Click to view entire image.
Friday, August 16, 2013
In volume 2
We consider the nature and formation of early congregations in volume 2. They struggled with a name. Russell's early exposure to One Faith/Age-to-Come belief (adherents of millenarianism as connected to The Restitution, a religious newspaper) led him to reject names beyond "Christians" or "Church of God." Individual congregations adopted a variety of names. One of these was "Church of the Firstborn." That name lead to confusion because a predominately Black church used it. In New York State several congregations used the name "Church of the Little Flock." In that connection we present this article taken from the Broome, New York, Republican, November 9, 1901. You may have to click on the image to view the entire article.
Update on B. F. Land.
... We're duplicating each others' work. So I'm posting a few paragraphs from Chapter 4 where Land appears in the story:
Margaret
(spelled Margareta in the 1880 Census) dated her “knowledge of the truth” to
about 1874 making her about eighteen or nineteen years old. Of course, this
does not mean she didn’t attend the class earlier. Her reference was to her
“consecration” and baptism. By 1876 she was married to Benjamin Franklyn Land.
We have not located a marriage record, but census records tell us that she had
her first child, a daughter named Ada, that year. Was B. F. Land a member of
the Allegheny Study Group? We think so, but we lack satisfyingly sound
documentation.
Land
came from a Methodist background. His father attended that church. To
distinguish themselves one of them used the name “Frank.”[1]
Frankly, we don’t know which was which, though we suspect that Frank was the
father. We base that on a Civil War pension application where the father is
listed as “Frank.” They were both cabinet makers, working in the same shop. Thurston’s
Directory for 1873-1874 only lists one of them, giving his occupation as
architect. In 1875, B. F. Land is a partner in the firm Getchell & Land,
carpenters and builders. This appears to be Margaret’s husband because we have
him living at 80 Cedar Avenue, Allegheny in 1878, an address that matches the
census records for Benjamin and Margaret. The marriage date alone is enough to
suppose that B. F. Land was a member of the Bible Class, though probably a
late-comer to it. We do not know how deep his interest was or how lasting.
Additionally,
we find in June 1874 Bible Examiner a request for tracts sent from B. F. Land.
This is a strong indicator that he was present at Storrs’ lecture earlier that
year. Also noted in that issue are letters from J. L. Russell, G. D. Clowes,
and W. H. Conley. Another indicator is a brief article, apparently originally a
letter to the editor, that we find in the April 21, 1875, issue of The
Restitution. The article is merely a quotation from the Bible book of
Revelation. Entitled “What the Spirit Saith,” it is signed Benjamin R.
Land. A poorly written copperplate R and
an F are easily confused. We suspect this is from Margaret’s husband. If so, it
shows him as interested in One Faith belief and anxious to encourage others.
Researchers have issued statements suggesting the
number of original participants ranging from a definite “five” to “about ten.” Names are suggested that are patently
impossible. Russell gives us an indefinite “small.” Bible Classes of this sort
were made up of friends who held similar interests though not necessarily to
the same religion. Russell ever distinguishes between the Age-to-Come
congregation and the Bible Class. We should take him at his word. They saw
themselves as independent body.
Sunday, August 11, 2013
Wherefore Art Thou Benjamin?
Does anyone out there have any information from Ancestry or a similar site about Benjamin Land?
As this time of
writing, I cannot put my hand on any primary documentation, but we know that
CTR’s sister, Margaret married Benjamin F Land in the mid-1870s. Margaret was
born in 1855, so would have been around 20 years old at the time of the
marriage. Their first child, Ada, was reportedly born in 1876. Ada was followed
by Alice (b.1878), Joseph (b.1880) and May F (Thelma) (b.1886).
Alice married Fred
Williamson, and May (Thelma) married Carl Kendall. Both couples allegedly
worked at Bethel at one point.
Benjamin Land was born
in Penn. (as were his parents) around 1849, and was apparently a cabinet maker.
He and his family later lived in Tampa, Florida.
The reason for the
query is an interesting note in George Storrs’ Bible Examiner for June 1874,
page 288. Storrs had just returned from a two week visit to Pittsburgh in early
May where he first met Joseph Lytel Russell. (Storrs would subsequently publish
letters from Joseph L and other Allegheny and Pittsburgh residents, like
William Conley and George Clowes).
Hot on the heels of his
return, Storrs obviously had requests for literature, and so on the aforementioned
page 288, he published this note:
Parcels sent to May 25 – Wm H Conley (2 parcels), G D Clowes Sen., B F
Land, J L Russell and Son (by Express).
Conley, Clowes and Russell were all contacts from that recent visit.
But there in the middle we see that a parcel was also sent to B F Land. Is it a
stretch of the imagination that he also was an Allegheny or Pittsburgh resident
at this time? And that he was to marry CTR’s sister? And that maybe their
meeting was in connection with the One Faith meetings and activities of that
era?
It’s just a footnote of
potential human interest.
Wednesday, August 7, 2013
What we know ... What we need.
From August 1878 to July 1879 Paton traveled, lecturing in various places. Some we can guess. Two we know. Barbour says Paton preached in Rochester. So we know that. Thanks to Ton who sent the file, we know he preached in Cleveland, Ohio.
We would like a more complete record. I'm at a loss. Ton is our super finder of newspaper articles. If he can't find it, I certainly can't. Anyone want to tackle this?
We need scaned (or originals) of anti-Russell booklets published in his life time. We have some. We need others. This may seem strange to some of you, but we've found interesting details in these booklets. One by a former Barbourite gave us interesting detial. We don't have Eseek Wolcott's (associate of Wendell) booklet. So if you have anything like this, even if you think it's pretty much worthless, contact us.
We're still researching the last chapter of volume one. And we're working on edits and corrections and slight addisitons to the other chapters.
We would like a more complete record. I'm at a loss. Ton is our super finder of newspaper articles. If he can't find it, I certainly can't. Anyone want to tackle this?
We need scaned (or originals) of anti-Russell booklets published in his life time. We have some. We need others. This may seem strange to some of you, but we've found interesting details in these booklets. One by a former Barbourite gave us interesting detial. We don't have Eseek Wolcott's (associate of Wendell) booklet. So if you have anything like this, even if you think it's pretty much worthless, contact us.
We're still researching the last chapter of volume one. And we're working on edits and corrections and slight addisitons to the other chapters.
Tuesday, August 6, 2013
Sunday, August 4, 2013
Saturday, August 3, 2013
Where Oh Where
From World’s Hope
notices throughout 1890 (volume 8)
Many rare historical
materials have not survived because they were in newspaper format and so viewed
more as ephemera at the time of publication. A classic example of this is
George Storrs’ Bible Examiner for 1871-73. The two years it was a weekly paper
do not appear to have survived – which is a great pity since those years might
have yielded useful historical information. Once Storrs’ paper became a monthly
magazine in 1873 and bound volumes were offered to the public, then it
survived.
So where oh where have
John Paton’s World’s Hope magazines gone? Above are advertisements found in
issues throughout 1890 (volume 8) offering bound volumes to whoever would buy
them for all but the first year (which we know has survived).
But whatever happened
to the other volumes listed above? Have they all failed to survive? Is there
anyone out there who can shed light on any further sources other than the
Detroit library system that likely has volumes 1-2, and the Almont library
system and Aurora University library that have some later issues? Many early associates of ZWT were attracted to
Paton’s theology and wrote letters to his magazine. The earlier years should
therefore be a useful historical source – if they still exist.
Wednesday, July 31, 2013
Muddying the Waters
by "Jerome"
Since the introductory essay published in a post below strongly
attacks the concept so favored by many writers, that CTR’s Bible Students were an
Adventist offshoot, it seemed a good idea to republish an article that
originally appeared on blog 2 about eighteen months ago. This is featured below
without any revision or updating.
Today, with all the
documentation available to us, we can see more clearly the connections and
differences between various developing views in the 19th century. If
you lived at the time – particularly if you were an onlooker – it would be very
easy to lump a number of disparate groups together under one label. Sometimes
the groups in question didn’t help matters by the terms they used. The article
tried to illustrate the problem, which can cloud judgments today.
At
the outset, I must warn readers that this has little to do with CTR’s actual
history. If it supplies anything at all to the project it will only be a
footnote. However, it has often been erroneously stated that CTR’s main
inspiration came from Adventism, whereas it has now been established on this
blog that the Age to Come movement was far more influential. In view of this,
it is interesting (to this writer at least) to see how the distinction between Adventist
and Age to Come both evolved, and yet at times was blurred, in the latter 19th
century – long after CTR had gone his own way.
Even
researchers who acknowledge Age to Come believers have lumped them together as
Adventists. A typical example is the thesis by the late David Arthur of Aurora
University, ‘Called Out of Babylon,’ which discussed people like Marsh and
Storrs under the chapter title ‘Age to Come Adventists.’ Storrs would not have
approved.
As
the Advent Christian Church became a denomination with a specific statement of
belief, so Age to Come adherents found associating with them more problematic.
Ultimately, people who had fellowshipped together – albeit uneasily –
increasingly divided into separate parties.
A
letter in The Restitution for July 28, 1880, called Adventists “half brethren”.
Reading through some Restitutions for the 1890s, they weren’t even being awarded
that backhanded honor by then.
And
yet...
On
the ground, there remained some confusion in the public consciousness as to who
was actually who.
However,
first – to illustrate how feelings within the Age to Come community became
increasingly anti-Adventist, a few choice quotations from the Restitution from
the 1890s:
From
the pen of W.H. Wilson in Restitution for July 8, 1896, page 1: “There is a
marked distinction between Adventists, and true
members of the Church of God, who believe
and obey the gospel of the Kingdom.
With regard to communing with Adventists, I would say, what fellowship can
obedient gospel believers have with those who destroy the gospel? We must be
firm in the faith, yet kind and gentle to all men.”
Being
a little more specific, one Ira R. Hall wrote in Restitution for August 12,
1896, page 1: “I had rather go into a place where they have never heard
anything, than to go into a Crisis’ Advent community.”
A
Crisis Advent community would of course be their former associates, the Advent
Christian Church.
Such
negative feelings were mutual. Another complaint from The Restitution for May
20, 1896, page 2: “We have a church here. They style themselves Adventists, but
do not fellowship (with) us, so we cannot worship with them. They reject the
glorious doctrine of the age to come.”
And
yet...
For
the public not directly involved with the protagonists, Age to Come people were
still often lumped together with Adventists. A report from evangelist A.H.
Zilmer preaching in Indiana in The Restitution for March 2, 1898, page 3, makes the comment “there is much prejudice against
the Adventists, AS WE ARE TERMED (capitals mine).”
It
may be that just preaching about the return of Christ was sufficient to confuse
the masses, but there was also the problem of nomenclature. Surprisingly (for
this writer at least) some Age to Come congregations still chose to call themselves
Advent Churches into the 1890s.
A
letter from J.S. Hatch in The Restitution for April 15, 1896, page 2, bemoaned the plethora of names in current use amongst
Restitution readers: “I find in my travels in one locality they call themselves
the Advent Church and in some the Church of the Abrahamic Faith, and in another
Church of the Blessed Hope, and still another Soul Sleepers, the name the
enemies of God call us, and some take the name of the One Faith. Is that right,
brethren? Come, let us have one uniform name in all localities.” Hatch then
makes a vigorous argument for them all to stick with the title Church of God.
What
was this? Age to Come congregations calling themselves the Advent Church? Yes. One
such congregation might have been one based in Philadelphia that was regularly
advertised in The Restitution in the latter 1880s as The Church of the Second
Advent. (For example, see The Restitution for December 5, 1888, page 4.)
Another
culprit (if that be the right word) was a familiar name to this blog, John T.
Ongley, who had been active in CTR’s home area in the 1870s. Ongley received a
special mention in The Restitution in 1897 (August 4, page 4) in a letter from the Leader and Secretary and
Treasurer of a newly established group. The letter reads in part: “We had the
pleasure of a visit from Elder J.T. Ongley of Crawford Co. Pa....Before leaving
he organised us in a body of ten members under the following rule of faith: -
We the undersigned...identify ourselves as the Church of God, called SECOND
ADVENT, in Batavia NY, organised this date, July 2, 1897, by Elder J.T. Ongley
(capitals mine).”
Funeral
reports from this era sometimes have Age to Come preachers speaking in what is
called The Advent Church, but whether this was their own fellowship or as guest
speakers for the occasion in Advent Christian Churches is not made clear.
Ultimately,
time took care of the confusion. The different titles for congregations thinned
down – at least slightly – and “Advent Church” slipped off the Age to Come radar.
By 1903 The Restitution for January 28, page 1, could
use the term Advent Church and define it with the comment “whose views of Bible
teaching, is voiced, in the main, by the World's Crisis and Our Hope” – clearly now referring to the
Advent Christian Church alone. The term Advent would be left with
those who had embraced it from the start. As the Evangelical Adventists faded
away, Advent without a Seventh Day prefix would generally refer to the Advent
Christian Church and its papers like The Crisis and Our Hope.
During
this time, CTR’s movement continued to grow – drawing fire from his former Age
to Come associates, with any connections long since overlooked and forgotten.
And CTR’s background was obscured by a lack of biographical information in his
own writings. So, being charitable, perhaps some of the past researchers who
did not have The Restitution paper available for consultation can be forgiven
for missing out on the nuances of the situation.
Monday, July 29, 2013
Mr. Schulz's introductory essay
This is, of course, first draft and unrevised. But I like it, and he said I could post it as is. Comments welcome
Introductory
Essay
It was once the fashion to introduce
books similar to this one with an apology for adding another work to an already
well-covered topic. We offer no such apology. The Watch Tower movement is one
of the most controversial and most written about religious movements of the
last two centuries. It is also one of the least understood and most
miss-represented movements. There is no accurately presented history of the
Watch Tower movement’s foundation years. This book exists because neither the
friends nor the enemies of Charles Taze Russell have produced anything
approaching a reasonably well researched and accurate account of the Watch
Tower’s early years.
Despite a persistent mythology to the contrary, the emergence
of the Watch Tower movement as a cohesive and separate religious identity owes
far less to Russell personally than it does to the adoption of mutually
agreeable doctrines. This process filled the years from 1871 to 1886. No one
doctrinal choice marked Russell and a growing body of associates as unique. The
collective did, resulting over time in a separate religious identity.
Friends of the Watch Tower and of Charles Taze Russell, the
founder of Zion’s Watch Tower, have seldom passed beyond an uncritical
reading of a biographical article published first in 1890, but a wealth of
detail is available. A Russell-centric view overlooks the interplay of
personalities and the debates that molded the loosely connected group a
distinct religion. Russell’s friends have separated the spiritual from the
mundane. Compartmentalizing history leaves no room for an accurate narrative.
Worse, one recent writer whose book presents a largely favorable picture of
Russell manufactured out of his or another’s imagination an entire narrative,
almost none of which is correct.
Russell’s admirers put him in a historically untenable
position. Even when presenting reasonably accurate narrative, they tend to
create or perpetuate a myth. For many of them, Russell was God’s special
instrument to restore vital truths. This apotheosis disconnects Russell from
the realm of critical history. It presents a false picture of Russell, his
associates and opponents. Even if one believes Russell was favored by God, no
person of faith should pursue myth-building at the expense of carefully
researched, accurate history. If God’s hand directed the Watch Tower movement
in Russell’s day, would that not best be shown by a reasonably well-researched
presentation of events that reconnects Russell to his environment? If Russell
had a place in God’s work, mythologizing him hides it.
Opposition writers also manufacture, distort and misrepresent
events. This is especially true of former adherents. Several examples come to
mind. Some suggest Russell plagiarized Paton’s Day Dawn. One frequent
though seldom accurate writer suggests that Russell stole the Herald of the
Morning subscription list. One former adherent has turned himself into an
Internet “troll,” posting in the comments section of any news article about
Jehovah’s Witnesses that Russell was an Adventist. The claim of Russellite
Adventism is common. Aside from the fact that this claim is wrong, we are at a
loss to explain how having been an Adventist would tarnish Russell’s character.
Russell was baptized a Presbyterian; he was a Congregationalist; he became a
One Faith Millenarian with Age-to-Come views. He was never an Adventist. Only
the intellectually lazy would associate him with Adventism.
Almost none of the published material meets an academic
standard. Of those few books that do, none of them consider the founding period
in any detail. All of them derive what little they say from a single article
from the 1890 Zion’s Watch Tower with some additions from Alexander Hugh
Macmillan’s Faith on the March. There is a consequent failure to grasp
key events in the growth an independent religious movement. And there is a
significant misdirection, because of the very narrow and contracted view of
Watch Tower history found in the Russell’s 1890 article.
Without looking further, writers
have uniformly suggested an Adventist origin for Watch Tower theology. There
were undeniable contacts with Adventism, and many of the early adherents came
from the fractured Adventist movement. Researchers tend to focus on what became
the Advent Christian Church, ignoring interchanges with other Adventist bodies,
including the Life and Advent Union, independent Adventist congregations and
Sabbatarian Adventists. The focus has been on the development of Watch Tower
doctrine from Millerite Adventism. This is a mistake.
As commonly told, Russell was
introduced to Millerite Adventism by Jonas Wendell and other Adventists. Some
suggest a Seventh-day Adventist connection, which is laughably ignorant.
Russell is supposed to have adopted much of Millerite theology. Though he
denied ever having been an Adventist he was one.
This is wrong. None of Russell’s doctrines owe their origin
to Millerism or any of the descendent Adventists organizations. Russell’s
belief system, with a few key exceptions, was developed while in association
with Age-to-Come believers, especially those in the One Faith Movement. This movement
was most closely associated with The Restitution, a newspaper published
in Plymouth, Indiana. Russell’s closest associates were connected to One Faith
or some form of Age-to-Come belief. This includes George Storrs.
Storrs was an independent Age-to-Come
believer, abandoning Millerite Adventism in 1844. You will find some of that
history documented in this book. Storrs and those loosely associated with The
Restitution avoided organizational structure. The movement spoke with
conflicting voices, but they held some key doctrines in common. They believed
in a restored paradise earth without the fiery destruction predicted by
Adventists. They believed that the prophecies, indeed all of scripture, should
be taken as literal. The Jews would be restored because the plain literal sense
of Scripture suggested they would be. They were divided on other issues. Storrs
taught a Fair Chance doctrine that some called Second Probationism. A
significant minority of One Faith believers followed this path. We will detail
other differences between the two movements.
There are several reasons why this
part of Russell’s history is miss-represented.. Many of Russell’s
contemporaries, particularly those outside the two movements, lacked a clear
understanding of what Adventism was and how it differed from Age-to-Come and
other pre-millennialist beliefs. One finds One Faith and Christadelphians
described as Age-to-Come Adventists – a name they rejected. Because Adventists,
Millenarians, and Christadelphians believed that Christ’s return was near,
outsiders lumped them under the one name.
While some of Russell’s
contemporaries and some academic writers today confuse Age-to-Come belief with
Adventism, the two parties did not. They saw themselves as distinct
doctrinally. The decade of the 1870s was a transitional period for the Advent
Christian Association. It was rapidly transitioning from a lose association
having belief in the near return of Christ and good Christian conduct as the
sole standard of association into a Church with more closely defined doctrine.
Some who associated with them were ostracized and found new associates among
Age-to-Come believers. George Stetson was one of these, though he died before a
decisive break between the two bodies occurred.
The division between Literalist and
Adventist belief affected Watch Tower adherents. Subsequent tensions between
Russell and Adventists derive from his Age-to-Come (also called Millennairan)
belief system which was derived from British Literalism. These differences
would serve as a sieve that would catch and remove from fellowship those who
accepted other systems. Paton and his followers, many of whom had been
Adventists, rejected Literalism, and this rejection of “plain sense” exegesis
accounts for many of their differences. Arthur Prince Adams plainly says that
his differences with Russell are based on his rejection of Literalist belief.
Adams sought the “hidden meaning” behind the Bible’s plain words. He explained
this in the introductory article to the first issue of his magazine:
By
Spirit of the Word I mean its real and intended meaning,
in contradistinction to its apparent and surface meaning, or the “letter.” It
is a common mistake among Christians to suppose that the Bible is written in
very plain and simple language, and that the correct meaning is that which lies
upon the surface – the most obvious and apparent sense. If I err not, the truth
is just the opposite of this. The Bible often means something very different
from what it says; there is a hidden, mystical sense that is like the pearl hid
in the depths of the sea, the real jewel.[1]
This stands in stark contrast to
Russell and his associates. They sought the Bible’s plain words. It is not our
purpose to suggest he succeeded in that quest. That determination is best made
by our readers. But we state the difference in theological perspective. It
explains much.
Another reason Russell is seen as a closet-Adventist derives
from un-reasoning opposition to his teaching. The name Adventist was seen as a
pejorative. Adventists were uniformly seen as on the fringe of American
religious life. Newspapers noted every passing and failed prediction, every
supposed and real extreme among Adventists. The described as “Adventist” those
who were not such. They manufactured events. Adventism became a hot-tar soaked
brush for editors to use when news was sparse. Painting Russell with the brush
of extremism is a fad among opposers. There
is, however, a real story behind the myth. One of our goals has been to tell
the real, historically verifiable, story.
We believe our research restores
detail. In doing so, we believe that a clear understanding of events emerges. We
examine the roots of Russell’s theology, tracing his doctrinal development to
various individuals and publications. This dispels the myth that Russell and
his early associations studied in a vacuum, independent of the commentary or
exposition of others. We explore the doctrinal disunity among early adherents.
How Russell and his associates addressed this explains the transition from mere
readership to an ecclesiastical unity.
There is a startling lack of
perspective in most “histories” of the Watch Tower movement or of the antecedent
and cognate groups. Advent Christians liked to claim there were thirty thousand
adherents world wide. We could discover no valid basis for that claim and
believe the number was much smaller. One Faith believers played a significant role
in Watch Tower history.[2]
They counted about four thousand adherents in 1880. Russell sent out six
thousand copies of Zion’s Watch Tower’s first issue. Numbers dropped precipitously
as real interest replaced hoped-for subscribers. Yet, by 1883 Russell could
report fourteen thousand subscribers. The belief system reached England before
Russell first published his magazine. There was an adherent in France in the
1870s. The message reached Germany in 1885, perhaps earlier. It reached Norway
about 1880 via personal letters. This represented a social shift not just among
millennialists but in American religion, and that makes this story important.
The actors in this religious and
social drama are archetypical. Of special interest to us is the self-view of
the principal and many of the minor players. You will find N. H. Barbour who
saw himself as God’s spokesman even if almost no one else did. He died with fewer
than a thousand adherents by his claim, and realistically probably had fewer
than two hundred truly-interested followers. You will meet Frank Burr who
believed he heard Christ’s voice. There is John Paton who saw himself as
divinely chosen, the recipient of divine revelation. There is Russell who
believed himself divinely led, as God’s “special agent for special times.” We
find Elizabeth [Lizzie] A. Allen who agonized over her life choices. We meet J.
C. Sunderlin who because of war wounds became an opium addict, seeking relief
in religion and a quack cure. Which of these you sympathize with will depend on
your approach to this story.
We leave issues of faith largely untouched.
We’ve taken a historian’s approach. We will tell you what Russell said of
himself and others. We will tell you what his associates said and did. We will
not tell you that all this was guided by Holy Spirit or God’s own hand. That’s
not a historian’s place. We will leave that analysis to your own their prayerful
(or skeptical) estimations of themselves and others. We have avoided the trend
among modern historiographers to analyze motives. We’ve borrowed our approach
from 19th Century historians who told their tales in detail, but
with little commentary. So we owe much to Francis Parkman, H. H. Bancroft, and Israel
Smith Clare, historians who within the limits of available documentations gave
their readers detailed, largely accurate, narratives.
However, we cannot entirely escape
addressing motives. When required to do so, we limit ourselves to presenting
them in the words or by the unambiguous acts of those involved. Russell is
overly kind to Albert Delmont Jones. Jones was a disreputable man, a thief, a
fornicator, a religious fraud. We tell that story here as much as possible from
public record and his own words. Other scandals will appear. (We humans are
prone to stupidity.) So you will read about William Henry Conley’s faith cure
house, its pastor, his relationship to the women and girls associated with
Conley’s faith-cure belief. There are others you won’t read about because we
cannot verify to our satisfaction that there was real scandal. Suspicion
attaches to one of Russell’s early associates and a young teenage girl. We tell
as much of that story as we can verify. We leave the unverified gossip to the
ebay posters, the Internet scandal mongers, and the conspiracy theorists and inept
wikipedia writers.
As perverse as it seems to say so,
the endless divisions that we chronicle here resulted in doctrinal unity. They
were key to the formation of an ecclesiastical unity centered on Zion’s
Watch Tower and its editor, Charles Taze Russell.
***
Watch Tower history as it has been
written resembles Greek mythology. As with Greek mythology the stories are
often told in conflicting ways. If you have ever read the myths of Pan’s
parentage, you understand what I mean. In the Russell mythology there is
Russell the saint and there is Russell the devilish, religious fraudster. We
have limited ourselves to Russell the man. We deal with unfounded claims in
each chapter. In the process, we probably offend everyone with a personal
commitment to the myths. We have enjoyed bursting bubbles. Watch the footnotes
carefully. We detail false claims in footnotes where we do not always do so in
text. We’ve been even handed in this. You will find us faulting claims made by
true believers and by opposition polemicists.
The first chapter considers Russell’s
youth. Several key ideas and some minor statements fall to research. Unlike a
Bible Student writer, we do not chronicle Russell as the modern-day Samuel,
destined to be God’s special servant in the last days. We do not question his
belief. This is not about belief. It’s about accurately told history. So, while
we recount what his mother said, we keep it in the context of real, verifiable
events. Others can put these events in the context of their belief systems, and
we may hold to belief systems of our own. But we only tell the story as we can
verify it, and we do that largely through Russell and his contemporary’s own
words supplemented with documentary evidence.
An endless amount of incorrect material is out there. That it
exists is a personal irritant. In many ways, writing this history has been a
salve to my irritation derived from the misguided, sometimes purposely
incorrect, and incurious approach of others. I do not care if you hate or adore
Russell. I do not care if you see any of the descendant religions as God’s
authoritative voice to humanity. We’ve written this book to present accurately
research history that meets academic standards. Our goal is to tell the history
in detail so that all the trends, events and outcomes make sense.
Mythology replaces history when lack
of curiosity is coupled by lack of thorough research. Among Russell’s
modern-day friends this is especially pronounced. A number of letters passed
between us and institutions representing descendant religions. In a nearly
uniform way, they focus on Russell, express lack of interest in anyone else,
and simply do not look for detail. This distorts the history. Russell did not
function in a vacuum. He was influenced by his friends, by his enemies, by what
he read and experienced. These details are recoverable. The biographies of his
early associates are available to a determined researcher. The “brothers”
Lawver, Hipsher, Tavender, Myers, and a host of others who receive more or less
mention in Zion’s Watch Tower were living people who had a physical and
spiritual presence in Russell’s life and an effect on his beliefs. There are
many others, some of considerable but forgotten prominence, who significantly
contributed to Watch Tower history and to the development of a unified body of
believers. But where are Aaron P. Riley or the small group in West Virginia who
withdrew from the Church of Christ to form a congregation? Not in any history
of the Watch Tower of which we are aware. Why is Calista Burk Downing a name
without biography in histories of Zion’s Watch Tower?
Probably there are several reasons
why the Watch Tower story hasn’t been told with nay sort of depth. Lack of
curiosity is a prime one. Past exchanges with interested parties elicited
comments such as, “Thank you for the photocopies. We’re only interested in
Russell himself.” This approach is part of the Saint Russell myth. Time and
circumstances have wounded this approach so that some who sustained it in the
past are no longer able to do so.
The other major problem has been lack of resources. The
resources we use to reclaim the biographies of Russell’s earliest associates
and to restate their place in Watch Tower history have always been out there. They
are somewhat easier to find now than they were twenty years ago. But individuals
and organizations with more resources than we have could have found them if
they had the curiosity to pursue the matter.
Attachment to a religious mythos in preference to accurately
told history has stifled curiosity. We have encountered a certain amount of
fear and resentment while writing this book. A university professor who is
writing a competing book strongly objected to our consideration of One Faith
belief because it undermines his premise. Another writer fears that we will
refute a story they wish to tell. A Bible Student expressed considerable
discontent that we do not present Russell as the God-directed Faithful and Wise
Servant. We’re writing history, not religious commentary. One person of
considerable talent as a writer, though he is published anonymously, suggested
that this history might show his religion as other than the Truth. Truth rests
with God. Truth is never embodied in his human servants simply because they are
human.
Another issue we address, though on
a limited scale, is the disconnect between the lives of Russell and his
associates and the world they lived in. The only redeeming feature of a
recently published biography of Russell is the author’s attempt to reconnect to
contemporary history. Russell was born into a world without flush toilets. In
court testimony someone tells of carrying “the slops” through Bible House to
drop them down a drain. I’m old enough to remember my stay in a forty room
mansion in Ohio where the only facilities were a two-door wooden outhouse. Most
of our readers aren’t that old. Russell was born into a world of no garbage
collection, where the streets were rank with filth. He walked down streets
littered with the leavings of draft animals and their owners. He was taught by
teachers who were outnumbered by students one hundred to one, who had little
education of their own and few resources to improve what they had.
We are disconnected from the social
issues of Russell’s day. Allegheny City and Pittsburgh were by reputation
better, more peaceful cities than some of the more easterly American cities.
Yet, they were filled with prostitution (we give details) and violence. A
gruesome murder took place just doors from the Russell’s home. The Western
states were subject to Native American uprisings and brutal repression. The
period from the 1870s to the 1890s was one of re-occurring financial
depression. Shoeing the feet of children was a major concern and a major
expense. Scandal was the norm in politics. People were willing to see the
period as “the last days” because it was violent, politically unstable, and
seemed very much to be exactly what Jesus had predicted.
An English writer described
Allegheny City and Pittsburgh in terms of the industrial area of Staffordshire.
Writing in 1859 he said that “there are the same red brick housed and workshops,
the same smoke, the same uneven streets – from the heavy weights drawn over
them – and at night, the glare of the iron furnaces at work.” The houses were
built “close up to the very tops of the hill-sides, and presenting something of
the appearance which the old town of Edinburgh does when viewed from off the
Calton Hill or Arthur’s Seat.” Pittsburgh and Allegheny City were large,
rambling, ill designed places. In 1853 the combined population was about one
hundred ten thousand. It was an area of churches. We detail Russell’s
associations with several denominations.
***
This was the era of Louisa Alcott’s Little Women. Read
it. It will help you connect to the age we consider. Pay attention to the details.
Note the cold, rat-infested house; consider the poverty, the infant mortality,
the approach to morals and religious infidelity. The era in which these events transpire
is both familiar and alien. This was an era of invention. The telephone was a
marvel. Cities were electrified, but most homes were without electricity. They
had gas if there were fortunate, oil lamps or candles if not. Few saw a telephone.
The Penny press and letter from friends connected one to the outside world.
The American west was still the Wild
West. The year Russell met Jonas Wendell the first transcontinental rail tracks
were joined at Promontory Point, Utah. New and more powerful steam engines were
marvels. Indian wars replaced the Civil War. When the Allegheny Bible Study
Class was re-examining old belief, grasshoppers plagued Kansas, Nebraska and
Missouri, eating varnish off furniture, paint off houses and peaches to the
pits. War and rumors of war were
everywhere. The Franco-Prussian was altered the face of Europe. Russia and
Turkey fought, both brutalizing civilians, especially women and little girls.
Fears of a general European war found a place in newspapers. Discontent and
abuses in the Reconstruction South led to talk of a second Civil War. The
United States had unsettled claims against the United Kingdom related to the
Confederate raider the CSA Alabama. There was talk of war. An English parliamentarian
suggested a test of arms. Cooler heads within the British government noted that
while America maintained a severely reduced army, it had a million men trained
to arms and baptized in blood. Any war with America would in high probability
cost the empire the newly formed Canadian Confederation.
Disasters beyond human control
brought with them a sense of impending or wrought Divine judgment. Currency and
credit manipulation by European banks, prominently the Bank of England,
amounted to a quiet war against the United States. Credit manipulation brought
consequences beyond those foreseen in boardrooms. Labor issues, oppressive working
conditions and issues of social equality led to riot and insurrection. The year
of Barbour and Russell’s grand missionary tour saw Pittsburgh burned and
Federal troops engaged in battle with railroad workers. A large segment of
Americans embraced protectionism. Depressions swept America and Europe. “Banker,”
always a ‘dirty word,’ became a blacker pejorative.
A pope died and another was elected.
Many Protestants (and interestingly, some Catholics) saw the popes and the
Roman Catholic Church as the embodiment of the more negative prophetic images. American
Protestants watched Catholic affairs in that light. The pope was variously seen
as the Biblical “man of sin” or the Anti-Christ. The Roman Church was seen as
Babylon the Great, the Mother of Harlots. By the last quarter of the Nineteenth
Century, a significant number saw Protestant churches as the Harlot’s
Daughters. Interactions with Catholics were suspect and scrutinized as a
possible fulfillment of prophecy. Otto von Zech, a German-born Evangelical
Lutheran clergyman was expelled from the Ohio Synod in part for refusing to characterize
the Catholic Church as Anti-Christ.
Our ancestors were not (taken as a
whole) stupid, nor were they more gullible than our contemporaries. But their
frame of reference was different. While the shift to a secularist society had
begun, most were still profoundly religious. Religion was a social and political
power, influencing –sometimes irrationally – public decisions. If they were
ready to believe what might seem to us irrational doctrines, we should note
that the same tendency exists today, though more often expressed in conspiracy
theory, political polemic, or ill conceived private and public policy. We haven’t
improved; we have only changed focus. The characters in this history deserve a
sympathetic consideration.
***
This is a far different book than we
envisioned. We anticipated a slim volume somewhat like our biography of
Barbour. We believed the basic facts were known, though as presented by most
writers the story lacked detail. As our research evolved, we made format
decision, some reluctantly. Among the decisions we hesitatingly made was that
leading us to present more or less extensive biographies of the principals. You
will find most of those in volume one. We believe these biographical excursions
are necessary for a comprehensive understanding of the Watch Tower movement’s
early years.
B.
W. Schulz
Saturday, July 27, 2013
Wednesday, July 24, 2013
Tuesday, July 23, 2013
The Emphatic Diaglott and the Watch Tower Society (revised)
by "Jerome"
(Note: I have been advised by the blog owners that an influx of new readers
recently showed some interest in an old article of mine on Benjamin Wilson’s
Emphatic Diaglott,, first published here back in 2011. That article was
actually abridged from an original that only appeared on blog 2. So I am
reproducing below the complete article. It has also been updated to document a
known discussion between Wilson and a ZWT adherent that came to light since the
original article was written.)
Although the Emphatic Diaglott
and its publication by the Watch Tower Society come a little later than the
period being researched on this blog, this translation had a major role to play
in the early history of the Society.
This article will review that
history briefly, but is mainly written to reveal who actually obtained the
plates and gave the copyright to the Watch Tower Society in 1902.
Benjamin Wilson’s Emphatic
Diaglott was first published in one volume in 1864 after being issued as a
part-work starting August 1858 with Wilson’s journal The Gospel Banner. The
version published by Fowler and Wells of New York was widely used by various Adventist
and Age to Come groups, and the main Age to Come newspaper The Restitution partly
grew out of The Gospel Banner. Wilson had been a friend of John Thomas, founder
of the Christadelphians, but the two ultimately had doctrinal differences and
split. While Thomas founded the Christadelphians, Wilson – although strongly
anti-organization - had a major role in the founding of the Church of God of Abrahamic
Faith. Today, the descendants of his group are usually called the Church of the
Blessed Hope or Abrahamic Faith – a faction who did not join the Church of God
General Conference in 1920.
Its connection with our history
starts when one of Nelson Barbour’s readers, Benjamin Keith, hiupon Wilson’s
translation of the Greek word “parousia” as “presence” rather than “coming”.
This set minds working on an apparently failed prediction for Christ’s second
coming in 1874. If the coming was an invisible presence (although that was not
how Wilson would understand the matter) then their expectations had actually
been fulfilled – but invisibly. This view ultimately became a major part of Charles
Taze Russell’s belief system. (Hereafter abbreviated to CTR).
Once established, Zion’s Watch
Tower Society highly endorsed the Diaglott. In Old Theology Quarterly for April
1893 “Friendly Hints on Bible Study and Students’ Helps” pages 9 and 10, the
Diaglott is highly recommended as “another of God’s special blessings for our
day...While we cannot say this work is perfect, we can say that we know of no
other translation of the New Testament so valuable to the critical student –
and this includes all to whom we write.”
Early copies had a note pasted
in the front entitled A Friendly Criticism, which detailed some doctrinal
differences between CTR and Wilson. While praising the work highly, the note
drew attention to certain issues such as a personal devil, the pre-human
existence of Jesus and his resurrected state - where the actual interlinear and
Wilson’s own English version were not thought to harmonize.
At the same time, The Restitution paper carried an advertisement for the Diaglott each week for several decades.
Wilson died in
1900. Shortly after, in 1902, the copyright to the Diaglott was obtained for
the Watch Tower Society, and they became its publisher for the next one hundred
years. Anyone who wanted to obtain a Diaglott now had to contact the Watch
Tower Society.
The journal “Christadelphian
Tidings of the Kingdom of God” for January 2009 in its article “Reflections”
commented on how some erroneously thought the Diaglott to be a product of
Russellism. It explained that “the confusion probably arises because the copyright for The
Diaglott was purchased in the early 20th century by an anonymous buyer who then
donated it to the Watchtower Society.”
The article viewed the Watch Tower Society’s publishing
the work as “a sad, ironic twist of history.” It stressed there was no evidence
that Wilson ever came in contact with Millennial Dawn.
This conflicts with a claim made in Consolation magazine
for November 8, 1944, page 4 which states “Mr Wilson knew of the truth, and it
is reported that he at one time attended some of the meetings of Jehovah’s
people, but disagreed on certain fundamental issues.” It must be said that this
is unreferenced information written decades after events, and the words “it is
reported” do not necessarily bode well.
What CAN be easily established today is that Wilson would
certainly have known of Millennial Dawn and CTR. Wilson wrote for The
Restitution almost up to the time of his death in 1900, and The Restitution regularly
reviewed CTR’s works and activities. Wilson was also a special contributor to
The Millenarian when it reviewed CTR’s Divine Plan of the Ages in February 1887.
And a nephew of Wilson wrote a booklet attacking CTR’s theology.
There is also an account of several meetings between Wilson and ZWT Pilgrim
J A Bohnet in 1892. Bohnet wrote up the experience many years later in an
article on the front page of the St Paul Enterprise for April 4, 1916. He
described how CTR had provided Wilson’s address, and how Bohnet visited Wilson
several times at his home in Sacramento, California. Amongst other things they
discussed CTR’s Friendly Criticism paste-in mentioned above. It was obviously
amicable, but there was no meeting of minds – they remained divided on a number
of issues including their understanding of the ransom and the pre-existence of
Christ.
What does come out from their conversations as recorded by Bohnet is
that reports that Wilson objected to CTR using his work so extensively were
denied by Wilson. He was also asked point blank whether he was a
Christadelphian? His answer was, “No, I am a member of no organized
denomination.”
Much misinformation has been circulated over how the
Watch Tower Society obtained the rights to the Diaglott.
The book “Jehovah’s Witnesses –
A Comprehensive and Selectively Annotated Bibliography” published by Greenwood
Press in 1999, is one such example. On page 61 it relates how Benjamin Wilson (or
as it calls him, Professor Wilson) wanted to sell the rights to the Diaglott
because he got into serious financial trouble, but blocked CTR’s attempts to
buy them. CTR then used a third party to keep his name out of it, so that
Wilson couldn’t stop him. When Wilson discovered CTR had obtained the rights by
such a devious method he publicly claimed there were numerous errors in the
Diaglott anyway and he was going to produce a revised edition. No supporting
references are given for this story, there is no record of anything of the sort
in The Restitution – as already noted above, this was a paper with plenty to
say about CTR on other issues - and history records that Wilson had been dead
for a couple of years when the rights changed hands. We can safely discount such
anecdotes as fantasy – with an obvious agenda.
Returning to the above quotation from “Christadelphian
Tidings”, their reference to an anonymous buyer harkens back to the Society’s
own description of the event. The Proclaimers book on page 606 made the comment:
“That
same year (1902), the Watch Tower Society came into possession of the printing
plates for The Emphatic Diaglott...Those plates and the
sole right of publication had been purchased and then given as a gift to the
Society.”
The original reference comes from the back
page of the Watch Tower for December 15, 1902 (which is not in the reprints).
In offering the Diaglott as part of a list of available publications, the blurb
stated:
“For several years a friend, an earnest Bible student,
desirous of assisting the readers of our Society's publications, has supplied
them through us at a greatly reduced price; now he has purchased the copyright
and plates from the Fowler & Wells Co., and presented the same to our
Society as a gift, under our assurance that the gift will be used for the
furthering of the Truth to the extent of our ability, by such a reduction of
price as will permit the poor of the Lord's flock to have this help in the
study of the Word. REDUCED PRICES.--These will be sold with ZION'S WATCH TOWER
only.”
So who was this earnest Bible student, anonymous friend
and benefactor?
The answer was established in a court hearing in 1907.
And it is not rocket science to guess who it really was.
In 1903 Maria Russell initiated court proceedings against
CTR for what ultimately resulted in a divorce from bed and board – an official
separation, but one where neither she nor CTR were ever legally free to
remarry. Much hinged on the issue of financial support, and in April 1907
testimony was taken on CTR’s financial situation. Maria tried to establish that CTR still had considerable funds,
whereas CTR testified that, bit by bit, he had already donated his assets to
the WT Society. CTR was questioned at length about his financial affairs over
previous years.
The Bible House had been turned
over to the Society in 1898 and other properties subsequently – including the house
Maria had lived in up to 1903. Now they were in 1907, CTR testified he had a
small bank balance and an arrangement for board and lodging for the duration of
his natural life.
However, the court testimony
shows quite clearly that, back in 1902, and for a little while thereafter, CTR
still retained direct control of funds in his own name. And in the details of
this testimony he explained quite openly just how the Society obtained the
Diaglott.
He stressed that the aim had
been to allow as many as possible to obtain the Diaglott, and so had made it
available on a not for profit basis.
Quoting from pages 204-205 of
the transcript of the April 1907 hearing, CTR said (and CAPITALS MINE):
“We publish also a brief New
Testament, with an interlinear translation in English, and the marginal
translation. It was published originally and for many years, for 30 or 40
years, by Fowler and Wells, of New York. THE PLATES WERE PRESENTED TO THE
SOCIETY BY MYSELF. The Society had certain corrections made in the new plates
etc., as they were considerably worn, and the edition which Fowler and Wells
retailed at $4.00 and wholesaled at $2.66 – 2/3 the Society is now publishing
at $1.50 per copy, and it includes postage of 16 cents on this, and as they are
nearly all purchased by subscribers to the Watch Tower it goes additional with
each volume, and in his subscription to the journal; that is to say, that the
Watch Tower for the year and this book that was formerly sold for $4.00 go
altogether, with postage included, for $1.50, WITH THE VIEW OF INTERESTING
PEOPLE IN THE WATCH TOWER PUBLICATION, and permitting the Watch Tower
subscribers to have the Diaglott in every home possible.”
So before CTR donated his
remaining assets to the Watch Tower Society, he was able to donate the plates personally
to the Watch Tower Society.
The repairs to the plates
extended the life of the Diaglott, and the new price made it more accessible to
the public. In addition, throwing in a year’s Watch Tower subscription as part
of the deal was adroit proselytizing. For instance, any newcomers to the world
of The Restitution who wanted a Diaglott (or wanted just to replace a copy),
now had to approach the Watch Tower Society for one. It was perhaps not
surprising that attacks on CTR’s theology intensified in The Restitution in the
early 20th century.
However, this leaves us with
the question: Why did CTR chose to remain anonymous, referring instead to a
nameless benefactor?
It is here this writer is on
shaky ground, because we have no direct way of knowing. But I can suggest two
reasons why CTR might have done this.
First, there are his comments
in the booklet A Conspiracy Exposed and Harvest Siftings published in 1894.This
detailed CTR’s recent difficulties with certain individuals. One was an Elmer
Bryan, who made certain accusations against CTR and brought two other brothers
(H Weber and M Tuttle) to see him to apply the steps of Matthew 18:15-17. As
recorded in the booklet, Brothers Weber and Tuttle heard both parties out and came
to the conclusion that Bryan’s accusations were ridiculous. One involved the
use of the pseudonym Mrs C B Lemuels (of behalf of Maria Russell) in
advertising material some years previously. In dispatching this criticism, CTR
said on page 45: “Besides, I bring my own name as little into prominence as
possible. This will be noticed in connection with everything I have published –
the O(ld) T(heology) Tracts, the DAWNS, etc.”
Looking at the tract series and early editions of the Dawns (Studies) one would be hard put to discover the author. CTR indeed kept quite a low profile. In some respects this was to change when the newspaper sermon work got off the ground. Newspapers wanted personalities and CTR reluctantly became one. But that was further down the line.
But that basic desire to keep a
personal name out of matters may have influenced CTR’s decision to donate the
Diaglott without claiming personal credit.
A second related reason may be
tied to another comment from A Conspiracy Exposed, this time page 40. In
connection with a business matter, CTR made the comment that he “preferred to
avoid any unnecessary notoriety.” Had the world known that CTR had bought the
plates and the rights from Fowler and Wells, there could have been uproar in
certain quarters. This writer would theorize that if various Age to Come groups
who used the Diaglott knew for certain that CTR had personally brought their
baby under his control – and now would only make it available with a year’s worth
of his journal – promoting his brand of heresy as they saw it – then cries of “Foul”
and “Unfair” would ring out loud and clear.
There would be rumbles whatever
happened, but no name – no direct blame. An anonymous benefactor leading to a
publishing organisation generously providing the volume at reduced cost to all
was far better P.R.
In fact, CTR did the public a great service. He rescued the Diaglott from potential oblivion with the state of the plates as they were. Then that reduction from $4.00 to $1.50 was well worth having. And for around a hundred years thereafter, the Watch Tower Society made this translation readily available to all. Ultimately the copyright expired and the Society’s inventory dwindled. Since 2004, groups like the Abrahamic Faith Beacon Publishing Society published their own version and viewed the translation as “coming home”. Interestingly, the modern versions published have retailed at a far higher price than the Watchtower Society ever charged, even when they did have a fixed contribution for literature.
Saturday, July 20, 2013
How John Paton told it...
A transcription of a four page
supplement issued with The World’s Hope for February 15, 1890. (Volume 8,
number 4).
THE EDITOR'S EXPERIENCE AS A PUBLISHER.
FROM the year 1875 to 1879 my time was
given to proclaiming in several states the principles of Bible truth as later
developed in DAY DAWN. In the autumn of 1879, Bro. A.D. Jones, then of
Pittsburg, urged me to write the substance of my lectures and have them
published in book form, He said, “We need such a book, to give people who hear
these lectures the evidence in permanent form, as well as to reach many who
have not the opportunity of hearing; and I am convinced that you are the one to
write it. Have you not thought of writing such a book?”
I confessed that I had thought of it, having realized the need of it in my work, and
having often been moved in spirit to write these things, but had never ventured
even to speak of it, because, for certain reasons, it seemed impracticable.
“Are the reasons of a financial nature?” he asked.
I admitted that such was the case; that
being dependent on the fruit of my labor for the support of myself and family,
I had no means to invest in publishing.
“Well,” he said, “I am willing to
publish such a book, paying all the expenses, if you will write it.”
It seemed to be of the Lord, and after
further deliberation, I decided to make the effort. I left off traveling,
except to fill my regular Sunday appointments, and devoted myself five days in
each week to writing for the book, and in about seven weeks, DAY DAWN was ready
for the press. Then followed the care of proof-reading, while it was being
printed.
The book was completed and ready for
circulation about the month of May, 1880. This was the first edition of which 4,000
copies were printed. It was arranged that I should have all the books I could
sell, and that we would give them to
the Lord’s poor – those unable to pay. I disposed of five hundred copies, but
always found it easier to give, than to sell. The book was freely advertised in
Zion’s Watch Tower, for which I was
then a constant writer, but for some reason my Post Office address was not
given, so that orders for the book did not come to me as a result of that
advertising.
The first edition was mainly all
disposed of in less than two years. My publisher came to Almont in August 1881,
and said that we should soon need another edition, and offered to publish it on
the same terms as before. To this I consented, as I was still unable to publish
it myself. He suggested that I should revise
the book, making such changes as seemed best to myself. Since sending out the
first edition, by a careful examination of the Word, my mind had undergone a
change as to the nature of Christ’s sacrifice, and the Atonement. I did not
deny the Ransom, as some have positively affirmed, but only denied the
correctness of their, and my own former theory
of the matter. I now saw that the idea of Substitution, or that Christ died instead of mankind, was unscriptural and
untrue, as we all die. The unity of Christ, as the Second Man, with
the whole race, I saw to be the Apostolic idea, so that all died and rose in him. So this fundamental and vital union with Christ, as the basis of a
practical and experimental at-one-ment with, or reconciliation to God, took the
place of substitution in DAY DAWN, when revised. Out of this Scriptural idea
that Christ is the “Head of every man,” and that all were reconciled to God in him, grew the idea that every man
would, indeed must, in due time, be
personally and practically reconciled to God through him. These two ideas, related to each other as cause and
effect, and clearly sustained by many Scriptures, constitute the chief, if not
the only, difference between the first and second editions of DAY DAWN. Those
who understand the position taken, can see that so far from ignoring or
belittling Christ as the Redeemer of men, it emphasizes his work as the Life-Giver, so that, “As in Adam all die, even so in
Christ shall all be made alive.”
About the time of the revision of DAY
DAWN, my articles, on account of the change above noted, were excluded from the
columns of Z.W.T., its Editor
regarding the doctrine as a dangerous and “damnable heresy,” and those who
accepted this change as unpardonable sinners, and therefore doomed to
annihilation at death. I personally endeavored to disabuse the brother’s mind
of such a great misconception of the idea; but it seemed of no avail.
About the same time,
for some other reason, my publisher had also been shut out from the pages of Z.W.T., and the publication of Zion’s Day Star had commenced. Its
Editor requested me to write for his paper. This I did for a few issues, but to
my great surprise, an article on the “Atonement,” was rejected and returned.
What counsels led him to such a conclusion, I did not know. But I could feel
that a crisis had come. It was not pleasant to be misunderstood, and thus
treated by brethren, but having the assurance that I was right, none of these
things moved me, and I quietly awaited the issue.
Soon my publisher sent
me word that he wanted to see me in reference to the republication of DAY DAWN,
and suggested that we meet at Dansville, N.Y. As this matter of republication
had been arranged at the time of his visit to Almont, before the re-writing of
the book, which was now done, I thought I knew what this proposed visit meant.
We met at Dansville in the early winter, in the presence of two others, and
after canvassing the situation for about twenty-four hours, I was informed that
he could not conscientiously publish the revised edition.
This was a heavy blow;
but dark as it then seemed, I have had great reason many times since then to
thank the Lord for that decision. I returned home feeling somewhat sad, but not
overwhelmed. I said to my wife, “It seems that the Lord does not want me to
have the book republished, and if so, I do not want to have it done.” Here the
matter rested for several weeks, nothing being said about it by me. Being in
Detroit, preaching, I called on a brother who was somewhat interested in my
work, and in the course of our visit he said,
“Brother Paton, I
understand that you are going to have DAY DAWN republished.”
“No,” I answered, “that
has been given up.”
“What does that mean?”
he asked, looking up with marked surprise.
I answered, “My
publisher has refused to do it.”
“On what ground?”
“On account of my
change of view on the Atonement.”
“Then publish it
yourself.”
“That,” I replied, “is
easier said than done.”
“But why not do it
yourself?” he persisted.
The answer was candid:
“The want of means.”
Think of my surprise
when he replied, “Go ahead and publish it in your own name; I will furnish the means.”
Thinking this might be
an impulse of his kind heart, expressed without due consideration, and without
knowledge of the amount of money required, and that he might regret it, I said,
“You surely do not realize what you are offering; you have no idea how much it
would cost.” To which he earnestly replied,
“I do not care how much
it costs.”
Still thinking he might
be surprised at the amount, I told him it would require a direct outlay of not
far from $800.00.
His reply was, “Is that all? Go ahead and do it and I
will run all risk of getting it back.”
This seemed another
Providential opening, and I acted accordingly. The book was published
forthwith. I may say, the brother never seemed to regret his offer. He supplied
me with the money as fast as it was needed, but, as two others, learning of the
facts, wanted to carry part of the burden, he was only required to furnish half
the amount named. He would not even take a note of hand, and refused to take
any interest at the final settlement. One of the other two furnished about
$300.00, and afterward said, “I do not want you to pay any of it back to me,
but let it go to furnish the poor free, and to help support your family as the
books are sold.”
This edition was only
3,000, and yet it has taken much longer to dispose of it than the other. This
has been partly due to the want of a means of advertising the book among those
who knew me, and who were interested in such matters; and, no doubt, in part to
the confessed effort on the part of the editor of Z.W.T. to hide the revised edition by publishing a false statement
that DAY DAWN was out of print, and by the promise of a similar book, with a
similar name; - which promise after several years of waiting was fulfilled. It
is not the first time that a strong-willed and earnest man has done evil that a
supposed good might come of it, or “verily thought he was doing God’s service,”
when persecuting those preaching or holding advanced truth. And God overrules
even the wrath of man for good. I rejoice in the assurance that the book with a
similar name, Millennial Dawn, as
well as Z.W.T., is doing much good,
reaching many we could not reach, and leading them to the knowledge of the same
general plan as that advanced in DAY DAWN, and causing many to go in advance of
their teacher, even to accept the larger hope as proclaimed by DAY DAWN and THE
WORLD’S HOPE. I have many evidences of this.
I would not mention
these unpleasant points only that they seem so intimately connected with this
“Experience,” and show some of the difficulties over which the Lord has brought
us.
After the publication
of the revised edition of DAY DAWN, in the summer of 1882, many friends urged
me to publish a periodical, as a means of spreading the gospel as I understand
it. This too was a silent ambition or earnest desire of my own heart, but I
waited for the moving of the waters. I wanted to be led by the Lord in the
matter, and I have long believed that the Lord in such things often moves
through his people. I waited to hear through them in whom I had confidence,
what he would have me do in the matter, assured that if he would have me
publish a paper, he would through them furnish the means.
Finally one brother
said, “Brother Paton, I think you must
publish a paper. These things are too good to be kept all to ourselves. And now
I make you this offer. If you will go ahead and publish a paper, sending out
samples to as many as possible, I will furnish means, if necessary, to the
extent of $1,000.00 for the first year.”
Knowing that his heart
was in the offer, and that he had the means at his command, I accepted the
suggestion as of the Lord, and began at once to make the arrangements needed.
But another trial of faith awaited me: for just when the first payment was
needed, the brother was laid upon a bed of sickness, and for about four months
was unable to do any business, or even to talk about these things.
Again I said to my
wife, “It seems as if these plans are to be frustrated.” She answered, “Well,
if the Lord wants the paper, he will furnish the mean: and if otherwise, better
stop now, than after you have gone further.” To this I agreed, and rested the
matter there.
But it was not allowed
to rest long. In about two weeks, a letter came from a brother, unknown
personally to me, who lived in Illinois, asking me to visit his place and give
a course of lectures. Soon after we met, he said,
“Do you know why I sent
for you? It was not only to hear you; there is another matter that controlled
me. We want a paper, and I think you
are the man to publish it. Have you ever thought of such a thing?”
I said I had thought of it, but that it did not seem
practicable. And he said, “Why?”
I was cautious in my
reply, being anxious to know what the Lord had been doing with him. He was
persistent:
“Is the difficulty a
financial one? Would you publish a paper if you had the means?”
I finally admitted that
I would. He then said:
“I think we must have
such a paper as you would publish, and I think there are others who will help;
but if it would start you in the
work, I have $500.00 for you at once.”
I then told him what
had been done, and how the work had been suspended. He had been moved in the
matter just in time to help out of the difficulty. From that event, THE WORLD’S
HOPE began to be published, and I have never doubted that I was doing the
Lord’s will in the matter.
The sick brother
recovered, and though it was not necessary for him to give as much as he had
offered, yet for years he gave liberally, to support this cause, and to send
the good tidings free to the poor. His heart is still in the work, but by a
peculiar turn of affairs, he has not, for the past year, been able to give as
before. This was another trial of faith; but still the means have been supplied
from other sources, and the poor are still being fed.
The HOPE has now been
published over seven years. For three years it was a monthly, and the printing
was done away from home. Then it was thought best to make a semi-monthly, and to
print it at home. The means were supplied to buy type, printing press,
paper-cutter and other furniture for the office. And the editor and his family,
(with some other help) have learned the printer’s trade, so far as this work
requires.
There have been many
little incidents of interest, that have been encouraging to faith. Some may
seek to account for these things as accidental; but it has become easier to see
the hand of the Lord in them. Some of these have been recorded. I will now
record another.
The last thing of
special importance with which the printing-office was furnished, was the
paper-cutter. I had learned that a new one, such as I needed, would cost
$80.00. But I found a second-hand one, that could be bought for $55.00. Soon
after, a brother said, “Isn’t there something else you need in your office?”
I did not wish to tell him about it, as he had already done so
much, so I said, “I think we are pretty well supplied.” But he was not
satisfied, and said, “I cannot help thinking there is something else you need,
and I want you to tell me, that I may help you.”
I then told him, but
that I wanted to obtain the means in some other way. He handed me $37.00, and
said I must take it, and I would perhaps get the balance somewhere else. I was
a little surprised at the peculiar amount. I would not have thought of it had
it been $35.00 or $40.00. On coming home, I received a letter from a brother
five hundred miles from the other, and who knew nothing of the facts, and the
letter contained a present of $48.00, - just enough, with the other, to make
the $55.00 needed.
So many such things
have occurred in our experience, that when doubts and fears arise, as they
sometimes do, the Saviour’s words seem appropriate, “O, thou of little faith,
wherefore didst thou doubt?”
These things are no
evidence of infallibility either of doctrine or life. But the Lord uses and
blesses imperfect agencies, to lead others into light. One earnest sister said,
“I am puzzled to know why the Lord can so bless such a heretic as you are.” Would he so bless one who had committed
an unpardonable sin?
For some time the idea
has been suggested that another edition of DAY DAWN is needed, as nearly all
are gone, and orders for them continue to come. This impression has been
growing stronger, and yet just how it
will be done, does not appear. The thought, as before, has been, if the work should be done, the Lord in some way
will supply the means. Within a few days, the brother in Illinois, who was
specially used for starting the HOPE, and who for years has been largely taken
up with another branch of work, so that we have had but little correspondence,
has again come to the front, to learn as to the need of the work, and proposes
to aid in getting out a new edition of DAY DAWN, and also suggests a plan
(given below) by which all who desire it, may help toward a larger circulation
of the paper and books. And I have just received from a friend in North
Carolina, ten dollars to help toward the new edition of DAY DAWN. It will not
require as much immediate outlay for another edition as the last, because much
of the work can be done at home. The sum of $500.00 will do about as much now,
as $800.00 did then.
This, then, is our
present attitude. It has been decided to begin at once; preparations having
already been partly made; and to proceed with the work as rapidly as the Lord
gives ability. We desire and expect his blessing on the effort, and we crave
the sympathy, prayers and co-operation of all who believe we have the truth,
and who desire a share in the work of making known the “good tidings of great
joy, which shall be unto all people.” We do not dictate as to what any one shall do, or how they shall work, but hope each one
will say, “Lord, what wilt thou have
me to do?” And may he direct us all to his glory, and the blessing of many.
This experience is
given by request, and as an illustration of some of the Lord’s ways. Believing
that “Thus far the Lord has led me on,” I would thank him, and still go on with
courage.
PLAN OF THE WORK
WE will endeavor to
describe the plan of work which has been suggested by the brother before
mentioned. Its object is to advertise and circulate THE WORLD’S HOPE, DAY DAWN
and MOSES AND CHRIST, and to secure to each reader of the HOPE a copy of each
book. We have decided to try it, as it seems right, and thinking it more
blessed to try to do a good work and fail, than not to try at all.
The plan is to appoint
each reader of the HOPE, who desires to co-operate with us in this work, an
agent for the sale of the book, MOSES AND CHRIST, urging that each one who has
not a copy already, will obtain one. Each agent thus appointed may do the work
without even leaving home. To this end, let each one send us a two-cent postage
stamp, and we will forward him a package of twenty envelopes and the same
number of printed copies of a circular letter, to be signed by the agent and
mailed to twenty persons of his own choice. The letter will advertise our
works, and invite each one receiving it to send for a copy of MOSES AND CHRIST.
If all the twenty respond, the agent will receive as his reward, a cloth-bound
copy of DAY DAWN, and credit of a year’s subscription to THE WORLD’S HOPE. Thus
each reader will possess both books. If all do not respond, the agent will be
supplied with more letters, if he wishes, till twenty do respond; but a credit
of nine cents will be given to the agent for each sale he secures, though all
the twenty do not respond.
The package of letters
sent out will all be numbered, and, in our account book, the number of the package
will be marked beside the name of the agent to whom it is sent. Then if each
agent will send us a list of the names and post offices to whom he sends the
letters, and if each one receiving such a letter, and sending for a book, will
return the circular letter to us, we can then give each agent the proper
credit.
Each one sending for
the book, MOSES AND CHRIST, may also send for a package of letters, and by
acting as agent, obtain the reward of DAY DAWN and WORLD’S HOPE, like the
others.”
By co-operating with us
in this plan, many who have expressed a desire to do something in this cause,
but knew not how, will have a good opportunity. Let this statement of the plan
be carefully studied, and then let those interested, and who are willing to
make the needed effort, send the two-cent stamp for the package of letters.
The prices of the
books, postage paid, are as follows: MOSES AND CHRIST, in paper cover, 30
cents; cloth-bound, 50 cents; DAY DAWN, in paper cover, 50 cents; cloth-bound,
75 cents. THE WORLD’S HOPE is $1.00 a year.
ADDRESS: J.H. PATON,
Almont, Mich. (Feb. 15, 1890.)
“Whatever thy hand
findeth to do, do it with thy might.” – Eccle. ix. 10.