Awake!, April 8, 1956

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WAGES OF SIN —SLEEP OR TORMENT? Simple facts about the condition of the dead

France in Ferment

Understand the causes behind the unstaH“ govemments of France

Trees—Nature’s Police Force

They break the wind, control the climate, conserve the soil

The Deaf in a World of Sound

Helping them "hear'

THE MISSION OF THIS JOURNAL

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CONTENTS

Are You Objective?

Just for His Name’s Sake

Wages of Sin—Sleep or Torment?

Hell Neither Hot nor Eternal

Pioneering at Last

France in Ferment

Why the Instability?

Trees—Nature’s Police Force

One Nation’s Expendables for Peace 15, Are Church Statistics Inflated?

"The Hypocrisy of Men Who Speak Lies” 17

The Funny Octopus

Russia Lifts an Iron Curtain

The Deaf In a World of Sound

"Your Word Is Truth”

The Value of Knowing Your Bible 25

Jehovah’s Witnesses Preach In All

the Earth—Ecuador

Do You Know?

Watching the World

Velum* XXXVII

Brooklyn, N. Y., April 8, 1m

Number 7

TATHAT does it mean to be objective JUL and why is it desirable that we be objective? To be objective means to be able to approach or discuss a question or probi lem without being swayed by emotion or personal considerations. This is notan easy thing to do, which is why so many people refuse to discuss religion. They cannot remain objective, but get excited. Yet we must be objective if we would know the truth, and the truth we should want to know, for the truth has power: "The truth will set you free.”—John 8:32, New World Trans.

The failure to be objective is one of the basic reasons why there is such disagreement among philosophers, among scientists and among the religious as to what is truth. Self-interest warps the judgment and so men, on the one hand, reject the truth when it is brought to their attention and, on the other hand, accept as truth that which is not the truth, apparently in all sincerity and yet not actually with clean hearts. To appreciate the truth we must approach it with “a right and good heart.*’—Luke 8:15, New World Trans.

This is true in spiritual or religious matters, in fact, there most of all. Self-interest, lack of objectivity, blinds one to that which is the truth and therefore to that which is to one’s greatest interest ultimately. The clergy of Jesus’ day furnish a pointed

OBJECTIVE ?

example. Their selfishness so blinded them, that they could not see that Jesus was fulfilling the many prophecies regarding the Messiah. Yes, no one should have been able to appreciate that fact more than they, with all the opportunities they had to study the Scriptures.

Yet it was not they but the common people who were heard to make such remarks as: ‘This is for a certainty The Prophet” “This is the Christ.” “When the Christ arrives, he will not perform more signs than this man has performed, will he?” These common people gladly heard Jesus, going to the temple early in the morning to hear him.—John 7:40, 41, 31; Luke 21:38, New Worid Trans.

. But their religious leaders simply could not come to such obvious conclusions. Why? Because they were unable to be objective, As Jesus plainly pointed out to them: “How can you believe, when you are accepting glory from one another and you are not seeking the glory that is from the only God?” Jesus' teaching and miracles posed a threat to their position in the community and so they simply could not make room for his sayings, for the truth about him, in their minds and hearts. —John 5:44, New World Trans.

The evolutionists of modern times furnish another example. Proceeding on the premise that the Bible simply could not be true, they are unable to be objective. Thus, if the desire had been merely to ascertain the truth, why should Lecomte du Nuoy have termed certain scientific evidence as having "all the unsatisfactory characteristics of absolute creation”? Why were these facts termed unsatisfactory? Did he not thereby admit his lack of objectivity, that he had hoped to find other proof? The evidence he found was valid, but it was unsatisfactory to Du Nuoy because it did not prove what Tie wanted it to prove. —Human Destiny, page 79.

Nor was Darwin himself any more objective, Says he in Origin o/ the Species (Vol. 2, page 49, 6th ed,): * ‘Geology assuredly does not reveal any such finely graded organic chain; and this perhaps is the most obvious objection which can be raised against the theory. The explanation Ues, however, in the extreme Imperfection of the geological record,”

Aside from the Bible, the geological record is the only one that can testify to man's early history. Why should Darwin term It ‘extremely imperfect’? How does he know, how could he have proved that it was? Obviously, Darwin did not look for a theory on the basis of the facts at hand, he was not objective, but he invented a theory and then looked for evidence to support it. Not finding it, he speaks of the “extreme imperfection1’ of* the geological record. But the fact is that this geological record is not only 'extremely imperfect’ as regards the origin of man, but nonexistent. even as Professor W. Branco of Berlin University said: “Paleontology tells us nothing on the subject—it knows no ancestors of man.” It is because of tenaciously holding to evolution in spite of the lack of evidence that unobjective men of science become the logical prey of the perpetrators of the "Piltdown man” hoax, and who knows how many others.

People who believe in the happening of miracles today invariably are not objective. They want to believe in miracles, they want to see them happen, not because such performances would bring honor to God’s name, but they want to see them merely out of curiosity, even as was the case with Herod Anti pas, who wanted to see Jesus perform a miracle. So they become the logical dupes of the superstitious little children who imagine they have seen a vision of the “virgin Mary,” as was the case with the hundreds of thousands that flocked to Heroldsbach, Germany, and to Sabana Grande, Puerto Rico, that were only io be disappointed and to have their own church afterward reject these reports as fraudulent. In the same category must be placed those who are deceived by modem so-called "faith healers.”

We cannot escape it. If we would avoid being deceived and if we would be able to appreciate the truth when we meet it we must be objective, we must keep selfish considerations from influencing our thinking. We must be willing to pay whatever price the truth costs in the way of preconceived nations, popularity or material gain. We do not need a higher education to appreciate the truth, but we do need to be free from selfish motives; we must have a "good and right heart,” And once having found the truth, and purchased it, as it were, we should net let it go for any consideration. So, as the wise man counsels, "buy the truth, and sell it not.”—Proverbs 23:23.

A man In California recently lived up to his name; new he is trying to live it down. Los Angeles police arrested the 36-year-old man for illegally crossing a busy street At headquarters the man identified himself as J. Walker.

one need* Io be a theologian to under-stand what the Bible says about the wages of sin. It is that dear* Where are the dead? Are they really dead? These are not difficult | question* when we let God1* Ward provide the answer*.

SIN pays wages. What are those wages?

An eternity of torment in red-hot fires? Or sleep in death ? When the Bible writers speak of death, do they associate it with sleep or with torment? When Jesus* friend Lazarus died and was resurrected after four days of being dead, had he been sleeping or had he been in torment? When Christ Jesus died and went to the Bible hell for three days, had he been asleep or in torment? We should not be afraid of these questions, but we should approach them in the Scriptural way, “with your power of reason.”—Romans 12:1, New World Trans,

The Creator himself told Adam what the wages of sin are. In clear language Jehovah God addressed Adam: “As for the tree of the knowledge of good and bad you must not eat from it, for in the day you eat from it you will positively die?* Was there any warning about eternal torture in red-hot fires taking place after death, so that the real wages sin pays are torment? There was none. Then are we to think that Jehovah, the God of justice, would hurl Adam into an eternity of torment without a warning? As we should expect, Adam was sentenced according to the warning God gave him. Said the Supreme Judge to disobedient Adam: “In the sweat of your face you will eat bread until you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken. For dust you are and to dust you will return?1 Can dust suffer torment? —Genesis 2:17; 3:19, New World Trans,

Death is what Adam earned. Death is what he received. After Adam’s death would God change the sentence to eternal torment? That would be impossible, for as God says: “I, Jehovah, change not.” Some 4,000 years after God executed the death sentence upon Adam, an apostle of Christ Jesus confirmed that sin’s wages were still unchanged: “The wages sin pays is death?’ —Malachi 3:6, Am. Stan. Ver.; Romans 6:23, New World Trans,

But some persons say that death is for the body, torment for the soul. That brings up the questions: What is a soul? Can a soul die? Genesis 2:7 shows that a soul is a living, breathing, sentient creature; it shows that Adam uxm a soul, that he did not have a soul separate and distinct from his body. The Bible is dear that the soul is not immortal: “The soul that sinneth, it shall die.” (Ezekiel 18:4, Am, Stan, Ver.) That leads to another question.

What Is Death?

Death is the end of any form of life. For man it is a state of unconsciousness, the end of intellectual and physical activity. Thus if eternal-torment teachers are to be believed, the dead are not really dead. But what really counts is not what men say but

what God says, Men can lie; God cannot So, according to God's Word, are the dead really dead ? Dead they are. Says the Bible: “The living know that they shall die: but the dead know not anything, neither have they any more a reward; for the memory of them is forgotten. Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do if with thy might; for there is no work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom, in Sheol, whither thou goest.”—Ecclesiastes 9:5, 10, Am. Stan. Ver.

Sheol is the Hebrew word originally used by Bible writers to represent grave-dom or the common grave of mankind. The translators of the Authorized Version Bible confused matters when they translated this one Hebrew word by three different English words: pit, grave and hell. This is misleading because it causes persons to think that hell is something different from the pit or the grave. Actually all three mean the same thing, for, wherever Sheol appears, it refers to the death state. This death state the Bible likens to sleep.

Job was a faithful servant of God who was afflicted by the Devil with a most loathsome, painful disease. Job's wife turned against him; his friends did likewise. According to the man-made idea of hell, Job was having about as much of it as any man could have on earth. If Job believed that the Bible hell or Sheol meant torment in flames that are never quenched, it is unreasonable that he should have uttered this prayer: “Oh that thou wouldest hide me in Sheol, that thou wouldest keep me secret, until thy wrath be past.” Concerning his hope Job added: “It shall go down to the bars of Sheol, when once there is rest in the dust.” Job thus hoped to rest from his present tormented state by going to the Bible hell and sleeping in the dust of the earth until the resurrection.—Job 14:13; 17:16, Am. Stan. Ver.

In the Bible, death is often associated with sleep, by the frequent appearance of the phrase “asleep In death.” A few examples follow: "The day our forefathers fell asleep in death.” “david, on the one hand, served the express will of God in his own generation and fell asleep in death and was, laid with his forefathers.” “If her husband should fall asleep in death, she is free to be married.”—2 Peter 3:4; Acts 13:36; 1 Corinthians 7:39, New World Trans.

If any man should know whether the dead are asleep or in torment, certainly it would be one who has come back from the dead. Lazarus, the brother of Mary and Martha, was one of those who came back from the Bible hell or Sheol, or Ha’des, as it is called in Greek, Yet Lazarus spoke not one word about being in torment. Christ Jesus, who resurrected Lazarus, tells us in conversation with his disciples what death means. “He said to them: 'Lazarus our friend has gone to rest, but I am traveling there to awaken him from sleep? Therefore the disciples said to him: 'Master, if he has gone to rest, he will get well? Jesus had spoken, however, about his death. But they imagined he was speaking about taking rest in sleep. At that time, therefore, Jesus said to them outspokenly: ‘Lazarus has died? ” (John 11:11-14, New World Trans.) So none other than the Son of God identifies death with sleep, not torment.

Hell Neither Hot nor Eternal

Teachers of torment after death say sinners go to hell. But the Bible says good people go there too. Teachers of torment say that hell is eternal. But the Bible says that hell is to be destroyed. Again we must “let God be found true, though every man be found a liar?’—Romans 3:4, New World Trans.

God's Word tells us at Psalm 16:10: “Thou wilt not leave my soul in hell; nei-

ther wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to see corruption.” This Scripture is quoted by the apostle Peter at Acts 2:31 and is specifically applied to Christ Jesus, proving that Jesus, though a man without sin, went to the Bible hell. If hell were a place of torment for eternity, then Jesus would still be there; he could not have gotten out.

But hell is not eternal. Telling of the time when hell, Sheol or Hades will be destroyed, Christ the Revelator says: “And the sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and heli delivered up the dead which were in them: and they were judged every man according to their works. And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death.” (Revelation 20:13, 14) If hell is the lake of fire, as some say, how is it cast into itself ? The truth is that hell is the common grave of mankind and that it will be destroyed when the resurrection will have emptied it of its contents of dead, unconscious people. The lake of fire into which hell is hurled is symbolic language for the second death or state of death from which there is no resurrection. .

Another symbol for everlasting destruction is Gehenna. This word occurs twelve times In the Bible. But Bible translators have often obscured this by rendering- the word as “hell” or the expression “fire of Gehenna” as “heli-fire.” (Matthew 18:9) This has naturally, but wrongly so, caused some to think that hell is hot. Explains The Encyclopedia Americana (1942 ed., v. 14, p. 81): “Much confusion and misunderstanding has been caused through the early translators of the Bible persistently rendering the Hebrew Sheol and the Greek Hades and Gehenna by the word hell." The use of the additional word hell-fire for “fiery Gehenna" has only heightened the misunderstanding,

Gehenna is the Greek word for the Valley of Hinnom at Jerusalem. Therein a fire was kept burning. The waste products of the city, as well as bodies of dead- animals and some bodies of executed criminals thought to be unworthy of a resurrection, were thrown into Gehenna. It is a fitting picture of the second death. Just as the lake of fire symbolizes everlasting destruction, so does Gehenna. The willfully wicked, such as the Jewish clergy in Jesus’ day, go to Gehenna and “shall sleep a perpetual sleep, and not wake.”—Jeremiah 51:57, Am. Stan. Ver.

It was also at the Valley of Hinnom in early times that children were burned to death in sacrifice to the pagan god Molech. But Jehovah showed that burning live people in fire is repugnant to him. Said God: “They have built the high places of Topheth, which is in the valley of the son of Hinnom, to burn their sons and their daughters in the fire; which I commanded not, neither came it into my mind.”—Jeremiah 7:31, Am. Stan, Ver.

Thus Jehovah goes on record as being not only opposed to torment of people by fire but also as never having had ft enter his mind. God is just. His own Word says that the wages of sin is death. And the dead in the graves are asleep, not in torment.

When the British government announced recently that it had annexed the tiny island of Rockall—an uninhabited rock in the Atlantic Ocean more than 200 miles west of Scotland—a London newspaper had to have some fun. Said the newspaper: “Pioneers, oh pioneers'. Alter the loss ol India, the Sudan and The Eneyclopcedia Britannica, we are at last re-asserting ourselves.’’

«k«ONOTlahgh, iPI do not weep jail —try to un

derhand." Those words, written by1 the Dutch philosopher Spinoza, . might well be ad- ' dressed to anyone & considering the • political situation * in France, for many people oytside France are inclined either to bemoan French governmental instability or to treat it as a huge joke. But it is no joke to those living there. And most

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Western observers admit that France is indispensable to the Atlantic alliance, if for no other reason, because of its geographical position. So, since the situation in France cannot be passed oft with a sentimental tear or with a cynical smile, let us try to understand.

Commenting upon the general elections that took place in France on January 2, 1956, the influential Paris daily Le Monde ruefully admitted: "The elected Deputies are the most faithful reflection of the electorate seen in a long time and are proportioned according to the divisions and subdivisions of the country.”—Le Monde, January 4, 1956.

Three Unfinished Revolutions

Most of the divisions that split this country and that are reflected in its current politics can be traced back to the failure or partial failure of three revolutions: the Reformation, the French Revolution of 1789 and the Industrial Revolution.

It should never be forgotten that the Reformation did not succeed in France to anywhere near the same degree as in many other countries of Europe. To this day the Catholic Church remains a powerful influence in France and holds the allegiance of a good percentage of the population. The clerical issue is one of the most divisive forces in the French political scene. Currently, this can be seen in the quarrel over state aid to Catholic schools, and smoldering underneath is the question of creating a United States of Europe, which many Frenchmen interpret as a Catholic effort to re-establish the Holy Roman Empire. Probably in no other country of the West are Vatican politics discussed so thoroughly and openly as in France. In the minds of many of the French, the Roman Catholic Church stands for the monarchy and the nobility, and needs to be constantly watched if free government is to be maintained. The failure of the Reformation in France left divisive seeds for the future.

The Revolution of 1789 was, in fact, a revolt against the clergy and the nobility. What is often overlooked is the fact that the resulting Republic was not accepted by all Frenchmen, so that it also has become one of the fundamental divisive factors of French opinion. The divisions in respect to the Revolution can be roughly sketched as follows: (1) those who never accepted

It form'the traditional Hight; (2) those Who think it more or less attained Its goals form the political Center; (3) those who think it did not go far enough form the traditional Left.

Most economists concede that, although a success politically, the Revolution failed to bring about economic reforms, so that social injustices continued. This partial failure of the Revolution sowed seeds of social unrest for France’s future.

The third historical source of France’s present divisions and subdivisions lies in the fact that the French Industrial Revolution was never really completed as were the English and the American revolution. The French character of rugged individualism took less kindly to the methods of large-scale organization, mass production and standardization that have been the upshot of the Industrial Revolution in most countries. The number of independent craftsmen, small shopkeepers and owners of small-scale Industries in France is enormous in comparison with most industrial nations.

The astounding success of the Poujade Movement in the recent elections can partly be attributed to the revolt of small craftsmen and tradesmen against state interference in favor of more efficient, large-scale manufacturing and distribution methods planned by what they call the technocrats. The partial failure of the Industrial Revolution in France left a large body of malcontents who find themselves obliged either to change their methods or to go out of business if France is to compete with other industrial nations.

The French Political Scene

From the foregoing it will be seen that these divisions stemming from the three unfinished revolutions cut across each of the three basic elements of which the nations of this world are composed, namely: religion, ■ politics and commerce. It Is inevitable—in fact, it is a tribute to the democratic process in France—that these fundamental differences should be reflected in the current French political scene. In that respect France is probably more truly democratic than most other nations, since the French National Assembly is a fairly accurate picture of the tendencies among the people, much more so than a two-party system could ever be. In his book Inside Europe John Gunther rails France “the reductio ad absurdum of democracy” (page 182). Which raises the question as to whether democracy, pushed to its extreme limits, is able to continue existence.

However that may be, France is committed to the democratic form of government. So to understand its workings we are more or less obliged to consider its political parties. And in that respect, France can boast of a selection that is second to none—the whole range, from Communist red to clerical Hack! In fact, at the beginning of the recent election campaign, the French minister of the interior registered no less than twenty-eight different parties or factions!

But take heart. We do not have to study them all. Running roughly from Left to Right, they can be reduced to the seven following groups.

The Communist party: The French Communist party is an offshot of the Socialist party. The latter, founded in 1905, although accepting the broad principles of the Marxist doctrine, developed two tendencies as to its application. These two trends grew farther and farther apart until December, 1920, when the Tours congress of the Socialist party split over affiliation with the Communist Third International. Those in favor quit the congress, regrouped, and the French Communist party came into being. Ten years

later, it had 40,000 card-bearing members and by 1947 it claimed a peak membership of 907,700—the second-largest Communist party outside the Soviet Union. Although its membership has dropped by more than half since 1947, It has retained a constant voting strength of about five million—a quarter of the French electorate! It entered the recent elections with 98 deputies in the National Assembly, and came out with 15Q. (including six fellow travelers).

The Socialist party: Originally founded (in 1905) as a revolutionary party dedicated to the socialization of the country's means of production and exchange, the French Socialist party was for many years the only champion of the working classes. The Communist party has stolen much of its thunder In this respect, and, although still a party of the Left, the Socialist party now finds its chief support among office workers, teachers and other government employees. Its membership, which reached a peak of 285,000 in 1937, now stands at about 120,000. Its voting strength fell from four and a half million in 1945 to two and three quarters million in 1951, but in the recent elections It regained nearly half a million votes and at present represents about 15 percent of the electorate. It is traditionally an anticlerical party and one of the main planks of its election platform was opposition to state aid for Catholic schools. It is also against Moscow-dominated communism. Its present leader, M. Guy Mollet, made the now-famous statement: “Politically, the communists are neither Left nor Right; they are East!" Before the recent elections, the Socialists had 103 deputies in the Assembly. They now have 94.

The Radical party: Founded in 1901, this is the oldest of French political parties. At the time of its formation, when France was bitterly divided between the Catholics and the Freemasons, nils party had the backing of the latter and was therefore anticlerical. It fought for the separation of church and state, and this constituted its main doctrine. When this separation was achieved, in 1905, the Radical party lost much of its doctrinal vigor and has since become a haven for capable men with widely divergent political beliefs, such as Edouard Herriot and Edouard Daladier, and; more recently, Edgar Faure and Pierre Mendes-France. Socially, the Radical party is mainly middle class. Politically, It is a Center party, with Right and Left wings respectively under Faure and Mendes-France. The latter has tried to unify the party by having Edgar Faure expelled, but, even now, the Radical deputies refuse to accept voting discipline in the Assembly. The Radicals, with nearly three million votes, represent about 14 percent of the electorate.

The Popular Republican Movement: This party, better known as the M.R.P., was founded after the last war and is the French equivalent of the Christian Democrat parties of other European countries. It represents a Catholic reply to the Communist party. It claims to be socially progressive and tries hard to stay on the Left, but in its campaign in favor of a united Christian (Catholic) Europe and of state aid to Catholic schools it has more often than not found itself lined up with the Right. After the war many Catholics hoped to see the formation of a strong Catholic Left capable of. preventing the working classes from falling Into the bands of the Communists. Thus, in June, 1946, the M.R.P, received five and a half million votes—a record 28 percent of the electorate. But it disappointed these hopes, and has been falling off ever since. In the recent elections it received two and a quarter million votes, about 11 percent of the total electorate, mostly in Catholic Brittany

and Alsace. M. Robert Schuman and M. Georges Bidault belong to this party.

The Independents and Peasants: These conservative groups make up the bulk of what are termed the “Moderates.” Well to the tight of Center, it is said that the Independents represent the conservatism of the industrial regions and the Peasants that of the rural areas. Generally proCatholic, the Moderates received three million votes in the last elections—about 14 percent of the total. M. Antoine Pinay and M. Paul Reynaud belong to this group.

The Social Republicans: This is the latest name chosen by what remains of the postwar R J?.F., or Gaullist movement. After the war this movement, under the leadership of General de Gaulle, went from strength to strength, and in 1951 received four and a quarter million votes, sending 120 deputies to the National Assembly. It represented a latent tendency in many Frenchmen for a vigorous government under a popular national leader. The movement was supported by many professional men, and de Gaulle’s Catholicism drew many Catholic votes. Some observers believe the genera] could have seized power if he had acted quickly after the war. But he withdrew from politics in 1953, and in the recent elections the Social Republicans received less than a million votes, a little over 4 percent of the electorate. In these elections General de Gaulle did not even bother to vote.

The Poujade Movement: The full name of this movement is the “Union for the Defense of .Tradesmen and Artisans” (U.D.C.A-). It was founded in 1953 by Pierre Poujade, a shopkeeper from central France. Its primary purpose was to organize resistance to tax inspectors who were “persecuting” small-shopkeepers. Its success in this field led it to extend its criticisms to the political situation in general, and a Poujadist rally held in Paris last year showed that others besides the shopkeepers were willing to support the movement. However, Its success in the recent elections surpassed the expectations of even its own leaders. It received two and a half million votes, and now has 52 deputies in the Assembly. Doubtless it received a large section of the old Gaullist vote, but it also rallied many other Frenchmen who are dissatisfied with the present regime. Some fear this movement has fascist leanings. Only the future will say how right or wrong they are.

Why the Instability?

From the foregoing it will readily be seen that no single party has a majority in the National Assembly, and so the choice is between a minority government, whose existence depends upon the unpledged support the other parties are willing to give it for each motion it puts to the Assembly, and a majority government composed of a coalition of two or more parties.

The difficulty in forming stable coalitions reveals the extent to which France still suffers from the divisions and subdivisions it has inherited from history. As has already been pointed out, these divisions cut right across its religion, its politics and its commerce. But they do not cut in a straight line. To illustrate: On social problems a coalition would be possible between the Socialists, the Mendds-France wing of the Radicals, the Catholic M.R.P. and possibly the ^x-Gaullist Socialist Republicans. But as soon as the question of state aid to Catholic schools came up, this coalition would explode. In other words, the social division left by the unfinished French Revolution does not run in the same direction as the religious division left by the unsuccessful Reformation. If religion would stay out of politics, France would be relieved of at least a third of its problems!

Finally, it should not be forgotten that the parliamentary system in France is thrown completely off balance by the existence .of so many Communist deputies. In the last Assembly there, were 98 of them. Now, after the recent elections, there are 150—almost one quarter of the National Assembly. If these represented a genuinely French workingman’s party, a stable majority could easily be found, the one formed in 1936 by the Radicals, the Socialists and the Communists, called the Front populaire (Popular Front). Many commentators have expressed the opinion that this is the only majority that has solid foundations in the country. It would represent a section of the public something similar to the British Labor party.

' But the Radicals and the Socialists cannot accept it today because, as the Socialist leader, M. Guy Mollet (prime minister at the time of this writing), so nicely put it, "the communists are not Left, they are East”—led by Moscow! Since no similar majority exists on the Right, France has to get along on Center coalitions that are afraid to act for fear the coalition will blow up. And the Assembly that has just been elected offers little hope of a change.

Indicative of the confusion and tempers that rule the French political scene is the incident that took place February 15,1956, on the floor of the National Assembly. The New York Times, February 16, stated that it was the worst brawl the Assembly had seen in twenty-two years, and quoted the French newspaper Le Figaro as saying: "The National Assembly gave to the country a spectacle of shame, and, to those who, in all parts of the world, ask if France has not entered on a course leading to real political decay, new reasons for alarm or rejoicing.”

It all started when a burly Poujadist deputy rushed to the rostrum and pushed aside an undersized Communist deputy who was there by right to act as the official supervisor of a ballot about to be taken on the credentials of a Poujadist. The unequal struggle was balanced when other Communist deputies rushed to the aid of their undersized colleague, which in turn caused other Poujadists to join the fray. Soon "the well of the house was a mass of bodies, with tail-coated Assembly attendants struggling to separate opposing forces in an uproar of confused shouts and banging of desk tops,” as well as the sound of some shots fired by an observer.

There are forces at work among the French people that reveal deep discontent. "R faut que fa change!” ("There must be a change!”) is an expression to be found on the lips of many Frenchmen of all classes. If five and a half million French people voted Communist, it is not because they love Moscow, but because they want to register a protest against social injustices. If two and a half million others voted for the Poujade Movement, it is because they are dissatisfied with the present state of things. With such movements afoot, anything could happen.

So France, the world’s greatest wine producer, is itself in ferment. But this fermentation is having one good effect. It is bringing to the surface many of those “that sigh and that cry” because of the present world distress. These are being gathered into the New World society before Jehovah gives his Son the order to start treading “the press of the wine of the anger of the wrath of God the Almighty.” Jehovah’s witnesses in France will see to it that as many Frenchmen as possible have an opportunity to take their stand for God and his kingdom and thus survive Armageddon and enter Jehovah’s new world, where they will find the peace they so ardently seek.—Ezekiel 9:4-6, Am. Stan. Ver.; Revelation 19:11-15; 2 Peter 3:13, New World Trans.

— NATUFWS'S

POLICE FOftce

YEARS ago, when the earth abounded with forests, trees were so numerous that a travel-minded squirrel could cover great distances and yet never touch the ground. Times changed. Man began to attack the forest; he went at it with a vengeance. To the settler the forest was something hostile, something that deserved fire or the ax and the saw. Little did man realize that he was disbanding nature’s police force, leaving himself at the mercy of wind and storms, unprotected from the ravages of tempests and floods.

The story is almost the same in every "country. In the North American continent;

for example, there were 820,000,000 acres of forest in 1630; today it is calculated that annual loss is said to exceed the: annual growth by over 50 percent. What happened? To make room for crops the forest had to go. Not only that; the timber magnates, the lumber 'f. kings, moved in. Their motto was

not more than one tenth of that forest area remains, and the

H0S10H CONTROL SWAM> CONTROL BROUGHT CONTROL WIND CONTROL

“Pillage and pass on! There is more

• beyond!" Finally, fire, often due to man’s carelessness, took its hideous toll. Thus to a great extent man disbanded nature’s police force.

Calamity was inevitable. We can see this by learning how trees protect the soil. Imagine a mountainside lined with trees. Rain beats down. The trees, acting like huge sponges, suck up the water and peg down the soil, protecting man from soil erosion. Tree roots spread in all directions so that a mere one hundred trees, occupying an area of five miles, will actually be supplying, in sum, three or four miles’ worth of cordage for holding the soil together. But let man disband his mountainside police force. Chop them all down. Then what? When the rain beats down there are no leaves and branches to cushion the rainfall and to allow it to trickle slowly to the bottom and be absorbed by the spongelike action of the trees. Now 90 percent of the water runs straight down the denuded hill into the valley below, taking with it the precious topsoil. With each rainfall soil erosion progresses. Finally the day comes when the topsoil has been carried down to the valley below. Then the stones and rubble come tumbling down on top of the soil that first tumbled

down, so that now matters are topsy-turvy in the valley region—all because man regarded trees as mere “timber” and not as guardians of the soil. For completely upsetting the equilibrium in nature man brings calamity upon himself.

jRicers, Wind and Swamps

It has become a dangerous tiling, in many places, to live near or on the banks of a river. It is often more perilous than living under the shadow of a volcano. For here again man has worsened matters. A hillside stripped of its trees allows water to rush down unhindered to the rain-choked river below, and the stream overflows its bank. Trees discipline rivers and protect us from floods.

Man can cut down trees, but can he cut down wind? There is a force invisible but powerful and destructive! Man can wall himself away from wind, but in the open country he is at the wind’s mercy. Yet not totally, since trees come to the rescue! Trees are nearly as vital in their task of wind-breaking as they are in that of disciplining rivers and staking down the soil. It is really amazing how trees break the force of wind. In the open plain winds sweep down unabated. What a difference it makes if one is standing in a Arid protected by a line of sturdy, full-branched trees! The wind then may hardly be felt.

Wind erosion is devastating. A large area in the southern part of the Great Plains region of the United States is known as the “Dust Bowl.” In the 1930’s half the area was cropped, half devoted to intensive cattie raising. Both of these forms of farming left the soil exposed to the danger of erosion by the winds that constantly swept over the rolling land. One of the successful means taken to reduce the area subject to dangerous winds was the planting of long “shelter belts” of trees; these effectively broke the force of the wind. Interestingly, the book The Earth’s Face and Human Destiny says: “A plain constantly exposed to wind pressure will be driven back to the most primitive conditions of life and growth."

Nature’s police force protects us in still another way. Says R. Zon in his Forests and Water: “The forest is the greatest desiccator of the soil.” So trees, acting like gigantic sponges, suck up moisture by the tons and thus help dry up swamps and control mosquitoes. In some localities, such as in Landes and Sologne (France), trees have been planted successfully for the purpose Of draining swamps.

Trees even protect our climate. They do this primarily by invisibly spraying into the air enormous amounts of water, so much moisture that trees have been called “oceans of the continent.” So the moisture rise from trees in turn affects the rainfall. A former Bombay correspondent for the Daily Telegraph made this statement regarding India: “A good deal of land has been cleared in recent years because of the high price of timber, but it would be foolish to fell indiscriminately, because the problem of afforestation is closely linked with the major problem of soil erosion, and even with that of climate. Vast areas of India which have been wantonly cleared of forest have had their climate changed almost beyond recognition; rainfall has so diminished that even habitation has become difficult."

Protection from Drought

This is one of the big jobs of nature’s police force. Trees protect us from drought by exerting tremendous influence upon the fall and distribution of rain. Vapor given off by forests into the atmosphere is often carried great distances, so that trees in one area may be the cause of rainfall in another that needs it more.

True, authorities differ as to the extent

of the role played by trees in influencing rainfall. Most of them maintain that there must be a continual feeding from the ocean. Writes H. S. Person in Little Waters: “Depending upon regional climatic conditions, a given store of water which has been blown in over the land from the ocean in the form of clouds, may be ‘worked’ three to five times as rainfall, because of alterations of evaporation and transpiration with precipitation, before it returns to the ocean as stream flow.” Other authorities place less emphasis on the role of the ocean. Thus R. Zon in Forests and Water maintains that only seven percent of all the water evaporated from the oceans enters into precipitation over land: “It may be assumed therefore that the moisture which is carried by the winds into" the interior of vast continents, thousands of miles from the ocean, is almost exclusively due to continental vapor, and not to evaporation from the ocean.”

As trees invisibly spray the air with their moist exhaust, they protect us from drought, since they add to the weight of clouds. Of course, other kinds of plant life send up moisture too, and even bare land sends up moisture under heat. But just look what trees do! In his The Triumph of the Tree John Stewart Collis says that “a full-grown willow can transpire up to 5,000 gallons in a single summer day. How much then a forest? Clouds can be made that way over the land, without benefit of seas. These are tree-clouds, not ocean-clouds.” Then Collis explains: “A broad fact is clear: namely, that forests by feeding clouds and perhaps making some more on their own, increase rainfall; and that they do this not only for their own locality but for other places since the wind will often carry the vessels a long way before unloading. ... Therefore if continentals wish to be sure of their rainfall, they should be careful about their forests. They have not always been thus careful. The result is that in some places after reckless lumbering, men have looked up to see the clouds steadily passing them by day after day without discharging their moisture, like ships refusing to put into port The primitives were nearer the truth when they paid special honour and made peculiar sacrifices to certain trees as the producers of rain?’

Many are the ways, then, in which nature’s police force comes to our rescue. Trees help check at least four ruthless “villains”: They feed clouds and thus keep in check drought; they break the devastating force of wind, which, unchecked, can easily go on a criminal rampage; they sponge up water and thus keep down unsightly swamps; they fight soil erosion at its very source by pegging down the soil, and in doing this they protect us from floods.

What more could we ask of trees? And yet they protect our feathered friends, the birds. And trees furnish beauty for the eye, wood for shelter and fruit for food. As our mind begins to grasp the innumerable benefits of trees we cannot help but marvel in a deeply appreciative way at the “greatly diversified wisdom of God.”—Ephesians 3:10, New World Trans.

One Nations Expendables for Peaces

<L Since 1914 the world h&s expended an unprecedented amount of lives and money in a futile quest for peace. One country, America, has paid a horrible price, as have many others. Reported the U.S, News d World Report of December 2, 1955: "The American people, from 1917 to date, have spent 880 billion dollars, and sacrificed 1.5 million de$d or wounded, in three wars that they hoped would assure a world in which Americans could live in peace. Yet, at the moment, the world is shaped less to American liking than at any time in years."

BLURCHES booming? Never before has there been the like! “Marked gains In church membership since 1940 in excess of the gains in population,” says the National Council of Churches in its current Year Book of the American Churches. Yet the National Council arouses our curiosity by its statement appearing in Information Service of October 8, 1955, which reeommen<Ift that readers view the church statistics with* caution. Why caution? Are not churches booming?

churches are listed in the Year Book tor the first time with no special allowance. The whole church membership is taken as the year’s gain! For example, the 1952 Year Book lists the Christ Unity Science Church for the first time. Its 682,172 members alone counted for more than one third of the “gain” reported for that year!

< Strong is the possibility that church statistics are inflated. This is the opinion of Winthrop S. Hudson, who wrote an article entitled “Are Churches Really Booming?” In the December 21, 1955, issue of The Christian Century. Writer Hudson reveals four reasons why church statistics are likely to be Inflated. His four points are worth knowing.

C, First, the statistics for a single religion do not always stand for a one-year membership gain. In the 1956 Year Book, reports writer Hudson, there are twenty-seven •denominations reporting for more than a one-year period. Thus the true picture of a one year’s membership gain is obscured, the statistics inflated. In the current Year Book fourteen religions report for a two-ye&r period; seven report for a three-year period; five report for a four-year period and one denomination finally sent in its membership gain after fourteen years!

C Second, according to The Christian Gentury article, is the fact that the 1956 Year Book supposedly reports the total church gain for the year 1954. But In reality the figures for ninety-nine denominations are not 1954 statistics. What does this mean? Considering that some of the figures go back to 1950, 1948, 1947, 1945, 1944, 1940, 1938 and that thirteen of them go back to 1936, it is likely that some of these churches have lost members and are reluctant to report the fact. If they gained, would not most of them report it? How many of these ninety-nine churches are still in existence?

C, A third reason why the sensational church statistics are likely to be inflated is that new ;,

•{•<[_ A fourth cause of inflation is the reporting i of membership gains by many churches in | round, generous figures. These figures all too | often have the appearance of being guesses, some of them seeming to he wild .guesses at that. An example of the generous-type statistics is the 1952 report of the Churches of Christ It showed an increase from 209,615 to 1,500,000. The latest Year Book shows an increase from 1,500,000 to 1,600,000. Asked The Ohrtstum Century writer •- “Viwild anyone pre tend that this represents a documented increase of 100,000 in church membership?" <L How far-reaching just two of the above-mentioned causes for inflation can be is illustrated by the membership gain for 1952. That year church membership gain was 3,604,124. But nine churches were listed that year for the first time. Of the several churches making more than a one-year report, the Russian Orthodox Greek Catholic Church reported an increase from 400,000 to 750,000; and the Churches of Christ an increase from 209,615 to That year the Chtist Unity Science.

Church ostensibly almost doubled, increasing from 682,172 to 1,112,123. These few items alone account for 2,405,864, or two thirds of 1952's 3,604,124 church membership gain! “If one subtracts the reported gain in Roman Catholic membership,” explains writer Hudson, “all other religious bodies are left with no increase in membership, to say nothing of keeping up with the increase in population.” C Concluded The Christian Century: “One thing is clear. Far from offering ‘proof of a boom in church membership, the statistics issued by the National Council show that the boom is largely a fiction.”

THE Home Mjtgtjger is a “National £athollc MofttEftrfor the Family.” It is published by^wa. Pius Society of St Paul with the permission of Catholic ecclesiastical authority and states its purpose to be “the promoting of Christian principles in the homelife of American families." In its August, 1955, issue it carried an article entitled: “They Call Themselves the Witnesses of Jehovah.”

Referring to Jehovah’s witnesses, the opening paragraph states: "They claim to keep no membership rolls as such, yet boast of over a million converts in the United States alone in the last few years.” The fact is that the Yearbook of Jehovah’s Witnesses for 1955 claims a total of 580,000 witnesses throughout the world.

The article continues by accusing Jehovah's witnesses of preaching that “all priests and ministers are the Devil Incarnate.” The fact is that nowhere do the publications of Jehovah’s witnesses refer to the clergy as the Devil Incarnate.

The article further claims that Jehovah’s witnesses believe that "Christ is floating around in the air," and that they expected Christ to come visibly in 1874, and then in 1914, when nothing had happened in 1874, and upon being disappointed in 1914 •they “came up with the dandy that Christ did come in 1914 but invisibly.” The fact is that Jehovah’s witnesses from the very beginning understood that Christ’s second presence was to be Invisible.

The writer in the Home Messenger goes on to say that because of not believing in the trinity, the translation put out by Jehovah’s witnesses changed “the Father, the Word and the Holy Spirit" to rend, "the spirit, the water and the word.” However, the fact is that these words also appear in all Roman Catholic translations. What the translation published by the witnesses does leave out are the words recognized as spurious by all non-Cathdlic Bible scholars, namely, the words, “in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost; and these three are one,” at 1 John 5:7, because no Greek manuscript written earlier than the fifteenth century contains these words. Even modern Catholic translations, such as Knox and Confraternity, acknowledge that the text is missing from all good Greek manuscripts.

Next the reader is assured that “Jail seems to be the proper background for the witnesses. Their ‘Judge’ Rutherford was in jail when their founder ‘Pastor’ Charles Taze Russell died In 1916,” and that he was sent there because of sedition and obstructing the draft. However, everyone knows that the United States did not have any sedition or draft act in 1916. The facts are that Judge Rutherford was not sentenced until 1918, more than a year and a half after Pastor Russell had died, and that this conviction was later reversed in court and acknowledged as unjust.

Regarding “Miracle Wheat” the writer states that Pastor Russell “was forced to return every cent received from this source, on the grounds that he had obtained the money fraudulently.” The facts are that no legal action was taken against Pastor Russell regarding “Miracle Wheat.” When his enemies raised the charge of fraud in connection with it he offered to refund the purchase price to anyone who had bought some of it and wanted it refunded. Not a single purchaser requested to have his money refunded. Incidentally,

tills wheat was donated by a friend to the Society and it was offered to the readers of The Watch Tower at the then prevailing price and the proceeds were used in the preaching work.

Regarding the military draft, the article states that Jehovah’s. witnesses have an “adeptness in avoiding the draft” The fact is that more than 3,500 served prison sentences during World War n in the United States for refusing to deny their ministerial status. It also states that “they refuse even to register for the draft.” All of Jehovah’s witnesses of draft age register. Not a one has ever been charged with failure to do so.

Regarding the publishing activities of the witnesses the writer goes on to say that “they are a publishing outfit, raking in millions of dollars annually.” The fact is that .the literature is distributed at cost and were it not for voluntary contributions the widespread work 6f the witnesses could not be carried on. No one connected with the organization directly or indirectly receives any salary, let alone profit These who devote their entire time to the direct service of the Society receive their board and room and a small allowance of fourteen dollars a month for clothing and incidental expenses, and this is the same for the board of directors as for the janitors and housekeepers.

The foregoing are representative of the some thirty-five lies, falsehoods and misstatements appearing in the Home Messenger's short article of two and one quarter pages on Jehovah's witnesses. While so many articles misrepresenting Jehovah’s witnesses appear in the religious press that to answer them all would leave little space or time for publishing constructive things, it does seem advisable occasionally, when there is a particularly flagrant disregard for the truth, to point out such misrepresentations.

The Home Messenger claims its purpose to be to inculcate Christian principles in American ‘ homes. Far from doing that, however, its course of action points to the fulfillment of Paul’s words regarding our day: “The inspired utterance says definitely that in later periods of time some will fall away from the faith, paying attention to misleading inspired utterances and teachings of demons, by the hypocrisy of men who speak lies, marked in their conscience as with a branding iron.”-—1 Timothy 4; 1-3, New World Trans.

The Funny Octopus

<L Octopuses are funny animals. How they detest starfish and sea cucumbers! If one of these creatures should enter an octopus’ home while it is gone, the octopus stubbornly refuses to return home. Having difficulty finding adequate housing anyway, the octopus is always eager to enter any cavity free from starfish and sea cucumbers. This tendency to enter ready-made homes provides the downfall of many an octopus, for fishermen take advantage of his eagerness. They lower an earthenware crock to the bottom with a floating marker attached. The octopus is easily lured into the elegant, smooth-sided "prefab” with everything but a "vacancy" sign on it. Gathering his arms together, the octopus moves ip, there to pass the daylight hours after a hard night of crab hupting. When the fishermen begin to pull up the crock, the octopus remains unperturbed, being reluctant to leave such a fine home; and sb the crock reaches the surface before the animal tries to escape. According to the Associated Press in ’1949, two fishermen who brought up an octopus "found him cuddling a bottle of gin—it was full, too.” The story did not say whether the fishermen’s report came before or after they relieved the octopus of his gin.

RUSSIA

By *'Awok»l" ctirMpondwt In Finland

LIFTS

AN

IRON CURTAIN

4( pjDRKKALA is ours!" That was the joyful p outcry of thousands of Finnish people when Russia opened the iron curtain on this tongue of land projecting Into the Gulf of Fin* land. After eleven years the boots of Finnish soldiers were once again tramping on old Finnish ground. In freezing weather Finns raised their blue and white flag. It symbolized the sentiment of the people—no longer was there an iron curtain Inside the borders of Finland.

C Porkkala (pronounced PORK-ka-la) la a peninsula just twenty miles west of the Finnish capital, Helsinki. Beautiful is the coast along the Porkkala area. Little wonder that, years ago, many wealthy people from Helsinki bought summer villas by the seaside. There farms and gardens flourished. The Finnish people were proud of Porkkala’s beautiful and prospering towns and villages. Then came war. In the peace treaty of 1944 Finland gave Russia a fifty-year lease of the 152-square-mile Porkkala area. A bitter blow this was to the Finnish people. It was like an ulcerous wound in the Finnish flesh. Imagine! an iron curtain just twenty miles from Helsinki. And a real iron curtain it was. No train entered Porkkala -unless it was blacked out.* the doors were locked, the blinds were drawn on the outside of the windows,

< Great was the joy of the Finnish people in September, 1955, when Moscow agreed to end its fifty-year lease. Then came January 26, the day Finnish soldiers marched into Porkkala. The next day over 400 newspapermen came in. A heavy snow blanket agd alienee greeted the visitors. AtKirkkonurnmithey saw the600-year-oldf stone church; it was bare. A hole in a window was filled up with a newspaper, with the name Pravda glaring into the eyes of the visitors.

tarkkMa

In the churchyard tombstones seemed to have disappeared; behind the church the Russians had built an athletic field.

<L Former Porkkala dwellers went back to their old home area with mixed feelings. There was joy, there was sadness. Sad hardly describes the feeling of the many people who returned only to find that their homes had vanished. Gone were all the houses in some villages! One island used to have about thirty villas—-they seemed to have been pushed right -ofl the land. Much of the property that remained in Porkkala was partly ruined and was falling to pieces.

<1. Why had Russia lifted an Iron curtain? Finnish newspapers spoke cautiously, for in getting back Porkkala Finland signed a continuation of a twenty-year friendship treaty with Russia. But foreign newspapers were not so reserved. They came out openly and said that Moscow's lifting of an iron curtain In a foreign land was just a skillful, propaganda-producing move in the cold war between East and West

<L A Swedish newspaper said that the Russians moved out so that Moscow could say it had given up ita last military base on foreign land. The New York Times said that Russia had made all eastern Europe a military base, so Porkkala was hardly needed; anyway Russia could easily make all of Finland a military base if it wanted to. Still, in Sweden as well as In Norway, the move is considered as a sign of lessening tension. This may be what Russia wants.

…