Rev. xv. 8, The temple is filled with smoke from the glory of God, and from His power, on the seven vials full of the seven last plagues being given forth. Here, in chap. 9, I take it the smoke is just the expression of the place whence it comes, being under judgment, and of the darkening tendency of what shall proceed thence, as the parent or nurse of the locusts thence issuing, and the smoke is "as* the smoke of a great furnace:" I suppose as expressing the fulness of its volume; the result was, that the sun and the air were darkened thereby. The air is, I believe, the symbolic mode of expressing universal connection with the earth, when looked at as not connected definitely with God. [Eccle. x. 20, A bird of the air shall carry the voice]. Mat. viii. 20, The birds of the air have nests,-see also xiii. 32; Mark iv. 32; Luke ix. 58, Eph. ii. 2. The prince of the power of the air, just as the word heaven is used in connection with the word fowl, Jer. vii. 33, xvi. 4, xix. 7, xxxiv. 20, xv. 3; Eze. xxix. 5, xxxi. 6, 13, xxxii. 4, xxxviii. 20; Dan. ii. 38, &c. I conceive also that the sun is thus used not as where the moon and stars are also mentioned, but as expressing in like manner universality, as we find "under the sun" so constantly used in Ecclesiastes: "What profit is there in any labour under the sun?" "There is no new thing under the sun," &c., and 2 Sam. xii. 12, "I will do this before Israel and the sun." Out of the smoke, thus darkening the sun and air, came forth locusts. Locusts were among the plagues of Egypt (Ex. x. 4—19), and were known always as a plague (Deut. xxviii. 38. Psal. cv. 34). In Pro. xxx. 27, the order of the locusts ("the locusts have no king, yet go they forth all of them by bands,") is spoken of, and in Nah. iii. 15, 17, the number ("make thyself many as the locusts.... thy crowned are as the locusts, and thy captains as grasshoppers"); but these locusts are symbolic, for they are monsters most incongruous in their parts. The power they had of harming was not natural to them, it was given; power as the power of a scorpion. To harm the grass of the earth, the green things or trees (i. e. to do the common works of their race), these locusts are prohibited, and limited to tormenting men-not to kill them, but to torment five months, with the anguish of the scorpion sting. By this I understand the infliction of some such things as the mark of the beast; something which, while it circumscribes man's liberty in a painful way, at the same time has a poisoning effect upon his soul. If the marauding nation spoken of in Joel i. and ii, are the same as these locusts, they come up against the land, ranging over its precincts, under a Satanic influence-for God having then set to his hand to restore, Satan is seeking to hinder. It strikes me that in the days of our Lord, when the remnant (issuing in the church) which corresponded with this 144,000, which shall (in the time we are now reading of) be delivered from the power of these plagues-that the remnant, I say, was delivered by its allegiance to the Lord from some such thing.—If any man confessed Jesus to be Christ, he was to be, ipso facto, aroσvvaywyos. Again, such edicts as we read of in Dan. iii. and vi. by Nebuchadnezzar and Darius, both of whom were of the stock which, in the day of these trials, shall be blossoming in wickedness, also may be considered. If the scene of these scorpion-stings be the land and its precincts, and any such thing be that referred to, we can see and understand it-for a Jew of very moderate attainment in Judaism would feel anguish and vexation of soul enough to make him hate VOL. III. This expression occurs also in Gen. xix. 28; Ex. xix. 18. 4 A life and choose strangling rather, though he might not refuse to submit.* Many The object of the description of their appearance seems to be to mark runs thus:- 1st.-In shape they were "like unto horses prepared for battle." Horses 2nd." On their heads crowns of gold"-expressing manifest and conscious 3rd. They had "faces like men's faces." From the use of the face (Ex. 4th." They had hair like the hair of women," (length of hair,) this is 5th.-- 6th." They had breastplates as it were breastplates of iron," unassailable 7th. "The sound of their wings was as the sound of chariots" (see Isa. They did not attack the grass of the earth, neither the green things, &c. An edict, instituting and enforcing a fine upon the observance of circumci- See for instance Pharaoh's edicts in Exodus. † Or any such dilemma. I think, as would throw a man who had naturally Jewish pro- marauders, if not their nest, was a thick mist of mysticism and error from beneath. The star, by whose means the way is made for them, does not seem to be marked as their leader. He, the star, is perhaps only the remover of the hindrances which prevent the smoke rising. The mists from beneath, in themselves savouring of judgment (as smoke tells of fire), do away with the light and air; destroying, apparently, that in which man finds his way before God, and that also which is the power of mutual association; thereupon result these marauders, already looked at. They seemed fit but for one thing, to eat grass, &c.; but, in fact, this they did not, but only used the power, not natural to them, but bestowed upon them, of torment and torture. Hitherto the sad results of each successive blast have been worse than those of that which preceded, and more manifestly laying bare, and declaring the presence of the hand of God; and so in the coming trumpet. On the sounding of the first, hail and fire, mingled with blood, were cast on the earth, to the destruction of one-third of its produce. The second brought a great mountain on fire into the sea, for a similar destruction of one-third of its contents. The third issued in the poisoning of one-third of the rivers and fountains, so that many men died. In The fourth brought darkness on one-third of the sun, and moon, and stars. The fifth was a scourge and trial of all not having the seal of God, thus making manifest God's object of affection and desire, and so confessing him nore plainly than ever; even as the gradual development of power, in that purt of the series which had preceded, had gradually made the Divine power, which was at the bottom of it all, more and more conspicuous, for the actions become more and more manifestly divine as to the extent of power. the fifth, the sealed having been exempted from the trial, so far at least as the scorpion stings were concerned (whether beyond this I know not). On the sixth angel sounding, the cry comes from the golden altar, as shewing where the mind which regulated, and which was the spring of it all, was; and perhas also shewing that that altar, which had been the altar of the heavenly caling, was in some sense, in its past history, connected with it all. The scne of this wave of trouble is wider than of the preceding, for its waters were circumscribed to the bounds of the Hebrew and Greek tongues. Here the trable springs up in the Euphrates, and has a fourfold energy, going whithersover there is idolatry. There is a haste and a wildness in the mighty rush here presented to us, and an all-devouring character of action prominently displayed in their first appearance, very unlike the character of action in the last trumpet. There is no presenting of any such idea of order, preparedress, dominion, intelligent lordship, or apparent gentleness, as in trumpet fifth; but the two hundred millions are presented at once, brilliant as the flames in action; and consumption, rather than victory, marking their progress; while behind them is felt the stinging wretchedness of subjection to them. The sorrow rolls in judgment over heathenism, but leaves it, in moral result, just where it was. If these horsemen are the Lord's, this visitation may be, perhaps, a plague, or pestilence, and the four angels be the same who, in chap. vii. 1, are represented as having it in them to withhold the wind, and so injure the earth, &c.; and so symbol is preserved throughout, which I judge to be the case. I know not whether the whole four angels were for a year, a month, a day, an hour, or whether one for a year, another for a month, another for a day -if so, as all four were loosed at once, the sorrow decreases, &c. Ere proceeding, we must remark, how immediately between the close of the results of the fifth trumpet, and the sound of the sixth, the announcement (verse 12)," one woe is past; and, behold, there come two woes more hereafter," comes in, referring to a somewhat similar verse, (chap. viii. 13), introduced between the results of the fourth trumpet, and the sounding of the fifth. A verse, similar to the twelfth verse of the ninth chapter, is found (chap. xi. 14):-"The second woe is past; and, behold, the third woe cometh quickly," which refers, I conceive, to the results of this sixth trumpet, and marks chap. x. and xi. 1-13, as a parenthesis. The object of this parenthesis I conceive to be just to shew the state, morally and as to circumstances, of the inheritance (toward the assuming of which, by the Lord, all this action is moving on) at the time of the end. It seems to me also to be presented more as a piece of prophetic history, and the burden of the parenthesis is the vision of the state of things, as characteristic of the place at that time, and not of those actions of the Lord, like the parts we have been considering, which have, as their end and object, the introduction of His Lordship only. Chap. x.-The object of the descent of this mighty angel, and his conduct as to the little book, seem to me two distinct things. Confessedly he is the Archangel, and comes to claim the earth and sea as his own, as was promised in Psalm viii. The connection of a cloud with the Lord is common-in the following places it was the covering of the Lord :—Ex. xvi. 10, "the glory of the Lord appeared in the cloud," xix. 9; xxiv. 15, 16; xxxiv. 5; Lev. xvi. 8, "I wil appear in the cloud, on the mercy-seat." See also, Num. xii. 5; Deut. xxx. 15; Dan. vii. 13. The connection of the returning Lord with clouds, is to frequent to need notice. This, and the rainbow about His head-that is, Hs crown, the insignia, as is seen in chap. iv. of the covenant with creation—aid His face like the Son of Man's (chap. i. 16), as the sun, and His feet like pillars of fire, (as in chap. i. 15), all tell His dignity. Well, He comes forn, in all this dignity, with a little book open in His hand. But the book des not seem the important thing, for He sets His right foot on the sea, and lft on the earth-thus claiming them for His own, and shouts aloud. Perhas, in 1 Thess. iv. 16, "with a shout, with the voice of the Archangel and ne trump of God," refers to the shout here given, to the swearing which follows, and to the seventh trump-I say, perhaps. Upon this shout, as of a lia, seven thunders utter their voices. In themselves, I conceive they are te divine sanction, or response to the action and cry of this lion, as in Ex. ix. 2; 1 Sam. xii. 17. In the substance of them, in that they could not be revealed, but wee sealed up, they may have contained some expressions of God's mind, in con nection with that which the little book opens; which, as connected rather witl God's estimate of the principle at work in the scene it would open, were not properly expressed at a time when all divine action was confined to the bringing in of the Lordship, and not to witnessing against evil. I know nothing which gives the soul more freedom in reading the book, than this sealing up, as telling of the care, and love, and foresight, which has closed in the book all that we might not see. It strikes me, that the voices having been heard by John, and the writing of them forbidden to him, that the revelation of them to him was, probably, somehow connected with his peculiar service of testimony.But, O! how sweet it is to rest in the love that sealed them to us, and opened them to John; and to be able to be without jealousy or grudging against Him who has made the difference, or against John, to whom it was made. On the command, "Seal up," and by a voice from heaven, the mighty angel lifts up his hand to heaven, and swears by Him, by the Everlasting Creator (thus letting out who himself, the while, was), that there should be no more delay, but, on the seventh angel sounding, the close of the mystery* of God, according to the testimony to the prophets, should take place. Then the voice that had commanded the sealing of the thunders' voices, sends John to take the little book. The mighty angel tells him, it shall be sweet in taste, but bitter in digestion; John takes it, and finds this true; and the mighty angel says to him, "Thou must prophesy again before many peoples, and nations, and tongues, and kings." There seems to me a correspondence between the bitterness in John's belly and the voices of the thunders; on God's part, judgment; on John's, as the representative of the servants of God, bitter sorrow. The introduction of this mighty angel also, seems to me connected with the change in the character of the prophecy; hitherto all the testimony had been about what God alone should do, and that as bringing in the Lordship,not a testimony to man, but a special prerogative revelation by the Son to his servants: now, however, it seemed good to state what, at that time, would be a matter of testimony to all nations, tongues, &c., for they all shall have part in the scene; and the testimony is not as to God's actions in bringing Lordship, but God's forbearance to man, when he, led by Satan, will be setting up other gods-and, therefore, John is chosen. For though the Lamb will be, and is the channel of communication, now and ever, from the Father and from God to the sons and servants, not he, but they, stand before the world; and, this, to me, is just the opening of the necessity for this change. As the temple hitherto has been the temple in heaven (xi.), such I suppose it here likewise; the more so, as the outer court is defined to be the holy city, i. e. Jerusalem, and it cannot be both temple and court. Moreover, in verse 19, Jerusalem having been spoken of, and so the danger of mistake brought in, the temple in heaven is specified. What is meant by the order, "rise and measure," &c., I know not, unless it be the expression of God's desire, and the way taken, to call the servant's mind, at this juncture, off especially, and definitely to fix it upon the blessed truths the servant knew from chap. vii. would, at the time this was acted out, be his own portion in the sanctuary itself. This would be refreshment from the bitterness of belly just felt, and about to be felt yet more in the scene which followed. The marking, too, the character of his sorrow, and most high position, to be able to have such (not sorrow for himself, but) from association with the Lord's name, and honour, and Spirit. And such, both in Ezekiel, chap. xl. onwards, and in chap. xxi. and chap. xxii. of Revelation, seems to be the object of the specification of measure; and how blessed, in that hour, will be the worship in the temple, though so sadly contrasted with the holy city, or outer court. And thus, for the first time in the book, I think, Jerusalem on earth comes before us. Estranged, indeed, from God's ways, and trodden down by the * The word mystery is never, I think, used in the New Testament in entire disconnection from the present dispensation. Though there are many mysteries connected with it-the mysteries of the kingdom of God, the mystery of faith, of Christ, of godliness, of God, of iniquity, would find their centre in the dispensation; being the revelation of various deep things, heretofore covered up. The mystery of God, as here, would, I conceive, be just the sum total of all of them-the prophets might be the New Testament prophets, on whom, with the apostles, the Church is founded. |