Volat avis sine meta, Quo nec vates, nec propheta, Evolavit altius. Tam implenda, quam impleta, Cœlum transit, veri rotam Mentis figens aciem; Quasi Seraphim sub alis, ADAM OF ST. VICTOR: Apud Daniel, Thes. Hymnol., ii. 166. Transcendit nubes, et transcendit sidera, transcendit angelos, transcendit omnem creaturam, pervenit ad Verbum, per quod facta sunt omnia. ST. AUGUSTIN: Serm. in Diebus Paschal., 253. is perfectly fanciful and worth less. CHAPTER IX. I. DATE. THE APOCALYPSE: ITS DATE AND DESIGN. FROM INTERNAL EVIDENCE. PECULIAR IDIOM.-SEVEN CHURCHES AS YET ONLY IN ASIA.-JUDAIZING HERETICS ACTIVE.THE JEWS STILL OCCUPYING AS A DISTINCT PEOPLE THEIR LAND. JERUSALEM NOT YET DESTROYED. THE SIXTH ROMAN EMPEROR ON THE THRONE.-NO INTERNAL EVIDENCE FAVOURING LATER DATE. THE EXTERNAL EVIDENCE ESTIMATED. II. DESIGN.-THEME, COMING OF CHRIST.-HIS COMING PARTLY VISIBLE, PARTLY INVISIBLE.-BOOK WITH SEVEN SEALS, SYMBOL OF THE ENTIRE PROPHECY.-OVERTHROW OF THE JEWISH AND PAGAN PERSECUTING POWERS. OF THE LATER OPPOSING POWERS.-MILLENNIAL AND HEAVENLY GLORY. I. DATE DETERMINED FROM INTERNAL EVIDENCE.' THE question whether the Apocalypse was written at an early or in the very closing period of the apostolic ministration has importance as bearing on the interpretation of the book. A true exposition depends, in no small degree, upon a knowledge of the existing condition of things at the time it was written; i.e., of the true point in history occupied by the writer, and those whom he originally addressed. The same is manifestly true of the prophecies in general; eminently so of those of Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Daniel. If the book were an epistle, like that to the Romans or to the Hebrews, it might be of comparatively little importance, in ascertaining its meaning, to be able to determine 1 The question whether John was the author of the Apocalypse is not considered in this book. There is an exhaustive discussion of this question in the first volume of Stuart's Commentary on the Apocalypse, filling nearly 200 pages, in which the author appears to give the fairest consideration and the fullest weight to the objections made to the Johannean authorship, but is compelled to believe, in the end, that the book was written by the apostle John. The latest work on this book which has fallen under notice is, “The Apocalypse Translated and Expounded,” by James Glasgow, D.D.; T. and T. Clark, Edinburgh. Prof. Glasgow gives the arguments for the Johannean authorship of the book in a concise form, and is throughout very able and well worthy of the study of all who are seeking to know the meaning of the word of God. With most of the late writers on this portion of Scripture he argues earnestly in favor of referring it to an early date. He has fixed on from A.D. 51 to 54. |