The Prophetic Faith of Our Fathers, vol. 3

III. Begg-Shares Mason’s and Cuninghame’s Views

JAMES A. BEGG; (1800-1868), Scottish writer on prophecy and promulgator of the seventh-day Sabbath, was born in Paisley. His father was a teacher and provided him a liberal education. He was apprenticed to the printing trade, at which he worked for some time. Then he became a bookseller and stationer in Glasgow. He was also “the publisher of a consider able number of works on doctrinal, prophetical, and other Bible subjects,” a persevering student, even to his old age. He excelled in the literary use of the English tongue, and rose to a recognized place among the prophetic authors of his time. ⁴¹ PFF3 560.1

Well known in his Held, Begg was conspicuous in his love for the Bible and for historical and Scriptural research. While especially fond of the prophecies, he also lectured on geology, creation, and the Flood. In his earlier life he was an adherent of the Reformed Presbyterian Church of Scotland. But he came to differ from that church on the question of the prophecies. The second premillennial coming of Christ gripped his heart, and in 1829 he published A Connected View of Some of the Scriptural Evidence of the Redeemer’s Speedy Personal Return. In 1831 he published The, Scriptural Argument for the Coming of the Lord, Letters to a Minister of the Gospel, on his and other Interpretations of our Saviour’s Predictions of His Return, and Christ’s Speedy Return in Glory. In 1832 he wrote a pamphlet, True Cause, of Prevalence of Pestilence, and in 1835 he published Extracts on Prophecy, Chiefly the Approaching Ad vent and Kingdom of Christ. In this he quotes from thirty prominent expositors. PFF3 560.2

Begg was very clear and explicit on the Little Horn as being the papal Antichrist and the Babylon of the prophecies upon whom tremendous judgments were due. Toward the end of his life, however, he drifted into the Futurist view of an individual antichrist yet to come. In common with most British expositors, he stressed the literal restoration of Israel. He also looked forward to the overthrow of Turkey. Among the signs of the approaching end he included spiritism. William Anderson, of Glasgow, spoke highly of Begg’s proclamation of “the truth of the kingdom” in western Scotland. ⁴² “ PFF3 561.1

His last book was titled An Examination of the Authority for a Change of the Weekly Sabbath at the Resurrection of Christ (1850), which brought him prominently before the public. Beginning about 1832, soon after the publishing of his first book on prophecy, Begg began the observance of the seventh-day Sabbath. ⁴³ His espousal of the Sabbath and his personal observance of it thereafter until his death; his contact with the Millerite Signs of the Times in 1840, just after it was started; his offer of articles on the continuing obligation of the seventh-day Sabbath, which they declined; his first communications in the Seventh Day Baptist Sabbath Recorder of New York in May, 1845; ⁴⁴ his articles on “The Original Sabbath Unchanged” in The Recorder, beginning November 13, 1845; ⁴⁵ his publication of An Examination of the Authority for a Change of the Weekly Sabbath; and his baptism in Glasgow, on July 7, 1853, by J. W. Morton, Seventh Day Baptist minister of Plainfield, New Jersey -all form part of a fascinating and unique story. PFF3 561.2

This will be dealt with more fully in connection with the revival of the Sabbath at the time of the expanding Advent Movement in America from 1844 onward. ⁴⁶ It appears that Begg was convinced of the binding obligation of the seventh-day Sabbath by the study of the Word itself, and not initially from con tact with Seventh Day Baptists. ⁴⁷ PFF3 561.3

1. REGRETS QUIBBLE OVER 2-500 YEARS

Begg’s “earliest acquaintance with Unfulfilled Prophecy” was derived from Archibald Mason, his fellow countryman, to whose “occasional pulpit ministrations” he was indebted. ⁴⁸ His Connected View Avas a reply to a series of antagonistic articles in the Christian instructor. He makes frequent allusions to Cuninghame’s writings, as well as those of Faber, Way, Drummond, Irving, and Keith. ⁴⁹ He extolls the study of prophecy, stressing its potential value to the JEWS for determining the time of Messiah’s first appearance and the protection of the early church from loss in the destruction of Jerusalem. ⁵⁰ PFF3 562.1

At the very outset Begg regrets Irving’s unfortunate reference to the Septuagint variation of 2400 instead of 2300. Begg indicates that the original Septuagint reads 2300 for determining the “mighty year of God’s glory.” Such quibbling attitudes, he says, throw “unnecessary doubt upon the certainty of the ‘times’ revealed,” and he makes supporting reference to Cuninghame’s clear evidences. ⁵¹ PFF3 562.2

2. ANTICHRIST DESTROYED BEFORE SECOND ADVENT

Begg holds that Antichrist will be destroyed before the millennium ⁵² -destroyed by the brightness of Christ’s second coming according to Paul. In Daniel 7, alter the four empires, the ten nations into which Rome Avas divided appear, the period of the Little Horn, or “Papal Antichrist,” is followed by the destruction of the Beast with the horns. ⁵³ PFF3 562.3

3. OTHER SYMBOLS OF DESTRUCTION FOR PAPACY

The same destruction is visited by the angel with the seven vials, under the sixth of which the Turkish Empire is dried up, and by the last of which Antichrist is destroyed as well. ⁵⁴ Begg also places the angel of Revelation 14:6, 7, with the “hour of God’s judgments,” just before the destruction of mystic Babylon. ⁵⁵ And with this he lists the final overthrow by the ten horns which have power one hour with the Beast. ⁵⁶ PFF3 562.4

4. PROGRESSIVE OUTLINE OF Daniel 7

The first resurrection, Begg avers, introduces the thousand years. The prophetic outline back of the millennium is thus described: “The seventh chapter [of Daniel] contains, as we have seen in speaking of the destruction of Antichrist, a prediction of four great empires which should exist from the beginning of the captivity till the Millennium. From three of these, viz. the Babylonish, the Persian, and the Grecian, the extensive dominion has long since passed away; and as it was predicted of the fourth or Roman empire, that ‘the ten horns out of this kingdom arc ten kings that shall arise, so was it divided into ten kingdoms, forming the present European dynasties, in which slate it has continued many centuries. The rise of Antichrist was predicted, as a little horn growing up among these horns or kingdoms; on account of whose blasphemies, thrones of judgment for his destruction are represented as being at length set by the Ancient of Days.” ⁵⁷ PFF3 563.1

5. STANDARD OUTLINE OF Daniel 2

In Daniel 2, “the same four monarchies are represented as the various parts of one great image, the Roman empire forming the legs and feet, and its subdivision into the present European kingdoms being here witnessed in the ten toes.” ⁵⁸ The mingling of the iron and clay is “by royal intermarriages.” Then Begg concludes: PFF3 563.2

“But the whole shall be broken to pieces when Christ shall come in the clouds of heaven for the establishment of that Kingdom which ‘shall not be left to other people.’” ⁵⁹ PFF3 563.3

This synchronizes with the sounding of the seventh angel, when the kingdoms of this world become the kingdoms of our Lord and of His Christ, and when the downfall of Babylon is announced by the heavenly shout of triumph. ⁶⁰ PFF3 563.4

6. BRITAIN ONE OF THE TEN HORNS AND TOES

Britain, Begg asserts, “forms one of the kingdoms symbolized by ‘the ten horns’ of the fourth beast, or Roman empire,” of Daniel 7, ⁶¹ which beast is to be given to the burning flame. It forms “one also of the ten toes of Nebuchadnezzar’s great image, which was ‘broken to pieces together.’” ⁶² And Britain, he adds, is one of the ten kings of Revelation 17: “Thus is Britain included in the destruction which shall overtake the ungodly nations.” ⁶³ PFF3 563.5

7. TURKEY’S OVERTHROW IN Daniel 11

Not only does Turkey constitute the special objective of the sixth vial, ⁶⁴ but Begg brings it in Daniel 11 thus: PFF3 564.1

“Daniel, in predicting the final overthrow of the Ottoman power (this application being generally admitted, we stop not to notice the grounds on which it is made,) foretold that ‘tidings out of the East and out of the North shall trouble him. Daniel 11:44.” ⁶⁵ PFF3 564.2