_THE SEALED ROLL OPENED._
REV. vi.
With the sixth chapter of the Apocalypse the main action of the book
may be said properly to begin. Three sections of the seven into which
it is divided have already passed under our notice. The fourth
section, extending from chap. vi. 1 to chap. xviii. 24, is intended to
bring before us the struggle of the Church, the judgment of God upon
her enemies, and her final victory. No detail of historical events in
which these things are fulfilled need be looked for. We are to be
directed rather to the sources whence the trials spring, and to the
principles by which the victory is gained. At this point in the
unfolding of the visions it is generally thought that there is a
pause, an interval of quietness however brief, and a hush of
expectation on the part both of the Seer himself and of all the
heavenly witnesses of the wondrous drama. But there seems to be no
foundation for such an impression in the text; and it is more in
keeping alike with the language of this particular passage and with
the general probabilities of the case to imagine that the "lightnings
and voices and thunders," spoken of in chap. iv. 5 as proceeding out
of the throne, continue to re-echo over the scene, filling the hearts
of the spectators with that sense of awe which they are naturally
fitted to awaken. We have to meet the Lord in judgment. We are to
behold the Lamb as "the Lion of the tribe of Judah;" and when He so
appears, "the mountains flow down at His presence."[132]
The Lamb then, who had, in the previous chapter, taken the book out of
the hand of Him that sat upon the throne, is now to open it, part by
part, seal by seal:--
And I saw when the Lamb opened one of the seven seals, and I heard
one of the four living creatures saying as with a voice of
thunder, Come (vi. 1).
Particular attention ought to be paid to the fact that the true
reading of the last clause of this verse is not, as in the Authorised
Version, "Come and see," but simply, as in the Revised Version,
_Come_. The call is not addressed to the Seer, but to the Lord
Himself; and it is uttered by one of the four living creatures spoken
of in chap. iv. 6, who are "in the midst of the throne and round about
the throne," and who in ver. 8 of the same chapter are the first to
raise the song from which they never rest, saying, "Holy, holy, holy,
is the Lord, God, the Almighty, which was and which is and which is to
come." The word _Come_ therefore embodies the longing of redeemed
creation that the Lord, for the completion of whose work it waits,
will take to Him His great power and reign. Not so much for the
perfecting of its own happiness, or for deliverance from the various
troubles by which it is as yet beset, and not so much for the
manifestation of its Lord in His abounding mercy to His own, does the
creation delivered from the bondage of corruption wait, as for the
moment when Christ shall appear in awful majesty, King of kings and
Lord of lords, when He shall banish for ever from the earth the sin by
which it is polluted, and when He shall establish, from the rising of
the sun to the going down of the same, His glorious kingdom of
righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost.
This prospect is inseparably associated with the Second Coming of Him
who is now concealed from our view; and therefore the cry of the whole
waiting creation, whether animate or inanimate, to its Lord is _Come_.
The cry, too, and that not only in the case of the first living
creature, but (according to a rule of interpretation of which in this
book we shall often have to make use) in the case of the three that
follow, is uttered _with a voice of thunder_; and thunder is always an
accompaniment and symbol of the Divine judgments.
No sooner is the cry heard than it is answered:--
And I saw, and behold a white horse: and he that sat thereon had a
bow; and there was given unto him a crown: and he came forth
conquering, and to conquer (vi. 2).
Few figures of the Apocalypse have occasioned more trouble to
interpreters than that contained in these words. On the one hand, the
particulars seem unmistakeably to point to the Lord Himself; but, on the
other hand, if the first rider be the glorified Redeemer, it is
difficult to establish that harmonious parallelism with the following
riders which appears to be required by the well-ordered arrangement of
the visions of this book. Yet it is clearly impossible to regard the
first rider as merely a symbol of war, for the second rider would then
convey the same lesson as the first; nor is there anything in the text
to establish a distinction, frequently resorted to, by which the first
rider is thought to denote foreign, and the second civil, war. Every
attempt also to separate the white horse of this vision from that of the
vision at chap. xix. 11 fails, and must fail. Probably it is enough to
say that not one of the four riders is a person. Each is rather a cause,
a manifestation of certain truths connected with the kingdom of Christ
when that kingdom is seen to be, in its own nature, the judgment of the
world. Even war, famine, and death and Hades, which follow, are not
literally these things. They are simply used, as scourges of mankind, to
give general expression to the judgments of God. Thus also under the
first rider the cause rather than the person of Christ is introduced to
us, in the earliest stage of its victorious progress, and with the
promise of its future triumph. The various points of the description
hardly need to be explained. The colour of the horse is _white_, for
throughout these visions that colour is always the symbol of heavenly
purity. The rider has a _crown given_ him, a crown of royalty. He has in
his hand a _bow_, the instrument of war by which he scatters his enemies
like stubble.[133] Finally, he _comes forth conquering and to conquer_,
for his victorious march knows no interruption, and at last leaves no
foe unvanquished. In the first rider we have thus the cause of Christ in
its essence, as that cause of light which, having already drawn to it
the sons of light, has become darkness to the sons of darkness. By the
opening of the first Seal we learn that this cause is in the world, that
this kingdom is in the midst of us, and that they who oppose it shall be
overwhelmed with defeat.
The interpretation now given of the first rider as one who rides forth
to judgment on a sinful world is confirmed by what is said of the three
that follow him. In them too we have judgment, and judgment only, while
the three judgments spoken of--war, famine, and death--are precisely
those with which the prophets in the Old Testament and the Saviour
Himself in the New have familiarised our thoughts.[134] They are not to
be literally understood. Like all else in the visions of St. John, they
are used symbolically; and each of them expresses in a general form the
calamities and woes, the misfortunes and sorrows, brought by sinful men
upon themselves through rejection of their rightful King.
The second Seal is now broken, and the second rider follows:--
And when He opened the second seal, I heard the second living
creature saying, Come. And another horse came forth, a red horse:
and to him that sat thereon it was given to take peace from the
earth, and that they should slaughter one another: and there was
given unto him a great sword (vi. 3, 4).
The second horse is _red_, the colour of blood, for it is the horse of
war: and slaughter follows it as its rider passes over _the earth_;
that is, not over the earth in general, but over the ungodly. Two
things in this vision are particularly worthy of notice. In the first
place, the war spoken of is not between the righteous and the wicked,
but among the wicked alone. The wicked _slaughter one another_. All
persons engaged in these internecine conflicts have cast aside the
offers of the Prince of peace; and, at enmity with Him who is the only
true foundation of human brotherhood, they are also at enmity among
themselves. Of the righteous nothing is yet said. We are left to
infer that they are safe in their dwellings, in peaceable habitations,
and in quiet resting-places.[135] By-and-by we shall learn that they
are not only safe, but surrounded with joy and plenty. In the second
place, the original word translated "slay" both in the Authorised and
Revised Versions deserves attention. It is a sacrificial term, the
same as that found in chap. v. 6, where we read of the "slaughtered
Lamb;" and here therefore, as there, it ought to be rendered, not
"slay," but "slaughter." The instant we so translate, the whole
picture rises before our view in a light entirely different from that
in which we commonly regard it. What judgment, nay what irony of
judgment, is there in the ways of God when He visits sinners with the
terrors of His wrath! The very fate which men shrink from accepting in
the form of a blessing overtakes them in the form of a curse. They
think to save their life, and they lose it. They seek to avoid that
sacrifice of themselves which, made in Christ, lies at the root of the
true accomplishment of human destiny; and they are constrained to
substitute for it a sacrifice of an altogether different kind: they
sacrifice, they slaughter, one another.
The third Seal is now broken, and the third rider follows:--
And when He opened the third seal, I heard the third living
creature saying, Come. And I saw, and behold a black horse; and he
that sat thereon had a balance in his hand. And I heard as it were
a voice in the midst of the four living creatures, saying, A
measure of wheat for a penny (or a silver penny), and three
measures of barley for a penny; and the oil and the wine hurt thou
not (vi. 5, 6).
The third living creature cries as the two before it had done; and a
third horse comes forth, the colour of which is _black_, the colour of
gloom and mourning and lamentation. Nor can there be any doubt that this
condition of things is produced by scarcity, for the figure of the
balance and of measuring bread by weight is on different occasions
employed in the Old Testament to express the idea of famine. Thus among
the threatenings denounced upon Israel should it prove faithless to
God's covenant we read, "And when I have broken the staff of your bread,
ten women shall bake your bread in one oven, and they shall deliver you
your bread again by weight: and ye shall eat, and not be
satisfied."[136] And so also when Ezekiel would describe the miseries of
the coming siege of Jerusalem he exclaims, "Moreover He said unto me,
Son of man, behold, I will break the staff of bread in Jerusalem: and
they shall eat bread by weight, and with care; and they shall drink
water by measure, and with astonishment: that they may want bread and
water, and be astonied one with another, and consume away for their
iniquity."[137] To give out corn by weight instead of measure was thus
an emblem of scarcity. The particulars of the scarcity here described
are obscured to the English reader by the unfortunate translation, both
in this passage and elsewhere, and in the Revised as well as the
Authorised Version, of the Greek _denarius_ by the English _penny_. That
coin was of the value of fully eightpence of our money, and was the
recognised payment of a labourer's full day's work.[138] In ordinary
circumstances it was sufficient to purchase eight of the small
"measures" now referred to, so that when it could buy one "measure"
only, the quantity needed by a single man for his own daily food, it is
implied that wheat had risen eight times in price, and that all that
could be purchased by means of a whole day's toil would suffice for no
more than one individual's sustenance, leaving nothing for his other
wants and the wants of his family. No doubt _three measures of barley_
could be purchased for the same sum, but barley was a coarser grain, and
to be dependent upon it was in itself a proof that there was famine in
the land. Again, as in the previous judgment, the words of the figure
are not to be literally understood. What we have before us is not famine
in its strict sense, but the judgment of God under the form of famine;
and this second judgment is climactic to the first. Men say to
themselves that they will live at peace with one another, and sow, and
reap, and plant vineyards, and eat the fruit thereof. But in doing this
they are mastered by the power of selfishness; the too eager pursuit of
earthly interests defeats its end; and, under the influence of deeper
and more mysterious laws than the mere political economist can discover,
fields that might have been covered with golden harvests lie desolate
and bare.
Nothing has yet been said of the last clause of this judgment: _The
oil and the wine hurt thou not._ The words are generally regarded as a
limitation of the severity of the famine previously described, and as
a promise that even in judging God will not execute all His wrath. The
interpretation can hardly be accepted. Not only does it weaken the
force of the threatening, but the meaning thus given to the figure is
entirely out of place. Oil and wine were for the mansions of the rich
not for the habitations of the poor, for the feast and not for the
supply of the common wants of life. Nor would a sufferer from famine
have found in them a substitute for bread. The meaning of the words
therefore must be looked for in a wholly different direction. "Thou
preparest a table before me," says the Psalmist, "in the presence of
mine enemies: Thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth
over."[139] This is the table the supply of which is now alluded to.
It is prepared for the righteous in the midst of the struggles of the
world, and in the presence of their enemies. Oil is there in abundance
to anoint the heads of the happy guests, and their cups are so filled
with plenty that they run over. In the words under consideration,
accordingly, we have no limitation of the effects of famine. The
"wine" and the "oil" alluded to express not so much what is simply
required for life as the plenty and the joy of life; and, thus
interpreted, they are a figure of the care with which God watches over
His own people and supplies all their wants. While His judgments are
abroad in the earth they are protected in the hollow of His hand. He
has taken them into His banqueting house, and His banner over them is
love. The world may be hungry, but they are fed. As the children of
Israel had light in their dwellings while the land of Egypt lay in
darkness, so while the world famishes the followers of Jesus have all
and more than all that they require. They have "life, and that
abundantly."[140] Thus we learn the condition of the children of God
during the trials spoken of in these visions. Under the second Seal we
could only infer from the general analogy of this book that they were
safe. Now we know that they are not only safe, but that they are
enriched with every blessing. They have oil that makes the face of man
to shine, and bread that strengtheneth his heart.[141]
The fourth Seal is now broken, and the fourth rider follows:--
And when He opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the
fourth living creature saying, Come. And I saw, and behold a pale
horse: and he that sat upon him, his name was Death; and Hades
followed with him. And there was given unto them authority over
the fourth part of the earth, to kill with sword, and with famine,
and with death, and by the wild beasts of the earth (vi. 7, 8).
The colour of the fourth horse is _pale_; it has the livid colour of a
corpse, corresponding to its rider, whose name, Death, is in this case
given. _Hades followed with him_, not after him, thus showing that a
gloomy and dark region beyond the grave is his inseparable attendant,
and that it too is an instrument of God's wrath. In chap. i. 18 these
two dire companions had also been associated with one another; and it
is important to notice the combination, as the fact will afterwards
throw light upon one of the most difficult visions of the book.
"Death" is not neutral death, that separation between soul and body
which awaits every individual of the human family until the Saviour
comes. It is death in the deeper meaning which it so often bears in
Scripture, and especially in the writings of St. John,--death as
judgment. In like manner Hades is not the neutral grave where the rich
and the poor meet together, where the wicked cease from troubling, and
where the weary are at rest. It is the region occupied by those who
have not found life in Christ; and, not less than death, it is
judgment. "Death" and "Hades" then are the culminating judgments of
God upon _the earth_, that is, upon the wicked; and they execute their
mission in a fourfold manner: by _the sword, and famine, and death,
and the wild beasts of the earth_. The world, the symbolical number of
which is four, instead of blessing such as submit themselves to its
sway, turns round upon them with all the powers at its command and
kills them. The wicked "are sunk down in the pit that they made: in
the net which they hid is their own foot taken."[142]
It is not easy to say why authority is given death and Hades over no
more than _the fourth part_ of the earth, when we might rather have
expected that their dominion would be extended over the whole. The
question may be asked whether it is possible so to understand the Seer
as to connect a "fourth part" of the earth, not with all the
instruments together, but with each separate instrument of judgment
afterwards named--one fourth to be killed with the sword, a second
with famine, a third with death, and a fourth by wild beasts. Should
such an idea be regarded as untenable, the probability is that a
fourth part is mentioned in order to make room for the climactic rise
to a "third part" afterwards met under the trumpet judgments.
The end of the first four Seals has now been reached, and at this point
there is an obvious break in the hitherto harmonious progress of the
visions. No fifth rider appears when the fifth Seal is broken, and we
pass from the material into the spiritual, from the visible into the
invisible, world. That the transition is not accidental, but
deliberately made, appears from this, that the very same principle of
division marks the series of the trumpets at chap. ix. 1, and of the
bowls at chap. xvi. 10. We have thus the number seven divided into its
two parts four and three, while in chaps. ii. and iii. we had it divided
into three and four. The difference is easily accounted for, three being
the number of God, or the Divine, and therefore taking precedence when
we are concerned with the existence of the Church, four being the number
of the world, and therefore coming first when judgment on the world is
described. It is of more consequence, however, to note the fact than to
explain it, for it helps in no small degree to illustrate that
artificial structure of the Apocalypse which is so completely at
variance with the supposition that it describes in its successive
paragraphs the successive historical events of the Christian age.
Passing then into a different region of thought, the fifth Seal is now
broken:--
And when He opened the fifth seal, I saw underneath the altar the
souls of them that had been slaughtered for the word of God, and
for the testimony which they held: and they cried with a great
voice, saying, How long, O Master, the holy and true, dost Thou
not judge and avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth?
And there was given them to each one a white robe; and it was said
unto them, that they should rest yet for a little time, until
their fellow-servants also and their brethren, which should be
killed even as they were, should be fulfilled (vi. 9-11).
The vision contained in these words is unquestionably a crucial one
for the interpretation of the Apocalypse, and it will be necessary to
dwell upon it for a little. The minor details may be easily disposed
of. By the consent of all commentators of note, the _altar_ referred
to is the brazen altar of sacrifice, which stood in the outer court
both of the Tabernacle and the Temple; the _souls_, or lives, seen
under it are probably seen under the form of blood, for the blood was
the life: and the law of Moses commanded that when animals were
sacrificed the blood should be poured out "at the bottom of the altar
of burnt-offering, which is before the tabernacle of the
congregation;"[143] while the _little time_ mentioned in ver. 11 can
mean nothing else than the interval between the moment when the souls
were spoken to and that when the killing of their brethren should be
brought to a close.
The main question to be answered is, Whom do these "souls" represent?
Are they Christian martyrs, suffering perhaps at the hands of the Jews
before the fall of Jerusalem, perhaps at the hands of the world to the
end of time? Or are they the martyrs of the Old Testament
dispensation, Jewish martyrs, who had lived and died in faith? Both
suppositions have been entertained, though the former has been, and
still is, that almost universally adopted. Yet there can be little
doubt that the latter is correct, and that several important
particulars of the passage demand its acceptance.
1. Let us observe how these martyrs are designated. They had been
slain _for the word of God, and for the testimony which they held_.
But that is not the full expression of _Christian_ testimony. As we
read in many other passages of the book before us, Christians have
"the testimony _of Jesus_."[144] The addition needed to bring out the
Christian character of the testimony referred to is wanting here. No
doubt the saints of old looked forward to the coming of the Christ;
but the testimony "of Jesus" is the testimony pertaining to Him as a
Saviour come, in all the glory of His person and in all the
completeness of His work. It is a testimony embracing a full knowledge
of the Messiah, and the inference is natural and legitimate that it is
not ascribed to the souls under the altar, because they neither had
nor could have possessed it.
2. The cry of these "souls" is worthy of notice, _How long, O Master,
the holy and the true_, where the word "Master," applied also in Acts
iv. 24 and Jude 4[145] to God as distinguished from Christ, corresponds
better to the spirit of the Old than of the New Testament dispensation.
3. The time at which the martyrs had been killed belongs not to the
present or the future, but to the past. Like all the other Seals, the
fifth is opened at the very beginning of the Christian era; and no
sooner is it opened than the souls are seen. It is true that the Seer
might be supposed to transport himself forward into the future, and,
at some point of Christian history more or less distant, to console
Christian martyrs who had already fallen with the assurance that they
had only to wait _a little time_, until such as were to be their later
companions in martyrdom should have shared their fate. But such a
supposition is inconsistent with the fact that St. John in the
Apocalypse always thinks of the Christian age as one hardly capable of
being divided; while, as we shall immediately see more clearly, it
would make it impossible to explain the consolation afforded by the
bestowal of the _white robe_.
4. The altar under which the blood is seen may help to confirm this
conclusion, for that blood is not preserved in the inner sanctuary, in
that "heaven" which is the ideal home of all the disciples of Jesus:
it lies beneath the altar of the outer court.
5. The main argument, however, in favour of the view now contended
for, is to be found in the act by which these souls were comforted:
_And there was given them to each one a white robe._ The white robe,
then, they had not obtained before; and yet that robe belongs during
his life on earth to every follower of Christ. Nothing is more
frequently spoken of in these visions than the "white robe" of the
redeemed, and it is obviously theirs from the first moment when they
are united to their Lord. It is the robe of the priesthood, and at
their very entrance upon true spiritual life they are priests in Him.
It is the robe with which the faithful remnant in Sardis had been
arrayed before they are introduced to us, for they had not "defiled"
it; and the emphasis in the promise there given, "They shall walk with
Me in white," appears to lie upon its first rather than its second
clause.[146] Again, the promise to every one in that church that
"overcometh" is that he "shall be arrayed in white garments;"[147] and
it is beyond dispute that the promises of the seven epistles belong to
the victory of faith gained in this world, not less than to the
perfected reward of victory in the world to come. In like manner the
Laodicean church is exhorted to buy of her Lord "white garments" that
she may be clothed, as well as "gold" that she may be enriched, and
"eyesalve" that she may see[148]; and, as the two latter purchases
refer to her present state, so also must the former. When, too, the
Lord is united in marriage to His Church, it is said that "it was
given unto her that she should array herself in fine linen, bright
and pure;" and that fine linen is immediately explained to be "the
righteous acts of the saints."[149]
Putting all these passages together, we are distinctly taught that in
the language of the Apocalypse the "white robe" denotes that perfect
righteousness of Christ, both external and internal, which is bestowed
upon the believer from the moment when he is by faith made one with
Jesus. It is that more perfect justification of which St. Paul spoke at
Antioch in Pisidia when he said to the Jews, "By Him every one that
believeth is justified from all things, from which ye could not be
justified by the law of Moses."[150] It had been longed for by the
saints of the Old Testament, but had never been fully bestowed upon them
until Jesus came. David had prayed for it: "Purge me with hyssop, and I
shall be clean: wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow;"[151] Isaiah
had anticipated it when he looked forward to the acceptable year of the
Lord: "I will greatly rejoice in the Lord, my soul shall be joyful in my
God; for He hath clothed me with the garments of salvation, He hath
covered me with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decketh
himself with ornaments, and as a bride adorneth herself with her
jewels;"[152] and Ezekiel had celebrated it as the chief blessing of
Gospel times: "Then will I sprinkle clean water upon you, and ye shall
be clean: from all your filthiness, and from all your idols, will I
cleanse you.... And ye shall be My people, and I will be your God. I
will also save you from all your uncleannesses."[153] But while thus
prayed for, anticipated, and greeted from afar, the fulness of blessing
belonging to the New Testament had not been actually received under the
Old. "He that is but little in the kingdom of heaven is greater than
John."[154] As we are taught in the Epistle to the Hebrews, even Abel,
Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, and all those heroes of faith
who had subdued kingdoms, wrought righteousness, obtained promises,
stopped the mouths of lions, quenched the power of fire, escaped the
edge of the sword, from weakness were made strong, waxed mighty in war,
turned to flight armies of aliens--even "these all, having had witness
borne to them through their faith, _received not the promise_: God
having provided some better thing concerning us, that apart from us they
should not be made perfect."[155] At death they were not made perfect.
They passed rather into a holy rest where they waited until, like
Abraham, who had "rejoiced that he should see Christ's day," they "saw
it and were glad."[156] Then the "white robe" was given them. They were
raised to the level of that Church which, now that Jesus had come,
rejoiced in Him with "a joy unspeakable and glorified."[157]
These considerations appear sufficient to decide the point. The souls
under the altar of the fifth Seal are the saints, not of Christianity,
but of Judaism. It is true that all of them had not been literally
"slaughtered." But it is a peculiarity of this book, of which further
proof will be afforded as we proceed, that it regards all true
followers of Christ as martyrs. Christ was Himself a Martyr; His
disciples "follow" Him: they are martyrs. Christ's Church is a martyr
Church. She dies in her Master's service, and for the world's good.
One point more ought to be noticed before we leave this Seal. The
language of these souls under the altar is apt to offend when they
apparently cry for vengeance upon their murderers: _How long dost Thou
not avenge?_ Yet it is enough to say that so to interpret their cry is
to do injustice to the whole spirit of this book Strictly speaking, in
fact, they do not themselves cry. It is their blood that cries; it is
the wrong done to them that demands reparation. In so far as they may
be supposed to cry, they have in view, not their enemies as persons,
but the evil that is in them, and that manifests itself through them.
At first it may seem difficult to draw the distinction; but if we
pause over the matter for a little, the difficulty will disappear.
Never do we pity the sinner more, or feel for him with a keener
sympathy, than when we are most indignant at sin and most earnest in
prayer and effort for its destruction. The more anxious we are for the
latter, the more must we compassionate the man who is enveloped in
sin's fatal toils. When we long therefore for the hour at which sin
shall be overtaken by the just judgment of God, we long only for the
establishment of that righteous and holy kingdom which is inseparably
bound up with the glory of God and the happiness of the world.
For this kingdom then the saints of the Old Testament, together with
all their "brethren" under the New Testament, who like them are
faithful unto death, now wait; and the opening of the sixth Seal tells
us that it is at hand:--
And I saw when He opened the sixth seal, and there was a great
earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the
whole moon became as blood; and the stars of the heaven fell unto
the earth, as a fig tree casteth her unripe figs, when she is
shaken of a great wind. And the heaven was removed as a scroll
when it is rolled up; and every mountain and island were moved
out of their places. And the kings of the earth, and the princes,
and the chief captains, and the rich, and the strong, and every
bondman and free man, hid themselves in the caves and in the rocks
of the mountains; and they say to the mountains and to the rocks,
Fall on us, and hide us from the face of Him that sitteth on the
throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb: for the great day of their
wrath is come; and who is able to stand? (vi. 12-17).
The description is marked by almost unparalleled magnificence and
sublimity, and any attempt to dwell upon details could only injure the
general effect. The real question to be answered is, To what does it
apply? Is it a picture of the destruction of Jerusalem or of the final
Judgment? Or may it even represent every great calamity by which a
sinful world is overtaken? In each of these senses, and in each of
them with a certain degree of truth, has the passage been understood.
Each is a part of the great thought which it embraces. The error of
interpreters has consisted in confining the whole, or even the
primary, sense to any one of them. The true reference of the passage
appears to be to the Christian dispensation, especially on its side of
judgment. That dispensation had often been spoken of by the prophets
in a precisely similar way; and the whole description of these verses,
alive with the rich glow of the Eastern imagination, is taken partly
from their language, and partly from the language of our Lord in the
more prophetic and impassioned moments of His life.
Thus it was that Joel had announced the purpose of God: "And I will
show wonders in the heavens and the earth, blood, and fire, and
pillars of smoke. The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon
into blood, before the great and the terrible day of the Lord come,"
and again, "The sun and the moon shall be darkened, and the stars
shall withdraw their shining;"[158] while, apart altogether from the
immediately preceding and following words, which prove the
interpretation above given to be correct, this announcement of Joel
was declared by St. Peter on the day of Pentecost to apply to the
_introduction_ of that kingdom of Christ which, in the gift of
tongues, was at that moment exhibited in power.[159] In like manner we
read in the prophet Haggai, "For thus saith the Lord of hosts; Yet
once, it is a little while, and I will shake the heavens, and the
earth, and the sea, and the dry land; and I will shake all
nations."[160] While, again, without our needing to dwell on the
connexion in which the words occur, we find the writer of the Epistle
to the Hebrews applying the prophecy to the circumstances of those to
whom he wrote at a time when they had heard the voice that speaketh
from heaven, and had received the kingdom that cannot be moved.[161]
The prophet Malachi also, whose words have been interpreted for us by
our Lord Himself, describes the day of Him whom the Baptist was to
precede and to introduce as the day that "burneth as a furnace," as
"the great and terrible day of the Lord."[162] This aspect, too, of
any great era in the history of a land or of a people had always been
presented by the voice of prophecy in language from which the words
before us are obviously taken. Thus it was that when Isaiah described
the coming of a time at which the mountain of the Lord's house shall
be established in the top of the mountains and shall be exalted above
the hills, and all nations shall flow into it, he mentions, among its
other characteristics, "And they shall go into the holes of the
rocks, and into the caves of the earth, for fear of the Lord, and for
the glory of His majesty, when He ariseth to shake terribly the
earth."[163] When the same prophet details the burden of Babylon which
he saw, he exclaims, "Behold, the day of the Lord cometh, cruel both
with wrath and fierce anger to make the land a desolation, and to
destroy the sinners thereof out of it. For the stars of heaven and the
constellations thereof shall not give their light: the sun shall be
darkened in his going forth, and the moon shall not cause her light to
shine;"[164] and again, when he widens his view from Babylon to a
guilty world, "For the Lord hath indignation against all the nations,
and fury against all their hosts.... And all the host of heaven shall
be dissolved, and the heavens shall be rolled together as a scroll:
and all their host shall fade away, as the leaf falleth from off the
vine, and as a fading fig from the fig tree."[165] Many other passages
of a similar kind might be quoted from the Old Testament; but, without
quoting further from that source, it may be enough to call to mind
that when our Lord delivered His discourse upon the last things He
adopted a precisely similar strain: "_Immediately_ after the
tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened, and the moon
shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and
the powers of the heavens shall be shaken."[166]
Highly coloured, therefore, as the language used under the sixth Seal
may appear to us, to the Jew, animated by the spirit of the Old
Testament, it was simply that in which he had been accustomed to express
his expectation of any new dispensation of the Almighty, of any striking
crisis in the history of the world. Whenever he thought of the Judge of
all the earth as manifesting Himself in a greater than ordinary degree,
and as manifesting Himself in that truth and righteousness which was the
glorious distinction of His character, he took advantage of such figures
as we have now before us. To the fall of Jerusalem therefore, to every
great crisis in human history, and to the close of all, they may be
fittingly applied. In the eloquent language of Dr. Vaughan, "These words
are wonderful in all senses, not least in this sense: that they are
manifold in their accomplishment. Wherever there is a little flock in a
waste wilderness; wherever there is a Church in a world; wherever there
is a power of unbelief, ungodliness, and violence, throwing itself upon
Christ's faith and Christ's people and seeking to overbear, and to
demolish, and to destroy; whether that power be the power of Jewish
bigotry and fanaticism, as in the days of the first disciples; or of
pagan Rome, with its idolatries and its cruelties, as in the days of St.
John and of the Revelation; or of papal Rome, with its lying wonders and
its antichristian assumptions, in ages later still; or of open and
rampant atheism, as in the days of the first French Revolution; or of a
subtler and more insidious infidelity, like that which is threatening
now to deceive, if it were possible, the very elect; wherever and
whatever this power may be--and it has had a thousand forms, and may be
destined yet to assume a thousand more--then, in each successive
century, the words of Christ to His first disciples adapt themselves
afresh to the circumstances of His struggling servants; warn them of
danger, exhort them to patience, arouse them to hope, assure them of
victory; tell of a near end for the individual and for the generation;
tell also of a far end, not for ever to be postponed, for time itself
and for the world; predict a destruction which shall befall each enemy
of the truth, and predict a destruction which shall befall the enemy
himself whom each in turn has represented and served; explain the
meaning of tribulation, show whence it comes, and point to its
swallowing up in glory; reveal the moving hand above, and disclose, from
behind the cloud which conceals it, the clear definite purpose and the
unchanging loving will. Thus understood, each separate downfall of evil
becomes a prophecy of the next and of the last; and the partial
fulfilment of our Lord's words in the destruction of Jerusalem, or of
St. John's words in the downfall of idolatry and the dismemberment of
Rome, becomes itself in turn a new warrant for the Church's expectation
of the Second Advent and of the day of judgment."[167]
While, however, the truth of these words may be allowed, it is still
necessary to urge that the primary application of the language of the
sixth Seal is to no one of such events in particular, but to something
which includes them all. In other words, it applies to the Christian
dispensation, viewed in its beginning, its progress, and its end,
viewed in all those issues which it produces in the world, but
especially on the side of judgment.
Nor ought such dark and terrible figures to startle us, as if they
could not be suitably applied to a dispensation of mercy, of grace
that we cannot fathom, of love that passeth knowledge. The Christian
dispensation is not effeminacy. If it tells of abounding compassion
for the sinner, it tells also of fire, and hail, and vapour of smoke
for the sin. If it speaks at one time in a gentle voice, it speaks at
another in a voice of thunder; and, when the latter is rightly
listened to, the air is cleared as by the whirlwind.
Although, therefore, the language of the prophets and of this passage
may at first sight appear to be marked by far too great a measure both
of strength and of severity to make it applicable to the Gospel age, it
is in reality neither too strong nor too severe. It is at variance only
with the verdict of that superficial glance which is satisfied with
looking at phenomena in their outward and temporary aspect, and which
declines to penetrate into the heart of things. So long as man is
content with such a spirit, he is naturally enough unstirred by any
powerful emotion; and he can only say that words of prophetic fire are
words of exaggeration and of false enthusiasm. But no sooner does he
catch that spirit of the Bible which brings him into contact with
eternal verities than his tone changes. He can no longer rest upon the
surface. He can no longer dismiss the thought of mighty issues at stake
around him with the reflection that "all the world's a stage, and all
the men and women on it only players." When from the shore he looks out
upon the mass of waters stretching before him, he thinks not merely of
the light waves rippling at his feet and losing themselves in the sand,
but of the unfathomed depths of the ocean from which they come, and of
those mysterious movements of it which they indicate. He sees sights, he
hears sounds, which the common eye does not see, and the common ear does
not hear. The slightest motion of the soil speaks to him of earthquakes;
the handful of snow loosened from the mountain-side, of avalanches; the
simplest utterance of awe, of a cry that the mountains and the hills
are falling. The great does not become to him little; but the little
becomes great. There is thus no exaggeration in the strength or even in
the severity of prophetic figures. The prophet has passed from the world
of shadows, flitting past him and disappearing, into the world of
realities, Divine, unchangeable, and everlasting.
FOOTNOTES:
[132] Isa. lxiv. 1.
[133] Isa. xli. 2.
[134] Ezek. vi. 11; Matt. xxiv. 6-8.
[135] Isa. xxxii. 18.
[136] Lev. xxvi. 26.
[137] Ezek. iv. 16, 17.
[138] Comp. Matt. xx. 2.
[139] Ps. xxiii. 5.
[140] John x. 10.
[141] Ps. civ. 15.
[142] Ps. ix. 15.
[143] Lev. iv. 7.
[144] Comp. chaps. i. 2, 9; xi. 7; xii. 11, 17; xix. 10.
[145] Margin of Revised Version.
[146] Chap. iii. 4.
[147] Chap. iii. 5.
[148] Chap. iii. 18.
[149] Chap. xix. 8.
[150] Acts xiii. 39.
[151] Ps. li. 7.
[152] Isa. lxi. 10.
[153] Ezek. xxxvi. 25-29.
[154] Matt. xi. 11.
[155] Heb. xi. 39, 40.
[156] John viii. 56.
[157] 1 Pet. i. 8 (R.V., margin).
[158] Joel ii. 30, 31; iii. 15.
[159] Acts ii. 16-21.
[160] Haggai ii. 6, 7.
[161] Heb. xii. 25-29.
[162] Mal. iv. 1, 5; Mark ix. 11-13.
[163] Isa. ii. 19.
[164] Isa. xiii. 9, 10.
[165] Isa. xxxiv. 2, 4.
[166] Matt. xxiv. 29.
[167] _Lectures on the Revelation_, p. 170.