Modern Spiritualism Part 3

4. If, therefore, it was invented by men at all, it must have been invented by _bad_ men.

5. All liars and religious impostors are bad men; but-

6. The Bible repeatedly and most explicitly forbids lying and imposture, under the threatening of most condign punishment.

7. Would, therefore, liars and impostors invent a book which more than any other book ever written, denounces lying and imposture, thus condemning themselves to the severest judgments of G.o.d, and at last to eternal death?

8. If, then, the Bible is not the invention of good men,-because such men would not lie and deceive; nor of evil men,-because such men would not condemn themselves; nor of good or evil angels, for the same reasons, who else can be its author, but he who claims to be, that is, the living G.o.d?

9. If, therefore, from the very nature of the case, it must be G.o.d's book, why not believe it, and obey it?

To return: Appeal is therefore made to the Bible; and the object is to learn what the Bible teaches about Spiritualism. When the claim is put forth that it is the disembodied spirits of dead men who make the communications, the Bible reader is at once aware of a conflict of claims.

In times when the Bible was written, there were practices among men which went under the names of "enchantment," "sorcery," "witchcraft,"

"necromancy," "divination," "consulting with familiar spirits," etc. These practices were all more or less related, but some of them bear an unmistakable meaning. Thus, "necromancy" is defined to mean "a pretended communication with the dead." A "familiar spirit" was "a spirit or demon supposed to attend on an individual, or to come at his call; the invisible agent of a necromancer's will."-_Century Dictionary._ Spiritualists do not deny that their intercourse with the invisible world comes under some, at least, of these heads. But all such practices the Bible explicitly forbids.

Deut. 18:9-12: "There shall not be found among you any one that maketh his son or his daughter to pa.s.s through the fire, or that useth divination, or an observer of times, or an enchanter, or a witch, or a charmer, or a consulter with _familiar spirits_, or a wizard, or a _necromancer_. For all that do these things are an abomination unto the Lord." Lev. 19:31: "Regard not them that have familiar spirits, neither seek after wizards, to be defiled by them: I am the Lord your G.o.d." See also, 2 Kings 21:2, 6, 9, 11; Rev. 21:8; Gal. 5:19-21; Acts 16:16-18; etc. Thus plainly in both the Old and New Testaments, are these practices forbidden.

An Impossibility.

But why does the Bible forbid such practices as necromancy, or a "pretended" communication with the dead?-Because it would be only a pretense at best; for such communication is impossible. The dead are unconscious in their graves, and have no power to communicate with the living. Let this truth be once established, and it is the death-blow to the claims of Spiritualism, in the cases of all who will receive it.

Allusion has already been made to a popular and wide-spread dogma in the Christian church which furnishes a basis for Spiritualism. It is that the soul is immortal, and that the dead are conscious. Spirits make known their presence, and claim to be the spirits of persons who have once lived here in human bodies. Now if the Bible teaches that there is no such thing as a disembodied human spirit, a knowledge of that fact would enable one to detect at once the imposture of any intelligence which from behind the curtain should claim to be such spirit. Any spirit seeking the attention of men in this life, and claiming to be what the Bible says does not exist, comes with a falsehood on its lips or in its raps, if the Bible is true, and thus reveals its real character to be that of a deceiver. In this case the Bible believer is armed against the imposture. No man likes to be fooled. No matter therefore how nice the communicating intelligence may seem, how many true things it may say, or how many good things it may promise, the conviction cannot be evaded that no real good can be intended or conferred by any spirit, or whatever it may be, masquerading under the garb of falsehood, or pretending to be what it is not. On such a foundation no stable superstructure can be reared. It becomes a death-trap, sure to collapse and involve in ruin all those who trust therein.

It is very desirable that the reader comprehend the full importance of the doctrine, as related to this subject, that the dead are unconscious and that they have no power to communicate with the living. This being established, it sweeps away at one stroke the entire foundation of Spiritualism. Evidence will now be presented to show that this is a Bible doctrine; and wherever this is received, the fabric of Spiritualism from base to finial falls; it cannot possibly stand. But where the doctrine prevails that only the thin veil that limits our mortal vision, separates us from a world full of the conscious, intelligent spirits of those who have departed this life, Spiritualism has the field, beyond the possibility of dislodgment. When one believes that he has disembodied spirit friends all about him, how can he question that they are able to communicate with him? and when some unseen intelligence makes its presence known, and claims to be one of those friends, and refers to facts or scenes, known only to them two, how can the living dispute the claim? How can he refuse to accept a claim, which, on his own hypothesis, there is no conceivable reason to deny? But if the spirits are not what they claim to be, how shall the inexplicable phenomena attending their manifestations be explained?-The Bible brings to view other agencies, not the so-called spirits of the departed, to whose working all that has ever been manifested which to mortal vision is mysterious and inexplicable, may be justly attributed.

The Soul Not Immortal.

Spiritualism declares it to be the great object of its mission, to prove the immortality of the soul, which, it says, is not taught in the Scriptures with sufficient clearness, and is not otherwise demonstrated.

It well attributes to the Scriptures a lack of plain teaching in support of that dogma; and it would have stated more truth, if it had said that the Scriptures nowhere countenance such a doctrine at all. But, it is said, the Scriptures are full of the terms, "soul" and "spirit." Very true; but they nowhere use those terms to designate such a part of man as in common parlance, and in popular theology, they have come to mean. The fact is, the popular concept of the "soul" and "spirit" has been formulated entirely outside the Bible. Sedulously, unremittingly, for six thousand years, the idea has been inculcated in the minds of men, from the cradle to the grave, that man is a dual being, consisting of an outward body which dies, and an inward being called "soul," or "spirit," which does not die, but pa.s.ses to higher spirit life, when the body goes into the grave. The father of this doctrine is rarely referred to by its believers, as authority, possibly through a little feeling of embarra.s.sment as to its parentage; for he it was who announced it to our first parents in these words: "Ye shall not surely die!" Gen. 3:4. When men began to die, it was a shrewd stroke of policy on the part of him who had promised them that they should not die, to try to prove to those who remained that the others had not really died, but only changed conditions.

It is no marvel that he should try to make men believe that they possessed an immaterial, immortal ent.i.ty that could not die; but, in view of the ghastly experiences of the pa.s.sing years, it is the marvel of marvels that he should have succeeded so well. The trouble now is that men take these meanings which have been devised and fostered into stupendous strength outside the pale of Bible teaching, and attach them to the Bible terms of "soul" and "spirit." In other words, the mongrel pago-papal theology which has grown up in Christendom, lets the Bible furnish the terms, and paganism the definitions. But from the Bible standpoint, these definitions do not belong there; they are foreign to the truth, and the Bible does not recognize them. They are as much out of place as was the inventor of them himself in the garden of Eden. Let the Bible furnish its own definitions to its own terms, and all will be clear. The opinion of John Milton, the celebrated author of Paradise Lost, is worthy of note. In his "Treatise on Christian Doctrine," Vol. I, pp. 250, 251, he says:-

"Man is a living being, intrinsically and properly one individual, not compound and separable, not, according to the common opinion, made up and framed of two distinct and different natures, as of body and soul, but the whole man is soul, and the soul, man; that is to say, a body or substance, individual, animated, sensitive, and rational."

In this sense the word is employed many times; but whoever will trace the use of the words "soul" and "spirit" through the Bible, will find them applied also to a great variety of objects; as, person, mind, heart, body (in the expression "a dead body"), will, l.u.s.t, appet.i.te, breath, creature, pleasure, desire, anger, courage, blast, etc., etc., in all nearly fifty different ways. But it is a fact which should be especially noted, that in not a single instance is there the least hint given that anything expressed by these terms is capable of existing for a single moment, as a conscious ent.i.ty, or in any other condition, _without the body_! This being so, none of these, according to the Bible, are the agency claimed to be present in Spiritualism.

Another fact in reference to this point, should be allowed its decisive bearing. The question now under investigation is, Is the soul immortal, as Spiritualism has taken upon itself to teach, and claims to demonstrate?

The Bible is found to be so lavish in the use of the terms "soul" and "spirit," that these words occur in the aggregate, _seventeen hundred times_. Seventeen hundred times, by way of description, a.n.a.lysis, narrative, historical facts, or declarations of what they can do, or suffer, the Bible has something to say about "soul" and "spirit." The most important question to be settled concerning them, certainly, is whether they are immortal or not. Will not the Bible, so freely treating of these terms, answer this question? Very strange, indeed, if it does not. But does it once affirm that either the soul or the spirit is immortal?-_Not once!_ Does it ever apply to them the terms "eternal," "deathless,"

"neverdying," or any word that bears the necessary meaning of immortal?-Not in a single instance. Does it apply to them any term from which even an inference, necessary or remote, can be drawn that they are immortal? Even reduced to this attenuated form, the answer is still an emphatic and overwhelming, _No!_ Well, then, does it say _anything_ about the nature and capabilities of existence of that which it denominates soul or spirit?-Yes; it says the soul is in danger of the grave, may die, be destroyed, killed, and that the spirit may be wounded, cut off, preserved, and so, conversely, made to perish.

It is sometimes claimed that it is not necessary that the Bible should affirm the immortality of the soul, because it is so self-evident a fact that it is taken for granted. But no one surely can suppose that the immortality of the soul is more self-evident than that of Jehovah; yet the Bible has seen fit to affirm his immortality in most direct terms. 1 Tim.

1:17: "Now unto the King eternal, _immortal_, invisible, the only wise G.o.d, be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen." 1 Tim. 6:16: "Who only hath _immortality_, dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto; whom no man hath seen, nor can see: to whom be honor and power everlasting. Amen." Let, then, similar Bible testimony be found concerning the soul; that is, that it is "immortal," or "hath immortality," and the taken-for-granted device will not be needed.

Chapter Three.

THE DEAD UNCONSCIOUS.

From the fact now established that the soul is not immortal, it would follow as an inevitable conclusion, that the dead are not conscious in the intermediate state, and consequently cannot act the part attributed to them in modern Spiritualism. But there are some positive statements to which the reader's attention should be called, and some instances supposed to prove the conscious state which should be noticed.

1. _The Dead Know not Anything._-As a sample of the way the Bible speaks upon this question, let the reader turn to the words of Solomon, in Eccl.

9:5, 6, 10: "For the living know that they shall die: but the dead know not anything, neither have they any more a reward; for the memory of them is forgotten. Also their love, and their hatred, and their envy, is now perished; neither have they any more a portion for ever in anything that is done under the sun.... Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might; for there is no work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom, in the grave, whither thou goest."

This language is addressed to the real, living, intelligent, responsible man; and how could it be plainer? On the hypothesis of the commonly believed distinction between the soul and the body, this must be addressed to the soul; for the body considered as the mere material instrument through which the soul acts, is not supposed of itself to know anything.

The body, as a body, independent of the soul, does not know that it shall die; but it is that which knows, while one is alive, that it shall die-it is that same intelligent being that, when dead, knows not anything. But the spirits in Spiritualism do know many things in their condition; therefore they are not those who have once lived on this earth, and pa.s.sed off through death; for such, once dead, this scripture affirms, know not anything-they are in a condition in which there is "no work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom." This is a plain, straightforward, literal statement; there is no mistaking its meaning; and if it is true, then it is not true that the unseen agents working through Spiritualism, are the spirits of the dead.

2. _The Spirit Returns to G.o.d._-Another pa.s.sage from the same writer and the same book, may recur to the mind of the reader, as expressing a different and contradictory thought. Eccl. 12:7. "Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was: and the spirit shall return unto G.o.d who gave it." A careful a.n.a.lysis of this pa.s.sage reveals no support for Spiritualism; for it does not say that the spirit, on returning to G.o.d, is conscious, or is capable of coming back and communicating with mortals. It is not denied that different component parts enter into the const.i.tution of man; and that these parts may be separated. Solomon himself may therefore tell us what he means by the term "spirit" which he here uses.

He employs the same word in chapter. 3:21 of this same book, but says that beasts have it as well as men. And then in verse 19, he explains what he means, by saying that they (man and the lower animals) _all_ have one _breath_. The record of man's creation in Gen. 2:7, shows that a vitalizing principle, called the "breath of life," was necessary to be imparted to the organized body, before man became a living being; and this breath of life, as common to man and to all breathing animals, is described in Gen. 7:21, 22, by the term ??? (_ruahh_), the same word that is used for "breath," in Eccl. 3:19, "spirit," in verse 21, and "the spirit," which G.o.d gave to man, and which returns to G.o.d, in chapter 12:7.

Thus it is clear that reference is here made simply to the "breath of life" which G.o.d at first imparted to man, to make him a living being, and which he withdraws to himself, in the hour of man's death. Job states the same fact, and describes the process, in chapter 34:14, 15: "If he [G.o.d]

set his heart upon man, if he gather _unto himself_ his [man's] spirit [same word] and his breath; ... man shall turn again unto dust." No one can fail to see here that Job refers to the same event of which Solomon speaks.

And at this point the question may as well be raised, and answered, Whence comes this spirit which is claimed to be the real man, capable of an independent and superior existence without the body? Bodies come into existence by natural generation; but whence comes the spirit? Is it a part of the body? If so, it cannot be immortal; for "that which is born of the flesh is flesh." John 3:6. Is it supplied to human beings at birth? If so, is there a great storehouse, somewhere, of souls and spirits, ready-made, from which the supply is drawn as fast as wanted in this world? And if so, further, is it to be concluded that all spirits have had a pre-existence?

and then what was their condition in that state? And again, how does it happen, on this supposition, that this spirit in each individual exhibits so largely the mental and moral traits of the earthly parents? These hypotheses not being very satisfactory, will it be claimed that G.o.d creates these spirits as fast as children are born to need them? and if so, who brings them down just in the nick of time? and by what process are they incarnated? But if G.o.d has, by special act, created a soul or spirit for every member of the human family since Adam, is it not a contradiction of Gen. 2:2, which declares that _all_ G.o.d's work of creation, so far as it pertains to this world, was _completed_ by the close of the first week of time? Again, how many of the inhabitants of this earth are the offspring of abandoned criminality; and can it be supposed that G.o.d holds himself in readiness to create souls which must come from his hands pure as the dew of heaven, to be thrust into such vile tenements, and doomed to a life of wretchedness and woe at the bidding of defiant l.u.s.t? The irreverence of the question will be pardoned as an exposure of the absurdity of that theory which necessitates it.

3. _The Spirits of Just Men Made Perfect._-This expression is found in Heb. 12:23, and seems, by some, to recognize the idea that spirits can exist without the body, and are to be treated as separate ent.i.ties. Thus interpreted it might appear to give some support to Spiritualism. But it will by no means bear such an interpretation. The apostle is contrasting the privileges of Christians in the present dispensation, with the situation of believers before the coming of Christ. What he sets forth are blessings to be enjoyed in the present tense. Yes, says one, that is just what I believe: We are come to spirits; they are all about us, and tip and talk and write for us at our pleasure. But hold! nothing is affirmed of spirits separately. The whole idea must be taken in. It is the "spirits of _just men_ made perfect;" and the participle "made perfect" agrees with "just men," or literally "the just made perfect" (d??a??? tete?e??????), not with "spirits." It is the _men_ who are made perfect to whom we are said to have come. But there are only two localities and two periods, in which men are anywhere in the Scriptures said to be made perfect. One is in this life and on this earth, and refers to religious experience ("Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect"); the other is not relative, but actual and absolute, and refers to the future immortal state when all the people of G.o.d will enter upon eternal life together ("G.o.d having provided some better thing for us, that they [the ancient worthies] without us should not be _made perfect_." Heb.

11:40). Thus, taken in either of the only two ways possible, the text furnishes no proof of Spiritualism. It doubtless refers to the present state, the expression, "spirits of just men," being simply a periphrasis for "just men," the same as the expression, "the G.o.d of the spirits of all flesh" (Num. 16:22), means simply "the G.o.d of all flesh," and the words "your whole spirit, and soul, and body" (1 Thess. 5:23), means simply the whole person.

4. _Spirits in Prison._-The apostle Peter uses an expression, which, though perhaps not often quoted in direct defense of Spiritualism, is relied upon extensively in behalf of the doctrine of the conscious state of the dead, which, as already shown, is the essential basis of Spiritualism. And such texts as these are here noticed to show to the general reader, that the Bible contains no testimony in behalf of that doctrine, but positively forbids it, as further quotations will soon be introduced to show. The pa.s.sage now in question is 1 Peter 3:19, where, speaking of Christ, it says: "By which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison." By the use of strong a.s.sumption, and some lofty flights of the imagination, and keeping in the background the real intent of the pa.s.sage, a picture of rather a lively time in the spirit world, can be constructed out of this testimony. Thus the spirits are said to be the disembodied spirits of those who were destroyed by the flood. See context.

They were in "prison," that is, in h.e.l.l. When Christ was put to death upon the cross, he immediately went by his disembodied spirit, down into h.e.l.l and preached to those conscious intelligent spirits who were there, and continued that work till the third day when he was himself raised from the dead. A thought will show that this picture is wrong, (1) in the time, (2) in the condition of the people, (3) in the acting agent, and (4) in the end to be attained. Thus, when Christ had been put to death, he was "quickened" (or made alive), says the record, "by the Spirit." This was certainly not a personal disembodied spirit, but that divine agency so often referred to in the Scriptures. "By which," that is, this Spirit of G.o.d, he went and preached. Then he did not go personally on this work. The "spirits" were the antediluvians; for they were those who were disobedient in the days of Noah. Now when were they preached to? Verse 20 plainly tells us it was "_when_ once the longsuffering of G.o.d waited _in the days of Noah_." In accordance with these statements now let another picture be presented: Christ, by his Spirit which was in Noah (1 Peter 1:11), and thus through Noah, preached to the spirits, or persons, in Noah's time, who were disobedient, in order to save all from the coming flood who would believe. They were said to be "in prison," though still living, because they were shut up under condemnation, and had only one hundred and twenty years granted them in which to repent or perish. Thus Christ was commissioned to preach to men said to be in prison, because in darkness, error, and condemnation, though they were still living in the flesh. Isa.

61:1. Dr. Adam Clarke, the eminent Methodist commentator (_in loco_), places the going and preaching of Christ in the days of Noah, and by the ministry of Noah for one hundred and twenty years, and not during the time while he lay in the grave. Then he says:-

"The word p?e?as? (spirits) is supposed to render this view of the subject improbable, because this must mean _disembodied_ spirits; but this certainly does not follow; for the _spirits of just men made perfect_ (Heb. 12:23), certainly means righteous men, and men _still in the church militant_: and the Father of spirits (Heb. 12:9) means men still in the body; and the G.o.d of the spirits of all flesh (Num. 16:22 and 27:16), means _men, not_ in a disembodied state."(1)

5. _Cannot Kill the Soul._-"Fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in h.e.l.l." Matt. 10:28. We know what it is to kill the body; and by a.s.sociation of ideas, it seems quite natural to form a like conception of the soul as something that can be treated in the same way.

Then if the soul cannot be killed like the body, the conclusion seems easy of adoption that it lives right on, with all sensations preserved, as it was with the body before its death. If it were not for the pagan definition of "soul," which here comes in to change the current of thought, such conclusions drawn from this text would not be so prevalent; and a little attention to the scope of Christ's teaching here will readily correct the misapprehension. This is brought out clearly in verse 39: "He that findeth his _life_ shall lose it: and he that loseth his _life_ for my sake shall find it." This is easily understood. No one will question what it is to lose his life; and Christ says that he who will do this for his sake, shall find it. Any one who has been put to death for his faith in the gospel has "lost his life" (had the body killed) for Christ's sake.

But Christ says, Do not fear them, even if they do this. Why?-Because ye shall find it-the life you lost. When shall we find it?-In the resurrection. John 6:40; Rev. 20:4-6. The expression, "shall find it,"

thus becomes the exact equivalent of the words, "are not able to kill the soul;" that is, are not able to destroy, or prevent us from gaining that life he has promised, if we suffer men, for his sake, to "kill the body,"

or deprive us of our present life. The correctness of this view is demonstrated by the word employed in these instances. That word is ????

(_psuche_). It is properly rendered "life" in verse 39, and improperly rendered "soul" in verse 28. This lesson, that men should be willing to lose their life for Christ's sake, was considered so important that it is again mentioned in Matthew, and reiterated with emphasis by Mark, Luke, and John; and they all use this same word ????, which is rendered "life."

In one instance only in all these parallel pa.s.sages have the translators rendered it "soul;" and that is Matt. 10:28, where it is the source of all the misunderstanding on that text.

6. _Souls Under the Altar._-As a part of the events of the fifth seal as described in Rev. 6:9-11, John says he saw the souls of the martyrs under the altar, and heard them crying for vengeance. If they could do that, it is asked, cannot disembodied souls now communicate with the living? Not to enter into a full exposition of this scripture, and the inconsistencies such a view would involve, it is sufficient to ask if these were like the communicating spirits of the present day. How many communications have ever been received by modern Spiritualists from souls confined under an altar? In glowing symbolism, John saw the dead martyrs, as if slain at the foot of the altar; and by the figure of personification a voice was given to them, just as Abel's blood cried to G.o.d for vengeance upon his guilty brother (Gen. 4:10), and just as the stone is said to cry out of the wall, and the beam out of the timber to answer it. Hab. 2:11.

7. _The Medium of Endor._-Aside from the direct teaching of the Scriptures, it is still held by some that there are scenes narrated in the Bible which show that the dead must be conscious. The first of these is the case of Saul and the woman of Endor, whom he consulted in order to communicate with the prophet Samuel, as narrated in 1 Samuel 28. Here, it must be confessed, is brought to view an actual case of spirit manifestation, a specimen of ancient necromancy; for the conditions, method of procedure, and results, were just such as pertain to the same work in our own day. But then, as now, there was no truth nor good in it, as a brief review of the narrative will show. (1) Samuel was dead. (2) Saul was sore pressed by the Philistines. Verse 5. (3) G.o.d had departed from him. Verse 4. (4) He had cut off those who had familiar spirits and wizards, out of the land, because G.o.d had forbidden their presence in the Jewish theocracy, as an abomination. Verse 3; Lev. 19:31. (5) Yet in his extremity he had recourse to a woman with a familiar spirit, found at Endor. Verse 7. (6) She asked whom she should bring up, and Saul answered, Samuel. Verse 11. (7) Saul was disguised, but the familiar spirit told the woman it was Saul, and she cried out in alarm. Verse 12. (8) Saul rea.s.sured her, and the woman went on with the seance. Verse 10. (9) She announced a presence coming (not from heaven, nor the spheres, but) up out of the earth, and at Saul's request gave a description of him, showing that Saul did not himself see the form. Verse 13. (10) Saul "perceived"