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206
Early Writings
who bore the pure banner, and were uniting with the idolaters under
the black banner, to persecute those bearing the white banner. Many
were slain, yet the white banner was held high, and believers were
raised up to rally around it.
The Jews who first aroused the rage of the heathen against Jesus
were not to escape unpunished. In the judgment hall, as Pilate
hesitated to condemn Jesus, the infuriated Jews cried, “His blood
be on us, and on our children.” The fulfillment of this terrible curse
which they called down upon their own heads, the Jewish nation
has experienced. The heathen and those called Christians alike have
been their foes. Those professed Christians, in their zeal for Christ,
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whom the Jews crucified, thought that the more suffering they could
bring upon them, the better would God be pleased. Many of the
unbelieving Jews were therefore killed, while others were driven
from place to place and were punished in almost every manner.
The blood of Christ and of the disciples, whom they had put to
death, was upon them, and they were visited with terrible judgments.
The curse of God followed them, and they were a byword and a
derision to the heathen and to so-called Christians. They were
degraded, shunned, and detested, as if the brand of Cain were upon
them. Yet I saw that God had marvelously preserved this people
and scattered them over the world that they might be looked upon as
specially visited by the curse of God. I saw that God had forsaken
the Jews as a nation; but that individuals among them will yet be
converted and be enabled to tear the veil from their hearts and see that
the prophecy concerning them has been fulfilled; they will receive
Jesus as the Saviour of the world and see the great sin of their nation
in rejecting and crucifying Him.