“All thy children shall be taught of the Lord” prophesied the book of Isaiah.Isaiah 54:13. Centuries later, Jesus assured his disciples that the Comforter, or Holy Ghost—the Spirit of truth—would remind them of everything he had taught them.See John 14:17, 26. How does Mary Baker Eddy’s educational system for her Church tie in with Biblical prophecy? J. Thomas Black, Olga Chaffee, and Christiane West Little of the Christian Science Board of Education recently joined Michael Davis of The Mary Baker Eddy Library to discuss the connection.
Olga Chaffee: Is it fair for us to say that there seems to be like a blueprint throughout the Bible of how the teaching “of the things of God” consistently happens somehow. Somebody, a prophet, caught a spiritual vision and was able to express or impart it in a measure. This happened in the Old Testament—Abraham, Moses, Isaiah, Daniel, and others. It happened in the New Testament to a fuller degree with Jesus, the master Christian. And then that’s what happened with Mary Baker Eddy. Now she didn’t have a personal teacher, or personal contact with a prophet, right? But she had the benefit of thorough Biblical teaching because she had been a scholar of the Bible since childhood. One could say she companioned with the prophets, and Jesus, and the apostles.
J. Thomas Black: When Elijah and Elisha had that famous walk just before Elijah ascended, all the prophets were standing around watching them. Elijah says, “What do you want from me?” Elisha answers, “I want a double portion of your spirit.” And Elijah says, “OK, if you see me when I go, you’ll get a double portion.”See II Kings, chap. 2. So they keep on walking and talking, and then this chariot of fire and the horses of fire come down, and Elisha sees it. It seems to me that what he perceived was the fundamental reality of Elijah’s teaching, and that it consisted of two parts: the Christianity or the Christly healing, and the science. That was kind of a prophecy, to me, of the coming of Christian Science.
