THE TREADING DOWN OF THE SANCTUARY

The agents by which the sanctuary is trodden under foot are the daily, or continual desolation, and the transgression, or abomination of desolation. Daniel 8:13; 11:31; 12:11. These two desolations, as we have already seen, are paganism and papacy. It is often urged as a sufficient argument against the view of the sanctuary of God in Heaven that such a sanctuary is not susceptible of being trodden under foot. But we answer, This is not impossible, when the New Testament shows us that wicked men (apostates) tread under foot the Minister of the heavenly sanctuary, our Lord Jesus Christ. Hebrews 10:29; 8:1, 2. If they can tread under foot the Minister of that sanctuary, then they can tread under foot the sanctuary itself. It is not impossible that the pagan and papal desolations should be represented as treading under foot the heavenly sanctuary, when the same vision represents the little horn as stamping upon the stars; Daniel 8:10; and when it is expressly predicted that the papal power should war against the tabernacle of God in Heaven. Revelation 13:5-7. The language of this vision, that these blasphemous powers should cast down the truth to the ground, stamp upon the stars, and tread under foot the sanctuary and the host, is certainly figurative, as it would otherwise involve complete absurdities.S23D 76.2

Let us now briefly trace the manner in which Satan has, by paganism and papacy, trodden under foot the sanctuary of the Lord. We have already seen that he has done this by erecting rival sanctuaries, where, in the place of the only living and true God, he has established “new gods that came newly up.” Deuteronomy 32:16, 17. In the days of the Judges and of Samuel, Satan’s rival sanctuary was the temple of Dagon, where the Philistines worshiped. Judges 16:23, 24. And when they had taken the ark of God from Israel, the Philistines deposited it in this temple. 1 Samuel 5. After Solomon erected a glorious sanctuary upon Mount Moriah, Jeroboam, who made Israel to sin, erected a rival sanctuary at Bethel, and thus drew away ten of the twelve tribes from the worship of the living God, to that of the golden calves. 1 Kings 12:26-33; Amos 7:13, margin. In the days of Nebuchadnezzar, the rival to the sanctuary of God was the temple of Nebuchadnezzar’s god at Babylon. And into this temple he carried the vessels of the Lord’s sanctuary, when he laid it desolate. Daniel 1:2; Ezra 1:7; 5:14; 2 Chronicles 36:7. At a still later period, Satan established at Rome a temple or sanctuary of “all the gods.” Daniel 8:11; 11:31.S23D 77.1

After the typical sanctuary of the first covenant had given place to the true sanctuary of God, Satan baptized his pagan sanctuary and heathen rites and ceremonies, calling them Christianity.S23D 77.2

Thenceforward he had at Rome a “temple of God,” and in that temple, a being exalted above all that is called God or that is worshiped. 2 Thessalonians 2:4. And this papal abomination has trodden under foot the holy city (Revelation 11:2; 21:2), by persuading a large portion of the human family that Rome, the place of this counterfeit temple of God, was “the holy city,” or “the eternal city.” And it has trodden under foot and blasphemed God’s sanctuary or tabernacle (Revelation 13:6; Hebrews 8:2) by calling its own sanctuary the temple of God, and by turning away the worship of them that dwell on the earth, from “the temple of God in Heaven,” to the sanctuary of Satan at Rome. It has trodden under foot the Son of God, the minister of the heavenly sanctuary (Hebrews 10:29; 8:2), by making the pope the head of the church, instead of Jesus Christ (Ephesians 5:23), and by leading men to the worship of that “son of perdition,” as one able to forgive past sins, and confer the right to commit them in the future, and thus turning men from Him who alone has power on earth to forgive sins, and to pardon iniquity and transgression. Such has been the nature of the warfare which Satan has maintained against the sanctuary and the cause of God, in his vain attempts to defeat the great plan of redemption which God has been carrying forward in his sanctuary. In order to present the cleansing of the sanctuary of God in Heaven, it is necessary to notice brieflyS23D 78.1