The Shut Door

Just when I had reached the state of mental adjustment and theological equilibrium regarding Sister White's visions and writings, outlined in my former letter, there came into my possession information which I had never had before -- photographic reproductions of early Adventist documents published by Elder James White: A Word to the Little Flock, printed in 1847; a broadside entitled To Those Who Are Receiving the Seal of the Living God printed in 1849; a file of the paper Present Truth from the first number in July 1849 to the issue of November 1850; and The Advent Review, printed at Auburn, NY, in 1850, containing among other things a reprint of O.R.L. Crozier's Day Star Extra article on the Sanctuary.

The diligent and repeated study of this source material gives a very different picture from that presented in SDA literature, and clearly substantiates some of the charges regarding "suppression" and the "shut door" which the denomination has been wont to deny.  Every repeated reading of the documents makes this clearer.   It is certain from the evidence that Elder James White, Sister Ellen G. White, Elder Joseph Bates, and those Sabbath-keeping Adventist believers associated with them in preaching and writing, taught emphatically for a number of years after the "disappointment" of October 22, 1844, that there was salvation for those only who were favorably responsive to the Advent Message known as the "Midnight Cry" just before October 22, 1844.

Sister White's first vision, a few weeks after the "disappointment" did not correct this error, but rather increased it.

The "light on the Sanctuary" as written by O.R.L. Crozier, and as seen in vision by Sister White for six years after the "disappointment," did not correct this error, but rather increased it.

Sister White's vision specifically on the subject of "The Shut Door," March 24, 1849, had not the slightest effect toward correcting this error, but rather confirmed it.  Elder White and the other brethren associated with her continued to write and to publish and to preach in her presence for more than a year after her vision on "The Shut Door" this same error of no salvation for non-Adventists.  And there is not recorded a word of protest from her, but on the contrary she writes in language similar to theirs, language which they could not possibly suppose meant anything different from their own presentations of the subject.  Her articles, so similar to the articles of her associates, are printed in Present Truth alongside of detailed and extended argument for the "shut door" for non-Adventists.  And these teachings of Sister White are presented as being the result of the gift of prophecy.

Also during those early years other erroneous ideas, such as those concerning the "image beast" and his number, were presented by Sister White, prefaced with the formula, "I saw."

As I am writing this for the consideration of those who have access to all the books and documents referred to, I shall not take the space here for long quotations from these sources.

My first definite instruction regarding the "Shut Door" controversy was obtained from Elder J. N. Loughborough's book The Great Second Advent Movement, edition of 1905.  In the year 1910 I read this book as part of the Missionary Volunteer Reading Course.  In the school year 1913-14, I studied the same book as the regular textbook in the course in Denominational History at South Lancaster Academy.   Knowing that the First Day Adventists claimed to be the opponents of the "Shut Door" idea after 1844, and that they laid the odium of that theory on Seventh-day Adventists, I formed a very poor notion of the honesty of First Day Adventists.

Come to read the source documents, I find that the SDA group, led by Elder And Sister James White, were known both among themselves and by the First Day Adventists as "the shut-door people," and that the "shut door" was bitter opposed by most First Day Adventists.  As late as 1850 Elder White published at Auburn, NY, a large pamphlet, The Advent Review, in which he quoted extensively from statements of Miller, Himes, etc., made at about the time of the "disappointment" in October 1844.  The purport as that according to their statements those Adventist leaders once believed in the "shut door" and had since given it up; Elder White's point was that they ought not to have given it up, that he still believed in it, and that to abandon it was apostasy.

Elder White was honest enough to admit later that he adhered to the "shut door" longer than many others (Life Incidents, Vol. i, Edition of 1868, page 207).

Thus I have had to adjust my thinking to admit the knowledge that the real situation on the "shut door" after 1844 was the reverse of that which was presented by Elder Loughborough, and much more nearly like the situation described by the First Day Adventists and other opponents of Seventh-day Adventists.

The first intimation which I had that Elder Loughborough might not be a safe guide on this point was from Elder L. E. Froom in a visit he made at my home, 53 Flower Avenue, Takoma Park, DC, near the time when he began his special research in Adventist source material.  Either then or later (I think both then and later) Elder Froom explained to me that at first he was considerably shocked at Elder Loughborough's unreliability, but that he had been much relieved in mind to find a letter from Sister White to Elder Loughborough which letter might have been misunderstood by him; and his false statements could have resulted from this misunderstanding rather than from intentional deception.

At the History Teachers' Convention at Takoma Park in the summer of 1940, one of the "doctors" casually mentioned that of course Elder Loughborough's book had been discredited.  No one appeared surprised.

So far as I have learned it seems now to be rather generally admitted by informed SDA leadership that the Sabbath-keeping Adventists under the leadership of Elder James White held to a "shut door" theory which they abandoned about the year 1851, but that if Sister White held the same view, she at least did not claim that it was divinely revealed to her as truth, and that therefore her prophetic gift is not impeached by her personal opinion, erroneous though it was.

From SDA leaders who had studied the matter thoroughly I accepted this explanation until I read the sources for myself.  Since ten I have been unable to believe that this attitude is other than "wishful thinking" entirely unwarranted by the evidence.  And really there is no great practical advantage in attempting logical acrobatics to defend Sister White from the "shut door" because there are sufficient other errors which saw in vision to discredit her visions as an authority on any subject whatever.

As to the "shut door":  We have a series of articles treating exhaustively on the "shut door" published in Present Truth and other papers by Elder White, 1849-1851.  On March 24, 1849, Sister White had an extended vision directly on the subject of the "shut door," which vision appeared in the Present Truth, Vol. i, Number 3, August, 1849.  There is not a statement in it which disagrees with or which would modify the "shut door" theory as presented by various writers in Present Truth during the years 1849 and 1850.  To try to force the language of this vision to mean something different from what it seems to say and from what it is admitted that all of Sister White's Sabbath-keeping associates were teaching, is absurd.  Such a forced interpretation was attempted in 1868 by Elder Uriah Smith in a booklet defending the "Visions," and again by Elder A.G. Daniells in an undated pamphlet The Shut Door and the Close of Probation.   Both of these discussions are utterly inadequate inasmuch as they extract Sister White's words out of the setting of "shut door" propaganda in which they appeared, and deal with them as a thing apart.  When her words are read in the setting in which they were given, I do not see how anyone can doubt their import to be in perfect agreement with the other "shut door" arguments of White, Bates, Rhodes, Edson, etc.

There are some persons, however, who will not admit evidence.  One SDA administrator is reported to have pointed to his black felt hat and said earnestly: "If Sister White should tell me that that hat is white, I should believe that it is white, and that there is something wrong with my eyesight that makes it look black to me."  That is the attitude which keeps papists believing in the infallibility of the pope, and keeps Sunday-keepers sure that they are right regardless of evidence.   But it is not the true Protestant position; it is not the Bible position; and I cannot bring myself to share that attitude.

There is a clear-cut logic to the "shut door" theory whether based on the parable of the virgins or on the Sanctuary service.  If the Advent Movement of the late summer of 1844, known as the "Midnight Cry," was in truth the fulfillment of the prophetic parable, then somehow those who were "ready" October 22, 1844, must have gone in with the Bridegroom and "the door was shut" against later arrivals.

It will be very evident as one reads that to doubt the "shut door" was to doubt the validity of the Midnight Cry Movement of the summer and autumn of 1844.  As the expression "shut door" aroused much opposition, it was more tactful to say "Midnight-Cry," and leave the "shut door" to be implied.  The watchful reader will find numerous instances of this pregnant use of the expression "midnight cry."  There seems to be an instance of this in Sister White's first vision.  It could hardly be otherwise so long as the terms "midnight cry" and "shut door" were logically inseparable.  Likewise the term "present truth" as used by Sabbath-keeping Adventists from 1847-51 is largely comprised of two things: the Sabbath and the "shut door."

It is notable that the "light on the sanctuary" buttressed the argument for the "shut door," modifying it very slightly if at all.  The SDA position on the Sanctuary as expressed in Present Truth and other publications during 1849 and 1850 fitted in beautifully with the "shut door" and strengthened the arguments for it that had come at first from the parable of the virgins.  In the Mosaic type, when the high priest entered the Most Holy Place on the 10th day of the 7th month, there was to be no man in the Holy Place, or first apartment of the Tabernacle.  Or in the language of the Adventists, 1845-1851, when the door into the second apartment was opened, the door into the first apartment was shut.  They reasoned that inasmuch as the ministration of the Holy of Holies concerned only those whose sins had been previously dealt with in the daily service of the Holy Place, and as there was no "daily service" conducted during the time the high priest was in the Holy of Holies, therefore those for whom Christ our High Priest ministers in the heavenly Holy of Holies since October 22, 1844, can be only those who had been entered on His "breastplate of judgment" as belonging to Israel -- the people of God or Adventist group -- before October 22, 1844.

The logic of this "shut door" theory seems more compelling than the less radical modifications adopted in 1851 and thereafter.  One wonders whether when the parable of the virgins reaches its final application, the door will not be just as tightly shut as these earnest Adventist believers from 1845-51 thought that it was.  (Note:   See The Reasons for My Faith by W. W. Fletcher.)

In late 1850 and throughout 1851 there was a gradual relaxing of the strict "shut door" -- first admitting the children of Believers, and then some who had not opposed the '44 Movement.  It should be noticed that this gradual opening of the door was not compelled by the logic of the Sanctuary Truth, nor was it the result for any vision of Sister White, but was forced upon the Advent Believers by the passing of the years and the apparent religious interest and conversion of some who had not been logically eligible under the strict "shut door" arguments.

It is significant that under the earlier "shut door" arguments the inability to repent depended upon an act of God.  In their presentation of the matter, Christ refuses to open the shut door of the parable, or He has moved into the Holy of Holies in the Heavenly Sanctuary where the seekers cannot find Him no matter how earnestly they seek.  Notice the frequent use of Hosea 5:6,7 to support this idea.  He shuts the door and no man can open it.  Rev. 3:7,8.  But in the "shut door" as finally taught after 1851 the emphasis is entirely upon the sinful and rebellious attitude of men -- they shut the door!  In this final meaning of "shut door" there is nothing to identify the process with 1844 or with the Advent Movement or with the parable of the virgins or with the "cleansing of the sanctuary."   It is an attitude of perverse disobedience possible for anyone at any time from the entrance of sin into the world to the present day -- and beyond.

One should notice as he reads these old Adventist publications those words and expressions which are used in a sort of technical sense by the "shut door" Adventists.  One should notice that Sister White uses these same words and expressions in the same way, assuming on the part of her readers a familiarity with the "shut door" logic.  These undesigned coincidences pile up into a tremendous weight of evidence, but they have never been dealt with in any attempt to defend Sister White from teaching the "shut door."  It is easier to limit the defense to those fewer times when she uses the definite expression "shut door."

Of like significance are the numerous occasions where those are mentioned for whom Elder and Sister White were laboring.  They are always the "little flock," the "company of believers," or some equivalent designation.  The significance of this seems to be overlooked by Elder Daniells in his pamphlet, "The Shut Door and Close of Probation," page 23; for after quoting from Sister White two short paragraphs which were printed in 1849, containing the expressions "Nothing should be too dear to sacrifice for the salvation of the scattered and torn flock of Jesus" . . . "and will now pardon all the transgressions of Israel."   "For all their sins will then be blotted out."  --   after quoting these statements about "Israel" and the "flock of Jesus" Elder Daniells says "Sure this statement does not indicate that Christ had closed His ministry for a lost world."  But it is not of the "lost world" that the paragraph speaks, but of "Israel."  It is true that the same paragraph mentions rescuing "souls from the coming storm of wrath."   But it nowhere indicates that these souls were other than those of the "Israel" already mentioned.

Of special interest is Elder F. M. Wilcox's book The Testimony of Jesus, pages 72-88, the chapter on "Suppression and the Shut Door."  It is Sister White's own statements quoted in those pages -- taken in connection with the source material in the early Present Truth papers, 1849-50 -- that seem to furnish the final evidence that she held and taught the same erroneous view as her husband did for about seven years after the 1844 "disappointment."  She evidently makes her defense with a faulty memory; for her statements are inconsistent with themselves and with the facts as made clear and certain in the early SDA papers printed in 1849 and 1850.   On pages 74 and 75 of Elder Wilcox's book Sister White disclaims knowledge that the 1851 edition of Experience and Views lacked anything from her first visions as first printed.  But on page 94 there is quoted a statement from that very 1851 edition showing that it, itself, claimed to be somewhat abridged from previous printings.   Elder Daniells' chief defense of Sister White in his pamphlet, The Shut Door and the close of Probation is that the changes were all made by her in person, or with her full knowledge and consent, and therefore are OK.  Contrariwise, her own defense is that the did not know of the omissions -- so of course she is not to be blamed for them.  Both arguments seem to be combined in Elder Wilcox's book as may be seen by comparing pages 74 and 75 with page 94.

Notice the section beginning on page 76, "The 'Shut Door' Defined."   This is very enlightening.  She says:

For a time after the disappointment in 1844 I did hold in common with the advent body, that the door of mercy was then forever closed to the world.

She could have added truthfully that this idea was "common to the advent body" for a few hours or a few days only; but was persisted in by her and Elder Whiteand Elder Bates and their followers for nearly seven years in fierce opposition to Miller, Himes, Litch, etc.

Then she adds,

This position was taken before my first vision was given me.

This is doubtless an accurate statement, but misleading to one not having access to the "sources."  For it could have been just as truly added, "and was confirmed by that first vision and by other later visions, and was held and taught by me as 'present truth' for nearly seven years."

Then she says,

It was the light given me of God that corrected our error, and enabled us to see the truth position.

As all "light" comes from God, this statement is doubtless true, but it is also misleading.  One might readily suppose that it was some vision of hers that cleared up the matter.  But there is no such vision on record.  Time went on until the "shut door" was a demonstrated absurdity and then the door was gradually "opened."

She adds,

I am still a believer in the shut-door theory, but not in the sense in which we at first employed the term, or in which it is employed by my opponents.

There was a shut door in Noah's day.

etc. etc.

As there is no question by anyone concerning the "shut door" which is always possible -- in Noah's day, or now, or in 1844, or at any other time, we need not stop on that.  It is evidently the only kind of "shut door" which she admitted correct when she wrote this defense.  But it is a "shut door" in which Jesus' moving from the Holy to the Most Holy Place has no immediate connection, and the parable of the virgins has no special bearing, and the arguments used by Sister White, Elder White, Elder Bates, and their associates, have no relevance.  The arguments used by SDAs for the "shut door" from 1844-1851 are applicable only to the variety of "shut door" which in her defense she repudiates.

The letter to Elder Loughborough printed on page 86 is also very interesting and may be the source of some of the inaccurate statements in his book, The Great Second Advent Movement.  As it was written about thirty years after the "disappointment," Sister White's memory may not have functioned perfectly -- she was always so active doing so much -- the past could easily become indistinct.

Other Troubling Matters

Through the years, contemporaneous with the vanishing authority of Sister White's writings, another matter has troubled me.  With the study of the Hebrew and Greek languages and of proper principles of exegesis an ever increasing number of Scripture texts have had to be dropped from my notes on various doctrines and prophecies.  They have been misapplied to matters with which they have no connection.  Often this has been caused by faulty translation or by lack of heed to the context.  When I found that I had been wrong through the years regarding the work of Sister White, I decided that it was possible for me to be wrong and for the Denomination to be wrong on anything.   So I started to re-study everything anew, especially such points as depended solely upon Sister White's authority contrary to recognized rules of exegesis.

Among the more vital prophecies of the Seventh-day Adventist system which seem clearly to have been misinterpreted through the years is the prophecy of the 2300 days of Daniel 8:14.  The relation of this verse to its context has always seemed rather vague as the denomination has used the text.  Students have asked about this in my Bible classes.  My best reply was that Sister White had said that the "daily" was not a vital matter (Preach the Word, pp. 7 & 8), so it seemed proper to divorce Daniel 8:14 from the context and use it pretty much by itself.  That is the way it is handled in all SDA literature and sermons.  The nearest approximation I have found to a Seventh-day Adventist recognition of the context in interpreting the 2300 days is in the article by David Arnold in Present Truth, Vol. I, No. 8.  Unintentionally Arnold clearly brings out the absurdity of dating Rome's oppression of Israel from 457 BC.   Even a casual reading of Daniel 8 indicates that the 2300 days comprise the period during which the "little horn" that came out of one of the four horns, should oppress the "sanctuary and host."  It is a period of oppression as truly as are the "time, times, and dividing of time" of other passages.  Yet SDAs start it not with any oppression but with the ending of oppression and the restoration of Jerusalem.  And the horn which is described as doing the work of oppression was not in contact with either "sanctuary" or "host" until centuries after 457 BC. This makes the Millerite movement an error of time as well as of event.   Had I lived in William Miller's day and known even the little Hebrew, Greek, history, and Bible that I know now, I should have been one of his foremost opponents.   And I should have been right, as his opponents, many of them, were right, whereas he was wrong on very nearly everything that he taught relating to prophecy, especially time prophecy -- and in nothing more glaringly wrong than in dating Rome's oppression of Israel from a Persian decree to restore and to build Jerusalem, given in 457 BC.  The idea is so absurd that Sister White's vouching for it as revealed in vision is as conclusive against her reliability as is her relation to the "shut door."

For the positive views of prophecy which have displaced in my thinking these palpable errors see the chapters on Daniel 8 and 9.

There are numerous other impossible things in Sister White's writings, such, for example, as the idea that God actively exerted Himself to deceive the Advent believers regarding the date 1843 previous to the "Midnight Cry" (EW 74; PT Vol. I, No. 11, p. 87.)
 

A Dilemma and the Way Out

The total picture of these early visions made it impossible longer to think that they were a miraculous revelation of divine truth and a manifestation of divine power.   This placed me in a terrible dilemma; for according to my former logic Sister White's work, being supernatural, must be either from God or from Satan.  I still could not see how it could possibly be from Satan.  There was only way out of this dilemma -- I had heard it suggested, but had never given it any serious investigation because I considered it entirely inadequate -- Might the "visions" be the result of a pathological condition?  Might they rise from a natural cause -- neither from God nor from Satan?  The dilemma I was in led me to give this question rather thorough investigation.  I was very much surprised at what I found.

I have numerous notebooks full of material from Medical Encyclopedias, etc., and from reputable medical journals.  I also have about as much more material on micro-film because I did not have time to copy so much.  These things I obtained at the Congressional Library and at the Army Medical Library, and other libraries.  The library card indexes point the way to valuable material under the headings Catalepsy, Catatonia, Hysteria, Hystero-epilepsy, Ecstasy, and Trance.  I found that there have been many instances of experiences very much like those of Sister White; that none of these conditions mentioned above have any tendency toward mental or physical deterioration.  After reading extensively in the medical literature on the subject, I have concluded that the most charitable, adequate, and likely cause of Sister White's "visions" is some combination of these entirely natural but rather rare conditions.  This conclusion has the advantage of leaving her sincerity and honesty unimpeached.  It leaves her writings as valuable for Christian instruction as they have proved to be in experience, without predicating for them any supernatural accuracy whatever.  They cease to be a criterion of prophetic truth or of Biblical exegesis or of anything else, but they retain such spiritual value as inheres in the writings of all Spirit filled Christian ministers.

Anyone studying this matter ought at least to read the following references, all of which are readily available here in Washington.

 

A System of Practical Medicine

by American Authors, Edited by William Pepper, M.D., LL.D., assisted by Louis Star, M.D.

Volume V.  Diseases of the Nervous System.

The following articles all by Charles K. Wills [?], M.D.

"Hysteria," pages 205-287.

"Hystero-Epilepsy," pages 288-313.

"Catalepsy," pages 314-338.

"Ecstasy," pages 339-352.

This book is available at the Library of the Army Medical Museum, corner of Seventh Street and Independence Avenue, S.W.

 

The Southern Literary Messenger, Vol. V, No. VII.

Richmond, July 1839, pages 433-438.

This is available at the Congressional Library.

 

The Journal of Psychological Medicine, A Quarterly Review of Diseases of the Nervous System, Medical Jurisprudence, and Anthropology.

Vol. IV, No. 4.  October 1870.

"Notes on Ecstasy and other Dramatic Disorders of the Nervous System," by Meredith Clymer, M.D., pages 657-688.

 

The Surprising Case of Rachel Baker  (Some editions titled Devotional Somnium)

Mais, Charles (Reporter)

Congressional Library Rare Book Room

Call Number AC901.M5  913. No. 9

(I have this on micro-film)

 

The Detroit Medical Journal, Vol. VI.  No. 3.  March, 1906, page 99

"Clinical Reports -- Two Cases of Catalepsy."

By W. J. Macdonald, M.D., St. Catherines, Ont.

This is available at the Army Medical Library.

 

The Medical Times and Hospital Gazette

London:  August 5, 1905, page 423.

"Case of Catalepsy," by Charles H. Miles.

This is available at the Army Medical Library.

 

Hypnotism

Moll, Dr. Albert

Translated by Arthur F. Hopkirk

New York: Charles Scribner's Sons.  1889.

Pages 87, 88, 122, 123, 124, 465, 466.

I found this at the City Library, Corner of Seventh St. and New York Aver.

 

The Monthly Homeopathic Review

London.  Vol. XLVII.  December 1, 1903, pages 726, 727.

"A Case of Catalepsy," by Stanley Wilds.

This is available at the Army Medical Library.

 

A Dictionary of Miracles

Brewer, E. Cobham

Philadelphia.  J. B. Lippincott Co.  1934.

Article "Trance," pages 308-314.

This is in Reading Room Reference (Alcove), Congressional Library.

 

Archives of Electrology and Neurology, A Journal of Electro-Therapeutics and Nervous Diseases.

May, 1875, pages 78-121.

"The Nature and Phenomena of Trance," by George M. Beard, M.D.

 

The Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, Jan. 1877.

Edited by J. S. Jewell, M.D., Professor of Nervous and Mental Diseases in Chicago Medical College, and H. M. Bannister, M.D.

 

A New Theory of Trance, and Its Bearings on Human Testimony

George M. Beard, M.D., pages 1-47.

(Read before the New York Medico-Legal Society, November 1, 1876.)

 

AESCULAPE, 1913, Pages 236-240.

L'Amour Mystique

Par le Docteur Charles Guilbert (de Paris).

The pictures are of special interest in this.  Available at the Army Medical Library.

 

Journal de Psychologie, Paris, 1925, pages 369-420, 465-499.

Les Etats De Consolation et Les Extases, pp. 369-420.

Les Sentiments De Joie dans L'Extase, pp. 465-499.  Par Pierre Janet.

Available at the Army Medical Library.

These last mentioned articles by Pierre Janet are especially interesting.   Pierre Janet, M.D. was Professor of Psychology in the College de France, and Director of the Psychological Laboratory in the clinic of the Salpetriere.  In 1906 he delivered a series of lectures on Hysteria in the Harvard Medical School and also lectured at Johns Hopkins University and in the Medical School of Columbia University.   These lectures were published in 1907 by Macmillan as The Major Symptoms of Hysteria.  He is also the author of a book Neuroses et Idees Fixes, Paris, 1898.  On pages 94-99 of this book is an interesting account of an "extatique."  However, this is not nearly so valuable as the articles in the Journal de Psychologie, mentioned above.

 

I have studied numerous other references, but these are representative, and perhaps sufficient.  The indexes list many German works on this subject, but as I do not read German, I have not been able to use them.  For those who read German the indexes should be a sufficient guide.