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

:4~6 Ihc Golden Aga fur May XI, I~SI :.$....-- - .>mems of the enlightening action of the holyrpirit, have been able to discern the true Mesdab.(Matthew 16 : 13-17) We are rejoiced toknow that the time is not now far distant whenthe deceived world will have its eyes openedmd recognize its true Redeemer, and whenthe people will shout: "Lo, THIS is our God : we .have waited for him, and He will save us".-Laiah 25 : 9.Satax1 has taken advantage of the rcli,' ~lOU8dement in man, ar?d by his blindi~ig lies hasdirected the \\-orld's xvorship to hi~:iaelf, bccornkgin vci-y rleerl the "god of this worltl". (2 Corinthians4 : 4) He had said in his Iienrt :"I sliallbe like the Most Hi;rIi": and he songl~to fu110~out this desire in e~-ery possihle way. But herhall be "cut clown to tlie ground" in the Lord'sdue time (Isaiah 14 : 12-17) ; and Jesus Christ,who did not seek to bc equal wit11 God, bnt 1:iadeHimself of no reputation arid aas ohedient untodeath, shall be highly exalted and give11 a namewhich is abore every ilnme, that at the xianle ofJesw every knee shall 1;ow i11 adorrition andworship. (Philippians 3 : 6-11, Dirrglott) "Exahim that is Ion.. and abase 11iin that is high," isthe principle on which God \~oiks.The patriarchs, a??tl the anciei~t \\-orlll in general,'were acquainted with the story of thetemptation in Eden ; and they hem that the seedof the woman \vna ultimately to destroy thetempter. Because of this, and because of thebate wickedness of the hearts of men (Jeremiah17: 9), Satall \\-as able to foist his counterfeit"seed of the \\-oinrin" upon tlie \\-orld. Wehtc. that this is so: for there is liar(lly a peopleon earth whose n~ytliological religio~i does notoontain reference to the "seetl" I)ruieing the headof the serpent. Referring to this pl~nse of thereligions of the heathen couiitries, \\-ilkinson(Vol. IV, p. 395) says : "The evil genius of tlieadversaries of the Eqyptian god IIorus [Osirisin another form] is frequently figured under theform of a snake, whose head he is setln piercingdth a spear. The same fable occurs in thereligid sf India, x\ here the nialig~aiit serpentCalyia is slain by Vishnu, in liis avatar [iricnrnation]of Criehna. The Scandii~avian deityTkor U-as said to have bruised the head of tliepat aernerlt .with his mace. The origin of thismay be rea$il\>raced to the Bible." The Greeks,dm, repredented tlieir god Spollo as ria? ii~g theserpent Pytho; arid Ilumnboltlt shons that theMexirans bad the same belief concerni~lg theirgod Teotl; "The serpent amehed by tho great ."-spirit Teotl, when he taker the form of the sub-%altern deities, io the geninr of ad-a real --Kakodtemon". (Mexican Researahes, VoL I, 1.p. 228) When examination is made of themvarious mythm, it ir found that in almost every s,case the serpent-destroying god dies aa the 2result of the injnribr received in the aombat,thus showing that the pagans knew that it waa..I;by dying that the promiaed Seed wrs to destroy; i:the adversary. - %:In the above quotation irom Wllkimon, it will .-be noticed that he nttributer to the Bible the .knowledge which the pegans had of destroyingthe serpent aa the.ino8rnation of evil; but he nodoubt means that this knowledge may be tracedto the accot~nt of the temptation in Eden, whichafterwards appeared in the Bible. The Bible curwe have it, of course, did not begin to b writtentill after the Exodus of the Israelites fromEgypt, 1615 B. C. Long before this date (theExodus was 857 years after the flood) the falsereligiorls of Babylonia, Egypt, and the othercountries were fully set up, originating, as wehave said, with Semiramis and her followexSIn the midst of all this idolatry, however, theLord always had his faithful few-Noah, Shem,Abraham, and others being specially mentioned.It m-as because the worship of the false Messiahwas in full operation in Egypt and in the sother countries, that Jehovah repeatedly warnedhis people, the Jewish nation, against followingthem. Bowing down to "sticka and stones" waain reality the worship of the dead. These imamenslaved the minds of those who served them,giving a seeming actuality to beinga who didnot exist; for the "gods" whom they representedwere in their graves, and are still waiting forthe resurrection in the Millennial reign ofChrist.The "Imags of JsaloYsy"We have already mentioned the faat that thepopular subjects of worship in every nationhave been the 'Wother and Son", images of .whom were everywhere aet up. Even the Jewishnation was for a time guilty of worshiping theBabylonian goddess with the false seed in herarms ; for one of her images i8 evidently referredto by Ezekiel (8: 3) when he says: "Andthe spirit lifted me up between the earth and theheaven, and brought me in visions of God toJerusalem, to the door of the inner gate thatlooketh toward the north; where was the seat* -