Take another illustration of my theme. In the Book of Mormon this truth was revealed, that in this western world a holy city would finally be builded by the people of God. A city called "Zion," the "New Jerusalem." When the saints saw that fact revealed in the Book of Mormon, they, very naturally, desired to know the place where the city would stand; and the Lord finally revealed the place where the City of Zion will be located. The place of that city is in the central portion of the land of Zion. Independence, Jackson county, Missouri, was designated as the place where the holy city is to be founded. No sooner was this known than straightway the gathering of the people to that point commenced. Some few hundreds of the saints gathered to that land and essayed to lay the foundations of the city, the glory of which was described in the Nephite Scriptures. In the course of time, however, the saints were expelled from Jackson county by the cruelty of their neighbors, who rejected their religion and rose up against the people of God. When the saints were compelled to leave Jackson county, they looked upon themselves as exiles from Zion, and it was rather with heavy hearts and with sinking hopes that they went to building other cities elsewhere in Missouri. Finally the entire state of Missouri rose against the people of God—and unjustly and by the violation of every principle of constitutional government, expelled some twelve thousand of the saints from that state. As you know, the saints located themselves on the Illinois side of the Mississippi river and founded the city of Nauvoo. They still counted themselves as exiles from Zion, and they thought that the cause of God—that is, many of them—thought that the cause of God was losing, that his purposes were being thwarted; they were exiles from the land of promise; the City of Zion was as a dream that was fast fading from their consciousness. Then the Prophet began to instruct them more fully concerning this matter of Zion. He called their attention to the fact that the whole of America, both north continent and south continent—was the land of Zion; that the promise of God concerning Zion related to this western hemisphere; that these great continents were consecrated chiefly unto the seed of Joseph, the patriarch in Israel, son of Jacob, and that this whole land was given to him as his inheritance. That is how it is that both Moses and also Jacob, in their blessings upon the head of Joseph declare that his blessings had prevailed above the blessings of his progenitors; and that his lands extended to the "utmost bounds of the everlasting hills." He was given the birthright in Israel, to stand at the head of Israel. (I Chron. 5:1-2.) Reuben "was the first born; but, forasmuch as he defiled his father's bed, his birthright was given unto the sons of Joseph, the son of Israel; and the genealogy is not to be reckoned after the birthright"—i.e., of Reuben. "For Judah prevailed above his brethren and of him came the chief ruler; but the birthright was Joseph's;" and hence the Scriptures frequently declare that God is a Father unto Israel, and Ephraim is his first born. (Jeremiah 31:9). This was a larger view of the subject of Zion than the saints had entertained. Can you see in this illustration, confirmation of our theme, viz., that no matter how great your conceptions may be of divine things, the divine things themselves are infinitely greater than you conceive them to be?
IV.
RESTORATION OF ISRAEL.
Still another illustration. It is a prominent principle of the faith of the Latter-day Saints that the great promises which God has made unto Israel, to the effect that they shall be gathered in from their dispersion, shall be fulfilled in this dispensation of the fulness of times. Of course you know, being familiar with the history of Israel, that they have been scattered among all the nations of the earth. This is true with reference to all the tribes of Israel. "I will sift the house of Israel among all nations" is what Amos represents the Lord as saying (Amos 9:8, 9). Of course you are aware of the fact that after the reign of Solomon, Israel divided into two kingdoms—the northern kingdom composed of the ten tribes, the southern kingdom, Judah, composed of the tribes of Judah and Benjamin. After a national existence of some two hundred years, the Assyrians overcame the northern kingdom and took the people captive into Assyria; but while in captivity there, we are informed by tradition, that the people resolved to leave the heathen nation by whom they had been led into captivity, and go into a land never before inhabited by man, and there they resolved that they would keep the statutes and the judgments of God even better than they had done in the land of their fathers. The historian who tells us of these circumstances (Esdras) also says that they performed something like a year and a half's journey to the northward, up through the narrow pass of the Euphrates and Tigris rivers, and thence northward, and inhabited the land; and since those days they have been known as "the lost tribes of Israel." The kingdom of Judah maintained but a precarious existence; it was first subject to one nation and then to another, until finally, toward the close of the first century of the Christian era, the nation was completely subjugated by the Roman power; her people were taken captive and sold into slavery, or scattered as exiles among the nations of the gentiles. Ever since then, until now, Judah has been a hiss and byword, a broken, scattered people. But over and above all these historical events rings out clear and strong the promise of God, as spoken by the mouth of Jeremiah, Saying:
"Hear the word of the Lord, O ye nations, and declare it in the isles afar off and say, he that scattered Israel will gather him and keep him as a shepherd doth his flock. For the Lord hath redeemed Jacob, and ransomed him from the hand of him that was stronger than he (ch. xxxi:10, 11). Behold I will bring them [the children of Israel] from the north country, and gather them from the coasts of the earth, and with them the blind and the lame, the woman with child and her that travaileth with child together; a great company shall return thither. They shall come with weeping and with supplications will I lead them: I will cause them to walk by the rivers of waters in a straight way, wherein they shall not stumble: for I am a father to Israel, and Ephraim is my first born." (Ch. xxxi: verses, 8, 9).
The Jewish Scriptures are full of this promise. It is iterated and reiterated; and it is well known that the tradition lives in Israel, that though now scattered abroad, yet will they at some time be called to resume the thread of their national existence, and Israel shall yet be known among the nations of the earth. As broad as the scattering has been, so broad also shall be the gathering. This message of ours, the gospel of Jesus Christ, has always been accompanied by proclamation of this doctrine of the gathering of Israel. The prophet Amos tells us that God had "sifted" Israel among the nations, and now unto the servants of God in this dispensation is given the commission to cry aloud unto Israel, "Come out of her, my people: that ye partake not of her sins, and receive not of her plagues," speaking of Babylon. God, I say, has repeatedly promised that there shall be a gathering together of Israel, and those who were led away into the "north countries," we are told shall be brought again to the land of their fathers; their prophets shall hear the voice of God, and shall not stay themselves, but they shall come forth in the power of God and bring their people unto Zion, where they shall receive blessings at the hands of the children of Ephraim, the first born, who holds the patriarchal right to bless and seal in the house of Israel. This is the faith of the Latter-day Saints respecting Israel.
V.
LOST TRIBES IN THE NORTH.
Permit me to make a little divergence at this point. I have observed some criticisms in our local press in relation to the views entertained by the Latter-day Saints about the return of the lost tribes of Israel from the land of the north. We have recently had the north pole discovered—well, discovered twice, if reports be true.[1] And it is claimed by the aforesaid local press that the Church entertains the view that somewhere, in this frozen region of the pole these lost tribes have lived, and that it has been the hope of the Latter-day Saints that from the north pole regions these lost tribes would return to supplement them in numbers and power and influence here in this land of our Zion. There is more or less of merriment indulged in because, now that the north pole has been discovered, lo, there is no people there and no place for a people. Ice fields, ice mountains, ice floes, with accompanying desolation—an absolute loneliness out there at the poles! Well, I think men for some time have been sufficiently close to the pole to lead any thoughtful person to the conclusion that such conditions of lonely desolation must have existed there, rather than any continent of salubrious climate and fertile soils, where a great people could be located. Let me offer this suggestion: If those of us who believe in the messages from God given in these last days are likely, because of inability to asses these messages at their full value—if we are likely to have misapprehensions of the messages and the purposes of God, certainly those who have no sympathy with them, and who do not believe in them are apt to have still wider misapprehensions of the messages and purposes of God. That being true, it is possible also that our local newspaper critics have formed misconceptions concerning an alleged belief of ours about the existence of the ten tribes somewhere in polar regions. I do not know how many Latter-day Saints may have entertained the view that about the polar regions were located the lost tribes of Israel. I do not know how many even of our students—the students of the gospel of this dispensation of the fulness of times—may have entertained the same view. There is the statement of Esdras that there was a year and a half's journey northward from Assyria, by the ten tribes; and there is the promise repeated frequently in Jewish Scriptures, that the Lord would lead back from the north the tribes of Israel. From these statements, some of our people may have concluded that necessarily these lost tribes must be established in the extreme northern portions of the earth, hence the region of the north pole. There may be something in our literature to that effect—I cannot say positively, because I have not had the opportunity, recently, to examine our literature with reference to that particular view. But of this I am positive; that in none of the revelations of God is there any expression that would lead one to believe that God had located the ten tribes about the north pole. The revelations of the Lord do not necessarily lead us to any such conclusion. When the Savior was in the western hemisphere, ministering among the Nephites, he called their attention to the announcement that he had made to his disciples in Judea, when he said, "Other sheep have I 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 10:16.) When ministering to the Nephites, I say, the Messiah explained to them that they were the "other sheep" he had in mind in this passage. Some of the disciples, he explained, believed that he had in mind the gentiles, not appreciating the fact that his manifestation of himself and of his truth to the gentiles should be through the manifestations of the Holy Ghost, rather than by ministration of himself personally to them. The disciples in Judea then had a misapprehension of this matter, though Jesus himself had said that he was not sent (personally) but to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. (Matt. 15:24.) Here, then, in this western world, were the "other sheep," that the Christ had in mind in this remarkable statement that he made to his disciples in Judea. The Messiah also informed the Nephites that he had not only fulfilled this Scripture but now there was still another mission that had been given him, namely to visit the lost tribes of the house of Israel, and manifest himself to them, for though these tribes were lost unto the children of men they were not lost unto the Father. He knew their location, and had given commission to his Son to minister unto them. (See III Nephi, chaps. 15, 16, 17.) But there is nothing in the statement of the Messiah to the Nephites that would compel us to believe that these lost tribes were located about the north pole; but merely expressions in the Scriptures that would lead one to conclude that they were located in northern lands. Then again, in the matter of this return of the "lost tribes of Israel," there are those I believe, who, seeing that there was small hope of a location for them about the north pole, have held that perhaps the said lost tribes were located upon some detached portion of the earth. As to that, I have no opinion to express; but this I believe, for myself, that within the known regions of the earth, where the children of men are located, it is quite possible for God to fulfill all his predictions in relation to the return of Israel. It would have been quite possible for God to scatter, or to use the language of the prophet Amos—"Sift the house of Israel among all nations, like as corn is sifted in a sieve," and "yet not the least grain fall upon the earth"—i.e., be lost to the knowledge of God, though now lost to men. And as it was possible to lose these tribes of Israel among the nations of the earth, so is it possible for God to recover them from their scattered condition from among these nations, with a display of the divine power. And with reference to this display of divine power, let me say that something must always be allowed to the character of prophetic language. You must remember that seers and prophets do not speak the cold, calculating language of philosophy, where every word is weighed in the exact scales of thought. Prophets do not follow the precision in their language that is required of the scientists. These men, prophets and seers, commune with God. Their finite life touches, for a moment, the infinite life of God. Their limited wisdom touches for a moment the supreme wisdom of the infinite. For an instant they see things large; and infused and inspired with the fire they have received from this contact with the divine, lo! they come with their message and speak it in the words of spiritual passion. Of course, to them, in this mood, the mountains will sink; the valleys will rise. Of course, the prophets, if in the north, will hear the voice of God, and the mountains of ice will flow down at their presence; the hills will rejoice and the mountains shout for joy! When men come with this inspiration upon them they see and feel things large, and they speak of them in that spirit; and when we come to reduce what they thus bring to us, from the heart of God, to our petty conceptions, we of course must be prepared to take into account the figurative language they speak. It is possible that if we fail to do this, we shall misapprehend, in part, some material fact of their message. Especially should one be on his guard in such highly picturesque matters as the return of the lost tribes from their long dispersion—from the lands of the north. In such an event not only will "mountains of ice flow down" at the presence of their prophets, but highways will be cast up in the midst of the great deep—their enemies will become a prey unto them—in barren deserts shall come forth pools of living water—the parched ground shall no longer be a thirsty land—the "boundaries of the everlasting hills shall tremble at their presence!" (Doc. and Cov., sec. 133.)
[Footnote 1: Having reference to Cook's claims of "discovering the pole" as well as Peary's discovery.]
We must make some allowance, I repeat, for the hyperbole of that language in which the message of these prophets is delivered—remember, it is vibrant with the great things of God; and it makes some effort to encompass these great things.