Where do Adventists get the idea that the New Jerusalem will come down from heaven through the constellation Orion?
December 16, 1848, the Lord gave me a view of the shaking of the powers of the heavens. I saw that when the Lord said "heaven," in giving the signs recorded by Matthew, Mark, and Luke, He meant heaven, and when He said "earth" He meant earth. The powers of heaven are the sun, moon, and stars. They rule in the heavens. The powers of earth are those that rule on the earth. The powers of heaven will be shaken at the voice of God. Then the sun, moon, and stars will be moved out of their places. They will not pass away, but be shaken by the voice of God.
Dark, heavy clouds came up and clashed against each other. The atmosphere parted and rolled back; then we could look up through the open space in Orion, whence came the voice of God. The Holy City will come down through that open space. I saw that the powers of earth are now being shaken and that events come in order. War, and rumors of war, sword, famine, and pestilence are first to shake the powers of earth, then the voice of God will shake the sun, moon, and stars, and this earth also. I saw that the shaking of the powers in Europe is not, as some teach, the shaking of the powers of heaven, but it is the shaking of the angry nations. (Early Writings, p. 41)
J. N. Loughborough records Ellen's vision which impressed retired sea captain, Joseph Bates, to provide the White Party's venture with sorely needed funds.
In the previous year, April 19, 1845, the Illustrated London News had published
something of great interest to astronomers from Lord Rosse, respected the wonderful
discoveries he had made through his monster telescope, especially a view of what
astronomers call "the gap in the sky." One evening, at the conference above mentioned,
at the house of Mr. Curtiss and in the presence of Elder Bates, who was yet undecided in
regard to these manifestations, Mrs. White, while in vision, began to talk about the stars,giving a glowing description of rosy-tinted belts which she saw across the surface of some planet, and added, "I see four moons." "Oh," said Elder Bates, "she is viewing
Jupiter!" Then having made motions as though traveling through space, she began giving
a description of belts and rings in their ever-varying beauty, and said, "I see seven
moons." Elder Bates exclaimed, "She is describing Saturn." Next she said, "I see six
moons," and at once began a description of the "opening heavens," with its glory, calling
it an opening into a region more enlightened. Elder Bates said that her description far
surpassed any account of the opening heavens he had ever read from any author. (J.N. Loughborough, The Great Second Advent Movement - Its Rise and Progress, 1905, p. 258)
Someone posted on a forum the following thought,
Hasn't anyone noticed that there is no such "place" as the constellation Orion (or any other constellation, for that matter)? The arrangement of stars is a trick of how we are looking at them. The 3 stars in Orion's belt look lined up from here, but travel away from here in any direction, and suddenly you find out that the don't line up at all, that some are much further away from us than others, and so on. Rigel is 775 light years away from us, Betelgeuse 425 LY and Meissa 1100 LY, and so on for all the others.
The night sky, all of the night sky, is utterly different from every vantage point in the universe other than earth. The constellation Orion, and all other constellations, do not exist and cannot be seen from anywhere but here.
Once you actually start doing some rational thinking, this kind of stuff should be seen for what it is -- superstitious nonsense.
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