Luther and Russell
Brief comments regarding the decline of the Ottomans and return of Israel.
MARTIN LUTHER ON THE LAST DAY
“When the Turk begins to fail a little the Last Day will surely come [der jungste Tag gewisslich kommen]. For this is the way it must be according to Scripture. There is commotion enough in the political life at present. Lawyers never had more to do than just now.”1
“When the Turk begins to decline, then the last day will be at hand, for then the testimony of the Scripture must be verified. The loving Lord will come, as the Scripture says: ‘For thus saith the Lord of Hosts, yet a little while and I will shake the heavens and the earth, and the sea and the dry land: and I will shake all nations, and the desire of all nations shall come.’ At the last there will be great alteration and commotion; and already there are great commotions among men. Never had the men of law so much occupation as now. There are vehement dissensions in our families, and discord in the church.”2
C. T. RUSSELL ON THE RETURN OF THE JEWS, BEFORE THEIR RETURN BEGAN
“We read of the restoration of Israel and other nations in Jeremiah, Isaiah and the minor prophets and also of the earth being restored to Edenic beauty, when the wilderness shall blossom as a rose, &c.: and the church, in general, believe in the restoration of a living remnant of Israel to their own land and to God’s favor, but as a rule they have never thought of the prophecy embracing the dead as well as the living, and other nations as well as Israel. But these things are mentioned in the same Bible.”
“How will this [Christ’s] kingdom rule over the world? Will it have Jerusalem for its capital or seat of empire? Will Christ sit in Jerusalem upon the throne of David? ‘Jerusalem shall be rebuilt upon her old heaps as in the former time,’ Israel after the flesh will again be the chief nation, and ‘a praise in the whole earth;’ for ‘the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it.’ But fleshly Israel is not nor ever again will be ‘the kingdom of God.’ They were once, but it was taken from them and given to another people, children of Abraham by faith – the church. Under the sounding of the seventh trumpet all the kingdoms of the world (now under the control of Satan) ‘become the kingdoms of our Lord; (they pass into the possession of Christ and under the rule of his kingdom, the devil being bound) – Revelation 20:2. Israel, with their capital in Jerusalem, will doubtless be the chief of these fleshly nations, but it will no more be the Heavenly kingdom than they.”3
These few lines in 1877 give priority to the faithful church, while predicting the regathering of Israel. The following year the return of the Jews to Palestine/Israel began.
(1) Luthers Werke: Kritische Gesamtausgabe: Tischreden,
6 volumes. (Weimar: H. Bohlau, 1912-1921).
(www.thefreelibrary.com/Lunther,+the+Turks,+and+Islam.-a0169989145)
(2) Table Talk, translated by Wm. Hazlitt, 6:325. (www.archive.org/stream/tabletalkmartin00hazlgoog/tabletalkmartin00hazlgoog djvu.txt)
(3) C. T. Russell, “The Object and Manner of Our Lord’s Return,” 1877, pages 24, 55.