IRREFUTABLE PROOFS OF THE AUTHENTICITY OF THE THREEFOLD GODHEAD STATEMENTS BY E.G.

WHITE
By Derrick Gillespie
INTRODUCTION: While carefully studying the issues for over 14 years (as a trained teacher in historical studies), I have honestly discovered that there are a myriad of strong supportive proofs that most SDA pioneers, after 1888 and before 1915, gradually adjusted their doctrinal views to teach a new or non-traditional version of trinitarianism, and that this is proven even in the writings of Adventisms chief pioneer, E.G. White! The modern SDA anti-Trinitarians seek to escape the reality of the LATER writings of Mrs. White CLEARLY evidencing a LATER recognition of three persons in the Godhead (i.e. an expansion on the message in her earlier writings), by trying to prove that her writings were tampered with (i.e. altered and added to by editors and manuscript aides) in every instance where three living persons or three holiest beings appear as part of the Godhead in her writings! Yet the circumstantial evidence available irrefutably proves that misguided notion to be false!! To the unbiased and objective thinker, the possibility of that happening on the scale postulated by the conspiracy theorists is very unlikely, and the following facts (grouped in two sections) prove it to be the case: IRREFUTABLE PROOFS: 1. Actual stenograph records, sometimes even self-signatured copies of ORIGINAL E.G. White writings (as provided by the E.G. White Estate), Xeroxed copies of actual SDA periodicals and doctrinal papers (like Signs of the Times, and Review and Herald) show/prove VERY MANY of the controversial E.G. White statements to have actually come from her pen while alive and still very much active. This writer personally took the time to view the evidence provided by the E.G. White Estate, and it is compelling. Email me at ddgillespie@live.com for that evidence. I also personally took the time to view in the General Conference archives online the very many photocopied pages of Signs of the Times, Review and Herald, Australian Union Conference Record, etc. (all of which I downloaded), and has seen for myself not just the actual pre-1915 articles of E.G. White with the three persons of the Godhead statements, but especially statements put out by her when very much in good health and active. Publication of controversial three persons statements in these pre-1915 periodicals, and attributing them to E.G. White, would no doubt have been challenged as false or tampered with by E.G. White herself, i.e. if they did not reflect her original writings. But she DID NOT register any such objection throughout the last 25 years of her life (i.e. 18901915), and she would have in fact read the final manuscripts by editors before they were published, at least up to about 1912. Some try to manufacture an argument about her being too sick and feeble in her later years to be able to properly monitor what was published and attributed to her, yet this again is a straw man argument, and lacks teeth. Most of the three persons statements came out while she was very much active (even before 1910; see her later years in the SDA Encyclopedia), i.e. she was healthy enough to be fully writing, FULLY monitoring her manuscript editors, FULLY overseeing the publishing of major books, articles, et al, even while travelling and preaching (including naming and attacking the pantheism of Dr. Kellogg, even while ignoring or refusing to name and attack the trinitarianism also present in in his writings). She was fully active in that regard up about 1910 or 1912, while living at Elmshaven (California) in the U.S., and yet she never once registered doubts about what was published on her behalf by her publishers. In addition, since the Church was previously dominated by anti-Trinitarian thinkers, if what was published and attributed to her

was suspicious, or tampered with in order to support trinitarianism, then the alert brethren (especially the anti-Trinitarian hardliners) would have brought it to her attention then (i.e. if she had indeed missed what her aides and publishers had published and attributed to her). Again, not even one case of that ever happening; even in view of the following reality, which gives further proof of my point.

2. Other pioneers contemporary with E.G. White (not just one or two) quoted her new (i.e. post1888 and pre-1915) three persons statements in their own pre-1915 articles while supporting a trinity of the Godhead, and they are on record (prior to 1910) doing so in officially published pre-1915 papers in Adventism; even quoting the actual manuscripts that she expressed the three persons statements, and used them, while she was alive, still healthy and very much active, to support their new Trinitarian stance. This, again, is another way to vouch for the authenticity of the controversial three persons and threefold Godhead statements of E.G. White. Several of these SDA pioneers (not just one or two) who were contemporary with her in the last 25 years of her life (i.e. 1890 -1915), and who quoted her three persons statements, even while using them to support their Trinitarian stance, were active pioneering workers and Church leaders, rubbing shoulders with E.G. White! Even while she was away from the U.S., and while in Australia (between 1891-1900), other SDA pioneers there in Australia (such as Robert Hare in 1909) were quoting her three persons of the Godhead statements and using them to support their new trinity beliefs! And yet never once did she rebuke them, or charge anyone with adding to her writings! No one then (up to 1915 when she died) ever brought a charge against publishers and editors tampering with her writings whenever the three persons statements were quoted. None! Critically, it must be remembered that F.M. Wilcox (a Church leader and the chief editor of Review and Herald) used her writings, while quoting her three persons statements, to proclaim himself and Adventists (in the early 1900s) to have become believers in the Trinity while E.G. White was alive. And yet, this same Church leader was promoted by E.G. White herself, in her own final will and testament, to be one of the first members of the board of managers of the E.G. White estate; and charged with the responsibility of preserving and protecting her writings!! Can you imagine if F.M Wilcox had quoted writings falsely attributed to E.G. White, and had used them to proclaim Trinitarianism as a belief of Adventists in 1913 (!!), what this would mean regarding him being a first member of that board after 1915? And yet no one, including E.G. Whites own son, W.C. White (who died in 1933), and who was also a first member of that board, ever accused F.M. Wilcox, or anyone for that matter, of tampering with her writings whenever the three persons statements were quoted. William C. White, retained, it seems, certain of his earlier views against the Holy Spirits separate personhood, and yet he never opposed his own brother and E.G. White Estate board member, F.M. Wilcox, for quoting what some today would call bogus or tampered with three persons of the Godhead statements from his mother!! That is powerful circumstantial evidence, and proves clearly that those modern anti-Trinitarians in Adventism (some of whom have apostatized) who manufacture this weak and false argument are like drowning men clutching at straws. There is just no support to the argument. Yes, it is true that in later years, after the death of E.G. White, and in response to her personal counsel to correct certain errors in earlier writings of pioneers, certain editorial changes were made to certain books, like Uriah Smiths Daniel and the Revelation! Yet there is still available (to scholars and historians) the earlier unedited version of 1897; and so scholastic comparison can be made to see what was edited, so as to ascertain the merit or demerits in those editions. And where E.G. White (in certain manuscripts) had written the word it, with reference to the Holy Spirit, the pronoun it was replaced (by later editors) with the pronoun he; which reflects a better consistency, considering that she herself had also used the pronoun he in several instances. And this is a very biblical approach, since this change uses the same pronoun used a total of 24 times (!!) by Jesus Himself in John chapters 14-16, i.e. when he was speaking of the

Spirit (despite, by acceptable rules of Greek grammar, we can call the Spirit it, just like personal spirit beings in Luke 9:39-42; a matter E.G. White herself seemed to have fully understood). No one in Adventism and its leadership today has ever denied these later (i.e. post-1915) editions were made, since there was no secret conspiracy (as the anti-Trinitarians vainly argue), and this reality, in and of itself, does nothing to disprove E.G. White actually wrote the MORE TELLING three persons of the Godhead statements in the first place. To villain-ise these PROVEN editions that were made, and to use them to speculate about others that are surmised and unproven, is simply a smokescreen tactic, and is a matter that is blown out of proportion, and is rather futile as a tactic if you ask me!! OBSERVATIONS: The foregoing is on record, is clear for all to see, and is certainly not all of the evidence that could be appealed to either. Yet I have observed, with some consternation, that all of this supportive circumstantial evidence, proving the real truth, is largely ignored and or downplayed by some (the modern SDA anti-Trinitarians), and usually this ostrich-head-inthe-sand approach is a convenient cop-out from facing the painful realities they are not prepared to face and come clean with. See their cop-out approaches highlighted here (click), along with how to refute these approaches. I have observed too that when all of these cop-out approaches fail, i.e. when it is undeniable that she did write the statements, then some of these dissidents in Adventism usually resort to questioning the true calling or true prophet status of Mrs. White; whom they had before stanchly supported. How sad! But, why do they do this? Because they realize that if at any time the Spirit is proven by E.G. White herself to be the third person of the Godhead (to use an expression of E.G. White herself), and not as a figure of speech, mind you, but as a numeric value, i.e. in the sense of there being three living persons of the Godhead (using another proven statement from her), then not only would trinitarianism be seen as a legitimate belief (once explained in the right way), but also Adventist pioneers themselves (the ones alive after 1888) would be proven to be the reason for the establishment of the current Trinitarian belief of the SDA Church; i.e. it was not resulting from some, so-called, misinformed new generation of misguided Adventists!! Yet, this precisely what the evidence shows, i.e. the pioneers grew into greater knowledge and adjusted/changed their views, and so I continue to say that these modern SDA dissidents are simply kicking against the pricks. Heres another reason why!! All around E.G. White from about 1891 or 1892 , up to 1915, several SDA pioneers were evidencing a shift to Trinitarian viewpoints, and some even before Dr. Kellogg (an SDA heretic) expressed a similar belief; with Kellogg being a misguided pioneer who mixed Trinitarian viewpoints with pantheistic viewpoints, resulting in Mrs. White naming and denouncing his pantheistic viewpoints as heresy, but not naming and denouncing the Trinitarian views he also expressed). And notice, these pioneers were all contemporary with Mrs. White, and were increasingly doing this shiftto-the-Trinitarian- viewpoints bit up to 1915!!, and yet never once did Mrs. White name their tailored trinitarianism as heresyonly pantheism of Dr Kellogg!! That is telling!!! Follow the telling evidence even more in the following. KICKING AGAINST THE PRICKSAs early as 1898, an SDA pioneer, while running a series of bible studies on the topic The Holy Spirit is a Person, HONESTLY and distinctly admitted in Adventisms leading doctrinal paper that (note the title of the article):
It seems strange to me now [in 1898], that I ever believed that the Holy Spirit was only an influence, in view of the work He doeswe want the truth because it is truth, and we reject error because it

is error, regardless of any views we may formerly have held, or any difficulty we may have

had, or may now have, when we view the Holy Spirit as a person. Light is sown for the righteous. Satan's scheme is to destroy all faith in the personality of the Godhead, the Father, Son, *AND Holy Ghost,also in his own personality Let us beware lest Satan shall lead us to take the first step in destroying our faith in the personality of this person of the Godhead,the Holy Ghost It was once hard for me to see how a spirit could be a person [but] Christ has put into the field, as his personal representative, the Holy Ghost, who is in charge of all the forces of God's kingdom to overthrow Satan and his angels; and the Holy Ghost is the only one to whom is delegated this authority from God. "The prince of the power of evil can be held in check only by the power of God in the third person of the Godhead, the Holy Spirit.""Special Testimony," No. 10, page 37. God and Christ have placed all the angels and the power of the throne of omnipotence under him [the Holy Spirit], to overthrow the rebellion against God's government.
-R.A. Underwood The Holy Spirit a Person, Review and Herald, Vol. 75, May 17, *1898, pg. 310

The above is more than a mouthful, coming long before 1915, and speaks volumes of the transitional viewpoints entering pioneering Adventism on this awesome subject long before the death of Mrs. White in 1915. The transition took on momentum by the first decade of the 1900s, so that by1913 a statement of some of the points of our SDA faith, as published on page 21 of the October 9 edition of The Advent Review and Sabbath Herald , it revealed the following: "For the benefit of those who may desire to know more particularly the cardinal features of the faith held by this denomination, we shall state that Seventh-day Adventists believe, 1. In the divine Trinity. This Trinity consists of the eternal Father, a personal, spiritual being, omnipotent, omniscient, infinite in power, wisdom, and love; of the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of the eternal Father, through whom all things were created, and through whom the salvation of the redeemed hosts will be accomplished; the Holy Spirit, the third person of the Godhead, the one regenerating agency in the work of redemption..."

IT IS NO SECRET TO THOSE WHO ARE PROPERLY INFORMED, THAT EARLY SEVENTHDAY ADVENTISTS (i.e. THE EARLIEST PIONEERS) LARGELY BELIEVED THAT THERE WAS NO TRINITY WHATSOEVER, AND THAT THE HOLY SPIRIT WAS NOT A PERSON OR "THIRD PERSON OF THE GODHEAD BUT JUST AN INFLUENCE OR POWER FROM GOD. THEY ALSO FELT THAT A BELIEF IN ANY SO-CALLED "TRINITY" WAS A VESTIGE OF PAGANISM AND ROMAN CATHOLICISM. BUT BY 1913 ALL THAT HAD ALREADY BEGUN TO CHANGE (SEE PROOF HERE); A MATTER SOME TODAY IN ADVENTISM STILL FIND HARD TO COME TO GRIPS WITH, EVEN AS THEY DEPERATELY KICK AGAINST THE PRICKS ABOUT WHAT THE HISTORICAL RECORDS NOW SHOW. THE TRUTH WHICH ALL CIRCUMSTANTIAL EVIDENCE CONVERGE ON, WHEN CAREFULLY STUDIED WITH AN UNBIASED MIND, IS THAT THE SDA PIONEERS THEMSELVES STARTED TO CHANGE THEIR POSITION ON THE GODHED ISSUES FROM AS EARLY AS 1888 AND 1892, AND IT BECAME FULLY EVIDENT BY 1915, DESPITE THE RESISTANCE OF THE HARDLINERS WHO STILL MAINTAINED ALL OF THE EARLIEST DOCTRINAL POSITIONS, i.e. ON ALL ASPECTS OF THE TRINITY!! WHAT IS CERTAN NOW, AS MORE AND MORE HISTORICAL EVIDENCE COMES TO LIGHT, IS THAT THIS POSITION IS UNTENABLE FOR SOMEONE REMAINING A TRUE SD ADVENTIST!! AND TO HOLD TO A FULL OR COMPLETE ANTITRINITARIAN POSITION, WHILE REMAINING A TRUE ADVENTIST, IS AKIN TO KICKING AGAINST THE PRICKS!! SEE MORE ON SOME IN ADVENTISM KICKING AGAINST THE PRICKS HERE. (Click)