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Saturday, November 22, 2014

 

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CONTENTS |The Sacrificial Blood

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The Purifying of The Heavenly


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But while we repudiate the clergyman's devil as a mere phantasma of disordered brains, we by no means deny the existence of what is styled diabolos in the scriptures. Our proposition at this point is, that the Devil of the clergy is not the Diabolos of scripture. This is easy to be seen by taking their representation of the devil as the definition of the word, and trying to expound the scriptures in which devil is mentioned thereby. Take, for instance, Heb. 2:14, where it is written, "Therefore for as much as the children (given of the Deity to the Son for brethren) partook of flesh and blood, he also himself in like manner shared in the same, that through the death (he accomplished) he might destroy that having the power of death, that is, THE DIABOLOS." Now, Paul elsewhere informs us that "Jesus was crucified through weakness" (2 Cor. 13:4); and the clergy teach that their diabolos, or devil, is second only to their Trinity in power - almost, if not quite, omnipotent; at all events, powerful enough to hold in eternal captivity and torture the vast majority of the human beings God has made. He either holds them with God's consent or against it; if he hold them with it, God and the Devil are made copartners; and God is made by their traditions to have created an enormous multitude of men, women, and children for no other destiny than eternal torments; which gives the lie to the scriptures, which teach that "'God is love:" if the Devil hold "the damned" against God's consent, then the Devil is more powerful than God! But, the clergy are unwilling to accept the consequences of their own theories. They would not like to admit the copartnership, nor the superior strength of their Devil; though upon their premises one or the other is unavoidable. They will admit, however, that their father and patron, the Devil, is vastly powerful. This is admission enough to illustrate the incompatibility of their traditions with scripture. Thus, How comes it that the Spirit laid hold upon death-stricken and corruptible flesh and blood, which is so weak and frail, called "the Seed of Abraham," that through its death he might destroy so mighty and powerful a Devil? Would it not have been more accordant with the requirements of the case for him to have combated with him unencumbered with flesh, or in the spirit-nature of angels? Became weak and dead to destroy the mighty and the living; when the Creator of the Devil could with a word annihilate him! But there is as little reason as scripture in "the depths of Satan" as the clergy teach; and therefore it would be mere waste of time and space to occupy ourselves any further with their speculations and traditions upon this subject.

The Spirit clothed himself with weakness and corruption - in other words, "Sin's flesh's identity" - that he might destroy the Diabolos. It is manifest from this the diabolos must be of the same nature as that which the Spirit assumed; for the supposition that he assumed human nature to destroy a being of angelic nature, or of some other more powerful, is palpably absurd. The Diabolos is something, then, pertaining to flesh and blood; and the Spirit or Logos became flesh and blood to destroy it.

Now, whatever flesh-and-blood thing it may be, Paul says that "it hath the power of death" - that is, it is the power which causes mankind to die. If, then, we can ascertain from Paul what is the power or cause of death, we discover what the thing is he terms the Diabolos; for he tells us that the Diabolos has the power of death.

Well, then, referring to Hos. 13:14, where the Spirit saith, "I will ransom them from the power of the grave," Paul exclaims, in view of this deliverance as the result of a price paid, "0 Death, where is thy sting? 0 Hades, (sheol, or grave,) where is thy victory?" The power of a venomous serpent to produce death lies in its "sting;" therefore Paul uses "sting" as equivalent to "power" hence his inquiry is, "0 Death, where is thy power?" This question he answers by saying, "The sting (or power) of death is SIN, and the strength of sin is the law." That the power of death is sin, he illustrates in his argument contained in his letter to the saints in Rome. In Rom. 5:12, he says, "Death by sin." He does not say, "By the Devil sin entered into the world;" if he had, this would have given "the Devil" existence before Sin: but he says, "By one man, or Adam, sin entered into the world." This agrees with Moses, who tells us that there was a time after the creation was finished when there was nothing in the world but what was "very good" - "and Elohim saw all that He (the Spirit) had made, and behold, it was very good" - Gen. 1:31. Man is, therefore, older than Sin, and, consequently, older than the Diabolos. Man introduced it into the world; and not an immortal devil, nor God. Neither God, then, nor such a devil, was the author of sin; but the authorship was constituted of the sophistry of the serpent believed and experimented by the Man, male and female.

Man, then, having introduced Sin, "death entered into the world by Sin; and so death passed upon all men ... to condemnation; for by one man's disobedience the many were constituted sinners; and the wages of sin is death to those who obey it" - Rom. 5:12, 18, 19; 6:23, 16. But though constituted sinners in Adam, if no law had been given after his transgression, his posterity would not have known when they did right or wrong; for Paul says, "I had not known sin, but by the law." The law is, therefore, "the strength of Sin." Sin reigns by "the holy, just, and good law," "through the weakness of the flesh" - Rom. 7:7, 12; 8:3. Where there is no law there is no sin; for "sin is the transgression of law:" so that "without the law sin is dead" - ch. 7:8; 1 John 3:4. This shows how inherently bad flesh is in its thoughts and actions, that a good thing should stir it up to wickedness. Its lusts and affections are impatient of control. Paul therefore said, "in me, that is, in my flesh, dwells no good thing." When this, which is utterly destitute of any good thing, is placed under a good law, scope is afforded it to display itself in all its natural deformity; and to prove that "the law of its nature" is not the law of God, but "the law of sin and death." Thus, the introduction of a good law, demanding obedience of that which has nothing good in it, is the occasion of sin abounding in the world (ch. 5:20), and thereby evinces its enormity, and shows that "SIN is an exceedingly great sinner" - kath, hyperbolen amartolos: - ch. 7:13. In this expression Paul personifies Sin; and says that it deceived him, slew him, and worked death in him.

"SIN" is a word in Paul's argument, which stands for "human nature," with its affections and desires. Hence, to become sin, or for one to be "made sin" for others, (2 Cor. 5:21), is to become flesh and blood. This is called "sin," or "Sin's flesh," because it is what it is in consequence of sin, or transgression. When the dust of the ground was formed into a body of life, or living soul, or as Paul terms it, a physical or natural body, it was a very good animal creation. It was not a pneumatic, or spirit body, indeed, for it would then have been immortal and incorruptible, and could neither have sinned nor have become subject to death; but for an animal or natural body, it was "very good," and capable of an existence free from evil, as long as its probationary aion, or period might continue. If that period had been fixed for a thousand years, and man had continued obedient to law all that time, his flesh and blood nature would have experienced no evil; and at the end of that long day, he might have been permitted to eat of the Tree of the Lives, by which eating he could have been changed in the twinkling of an eye into a spirit-body, which is incorruptible, glorious, and powerful; and he would have been living at this day. But man transgressed. He listened to the sophistry of flesh, reasoning under the inspiration of its own instincts. He gave heed to this, "the thinking of the flesh," or carnal mind, which "is enmity against God, is not subject to his law, neither indeed can be." The desire of the flesh, the desire of the eyes, and the pride of life, which pertain essentially to all living human, or ground, souls, were stirred up by what he saw and heard; and "he was drawn away of his lust, and enticed." His lust having conceived, it brought forth sin in intention; and this being perfected in action, caused death to ensue - James 1:13. Every man, says the apostle, is tempted in this way. It is not God, nor the clerical devil that tempts man, but "his own lust," excited by what from without addresses itself to his five senses, which always respond approvingly to what is agreeable to them.

Seeing that man had become a transgressor of the divine law there was no need of a miracle for the infliction of death. All that was necessary was to prevent him from eating of the Tree of Lives, and to leave his flesh and blood nature to the operation of the law peculiar to it. It was not a nature formed for interminable existence. It was "very good" so long as in healthy being, but immortality and incorruptibility were no part of its goodness. These are attributes of a higher and different kind of body. The animal, or natural body, may be transformed into a deathless and incorruptible body, but without that transformation, it must of necessity perish.

This perishing body is "sin," and left to perish because of "sin." Sin, in its application to the body, stands for all its constituents and laws. The power of death is in its very constitution, so that the law of its nature is styled "the law of Sin and Death." In the combination of the elements of the law, the power of death resides, so that "to destroy that having the power of death," is to abolish this physical law of sin and death, and instead thereof, to substitute the physical "law of the spirit of life," by which the same body would be changed in its constitution, and live forever.

By this time, I apprehend, the intelligent reader will be able to answer scripturally the question, "What is that which has the power of death?" And he will, doubtless, agree, that it is "the exceedingly great sinner SIN," in the sense of "the Law of Sin and Death" within an the posterity of Adam, without exception. This, then, is Paul's Diabolos, which he says "has the power of death" which "power" he also saith is "sin, the sting of death."

But why doth Paul style Sin diabolos? The answer to this question will be found in the definition of the word. Diabolos is derived from diaballo, which is compounded of dia, a preposition, which in composition signifies across, over, and answers to the Latin trans; and of ballo to throw cast; and intransitively, to fall, tumble. Hence, diaballo, is to throw over or across; and intransitively, like the Latin trajicere, to pass over, to cross, to pass. This being the signification of the parent verb, the noun diabolos is the name of that which crosses, or causes to cross over, or falls over. DIABOLOS is therefore a very fit and proper word by which to designate the law of sin and death, or Sin's flesh. The Eternal Spirit drew a line before Adam, and said, Thou shalt not cross, or pass over that line upon pain of evil and death. That line was the Eden law; on the east of that line was the answer of a good conscience, friendship with God, and life without end; but on the west, fear, shame, misery, and death. To obey, was to maintain the position in which he was originally placed; to disobey, to cross over the line forbidden. But "he was drawn away, and enticed by his own lusts." The narrative of Moses proves this. The man was enticed of his own lust to cross over the line, or to disobey the law; so that his own lust is the Diabolos. Thus, etymology and doctrine agreeing, our definition must be correct. (End of quote from Eureka.)

 


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