How about, "These relate to future events which will be disclosed in their order"? In addition, I believe most anything Ellen White said relate to time after 1844.

You're in the majority Rosangela. Most of the church thinks when Ellen White says "These relate to future events which will be disclosed. . . " she is talking about the past! You confirm my point that these plain statements I've posted are as obscure to many of us as the prophecies regarding the first Advent of Christ were obscure to the Jews.

One of the reasons for this state of affairs is that many of us discount statements that don't support our views. I put this little compilation together hoping that some would see the internal consistency in EGWhite's statements; when you put them together rather than taking them in isolation and discounting them, the evidence is overwhelming that she believed and taught that much more of Daniel and Revelation applies now and to the future than what the church allows.

I bring this up because the destiny of the church is at stake. I believe she is correct in stating that a clearer understanding of Daniel and Revelation will be the means of the final revival leading to the latter rain and the return of Christ. If the view of the church on the prophecies contained in these two books was accurate she wouldn't make such an assertion. But as the scripture states, Laodicea believes it knows and understands all of the essential truths contained in the prophecies notwithstanding the testimony of Christ and the prophets to the contrary. We feign humility but refuse to be taught.

Mark and kland,
I don't see the double fulfillment of time prophecies as having a basis. If you think that the seven trumpets, in the same way as the plagues, weren't yet fulfilled, and that they probably will have a future fulfillment, this is OK to me. What I don't see as OK is saying that they had a historic fulfillment but will have also a future fulfillment. This is mixing historicism with futurism. Like when it is said that the 1260 days are both 1260 years in the past and 1260 days in the future. This is completely inconsistent. Still worse, it smells like Ford's apotelesmatic principle.

Mark, I agree with your realization, and its practical Church implication, here that much more can be learned for an application in our day from the prophecies of Daniel and Revelation. In fact my blog deals with many of the SOP quotes you have referred to, also exegetically delving into their elucidating Biblical context. So you may find many of my blog posts pertinently helpful here. (The cited Post Titles/Subjects/Bible|SOP reference should suffice in finding the pertinent posts, if you have any specific reference question let me know.

As a most thematically pertinent starter, I would recommend the “Unrolling of the Scroll” (Rev 5|Dan 10-12|Rev 10-11) post which stemmed from EGW’s ‘Mark of the Beast further understanding’ statement in GCDB, March 2, 1899 par. 3 (cf. 6T 17 (1900)). (You can comment on my blog posts in this discussion forum.)

Might want to define those terms.


Are there one or two 1260s? I believe there is only one 1290 and 1335. But, could there be two 1260s? If the 1290 relates to the 1260 and the 1290 applies to the future, and we know the 1260 applies to the past, then could it mean there are two 1260s?

And if the 1290 doesn't apply to the future, then what part of Daniel 12 "is a warning that we shall all need to understand before the time of the end"?

In the historicist view, there is a figurative interpretation of the time periods of eschatological prophecies (a day for a year). Thus, these prophecies have a long-range nature. In the futurist view, there is a literal interpretation of the time periods of eschatological prophecies (a day for a day). Thus, these prophecies have a short-range nature. For historicists, all eschatological time-prophecies have already been fulfilled; for futurists, none of them has been fulfilled yet. It’s obvious that both methods are incompatible and can’t be mixed. You must have a standard to interpret eschatological time periods – either literally or figuratively; it can’t be both.


Even if there were two, either both would have to be literal, or both figurative.


Why would it apply to the future?


The passage says:

The people of God need to study what characters they must form in order to pass through the test and proving of the last days. Many are living in spiritual weakness and backsliding. They know not what they believe. Let us read and study the twelfth chapter of Daniel. It is a warning that we shall all need to understand before the time of the end. There are ministers claiming to believe the truth who are not sanctified through the truth. Unless a change comes in their lives, they will say, "My Lord delayeth His coming." {15MR 228.2}

To me, Ellen White is referring simply to "the test and proving" of character that will occur before/during the time of trouble mentioned in v. 1, 10. The emphasis in the passage is not time periods, but character.

Roseangela: I agree in part with your understanding here. Namely that post 1844 there are no longer applicable time elements in any prophecy that may be fulfilled, even spiritually re-fulfilled post 1844 as per the clear SOP statements towards this. However, as just stated, I indeed do not see that this precludes a typological/spiritual re-fulfillment of the prophecy, as it is seen with the three ways of fulfillment in Christ’s Olivet discourse. The book of revelation also has a Literal (Chapter 2&3), Historical (ca. 4-13:10) and Eschatological (13:11-21) [Ch. 22 = post GC] waves of fulfillment, however, as I substantively see it, certain parts in the other waves can have partial/typological/spiritual fulfillment in the current waves when/as the prophetic/development need/reality is.

NJK,

Yes, some prophecies may have a double fulfillment, but not prophecies with a time element, specially if this forces you to use two different systems of interpretation, for these systems of interpretation are mutually exclusive. For instance, Ford defends multiple fulfillments, but for this he had to abandon historicism and opt for preterism.

Rosangela,

I actually would not see a problem of having a double fulfillment of a time prophecy with one (i.e., the historical) having a symbolic day for a year time and the eschatological having a literal day understanding. That is because the two fulfillements don’t have to literally be the same. They just come to involve the same Spiritual elements which equally lead to matching applicable fulfillments. The only reason why I do not see this as Biblical, indeed contrary to even some SDA preachers/expositors, are because of the SOP’s many, clear and unequivocal “I was shown” statements opposing this for eschatological prophecies. (E.g., 2SM 73 (1885), 10MR 270 (1888); 272 (1891); 7BC 971 (1900); cf. LDE 35-36; RH, November 1, 1850 par. 12; cf. RH, Nov. 22, 1892 par. 7.) Clearly God wanted to make this clear. (Interestingly enough a literal time fulfillment would be seen in a local/literal fulfillment wave, however the time elements prophecies in Revelation’s prophecies don’t have such fulfillments, and also no time element was found in Christ’s Olivet discourse which did have this Local/Literal fulfillment.).

However, as expounded upon in this post for the “42 months element” of Rev 11:2, I do see that the fulfillment of a Historical time element in a prophecy, if the prophecy as a whole is eschatologically re-fulfilled, can come to indicate a key aspect of how to expect to see that eschatological fulfillment. (I.e., for Rev 11:2, the “42 months” = Rev 13:5 fulfillment which were historically fulfilled in the time when the Catholic Church having was allowed to have power to act, even over God’s People/Truth. So, as I have shown in that post, the Two Witnesses prophecies has an eschatological fulfillment which parallels, especially thematically the Historical fulfillment, but no symbolic or literal time element is involved. Only a Spiritual indication is provided by that time element for its Eschatological fulfillment.

My Theological understanding, also based upon my understanding of God and the Future for this ‘no calculative/“reckonable” time in Eschatological prophecies is that (a) God now expects his people to live according to the prophetic faith that the Historical time fulfillments have provided and (b) Christ’s coming could, in the Eschatological Wave, occur imminently, i.e., at any moment (as I understand it, based on Rev 8:1 & EW 16 (see Note #1 in here), within half a day), whenever, either the work will be finished or when, in an extreme, possible, emergency, there could be a development where the lives of God’s faithful remnant people is decidedly and capably threatened (however, as God’s Prescient Wisdom “knows”, this is not likely to occur without all predicted Final events which end up in this “Death Decree” to first unravel as “planned”). So any of these time elements would be cut short, or even extended if those final events had not yet be fully unravelled or begun to develop. (I know that Classic Foreknoweldge subscribers see that God has already seen the Future and symbolocially related it, I however see that God has “prognosticated” what is likely to happen and set out the best plan for this to be developed in a GC context, and Eschatologically, where the utter end will come, it will be the natural passions and will of man, especially when “influenced” by the released Four Winds, which will come to self determine this end, and all of this will be a direct counteracting reaction to/against the increasing success of the Church in spreading the Final Gospel message.

The key in the Eschatological Age/Wave of prophecy is acting in Faith to Finish God’s Work and not by “faithlessly/basely seeking a sign” (Matt 16:1-4), in a time to be fulfilled, as many rebellious SDA’s (e.g., David Gates, even Doug Batchelor priorly, to a certain predictive point (see details of both in this blog post) have spuriously tried to claim/do.

Guess I was mistaken and should have asked you to contrast Preterism with Futurism. I had to look it up and saw there was a difference, though not sure exactly, with historicism. The way I understand it is that papacy was disturbed by how the scriptures (Daniel 7) pointed to them. So they got jesuit Ribera to come up with futurism, which took the 1260 years and said, that's 3.5 years and is way far in the future. At the same time, jesuit Alcazar came up with preterism which took the 1260 years and said, no, no, that's 3.5 years and it's way in the past. That is, anything to say it didn't cover the Protestant's interpretation of Daniel 7.

Would you be saying that once a number is interpreted all occurrences of the number mean the same?

How do you conclude it doesn't? It is first listed in chapter 12, so you can't say it's been interpreted to mean the past elsewhere and so has to be the same here.

The time of trouble happens in the future, right?