It is scarce possible for any that either love or fear God not to feel their hearts extremely affected in seriously reading either the beginning or the latter part of the Revelation. These, it is evident, we cannot consider too much; but the intermediate parts I did not study at all for many years; as utterly despairing of understanding them, after the fruitless attempts of so many wise and good men: and perhaps I should have lived and died in this sentiment, had I not seen the works of the great Bengelius. But these revived my hopes of understanding even the prophecies of this book; at least many of them in some good degree: for perhaps some will not be opened but in eternity. Let us, however, bless God for the measure of light we may enjoy, and improve it to his glory.
The following notes are mostly those of that excellent man; a few of which are taken from his Gnomon Novi Testamenti, but far more from his Ekklarte Offenbarung, which is a full and regular comment on the Revelation. Every part of this I do not undertake to defend. But none should condemn him without reading his proofs at large. It did not suit my design to insert these: they are above the capacity of ordinary readers. Nor had I room to insert the entire translation of a book which contains near twelve hundred pages.
All I can do is, partly to translate, partly abridge, the most necessary of his observations; allowing myself the liberty to alter some of them, and to add a few notes where he is not full. His text, it may be observed, I have taken almost throughout, which I apprehend he has abundantly defended both in the Gnomon itself, and in his Apparatus and Crisis in Apocalypsin. Yet I by no means pretend to understand or explain all that is contained in this mysterious book. I only offer what help I can to the serious inquirer, and shall rejoice if any be moved thereby more carefully to read and more deeply to consider the words of this prophecy. Blessed is he that does this with a single eye. His labour shall not be in vain.
Adam Clarke
Introduction to the Revelation of St. John the Divine
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INTRODUCTION TO THE REVELATION OF ST.
JOHN THE DIVINE
AS there has been much controversy concerning the authenticity of this book; and as it was rejected by many for a considerable time, and, when generally acknowledged, was received cautiously by the Church; it will be well to examine the testimony by which its authenticity is supported, and the arguments by which its claim to a place in the sacred canon is vindicated. Before, therefore, I produce my own sentiments, I shall beg leave to lay before the reader those of Dr. Lardner, who has treated the subject with much judgment.
“We are now come to the last book of the New Testament, the Revelation; about which there have been different sentiments among Christians; many receiving it as the writing of John the apostle and evangelist, others ascribing it to John a presbyter, others to Cerinthus, and some rejecting it, without knowing to whom it should be ascribed. I shall therefore here rehearse the testimony of ancient Christians, as it arises in several ages. “It is probable that Hermas read the book of the Revelation, and imitated it; he has many things resembling it. It is referred to by the martyrs at Lyons. There is reason to think it was received by Papias. Justin Martyr, about the year 140, was acquainted with this book, and received it as written by the Apostle John; for, in his dialogue with Trypho, he expressly says: ‘A man from among us, by name John, one of the apostles of Christ, in the revelation made to him, has prophesied that the believers in our Christ shall live a thousand years in Jerusalem; and after that shall be the general, and, in a word, the eternal resurrection and judgment of all together.’ To this passage we suppose Eusebius to refer in his ecclesiastical history, when giving an account of Justin’s works, he observes to this purpose. He also mentions the Revelation of John, expressly calling it the apostle’s. Among the works of Melito, Bishop of Sardis, one of the seven Churches of Asia, about the year 177, Eusebius mentions one entitled, ‘Of the Revelation of John.’ It is very probable that Melito ascribed this book to the apostle of that name, and esteemed it of canonical authority. Irenæus, bishop of Lyons in Gaul, about A.D. 178, who in his younger days was acquainted with Polycarp, often quotes this book as the Revelation of John, the apostle of the Lord. And in one place he says: ‘It was seen not long ago, but almost in our age, at the end of the reign of Domitian.’
“Theophilus was bishop of Antioch about 181. Eusebius, speaking of a work of his against the heresy of Hermogenes, says: ‘He therein made use of testimonies, or quoted passages, from John’s Apocalypse.’ The book of the Revelation is several times quoted by Clement of Alexandria, who flourished about 194; and once in this manner: ‘Such a one, though here on earth he is not honoured with the first seat, shall sit upon the four and twenty thrones judging the people, as John says in the Revelation.’ Tertullian, about the year 200, often quotes the Revelation, and supposes it to have been written by St. John, the same who wrote the First Epistle of John, universally received: ‘Again, the Apostle John describes, in the Apocalypse, a sharp two-edged sword coming out of the mouth of God.’ He also says: ‘We have Churches that are the disciples of John. For though Marcion rejects the Revelation, the succession of bishops, traced to the original, will assure us that John is the author:’ by John undoubtedly meaning the apostle.
“From Eusebius we learn that Apollonius, who wrote against the Montanists about 211, quoted the Revelation. By Caius, about 212, it was ascribed to Cerinthus: it was received by Hippolytus about 220, and by Origen about 230. It is often quoted by him. He seems not to have had any doubt about its genuineness. In his Commentary upon St. John’s gospel, he speaks of it in this manner: ‘Therefore John, the son of Zebedee, says in the Revelation.’ Dionysius, bishop of Alexandria, about 247, or somewhat later, wrote a book against the Millenarians, in which he allows the Revelation to be written by John, a holy and divinely inspired man. But he says, ‘He cannot easily grant him to be the apostle, the son of Zebedee, whose is the gospel according to John, and the catholic epistle.’ He rather thinks it may be the work of John an elder, who also lived at Ephesus in Asia, as well as the apostle. It also appears, from a conference which Dionysius had with some Millenarians, that the Revelation was, about 240 and before, received by Nepus, an Egyptian bishop, and by many others in that country; and that it was in great reputation. It was received by Cyprian, bishop of Carthage, about 248, and by the Church of Rome in his time, and by many Latin authors. The Revelation was received by Novatus and his followers, and by various other authors. It is also probable that it was received by the Manichees. It was received by Lactantius, and by the Donatists; by the latter Arnobius about 460, and by the Arians. “In the time of Eusebius, in the former part of the fourth century, it was by some not received at all; and therefore it is reckoned by him among contradicted books. Nevertheless, it was generally received. Eusebius himself seems to have hesitated about it, for he says: ‘It is likely the Revelation was seen by John the elder, if not by John the apostle.’ It may be reckoned probable that the critical argument of Dionysius of Alexandria was of great weight with him and others of that time. The Revelation was received by Athanasius, and by Epiphanius; but we also learn from him that it was not received by all in his time. It is not in the catalogue of Cyril of Jerusalem, and seems not to have been received by him. It is also wanting in the catalogue of the Council of Laodicea, about 363.
“The Revelation is not in Gregory Nazianzen’s catalogue; however, it seems to have been received by him. It is in the catalogue of Amphilochius; but he says it was not received by all. It is also omitted in Ebedjesus’ catalogue of the books of Scripture received by the Syrians; nor is it in the ancient Syriac version.
“It was received by Jerome; but he says it was rejected by the Greek Christians. It was received by Rufin, by the third Council of Carthage, and by Augustine, but it was not received by all in his time. It is never quoted by Chrysostom, and probably was not received by him. It is in the catalogue of Dionysius, called the Areopagite, about 490. It is in the Alexandrian MS. It was received by Sulpicius Severus about 401; and by J. Damascenus, and by Œcumenius, and by many other authors. Andrew, bishop of Cæsarea, in Cappadocia, at the end of the fifth century, and Arethas, bishop of the same place, in the sixth century, wrote commentaries upon it. But it was not received by Severian, bishop of Gabala; nor, as it seems, by Theodoret. Upon the whole, it appears that this book has been generally received in all ages, though some have doubted of it, and rejected it; particularly the Syrians, and some other Christians in the east.
“Having thus represented the external evidence of the genuineness of the Book of the Revelation, or of its being written by St. John, I should proceed to consider the internal evidence. But I need not enlarge here, but merely take notice of a few things of principal note, which learned men insist upon as arguments that the Revelation has the same author with the gospel and epistles that go under the name of the Evangelist and Apostle John. Revelation 1:1: ‘The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave unto him, to show unto his servant things which must shortly come to pass. And he sent and signified it by his angel unto his servant John.’ “Hence it is argued, that John styles himself the servant of Christ, in a sense not common to all believers, but peculiarly to those who are especially employed by him. So Paul and other apostles call themselves servants of God and of Christ. Particularly Romans 1:1: ‘Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ.’ James 1:1: ‘James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ.’ 2 Peter 1:1: ‘Simon Peter, a servant and an apostle of Jesus Christ.’ Jude 1:1: ‘Jude, a servant of Jesus Christ.’ So Moses is called ‘the servant of God,’ Numbers 12:7; and Hebrews 3:2; and in like manner many of the prophets. And in this very book, Revelation 10:7, is the expression, ‘as he has declared unto his servants, the prophets.’
“This observation may be of some weight for showing that the writer is an apostle, but it is not decisive; and in the same verse, whence this argument is taken, the phrase is used in its general sense: ‘Which God gave unto him, to show unto his servants.’ Revelation 1:2: ‘Who bare record of the word of God, and of the testimony of Jesus Christ, and of all things that he saw.’
“Some suppose the writer here refers to the written gospel of St. John, and should be understood to say that he had already borne testimony concerning the word of God, and of Jesus Christ. But these words may be understood of this very book, the Revelation, and the things contained in it. The writer says here, very properly at the beginning, and by way of preface, that he had performed his office in this book, having faithfully recorded in it the word of God which he had received from Jesus Christ. Certainly, if these words did clearly refer to a written gospel, they would be decisive; but they are allowed to be ambiguous, and other senses have been given of them. By some they have been understood to contain a declaration that the writer had already borne witness to Jesus Christ before magistrates. Moreover, I think that, if St. John had intended to manifest himself in this introduction, he would more plainly have characterized himself in several parts of this book than he has done. This observation therefore appears to me to be of small moment for determining who the writer is.
“Farther, it is argued, in favor of the genuineness of this book, that there are in it many instances of conformity, both of sentiment and expression, between the Revelation and the uncontested writings of St. John. Our Saviour says to his disciples, John 16:33: ‘Be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.’ Christian firmness under trials is several times represented by overcoming, overcoming the world, or overcoming the wicked one, in St. John’s First Epistle, 1 John 2:13, 14; 4:4; 5:4, 5. And it is language peculiar to St. John, being in no other books of the New Testament. And our Lord says, Revelation 3:21: ‘To him that overcometh will I grant to sit with the in my throne; even as I also overcame, and am set down with my Father in his throne.” Compare Revelation 2:7, 11, 17, 26; 3:5, 12, 21; 21:7.
“Concerning the time of writing this book, I need not now say much. It is the general testimony of ancient authors that St. John was banished into Patmos in the time of Domitian, in the latter part of his reign, and restored by his successor Nerva. But the book could not be published till after John’s release and return to Ephesus in Asia. As Domitian died in 96, and his persecution did not commence till near the end of his reign, the Revelation seems to be fitly dated in the year 95 or 96. Mill places the Revelation in the year of Christ 96, and the last year of the Emperor Domitian. At first he supposed that the Revelation was written at Patmos; but afterwards he altered his mind, and thought it was not written till after his return to Ephesus. He builds his opinion upon the words of Revelation 1:9. If so, I apprehend it might not be published before the year 97; or, at the soonest, near the end of 96. Basnage places the Revelation in 96. Le Clerc, likewise, who readily admits the genuineness of this book, speaks of it in the same year. Mr. Lowman supposes St. John to have had his visions in the Isle of Patmos, in 95; but Mr. Wetstein favours the opinion of those who have argued that the Revelation was written before the Jewish war. He also says that, if the Revelation was written before that war, it is likely that the events of that time should be foretold in it; to which I answer, that though some interpreters have applied some things in this book to those times, I cannot say whether they have done it rightly or not, because I do not understand the Revelation. But, to me, it seems that though this book was written before the destruction of Jerusalem, there was no necessity that it should be foretold here; because our blessed Lord had, in his own preaching, frequently spoken very plainly and intelligibly concerning the calamities coming upon the Jewish people in general, and the city and temple of Jerusalem in particular; and his plain predictions and symbolical prefigurations of those events were recorded by no less than three historians and evangelists before the war in Judea broke out.
“Grotius, who places this book in the reign of Claudius, was of opinion that the visions of this book were seen at different times, and afterwards joined together in one book, in the same way as the visions and prophecies of some of the prophets of the Old Testament.
“Concerning this opinion it is not proper for me to dispute: though there appears not any foundation for it in the book itself, as Vitringa has observed. But that the Book of the Revelation in its present form, sent as an epistle to the seven Churches of Asia, Revelation 1:4, was not composed and published before the reign of Domitian, appears to me very probable, from the general and almost universally concurring testimony of the ancients, and from some things in the book itself.
“I shall now transcribe a part of L’Enfant’s and Beausobre’s Preface to the Revelation, at the same time referring to Vitringa, who has many like thoughts:—
“Having quoted Irenæus, Origen, Eusebius, and various other writers, placing St. John’s banishment at Patmos in the latter part of the reign of Domitian, and saying, that he there saw the Revelation, they say: ‘To these incontestable witnesses it is needless to add a long list of others of all ages, and of the same sentiment, to whom the authority of Epiphanius is by no means comparable.’ And they go on: ‘We must add to so constant a tradition other reasons which farther show that the Revelation was not written till after Claudius and Nero. It appears from the book itself that there had been already Churches for a considerable space of time in Asia; forasmuch as St. John, in the name of Christ, reproves faults that happen not but after a while. The Church of Ephesus had left her first love. That of Sardis had a name to live, but was dead. The Church of Laodicea was fallen into lukewarmness and indifference. But the Church of Ephesus, for instance, was not founded by St. Paul before the last years of Claudius. When in 61 or 62, St. Paul wrote to them from Rome, instead of reproving their want of love, he commends their love and faith, Ephesians 1:15. It appears from the Revelation that the Nicolaitans made a sect when this book was written, since they are expressly named; whereas they were only foretold and described in general terms by St. Peter, in his second epistle, written after the year 60, and in St. Jude, about the time of the destruction of Jerusalem by Vespasian. It is evident from many places of the Revelation that there had been an open persecution in the provinces; St. John himself had been banished to the Isle of Patmos for the testimony of Jesus. The Church of Ephesus, or its bishops, is commended for their labour and patience, which seems to imply persecution. This is still more clear in the words directed to the Church of Smyrna, Revelation 2:9: I know thy works and tribulation. For the original word always denotes persecution in the scriptures of the New Testament, as it is also explained in the following verse. In the thirteenth verse of the same chapter mention is made of a martyr named Antipas, put to death at Pergamus. Though ancient ecclesiastical history gives us no information concerning this Antipas, it is nevertheless certain that, according to all the rules of language, what is here said must be understood literally. All that has been now observed concerning the persecution, of which mention is made in the first chapters of the Revelation, cannot relate to the time of Claudius, who did not persecute the Christians; nor to the time of Nero, whose persecution did not reach the provinces; and therefore it must relate to Domitian, according to ecclesiastical tradition.’
“The visions therefore here recorded, and the publication of them in this book, must be assigned, as far as I can see, to the years of Christ 95, and 96, or 97.”
The reasoning of Dr. Lardner, relative to the date of this book, is by no means satisfactory to many other critics, who consider it to have been written before the destruction of Jerusalem; and in this opinion they are supported by the most respectable testimonies among the ancients, though the contrary was the more general opinion. Epiphanius says, that John was banished to Patmos by Claudius Cæsar; this would bring back the date to about A.D. 50. Andreas, (bishop of Cæsarea, in Cappadocia, about A.D. 500,) in his comment on this book, chap. vi. 16, says: “John received this Revelation under the reign of Vespasian.” This date also might place it before the final overthrow of the Jewish state; though Vespasian reigned to A.D. 79. The inscription to this book, in the Syrian version, first published by De Dieu, in 1627, and, afterwards in the London Polyglot, is the following: “The Revelation which God made to John the evangelist, in the island of Patmos, to which he was banished by Nero Cæsar.” This places it before the year of our Lord 69, and consequently before the destruction of Jerusalem. Of this opinion are many eminent writers, and among them Hentenius, Harduin, Grotius, Lightfoot, Hammond, Sir Isaac Newton, Bishop Newton, Wetstein, and others.
If the date could be settled, it would be of the utmost consequence to the right interpretation of the book; but, amidst so many conflicting opinions, this is almost hopeless.
Dr. Lardner has given several proofs, from internal evidence, that the Revelation is the work of St. John; as there are found in it the same forms of expression which are found in his gospel and epistles, and which are peculiar to this apostle. Wetstein gives a collection, which the reader may examine at his leisure. E. g. compare:—
Revelation 22:8, 10. — John 7:51-53; 14:23, 24. Dr. Lardner has considered several of these, with the addition of other resemblances, in his account of Dionysius, bishop of Alexandria, in A.D. 247, in the third volume of his works, pages 121-126. This mode of proof, as it applies to most of the above references, is not entirely satisfactory. Dionysius argues that the style of the Revelation is totally different from that of John in his acknowledged writings; and it seems strange to me that this should be contested by any man of learning. Nothing more simple and unadorned than the narrative of St. John in his GOSPEL; nothing more plain and natural than his EPISTLES; but the REVELATION, on the contrary, is figurative, rhetorical, laboured, and elevated to the highest degree. All that can be said here on this subject is, that if the Spirit of God choose to inspire the words and style, as well as the matter, of his communications, he may choose what variety he pleases; and speak at different times, and in divers manners, to the same person. This, however, is not his usual way. For other matters relative to this subject I must refer to the following preface, and to the writers quoted above.
Preface to the Revelation of St. John the Divine
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PREFACE TO THE REVELATION OF ST. JOHN
THE DIVINE
AMONG the interpreters of the Apocalypse, both in ancient and modern times, we find a vast diversity of opinions, but they may be all reduced to four principal hypotheses, or modes of interpretation:—
1. The Apocalypse contains a prophetical description of the destruction of Jerusalem, of the Jewish war, and the civil wars of the Romans.
2. It contains predictions of the persecutions of the Christians under the heathen emperors of Rome, and of the happy days of the Church under the Christian emperors, from Constantine downwards.
3. It contains prophecies concerning the tyrannical and oppressive conduct of the Roman pontiffs, the true antichrist; and foretells the final destruction of popery.
4. It is a prophetic declaration of the schism and heresies of Martin Luther, those called Reformers, and their successors; and the final destruction of the Protestant religion.
The first opinion has been defended by Professor Wetstein, and other learned men on the continent.
The second is the opinion of the primitive fathers in general, both Greek and Latin.
The third was first broached by the Abbé Joachim, who flourished in the thirteenth century, was espoused by most of the Franciscans; and has been and still is the general opinion of the Protestants.
The fourth seems to have been invented by popish writers, merely by way of retaliation; and has been illustrated and defended at large by a Mr. Walmsley, (I believe,) titular dean of Wells, in a work called the History of the Church, under the feigned name of Signior Pastorini.
In this work he endeavours to turn every thing against Luther and the Protestants, which they interpreted of the pope and popery; and attempts to show, from a computation of the Apocalyptical numbers, that the total destruction of Protestantism in the world will take place in 1825! But this is not the first prophecy that has been invented for the sake of an event, the accomplishment of which was earnestly desired; and as a stimulus to excite general attention, and promote united exertion, when the time of the pretended prophecy was fulfilled. But 1825 is past by, and 1832 is come, and the Protestant Church is still in full vigour, while the Romish Church is fast declining.
The full title of the book which I quote is the following:— “The General History of the Christian Church, from her birth to her final triumphant state in Heaven, chiefly deduced from the Apocalypse of St. John the Apostle. By SIG. PASTORINI.
‘Blessed is he that readeth and heareth the words of this prophecy.’-APOCALYPSE, Revelation 1:3.
Printed in the year M.DCC.LXXI.” 8vo. No place nor printer’s name mentioned.
The place where he foretells the final destruction of Protestantism is in pp. 249 and 262.
The Catholic college of Maynooth, in Ireland, have lately published a new edition of this work! in which the author kindly predicts the approaching overthrow of the whole Protestant system, both in Church and state; and in the meantime gives them, most condescendingly, Abaddon or the devil for their king!
Who the writer of the Apocalypse was, learned men are not agreed. This was a question, as well in ancient as in modern times. We have already seen that many have attributed it to the Apostle John; others, to a person called John the presbyter, who they say was an Ephesian, and totally different from John the apostle. And lastly, some have attributed it to Cerinthus, a contemporary of John the apostle. This hypothesis, however, seems utterly unsupportable; as there is no probability that the Christian Church would have so generally received a work which came from the hands of a man at all times reputed a very dangerous heretic; nor can the doctrines it contains ever comport with a Cerinthian creed. Whether it was written by John the apostle, John the presbyter, or some other person, is of little importance if the question of its inspiration be fully established. If written by an apostle it is canonical; and should be received, without hesitation, as a work Divinely inspired. Every apostle acted under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. John was an apostle, and consequently inspired; therefore, whatever he wrote was written by Divine inspiration. If, therefore, the authenticity of the work be established, i.e., that it was written by John the apostle, all the rest necessarily follow. As I have scarcely any opinion to give concerning this book on which I could wish any of my readers to rely, I shall not enter into any discussion relative to the author, or the meaning of his several visions and prophecies; but for general information refer to Dr. Lardner, Michaelis, and others. Various attempts have been made by learned men to fix the plan of this work; but even in this few agree. I shall produce some of the chief of these: and first, that of Wetstein, which is the most singular of the whole. He supposes the book of the Apocalypse to have been written a considerable time before the destruction of Jerusalem. The events described from the fourth chapter to the end he supposes to refer to the Jewish war, and to the civil commotions which took place in Italy while Otho, Vitellius, and Vespasian were contending for the empire. These contentions and destructive wars occupied the space of about three years and a half, during which Professor Wetstein thinks the principal events took place which are recorded in this book. On these subjects he speaks particularly in his notes, at the end of which he subjoins what he calls his ανακεφαλαιωσις, or synopsis of the whole work, which I proceed now to lay before the reader.
“This prophecy, which predicts the calamities which God should send on the enemies of the Gospel, is divided into two parts. The first is contained in the closed book; the second, in the open book.
I. The first concerns the earth and the third part, i.e., Judea and the Jewish nation,
II. The second concerns many peoples, and nations, and tongues, and kings, Revelation 10:11, i.e., the Roman empire.
1. The book written within and without, and sealed with seven seals, Revelation 5:1, is the bill of divorce sent from God to the Jewish nation.
2. The crowned conqueror on the white horse armed with a bow, Revelation 6:2, is Artabanus, king of the Parthians, who slaughtered multitudes of the Jews in Babylon.
3. The red horse, Revelation 6:4. The Sicarii and robbers in Judea, in the time of the Proconsuls Felix and Festus.
4. The black horse, Revelation 6:5. The famine under Claudius.
5. The pale horse, Revelation 6:8. The plague which followed the robberies and the famine.
6. The souls of those who were slain, Revelation 6:9. The Christians in Judea, who were persecuted, and were now about to be avenged.
7. The great earthquake, Revelation 6:12. The commotions which preceded the Jewish rebellion.
8. The servants of God from every tribe, sealed in their foreheads, Revelation 7:3. The Christians taken under the protection of God, and warned by the prophets to flee immediately from the land.
9. The silence for half an hour, Revelation 8:1. The short truce granted at the solicitation of King Agrippa.
Then follows the rebellion itself.
1. The trees are burnt, Revelation 8:7. The fields and villages, and unfortified places of Judea, which first felt the bad effects of the sedition.
2. The burning mountain cast into the sea which in consequence became blood, Revelation 8:8; and,
3. The burning star falling into the rivers, and making the waters bitter, Revelation 8:10, 11. The slaughter of the Jews at Cæsarea and Scythopolis.
4. The eclipsing of the sun, moon, and stars, Revelation 8:12. The anarchy of the Jewish commonwealth.
5. The locusts like scorpions hurting men, Revelation 9:3. The expedition of Cestius Gallus, prefect of Syria.
6. The army with arms of divers colours, Revelation 9:16, 17. The armies under Vespasian in Judea. About this time Nero and Galba died; after which followed the civil war, signified by the sounding of the seventh trumpet, Revelation 10:7, 11; 11:15.
1. The two prophetic witnesses, two olive trees, two candlesticks, Revelation 11:3, 4. Teachers in the Church, predicting the destruction of the Jewish temple and commonwealth.
2. The death of the witnesses, Revelation 11:7. Their flight, and the flight of the Church of Jerusalem, to Pella, in Arabia.
3. The resurrection of the witnesses, after three days and a half, Revelation 11:11. The predictions began to be fulfilled at a time in which their accomplishment was deemed impossible; and the doctrine of Christ begins to prevail over Judea, and over the whole earth.
4. The tenth part of the city fell in the same hour, and seven thousand names of men slain, Revelation 11:13. Jerusalem seized by the Idumeans; and many of the priests and nobles, with Annas, the high priest, signified by names of men, i.e. men of name, slain by the Zealots.
5. The woman clothed with the sun, the moon under her feet, and a crown of twelve stars on her head, Revelation 12:1. The Christian Church.
6. The great red dragon seen in heaven, with seven heads, seven diadems, and ten horns, Revelation 12:3. The six first Cæsars, who were all made princes at Rome, governing the armies and the Roman people with great authority; especially Nero, the last of them, who, having killed his mother, cruelly vexed the Christians, and afterwards turned his wrath against the rebellious Jews.
7. The seven-headed beast from the sea, having ten horns surrounded with diadems, Revelation 13:1. Galba, Otho, and Vitellius, who were shortly to reign, and who were proclaimed emperors by the army.
8. This beast, having a mouth like a lion, the body like a leopard, the feet like a bear, Revelation 13:2. Avaricious Galba; rash, unchaste, and inconstant Otho; Vitellius, cruel and sluggish, with the German any.
9. One head, i.e., the seventh, cut off, Revelation 13:3. Galba.
10. He who leadeth into captivity shall be led into captivity; he who killeth with the sword shall be killed with the sword, Revelation 13:10. Otho, who subdued the murderers of Galba, and slew himself with a dagger, Vitellius, who bound Sabinus with chains and was himself afterwards bound.
11. Another beast rising out of the earth, with two horns, Revelation 13:11. Vespasian and his two and, Titus and Domitian, elected emperors at the same time in Judea.
12. The number of the wild beast, 666, the number of a man, TEITAN, Titan or Titus: T, 300. E, 5. I, 10. T, 300. A, 1. N. 50, making in the whole
666. [But some very respectable MSS. have 616 for the number; if the N be taken away from Teitan, then the letters in Teita make exactly the sum 616.]
13. A man sitting upon a cloud, unity a crown of gold upon his head, and a sickle in his hand, Revelation 14:14. Otho and his army, about to prevent supplies for the army of Vitellius.
14. An angel of fire commanding another angel to gather the vintage; the winepress trodden whence the blood flows out 1600 furlongs. The followers of Vitellius laying all waste with fire; and the Bebriaci conquering the followers of Otho with great slaughter.
Then follow the seven plagues:—
1. The grievous sore, Revelation 16:2. The diseases of the soldiers of Vitellius through intemperance.
2. The sea turned into blood, Revelation 16:3. The fleet of Vitellius beaten, and the maritime towns taken from them by the Flavii.
3. The rivers turned into blood, Revelation 16:4. The slaughter of the adherents of Vitellius, at Cremona and elsewhere, near rivers.
4. The scorching of the sun, Revelation 16:8. The diseases of the Vitellii increasing, and their exhausted bodies impatient of the heat.
5. The seat of the beast darkened, Revelation 16:10. All Rome in commotion through the torpor of Vitellius.
6. Euphrates dried up, and a way made for the kings of the east; and the three unclean spirits like frogs. The Flavii besieging Rome with a treble army; one part of which was by the bank of the Tiber.
2. The seven kings, Revelation 17:10. CÆSAR, AUGUSTUS, TIBERIUS, CALIGULA, CLAUDIUS, NERO, and GALBA.
3. The eighth, which is of the seven, Revelation 17:11. Otho, destined by adoption to be the son and successor of Galba.
4. The ten horns, Revelation 17:12-16. The leaders of the Flavian factions.
5. The merchants of the earth, Revelation 18:11; i.e., of Rome, which was then the emporium of the whole world.
6. The beast and the false prophet, Revelation 19:20. Vespasian and his family, contrary to all expectation, becoming extinct in Domitian, as the first family of the Cæsars, and of the three princes, Galba, Otho, and Vitellius.
7. The millennium, or a thousand years, Revelation 20:2. Taken from Psalm 90:4, a time appointed by God, including the space of forty years, from the death of Domitian to the Jewish war under Adrian.
8. Gog and Magog, going out over the earth, Revelation 20:8. Barchochebas, the false Messiah, with an immense army of the Jews, coming forth suddenly from their caves and dens, tormenting the Christians, and carrying on a destructive war with the Romans.
9. The New Jerusalem, Revelation 21:1, 2. The Jews being brought so low as to be capable of injuring no longer; the whole world resting after being expiated by wars; and the doctrine of Christ propagated and prevailing everywhere with incredible celerity.
Wetstein contends (and he is supported by very great men among the ancients and moderns) that “the book of the Revelation was written before the Jewish war, and the civil wars in Italy; that the important events which took place at that time, the greatest that ever happened since the foundation of the world, were worth enough of the Divine notice, as the affairs of his Church were so intimately connected with them; that his method of exposition proves the whole book to be a well-connected, certain series of events; but the common method of interpretation, founded on the hypothesis that the book was written after the destruction of Jerusalem, is utterly destitute of certainty, and leaves every commentator to the luxuriance of his own fancy, as is sufficiently evident from what has been done already on this book; some interpreters leading the reader now to Thebes, now to Athens, and finding in the words of the sacred penman Constantine the Great; Arius, Luther, Calvin; the Jesuits; the Albigenses; the Bohemians; Chemnitius; Elizabeth, queen of England; Cecil, her treasurer; and who not?”-See Wetstein’s Gr. Test., vol. ii. p. 889. Those who consider the Apocalypse as a prophecy and scenical exhibition of what shall happen to the Christian Church to the end of the world, lay this down as a proposition, which comprises the subject of the whole book: The contest of Christ with his enemies; and his final victory and triumph over them. See 1 Corinthians 15:25; Matthew 24:1-51; Mark 13:1-37; Luke 21:5-38. But what is but briefly hinted in the above scriptures, is detailed at large in the Apocalypse, and represented by various images nearly in the following order:—
1. The decrees of the Divine providence, concerning what is to come, are declared to John.
2. The manner in which these decrees shall be executed is painted in the most vivid colours.
3. Then follow thanksgivings to God, the ruler and governor of all things, for these manifestations of his power, wisdom and goodness. After the exordium, and the seven epistles to the seven Churches of Asia Minor, to whose angels or bishops the book seems to be dedicated, (Revelation 1:1-3:22,) the scene of the visions is opened in heaven, full of majesty; and John receives a promise of a revelation relative to the future state of the Church, Revelation 4:1-5:14. The enemies of the Church of Christ which the Christians had then most to fear were the Jews, the heathens, and the false teachers. All these are overcome by Christ, and over them he triumphs gloriously. First of all, punishments are threatened to the enemies of the kingdom of Christ, and the preservation of his own followers in their greatest trials determined; and these determinations are accompanied with the praises and thanksgivings of all the heavenly inhabitants, and of all good men, Revelation 6:1-10:11.
The transactions of the Christian religion are next recorded, Revelation 11:1-14:5. The Christians are persecuted:—
1. By the Jews; but they were not only preserved, but they increase and prosper.
2. By the heathens; but in vain do these strive to overthrow the kingdom of Christ, which is no longer confined within the limits of Judea, but spreads among the Gentiles, and diffuses itself over the whole Roman empire, destroying idolatry, and rooting out superstition, in every quarter, Revelation 12:1-13:10.
3. False teachers and impostors of various kinds, under the name of Christians, but enemies of the cross of Christ, more intent on promoting the interests of idolatry or false worship than the cause of true religion, Revelation 13:11-18, exert their influence to corrupt and destroy the Church; but, notwithstanding, Christianity becomes more extended, and true believers more confirmed in their holy faith, Revelation 14:1-5. Then new punishments are decreed against the enemies of Christ, both Jews and heathens: the calamities coming upon the Jewish nation before its final overthrow are pointed out, Revelation 14:1-15:8. Next follows a prediction of the calamities which shall take place during the Jewish war; and the civil wars of the Romans during the contentions of Otho and Vitellius, Revelation 16:1-16, who are to suffer most grievous punishments for their cruelties against the Christians, Revelation 17:1-18. The Jewish state being now finally overthrown, Revelation 18:1-24, the heavenly inhabitants give praise to God for his justice and goodness; Christ is congratulated for his victory over his enemies, and the more extensive progress of his religion, Revelation 19:1-10. Opposition is, however, not yet totally ended: idolatry again lifts up its head, and new errors are propagated; but over these also Christ shows himself to be conqueror, Revelation 19:11-21. Finally, Satan, who had long reigned by the worship of false gods, errors, superstitions, and wickedness, is deprived of all power and influence; and the concerns of Christianity go on gloriously, Revelation 20:1-6. But towards the end of the world new enemies arise, and threaten destruction to the followers of Christ; but in vain is their rage, God appears in behalf of his servants, and inflicts the most grievous punishments upon their adversaries, Revelation 20:6-10. The last judgment ensues, Revelation 20:11-15, all the wicked are punished, and the enemies of the truth are chained, so as to be able to injure the godly no more; the genuine Christians, who had persevered unto death, are brought to eternal glory; and, freed from all adversities, spend a life that shall never end, in blessedness that knows no bounds, Revelation 21:1-22:21. See Rosenmuller.
Eichhorn takes a different view of the plan of this book; though in substance not differing much from that above. According to this writer the whole is represented in the form of a drama, the parts of which are the following: I. The title, Revelation 1:1-3. II. The prologue, Revelation 1:4-3:22; in which it is stated that the argument of the drama refers to the Christians; epistles being sent to the Churches, which, in the symbolic style, are represented by the number seven. Next follows the drama itself, the parts of which are:—
The prolusio, or prelude, Revelation 4:1-8:5; in which the scenery is prepared and adorned.
Act the first, Revelation 8:6-12:17. Jerusalem is taken, and Judaism vanquished by Christianity.
Act the second, Revelation 13:1-20:10. Rome is conquered, and heathenism destroyed by the Christian religion.
Act the third, Revelation 20:11-22:5. The New Jerusalem descends from heaven; or the happiness of the life to come, and which is to endure for ever, is particularly described, Revelation 22:6-11. Taken in this sense, Eichhorn supposes the work to be most exquisitely finished, and its author to have had a truly poetic mind, polished by the highest cultivation; to have been accurately acquainted with the history of all times and nations, and to have enriched himself with their choicest spoils. My readers will naturally expect that I should either give a decided preference to some one of the opinions stated above, or produce one of my own; I can do neither, nor can I pretend to explain the book: I do not understand it; and in the things which concern so sublime and awful a subject, I dare not, as my predecessors, indulge in conjectures. I have read elaborate works on the subject, and each seemed right till another was examined. I am satisfied that no certain mode of interpreting the prophecies of this book has yet been found out, and I will not add another monument to the littleness or folly of the human mind by endeavouring to strike out a new course. I repeat it, I do not understand the book; and I am satisfied that not one who has written on the subject knows any thing more of it than myself. I should, perhaps, except J. E. Clarke, who has written on the number of the beast. His interpretation amounts nearly to demonstration; but that is but a small part of the difficulties of the Apocalypse: that interpretation, as the most probable ever yet offered to the public, shall be inserted in its proper place; as also his illustration of the xiith, xiiith, and xviith chapters. As to other matters, I must leave them to God, or to those events which shall point out the prophecy; and then, and probably not till then, will the sense of these visions be explained. A conjecture concerning the design of the book may be safely indulged; thus then it has struck me, that the book of the Apocalypse may be considered as a PROPHET continued in the Church of God, uttering predictions relative to all times, which have their successive fulfilment as ages roll on; and thus it stands in the Christian Church in the place of the SUCCESSION of PROPHETS in the Jewish Church; and by this especial economy PROPHECY is STILL CONTINUED, is ALWAYS SPEAKING; and yet a succession of prophets rendered unnecessary. If this be so, we cannot too much admire the wisdom of the contrivance which still continues the voice and testimony of prophecy, by means of a very short book, without the assistance of any extraordinary messenger, or any succession of such messengers, whose testimony would at all times be liable to suspicion, and be the subject of infidel and malevolent criticism, howsoever unexceptionable to ingenuous minds the credentials of such might appear. On this ground it is reasonable to suppose that several prophecies contained in this book have been already fulfilled, and that therefore it is the business of the commentator to point such out. It may be so; but as it is impossible for me to prove that my conjecture is right, I dare not enter into proceedings upon it, and must refer to Bishop Newton, and such writers as have made this their particular study.
After having lived in one of the most eventful eras of the world; after having seen a number of able pens employed in the illustration of this and other prophecies; after having carefully attended to those facts which were supposed to be the incontestable proofs of the fulfilment of such and such visions, seals, trumpets, thunders, and vials of the Apocalypse; after seeing the issue of that most terrible struggle which the French nation, the French republic, the French consulate, and the French empire, have made to regain and preserve their liberties, which, like arguing in a circle, have terminated where they began, without one political or religious advantage to them or to mankind; and after viewing how the prophecies of this book were supposed to apply almost exclusively to these events, the writers and explainers of these prophecies keeping pace in their publications with the rapid succession of military operations, and confidently promising the most glorious issue, in the final destruction of superstition, despotism, arbitrary power, and tyranny of all kinds, nothing of which has been realized; I say, viewing all these things, I feel myself at perfect liberty to state that, to my apprehension, all these prophecies have been misapplied and misapprehended; and that the KEY to them is not yet intrusted to the sons of men. My readers will therefore excuse me from any exposure of my ignorance or folly by attempting to do what many, with much more wisdom and learning, have attempted, and what every man to the present day has failed in, who has preceded me in expositions of this book. I have no other mountain to heap on those already piled up; and if I had, I have not strength to lift it: those who have courage may again make the trial; already we have had a sufficiency of vain efforts.
Ter sunt conati imponere Pelio Ossam
Scilicet, atque Ossæ frondosum involvere Olympum:
Ter Pater extructos disjecit fulmine montes.
VIRG., G. i. 281.
With mountains piled on mountains thrice they strove
To scale the steepy battlements of Jove;
And thrice his lightning and red thunder play’d,
And their demolish’d works in ruin laid.
DRYDEN
I had resolved, for a considerable time, not to meddle with this book, because I foresaw that I could produce nothing satisfactory on it: but when I reflected that the literal sense and phraseology might be made much plainer by the addition of philological and critical notes; and that, as the diction appeared in many places to be purely rabbinical, (a circumstance to which few of its expositors have attended,) it might be rendered plainer by examples from the ancient Jewish writers; and that several parts of it spoke directly of the work of God in the soul of man, and of the conflicts and consolations of the followers of Christ, particularly in the beginning of the book, I changed my resolution, and have added short notes, principally philological, where I thought I understood the meaning.
I had once thought of giving a catalogue of the writers and commentators on this book, and had begun a collection of this kind; but the question of Cui bono? What good end is this likely to serve? not meeting with a satisfactory answer in my own mind, caused me to throw this collection aside. I shall notice two only.
1. The curious and learned work entitled, “A plaine Discovery of the whole Revelation of St. John,” written by Sir John Napier, inventor of the logarithms, I have particularly described in the general preface to the Holy Scriptures, prefixed to the Book of Genesis, to which the reader is requested to refer.
2. Another work, not less singular, and very rare, entitled, “The Image of both Churches, after the most wonderful and heavenly Revelation of Sainct John the Evangelist, containing a very fruitfull exposition or paraphrase upon the same: wherein it is conferred with the other scriptures, and most auctorised histories Compyled by John Bale, an exyle also in thys lyfe for the faithful testimony of Jesu.” Printed at London by Thomas East, 18mo., without date.
The author was at first a Carmelite, but was afterwards converted to the Protestant religion. He has turned the whole of the Apocalypse against the Romish Church; and it is truly astonishing to see with what address he directs every image, metaphor, and description, contained in this book, against the corruptions of this Church. He was made bishop of Ossory, in Ireland; but was so persecuted by the papists that he narrowly escaped with his life, five of his domestics being murdered by them. On the accession of Mary he was obliged to take refuge in the Low Countries, where it appears he compiled this work. As he was bred up a papist, and was also a priest, he possessed many advantages in attacking the strongest holds of his adversaries. He knew all their secrets, and he uncovered the whole; he was acquainted with all their rites, ceremonies, and superstitions, and finds all distinctly marked in the Apocalypse, which he believes was written to point out the abominations, and to foretell the final destruction of this corrupt and intolerant Church. I shall make a few references to his work in the course of the following notes. In Revelation 17:1, the author shows his opinion, and speaks something of himself: Come hither, I will show thee the judgment of the great whore, &c. “Come hither, friende John, I will show thee in secretnesse the tirrible judgement of the great whore, or counterfaite Church of hypocrites. Needs must this whore be Rome, for that she is the great citie which reigneth over the kings of the earth. Evident it is both by Scriptures and Cronicles that in John’s dayes Rome had dominion over all the whole world: and being infected with the abominations of all landes, rightly is shee called Babylon. or Citie of Confusion. And like as in the Scriptures ofte tymes under the name of Jerusalem is ment the whole kingdom of Juda, so under the name of Rome here may be understanded the unyversall worlde, with all their abominations and divilleshnesses, their idolatryes, witchcraftes, sectes, superstitions, papacyes, priesthoodes, relygions, shavings, anointings, blessings, sensings, processions, and the divil of all such beggeryes. For all the people since Christes assencion, hath this Rome infected with hir pestilent poisons gathered from all idolatrous nations, such time as she held over them the monarchial suppremit. At the wryting of this prophecy felt John of their cruiltie, being exiled into Pathmos for the faithfull testimony of Jesu. And so did I, poore creature, with my poore wife and children, at the gatheringe of this present commentary, flying into Germanye for the same,” &c.
Shall I have the reader’s pardon if I say that it is my firm opinion that the expositions of this book have done great disservice to religion: almost every commentator has become a prophet; for as soon as he began to explain he began also to prophesy. And what has been the issue? Disappointment laughed at hope’s career, and superficial thinkers have been led to despise and reject prophecy itself. I shall sum up all that I wish to say farther in the words of GRASERUS: Mihi tota Apocalypsis valde obscura videtur; et talis, cujus explicatio citra periculum vix queat tentari. Fateor me hactenus in nullius Scripti Biblici lectione minus vroficere, quam in hoc obscurissimo Vaticinio.
THE REVELATION OF ST. JOHN THE DIVINE
Chronological Notes relative to this Book.
-Year of the Constantinopolitan era of the world, or that used by the Byzantine historians, and other eastern writers, 5604.
-Year of the Alexandrian era of the world, 5598.
-Year of the Antiochian era of the world, 5588.
-Year of the world, according to Archbishop Usher, 4100.
-Year of the world, according to Eusebius, in his Chronicon, 4322. -Year of the minor Jewish era of the world, or that in common use, 3856. -Year of the Greater Rabbinical era of the world, 4455.
-Year from the Flood, according to Archbishop Usher, and the English Bible, 2444.
-Year of the Cali yuga, or Indian era of the Deluge, 3198. -Year of the era of Iphitus, or since the first commencement of the Olympic games, 1036.
-Year of the era of Nabonassar, king of Babylon, 845.
-Year of the CCXVIIIth Olympiad, 4.
-Year from the building of Rome, according to Fabius Pictor, 843. -Year from the building of Rome, according to Frontinus, 847. -Year from the building of Rome, according to the Fasti Capitolini, 848. -Year from the building of Rome, according to Varro, which was that most generally used, 849.
-Year of the era of the Seleucidæ, 408.
-Year of the Cæsarean era of Antioch, 144.
-Year of the Julian era, 141.
-Year of the Spanish era, 134.
-Year from the birth of Jesus Christ, according to Archbishop Usher, 100. -Year of the vulgar era of Christ’s nativity, 96.
-Year of Pacorus II, king of the Parthians, 6.
-Year of the Dionysian period, or Easter Cycle, 97.
-Year of the Grecian Cycle of nineteen years, or Common Golden Number, 2; or the first embolismic.
-Year of the Jewish Cycle of nineteen years, 18; or the year before the seventh embolismic.
-Year of the Solar Cycle, 21.
-Dominical Letters, it being the Bissextile, or Leap Year, CB. -Day of the Jewish Passover, the twenty-fifth of March, which happened in this year on the day before the Jewish Sabbath.
-Easter Sunday, the twenty seventh of March.
-Epact, or age of the moon on the 22d of March, (the day of the earliest Easter Sunday possible,) 11.
-Epact, according to the present mode of computation, or the moon’s age on New Year’s day, or the Calends of January, 19.
-Monthly Epacts, or age of the moon on the Calends of each month respectively, (beginning with January,) 19, 21, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 26, 26, 27, 29, 29.
-Number of Direction, or the number of days from the twenty-first of March to the Jewish Passover, 4.
-Year of the Emperor Flavius Domitianus Cæsar, the last of those usually styled The Twelve Cæsars, 15: Nerva began his reign in this year. -Roman Consuls, C. Antistius Vetus, and C. Maulius Valens.
Joseph Benson
Preface
BEN_VOL8.PDF, source PDF p. 904
REVELATION OF ST. JOHN THE
DIVINE.
PREFACE
This Book of the Revelation has, for very good reasons, been received as one of the sacred books of the New Testament. The chief of these reasons have been mentioned by many authors, and are represented with great evidence and strength by Sir Isaac Newton, who observes, he does not find any other book of the New Testament so strongly attested, or commented upon so early, as this. And Dr. Lardner has collected with great care and faithfulness the testimonies of the most early Christian writers to the books of the New Testament, in his Treatise on the Credibility of the Gospel History. The testimony of some of the most eminent to the authority of this book is as follows: — 1. Justin Martyr, a person of great name, about the year of Christ 140, and so about fifty or sixty years after the writing of this book, expressly calls it a prophecy, and ascribes it to John the apostle, saying, “A man from among us, by name John, one of the apostles of Christ, in the Revelation to him, has prophesied,” &c. 2. Mileto, bishop of Sardis, one of the seven churches mentioned in the second and third chapters, wrote a book on the Revelation by St. John, which some think was an entire commentary; but whether or not, it shows he esteemed it a book of canonical authority. 3. Irenæus, who wrote about A.D. 178, within seventy or eighty years of St. John, expressly ascribes the Revelation to him, calling him the disciple of the Lord. His testimony to this book, as Lardner observes, “is so strong and full, that, considering the age of Irenæus, it seems to put it beyond all question that it was the work of St. John the apostle and evangelist.” 4. A little later, Theophilus of Antioch, in a book of his against the heresy of Hermogenes, makes use of testimonies from St. John’s Apocalypse. 5. Clement of Alexandria quotes these revelations as St. John’s, saying, “As John testifies in the Revelation.” And he refers to them as the words of an apostle, or as having the authority of apostolic writings. 6. Tertullian, who wrote about the year of Christ 200, and so somewhat about a hundred years after the time in which this book was written, observes, “John, in his Apocalypse, is commanded to correct those who ate things sacrificed to idols, and committed fornication.” And again: “We have churches, disciples of John; for, though Marcion rejects his Revelation, the succession of bishops, traced to the original, will assure us that John is the author of it.” We cannot wonder that Marcion should reject the Revelation, since he rejected all the Old Testament, and of the New received only the gospel of St. Luke, and ten epistles of St. Paul, which also he had corrupted and altered.
But this book of the Revelation, though never rejected by the ancient church, and as fully authenticated as any part of the canon of the New Testament, yet from the obscurity of the prophecies contained in it before their completion, was less known and less studied than the gospels, Acts, and epistles. Perhaps, says Dr. Apthorp, it was purposely concealed from being publicly read in the congregations of the early Christians, on principles of prudence and loyalty, as it distinctly foretold the subversion of the Roman empire, and the erecting other dynasties on its ruins. It was, however, universally received by the Latin Church, most interested in its predictions; and Eusebius and the Greek Church concurred with the Latins in venerating its authority as an essential part of the sacred canon. Indeed, the churches in general, nearest the times of the writing of this book, received it with so full consent, that, in a very few years, as Dr. Mill observes, it was acknowledged and placed in the number of apostolical writings, not only by the churches of Asia, but by the neighbouring churches of Syria and Samaria, by the more distant churches of Africa and Egypt, by Rome, and the other churches of Europe. Such reasons there are to receive this as one of the books of the Holy Scriptures of the New Testament, that hardly any one book has more early, full, or authentic attestations given to it.
Now all who thus receive it must acknowledge that it proceeds from the Spirit of prophecy; and that Spirit itself declares, “Blessed is he that readeth, and they that hear, the words of this prophecy,” &c., chap. 1:3. If we acknowledge this to be a true testimony respecting this book, as we must if we own it to be a book of Holy Scripture, we must acknowledge, also, that, how obscure soever the words of this prophecy may be, they are yet sufficiently intelligible to be very useful. Considering, however, the nature and design of prophecy, and the style and manner of expression generally used in it, we are not to expect that prophecies should be as easily understood as doctrines or precepts delivered in plain language, and the common familiar forms of speech. The nature and intention of prophecy were not to gratify our curiosity, by giving us to know future events, or, as it were, enabling us to tell the fortunes of the church and world; but to answer wise and good purposes; to confirm our faith, patience, and constancy; to encourage our hope and trust in God, and give us assurance of his protecting the cause of truth and righteousness, that is, of true religion: and especially to answer these good ends when we might be tempted to forsake true religion, by the power of prevailing error and reigning corruption, or might be greatly dejected and despair of success, when opposition to the truth is so powerful and violent as hardly to leave a reasonable prospect of bearing up against it. In such a state of things, which often has happened, it has been the use of prophecy to support the confidence and courage of good men, with lively and affecting representations of the majesty, power, and goodness of God; of his care to protect his cause and people, and of the power of his providence to superintend and order all things in the world in that way which shall most promote his own glory and the salvation of mankind. And, finally, the design of prophecy is to represent these things in such a manner as shall fix men’s attention, and confirm their faith in the truth of the Scriptures in which such prophecies are contained, and in his faithfulness certainly to accomplish his word in all things.
When such events of future time are foretold as shall, in their accomplishment, confirm our faith in the goodness, power, and faithfulness of God, and by such strong and lively representations thereof as shall make deep impressions on our minds, they answer a very wise and important design, and are of greater use than plainer precepts, enjoining constancy and perseverance, or plain promises of encouragement and reward, delivered in expressions more easy to be understood. In the first ages of Christianity, as well as in after times, good men were wont to be greatly discouraged with the afflictive state of the church, and the powerful opposition that was made to the gospel. For they hardly knew how to reconcile such a state of things with what they thought the Scriptures had given them reason to expect in the kingdom of the Messiah. It was, therefore, wise and proper, by a prophecy in the Christian Church, to support the minds of good men under these afflictions with assurances of Christ’s second coming, in its proper season, and of the watchful providence of God over his cause and people in the mean time. Thus the prophecies of this book are to us in the Christian Church of the like use that the prophecies of Christ’s first appearance were of to his ancient church.
That this is, properly speaking, a book of prophecy of things to come, as well as a description of the then present state and condition of the churches in Asia, Christ himself declares, Revelation 1:19, saying, “Write the things which thou hast seen, and the things which are, and the things which shall be hereafter;” and, Revelation 4:1, John heard a voice, which said, “Come up hither, and I will show thee the things that must be hereafter.” Some of these predictions, indeed, related to events not far distant from the time when the vision and prophecy were given, and, therefore, were soon to be accomplished. Thus the book is termed, Revelation 1:1, “the Revelation of Jesus Christ, &c., to show unto his servants things which must shortly come to pass;” and, Revelation 1:3, “Blessed is he that readeth, &c., for the time is at hand.” But from these and such like expressions we cannot infer, as some have done, that the whole prophecy was to be accomplished in a few years after the vision. They only show that the things foretold were soon to begin to be accomplished; not that their accomplishment was soon to end; the time included in these predictions evidently extending from the period when John had these visions to the day of final judgment.
At the time when John received the discoveries contained in this book, he was in banishment for “the word of God, and for the testimony of Jesus;” and the church was under persecution so long as the Roman empire continued heathen. Severe persecutions were almost perpetually renewed; and, a little before the time of Constantine, they were so severe, that they seemed to threaten the utter destruction of all who could not be forced to renounce the Christian faith, and fall in with the idolatrous worship established in the empire. The last persecution, under Diocletian, destroyed such incredible numbers, that the persecutors boasted they had effaced the name and superstition of the Christians, and had restored and propagated the worship of the gods. Yet the divine providence, after several great revolutions, made way for the authority of Constantine the Great, who put an end to the long persecution of ten years, gave freedom to the churches, and finally gave all protection and countenance to the Christian Church, and all assistance to promote the Christian faith and worship. So that the same power which before persecuted now protected the religion of Christ. The first period of prophecy, then, seems naturally to point out this period of history, which in general answers to it with great propriety and exactness, and will direct us to look for the fulfilment of the several parts of it, in some of the events of providence, which took place between the time of the vision, and the year of Christ about 323, when the opposition of the idolatrous power of Rome gave way to the protection and favour of Christian emperors.
The second period of prophecy points out the period of history between the year of Christ 323 to about 750, in which compass of time we seem to be directed to look for the accomplishment of the several particular predictions contained in this period; namely, when the Roman empire beginning to lose its power, and becoming unable to protect the church, a swarm of idolatrous nations from the northern countries, under several names, broke in upon that empire, and divided the western part of it into several separate and independent governments, or kingdoms; so that the Christian faith and worship were in as much danger from the idolatry of the northern nations, who had divided the empire among them, as they were before in danger from the idolatry of the empire itself. It pleased God, also, to permit that impostor, Mohammed, and his successors, to gain so much ground, and to spread that imposture so far and so fast, that it threatened the ruin of the Christian name and religion in the East. Yet the idolatrous northern nations were soon themselves brought to embrace Christianity, and to use all their power and authority to protect and promote it. And though the Saracens made great inroads for some time, yet was their progress stopped both in the east and west, as shall be shown in the proper place.
The third period seems also to be determined to the time of its beginning and ending by the prophecy itself, including the time of the beast, of the woman’s being in the wilderness, and of the treading down of the holy city; which times are variously expressed, but plainly in such a manner as to intend the same duration. It is said to be for “forty-two months;” (Revelation 11:2; 13:5;) “for a time, times, and half a time;” (Revelation 12:14;) which ways of numbering are explained by another; namely, twelve hundred and sixty days, Revelation 11:3. The difficulty then of assigning the exact historical time of this period lies chiefly in fixing when these twelve hundred and sixty days are to begin; or, which will be the same, at what period in history we are to fix the beginning of the power of the beast, of the flying of the woman into the wilderness, and of treading the holy city under foot; for these are the calamities of this period. When the last-mentioned period shall have continued the time specified in the above-mentioned numbers, namely, forty-two months, a time, times, and half a time, or twelve hundred and sixty days, according to the style of prophecy, the beast shall be destroyed, that old serpent, which is the devil and Satan, shall be bound a thousand years, during which time the church shall be in a happy and peaceful state, which will be the fourth remarkable period, described Revelation 19:20; 20:2.
When these thousand years shall be expired, Satan again shall be loosed out of his prison for a short time; and this will make a fifth period, Revelation 20:7. This shall occasion a new and the last attempt of error and wickedness against truth and righteousness; but this attempt shall end in the final ruin of all the enemies of religion, which shall be the sixth period, chap. 20:9, 10.
The seventh period, set forth in chap. 21., 22., respects the everlasting happiness of the righteous and faithful servants of God and Christ in a state of glorious immortality, and an endless sabbath. This order of the prophecies given by Lowman appears very natural and intelligible, and more agreeable to the important facts of history than perhaps any other system; and yet it is the truth of history which alone can show us what has been the providence of God toward the church and world from the time of this vision of St. John to our own days.
It is evident such a plan of prophecy and order of history are well calculated to answer the important designs of revelation in general, to prepare the church to expect opposition and sufferings in this present world, to support good men under all the trials of their faith and patience, to give encouragement to persevere in true religion, whatever dangers may attend our so doing, to assure us that God will attend to and protect his own cause, so that no opposition shall finally prevail against it; that God will assuredly judge and punish the enemies of truth and righteousness, and that their opposition thereto shall certainly end in their own destruction, when the faithful perseverance of the true followers of Christ shall be crowned with a glorious state of immortal life and happiness. The great truths concerning the majesty of God, the wisdom and care of his providence, the dignity, authority, and power of Christ, the protection of the church, the restraint and punishment of its enemies, and the final happiness of all who shall faithfully persevere in true faith, piety, and virtue, are here delivered in such an awful manner, such animated language, and striking representations, as must greatly affect the spirits of genuine Christians. A regard to this book of Revelation, as predicting events by a Spirit of prophecy, which, therefore, will surely come to pass, serves to raise us above the fear of men, by a lively faith and assured confidence in God. To look upon the promises and threatenings of this book as infallible predictions, which shall certainly be accomplished, must animate every well-disposed and considerate person to resist all temptations of error and sin with faithfulness, constancy, and zeal. The lake of fire, and the terrors of the second death, the portion of the fearful and unbelieving; and, on the other hand, the glory and felicity of the New Jerusalem, and a right to the tree of life, the portion of all the faithful, are represented by such strong and lively images, as are calculated, not only to fix men’s attention, but to touch their hearts and affections, and engage them with zeal and diligence to follow the wise directions of truth and righteousness. And an exact conformity between these prophetic descriptions and the real state of the church and the world, for a series of some hundreds of years, gives continually new and increasing evidence of the truth and importance of the Christian revelation, and the authenticity and authority of the books of the New Testament; and it greatly confirms our faith in God’s promises and threatenings, and thereby gives them their full force and influence upon us. Such is the improvement which the Holy Spirit of prophecy designed should arise from the perusal of this book of Revelation; and doubtless it has had, and still will have, this effect upon thousands that seriously read and weigh its contents. For one of its prophetic declarations is, “Blessed is he that readeth, and they that hear, the words of this prophecy, and keep those things that are written therein.” It must be observed, however, that in the interpretations and applications of these prophecies we are not to expect demonstrations, or such proofs as shall be liable to no manner of objection; or that some weak and ill-informed persons may not wrest these prophecies, as they do the other scriptures, and may do any principles whatsoever, to extravagant expectations, designs, and actions. It should be sufficient to satisfy us, if we find a proper and probable sense of these prophetic expressions and descriptions, suited to the manifest and wise design of the whole prophecy. And if these interpretations are supported by an application of events in history, that are justly applicable, both to the prophetic descriptions, and to the series and order of the predictions; if they are events worthy a spirit of prophecy to reveal, and agreeable to the spirit and intention of this prophecy in particular, we may, without exposing ourselves to the charge of being over credulous, reasonably rest satisfied with them. Then we may represent these prophecies to ourselves in that noble and useful view in which a great author (Bossuet, bishop of Meaux, Explication of the Revelation, Preface) has placed them: “In the gospel of St. John we read the life of Christ on earth; a man conversing with men, humble, poor, weak, and suffering; we behold a sacrifice ready to be offered, and a man appointed to sorrows and death; but in the Revelation we have the gospel of Christ now raised from the dead. He speaks and acts as having conquered the grave, and triumphed over death and hell, as entered into the place of his glory; angels, principalities, and powers being made subject to him; and exercising the supreme universal power he has received from the Father over all things in heaven and earth, as our Saviour, for the protection of his church, and for the sure happiness of his faithful servants in the end.”
Nothing, says Dr. Apthorp, who pursues the same line of interpretation with Lowman, in the Jewish prophecies themselves, exceeds the sublimity of the exordium of the Apocalypse; “the vision of Jesus Christ, the monarch of his church, and the divine instructions to the Asian churches, and in them to the churches of all succeeding times, Revelation 1:1-8; 3.; 4. In the second vision heaven opens, the throne of God is surrounded by his saints, and the Lamb opens the seven seals amidst the acclamations of the angelic hosts, chap. 5.-viii. In the third vision the angels sound the seven trumpets, 8.-11. In the fourth vision the dragon persecutes the church, the two beasts rise from the earth and sea, and are defeated by the Lamb, Revelation 11:15; 14. In the fifth vision the angels pour the vials of the wrath of God on the kingdom and throne of antichrist, chap. 15.-19. In the sixth vision Satan is bound for a thousand years, chap. 20. The seventh vision reveals the destined glories of the true religion, emblemized by the new heavens and new earth, and the New Jerusalem descending from God out of heaven, chap. 21., 22.”
Respecting the style of this book we may rely on the testimony of Blackwall. “The Revelation,” says he, in his Sacred Classics, “is writ in much the same style with the gospel and epistles, and entertains and instructs the reader with variety of Christian morals and sublime mysteries. From this noble book may be drawn resistless proofs of our Saviour’s eternal existence; the incommunicable attributes of eternity and infinite power are there plainly and directly applied to Jesus, the Son of God. It is in vain to look for more lofty descriptions or majestic images than you find in this sacred book. Could the acclamations and hallelujahs of God’s household be expressed with more propriety and magnificence than by the shouts of vast multitudes, the roaring of many waters, and the dreadful sound of the loudest and strongest thunders? And how transporting an entertainment must it be to the blessed to have all the strength of sound, tempered with all its sweetness and harmony, perfectly suited to their celestial ear and most exalted taste! The description of the Son of God in the nineteenth chapter, verses 11-17, is in all the pomp and grandeur of language. We have every circumstance and particular that is most proper to express power and justice, majesty and goodness; to raise admiration and high pleasure, corrected with awe.”
Joseph Sutcliffe
The Revelation of John the Divine.
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THE REVELATION OF
JOHN THE DIVINE.
THE cherubim in the Hebrew sanctuary are depicted as spreading their wings around the mercyseat, and in a position somewhat inclined, as though they were desirous to pry into the mysteries contained in the ark. St. Peter confirms this idea. After stating that the prophets had strove to decypher the swelling exuberance of the Spirit, which spake in them of the salvation which is come to us, he adds, “which things the angels desire to look into.” 1 Peter 1:10-12. Ephesians 3:10. Daniel, in like manner, kept his eye with prayers and tears on the out-beaming radiances of the future sufferings and glory of the church. He was admitted to see the conflicts and succession of the four great monarchies which ruled the ancient world, Babylon, Persia, Greece, and Rome. He particularly noticed the very singular character of the fourth empire, in which the God of heaven would set up a kingdom which should never be destroyed, nor left to other people, the conquerors of the nations. Daniel 2:36-45. These prophecies, perfectly realized by providence in future years, like the pillars of Jachin and Booz in front of the temple of God, display their splendid chapiters, crowned with the glory of revelation, and laugh at all the empoisoned arrows of atheism and revolt. Of the evangelical Zion it is said, Her foundation is the holy hill — she shall never be moved. St. John, having studied those disclosures of the divine pleasure, was allowed in hoary age, like the venerable Daniel, to see the extension of those revelations in the kingdoms of the earth, to the final consummation of the ages. He unlooses the seven seals, and sounds the seven trumpets; he also hears the seven thunders, but records not their voices, leaving the comments with providence. He foresaw the candlestick removed from Asia for apostasy, and the cloud of Mahomedan darkness, rising out of the bottomless pit, or hell, let loose in their bloody wars and conflicts. He describes the exile and sufferings of the saints, fighting against the great red dragon of pagan Rome. He depicts the antichristian tyranny, as a beast creeping out of the earth in the dark. He foresaw the splendid drapery of the harlot church, and the bloody sufferings of the witnesses, children of the chaste bride, in all their conflicts to establish the pure and spiritual worship of God amid the domination of lucrative idolatry. He heard the final songs of victory. “Hallelujah, the Lord God omnipotent reigneth. The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our God, and of his Christ.”
John was banished to the isle of Patmos in the year of Christ ninety five, and allowed to return to Ephesus in ninety seven. In this solitary retreat the Lord consoled him with a succession of revelations, the most luminous that had ever been opened to the mind of man. The consolations of this book to a suffering church are beyond description. It opened all heaven as spectators of her conflicts, loading her with eulogies, and with full assurances of victory and eternal glory.
How well this revelation was received by the few who then knew how to appreciate its worth, we may judge from the martyrdom of Polycarp, bishop of Smyrna. He was a disciple of John in his younger years, and had acquired the glory in the church to be bishop of Smyrna. In the year 167, when arrested and brought by a guard of soldiers before the Proconsul in Smyrna, and when unmoved by the entreaties of friends and the menaces of foes to renounce Christ, he cited in his last prayer, ere the flames surrounded him, some words of the elder, in Revelation 11:17. Mr. T. H. Horne, B. D., justly remarks, that “this book was very generally, if not universally acknowledged, during the two first centuries, and yet in the third it began to be questioned.” The reasons are sufficiently apparent. The sects, whose faith was not pure, and afterwards the whole Arian age, could not brook to see the Adonai seated at the right hand of Jehovah, and all things put under him. Psalm 110. Dr. Lardner, on this subject, forms an exception. He himself believed in the divine assumption, and vindicated the authenticity of the book.
The first regular attack against St. John, as the author of the Revelation, was by Dennis of Alexandria, who says, as carefully abridged by Du Pin, that the inscription in the first verse was a forgery; that some have attributed it to Cerinthus; that others had attributed it to some other John, there being many of that name. Respecting the twelve caveats of Dennis, Du Pin adds, that they are very weak.
Eusebius put the Revelation in the canonical books of the new testament, but adds afterwards, that some do not receive it. — Hist. Ecclesiastes lib.
3. cap. 25.
William Whiston, professor of mathematics in the university of Cambridge, wrote an essay on the Revelation, 1706, quarto, pp. 395. Whiston says, p. 32, “These visions were seen by John in the isle of Patmos, where he was banished, as in ver. 9, 10, ‘for the word of God, and for the testimony of Jesus,’ as all chronologers agree, whether papists or protestants. What most confirms this assertion, and reduces it to almost a certainty, is the testimony of Irenæus, who lived in the next age, and who had been the frequent auditor of those who had conversed with John, and of whom he had made particular enquiries concerning the book of Revelation. He adds, that he had accurately collated the different copies, and weighed the disputations concerning this admirable work. This authentic writer affirms, what was then very commonly known, that the Apocalypse was seen in vision by John, a little before his time, at the close of the reign of Domitian.”
The emperor Domitian did not die till the year ninety six. Many writers therefore place the visions of John in that year, which was twenty six years after the destruction of Jerusalem. The chronology of Irenæus is the more to be confided in, as it synchronizes with the records of certain heathen writers referred to by Eusebius. By consequence, none of the events predicted by John can refer to any occurrences anterior to the destruction of Jerusalem.
The title given to the author of this book is Θεολογου, the Divine. This high appellation is used by Origen, without any apology, a title consequent on the sublimity of his predictions. It is continued in Jerome, Theologi; in Beza, in Coccejus, and others. The Platonists had given it to Orpheus, or the divine poet, as is noted by Dr. Hammond.
Now, that I may the better give the general sense of the church on this mysterious book, and not my own weak conjectures, I have procured Mede, More, Marlorat, Whiston, Jurieu, and others who have written largely on the subject, besides a very ample assortment of sacred versions, and of ancient and modern criticism. May God help me to make the selection assortable with the plan of a Family bible, using as to the sense, my own judgment, and giving an abridged translation of others. But, gentle reader, do not expect too much of man, for providence alone can give the true comment on prophecies. The veil of futurity must not be lifted up too far, lest men should forget the state of their conscience, and their present duties, to indulge unseasonably in the hopes of the church. I am however decided in opinion, that this mysterious book is now more unlocked than at any former period.
Daniel Whedon
Introduction
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REVELATION
INTRODUCTION
INSTEAD of a permanent order of prophets, as in the Old Testament, we are presented in the New, once for all, with a permanent prophecy. The Apocalypse furnishes us all the prediction we need during the Christian ages. It answers to the inquirer, from the primitive age to the present, the great question, “What is the structure of the Christian dispensation from the time of its establishment even down to its emergence into eternity?” It thence furnishes the true form of New Testament eschatology; the true order and shaping of the last events of human and earthly history within the sphere of the kingdom of Christ, from the first advent to the second. The book has been very much misinterpreted; so much so, that with some it is an established maxim that “the Apocalypse either finds its interpreter mad or makes him so.” Yet it may with truth be affirmed, that all who have accepted the above eschatological view have, in the great outline, essentially agreed, however they may have varied in subordinates. The Messianic dispensation, from the time of the first advent to the second, is found by all such interpreters to consist in a series of struggles between the powers of evil and the powers of good, until the final triumph of the righteous cause. The Apocalypse has ever been, therefore, the beacon of the final subjection of the world-power to Christ. It is the book of sure hope, the charter of ultimate victory. Under this view of the book we can enter upon its interpretation with a trust that, whatever be the error of our particular interpretations, our whole cannot be far from right. The organic structure of the New Testament, we may add, requires the Apocalypse. Without that book the New Testament is an unfinished volume; it has hardly even “a lame and impotent conclusion,” but rather no conclusion at all. This is a general but strong argument against all doubts of its canonicity and of its place in the canon.
AUTHORSHIP OF THE APOCALYPSE.
The testimony to the authorship of the Apocalypse by John, on historical grounds, is early, abundant, and uncontradicted within the Church. During the first century after its publication it is either directly affirmed to be the apostle’s, or quoted as his by a dense body of writers. We may name Papias, John’s contemporary; Justin Martyr, (between A.D. 139 and 161;) Melito, bishop of Sardis, (about A.D. 171;) Theophilus, bishop of Antioch, (about 180;) and Irenaeus, (about 180.) Next we have Tertullian, (about 220,) Hippolytus, bishop of Ostia. (about 240,) Clement of Alexandria, (about 200,) and Origen, (about 233.) To these add Jerome, Augustine, Basil the Great, Athanasius, Gregory of Nyssa, and Ambrose. Of two of these successive witnesses we give the explicit testimony:— Justin Martyr says:
“A certain man among us, whose name was John, one of the apostles of Christ, in a revelation made to him, prophesied that those believing in our Christ will spend a thousand years in Jerusalem, and after that the universal, and, to speak
comprehensively, the eternal, resurrection and judgment of all together, shall take place.”
Irenaeus, (whom we have elsewhere called the grand-pupil of John,) in numerous passages gives “John the disciple of the Lord,” “who leaned upon his bosom,” as author of the Apocalypse. So, speaking of the antichristic number, 666, he says that number is found “in all the good and ancient copies, and is attested by those who have seen John face to face.” We see at once that Irenaeus gives the testimony heard by himself of John’s own personal acquaintances, who had discussed the matter of the true text with the apostle himself, and with no other John than the apostle. It is certain that the publication of the Apocalypse must have been an event of great public notoriety among the Churches of Asia Minor. It came from the great survivor of the apostolic body known throughout the Christian world—the disciple who leaned upon the bosom of Christ himself. It was addressed to the seven principal Churches in tones of imperative apostolic warning. It no doubt went the public round of those seven great Churches, being publicly announced and read in their congregations. It furnished the great programme of the future of the Messianic Church. With the friends and contemporaries of John, therefore, both the authorship and date of the Apocalypse must have been matters of profound interest and perfect knowledge. It must have been an event for half a century. When, therefore, Irenaeus tells us that his information came from John’s own interviewers, we have a rarely sure authority. It is no guess, no conjecture, but an immediate knowledge. And this, be it noted, applies to our coming discussion of the date, as well as to the authorship. An argument is drawn against John’s authorship from the difference of its style from that of John’s Gospel and Epistles. We discuss this point further under the head of DATE. While it is fully admitted that the diversity of style is very great, that fact is not with out its explanations, as there shown. But while these diversities are undeniable, scholars have, on the other hand, found many traces of underlying identity. These identities justify the belief that the diversities of style arise from the diversity of conditions. The identity, especially of the theology of the Apocalypse with that of the Gospel and Epistles, has been discussed at great length, and shown with great clearness, by Gebhardt, in his work, “The Doctrine of the Apocalypse.”
In opposition to this body of early historical evidence there is nothing of a historical character to present. The Alogi, a small heretical sect, denied the apostolic authorship, because they held it a production unworthy of John. In the third century, Caius of Rome rejected it because he interpreted it to teach Chiliasm, that is, the premillennial advent. On the same grounds Dionysius, successor of Origen at Alexandria, and Eusebius the historian, entertained doubts of its apostolic origin. But none of these testify to the fact on historical grounds. Whether the book is obscure, and unworthy an apostle, or teaches erroneous doctrine, are matters of opinion; in which we are as competent to judge as either of these eminent scholars. Our conclusion as to the authorship is to be ruled by authentic witnesses who testify to a fact they know; but in regard to its worthiness or its interpretation we are not ruled by the opinions of men who know no better than we. Historically, therefore, the testimony in favour of John’s authorship of the Apocalypse is not only overwhelming but uncontradicted. DATE OF THE APOCALYPSE.
On the question of date the historic testimony is as unanimous as on the question of apostolic authorship. The pretence that it was written in the time of Nero or Galba has not a single testimony in all the Christian literature of the first three—we might say, of the first five—centuries. There is not a single author of the first three centuries that gives any other date than the reign of Domitian.
First comes the decisive testimony of one who certainly knew the true date, Irenaeus, the grand-pupil of John, whom we have already adduced as quoting the words of the personal friends of John whom he knew. In regard to the real name symbolized by 666, he tells us: “If it were necessary for this name to be at the present time proclaimed, it would have been uttered by him who saw the apocalypse; for it was not seen a long time ago, but almost in our own generation, at the end of the reign of Domitian.”
The opponents of the Domitianian date, very unjustifiably styling this the “Irenaean tradition,” heroically assume that all the other testifiers to the same date derive their knowledge of the date from Irenaeus, so that the testimony of all “is reduced to the testimony of one man.” Ask them for their proof of such derivation, and their helpless reply is, that “it is the same tradition.” But how that proves that this “same tradition” came through the same one man, is what they can adduce nothing to show. In our remarks on Irenaeus’s testimony to John’s authorship we noted how widely notorious both authorship and date must have been to John’s contemporaries, and so the same “one tradition” must have come down to the generation of Irenaeus through thousands of different channels. The so-called “Irenaean tradition” was the sole tradition of the whole Church. The foolish fable of the Neronian date has no existence in literature until the sixth century. Its revival in modern times, on the most fantastic grounds, is a discredit to biblical criticism. The real object of these pseudo-criticisms is to identify John’s conception of the recovery of the beast of 13:1 from death with a vulgar superstition of the Roman populace that Nero, after his assassination, had a resurrection from the dead—a superstition which closer research shows really not to have existed. (See our closing notes to chapter 17.) Against this imaginary derivation from Irenaeus there are decided proofs. 1. No witness, except Eusebius the historian, refers to Irenaeus as his author. 2. Variations and subordinate additions show independence of testimonies. 3. The corroborations which we shall soon give from secular history, of the Domitianian date of John’s Patmos residence could not, at any rate, have come down through Irenaeus.
Clement of Alexandria says, “After the tyrant died, John returned from the island of Patmos to Ephesus.” Clement does not in this clause mention Domitian by name; but we know from Eusebius, who quotes these words from Clement, that Domitian was the “tyrant” that Clement meant. For Eusebius introduces the quotation by saying, that John “addressed the Churches of Asia, on his return from his banishment to the isle of Patmos, after the death of Domitian.”
Origen alludes to the imperial banisher of John in a remarkably similar manner: “The emperor of the Romans, as tradition teaches, condemned John for testifying on account of the word of truth, to the island of Patmos. And John narrates the things in regard to his testimony, not telling who condemned him, saying these words in his Apocalypse: ‘1 John, etc. Revelation 1:9.’” Origen here notes John’s silence about his banisher, not as though it were doubtful who he was, but as a forbearance on the part of the apostle. See our note on the passage. John names his banishment, but, forbearingly, not his banisher. That Origen knew “the tradition” of Domitian there can be no reasonable doubt; and there is no reason to suppose that he knew any other, or that any other existed. By “emperor of the Romans,” therefore, he meant Domitian.
Victorinus, Bishop of Pettau, and martyr under Diocletian, third century, says, “This John saw, when he was in the island of Patmos, being condemned to the mines by Domitian Caesar.”
In the fourth century the Domitianian date is, for the first time, apparently contradicted by Epiphanius, Bishop of Salamis, who uses the phrases, “after he was ninety years old,” “after his return from Patmos, which took place under Claudius Caesar;” that is, about the year A.D. 54. On this we may note: 1. It helps not the advocates of Nero a particle. 2. It gives the name of an emperor which almost nobody advocates. 3. Epiphanius has a low character for accuracy with scholars. 4. The passage contradicts itself; for John (who is universally held as younger than the Saviour) was scarce half ninety years old in the time of Claudius. Finally, it gives nearly the true Domitianian date; for John was probably not far from ninety on his return from his banishment by that emperor. The real fact seems to be, that Epiphanius himself had the Domitianian date in view, but twice misrecollected the name of the emperor of that date.
It is not until the sixth century that the Neronian fable appears. The unknown writer of the subscription to the Apocalypse of the Philoxenian Version (Syriac) says, “The revelation which was made by God to John the Evangelist in the island of Patmos, whither he was banished by the Emperor Nero.” A statement made for the first time six centuries after date, would be considered valueless by any critical historian. This passage, therefore, so far as this discussion is concerned, has no existence. It furnishes not the slightest proof of any existing tradition or opinion in the Church favouring that date. The ignorant writer names Nero just because Nero was, traditionally, the standard Roman persecutor, the first to be thought of when a persecutor is to be mentioned.
There are two remarkable passages in the early Church writers, which have been so manipulated to prove the Neronian date that it is necessary to notice them. The first is from Eusebius, who says: “It was at Rome that Peter was crucified with his head downward, that Paul was beheaded, and John was banished to the island.” Now this says nothing about the date of the three events, but only the place, namely, Rome. And Tertullian: “Happy that Church in which the apostles poured forth their whole doctrine and their blood; where Peter imitated the passion of his Lord; where Paul was crowned with the martyrdom of the Baptist; and where the apostle John, after he had been immersed in hot oil and suffered nothing, was banished to the island.” Not a word is here said of date, but only of place. The locality of all these events is said to be Rome; their time is unmentioned.
DATE OF THE PATMOS RESIDENCE.
Besides these direct proofs, the records of the date of John’s banishment and return even more decisively fix the date of the writing. First, it is in Domitian’s reign alone, that history finds the custom of banishing individuals for religious reasons; and it is uniformly agreed that the banished were restored at, or after, the close of his reign. Under Nero the punishment was immediate execution, not banishment. The Pagan historian of these times, Dion Cassius, says: “Nerva” (the successor of Domitian) “released those that had been condemned, and restored those that had been banished for impiety;” that is, for rejecting paganism. Eusebius, the historian, says: “They marked the time accurately, namely, in the fifteenth year of Domitian, relating that, besides many others, Flavia Domitilla, who was niece of Flavius Clemens, one of the then aristocracy of Rome, was, on account of her testimony to Christ, banished for punishment to the Pontian island.” Tertullian, with a slight inaccuracy, varies from the unanimous account of all other writers, and makes Domitian restore those whom he had banished. Victorinus, in a passage above quoted, says that John was “condemned to the mines by Domitian Caesar.” Eusebius, in his Chronicon, says that John’s banishment was in the fourteenth year of Domitian’s reign. We need, however, quote no further on this point; for with the exception of the untrusty Epiphanius, who dates the banishment under Claudius, (which nearly nobody now believes,) all before the sixth century, both pagan and Christian writers, date the banishment under Domitian. But if John resided in Patmos under Domitian, he wrote the Apocalypse under Domitian.
Against the Domitianian date certain passages are quoted from the book itself; but it is fatal to this argument that it is obliged to assume certain peculiar interpretations of those passages—interpretations which are entirely inadmissible. Thus, because the city of Jerusalem and temple are mentioned, Revelation 11:1, and the tribes in Revelation 7:4-8, it is assumed by these interpretations that Jerusalem, the literal city, was not yet destroyed. But is it not a wonderful blunder to assume that because a thing is mentioned, it really exists at the time of mention? Is a thing never named or described after it has been once destroyed? But the use of Jerusalem and temple and tribes as apocalyptic symbols, no more proves the literal existence of the city than the descriptions of Babylon prove that that great capital then existed in all its power and glory. See our notes on those two passages.
Another equally fallacious argument is derived from the assumption that the “beast” of Revelation 13:1, etc., represents Nero. It is assumed that the “kings” of Revelation 17:10 are Roman emperors; and, counting in Julius Caesar, who preceded Augustus, the sixth who now “is” would be Nero. (See our notes.) Then the date of the book must be under Nero, and the wounded head must be identified with Nero’s suicide. It is, in fact, to maintain this fabulous identification, that the historical proofs of the Domitianian date are so unscrupulously outraged by the false “criticism.” The earlier date has been, finally, deduced from the strong and youthful style of the Apocalypse. There is confessedly a great difference in style between the Apocalypse and John’s Gospel and Epistles. From this marked contrariety one class of critics has denied that both were by the same writer; and others would infer that the Apocalypse was much the earlier written. The answer to either one of these two inferences would refute the other.
It is admitted that the style of the Apocalypse is much more rhapsodical, abounding in Hebraisms, solecisms, and defiances of grammatical rules. The Gospel and Epistles, as exhibiting more Greek culture and a calmer spirit, are plausibly inferred to be the later productions. Yet this single difficulty cannot be allowed to invalidate the solid historical demonstrations, both that the Apocalypse is John’s and that it was written late in life. An illustrative parallel may be drawn, as one instance, from the case of Thomas Carlyle. Early in life his biography of Schiller was written in chaste, calm, Addisonian English; but with this his history of the French Revolution and all his other later productions stand in most violent contrast. It was in his mature life and old age that his style grew bold and wild, and often grotesque and paroxysmal. There was not only the appearance of two contrasted styles, but of two very opposite minds. The one was the style of the pure quiet thought of the age of Queen Anne, the other was steeped in the most intense and turbulent spirit of modern Germany. Now John’s Gospel and Epistles were written in his best Greek to win his Ephesian audience to the history and doctrines of Jesus. On the contrary, in the Apocalypse he is an emulator of the prophets of the Old Testament. His soul as well as his style is Hebraized. Both from the mental frame into which his inspiring theme wraps him, and from set purpose, he forces and tortures language to express his colossal conceptions in the grandest and most energetic forms. He does not, like Carlyle, possess himself of a new and foreign style and mind; but rather returns to the style and mind of his youth, before Grecian culture had softened his Hebraism— the era when Jesus surnamed him a “son of thunder.” We do not hesitate, therefore, to recognise in the Apocalypse both the venerable age and the renewed youth of the last of the apostles.
SACRED NUMBERS OF THE APOCALYPSE.
That certain numbers have a symbolical significance is now admitted by all eminent commentators. The frequent coincidence of the same number in the numbering of actual literal objects, of course proves nothing; but when we are within the sphere of symbols, and where numbers are a matter of the author’s pure choice, an element of significance found repeatedly occurring furnishes the probable reason of the particular selection. For a brief complete ascertainment of the symbols 3, 4, 7, 12, the reader is referred to our note, Sacred Numbers, at the close of Luke 6. Here we may first note:—
THE CREATIONAL NUMBER, FOUR.
The first four of the seven seals, of the seven trumpets, and the seven vials, are creational; that is, connected closely with the physical frame of the earth. See our notes. The remaining divine threes of each of these three sevens mount higher, and refer to the spiritual interests of man. The fours symbolize the world in the aspects of sin and woe; the threes present the consequent retribution and redemption. The former presuppose Adam, the fall, and the ruin; the latter auspicate Christ, the judgment, and the renovation. So also Revelation 7:1, four angel guardians over physical objects, four winds, four corners; and, Revelation 20:8, four corners of the earth. See following passages for enumerations of four particulars: Revelation 7:9; 8:5; 10:11; 11:9; 12:9; 13:7; 14:6; 17:15. To some of these instances we would not attribute a creational character, from their single intrinsic nature; but there is, perhaps, no one in which it may not well be found after the law has been ascertained by induction from a sufficient number of instances.
THE NUMBER SEVEN.
Seven is the prince of sacred numbers. That it is viewed as a combination of the creational four and the trinitarian or divine three, thus symbolizing the totality of the world and God, is clear from the seven seals, trumpets, and vials. How it dominates in the Apocalypse is shown in our note closing Luke vi, enumerating no less than fifteen series measured by that number. Dr. Pusey (Daniel, p. 167) suggests that the adoption of this number has also a basis in the development of the human bodily system. He quotes plentiful authorities showing the ancient opinion that human life advances by seven-year stages. Plutarch tells us that “Heraclitus and the Stoics say that man’s perfection begins about his second seventh year.” Solon has left a poem describing the seven-year advancing stages of life to the tenth, agreeing with the psalmist in his limitation; but other thinkers counted to the twelfth, making eighty-four years the natural limit. Modern law makes thrice seven the period for attaining manhood.
But is there not another corporeal basis for the number seven? Some thinkers tell us that our seven-day period of labour and repose is the true measure suited to man’s constitution. More or less would not adjust well to his nature. Our impression is, that most men feel this to be the fact. Whatever other concordant reasons there may be, then, the week has truly a fixed physiological basis. “The sabbath was made for man.” It might seem, then, that the parable of the divine creational rest was framed as basis for the sabbath law in the decalogue. Whatever physical basis the seven-day cycle of the Mosaic cosmogony possesses, it seems quite clear that that cycle is prepared and adjusted for the decalogue, not the decalogue to the cycle. As man is the miniature image of God, so man’s repose is miniature of God’s parabolic repose, and man’s little week is the miniature of God’s stupendous week. Yet the week, in accordance with all these facts, has an astronomical basis in its being the approximate quarter of a month.
THE NUMBER TEN
seems to symbolize the human universality of our race, usually in its secular and even profane aspect. Ten utterances are given by Moses (Genesis i) as uttered by Elohim in bringing the world to becoming the home of man. It is remarkable that both genealogies of the race, from the creation to the flood, and from the flood to Abraham, contain ten generations. Ten were the plagues of Egypt revealing Jehovah to the profane world. Ten were the commandments, the law for all the world. Ten the toes of Daniel’s image ultimately representing the nations of the world; and ten the horns of the apocalyptic beast symbolizing the same universality. Ten were the virgins of the parable representing our probationary race. Ten multiplied by seven represents a similar universality. See our introductory note to Luke 10. Seventy was the number of deacons representing a universal ministry; seventy was, with the Jews, the symbolic number of the nations of the earth. Ten raised to a cube, and usually multiplied into some other number, serves to increase the whole number to a magnitude required by the subject. See notes on Revelation 7:4; 9:16; 11:13; 20:4. TIME NUMBERS.
Whether the Apocalypse in its number of 1260 days uses “a day for a year,” has been a much-mooted question. Symmetry requires something like such a symbolism. Where a beast symbolizes a nation, a symbolic reduction of number is required. For, how monstrous would be the making the life of a beast 1260 years! The rude proportion is: As a beast to a nation so 1260 days to 1260 years. So in Ezekiel 4:1-8 the proportion was: As Ezekiel’s tile was to Jerusalem, so was a day to a year. Wordsworth rightly makes the 42 months, or 1260 days, an adverse period; but not only does this number in its various forms symbolize the adverse, but also the extension or magnitude of the period. John’s great numbers are usually the exact for the inexact. Such are the 144,000 of chapter 7; the 200,000,000 of Revelation 9:16; the 7,000 of Revelation 11:13; the 1,000 of Revelation 20:2. Daniel’s seventy weeks were very nearly literal; the symbol existing not in the events predicted, but, if at all, only in the weeks, or rather, literal heptads. Hence both the Jewish and Christian expositors have looked for an exact period of seventy years. In the Apocalypse, however, the analogy appears to be in favour of viewing the 1260 days as an approximation to a definite period of extended centuries. See notes on Revelation 12:14 and 13:5. STRUCTURE OF THE BOOK.
A comparison of passages will show that John received THREE DISTINCT COMMISSIONS to prophesy, from three distinct donors, producing what may, not improperly, be styled three apocalypses.
The FIRST COMMISSION (Revelation 1:19) is given by Christ himself in a CHRISTOPHANY or personal appearing; and hence we have, in chaps, 2, 3, what we may call the Christophanic apocalypse.
The SECOND (Revelation 4:1) is bestowed by a THEOPHANY, or present God; and hence we have, in iv-ix, the Theophanic apocalypse. The THIRD (Revelation 10, 11) is bestowed by a personally appearing angel, (chap. 10,) and hence the remainder of the book is the ANGELOPHANIC apocalypse.
The first, or CHRISTOPHANIC part, is Christ’s messages dictated to John, and addressed to the seven representative Churches of Asia, and through them to all the Churches of the Christian ages.
The second, or THEOPHANIC part, is a prophetic presentation of the then future of the Christian dispensation, exhibited not in chronological history, but in a few pictorial phases, through a cycle of six opening seals succeeded by a celestial sealing.
The third, or ANGELOPHANIC part, presents, in a fuller and more definite chronological order and completeness the same Christian dispensation, exhibiting the struggles of Christ and Antichrist, down through the days of divine triumph to the final judgment and eternity. This third part consists of the great historical Seventh Trumpet, preluded by the six previous trumpets. As a whole, the six-seal series and the seven-trumpet series go over the same cycle of time; the former by phases, the latter, first (in the six trumpets) by phases and then (in the seventh) by consecutive history. The seventh trumpet is the true historic consecutive Apocalypse. It deals in chronological events and movements. Yet it is not so specifically minute as to mention any single human individual in history. There is no mention of Nero, nor Charlemagne, nor Napoleon, nor of the Crimean war; the curiosity that looks into the Apocalypse as a fortune-telling record of particular contemporaneous events or personages is the source of a large amount of the discredit resting on this book. Those who expect to find contemporaneous events exhibited large as life in this book forget how great a space so small a map as the Apocalypse has to cover. When Alcibiades was boasting of the large estates he was to inherit, Socrates laid before him the map of Greece, and brought him to modesty by asking him to point out his broad acres. We need a similar modesty in estimating our own magnitude in the Apocalypse.
THE PREDICTION, THE AGENTS, AND THE APPARATUS.
The object of the Apocalypse, mainly, is prediction. And these predictions appear in a series of pictures, or symbolical images, presented to the seer and represented to us by him in words. But a large part of the book is occupied with a description of the agents, and of the apparatus or machinery, as we may call it, by whom and by which these pictures are presented to view. These three parts—the agents, the apparatus, and the prediction—must be distinguished from each other by the reader. The agents are, Christ, God, the angel of chap. x, and various angels. The apparatus consists of the sceneries and inanimate objects, the seals, the trumpets, the vials, etc. Thus in the second part the fourth and fifth chapters are entirely occupied with the agents and apparatus and their action, by which the “seals” are to be brought out and the predictions the seals contain are to be brought to view. It is the revealed contents of the seals which are the true predictions. Very erroneous conclusions result when an agent or apparatus is mistaken for a predictive symbol. Sad errors are produced, for instance, when the angel of chap. x is taken as symbolizing an event in human history. Yet in the word apparatus there is no depreciation. For this part of the book is sublimely significant of the overruling providence of God in the system of the world. The Apocalypse becomes thereby a panorama, on a finite human scale, of the divine
Roman Emperors.
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administration. The apocalyptic panorama represents the divine administration, as an orrery represents the solar system. It is a minute model of the divine government during the Messianic dispensation until it merges into eternity.
In our Commentary, while differing in some subordinate views, we agree with the body of evangelical commentators in the most important eschatological results. Rejecting the immense mass of complex ingenuities with which the text has been overlaid by the ultra-historical school, we still gauge the progress of the world by some great epochal points, and attain a clearness in our view of the whole. Our division into Three Apocalyptic Commissions must sustain itself by the evidences of co-ordination furnished by the threefold statement and by the results. In our own explication of xiv-xvi we think the evidences will appear to most readers conclusive. Our view of the Seventh Trumpet, as furnishing a perfectly consecutive history to the end, we believe to be both maintainable and very important in its conclusions. Our hope, on the whole, is, that we have furnished an elucidation, by the light of which the book will be read by a large class of minds with easy understanding and fresh interest. Our ministry generally have almost dropped the Apocalypse from study or public use. And yet we have been impressed with the belief, that, relieved from the burdens that have been laid by complex and questionable commentary upon it, the book is full of inspiring topics and vivid illustrations for the pulpit.
ROMAN EMPERORS.
DATES OF COMMENCEMENT OF THEIR REIGNS.
B.C. 31. AUGUSTUS. Christ born, four years before the Vulgar Era. A.D. 14. TIBERIUS. A.D. 30. Christ crucified.
37. CALIGULA. Conversion of Paul.
41. CLAUDIUS.
54. NERO—who was deposed and committed suicide. 60-62. St. James’s Epistle and martyrdom. Book of Hebrews written. 66. Peter and Paul martyred.
68. GALBA—reigned six months.
69. OTHO—reigned two months.
69. VITELLIUS—reigned eight months.
Plan of the Apocalypse.
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Editorial note: The supplied edition prints “Revelation 9:12-24” here (WHD_CO14.PDF, physical PDF page 426). The surrounding discussion of the announcement and description of the sixth trumpet corresponds to Revelation 9:12–21 in the King James Version. The origin of the printed numbering is not established here; the historical wording is retained. WHD_CO14.PDF, PDF page 426.
70. VESPASIAN. Destruction of Jerusalem.
79. TITUS. John’s three Epistles. Epistle of Jude.
1. The book and unaccepted challenge for its opening 1-4
2. Challenge accepted and book taken by the Lamb 5-7
3. Successive songs of praise to the Lamb by beasts, elders, angels, and all creation 8-14
III. OPENING OF THE SEVEN SEALS Revelation 6:1-8:1 A. The Seal-Cycle.—The six-seal cycle briefly pictures the phases of the Messianic age down to the final dissolution; the seven trumpet cycle pictures and narrates more fully the same course of time to the final judgment.
With counter picture of celestial reward of Saints Revelation 7:1-17 a. Winds are silenced while OLD TESTAMENT SAINTS are sealed 144,000 Revelation 7:1-8
b. Then number of NEW TESTAMENT SAINTS; too great to be numbered; with song Revelation 7:9, 10
c. Surrounding circle of ANGELS, with song Revelation 7:11, 12
d. ELDER’S explanation and glorious picture of their HEAVENLY STATE. Revelation 7:13-17
SEVENTH SEAL—Issues no revelation, but inaugurates the Seven Trumpets Revelation 8:1-6
IV. THE SEVEN TRUMPETS Revelation 8:7-20:10 B. The Trumpet-Cycle.—As the seal-cycle pictures the Messianic age briefly, so this trumpet-cycle both pictures (in first six trumpets) and narrates (in the seventh) the same down to judgment and eternity. ——FOUR CREATIONAL TRUMPETS.——
1. THE ANGELOPHANY—Descent of the World-Angel Revelation 10:1, 2
2. He announces that in the sounding of the SEVENTH TRUMPET the eschatological mystery of God will be finished; that is, the trumpet will sound even to judgment and eternity Revelation 10:3-7
3. Third Prophetic Commission bestowed on John Revelation 10:8-11
4. An outlined ground plan of the events of the Seventh Trumpet; that is, of the whole of Revelation 12:1- Revelation 22:5 11:1-13 Embracing:—
a. The mystic Jerusalem=the pure Church ascertained by measurement Revelation 11:1-2
b. The martyr two witnesses=the faithful few Revelation 11:3-6 c. Their destruction by the beast, and resurrection, triumph, and avenging Revelation 11:7-13
II. SOUNDING OF THE (third woe) SEVENTH TRUMPET Revelation 11:14
WARS OF CHRIST AND ANTI-CHRIST
[As the wars of Christ and antichrist extend from the first to the second Advent, so the SEVENTH (or THIRD WOE) TRUMPET covers the entire of that period, furnishing a consecutive HISTORY, with its regular symbolical chronology through the whole.] Triumphant voices chant the anticipation of its contents Revelation 11:15-19
Events of the Seventh Trumpet commence, extending to end of book Revelation 12:1
I. PERSONALITIES OF THE WAR.
Satanophany, the Dragon incarnate in the Roman Empire Revelation 12:1-4
The star-crowned woman, the Church, assailed by Dragon Revelation 12:1-6
Michael her champion; firmamental war; Dragon cast to earth Revelation 12:7-17
First (sea-risen) Beast=Christianized Roman Empire Revelation 13:1-10
Second (earth-born) Beast=Roman hierarchy=Clergy Revelation 11-13 Living Image of First Beast=the Popedom Revelation 14-18 II. EVENTS OF THE WAR.
THE THREE OVERTHROWS OF ANTICHRIST; namely, of his Capital, his Harlot, and his Armies Revelation 14:1-20:3
I. FIRST OVERTHROW—of Antichrist’s CAPITAL, BABYLON Revelation 14:1-16:21
(The overthrow of BABYLON by JERUSALEM, three chapters, 14-16. The scene of belligerent preparation is at JERUSALEM, Mount Zion, the temple.)
1. The chapter of War Menace by Jerusalem against Babylon Revelation 14:1-20
a. ANTICIPATIVE BUT INDEFINITE JOY-SONG AT JERUSALEM, ON MOUNT ZION Revelation 14:1-5
3. The chapter of the Destruction of Babylon by batteries of wrath poured from Jerusalem Revelation 16:1-21 a. The four creational vials upon earth, sea, waters, and sun Revelation 16:1-9
b. Fifth vial on kingdom of the beast Revelation 16:10-11 c. Sixth vial on the Euphrates, for the kings of the east Revelation 16:12
d. The three frogs—Antichristic rally in behalf of Babylon Revelation 16:13-16
e. Seventh vial on the air—earthquake, crash, BABYLON’S DOWNFALL Revelation 16:17-21
II. SECOND OVERTHROW—of Antichrist’s HARLOT=the corrupt Church Revelation 17:1-18
1. Picture of the Harlot mounted on the Beast Revelation 17:1-6
John Wesley
Notes on the Revelation of Jesus Christ.
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NOTES ON THE REVELATION
OF JESUS CHRIST.
It is scarce possible for any that either love or fear God not to feel their hearts extremely affected in seriously reading either the beginning or the latter part of the Revelation. These, it is evident, we cannot consider too much; but the intermediate parts I did not study at all for many years; as utterly despairing of understanding them, after the fruitless attempts of so many wise and good men: and perhaps I should have lived and died in this sentiment, had I not seen the works of the great Bengelius. But these revived my hopes of understanding even the prophecies of this book; at least many of them in some good degree: for perhaps some will not be opened but in eternity. Let us, however, bless God for the measure of light we may enjoy, and improve it to his glory.
The following notes are mostly those of that excellent man; a few of which are taken from his Gnomon Novi Testamenti, but far more from his Ekklarte Offenbarung, which is a full and regular comment on the Revelation. Every part of this I do not undertake to defend. But none should condemn him without reading his proofs at large. It did not suit my design to insert these: they are above the capacity of ordinary readers. Nor had I room to insert the entire translation of a book which contains near twelve hundred pages.
All I can do is, partly to translate, partly abridge, the most necessary of his observations; allowing myself the liberty to alter some of them, and to add a few notes where he is not full. His text, it may be observed, I have taken almost throughout, which I apprehend he has abundantly defended both in the Gnomon itself, and in his Apparatus and Crisis in Apocalypsin. Yet I by no means pretend to understand or explain all that is contained in this mysterious book. I only offer what help I can to the serious inquirer, and shall rejoice if any be moved thereby more carefully to read and more deeply to consider the words of this prophecy. Blessed is he that does this with a single eye. His labour shall not be in vain.
Adam Clarke
Introduction to the Revelation of St. John the Divine
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INTRODUCTION TO THE REVELATION OF ST.
JOHN THE DIVINE
AS there has been much controversy concerning the authenticity of this book; and as it was rejected by many for a considerable time, and, when generally acknowledged, was received cautiously by the Church; it will be well to examine the testimony by which its authenticity is supported, and the arguments by which its claim to a place in the sacred canon is vindicated. Before, therefore, I produce my own sentiments, I shall beg leave to lay before the reader those of Dr. Lardner, who has treated the subject with much judgment.
“We are now come to the last book of the New Testament, the Revelation; about which there have been different sentiments among Christians; many receiving it as the writing of John the apostle and evangelist, others ascribing it to John a presbyter, others to Cerinthus, and some rejecting it, without knowing to whom it should be ascribed. I shall therefore here rehearse the testimony of ancient Christians, as it arises in several ages. “It is probable that Hermas read the book of the Revelation, and imitated it; he has many things resembling it. It is referred to by the martyrs at Lyons. There is reason to think it was received by Papias. Justin Martyr, about the year 140, was acquainted with this book, and received it as written by the Apostle John; for, in his dialogue with Trypho, he expressly says: ‘A man from among us, by name John, one of the apostles of Christ, in the revelation made to him, has prophesied that the believers in our Christ shall live a thousand years in Jerusalem; and after that shall be the general, and, in a word, the eternal resurrection and judgment of all together.’ To this passage we suppose Eusebius to refer in his ecclesiastical history, when giving an account of Justin’s works, he observes to this purpose. He also mentions the Revelation of John, expressly calling it the apostle’s. Among the works of Melito, Bishop of Sardis, one of the seven Churches of Asia, about the year 177, Eusebius mentions one entitled, ‘Of the Revelation of John.’ It is very probable that Melito ascribed this book to the apostle of that name, and esteemed it of canonical authority. Irenæus, bishop of Lyons in Gaul, about A.D. 178, who in his younger days was acquainted with Polycarp, often quotes this book as the Revelation of John, the apostle of the Lord. And in one place he says: ‘It was seen not long ago, but almost in our age, at the end of the reign of Domitian.’
“Theophilus was bishop of Antioch about 181. Eusebius, speaking of a work of his against the heresy of Hermogenes, says: ‘He therein made use of testimonies, or quoted passages, from John’s Apocalypse.’ The book of the Revelation is several times quoted by Clement of Alexandria, who flourished about 194; and once in this manner: ‘Such a one, though here on earth he is not honoured with the first seat, shall sit upon the four and twenty thrones judging the people, as John says in the Revelation.’ Tertullian, about the year 200, often quotes the Revelation, and supposes it to have been written by St. John, the same who wrote the First Epistle of John, universally received: ‘Again, the Apostle John describes, in the Apocalypse, a sharp two-edged sword coming out of the mouth of God.’ He also says: ‘We have Churches that are the disciples of John. For though Marcion rejects the Revelation, the succession of bishops, traced to the original, will assure us that John is the author:’ by John undoubtedly meaning the apostle.
“From Eusebius we learn that Apollonius, who wrote against the Montanists about 211, quoted the Revelation. By Caius, about 212, it was ascribed to Cerinthus: it was received by Hippolytus about 220, and by Origen about 230. It is often quoted by him. He seems not to have had any doubt about its genuineness. In his Commentary upon St. John’s gospel, he speaks of it in this manner: ‘Therefore John, the son of Zebedee, says in the Revelation.’ Dionysius, bishop of Alexandria, about 247, or somewhat later, wrote a book against the Millenarians, in which he allows the Revelation to be written by John, a holy and divinely inspired man. But he says, ‘He cannot easily grant him to be the apostle, the son of Zebedee, whose is the gospel according to John, and the catholic epistle.’ He rather thinks it may be the work of John an elder, who also lived at Ephesus in Asia, as well as the apostle. It also appears, from a conference which Dionysius had with some Millenarians, that the Revelation was, about 240 and before, received by Nepus, an Egyptian bishop, and by many others in that country; and that it was in great reputation. It was received by Cyprian, bishop of Carthage, about 248, and by the Church of Rome in his time, and by many Latin authors. The Revelation was received by Novatus and his followers, and by various other authors. It is also probable that it was received by the Manichees. It was received by Lactantius, and by the Donatists; by the latter Arnobius about 460, and by the Arians. “In the time of Eusebius, in the former part of the fourth century, it was by some not received at all; and therefore it is reckoned by him among contradicted books. Nevertheless, it was generally received. Eusebius himself seems to have hesitated about it, for he says: ‘It is likely the Revelation was seen by John the elder, if not by John the apostle.’ It may be reckoned probable that the critical argument of Dionysius of Alexandria was of great weight with him and others of that time. The Revelation was received by Athanasius, and by Epiphanius; but we also learn from him that it was not received by all in his time. It is not in the catalogue of Cyril of Jerusalem, and seems not to have been received by him. It is also wanting in the catalogue of the Council of Laodicea, about 363.
“The Revelation is not in Gregory Nazianzen’s catalogue; however, it seems to have been received by him. It is in the catalogue of Amphilochius; but he says it was not received by all. It is also omitted in Ebedjesus’ catalogue of the books of Scripture received by the Syrians; nor is it in the ancient Syriac version.
“It was received by Jerome; but he says it was rejected by the Greek Christians. It was received by Rufin, by the third Council of Carthage, and by Augustine, but it was not received by all in his time. It is never quoted by Chrysostom, and probably was not received by him. It is in the catalogue of Dionysius, called the Areopagite, about 490. It is in the Alexandrian MS. It was received by Sulpicius Severus about 401; and by J. Damascenus, and by Œcumenius, and by many other authors. Andrew, bishop of Cæsarea, in Cappadocia, at the end of the fifth century, and Arethas, bishop of the same place, in the sixth century, wrote commentaries upon it. But it was not received by Severian, bishop of Gabala; nor, as it seems, by Theodoret. Upon the whole, it appears that this book has been generally received in all ages, though some have doubted of it, and rejected it; particularly the Syrians, and some other Christians in the east.
“Having thus represented the external evidence of the genuineness of the Book of the Revelation, or of its being written by St. John, I should proceed to consider the internal evidence. But I need not enlarge here, but merely take notice of a few things of principal note, which learned men insist upon as arguments that the Revelation has the same author with the gospel and epistles that go under the name of the Evangelist and Apostle John. Revelation 1:1: ‘The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave unto him, to show unto his servant things which must shortly come to pass. And he sent and signified it by his angel unto his servant John.’ “Hence it is argued, that John styles himself the servant of Christ, in a sense not common to all believers, but peculiarly to those who are especially employed by him. So Paul and other apostles call themselves servants of God and of Christ. Particularly Romans 1:1: ‘Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ.’ James 1:1: ‘James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ.’ 2 Peter 1:1: ‘Simon Peter, a servant and an apostle of Jesus Christ.’ Jude 1:1: ‘Jude, a servant of Jesus Christ.’ So Moses is called ‘the servant of God,’ Numbers 12:7; and Hebrews 3:2; and in like manner many of the prophets. And in this very book, Revelation 10:7, is the expression, ‘as he has declared unto his servants, the prophets.’
“This observation may be of some weight for showing that the writer is an apostle, but it is not decisive; and in the same verse, whence this argument is taken, the phrase is used in its general sense: ‘Which God gave unto him, to show unto his servants.’ Revelation 1:2: ‘Who bare record of the word of God, and of the testimony of Jesus Christ, and of all things that he saw.’
“Some suppose the writer here refers to the written gospel of St. John, and should be understood to say that he had already borne testimony concerning the word of God, and of Jesus Christ. But these words may be understood of this very book, the Revelation, and the things contained in it. The writer says here, very properly at the beginning, and by way of preface, that he had performed his office in this book, having faithfully recorded in it the word of God which he had received from Jesus Christ. Certainly, if these words did clearly refer to a written gospel, they would be decisive; but they are allowed to be ambiguous, and other senses have been given of them. By some they have been understood to contain a declaration that the writer had already borne witness to Jesus Christ before magistrates. Moreover, I think that, if St. John had intended to manifest himself in this introduction, he would more plainly have characterized himself in several parts of this book than he has done. This observation therefore appears to me to be of small moment for determining who the writer is.
“Farther, it is argued, in favor of the genuineness of this book, that there are in it many instances of conformity, both of sentiment and expression, between the Revelation and the uncontested writings of St. John. Our Saviour says to his disciples, John 16:33: ‘Be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.’ Christian firmness under trials is several times represented by overcoming, overcoming the world, or overcoming the wicked one, in St. John’s First Epistle, 1 John 2:13, 14; 4:4; 5:4, 5. And it is language peculiar to St. John, being in no other books of the New Testament. And our Lord says, Revelation 3:21: ‘To him that overcometh will I grant to sit with the in my throne; even as I also overcame, and am set down with my Father in his throne.” Compare Revelation 2:7, 11, 17, 26; 3:5, 12, 21; 21:7.
“Concerning the time of writing this book, I need not now say much. It is the general testimony of ancient authors that St. John was banished into Patmos in the time of Domitian, in the latter part of his reign, and restored by his successor Nerva. But the book could not be published till after John’s release and return to Ephesus in Asia. As Domitian died in 96, and his persecution did not commence till near the end of his reign, the Revelation seems to be fitly dated in the year 95 or 96. Mill places the Revelation in the year of Christ 96, and the last year of the Emperor Domitian. At first he supposed that the Revelation was written at Patmos; but afterwards he altered his mind, and thought it was not written till after his return to Ephesus. He builds his opinion upon the words of Revelation 1:9. If so, I apprehend it might not be published before the year 97; or, at the soonest, near the end of 96. Basnage places the Revelation in 96. Le Clerc, likewise, who readily admits the genuineness of this book, speaks of it in the same year. Mr. Lowman supposes St. John to have had his visions in the Isle of Patmos, in 95; but Mr. Wetstein favours the opinion of those who have argued that the Revelation was written before the Jewish war. He also says that, if the Revelation was written before that war, it is likely that the events of that time should be foretold in it; to which I answer, that though some interpreters have applied some things in this book to those times, I cannot say whether they have done it rightly or not, because I do not understand the Revelation. But, to me, it seems that though this book was written before the destruction of Jerusalem, there was no necessity that it should be foretold here; because our blessed Lord had, in his own preaching, frequently spoken very plainly and intelligibly concerning the calamities coming upon the Jewish people in general, and the city and temple of Jerusalem in particular; and his plain predictions and symbolical prefigurations of those events were recorded by no less than three historians and evangelists before the war in Judea broke out.
“Grotius, who places this book in the reign of Claudius, was of opinion that the visions of this book were seen at different times, and afterwards joined together in one book, in the same way as the visions and prophecies of some of the prophets of the Old Testament.
“Concerning this opinion it is not proper for me to dispute: though there appears not any foundation for it in the book itself, as Vitringa has observed. But that the Book of the Revelation in its present form, sent as an epistle to the seven Churches of Asia, Revelation 1:4, was not composed and published before the reign of Domitian, appears to me very probable, from the general and almost universally concurring testimony of the ancients, and from some things in the book itself.
“I shall now transcribe a part of L’Enfant’s and Beausobre’s Preface to the Revelation, at the same time referring to Vitringa, who has many like thoughts:—
“Having quoted Irenæus, Origen, Eusebius, and various other writers, placing St. John’s banishment at Patmos in the latter part of the reign of Domitian, and saying, that he there saw the Revelation, they say: ‘To these incontestable witnesses it is needless to add a long list of others of all ages, and of the same sentiment, to whom the authority of Epiphanius is by no means comparable.’ And they go on: ‘We must add to so constant a tradition other reasons which farther show that the Revelation was not written till after Claudius and Nero. It appears from the book itself that there had been already Churches for a considerable space of time in Asia; forasmuch as St. John, in the name of Christ, reproves faults that happen not but after a while. The Church of Ephesus had left her first love. That of Sardis had a name to live, but was dead. The Church of Laodicea was fallen into lukewarmness and indifference. But the Church of Ephesus, for instance, was not founded by St. Paul before the last years of Claudius. When in 61 or 62, St. Paul wrote to them from Rome, instead of reproving their want of love, he commends their love and faith, Ephesians 1:15. It appears from the Revelation that the Nicolaitans made a sect when this book was written, since they are expressly named; whereas they were only foretold and described in general terms by St. Peter, in his second epistle, written after the year 60, and in St. Jude, about the time of the destruction of Jerusalem by Vespasian. It is evident from many places of the Revelation that there had been an open persecution in the provinces; St. John himself had been banished to the Isle of Patmos for the testimony of Jesus. The Church of Ephesus, or its bishops, is commended for their labour and patience, which seems to imply persecution. This is still more clear in the words directed to the Church of Smyrna, Revelation 2:9: I know thy works and tribulation. For the original word always denotes persecution in the scriptures of the New Testament, as it is also explained in the following verse. In the thirteenth verse of the same chapter mention is made of a martyr named Antipas, put to death at Pergamus. Though ancient ecclesiastical history gives us no information concerning this Antipas, it is nevertheless certain that, according to all the rules of language, what is here said must be understood literally. All that has been now observed concerning the persecution, of which mention is made in the first chapters of the Revelation, cannot relate to the time of Claudius, who did not persecute the Christians; nor to the time of Nero, whose persecution did not reach the provinces; and therefore it must relate to Domitian, according to ecclesiastical tradition.’
“The visions therefore here recorded, and the publication of them in this book, must be assigned, as far as I can see, to the years of Christ 95, and 96, or 97.”
The reasoning of Dr. Lardner, relative to the date of this book, is by no means satisfactory to many other critics, who consider it to have been written before the destruction of Jerusalem; and in this opinion they are supported by the most respectable testimonies among the ancients, though the contrary was the more general opinion. Epiphanius says, that John was banished to Patmos by Claudius Cæsar; this would bring back the date to about A.D. 50. Andreas, (bishop of Cæsarea, in Cappadocia, about A.D. 500,) in his comment on this book, chap. vi. 16, says: “John received this Revelation under the reign of Vespasian.” This date also might place it before the final overthrow of the Jewish state; though Vespasian reigned to A.D. 79. The inscription to this book, in the Syrian version, first published by De Dieu, in 1627, and, afterwards in the London Polyglot, is the following: “The Revelation which God made to John the evangelist, in the island of Patmos, to which he was banished by Nero Cæsar.” This places it before the year of our Lord 69, and consequently before the destruction of Jerusalem. Of this opinion are many eminent writers, and among them Hentenius, Harduin, Grotius, Lightfoot, Hammond, Sir Isaac Newton, Bishop Newton, Wetstein, and others.
If the date could be settled, it would be of the utmost consequence to the right interpretation of the book; but, amidst so many conflicting opinions, this is almost hopeless.
Dr. Lardner has given several proofs, from internal evidence, that the Revelation is the work of St. John; as there are found in it the same forms of expression which are found in his gospel and epistles, and which are peculiar to this apostle. Wetstein gives a collection, which the reader may examine at his leisure. E. g. compare:—
Revelation 1:1. — John 12:33; 18:37; 21:19. Revelation 1:5. — 1 John 1:7.
Revelation 1:7. — John 19:37.
Revelation 1:9. — 1 John 5:10.
Revelation 2:10. — John 20:27.
Revelation 2:17. — John 6:32.
Revelation 3:4. — John 6:66.
Revelation 3:7, 9. — John 15:20; 17:8; 1 John 2:5. Revelation 3:9. — John 11:27.
Revelation 3:10. — John 12:27.
Revelation 3:21. — 1 John 2:13, 14; 4:4; 5:5. Revelation 6:12. — John 1:29.
Revelation 9:5. — John 18:26; 3:17.
Revelation 12:9. — John 12:31.
Revelation 19:13. — John 1:1.
Revelation 21:6. — John 7:37.
Revelation 22:8, 10. — John 7:51-53; 14:23, 24. Dr. Lardner has considered several of these, with the addition of other resemblances, in his account of Dionysius, bishop of Alexandria, in A.D. 247, in the third volume of his works, pages 121-126. This mode of proof, as it applies to most of the above references, is not entirely satisfactory. Dionysius argues that the style of the Revelation is totally different from that of John in his acknowledged writings; and it seems strange to me that this should be contested by any man of learning. Nothing more simple and unadorned than the narrative of St. John in his GOSPEL; nothing more plain and natural than his EPISTLES; but the REVELATION, on the contrary, is figurative, rhetorical, laboured, and elevated to the highest degree. All that can be said here on this subject is, that if the Spirit of God choose to inspire the words and style, as well as the matter, of his communications, he may choose what variety he pleases; and speak at different times, and in divers manners, to the same person. This, however, is not his usual way. For other matters relative to this subject I must refer to the following preface, and to the writers quoted above.
Preface to the Revelation of St. John the Divine
CLA_REV.PDF, source PDF p. 12
PREFACE TO THE REVELATION OF ST. JOHN
THE DIVINE
AMONG the interpreters of the Apocalypse, both in ancient and modern times, we find a vast diversity of opinions, but they may be all reduced to four principal hypotheses, or modes of interpretation:—
1. The Apocalypse contains a prophetical description of the destruction of Jerusalem, of the Jewish war, and the civil wars of the Romans.
2. It contains predictions of the persecutions of the Christians under the heathen emperors of Rome, and of the happy days of the Church under the Christian emperors, from Constantine downwards.
3. It contains prophecies concerning the tyrannical and oppressive conduct of the Roman pontiffs, the true antichrist; and foretells the final destruction of popery.
4. It is a prophetic declaration of the schism and heresies of Martin Luther, those called Reformers, and their successors; and the final destruction of the Protestant religion.
The first opinion has been defended by Professor Wetstein, and other learned men on the continent.
The second is the opinion of the primitive fathers in general, both Greek and Latin.
The third was first broached by the Abbé Joachim, who flourished in the thirteenth century, was espoused by most of the Franciscans; and has been and still is the general opinion of the Protestants.
The fourth seems to have been invented by popish writers, merely by way of retaliation; and has been illustrated and defended at large by a Mr. Walmsley, (I believe,) titular dean of Wells, in a work called the History of the Church, under the feigned name of Signior Pastorini.
In this work he endeavours to turn every thing against Luther and the Protestants, which they interpreted of the pope and popery; and attempts to show, from a computation of the Apocalyptical numbers, that the total destruction of Protestantism in the world will take place in 1825! But this is not the first prophecy that has been invented for the sake of an event, the accomplishment of which was earnestly desired; and as a stimulus to excite general attention, and promote united exertion, when the time of the pretended prophecy was fulfilled. But 1825 is past by, and 1832 is come, and the Protestant Church is still in full vigour, while the Romish Church is fast declining.
The full title of the book which I quote is the following:— “The General History of the Christian Church, from her birth to her final triumphant state in Heaven, chiefly deduced from the Apocalypse of St. John the Apostle. By SIG. PASTORINI.
‘Blessed is he that readeth and heareth the words of this prophecy.’-APOCALYPSE, Revelation 1:3.
Printed in the year M.DCC.LXXI.” 8vo. No place nor printer’s name mentioned.
The place where he foretells the final destruction of Protestantism is in pp. 249 and 262.
The Catholic college of Maynooth, in Ireland, have lately published a new edition of this work! in which the author kindly predicts the approaching overthrow of the whole Protestant system, both in Church and state; and in the meantime gives them, most condescendingly, Abaddon or the devil for their king!
Who the writer of the Apocalypse was, learned men are not agreed. This was a question, as well in ancient as in modern times. We have already seen that many have attributed it to the Apostle John; others, to a person called John the presbyter, who they say was an Ephesian, and totally different from John the apostle. And lastly, some have attributed it to Cerinthus, a contemporary of John the apostle. This hypothesis, however, seems utterly unsupportable; as there is no probability that the Christian Church would have so generally received a work which came from the hands of a man at all times reputed a very dangerous heretic; nor can the doctrines it contains ever comport with a Cerinthian creed. Whether it was written by John the apostle, John the presbyter, or some other person, is of little importance if the question of its inspiration be fully established. If written by an apostle it is canonical; and should be received, without hesitation, as a work Divinely inspired. Every apostle acted under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. John was an apostle, and consequently inspired; therefore, whatever he wrote was written by Divine inspiration. If, therefore, the authenticity of the work be established, i.e., that it was written by John the apostle, all the rest necessarily follow. As I have scarcely any opinion to give concerning this book on which I could wish any of my readers to rely, I shall not enter into any discussion relative to the author, or the meaning of his several visions and prophecies; but for general information refer to Dr. Lardner, Michaelis, and others. Various attempts have been made by learned men to fix the plan of this work; but even in this few agree. I shall produce some of the chief of these: and first, that of Wetstein, which is the most singular of the whole. He supposes the book of the Apocalypse to have been written a considerable time before the destruction of Jerusalem. The events described from the fourth chapter to the end he supposes to refer to the Jewish war, and to the civil commotions which took place in Italy while Otho, Vitellius, and Vespasian were contending for the empire. These contentions and destructive wars occupied the space of about three years and a half, during which Professor Wetstein thinks the principal events took place which are recorded in this book. On these subjects he speaks particularly in his notes, at the end of which he subjoins what he calls his ανακεφαλαιωσις, or synopsis of the whole work, which I proceed now to lay before the reader.
“This prophecy, which predicts the calamities which God should send on the enemies of the Gospel, is divided into two parts. The first is contained in the closed book; the second, in the open book.
I. The first concerns the earth and the third part, i.e., Judea and the Jewish nation,
II. The second concerns many peoples, and nations, and tongues, and kings, Revelation 10:11, i.e., the Roman empire.
1. The book written within and without, and sealed with seven seals, Revelation 5:1, is the bill of divorce sent from God to the Jewish nation.
2. The crowned conqueror on the white horse armed with a bow, Revelation 6:2, is Artabanus, king of the Parthians, who slaughtered multitudes of the Jews in Babylon.
3. The red horse, Revelation 6:4. The Sicarii and robbers in Judea, in the time of the Proconsuls Felix and Festus.
4. The black horse, Revelation 6:5. The famine under Claudius.
5. The pale horse, Revelation 6:8. The plague which followed the robberies and the famine.
6. The souls of those who were slain, Revelation 6:9. The Christians in Judea, who were persecuted, and were now about to be avenged.
7. The great earthquake, Revelation 6:12. The commotions which preceded the Jewish rebellion.
8. The servants of God from every tribe, sealed in their foreheads, Revelation 7:3. The Christians taken under the protection of God, and warned by the prophets to flee immediately from the land.
9. The silence for half an hour, Revelation 8:1. The short truce granted at the solicitation of King Agrippa.
Then follows the rebellion itself.
1. The trees are burnt, Revelation 8:7. The fields and villages, and unfortified places of Judea, which first felt the bad effects of the sedition.
2. The burning mountain cast into the sea which in consequence became blood, Revelation 8:8; and,
3. The burning star falling into the rivers, and making the waters bitter, Revelation 8:10, 11. The slaughter of the Jews at Cæsarea and Scythopolis.
4. The eclipsing of the sun, moon, and stars, Revelation 8:12. The anarchy of the Jewish commonwealth.
5. The locusts like scorpions hurting men, Revelation 9:3. The expedition of Cestius Gallus, prefect of Syria.
6. The army with arms of divers colours, Revelation 9:16, 17. The armies under Vespasian in Judea. About this time Nero and Galba died; after which followed the civil war, signified by the sounding of the seventh trumpet, Revelation 10:7, 11; 11:15.
1. The two prophetic witnesses, two olive trees, two candlesticks, Revelation 11:3, 4. Teachers in the Church, predicting the destruction of the Jewish temple and commonwealth.
2. The death of the witnesses, Revelation 11:7. Their flight, and the flight of the Church of Jerusalem, to Pella, in Arabia.
3. The resurrection of the witnesses, after three days and a half, Revelation 11:11. The predictions began to be fulfilled at a time in which their accomplishment was deemed impossible; and the doctrine of Christ begins to prevail over Judea, and over the whole earth.
4. The tenth part of the city fell in the same hour, and seven thousand names of men slain, Revelation 11:13. Jerusalem seized by the Idumeans; and many of the priests and nobles, with Annas, the high priest, signified by names of men, i.e. men of name, slain by the Zealots.
5. The woman clothed with the sun, the moon under her feet, and a crown of twelve stars on her head, Revelation 12:1. The Christian Church.
6. The great red dragon seen in heaven, with seven heads, seven diadems, and ten horns, Revelation 12:3. The six first Cæsars, who were all made princes at Rome, governing the armies and the Roman people with great authority; especially Nero, the last of them, who, having killed his mother, cruelly vexed the Christians, and afterwards turned his wrath against the rebellious Jews.
7. The seven-headed beast from the sea, having ten horns surrounded with diadems, Revelation 13:1. Galba, Otho, and Vitellius, who were shortly to reign, and who were proclaimed emperors by the army.
8. This beast, having a mouth like a lion, the body like a leopard, the feet like a bear, Revelation 13:2. Avaricious Galba; rash, unchaste, and inconstant Otho; Vitellius, cruel and sluggish, with the German any.
9. One head, i.e., the seventh, cut off, Revelation 13:3. Galba.
10. He who leadeth into captivity shall be led into captivity; he who killeth with the sword shall be killed with the sword, Revelation 13:10. Otho, who subdued the murderers of Galba, and slew himself with a dagger, Vitellius, who bound Sabinus with chains and was himself afterwards bound.
11. Another beast rising out of the earth, with two horns, Revelation 13:11. Vespasian and his two and, Titus and Domitian, elected emperors at the same time in Judea.
12. The number of the wild beast, 666, the number of a man, TEITAN, Titan or Titus: T, 300. E, 5. I, 10. T, 300. A, 1. N. 50, making in the whole
666. [But some very respectable MSS. have 616 for the number; if the N be taken away from Teitan, then the letters in Teita make exactly the sum 616.]
13. A man sitting upon a cloud, unity a crown of gold upon his head, and a sickle in his hand, Revelation 14:14. Otho and his army, about to prevent supplies for the army of Vitellius.
14. An angel of fire commanding another angel to gather the vintage; the winepress trodden whence the blood flows out 1600 furlongs. The followers of Vitellius laying all waste with fire; and the Bebriaci conquering the followers of Otho with great slaughter.
Then follow the seven plagues:—
1. The grievous sore, Revelation 16:2. The diseases of the soldiers of Vitellius through intemperance.
2. The sea turned into blood, Revelation 16:3. The fleet of Vitellius beaten, and the maritime towns taken from them by the Flavii.
3. The rivers turned into blood, Revelation 16:4. The slaughter of the adherents of Vitellius, at Cremona and elsewhere, near rivers.
4. The scorching of the sun, Revelation 16:8. The diseases of the Vitellii increasing, and their exhausted bodies impatient of the heat.
5. The seat of the beast darkened, Revelation 16:10. All Rome in commotion through the torpor of Vitellius.
6. Euphrates dried up, and a way made for the kings of the east; and the three unclean spirits like frogs. The Flavii besieging Rome with a treble army; one part of which was by the bank of the Tiber.
The shame of him who is found asleep and naked. Vitellius, Revelation 16:15. Armageddon, Revelation 16:16. The prætorian camps.
7. The fall of Babylon, Revelation 16:19. The sacking of Rome.
1. The whore, Revelation 17:1. Rome.
2. The seven kings, Revelation 17:10. CÆSAR, AUGUSTUS, TIBERIUS, CALIGULA, CLAUDIUS, NERO, and GALBA.
3. The eighth, which is of the seven, Revelation 17:11. Otho, destined by adoption to be the son and successor of Galba.
4. The ten horns, Revelation 17:12-16. The leaders of the Flavian factions.
5. The merchants of the earth, Revelation 18:11; i.e., of Rome, which was then the emporium of the whole world.
6. The beast and the false prophet, Revelation 19:20. Vespasian and his family, contrary to all expectation, becoming extinct in Domitian, as the first family of the Cæsars, and of the three princes, Galba, Otho, and Vitellius.
7. The millennium, or a thousand years, Revelation 20:2. Taken from Psalm 90:4, a time appointed by God, including the space of forty years, from the death of Domitian to the Jewish war under Adrian.
8. Gog and Magog, going out over the earth, Revelation 20:8. Barchochebas, the false Messiah, with an immense army of the Jews, coming forth suddenly from their caves and dens, tormenting the Christians, and carrying on a destructive war with the Romans.
9. The New Jerusalem, Revelation 21:1, 2. The Jews being brought so low as to be capable of injuring no longer; the whole world resting after being expiated by wars; and the doctrine of Christ propagated and prevailing everywhere with incredible celerity.
Wetstein contends (and he is supported by very great men among the ancients and moderns) that “the book of the Revelation was written before the Jewish war, and the civil wars in Italy; that the important events which took place at that time, the greatest that ever happened since the foundation of the world, were worth enough of the Divine notice, as the affairs of his Church were so intimately connected with them; that his method of exposition proves the whole book to be a well-connected, certain series of events; but the common method of interpretation, founded on the hypothesis that the book was written after the destruction of Jerusalem, is utterly destitute of certainty, and leaves every commentator to the luxuriance of his own fancy, as is sufficiently evident from what has been done already on this book; some interpreters leading the reader now to Thebes, now to Athens, and finding in the words of the sacred penman Constantine the Great; Arius, Luther, Calvin; the Jesuits; the Albigenses; the Bohemians; Chemnitius; Elizabeth, queen of England; Cecil, her treasurer; and who not?”-See Wetstein’s Gr. Test., vol. ii. p. 889. Those who consider the Apocalypse as a prophecy and scenical exhibition of what shall happen to the Christian Church to the end of the world, lay this down as a proposition, which comprises the subject of the whole book: The contest of Christ with his enemies; and his final victory and triumph over them. See 1 Corinthians 15:25; Matthew 24:1-51; Mark 13:1-37; Luke 21:5-38. But what is but briefly hinted in the above scriptures, is detailed at large in the Apocalypse, and represented by various images nearly in the following order:—
1. The decrees of the Divine providence, concerning what is to come, are declared to John.
2. The manner in which these decrees shall be executed is painted in the most vivid colours.
3. Then follow thanksgivings to God, the ruler and governor of all things, for these manifestations of his power, wisdom and goodness. After the exordium, and the seven epistles to the seven Churches of Asia Minor, to whose angels or bishops the book seems to be dedicated, (Revelation 1:1-3:22,) the scene of the visions is opened in heaven, full of majesty; and John receives a promise of a revelation relative to the future state of the Church, Revelation 4:1-5:14. The enemies of the Church of Christ which the Christians had then most to fear were the Jews, the heathens, and the false teachers. All these are overcome by Christ, and over them he triumphs gloriously. First of all, punishments are threatened to the enemies of the kingdom of Christ, and the preservation of his own followers in their greatest trials determined; and these determinations are accompanied with the praises and thanksgivings of all the heavenly inhabitants, and of all good men, Revelation 6:1-10:11.
The transactions of the Christian religion are next recorded, Revelation 11:1-14:5. The Christians are persecuted:—
1. By the Jews; but they were not only preserved, but they increase and prosper.
2. By the heathens; but in vain do these strive to overthrow the kingdom of Christ, which is no longer confined within the limits of Judea, but spreads among the Gentiles, and diffuses itself over the whole Roman empire, destroying idolatry, and rooting out superstition, in every quarter, Revelation 12:1-13:10.
3. False teachers and impostors of various kinds, under the name of Christians, but enemies of the cross of Christ, more intent on promoting the interests of idolatry or false worship than the cause of true religion, Revelation 13:11-18, exert their influence to corrupt and destroy the Church; but, notwithstanding, Christianity becomes more extended, and true believers more confirmed in their holy faith, Revelation 14:1-5. Then new punishments are decreed against the enemies of Christ, both Jews and heathens: the calamities coming upon the Jewish nation before its final overthrow are pointed out, Revelation 14:1-15:8. Next follows a prediction of the calamities which shall take place during the Jewish war; and the civil wars of the Romans during the contentions of Otho and Vitellius, Revelation 16:1-16, who are to suffer most grievous punishments for their cruelties against the Christians, Revelation 17:1-18. The Jewish state being now finally overthrown, Revelation 18:1-24, the heavenly inhabitants give praise to God for his justice and goodness; Christ is congratulated for his victory over his enemies, and the more extensive progress of his religion, Revelation 19:1-10. Opposition is, however, not yet totally ended: idolatry again lifts up its head, and new errors are propagated; but over these also Christ shows himself to be conqueror, Revelation 19:11-21. Finally, Satan, who had long reigned by the worship of false gods, errors, superstitions, and wickedness, is deprived of all power and influence; and the concerns of Christianity go on gloriously, Revelation 20:1-6. But towards the end of the world new enemies arise, and threaten destruction to the followers of Christ; but in vain is their rage, God appears in behalf of his servants, and inflicts the most grievous punishments upon their adversaries, Revelation 20:6-10. The last judgment ensues, Revelation 20:11-15, all the wicked are punished, and the enemies of the truth are chained, so as to be able to injure the godly no more; the genuine Christians, who had persevered unto death, are brought to eternal glory; and, freed from all adversities, spend a life that shall never end, in blessedness that knows no bounds, Revelation 21:1-22:21. See Rosenmuller.
Eichhorn takes a different view of the plan of this book; though in substance not differing much from that above. According to this writer the whole is represented in the form of a drama, the parts of which are the following: I. The title, Revelation 1:1-3. II. The prologue, Revelation 1:4-3:22; in which it is stated that the argument of the drama refers to the Christians; epistles being sent to the Churches, which, in the symbolic style, are represented by the number seven. Next follows the drama itself, the parts of which are:—
The prolusio, or prelude, Revelation 4:1-8:5; in which the scenery is prepared and adorned.
Act the first, Revelation 8:6-12:17. Jerusalem is taken, and Judaism vanquished by Christianity.
Act the second, Revelation 13:1-20:10. Rome is conquered, and heathenism destroyed by the Christian religion.
Act the third, Revelation 20:11-22:5. The New Jerusalem descends from heaven; or the happiness of the life to come, and which is to endure for ever, is particularly described, Revelation 22:6-11. Taken in this sense, Eichhorn supposes the work to be most exquisitely finished, and its author to have had a truly poetic mind, polished by the highest cultivation; to have been accurately acquainted with the history of all times and nations, and to have enriched himself with their choicest spoils. My readers will naturally expect that I should either give a decided preference to some one of the opinions stated above, or produce one of my own; I can do neither, nor can I pretend to explain the book: I do not understand it; and in the things which concern so sublime and awful a subject, I dare not, as my predecessors, indulge in conjectures. I have read elaborate works on the subject, and each seemed right till another was examined. I am satisfied that no certain mode of interpreting the prophecies of this book has yet been found out, and I will not add another monument to the littleness or folly of the human mind by endeavouring to strike out a new course. I repeat it, I do not understand the book; and I am satisfied that not one who has written on the subject knows any thing more of it than myself. I should, perhaps, except J. E. Clarke, who has written on the number of the beast. His interpretation amounts nearly to demonstration; but that is but a small part of the difficulties of the Apocalypse: that interpretation, as the most probable ever yet offered to the public, shall be inserted in its proper place; as also his illustration of the xiith, xiiith, and xviith chapters. As to other matters, I must leave them to God, or to those events which shall point out the prophecy; and then, and probably not till then, will the sense of these visions be explained. A conjecture concerning the design of the book may be safely indulged; thus then it has struck me, that the book of the Apocalypse may be considered as a PROPHET continued in the Church of God, uttering predictions relative to all times, which have their successive fulfilment as ages roll on; and thus it stands in the Christian Church in the place of the SUCCESSION of PROPHETS in the Jewish Church; and by this especial economy PROPHECY is STILL CONTINUED, is ALWAYS SPEAKING; and yet a succession of prophets rendered unnecessary. If this be so, we cannot too much admire the wisdom of the contrivance which still continues the voice and testimony of prophecy, by means of a very short book, without the assistance of any extraordinary messenger, or any succession of such messengers, whose testimony would at all times be liable to suspicion, and be the subject of infidel and malevolent criticism, howsoever unexceptionable to ingenuous minds the credentials of such might appear. On this ground it is reasonable to suppose that several prophecies contained in this book have been already fulfilled, and that therefore it is the business of the commentator to point such out. It may be so; but as it is impossible for me to prove that my conjecture is right, I dare not enter into proceedings upon it, and must refer to Bishop Newton, and such writers as have made this their particular study.
After having lived in one of the most eventful eras of the world; after having seen a number of able pens employed in the illustration of this and other prophecies; after having carefully attended to those facts which were supposed to be the incontestable proofs of the fulfilment of such and such visions, seals, trumpets, thunders, and vials of the Apocalypse; after seeing the issue of that most terrible struggle which the French nation, the French republic, the French consulate, and the French empire, have made to regain and preserve their liberties, which, like arguing in a circle, have terminated where they began, without one political or religious advantage to them or to mankind; and after viewing how the prophecies of this book were supposed to apply almost exclusively to these events, the writers and explainers of these prophecies keeping pace in their publications with the rapid succession of military operations, and confidently promising the most glorious issue, in the final destruction of superstition, despotism, arbitrary power, and tyranny of all kinds, nothing of which has been realized; I say, viewing all these things, I feel myself at perfect liberty to state that, to my apprehension, all these prophecies have been misapplied and misapprehended; and that the KEY to them is not yet intrusted to the sons of men. My readers will therefore excuse me from any exposure of my ignorance or folly by attempting to do what many, with much more wisdom and learning, have attempted, and what every man to the present day has failed in, who has preceded me in expositions of this book. I have no other mountain to heap on those already piled up; and if I had, I have not strength to lift it: those who have courage may again make the trial; already we have had a sufficiency of vain efforts.
Ter sunt conati imponere Pelio Ossam
Scilicet, atque Ossæ frondosum involvere Olympum:
Ter Pater extructos disjecit fulmine montes.
VIRG., G. i. 281.
With mountains piled on mountains thrice they strove
To scale the steepy battlements of Jove;
And thrice his lightning and red thunder play’d,
And their demolish’d works in ruin laid.
DRYDEN
I had resolved, for a considerable time, not to meddle with this book, because I foresaw that I could produce nothing satisfactory on it: but when I reflected that the literal sense and phraseology might be made much plainer by the addition of philological and critical notes; and that, as the diction appeared in many places to be purely rabbinical, (a circumstance to which few of its expositors have attended,) it might be rendered plainer by examples from the ancient Jewish writers; and that several parts of it spoke directly of the work of God in the soul of man, and of the conflicts and consolations of the followers of Christ, particularly in the beginning of the book, I changed my resolution, and have added short notes, principally philological, where I thought I understood the meaning.
I had once thought of giving a catalogue of the writers and commentators on this book, and had begun a collection of this kind; but the question of Cui bono? What good end is this likely to serve? not meeting with a satisfactory answer in my own mind, caused me to throw this collection aside. I shall notice two only.
1. The curious and learned work entitled, “A plaine Discovery of the whole Revelation of St. John,” written by Sir John Napier, inventor of the logarithms, I have particularly described in the general preface to the Holy Scriptures, prefixed to the Book of Genesis, to which the reader is requested to refer.
2. Another work, not less singular, and very rare, entitled, “The Image of both Churches, after the most wonderful and heavenly Revelation of Sainct John the Evangelist, containing a very fruitfull exposition or paraphrase upon the same: wherein it is conferred with the other scriptures, and most auctorised histories Compyled by John Bale, an exyle also in thys lyfe for the faithful testimony of Jesu.” Printed at London by Thomas East, 18mo., without date.
The author was at first a Carmelite, but was afterwards converted to the Protestant religion. He has turned the whole of the Apocalypse against the Romish Church; and it is truly astonishing to see with what address he directs every image, metaphor, and description, contained in this book, against the corruptions of this Church. He was made bishop of Ossory, in Ireland; but was so persecuted by the papists that he narrowly escaped with his life, five of his domestics being murdered by them. On the accession of Mary he was obliged to take refuge in the Low Countries, where it appears he compiled this work. As he was bred up a papist, and was also a priest, he possessed many advantages in attacking the strongest holds of his adversaries. He knew all their secrets, and he uncovered the whole; he was acquainted with all their rites, ceremonies, and superstitions, and finds all distinctly marked in the Apocalypse, which he believes was written to point out the abominations, and to foretell the final destruction of this corrupt and intolerant Church. I shall make a few references to his work in the course of the following notes. In Revelation 17:1, the author shows his opinion, and speaks something of himself: Come hither, I will show thee the judgment of the great whore, &c. “Come hither, friende John, I will show thee in secretnesse the tirrible judgement of the great whore, or counterfaite Church of hypocrites. Needs must this whore be Rome, for that she is the great citie which reigneth over the kings of the earth. Evident it is both by Scriptures and Cronicles that in John’s dayes Rome had dominion over all the whole world: and being infected with the abominations of all landes, rightly is shee called Babylon. or Citie of Confusion. And like as in the Scriptures ofte tymes under the name of Jerusalem is ment the whole kingdom of Juda, so under the name of Rome here may be understanded the unyversall worlde, with all their abominations and divilleshnesses, their idolatryes, witchcraftes, sectes, superstitions, papacyes, priesthoodes, relygions, shavings, anointings, blessings, sensings, processions, and the divil of all such beggeryes. For all the people since Christes assencion, hath this Rome infected with hir pestilent poisons gathered from all idolatrous nations, such time as she held over them the monarchial suppremit. At the wryting of this prophecy felt John of their cruiltie, being exiled into Pathmos for the faithfull testimony of Jesu. And so did I, poore creature, with my poore wife and children, at the gatheringe of this present commentary, flying into Germanye for the same,” &c.
Shall I have the reader’s pardon if I say that it is my firm opinion that the expositions of this book have done great disservice to religion: almost every commentator has become a prophet; for as soon as he began to explain he began also to prophesy. And what has been the issue? Disappointment laughed at hope’s career, and superficial thinkers have been led to despise and reject prophecy itself. I shall sum up all that I wish to say farther in the words of GRASERUS: Mihi tota Apocalypsis valde obscura videtur; et talis, cujus explicatio citra periculum vix queat tentari. Fateor me hactenus in nullius Scripti Biblici lectione minus vroficere, quam in hoc obscurissimo Vaticinio.
THE REVELATION OF ST. JOHN THE DIVINE
Chronological Notes relative to this Book.
-Year of the Constantinopolitan era of the world, or that used by the Byzantine historians, and other eastern writers, 5604.
-Year of the Alexandrian era of the world, 5598.
-Year of the Antiochian era of the world, 5588.
-Year of the world, according to Archbishop Usher, 4100.
-Year of the world, according to Eusebius, in his Chronicon, 4322. -Year of the minor Jewish era of the world, or that in common use, 3856. -Year of the Greater Rabbinical era of the world, 4455.
-Year from the Flood, according to Archbishop Usher, and the English Bible, 2444.
-Year of the Cali yuga, or Indian era of the Deluge, 3198. -Year of the era of Iphitus, or since the first commencement of the Olympic games, 1036.
-Year of the era of Nabonassar, king of Babylon, 845.
-Year of the CCXVIIIth Olympiad, 4.
-Year from the building of Rome, according to Fabius Pictor, 843. -Year from the building of Rome, according to Frontinus, 847. -Year from the building of Rome, according to the Fasti Capitolini, 848. -Year from the building of Rome, according to Varro, which was that most generally used, 849.
-Year of the era of the Seleucidæ, 408.
-Year of the Cæsarean era of Antioch, 144.
-Year of the Julian era, 141.
-Year of the Spanish era, 134.
-Year from the birth of Jesus Christ, according to Archbishop Usher, 100. -Year of the vulgar era of Christ’s nativity, 96.
-Year of Pacorus II, king of the Parthians, 6.
-Year of the Dionysian period, or Easter Cycle, 97.
-Year of the Grecian Cycle of nineteen years, or Common Golden Number, 2; or the first embolismic.
-Year of the Jewish Cycle of nineteen years, 18; or the year before the seventh embolismic.
-Year of the Solar Cycle, 21.
-Dominical Letters, it being the Bissextile, or Leap Year, CB. -Day of the Jewish Passover, the twenty-fifth of March, which happened in this year on the day before the Jewish Sabbath.
-Easter Sunday, the twenty seventh of March.
-Epact, or age of the moon on the 22d of March, (the day of the earliest Easter Sunday possible,) 11.
-Epact, according to the present mode of computation, or the moon’s age on New Year’s day, or the Calends of January, 19.
-Monthly Epacts, or age of the moon on the Calends of each month respectively, (beginning with January,) 19, 21, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 26, 26, 27, 29, 29.
-Number of Direction, or the number of days from the twenty-first of March to the Jewish Passover, 4.
-Year of the Emperor Flavius Domitianus Cæsar, the last of those usually styled The Twelve Cæsars, 15: Nerva began his reign in this year. -Roman Consuls, C. Antistius Vetus, and C. Maulius Valens.
Joseph Benson
Preface
BEN_VOL8.PDF, source PDF p. 904
REVELATION OF ST. JOHN THE
DIVINE.
PREFACE
This Book of the Revelation has, for very good reasons, been received as one of the sacred books of the New Testament. The chief of these reasons have been mentioned by many authors, and are represented with great evidence and strength by Sir Isaac Newton, who observes, he does not find any other book of the New Testament so strongly attested, or commented upon so early, as this. And Dr. Lardner has collected with great care and faithfulness the testimonies of the most early Christian writers to the books of the New Testament, in his Treatise on the Credibility of the Gospel History. The testimony of some of the most eminent to the authority of this book is as follows: — 1. Justin Martyr, a person of great name, about the year of Christ 140, and so about fifty or sixty years after the writing of this book, expressly calls it a prophecy, and ascribes it to John the apostle, saying, “A man from among us, by name John, one of the apostles of Christ, in the Revelation to him, has prophesied,” &c. 2. Mileto, bishop of Sardis, one of the seven churches mentioned in the second and third chapters, wrote a book on the Revelation by St. John, which some think was an entire commentary; but whether or not, it shows he esteemed it a book of canonical authority. 3. Irenæus, who wrote about A.D. 178, within seventy or eighty years of St. John, expressly ascribes the Revelation to him, calling him the disciple of the Lord. His testimony to this book, as Lardner observes, “is so strong and full, that, considering the age of Irenæus, it seems to put it beyond all question that it was the work of St. John the apostle and evangelist.” 4. A little later, Theophilus of Antioch, in a book of his against the heresy of Hermogenes, makes use of testimonies from St. John’s Apocalypse. 5. Clement of Alexandria quotes these revelations as St. John’s, saying, “As John testifies in the Revelation.” And he refers to them as the words of an apostle, or as having the authority of apostolic writings. 6. Tertullian, who wrote about the year of Christ 200, and so somewhat about a hundred years after the time in which this book was written, observes, “John, in his Apocalypse, is commanded to correct those who ate things sacrificed to idols, and committed fornication.” And again: “We have churches, disciples of John; for, though Marcion rejects his Revelation, the succession of bishops, traced to the original, will assure us that John is the author of it.” We cannot wonder that Marcion should reject the Revelation, since he rejected all the Old Testament, and of the New received only the gospel of St. Luke, and ten epistles of St. Paul, which also he had corrupted and altered.
But this book of the Revelation, though never rejected by the ancient church, and as fully authenticated as any part of the canon of the New Testament, yet from the obscurity of the prophecies contained in it before their completion, was less known and less studied than the gospels, Acts, and epistles. Perhaps, says Dr. Apthorp, it was purposely concealed from being publicly read in the congregations of the early Christians, on principles of prudence and loyalty, as it distinctly foretold the subversion of the Roman empire, and the erecting other dynasties on its ruins. It was, however, universally received by the Latin Church, most interested in its predictions; and Eusebius and the Greek Church concurred with the Latins in venerating its authority as an essential part of the sacred canon. Indeed, the churches in general, nearest the times of the writing of this book, received it with so full consent, that, in a very few years, as Dr. Mill observes, it was acknowledged and placed in the number of apostolical writings, not only by the churches of Asia, but by the neighbouring churches of Syria and Samaria, by the more distant churches of Africa and Egypt, by Rome, and the other churches of Europe. Such reasons there are to receive this as one of the books of the Holy Scriptures of the New Testament, that hardly any one book has more early, full, or authentic attestations given to it.
Now all who thus receive it must acknowledge that it proceeds from the Spirit of prophecy; and that Spirit itself declares, “Blessed is he that readeth, and they that hear, the words of this prophecy,” &c., chap. 1:3. If we acknowledge this to be a true testimony respecting this book, as we must if we own it to be a book of Holy Scripture, we must acknowledge, also, that, how obscure soever the words of this prophecy may be, they are yet sufficiently intelligible to be very useful. Considering, however, the nature and design of prophecy, and the style and manner of expression generally used in it, we are not to expect that prophecies should be as easily understood as doctrines or precepts delivered in plain language, and the common familiar forms of speech. The nature and intention of prophecy were not to gratify our curiosity, by giving us to know future events, or, as it were, enabling us to tell the fortunes of the church and world; but to answer wise and good purposes; to confirm our faith, patience, and constancy; to encourage our hope and trust in God, and give us assurance of his protecting the cause of truth and righteousness, that is, of true religion: and especially to answer these good ends when we might be tempted to forsake true religion, by the power of prevailing error and reigning corruption, or might be greatly dejected and despair of success, when opposition to the truth is so powerful and violent as hardly to leave a reasonable prospect of bearing up against it. In such a state of things, which often has happened, it has been the use of prophecy to support the confidence and courage of good men, with lively and affecting representations of the majesty, power, and goodness of God; of his care to protect his cause and people, and of the power of his providence to superintend and order all things in the world in that way which shall most promote his own glory and the salvation of mankind. And, finally, the design of prophecy is to represent these things in such a manner as shall fix men’s attention, and confirm their faith in the truth of the Scriptures in which such prophecies are contained, and in his faithfulness certainly to accomplish his word in all things.
When such events of future time are foretold as shall, in their accomplishment, confirm our faith in the goodness, power, and faithfulness of God, and by such strong and lively representations thereof as shall make deep impressions on our minds, they answer a very wise and important design, and are of greater use than plainer precepts, enjoining constancy and perseverance, or plain promises of encouragement and reward, delivered in expressions more easy to be understood. In the first ages of Christianity, as well as in after times, good men were wont to be greatly discouraged with the afflictive state of the church, and the powerful opposition that was made to the gospel. For they hardly knew how to reconcile such a state of things with what they thought the Scriptures had given them reason to expect in the kingdom of the Messiah. It was, therefore, wise and proper, by a prophecy in the Christian Church, to support the minds of good men under these afflictions with assurances of Christ’s second coming, in its proper season, and of the watchful providence of God over his cause and people in the mean time. Thus the prophecies of this book are to us in the Christian Church of the like use that the prophecies of Christ’s first appearance were of to his ancient church.
That this is, properly speaking, a book of prophecy of things to come, as well as a description of the then present state and condition of the churches in Asia, Christ himself declares, Revelation 1:19, saying, “Write the things which thou hast seen, and the things which are, and the things which shall be hereafter;” and, Revelation 4:1, John heard a voice, which said, “Come up hither, and I will show thee the things that must be hereafter.” Some of these predictions, indeed, related to events not far distant from the time when the vision and prophecy were given, and, therefore, were soon to be accomplished. Thus the book is termed, Revelation 1:1, “the Revelation of Jesus Christ, &c., to show unto his servants things which must shortly come to pass;” and, Revelation 1:3, “Blessed is he that readeth, &c., for the time is at hand.” But from these and such like expressions we cannot infer, as some have done, that the whole prophecy was to be accomplished in a few years after the vision. They only show that the things foretold were soon to begin to be accomplished; not that their accomplishment was soon to end; the time included in these predictions evidently extending from the period when John had these visions to the day of final judgment.
At the time when John received the discoveries contained in this book, he was in banishment for “the word of God, and for the testimony of Jesus;” and the church was under persecution so long as the Roman empire continued heathen. Severe persecutions were almost perpetually renewed; and, a little before the time of Constantine, they were so severe, that they seemed to threaten the utter destruction of all who could not be forced to renounce the Christian faith, and fall in with the idolatrous worship established in the empire. The last persecution, under Diocletian, destroyed such incredible numbers, that the persecutors boasted they had effaced the name and superstition of the Christians, and had restored and propagated the worship of the gods. Yet the divine providence, after several great revolutions, made way for the authority of Constantine the Great, who put an end to the long persecution of ten years, gave freedom to the churches, and finally gave all protection and countenance to the Christian Church, and all assistance to promote the Christian faith and worship. So that the same power which before persecuted now protected the religion of Christ. The first period of prophecy, then, seems naturally to point out this period of history, which in general answers to it with great propriety and exactness, and will direct us to look for the fulfilment of the several parts of it, in some of the events of providence, which took place between the time of the vision, and the year of Christ about 323, when the opposition of the idolatrous power of Rome gave way to the protection and favour of Christian emperors.
The second period of prophecy points out the period of history between the year of Christ 323 to about 750, in which compass of time we seem to be directed to look for the accomplishment of the several particular predictions contained in this period; namely, when the Roman empire beginning to lose its power, and becoming unable to protect the church, a swarm of idolatrous nations from the northern countries, under several names, broke in upon that empire, and divided the western part of it into several separate and independent governments, or kingdoms; so that the Christian faith and worship were in as much danger from the idolatry of the northern nations, who had divided the empire among them, as they were before in danger from the idolatry of the empire itself. It pleased God, also, to permit that impostor, Mohammed, and his successors, to gain so much ground, and to spread that imposture so far and so fast, that it threatened the ruin of the Christian name and religion in the East. Yet the idolatrous northern nations were soon themselves brought to embrace Christianity, and to use all their power and authority to protect and promote it. And though the Saracens made great inroads for some time, yet was their progress stopped both in the east and west, as shall be shown in the proper place.
The third period seems also to be determined to the time of its beginning and ending by the prophecy itself, including the time of the beast, of the woman’s being in the wilderness, and of the treading down of the holy city; which times are variously expressed, but plainly in such a manner as to intend the same duration. It is said to be for “forty-two months;” (Revelation 11:2; 13:5;) “for a time, times, and half a time;” (Revelation 12:14;) which ways of numbering are explained by another; namely, twelve hundred and sixty days, Revelation 11:3. The difficulty then of assigning the exact historical time of this period lies chiefly in fixing when these twelve hundred and sixty days are to begin; or, which will be the same, at what period in history we are to fix the beginning of the power of the beast, of the flying of the woman into the wilderness, and of treading the holy city under foot; for these are the calamities of this period. When the last-mentioned period shall have continued the time specified in the above-mentioned numbers, namely, forty-two months, a time, times, and half a time, or twelve hundred and sixty days, according to the style of prophecy, the beast shall be destroyed, that old serpent, which is the devil and Satan, shall be bound a thousand years, during which time the church shall be in a happy and peaceful state, which will be the fourth remarkable period, described Revelation 19:20; 20:2.
When these thousand years shall be expired, Satan again shall be loosed out of his prison for a short time; and this will make a fifth period, Revelation 20:7. This shall occasion a new and the last attempt of error and wickedness against truth and righteousness; but this attempt shall end in the final ruin of all the enemies of religion, which shall be the sixth period, chap. 20:9, 10.
The seventh period, set forth in chap. 21., 22., respects the everlasting happiness of the righteous and faithful servants of God and Christ in a state of glorious immortality, and an endless sabbath. This order of the prophecies given by Lowman appears very natural and intelligible, and more agreeable to the important facts of history than perhaps any other system; and yet it is the truth of history which alone can show us what has been the providence of God toward the church and world from the time of this vision of St. John to our own days.
It is evident such a plan of prophecy and order of history are well calculated to answer the important designs of revelation in general, to prepare the church to expect opposition and sufferings in this present world, to support good men under all the trials of their faith and patience, to give encouragement to persevere in true religion, whatever dangers may attend our so doing, to assure us that God will attend to and protect his own cause, so that no opposition shall finally prevail against it; that God will assuredly judge and punish the enemies of truth and righteousness, and that their opposition thereto shall certainly end in their own destruction, when the faithful perseverance of the true followers of Christ shall be crowned with a glorious state of immortal life and happiness. The great truths concerning the majesty of God, the wisdom and care of his providence, the dignity, authority, and power of Christ, the protection of the church, the restraint and punishment of its enemies, and the final happiness of all who shall faithfully persevere in true faith, piety, and virtue, are here delivered in such an awful manner, such animated language, and striking representations, as must greatly affect the spirits of genuine Christians. A regard to this book of Revelation, as predicting events by a Spirit of prophecy, which, therefore, will surely come to pass, serves to raise us above the fear of men, by a lively faith and assured confidence in God. To look upon the promises and threatenings of this book as infallible predictions, which shall certainly be accomplished, must animate every well-disposed and considerate person to resist all temptations of error and sin with faithfulness, constancy, and zeal. The lake of fire, and the terrors of the second death, the portion of the fearful and unbelieving; and, on the other hand, the glory and felicity of the New Jerusalem, and a right to the tree of life, the portion of all the faithful, are represented by such strong and lively images, as are calculated, not only to fix men’s attention, but to touch their hearts and affections, and engage them with zeal and diligence to follow the wise directions of truth and righteousness. And an exact conformity between these prophetic descriptions and the real state of the church and the world, for a series of some hundreds of years, gives continually new and increasing evidence of the truth and importance of the Christian revelation, and the authenticity and authority of the books of the New Testament; and it greatly confirms our faith in God’s promises and threatenings, and thereby gives them their full force and influence upon us. Such is the improvement which the Holy Spirit of prophecy designed should arise from the perusal of this book of Revelation; and doubtless it has had, and still will have, this effect upon thousands that seriously read and weigh its contents. For one of its prophetic declarations is, “Blessed is he that readeth, and they that hear, the words of this prophecy, and keep those things that are written therein.” It must be observed, however, that in the interpretations and applications of these prophecies we are not to expect demonstrations, or such proofs as shall be liable to no manner of objection; or that some weak and ill-informed persons may not wrest these prophecies, as they do the other scriptures, and may do any principles whatsoever, to extravagant expectations, designs, and actions. It should be sufficient to satisfy us, if we find a proper and probable sense of these prophetic expressions and descriptions, suited to the manifest and wise design of the whole prophecy. And if these interpretations are supported by an application of events in history, that are justly applicable, both to the prophetic descriptions, and to the series and order of the predictions; if they are events worthy a spirit of prophecy to reveal, and agreeable to the spirit and intention of this prophecy in particular, we may, without exposing ourselves to the charge of being over credulous, reasonably rest satisfied with them. Then we may represent these prophecies to ourselves in that noble and useful view in which a great author (Bossuet, bishop of Meaux, Explication of the Revelation, Preface) has placed them: “In the gospel of St. John we read the life of Christ on earth; a man conversing with men, humble, poor, weak, and suffering; we behold a sacrifice ready to be offered, and a man appointed to sorrows and death; but in the Revelation we have the gospel of Christ now raised from the dead. He speaks and acts as having conquered the grave, and triumphed over death and hell, as entered into the place of his glory; angels, principalities, and powers being made subject to him; and exercising the supreme universal power he has received from the Father over all things in heaven and earth, as our Saviour, for the protection of his church, and for the sure happiness of his faithful servants in the end.”
Nothing, says Dr. Apthorp, who pursues the same line of interpretation with Lowman, in the Jewish prophecies themselves, exceeds the sublimity of the exordium of the Apocalypse; “the vision of Jesus Christ, the monarch of his church, and the divine instructions to the Asian churches, and in them to the churches of all succeeding times, Revelation 1:1-8; 3.; 4. In the second vision heaven opens, the throne of God is surrounded by his saints, and the Lamb opens the seven seals amidst the acclamations of the angelic hosts, chap. 5.-viii. In the third vision the angels sound the seven trumpets, 8.-11. In the fourth vision the dragon persecutes the church, the two beasts rise from the earth and sea, and are defeated by the Lamb, Revelation 11:15; 14. In the fifth vision the angels pour the vials of the wrath of God on the kingdom and throne of antichrist, chap. 15.-19. In the sixth vision Satan is bound for a thousand years, chap. 20. The seventh vision reveals the destined glories of the true religion, emblemized by the new heavens and new earth, and the New Jerusalem descending from God out of heaven, chap. 21., 22.”
Respecting the style of this book we may rely on the testimony of Blackwall. “The Revelation,” says he, in his Sacred Classics, “is writ in much the same style with the gospel and epistles, and entertains and instructs the reader with variety of Christian morals and sublime mysteries. From this noble book may be drawn resistless proofs of our Saviour’s eternal existence; the incommunicable attributes of eternity and infinite power are there plainly and directly applied to Jesus, the Son of God. It is in vain to look for more lofty descriptions or majestic images than you find in this sacred book. Could the acclamations and hallelujahs of God’s household be expressed with more propriety and magnificence than by the shouts of vast multitudes, the roaring of many waters, and the dreadful sound of the loudest and strongest thunders? And how transporting an entertainment must it be to the blessed to have all the strength of sound, tempered with all its sweetness and harmony, perfectly suited to their celestial ear and most exalted taste! The description of the Son of God in the nineteenth chapter, verses 11-17, is in all the pomp and grandeur of language. We have every circumstance and particular that is most proper to express power and justice, majesty and goodness; to raise admiration and high pleasure, corrected with awe.”
Joseph Sutcliffe
The Revelation of John the Divine.
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THE REVELATION OF
JOHN THE DIVINE.
THE cherubim in the Hebrew sanctuary are depicted as spreading their wings around the mercyseat, and in a position somewhat inclined, as though they were desirous to pry into the mysteries contained in the ark. St. Peter confirms this idea. After stating that the prophets had strove to decypher the swelling exuberance of the Spirit, which spake in them of the salvation which is come to us, he adds, “which things the angels desire to look into.” 1 Peter 1:10-12. Ephesians 3:10. Daniel, in like manner, kept his eye with prayers and tears on the out-beaming radiances of the future sufferings and glory of the church. He was admitted to see the conflicts and succession of the four great monarchies which ruled the ancient world, Babylon, Persia, Greece, and Rome. He particularly noticed the very singular character of the fourth empire, in which the God of heaven would set up a kingdom which should never be destroyed, nor left to other people, the conquerors of the nations. Daniel 2:36-45. These prophecies, perfectly realized by providence in future years, like the pillars of Jachin and Booz in front of the temple of God, display their splendid chapiters, crowned with the glory of revelation, and laugh at all the empoisoned arrows of atheism and revolt. Of the evangelical Zion it is said, Her foundation is the holy hill — she shall never be moved. St. John, having studied those disclosures of the divine pleasure, was allowed in hoary age, like the venerable Daniel, to see the extension of those revelations in the kingdoms of the earth, to the final consummation of the ages. He unlooses the seven seals, and sounds the seven trumpets; he also hears the seven thunders, but records not their voices, leaving the comments with providence. He foresaw the candlestick removed from Asia for apostasy, and the cloud of Mahomedan darkness, rising out of the bottomless pit, or hell, let loose in their bloody wars and conflicts. He describes the exile and sufferings of the saints, fighting against the great red dragon of pagan Rome. He depicts the antichristian tyranny, as a beast creeping out of the earth in the dark. He foresaw the splendid drapery of the harlot church, and the bloody sufferings of the witnesses, children of the chaste bride, in all their conflicts to establish the pure and spiritual worship of God amid the domination of lucrative idolatry. He heard the final songs of victory. “Hallelujah, the Lord God omnipotent reigneth. The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our God, and of his Christ.”
John was banished to the isle of Patmos in the year of Christ ninety five, and allowed to return to Ephesus in ninety seven. In this solitary retreat the Lord consoled him with a succession of revelations, the most luminous that had ever been opened to the mind of man. The consolations of this book to a suffering church are beyond description. It opened all heaven as spectators of her conflicts, loading her with eulogies, and with full assurances of victory and eternal glory.
How well this revelation was received by the few who then knew how to appreciate its worth, we may judge from the martyrdom of Polycarp, bishop of Smyrna. He was a disciple of John in his younger years, and had acquired the glory in the church to be bishop of Smyrna. In the year 167, when arrested and brought by a guard of soldiers before the Proconsul in Smyrna, and when unmoved by the entreaties of friends and the menaces of foes to renounce Christ, he cited in his last prayer, ere the flames surrounded him, some words of the elder, in Revelation 11:17. Mr. T. H. Horne, B. D., justly remarks, that “this book was very generally, if not universally acknowledged, during the two first centuries, and yet in the third it began to be questioned.” The reasons are sufficiently apparent. The sects, whose faith was not pure, and afterwards the whole Arian age, could not brook to see the Adonai seated at the right hand of Jehovah, and all things put under him. Psalm 110. Dr. Lardner, on this subject, forms an exception. He himself believed in the divine assumption, and vindicated the authenticity of the book.
The first regular attack against St. John, as the author of the Revelation, was by Dennis of Alexandria, who says, as carefully abridged by Du Pin, that the inscription in the first verse was a forgery; that some have attributed it to Cerinthus; that others had attributed it to some other John, there being many of that name. Respecting the twelve caveats of Dennis, Du Pin adds, that they are very weak.
Eusebius put the Revelation in the canonical books of the new testament, but adds afterwards, that some do not receive it. — Hist. Ecclesiastes lib.
3. cap. 25.
William Whiston, professor of mathematics in the university of Cambridge, wrote an essay on the Revelation, 1706, quarto, pp. 395. Whiston says, p. 32, “These visions were seen by John in the isle of Patmos, where he was banished, as in ver. 9, 10, ‘for the word of God, and for the testimony of Jesus,’ as all chronologers agree, whether papists or protestants. What most confirms this assertion, and reduces it to almost a certainty, is the testimony of Irenæus, who lived in the next age, and who had been the frequent auditor of those who had conversed with John, and of whom he had made particular enquiries concerning the book of Revelation. He adds, that he had accurately collated the different copies, and weighed the disputations concerning this admirable work. This authentic writer affirms, what was then very commonly known, that the Apocalypse was seen in vision by John, a little before his time, at the close of the reign of Domitian.”
The emperor Domitian did not die till the year ninety six. Many writers therefore place the visions of John in that year, which was twenty six years after the destruction of Jerusalem. The chronology of Irenæus is the more to be confided in, as it synchronizes with the records of certain heathen writers referred to by Eusebius. By consequence, none of the events predicted by John can refer to any occurrences anterior to the destruction of Jerusalem.
The title given to the author of this book is Θεολογου, the Divine. This high appellation is used by Origen, without any apology, a title consequent on the sublimity of his predictions. It is continued in Jerome, Theologi; in Beza, in Coccejus, and others. The Platonists had given it to Orpheus, or the divine poet, as is noted by Dr. Hammond.
Now, that I may the better give the general sense of the church on this mysterious book, and not my own weak conjectures, I have procured Mede, More, Marlorat, Whiston, Jurieu, and others who have written largely on the subject, besides a very ample assortment of sacred versions, and of ancient and modern criticism. May God help me to make the selection assortable with the plan of a Family bible, using as to the sense, my own judgment, and giving an abridged translation of others. But, gentle reader, do not expect too much of man, for providence alone can give the true comment on prophecies. The veil of futurity must not be lifted up too far, lest men should forget the state of their conscience, and their present duties, to indulge unseasonably in the hopes of the church. I am however decided in opinion, that this mysterious book is now more unlocked than at any former period.
Daniel Whedon
Introduction
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REVELATION
INTRODUCTION
INSTEAD of a permanent order of prophets, as in the Old Testament, we are presented in the New, once for all, with a permanent prophecy. The Apocalypse furnishes us all the prediction we need during the Christian ages. It answers to the inquirer, from the primitive age to the present, the great question, “What is the structure of the Christian dispensation from the time of its establishment even down to its emergence into eternity?” It thence furnishes the true form of New Testament eschatology; the true order and shaping of the last events of human and earthly history within the sphere of the kingdom of Christ, from the first advent to the second. The book has been very much misinterpreted; so much so, that with some it is an established maxim that “the Apocalypse either finds its interpreter mad or makes him so.” Yet it may with truth be affirmed, that all who have accepted the above eschatological view have, in the great outline, essentially agreed, however they may have varied in subordinates. The Messianic dispensation, from the time of the first advent to the second, is found by all such interpreters to consist in a series of struggles between the powers of evil and the powers of good, until the final triumph of the righteous cause. The Apocalypse has ever been, therefore, the beacon of the final subjection of the world-power to Christ. It is the book of sure hope, the charter of ultimate victory. Under this view of the book we can enter upon its interpretation with a trust that, whatever be the error of our particular interpretations, our whole cannot be far from right. The organic structure of the New Testament, we may add, requires the Apocalypse. Without that book the New Testament is an unfinished volume; it has hardly even “a lame and impotent conclusion,” but rather no conclusion at all. This is a general but strong argument against all doubts of its canonicity and of its place in the canon.
AUTHORSHIP OF THE APOCALYPSE.
The testimony to the authorship of the Apocalypse by John, on historical grounds, is early, abundant, and uncontradicted within the Church. During the first century after its publication it is either directly affirmed to be the apostle’s, or quoted as his by a dense body of writers. We may name Papias, John’s contemporary; Justin Martyr, (between A.D. 139 and 161;) Melito, bishop of Sardis, (about A.D. 171;) Theophilus, bishop of Antioch, (about 180;) and Irenaeus, (about 180.) Next we have Tertullian, (about 220,) Hippolytus, bishop of Ostia. (about 240,) Clement of Alexandria, (about 200,) and Origen, (about 233.) To these add Jerome, Augustine, Basil the Great, Athanasius, Gregory of Nyssa, and Ambrose. Of two of these successive witnesses we give the explicit testimony:— Justin Martyr says:
“A certain man among us, whose name was John, one of the apostles of Christ, in a revelation made to him, prophesied that those believing in our Christ will spend a thousand years in Jerusalem, and after that the universal, and, to speak
comprehensively, the eternal, resurrection and judgment of all together, shall take place.”
Irenaeus, (whom we have elsewhere called the grand-pupil of John,) in numerous passages gives “John the disciple of the Lord,” “who leaned upon his bosom,” as author of the Apocalypse. So, speaking of the antichristic number, 666, he says that number is found “in all the good and ancient copies, and is attested by those who have seen John face to face.” We see at once that Irenaeus gives the testimony heard by himself of John’s own personal acquaintances, who had discussed the matter of the true text with the apostle himself, and with no other John than the apostle. It is certain that the publication of the Apocalypse must have been an event of great public notoriety among the Churches of Asia Minor. It came from the great survivor of the apostolic body known throughout the Christian world—the disciple who leaned upon the bosom of Christ himself. It was addressed to the seven principal Churches in tones of imperative apostolic warning. It no doubt went the public round of those seven great Churches, being publicly announced and read in their congregations. It furnished the great programme of the future of the Messianic Church. With the friends and contemporaries of John, therefore, both the authorship and date of the Apocalypse must have been matters of profound interest and perfect knowledge. It must have been an event for half a century. When, therefore, Irenaeus tells us that his information came from John’s own interviewers, we have a rarely sure authority. It is no guess, no conjecture, but an immediate knowledge. And this, be it noted, applies to our coming discussion of the date, as well as to the authorship. An argument is drawn against John’s authorship from the difference of its style from that of John’s Gospel and Epistles. We discuss this point further under the head of DATE. While it is fully admitted that the diversity of style is very great, that fact is not with out its explanations, as there shown. But while these diversities are undeniable, scholars have, on the other hand, found many traces of underlying identity. These identities justify the belief that the diversities of style arise from the diversity of conditions. The identity, especially of the theology of the Apocalypse with that of the Gospel and Epistles, has been discussed at great length, and shown with great clearness, by Gebhardt, in his work, “The Doctrine of the Apocalypse.”
In opposition to this body of early historical evidence there is nothing of a historical character to present. The Alogi, a small heretical sect, denied the apostolic authorship, because they held it a production unworthy of John. In the third century, Caius of Rome rejected it because he interpreted it to teach Chiliasm, that is, the premillennial advent. On the same grounds Dionysius, successor of Origen at Alexandria, and Eusebius the historian, entertained doubts of its apostolic origin. But none of these testify to the fact on historical grounds. Whether the book is obscure, and unworthy an apostle, or teaches erroneous doctrine, are matters of opinion; in which we are as competent to judge as either of these eminent scholars. Our conclusion as to the authorship is to be ruled by authentic witnesses who testify to a fact they know; but in regard to its worthiness or its interpretation we are not ruled by the opinions of men who know no better than we. Historically, therefore, the testimony in favour of John’s authorship of the Apocalypse is not only overwhelming but uncontradicted. DATE OF THE APOCALYPSE.
On the question of date the historic testimony is as unanimous as on the question of apostolic authorship. The pretence that it was written in the time of Nero or Galba has not a single testimony in all the Christian literature of the first three—we might say, of the first five—centuries. There is not a single author of the first three centuries that gives any other date than the reign of Domitian.
First comes the decisive testimony of one who certainly knew the true date, Irenaeus, the grand-pupil of John, whom we have already adduced as quoting the words of the personal friends of John whom he knew. In regard to the real name symbolized by 666, he tells us: “If it were necessary for this name to be at the present time proclaimed, it would have been uttered by him who saw the apocalypse; for it was not seen a long time ago, but almost in our own generation, at the end of the reign of Domitian.”
The opponents of the Domitianian date, very unjustifiably styling this the “Irenaean tradition,” heroically assume that all the other testifiers to the same date derive their knowledge of the date from Irenaeus, so that the testimony of all “is reduced to the testimony of one man.” Ask them for their proof of such derivation, and their helpless reply is, that “it is the same tradition.” But how that proves that this “same tradition” came through the same one man, is what they can adduce nothing to show. In our remarks on Irenaeus’s testimony to John’s authorship we noted how widely notorious both authorship and date must have been to John’s contemporaries, and so the same “one tradition” must have come down to the generation of Irenaeus through thousands of different channels. The so-called “Irenaean tradition” was the sole tradition of the whole Church. The foolish fable of the Neronian date has no existence in literature until the sixth century. Its revival in modern times, on the most fantastic grounds, is a discredit to biblical criticism. The real object of these pseudo-criticisms is to identify John’s conception of the recovery of the beast of 13:1 from death with a vulgar superstition of the Roman populace that Nero, after his assassination, had a resurrection from the dead—a superstition which closer research shows really not to have existed. (See our closing notes to chapter 17.) Against this imaginary derivation from Irenaeus there are decided proofs. 1. No witness, except Eusebius the historian, refers to Irenaeus as his author. 2. Variations and subordinate additions show independence of testimonies. 3. The corroborations which we shall soon give from secular history, of the Domitianian date of John’s Patmos residence could not, at any rate, have come down through Irenaeus.
Clement of Alexandria says, “After the tyrant died, John returned from the island of Patmos to Ephesus.” Clement does not in this clause mention Domitian by name; but we know from Eusebius, who quotes these words from Clement, that Domitian was the “tyrant” that Clement meant. For Eusebius introduces the quotation by saying, that John “addressed the Churches of Asia, on his return from his banishment to the isle of Patmos, after the death of Domitian.”
Origen alludes to the imperial banisher of John in a remarkably similar manner: “The emperor of the Romans, as tradition teaches, condemned John for testifying on account of the word of truth, to the island of Patmos. And John narrates the things in regard to his testimony, not telling who condemned him, saying these words in his Apocalypse: ‘1 John, etc. Revelation 1:9.’” Origen here notes John’s silence about his banisher, not as though it were doubtful who he was, but as a forbearance on the part of the apostle. See our note on the passage. John names his banishment, but, forbearingly, not his banisher. That Origen knew “the tradition” of Domitian there can be no reasonable doubt; and there is no reason to suppose that he knew any other, or that any other existed. By “emperor of the Romans,” therefore, he meant Domitian.
Victorinus, Bishop of Pettau, and martyr under Diocletian, third century, says, “This John saw, when he was in the island of Patmos, being condemned to the mines by Domitian Caesar.”
In the fourth century the Domitianian date is, for the first time, apparently contradicted by Epiphanius, Bishop of Salamis, who uses the phrases, “after he was ninety years old,” “after his return from Patmos, which took place under Claudius Caesar;” that is, about the year A.D. 54. On this we may note: 1. It helps not the advocates of Nero a particle. 2. It gives the name of an emperor which almost nobody advocates. 3. Epiphanius has a low character for accuracy with scholars. 4. The passage contradicts itself; for John (who is universally held as younger than the Saviour) was scarce half ninety years old in the time of Claudius. Finally, it gives nearly the true Domitianian date; for John was probably not far from ninety on his return from his banishment by that emperor. The real fact seems to be, that Epiphanius himself had the Domitianian date in view, but twice misrecollected the name of the emperor of that date.
It is not until the sixth century that the Neronian fable appears. The unknown writer of the subscription to the Apocalypse of the Philoxenian Version (Syriac) says, “The revelation which was made by God to John the Evangelist in the island of Patmos, whither he was banished by the Emperor Nero.” A statement made for the first time six centuries after date, would be considered valueless by any critical historian. This passage, therefore, so far as this discussion is concerned, has no existence. It furnishes not the slightest proof of any existing tradition or opinion in the Church favouring that date. The ignorant writer names Nero just because Nero was, traditionally, the standard Roman persecutor, the first to be thought of when a persecutor is to be mentioned.
There are two remarkable passages in the early Church writers, which have been so manipulated to prove the Neronian date that it is necessary to notice them. The first is from Eusebius, who says: “It was at Rome that Peter was crucified with his head downward, that Paul was beheaded, and John was banished to the island.” Now this says nothing about the date of the three events, but only the place, namely, Rome. And Tertullian: “Happy that Church in which the apostles poured forth their whole doctrine and their blood; where Peter imitated the passion of his Lord; where Paul was crowned with the martyrdom of the Baptist; and where the apostle John, after he had been immersed in hot oil and suffered nothing, was banished to the island.” Not a word is here said of date, but only of place. The locality of all these events is said to be Rome; their time is unmentioned.
DATE OF THE PATMOS RESIDENCE.
Besides these direct proofs, the records of the date of John’s banishment and return even more decisively fix the date of the writing. First, it is in Domitian’s reign alone, that history finds the custom of banishing individuals for religious reasons; and it is uniformly agreed that the banished were restored at, or after, the close of his reign. Under Nero the punishment was immediate execution, not banishment. The Pagan historian of these times, Dion Cassius, says: “Nerva” (the successor of Domitian) “released those that had been condemned, and restored those that had been banished for impiety;” that is, for rejecting paganism. Eusebius, the historian, says: “They marked the time accurately, namely, in the fifteenth year of Domitian, relating that, besides many others, Flavia Domitilla, who was niece of Flavius Clemens, one of the then aristocracy of Rome, was, on account of her testimony to Christ, banished for punishment to the Pontian island.” Tertullian, with a slight inaccuracy, varies from the unanimous account of all other writers, and makes Domitian restore those whom he had banished. Victorinus, in a passage above quoted, says that John was “condemned to the mines by Domitian Caesar.” Eusebius, in his Chronicon, says that John’s banishment was in the fourteenth year of Domitian’s reign. We need, however, quote no further on this point; for with the exception of the untrusty Epiphanius, who dates the banishment under Claudius, (which nearly nobody now believes,) all before the sixth century, both pagan and Christian writers, date the banishment under Domitian. But if John resided in Patmos under Domitian, he wrote the Apocalypse under Domitian.
Against the Domitianian date certain passages are quoted from the book itself; but it is fatal to this argument that it is obliged to assume certain peculiar interpretations of those passages—interpretations which are entirely inadmissible. Thus, because the city of Jerusalem and temple are mentioned, Revelation 11:1, and the tribes in Revelation 7:4-8, it is assumed by these interpretations that Jerusalem, the literal city, was not yet destroyed. But is it not a wonderful blunder to assume that because a thing is mentioned, it really exists at the time of mention? Is a thing never named or described after it has been once destroyed? But the use of Jerusalem and temple and tribes as apocalyptic symbols, no more proves the literal existence of the city than the descriptions of Babylon prove that that great capital then existed in all its power and glory. See our notes on those two passages.
Another equally fallacious argument is derived from the assumption that the “beast” of Revelation 13:1, etc., represents Nero. It is assumed that the “kings” of Revelation 17:10 are Roman emperors; and, counting in Julius Caesar, who preceded Augustus, the sixth who now “is” would be Nero. (See our notes.) Then the date of the book must be under Nero, and the wounded head must be identified with Nero’s suicide. It is, in fact, to maintain this fabulous identification, that the historical proofs of the Domitianian date are so unscrupulously outraged by the false “criticism.” The earlier date has been, finally, deduced from the strong and youthful style of the Apocalypse. There is confessedly a great difference in style between the Apocalypse and John’s Gospel and Epistles. From this marked contrariety one class of critics has denied that both were by the same writer; and others would infer that the Apocalypse was much the earlier written. The answer to either one of these two inferences would refute the other.
It is admitted that the style of the Apocalypse is much more rhapsodical, abounding in Hebraisms, solecisms, and defiances of grammatical rules. The Gospel and Epistles, as exhibiting more Greek culture and a calmer spirit, are plausibly inferred to be the later productions. Yet this single difficulty cannot be allowed to invalidate the solid historical demonstrations, both that the Apocalypse is John’s and that it was written late in life. An illustrative parallel may be drawn, as one instance, from the case of Thomas Carlyle. Early in life his biography of Schiller was written in chaste, calm, Addisonian English; but with this his history of the French Revolution and all his other later productions stand in most violent contrast. It was in his mature life and old age that his style grew bold and wild, and often grotesque and paroxysmal. There was not only the appearance of two contrasted styles, but of two very opposite minds. The one was the style of the pure quiet thought of the age of Queen Anne, the other was steeped in the most intense and turbulent spirit of modern Germany. Now John’s Gospel and Epistles were written in his best Greek to win his Ephesian audience to the history and doctrines of Jesus. On the contrary, in the Apocalypse he is an emulator of the prophets of the Old Testament. His soul as well as his style is Hebraized. Both from the mental frame into which his inspiring theme wraps him, and from set purpose, he forces and tortures language to express his colossal conceptions in the grandest and most energetic forms. He does not, like Carlyle, possess himself of a new and foreign style and mind; but rather returns to the style and mind of his youth, before Grecian culture had softened his Hebraism— the era when Jesus surnamed him a “son of thunder.” We do not hesitate, therefore, to recognise in the Apocalypse both the venerable age and the renewed youth of the last of the apostles.
SACRED NUMBERS OF THE APOCALYPSE.
That certain numbers have a symbolical significance is now admitted by all eminent commentators. The frequent coincidence of the same number in the numbering of actual literal objects, of course proves nothing; but when we are within the sphere of symbols, and where numbers are a matter of the author’s pure choice, an element of significance found repeatedly occurring furnishes the probable reason of the particular selection. For a brief complete ascertainment of the symbols 3, 4, 7, 12, the reader is referred to our note, Sacred Numbers, at the close of Luke 6. Here we may first note:—
THE CREATIONAL NUMBER, FOUR.
The first four of the seven seals, of the seven trumpets, and the seven vials, are creational; that is, connected closely with the physical frame of the earth. See our notes. The remaining divine threes of each of these three sevens mount higher, and refer to the spiritual interests of man. The fours symbolize the world in the aspects of sin and woe; the threes present the consequent retribution and redemption. The former presuppose Adam, the fall, and the ruin; the latter auspicate Christ, the judgment, and the renovation. So also Revelation 7:1, four angel guardians over physical objects, four winds, four corners; and, Revelation 20:8, four corners of the earth. See following passages for enumerations of four particulars: Revelation 7:9; 8:5; 10:11; 11:9; 12:9; 13:7; 14:6; 17:15. To some of these instances we would not attribute a creational character, from their single intrinsic nature; but there is, perhaps, no one in which it may not well be found after the law has been ascertained by induction from a sufficient number of instances.
THE NUMBER SEVEN.
Seven is the prince of sacred numbers. That it is viewed as a combination of the creational four and the trinitarian or divine three, thus symbolizing the totality of the world and God, is clear from the seven seals, trumpets, and vials. How it dominates in the Apocalypse is shown in our note closing Luke vi, enumerating no less than fifteen series measured by that number. Dr. Pusey (Daniel, p. 167) suggests that the adoption of this number has also a basis in the development of the human bodily system. He quotes plentiful authorities showing the ancient opinion that human life advances by seven-year stages. Plutarch tells us that “Heraclitus and the Stoics say that man’s perfection begins about his second seventh year.” Solon has left a poem describing the seven-year advancing stages of life to the tenth, agreeing with the psalmist in his limitation; but other thinkers counted to the twelfth, making eighty-four years the natural limit. Modern law makes thrice seven the period for attaining manhood.
But is there not another corporeal basis for the number seven? Some thinkers tell us that our seven-day period of labour and repose is the true measure suited to man’s constitution. More or less would not adjust well to his nature. Our impression is, that most men feel this to be the fact. Whatever other concordant reasons there may be, then, the week has truly a fixed physiological basis. “The sabbath was made for man.” It might seem, then, that the parable of the divine creational rest was framed as basis for the sabbath law in the decalogue. Whatever physical basis the seven-day cycle of the Mosaic cosmogony possesses, it seems quite clear that that cycle is prepared and adjusted for the decalogue, not the decalogue to the cycle. As man is the miniature image of God, so man’s repose is miniature of God’s parabolic repose, and man’s little week is the miniature of God’s stupendous week. Yet the week, in accordance with all these facts, has an astronomical basis in its being the approximate quarter of a month.
THE NUMBER TEN
seems to symbolize the human universality of our race, usually in its secular and even profane aspect. Ten utterances are given by Moses (Genesis i) as uttered by Elohim in bringing the world to becoming the home of man. It is remarkable that both genealogies of the race, from the creation to the flood, and from the flood to Abraham, contain ten generations. Ten were the plagues of Egypt revealing Jehovah to the profane world. Ten were the commandments, the law for all the world. Ten the toes of Daniel’s image ultimately representing the nations of the world; and ten the horns of the apocalyptic beast symbolizing the same universality. Ten were the virgins of the parable representing our probationary race. Ten multiplied by seven represents a similar universality. See our introductory note to Luke 10. Seventy was the number of deacons representing a universal ministry; seventy was, with the Jews, the symbolic number of the nations of the earth. Ten raised to a cube, and usually multiplied into some other number, serves to increase the whole number to a magnitude required by the subject. See notes on Revelation 7:4; 9:16; 11:13; 20:4. TIME NUMBERS.
Whether the Apocalypse in its number of 1260 days uses “a day for a year,” has been a much-mooted question. Symmetry requires something like such a symbolism. Where a beast symbolizes a nation, a symbolic reduction of number is required. For, how monstrous would be the making the life of a beast 1260 years! The rude proportion is: As a beast to a nation so 1260 days to 1260 years. So in Ezekiel 4:1-8 the proportion was: As Ezekiel’s tile was to Jerusalem, so was a day to a year. Wordsworth rightly makes the 42 months, or 1260 days, an adverse period; but not only does this number in its various forms symbolize the adverse, but also the extension or magnitude of the period. John’s great numbers are usually the exact for the inexact. Such are the 144,000 of chapter 7; the 200,000,000 of Revelation 9:16; the 7,000 of Revelation 11:13; the 1,000 of Revelation 20:2. Daniel’s seventy weeks were very nearly literal; the symbol existing not in the events predicted, but, if at all, only in the weeks, or rather, literal heptads. Hence both the Jewish and Christian expositors have looked for an exact period of seventy years. In the Apocalypse, however, the analogy appears to be in favour of viewing the 1260 days as an approximation to a definite period of extended centuries. See notes on Revelation 12:14 and 13:5. STRUCTURE OF THE BOOK.
A comparison of passages will show that John received THREE DISTINCT COMMISSIONS to prophesy, from three distinct donors, producing what may, not improperly, be styled three apocalypses.
The FIRST COMMISSION (Revelation 1:19) is given by Christ himself in a CHRISTOPHANY or personal appearing; and hence we have, in chaps, 2, 3, what we may call the Christophanic apocalypse.
The SECOND (Revelation 4:1) is bestowed by a THEOPHANY, or present God; and hence we have, in iv-ix, the Theophanic apocalypse. The THIRD (Revelation 10, 11) is bestowed by a personally appearing angel, (chap. 10,) and hence the remainder of the book is the ANGELOPHANIC apocalypse.
The first, or CHRISTOPHANIC part, is Christ’s messages dictated to John, and addressed to the seven representative Churches of Asia, and through them to all the Churches of the Christian ages.
The second, or THEOPHANIC part, is a prophetic presentation of the then future of the Christian dispensation, exhibited not in chronological history, but in a few pictorial phases, through a cycle of six opening seals succeeded by a celestial sealing.
The third, or ANGELOPHANIC part, presents, in a fuller and more definite chronological order and completeness the same Christian dispensation, exhibiting the struggles of Christ and Antichrist, down through the days of divine triumph to the final judgment and eternity. This third part consists of the great historical Seventh Trumpet, preluded by the six previous trumpets. As a whole, the six-seal series and the seven-trumpet series go over the same cycle of time; the former by phases, the latter, first (in the six trumpets) by phases and then (in the seventh) by consecutive history. The seventh trumpet is the true historic consecutive Apocalypse. It deals in chronological events and movements. Yet it is not so specifically minute as to mention any single human individual in history. There is no mention of Nero, nor Charlemagne, nor Napoleon, nor of the Crimean war; the curiosity that looks into the Apocalypse as a fortune-telling record of particular contemporaneous events or personages is the source of a large amount of the discredit resting on this book. Those who expect to find contemporaneous events exhibited large as life in this book forget how great a space so small a map as the Apocalypse has to cover. When Alcibiades was boasting of the large estates he was to inherit, Socrates laid before him the map of Greece, and brought him to modesty by asking him to point out his broad acres. We need a similar modesty in estimating our own magnitude in the Apocalypse.
THE PREDICTION, THE AGENTS, AND THE APPARATUS.
The object of the Apocalypse, mainly, is prediction. And these predictions appear in a series of pictures, or symbolical images, presented to the seer and represented to us by him in words. But a large part of the book is occupied with a description of the agents, and of the apparatus or machinery, as we may call it, by whom and by which these pictures are presented to view. These three parts—the agents, the apparatus, and the prediction—must be distinguished from each other by the reader. The agents are, Christ, God, the angel of chap. x, and various angels. The apparatus consists of the sceneries and inanimate objects, the seals, the trumpets, the vials, etc. Thus in the second part the fourth and fifth chapters are entirely occupied with the agents and apparatus and their action, by which the “seals” are to be brought out and the predictions the seals contain are to be brought to view. It is the revealed contents of the seals which are the true predictions. Very erroneous conclusions result when an agent or apparatus is mistaken for a predictive symbol. Sad errors are produced, for instance, when the angel of chap. x is taken as symbolizing an event in human history. Yet in the word apparatus there is no depreciation. For this part of the book is sublimely significant of the overruling providence of God in the system of the world. The Apocalypse becomes thereby a panorama, on a finite human scale, of the divine
Roman Emperors.
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administration. The apocalyptic panorama represents the divine administration, as an orrery represents the solar system. It is a minute model of the divine government during the Messianic dispensation until it merges into eternity.
In our Commentary, while differing in some subordinate views, we agree with the body of evangelical commentators in the most important eschatological results. Rejecting the immense mass of complex ingenuities with which the text has been overlaid by the ultra-historical school, we still gauge the progress of the world by some great epochal points, and attain a clearness in our view of the whole. Our division into Three Apocalyptic Commissions must sustain itself by the evidences of co-ordination furnished by the threefold statement and by the results. In our own explication of xiv-xvi we think the evidences will appear to most readers conclusive. Our view of the Seventh Trumpet, as furnishing a perfectly consecutive history to the end, we believe to be both maintainable and very important in its conclusions. Our hope, on the whole, is, that we have furnished an elucidation, by the light of which the book will be read by a large class of minds with easy understanding and fresh interest. Our ministry generally have almost dropped the Apocalypse from study or public use. And yet we have been impressed with the belief, that, relieved from the burdens that have been laid by complex and questionable commentary upon it, the book is full of inspiring topics and vivid illustrations for the pulpit.
ROMAN EMPERORS.
DATES OF COMMENCEMENT OF THEIR REIGNS.
B.C. 31. AUGUSTUS. Christ born, four years before the Vulgar Era. A.D. 14. TIBERIUS. A.D. 30. Christ crucified.
37. CALIGULA. Conversion of Paul.
41. CLAUDIUS.
54. NERO—who was deposed and committed suicide. 60-62. St. James’s Epistle and martyrdom. Book of Hebrews written. 66. Peter and Paul martyred.
68. GALBA—reigned six months.
69. OTHO—reigned two months.
69. VITELLIUS—reigned eight months.
Plan of the Apocalypse.
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Editorial note: The supplied edition prints “Revelation 9:12-24” here (WHD_CO14.PDF, physical PDF page 426). The surrounding discussion of the announcement and description of the sixth trumpet corresponds to Revelation 9:12–21 in the King James Version. The origin of the printed numbering is not established here; the historical wording is retained. WHD_CO14.PDF, PDF page 426.
70. VESPASIAN. Destruction of Jerusalem.
79. TITUS. John’s three Epistles. Epistle of Jude.
81. DOMITIAN. Apocalypse written about A.D. 95.
96. NERVA. Restores John from Patmos.
98. TRAJAN. Death of John.
PLAN OF THE APOCALYPSE.
1. Title of the book Revelation 1:1-3;
2. Dedication to the Churches, Revelation 1:4-8 1:1-8 PART FIRST.
THE CHRISTOPHANIC APOCALYPSE Revelation 1:1-3:22
1. The Christophany and first prophetic commission Revelation 1:9-20
2. Epistles successively to the seven churches Revelation 2:1-3:22 PART SECOND.
THE THEOPHANIC APOCALYPSE Revelation 4:1- Revelation 9:21 I. THE THEOPHANY—GOD ENTHRONED IN STATE Revelation 4:1-6 The Beasts, or Cherubim—The four and twenty Elders 7-11 II. PRELUDE TO OPENING THE SEVEN SEALS Revelation 5:1-14
1. The book and unaccepted challenge for its opening 1-4
2. Challenge accepted and book taken by the Lamb 5-7
3. Successive songs of praise to the Lamb by beasts, elders, angels, and all creation 8-14
III. OPENING OF THE SEVEN SEALS Revelation 6:1-8:1 A. The Seal-Cycle.—The six-seal cycle briefly pictures the phases of the Messianic age down to the final dissolution; the seven trumpet cycle pictures and narrates more fully the same course of time to the final judgment.
Four Creational Seals.
FIRST SEAL—White horse of Conquest Revelation 6:1-2 SECOND SEAL—Red horse of Carnage Revelation 6:3 THIRD SEAL—Black horse of Scarcity Revelation 6:5, 6 FOURTH SEAL—Pale horse—four-fold Death Revelation 6:7, 8
Three Spiritual Seals.
FIFTH SEAL—Cry from souls under Altar=Persecution Revelation 6:9-11
SIXTH SEAL—Final earthly Dissolution and Doom
Revelation 6:12-17
With counter picture of celestial reward of Saints Revelation 7:1-17 a. Winds are silenced while OLD TESTAMENT SAINTS are sealed 144,000 Revelation 7:1-8
b. Then number of NEW TESTAMENT SAINTS; too great to be numbered; with song Revelation 7:9, 10
c. Surrounding circle of ANGELS, with song Revelation 7:11, 12
d. ELDER’S explanation and glorious picture of their HEAVENLY STATE. Revelation 7:13-17
SEVENTH SEAL—Issues no revelation, but inaugurates the Seven Trumpets Revelation 8:1-6
IV. THE SEVEN TRUMPETS Revelation 8:7-20:10 B. The Trumpet-Cycle.—As the seal-cycle pictures the Messianic age briefly, so this trumpet-cycle both pictures (in first six trumpets) and narrates (in the seventh) the same down to judgment and eternity. ——FOUR CREATIONAL TRUMPETS.——
FIRST TRUMPET—Plague upon Earth, hail, and fire
Revelation 8:7
SECOND TRUMPET—Plague upon Sea, mountain-sized fire-bolt Revelation 8:8, 9
THIRD TRUMPET—Plague upon Waters, star Wormwood
Revelation 8:10, 11
FOURTH TRUMPET—Plague upon Luminaries, dimness
Revelation 8:12
——THREE SPIRITUAL (OR WOE) TRUMPETS.——
An eagle appears and announces the THREE COMING WOE TRUMPETS, namely, of locust-demons, (Revelation 9:1-11,)war-demons, (Revelation 9:12-21,) and antichrist, (Revelation 12:1-17.) Revelation 8:13
FIFTH TRUMPET—Abyssmal Locust-demons—emblems of infernal errors, lies, and vices Revelation 9:1-11 SIXTH TRUMPET—War-horse demons—emblem of Christendom’s wars Revelation 9:12-24
PART THIRD.
THE ANGELOPHANIC APOCALYPSE Revelation 10:1- Revelation 22:21
1. THE ANGELOPHANY—Descent of the World-Angel Revelation 10:1, 2
2. He announces that in the sounding of the SEVENTH TRUMPET the eschatological mystery of God will be finished; that is, the trumpet will sound even to judgment and eternity Revelation 10:3-7
3. Third Prophetic Commission bestowed on John Revelation 10:8-11
I. PRELUDE TO THE SEVENTH TRUMPET Revelation 11:1-14
4. An outlined ground plan of the events of the Seventh Trumpet; that is, of the whole of Revelation 12:1- Revelation 22:5 11:1-13 Embracing:—
a. The mystic Jerusalem=the pure Church ascertained by measurement Revelation 11:1-2
b. The martyr two witnesses=the faithful few Revelation 11:3-6 c. Their destruction by the beast, and resurrection, triumph, and avenging Revelation 11:7-13
II. SOUNDING OF THE (third woe) SEVENTH TRUMPET Revelation 11:14
WARS OF CHRIST AND ANTI-CHRIST
[As the wars of Christ and antichrist extend from the first to the second Advent, so the SEVENTH (or THIRD WOE) TRUMPET covers the entire of that period, furnishing a consecutive HISTORY, with its regular symbolical chronology through the whole.] Triumphant voices chant the anticipation of its contents Revelation 11:15-19
Events of the Seventh Trumpet commence, extending to end of book Revelation 12:1
I. PERSONALITIES OF THE WAR.
Satanophany, the Dragon incarnate in the Roman Empire Revelation 12:1-4
The star-crowned woman, the Church, assailed by Dragon Revelation 12:1-6
Michael her champion; firmamental war; Dragon cast to earth Revelation 12:7-17
First (sea-risen) Beast=Christianized Roman Empire Revelation 13:1-10
Second (earth-born) Beast=Roman hierarchy=Clergy Revelation 11-13 Living Image of First Beast=the Popedom Revelation 14-18 II. EVENTS OF THE WAR.
THE THREE OVERTHROWS OF ANTICHRIST; namely, of his Capital, his Harlot, and his Armies Revelation 14:1-20:3
I. FIRST OVERTHROW—of Antichrist’s CAPITAL, BABYLON Revelation 14:1-16:21
(The overthrow of BABYLON by JERUSALEM, three chapters, 14-16. The scene of belligerent preparation is at JERUSALEM, Mount Zion, the temple.)
1. The chapter of War Menace by Jerusalem against Babylon Revelation 14:1-20
a. ANTICIPATIVE BUT INDEFINITE JOY-SONG AT JERUSALEM, ON MOUNT ZION Revelation 14:1-5
b. THREE ANGELS HOVERING OVER JERUSALEM Revelation 14:6-12
1. First angel proclaims triumphal everlasting Gospel Revelation 14:6, 7
2. Second angel defines the object of these war manifestoes, Babylon Revelation 14:8
3. Third angel pours forth a volume of divine malediction against Babylon and her devotees for martyring the saints Revelation 14:9-12
c. SKY-VISION (over Jerusalem) SYMBOLIZING THE DESTRUCTION OF BABYLON Revelation 14:14-20
2. The chapter of War Preparation (at Jerusalem) for Babylon’s destruction Revelation 15:1-8
The seven destroying angels in temple; presented with vials Revelation 15:1-7
Depot of divine wrath—in Jerusalem temple Revelation 15:8
3. The chapter of the Destruction of Babylon by batteries of wrath poured from Jerusalem Revelation 16:1-21 a. The four creational vials upon earth, sea, waters, and sun Revelation 16:1-9
b. Fifth vial on kingdom of the beast Revelation 16:10-11 c. Sixth vial on the Euphrates, for the kings of the east Revelation 16:12
d. The three frogs—Antichristic rally in behalf of Babylon Revelation 16:13-16
e. Seventh vial on the air—earthquake, crash, BABYLON’S DOWNFALL Revelation 16:17-21
II. SECOND OVERTHROW—of Antichrist’s HARLOT=the corrupt Church Revelation 17:1-18
1. Picture of the Harlot mounted on the Beast Revelation 17:1-6
2. Angel’s exposition of the Beast Revelation 17:7-14
3. Exposition of the Harlot and her total destruction Revelation 17:15-18
4. Song of Triumph over the accomplished destruction of Babylon Revelation 18:1-24
a. Angelic announcement of past downfall and prospective ruin Revelation 18:1-3
b. Celestial rehearsal of ancient predictions now fulfilled Revelation 18:4-8
c. Portraiture of her mercantile and commercial desolations Revelation 18:9-20
d. Mournful picture of her home silence and darkness Revelation 18:21-24
5. Song of triumph over destroyed harlot and coming of pure bride Revelation 19:1-10
III. THIRD OVERTHROW—of Antichrist’s ARMIES Revelation 19:11-20:3
1. Descent of the Great Captain and armies of heaven Revelation 19:11-16
2. Sun-angel calls the birds to a coming banquet Revelation 19:17-18
3. Capture and penalty of Beast and False Prophet Revelation 19:19-21
4. Capture of the real Antichrist—Satan, and his thousand-year imprisonment Revelation 20:1-3
RESULT OF OVERTHROWS—the thousand-year repose of victory and reign— the MILLENNIUM Revelation 20:4-6
New rebellion of Satan—closed by his destruction Revelation 20:7-10
THE FINAL JUDGMENT AND AWARDS Revelation 20:11-22:5
1. The throne, the resurrection, and vanishing earth Revelation 20:11, 12
2. The final penal award—the lake of fire Revelation 20:13-15
3. The final glorious award—the new heaven and earth Revelation 21:1-22:5
a. Visible descent of the new Jerusalem to the new earth Revelation 21:1-4
b. Divine announcement of its blessedness and conditions Revelation 21:5-8
c. Description of the heavenly city Revelation 21:9-27 d. Its river and tree of life—Close of Apocalypse Revelation 22:1-5
EPILOGUE—Four attestations to this Apocalypse Revelation 22:6-20
1. By ANGEL, briefly reiterating the divine endorsement Revelation 22:6
2. By JOHN, recapitulating God’s sending angel and his own over-reverence to him Revelation 22:6-9
3. By GOD, realizing the judgment as immediate Revelation 22:10-15
4. By JESUS, reaffirming his own coming, denouncing corrupters of the record Revelation 22:16-19
John’s final welcome to the coming—BENEDICTION Revelation 22:20, 21