The Watchtower Society and John and Morton Edgar - A2Z.org

Now, we shall take up the next chart. This chart, as you perhaps saw at a glance, refers to the paralleldispensations, the Jewish age and the Gospel age. You all know that God set apart this typical people, thenation of Israel, and He said to them, "You only have I known of all the families of the earth.” And whenChrist came He would now allow his disciples to go into the Gentiles or Samiritans; they were to go only toIsrael. Now this special favor of God began at the death of Jacob, and ended at the death of Christ, when Christcast them off, saying, "Behold, your house is left unto you desolate." There they were cast out of God's favor.Brother Russell shows in the second volume of Millennial Dawn that the period of disfavor would be exactlyequal to the period of favor. He proves that from Zechariah, Isaiah and Jeremiah, as we all know-the "double."Therefore, it is an easy matter to find out when the favor would return to Israel. Paul tells us that blindness hashappened in part to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles be come in. Therefore, the time when favor wouldbegin to return would be the time also when the fullness of the Gentiles would be come in.Now, we start from the death of Jacob, when the Jewish age began; it could not begin before because thePatriarchal age did not cease until then. So we start from the death of Jacob, the founder of the Jewish age, andmeasure to the death of Christ, and find the period to be 1,845 years. Therefore, we have simply to add 1,845 tothis year 33, and we get the year 1878 as the end of the Gospel age.Some are apt to say, "Well, surely the Gospel age is not finished yet; 1878 is a long way past." No, dear friends,it is not finished yet, because there is something more. You remember that in this year 3 3 A. D., about fivedays before his death, Jesus said, "Behold, your house is left unto you desolate." There the system, the nation,of Israel, was cast off, but we know further that the nation was not dead right there and then; the fall began atthat time, but the fall was not complete until the year 70 A. D., when Jerusalem was destroyed and the Israeliteswere scattered over all the earth, and since then they have been a nation no more. There was the end of the1,845 years, and then the fall occupying 37 years. The harvest ended in October, 69, and the next year, 70, thenation was destroyed. And so we expect then, seeing that this was a typical people, that from the death of Jesusthere was a period of 1,845 years, at the end of which Christendom was cast off; and since that time, the springof 1878, there has been a gradual fall of Christendom, the end of the harvest being October, 1914, and the nextyear, 1915, seeing the destruction of this "present evil world." And all the signs of the times point to that, as you