Page 21 - Watchman- What of the Night

Chapter V: Tribulation and Wrath

We concluded our last chapter with the statement that there is a clearly defined
distinction in scripture between the use of the word ―tribulation‖ and the use of the
word ―wrath.‖ This distinction can be established and maintained, and is not merely

asserted.
In interpreting scripture it is important that correct distinctions shall be made. If not,
there will be a loss in understanding. But such distinctions in the uses of words and

phrases must be legitimate and reasonable, drawn from enough occurrences of the
words or phrases in the sacred text, with a sufficiently defined cleavage, to warrant
the making of such distinctions. To allege distinctions that violate the laws of
language, logic and sound hermenteutics is worse than nothing and creates confusion
unbounded. The Darby-Kelly-Scofield-Gaebelein school of eschatology has been

guilty of this very thing, and has gendered endless confusion and error as a result. The
average reader of such prophetic material is overawed by the eminence of the authors
and accepts their statements ex cathedra. He does not stop to weigh the matter or to

consider whether the distinctions made are tenable or sensible, and does not even look
up the scriptures to check on the correctness of the statements. If he did, he would be
disillusioned regarding the accuracy of his ―sources.‖ It was when this writer was
persuaded to examine and prove these things, after having accepted them for years at
their face value, that found a multitude of errors, and a large part of the structure to be

ingeniously fictitious.
Having committed themselves to the hypothesis of three comings of Christ, or split
stages of the second coming, they are compelled to resort to every variety of twisting,

fantastic interpretations and false distinctions, to support a hopeless case, ignoring
many plain scriptures that completely refute it. The whole approach and technique are
reminiscent of the special pleaders for organic evolution. They wish it accepted by the
weight of their opinion and not by specific evidence. Incidentally this view arose at
about the same time that organic evolution, the so-called Higher Criticism, and

Marxism matured and crystallized. We will demonstrate this in more detail later.
For the distinction we are about to make between tribulation and wrath we invite
the careful investigation and research of evert reader. To aid in this we will append a

list of references from a Greek concordance of the words dealt with.
The Greek word often translated ‗tribulation‘ appears 44 times in the N.T., and is
translated as follows: ‗burdened‘ once, ‗anguish‘ once, ‗affliction‘ or ‗afflicted‘ 17
times, ‗tribulation‘21 times, ‗persecution‘ once, ‗trouble‘ three times. Of these 44 uses
of the Greek noun there are 36 that are distinctly and directly related to the sufferings
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