1883 Haydock Douay Rheims Bible
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| Revelation of John 1:1 | The Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave to him to make known to his servants the things which must shortly come to pass: and signified, sending by his Angel, to his servant, John, | \f + \fr 1:1-3\ft The Apocalypse, or Revelation. I rather prefer the word Apocalypse, which the Latin interpreter did not think fit to change. --- Of Jesus Christ....by his Angel, sent to his servant John. So that these things were immediately revealed to St. John by an Angel, who represented and spoke in the person of Christ.--- Which must shortly come; and as it is again said, (ver. 3.) the time is at hand. This cannot be meant of all things in the Apocalypse, where mention is also made of the day of judgment, and of the glory of heaven at the end of the world. It can only mean, that some things were to happen shortly, that is what is said of the seven churches. (Chap. 2.; Apocalypse 3.) Or the persecutions foretold should begin shortly. Or else these expressions are only to signify, that all time is short, and that from the coming of the Messias, we are now in the last age, or the last hour. See 1 John 2:18. (Witham) --- St. John excites their attention by the most pressing motives, the approach of the events. Whatever explanation be given of this book, it is equally true in all, that the time is at hand, when it will begin to be accomplished. To find our consolation and happiness in this sacred book, according to the promise of the Holy Spirit, we must peruse it with faith and humility, receive the interpretation of the Church with submission and docility, and practise the truths contained with fidelity and promptitude. What is the life of man, since ages are but moments that escape us? Eternity is but a moment, but a moment that will never end. |
| Revelation of John 1:2 | Who hath given testimony to the word of God, and the testimony of Jesus Christ, what things soever he hath seen. | |
| Revelation of John 1:3 | Blessed is he, that readeth and heareth the words of this prophecy: and keepeth those things which are written in it: for the time is at hand. | |
| Revelation of John 1:4 | John to the seven churches which are in Asia. Grace be unto you, and peace from him, *who is, and who was, and who is to come, and from the seven spirits which are before his throne: Exodus 3:14. | \f + \fr 1:4-6\ft John to the seven churches,{ Ver. 4. Ab eo qui erat, et qui est, et qui venturus est, apo tou o on, kai o en, kai o erchomenos, as if it was said, apo tou os legetai o on, etc.|} afterwards named; and by them, to be understood of all churches, bishops, and people in the like dispositions. --- From him, who is, who was, and who is to come. As these words are only applied, and applicable to him, who is truly God and eternal, Alcazar (p. 176) applies them to God the Father. Others think them to be spoken of God, as the word God agrees to all the three divine persons, who are one and the same God. See Ribera. --- And from the seven spirits. Alcazar understands them of seven of God's attributes, or perfections, but, by the common exposition, are meant seven of the chief created spirits, who in a special manner assist at the throne of God, employed to execute God's commands, as Raphael saith, (Tobit. 12:15.) I am one of the seven who stand before God. (Witham) --- Spirits, etc. Some understand this of the Holy Ghost, on account of his seven gifts; but the most literal interpretation is of the principal Angels, who always surround the throne of God, and are his ministering spirits. (Calmet) --- And from Jesus Christ,{ Ver. 5. Qui est testis fidelis, o martus o pistos. Martyr ille fidelis.|} made man, and the Redeemer of mankind, whom St. John here names after the seven spirits, because he continues his discourse about Christ, who is the faithful witness; testified and approved of God by so many miracles, prophecies, etc. He is the chief of the martyrs or witnesses, as the Greek word signifies. --- The first begotten of the dead, both first in dignity, and first that rose to an immortal life. --- The prince of the kings of the earth, whose power is infinitely greater than all theirs; and this to put the suffering Christians in mind, that they needed not to fear the persecuting emperors, who have no power after this life. --- And Christ hath made us a kingdom, inasmuch as by his grace he has made us members of his true Church, called the kingdom of God, and promised us to reign with him in his glorious kingdom in heaven. --- And hath made us priests to God, and his Father, to offer up spiritual sacrifices. See 1 Peter 2:9. --- To him be, or is due, glory and empire, for ever and ever. Amen. That is, to Jesus Christ. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 1:5 | And from Jesus Christ, who is the faithful witness, *the first begotten of the dead, and the prince of the kings of the earth: who hath loved us, and washed us from our sins *in his own blood, 1 Corinthians 15:20.; Colossians 1:18. --- ** Hebrews 9:14.; 1 Peter 1:19.; 1 John 1:7. | |
| Revelation of John 1:6 | And hath made us a kingdom, and priests to God and his Father: to him be glory and empire, for ever and ever. Amen. | |
| Revelation of John 1:7 | *Behold, he cometh with the clouds, and every eye shall see him, and they that pierced him. And all the tribes of the earth shall bewail themselves because of him: Even so: Amen. Isaias 3:13.; Matthew 24:30.; Jude 1:14. | Behold he cometh, or is to come at the day of judgment. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 1:8 | *I am Alpha, and Omega, the beginning and the end, saith the Lord God, who is, and who was, and who is to come, the Almighty. Isaias 41:4.; Isaias 44:6.; Isaias 48:12.; Apocalypse 21:6.; Apocalypse 22:13. | I am Alpha, and Omega. These, the first and last letters of the Greek alphabet, signify the same as what follows, the beginning, and the end, the first cause and last end of all intelligent beings, who is, and who was, and who is to come, the Almighty. These words agree only to him, who is the true God, and here are applied to our blessed Redeemer, who is to come and judge all. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 1:9 | I John, your brother, and companion in tribulation, and in the kingdom, and patience in Christ Jesus, was in the island, which is called Patmos, for the word of God, and for the testimony of Jesus: | |
| Revelation of John 1:10 | I was in the spirit on the Lord's day, and heard behind me a great voice, as of a trumpet, | On the Lord's day.{ Ver. 10. In Dominica die, en te kuriake emera.|} Not on the Jewish sabbath, which is our Saturday, but on the Christian sabbath, our Sunday, called the Lord's day. The Church, in the apostle's time, changed the day of rest, on which the Jews were commanded to rest and sanctify that day, from Saturday to Sunday, from the last day of the week to the first. They judged this only to be an indispensable precept, that some day or some time should be appointed, in a special manner, for God's service and worship, on which Christians should also abstain from servile works, that were not of necessity: as to the determination of such a day of the week, they judged that the Church had power to change the day. The late pretended reformers have all agreed with us in this change. And if they would have all that is expressed in this commandment, to be of an indispensable and unchangeable obligation, according to the letter of the law, they ought certainly to observe, to sanctify, and to abstain from all servile works on Saturdays, or on the Jewish sabbath. --- A great voice, as of a trumpet. To signify the importance of things to be revealed. (Witham) --- Voice, etc. This was most likely St. John the Baptist, who calls himself the voice of one crying in the desert, and who in Malachias is called the Angel of the Lord, as he is also styled in the first verse of this chapter. (Pastorini) |
| Revelation of John 1:11 | Saying: What thou seest, write in a book: and send to the seven churches which are in Asia, to Ephesus, and to Smyrna, and to Pergamus, and to Thyatira, and to Sardis, and to Philadelphia, and to Laodicia. | |
| Revelation of John 1:12 | And I turned to see the voice that spoke with me: and being turned, I saw seven golden candlesticks, | I saw seven golden candlesticks, which, by the last verse of this chapter, represented the seven Churches of Asia. We may suppose these candlesticks to have been shewn to St. John, like what is described, Exodus 25:31. For in these visions of St. John are frequent allusions to the former tabernacle, and to things relating to the service and worship of God, which Moses was ordered to make. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 1:13 | And in the midst of the seven golden candlesticks, one like to the Son of man, clothed with a long garment, and girded about the paps with a golden girdle: | And in the midst of the seven golden candlesticks, that is walking among the candlesticks, like unto Christ, as he many times called himself the Son of man, and at other times told the Jews he was the Son, the only begotten Son of God. By this walking among the candlesticks is signified his providential care over all the particular Churches, which make up one Catholic Church. --- With a long garment,{ Ver. 13. Vestitum podere, endedumenon podere. See Exodus 28:51.; Daniel 10:5.|} and a golden girdle, with a resemblance of the habit of the priests. (Witham) --- Jesus Christ is in the midst of his Church to enlighten it, to defend and sanctify it, the true model of pastors, who should reside in the midst of their flock, be clothed with sanctity and justice, and girt with the golden girdle, that is with singular purity, always ready for combat and labour, by their charity and zeal. |
| Revelation of John 1:14 | And his head and his hair were white, as white wool, and as snow, and his eyes were as a flame of fire, | |
| Revelation of John 1:15 | And his feet like unto fine brass, as in a burning furnace, and his voice as the sound of many waters: | His feet like unto fine brass, to signify the purity and steadfastness of his steps and actions. --- His voice as the sound of many waters, the sound of his preaching by himself, and by his apostles, has been heard throughout all nations of the world. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 1:16 | And he had in his right hand seven stars: and from his mouth came out a sharp two-edged sword: and his face as the sun shineth in his strength. | In his right hand seven stars, which, as it is said, (Apocalypse 1:20.) were the Angels, that is the bishops of the seven churches, by this comparison is expressed their dignity. --- And from his mouth came out a sharp two-edged sword. The word of God preached is compared to a two-edged sword. (Ephesians 6:17.; Hebrews 4:12.) It also signifies God's severity in punishing sinners. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 1:17 | And when I had seen him, I fell at his feet as dead. And he laid his right hand upon me, saying: Fear not: *I am the first and the last, Isaias 41:4.; Isaias 44:6.; Isaias 48:12.; Apocalypse 21:6.; Apocalypse 22:13. | I am the first and the last. These are the words of the Son of man, or of him that represented our Saviour, Christ, to St. John. To be the first and the last, is another expression agreeing only to him who is the true God, as it is divers times applied by the prophet Isaias. (Witham) --- From the 12th verse to this place we have a description of the Son of man, that is Christ. The different emblematical descriptions of his countenance, his dress, etc. are similar to what are used by other prophets, and easily explained of his attributes, his eternity, vengeance, etc. etc. (Omnes passim.) |
| Revelation of John 1:18 | And alive, and was dead; and behold I am living for ever and ever, and have the keys of death and of hell. | And alive, and was dead; always living as God, and as man was dead, died on the cross for the salvation of all men, rose again, triumphed over hell, death, and sin, and am living for ever and ever, and have the keys of death and of hell, power over all, all things being made subject to me, even as man, or as God and man. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 1:19 | Write, therefore, the things which thou hast seen, and which are, and which must be done hereafter. | |
| Revelation of John 1:20 | The mystery of the seven stars, which thou sawest in my right hand, and the seven golden candlesticks: the seven stars are the Angels of the seven churches, and the seven candlesticks are the seven churches. | Angels. These are the seven bishops of the churches. Christ's having them in his right hand, shews the care he takes of his Church. (Calmet) |
| Revelation of John 2:0 | Directions to write to the Angels or bishops of Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamus, and Thyatira. | |
| Revelation of John 2:1 | To the Angel of the church of Ephesus write: These things, saith he who holdeth the seven stars in his right hand, who walketh in the midst of the seven golden candlesticks: | \f + \fr 2:1-7\ft To the Angel of the church of Ephesus. The great St. Timothy, who was bishop of Ephesus, died a glorious martyr about this time. But as for the admonitions and reprehensions given in these letters, we must take notice, that they are given to the faithful of each church, and not only to the bishops, as it appears by the words so often repeated. (Witham) --- Angel. This could have been no other than St. Timothy, who was then bishop of Ephesus. We must not suppose the faults, which are reproved by St. John, to belong individually to St. Timothy, but to some members of the Church. (Bossuet, and others) --- These things, saith he, who holdeth, etc. That is, Christ, or the Angel who represented Christ, as appeareth by his titles repeated out of the last chapter. --- And hast not failed, or fainted, in opposing the teachers of false doctrine. --- Thou has left thy first charity, or first fervour, a common, yet a very dangerous disposition, and especially in a bishop, charged with the care of those under him. --- Do penance....practise the first works, return to thy first fervour, or I will remove thy candlestick out of its place. The church of Ephesus is threatened, as in danger to lose its faith, which faith should be transplanted and received in other places. It is what God has divers times permitted, that churches flourishing in the profession of the true Christian faith should be perverted by infidelity and heresy, while the faith hath been planted in other kingdoms of the world. I need not bring instances, where candlesticks have been removed out of their places. (Witham) --- The Nicolaites were an infamous sect, who disturbed the rising Church by the superstitions and all the impurities of paganism. See St. Augustine, de haeresib. --- To him, to every one that overcometh, I will give to eat of the tree of life, (that is, eternal happiness, differently expressed in these letters) which is in the paradise of my God. It is spoke in the person of Christ, as man. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 2:2 | I know thy works, and thy labour, and thy patience, and how thou canst not bear the wicked: and thou hast tried them, who say they are apostles, and are not, and hast found them liars: | |
| Revelation of John 2:3 | And thou hast patience, and hast endured for my name, and hast not fainted. | |
| Revelation of John 2:4 | But I have against thee, that thou hast left thy first charity. | |
| Revelation of John 2:5 | Be mindful, therefore, from whence thou art fallen: and do penance, and do the first works. Or else I come to thee, and will move thy candlestick out of its place, unless thou do penance. | |
| Revelation of John 2:6 | But this thou hast, that thou hatest the deeds of the Nicolaites, which I also hate. | |
| Revelation of John 2:7 | He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith to the churches: To him that overcometh, I will give to eat of the tree of life, which is in the paradise of my God. | |
| Revelation of John 2:8 | And to the Angel of the church of Smyrna write: These things saith the First and the Last: who was dead, and liveth: | \f + \fr 2:8-11\ft To the Angel of the church of Smyrna. To St. Polycarp, or some bishop there before him. No reprehension is given to this bishop, or to his church, but a commendation for suffering in poverty and tribulation, when they were rich in grace. (Witham) --- Poverty. He was poor in temporal things, but rich in grace and merits. --- Thou art blasphemed by those false teachers, who call themselves Jews and Israelites, and the chosen people of God, waiting for the coming of the Messias, but are not to be looked upon as such; having refused to own their true Messias, Jesus Christ, they are the Synagogue of Satan, the greatest enemies of the true faith. --- You shall have tribulation ten days, which several here understand for a long time, others for a short time, ten times being used in both senses. (Witham) --- The first death is that of the body, the second of the soul. (Ven. Bede) |
| Revelation of John 2:9 | I know thy tribulation and thy poverty, but thou art rich: and thou art blasphemed by those who say they are Jews, and are not, but are the synagogue of Satan. | |
| Revelation of John 2:10 | Fear none of those things which thou shalt suffer. Behold, the devil shall cast some of you into prison, that you may be tried: and you shall have tribulation ten days. Be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee the crown of life. | |
| Revelation of John 2:11 | He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith to the churches: He that shall overcome, shall not be hurt by the second death. | |
| Revelation of John 2:12 | And to the Angel of the church of Pergamus write: These things saith he that hath the sharp two-edged sword: | \f + \fr 2:12-17\ft To the Angel of the Church of Pergamus. This Church is exhorted to do penance, and reprehended, as the seat or throne of Satan. It is only said, that the bishop lives where this satanical seat is, that he had not denied the faith, even under the persecution, when St. Antipas suffered martyrdom, of whom see Tillemont in the persecution under Domitian, tom. ii, p. 119, and note 523; and Bollandus, April 11th; though the acts themselves be not of great authority. --- Thou hast them that hold the doctrine of the Nicolaites, which is compared to that of Balaam, who taught Balac to cast a scandal before the children of Israel, by which they were seduced by the women of the Moabites, and fell into the sin of fornication and idolatry. (Numbers xxiv. and 31:16.) --- To him that overcometh, I will give the hidden manna; a happiness in heaven, which the eye hath not seen, etc. --- And a white{ Ver. 17. Calculum candidum, psephon leuken. See (Acts 26:10.)|} stone, with a new name written, as a mark of the happiness promised to all those who shall conquer. An allusion to the custom of giving a white stone to those that were tried and acquitted, and also to persons promoted to a dignity; and a black stone to such as were found guilty. See Acts 26:10. (Witham) --- This new name is the eternal recompense, unknown and despised by worldlings, but esteemed by the faithful, who know the excellence of the rewards promised by God. (Calmet) |
| Revelation of John 2:13 | I know where thou dwellest, where the seat of Satan is: and thou holdest fast my name, and hast not denied my faith. And in those days Antipas was my faithful witness, who was slain among you, where Satan dwelleth. | |
| Revelation of John 2:14 | But I have a few things against thee: because thou hast there them that hold the doctrine *of Balaam, who taught Balac to cast a stumbling block before the children of Israel, to eat, and to commit fornication: Numbers 24:2.; Numbers 25:2. | |
| Revelation of John 2:15 | So hast thou also them that hold the doctrine of the Nicolaites. | |
| Revelation of John 2:16 | In like manner do penance: if not, I will come to thee quickly, and will fight against them with the sword of my mouth. | |
| Revelation of John 2:17 | He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith to the churches: To him that overcometh, I will give the hidden manna, and will give him a white stone; and in the stone a new name written, which no man knoweth but he that receiveth it. | |
| Revelation of John 2:18 | And to the Angel of the church of Thyatira write: These things saith the Son of God, who hath eyes as a flame of fire, and his feet like fine brass: | \f + \fr 2:18-29\ft To the Angel of the church of Thyatira. Here is first a commendation of their constancy in the faith, in good works, charity, patience, and ministry, which chiefly regards their bishop, whoever he was at that time. The heretics, called Alogians, who rejected the Apocalypse, (chiefly because of the clear proofs of the divinity of the Word, or Son of God) pretended that there was not church at Thyatira, when St. John is supposed to have written his Apocalypse. They have no proof of this. This same church was afterwards perverted by the Montanists. See St. Epiphanius, haer. li. p. 455. Here follows a reprehension that they permitted the woman, (here called by the name of Jezabel,{ Ver. 20. Mulierem Jezabel, ten gunaika Iezabel. Dr. Wells, in his amendments to the Protestant translation, has put thy wife, and in the Greek gunaika sou, which he says is found in the Alexandrian and several other manuscripts. But neither the Oxford edition of 1675, nor that at Amsterdam of 1711, take notice of this reading in any one manuscript. As for that one manuscript of Alexandria, I guess by Walton's Polyglot, that it cannot well be read in that place. And though it is likely that the author of the Syriac version may have found that reading, yet there is nothing for it in the Arabic or Ethiopic, nor in the vulgar Latin, which, as Dr. Wells himself takes notice on 1 John 5:7. is more ancient than any other version or Greek manuscripts. And though we find uxorem tuam in St. Cyprian ad Antonianum, edit. Rig. p. 72, and in the edition of Dr. Fell, published in Amsterdam, in the year 1701, p. 248, where he says in the note mark a, cui interpretationi favent illa Graeca exemplaria, quae legunt, gunaika sou, but he did not think fit to tell us where any such manuscripts were to be found, nor have I heard that they have been seen by any one. It is certain St. Epiphanius did not find sou, nor think this the true reading, when in the heresy of the Alogians, by Jezabel, he understands Maximilla, Priscilla, or Quintilla, in Marcion's time.|} as was called the wife of Achaz, who persecuted the true prophets, and protected the false ones, 3 Kings xviii.) to seduce the servants of God, to commit fornication, and eat of things offered to idols. There is no probability that this Jezabel was wife to the bishop of that church. Had this been true, the bishop would have deserved a reprehension much more severe than is here given him. Alcazar thinks that by this woman was meant some heretical sect, or the corrupt synagogue of the Jews; but interpreters commonly understand some powerful woman thereabout among the infamous Nicolaites, who by her authority and artifices, brought many to embrace that sect. --- I give her time to do penance; and she will not, or would not repent. It is Christ who speaks as God, for who but God gives sinners time to repent? --- Behold, I will cast her into a bed, etc. Some understand a bed of sickness, others of corporal death, others eternal torments in hell, where she, and they that sin with her, shall be in very great tribulation, unless first they do penance. --- All the churches shall know that I am he, who searcheth the reins and hearts, which God alone can do. See (Psalm 7:10.; Jeremias 17:10.; etc.) It is God also who will give to every one ... according to his works. See (Psalm 61:13.; Proverbs 24:12.; Romans 2:6.; and in divers other places.) --- I will not put upon you any other weight, etc. That is, not the insupportable burden of the Jewish ceremonies, to which teachers of false doctrines would have you subject. (Witham) --- Whoever does not give in to this new doctrine of the Nicolaites and Gnostics, and does not approve the deep and abstruse doctrines of Satan, which they teach, shall have no new weight or punishment. Let them keep the doctrine once delivered. (Calmet) --- Yet in the faith which you have already learnt, remain steadfast, till I come. --- To them who shall overcome, etc. I will give power over or above all nations. This shews that the saints, who are with Christ our Lord in heaven, receive power from him to preside over nations, and provinces, as patrons; and shall come with him at the end of the world to execute his will against those who have not kept his commandments. (Challoner) --- End. This alludes to the day of judgment, when the faithful shall sit on thrones with Christ. And he shall inherit the morning star of perpetual bliss, that shall never set. --- They shall triumph over all the wicked world, and under me shall rule them, as it were, with a rod of iron, being so much exalted above them. --- As the vessel of a potter, shall all their present greatness be broken. To every such faithful servant, I will give the morning star, another expression to signify eternal light, or eternal happiness. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 2:19 | I know thy works, and thy faith, and thy charity, and ministry, and thy patience, and thy last works which are more than the former. | |
| Revelation of John 2:20 | But I have a few things against thee: because thou permittest the woman, Jezabel, who calleth herself a prophetess, to teach and to seduce my servants, to commit fornication, and to eat of things offered to idols. | |
| Revelation of John 2:21 | And I gave her a time to do penance: and she will not repent of her fornication. | |
| Revelation of John 2:22 | Behold, I will cast her into a bed: and they that commit adultery with her, shall be in very great tribulation, unless they do penance from their deeds. | |
| Revelation of John 2:23 | And I will kill her children with death, and all the churches shall know, *that I am he who searcheth the reins and hearts: and I will give to every one of you according to your works. But I say to you, 1 Kings 16:7.; Psalm 7:10.; Jeremias 11:20.; Jeremias 17:10.; Jeremias 20:12. | |
| Revelation of John 2:24 | And to the rest who are at Thyatira: Whosoever have not this doctrine, and who have not known the depths of Satan, as they say, I will not put upon you any other burden: | |
| Revelation of John 2:25 | Yet that which you have, hold fast till I come. | |
| Revelation of John 2:26 | And he that shall overcome, and keep my works unto the end, I will give him power over the nations; | |
| Revelation of John 2:27 | And he shall rule them with a rod of iron, and as the vessel of a potter they shall be broken, | |
| Revelation of John 2:28 | As I also received from my Father: and I will give him the morning star. | |
| Revelation of John 2:29 | He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith to the churches. | |
| Revelation of John 3:0 | Directions what to write to Sardis, Philadelphia, and Laodicia. | |
| Revelation of John 3:1 | And to the Angel of the church of Sardis write: These things, saith he who hath the seven Spirits of God, and the seven stars: I know thy works, that thou hast the name of being alive, and thou art dead. | \f + \fr 3:1-6\ft To the Angel of the church of Sardis. He begins with a severe reprehension, thou hast the name of being alive, and thou art dead, which we may understand of the greatest part of them, and of being dead by the worst of deaths, which is that of sin. (Witham) --- In the style of the sacred writers, to live, is to be in the state of grace, and to bring forth good works; as, to be dead, is to live in sin, and in the neglect of Christian duties. (Calmet) --- Here we see that the opinion of men is no advantage to us, when our internal dispositions are not correspondent to our external appearance. For what we are in thy sight, O Lord, so much we are, and no more, says St. Augustine. --- The bishop is charged with this fault, that he did not watch and take care of his flock. He is admonished to repent, and to strengthen those that were not dead, but ready to die.{ Ver. 2. Et ceterae quae moritura erant, ta loipa a mellei apothanein, meaning persons, not things.|} (Witham) --- God does not seek to surprise us and lay snares for us. But when he tells us that he will come like a thief, it is only to admonish us not to slumber. Had he wished to take us unawares, he never would have admonished us beforehand. (Calmet) --- But thou hast a few names, etc. That is, a few persons not yet defiled, neither as to their consciences, souls, nor bodies. --- They shall walk with me in white apparel, etc. It is a new way of expressing the happiness of heaven. (Witham) --- White is the color of joy, festivity, and triumph. The Angels always appeared clothed in white. (Calmet) |
| Revelation of John 3:2 | Be watchful, and strengthen the things that remain, which are ready to die. For I find not thy works full before my God. | |
| Revelation of John 3:3 | Have in mind, therefore, in what manner thou hast received and heard; and observe, and do penance. If then thou shalt not watch, *I will come to thee as a thief, and thou shalt not know at what hour I will come to thee. 1 Thessalonians 5:2.; 2 Peter 3:10.; Apocalypse 16:15. | |
| Revelation of John 3:4 | But thou hast a few names in Sardis, which have not defiled their garments: and they shall walk with me in white, because they are worthy. | |
| Revelation of John 3:5 | He that shall overcome, shall thus be clothed in white garments, and I will not blot his name out of the book of life, and I will confess his name before my Father, and before his Angels. | |
| Revelation of John 3:6 | He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith to the churches. | |
| Revelation of John 3:7 | And to the Angel of the church of Philadelphia write: These things, saith the Holy One and the True One, *who hath the key of David: he that openeth, and no man shutteth: shutteth, and no man openeth: Isaias 22:22.; Job 12:14. | \f + \fr 3:7-13\ft To the Angel of the church of Philadelphia. There were several towns of this name; here is understood that which was near Sardis, in Lydia. Here is no more than an admonition to persevere, to hold that which thou hast. Christ takes the title of the Holy One, and True One, who hath the key of David; that is being the son of David, and the promised Messias, hath supreme power in the Church: who opens the gate of salvation, and no one shuts it against his elect. (Witham) --- By the key in this place may be understood either the key of the Church, or of the kingdom of heaven. Jesus Christ has both, he opens and shuts the heavens by his infinite power. But in the Church on earth he has entrusted this key (his power) to his apostles and ministers; whatever is bound or loosened by them is ratified by him in the kingdom of his glory. (Calmet) --- I have set before thee a door open, by giving thee graces to save thee, which no one shall be able to hinder, because thou hast of thyself little power or strength,{ Ver. 8. Virtutem, dunamin, strength.|} and hast kept my word, and not denied the faith. (Witham) --- I have sent you to preach, and have given my blessing to your labours. You shall, notwithstanding all your adversaries, eventually succeed. St. Paul makes use of the same manner of expression, 1 Corinthians xvi., I see a great door is open to me, and at the same time many adversaries; and again, 2 Corinthians 2:and Colossians iv., On account of your little strength, your want of talents, eloquence, supernatural gifts, etc. I have not exposed you to great trials. Thus does the Almighty always proportion the trials he sends, and the temptations he permits in his servants, to the graces and strength he has given them. --- Those who were neither Jews nor Christians, shall come and abjure at your feet their former errors, and shall evidently perceive that you are strengthened by me. (Calmet) --- Christ also promises that he will make the false abandoned Jews subject to the bishop and his Church, and to own them to be the beloved and chosen people. God promises to preserve them in the hour or time of temptation and persecutions, which should happen to all the inhabitants of the earth. (Witham) --- He here advertises him of the persecution which was about to take place, and by which he would try the fidelity of his servants. In ver. 12., he relates the triumph and everlasting beatitude of the martyrs. --- He that overcomes, I will make him a pillar, etc. so as to stand firm against his enemies, and to be secure of his endless happiness. --- I will write upon him the name of my God, a subscribed citizen of the celestial Jerusalem, with the new name of Jesus, the Saviour and Redeemer of mankind. He alludes to the custom of writing names upon pillars, palaces, etc. --- From the words my God, the Socinians pretend that Christ is not the true God, as we may find in the disputes which Servetus had with Calvin. Calvin answered the Socinians, as all Catholics do, that Christ was both God and man: this and divers things were spoken of Christ as he was man, but that many things in the Scriptures could not apply to him, unless he was also truly God. And by such places is clearly confuted the blasphemy and error of the Arians and Socinians. The argument concludes in the principles of the Catholics, who allow the authority of the Church in expounding the sense of the Scriptures; but the Calvinists, and all other pretended reformers, having shaken off that authority, and having allowed that the holy Scriptures are to be interpreted according to every man's private judgment or spirit, this set Calvin and Servetus, every Calvinist and Socinians, upon the same level. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 3:8 | I know thy works. Behold, I have given before thee an open door, which no man can shut: because thou hast a little strength, and hast kept my word, and hast not denied my name. | |
| Revelation of John 3:9 | Behold, I will give of the synagogue of Satan, who say they are Jews, and are not, but do lie: Behold, I will make them to come and adore before thy feet: And they shall know, that I have loved thee. | |
| Revelation of John 3:10 | Because thou hast kept the word of my patience, I will also keep thee from the hour of the temptation, which shall come upon the whole world to try them that dwell upon the earth. | |
| Revelation of John 3:11 | Behold, I come quickly: hold fast that which thou hast, that no man take thy crown. | |
| Revelation of John 3:12 | He that shall overcome, I will make him a pillar in the temple of my God, and he shall go out no more: and I will write upon him the name of my God, and the name of the city of my God, the new Jerusalem, which cometh down out of heaven from my God, and my new name. | |
| Revelation of John 3:13 | He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith to the churches. | |
| Revelation of John 3:14 | And to the Angel of the church of Laodicia, write: *These things saith the Amen, the faithful and true witness, who is the beginning of the creation of God. John 14:6. | \f + \fr 3:14-22\ft The seventh and last letter is to the Angel of the Church of Laodicia. Christ here takes the title of the Amen,{ Ver. 14. Haec dicit Amen; tade legei o Amen. Ille qui est Amen.|} as if he said, I am the Truth. --- The beginning of the creation, or of the creatures of God, to which is added in the first chapter, the beginning and the end. --- Thou art neither cold nor hot, but lukewarm. A dreadful reprehension, whatever exposition we follow. According to the common interpretation, by the cold are meant those who are guilty of great sins; by the hot, such as are zealous and fervent in piety and the service of God; by the lukewarm or tepid, they who are slothful, negligent, indolent, as to what regards Christian perfection, the practice of virtue, and an exact observance of what regards the service of God. On this account they are many times guilty in the sight of God of great sins, they forfeit the favour and grace of God, fancying themselves good enough and safe, because they live as others commonly do, and are not guilty of many scandalous and shameful crimes, to which they see others addicted. --- I would thou wert either cold or hot. This is not an absolute wish, because the condition of the cold is certainly worse in itself; but it is to be taken with regard to the different consequences, which oftentimes attend these two states, and to signify to us that the lukewarm may be farther from a true conversion, inasmuch as they are less sensible of the dangers to which they remain exposed, than such as commit greater sins. Their careless indevotion becomes habitual to them, they live and die with a heart divided betwixt God and the world; whereas greater and more shameful sinners are not without an abhorrence of such vices which they commit; a fear of punishment, of hell and damnation, strikes them by the mercies of God offered even to sinners, and makes them enter into themselves like the prodigal son; they detest their past lives, and by the assistance of God's graces become both fervent and constant in the duties of a Christian life. (Witham) --- Tepidity in a Christian life, and in the service of God, is oftentimes more dangerous than absolute wickedness. The open sinner is easily made sensible of his danger; he experiences the stings and reproaches of conscience, whilst the tepid Christian lives without remorse, fear, or apprehension, and listens not to those who wish to shew him the danger of his situation. I dare venture to affirm, says St. Augustine, that to fall into some public and manifest sin would be of advantage to the proud, that so those who by their self-complacency had so often fallen before, may now become displeased with themselves and humble. (Calmet) --- To the lukewarm it is said, I will begin to vomit thee out of my mouth; that is if thou continue in that state, I will permit thee to run on and be lost in thy sins. Thou blindly sayest within thyself, I am rich, etc. A false conscience generally attends a lukewarm soul and those who serve God by halves; they flatter themselves that all goes well enough with them, when they see they are not so vicious, as many others: but here the spirit of God, who penetrates the secret folds and windings of slothful souls, admonisheth them of their dangerous mistakes, that they are wretched, poor, blind, and naked, when God, by his grace, does not inhabit their souls, though they may have millions of gold and silver in this world. I counsel thee to buy of me gold tried in the fire, the love of God purified by trials and troubles in this life, to recover thy lost innocence, to be clothed with the habit of grace, to anoint thy eyes with eye-salve, by a serious reflection on what regards thy eternal salvation. --- I chastise those whom I love. He concludes all the former admonitions by telling them: first, that to be under trials and troubles, is a mark of God's favour and his paternal care; secondly, to hearken to the voice of God, when he knocks at the door of their heart; and thirdly, he promises them the reward of eternal happiness---he that overcomes, shall sit with me on my throne: though this does not imply an equality of happiness, not even to all the saints, much less with God himself, but only that the elect shall be in the throne as it were of heaven, and partakers of heavenly happiness according to their past good works. --- I should not here mention the wild and ridiculous fancies of one Mr. Brightman, when he pretends to expound to all men these letters to the seven bishops of Asia[Asia Minor], were it not to shew how the obscure predictions of St. John's revelation have been turned and abused by the loose interpretations of some of the late reformers, as may be seen more at large, when we mention their arbitrary fancies about the whore of Babylon and the popish antichrist. I shall here with Dr. Hammond, give the reader a taste of such licentious expositions of the divine oracles. The Calvinist, Mr. Brightman, pretended he had his expositions by divine inspirations, and so gave his commentary the title of Revelation of the Revelation. I shall quote his words out of Dr. Hammond. "Mr. Brightman assures his readers, that by the churches of Sardis, Philadelphia, and Laodicia, were meant Germany, France, and Britain. He says a most heavy trial was now suddenly to invade the Christian world....that the three said churches were most favourably admonished of this tempest by the epistles written to them by name, nomination....that he found and understood this to be so by divine inspiration, from the inscriptions of these letters, and so should be guilty of a sin against the Divine Majesty, if he concealed them." Not to tire the reader with his fancies about Ephesus and Pergamus, which may be seen in Dr. Hammond, Rev. 2:13., "on those words, in those days was Antipas, etc. Mr. Brightman has this wanton fancy on the name Antipas, that it doth denote that the martyrs of his time (which was after Luther) should be antipapae, or antipopes;" that is adversaries to the popes and popery. Dr. Hammond (p. 928) gives us Mr. Brightman's conceit on the name Thyatira, which must be taken for the same as Thygatheira, signifying a young daughter, and so denotes the growth of piety in the Church from the year 1300, from Wycliffe's time to 1520, that is, till it came to perfection in Luther's days. Page 932. note a, "Sardis, according to Mr. Brightman," says Dr. Hammond, "is the first reformed church in the antitype, to wit, that of Germany, which began at Wittenburg, by Luther, in the year 1517. And the proof is, that Sardis is more to the south than Thyatira, and so must have more of truth in it; or, because there is no mention made of Balaam and Jezabel, which he resolved must signify the doctrines of Christian Rome, the absence of which must signify a breaking off from the Romish communion; or, that she (the German Church) had a name to be living, but was dead, by the doctrine of consubstantiation among the Lutherans, even after the reformation. This," says Dr. Hammond, "were a strange way of interpreting dreams, which no oneirocritic would allow, but a much stranger of explaining prophecies." Page 933, "Philadelphia, says Mr. Brightman, must needs be the Helvetian, Swedish, Genevan, French, Dutch, and Scotch reformed Churches. No reason again for it, but that the city of Philadelphia was yet farther south than Sardis, and so must needs signify more increase of reformation; 2. that the name of Jezabel was not in it; 3. that the word Philadelphia, signifying brotherly love, cannot be applied to any but this pattern of all piety (to which Mr. Brightman had so much kindness) the Church of Helvetia and Geneva. And the reformed Church of England must be that of Laodicia,....because episcopacy was here retained, and so a mixture of cold with that of heat, and consequently is the lukewarm Church that is found fault with." O the profound interpretations and bright inventions of Mr. Brightman! (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 3:15 | I know thy works: that thou art neither cold nor hot: I would thou wert cold or hot: | |
| Revelation of John 3:16 | But because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of my mouth. | |
| Revelation of John 3:17 | Because thou sayest: I am rich, and made wealthy, and I have need of nothing: and knowest not, that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked. | |
| Revelation of John 3:18 | I counsel thee to buy of me gold tried in the fire, that thou mayest be made rich, and mayest be clothed in white garments, and the shame of thy nakedness may not appear: and anoint thy eyes with eye-salve, that thou mayest see. | |
| Revelation of John 3:19 | *Those whom I love, I rebuke and chastise. Be zealous, therefore, and do penance. Proverbs 3:12.; Hebrews 12:6. | |
| Revelation of John 3:20 | Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man shall hear my voice, and open to me the gate, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me. | |
| Revelation of John 3:21 | To him that shall overcome, I will give to sit with me on my throne: as I also have overcome, and have sat with my Father on his throne. | |
| Revelation of John 3:22 | He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith to the churches. | |
| Revelation of John 4:0 | The vision of the throne of God, the twenty-four ancients, and the four living creatures. | |
| Revelation of John 4:1 | After these things I saw: and behold a door opened in heaven: and the first voice which I heard, was as it were, of a trumpet speaking with me, said: Come up hither, and I will shew thee the things which must come to pass hereafter. | No sooner had St. John received in the preceding vision the documents he was to transmit to the seven Churches of Asia[Asia Minor], when, behold, a new scene displays itself. Heaven opens, and St. John is invited up thither by the voice which had spoken to him before, and is told he shall see what is to happen in future ages. On a sudden appears a throne, and the Almighty himself seated upon it. The rainbow which surrounds the throne, denotes the covenant of reconciliation and peace between God and man. (Walmesley) --- Behold a door open. Here begins what may be looked upon as the second part of the Apocalypse, and from hence to the two last chapters are contained wars and victories of the Church over all its enemies, the devil, Jews, heathens, and heretics. These visions are so differently expounded, when applied to different events, that this alone may convince us how uncertain are those various interpretations. The servants of God are taught that they must expect to meet with many trials, afflictions, and persecutions; but this ought to be a great subject of consolation to the faithful, that they are assured of victory if they fight manfully, and of a recompense of endless happiness for their short labours. Such visions and majestic descriptions shew that St. John was inspired by the same spirit of God, as the ancient patriarchs and prophets. --- I will shew thee the things which must come to pass hereafter; that is after the things already revealed concerning the seven Churches, and therefore after the destruction of Jerusalem, which was about twenty years before St. John wrote this Apocalypse. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 4:2 | And immediately I was in the spirit: and behold there was a throne set in heaven, and one sitting upon the throne. | I was in the spirit, rapt as it were in an ecstacy into heaven, and saw a throne, and one sitting, representing God the Father. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 4:3 | And he that sat, was to the sight like the jasper and the sardine-stone: and there was a rainbow round about the throne, in sight like unto an emerald. | And he....was to the sight like the jasper,{ Ver. 3. Similis erat aspectui jaspidis, omoios orasei iaspidi.|} or had the appearance of jaspers, as to the colours with which he appeared, etc. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 4:4 | And round about the throne were four and twenty seats: and upon the seats, four and twenty ancients sitting, clothed in white garments, and golden crowns on their heads. | About the throne were four and twenty seats, or lesser thrones, with twenty-four seniors or senators upon them, representing the illustrious saints both of the Old and New Testament, clothed in white garments, in token of their innocence, and crowns of gold, signifying the glory of the heavenly inhabitants. (Witham) --- These four and twenty elders sitting round the throne of God, represent the judgment which the Almighty was about to pass upon the enemies of his Church. Thus in Daniel, when he was about to pronounce sentence against Antiochus Epiphanes, "thrones were placed, and the ancient of days sat,...the judgment sat, and the books were opened." (Daniel 7:9, 10.) They represent kings and priests who attend on the Sovereign Judge. It appears as if God intended to designate by the number the ancient patriarchs and the twelve apostles, who judge with the Lord, and condemn the injustice of their persecutors. (Calmet) |
| Revelation of John 4:5 | And from the throne proceeded lightnings, and voices, and thunderings: and seven lamps were burning before the throne, which are the seven spirits of God. | Lightnings, a symbol of God's majesty and power. --- Seven lamps burning, which signified the seven spirits of God, the chief spirits that attend his throne. See Apocalypse 1:4. (Witham) --- The lightnings, loud voices, and thunders, which come from the throne of God, announce alarms and severe hardships, such as persecutions, heresies, calamities, etc. by which he tries the fidelity of his servants on earth. And the seven spirits of God, who appear under the form of burning lamps, are seven Angels, as before mention, (Chap. 1:4.) standing ready to execute the divine commands. (Walmesley) |
| Revelation of John 4:6 | And before the throne was as it were a sea of glass like crystal: and in the midst of the throne, and round about the throne were four animals full of eyes before and behind. | A sea of glass, like crystal, calm and transparent, and may signify that the saints had passed a boisterous sea of troubles in this world, which is now changed into everlasting tranquillity. --- Four living creatures, or animals. Alcazar (p. 364) takes notice of thirty different expositions of these animals. He understands the apostles, bishops, and preachers of the Christian faith: others, four of the chief Angels or celestial spirits. Several others expound them of the four evangelists: yet this was before St. John himself had written his gospel. (Witham) --- The extensive sea of glass, here described transparent as crystal, represents what may be called the floor of heaven. Before the throne and round it stand four living creatures, of an extraordinary shape, which denote the four great prophets, Isaias, Jeremias, Ezechiel, and Daniel. Their bodies are described full of eyes, both before and behind, an emblem of their prophetic sight, that penetrates into all ages past, present, and to come. And their being also full of eyes within, indicates that their extensive knowledge arises from an interior divine inspiration. They have each six wings, in the same manner as the seraphim appeared to the prophet Isaias. (Chap. 6:2.) Some have imagined these four symbolical animals to represent the four evangelists; but we think improperly, as St. John was still living and there present in person. The first animal is here said to resemble a lion, the king of beasts, because the prophet Isaias, represented by it, was descended of the royal race of David. The second animal resembles a calf, and represents the prophet Jeremias in his character of priest; the calf, which was the principal victim in Jewish sacrifices, being on that account the emblem of the priesthood. The third animal, exhibiting Ezechiel, has the countenance of a man; because God, in speaking to that prophet, always addresses him by the name of son of man. The fourth animal, denoting Daniel, resembles a flying eagle, on account of the sublime oracles of this prophet, who soars to the highest objects, and views the succession of all the great empires that were to rise up in the world to the end of time. Probably these four principal prophets are to be understood to represent all the prophets of the old law. (Walmesley) |
| Revelation of John 4:7 | And the first animal was like a lion, and the second animal like a calf, and the third animal having the face as of a man: and the fourth animal was like an eagle. | Like a lion, etc. The qualities in these animals are observed to be courage and strength in the lion; profit to human life, by the calf; reason and wisdom, by the face of man: soaring high, and rapidity or swiftness, by the eagle: whether we understand those spiritual perfections to belong to blessed spirits, or to the apostles in general, or to the four evangelists. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 4:8 | And the four animal had each of them six wings: and round about and within they are full of eyes. And they rested not day and night, saying, *Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty, who was, and who is, and who is to come. Isaias 6:3. | Each of them six wings. See the like visions, Ezechiel 1:4; Isaias 6:2. These signify their swiftness in executing God's just commands. --- Full of eyes: a symbol of knowledge and watchfulness. --- They rested not day and night. There is no night in heaven; but hereby is signified, that they praised God without intermission for all eternity, saying: Thou art worthy, O Lord, our{ Ver. 8. Dignus est Domine Deus. God is wanting in many copies, but Dr. Wells restored it as the true reading.|} God, etc. (Witham) --- They repeat the word holy three times, probably in honour of the blessed trinity. And the four and twenty elders prostrate before the throne, in token of their acknowledging all their happiness and pre-eminence to be his gift. (Walmesley) |
| Revelation of John 4:9 | And when these animals gave glory, and honour, and benediction to him that sitteth on the throne, who liveth for ever and ever, | |
| Revelation of John 4:10 | The four and twenty ancients fell down before him that sitteth on the throne, and adored him that liveth for ever and ever, and cast their crowns before the throne, saying: | Nothing is so well adapted to give us an idea of the infinite majesty of God, and of the sovereign respect which is due to him, as this description. How ought Christians to appear in the presence of the God of armies, if what is most august and most elevated in heaven acknowledges its lowness and nothing before this tremendous Majesty? (Calmet) |
| Revelation of John 4:11 | Thou art worthy, O Lord our God, to receive glory and honour and power: because thou hast created all things, and for thy will they were, and have been created. | |
| Revelation of John 5:0 | The book sealed with seven seals is opened by the Lamb, who thereupon receives adoration and praise from all. | |
| Revelation of John 5:1 | And I saw in the right hand of him that sat on the throne, a book written within and without, sealed with seven seals. | A book written within and without.{ Ver. 1. Intus et foris, esothen kai opisthen; on the back side.|} Books were then skins, membranes, or parchments, and when written on both sides part of the writing appeared, though they were rolled up. --- Sealed with seven seals, as containing mysteries and secrets of high importance. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 5:2 | And I saw a strong Angel, proclaiming with a loud voice: Who is worthy to open the book, and to loose the seals thereof? | |
| Revelation of John 5:3 | And no man was able neither in heaven, nor on earth, nor under the earth, to open the book, nor to look on it. | No man was able,{ Ver. 3. Aperire librum, neque videre illum, blepein kai anagnonai, legere.|} etc. As to the contents, some understand the prophecies and mysteries both of the Old and New Testament; others, the events that should afterwards happen to the Church of Christ, as various persecutions against Christians. Alcazar would have the sense of these words to be, that only Christ and his Spirit could open the book to others, and make them believe and know the punishments prepared for the wicked, and the reward reserved for God's faithful servants. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 5:4 | And I wept much because no man was found worthy to open the book, nor to see it. | |
| Revelation of John 5:5 | And one of the ancients said to me: Weep not: behold the lion of the tribe of Juda, the root of David, hath conquered to open the book, and to loose the seven seals thereof. | Behold the lion, of the tribe of Juda, etc. viz. Jesus Christ, who was descended from that tribe, denominated a lion on account of his great power, by which title we find him designated also in the prophecy of Jacob. (Genesis 49:9.) (Calmet) -- It is he who has merited by his triple victory over death, sin, and hell, the great honour of opening the book, and revealing the secrets therein contained. |
| Revelation of John 5:6 | And I saw: and behold in the midst of the throne, and of the four animals, and in the midst of the ancients, a Lamb standing as it were slain, having seven horns and seven eyes: which are the seven spirits of God, sent forth into all the earth. | I saw....a Lamb standing as it were slain, with the prints and marks of its wounds. It was of this lamb (that is, of our Saviour Jesus Christ) that St. John the Baptist said: "Behold the Lamb of God, that taketh away the sins of the world." (John 1:29.) (Witham) --- Here again Jesus Christ is plainly marked out, the Lamb of God, the victim of expiation, who by his death has reconciled us with his Father; and who, even in heaven, bears the marks of his passion, and by the wounds therein received continually inclines his Father to shew us mercy. He has seven horns, as so many crowns and marks of his omnipotence; and seven eyes, to represent his infinite knowledge and wisdom. (Calmet) --- Having seven horns and seven eyes, (to signify his power and his knowledge,) which are the seven spirits subject to Christ. See Apocalypse 1:4. It is observed that in the Revelation of St. John, the number seven is divers times applied to signify a multitude, and a number implying perfection, and three and a half for a small number. Thus are represented the seven candlesticks, seven churches, seven spirits, seven seals, seven trumpets, seven vials, etc. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 5:7 | And he came: and took the book out of the right hand of him that sat on the throne. | \f + \fr 5:7-8\ft He....took the book,{ Ver. 7-8. Cum aperuisset: in the present Greek only, ote elabe; and in one or two manuscripts of the Marquis de Velez, enoixe.|}...and when he had opened it, or was about to open it, (in the Greek is only, he took it: which was a sign that he would open it)...the four and twenty ancients fell down before the Lamb, to adore him, as appears by what follows, ver. 13. --- Having every one of them harps to celebrate his praise, and golden vials full of odours, which are the prayers of the saints: which shews that the saints in heaven offer up before the throne of the Divine Majesty the prayers of the faithful. (Witham) --- Harps, etc. These harps are symbols of the praise which good men render to God; and the vials full of odours represent the prayers of the saints. In conformity with this idea, St. John wishes to represent these four and twenty ancients as so many senators, who present to the Almighty the prayers and homages of good men on earth. (Estius; Clement of Alexandria) --- This also is an imitation of what was practised in the temple, in which were always around the altar, in times of sacrifice, Levites with musical instruments, priests with vials to contain the wine and blood, and censers to hold the incense (Calmet) --- The prayers of the saints. Here we see that the saints in heaven offer up to Christ the prayers of the faithful upon earth. (Challoner) |
| Revelation of John 5:8 | And when he had opened the book, the four animals, and the four and twenty ancients fell down before the Lamb, having every one of them harps, and golden vials full of odours, which are the prayers of the saints: | |
| Revelation of John 5:9 | And they sung a new canticle, saying: Thou art worthy, O Lord, to take the book, and to open the seals thereof: because thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God, in thy blood, out of every tribe, and tongue, and people, and nation: | They sung a new canticle, etc. called new, as belonging to the New Testament, or alliance of the new law of Christ. (Witham) --- Canticle; that is, excellent. The Scripture generally attaches the epithet new to canticles. New canticles are always more agreeable, says Pindar. (Grotius) --- And hast redeemed, etc. The twenty-four ancients here may well represent all, who are in possession of beatitude. They all acknowledge it is to Jesus Christ they are indebted for the felicity they enjoy; it is he that has assembled at the foot of God's throne all the nations of the world, faithful souls from every tribe and tongue, and people and nation, by his blood. (Calmet) |
| Revelation of John 5:10 | And hast made us to our God a kingdom, and priests: and we shall reign on the earth. | And hast made us to our God, etc. See 1 Peter 2:5, 9. (Witham) --- All Christians may justly be styled kings and priests of God, by the spiritual empire they possess over their passions and the world; and by the continual offering they make on the altar of their hearts, by means of the prayers they daily offer up to God. (Origen) --- Thus they say, we shall reign on the earth by the empire we shall exercise over our passions; and by the union we shall have with Jesus Christ and his Church, triumph over all who have persecuted us. (Estius; Andraeas.) |
| Revelation of John 5:11 | And I saw, and I heard the voice of many Angels round about the throne, and the living creatures and the ancients: and the number of them was *thousands of thousands, Daniel 7:10. | The number of them was thousands of thousands.{ Ver. 11. Millia millium, muriades muriadon, kai chiliades chiliadon.|} In the Greek also, ten thousand times ten thousand. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 5:12 | Saying, with a loud voice: The Lamb that was slain is worthy to receive power, and divinity, and wisdom, and strength, and honour, and glory, and benediction. | The Lamb is worthy....to receive power and divinity,{ Ver. 12. Accipere virtutem et divinitatem: in the Greek, instead of divinitatem, plouton. In one or two manuscripts of the Marquis de Velez, theoteta.|} etc. The Socinians and new Arians from hence pretend that the Lamb, Jesus Christ, is not the same true God with the Father, but only deserved divinity, or to be made God in an inferior and an improper sense. The argument is of no force at all in the ordinary Greek, where for divinity is read riches. The sense is, thou art worthy to have thy power and divinity acknowledged and praised by all creatures both in heaven and earth: and the following words are a confutation of the Socinians, "I heard all saying: To him that sitteth on the throne, and to the Lamb, benediction, and honour, and glory, and power, forever and ever," where the same divine power is attributed to the Father and to the Son of God, Jesus, true God and true man. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 5:13 | And every creature, which is in heaven, and on the earth, and under the earth, and such as are in the sea, and the things that are therein, I heard all saying: To him that sitteth on the throne, and to the Lamb, benediction, and honour, and glory, and power for ever and ever. | |
| Revelation of John 5:14 | And the four animals said: Amen: And the four and twenty ancients fell down on their faces, and adored him that liveth for ever and ever. | |
| Revelation of John 6:0 | What followed upon the opening six of the seals. | |
| Revelation of John 6:1 | And I saw that the Lamb had opened one of the seven seals, and I heard one of the four animals, saying, as with a voice of thunder: Come, and see. | I saw that the Lamb had opened one of the seven seals, or the first seal. The interpreters are much divided in expounding what is to be understood by the sealed up contents, and in applying them to such and such persecutions, persons, and events, by all which it appears that there is no certainty as to such applications and expositions, even of particular ancient fathers; though at the same time it is both certain and evident that many pretended interpretations, (that is, arbitrary inventions, from the private spirit of heretics) are both false and groundless, contradictory to the unexceptionable authority (to use Dr. W.'s words) of the primitive fathers, and inconsistent with the doctrine and belief of the Catholic Church, as I may have occasion to shew that the ridiculous fable is of this number, of so many popes being antichrist, and the beast of this Apocalypse. I shall, for the satisfaction of the Christian reader, as I hinted in the preface of this book, give a short account of those expositions that are not improbable. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 6:2 | And I saw: and behold a white horse, and he that sat on him had a bow, and a crown was given to him, and he went forth conquering that he might conquer. | A white horse, such as conquerors used to ride upon at a solemn triumph. This is commonly understood of our Saviour, Christ, who, by himself and by his apostles, preachers, martyrs, and other saints, triumphed over all the adversaries of his Church. He had a bow in his hand, the doctrine of his gospel, piercing like an arrow the hearts of the hearers; and the crown given him, was a token of the victory of him who went forth conquering, that he might conquer. (Witham) --- He that sitteth on the white horse is Christ, going forth to subdue the world by his gospel. The other horses that follow represent the judgments and punishment, that were to fall on the enemies of Christ and his Church: the red horse signifies war; the black horse famine; and the pale horse (which has death for its rider) plagues or pestilence. (Challoner) --- White horse; viz. Jesus Christ, who came to subdue all nations to the faith. The bow signifies the gospel, and the word of God, those powerful arms, of which St. Paul so often speaks, as being so necessary for all who are engaged in bringing souls to the faith of Christ. The crown marks the sovereign power of Jesus Christ, and the assurance of conquest. (Cornelius[Cornelius a Lapide?]; Bossuet; Du Pin) |
| Revelation of John 6:3 | And when he had opened the second seal, I heard the second animal, saying: Come, and see. | \f + \fr 6:3-4\ft Opened the second seal, etc. portending wars and shedding of blood, and so he is said to have power to take away peace from the earth. (Witham) --- Another red horse. This red horse signifies the cruel persecutions, which the Roman emperors carried on against the Christian religion. For this end, it is said immediately after, one sat thereon, to take peace from the earth, and kill one another; for this purpose was a great sword given to him. (Andraeas; Menochius; Grotius) |
| Revelation of John 6:4 | And another red horse went forth: and it was given to him who sat thereon, to take away peace from the earth, and that they should kill one another, and to him was given a great sword. | |
| Revelation of John 6:5 | And when he had opened the third seal, I heard the third animal, saying: Come thou, and see. And behold a black horse, and he that sat on him had a pair of scales in his hand. | The third seal....a black horse. This is also commonly expounded of wars and persecutions, and particularly of famine, by the scales in the rider's hand, and by two pounds of wheat being sold for a penny: a great price, considering the value of money at that time. (Witham) --- The black horse represents the public miseries, famines, etc. which, particularly the latter, the Roman empire frequently experienced during the reign of the persecuting emperors. The balance, which the rider is said to hold in his hand, represents the strict manner in which people would measure out whatever they sold during the time of famine. (Andraeas; Hamm; Bossuet) |
| Revelation of John 6:6 | And I heard as it were a voice in the midst of the four animals, saying: Two pounds of wheat for a penny, and thrice two pounds of barley for a penny, and hurt not the wine, and oil. | |
| Revelation of John 6:7 | And when he had opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth animal, saying: Come, and see. | \f + \fr 6:7-8\ft The fourth seal....a pale horse, the rider's name death. It is also expounded of trials, afflictions, persecutions, and especially of plagues, over four parts of the earth, by which may be denoted the great power and extent of the Roman empire. In the Greek we read, over the fourth part of the earth; which some reconcile, by observing that the Roman empire had dominions under it in all the four parts of the world, east, west, north, and south; and that its dominions might be said to comprehend the fourth part of the world. (Witham) --- By the pale horse, and the rider, death, who sat upon it, followed by hell, are meant that dreadful mortality which ever attends famines, etc. He had power to kill with sword, with famine, etc. All these evils came upon the Roman people, and history has preserved the memory of them, to shew the truth of the prophecy here delivered by St. John. (Grotius; Calmet) |
| Revelation of John 6:8 | And behold a pale horse, and he that sat upon him, his name was death, and hell followed after him; and power was given to him over the four parts of the earth, to kill with sword, with famine, and with death, and with the beasts of the earth. | |
| Revelation of John 6:9 | And when he had opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of them that were slain for the word of God, and for the testimony which they held. | etc. After the opening of the fifth seal, the souls of the martyrs under the altar cried aloud for justice, saying, how long, etc. Out of zeal for God's honour, and the good of the Church, they pray that the enemies of Christ, and of the Christian faith, may be humbled, and that all may acknowledge and fear the justice of God, by the punishment of his enemies, and the reward of his faithful servants. St. Jerome, by under the altar, understands Christ himself, under whom, as under their head, are all the martyrs. Some who doubted or held that the blessed were not admitted to see God, in heaven before the day of general judgment, have turned this expression, under the altar, or at least the expressions of some of the fathers upon these words, as if they were favourable to their error, which is sufficiently disproved, even by the words that follow, that white robes were given to each of them one, in which they are said to walk with him wherever he goeth. (Chap. 3:4. and Apocalypse 14:4.) (Witham) --- Under the altar. Christ, as man, is this altar, under which the souls of the martyrs live in heaven: as their bodies are here deposited under our altars. --- Revenge our blood. They ask not this out of hatred to their enemies, but out of zeal for the glory of God, and a desire that the Lord would accelerate the general judgment, and the complete beatitude of all his elect. (Challoner) --- These holy souls, who had been slain for the word of God, do not beg the Almighty to revenge their blood, through any hatred to their enemies, but through the great zeal with which they were animated, to see the justice of God manifested: that by this severity they might be moved to fear him, and be converted to him. Thus in the Scripture we often read of the prophets beseeching the Almighty to fill their enemies with confusion, to humble them, etc. (Perer; Bossuet; Du Pin, etc.) --- And white robes. To console them, they each had given them a white robe, as a mark of their innocence, and as an assurance that on account of it they would in due time receive the full measure of beatitude. They should rest yet a little while, most probably to the day of final retribution, when the number of those destined to be their brethren in bliss should be completed. Then they should altogether receive full recompense, and their persecutors be covered with confusion. (St. Augustine, serm. xi. de sanctis; St. Gregory the great, lib. 2:Moral. cap. iv.) |
| Revelation of John 6:10 | And they cried with a loud voice, saying: How long, O Lord, (holy and true) dost thou not judge and revenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth? | |
| Revelation of John 6:11 | And white robes were given, to each of them one: and it was said to them, that they should rest yet for a little time, till their fellow servants, and their brethren, who were to be slain even as they, should be filled up. | |
| Revelation of John 6:12 | And I saw, when he had opened the sixth seal: and behold, there was a great earthquake, and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair: and the whole moon became as blood: | At the opening of the sixth seal....a great earthquake, etc. Many think that these dreadful signs, of the sun turning black, etc. are not to happen till the time of antichrist, a little before the end of the world. See Matthew xiv.; Luke xxi.; Isaias xiii. and xxxiv.; Ezechiel xxxiii.; Daniel xii.; etc. Others apply these prodigies to God's visible chastisements, on the heathen emperors and persecutors of the Christians, before the first Christian emperor Constantine. (Witham) --- And I saw. The sixth seal being opened, St. John sees painted before him the severe and terrible manner in which the Almighty would revenge himself on his enemies. It may refer either to the time of Constantine, when we behold the Christian religion triumphing on the ruins of paganism, and after his death, and that of his sons, the empire of Rome given up a prey to barbarians, Rome itself taken and pillaged, and all the provinces thrown into dreadful disorder and consternation; or it may likewise refer to the day of general judgment, when the Almighty will make sinners drink the wine of his indignation, in presence of all the just; of which dreadful time of vengeance all other particular judgments are only imperfect figures. (Victorin; Ven. Bede; Tichon) --- St. John, in imitation of the ancient prophets, makes use of the earthquake, etc. hyperbolically, to mark more strongly the dreadful and horrible evils with which the Roman empire, and its persecuting emperors, were to be overwhelmed. Rome itself was filled with wars and seditions, both at home and abroad. The emperors were all destroyed by the Almighty in a most singular manner; witness Maxentius, who was thrown headlong into the Tiber; Maximin Jovius, who, under a horrible and incurable disease, owned the hand of the Almighty afflicting him; Maximin Daia, who, being overcome in battle, fled away in disguise, and at last, seized with a strange disease, his bowels were all consumed, he lost his eyes, and died reduced to a mere skeleton. Witness likewise Licinius, who, being engaged with Constantine, was always beaten, and at length strangled. Maximian also, the rival of Constantine, who strangled himself in Marseilles, where he had been confined. (Calmet) |
| Revelation of John 6:13 | And the stars from heaven fell upon the earth, as the fig-tree casteth its green figs when it is shaken by a great wind: | |
| Revelation of John 6:14 | And the heaven withdrew as a book rolled up: and every mountain, and the islands were moved out of their places. | And every mountain. In the dreadful confusion of the Roman empire, in the time of Constantine, so great was the revolution, that mountains appeared, as it were, moved out of their places; islands shifted from their accustomed situations. We behold at one time seven persons, Maximin Galerius, Maxentius, Severus Caesar, Maximin, Alexander, Maximin Hercules, and Licinius, all aiming at the empire. The first six perished in nine years, from 305[A.D. 305] to 314: Licinius was strangled in 324. All these were enemies of the Christian religion. Constantine, who supported it, remained sole master of the empire. (Calmet) |
| Revelation of John 6:15 | And the kings of the earth, and the princes, and the tribunes, and the rich men, and the strong men, and every bond-man, and every free-man hid themselves in the dens, and in the rocks of the mountains: | |
| Revelation of John 6:16 | And they say to the mountains and to the rocks: *Fall upon us, and hide us from the face of him that sitteth upon the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb: Isaias 2:19.; Osee 10:8.; Luke 23:30. | |
| Revelation of John 6:17 | For the great day of their wrath is come: and who shall be able to stand? | |
| Revelation of John 7:0 | The number of them that were marked with the seal of the living God; and clothed in white robes. | |
| Revelation of John 7:1 | After these things, I saw four Angels standing on the four corners of the earth, holding the four winds of the earth, that they should not blow upon the earth, nor upon the sea, nor on any tree. | I saw four Angels, etc. Though some understand here evil spirits, whom God may make use of as instruments to punish the wicked, yet we may rather, with other interpreters, understand good angels sent from God to guard and protect his faithful servants both from evil spirits and wicked men. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 7:2 | And I saw another Angel ascending from the rising of the sun, having the sign of the living God: and he cried with a loud voice to the four Angels, to whom it was given to hurt the earth and the sea, | Having the seal. This sign is generally supposed to be the sign of the cross. In the East, it was the custom to impress some indelible mark upon the soldiers. This sign[the sign of the cross] amongst the ancient Christians was used on every occasion. (Calmet) |
| Revelation of John 7:3 | Saying: Hurt not the earth, nor the sea, nor the trees, till we seal the servants of our God in their foreheads. | Hurt not the earth, etc. Some understand Christ himself, who gives his commands in this manner to the Angels; others, an Angel of a higher rank or order. --- Till we seal the servants of our God in their foreheads, which may be expounded, let not persecutions and trials come upon them till they are strengthened by the spirit and grace of God, with which St. Paul sometimes says the servants of God are signed and sealed. See 2 Corinthians 1:22.; Ephesians 1:13. He alludes to the passages of Ezechiel, (Ezechiel 9:4.) where God bids an Angel mark with the letter Tau the foreheads of those who should not be hurt by the judgments that were to fall upon Jerusalem; so God would protect the faithful Christians, who believed and put their trust in Christ crucified, and who from the first ages[centuries], in testimony of this faith, used to sign themselves by making the sign of the cross on their foreheads, of which the letter Tau was a figure or resemblance. See Tertullian, lib. de Corona militis. I beg the reader's patience, if I here set down what I find in the great Synopsis Papismi, in folio, put out by Mr. Andrew Willet, and dedicated first to queen Elizabeth, and afterwards to king James the first. Among his demonstrations, as he calls them, that the pope is the antichrist, (Controv. 4:q. 10. p. 232 and 233) he tells us in plain terms, "that the sign of the cross is one of the visible signs of antichrist. And who," saith he, "hath taught the papists that the sign of the cross is to be borne or made on men's foreheads? And that with crossing the forehead we are preserved from dangers? The superstitious marks of the cross had their beginning from the beast's name, since the number of the beast's name in the Revelation of St. John is by these Greek letters, chxs. The first letter, ch, is a cross; the middle letter, x, (in Latin, X) is also a side long cross; and the last letter, s, contains both s and t of which the latter is called a headless cross;" and then Mr. Willet concludes in these words, "And thus it plainly appears, that the marks whereby the papists say they honour Christ, are rather a dishonour to him, and are in very deed the cognizance of antichrist." Such an ingenious, and at the same time learned fancy, may perhaps outvie even those we have cited out of Mr. Brightman [in the annotations on Apocalypse 3:14-22.], and may be equally serviceable to any country parson on the fifth of November, or on any day when he shall think fit to hold forth against the pope or popery. I suppose that Mr. Willet did not know that the Christians in the first ages[centuries] (as all Catholics to this day) made so frequent use of the sign of the cross, as it is witnessed by Tertullian above two hundred years before even any Protestant pretended that the popes began to be antichrists, or the great antichrist. And this, says he, they do by a tradition from father to son. At every setting forward or going about any thing, at coming home or going out, at putting on our clothes, at going to bathe, to table, to light a candle, to bed, to sit down, to any thing, we make the sign of the cross on our foreheads. And this is a tradition. The like is witnessed by St. Chrysostom, St. Cyril of Jerusalem, and many of the Fathers. At the same time that with our hand we make the sign of the cross, we say these words, "in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost;" the words used when any one is made a Christian [at his baptism], according to the command of Christ. [Matthew 28:19.] So that the action itself puts us in mind that Jesus Christ died for us on the cross; and by the words, we make a profession of our Christian faith, that we believe in one God and three Persons. Can we do this too often? Dare we be ashamed of doing it? Was ever any thing more ridiculous than to call this in very deed the cognizance of antichrist? What must Mr. Willet have thought of the Protestants, or what can they think of him, and such like folio scribblers, to prove the popes the beast of St. John's Revelation? What must, I say, Mr. Willet think of the public liturgy, or the book of common prayer, approved and used by the Church of England in his time, and which ordains that the sign of the cross shall be made by the priest on the forehead of every one that is baptized? This, according to Mr. Willet, is (when any one is made a Christian) to give him the badge, and visible sign of antichrist, to the dishonour of Christ, and what in very deed is the cognizance of antichrist. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 7:4 | And I heard the number of them that were sealed, an hundred forty-four thousand sealed, of all the tribes of the children of Israel. | I heard the number of them that were sealed. By these determinate numbers need only be understood a great number of Jews converted and saved, though much greater was the number of the saved taken from among the Gentiles of all nations, of which it is said, I saw a great multitude, which no man could number, etc. (Witham) --- The number of one hundred and forty-four thousand is not to be taken in a literal and strict sense, but to express in general terms the great number of the elect; for it appears that the tribe of Dan, which certainly must have produced some elect, is not mentioned, and the tribe of Joseph is put in lieu of that of Ephraim: so that if it be supposed that these numbers must be taken literally, the tribe of Joseph would have produced a double number to that of any other tribe, since Manasses was his son, and the tribe of Dan would have produced none. (Ven. Bede) |
| Revelation of John 7:5 | Of the tribe of Juda, twelve thousand sealed: Of the tribe of Ruben, twelve thousand sealed: Of the tribe of Gad, twelve thousand sealed: | |
| Revelation of John 7:6 | Of the tribe of Aser, twelve thousand sealed: Of the tribe of Nephthali, twelve thousand sealed: Of the tribe of Manasses, twelve thousand sealed: | |
| Revelation of John 7:7 | Of the tribe of Simeon, twelve thousand sealed: Of the tribe of Levi, twelve thousand sealed: Of the tribe of Issachar, twelve thousand sealed: | |
| Revelation of John 7:8 | Of the tribe of Zabulon, twelve thousand sealed: Of the tribe of Joseph, twelve thousand sealed: Of the tribe of Benjamin, twelve thousand sealed. | |
| Revelation of John 7:9 | After this I saw a great multitude, which no man could number, of all nations, and tribes, and peoples, and tongues: standing before the throne, and in sight of the Lamb, clothed with white robes, and palms in their hands: | |
| Revelation of John 7:10 | And they cried with a loud voice, saying: Salvation to our God, who sitteth upon the throne, and to the Lamb. | Salvation to our God; that is our salvation is from God, to whom be praise for ever, Amen, benediction, or blessings, thanksgiving. etc. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 7:11 | And all the Angels stood round about the throne, and the ancients, and the four living creatures: and they fell down before the throne, upon their faces, and adored God, | |
| Revelation of John 7:12 | Saying: Amen. Benediction and glory, and wisdom, and thanksgiving, honour, and power, and strength to our God for ever and ever. Amen. | |
| Revelation of John 7:13 | And one of the ancients answered, and said to me: Who are these that are clothed in white robes, and whence came they? | |
| Revelation of John 7:14 | And I said to him: My Lord, thou knowest. And he said to me: These are they who are come out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and have made them white in the blood of the Lamb. | White in the blood of the Lamb. That is, they have been cleansed and purified from sin, by the death, merits, and grace of Christ crucified. (Witham) --- The whole of this verse must be understood in a mystical sense, for we are said to make our garments white in the blood of the Lamb, when we enter into his Church by baptism, or wash away our sins by penance or martyrdom. (Calmet) |
| Revelation of John 7:15 | Therefore they are before the throne of God, and serve him day and night in his temple: and he that sitteth on the throne, shall dwell over them. | Therefore they are before the throne of God....in his temple; that is therefore are they now happy in heaven, where the temple was represented to be, as observed before. --- He that sitteth on the throne shall dwell, or dwelleth over them. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 7:16 | *They shall not hunger nor thirst any more, neither shall the sun fall on them, nor any heat. Isaias 49:10. | |
| Revelation of John 7:17 | For the Lamb, which is in the midst of the throne, shall rule them, and shall lead them to the fountains of the waters of life, *and God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes. Isaias 25:8.; Apocalypse 21:4. | The Lamb, which is in the midst of the throne, God and man, shall rule{ Ver. 17. Reget eos, poimanei, etc.|} them as a shepherd does his flock. By the Greek, And shall lead them unto fountains of living waters;{ Ver. 17. Ad vitae fontes aquarum, epi zoes pegas udaton; not zosas, as in some manuscripts.|} literally, to the fountains of life of waters; shall bless them with everlasting happiness. (Witham) --- He represents the happiness of the saints, under the idea of being exempt from all the wants and evils of this life. For we are not able, according to truth itself, to conceive the happiness that is prepared for us; wherefore we must content ourselves with considering what it is not, rather than what it is. He, nevertheless, seems to compare heaven to a temple or palace, in which we observe ministers and servants all in their proper order, his counsellors (if we may be allowed the expression) and friends seated in presence of their prince, and the souls of the just singing the praises of the Most High. (Car.) |
| Revelation of John 8:0 | The seventh seal is opened: the Angels with the seven trumpets. | |
| Revelation of John 8:1 | And when he had opened the seventh seal, there was silence in heaven, as it were for half an hour. | There was silence in heaven: which is to represent as it were a general consternation, and an expectation of dreadful events at the opening of the seventh seal, and when seven Angels stood prepared to sound seven trumpets. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 8:2 | And I saw seven Angels standing in the presence of God: and to them were given seven trumpets. | |
| Revelation of John 8:3 | And another Angel came, and stood before the altar, having a golden censer: and there was given to him much incense, that he should offer of the prayers of all saints upon the golden altar, which is before the throne of God. | Stood before the altar, having a golden censer. In the visions is an allusion to the tabernacle and its parts. The altar of perfumes was in the sanctum[the holy place], hard by the entrance into the sanctum sanctorum[the holy of holies], and here the golden altar is said to be before the throne of God. The incense from the censer is said to be the prayers of all the Saints, which the Angel offered up. The altar seems to signify our Saviour Christ, as the prayers of all the faithful are always made through the merits of Christ, our only chief Mediator or Redeemer. By the fire cast upon the earth, (ver. 5.) is signified the fire of divine charity, now to be exercised by the ways of justice, to draw persons to their conversion by punishments. (Witham) --- We may observe both in this and other places of the Apocalypse, that St. John makes continual allusions to what was done in the temple of Jerusalem, for which he gives us symbolical reasons. Thus on the present occasion, the incense which was offered morning and evening in the temple, on the golden altar, is represented as done here in heaven. (Calmet) |
| Revelation of John 8:4 | And the smoke of the incense of the prayers of the saints ascended up before God, from the hand of the Angel. | |
| Revelation of John 8:5 | And the Angel took the censer, and filled it with the fire of the altar, and cast it on the earth, and there were thunderings, and voices, and lightnings, and a great earthquake. | |
| Revelation of John 8:6 | And the seven Angels who had the seven trumpets, prepared themselves to sound the trumpet. | |
| Revelation of John 8:7 | And the first Angel sounded the trumpet, and there was hail, and fire mingled with blood, and it was cast on the earth, and the third part of the earth was burnt up, and the third part of the trees was burnt up, and all green grass was burnt up. | The first Angel sounded, etc. From this place to the eleventh verse of chapter xx. the visions are differently expounded. Some interpret them, without applying them to any particular events, as general comminations, in a mystical and allegorical sense of the many persecutions which God permits to happen to his Church. Others think that they are all predictions, which shall not happen till a little time before the end of the world, in antichrist's time, after which will follow the day of the general judgment, the punishment of the wicked, and the reward of the just. But there are others, both ancient and later writers, as in particular Alcazar, the bishop of Meaux (Bossuet,) Pere Alleman, to whom we may add among the Protestants, Dr. Hammond, whom the bishop of Meaux calls the most learned of all the English Protestants. According to the interpretations which these writers have followed, these predictions of St. John (except the last persecution, when the devil shall be let loose, Apocalypse 20:7, in the time of the great antichrist) have already happened in the three first ages[centuries], during the persecutions of the heathen emperors, as I shall briefly take notice. Hail therefore, and fire, blood, falling of stars, etc. some look upon as mystical representations, to signify that a great many trials and persecutions shall happen to the good, and a great many punishments and chastisements shall fall upon the wicked; with this grand difference, that the sufferings of the good shall be short and momentary, and their reward a crown of endless glory; but the wicked, if any of them escape punishments in this world, can never escape eternal torments with the devils in the next. 2. It is also a very common opinion, that all these disasters shall happen in a great measure, literally about antichrist's time, a very short time before the end of the world. 3. Others apply all these events to the judgments which God's justice exercised either upon the Jews, in the time of Trajan and Adrian, or upon the heathen Roman emperors, and upon the pagan city of Rome, for persecuting the servants of God. (Witham) --- As these Angels with their trumpets, according to Pastorini, denote the sufferings of the Church during the seven ages that it lasts, it may not be improper to point out the time, according to his opinion, when each Angel sounded the trumpet. Thus the first trumpet denotes the persecutions of the first three centuries, in which the Christians suffered death by the sword, (denoted by blood) by being stoned, (denoted by the hail) and by fire, when the third part of the trees were burnt, that is, the third part of the clergy were destroyed. (Pastorini) |
| Revelation of John 8:8 | And the second Angel sounded the trumpet: and as it were a great mountain, burning with fire, was cast into the sea, and the third part of the sea became blood; | The great mountain denotes the heresy of Arius, which caused the greatest troubles in the Church, and destroyed many churches, which are here denoted by the ships. (Pastorini) |
| Revelation of John 8:9 | And the third part of those creatures died which had life in the sea, and the third part of the ships was destroyed. | |
| Revelation of John 8:10 | And the third Angel sounded the trumpet, and a great star fell from heaven, burning as it were a torch, and it fell on the third part of the rivers, and upon the fountains of waters: | A great star fell. The bishop of Meaux [Bossuet] thinks this agrees very well to Cochebas, or Barcochebas, who in Adrian's time pretended to be the true Messias of the Jews; his name also signifying a star. He was the chief cause of those wars, and of the utter destruction of the Jews. (Witham) --- The third trumpet points out to us the punishment that falls upon the Roman empire, in its destruction by the northern nations. These people spread themselves over the third part of the rivers and provinces of ancient Rome. The star is called wormwood, from the bitter calamities and miseries which they inflicted upon the Roman empire. (Pastorini) |
| Revelation of John 8:11 | And the name of the star is called Wormwood: and the third part of the waters became wormwood: and many men died of the waters, because they were made bitter. | |
| Revelation of John 8:12 | And the fourth Angel sounded the trumpet, and the third part of the sun was smitten, and the third part of the moon, and the third part of the stars, so that the third part of them was darkened, and a third part of the day shined not, and of the night in like manner. | The third part of the sun was smitten. This may signify a third part of men killed in those wars, or (according to the opinion that refers all to antichrist's time) that in those days the sun and moon shall not give above a third part of their light. (Witham) --- Here we behold a noble figure of the Church, which whilst in its most flourishing state, like the sun, is suddenly obscured, and a third part extinguished by the heresy and schism of the Greeks, under Photius, which began in 866[A.D. 866], and infected all orders of Christians, clergy and laity, princes and individuals, signified by the sun, moon, and stars. (Pastorini) |
| Revelation of John 8:13 | And I beheld, and heard the voice of one eagle flying through the midst of heaven, saying with a loud voice: Wo, wo, wo to the inhabitants of the earth, by reason of the other voices of the three Angels, who are yet to sound the trumpet. | The voice of one eagle: in divers Greek copies, of an Angel, saying, Woe, woe, woe! It is to foretell, in general, greater punishments and miseries. The Protestant translation has followed those Greek copies that read an Angel; but Dr. Wells, in his amendments, has restored that reading of an eagle which the ancient Latin interpreter had met with. (Witham) --- An eagle, on account of its swiftness, is here represented as chosen to announce by its cry of woe on the three succeeding ages of the Church, greater disasters to be sustained than in the preceding ages. (Pastorini) |
| Revelation of John 9:0 | Locusts come forth from the bottomless pit: the vision of the army of horsemen. | |
| Revelation of John 9:1 | And the fifth Angel sounded the trumpet: and I saw a star fall from heaven upon the earth, and to him was given the key of the bottomless pit. | The fifth Angel....and I saw a star, etc. This again may be to represent the confusion of all things in antichrist's time, or it may signify the fall and apostacy of great and learned men from the Christian faith. Bossuet applies it to the fall of Theodotus, of Byzantium, towards the end of the second age; but certainly no great stress can be laid on such arbitrary applications, which it is no hard matter to invent, as may be seen by the different fancies we may meet with about the locusts, etc. (Witham) --- Here is a description of the rise and progress of the reformation. This trumpet begins with announcing to us the fall of a star from heaven; a very just emblem of the apostacy of Luther, who in quality of a priest and religious man is styled a star, but renouncing his faith and vows, may truly be said to have fallen from heaven upon the earth. (Pastorini, hic.[here]) --- To him (that is, to the Angel, not to the fallen star) was given the key of the bottomless pit, which properly signifies hell. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 9:2 | And he opened the bottomless pit: and the smoke of the pit ascended as the smoke of a great furnace: and the sun was darkened, and the air, with the smoke of the pit: | And the smoke, etc. Luther and his followers propagated and defended their new doctrines with such heat and violence, as to occasion every where seditions and insurrections, which they seemed to glory in. Luther openly boasted of it. "You complain," said he, "that by our gospel the world is become more tumultuous; I answer, God be thanked for it; these things I would have so to be, and wo to me if such things were not." --- The sun was darkened, etc. The light of faith, which is the word of God, may well be represented by the sun, according to that of the Psalm 118:105., "Thy word, O Lord, is a lamp to my feet, and a light to my paths." And as the air is the spring of man's respiration and life, it may be a just type of morality, which gives spiritual life and worth to all human actions. By the sun, therefore, and air being darkened, we are to understand faith and morality obscured and perverted by the novel doctrines of the reformers. (Pastorini, hic.[here]) |
| Revelation of John 9:3 | And from the smoke of the pit there came out locusts upon the earth, and power was given to them, as the scorpions of the earth have power: | There came out locusts; devils, in antichrist's time, when the chief devil, Abaddon, the destroyer, shall be as it were let loose. Others by locusts, understand the Goths and those barbarous people that made an irruption into the Roman empire, in the time of Decius, about the year 250[A.D. 250]. Others again, by locusts, understand heretics, and especially those heretics that spring from the Jews, and with them denied the divinity of our Saviour Christ, as Theodotus, Praxeas, Noetus, Paul of Samosata, Sabellius, Arius, etc. These were the great enemies of Christian religion, and instruments of the devil: they tormented and infected the souls of men, stinging them like scorpions with the poison of their heresies. They had power for five months, by which is signified for a short term, but had no power to hurt those who were sealed with the seal of God in their foreheads. God protected, at least from sin, his faithful servants. It is to no purpose to give the reader divers fancies and inventions about their shape, their heads, tails, hair, teeth, etc. nor is it worth my while to confute such writers as Mr. Willet, who, Brightman-like, makes Abaddon the pope, and the locusts to be friars mendicant. With this fifth trumpet ended the first of the three woes, as we are told in ver. 12. (Witham) --- The locusts are commonly understood of heretics. They are not able to hurt the green tree; that is, such as have a lively faith, working by charity; but only the reprobate. The latter are represented as prepared to battle, as being ever ready to contend; they wear counterfeit gold on their heads, for all is but pretence and fiction; in shape they are as men, in smoothness of speech as women; in fury and rage against all that opposes them, as lions; their breasts and hearts are as hard as iron; they are full of noise and shuffling; the sting of their pestiferous doctrine is worse than that of a scorpion; but their reign is generally but for a short time. (Challoner) --- Heretics are compared to locusts, says St. Jerome, because they are a species of insects extremely hurtful to mankind, as they occasion famine, eat up the harvest, and even strip the trees and the vines. With very great propriety then may the locusts here mentioned be understood of the first reformers, not only on account of their rapacity, but also for their number. Luther was their leader, by allowing every one to be his own interpreter of Scripture, the effects of which we have described by Dudithius, a learned Protestant divine, in his epistle to Beza. "What sort of people are our Protestants, straggling to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine, sometimes to this side, and sometimes to that? You may, perhaps, know what their sentiments in matters of religion are to-day; but you can never certainly tell what they will be to-morrow. In what article of religion do these churches agree, which have cast off the bishop of Rome? Examine all of them from top to bottom, and you will scarce find one thing affirmed by one, which is not immediately condemned by another for wicked doctrine." The same confusion of opinions is thus described by an English Protestant, the learned Dr. Walton: "Aristarchus heretofore could scarcely find seven wise men in Greece, but with us scarce are to be found so many idiots; for all are doctors, all are divinely learned; there is not so much as the meanest fanatic, or jack-pudding, who does not give you his own dreams for the word of God." (Pastorini, hic.[here]) |
| Revelation of John 9:4 | And it was commanded them that they should not hurt the grass of the earth, nor any green thing, nor any tree: but only the men who have not the sign of God on their foreheads: | Nor any green thing. The Greek and Latin texts express it every green thing; meaning, that though the locusts, or the sects of Protestants, are allowed by the Almighty to seduce some of all sorts from the Church, yet that the generality of the faithful will be preserved unhurt. (Pastorini) |
| Revelation of John 9:5 | And it was given to them that they should not kill them; but that they should torment them five months: and their torment was as the torment of a scorpion when he striketh a man. | |
| Revelation of John 9:6 | *And in those days men shall seek death, and shall not find it: and they shall desire to die, and death shall fly from them. Isaias 2:19.; Osee 10:8.; Luke 23:30. | |
| Revelation of John 9:7 | *And the shapes of the locusts were like to horses prepared for battle; and on their heads as it were crowns like gold: and their faces were as the faces of men. Wisdom 16:9. | And the shapes of the locusts. We now come to the description of these locusts, which expresses the spirit of sedition and rebellion that animated the reformers and their proselytes. Luther proclaimed himself the leader in this as well as in other articles of the new discipline: see his works, particularly Contra statem Ecclesiae et falsò nominatum ordinem Episcoporum, lib. contra Sylvest. Prieras, De Saeculari potestate et Contra Rusticos, etc. Erasmus thus describes the effects of the inflammatory doctrine of these ministers of evangelical liberty: "I saw them (the people) come forth from their sermons with fierce looks and threatening countenances," like men "that just come from hearing bloody invectives and seditious speeches." Accordingly, we found "these evangelical people always ready to rise up in arms, and equally as good at fighting as at disputing." The learned Protestant historian, Dr. Heylin, in his Cosmography, (B. i.) says of the Calvinists: "Rather than their discipline should not be admitted, and the episcopal government destroyed in all the Churches of Christ, they were resolved to depose kings, ruin kingdoms, and to subvert the fundamental constitutions of all civil states." --- And on their heads, etc. These crowns shew clearly their general spirit of independence; and their faces being as the faces of men, indicate the presumption with which they announced themselves as teachers of orthodox and holy doctrine. (Pastorini, hic.[here]) |
| Revelation of John 9:8 | And they had hair as the hair of women, and their teeth were as the teeth of lions: | And they had hair as the hair of women. This latter allusion, unhappily for the sectaries, betrays too plainly their sensual disposition towards that sex, their shameful doctrine on that score, and the scandalous example of their practice. Luther, in despite of a vow he had solemnly made to God of observing continence, married; and married a nun, equally bound as himself to that sacred religious promise! But, as St. Jerome says, "it is rare to find a heretic that loves chastity." Luther's example had indeed been anticipated by Carlostadius, a priest and ringleader of the Sacramentarians, who had married a little before; and it was followed by most of the heads of the reformation. Zuinglius, a priest and chief of that sect which bore his name, took a wife. Bucer, a religious man of the order of St. Dominic, became a Lutheran, left his cloister, and married a nun. oecolampadius, a Brigittin monk, became a Zuinglian, and also married. Cranmer, archbishop of Canterbury, had also his wife. Peter Martyr, a canon regular, embraced the doctrine of Calvin; but followed the example of Luther, and married a nun. Ochin, general of the Capuchins, became a Lutheran, and also married. Beza, the most celebrated minister in the Calvinistic party, being asked in his old age, by an intimate acquaintance of his, (Deshayes, governor of Montargis) what was the leading reason which connected him so closely with the Calvinists? Beza called in his mistress, a beautiful young girl who lived with him, and said: "That is the principle reason which convinces me of the excellence of my religion." (Marsollier's Life of St. Francis de Sales, book iii.) --- Thus the principal leaders in the reformation went forth preaching the new gospel, with two marks upon them---apostacy from the faith, and open violation of the most sacred vows. The passion of lust, it is also well known, hurried Henry VIII of England, into a separation from the Catholic Church, and ranked him amongst the reformers. (Pastorini, hic.[here]) --- Teeth of lions. What is more known than the truth of this representation? Did not the reformers, wherever they got footing, pillage the churches, seize the church possessions, destroy the monasteries, and appropriate to themselves the revenues? Such was the case in Germany, in Holland, in France, in Switzerland, in Scotland, and in England; what a scene of rapine! Let it suffice to say, that in the reign of Henry VIII were suppressed not less than 645 monasteries, 90 colleges, 110 hospitals, and 2374 chantries and free chapels; (Baker's Chron.) the lands, etc. of all which were confiscated to the king. Is not this to devour with lions' teeth? The whole explication here given of the allegory of the locusts, we presume, appears so consonant with the history of the reformation, that the propriety will not be denied. The application is even so obvious, that the learned Protestant divine, Dr. Walton, used it for describing the multitudes of new sectaries that swarmed out of the English Church. Thus he speaks in the preface of his Polyglot: "The bottomless pit seems to have been set open, from whence a smoke has risen, which has darkened the heavens and the stars; and locusts are come out with stings, a numerous race of sectaries and heretics, who have renewed all the ancient heresies, and invented many monstrous opinions of their own. These have filled our cities, villages, camps, houses, nay our pulpits too, and lead the poor deluded people with them to the pit of perdition." (Pastorini, Apocalypse ix.) |
| Revelation of John 9:9 | And they had breastplates, as breastplates of iron, and the sound of their wings was as the noise of chariots of many horses running to battle: | |
| Revelation of John 9:10 | And they had tails like scorpions, and stings were in their tails: and their power was to hurt men five months: and they had over them | And their power was to hurt men five months. The duration of their power is here limited, but we dare not venture to explain what is meant by the dark expression, five months; time to come must clear up the difficulty. (Haydock) |
| Revelation of John 9:11 | A king, the Angel of the bottomless pit: whose name, in Hebrew, is Abaddon; and in Greek, Appollyon; in Latin, Exterminans. | |
| Revelation of John 9:12 | One wo is past, and behold there come yet two woes more hereafter. | |
| Revelation of John 9:13 | And the sixth Angel sounded the trumpet: and I heard a voice from the four horns of the golden altar, which is before the eyes of God, | At the sounding of the sixth trumpet, are said to be loosed the four angels bound in the river Euphrates. By these four angels, and the two hundred millions of horsemen, many understand the devils and their instruments, men incited by them in antichrist's time, to make war and persecute the Church of Christ, who shall destroy a third part, that is, a great part of men then in the world. Divers others apply this to the Persians, the successors of the Parthians, who about the middle of the third age[century], in the time of Valerian, a great persecutor of the Christians, passed the Euphrates, which used to be the bounds of the Roman empire to the east, defeated, took, and kept Valerian prisoner, which by its consequences gave a great stroke to the Roman empire. See the bishop of Meaux[Bossuet], Pere Alleman, etc. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 9:14 | Saying to the sixth Angel, who had the trumpet: Loose the four Angels, who are bound in the great river Euphrates. | |
| Revelation of John 9:15 | And the four Angels were loosed, who were prepared for an hour, and a day, and a month, and a year, to kill the third part of men. | And the four angels were loosed. This seems to indicate the moment in which Satan himself is loosed from the abyss or hell, where, as we shall see in Apocalypse 20:2. he was chained up for a thousand years. This is the time of antichrist, whose coming, as St. Paul says, is according to the working of Satan. (2 Thessalonians 2:9.) The antichristian period is described by the ancient Fathers as the most dreadful of all; and the Apocalypse plainly shews it to be so, as we shall see. But we have this comfort, that his time will be short. He must be loosed a little time. (Apocalypse 20:3.) |
| Revelation of John 9:16 | And the number of the army of horsemen was twenty thousand times ten thousand. And I heard the number of them. | Twenty thousand times ten thousand, or two hundred millions. Such an immense multitude cannot be accounted for, but by supposing a great part of it to consist of the infernal beings in human form, as it is doubtful whether there be that number of men capable of bearing arms upon the whole globe of the earth. |
| Revelation of John 9:17 | And thus I saw the horses in the vision: and they who sat on them, had breastplates of fire, and hyacinth, and brimstone, and the heads of the horses were as the heads of lions: and from their mouths proceeded fire, and smoke, and brimstone. | And thus I saw the horses in the vision. The horsemen appeared to St. John with breastplates of fire, and of hyacinth, and of brimstone. By this expression is indicated the firing of carabines, or such firearms as cavalry use, which are applied to the breast when shot off. St. John took the fire that issued out of the muskets to come from the horsemen's breast, on which the muskets rested, and so thought the horsemen had breastplates of fire. The prophet here even describes to us the composition of gunpowder, with its three ingredients, viz. brimstone or sulphur, fire or charcoal, and hyacinth or saltpetre; because saltpetre, when set on fire, emits a flame of a fine purple colour, similar to the colour of the hyacinth stone. Here then we see revealed to St. John both the composition and use of gunpowder, to which he and all mankind at that time were strangers. Then it is said: And the heads of the horses, etc. Here is pointed out the artillery of the army, or cannon. He saw in this vision the whole army drawn up at a distance, and the artillery placed upon a line with the cavalry. He seemed to confound the cannon with the horses, and the cannons' mouths with the mouths of the horses, as the height of both from the ground is nearly the same. He describes the appearances as he saw in the vision, not the reality. When therefore he says, the heads of the horses were as the heads of lions, it is the same as if he said, the mouths of the cannon were as to the noise they made, like the mouths of roaring lions. Hence it appears that St. John, in this vision, both saw the fire of the cannon, and heard the explosion. |
| Revelation of John 9:18 | And by these three plagues was the third part of men killed, by the fire, and by the smoke, and by the brimstone, which issued out of their mouths. | |
| Revelation of John 9:19 | For the power of the horses is in their mouths, and in their tails. For, their tails are like to serpents, having heads; and with them they hurt. | For the power of the horses. The power of the imagined horses or real cannon, lying in their mouths and in their tails, signifies that the mischievous power of the cannon is directed to the object by their mouths, but takes its birth in the tail or breech of the cannon, where the charge is lodged: whence the cannon's breech is here compared to the serpent's head, which contains its venom. (Pastorini, hic.[here]) |
| Revelation of John 9:20 | And the rest of the men, who were not slain by these plagues, neither did penance for the works of their hands, that they should not adore devils, and idols of gold, and silver, and brass, and stone, and wood, which neither can see, nor hear, nor walk: | The rest of men, who were not slain by these plagues, which before are metaphorically called fire, smoke, and brimstone, did not for all that do penance, nor repent of their idolatrous worship of devils, and of idols of gold, silver, etc. nor for their sorceries of magic, nor for their fornication, nor for their thefts. This again may be either understood of what shall happen hereafter, a little before the end of the world (see Cornelius a Lapide); or perhaps of the Roman heathen idolaters, who still persisted in their iniquitous practices. Dr. Hammond expounds it of the Gnostic heretics. But to apply it to popish Christians, is a groundless invention of the late pretended reformers, neither supported by any authority or reason; (though Dr. W. is pleased to join with them) whereas all Catholics (and as he calls them, papists) have constantly declared in their controversies, in all their catechisms, that they adore none but God alone. Of this more hereafter. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 9:21 | Neither did they penance for their murders, nor from their sorceries, nor from their fornication, nor from their thefts. | |
| Revelation of John 10:0 | The cry of a mighty Angel: he gives John a book to eat. | |
| Revelation of John 10:1 | And I saw another mighty Angel come down from heaven clothed with a cloud, and a rainbow upon his head, and his face was as the sun, and his feet as pillars of fire; | I saw another mighty Angel. Some expound it of Christ himself: others of an Angel, representing the power of God over the sea and land. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 10:2 | And he had in his hand a little book, open: and he set his right foot upon the sea, and his left foot upon the land: | |
| Revelation of John 10:3 | And he cried out with a loud voice, as when a lion roareth. And when he had cried out, seven thunders uttered their voices. | Seven thunders uttered their voice, to signify the following approaching evils, which St. John is ordered not to write down, though they were shewn to him; and if he was not to write them, even in such a mystical and prophetical manner as he wrote the other things, who can pretend to know any thing of them? (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 10:4 | And when the seven thunders had uttered their voices, I was about to write: and I heard a voice from heaven saying to me: Seal up the things which the seven thunders have spoken: and write them not. | And when the seven thunders had, etc. St. John is not permitted to write, but ordered to seal up the things which the seven thunders had spoken; which circumstance seems to insinuate, that the things spoken by the seven thunders were seven particulars of antichrist's persecution, as the word thunder is generally used in the Apocalypse to denote some disaster; and these seven particulars being most dreadful and severe, the Almighty chose to have them sealed up, or kept concealed, lest the foreknowledge of them should too much terrify and damp the human mind. |
| Revelation of John 10:5 | *And the Angel whom I saw standing upon the sea, and upon the land, lifted up his hand to heaven: Daniel 2:7. | \f + \fr 10:5-6\ft The Angel....swore....that time shall be no longer. This seems to favour very much the exposition of those interpreters who think that all these things are not to be fulfilled till some short time before the end of the world. Others (of which see Alcazar, etc.) take this to be a prediction of the ruin and destruction of the Jews, particularly under the emperor Adrian. Others (see the bishop of Meaux[Bossuet]) understand by this, that the time was approaching when God, by his judgments, would put an end to the idolatry and heathen worship of pagan Rome, and that his providence would make the Christian faith triumph over all its adversaries, and his Church flourish, as foretold by the ancient prophets; that is, this should come to pass when the seventh Angel should sound his trumpet. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 10:6 | And he swore by him that liveth for ever and ever, who created heaven, and the things which are therein; and the earth, and the things which are therein; and the sea, and the things which are therein: That time shall be no longer: | |
| Revelation of John 10:7 | But in the days of the voice of the seventh Angel, when he shall begin to sound the trumpet, the mystery of God shall be finished, as he hath declared by his servants, the prophets. | Declared. Literally, evangelized, to signify the good tidings, agreeable to the gospel, of the final victory of Christ, and of that eternal life which should be the reward of the temporal sufferings of the servants of God. (Challoner) |
| Revelation of John 10:8 | And I heard a voice from heaven speaking to me again, and saying: Go, and take the book, that is open, from the hand of the Angel standing upon the sea, and upon the land. | |
| Revelation of John 10:9 | And I went to the Angel, saying unto him, that he should give me the book. And he said to me: *Take the book and devour it: and it shall make thy belly bitter, but in thy mouth it shall be sweet as honey. Ezechiel 1:1. | \f + \fr 10:9-10\ft Take the book, and devour it. See Ezechiel 2:and 3:It was sweet in my mouth; I was delighted to read and hear the victories and glory of God's faithful servants; but it became bitter in my belly, when I considered the judgments of God upon so many sinners, who by their own wilful blindness were lost for eternity. (Witham) --- This mysterious book, presented to St. John precisely between the sound of the sixth and seventh trumpet, or rather between the irruption announced at the sound of the sixth trumpet, and the persecution which is then to follow and to precede the sound of the seventh trumpet, appears to represent the book of the gospel, which shall be given to the Jews at the end of the sixth age of the Church. This book will be then to them full of sweetness, because they will see in it the tender love of Jesus Christ; but at the same time it will cause bitterness, because they will see in it with grief their infidelity and that of their fathers. (Bible de Vence) |
| Revelation of John 10:10 | And I took the book from the hand of the Angel, and devoured it: and it was in my mouth sweet as honey: and when I had devoured it, my belly was bitter: | |
| Revelation of John 10:11 | And he said to me: Thou must prophesy again to many nations, and peoples, and tongues, and to kings. | Thou must prophesy again: we may understand what still follows in this Apocalypse, or his gospel written afterwards, or his preaching and instructing the Asiatic Churches. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 11:0 | He is ordered to measure the temple: the two witnesses. | |
| Revelation of John 11:1 | And there was given me a reed like unto a rod, and it was said to me: Arise, and measure the temple of God, and the altar, and them that adore in it. | The apostle is ordered to measure the temple. Two prophets are promised, to teach mankind. They are put to death, and in three days and a half after they are raised to life, and ascend to heaven. A great earthquake follows. The seventh Angel sounds the trumpet. The elders give thanks to God. --- Measure the temple, etc. This is to signify that the divine Providence would always protect his faithful servants, who are called the temple of God; (1 Corinthians 3:17.; 2 Corinthians 6:16.) but by the outward court not to be measured, because it is given to the Gentiles, etc. (Apocalypse11:2) is commonly understood idolaters, infidels, heretics, who are not in the temple of God, nor in his Church. It is an allusion to the Jewish temple, and the different divisions of it, the Gentiles not being permitted to enter into the temple itself, but only into that outward part called the court of the Gentiles. (Witham) --- The churches consecrated to the true God, are so much diminished in number, that they are represented by St. John as one church; its ministers officiate at one altar; and all the true faithful are so few, with respect to the bulk of mankind, that the evangelist sees them assembled in one temple, to pay their adorations to the Most High. (Pastorini) |
| Revelation of John 11:2 | But the court, which is without the temple, cast out, and measure it not, because it is given to the Gentiles, and the holy city they shall tread under foot forty-two months: | The holy city they shall tread under foot forty-two months.{ Ver. 2, etc. Atrium autem quod est foris, ten aulen exothen, not esothen, as in some manuscripts. --- Dr. Wells, when he tells us, on the third verse of this chapter, that the consent of the primitive Church and their unexceptionable authority, require that by the two witnesses we understand Henoch[Enoch] and Elias[Elijah], seems to be convinced of it by the authority (as he imagines) of Dr. Grabe. This we find by his own words, (p. 79) "I shall hear," saith he, "adjoin a note of the late most learned and pious divine, Dr. Grabe, in reference to this matter, in a passage of St. Irenaeus, lib. v., ch. V. It is note 4, in p. 405, Oxon. Edit. and runs thus in the doctor's own words: Disputationem de loco in quam Deus transtulerit et huc usque viventes conservarit Enochum et Eliam Augustinus indicavit ad fidem non pertinere, at cum hic Irenaeus doceat Apostolorum discipulos et (N. B.[Nota Bene, Note Well?]) auditores dixisse, etc. And the note in Dr. Wells ends with these words: Plures alios legendo notes licet. After this Dr. W.[Wells] adds: I have taken the pains to transcribe all these citations, that the reader may see how generally the Fathers do agree in this matter. And the same Dr. Wells a little after: Whereupon, saith he, the good doctor (Grabe) adds in reference to himself: mihi parum tutum videtur aliter nunc sentire. And had all others the like due esteem for the Fathers, and the like modest opinion of themselves, there would quickly be taken away that great and unhappy difference of opinions, which is now in the Church, as to points of religion." I wish, no less than Dr. Wells, that all others had the like due esteem of the Fathers, and the like modest opinion of themselves as the author of this note, and he who writ, mihi parum tutum videtur aliter nunc sentire. By such dispositions of submission to the doctrine delivered or witnessed by the consent of the primitive Fathers, might be quickly taken away the unhappy differences in points of religion betwixt us, and all pretended reformers, who, by setting up their private judgment against the authority of the Catholic Church, have brought in these differences. Luther led the way: I care not, said he, if a thousand Cyprians, a thousand Augustines, are against me, etc. But I am fully persuaded that Dr. W. did not know that all this Latin note, with the citations of the Fathers, and with those words upon them, (mihi parum tutum videtur aliter nunc sentire) are not the words of the learned and pious divine, Dr. Grabe, but are found word for word in the third note of Franciscus Feuardentius, in his Paris edition of St. Irenaeus, in the year 1576, p. 322, from whence they were taken above a hundred years after by Dr. Grabe. Had Dr. W. taken notice that they were the words of so warm an adversary of the pretended reformation as Feuardentius, I doubt whether he would have given such high commendations of the true author, with an N. B. on those words of Feuardentius, mihi parum tutum videtur, etc. But I am glad that Dr. Grabe and Dr. Wells are of the same judgment with the author of the note.|} That is, Gentiles and Jews shall be permitted to persecute the Church and the faithful servants of God; but only for a short time, expressed by forty-two months, as elsewhere by twelve hundred and sixty days, and also by a time, and times, and half a time, which, as St. Jerome observes, is for a year, and two years, and half a year, which three different ways of speaking by years, by months, and by days, are only to signify that God never permits his faithful to be under any violent persecution for any long time. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 11:3 | And I will give to my two witnesses, and they shall prophesy a thousand two hundred sixty days, clothed in sackcloth. | My two witnesses....shall prophesy twelve hundred and sixty days. It is a very common interpretation, that by these two witnesses must be understood Henoch[Enoch] and Elias[Elijah], who are to come before the end of the world. It is true this is what we read in several of the ancient Fathers, insomuch, that Dr. Wells, in his paraphrase, calls it the "consent of the primitive fathers," and in his notes says, it is of "unexceptionable authority." This opinion (at least as to Elias) is grounded on those words of the prophet Malachy, (Malachias 4:5.) behold, I will send you Elias, the prophet, before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord; and also on the words of our Saviour, Christ, (Matthew 17:11.) where he tells his disciples: Elias indeed shall come, and restore all things. But I cannot say that the consent of the fathers is so unanimous as to Henoch: for we find by St. Hilary, that some thought Jeremy[Jeremiah] was to come with Elias, and he himself thought that with Elias would come Moses. See his commentary on Matt., p. 710, Nov. edit. Secondly, allowing it a received opinion that Henoch and Elias are again to come before the day of judgment, yet it is not the constant doctrine of the ancient fathers, that by these two witnesses in this place of the Apocalypse, must be understood Henoch and Elias. St. Cyprian expounds it of two sorts of martyrs for the Catholic faith; to wit, they who suffer death, and others who only suffered imprisonment, loss of goods, and the like. Others expound it of the testimonies concerning Christ and his Church, of which some are in the Old Testament, some in the New. To these we must join all those interpreters who expound all the visions and predictions in the Apocalypse, till the 20th chapter, of the persecutions raised by the Jews: or by the heathens against the Church, which have already happened. Of these, both as to ancient fathers and later interpreters, see Alcazar in his Prologomena, note 6, p. 33, and note 12, p. 48. (Witham) --- Two witnesses. It is commonly understood of Henoch and Elias. (Challoner) |
| Revelation of John 11:4 | These are the two olive-trees, and the two candlesticks, standing before the Lord of the earth. | These are the two olive-trees, flourishing with works of piety and mercy, and the two candlesticks shining with faith and good works. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 11:5 | And if any man will hurt them, fire shall come out of their mouths, and shall devour their enemies: and if any man will hurt them, in this manner must he be killed. | And if any man would hurt them, etc. These two verses seem to signify both the miracles which God many times wrought by the prayers of his martyrs, as he had done formerly in the time of Elias[Elijah] and the exemplary punishments with which from time to time he chastised those by whom they were persecuted, and that he will do the like by Henoch[Enoch] and Elias, when they shall come. (Witham) --- In this and the following verse are expressed the miraculous powers with which the two witnesses will be invested. These powers will be necessary to enable them to prove the truth of their doctrine. Every messenger who appears with a commission from God, is always furnished with means to prove it. Thus our Saviour and his apostles worked miracles in testimony of the Christian religion. And in the Old Testament, Elias convicted the false prophets by a miracle. See 3 Kings xviii. Every new teacher consequently, who comes destitute of this sanction, can claim no credit, but is only to be considered as an imposter. (Pastorini) |
| Revelation of John 11:6 | These have power to shut heaven, that it rain not in the days of their prophecy: and they have power over waters to turn them into blood, and to strike the earth with all plagues as often as they will. | |
| Revelation of John 11:7 | And when they shall have finished their testimony, the beast, that ascendeth out of the abyss, shall make war against them, and shall overcome them, and kill them. | The beast, etc. God, for the greater good and glory of his servants, permits the devil by antichrist, and such like instruments, to torment them, and put them to death; and yet by dying they conquer, to the eternal confusion of their persecutors, who shall behold them going up to heaven, to be there happy with God in his kingdom for ever. (Witham) --- Antichrist, impelled by Satan, shall kill them. (Pastorini) |
| Revelation of John 11:8 | And their bodies shall lie in the streets of the great city, which is called spiritually Sodom, and Egypt, where also their Lord was crucified. | Their bodies shall lie in the streets. It is what has often happened to the bodies of the martyrs, and may happen to Henoch[Enoch] and Elias[Elijah], for three days and a half, for a short time. --- The great city. Some understand any city where Christians are persecuted. Others by the following words, where also their Lord was crucified, will needs have to be understood Jerusalem, which they hold shall be rebuilt in the time of antichrist, and where by him shall be put to death Henoch and Elias. But others think it may be expounded of heathen Rome, which in a mystical sense might be called Sodom for its infamous crimes, and Egypt for its idolatries and superstitions, where Christ might be said to be crucified, not as to himself, but in his members, according to what he himself said, Matthew 25:40., "inasmuch as you did it to one of these, my least brethren, you did it to me." (Witham) --- City; Jerusalem, which it is supposed will be the residence of antichrist, and filled with a great concourse of people. (Menochius) |
| Revelation of John 11:9 | And they of the tribes, and peoples, and tongues, and nations, shall see their bodies for three days and a half: and they shall not suffer their bodies to be laid in sepulchres. | |
| Revelation of John 11:10 | And the inhabitants of the earth shall rejoice over them, and make merry: and shall send presents one to another, because these two prophets tormented them that dwelt upon the earth. | The inhabitants of the earth shall rejoice, etc. The persecutors rejoice and make merry for a while, when they seem to get the better of the Christians. Dioclesian caused pillars to be erected to him, as if he had destroyed the Christian religion; and when, by his cruelties he saw the faith of Christ, still increase more and more, he fell into a kind of madness, and laid down his empire. See Baron.[Baronius] ad an. Dni. 304[A.D. 304], p. 771. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 11:11 | And after three days and a half, the spirit of life from God entered into them. And they stood upon their feet, and great fear fell upon them that saw them. | The spirit of life from God entered into them, etc. It is an allusion to a vision in the prophet Ezechiel, Ezechiel xxxvii. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 11:12 | And they heard a great voice from heaven, saying to them: Come up hither. And they went up to heaven in a cloud: and their enemies saw them. | |
| Revelation of John 11:13 | And at that hour there was a great earthquake, and a tenth part of the city fell: and there were slain in the earthquake, names of men seven thousand; and the rest were cast into a fear, and gave glory to the God of heaven. | A great earthquake. By which may be signified the consternation that fell upon the persecutors of Christians, when by God's visible chastisements, seven thousand (that is, many of them) perished miserably; others were struck with fear, others converted. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 11:14 | The second wo is past: and behold the third wo will come quickly. | These visions belonged to the second woe, and the third woe is at hand. (Witham) --- Second woe; the persecution of antichrist. --- Third woe, or the day of judgment, is near at hand. (Pastorini) |
| Revelation of John 11:15 | And the seventh Angel sounded the trumpet: and there were great voices in heaven, saying: The kingdom of this world is become our Lord's and his Christ's, and he shall reign for ever and ever. Amen. | The seventh Angel, etc. The saints and blessed spirits in heaven are represented praising God with loud voices, at the approaching of the kingdom of God; some understand at the end and consummation of the wicked world, after the destruction of antichrist, when the blessed shall reign in heaven: but others expound this of the triumph of the Christian faith and Church, when the providence of God putting an end to the persecutions against the Christian religion, by the miserable end of Dioclesian, Maximian, Maxentius, etc., made the kingdom of this world (the powerful Roman empire) become the kingdom of our Lord, by his raising Constantine the great to the empire, and under him making the faith of Christ triumph over all its persecutors and adversaries. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 11:16 | And the four and twenty ancients, who sit on their seats in the sight of God, fell upon their faces and adored God, saying: | |
| Revelation of John 11:17 | We give thee thanks, O Lord God Almighty, who art, and who wast, and who art to come: because thou hast taken thy great power, and thou hast reigned. | |
| Revelation of John 11:18 | And the nations were angry, and thy wrath is come, and the time of the dead to be judged, and to render a reward to thy servants, the prophets, and to the saints, and to them that fear thy name, little and great, and to destroy them who have corrupted the earth. | |
| Revelation of John 11:19 | And the temple of God was opened in heaven: and the ark of his testament was seen in his temple, and there were lightnings, and voices, and an earthquake, and great hail. | The temple of God was opened....the ark of his testament was seen; which P. Alleman applies to the cross that appeared in the air to Constantine. Such applications may be probable, but cannot be called certain. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 12:0 | The vision of the woman clothed with the sun; and of the great dragon, her persecutor. | |
| Revelation of John 12:1 | And there appeared a great wonder in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars: | A woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet. By this woman, interpreters commonly understand the Church of Christ, shining with the light of faith, under the protection of the sun of justice, Jesus Christ. The moon, the Church, hath all changeable things of this world under her feet, the affections of the faithful being raised above them all. --- A woman: the Church of God. It may also, by allusion, be applied to our blessed Lady[the Virgin Mary]. The Church is clothed with the sun, that is, with Christ: she hath the moon, that is, the changeable things of the world, under her feet; and the twelve stars with which she is crowned, are the twelve apostles: she is in labour and pain, whilst she brings forth her children, and Christ in them, in the midst of afflictions and persecutions. (Challoner) --- Under the figure of a woman and of a dragon, are represented the various attempts of Satan to undermine the Church. --- On her head....twelve stars, her doctrine being delivered by the twelve apostles and their successors. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 12:2 | And being with child, she cried travailing in birth, and was in pain to be delivered. | With child, etc., to signify that the Church, even in the time of persecutions, brought forth children to Christ. (Witham) --- It likewise signifies the difficulties which obstructed the first propagation of Christianity. (Pastorini) |
| Revelation of John 12:3 | And there appeared another wonder in heaven: and behold, a great red dragon, having seven heads and ten horns, and on his head seven diadems, | Another wonder in heaven; that is, in the Church of Christ, though revealed to St. John, in the visions, as if they were seen in heaven. --- A great red dragon; a fiery dragon, with seven heads and ten horns; that is many heads and many horns. By the dragon is generally understood the devil, (see ver. 7 and 9) and by the heads and horns, kings and princes, who act under him, persecuting the servants of God. (Witham) --- Dragon, etc. the devil; and by the seven heads and ten horns, are meant those princes and governors who persecute the Church of Christ. (Calmet) |
| Revelation of John 12:4 | And his tail drew the third part of the stars of heaven, and cast them to the earth; and the dragon stood before the woman, who was ready to be delivered, that, when she should be delivered, he might devour her son. | His tail drew the third part of the stars: a great part of mankind. This is spoken with an allusion to the fall of Lucifer from heaven, with the rebellious angels, driven from thence by St. Michael. (Witham) --- According to Pastorini, this passage refers to the angels whom Lucifer drew after him by sin to the earth. Menochius interprets it of those bishops and eminent persons who fell under the weight of persecution, and apostatized. --- And the dragon stood before the woman, etc. The devil is always ready, as far as God permits him, to make war against the Church and the faithful servants of God. The woman, the Church, brought a man child, or rather many men children, stout and valiant in the profession of the true faith, able to resist and triumph over the attempts of the persecutors in all nations, not of themselves, but by the grace and power of Jesus Christ, their protector, who is able to rule all nations as it were with a rod of iron, to frustrate all their attempts, and turn their hearts as he pleaseth. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 12:5 | And she brought forth a man child, who was to rule all nations with an iron rod: and her son was taken up to God, and to his throne: | A man child; that is, a masculine race of Christians, willing to confess the name of the Lord, and to fight his battles; who, through the merits of Jesus Christ, should triumph over all the attempts of the world. (Calmet) --- Her son (or children) was taken up to heaven, guarded by the special favour of God. They always overcome the devil, and all their adversaries, by reason of the blood of the Lamb, by the merits of Christ. And they loved not the life of the body, so as to preserve it, by incurring the death of the soul. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 12:6 | And the woman fled into the wilderness, where she had a place prepared by God, that there they should feed her a thousand two hundred sixty days. | The woman fled into the wilderness. The Church, in the times of persecutions, must be content to serve God in a private manner; but by divine Providence, such persecutions never lasted with violence only for a short time, signified by 1260 days, or as the same is expressed here, (ver. 14) for a time, and times, and half a time, that is for a year, and two years, and half a year. (Witham) --- The Christians were accustomed to fly during the times of persecution into the deserts, to avoid the fury of the pagans. This was done by the greatest saints; and St. Jerome remarks, that it was this which gave rise to the eremitical state of life. |
| Revelation of John 12:7 | And there was a great battle in heaven: Michael and his Angels fought with the dragon, and the dragon fought, and his angels: | |
| Revelation of John 12:8 | And they prevailed not, neither was their place found any more in heaven. | |
| Revelation of John 12:9 | And that great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, who is called the devil, and Satan who seduceth the whole world, and he was cast forth unto the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him. | |
| Revelation of John 12:10 | And I heard a loud voice in heaven, saying: Now is come salvation, and strength, and the kingdom of our God, and the power of his Christ: because the accuser of our brethren is cast forth, who accused them before our God day and night. | \f + \fr 12:10-12\ft Now is come salvation....rejoice, O ye heavens. The blessed in heaven rejoice for the victories of the faithful on earth, and also for the reward and glory which would shortly be given them in heaven. (Witham) --- Woe to the earth, etc. Both Pastorini and Calmet refer this woe to the persecution of Dioclesian. The dragon, the devil, is more irritated than ever against the Christians; he therefore stimulates the pagans to exercise their utmost cruelty against them, knowing that a Christian emperor (Constantine) would in a short time extend the reign of Jesus Christ over the whole world. |
| Revelation of John 12:11 | And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony, and they loved not their lives unto death. | |
| Revelation of John 12:12 | Therefore rejoice, O ye heavens, and you that dwell therein. Wo to the earth, and to the sea, because the devil is come down to you, having great wrath, knowing that he hath but a short time. | |
| Revelation of John 12:13 | And after the dragon saw that he was cast unto the earth, he persecuted the woman, who brought forth the man child: | |
| Revelation of John 12:14 | And there were given to the woman, two wings of a great eagle, that she might fly into the desert to her place, where she is nourished for a time, and times, and half a time, from the face of the serpent. | There were given to the woman two wings of a great eagle. By these two wings, some understand the love of God, and the fear of offending him; others, piety, prudence, etc. (Witham) --- The Church, on account of the severe pressure of the persecution, obtained from the Almighty a special protection and assistance. (Pastorini) |
| Revelation of John 12:15 | And the serpent cast out of his mouth, after the woman, water, as it were a river: that he might cause her to be carried away by the river. | The serpent (the dragon, the devil) came out of his mouth, etc. He endeavoured to destroy the Christian religion; but the earth, that is, the princes of the earth, as God was pleased to turn their hearts, helped to turn away the persecutions. (Witham) --- As a last effort, the devil raises a more bloody persecution than was ever known before. See Eusebius, History of the Church. |
| Revelation of John 12:16 | And the earth helped the woman, and the earth opened her mouth, and swallowed up the river, which the dragon cast out of his mouth. | And the earth helped the woman. A prince of the earth, Constantine, came to the succour of the Church, and caused the persecution to cease. |
| Revelation of John 12:17 | And the dragon was angry against the woman: and went to make war with the rest of her seed, who keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ. | |
| Revelation of John 12:18 | And he stood upon the sand of the sea. | And he stood upon the sand of the sea;{ Ver. 18. Et stetit super arenam maris. The ordinary Greek copies, estathen, steti, which the Protestant translators followed, beginning chapter xiii. with these words, and I stood upon the sand of the sea, as if St. John spoke of himself. But Dr. Wells, in his amendments, has corrected the Protestant translation, and restored the reading estathe, stetit, as we find it in the Latin Vulgate. I have reckoned near upon a hundred places in the Apocalypse only, wherein Dr. Wells has preferred those readings in the Greek manuscripts which are conformable to our Latin Vulgate.|} that is the dragon seemed to be at a stand, to rest a while, not being able to raise any more persecutions. Now as to the time that these things should come to pass, many by seven heads and ten horns understand many powerful wicked kings, who should persecute the good, especially about antichrist's time, when the faithful at different times should be oppressed, and forced to fly as it were into the wilderness to worship God in private. And when the end of the world seems to draw near, the devil with greater malice will persecute God's servants, his time being short. Others apply these predictions to the particular persecutions in the Church by the Jews, and by the heathen emperors in the first three Christian ages[centuries] before Constantine's time, when idolatry was destroyed, when the face of the Church was changed, and when she became victorious, and publicly triumphed over her former enemies, the heathens; and by the man child, whom God took under his special protection, they will have to be understood Constantine himself. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 13:0 | Of the beast with seven heads: and of a second beast. | |
| Revelation of John 13:1 | And I saw a beast coming up out of the sea, having seven heads and ten horns, and upon his horns ten diadems, and upon his heads names of blasphemy. | I saw a beast coming out of the sea. By this first beast several understand antichrist, as St. Irenaeus, lib. V. ch. XXVIII. and St. Gregory, lib. XXXI. Moral. ch. XLI. But this is not certain. By the other beast{ Ver. 1. Though St. Irenaeus, and also St. Gregory, (lib. xxxi. mor. ch. XLI.) by the first of these two beasts understand antichrist, and others would have antichrist to be meant by one of the two, yet this is not to be looked upon as absolutely certain, not being witnessed by the consent of primitive Fathers. The ancient Fathers, especially in the exposition of obscure prophecies, many times give us no more than their private opinions, or suspicions and conjectures, as St. Augustine expressly takes notice in the 20th book de Civ. Dei[City of God], (ch. XIX. tom. 7. p. 597. Nov. Ed.) where he speaks of antichrist: so that though St. Irenaeus had seen St. Polycarp, who was a disciple of St. John the evangelist, yet he delivers us divers things concerning antichrist, which are no more than his private opinions and conjectures, in which others do not agree with him; as that antichrist shall be of the tribe of Dan; that he shall sit in the temple of Jerusalem. He was also in an error as to Christ's reign of a thousand years upon the earth with his elect. Arethas, bishop of Caesarea, in Cappadocia, in the sixth age[century], in his commentary on the Apocalypse, (tom. vi. Bib. Patrum, Edit. Colon) speaking of this opinion, that some would have the first beast (Apocalypse xiii. 1.) to be antichrist, and others the second beast, only says: quidam sic accipiunt, etc.|} coming up out of the earth, (ver. 11) many understand antichrist's false prophet, some famous impostor and magician in antichrist's time, who will do great wonders and signs. The seven heads and ten horns, may again signify a great number of kings and princes, who shall be overcome by antichrist, and submit themselves to him. The dragon, or devil, gives that great power to antichrist, signified by the different parts of the beast, some like to a leopard, others to a bear, and others to a lion. The head wounded to death and cured, is either antichrist himself or some one of those heads or kings, cured by the devil and diabolical arts after a mortal wound. (Witham) --- This first beast, with seven heads and ten horns, is probably the whole company of infidels, enemies and persecutors of the people of God, from the beginning to the end of the world. The seven heads are seven kings, that is, seven principal kingdoms or empires; which have exercised, or shall exercise, tyrannical power over the people of God: of these, five were then fallen, viz. the Egyptian, Assyrian, Chaldean, Persian, and Grecian monarchies: one was present, viz. the empire of Rome: and the seventh and the chiefest was to come, viz. the great antichrist and his empire. The ten horns may be understood of ten lesser persecutors. (Challoner) |
| Revelation of John 13:2 | And the beast which I saw was like to a leopard, and his feet were as the feet of a bear, and his mouth as the mouth of a lion. And the dragon gave him his own strength, and great power. | M. Bossuet, bishop of Meaux, observes in the emperors Maximian Herculeus, Galerius Maximin, and Dioclesian, the distinguishing characters of these three animals. The leopard represents Maximian, a changeable, restless and cruel prince. The bear figures Galerius Maximin, a man from the north of cruel and brutal disposition, terrible mein, and gigantic stature. Lactantius moreover informs us, that he took a pleasure in feeding bears, which bore so great a resemblance to him in size and brutality. The lion, in fine, is the symbol of Dioclesian, who was cruel and vehement against Christians. (Calmet) --- The whole of this is by Pastorini applied to the empire of Rome, which was composed of the territories of the three preceding empires, which are represented by Daniel under the figure of these animals. And as the body of the beast was like to a leopard, the centre and capital of the Roman empire, under antichrist will be the Grecian empire, denoted by the leopard, of which Constantinople became the capital. Various interpreters explain the whole of this vision by different ways. (Haydock) |
| Revelation of John 13:3 | And I saw one of his heads as it were wounded to death: and his deathly wound was healed. And all the earth was in admiration after the beast. | One of his heads, etc. Some understand this of the mortal wound which the idolatry of the Roman empire (signified by the sixth head) received from Constantine; which was as it were healed again by Julian the apostate. (Challoner) |
| Revelation of John 13:4 | And they adored the dragon, which gave power to the beast: and they adored the beast, saying: Who is like to the beast? and who shall be able to fight with him? | They adored the dragon; that is in antichrist's time, they will adore both antichrist and the devil, who will make war against the saints for forty-two months, that is a short time, signified also by 1260 days, and by three years and a half. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 13:5 | And there was given to him a mouth, speaking great things, and blasphemies: and power was given to him to act forty-two months. | |
| Revelation of John 13:6 | And he opened his mouth in blasphemies against God, to blaspheme his name, and his tabernacle, and them that dwell in heaven. | His tabernacle, etc. That is, his Church, and his saints. (Challoner) |
| Revelation of John 13:7 | And it was given to him to make war with the saints, and to overcome them: and power was given him over every tribe, and people, and tongue, and nation: | |
| Revelation of John 13:8 | And all that dwell upon the earth adored him: whose names are not written in the book of life of the Lamb which was slain from the beginning of the world. | Slain from the beginning. In the foreknowledge of God; and in as much as all mercy and grace, from the beginning, were given in view of his death and passion. (Challoner) |
| Revelation of John 13:9 | If any man have an ear, let him hear. | |
| Revelation of John 13:10 | He that shall lead into captivity, shall go into captivity: *he that shall kill by the sword, must be killed by the sword. Here is the patience and the faith of the saints. Genesis 9:6.; Matthew 26:52. | Here is the patience, etc. Here is the motive of the patience and the faith of the saints, or the servants of God in this world. By faith they rely on the promises of God for the reward of their patience, and leave him to vindicate as he may judge fit their cause with respect to their persecutors. (Pastorini) |
| Revelation of John 13:11 | And I saw another beast coming up out of the earth, and he had two horns, like a lamb, and he spoke as a dragon. | I saw another{ Ver. 11. Vidi aliam bestiam, eidon allo therion. Another wild beast. St. Irenaeus calls this second beast armigerum primoe, and takes notice that he is also called in other places of the Apocalypse (Chap. 16:13.; Apocalypse 19:20.; Apocalypse 20:10.) the false prophet, pseudopropheta of the first beast. By what is said in this chapter, this second beast must live and act at the same time with the first; for it is said, ver. 12, that he exercised all the power of the former beast in his sight, enopion autou; and again, ver. 14, that he did wonders in the sight of the first beast, enopion tou theriou. 2. It is said that this second beast made all that dwelt on the earth adore the first beast. 3. That he made all persons make an image to the first beast, that was wounded and cured, and that they should be slain who adored not that image. 4. He caused that all persons should have the character of the first beast, and the number of his name, that is of the name of the first beast. All those who hold that the first beast in this chapter is antichrist, who is to come a little before the end of the world, hold in like manner that the second beast is not come, but will also come at the same time; and that he is to be a famous imposter and false prophet in antichrist's time. But they who hold the first beast not to be antichrist, but to be the idolatry of heathen Rome, by the second beast understand the philosophers and magicians, who were accustomed to raise the indignation of the pagan emperors against Christians. This exposition of the bishop of Meaux, and of divers Catholic interpreters, I shall here give in Dr. Hammond's words: "By the second beast is meant magic, auguries, and oracles of heathens, made use of to advance idol worship. This beast had two horns, two powers, with some resemblance of Christ, the Lamb; the power of doing some kind of miracles, even of making fire seem to come down from heaven, as Philostratus relates of Apollonius of Tyanea, (lib. v. ch. V.) and the pretended power of prophecy by dubious and obscure oracles; by which also they engaged the emperors to promote idolatry, and to make bloody edicts against Christianity, to force every one to join in their heathen worship, and to shew that they did so by exterior marks and signs, by tickets, to shew that they had sacrificed to idols, otherwise they should be incapable of buying and selling, that is of enjoying any particular advantages, or the common benefits of life." Dr. Hammond did not think it worth taking notice of, that so many writers of the pretended reformation would have the second beast to be a great many popes, whom they affirm to be the famous antichrist. Never was there a more groundless or a more malicious invention, without shadow of authority or reason, and evidently contradictory to both, which I may shew as occasion offers, and as far as these short notes will permit. Here I shall only touch upon what relates to that which is said in this chapter. 1. The late reformers, some of them, make the first beast the popish antichrist, (as we may see in the bishop of Meaux, and also in Dr. Wells) and some affirm this of the second beast. The two beasts are quite different: are they both the popish antichrist? 2. Some of them prove the popes to be the second beast, because the pope's mitre has a resemblance of his two horns: does this deserve an answer? See the bishop of Meaux. 3. Is it not as ridiculous to pretend that by fire coming from heaven, is meant the pope's excommunications? Is not the power of excommunication grounded in St. Paul? Do not the Protestants themselves own, and make use of this power? 4. Those Protestants who tell us the second beast is the popish antichrist, say that the first beast was the state of paganism in the Roman empire. This, as they own, was destroyed before the popes began to be antichrist: how does this agree with what is here said of the second beast, antichrist's armiger, that he exercised all his power in the sight and in the presence of the first beast? 5. How can they pretend that the popes ever ordered all to be slain who would not adore the first beast? (that is, heathen idols, or the images of heathen gods, of Jupiter, Mars, etc.) or who did not bear on his forehead or hand the character, the mark, or the number of some of their heathen gods or heathen emperors? 6. If the second beast be the popish antichrist, all those Protestants have been guilty of a grievous oversight, who have endeavoured to prove the popes antichrist, by finding the number 666 in their names, or in the word Lateinos; for it is evident by this chapter, (ver. 17) that the number of the name belongs to the first beast, and not to the second. 7. This contradicts what the Protestants teach with St. Paul (2 Thessalonians. ii.) that antichrist is to be the man of sin, who will make himself adored above all that is called or worshipped as God; whereas, in this place of the Apocalypse, the second beast does not make himself, but the first beast, to be adored. Therefore this second beast is not the popish antichrist. Of this more in the following chapters.|} beast, etc. He had two horns like those of the Lamb, pretending to imitate Christ by an outward sanctity, and by working strange things. (Witham) --- This second beast with two horns may be understood of the heathenish priests and magicians, the principal promoters both of idolatry and persecution. (Challoner) |
| Revelation of John 13:12 | And he executed all the power of the former beast in his sight: and he caused the earth, and them that dwell therein, to adore the first beast, whose deadly wound was healed. | He executed all the power of the former beast in his sight, or before him, doing great wonders, as Christ foretold should be done by false prophets, (Matthew 24:24) making even fire by lightning come from heaven, as the devil was permitted to do in the time of Job. (Job i.) --- He caused men to adore the first beast, whose deadly wound was healed, and the image of the first beast, of antichrist, to be adored, and that no one should buy or sell any thing, unless he had on his forehead or on his arm, some particular mark, called the character of this false Christ, or antichrist; or his name, or the number of his name, that is, his name which was made up of numeral letters, 666; but as St. Irenaeus thinks, in Greek letters or characters, as St. John wrote his Revelation in Greek. According to the application made by the bishop of Meaux, etc. by the first beast with seven horns were signified the cruel persecutors of the Church, Dioclesian and other six persecuting emperors, to wit, Maximian Herculeus, Galerius Maximian, Constantius Chlorus (father to Constantine), Maxentius, Maximinus, and Licinius. These they look upon to have been the seven heads of the first beast, and by this beast they understand the idolatry of the heathen Roman empire; and by the ten horns, a great many barbarous nations, who in their time made irruptions and pillaged the empire, and afterwards brought destruction upon the whole Roman empire, to wit, the Goths, Vandals, and the rest. The resemblances of a leopard, bear, and lion, are introduced with an allusion to what is written by the prophet Daniel, (Daniel vii.) meaning the four great empires: by the leopard, that of the Chaldeans; by the bear, that of the Persians; by the lion, that of the Grecians and of Alexander the great; lastly, that of the Romans, which is not represented by any one beast, but as a compound of others. When it is said that the beast had received a mortal wound, and was cured again, these interpreters understand the idolatry of the empire, which was in a great measure destroyed by Constantine, but which was again revived and renewed by Julian the apostate. He might well be said to have a mouth speaking great things and blasphemies; but his power lasted only for a short time, signified by forty-two months, though literally he did not reign so long. By the other beast, (ver. 11) these interpreters, as also Dr. Hammond, understand the philosophers and magicians, with their auguries and pretended oracles of the heathen gods. For these men, under Dioclesian, and particularly under Julian, were constantly exciting the emperors and the people against the Christians, telling them that the gods required that the religion of the Christians should be utterly destroyed. We find in the histories of those times, that an image or statue was erected to Julian, together with Jupiter, Mars, and Mercury, and orders given to put to death all those who refused to adore that image. See St. Gregory of Nazianzus, Orat. 3. contra Julianum, and Sozomen, lib. V. Hist. ch. XVII. Under Dioclesian, and also under Julian, meats offered to idols, were thrown into fountains; and waters consecrated to idols, were sprinkled upon all things to be sold in the market, to the end that the Christians might be defiled by every thing that they bought or eat. As to the number of the name of the beast, 666, in these Greek letters, chxs, nothing can be produced but mere conjecture. St. Irenaeus{ Ver. 12. Est enim numerus hominis, et numerus ejus sexcenti sexaginta sex; arithmos gar anthropou esti, kai o arithmos autou chxs. St. Irenaeus, (lib. v. ch. XXX. p. 370) numerus nominis bestiae secundum Graecorum computationem per litteras quae in eo sunt, sexcentos habebit et sexaginta et sex. Eusebius (lib. v. History of the Church, ch. VIII. Ed. Valesii) citing the words of St. Irenaeus, in Greek, p. 172: oti o arithmos tou onomatos tou theriou, kata ten ton ellenon psephon dia ton en auto grammaton emphainetai. But he declares it rash and dangerous to affirm any thing: emeis oun ouk apokinduneuomen, etc. As for the name itself, he proposes first euanthas and then of Lateinos says, that valdè verisimile est quoniam novissimum, regnum (to wit, of the four kingdoms, in Daniel) hoc habet vocabulum. It is evident he speaks of the empire, not of the Christian church of Rome. Latini enim sunt qui nunc regnant, sed non in hoc nos gloriabimur. Sed et Teitan....omnium nominum, quae apud nos inveniuntur magis fide dignum est....but adds, nos tamen non periclitabimur in eo, nec asseverantes pronuntiabimus, etc. Dr. Wells in a note observes, that Mr. Mede and Mr. Whiston, without sufficient grounds, take notice of this conjecture of St. Irenaeus, as favouring their notion of the pope to be antichrist.|} (lib. V. ch. XXX. p. 371. Ed. Feuardentii) says, that according to the testimony of those who had seen St. John, the number of the beast was to be computed by Greek letters. He takes notice that this number of 666 may be found in several names. He produces some examples, and amongst others the word Lateinos; of which he says, it may seem very likely that this is the name, because the last of the four empires, which were spoken of by the prophet Daniel, was then extant, and had this name of the empire of the Latins. Take notice, that he has not a word that hints at the Latin Church, as some of the late pretended reformation would insinuate. But, says he, the word Teitan carries with it a greater probability. Yet, he concludes, that such expositions are uncertain, and he will not venture to say that this will be the name. The bishop of Meaux proposes, DIoCLesAVgVstVs: but this is to look for it in Latin letters. Others have produced other names. Such fancies and conjectures seem full as well omitted. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 13:13 | And he did great signs, so that he made even fire to come down from heaven unto the earth in the sight of men. | |
| Revelation of John 13:14 | And he seduced them that dwell on the earth, by the signs, which were given him to perform in the sight of the beast, saying to them that dwell on the earth, that they should make the image of the beast, which had the wound by the sword, and lived. | |
| Revelation of John 13:15 | And it was given him to give life to the image of the beast, and that the image of the beast should speak: and should cause, that whosoever will not adore the image of the beast, should be slain. | |
| Revelation of John 13:16 | And he shall make all, both little and great, rich and poor, freemen and bondmen, to have a mark in their right hand, or on their foreheads. | |
| Revelation of John 13:17 | And that no man might buy or sell, but he that hath the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name. | |
| Revelation of John 13:18 | Here is wisdom. He that hath understanding, let him reckon the number of the beast. For it is the number of a man: and his number is six hundred sixty-six. | Six hundred sixty-six. The numeral letters of his name shall make up this number. (Challoner) |
| Revelation of John 14:0 | Of the Lamb, and of the virgins that follow him: Of the judgments that shall fall upon the wicked. | |
| Revelation of John 14:1 | And I saw: and behold a Lamb stood on Mount Sion, and with him n hundred forty-four thousand having his name, and the name of his Father, written in their foreheads. | Behold a Lamb, by which is divers times represented our Saviour Christ. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 14:2 | And I heard a voice from heaven, as the voice of many waters, and as the voice of great thunder: and the voice which I heard, was as of harpers, harping on their harps. | |
| Revelation of John 14:3 | And they sung as it were a new canticle, before the throne, and before the four animals, and the ancients, and no man could say the canticle, but those hundred forty-four thousand, who were purchased from the earth. | They sung as it were a new canticle. In these visions, after persecutions, are sometimes introduced rejoicings to encourage the servants of God in their sufferings from the wicked world. --- No man could say (or sing) the canticle, but those hundred and forty-four thousand: by which are signified the elect, who were not defiled with women. Some expound this literally of those who always lived virgins; others understand all those who lived or died with a pure and clean heart, exempt from the corruption of vices, and of whom it is said, (ver. 5) that in their mouth was found no lie, and that they were without spot for the throne of God. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 14:4 | These are they who were not defiled with women: for they are virgins. These follow the Lamb whithersoever he goeth. These were purchased from among men, the first-fruits to God, and to the Lamb: | These are they, etc. In the style of the prophets, by fornication is meant idolatry, and virginity signifies cleanness from all sacrilegious worship. These, therefore, are virgins in this sense, who have not fallen into the impurities of creature worship. But others, as St. Augustine, understand it of persons who have lived in continency. The first, however, is the more literal sense. (Calmet) |
| Revelation of John 14:5 | And in their mouth there was found no lie: for they are without spot before the throne of God. | |
| Revelation of John 14:6 | And I saw another Angel flying through the midst of heaven, having the eternal gospel, to preach to them that sit upon the earth, and over every nation, and tribe, and tongue, and people: | \f + \fr 14:6-7\ft Another Angel,...saying: Fear the Lord.{ Ver. 6-7. I cannot but admire how Dr. W., after his learned modern divines, Mr. Mede and Mr. Whiston, could hook in the popish antichrist in so many places on this chapter, as ver. 7, where it is said fear God, the Christians, says he, are forewarned not to fall into any corruptions the visible Church afterwards fell into, particularly popery. According to a great many of our Protestant adversaries, the popes have been the great antichrist ever since the destruction of the heathen Roman emperors in the fourth age[century], and yet no man ever dreamt of it or suspected it. The Protestants tell the people, they need but open their Bibles and Testaments to see and find the monstrous popish antichrist, the frightful beast with seven heads and ten horns; and what is more strange than all the rest, not any one of the Latin or Greek Church for so many ages[centuries] could ever see the least appearance of what to them is visible at the first sight. The Greek Church, by an unfortunate schism, was divided from the Latin in the ninth age[century]: they wanted not learned men among them, well read in the Scriptures, who omitted nothing that could be alleged to justify their schism and separation from the pope of Rome. Is it possible that neither Photius nor any one among them should see this truth, so palpable that every Protestant presently discovers it at the opening of his New Testament? This at once would have justified their separation. This invention, which doubtless was suggested by the most subtle adversary of popery, first came, says the bishop of Meaux[Bossuet] on the Apocalypse, from the late Manicheans, a sect among the Albigenses, as infamous for their errors as for their morals, (see Nat. Alex. tom. 6. Saec. 11. and 12. p. 490. and tom. 7. Saec. 13. p. 66) who, among other detestable blasphemies against God, against Jesus Christ and his blessed Mother, taught the people that pope Silvester in Constantine's time was antichrist, and the Church from that time was become a den of thieves, and the harlot in the Apocalypse. I scarce think the reasons they brought will be approved by the writers of the late reformation, inasmuch, said they, as the Church and ministers of the Church were then permitted to receive ecclesiastical benefices and revenues. These heretics were followed in some points by Wycliffe and his disciples; but perhaps upon a strict examination, they only meant that the pope and bishops taught antichristian doctrine, and so were to be esteemed adversaries of Christ and precursors of antichrist. We may look upon Luther (though he denied the Apocalypse of St. John to be canonical Scripture) and the Lutherans and Calvinists, to be the true inventors of this empty and incoherent fable of the popish antichrist, twelve hundred years after the popes had successively one after another been the one, great, and famous antichrist. These lovers of novelty, liberty, and Church lands found the obscure revelations in the Apocalypse very convenient for their arbitrary fancies, where they could make the wicked Babylon not signify the heathen Roman empire, with St. Irenaeus and the primitive fathers, but to be the Christian popish Rome; and the scarlet whore must be the popes and cardinals who wear scarlet and purple. An argument not inferior to that Mr. Andrew Willet, who found out the pope to be the angel that opened with a key the bottomless pit, because, said he, who gives the cross keys for this arms but the pope? The last reformers of the faith found their ingenious expositions on the Apocalypse a fit means to stir up kings and princes, as well as the ignorant populace and unthinking mob against the tyranny of this Babylon: it is not my remark, nor that of the bishop of Meaux only, but of their learned Dr. Hammond, who, after he hath given us the extravagant and trifling ravings of Mr. Brightman, says, "that what such writers aim at, is to put the people in mind that they are to pull down antichrist. Nothing (says Dr. Hammond) can be more effectual towards the raising and fomenting of commotions." It is evident the country parson can never be at a loss, or want matter, to excite his parishioners (as occasion offers itself) to a detestation of popery and all papists, if he has but Mr. Brightman's revelations on the seven epistles in the second and third chapters of St. John's Apocalypse, written to the Protestant churches by name. See what we have cited on those chapters. If he keep by him Mr. Willet's expositions of the number of the name of antichrist, whereby he may prove that the three letters are each of them crosses, and that the sign of the cross, still retained by papists, is in very deed the cognizance of antichrist. He may confirm the same by Mr. Willet's evident demonstration, as he himself calls it. Take it in his own words, in his Synop. Papismi. Controv. 4. q. 16. "Antichrist, says he, is the great whore of Babylon, that is of Rome: and here, saith Willet devoutly, we are to note the singular providence of God, who suffereth not a jot of his word to fall to the ground: for even so verily, in the year 853[A.D. 853], next after Leo. IV. there was a right whore elected pope, called John, or if you will, Joan VIII. who fell in labour in the midst of a solemn procession: thus then by evident demonstration it appeareth that the pope is the whore of Babylon, and consequently antichrist." Is not this witty? No matter if by the same logic every whore that ever lived in Rome may be proved antichrist. But as for the story of pope Joan, David Blondel, a French hugonot, has shewn it to be a fable; for it neither was pope John, nor Joan, that succeeded Leo IV. in the year 853. Leo IV. died in July 853, to whom succeeded, in August or September of the same year, Benedict III. so that no place is found for pope John or Joan, to reign after Leo two years and five months, as the authors of that story pretend. The parson, if need be, may add the expositions on the seven vials of the learned and pious divine, Mr. Mede, as Dr. W. calls him: (though the bishop of Meaux looks upon him as a mere enthusiast) the effusion of the first vial, says Mede, was when the Waldenses and Albigenses, and the followers of Wycliffe, and Hus began to renounce popery. The second vial was completed by what is more eminently styled the reformation, begun by Luther, and carried on afterwards by many others. The third vial was completed partly by the laws made here in England in the reign of queen Elizabeth against popish priests, partly by the great overthrow given to the Spanish armada, in the year 1588, and also to the Spanish forces in the Netherlands. See the rest in Dr. W. p. 127. But Dr. W. with Mr. Whiston, looks upon the vials to be all still future. I cannot think that the learned men among the Protestants believe the popes to be antichrist, especially since time, that discovers what is true as to matters of fact, that are pretended to be foretold, has confuted the conjectures of de Moulin, Jurieu, Mede, Whiston, etc. I must here do justice to divers learned men of the Protestant communion. Grotius, in a letter (epist. 557.) to the Protestant John Gerard Vossius, tells him, "that they who did not believe the popes to be antichrist, nevertheless judged it necessary to give such interpretations, for the public good of the Protestant religion." See Mons. de Meaux in his advertisement, num. 1. The same Vossius answers, (ep. 571.) "that he himself having told a certain minister of Dort, whom he calls thickscull, (lourde tete) that he should not impose on the people, even against popery, that minister presently asked him if he was for taking the papists' part, whom, said he, we cannot run down too much, that the people may the more detest their Church. This, adds Vossius, is much the same as some others said to me at Amsterdam: why should not we say the pope is antichrist? must we leave off saying so? and make the people leave our communion more and more, as if too many did not leave it already?" This was a secret that was not to be divulged. Of our English Protestants, I have read Dr. Hammond's paraphrase and notes, on the second chapter of Thessalonians; and on the Revelation or Apocalypse, he never pretends that the popes are antichrist. The predictions in St. John, of the beasts, of the fall of Babylon, of the great harlot, he expounds, as fulfilled already, by the destruction of pagan Rome, and of its idolatry, superstitions, auguries, under the heathen emperors, much after the same manner as Alcazar, and as the bishop of Meaux and other Catholic writers. Mr. Richard Montague, in his Gag. p. 74, writes thus: "Whether the pope be that antichrist, or not, the Church (of England) resolveth not, tendereth it not to be believed any way. Some, I grant, are very peremptory indeed that he is. He, for instance, who wrote and printed it, I am as sure the pope is antichrist, that antichrist spoken of in the Scripture, as that Jesus Christ is God: but they that are so resolute, peremptory, and certain, let them answer for themselves. The Church is not tied, nor any one that I know of, to make good their private imaginations. For myself, I profess ingenuously I am not of opinion that the bishops of Rome personally are that antichrist....nor yet that the bishops of Rome successively are that antichrist," etc. He only holds the pope and papists to be antichrists improperly in the sense that St. John says, there are many antichrists. He cites for the same opinion Melancthon and others. Mr. Thorndike, in his just weights and measures, (chap. 2.) speaking to these two points, that the pope is antichrist, and papists idolaters. "The truth, says he, is they of the Church of Rome have overcharged us, in calling us heretics....but they that would have the pope antichrist, and the papists idolaters, have revived it upon them, and taken their revenge beyond the bounds of blameless defence....Let them not lead the people by the nose, to believe that they can prove the supposition, which they cannot," etc. The same Mr. Thorndike, in Apocalypse 19, p. 125, etc. shews more at large that their reverencing images in churches is no idolatry. And again, (p. 149) "having shewed, says he, why the Church of Rome cannot be charged with idolatry, I may from hence infer that the pope cannot be antichrist." Yet Dr. W. on the Apocalypse, has another argument to prove that the pope is antichrist, that is, by a new invention, the mystical antichrist, foretold by St. John, and his reign to be twelve hundred and sixty years, only because he supposeth that the pope and papists give divine honour, the honour that is due to God alone, to images, saints, and Angels. This he continually repeats, and takes it for a thing granted. It seems very strange, that so learned a doctor, after such mistakes have been canvassed and cleared, as appears by what hath been written by Mr. Thorndike on this subject, should still run on in this groundless supposition, contrary to all the protestations which the Catholics have constantly made. Every little papist boy or girl can assure the doctor, that they have been always taught to give divine honour and worship to God alone: they will recite to him the words of their catechism, that they pray indeed before images, to put them in mind of things thereby represented, but they do not pray to them, because they know they can neither see, nor hear, nor help them: they will tell him that the Angels and saints, even the blessed Virgin Mother of Christ, and the true mother of God made man, is no more than a creature below God, at an infinite distance; and so that the inferior honour that we pay to them, is nothing like to that supreme and divine honour, which we pay to God alone. In a word we know, and have always professed that images, Angels, and saints are but creatures; and as we are not such fools as to think them Gods, so neither are we so senseless as to pay them divine honour.|} By this Angel are represented the preachers of the gospel, exhorting all men to the true faith and a good life. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 14:7 | Saying with a loud voice: Fear the Lord, and give him honour, because the hour of his judgment is come: and adore ye him, *who made heaven, and earth, the sea, and the fountains of waters. Psalm 114.; Acts 14:14. | |
| Revelation of John 14:8 | And another Angel followed, saying: *She is fallen, she is fallen, that great Babylon, which made all nations drink of the wine of the wrath of her fornication. Isaias 21:9.; Jeremias 51:8. | Another Angel,...saying:...She is fallen, she is fallen, that great Babylon. By Babylon, as observed before, may very probably be signified all the wicked world in general, whom God will punish and destroy after the short time of this mortal life: or may be signified every great city, and perhaps Rome returned to idolatry in the time of antichrist, a little before the end of the world, or may be signified the idolatry of heathen Rome, in the fourth age[century], when the Christian religion, under Constantine and his successors, began to triumph over paganism, that is according to those interpreters followed by Alcazar, Bossuet, P. Alleman, etc. which exposition Dr. Hammond thus expresseth: "the whole impure city of heathen Rome, under the title of Babylon, that old idolatrous city that had lain so heavy upon the people of God....should speedily be destroyed, for advancing the heathen worship." (Witham) --- It is probable that here by the great Babylon is meant the city of the devil; that is, the universal society of the wicked: as Jerusalem is taken for the city and the Church of God. (Challoner) |
| Revelation of John 14:9 | And the third Angel followed them, saying with a loud voice: If any man shall adore the beast, and his image, and receive his mark on his forehead, or in his hand: | \f + \fr 14:9-10\ft The third Angel followed....if any man shall adore the beast,...he also shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is mingled with pure wine, etc. That is, he shall drink of the bitter cup of God's indignation, not mixed with water, or any thing to diminish its force, but with wine and wine; that is with punishments upon punishments for ever and ever. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 14:10 | He also shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is mingled with pure wine, in the cup of his wrath, and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the sight of the holy Angels, and in the sight of the Lamb: | |
| Revelation of John 14:11 | And the smoke of their torments shall ascend up for ever and ever: neither have they rest day or night, who have adored the beast, and his image, and whosoever received the mark of his name. | |
| Revelation of John 14:12 | Here is the patience of the saints, who keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus. | Here is the patience of the saints. Here patience is necessary, so as not to be carried away with such pleasures and vanities as are offered in the wicked Babylon, and to remain firm under persecutions with the pious inhabitants of Jerusalem. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 14:13 | And I heard a voice from heaven, saying to me: write: Blessed are the dead, who die in the Lord. From henceforth now, saith the Spirit, that they may rest from their labours: for their works follow them. | Blessed are the dead (all the dead) who die in the Lord, and not the martyrs only, for their works follow every one. (Witham) --- It is understood of the martyrs, who die for the Lord. (Challoner) --- For their works follow them. It is just that they rest at length from their labours, and enjoy for eternity the recompense of their fidelity. They land on the shores of their native country, enriched with the treasures of the good works they have done in this lower world. This is said in express contradiction to those who denied the necessity of good works, and maintained the indifference of actions. This seems to have been the doctrine of the Nicolaites and other heretics of those times. (Calmet) --- The Holy Ghost confirms the sentence of their happiness, not only because at the moment of their departure their hard labours and penitential works cease, but their souls are admitted to a glorious immortality, the recompense of their good works. (Pastorini) |
| Revelation of John 14:14 | And I saw, and behold a white cloud: and upon the cloud one sitting like to the Son of man, having on his head a golden crown, and in his hand a sharp sickle. | \f + \fr 14:14-20\ft Like to the Son of man. That is, to our Saviour Christ, sitting on a white cloud, with a crown of gold, and in his hand a sharp sickle. And another Angel, desiring of him to do justice, by putting in his sickle, because the harvest of the earth was ripe, dry, and withered; that is the wicked, ripe for punishment. The like is again represented by the sickle, which is said to be put to the clusters of the vineyard: and they were cast into the great wine-press, or lake of the wrath of God, into hell, where the blood is said to come out even up to the horses' bridles, for a thousand and six hundred furlongs: a metaphorical way of expressing the exceeding great torments of the wicked in hell. But to pretend form hence to give the just dimensions of hell, is a groundless conjecture; of which see Cornelius a Lapide. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 14:15 | And another Angel came out of the temple, crying with a loud voice to him that sat upon the cloud: *Put in thy sickle, and reap, because the hour is come to reap, for the harvest of the earth is ripe. Joel 3:13.; Matthew 13:39. | |
| Revelation of John 14:16 | And he that sat on the cloud, put his sickle into the earth, and the earth was reaped. | |
| Revelation of John 14:17 | And another Angel came out of the temple, which is in heaven, he also having a sharp sickle. | |
| Revelation of John 14:18 | And another Angel came out from the altar, who had power over fire: and he cried with a loud voice to him that had the sharp sickle, saying: Put in thy sharp sickle, and gather the clusters of the vineyard of the earth: because the grapes thereof are ripe. | |
| Revelation of John 14:19 | And the Angel put his sharp sickle into the earth, and gathered the vineyard of the earth, and cast it into the great wine-press of the wrath of God: | |
| Revelation of John 14:20 | And the wine-press was trodden without the city, and blood came out of the wine-press, even up to the horses' bridles, for a thousand and six hundred furlongs. | |
| Revelation of John 15:0 | They that have overcome the beast, glorify God. Of the seven Angels with the seven vials. | |
| Revelation of John 15:1 | And I saw another sign in heaven great and wonderful, seven Angels having the seven last plagues: for in them is filled up the wrath of God. | I saw....seven Angels, having the seven last plagues. Many by these understand chastisements that will fall upon the wicked a little before the end of the world, and so take these plagues and vials that are poured out, in the next chapter, mostly in a literal sense. Others apply them to different calamities that happened to heathen Rome; but the applications are so different, that they serve to convince us how uncertain they are. In the mean time St. John seems to repeat the same things in a different manner, and some times by way of anticipation, as here the saints are introduced rejoicing, in view of that happiness in heaven which is prepared for them. (Witham) --- Here is a new vision, great and wonderful, seven Angels holding the figurative symbols of seven plagues. They are called the last, because in them is completed the wrath of God, being inflicted on mankind in the last period of the world, the period of Christianity. The first of these scourges takes place shortly after the commencement of the Christian era, and the seventh puts an end to the world. (Pastorini) |
| Revelation of John 15:2 | And I saw as it were a sea of glass mingled with fire, and them that had overcome the beast, and his image, and the number of his name, standing on the sea of glass having the harps of God: | I saw....a sea of glass, mingled with fire: by which are signified the storms and dangers which they had happily passed: now they are said to be singing the canticle of Moses after he had passed the Red Sea, Cantemus Domino, "Let us sing to the Lord," etc. [Exodus xv.] As Moses was a figure of Christ, and the Israelites of the Christians, so it is now called the canticle of the Lamb. (Witham) --- By the sea of glass is meant the firmament that makes the floor of heaven, which is here said to be mingled with fire, in allusion to the troubles and persecutions which the faithful, who are standing on this sea, have sustained. The beast that is here mentioned is an allusion to idolatry or heresy (Pastorini) |
| Revelation of John 15:3 | And singing the canticle of Moses, the servant of God, and the canticle of the Lamb, saying: Great and wonderful are thy works, O Lord God Almighty: just and true are thy ways, O King of ages. | And singing. This sea of glass and fire may also represent the sea which Moses passed in leaving Egypt; and the memory of this famous event, in every respect so similar to the deliverance of the saints from the persecutions to which they had been exposed during their lives, affords them the opportunity of singing the canticle of Moses, at the conclusion of which, they join in the praises of the Almighty for their own particular deliverance. (Calmet) --- O King of ages. In the common Greek is now read, O king of saints. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 15:4 | *Who shall not fear thee, O Lord, and magnify thy name? For thou only art holy: for all nations shall come, and shall adore in thy sight, because thy judgments are manifest. Jeremias 10:7. | |
| Revelation of John 15:5 | And after these things I saw, and behold, the temple of the tabernacle of the testimony in heaven was opened: | And after these things. Here the scene changes, and is carried back to the period of time that immediately precedes the seven plagues. This removal of the scene St. John insinuates by the unusual circumlocution, "after these things I beheld," and looked on the commencement of this scene. The temple opens, and the seven Angels with the seven plagues proceed from the sanctuary to execute the work they are charged with. (Pastorini) --- One ought not to be surprised to see the good Angels employed in these kinds of offices, as justice is no less an attribute of the Deity than mercy, and therefore equally the object of the ministry of the Angels. (Calmet) --- Behold, the temple of the tabernacle....in heaven, was opened. We have before observed, that these visions were shewn to St. John as it were in a temple in heaven, and with an allusion to the sanctuary and its parts under Moses. The Angels are seen coming out with clean and white linen, and with golden girdles, being an allusion to the habits of the priests in the ancient law. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 15:6 | And the seven Angels came out of the temple, having the seven plagues, clothed with clean and white linen, and girded about the breast with golden girdles. | |
| Revelation of John 15:7 | And one of the four animals gave to the seven Angels seven golden vials, full of the wrath of God, who liveth for ever and ever. | |
| Revelation of John 15:8 | And the temple was filled with smoke from the majesty of God, and from his power: and no man was able to enter into the temple, till the seven plagues of the seven Angels were fulfilled. | The temple was filled with smoke, etc., as in the time of Solomon. (2 Paralipomenon vii.) (Witham) --- The vials are given to the Angels by one of the four living creatures, that is, by a prophet, because at that time the effects had not happened, but were to happen in time to come, and are therefore announced by way of prophecy; and the temple was filled with smoke, manifesting first the majesty of God, and secondly his power. (Pastorini) |
| Revelation of John 16:0 | The seven vials are poured out: the plagues that ensue. | |
| Revelation of John 16:1 | And I heard a great voice out of the temple, saying to the seven Angels: Go, and pour out the seven vials of the wrath of God upon the earth. | I heard a great voice. Bossuet explains the pouring out of the seven vials in this manner. The five first he supposes to have taken place under the reign of Valerian and Gallien; the sixth he supposes to have been poured out during the reigns of Valerian, Dioclesian, and Julian; and the seventh under Honorius and the Alani. (Bossuet) --- All commentators, however, seem to agree that the great city mentioned in the 19th verse, is to be understood of Rome, and that the plagues which are here foretold, are denounced against her. (Calmet, Pastorini, etc.) --- Go and pour out the seven vials, etc. According to the exposition followed by the bishop of Meaux[Bossuet], all these seven vials are already past, being punishments and judgments exercised against the heathen emperors, from the time of Valerian even to the time of Julian, at whose death it might be said, (ver. 17) it is done. Idolatry is destroyed, as to its public worship. Here in particular, by the drying up of the Euphrates, and by the armies of the East, these interpreters understand those of the Persians, who first gave the great shock to the empire in Valerian's time, and by whom afterwards Julian the apostate was defeated, and killed. By the great Babylon they also understand idolatrous Rome; and by the islands and mountains sunk by earthquakes, they understand the destruction of divers kingdoms. According to another interpretation, (which is very common) all these judgments are to come before the end of the world; and will be in a manner literally executed about antichrist's time. At the first vial, men shall be struck with ulcers and wounds, not unlike to the sixth plague of Egypt. At the second and third vial, the sea and fountains shall be turned into blood, as in Egypt. At the fourth vial shall be excessive scorching heats, tormenting men, and burning every thing for their use. At the fifth vial darkness, like that of Egypt. At the sixth vial, (ver. 12.) the Euphrates dried up, to open a passage for the armies from the East, to come and join the forces of antichrist. And the three unclean spirits like frogs, may signify devils sent by the dragon, or chief of the devils, to excite the wicked to all manner of unclean abominations. They are here said to be gathered together in a place called Armagedon, perhaps with an allusion to Mageddon, in the tribe of Manasses, where the two kings of Israel, Ochozias and Josias, perished. (4 Kings 9:21.) And they are brought in only to signify a place of great destruction. See also Zacharias 12:11. At the seventh vial, a voice, it is done, that is the reign of the wicked in general, and of antichrist, is at an end. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 16:2 | And the first went, and poured out his vial upon the earth, and there fell a sore and most grievous wound upon the men, who had the mark of the beast; and upon them who adored his image. | And the first. From hence it appears that the first vial was poured out indiscriminately upon the good equally with the wicked. But behold the different consequences that follow: those that have the mark of the beast are afflicted with a sore and grievous wound, which is said in allusion to the madness, fury, and despair with which the wicked were afflicted, whilst St. John's omitting to say any thing of the just, shews that they bore it with resignation and joy. (Calmet) |
| Revelation of John 16:3 | And the second Angel poured out his vial into the sea, and there came blood as of a dead man: and every living soul died in the sea. | And the second. On pouring out the vial follows the divine judgment. There appears blood, like that of a dead man. This passage, Pastorini is of opinion alludes to the Arian heresy, which, like blood, flowed in vigorous circulation whilst in health and strength, gradually retarded its motion, as in a dying man, and was at last totally lost and stopped, like the circulation in a dead man. Hence every living soul died in the sea. (Pastorini) --- Calmet interprets it as a prediction of the calamities which befell the Roman empire, during the invasion of the Persians on the east, and the Goths and other barbarous nations on the west. |
| Revelation of John 16:4 | And the third poured out his vial upon the rivers, and the fountains of waters, and there was blood. | Upon the rivers. That is, on the Roman provinces in Italy, and Rome itself. This is the last stroke employed by the Almighty for the total destruction of Rome. The divine judgment being executed, the Angel of the waters, that is, the Angel that presided over the Roman states, cries out, (ver. 5, 6.) thou art just, etc. (Pastorini) |
| Revelation of John 16:5 | And I heard the Angel of the waters, saying: Thou art just, O Lord, who art, and who wast, the holy one, who hast judged these things: | |
| Revelation of John 16:6 | For they have shed the blood of the saints and prophets, and thou hast given them blood to drink; for they deserve it. | |
| Revelation of John 16:7 | And I heard another from the altar, saying: Yea, O Lord God Almighty, true and just are thy judgments. | |
| Revelation of John 16:8 | And the fourth Angel poured out his vial upon the sun, and it was given to him to afflict men with heat, and fire: | And the fourth Angel. Here is the punishment of the Greeks during the siege of Constantinople by the Turks, where the fire engines, that were then made use of for the first time, so reduced the Grecian army, that the walls of the city were reduced to ashes, and the whole town to flames. Hence it appears how the Greeks were scorched with great heat; and how they blasphemed the name of God, appears too evident from the history of Notaros, admiral of the Constantinopolitan fleet. (Pastorini) |
| Revelation of John 16:9 | And men were scorched with great heat, and they blasphemed the name of God who hath power over these plagues, neither did they penance to give him glory. | |
| Revelation of John 16:10 | And the fifth Angel poured out his vial upon the seat of the beast: and his kingdom became dark, and they gnawed their tongues for pain: | Calmet explains this passage of Rome the seat of idolatry, which was given up to the pillage of the barbarians under Alaric. (Calmet) |
| Revelation of John 16:11 | And they blasphemed the God of heaven, because of their pains, and wounds, and did not penance for their works. | |
| Revelation of John 16:12 | And the sixth Angel poured out his vial upon that great river Euphrates: and dried up the water thereof, that a way might be prepared for the kings from the rising of the sun. | River Euphrates. That is, a passage is laid open for the potentates of the East to lay their destructive hands upon the countries on this side the Euphrates. For they are the spirits of devils working signs, which are sent forth by the eastern princes, to oblige all to unite in arms against the great day of the Almighty God. (Pastorini) |
| Revelation of John 16:13 | And I saw from the mouth of the dragon, and from the mouth of the beast, and from the mouth of the false prophet, three unclean spirits like frogs. | |
| Revelation of John 16:14 | For they are the spirits of devils working signs, and they go forth unto the kings of the whole earth, to gather them to battle against the great day of the Almighty God. | |
| Revelation of John 16:15 | *Behold, I come as a thief. Blessed is he that watcheth and keepeth his garments, lest he walk naked, and they see his shame. Matthew 24:43.; Luke 12:39.; Apocalypse 3:3. | |
| Revelation of John 16:16 | And he shall gather them together into a place, which is called in Hebrew Armagedon. | Armagedon. That is, the hill of robbers. (Challoner) |
| Revelation of John 16:17 | And the seventh Angel poured out his vial into the air, and a great voice came out of the temple from the throne, saying: It is done. | |
| Revelation of John 16:18 | And there were lightnings, and voices, and thunders, and there was a great earthquake, such as never hath been since men were upon the earth: such an earthquake, so great. | The seventh vial is poured out upon the air which lies between the earth and the heavens, to indicate that the judgments of God are going to fall upon the whole creation. After which follow these words, it is done. All is over, time is no more; upon which immediately follow lightnings, etc. |
| Revelation of John 16:19 | And the great city was made into three parts: and the cities of the Gentiles fell, and great Babylon came in remembrance before God, to give her the cup of the wine of the indignation of his wrath. | Great Babylon came in remembrance before God. The time of God's punishing the wicked world is approaching: for by a third interpretation, Babylon may signify metaphorically all the wicked in general. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 16:20 | And every island fled away, and the mountains were not found. | |
| Revelation of John 16:21 | And great hail like a talent came down from heaven upon men: and men blasphemed God, because of the plague of the hail: because it was exceeding great. | And great hail like a talent came down, etc.{ Ver. 21. Et grando magna sicut talentum, os talantiaia, quasi talentaris. The Protestants and Mr. N. translate hail about the weight of a talent, as if every hailstone were of that weight.|} Which need not be taken literally, but only metaphorically, to signify the heavy weight of God's judgments upon sinners. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 17:0 | The description of the great harlot, and of the beast upon which she sits. | |
| Revelation of John 17:1 | And there came one of the seven Angels, who had the seven vials, and spoke with me, saying: Come, I will shew thee the condemnation of the great harlot, who sitteth upon many waters. | I must repeat what I have already taken notice of, both in the preface to the Apocalypse, and sometimes in the annotations, that there are three ways of expounding all the visions of this revelation, from the end of Apocalypse 3. to the end of chap 20:10. all of which seem grounded on the opinions of the ancient Fathers. According to the first, all these visions are only to be fulfilled in antichrist's time, a little before the end of the world. According to the second, the visions may be applied to particular events, which happened in the first three or four ages[centuries], under the persecuting heathens, till by Constantine, and the succeeding Christian emperors, idolatry by degrees was extirpated, and the faith of Christ triumphed over all its enemies, whether Jews or pagans. According to the third, by the great city of Babylon, is mystically and metaphorically signified all wicked great cities in the world, all the multitude of the wicked dispersed in all nations, their short and vain happiness, their persecutions and oppressions of the good and faithful servants of God, who live piously in this world, and who are called to be citizens of the celestial Jerusalem in the kingdom of God, where he reigneth for ever with his Angels and saints, and where they all reign with him, happy in his sight and enjoyment. I am more and more inclined to this third exposition, by reading this 17th chapter, with the contents of the 18th, 19th, and 20th chapters, till the 11th verse, and by reading what St. Jerome says in general terms, in his epistle to Marcella, tom. 4, part 1, p. 166, Nov. edit. "that all this book (of the Apocalypse) is either to be expounded spiritually, or if we follow a carnal interpretation, we must content ourselves with Jewish fables. And especially by reading what St. Augustine has delivered us upon the chief difficulties of the Apocalypse, in his 20th book de Civ. Dei[The City of God], from ch. VI. to ch. XVI. and from p. 578. to p. 594. tom. 7. Nov. edit. To expound then these chapters together according to this third interpretation. (Witham) --- Of the great harlot. Nothing can be better applied than this epithet to ancient Rome, which had conquered almost all the kingdoms of the known world, as it is said in ver. 18., she is the great city, a kingdom which hath dominion over the kings of the earth; ver. 9., it was built upon seven mountains; ver. 6., was watered with the blood of the saints and martyrs of Jesus Christ; and in fine, ver. 5., it was the great Babylon, as St. Peter, in his first epistle, pleases to call it. (Calmet) --- Come, I will shew thee the condemnation of the great harlot,...Babylon....the mother of the fornications. By this harlot, and this Babylon, is signified the multitude of all the wicked of all times and places, who have abandoned themselves to sensual pleasures, and sought for their happiness in riches and worldly grandeur; for this reason she is said to carry on her forehead this inscription, a mystery; that is, to be understood in a mystical sense of all the wicked, who make up as it were one city, as St. Augustine observes, which may be called Babylon, the city of confusion, the city of idolatry, and of all manner of vices. --- The beast, that is, the devil, carries her, whose suggestions the wicked follow. He comes out from the bottomless pit. He was, that is had a much greater and more extensive power over the wicked world before Christ's coming and incarnation; and he is not, that is according to St. Augustine, his power hath been much extenuated and lessened since that time. He is bound or chained up for a thousand years, as it is said, Apocalypse 20:2. By which may be understood all the time from Christ's coming, and the establishing of his Christian Church, till the last and severest persecution under antichrist. See St. Augustine, lib. xx. de Civ. Dei. ch. VII. And when he shall come again, and be let loose, as it were, in antichrist's time, he must continue a short while: for all the ancient fathers agree, by the interpretations they give to the Scripture, that antichrist, and consequently the devil with antichrist, must reign but a short time. The scarlet coloured beast, the devil, called the prince of this world, on whom the harlot gilded with gold sat; that is, all the wicked, and particularly all wicked kings and princes, with their worldly greatness, who were drunk with the wine of her prostitution; that is, who abandoned themselves and indulged their passions with all sensual pleasures, and contented themselves with the vain and deceitful happiness of this life; to be convinced of which, the Angel is said to have taken St. John in spirit into a wilderness from the company of the wicked world, the better to see and contemplate the vanity of their short and false happiness. This woman, this harlot, this Babylon, this multitude of the wicked, especially the heathen persecuting emperors at Rome, and in all other places, (and they who acted against the Christians under them) are said to be drunk with the blood of the saints, and the blood of the martyrs, by putting the Christians, the Catholics and the servants of God to death, from the foundation of the world to its consummation, by the instigation of the beast, the devil. The beast, the devil, is represented with seven heads and ten horns; that is, with many heads and many horns, signified by the numbers seven and ten. See St. Augustine, ch. XXIII. p. 606. --- The seven heads, as it is said, ver. 9, are seven mountains, and seven kings, that is a great many. And also the ten horns, (ver. 12.) are ten kings. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 17:2 | With whom the kings of the earth have committed fornication: and they who inhabit the earth, have been made drunk with the wine of her prostitution. | |
| Revelation of John 17:3 | And he took me away in the spirit into the desert. And I saw a woman sitting upon a scarlet coloured beast, full of names of blasphemy, having seven heads and ten horns. | |
| Revelation of John 17:4 | And the woman was clothed round about with purple and scarlet, and gilded with gold, and precious stones, and pearls, having a golden cup in her hand, full of the abomination and filthiness of her fornication. | Cup....full of the abomination, etc. These are common scriptural expressions for the abominations of idolatry, with which ancient Rome had notoriously polluted herself. For not content with worshipping her own heathenish gods, she adopted those of all the countries and nations she had subdued. In Rome itself there were no less than 420 heathenish temples, so that one of their most famous poets, Ovid, (lib. 1:Trist.) says: Sed quae de septem totum circumspicit orbem, Montibus Imperii, Roma, Deûmque locus. |
| Revelation of John 17:5 | And on her forehead a name was written: A mystery: Babylon the great, the mother of the fornications and abominations of the earth. | A mystery. That is, a secret, because what follows of the name and title of the great harlot is to be taken in a mystical sense. --- Babylon. Either the city of the devil in general; or, if this place be to be understood of any particular city, pagan Rome, which then and for 300 years persecuted the Church, and was the principal seat both of empire and idolatry. (Challoner) |
| Revelation of John 17:6 | And I saw the woman drunk with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus. And when I had seen her, I wondered with great admiration. | Drunk with the blood of the saints. Such was pagan Rome, for innumerable were the martyrs she put to death, both throughout the extent of her vast dominions, and even in her own bosom, the city itself. These were the victims of the ten persecutions raised by Rome against the Christians. Such was the woman drunk with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus. (Pastorini) |
| Revelation of John 17:7 | And the Angel said to me: Why dost thou wonder? I will tell thee the mystery of the woman, and of the beast which carrieth her, which hath the seven heads and ten horns. | |
| Revelation of John 17:8 | The beast which thou sawest, was, and is not, and shall come up out of the bottomless pit, and go into destruction: and the inhabitants on the earth (whose names are not written in the book of life from the foundation of the world) shall wonder, seeing the beast, that was, and is not. | The beast which thou sawest. This beast, which supports Babylon, may signify the power of the devil; which was, and is not, being much limited by the coming of Christ, but shall again exert itself under antichrist. The seven heads of this beast are seven mountains or empires, instruments of his tyranny; of which five were then fallen, as above, Apocalypse 13:1. The beast itself is said to be the eighth, and is of the seventh; because they all act under the devil, and by his instigation, so that his power is in them all, yet so as to make up, as it were, an eighth empire distinct from them all. (Challoner) |
| Revelation of John 17:9 | And here is the understanding, that hath wisdom. The seven heads are seven mountains, upon which the woman sitteth, and they are seven kings. | Seven mountains. We have already observed that ancient Rome stood upon seven mountains. The same cannot be said of modern Rome, as some of the hills are not inhabited. --- The seven heads....are seven kings, or seven Roman emperors, who were particularly distinguished as the chief supporters of idolatry, and the most virulent persecutors of the Christian religion. Their names were Nero, Domitian, Severus, Decius, Valerian, Dioclesian and Antichrist. --- Five of them are fallen or gone, viz. Nero, Domitian, Severus, Decius, Valerian, who supported the idolatrous empire for a time; one is, viz. Dioclesian, with whom the reign of idolatry falls; and the other is not yet come, that is, antichrist. |
| Revelation of John 17:10 | Five are fallen, one is, and the other is not yet come: and when he is come, he must remain a short time. | Five are fallen, one is, and the other is not yet. The meaning of this is obscure. And perhaps it were better to own with St. Augustine that we do not know the meaning, than to advance suspicions and conjectures. But it is not improbable that by these seven kings may be understood the collection of kings, in what are called the seven ages of the world, from its creations to its consummation. The first age, is reckoned from Adam to Noe[Noah], and the deluge: the second age, from Noe to Abraham; the third, from Abraham to Moses; the fourth, from Moses to David; the fifth, from David to Christ. These five were past, and fallen, when St. John wrote. The sixth is, and is to last from Christ to antichrist. And another, the seventh, is not, being the time of antichrist, and only a short time. See Cornelius a Lapide on this verse. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 17:11 | And the beast that was, and is not: the same is also the eighth: and is of the seven, and goeth into destruction. | The beast that was, and is not: is the eighth: and is of the seven. The devil reigns with the kings in all these ages: he is of the seven, because he is the prince under whom reign the wicked in all ages: he is also the eighth, inasmuch as he is their prince, and they are only his instruments. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 17:12 | And the ten horns, which thou sawest, are ten kings: who have not yet received a kingdom, but shall receive power as kings one hour after the beast. | The ten horns, or ten kings, which thou sawest, as yet have received no kingdom, but shall receive power as kings one hour after the beast; or, as it is in the Greek, with the beast. According to the common interpretation, this must be referred to ten, or many kings, who are different from all the wicked kings that had been, and who should follow and live at the same time with the beast, by which here seems to be signified antichrist. Or, if by these ten kings we understand all the wicked kings, who were to come after St. John wrote, to the end of the world, they had not yet kingdoms, but the kingdoms which they should have, and all their vain happiness, would be very short, and at the same time they would be under the beast, and subject to him. (Witham) --- Ten horns. These denote ten kings or ten powers; namely, Goths, Huns, Alans, Vandals, Saxons, Burgundians, Franks, Heruli, Suevi, etc., the chief of the Barbarians that invaded the Roman empire in the fifth century. --- They shall receive power as kings, one hour after the beast; that is, they will serve under their own leaders, to assist pagan Rome a little against its enemies; and their one design is afterwards to take the fruitful provinces of Rome to themselves, which we know they did. (Pastorini) --- Ten kings. Ten lesser kingdoms, enemies also of the Church of Christ; which nevertheless shall be made instruments of the justice of God, for the punishment of Babylon. Some understand this of the Goths, Vandals, Huns, and other barbarous nations that destroyed the empire of Rome. (Challoner) |
| Revelation of John 17:13 | These have one design, and their strength and power they shall deliver to the beast. | These have one design, to make themselves as happy as they can in this world: and their power they shall give to the beast, being always slaves of the devil. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 17:14 | These shall fight with the Lamb, and the Lamb shall overcome them; *because he is Lord of lords, and King of kings, and they that are with him are called, and elect, and faithful. 1 Timothy 6:15.; Apocalypse 19:16. | These shall fight with the Lamb. Their actions and affections being always led away with the love of this world, which is an enemy to Christ and his doctrine: but the Lamb, Christ, shall overcome them, and punish them, when he pleases: for he, Christ, God and man, is Lord of lords, and King of kings; and as St. John says again, (chap. 19:16,) has written on his thigh, the King of kings, and Lord of lords, to signify to us his divinity, or divine nature. (Witham) --- All these different people were either heathens or heretics, and of course were bitter enemies to the Catholic religion; but the Lamb overcame them, by turning their hearts, and converting them to Christianity. |
| Revelation of John 17:15 | And he said to me: The waters which thou sawest, where the harlot sitteth, are peoples, and nations, and tongues. | etc. The waters which thou sawest, where the harlot sitteth, signify the different nations, in all which is a multitude of wicked, especially among the great ones of this world. (Witham) --- And the ten horns....shall hate the harlot. That is, ancient Rome; they will make her desolate, by laying waste all her provinces; they will make her....naked, by stripping her of her shining ornaments, her gaudy palaces, Egyptian obelisks, magnificent temples, theatres, triumphal arches, etc. --- They will eat her flesh, by plundering her of her wealth and riches, with which she has fed herself by plundering the rest of the world; and lastly, they will burn her with fire; all which we know has been accomplished, even to a tittle. (Pastorini) --- Alaric, the Goth, in 410[A.D. 410], took the city, pillaged it, and delivered it over to fire and the plunder of his soldiers for three days. The only privileged places that escaped were the churches. (Calmet) --- Genseric plundered it for fourteen days, in 455, and set fire to it. Odoacer took it, and deposed the emperor, in 476; and Totila, in 546, burnt it, and reduced it to a solitude. Procopius says he left not one human creature in the city. (Pastorini) --- These shall hate the harlot. There is no true love or friendship among them: the wicked hate, envy, make war against the wicked, though they make alliances sometimes one with another. --- For God hath put it into their hearts, permits them, and makes use of them as instruments of his justice, against one another: and they give their kingdom to the beast: the wicked reign under the prince of this world, the devil, as long as God pleases, and till his words and judgments are fulfilled. All the contents of the following chapters agree with this exposition. When the Angel cries, (chap. 18.) Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, the false happiness of the wicked is come to its last period; though St. John speaks sometimes by anticipation, especially when the rejoicings of the saints are represented, and the miseries and consternation of the wicked, to encourage the servants of God to patience and perseverance under their trials and persecutions in this mortal life. Babylon will in a short time be the habitation of devils: and therefore the good are admonished by these words, go out from her, my people, avoid and detest her wicked ways. Almighty God hath remembered her iniquities, the provocations of the wicked, nor can they escape the hand of his justice. They lived as if they were never to be called to an account. Babylon, blinded with sensual delights, pride, and vanity, said in her heart, I sit as a queen above others, and sorrow I shall not see; like the wicked in the psalmist, who is Lord over us? (Psalm xi.) But all her plagues (chap. 18:8.) come in one day, at the day of death, or the day of judgment. Then are represented the weeping and mourning of all the accomplices of the wicked, like the disappointment of merchants by the burning and destruction of a great city, where they found so great profit in disposing and selling their merchandise. After this, in the 19th chapter, the blessed in heaven sing Alleluia, etc. the God Almighty hath reigned, or is about to reign. At the latter end of the 19th chapter, ver. 17, it is said, I saw an Angel standing in the sun; saying to all the birds, etc. Here are represented God's judgments on the wicked, as it were after a great battle, in which kings and many noblemen are slain, so that the birds are invited to drink of their blood. --- The beast was taken, and with him the false prophet. We may take this as spoken by anticipation of antichrist, and his great impostor, or false prophet. For still after this, (chap. 20:7.) is foretold, according to St. Augustine, the last persecution by the devil, and by antichrist with Gog and Magog; for it is then that fire came down from heaven, and was to devour them; and there it is expressed that the devil, who seduced them, and all the wicked, was cast into the lake of fire, into hell, where also the beast, antichrist, and the false prophet shall be tormented for ever and ever. Now to give a short account of the two other expositions. The first of them, followed by a great many, (as may be seen in Alcazar and Cornelius a Lapide) holds that all these visions will come to pass in the short reign of antichrist, a little while before the end of the world. These interpreters are divided about the signification of Babylon: some understand Babylon the metropolis of Chaldea, where they think that antichrist will begin to reign; others understand Constantinople, the seat of the Turkish empire, which is also built upon seven hills: but many understand Rome, not Christian Rome, but Rome that was a heathen city in the first ages[centuries], and which they think will be heathen Rome again in antichrist's time. See a great number of the fathers and interpreters for this opinion cited by Cornelius a Lapide. By the beast that carries her with her idolatry and vices, they understand the devil; and by the seven heads and ten horns, kings, who shall be in the time of antichrist, and submit themselves to him. All these kings and persecutors will receive their power one hour after, or with the beast, by which they rather understand antichrist, whose reign shall be short, as shall be that of the devil, who shall be let loose, and have greater power for a little while. By the eighth, who is of the seven, they understand the devil, because all the seven will be as it were his instruments. The same kings who committed fornication with the harlot, are also said to hate her, and burn her, says Gagneius, by being the cause of her damnation and destruction: for none are greater enemies than sinners' accomplices. As to the other exposition, (for which see Alcazar, the bishop of Meaux[Bossuet], etc.) they look upon all these visions till the last persecution under antichrist, (chap. 20:7. 10.) to be already fulfilled by the destruction of the heathen Roman empire, as they are also expounded by Dr. Hammond. Babylon is the ancient heathen Rome, mother of fornication, that is of idolatry and of all kind of vices, sitting upon a scarlet beast, supported by the pagan emperors in all their grandeur, pomp, and vanity. When it is said of her, that she was, and is not, this is not to be taken with a regard to the visions one after another represented to St. John, nor with a regard to the time when he wrote under Domitian. She is said to come again out of the bottomless pit, when the same heathen worship was again renewed by Julian the apostate, who had a design and endeavoured to destroy the Christian religion. The seven heads are ingeniously applied to Dioclesian, Maximian Herculeus, Constantius Chlorus, Maximus, and Maxentius, which in a vision of St. John, are said to be the five that are fallen. One, to wit, Maximinus, is the sixth, represented as then in being; and another, the seventh, it is said is not yet come; to wit, Licinius, whose persecution but a short time. The eighth, who is called also one of the seven, they take to be Maximian Herculeus, who had laid down the empire with Dioclesian, but took it up again, and so was the eighth, but of the seven mentioned before. The ten horns represented as not yet having a kingdom, but who are to receive power as kings, one hour after the beast, or at the fall of the empire, are those kings and princes by whom the Roman empire was destroyed; as the Goths, Vandals, Lombards, Burgundians, Franks, Huns, Alans, Suevi, also Persians and Saracens, who invaded and dismembered different parts of the empire: but no great stress need be laid on the exact number of ten; which, as St. Augustine says, may be taken for a great many. They all come with the same design, (ver. 13.) to enrich and settle themselves in the dominions of the empire; yet afterwards they gave their power to the beast, by entering into alliances with the emperors, as Alaric, the Goth, and others did. They at first fought with the Lamb, being then heathens, and afterwards many of them Arians, till the Lamb overcame them, and brought them to the true Christian faith. They are said to have hated the harlot, making her destitute by pillaging Rome and divers other cities: they devoured her flesh, her treasures, God putting it into their hearts, making use of them as instruments to punish these wicked persecuting idolaters; yet they afterwards sometimes agreed to give her their strength by agreements and alliances, till the time that God decreed the empire should be in a manner destroyed. These interpreters conclude that by Babylon must necessarily be understood Rome, because it is said that seven heads, upon which the woman sitteth, are seven mountains; and it is well known that Rome is built upon seven hills; and secondly, because the woman is said to be the city, which hath dominion over the kings of the earth. But first, those seven mountains are also called seven kings; secondly, Constantinople is also built upon seven hills; thirdly, seven may be taken for many. And I cannot but take notice, that some expressions in this and in the next chapter, seem to agree better with that exposition, which takes Babylon for the multitude of all the wicked: as when we read (chap. 18:3.) that all nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornication; (ver. 23.) that all nations were deceived by her sorceries; (ver. 24.) that in her was formed the blood of the prophets, and of the saints, and of all that were slain upon the earth. For though the Roman empire was of so large an extent, yet a greater part of the world was never subject to the Romans: many apostles and martyrs were not put to death at Rome, nor by the Romans, but by the Persians, and in India, etc. so these general expressions are more easily expounded, if by the great city of Babylon we understand the multitude of the wicked in all parts of the world: not but that these visions may also regard heathen Rome as the chief place where such persecutions were acted, and where all kind of vices were practices. --- N. B.[Nota Bene, Note Well?] Some have taken notice, that the English Protestants print the 5th verse of this chapter in capital letters: Mystery Babylon the great, the mother of harlots, and abominations of the earth. I will suppose that these words are only printed in this manner, because they contain an inscription; as when it is said, that he who was called the word of God, had written upon him, the King of kings, and Lord of lords, which words are also printed in great letters: but if our adversaries do this, to make the Church of Rome to be looked upon as the whore of Babylon, and the pope as antichrist, nothing can be more unfair, nothing more ridiculous, as I may shew on the following chapters. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 17:16 | And the ten horns, which thou sawest on the beast, these shall hate the harlot, and shall make her desolate and naked, and shall eat her flesh, and shall burn her with fire. | |
| Revelation of John 17:17 | For God hath given into their hearts, to do that which pleaseth him: that they give their kingdom to the beast till the words of God be fulfilled. | |
| Revelation of John 17:18 | And the woman which thou sawest, is the great city, which hath dominion over the kings of the earth. | |
| Revelation of John 18:0 | The fall of Babylon: kings and merchants lament over her. | In this chapter is a repetition of the fall of Babylon and the mourning of other nations, and their consternation for its sudden destruction, to which may be applied the three mentioned expositions. Among the sorts of merchandise, (ver. 13.) are mentioned slaves, and the souls of men. Some of our Protestant adversaries (see Mr. Theophilus Higgons) tell us, that it is only Popish Rome that deals with this sort of merchandise. But I must needs say, our adversaries have the misfortune to betray a shameful ignorance, whensoever they undertake to bring proofs to shew the popes to be antichrist. Here it is so evident that by the souls of men are meant only bond slaves, which merchants used to bring and sell at Rome, that Dr. Wells instead of slaves and souls of men, in the amendments made to the Protestant translation, has translated hired servants and bond servants, as Dr. Hammond had before put in his paraphrase, and proved it in his notes. It is from the mysterious visions of these revelations, especially in the 17th and 18th chapters, that divers Protestant writers would make the people believe that all the popes for above twelve hundred and sixty years have been the detestable antichrist, the great whore of Babylon, the monstrous beast with seven heads and ten horns. This new invention, and their wild fancies upon it, are full as monstrous as the beast. The obscurity of the visions furnishes them with a more convenient handle for their main design, which is to make the pope and the popery odious to the people, where they can with less hazard advance their groundless and licentious expositions: and where the expressions are mystical and allegorical, it is no hard matter, said Dr. Hammond, to transform any thing into any thing, and thus to lead the people by the nose, said Mr. Thorndike on this very subject. Never was there a fable invented by men, that pretend to be interpreters of the holy Scriptures, so empty, so incoherent in its parts, so contradictory to the Scripture, and to the unexceptionable authority of the primitive fathers, to use the words of Dr. Wells, who therefore is pleased to own that he is not so sanguine as divers others of his communion, to think that the popes are the great, literal, and famous antichrist, emphatically so called, but by another new invention, as groundless and as frivolous as the former, he would have above two hundred popes for the same term of twelve hundred and sixty years, to have been the mystical antichrist: he does not only mean antichrist improperly and metaphorically so called, as are all heretics who teach false doctrine, and so are adversaries to Christ, of which St. John said, (1 John 2:18.) they are become many antichrists. The doctor's mystical antichrist or antichrists, he pretends were foretold in this revelation of St. John, who were to reign for twelve hundred and sixty days, that is by a new exposition of his learned divines of the reformation, twelve hundred and sixty years, which no one dreamt of before them. I had designed and prepared an appendix to these annotations on the Apocalypse, with a confutation of their arbitrary expositions and groundless arguments; but by the advice of a learned friend, for whose judgment I have the greatest esteem, I shall only give the reader in short what I hope may be sufficient to shew that the popes can neither be that mystical antichrist, nor antichrist emphatically so called: and that both from the authority of Scriptures and of all the primitive Fathers, both of the Greek and Latin Church, in which we find any thing concerning antichrist. It may be observed that the Fathers, or ancient interpreters, sometimes give us their private conjectures and opinions, as St. Augustine takes notice, in which others do not join with them, as that antichrist is to be of the tribe of Dan, a Jew, and chiefly to be acknowledged by the Jews, who will pretend to be their Messias, who is to sit in the temple rebuilt at Jerusalem, to overcome three kings, and seven others to submit to him, etc. These are the suspicions and opinions of some; though none of them favour their system of the popish antichrist. But whosoever consults the primitive Fathers, as I make bold to say I have done with all possible exactness, will find that the Scripture and Fathers unanimously agree in these three following points, (utterly destructive of their systems of the popish antichrist) to wit: 1. That antichrist must be one single man; 2. that he shall not come till about the end of the world; 3. that he shall but reign a very short time. In the holy Scriptures we only find the word itself, antichrist, five times, that is, in the 1st and 2nd Epistle of St. John. In four of these places, he only speaks of antichrists improperly so called, as being seducers and adversaries of Christ; and of the one proper antichrist he only says, (1 John 2:18,) as you have heard that antichrist cometh, or is to come. But it is generally agreed, even by Protestants, that St. Paul (2 Thessalonians ii.) speaks of the great antichrist; and there he is called the man of sin, the son of perdition, he who opposeth, and is lifted up above all that is called God, or that is worshipped, etc. St. Paul also there adds, then that wicked one shall be revealed, (that is, about the time of the day of judgment,) whom the Lord Jesus shall kill with the spirit of his mouth, and shall destroy with the brightness of his coming: from which it follows, both that antichrist is to be one man, and that his coming and the glorious coming of our Saviour shall concur together. If our adversaries will understand the predictions of the prophet Daniel (Chap. 7.) of antichrist, and not only of Antiochus, he must also be one particular king, who shall overcome other kings, that little horn that sprang up amidst other ten horns. In the Revelation or Apocalypse of St. John, we no where find the name of antichrist. Secondly, I take notice that divers of the ancient Fathers, as St. Chrysostom, St. Cyril of Jerusalem, Theodoret, etc. never bring any passages out of the Apocalypse when they speak of antichrist. Thirdly, nor is this to be wondered at, since divers of them by the beast, Babylon, and the scarlet whore, understood the devil, or heathen Rome with its heathen Roman emperors, and taught that all those visions till the 20th chapter are fulfilled already, before the coming of antichrist. Dr. Hammond gives their interpretations in these words, in his first note on the Revelation, chapter xviii: "What is said of the fall of Babylon cannot belong to Christian Rome, neither to the emperor Honorius, who was then a Christian, and at Revenna, nor to Innocentius, the pope or bishop of Rome, by the ordering of God's providence....rescued like Lot out of Sodom also at Revenna, nor generally to the Christians, who survived to restore and re-edify the city, a more Christian city than before, but to the heathen part of the city: so that the sum of the fall of Babylon is the destruction of the wicked and heathen, and the preserving of the pure and Christian Rome, and so in effect the bringing of that city and empire to Christianity." Thus Dr. Hammond. Nothing that the Protestants bring, as I think, has even the face or appearance of an objection, unless it be when they tell us, that by Babylon in St. John's Revelation is meant Rome; therefore, say they, the Church of Rome must be Babylon, and the scarlet whore that sitteth there must be the pope with his cardinals, clothed in scarlet and purple. I answer: All Catholics, and all men of sense, have reason to wonder and ask by what kind of logic they have hooked or drawn into the consequence the Church of Rome. There is not, as the bishop of Meaux[Bossuet] desires the Protestants to take notice, in all these visions and predictions the least hint or insinuation of a fallen corrupted church, but of a heathen city and pagan empire. Many by Babylon understand the multitude of the wicked in general: but we will willingly allow that by Babylon was meant Rome, yet not Christian Rome or the Church of Rome, but heathen Rome and its pagan emperors, with their dress of purple and scarlet. Let me again cite to these our adversaries, the paraphrase of their learned Dr. Hammond, p. 985: "I will shew thee the vengeance that is ready to befall the imperial dignity of Rome, fitly styled the great whore....for their worship of many heathen gods. I saw a woman, that great whore, the imperial power of pagan Rome, seated on an emperor in a scarlet robe, a great blasphemer against God," etc. --- Now as to the ancient Fathers, and what they have witnessed and delivered to us concerning the three above mentioned points. St. Irenaeus, on whose testimony the Protestants seem to lay the greatest stress, tells us, (lib. V. c. xxx, p. 361. Ed. Rig.) that antichrist shall be a wicked king....who shall overcome ten other kings. He also makes his conjecture on the number of the name of a single man. As to the time of his coming, he says, (p. 363) that it shall be at the end of the world, and when the end of all things shall come. That he shall reign upon the earth three years and six months: or, as he says again, for forty-two months. Rex impius et injustus....novissimo tempore....quoniam finis fiet....regnans annis tribus et sex mensibus, etc. St. Chrysostom: (tom. 6. Nov. Ed. Ben. p. 238) What is the little horn? I say it is antichrist appearing among some kings, and that he is a man, anthropos esti. See also his 3rd homil. on 2 Thess. Who is antichrist? a certain man, etc. anthropos tis. And hom. iv. Antichrist, says he, will be destroyed by Christ's coming, etc. Theodoret, on Daniel (Ch. VII. t. 2, p. 631. Ed. Par. 1642) The little horn is antichrist, etc. And Apocalypse 11. He will glorify the god Maozim in this place: which the Protestants may take notice of, that he expounds thus: Instead of the gods which his forefathers adored, he will set himself up for the strong and powerful god, signified by the word Maozim. See on 2 Thess. tom. 3, p. 386. Antichrist is called the man of sin, because by nature a man, who will call himself the Christ, etc, God hath decreed he shall appear at the end of the world: para ton tes sunteleias kairon. St. Cyril of Jerusalem: (Cat. xv, p. 162. Ed. Par. 1640): The devil will bring a certain man, a magician, falsely calling himself the Christ. And this will come after the time of the Roman empire, and when the end of the world shall approach: tes tou kosmou sunteleias. He shall be destroyed by the glorious coming of Christ. He will act only for three years and six months: epi tria ete mona, kai menas ex. He brings proofs, p. 165 and 166, to shew that antichrist's reign will last but three years and a half, being also expressed by months. And these things, says he, we draw from the divine Scriptures, ek theion graphon, yet does not bring any place out of the Apocalypse. I do not cite Hippolytus on the Apocalypse, because that book we now have with his name is thought not to be his. Theophylactus, oecumenius, and Euthymius follow St. Chrysostom. In the BB. Patrum, (tom. 4. Ed. Colon. p. 517) we have a commentary on the Apocalypse of Andreas, bishop of Caesarea, in Cappadocia, and another (tom. 6. p. 59) of Arethas, bishop of the same city, which is in a manner an abridgment of the former. They both agree that the reign of antichrist will last but three years and a half, for which also they cite Hippolytus. St. John Damascene, in the eighth age[century], (lib. 4. Orthod. fid. ch. XXVIII. Ed. Basil. p. 389) says that antichrist is to come at the end of the world. None of these writers dreamt that the bishops of Rome were antichrist. The Latin Fathers, upon antichrist, deliver us the very same truths. Tertullian, to omit other places, lib. de Resur. carnis. ch. XXVII. Those, saith he, in antichrist's time at the end of the world, etc. St. Cyprian, in the middle of the third age[century], (Ep. 56. Ed. Rig. and in other epistles) was apprehensive that the time of antichrist was then approaching, as divers of the Fathers feared the same in their time, but he always joins with antichrist the end of the world. Scire debetis et occasum saeculi, et antichristi tempus appropinquasse....praenuntiata sunt haec futura in fine saeculi, deficiente jam mundo et antichristo propinquante. See Ep. 68. ad Clerum in Hispania, p. 115. See Lactantius, lib. 7. div. Institut. ch. XVII: Antichrist, says he, will come; imminente jam temporem conclusione, etc. St. Hilary (on Matt. xxiv. can. or cap. 26) tells us, that antichrist is to come when the day of judgment is at hand. See also can. 33. See St. Ambrose, (t. L. de ben. Prophet. ch. VII. p. 523) where he also thinks that antichrist will be of the tribe of Dan. See t. 2. in Psalm xlv. p. 1028. St. Jerome (on Daniel vii. tom. 3, p. 1101. Nov. Ed.) says, that by the little horn is meant antichrist. "Let us say what all ecclesiastical writers have delivered to us, that at the end of the world, when the kingdom of the Romans is to be destroyed, there will be ten kings, who will divide among them the Roman world, and the eleventh will rise up, a little king, who will overcome three of those ten....and the other seven will submit to the conqueror." Take notice, that these words, "what all ecclesiastical writers have delivered to us," quod omnes ecclesiastici scriptores tradiderunt, in consummatione mundi, quando regnum est Romanorum, etc. are not to be extended to every particular in this sentence, but only to what he and other ecclesiastical writers agreed in, to wit, that antichrist was not to come till about the end of the world, and that the heathen Roman empire was first to be destroyed. But it does not follow, that presently after the destruction of the Roman empire, both antichrist and the end of the world (which others also join together) should happen. This was indeed, for some time at least, the particular opinion of St. Jerome and of some other Fathers; but divers others hold that the Roman empire is now long ago destroyed, though antichrist be still to come. St. Jerome also tells us that ten kings shall divide the Roman world; but St. Augustine puts us in mind, that by ten may be signified many. And besides, there are other expositions on these kings and on Babylon, which are very probable, as shewn already. St. Jerome also (on Daniel, p. 1103) says, the reign of antichrist will last but three years and a half. On the 12th chapter, (p. 1133) he takes notice that the same short time is signified by 1260 days. P. 1127, he tells us Antiochus was a figure of antichrist, but that many things in that prophecy agree better to antichrist himself at the end of the world: rectius in fine mundi hoec facturus est antichristus. See also his Ep. to Algasia, tom. 4, part 1, q. 11, p. 200. St. Augustine began his learned work, de Civ. Dei[City of God], soon after the destruction of Rome by Alaric, about the year 410[A.D. 410], as he tells us, lib. 2. retract. ch. XLIII, though he did not finish these books about the year 427. He is far from finding any certainty of the approach of antichrist, as I shall have an occasion to shew on Apocalypse 20. of this Apocalypse; and shall only here take notice, that he delivers it as a certain truth, that the reign of Antichrist will last but three years and a half, (lib. 20, ch. XXIII) which he tells us we are the more certain of, the same short time being expressed in the Scriptures by years, by months, and by days: tres annos et semissem, etiam numero dierum aliquando, et mensium numero declaratur. St. Gregory, in his moral books on Job, (tom. 1) makes frequent mention of antichrist, little dreaming that his predecessors for almost two hundred years, that he himself and his successors for so many ages[centuries], were antichrist, foretold in the Apocalypse. Lib. 12, ch. XV, p. 410, he says antichrist will be permitted to be exalted for a little time; parvo tempore. Lib. 13, p. 32, he calls him that damnable man whom the apostate angel will make use of at the end of the world; in fine mundi: and again, (lib. 29, ch. VII, p. 925,) in mundi termino, etc. --- Now to conclude from what hath been said. The Scripture, and all both Greek and Latin Fathers, acknowledge no particular antichrist, properly so called, but him who shall be one single man, who is not to come till about the end of the world, who is to reign but a short time. Let our adversaries reconcile this doctrine with their systems of the popish antichrist, whether emphatical or mystical. They tell us that 1260 days, being prophetic days, must be taken for years; and that just so long must reign the popish antichrist. It is true we have two examples in Scripture, and only two, as the bishop of Meaux observes, in which days are put for years, to wit, (Numbers 13:34.; Ezechiel 4:5.) and in both places we are admonished that days unusually stand for years. And certainly, unless we have particular proofs to the contrary, days even in the writings of the prophets are to be taken for days, months for months, years for years. Now in this place, since the same term of antichrist's reign both in Daniel (to whom St. John alludes) and in the Apocalypse, is also expressed by as many years and months as come to no more than 1260 days, it is manifest that St. John by days means days, and not years. So[See?] divers other convincing proofs of this matter in the advertisement of the bishop of Meaux, num. 24. This the ancient Fathers saw very well, and so not one of them understood this of a number of so many years. Yet unless we allow this arbitrary and groundless exposition, that by 1260 days are meant years, the whole system of so many popes being antichrist is utterly destroyed. But let us see what pleasant work they can make of it, if we suppose days to be years; with a second supposition, that above two hundred men are one man; and with a third, that the end of the world, at which antichrist is to come, has now been ending for 1260 years. The popish antichrist, say they, is to last 1260 years and no longer: and they are certain that he began some time in the fifth age[century], as soon as the Roman empire was destroyed by ten kings; for the popish antichrist was to begin with those kings that began to reign with the beast, and the pope renewed heathenism and idolatry at that very time. From hence they have made different computations: 1. From the year 410, when Alaric, the Goth, pillaged and almost destroyed Rome; add to this number 1260 years, and the antichristian reign of the popes should have come to a period in 1670, or thereabouts. This by the event being found a mistake, others, as Jurieu and Mr. Whiston, found out a new epoch, and dated the beginning of the popish antichrist from the year 455 or 456, under the great, learned, and virtuous St. Leo, when Genseric, the Vandal, again plundered Rome; adding the aforesaid number, and the reign of the popish antichrist was to end in 1715 or 1716. The author of a late book, entitled Charity and Truth, laughs at Mr. Whiston, that he has outlived his nine whimsical demonstrations, by which in his Essay on the Revelation he had shewn that the papacy was to expire in the year 1716. This term being also expired, and this popish antichrist going prosperously on at this present year, (1730) under Benedict XIII. whom even the Protestants themselves, commonly allow to be a very holy and virtuous pope or antichrist, some have computed that the beginning of this popish antichrist may be dated from the year 475, when both the dignity and name of the Roman empire ceased under Augustulus: and thus they may hope for the destruction of antichrist, and (as I think they hold) of the end of the world, just five years hence, 1735. Luther, at the beginning of the reformation, made some pretence to prophecies, as the particulars are related by the bishop of Meaux in his excellent History of the Variations, and among the rest, that the antichristian reign of the popes should come to an end in two years time. Luther's preaching was to be looked on as the breath of Christ, by which the man of sin, the popish antichrist, should be destroyed, and that whilst he drank his beer quietly at his fireside with his two friends, Amsdorf and Melancthon. See the Hist. of Variations, lib. 1:and num. ix. if you can --- Spectatum admissi risum teneatis. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 18:1 | And after these things I saw another Angel coming down from heaven, having great power: and the earth was enlightened with his glory. | |
| Revelation of John 18:2 | And he cried out with a strong voice, saying: *Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen: and is become the habitation of devils, and the hold of every unclean spirit, and the hold of every unclean and hateful bird: Isaias 21:9.; Jeremias 51:8.; Apocalypse 14:8. | Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen. Idolatrous Rome is fallen. That mighty seat of power and dominion is fallen. The long fixed abode of voluptuousness and luxury, for the merchants of the earth have become rich by the strength of her delicacies, and now the hand of God hath struck her. It is utterly destroyed; not a human being in it. Thus it is become an accursed place, given up for an habitation of devils and a hold of every unclean spirit, or of frightful spectres and ghosts, and a hold of every unclean and hateful bird, of owls, ravens, vultures, etc. etc. (Pastorini) |
| Revelation of John 18:3 | Because all nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornication: and the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her: and the merchants of the earth have become rich by the strength of her delicacies. | |
| Revelation of John 18:4 | And I heard another voice from heaven, saying: Go out from her, my people: that you be not partakers of her sins, and that you receive not of her plagues. | Go out from her, my people. The people of God, the Christians, are all here told to leave the falling city, lest they be partakers of her sins, and receive of her plagues. At the time of Alaric's sacking Rome, many fled away to St. Jerome, who was then in Judea; others fled into other parts, as many holy fathers testify. St. Jerome says, (Ep. vii) that St. Paula and several illustrious Christian families had left Rome as if by particular inspiration, and retired into Judea. The holy pope Innocent was drawn by a particular providence out of the city, as Lot out of Sodom, that he might not see the ruin of a guilty people, says Orosius, lib. 7. ch. XXXIX. We read likewise that Melania, as if she foresaw the approaching catastrophe, had prevailed upon many Christians to retire with her from a city doomed to destruction. (Histor. Laus. ch. CXVIII.) In fine, we all know that when the storm broke out, the Christians took refuge and were saved in the Churches of St. Peter and St. Paul, which Alaric had allowed to be places of safety. (Haydock) |
| Revelation of John 18:5 | For her sins have reached to heaven, and the Lord hath remembered her iniquities. | |
| Revelation of John 18:6 | Render to her as she also hath rendered to you: and double ye the double according to her works: in the cup, wherein she hath mingled, mingle unto her double. | |
| Revelation of John 18:7 | As much as she hath glorified herself, and hath been in delicacies, so much torment and sorrow give unto her: because she saith in her heart: *I sit a queen, and am not a widow: and sorrow I shall not see. Isaias 47:8. | |
| Revelation of John 18:8 | Therefore shall her plagues come in one day, death, and mourning, and famine, and she shall be burnt with the fire: because God is strong, who shall judge her. | |
| Revelation of John 18:9 | And the kings of the earth, who have committed fornication, and lived in delicacies with her, shall weep, and bewail themselves over her, when they shall see the smoke of her burning: | |
| Revelation of John 18:10 | Standing afar off for fear of her torments, saying: Alas! alas! that great city, Babylon, that mighty city: for in one hour is thy judgment come. | Alas! alas! St. Augustine informs us, that the people of the eastern provinces, and the remotest cities, mourned in a public manner on this occasion. (De Civ. Dei. lib. 1, ch. XXXIII.) |
| Revelation of John 18:11 | And the merchants of the earth shall weep and mourn over her: for no man shall buy their merchandise any more: | |
| Revelation of John 18:12 | Merchandise of gold, and silver, and of precious stones, and pearls, and of fine linen, and purple, and of silk, and scarlet, (and all thyine wood, and all manner of vessels of ivory, and all manner of vessels of precious stone, and of brass, and iron, and marble, | |
| Revelation of John 18:13 | And cinnamon) and odours and ointment, and frankincense, and wine, and oil, and fine flour, and wheat, and beasts, and sheep, and horses, and chariots, and slaves, and souls of men. | We see here enumerated the articles of the luxury of the pagan Romans in dress, in ornaments, in furniture, in equipage, in the sumptuousness of their tables, etc. etc. Nothing is more remarkable than the extravagant luxury and profusion of some of the Roman emperors at their tables. Caligula once spent (according to Seneca) for a supper, 150,000 crowns. Suetonius tells us, that the emperor Vitellius would feast himself thrice, and often four times in a day, spending 10,000 crowns at each meal. But now they are all gone; they are now the fuel of fire, and in one hour brought to nought. (Haydock) |
| Revelation of John 18:14 | And the fruits of the desire of thy soul are departed from thee, and all fat, and goodly things are perished from thee, and they shall no more find them. | |
| Revelation of John 18:15 | The merchants of these things, who were made rich, shall stand afar off from her, for fear of her torments, weeping and mourning. | |
| Revelation of John 18:16 | And saying: Alas! alas! that great city, which was clothed with fine linen, and purple, and scarlet, and was gilded with gold, and precious stones, and pearls: | |
| Revelation of John 18:17 | For in one hour are so great riches come to nothing: and every ship-master, and every one that sails into the lake, and mariners, and they that work at sea, stood afar off, | |
| Revelation of John 18:18 | And cried out, seeing the place of her burning, saying: What city is like to this great city? | |
| Revelation of John 18:19 | And they cast dust upon their heads, and cried out, weeping and mourning, saying: Alas! alas! that great city, wherein all were made rich, who had ships at sea, by reason of her prices: for in one hour she is made desolate. | |
| Revelation of John 18:20 | Rejoice over her, thou heaven, and ye holy apostles, and prophets: for God hath judged your judgment on her. | Rejoice....heaven, the holy apostles and prophets, and all the holy ministers of the gospel: and holy men are invited here to rejoice, because the divine justice is accomplished in the ruin of that guilty city. (Pastorini) --- By the words prophets, etc. are not meant those of the old law, as pagan Rome had not been the cause of their deaths, but here only includes all the prophets, saints, and martyrs, who had been put to death for Christ throughout the whole Roman empire. (Haydock) |
| Revelation of John 18:21 | And a mighty Angel took up a stone, as it were a great mill-stone, and cast it into the sea, saying: With this violence shall Babylon, that great city, be thrown down, and shall now be found no more. | |
| Revelation of John 18:22 | And the voice of harpers, and of musicians, and of them that play on the pipe, and on the trumpet, shall no more be heard in thee: and no craftsmen of any art whatsoever shall be found any more in thee: and the sound of the mill shall be heard no more in thee: | |
| Revelation of John 18:23 | And the light of the lamp shall shine no more in thee; and the voice of the bridegroom and bride shall be heard no more in thee: for thy merchants were the great men of the earth, for all nations have been deceived by thy sorceries. | |
| Revelation of John 18:24 | And in her was found the blood of prophets and of saints: and of all who were slain upon the earth. | |
| Revelation of John 19:0 | The saints glorify God for his judgments on the great harlot. Christ's victory over the beast, and the kings of the earth. | |
| Revelation of John 19:1 | After these things I heard as it were the voice of many multitudes in heaven, saying: Alleluia: salvation, and glory, and power is to our God: | Here we enter upon a new scene. Babylon the great is fallen. The saints are here represented rejoicing over the woman who was drunk with the blood of the saints. (Chap. 17:6.) (Calmet) --- The voice of many multitudes....saying: Alleluia. In these visions, when the martyrs have triumphed and overcome persecutors, are sometimes represented their praises of God in heaven. Here in the Protestant translation, are retained Alleluia and Amen, which as St. Augustine takes notice, used not to be changed nor translated in any language. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 19:2 | For true and just are his judgments, who hath judged the great harlot, which corrupted the earth with her fornication, and hath revenged the blood of his servants, at her hands. | |
| Revelation of John 19:3 | And again they said: Alleluia. And her smoke ascendeth for ever and ever. | |
| Revelation of John 19:4 | And the four and twenty ancients, and the four animals, fell down and adored God, that sitteth upon the throne, saying: Amen: Alleluia. | |
| Revelation of John 19:5 | And a voice came out from the throne, saying: Praise ye our God, all ye his servants: and you that fear him, little and great. | |
| Revelation of John 19:6 | And I heard as it were the voice of a great multitude, and as the voice of many waters, and as the voice of great thunders, saying: Alleluia: for the Lord our God, the omnipotent, hath reigned. | The voice of a great multitude. Menochius applies this voice to the multitude of Angels and saints, which from its strength may be compared to the voice of rushing waters, and because of the terror with which it strikes the wicked. Pastorini understands by this voice of many waters, the voices of many Angels that preside over the nations, denoted by waters, which had all before groaned under the tyranny of antichrist; and the voice of great thunders, that of the Angel who presides over fire, which, as employed in military engines, by its explosion resembles thunder. It must be observed that the latter author refers it to the last stage of the world. |
| Revelation of John 19:7 | Let us be glad and rejoice: and give glory to him: for the marriage of the Lamb is come, and his wife hath prepared herself. | For the marriage, etc. In the New Testament, the word marriage points out the establishment of the Church, the vocation of different people to the faith, or the reign of the Messias. (Calmet) |
| Revelation of John 19:8 | And to her it is granted, that she should clothe herself with fine linen, glittering and white. For the fine linen are the justifications of saints. | Fine linen. The symbol of justifications, or the good works and merit of her holy members; the most pleasing attire in which she can present herself to the Lamb. Her robe is glittering and white, because she has been purified as silver in the furnace, and washed white in the waters of tribulation and persecution. (Pastorini) --- The fine linen, or byssus, here mentioned, is, according to Calmet, a kind of silk produced by a shell-fish, called pinna; though the same learned commentator allows that the Greek authors use this word for fine linen. |
| Revelation of John 19:9 | And he said to me: Write: *Blessed are they who are called to the marriage supper of the Lamb: and he said to me: These words of God are true. Matthew 22:2.; Luke 14:16. | |
| Revelation of John 19:10 | And I fell down before his feet to adore him. And he saith to me: See thou do it not: I am thy fellow-servant, and of thy brethren who have the testimony of Jesus. Adore God. For the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy. | And I fell before his feet, to adore him.{ Ver. 10. Cecidi ante pedes ejus ut adorarum illum: epeson emprosthen ton podon autou proskunesai auto, proskunein, as Mr. Legh shews out of other authors: promiscuè de Dei et hominum cultu apud LXX.[the Septuagint] usurpatur, cui respondet apud Latinos, adorare, quod est quasi ad aliquem orare, says Erasmus, capite vel corpore inclinato. We have very many examples in the holy Scripture, where both proskunein and latreuein signify not only divine honour, but also the honour paid to men. When God gave the ten commandments, (Exodus xx.) he forbad his people to adore strange gods; non adorabis ea, neque coles; ou proskuneseis autois, oude me latreuseis autois. Yet the same words are used in a great many places, where it is evident that no divine adoration or worship was designed, as we read of Abraham, (Genesis xxvii. 7.) adoravit populum terrae, prosekunese to lao tes ges; Genesis xlii. 6. of Joseph's brethren, cum adorassent eum fratres sui, prosekunesan auto epi prosopon. See also 1 Kings xx. 41. where David is said to have adored Jonathan, cadens pronus in terram adoravit, epesen epi prosopon kai prosekunesen auto tris. See likewise 3 Kings 1:16. where Bethsabee[Bathsheba] is said to have adored old king David, adoravit regem, prosekunese to basilei. Though in these and many other places be the same expressions as when St. John is here said to have fallen at the angel's feet to adore him, or worship him, yet no one can think that in these places is meant the supreme worship due to God alone: did Bathsabee take her old, decayed, dying husband, David, to be God, or design to pay him divine honour? Nothing then is more frivolous than such arguments drawn from the like words, which have different significations.|} They of the pretended reformation think they have here a clear proof that no veneration is due to Angels and saints, and that papists in so doing are idolaters. In answer to this: First, they make St. John the apostle guilty of that idolatry which they lay to our charge. For they must suppose and grant that St. John, as to the dispositions of his mind and will, was just ready, or rather falling down, did pay an idolatrous worship to the Angel; and what Christian can believe this of so great an apostle, that after he had been favoured with all those extraordinary visions, he should either be so very ignorant as not to know what was idolatry, or so impious as to become guilty of it, and give divine honour to any creature? And what makes St. John altogether inexcusable, (had it been idolatry) we find him doing the very same a second time, in the last chapter of the Apocalypse; (ver. 7 and 8) that is, falling down at the Angel's feet to adore. Secondly, as it would be extravagantly unreasonable to suspect this apostle, this evangelist, this prophet of the new law, to be guilty of what every Christian, every Jew knows to be idolatry; to wit, to give the divine honour due to God alone to any creature whatsoever; so in reason we cannot but conclude that he was not for giving divine honour to any Angel, knowing them all to be God's creatures. If therefore he was about to pay divine honour, we must either say that he took him who then appeared to him to be our Saviour Christ, God and man, as some expound it; or, which seems more probable, he was only for offering an inferior honour and veneration to the Angel, such as he knew was lawful: and therefore he was for doing it afterwards a second time; though the Angel would not receive it from St. John, to make us the more convinced of the great dignity of this apostle and prophet, who should be raised in heaven to a degree of glory, not inferior to that of the Angels: and thus the Angel tells him, that he is his fellow creature, who with him must adore Almighty God, that by these prophecies they both bear testimony concerning Jesus Christ and his Church, the Angel by revealing them, and St. John by publishing them, which seems to be the sense of the following words, for the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy: or they may be expounded thus, for the testimony that we give concerning Christ and his Church, we both of us receive from the divine spirit of God, who reveals such truths to his prophets. Thirdly, the Protestants are for proving us idolaters from what St. John was about to do, or rather from what he did, expressed in these words, and I fell before his feet to adore him; or, as in the Protestant translation, and I fell at his feet to worship him. Now it is certain and evident that these words neither in the Latin nor in the Greek, express that divine worship and honour which is due, and which is given to God alone, whether we consult the Hebrew or the Septuagint of the Old Testament, the very same words are many times used to signify no more than an inferior honour given to creatures. This is a thing well known, and agreed upon by every Protestant as well as Catholic, who has read the Scriptures, or who knows any thing of Latin, Greek, or Hebrew. Fourthly, it seems very strange, very unaccountable, that our adversaries will not understand the difference betwixt divine honour due to God alone, and an inferior honour, respect, or veneration given to Angels or saints, to their relics or images, which inferior honour may, in some sense, be called a religious honour, inasmuch as it is paid to persons or things that may be called sacred or holy. Is not honour or veneration certainly different, as the objects or things we pay honour to, and the intention of him that pays this honour, are different, though perhaps the exterior marks of bowing, of kneeling, of prostrating, of kissing, may be the same? We honour the king, and we also honour his courtiers, his officers, and such as are invested with dignities and authority from him: but shall any one think that we pay the same honour to all these persons or things belonging to them? though the eastern people kneel or prostrate themselves before kings or persons in dignities, they neither give nor design to give them divine honour. Why will our adversaries pretend to make us idolaters against our wills, minds, and intentions, when we have always protested that we give divine honour and supreme worship to God alone? that we honour, worship, serve and adore him only as the author of all things? that we never design to pay any thing but an inferior honour to the highest Angels or saints, or to their relics and images. We know, believe, and profess that there is an infinite distance betwixt God the creator, and the highest and most perfect of all created beings; so that the honour we give them is infinitely inferior, as they themselves are, to the honour that with our hearts and minds we pay to God: and must it be said that we give divine honour to creatures, and so become idolaters, when we never design it, when we design quite the contrary? This made Mr. Thorndike, in his book of just weights and measures, tell his Protestant brethren, that the Church of Rome cannot be charged with idolatry for their reverencing images, nor on any other account; and so exhorts them not to pretend to lead the people by the nose, to make them believe suppositions which they cannot prove. See Apocalypse 2:and xix. (Witham) --- Fell before, etc. St. Athanasius and St. Augustine think St. John took the Angel to be Jesus Christ, and as such was desirous of paying him the supreme homage, or latreia. (Calmet) --- St. John, in token of gratitude, offers to pay to the Angel such homage as is due to a being of his rank, which the Angel however refuses to accept, giving for reason, that his is a fellow-servant of the apostle, and of the apostle's brethren, who bear testimony to Jesus Christ. (Pastorini) --- This speech evidently agrees with the character of John the Baptist, but not with that of a real Angel. --- Testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy. The testimony which you give to Christ, by suffering for his holy name and the profession of his doctrine, is of equal value with the spirit of prophecy which I possess (Pastorini; Calmet) |
| Revelation of John 19:11 | And I saw heaven opened, and behold a white horse; and he that sat upon him, was called Faithful and True, and with justice he judgeth and fighteth. | Behold a white horse. The titles and character given to him that sat on this white horse, shew that hereby was represented Jesus Christ, called also here the word of God, ver. 13; and ver. 16, and he hath on his garment and on his thigh written: King of kings and Lord of lords, etc. (Witham) --- And he that sat, etc. The heavens open and St. John sees Jesus Christ, the Son of God, descending, seated on a white horse. He is known by the peculiar appellations of faithful and true. Faithful, in protecting his servants; and true, by always keeping strictly true whatever he promises. (Pastorini) |
| Revelation of John 19:12 | And his eyes were as a flame of fire, and on his head were many diadems, having a name written, which no man knoweth but himself. | Flame, etc. Which shews his indignation. --- Diadems; the mark of power. So Ptolemy, the king of Egypt, after he had entered Antiochia, took two crowns, to signify that he was king of two countries, Syria and Egypt. (Pastorini) --- Which (name) no man knoweth but himself. Some interpreters think St. John alludes to an ancient custom which still obtains among the Orientals, of having a secret name, which they discover to no one. (Calmet) --- Pastorini understands this to be the name of the word of God, as mentioned in the subsequent verse; which is so comprehensive in its meaning, that human reason cannot fathom it, and no man knoweth but himself. |
| Revelation of John 19:13 | *And he was clothed with a garment sprinkled with blood: and his name is called, THE WORD OF GOD. Isaias 63:1. | Sprinkled with blood, etc. Which betokens the carnage made among his enemies. |
| Revelation of John 19:14 | And the armies which are in heaven followed him on white horses, clothed in fine linen, white and clean. | The armies, etc. The celestial armies of saints follow the Son of God, as their captain and commander; they are all like him, mounted on white horses, and clothed in fine linen, white and clean, a symbol of their merit and glory. (Pastorini) |
| Revelation of John 19:15 | And out of his mouth proceedeth a sharp two-edged sword: that with it he may strike the Gentiles. *And he shall rule them with a rod of iron: and he treadeth the wine-press of the fury of the wrath of God the Almighty. Psalm 2:5. | Sharp two-edged sword. The power which Christ exercises over the impious. (Menochius) --- Wine press, etc. This painting corresponds to the triumph of Jesus Christ. (Calmet) --- Some of the attributes here mentioned are also ascribed to Christ, by the prophet Isaiah, (Isaias 63:2, 3.) "Why then is thy apparel red, and thy garments like theirs that tread in the wine press? I have trodden the wine-press alone, and of the Gentiles there is not a man with me: I have trampled on them in my indignation, and have trodden them down in my wrath, and their blood is sprinkled upon my garments, and I have stained all my apparel." (Pastorini) |
| Revelation of John 19:16 | And he hath on his garment and on his thigh written: *King of kings, and Lord of lords. 1 Timothy 5:15.; Apocalypse 17:14. | |
| Revelation of John 19:17 | And I saw an Angel standing in the sun, and he cried with a loud voice, saying to all the birds that were flying through the midst of heaven: Come, and gather yourselves together to the great supper of God: | An Angel....in the sun,...with a loud voice invites all the birds of the air to a most plentiful entertainment which is preparing for them, where they may fill themselves with human flesh of all kinds; from that of kings to that of bondmen; (ver. 18) and with the flesh of horses and that of them that sin on them: an expressive picture of the immense slaughter that is going to be made. It would seem that this bloody scene will terminate in the evening of the day, as the invitation is given to a supper. (Pastorini) |
| Revelation of John 19:18 | That you may eat the flesh of kings, and the flesh of tribunes, and the flesh of mighty men, and the flesh of horses, and of them that sit on them, and the flesh of all freemen, and bondmen, and of little and of great. | |
| Revelation of John 19:19 | And I saw the beast, and the kings of the earth and their armies gathered together, to make war with him that sat upon the horse, and with his army. | We have just now seen the heavenly captain on horseback, at the head of his holy troop, marching to battle; and now we see who are the enemies he comes to encounter. Here is the beast, or antichrist, with prodigious armies gathered from all parts of the earth, and headed by their kings and princes. (Pastorini) |
| Revelation of John 19:20 | And the beast was taken, and with him the false prophet: who wrought signs before him, wherewith he seduced them, who received the mark of the beast, and who adored his image. These two were cast alive into the pool of fire burning with brimstone. | The beast, etc. Antichrist is taken alive. (Menochius) |
| Revelation of John 19:21 | And the rest were slain by the sword of him that sitteth upon the horse, which proceedeth out of his mouth; and all the birds were filled with their flesh. | |
| Revelation of John 20:0 | Satan is bound for a thousand years: the souls of the martyrs reign with Christ in the first resurrection. The last attempts of Satan against the Church: the last judgment. | |
| Revelation of John 20:1 | And I saw an Angel coming down from heaven, having the key of the bottomless pit, and a great chain in his hand. | |
| Revelation of John 20:2 | And he laid hold on the dragon, the old serpent, which is the devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years: | And bound him for a thousand years. I shall give the reader an abridgment of what St. Augustine has left us on this chapter, in his 20th book de Civ. Dei[City of God]. From the 5th to the 16th Apocalypse, (t. vii. p. 578 et seq.) he treats upon these difficulties: What is meant by the first and second resurrection; by the binding and chaining up of the devil; by the thousand years that the saints reign with Christ; by the first and second death; by Gog and Magog, etc. As to the first resurrection, Apocalypse 6., he takes notice on the 5th verse, that resurrection{ Ver. 2. St. Augustine, ch. VI. Prima animarum est.|} in the Gospels, and in St. Paul, is applied not only to the body but also to the soul; and the second resurrection, which is to come, is that of the bodies: that there is also a death of the soul, which is by sin; and that the second death is that of soul and body by eternal damnation: that both bad and good shall rise again in their bodies. On those words, (ver. 6) Blessed is he that hath part in the first resurrection; in these the second death hath no power. Such, saith he, (chap. 9.) as have risen from sin, and have remained in that resurrection of the soul, shall never be liable to the second death, which is damnation. Cap. vii. p. 580, he says that some Catholics not understanding rightly the first resurrection, have been led into ridiculous fables,{ Ver. 2. Ch. VII, p. 580. In quasdam riduculas fabulas.|} and this by the interpretation which they put on the thousand years; as if the first resurrection implied a resurrection of the bodies of the martyrs and saints, who should live on the earth with Christ for a thousand years before the general resurrection, in all manner of delights. This was the opinion of those called Millenarians: this, saith he, might seem tolerable in some measure,{ Ver. 2. P. 581. Utcunque tolerabilis.|} if taken for spiritual delights, (for we ourselves were once in these sentiments) but if for carnal pleasures, it can only be believed by carnal men. He then expounds what may be understood by the binding and chaining of the devil for a thousand years; (Cap. vii. et viii, p. 581) that the thousand years, meaning a long time, may signify all the time from Christ's first coming{ Ver. 2. Mille annòs pro annis omnibus hujus saeculi posuit, etc. Ch. VIII, p. 583. A primo adventu Christi usque ad finem saeculi.|} to his second at the end of the world, and to the last short persecution under antichrist. The devil is said to be bound, that is, his power much lessened and restrained, in comparison of the great and extensive power he had over all nations before Christ's incarnation; not but that he still tempts many,{ Ver. 2. Ch. VIII, p. 583. Alligatio diaboli est non permitti exercere totam tentationem, etc.|} and raiseth persecutions, which always turn to their greater good; and that towards the end of the world he shall be let loose, as it were, for a short time, and permitted with his infernal spirits to exercise his malice against mankind, to try the patience of the elect, and to shew the power of God's grace, by which his faithful servants shall triumph over the devil. (N. B.[Nota Bene, Note Well?]) What St. Augustine adds divers times in these chapters: "Let no one," says he, "imagine{ Ver. 2. Ne quis existimet eo ipso parvo tempore, quo solvetur diabolus, in hac terra ecclesiam non futuram, etc. Tales erunt, cum quibus ei belligerandum est, ut vinci tanto ejus impetu, insidiisque non possint, etc.|} that even during that short time, there shall be no Church of Christ on the earth: God forbid: even when the devil shall be let loose, he shall not be able to seduce the Church." Cap. ix, p. 586, he expounds those words, (ver. 4-5) I saw the souls of them that were beheaded....and they lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years....This is the first resurrection: that is the first resurrection is while the devil is chained up for the space of a thousand years. He takes notice that the present state of the Church is many times called the kingdom of God, and that the Church of Christ reigns now with Christ, both in the living saints and in those who are dead, in the souls of the martyrs, and of others, who having lived and died piously, now reign with Christ, not yet in their bodies,{ Ver. 2. Ch. IX, p. 586. Quamvis ergo cum suis corporibus nondum, jam tamen eorum animae regnant cum eo.|} but their souls reign with him. On those words of the 4th verse: who had not adored the beast, nor his image, nor received his mark, he only gives this exposition, as agreeable to the Christian faith, that by the beast may be understood the multitude of wicked sinners in general, and the image of the beast{ Ver. 2. P. 587. Quae sit ista bestia....non abhorret a fide recta, ut ipsa impia civitas intelligatur, et populus infidelium contrarius populo fideli, et civitati Dei. Imago vero simulatio ejus mihi videtur....fallaci imagine Christiani.|} those who are of the Church in outward appearance and profession only, and not by their works. When it is said (ver. 5) that the rest of the dead lived not till the thousand years were finished: they lived not, says he, as to their souls, when they should have lived; and therefore not being happy in heaven, when their bodies shall rise, it shall not be to life, but to judgment and damnation, which is the second death. Cap. xi, he expounds the 7th and 8th verses, where it is said that Satan shall be loosed....and seduce the nations which are over the four quarters of the earth, Gog and Magog,{ Ver. 2. Ch. XI, p. 589. De Gog et Magog: haec erit novissima persecutio, novissimo imminente judicio, quam sancta ecclesia toto terrarum orbe patietur, universa scilicet civitas Christi ab universa diaboli civitate.|} and shall gather them together to battle. This, says St. Augustine, will be the last persecution at the approach of the day of judgment, which the whole city, or the whole Church of Christ dispersed through the universe, will suffer from the whole city of the devil. Neither need Gog and Magog be taken for a particular{ Gentes istae, quas appellat Gog et Magog, non sic sunt accipiendae, tanquam sint aliqui in aliqua parte terrarum barbari constituti....non utique ad unum locum venisse, vel venturi esse significati sunt, etc.|} barbarous people, but such as are dispersed in a manner in every nation, and who shall then break out by the instigation of Satan into an open hatred and persecution against the faithful servants of God; as it is said, (ver. 8.) they ascended upon the breadth of the earth, and surrounded the camp of the saints, where we cannot literally understand one camp, one city, or one place, but the Church every where dispersed. Cap. xii, he expounds the 9th verse, where he takes fire to signify, metaphorically, the firm resistance and constancy of the good, and the fire{ Ver. 2. Ch. XII, p. 589. Bene intelligitur ignis de caelo de ipsa firmitate sanctorum, qua non cessuri sunt saevientibus, quoniam non poterunt attrahere in partes antichristi sanctos Christi.|} of their zeal, which devoured as it were the wicked; or we may understand with others, the temporal fire of God's judgments in this world against the wicked, but not the last eternal fire; because the eternal fire comes not down from heaven but the wicked are cast into it below. Cap. xiii, he teacheth that the last persecution{ Ver. 2. Ch. XIII. Haec persecutio novissima, quae futura est ab antichristo (p. 590) tribus annis et sex mensibus erit....tempus exiguum, etc.|} of antichrist, here mentioned, shall last but three years and six months; that is a little while. Cap. xiv and xv, he expounds the 10th and following verse, of the devil being cast into the lake of fire, after the last persecution of antichrist. By the beast he understands, as before, the city or multitude of all the wicked; and by the false prophet, either antichrist or the outward appearance of faith in them that have none. Then follows the last judgment, where it is said that the books are opened, and also that another book was opened. By the first book, may be understood men and their consciences; and by the other book, the book of life, that{ Ver. 2. Ch. XV, p. 593. Praedestinationem significat eorum, quibus aeterna dabitur vita, etc.|} of eternal predestination. Thus far S. Augustine, where we see that he delivers the common Catholic doctrine, that by the thousand years, so often mentioned in this chapter, he understands all that time in which the souls of the martyrs, and of all other saints, reign happy with Christ in heaven, till after the general resurrection they receive a full and complete happiness, both as to soul and body. A false exposition of these thousand years gave occasion to the mistake, the error, and heresy of those called the Millenarians, which Mede and Dr. W. have followed. Papias, who lived soon after, or perhaps with St. John, was the chief promoter of this mistake; a man, says Eusebius, of "little judgment and capacity,"{ Ver. 2. Eusebius (lib. 3, ch. XXXIX) says of Papias, omikr[] on ton noun; and that he followed muthikotera.|} who misconstrued the discourses which he heard. He was followed by divers writers in the second, third, and fourth century, who did not hold with Cerinthus and his followers, that the saints should rise before the general resurrection, and reign with Christ on earth for a thousand years in all manner of sensual pleasures; but in spiritual delights, in the city of Jerusalem, built anew after that glorious manner described in the next chapter. Now though this opinion had several considerable abettors, of which I find these seven: Papias, St. Justin[St. Justin Martyr], St. Irenaeus, Tertullian, Nepos, (a bishop, in Egypt; in Eusebius, lib. vii. ch. XXIV.) Victorinus Petabionensis, Lactantius, and Severus Sulpitius: yet were there always other learned Catholic writers who rejected it as a fable. Of this number was Caius, a priest, at Rome, about the end of the second age[century]; Origen, in his prologue on the Canticles; St. Denys, of Alexandria, who in the third age[century] wrote to confute Nepos; (see Eusebius, lib. vii. History of the Church, ch. XXIV., who treats it as a fable ) St. Basil,{ Ver. 2. St. Basil (tom. 3, p. 284) says, graiodeis muthous.|} who calls it an old wife's tale, and a Jewish fiction, Epist. 293; St. Gregory of Nazianzus, Orat. 52; St. Epiphanius, St. Jerome, Philastrius, Theodoret, who place this opinion among the heresies and heretical fables: so that this could never be looked upon as the constant doctrine and tradition of the Church. The bishop of Meaux[Bossuet] takes notice, that Mede either mistook or falsified the text of St. Justin,{ Ver. 2. St. Justin, (Ed. Joachimi Perionii, p. 62.) multis autum eorum, etiam qui integrae piaeque sententiae Christianae sunt, haec incognita (seu non agnita) esse tibi exposui. In the Greek of Rob. Stephen, out of a manuscript in the king's library, in the year 1551, p. 88, pollous d au, kai ton tes katharas, kai eusebous onton christianon gnomes, touto me gnorizein, esemena soi.|} who, in his Dialogue with Tryphon, holds that opinion of a thousand years reign; but adds, "I also told you, that many who are Christians of pious and sound sentiments, do not own this to be true." Thus we read in the Greek, as well as in the Latin translation: but Mr. Mede quite changes the sense, by adding a negative in this manner; but many who are not of this pure and holy doctrine, etc. We may observe that St. Justin says in the next page, that they who own not the resurrection of the body, and say that souls go to heaven without any future resurrection, are not to be accounted Christians, but are to be looked upon as Sadducees and unbelievers. Which is very true. And he adds, that he, and others who think right with him, know that there will be a resurrection of the flesh, and a rebuilding of Jerusalem for a thousand years, which St. Justin himself judged grounded on the prophets, Isaias, Ezechiel, etc. So that not to make St. Justin contradict himself, he mentions three opinions: the first is the heresy of those who absolutely denied the future resurrection of the dead: these were not Christians, but unbelievers, Sadducees, etc. The second was of those who held that the martyrs and saints should rise, and reign for a thousand years in their bodies on the earth; this, which was his own opinion, he calls the right and true doctrine. But thirdly, he does not condemn those pious Christians who, as he had said before, disowned this thousand years reign, for this would be to contradict himself. (Witham) --- In the above chapter, what man can reflect without trembling, that the devil has the rage of a dragon, the cunning of an old serpent, the malice of a calumniator, and that he is a most implacable enemy? On the other hand, what man is there that does not feel consolation in the reflection, that Jesus Christ has vanquished this savage fiend, and bound him in fetters, by limiting the exercise of his rage and malice? Some understand this chaining of the dragon of the reign of Constantine, and particularly after the defeat of Licinius; (see above, [Apocalypse] Apocalypse 12:18.) and the thousand years of the intermediate period between Constantine and antichrist, when the devil will again be let loose, but for a short time, only three years and a half. (Bible de Vence) --- Bound him, etc. The power of Satan has been very much abridged by the passion of Christ; for a thousand years; that is for the whole time of the new testament, but especially from the time of the destruction of Babylon or pagan Rome, till the new efforts of Gog and Magog against the Church, towards the end of the world. During which time the souls of the martyrs and saints live and reign with Christ in heaven, in the first resurrection, which is that of the soul to the life of glory, as the second resurrection will be that of the body, at the day of general judgment. (Challoner) |
| Revelation of John 20:3 | And he cast him into the bottomless pit, and shut him up, and set a seal upon him, that he should no more seduce the nations, till the thousand years be finished: and after that, he must be loosed a little time. | |
| Revelation of John 20:4 | And I saw seats, and they sat upon them: and judgment was given unto them: and the souls of them that were beheaded for the testimony of Jesus, and for the word of God, and who had not adored the beast, nor his image, nor received his mark on their foreheads, or in their hands, and they lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years. | |
| Revelation of John 20:5 | The rest of the dead lived not till the thousand years were finished. This is the first resurrection. | |
| Revelation of John 20:6 | Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection: in these the second death hath no power: but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with him a thousand years. | |
| Revelation of John 20:7 | And when the thousand years shall be finished, Satan shall be loosed out of his prison, and shall go forth and seduce the nations which are over the four quarters of the earth, *Gog, and Magog, and shall gather them together to battle, whose number is as the sand of the sea. Ezechiel 38:14. | |
| Revelation of John 20:8 | And they ascended upon the breadth of the earth, and surrounded the camp of the saints, and the beloved city. | |
| Revelation of John 20:9 | And fire came down from God out of heaven, and devoured them: and the devil, who seduced them, was cast into the pool of fire and brimstone, where both the beast | |
| Revelation of John 20:10 | And the false prophet shall be tormented day and night for ever and ever. | |
| Revelation of John 20:11 | And I saw a great white throne, and him that sat upon it, from whose countenance the earth and heaven fled away, and there was no place found for them. | |
| Revelation of John 20:12 | And I saw the dead, great and small, standing in presence of the throne, and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were judged by those things which were written in the books, according to their works. | |
| Revelation of John 20:13 | And the sea gave up the dead that were in it: and death and hell gave up their dead that were in them: and they were judged every one according to their works. | |
| Revelation of John 20:14 | And hell and death were cast into the pool of fire. This is the second death. | |
| Revelation of John 20:15 | And whosoever was not found written in the book of life, was cast into the pool of fire. | |
| Revelation of John 21:0 | The new Jerusalem described. | From the seventh verse of the foregoing chapter, begins as it were the third part of the Apocalypse containing the coming of antichrist, the great day of judgment, the punishment of the wicked, and the eternal happiness of God's elect in heaven, or in the celestial Jerusalem, which St. John describes in this chapter as if it were like a large city, beautified and enriched with gold and all manner of precious stones, etc. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 21:1 | And* I saw a new heaven and a new earth. For the first heaven and the first earth was passed away, and the sea is now no more. Isaias 65:17.; Isaias 66:22.; 2 Peter 3:13. | New, by their form and qualities, but not by their substance. --- The first heaven and first earth was passed away: being changed, not as to their substance, but in their qualities. (Challoner) |
| Revelation of John 21:2 | And I, John, saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. | Coming down from God out of heaven. By the city we must understand its citizens, the Angels and saints. (Witham) --- Justice, innocence, the good works of the saints, are the ornaments of the inhabitants of this new Jerusalem, the Church triumphant. If the world of the old Adam has appeared so beautiful, so magnificent, good God, what will be the riches of that which is made for Jesus Christ, the second Adam, and for his members! O Jesus! Father of the world to come, render us worthy of this new and everlasting world, and give us a disgust, a mortal hatred, for that which perishes, and which is the cause of our perdition. |
| Revelation of John 21:3 | And I heard a great voice from the throne, saying: Behold the tabernacle of God with men, and he will dwell with them. And they shall be his people: and God himself with them shall be their God: | Behold the tabernacle of God with men, inasmuch as God's elect shall there dwell with him for ever and ever. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 21:4 | *And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes: and death shall be no more, nor mourning, nor crying, nor sorrow, shall be any more; for the former things are passed away. Isaias 25:8.; Apocalypse 7:17. | |
| Revelation of John 21:5 | And he who sat on the throne, said: *Behold, I make all things new. And he said to me: Write, for these words are most faithful and true. Isaias 13:19.; 2 Corinthians 3:17. | |
| Revelation of John 21:6 | And he said to me: It is done: I am alpha and omega, the beginning and the end. To him that thirsteth I will give of the fountain of the water of life, gratis. | It is done. The state of Christ's Church on earth, and in this world, is now finished; and the time is come to reward the good, and to punish the wicked in the lake burning with fire and brimstone, in hell, with the devils for all eternity. (Witham) --- This living water is God himself, of which the saints shall be inebriated at the source; that is in God himself. Enviable moment, when all the designs of God upon Jesus Christ and upon his Church will be accomplished: but how little thought of now! And how can we hope to be inebriated at this source of God above, if we do not aspire after it whilst we are in this dreary desert here below? He who begins and finishes gratuitously here below the work of our faith, crowns it still more liberally in heaven. |
| Revelation of John 21:7 | He that shall overcome, shall possess these things, and I will be his God; and he shall be my son. | |
| Revelation of John 21:8 | But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and fornicators, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, their portion shall be in the pool burning with fire and brimstone: which is the second death. | |
| Revelation of John 21:9 | And there came one of the seven Angels, who had the vials full of the seven last plagues, and spoke with me, saying: Come, and I will shew thee the bride, the wife of the Lamb. | I will shew thee the bride, the wife of the Lamb: all the Church triumphant in heaven. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 21:10 | And he took me up in spirit to a great and high mountain, and he shewed me the holy city, Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, | |
| Revelation of John 21:11 | Having the glory of God: and the light thereof like to a precious stone, as a jasper stone, as crystal. | |
| Revelation of John 21:12 | And it had a wall great and high, having twelve gates: and in the gates twelve Angels, and names written thereon, which are the names of the twelve tribes of the children of Israel: | |
| Revelation of John 21:13 | On the east, three gates: and on the north, three gates: and on the south, three gates: and on the west, three gates. | |
| Revelation of John 21:14 | And the wall of the city had twelve foundations, and in them the twelve names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb. | |
| Revelation of John 21:15 | And he that spoke with me had a measure, a golden reed, to measure the city and the gates thereof, and the wall. | |
| Revelation of John 21:16 | And the city is situate four-square, and the length thereof is as great as the breadth: and he measured the city with the golden reed for twelve thousand furlongs: and the length, and the height, and the breadth of it are equal. | The city is situate four-square;{ Ver. 16. In quadro, tetragonos, quadrangularis.|} and by what follows, so as to be a perfect square, though every thing that is quadrangular is not always a square, or perfect square. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 21:17 | And he measured the wall thereof a hundred and forty-four cubits, the measure of a man, which is of an Angel. | The measure of a man, which is of an Angel.{ Ver. 17. Mensura hominis, quae est Angeli; metron anthropou, o estin aggelou.|} This seems, without doubt, the sense of it. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 21:18 | And the building of the wall thereof was of jasper stone: but the city itself pure gold, like to clear glass. | |
| Revelation of John 21:19 | And the foundations of the wall of the city were adorned with all manner of precious stones. The first foundation jasper: the second, sapphire: the third, a chalcedony: the fourth, an emerald. | |
| Revelation of John 21:20 | The fifth, sardonyx: the sixth, sardius: the seventh, chrysolite: the eighth, beryl: the ninth, a topaz: the tenth, a chrysoprasus: the eleventh, a jacinth: the twelfth, an amethyst. | |
| Revelation of John 21:21 | And the twelve gates are twelve pearls, one to each: and every several gate was of one several pearl: and the street of the city was pure gold, as it were transparent glass. | |
| Revelation of John 21:22 | And I saw no temple in it. For the Lord God Almighty is the temple thereof, and the Lamb. | No temple in it. No need of a temple for divine worship, where God is in such a perfect manner present to all the blessed, where nothing can distract or divert their souls from endless adorations, praises, etc. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 21:23 | *And the city hath not sun, nor moon to shine in it: for the glory of God hath enlightened it, and the Lamb is the lamp thereof. Isaias 69:19. | Needeth not sun nor moon, where there is no vicissitude or succession of day and night, the divine brightness always shining to them. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 21:24 | And nations shall walk in the light of it: and the kings of the earth shall bring their glory and honour into it. | The kings of the earth shall bring their glory; the elect, of all states and conditions, shall now be exalted like kings, or rather infinitely above the glory that we can imagine of any kings in this world. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 21:25 | *And the gates thereof shall not be shut by day: for there shall be no night there. Isaias 60:11. | |
| Revelation of John 21:26 | And they shall bring the glory and honour of the nations into it. | |
| Revelation of John 21:27 | There shall not enter it any thing defiled, or any one that worketh abomination, or a lie, but they who are written in the book of life of the Lamb. | There shall not enter it any thing defiled. This is what we ought always to remember and have in our minds. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 22:0 | The water and the tree of life. The conclusion. | |
| Revelation of John 22:1 | And he shewed me a river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding from the throne of God, and of the Lamb. | A river of water of life, or of living water. It is spoken with allusion to the rivers of paradise and to the tree of life. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 22:2 | In the midst of the street thereof, and on both sides of the river, was the tree of life, bearing twelve fruits, yielding its fruits every month, and the leaves of the tree for the healing of the nations. | For the healing of the nations, or Gentiles, to signify the call of all Gentiles or nations to this heavenly happiness. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 22:3 | And there shall be no curse any more: but the throne of God, and of the Lamb, shall be in it, and his servants shall serve him. | |
| Revelation of John 22:4 | And they shall see his face: and his name shall be on their foreheads. | They shall see his face. Thus in a few words is expressed the happiness of the blessed in heaven; they shall see God, from which vision proceed love, joy, and everlasting praises of the divine Majesty. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 22:5 | *And night shall be no more: and they shall not need the light of a lamp, nor the light of the sun; for the Lord God shall enlighten them, and they shall reign for ever and ever. Isaias 60:20. | |
| Revelation of John 22:6 | And he said to me: These words are most faithful and true. And the Lord God of the spirits of the prophets sent his Angel, to shew his servants the things which must be done shortly. | These words are most faithful. Here begins the conclusion and close of all these revelations. --- The Lord God of the spirits of the prophets sent his Angel to shew, etc. and in the 16th verse it is said: I, Jesus, have sent my Angel to testify: from whence we may understand that Jesus, as to his person, is the same Lord God with the Father, though as man he is the root of the offspring of David, of the race of David, as the Messias was to be. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 22:7 | And behold, I come quickly. Blessed is he that keepeth the words of the prophecy of this book. | Behold I come quickly. Man's life is short, and at his death he must give an account to God. All time is short, if compared with eternity. St. John (ver. 8) was again for casting himself at the feet of the Angel, though here it is not expressed whether it were to adore God, or whether it were by an inferior veneration to the Angel, often expressed by adoration. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 22:8 | And I, John, who have heard and seen these things. And after I had heard and seen, I fell down to adore before the feet of the Angel, who shewed me these things: | \f + \fr 22:8-9\ft This is the second time the saint wishes to adore the Angel, but not with the supreme worship of latria, as he knew the object of his worship was only an Angel, and of course a mere creature; but the Angel, through respect for St. John, still refuses the proffered honour, (see Apocalypse 19:10.) and to shew the holy society that was hereafter to exist between Angels and men, who were to compose but one and the same family. (Bible de Vence) |
| Revelation of John 22:9 | And he said to me: See thou do it not: for I am thy fellow-servant, and of thy brethren, the prophets, and of them who keep the words of the prophecy of this book: Adore God. | |
| Revelation of John 22:10 | And he saith to me: Seal not the words of the prophecy of this book: for the time is at hand. | Seal not the words; as not designed to be kept sealed or secret, but to be delivered to the faithful for their instruction, that they may be prepared to suffer persecutions; that their faith, hope, and charity may be enlivened and increased by a firm expectation of their happiness in the next world, after short sufferings in this. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 22:11 | He that hurteth, let him hurt still: and he that is filthy, let him be filthy still: and he that is just, let him be justified still: and he that is holy, let him be sanctified still. | He that hurteth, (by living in sins against God, himself, and his neighbours) let him hurt still; that is he shall be permitted; and he that is just, let him be justified still, and increase in virtues by God's assistance. (Witham) --- It is not an exhortation or license to go on in sin, but an intimation that how far soever the wicked may proceed, their progress shall quickly end, and then they must expect to meet with proportionable punishments. (Challoner) |
| Revelation of John 22:12 | Behold, I come quickly: and my reward is with me, to render to every man according to his works. | |
| Revelation of John 22:13 | *I am alpha and omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end. Isaias 41:4.; Isaias 44:6.; Isaias 48:12.; Apocalypse 1:8.; Apocalypse 1:17.; Apocalypse 21:6. | I am alpha and omega. See Apocalypse 1:8. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 22:14 | Blessed are they that wash their robes in the blood of the Lamb: that they may have a right to the tree of life, and may enter in by the gates into the city. | That they may have a right or power to eat of the tree of life. A right grounded on the promises of God and his graces. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 22:15 | Without are dogs, and sorcerers, and the unchaste, and murderers, and those that serve idols, and every one that loveth and maketh a lie. | Without are dogs; meaning unbelievers, and whosever loveth and maketh a lie, that is all the wicked, who have not walked in the ways of truth. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 22:16 | I, Jesus, have sent my Angel, to testify to you these things in the churches. I am the root and stock of David, the bright and morning star. | |
| Revelation of John 22:17 | And the Spirit and the bride say: Come. And he that heareth, let him say: Come. And he that thirsteth, let him come: *and he that will, let him take the water of life, gratis. Isaias 55:1. | And the Spirit and the bride say: Come. That is, the Spirit of God, who moves us to love and praise him; and the bride, that is the Church, the spouse of Christ, which earnestly desires to be happy in the enjoyment of God: and every one that heareth these divine promises, let him with all the affections of his soul, with his whole heart, say: Come. He that thirsteth after justice, the Author and Fountain of all justice, let him come and be filled gratis by the bounty and liberality of our merciful God. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 22:18 | For I testify to every one that heareth the words of the prophecy of this book: If any man shall add to these things, God shall add unto him the plagues written in this book. | \f + \fr 22:18-19\ft I, John, testify and bear witness of all the truths contained in this revelation: If any man shall add to these things, he becomes guilty of sin, and makes himself liable to the punishments and plagues that are written in this book. (Witham) |
| Revelation of John 22:19 | And if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life, and out of the holy city, and from these things which are written in this book. | |
| Revelation of John 22:20 | He that giveth testimony of these things, saith: Surely, I come quickly: Amen. Come, Lord Jesus. | \f + \fr 22:20-21\ft He that giveth testimony of these things, that is God, and Jesus Christ by an Angel, saith, surely, (or even so, or truly, these are certain truths) I come quickly, to reward the good and punish the evil. To which words St. John himself replieth with a zealous prayer and earnest desire, saying, Amen, let it be so. --- Come, Lord Jesus: come, and remain always in my soul by thy grace, and make me partaker of thy glory for ever and ever. Amen. (Witham) --- Conclusion. The Church in sighs and groans, and by the mouth of her children, solicits the coming of Jesus Christ, her divine Spouse. The fruit to be drawn from the perusal of this sacred book, is ardently to desire the kingdom of God, to sigh after the day of eternity, to feel the weight of the yoke of the present life, and the disgrace of our exile, and to live here below as strangers. Enkindle in me, O Lord, this desire; enable my poor soul to join with the beloved disciple in this prayer: Come, Lord Jesus; that she may go and lose herself in Thee, who art her Centre, her God, her All. |
| Revelation of John 22:21 | The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. Amen. |