparently in the very near future." Our answer is: We hold (1) that the Lord used his mind to foretell in this language the second smiting, though "that Servant" was not aware of this; (2) that while it is true that we find him expressing himself in these two different ways, in fairness to our dear Pastor, as well as in harmony with his repeated statements that prophecies and types connected with tests of character cannot be clearly understood until fulfilled, it is to be said that no certainty could be affirmed of either view until after the tests connected with the fulfillment of this and its two following and closely associated types had been met; consequently the tests connected with the fulfillment having been met, we now see that his statement in Z. 1916, p. 39, col. 2, par. 4, is the correct one, with reference to the first smiting, and that the one on page 263 is not the correct one for the first, but is for the second smiting. Therefore, we ought not to insist on the latter as binding in proof of the first smiting.
(21) One of the objectionable things in the writings of J.F. Rutherford and F.H. McGee is that they quote from some places in Brother Russell's writings what they think favors their view, and omit quoting from other places what gives another thought, and thus fail to do justice to "that Servant." Our method in dealing with the various expressions of "that Servant" when they appear contradictory is to seek to harmonize them whenever possible, as we would apparent Scriptural contradictions; and whenever such a harmonization is impossible, we seek to follow that expression of his opinion that seems most reasonable and
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most in harmony with the fulfilled facts. Let us not forget that Brother Russell repeatedly corrected his own interpretations, when fulfilled events proved that he did not clearly understand and teach them before they were fulfilled. For following Brother Russell's example and principles in this the writer repeatedly has been falsely accused of repudiating Brother Russell's teachings. Both J.F. Rutherford and F.H. McGee and their associates have been guilty of this, some of them doing so even in their discourses. We are thoroughly loyal to "that Servant."
(22) No valid argument has yet been presented against the first smiting of Jordan as given above. To the statement, that Brother Russell wrote that the first smiting of Jordan was to be after the war, the writer has the following to say: We have read everything that "that Servant" published on the smiting of Jordan, and repeatedly heard and questioned him on the subject, but never read or heard his expressing such a thought. The quotations given above prove that he thought the smiting of Jordan was going on in January, 1916, and imply that it began in the Fall of 1914. Therefore, the writer, while conceding that in some places "that Servant" spoke of it as yet future, challenges the truthfulness of the statement that Brother Russell wrote that the first smiting of Jordan was to begin after the war, though a Convention Report sets forth such a thought as his. For he held New Year, 1916, that in a little more than a year the "chariot" would come, Z. 1916, p. 39, col. 2, par. 2, "'Are you expecting the fiery chariot any minute now, or do you think it some little distance off—perhaps some months yet, or perhaps a year or more?' will be asked. At least a year, or probably more, is my thought." And true enough, a year and a half later, in June, 1917, it appeared!
(23) Repeatedly in 1915, e.g., as shown above twice by quotation from Z. 1915, p. 286, col, 2, par. 4,
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"that Servant" expressed the thought that the antitypical Elijah and Elisha were then "walking and talking together" beyond Jordan. This quotation implies that Jordan's first smiting had at least begun. Such antitypical walking and talking beyond Jordan in the Summer of 1915 at first hearing seems to be contradictory to the thought that Jordan's first smiting was not yet completed until the Fall of 1916. How harmonize these things? Our answer is, that while in the type the first event had to be completed before the second could begin, such is not the case in the antitype, because the antitype expresses relations and activities toward different classes, which could operate during the same period, though not, of course, at the same instant of time. The antitypical Elijah's smiting Jordan during the two years represents his relations and activities toward the peoples, as distinct from the Great Company, while their walking and talking together represent their relations and activities toward one another. Both of these could be going on during the two years indicated above, while, of course, in the type the prophets could not be crossing the Jordan, and be on the other side at the same time. When it is clearly seen what is meant by the walking and talking, as well as by the smiting, it will be seen that the antitypical smiting began before the antitypical walking and talking, and also ended before the latter ended. Therefore, while in the antitype parts of both of these acts were synchronous, other parts were not. In other words, the harmony is this: that as sometimes during the two years we were smiting the peoples, i.e., doing a work toward the public, at other times during nearly all of these two years and for some months following we were walking and talking together, i.e., fellowshipping in sympathetic co-operation and in study, as God's people.
(24) In F.H. McGee's "Timely Letter of Importance," on page 3, col. 2, from the first paragraph to
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the first paragraph on the next page, he tells the brethren, that we claim that Elijah's and Elisha's talking together means that they had a controversy together. This statement is news to us. We never so interpreted their talking together; on the contrary, our interpretation of their talking is an activity the very reverse of a controversy. The brother has here set up a man of straw and kicked it over. This misstatement of our view of Elijah's and Elisha's talking together is but one, among many others, made in this brother's paper, misstatements that will be pointed out as we go on. The Brother heard us at the Fort Pitt Convention explain that Elijah's and Elisha's walking and talking together represented the harmony between the antitypical Elijah and Elisha in certain respects. This in the meantime he seems to have forgotten.
(25) Ever since the summer of 1915 we have understood this walking and talking to represent the harmonious relation and co-operation, and the peaceful discussion of spiritual subjects, on the part of the Lord's people represented by Elijah and Elisha. Furthermore, this understanding of the matter, which the writer received from our dear Pastor, is sure proof that in the antitype there would be no breach of harmony between the two classes before the separation would occur, even as in the type there was no breach in the harmony existing between the two before their separation. From this fact, that there was no disharmony between Elijah and Elisha before their separation, we draw the conclusion, that we must, since the Summer of 1917, be living beyond the time typed by Elijah's and Elisha's walking and talking together; for in the beginning of that Summer great disharmony came into existence among God's people; and therefore we must be beyond the time of the separation of Elijah and Elisha; consequently the separation that occurred between God's people dividing them into two groups, following their harmonious walking and talking,
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must be the separation typed by the separation between Elijah and Elisha. This began nearly eight months after the Jordan's first smiting ended.
(26) F.H. McGee and his associates on the Committee are now denying that the division that occurred in the Summer of 1917 among God's people was the separation of the antitypical Elijah and Elisha, and are looking for one in the future, as they seemingly believe now that Jordan has not as yet had its first smiting. They are not only unable to harmonize their denial with the fact that there would be harmony in the antitype until the separation, but also are utterly unable to explain the division that has occurred from the Scriptural standpoint. This inability they admit! Having rejected the light that they once saw on this subject, they now walk in measurable darkness, while the explanation that we have been offering, they disparage and misstate—an explanation that, when carefully studied, will be found to harmonize with the picture, the facts of the case and "that Servant's" various expressions; and an explanation which most of the Committee at one time thought correct, as can be seen from a statement that they signed entitled, "A Letter to International Bible Students," published March 1, 1918, the first page, the last paragraph of the first column beginning in the fourth line from the bottom: "As if almost possessed of the gift of the ancient Prophets, he looked forward to the experiences of the very last members of the Church and seemed to sense an especially fiery trial and a strong delusion that would sweep through the ranks of the Truth people and work havoc with vast numbers of the partly consecrated, failing of deceiving only the 'very Elect.' Alas, that in so short a time after the departure of our dear Pastor there should be realized a complete and worldwide fulfillment of his solemn predictions! Yea, so subtle and so heart-searching has been this fiery trial, as apparently to overtake the majority unawares!
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[This statement was based on that from Brother Russell which was quoted above, to the effect that the Chariot would be with us in a little over a year.] Perhaps not since the days of the apostasy, early in this Gospel Age, has there been such a severe test upon the people of God." So far the quotation. Later to evade our thought, they denied the typical character of Elijah's and Elisha's last related acts.
(27) Now let us examine the events that occurred in the experiences of the antitypical Elijah and Elisha from the Summer of 1915 to that of 1917, and see if they do not antitype the walking and talking of the two Prophets after their crossing Jordan. If we examine the "Towers" of that period we find that "that Servant" repeatedly wrote on Elijah and Elisha and the antitypes of these. The following pages in the "Tower" will show this: Z. 1915, p. 285-287; Z. 1916, pp. 4, 5; 38-40; 263, col. 2, par. 4 to par. 2 on 264. In many other articles of the "Towers" of those years he taught on those lines, particularly showing the distinction between the two classes, their privileges, offices, rewards, etc. Time and again in his sermons he referred to the same things. The brethren, of course, as we will remember, discussed these subjects during those years. These discussions were conducted with great harmony and friendship on all sides. This seems to be in part what is symbolized by Elijah's and Elisha's talking together, while their walking together represents the sympathetic co-operation existing among God's people at that time. All will testify to such co-operation.
(28) How often, when the privileges that would become the Great Company's after the separation were discussed, the statement was made antitypical of Elijah's answer to Elisha's request that if the Elisha class would remain faithful in following the Elijah class in sympathy and co-operation, as was fitting for the Great Company to do toward the Little Flock, they
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would become the successor of the Little Flock in the office of being God's mouthpiece to Nominal Spiritual Israel! In the following quotations the antitypical Elisha's acknowledging, sympathizing and co-operating with the antitypical Elijah are set forth as a condition that the former must fulfill until the separation, if he would become the antitypical Elijah's successor, and are explained as the meaning of the word "see" in the sentence, "if thou see me, when I am taken from thee, it shall be so": 2 Kings 2:10; Z. 1904, p. 254, col. 1, par. 1: "If this be the correct interpretation of the type there should be a special significance attaching to Elisha seeing the departure of Elijah. It would seem to signify close personal friendship and loyalty between them down to the very close." Z. 1915, p. 286,: col. 2, par. 5, says, "It was while the two went on, with no knowledge of how far they would go, that Elijah said to Elisha, 'What would you like as a reward for your faithfulness in journeying with me?' Elisha responded that he would most prefer a large measure of the spirit of the Lord, which so notably was manifest in Elijah. The reply was that he could get this blessing only under special conditions; namely, that he would continue faithful in co-operation until the last—until Elijah would be taken. This would be a hard matter; for, if Elisha's attention were permitted to wander, he would not get so rich a blessing." We have italicized the words that in these quotations from the "Tower" explain the meaning of the clause, "if thou see me when I am taken from thee." These explanations so italicized prove that "that Servant" thought that the word "see" in 2 Kings 2:10 has the meaning, to recognize; for what was that kind of loyalty to Elijah which was required of Elisha other than acknowledging, sympathizing and co-operating with him? Are not these the ideas that are implied in the word recognize? And are these not the ideas that "that Servant" says are meant by the word "seeing"
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in this passage? They certainly prove that the thought of the word "see" here is to recognize; for at times to recognize means to acknowledge, sympathize and cooperate with.
(29) F.H. McGee disputes that the word to recognize in the sense of acknowledging, sympathizing and co-operating with another is one of the meanings of the Hebrew word, raah, which is translated in this verse to "see." In this also he seems to be mistaken. That "that Servant's" explanation of the meaning of the word in this verse is in harmony with Biblical usage is evident from many Scriptures, one of the most notable of which is in Hab. 1:13, "Thou art of purer eyes than to behold (raah, recognize, that is, acknowledge, sympathize and co-operate with) evil." Another very plain case is where Elisha, out of deference to the righteous Jehoshaphat, was willing to consider and to recognize the wicked Jehoram, as he himself puts it in 2 Kings 3:14, "As the Lord liveth … I would not look toward thee nor see (recognize) thee." Raah is given this same meaning, among others, in the following passages: 1 Sam 24:15; 1 Chro. 17:17; Ps. 66:18; 119:27; 138:6; Is. 17:7, 8; 26:10; 33:15. While the word raah is not translated recognize in any of these verses, as indeed the word occurs nowhere in the Revised or Authorized Versions, nevertheless the idea "to recognize" is in all of them; and it is in this sense also that the word occurs twice in 2 Kings 2:12, as will appear later in our discussion.
(30) Above we discussed the antitype of Elijah's and Elisha's walking and talking together beyond Jordan before the separation, and showed that it was their fellowshipping together and sympathetic co-operation in service and study as God's people. This thought, we believe, is the correct explanation of the typical walking and talking as these are set forth in 2 Kings 2:11. Further, the Lord has given us an understanding of the antitype of Elijah's suggestion and
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Elisha's reply, as these are recorded in 2 Kings 2:9: "Elijah said unto Elisha, Ask what I shall do for thee, before I be taken away from thee. And Elisha said, I pray thee, let there be of me two parts [classes] in thy spirit [power, office]." This particular antitype does not contradict nor set aside our explanation of the antitypical walking and talking of v. 11; but that explanation is not the explanation of v. 9, which, praise God, we see in its wondrous beauty.
(31) As a preliminary to our explanation we desire to remind our dear readers that in giving a class type, God always, so far as we know, gives the type from the standpoint of the finished picture, so that those only are meant in the antitype who continue in the pertinent matter to its end. As good illustrations of this fact we may mention examples from the picture of the two smitings of Jordan. We know that some who have been proven to be in the Great Company took part temporarily in the first smiting of Jordan, but did not keep it up to the end, or did not smite in the spirit and power of antitypical Elijah. Hence, they not being participators in the completed act, are not a part of the antitype of Elijah's smiting Jordan—they are not in the finished picture. Again, not a few members of the Little Flock took part in the second smiting of Jordan, but did not smite in the Elisha spirit. Hence they are excluded from the finished picture of Elisha's smiting Jordan. This principle is also seen in the picture of the antitypical three hundred as consisting of the Little Flock only. Temporarily and in a spirit different from that of the Little Flock some crown losers did attack the doctrines of the Divine right of kings, clergy, aristocracy and labor during antitypical Gideon's First Battle; but they failed to keep it up until the end of the antitypical trumpet blowing, or they blew in a spirit foreign to that of the Little Flock. Hence they are not in the finished picture of the antitypical three hundred, but are in the finished
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picture of the antitypical nine thousand and seven hundred. This principle can also be seen in the picture of the consecration of the priesthood. All consecrators were at the time of their consecration and Spirit-begettal in the priesthood as to their new creatures, and in the Lord's Goat as to their humanity; but those who later became measurably unfaithful (the Great Company) or altogether unfaithful (the Second Death class) are not typed as in the priesthood nor in the Lord's Goat in the finished picture. These illustrations are sufficient to prove that in class types only the finished picture is meant. Hence the types set forth what from God's standpoint is the finished picture, not a class of tentative members who fall out of that class. This principle will help us to construe the antitype of Elijah's suggestion and Elisha's reply now under study; and for this reason it was discussed here.
(32) Elisha's reply (2 Kings 2:9), which we have correctly translated above, was a request to be Elijah's successor as the chief prophet of God to Israel. He wanted the firstborn's share among the prophets, considered as sons of a figurative family (Deut. 21:17). This would have made him Elijah's successor; for Elijah was the chief prophet of the Lord to Israel, and Elisha, as having the firstborn's share, would be the chief one among the Lord's prophets to Israel, i.e., the prophets in Israel are represented as the figurative children of their chief—Elijah—and his successor would thus be the chief, and, accordingly, the figurative father of the other prophets, yet all the time remaining a [figurative] son [subordinate] to Elijah. This made him the firstborn in the prophet family, which is what his request meant. Details on this will be given later. Now the questions arise: How did antitypical Elijah suggest that antitypical Elisha request some boon from him before his separation from the latter? And how did antitypical Elisha make his reply? We answer that it was in both cases by acts,
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not by words. This brings up the question: What were the acts that God regards as the suggestion to ask for a parting boon and as the reply to that suggestion? These speak plainly to our minds.
(33) We find the acts whereby antitypical Elijah suggested that antitypical Elisha make the request for a final boon before their parting in the efforts that antitypical Elijah made to secure a record of the Truth talents, experiences, trials and opportunities of those whom later events proved to be antitypical Elisha. The effort to secure this record was naturally begun by the earthly leader of the Elijah class at that time—"that Servant." He started that effort in the last three paragraphs of an article in Z '16, 141, entitled, Your Brethren That Hated You; and naturally the rest of the faithful Elijah class followed him in the work of encouraging those who later proved to be antitypical Elisha to send to him a report of their Truth talents, experiences, trials and opportunities, for recording under the file, I. H. S. [Jesus Salvator Hominum, i.e., Jesus the Savior of Men] at the office in Brooklyn. But one may ask, Why was this I. H. S. file desired? We reply, It was wanted that there might be on hand a card index of the brethren according to their capabilities for the various features of the service, so as to assemble them quickly for the work for which preparation was then going on. And what was that work? It was a future, hence the second, smiting of Jordan, since the first had been going on for a year and a half. Our Pastor wanted to know for which branch of the service each one had special talents so that he could expeditiously put him therein when that future smiting would start. And how did antitypical Elisha reply to the suggestion that he ask a parting boon before antitypical Elijah would leave him? First, by their desiring a share in what proved to be the second smiting of Jordan; second, by giving to Bro. Russell and to others of the Faithful a record
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of their Truth talents, experiences, trials and opportunities for what proved to be the second smiting of Jordan; and, third, by holding themselves in readiness for what proved to be the second smiting of Jordan. It was thus done by acts.
(34) But one might object that in seeking such a record of antitypical Elisha, antitypical Elijah did not understand that he was offering to bestow a parting boon or was mustering antitypical Elisha for the second smiting of Jordan, and that in engaging in the three above-mentioned activities antitypical Elisha did not think that he was desiring a parting boon and to engage in the second smiting of Jordan. We concede that the objections present a difficulty at first thought, but add that the lack in the pertinent understandings does not determine the question, but God's view of the matter determines it. Whether antitypical Elijah understood or did not understand that he in the pertinent acts was offering a parting boon to antitypical Elisha, God did know it to be such, and therefore adjusted the type in the way that would express His understanding of what that pertinent effort of antitypical Elijah really meant according to the finished picture. And whether antitypical Elisha understood or did not understand that he was in the pertinent acts asking to engage in the second smiting of Jordan, which implies successorship to antitypical Elijah as mouthpiece to the world, God did know this as what that would actually prove to be which He desired, and that it would mean successorship to antitypical Elijah and the second smiting of Jordan, and therefore adjusted the type in the way that would express His understanding of what that pertinent factual reply of antitypical Elisha really meant in the finished picture.
(35) God's view of the situation is therefore the dominating factor in the matter. He knew that it would be antitypical Elisha, as the successor of antitypical Elijah, who would smite Jordan the second
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time; and since He knew that the record that antitypical Elijah sought was in reality to enroll the second smiters of Jordan and since He knew that antitypical Elisha, as the successor of antitypical Elijah in mouthpieceship to the world, would do the second smiting of Jordan and since what antitypical Elisha from God's standpoint desired was realized in the second smiting—successorship to antitypical Elijah as mouthpiece to the world—God put into Elisha's mouth the request that corresponded to what the thing desired would really prove to be, viz., the second smiting of Jordan, as the first public activity of the successor of antitypical Elijah as God's mouthpiece to the world. This transaction proves that God adjusts the types to what the facts of the antitype would be and not to any lack of our understanding of what the antitypes might mean. Who, without the Lord's enlightenment, would have thought that tucked away in the acts of asking for a record of the brethren's Truth talents, experiences, trials and opportunities would be hidden the antitype of Elijah's suggestion that Elisha ask a parting boon of Elijah? And who, apart from the Lord's illumination, would have thought that tucked away in antitypical Elisha's response to the request for such a record would be hidden the antitype of Elisha's request? It is of the Lord's doing and is marvelous in our eyes! Praised be the Lord for another ray of the advancing light!
(36) Keeping in mind, therefore, that Elijah's and Elisha's walking and talking together, up to the very moment of their separation, represents the unbroken and sympathetic harmony of their antitypes in heart, mind and work, we remark that what was said above must be here emphasized again: that which broke the harmony of heart, mind and work among the Lord's people must be the antitype of that which separated Elijah and Elisha. Undeniably the breaking of the harmony in heart, mind and work, existing among
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the Lord's people after the first smiting of Jordan, was the trouble that involved the organization through which the work of the Lord's people was being conducted; and this trouble began organizationally June 13-20, 1917, in the Board, on account of the writer's British work and J.F. Rutherford's usurpation of power resisted by the four Directors. The only evasion of this fact is the manifestly erroneous opinion which was advocated from different standpoints by J.F. Rutherford on the one hand, and Menta Sturgeon on the other, J.F. Rutherford affirming that the so-called "Opposition" were of the Second Death Class, and Menta Sturgeon affirming that J.F. Rutherford and all others heartily supporting him were of the Second Death class.
(37) Therefore the proposition is undeniable by all who know the facts, that the trouble which destroyed the harmony between the Lord's people, and separated them into two classes, resulted from an organizational trouble which broke out in the W. T. B. & T. Society's Board during the week beginning June 13 (when the writer's petition to have his English work investigated was considered in a special Board meeting, and four of its members were appointed a committee to conduct the investigation, which they did from June 14-19) and ending June 20 (when the Board met, and its committee reported favorably on the writer's English activity, and later sought to rescind the by-laws which J.F. Rutherford was using wrongly to justify his usurping complete controllership of the work). It was this discussion and trouble in the Board that proved to be the foundation of the separation. Where there is the necessary candor and honesty with reference to the facts, this presentation of the matter will be admitted as being true as respects the facts.
(38) In the type the fiery chariot is shown to be the instrument that separated the two prophets. The language describing the separation in the authorized version
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is as follows: "Behold there appeared a chariot of fire and horses of fire and parted them both asunder." Let us keep in mind the thought that the separation—that is, the taking away of Elijah from Elisha—was caused by the fiery chariot running between them and not by the whirlwind; for the whirlwind took Elijah up; and if the idea of taking up had been intended in the Hebrew of 2 Kings 2:10, the word used would be nasaah; while the word the Bible uses to indicate the taking of Elijah from Elisha is the Hebrew word lakach. Elijah was "lakached" from Elisha by the chariot running between them, after which they never were together again; and not by the whirlwind, which occurred after Elijah was "taken"' (lakached) from Elisha, thus the taking away from one another was done not by the whirlwind, but by the chariot alone before the whirlwind occurred, though the latter followed the former shortly. In testimony that this was "that Servant's" understanding as to the "taking," and was used so by him to explain the antitype, we quote from his statement of the matter respecting the antitype in Z. 1916, p. 264, col. 1, par. 1: "It will be after the smiting of Jordan—after the division of the people by the Message of the Truth and the mantle of Elijah's power—that the separation of the Church into two classes will take place. Thereafter the Elijah Class, the Little Flock Class [a comparatively small number] will be clearly manifested, separate and distinct from the Great Company Class. The division, be it remembered, will be caused by the fiery chariot—some very severe, trying ordeal, which the Elect Class will promptly accept and enter into; the Elisha Class holding back from the persecution, but not drawing back to sin or to a repudiation of the Lord. It will be but a little later on that the whirlwind (probably anarchy) will bring about the change of the Elijah Class." Very clear indeed is this.
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(39) This quotation proves that the division caused by the antitypical fiery chariot was antitypical Elijah's taking away from the Elisha Class, and henceforth he stands "clearly manifested, separate and distinct"; i.e., he would while in the flesh be recognized as separate and distinct from the Great Company. Then it also shows that some time later, after they are separate and distinct (lakached), the whirlwind experience will take place. So also, if his being taken up by the chariot had been meant by the expression, "if thou see me when I am taken [lakached] from thee," the Hebrew word nasaah would have been the proper word to use and not lakach. Let this thought be kept firmly in mind and everything will become clear in the antitype, as it is clear in the type.
(40) Now as to the meaning of the fiery chariot. The writer understands it to represent the Society, in its organizational aspects, itself involved in, and then producing, a fiery trial among God's people. This thought became clear to his mind as early as September, 1917; but influenced, as many others were, by "that Servant's" latest expression on the smiting of Jordan as being future, and like many others, forgetting his statements in the comments quoted-above to the effect (1) that at New Year, 1916, the smiting was going on, and (2) that somewhat after the Fall of 1914, we had been walking and talking, beyond Jordan, he could not see his way clear to endorse this view, until early in December, he came to see clearly that Jordan had been smitten from 1914 to 1916.
(41) Some may object that "that Servant" never said that the Society, organizationally considered, would be the chariot; but rather defined the fiery chariot as a sore trial. Our answer is: It is true that he sometimes defined the fiery chariot as a sore trial, but at other times he tells us that he did not know what the chariot would be. Z. 1915,.p. 286, col. 2, par. 7, "We may not hope to clearly understand in advance the full
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import of the fiery chariot, nor of the whirlwind"; and Z. 1916, p. 39, col. 2, par. 1, "But here is the way the Lord pictures the matter: first, there will be the chariot of fire. We do not know what this will be; but we understand that some fiery experience will cause a separation between the two classes of the Lord's people." F.H. McGee, one-sidedly emphasizing the first set of expressions, ignores the second; and then tries to prove that we do not agree with "that Servant." Surely it is not fair to treat Brother Russell, nor the Church, nor his fellow-servant in this manner. Wherever in "that Servant's" writings we find an apparent contradiction, we should seek to harmonize, not ignore it, and dogmatically emphasize one set of expressions alone to refute an adversary, as J.F. Rutherford and F.H. McGee do.
(42) We offer the following as an harmonization of the apparent contradiction: The expression fiery chariot involves two conjoined ideas, first a chariot, and secondly, a fire. According to Scripture usage (1 Pet. 4:12, see Diaglott) fire, burning, is used to represent severe trials, as well as destruction, while according to Scripture a chariot represents an organization. See Berean comments on Ex. 14:9 and Is. 31:1, as well as numerous other Berean comments. Keeping these two ideas of fire and chariot apart in our thoughts, we can readily see the harmony. When "that Servant" defined the fiery chariot as a fiery trial, the Lord used his mind to explain the fire in the picture, and not the chariot; and, when he said that he did not know what the chariot represented, the Lord used his mind to show that he did not know what the chariot as distinct from the fire represented. The reason for the Lord's keeping "that Servant's" mind in the dark on this phase of the subject is very apparent: it was not due to be understood; because it would have made the passage so clear as to have destroyed the experience as a trial to those who understood
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its full import, whereas the Lord designed the experience to be one of the sharpest trials of His people in the end of the Age. Thus it will be seen that the writer by no means disagrees with "that Servant." The advancing light, after the trial was met, has permitted him by the Lord's grace to see what "that Servant" (in comparison with whom the writer considers himself as a pigmy is to a giant), was unable to see, because not "due."
(43) Let us look briefly at the word Society, as we used it above in the expression, "viewed in its organization aspects." From the standpoint of a society the word organization has at least two meanings. First, a set of individuals who have combined in a body to carry out some purpose described in their constituent articles or charter; and, second, their trustees or directors systematically arranged to further the purposes of the body, and to function its controlling, executive and managerial machinery as a body. The W. T. B. & T. Society, according to the first definition, means its membership, the shareholders, and, according to the second definition, means the Board systematically arranged and functioning its controlling, executive and managerial machinery as a body. Therefore the words Society and Organization properly have both meanings of the word; and usage in connection with the W. T. B. & T. Society's affairs proves this to be true. It is in the sense of the second definition that the word organization is more frequently used of the W. T. B. & T. Society; and the organization in this sense of the word we understand is typed by the chariot in the passage under consideration. The second definition is the sense in which we have constantly used the word organization in explaining the chariot; and proves how inapplicable F.H. McGee's remark is, when he says that, if the Society were meant by the chariot, Elijah and Elisha would have had to be in the chariot until their separation. The whole of the
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Truth people never were, nor could be, in the Board organizationally, which fact overthrows his objection; and even if one should grant that the first definition of the word would apply here, his criticism would still be wrong; because the Society as the shareholders consisted of but one-tenth of the Lord's consecrated people; therefore would exclude nine-tenths of the Elijah and Elisha classes from the symbolic chariot. Moreover, as such driving of the chariot implies controllership, we see that they were not in the "chariot" at all; for they did not control it.
(44) On this point J.F. Rutherford's position is more logical than F.H. McGee's; for he properly recognizes the chariot to be the Society, a definition which the Society friends (repudiating their first definition, i.e., Vol. VII) borrowed from the writer, and to whose use the writer yields them the most hearty permission! We ought here to restrict ourself to the second use of the word; for it is not true that the Society as shareholders were themselves in trouble, and plunged the Church itself into trouble, thus dividing it. That it was itself in trouble, and then plunged the Church into trouble, is true of the Society, only as viewed from the standpoint of the second definition. But from the standpoint of neither definition is there appropriateness in J.F. Rutherford's exhortation to the friends to get into the chariot, the Society, as a means of mounting to the skies; for neither by entering the Board of Directors, nor by entering into shareholder membership (which can be done by money only!) would anybody be able to mount to the skies! It will be noticed that before the writer presented his definition of the chariot the Society friends, as their leaders taught, claimed that the Seventh Volume was the chariot by which to mount to the skies, a view of the antitypical chariot that is untrue and unthinkable, and has been discarded.
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(45) F.H. McGee and J.F. Rutherford tax the writer with disagreeing with "that Servant's" teaching that the antitypical Elijah would ascend in the antitypical chariot to heaven; but they do this in keeping with their frequent indulgence in a one-sided emphasis on one set of Brother Russell's statements, and with their neglect of another. While "that Servant" does in places say that Elijah ascended in the chariot, he also has told us that Elijah did not ascend to heaven in the chariot; for example, in Z. 1904, p. 254, col. 1, par. 1, he puts the matter very emphatically as follows: "The record is that Elijah and Elisha were separated by chariots [the Hebrew is singular, a chariot] of fire; but that Elijah was taken up, not by these [this], but by a whirlwind into heaven." It is noticeable that the Bible says nothing at all about Elijah mounting the chariot, but implies that the speed of the chariot would have made this impossible.
(46) How should we treat these seeming contradictions in Brother Russell's statements? Our answer is that the fulfillment must determine the question, and its facts (as will later be given) prove that the opinion of "that Servant," quoted above, is the accurate one and not the one which J.F. Rutherford and F.H. McGee emphasize, the latter with so many capitals and italics.
(47) If they and their associates had more fully informed themselves on "that Servant's" writings on these matters, or, if so informed, would stress both sets of statements, it would have been better for themselves and for the brethren. In this particular, as in the others, wherein they have accused us of repudiating "that Servant's" teachings, it will be seen that we have not so done. We, therefore, have the good assurance that we are in harmony with "that Servant," when we say that Elijah did not ascend to heaven in the chariot. It was used for the separation and for the separation only. The type and antitype demonstrate that such an
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ascent would be impossible; and the type not only neither mentions nor implies, but discountenances such a ride to heaven, and implies that the ascent to heaven was apart from the chariot—that is, in the whirlwind, after the chariot had speeded away.
(48) Having seen what is meant by the chariot, we call attention to the fact that J.F. Rutherford tells us that the horses represent "lurid prophecies," and the horsemen represent Ezekiel and John. Let us for a moment examine these definitions. By Ezekiel and John either the writers of the two books are meant, or the books themselves. If he means the writers, his horsemen would be dead; and therefore could not drive the chariot; and hence these could not be the antitypical horsemen. On the other hand, by the books, Ezekiel and John, we would have to understand either the prophecies of which these consist or the paper upon which these prophecies are printed. But according to his definition the prophecies of Ezekiel and John are his "lurid" horses, and therefore his horsemen must be paper. In either case, then, his horsemen are wrongly defined; for they give us either dead or paper horsemen! One wonders why he did not add Solomon to the horsemen! Was it because the Song of Solomon contains no "lurid, prophecies"? The writer never defined, as F.H. McGee and J.F. Rutherford claim of him, the horses as "lurid legalities."
(49) Again the facts of the case will not permit of J.F. Rutherford's settings of things, i.e., that after the big drive began, Volume VII began to divide the Church (this is necessary to his view that the big drive was the first smiting of Jordan), to be accepted as the true one; for the division began 20 days before Volume VII appeared and over two months before its teachings started to cause friction among the friends. Moreover it began to produce nausea a month before the big drive began, which again upsets his setting of things. The division had its first faint foregleams on
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June 21, 1917, when J.F. Rutherford had the writer dismissed from service at the Tabernacle, and tried to send him away from Bethel; it reached a decided stage June 27, when after his further service was refused, he was officially informed that his British work was disapproved; and as far as his personal part was concerned, the division was completed in him July 27, when he was excluded from Bethel. Thus the separating process in his case lasted exactly a full calendar month.
(50) With some of the members of the Bethel family the division, as far as their personal part is concerned, began a little later, caused by the "present management's" starting to divide the "Bethelites" into two groups; it reached a marked stage July 17; and in August was completed in quite a number of them. The dividing work kept on in Bethel for some months later, its process being with some individuals of shorter, with other individuals of longer, duration before completion. After the ousting of the Board members July 17, the separating work more especially began from the Bethel to reach brethren on the outside, the separating process in each case being of varying duration until completed. On the other hand, the separating influence of Volume VII was almost indiscernible before September. As for the influence which that volume had on the friends in the separation, the following seems to be the actual situation: On account of the conflicting statements issued by the two contending parties, though very much disturbed and dissatisfied by the course of the present management, many were unable to decide to their own satisfaction as to the stand that they should take, and with many of these Volume VII proved to be a means that enabled them to make up their minds against the present management; thus they took their stand with those who apart from Volume VII had taken their stand on the basis of the principles involved, before Volume
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VII had appeared and over two months before it began to affect the situation. Volume VII and its contents, therefore, could not be made a distinct part of the scene, summarized in the horses, horsemen and chariot. It was but one of the many means of propaganda to land brethren on Elisha's side of the chariot; but it had the opposite effect on quite a number. It is plainly evident that the division began before Volume VII began to exert influence on the situation among God's people. With this all of the facts of the case agree.
(51) We have already given our definition of the chariot; and now in harmony with "that Servant's" thought on the symbolic meaning of horses and horsemen found, for example, in the Berean comments on Ex. 14:9 and Is. 31:1, etc., we suggest that horses, representing as they do doctrines, secular or religious, in this type represent the doctrines, supposedly legal, but actually illegal, that J.F. Rutherford hitched to the Society. These doctrines were as follows: (1) that the shareholders can pass binding by-laws for the Society; (2) that Brother Russell's exercising controllership in the Society's affairs for over thirty years made it the Society's law that every president should do the same; (3) that the law requires an annual election of directors (the law that required such an election was passed after the Society's Charter was granted and expressly states that it was not retroactive. Hence it did not require that the Society's Directors be elected otherwise than provided for in the Charter. Hence J.F. Rutherford's contention on this and on all his other supposedly legal points was entirely illegal); (4) that, when this (annual election) does not occur, vacancies take place in the directorate; (5) that the president, therefore, had to fill these vacancies, which had been unfilled by the Board more than thirty days; (6) that no directors were ousted; and (7) that only vacancies were filled. Undeniably,
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J.F. Rutherford hitched these symbolic horses to the Society, as the latter word is understood in the second definition.
(52) The horsemen, representing doctrinal leaders, symbolize the present management, i.e., J.F. Rutherford, A. H. MacMillan and W. E. Van Amburgh, the directors of the course of these illegal doctrines; their controllership of the organization is indicated by the fact that the horsemen drove the horses and directed the chariot. This combination of things, the supposedly legal, but actually illegal, theories, "the present management" and the Society, both as constituted before the ousting of the four directors, and afterwards as changed, proved under the controllership of these three to be very trying (fiery) to both classes in the Church; and this combination, thus aglow with trials in itself, suddenly made its appearance before the Church; and rushing amid, and spreading trials among, the brethren, split them into two parts. What consternation it caused! Candor, truth, knowledge and honesty on the subject prevailing, everyone must admit this is actually what occurred in the Summer of 1917.
(53) It was this, and this alone, that brought to an end the harmony that previously prevailed among the two classes of God's people. The world over, this combination, forcing all the brethren to take sides for or against the W. T. B. & T. Society (in the second sense of that word), its policies and its management, ruthlessly split up one ecclesia after another. That these are the facts is undeniable. F.H. McGee for months on this subject believed as the writer; and for this belief's sake April 29, 1918, said that he would, and then actually did, vote to repeal the resolution of the Committee passed Feb. 23, forbidding its members on pain of being out of harmony with the Committee to preach especially on typical, symbolical and prophetical subjects not explained by "that Servant,"
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in order that, against J.F. Rutherford's interpretation of Elijah and Elisha as given in the Tower of Feb. 15, 1918, the one which is held by the writer (which F.H. McGee then believed, and which, July 27, the writer first learned he had given up) could be presented to safeguard the brethren against falling away to the Society. He gave no special stress at that time to the thought that he wanted the resolution repealed because of desiring to put aside the appearance of disharmony in the Committee on the subject. Nor can he fairly contradict the fact that the peace prevailing in the Church was destroyed as just described, and that, on a larger scale than ever before in the end of the Age, dividing God's people into two classes. If the supposition which he tentatively suggests were correct, it would have been Nominal Spiritual Israel (how could these people unorganized as a society be a chariot?) drawn by the doctrine of the Divine right of kings, etc., that divided God's people into two classes in the Summer of 1917 after having destroyed the peace among them; for the peace has already been broken; and therefore as he offers us "a visionary interpretation of types" for the future, which implies that this peace has not yet been broken, his guess belongs to the domain of "fanciful interpretations and wild speculations"! Indeed, the facts demonstrate that such a combination did not then cause the division that marred the previous peace, which being broken, we must be living after the division, typed by the separation of the two Prophets; nor does his remark that the interpretation given above on the horses, horsemen and chariot is a step from the sublime to the ridiculous avail anything as against the facts. The facts show that in this way the previously existing peace and union were broken, and contention and division set in; and therefore we would have to state that it is only F.H. McGee's opinion that this interpretation is a step from the
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sublime to the ridiculous, an opinion that is not only unprovable, but contrary to facts. It was no ridiculous, but a most painful experience that is here explained, as all acquainted with the facts know it to have been.
(54) We recall that our dear Pastor told us that the division of Elijah and Elisha would not be connected with differences on religious doctrines; in harmony with this statement we find the fulfillment to have been. It was questions of policy, law and rulership that were connected with the division. There is a slight reference to friction between the two Prophets implied in the word parad, translated in 2 Kings 2:11 parted asunder as the word is defined by Gesenius, the ablest Hebrew lexicon, to separate by a breach, page 688, col. 1, par., 2, Bagster Edition. The reason why the type does not markedly suggest disagreement among the generality of God's people at the time of and after the separation seems to be due to several considerations: First, a division between the friends through a test, of itself implies personal differences; and secondly, to show that the fault lay not with the generality of God's people, but with the few who are pictured by the horsemen forcing the trouble upon the many. Nor are we to infer that the horsemen were not parts of God's people; for the expression, horsemen of Israel's chariot, implies that they were; but rather they are set forth apart from Elijah and Elisha to type that "the present management," in their relation to the Board and the general work, were not keeping the peace and unity that the rest of God's people as a rule were. We fear that they were seeking other things, which interested them more than Zion's welfare.
(55) A remark previously made bears repetition here: The separation of Elijah and Elisha, Elijah being "lakached" from Elisha, was completed by the chariot running between them, and before Elijah went up in the whirlwind. The remark that we made on the meaning of lakach, "taken," as distinct from
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nasaah, "taken up," must be kept in mind, if we would see clearly on the subject before us; for the chariot's running between them took Elijah away from Elisha, even as in the antitype the Little Flock was taken away from the Great Company by the Society running between them; this and this only is meant by Elijah's being taken from Elisha.
(56) The whirlwind experience in the type followed the experience of the severance of the Prophets by the chariot. As we are all aware, "that Servant" interpreted the whirlwind experience to represent the Church leaving this earth. So considered, according to the transactions of the antitype, the time succession of the events in the story of what Elijah and Elisha did in 2 Kings 2:11-14, is not intended to give the time succession of the happenings in the antitype of this story; rather, in harmony with a procedure often followed in the Scriptures, all that is said of Elijah is treated of unto a completion, before Elisha's acts are described at all, without regard to the chronological succession of the events in the antitype, in which there is a different time order of events from that of the type. Accordingly, we understand that in the antitype there is a parenthesis of a number of years' duration between the separation of the Little Flock from the Great Company, and the departure of the Little Flock from this world; and within this parenthesis, not only all that is the antitype of Elisha's acts in verses 12-14, but all that Elisha did later occurs. Doubtless the Lord arranged the type in this unexpected way; to hide the thought until after fulfillment, so as to test more thoroughly the hearts of all at the time of the fulfillment. And this test did occur.
(57) The Lord frequently inverts the time order of the events to hide the thought, as we all know, e.g., (1) in a doctrinal passage, Rom. 8:30, F. 182, par: 1; (2) in a prophetical passage, Joel 2:28, 29, E. 164, par. 1, and note, instanced by "that Servant," as
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examples of such inversions. (In the latter passage the Lord describes the restitution blessings first, and then the Gospel-Age blessings afterwards, in a way that hid the matter very thoroughly, until the part of the prophecy that is given last was nearly entirely fulfilled, before the prophecy given first was understood as occurring at a later time.) And (3) in a notable and familiar typical passage, Lev. 16:15-22. Here the Lord, disregarding the time order of the events as they would take place in the antitype, describes unto a completion one set of events followed by the description of another, without mixing up in the typical presentation both sets of events in a way that would mark clearly the time order of their happenings in the antitype; for instance: (1) the Lord's goat is first sacrificed and (2) its blood is sprinkled on the mercy seat; then (3) the procedure with the Scapegoat is enacted. In the antitype everything done with Azazel's goat after its binding at the door and the casting of lots over both goats will be completed before the blood of the antitypical Lord's Goat will be sprinkled on the mercy seat. We know this, because all of the Great Company will have to be dead before the blood of the antitypical Goat is sprinkled on the antitypical Mercy Seat; that is, before The Christ appears in the presence of God to make atonement for the world; for if The Christ would appear in the presence of God to make atonement for the world, before all of the Great Company were dead, those of them yet in the flesh would lose the covering of the blood of the antitypical Bullock, and would, consequently, have to be remanded to the Second Death; for the Great Company is "the house" of the antitypical Aaron, for which house, as well as "for himself," that is, the Body of the antitypical Aaron, the latter makes atonement through the imputation of the merit of the antitypical Bullock. For The Christ cannot receive from the hands of Divine justice the release of the imputed merit for use on
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behalf of the world until all under the covering of that imputed merit are by the High Priest taken out from thereunder. The Little Flock comes out from under this merit by the completion of its sacrificial death; the Great Company by the completion of its constrained death. Here, therefore, we have a case exactly paralleling the case of Elijah and Elisha under discussion. Just as the acts connected with the Lord's goat were brought unto a completion before the scapegoat's experiences occurred, and yet the Azazel's Goat completes its experiences before the presentation of the blood of the antitypical Lord's Goat on the mercy seat; so in 2 Kings 2:11-14, the events in Elijah's case were brought into a completion before the events in Elisha's case took place at all; nevertheless we will give clear proof that in the antitype all of the events in Elisha's experiences described in 2 Kings 2:12-14 occurred in the antitypical Elisha's experience after the separation of the Little Flock from the Great Company, and before the taking of the Little Flock to heaven. Hence the events typed in 2 Kings 2:12-14 occur during a time parenthesis between these two antitypical events.
(58) Before giving proofs of this it will assist to clearness of understanding to describe Elisha's seven activities at and after the separation, after which we will set forth the proofs of the time parenthesis between the separation of the Little Flock and the Great Company on the one hand, and the taking of the Little Flock from this earth on the other hand, in which parenthesis all of the events typed in 2 Kings 2:12-14 take place. The first statement made of Elisha is "he saw it." First we note that the "it" in this expression is in italics, which proves that it has no corresponding word in the Hebrew text; and that it was inserted by the translators to give what they supposed was the thought intended. We believe the Lord purposely omitted using the proper word, to hide the
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thought until due time; as e.g., he frequently did in 1 Cor. 15, notably verses 21, 23, 47, 48. According to our understanding the inserted word should be him, i.e., Elijah; and the word saw should have been rendered recognize, just as this is the force of the word "see" raah in 2 Kings 2:10: "If thou see [recognize] me when I am taken from thee." We note that in this verse the words "when I am" are also in italics; thus they are inserted without having corresponding words in the Hebrew text. In harmony with our Pastor's explanation of this verse, given above, we think the passage should be completed as follows: "If thou recognize me until and when I am taken from thee." Our readers are requested to read again our exposition of this verse and the proofs offered on the translation of the word raah as meaning to recognize in this passage given above. Keeping in mind what Elijah told Elisha (2 Kings 2:10) was the condition that the latter must fulfill to receive the blessings summed up in his successorship to Elijah, we see the propriety of the Lord's calling attention to the fact that Elisha did fulfill this condition, did recognize Elijah up to and during the separation; and thus this fact is stated by the Lord, as a matter of record that Elisha fulfilled the condition necessary to receive the desired blessing, to emphasize the propriety of Elisha receiving the desired office with its associated blessings.
(59) The antitype certainly shows that this feature of the type was fulfilled in the experiences administered to each individual while undergoing the separation process. In every case, before the break became complete, the Elisha class did recognize the separating brethren, during the period in which the separating process was proceeding; that is, they acknowledged and sympathized and co-operated with them, with decreasing fervor, however, as the separating process continued; and it was only after the separation was complete that the recognition was in each individual
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case withdrawn. Such recognition is also implied in Elisha's exclamation, "My father! My father!" The writer will give his experience with J.F. Rutherford as illustrative of the general experiences of the separating brethren with the Society friends, as showing that there was such a recognition, decreasing in intensity, however, until the separating process was complete, when it ceased altogether. Repeatedly between June 27 and July 27 J.F. Rutherford and the writer had brotherly talks, and at least on two occasions prayed together, frequently embraced one another, and assured one another of their confidence in one another as children of God. Frequently during this time he asked the writer for his opinion on Bible questions in private, and at the Bethel table before the family, and on some things asked him his advice. This is in general true of our experience during that time with some other members of the Bethel family, who remained with the Society. Among others, acts of recognition were exercised by J.F. Rutherford July 18-24, when the writer sought to mediate between him and the ousted directors; and it was only after the writer suggested (July 24) as an indispensable thing for a reconciliation that J.F. Rutherford accept the four ousted brothers as directors, and as a necessary thing for future peace in, and safety for, the work, agree to two other brothers acting with him as an executive committee in the Society's affairs, that J.F. Rutherford finally became firmly set against him, excluding him from Bethel three days later. Thus repeatedly from June 27 to July 27 J.F. Rutherford recognized the writer as a part of the antitypical Elijah. Each one of the separated brethren will doubtless recall experiences with the Society friends throughout this separating process that were like those that the writer had with J.F. Rutherford from June 27 to July 27; many of the Society friends will doubtless recall their having performed acts toward
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the separating brethren that were in kind like those that J.F. Rutherford performed toward the writer. These were the antitypical facts.
(60) The second thing that Elisha did at the separation was to cry out: "My father! My father! the chariot of Israel and the horsemen thereof!" The cry, "My father! My father!" is based upon and is in part an explanation of the thought, Elisha saw (recognized) him. J.F. Rutherford's acts of recognition toward the writer partly constitute his part toward the writer, as in the antitype he cried out, "My father! My father!" But the expression, "My father! My father!" implies more than such recognition. Additionally it is a statement of surprise, sorrow and discussion, and typifies the surprise and sorrow which the Society friends felt and expressed at, and the discussions which they held over, the fact that those who had been, as it were, the leaders (father here means leader) of the Church should act in a way which the Society friends mistakenly thought was wrong, and which they thought was leading the separating brethren into the Lord's disfavor. Surely all the Society friends will recognize that they expressed such surprise, felt such sorrow, and held such discussions with respect to the so-called "Opposition" during the separating process.
(61) The second thought in Elisha's exclamation was: "the chariot of Israel," i.e., an organization belonging to God's people, the W. T. B. & T. Society. Was there anything that the staunch supporters of the "present management" did corresponding to Elisha's crying out, the "chariot of Israel"? Assuredly! for this feature of the type represents the recognition of, the surprise and sorrow at, and the discussion of, the Society among its loyal supporters. Certainly the Society's advocates were surprised and saddened to find the affairs of the Society in the condition in which they were; and certainly did discuss and recognize the
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organization of the Lord's people, the chariot of Israel, crying out, "the Society! the Society! the Society! the Channel! the Channel! the Channel! We must stand by the Society! We must stand by the Channel! We must defend the Society in its trial! We must be loyal to the Society, because it is the Channel! Whatever the wrong that has been done by the Society leaders, we must nevertheless remember that the Society is the Channel!" From this description all will recognize that the events beginning with the summer of 1917 were associated with such surprise and sorrow at, and recognition and discussion of, the Society; and this well antitypes Elisha's exclamation, "the chariot of Israel!"
(62) The third thought in Elisha's exclamation is contained in the words, "and the horsemen thereof!" Understanding horsemen to represent leaders of secular or religious doctrines, and understanding the typical horsemen to represent J. F. Rutherford, A. H. MacMillan and W. E. Van Amburgh, as advocates of the supposedly legal, but actually illegal doctrines above described, it would seem that the expression, the horsemen of Israel, indicates a recognition and discussion of, surprise at, and sorrow at, and for, these brothers. Certainly the friends, on the one hand, were surprised and saddened at the trials in which these were involved! but amid all this they certainly persisted in discussing and in recognizing them as the leaders who should be followed, because they controlled "the channel"; as a prominent brother and sister put it, "We must stand by the 'present management,' because they have the goods!" In these facts we, therefore, find a clear antitype of Elisha crying, "the horsemen thereof!" Again, the antitype is clearly factual.
(63) The third part of Elisha's activity (2 Kings 2:12) is expressed in the statement, "and he [Elisha] saw [recognized] him no more." We give the word
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raah in both its occurrences in this verse, as well as in verse 10, the same meaning, that is, to recognize, which here means to acknowledge, to sympathize, to co-operate with. We have already shown this to be "that Servant's" thought on the use of the word in verse 10; and also have shown that it has the same meaning in its first occurrence in verse 12. This passage seems to intimate that Elisha knew of Elijah's presence in the earth after his whirlwind experience, as will be shown hereinafter, and seems also to intimate the thought that Elisha was not disposed to be subject to Elijah in the way in which he had been; and from the desire not to be subject to Elijah he probably told the sons of the Prophets not to seek Elijah, fearing probably that he might return (2 Kings 2:15-18). Underlying this mental state of Elisha was doubtless his thought that God wanted him, and not the separated Elijah, henceforth to be the Prophet to Israel. Elisha doubtless thought that it would be to the best interests of all concerned for him to have nothing more to do with Elijah, whose presence with him would undoubtedly have hindered the influence of his ministry with the people through their partisanship toward one or the other Prophet. This would enable us to see why he should no longer recognize Elijah as he had formerly done in harmony with the proprieties of the case.
(64) How appropriately in the antitype this disfellowshipment followed "the-chariot-of-Israel-and-the-horsemen-thereof" delusions! Let us look at the antitype and see whether any fulfillment of such a line of thought, as has just been set forth, has taken place. Surely it has in the disfellowshipment of the so-called "Opposition" by the Society people, which disfellowshipment was first of all exercised by W. E. Van Amburgh, July 31, 1917, at a meeting of the People's Pulpit Association, when he refused the writer's proffered hand. At the Boston Convention, Aug. 5, A. H.
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MacMillan and others refused the hands of some of the other separated brethren at the love feast; a little later, under the influence of a sermon delivered by W. E. Van Amburgh, Sister Seibert refused to accept the writer's proffered hand. A. H. MacMillan and C. J. Woodworth treated him in the same way. The "avoid-them-that-cause-divisions-among-you" campaign soon spread from Bethel to the outside, from Church to Church. So marked did this disfellowshipment become that many of the Society people think that the "Opposition" are in the Second Death class, and will not even notice them when they pass them on the street. In harmony with this disfellowshipment campaign "the present management" and many pilgrims, elders, etc., have driven the faithful Elijah from the association of the Society brethren. Surely the antitypical Elisha sees, recognizes, the antitypical Elijah no more! Thus again we recognize how the facts between type and antitype correspond in this case. From the above explanations it will be apparent how unfounded is F.H. McGee's criticism of the writer's view of raah.
(65) The fourth activity of Elisha was his rending his own clothes into two pieces. Clothing in the symbols of the Bible represents our graces of heart and mind. "Put on, therefore, as the Elect of God, holy and beloved, bowels of mercy, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, etc." "Be clothed with humility." (Col. 2:12, 13; 1 Pet. 5:5.) Other passages along the same line will come to every Bible student's mind. To rend one's clothes would seem to represent doing violence to one's graces, and to rend them in twain would seem to represent such gross violence done to one's graces as to tear them in twain, and thus to expose one's double-mindedness, which is a quality of the Great Company (Jas. 1:8). This action of Elisha's seems to find a fitting antitype in the violence to Truth, Justice and Love committed by J.F. Rutherford
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and his supporters against the so-called "Opposition." As an illustration of this gross, unscriptural conduct we refer to J.F. Rutherford's "Harvest Siftings," cruel in itself and grossly deceptive as to facts. All over the world those who stood faithful for "that Servant's" arrangements were treated with gross injustice, lovelessness and misrepresentation by those who rallied to the battle cry, "the channel! the channel!" Yea, the antitypical Elisha very violently rent his own garments! Thus again we find the facts of the case clearly to harmonize with the picture that God has furnished us of these experiences. Garments also represent official powers, as illustrated in the garments of beauty and glory. And from this standpoint, a secondary antitype of Elisha's rending his garments from top to bottom, we understand antitypical Elisha giving up entirely his office as servant to antitypical Elijah preparatory to taking the mouthpieceship to the public.
(66) As his fifth activity Elisha seized the mantle of Elijah that fell from him. The five Board members, by permitting J.F. Rutherford to have his own way, and by declining to bring a suit, which would perhaps have been the only means of bringing a person constituted as he is, to time, let "the mantle" fall from them, i.e., let the powers typed by the mantle slip from their control, and thus from the control of the Elijah class, whose representatives in the exercise of this power they were; for these brothers, as the Board's majority, were the ones in whom representatively the Church held controllership of certain essential parts of the mantle, that is, the control of the general work, of the Truth literature, of the Truth agencies and of the Truth propagating finances. From 1 Kings 19:15, 16 we see that it was the Lord's good pleasure that Elijah anoint Hazael, Jehu and Elisha; but as a matter of fact Elijah anointed the last only, Elisha anointing the other two, the first in person, the other by a representative (2 Kings 8:7-14; 9:1-10).
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This charge of the Lord, however, to Elijah proves to us that Jehovah would have been more pleased to have had Elijah anoint all three; and this would therefore prove that, in the antitype, the Lord would have been more pleased, if the antitypical Elijah had retained the office of mouthpiece to Nominal Spiritual Israel, until he had anointed all three of the classes typed by these three men. However, foreknowing that the five directors would fail to restrain J.F. Rutherford's autocratic use of powers and to institute a lawsuit (a step that F.H. McGee and the writer urgently advised them to take as the only thing apparently that would have kept the controllership of the work in the hands of the Elijah class in its representatives, the Board's majority), God adjusted the type to what He foresaw would be the course of events in the antitype, knowing that He could overrule all things for the good of both Prophets concerned; hence God did not force His good pleasure; He consented to let the thing more pleasing to Him remain undone—that is, Elijah's anointing Hazael and Jehu—and to permit Elisha to do this as a picture of what He foreknew would came to pass nearly 2800 years later. When, then, the directors failed to resist J.F. Rutherford with sufficient resolution, and additionally failed to bring a lawsuit to force him to give up the fruits of his usurpation, the antitypical Elijah, in their representatives, the Board (which, being a deliberative and controlling body, would, for decisions respecting the work, in ultimate analysis, be the majority) dropped his power to be God's mouthpiece to Nominal Spiritual Israel. Elisha, picking up the mantle, represents the acts of the antitypical Elisha, in the Society leaders as their representatives, securing to himself the power to be God's mouthpiece to Nominal Spiritual Israel. Thus the falling of the mantle from Elijah and its taking up by Elisha we understand to have found its fulfillment in
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the troublesome experiences among the Lord's people in 1917.
(67) As his sixth activity described in 2 Kings 2:12-14 Elisha smote Jordan. The fact that nothing is said of Elisha's wrapping the mantle, as did Elijah, is in harmony with the thought that in the smiting of Jordan by the antitypical Elisha, everything in their power applicable for smiting was not used, e.g., many smiting tracts and sermons and Volume Four. The Photo-Drama was almost unused. These things, which would have "smitten" much better than what was used, were left unused. Elisha thus smote with an unfolded mantle. As in the antitypical Elijah's case, so in the antitypical Elisha's case, the smiting was done by the Great Company as new creatures approved by one another, laying hold of certain features of the Truth, of the controllership of the work (exercised by it representatively in J.F. Rutherford), of parts only of the appropriate Truth literature, of parts only of the pertinent branches of the work, and of the necessary finances; and using them to reprove those who claimed Divine right, and their supporters, they sentenced their institutions to destruction and them to dismissal from office and to punishment for their wrong doing. The conservatives and radicals in Christendom were by this smiting increasingly separated.
(68) The seventh activity of Elisha, according to 2 Kings 2:12-14, was his crossing the river. From the fact that in the type nothing is said of Elisha's going over on dry ground, as was said of both Prophets at the first smiting, we may infer that the Great Company would not be unharmed as new creatures by their course in the smiting. Certainly the injury that the Great Company brought upon themselves as new creatures by the fanaticism, imprudence and misrepresentations connected with their smiting, proves that they did not cross over antitypical Jordan dry shod; and to indicate that they would not do their work without
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injury to their new creatures, the Scriptures seem to omit saying that Elisha went over dry shod. His passing completely over represents his antitype finishing the smiting work. We understand that the "Great Drive" in which the Society people engaged beginning about Oct. 1, 1917, and ending about May 1, 1918, is the antitype of Elisha smiting the Jordan. F.H. McGee charges the writer with teaching that the antitype of the second smiting of the Jordan began July 17; here again he misstates the writer's thought. Nor was the publication of Volume VII the smiting of Jordan, as he again misrepresents us to teach. The second smiting of Jordan was the previously described reproving and sentencing work, on the part of the Society people during the seven months mentioned foregoing; it, therefore, began, as the writer has consistently taught from the outstart in the Fall of 1917, and not July 17. However, F.H. McGee probably has confused a part of Menta Sturgeon's interpretation of what occurred July 17, 1917, with the writer's understanding of when the smiting of Jordan began. Menta Sturgeon held that the first smiting of Jordan began in the Bethel dining room July 17, 1917, by the four ousted members of the Board, F.H. McGee and the writer reproving J.F. Rutherford and his associates for, and protesting against, their usurpation. The writer never has been able to endorse Menta Sturgeon's view on this subject. F.H. McGee devotes more than a column on page four to refuting this, his confusion of views as the writer's, thus setting up and kicking over this, another one of his straw men. He even puts in quotation marks statements that he says the writer made, but which the latter never made, to the effect that the second smiting of Jordan began on July 17!
(69) From the above discussion it will be seen that J.F. Rutherford and the writer agree that the work done Oct., 1917, to May, 1918, was a smiting of
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Jordan. However, they disagree as to which smiting of Jordan it was. J.F. Rutherford affirms that it was the first; the writer, that it was the second. How can we determine this question? We reply that the facts give an unanswerable proof of the writer's view, and an unanswerable refutation of J.F. Rutherford's view. The type proves that there would be no interruption of the peace, harmony and fellowship between the antitypical Elijah and Elisha before their separation; consequently the peace, fellowship, harmony and co-operation between the antitypical Elijah and Elisha beginning to end just before June 21, 1917, the first smiting must have been over before this breach of peace began. The circumstances leading up to the start of the separation were the following: J.F. Rutherford refused to permit the writer at his request to return to England. He also over a week later refused to open the English case again, and to call a Board meeting for its consideration. Then the writer drew up a petition that the majority of the Board signed June 13, requesting J.F. Rutherford to call a Board meeting to consider the writer's British work. Thereupon the storm broke out in the Board, culminating June 20. An increasingly unfriendly attitude, starting with a small beginning, was meantime assumed toward the writer by J.F. Rutherford, W.E. Van Amburgh, A.H. MacMillan, W.F. Hudgings and R.J. Martin and their supporters. On June 21 the first preparations were made to drive the "chariot" between the supporters of the "present management" and the "Opposition" in the person of the writer, first, by refusing him work at the Tabernacle, and, secondly, by attempting to send him away from Bethel. The chariot reached him June 27 and started to separate him from antitypical Elisha. As the news of the dispute in the Board spread among the Bethel family, the disharmony increased; and thus we find that by June 27 the division, whose prior step was the breaking of the
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peace between Elijah and Elisha, had set in. This divisional work proceeded and was world-wide before the "Big Drive" commenced, Oct., 1917; consequently the "Big Drive," that began at this time, following, as it did by over three months, the beginning of the separation, must be the second smiting of Jordan, while the first smiting of Jordan must have been completed some little time before the separation between the two classes began. Thus, then, the facts of the case clearly prove that the "Big Drive" was the second smiting of Jordan; and just because it was zealously engaged in by a majority of the consecrated people of the Lord, even as "that Servant" showed that the Great Company would be in the majority in the Church, it was a work on a larger and more noticeable scale than that of the first smiting of Jordan; but otherwise was in every respect the latter's inferior, and would have been more so, but for some of the Faithfuls' help. The following argument also proves that the partisan Societyites are antitypical Elisha. Whoever after the separation had the mantle was antitypical Elisha, since in the type after the separation Elisha had the mantle. Facts prove that the separation set in beginning June 27, 1917, and was in an advanced stage by October. But from that time onward for years the partisan Societyites had the mantle; hence they are antitypical Elisha—members of the Great Company and Youthful Worthies. This follows from the proof just given that the separation between antitypical Elijah and Elisha has set in.
(70) In 2 Kings 2:12-14, the question that Elisha asked while smiting the waters, "Where is the Lord God of Elijah?" should be translated as follows: "Where is Jehovah? He is even the God of Elijah." Compare the American Revised Version, text and margin. In this language we believe there is an intimation of the delusion under which the antitypical Elisha would suffer at the time of his smiting. It
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will be recalled that the Society friends claimed that a sure evidence that Jehovah stood on the side of them as His antitypical Elijah was the great prosperity of their work, which they claimed came from God and was His way of owning them as "His very own." It is ever the habit of shallow religious theorists to ascribe their external prosperity to God as proof of their favor with Him. Throughout the smiting the Society brethren reiterated this, sometimes boastingly, to the so-called "Opposition" as a challenge that God was on their side, and was treating them, the supposed Elijah, as the object of His special favors. Instead of their proving thereby that they were the antitypical Elijah, they antityped Elisha in his asking the following question: "Where is Jehovah? [on whose side is He standing?] He is even the God of Elijah!" He is the prosperer (the God) of us, and thus approves of us as the antitypical Elijah; and He is thus shown to be on our side; therefore we must be Elijah. But the fact that they threw out this challengesome question and answer, is only another proof that they are the antitypical Elisha; and that as such they, while so questioning and answering, labored under the delusion that they were the antitypical Elijah. How wise is our God! How deep are His riches of wisdom and knowledge and how unsearchable His judgments and His ways past finding out until His purposes are accomplished! (Rom. 11:33.)
(71) It is not to be understood that all who remained with the Society are of the Great Company, nor that all who left the fellowship of the Society's friends will ultimately be in the Little Flock; rather we are to understand that we have here only a general picture of God's people, showing only how mouthpieceship would be transferred from the one to the other class, without indicating in every case to which class the individuals belonged; and that of those only can we say of a certainty that they are of the Elisha
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class who heartily co-operated in doing the seven things antitypical of what Elisha did in the type; while those only of the separated brethren are of the Elijah class who manifested from the heart the Lord's spirit in faithfulness. The writer has the good assurances that not a few of the "very Elect" are still with the Society, bewildered as they were by the extraordinary circumstances connected with the separation, and in their hearts and in many cases with their mouths disapproved of the "present management"; as there is ground for fearing that not a few of the so-called "Opposition" lack the Elijah spirit. Nor would we think that those who did some, but not all, of the seven things typed by Elisha's seven acts would necessarily be of the Great Company. It seems that only such as, generally speaking, have heartily joined unto a completion in all seven things antitypical of 2 Kings 2:12-14 are represented in the finished picture. Our good hope is that in due time the Lord will open the eyes of all of the "very Elect," bewildered as many of them have been, and have consequently continued in measurable co-operation with the Society; and through opening their eyes effect their deliverance. The touchstone that will definitely decide the case for each one, we believe, is the true answer to this question: "Did I heartily and fully do the seven things typed by Elisha's seven acts in connection with his separation from Elijah?" As far as the leaders are concerned, who for one reason or other acted as agents to spread the delusion whereby the Society friends were misled on the situation, our fear for everyone of them is that he had lost his crown. The writer believes that the Lord's time has come that the friends with and against the Society should become familiar with the real condition of affairs; therefore plainly but lovingly he sets forth what seems to him and others to be meat in due season
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on the situation. The Lord bless each one in his use of this meat!
(72) A number of the dear ones have asked us to harmonize our thought, that the separation of antitypical Elijah and Elisha has taken place, with our teaching that the separation of the Little Flock and the Great Company is not yet complete. Believing these inquiries to be an indication from the Lord, we give the following answer: In the Scriptures God gives various views of the same general work from different standpoints through divers types; e.g., Rahab types the Great Company from one standpoint, Lot from another, Eli from a third, the Foolish Virgins from a fourth, Elisha from a fifth, etc. See P.T. Vol. 1, p. 174, last par. If this principle is kept in mind the harmony between the two sets of statements will become apparent. The separation of Elijah and Elisha does not represent the separation of the Little Flock and the Great Company from all standpoints; and, hence, does not represent the separation of every individual of the two classes. Rather, as Elijah represents the Little Flock as a class in its office as God's mouthpiece to Nominal Spiritual Israel and as Elisha, while they were together, represents the Great Company as an unmanifested class, as the former's prospective, and after their separation, as his actual successor in the office as God's mouthpiece toward Nominal Spiritual Israel, we are to expect the antitype of their separation to show, not how every individual would do in the separation, but how as a class the Great Company would gain the mantle, the power to be God's mouthpiece to Nominal Spiritual Israel, in connection with a separation between the classes as such. Since classes as such are referred to, and not all the individuals of each class, in the above-mentioned office, we are not to expect to have witnessed every individual of the Little Flock to be separated from every individual of the Great Company while the antitypical
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separation of Elijah and Elisha was being enacted. We sought to point this out in the preceding paragraph. But what we ought to expect and what we did see in the antitype were the following: (1) the Little Flock as such losing controllership of the public work; (2) the Great Company as such gaining such controllership; (3) a class separation of the two classes; (4) an individual separation of many individuals of both classes; (5) a heart's disapproval of the course of the Great Company's leaders by many Little Flock individuals who had not yet separated themselves from association with the Society leaders and their work, i.e., an internal separation; (6) the bewilderment on the part of many Little Flock individuals gradually giving way to an understanding of the conditions and events on their being Scripturally explained to them; and (7) finally, and especially, a class fulfillment of every detail of the type. We have seen every one of these things. Hence, we know that the antitype of Elijah's and Elisha's separation has indeed and in truth occurred, though not yet completed in all individuals.
(73) In other types the Lord gives us other aspects of the separation between the Little Flock and the Great Company. The World's High Priest leading Azazel's Goat forth is one of these; another is the consecration of the Levites (Num. 8:5-26) and the general description of them and their work as distinct from the Priests and their work (Num. 3:4; 7:1-9). In the former the World's High Priest is represented as resisting the errors of doctrine and practice in Azazel's Goat class—i.e., their revolutionism—and by such resistance forcing them into the fit man's hands. Only they who faithfully take part in this work, not temporarily, but unto a completion, are a part of the World's High Priest. Whoever ceases to do this unto a completion is not a part of the finished picture. The antitype of the High Priest leading forth Azazel's Goat
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is not yet complete, but has been in process of enactment since late in November, 1916, beginning in Britain. Some of the High Priest's members have not yet knowingly partaken in the work of leading Azazel's Goat forth. Ultimately, all of them will so engage in this work, until it is completed. The type of the Levites, which brings out more of a detailed aspect of the antitype, though not an individual one, is likewise now in process of fulfillment; but is not yet completed. When it is complete every individual Levite will be in his place and every individual Priest will be in his place, and each will be recognized as such. Hence, we cannot now positively assert in every case who is an antitypical Priest and who is an antitypical Levite. However, every new creature who is a revolutionist or an ardent partisan supporter of revolutionists is a Levite; for the priests, as the very Elect are neither Baal worshipers nor kissers (1 Kings 19:18; Rom. 11:4).
(74) But we imagine some will say that the writer was judging when he set forth the thought that the Society leaders and all new creatures who heartily cooperated with them in the division, beginning June 27, 1917, were manifested as Great Company members. Such who so object, base their exception on 1 Cor. 4:5. We heartily agree with this passage. Its injunction should be obeyed. Whoever judges before the Lord reveals His judgment is disregarding the Lord's command here given, and will surely reap unhappy consequences for his presumption; but this passage does not forbid but commands announcing the Lord's judgment after He has brought to light the hidden things of darkness and made manifest the counsels of hearts (1 Cor. 4:5). The course of a faithful child of God will be to wait on the manifestation of the Lord's judgment, and when the circumstances require that the Lord's manifested judgment be announced, then a faithful servant of God may make such announcement.
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For let us not forget that in the judgment beginning at the house of God (1 Pet. 4:17, 18), throughout the Parousia period of Christ's Second Advent, the Lord, by manifesting the counsels of the hearts and by bringing to light the hidden things of darkness, manifested the consecrated who retained the spirit of consecration on the one hand, and those who lost the spirit of consecration; and demonstrated thereby who are in the Second Death class. There were leaders among the Truth people who in harmony with this manifestation were proven, by renouncing the Ransom and their share in the Sin-Offering, to be of the Second Death class; and "that Servant" on not a few occasions mentioned these by name with the remark that they were of the Second Death class. By this course, he exercised no forbidden judging; for he waited until the Lord had made His judgment manifest. Likewise throughout this (the Parousia) period of the Lord's Second Advent, He manifested the difference between the nominal and real Church; and it, therefore, was no forbidden judging to announce that the nominal Church and all of her agents had ceased to be God's mouthpiece. Nor was it forbidden judgment in the smiting of Jordan to announce the judgments of Ps. 149:5-9; for duty required it.
(75) Since about the time of "that Servant's" death we have been living in the Epiphany period of the Second Advent exclusively; and as during the Parousia period God manifested the ungodly, the Second Death class, of 1 Pet. 4:18; Ps. 1:1, so now He is manifesting the sinner, Great Company Class, of these verses. Before this manifestation had been clearly made, it would have been sinful to point out anyone as a member of the Great Company; and in harmony with this our Pastor faithfully warned us to refrain from judging, until the manifestation would come. It is now here; and because it is necessary for the safeguarding of the flock against the leaders who have been manifested
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as members of the Great Company, it is proper to announce these as being in the Great Company. For now we are living in that time of which he said in Z. 1916, page 264, col. 1, par. 1: "Thereafter [after the separation and before the whirlwind] the Elijah class, the Little Flock class, will be clearly manifested, separate and distinct from the Great Company." The editorial committee of the Pastoral Bible Institute, in a sample copy of "The Bible Standard" and in No. 1 of "The Herald of the Kingdom," very properly set forth the thought that we are in the Epiphany period of the Lord's Second Advent, a thought that one wonders how they can harmonize with their other thought that no light has come since "that Servant" has passed away. As we are in the bright-shining period, it follows that the Truth must be shining more and more.
(76) Accordingly, the Epiphany (bright shining) is the period in which the Great Company is being manifested as separate and distinct from the Little Flock (1 Cor. 3:11-15). The Lord has been doing this Epiphany work, starting the preliminary shedding forth of the Epiphany light, exposing opposite ambitions of certain brethren on the same day both in England and America; i.e., in both Bethels, Oct. 16, 1916, and beginning to manifest their Scriptural significance about four months later in England. Therefore, it is not a forbidden judgment to say of the partisan Societyites, who in the light of the Epiphany are demonstrated as being in the Great Company, that they are of that class. It is sometimes as harmful not to make some announcements after the Lord has manifested His judgment, as to announce judgments before the Lord has manifested them. There is every reason for believing that much harm has been produced among God's people by keeping this announcement from them, as the Pastoral Bible Institute Committee and many of their supporters have sought to do, after the Lord manifested His judgment. Therefore, it is
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not only permissible, but under the present circumstances highly necessary for the safeguarding of the Little Flock to judge not before, but after the time.
(77) Above, the fact was stated, but not proven, though shown to be in harmony with Scriptural usage in other cases, that while the type of Elijah and Elisha (2 Kings 2:11-14) itself does not indicate it, the antitype demonstrates that there is a parenthesis of some duration between the separation of the antitypical Elijah and Elisha and the former's ascent to heaven, in which parenthesis the events of antitypical Elisha's ministry are antityped; and that, therefore, antitypical Elijah is in the world long after antitypical Elisha receives the mantle. We now desire to offer a number of proofs that demonstrate this clearly.
(78) The facts of experience, as presented above, prove, we believe, this to be the case. We have proven the complete correspondence of type and antitype with regard to the seven events told of Elisha in 2 Kings 2:12-14 and with regard to the Society friends' acts; and yet, experience proves that the Little Flock has not left the world in the whirlwind, which is not yet here; and let us remember that everything typed in the separation of the two Prophets, as well as in the events that preceded their separation, has found its antitype in the events given above. Therefore, there is such a parenthesis in the antitype, the facts of the case proving it. Hence, it follows that the facts of experience prove that between the separation of the antitypical Elijah and Elisha, and the former's leaving this earth, there is a time parenthesis in which the events antitypical of Elisha's ministry occur.
(79) Psalm 46:1-4 demonstrates that the Little Flock will be in the world throughout the revolution (1 Kings 19:11, 12). While, therefore, in the flesh, it will witness the revolution, which will overthrow the symbolic dragon, beast, and image of the beast; for Rev. 16:18-20 and 18:9 demonstrate that the revolution
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will overthrow these institutions; but the Jordan represents the peoples as they are grouped in these organizations and labor organizations. The revolution, therefore, will destroy symbolic Jordan; and, therefore, both smitings of Jordan must precede the revolution: (1) since there will be no Jordan to smite after the revolution; and (2) since revolutionary conditions will not permit of Jordan's smiting during the revolution; and (3) since the sentence of destruction upon these institutions must precede their destruction. Since, therefore, the antitypical Elisha's smiting, also, must precede the revolution, he must have the antitypical mantle before the revolution; but the Little Flock does not leave the world until early in anarchy: evidently, therefore, Elisha gets Elijah's mantle some time before Elijah leaves this earth for heaven. Hence, there is a time parenthesis between the separation of the antitypical Elijah and Elisha and the former's leaving the earth, during which time parenthesis the acts typed by Elisha's ministry take place.
(80) Another argument demonstrates that Elisha will have the mantle before the revolution. We have just proven that the revolutionists will destroy the dragon, beast, and image of the beast. The destruction of these institutions is typed by the destruction of the whole family of Ahab (2 Kings 9 and 10). Ahab himself represents the dragon—Europe as an Autocracy; Ahaziah, his son, the dragon—Europe as consisting of a number of separate nations acting independently of one another; while Jehoram seems to represent the dragon—Europe as a Concert of Powers that has existed for about 120 years. The rest of the children of Ahab seem to represent all the separate governments either constituting, or more or less associated with, the dragon in this last-mentioned phase. Jezebel represents the beast and the image of the beast (B 256; D, "Battle of Armageddon" chapter, top of page ii). Jehu in a revolution killed Ahab's family. Therefore, just
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as the revolutionists will destroy the last-mentioned phase of the dragon as well as the beast and its image, they stand related to these, just as Jehu, the revolutionist, stood related to the types of these. Therefore, Jehu represents the revolutionists. Turning to 2 Kings 9:1-10 we learn that Elisha somewhat less than twelve years after he had received the mantle, anointed Jehu through a representative to become the revolutionist; consequently the antitypical Elisha was to have the mantle some considerable time before the revolution; for he anoints the revolutionists, and since the Elijah class does not leave the world until early in anarchy, the antitypical Elisha has the mantle a long time before the antitypical Elijah will leave the world; hence, there is a time parenthesis of some duration in the antitype between the separation of the antitypical Elijah and Elisha and the antitypical Elijah's leaving the world, during which time parenthesis the events typed by Elisha's acts in the book of 2 Kings set in.
(81) Rev. 16:17, according to the Berean comments, proves that the Great Company as such would circulate as its message the contents of the seventh vial, which, according to verses 18-20, precedes the revolution. To have the power implied in circulating this message implies the existence of the Great Company as such, and, therefore, its separation from the Little Flock and its having the mantle; and, hence, this passage is another proof that the Great Company would have the antitypical mantle quite a while before the antitypical Elijah leaves the earth, which does not take place until early in anarchy, an event preceded by the revolution, which, in turn, is preceded by the Great Company as such pouring out the seventh vial. Actually, the present argument in the light of experience demonstrates that the antitypical Elisha would have the mantle before the war would be over. This argument clearly proves that there is a time parenthesis between the separation of the antitypical Elijah and
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Elisha and the taking of the antitypical Elijah to heaven, in which time parenthesis the events typed by Elisha's ministry occur. The writer believes that "The Finished Mystery" is the seventh vial in a vile condition. C. J. Woodworth seems to have labored under an exaggerated estimate of the ministry of his book, when he found Volume VII referred to so frequently in Revelation and elsewhere in the Bible, i.e., under some sixty different designations, chariot, etc., etc., etc. The writer is of the opinion that the only direct reference by designation to the Seventh Volume made in the book of Revelation is in the 16th chapter, 17th verse, under the symbol of the seventh vial. It has been doing a work plaguesome to Babylon. The exposing or refutative truths of the book surely did smite Jordan and plague Babylon; but as far as the writer can see, these are its only missions having Divine approval. It seems to be wholly unfit for the edification of the Little Flock; and is proven to be one of the features of the strong delusion that entrapped the Great Company. In the words of Rev. 16:17, "It is done," given as the Great Company's message, we have a prophecy to the effect that the Great Company would declare the completion of the Little Flock, a thing that Volume VII announced as imminent. Its completion was openly taught at the 1918 Passover Convention at Brooklyn by certain of the Society leaders. The title of the book, "Finished Mystery," was by its writers, as well as by some of their co-laborers, selected on the basis of the message, "It is done"; it is finished. The Great Company were, in harmony with this Scripture, the first to announce the sealing of all of the elect as completed: "It is done," which sealing they claimed was completed at the Passover, 1918. In the writer's judgment their date is two years late. There is strong Scriptural evidence demonstrating that the Elect were all sealed in the forehead before "that Servant" passed beyond the vail; and one passage seems to prove that this was accomplished
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by Passover, 1916. But detailed proofs of this will be found in our issue of Aug., 1929.
(82) The statement in Rev. 19:1, 2, combined with the preceding argument, furnishes us a further proof that the Great Company, distinct and separate from the Little Flock, would, after having the mantle, be heard delivering their plaguing message by the Little Flock while in the flesh. In Rev. 19:1 the words translated "much people" are the same as the words translated a "great multitude" in verse 6, and in Rev. 7:9. A summary of the message of the "Big Drive" is given in these two verses. It is this message itself, and this message alone, so summarized, that makes the Seventh Volume the seventh vial; and the Society supporters orally, through Volume VII, "The Fall of Babylon" and several numbers of the Kingdom News, certainly did give the message described in these two verses. That there would be a pause in which they would cease the plaguing is evidenced by the third verse, which shows a renewal of the denunciation of Babylon as follows: "and again they said Hallelujah, and her smoke rose up forever and ever." We seem to be living in this pause, which will be broken, when again they will say, "Hallelujah, and her smoke rose up forever and ever." [This chapter was published in the first issue of The Present Truth in Dec., 1918, then again in May, 1919. When the Government later ceased prosecuting the Society leaders and permitted the sale of Vol. VII, the pause ended and the Society adherents began to fulfill Rev. 19:3 as we had on the basis of this verse forecast it of them.]
(83) F.H. McGee criticizes the writer's use of this, our fifth argument, on the alleged ground that some of the things heard by John in Revelation will not occur until long after the Little Flock has left the flesh. Our answer is that, while in some cases the things John saw were things to be fulfilled after the John class leaves the world, his objection, it will be seen, is not well
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taken against the use of these verses to prove that the John class while in the flesh would hear the Great Company as such deliver its message; for these two verses are not of those that refer to events occurring after the Church leaves the flesh. The following remarks, we trust, will clarify the subject: As we all know, what John does in Revelation, symbolizes what the Church does during those fulfillments symbolized by John's actions. Let us remember that every thing that John heard and saw, as recorded in the Revelation, he heard and saw on the Isle of Patmos. The word Patmos means suffering, mortal, and is used to symbolize the suffering and mortal condition in which the Church lives while in the flesh. Therefore, while in the flesh, i.e., on symbolic Patmos, the antitypical John would do all of the things symbolized by the Apostle's acts during the vision on literal Patmos. Some of the things that John saw represent things that, happening while he was in the flesh, the antitypical John would see while in the mortal, suffering condition, symbolic Patmos, with the eyes of the body, as well as of the understanding; and some of the things that John saw represent things which would occur after the antitypical John would leave the flesh, and which he would see while in the flesh, i.e., on symbolic Patmos, by the eye of faith alone. In Rev. 6 and 7 the events that he is represented as seeing, he saw while in the flesh, with the eyes of the body, as well as of the understanding. In other words, everything in the book is seen by antitypical John while in the flesh, whether they occur while he is in the flesh or not. If they occur after he leaves the flesh, while in the flesh he sees them with the eyes of his understanding alone; and if they occur while he is in the flesh he sees them with both physical and mental eyes. But whenever he is said to hear this or that the reference always is to things transpiring at the time of the hearing. It will be noted that the text does not say John saw, but John
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heard the Great Company message. This refutes the objection of F.H. McGee. Additional to the fact that John's hearing this or that means that it refers to things transpiring before him, from the statement and work of the Great Company as given in Rev. 16:17 preceding the revolution of verses 18-20, which work is in part described in Rev. 19:1, 2, we conclude that this work is before the revolution and is, therefore, before the Church leaves the flesh, which occurs early in anarchy. Therefore, it is with the ears of both body and mind that the John class hears the message of the Great Company (Rev. 19:1, 2) delivered while the Little Flock is yet in the flesh.
(84) C. J. Woodworth's statement that the John class hears this message, while in heaven, outside the body, is in harmony with the thought that the Great Company does not get their mantle, until after the Little Flock leaves the earth; but is out of harmony with the book of Revelation, because it takes the John class away from symbolic Patmos, the mortal, suffering condition, as witnessing the things described; and this, of course, is in disharmony with the fact that the literal John saw and heard the whole Revelation, while on the literal Patmos, and that, therefore, the John class must witness either bodily or mentally the fulfillments on symbolic Patmos. Therefore, C. J. Woodworth and F.H. McGee seem to be mistaken on the proper understanding of the passage. For the facts above-stated prove that, while in the flesh, with their physical and mental ears; the antitypical John would hear the Great Company rebuking Great Babylon, which rebuke is a part of the work called the second smiting of Jordan. Consequently, we conclude from this proof that there is a time parenthesis between the separation of the antitypical Elijah and Elisha, and the antitypical Elijah's leaving this earth for heaven,
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in which time parenthesis the acts typed by Elisha in the book of 2 Kings are performed.
(85) Without entering into an explanation of the meaning of the type, we set forth the anointing of Hazael by Elisha (2 Kings 8:7-13) as antityping something that takes place before the revolution, which is proved both by the order of the events in 2 Kings 8 and 9 and by the statement made in 1 Kings 19:15-18, where we are shown that, with certain exceptions, those who are delivered from Hazael's symbolic sword will be slain by Jehu's symbolic sword. Since Jehu, as proven above, represents the revolutionists and will slay with certain exceptions those who escape Hazael's sword, Hazael must begin his work of slaying with his symbolic sword before Jehu begins his. Since Elisha anointed Hazael (2 Kings 8:7-15) by his speech, and not with oil—even as Elijah anointed Elisha not with oil, but with his mantle (1 Kings 19:19-21), but not, as F.H. McGee intimates, on the day of their separation—to begin his work of slaying before he anointed Jehu (2 Kings 9:1-10) to inaugurate the revolution in Israel, it follows that Elisha, who quite a number of years after receiving the mantle anointed Hazael, represents something that the Great Company, after separating from the Little Flock, does before anointing the revolutionists for the revolution; hence, it follows that there is parenthesis between the separation of the antitypical Elijah and Elisha, and the antitypical Elijah's leaving this earth (since the Little Flock does not leave until early in anarchy), in which time-parenthesis the acts typed by Elisha in the book of 2 Kings actually occur.
(86) Closely connected with the preceding argument is another drawn from 1 Kings 19:18. In the preceding verses, as we have just explained, Hazael, Jehu and Elisha are each separately spoken of as doing with his symbolic sword a slaying work. From the 18th verse we learn that 7000 only (those who have
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not bowed the knee to Baal or kissed him) would overcome the symbolic swords of these three classes; and in Rom. 11:4 Paul assures us that these 7000 represent the "very elect"; consequently it follows that the antitypical Elijah, overcoming as he will the swords, not only of Hazael and Jehu, but the sword of Elisha as well, must to overcome the latter's sword be in the world after Elisha gets his sword, which, of course, happened after his separation from Elijah; hence, this argument is another that proves the time-parenthesis existing in the antitype between the separation of the Little Flock and the Great Company, on the one hand, and the taking of the Little Flock from this world, on the other, in which parenthesis the acts typed by Elisha in the book of 2 Kings take place.
(87) The sending away of Azazel's Goat by the High Priest (Lev. 16:20-22) demonstrates that the Elisha class as separate from the Elijah class exercises its office for some time, while the antitypical Elijah is yet in the flesh. Not only does the High Priest in the robes of sacrifice confess the special sins of all Israel over this Goat, but while so arrayed he leads it from the door of the Tabernacle to the gate of the court, and sends it away in the hands of the fit man. His sacrificial robes represent the thought that while doing these two works, He would in some of His members yet be in the flesh. Since this is the last priestly work that the World's High Priest does in the flesh before leaving the earth, both parts of this work are evidently participated in by all of the last representatives of the World's High Priest. We have already shown that confessing the sins over this Goat represents how in the figure of Jordan's smiting the Elijah class reproved evil-doers in the hearing of the Great Company class, both in and out of the Truth, from the fall of 1914 to that of 1916. This implies that, before this period was over, everyone of the last members of the World's High Priest would share in at least a part of the confessing
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of these sins of willfulness over the head of this antitypical Goat; and this agrees with the thought that some time before "that Servant" passed beyond the vail—that is, about the preceding Passover—all of the Elect were sealed in their foreheads. Thus, even the last one sealed was given a share in this confessing work and, hence, a share in smiting Jordan. Elisha's separation from Elijah is the same general work as the driving of the Levites as new creatures away from the priests out of the holy into the court. While as new creatures they are being so treated, their humanity is by the High Priest (as represented by Azazel's Goat being led from the door of the Tabernacle to the gate of the court and falling into the hands of the fit man) driven away from sacrificing on the Altar, where they exert frantic efforts to follow their own wills and their own double-mindedness, i.e., their revolutionism, in the court, and are given over to the unfavorable circumstances and persons who will work at the destruction of their flesh.
(88) Having seen that the confession of Christendom's wilful sins over the head of the Great Company was finished in the Fall of 1916, we remark: in America, public dragging of the main part of the Great Company class from their usurped forms of service took place after the controllership of the Society was seized by them, through the priests resisting their evil works, especially by the four publications issued by the majority of the Directors, F.H. McGee, the writer and other members of the High Priest, part of these assisting financially and otherwise to carry out this work. To defend themselves against these resisting exposures, the usurping brothers with their supporters, sought to divert attention from these exposures and resorted to the "great drive," through which their errors of interpretation led to their falling into the hands of the fit man. The fit man for these was, first, unfavorable circumstances, the war conditions; and,
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second, investigating, prosecuting, judicial and penal officials, culminating in severe punishments. Procedures identical in principle, if not just like them in outward form, have been or will be enacted against other members of this class, until all of the Great Company will have been thus dragged from the door of the Tabernacle to the gate of the court, and sent away in the hands of the fit man. There seems to be reason for believing that this work will continue perhaps for several years. It began in the Fall of 1916 in England in connection with our work there; and all of the work of leading Azazel's Goat forth is done by the High Priest through those of His members who are in the flesh resisting the Great Company's revolutionism. This work is represented by the priest dragging the goat; and the efforts of the Great Company to escape are represented by the goat's jerking, the conflict between the two ending only after Azazel's Goat reaches the hands of the antitypical fit man. Let us repeat the statement: This work of dragging this Goat forth seemingly is a long-drawn-out affair! Various sections of Azazel's Goat being successively so treated, it will probably be several years yet before the entire work is finished by the High Priest through His members in the flesh. This whole transaction proves that there is a time parenthesis between the separation of the antitypical Elijah and Elisha, and the former's being taken from this earth, in which parenthesis the acts typed by Elisha's acts in 2 Kings are done.
(89) Before leaving this point it might be well to refute an opinion that is widespread among the Society friends; i.e., that the Society leaders and others of their number who have been imprisoned are the antitypical John the Baptist in prison. If this were true, what we said regarding them as a part of Azazel's Goat coming into the hands of the fit man could not be true; but this, like some others of their experiences, is a counterfeit of the experiences of the
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true Church. Just as the Elisha class, claiming to be the real Elijah, is a counterfeit Elijah, so the Elisha class claiming to be John the Baptist is a counterfeit John the Baptist. In every case these experiences are counterfeits. We can see this to be true of their John the Baptist claim from a consideration of two facts. In the first place, they were not brought into their trouble because of denouncing an illicit union between the American government and the Romanist Church; for neither did they denounce, nor were they prosecuted and imprisoned for denouncing, such a union; therefore, their imprisonment could not antitype John's imprisonment for reproving Herod and Herodias. In the second place, their contention is untrue because that feature of the union between the Church and State, represented by the union of Herod and Herodias, had not as yet taken place. Had these dear brothers given heed to "that Servant's" uniform teaching on this subject, whose last printed expression thereon is found in his Foreword to Vol. III, page iv, par. 1, and in the Foreword of Volume IV, pages ii, iii (where he shows that this union will take place after the war and before the revolution; and then bring about the persecution of the antitypical John class during the period in which the antitypical Herodias will sit as queen, compare Rev. 17:3-6, 16-18, Rev. 18:7-10), they would, perhaps, not have fallen into this mistake. Thus, we see for these two reasons alone their claim of being the antitypical John the Baptist in prison is unfounded. This experience of the antitypical John is yet future, [which was true in 1918 when this article was written; but his experience of restraint—the antitypical imprisonment—began Aug. 3, 1927], and their experience, set forth as such, is a counterfeit-John-the-Baptist-imprisonment-experience, which does not type a literal imprisonment, as their smiting of Jordan was the genuine second, but a counterfeit first smiting of Jordan. Instead of the antitypical John-the-Baptist-experience,
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they are undergoing the experiences of a part of Azazel's Goat at the hands of the fit man. Truly, our God moves in a mysterious way!
(90) Elijah's remaining on the earth, and performing in one case an active ministry years after his separation from Elisha proves that there is a time-parenthesis between the separation of the antitypical Elijah and Elisha and the former's being taken away from this earth, during which parenthesis the antitypical Elisha performs the acts that Elisha typed in the book of 2 Kings. The act in question is Elijah's sending a letter, about eight years after the separation, to Jehoram, King of Judah, severely reproving him for his sins and threatening him with condign punishment from the Lord (2 Chro. 21:12-15). Those of his punishments that are recorded in vs. 16, 17 preceded his incurable sickness, from which disease he died after it plagued him for two years. Probably the events, for which F.H. McGee makes no time allowance recorded in vs. 16, 17, lasted two years. Some considerable lapse of time between the sending of the letter and the beginning of the punishments of vs. 16, 17 must have occurred. The letter, in all likelihood, was sent about the fourth year of Jehoram's reign, which lasted eight years. F.H. McGee overlooks the language of v. 18, where the words, "after all this," occur, which refer to the many events of vs. 16, 17; and he assumes that the sickness set in immediately after the letter came. However, the determination of the length of the period between the separation of Elijah and Elisha and the letter's coming to Jehoram is not essential to the argument that we are presenting. The writer thinks the period was about eight years. If one can prove that Elijah, and not Elisha, sent this letter, no matter how long the interval between the separation and the letter, our point would be proven. We will establish this point, and then make some chronological remarks that will prove F.H. McGee's chronology to
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be incorrect and confusing to one giving it close attention.
(91) Before establishing this thought let us reason on the letter itself. The language is: "There came a writing to him from Elijah, the prophet, saying," etc. The structure of the language proves that at the start of its journey the letter left Elijah; for the writing came from Elijah. If the thought that some assume were true, that Elijah wrote the letter as a prophecy, before the separation, and deposited it with some one else for delivery when the proper time would come, the language, to change it as little as possible, would have to read as follows to make that thought even probable: "There came a writing of Elijah, the prophet, saying"; and even if the language should so read, it would still not absolutely determine the question as to whether it was started on its journey by Elijah directly or by him through an agent. But the form of the language actually used shows that the letter left Elijah at the time that it was sent; for the language says, "There came a letter from Elijah, the prophet."
(92) F.H. McGee properly rejects the theory that the letter was a prophecy of the wickedness, as well as of the punishment of Jehoram, and was deposited by Elijah with some one before he separated from Elisha. He advocates another theory: namely, that the word, Elisha, ought to be put into the text instead of Elijah. He told us at the Asbury Park Convention that he made this statement on good authority. It seems, therefore, that, according to his "Letter of Importance" this authority is the note on Josephus' account of this transaction by his translator, Mr. Whiston, who, in his note on the passage in Josephus, where the latter in harmony with the Bible, said Elijah sent the letter, and where, according to the best readings, he adds that he was yet upon the earth, makes the following criticism: "This epistle in some copies of Josephus is said to have come to Jehoram from Elijah, with this
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addition, 'for he was yet upon earth,' which could not be true of Elijah, who as all [nominal churchmen] agree, was gone from the earth about four (not thirteen as F.H. McGee puts it) years before, and could only be true of Elisha, nor, perhaps, is there any more mystery here than that the name of Elijah has anciently crept into the text instead of Elisha." So far Mr. Whiston.
(93) From this remark we notice that Josephus, a priest, being familiar with the Hebrew text, proves the fact that in his day the Hebrew text in this passage, read, not Elisha, but Elijah, who in harmony with Jewish beliefs, was on earth after the separation; hence we conclude that the Hebrew text in the time of Christ contained the word Elijah. Furthermore, the Greek translation of the Old Testament, which is called the Septuagint, and which was made according to the best authorities between 286 and 284 B. C., reads Elijah, and not Elisha, and therefore we see that the reading Elijah was recognized as right even so long ago as 300 years before our era. No translation contains the word Elisha; there is no Hebrew text that gives Elisha as a variant reading; thus we have the strongest kind of manuscript evidence that the reading Elijah is correct.
(94) In addition to the manuscript, the doctrinal argument is also strong. When we understand the basis of Mr. Whiston's objection, and realize that such an objection could not have occurred to the ancient Jews, nor will it to Truth people, if they are on their guard, we see the unsoundness of the whole argument. Mr. Whiston, contrary to the Bible (John 3:13) believed, as the whole nominal church does, that Elijah went forever to the heavens where the saints will dwell with God; and of course, deluded by this thought, he was forced to accept one or the other of the two above-mentioned theories, which deny that the letter came from Elijah; but the Jews, not believing such a
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doctrine, had not the least difficulty in believing that Elijah was temporarily taken somewhere into the skies, and then left down on the earth again. (2 Kings 2:16; compare with Acts 8:39, 40.) Therefore it never occurred to them to question the statement that Elijah sent the letter. Nor can false and nominal-church doctrines be accepted by Truth people as a compelling reason for rejecting an invariant Bible reading in the original, and occurring in all translations.
(95) To F.H. McGee's objection that Elijah being no longer the prophet, when the letter was sent, while the letter is said to have come from the prophet, which expression he claims implies that Elisha, being the prophet, must be meant, we answer: The Bible as well as ordinary usage frequently gives one titles of office long after he has ceased to exercise the office. We speak of Colonel Roosevelt, and yet he has long since ceased exercising the office of a Colonel. In Heb. 10:12, we read: "But this man … sat down at the right hand of God." Here our Lord is spoken of as a man in glory; not because he is yet a man, but because he had once been a man. We therefore conclude that F.H. McGee's rejection from the Bible of an incontestable reading, which rejection is necessary for the plausibility of his theory, is an arbitrary procedure, whose underlying principle implies the right to alter the Bible to maintain one's personal theories, and is also a proof of the weakness of his position. This passage proves that Elijah by the whirlwind—not the chariot—left the earth for a short time only; then returned and lived here a long while, and during such abode on the earth sent this letter to Jehoram, as stated in 2 Chro. 21:12-15.
(96) Why did Elijah have to return to the earth? Apparently to send the letter as a partial typical equivalent of John's typical reproof of Herod. For just as John reproved the wickedness of Herod connected
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with Herodias, so Elijah reproved the wickedness of Jehoram connected with the latter's union with the daughter of Ahab, who was half-heathen and wholly idolatrous, and who introduced Baalism and many other evils into Judah. This types in part the reproof the true Church will give to the civil power, for an antitypical wrong union, a reproof that is typed in more detail by the circumstances connected with that of John, who as we know is typically an elaboration of the Elijah type. This type proves that the true Church has yet [after 1918] a public work to perform; it also proves that the antitype of John the Baptist's experience must occur after the separation of the antitypical Elijah and Elisha. [Since 1918 both Elijah's Letter and John's Rebuke have gone forth.] Thus Elijah's letter is given us in the Scriptures as a sure proof of the fact that there is a time-parenthesis between the separation of the antitypical Elijah and Elisha, and the former's whirlwind experience, during which time-parenthesis the acts typed by Elisha in 2 Kings occur.
(97) Before leaving the discussion of this letter we desire to make a few chronological explanations, which will harmonize the chronology that F.H. McGee leaves unharmonized. There are difficulties in dovetailing the chronologies of the Kings of Judah and of Israel with one another from the reign of Ahab until the end of the reign of Jehoram, kings of Israel. The key to the difficulty lies in these facts: While preparing for their war with the King of Syria, Ahab took his son, Ahaziah, as his coregent, and Jehoshaphat took his son, Jehoram, as his coregent. At the time of the death of Ahab, Ahaziah took his brother, Jehoram, the son of Ahab, as his coregent; while a year before he died, Jehoram, the son of Jehoshaphat, King of Judah, took his son, Ahaziah, as his coregent. If we keep these facts in mind every tangle will be taken out of
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the chronology of these reigns. In proof of this we submit the following:
(98) Ahab died in the twenty-second year of his reign, and in the eighteenth of Jehoshaphat's (1 Kings 16:29; 22:41, 42); but in the seventeenth year of the latter's reign, Ahab took his son, Ahaziah, as his coregent (1 Kings 22:51). The latter died after a reign of (somewhat over) two years (1 Kings 22:51), and was succeeded by his brother, Jehoram, in the fifth year (2 Kings 8:16), before Jehoshaphat's death, i.e., in the twenty-first year of Jehoshaphat's reign. But his brother Ahaziah took him as his coregent in Jehoshaphat's eighteenth year (2 Kings 3:1), which was, therefore, just after Ahab's death. In the second year before the beginning of Jehoram's coregental reign, Jehoshaphat took his son, also a Jehoram, as his coregent (2 Kings 1:17), which, therefore, was in the seventeenth year of Jehoshaphat and hence in the same year as Ahab took his son Ahaziah as his coregent, seemingly at the time of preparation for the war with Syria (1 Kings 22). Jehoram of Judah in the eleventh year of Jehoram of Israel (2 Kings 9:29), took his own son Ahaziah as his coregent, and was succeeded by the latter in the twelfth year of Jehoram of Israel (2 Kings 8:25). This brief and, we trust, clear explanation takes all the tangles and apparent contradictions out of these chronologies, which have puzzled chronologians for centuries.
(99) Jehoram, King of Israel, as shown above, became sole king in the twenty-first year of Jehoshaphat's reign. The separation between Elijah and Elisha occurred after the death of Ahaziah, the brother of Jehoram, according to 2 Kings 1 and 2, and therefore the separation between Elijah and Elisha occurred sometime (exactly when we do not know) between the beginning of the twenty-first and the end of the twenty-fifth year of Jehoshaphat's reign (2 Kings 3:6-14). Let us, making very liberal concessions,
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say that this separation took place four full years *before [PT '50, 64] the death of Jehoshaphat, and that Elijah's letter came to Jehoram four full years after Jehoshaphat's death. This would make the period between the separation of the two prophets and the sending of the letter eight years, and not thirteen years, as F.H. McGee thinks. Mr. Whiston, as shown foregoing, gives it as four, but this is very probably too short a time for the fulfillment of the pertinent events.
(100) However, as said before, the determination of the exact length of time between the separation of Elijah and Elisha, and the sending of the letter, is not material to the question as to who sent the letter; for Elijah could have lived thirteen as well as six or eight years after the separation. But the thing for us to emphasize in this matter is reverently to hold by the invariant reading of the Hebrew manuscripts and all the translations of 2 Chro. 21:12; and not, after the manner of higher critics and the clergy, whom, of course, F.H. McGee did not mean to imitate, arbitrarily reject it for a theory.
(101) Knowing that before the separation some of the Lord's people would expect the antitypical Elijah to leave the world before the antitypical Elisha would get the mantle, our dear Heavenly Father doubtless has been graciously pleased to insert this bit of history about Elijah's letter into the Bible to help us, one and all, to see the truth on the subject, after we had stood the necessary tests. In other words, the peculiar historical setting of the separation between Elijah and Elisha, the former's ascension to heaven and the latter's activities in the book of 2 Kings are a part of the Divine wisdom to hide the time succession of the antitypical events, in order to the severer testing of all concerned. "Righteous are thy judgments, O Lord!" And for them we praise Him.
(102) We thus conclude, from the nine reasons above given, that there is a time-parenthesis between
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the separation of the antitypical Elijah and Elisha, and the former's ascending to heaven, during which parenthesis the acts typed by Elisha's in 2 Kings occur. Therefore we deny that antitypical Elisha was not to have the mantle, until after antitypical Elijah leaves this world. Notwithstanding F.H. McGee's and J.F. Rutherford's many capitals and italics to the contrary, we affirm confidently that antitypical Elijah remains in the world a long while, after antitypical Elisha gets the mantle. These nine Biblical reasons are in harmony with, and prove the thought, that the separation beginning with the summer of 1917, followed by a smiting of Jordan, as it was preceded by a smiting of Jordan, is the predicted and anticipated antitype of the separation between Elijah and Elisha. Praised be our God that we have come thus far in the unfolding of His marvelous Plan! Praised be our God that our labors of sacrifice have already been blessed to the completion of the sealing of the Elect! Praised be our God that, while having lost the privilege of service to the nominal people of God, we have, under our Head, gained the privilege of leading Azazel's Goat from the door of the Tabernacle to the gate of the court, as well as the work of supervising their service as Levites after their cleansing (Num. 8:22), works that are attended with much difficulty, unpopularity, breaking of tender ties and misrepresentation; but works that give to the faithful the assurance that their deliverance draweth nigh; for this is among the last parts of the sufferings of the world's High Priest! Let us rejoice greatly in what this implies! Let us permit it to influence us to press on.
(103) Having by the Lord's Grace seen early in December, 1917, the general outlines of what has been given above on Elijah and Elisha, as a veritable Gethsemane Angel in the dark hour of near despair, with a heart overflowing with gratitude and appreciation, the writer began to declare it to others, first at Philadelphia,
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December 17, 1917. Many own its helpfulness. We can think of no spiritual harm coming to a member of the Little Flock from the presentation of this subject matter. The presentation undoubtedly will hurt the feelings of the Great Company class; but that is unavoidable. It is also incidental to working in them that "godly sorrow [that] worketh repentance to salvation not to be repented of" (2 Cor. 7:10), as essential to washing their spotted robes white in the blood of the Lamb. For the faithful it is full of comfort! Ah! It still remains true: "The meek will He guide in judgment! The meek will He teach His way," and none others! (Ps. 25:9.) We leave the subject of Elijah and Elisha with the full assurance of faith that the Gracious Heavenly Father has opened our eyes of understanding with regard to it, and thereby has given us an enhanced appreciation of His wisdom and goodness, and with the ardent prayer that God may bless its meditation to His dear Israel, both of the Little Flock and the Great Company!
BEREAN QUESTIONS
(1) Describe recent correct and incorrect discussions of the last related acts of Elijah and Elisha.
(2-5) State and describe three principles connected with an understanding of Scriptures.
(6) Why cannot types and prophecies connected with trials of character be clearly understood before such trials are met? Give an instance that proves this rule; and show how this instance proves that some parts of such types can be measurably understood beforehand; and how such understandings help on details after the trial is met.
(7) Explain two testimonies from our Pastor proving the first smiting of Jordan was going on in 1915 and 1916.
(8) What is implied in the antitype of smiting Jordan?
(9) Analyze and prove the antitypical mantle.
(10) What is symbolized by its folding?
(11) What facts prove this antitype? Why?
(12) Explain the three things implied in the smiting work; and show their harmony with Psalm 149:5-9.
(13) Show their harmony with Lev. 16:20, 21.
(14) Whom do Elijah and Elisha during the first smiting
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type? What kind of tests brought out the differences between their antitypes?
(15) What is represented by the division of the waters into two parts? By what truths was it accomplished?
(16) What things are represented by the prophets crossing Jordan entirely, dry shod and together?
(17-18) Give four reasons for the teaching that Jordan's smiting was from the Fall of 1914 to that of 1916.
(19) How may we refute the objection that the work done toward the public in these two years was on too small a scale to be the first smiting of Jordan?
(20) How may we harmonize seeming discrepancies in our Pastor's Towers on the smiting of Jordan?
(21) What procedure should we avoid and follow in dealing with such seeming discrepancies?
(22) How may we answer the objection that our Pastor wrote that Jordan's first smiting would be after the war?
(23) How may we harmonize the thoughts that antitypical Elijah was smiting Jordan 1914-1916, and that antitypical Elijah and Elisha were walking and talking beyond Jordan 1915-1917?
(24) Point out and refute a misinterpretation of the antitypical "walking and talking."
(25) Give the true interpretation of the antitypical "walking and talking," and the two conclusions that follow from this interpretation.
(26) Explain the various attitudes of the "Committee" on the separation among the Lord's people beginning with the Summer of 1917. Explain the result of their present attitude on the subject.
(27) What facts harmonize with the thought that the antitypical "walking and talking" occurred from the Summer of 1915 to that of 1917?
(28) Give the conversation between Elijah and Elisha; and explain, type and antitype, its various parts, especially the expression "if thou see me."
(29) Prove from the Scriptures quoted and cited that the Hebrew word raah, among other meanings, signifies to "recognize."
(30) Where were Elijah's and Elisha's walking and talking together discussed? What were they shown to
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type? Of what was that a correct discussion? Of what does 2 Kings 2:9 treat? Where was its antitype not given? Why not? How does its antitype stand related to the antitype of 2 Kings 2:11?
(31) How does God always set forth a class type? Please show this from the two smitings of Jordan, the first battle of Gideon and the consecration of the priesthood and the Lord's goat.
(32) What did Elisha's answer in 2 Kings 2:9 imply? How is this evident? How did antitypical Elijah suggest that antitypical Elisha request a parting boon? How did antitypical Elisha reply to the suggestion? What does this fact in each case bring up?
(33) What acts did antitypical Elijah do suggesting that a parting boon be asked? Who started and who continued these acts? Where is this start recorded? Why was it made? In connection with what prospective work was this suggestion made? What use should the resultant record serve? In what three ways did antitypical Elisha make request for the parting boon?
(34) What objection may be made to our understanding of the antitypical suggestion and request? How is this objection to be characterized? How is it to be answered? What determines the question? Who knew the exact meaning of the antitypes involved? How did He regard them?
(35) What dominates this matter? What three things did God know about the involved antitypes? What did this move Him to do with the pertinent types? What did He ignore in the antitypes? What only could have clarified the understanding as to the pertinent antitypes in relation to the types? How should this affect us?
(36) Of what was the breaking of the harmony among the Lord's people in 1917 the antitype? What two evasions are made against this explanation?
(37) If these evasions were true, what two conclusions would have to be drawn? What does the refutation of the two parts of the second do with the first conclusion? What are the facts and the date of the trouble that led up to the separation of the Church into its two classes?
(38) What did and what did not separate Elijah and Elisha? Give a corroborative testimony.
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(39) Analyze this testimony, and show from the Hebrew word used, and the one not used, that the separation was caused by the chariot, not by the whirlwind.
(40) What is the antitype of the fiery chariot? Give a short history of how this antitype gradually became clear.
(41) What varying explanation of the fiery chariot does our Pastor give? What course of treating these varying expressions should we avoid? Why?
(42) How may we harmonize these varying expressions? Why was "that Servant" not given the full light on the subject? Why was not, and why was another given it?
(43) Give and explain two definitions of the word organization as applied to a Society like the W. T. B. & T. S. Which of these definitions fits the antitype of the fiery chariot? From the standpoint of these definitions give three refutations of the objection that the Society as the antitypical chariot would imply that Elijah and Elisha were in the typical chariot.
(44) What two views of the antitypical chariot have the Society leaders given? Show the inappropriateness of the exhortation, "Get into the chariot and mount to the skies," from the standpoint of both views.
(45) What varying expressions on Elijah's ascent do we find in "that Servant's" writings?
(46) How are these to be treated?
(47) How are they not to be treated? What are the proper conclusions from the facts of the case?
(48) State and refute a false view of the horses.
(49-50) How do the facts refute J.F. Rutherford's view given in Z. 1918, p. 51, etc., in re the horses, the first smiting of Jordan and the separation in the Church?
(51) What do horses symbolize? What are the antitypes of those in 2 Kings 2:11?
(52) What do horsemen symbolize? Who are the antitypes of the horsemen of 2 Kings 2:12? How did the combination of antitypical horses, chariot and horsemen destroy the prevailing peace and unity among God's people?
(53) What was F.H. McGee's first and second view of the Last Related Acts of Elijah and Elisha? Refute his second view.
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(54) What kind of questions did not, and what kind of questions did occasion the separation? How does the type indicate friction between the two prophets? Why was it not more markedly indicated? What is not, and what is the reason for the antitypical horsemen being set forth as distinct from Elijah and Elisha?
(55) What remarks should be kept in mind on the separation of Elijah and Elisha? Why?
(56) What event immediately followed the typical separation? What did it type? What is the difference in the time order of the events of 2 Kings 2:11-14, etc., and those in the antitype? Why did the Lord arrange a different time order of the events of the type and antitype?
(57) Give and explain examples of three kinds of passages illustrating this exceptional Scriptural usage.
(58) Why should we study Elisha's seven acts before considering the "parenthesis"? Explain and prove the remarks made on the words "it" and "saw" in the expression: "He saw it." What words should be supplied in 2 Kings 2:10? Why? Why is it recorded that Elisha recognized Elijah at the time of the separation?
(59) By what exclamation is such recognition likewise indicated? What is the antitype of such recognition? Give and explain some examples illustrating this. What is the time difference in the typical and antitypical separation?
(60) What things are typed by Elisha's exclamation, "My Father! My Father!"? How were they fulfilled?
(61) What things are typed by Elisha's exclamation, "The Chariot of Israel"? How were they fulfilled?
(62) What things are typed in Elisha's exclamation, "And the Horsemen thereof"? How were they fulfilled?
(63) How and why did Elisha "see" Elijah no more?
(64) Explain its antitype and give examples of it among individuals and classes.
(65) According to Biblical symbols what do garments represent? And what does rending one's garments represent? What is the primary antitype of Elisha's rending his garments in twain? Its secondary antitype?
(66) Explain, type and antitype, the transfer of the mantle and God's relation to it.
(67) Explain Jordan's second smiting.
(68) Explain, type and antitype, Elisha's passing over
Last Related Acts of Elijah and Elisha.
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Jordan. State and refute a view of the antitypical first smiting of Jordan which teaches its beginning July 17, 1917. How was this view confusedly used to refute the true view?
(69) Give and describe three facts which prove that the "Big Drive" was the second smiting of Jordan. What follows from this proof?
(70) Show how the proper translation of Elisha's question in 2 Kings 2:14 proves that during Jordan's second smiting his antitype would think he was the Little Flock?
(71) What things do, and what things do not definitely prove whether one is of the Elijah or Elisha Class?
(72) Harmonize the thought that antitypical Elijah and Elisha are separated with the thought that the Little Flock and the Great Company are not completely separated.
(73) What other types treat of the separation of these?
(74) Define and illustrate right and wrong judgments.
(75) What kind of judgments are forbidden, and approved in the Epiphany? Give examples and proofs.
(76) What is one of the Lord's Epiphany works? How has it proceeded? What judging duties flow from it?
(77) What had been stated, illustrated and not proven?
(78) What facts of experience prove the parenthesis?
(79) How and why do Ps. 46:1-4; 1 Kings 19:11, 12; Rev. 16:18-20; 18:9 prove the parenthesis?
(80) How do 2 Kings 9 and 10 prove the parenthesis?
(81) How does Rev. 16:17, 18-20 in connection with Vol. VII and the Society leaders' announcement at Passover, 1918, prove the parenthesis?
(82) How does Rev. 19:1, 2 prove the parenthesis? What forecast was made on Rev. 19:1-3?
(83) State and refute an objection made against using Rev. 19:1, 2 to prove the parenthesis.
(84) State and refute the opinion that the whole Little Flock must be beyond the veil before the message of Rev. 19:1, 2 is given.
(85) How do the events of 2 Kings 8 and 9, and the statements of 1 Kings 19:15-18 prove the parenthesis?
(86) How do 1 Kings 19:18 and Rom. 11:4 prove the parenthesis?
(87) Point out the similarity of the acts antitypical of
Elijah and Elisha.
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Lev. 16:20-22 and 2 Kings 2:8, 11-14. Prove that these events were participated in by the last member of the antitypical High Priest and Elijah while in the flesh.
(88) How was the first American contingent of Azazel's Goat led from the door of the Tabernacle to the gate of the court, and delivered to the fit man? When did this work with the antitypical live goat begin? When will it end? How does this work prove the parenthesis?
(89) Refute the widespread opinion of Society friends that the imprisoned Society adherents were the antitypical John the Baptist, in prison.
(90) Give a general description of the contents and chronology of Elijah's letter to Jehoram (2 Chro. 21:12-15).
(91) Prove that Elijah sent the letter direct to Jehoram, and that it was not a prophecy of Jehoram's wickedness deposited with some one else to deliver years later.
(92) State and describe historically the theory that Elisha, and not Elijah, sent the letter.
(93) Explain the historical and manuscript evidence for the correctness of the reading "from Elijah."
(94) Upon what ground is the claim made that "Elisha" must here be substituted for "Elijah"?
(95) State and refute the claim that the expression "the prophet" in 2 Chro. 21:12 proves that Elisha must be intended. What conclusion should be drawn from the point under discussion?
(96) Why did Elijah have to return to the earth? And what two things are proven by the letter-episode?
(97) What implied facts supply the key to harmonize the synchronisms in the reigns of Judah's and Israel's kings from Ahab to Jehu?
(98) What are the Scriptural proofs?
(99) What is, and what is not the probable time of sending the letter after the separation?
(100) What is not, and what is the main thing to emphasize in discussing the letter?
(101) Why is the account of the letter in the Bible?
(102) What conclusions should we draw from the nine proofs on the parenthesis?
(103) What effects have come, and may be expected to come from the above explanation of the Last Related Acts of Elijah and Elisha?