The Gathering of Israel

Chapter 13—Meshullam and Old Jerusalem

If in 1850 and 1851 the Seventh-day Adventists held doctrines incompatible with the various contemporary teachings on “the time,” the “age to come,” and the Jews, why, then, did they need the “Gathering Time” counsels from Mrs. White? Because they were not isolated from the battle of ideas in the various Adventist journals. A few, such as Edson, had obviously been affected by the currently popular interpretations of prophecy and contemporary news. Though there seems to be no indication that Edson’s hints of an 1850 “sealing” in Jerusalem roused any interest in going there, yet from other quarters, at that very time, there came inducements to action in connection with “the story of Meshullam.” GI 11.4

In June, 1850, Mrs. Clorinda Minor of Philadelphia, after having returned from a visit to Palestine, published a brief biographical sketch of John Meshullam—an English-born Jewish Christian who farmed near Bethlehem and did what he could to aid the indigent Jews in Jerusalem by giving them produce or employment. Early in 1851 she enlarged her narrative by including an account of her travels, taken from her diary. In this book, entitled Meshullam! or, Tidings From Jerusalem, she appealed for funds and helpers for Meshullam’s project, ¹ which she invested with a prophetic significance. GI 11.5

Her visionary enthusiasm saw in his flourishing crops a sign of God’s returning favor to “the land.” Her imagination transformed his handful of Jewish tillers into the vanguard of Israel’s return to their soil, and her fancy saw them as prospective converts who would constitute the “remnant” gathered to welcome their returning Messiah to His capital, preparatory to the complete restoration after the Second Advent. ² GI 11.6

Her plan was not only to collect money and supplies, but also to take over a group of settlers. They were to till the soil and work for the rehabilitation of the indigent Jews of Jerusalem, to free them from dependence on their rabbis and on the largesse of international Jewry, and also to convert them. GI 11.7

Numerous articles appeared in 1851 in the Advent Harbinger, J. B. Cook backing Mrs. Minor enthusiastically, but Marsh cautioning and Crozier eventually disparaging. ³ Both Marsh and Crozier considered her project visionary, doubtful of success, and also unscriptural because they expected no return of the Jews until after the Advent. GI 11.8

The following autumn Mrs. Minor did sail with a group of seven. Soon, however, there came trouble, bad reports, and a parting of the ways with Meshullam, who disclaimed his would-be helper. ⁴ Mrs. Minor, who observed the Sabbath though she was not a Seventh-day Adventist, appears to have tried unsuccessfully to induce the Seventh Day Baptists to take over her project. ⁵ Since she was well known to some of the early Seventh-day Adventists, ⁶ it is quite possible that some of them would have been drawn into this “going to old Jerusalem” if it had not been for Mrs. White’s “Gathering Time” counsels. GI 11.9