Rumors

[Gail]

Is that white because of the actual colour or white because of the glory shining from it?

[John317]

Quote:

Jesus has 'white' hair if that means anything.

huh? Where does it say that?

Rev. 1: 14. The color of His hair here, though, means nothing (except to Farrakhan, apparently) in terms of determining race because it is a spiritual view of Christ and is not describing him as he was while on earth. To believe otherwise would require us to believe that Jesus looks like a lamb, that he walks in the middle of lamps, that he has a sword coming out of his mouth, and that he rides a white horse, etc. They all portray reality but it is a reality that transcends the metaphors.

[Amelia]

Quote:

Ugh. Try the Bible?

Oh no. You made the factual statement, you need to back it up with text.

[Woody]

Sorry. John317 just proved me wrong. Oh well.

[Amelia]

Quote:

New International Version

Revelation 1

1:14

His head and hair were white like wool, as white as snow, and his eyes were like blazing fire.

[John317]

Doesn't matter to me at all.

But now I am curious; is it easier to have faith and love for someone who looks like yourself, or harder? Do those blacks who believe Jesus was a black man have a stronger faith than they would if He were "proven" (prior to His second coming) to be of another color?

Good point. I think that if someone's faith is such that they need to believe Jesus is black, then it does show their faith is weak, or at least not mature; but I think that if I were talking to a black person who showed it was important to establish that Jesus was black, I would not want to say anything to weaken his faith. The fact is that Jesus was neither caucasian nor black. He was not an African. He was a middle eastern Jew, and so far as I know no one in history described them or portrayed them as black.

But now I am getting into an argument about Jesus' color and I don't really want to do that.

I have a sister who is white (of course-- our mother and father being pure caucasian, NOT THAT IT MATTERS), but this sister adopted a black baby. My sister gives this black child black dolls to play with and has a picture of a black Jesus in her bedroom. I think it's great!

[Woody]

Quote:

But now I am getting into an argument about Jesus' color and I don't really want to do that.

NO NEED to for the Bible is clear as Amelia has quoted. His hair and head is white.

[John317]

Quote:

New International Version

Revelation 1

1:14

His head and hair were white like wool, as white as snow, and his eyes were like blazing fire.

Just to take this one step further, I have talked with followers of Louis Farrakkhan who believe (incredibly, to me) that this verse establishes without question that Jesus is black. They focus on the word "wool" and say it proves that he was a black man because no white "honky" or "cracker" (Big Smile- joking!) has hair like wool?

What they don't realize (and this is NOT what I tell them, because I don't argue Jesus' color with them) is that the verse is comparing his hair to the whiteness of wool. IT IS NOT SAYING THAT HIS HAIR LOOKS LIKE WOOL, BUT RATHER IT IS WHITE LIKE WOOL IS WHITE. If his hair looks like wool, then we also have to say it looks like snow. What a strange picture that is. So his hair was white as wool and as snow. That is very WHITE. Big difference, but if someone wants to believe something else... oh well.

The picture that Farrakhan has in his mind's eye of Jesus on the basis of this verse is that Jesus looks like an old black man whose wooly hair has turned all white.

[Woody]

Quote:

The picture that Farrakhan has in his mind's eye of Jesus on the basis of this verse is that Jesus looks like an old black man whose wooly hair has turned all white.

YUCK. OR am I allowed to say that without being called a racist?

[Amelia]

The Jesus of my minds eye isn't old but ageless.

[Woody]

The Jesus of my minds eye isn't old but ageless.

An ageless guy who according to scripture has gone gray?

[Woody]

It would be an interesting study to look at what the feelings of Ellen White were towards blacks. Here are a few ...

Quote:

"Opportunities are continually presenting themselves in the Southern States, and many wise, Christian colored men will be called to the work. But for several reasons white men must be chosen as leaders." 9T p. 202.

"The work of proclaiming the truth for this time is not to be hindered by an effort to adjust the position of the Negro race." 9T p. 214.

"The Colored People should not urge that they be placed on an equality with White People." 9T p. 214.

"No one is capable of clearly defining the proper position of the colored people." 9T p. 213.

[Stan]

Do you think that has the same relevancy now as it did then?

[Woody]

Depends upon if you are speaking as a Black person or a White person or as a Prophet.

[John317]

Do you think that has the same relevancy now as it did then?

I don't believe they do have the same relevancy today because Ellen White was writing about the situation as it then existed, primarily referring to what the conditions were in the Southern states.

She recognized that it could have made it only harder to spread the gospel and teach blacks if our methods only brought hatred and resistance upon the blacks. She was in no way condoning racist policies or practices, although what she did and said could be interpreted that way. (And of course I don't know of anyone knowledgeable in the history of our church who would deny that some terrible injustices were allowed or condoned.)

I think the situation is somewhat similar vis-a-vis slavery in the Bible. Neither Jesus nor Paul called for the overthrow of slavery, yet the principles of love they spoke of certainly made slavery an impossible thing for Christians if they really understood Jesus' message.

So Jesus did not call for political and social revolution against the Roman Empire or against the governments of the world, and neither does the rest of the NT. Ellen White didn't either. But what Jesus taught, if put into practice widely enough, will eventually change many things in society. I think it did in the case of Martin Luther King. Thank God our country went that way, rather than the way advocated by the earlier views of Malcolm X and the Black Panther Party. That could potentially have resulted in a major blood bath. But Jesus' teachings will not change society's practices or values through force or violent revolution. It accomplishes change through love and education. I don't believe the church should be involved in violent revolts, even though we can understand and sympathize why people are revolting.

[CyberGuy]

It has long been suspected that Ellen White had black heritage. I don't know if there is proof, and I hadn't heard about James' heritage before. But even as a child, long before I heard others say it, photos of Ellen made me think she might have been of mixed race. But why would it matter anyway? To me it's one of those off-our-mission topics that we tend to get all excited about, and then we wonder why we spent so much time and energy on it.

No Ellen was not of mixed race. As a child a jealous child threw a rock at Ellen and broke her nose and disfigured her face. Ever since then her face looked different than it would have normally. In todays medical technology she would have had reconstructive surgery. But back then they just made do with how the bones healed.

[Amelia]

Originally Posted By: Amelia

The Jesus of my minds eye isn't old but ageless.

An ageless guy who according to scripture has gone gray?

Gone gray? I don't think so. That is a discriptive sentence. Hair and head were white as snow and eye blazing. How many times today do we use discriptive words to convey a persons attitude or emotion or action? All the time and usually to an exageration. So hair and head as white as wool/snow? His Holy radience maybe? And eyes blazing? Well I think that pretty much says Jesus was having attitude. Whoowee

[LifeHiscost]

Maybe that's why the Bible contains no physical description of him, beyond the ones in Revelation.

"For [the Servant of God] grew up before Him like a tender plant, and like a root out of dry ground; He has no form or comeliness [royal, kingly pomp], that we should look at Him, and no beauty that we should desire Him." Isaiah 53:2

"....for salvation is of the Jews." John 4:22 KJV

Regards!

[John317]

Based on that description of him in Isaiah 53, what would you say he looked like? Do we know?

It is interesting that there is a story about Ellen White's pointing at a picture once of Jesus and saying that it looked more like Jesus' likeness than any other that she had seen. I'll have to look into whether this story is apocryphal or not.

[phkrause]

I agree with what you have said here. I do believe that what she said in this particular area had to do with the time in which she lived. Especially if you look at the statement that Redwood quoted from EGW: "Opportunities are continually presenting themselves in the Southern States, and many wise, Christian colored men will be called to the work. But for several reasons white men must be chosen as leaders." 9T p. 202. That last sentence seems to indicate that this is something she received form the Lord, to write down for that time. And that when times change so would this. Besides I think that the whole chapter should be read not just take these two sentences out of contents. We should read all of it, pages 199 to 203. I personally would never advocate this now at all. But she does make some good points.

pkrause

[Stan]

Both EGW and myself have been believers in what she term "Present Truth"

[Kountzer]

There's a show that comes on 3ABN on sabbaths, & other days. I can't recall the name of the show, but it deals with adventist history, EGW, etc. It was created & narrated by Australian sda. Anyway, they've shown pictures, profile pictures of Ellen White that would suggest that she has black heritage.

There is this black sda elder who has written a book on the subject. I spoke with him briefly at GC in Toronto in 2000. The church had various exhibitions, book stores, etc., in the basement of this exhibition hall. They had that elder, who was selling his book, stashed off in a corner, away from main traffic. No big deal.

So yes, I've heard that before about Ellen White, but not about James White. As others have mentioned, I don't think it really matters. A person is either connected with God or he or she isn't. Their skin color is not even a factor in that.

[phkrause]

D_Bishop, I've watched this show also. Very informative and well done. I've also heard about EGW's heritage. And I agree with your statement: "I don't think it really matters. A person is either connected with God or he or she isn't. Their skin color is not even a factor in that."

pkrause

[lazarus]

Something to chew on!!! Take your time...I don't want you to choke!!!

Mr. Joslyn opens his report by quoting five excerpts from a book that challenges Ellen White's previously documented Anglo-Saxon ancestry.]

When James S. White and Ellen Gould Harmon married about 1848, they suddenly realized their marriage placed them under an old law which forbade Whites to marry Coloreds and in less than ten years, they found themselves gravitating toward the Ohio Colony where mulattoes had settled. [p. 13]

James White along with his mulatto wife, Ellen White also moved westward to Saratoga, to Rochester, New York to Ohio on onward to Battle Creek, Michigan where they lived among the Colored people. [p. 12]

[Ellen] could relate with the plight of the mulatto and slave groups for these were her people. [p. 13]

In Battle Creek, memorials are being erected in honor of two great women, Harriet Tubman and SoJourner Truth. It would be proper to have another erected in honor of another great African-American woman, Ellen Gould Harmon White. [p. 13]

Eunice Gould Harmon, Ellen’s mother was a mulatto; whose roots can be traced to New Jersey and the Caribbean. The roots of Robert Harmon, her father, were of the African/Moor/Nanticoke Indian and English Colored people living on the Eastern Shores of Delaware. [p. 33]

The above are just a few quotes from an interesting book published in 1999—The Genealogy of Ellen Gould Harmon White: The Prophetess of the Seventh-day Adventist Church, and the Story of the Growth and Development of the Seventh-day Adventist Denomination As It Relates to African-Americans. Book Two (Click on the hand icon for footnote references throughout the report.) Click: Footnote (Nashville, Tenn.: Dudley Publishing Services). According to its author, Charles Edward Dudley, Sr., D.D., L.L.D., pastor of the First Seventh-day Adventist Church in Shelbyville, Tennessee, Ellen Gould (Harmon) White was descended from or at least related to five Gould brothers who “came from the Dutch West Indies and settled near Salem, New Jersey,” by the mid-1680s. They established a settlement that became known as Gouldtown, just east of present-day Bridgeton in Cumberland County. Dr. Dudley follows only descendants of one brother, Benjamin, who is supposed to have married Elizabeth Ann Adams, a granddaughter of John Fenwick, an English soldier-turned-Quaker and founder of the Salem colony. Click: Footnote

Dr. Dudley’s study of the ancestry of Ellen White, and more specifically her possible connection to persons of color, developed from a curiosity about her background that has “been discussed for years,” although the “limited genealogical research which has been done on both her father’s and mother’s side of the family has not shown any such ancestry.” The interest in Ellen’s background derives from photographs of her, showing what some have called “ambiguous” features: “‘Mrs. White’s features often raise the question of whether she had any Black or Indian ancestry.

There's more

http://www.whiteestate.org/issues/genealogy.html

[lazarus]

Quote:

The picture that Farrakhan has in his mind's eye of Jesus on the basis of this verse is that Jesus looks like an old black man whose wooly hair has turned all white.

YUCK. OR am I allowed to say that without being called a racist?

Redwood, all you have to do is to keep posting and your own words tell the story.