Secrets Unsealed

ANCHOR School of Theology

Stephen Bohr

1. Principles for the Study of Bible Prophecy- Part 1

2. Principles for the Study of Bible Prophecy- Part 2

3. Principles for the Study of Bible Prophecy- Part 3

4. Notes on Daniel 2

5. The Importance of the Historical Flow Method- Part 1

6. The Importance of the Historical Flow Method- Part 2

7. Christ is the Center of Bible Prophecy Part 1

8. Christ is the Center of Bible Prophecy Part 2

9. A Providential Election

10. The Sabbath and Redemption

11. The Son (God) and the number 666

12. Who’s Hero Is Jesus Christ?

13. What Was Literal & Local is Spiritual & Global

14. The Flood Story As An Illustration of Historical Typology

15. The Year-Day Principle

16. God’s Israel: Understood Globally and Spiritually

17. Israel and the Fig Tree Part 1

18. Israel and the Fig Tree Part 2

19. The Stoning of Steven.. The Last Straw

20. How to Interpret Biblical Symbolism Part 1

21. How to Interpret Biblical Symbolism Part 2

22. The Sanctuary Sequence in the Book of Revelation

23. Daniel’s Little Sealed Book

24. Revelation 10

25. The Importance of Literary Structure in the Study of the Millennium Part 1

26. The Importance of Literary Structure in the Study of the Millennium Part 2

27. Revelation 12-22

28. How All the Books of the Bible Meet and End in Revelation

29. Learn how to use the writings of Ellen G. White- Part 1

30. Learn how to use the writings of Ellen G. White- Part 2

Welcome to the last session of Anchor Bible School.

It's good to see you all nice and dressed up and we have an exciting study in the next several minutes, but we want to have a word of prayer to ask for God's guidance first of all and so let's just bow our heads for a word of prayer.

Father in heaven we thank you for the privilege of being here this afternoon, we thank you because we're able to study this magnificent prophecy of Daniel 11 40 to 45, we ask for the guidance of your Holy Spirit that you might give us understanding of this complex passage and we thank you for hearing our prayer we ask it in Jesus name Amen.

Now basically we're discussing how we can discover Ellen White's comments on any given text or passage without her quoting it or even alluding to the language.

Daniel 11 is a good example of how to do it.

So we're going to follow the material that you have before you line by line, precept by precept, here a little, there a little, and hopefully we'll be able to cover it within the time constraints that we have.

There is a passage in the book of Daniel which has always been a subject of lively discussion among Seventh-day Adventist theologians, and that passage is Daniel 11 40 to 45.

Until recently most of the Adventist scholars agreed that the King of the North represents the papacy and the King of the South represents atheism or secularism, but now a new view has appeared on the horizon that sees radical Islam as playing a significant role in the fulfillment of this specific prophecy.

Those who have embraced this view have concluded that the events of 9-11 and the war against Al-Qaeda are so significant that they must be contemplated somewhere in Bible prophecy.

This has sparked a new interest in the study of the fifth and sixth trumpets in conjunction with Daniel 11 verses 40 to 45.

Now usually Ellen White has provided invaluable guidance in the interpretation of difficult prophetic passages, but unlike other passages in the book of Daniel Ellen White seems to be silent on these specific verses especially verses 40 to 45.

Nowhere to my knowledge does she ever quote verses 40 to 45, nor does she echo the terminology that is used in these verses.

This seeming silence has provided individuals with the idea that Ellen White had nothing to say about these specific verses.

We therefore ask, Did Ellen White have anything to say about the meaning of these verses, or does her apparent silence indicate that their meaning would remain a mystery until long after her death?

In this article or this study we will seek to answer this question.

Now let's discuss first of all Ellen White's use of Daniel 11.

To my knowledge there are only 3 primary LNG White references to Daniel 11 except for 1 that is found in the little booklet A Word to the Little Flock Scattered Abroad to which I'm going to make reference later in this study.

1 of these 3 primary references is general in nature and indirect, excuse me, 1 is indirect, the other is general, and the other is quite specific.

Only in the specific reference once in her writings does Ellen White actually quote any verses from the chapter, and those verses that she quotes are verses 30 to 36.

Unfortunately as stated before she never quotes nor does she even allude to the language of verses 40 to 45, So it would seem well nigh impossible to discover how Ellen White understood these verses.

Now let's take a look at these 3 specific quotations.

As I mentioned 1 of them is indirect, another 1 is very general, and the third is more specific and she actually quotes verses in that 1.

The first quotation is indirect because she does not specifically mention Daniel 11 but only alludes to it and I'm going to show you in what sense she alludes to Daniel 11 without actually mentioning Daniel 11.

In 1896 Ellen White wrote the following words The light that Daniel received from God was given especially for these last days.

The visions he saw by the banks of the Uli, and I put in brackets there Daniel 8 verse 2, in other words Daniel 8 was given next to the Uli, and the Hydekel, The vision that was given by the Heidekel was Daniel 10 verse 4 and chapter 11.

The great rivers of Shinar are now in process of fulfillment, and all the events foretold will soon come to pass.

Now the second quotation is found in Testimonies Volume 9 and it was written in 1909, And if you're going to the next page we find the quotation there.

The world is stirred with the spirit of war.

The prophecy of the 11th chapter of Daniel has nearly reached its complete fulfillment.

Soon the scenes of trouble spoken of in the prophecies will take place.

So in 1896 she wrote that the visions that Daniel received by the Uli, that's Daniel 8, and the Heidekel Daniel 10 through Chapter 11, the great rivers of Shinar were in the process of fulfillment, and she says the events would soon come to pass.

And in the second statement she actually mentions the 11th of Daniel but she doesn't quote any verses and she says that has nearly reached its complete fulfillment.

Now there's another quotation and this 1 was written in 1904, It is the only quotation where Ellen White actually quotes verses from Daniel 11.

As I mentioned before she quotes verses 30 to 36 and now I read that specific statement found in manuscript releases volume 13 page 394 She says.

The prophecy in the 11th of Daniel has nearly reached its complete fulfillment.

Much of the history that has taken place in the fulfillment of this prophecy will be repeated.

In the 30th verse a power is spoken of that shall be grieved and return, and have indignation against the holy covenant.

So shall he do, he shall even return, and have intelligence with them that forsake the holy covenant.

And then she quotes verses 31 to 36 and she ends by saying, scenes similar to those described in these words will take place.

Those are the only 3 quotations from the writings of Ellen White where she either alludes to Daniel 11, refers in general terms to Daniel 11 and actually quotes verses from Daniel 11.

Now we need to analyze these statements to find out what we can glean from them what information is valuable in determining her concept of Daniel 11.

Now let's examine first of all the quotation from Testimonies to Ministers page 112, the first 1 that was written in 1896.

This statement has 2 key items of information.

First, the prophecies of Daniel 8 and 11 run concurrently and are parallel.

The prophecy by the Uli was the 1 given in Chapter 8 and the 1 by the Heidekel was the 1 given in Chapters 10 and 11.

And so basically by saying that these prophecies are in the process of fulfillment and soon what is prophesied will take place.

She's saying that Daniel 8 and Daniel 11 are parallel and we already studied that in 1 of our previous classes, remember that you have this book within the book and it begins with Persia in Chapter 8 and then Chapter 11 begins with Persia also and they work their way through.

So what I want us to notice then is the prophecies of Daniel 8 and 11 or 10 and 11 are parallel.

The second point that we need to take into account is that both of these prophecies were in the process of fulfillment when Ellen Wright wrote in 1896.

Unfortunately in this statement Ellen White does not specify how much of the chapter had already been fulfilled when she wrote the statement correct?

She simply says that Daniel 8 and Daniel 11 were in the process of fulfillment, but she doesn't say where the fulfillment was, the beginning of the chapter, the middle of the chapter, or the end of the chapter.

She merely stated that these prophecies were in the process of fulfillment, so we would be interested in knowing where the process was.

Now the quotation in Testimonies for the Church, volume 9, page 14, adds some very valuable information.

When Ellen White wrote this testimony in 1909 she stated that the prophecy of Daniel 11, this is the important detail, had nearly reached its complete fulfillment.

So do we know from this statement where the prophecy was in its fulfillment?

So the quotation in Testimonies for the Church, Volume 9, page 14, adds some very valuable information.

When Ellen White wrote this testimony in 1909 she stated that the prophecy of Daniel 11 had nearly reached its complete fulfillment.

Thus we can be certain that in 1909 the process of fulfillment of Daniel 11 was in the last few verses of the chapter.

Now the third quotation the 1 from manuscript releases volume 13 and page 394 written in 1904 contains some significant information that is not found in the other 2 quotations.

In this statement Ellen White explains that much of the history that had taken place in fulfillment of this chapter will be repeated.

The critical question then is this, which history was she referring to that would be repeated?

Fortunately we don't have to guess because she immediately quotes verses 30 to 36, then right after she quotes these verses she again repeats the thought that much of the history that has occurred in fulfillment of these verses will be repeated when she says scenes similar to those described in these words will take place.

In other words she says much of the history that has fulfilled this chapter will be repeated, then what does she quote?

Verses 30 to 36, and after quoting verses 30 to 36 then she says scenes similar to those described in these words will take place.

So which are the events that already took place that were fulfilled?

The events in verses 30 to 36, and in the future we're going to find that scenes similar to the ones in verses 30 to 36 will take place.

Clearly Ellen White understood that verses 30 to 36 and I might say also verses 37 to 39 even though she does not quote them, had already been fulfilled in the past when she wrote.

They had already been fulfilled, she says they'll be seen similar to these.

Now if verses 30 to 39 had already been fulfilled in the past then the similar future scenes must be described where?

Thus verses 30 to 39 describe events in the past while verses 40 to 45 describe events in the future.

Well Let me go over it again because this is a very important point.

Ellen White understood that verses 30 to 36 and also 37 to 39 had already been fulfilled in the past when she wrote.

If verses 30 to 39 had already been fulfilled in the past then the similar scenes that she said would be fulfilled in the future must be verses 40 to 45, because if 30 to 39 were fulfilled and there's going to be future scenes similar to those then the only place you can look is verses 40 to 45.

It is important to realize that Ellen White, this is vitally important, Ellen White is not saying that these verses have a dual fulfillment, she's not saying that verses 30 to 39 are going to be fulfilled twice, once in the past and 1 in the future.

What she is saying is that much of the history that fulfilled these verses will be repeated.

Stated another way, it is not the prophecy in verses 30 to 39 that will be fulfilled once again, but rather much of the history which fulfilled the prophecy in the past that will be repeated in similar fashion in the future.

Is it different to say that the prophecy will be fulfilled twice than to say that much of the history will be fulfilled twice.

These verses don't have a double fulfillment, it's just that they were fulfilled in the past and in the future there are going to be scenes similar to the ones that were already fulfilled in the past.

At this juncture in our study we must ask, what or why will the historical scenes of the past repeat once again in similar fashion?

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ANCHOR School of Theology

30. Learn how to use the writings of Ellen G. White- Part 2

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