The Watchtower — December 1, 1963

The “Golden Rule”—Proof of Wisdom

EARLY last winter in the Columbia Heights section of Brooklyn, New York, a middle-aged man was seen hurrying to his auto just as a policeman fastened a green ticket to his car because of a parking violation. Outraged, he gave vent to a volley of intemperate, angry words, which the policeman ignored as he kept walking away. What had the car owner gained by his outburst? Nothing; he merely added to his own bad feelings while setting the policeman against him.

How different the instance of the English missionary in Lagos, Nigeria! Upon coming to his parked auto one day there stood a dark-skinned native officer who took him to task for parking his car where there happened to be a No Parking sign, which, however, had been put there only the day before. The officer asked for his identification cards, and as he copied off the information he kept up a tirade on the seriousness of the offense.

All of a sudden the officer looked up with a puzzled expression on his face as he asked, “You don’t abuse me?” The missionary replied, “Why should I? You’re just doing your job.” Eyeing him rather curiously, the officer asked, “And what may be your job?” “I am a missionary, one of Jehovah’s witnesses,” was the answer. Obviously he had not expected that reply, and at once the tone of his voice changed. The conversation led to the Bible, with the upshot that the two parted as friends but only after arrangements had been made for the missionary to study the Bible with the officer. Obviously it paid this missionary to treat the officer as he himself would have wanted to be treated.

How easy it is to forget that an officer, guardian or usher might be fully aware of the way you feel and may not be at all happy about what he has to do in the line of duty, such as enforcing restrictions, regulations or making out a ticket for some traffic or parking violation! His is not an easy job. Do not abuse him for carrying out his trust nor try to pressure him to be unfaithful to it. Why not, rather, make it easier for him by being respectful, courteous and considerate, for is that not the way you would want to be handled if you were in his place? In doing so, you will make it not only easier for him but also more pleasant for yourself. We cannot work at making things more pleasant for others without feeling better for it ourselves, if not also being rewarded in kind.

Yes, heeding the so-called Golden Rule, “Just as you want men to do to you, do the same way to them,” is not only the just and right thing to do, the loving and kind thing to do, but it is also the wise thing to do. In fact, Jesus Christ, who gave to men the positive form of the “golden rule,” stressed this very point when he said, in the same connection: “Practice giving, and people will give to you. They will pour into your laps a fine measure, pressed down, shaken together and overflowing. For with the measure that you are measuring out, they will measure out to you in return.”—Luke 6:31, 38.

The “golden rule” gets at the core of human relations; and the problem of human relations, as noted by such scholars as Pitirim A. Sorokin of Harvard University, is the foremost one facing mankind. As one comment on New York City’s newspaper strike well put it: “How is it possible that any civilization so advanced can place a man in space, yet cannot build good faith and trust between an employer and an employee?”—Wall Street Journal, February 14, 1963.

How is it possible? It is possible because people today do not believe in doing to others the way they would have others do to them. Their lack of faith in God and their shortsighted selfishness blinds them to the wisdom of the “golden rule.”

Look where we will, we will find that following the “golden rule” is proof of wisdom. The waiter, the clerk or the salesman who handles his guests or customers in the way he would like to be handled by them is bound to be more successful than the one who is indifferent. Likewise the guest or customer who handles the waiter, clerk or salesman as he would like to be handled is far more likely to get good service than the one who treats such employees as mere servants.

In particular does this principle apply to married folk because of their continuous, close, intimate relationship. The more thoughtfulness, consideration and affection each shows the other, the more of these each is likely to receive from the other. So when one recognizes that the other is holding back thoughtfulness or affection, it is well to ask, “To what extent am I merely receiving back what I am handing the other?” If both heeded the “golden rule,” the situation would never deteriorate to desertion, separation or divorce, not to say anything about marital unfaithfulness. And certainly such things are not conducive to happiness.

Nor may parents overlook this principle simply because God’s Word requires that their children obey them. The Bible also says: “Fathers, do not be irritating your children.” (Eph. 6:4) By needlessly irritating his children, a father works against the best interests of both. Early in 1963 the radio told of a teen-age son who stabbed his father to death because of a rebuke. Apparently that rebuke was the last straw. Not that any irritation justifies murder of one’s father, patricide. But, doubtless, had the father given thought to not needlessly irritating his son, he would still be alive. This principle, incidentally, might be said to be applicable to all whose prerogative it is to give rebukes. Give it in the way you would receive it, and you are more likely to benefit the one receiving it as well as keep his love.

And in all this note that the “golden rule” requires you to take the initiative. It is not ‘Do to others as they do to you.’ No, but ‘You do to others just as you would have them do to you,’ and that regardless of what they may do. That is wisdom, divine wisdom. Heed it for your own well-being and happiness.

Christianity—Where Opposites Meet

The true worship of God is both well balanced and inclusive. Is your worship of that kind?

IT WAS autumn, 1961. The air was tense in a certain town of a British West African colony. Expecting the worst because a change of government was imminent, the British ringed the town with thousands of troops. All Europeans were ordered to leave the city and especially the womenfolk. However, one missionary couple, much to the chagrin of the officials, saw no reason for them to leave the town. Eventually the storm blew over, the transfer was made without any violence.

Why did this couple not consider it foolhardy to remain? Because, due to their unselfish work among the Africans, they had real friends among them. To them the Africans were their brothers, and the Africans to whom they ministered considered the missionaries as their brothers, despite the difference in skin color. Needless to say, their remaining created much favorable comment among the Africans. This is just a single, minor incident, but one very typical of true Christianity, which recognizes no race distinctions and where, in this respect also, it may be said that what some call opposites, whites and blacks, meet.

In fact, this meeting of opposites within Christianity is true of every sphere of human relations. For example, in Christianity opposites as to education meet on a common footing. Thus the highly educated Pharisee, the apostle Paul, cooperated with such “unlettered and ordinary” men as Peter and John, even as today at assemblies of dedicated Christians college professors serve side by side with or sit beside others who first began to learn to read and write upon coming in touch with the New World society of Jehovah’s witnesses. The highly educated do not look down upon these with little formal education nor do the latter despise the former as “eggheads.”—Acts 4:13; Prov. 14:17; Acts 17:34; 22:3.

Then, again, true Christianity unites nationalities that long have had antipathies toward one another, such as the Irish of Eire and the Irish of Ulster. For Christians “there is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor freeman, there is neither male nor female.” The same also applies to such divisive factors as wealth and culture, not that the two necessarily go together. They heed the counsel of the disciple James: “Let the lowly brother exult over his exaltation, and the rich one over his humiliation,” thus the two will come on a common level.—Gal. 3:28; Jas. 1:9, 10.

In true Christianity there is not even a segregation according to age, no religious kindergartens for children or Sunday schools, but all meet together as did the Israelites of old in obedience to the command: “Congregate the people, the men and the women and the little ones . . . in order that they may listen and in order that they may learn.” Youth has respect for what maturity and years of experience has to offer, and old age appreciates the eagerness of youth. As some Brazilian Witnesses like to put it, “We have no old folks among us, only some have been young longer than others!”—Deut. 31:12.

OPPOSITE QUALITIES MEET

In true Christianity not only do persons of opposite characteristics meet, but what are generally considered as opposite qualities meet within the same individual Christian. How so? In that it produces well-balanced personalities. For example, as a rule people do not associate the qualities of tenderness, gentleness, meekness and mildness with a forceful, bold and fearless dynamic personality. Yet in true Christianity these opposite qualities meet in the individual.

Setting the pattern for this was none other than Jesus Christ himself. Bold, fearless and dynamic, he minced no words in driving home his points to the assembled multitudes or to his foes. “Hypocrite! First extract the rafter from your own eye, and then you will see clearly how to extract the straw from your brother’s eye.” “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! . . . Serpents, offspring of vipers, how are you to flee from the judgment of Gehenna?” As a man of action he on two occasions ‘drove all those with sheep and cattle out of the temple precincts, pouring out the coins of the money-changers and overturning their tables.’—Matt. 7:5; 23:29-33; 21:12; John 2:15.

Yet he had it within himself to manifest kindness, mildness and compassion: “On seeing the crowds he felt pity for them, because they were skinned and thrown about like sheep without a shepherd.” To such he extended the invitation: “Come to me, all you who are toiling and loaded down, and I will refresh you. Take my yoke upon you and become my disciples, for I am mild-tempered and lowly in heart, and you will find refreshment for your souls. For my yoke is kindly and my load is light.”—Matt. 9:36; 11:28-30.

Of that able imitator of Jesus Christ, the apostle Paul, the same can be said. Both in the book of Acts and in his letters we read of his fearless steadfastness; he boldly stood for the truth and expressed it regardless of whom it affected, whether a fellow apostle or other fellow Christians, whether hostile mobs or governors and kings, and he took them all in his stride, as occasion demanded.—Acts 13:9-11; 14:19; 15:39; 17:23-32; 21:30-40; 24:10; 25:8-11; Gal. 2:11-14.

At the same time Paul could write of himself: “We became gentle in the midst of you, as when a nursing mother cherishes her own children. So, having a tender affection for you, we were well pleased to impart to you, not only the good news of God, but also our own souls, because you became beloved to us.” “As a father does his children, we kept exhorting each one of you, and consoling and bearing witness to you.” Yes, in the apostle Paul as well as in Jesus Christ the opposite qualities of the hardy soldier and the gentle shepherd met, bold fearlessness, righteous indignation, and tenderness, mildness and kindness.—1 Thess. 2:7, 8, 11.

Since this is so, it is to be expected that Christians would be counseled to cultivate these opposite qualities within themselves, and so we find it: “Stay awake, stand firm in the faith, carry on as men, grow mighty.” “Finally, go on acquiring power in the Lord and in the mightiness of his strength.” “As a fine soldier of Christ Jesus take your part in suffering evil.”—1 Cor. 16:13; Eph. 6:10; 2 Tim. 2:3.

At the same time we also read: “Become kind to one another, tenderly compassionate, freely forgiving one another just as God also by Christ freely forgave you.” “If, then, there is any encouragement in Christ, if any consolation of love, if any sharing of spirit, if any tender affections and compassions, make my joy full in that you are of the same mind and have the same love, being joined together in soul, holding the one thought in mind.”—Eph. 4:32; Phil. 2:1, 2.

A MESSAGE OF OPPOSITES

The good news of God’s kingdom that Christianity publishes may also be said to be an instance where opposites meet. Thus the prophetic command from which Jesus quoted, when he returned to his hometown of Nazareth, contained a twofold, contrasting commission: “Jehovah has anointed me to tell good news to the meek ones. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to those taken captive and the wide opening of the eyes even to the prisoners; to proclaim the year of good will on the part of Jehovah and the day of vengeance on the part of our God; to comfort all the mourning ones.” Even as Jesus did both while he was on earth, so his followers on earth today do the same—they preach the good news of an earthwide Paradise and warn of Armageddon, the war of the great day of God the Almighty.—Isa. 61:1, 2; Rev. 16:14, 16; 21:4.

Note how forcefully this point is driven home in the prophecy of Micah 5:7, 8, which finds its fulfillment in our day: “The remaining ones of Jacob must become in the midst of many peoples like dew from Jehovah, like copious showers upon vegetation, that does not hope for man or wait for the sons of earthling man. And the remaining ones of Jacob must become among the nations, in the midst of many peoples, like the lion among the beasts of a forest, like a maned young lion among droves of sheep, which, when it actually passes through, certainly both tramples down and tears in pieces; and there is no deliverer.”

Certainly a greater contrast or set of opposites could hardly be imagined. What fall more gently and are more refreshing than the dew and copious showers that are so life-sustaining, and especially in the land of Palestine where those words were written? And what is more destructive than a young lion in the midst of a drove of helpless sheep? True Christians fill both roles. For persons of goodwill toward God they have a refreshing, life-sustaining message. But for the enemies of the truth, the message true Christians bring is as devastating as a young lion because of the havoc they play with false doctrines, which they slash, to use another figure of speech, with the “sword of the spirit,” the Word of God.—Eph. 6:17.

Why is it that these opposites meet in Christianity? Because it is the religion of the one true God, Jehovah, who is impartial and whose qualities are perfectly balanced. Because of his power and justice he is “a consuming fire” to the wicked, but to the lovers of righteousness he shows his other side: “It is the acts of loving-kindness of Jehovah that we have not come to our finish, because his mercies will certainly not come to an end. They are new each morning.”—Heb. 12:29; Lam. 3:22, 23.

Truly Christianity recommends itself to all lovers of truth and righteousness. Having “the wisdom from above,” it is “first of all chaste, then peaceable, reasonable, ready to obey, full of mercy and good fruits, not making partial distinctions, not hypocritical.”—Jas. 3:17.

Victory for God’s Woman over Her Ancient Enemy

“Do not rejoice over me, O you woman enemy of mine. Although I have fallen, I shall certainly rise up; although I dwell in the darkness, Jehovah will be a light to me.”—Mic. 7:8.

1. What two women have been enemies of long standing and what questions does that enmity pose?

For four thousand two hundred years God’s woman and her ancient enemy have faced each other. For most of this time it has appeared that the ancient enemy woman has had the upper hand over God’s woman. What is the standing of the two women with regard to each other today? When will their enmity end? And how? Will it end with a compromise and an agreement to coexist on a friendly basis, or will it end in the destruction of the one and the eternal victory of the other? This is no mere squabble between two women that is their personal affair and that matters little to the rest of us as to how it turns out. The outcome does concern us all. Think so or not, we are all of us involved either with the one woman or with the other woman. We ought to know what should be our relations to them, and that right now! But how can we know?

2. (a) Where may we look for information on this case? (b) Who will be victorious, and with what result to mankind?

² There is a book of information on their entire case. What book is that? It is the book that tells us how womankind came into existence and how woman became mother to us all. It has more sound, balanced counsel about women than any other book on earth. It is the Holy Bible. From its first book, Genesis, to its last book, Revelation or Apocalypse, it traces the development of this case of feminine enmity from its start and carries us along over its high points until its grand climax in the brilliant victory of God’s woman over the ancient enemy woman. Thus we can know in advance whether we are going to win with the one or lose with the other. Losing with the enemy woman will wipe out our everlasting future. Winning with God’s woman will ensure for us endless life in supreme happiness in the universal family of God the Great Father.

3. (a) Can the enemy woman now be identified? (b) What are we not to understand by the expression “God’s woman”?

³ That enemy woman—just who is she? That has long been a mystery, but she can now be identified. And God’s woman—just who is she? Does the expression “God’s woman” apply to a woman in the same way that ancient prophets like Moses, Elijah and Elisha and even the Christian overseer Timothy were each called a “man of God”? No, because this particular woman is God’s in the sense of being His wife. But since when has God in heaven been married? Who is his wife? And is she a goddess to be worshiped by us? These questions deserve an answer. However, at the start we must not think of God’s woman or wife from the standpoint of the religious mythologies of worldly nations that tell us of the various gods and their goddess wives. God’s own Book, the Holy Bible, presents His wife as being something altogether different.

4. In what circumstances and with what expressions did God first mention his woman to man?

⁴ Very early in the history of mankind God made mention of his woman or wife. It was in the paradise garden of Eden. The first human couple, Adam and Eve, had just sinned at the inducement presented by the lying serpent. God the heavenly Father examined his disobedient earthly son and daughter. He got their own admission of having broken the divine law. Their start in sin they got from the lying serpent, but not from just that snake on the ground, rather, from that intelligent person unseen behind that snake. Fitting his language to the literal snake, God said to that unseen Liar, Slanderer and Opposer of God: “Upon your belly you will go and dust is what you will eat all the days of your life. And I shall put enmity between you and the woman and between your seed and her seed. He will bruise you in the head and you will bruise him in the heel.” (Gen. 3:14, 15) Who is the woman mentioned?

5, 6. (a) Why could Eve not presume she was the woman? (b) How did the existence of the heavenly woman begin to make itself known to Eve?

⁵ The fleshly woman Eve may have thought that she was the woman. But after sinning against her God and Father could she be a “woman of God”? From her start she was Adam’s wife and never God’s wife.

⁶ Eve did not appreciate that there was another woman in existence, for this woman was invisible to her. She was heavenly, not earthly or fleshly like Eve. The evidence that this other woman existed began to make itself known to Eve when she and her husband were driven out of the garden of Eden and suddenly, out of the invisible realm, there appeared as guards at the entrance of the garden persons she had never seen before. How did this come about? It was by a miracle of God. Genesis 3:24 says: “So he drove the man out and posted at the east of the garden of Eden the cherubs and the flaming blade of a sword that was turning itself continually to guard the way to the tree of life.” These cherubs were representatives of God’s heavenly woman. According to the record kept in the entire Bible, this “woman” turned out to be the mother of the Seed that actually bruises the great unseen Serpent in the head.

7, 8. Who introduces Jehovah’s wife to us, and by what means?

⁷ It is not we who attribute to God a heavenly wife. He himself is the One who first tells us of his marriage estate and of his wife, introducing his wife to us, as it were. He did so in the eighth century before Christ, by means of his prophet Isaiah. Immediately after foretelling the sufferings of Christ as the Lamb of God and then of his glorification, the prophet Isaiah proceeds to direct himself to God’s woman and say:

⁸ “‘Cry out joyfully, you barren woman that did not give birth! Become cheerful with a joyful outcry and cry shrilly, you that had no childbirth pains, for the sons of the desolated one are more numerous than the sons of the woman with a husbandly owner,’ Jehovah has said. ‘For your grand Maker is your husbandly owner, Jehovah of armies being his name; and the Holy One of Israel is your Repurchaser. The God of the whole earth he will be called. For Jehovah called you as if you were a wife left entirely and hurt in spirit, and as a wife of the time of youth who was then rejected,’ your God has said. ‘O woman afflicted, tempest-tossed, uncomforted, here I am laying with hard mortar your stones, and I will lay your foundation with sapphires. And I will make your battlements of rubies, and your gates of fiery glowing stones, and all your boundaries of delightsome stones. And all your sons will be persons taught by Jehovah, and the peace of your sons will be abundant.’”—Isa. 54:1, 5, 6, 11-13.

9. Jesus Christ, in quoting from Isaiah’s prophecy, made what application of it?

⁹ Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God, quoted from this prophecy of Isaiah and stated that all these sons of God’s woman would come to him, the Son of God. To the Jews at Capernaum whom he had fed miraculously with bread and fish, Jesus said: “I am the bread that came down from heaven; . . . No man can come to me unless the Father, who sent me, draws him; and I will resurrect him in the last day. It is written in the Prophets, ‘And they will all be taught by Jehovah.’ Everyone that has heard from the Father and has learned comes to me.”—John 6:24, 25, 41-45.

10. In Isaiah’s prophecy what is used to symbolize God’s woman, and, as thus symbolized, what does she experience?

¹⁰ God’s words to his woman as given in Isaiah’s prophecy talk about laying her stones with hard mortar and her foundation with sapphires, and making her battlements of rubies, her gates of fiery glowing stones and her boundaries of delightsome stones. From this it becomes clear that God’s woman is symbolized by a city. As symbolized by this city she goes through the experience of being afflicted, tempest-tossed and uncomforted and without any children or citizens, and she needs to be repurchased so as to belong again to her God, Jehovah. Take note that these words are not addressed to the nation of Israel, as the words of Jeremiah’s prophecy (Jer 3:14, 20; 31:32) are, which also speak of a husbandly owner. Rather, God’s words by his prophet Isaiah are directed to a city that is rescued from a condition like childless widowhood and that becomes filled with children or citizens whom Jehovah God himself teaches because he is her husband.

11. What is a “city,” and what further questions are raised?

¹¹ A city is an organization, and therefore God’s woman is no one person having feminine qualities but is an organization of persons, all these being “joined together in oneness.” (Ps. 122:3) Where, now, is this organization? Is it on earth, as the nation of natural Israel was in the days of Isaiah and Jeremiah?

GOD’S WOMAN IDENTIFIED

12, 13. In likening a city to a woman, how does Paul eliminate earthly Jerusalem from being the woman of God?

¹² God’s own written Word, the Holy Bible, tells us where his wifelike organization is found. The Christian apostle Paul quotes from Isaiah’s prophecy above and shows that she is not on earth in the form of the nation of natural Israel, the Jewish nation that today has its capital at Jerusalem, in the new part of the city, whereas the Mohammedan nation of Jordan has the old part. Note how the apostle Paul likens a city to a woman and how he eliminates Jerusalem on earth from being God’s woman. Taking as his illustrations Sarah the wife of the Hebrew patriarch Abraham and her Egyptian slave girl named Hagar, Paul writes to spiritual Christians:

¹³ “Abraham acquired two sons, one by the servant girl and one by the free woman; but the one by the servant girl was actually born in the manner of flesh [by means of Hagar who was still young enough to conceive children], the other [son] by the free woman through a promise. These things stand as a symbolic drama; for these women mean two covenants, the one from Mount Sinai, which brings forth children for slavery, and which is Hagar. Now this Hagar means Sinai, a mountain in Arabia, and she corresponds with the Jerusalem today, for she is in slavery with her children. But the Jerusalem above is free [as Sarah was], and she is our mother. For it is written [in Isaiah 54:1]: ‘Be glad, you barren woman who does not give birth; break out and cry aloud, you woman who does not have childbirth pains; for the children of the desolate woman are more numerous than those of her who has the husband.’ Now we, brothers, are children belonging to the promise the same as Isaac [the son of Sarah] was. But just as then the one born in the manner of flesh began persecuting the one born in the manner of spirit, so also now. Nevertheless, what does the Scripture say? ‘Drive out the servant girl and her son, for by no means shall the son of the servant girl be an heir with the son of the free woman.’ Wherefore, brothers, we are children, not of a servant girl, but of the free woman [the Jerusalem above]. “—Gal. 4:22-31; Gen. 21:1-10.

14, 15. How does a second witness identify the wife of Jehovah?

¹⁴ This identifies God’s woman, or the wife of Jehovah, as being a heavenly organization Scripturally called “Jerusalem above.” A double witness to this fact is given to us in the inspired letter to the Hebrew Christians. Referring first to Mount Sinai in Arabia, the mountain from which the Ten Commandments of God’s law covenant with the nation of Israel were given and which mountain was pictured by the servant girl Hagar, Hebrews 12:18-28 says, in part:

¹⁵ “You have not approached that [mountain] which can be felt and which has been set aflame with fire, and a dark cloud and thick darkness and a tempest, . . . But you have approached a Mount Zion and a city of the living God, heavenly Jerusalem, and myriads of angels, in general assembly, and the congregation of the first-born who have been enrolled in the heavens, and God the Judge of all, and the spiritual lives of righteous ones who have been made perfect, and Jesus the mediator of a new covenant, and the blood of sprinkling, which speaks in a better way than Abel’s blood. . . . At that time his voice shook the earth, but now he has promised, saying: ‘Yet once more I will set in commotion not only the earth but also the heaven.’ Now the expression ‘Yet once more’ signifies the removal of the things being shaken as things that have been made, in order that the things not being shaken may remain. Wherefore, seeing that we are to receive a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us continue to have undeserved kindness, through which we may acceptably render God sacred service with godly fear.”

16. (a) What expressions of Hebrews 12:18-28 prove God’s woman is a heavenly organization? (b) Jehovah’s pronouncement of sentence upon Satan meant what concerning his woman and her Seed?

¹⁶ The Jerusalem above is here called “a city of the living God, heavenly Jerusalem.” She is God’s woman or wife. She is the heavenly organization made up of the “myriad of angels, in general assembly.” This organization of holy angels was present with Jehovah God in heaven when he pronounced sentence upon the Great Serpent at the garden of Eden almost six thousand years ago. Thus when Jehovah spoke of putting enmity between the Serpent and the “woman” and said that the woman’s seed would bruise the Serpent in the head, Jehovah’s woman or wife was there with him in heaven. She was the “woman” to provide the Seed for this act. The One whom she provided directly for this victorious act was the only-begotten Son of God, who became Jesus Christ on earth and who said: “I am the bread that came down from heaven.”

17. (a) When and how did Jesus become heavenly Jerusalem’s firstborn spiritual son? (b) When did his sonship become full-fledged?

¹⁷ The first step in this direction was the birth of Jesus in the year 2 B.C. But the heavenly Jerusalem really brought him forth as her firstborn spiritual Son thirty years later, A.D. 29. In that year Jesus was baptized in water, and his heavenly Father poured down holy spirit upon him and announced his begettal as a spiritual Son by saying: “This is my Son, the beloved, whom I have approved.” Three and a half years later the heavenly Jerusalem really did bring him forth as a full-fledged spirit Son of hers when God healed the heel wound inflicted by the Great Serpent and raised Jesus Christ from the dead to spirit life in heaven. Then the heavenly Jerusalem received him into the midst of her organization of angelic sons in heaven, but as the Chief One among them, in the position of Archangel.—Matt. 3:13-17; 27:27 to 28:10; 1 Pet. 3:18, 19.

18. How could heavenly Jerusalem then rejoice, as Sarah rejoiced?

¹⁸ At this marvelous event heavenly Jerusalem had great cause for being glad and crying aloud. Her childlessness as measured from the time of the promise of a Seed to her at the garden of Eden had ended with the full birth of her most glorious Son. She rejoiced, just as the aged Sarah rejoiced at the birth of her only son Isaac.

19. What additional children was heavenly Jerusalem to have?

¹⁹ However, the apostle Paul said to his Christian brothers: “Now we, brothers, are children belonging to the promise the same as Isaac was. Wherefore, brothers, we are children belonging to the promise the same as Isaac was. Wherefore, brothers, we are children . . . of the free woman.” (Gal. 4:27, 28, 31) This brings to light the fact that the heavenly Jerusalem was to have additional children for the fulfillment of Jehovah’s promise in Genesis 3:15 concerning the Seed of the woman.

20. When did these other spiritual children begin to be brought forth, giving still more reason for Jehovah’s woman to cry out joyfully?

²⁰ Yet as Isaiah 54:1 foretold, she was to have spiritual children in greater numbers than the children of the symbolic slave girl who, in the form of the nation of natural Israel, had been united for a while with Jehovah God. These other spiritual children, according to the promise of Genesis 3:15, began to be brought forth on the day of Pentecost, fifty days after Jesus Christ’s resurrection, when the holy spirit was poured out upon one hundred and twenty faithful disciples of Jesus who were waiting in Jerusalem. (Acts 2:1-39) There Jehovah begot them by his spirit. At this Jehovah’s woman, the long-time barren heavenly Jerusalem, had still more reason to be glad and cry out joyfully. Today, in this year 1963, she has a remnant of this spiritual seed yet on earth, who are awaiting their full birth in the heavens.

THE ENEMY WOMAN

21. (a) Since what time was God’s woman symbolized by earthly Jerusalem? (b) When did the enemy woman appear?

²¹ Who, though, is that other woman, the enemy of the heavenly Jerusalem? And when did God’s woman confront this enemy woman for the first time? Ever since King David captured the citadel of Jerusalem and made it his capital city in the eleventh century before Christ, God’s woman had been symbolized by the Jerusalem on earth. In fact, she came to be called by the name of this earthly city. (2 Sam. 5:1-9) Earthly Jerusalem had its roots in the city of Salem, where King Melchizedek was “priest of the Most High God” in the days of the patriarch Abraham in the twentieth century before Christ. (Gen. 14:17-20) But, of course, God’s woman, the heavenly Jerusalem, existed before that. In the days of ancient Salem the enemy woman was already existing, and in part of the realm over which she held sway the patriarch Abraham was moving around. It was around two hundred years before Abraham’s birth that the enemy woman appeared.

22. (a) How did the enemy woman get to be named after the ancient city Babylon? (b) What indicates that the enemy woman is something greater than the literal city?

²² According to the last book of the Bible the enemy woman came to be called by the name of an earthly city. Her mysterious name, Babylon the Great, points back to the city of Babylon built on the bank of the Euphrates River in the land of Shinar in the twenty-third century before Christ. This city became a symbol of Babylon the Great. However, because she is called the Great it indicates that the enemy woman is something greater than the literal city of Babylon on the Euphrates. The enemy woman still exists today, even after ancient Babylon has lain in moldering ruins for more than a thousand years. (Rev. 14:8; 17:5) True, Babylon the Great has her roots in ancient Babylon, but she is greater and of a longer life and wields more world power than ever that ancient Wonder City did.

23. Who built Babylon, and what was the purpose of the city builders?

²³ In the century following the global flood of Noah’s day the riverside city was built, not by that godly man but by a great-grandson of his, an ambitious rebellious descendant named Nimrod. His city is the first city that the Bible names after the Flood, and it became the beginning of Nimrod’s kingdom. (Gen. 10:8-12) It was built to obstruct the carrying out of God’s will concerning the earth as man’s home. It was made the seat of false religion, which is denoted by the fact that the city builders started putting up a “tower with its top in the heavens.” All this project was planned and carried forward to make a name, not for the God of Noah, but for the city builders, particularly for Nimrod its king, who came to be called “Nimrod a mighty hunter in opposition to Jehovah.”

24. Jehovah’s displeasure with the scheme was shown how, and what confusion resulted?

²⁴ Jehovah God and his woman in heaven were not pleased with the scheme. He could not bless the city. So, in order to show his displeasure and to hold up the project, he confused the language of the builders. Unable to understand one another and work together, the builders scattered according to their language groups, leaving only a minority in the city under Nimrod. Because their language was confused at this religious center and because confusion resulted in the city for awhile, its name was called Confusion. This is what the name Babel means in Hebrew, the language that Noah and his faithful son Shem spoke. In the first Greek translation of the Hebrew Scriptures the name is Babylon.—Gen. 11:1-10.

25. (a) What did the scattered city builders carry with them? (b) As a result, when and how did Babylon the Great appear as an enemy woman?

²⁵ King Nimrod set up a small-scale empire of his own, with eight cities in it, the capital city being Babel or Babylon. Of course, his false religion which was in opposition to Jehovah prevailed in his own empire. But the false religion of Babylon became more widespread than that. The builders who had received a confusion of language and who therefore had to scatter to distant territories carried Babylon’s religion with them but, of course, in their new languages. Their religious ideas remained the same but were expressed in different languages. What resulted? An empire of false religion with the religion of Babylon as its common base was established, with a varied and complicated organization, but with all its religious doctrines and practices basically those of original Babylon. Here Babylon the Great made its appearance in the arena of conflict. Here God’s woman, the heavenly Jerusalem or Zion, came face to face with the enemy woman, the world empire of false religion based upon the religion of ancient Babylon.

26. Who dominates the world empire of Babylonish religion?

²⁶ The Great Serpent, the lying Satan the Devil, was behind the building of Babylon and its religious tower and behind its false religion. He was really the invisible god of Babylon and of her false religion. He became what the Holy Scriptures call him, “the god of this system of things.” (2 Cor. 4:4) He dominates the world empire of Babylonish religion.

27. (a) What is the religion of God’s woman? (b) Who practiced her religion on earth, and why did they suffer religious opposition?

²⁷ To the contrary of this, the religion of God’s woman, the heavenly Jerusalem, is the worship of the one living and true God, Jehovah her husband. Her religion met with stout opposition on the earth. The contest of religions now set in after the Flood. By the religious opposition on earth the heavenly Jerusalem, God’s woman, was not directly affected. But she had practicers of her religion on the earth, such as Noah, Shem and the patriarch Abraham, a descendant of Shem. These godly men and their families were directly affected by the religious opposition from Babylon the Great. What this enemy woman did against Noah, Shem, Abraham and his God-fearing descendants was as if done to God’s woman. This was especially true because through this line of faithful men the Seed of God’s woman was to come.

28. Through what line of descent was Abraham born and what did Jehovah promise to him?

²⁸ Noah’s blessing upon his son Shem made it certain that the woman’s Seed in its earthly, human connections would come through Shem rather than through Japheth and Ham. (Gen. 9:24-27) In Shem’s own lifetime Jehovah God called his descendant Abraham out from the neighborhood of Babylon in the land of Shinar. When inviting Abraham out Jehovah said to him: “I shall make a great nation out of you and I shall bless you and I will make your name great; and prove yourself a blessing. And . . . all the families of the ground will certainly bless themselves by means of you.” And after Abraham arrived in the Promised Land hundreds of miles to the west of Babylon, Jehovah said: “To your seed I am going to give this land.”

29. (a) In what manner did Jehovah make certain the promised Seed would come through Abraham and Isaac? (b) Then why was Babylon the Great against Abraham’s descendants?

²⁹ When, over thirty years later, Abraham obeyed Jehovah and proceeded to offer up as a human sacrifice his beloved son Isaac, Jehovah’s angel stopped Abraham and said: “I shall surely bless you and I shall surely multiply your seed like the stars of the heavens and like the grains of sand that are on the seashore; and your seed will take possession of the gate of his enemies. And by means of your seed all nations of the earth will certainly bless themselves due to the fact that you have listened to my voice.” (Gen. 12:1-3, 7; 22:1-18) This made it certain that the promised Seed of God’s woman would come through Abraham and his son Isaac as an earthly channel. When this Seed came to power, it would mean hurt to the Great Serpent, Satan the Devil, the god of Babylon the Great. For this reason she, as the woman enemy of God’s woman, was against that Seed and the line of descent by which the Seed would come.

[Picture on page 715]

Abraham sends Hagar, the servant girl, and Ishmael her son away

Part Two

1. (a) For how long did Babylon the Great have its seat in the ancient city of Babylon? (b) How did Babylon the Great hold sway over other world powers? (c) To what end has she taken advantage of her religious control?

THE principal seat of Babylon the Great as a world empire of false religion was in the ancient city of Babylon on the Euphrates River. This continued to be the case until Babylon fell from her position as the third world power of Bible history in 539 B.C. and yielded place to the Medo-Persian World Power. Two other world powers preceded the Babylonian World Power, and those two were (1) the Egyptian and (2) the Assyrian. Nevertheless, Babylon the Great, the world empire of Babylonish religion, had also held sway over those two earlier world powers. She took advantage of her religious control over them to use them against the Seed of God’s woman by trying to destroy the line of descent by which the Seed came. Babylon the Great is an international harlot, and she yields herself to the political rulers of the earth in order to gain her religious objectives. She thus unites religion to politics.

2. In Egypt, what did Babylon the Great try to do? With what measure of success?

² After Joseph, the grandson of the patriarch Isaac, died as the prime minister of Egypt, Babylon the Great as a religious force worked with Egypt’s Pharaohs in a try at destroying Joseph’s people, the Hebrews. These were then guests, alien residents, in the land of Egypt. Pharaoh made them slaves at hard labor, to kill them off. This failing, Pharaoh decreed that all Hebrew male babies should be killed at birth. Babylon the Great must have felt triumphant over God’s woman, who was represented in Egypt by the Hebrews, the sons of Israel. Despite the devilish measure applied by Pharaoh who committed religious fornication with Babylon the Great, Hebrew male babies continued to be born and preserved, including Moses.

3. How was vexation heaped upon Babylon the Great in Egypt?

³ When forty years old Moses tried to lead a movement for liberating the children of Israel, but was obliged to flee to the distant land of Midian. Forty years later Jehovah sent Moses back as his prophet to lead the Israelites out of the land of slavery. By a string of ten devastating plagues in a row upon Egypt Jehovah acted in behalf of the Seed of his woman, for “upon their gods Jehovah had executed judgments,” which left all the firstborn sons of Egypt dead. What a vexation this must have been to religious Babylon the Great! Shortly afterward Jehovah exposed the helplessness of her religion by destroying all of Pharaoh’s military pursuit forces in the depths of the Red Sea but bringing the Israelites safely through and on their way to the land that he had promised to give to Abraham his friend.—Num. 33:4; Ps. 78:43-53; Ex. 15:1-21.

4. (a) The family line of what king of Israel got to be the target of the enemy woman? (b) The overreaching of Solomon was accomplished how?

⁴ Four hundred and forty-three years later saw King David ruling in Zion, the citadel of Jerusalem, as sovereign over all twelve tribes of Israel. Because David proved to be a man agreeable to his own heart, Jehovah made a covenant with him for an everlasting kingdom in his royal line. (2 Sam. 7:1-18; 1 Sam. 13:14) By this royal covenant with David, God’s woman knew that her promised Seed must come through the family line of King David. In short order, the enemy woman Babylon the Great got to know this and she set herself against David’s royal line. Solomon the son of David succeeded him to “Jehovah’s throne” in Zion (Jerusalem) and built the magnificent temple for Jehovah’s worship. He also further beautified Jerusalem as the holy city of Israel’s God. But Solomon did not prove to be the promised Seed of God’s woman. Religious Babylon the Great overreached King Solomon in his old age by means of her representatives, the many pagan wives of Solomon, for whom he built religious high places for the worship of their gods.—1 Ki. 11:1-10.

5. What developed after Solomon’s death to endanger the earthly representative of God’s woman?

⁵ After unfaithful Solomon’s death a rebellion split the kingdom of the house of David in two. The rebellious northern kingdom of Israel set up its own national capital and the worship of golden calves, and finally at Samaria, the third capital, the worship of Baal was introduced. But Jerusalem (Zion) remained the capital of the kingdom of Judah of but two tribes, with the tribe of Levi serving at Jehovah’s temple. (1 Ki. 11:41 to 16:33) Two centuries passed thus, and then the Israelites began to feel the domination of a new world power, in the eighth century before Christ. In the year 740 B.C. Samaria, the capital of the northern kingdom of Israel, was sacked by King Sargon II of Assyria and the kingdom was overthrown and the surviving Israelites were deported to Assyrian territories. Some years later came the invasion of the land of Judah by the Assyrians under King Sennacherib son of Sargon II. Jerusalem, the earthly representative of God’s woman, became endangered. At that time Babylon was subject to Assyria; yet Assyria practiced Babylonish religion.

6. On behalf of Assyria’s king and god, what arrogant taunts were hurled at the city of Jerusalem?

⁶ From his siege position before the Judean city of Lachish the Assyrian Sennacherib sent messengers to Jerusalem and arrogantly demanded that King Hezekiah surrender the holy city. The Assyrian spokesman, Rabshakeh, stood before the city walls and proceeded to act as a witness for Nisroch the god of King Sennacherib. Loudly he shouted out to the Jews on the city walls: “Do not listen to Hezekiah, for he allures you, saying, ‘Jehovah himself will deliver us.’ Have the gods of the nations at all delivered each one his own land out of the hand of the king of Assyria? Where are the gods of Hamath and Arpad? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim, Hena and Ivvah? Have they delivered Samaria out of my hand? Who are there among all the gods of the lands that have delivered their land out of my hand, so that Jehovah should deliver Jerusalem out of my hand?”—2 Ki. 18:9-37.

7. (a) Did Jerusalem surrender? (b) What answer did Jehovah send back by his prophet Isaiah?

⁷ Jerusalem sent back to Sennacherib a refusal to surrender. So he found it necessary to send another message belittling Jerusalem’s God Jehovah. Then, from within the holy city, Jehovah by his prophet Isaiah sent back these defiant words: “The virgin daughter of Zion has despised you, she has held you in derision. Behind you the daughter of Jerusalem has wagged her head. Whom have you taunted and spoken of abusively? And against whom have you lifted up your voice and do you raise your eyes on high? It is against the Holy One of Israel! By means of your messengers you have taunted Jehovah . . . I shall certainly put my hook in your nose and my bridle between your lips, and I shall indeed lead you back by the way by which you have come.”—2 Ki. 19:1-28.

8. In fulfillment, what happened to Sennacherib and to his troops?

⁸ That night Jehovah’s angel struck dead a hundred and eighty-five thousand of Sennacherib’s troops, and in the morning as by means of a hook in Sennacherib’s nose Jehovah yanked him back to Nineveh, capital of Assyria. But after that defeat Sennacherib leveled rebellious Babylon to the ground; yet never was he able to boast of destroying, or even capturing, Jerusalem. It was while Sennacherib was engaged in reconstructing Babylon that he was murdered by two of his sons when he was worshiping in the temple of his god Nisroch. (2 Ki. 19:35-37) What a triumph for God’s woman!

CAPTIVITY AND DELIVERANCE

9. What developments led to the destruction of the city by whose name God’s woman was called?

⁹ However, the conflict between God’s woman and her enemy Babylon the Great was by no means over. In the following century the reconstructed Babylon rose to the position of the dominant world power, under her greatest king, Nebuchadnezzar II. By now Jerusalem and her temple of Jehovah’s worship had become thoroughly defiled. What now took place was an apparently permanent defeat for God’s woman and a crowning triumph for her enemy, for in 607 B.C. Jerusalem, by whose name God’s woman was called, was destroyed.

10. Why could God’s woman say to Babylon the Great: “Do not rejoice over me”?

¹⁰ However, God’s woman, the heavenly Jerusalem, remained and she knew that the destruction of the earthly city was a judgment executed by her husband Jehovah. By statements in the prophecies of Isaiah, Jeremiah and other Jewish prophets, she knew that earthly Jerusalem’s destruction was to be just temporary, for just seventy years. Then her exiled children would be liberated from their captor, Babylon, and would return and rebuild Jerusalem and her temple. So, during those years of desolation, God’s woman as represented by earthly Jerusalem could say to Babylon and to her counterpart, Babylon the Great: “Do not rejoice over me, O you woman enemy of mine. Although I have fallen, I shall certainly rise up; although I dwell in the darkness, Jehovah will be a light to me.”—Mic. 7:8.

11, 12. What prophecies were now due to be fulfilled upon Babylon, and what proverbial saying could be raised up against her royal dynasty?

¹¹ Babylon had sinned terribly against Jehovah. His inescapable vengeance deserved to come upon her. The cup of humiliation, despoiling and destruction that she had made earthly Jerusalem drink must now, in turn, be handed to her. Prophecies that Jehovah had spoken by his holy prophets long in advance were now hastening to their fulfillment. The very armies that he had foretold assembled against her from a number of nations. The very man whose name he had announced beforehand he called to head these armies, Cyrus! He put it into his heart to rob the great city of her river defense. He caused the city gates to be left open for the invasion of Cyrus’ troops. He sent a hand to write upon the wall of the banquet hall of King Belshazzar that the number of the days of his kingdom had reached its finish, the balances had found him deficient in weight, and his kingdom was to be divided and shared between the Medes and the Persians. Shortly afterward, the same night in 539 B.C., Belshazzar was killed, the royal dynasty begun by Nebuchadnezzar eighty-six years previously ended, and Jerusalem’s exiles could raise up Isaiah’s proverbial saying against that dynasty:

¹² “O how you have fallen from heaven, you shining one, son of the dawn! How you have been cut down to the earth, you who were disabling the nations! As for you, you have said in your heart, ‘To the heavens I shall go up. Above the stars of God I shall lift up my throne, . . . I shall make myself resemble the Most High.’ However, down to Sheol you will be brought, to the remotest parts of the pit.”—Isa. 14:3-15; Dan. 5:1-31.

13. The Jewish exiles were now in position to say what words to the city of Babylon?

¹³ To the city of Babylon itself the Jewish exiles could now say the prophetic words of Isaiah: “Come down and sit down in the dust, O virgin daughter of Babylon. Sit down on the earth where there is no throne, O daughter of the Chaldeans. . . . Sit down silently and come into the darkness, O daughter of the Chaldeans; for you will not experience again that people call you Mistress of Kingdoms.” The Jewish exiles could at the same time say to her, their former captor: “There is One repurchasing us. Jehovah of armies is his name, the Holy One of Israel.”—Isa. 47:1-5.

14. How were the exiles restored, the temple rebuilt and the walls of Jerusalem put in respectable condition?

¹⁴ Then, as Israel’s Repurchaser, Jehovah roused up the spirit of Babylon’s conqueror, Cyrus the Persian, to publish his decree releasing the Jewish exiles to return to Mount Zion and rebuild Jerusalem and Jehovah’s temple there. Toward the end of Jerusalem’s seventieth year of desolation a faithful remnant of Israelites and thousands of their non-Jewish servants were back in their homeland and located at their former city sites. Jerusalem’s desolation ended, and she woke up from her stupor of affliction, shook herself free from the dust, rose up and sat on a respectable chair as a holy city. On the first day of their seventh lunar month in 537 B.C. an altar was built in the temple area and Jehovah’s worship was renewed. After many years of enemy opposition the rebuilding of the temple was completed, in 516 B.C. Sixty-one years after that the walls of Jerusalem were put in respectable condition, to the further frustration of the enemies who were against Jehovah’s worship and against the Seed of His woman.

15. (a) Although Babylon the city kept declining, how did Babylon the Great continue to flourish? (b) Contrast the reaction by representatives of God’s woman and Babylon the Great to the human birth of the Seed.

¹⁵ Thus Jerusalem (Zion) again wielded religious influence over Jehovah’s worshipers. As regards Babylon, this pagan city ceased to be a world power and kept declining politically and commercially. However, her greater counterpart, Babylon the Great, continued to flourish and to retain her religious kingdom over the Gentile kings and world powers of the earth, including the Medo-Persian, the Grecian and the Roman Empires. She kept on the watch for the promised Seed of Jehovah’s woman to appear. She was willing to serve the interests of the Great Serpent, Satan the Devil, toward bruising the heel of the woman’s Seed. She did not rejoice that night in the autumn of 2 B.C. when the Seed had a human birth from a Jewish virgin in Bethlehem and was called Jesus. Representatives of God’s woman, a multitude of the heavenly angels, did rejoice and joined in “praising God and saying: ‘Glory in the heights above to God, and upon earth peace among men of good will.’” But Babylon the Great did not join in. Instead, she schemed for the death of the child Jesus at the hands of Jerusalem’s non-Jewish ruler, King Herod, an appointee of Rome.

16. How did Jehovah prevent for a time the bruising of the Seed?

¹⁶ While Jesus was being brought up at Bethlehem she sent some of her religious wise men, astrologers from the east, to notify King Herod that the future king of the Jews had been born. Herod, on information from the unsuspecting Jewish priests and scribes, sent the astrologers to Bethlehem, where they found the child, no longer in the stable of his birth, but in a house. (Luke 2:7, 12; Matt. 2:11) Almighty God interfered with their reporting back to Herod and betraying the whereabouts of the Seed of his woman. He had the child Jesus taken down to Egypt for a while and then, after Herod’s death, taken up to Nazareth in the Roman province of Galilee. So Babylon the Great had to wait for a later opportunity to bruise the Seed.

17. How was an apparent victory over the Seed accomplished, with whom rejoicing and whom mourning?

¹⁷ In the year 33 the politically ambitious priests and religious leaders of the faithless Jews lent themselves to the scheme of Babylon the Great. They secretly arrested Jesus Christ, condemned him to death for blasphemy and handed him over to the Roman Governor of Jerusalem with the insistent demand that he be put to death on a torture stake. Finally the governor yielded, and Jesus died at Calvary on the afternoon of the Jewish passover day. As he lay dead and buried, Babylon the Great rejoiced, and the earthly Jerusalem continued to celebrate its passover and the subsequent feast of unleavened cakes. But God’s woman, as represented by a Jewish remnant who faithfully followed her Seed when alive in the flesh on earth, mourned.

18. What reversal of matters occurred on the third day?

¹⁸ But O what a reversal of matters on the third day of his death! His heel wound was completely healed when his heavenly Father, Jehovah God, resurrected him to life in the spirit and God’s woman received her Seed to herself in the heavenly realm. By means of angels and by her Seed himself, who manifested himself as alive from the dead, she communicated her joy to the remnant of his followers. Their mourning turned into boundless joy. During the following forty days he made repeated appearances to the faithful apostles and other disciples. Then he ascended to heaven and presented himself before Jehovah God, who seated his beloved Son at his right hand. God clothed him with immortality, beyond all further personal hurt by the Great Serpent, the Devil.

REMAINING ONES OF HER SEED PERSECUTED

19. At Pentecost what took place, giving heavenly Jerusalem occasion to “cry out joyfully”?

¹⁹ Ten days later came the Jewish Pentecost. Then Jehovah God made his woman further fruitful, for, by pouring out his holy spirit upon the faithful ones on earth, he had his woman begin to bring forth the remaining members of her seed, the joint heirs of Jesus Christ her Principal Seed. Displaying no bondage to religious Babylon the Great but acting on the freedom for which Christ set them free, the spirit-filled disciples began to preach their marvelous message of liberation. The apostle Peter, as the principal spokesman, said to the inquiring Jews: “Let all the house of Israel know for a certainty that God made him both Lord and Christ, this Jesus whom you impaled.” (Acts 2:36) Three thousand of them believed, repented, were baptized and received the “free gift of the holy spirit” and were added to the spiritual seed of God’s woman. How the heavenly Jerusalem could now “cry out joyfully” as a mother of many spiritual children, in fulfillment of Isaiah’s prophecy (Isa 54:1-13)!

20, 21. (a) Thereafter, how did Babylon the Great try to prevent the development of the remainder of the seed of God’s woman? (b) At the destruction of Jerusalem did Babylon the Great have cause to rejoice?

²⁰ Religious Babylon the Great could no longer use her kingdom over the political rulers of the earth to bruise the heel of the Principal Seed of Jehovah’s woman, for he was immortal in heaven at God’s right hand of power. But she could try to prevent the development of the remainder of the seed of God’s woman by persecuting them even to the death. Up to the year 64 (A.D.) she used mainly the faithless Jews in Jerusalem and in the synagogues located elsewhere inside and outside the Roman Empire. Then occurred the accidental burning of old Rome. The remnant on earth of the seed of God’s woman were accused of having done this and were persecuted by the Roman authorities. Six years later came the horrible destruction of earthly Jerusalem, not by any spiritual children on earth of God’s woman, but by the Romans against whose domination the faithless Jews revolted.

²¹ Babylon the Great had no reason to rejoice triumphantly over this destruction of earthly Jerusalem, for the disciples of Jesus had followed his warning and had escaped from the doomed city and continued their worship outside the Roman province of Judah.

22. As regards God’s woman, did she have reason to mourn?

²² As regards God’s woman, the heavenly Jerusalem, she had no reason to mourn as she did in 607 B.C. when the Babylonians destroyed earthly Jerusalem and its temple. Earthly Jerusalem no longer represented her, but she had the remnant of her children, still free, and these together with the glorified Jesus Christ made up a spiritual temple that Babylon the Great could not destroy by destroying earthly, material religious buildings, even the buildings in which the congregation of Christ’s faithful followers held their religious gatherings.

23. Who compose Christ’s Bride, and what is their relationship to God’s woman?

²³ The entire congregation of 144,000 faithful spiritual followers of Christ were to make up a figurative Bride for the Lord Jesus Christ, and God’s woman was assigned to bring forth all these 144,000 successfully as the remainder of her seed that she might thus furnish a Bride for her Principal Seed, Jesus Christ. Thus God’s woman would be as a mother to Christ’s Bride, and the whole congregation as a Bride would be her spiritual daughter.

EXPOSURE OF BABYLON THE GREAT THE ENEMY

24. What revelation from God did John disclose about a Greater Babylon to be contended with?

²⁴ Whether the Christian congregation, the Bride class, discerned it beforehand from an understanding of the ancient Hebrew prophecies concerning Babylon on the Euphrates River or not, before the last one of the twelve apostles of Christ died they were definitely informed that they had a Greater Babylon to contend with. The last-surviving apostle, John, was given a revelation from God that pointed her out and gave her the mysterious name “Babylon the Great, the mother of the harlots and of the disgusting things of the earth.” From the symbolic description of her they knew that this religious international harlot would become “drunk with the blood of the holy ones and with the blood of the witnesses of Jesus.” That meant the blood of members of the Christian congregation of 144,000 disciples, the Bride of Christ. They knew that she would ride a ferocious political system pictured by the scarlet seven-headed, ten-horned beast, and that this beast itself, as a whole, would be an eighth world power, an eighth “king.” In the apostle John’s day the Roman Empire was persecuting Christ’s Bride class

25. How did Christendom come into existence and become a servant of Babylon the Great against the remnant of the seed?

²⁵ In the early fourth century Emperor Constantine became the pagan Roman Pontifex Maximus, and he pretended to become a Christian. He convened the first ecumenical council of religious bishops, not in old Rome, but in Asia Minor, at Nicaea, in 325 (A.D.). With the religious bishops who compromised with him he formed what has been called “the first Christian state.” In this way Christendom came into existence. As a servant of Babylon the Great, Christendom became and still is the worst persecutor of the remnant of the seed of God’s woman, to prevent the completing of the Bride of Christ.

26. (a) Since the breakup of the Roman Empire, has Babylon the Great continued to dominate the world power? (b) What is the scarlet wild beast, and who is its rider?

²⁶ After the Roman Empire, including the so-called Holy Roman Empire, was broken up, Babylon the Great exercised her religious kingdom over the next world power, the seventh, the Anglo-American World Power. After World War I, and at the instigation of the victorious Anglo-American World Power, the Eighth World Power was formed, symbolized by the scarlet, ten-horned, seven-headed wild beast, namely, the League of Nations. Twentieth Century history proves that the League was ridden by the international harlot Babylon the Great; and, by Babylon the Great, the Bible means, not papal Rome or Vatican City, but the world empire of Babylonish religion, all false religions included.

27. When did the scarlet beast go into the abyss, and when and in what form did it climb out and then get what rider?

²⁷ True to the prophecy of Revelation 17:7, 8, and as modern history records, the scarlet beast went into the abyss of helpless inaction in World War II. When in 1945, with the help of the victorious Anglo-American World Power, it climbed out of the abyss, it did so in the form of the United Nations. Immediately Babylon the Great climbed on its back. The last encyclical by the late pope entitled “Peace on Earth” is only one of many available proofs that the world empire of Babylonish religion rides the scarlet beast.

28. (a) How does the rider get unseated from the back of the beast? (b) What judgment from Jehovah descends upon her, and with what result? (c) Before that, what should lovers of clean religion do?

²⁸ But not for long! As the apostle John saw God’s angel hurl a stone the size of a great millstone into the deep sea, John heard him say: “Thus with a swift pitch will Babylon the great city be hurled down, and she will never be found again. Yes, in her was found the blood of prophets and of holy ones and of all those who have been slaughtered on the earth.” That includes, besides the killing of thousands of Jehovah’s Christian witnesses, the blood shed in the two world wars of our century. (Rev. 18:21-24) With a swift pitch she will be unseated from the back of the Eighth World Power. Suddenly, as if “in one day,” Jehovah’s long-due execution of judgment will descend upon her, and her whole religious system will be burned like a great city to the ground. She will be reduced to ruins just as certainly as ancient Babylon was. (Rev. 17:12 to 18:20) By all means, before then let all lovers of clean, true religion detach themselves from that ancient enemy of God’s woman. Save yourselves from being caught in her sudden destruction!

29. (a) Besides the woman enemy, who else meet their doom? (b) Demon influences are gathering them to what place? (c) Who finally gets the Seed’s attention?

²⁹ What a victory that destruction will be for God’s woman over her ancient enemy! But matters will not stop there. Shortly afterward those political powers over whom Babylon the Great exercised a religious kingdom or with whom she committed religious fornication will all meet their doom. Even now demon influences are gathering them to the battlefield of Har–Magedon in a challenge to the universal rule of God’s kingdom by his Messiah, the Principal Seed of God’s woman. There her Seed, with all his heavenly armies, will attack those enemy forces and destroy them, proving himself to be King of kings and Lord of lords. Then the devilish Bruiser of the heel of the Seed of God’s woman will get attention and be bound and hurled with his demons into the abyss and imprisoned. Thus at last the Seed of God’s woman will bruise the Serpent’s head.

30. Why will God’s woman have further cause for joy?

³⁰ After that triumphant hour God’s woman will have still further joy. The marriage of her Principal Seed to the Bride class, her figurative daughter, will be fully consummated. The heavenly Father, Jehovah God, will rejoice with his woman, his universal heavenly organization. On earth a “great crowd,” whose final number is not yet known to us, will be survivors of the universal war of Har–Magedon and will rejoice at the union of the Bridegroom and his faithful virgin Bride. Just as God’s woman was symbolized by a city, so the Bride organization of 144,000 members will be like a holy heavenly city, a New Jerusalem. Figuratively speaking, glorious new heavens will reign over a righteous new earth.—Rev. 21:1-21.

31. What benefits will flow from the throne of God to appreciative men and women on earth?

³¹ Through the heavenly New Jerusalem there will flow forth from the throne of God and of his Lamblike Son Jesus Christ a river of water of life with also trees of life on each side, that all appreciative men and women on earth may partake of these provisions for everlasting life. Even the dead whom God remembers will be resurrected and have the blessed opportunity to partake of those life-giving provisions. Paradise will overspread all the earth. Death inherited from Adam and Eve will be no more. Forever the righteous new earth will ring with praises to Jehovah God for giving victory through Christ to God’s woman over all her ancient enemies.

[Picture on page 722]

King Belshazzar dies at the hands of the Medes and the Persians in 539 B.C.

Church Failure as Seen by Her Leaders

FAILURE IN THE CITIES

“The most compelling mission of the Church today,” says clergyman G. Paul Musselman in the Saturday Evening Post of November 18, 1961, “is not in the far-off, least civilized corners of the globe. The biggest task lies right at the heart of urban civilization, in the tall towers and asphalt jungles of our cities. That is where the Church has failed. It is a failure that is told in terms of dwindling congregations and closed church buildings—and an increasing inability of the Church to enter the lives of those who desperately need something of the spirit to give meaning to our materialistic civilization. . . . In the past fifteen years or so New York City has lost more than 300 churches, Chicago 150, Cleveland 72, and Detroit 63. . . . Church leaders are taking a new look at expensive church buildings in which clublike congregations sometimes ignore the world outside and slowly hug themselves to death in huge structures they no longer can support. . . . Perhaps Protestantism must lose a few more status symbols before it remembers that its destiny is not to be a custodian of property but to be the creator of a Christian culture.”

TOO CONCERNED OVER RESPECTABILITY

The New York clergyman Harold A. Bosley was reported by the Miami Herald of July 19, 1962, as saying: “This nation’s churches have become so fearful of saying the wrong thing that they simply say nothing. We are so respectable we are afraid of our own shadow. . . . American churches used to be the moral custodians of the community and would cross swords with anybody, but today they have timidly forsaken that role.” Along this same line Cynthia Clark Wedel, a vice-president of the National Council of Churches, said, as reported by the Houston Post of October 1, 1961: “Too many churches reflect an image compounded almost entirely of sweetness and light. We are afraid that if the Church becomes involved in anything controversial, it will cease to be popular—people might leave or not want to come in.”

“PLATITUDES AND FIDDLE-FADDLE”

As quoted in the Press-Enterprise of Riverside, California, in its issue of September 30, 1962, clergyman Henry J. Stokes is reported as saying: “Our current unrest and upheaval in every realm; the growing view by the observing world that the church is irrelevant with its platitudes and fiddle-faddle of much activism; and the realization that human relations in whose welfare Christ is vitally concerned have unmasked our shallow spiritual grasp of the true witness. These and other thorny affairs make the requirements of preaching an almost impossible assignment. In it all, the preacher cannot please God and man. Often he pleases neither.”

AVOIDING ITS RESPONSIBILITIES

Anglican clergyman A. Gordon Baker is reported by the Toronto Daily Star of April 2, 1962, as saying: “The Church has been sidestepping its responsibilities for centuries. . . . Christianity has become as vacuum-packed as the coffee on the shelves of today’s supermarkets. Surely Jesus Christ did not endow a church with his presence in order to establish a comfortable and secure private club.”

Pergamum—“Where the Throne of Satan Is”

THE opening chapters of the Bible book of Revelation contain seven messages that were sent to as many congregations in Asia Minor. Included in what the apostle John wrote to the congregation at Pergamum was the following: “I know where you are dwelling, that is, where the throne of Satan is; and yet you keep on holding fast my name, and you did not deny your faith in me even in the days of Antipas, my witness, the faithful one, who was killed by your side, where Satan is dwelling.”—Rev. 2:12, 13.

Just where was this city of Pergamum? What is its history? What distinguished it from other cities? Why was it described as “where the throne of Satan is” and “where Satan is dwelling”?

All seven congregations to whom John wrote were situated in what was then known as the Roman province of Asia, but today forms the western part of Asiatic Turkey. Pergamum was the most northerly as well as the most westerly of these cities, being some fifty miles north of Smyrna and less than fifteen miles inland from the Aegean Sea. Today the Moslem city of Bergama lies just below the ancient site of Pergamum.

Pergamum rested largely upon a steep hill that stood between two branches of the Caicus River. This hill rose suddenly to a height of a thousand feet and, except for its southern slope, was extremely difficult of access. The city was well named Pergamum (Pergamon, Pergamus) for the name came from a root meaning “tower” or “fortress,” which root is also related to the German word burgh.

It was an ideal location for a fortress as well as a capital city, for it commanded the surrounding territory for many miles. No wonder that when Alexander the Great set out on his eastern campaign he sent Barsine and her son, the illegitimate Herakles (Hercules), to Pergamum for safekeeping And no wonder that some years later Lysimachus, one of the generals among whom Alexander’s empire was divided after his death, chose Pergamum for the safekeeping of so much of his treasure: 9,000 talents or about $10 million.¹

ITS HISTORY

The history of Pergamum does not go back far; it appears to have been a newcomer among the cities of Asia Minor. Archaeologists have dug up artifacts going back to about the eighth century B.C.² Pergamum first appears in written history in 399 B.C., when Xenophon and his 6,000 mercenaries, the remnant of the famed retreating “Ten Thousand,” occupied the city. For some fifty years thereafter it was part of a Persian satrapy, after which its ruler declared its independence, which it enjoyed until the time of Alexander. After Alexander’s death it became part of the territory that fell to Lysimachus in the year 301 B.C.³

The treasure that Lysimachus left in Pergamum he put in charge of a trusted lieutenant, one Philetaerus, a eunuch. There are a number of versions as to just how he became ruler of Pergamum and its surrounding country; suffice it to say that he was able to take advantage of the troublous times and the wealth put in his safekeeping and proved himself a sagacious and discreet ruler in both internal and external affairs. He thereby established the dynasty of the Attalids and set the pattern for those who followed him. His rule marked the beginning of the rise of the star of Pergamum.

After a rule of twenty years he was succeeded by a son of his brother who, after ruling for about a like period of time, was in turn succeeded by Attalus I in 241 B.C. He became noted for his great wealth and in particular for freeing Pergamum from the burden of paying tribute to the raiding Gauls by defeating them in battle, after which he proclaimed himself king. When he died in 197 B.C., his son Eumenes II took the throne, under whom Pergamum became one of the greatest kingdoms of the East and reached its heights in magnificence, in size, in prosperity and in art, literature and science. And, it might be added, as a mecca of pagan religion. When Eumenes II died in 159 B.C. he left the kingdom to his brother Attalus II as his own son was but a child, and which brother took the name Philadelphus, or “lover of brother.”⁴

When Philadelphus or Attalus II died in 138 B.C., the son of Eumenes II, namely, Attalus III, became ruler. Historians differ as to why his brief rule was marked with so much bloodshed, even as they differ as to why he willed Pergamum to Rome, upon his death, which occurred in 133 B.C. Some say that suspicions regarding the sudden death of his mother, whom he had loved so much as to take the title Philometor, “lover of mother,” and that of his wife caused him to embark on an orgy of murder, only later to be regretted, whereas others list among his crimes the murder of his mother. Thus some term his willing of Pergamum to Rome a most judicious act in view of Rome’s liberal policies, whereas others say it is inexplicable except as the act of a madman. An illegitimate brother successfully challenged Rome, but only for a short time, and in 130 B.C. the kingdom of Pergamum became a Roman province.⁴

CHARACTERISTICS OF PERGAMUM AND ITS RULERS

Pergamum enjoyed independence for 150 years, and the members of its dynasty stood in striking contrast to those of others all around it. Instead of scheming one another’s death, as was the order of the day, they manifested family affection. Thus history records the time when Eumenes II was waylaid by assassins while on a journey and was left unconscious. Report got out, even to Rome, that he had been killed; and so his brother took the reins of government and married the wife of Eumenes II. But Eumenes II recovered and proceeded to return to Pergamum. Hearing of this, his brother at once divested himself of his royal robes and went out to meet his brother. Eumenes II, meeting his brother and his wife, embraced them and whispered into the ear of his brother: “Do not be in a hurry for my wife until you are sure I am dead.” And it is said that this was the only notice he ever took of the matter, treating them ever after with undiminished affection.⁵ Thus in his testament he not only willed the kingdom to his brother, but willed that his brother Attalus II should rule in fact as king, until his death, and only then should his own son become ruler. He even requested that his widow become the wife of his brother so that there would be no question as to his authority and right, this being the same woman his brother had temporarily as wife when he thought Eumenes had been killed.

Concerning Pergamum one authority states:

“If the kings of Pergamum were able patiently to build up a rich and flourishing kingdom, to make this kingdom famous in Greece, to protect it against attacks of their neighbors, both Greeks and barbarians, and to appear as patrons of learning and art, they owed it to their own skill, to their sound economic policy and unceasing efforts to develop the natural resources of their territory.”⁶

In Pergamum were invented the elegant hangings called tapestry. It also was famed for its gold-woven clothes, the vestes Attilae, its pottery and its precious ointments. Its rulers were interested even in cattle breeding, horticulture and other aspects of scientific farming. And they were literary men of such a fondness for books that only Alexandria had a library larger than that at Pergamum. It is said that Ptolemy (V-?) of Egypt became so apprehensive lest his library at Alexandria be eclipsed by that of Pergamum that he put an embargo on papyrus, on which Egypt had a monopoly. But this proved to be a blessing to Pergamum, for one of its citizens invented parchment (which got its name from Pergamum), a far superior writing material. When Pergamum was a Roman province, Cleopatra prevailed on Mark Antony to replenish her Alexandrian library with books from the library at Pergamum, which he did, to the extent of 200,000 scrolls.⁷

Pergamum is also famed for its sculpture. Chief among the many treasures dug up from its ruins is the gigantic frieze, 150 yards in length, that was a part of its Great Altar to Zeus and depicted a battle between gods and giants. Concerning it we are told:

“This enormous frieze . . . cannot fail to impress visitors by the size of its figures, the energy of the action, and the strong vein of sentiment which pervades the whole, giving it a certain air of modernity. . . . The giants are strange compounds, having heads and bodies of wild and fierce barbarians, sometimes also human legs, but sometimes in the place of legs two long serpents, the heads of which take with the giants themselves a share in the battle . . . The gods are obviously inferior in physical force, indeed a large proportion of the divine combatants are goddesses. Yet everywhere the giants are overthrown, writhing in pain on the ground, . . . everywhere the gods are victorious, yet in victory retain much of their divine calm.”⁸a

RELIGION IN PERGAMUM

Aside from their politics, the rulers of Pergamum were ardent Grecophils or lovers of things Greek. Especially was this true regarding its pagan worship, of which it was a veritable citadel. Athena, goddess of poetry and learning, came first in worship. Second only to her was the chief of Greek gods, Zeus. Prominent also were Dionysus, god of wine, and Aphrodite, goddess of sensual pleasure. Having a fame of his own was Aesculapius as the god of healing. From the large school in connection with his cult came Galen, the “father of medicine.” Other deities worshiped in Pergamum were Apollo, the ancient Ceibiri, Demeter, Eros, Herakles, Hermes, Poseidon, as well as a host of minor ones.⁹

In addition to lavish temples and beautiful groves dedicated to such gods was the Great Altar to Zeus Soter. Made of marble, it was more than a hundred feet square and nearly fifty feet high. It had a huge staircase and colonnades on three sides. Ornamenting it was the gigantic frieze previously mentioned. Found in the Berlin Museum today, it has been termed the “most impressive monument of sculpture produced by ancient Europeans.”¹⁰

Another striking feature of pagan worship in Pergamum was its worship of political rulers. They did not believe in democracy but did more or less rule as benign autocrats. They were credited with divine descent and worship from the beginning. Attalus I, because of freeing his people from the threat and yoke of the Gauls or Galatians, was hailed as “King Attalus the Savior.” It is not surprising therefore that Pergamum should be the first provincial city to erect a temple for the worship of the Roman emperor. It erected its first, to emperor Augustus, in A.D. 29, its second in the time of Trajan (A.D. 98-117), and its third in the days of Severus,¹¹ who ruled A.D. 193-211.

“WHERE THE THRONE OF SATAN IS”

Why did John refer to Pergamum as “where the throne of Satan is”?b Some have said that this was because Pergamum was the halfway house or bridge between the religion of ancient Babylon and that of Rome. True, as one historian says: “The defeated Chaldeans fled to Asia Minor and fixed their central college at Pergamos”; referring to their defeat in 539 B.C. However, by the time John had his vision recorded in the book of Revelation, A.D. 96, the seat of “Babylon the Great,” or the world empire of false religion, had been removed to Rome.—Rev. 14:8.¹²

Others hold that these words apply to Pergamum because it was one of the centers of the worship of Aesculapius, which god of healing had as his symbol a serpent. But merely this symbol would hardly be sufficient to entitle this religion the distinction of Satan’s seat; besides, there is no evidence that it represented a threat to the early Christians.

Still others apply John’s words to the Great Altar to Zeus Soter for which Pergamum was famous. True, this altar was outstanding due to its immense size, but it does not seem reasonable to conclude that merely that fact would determine where Satan’s throne is. When we consider that Satan is termed the invisible “god of this system of things,” it is apparent that his throne would be something more than a mere pile of stones.—2 Cor. 4:4; Matt. 4:8-10.

Rather, what seems to be the most reasonable explanation of John’s words is that what made them apply to Pergamum was its temple and cult of the worship of the emperor. Certainly this form of worship presented a serious threat to the early Christians; many were the martyrs it caused because Christians kept integrity and refused to compromise. Since Revelation 2:13 mentions Satan’s throne in the same breath with the martyrdom of Antipas, it is reasonable to conclude that the two have an association, and this they would have if Satan’s throne referred to the worship of the emperor or the State.

Perhaps an even more powerful reason for so interpreting John’s words is the fact that the book of Revelation was written for the benefit of not solely those living in John’s day but even more so those in our day; and today the worship of the emperor in the giving of religious adoration to the State has again manifested itself on every hand. It was seen in Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy, and is being seen in all Communist and other totalitarian lands and even in some claiming to be democracies. The words at Revelation 2:13 are indeed encouraging to all who suffer today for taking a firm stand as did Antipas in the first century.

REFERENCES

¹ Encyclopædia Britannica, 9th Edition, Vol. 18, p. 538.

² The Attalids of Pergamum—Hansen, p. 10.

³ Pergamos (German)—T. L. Ussing. pp. 3, 4.

⁴ The Standard History of the World, Vol. 3, pp. 1049-51.

⁵ Universal History—Goodrich, pp. 263, 264.

⁶ The Cambridge Ancient History, Vol. 8, p. 608.

⁷ Encyclopedia Americana, Vol. 17, p. 319.

⁸ Encyclopædia Britannica, 1959 Edition, Vol. 10, p. 818.

⁹ Die Kulte und Heiligtümer der Götter in Pergamum—Ohlenmutz.

¹⁰ Harper’s Bible Dictionary, p. 538.

¹¹ The Bible and Archaeology—J. A. Thompson, pp. 414-417.

¹² “Babylon the Great Has Fallen!” God’s Kingdom Rules!, pp. 331-333.

[Footnotes]

The Gift of Immortality

THE greatest gift a mortal man could be given is that of immortality. It would mean for him deathlessness, independence from any created thing for his existence and the impossibility for him to waste away and decay. Being made of flesh that does waste away and that needs outside energy to keep it alive, man is corruptible. He is not born with immortality, as some persons imagine.

If every man possessed an immortal soul that perpetuated forever his conscious existence, why would God hold out immortality as a reward to Christians for faithfulness? Why would his Word speak of incorruptibleness as something to be sought? Would God tell men to seek what they already have? The Bible says: “He will render to each one according to his works: everlasting life to those who are seeking glory and honor and incorruptibleness by endurance in work that is good.” (Rom. 2:6, 7) Because man is corruptible and his body wastes away with the passing of time, the gift of immortality is something to be highly prized.

Many thousands of years passed after the creation of the first man before the Creator, Jehovah, rewarded one of his creatures with immortality. Until then, he alone possessed it, being incorruptible, indestructible and imperishable. That One was the first of his created sons who, while on earth as a perfect man, was known as Jesus Christ. The Scriptures speak of him as “the first-born of all creation.” (Col. 1:15) On the third day following his violent death on a torture stake Jehovah raised him from the dead, not as a corruptible human whose body can waste away, but as an immortal spirit creature. Regarding this the apostle Peter wrote: “For Christ himself died once for all, for sin, an upright man for unrighteous men, to bring us to God, and was physically put to death, but he was made alive in the spirit.”—1 Pet. 3:18, AT.

Being the first of Jehovah’s creatures to receive immortality, he was, at the time the apostle Paul wrote to Timothy, the only creature possessing it. As an immortal spirit, he now dwells in a glory that is unapproachable by man. No man could endure to see it just as no man can endure to see with unprotected eyes the intensely bright fireball of a hydrogen-bomb blast.

Speaking of this only rightful Potentate who has been anointed by God as King, Paul states: “This manifestation the happy and only Potentate will show in its own appointed times, he the King of those who rule as kings and Lord of those who rule as lords, the one alone having immortality, who dwells in unapproachable light, whom not one of men has seen or can see.”—1 Tim. 6:15, 16.

That some of Jesus’ faithful followers would also be given the gift of immortality is made clear in the Scriptures. The apostle John wrote: “Beloved ones, now we are children of God, but as yet it has not been made manifest what we shall be. We do know that whenever he is made manifest we shall be like him, because we shall see him just as he is.” (1 John 3:2) It has not been possible for these followers of Jesus to visualize what they will look like when they become immortal spirit creatures like the resurrected Christ. The physical eye cannot register the appearance of spirit creatures. Their glory is beyond the range of visible light as well as other radiations in the electromagnetic spectrum.

How these faithful followers will receive immortality will be by the same means Jesus received it. They must first die and then be resurrected as spirit creatures. The apostle Paul speaks of this in his letter to the Corinthians. “So also is the resurrection of the dead. It is sown in corruption, it is raised up in incorruption. It is sown a physical body, it is raised up a spiritual body. For this which is corruptible must put on incorruption, and this which is mortal must put on immortality.”—1 Cor. 15:42, 44, 53.

What Paul said about the gift of immortality was directed, not to the world of mankind, but to the members of Christ’s congregation who had been anointed with holy spirit to be kings with him. “If we go on enduring, we shall also rule together as kings.” (2 Tim. 2:12) As would reasonably be expected, this kingly group is limited in size. Not all who exercise faith in Jehovah and in Jesus Christ are divinely chosen to be members of it, and therefore only a comparatively small number are resurrected to spirit life, as Paul describes, and given the gift of immortality.

The vast majority of faithful Christians can look forward to being earthly subjects of that heavenly body of kings. They are the meek who will “possess the earth.” (Ps. 37:11) Their reward for maintaining integrity to Jehovah will be, not the gift of immortality, but the gift of eternal life in human perfection. They will receive what the first man Adam could have had if he had been obedient.

Although they will enjoy human perfection, they will still be corruptible because they will still be made of flesh that is capable of decaying or of being destroyed by another creature. They will have the power to live indefinitely, but for them to continue living they will have to keep their bodies supplied with food and water. Without these necessities they would waste away. Such is not the case with the few who are made incorruptible by being given the gift of immortality. Their continued existence is not dependent upon outside sources of energy. God has given them the power to be self-sustaining, just as he is. This is one of the factors that contributes to their being superior to the angels. Their superiority is revealed by Paul’s statement to them: “Do you not know that we shall judge angels?”—1 Cor. 6:3.

The angels have the power of an indefinite life, but their life force is not self-sustaining and indestructible. Immortality was never given to them. This is evident from the fact that the resurrected Jesus was the only one of Jehovah’s creatures who possessed it in the days of the apostle Paul, although angels had been living for a very long time before then.

For the chosen few who receive the gift of immortality, death loses its sting forever. They are made eternally free from its power. “Then the saying will take place that is written: ‘Death is swallowed up forever.’ ‘Death, where is your victory? Death, where is your sting?’” (1 Cor. 15:54, 55) As these receive the marvelous gift of immortality, faithful Christians not of this select group are assured that Jehovah will keep his promise to give eternal life to everyone exercising faith in him and his Son.—John 3:16.

Never Failing Our God in This Time of the End

THE Creator, Jehovah God, needs no one. He is wholly self-contained. He existed alone throughout a past eternity without ever feeling lonely, without feeling the need of anyone.

However, in his wisdom and love he saw fit at one point in that past eternity to begin to create creatures, the first of these being his only-begotten Son, the Word, the one later known as Jesus Christ. When Jehovah God and his Son made man they made him in their image, endowing him with certain attributes and faculties and giving him the freedom of choice, to do right, to obey and live or to do wrong, to disobey, and die. But regardless of what man would do, God would remain faithful, for he cannot deny himself.—2 Tim. 2:13.a

God’s purpose for Adam and Eve was that they should increase in number, subdue the earth and exercise dominion over the lower animals. (Gen. 1:28) As a test of their appreciation and worthiness God placed a restriction upon them; they were not to eat of the fruit of a certain tree. (Gen. 2:17) So long as Adam and Eve obeyed God’s laws they brought pleasure to him, even as we read: “A wise son is the one that makes a father rejoice.”—Prov. 10:1.

But when Adam and Eve rebelled they no longer brought God pleasure and joy and so he divorced them from his righteous organization of creatures and drove them out of the garden of Eden to die while eking out a meager existence from a cursed earth that brought forth thorns and thistles. (Gen. 3:19) However, Jehovah God was not frustrated or made helpless because Adam and Eve had failed him. He, being the universal Almighty Sovereign, will have his purpose regarding the earth and humankind carried out in spite of what any creatures may or may not do.—Isa. 55:11.

Since Adam’s day many other creatures have failed God. There was Esau who despised his birthright, showing himself to be a person not appreciating sacred things. (Heb. 12:16) Among other notable ones that failed Jehovah were Cain, Achan, King Saul and King Solomon. In fact, the entire nation of Israel, with but few exceptions, failed Jehovah at the time he sent his Son to earth. And then there was Judas Iscariot who so miserably failed God after having been an intimate companion of God’s Son for some three years. All these had privileges of serving God and all failed God because of their unfaithfulness. All shrank back for one reason or another so that God could no longer take pleasure in them.—Heb. 10:38, 39.

However, during all this time Jehovah God has had creatures, both spirit and human, that have not failed him. Included among these are his first-begotten Son, Jesus Christ, Abel, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Moses, David and many others such as the faithful apostles. All these remained faithful and so brought pleasure to God, giving him an answer that he could make to the one taunting him, the Devil, Satan.—Prov. 27:11.

We who are living in this time of the end of this old world, as is apparent from the fulfillment of Bible prophecy—whom will we imitate? Those who failed God or those who proved faithful? Today God has a people that are proving faithful to him, carrying out his purposes, even as he foretold. (Isa. 43:10-12) This people he has enlightened by a knowledge of him and his purposes; he has put his spirit upon them and ordained them to be his witnesses. Will we individually keep integrity by right conduct, by never compromising, by keeping steadfast in the ministry, and so be among the faithful ones that never shrink back, that never fail God?

In order never to be failing our God in the time of the end we must guard against any tendency to shrink back. This shrinking back can begin very subtly, almost imperceptibly, as when we refuse to make progress, as when we shrink from taking a forward step, as when we turn down added privileges in the Christian ministry.

What will aid us to keep from shrinking back? There are many aids of which we can avail ourselves. One of these is the regular study of God’s Word with the helps he has provided, for his Word is “beneficial for teaching, for reproving, for setting things straight, for disciplining in righteousness.” (2 Tim. 3:16, 17) Another great aid is prayer, talking to God. Still another aid is the weekly gathering of ourselves together at our Kingdom Halls and neighborhood Bible studies, where we can incite one another to love and fine works. Nor would we overlook the strength that comes from zealous activity in the ministry. By taking advantage of all such aids we shall be able to resist any tendency to shrink back and thus keep from failing our God in this time of the end.

[Footnotes]

Questions From Readers

● Would you please explain Psalm 78:24, 25? Does this indicate that angels need some type of nourishment to continue living?—D. H., United States.

Psalm 78:24, 25 in the King James Version says that the Israelites ate “angels’ food” in the wilderness. We read: “And had rained down manna upon them to eat, and had given them of the corn of heaven. Man did eat angels’ food: he sent them meat to the full.” Interestingly, The Newberry Study Bible, edited by Thomas Newberry and based on the King James Version, says in a marginal note pertaining to the expression “Man did eat angels’ food”: “ish or Everyone did eat the bread of mighty ones, Heb. lehhem abbirim.” Now note the rendering of these verses in the New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures: “And he kept raining upon them manna to eat, and the grain of heaven he gave to them. Men ate the very bread of powerful ones; provisions he sent them to satisfaction.”

Yes, the Israelites, though they were mere men, ate “the very bread of powerful ones.” And this expression has reference to the manna they ate in the wilderness. Well, then, was the manna really the food of angels given by God to man? The manna did, as it were, descend from heaven, because it appeared upon the ground by the operation of God’s spirit from heaven. However, this was not any kind of bread that angels eat, nor have we any Scriptural proof that the angels in heaven eat anything.

So, when Psalm 78:24 and 25 shows that in eating manna the Israelites “ate the very bread of powerful ones,” what is meant? Simply that they subsisted on food from a powerful spiritual source, supplied by reason of the operation of Jehovah’s spirit or active force. Hence, they were eating food that was divinely provided.

● Since the Logos, the prehuman Jesus, was not among the angels used by Jehovah to transmit the law of God to Moses, how is Exodus 23:20-23, which speaks of an angel with the name of Jehovah within him, to be understood?—A. M., United States.

That the Logos, the Son of God, was not among the angels used by God at the time he transmitted his law to Moses is clear from the words of Paul at Hebrews 2:2, 3: “If the word spoken through angels proved to be firm, and every transgression and disobedient act received a retribution in harmony with justice; how shall we escape if we have neglected a salvation of such greatness in that it began to be spoken through our Lord and was verified for us by those who heard him?” It therefore follows that the angels were used at that time and that the Son of God, the prehuman Jesus, was not.

However, this does not rule out the possibility of the Logos’ having been used in some special capacity in God’s dealing with Israel. Exodus 23:20-23 says: “Here I am sending an angel ahead of you to keep you on the road and to bring you into the place that I have prepared. Watch yourself because of him and obey his voice. Do not behave rebelliously against him, for he will not pardon your transgression; because my name is within him. However, if you strictly obey his voice and really do all that I shall speak, then I shall certainly be hostile to your enemies and harass those who harass you. For my angel will go ahead of you.” It is reasonable to conclude that this angel of whom Jehovah says “my name is within him” was Jesus Christ in his prehuman spirit form. (1 Cor. 10:1-4) Jesus, whose name means “Jehovah is salvation,” is the chief one to uphold and vindicate his Father’s glorious name.

The angel with God’s name within him is not spoken of as giving Israel its code of laws but, rather, as guiding the Israelites on the way to the Promised Land. Thus the words of Paul at Hebrews 2:2, 3 do not rule out the strong likelihood that the angel of Exodus 23:20-23 was Jesus Christ in his prehuman spirit form.

Then I came to be beside him as a master worker, and I came to be the one he was specially fond of day by day, I being glad before him all the time, being glad at the productive land of his earth, and the things I was fond of were with the sons of men.—Prov. 8:30, 31.

Announcements

FIELD MINISTRY

Servants of Jehovah must be faithful and dependable during this “time of the end” of Satan’s wicked system of things. In December Jehovah’s witnesses will continue to prove their faithfulness to God by sharing fully in the ministry, offering to all persons the New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures, and a Bible-study booklet, on a contribution of $1.

CONVENTION REPORT

You will be glad to know that the complete Report on “Everlasting Good News” Assembly of Jehovah’s Witnesses is now ready. After setting out the high points of the entire eight-day program in New York’s Yankee Stadium, it relates interesting experiences and outstanding events in connection with each of the assemblies held around the world. From the assembly’s starting point in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, it takes you to New York, then on to Europe, over to Palestine, on to the Far East, and around to the finale of this grand Around-the-World Assembly ten weeks later in the Rose Bowl at Pasadena, California. Bound with this fascinating 192-page report, which is liberally interspersed with pictures, are 32 additional pages of pictures on fine glossy paper showing some of the most interesting things seen by those who traveled with the assembly all the way around the world. You may have as many copies as you can use, for 35 cents each.

IS THE BIBLE A CLOSED BOOK TO YOU?

The Holy Bible is the best seller of all times. Though universally acknowledged as the Book of Books—already distributed in over two billion copies in 1,200 languages—yet it is still a closed book to many! Archaic, outdated language and stiff, obscure translation have long combined to discourage most persons from Bible reading. Now, the New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures, a new modern translation in our everyday speech, opens up the Book of books to you and your family. Send for your copy today and receive free a 32-page booklet on a timely Bible subject. Send only $1. Reading this translation will be a new experience for you.

“WATCHTOWER” STUDIES FOR THE WEEKS

January 5: Victory for God’s Woman over Her Ancient Enemy, ¶1-29. Page 712.

January 12: Victory for God’s Woman over Her Ancient Enemy, Part Two, ¶1-31. Page 719.