Bob Thiel has recently quoted extensively from Stephen Flurry's book on the matter of Herbert Armstrong's plagiarism. It seems the Stephen just doesn't accept it, and Bob is quick to agree.
"While it is true that Mr. Armstrong read Judah’s Scepter and Joseph’s Birthright, along with other books about the “Anglo-Israel” theory, he did not copy those works. Joe Jr. made that dishonest claim without any supportive evidence whatsoever, simply because he dislikes Mr. Armstrong and doesn’t agree with the book that more than 6 million people requested." (Flurry Jr.)
"PCG's Stephen Flurry, anti-COG critics notwithstanding, is correct that the books are not the same... The PLAIN TRUTH is that HWA came to a variety of different conclusions than J. Allen did, the books are not the same, and I do not believe that HWA plagiarized it." (Bob)
No supportive evidence whatsoever? Hogwash.
Here, for the edification of Stephen, are a few choice examples out of hundreds of possibilities. I've double checked the quotes - the details are at the bottom if anyone wants them. In fact, you might want to see if you can identify who wrote which.
1a. Remember that the term "Jew" is merely a nickname for "Judah." Hence, it applies to only to the one nation, or House of Judah only - never to the House of Israel.
1b. The name Jew is derived from, or rather is a corruption of, the name Judah.... Hence it is that the names Jew and Jews are applied only to the people who composed the kingdom of Judah.
2a. But the great bulk of Israelites are not the Jews, just as the great bulk of Americans are not Californians, and yet all Californians are Americans.
2b. Jews are Israelites, just as Californians are Americans. But most Israelites are not Jews, just as most Americans are not Californians.
3a. That Dan's leap landed him in Ireland is evident, for in that island we find to this day Dans-Lough, Dan-Sower, Dan-Monism, Dun-dalke, Dun-drum, Don-egal Bay and Don-egal City, with Dun-glow and Lon-don-derry just north of them.
3b. And in Ireland we find they left these "waymarks": "Dans-Laugh," "Dan-Sower," "Dun-dalke," "Dun-drum," "Don-egal Bay," "Don-egal City," "Dun-glow," "Lon-don-derry,"...
I remember reading a passage from Allen to a fellow church member way back in the 70s. The reaction? "That sounds just like Mr Armstrong!" Anyone being honest with the two books would, in my opinion, come to the same conclusion.
But True Believers care little for the facts I guess. No, Mr Armstrong did NOT plagiarise; no Mr Armstrong was NOT an alcoholic, no Mr Armstrong did NOT have sex with his own daughter: reminiscent of German housekeeper Gretchen Kraus in the 80s TV series Benson calling out "I can't HEAR you!"
When your beloved idol is showing the cracks it's often easier to apply another layer of whitewash and pretend otherwise.
Answers: (1) Armstrong 1967 p.80, (2) Allen 1902 p.66, (3) Allen 1902 p.71, (4) Armstrong 1967 p.82, (5) Allen 1902 p.266-267, (6) Armstrong 1967 p.117-118.
179 comments:
The big difference between Mr. Allen's and Mr. Armstrong's writings is that Mr. Armstrong discussed specific future prophecies for Israel, such as the coming captivity and punishment which Allen did not. BI is not Allen's invention. It long preceded Allen.
So much for the Armsrong and "Armstrongite" bashing.
It isn't clear whether we liked Benson more before he became governor or after.
Maybe we would have a better time if we merely chose different soap operas and map the Armstrongist Characters to it.
As for Herbert Armstrong going one up on Allen by promoting specific future prophecies for Israel, such as the coming captivity and punishment, let us say that Armstrong should have stopped short with just plagiarizing the material. Those specific future prophecies turned out to make Herbert Armstrong a false prophet -- and that is how he singlehandedly managed to thoroughly discredit British Israelism. We have him going all the way back to the Thirties' "Bible Advocate" spouting wild-eyed preachments of the future -- an harbinger of things to come -- followed by his declaration during World War II that the United States and Britain would lose the War, based on British Israelism. This is not to mention 1975 in Prophecy: A total embarrassment if ever there was one and one in which all credibility of Herbert Armstrong and his beloved British Israelism was forever smashed. Except people kept believing it even after "The Great Disappointment".
Now there are those who say that Herbert Armstrong had a prediction come true. Bully for him. It only takes one false prophecy to make a false prophet. Herbert Armstrong had at least 100 of them. He claimed not to be a prophet, but making a prediction in coworker letters and signing it "In Jesus' Name" just puts blasphemy to the idolatry. People staunchly ignore "from such turn away". People should look
at the other false prophecies of the past before deciding to "support" Herbert
Armstrong in his madness.
Herbert Armstrong should have stuck with plagiarizing Identity Theft. Jews today refute BI vigorously for valid reasons.
There's just no way to put the genie back in the bottle, once Pandora's Box has been opened: Herbert Armstrong quite obviously stole from Allen [and a lot of others], quoting from reference works he found in the Portland, Oregon library all those years ago, he spouted false prophecies, and even if you vigorously defend him on the incest charge, consider that he let his son romp with 200+ AC coeds and we all had to pony up for his $5 million settlement for the divorce from Ramona.
It would seem the best time of all to let the chips fall where they may and stop making excuses for Herbert Armstrong: Take the bitter pill of Dr. Phil and start taking responsibility without making excuses as a codependent.
"The big difference between Mr. Allen's and Mr. Armstrong's writings is that Mr. Armstrong discussed specific future prophecies for Israel, such as the coming captivity and punishment which Allen did not. BI is not Allen's invention. It long preceded Allen."
Big whoop de doo. Just because you plagiarise a book and then add a couple chapters of your own to what you plagiarised, that doesn't mean you didn't plagiarise the book. You've committed the "red herring" fallacy. Rather than refute the evidence of plagiarism, you're trying to change the subject.
I'll re-post here what I originally said down below in the "BI Challenged" commentbox: Herbert Armstrong's plagiarism of Allen is pretty clear to anyone who is willing to open his eyes. As Ralph Orr said:
"Armstrong’s dependence on Allen is more evident in his later work, The United States and British Commonwealth in Prophecy. Though Allen is never mentioned in that text, the book so tightly follows Allen that the plagiarism is obvious."
But, as Orr explains, the plagiarism of Allen actually predates US&BCIP, but first shows up in Armstrong's early writing, "What is the Third Angel's Message?" --
"Armstrong’s first direct quote of Allen in What is the Third Angel’s Message? is from page 227 of Judah’s Sceptre and Joseph’s Birthright: 'It is a well-known fact that the history of no country on the face of the earth has so puzzled historians as that of Ireland.' Armstrong’s second quotation, 'It is unmistakably recorded in British history that the earliest settlers in Wales and southern England were called Simonii,' is found in Allen on page 275. Allen frequently used phrases such as 'It is a well-known fact,' and 'It is unmistakably recorded' to lend an air of authority to his work."
http://www.wcg.org/lit/prophecy/anglo/howanglo.htm
Now, to set the cat among the pigeons. Ummmm....let's see, how do I say this without you all exclaiming, "How gauche!"? What's so bad about copying what someone said or wrote, particularly if it is in the public domain? Keep in mind that copyright laws and the odour attendant to plagarism are a fairly modern convention. At one time it was not considered the abomination it is deemed to be today.
Alright, the Armstrong book contains no bibliography, but in his defense I remember that somewhere, and I suspect it was in the expanded serialized autobiography that appeared in the PT, HWA wrote that he had learned about BI from a manuscript he had received from a minister in Florida. Come to think of it, he at various places disclosed the origins of various doctrines. For example, he said that he learned about church government from a paper and other info that a couple of underlings had presented (Hoeh and Meredith, I think), he formulated a lot of his World Tomorrow booklet from a Gerald Waterhouse thesis, he relied on Robert Kuhn for what he taught about the spirit in man, and so on. I went through my experience in WCG aware that he had derived doctrine from other people, and the reason I knew it was his own disclosures. I don't know why these admissions eluded everyone else.
this is such a common tatic....if you can't discredit the argument, try to discredit the individual...
such a common tatic...if you can't counter the argument, try to discredit the person....
the facts all point to BI, and no one can counter that, so they turn the focus to the man, and try to discredit him (as if that will disprove BI).
hmmm, not sure how that happened, but at least the post went through...lol
Anonymous said:
"I went through my experience in WCG aware that he had derived doctrine from other people, and the reason I knew it was his own disclosures. I don't know why these admissions eluded everyone else."
My guess is either a) it did not elude them, so they are being disingenuous on purpose in order to stick it to HWA; or, 2) it eluded them because they are so blinded by their own personal hatred of HWA--much like Joe and the boys (known not to be friends of the truth themselves).
Back in the day when HWA was writing using various sources, including Allen's work, the approach regarding quotations was completely different. Back then it seems to have followed the line of "imitation is the sincerest form of praise" as opposed to "hey, you can't write something so close to what I have--I'm gonna sue your pants off!"
Some seem to forget that HWA's life spanned from the horse and buggy age to the Space Age and a little furter. When he published his writtings on BI without the bibliography or other attributons required today, it was a completely different environment; one without those requirements.
Oh, and just one more overall point: it may be that HWA was simply ahead of his time. Who else predicted--well in advance--that Germany would rise from the ashes to become the strong-man of Europe once again (at a time when Germany was a pile of rubble), the fall of the Berlin wall, the fall of the USSR, the amalgamation of the two Germanys back into one, the pairing of Eastern and Western Europe, and the rise of the European Community (now Union) to economic and military prominence on the world stage? Why land's sake, I do believe that was good ol' Herbert W. Armstrong.
In a previous post somewhere in this blog site, somebody accused Mr. Apartian of confirming that HWA had incest with one of his daughters. Mr. Apartian has been asked and denies this--he never said that HWA ever did such a thing. The poster who "quoted" him is lying.
HWA did apparently have difficulty believing that his own son was a profligate seducer of women; I guess it is difficult for a father to believe such evil of his own kids. Question: those of you who do have sons old enough to, well, have "carnal knowlege" of a young woman--if someone came to you today and told you he was sleeping around like an alley cat, would you believe it easily? Not having a son myself, I can't answer with certainty, but I imagine I would have to see a heck of a lot of actual proof (not just someone's verbal accusation) before I would believe it.
Hey, wasn't it Gene Hogberg who said that he met a power broker in the European Community/Union (Otto Von Hapsburg, as I recall), who said something to him along the lines of "Mr. Hogberg, you are a good American. If you ever find yourself in a concentration camp in Europe, give them my name and I will get you out"?
Don't forget that Paul himself thought that Christ will come during his time when he said "...then we which we are alive be caught up together with them [the resurrected] in the cloud...'.
We do not call Paul a false prophet because of this, do we?
Gavin,
http://patris.apu.edu.
offcampus.resources.
apu.edu/search/
a?SEARCH=
tkach&searchscope=
32&SUBMIT=Submit+
Search
As long as you are comparing one document with another, why not try to find some differences in Transformed by Truth sold in 1997, and the library copy of Tkachjr's so called doctoral thesis he turned in for full academic credit three years later (2000) at Azusa?
Mike Feazell signed this academic abortion dead on arrival, but sure didn't spellcheck it. Riddled with errors.
Stan
Let me get this straight.
Flurry & Thiel say Herb didn't copy.
AW gives examples of copying.
The counter-response?
* Herb put a different spin on it.
* Plagiarism isn't so bad.
* You're attacking the person.
* He was just ahead of his time (???)
* A Dibar Apartian story about non-incest.
* Paul made false prophecies too.
Jared picked up the first red herring, but at the rate we're going Gavin could open a pickled herring factory. Talk about being in denial!
Why not just face it: he copied. And for anyone who thinks the rules were different back then, consider that plagiarism is an issue with the earlier Adventist prophetess Ellen White too, and I don't see the Herb team springing to her defence.
HWA did apparently have difficulty believing that his own son was a profligate seducer of women;
Clinton's dad probably would have felt the same way if he had lived when his son was in office.
Now are we talking about the same Herbert Armstrong that stated he never got his doctrine from any man but from God? If this is the case BI and the Allen work justify these kinds of posts against HWA. Also i can see from these blogs that the defenders of Armstrongism have to go out on a very long limb of the tree to make HWA look good. HWA told all to stay close to the trunk of the tree. Again by HWA's own words he has always convicted himself as being a false prophet, as well as a plagerist. And that is just a small part of what he had said and wrote over the years that have haunted his legacy.These blogs have some very well informed and educated people who have sifted out the chaff from the wheat and posted the "REAL TRUTH" about HWA and cronies.
You people who cling to your British Israelism, and the so-called understanding it brings regarding the time of the end seem awfully cocksure of yourselves.
I challenge you to go to http:/www.imninalu.net/myths-brits.htm, and invest some time in reading the materials presented there.
I have to warn you, though. If you read the entire essay, there is no way you'll be able to continue believing in British
Israelism!
Also, don't be coming back here to report that you only read the first couple of pages, and then give a lame excuse for not reading the whole thing. Be open minded, and read the entire essay! If you are really interested in truth rather than ACOG dogma, now's the time to show it!
BB
Correction! There should be two slashes between http: and www.
Apologies.
BB
Herbert Armstrong is a late-comer on the scene re the identity of Western Europe,real or assumed.
Our family was working on Israeli connections back in the 1600s and 1700s.
One rellie,whilst on a botanical expedition to Lapland collected toponymical data for his later writings.
This chap was called Olof Rudbeck the Younger,who because he knew Greek and Hebrew was able to make comparisons between Lappish and Hebrew.His grandfather had knowledge of the traditions and myths,also.
So, I have more than just a passing interest in these matters.
Whether Olof Rudbeck,the Younger,was right only time will tell.
Jorgheinz
"It only takes one false prophecy to make a false prophet."
Tis true...and along with...
"But the prophet who presumes to speak a word in my name which I have not commanded him to speak, or who speaks in the name of other gods, that same prophet shall die. And if you say in your heart, ‘How may we know the word which YAHWEH has not spoken? When a prophet speaks in the name of YAHWEH, if the word does not come to pass or come true, that is a word which YAHWEH has not spoken; the prophet has spoken presumptuously, you need not be afraid of him." (Deuteronomy Chapter 18 verse 20)
...we can also let go of the madness and flubs of Isaiah, Jeremiah and Ezekiel at least and cut the legs out from under the loons that use these guys to interprate the news...
There were, of course, a number of "Isaiahs" and competing prophecies in the texts. Some for the Torah, some against and some neutral. Some may also have been planeted and known false to give the other guys writing their segments a black eye based on Deut.
Nothing is as it appears and these authors didn't even predict events in their own times well, much less in ours...
BI is BS and a source of unending racisim and ignorance. We're all one and the same part of the one bigger thing, whatever that is. I managed an entire career never giving as sermon on BI. It was the "come on folks, where do babies come from," that got me in Zebulon..I mean Dutch. :)
To those who may "cling' to Armstrongism using the argument of it being no big deal, i must ask a few questions.
(1). Would you believe that the end of the age started in 1936?
Or 1972?
(2). Do you believe HWA and his cronies when they say Herbert Armstrong and WCG NEVER set dates?
(3). Do you beleive if HWA and Hoeh, Meredith etc. ever did speak from the authority of GOD and make prophecies that did not come about in the time-frame predicted?
I wonder how many out there in HWA land ever took the time to see if this stuff is true or not.
If so maybe all the splinters and their members would fold up shop and seek where the real truth is.
For those interested just look up predictions and dates set for the end time using exact years in the March 1934, June-July 1934 , June 1953 and September 1955 Plain Truth magazines. And don't forget the infamous "1975 in Prophecy".
Then tell us how it is not a big deal. There are many more reference for you to dig out for yourselves about the hypocracy . To me when they repeatedly lied, deceived and then would never admit their mistake, the injustice and damage to many was set in stone. To those seeking "Truth", it is a big deal.
BI, and plagerism is just the tip of the iceberg when dealing with the doctrines of Herbert Armstrong.
jim hamby
As has been pointed out, do we accuse Paul a liar and false teacher because he claimed that he and the brethreon will "be caught up together with them [the resurrected ones] in the clouds"?
Now what is the point here?
Okay let us dump Mr. Armstrong
for all you want.
Does that make the BI false?
Or is the view about BI dependent on whatever mistakes Mr. Armstrong committed?
Are we using Mr. Armstrong as an excuse to reject every that has to do with COG's?
Is that honest thinking?
If I may ask all the anonymous poster here a little favor: Could you come up with a "handle" or pseudonym here so the rest of us can more easily reply to each post? It's a pain in the hinder parts to have to say, "The anonymous poster in comment no. 7 said," and "The anonymous poster in comment no. 13 said," etc.
Anyway, as Ned observed, now that the evidence is undeniable that Bob Thiel and Stephen Flurry don't know what they're talking about, that Herbert Armstrong really was guilty of plagiarising J.H. Allen's writings and pretending they were his own ideas, the only responses the Armstrongists here have been able to come up with are to dig in their heels and to fling more rotting red herrings. But those responses are really another way of admitting that Bob Thiel and Stephen Flurry are wrong about Herbert Armstrong's plagiarism.
Of all those red herrings, I think my favorites are, "What's so bad about stealing somebody else's ideas and palming them off as your own?" and "Joe Tkach Jr. plagiarised himself!" (is it even possible to plagiarise one's own work???) But "Dibar Apartian reportedly denies saying what others report he said about Herbert Armstrong's incest" is also a front-runner.
Anonymous 666 here.
Let all of those who support Herbert Armstrong's version of plagiarized British Israelism please, please come up with:
1) Original DNA of Ephraimites and Mannassites of circa 1800 B.C.;
2) DNA tests of pure blooded all Americans today;
3) Correlations of DNA from 1) and 2) above to prove that Americans are of the Tribe of Manasseh;
4) Actual unusual prophecies Herbert Armstrong gave based on Scripture and British Israelism concerning the validated identity of Manasseh as the United States which have actually come true and are validated.
In addition, prove that Herbert Armstrong was not a liar and false prophet committing idolatry.
After you have proved these things there are just three more things:
1) Prove you are converted;
2) Prove your humility and give three examples;
3) Give us objective proof that the fantasies based on distorted perceptions created out of thin air from dubious sources are really, truly going to come true.
It's time to put up or shut up: We've heard enough excuses and want you to admit where you are so very wrong, just for once. It doesn't seem that your god is supporting you in your cause.
In case anyone is interested in plagiarism in general, I have plagiarized an article from The Guardian from Great Britain, from 23rd November 2005.
In reality I suppose it’s not plagiarized, as I have acknowledged where it came from.
- - - -
A history of plagiarism (not my own work)
Stephen Moss
Wednesday November 23, 2005
The Guardian
"Immature poets imitate; mature poets steal" - TS Eliot
Plagiarism - the attempt to pass off the ideas, research, theories or words of others as one's own - is a serious academic offence. A new study by the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority warns that exam boards appear to be failing to spot cheating, even though the number of cases of fraud is increasing. Last year, 3,600 teenagers were caught breaching the rules - a 9% rise on the previous year.
The word plagiarism derives from Latin roots: plagiarius, an abductor, and plagiare, to steal. An example of plagiarism would be copying this definition and pasting straight into a report. Plagiarism is a very ancient art. Shakespeare stole most of his historical plots directly from Holinshed. Laurence Sterne and Samuel Taylor Coleridge were both accused of plagiarism. The extent of Coleridge's plagiarism has been debated by scholars since Thomas de Quincey, himself an accomplished borrower, published an exposé in Tait's Magazine a couple of weeks after Coleridge's death. Oscar Wilde was repeatedly accused of plagiarism: hence the celebrated exchange with Whistler: "I wish I'd said that, James."
"Don't worry, Oscar, you will."
In modern times, plagiarism is not limited to lazy and dishonest students. Martin Luther King plagiarised part of a chapter of his doctoral thesis. George Harrison was successfully sued for plagiarising the Chiffons' He's So Fine for My Sweet Lord. Alex Haley copied large passages of his novel Roots from The African by Harold Courlander. Princess Michael was accused of plagiarism over her book on royal brides. Jayson Blair, then a reporter for the New York Times, plagiarised many articles and faked quotes.
In 1997, less than six months after winning the Booker prize, Graham Swift's Last Orders was at the centre of accusations that the author had crossed the line between inspiration and plagiarism by "directly imitating" an earlier work, the 1930 novel As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner. Confronted with the accusations, Swift said his book was an "echo" of Faulkner's.
Originality has mattered a great deal in the last 200 years, though the importance we attach to it may be declining. TS Eliot's The Waste Land was critical. To read The Waste Land is also to read Shakespeare, Chaucer, Webster and many others. According to one critic, Eliot practises a "verbal kleptomania". In that sense, then, all culture is plagiarism. "I can sum up my thoughts on this in two lines," said novelist Julian Barnes of the Swift-Faulkner affair. "When Brahms wrote his first symphony, he was accused of having used a big theme from Beethoven's Ninth. His reply was that any fool could see that."
• We apologise for the fact that three words of the above piece are the author's own.
Sources: www.collegeboard.com; www.plagiarism.org; www.hnn.us; www.wikipedia.org; The Johns Hopkins Guide to Literary Theory and Criticism; The Columbia Encyclopaedia (sixth edition); essay by David Bouchier on www.wshu.org; essay by Anthony Julius in the Guardian November 30 1996; Guardian news reports, November 24 1986, March 10 1997, July 11 1997, November 22 2005
And to see some of those on this post's comments, i must say that God the Father and Christ must not only condone this behaviour from his true ministers, but promote it. Lying is ok and covering it all up is ok too!
After all we are not to questions God's anointed right?
Of course lying is ok as long as it furthers their idea of the gospel!
Hwa always told a bigger lie to cover up the previous one. He would use the "wag the dog" trick as well (remember the receivership?)
From the beginning when he said he was nver a part of COG7, never took money from them etc. Well if you accept it as true, then how come if he was never part and parcel with them, he was ordained by them?
After all credibility is a factor here with HWA and his church. How was it he could leave COG7 and start his own church? It was so against his position on Church Government!. He could adamantly set dates and then deny them over and over. He could set a doctrine over just one scripture (read his 'Proof of the Bible'), this when David Jon Hill had written a article about the 12 rules of bible study, where one of them was about not using one scripture to set doctrine. Of the other 11, if you look at them, you will see that HWA and company botched most of them. And this being a WCG sactioned article in two successive GN's. But then Hoeh comes around and states later that HWA was not wrong but Adam Clarkes Commentary was to blame! Now that is a real stretch but we all were to believe it because it came from the Apostle or one of his "true?" ministers.
So plagerism coming from the mind of a sociopath, is to be set in stone as if coming from God himself. That is the brainwashing the sheep were subjected to. And to top it all off, they would twist and misquote scripture by leading sheep to only parts of scripture to back up their belief system.
That was another of the points David Jon Hill's Good News articles stated that HWA and WCG went contrary to( that of reading the texts in context), usually utilizing the scriptures before and after to get the gist of what was being said. But instead of doing this, the "here a little" proof texting was used and then to back it up, misquote the secular sources and even bible references. Anything to keep their agenda.
But i see here that the supporters of HWA will still defend him , so instead of just the facts, they will compromise the "real truth".
rod 2
In other words, a person (Mr. Armstrong in this case) is guilty unless proven otherwise.
but on the other hand Mr. Allen is not guilty (even if he "copied" from people like Richard Brothers and John Wilson who wrote about BI long before Allen saw light), unless proven otherwise.
I am not fond of Mr. Armstrong, either. But I do not let that blind my thinking.
I guess it is like one who quotes from a source, as long as he indeed quotes from that source, and accurately, then he does not need to carry it out to the previous tier to see if that one quoted accurately, for he is just giving due to the one he quotes. That is fine. However if one does not give due regard to the source quoted, or takes the information into his own domain as if coming from him only . Then a problem arises, as is the case of HWA.
Allen ,if he did not use his source correctly, would be an issue unwarranted here.
"In other words, a person (Mr. Armstrong in this case) is guilty unless proven otherwise."
No, he's guilty of plagiarism because the evidence proves he is guilty.
Unless you have evidence that "J.H. Allen" was actually a nom de plume of Herbert Armstrong?
Anonymous 666 here:
One of the problems of plagiarized plagiarism is that the plagiarized materials were often plagiarized.
For example, Ellen G. White posited that Waldensians were part of the true church as Sabbatarians. Then Dugger and Dodd plagiarized from her and Herbert Armstrong picked it up as gospel truth.
The irony is that morons keep saying that Waldensians were Sabbath keepers, even though they themselves today say they never were. The imbecilles need to draw the curve and pick the points to match: There are seven church eras [which probably isn't true], so therefore we must be able to identify them in history. Pick a group. Why they're [pick a church on the mail route] xxxx. Therefore, since we are from xxxx and yyyy, we are the true church. Moreover, we are now the [pick an era].
Ministers and writers for the flagship magazines are good at taking snippets and snatches of something and building an entire superstructure. It's like being lost in the woods and 10 years later, people find you with a mansion with a three car garage, 60" flat screen HD TV, Satellite, tri-wave ovens and an SUV all built from available materials found while you were lost. Or reading a cover of a book and coming up with a Sabbath sermon based on it the next day -- sometimes reversing the whole premise of the book.
Not only are these folks thieves, they are master story tellers, weaving fantasies out of the whole cloth of distorted perception for the entertainment and consumption of abject fools and idiots.
Jim Hamby asks:
Do you believe HWA and his cronies when they say Herbert Armstrong and WCG NEVER set dates?
Anyone who says HWA never set dates is either ignorant or lying. This is one of the reasons RCM says even his famous "2017" is not a firm date, but is just his best attempt at pulling the current evidence together. RCM has gotten in trouble with the Armstrongist idolaters for his criticisms of HWA's date-setting, and he is determined not to make that same mistake himself.
Although RCM's critics attack him for focusing so much on 2017, if they would listen they would realize he is doing the opposite of what HWA did, because he admits up front that he doesn't know the exact timing, and says he wants LCG to avoid the mistakes HWA made in setting dates.
I thought RCM was going with 2012, instead of the 2017 you stated. Also RCM has said on the videos sent out to the churches that HWA and WCG NEVER set dates,came close but never did. This is recent and is what i was referring to, and is deceiving as RCM was around during the times of some of this date setting and was a part of it at that time when he wrote some of his articles. By the way in the past in WCG, even Dr. Hoeh wrote that times of the gentiles and how some had picked dates such as 1936, and they were mere guesses. This in the June 1953 and September 1955 in the Plain Truth magazines . Since HWA had very strongly not guessed but set a date for this in 1934 in the March and June-july PT's, one can see where the coverups over the years began. And do not forgert Hoeh's and HWA's explanation for the 1975 in Prophecy not coming about. These guys as well as RCM have deceived everyone willing to be with these comments and writings. This stuff is readily available for your edification and if you do not remember RCm's statement's on never setting dates, you may want to ask others in LCG, as he has said this on many occasions.
jim hamby
A bit of oddball amplification regarding the non attributed wholesale use of another person’s material:
Although HWA was indeed quite old and is indeed quite dead for a very long time, the conventions regarding what is and is not plagiarism predate him by a long shot. In fact, one account I have read mentions that Armstrong was called out on this issue when he was writing for Bible Advocate. We are not looking at this with a jaded eye. HWA was an unabashed plagiarist. He knew it. He just didn’t care and didn’t care when he was found out.
As for his conduct in regards to GTA’s humping every woman who would have him, the conclusion one must draw when looking at the entire history of the WCG is that HWA knew about it for a long time and just whipped it out to use as ammunition against his son during their many power struggles.
Or
HWA was far more senile far earlier than anyone suspected.
Or
I think our not disclosed identity posters KNOW the PLAIN TRUTH on this issue intellectually, but are unwilling to accept it emotionally. The story goes a little like this:
I lost track of my son when he was in the Navy, although he was stateside for most of his tour and could have visited his mother and myself at our college. His mother was always very concerned about him and demanded that I be the man in this situation and make every attempt to keep in contact with him. I told him not to join the Navy to begin with and felt that his doing so was a deliberate act to publicly embarrass me and my work. My other son and I were very busy with the work that we founded and keeping track of this errant son was a frequent distraction.
Moreover, it was entirely distasteful. Besides dragging me from my highly profitable enterprise, I had found my youngest son involved with people of low breeding and seemingly deviant behavior. The tattoos, the drinking and his living arrangements all spelled out what type of man my youngest child had become. I am lucky that my wife was not as worldly as I. Had she suspected the truth, it would have broken her heart.
Beyond being by any measure deviant, my son’s lifestyle carried with it certain hazards. Most of his occasional problems could be solved by money. In this way, I suppose he is not unlike many adult children. Due to his entanglements, I had to carry out my bail outs with a degree of discretion not normally expected. In the end, I felt that this additional entitlement of his was a form of blackmail.
At the point that I was ready to cut him free for good, he escalated his normal level of crisis to the point where my wife demanded that I bring the boy home. The Korean War then broke out and my son was placed on a float. As opposed to getting him away from trouble, it became very clear that he would now be confined by these problems he had created for himself. I am not sure what or how much my wife knew, but she became emphatic that when my youngest son was released from service, he would come to live with us at our campus.
That I had no leverage over an adult child was of absolutely no consequence to her. By that I mean that she had decided and it was now my business to make it so. Period.
So I bribed the kid. I gave him his own house. I gave him a do nothing job in the mailroom of our enterprise. All of this was his—as long as the underground interludes he had previously been so engrossed in remained a thing of the past.
My efforts were blessed. He started chasing girls. Simple conventional misbehavior was a marked improvement. Moreover, he became an asset to my enterprise, serving as his brother’s second and my occasional editorial henchman. He had been lost and he had been found and we would slay the fatted calf. He bloomed, right where his mother could see him and bring her joy.
When his older brother was suddenly taken from us, he stepped in without missing a beat. Freed from his brother’s shadow, he bloomed again. He was better than me in my own medium, radio. Thanks to his mother’s good looks, he was the fit for television that I could never have been.
I was soon dealing with a giant. As opposed to being proud, a father’s luxury, I found myself disposed to quite another emotion. Over time, that emotion was all that I could feel towards him.
Anonymous 666 here:
Mark Lax has brought up several good points here. He sees the situation with a clear head -- something many of us should be jealous of.
In this issue of plagiarism, there is an issue which died in the wool Armstrongists should consider: If God really exists, is righteous and really cares, then He would be very displeased that Herbert Armstrong was a plagiarist, a liar and a false prophet setting dates perpetually missed, among other things.
Peter wrote that judgment begins at the house of God. Therefore, those Armstrongist idolaters who whore after the liars, thieves and whores of the churches of God, are all co-conspirators and accessory after the fact for the sins of the leadership. Not only do the Armstrongist idolaters protect and cover up the outrageous behavior, but they *pay* their wicked leaders to support them in their victimization. When this is pointed out the them, they become defiant -- and that defiance looks a lot like the unpardonable sin, blaspheming the Holy Spirit.
So forget the United States and Britain as being the lost house of Israel being punished for Sabbath breaking and idolatry. Just forget it. Those blessings which are supposed to accrue to the Spiritual House of Israel will be taken away, and the Armstrongist Churches of God will be punished, likely seven times over, before God would even *think* to punish the Brits and Americans under the pall of British Israelism.
Expect bad weather.
Expect a lot of bad things.
The days of Church of God members being protected from the destruction of such things as the falling Twin Trade Towers may well be over. Certainly, one view is that the Living Dead Church of God under Meredith has already gotten a sample of God's wrath from the Milwaukee murders and the personal plagues of sicknesses of the Rod of God. It would appear the God has allowed Satan to stir up adversaries, particularly David Pack -- not discounting the vultures of United waiting in the wings to swoop in. Death awaits. As that song says, "It won't be long now".
The splinters keep spintering, plagiarism increases as the Day of Judgment draws near. Gerald Flurry was actually caught and sued over it by the Worldwide Church of God, who, when they received bundles of mammon of this world, cheerfully gave up and ceased to care any longer. One wonders what God has in store beyond the online DUI records of the six-pack prophet.
It goes on and on in an unending soap opera rendering unbelievable entertainment just a shade under that of Jack Bauer on "24". The skulduggery is a wonder to watch from the sidelines as the battle lines are drawn and the churches of God go into skirmishes over such things as "A Sabbath Test". The fireworks should be fun to behold.
As a side note, for those not tapped in to the most recent renderings of church infighting, there has been a revolution at the Christian Churches of God: The new group is bigger, happier and friendlier with faces familiar to the genera, taking its new form at:
http://www.assemblyofeloah.org/
Same nutty doctrines 5 deviations from the mean of the mainstream churches of God, but still... escape into a quieter domain is, if not living well, certainly living much better. Wade Ewart Cox is effectually dead and except for a moderately large website, nothing at all. And the website... has gone into disuse much as the Tabernacle at Shiloh. It's maintenance looks like it's a nightmare and should certainly be an embarrassment to it's cultmeister owner.
But here's a head's up: Scripture fairly demands that believers mark those who cause division. Just where has United, Living and the rest ever marked the CCg for causing divisions? Certainly, declaring the Koran equal to the Bible should at least raise a squeak of protest. But no, yet again, the churches of God flagrantly disobey God and Scripture to do their own thing. If there is a God who cares, they will certainly smart for that.
Finally, for you scofflaws who go where Angels fear to tread, here's a Scripture you should consider:
Revelation 22:15 For without are dogs, and sorcerers, and whoremongers, and murderers, and idolaters, and whosoever loveth and maketh a lie.
Yes, the male prostitutes won't make into the Kingdom. That's a given in Scripture. Sorcerers are obviously of Satan the Devil. And people can sort of get the idea that whowemongers and murderers wouldn't be acceptable companions of God the Father and Jesus Christ for all eternity. However, idolators is problematic, since Armstrongists continue to insist putting a man between them and God. It gets much worse right at the end: You Armstrongists who love and make lies, you are out. Expect weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth as you are thrown into the Lake of Fire for your inattention to God's Declaration. Judgment begins with you and you have miserably failed the test.
The day I started becoming suspicious of BI was when I asked Ron Dart if he believed in the Calvinist rule of Sola Scriptura (Solely Scripture). He said, “that's a big subject, but no, no I do not.” Then he told me to get away somewhere quiet and private and think about it carefully, pray about it, and I'd come to see that sola scriptura could not be correct. I thought that was an odd and rather simplistic answer from one a Bible teacher, so I pressed him a little further and asked him to briefly explain why he didn't believe in it. After all, I said, the church always taught us to prove doctrines from the Bible. You know, line upon line, etc. I always assumed the church believed in this rule. Mr. Dart replied that there were just too many issues related to doctrines that could not be answered using the principle of sola scriptura (using only the Bible to prove it out); such as: how to figure the calendar and Holy Days, and the identity of the modern day Israel as the US and GB. I was struck at that moment with the realization that I had ignorantly gone through nearly twenty years in the church and never considered that there were doctrines I firmly believed in that no one here, including myself, could prove using the Bible!
Anyway, I asked him how can we say these are “doctrines” and “truths” he replied in a raised tone and a wave of the hand, “WE CAN'T! Just as he began to say more, his wife came and took him away by the arm with a word or two.
That conversation was the seed that eventually sprouted in my brain to ask more, read more, and accept the facts, which eventually led me out of Armstrongism.
I think it would be interesting for the anti-COG to post their beliefs and let the rest us critique them, I haven't seen anything positive from any of them. The whole focus seems to running others down. No one is making any one attend any COG, everyone that does attend does it of their own free will. I certaintly won't try to convince someone that doesn't want to that they should attend.
I personally don't believe any one of us would want every detail of our personal lives out there for all to see. Especially after a life of over 90 years. I guess king David wouldn't cut the muster today. After all he committed adultry and had the husband of his mistress killed. Yet after repentance he was washed clean of his sin. I for one don't appreciate the constant attack on a man who has been dead for 19 years and is not here to defend himself.
My personal belief is that God preserved the directly inspired words of the prophets in the text of the bible and that they obvioulsy spoke other things that are not in there. Does that make them false prophets? God be the judge whether a man is or isn't.
It truly is a blind soul that doesn't see bible prophecy being fulfilled before our eyes.
"I think it would be interesting for the anti-COG to post their beliefs and let the rest us critique them, I haven't seen anything positive from any of them."
Well, I'm not "anti-COG," but if you're really curious about my beliefs and would like to critique them, you can find them here:
http://www.scborromeo.org/ccc.htm
(Lots of footnotes and bibliographical cites there too, so there's no plagiarism)
Ken, (Thank you ever so much for using your name)
The David defense doesn't wash.
Consider the following differences in behavior:
When David was confronted with his sins, he truly repented and turned from his ways. He did not curse Samuel.
Whereas when HWA was confronted with his sins, he would disfellowship, excommunicate, slander, defame, and cower in Tucson to avoid being served and deposed while his dumb sheep and cracker jack lawyer obstructed the State of California.
It is comforting to know that Mr. Armstrong, the plagiarist, was so vile, he was responsible for all all the choices and decision that we made while in WCG.
So in the meantime we can ignore:
1. the fact that America is in moral, economic and military decline
2. that America is deep in debt amounting to scores of trillions and growing
3. that America is in danger of the growing threat of China and Europe, etc.
In short, we know America will be okay. And we will be okay.
And since we have established that Mr. Armstrong was a liar, then we have proven that we don't have to keep God's laws - especially the Sabbath and tithing - or the entire Mosaic law.
Rght?
Twenty years after his death, Mr. Armstrong, remains the reason for all our woes. What comforting thought.
I have not visited this site for three days and am just now getting in on the storm of controversy. HWA always maintained that his religious philosophy was syncretic. "Many churches have part of the truth, but only we have all of it." My guess is that Armstrongites do not have heartburn over the fact that he borrowed liberally from many other sources to arrive at The Truth. The fact that HWA lifted some text pretty much intact is, likewise, a non-issue I would guess. So when we try to impart to Armstrongites some sense of indignation over plagiarism, I think we are flogging a dead horse. The Armstrongites have created their own value system and it centers on what HWA as an Apostle of God. If it came out of his pen or through his lips, it receives the Armstrongite imprimatur, no matter what any reasonable system of ethics might require.
After reading all the manipulation of the truth the pro-COG contributors have done, all I can say is that I am so glad I am no longer an Armstrongite. What they have written has probably done more to hurt the Armstrongite cause than any detractors could. Kind of like how Rush Limbaugh's making distasteful imitation of Michael J. Fox hurt the Republican party.
-- Neo
Anonymous 666 here:
So in the meantime we can ignore:
1. the fact that America is in moral, economic and military decline
2. that America is deep in debt amounting to scores of trillions and growing
3. that America is in danger of the growing threat of China and Europe, etc
-----------------------------
Herbert Armstrong as the emissary of God brought us the truth so we can ignore:
1) The churches of God he spawned are in moral and spiritual decline;
2) The churches of God consider themselves rich Spiritually, but are poor, blind and naked spiritually speaking;
3) That the churches of God are in danger of being wiped out in favor of other groups who will Worship God, honor Jesus Christ, preach the gospel, and, most importantly love one another without rancor and divisions.
It's 20 years and counting after the Death of Herbert Armstrong. If this is a time of testing and trials -- a time of repentance -- then there are only 20 years left of the 40 years of testing and trials.
The churches of God have an opportunity to enter into a glorious Kingdom and be the Bride of Christ. At present, though, it looks like idolatry is standing in the way of Armstrongists, and their postings here and elsewhere are an indication they are not willing to give it up and divorce themselves from wickedness -- quite an apt description of the unpardonable sin. If they want to continue to be agents of Satan the Devil, liar and murderer from the beginning, that is entirely their choice.
As if the COG's are some of the most wicked people on earth.
"It is comforting to know that Mr. Armstrong, the plagiarist, was so vile, he was responsible for all all the choices and decision that we made while in WCG."
Another red herring. Whether or not Herbert Armstrong the Plagiarist was responsible for all the choices and decisions we made while in the WCG (he obviously wasn't), it doesn't change the fact that Herbert Armstrong was a plagiarist.
"In short, we know America will be okay. And we will be okay."
Another red herring. Just because the U.S. is in moral and spiritual decline and faces dangerous enemies both internal external, that doesn't make Herbert Armstrong any less a plagiarist.
"And since we have established that Mr. Armstrong was a liar, then we have proven that we don't have to keep God's laws - especially the Sabbath and tithing - or the entire Mosaic law."
No, the fact that Herbert Armstrong was a liar and a plagiarist doesn't tell us anything at all about the truth or falsity of his doctrines. Of course every single distinctive teaching of Herbert Armstrong was false, but that's a whole 'nuther subject.
"Twenty years after his death, Mr. Armstrong, remains the reason for all our woes. What a comforting thought."
Don't be silly. Of course he's not the reason for all our woes. He just the reason for the woes that he is the reason for. Similarly, the numerous self-appointed successors of Herbert Armstrong (well, I guess Joe Tkach Jr. isn't actually self-appointed, but then he's also not an Armstrongist any more and his teachings are far, far less pernicious than Armstrongist teachings) are responsible for the trouble and woe their false teachings are wreaking in the lives of their followers. Or do you think that false doctrine doesn't screw up people's lives?
I left WCG in 2000. I just want to encourage every one to move on with their lives. Many of us have found Christians in other faiths who have welcomed us with open arms. There is so much that I did not know. I went from being suicidal to total envovement in a local church. Dwelling on the past only produces wounds that will never heal.
Joe Tkach Jr. isn't actually self-appointed, but then he's also not an Armstrongist any more and his teachings are far, far less pernicious than Armstrongist teachings
Are you sure about that? Some would say Joe Jr. married the most damaging elements of Armstrongism, including its cultic and abusive reliance on an autocratic Pastor General, to a superficial and inauthentic version of evangelical Christianity, which most actual evangelicals recognize as hopelessly muddled and false.
If Joe Jr. had presented his changes honestly and openly, in a spirit of accountability and true Christian selflessness, WCG today would be much larger and more vibrantly orthodox -- but it wouldn't have Joe Jr. as its leader.
Instead, Joe Jr. drove thousands of people away from any kind of Christianity at all, and did not make the decisions that would either have led to the largest or most orthodox WCG (or both). He milked it for his personal gain, not caring about the thousands of spiritual lives he would ruin.
Like it or not, Flurry and Meredith are at least authentic Armstrongists. Joe Jr. is neither an authentic Armstrongist nor an authentic Christian.
Personally, I can't speak of what Mr. Armstrong repented of and I doubt anyone in this forum can. I am sure David had his nay sayers during his life that would never forgive him for adultry and murder.
If plagiarism were really an issue for the publishers of J.H. Allen’s book, don't you think there would be legal action from the copy write holders? If they didn't think it was why should we? Content is relative, if I speak about baseball, I will quite likely be plagiarizing someone. It's like saying Christ plagiarized all the quotes of the Old Testament in the New Testament. Or that anyone that uses other COG sources in a sermon has plagiarized those sources. No one really cares if it furthers the doctrinal understanding of the hearers.
Was Mr. Armstrong perfect? I wouldn't belong to an organization thought so. Was he a monster? He certainly doesn't deserve that. When he died he left untold millions unspent. The corporation was very healthy and was poised to continue on. No one can honestly say Mr. Armstrong didn't believe what he preached all those years, if he didn't believe in the church he would have divided it up before his death and reaped the physical rewards. But instead it was left to others to carry on, and they turned their back on the commission. The history of the church of God has not been ideal because men are not perfect. That doesn't release us from our personal responsibility to carry the commission spelled out at the end of the first three Gospel accounts.
The point about the mention of America's current situation is that it was basically only Mr. Armstrong who was making all those bold statement at a time when America was high on tops [it is not even important whether only HWA or somebody else also said so]. Sure he made some mistakes (Who anyway did not make mistake among even God's men in the Bible? Who is clean among us anyway?). All the "worship"(real or alleged) and the villification of the man pass away (hopefully). But when things begin to happen we will have no more alibi. No more "red herring" or plagiarism smokescreen to hide behind. We will only ourselves to blame.
"Are you sure about that?"
Yes, absolutely sure. The WCG under Joe Tkach Jr. may be an insipid little shell of a Christian group, but the last time I checked they weren't telling people it was a sin to have doctors treat their life-threatening illnesses, and they weren't wreaking havoc on families with a hyperstrict doctrine of divorce and remarriage. Also, say what you will about Joe Tkach's unwillingness to let go of his death grip on what is left of the WCG, but at least the few remaining WCG ministers don't usually stick their noses into their members private lives the way Armstrongist ministers are wont to.
I quite agree about the Tkachian mishandling of the doctrinal changes, and the dishonesty and duplicity of his administration is pretty well documented. But the WCG isn't a life-domineering "cult" the way it used to be. Indeed, the WCG these days is a lowest-common-denominator superfluous ditto mark of a Protestant sect. It's difficult to get upset about Joe Tkach's lack of accountability over a little doctrinally relativistic sect that is vanishing before our eyes, that offers nothing of value that a Christian couldn't find at almost any other church in the neighborhood.
"If plagiarism were really an issue for the publishers of J.H. Allen’s book, don't you think there would be legal action from the copy write holders?"
I'm not sure there was any copyright on J.H. Allen's book by the time Herbert Armstrongs plagiarism became evident. In any case, just because the victim of someone's theft doesn't press charges, that doesn't make one any less a thief.
"If they didn't think it was why should we?"
Herbert Armstrong claimed to have "restored" this doctrine to the One True Church. In fact the doctrine had already been "restored" by others. The plagiarism he committed helps to show that the British Israelism heresy was already becoming popular in the crowd that Herbert Armstrong was running with. He unwillingness or inability to properly cite and credit his sources also shows that he lacked the scholarly background and training necessary to determine whether or not an idea makes the slightest bit of sense, which of course British Israelism doesn't.
"Was he a monster? He certainly doesn't deserve that."
"Monster" seems too harsh. I feel sorry for him, but I wouldn't feel sorry for a "monster." He did have a primarily negative influence on people, though, sad to say. By no means a completely negative influence, but all in all the bad outweighed the good.
"When he died he left untold millions unspent. The corporation was very healthy and was poised to continue on."
I'm not so sure about that. My impression is that the financial affairs of the WCG back then weren't really being managed wisely. Extravagant spending and lack of planning were the rule of the day.
"No one can honestly say Mr. Armstrong didn't believe what he preached all those years, if he didn't believe in the church he would have divided it up before his death and reaped the physical rewards."
I think he probably did believe the crazy stuff he preached. He does seem to have had a gigantic ego. I'm not sure which is more pathetic, though -- a man who believes he is the End-time Elijah and the one and only Apostle of God for the One True Church, or a man who is a seventh-day adventist version of Elmer Gantry. Delusional egotistical heretic vs. egotistical conman.
Anyway, just because he didn't carve up the WCG before he died, that doesn't prove he wasn't an Elmer Gantry. Let's say he was an Elmer Gantry -- having gotten what he's seeking, the pleasures of a supremely nice lifestyle and the satisfaction of having pulled the wool over thousands of followers who give him continual adulation, why go to the trouble to wreck it before he dies? Why not keep up the show and ensure a lot of people come to your funeral and say nice things about you?
I'm not saying that's what Herbert Armstrong was about. In fact I don't believe that's what he was about. I'm just saying that your consideration doesn't establish that he was sincere.
"But instead it was left to others to carry on, and they turned their back on the commission."
Yes, and it's a good thing they did. The fewer followers of Armstrong (or any other false teacher) there are, the better off everyone will be.
"The point about the mention of America's current situation is that it was basically only Mr. Armstrong who was making all those bold statement at a time when America was high on tops"
No, he wasn't, although he boasted that he was and he wanted his followers to think he was the only one.
"But when things begin to happen we will have no more alibi."
Don't hold your breath. It's been almost 80 years since Herbert Armstrong started claiming that things are about to begin to happen, and still his followers are waiting for the return of the oft-promised and earnestly-longed-for death camps and the outpouring of plagues and tribulation.
But then even if the U.S. and Britain suffer national calamities in the years ahead, that wouldn't prove that British Israelism is true or that Herbert Armstrong wasn't a false prophet. Really nasty things can happen to nations and yet it not even be hinted at in Bible prophecy. It's just life in this fallen world.
"No more 'red herring' or plagiarism smokescreen to hide behind."
Yes, I'm not surprised that an Armstrongist wouldn't put a premium on things like truth and honesty and intellectual coherence. Ah how I remember thinking like that!
We will only ourselves to blame.
In other words the old WCGers were largely emotion-driven and non-thinkers - being offended by Tkach's dishonesty?
There is so much bashing, name-calling and accusations of Armstrong and COGers,but hardly any proof presented to disprove WCG's old teachings.
To Ken Johnson.
Well Rod Meredith sure can attest to who repents and not. He even stated he was sure GTA repented before he died, so with that stellar example of knowing who repents and doesn't we all can take solace that we can also tell if someone has repented.
On the subject of HWa leaving millions when he died in the church, well- he was so old and seemed not to be with it for some years with bad health, and don't forget the Two Tree sermons and trunk of the tree... It was sad to hear him try to communicate with us via tape with those messages. He just did not have the energy to clean out the church. HE COULD have though being the church was "Herbert W. Armstrong Corporate Sole".
On the part of attending of one's free will, i attest that many are brainwashed into believing if they left the COG, their spiritual life would be at risk.
A few years ago at the F.O.T. on the Last Great Day, an example of this "spiritual blackmail" was thrust upon all who were in attendance about "If one was to leave before sundown on the Last Great Day to return home from the feast, you would be in danger of losing your chance at eternal life". Now this was reiterated three times throughout the messages that day. A blind woman called me in tears after that Feast, because she thought she had lost out on salvation because she had to catch her bus home a few hours before sundown on the LGD. Now she lived so out of the way in the toolies , that no one was going her direction so she had to take the bus. This was the Feat in South dakota for LCG and she lived in northwest Wyoming. Now some might just blow this off , but we were informed that the "when two or more are gathered in my name" approach was used here by Three ministers , it would be bound in Heaven(yes a change had been made where two or more ministers can make that change instead of what Hoeh had written in the past ). this gals minister was called by me . I told him about this and he stated to me before he called this lady, that any of what those characters who stated this would never be "bound in heaven". He after talking with this blind lady called me back thanking me for letting him know.
Also since the church had in January 1952 in the Good News Magazine stated by Dr. Hoeh on the subject of making mistakes while in a position of God's ministry "One in God's office can't afford to make any mistakes", and goes on to state if any would make a mistake in God's Office "That is why you have to suffer the consequences of
ignorance!".
With this in mind at least the cog's and HWA could of and should have tried harder to NOT make mistakes and correct them so not to have the credibility problem that exists today, in LCG's and others poor scholarship.
jim hamby
Most religious folks appreciate plagiarism! They just see it as more people spreading the message, and who really cares about the vanity of who originated the thoughts in a book or article?
The issue with HWA and Allen, HWA and Ruppert, HWA and Dugger and Dodd isn't so much a plagiarism issue. HWA's claim was that "God" was revealing new truth to him. The picture one got was one of God speaking directly to HWA, as in the Mosaic or Jesus sense. This inspiration was supposedly responsible for what HWA preached and wrote.
That's why it's such a shock for a true believer to discover and read HWA's source material, and find that it was often repeated word for word. And, it wasn't directly from God! Like many of the rest of us who put our trousers on one leg at a time, the man read things, thought they made sense, and repeated them. There is certainly nothing miraculous or special about that. It was an illusion.
Anonymous 666 here:
"There is so much bashing, name-calling and accusations of Armstrong and COGers,but hardly any proof presented to disprove WCG's old teachings."
I guess you don't study Scripture much. Care to explain why Herbert Armstrong and the WCG was so blase about eating out in restaurants on the Sabbath? Oh, right. It's OK. Ezra and Nehemiah were just Pharisaical.
And then there's the calendar. Care to explain why Christians would accept the authority of the Jews when the Apostle Paul said not to? And how is it that the Equinox set by Hillel ends up to be April 6 / 7 today? Even the Jews know better but can't fix it because they don't have a valid Sanhedrin yet.
Prove British Israelism from the Bible. Be sure to include the Scripture which says "United States and Britain" please. If you want Lutefisk, then do be certain to include the fruit of contention and division BI has caused.
All those people with all those beliefs, all fighting against one another: If you want the proof through the fruit of Armstrong's religion, look at what the churches of God say about each other. Without any love, joy and peace, but with the claim each one is the one and only true church [devoid of praise worship for Jesus], it is clear that they all can't be right. And do consider the various booklets floating around about the 144,000.
As for the "prophesies are a little late" Lutefisk, consider some of the prophecies failed before they were even made. Now *that* is failed prophesy!
Consider the qualifications of an elder. The leaders of the churches of God often could not qualify. Mark Lax is clear that Herbert Armstrong, as a bad parent, could not. Listen up: Herbert Armstrong was not qualified to be an elder -- ever! Forget your endless excuses and the David defense. The David defense doesn't fly because it doesn't apply: There was a clear separation between the civil and religious. The New Testament qualifications for a religious leader simply does not permit someone like Herbert Armstrong to be an elder, let alone have the position he claimed [falsely] to have as an Apostle. Critics please feel challenged to prove from New Testament Scripture that Herbert Armstrong was an Apostle as he himself claimed to be, please. It can't be done. If you attempt to do so, you will be found to be a liar -- a child of Satan the Devil.
As for the allegation, "There is so much bashing, name-calling and accusations of Armstrong and COGers,but hardly any proof presented to disprove WCG's old teachings", which old teachings are we talking about? Pentecost on Monday? Going to doctors for treatment was a lack of faith and sin? Divorce and remarriage? 1975 in Prophecy? The floods, drought and famine in the United States in 10 years from 1964? The prophecy in 1964, "I tell you on the authority of Jesus Christ, in ten years there won't be a single tree standing in the Pacific Northwest"?
Armstrongists here certainly inhabit a fact free Universe of their own imagining. It's particularly interesting because the Jonestown documentary is on tonight. Jim Jones supporters were saying the very same thing Armstrongist supporters have been saying here. The wages of sin is death.
With the churches of God, it's "Back to the Bible", where each one of them has turned their back on obeying Scripture.
Some of us here don't disagree with some of the doctrines [many do], but the idolatry of Herbert Armstrong is one thing that we can all agree should not be part of any religion. And don't kid yourself, each protest raised for this or that false prophet standing between the people and God, is still idolatry.
And the heresy and anomalies go on and on.
The best proof against Armstrongism, though, is the lack of the fruit of the Spirit. Isaiah said it best "The way of peace they know not". Self-delusion is so very comforting until reality sets in.
In the meantime, consider this, those Armstrongist supporters expect us to respect their position for no particularly good reason. That is certainly not going to happen. Whining won't make it any better.
The hatred had clearly gone real deep through the bones. I cannot help that.
On January 16th, 1986, our apostate apostle left us to fiend for ourselves. In that time, hundreds of splinters have taken the alleged same baton and ran with it!
1975 has passed and gone without a hint of the world tomorrow! That was 31 years ago! As with all false prophets, time fades in the memories of the cultist membership. They fail to recognize that their cults “prophet” has has an unprofitable failure rate. What to do? What to do? Blame it on the members. Herbert claimed he was never a prophet, the proof however is on my PC. The sound file of Herbert speaking, declares himself an prophet. But when the prophecies failed he blamed it on you and I.
Herbert WAS a thief and an liar. The coger's who contribute to this Blog will always defend the failure of themselves and their holy prophet. Pope Armstrong. Let me ask, “How could you believe in Herbert after all of his failed prophecies? What did you tell yourselves after the failures? What do you whisper to yourselves late at night to justify all the failings of your most high prophet?
Saddam, our old American friend in Iraq thought so high of himself that he was sure that the Americans would not attack him. In the two years that followed, the man found himself humbled by the circumstances he found himself in. Pride goes before a fall. So it was with Saddam, so it will be with you who follow the tenants of Armstrongism!
Jesus gave the blind sight.
Armstrong threw caustic acid into your eyes.
Go and stumble fool(s)!
Kscribe.
CoGs evil?
Yes, of course. That was thrown out as a crimson Lutefisk -- a sort of Norwegian version of a red herring, but one which does have basis in fact.
Consider stalking and fondling, both covered up with bellicose fervency and plausible deniability. Fortunately, events in the Churches of God are too well documented for people hoping to escape under the radar by protesting that those exposing those things of which the Churches of God must repent before they can even be considered for the Kingdom of God, let alone be without spot and wrinkle.
So let's help out with an illustration.
This past of Feast of Tabernacles, my wife and I had the joy of attending with a smaller group which has a modestly competent leadership which does many of the right things. As the minister took us out to dinner [one of his many acts of charity during the Feast, including, but not restricted to, driving an elderly widow into town to help her get groceries and other provisions], he said many things, two of which are recounted here. First, he said [with utter humility and without a shred of irony] that he was very wicked. We can't testify to that because we saw his good works and evidence of the fruit of the spirit. Perhaps, his heart was so laden with the love of God that he felt inadequate to be considered among the righteous. Certainly, as a working stiff, ordained, but having a different day job outside the ministry and having experience in the business world as a blue collar type technologist, he knew and understood the joys, triumphs, trials and sorrows of the day to day average wage earner striving to keep themselves and their families provided for.
The second thing he did was plead with me to help him. He was utterly sincere. My wife and I did what we could and strove to give him what we thought he could use -- along with continually praying for him and his congregation [growing in grace and in knowledge].
There is a third thing: He is a man who sincerely wants the churches of God to settle their differences and get the brethren all back together. He sets an example: The people at the Feast Site came from at least three different churches of God and spent the Feast in total peace and harmony. The brethren will do that when they are left to their own devices without the cloud of wicked administrators and ministers rotten egging them on to division.
Now here's the point: The CoGs are evil. Not all of them. Quite a few. They are populated with narcissists who don't listen to people and who do not keep the civil laws, let alone the Ten Commandments. Some are even psychopaths.
My message is this to the congregations, ministers and people of the churches of God: "Fix the problems". Or if you prefer, "Clean up your act". "Seek the Lord while He may be found."
The Satanic Wars [hey, that would make a catchy book title!] amongst the churches of God leadership, the avarice, the lust for power, the machinations of Church Corporate politics are disgusting to those who really give a rip about being counted righteous by the mercy of God. It is unlikely that God the Father or Jesus Christ would be fond of the behavior laced like leaven throughout the churches of God over decades of debauchery.
The point is not hatred. Some here interpret the point as hatred because that is how they see the world. They are tainted with both entitlement and defensiveness, in spite of how many times at each passover they sing Psalm 51 [which, frankly applies more to many of the ministers who drink to much and commit idolatry and adultery]. The real point is: The CoGs are evil.
And judgment begins at the House of God. For you Biblical Illiterates so proud of your Armstrongist beliefs, that's actually Scripture from the Bible, by the way. You might spend a little time with Scripture and transcend the immutable gulf between head knowledge and life practices.
And the point is: Now is a good time to repent.
Drag out fasting, if not sackcloth and ashes and pray for unity, if you are so all-fired offended by complaints of malfeasance.
Hi
got a picture to send to Gavin, how do you do that? contact info??
Thanks
Hi Frank
You can drop me a note at otagosh@gmail.com
Gavin
There is no plagiarism on news and events and facts. Reporting on a news event is not plagiarism – but copying someone else’s news report would be. HWA seems to have taken the not completely unreasonable view that there is no copyright on truth.
I remember a sermon given some years ago, the gist of it being that HWA had read a particular article (I have to admit not remembering exactly what the subject was), and was quite happily virtually copying the article. It was asked should he do this, and he replied that it was fine, he had read it and agreed with it, was sure that it was true, and so there was no problem in his copying it.
It sounds like he was looking at things in the sense that there is no copyright on truth. If something is true, then it’s available for everyone. It’s not infringing someone’s copyright on a ‘work of art’. This is not the legal definition, but seemed to be the rule of thumb HWA used.
As ‘Saac’s son’ mentioned, ‘Most religious folks appreciate plagiarism! They just see it as more people spreading the message, and who really cares about the vanity of who originated the thoughts in a book or article’.
HWA seemed to apply the same rule for his BI writings. It is on record that he wrote to the publisher’s of Allen’s book, making enquiries about it. He wrote a second letter to the publishers, enquiring about the possibility of them being interested in publishing a work he was writing on the subject. You hardly write to the publisher of a book you have just plagiarized, offering your plagiarized version, if you think you have actually committed plagiarism.
So it seems HWA didn’t consider he was committing plagiarism, even if legally he may have been. Rather it seems he felt he was just helping to spread this truth that he had come across through the works of a few other authors, to which he added his additional views.
HWA seems to have taken the not completely unreasonable view that there is no copyright on truth.
If this is true, why did HWA have his WCG legal department crack down on other preachers who tried to use for themselves the works HWA had written? It seems HWA thought it was OK when he used Allen's work and others', but when others used HWA's work, he considered it a crime.
To follow up on that last comment, there's the famous case of WCG's legal department trying to stop CG7 from publishing a little booklet called "Has Time Been Lost?" The Denver church politely pointed out that they'd been publishing the title since long before Herb pilfered it, LOL.
"It sounds like he was looking at things in the sense that there is no copyright on truth. If something is true, then it’s available for everyone. It’s not infringing someone’s copyright on a ‘work of art’. This is not the legal definition, but seemed to be the rule of thumb HWA used."
It's as we always suspected: Herbert Armstrong could not tell right from wrong.
Perhaps he should have changed the title to "Whose Time's Been Lost?".
What god is in your wallet?
Gavin's right. In fact, if you want to compare CG7's booklet with HWA's, the first couple of pages of each are reproduced in the November 1998 Servants' News. Check out page 24.
The same issue includes a chapter-by-chapter comparison of US&BC with Allen's book, starting at page 19. By the way, Servant's News was facing some financial difficulty at the time, so the November issue actually came out in the spring of 1999.
The December 1998 issue has more discussion on HWA, with the good stuff beginning on page 17. Some of it's even funny -- for example, this little bit of backtracking:
Co-worker letter, February 25, 1982: “I hope to arrange for the use of Petra as a possible refuge or place of safety during the Great Tribulation when I see King Hussein. Pray for this please.”
Co-worker letter, July 16, 1982: Incidentally, I know many of you seem to have your hearts set on going very soon to Petra as "the place of safety" during the soon-coming Great Tribulation. Well, GET YOUR MINDS OFF PETRA. Brethren, I HAVE NEVER said that Petra definitely is the place of protection where God will take us. I HOPE IT IS NOT!
By the way, I personally disagree with Norm Edwards (the editor of Servants' News) on many points. Flipping through these two issues of SN reminds me just how much mush there was in the publication. However, the articles mentioned above are among the most valuable critiques of Herbert W Armstrong, in my opinion. Why? Because they are written by Sabbathkeepers, for Sabbathkeepers. Plus, there's none of the more scurrilous and difficult-to-prove rumors (such as incest). That makes it a good starting point.
So go ahead. Download the two issues and read the articles about HWA. After all, you're not afraid to at least look at the facts, are you?
THE TRUE AND NOBLE ORIGINS OF THE ANGLO-ISRAEL MESSAGE
By
Alan Campbell B.A. [U.K.]
YOU hear so many strange things about BritishIsraelites. Who are they? where did this Anglo-Israel teaching have its origins? Are they a crazy racist cult, a new American sect? Opponents of Anglo-Israel, having little or no Scriptural evidence to refute our teachings, prefer to frighten sincere seekers for truth by seeking to smear British-Israel with the biggest tar brush possible. A favourite method seems to be that of claiming that the Anglo-Israel teaching originated with the writings of the deranged Richard Brothers, who was for a time confined to a lunatic asylum in the late eighteenth/early nineteenth century. Now I feel sure that you the reader
would prefer the truth, and so we will trace the origins of our message and tell you of the many distinguished clergymen, evangelists and preachers of many diverse
Protestant denominations who have held to our beliefs, as well as many members of our own British Royal Family.
Let us be clear about one thing, there was a knowledge of and writings about the Israel Identity of the Celto-Anglo Saxon and related peoples long before poor Richard Brothers ever stumbled upon this truth.
1) As long ago as the 6th Century A.D.an early British Historian Gildas named "the Wise" wrote at the era when the pagan Saxon's were invading Christian Celtic Britain. He wrote that these events were taking place to the end that our Lord might in this land try after His accustomed manner these His Israelites whether they loved Him or not:
2) In 1314 A.D. the nobility of Scotland signed the Scottish Declaration of Independence at Arbroath Abbey. In it they stated their belief in the Israel identity of their people:-
"We know and from the chronicles and books of the ancients gather, that the nation of the Scots passing from the greater Scythia through the Mediterranean Sea and the Pillars of Hercules (Straits of Gibraltar) and sojourning in Spain ... and convey there one thousand two hundred years after the outgoing of the people of Israel".
3) Sir Francis Drake (1540-1596) wrote to Rev. John Foxe,the famous Martyrologist:
"God may be glorified, His church, our Queen and country preserved, the enemies of truth vanquished; that we might have continued peace in Israel. Our enemies are many but our protector commandeth the whole earth"
4) French Huguenot Counsellor Le Loyer wrote in his "The Ten Lost Tribes Found" (1590)
"The Israelites came to and founded the English Isles"
5) John Saddler MA, M.P- in 1649 in his learned work "Rights of the Kingdom or Customs of our Kings and Parliaments" advocated the Israelitish origins of the English.
A TESTIMONY OF OUR IDENTITY
6) In 1723, Dr.Jacques Abaddie (1654-1727), Huguenot refugee and Dean of Killaloe, Ireland, in his Le Triomphe de la Providence et de la Religion, wrote:
"Certainly, unless the Ten Tribes have flown into the air, or been plunged to the earth's centre, they must be sought in that part of the North which, in the time of Constantine, was converted to the Christian Faith - namely among the Iberians, Armenians, and Scythians; for that was the place of their dispersion-the wilderness where God caused them to dwell in tents, as when they came out of the land of Egypt... Perhaps, were the subject carefully examined, it would be found that the nations who in the fifth age made irruption into the Roman Empire, and whom Procopius reduces to ten in number, wer in effect the Ten Tribes,who kept in a state of separation up to that time, then quitted the Euxine and Caspian, the place of their exile, because the country could no longer contain them. Everything fortifies this conjecture; the extraordinary multiplication of this people, marked so precisely by the prophets, the number of the tribes, the custom of those nations to dwell in tents, according to the oracles, and many other usages of the Scythians similar to those of the children of Israel."
translated from the French by Revd Robert Douglas
Dr Abaddie published his work in Amsterdam and the original four volumes can be seen in the British Museum.
7) In 176I Alexander Cruden published the first edition of the famous Bible aid, "Crudens Concordance". The dedication page of this original edition contained these words:- "that it may be said by the present and future ages, that King George III has been an Hezekiah to our British Israel".
8) In 1813 RalphWedgwood in his publication "The Book of Remembrance" demonstrated that England is Ephraim.
9) In 1815 Revd James Hartley Frere wrote a book entitled A Combined View of the Prophecies of Daniel, Esdras and St John in which he showed that the British were Israel.
10) In 1816 Revd B. Murphy published Precursory Proofs that the Israelites came into Egypt and Ireland - he went on to publish The Advocate of Israel and the Isle of Erin.
11) In 1828 - Revd J. W Brooks wrote an article which he signed Abdul which was published in the Jewish Chronicle and in which he proved the Welsh to be
of Israel descent.
12) In 1840 - Revd John Wilson M.A. a Scottish Presbyterian minister authored the classic book Our Israelitish Origin in which he combined the record of history and Bible Prophecy with the most up to date discoveries of archaeology. His writings and lectures helped to make the Israel Message widely known.
13) The Israel Message was to spread to the United States where one of the leading exponents was Revd Joseph Wild D.D. minister of Union Congregational
Church Brooklyn, New York who published many books on Anglo-Israel including The Lost Ten Tribes in 1879.
As the truth of our Israel Identity gained momentum, it would be hard to include them all. We shall therefore list the best known by their religious denomination
which shows how the Anglo-Israel belief took root amongst Christians of diverse back grounds. Our roll of Honour includes:-
ANGLICAN
Archbishop Bond of Montreal
Revd Titcomb D.D. Bishop of Rangoon
Rt Revd M.S. Alexander -Anglican Bishop in Jerusalem
Rt Revd Thornton D.D.- First Anglican Bishop of Ballarat Australia who stated "British Israel truth is most wonderful I wish I had known it twenty five years earlier.
It makes clear so many things that have been obscure.
METHODIST
Bishop H.A. Allen of the Wesleyan Methodist Church in California USA who wrote Judah's Sceptre and Joseph's Birthright back in 1902. This book is still a
B.I. Classic today, a century later and has run into millions of copies. Reviewing the book at the time of publication the Baptist Messenger stated "that the arguments produced by Mr Allen seem to be unanswerable."
Dr Dinsdale Young (1861-1938) the famous English Methodist preacher, who pastored Westminster Central Hall and was President of the Wesleyan Conference
stated:
"I increasingly believe that the weight of argument is with the British-Israel position. My heart warms to it, because of its splendid adherence to the Bible. The British Israel Federation has lighted a lamp the golden beauty of which shall never be obscured."
Revd Robert Bradford - Belfast Methodist clergyman, Member of Parliament for South Belfast in the British House of Commons. He spoke extensively on the
Message both in the U.K.and in Canada and was to be assassinated by Irish Republican terrorists in 1982.
PRESBYTERIAN
In addition to Revd John Wilson, we have Revd James McGaw, a Reformed Presbyterian minister who authorised Suppose we are Israel. He testified that:
"The revelation brought to me through the study of the Israel Truth, has established my faith in the Bible as the Inspired Word of God."
Revd Duncan McDougall- Free Church of Scotland.
BAPTIST
For many years the Woodward Avenue Baptist church in Detroit U.S.A was regarded as the largest Anglo-Israel congregation. Two of its Pastors were leading
exponents of Anglo-Israel.
Dr John Wellington Hoag (1915-1947)
Pastor William J Washer (1947-1962)
Dr Mordecai Ham - a convert of the famous evangelist Billy Sunday. Dr Ham led Billy Graham to Christ back in 1934. He held an honorary doctorate from Bob Jones University in Greenville South Carolina, and published a magazine entitled The Kentucky Revivalist.
Revd T. R. Howlett B.A. minister of Calvary Baptist Church Washington D.C.author of The Ten Lost Tribes of Israel Found and identified in the Anglo-Saxon Race
Pastor James Mountain D.D. leading Baptist Fundamentalist in the United Kingdom. Author of Modernism Refuted and compiler of Hymns of Faith and Consecration. He authored British Israel Truth Defended and The Triumph of British Israel.
HOLINESS
Revd Maynard James - editor of The Flame magazine.
SALVATIONIST
Major A Smith of the Salvation Army in South Africa.
FULL GOSPEL/PENTECOSTAL
Charles Parnharn pioneer of Pentecost, at whose Topeka Bible College the Pentecostal outpouring began at the turn of the 20th Century.
Pastor Jones and Dan Williams - founders of the Welsh Apostolic Church.
Principal George Jeffreys - founder of the Elim Pentecostal Church and the Bible Pattern Church.
Evangelist Stephen Jeffreys - the Principal's brother.
Evangelist E.W Bosworth author of Christ the Healer.
Pastor Leo Harris - founder of the Christian Revival Crusade in Australia.
CONGREGATIONAL
Revd Dr Pascoe Goard - a graduate of Wesleyan College in Winnipeg, Canada, he pastored the Knox Congregational Church in Vancouver, going on to be Vice President of the British Israel World Federation and Editor of the National Message magazine. He was author of many Anglo-Israel books, and helped start the Harrow Weald Bible College.
Revd Merton Smith converted in a Moody Revival - he went on to become organising secretary for Moody's campaign in Britain and America. He helped to
establish the Moody Bible Institute and was Pastor of the Grandveiw Congregational Church Vancouver, Canada.
OTHER DISTINGUISHED BELIEVERS IN ANGLO-ISRAEL
Professor Charles Totten of Yale University U.S.A.
Professor Piazzi Smith Astronomer Royal of Scotland
Admiral Fisher - First Sea Lord
Hon. W E Massey - Prime Minister of New Zealand
ROYALTY ALSO
Queen Victoria
King Edward VII
King George V
King George VI
Princess Alice, Countess of Athlone
ANGLO-ISRAEL PUBLICATIONS
To further refute those who say Anglo-Israel is some recent cult, we list some of our magazines going back over one hundred years and more:-
1866 The Watchmen of Ephraim
1875 Israel's Glory Leader
1877 The Banner of Israel
1888 The Two Witnesses
1890 Our Race
1922 The National Message
1926 The Watchman of Israel
These are given as just a random sample.
CONCLUSION
The evidence that we has produced in this small publication gives striking evidence to the historical background of the Anglo-Israel movement, not to mention the wide range of godly and scholarly men out of every Christian denomination who have proclaimed this truth. Let me finish by giving you
AN ATHEIST'S TESTIMONY TO THE ANGLO-ISRAEL TRUTH
Charles Bradlaugh K.C. M.P was one of the leading atheists in Britain even being barred from Parliament for a time because of his infidel beliefs. He would address huge atheist meetings in public halls across the country. He would read the promises that God made to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and then quite correctly point out that the promises had not been fulfilled in the Jews. He wrongly deduced therefore that the Bible was untrue and there was no God. Late in life he was introduced to the Anglo-Israel message and was a regular attender at meetings. The one time atheist declared "I love to come, it is most wonderful what light British-Israel truth throws on the Bible."
THE LORD JESUS CHRIST DIED FOR OUR SINS AND ROSE AGAIN FOR OUR JUSTIFICATION. YOUR NATIONAL IDENTITY AS THE RACIAL SEED OF ISRAEL WILL NOT SAVE YOU OTHERWISE CHRIST NEED NOT HAVE COME. WE EXHORT OUR READERS TO REPENT AND OBEY THE GOSPEL.
I wonder if the entire church of God experience could be summed up by two words:
Careless incompetence?
"TELL ME, PLEASE"
British-Israel Identity Foundation Truths
By
the late Revd D. and Mrs J.N. Seekins, UK
PART TWO
Part One of this article in the April-June issue ended with the question: Now, if the House of Israel did not return to Palestine (Canaan), WHERE DID THEY GO? The following quotations will help us in our quest
Apocrypha (R.V.) 2 Esdras 13: 40-45:
"These are the Ten Tribes, which were led away out of their own land in the time of Osea the king, whom Salmanasar the king of the Assyrians led away captive, (2 Kings 17) and he carried them beyond the River, and they were carried into another land. But they took this counsel among themselves, that they would leave the multitude of the heathen, and go forth into a further country, where never mankind dwelt, that they might there keep their statutes which they had not kept in their own land. And they, entered by, the narrow passages of the River Euphrates. For the Most High then wrought signs for them, and stayed the springs of the River, till they were passed over. For through that countrv there was a great way to go, namely of a year and a half, and the same region is called Arzareth" (that is, 'another land' - see Deuteronomy 29:28).
Flavius Josephus, learned Jewish historian, A.D.38-100, in his Book XI, chapter 5, states:
"Wherefore there are but two tribes in Asia and Europe subject to the Romans, while the Ten Tribes are beyond Euphrates till now, and are an immense multitude, and not to be estimated by numbers".
The Jewish Prayer Book (The Authorized Daily Prayer Book of the United Hebrew Congregations of the British Empire):
"As for our brethren, the whole House of Israel, such of them as are given over to trouble or captivity', whether they abide on sea or on dry land, may the All - Present have mercy upon them and bring them forth from trouble to enlargement, from darkness to light, and from subjection to redemption now, speedily and at a near time, and let us say, Amen."
(Note: that particular statement/prayer by official Jewry is an open acknowledgment of the fact that the House of Israel, i.e. the Ten Tribes, are not found in Jewry today).
Dr Alfred Edersheim:
"In what has been said, no notice has been taken of those wanderers of the Ten Tribes, whose trackless footsteps seem as mysterious as their after fate... Still the great mass of the Ten Tribes was, in the days of Christ, as in our own, lost to the Hebrew nation".
Dr Neubauer, in The Jewish Quarterly Review:
"The hope of the return of the Ten Tribes has never ceased amongst the Jews of the exile".
C.& A.D.Rothschild, in The History and Literature of the Israelites, vol. 1, page 489:
"The Ten Tribes of Israel were irretrievably lost, and a deep and impenetrable silence clings round their dispersion. The thick folds of the veil have never been lifted."
Isaac Leiser, in The Jewish Religion, vol. I, page 256:
"By, this return of captives - from Babylon - the Israelitish nation was not restored, since the Ten Tribes were yet left in banishment, and to this day the researches of travellers and wise men have not been able to trace their fate".
Israel Zangwill, well-known writer, referring, to Jewish persecution, at a conference in 1903 said:
"To live and not to live is worse than to die. That is our position. I had rather we died and were done with. I thank heaven that Ten Tribes at least were lost". (The Voice of Jerusalem, page 85).
And from a letter from the Chief Jewish Rabbi, dated November 18th, 1918 (5679) to the Revd Merton Smith:
"The people known at present as Jews are descendants of the tribes of Judah and Benjamin with a certain number of descendants of the tribe of Levi. As far as is known, there is not any further admixture of other tribes. The Ten Tribes have been absorbed among the nations of the world. We look forward to the gathering of all the tribes at some future day".
And in June 1950a further letter from the Chief Rabbi stated:
"The Jews of today,do not represent the whole of the twelve tribes. What happened to the Ten Tribes who occupied Northern Palestine in Bible times is not definitely,known. Modem Jewry is considered as being descended from the ancient tribe of Judah, and to a lesser extent, the tribe of Benjamin".
Kitto states:
"After the captivity, we hear very little of the territories of the Tribes, for ten of them never returned".
In the year 1131 A.D. the famous Rabbi Moses Maimonides, called by, the Jews their Second Moses, wrote:
"I believe the Ten Tribes to be in various parts of Europe".
Sharon Turner, the famous historian, states:
"The Anglo-Saxons, Lowland Scots, Normans and Danes have all sprung from that great fountain of the human race which we have distinguished by the terms Scythian and Gothic.The first appearance of the Scythian.tribes in Europe may be placed in the seventh century before the Christian era ... The migrating Scythians crossed the Araxes, passed out of Asia, and suddenly appeared in Europe in the sixth century B.C."
(Note:This was the exact time of the release of the Ten Tribes from their captivity in Assyria).
Dr George Moore says:
"The name of Goth, as already surmised, was probably transferred from Palestine to the neighbourhood of the Caspian Sea, where the Getae, and the Sacae, the Goths and the Saxons, are historically found together".
Du Chaillu, in his work The VikingAge declares:
"A careful perusal of the sagas will enable us, with the help of the ancient Greek and Latin writers, and without any serious break in the chain of events, to make out a fairly continuous history which throws considerable light on the progenitors of the English-speaking peoples; their migrations northward from their old home on the shores of the Black Sea; their religion; and their settlement of Scandinavia and of England".
Prideaux finds that the Cimbrians (Kumrii) came from between the Black and Caspian Seas, and that with them came the Angli. The famous John Milton, writing in his History of Britain (1670), says of the Saxons:
"They. were a people thought by good writers to be descended of the Sacae, a kind of Scythians in the north of Asia, thence called Sacasons, or sons of Sacae..." (pp 506-7,1835 edition).
(Sacae was derived from Saac, another name from the same people. The name Saac was derived from Isaac, the "I" being unpronounceable in Hebrew, as they had no letter "I". Hence also Saac-sons).
Professor Freeman, in his Origin of the English Nation, has the following passage:
"Tribe after tribe, Angles, Saxons, Jutes, Frisians, poured across the sea to make new homes in the Isles of Britain. Thus grew up the English nation - a nation formed by the union of various tribes of the same stock. The Dane hardly needed assimilation; he was another kindred tribe, coming later than the others. Even the Norman was a kinsman".
Sir Francis Palgrave, in his English Commonwealth, says:
"Britons, Anglo-Saxons, Danes and Normans were all relations, however hostile, they were all kinsmen, shedding kindred blood"
In 1590, A.D., M Ie Loyer, a French magistrate, said:
"The expectations of the Hebrew prophets are bein fulfilled in England and her people".
Counsellor le Loyer issued a large volume, The Lost Ten Tribes Found, and from an account published in the Petit Parisien of June 24th 1913:
"Le Loyer says he has found the Israelites, and that today they form the English people".
The Revd Dr Dean Jean Jacques Abbadie, the greatest scholar in Europe of his day, 1654-1727, and of an old Huguenot family, in his Le Triomphe de la Providence et de la Religion, published in Amsterdam in 1723,stated:
"Unless the Ten Tribes have flown into the air,or have been plunged to the centres of the earth, they must be sought for in the north and west, and in the British Isles".
The writer of this Bible and secular study feels a very special affinity with Dr Abbadie, as his own family ancestors too were French Huguenots, Protestant Christians who had to flee from France to England several centuries ago to escape dreadful persecution or death because they believed the Bible as the Word of God, and not the Papal (Roman Catholic) doctrines. Remarkably enough, Dr Abbadie applied for English denizenship in 1687, as did some of the writer's own Huguenot ancestors (the Seguins) in the same year, (obtaining naturalisation subsequently): Dr Abbadie soon afterwards became the pastor of the London French Protestant Church known as The Savoy, with some of the Seguins as members of his church congregation. Hence the feeling of close affinity. I find it very remarkable to know that three hundred years ago a French Huguenot "B.I" taught my ancestors, and now in my own generation I likewise teach these precious truths. The reference in Dr Abbadie's statement to the Ten Tribes being in the north and west, and in the British Isles, is quite simply due to the fact that as a scholar, he knew that, e.g. the prophecies of Isaiah which are addressed to Israel 'in the isles' pertained to the British Isles, for, as Hebrew scholars have noted, those isles are clearly identified in the Hebrew language of Scripture. One small example relating to Israel being in isles north-west of Palestine is at Isaiah 49:12; it should be understood that the Hebrew language has no equivalent for 'north-west', but instead would be 'north AND west'. Ferrar Fenton renders the verse "Look! these came from afar! these from the north-west!" The whole chapter is a wonderful example of the LORD's unfailing faithfulness to His covenants with Israel, here shown to be in isles north-west of Palestine.
Professor Odlum, formerly of TokyoUniversity, says:
"The proof that the Anglo-Saxon people are the House of Israel in a national and official sense is as clear to my mind as the noonday sun is to the eyes of mortals".
King George VI, broadcasting to the nation on the eve of 'D- Day', June 6th 1944, said:
"We dare to believe that God has used our nation and Empire as an instrument for fulfilling His High purpose".
And the Rt. Hon. Winston Spencer Churchill, British Prime Minister, speaking to the United States Congress in 1942, said:
"He must indeed have a blind soul who cannot see that some great purpose and design is being worked out here below of which we have the honour to be faithful servants".
In the Times newspaper of 7th May1919, the late Lord Fisher, Admiral of our Fleet, stated:
"Why we win, in spite of incredible blunders, is that we are the 'lost' Ten Tribes of Israel".
Professor Piazzi Smyth, late Astronomer Royal for Scotland, said:
"The effect of the discovery of the identity of the Anglo-Saxons with Israel is two-fold. First, it causes us to behold and acknowledge therein the accomplishment of a true miracle, and of the mightiest kind through the ages, consummated in our own days. Second, it causes the Bible to become for us, as it was for the tribes of Israel of old, an infallible Book for national guidance in politics, as well as a collection of inspired instruction for each individual soul in religion".
William Tyndale, the Protestant martyr, and translator of our English Bible, stated:
"The properties of the Hebrew tongue agree a thousand times more with the English than with Latin".
Canon Lyson compiled a list of four thousand Hebrew words from English dictionaries and stated:
"The Hebrew is the structure on which the English language was built".
Professor Max Muller of Oxford University stated that English contained eight hundred Hebrew roots. The Revd Jacob Torillin, in his Comparative Vocabulary of Forty-Eight Languages, states:
''About one fourth of the words in our own Saxon tongue bear an affinity with the Hebrew in primary or secondary degree. Not only in words does this affinity exist... but in the arrangement of ideas and in the single structure of the sentences it also has a near agreement".
The Revd Eliezer Williams, Vicar of Lampeter (1784) states:
"The roots of the ancient British, or real Welsh, words, may be regularly traced in the Hebrew (language)... Scarcely a Hebrew root can be discovered that has not its corresponding derivative in the ancient British language".
Alex Geddes, LL.D., says:
"Luckily for an English translator of the Bible, he will not be often under any great necessity of departing much from the arrangement of the Hebrew, especially in the poetical parts of Scripture, where the two idioms are so congenial as to appear almost like twin brothers".
Many years ago, the distinguished antiquary, the late Sir William Betham, Ulster King-at-Arms, said to the Revd A. King, who had intelligently consulted him respecting a family crest:
"I see you are interested in this: I am an old man, you are young; if you take my advice, you will follow up the study of heraldry, and if you go far enough it will lead you into the camp of Israel'.
The writer's own experience confirms this marvellous fact. For some considerable years now he has researched his own family tree, and possesses photocopies of authoritative statements pertaining to his own surname and its origin. I have already intimated that the family name in France was Seguin (or, De Seguin), having become anglicised when the family moved to England. According to Dr. P.H. Reaney, A Dictionary of British Surnames (1976)...(Seekins: Identical with French Seguin which Albert Dauzat (Librairie Larousse, Paris) derives from OG (visigothic) Sigwin 'Victory-Friend', etc. etc. Well informed British-Israel Christians will not need to be told that the Visi-Goths were a major part of the House of Israel who moved across Europe circa 100-500A.D., exactly as we have already shown in our numerous scholarly quotations. To which Iwould add this further fact. My own photocopies taken from Armorial General (Tome II) by Johannes Baptiste Rietstap, showing some of the numerous Arms of the various branches of the French Seguin's down the centuries, illustrate amongst these branches the twelve-stoned breastplate, the eagle, and the serpent, the latter two being of course connected with the tribe of Dan. And (if I may be forgiven) just one more confirmatory statement pertaining to one's own personal ancestry, to show yet again the original descent from Israel. In Dictionnaire De La Noblesse, by Francois Alexander Aubert De La Chenave-Desbois Et Badier, (Paris 1873), for example, the author gives much detail regarding a number of the Seguin's nobility,e.g.Aldebert De Seguin De Borne, Seigneur and Baronde Prades, Rochevalier,and autres Terres, Gentilhomme ordinaire de la Chambre du Roi
LOUIS XIII, serving in this capacity in 1624. The word 'Gentilhomme' is particularly significant, as is explained by Charles E. Lart in his Huguenot Pedigrees, and I quote:
"Neither was gentilhomme the equivalent of 'Gentleman', which usually signifies a person of education, manners or social position; the French term being strictly applied to those of ancient race, whose origin was lost in the night of time. It was the one title which even the king could not create, for he could not make a 'gentilhomme', who was the product of race and time: nor could he unmake him, for 'once a gentilhomme always a gentilhomme'."
The same book by Lart describes the (De) Seguin's as an 'ancienne Famille noble', i.e. an ancient noble family. The writer of this particular Bible and secular study is greatly humbled as he meditates on the unfailing faithfulness of our covenant-keeping God, Who has preserved His people Israel, of which I am proven to be one, down through milleniums of time.
Herbert Bruce Hannay, in European and Other Race Origins, says:
"The hypothesis that the British are the modern representatives of the ancient Beth Sak (i.e. House of Isaac) is one that is hardly open to doubt; except by minds that deliberately refuse to accord just weight to the facts, inferences, and probabilities upon which that hypothesis is based".
Charles Hulbert, in his Religions of Britain (1825) states:
"So near is the resemblance between the Druidical religion of Britain and the Patriarchal religion of the Hebrews, that we hesitate not to pronounce their origin the same".
Cassell's History of England states:
"The Druidical rites and ceremonies in Britain were almost identical with the Mosaic ritual".
Sir William Temple (Chambers's Encyclopaedia 1628-99), British Diplomatist and Essayist, Ambassador in Netherlands, Moderate, Protestant Statesman) states
(of the early Britons)
"In their system of jurisprudence; in the administration of law by twelve judges; in their social order; in the rights of property; in the provision made for ministers of religion; in the institutions of chivalry; in the science of heraldry, or symbols; in architecture, carving, gilding, in the use of metals, in needlework, poetry and music, we trace our Israelitish origin".
Sir Edward Creasy, in his History of England, states:
"The British tin mines mainly supplied the glorious adornment of Solomon's temple, and thence also came the chief material of the armour of the kings and chieftains of heroic Greece".
As is well known, there was regular trade between the Middle East and Britain in Solomon's day, and the writer had thrilling evidence of this when my wife and I had a holiday break at Mount Avalon, Glastonbury, a good many years ago. Visiting nearby Somerton, in conversation with a local lady newspaper reporter, she asked me if we had ever been to see 'King Solomon's Alabaster Mines' nearby! Needless to say, this was a very thrilling suggestion, knowing as we do our Israel heritage. Suffice it to say that we very quickly motored to the place indicated, obtained permission from the farmer on whose land we had to investigate, (he showed to us a bowl carved from a piece of such alabaster) and brought home some pieces of alabaster, which we possess to this day. A very remarkable link with our Israelite ancestors, after some three thousand years.
To conclude our list of evidences of our national descent from Israel, just a few more witnesses add their testimonies to our by no means exhaustive study. The great painter artist, Holman Hunt, who studied the Hebrew physiognomy in Palestine, made the noteworthy declaration that, after careful observation, he believed that the ancient type of the Hebrew nation approached nearer to the Anglo-Saxon than to any other. The Revd Elieser Bassin, C.M. Ph.B., born in Russia of both wealthy
and pious Jewish parents, tells us in his book British and Jewish Fraternity:
"The Hebrew Scriptures point to the British Isles as the home of God's first-born". (i.e. Ephraim, the collective name for the Ten Tribes, see Jeremiah 31:9);
he has also stated;
"It is my conviction that Britain is the nation with whom God has from first to last identified Himself. I, an Israelite of the House of Judah claim you as Israelites of the House of Ephraim (Le. the House of Israel). As believers in the faithfulness of our covenant-keeping God, I call you to awake from your sleep".
Professor Totten, of Yale University, said:
"I cannot state too strongly that the man who has not seen that Israel of the Scriptures is totally different from the Jewish people is yet in the very infancy, the mere alphabet - of Biblical study".
Sir Charles Marston, F.S.A., the famous archaeologist, author of The Bible is True, The Bible Comes Alive etc., speaking at a meeting of lay churchmen at the Caxton Hall, Westminster, on Saturday, 2nd February 1929, said:
"Great Britain was the first of all nations to adopt Christianity. Bible study and the results of the Great War are forcing me to the certain conclusion that today, we, as a nation, represent the Lost Sheep of the House of Israel... "
A statement from The Jewish Chronicle of 2nd May 1890 is very much to the point regarding the House of Israel, i.e. the ten so-called 'lost' tribes:
"The problem, then, is reduced to its simplest form. The Ten Tribes are certainly in existence. All that has to be done is to discover which people represent them".
And, from The Jewish Encyclopaedia, 1925 edition, vol. 12, page 249:
"If the Ten Tribes have disappeared, the literal fulfilment of the (Bible) prophecies would be impossible. If they have not disappeared, obviously they must exist under a different name".
Which is, of course, the exact truth of the matter, and we could add to our testimonies to this effect, many times over.There are many 'facets' to this great 'British- Israel' Truth, each one of which would be a further long and detailed study in its own right; perhaps just one or two facets might be very briefly touched upon. Throughout the centuries, time and time again, the LORD has answered prayers and delivered our nation from its enemies, e.g. the Spanish Armada, Napoleon,
from defeat in the 1914-18 Great War, and a generation later, from Hitler etc.
Psalm 124 is very much to the point:
"If it had not been the LORD Who was on our side, (despite our many sins as a nation, we would add, and because of His covenant with Abraham), now may Israel say; if it had not been the LORD Who was on our side, when men rose up against us: Then they had swallowed us up quick..."
Then, too, there are many Bible prophecies that tell us that the purpose of God for the House of Israel would be an on-going one, throughout centuries of time and
this present age also, until eventually Israel and Judah are re-united at the time of the Return of the Lord Jesus Christ, when He will govern this world in righteousness, ruling on the Throne of David. Ezekiel 37:22 is very clear:
"And I will make them one nation... and One King shall be King to them all, and they shall be no more two nations, neither shall they be divided into two kingdoms any more at all'.
Jesus told the Jewish leaders (Matthew 21:43):
" Therefore say I unto you, the Kingdom of God shall be taken from you, (from the Jews) and given to a nation (not the church) bringing forth the fruits thereof".
History records that, despite our many imperfections etc. the Anglo-Saxon-Celtic House of Israel peoples have led the world in producing such 'fruits'; taking the
gospel of Jesus Christ to the 'four corners' of the world, and ever at the forefront in humanitarian action. And all this despite our national blindness to our Identity as
the House of Israel. Finally; what then is the major significanceof the proof that we, the Anglo-Saxon-Celtic peoples, are the House of Israel?
Following the failure of all twelve tribes to keep their promises to God, as detailed under the old Mosaic Covenant, God promised that He would provide a New
Covenant, an everlasting Covenant, with the Houses of Israel and Judah, (Jeremiah 31:31-37; Jeremiah 32:40 etc). That New Covenant (Hebrews 8 etc) was ratified by the Blood of the Son of God, the Lord Jesus Christ, on the cross at Golgotha, and the way is now open for all Israel to return to the LORD in sincere repentance. This they will most certainly do, in God's Own good time, for as the hymn has it: 'God is working His purpose out, as year succeeds to year', and He has sworn that He will have His way with His people. So then, as all Christians well know, there is a Living God, and as Christians who have had their hearts and minds opened to 'B.I. Identity Truths' will also understand, God's great plan includes the present and future welfare of our own British nation. All who love the LORD, the Ever-Faithful Covenant-Keeping God of Israel, must watch and pray to see what He would have us do, in these last days. We who have consistently sought the LORD down the years are convinced that a great move by the Holy Spirit is imminent in our land, and we echo the words of Isaiah of old:
"Here am I, send me".
Amen and Amen
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ISRAELITES WERE IN AMERICA BEFORE COLUMBUS!
By
Pastor Alan Campbell
1992 marked the 500th Anniversary of Columbus' voyage of discovery from Spain to what was then known as the New World in 1492. No doubt there were those who who exploited the celebration of this event to emphasize the Hispanic as opposed to the Anglo-Saxon element in American Culture and society. However it is becoming an increasingly well known and documented fact, that not only were there North Europeans on the American continent long before the voyage of Columbus, but also that Phoenicians/ Israelites sailed from the Middle East through the Mediterranean and across the Atlantic to these shores centuries before the birth of Christ.
I became aware of these exciting facts of suppressed history during my first visit to the United States in 1984. While attending the AMERICA'S PROMISE MINISTRIES camp in New Mexico that year, I was able to visit the site at Los Lunas, near Albuquerque, and see the rock with the Ten Commandments carved in the ancient script.
My curiosity being aroused, I went on to study the books Saga America and America B.C. by Professor Barry Fell of Harvard University, also Cyrus Gordon's Before Columbus and They All Discovered America by Charles Boreland; from these books and various other research items the following facts emerge:
THE PHOENICIANS CAME TO AMERICA
The term Phoenician is a general one, which covers not only the seafaring peoples based in the ancient cities of Tyre and Sidon (on the coast of modern Lebanon) but also the sea-roving Israelite tribes of Dan, Asher and Zebulon, whose tribal territories in Canaan were adjacent to these city states on the East Mediterranean coastline. These peoples planted trading posts and mercantile colonies along the shores of north Africa and Spain, and they engaged in a flourishing tin trade in the southwest corner of the British Isles, their ships passing through the Straits of Gibralter, then known as the 'Pillars of Hercules'.
As long ago as 1913, author T. C. Johnston in his book Did The Phoenicians Discover America? claimed that the American continent was discovered and settled by Phoenicians and Hebrews who kept in contact with the Middle East for some three hundred years. He clairned that North America was the Biblical Ophir, visited by the fleets of King Solomon, and he outlined some twenty-six points of comparison between the civilization of the Eastern Mediterranean homelands of the Phoenicians and Hebrews and the Mayan, Inca and Aztec civilizations in the New World.
More research by Professor Barry Fells points to Punic or Phoenician inscriptions found in New England, Ohio and West Virginia, and also the discovery of coinage and trade goods in the United States which had come from the Phoenician city of Carthage in North Africa.
THE ANCIENT CELTS CAME TO AMERICA
The name Celts was the designation given to those peoples who emerged from the same geographical location where the so called 'Lost Tribes of Israel' had disappeared from at an earlier stage of world history. These people migrated across Europe to settle in the British Isles and the coasts of France and Spain. They were a well organized sea power at the time when Julius Caesar and his Roman legions invaded Britain in 55 B.C.; and he, in fact, makes reference to their ocean-going vessels. Professor Fell has now identified the megalithic structures at Mystery Hill, New Hampshire as a type of temple observatory dedicated to the ancient Celtic sun-god Bel (it was for worshipping this same Baal that their Israelite ancestors had been cast out of Palestine). He claims that other sites dedicated to this same deity and to other Celtic gods and goddesses have been located in Vermont, together with Celtic burial urns and other artifacts.
THE IRISH AND WELSH WERE IN AMERICA BEFORE COLUMBUS
It has been rightly said that when the Norsemen/Scandinavians arrived in North America in the Tenth Century, they found that the Irish had got there before them. Although sceptics have ridiculed the legends of the Irish monk Brendan and his journey to America in a hide-covered boat known as a coracle, yet a reconstruction of the voyage in recent times has demonstrated that the route described in the legends from Ireland to Newfoundland, and on to Florida by way of the Bahamas is indeed accurate. It also seems likely that Culdees from the ancient Celtic Church in Ireland, fleeing the sea raids of the still pagan Vikings, followed Brendan's route, seeking refuge first in Iceland, then Greenland, Newfoundland and finally, deep into North America, where they disappear, perhaps giving rise to the traditions common to the Aztecs, lncas and Mayas, of visits by bearded white men.
Legends and traditions also persist that a Welsh Prince named Madog and his followers, fleeing from violence and bloodshed in Wales, escaped by ship and, using ancient Celtic maps and charts, crossed the Atlantic and landed on American soil at Mobile Bay in 1170 A.D.. Moving inland, they built fortified settlements in Alabama, Georgia and Tennessee, giving rise to later claims of discovery of 'Welsh Indians' between the mid 1500's and early 1800's. George Catlin believed that he had traced the descendants of these Welsh settlers among the Mandan Indians, many of whom were blue-eyed and whose language contained elements of Welsh.
THE SCANDINAVIANS PRECEDED COLUMBUS BY 500 YEARS
Less open to question or dispute than any of the other groups I have mentioned, is the coming of the Norse or Scandinavian explorers and settlers whose activities in North America lasted from before 1000 A.D. to the late 1300's. The names which immediately spring to mind are those of Bjarni Herjulfon, Eric the Red and his son Leif Ericsson. These Viking settlers travelled from Greenland to New England, which Leif called Vinland because of the abundance of wild grapes found there; at least one building, the Newport Church Tower, still stands as evidence of these pre-Columbian Norse settlements.
CONCLUSION
In light of these few brief facts which I have outlined, it is now obvious that the seed of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob did indeed 'spread abroad to the West' (Genesis 28:14) as Almighty God had promised. They had in fact discovered, traded with, and even for a time made settlements in North America, long before Columbus reached the West Indies in 1492.
By all means let us pay tribute to the achievements Columbus made, but let us as Christian Israelites do our best to bring before our people the increasing evidence of the pre-Columbian history of America, which clearly shows God's Covenant people staking claim to their New Promised Land from the very earliest times.
There's nothing like careless incompetence unless it is assertive incompetence.
Let me get this straight: By quoting the opinions of fools in previous centuries, you've "proved" your premise? That those with wishful thinking from before 1900 somehow validate stupidity?
I guess that is how these academics get where they are: Build your thesis with quotes from the past whether or not there is a scientific basis for the data. That way you can prove almost anything whether it works in the real Universe or not.
Hopefully, the historians you choose aren't as big as liars as the other historians who refute them.
Just because ten thousand people think that the brain is a radiator to cool the blood, doesn't make it one. Just because theologians of the Sixteenth, Seventeenth, Eighteenth and Nineteenth Century see fit to aggrandize their country by Divine Fiat doesn't mean that the Ancient Romans, Greeks and Babylonians didn't have Divine bragging rights either. Maybe the Medes and Persians were the lost tribes of Israel because their country was so great -- until Alexander the Great. It's too bad they didn't understand their national identity -- along with everything cultural which made them what they were -- lost when they were taken into captivity.
Next let's quote the Mormans to prove that Native Americans were really the lost 10 tribes of Israel. Equal time would be fair, wouldn't you say?
And if you really want religion from a Church of God, then you should take as gospel everything over at ccg.org -- after all, there are all those "scholarly quotes" to "prove" abjectly silly premises.
[I don't care how many certificates you have as a mechanic -- my car still won't start after you "fixed" it -- and I'm not interested in the experts you called to prove that the car *will* start!]
Careless incompetence: Onward and cross-ward!
Pro 26:12 Seest thou a man wise in his own conceit? there is more hope of a fool than of him.
I guess your hatred of Mr. Armstrong and COG have become a cancer.
Christ said:
"That thou doest, do quickly."
That's it my amigo.
Anonymous: A couple of artifacts is hardly conclusive proof of BI. Coins have a way of showing up wherever people go, ships get lost, and settlements die out. Also Anon 666 has a point - Quoting people who believe in BI doesn't make it valid.
In order to prove BI, you would need to present proof that 10 separate tribes that had completely lost their identity, migrated to specific locations in Europe to settle with their specific tribe, and maintain an identity for over two millenia despite wars, plagues, migration, and intermarriage. You would also need to prove to that God may love all, but white folk are his favorite. You would need to prove that despite my ancestry being from all over Europe, I am now a member of Manasseh simply because I am an American. Lastly, despite there being a limited number of base sounds that humans are capable of making in speech, that a few obscure and dubious similarities in place names and syllables of words in European languages and Hebrew, things like 'Ish' in British, 'Ire' in Ireland, and 'Den' (Dan) in Denmark are conclusive proof of Israeli descent. I have seen more and better documented evidence contrary to BI than I have for it.
But that is me...I'm not like Chuck Norris, who CAN lead a horse to water AND make it drink! (www.chucknorrisfacts.com)
;)
What?! This can't be! Everyone knows that God gave the Apostle, Prophet, End-time Elijah, (etc. etc. etc.) Herbert W. Armstrong this PROFOUND TRUTH, this VITAL KEY! that was NEVER REVEALED UNTIL OUR DAY!
If indeed the Israelites are not found in Britain and America, then the promises to Abraham are unfulfilled. Then God is a liar, and we and all people have no hope......
"If indeed the Israelites are not found in Britain and America, then the promises to Abraham are unfulfilled. Then God is a liar, and we and all people have no hope......"
The Old Testament clearly shows the promises of national blessing were fulfilled by ancient Israel. Furthermore, St. Paul said the promises to Abraham that all the earth would be blessed through Abraham's seed were fulfilled by Jesus, the seed of Abraham. If you're a Christian, why do you believe Herbert Armstrong and the British Israelists instead of St. Paul? Why are you looking to nations and races for something that only Jesus can give?
Ken Johnson:
I second what Jared stated.
The Old Covenant was fulfilled. We are under the New Covenant now.
Armstrongism can't exist solely under the New Covenant so therefore Armstrongism diminishes Jesus' role in order to keep parts of the old covenant open...and you under their thumbs.
Besides, Ken, according to the COG version of BI, if you had made such a statement in 1776, then the proper and appropriate response would be:
"No, they just haven't been fulfilled yet! See, the 2520 years end in the early part of the next century, when we'll have the Louisiana Purchase and the British Empire will expand like nobody's business!"
And I'm guessing you, living in 1776, would say, "Yeah, right."
How do you know the 2520 years have been interpreted correctly? Maybe they end in, oh, say 2048, and then the true Israelitish peoples will suddenly rise from obscurity to prominence!
Uh oh... But that would mean that the US and Britian are no more Israelitish than Spain was a few hundred years ago. We can't have that!
Let me "tackle" the Israelite question from the Scandinavisn side.
Daniel Juslenius, in the late 1600s and early 1700s,
looked at 200 place names in Persia, ( where Israel had been) and 200 place names in Finland which were similar in structure.
Daniel Juslenius was a professor of theology, with a doctorate who knew his Greek,Hebrew and Latin.Would a scholar make 200 mistakes?Hardly likely.He concluded that these place names in different climes had been given by the same (SAME/SAMI..pardon the pun)people.
Olof Rudbeck,the Younger, a blood forbear of mine,born into a household of Hebrew-speaking scholars, a professor of medicine and all round scientist like his father before him,made a connection between the Lapp and Hebrew languages.This man travelled to Lapland,knowing the Lappish place names.His "theories" and "speculations" are considered quaint and out-of-date by modern scholars and historians who have failed to address many issues satisfactorily.
Look at Levi Fell in Lapland...Jews were not allowed into Finland until about the 1840s.And this place name has been around for hundreds of years.True, a minority of Jews were living in the cities on the Finnish West Coast but they didn't venture beyond that. What about Levi-Saari, a small island,almost unnoticed in a Finnish lake.And those "eli" suffixes and prefixes in Finnish toponyms.Some of these may have come through the Catholic church in the very early days, but this would only account for a minority.
The word "eli" in Hebrew means " high,noble or lofty". One of the meanings of the Finnish word "eli" is STAR,the thing that scintillates in the heavens. Language is metaphoric,hence the use of this word.
The Finnish language also has the constructions, "YLI", "ILI",two other forms of "eli".
"YLL" is an Albanian word for star.
There is an inbuilt "Hebrew" aspect in Finnish syntax,like it or not.
Where did these names come from? If one reads carefully into Finnish history one will find that the 3rd Crusade virtually destroyed a Sabbath-keeping culture,just as the Catholic church all but destroyed the brilliant culture of Provence,France.Yes,this culture was descended from Aramaic speaking peoples who lived in Finland in the very early days.
And they have left some of their "fingerprints"
To say there is no philological connection between Hebrew and Finnish and also Gaelic is arrant nonsense.Some Finnish scholars(note only some) say that these Hebrew or Aramaic words are loan words.Piffle.
Protestantism teaches that the hope of the Christian is heaven,despite the fact that the Bible PLAINLY says that man will never get there.
Similarly,many scholars will swear black and blue that an apple in front of their face is a pear.There is a word for that.
And here is another thing unrelated to Finland.Would someone kindly tell me how Dyfyd and Powyss districts in Wales have the place names "BEULAH" (= "married woman" in Hebrew.) Come forth, you BI bashers and explain to me how you get Hebrew names that preceded that Jews in Britain by hundreds of years.(Don't quote me DNA typings,either.We do not yet have the full picture).
Philology cannot be ignored.
There was DIRECT sea traffic between the Mediterranean and Great Britain in the millenium, at least, preceding Christ.Yes,people from Palestine could and did get to Britain.Only noddies and nescients would challenge that.
That's my rant for the present.
Jorgheinz
Why is it that everyone IGNORES what the Bible says about the tribes of Israel.AFTER the tribulation they are going to return to Israel,to Palestine, from the coastlands, the islands,Egypt,Assyria, Sinim (you have your choice of many locations)and the heavens if need be,and every corner of this earth.
You don't believe the Bible??
So get to believe it.
12 tribed Israel is spread across the globe and JEWRY does not account for the total of Israel.Read your Bibles,you people and see what it says,not what you think or have been taught it says.
There are Hebrew cemeteries in Russia, in which are buried descendants of the tribes of Israel.And those who say Firkovitch faked the inscriptions,all 800 of them, need to have the cerebral hemispheres checked out.And these inscriptions also say that these people came from "Sinim". If you take the Vulgate rendition, it makes for interesting debates.
It's about high time some proper logic was applied instead of populist piffle.
See ya!!
Jorgheinz
"Would someone kindly tell me how Dyfyd and Powyss districts in Wales have the place names 'BEULAH' (= 'married woman' in Hebrew.) Come forth, you BI bashers and explain to me how you get Hebrew names that preceded that Jews in Britain by hundreds of years."
No, how about you come forth with the evidence that those places were called "Beulah" hundreds of years before the Jews came to Britain? The Jews were expelled by Edward I in the latter 1200s A.D., so IF there is any evidence from before 1300 A.D. that those places were named "Beulah," that could be explained by the presence of Jews in Britain. Personally I doubt there is any such evidence to support those places being named "Beulah" so far back in British history.
On the other hand, Christians knew about Isaiah's reference to the New Jerusalem as "Beulah," so those places could have been named by Christians in Britain.
Another possibility is that the "Beulah" place names in Wales are worn-down derivatives of some long-lost Welsh or Celtic place name that originally bore absolutely no resemblance or relation to anything Hebrew.
There you have three possible explanations of your Welsh "Beulahs," and none of them require us to trace the genealogy of the Welsh people back to any of the tribes of Israel.
Yes, the Phoenicians were great seafarers, and yes, maybe they reached Britain (shades of Aylett Sammes). It's not impossible. Interestingly enough, the Phoenicians, being Canaanites, spoke a language that was related to Hebrew. What if British Israelism has latched onto the wrong set of Hebrew-speakers? Maybe the Armstrongists should begin promoting British Canaanism. Surely descent from accursed Canaan would account for all the sins and wickedness committed by the British and American peoples, right?
As for the claim that there are Hebrew words and place names in Finland, I'll believe that when I see the proof. Finnish and Hebrew are so drastically different that any similarities one finds are almost certain to be coincidences, false cognates and nothing more. Finnish is most closely related to Hungarian, and even there the similarity is hardly evident, so there is no way anyone could establish Finnish as an evolutionary offshoot of Hebrew or Aramaic.
"If one reads carefully into Finnish history one will find that the 3rd Crusade virtually destroyed a Sabbath-keeping culture,"
You're probably talking about the "Third Swedish Crusade" or Northern Crusade of 1293, not the more famous Third Crusade in the Middle East. The Northern Crusades were wars against the pagan nations and tribes in the regions of Finland, Karelia, Esthonia, and Lithuania. I'm not aware of any Sabbath-keeping pagan cultures in those regions circa 1300 A.D., but IF there were any Sabbath-keepers up there they'd be outposts of Judaism, not colonies of the Lost Ten Tribes.
"just as the Catholic church all but destroyed the brilliant culture of Provence, France."
That is, the brilliant culture that had been overrun by a suicide cult that believed marriage and having babies was evil. Yeah, the Albigensian Crusades were pretty horrible affairs, but the Albigensians were a pretty twisted lot, and no brilliant culture of Provence would long have survived the intellectual and demographic catastrophic that inevitably would have resulted if the Albigensians had successfully taken over Europe as they intended to.
"Protestantism teaches that the hope of the Christian is heaven, despite the fact that the Bible PLAINLY says that man will never get there."
You don't mean the same Bible that quotes Jesus telling the thief on the cross, "Today you shall be with Me in Paradise," do you? But there's no scriptural text that plainly says man will never get to heaven. You're probably thinking of the text in St. John's Gospel, where it says no one has ascended to heaven but the Son of Man who came down from heaven, which is hardly a plain statement that man will never get to heaven.
"There are Hebrew cemeteries in Russia, in which are buried descendants of the tribes of Israel."
Yes, I know all about those Hebrew cemeteries. They are the graves of Jewish Khazars -- proselytes, not descendants of the Lost Ten Tribes. You'd know that too if you had done any studies of Jewish Khazaria.
"You don't believe the Bible??"
Yes, I believe the Bible. That's why I no longer believe in British Israelism.
jorgheinz,
The presence of a few hebrews in isolated places in Europe and northern Asia does not make the country they reside in a 'Tribe of Israel' any more than moving my entire family to China would make China an American country.
BI is not only fantasy, but inherently racist.
Why would anyone even want to believe in British Israelism? It is the theory which was used to make tithe slaves out of thousands of WCG members. It is racist, and implies that Jews and Israelites are the chosen ones, and everyone else is "less than"
Now, the Jews, after thousands of years, never assimilated, for the most part. There are distinct and recognizable Jewish communities around the world. In fact, the Jewish gene pool has been the topic of many studies, and for various reasons. The relatively small number of Hebrews who were deported from Israel by the capturing Assyrians, and dispersed, did assimilate into their various new countries, and vanished as a result.
Prior to the relocation, King Asa had attracted a huge number from the upper ten tribes, those who did not want to practice the Canaanite religion, and they emigrated to Judah. King Hezekiah did the same. Many of the original citizens in the north also intermarried with the people whom the Assyrians moved into their lands, and became the Samaritans.
Really, the ten lost tribes were never lost, and were semitic people, not nordic or Aryan types. King Sargon II of Assyria bragged that he had captured and relocated about 27,000 Israelites during the captivity. That's a shockingly small number!
Genetic studies have proven that the Arabs and Armenians have more genetic markers in common with the Jews, than do Europeans.
But, hey, if it makes you happy....
Know what just makes me ROFLMAO about this whole issue? How many times was it thundered from the pulpit, "Brethren, that picture in the living rooms of your unconverted relatives is NOT of the Jesus Christ of your Bible!!! Jesus was a Jew, and did not have the features of a white man as depicted in that picture!"
But, then, somehow they expected us to believe that the lost ten tribes were predominantly blond haired, blue eyed people. We're talking about a race of people here, or group of tribes, that had existed side by side with darker skinned Egyptians, the Canaanites, and children of Ishmael, all of them black haired, brown eyed. You only need look as far as Moses to know that there was intermarriage. Also, the Levitical laws governing warfare allowed soldiers to take wives from amongst the vanquished, who no doubt were not fair skinned by anybody's definition.
Also, this talk of finding words in the languages of the nordic cultures which seem similar to Hebrew words is about as logical as playing all your rock albums backwards in an attempt to find praises to Satan. If one language is spawned by another there will be a predominance of root words from that language. We find many Latin and Greek roots in our Europe-based languages, but almost no Hebrew or Aramaic root words.
If asked to place a bet, based on evidence collected, on the veracity of the theory of British Israelism or that of the Theory of Evolution, I'd bet my last dollar on Darwin!
BB
It's nice to go fishing and get bites.
Jared, if you read more carefully you would find that some of those inscriptions in Russian cemeteries DID refer to tribes of Israel other than Jewish.
Yes, the Phoenicians did speak a language similar to Hebrew and there is an outside chance that they named Beulah in the districts already mentioned.
But methinks and knows you are omitting a lot of British history that would, in part, back BI.Your sayso does not make BI invalid. I don't agree with a lot of BI doctrine but they have more than a few valid points.
I will address some of the other issues you raise later.
Why is it that tunnel vision mortals have the greatest of difficulty recognising other people's ideas?
Jared,do you know that some of your Roman Catholic archbishops in France have recognised France as the repository of David's throne.Are you going to ignore them.
Check it out, may I suggest.
Jorgheinz
There is yet another example of the fallacy of BI theory. When Jesus was asked by Pilate if he was the King of the Jews, did he not say, "It is as you say?" Didn't Pilate have it inscribed that Jesus was the King of the Jews?
Who authorized Mr Allen, armstrong, or some frog bishop to knock him off that throne?
_Jared, if you read more carefully you would find that some of those inscriptions in Russian cemeteries DID refer to tribes of Israel other than Jewish._
I read very carefully, and I'm well aware of the fact that some of the Jewish Khazars eventually came to believe, quite erroneously, that they were lineally descended from the tribes of Israel. As I indicated, scholars of Khazarian history have been all over those Khazarian gravemarkers. Some are proven fakes, but even the dubious ones don't prove anything about any Lost Ten Tribes living in Scythia. I mean, think about it: if they had lost their identity, what were they doing putting inscriptions on their gravemarkers claiming to be descendants of this, that, or the other Israelite tribe? Evidently the Jewish Khazars didn't believe they were "lost."
I recommend you get a hold of Kevin Brook's work on Khazar history.
"But methinks and knows you are omitting a lot of British history that would, in part, back BI."
There isn't any British history that backs British Israelism. Nennius, Geoffrey of Monmouth, and Aylett Sammes don't count as "history" in the sense of an authentic and reliable account of what really happened. Oh, I guess there's Gildas, which British Israelists have sometimes misread to make it seem like Gildas identified the Britons as racial Israelites (in fact he was talking about Christian Britons as spiritual Israelites).
_Jared,do you know that some of your Roman Catholic archbishops in France have recognised France as the repository of David's throne.Are you going to ignore them._
Are you referring to Baigent, Leigh, and Lincoln's "Holy Blood Holy Grail"? Or are you referring to Arthur Zuckerman's out-of-date and discredited "A Jewish Princedom in Feudal France"? Those sources argue for a Davidic princedom in southern France during medieval times. Well, the non-scholars and conspiracy theorists Baigent, Leigh, and Lincoln just use Zuckerman's scholarly, albeit erroneous, work in support of their Merovingian fantasy, whereas Zuckerman attempted to show that the medieval Jewish communities of southern France actually were ruled by princes of the line of Zerubbabel. Baigent, Leigh, and Lincoln are purveyors of pseudoscholarly bilge, whereas Zuckerman, a genuine scholar, was talking about Jews, not Lost Ten Tribes disguised as Gentiles.
Anyway, I'm not aware of any Catholic archbishops recognising France as the repository of David's throne, but it's not impossible -- people can believe all kinds of silly things. One does wonder, however, how France fits into the "three overturns" of British Israelism.
From ANON in USA:
"Next let's quote the Mormans to prove that Native Americans were really the lost 10 tribes of Israel. Equal time would be fair, wouldn't you say?"
The Mormons were not the first to say that the Native Americans were the Lost 10 Tribes. There were so many who preceeded Joseph Smith who believed. That may have been the thought of most of Protestant and Puritan thought back in that time. As early as the 1600s they believed the Indians were Israel, that is ONE of the reasons that there was such a large effort to convert them.
"The Old Covenant was fulfilled."
NO, the Old Covenant became obsolete, different word.
"The irony is that morons keep saying that Waldensians were Sabbath keepers, even though they themselves today say they never were. The imbecilles need to draw the curve and pick the points to match...."
Morons and Imbecilles, really, nice things to call people you disagree with. Get a life.
"Go and stumble fool(s)!"
Beware the judgement for calling people fools.
"The Old Testament clearly shows the promises of national blessing were fulfilled by ancient Israel."
Where does it clearly show any of that? The only time of any stability was for a short time of David's reign, no way. Oh come on....
"...and no brilliant culture of Provence would long have survived the intellectual and demographic catastrophic that inevitably would have resulted if the Albigensians had successfully taken over Europe as they intended to...."
So it was okay to kill them, is that what you are trying to tell us? I guess if they are 'separated brethren' it is okay to separate them limb from limb. Sad how you can minimalize butchery.
As far as the peoples of early America, look at the book 500 Nations on Amazon.com. On the back page, if it is still viewable, is a photo of a Naragansat (sp?) Indian, from Connecticut. He is obviously of African heritage as were the American Indians from extreme eastern Long Island. Somehow Squanto, the Indian who helped the Mayflower settlers, spoke English. Maybe he was in Virginia at some time, but the history of the Pilgrims only states he spoke English.
As far as plagarism is concerned, you are probably right overall. But imagine this, the first US and BC book was published in 1954, HWA wrote his articles for the Bible Advocate in the 30s. He also mentioned many times that he would write much of what he was researching out, usually in different words, to commit those things to memory. I feel that he just gave his notes from his research to someone and said, "use this."
I have no absolute proof of that, but I sometimes wonder. Also, how many of us knew about JH Allen's book because you read the US and BC and asked around about it. Is it possible that Allen's book is still in print because HWA used it, all too liberally though?
Basically, this is plagarism, but, a book that was out of print a few times, kept being sold. I bought a copy of it having heard that is where HWA got it from. Many others I know had copies of it as well. So somewhere along the way to someone he must have acknowledged where he learned this stuff from. It was common knowledge and people bought Allen's book.
Plagarism versus calling people fools, feeling the Albigensian Crusade was okay, well I think since the guy has been dead for 21 years, maybe there is an explanation.
Similarly, the scriptures say it is a shame to talk about things done in darkness. There is no absolute proof of the other things discussed on this blog and elsewhere. There is a lot of hearsay. Most of the posters on this site claim to be and act as Christians. Some obviously could care less.
But really, to continue to run someone down who no one writing here has heard admit this disgusting thing he is accused of, never heard his son say anything, or anyone else. Why not be at least a little on the safe side and maybe say, 'I believe' this and that to be so. Really, the plagarism is bad, really bad, but the other stuff. No real habeus corpus here folks until something else comes to light.
"Somehow Squanto, the Indian who helped the Mayflower settlers, spoke English. Maybe he was in Virginia at some time, but the history of the Pilgrims only states he spoke English."
Typical BI scholarship. Take some random fact and make it sound vaguely suggestive of a mysterious and unknown history.
Much more is known about Squanto than "only" that "he spoke English". And it doesn't suggest an ancient link between New England American Indian tribes and Europe.
See, for example, the brief biography in Wikipedia at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Squanto
"The Mormons were not the first to say that the Native Americans were the Lost 10 Tribes."
Yes, you're right, Joseph Smith was not the first person to make the absolutely ridiculous claim that the Indians were Israelites. So what?
"NO, the Old Covenant became obsolete, different word."
It became obsolete because it was fulfilled. Christianity has always maintained that with Jesus, every jot and tittle of the Law and Prophets was and is and ever shall be fulfilled. That's the teaching of Hebrews, Romans, I & II Corinthians, Galatians, the four Gospels . . . .
I said: "The Old Testament clearly shows the promises of national blessing were fulfilled by ancient Israel."
"Where does it clearly show any of that? The only time of any stability was for a short time of David's reign, no way. Oh come on...."
Um, you do realise, don't you, that David had a son named Solomon? There was rather a great deal more stability in his reign than in his father's. Go re-read the way the Scriptures describe the prosperity and peace of Solomon's reign. Note that the words are virtually identical to what was promised to Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, and Ephraim and Manasseh. Coincidence? I think not.
"So it was okay to kill them, is that what you are trying to tell us?"
Well, self-defense is entirely legitimate, and the Albigensians were a pack of nutburgers aiming at destroying Europe's civilisation. The tragedy of the Albigensian Crusade is of a necessary and inescapable police action gone horribly, horribly wrong. The Christians tried talking to them first, but when the Albigensians murdered the legates sent to them, all hopes for a peaceful solution were ended.
"I guess if they are 'separated brethren' it is okay to separate them limb from limb. Sad how you can minimalize butchery."
Don't say such foolish things. You're reading my words the way Armstrongists (mis)read the Bible. In no way did I minimise butchery -- neither the butchery committed by the Albigensians nor that committed by the Catholics.
"As far as the peoples of early America, look at the book 500 Nations on Amazon.com. On the back page, if it is still viewable, is a photo of a Naragansat (sp?) Indian, from Connecticut. He is obviously of African heritage as were the American Indians from extreme eastern Long Island."
And this proves British Israelism how? So there was a little cross-Atlantic migration from time to time. That hardly proves Semitic Israelites migrated to Britain and miraculously turned into Germanic peoples.
"Somehow Squanto, the Indian who helped the Mayflower settlers, spoke English."
Maybe he was a descendant of the Lost Ten Tribes, the original language of which everyone knows to have been English.
"As far as plagarism is concerned, you are probably right overall."
You're close -- we are right overall, not just probably right. The plagiarism question has been settled.
"Plagarism versus calling people fools, feeling the Albigensian Crusade was okay,"
You're very wrong to feel that the Albigensian Crusade was okay, ANON. (Well, I can only assume you're talking about yourself, since there's no one else here you could possibly be referring to.)
"well I think since the guy has been dead for 21 years, maybe there is an explanation."
Yesterday was the anniversary of Herbert Armstrong's death. I kind of wonder if that's partly what helped touch off the unprecedented outpouring of defensive posts from Armstrongists here. By far this post is the one that has attracted the most responses here. It's quite astounding.
I've got a theory about the unprecedented number of posts by Armstrongists that you cited, Jared. It appears that some people are beginning to wake up! The typical Armstrongite mindset is to simply ignore data which counters their belief system. Can you imagine what it would take to cause an Armstrongite to overcome all of his/her programmed reticence, and to actually post here and attempt to counter the many documented facts being presented?
I hope my theory is correct. As the UNCF always says, "A mind is a terrible thing to waste" (and, I would add: "especially on Armstrongism!")
BB
The main difference between those that believe in BI and those that don't is as follows:
For those that don't believe in BI now is the only time of salvation. If Christ is no confessed before death, the soul is lost.
The view of COG that all who ever lived will have their chance to be in God's kingdom.
All religions of the world except COG condemn untold billions to damnation because they never confessed Christ.
COG teaching on BI teaches that the Israelites were blessed because of Abraham's obedience. They were a special people as far as physical blessings only. After the death of Christ salvation was open to all men who ever lived, but in there own order, Christ the first fruits, then those who are alive at His coming, then the remainder of the world.
So called orthodox Christianity has many factions teaching a variety of beliefs and most do not agree on doctrine or else they all would be one church. They mistakenly place Satan on the same plane with God in a battle for souls. I dare say if this is the view, the devil is winning hands down.
I personally don't care what any of you believe, and I surely won't change your mind. But understand, if you aren't truthful and accurate, then you are making the same mistakes as those you accuse.
The churches of God put the information out there for individuals to decide if they want to act on it or not. Most people come from the orthodox churches because those organizations did not answer their biblical questions. That is the case for me. I know what the Baptist teach, I was baptised (the first time) in a Baptist church. Good people, shallow understanding of scripture.
The evidence for BI is sustantial, whether you believe it to be is perhaps arguable, but the history is there.
There is more evidence to support BI than there is for evolution and yet I don't see evolution challenged here.
As far as damages done by various groups of churches, I know with all the scholars on this site that you can find other churches present and past, besides COG that have done far more damage to people physically and emotionally.
I know were are by far not perfect, but this card is way overplayed. I say this after 20 years of attendance with three different groups.
Some of you don't know what COG doctrines are and some of you are bitter over being mistreated, that much I can tell. The last thing I want to do is get in the middle of your bashing if that's what you really want to do. But if this blog is really for understanding, maybe some good will come of it.
The doctrine of BI is firmly cemented in not only COG but also is gaining momentum among some orthodox evangelical groups. You just might hear this doctrine expounded when you go back to your orthodox congregation.
Ken Johnson,
I am Presbyterian and we do not believe or teach that untold billions are condemned to damnation. Haven't you ever heard of the apostles creed, just for starters? Satan is really downplayed as well, we put the onus on the individual.
Just to be clear - I am not advocating Presbyterianism as the one true way. Just responding to that very very broad brush you used. I am a member of that denomination largely because the pastor, presbytery, and the synod have very little power over the laity. The individual's relationship with Christ is stressed.
I personally DO care what you believe. Whether you are willing to admit to it or not, the members of the XCG's put a great deal of blind faith in the leadership of their particular church, especially where matters of extra biblical doctrine, and prophecy are concerned. I hate the idea of people handing over free will and disengaging their brains to, in many cases, men who are mental cases.
Evolution has come up several times on this blog. The problem with evidence for BI is that where it isn't manufactured, it is largely circumstantial, or suspect.
There is a great deal of evidence against evolution which you can check out here: www.scienceagainstevolution.org. This site is a good resource because instead on putting forth some of the more ridiculous typical Christian counter arguments against evolution, they go into detail on why science disproves evolution using evolutionists own evidence and methods.
You said" As far as damages done by various groups of churches, I know with all the scholars on this site that you can find other churches present and past, besides COG that have done far more damage to people physically and emotionally.
I know were are by far not perfect, but this card is way overplayed. I say this after 20 years of attendance with three different groups."
The wrongs of other churches in history both ancient and present is hardly an excuse for the wrongs done by the xcg's. This card is not overplayed because the xcg's still deny their part in it. What is overplayed is the XCG excuse: "We leave it up to the individual." Adding insult to injury on that statement is that fact that they don't admit that they leave it up to the individual under threat of jeopardizing their shot at everlasting life.
Bitter? Sure at first. Now I am just worried about my parent's well being since they still attend an xcg.
Orthodox Christianity adopting BI??? You have anything to back this up? I find this very difficult to believe. Orthodox Christianity believes the Old Covenant was fulfilled and that Jesus is on the throne...Not much room for BI there.
Ken Johnson wrote:
"All religions of the world except COG condemn untold billions to damnation because they never confessed Christ."
Ken, you mentioned the need to be truthful and accurate; I would suggest that you also avoid hyperbolic rhetoric, because your statement above conveys either a carelessness when you wrote that, or a blatant ignorance of "all religions of the world." First of all, as Charlie Kieran stated, not even all Christians make such a blanket damnation. But your egregiously obvious mistake is in saying that ALL religions of the world damn everyone who does not confess Christ. Personally, I haven't heard any Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, Jains, Sikhs, Daoists, etc. condemning anyone for not confessing Christ. In fact, in many of the world's religions, there is no idea of eternal damnation at all, Christ or not.
To Jared Olar,
Jared,
Upon whom do you believe the
Catholic Church was founded? And whom is the intermediary? And who was her son?
Three people...and what race did they come from?
Right,on this basis your Church is founded on Israelites.And before someone rushes in and say "Chaldean" I will say it for you.
Many Spanish Catholic nobles were Jewish by descent.The Royal Houses of Europe,and its nobility are riddled with Jewry.This is absolute fact. One example is/was the House of Narbonne.I suggest that you check the various Websites of Radio Islam..they know chalk from cheese.
The Bible plainly states that Israel would be scattered through the nations.From memory, the DNA profile for Great Britain alone is about 7% Semitic. That is enough to qualify for "Jacob's trouble". And the Semitic content of Europe is increasing steadily. Fun and games up ahead.
Do you realise that at least one Pope upheld the throne of France as being that of David?And he probably wasn't the only one. I said "Roman Catholic archbishops". How many archbishops is a Pope worth? I think I more than cover myself.
Spain was known for being on the emigration highway to Great Britain.History records that Jews and Israelites migrated there(to Spain, that is).The DNA profile for Great Britain shows part of her populace as
having originated in Spain.FACT!!
Now the time frame may be a different story, but technically Brits came in large numbers from Spain.
Why is it that people have their heads in the sand re BI? I recognise that Europe is Japheth ,but you cannot stop there.Japheth was to dwell in the tents of Shem. So where you find Japheth you also find Shem,if you believe the Book.
And may I say this...the Jewish infused nobility and royalty of Europe is going nowhere without the POPE in a reinvigorated Europe.
The Pope is considered a Prince and features in the official website of European royalty and nobility which organisation has been going since about the 1400s.
The powers that will matter in Europe will be partly descended from Jewry.Their church is founded on Jews as they say. Europe will have another hour of glory, and a good part of its hierarchy will be Jews, crypto-Jews and yes even Israelites.
You see, Jared, our family has a stake in the history of Europe.One member, a chancellor of France negotiated between the then King and the then Pope.We are mentioned in church archives as far back as 1297 and are mentioned as being Knights of St John Hospitalliers around 1200.And we went to the Crusades as chevaliers.We were faithful to the orders of the then Bishop of Laon.
I am a little bit French,because all of the above is hundreds of years old.France has had a glorious past and her kings said they came from Troy...they also recognise they came from the Dead Sea area.
Sweden,British and French history aligns those nations with Troy.Let me put it this way.Upstart historians and others involved in history try to dismiss the BI testimony with an airy wave of the hand.They insult the intelligence of these ancient commentators.Those ancient commentators were closer to the action than we are today.
JOSEPHUS meant what he said when the Israelites were thriving in multitudes on the other side of the Euphrates.
If you can prove that BI is totally wrong bring forth your PROOFS?.Nothing you have cited so far can be considered valid testimony.
Yes, BI are wrong in a number of things,but they have some worthwhile things to say.
You simply cannot dismiss tradition and history because it does not conform to your narrow view.I respect your right to air your views, but I do not agree with them all and neither I should.
Bob Thiel has posted a response to this post. It's a classic example of Thielian incoherence. He still insists that, facts be damned, Herbert Armstrong was not a plagiarist . . . but he also concedes that, yes, Herbert Armstrong was a plagiarist, even referring to Norman Edwards' expose of how Herbert Armstrong pretty much stole "Has Time Been Lost?" from the Church of God (Seventh-Day):
"The truth is that yes, HWA could be forgetful. But he was not a plagiarist . . . I think a factor in HWA's failure to properly credit other sources was his lack of formal education."
Okay, so Herbert Armstrong failed to properly credit his sources, paraphrased Allen's book too much, and lifted "Has Time Been Lost?" from the CG7 . . . but he didn't commit plagiarism. Well, Billyboy Clinton should have had Thiel on his team to help defend him from the Monica Lewinski scandal. Thiel's got a case of denial that's of Clintonian proportions.
camfinch said...
Ken Johnson wrote:
"All religions of the world except COG condemn untold billions to damnation because they never confessed Christ."
I stand corrected. In my haste I said all religions when I in fact meant all Christian based religions. Thanks for pointing that out.
The thrust of my point was and still is that orthodox religions are exclusionary. I stand on that assertion even in face of the "Apostles Creed". Muslims, Taoist, Hindu's etc. are all excluded from Christ kingdom as per orthodox dogma. 5 billion people on the earth today are not in any way associated with Christ other than possibly simply knowing of Him.
I understand some think Christ went and preached the gospei in hell, therby testifying of Himself. He did preach the gospel to those in chains, namely the fallen angels who are to this day restrained, but He did not preach to all of humanity that had ever lived, since those individuals are dead and in the grave to this day....but I digress.
The challenge is for you, to show why God would condemn all these billions to eternal damnation or what is His plan for these people.
If you know, please tell us. The COG get challenged constantly for not being accurate. I am putting the ball in your court. Please explain what God has in store for us as human beings. What is our ultimate destiny?
The other religions of the world (non-Christian) of course don't require the espousal of Christ. They are however mostly exclusionary as far as others outside their cult are concerned.
So let's discuss this issue, the orthodox view on the 5 billion people alive today and their destiny if they die having not confessed Christ as their Lord and Savior.
I apologize for using too wide a brush........I reserve the right to correct mistakes before being hanged.
Yes, Jesus, Mary, and Peter were Jews. How do that help support the false doctrine that the Lost Ten Tribes are now the nations of Britain, Canada, the U.S., France, etc.?
"Many Spanish Catholic nobles were Jewish by descent. The Royal Houses of Europe,and its nobility are riddled with Jewry. This is absolute fact. One example is/was the House of Narbonne."
As an ardent student of history with a penchant for medieval history and genealogy, I have long been well aware of the fact that many royal and noble families of Europe are descended from Jews who converted to Christianity. But the Tea-Tephi story is pure bunkum, concocted in the 1800s by the British Israelists, nowhere attested in any medieval or ancient text.
"I suggest that you check the various Websites of Radio Islam..they know chalk from cheese."
Radio Islam?? Why would anyone want to consult anti-Semitic Know Nothings to try to find out which families have Jewish ancestry?
"The Bible plainly states that Israel would be scattered through the nations."
Yep, and they were, and they still are.
"From memory, the DNA profile for Great Britain alone is about 7% Semitic. That is enough to qualify for 'Jacob's trouble.'"
So God is going to smack the British people just because 7 percent of their DNA came from Jews and Arabs? Why does God not like Semitic DNA?
"Do you realise that at least one Pope upheld the throne of France as being that of David?"
Which one are you talking about? Are you sure you're not just misremembering Einhard's habit of referring to his friend Charlemagne as "David"? But that wasn't a claim that the Frankish kings were descendants of King David, any more than Gildas' reference to the Britons as "God's Israel" was a claim that the Britons were descendants of Israel.
"How many archbishops is a Pope worth?"
You've got me curious. Please name these Archbishops who, according to you, believed (quite mistakenly) that the very French throne was the throne of David.
"Spain was known for being on the emigration highway to Great Britain. History records that Jews and Israelites migrated there (to Spain, that is). The DNA profile for Great Britain shows part of her populace as
having originated in Spain. FACT!!"
All true, but none of it proves the British people are Israelites in disguise. According to the teachings of the Old Testament, even if they have a smidgen of Jewish blood, they're still Gentiles, not Israelites.
"I recognise that Europe is Japheth ,but you cannot stop there. Japheth was to dwell in the tents of Shem. So where you find Japheth you also find Shem, if you believe the Book."
That's one possible interpretation of Noah's prophecy in Gen. 9 (supported by St. Justin Martyr, for example). However, the oldest interpretation is that found in the Book of Jubilees, which identifies the "he" who shall dwell in the tents of Shem as God, not Japheth.
"The powers that will matter in Europe will be partly descended from Jewry. Their church is founded on Jews as they say."
There are a lot of Gentiles who are descended from Jews, yes.
"We are mentioned in church archives as far back as 1297 and are mentioned as being Knights of St John Hospitalliers around 1200."
I've been able to trace my mother's genealogy back to medieval nobility and royalty too.
"France has had a glorious past and her kings said they came from Troy."
Again, I'm aware of the ancient legends that linked the Franks (and even the Gauls before them) and other European peoples with Troy. Who knows, it might even be true, even if there's no historical evidence to support it.
"JOSEPHUS meant what he said when the Israelites were thriving in multitudes on the other side of the Euphrates."
Of course, if the Israelites had been lost in those days, Josephus couldn't have said that. So much for claims of Israelites migrating from Media and becoming Cimmerians and Scythians . . . .
"If you can prove that BI is totally wrong bring forth your PROOFS. Nothing you have cited so far can be considered valid testimony."
That's not how it works. Supporters of British Israelism need to bring forth their proofs. The burden of proof is on those who make the extraordinary claim. So far, nothing they have cited can be considered valid testimony.
Ok,
Who is the ex-WCg member who worked out of WCG years ago to copywrite HWA's material. He did live in Missouri? I asked this gentleman why he was able to ,after the apostacy, to put out a lot of the material, without getting into HOT WATER from Tkach and company. He stated it was because HWA had questionable material that could not be copywrited because of problems like the plagerism thing we read here.
This guy sent me a whole two boxes of these pamphlets as well.
Anyway i hope this can explain some of the plagerism issues. HWA then did not own all the interlectual property (as it was put to me) because of that.
I see Bob Thiel say HWA was "forgetful", not a plagarist. I guess he was so forgetful, he did not remember setting dates repeatedly (might explain whay he denied he ever did). He was so forgetful he might of mistook his daughter for his wife(that might explain the incest thing).
HWA was so forgetful he forgot what he had written before and preached (that might explain some of his doctrinal shifts). He was so forgetful that he forgot he had said he was a prophet (which explains the false prophecies he predicted in GOD's name).
Well i guess Dr. Thiel with my help here clears everything up quite nicely,
jim hamby
Jared,
You just don't get it, do you.
I notice that you get very selective in what material you comment on.
History proves that Jews were in Spain in Solomon's time.Only Jews??
You can bet that if Jews were in Spain, so were Israelites.Israel was a pretty mobile society within its own land and tribes were allowed to intermarry.
May I suggest you carefully look at what the Scottish Parliament say in the Arbroath Declaration.And the Pope didn't refute the inferred origins of the Scottish people.
I am not going to name the Pope, at least who supported the claim that France was the throne of David.You don't get what I am saying, once again,but that's fine by me.
You have been able to trace your lineage back to mediaeval nobility and royalty ( we are Hohenzollern by the way)..that's great.That means you come from an educated ancestry and can probably find your family names listed in the official register of European royalty and nobility.Why don't you do some more expansive reading,may I suggest.You finally,hopefully, might get the bigger picture about Europe.
Do you believe in the third miracle of Fatima? I do,and I am not even a Catholic.Those visions were real and the last one does relate to the future.And the whole world is going to be involved but much of the action is going to stem from Europe.What do you think God means when he says, "Come out of her my people"? Ponder over that.
Jared,seeing you are so sure that white honky Europe is NOT Israel, then may I suggest you name for me,tribe for tribe,where Israel really is. You see, I am expecting from you the same sort of proof that you are expecting from me. I won't hold my breath.And don't point me to insignificant peoples somewhere in the plateaus of Asia.We limit God.
The 10 tribes were to be a big player on the world scene.God isn't miserable with birthright blessings.
And Jared,I am aware of the Gaulish tribes;there is a strong possibilty we come from the Morini.But that I cannot prove.
God doesn't dislike Semitic DNA.He hates rebellion.But you being a Biblical student should know that God is not only going to swipe Israel but the WHOLE WORLD for its waywardness.Israel was going to be almost uncountable, by number,as promised to Abraham,like the sands of the sea.You need to look at some pretty big pieces of population,not insignificant tribes somewhere in the high Himalayas or the Caucasus.
Another matter. If Radio Islam say that the nobility of Europe has been infused with Jewish blood you had better believe it.Their history is pretty correct and detailed but, of course,they do it for the wrong reason.Haven't you overlooked the obvious,or rather chosen to ignore it.You are related,by your own admission to European royalty/nobility.Get what I am trying to say??
I do believe that this little tit-for-tat is going nowhere.I will let you have the final say,though,or if you wish a continuing input on this matter.You do have some good points but none of us is perfect.
All the best,
Jorgheinz
A few random thoughts, after viewing some of the latest postings:
A poster above listed two theories regarding the hereafter: 1) Non-BI people were described as believing that if you don't find Jesus in this lifetime, you will burn forever in h3llfire. 2) BI adherents were described as more merciful, believing that everyone would eventually have their chance via the "second resurrection"
It's great to be able to be proud of your church group and chauvinistic about it's beliefs, but there are certainly other beliefs in this general category. For instance, there is the belief (alleged to have been taught by Jesus and the apostles) of the restitution of all things, in which all humans are eventually saved. There are some rather strong exegetics on this topic on many websites, supporting universal salvation.
There is also the belief of successive lives, or reincarnation. The Eastern Orthodox church is alleged to have believed in this well into the Christian era. Once again, strong exegetics are available on many websites.
Another thought: Most people know of the Jewish diaspora. Most of those in the diaspora have stuck to Judaism, basically as it was taught during the era of the second temple, and are identifiable and distinguishable from other ethnic groups around the world. However, there is also another diaspora, the Armenian one.
Armenians also believe that they are the chosen people. Their written language is similar to written Hebrew, and most of these folks have resisted assimilation to the same degree as Jewish people. Curiously, they share much more dna with the Jews than do any of the suspected tribes supposedly located in Europe. In fact, there are African and Ethiopian peoples who also share much more dna with the Jews than do Europeans!
Someone brought up the 7% figure for Europeans. In terms of significance, that figure is only indicative of occasional intermarriage amongst the Anglo Saxon Norman Pictish Celts and the members of the Jewish diaspora present in their countries. I mean, let's be fair. Let's call people by what their predominant dna indicates that they are, while also acknowledging that there might be some other dna present, because at this point in human history, we're all pretty much mongrels. Native Americans have higher standards when assigning tribal affiliation. No way would 7% Hopi qualify one as a Hopi tribe member!
Lastly, I must look at what happened in history, immediately preceding the USA and Brittain's rise to prominence, and wealth. Anyone want to take a guess? It was the Protestant Reformation! (Easy, Jared, remember I'm an agnostic, so this is just for the sake of argumentation) The USA was founded based on Protestant and Christian Deist principles, and Sabbath keeping, the holydays, and unclean meats were never a part of our national history. Nor were they, as far as I know, part of the UK's history. So, here we have nations being "blessed" for keeping allegedly pagan customs, according to all of the Judeophiles in our midst. If you were God, would you reward your children for founding a nation in a way that totally defied Torah? Is that what happened to Israel every time they turned to the Canaanite religion? Or was punishment and captivity nearly immediate with every instance.
What happened here? Did God suddenly say to himself "Oh it's just no use, they're not going to obey Torah no matter what I do, so I may as well bless them to fulfill my promises to Abraham, Isaad and Jacob?"
Is it possible that the New Testament is spurious? Is it possible that the apostles Paul and Peter really did establish the one part of the Christian Church as the "Church unto the Gentiles" with less than Jewish standards, and is it possible that that church today is the Catholic Church? Did Martin Luther put them "back on track?"
Seems like there's a lot of thinking and research to be done here, and if folks just want to stay on the path of British Israelism, there is a lot of explaining and twisting to be done!
BB
I am a Messianic Jew who attends a mainstream Synagogue and do not regard myself as a christian, but a believer in Yeshua HaMashiach.
Nevertheless, having been a member of WCG for over 15 years, I have learnt many lessons along the way.
The Jewish people take their ancestry very seriously. There are many Jewish organisations whose sole mission is to identify lost tribes and bring them home to Israel. Recently, the Bnei Manashe from India have been officially recognised as Jewish along with some hill tribes in Burma. BI adherents would do well to familiarise themselves with the exhaustive rigour that these organisations apply.
As far as I can see, the COG's are pretty "Judenrein" and quite anti-semitic in their theology (as is most of christianity). They threw out the Jewish baby with the Jewish bathwater. The Messianic Scriptures are Jewish from Mattisyahu to Revelation, penned by Jewish authors (with the exception of Luke who was probably a convert) and scholars are slowly recognising this.
I was also intrigued by the recent comment on Universal Salvation. Jews have always believed that G-d's salvation is universal and are baffled by much of christian theology which has distorted, tampered, misinterpreted or ignored the original Jewish Thoughtform.
Baruch HaShem that this is slowly changing.
"You just don't get it, do you."
I guess it depends on what "it" is.
"I notice that you get very selective in what material you comment on."
Well, there are only so many hours in the day, so I have to be selective, and it only stands to reason that I'd try to strain out the bits that don't seem relevant to the main points under discussion.
"History proves that Jews were in Spain in Solomon's time. Only Jews?? You can bet that if Jews were in Spain, so were Israelites."
But of course. After all, Jews are Israelites.
"May I suggest you carefully look at what the Scottish Parliament say in the Arbroath Declaration. And the Pope didn't refute the inferred origins of the Scottish people."
Interestingly enough, a couple months ago I was engaged in a lively discussion of the Declaration of Arbroath at another forum. I'm very familiar with the mythical origins of the Scottish people asserted in the Declaration of Arbroath, and it may help you to know that just because a group of Scottish nobles assert something in a letter to the Pope, that doesn't mean the assertion is an infallible declaration of the papal magisterium. Anyway there's nothing in the Declaration of Arbroath that supports British Israelism.
"I am not going to name the Pope, at least who supported the claim that France was the throne of David."
Then I can only assume you can't back up your claim. Not that it matters anyway, since the personal opinions of a Pope are just personal opinions, perhaps true, perhaps not.
"Why don't you do some more expansive reading,may I suggest."
How much more expansive should my reading get to satisfy you? I majored in medieval history in college and continue to do reading and study in that field (primary sources I mean, not just secondary and tertiary ones).
"Do you believe in the third miracle of Fatima? I do,and I am not even a Catholic."
Yes, I do believe in the third "secret" (not miracle) of Fatima. It doesn't have anything to do with British Israelism.
"Jared,seeing you are so sure that white honky Europe is NOT Israel, then may I suggest you name for me, tribe for tribe, where Israel really is."
That's not possible, since even the Israelites themselves aren't exactly sure which of them belongs to which tribe any more (except for the priestly families or cohanim). The Israelite people are no longer a tribal nation and haven't lived according to the Law of Moses since 70 A.D., so tribal identity is of no practical importance to most Israelites.
In any case, it's frankly irrelevant who is descended from which Israelite tribe, because in Jesus, in the New Israel, all the nations of the earth can participate in Israel's promises and blessings.
"The 10 tribes were to be a big player on the world scene. God isn't miserable with birthright blessings."
Trouble is, those prophecies that you may like to see as foretelling the 10 tribes as big geopolitical players are capable of interpretation in a quite different fashion. What looks big from the standpoint of salvation history may look pretty insignificant to those who, like you, are looking at things from a temporal point of view.
"God doesn't dislike Semitic DNA. He hates rebellion. But you being a Biblical student should know that God is not only going to swipe Israel but the WHOLE WORLD for its waywardness."
Ah, well in that case it obviously isn't their smidgen of Semitic DNA that will qualify the British people for divine wrath. Descent from Israel is irrelevant to one's standing before God. As St. Paul said, he is a Jew who is one inwardly, who is circumcised of heart. It's more important who is spiritually affiliated with the Twelve Apostles than who is genealogically affiliated with the Twelve Patriarchs.
"Israel was going to be almost uncountable, by number,as promised to Abraham, like the sands of the sea.You need to look at some pretty big pieces of population, not insignificant tribes somewhere in the high Himalayas or the Caucasus."
Well, there are about a billion Catholics and millions and millions of other Christians. Seems like the prophecy of Israel's unimaginably massive population has been fulfilled.
"Another matter. If Radio Islam say that the nobility of Europe has been infused with Jewish blood you had better believe it. Their history is pretty correct and detailed but, of course, they do it for the wrong reason."
No one needs to wade through a sewer to find evidence of the intermarriage of European nobility with families of Jewish descent, but thanks anyway.
"Haven't you overlooked the obvious, or rather chosen to ignore it. You are related, by your own admission to European royalty/nobility. Get what I am trying to say??"
Yes, I think I do get what you're trying to say.
Just so you know, in my genealogical research on my mother's ancestry, I have yet to trace any descent from those European families that intermarriage with families of known Jewish ancestry. But that's okay, I think Jesus very probably loves me anyway.
"I do believe that this little tit-for-tat is going nowhere."
Didn't have much chance of going anywhere else, I don't think.
Jared Olar says:
"In any case, it's frankly irrelevant who is descended from which Israelite tribe, because in Jesus, in the New Israel, all the nations of the earth can participate in Israel's promises and blessings."
Remember that God's new covenant is with Israel and Judah - not with gentiles. So even to the new covenant era God distiguish between Judah and Israel. The gentiles had no God, no Christ no promises whatsoever untill they were "brought nigh by the blood of Christ" (Eph.2)
That does not do away with tribal or ethnic distinction, for in Revelation the tribe are well distiguished - from each other and from the "nations" - even to time ahead of us.
If you are not even interested in who the true Israelites are, then I doubt if you even know who their true God is. The matter of Israelites' whereabout is important to God and Christ whose instruction to the disciples was to go to the lost sheep of the "house of Israel".
Well I know you will spiritualize that away for a quick exit.
You guys who are coming in here from the ACOGs: Do you still believe that Simon Magus started the Catholic Church?
My Uncle's brother's cousin's sister's niece's mother's grandson's cousin once removed's plumber once unstopped a toilet owned by his brother in law that felt there was a good chance that an ancestor of his had no idea who he was or where he had descended from, however, he lived near a non-descript town somewhere in Europe that if you had a bad cold and really mangled the pronunciation of the town, could possibly sound similar to a Hebrew surname, therefore all of the aforementioned relatives are Israelites!
Holy Smokes! With proof like this, how could anyone on earth not believe in BI!!!
Obviously I am jesting, however, the 'proofs' in favor of BI, being offered are not much better and in many cases much more suspect.
“Remember that God's new covenant is with Israel and Judah - not with gentiles.”
I haven’t forgotten. The fact that the New Covenant was promised to Israel, not to Gentiles, and was made with Israelites, not with Gentiles, is the reason why all the original Christians were Jews, not Gentiles.
However, in the Old Testament prophets we find that the New Covenant promises involve the opening of salvation to all peoples, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. Therefore in keeping His promises to His people, God reconstituted the People of God on a new basis. Now it is faith in Jesus that makes one an Israelite, not descent from Abraham and circumcision of the flesh. Salvation is of the Jews, and the Savior is a Jew.
“So even to the new covenant era God distinguish between Judah and Israel.”
Not in any salvational sense. In that sense there is no distinction between Judah and Israel, or between Israel and the Gentiles.
“The gentiles had no God, no Christ no promises whatsoever until they were ‘brought nigh by the blood of Christ’ (Eph. 2)”
Exactly – it is by the blood of Christ they were brought near, not by their DNA. If you are washed in the blood of the Lamb, if you have His blood, then you have the “spiritual DNA” of the Head of the New Israel, regardless of your genealogy. In this way, the fullness of the Gentiles can be brought in, and the prophecy can be fulfilled that Israel would be sifted among the Gentiles like wheat and yet not a single grain fall to the ground and be lost. If salvation depended on genealogy, then that prophecy could never be fulfilled, because in most cases there is no way to prove which Israelite belongs to which tribe, and in other case there are those of Israelite descent who would be, under the Old Law, permanently cut off from the People of God but can no be reunited and reconciled in Jesus.
“That does not do away with tribal or ethnic distinction, for in Revelation the tribes are well distinguished - from each other and from the ‘nations’ - even to time ahead of us.”
Well, *most* of the tribes are well distinguished. Don’t forget that the Tribe of Dan is absent from the list in Rev. 7. Apparently all the descendants of the Tribe of Dan will be excluded from the Kingdom of God, at least if we take the symbolic vision of Rev. 7 literally. But then it’s never a good idea to take symbolic visions literally, since they are, well, symbolic. (By the way, have you ever noticed that the Danites are excluded from the tribal genealogies of I Chronicles too? They only show up in a single blink-and-you’ll-miss-it reference, “Hushim the son of Acher,” which means, “Hushim the son of So-and-so.” The author of I Chronicles must have had it in pretty bad for the Danites since he couldn’t even bring himself to say Dan’s name. No genealogies are traced from Dan in I Chronicles – there’s a real “lost tribe” for you.
“If you are not even interested in who the true Israelites are, then I doubt if you even know who their true God is.”
I’m very much interested in who the true Israelites are. I just follow a different criterion for determining who is and isn’t a “true Israelite.”
“The matter of Israelites' whereabouts is important to God and Christ whose instruction to the disciples was to go to the lost sheep of the ‘house of Israel.’”
Of course it’s important. It’s not possible that God would want any to be lost, and certainly not the people to whom the promises originally were given. It’s just not important in terms one’s standing in God’s sight. Genealogy and circumstances of one’s birth have no bearing on who can be saved, and how one can be saved.
Perhaps you think that's "spiritualising it away," but do you really think the flesh can avail us in God's sight?
“For instance, there is the belief (alleged to have been taught by Jesus and the apostles) of the restitution of all things, in which all humans are eventually saved. There are some rather strong exegetics on this topic on many websites, supporting universal salvation.”
For those who aren’t familiar with what BB is talking about, he’s referring to “apocatastasis,” “restoration to the original condition.” It’s a feature of Origenism, and was formally condemned by orthodox Christianity at the Constantinopolitan council of A.D. 543. There’s a very helpful article about it in the old Catholic Encyclopedia, found online here:
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/01599a.htm
“There is also the belief of successive lives, or reincarnation. The Eastern Orthodox church is alleged to have believed in this well into the Christian era. Once again, strong exegetics are available on many websites.”
I’m not aware of any evidence of belief in metempsychosis or reincarnation in the Eastern Orthodox Church.
“Armenians also believe that they are the chosen people. Their written language is similar to written Hebrew, and most of these folks have resisted assimilation to the same degree as Jewish people.”
Do you mean the Armenian alphabet? Their alphabet doesn’t seem all that similar to the Hebrew alphabet. But it’s true that all Western alphabets are, in one way or another, descended from the ancient Canaanite/Hebrew script, which was in turn influenced by Egyptian hieroglyphics.
But yes, it’s true that there is an Armenian tradition that their language was the language of Eden, that theirs was the language spoken by Noah, who famously disembarked from the ark in the mountains of Ararat (Urartu, an ancient kingdom located in what would later be called Armenia).
“Curiously, they share much more dna with the Jews than do any of the suspected tribes supposedly located in Europe.”
Yes, that is curious, isn’t it! ;-) Not surprising, though. Josephus identifies the Armenians as descendants of Hul, son of Aram, son of Shem, with the Jews being descended from Aram’s brother Arpakshad. So it seems even in ancient times there was awareness, or a belief, that Israel and Armenia belonged to the same general family of nations.
“In fact, there are African and Ethiopian peoples who also share much more dna with the Jews than do Europeans!”
Amazing how a black-skinned Ethiopian could be more closely related to the generally white-skinned Jews than a white-skinned European. And yet the DNA doesn’t lie – the Falashas of Ethiopia (who now live in Israel thanks to Operation Solomon) are blood-descendants of Israel.
“Lastly, I must look at what happened in history, immediately preceding the USA and Britain's rise to prominence, and wealth. Anyone want to take a guess? It was the Protestant Reformation! (Easy, Jared, remember I'm an agnostic, so this is just for the sake of argumentation)”
Well, I simply have *no* idea what you could possibly be implying about me, BB.
:-D
“So, here we have nations being ‘blessed’ for keeping allegedly pagan customs, according to all of the Judeophiles in our midst. If you were God, would you reward your children for founding a nation in a way that totally defied Torah?”
Ah, but you see, there was that “seven times” prophecy, you know. God had no choice but to start blessing the Anglo-Saxon peoples circa 1800, because He said He would withhold the blessings for “seven times.”
Yeah, right. Like there’s even the slightest hint anywhere in scripture that “seven times” was meant to be taken in a symbolically chronological sense. It’s actually kind of amusing, when you think about it, how the British Israelists were able to turn “seven” into “2,520.” First take “times” as a reference to “years” a la Daniel and St. John’s “time, times, and half a time,” then arbitrarily latch onto 360 as the supposed number of days in a Hebrew calendar year, and then use the “day-for-a-year” principle. Never mind that in the original Hebrew the word merely means “sevenfold,” not seven “times.” It’s the inspired King James Version that we have to follow, not the original Hebrew. Really, if “seven times” had been meant as a chronological prophecy, it would have be couched in terms more like what you find in Daniel 9. There is simply no basis for the British Israelist interpretation of “seven times.”
Anyway, you make a very, very good point. Circa 1800, there was no one on earth who had the slightest notion that God had supposedly promised to pour out the birthright blessings at that time, so if the U.S. and Britain really are the Joseph tribes, then to all appearances God would have been blessing them in spite of their disobedience and without any sign of genuine repentance on their part (quite unlike what happened leading up to the end of the Babylonian Captivity, which the scriptures portray as a time of penance for Israel to expiate their sins). No, it was all an automatic thing, triggered magically by the secret numerological message of the Blessings and Curses chapter in Leviticus.
“Is it possible that the New Testament is spurious? Is it possible that the apostles Paul and Peter really did establish the one part of the Christian Church as the ‘Church unto the Gentiles’ with less than Jewish standards, and is it possible that that church today is the Catholic Church? Did Martin Luther put them ‘back on track?’”
Well, anything is possible . . . .
"The Jewish people take their ancestry very seriously.”
True, even though most Jews can no longer trace their exact tribal descent. For most of them, it is something that, if they have any idea at all which tribe their ancestors belonged to, they can’t be sure of. It’s the priestly families who have generally done the best job of preserving the records and traditions of their Aaronic ancestry: observant Jews usually know who the cohanim are, I believe. Some of the Davidic families (descendants of Zerubbabel) also still maintain their traditional descent.
“There are many Jewish organisations whose sole mission is to identify lost tribes and bring them home to Israel. Recently, the Bnei Manashe from India have been officially recognised as Jewish along with some hill tribes in Burma.”
Yes, a while back I read about the Bnei Menashe, or the Manmassi. From what I can tell, they do seem to be descendants of Israel, perhaps Manassites as traditionally believed. They have in any case preserved elements of Jewish practice and tradition.
“I was also intrigued by the recent comment on Universal Salvation. Jews have always believed that God's salvation is universal and are baffled by much of Christian theology which has distorted, tampered, misinterpreted or ignored the original Jewish Thoughtform.”
Well, there are Jews and there are Jews. Jewish belief has never been uniform or remained unchanged, and although Jewish rabbinic traditions often provide very helpful insight in interpreting and understanding the New Testament, we also have to be careful about anachronism, since Jewish beliefs have been influenced at times by Christianity and other trends and currents. We can’t always be sure that the Jewish traditions reflected in sources from circa 200 A.D. can be safely projected back to the Judaism(s) of circa 70 A.D.
“Baruch HaShem that this is slowly changing.”
Yes, certainly the expulsion of anti-Semitism from Christian theology and doctrine is one of the very positive developments in Christianity that we’ve seen in recent decades.
Jared,
Contrary to what I said before, I will comment.
You points are very well made and show a depth of research that most people would envy.Take that as a sincere compliment.
Everyone has a different approach and perspective which should be respected,even though at times it may not always appear so on this blog.
And,you present reasoned logic which I respect but with which I will not always agree.Hey,that's where the spice of life comes from.
This world is full of myth and tradition.And,yes, it is hard to separate fact from fiction because of pagan influence in the history presented to us.But there is some truth even in the most outlandish history,which, I believe, is often worth taking on board.
We can all be spiritual Jews as a result of Christ's sacrifice.The Cohanim say they are Jewish and one day will be subjected to the acid test.Their say-so does not make their genealogy authentic, necessarily. Aren't I a sceptic.But bits of history tell me these self-proclaimed Jews,all keeping the Law, could in part be disqualified because of tribal impurity.In the Millenium there will be sacrifices at the Temple in Jerusalem, and you can bet your boots that a sifting process would have taken place to ensure that ONLY those with DNA integrity,whatever that is, will be officiating.
There is going to be a physical Israel in the Millenium, as you know.Whether you believe the same I wouldn't know.But the bulk of these Israelites are not going to be the progeny of proselytes, but true, blue descendants of the original twelve tribes.(You may not agree with this,but with God nothing is impossible. He has to recognise ancient Israel racially in order to bring it to its senses,and I personally believe God has kept Israel, in her places of residence, reasonably intact genetically.) Unless, of course,God chooses to give those who call themselves Israelites the requisite genetic profiles as a one-off.(but that is only speculation).Great importance was placed on Jewish "purity" in the O.T.times..those who returned from captivity in the times of Ezra and Nehemiah had to produce their genealogy to be considered bona fide Jews.Those who were with them who couldn't, were "out in the cold" so to speak.God made the physical races discrete and there is no reason to believe that there will be a degree of artificiality in the DNA structure of racial nominations in the 1000 year period.
That verse in Revalation which says " come out of her,my people" is wonderfully abstruse and allows for many interpretations.Just which people are being talked about is not entirely clear but one is allowed to speculate.
The time of "Jacob's trouble" is coming up which he shall be saved out of.Whatever is going to happen to Jacob is pretty horrendous, and is going to spread him around the world.I personally believe that the worldwide "Jewish" population is TOO SMALL to apply to the profundity of tragedy in this verse.This is going to be worse than anything we have seen before,far worse than the Holocaust of World War Two.So.therefore, in my eyes,there have to be HUGE populations of Israelites, unrecognised by the world,spread around its circumference which God will caused to be sorted out at the appropriate time.
There are linguists and scholars
on both sides of the fence,each conventionally educated who believe differently.Who is right? Each, in his/her eyes is correct.
Only time will tell.
Jorgheinz
Jared Olar said:
"Perhaps you think that's "spiritualising it away," but do you really think the flesh can avail us in God's sight?"
Such is what I anticipated would the reaction. The word "lost" is clearly the little big word that is causing great confusion about the subject "lost 10 tribes of Israel".
"Lost" [as opposed to "saved"] as used by the mainstream theologians
cannot be applied to Israel. Israel is not lost [in this popular
definition of lost] as Paul would testify (Rom.11.1f). Rather Israel
is merely temporarily blinded to this day (v.8). But as God promised Israel will be saved (v.26).
Lost as used by Christ can only mean lost from general public view or knowledge - lost from general historical awareness. They lost even their understanding of their own identity, saved for a few.
God had promised to make a great nation of Israel:
Gen 28:14 And thy seed shall be as the dust of the earth, and thou
shalt spread abroad to the west, and to the east, and to the north,
and to the south: and in thee and in thy seed shall all the families
of the earth be blessed.
It is true, the Jews have spread to the four corners of the earth. But they have not touched the world the way the Americans, British and West Europeans did.
So the present day Israel can hardly be the "lost sheep of the house of Israel". And Israel is not even lost - spiritually speaking.
I understand why most of you cannot admit the possibility of British and American Israelism. Admitting it is possible or even better that it is true would wipe out your whole belief system. The truth of it would mean that the Old Testament is relevant. That God will punish this nation and all Israelite descendants for lawlessness. You would even have to admit then that the Great Whore in Revelation might be the church you attend.
To admit that BI is true would mean eating all the nasty words said about Mr. Armstrong. It would mean that the TEN COMMANMENTS are to be kept, including the fourth commandment. It would mean the Holy Days of Lev. 23 are for Christians. Of course it has to be written off.
To admit it would mean that the European Union led by the authority of the Catholic/Orthodox Church will become the "The Beast" of Revelation. The mother church will not suffer the loss of daughters, all daughters who fled during the Reformation will return.
Of course you want it stamped out. To admit it was true would mean that you worship the wrong god. A god who blinds and deceives the whole world.
I understand why you can't admit the British Israelism could be true....
I can see why you want it stopped.
Ken Johnson
"Israel is not lost [in this popular definition of lost] as Paul would testify (Rom.11.1f)."
Jesus called them "lost sheep." He said He came to seek that which was lost, and that He came to call sinners to repentance. If Christianity is true, then non-Christian Israelites are "lost sheep" in biblical parlance.
"Rather Israel is merely temporarily blinded to this day (v.8)."
Yes, that's why they have "lost" their way. That's why they are "lost sheep." It's got nothing to do with a Gentile not knowing that way, way, way back in his genealogy he had an Israelite ancestor.
"Lost as used by Christ can only mean lost from general public view or knowledge - lost from general historical awareness."
Ah, so we are saved by general historical awareness, eh? If only Israelites were in the general public view or knowledge, then they might have a shot at salvation. Right. Every other place where Jesus refers to "lost sheep," He means those who are spiritual lost, those who are enslaved to sin, sheep who have gone astray, who have turned everyone to his own way. But you would like us to think that just this once He was talking about Israelites who mistakenly think they are Gentiles.
"It is true, the Jews have spread to the four corners of the earth. But they have not touched the world the way the Americans, British and West Europeans did."
"Touched the world"? You quoted Gen. 28:14, which says all the nations of the world would be blessed in Jacob and in Jacob's Seed. That's a repeat of the promise to Abraham, which St. Paul says refers ultimately to the Messiah. The Jews gave the world the Savior. You really think mere temporal pomp and fleeting material glory is superior to eternal salvation? Sorry, ANON, the arm of flesh cannot save you.
Ken has provided a long list of non sequiturs . . . .
"I understand why most of you cannot admit the possibility of British and American Israelism."
You mean you too have come to realise that it's false?
"Admitting it is possible or even better that it is true would wipe out your whole belief system."
It would also mean we would have to stop noticing all the evidence that it's false.
"The truth of it would mean that the Old Testament is relevant."
Most Christians believe the Old Testament is relevant, but most Christians aren't British Israelists. The Jews believe the Old Testament, the Tanakh, is relevant, but most Jews aren't British Israelists (Yes, you've got Yair Davidiy and his handful of followers in the Brit-Am crowd, but he and his views are rejected by most Jews).
"That God will punish this nation and all Israelite descendants for lawlessness."
God punishing this nation wouldn't mean this nation was Manasseh. The Scriptures teach that God's wrath is poured out on all the wicked, not just wicked Israelites.
"You would even have to admit then that the Great Whore in Revelation might be the church you attend."
There are a ton of anti-Catholic bigots out there who believe that, but who aren't British Israelists.
"To admit that BI is true would mean eating all the nasty words said about Mr. Armstrong."
British Israelism existed before Herbert Armstrong discovered it, and there are still a lot of non-Armstrongist British Israelists. One can believe that Herbert Armstrong was a false prophet and heresiarch and believe in British Israelism.
"It would mean that the TEN COMMANMENTS are to be kept, including the fourth commandment."
Most Christians believe the Ten Commandments are to be kept, including the third commandment. ;-) But they aren't British Israelists. Indeed, most seventh-day Sabbatarians aren't British Israelists either. Again, the one thing has got nothing to do with the other.
"It would mean the Holy Days of Lev. 23 are for Christians."
British Israelism does not require one to believe the Hebrew festivals of Lev. 23 are mandatory on Christians. How would Anglo-Saxons being Israelites mean that all Christians, even Gentiles, would have to observe the festivals that God only commanded Israelites to observe?
"To admit it would mean that the European Union led by the authority of the Catholic/Orthodox Church will become the 'The Beast' of Revelation."
Again, there are a huge pile of fundamentalist Christians who are deluded into believing the Catholic Church will somehow take over the European Union and become "the Beast," and yet most of them aren't British Israelists.
"The mother church will not suffer the loss of daughters, all daughters who fled during the Reformation will return."
Including the Armstrongists? After all, history shows that Armstrongism ultimately originated from the Protestant Reformation.
"Of course you want it stamped out. To admit it was true would mean that you worship the wrong god. A god who blinds and deceives the whole world."
Well, there is only one God, and He doesn't deceive anybody. But since the evidence clearly shows that British Israelism is false and contrary to Scripture, if a god inspired British Israelism then I am happy not to worship him.
"I understand why you can't admit the British Israelism could be true...."
With all those non sequiturs, Ken, I think it's clear that you don't understand at all.
Jared said...
"After all, history shows that Armstrongism ultimately originated from the Protestant Reformation."
Sounds like RC revisionism, maybe you and Jr. need to get together a write an anti armstrong polemic. Again, no proof that it came from the Protestant reformation, no specific history to prove that at all.
Confidential in the USA
Basically, what Ken has done is to take my statement that his whole religious system stands or falls with British Israelism, turned it around, expanded upon it, and threw it back in our faces. And, as Jared so eloquently pointed out, Ken's flawed reasoning did include many oxymorons or non sequiturs. In fact, it was simply a rehash of the original Herbert W. Armstrong sales pitch which was used to ensnare and control thousands of ACOG members, and remains the approach of ACOG evangelism today.
I found Jared's comments on the Armenians to be insightful. Given their origin, based on Josephus' writings, coupled with dna or genetic testing, all but the really dense among us can observe and appreciate the ways in which modern science can trace common parentage, and establish familial or tribal relationships. That the Armenians can be linked genetically to the Jews or Israelites, while Europeans can only incidentally be linked to the Jews (at a percentage indicating occasional, infrequent intermarriage) speaks volumes, especially because the time frame involved is roughly comparable for both groups. So, you might say the Armenians are a control group in the BI hypothesis. The ACOG attitude is exemplified by my experience at Embarrassing College, at which all of my fellow students diligently searched for a Jew in their family woodpile!
In high school science class, we were once asked where the flame and smoke go when one blows out a match or candle. Being a young smartass, and knowing that I was about to be excused from class to prepare for a dramatic production, I wrote the word "Away" on the blackboard. Oddly enough, I later learned that the teacher agreed with my overly simplistic analysis. He expanded, for the class's benefit, explaining that the elements of the combustion process dissipated into the atmosphere and would become indistinguishable or unrecognizeable at some point in the immediate future.
I've already stated for the benefit of this blog that I am an agnostic, or truthseeker. This involves open-mindedness. If my heritage could be proven to be linked to the ten lost tribes, I would want to know this, just as a matter of personal interest. This knowledge would not necessarily indicate all of the elements which Ken introduced, because there are many more questions involved, some unresolvable. Buying into BI does not automatically make one embrace the entire ACOG schtick, except in the minds of die-hard Armstrongites. However, for Armstrongism, BI is one of the major branches of the tree, if not the trunk.
Bottom line is "We'll see!" Or, not.
BB
Confidential in the USA said: "Sounds like RC revisionism, maybe you and Jr. need to get together a write an anti armstrong polemic. Again, no proof that it came from the Protestant reformation, no specific history to prove that at all."
You obviously need to do more reading in Sabbatarian history than Dugger and Dodd, Hoeh, or Nickels. It's indisputable that Herbert Armstrong was an elder in the Church of God (Seventh-Day), and it's indisputable that the Church of God (Seventh-Day) arose from the Adventist Movement, which in turn was mainly an outgrowth of the Baptist Movement (including Sunday and Saturday Baptists). The Baptists arose from the Separatists and Puritans of England, who of course arose from the Anglican Church. Guess what church the Anglican Church arose from.
All of that history is amply documented and indisputable, despite Dugger and Dodd's implausible denial that Church of God (Seventh-Day) was ever really affiliated with the Seventh-Day Adventists, and despite unsupportable claims that Sabbath-keepers existed continuously and corporately from the days of the Apostles until the appearance of the Seventh-Day Men among the Puritans and Separatists of England in the early 1600s.
Jared,
As you can see, unfortunately Ken Johnson did what the rest of us did when we were dedicated armstrongists and were faced with information that exposed the flaws in our beliefs.
Retreat back to:
1.) Everyone else is wrong because armstrong was right and he was God's Apostle - Despite all the evidence to the contrary
2.) Oh no - The Great Whore of Babylon! - Despite all the evidence to the contrary
3.) US of Europe becomes the beast of revelation, led by the antichrist pope - Despite the fact that if European Union is now, what? 25 member states? Not the Ten we were supposed to shudder in fear at?
4.) All the protestant churches will reunite with the Holy Catholic Church. (Being a protestant myself, I really cannot see that happening. Protestant denominations will self-destruct and implode first due to internal squabbles and public scandals. Much like the WCG and several of the splinters have done).
5.) The comfort blanket of BI - This is what makes them feel so special and superior - Without it the house of cards comes falling down.
What has been interesting to observe here in these past few threads on the subject is to see the believers in BI start watering down their original beliefs by explaining away this and theorizing on that as the evidence against BI began to mount against it.
Shoot, now I know that being 7% of something qualifies me to partake of that tribes blessings or curses.
I hope they remember that 7% thing the next time a 'spiritual Israelite' asks their 'Israelite' daughter to dance at the next social. ;)
Well, Charlie, some of us enlightened ones wouldn't ever think of restricting our sons' or daughters' dating choices based on skin color. But, you make some valid points.
Any time one inserts oneself into a body of literature, it gives one a greater sense of depth or purpose. Ask any Shakespearian actor! British Israelism is an unprovable theory, an artificial device, used by certain teachers, to get Anglo Saxons and others to see themselves in the Bible, and to create a false sense of relevance. The problem is, when you start to scrutinize BI from a scientific or historical perspective, it begins to break down and fall apart. In fact, another theory, the Theory of Evolution, has shown better resistance to the constant test and retest utilized in the scientific community.
If we really want to get into plagiarism, there are some topics which we have not yet broached, such as plagiarism in the Bible. Certain of the Psalms have been found in ancient Sumerian literature, with Sumerian culture having predated the Bible by thousands of years. And, then, there is the matter of the plagiarism of God. The god El was a fixture in several of the ancient pantheons of the so-called pagan cultures, as was Baal. El had a wife, whose name was Asherah. This is pre-Moses, before the genesis of the Israelite people, not something imparted during Babylonian captivity.
Further, the Sumerians have a story of a global flood with many parallels to the story of Noah. It is quite possible that the Bible does not even provide an original, truthful or faithful record of the historical events of mankind. Much was repeated as oral tradition for hundreds or thousands of years before it was finally placed into written form.
I have a paper, written by a brilliant Jewish scholar, indicating that the Jewish religion and the Torah were not really even fully recognized as the official governing factors in the Jews relationship with YHWH until shortly prior to the time of the second temple in Jerusalem. The paper also traces the evolution of the Jewish religion from various sources, with many elements having been borrowed from the nations surrounding Israel. Agriculturally based festivals, as an example, predated the festivals of the Torah. Some of the Jewish holy days are amazingly similar to the festivals in the Canaanite religions.
This all relates to Gavin's piece on comfort zones. Most of the COGgers never really study beyond the depths of what they are taught in their own little cult. They really should step out more often. It is both enlightening, and an enriching experience, as well.
BB
Chrlie Kieran says:
1.) Everyone else is wrong because armstrong was right and he was God's Apostle - Despite all the evidence to the contrary
What evidence?
2.) Oh no - The Great Whore of Babylon! - Despite all the evidence to the contrary
Again, what evidence?
3.) US of Europe becomes the beast of revelation, led by the antichrist pope - Despite the fact that if European Union is now, what? 25 member states? Not the Ten we were supposed to shudder in fear at?
So you are fully convinced that 25 states will remain or even increase?
4.) All the protestant churches will reunite with the Holy Catholic Church. (Being a protestant myself, I really cannot see that happening. Protestant denominations will self-destruct and implode first due to internal squabbles and public scandals. Much like the WCG and several of the splinthou ters have done).
How sure are you they will not?
Have you not considered the power of "signs and wonder" that the false prophet can do?
5.) The comfort blanket of BI - This is what makes them feel so special and superior - Without it the house of cards comes falling down.
God made Israel special treasure - not for them to feel superior and looking down on others. It isnot acomfort blanket - it is a serious responsibility.
The anti-BI clearly do not appreciate the great favor that God gave Israel. They probably think they got it all by their own power and ability. Which is tragin. Ungratefulness - especially tothe great God - is a great sin. Pres. Lincoln realiazed it.
How long will you disdain the favor that God to you?
Let's face it! Israel never amounted to any more than a little pissant nation, subject to captivity and freedom at the pleasure of the much larger empires surrounding it. Its heyday was under King David and King Solomon (if they ever even existed in the first place). Shortly thereafter there was religious civil war, shrinking the country, and diminishing its influence even further.
The BI hypothesis, by bringing in the US and BC, artificially boosts the importance and stature of Israel, and I might add, in a totally unwarranted way. Even today, if not for powerful allies, the re-created state of Israel could not exist.
"Have you not considered the power of 'signs and wonder' that the false prophet can do?"
Yeah, I think he may have a point there, Charlie. I mean, the false prophet and teacher of absurd heresies Herbert Armstrong didn't even work any signs and wonders, and just look at how many people he deceived, so imagine what will happen when the Catholic Antichrist finally shows up and mesmerises Protestants into coming back home to Rome.
Anon,
The evidence against BI is overwhelming. But I know you can't see it. Some of it has been discussed here on this site lately, but why don't you do a little outside of your COG research and see for yourself.
There is no evidence the Catholic Church is the Great Whore of Babylon, and quite frankly smearing 1/6th of the earth's population as pseudo devil worshipers is a lousy thing to do...which is basically what we were taught in the WCG.
Signs and Wonders of the False Prophet: Such as? Will they be anything like the signs and wonders of the two witnesses? Two dudes wearing burlap with 800 degree halitosis?
As to Europe - Currently 25 member countries with 3 candidate members. That will be 28...Again, well past the 10 that herbie was scaring children and old ladies with. What makes me so sure that it will remain or increase? With Europe you can only be sure of one thing: They all agree that they'll never agree on who will be in charge.
Until you can come to terms with the fact that Jesus fulfilled the old covenant and sits on the throne armstrongists and BI believers will continue to diminish the life, sacrifice, and resurrection of Jesus.
Let's see: John 3:16 "For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son just so we wouldn't have to sacrifice lambs and fatted calfs on a stone altar anymore." So, Jesus came to save the livestock??? Waitaminnit! That isn't what it says.
Check this verse out again, Anon and then you tell me if being 7% Israelite is all that dang special.
Excuse me: "Sheep and chubby calves"
charlie kieran said (my reply in italics):
The evidence against BI is overwhelming. But I know you can't see it. Some of it has been discussed here on this site lately, but why don't you do a little outside of your COG research and see for yourself.
You call that proof?
There is no evidence the Catholic Church is the Great Whore of Babylon, and quite frankly smearing 1/6th of the earth's population as pseudo devil worshipers is a lousy thing to do...which is basically what we were taught in the WCG.
Rev 12:9 And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him.
One billion plus don't necessarily mean right.
Signs and Wonders of the False Prophet: Such as? Will they be anything like the signs and wonders of the two witnesses? Two dudes wearing burlap with 800 degree halitosis?
Mar 13:22 For false Christs and false prophets shall rise, and shall show signs and wonders, to seduce, if it were possible, even the elect.
The false prophet has not done those wonders yet. Yet you seem more ready to believe him than the maligned Churches of God. That is a clear testimony of his drawing ability.
The two witnesses were sent not to convince the world, but to witness. The false prophet will do his thing to deceive - and deceive many.
It is the final destruction that this deceived world would inflict on itself and Christ's timely intervention that will finally settle everything in everybody's mind. In the meantime it would be best to reconsider your trust in numbers.
As to Europe - Currently 25 member countries with 3 candidate members. That will be 28...Again, well past the 10 that herbie was scaring children and old ladies with. What makes me so sure that it will remain or increase? With Europe you can only be sure of one thing: They all agree that they'll never agree on who will be in charge.
You obviously have a great trust in human rationality. We will see the truth about Europe as time unfolds.
Until you can come to terms with the fact that Jesus fulfilled the old covenant and sits on the throne armstrongists and BI believers will continue to diminish the life, sacrifice, and resurrection of Jesus.
If you only truly understood and appreciated the deep symsbolisms of the holydays, you'd better appreciate the goodness and sacrifice that Christ went through.
Let's see: John 3:16 "For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son just so we wouldn't have to sacrifice lambs and fatted calfs on a stone altar anymore." So, Jesus came to save the livestock??? Waitaminnit! That isn't what it says.
Check this verse out again, Anon and then you tell me if being 7% Israelite is all that dang special.
Rom 11:17 And if some of the branches be broken off, and thou, being a wild olive tree, wert grafted in among them, and with them partakest of the root and fatness of the olive tree;
Rom 11:18 Boast not against the branches. But if thou boast, thou bearest not the root, but the root thee.
Rom 11:19 Thou wilt say then, The branches were broken off, that I might be grafted in.
Rom 11:20 Well; because of unbelief they were broken off, and thou standest by faith. Be not highminded, but fear:
Rom 11:21 For if God spared not the natural branches, take heed lest he also spare not thee.
Rom 11:22 Behold therefore the goodness and severity of God: on them which fell, severity; but toward thee, goodness, if thou continue in his goodness: otherwise thou also shalt be cut off.
Rom 11:23 And they also, if they abide not still in unbelief, shall be grafted in: for God is able to graft them in again.
Rom 11:24 For if thou wert cut out of the olive tree which is wild by nature, and wert grafted contrary to nature into a good olive tree: how much more shall these, which be the natural branches, be grafted into their own olive tree?
Rom 11:25 For I would not, brethren, that ye should be ignorant of this mystery, lest ye should be wise in your own conceits; that blindness in part is happened to Israel, until the fullness of the Gentiles be come in.
"If you only truly understood and appreciated the deep symbolisms of the holydays, you'd better appreciate the goodness and sacrifice that Christ went through."
Actually I've found that some of the best explanations of Hebrew festival typology come from Christians who understand that there is no obligation to celebrate the Hebrew festivals. Jean Danielou, for one.
"Let's see: John 3:16 'For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son just so we wouldn't have to sacrifice lambs and fatted calfs on a stone altar anymore.' So, Jesus came to save the livestock??? Waitaminnit! That isn't what it says."
Absolutely brilliant, Charlie. Couldn't have said it better.
“ Danielou”? "Danielou”?
Quotes follow,
Speaking of God:
"For He is always unknown, He is always paradoxically, well known." Danielou adds; "Emmanuel Berl said recently that he had never met an atheist, only men who believe in God, without knowing exactly what they believe."
Sounds just like two scholars on this blog who can’t stop patting each other on the back. These men such as Danielou are trained in Theological Cemeteries. I call them that because that is where the truth gets buried. Talk about spoon fed religion where there is no freedom to think outside the box! I own a copy of the Catholic Catechism. Seems like you guys could at least count the Commandments correctly, that sure doesn’t inspire my confidence. I am sure you have some high brow way of defending it. I just read my bible. Ex 20 and Deut 5 both list the 4th Commandment as the Sabbath command.
I might have some modicum of respect had you quoted another Catholic trained scholar, namely Samuel Bacchiocchi. Bacchiocchi’s works are some of the most definitive on the subject of the Sabbath and the Holy Days outside the COG. Catholic Scholars all agree the Catholic church teaches according to Catholic tradition, not according to the bible. Ask any priest and he will tell you that Sunday worship is not supported in the bible. Sunday worship is a Catholic tradition.
The perpetual virginity of Mary? Do you really think she remained a virgin after being married? Christ had brother and sisters. Some claim half brothers and sisters because that hurts their belief system.
I find that there is a serious and fundamental misunderstanding of basic COG doctrines.
The 7% DNA assertion that has been bantered about on this blog has no relevance to what we have been discussing. Do we have definitive DNA from a direct descendant of the tribe of Manasseh or Ephraim to compare with DNA harvested from a known ancestor? That argument is scholarly hogwash. God numbers and names the stars and your trying to tell me he can't direct and keep track of a billion Isrealites. There were twelve original tribes, which one Joseph while in Egypt was split into two, because the blessings were directly passed onto them by Jacob, leaving a total of 13. Each tribe had their own familial characteristics. To say that we are only 7% Jewish to rule out BI is not a valid argument. No one, I know of is claiming Jewish descent for America and Britain. Read your own bible, does it not make a distinction between Judah and Israel?
However, true meaning and understanding is granted to those that what? PS 111:10 DO HIS COMMANDMENTS. Definition of sin? IJohn 3:4 Sin is the transgression of the LAW.
Is commandment keeping really necessary? Rev. 22:14 Blessed are those that do His Commandments.
Hebrews 4 covers the neccesity of Christians to keep the Sabbath. Heb 4:9 There remains therefore a rest (root; Sabbatismos) for the people of God. Every other time that Greek word is used it is translated Sabbath. Seventh Day Sabbath.
In response, please don’t use big words, I am but a humble Sabbath keeper…….
Poor old Ken. I guess it won't help to tell you that those pesky Lutherans count the commandments the same way (check out Luther's Small Catechism), or that either numbering system isn't actually part of the Hebrew. The full text is there for all to read in any Bible, how you split them up is a matter of tradition. Jared might know for sure, but I'd think the naughty Catholic numbering came long before the one used by most Protestants.
There, no big words needed.
Nice job Ned. Guess you shut me up.
Jeez-o, Ken! Do you know how genetic markers work at all?
Also, I don't want for you to think of this as back patting one of our resident history scholars, but you really need to visit xcg.kingary.net to inform yourself about Bacchiocchi. There may be some things of which you are not aware.
For anyone else listening in, I really have to admire Ken for having the cajones to ask questions, and to bring up what many others are probably thinking. It's very important to be open to evidence or truth, even though it may not necessarily lead you down the path that you might think. In the field of science, people actually admire those who correct error, thus increasing kwowledge or accuracy. It would be nice if religion functioned with the same integrity. If HWA had been Einstein, he would have been happy to see his theories modified and corrected! Instead he was like a jowl shaking version of the pope when confronting Galileo!
BB
quoting Jared Olar.
"The Baptists arose from the Separatists and Puritans of England, who of course arose from the Anglican Church."
Even the Catholic Encyclopedia says that the first Baptists were Sabbath Keepers. Additionally, they got their traditions from many before them. There is an amazing little booklet that I was introduced to before attending the WCG entitled: "Trail of Blood." It claims much the same history that Dugger and Dodd, et al, have on who preceded them. But no mention of the Sabbath, yet it is a Baptist booklet.
Although one may have come from an Anglican Church, does not mean that those who introduced them to Sabbath keeping were necessarily Anglicans, there were many, many Anabaptists in Northern Europe and England at the time who were Sabbath keepers.
As far as coming from the 'adventist movement,' that is a falsehood. The SDAs tell of a certain woman who was a Seventh Day Baptist, not a traditional baptist mind you, who introduced the Sabbath to them.
The Sabbath did not come from the Adventist Movement, it came 'through' it and eventually became a great part of the movement.
You mention "despite Dugger and Dodd's implausible denial that Church of God (Seventh-Day) was ever really affiliated with the Seventh-Day Adventists." Jared, you are honestly researching this stuff, but look at what that statements means to your previous statement of 'the adventist movement.' The SDAs became the corporate name of one group and the COG, well, some were called the Church of Christ, separated from the people of the SDAs, not the corporation. So, they could honestly say that had nothing to do with the SDAs and an organization. Saying 'we were never Seventh Day Adventists' would be true of the people who stayed with the name 'church of God.' Even Ellen White's husband said the name was 'always church of God.' Another elder in that meeting where the name was decided on for business reasons came up with the SDA name. There is a difference between Sabbatarian Adventist, not an official corporate name, and the 'Seventh Day Adventists' the corporate name. Although many in the GoG7 may have been SDAs, the CoG7 can claim they were never officially associated with the corporation named SDAs. So, there is not dishonesty, this would have been very clear to them and a matter of symantics. There were at one time together as Sabbatarian Adventists, but they, the COG7 Corporation, were never a part of the official Seventh Day Adventist Corporation.
I would agree that there is no proof of corporate Sabbath keepers throughout the history of the Christian church, but I would say that there has always been at least one person on earth who claimed the name of Jesus Christ since the founding of the church who kept, if not perfectly, at least in some way, the Seventh Day as the Sabbath.
Jared, you are definately well researched and attempting to honestly communicate here on this blog.
Please read this from a perspective that others may be well read in areas that you have not yet had the chance to read, or may not even have the desire to explore due to your current focus and what is important to you.
Are we making a distinction between being ideologically aligned with the SDA's and being corporately aligned with them?
I always have to laugh when a spade is technically not able to be called a spade. There are ACOG members on the various forums who actually resent it when one refers to them as Armstrongites.
What I find humorous about this is that it's almost as if Dugger and Dodd thought there was a stigma to being an Adventist, but not one to being COG-7.
"Seems like you guys could at least count the Commandments correctly, that sure doesn’t inspire my confidence. I am sure you have some high brow way of defending it. I just read my bible. Ex 20 and Deut 5 both list the 4th Commandment as the Sabbath command."
Actually I discussed the question over the "correct" numbering of the Ten Commandments last year, here:
http://xcg.kingary.net/2006/03/19/bacchiocchi-bears-false-witness
There are three different ways of numbering the Ten Commandments: the Catholic/Lutheran way, the Protestant/Eastern way, and the Orthodox Jewish way. As mentioned by another commenter, the scriptural text does not number the Ten Commandments.
"For He is always unknown, He is always paradoxically, well known. . . . Emmanuel Berl said recently that he had never met an atheist, only men who believe in God, without knowing exactly what they believe."
Makes perfect sense to me.
"Sounds just like two scholars on this blog who can’t stop patting each other on the back."
I don't know how many scholars comment here, but if you say there are at least two of them, and that they like patting each other on the back, I guess I'll take your word for it.
"Catholic Scholars all agree the Catholic church teaches according to Catholic tradition, not according to the bible."
Are these Catholic Scholars the same "experts" who journalists are always saying agree? I've read quite a few Catholic scholars' works, and there seems to be a pretty broad spectrum of opinion on various topics reflected in their works. It doesn't resemble at all your picture of a "spoon fed religion where there is no freedom to think outside the box," although Armstrongism definitely fits that bill -- and they don't even have a catechism.
Just so you know, not all Catholic scholars believe and accept Catholic teachings. But if you want to know what the Catholic Church believes about the Bible and Tradition, you should read Vatican II's dogmatic constitution "Dei Verbum" (The Word of God):
http://www.ewtn.com/library/COUNCILS/V2REVEL.HTM
The Catholic Church does not see any dichotomy between Bible and Tradition, as if we have to choose one or the other, or place one over the other. After all, the Bible is itself a Christian tradition, and Christian tradition has always drawn from the Bible. Thus, the Catholic Church finds warrant for the Lord's Day not just in tradition, but also in scripture. "Scripture alone" would not not suffice to support the Lord's Day, true, but then the early Christians did not believe in "scripture alone," especially since the first Christians didn't have a complete Bible (it was still being written), and the later Christians often didn't have copies of every book.
I'll stop here, since I think in this comment I've gone far enough in taking the discussion away from British Israelism.
Saac's Son said...
"Are we making a distinction between being ideologically aligned with the SDA's and being corporately aligned with them?"
Well, we are supposed to be thinking on this blog, are we not? There is a distinction here and the words this responded to is that they were SDAs at one time and just like in the WCG days we were constantly being told we came from the SDAs. It is pretty clear, Saac, that Dugger was attempting to describe they were a unique organization.
You find it laughable and have so much emotion to your comment with little or no thinking. I doubt that Dugger had as much opposite passion and emotion when he stated a simple fact that he was not SDA. You can laugh all you want at distinction, but you are approaching this in a small minded way, just making fun of the concept, you are not thinking just reacting.
Being called an Armstrongite or calling the religion Armstrongism is a label from a sarcastic attitude. Those who make these labels have their own isms, just because they have sheer size in numbers does not make them correct. There are too many who make labels of others who do not agree with each other and label each other, so, who is right?
"Even the Catholic Encyclopedia says that the first Baptists were Sabbath Keepers."
Really? I rather doubt that, but if so then the Catholic Encyclopedia is wrong on that point. The first Baptists were the followers of the Separatist John Smyth of England in the early 1600s, and they all believed that Sunday was the Sabbath, to be observed as strictly as the Jews observe the Sabbath. Thus, in that sense they were "Sabbath-keepers," but they weren't seventh-day Sabbatarians. Confusing Protestant first-day Sabbatarians with seventh-day Sabbatarians is a mistake that is pretty common among seventh-day Sabbatarians. Robert Thiel has made the same mistake of trotting out the Pilgrims and Puritans of Massachusetts as seventh-day Sabbatarians, just because they referred to Sunday as "the Sabbath." He also claimed a historical link between the Puritans and the medieval Cathari, just because "Cathari" means "the Pure Ones" or "puritans." Never mind that there is no way you would ever confuse an English Puritan with a Cathari (except they both were anti-Catholic bigots), the similarity of the name was all Thiel needed to assert a historical connection that no legitimate historian, or anyone who has done a little reading, could take seriously.
"There is an amazing little booklet that I was introduced to before attending the WCG entitled: 'Trail of Blood.' It claims much the same history that Dugger and Dodd, et al, have on who preceded them. But no mention of the Sabbath, yet it is a Baptist booklet."
Yes, I'm well aware of the pseudohistorical work known as "The Trail of Blood." It is the best known presentation of the belief known in Baptist circles as "Landmarkism" or "Successionism." The Baptist scholar James E. McGoldrick has thoroughly debunked Landmarkist pseudohistory in "Baptist Successionism: A Crucial Question in Baptist History." The Adventists, from whom Armstrongism was historically derived, arose from the Baptists, and they naturally inherited from the Baptists a lot of similar beliefs and emphases and ways of looking at things. Basically what Dugger and Dodd, and Hoeh, did in their works of pseudohistory is to adopt the old Successionist or Landmarkist model and modify it in order to show a continuous history of seventh-day Sabbatarian Christians. Baptists would scan history to look for Baptist "landmarks" -- evidence of Baptist beliefs -- but seventh-day Sabbatarians look for seventh-day Sabbatarian "landmarks." Same unhistorical system, slightly different set of doctrines.
"Although one may have come from an Anglican Church, does not mean that those who introduced them to Sabbath keeping were necessarily Anglicans, there were many, many Anabaptists in Northern Europe and England at the time who were Sabbath keepers."
In fact historians have found no evidence that there was any connection between the origin of the seventh-day Sabbatarians of England and the origin of the other seventh-day Sabbatarians of Europe at that time. The best scholarly work that addresses that question is "The Seventh-Day Men," by Bryan Ball, who is himself a keeper of the Saturday Sabbath. The Sabbatarian Anabaptists of Eastern Europe arose in the latter 1500s about the same time that English Sabbatarianism appears, but they arose independently. What seems to have happened in England is that many English Protestants began to emphasise the Old Testament, and they began to observe the Lord's Day with the strictness of the Jewish Sabbath. But then some of them began to wonder, "If we believe the Bible is the sole rule of faith, and we really shouldn't have anything in common with those dirty little papists, then shouldn't we observe the seventh-day Sabbath? Isn't the first-day Sabbath a later corruption of those filthy, devil-worshipping Catholics?" Voila! Seventh-day Sabbatarianism is born, the first known leader being an Anglican minister named John Traske circa 1610.
"As far as coming from the 'adventist movement,' that is a falsehood."
And yet you go on to say that the Church of God (Seventh-Day) did arise from the Adventists. . . .
"The SDAs tell of a certain woman who was a Seventh Day Baptist, not a traditional baptist mind you, who introduced the Sabbath to them."
That, of course, was before they were "Seventh-Day Adventists" per se. At that time they were the remains of the Millerites, in the process of morphing into "Adventists." Not all of the survivors of William Miller's heretical apocalyptic mania accepted the seventh-day, but the largest part of them did. The Church of God (Seventh-Day) came from that larger group of "Post-Millerites."
"The Sabbath did not come from the Adventist Movement, it came 'through' it and eventually became a great part of the movement."
Of course. But the Church of God (Adventist), later called the Church of God (Seventh-Day), mother church of the Radio Church of God, did come from the Adventist Movement. One of the early prominent ministers of the Church of God (Adventist) was Gilbert Cranmer, a former SDA minister who came to reject Ellen G. White as a false prophetess. The historical and corporate link between the SDAs and the Church of God (Seventh-Day) is amply documented.
"There were at one time together as Sabbatarian Adventists, but they, the COG7 Corporation, were never a part of the official Seventh Day Adventist Corporation."
True, but those who organised the CG7 were once a part of the SDA sect, and many of them were former believers in Ellen G. White.
"I would agree that there is no proof of corporate Sabbath keepers throughout the history of the Christian church, but I would say that there has always been at least one person on earth who claimed the name of Jesus Christ since the founding of the church who kept, if not perfectly, at least in some way, the Seventh Day as the Sabbath."
Of course that's quite possible, even if unprovable. But it takes more that just one lone believer to make a "church."
Anyway, to sum up, it is as I said: the historical lineage of the Armstrongist family of sects traces back through the Adventists to the English Baptists, and from them to the Anglican Church in the late 1500s and early 1600s. Hence, if the Catholic Church is going to succeed in bringing all of its "daughters" back home, then the Armstrongists will have to convert to Catholicism. Somehow I don't see very many people following the path that I walked.
"Being called an Armstrongite or calling the religion Armstrongism is a label from a sarcastic attitude."
On the contrary, since there are perhaps millions of different subsets of religious and philosophical belief, it is necessary to distinguish them and classify them. Most people aren't believers in the teachings that Herbert Armstrong packaged together as "the Truth of God," so it makes no sense for them to refer to Armstrong's teachings as using the Armstrongist in-house jargon, "the Truth." Instead, they are going to find what is distinctive about those beliefs and come up with an easy-to-remember name. What sets Herbert Armstrong's teachings apart from other teachings is that he is the one who taught them, so the most logical and most accurate name for his teachings is "Armstrongism." It is THE correct name for the religion that he invented (that, of course, his followers believe he didn't invent, but merely restored -- but that is another one of his teachings). Armstrongists are just going to have to get used to the fact that pretty much everyone else on earth has settled on a name for their religion. It's not an insult, it's not done in mockery. It's just a matter of convenience and accuracy.
Or should the Lutherans and Calvinists fly off the handle every time someone refers to them in an accurate and neutral way too?
to the one who wrote that the first baptists were sabbath keepers, and the source it the "catholic encyclopedia", i would ask which one . I cannot find it in my 1913 catholic encyclopedia",
jim hamby
I'm not the one who made the remark, however you can learn more about Sabbatarian Baptists from the online version of the Catholic Encyclopedia. I don't know how to convert a link, but type into your browser: http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/13287a.htm, and an article will come up.
Sometime in the past, I had read an independent history of the COG movement, and was aware of this sabbatarian Baptist connection, but believe it would be a misstatement of fact to assume that all of the original Baptists were sabbatarian, or that there was any major presence of sabbatarianism amongst the original colonists of the USA. If anything, the sabbatarians were a minor subset of the greater Baptist movement.
BB
I remember doing research years ago for my minister in GCG at the time, and when i saw the claim "sabbath", it turned out to be "Sunday" after reading the page or two before and after the reference. Thanks for the link, and it is the same way as with HWA and company trying to prove the Waldensians kept the 7th day sabbath. I just took the time to see that some of those references were quoted out of context. Like the one where the "Sabbath Bell" was used. A few pages before thereference showed that it was all that was left of the church that was burned by the inquisitors. A few pages after showed they had rebuilt the church and used this Sabbath bell to ring in their first "SUNDAY" services they had had in a long time. When i brought it up, i was told by the minister that it had to have been Pentecost the Waldensians wrote about. But in further study a page or two later showed "Sunday". This is the type of research done by WCG etc. that show a lack in truthful research and scholarship. The deceptive practices used are the same as their "prooftexting' as a means of teaching all their agenda.
Mat 7:13 Enter ye in at the strait gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat:
Mat 7:14 Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it.
My advice to Ken Johnson is to leave these law-despisers to their devices.
Ken Johnson the Armstrongite, said,
Jared, You obviously are well read in secular and Catholic writings. What you don’t know is scripture, because if you did….you would know that the prophecies of Rev 17 and 18 speak of a Geopolitical/ Religious combine. This Church would have existed down throughout the centuries and would have a reputation for mixing itself with the wordly governments of the day, influencing the laws and culture to the extent that at times others with different beliefs were put to death for those beliefs.
I know you cannot honestly admit the possibility that these prophecies might be relevant. But I don’t expect you too.
You will have your part in God’s Kingdom it if that is your desire. Everyone that ever lived will have the opportunity. Now I know what your Church would say about a heretic like myself, we have history to prove that.*
*Fox’s Book of Martyrs, Chap. 4 Papal Persecutions
Of course, as of today that organization doesn’t have the authority to persecute it perceived enemies, but history has a way of coming around and I know it will have the opportunity again in the near future to deal decisively with “heretics” like myself. I do not hate the Catholic Church and I surely don’t hate the adherents. I work with and socialize with Catholics who are wonderful people. The reason the Catholic Church can’t stand Sabbath keepers is because as a whole they do not bend to Papal will.
By the way, the Churches of God, pick an era, have always had problems with anti-Sabbath/Law individuals trying to come in and change doctrine or take over. Nothing new, it happened when Ellen G. White declared herself a prophetess and adopted the name Seventh Day Adventist. The faithful moved on and continued to keep the faith once delivered.
I have moved through two organizations to date. And will continue to move on if necessary. One of those the WCG is the parent church to the one I attend today. I don’t deny that parentage, I also don’t agree with what they teach today. The Church of God is a body of believers not a corporate organization, so to say they originated out of the Reformation is inaccurate.
Also notice in Rev. that there is one Church that obviously does not associate nor ever has associated with the Harlot Church. So your assertion that all churches will return is erroneous.
The Reason BI is relevant to the COG is because the identity of the nations is the key to deciphering the prophesies of the blble. I know a lot of you are thinking, “false prophecies”, but I fully believe time will bear out the facts as understood by the C’sOG. This is my last post on the topic. My beliefs are unshaken.
Heb 11:1
Hi,
I'm not sure whether these links are different from the COG7th Day or Sabbatarians mentioned so far, but I think they may have a different background from the Churches of God.
These are called Seventh Day Baptists and I don't think they are linked with the Adventists so far as I can tell. They do have a history of doctrinal change from one nation to another however.
Mainly those in Europe remain Unitarian as well as Sabbatarian of Baptist background, while the American ones are either Trinitarian or Binitarian/Ditheist.
I hope I am not sending some link which has already been mentioned, although I didn't notice it anywhere.
********
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seventh_Day_Baptist
A Choosing People
A THUMBNAIL SKETCH OF
SEVENTH DAY BAPTISTS
1650 - PRESENT
http://www.seventhdaybaptist.org/images/7DB/Linda/SEVENTH%20DAY%20BAPTIST.htm
SEVENTH DAY BAPTIST
CONFERENCE
It’s Origin
Printed for the
SEVENTH DAY BAPTIST GENERAL CONFERENCE
by
THE AMERICAN SABBATH TRACT SOCIETY
Plainfield, New Jersey
Computer Scanned and Formatted
by
The Seventh Day Baptist Historical Society
2002
"Mat 7:13 Enter ye in at the strait gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat"
Of course it is my conviction that believers in British Israelism are among the many who seem to be crowding down the path to perdition.
"Jared, You obviously are well read in secular and Catholic writings. What you don’t know is scripture"
Well, during my 32 years in the WCG, I got to know scripture pretty well (mostly having to read it through Armstrongist lenses, of course). I don't think my knowledge and grasp of scripture has declined any in the past seven years or so.
"the prophecies of Rev 17 and 18 speak of a Geopolitical/ Religious combine."
On that we are agreed.
"This Church"
The visions don't specify a "Church," but rather indicate the government and religion of the pagan Roman Empire. That is the only interpretation of those chapters that we meet among the early Christians. Is it really likely that an interpretation of Bible prophecy that nobody thought of until the end of the Middle Ages is the one that God vouchsafed to the Church?
"would have existed down throughout the centuries and would have a reputation for mixing itself with the wordly governments of the day, influencing the laws and culture to the extent that at times others with different beliefs were put to death for those beliefs."
At the time Revelation was written, the only entities that were martyring Christians were the Roman Empire and, to a much less degree, certain Jewish authorities.
"Everyone that ever lived will have the opportunity."
We agree on that, but disagree about the timing
"Now I know what your Church would say about a heretic like myself, we have history to prove that.*
*Fox’s Book of Martyrs, Chap. 4 Papal Persecutions"
May I recommend you try not to view present realities through the lens of 17th. century Reformation polemics? I can assure you that Chapter 4 of Fox's Book of Martyrs in no way reflects what the Catholic Church today would say about a heretic such as yourself.
"Of course, as of today that organization doesn’t have the authority to persecute it perceived enemies, but history has a way of coming around and I know it will have the opportunity again in the near future to deal decisively with 'heretics' like myself."
Ken, I will go out a little on a limb and predict that you will go to your grave never having seen this Catholic persecution of non-Catholics that you are expecting in the near future. Of course I am by no means a prophet, nor have I been given any special revelation. But just by looking at the signs of the times, I deem that there is just too much that would have to happen before Catholics ever went back to the bad old days of the auto da fe. I could be wrong, but the return of the Inquisition is a virtual impossibility. For one thing, before it could happen, the Catholic Church would have to convene a new oecumenical council to reverse Vatican II and reinstitute all the old canon law that was stripped from the Code that made the Inquisition possible, and there is no way the Church could ever convene a new council in its current state.
"The reason the Catholic Church can’t stand Sabbath keepers is because as a whole they do not bend to Papal will."
No, the real reason is that we see that the New Testament teaches that Sabbath-keeping is not mandatory any more, and two cannot walk together except they be agreed.
"Nothing new, it happened when Ellen G. White declared herself a prophetess and adopted the name Seventh Day Adventist. The faithful moved on and continued to keep the faith once delivered."
Funny thing is, the SDAs see themselves as the faithful, and they deploy all the polemical arguments against "anti-Law" people that Armstrongists do.
"The Church of God is a body of believers not a corporate organization, so to say they originated out of the Reformation is inaccurate."
The historical record is absolutely clear, Ken. Armstrongism is a historical and doctrinal outgrowth of the radical Reformation.
"So your assertion that all churches will return is erroneous."
Well, whoever is the Harlot and whoeve is the Virgin Mother, I did not say and do not believe that all churches will return. I just said that IF all children of the Reformation will return (they won't ever return), then that would have to include the Armstrongist sects too.
"The Reason BI is relevant to the COG is because the identity of the nations is the key to deciphering the prophesies of the blble."
That is one of the biggest problems with British Israelism: it supplants Jesus as the center and focus of Bible prophecy. "The testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy," Revelation says. Christianity puts its prophetic emphasis on Jesus, not the modern day genetic descendants of Jacob.
"This is my last post on the topic."
That's okay, this commentbox is filled to overflowing already.
"These are called Seventh Day Baptists and I don't think they are linked with the Adventists so far as I can tell."
No, the Seventh-Day Baptists are not linked to the Adventists, other than the fact that the Seventh-Day Adventists learned about seventh-day Sabbatarianism from the Seventh-Day Baptists. But otherwise Adventism and Seventh-Day Baptism have distinct "genealogies" within the broader Baptist movement.
The Seventh-Day Baptists have never been British Israelists, by the way.
I used to post on one of the Messianic boards. They had their own take on the beast and false prophet. At this point in history, if one believes the Bible, and believes that Revelation was intended to be part of the canon, these Messianics' understanding makes more sense than HWA's interpretation. It involves the nations which historically gave problems to Israel, and the Islamic religion, rather than a revival of the Roman Empire led by the Catholic Church.
I'll hit a couple of the highlights:
Psalm 83 provides the key to understanding Daniel 7 and Revelation 13.
Ps 83:4 "They have said , Come, and let us cut them off from being a nation; that the name of Israel may be no more in remembrance. 5: For they have consulted together with one consent: they are confederate against thee:"
In the next verses, the enemy nations are actually named: Edom, the Ishmaelites, Moab, the Hagarenes, Gebal, Ammon, Amelek, the Philistines, the inhabitants of Tyre, and Assur. These ten nations are generally recognized as being Muslim nations surrounding Israel, and could easily fit the role of the ten horns of the fourth beast of Daniel 7.
Rev.20:4 And I saw thrones, and they sat on them. And judgement was given to them, and the souls of the ones having been beheaded because of the witness of Yahshua, and because of the Word of Elohim, and who had not worshipped the beast nor its image, and had not received the mark on their forehead and on their hand. And they lived and reigned with Messiah a thousand years. (Describes the martyrred ones and their method of death)
Rev. 17:5 And on her forehead was a name having been written: Mystery, Babylon the Great, the Mother of the Harlots and of the Abominations of the Earth. (Babylon is located in Iraq. Saddam Hussein was in the process of restoring the city prior to the recent war, and his recent death)
Finally:
1) The events described in scripture are all centered on the Middle East.
2) The Islamic method of executing heretics is beheading. Historically, Catholics used burning at stake as the method of punishing unrepentent heretics.
3)The great harlot sits on many waters. The nations of Islam fit here, too, as they stretch from Atlantic Ocean to Red Sea, to Persian Gulf, to the Indian Ocean, to islands such as Indonesia, and Maylasia.
4) The four angels will be released from imprisonment under the Euphrates River, and that river will dry up, allowing access from the Muslim East to the Middle East.
Anyone believing that this is the time of the end must be very frustrated waiting for the very slow pace of events in Europe, and the lack of activity of the Catholic Church. Not so with the world of Islam! The new leader of Iran has linked himself with the appearance of the final Iman. The Muslims are united in a holy jihad against both the Great Satan (us, Israel's protector), and Israel. From an historical standpoint, it would make much more sense for an Islamic holy man to set up operations in Jerusalem than for the pope to suddenly move from the Vatican, because the Muslims have always claimed Jerusalem as their holy city, and controlled it until the six day war several decades ago.
HWA based his interpretation of prophecy on the World War II era, and many seem to want to stick with that. But, as opposed to attempting to make that model continue to fit, the interpretation above reflects what we see around us today, using several new keys from the Bible.
BB
"HWA based his interpretation of prophecy on the World War II era, and many seem to want to stick with that. But, as opposed to attempting to make that model continue to fit, the interpretation above reflects what we see around us today, using several new keys from the Bible."
Indeed, that Messianic Jewish interpretation has a lot more going for it than the Armstrongist model. At least it doesn't stupidly and unhistorically interpret "Israel" to mean "the U.S.A." and "Assyria" to mean "Germany." But then it is also subject to the same weakness as the Armstrongist model, that of being time-bound to what is going on in current events. If the geopolitical scene changes to make the Messianic Jewish interpretation implausible, the way the scene changed from the World War II and Cold War state of affairs, will Messianic Jews continue to advocate their interpretation the way Armstrongists continue to try to go for a gallop on the bones of the Armstrongist horse?
Jared,
The Rabbi, or Elder who explained their understanding to me went to great lengths and took a great deal of his time to do so. I'd like to think that it was because he realized that I visited their site motivated by a sincere desire to learn.
However, what you say is so true. So many people over the ages have attempted to insert themselves into the Bible, based on what they see around them. In some cases, they have placed time limits (conveniently denied later) on their "prophecies", and end up in a Deut. 18:20 situation.
One item which reinforces my agnosticism is the realization that none of the erstwhile latter day prophets who seek so much control in our lives have what some call "the witness of God" behind them. I mean that in the sense that scripture indicates that God somehow always let everyone know through whom He was working, whether it be Moses, the prophets, John the Baptist, Jesus Christ, or the Apostles. It was like God gave these people a letter of introduction, or his personal calling card. This is something which you just don't see in the work of Herbert W. Armstrong, or his successors. There's plenty of the Deut. 18:20 activity, but not the witness of God.
I wonder how many of the ACOG members even wonder about that.
BB
Ah, the pot of dissension keeps bubbling.
WONDERFUL STUFF.
151 comments so far...that must be a record for any one subject.Keep it up,gentlemen.
Iron sharpens iron, as they say.
In the matter of the identification of the Beast,isn't there just one,eeny,teeny,weeny critical clue that no one has touched on yet. I love being cryptic.Can any one guess what it is?
And for those who believe in the 3rd vision of Fatima,as I do, and Jared,too,may I suggest you check out the status of England. Bless Herb's soul...he predicted the downfall of UK. We don't need his help: it appears the 3rd vision of Fatima does it for us.
Cheers
jorgheinz
You aren't referring to "666" are you?
Hi Jared,
A good guess. I was wanting the words " seven hills/mountains" but 666 will do.
The Bible talks about the seven mountains,as you know, ( Rev 17:9),and it is quite specific about the identity of the woman, as I read it. I have to allow for other persons' takes on this.I am not that closed minded.
My old Presbyterian Grannie talked about the seven hills of Rome, well before I came into Worldwide.Grannie had a march on Herb in my life.
To be fair,Grannie came from an era when everything was black and white, and there was no questioning of church beliefs.Protestant or Catholic,you accepted what they told you.
Let me say this though.Europe is in for a rough ride ahead,regardless of where the seven hills are.
jorgheinz
The primitives were not explicit enough. There are seven hills or mountains in the Jerusalem area, and the Jews are condemned throughout the Bible as those who killed the prophets.
Hi Saac's Son,
God loves a trier.Anything is possible to him that believes.Gavin and Jared might like to discuss in detail the politico-historic-theological implications of your statement.On a liberal website like this, all viewpoints are catered for and I am sure we could find a "Line of Best Fit" for you.
However,the Bible itself does identify the location of the seven hills,as I read it.For consistency sake,may I suggest you revert to Revelation and find out more about the "entity" that occupies the seven hills of Rome.Even my old Grannie understood this, and this is one of the few aspects of the Herbal doctrine she would have agreed with.
But, if you do find that Jerusalem is the site of the seven hills of Revelation,come back and let's have a discussion.There are many people on board this blog more qualified than myself...I am only a neophyte.
And hey, it's fun discussing these issues.
All the best,
Jorgheinz
Well, Yorgie, I'm glad to know that Grannie's opinions constitute some sort of "proof" in your mind!
Really, I hope nobody is seriously concerned about Armstrong's Apocalypse scenario. There has been great debate both prior to and after canonization as to whether Revelation even belongs in the canon.
Also, many historians have pointed out that the so-called Medo-Persian empire never existed. This would throw out any timeline based on the wee beasties. Plus the Jews (oracle keepers) seem to think we've got about 250 more years until absolute year 6,000. This, in addition to the bogus Scandinavian (as opposed to semitic) Israelites!
Any way you look at it, Armstrongites and those who informed them have a lot of questions to answer about their blatant speculations.
Hi Gamaliel,
Do you think I rely on Grannies' take of the identity of the woman that sits on seven hills.?That's just a diversion to test the mental fabric of people.
If I could resurrect,a colonel, a forbear who marched into the Netherlands in the year of 1572 with his troops, he would have no hesitation in telling you who the woman of the apocalyse was.He was a witness to the religious atrocities committed in those times.
Gamaliel, isn't it funny that all of the tomes in the local libraries,written by Ph.D's, professors of history and other scholars with doctorates ALL embrace at least the Persian and the Roman Empires.Are you telling me that your erudition is greater than the sum of theirs?And remember,these men have been on digs and have seen at first hand the archaeology of these civilisations.
You have to call these civilisations something..they did exist,you know.Archaeology proves that a million times over.If you don't believe hard, physical evidence, what do you believe? Mind you,Christ did speak about this attitude.But that's another matter.
Are you telling me that the amassed weight of archaeological data( for your sake let's call it that) is WRONG?
What planet do you inhabit or are you just stirring with one tongue in cheek? If so, I have WILLINGLY taken your bait.Nothing like a good old stoush,hey what, old chap.
Persepolis,Susa and other sites formed part of the Persian Empire.And they will even show you Daniel's tomb...pardon, supposed tomb.Tell me they don't exist and are a fabrication?Dear me, I would feel sorry for you.
GET REAL,GAMALIEL.Look at Europe.They have a REAL problem.Europe has an ability to deal very effectively with people seen as different.What do you think the Reformation,The Spanish Inquisition and Nazi Regime were all about? And Europe is most definitely mentioned in the Bible.(If you believe Revelation, Europe is in the text.If you don't believe Revelation there will be people around one day to remind that it does exist.)
Perhaps you need to catch up on some extra reading.If you have done so,the content has obviously not filtered through. The leopard has not changed its spots and already is starting to bare its teeth,just a little, in certain matters.And don't mistake that for a yawn,either.
Gamaliel,what do you really believe,or where have you been all these years.This earth is under threat in more ways than one:open your eyes.
The land of Israel is under threat.Do you think she could defend herself against sustained attack from superior forces? She has many nations that want her destroyed.Deny the reality of this.And by the way, this is all mentioned in the Good Book that you cast aspersions on or have some sort of mental block over.
As the adage goes, let the unwary and soporific go their way for they shall be wakened one day with an almighty thump into the future world of today.
Whether you like it or not, the events portrayed in Revelation are an inevitability,whether by the means outlined or by some other earthly agency.
jorgheinz
I'm an avid reader, reading very widely. I let evidence and facts lead me to my conclusions, not
Armstrongism. I could easily recommend some reading materials for you, but, like most Armstrongites, you'll either refuse to read them, or you'll read them and continue believing your Armstrongism. Consequently, you're not worth my time. I posted what I posted for the greater audience, not for you specifically.
Gamaliel,
Never mind about the others..you have got me.They( the others) will probably answer in due course.
You deserve a medal for ignorance.
You choose to ignore, by design I suspect, the matter of the Medo-Persian Empire.You say that you have read widely but surely not wisely.Your reading would have taken you to the world of the Achaemenids.Tell me they did not exist; tell me that the multiplicity of satrapies did not exist.Tell me they are myth.Hundreds of papers,scores of books have been written on the matter.Most by bona-fide scholars who can back up their writings by fieldwork.Wakey,wakey,Gamaliel.
For historical enlightenment, may I suggest you obtain the DVD edition of the 4 part TV series that retraces the steps of Alexander the Great on his almost worldwide expedition.Write to the American/British history professor who compiled this series.And tell him that one of his sources, Flavius Arrianus never lived.Tell him he is an ignoramus.He might question who is the ignoramus.
Pull your head out of the sand,old boy.And,no, I don't follow Armstrongism.I read what the Bible says and much of it is backed by rock-solid archaeology.Next you will be wanting to tell me Jerusalem doesn't exist.
Gamaliel, we have your type in the Antipodes who swear that the Egyptians never visited Australia,DESPITE archaeological proof.You cannot mistake ANUBIS for anything else,hardly.Doubters in NZ say that pygmies never inhabited that country despite skeletons of such having been found.Pygmies were also in the UK,Sri Lanka, Australia etc.
May I suggest you change your brand of medication;the current prescription is not doing much for your rationale.
Cheers.
jorgheinz
http://www.infidels.org/library/magazines/tsr/2000/2/002what.html
Gamaliel,
If the reference to that website on Infidels is the most intelligent remark you can make I pity you.
Gamaliel, you would not know an infidel if you tripped over one.My forbears were dealing to them in the Holy Land in the 1200s.These knights were called Crusaders, just in case you haven't heard the name.
You sure have some emotional and mental problems there, buddy.
Your take on life and religion sure is ROCK SOLID.
jorgheinz
Gamaliel,
I have another word for you.
You don't have the inbred intelligence to conduct a rational argument. You are gutless,letting others form your opinions for you, and ARE led around like a prize bull with a ring in its nose
Methinks you were conned by HWA and are still trying to get over the fact you were conned.However, I stand to be corrected on this as minds like yours are hard to read you know.
Bitterness clouds the thinking,you know,old chap.
You have not responded to any of my questions,except to utter some sort of primeval native grunt, so to speak.Maybe I can believe in evolution, after all.
That's my lot. If you can utter anything intelligent, post it on the blog, otherwise don't insult people with your mindless twittery.
Roger, over and out.
Jorgheinz
Your dimestore psychology and snide putdowns speak volumes about your own self-image and sense of security, especially considering my own sparseness of verbiage. Your arrogance is overwhelming. There is no such thing as a superiority complex, it's just an inferiority complex turned inside out. So, what precisely are you trying to cover up?
Gamaliel,
I am trying to cover nothing up.
I have no inferiority complex, I can assure you, neither a superiority one.
But what I do rail against is blatant distortion of obvious physical facts.
And I don't find fault in your paucity of words.Some people are naturally reserved.You rubbish the philosophy of Armstrongism, yet you are not person enough to offer an acceptable substitute.But when you make assertions I expect you to back them up with proof, not the ramblings of woolly headed "philosophers".You show me a website which is very obviously the habitat of free-thinkers,sceptics, cynics,philosophers etc.There is nothing wrong with that,necessarily.But so often their works are great wafflings and billowings of the mind, often designed to downput the God of Heaven.I don't need this website...I have plenty of ramblings to read from family archives...those of Lutheran and Calvinist ministers who DID believe in God and their writings are EQUALLY outrageous.So, you see I am not partial to one side or the other.
You put forth the consideration that the "Medo-Persian Empire" did not exist,mischievously or otherwise.It seems you don't believe the archaeology presented. I suppose you will now tell me that Parthia did not exist,despite hard archaelogical evidence.
To say there is NO GOD is a copout.Paul said there is ample evidence around.
If you are not an atheist,please CORERECT me.But atheists have nothing to hang their hats on.Nothing at all.They virtually blaspheme the name of the Almighty by denying his existence.Just imagine when the ALMIGHTY GIVES ALL ATHEISTS their greatest wish.To live in a world without God.There are scriptures to cover that but you probably wouldn't agree with them so we won't go there.
Gamaliel, what force or agency keeps the molecules in your body in a state of harmony? What say that agency decided to give you a practical demonstration, on your own body of what happens when he ceases to be the Sustainer of Life.That is actually described in the Bible, believe it or not.
One thing I have noticed that men tend to worship their own opinions rather than that of God.
You would probably deny the British-American descent from ancient Israel.Everyone rages against it but no one, yet no one on this or many other blogs has sat down or composed a list of the countries where the tribes of Israel reside today.That is because they have no substitute.As I have said before,bring forth your proofs of an alternative line of descent for the Ten Tribes.And no one,well maybe one, has been game enough. Tell me where Reuben and his outposts reside,where Manasseh and his outposts reside, where Ephraim and his outposts reside.I dare you to show me.And remember,there will be tribal or racial affinities.
And if you look very,very carefully you will find that DNA DOES back up BI theory.Oh,yes sirree.But why should I produce this sort of evidence to you who wouldn't accept it.If you don't accept archaelogy and science,what the hell will you accept.And yet, funnily enough you would go along, quite happily with the ramblings of so-called philosophers without one skerrick of proof.
AMAZING!!
jorgheinz
A CHALLENGE TO GAMALIEL....
if he is person enough to accept it.
Gamaliel,
You downput so-called Armstrongism...so do I funnily enough.
But he was not entirely wrong.
Seeing you are so sure that the Western tribes of Europe are not, at least in part,descended from Israel,show me where the tribes of Israel are located today around the world.
Name the country,the present day name of the people, the name of the Israeli tribe from which they are descended.
The Bible says they are spread around the world and after say 2700 years I would expect at least a 100 page outline,full of names.
Give me your alternative version or be shown up for the fraud that you really are.
My versions would be based on people like Yair Davidy.He is pretty detailed.Counter Yair Davidy's writings with ones of equal length and detail.
And as I have said before,don't obfuscate the space with names of obscure mountain tribes.
Israel was to be a FORCE in the world..so there's a clue.
Send your detailed reply to Gavin so he can establish a link..remember at least 100 pages..really, it should be 1000 pages but 100 pages will suffice.
I await your extremely detailed reply with alacrity.
jorgheinz
To Gamaliel,
Let us modify that request for the alternative descent of the "Lost" Ten Tribes of Israel.
Let's get very specific.
I want a line by line REBUTTAL of the TOTALITY of YAIR DAVIDY'S works with attached BIBLIOGRAPHY,AND the alternative version,line by line (which can be checked) with BIBLIOGRAPHY.
Yair has gone into great depth.Let us see if the detractors can offer a credible alternative on EVERY POINT that Yair Davidy raises.
Fools and dickheads utter all their mind( which is very little).
They don't like being challenged.
Now let us see if THE implied scholarship really exists that will counter Yair Davidy, or whether we are dealing with woolly thinkers,dreamers and hollow men.
God has left clues as to the location of the 10 tribes today.Let us see if the detractors really have the intellectual nous not only to PICK UP ON THIS but to have the balls to come out from their boltholes and present their data and evidence against both the Bible and physical archaeology.
I await your 1000 PAGE reply with interest.
jorgheinz
I don't have time for your nonsense. Yair Davidy appears to be rather kookish. Didn't he once fraudulently claim to be a rabbi? I regard him in about the same way as I do David Koresh. What is his real name, anyway?
1) When Jereboam began his apostasy into the Canaanite religion, many of the Israelites from the north were outraged, and emigrated to Judah in the south. During the time of King Asa, there was an open invitation to observant ones in the northern kindom to move to Jerusalem.
2) Sargon claimed in his memoires that he only captured, and relocated 27,263 Israelites, many of whom later returned to their ancestral homes. Concurrently with this, numerous "colonists" from other captured nations were moved into Northern Israel, to mix with, dilute, and intermarry with the remaining Israelites. (Ever hear of Samaritans?) Again, there was emigration to Judah.
3) At the end of their captivity, various of the 27,000 relocated ones also moved back to Israel and Judah. Others were simply absorbed into the meltingpots of the lands of their relocation, and had their genes seriously diluted much like a pedigreed dog mixing with mongrel mutts, to the point where the Israelite genes are unrecognizeable as such today.
We know, therefore from the Bible and history that a portion of the lost ten tribes were relocated, another portion intermingled with the people sent to colonize Israel, and many voluntarily moved to Judah where the Yahwistic religion had not been supplanted by the Canaanite religion. The ones who emigrated to Judah may have intermarried amongst the Jews, but otherwise maintained their culture and heritage. Josephus indicates that all of the tribes were present and accounted for in Jerusalem during his lifetime.
Also, these were semitic people, not blond haired, blue eyed Nordic or Aryan people. The Torah (and entire Bible for that matter) is Israel-centric, not USA or Euro-Centric.
All of these facts are readily available in the Bible, history, and various websites. But, hey, believe what you wish. The lost ten tribes are a myth. And, most historians recognize our disputed empire as the Persian Empire, not the Medo-Persian Empire.
That's it for me. You see, I have a life, a very good one as a matter of fact. If someone else has the time to deal with your theories and demagoguery, let them have a go at you.
Gamaliel,
You are being very selective.
You produce only a few facts,some of which I agree with, would you believe.
But when you and your ilk are pressed for intimate detail on the 10 tribes out of Palestine you slither,you wriggle,you dodge the issue.You have nothing but platitudes.
You recite the tired old rubbish that we have heard for 25 years.
A myth....NO. But let it be that way to you.
And incidentally, I don't need to rely on HWAs take on this matter.
Bye bye.
Jorgheinz
Yair Davidy? I've read some of his stuff and, well, I wouldn't bother investing time in refuting it any more than in refuting flat-earthism. Life is too short to run around barking at every passing car. Davidy is out of touch, ill-informed, dogmatic, ignorant and (based on personal correspondence I've had with the guy at his initiative) a complete and total plonker.
Jorgheinz, you need to find a more credible authority than that. A bit of a puzzler because there are no credible authorities who defend BI that I know of. BUT, here's the challenge:
Find and cite ONE university teacher (lecturer, professor) at an accredited institution who upholds BIism. ONE. Now there's a nice little research task. ONE. Not some 19th century guy, he or she has to be living, though I'd consider an emeritus position as tenable. Preferably in a related discipline (history, anthropology, theology... )
ONE, Jorgheinz. Just one. Name ONE.
Time to put up or...
jorgheinz,
You remind me of some people. You didn't want me to debate you, which is why you suddenly shuffled me under the skirts of Yair Davidy, who is apparently your sole and primary source for all things BI. I consider that to display precisely as much intelligence as sending me a copy of the "United States and British Commonwealth in Prophecy". So you switched gurus, and chose one who provides a bibliography, as opposed to plagiarizing!
Now, I would have been impressed if you had been working from your own bibliography, which you had carefully compiled after years of deep study, during which you had also attempted to disprove British Israelism. In other words, it would be nice, indeed, if you had developed your own primary sources.
I've visited Yair's site. I've listened to a radio interview featuring Yair. I was not impressed.
Gamaliel,
Yes,indeed this topic is closed.
Yes, there are American scholars with PhDs and not from third rate Bible Colleges,either, who believe BI theories.And incidentally, I have stated that BI is not totally correct which little matter you seem to have ignored.Once again,selective reasoning on your part.
Yair Davidy, a plonker? Hardly.
It is no use talking to a closed mind such as yours.But you haven't read half the available evidence.
jorgheinz
That's it.
Yeah. Don't feel too badly, though.
My mind was closed to Charles Manson, the Unabomber, Jim Jones, David Koresh, Fidel Castro, the Rev. Sun Myung Moon, and L. Ron Hubbard as well.
Guess the old saying is true: One man's eschatology is another's scatology.
Jorgheinz... you say "there are American scholars with PhDs and not from third rate Bible Colleges,either, who believe BI theories."
Okay, so NAME ONE. That was my challenge. Name ONE. Your assurances are empty unless you can back up your claim with... a name. At least one. One who, as you say, doesn't hail from a third rate Bible College.
Take your time, I'm sure you have a lot to choose from. Feel free to post more than one if necessary, but at least ONE.
Is that too much to ask?
I'd like to see him do this, too, YR. However, if he can, it still would not constitute proof one way or the other about the soundness of the basic theory.
Remember, there were certifiable geniuses, with impeccable credentials, who fell for Herbert W. Armstrong's nifty little package of "truths". No doubt there wea something missing or wrong in these folks' lives, but it illustrates the fact that intelligence and beliefs are not necessarily universally interrelated.
aGentlemen,
Why not, for a change, apply the same derisory/critical yardsticks to your own beliefs ( if you have any) as you do to those of the
opposition?
Or is that asking too much of sceptics,cynics,rationalists such as yourselves?
Cynics and their like have no set belief systems yet they seem to have this morbid desire to investigate and comment upon other's belief systems.Is this not a little irrational?.It could be, perhaps,that you gentlemen have a belief in unbelief.Now, that's truly interesting.
Why show such a keen interest in things theological when you deny the very central mainstay of it's existence? Or am I incorrect in this assumption?
As "Gamaliel" has rightly remarked, 1000 professorial names would not necessarily constitute proof of any belief or tenet.
You want me to name one.Why should I do that?.As aforestated,even 1000 would not satisfy you.You are to be congratulated on your belief in unbelief, a highly irrational concept but one which I might understand.Gentlemen, I am enjoying this.Been this way before with family.A mixture of Jewish and Roman Catholic rellies produce wonderful opportunities for disagreement.And before that a LONG line of Lutheran biskops,predikanten and prosten.
There is nothing new under the sun.
You will believe,oops,unbelieve in what others believe and I will believe in what I believe.And neither will be able to convince the other.
So, a hearty good-day to you and may you continue the good work against HWAism.Hey, I am with you for much of the way BUT you have not yet convinced me of the invalidity of BIism for want of a better word.Would you believe DNA does back up what Herb said but it's just that youse guys have not yet caught on.
Seek and ye shall find.
Gentlemen,
I feel honoured, and humbled,to be in such august and outstanding company.
It is not everyday that one gets such an opportunity as this to tangle with what is/are one or two cynics, absolutely outstanding in their field.Congratulations,you keep the disgust fresh; you are to be commended on the high quality of your dubious logic.Let's face it,you have the best of the worst.
Keep it up, gents.You are a pleasure to deal with.
jorgheinz
Gentlemen,
The Bible states quite categorically that the 12 tribes of
Israel were
(1) To be sifted through the countries as wheat and not a grain would be lost.Therefore,this strongly suggests their DNA was to largely remain intact.
(2) To be brought back to Palestine...look at the various timings..one at the time of the return from Babylon, and also at the time of Christ's return ( you do seem to believe a little of the Bible, I see,but for what purpose is another matter.)
1948 is possibly another part of the prophetic fulfilment.
God is not a liar:he means what he says.
Tradition surrounding Britain may seem myth to some; have you ever investigated it? What did you find?
Nothing.Start looking again.
The upcoming tribulation will involve ALL of Jacob...it is the time of his trouble.The Bible is emphatic on this.
The Bible does not say "Jews" it says "Jacob"..don't try to mount your high "theological" horses with me.What you say does not wash and never will.
Isn't it funny how God allowed the 10 Tribes to be absorbed and lose their identity ,yet saw to it that Judah and associated Benjamin retained their very obvious genes.
Something wrong there gents..back to the drawing board for you.
God is not a distorter of his word though some on this Blog seem to be.
NOWHERE but NOWHERE in his Bible does God say that his 10 tribes were to be absorbed by Gentiles.This is man's idea, alone, and arrant rubbish and nonsense.
Your rant is reminiscent of that of Ralph Orr of Worldwide some years ago.
And in Gen 49 and elsewhere God describes the qualities,attributes of the 12 tribes.They were to be nations or parts of nations,not relic DNA in some insignificant tribe.
And you know the classical locations of those tribes,and yes there could be some revision but not a complete repudiation as you may suggest.
That's it.
jorgheinz
Gentlemen,
The Bible states quite categorically that the 12 tribes of
Israel were
(1) To be sifted through the countries as wheat and not a grain would be lost.Therefore,this strongly suggests their DNA was to largely remain intact.
(2) To be brought back to Palestine...look at the various timings..one at the time of the return from Babylon, and also at the time of Christ's return ( you do seem to believe a little of the Bible, I see,but for what purpose is another matter.)
1948 is possibly another part of the prophetic fulfilment.
God is not a liar:he means what he says.
Tradition surrounding Britain may seem myth to some; have you ever investigated it? What did you find?
Nothing.Start looking again.
The upcoming tribulation will involve ALL of Jacob...it is the time of his trouble.The Bible is emphatic on this.
The Bible does not say "Jews" it says "Jacob"..don't try to mount your high "theological" horses with me.What you say does not wash and never will.
Isn't it funny how God allowed the 10 Tribes to be absorbed and lose their identity ,yet saw to it that Judah and associated Benjamin retained their very obvious genes.
Something wrong there gents..back to the drawing board for you.
God is not a distorter of his word though some on this Blog seem to be.
NOWHERE but NOWHERE in his Bible does God say that his 10 tribes were to be absorbed by Gentiles.This is man's idea, alone, and arrant rubbish and nonsense.
Your rant is reminiscent of that of Ralph Orr of Worldwide some years ago.
And in Gen 49 and elsewhere God describes the qualities,attributes of the 12 tribes.They were to be nations or parts of nations,not relic DNA in some insignificant tribe.
And you know the classical locations of those tribes,and yes there could be some revision but not a complete repudiation as you may suggest.
That's it.
jorgheinz
Jorgheinz,
I'm happy for you. Enjoy your beliefs. You get the opportunity to have had the last word on this, at least for this round. I'm not going to make any further comment until the topic resurfaces in a fresh thread.
Jared,Gamaliel and others,
GENTILEMEN,
For such we ALL are.
How could I, a barely littorate Japhethite,still chiselling Ruinic inscriptions,believe in the British Herbalite doctrine after your lengthy and eloquent
testy-moany.
I repent in SAKA-cloth and ASHERIM.
One is simply overwhelmed with the opulence of your supportive evidence.How could I ignore it?
Even with perhaps 5000 pages of material to call on,which could be presented to you,I am convinced that the sheer weight of your own amassed evidence would completely overshadow mine.It is hardly worthy of your august and lofty attention.
It is far better that a novitiate and neophyte such as myself, defer to your accumulated enlightenment and use it to guide my faltering spiritual steps.By the radiance emitted by your erudition and scholarship,and your docents excelsior approach,I can hardly become benighted.
It has been an absolute pleasure exchanging mutually heretical views.You are to be encouraged in your search for El Dorado.
I am convinced that we are pursuing a common goal of unbelief whilst treading disparate,divergent and intransigent pathways.
Indole Skatologically yours,
Jorgheinz
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