WG-03-4. THE WORLD-SYSTEM: ITS ORIGIN

4. THE WORLD-SYSTEM: ITS ORIGIN

MAN’S physical organization is such that he cannot obtain, by any investigation he is able to make, the slightest infor­mation concerning the causes of social conditions as he finds them in the world, or concerning the origin of the human family, or concerning the end towards which the world movements are hastening. Of these and kindred matters he cannot possibly know anything except by Divine revelation. To speculate touching such matters is foolish and irrational in the extreme; for, apart from revelation, we have no data from which in­ferences may be drawn, and no possibility of securing such data. Therefore, to one who inquires concerning things spiritual and unseen, concerning the mysteries of sin, sickness, and death, and concerning the tendency of the human heart to evil, the first question to be settled is, Have we a revelation? If he answers that question in the negative, the inquiry is logically at an end.

We are not here entering upon a discussion of the question whether or not the Bible is true. Even the man who has not for himself decided that question in the affirmative may nevertheless profitably examine the explanation which Holy Scripture gives of the great complex world-system in which he finds himself. After so doing he will be able to test that explanation by the results of his observation, by the whole state of human affairs as revealed to him in his intercourse with his fellow-men and in his daily paper, and by what he finds in his own heart. And it may be that, as the Scriptural explanation sheds its light upon the mysteries and perplexities of human nature and human history, he may not only come to comprehend the mysteries, but may also (which is of greater importance) come to realize that the light whereby he has explored them is indeed Divine.

Scripture says that the state of humanity in all its phases is the result of an experimental career upon which the parents of the race embarked with­out the sanction of God and in violation of His express command. It tells us further that the conception of this experiment did not originate with man, but was prompted by a spiritual being of great wisdom and power, who aimed to be man’s leader in spiritual matters and to direct his career. We were not told what were the full results which Satan hoped to accomplish by alienating the human race from God and attaching it to himself, but we do know that he seeks to be worshipped (Luk 4:6-7; Rev 13:4). It is, moreover, evident that his plan did not disclose as its object the destruction or the injury of the race; but that, on the contrary, he represented himself as solicitous for the well-being of humanity, and for the achievement by it of the best possible results that are attainable apart from God.

Because of ignorance of what the Scriptures teach about Satan many people would violently resent the statement that the world is following his leadership. This, however, is not an occasion for a show of resentment. No candid person will deny that the enterprise upon which men are engaged consists essentially in the attempt to organize the best possible world, and to achieve the best possible conditions that can be attained apart from God.

Who, then, is the god of this world; that is, its spiritual leader and organizer, the person according to whose ideals its activities are planned and its course directed? Satan himself declared that all the kingdoms of the earth and the glory of them are his, and that he can “give them to whomsoever he will” (Luk 4:5-6). This is a startling statement, and is not one of his lies, for Scripture repeatedly confirms the statement that Satan is the prince and god of this world (John 12:31; John 14:30;xvi. 11; Acts 26:18; 2Co 4:4). We wish to grasp the import of this statement, and then to test its probability by our observations of the great and complex world-system which envelops us.

Scripture tells us further that the parents of our race were attracted by the supposed advantages of the career upon which Satan urged them to embark, the chief characteristic of that career (as set forth by the tempter) being the opportunity for progress or self-improvement through the pursuit and acquisition of knowledge. The first human pair exercised their power of choice by accepting the career thus offered to them, thereby committing the race to the consequences of that choice, the first consequence being death, or separation from God. Here again we pause to note that the Bible is the only Book which offers an explanation of the stupendous fact of death. Infidel philosophy can but ignore it. Why should man die? Infidel philosophy can give no answer.

According to Scripture, therefore, we have in the world-system around us the consequence of the acceptance by the human family of Satan’s programme and leadership, it having pleased God in His wisdom to permit the working out of this experiment until His time shall come for bringing it to its inevitable end.

It is particularly to be observed in the Scripture narrative that the Satanic programme, spread before the first man and woman, contained only what the natural mind adjudges to be a desirable and legitimate object of pursuit. Only one thing stood in the way, namely, a Divine commandment which to all appearance was arbitrary. Under the force of plausible reasoning that restraint was overcome. God’s wisdom and His love in imposing it were called in question. Man then, for the first time, set himself to do what he has been prone to do ever since—namely, to question and pass judgment upon the expediency of a Divine commandment. He became, in a word, a “higher critic”; that is to say, a man who assumes to criticize the Word of God. Thus it was that the human family entered upon the stupendous experiment of devising a world-system according to Satanic principles. The account of this momentous event given us in Scripture is exceedingly brief, but every word is charged with a Divine wealth of meaning. The brevity of the account is one of its Divine characteristics, since no human author could have dealt with such an event in that fashion. God does not tell us why, in the moral government of His universe and in the sight of His spiritual creatures, it was necessary that the great human experiment should be suffered to unfold itself through long centuries, until its failure should be demonstrated at every point; but He has seen fit to give us in concise form the history of the event which is the cause of all that confronts us in the world around.

Let us study that history, and the more attentively because it is, as a rule, grossly distorted and grievously misunderstood. And let us not fear to scrutinize it with the utmost rigidity, know­ing that, if the account be true, we have here the germ from which all human history, with its cries and tears, “its oceans of blood and continents of misery,” has unfolded. If God has given this account, it will not be an allegory. He will not mock us in detailing the tragedy of His creation. If it be true, we shall read its truth in the social conditions of all the ages, and in the nature of each human heart. If it be true, its impress will certainly be observable upon the whole course of human affairs.