C0C?0?8

Please Note:

This paper wa s presented to the Daniel and Revelation Committee of the General Conference of Seventh­

day Adventists. It should be considered a working paper or draft

position. Therefore. the researcher should bear in mind that positions expres s ed in this paper may not necessarily reflect what the author would wish to be in an

edited publi s hed paper. Please refer to the book, Symposium

on Revelation. published by the Biblical Research Institute, 1992.

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.... White \..ibrai'Y Jam .... ANDREWS UMlV~RS\ll THE MARK OF THE

BEAST

Preterists have said that the mark of the beast (Rev 13-20) was something that Nero applied to Christians. Not that preterists have ever proved that Nero did apply a marktoChristians; they're just certain that Nero was the beast. Dispensa­tional futurists, on the other hand, have said that it's the actual number 666, to be branded on people in the end time by the ruler of a revived Roman Empire. And Sabbath-keeping Adven­tists since the 1840s have generally linked the mark of the beast to Sunday keeping and the Roman Catholic Church.1

The three interpretations cannot all be right; but noteworthy is their agreement that the beast has something to do with Rome.

In perceiving a relationship between the mark of the beast and the church of Rome, Seventh­day Adventists have had the support of numerous commentators of the past. Questions on Doctrine,2 cites John Purvey (Wycliffe's as­sociate), Andreas Osiandet; Nikolaus von Amsdor~ Heinrich Bullinget; Nicholas Ridley, John N apiet; John Cotton, and other famous men as samples of expositors who have as-

By C. Mervyn Maxwell

Andrews University March, 1989

sociated the mark of the beast with papal authority. Questions on Doctrine acknowledges, howevet; that "none of these expositors, of the centuries past, applied the mark of the beast specifically to the Sabbath issue."

In recent times some Seventh-day Adventists have taken up a new position, namely that the mark of the beast is any form of false worship,3 but this broad interpretation does not seem to have gained unanimous adoption.

The thesis of this paper is that the mark of the beast is "committed end-time approval of coer­cive Sunday-keeping in opposition to clear light on the Sabbath question and in harmony with classic Roman Catholicism."

In attempting to establish this position, no attempt will be made to redo all that others on the Daniel and Revelation Committee have al­ready done.4 We'll begin with the statement of a few hermeneutical principles and then list some questions to be answered.

Some basic hermeneutical principles. Some basic hermeneutical principles relevant to our quest include:

lSee, e.g., Joseph Bates, The Seventh-day Sabbath a Perpetual Sign, 2d ed (New Bedford, 1847), p. 59: "Is it not clear that the first day of the week for the Sabbath or holy day is a mark of the beast. It surely will be admitted that the Devil was and is the father of all the wicked deeds of Imperial and papal Rome. It is clear then from this history that Sunday, or fJ.rSt day, is his Sabbath throughout christendom."

2(Washington: Review and Herald Publishing Association, 1957), pp. 180-181. The authors credit vols. 3 and 4 of LeRoy Edwin Froom, Prophetic Faith of Our Fathers, 4 vols. (Washington: Review and Herald Publishing Association, 1946- 1954).

axxx 4Notably, William Johnsson, in the paper he presented at Marienhohe.

CMM: The Mark of the Beast (Unflnished), p. 2

Principle No. 1-That the Bible is an in­spired unit. Though holy men spoke in different ways, the God of truth spoke through them (Heb 1:1; 1 Pet 1:11; etc) and they therefore delivered a unified message.

Principle No. 2-That Revelation is closely linked to Daniel and to Matt 24-25 and to 2 Thess 2.5 ____..

Principle No.3- That when Daniel, Matt 24-25, 2 Thess 2, and Revelation deal propheti­cally with major political entities, they deal selec­tively with those entities that most directly affect GOd's worshipersL primarily Jews and Christians and secondarily Moslems. As God's people have extended their areas of habitation from the Middle East to Europe, to the Americas, and to most portions of the globe, prophetic foresight has kept pace.

In the first century A.D., when prophetic ful­fillment focused on events and persons in the Roman Empire, four empires juxtaposed one another in series across Eurasia, the Roman, Parthian, Kushan, and Han Empires,6 but of these empires, the Roman covered the territory where most of the Jews and Christians lived at the time. Thus it was that the Roman Empire occupied a major . focus of Daniel's political prophecies in the first century.

Principle No. 4-The major prophecies of Revelation, like those of Daniel, Matt 24-25, and 2 Thess 2, (a) stretch from the prophet's day to the second cominEV (b) deal mainly but not ex-

dusively7 with the harsh side of political and reli · o-politicai entlties, (c) warn of major a

• tasy and tn ation, and (d) promise a Christ­. centered outCOme, wtfh rewards for the ~righteous and destruction for the wickeg. Though these prophecies in general progress from the prophet's day to the end of time, they do not necessarily do so in simple sequential narrative form.S

Principle No. 5-Four sweep-of-hisW!I E.,_rophecies are to be found in Daniel (cbs. 2, 7, 8-9, 10-12) and four in Revelation (the letters, the seals, the trumpets, and the great controver­,&stocy).

Five questions to be discussed. The five questions we'll try to answer are (A) Is the beast that has the mark Roman Catholic? (B) Is the mark of the beast presented in Revelation as an end-time phenomenon? (C) Does the mark have to do with. Sabbath and Sunday? (D) In the past has the Catholic Church play an outstanding role in coercively favoring Sunday at the expense of Sabbath? and (E) What difference does it make?

A. Is the Beast that Has the Mark Roman Catholic? That the sea beast is Rome or Roman is sug­

.eestea at the outset by its obvious links with the little hom of the fourth beast of Dan 7, which has

been shown by many others to be Rome and even the Roman Catholic Church.

A chart confirms the comparison.

5A recent monograph linking Revelation with Daniel is G. K Beale, The Use of Daniel in Jewish Apocalyptic Literature and in the Revelation of St. John (Lanham, Md.: University Press of America, Inc., 1984). Another, of course, is Jon Paulien's dissertation on the trumpets.

6See William H. McNeill, The Rise of the West, (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1963), p. 317; also, Maxwell, God Cares, 2 vols. (Boise: Pacific Press Publishing Association, 1981, 1985) 1:36.

7 In contrast to Dan 7 and 8, Dan 2 presents human government at its best: the image is of "exceeding brightness," verse 31 RSV. In the seven letters of Revelation Christ compliments most of the churches. Even to Thyatira He says, "I know your works, your love and faith and service and patient endurance, and that your latter works exceed the fJ.rSt," Rev 2:19.

8Rev 12-14 in particular presents a braid rather than a thread of history, repeatedly backing up to augment information presented earlier. See the Appendix.

I .

CMM: The Mark of the Beast (Unfmished), p. 3

The little horn

Daniel 7 and 8

Speaks great words against God

Thinks to change time and law

Tramples on the sanctuary and the host

Wears out the saints for a time, two times, and half a time

So what according to Daniel and Revelation are the characteristic features or marks of the sea beast? (1) Blaspheming God and changing His law, (2) . undermining the ministry of the ~eavenly sanctua!ll and (3) oppressing God's saints during a special .1260-day period.

The Catholic Church is avowedly Roman. Its F ~

official name today, as it has been throughout most of its long history, is The_ Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church of Rome. 10 And how did the Catholic church come to possess its unique Romanness?

"The dragon gave its power, throne, and great authority to the beast," Rev 13:2.

A throne is a symbol of authority. But because this passage already contains the words "power" and "authority," we expect "throne" here to con­vey a more literal meaning. Basically, a throne is a place where an important person sits. Other words for throne are the Greek cathedra and the Latin sedes. In the Catholic church, the building in which a bishop's throne (or cathedra) is lo-

The sea beast

Revelation 13

Utters blasphemies against God

Blasphemes God's name, His dwelling and those who dwell in heaven

Makes war with the saints for forty-two months9

cated is called his "cathedral." The city in which his throne is located is called his sedes in Latin and in English, his "see." The ultimate see in Catholicism is the Holy See, the city where the Pope's throne is located. This ci~ is of course Rome1 or more specifically, ;ince the 1929 Treaty ~f the Lateran with Italy, Vatican City, a 108.7 acre tract on Vatican Hill, lying wholly within Rome.

And how did the dragon, the Roman Empire, give its power, its authority, and the place of its rulership (its "throne," or see, or city) to the Roman Church?

The familiar steps need no elaboration here. The empire was named for the city of Rome, being in fact an extention of Rome as a city-state (analogous to the way the Roman Catholic Church is, theologically and administratively, an extension of Rome as a city-church.) Ronie was by far the west's largest city. Revered as the Eternal City, it pulsed with power and mystery. And much of this formidable secular prestige

9The 1260 days are mentioned seven times, twice in Daniel and five times in Revelation: Dan 7:25; 12:7; Rev 11:2; 11:3; 12:6; 12:14; 13:5. There are not, (as some have suggested) several 1260-day periods. There is only one. Its frequent mention calls attention to its vast importance.

lOJohn L. McKenzie, S.J., The Roman Catholic Church, ed. E. 0. James, History of Religion Series (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Wmston, 1969), p. xii, asserts that "Roman Catholics believe that their Romanism is a reflection of the authentic Christianity of their church." On the other hand, other attempts have been made by some American Catholics to mute this Romanness, evidently to make it easier for Protestant Americans to become Catholics. See, e.g., the widely distributed The Faith of Millions (Huntington, lnd: Our Sunday VISitor, Inc., 1963, 1974), by John O'Brien who, like McKenzie, is also of the University of Notre Dame.

CMM: The Mark of the Beast (Unfmished), p. 4

was inherited by the Roman pope.

The founding in 330 of Constantinople (now Istanbul) as the empire's new capital placed the imperial seat of government some 1300 kilometers or about 800 miles away to the east, more than a month's marching time for an army.

Several emperors besides Constantine con­~ed or offered power to the paf&2 Step by step, the Roman Empre (the dragon) did indeed give its powet; throne, and great authority to the Catholic Church (the leopard-bodied sea beast). A climax came in 538 when the armies of the Empire drove the Arian Ostrogoths out of Rome.ll By 538, therefore, the 1260 years could begin.

,Catholic employment of judicial torture based on Roman civil law reveals its ROmanness at its worst. ROman law atlowed the suspicion that an ~

accused person was most probably guilty. Roman judges therefore applied torture routinely to force a person to confess his crime and regarded such torture an appropriate part of the punish­ment. When the Germanic tribes took over the territory of the Roman Empire, the practice of judicial torture largely ceased. When around 850 a church court torturoo the monk Gottschalk for his non- Catholic views on predestination, the people of Lyons protested, reminding their bishop that they Bible says that persons over­taken in a fault should be restored in a spirit of gentleness.12 Says the New Catholic En­cyclopedia:

Under the influence of Germanic customs and concepts, torture was little used from the 9th to the 12th centuries, but with the

revival of Roman law the practice was reestablished in the 12th century. . . . In 1252 [Pope] Innocent IV sanctioned the infliction of torture by the civil authot?.ti~ upon heretics, and torture came to have a recognized place in the procedure of the inquisitorial courts.13

In the most brutal and non-Christian aspect of its medieval activity, the Roman Church ap­pears as a direct and dynamic descendent of the Roman Empire. The little hom emerged unmis­takably from the head of the terrible beast.

People were turned upside down and sawn down the middle; they were slowly pierced through the body by spikes inside the iron maiden ofNurenberg.Eighty-five percent of the victims--some two to four million, we are told­were women, excruciatingly tortured to death by instruments like red hot pincers, the breast rip­pet; and the expandable vaginal pear.14

The 1260 days. Is there a real basis for the familiar Seventh-day Adventis~ition that th.!L

~ 1260 year-days ran from 538 t~98?

Laying aside, for the sake of argument, insis­tence on precise dates (though these can be defended), and painting with a large brush in­stead, a clear and formicable case can be made that the French Beyolution was a mighty epoch .marfe;_,fnd that~the close of the fourth- and the~ beginning of the fifth-centuries also marked a eolloSal change of affairs in western Europe~

c: with enormous co~uences for the future. I

Edward Gibbon began the second division of his Decline and Fall with the age of Justinian.

llFor a brief account, see God Cares, 1:145-147; for a longer one, see Maxwell, "An Exegetical and Historical Examination of the Beginning and Ending of the 1260 Days of Prophecy, With Special Attention Given to AD. 538 and 1798 as Initial and Terminal Dates" (master's thesis, The Seventh- day Adventist Theological Seminary, 1951.

12See George E. McCracken and Allen Cabaniss, eds., Early Medieval Theology, in John Baillie, John T. McNeill, and Henry P. VanDusen, eds., The Library of Christian Classics (Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1957) 9:168-169.

13New Catholic Encyclopedia, art. "Torture." 14 Robert Held, Inquisition/Inquisici6n: A Bilingual Guide to ••• Torture Instruments (Florence: Qua d' Arno,

Publishers, 1985.

/

CMM: The Mark of the Beast (Unfinished), p. 5

He had good reason to. The close of the fifth and beginning of the sixth centuries marked a genuine turning point with (a) collapse ofRoman civilization15 and (b) the collapse of Christianity, in addition to the better known data about (c) the virtual extinction of the third Arian tribe and (d) the virtual papal take-over of Rome in 538-and (e) the epochal significance of the French Revolution 1260 years later.

More needs to be said about the relative de­Christianization of Europe with the barbarian invasions and subsequent re-Christianization. A modern illustration can be seen, say, in Macau, a small Portuguese (hence Catholic) colony on the coast of China. The influx of half a million Chinese in recent decades has not pushed Chris­tianity into the South China Sea; the Catholic Church still operates some churches, schools, and orphanages there and other denominations have small units as well. But the overwhelming impression is of Buddhism and materialism, church attendance is almost nonexistent, and the children who fill the Catholic schools are largely Chinese non-Christians. ]

An analogous situation seems to have ob­tained in formerly Roman Europe by the early 500s. Only three tribes were Christian, and they wereArian.

But by the time these three tribes were wiped out, the vigorous Franks had taken on the Catholic faith. Europe was re-Christianized from the British Isles as well as from elsewhere, but when the process was largely completed, a couple of centuries or so latet; Roman Catholic theology and practice had triumphed.

Meanwhile, the Greek Orthodox church ex­perienced a steady decline in its territory, both in

15 See a paper by Daniel Augsburger

members and in economics.16

The mortal wound. In 1798, 1260 years latet; the Pope was taken into captivity and the Catholic Church was dealt a mortal blow. It hap­pened just as Revelation had foretOld, with remarkable accuracy.

The papacy had experienced other military defeats and even captivities during its long 1260' years, but thiS one was uni ue in two hi significant ways. t came as the climax of several ~ centuries of decline in the influence of 0-~ Catholicism on the minds of Europeans, and it was not merely a military coup but was a stroke deliberately intended to terminate the papacy.

During the French Revolution and under or­ders from the revolutionary French government, General Alexander Berthier issued a proclama­tion in Rome on February 15, 1798, informing Pope Pius VI and the people of Rome that the Pope should should no longer "exercise any func­tion."17

Richard Duppa, a British writer who was in Rome at the time, says that the pope was ar-rested in the Sistine Chapel while he was celebrating the twenty-third anniversary of his coronation and receiving the congratulations of the Cardinals. Citizen Hallet; the French com­missary-general, and Cervoni, who commanded ~l the French troops in Rome under General Ber- ~ · thiet; "gratified themselves in a peculiar triumph over this unfortunate potentate. During that ceremony they both entered the chapel, and Haller announced to the sovereign pontiff on his throne, that his reign was at an end. The poor old man seemed shocked at the abruptness of this unexpected notice but soon recovered him-self with becoming fortitude." The Pope's Swiss

16 See, for example, Judith Herrin, The Formation of Christendom (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1987) . . f: and the re-Christianization had begun along Catholic lines

17John Adolphus, The History of France, vol. 2 (London: George Kearsley, 1803), p. 365.

CMM: The Mark of the Beast (Unf'mished), p. 6

guards were dismissed and Republican soldiers were installed in their place.18

In spite of the pope's advanced age and frail health (he was in his 80s), he was hustled off by French soldiers to a string of different addresses in Italy and southern France. He died in prison in the fortress city of Valence on August 29, 1799. For awhile his body was left lying around un­buried. In the words of George Trevot;

The Papacy was extinct: not a vestige of its existence remained; and among all the Roman Catholic powers, not a finger was stirred in its defense. The Eternal City had no longer prince or pontiff; its bishop was a dying captive in foreign lands; and the decree was already announced that no successor would be allowed in his place.19

About a century latet; Joseph Rickaby, a Jesuit Priest, observed that when, in August 1799, Pope Pius VI passed away as a French prisonet; "half Europe thought ... that with the Pope the Papacy was dead. "20

I had occasion once to examine the memoirs of Don Manuel de Godoy, prime minister of Catholic Spain at the time of the pope's captivity. I found no reference to the event. Even this important Catholic statesman didn't care enough about the pope to comment on his troubles.21

We have glanced at beginning-and-ending events that seem to confirm our hypothesis that the Roman Church is the fulfillment of the sea beast.

B. Is the Mark of the Beast an End-Time Phenomenon? Is the mark of the beast an end-time

phenomenon?

Yes, it must be. It is mentioned in Revelation only in connection with end-time events.

1. The lamb-homed earth beast seeks to im­pose it during its campaign to increase the wor­ship of the sea beast, after the sea beast has recovered from its deadly wound. And the wound

isn't even inflicted until the close of the 1260 days (around 1 798). ·

2. The third angel issues its dire and dramatic warning against reception of the mark of the beast, and its message is delivered after the first angel has already announced the arrival of judg:_ ment hour (1844).

3. The first plague falls on those who have the

18,f. Richard Duppa, A Brief Account of the Subversion of the Papal Government. 1798, 2d ed. (London: G. G. and J. Robinson, 1799), pp. 46, 47.

19 George Trevor, Rome: From the Fall of the Western Empire (London: The Religious Tract Society, 1868), p. 440.

20 J oeeph Rickaby, "The Modem Papacy," in Lectures on the History of Religions, vol. 3, lecture 24, p. 1 (London: Catholic Truth Society, 1910).

21 Don Manuel de Godoy, Prince of the Peace: Memoirs of Don Manuel de Godoy, J. B. Desmenard, ed. and trans. 2 vols. (London: Richard Bentley, 1836.)

CMM: The Mark of the Beast (Unfmished), p. 7

mark of the beast, and the plagues begin after ...... the heavenly sanctuary is closed up. -

Although the general characterics of the sea beast are portrayed in Rev 13:5-10, it's "mark" is not mentioned there, nor any attempt during the 1260 years to get it imposed on anyone.

Nor is the mark of the beast mentioned in connection with the judgments associated with the seven trumpets or the seven seals.

It is an end-time phenomenon.22

C. Is the Mark of the Beast Conce~ed Primarily with the Sabbath-Sun­day Question or With False Worship in General?

The mark of the beast cannot be just any lightning, voices, peals of thundet; an system of false worship. It's not the mark of the earthquake, and heavy hail. dragon, nor the mark of Islam. It's the mark of \he beast, just as the image of Rev 13 is the image of the beast. If we are to be faithful to Scripture, we must limit the possibilities to elements of Roman Catholicism.

Furthet; the mark is pointedly related to com­mandment keeping, which brings us to Her­meneutical PnncTpal No. 6-Eacb of the four_

<r divisions of the first half of Revelation is intro-duce<I by a sanctuary scene, focused on a dif:.. ' ferent item of furniture, dra'wing attention on the division's primary messa~.23 The fourth of these introductory scenes is &v 11:19-

God's temple in heaven was opened, and the ark of his covenant was seen within his temple; and there were flashes of

Of salient importance is the observation that with this introduction focused on the ark in the most holy place, Rev 12-14 is the only division in which God's peQple are defined as command­ment keepers (unless 22:14 is another such place) and they are so defined there twice, in 12:17 and 14:12.

That the commandment emphasis is directed to Sabbath observance is partly confirmed by the call in the first angel's message to worship God, "who made heaven and earth, the sea and the fountains ofwatet;" virtually a citation from the Sabbath commandment.

The mark of the beast is opposed to the seal of -God-as Sir ISaac Newton observed24 long before there was a Seventh-day Adventist.

22That is, it is an end-time phenomenon if the first angel's message is in fact an announcement about the arrival of judgment hour, if the plagues are not the same as the trumpets, and if the 1260 days follow rather than precede the deadly wound. For an examination of the interpretation of TJA:fJev in Rev 14:6, and of the significance if any of the absence of Kat etdov in Rev 13:5, see the appendix. As for the plagues, we'll not reinvent the wheel. Kenneth A Strand has ably demonstrated that the trumpets belong in the historical half of Revelation, stretching from the prophet's day to the second coming, and that the plagues belong in the end-time half of the book. I have done the same, building on Strand's arguments, in God Cares, vol 2.

23The church letters are introduced by a lampstand scene, calling attention to Christ's personal interest in His church; the seals, by a throne (table of shewbread?) scene of God power and Christ's redemptive grace, assuring us of heaven's concern for souls under persecution and distress; the trumpets, by a scene at the golden altar, from whence God's people's prayers are answered through judgments on their enemies. The flrBt division of the second or end-time half of Revelation deals with the seven plagues which fall after probation's close; appropriately, its sanctuary scene shows the temple shut up.

24See again Questions on Doctrine, p. 180.

I ,_ e

1 /

CMM: The Mark of the Beast (Unfmished), p. 8

in which she saw the seal of God as the Sabbath-The first Sabbath-keeping Adventist to define the seal as the Sabbath was Ellen G. White, which brings us to Hermeneutical Principle No. 7-Ellen G. White's intewret.ations of the Bible should be taken seriously unless we find clear reason to oppose them. Her writings have proved of great blessing to millions of people of various faiths. Seventh-day Adventists ought not to "shoot themselves in the foot" by undervalu­ing them.

rising like the sun in the east and sending outs \-SQ.l-- ~ lr"'

In his Vindication of the Sabbath, the book Joseph Bates was writing in the fall of 1848 with a York shilling in his pocket, Bates defined the seal of God (Rev 7: 1-3) as character develop­ment:

... just as it will be in the last days, when the 144,000, all of the living children, are sealed with the seal of the living God in their foreheads, having been marked or sealed in a similar manneJ; and by the remnant of the messengers that four years ago were writing, lecturing and ex­horting the people of God to get clear of the mark of the beast by coming out of Babylon, because she had fallen; develop­ing their true profession, or christian characteJ; even then ... ; with this dif­ference, that this simultaneous sealing of

. the 144,000 will show such a clear developement of christian chracter in their lives and shining foreheds (or faces,) that it will be clearly understood that Jesus has redeemed them from all iniq­uity, by purifying "unto himself a peculiar people, ZEALOUS OF GOOD WORKS. "25

But at DorchesteJ; Mass., the following November 18 or 19, Ellen G. White had a vision

25 Vindication, p. 96.

its ever increasing rays of light.26 ~ t' Ellen White did not see that her concept of the ~;1..\Juv-l,

Sabbath negated Bates's view that it involved e " ' character development. She combined the views, and enriched them with Christ's righteousness: "In 1882 she wrote,

Not one of us will ever receive the seal of God while our characers have one spot or stain upon them. It is left with us to remedy the defects in our characters, to cleanse the soul temple of every defile­ment. Then the latter rain will fall upon us as the early rain fell upon the disciples on the day of Pentecost.27

It; incidentally, this seems frightening, notice that on the next page she added,

No one need say that his case is hopeless, that he cannot live the life of a Christian. ... Jesus is our ever-present help in time of need. Only call upon him in faith, and he has promised to hear and answer your petitions. Oh, for a living, active faith!

In 1898, in The Desire of Ages, she spoke of the Sabbath-sign as set firmly in the righteous­ness of Christ:

God designed that its [the Sabbath's] ob­servance should designate them [the Jews] as His worshipers. It was to be a token of their separation from idolatry, and their connection with the true God. But in order to keep the Sabbath holY. men ~ust t1iemselves be holy. Through faith they must become partakers of the

26Joseph Bates, A Seal of the Living God: A Hundred Forty- Four Thousand, of the Servants of God Being Sealed, in 1849 (New Bedford, 1849), pp. 25, 26; cf. Ellen G. White, Life Sketches, p. 125. Bates commented on p. 31 that he had seen Mrs. White have many visions in the foregoing two years, and "in every instance they have been in accordance with God's word: setting the promises of God, and the closing scenes around us in harmonious, scriptural order, leaving the hearers the privilege of searching the scriptures for the proof, and also in rebuking sins of omission and commission, without partiality to friend or foe, .. " (emphasis supplied).

27Ellen G. White, Testimonies for the Church, 5:214.

.. CMM: The Mark of the Beast (Unfmished), p. 9

righteousness of Christ. When the command was given to Israel, "Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy," the Lord said also to them,

"Ye shall be holy men unto Me." Ex. 20:8; 22:31. Only thus could the Sabbath distin­guish Israel as the worshipers of God.28

D. Did Medieval Roman Christianity Play an Outstanding Role in op­posing the Sabbath and Enforcing Sunday?

Did Medieval Roman Christianity play an out­standing role in opposing the Sabbath and en­forcing Sunday-a role that could appropriately be termed the "mark of the beast"?

Indeed it did! And the story of what happened is important if we are to view the Roman Church in true perspective.

Early in the second century the Sabbath was already rather generally lost sight of; and Sunday widely celebrated. This rejection of the Sabbath and favoring of Sunday was not confined to Rome-nor to Alexandria and Rome-despite a widespread impression among sabbatarians today that this was the case.

Examination of extant literature reveals the same Sabbath-Sunday theology all around the Mediterranean basin. Sunday was honored in favor of the resurrection of Christ and Sabbath was downgraded as applicable only to Jews.

When Justin said that "Sunday is the day on which we all in cities and country places as­semble in one place," he was speaking as a widely traveled person, who had been born in Palestine, had lived apparently for some time in Ephesus, and who even in later life did not live continuous­ly at Rome.29

A decade or two after Justin's death, Hegesip­pus traveled (around 180) from Palestine to Rome. A report he made confirms the widespread nature of Sunday observance; for in it he said that all along his route he found similar customs being observed in the Christian centers.

Further Ireneaus, bishop in France around the same date (180), denied that Christians

needed to be told to "keep one day idle." Arguing against the Gnostics, he insisted that Jesus did not break the Sabbath-but went on to say that Jesus kept it on the basis that "Jerusalem [was] then dwelling in safety." Once the temple was destroyed, the law of Moses and its Sabbath were terminated. Incredibly, for Irenaeus, the "decalogue" did not enjoin the literal Sabbath.

Nor did it for Theophilus, like Irenaeus a bishop about the same time but in Antioch at the other end of the Mediterranean. In quoting the ten commandments in his Apology toAutolycus, he omitted the fourth and made up the space with various brief Mosaic instructions.

In North Africa a couple of decades later (around 20.0 or so) Tertullian, like Ireneaus, defended Jesus against the Gnostic charge that He broke the Sabbath; but Tertullian proceeded to say that the Sabbath was abolished, not by a different God from the one who made it as the Gnostics averred, but by the very same God who made it.

This does not mean that no one observed the true Sabbath in the second and third centuries.

-Justin knew of some Jewish and even Gentile Christians who were observing it, and Tertullian knew a certain few (pauculos quosdam) who annoyed him by insisting on standing joyously for prayer on Sabbath the way everyone did on Sunday. We may assume further that the com­ments made by Barnabas in Alexandria, by Ig­natius to the Magnesians, and later by Victorinus of Pettau imply the existence in those places of scattered observers of the true Sabbath in the second and third centuries.

28Ellen G. White, The Desire of Ages, p. 283. Emphasis supplied. 29 In his martyrology he is quoted as having said at his trial that he then in Rome for the second time. We do

not even know where he was living when he wrote in his First Apology, about Christians everywhere meeting on Sunday.

CMM: The Mark of the Beast (Unfmished), p. 10

But undoubtedly the Sabbath was largely lost sight of at that time.

When we tum to documents from the fourth century, howevet; we are almost startled by the change in attitude. My students never fail to note the sudden shift as I give them the documents each year.

It is during the fourth century, around 360, that the Council of Laodicea required that the gospels be read and the Lord's supper celebrated on Sabbath every week. The action was as much in favor of the Sabbath as against it; but Laodicea was only a regional synod and was not immedi­ately binding everywhere, though later on its canons were endorsed by a General [i.e., mostly Eastern] Council.

At the end of the fourth century Epiphanius, in his famous Panarion, a massive study of 80 heresies, rejoiced that Christians_had the "great circumcision" in place of the little circumcision, the "great Lamb" in place of the little lamb, and the "great Sabbath" in placeofthelittle Sabbath. The "great Sabbath" was an ostensibly sabbatic way of holy living which ignored the literal day.

When Epiphanius mentioned the Sabbath again, he observed (near the end of the fourth century) that in a few places (tv nat de T01totr)

Christians were in fact assembling on the literal Sabbath.

By the middle of the fifth centu t ad become so widespreag

tli.at Socrates of Constantinople could report in his Church History, 5.22, that in "all churches, except ·those at Alexandria and at Rome the

.... . . ' sacred mystenes were being celebrated on the Sabbath of every week." (The statement should

· not be supposed to connote holy Sabbath keep­ing. It speaks only of the celebration of the the Lord's Suppet; "the sacred mysteries," on the Sabbath. But nothing of the sort was common in the second century, according to our sources.)

Fbat we are dealing with here is not the tapering out of a long tradition of Sabbath obsel­~ance but a resurgence or revival of intexmt in~

the Sabbath. Many factors appear to have con­tributed to this new interest in the Sabbath, one of which appears to have been the spread of monasticism from Egypt in the late 300s and early 400s. It is notable that the ~~nee of Sabbath-Sunday lectionaries is attested only from the fourth century onward. It is notable, too, that in western Europe, it was Cassian, a monk, who advocated some kind of Sabbath ob­servance along with Sunday (around 415-430), and that he advocated it to no avail.

We summarize before proceeding: Sunday ob­servance and Sabbath rejection were not charac­teristic of the Roman church alone in the early centuries; they were characteristic of the state of Christianity at the time. This observation is in harmony with Paul's statement that the mystery of iniquity was already at work even in the mid­dle of the first century. It is also in harmony with two references in GC 444 to the perilous "spiritual declension" from truth and purity which took place "in the first centuries."

In connedection with the fourth- and fifth­centu revival we have been speakin 0 the Sabbath quickly came to be honored along with Sunday in the Coptic, Ethiopian, Armenian, and 'Greek OrthOdox Churches. The African church accepted it partially too~as evidenced in the writings of Augustine. But the African church was wiped out in the Moslem invasion of the seventh century. As for the Coptic and Armenian Churches (and the Nestorian Church, which didn't accept the Sabbath), though permitted by their Moslem overlords to continue to exist, they became stereotyped and weak.

The church that turned out to be the most dynamic of all was the church of the Roman west, and it was this church which conspicuo~ opposed the Sabbath and enforced Sunday al­most as if it were the Sabbath. 30Thus the Roman church becam ost authentic fu -lllment of the little hom of Dan 7 and the ~

oeast of Rev 13J!t that it did more than any of t'he others to change times and the laws and to

30 Benjamin ~eo~ge Wllkinson, Truth Triumphant: The Church in the Wilderness (Mountain View, Calif. : Pacific Press Publishing Association, 1944) was a pioneer, if an inaccurate one, in this interpretation.

CMM: The Mark of the Beast (Unfmished), p. 11

blaspheme the sanctuary of God; and it per­secuted in the process. It was characterized, marked, by a coercive attitude toward Sunday in opposition to the true Sa th.

Against the Quartodeclmans. Rome's potential for antagonism to the Sabbath and coercive endorsement of Sunday appeared early. Before the end of the second century, Victor I, bishop of.Rome, became irritated by the custom of the Quartodecimans of Asia of observing Easter on the 14thofNisan, regardlessoftheday of the week on which it fell. This is generally known.

What is not so widely recognized is that the church of Rome was no different from all the other churches of the world that we know of in its preference for celebrating Easter on Sunday. When preparing to launch his attack against the Quartodecimans, Bishop Victor conducted a poll of the pastors of the main city churches in the Roman Empire. Eusebius reports that Victor received replies in favor of Easter Sunday from the bishops of Caesarea, Jerusalem, Corinth, Gaul, Osrhoene, and in Pontus, along with "a good many others." Later in his account, Eusebius has occasion to refer to the bishops in Tyre and Ptolemais, and Alexandria. All of the churches that these bishops represenied favored a Sunday Easter. But the only one of them that was prepared to excommunicate the Quar­todecimens was the church in Rome. Indeec( after Victor excommunicated the Quar­todecimans, he was rebuked by several of the bishops. The rebuke from Bishop Irenaeus is preserved by Eusebius. Here is a beginning ofRome's coercive defense of Sunday.

The Roman Sabbath fast. Shortly after the Quartodeciman Controversy, that is, about A.D 200, the church of Rome began to enforce a Sabbath fast as a continuation of the reguiar Friday half-fast which many Christians at the time were observing. Most other churches refused to go along, and the only ones that ended up observing Rome's Sabbath fast turned out to be those in western Europe under Rome's strongest influence. The big church in Milan, for example, simply capitulated to Rome only after a long struggle.

Refusal to adopt the Sabbath revival.

Later in this fourth century, as the Sabbath sprea WI monas CJSm rom gypt, the Chris­tians in western Euro were cons icuous fo

. not adopting it. We have mentioned that Cassian tried to introduce it in southern France in vain.

Now The Convert's Catechism is widely quoted by all of us for its statement that the Catholic church at the Council of Laodicea around 360 transferred th; solemnity of the day from Sabbath to Sunday. This statement is a remarkable claim by the Catholic church, but it ISn't good hiStory. The Council ofLaodicea was~ local Eastern synod at which, so far as we know, Rome had no voice. Its demand that the Lord's supper be celebrated and the gospels read on Sabbath reflected the Eastern Greek attitude to the Sabbath and was contrary to what was going on at that time in the West.

2 Thess 2 said that the man of sin would be hindered until the power that was hindering him was taken out of the way. Dan 7:24,25 portrayed a time when the ten horns would rise on the head of the beast, after which the little hom would emerge and grow to become more stout than his fellows, and in the process uproot three horns. Put togethet; these statements bid us look for some change in the Roman church as the tribes invaded and pagan Rome was taken out of the way and three of the horns were plucked up­and as the dragon of Rev 12-14 gave the sea beast its powet; seat, and great authority.

We know that in the fifth century the tribes invaded the Roman empire en masse, and soon the western empire was populated with people who were either pagan ot; in the case of three of the tribes, Arian. With the ultimate decline of the West and the transference of imperial govern­ment to Constantinople, the bishop of Rome, as we all know, became a dominant figure in Italy. Armies from Second Rome (Constantinople) destroyed the Arian tribes which inhibited the pope for awhile. This left western Europe almost entirely in the political hands of pagan powers. Almost, but not quite. For just before the Arian Vandals and Arian Ostrogoths were liquidated, the Franks opted for Christianity, and of the Roman type at that.

The Council of Orleans, 538. In 538, the year when the back of the Ostrogoths was broken

CMM: The Mark of the Beast (Unfmished), p. 12

at Rome, the year that we perceive as the com­mencement of the 1260 days, a church council in Orleans passed its 28th canon, which required the cessation of active farm work on the Sunday in order to allow agricultural workers to attend church. This Catholic Sunday law differed from Constantine searlierlawofMarc , 321,in that it was expressly religious, freed agricultural workers (who were not freed by Constantine's law of March 7, 321),and was enacted by the church rather than by the state.

Isidore of Seville exalts Sunday above Sabbath. During the sixth century the tribes in Spain became Catholic. Thus around the years 600 Isidor of Seville (560-636) would write,

It is clear that Sunday was already very solemn in the Holy Scriptures. It is indeed the first day of the world, the day when the angels were created; the day when Christ was resurrected; the day when the Holy Spirit fell upon the apostles; the day when the manna was given for the first time in the wilderness. . . . Is not the Sabbath the seventh day which follows Sunday? It must be, therefore, on Sunday that manna fell for the first time. For the Jews already . then our Sunday was greater than Sabbath.

Dr. Daniel Augsburger has observed31says that this statement by Isidor was copied ver­batim by Bede in Britain, by Alcuon, the British scholar who served conspicuously in the court of Charlemagne, and by Rabanus Maurus, ninth­century Archbishop of Mainz.

The Letter from the Lord. About this same time, near the beginning of the 1260 days, as western Europe was being converted to Roman Catholicism, appeared the famous "Letter from the Lord," sometimes known as the "Letter from Heaven." It seems to have appeared first in one of the Mediterranean islands off the east coast of Spain. From there it traveled far to the north and easrt and was still being quoted centuries

later. Under the most terrible threatening, this document called on people to "keep My com­mandments and venerate the holy day of the Lord."

Remember the tables of Moses My ser­vant [it went on], and the law and precepts which I gave him to preach to the peoples, that they might fear Me and keep My law." "If you do not correct your ways I will send you worms and locusts that will eat your harvests and rapacious bulls that will devour you, because you did not keep the holy day of the Lord. Anyone who does not keep it will be accursed. On the Lord's day you must not wash your clothes nor wash or cut your hair. Whoever does so, let him be accursed. I tell you once more that I was ... resurrected on the Lord's day. .. . In that day I made heaven and earth .. .and sanctified the day of the Lord and established the observance of the rest to everyone on that day. ...

Mediaeval Handbooks of Penance. To save time, we pass over punishments for Sunday breaking in the various handbooks of penance, which were prepared for priests during the Mid­dle Ages in western Europe. For washing one's head on Sunday, for example, weeks of fasting and even excommunication in extreme cases might be required.

The Great Schism of 1054. Arguably the most dramatic evidence ' · pre erence for Sunda in o

researches of R. L. Odom, reported in the first issue of Andrews University Seminary Studies (1963) under the title, "The Sabbath in the Great Schism of A. D. 1054," show that "one of the main issues involved in "the cleavage between east and west in 1054 was the matter of fasting or celebrating on the Sabbath, the seventh day of the week."

Sabbath observance was not the only bone of

31 In Kenneth A Strand, ed., The Sabbath in Scripture and History (Washington: Review and Herald Publishing Association, 1982), p. 191. ·

CMM: The Mark of the Beast (Unfmished), p. 13

contention, of course. The use of unleavened bread in the communion service, celibacy of the lower clergy, and the primacy of the pope were other issues.

The southernmost portion of Italy had been colonized in pre-Christian centuries by Greeks. In fact, the name "Greece" was first applied to that part of the world rather than to the homeland. The Greek- speaking Christians of the eleventh century in southern Italy were more in fellowship with the Greek Orthodox Church than with the Roman Catholic. But they lived in juxtaposition to Roman Catholics. It was for this reason then that their refusal to observe the Sabbath fast, so dear to the Romans, ultimately resulted in friction. Correspondence was engaged in and the ire of Pope Leo XIX was aroused.

The legates from Rome finally placed the famous bull of excommunication on the high altar of the church of Hagia Sophia, at 9:00 in the morning on July 12, a Sabbath morning. They were irritated because the deacons were preparing to celebrate the Lord's supper on that day.

Cardinal Humbert, one of the Roman legates, soon thereafter wrote a treatise about the matter in which he ~ticized the Eastern Christians for carrying on "an observance of the Sabbath ·similar to that of the Jews, and in which he ' rec1ted a probably legendary statement at­tributed to Pope Sylvester in the time of Con­stantine in which that bishop had said that Christians should celebrate the Lord's day on account of the resurrection as a day of joy but that "every Sabbath day [on account] of the burial is to be estimated in execration of the Jews."

But Patriarch Michael Serularius went so far on behalf of the Greek church as to say that "we -are commanded also to honor the Sabbath equ'!l­

.. "ly with the [Sunday] lord's [day], and to keep (i2, and not to work on it."

The sequel was that the Roman church began to dedicate Sabbath to the Blessed Virgin, result-

32Augsburger in The Sabbath in Scripture, p. 106.

ing in the celebrarion of Our Lady's day next to the celebration of the Lord's day.

This act of the Roman church in excom­munieatingmillions of fellow Christians beca~

ey 1ns1S on mn some n s · al on Sab-bath epitomizes Rome's eligibili as the fulfiller o the little horn prophecy of Dan 7:24,25 and the sea-beast prophecy of Rev 13.

Thomas Aquinas. But the Roman Church went even further. In the thirteenth century Thomas Aquinas, whose authority as a Catholic theologian is unequalled, declared specifically,

In the New Law the keeping of the Sunday supplants that of the Sabbath, not in vir­tue of the precept of the law, but through determination by the church and the cus­tom of the Christian people.

Thomas distinguished between moral and ceremonial aspects of the Sabbath command­ment, insisting that the day on which the com­mandment was to be observed was ceremonial and hence subject to the church's power of the keys. Even the Sabbath's moral aspects were to be imposed less strictly under gospel freedom.

Sabbath keeping as sin. Then Thomas proceeded to make the literal keeping of the Sabbath commandment a very grievous sin.32

When a church in the name of Christ declares the keeping of a commandment to be a very grievous sin, that church has surely "spoken great things against the most High." When that same church transfers the authority of the fourth commandment to Sunday and does so whimsically on the basis of what it feels is impor­tant and what isn't, it has_ surely sought to "change times and the law."

Worldwide opposition to Sabbath. There is more to be said. If today the American con­tinents and much of what we call the third world has been more or less Christianized, the credit goes to western Europe. It was done either by Roman Catholics or by Protestants, who emerged out of the Roman background. It is widely conceded that the Protestant churches

CMM: The Mark of the Beast (Unfmished), p. 14

did not come all the way out of ROme. And among the features of Rome which Protestans took with them were both the observance of Sunday and the insistence that Sabbath ought not to be ob­served.

The mark of the beast. At which point we repeat what we said somewhere _above, that the mark of the beast is not merely Sunday obser­vance. Portrayed in the Bible as a sin, it must be

Sunday observance in conscious opposition to awareness that it's wrong. Even more than this, the mark of the beast must be coercive S~nday observance. Have not Seventh-day Adventists said for a century that when people- finally enter the mark of the beast experience, they will do so w en widesprea un ay egiS ation is being ~nacted.

Cd'v( B £). The Mark of the Beast an End-Time Phenomenon.

WhyisthecoerciveSunday-keepingoftheend more serious, an evil and ferocious mark of the. time designated "mark of the beast," when the m. -Bible doesn't seem to apply the term to Chris- "The pope can modify divine law," said Petrus tians of earlier days? de Ancharano.

Perhapsthetermisintroducedin theend time "The Sabbath, the most glorious day in the tOoesignate a new depth of sinfulness.1 The coer- law, has been changed into the Lord's day ... by cive anti-Sabbath Sunday theology of the Middle the authority of the church," declared the . ha t it an aura of ignorance. People Archbishop of Reggio at the crucial Council of seem not to have realized that Sabbath could Trent. possibly be the right day. We note that with the rise of Puritanism in Britain and its sabbatic Sunday, there arose a great agitation about the Sabbath question. But the Sabbath question

. then in vogue had nothing to do with the choice of the day to be observed but only with the way it was to be observed. Hardly any sabbatic Puritans seem to have countenanced the idea that Sunday could be the wrong day. They believed that the seventh day was a perpetual sign of the New Covenant. With reasoning that doesn't convince us but that seemed logical enough to those intelligent people, they insisted that God had shifted the seventh day from Sab­bath to Sunday, while still keeping it the seventh day.

ho. -..1e But in the end time we u)idetstami tlt&t the

preaching or the three angels' messages; and the. ~experience o 200 ea s o reli ious reedom · "'the United States give~veryone a thorough 'opportunity to contrast the wickedness of coer­f'cive Sunday legislation with the innocence of 'true religious freedom. This will make the sin far r- '

People in bygone times could say such things in innocence, it may be; but we cannot. Today we know bettet; and we know that God didn't change His law even to excuse Jesus from Geth­semane and crucifiXion.

A body of Christians in the past felt free to change God's law, and to harrass, persecute, and excommunicate millions of Christians who chose to obey it. They will feel free to do it again, in spite of great light.indeed.

The mark of the beast in the "forehead" rae­resents mental assent to the church's belief and ·behavior. The mark in the hand represents ac­tivity carried on in harmony with such beliefs. A person's "forehead" may not approve what his or her "hand" does, but actions speak louder than words.

E. What Difference Does a Day Make? The Bible calls the Sabbath God's special sign. as well as the Sabbath. Ritual circumcision was

In Old Testament times God asked His people to observe two special signs, ritual circumcision

first performed around 2000 B.C. on Abraham, the father of the Jewish race. It was an ethnic distinction, which according to Paul ceased to

CMM: The Mark of the Beast (Unfmished), p. 15

have saving significance when the Jewish people as a group ceased to be uniquely God's chosen ; peo~ .

Today, "in Christ ... there is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Chrit Jesus." Galatians 3:27, 28.

Since the cross, ritual circumcision has counted for little one way or the other. The com­mandments, howevet; still matter! Paul said in 1 Corinthians 7:19 RSV, "Neither circumcision counts for anything [any more] nor uncir cumci­sion, but keeping the commandments of God."

Other translations make the meaning even clearer. "Circumcision is nothing and uncircum­cision is nothing. Keeping God's commandments is what counts." NN.

"Circumcision is nothing, and uncircumcision is nothing, but what matters is the keeping of the commandments of God." NASB.

The Sabbath has nothing ethnic about it. It was offered to the Jewish because it was offered to all races. The Sabbath was made for mankind! Mk2:27.

Because it was offered to the Jews along with everyone else, we find God saying to the Israel­ites at Mount Sinai, "You shall keep my Sab­baths, for this is the sign between me and you throughout your generations, that you may know that I, the Lord, sanctify you . ... It is a sign for ever between me and the people of Israel, that in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, and on the seventh day he rested, and was refreshed." Ex 31:12.

The Sabbath is a sign showing that God made us and that He sanctifies or remakes us.

The setting for the statement was impressive. God had led the Israelites triumphantly out of Egypt. They were camping awhile at the foot of Mount Sinai. With a light and sound display that would make a rock concert seem like a kinder­garten murmut; God called attention to the ten commandments. There were "thunders and lightnings, and a thick cloud upon the mountain, and a very loud trumpet blast ... and the whole mountain quaked greatly." Exodus 19:16-19. Then God had Moses place a copy of the ten commandments, carved in stone, in the "ark of

the covenant" (or "ark of testament") in the sanctu~ry's._jn~ermost room, the . most holy place. See Ex 32:15,16; 25:16.21; Num 10:33.

In the sanctuary scene (Rev 11:1.9) which introduces the great controversy diVision, the heavenly temple opened up so John could see deep inside it. He saw heaven's "ark of his covenant." As he looked, there were "flashes of lightning, voices, peals of thundet; an earthquake, and a heavy hail."

God was taking John back to Mount Sinai.

God is calling us too back to Mount Sinai, back to the sanctuary, back to Jesus our High Priest, to the ten commandments, and the Sabbath.

Back to Pentecost too, we may add, with its flashes of light, roaring voices, and shaking foun­dations. Pentecost was a commemoration of Sinai. It happened in the Bible month Sivan,just as Sinai did. Thus Pentecost was a reminder of the New Covenant promise, "I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to keep my statutes" (Ez 36:27); "I will write my law in your heart" (Jer 31:33). Pentecost is not to be remembered primarily for spiritual gifts but for making pos­sible loyalty to God's commandments.

The Sabbath is for everyone. Isaiah the prophet knew that the Sabbath wasn't only for

e ews. "The foreigners who join themselves to t he LOrd," he wrote in his chapter 56:6,7, "to minister to him, to love the name of the Lord, and to be his servants, everyone who keeps the sabbath, and does not profane it, and holds fast my covenant-these I will bring to my holy mountain, and make them joyful in my house of prayer." Is 56:6,7.

Isaiah's language about God's "servants:' "joyful" on God's "mountain" sounds like the 144,000 servants of God, singing on Mount Zion in Rev 14! Isaiah's promise is made about "for­eigners," non-Jews, Gentiles, who keep the Sab­bath.

The Seal of God. God's end-time people keep the commandments and accept God's "seal." So what is the seal of God? It's the same as His sign!

In ancient times people signed their docu-

( l;o \ -~· )pD\: v"['

ments in the same way they sealed them. They i ~ . stamped them with a signet ring or seal. See '

CMM: The Mark of the Beast (Unfmished), p. 16

pp.Rev.6,7:46,47. So "to sign" and "to seal" were the same thing. God's "sign" in our foreheads is the same as His "seal."

Nowadays we sign a document by writing our signature on it. Our signature or sign is our name. When we sign in some official capacity, we have a typist identify ourselves more fully, in­dicating our official capacity as part of our sig­nature.

A bank manager has his secretary type, "Johnson Doe, Manage~; First Federal of Big­town." God conceivably could have a secretary type, "Lord God, Creatot; Heaven and Earth." And this is just about the way God did sign His name in the Sabbath commandment!

"Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. . .. the seventh day is a sabbath to the Lord your God . ... for in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day; therefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day and hallowed it." Exodus 20:8-11.

How could God sign a document more sig­nificantly? How could He offer the Sabbath to us more authoritatively?

He doesn't force us to keep the Sabbath. Bil­lions of people who neglect it or make light of it can testify to this. But He does come to us, make His request, and sign or seal it, "Lord God, Creatot; Heaven and Earth."

God's name, the Lamb's name. The 144,000, who have God's seal in their foreheads, are also described as having God's name and the Lamb's name there too. Revelation 14:1-5.

Ancient worshipers had their god's literal name tattoed on their bodies. The "name" that Revelation talks about is much more than a tattoo! Names in Bible days represented a person's character. See pp.Rev.2,3:19,20. When God told Moses His "name" He listed His char­acter qualities, "merciful and gracious, slow to anget; and abounding in steadfast love and faith­fulness," and so on. Exodus 34:5,6.

'-Fully matured Sabbath keepers have God's name in their foreheads in the sense that they have allowed God's Spirit to change their char­acters until they resemble God's character.

God is love. His law is love. When people obey

Him fully, they love.

God is holy. His law is holy. When people obey Him fully, the Holy Spirit lives out in their lives the purity and honesty and unselfiShness that mark the character of God Himself.

So how is God's name the same as His seal? We are sinners. If we are ever going to keep an entire Sabbath day holy, we need a distinct and deep seated change in our most basic patterns. Jesus told Nicodemus that even a good man like he needed to be born again. John 3:5. We can never keep a whole Sabbath holy unless some­thing happens in us everyday. We must be in such fellowship with Christ that we live purity, hones­ty, compassion, helpfulness, all week long.

God's people at the very end of time will be "spotless," free from lies, true and honest, chaste, pure, kind. They will keep God's com­mandments even when faced with starvation and execution

But how? They conquer the dragon "through the word of their testimony," and they love not their lives "even unto death." Revelation 12:11.

But this by no means all. How often our will power lets us down! The overcomers have "the blood of the Lamb." In fact, they have the Lamb. They have Michael the great Prince. Daniel12: 1. In some marvelous and mysterious manner He has come knocking and has been welcomed into their hearts. He has brought with Him all the "gold, eyesalve, and white raiment" they could use. Revelation 3:15-22.

Wonderful thought! He has brought Himself. And Colossians 2:9 says, "In him dwells all the fulness of deity bodily." So when in His own special way He enters us in response to our faith, He brings His Godhead with Him! And then we are "filled with all the fulness of God"! Ephesians 3:17- 19.

"You shall keep my sabbaths, for this is a sign between me and you ... that you may know that I, the Lord, sanctify you."

So this is how the 144,000, the "saints," God's "remnant," young and old, escape the mark of the beast and are able to keep all the command­ments of God and stand complete in holiness and purity as God's fully ripened grain!

CMM: The Mark of the Beast (Unf'mished), p. 17

"What difference does the day make?" The se > nt is ad to have us on worshi in Goo-providing we do so in our own way. He persuaded Eve to eat the forbidden fruit so she could become like God, not unlike Him. "You will be like God," he promised. Gen 3:5. The serpent was pleased to have Eve honor God in her own way.

Cain worshiped God in his own way, with

garden produce instead of a lamb. The Roman Church worshiped God in its own way. Moslems by the millions worship God in their own way.

Cain and the Roman Church in time grew angry with people who wors in His

osen way. 01ng so seems to be characteristic .. of many of us when we insist on worshiping God in our own own way.

.-

Excursus deallng with #Cal udov. Is leal £tdov a reliable and/or essential indicator for scene breaks?

John uses #Cal udov to mark patently obvious paragraph breaks at 13:1 ("I saw a beast"); 13:11 ("I saw another beast"); 14:1 ("I saw and behold a Lamb on Mt. Zion"); 14:6 ("I saw another angel fly"); and 14:14 ("I saw and behold a white cloud").

These examples of #Cal udov have been taken from chs. 12-14. We can fmd many others, such as 15:1 ("I saw another sign, seven angels"), 16:13 ("I saw out ofthemouthofthedragon"), 9:1 ("I saw a star fall"), 10:1 ("I saw another angel"), and so on, through several other examples.

However, John also used various other introductory terms in place of #Cal

£tdov. A frequent alternative is #Cal 1JIWUG(!,-"l"l heard"), as in 11:12 ("I heard a loud voice"), 12:10 ("I heard a loud voice"), andf:4 ("I heard the number of those who were sealed").

In 9:1 he uses both #Cal udov and #Cal 1JIWUGa ("I saw and heard an eagle").

Sometimes leal £tdov is modified by pr:ra TavTa or paa TOVTO to produce "after this I saw."

In s ite of the ab evidence for literary craftmanship in Revelation, John was not enslaved by his literary patterns. For examp e, the seven e rs are ~ously fiigfily wroUght lite! my gems. In them, phrases like Tad£ AEY£l ("these things says"), otda aov Ta £pya ("I know your works"), and 'O £XWV ovr

aKovacrrw, etc. ("Let whoever has ears hear"), occur almost uniformly as outline markers. They do not occur quite uniformly, however. Otda aov Ta £pya occurs only five times, not seven times as we might have expected, being replaced by otda KaTOlK£tr ("I know where you live") in the Pergamum letter, and by otda

aov T1JV BA!tptv ("I know your tribulation") in the Smyrna letter. Incidentally, Pergamum and Smyrna are not in chiastic relation. And "to the one who conquers I will give" occurs with a variety of variations. Thus even the highly wrought seven letters do not employ literary phraseology with perfect consistency.

Returning to Kat £tdov, we observe that when the seventh seal is opened in 8:1 no Kat £tdov or other set phrase marks the new scene; and in our great controversy division in which we are most interested at present, there is no Kat

£tdov marker to commence the scene when the heavenly war breaks out in 12:7, or when the great red dragon sees that he has been thrown out of heaven in 12:13.

We can probably conclude, then, that though the presence of such formulas as· leal £tdov and Kat 1JIWUGa and some others are suggestive of scene breaks, neither their presence nor their absence is coercive proof of one. In the fmal analysis, the beginning and ending of scenes and even of major divisions of Revelation must be determined by context and content rather than by literary markers.

At the 1987 MarienhOhe meeting of DARCOM, the suggestion was advanced that the Semitic underlayment of the Apocalypse so obscures the Seer's use of the Greek aorist as to leave the true significance of "the hour of his judgment 7JA:{}ev " entirely ambiguous. I would like to suggest some considerations to reduce this perceived ambiguity.

Specifically, the hurdle perceived in translation of the aorists in Revelation is the demonstrable relationship of a number of them to the Hebrew perfect; and the Hebrew perfect can be construed, depending on context, as perfect (past, present, or future), gnomic (proverbial), statjc (present continuous), and futuris­

tic. Thus "the hour of his judgment 1JADev " might, theoretically, be tantamount to nothing more than a proverbial warning, "God judges," or "God is going to judge you someday."

But all agree that a great many aorists in Revelation are unambiguous narrative past tenses. Think of the numerous occurrences of leal udov ("and I saw")and leal 1JKOVOa ("and I heard"), discussed elsewhere in this paper, which help make up the fabric of Revelation from beginning to end.

We remind ourselves that though the meaning of the aorist in koine Greek outside the NT was commonly equivalent to the simple English past, it was also

commonly equivalent to the English perfect. Several aoristic statements in Revelation referring to judgment make sense as English pasts or English perfects but don't make sense as gnomic or other unusal kinds of verbs.

6:16---Hide us, because the great day of his anger has arrived (1JA.Dev ).

11:15-You have taken (tLA7Jifxxr) your kingdom ... and the time to judge the dead has arrived (1JADev ).

14:15-Put in your sickle, because the hour to reap has arrived (1JA.Dev ).

15:4---Your righteousness has been revealed (tf/>avtpw/)7Joav ).

16:5, · 6---You are righteous, because you have judged ( tKptvap these things.

19:2-He has judged (tKptvev) the great harlot.

We conclude that the cry of the flrBt angel in 14:7 should be translated, "The hour of your judgment has arrived," in harmony with well established Adventist understanding. The flrBt angel, then, does belong to the close of the 2300 days-and the tqir-~gel's warning about the mark of the beast must be perceived as an ,hd- time phenomenon.