III. Cumming-Shifts Focal Point to 1867
JOHN CUMMING (1807-1881), Scottish expositor of prophecy and pastor of Scotch Church, Crown Point, received an M.A. from the Aberdeen University in 1827. After engaging in private tutoring he received a license to preach in 1832. He was particularly active in Romanist controversies and was widely known for his exposition of prophecy. He held that the last of the seven vials was to be poured out by 1867, and made 1867 the great focal point of prophetic expectation. In 1868 he sought to attend the Vatican council, but was refused. A glance at the titles of his books gives the scope of his study and his emphasis. PFF3 712.4
Altogether Cumming produced more than twenty volumes, some of which were translated. Apocalyptic Sketches (1849), first delivered as lectures in Exeter and in London, passed through several printed editions. His leading works were: The Sixth Vial (1843); Lectures for the Times; or an Exposition of Tridentine and Tractanan Popery (1844); Apocalyptic Sketches(1849); Prophetic Studies, or Lectures on the Book of Daniel(1850); Lecture... on Romanism Idolatrous (1851); Lecture on Romanism Persecuting (1851); The Signs of the Times (1854); The End (1855); The Great Tribulation (1859); The Great Preparation (1860); The Millennial Rest (1862); Behold, the Bridegroom Cometh (1865); The Sounding of the Last Trumpet(1867); The Last Warning Cry (1867); The Seventh Vial, or the Time of Trouble Begun (1870); and The Fall of Babylon(1870).PFF3 713.1
1. WORLD’S TWILIGHT FOLLOWED BY ETERNAL DAY
In an address on The Sixth Vial: A Sermon for the Times (1843), delivered in his church in April, 1843, Cumming couples the drying up of the Turkish power (the Euphrates) with the restoration of the kings of the East (the Jews), the latter being “the chief sign of the times in which we live.” The marvel of their persistence through the years is noted, along with the resurgence of Catholicism and the waning of Protestantism. On this he remarks:PFF3 713.2
“The very name of Protestant, which once was the rallying cry of this mighty land, and the secret of the eloquence of our senate and of the effects of our pulpit, is dying away like distant music; and the majestic truths of which it has been venerated as the symbol, are falling like the too ripe ears of harvest before the sickle of the Papacy-like the verdure and the blossoms of earth before the blast of the siroc. or the breath of the simoom of the desert.” PFF3 713.3
The tragic inroads of the Oxford Tractarians are deplored -“The Church is made the substitute of Christianity-the priest, for the Holy Spirit.” The three unclean spirits are declared abroad “croaking like an unclean frog from behind decorated altars and gaudy rites.” The great day is at hand. Armageddon impends, and the world’s ruin. He adds:PFF3 714.1
“We feel and hear creation groaning and travailing, waiting for the manifestation of the sons of God. Behind the lowering cloud, however, there is a glorious apocalypse. The twilight that closes in darkness shall be followed by a twilight that will be merged in eternal day. It is at the close of this Vial that Christ adds (ver. 15), ‘Behold I come as a thief. Blessed is he that watcheth and keepeth his garments.” PFF3 714.2
2. 1260 YEARS DATED FROM 532 TO 1792
In another address on The Signs of the Times (1854), before the Y.M.C.A., Gumming discusses the prophetic numbers of Daniel and Revelation. The 1260 years are there assigned to the Roman apostasy. “This is almost universally accepted,” the “witnesses in sackcloth” being the “saints worn out.” This period he dates from Justinian’s authorization of papal power in 532 and ending in 1792 when “great convulsions took ... initial active operation.” Now the scourging of the Papacy is under way, and in the final act it will be destroyed “by the brightness of His coming.” PFF3 714.3
3. 2300 YEARS PLACED FROM 430 B.C. TO A.D. 1820
The 2300 year-days include “the duration of the Mahometan power.” This Cumming dates from 430 B.C., the “era of the noon-tide glory of the Persian Empire.” From that date Daniel “looks along the centuries” and “predicts that 2300 years from that date its decay would begin.” This “lands us on the year 1820,” from which date the wasting away of the Mohammedan power had been progressing. In support, Cumming lists the Greek insurrections, revolts of provinces, destruction of Turco-Egyptian fleets, etc. This he refers to as the “progressive evap oration of Mahometanism, beginning in 1820, and expected by every student of prophecy to end in a very short time.” This dying out, or “gradual decay,” Cumming asserts, is assuredly under way, in proof of which he cites Habershon and others. The same contention is set forth in his Apocalyptic Sketches.PFF3 714.4
4. 1867 MADE THE GREAT FOCAL POINT
In his Great Tribulation, Cumming places stress upon 1867 as the great focal point, to which “the best, the wisest, and the most thoughtful “expositors were looking, on the basis of the 1260 years from A.D. 607, by some and the 1335 years by others. By a different reckoning, the 1260 years of the “great Western apostasy” were from 532 to 1792. The thirty additional years of the 1290 years would lead to 1822, when one commentator would also end the 2300 years, with the beginning of the exhaustion of Turkey. And the forty-five years more of the 1335 would lead to 1867. Then he observes that “according to both theories,” 1867“evolves as the year of stupendous changes.” PFF3 715.1
In support he cites Lady Hester Stanhope, Irving, Major Denham, Cuninghame, Bickersteth, and Scott. So he maintains that “1867 is an era fraught with gigantic issues.” Some think it is “the commencement of the millennial rest; others think it is the destruction of all the errors whose roots are struck deep into our world, and the universal spread of the empire of the Prince of Peace.” PFF3 715.2
5. SARACENIC WOES: 612-762; TURKISH WOE; 1057-1453
Later treatises, such as The Great Preparation (1860), simply reiterate and amplify these positions, going into other details-the 2300 years from 481 B.C. to A.D. 1821, and the “waning of the Mahometan Crescent,” or drying up of the Turco-Moslem power. The 150 years of the Saracenic woe he places between 612 and 762, and the 396 years (365 + 30+1) of the Turco- Moslem woe he extends from the loosing of these forces in 1057, under the lead of Togrul Beg, to the possession of Constantinople in 1453; thus also in his Behold, the Bridegroom Cometh (1865), in which he asserts that, “the great chronological epochs of prophecy all expire in 1867,” and in The Sounding of the Last Trumpet (1867), Cumming’s various tables for the various time periods all stress the 1867 focal date. He even titled one prediction The. End of the World in 1867 (1866).PFF3 715.3
So again we see that the whole emphasis has been shifted, by means of the 1335-year interpretation, away from 1843-47, on to 1867, as the new great focal point.PFF3 716.1