VALLEY OF DRY BONES.

by Isaac N. Vanmeter

Signs of the Times, Vol. 41, # 18 and 20, Sept. 15 and Oct. 15, 1873

ELDER G. BEEBE - DEAR BROTHER IN CHRIST: - Brother James Colman, of Iowa, requested my views some time since, to be given in the "Signs of the Times," on the vision of Dry Bones, found in Ezek., chapter xxxvii. And I propose to comply with his request if you shall see proper to insert the following thoughts. I am free to confess to the strange brother, and to all others, that this remarkable vision of the prophet is not as clear to my understanding, in some of its parts, as I desire it should be before attempting to write any thing for the consideration of the children of God, but such views as the Lord may deign to give me I shall present, remarking that I do not know the views of any of my brethren on the entire connection.

Ezekiel, the son of Buzi, who saw this vision, was among the captives who had been carried away from the land of Judah to the land of Chaldea by the armies of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, and he (the prophet) appears to have been located among the captives of the house of Judah on the river Chebar. Chap. i. 1. The time of this vision appears to have been the second year of Judah's captivity of seventy years in the empire of Babylon, and hence the fulfillment of the vision did not occur short of sixty-eight or sixty-nine years afterwards; but length of years or of ages, is no hindrance to the fulfillment of the word of Him who sees the end from the beginning, and with whom a thousand years are as one day. The seventy years captivity of Judah spoken of by Jeremiah (ch. xxv. 11, 12), was brought upon them for their sin's and abominations before the Lord. II Chron. xxvi. 11-23.

I might cite many places in holy writ setting forth the transgressions, disobedience, and shameful ingratitude of the house of Judah, for which God sent the king of Babylon to overcome them, lead them away captives, and to destroy their city and temple; but the reader can find enough in the above citation and elsewhere to show the justice of the King of heaven in their sore calamities. Their captivity as a people was but a just recompense for their sins, and after they were brought to see many of their sons put to the sword, their country desolated, their capitol in ashes, their temple demolished and themselves removed from off their own land to a distant country, and held as the unwilling subjects of a foreign power, then they were led to feel and see the effects of their own folly, and to realize the truth of the solemn and awful predictions and of the prophets who had been sent unto them to warn them in the name of the Lord. Their doom as a people was fixed for seventy years, as exiles from their native land, and as servants to the king of a foreign and mighty nation. In a strange land, among a strange people, and believing, as doubtless the most of them did, that their captivity would be perpetual, they sat down by the rivers of Babylon and wept when they remembered Zion. There their captors mocked them, and required them to sing one of the songs of Zion; but they had no spirit to sing of their once magnificent Zion, for now she was as a plowed field, and Jerusalem was in ruins. - Psa. 137. Ezekiel, the prophet and priest to the people of Judah, was among them, and sharing their exile and their trials, but perhaps not their guilt as a nation.

After the Lord had shown the prophet many other wonderful visions respecting the destiny of his own, and of several of the surrounding nations, He, by his Spirit, carried him and set him down in the midst of a valley full of bones, and caused him to pass by them round about; and after he had surveyed the strange and uninviting scene, he said, "Behold there were very many in the open valley; and lo, they were very dry." That the valley of dry bones was designed to represent the "whole house of Israel" is asserted by Jehovah himself in the 11th verse of this chapter. Their present dry, dead and scattered condition, when the prophet was called upon to survey and inspect them, represented their present state of captivity, away from their native land, scattered among the heathen, without hope of deliverance; and their shaking, coming together, being clothed upon with sinews, flesh and skin, and standing up together as an army represented their deliverance from captivity and return to their own land, and their future prosperity in Canaan. Both these propositions are fully and clearly explained to the prophet by the Lord himself in the succeeding part of this chapter, and was finally, at the end of the seventy years, literally fulfilled in their deliverance and restoration. But as the seventy years captivity, and many of the predictions of Ezekiel, Jeremiah and others respecting the same, had reference to the house of Judah only, and did not apply to the house of Israel, some difficulties must be met and explained before we can have a proper and intelligent view of even the literal fulfillment of some of these predictions, and an understanding of the history of these times as embracing the descendants of Abraham.

My knowledge of sacred and profane history is too limited, and the length I purpose to make this article too short to do the subject justice; but I shall venture to notice a few things in the history of this people, which I deem necessary to a correct understanding of the 37th of Ezekiel, and many other parts of holy writ. From the time of the revolt of the ten tribes, under Jereboam, they were called the kingdom and house of Israel, and the two tribes who remained true to the house of David, to wit, Judah and Benjamin, who acknowledged the right of Rehoboam, the son of Solomon, to the crown, were called the kingdom or house of Judah; and from the time of this division of the nation of Israel, the two kingdoms remained, for the most part, in a state of separation from, and non-intercourse with each other. See I. Kings xii. 16-21. Jereboam was an idolatrous king, and caused Israel to sin greatly, and to worship idols and gods of their own make, (see I. Kings xii. 28) just like many of the present day who have gone out from the true house of God, and set up institutions and practices unknown to the gospel of Christ. The kingdom of Israel continued for about two hundred and fifty-five years, governed by about nineteen kings, the most of whom "did evil in the sight of the Lord;" and after they had been reproved and instructed by many inspired prophets, they were finally invaded by the Assyrians, under Shalmaneser, Samaria, their capital, was taken, and Hoshea, their king, and the principal part of Israel were carried captives into Assyria in the year before Christ, according to Usher, 721, and according to others, 716. The kingdom of Judah was ruled also by nineteen kings, but they continued as a commonwealth about one hundred and thirty-three years longer than the kingdom of Israel, counting the captivity of Judah to begin at the time that Nebuzar-adan took Jerusalem, and burnt the house of the Lord, about B. C. 583. With these facts before me, together with the language of the prophets respecting the seventy years captivity, I am led to the conclusion that the kingdom of Judah alone was included in the captivity in Chaldea, or Babylon, from which they were delivered after the lapse of 70 years; while the kingdom of Israel, which lost its nationality one hundred and thirty-three years earlier, never was re-established. These facts are important to be noticed on more than one account.

The resurrected bones when all standing up, and living, and presenting the appearance of an "exceeding great army," are said to be "the whole house of Israel;" and the two "sticks" in the hand of the prophet were to become one, (verse 17) and at the 21st and 22d verses the explanation is given, that all the scattered tribes were to be gathered together into their own land, and be made one nation, and "one king shall be king to them all." I must not speak of all the wonderful things the Lord did for his people, even in their captivity, or it would extend this article to too great a length. I would only remind the reader of the education of Daniel and his fellow captives in all the wisdom of the Chaldeans at the expense of the king; how they were advanced to high honors at court; their wonderful preservation in the furnace, and in the lion's den, and how the haughty kings of earth were made to acknowledge publicly the God of Israel, &c. After the prophet had taken a survey of the dry and scattered bones of the valley, and had pronounced them very many and very dry, the Lord propounded to him a hard question, or one that human reason and philosophy could not answer, unless it should be in the negative: "Son of man, can these bones live?" It must have looked to the prophet like a bad chance, even impossible, for such dry, lifeless, scattered bones, to ever possess life, form and beauty, and to stand up and travel out of that valley! Struck with the ghastly spectacle, and sensible of the impotency of human power and wisdom in such a case, he makes an humble confession: "0 Lord God, thou knowest." He was commanded to prophesy to, or upon, those dry bones, and to say, "0 dry bones, hear the word of the Lord." He was told on other occasions to prophesy to the captives of his people "whether they would hear, or whether they would forbear" (Ch. iii. 11, &c.) and was repeatedly reminded that they were a stiffnecked and rebellious people; yet he was to proclaim the word of the Lord to them, and warn them, so as to clear his own skirts and leave them without excuse. "If thou warn the wicked and he turn not," &c., "he shall die in his iniquity," is the language of God to his watchmen under that covenant of works, and a temporal death resulted upon the disobedience of certain statutes. They had not obeyed the voice of Jeremiah and other servants of God sent unto them to warn them of their wickedness and their danger, and hence were cut off from their own land, and were as dead men, in their own estimation. "Our bones are dried, and our hope is lost: we are cut off for our parts." They had no hope of returning to their native country, and expected to be buried in a strange land, and hence the force of the vision, and the suitableness of its figures.

God told the prophet for his encouragement and instruction that he would cause breath to enter into these bones, and they should live; that he would first lay sinews and flesh upon them, and cover them with skin, and then give them breath, and they should live. "So I prophesied as I was commanded; and as I prophesied there was a noise, and behold a shaking, and the bones came together, bone to his bone. And when I beheld, lo, the sinews and flesh came upon them, and the skin covered them above; but there was no breath in them." As the captives of Judah, as a body, are represented here as dead men, and their bones dried, their hope of deliverance cut off, and they in their graves, the figures are very striking, and well calculated as an allegory to set forth to the mind of the prophet, and to his captivated countrymen, the stern realities of their condition as captive exiles without life or hope; but their reviving, living, and standing up an exceeding great army, represented their future deliverance at the end of the seventy years. That the bones (captives) were not literally dead is evident from their hearing, shaking, and coming together as the prophet proclaimed the word of the Lord. After the shaking and coming together, and being clothed with sinews, &c., presenting them in the form of men, the Lord had yet to give them life and cause them to stand up: showing most clearly and vividly the effects of the word of the Lord proclaimed to them by the prophet when it should be literally fulfilled in the proclamation of Cyrus, king of Persia, announcing throughout all his realms the stirring and animating tones of deliverance. The prophet was commanded, after the bones had come together and were clothed with flesh, to prophesy to the wind, (not in his own name,) and say, "Thus saith the Lord God, Come from the four winds, 0 breath, and breathe upon these slain, that they may live." He prophesied accordingly, and "the breath came into them, and they lived and stood up upon their feet, an exceeding great army. Then He said unto me, "Son of man these bones are the whole house of Israel." The Lord then explained to the prophet in the succeeding verses of the chapter the meaning of the whole vision. how that the captive Jews, who now felt as dead men, their hope cut off, and they in their graves, buried beyond expectation of deliverance, should, by and by, be roused from their graves and their slumbers by the proclamation of Cyrus, whose spirit the Lord stirred up to release the captives and send them back into their own land. Ezra i.

I have stated that the house of Judah, or the two tribes of Judah and Benjamin only, were included in this seventy years' captivity, and that the vision was designed to represent them, mainly, so we read in Ezra i. 5: "Then rose up the chief of the fathers of Judah and Benjamin," &c., and prepared to rendezvous under Zerubbabel and Joshua, and return to thew own land; but as the bones when standing up an exceeding great army are declared to be the "whole house of Israel," and the two sticks that were to become one in the prophet's hand, together with the explanation given of the sticks from verse nineteen forward, a remark or two are necessary to reconcile some seeming differences. I understand, or hope I do, that the language respecting the restoration of Israel, and the re-establishing of their temple worship contemplated the return of some of all the tribes of Israel, or of both kingdoms, or houses, into which they had been divided after the death of Solomon; and that this was literally fulfilled at the time of the restoration, and during the succeeding years of the growth of Jerusalem, and the growing prosperity of the land of Judah. While Ezra informs us that there were forty and two thousand three hundred and three-score of the house of Judah who returned, besides over seven thousand servants, (Ezra ii. 64, 65), yet from the language of Cyrus, whose dominion included the cities of the Medes, where the ten tribes had been settled in their captivity, and from many other places in holy writ, I understand that some, a remnant, of all the tribes, or of both houses of Israel, returned, and became one people - See II. Kings, xvii. 6. Ezra i. 3, 4. Brother Beebe, this subject is too wide for one article, and as I am not done with even the literal bearings, I propose to continue at another time. _____________________________________________________________________

DEAR BROTHER BEEBE: - I have just perused my first article on the above subject, as published in No. 18 of the current volume, and I propose to pursue the subject further by your permission.

These bones are the whole house of Israel." I stated in my former article that the seventy years' captivity was applicable alone to the house of Judah, but that after their captivity ended, and they were gathered together under the proclamation of King Cyrus, that they, together with a remnant of the ten tribes, or of the kingdom of Israel, under one ruler, they were called the whole house of Israel, and I wish to make a few further remarks on this part of the subject, so that its gospel application may look more consistent and clear. Cyrus, in some respects, was a figure of Christ, as his character, offices, and even his name were foretold by inspiration more than a hundred years before his birth, and he is called the Lord's anointed, his shepherd, who should do all his pleasure, and should restore Israel, and build Jerusalem and the temple, &c. Compare what is said of Cyrus in Isaiah xliv. 28; xlv. 1-4, with what is said of Christ in Isaiah lxi. 1-6, &c. The characteristics of the two are very similar and striking. The one was to deliver and restore God's national people from an earthly captivity to their promised earthly inheritance and prosperity; the other was to deliver gospel Israel from their captivity under sin and death, and from the curse of the divine law, and to bring them into the possession and enjoyment of the gospel rest. As under the proclamation and direction of Cyrus a part of both the houses of Judah and of Israel returned to literal Canaan, and became one people, under one king; so under the proclamation and direction of Jesus Christ through his gospel and the ordinances, both Jews and Gentiles, or some of each, are delivered from sin, and brought into one body by one Spirit, having but one fold, one shepherd, one King over them all. The two sticks in the vision were to be joined together and become an undivided nation; so Christ says, "Other sheep I have which are not of this fold, them also I must bring, and they shall hear my voice, and there shall be one fold and one Shepherd." - John x. 16. "For he is our peace, who hath made both one, and hath broken down the middle wall of partition between us; having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances; for to make in himself of twain one new man, so making peace." Eph. ii. 14, 15.

This vision of the dry bones, in some of its bearings, may well represent the church or body of Christ as dead in trespasses and sins, but not, as I think, in all its parts as an allegory, or metaphorical vision; and I shall very briefly notice wherein it does, and wherein it does not well represent the body of Christ in her unregenerate state. The bones were dead, dry and scattered, and so are all the members of the body or church of Christ before they are quickened into life.

"I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint; my heart is like wax: it is melted in the midst of my bowels. My strength is dried up like a potsherd, and my tongue cleaveth to my jaws; and thou hast brought me into the dust of death." - Ps. xxii. 14, 15. "Thine eyes did see my substance, yet being unperfect; and in thy book all my members were written, which in continuance were fashioned, when as yet there was none of them." Ps. cxxxix. 16. "Hast thou not poured me out as milk, and curdled me like cheese? Thou hast clothed me with skin and flesh, and hast fenced me with bones and sinews." - Job. x. 10, 11. "They are all gone out of the way." - Rom. iii. 12. "All we like sheep have gone astray, we have turned every one to his own way." - Isa. liii. 6. The above show the dry, dead and scattered condition of the members of the body of Christ before they are made alive, and the dry bones in the valley may well represent them in the same state, destitute of vitality and motion. This state of death in trespasses and sins is abundantly taught in the scriptures to be the condition of all unregenerate sons and daughters of Adam; and it is as clearly taught in holy writ that no power nor means can give them spiritual life but the power of God. The dry bones therefore, while they well illustrate the state of dead sinners, or the unregenerate, as far as their dry and scattered condition is concerned, yet the effect of the proclamation of the prophet upon them, in causing them to shake and come together, bone to his bone, and stand up, before there was any life in them, does not seem to me to represent the condition and conduct of sinners destitute of life. Such an idea might suit the notion of the conditionalist, the free (!) moral agent, who teaches that sinners must make the first move - the first step, and make a mighty effort, or shaking, and come to the church, (a protracted meeting) or God will never give them life. On this part of the vision of Ezekiel, I have heard some very precious and able brethren comment in a way to encourage the Arminian, and the free-willer, while he (the speaker) did not intend to encourage or sustain the popular theories of the day. In expounding and applying the metaphors and symbols of inspiration, whether in the old or new testaments, when we have ascertained and expounded them as was designed to be originally applied, we are safe; but when we attempt to carry the figure beyond its prime and clear application, we should, or I feel like I should, proceed with extreme caution. But I, in my weak conceptions, should darken counsel instead of edifying and instructing my hearers. On account of my own liability to misapprehend the meaning of visions and revelations of the divine Spirit to holy men, I have hesitated much about writing on this vision shown to the prophet by the Lord of hosts.

The whole vision was evidently fulfilled literally by the restoration of Israel to their own land, and their prosperity and peace under one king, and under the laws of the first covenant; and as they had previously been redeemed from their bondage in Egypt, brought into the promised land, and organized under law as a nation, and were not only reinstated in the enjoyment of former privileges, and under the same covenant and laws they had before enjoyed, I can apply the vision only to the church after her organization under the gospel, and not to her while dead in sin.

Typical Israel lost her privileges by disobedience, and rebellion against God under Moses' law; gospel Israel has in many instances, lost her privileges and enjoyments through disobedience to the law of Christ, through indfference to his honor and glory, through the captivations of the world, &c. Typical Israel in Babylon was not literally dead and in her grave, but she felt to be virtually so for a time. Typical Israel was not so dead but what she could hear the word of the Lord, from a prophet's mouth, and shake under its solemn proclamation, come together and assume the appearance of men, and a church, though in a state of religious death or torpidity, may hear the word of the Lord proclaimed by a messenger he may send to reprove, rebuke, exhort, and may shake and come together into their places, bone to his bone. "Thou hast a name that thou livest and art dead. Be watchful, and strengthen the things which remain that are ready to die; for I have not found thy works perfect before God." - Rev. iii. 1, 2. "1 know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot," &c. - See same chapter, 13 to 22 inclusive, and chapter ii. 4,5. "But she that liveth in pleasure is dead while she liveth." - I. Tim v. 6. "For to be carnally minded is death." - Rom. viii. 6. "If ye live after the flesh ye shall die." - Rom. viii. 13.

After the bones had come together, and were clothed with flesh, &c., God caused the breath to come into them and they lived, so when a lifeless church, who is asleep and scattered in the world, and are after the world, hears the solemn proclamation from the lips of an under shepherd sent from God,'saying, "Awake, thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light," and they drop the things of the world and come together, each in his place in the body - bone to his bone, then the Lord breathes on them the sweet influences of his Spirit and love. To a church thus cold and lifeless in religion, but growing rich in the world, and careless about her obligations, her Redeemer and Husband says, in accents of love, "Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me." - Rev. iii. 20. "Return, thou backsliding Israel, saith the Lord; and I will not cause mine anger to fall upon you, for I am merciful saith the Lord, and I Will not keep anger for ever." - Jer. iii. 12-14.

As Babylon of old, and her forces captivated the typical house of Judah, and led her away from her own land which she had abused, so mystical Babylon has long since led away many of the gospel house of Judah into her dominions, and many are there yet, and the voice of God is to them, "Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues." - Rev. xviii. 4. Dead sinners do not hear, and shake, and come together, before they have life, as the first thing the Lord does for them is to communicate spiritual life and perceptions, and this gives them ability to hear, to move, and to come; but a church of regenerate and quickened persons can hear, and move, and come together when one of God's sent ministers or prophets proclaims faithfully the word of the Lord to them concerning their solemn duties and obligations, though such church may be denominated dead and inactive. God does not call his people out of darkness into light, and then allow them to remain inactive and in darkness, but he requires of them lives of active obedience, and a faithful observance of all the ordinances of his house.

But the prophet and the faithful fathers of Judah wept no more bitterly by the rivers of Babylon over their deplorable captivity and disgrace as a nation, than have many of the watchmen in more modern times done over the anti typical house of Judah and Israel, in her forlorn and lifeless condition. Neither was the prophet more discouraged nor perplexed at the question, "Can these bones live?" than a minister of the gospel sometimes is in surveying the dry, lifeless and scattered condition of a church. To behold the members of a church down in the valley, not of humility and meekness, but in the valley of shame and reproach, below the standing and moral dignity of their high calling; to see them lifeless and dead to the cause of truth, and the order and prosperity of Zion, scattered about, and running after the offices, houses and wealth of the world, is a spectacle before the eye of a faithful minister of the word, the most deeply mortifying, afflictive and discouraging. If he were asked, while thus taking a survey of such a scattered and lifeless church, Son of man, can this church, so careless and so cold, ever live again and prosper? Can this dry tree ever blossom again, and bear fruit unto holiness? He could but exclaim, with the prophet, "0 Lord God, thou knowest."

The prospect, dear brother Beebe, and fellow laborer in the vineyard of Christ, often looks gloomy and discouraging; the dreary clouds of winter hang over Zion so long and so heavy; but the command is to Go, and proclaim the word of the Lord, and he, himself, will clothe the dry bones with sinews, flesh and skin, and breathe into them fresh life and hope. Go to the children of captivity, my fellow laborers, and proclaim the coming deliverance, the coming spring, when it shall be said with joyful acclamations, "Rise up, my love, my fair one, and come away. For lo, the winter is past, the rain is over and gone; the flowers appear on the earth, the time of the singing of birds is come, and the voice of the turtle is heard in our land. The fig tree putteth forth green figs, and the vines with the tender grape give a good smell. Arise, my love, my fair one, and come away." Song ii. 10-11. May the Lord turn away the captivity of his people, and cause them to arise from their slumbers, and clothe them with righteousness as with a garment.

This subject might be applied with equal force to the individual experiences of God's children, who have their seasons, personally, of captivity, of sloth, and even death, in their religious feelings and exercises.

But I must close, as the field still extends before me, and I fear I have been too lengthy already.

Respectfully,

ELDER L N. VANMETER.

Please direct your comments to Mike Krall.

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