THE REVELATION OF ST. JOHN THE DIVINE
AN INTERPRETATION
Transcriber’s Notes
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Punctuation has been standardized.
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Index references have not been checked for accuracy.
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Footnotes are identified in the text with a superscript number and are shown immediately below the paragraph in which they appear.
Transcriber’s Notes are used when making corrections to the text or to provide additional information for the modern reader. These notes are identified by ♦♠♥♣ symbols in the text and are shown immediately below the paragraph in which they appear.
THE
REVELATION OF ST. JOHN THE DIVINE
AN INTERPRETATION
BY
A. H. AMES, M.D., D.D.
NEW YORK: EATON & MAINS
CINCINNATI: CURTS & JENNINGS
Copyright by
EATON & MAINS,
1897.
Eaton & Mains Press,
150 Fifth Avenue, New York.
Preface
The essay which follows is based upon a conviction that the closing book of the canon of the New Testament, known as the Revelation of Saint John, presents the thoughts of that holy man and inspired apostle upon the subject of the kingdom of Christ, as derived by him from the Old Testament Scriptures and from the teachings of Christ or as drawn from direct revelations made to himself. The book presents a single theme and has a well-preserved unity.
With those theories of interpretation which would make of the book an epitome of history, either as confined to particular epochs or as a whole, and which presuppose its design to be the prediction of events, great or small, in the progress of the world or the Church, the writer of this essay is not in sympathy. It is mainly because of the vagaries and conceits to which these theories have opened the way, which have clouded rather than cleared the mysteries of the Apocalypse and been more promotive of strife than of salvation, that so many thoughtful and pious minds have been driven from the study of what is one of the most beautiful, as it is one of the most practical, parts of the word of God. How readily the coincidences, for such they are, which have been appealed to as verifications of these theories may be explained and accounted for will be shown in the course of the essay.
Questions of criticism or scholarship do not lie within the scope of the essay. It is assumed, not, however, without examination and reflection, that the Revelation is the work of John, the son of Zebedee, one of the twelve, and “the disciple whom Jesus loved.” It is also assumed that he was the author of the fourth gospel and of the epistles which bear his name.
Commentaries upon the Revelation have been so numerous that their titles would fill a volume. It is not likely that anything can be said concerning it which is entirely new and has not been somewhere set forth. The writer of this essay claims originality so far as that he has not seen the views here expressed elsewhere presented, although they may have appeared previously. It is not possible for him to say whence he has gathered the material which has grown into the essay, so as to make formal acknowledgment. Alford, Bengel, Hengstenberg, Wordsworth, The Speaker’s Commentary, Ellicott’s Commentary, The Expositor’s Bible have been consulted freely, and also The Symbolic Parables of the Apocalypse, published by T. and T. Clark. The best commentary upon the Revelation he has found to be the Scriptures themselves.
Washington, D. C.
Contents
Rules of Interpretation—The Structure of the Book—Reference to Old Testament—Emblems Interpreted by Light of Jewish Scriptures and Ritual—Particular Attention to Numbers
The Seven Churches of Asia, or the Kingdom as it Actually was in the Days of the Apostles and is Now
Fundamental Principles on Which the Kingdom is Based—Emblem of the Seals—Opening of the Seals—The Sealed Elect
The Means by which the Kingdom of Christ is Advanced—Natural Providences—The Two Witnesses, or the Supernatural Scriptures
The Foes of the Kingdom—The Dragon—First Wild Beast, or Spirit of Worldliness—Second Wild Beast, or Spirit of False Prophetism—Anticipations of Victory
The Counterfeit of the Kingdom, or the False Church—The Judgments of God—Vision of the Vials—Babylon and its Doom—Methods of Success Reiterated
Progressive Steps by Which the Ideal Kingdom is to be Realized—Restraints upon the Power of Satan—Outpouring of the Holy Spirit under the Emblem of Resurrection—Union of Christian Believers—Final Triumph over Barbarism under the Emblem of Gog and Magog
The Ideal of the Kingdom—Its Distinctive Features—The Central Principle of the Kingdom—Negative Characteristics—Fruits and Results
Introduction
Rules of Interpretation
If the Revelation of Saint John has any right to a place in the canon of the New Testament, it is reasonable to presume that its intention was to conform to that general purpose for which all divinely inspired Scripture is said to be given, namely, to “be profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works.”
What peculiarly distinguishes it is that it clothes spiritual truth with a garb of mystery which, by challenging investigation, stimulates inquiry; which affords to the mind that solves its obscurities the satisfaction always to be found in the discovery of the recondite and difficult; which throws around prose realities the pleasing charm of poetry and art; and which, by connecting material things with a divine revelation, and thus linking together nature and the supernatural, attests the unity of the universe in which we are placed and shows the world about us and human history to be full of the presence of God.
It would surely argue great presumption in any man to claim a perfect understanding of a book so marvelous as the Apocalypse, whose teachings are not for one age, but for all ages. Very confidently, however, it may be asserted that by the use of certain rules of interpretation many of its mysteries may be explained and its application to practical life and conduct be made evident. The reasonableness of these rules would be readily admitted if applied to any other part of holy writ; and hesitation to accept them here proceeds solely from that mistaken view of the design of the Revelation which isolates it from the rest of the sacred canon as something [♦]anomalous and unique. So far is this from being the case that no book in the Bible can afford to stand by itself so little as the Apocalypse, inasmuch as there is no other into the fabric of which so much of the other Scriptures is intentionally woven. The impression which close study of it makes is that it was designed by its author to serve as a sacred clasp to bind together and hold in harmonious coherence the whole of God’s wonderful volume.
[♦] “anomaioms” replaced with “anomalous”
The principles of interpretation deserving special notice are four in number.
1. The structure of the book itself furnishes some guide to its interpretation.
The opening chapters comprise brief letters, seven in all, which the author is directed to write to seven churches of Asia, the number indicating, not that these comprehended all the churches in that region, but that in them were represented all phases of religious life. These letters set before us both the spiritual state and the environment of the churches, and are advisory, monitory, reproachful, or comforting as the cases demanded.
The closing chapters present us with a picture of the perfected Christian Church—a symbolical vision, incomparable in its exquisite beauty, of the complete and permanent triumph of the Gospel of Christ, in the individual heart and on the larger field of the world, over all opposing forces; the realization, in fact, on earth of the ideal kingdom of God made ready for the Lamb.
The most plausible suggestion, therefore, which presents itself is that the intermediate portion of the book is intended to present in its figures and symbols the means by which the last condition is to be reached from the earlier one, the unformed and fluctuating state of the beginning developed into the ripeness and perfection of the close, and that under the guise of metaphor, trope, and vision there are revealed to us the dangers which the Church of Christ must expect, the enemies it must subdue, the weapons by which victory must be achieved, the encouragements upon which it may rely, and, in short, the steps through which the immature and carnal must be led in order to reach up to the pure and perfect.
Nor is it with the Church at large that the warnings and counsels have alone to do. If “whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our learning,” each individual disciple of Christ may find in this book a chart for his own life’s journey and have sufficient warning against the sunken rocks, the adverse tides, the dangerous headlands which are to be shunned, and which are here so clearly and plainly marked out for him that he may, in the close and careful study of the map, find equal profit and pleasure.
It is very important in this connection to note the statement of the writer in the first verse of the book, that his commission was “to show unto” the servants of God “things which must shortly come to pass.” It is only by a very forced construction of the words that they can be made to signify a prophecy whose fulfillment is to be delayed for long centuries indefinite in their number. The most natural construction surely is that the revelation intrusted to him is one of which the whole, and not a part only, is to find its application in the times in which he lived, or soon thereafter, and to continue applicable until the glorious result is attained of which the closing part speaks. And if we shall dismiss from our minds all prepossessions springing out from that view of the book which makes it a syllabus, or table of contents, of Christian history the force of this remark will more clearly appear.
2. Reference must constantly be made to the Old Testament.
This rule, which is of importance in order to understand any part of the New Testament, becomes of the highest necessity in any attempt to interpret the Revelation. The writer was evidently a diligent student of the older Scriptures, absorbing their images and emblems until they had become a part of himself. Much in his writings that at first seems obscure becomes plain when we put ourselves in his position and study the Scriptures, which were evidently in his thoughts.
The prophetical books of the Old Testament especially are to be studied. Between the relation in which the older prophets stood to the laws and institutions of Moses and that which the apostles of the New Testament dispensation sustained to the Lord Jesus Christ a strong similarity exists. Neither the one nor the other claimed to be originators or independent discoverers, but rather witnesses to truths already revealed, which they accepted as primary and fundamental facts. Into the clear understanding, indeed, of these they were enabled by divine inspiration to look more deeply than others could, and they were also supernaturally aided to draw them out into great principles, capable of application to human thought and conduct in the shaping of individual and national life and practice. Thus, naturally and by sympathy of condition, the later writers found themselves led into careful and profound study of their predecessors. The prophecies of Daniel and Zechariah deserve to be especially consulted. Written, as they were, at or near the time of the captivity of Judah, they had peculiar interest for one who was himself an exile for the truth. Some of the imagery of the Revelation is drawn from the glowing poetry of Isaiah. And almost the entire Book of Joel has been worked into the Apocalypse.
But of all helps to an understanding of the Revelation the most fruitful is a close and careful comparison with the Book of Ezekiel; especially is this the case in reference to the closing chapters of both. Between the authors of these two works there were striking similarities of character and condition. But a more powerful bond of union is found in the fact that both of them were preëminently prophets of the Holy Spirit, seeming to have reached truer and profounder views of his work in the economy of redemption than any predecessors in their separate dispensations. Isaiah and Paul wrote of Christ and his Church; but if we wish to learn the fullest development of the office of the Holy Ghost we must turn to the pages of Ezekiel and John.
In addition to the Old Testament references, the prophetical discourses of our Lord uttered near the close of his ministry and recorded in the synoptical gospels will throw much light on the Book of Revelation. The omission of these from the gospel of John may be accounted for by the fact that in the Revelation the apostle had made such large use of them. The important prediction of Paul concerning the man of sin, found in 2 Thessalonians ii, must also be compared with those of John.
3. The emblems and symbols of the Revelation must be interpreted by the light of the Jewish Scriptures and ritual.
This, indeed, follows as a corollary form the preceding rule, but is of so much importance as to deserve special mention. Sometimes a word or a figure of speech or the connections of a sentence or a passing allusion to some sacrificial service will afford a clew to what at the time was in the mind of the writer. Inasmuch as he was a Jew, “taught according to the perfect manner of the law of the fathers,” familiar with the Scriptures, traditions, usages, and history of his religion, his interpretation of symbols and emblems would naturally be such as would occur to the mind of a Jew. We must place ourselves as near as possible to his standpoint. Yet, as he was also an inspired apostle of the Lord Jesus Christ, we must be prepared to concede that he read deeper into these mysteries than his fellows did and was able to import into them a richer meaning.
4. Particular attention must be given to the numbers found in the book.
Much that is fanciful and extravagant has, it must be conceded, been written on this subject, and to many persons any discussion of it is distasteful. Yet it is certain, as the Wisdom of Solomon says, that God has “ordered all things in measure and number and weight.” Otherwise there could be no such thing as exact science. Truths lie veiled in figures, for these represent fixed principles and plans in the divine mind. As a general truth, it may be stated that the ideas expressed by numbers, not only in this book, but throughout the Bible, whenever these are used symbolically, are those of fullness, exactness, and perfection, on one hand, or deficiency, incompleteness, and imperfection, on the other.
The numbers which figure most largely in symbolism are seven, twelve, six, and three and a half.
Seven is called the sacred number, and seems to express the idea of perfection or fullness to the highest degree and in the most unlimited sense. As seven days make a complete week, whole and entire, without redundancy or deficiency, so that to which the number seven is attached must be taken as perfect, fully developed, as a complete whole. The expressions “seven spirits,” “seven seals,” “seven trumpets,” etc., imply that what they represent must be taken as entire, with no possible capacities lying in them unexhausted.
Twelve, also, signifies completeness; but its use and application are more restricted. It is usually connected with the Church of God, and possibly has some special reference to it. Thus there are twelve patriarchs, twelve apostles, twelve foundations to the holy city. As the number is formed by the multiplication of three, representing the Trinity, and four, representing the world with its quarters, it conveys the thought of universality as the assured destiny of the Church.
Six is, also, as a symbol, connected with the Church; but, both because it is less than seven, and only the half of twelve, has a sinister significance. It represents the malign and baleful influences which corrupt and disintegrate the Church, shearing it of its power, limiting and obstructing its mission, and leaving it incomplete, defective, and corrupt.
Three and a half is a number having special signification and requiring particular investigation. A correct appreciation of its meaning will throw light upon some of the most obscure portions of the Apocalypse.
It occurs—and is, indeed, the only number of which this may be said—in various forms. Since three and a half years comprise forty-two months, and since forty-two months of thirty days each (the usual prophetical computation) equal twelve hundred and sixty days, we may take these three forms, three and a half, forty-two, and twelve hundred and sixty, as equivalent expressions. So, also, the expression, “a time, times, and the dividing of times” (1 + 2 + ½ = 3½), is probably but another form of this number. That some law governs the choice of these various forms is probable; but what, it is does not appear.
Since three and a half falls short of seven, it designates incompleteness. But, inasmuch as it is the exact half of seven (in this differing from six), it signifies an incompleteness which has, so to speak, a completeness of its own—that is, an incompleteness which is not anomalous and irregular, such as would be expressed by six, but one which is, by the appointment of God or as a result of its own nature, intended to be such. Any period of time or epoch in human history which has prescribed and well-marked limits or boundaries, any part of the plan of Providence which has a specified, but only temporary and partial purpose as related to the whole course and complete plan of the divine Being, is always designated by one or the other of the forms of this number.
Judaism, for instance, answered these conditions. It was a providentially ordered dispensation, but with a specific and limited object; fulfilling a definite, but not the complete purpose of Providence; a stage in the movement of humanity toward the kingdom of God, but not itself the realization of that kingdom; a type which needed an antitype to round it out, and throughout which ran the marks that proved it to be only temporary and preparatory to a higher dispensation into which it was to blossom. It was “a schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ.” Its glory was something which was “to be done away,” and consequently falls short of “that which remaineth.” And it reached the “fullness” of its “time” when “God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons.” And it will be found that whenever Judaism is symbolized by a number in the Book of Revelation, it is designated by one of the allotropic forms of three and a half.[¹]
[¹] See Revelation xi, 3; xii, 6, 14.
So, likewise, Gentilism, to which a definite and distinct character or purpose is attributed, both by our Lord (Luke xxi, 24) and by Saint Paul (Romans xi, 25), but which, when severed from its Jewish antecedents, has the like features of incompleteness and deficiency, would be symbolically expressed by some form of the same number.[¹]
[¹] See Revelation xiii, 5.
So generally accepted seems to have been this symbolical use of numbers that it appears even in such pure and simple prose as the gospels. The evangelist Matthew, in recording the genealogy of our Lord, divides the period between Abraham and Christ into three cycles with fourteen generations in each, or forty-two in all. This period is exactly coeval with Judaism as a distinct dispensation; and forty-two is, as we have seen, one of the interchangeable forms of the number three and a half. Inasmuch as the actual number of generations was, as is generally agreed, more than forty-two, and some principle of accommodation must have controlled the evangelist in choosing it, we have a right to conjecture that the symbolism was so well established that no erroneous impression would be conveyed.
Using these rules of interpretation as a guide, it will be found that many, if not most of the obscurities which have made this book so perplexing and incomprehensible will be removed. A unity of purpose will be seen pervading it. It will no longer appear anomalous and outré, but harmonious with the rest of the oracles of God; a book for the perusal of every individual believer, no matter how simple and unlearned he may be; having direct reference to his heart-experience and his moral conduct; a vade mecum for the journey of life through whose aid he may safely encounter the dangers and surely overcome the hindrances he may meet.
The great theme which the inspired writer and apostle here sets before us is the mediatorial kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ. The principles which lie at the basis of that kingdom—the oppositions, external and internal, to its beginning and completion, the agencies, divine and human, upon which reliance must be placed to achieve success, its superiority to and triumph over all hostile forces, and all these both in the heart of each individual Christian and in that aggregation of Christians which we call the Church—are here delineated as they were revealed to Saint John.
The theories which make of this book an anticipation of history, and which find in the events of the last nineteen centuries continued fulfillments of its predictions, or which confine those fulfillments to the periods either near the primitive age or near the future and final scenes of the drama of time are regarded as being not wholly erroneous, but incomplete and partial.
That the great purposes of divine Providence are continually finding their fulfillment in the history of men and nations is a truth not confined to this book, but spread throughout all the sacred Scriptures. The laws of the divine administration are very exact; they can be neither obeyed nor disregarded without the necessary accompaniments of legitimate and appointed consequences. There is no improbability at all that moral and spiritual truths may have their processes and cycles of development, just as natural things have their seasons and times of maturity. Whether the events that have occurred, the organized bodies, secular or religious, that have appeared on the field of the world, were in the mind of the apostle as he wrote is a question neither affirmed nor denied. What is meant to be said is that the Revelation does more than merely predict results. It goes down into the profound region of causes and reveals the continuity of the plans of the divine Being. However ingenious or plausible, therefore, the explanations put upon the prophecies of this book by the theories spoken of above, it is not confined to them. As long as the world lasts there will be, in every age and in the experience of every believer, a fulfillment of the truths here set forth. Its warnings and comforts will never be out of date. Its promises and its threats are alike imperishable, for they are a part of that “word of our God” which “shall stand forever.”
A definition of the phrase “kingdom of Christ” is nowhere attempted in the Revelation. It was not needed in an age when the theme was the staple of preaching and teaching. To show that it must not be confounded with the visible Church was the purpose of the epistles to the churches of Asia with which the Apocalypse begins. The fundamental principle upon which the kingdom is founded, the universal sovereignty of Christ based upon his redemptive work, is taught under the emblem of the seals. The writer then advances to the instrumentalities, natural and supernatural, by means of which the kingdom is to be brought to its consummation. The antagonisms which the kingdom must encounter from foes without and within are next plainly revealed, and, lest the revelation may cause discouragement, prophecies of sure and final victory mingle with warnings. The retributive resources of the kingdom, the just judgments which fall upon its foes, and especially upon the false and counterfeit Church, are taught under the emblem of the vials. The next section discloses to us the stages of progress through which the kingdom ascends to its complete establishment, and the signs by which we may test its advance or detect its decline. And finally, with that glowing picture of the ideal kingdom as it shall be realized on earth when the Galilean shall have conquered, a picture so beautiful that our highest conceptions of heaven seem embodied in it, the divine seer closes his rapturous vision.
PART I
The Seven Churches of Asia
Revelation of Saint John the Divine
PART I
The Seven Churches of Asia, or, the Kingdom as it Actually was in the Days of the Apostles and is now
The chapters which contain the epistles to the churches of Asia need not detain us long; not that they are devoid of interest, but because anything like a commentary upon the text lies outside the scope and design of this essay, whose purpose is to interpret the general intent of the book itself.
The value of these letters to us lies in the pictures presented in them of the religious state of the churches to which they were addressed, and which doubtless were representative of the Christian world in the days of the writer. The reading of them will dispel any illusion in which we may have indulged as to the superiority of the apostolical age over subsequent ones, and will shatter any hypothesis we may have formed that primitive Christianity was anything like Utopia. The condition of the churches which they reveal to us was one in which doubt and faith, loyalty and declension, purity and worldliness, evil and good were interspersed in varying proportions. The tares had already begun to grow with the wheat.
And a moment’s reflection will convince us that no other result could reasonably be expected. Divine grace does not obliterate human nature, and its operations are always in accordance with rule. The regeneration of a soul is not synonymous with its entire sanctification. Growth is an invariable accompaniment of life. It would have been a new and altogether anomalous state of things if the average of conduct attained by converts from Jewish and pagan standards of thought and morals had equaled that to which we may aspire in whom centuries of training in the family, the State, and the Church have created a Christian consciousness. Fervor and zeal the early disciples unquestionably had, but with sad mixture of inconsistency, inexperience, and weakness.
It has always seemed hard for Christians to comprehend and fully believe the promise which our Lord gave to the Church through the apostles, that the Holy Ghost, when he should come, should “abide” with it “forever.” And this abiding presence throughout all ages of the Spirit of truth is not to be in partial or transient manifestation, but in all the fullness of his divine offices. And attention must be called to the fact that John, in unfolding the processes and forces by which the kingdom of Christ is to be brought to its triumphant completeness, points us at the beginning of his prophecy (Revelation iv, 5) to the seven spirits of God “burning before the throne,” as if to impress upon us the perfection of degree in which the Holy Spirit gives himself to this work. This does not mean that there is monotonous identity in the modes of his manifestation, or that the work that he does is the same in kind with that which he has done in the past. We are expressly told that “there are diversities of gifts, but the same spirit. And there are diversities of administrations, but the same Lord. And there are diversities of operations, but it is the same God that worketh all in all.” Some things which God does he never repeats. His special presence or work at some periods and in some things does not imply that he is any the less, while not in the same special way, present at all times and in all things.
“In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.” That was done once for all. From that period up to this time, indeed, the “Father worketh;” but it is not as Creator, but as Providence, developing and evolving from that beginning the possibilities that lay in it. What we call science is the record of this development, aiming only at the accurate presentation of the facts of providence and the adaptation of them to human needs and destiny. Nature is the terminus ad quem toward which discovery and invention tend, not the terminus a quo from which they start. Progress in them does not mean adding anything to nature or superseding it or leaving it behind and moving to something beyond it, but merely approaching closer to it, bringing us to better knowledge of and fuller acquaintance with it.
So, likewise, that inspiration of the Holy Ghost by which holy men of God were moved to speak and write what was specially revealed to them is never to be repeated. The lines along which and the limits within which the Christian Church is to be led were laid down once for all, as those of nature also were. The work of the Spirit now is that of a Providence to bring to realization the ideal then foreshadowed; and in doing this he has divine freedom to breathe where and when he listeth. Pentecost was the commencement of a process of which the closing chapters of the Revelation disclose the completion. And in order to attain this end the perpetual presence and indwelling of the Holy Spirit are promised in all their richness and perfection, but in accordance with the laws of human nature and with constant increments of knowledge and power.
It is vain, therefore, to claim commanding authority for any ceremony, formula, or organization on the ground that it corresponds with primitive Christianity. The apostles never felt themselves bound to that first sketch of the Church which they drew at Pentecost, as if this were among the things supernaturally revealed; but they modified and revised it whenever they could say, “It seemed good to the Holy Ghost and to us.” Nor have we any reason to believe that the process of evolution which continued throughout their lives ended therewith. The Holy Spirit did not then cease his work of guidance and inspiration. That is the truest and most apostolical Christianity which, like John, being “in the Spirit on the Lord’s day,” holds itself ever ready to hear and obey the “great voice, as of a trumpet,” behind and above it.
And this is the lesson we are to learn from the seven epistles to the churches of Asia. They are the record of the beginning of the kingdom of Christ, repeated in the conversion and regeneration of every individual Christian. They show the point of departure from which progress is to be made toward the consummation and perfection of the ideal. The Christian world as it was then, with its graces and its faults, is disclosed to us. The apostle, with his clearer eye, was able to look below the facts and recognize the principles struggling for the ascendency; and, using these facts as his data, he drew from them a prophecy of the development of the kingdom of Christ of marvelous interest and instruction for all subsequent ages. Nor is there a single force, friendly or hostile to the kingdom, which does not appear in the warnings or encouragements he is directed to write to these infant churches. Whoever will take the sketch of the kingdom as it actually appeared to the eye of John, and contrast it with the culmination of the process so exquisitely pictured in the last two chapters of the Apocalypse, will have some conception of the field over which he must travel if he would “come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.”
PART II
Fundamental Principles on which the Kingdom is Based
PART II
Fundamental Principles on which the Kingdom is Based. Emblem of the Seals.
With the fourth chapter the symbolical part of the Revelation begins, and continues to the end of the book. In that portion of it upon which we now enter, and which includes chapters iv–viii, 1, the emblem of a seal is employed so frequently as to make it the distinctive feature. We are told of a book “sealed with seven seals” which none but the Lamb is worthy to open. Then we are told of the opening of these seals, with visions accompanying the successive loosing of them. And, lastly, a specific number of persons sealed in their foreheads are shown us, following which an innumerable company is seen gathered before the throne of God. It behooves us to ascertain the typical meaning of a seal; and if we succeed in so doing the purpose of the writer will be disclosed.
1. The Emblem of the Seals.—The seal has been usually taken as signifying concealment or secrecy; sealed things have been regarded as synonymous with hidden things. And very much conjecture has been offered as to what were the hidden mysteries contained in the sealed book or scroll. But, whatever secondary meaning the seal may have, concealment is not its principal one. A seal denotes, primarily and specifically, ownership, not secrecy. The sealing of anything implies that it is, or is claimed to be, the property of him who affixes the seal. The outward stamp is the declaration that the owner makes of his rights and is the official token of his authority. It is the mark of lordship or seigniority. Any concealment of contents therein involved is a secondary consideration.
Some illustrations from Scripture will substantiate this interpretation.
When it is said (Romans iv, 11) that Abraham received “the sign of circumcision, a seal of the righteousness of the faith which he had,” it is meant that he then became in a special sense the personal property of Almighty God and entitled to all the protection of Omnipotence.
“He that hath received his testimony hath set to his seal [‘hath set his seal to this,’ Revised Version] that God is true” (John iii, 33), means that the assured conviction of God’s reality and faithfulness has become the personal possession of the believer, something which belongs to him of right.
“Him hath God the Father sealed” (John vi, 27) means that God officially ratifies and acknowledges as his own what Christ does, and attests it with the stamp of authority.
When Pilate sealed the sepulcher where Christ was laid (Matthew xxvii, 66) it was meant that the tomb became the property of the Roman empire and was under the guardianship of its officials, and that whoever tampered with it must be prepared to try questions with Cæsar.
“Ye were sealed with that Holy Spirit” (Ephesians i, 13) means that ye received as your own possession, in your own personal experience, the earnest of your inheritance; the gift of the Holy Spirit attests your rightful claim to it.
These examples will suffice to indicate the scriptural meaning of the seal. We have only to apply this meaning to the solution of the problem before us. “A book written within and on the back side,” that is, completely, all over, with no blank or empty space, is seen lying in the right hand of God on the throne. Plainly, this book with its contents signifies something over which the divine Being asserts supreme sovereignty, which he claims as his of right and alone. And the number of the seals—seven—indicates that this sovereignty is complete, undivided, perfect.
What the contents of the book were we may infer from the preceding chapter (iv), in which we are shown the court of the Lord God omnipotent, with his loyal and obedient servants and hierarchies worshiping him and saying, “Thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created.” The book with its seals is a symbol of the fundamental truth of all truths, that all things and beings in this universe, whatever and wherever they are, belong originally and normally to the Creator. His sovereignty over his creatures is absolute, illimitable, and eternal.
It is quite in accordance with John’s cast of mind (and this furnishes no slight evidence as to the authorship of the Revelation) in unfolding to us the plan of redemption to take his stand at that period in the past, far back and without date, when God was all in all, and when sin had not entered to dispute his supremacy; just as in his gospel he commences, not with the Christ in the maturity of his powers, or even incarnate in the flesh, but with the preëxistent Word who was “in the beginning,” “was with God,” and “was God.” Profoundest of all the apostles, his mind reveled in the contemplation of beginnings and ends, of the primeval origin and final consummation of things, of the alpha and omega of creation.
But along with this vision of sovereignty came the coincident remembrance of the universe as it is, disordered and in rebellion; of a sinful world wandering from its orbit, disputing the supremacy of its Maker and God, and in unequal and hopeless conflict with Omnipotence. Into whose possession should it pass, and who could assume the reins of power which seemed to have fallen from the hands of the Creator?
A thought similar to this appears to have passed through the mind of Isaiah when he turned from the vision of the throne “high and lifted up,” with the seraphim veiling their faces in the presence of holy Majesty, to the spectacle of himself and the world, and cried, “Woe is me! for I am undone.”
So John “wept much” when, after this view of immaculate purity combined with almightiness, he contemplated a sinful world powerless to dispute what it would not willingly obey. Who was there worthy to “open the book” and to “loose the seals thereof,” and thus to bring back creatures to their rightful allegiance? If they would not submit, yet could not resist, the result could be only disaster, for the heavens must rule, and successful rebellion was impossible.
But there came to John hope and help, as there had come also to Isaiah; and to both from “the altar.” As John looked he beheld the “Lion of the tribe of Judah,” but in the form of a “Lamb as it had been slain,” take the book from the right hand of God and proceed to break the seals.
Now, if a seal is the emblem of ownership it follows that the authorized and permitted loosing of a seal must mean the transference, or delegation, of proprietorship. And this is the meaning here. There is an endowment—donation, rather—of authority, and the change in possession is published. That which belonged to and had been under the rule of the Father is consigned to and becomes the possession of the Son. And the change is not simply one of sovereigns, but of the ground principle of sovereignty; not only of rulers, but of methods of rule. The song of the “elders” and “living creatures” is now, not “Thou didst create,” but “Thou hast redeemed us to God by thy blood.” There is presented to us, in fact, a picture of the mediatorial sovereignty of the Son of God. We see the inauguration of the kingdom of Christ, the fundamental principle of which is, “Ye are not your own;” for “ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God.” It was written in the Psalms, “The Lord hath said unto me, Thou art my Son; this day have I begotten thee. Ask of me, and I shall give thee the heathen for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession.” John was looking upon the fulfillment of that decree.
Of this mediatorial kingdom of Christ, thus presented to us in symbol, so much is said in the Bible that only a few texts need to be referred to out of the many which might be cited. Our Lord himself said of it that the Father “hath committed all judgment unto the Son” (John v, 22). And again, “All things are delivered unto me of my Father” (Matthew xi, 27). And still again, “All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth” (Matthew xxviii, 18). So in Hebrew ii, 8, it is recorded, “Thou hast put all things in subjection under his feet.” And Paul has written, “Then cometh the end, when he shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father; when he shall have put down all rule and all authority and power. For he must reign, till he hath put all enemies under his feet” (1 Corinthians xv, 24, 25).
2. The Opening of the Seals.—In the exercise of his sovereignty the mediating and atoning Lamb assumes the authority committed to him, and the history of redemption begins. We approach the heart of this wonderful book, and its great purpose begins to reveal itself. But the unfolding of that history has been so different from the conception of it that was possible even to an apostle that “blindness in part” would happen to us all if we had not the revelation of God’s plans made known to us in order to check despondency and animate to labor.
John was one of those to whom the Master had said, “Behold, I send you forth.” He had heard and has recorded the prayer of the great High Priest, “As thou hast sent me into the world, even so have I also sent them into the world.” He had received the great commission, “Go ye therefore, and teach all nations.” He had been taught that Christians were to be “the salt of the earth” and “the light of the world” and were to “occupy” until Christ comes again. What expectation more reasonable could he entertain than that redemption, proceeding from the heart of the Father, consummated in the sacrifice of the Son, and applied by the ever-abiding Spirit, would move forward without let or hindrance from its commencement to its glorious realization? And this is implied in the vision of the opening of the first seal: “Behold a white horse: and he that sat on him had a bow; and a crown was given unto him: and he went forth conquering, and to conquer.” The first stroke of God’s providence always drives the kingdom well forward. It is the subsequent ones that try men’s faith.
When the promise of the seed which should bruise the serpent’s head was given to Eve, and, following that, a son was born to her, was it not natural that, in the fullness of her faith, she should exclaim, “I have gotten a man from the Lord?”
When Almighty God, who had just beaten down Pharaoh and Amalek and written the law with his own fingers, said to Moses, “As truly as I live, all the earth shall be filled with the glory of the Lord,” could the prophet have any doubt that the ark of the covenant would move triumphantly onward until it came to perfect rest in Canaan?
There is much to show that the apostles of Christ anticipated the speedy conquest of the world by his kingdom. The conversion of thousands at Pentecost, the multitude of accessions which followed, the obedience of a great company of priests, the appearance of miracles all conspired to foster this expectation. The morning hour of every reformation is bright and golden. It is later on that clouds gather and the skies darken. Painful realities soon shake men out of such sunny dreams, and banish such fond illusions as did the murder of Abel, the lusting after the fleshpots of Egypt, the imprisonment of Peter, the defection of Ananias, the martyrdom of Stephen and James. And as the pendulum of hope swings so easily to the extreme of despair, and every little Ai seems to our alarmed imagination a walled Jericho, nothing can be conceived more helpful to faith and courage than to learn that such things must needs be, and to be comforted at the same time with the assurance that, though in the world we shall have tribulation, yet Christ has overcome the world and we must not lose heart.
This is the purpose for which the visions accompanying the opening of the seals were given to John. The second seal signifies war; the third, famine; the fourth, pestilence; the fifth, martyrdom; the sixth, revolutions that seem to “shake the heavens, and the earth, and the sea, and the dry land.” These are strange instruments to do God’s will, [♦]unlooked-for messengers to perform his bidding. But not only all things, but all events as well, are under the sovereignty of Christ; and in spite of these obstacles, and perhaps by means of them, his kingdom moves forward. And when the seventh and last seal shall be broken, when every messenger shall have been delegated, when the last needed encouragement shall have been given and the last enemy destroyed, then will come the unbroken and eternal Sabbath of rest.
[♦] “unlookod” replaced with “unlooked”
3. The Sealed Elect.—The third part of this section comprises two visions: first, of the “hundred and forty and four thousand,” out of the twelve tribes of Israel, sealed in their foreheads; and, then, of a great multitude out of all nations and peoples, clothed in white robes and bearing palms in their hands. The purpose of these visions is to show that God’s ownership extends, not only to things and events, but to persons as well. “The Lord knoweth them that are his.”
There need not be any hesitation in interpreting these visions as referring to Jewish and Gentile Christians respectively. The same distinction between the two is made in chapter xiv, 1–6, where the hundred and forty-four thousand who stand on Mount Zion singing a song which no others could learn, namely, the song of Moses and the Lamb, are marked off from those in every nation and people to whom the angel flies with the everlasting Gospel.
It is not meant, surely, that the number one hundred and forty-four thousand is to be taken in an absolutely literal sense. The definite number in all probability stands for a great multitude. How large the number of believing Israelites was in the days of the apostle we have no means of determining. That it was large may be fairly inferred from Acts xxi, 20. And in the great day of accounts the number may be seen to be beyond our largest calculation.
Still less are we authorized to impute this separation of Jew from Gentile to any national exclusiveness on the part of John. No apostle of the circumcision was any more emphatic than was Paul, the apostle of the Gentiles, in asserting that the order of salvation is, first, the Jew, then, the Gentile, and that “God hath not cast away his people which he foreknew,” although “blindness in part is happened to Israel, until the fullness of the Gentiles be come in.” And what part the Jew may yet play in bringing about that fullness no man is able to predict.
Moreover, there is no inferiority implied in the privileges and graces which the great multitude enjoys as compared with the sealed elect. They are kings and priests unto God; they are clothed with the robes of victory and joy. And the images by which their nearness to Christ and their participation in the fullest measure of nourishment, safety, and felicity are expressed are not elsewhere exceeded in the Revelation. The description of their triumph seems to anticipate the consummation of the ideal kingdom of Christ, with which the closing chapters of the Apocalypse are replete.
PART III
The Means by which the Kingdom of Christ is Advanced
PART III
The Means by which the Kingdom of Christ is Advanced—Emblem of the Trumpet
The section of the Revelation which begins with chapter viii, 2, and closes with chapter xi, is characterized by the symbol of the trumpet. In the interpretation of this symbol the key to the understanding of the section must be found. It must not be inferred, because the vision of the trumpets follows that of the seals, that it designates events subsequent to the latter. The seals themselves, as we have seen, are not intended to be predictions of historical events, but strictly emblems of truths or principles; and the trumpets must be in like manner regarded. Succession, coincidence, or any other relation of time has no necessary connection with them. They represent varying phases of the kingdom of Christ, and their relation thereto is the only one that need be regarded.
The trumpet was a familiar instrument in the ritual of Judaism, having a well-known and prescribed use, and is frequently referred to in the Scriptures. The mention of the word would readily suggest to the mind of a Jew its symbolic import, and the writer of the Apocalypse doubtless employed it in this sense.
The trumpet was used as a means of summons. When an assembly was to be gathered, when an alarm was to be given, when a message was to be communicated, it was by the trumpet that attention was arrested and a hearing enforced. It signified that tidings were to be delivered to which it behooved men to listen. It increased the range of the unassisted human voice, with the difference that, while the intensifying of the sound through the use of the instrument carried it over larger spaces, there was a loss of that delicacy, flexibility, and capacity to convey emotions which belong to the unaided human organs of speech.
It was by the trumpet, sounding long and loud, that Jehovah announced his presence at Sinai to Moses and the awe-stricken people, and bade them prepare to receive his law. It was by the blowing of trumpets that the approach of the jubilee year was announced—that very striking type of the redemption purchased by Christ. When the Israelites were marching around Jericho “seven priests bearing seven trumpets of rams’ horns” went before the ark of the Lord; and on the seventh day, when, “at the seventh time,” the priests blew with the trumpets, the walls fell. And the prophet Joel says, “Blow the trumpet in Zion, sanctify a fast, call a solemn assembly: gather the people.” So familiarly has this symbolism passed over into the Christian Church that the preaching of salvation is very commonly spoken of as the blowing of the Gospel trumpet.
If the seals emblematize the truth that all things belong of right to Christ as Mediator, the question very naturally follows, How is this de jure ownership to be made a de facto one, and what instruments are put into the hands of the Church to enable it to establish the kingdom of Christ on earth? The vision of the trumpets is designed to be the answer to this question.
The trumpets, then, signify the instrumentalities by which men are called to the kingdom of Christ, or the measures which the divine Being employs to advance that kingdom. Their number, seven, indicates that these measures are complete and comprehensive, including every available resource and employing all possible methods of approach to man. God avails himself of every legitimate device to constrain a sinful world to accept the proffer of salvation ere he passes from chastisement and correction to retributive and final judgment. Thus those who reject the offer will be found without excuse, and the despisers of the wedding garment will be stricken speechless in the day of accounts.
The sounding of the trumpets, it will be noticed, is preceded by the “prayers of the saints;” for that “the effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much” with God is one of the fundamental facts of the kingdom (Psalm xviii, 6–17). And the token of the hearing of the prayers is seen in the “voices, and thunderings, and lightnings, and an earthquake” that followed when the seven angels with the trumpets prepared to sound. The vision doubtless recalled to John’s mind the remembrance of that day when, as the disciples prayed, “the place was shaken where they were assembled together;” God revealing himself in the new dispensation as he had done at Sinai when about to communicate his law. The grandeur of the preparation suggests the importance of the tidings to be communicated.
It will be also observed that the episode of the “two witnesses” (chapter xi) falls within the section marked by the trumpet emblem. The appropriateness of this and the ease with which it takes its place here furnish no slight evidence that the explanation of the Revelation adopted in this essay is correct.
There are two modes by which the divine Being has chosen to communicate the knowledge of himself and of his will. These are his works and his word. The one is that manifestation of himself in nature of which Paul speaks when he says, “The invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead.” The other is supernatural, the revelation of himself as a power above nature and not limited by its laws. It is of this that Peter says, “We have also a more sure word of prophecy.”
The most searching and subtle analysis to which knowledge and its sources have been subjected has resulted in this—that even in the alembic of modern doubt, after the most biting acids have tried their solvent power, there is left as the residuum a conviction that, besides this known and knowable universe, there exists a first cause or force. At the beginning and basis of all things a duality must be acknowledged. If human thought by its unaided light is incompetent to go beyond this, it is not allowed to stop short of it. “The momentum of thought,” Herbert Spencer says, “inevitably carries us beyond conditioned existence to unconditioned existence.” “The certainty that, on the one hand, such a power exists, while, on the other, its nature transcends intuition and is beyond imagination, is the certainty toward which intelligence has been from the first progressing. To this conclusion science inevitably arrives as it reaches its confines.” This power, which science may know only as “an infinite and eternal energy,” is the Being whom the Scriptures reveal to us as the Lord God, of whom and through whom and to whom “are all things: to whom be glory forever.”
From this first Cause knowledge comes to us through two channels—his deeds and his words. The first of these is accessible to all mankind; for the Gentiles, which have not the law, “show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness.” But as that which is constant and habitual soon ceases to attract attention, and the orderly and uniform processes of nature excite less interest and awaken feebler curiosity than the anomalous and occasional, in like manner it is most frequently by calamities, adversities, seeming withdrawals of God’s face that men are brought to reflection, consideration, and obedience. “When thy judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world will learn righteousness.” It is this truth that the vision of the trumpets symbolizes. It signifies the warnings in the field of natural providence which the divine Being gives to men, in order to show the evil and peril of sin and thus draw back their souls from the pit. The second of these channels of knowledge is found in the oracles of God, the Scriptures committed to the chosen people. And these are symbolized in the episode of the “two witnesses,” which forms a part of the trumpet section.
The details of the trumpet scenes are not, it must be confessed, easy of interpretation. They seem to be selected from various parts of the Old Testament, and grouped according to some plan not explained to us, suggesting the thought that the interpretation of them is not to be found in any single event, but in some common truth embodied in many events.
The conjunction of “hail” with “fire” (viii, 7) is also found in Exodus ix, 24; that of “fire” with “blood” (viii, 7) in Joel ii, 30; while all three of these elements are separately mentioned in many passages. The moving of mountains (viii, 8) is referred to in Psalm xlvi, 2, and Isaiah liv, 10; and a burning mountain in Jeremiah li, 25. “Wormwood” (viii, 11) occurs in Jeremiah ix, 15, and Amos v, 7. The darkening of the heavenly bodies (viii, 12) is found also in Isaiah xiii, 10; Amos viii, 9; and Joel ii, 31. “Locusts” (ix, 3) are mentioned in Exodus x, 4; Nahum iii, 17; Joel i, 4.
But the assemblage of the events in the Revelation differs from any other in the Bible. It is more systematically arranged than in the series foretold by our Lord in Matthew xxiv. It differs from the account of the Egyptian plagues of Exodus in omissions, the introduction of new details, and in the fact that the plagues occur in a different order. The hail, for instance, which is the seventh Egyptian plague, is the first of the plagues in the Revelation. All this may be explained by the fact that the plagues of Egypt were confined to that country and were adapted to its local climatic conditions, while the plagues of the Revelation have for their field the world itself, and were intentionally diversified in being fitted to this larger sphere.
That a close connection exists between man and his dwelling place, the earth, is a truth in which both science and the Scriptures cordially concur; the dispute, if any, between them is not as to the fact, but its cause. The doctrine of evolution, which receives such wide acceptance, rests upon this connection as a fundamental axiom; and the Scriptures confirm the fact in the accounts of the creation and the fall. The difference between science and the Scriptures is, that what evolution attributes to the operation of natural law the Bible explains by the working of a moral power. As for man’s sake the ground was cursed and all nature made to suffer by reason of his rebellion, so do they bear constant witness to his advance or degeneration in righteousness. As purity is in general promotive of prosperity, so does sin produce disaster. “As the moral life of the soul expresses itself in the physical life of the body for the latter’s health or corruption, so the conduct of the human race affects the physical life of the universe to its farthest limit in space. The Old Testament is not contented with a general statement of this great principle, but pursues it to all sorts of particular and private applications. The curses of the Lord fell, not only on the sinner, but on his dwelling, his property, and even on the bit of ground he occupied. The doctrine of the Old Testament is that man’s sin has rendered necessary the destruction of his material circumstances, and that the divine judgment includes a broken and rifled universe.”[¹]
[¹] Isaiah, vol. i. chap. xxxviii, pp. 419, ff., in the Expositor’s Bible, New York, A. C. Armstrong & Co.
And these calamities, whether brought about directly by the divine Governor, or through the operation of general laws, which is but another mode of his action, are so many trumpet calls from God warning men to retrace their erring steps and submit to his kingdom. “It was plague and fire,” Leigh Hunt says, “that first taught the Londoners to build their city better.” And the divine Being may make use of like means to forward his moral government.
1. Natural Providences.—In the first trumpet scene the blow falls upon the earth itself. Its productive resources were severely diminished through the destructive agencies of nature, intensified, it may be, by the horrors of war. The hail and the fire were mingled with blood. And, since food is essential to life, “the king himself being served by the field,” such a disaster must sorely oppress mankind. The apostle had himself witnessed at least one widely-extended famine, and had noted how the exhibition of Christian benevolence had been made the means of promoting the kingdom of Christ (Acts xi, 28–30).
The second trumpet scene deals with disasters affecting “the sea,” the great highway of commerce, and disturbing the exchanges of the products of labor among men. More than once in the history of the world social revolutions have been the plowshare turning up the soil, that seeds of religious reformation might the better grow.
In the third trumpet scene it is the sources of water supply that are affected. A star, falling from heaven, turns them to wormwood, which in the Old Testament is used as a symbol of bitterness and poisoning. It is in the contamination of these sources that epidemics and pestilences usually find their commencement, and a merciful Providence generally spares them until other and milder warnings have been tried.
In the fourth trumpet scene the heavenly bodies are involved, carrying out the idea, so frequently expressed in the Bible, of the sympathy which the whole creation seems to feel with the great events transacted on earth. The universe is so bound together that whatever touches one part of the great Governor’s empire ultimately affects every other (Exodus x, 21–24; Isaiah xiii, 9–11; Joel ii, 31; Matthew xxiv, 29; xxvii, 45). Yet the images in this scene may be figurative emblems of the ruling powers of earthly kingdoms, and the vision may be interpreted as synonymous with the predictions of Haggai ii, 6–9, and Hebrews xii, 26–29, in which the shaking of heaven and earth is made to precede the coming of the kingdom of Christ.
The fifth trumpet scene is undoubtedly the most difficult of all to interpret and requires more elaborate treatment. In striving to explain its obscurities the only safe and satisfactory method is to search for what may be regarded as certain and plain in the vision, and from this as a starting point to essay the more difficult.
Two things seem to stand out prominently and comparatively clearly in the scene. Assuming the star which fell from heaven, to whom was given the key of the bottomless pit, and who is closely connected with the angel of the pit named Abaddon or Apollyon—that is, destroyer—to be a representation of Satan, then for the first time this archenemy of God and man is introduced personally upon the stage. In whatever the fifth trumpet signifies he directly or indirectly has a preëminent share. Then, again, the mention of locusts points us to the prophecy of Joel, where the destructive ravages of this scourge are such a conspicuous figure. If we can reach a satisfactory solution of Joel’s prophecy we may reasonably expect an understanding of this prophecy of the Revelation.
In the great prophecy of Joel, brief in extent, but comprehensive in import, the background upon which the earnest preacher of God paints his vivid pictures is the alarming condition of spiritual declension and apathy into which the people had fallen, accompanied with fearful neglect of the service of God and its ordinances. To awaken the people out of this deadly state he predicts the approach of an awful scourge, the ravages of which would be felt in a resultant condition of extraordinary impoverishment and penury. Poverty of spirit must precede entrance into the riches of the kingdom of heaven. And so the prophet is commissioned to promise that, after repentance and renewal of consecration, there shall be a rich and plentiful effusion of the Holy Spirit; and he assures the penitent that “whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be delivered” and shall escape the impending destruction.
Nothing is more probable, therefore, than that the writer of the Revelation meant to warn the Church of Christ against a decline in faith or relaxation in zeal. He assured it that such a lapse would be followed by the intrusion into its field of some dangerous enemy. What the character of this enemy should be is indicated by two things. It will be noticed that, if John deviates from the description of the locusts given by Joel, it is in the direction of bringing humanity more into the picture. The locusts spoken of in this fifth trumpet scene are to have crowns like gold upon their heads; their faces are to be as the faces of men; their hair to be as the hair of women; they are to hurt, not as real locusts do, the earth and its products, but men; their sting, unlike that of other locusts, is to be as the sting of scorpions; and their work will be, not the destruction of human life, but the causing of such misery as to make human life unhappy and undesirable. They are to be under the direction of Satan, whose field of operations in the warfare he wages against the kingdom of Christ is, not the earth, but the world of human beings.
The truth, then, which seems to be indicated in this obscure vision is, that whenever a Christian man or Church declines into lukewarmness or apathy there may be expected to follow an incursion and invasion by other and lower forms of religious life and thought. Wherever iniquity abounds and the “love of many” waxes cold there is sure to be an inroad of heresy, false doctrine, more or less heterodoxy of creed. The human heart, like nature, abhors a vacuum. Where true godliness wanes false religions rush in to fill the void; and the intensity of zeal which false religions awaken measures the declension that has befallen true faith. The evil spirit that comes back to a home from which he has been once expelled, and finds it empty, swept, and garnished, takes to himself seven other spirits more wicked than himself, “and the last state of that man is worse than the first.” The temperature of religion when it falls to lower levels never does so equably. The nobler and more ideal parts suffer most severely, and, like the shriveled idol of the Philistines, at last “only the stump of Dagon is left to him.”
There can be no question that the advocates of the historical interpretation of the Revelation have a very strong support for their hypothesis in the application of this part of it to the rise and growth of Mohammedanism. It is not to be denied that many of the essential characteristics of that false religion are quite accurately delineated in this picture. The rise and rapid extension of Mohammedanism were possible only because of the dead, formal, and corrupt condition of the Christendom which it encountered. Its prophet and founder preached a faith which was purer than that of many a so-called Christian bishop; and it achieves its triumphs now only in those regions where Christianity has degenerated into spiritual barrenness and puerile ceremonialism. But in this, as in so many instances, the historical interpretation errs, not through incorrectness, so much as through incompleteness. In claiming any one historical event as the fulfillment of prophecy it impoverishes inspiration by confining that fulfillment to a single fact. Mohammedanism is but one illustration of a profounder truth. The Revelation of John is meant for all ages. It is constantly finding new illustrations and applications. In setting before us the causes of decline as well as of growth, the Revelation teaches us to be looking for these causes at all times, that we may avert the decline or forward the growth; and thus it is furnishing new examples of its divine truth and new evidences of its divine origin, without exhausting its force in any single example or any single evidence.
The sixth trumpet sounds, and the vision which is presented to us is one of increasing danger and darkness. Warnings unheeded give way to alarms still more threatening. The noonday bell of invitation deepens into the curfew toll of departing day. The approach of an immense and imposing array of horsemen armed for battle strikes deeper terror than did the invasion of the locusts and indicates judgments more formidable. The power of Satan to harm is overmastering mercy’s efforts to save, and the restrictions which had been laid upon his authority are being relaxed. We are told now that “by these three was the third part of men killed, by the fire, and by the smoke, and by the brimstone.” As there is suggested a spiritual condition which has gone beyond mere declension and apathy to deeper states of alienation from God, so the perils threatened end, not with a destruction of the happiness of life, but in death itself.
It must be noticed that the region from which the new and alarming scourge proceeds is the “great river Euphrates.” To understand this we must place ourselves at the standpoint of the apostle. The river Euphrates was to Palestine what the Danube and the Rhine were to the Roman empire—the line of demarcation between civilization and barbarism. The East was the quarter from which the earlier prophets always apprehended danger. It was in the Euphrates that Jeremiah was bidden to cast the book with the stone tied to it (Jeremiah li, 63). On the hither side of the great river lay the kingdoms with which Israel had mainly had intercourse. On the north of Palestine was Syria, on the south, Egypt; on the banks of the Euphrates and Tigris or near by were Assyria and Babylon. The peoples of these kingdoms were, indeed, nations whose God was not the Lord; yet between them and Israel a modus vivendi had to some degree been established, and some common rules of international intercourse were recognized. But on the farther side was the land of barbarians among whom the arts of civilization were unknown, who acknowledged no code of comity or obligation with which the chosen people were familiar, whose ways and modes of warfare were impenetrable and strange, and from whom all possible evils might be expected.
There is, it must be sadly confessed, in all human beings a latent germ of barbarism, a survival of the carnal or animal nature. Suppressed, indeed, it may be by culture, education, or other moral or secular forces, and its existence hardly surmised, yet it only awaits fostering conditions to manifest its presence and reassert its power. Without divine grace no Christian is free from liability to an outburst of the carnal mind which may destroy the spiritual life of the soul. Nor does any grade of civilization exempt nations from the possibility of a reversion to barbarism, if the excitements to it are allowed to exist or precautions against its inroads are neglected. Bishop Butler expressed the opinion that whole communities, like individuals, might become insane. Perhaps it is nearer the truth to explain the sudden frenzies to which men and nations have sometimes given way as an uncontrolled irruption of the barbarous element within. Farther on, in the twentieth chapter of the Revelation, we shall find this tendency toward barbarism more particularly referred to by John, and the appreciation of it will help us there to solve one of the most perplexing problems of the book.
Ethnology either ignores this liability to revert to barbarism or denies it, and by so doing impairs the value of those hypotheses as to the primitive condition of the race which it seeks to substitute for the Bible story. It is not always easy to determine whether any particular stage of barbarism marks a step upward in the advance of a growing people or a decline toward animalism from a superior state; yet the correctness of our inferences depends upon an accurate diagnosis of this question.
But human experience is constantly furnishing illustrations confirming the utterances of the word of God as to the possibility of a fall from high grades of cultivation to the depths of savagery. If the counsels of God are unheeded and the convictions of the Holy Spirit are resisted nothing can follow but a descent into lower grades, until the savage forces that underlie our nature assert supremacy and overleap the weak barriers which reason and judgment set up to stay them.
Something like this seems to be the warning meant to be conveyed through the sixth trumpet. A striking commentary upon this was given but a few centuries after John’s death, when the hordes of barbarians that had been only waiting opportunity swept with irresistible fury over the crumbling walls of the corrupt and decadent Roman Empire, and imposed upon the Christian Church the task of saving civilization itself from destruction. We may not even now relax our watchfulness or put off the armor of our faith, lest this may involve a reversion of mankind to barbaric naturalism. And a return to barbarism is the lowest condition to which human nature can fall. From such a state recovery is well-nigh hopeless and repentance an extreme improbability, for the resources of mercy will have been almost exhausted, and beyond lies only doom.
It should be noticed that the Revelation speaks of three woes. The first one predicted is described under the fifth trumpet. The second one is declared by the sixth trumpet. The third one is not uncovered at all. It lies in that future world from which the curtain is not lifted and into which even the light of revelation feebly penetrates. Whoever has rejected all the warnings of love and descended the moral scale until he has reverted to the state of sensualism is but a step from the second death. “He that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption.”
2. The Two Witnesses, or, the Supernatural Scriptures.—The episode of the “two witnesses,” to which we are now brought, is one that has sorely tried expositors. Though many and various solutions of it have been attempted, Alford, in his commentary upon the passage, says, “I will further remark, and the reader will find this abundantly borne out by research into histories of Apocalyptic exegesis, that no solution at all approaching to a satisfactory one has ever yet been given ... of this portion of the prophecy.” If it shall be found, therefore, that the principles which have hitherto guided us enable us to penetrate to the core of this mystery, and evolve a meaning intelligible and reasonable, and which, while interpreting all the details without distortion or suppression, is in harmony at the same time with the Scriptures in general and with the purpose for which they have been revealed, then we may indulge the hope that these principles are correct and may advance with some confidence to the problems that still lie before us. Though long tunnels are yet to be threaded, with only brief intervals between them of open air, we shall in time, perhaps, reach the light of day and rest in the sunshine of discovered truth.
It has been already said that through the vast space that intervenes between the divine Being and man two great lines of communication stretch. These are his works and his word. It is this truth which the trumpets symbolize, and we have not yet gotten beyond the section of the Revelation in which this emblem of the trumpets is the ruling one. Six of the trumpets have sounded. Whatever can be done by natural providences to arouse men to spiritual thought and action has been sounded by them. Nature has no other voices with which to speak to mankind. But the resources of Omnipotence are not exhausted. God has yet other means of approach to his creatures. And if, therefore, because of heedlessness or obduracy or preoccupation of mind or absorption in temporal things, one of these lines of light from God’s mercy falls with too light a touch to arrest men’s attention or awaken them to danger or win their consent to seek God’s favor, there remains another and more efficient one, namely, his written word; and here is the place where we should expect allusion to it.
The two witnesses, then, may be reasonably interpreted as signifying the law and the prophets, the titles under which the Old Testament Scriptures received by John as divinely inspired were almost universally designated. Should these fail of their purpose, even the divine Being, we may reverently say, had no other way of reaching man. It is our Lord himself who says, “If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rose from the dead.” When the great and strong wind rending the mountains, and after this the earthquake, and after this the fire, have failed, it is possible that the still small voice will arouse to faith and hope and duty. Should it not do so, then the case is hopeless.
In order to verify the solution which is here proposed of the episode of the two witnesses, a careful examination will be made of the facts as detailed in the text.
The introduction of the two witnesses, however, is preceded by two visions by way of prelude. This, we shall find, is what we might reasonably expect. If the witnesses are, indeed, symbols of the sacred Scriptures, God’s direct revelation of his will and character to men, it is proper that the scope and purpose of all revelation shall be plainly laid down, that we may know how far the revealed word of God is to be regarded as evidence, and also that some criteria shall be given by which we shall be able to discern what the inspired writings are, and how to differentiate them from human productions. In other words, we have here from the pen of John his own views of biblical criticism, and it would have been well if they had been more carefully heeded in the discussions of inspiration recently so rife.
In the first of these two visions a “mighty angel” is seen to “come down from heaven, clothed with a cloud” and with “a rainbow upon his head.” And he had in his hand a little book open. But, when “seven thunders had uttered their voices” and John was “about to write,” a voice was heard from heaven saying, “Seal up those things which the seven thunders uttered, and write them not.” This prohibition is distinctly declared to be only for a time. “In the days of the voice of the seventh angel, when he shall begin to sound, the mystery of God should be finished, as he hath declared unto his servants the prophets.”
If the interpretation put upon the two witnesses is correct, and if they symbolize the Scriptures, then the purpose of this prelude is to indicate what we are to look for in them. It is not the design of the Bible to communicate all possible truth, but only such measure of it as has reference to the kingdom of Christ. Although the things which are revealed belong to us and to our children, there are still secret things which belong to the Lord our God. He has communicated much, but he has withheld much, and doubtless the reasons for the revelation and the reserve are equally wise. There are truths which man’s own powers enable him to discover. There are other truths beyond his ability to comprehend even should they be revealed. These are excluded from the Scriptures as being aside from their purpose. It is only “when that which is perfect is come,” and “that which is in part shall be done away,” that we shall know as we are known. Very much that we know not now we shall know hereafter. But the Bible has specific reference to the kingdom of Christ and reveals only what has relation to that kingdom. “The testimony of Jesus” is the spirit of all prophecy. That which lies within the capacity of man to discover is left to the wisdom and patience of men. That which pertains to the future life, and would simply satisfy curiosity to know, is reserved to the time when we shall have laid aside mortality. The Scriptures reveal to us only what it is needful for us to know that we may enter and enjoy and forward the [♦]kingdom of Christ. Paul was not allowed to utter the words he had heard in his heavenly ecstasy, and John is likewise prohibited from uttering things which belong solely to the divine Being and await his pleasure to publish. It was sufficient for him to be told that, however bitter and unpalatable his message might be, he must still “prophesy before many peoples, and nations, and tongues, and kings.”
[♦] “kingom” replaced with “kingdom”
The second prelude also has reference to the limitations within which all revelation is confined. “There was given me a reed like unto a rod: and the angel stood, saying, Rise, and measure the temple of God, and the altar, and them that worship therein. But the court which is without the temple leave out, and measure it not; for it is given unto the Gentiles: and the holy city shall they tread under foot forty and two months.”
There are two elements in this which furnish guides to its interpretation. One is the distinction so emphatically made between the temple itself, which, as we know, was reserved exclusively for Israelites, and the outer courts, which were given to the Gentiles. The other is the use of the symbolical number forty-two.
Now is it not a reasonable thing that the apostle, when about to point us to the law and the prophets as God’s two witnesses, shall put a broad distinction between them and all mere human productions? The temple itself is the field within which they fulfill their office, and those only who speak from it are God’s accredited messengers. If the Scriptures are the standard by which truth concerning the kingdom of Christ is to be tested, if they have authority to bind the consciences of men, there must be some criterion by which they shall be judged. And this is the criterion—“Salvation is of the Jews.” God’s messengers and witnesses sprang from them. And Paul confirms this declaration when he says that the chief advantage which the Jews had was that “unto them were committed the oracles of God.” The highest creations of human genius fall short of the special inspiration which belonged to the prophets and patriarchs and apostles of Israel. The outer courts, indeed, were given to the Gentiles. Theirs was the world of art, of science, of commerce, of literature, of politics, of earthly dominion; but the temple and the altar belonged to the chosen race. Brilliant stars brightened the darkness of the Gentile sky, but the sun of spiritual truth shone only to the teachers whom God called out of Israel; and Homer and Æschylus, and muse and sibyl, must “pale their ineffectual fires” in the presence of his seers and anointed ones. And this is confirmed by the use of the symbolical number forty-two. This number, as we have seen in the Introduction, typifies a period which has definite limits and fulfills a specific purpose. It may designate Judaism proper or Gentilism proper. And the meaning here is that now, and throughout this present cycle of time, the kingdom of God has been taken from the Jew and given to a nation bringing forth the fruits of the kingdom. Neither the temple, nor the altar, nor the inspired Scriptures belong now exclusively to the Jew. The chosen race has forfeited its prerogative of exclusiveness, and the foot of the Gentile treads the inner as well as outer court. The Bible belongs to us as well as to Israel.
With these important and interesting preludes explained, and the reason of their introduction in this place accounted for, we are prepared to investigate the vision of the two witnesses.
It has already been said, but the importance of the matter requires its repetition, that the paragraph containing the vision of the witnesses is a part of the section of the Revelation of which the trumpet is the ruling symbol; for it is not until the close of this paragraph that the seventh trumpet sounds. It seems, therefore, plausible that what is symbolized by the witnesses has some continuous connection with that which is designated by the trumpets. And, inasmuch as the trumpets are emblems of the instrumentalities which the divine Being employs to call men to repentance, obedience, and the service of himself, the witnesses are an emblem of some such instrumentality, having the same end in view, but operating in a different mode. The six trumpets which have already sounded represent what the divine Being does by way of natural providence, approaching men by calamities, distresses, the observed connection between impiety and moral, as well as intellectual, decadence, and such like means. But nature in any and all of its modes of manifestation does not comprise all the modes of communication between God and man. Nor is the testimony which it bears to God the highest testimony. The same Being who “formeth the mountains, and createth the wind,” who “maketh the morning darkness, and treadeth upon the high places of the earth,” also “declareth unto man what is his thought.” “The heavens,” indeed, “declare the glory of God; and the firmament showeth his handiwork.” But the law of God does more. It converteth the soul. Nature’s witness is given by dumb signs or inarticulate sounds. It has no speech nor language. Its worshipers may cry aloud to their Baal from morning until the time of the evening sacrifice, but there is none to hear, nor any God that regards. It is to and through the human spirit that the divine Spirit must communicate his deepest truths; nor has he done all that may be done until he has given to men his word. “The grass withereth, the flower fadeth; but the word of our God shall stand forever.”
The two witnesses, human and intelligent, aptly and appropriately represent this higher mode of communication which God employs to impress and teach men. By them we are to understand the law and the prophets, the two component parts of the Old Testament Scriptures, which at the date of the Apocalypse constituted the only canonical Scriptures known. In the paragraph which follows there is an intimation of the New Testament; but as yet it was not in existence as a collected code. The Bible which Christ and his apostles knew was the Jewish Bible.
The proof of this somewhat novel interpretation of the two witnesses, if, indeed, any interpretation of any part of the Apocalypse can be called novel, lies in the fact that it explains all the details of the vision which are presented to us simply, easily, and without any forced construction. It is essential to group together the separate details, and then endeavor to explain them.
The seer says of these two witnesses that they prophesy in sackcloth twelve hundred and sixty days, which, as has been said in discussing rules of interpretation, is one of the numbers symbolical of Judaism; they are identified as corresponding with the “two sons of oil, that stand by the Lord of the whole earth,” of whom Zechariah wrote (Revised Version); they have power to devour their enemies and shut heaven by the miracles of withholding the rain, turning waters to blood, and smiting the earth with plagues. There is a period when their “testimony” is finished. When that period is reached their enemy, the beast from the bottomless pit, kills them, and their dead bodies lie exposed for three and a half days “in the street of the great city, which spiritually is called Sodom and Egypt, where also our Lord was crucified.” At the end of this period “the Spirit of life entered into them, and they stood upon their feet;” and they finally “ascended up to heaven” amid convulsions which shake the earth and fill men with terror.
How accurately all these features of the paragraph find their fulfillment in the law and the prophets, or the Old Testament Scriptures, may be readily shown:
First. It is worthy of consideration as a strong point that the expression, “the law and the prophets” (sometimes “Moses and the prophets”), is the one almost invariably employed by our Lord in designating the older Scriptures (Matthew v, 17; vii, 12; xi, 13; xxii, 40; Luke xvi, 31; xxiv, 27; as also John i, 45; Acts xiii, 15; xxviii, 23).
Secondly. The testimony of the prophets and writers of the Old Testament may be truly said to have been given in sackcloth. What one of these messengers of God ever met with a cordial reception? Well did Stephen say, perhaps in the hearing of John himself, “Which of the prophets have not your fathers persecuted?” “They were stoned, were sawn asunder, were tempted, were slain with the sword: they wandered about in sheepskins, and goatskins; being destitute, afflicted, tormented” (Hebrews xi, 37; Luke xi, 49–51).
Thirdly. The law and the prophets found their special embodiments and representatives in Moses (John i, 17) and Elijah (Malachi iv, 4, 5); one the unequaled statesmen and legislator, the other the most striking and, in many respects, the greatest of the long line of prophets. The miracles ascribed to the two witnesses were actually wrought by these two extraordinary and typical men. To Moses was given power to turn waters to blood and to smite the earth with plagues. It was at the prayer of Elijah that the heaven was shut so that it rained not but according to his word.
Fourthly. Zechariah’s vision of the “two olive branches which through the two golden pipes empty the golden oil out of themselves,” and which are said to be “the two anointed ones, that stand by the Lord of the whole earth,” finds its most appropriate and exact fulfillment in the Holy Scriptures, which testify of Jesus (John v, 39). And it was the representatives of the law and the prophets, or Moses and Elijah, who were chosen to stand by our Lord when he appeared in glory upon the Mount of Transfiguration.
Fifthly. The “testimony” of the law and the prophets is distinctly said by our Lord himself to have been “finished” when his own forerunner, John the Baptist, appeared. “For all the prophets and the law prophesied until John” (Matthew xi, 13); “The law and the prophets were until John” (Luke xvi, 16).
Sixthly. Although the Jews professedly acknowledged the law and the prophets to be of divine origin, our Lord emphatically charged against them that they had by their glosses and traditions in effect abrogated them; devitalizing them and making their authority to be a dead letter (Matthew xv, 6; Mark vii, 13; Luke xi, 52).
Seventhly. At no period did this nullification of the power of the Holy Scriptures reach such extremes as during our Lord’s active ministry on earth. The dead bodies of the law and the prophets may be said, without exaggeration, to have lain exposed in the streets of Jerusalem, where our Lord was crucified.
Eighthly. The bodies of the two witnesses are said to have lain “three days and a half.” As the period of our Lord’s active ministry has been computed at three and a half years the number may refer to that. But as three and a half is a symbolical number, designating a half period, it may be used to designate the same here. The ministry of our Lord was such a half period, which was not completed until it had been supplemented by the gift of the Holy Spirit.
Ninthly. After the “three days and a half the Spirit of life from God” is said to have “entered into” the two witnesses, “and they stood upon their feet.” This was remarkably fulfilled on the day of Pentecost, when, by the illumination and inspiration of the Holy Ghost, the apostles were moved to draw from the law and the prophets those convincing arguments and promises and appeals which led to the conversion of thousands.
Tenthly. The two witnesses after their resurrection are said to have “ascended up to heaven” in the presence of their enemies. This finds its fulfillment in the fact that the Hebrew Scriptures, with the added life given them by the New Testament, have been accepted by the Christian Church, not as the exclusive property of the Jewish Church or as the archives of the Hebrew nation, but as the common heritage of the world and the canonical word of God to the whole human race.
Lastly. The convulsions of nature which are said to have accompanied the ascent of the witnesses to heaven were exactly fulfilled, as John could testify, in the events that followed Pentecost—the terror and alarm of Christ’s enemies, the fear that came upon all, the shaking as by an earthquake of the place where the disciples were assembled in prayer, and the rapid increase in numbers of those who were slain of the Lord and raised to a new spiritual life.
If this explanation of the episode of the two witnesses is correct the depreciation, or rather, perhaps, under-appreciation of the Old Testament, which exists even among those who do not question its inspiration, is without ground or reason. In the opinion of St. John the addition of the New Testament does not in any wise supersede or render obsolete the older Scriptures. In the education of the human race the Creator did not begin with the more abstruse and highly developed teachings of the New Testament, but with the natural, biographical, historical, and providential facts of the Old. With the exception of the evangelical gospels, which belong really to both dispensations, since the Christ whose life and words and deeds are there recorded is both the consummation of the one dispensation and the seed and promise of the other, no part of holy writ exceeds in interest, attractiveness, and simplicity the law and the prophets, in which John and Peter and Paul were trained.
The Old Testament contains, albeit in embryo, all doctrines and truths essential to the kingdom of Christ. If for a while it was kept secreted within the bounds of Judaism, this was not because its revelations were meant exclusively for the chosen people, but that its sacred treasures might be guarded from waste and wanton destruction until the rest of the world was prepared to welcome them. If much of its meaning was misconceived and misconstrued by the Jewish mind, this must be attributed largely to the frailty and ignorance of human nature. The New Testament does not so much add to the Old Testament as illustrate, explain, and apply it. It is the interpreter, not the destroyer, of the Old. It opens its secrets, brings to light its truths, reveals to us the face of Jesus Christ everywhere in it, and enforces its teachings by the power of the Holy Spirit. But the Scriptures of the Old Testament are the imperishable record of the foundation of Christ’s kingdom upon earth. Without them the writings of the New Testament would be without connection with that continuous chain of inspiration whose first link was forged when God said, “Let there be light.” And, equally so, without the New Testament the Old would be merely a foundation lacking a superstructure, and thus incomplete. Its chain of inspiration would be without any sure anchorage in the future eternity, and thus hang helpless and useless, with no power to bridge the gulf between the alpha and omega, the beginning of time and its end. But the Old Testament can never become obsolete. Not one jot or tittle of it shall pass away until all is fulfilled. And the revelation given in the New [♦]Testament can no more supersede or abolish it than science can supersede nature, of which it is the ordained expositor.
[♦] “Testameut” replaced with “Testament”
There is a healthiness, too, about the Old Testament like to the quiet restfulness of nature. When men are disposed to wander from the safe path into the vagaries of mysticism or asceticism nothing will correct the aberrance more surely than diligent and profound study of its sober realities and its everyday life. The reading of it calms the fevers and dispels the illusions to which we are prone. It brings to us those soothing influences which we feel when we look at the
“Good gigantic smile of the brown old earth
On autumn mornings,”
or, lying under forest shades, watch the gentle swaying of foliage, or listen to the purling of brooks, or catch glimpses of the calm blue sky. We need its concrete facts to save us from the abstractions of a vague and unreal idealism.
Thus closes the vision of the trumpets. They represent the messengers whom God employs to call men to repentance, the methods he avails himself of to forward the kingdom within and without us. He will not cease to strive with us until every appeal likely to reach us has been tried. When nature and the supernatural, the word of God in providence and the richer word of God in revelation, have exerted their power the resources of the divine Being have been, we may with all reverence say, exhausted, and the time is ripe for the closing of the drama of probation, that he which is righteous may be righteous still, and he which is filthy may be filthy still.
Yet the writer of the Revelation does not allow us to remain in doubt as to the result of God’s efforts to save a lost world. The wisdom of God is not astray. “He will rest in his love.” He has himself absolute confidence in the success of the plans of redemption. When the seventh and last trumpet shall sound the curtain will fall upon a world restored to God, upon a paradise regained, and great voices in heaven shall say, “The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of his Christ; and he shall reign forever and ever.”
PART IV
The Foes of the Kingdom
PART IV
The Foes of the Kingdom
With chapter xii another section of the Apocalypse begins. Two great truths relating to the kingdom of Christ have been discussed—the fundamental principle of mediatorial sovereignty upon which it is based, and the instruments, providence and the written word, by which it is advanced. It follows very naturally and logically that the antagonists by whom the kingdom is opposed should also be disclosed to us. Out of his abundant grace and in tender compassion for human ignorance, God has made known to us, through this marvelous book, the adversaries with whom we must contend before the kingdom can attain its consummation in our hearts or in the world at large.
While no part of the Revelation is easy of interpretation, or can be made intelligible without very careful study both of itself and of the whole Bible, there has been added to this part of it the embarrassment of the odium theologicum. Bitter controversial strifes have raged around the interpretation of it and have raised a cloud of prejudices, through which the truth has been sometimes dimly seen. From all such prejudices we must free ourselves. We are approaching holy ground, and it behooves us to put off our shoes, that nothing of human invention may intervene between our naked feet and the sacred floor of God’s temple.
We need this caution the more because from the nature of the case the interpretation of this part carries us more or less into the field of history. The foes of the kingdom of Christ are visible foes, as well as invisible. The contest is not only for the individual man, but for the race. The commission given to the Church is, “Go, preach my Gospel to every creature;” and the keynote of the song of triumph with which the last part closed was, “The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of his Christ.”
There is, therefore, a tendency to confine the interpretation to the field of history, to direct the attention to large and collective bodies of men, either world powers or religious societies, or to those historical events and cycles of events which have apparently changed the currents of the ages, and to insist that in these the fulfillment of the prophecy lies.
But history itself is only the record of individuals. We delude ourselves when we fancy that by association anything is created. That mystical something which is imagined to be in collective bodies more than in the individuals that compose them is a mere figment of the brain, and to discuss it is simply to revive the barren conceits of the schoolmen. A Church is only “a congregation of believing men;” a State is a coöperative association of individuals, not a corporation; and neither one has any powers or forces other than those which exist in the individual members. Man is both the microcosm and the macrocosm.
The chief value of the inspired book which we are now studying lies in the fact that it discloses to us those forces, spiritual and otherwise, the conflict between which makes up the life history of each individual of mankind. It is a chart meant for every navigator of this boundless ocean of human existence. Its truths will be as precious and important to the last man on this globe as they are to us. The reefs and breakers it describes are not perils past which any age can sail and then look back upon as things done with, but dangers which beset every voyager. It is true that in the history of large bodies of men, whether secular or religious in their character—in the temptations, declension, growth, and triumph of nations and Churches—illustrations of its truths and fulfillments of its predictions will be found. But these, we must insist, are merely illustrations. Long as the world shall last the [♦]Apocalypse will prove itself to be a part of God’s boon of revelation, in that each follower of Christ shall find it of inestimable value for his own private guidance, inspiration, and study.
[♦] “Apocalyse” replaced with “Apocalypse”
Looking by the light of God’s lamp through the ages to come, John was allowed to foresee the successful completion of the life work and plans of Jesus the Saviour. He who began both his gospel and his great epistle with “the beginning” also follows the course of the drama of redemption to its final “amen.” The saint who, leaning on the bosom of Jesus, looked up to him as the Author of his faith was also permitted to fall at his majestic feet and worship him as its Finisher. And, from personal communion with and contemplation of him as the Son of man, he rose to the grander conception of him as the Christ, the Word of God, King of kings, and Lord of lords. He was taught, also, that the progress through which his own conceptions of the Son of God had passed was but a type and example of that which shall take place in time on the field of the world and in the hearts of mankind. The cross upon which Jesus of Nazareth suffered was, indeed, a throne from which he ascended to the crown of the universe. But John, too, saw that ere that final consummation can be reached there are foes to be encountered, hindrances to be removed, antagonists to be overthrown. A great and effectual door is opened unto us, but there are many adversaries. To the consideration of these he therefore now calls our attention:
1. The Dragon, or Satan.—The first of the adversaries with whom the kingdom of Christ has to dispute supremacy is the devil, the archfiend and enemy of God and man.
That Satan, the evil one, is referred to in the description of the great red dragon having seven heads, ten horns, and seven diadems seems an interpretation so natural that it is hardly worth while to seek for far-fetched meanings when so plausible an explanation lies near at hand. The ten horns (Zechariah saw but four—Zechariah i, 18) are the instruments with which he seeks to scatter and destroy the sheep of God. The seven heads with diadems represent the pride and haughtiness of spirit in which he boasts that the power and glory of all kingdoms have been delivered to him and that he gives them to whom he will. It is a struggle for life and death between him and the Christ. If Paul, the man of affairs, with his practical conception of things in their concrete relations, says, “Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood, but against the principalities, against the powers, against the world-rulers of this darkness, against the spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places” (Revised Version), much more strongly does John, with his intuition of abstract principles, recognize and emphasize the power and working of the dark spirit whose names are Satan and “destroyer.” No writer of the New Testament speaks oftener or more clearly of the evil spirit than does John. In vivid imagery and with graphic condensation he sums up the history of the kingdom of darkness, the long record of Satan’s undying antagonism to the kingdom of Christ.
The woman arrayed “with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars” (see Genesis xxxvii, 9), represents the Church collectively and in its most general expression; primarily, the Jewish Church, inasmuch as Christianity had just begun its mission; but not confined thereto. Against the Church, against every individual of it, this murderer and liar from the beginning wages relentless warfare. His is the power behind all other antagonisms. To devour the child of the woman in the hour of its birth, to destroy humanity itself if he can, seems to be the aim of his being. Not a soul is now born into the kingdom of Christ by regenerating grace but Satan is there to crush the newly-given life, if possible, in its inception.
When the first gospel of salvation and victory was given to Eve, “Thy seed shall bruise the serpent’s head,” Satan began his machinations to defeat the prophecy, even though he knew that he could do no more than bruise the heel of the promised seed.
When the promise given to Abraham of a posterity countless as the stars of heaven was about to receive its fulfillment in the extraordinary fertility of the sons of Jacob in Egypt, it was Satan who inspired Pharaoh to issue the cruel edict commanding the death of every Hebrew male child.
When Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea it was the same dragon that urged Herod to his mad purpose of slaying every young child throughout its coasts. “This is the heir; let us kill him, that the inheritance may be ours.”
And it is against this wily foe, “the prince of the power of the air,” “the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience,” that we all have continually to struggle.
For protection against such an adversary there is certainly need of divine aid. And that help has never been withheld. “There were given to the woman the two wings of a great eagle.” Is not this an echo of Exodus xix, 4, “I bare you on eagles’ wings,” and also of Psalm xci, 4, “And under his wings shalt thou trust”? And in addition to this we are told that God prepared “a place” in the wilderness where the woman might fly and be nourished. Does not this refer to Palestine, that quiet, secluded land, nigh the great highways of the world and yet aloof from them, where in comparative isolation Israel might develop her own resources and grow in strength until she should be ready for her broader mission? If the purpose of the divine Being fell short of full realization the fault was not his, but hers, through her lust to be like the surrounding nations.
The numbers, too, representing the period of this seclusion, “twelve hundred and sixty days,” and “a time, times, and half a time,” are forms of three and a half, which, as has been said in the Introduction, symbolizes Judaism, or any cycle with a definite purpose which is, however, only a half period.
And further confirmation of the reference to the Church of Israel is found in the allusion to the archangel Michael, who is always represented in the Scriptures as sustaining some special relation to Israel (Daniel x, 21; xii, 1).
Yet, mighty as Satan is and venomous as is his hostility, the believer is endowed with weapons of offense and defense still more potent. “They overcame him by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony” (or “witness” with reference, doubtless, to the testimony of the two witnesses of the preceding chapter). In other words, the cross of Christ and the word of God are the conquering weapons with which believers win the victory over Satan. The Lord Jesus had most plainly foretold the secret of victory in the hearing of John when he had said, “Now is the judgment of this world: now shall the prince of this world be cast out. And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me.” And, doubtless, these words came with fullness and force to the memory of the apostle when he heard the “loud voice saying in heaven, Now is come salvation and strength, and the kingdom of our God, and the power of his Christ: for the accuser of our brethren is cast down.”
Not yet, however, is Satan ready to cease his efforts to destroy. He changes the field of conflict, but does not relinquish the malice of his assault. If he cannot in heaven, that is, the Church, countervail the kingdom of Christ, he will attempt it in the earth, on the field of secular life. “The serpent cast out of his mouth water as a flood, after the woman: that he might cause her to be carried away of the flood.” There is, perhaps, a reference here to Isaiah lix, 19: “When the enemy shall come in like a flood, the Spirit of the Lord shall lift up a standard against him.” Looking back at that chapter, we shall find that the flood spoken of means an unusual increase of social disorders and crimes. That is most probably the meaning here. Satan is the foe alike of God and man. His enmity is directed as much against all order and morality as against goodness and righteousness. He is that “lawless one” of whom Paul speaks in 2 Thessalonians ii, 3 (Revised Version). If he were allowed to carry out his will he would subvert all government, spiritual or secular. But, says the apostle and seer, “The earth helped the woman.” For its own protection and existence the State must execute laws, must preserve order, and must secure itself against anarchy and unbridled libertinism; and, in so far as it guards social morality, it fosters spiritual prosperity. In restraining crime and violence it must needs allow the kingdom of Christ opportunity to grow.
Foiled thus again, Satan does not abandon the conflict, but resorts to other and more wily means to make war with the “remnant” of the woman’s seed “which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ;” and the history of these efforts must next engage our attention.
2. The First Wild Beast, or the Spirit of Worldliness.—In the chapter of the Revelation which precedes the appearance of the beasts (Revelation xii, 12) the warning had been given, “Woe to the inhabiters of the earth and of the sea! for the devil is come down unto you, having great wrath.” We are now to witness the fulfillment of this warning. The apostle saw two wild beasts rise, one from the sea, the other from the land, both of them formidable foes and intense in their hostility to the kingdom of Christ. There can hardly be a question but that these are intended to represent the means by which Satan, thwarted in his direct assaults, endeavors to carry on his warfare. And just as Christ, in carrying forward his mediatorial kingdom, makes use of the two instrumentalities, providence and the written word, so also, in imitation of him, his fierce antagonist has his two emissaries and agents. We shall find as we study this part of the Revelation that one of the most deceptive and dangerous arts which Satan employs is his manner of counterfeiting the form and aping the methods of Christ, in hope that he may thereby delude the unsuspecting or heedless. We ought, therefore, very carefully to note every feature, that we may be able to detect these dangerous incarnations of the spirit of evil, and thus escape his snares.
The first wild beast of John’s vision rose from the sea—an expression which, when used symbolically, designates the secular or temporal world, in antithesis to the Church. His distinctive characteristics are intense pride, the possession of vast power, strong vitality enabling him to recover speedily from severe injuries, insatiable craving after homage and ability to secure it, outrageous blasphemy, and undisguised as well as unceasing hostility to Christ and his saints. It is a mooted question whether by this beast John meant to describe and foretell the coming of some individual person or some organization of men, secular or religious, State or Church; or whether the characteristics he portrays are intended to represent some principle of evil, always at work, mightier and more enduring than any organization of men, which manifests itself in various forms and at all times, but transcends all its manifestations, and against which, because it is one of Satan’s most successful means of antagonism, every Christian must keep perpetual watch.
The latter of these hypotheses seems to be more in keeping with the cast of John’s strongly idealistic and abstract mind, and also with the purpose of the Apocalypse as intended for the edifying of believers. And furthermore, as the kingdom of God is not something that cometh “with observation,” so that men can say of it, “Lo here! or, lo there!” but is something “within” us, so its opponent is not to be sought in any particular organization or special event or single individual, but rather in some abstract principle, all the more dangerous because it exists separate and distinct from these.
In his description of this wild beast John draws his data from the prophecy of Daniel; and a study of that book will aid in the elucidation of this. It is, indeed, true that in the mind of Daniel the antagonists and allies of God alike assumed the form of kingdoms, or world powers. But this resulted from the fact that his cast of mind was essentially concrete, and also because as a statesman and man of affairs, charged with the administration of finances and politics, accustomed to the handling of men in collective bodies and to deal with matters affecting their external relations, his conceptions of religion regarded rather its outward manifestations than its inward power. We are not, however, compelled to believe that John, while using the prophecies of Daniel as his basis, was limited to the conceptions of the older prophet. He had a better key to the hieroglyphics of the kingdom and could read their meaning more clearly. Behind the forces which play their part upon the world’s stage he could recognize the spiritual principles of which they were incarnations.
The world power which loomed largest to the mind of Daniel, and whose hostility to the kingdom of Christ was most dreaded by him, was one that sprang up after the death and among the successors of Alexander the Great. That extraordinary captain and gifted statesman, the first ruler who grasped the conception of the essential unity of mankind and who strove to realize it by the fusion of races into one nation, left no one at his death capable of comprehending or executing his plans; and the empire that was formed by his ten generals was a heterogeneous one, possessing elements both of weakness and strength that were incapable of being welded into unity. Among the descendants and successors of these generals was Antiochus Epiphanes, whose hatred of Judaism amounted to real monomania, and whose insane purpose to exterminate utterly the customs, usages, religion, and even the existence of Judaism carried him to such extremes as to arouse a spirit of revolt which, under the guidance of the Maccabees, defeated his intent. In him the prophet Daniel foresaw the incarnation of all that is hostile to Christ and his kingdom.
In the days of John the political sovereignty of the world was wielded by a still more formidable power, one that combined in itself the strength of all the four kingdoms of Daniel, uniting the lion, the bear, and the leopard with the added and imparted authority and power of the dragon. That power was the Roman Empire, between which and Christianity had already begun the antagonism which was to leave its decisive and disastrous effects upon both.
The policy of Rome toward conquered peoples and religions had not been one, customarily, of harsh severity; indeed, it had been marked in general by unusual liberality. Having so many gods in her own Pantheon, it has been said, the addition or subtraction of a few more or less was hardly worth consideration. But upon one thing Rome invariably and absolutely insisted—the preservation of public order. Her administration was one of strict, even stern, paternalism. The individual existed for the State, and had no rights but such as the State allowed. The central power did all the thinking; the subject had only to submit, whatever his personal wishes. Upon the emperor, as the embodiment of the State, devolved the onerous responsibility of securing and, if need were, of enforcing peaceful and lawful relations between men and men. Whenever therefore, the profession of any religion or the organization of any guild or association interfered with the prosperity of any branch of trade or commerce or manufacture, the emperor felt called upon to interpose, in order to redress the injury caused or wrong suffered thereby. The more conscientious and upright the emperor, the more he felt the responsibility of administering the laws; and thus just and righteous rulers, like Trajan and Antoninus and Marcus Aurelius, were more likely to enforce these rules of order, even to the point of persecution, than such men as Nero and Caligula and Domitian, upon whom moral considerations sat loosely.
The early persecutions of Christians sprang out of this fact. There were things Christian men would not do. They would not eat meat sacrificed to idols; they would not attend the spectacles of the theater; they would not worship or own images; and, as the trades and professions that lived by these things suffered with the increase of Christians, complaint was made to the emperor, and the power of the State invoked in behalf of public order. The riot at Ephesus (Acts xix, 23–41) is a case in illustration.
Very soon, however, the Roman authorities came to see that there was something back of Christian worship that differentiated it from other cults. There was a principle of individual liberty, a conviction of personal freedom, an appreciation of unseen and divine realities which, if unchecked, threatened the paternalism and the emperor—the worship of the Cæsars and the continuance of the empire; and so Christians began to be persecuted simply because they were Christians. Thus began the antagonism that did not cease until the empire became nominally Christian, and the Church, striving after the universality of the empire, became worldly and paternal in its turn. This antagonism John clearly discerned, and reveals it in the Apocalypse.
But we shall be astray if we conceive that the beast which the apostle saw symbolized only the Roman or any other empire. There is an evil principle which was in existence long before that empire was established, and has continued with unabating energy since its dissolution; of whose power earthly and worldly kingdoms are but manifestations; which Satan has employed in all ages as one of his most successful weapons; and whose deadly hostility to the Christian and the Church is implacable. It is the principle of worldliness, that spirit of the world against which the Bible so frequently and faithfully warns us.
It is not easy to define worldliness. If it could be described exactly, and its bounds accurately meted, its danger would be greatly diminished. If we could point to the doing or abstaining from doing of specified things, or the using or refraining from using of any particular faculties, and say, “This is worldliness and this only,” how much easier it would be to avoid it! Worldliness is a principle, a spirit and temper of the soul. It can find a field for its exercise anywhere and everywhere, in things essentially good as well as in the essentially evil. Its intrinsic spirit lies in this—that it disengages men and things from their normal relation of dependence upon and subjection to God, and sets them up as rivals to him. It assumes to displace the Creator from his rightful sovereignty over thoughts and desires and affections and activities, and transfers allegiance to some created thing. It substitutes something temporal and earthly for God and gives to it the worship that belongs undividedly to him. It manifests itself, John tells us, in “the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the vainglory of life.” This is the spirit of which the Bible speaks so plainly and forcibly in passages like these: “If the world hate you, ye know that it hated me before it hated you;” “The carnal mind is enmity against God, for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be;” “Know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? whosoever, therefore, will be a friend of the world, is the enemy of God;” “If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him.” And every characteristic of the wild beast which John saw exhibits this spirit of worldliness. It, and it alone, exhausts the fullness of the description.
Of this beast which John saw, one of the heads was, as it were, “wounded [or slain] to death”—the very words which were used in the description of the Lamb (Revelation v, 6), as if there were in this an attempted, although feeble, imitation of Christ. Worldliness, too, has its Calvaries and Gethsemanes; but they fall far short in measure and in purpose of the great sacrifice of the cross. They are compulsory, not self-chosen sacrifices; they are not redemptive and substitutional in their design, but retributive inflictions of divine justice; they involve but a part of the being, and are not, as was Christ’s offering, the surrender of the whole self.
Many such wounds has worldliness received. The serpent’s head has been bruised again and again by the seed of the woman. In the judgments which have come upon the world throughout the course of its history—in the deluge, the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, the exodus from Egypt, the overthrow of Nineveh and Babylon, the fall of Jerusalem—its spirit has been rebuked, condemned, punished. Indeed, in all the dissolutions and decay of nature—in the fading of the grass, in the falling of the flower and of the leaf—the warning is being constantly given, “The world passeth away, and the lust thereof.” Most of all, in the cross of Christ has the world received its deadliest wound. But how soon is the wound healed, how quickly are the lessons of providence forgotten! and the tide of worldliness, stayed for a moment, resumes its volume and rapidity and carries its victims to their destruction.
It is this power of recuperation which contributes to the might of worldliness and makes it the more dangerous. Success adds to its fascinations and multiplies its votaries. “All the world wondered after the beast” whose deadly wound was healed. In comparison with its triumphs the cross of Christ becomes a stumbling-block to some and foolishness to others, because of the paucity of its victories. And in worshiping the beast its followers are scarcely aware, or are oblivious to the fact, that they are worshiping the dragon himself; for Paul says, “The things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to devils, and not to God.”
Another striking and conspicuous characteristic of the first beast was his virulent blasphemy. Upon his heads were “the names of blasphemy.” The voices of his mouth were blasphemy. His fierce, ambitious purpose to displace God and usurp his throne—and this is what the Bible defines blasphemy to be—moved him to demand such homage as can be given rightly to God alone, and to set up his own tabernacle and name as competitors with God’s. Is not this descriptive of the spirit of worldliness? How exacting it is of the worship of its devotees! In place of the Creator, who is blessed for ever, it substitutes the creature. It enthrones nature in some one or other of its phases as the rival of the divine Being. It will not admit the visible universe, with its laws, to be merely the vehicle through which God reveals himself and his thoughts, but demands for it equality of homage with its Maker. It does not claim for itself power to work miracles, and will not believe that any are possible. It does not base its authority upon any supernatural revelation, and denies that any is needful. Like Absalom, in the gates it whispers in every man’s ears, “O that I were made judge in the land!” and thus draws unwary souls into treason against their King. It arrogates to itself the right to the whole of man’s being—to all beauty and life, to all literature and art, to all recreation and enjoyment, to the exclusive and undivided use and administration of all earthly powers and faculties.
And how ruthless and cruel this spirit of worldliness can be! Does any human soul, driven by dissatisfaction and heartache, seek to lift the veil and penetrate to the secret shrine of the universe, or to pierce the “rose mesh” of mystery that surrounds us and ascend to the divine Spirit above and beyond it, how quickly is the fascinating smile of the world turned to bitter scorn, and its smooth flattery to remorseless persecution! With what haughtiness and assumption does it contend that, in everything relating to music and poetry, to the æsthetic arts, to finance and politics and social matters, the question of morals has no place and God and religion have no right to enter!
To this beast, we are further informed, power, or authority, was given “to continue forty and two months.” This number, it has been previously said, is the symbol of an epoch which is limited and fractional, but which has a definite purpose pervading it.
Throughout the whole period of Judaism this beast raged with all his ferocity against the Church of the Old Testament. And, although the wild beast next to be delineated was a more formidable adversary to religion than even he, yet the temptation to fall into the ways, and follow the practices, and to drop down to the religious level of the ungodly world of heathenism around constituted a peril to the Hebrew faith against which the prophets had need frequently to lift their voices. And how constant even now is the peril to the Christian Church and the Christian believer of falling into the worship of the same beast of worldliness, is so patent a truth that every man’s observation and experience are sufficient to prove it. The victims of worldliness are, indeed, many, and to resist sorely tries “the patience and the faith of the saints.” But its doom is sure and irretrievable, whether that doom shall come by the sword of God or by captivity. Its own methods of hostility shall be turned against itself.
3. The Second Wild Beast, or the Spirit of False Prophetism.—In attempting to solve the mystery of the second wild beast which John saw we are confronted with a task much more serious than has as yet been presented to us. Not only is this antagonist of Christ a more formidable one than any hitherto encountered, but there seems an almost purposed obscurity and indistinctness about the description, as if to the seer himself the beast appeared in so vague and nebulous a form, or else was of such composite and heterogeneous character, as to be incapable of more exact delineation. The only way to reach the truth is to seek out such features of the description as may be regarded plain, and from them to advance to the more perplexing ones.
It will be noticed, then, that the second beast rises not as the preceding from the sea, but from the earth; that is, from the Church, not in its ideal state, but in its actual condition, as the field of human activity and influence.
Again, it is noticeable that, while in the description of the first beast the expression “it was given him” occurs again and again (much more conspicuously in the original than in the translation), in the case of the second one this expression is, in the main, although not in every instance, superseded by words suggesting active agency—“he doeth,” “he maketh,” “he causeth”—these being all various renderings of the same Greek word. This would seem to imply that, while the first beast is merely an emissary or instrument executing the will of another, the second differs from him in that he has, or assumes to have, some power of originating action, some causative agency, and that he regards himself as having independent authority. While, therefore, the results effected by both are the same (“He had power to give breath to the image of the beast”), those results are brought about in different ways.
Another very important feature of the description is that, while the distinguishing characteristic of the first beast is blasphemy—an open and undisguised assumption of the prerogatives of God, with intense and avowed hostility to him—the properties of the second are duplicity, deception, and self-deceit—perversion of the truth rather than antagonism to it; and hypocrisy, if more insidious, is far deadlier than open opposition. He has the appearance of a lamb, while speaking as a dragon. He is said to work miracles, or at least is said to profess so to do, which the first beast did not. And he counterfeits the work of God, in that by a peculiar mark he stamps upon his followers his claim to them, as the divine Being affixes to his a seal in attestation of his ownership.
One further remark may be made. Three times in the subsequent part of the Revelation (Revelation xvi, 13; xix, 20; xx, 10) these two adversaries of Christ are brought into juxtaposition, and in these instances it is the first beast alone who is designated by that name. The second beast has the synonym of “the false prophet.” The term seems to mark his superior power or craft; to the malice of a beast is added the higher intelligence of a man. The combination attests the formidable character of this wily antagonist.
In this last-named feature lies a suggestion which may serve as a clew to the interpretation of the symbol and unveil its mystery. A false prophet can stand only in contrast with a true one. It will be needful, therefore, to discuss, somewhat in detail, the characteristic functions of the prophetical office as set forth in the Scriptures.
“The usage of the word [prophet],” says Cremer,[¹] “is clear. It signifies one to whom and through whom God speaks. What really constitutes the prophet is immediate intercourse with God, a divine communication of what the prophet must declare. Two things, therefore, go to make the prophet—an insight granted by God into the divine secrets or mysteries, and a communication to others of those secrets. New Testament prophets were for the Christian Church what Old Testament prophets were for Israel, inasmuch as they maintained intact the immediate connection between the Church and, not the Holy Spirit in her, but the God of her salvation above her. The prophets, both in the old and the new dispensations, were messengers or media of communication between the upper and the lower world.”
[¹] Lexicon of New Testament Greek, third English edition, pp. 568, 569.
“The primary idea of a prophet,” says Ewald,[¹] “is of one who has seen or heard something which does not concern himself, or not himself alone, which will not let him rest. It wholly absorbs him, ... so that he no longer hears or is conscious of himself, but of the loud and clear voice of another who is higher than himself. He acts and speaks, not of his own accord; a higher one impels him, to resist whom is sin. It is his God, who is also the God of those to whom he must speak.”
[¹] Prophets of the Old Testament, vol. i, p. 7. London, Williams and Norgate.
“That which,” says Oehler,[¹] “made the prophet a prophet was not his natural gifts nor his own intention; and that which he proclaimed as the prophetic word was not the mere result of instruction received nor the product of his own reflection. The prophet, as such, knows himself to be the organ of divine revelation, in virtue both of a divine vocation capable of being known by him as such, ... and also of his endowment with the enlightening, sanctifying, and strengthening Spirit of God.”
[¹] Theology of the Old Testament, §§ 205, 206. New York, Funk and Wagnalls.
With these statements the concurrent testimony of the New Testament is in harmony: “God ... at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets” (Hebrews i, 1); “The prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost” (2 Peter i, 21).
It was, therefore, essential to the credibility and authority of the prophet that he should have received some direct revelation from God. The message intrusted to him to deliver must be from a source above and outside himself. It was not sufficient that God spake in him; he must be able to say that God spake to him. When to the student prepared by the guidance of a teacher to receive them nature reveals its facts and laws, these come to him as something external to him. They are not suggestions or inspirations of his own mind, but owe their origin to a source exterior to it. So likewise with the prophet. How the revelation came to him, and how his hearers became convinced that God had spoken to him, are questions that do not touch the truth of his message. The important thing is that the prophet was the agent and representative of God in delivering a message which had previously been committed to him. Herein lay the distinction between the priesthood and the prophetical office. A priest was a man on whom was laid the responsibility of appearing before God on behalf of men; a prophet was one who stood in the presence of men on behalf of God. A priest represented man in the court of God; a prophet represented God in the court of human life. A priest was man’s advocate; a prophet was God’s advocate. The function of the priest was to intercede for his fellows; identity of condition and tender sympathy with them were therefore prime requisites. The function of a prophet was to deliver God’s word to man; strict fidelity to his message and to the truth were his essential qualifications. As the priesthood, then, was a type of Christ, finding its perfect realization in him who laid down his life a ransom for us, the prophetical office was a type of the Holy Ghost, whose work it is to convey to man the message of God, whether it be of conviction, of justification, of sanctification, of inspiration, or of assurance.
If, therefore, by a “false Christ” is meant one who usurps the place of Christ and substitutes himself for him, demanding from men the allegiance due only to the Son of God, then by a “false prophet” must be meant one who unconsciously or purposely substitutes himself for the Holy Spirit, setting forth his own conceptions or visions as the voice of God.
“The characteristic,” says Oehler,[¹] “of the false prophets is declared to be that they speak that which they themselves have devised. These latter are designated (Ezekiel xiii, 2) as prophets ‘out of their own hearts,’ who ‘follow their own spirit, and have seen nothing;’ ‘they speak,’ according to Jeremiah xxiii, 16, ‘a vision of their own heart, and not out of the mouth of the Lord.’”
[¹] Theology of the Old Testament, p. 464.
No stage of history has been free from such presumptuous prophets. Their existence and the disastrous work they wrought are set forth again and again in the Old Testament Scriptures. But that their appearance in larger numbers and under more formidable guises may be expected in the New Testament dispensation follows from a consideration of the influence of Christianity upon human nature.
Unquestionably, one marked result of that copious effusion of the Holy Spirit, which beginning at Pentecost has continued until now, was a quickening of the human soul to a realization of its individuality. Fifteen centuries of sad experience and a convulsion which disrupted Western Christendom were needed to bring any large portion of the Church to an appreciation of the privileges which inhere in this individualism. Since the great Reformation of the sixteenth century, men have come by freer study of the Bible to discern more clearly the possibilities which it teaches of personal consciousness of sonship, and of the individual possession by the Holy Spirit of every soul availing itself of the privilege; although there have never been wanting those who have discerned the possibility of individual communion with the spiritual world.
In individualism lurks a danger against which no revelation can absolutely secure us. I may transgress its prescribed limitations and become excessive. It may strive after independence from its Creator and put forth its hands to forbidden fruit. It may assume prerogatives which the divine Being reserves to himself. It may substitute its own imaginings and volitions for voices of God, and displace that real spirituality which only the Holy Ghost can create with an auto-spiritualism which is deceptive, illusory, and specious, the precursor of spiritual and intellectual anarchy.
Our Lord gave warning of this peril when, predicting the trials which should come, he said, “There shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall show great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect.” Paul foresaw it, saying to the Ephesian elders, “Of your own selves shall men arise, speaking perverse things, to drawaway disciples after them.” It was this which led John to write, “Believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world.”
The writer of the Revelation had no need to go beyond his own memory to find symptoms of this spirit. Already it had begun to manifest itself in the apostolic Church. Simon Magus was a conspicuous but not solitary example. In the epistles to the seven churches there are cautions against “the Nicolaitans” and “the woman Jezebel, which calleth herself a prophetess,” very distinct from those which denounce the pleasures or the persecutions of the world. In the ante-Nicene age gnosticism, with its pretensions to a theosophy more profound, a knowledge more extensive and exact, a code of ethics more consistent, and a self-denial more rigid than those of the faithful, was a more dangerous adversary than the Roman empire; and we who appreciate the skillfulness of its specious arguments realize that nothing but the providence of God carried the artless and unsuspicious Church safely through the peril.[¹] And throughout the ages since there has been a continuous reappearance of this spirit, sometimes within, sometimes outside the Church; not always avowedly antagonistic to Christianity, but assuming to be a more perfect form of it; not impugning the authority of the Scriptures, but claiming to possess deeper views of their esoteric meaning; not openly subverting the foundations of morals, but superseding them by a show of a more austere and uncompromising sanctimoniousness. It so puts on the appearance of a lamb that its dragon nature is hard to detect. It has cropped out in Manichæism, in Paulicianism, in Albigensianism, among hermits and pillar saints, among pietists, mystics, occultists, and other professors of a strained and exalted perfection and illumination to which only the elect initiate can aspire, and from which the common masses of believers are excluded.
[¹] Bigg, Christian Platonists of Alexandria, Bampton Lectures, 1886, lecture i, p. 35; Harnack, History of Dogma, book i, chapter iv.
It is hard to describe this spirit by a single name. It wears so many forms that no one word can comprehend all of them. Even the apostolic pen failed to depict this adversary clearly or sketch its outline with distinctness. Deceit seems to be the pervading and controlling element of its being, and to affect both substance and form. But it has as its usual accompaniment one mark which it stamps upon its devotees—a scrupulous and rigid asceticism which deludes itself with the hope of emancipation from the necessary conditions of earthly life, which denounces as sinful things proper in themselves, simply because they are natural or secular, and which aims at the profitless and impracticable task of anticipating in this life the celestial state of disembodied spirits. No creature can ever with impunity contravene the laws imposed upon his nature. The abnormal and excessive development of one side of man’s constitution is sure to involve a corresponding atrophy of some other side, and thus the sins excluded by one system of defenses find entrance through some other avenue left unguarded. And the constant result of asceticism has been in the end to revive with new power the worldliness it aimed to destroy; so that in this sense the second beast gives “life” and breath “unto the image” of the first. For the termination of all hyperspiritualism has been either in an arrogant self-exaltation, the very opposite of Christian humility and love, or in an antinomianism which, under the affectation of liberty, gives loose rein to sensualism.
To the question, which thus becomes of vital importance, How shall we “try the spirits” to know “whether they are of God”? John has elsewhere furnished a sufficient answer: “Every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God: and every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God: and this is that spirit of antichrist, whereof ye have heard that it should come; and even now already is it in the world” (1 John iv, 2, 3).
The central principle of all asceticism, in whatever form, and whether perceived and acknowledged or not, is that matter is essentially evil and spirit essentially good. It is in the contact of soul with body and of spirit with matter that sin lies. Holiness, therefore, means only the diminution or destruction of this contact. All bodily desires, activities, and enjoyments, if they cannot be annihilated, must be reduced to the minimum, that thereby the ascendency of the spirit may be gained and maintained. Thus human nature is mutilated to half its capacities. Religion becomes only a “concision,” not a process of transformation. The problem of redemption is no longer the moral one of the salvation of the soul from the guilt and pollution of sin, but the metaphysical one of the liberation of the spirit from matter.[¹] By such as hold this view of things the assumption by the Son of God of the likeness of sinful flesh, his birth, his fellowship with earthly conditions and experiences, can never be fully accepted; his crucifixion is attenuated into a figure of speech or becomes a mere parable, and cannot be the necessary means of our salvation.
[¹] Möller, History of the Christian Church, vol. i, pp. 152, 153. New York, Swan Sonnenschein & Co., 1892.
Against such a theory the Revelation is one long protest. Its keynote is salvation through “the Lamb that was slain.” Nor does anything prove so conclusively that John was the author of the Apocalypse as the fact that in it, in the fourth gospel, and in the epistles which bear his name, the central and fundamental truth was the same: “The Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us;” and, “This is he that came by water and blood, even Jesus Christ; not by water only, but by water and blood. And it is the Spirit that beareth witness, because the Spirit is truth.”
The acquisition of knowledge depends as much upon a right method as upon an earnest purpose. Alphabets must be mastered before sentences can be read. No one can understand the higher mathematics who has not been grounded in the fundamental axioms. And one of the axioms of the spiritual life is that the Holy Spirit cannot be given until Jesus is glorified (John vii, 39). Whoever does not accept, with all implied therein, the exemplary earthly life and the atoning and sacrificial death of the Son of God may well pause to reflect whether the spirit which leads and moves him is indeed the Spirit of God, or whether it is not the spirit of evil and untruth. We may not set limits to the spiritual flights of which the soul is capable, but it must have a solid basis from which to start; otherwise it wastes its strength in aimless wanderings amid mazy fogs and vagaries.
The path of truth lies between extremes, and from either side of the ridge along which it winds steep declines lead to dangerous abysses. If a man, on the one hand, accepts to the full the reality of the incarnation of the Son of God, and then does not advance to that other revealed truth, that the Holy Ghost is of equal power and divinity and that his mission is as wide in its range and as complete in its effects, religion will be to him a thing of externals, of outward and mechanical forms and rites. On the other hand, the ascetic who would aspire to the full heights of the revelation of the Holy Spirit without accepting what must precede success—the real humanity of our Lord, his cross, his grave, his resurrection—will surely miss the path and be lost in abstractions, fanaticisms, delusion, and deceit.
One last feature descriptive of the second beast remains to be considered—the number of his name. “Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is six hundred threescore and six.” If John meant to cover a mystery he has certainly succeeded, for no explanation has as yet been offered convincing enough to command the acceptance of the Church. Unquestionably this is the most difficult to solve of all the problems of the book, and the apostle is thought to intimate this in saying, “Here is wisdom;” although possibly his meaning is that the special need for wisdom lies in defense against the wiles of this adversary, rather than in solving the mystery of his name.
The interpretation which has met with the largest assent is based on the usage of employing the letters of the Greek and Hebrew alphabets as numerals. Men have attempted to discover some name the letters of which when added will give the numerical value six hundred and sixty-six. The name which has secured the largest number of advocates is Lateinos (Latin), which, written in Greek characters and numbered, gives six hundred and sixty-six. By Roman Catholic interpreters who accept this solution the empire of Rome is supposed to be meant; by Protestants, the Church of Rome. Dr. Adam Clarke thought this solution to “amount nearly to demonstration.”
In recent times many German and other scholars, mainly for reasons based on a special theory of the date of the Revelation, prefer the words Nero Cæsar, which, written in Hebrew letters, number six hundred and sixty-six. Irenæus (died about 202), who attempted the problem, out of many names preferred Teitan, possibly to suggest an analogy between the attempts of Roman emperors to crush the Church and the unsuccessful war of the Titans against the gods, without venturing to put forth his opinions in more definite form. Very many other names of men, ancient and modern, have been proposed, with greater or less plausibility; for curiosity to decipher numerical symbols, when it possesses a man, holds him with almost the fascination of gambling. But it is apparent that the combination of names possible with only a few letters is so much beyond computation that almost apostolical inspiration is requisite to decide upon the right one.
To the word “Lateinos,” strong as are its claims, the objection lies that the Roman or Latin empire can scarcely be meant, since the beast John describes is evidently a spiritual power, not a secular one. Nor can the Roman Church be meant, for it was not known as Latin in the days of the apostle, nor for centuries afterward; and, as one design of the Apocalypse was to comfort and instruct the generation in which John lived, it would have been inconsistent with that design to select a name which could have no meaning intelligible to it or to many generations succeeding. There is wisdom in the words of Bleek:[¹] “The discovery that a definite name contains this number as the value of its letters in Greek would not warrant us to assume the correctness of the interpretation if other hints in the book respecting the beast did not agree.”
[¹] Lectures on the Apocalypse, p. 87. London, Williams & Norgate, 1875.
Another explanation offered is that the number six hundred and sixty-six is but a threefold repetition of the number six, John thus intending to mark in the most emphatic manner that, however mighty the power or long the duration of the beast shall be, it will inevitably fall short of the completeness and permanence of Christ’s kingdom, as six is less than seven.
Still another explanation proposed is that the number was originally written with the Greek letters χξϛ; χ being equal to six hundred, ξ to sixty, and ϛ to six. As χ (ch) is the initial letter of Christ, ξ is supposed to be an emblem of Satan, being afterward so used by the Gnostics, and ϛ is the initial of σταυρός, cross. The symbol, it is said, refers to some Satanic power intervening between Christ and the cross, some system which honors him as teacher but denies him as Saviour, which accepts Jesus, but not “him crucified.” The description accords well enough with that of the second beast; but whether it can be extracted from the number six hundred and sixty-six is another question. The monogram, while harmonizing with the symbolism of the Apocalypse, and also delineating the nature of the beast, does not explain the emphasis which seems to be laid upon his “name.”
There is, however, one detail in this part of the description of the beast often overlooked, but which may carry us far on our way to decipher the secret of the number. The number of the name is not monopolized by the beast; it does not exhaust itself in any single individual. We are told that “no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name.” The beast has followers who imbibe his spirit and partake of his characteristics, and to whom his name and number are equally appropriate. It is more in keeping with this statement, as well as with other details, to interpret the beast as a principle rather than a person, as being some spirit of evil which, assuming prominence in some man or organization, is yet shared by many men and organizations. The ascetic, false prophetism which fulfills the other details of the description coincides also with this.
If, following out the rule of interpretation which has guided us hitherto, and assuming that John drew his prediction of the future from facts and tendencies existing in his day, we read the epistles contained in chapters ii and iii, we shall find that among the perils which threatened the apostolic Church none was more imminent than that which is called “the doctrine of the Nicolaitans,” which was but a reproduction of the heresy of Balaam, the gifted and formidable rival and antagonist of Moses; the name Nicolaus, indeed, meaning in Greek the same that Balaam does in Hebrew. So deep a mark did Balaam make that throughout the Old Testament, as well as the New, he stands as the representative, as he was the first example, of that spirit of false prophetism which, beginning as ascetism, degenerates into antinomianism and prostitutes genius to the service of the flesh. Now, it is certainly true, as Züllig shows,[¹] that the words “Balaam, the son of Beor, soothsayer,” if written in Hebrew letters do make up the sum six hundred and sixty-six. It seems, therefore, probable that some embodiment of his insidious spirit, some reproduction of his deadly doctrine, with its resultant lawless practices, is the solution of this mysterious symbol, the second beast, against which John earnestly warns the Church in all ages to guard itself as the most dangerous foe to the kingdom of Christ. And possibly the archæological researches which are now bringing to light much of the hidden history of earlier ages may yet discover to us the sect which served as the basis of his warning.
[¹] Bleek, Lectures on the Apocalypse, p. 285.
The interpretation which has here been put upon the symbols of the two wild beasts—namely, that they represent, the one the spirit of worldliness, the other that autospiritualism or self-centered piety which, for lack of a more comprehensive phrase, may be designated as false prophetism or false asceticism—derives some confirmation from the fact that their resulting effects have been such as the author of the Revelation predicted. Worldliness seems the baser of the two, but its dominion is briefer and less stable. As the mind can never be content with agnosticism, but must by necessity search for some explanation of the mystery of being until satisfaction is gained, so the heart can never fully rest in hopes and themes and joys which are only earthly. The religious instincts inherent in and inalienable from our nature will assert themselves and cry for God. On the other hand, asceticism, while it seems to present a loftier ideal and holds men thereby with a more permanent grasp, is all the more baleful by reason of its deceptiveness. It veils pride, ambition, malice, selfishness, under the guise of superior sanctity, which, while imposing on others by its well-masked duplicity, lulls its victims into almost hopeless slumber by its hypocrisy. Those whom it allures by its professions of superior piety it mocks with disappointing dreams. It is the dark shadow that always waits on holiness and liberty; it is the special temptation that besets souls seeking after purity and knowledge; while worldliness is that to which those are most prone who mingle much with the world and deal with earthly realities. If, on the one hand, it is easy for men to fall into the danger of using their heaven-given faculties for the ignoble purpose of gratifying their lower desires or of turning stones to bread simply that they may live, it is equally easy, on the other, to wander into the opposite error of presuming rashly upon God’s providence and mercy, although humility has degenerated into boasting and love has been perverted to censoriousness. From neither tendency can the regeneration of the world come; both are alike enemies of God and of man.
4. Anticipations of Victory.—It is one of the characteristic peculiarities of St. John’s literary style to introduce a subject which for the moment he merely suggests to our notice, returning to it subsequently in order that he may amplify and complete it. He goes over his work again and again, each time adding some new touch, with the purpose of bringing out in greater prominence some detail of his subject. While each section, therefore, contains in measure an epitome of the whole, in each one some single point is more specifically and elaborately discussed. There is, it is true, advance of thought; but the eagle of the apostolic band moves in circles, bringing into notice of his keen eye every part of the field over which he soars, while each swoop of his wing carries him a little beyond his former orbit, so that his progress is in spirals. The principle which controlled him seems to have been that of presenting to us in sharp and striking antithesis the contrasts between conflicting ideas, while he holds them under our observation.
It is also characteristic of a disposition like St. John’s, and of a life so contemplative and secluded as his was, to view things in the light of their essential principles; not as they become, modified by contact and in relation with each other, but as they radically and germinally are. By consequence such minds, instead of being occupied with the intermediate changes, pass at once to ultimate results and see the end in the beginning.
An instance of this appears in the fourteenth chapter, which is really but an epilogue to the preceding chapters. In the twelfth and thirteenth chapters we have had presented to our vision the formidable enemies with which the Christian believer must struggle. They have been described most graphically and with a fullness of detail not subsequently exceeded. The dramatis personæ are all put upon the stage, and no new actors in the tragedy of existence need be expected. But these enemies are sufficiently numerous and terrible to excite apprehension and awaken earnest inquiries as to our means of resistance and possibilities of success. The seer, therefore, pauses for a moment to review the resources put within our reach and to assure us of their adequacy. “Greater is he that is in you,” he says, “than he that is in the world.” And he fully indorses the emphatic declaration of Paul, “The weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds.”
In prophesying victory over the dragon and the beasts to the saints of Christ, John separates them into two classes, as he had done in chapter vii. This is not in any spirit of Jewish narrowness or exclusiveness. He had long gotten beyond that and learned to call no man common whom God had cleansed. Even Paul, the apostle of the uncircumcision, recognized a distinction between the Jew, who was first, and the Gentile; so there can be alleged against John no bigotry in recognizing the distinction, inasmuch as he foreshadows equal victory to both classes. There can hardly be a question that by the “hundred forty and four thousand” John meant Israelites after the flesh; for they “stood on the mount Sion;” they sang a song which none others but themselves could learn, namely, the song of Moses and of the Lamb (xv, 3); they were “the first fruits unto God and to the Lamb” (xiv, 4); they were without “guile,” with reference no doubt to John i, 47. They were “virgins,” having the true asceticism—freedom from ungodliness and worldly lusts. There was reason for rejoicing to a Jew like John in the fact that, in spite of the opposition of the rulers and Herods among the chosen people to whom had been committed the oracles of God, and on the very spots of the crucifixion and resurrection, so many of his former co-religionists had become disciples of Christ and followed the Lamb whithersoever he led them.
But the word of God is not bound, nor is it the exclusive property of any race; and the seer immediately adds the vision of the multitudes of “every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people,” to whom “the everlasting Gospel” was preached and among whom it found adherents. The fullness of the times had come, and Gentiles might “fear God, and give glory to him,” the one Creator of “heaven, and earth, and the sea, and the fountains of waters.”
One new feature is now introduced. Babylon, which occupies so much of the subsequent part of the Apocalypse, is here for the first time mentioned. Babylon, it will be attempted to show, is not another adversary, but an apostate Church which has succumbed to adversaries and thereby become a counterfeit and rival to Christianity. It is here brought upon the stage by anticipation, and its doom foretold, to give completer assurance of the coming victory over all forms and results of sin and evil.
The age in which John lived was an age of martyrdom. How severely this fact tried “the patience” and faith of the early Christians we know from hints in other apostolical writings. Paul found it necessary to show to his brethren in Rome that if they suffered with Christ it was that they might be also glorified together with him. Peter, too, comforts those whose faith was being so sorely tried with the assurance that the trial of their faith was “more precious than of gold that perisheth,” and would be “found unto praise and honor and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ.” And so John gives to the Church of his day the glad tidings that, although God buries his workmen, he carries on his work; that they, if they died “in the Lord,” should “rest from their labors;” and that “their works” should survive and go on winning victories after their departure.
If it should be asked how or with what weapons they were to overcome, John gives the answer which is found so often in the Book of Revelation that it is one of the keys to unlock its mysteries—they overcome “by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony” (Revelation xii, 11); by which latter expression is meant, doubtless, the Scriptures, as explained in the chapter upon the two witnesses. That the two visions which now follow, the harvest of the world and the vintage scene, refer to these two weapons of success furnishes an explanation of them so simple and easy that it is strange they should have occasioned so much difficulty to commentators.