In a blog on this website dated 25 October 2011, I mentioned that “The Ellen White Project” editors intend to pass a book manuscript to a major academic publisher this month. This brief comment evoked questions from as far away as Russia, so in response I will seek to answer some of the main questions that are in my readers’ minds.

The manuscript hopes to provide a scholarly introduction to Ellen White in the context of American religious history. I feel deeply privileged to have been chosen as one of 21 chapter authors, in that I am an Australian. Oh yes, Joan and I have lived for almost eight years in such states as Illinois, Michigan and California, and I know many of the other authors personally. But the project looks at Ellen White as “an American prophet”; my special interests are illustrated by the content of my MLitt and PhD theses completed for Australian universities. In other words, Ellen White spent the years 1891-1900 in New Zealand and Australia; I am interested in her entire life (1827-1915), but I want to explore the 87 years with special reference to her nine years “Down Under.”

This American project is an exciting one in both conception and execution. The most controversial book ever published by our church came from the press in 1957, and a group of brave scholars decided that after almost fifty years it may be appropriate to try to understand the book and its reception. The result: a landmark conference at Andrews University marking the first fifty years of Seventh-day Adventists Answer Questions on Doctrine. I had long wanted to say what was in my paper; now my perspectives can be interpreted within the balancing opinions of the other presenters. All the papers are conveniently available on the Andrews University site: qod.andrews.edu. Why mention this project here? Because it encouraged the editors of The Ellen White Project to plan an exploration of Ellen White’s life and thought in a similarly open manner.

The way the editors followed through with their objective is impressive, to say the least. One of their early tasks was to define the project and select 21 authors to draft chapters. Then they selected two respondents to read each chapter: one an Adventist, the other a competent scholar in North American religious history from beyond the borders of our church. At the conference in Portland, Maine, held during October 2009, each author was given several minutes to profile their chapter (it was already in the hands of all the attendees) before the respondents delivered their assessment. Then the chapter and the responses were discussed in an open forum. After that, the editors and authors had almost two years of dialogue to refine the text ready for presentation to a major academic publisher.

I don’t need to go into more detail about all this, since blogs by both Adventist and non-Adventist participants are freely available on the Internet (Google “The Ellen White Project”). I sincerely believe that the book will meet its primary purpose, to introduce Ellen White to intelligent, non-Adventist readers.

During the turmoil of 1980, our Adventist co-founder was in the eye of a violent storm. I decided to enroll in a public university to write a thesis about her. I already had a couple of master degrees and a doctorate, but they were in areas like Systematic Theology, Ministry and Biblical Studies. Now I was starting again, in another discipline, history. So I had to attend undergraduate lectures and write papers in historical studies before I could even start graduate research. Then, one of the requirements at the time for the course I chose (MLitt) was for each student to present their project to a combined gathering of history lecturers and graduate students. That day stands out clearly in my memory. I was amazed at the level of interest that hard-nosed historians and graduate students had in Ellen Gould White.

I was under pressure in that first post-graduate degree in historical studies, in that a Distinction was required in order to gain entry into the PhD research that I wanted to undertake. Yesterday I had occasion to review my papers and articles that Bille Burdick has so efficiently placed on sdanet.org/atissue, between 1998 and 2009. It is obvious that in those pieces of writing I am trying to function as a believer who is also an historian.

That is why some readers are deeply upset with what I write. On one side, some want only expressions of faith. On the other side, some want only the perspectives of history. I have tried to offer both. I will, in due course review The Ellen White Project through both those lenses. That, I know, is unacceptable to some friends that I cherish, but I must be true to my convictions. Ellen White assures us that “we have nothing to fear” with reference to the future, except as we forget how the Lord has led and taught us in the past.

Arthur Patrick, 26 October 2011

One of my cherished documents is a photocopy of Hiram Edson’s handwritten account of his experience in Millerism and early Sabbatarian Adventism. Edson’s narrative underlines the pervasive impact of his dark experience on 22 October 1844. When Dr Richard B. Ferret speaks, tomorrow, at Avondale College of Higher Education on “Doctrine or Deed: Ongoing Tensions in Adventism,” his stimulating message will be deliberately timed for the 167th anniversary of the Great Disappointment.

Rick’s doctoral thesis on the development of Adventism won a prestigious award from the Sydney College of Divinity in 2006; he now lectures in Avondale’s Faculty of Theology. Incidentally, his address will be available on a CD from the College Church Office, so that anyone, anywhere, can share the last of the six Educational Events planned for College Church members and their friends during 2011. Some of the readers of this website may like to scan an earlier report that I prepared at the time Rick finished his doctoral study, before he turned it into a scintillating book that was published in England (2008).

AFTER RICHARD FERRET: SHOULD ADVENTISTS BAPTIZE SOCIOLOGY, NOW?

The Millerites who embraced the practice of baptism by immersion did so with deep conviction and a sense of intense urgency, as when Charles Fitch immersed successive groups of believers on a single day shortly before 22 October 1844. For Adventists now, baptism not only recapitulates the death, burial and resurrection of Christ: it also incorporates the believer into a remnant community that cherishes boundaries completely unknown to Fitch. Baptism is an act of acceptance that usually follows an extended period of instruction and requires formal approval from a congregation, typically through its elders and church board. North American evangelists like Fordyce Detamore pioneered ways to prepare candidates for baptism during three-week campaigns; however, in some mission fields, converts have at times spent years in a “class ready” (to employ a term from Papua New Guinea) prior to immersion.

Historical studies, in a sense, began “instruction for baptism” into Adventism eight decades ago when Everett Dick enrolled at the University of Wisconsin. The quality of Dick’s research and the maturity of his conclusions indicate his dissertation was worthy of incorporatation without delay into the thought and life of the Adventist community. Eminent authors like Francis D. Nichol (1944) and LeRoy Edwin Froom (1954) used Dick’s dissertation but declined to mention it in their Review and Herald publications. After six decades, historian Gary Land wrote a Foreword and an extended Bibliographical Essay for Dick’s dissertation when Andrews University Press decided to publish it (1994). However, during the long wait for recognition, the church lost much of Dick’s potential—instead of Adventist history, he focused his historical skills on the American frontier.

Painful terminations and covert marginalisations of Adventist historians for alleged heresy marred the church’s record for more than a decade after 1975. However, even by 1978, constructive initiatives were evident, when Gary Land contended that the professionalisation of Adventist historiography was in process and when, in 1979, the first textbook for the study of Adventist history to be written by a trained historian came from Pacific Press. During 1983, Adventism in America: A History was edited by Land and published by Eerdmans, the only volume of a projected Studies in Adventist History series to see the light of day. By then the indefatiguable George Knight was getting equipped to write books at about the rate some scholars produce articles. Slowly and painfully, the discipline of Adventist history reached a level of acceptance that indicated its Adventist “baptism” was a recognized reality.

Sociology’s Turn for Instruction

Two early initiatives highlighting the value of sociology for Adventism came in the writings of North American Charles Teel (1980) and Fijian/Australian Robert Wolfgramm (1983). Ronald Lawson, trained in history and sociology, patiently conducted interviews with Adventists worldwide; some of the finest journals of their genre published his perspectives. Gregory Schneider’s sociological study of Methodism and his Spectrum articles on Adventism caused us to wish Schneider would apply his toolkit to the study of Adventism more fully. In Australia, building to some extent on pioneering research by John Knight at the University of Queensland, Harry Ballis and others employed sociology in their studies of Adventist ministry, education and publishing. Such master and doctoral studies indicate that sociological insights may at times be uncomfortable for the Adventist church but they may also be particularly instructive.

Enter Rick Ferret

For the past seven years Rick Ferret has juggled the demands of employment while undertaking a doctoral program with the Sydney College of Divinity (SCD). Early this year when Ferret completed his dissertation, the SCD appointed three examiners to assess it and provided them with fifteen criteria to apply in the process of evaluation. On Friday, 4 August 2006, the SCD advised Ferret that the reports were in hand: all three examiners rated Ferret’s work in Category A, accepting it as meeting the requirements for a PhD degree without change of argument or content. The comments of one typify the general tone of all: “the research is particularly thorough, academically responsible, historically accurate and complete, balanced, its conclusions credible, and expressed with a suitable academic precision.”

The two examiners in the United States and the one in Australia share long experience in higher education with particular expertise in history, theology and sociology; they were chosen by the SCD as matching well the historical substance of the dissertation, its theological content and its sociological orientation. Ferret’s title, “Charisma, Sectarianism and Institutionalisation: Identity Issues in Seventh-day Adventism,” developed from long years of struggle with the history of his church since 1844, including its teachings and its controversies. His bibliography (pages 384-416) indicates a thorough grasp of the diverse literature.

Ferret claims that “Seventh-day Adventism has proved immensely successful in terms of both evangelism and institutionalisation.” He also states:”The proliferation of SDA institutions throughout the world suggests, however, that Adventism remains embroiled in tensions between imminence and occupancy; between apocalyptic ideals and modern realities, between what it teaches and what it actually does (361-2).”

Light on the Dilemma

Ferret retains some of the patience and active listening skills fostered by his initial training as a nurse, to which he has added the insights of tertiary teacher, chaplain and pastor. To read his dissertation is to note the effective way that he incorporates published studies of Adventism like those of Rolf Pöhler (1999, 2001) and Douglas Morgan (2001). Pöhler’s dissertation at Andrews University investigated the nature, extent and direction of Adventist doctrinal developments in the light of the religious background of the church and the sociological forces at work in it, analysing the Adventist response to doctrinal adjustments and discussing Ellen White’s involvement in and conception of doctrinal change. Based on Pöhler’s work, Ferret argues that Adventist teachings have been significantly affected by theological and hermeneutical developments under the impact of sociological forces that have tended to move the denomination closer towards evangelical Protestantism. Ferret also finds Morgan’s dissertation written at the University of Chicago particularly illuminating in the way it traces continuity and change in Adventist apocalypticism within American society.

However, Ferret also draws upon the insights of many other major researchers. He cites Michael Chamberlains’ trans-disciplinary study (2001, later published by Post Pressed) of Adventist education at Avondale College with its special interest in socio-cultural change and the associated need to develop a thoroughly informed hermeneutic for Ellen White’s writings. Ferret is clearly appreciative of Bruce Manners’ dissertation (2004) and its implication that Adventist publishing is at its finest when it is frank. However, although Ferret drinks from many deep wells, he provides his own cup: an interpretive model that (he claims) fits the church’s need.

An Overview of Adventism

Ferret’s exploration begins with Millerism and the painful transition that birthed Sabbatarian Adventism. A long introduction (pages 9-51) introduces Weberian methodology, defines charisma, legitimation, and its routinization. Chapter 2, “American Revivalism, Millennial Dreams, Crisis and Charismatic Inauguration” prepares the way for two chapters on how Ellen White’s charisma was legitimized and Adventist identity was formulated. Chapters 4 and 5 (“The Routinisation of Charisma in Adventist Experience,” “Imminence and Delay: A Constant Impasse”) prepare the reader for two chapters that tour the sectarian controversies within Adventism from 1844 to the present. Chapter 8, “Doctrine and/or Deed: Dilemmas of Institutionalisation” summarises the main issue of the dissertation in readiness for ten pages of conclusions.

I finished reading a compelling PhD study by Paul McGraw of Pacific Union College on the day that Ferret received notice of his examiners’ approvals. McGraw intimated the nature of his research at the Triennial Session of the Association of Seventh-day Adventist Historians in Portland, Oregon, on 11 April 1998; now his 315 pages fulfil the high expectations that seemed latent in his project eight years ago.2 I almost held my breath as I re-read Ferret’s final copy in the light of McGraw’s dissertation: both plough some of the same ground. The two studies are vastly different in methodology: McGraw uses well copious and often new primary sources; Ferret offers fresh syntheses and applications of existing literature. Both dissertations are greatly needed by the church, not least because they demonstrate why two scholars working in total isolation from each other arrived at congruent conclusions.

Adventism in the Information Age

Ferret observes that the student of SDA theology “can easily recognise the themes of restorationism, perfectionism, Arminianism and revivalism that were common” in the society that birthed Adventism as one of 279 utopian communities established in the United States between 1787 and 1919. While he displays a deep commitment to the Adventist pioneers who transformed a Great Disappointment into a dynamic new movement, he wants contemporary Adventists to better implement Scripture as the church’s authority. He deems that in the controversies of the past generally, and particularly in those occurring since the Evangelical Conferences of the 1950s, too many of his fellow believers have polarised around rival extremes that may be described as reversionist or rejectionist. Ferret’s advocacy of a transformationist response to new data will resonate with those who seriously accept Ellen White as “the Lord’s messenger,” given to us as a lesser light to lead us to the greater light.

A Subjective Interpretation

What potential is evident in Ferret’s work? It will stand the test of time and scrutiny as well as prove to have outstanding significance for the lively, ongoing discussion relating to Adventist identity. How might we compare it with other explorations of Adventism?

I write merely as an historian. My passion during the Adventist crisis of the 1980s was to interpret Ellen White’s nine years in the lands Down Under faithfully, in terms of the cultural and religious context in which she ministered between 1891 and 1900 and in the light of newly-available primary sources. For me, that task required a stimulating decade of research in order to understand something of Australian history, via a PhD program at the University of Newcastle. One by-product of the process was the opportunity to note the contribution of Australia’s pioneer explorers as they traversed this vast, dry continent, seeing it with European eyes for the first time. Some of my United States friends equate a journey of similar rigor undertaken by Lewis and Clark as highly important within their culture. Before Lewis and Clark, Americans knew there was a West Coast with its Pacific Ocean. But was there a way from the Mississippi River via the Missouri and the Columbia to the Pacific? The courage, skill and effort of Lewis and Clark demonstrated that there was.

A major reason why Adventism lost so many ministers, teachers and members during the 1980s lay in our inadequate understanding of continuity and change with reference to Adventist teaching. Rolf Pöhler fills for Adventism a Lewis and Clark role, demonstrating with his Andrews University dissertation of 1995 that change was a reality and that it could be constructive if we related to it coherently. There was a way through the Rocky Mountains of Adventist controversies; equipped with the grace and the graciousness of God the rivers could be forded and the dangerous passes negotiated.

Rick Ferret cannot redo the more pioneering explorations already undertaken by Rolf Pöhler and others; he is a mapmaker for some of the road construction that is needed for the Adventist journey toward the Kingdom of God. Ferret adds to the growing evidence that historical and theological studies are crucial for our self-understanding and mission. More than that, his dissertation offers convincing evidence that it is time for the Adventist church to plan another baptismal service. Sociology has been in a “class ready” long enough; it has now proved itself as a constructive discipline that can reliably assist the Adventist quest to understand the way the Lord has led and taught us since 1844.

Let’s baptize this illuminating social science. Now. Without further delay!

Written by Arthur Patrick in 2006, slightly edited and then posted 21 and 23 October 2011

My readers may appreciate a short biography of Rolf Pöhler, since he has lived mainly in Europe and the United States, and has not yet visited Australia.

Rolf J. Pöhler (1949) was born and raised in Germany, the heartland of the Protestant Reformation. After his pastoral training at Seminar Marienhöhe in Darmstadt and some work experience in Berlin, he attended Andrews University (Michigan, USA), where he earned MA and PhD degrees in theology in 1975 and 1995, respectively. His doctoral dissertation is entitled “Change in Seventh-day Adventist Theology.” It was published in two volumes by Peter Lang (1999 and 2000) and deals with the dynamics of doctrinal continuity and change from a historical and hermeneutical perspective.

For 16 years, Pöhler has served the Adventist Church as church pastor, departmental director, and union president. For the last 20 years, he has been Lecturer of Systematic Theology at Friedensau Adventist University in Germany. He is the Director of the newly founded Institute of Adventist Studies at Friedensau. Pöhler has edited and published several books in German, including an introduction to Adventism for the general public (Christsein heute – Gelebter Glaube) and a contemporary presentation of the Fundamental Beliefs of Seventh-day Adventists (Hoffnung, die uns trägt). In addition, he has published well over 200 articles in scholarly and popular journals.

Pöhler is an internationally acclaimed preacher, speaker, author and lecturer; he has been teaching at several European Adventist seminaries. He is married to Regine and has two children.

Why is Dr Pöhler’s visit likely to be significant? First of all, his doctoral dissertation is (in my opinion) the most thorough study yet undertaken on continuity and change in Adventist teaching. Back in the late 1970s, I read a major paper that he had written at Andrews University and made a mental note that we would hear more of this student in the coming years. My hunch was not only fulfilled but greatly enhanced when his doctoral dissertation, completed in 1995, at last reached Australia. I reviewed it for the South Pacific Division paper and, since then, have watched as many others have come to appreciate its depth and clarity.

Second, Dr Pöhler’s publications demonstrate his deep commitment to the church we love.

Third, although English is not his first language, Dr Pöhler has long demonstrated his ability to communicate with English-speaking audiences, especially “thinking believers,” the type of people that this website is designed to serve.

Adventists often access Revelation seminar materials through the Ministerial Association of their local conference or from the Resource Centre of the Australian Union Conference (PO Box 4368, Ringwood, Vic 3134, Australia). It is the intention of the South Pacific Division to market the excellent DVDs on Revelation developed by Dr Graeme Bradford (a well-known Australian evangelist) and Dr John Paulien (a world-recognised New Testament exegete and Dean of the School of Religion at Loma Linda University in the US) to local churches and conferences as economically as possible. Readers of adventiststudies.com can go to the website <revelationhope.com> to see more about the materials by Doctors Bradford and Paulien that are available at the lowest price. Currently, the Revelation program features on Hope Channel each Saturday afternoon around 4pm. It can be also picked up on broadband under Hope Channel, international live programs.

When I am trying to focus the interest of church attendees on the excellent DVD series that Dr Bradford and Dr Paulien have developed, I offer a sermon something along the following lines. (Bear in mind that this is a summary only, not a transcript.)

“The Revelation of Jesus Christ”

Scripture Reading: Revelation 1:9-18, NIV.

 I’ve read a fascinating book many times recently. Some books you need to read only once. However, I get more out of this book every time I read it, and I’ve been doing that for sixty years. Read Revelation 1:1.

So the first thing to emphasise is that this is “The revelation of Jesus Christ.” Revelation is an interesting term. It literally means a disclosure, revelation, manifestation, appearance, or a big dose of spiritual enlightenment. The verb is usually translated to uncover, to reveal, to plainly signify, to distinctly declare, to set forth, to announce, to manifest.

Our society throws the original Greek word around a lot, like in the arresting movie “Apocalypse Now.” A whole body of Jewish writing is described as “apocalyptic literature.” Just as the Bible has history (Kings, Chronicles), and poetry (Psalms), it also has apocalyptic embedded in various books of the Old Testament and the New. We Adventists know and love best the apocalyptic books of Daniel and Revelation.

How can we recognise apocalyptic when we see it? Well, it abounds in symbols of many kinds, including symbolic numbers. Angels populate apocalyptic. It is a literature of crisis, suffused with a sense of immediacy, urgency and expectation. It claims to offer dreams and visions about realities usually unseen by mortal eyes. It is often associated with another mysterious word, eschatology. That one isn’t so hard to understand if we break it up. Eschatology has two parts: eschatos, last, and logos, word. So eschatology is simply a word about last things, like death or the end of the world. One is a personal end, your death or mine. The other is a cosmic death, the end of the planet.

So the last book of the Bible is an apocalypse about, or a revelation of, Jesus Christ. We could expect vivid, poetic descriptions of him in such writing. There are a great many; let’s notice four examples.

Chapter 1:17-18, “the Living One”; chapter 5:6, “a slain lamb”; chapter 12:5, “a man child”; 14:14-16 “a son of man” with a sickle; a rider on a white horse who is “King of kings and Lord of lords,” 19:11,16.

Who could write an apocalypse about Jesus? It would help a bit if you knew him well on earth, and had written a book about him and letters to your friends about him. Cf. John 20:30-31; I John 1:1. It would help even more if you saw panoramic visions of him as Living Redeemer, Slain Lamb, Gatherer of Earth’s Harvest, King of Kings. John the Beloved Apostle fits the need so well!

A sermon at best can be an effective starter for our journeys through the coming week. I’d like nothing more than that you actually picked up the Bible and read Revelation this week. You’ll be mystified, frustrated, enthralled, inspired and much more. Almost all human learning happens when we try to overcome some obstacle, some barrier. Parts of Revelation certainly pose obstacles for us to overcome. But some parts are so clear we can be sure about what they mean. Here, for starters, are seven things that may be of some help to you as you read this scintillating apocalypse. (Seven, because you’ll find so many sevens in Revelation!)

1. The first thing I’d like you to notice is that Revelation is a mosaic. We don’t know much about mosaics in our culture, though we do speak of mosaic tiles. A mosaic is a picture made of small pieces of stone or glass, of different colours, inlaid to form a design. John’s culture abounded with mosaic pictures. He wrote a book that is a mosaic of gemstones from the Old Testament. At the College Church we have a half-dozen or more “Educational Events” each year that I coordinate. The first one for this year was a presentation by our newest doctor in the Faculty of Theology who has spent years studying Revelation. I guess I was astounded as to how much of the Book of Revelation, both in ideas and language, is simply a mosaic of Old Testament gemstones put together in a fresh setting.

2. The next thing you need to notice is that the Book of Revelation is a war story. It isn’t a peaceful book, I’m afraid. It is a volume of conflict, between good and evil, righteousness and sin, Christ and Satan. As Adventists, ever since 1858 we have been aware of Ellen White’s growing list of books about The Great Controversy Between Christ and His Angels and Satan and His Angels. Revelation, the final book of the New Testament is a book about conflict, a great war in which the armies of the Living God take the field, and win. It is a war in which every one of us is engaged from the day we are born until the day we die. It is also a strangely different war: a lamb wins by being slain, and redeeming us to God–by his blood.

3. Revelation is a narrative of crisis. All kinds of important things are up for grabs. The destiny of individuals. The justice of God. The fate of the planet. The well-being of the universe. To read it is to be drawn into a compelling narrative.

4. Revelation is also a tale of two cities. The Old Testament depicts a long struggle between Babylon and Jerusalem. One is the city of pride, possessions, self-sufficiency, earthly power. The other is the City of the Prince of Peace. The literal Jerusalem fails, so God revises the hopes of his people with the promised heavenly Jerusalem, the New Jerusalem that comes down from God out of heaven.

5. Revelation includes a series of hymns of praise. It constantly focuses on creation and redemption; see chapters 4, 5, 15, 19, for some instances.

6. Revelation is far more than a story of war, a narrative of crisis, a tale of rival cities, a sublime hymnbook. Yes, there is plenty of tension in it. But Revelation is primarily a Book of Resolution. The towering problem of sin is met, the planet and its people are restored. There will be no more tears, death. The entire universe will be clean, one pulse of harmony and gladness will beat throughout God’s vast creation.

7. So we must end where we began. John’s Book of Revelation is an apocalypse of Jesus, an unveiling of the Risen Lord, slain, but victorious. He came, he is coming to earth a second time. And a third time. He is restoring Eden. He is giving his people a New Jerusalem.

Life in the Christian communities of the first century was precarious. So far as we know, when John wrote Revelation, the other eleven disciples and the Apostle Paul were already long dead, perhaps none of them from natural causes. Acts 12:2 tells us that Herod had James “put to death with the sword.” Peter, tradition suggests, was crucified upside down. Paul was beheaded. But John, the youngest of the disciples survived, it seems, for sixty years after the crucifixion. Then the Roman authorities decided they must get rid of him. How? Fry him. Evidently they prepared a huge cauldron of boiling-hot oil, and strong men lifted the aged saint high and threw him in. The Lord looked after John just as well in the bubbling oil as he cared for the three Hebrews in the burning fiery furnace back in that other apocalypse, Daniel. What to do with the unfryable Apostle John? Banish him to the rocky island in the Aegean Sea, Patmos.

Revelation 1:9-11. The seven churches were just like ours: College Church, Port Macquarie, Wauchope, Mona Vale, Hillview, Kanwal and more. Revelation 1:3 is a promise for us all: “Blessed is the one who reads the words of this prophecy.”

Arthur Patrick, 30 September 2011