Revelation

The City of Failure (Sardis)

Professor: Dr. R.J. Rushdoony

Subject: Prerequisite/Law

Lesson: 6-30

Genre: Talk

Track: 174

Dictation Name: RR129C6

Location/Venue:

Year: 1960’s-1970’s

Let us begin with prayer. Almighty God our heavenly Father we give thanks unto Thee for the blessing so f the week past. And we pray our Father that day by day thou would in all things give us a grateful heart. Make us mindful of how rich Thou art unto us. Make us mindful of Thy protecting care; give us believing hearts that we may hear and accept Thy word. Make us obedient in all things, and prompt and willing in Thy service. In Jesus name, amen.

Our scripture today is the third chapter of Revelation, verses 1-6. Revelation 3:1-6. The City of Failure.

“3 And unto the angel of the church in Sardis write; These things saith he that hath the seven Spirits of God, and the seven stars; I know thy works, that thou hast a name that thou livest, and art dead.

2 Be watchful, and strengthen the things which remain, that are ready to die: for I have not found thy works perfect before God.

3 Remember therefore how thou hast received and heard, and hold fast, and repent. If therefore thou shalt not watch, I will come on thee as a thief, and thou shalt not know what hour I will come upon thee.

4 Thou hast a few names even in Sardis which have not defiled their garments; and they shall walk with me in white: for they are worthy.

5 He that overcometh, the same shall be clothed in white raiment; and I will not blot out his name out of the book of life, but I will confess his name before my Father, and before his angels.

6 He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches.”

The seven letters of Revelation 2 and 3 to the seven churches, are as we have seen, literal letters to actual churches of the day, given by Jesus Christ through the apostle John. But these seven letters also are typical of all churches in all times, and Christ’s word to them.

The letter to the church of Sardis is the second most severe of the seven letters. But in some respects it is the most disturbing. To understand this letter, again we must understand Sardis. Sardis was the ancient capital of Lydia, and we are familiar with Lydia, the kingdom of Lydia through its great king, Croesus. And the expression: “As rich as Croesus” has remained a proverb for a few thousand years.

Sardis was the capital of Lydia. The entire country was very wealthy. It was at the center of the trade route between Asia and Africa, Asia and Europe. It was in itself a great trading center as well as a manufacturing center. When we examine the people of Sardis, the Sardians, we have a very early testimony to their stature from Herodotus, who wrote: “The tender footed Medians can only play on the Sithara, strike the kithara, and sell by retail.”

Now, this testimony is not a bad one. Herodotus obviously does not think well of them, but if he can say no more than this, the character of the Sardians does not come out badly. And the people of Lydia did not have a particularly bade reputation, they were envied by and large. People who are wealthy and prosperous beyond and above all their neighbors are likely to be the target of envy, and if no more than this is said about the Sardians, we can conclude that while they have their faults they were not a particularly bad people.

What then was the aspect in Sardis that brought on this condemnation by Christ? And why is Sardis picked out as typical of a situation that is a continuing one over and over again in history? When we examine the city of Sardis, the capitol, much of this becomes apparent to us. Sardis was built on a hilltop, a sharp, steep, rocky ledge. There was one pathway up to the town, and a narrow one; so that only a few people at one time could go abreast up to the top.

As a result, a handful of soldiers up at the top, at the gate, could withstand a sizeable army, because they could only come up to the city a few at a time. The walls were high, thick. And the walls overlooked the steep slopes. Any man climbing up these slopes to Sardis were defenseless. They had to use both hands to clamber up the sides of the hill, and one or two men, standing on the wall, could pick them off with ease.

As a result, from a military perspective, Sardis was believed to be impregnable. But the ironic fact is that Sardis was taken, over and over and over again. The sense of security which came from their position was their downfall. And this sense of security, over and over again led to their capture.

After all, when all you needed was a handful of men to pick off any enemy who might try to climb up the hill side, an enemy who would be defenseless because he would be using both his hands to climb; and when you had a very able and sizeable force of men within the city, the sense of security would be very great. And of course the enemies of Sardis, of Lydia, knew how powerful the city was, how under any kind of defense it was impregnable. So naturally they never gave warning of attack, they did not say: “Here citizens of Sardis, at 9 0’clock on Monday morning we shall attack here.” Quite the contrary. They attacked without declaration of war, without warning, in the middle of the night or towards the early hours of the morning, with forced marches through the night to get there as quickly as possible. And no doubt they commonly had spies within the city to inform them when the sense of security had left the Sardians careless.

This then was the destiny of Sardis, to be the city of failure. A repeated target of attack because it was wealthy, because it had good sense in many things, including the fact that during most of its history it had a hard-money policy, so that it attracted wealth, it was a center not only of trade but of wealth in gold.

It sat back in confidence, and all it needed was one sleepy night each generation, and it was taken.

Now, the sin of the church in Sardis is comparable to this. The church in Sardis had a good reputation; it was good outwardly, it was virtually dead inwardly. It had the appearance of life. But like the Sardians it was given to a sense of security. It was at ease in the world; they believed in God, they got along with the community, what was there to worry about? And so they were relaxed and careless and casual, and had no strong stand. They felt no problems, no tensions. They were unmindful of the fact that the world is at war with Jesus Christ, and therefore His followers. And so they were drifting into a position of complacency and of security. They had become like all of Sardians. Nothing was ever going to touch them.

And so Jesus Christ said: “Remember therefore how thou hast received and heard, and hold fast, and repent. If therefore thou shalt not watch, I will come on thee as a thief, and thou shalt not know what hour I will come upon thee.”

Our Lord says, ‘Even as the enemies of Sardis have attacked and taken the city again and again without warning, because their sense of security has made them unmindful of the relaities of this world; even so I will come. A thief gives no warning, and I will come upon you with your sense of security, with your feeling: “what problems do we have? The world is a good place for us, everything is going our way here in Sardis.” And will come, and by my judgment, strip you of all that you have.’

“Thou hast a few names even in Sardis which have not defiled their garments; and they shall walk with me in white: for they are worthy.

He that overcometh, the same shall be clothed in white raiment; and I will not blot out his name out of the book of life, but I will confess his name before my Father, and before his angels.”

Our Lord here speaks of the fact that some of the Sardian Christians had defiled their garments. Now this again is a technical term, it has reference to the Mosaic Law. The Mosaic Law spoke of the defiling of garments in three ways. The first legislation that dealt with defiled garments was Leviticus 13:47, which speaks about the Leprosy of clothing. Now the term leprosy in the Bible is a much broader one than our English word leprosy. By leprosy we mean Hansen’s Disease. The Biblical word leprosy covered Hansen’s Disease, and a number of other infections by various fungi. In Leviticus 13:47 where it speaks of the leprosy of garments, it has reference to a particular type of mildew that infected garments. Several of the varieties are no longer known to us. This mildew which infected the garments came from improper cleansing.

Then, another type of defiling of garments is referred to, a second type in Leviticus 19:19 and Deuteronomy 22:11, where it was forbidden that garments be made of diverse materials. Thus, linen and wool could not be woven together to create one garment, nor cotton and wool. Diverse types of materials could not be confused.

The third type of defilement of garments is spoken of in Deuteronomy 22:5, where garments belonging properly to the other sex could not be worn.

Now, all these three have reference to the defiling of garments, to a literal legislation in the Mosaic law forbidding certain practices, or governing certain practices. But they also typically and symbolically referred to the law of discontinuity and the principle of separation. The Bible requires a respect for differences, so that different things must be used differently, and things cannot be integrated casually and carelessly. There is a principle of separation. Good and evil cannot be brought together and made one. Similarly, two good things cannot be confused, because each has its function and each its place. Wool has its place, and cotton its place, and to bring the two together does not add strength, either to the one or to the other, but is basically destructive of both.

There are those who base their beliefs on segregation, on these verses. And there is ground in various other passages of scripture for this principle, that things dissimilar can both be good in the sight of God, but they are not to be brought together and confused.

The sin of the Sardian Christians is precisely this: by their sense of security they were blunting the distinction between the world and the church. They were insisting that they could be secure in a world that was hostile to Christ, that was at war with Him. And therefore Christ says: ‘You have no security from me, first of all. Because if you are going to find your security in the world, you are going to face my judgment. And so I will come upon you as a thief in the night. But those that hearken unto me I will confess their name before my Father and before His angels. Men will be compelled either to integrate themselves with the world or with me, and those who unite themselves with me by faith, they will remain forever citizens of the kingdom of life, and of my empire whom I will confess before my Father, and before the angels.’

The story of Sardis is a very moving one, it was an archeologist who some years ago called Sardis the City of Failure. It is a telling name. A city that from the military point of view was impregnable, became the city of failure. Its sense of security was its downfall. And the world today is full of Christians like these. Nothing is going to touch them; the world is not going to disturb them; all things are going to go on just as they are, and they have no problems. But the word of the Lord to the church of Sardis is a warning.

“He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches.”

Let us pray. Our Lord and our God, we thank Thee for this word of warning, and we thank Thee that by Thy Holy Spirit, Thou hast called us and separated us unto Thee. Make us ever mindful that we live in a world that is at war with Thee, and therefore at war against us. A world that cannot have security, because the world is under Thy judgement. Teach us therefore our Father, day by day to find our securities in Thee, that we might be saved in the time of trouble, that we might know the warfare that confronts us and is around us, and in Jesus Christ may be more than conquerors. Grant us this we beseech Thee, in Jesus name, amen.

Are there any questions now? Yes.

[Audience Member] ...?...

[Rushdoony] A good question. Herodotus has survived partly because he was a good gossip. And people enjoy gossip more than history, and so many ancient works of history have disappeared either entirely or in part, and Herodotus has survived because from beginning to end Herodotus was the gossip of his day, and everywhere he went he had an ear for the small talk, for the little tidbits, and as a result more people enjoyed reading Herodotus, more copies of his manuscripts were in existence, and therefore they survived. It was not because Herodotus was a great historian, far from it, and then as now, people are more interested in gossip.

[Audience Member] ...?...

[Rushdoony] Yes.

[Audience Member] ...?...

[Rushdoony] Yes, well, the basic religion of that area was a fertility cult religion, with different variations. Which meant that they worshipped basically nature, and the creative forces within it. it was naturalistic to the core. So this was basically the faith of the Lydian’s. They were not a particularly religious people however, they were more interested in business and in money, and at that they were very successful. Very successful, so that as you yourself pointed out in that illustration, the wealth of the Lydian’s was no exaggeration, it was a fantastic thing.

[Audience Member] ...?...

[Rushdoony] Yes, yes. That is a part of fertility cult faith. Yes, the earth mother you find in every fertility cult with different names. Yes?

[Audience Member] ...?...

[Rushdoony] I am sorry, the acoustics here are not good…

[Audience Member] ...?...

[Rushdoony] Oh, the book of life, yes.

[Audience Member] ...?...

[Rushdoony] Yes, the book of life has reference to those who are saved, those who have eternal life. Now, the reference to blotting them out is this: Eternal security of course, is taught by the whole of scripture, and our Lord said and the gospel of John records it: “Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you.” Everyone however, who becomes a Christian outwardly, through membership in the church, becomes as it were, outwardly enrolled in the book of life. They are in the church, and the church is the kingdom of life. So that because they demonstrate outwardly, as well as inwardly they are not of Christ, He cuts them off and they are blotted out of the Book of Life. They have no part in the eternal destiny which belongs to those who are true members. Does that help explain?

Yes?

[Audience Member] ...?...

[Rushdoony] He is moving in terms of his faith, and whatever is your God is your source of power. for him power is still in the state, so that he cannot see the state school system as collapsing, so that as he looks to the future, he is going to be realistic, he is going to move in terms of power, the state. So he wants to work from within this structure and try to reform it, which is an impossibility. Now, if we do not believe that the state is the god walking on this earth, then we are going to say: “Well, we can create something else because the state is under the judgment of God because of its apostasy.”

Now, in 1950 the number of children who were not in state schools was a pathetic minority. Today, as I pointed out more than once, there are 25-30% of the grade school children, and 10% of the high school children, and as I have also pointed out, Columbia Teachers College authorities have estimated fearfully that by the end of this century the public school will be gone, at the present rate of growth of non-statist schools.

But this does not carry any weight with one who believes that power is in the state; if the state is his god, if the state is his hope. Only he wants it of course on a conservative scale. As an evolutionist, the only power there is in the universe is that which is emerging in man, and it comes to focus in the state, so he is going to remain a statist. But a conservative statist. So he cannot see anything that will undercut the state or will weaken it. As a result his basic perspective is very weak.

A good example of this kind of fallacy appears for example in the acclaim given today to Hume by conservative. For example, National Review have singled him out as the great hero of the conservative cause, because where the state is concerned, at some point he definitely had a conservative view of politics and economics. But it is interesting that Peter Gay, in his book The Enlightenment which is the best single study of the subject together with Ernst Cassirer’s book The Philosophy of the Enlightenment has said that, speaking as one who believes in the Enlightenment, the man who represents the epitome of the enlightenment philosophy and attitude was David Hume.

Now, here you have the Conservative and the Liberal agree, this man is their great white father, as it were. Why? Well, the one looks to his basic philosophy, the other takes a few particular opinions in a particular area, and he likes those but he doesn’t consent to the basic philosophy, because he is a liberal.

Now this is the problem with any evolutionist. An evolutionist is inescapably a Liberal.

[Audience Member] ...?...

[Rushdoony] What?

[Audience Member] ...?...

[Rushdoony] Yes, right. Right. The Liberals use him, and there is a great deal in Lincolns early career because he was a Whig at first, which makes him quite congenial to use by the Liberals; even though he didn’t go far enough, and he was an ultra-strong segregationist, these things they overlook. In fact, some deny it now although in all his writings that is very apparent. So they go to Lincoln and take what they want; but of course with Lincoln it is a mixed picture. But with Hume he was what he was from start to finish, he just hadn’t gone as far in his liberalism when it came to politics and economics.

Yes?

[Audience Member] ...?...

[Rushdoony] Yes, Acts 17:26 speaks of men as having been made of one blood, God hath “made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation;”

Now, first, all men have a common ancestry in Adam. Second, God makes it clear that there is basic division in humanity, this division is between those who are believers in him, and those who are, children as it were, He says of Satan. And this is the division which cannot be bridged, so there is this basic division. Then, there are divisions between races and cultures, which cannot be bridged overnight, and God hath appointed the bounds of their habitation, and God has decreed and destined certain things, certain abilities, certain talents in different peoples, there is no getting around it; there is a diversity in the various people.

For example, the difference between Germans and Italians is very marked. Each has a particular kind of genius, a particular kind of ability, a different type of emotional temperament. This is a very, very real thing. We cannot underrate or obscure the differences between various nationalities, let alone between different races.

Now, the Biblical law concerning marriage, and is laid down for us in the Genesis 2, where it speaks of Adam and Eve, and the statement there by Adam: “This is bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh” and God’s statement: “I will make an help meet for him.” The word help meet there has the force of the mirror, an image, and Paul says in 1st Corinthians 11 that even as Adam was created in the image of God; Eve was created, and woman are created, in the image of man. It is the image of God, second hand, reflected image.

Now what does this mean? It means therefore, that man must marry something that as it were, reflects his image. Something that brings fulfillment to him in terms of his nature, his calling, his faith; and can a Christian for example, find fulfillment of his nature and of his calling by marrying an unbeliever? Or can a person for example, coming from a highly advanced culture, say, a person born in Germany coming from a long background of college graduates and Christians; marry, say someone from Africa who has no such background of faith or character or culture, and whose entire outlook is different? Will she be a helpmeet to him? And the answer is obviously not.

So it is a violation of Gods law concerning marriage.

[Audience Member] ...?...

[Rushdoony] Yes, definitely. Yes?

[Audience Member] ...?...

[Rushdoony] Yes. Now we have to say that in Adam and in Eve, all the potentialities of the human race, and all the races were present. After the time of Noah, and in Noah and his family these potentialities again were present; as the people scattered after the Tower of Babel, there was selective breeding in terms of certain interests, certain tastes, certain standards. Each culture went its way, and each culture therefore developed those things it considered desirable. It is wrong to speak for example of the cultures of Africa as primitive, that is an evolutionary perspective. They are highly developed in the wrong direction, they are degenerate cultures. It used to be held for example that the various primitive peoples, so called, had very simple languages. It wasn’t 15-20 years ago that many anthropologists in this country for example said that some of the Indian languages had only 5-600 words, this was said concerning the Piute’s and the Bannock. And a Swedish anthropologist who I came to know worked among the Bannocks for years, and he said: “They have a vocabulary as extensive as the English, and as highly developed a language.” In fact in some respects he said it is more intricately developed. They are not primitive.

Now what have they done? They have developed in terms of a particular standard. For example, in Africa the culture was one which to us represents a dead level. The reflective person didn’t last, he was killed off. Certain types of physical characteristics were desirable, and there was selective breeding in terms of this, and other types were bred out. The premium was on quick movement, dexterity in hunting and killing, not on intelligence. And they have developed a culture that is different; for example we know physiologically that Negro athletes, even though they are 1-2% of our college population, do very well on short sprints. They tend to command it. It is rare that one of them does well in the mile, because they did develop out of their African background survival in terms of those who could get away fast, and for a short distance sprint into the woods or up a tree or something. So that the necessities of survival in terms of their cultural conditions led them to develop in a certain way.

Now, in China we know for example that very early they put a premium in their culture in relative hairlessness among men, so that a man was very unpopular with the girls and unlikely to get married and to prosper if he were heavily bearded; and there word for barbarian came to be: “The hairy one.” So that they developed a type of man who tended to be relatively beardless, and shorter too, of stature. Because they didn’t like the larger size. This through the centuries had its effect, and it can be traced to a certain extent through skeletal remains and so on.

Each culture therefore, developed a particular kind of standard in terms of its faith; for example, all of us come from an Indo-European cultural background, and one of the things most highly admired by the Indo-European peoples, you find this as a standard in all the early Indo-European peoples; the eagle. We have it here in this country. And among the primitives or early Indo-European peoples, the eagle was very often a symbol of something that was representative of their spirit. Well, they liked the eagle beak. They thought that a commanding nose, a beautiful nose, was one that was high and tended to come down, in fact in many cultures including for example the Armenians and Indo-European ones, mothers would try to shape the nose because that was desirable.

So that, as compared for example with the Oriental peoples, we are all nose. This is their attitude towards them, I lived in China town for a few years in San Francisco in the 30’s, and for them every American was all nose, they all look alike, they are all nose! Well, this represents the cultural background you see, centuries of this. And similarly our culture, I mentioned this in one of my talks, we have been breeding selectively for example, as a result of Christianity.

Now, we know from church records going back how people who were Christians had a higher birthrate compared with those who were not, and those who were in trouble with the law we find that their birthrate was comparatively low. So that the non-Christians were breeding themselves out each generation in our Christian society. So that this, especially in Western Europe where Puritanism tended to set in and harden these discriminatory standards, created a type of person with greater self-control and independence, so that you have a typical Western European. The person with more self-discipline, more given to reflective and intellectual qualities, so that; all men have come from one background, but as a result of religious and cultural standards they have gone their ways, and the diversity is increasing today rather than being diminished.

I was interested, one of our group was in Europe for seven weeks recently, and he said between his first trip after the war, and this most recent one, the most interesting phenomenon to him is the vast increase of nationalism, an intense one. And he said: “This is being accentuated by the laws of various countries.” Switzerland for example is now eliminating 5% of all its foreigners every year. This goes for Americans, Italians, Germans, French, 5% are dropped each year, their permission to stay is cut, they have got to leave.

Yes?

[Audience Member] ...?...

[Rushdoony] Very, very fine. The sad fact of it is, at least the Sardians had a good location and good walls that gave them a sense of security, our leaders in Washington are drawing their sense of security increasingly from some treaties and pacts, all they have to do is to get the Communists to sign them and they feel that they are that much more secure. And this to me is the fantastic absurdity of it.

To return to what we were discussing a moment before, in some countries in Asia where Catholic and Protestant missions have only been a 150 years or so, and they have formed communities and societies, you can see differences between those people and their non-Christian neighbors. It is that marked in so short a time because there is immediately a standard that begins to operate.

[Audience Member] ...?...

[Rushdoony] Yes. That is true. The fact that Japan is so markedly superior to the rest of Asia, there are a number of factors, and one of them definitely is the fact that the missionaries, the Catholic missionaries who went there in the 17th century converted hundreds of thousands of people, and were beginning to have a major impact on the country, before of course there was a ruthless extermination. But it went underground and did survive to a limited degree to modern times, but it did leave a profound stamp upon Japan, and a great deal of the present character of Japan is due to what happened then. That is one of a number of factors, but it is an important one.

[Audience Member] ...?... population explosion …?...

[Rushdoony] Right, basically what they are doing is to subsidize a population explosion on the worst levels, by penalizing us tax wise every which way.

Our time is almost up, but there are a couple of things I would like to share briefly with you, and this from Luther’s commentary on the epistles of Romans, and sometimes now-a-days I find people who claim to be Bible believing objecting if I bring any application to modern situations from the Bible, and: ‘criticizing statism, that is a terrible thing.’

But this is interesting, Luther is commenting Romans 2:2-3 “And thinkest thou this, O man, that judgest them which do such things, and doest the same, that thou shalt escape the judgment of God?”

And he says in part, and I quote: “And here is a mistake which most people make. When they see how other sinners are punished, they are glad and say: ‘Well and good, the punishment is just, the evil doer deserved it.’ in reality however, they should become afraid and confess: ‘That person was punished yesterday, and tomorrow it may be my turn!’ according to the proverb: “The puppy is punished to terrify the hound.”

Today we may apply the Apostle’s words first to those rulers who, without cogent cause inflict exorbitant taxes upon the people, or by changing and devaluating the currency, rob them, while at the same time they accuse their subjects of being greedy and avaricious. “

Now, that is what I call good application. They could say the same thing today.

Then I’d like to call your attention to a few books, and I do have a few forms if anyone is interested in them by Edward F. Hills, who I regard as the outstanding textual scholar of our time. This one, The King James Version Defended. Here he defends the received text, the text which has been until this century the accepted, the standard text of all the churches, and which now by these modern translations is being attacked. And he points out the validity of the received text, that is the received text in the original Greek and Hebrew. He carries this further in this volume: Believe Bible Study. Then on evolution, Evolution in the Space Age. He knows his sciences very well, and is an extremely brilliant writer. You will find these books very, very definitely of interest.

Then I do have some more since there were those who requested them copies of newsletter 24, so that if you would like some more copies just see me after the meeting. Well, with that we stand adjourned.