May 25 – Debatable Immortality

In the last half of the 19th century, Miles Grant became famous as a great debater on religious questions, and his ideas influence the Smith-Horr-Blakely family of Vermont. 

Miles Grant childhood home

Miles Grant grew up on a farm in Torrington, Connecticut.  His mother was “a praying Christian”, and his father donated to the construction of a Baptist church in Torrington, Connecticut, but the family did not attend church regularly.  

As a young man, Miles Grant became a schoolteacher.   He was an atheist, and frequently criticized religion.  One time, he bought a Bible at an auction with the express purpose of making fun of it.

In December 1842, he attended a series of religious lectures by an early “Millerite” preacher, Henry Chittenden, in a Methodist meetinghouse, in order to mock him.  But at the very first lecture, Grant became convinced that “the Bible is true.”  He went to his room in Humphrey’s Hotel where he prayed secretly for four days, and “obtained pardon, peace, and joy.”  He returned to the lectures, which were extended into a month-long revival.  Grant renounced the drinking, dancing, and card-playing that he had enjoyed, and “discarded all questionable habits”.  

Miles Grant, age 30

For the next few years, still within the Methodist church, he joined frequent study groups and prayer groups, and continued teaching.  He began to be invited to small prayer groups in homes & schoolhouses, then was invited to meetings in other towns.  He married another believer, Mary Augusta Tolles. 

By the spring of 1850, he was convinced of the Second Coming of Jesus Christ, and dissatisfied with the response within the Methodist churches, so he quit his local Methodist church and his teaching job to become a full-time evangelist.  In 1852, he published a notice for a camp meeting, saying: 

“We are satisfied that the end is emphatically near, and that all who are not ready for the “crisis,” have no time to lose, if they intend to be saved when the king comes to gather his faithful ones.”

The most important tenet of Grant’s belief was the new doctrine of Conditional Immortality.  He rejected the traditional belief in the immortality of the soul & eternal torture of sinners & non-believers.  Adventists developed the belief that human souls were not naturally immortal, and they would merely sleep between their own death and the Second Coming (Advent) of Christ, followed by the Last Judgment before the World to Come.  This doctrine was called Conditional Immortality.  Only God’s grace could confer immortality upon righteous souls.  In Adventist literature, there is great emphasis on “awakening” the soul during one’s lifetime so that it could be reanimated at the final Resurrection.  People outside the movement were called “sleepers”. 

In arguing for the idea of Conditional Immortality, the Adventists rejected not only the eternal tortures of Hell, but also the Spiritualist notions of a limbo existence of intermediary souls, a “spirit world” afterlife seeming to be independent of God.

This new idea of Conditional Immortality appealed to educated people, and Elder Grant made it sound like a scientific truth.  

“When honest truth-seekers differ, what shall be done? Reexamine the evidence and appeal to the highest authority. In this case there are three standards to which we may appeal: science, the Bible, and current theology.  Many will not accept the Bible or current theology as a standard, but they will agree to abide by the voice of science. Then let Science speak first. “ 

Grant taught that Christians should be a holy people, consecrated to an ideal life, to earn their resurrection. 

In 1854, Miles Grant moved to Boston and began to lead his own Free Chapel in a meeting hall.  He could claim that the prayer meetings drew 40 to 50 participants and several hundred on the Sabbath.  In 1856, Elder Grant became the editor of a weekly Adventist newspaper, The World’s Crisis, with his wife’s help. 

He began to travel around New England to preach, and he was often challenged by mainstream preachers to debate religious questions on which they disagreed.  One of Elder Grant’s most famous early debates was held between Adventist preachers in Boston in November of 1858.  The question at issue was about Conditional Immortality:  “Do the Scriptures teach the doctrine of the eternal conscious suffering of the wicked?”

festive 1868 Methodist camp meeting in NY

In December 1859, a 4-evening debate was held in Seneca Falls, N.Y., on “The State of the Dead”.  Adventist Elder W.W. Clayton argued against the idea of Conditional Immortality, affirming that “When man dies, his spirit remains in a conscious state, separated from his body, until the resurrection.”  Large crowds attended. 

Between these two highly publicized debates, Mr. Grant came to Castleton to speak, probably to debate his favorite question with another preacher at Castleton Seminary.

  

In March, Hiram Horr’s sister Sarah came from neighboring Poultney to Castleton to attend the meetings.  (see letter excerpt in Mr. Grant in Castleton post)  She brought her 21-year-old nephew Lucius and a young lady from just over the state line in Hampton, New York, Miss Betsy Ann Hotchkiss.  It is unclear what the relationship may have been between Lucius & Betsy Ann.  Attending edifying lectures was one way for young people to get together at the time.  The topic for debate was probably Conditional Immortality, since he was developing his reputation on that subject at this time.  He appealed to the rationality and scriptural authority.  Sarah, Lucius, & Betsy Ann were reportedly “quite in favor of the man”. 

In 1862, Sarah Horr visited Castleton again for a week to hear Mr. Grant.  Sarah Smith Horr does not express her own opinion of the preacher’s beliefs, but she believes that he is sincere and worth listening to, whether or not he is theologically correct.

info:  Wikipedia.com

info & images:  Piper, Fred LeRoy.  Life and Labors of Miles Grant. Boston: Advent Christian Publication Society, 1915.