(corrected) EXPOSITION
OF THE APOCALYPSE.
FIRST
SECTION OF THE SEVENTH SEAL ...................................... 11
Preparation
For Sounding ............................................””””””””””” 11
1. The Apostacy in the Preparation-Period
,,,.......................,.,..............
12
2. Preparation Judgments upon
Ghost-Worshippers .,,,.,...,...............,..,.. 25
CHRONOLOGICAL
SYNOPSIS OF THE SEALING AND
PREPARATION
PERIOD ...................................................”..’.’....’ 33
BLOWING
OF THE FOUR WINDS ..,..........,..........,.,.,.....,..,.,.,,..,..,...,,,.. 36
THE
FIRST FOUR TRUMPETS ............................................... 37
ACT
I - FIRST WIND TRUMPET
The
Earth subjected to hail and fire mingled with blood.
1. The Symbols explained
..............................................”””’ 42
2. Historical Exposition
.......................................................’
ACT
Il-SECOND WIND TRUMPET
A
great burning mountain Cast into the sea.
2. Historical Exposition
,,,,,,,,,,,,................,.................,...........,,.,..., 52
ACT
III - THIRD WIND TRUMPET
The
great blazing star Apsinthos embitters the Waters
1. The Symbols explained
,,,,,,,,........................,................................ 58
2. Historical Exposition
,,,,,,,............................................,.,.............. 62
ACT
IV - FOURTH WIND TRUMPET
Eclipse
of a third of the lights of the Catholic Firmament
1
Symbols
Explained.................................................................... 68
2.
Historical Exposition,,,.............................. 70
A
WARNING PROCLAMATION
1.
Symbols explained ....”””””””””””””””””””’ 75
2.
Historical Exposition ..”............’.”.”.”””...... 77
SECOND
SECTION OF THE SEVENTH SEAL
ACT
I - THE FIFTH TRUMPET, OR FIRST WOE
The
Locust-Plague for the tormentation of the Unsealed
I. SYMBOLS EXPLAINED
,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,....,,.....,,,.....,,,.......,,,,,,,,.,,,,... 81
8
EXPOSITION
OF THE APOCALYPSE.
1. The Pit of the Abyss ~ 82
2. The Key oft he Pit ..................................................................................... 84
3,
The Abyss, or “Bottomless Pit”
.............................................................. .. 85
4~
The Smoke of the Pit ..............................................................................
86
5. The Sun and Air darkened by the Smoke
....................~........................... . 87
6. “Out of the Smoke came forth Locusts
into the Earth” .............................. 88
7, “Power was given to the locusts
as the scorpions of the earth have power” 91
8. Chaplets like to gold
.......,,.......,,..........,.......,,,,,..,...~........,,,.......,............ . 91
9,
Faces as the Faces of Men
........,.........,,.....,...,,,.........,.................,........... . 92
10. “Their teeth were as of Lions”
...,.,,.......,,.......,,..,......,...,,,..,...........,.. 92
11. “They had their Breasts as it were
Breasts of Iron” ...,....,....,,..,,,......,.. 92
12. The two periods of “Five Months” each
,,...........,...,.,........,.,.......,.... 93
13. “And they had over them a king”
.....................,,..,..,.......,.,,......,........ 93
II. SYNTHETIC EXPOSITION OF THE FIRST WOE
.....,....,,............. 95
III. HISTORICAL EXPOSITION
1. Origin of the Star ..,.,,,,........,,.,,...,,...,,,.,.,.....,,,,....,...,...,,..,,,..,...,..
...... 96
2. The Pit becomes a Burning Furnace
..........,..,,...,,.,.......,...,,,.,......,....... 98
3,
The Pit of the Abyss opened .....,,.........,,,.,......,,...............,.,,,,,.....,..
.... 100
4,
The Smoke and Locusts ascend out of the Abyss,,.,......,....,,,.,,,,......... 102
5. The Sun and Air darkened
................................................................... 103
6. The torment and injury
........................................................................ 105
7.
The Angel of the Abyss
....................................................................... 106
ACT
Il-SIXTH TRUMPET, OR SECOND WOE
I. Eastern Part
The
Four Euphratean Angel-Powers
I. SYMBOLS EXPLAINED
1. “One Voice of the Four Horns”
...................................................... 111
2. “Loose the Four Angels”
............................................................... 114
3. Symbolic Period of Loosing
........................................................... 115
4,
Number of the Cavalry
................................................................. 116
5. The Horses and their Riders
........................................................... 117
6. Breasts Fiery and Hyacinthine
........................................................ 118
7,
“With the Heads they do injure”
..................................................... 119
8. Fire, Hyacinth, and Sulphur
........................................................... 120
9. Lake of Fire burning with Sulphur
................................................... 120
10.”The
Rest of the Men”
................................................................. 121
11.
“The Daemonials” 121
12.”Idols”
.....................................................................................
132
II. HISTORICAL EXPOSITION
1. Preparation of the First Euphratean
Angel ...........,,,,,,,,..................... 140
2. The loosing of the First Angel ....................,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,................
143
3. The Beginning of the 391 Years and 30
Days ..,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,................. 145
4. The First Interval
......................................................................... 146
EXPOSITION
OF THE APOCALYPSE.
5. The Preparation of the Second Angel
............................................... 148
6. Loosing of the Second Angel
.......................................................... 149
7. The Second Interval .....................................................................
151
8. The Preparation of the Third Angel
................................................. 152
9. The loosing of the Third Angel
....................................................... 154
10. Third Interval in which the Preparation
of the Fourth Angel is completed .
156
11. Loosing of the Fourth Angel
......................................................... 157
12. “The Fire, the Smoke and the Sulphur”
........................................... 158
13. The Killing of the Third
............................................................... 160
FOURTH
SECTION OF THE SEVENTH SEAL
2.
The Western PartEXPOSITION
2. The “One Body” the Golden Light-bearer
of the Spirit ........................ 221
I. POSITION OF THE “ONE BODY” IN THE
PRESENT STATE ......... 224
2. “Reed like a Rod”
....................................................................... 225
3. The Altar
................................................................................... 226
4. All not of the “On Body” Excommunicate
........................................ 227
5. The Holy Polity trampled Forty-two
Months ..................................... 232\
Page 11
The
chapters of th is volume are numbered according to the numbers of the chapters
of the Apocalypse; so that the eighth chapter of this work is an exposition of
the eighth chapter of the Apocalypse, and so on to the eleventh inclusive. The
previous volume having introduced the Seventh Seal, this volume proceeds to
expound the Seal properly.
FIRST
SECTION OF THE SEVENTH SEAL
This
section comprehends the events resulting from the release of the Four Winds,
held by the Four Angels standing at the Four Corners of the Earth Apoc. 7:1. When in operation, they were to
blow injuriously upon the earth, the sea, and the trees, of Daniel’s Fourth
Beast-Dominion. They were what Gibbon styles “the threatening tempests of
barbarians which subverted the foundations of Roman greatness.” They were
commissioned against the catholic empire of the west, and did not cease to blow
until they had sorely plagued the Apostasy, and disrobed Old Rome of its glory
and dominion. The Four Wind-powers angelized against Roman Europe are identical
with the first four trumpets, which were sounded or blown against “the earth,”
the “trees,” and “sea,” which were not plagued to the subversion of their
sovereignty until these trumpets had produced their full effect.
PREPARATION
FOR SOUNDING
The
seven angels, which John tells us in ch. 8:2, he saw standing before the Deity,
and to whom were given seven trumpets, he further informs us, in the sixth
verse, “prepared themselves to sound.” Though they had been commissioned in the
days of Constantine, they had also been forbidden to execute judgment until the
sealing of the 144,000 was duly effected. Their preparing to sound was no part
of their sounding. When the trumpets were given them they were quiescent, and
quiescent they remained during the “voices, and thunders, and lightnings, and earthquake”
of the reigns of Constantius and Julian; but, when the earthquake was over, and
the Catholic Apostasy found unexpected
Page 12 .
deliverance
in the military election of JOVIAN, a trinitarian catholic, nothing improved by
the well merited castigation it had experienced, it progressed from bad to
worse, until the forbearance of the Deity had attained the limit which, in His
wise foreknowledge of all things, He had fixed, and beyond which He had
predetermined that the blasphemous superstition should not continue unscathed
by the fierceness of His devouring indignation. From the death of Julian, A.D.
363, to the death of Theodosius the Great, and the revolt of the Goths under
Alaric, A.D. 395’ a period of thirty-two years, was the period also of the
preparation for sounding, which terminated in the Gothic blast of the First
Wind-Trumpet. At the end of this PREPARATION-PERIOD, the Catholic Imperiality
was finally divided into Two SOVEREIGNTIES, which answered to the Two IRON LEGS
of Nebuchadnezzar’s Image the
sovereignty of Constantinople under Arcadius, and the sovereignty of Rome under
Honorius, both of them the worthless sons of the catholic tyrant “ Theodosius
the Great.”
This
preparation period of thirty-two years includes the reigns of Jovian, Valentinian
and Valens, Gratian, and Theodosius - of Jovian, who reigined about seven
months; of Valentinian, who ruled twelve years; of Gratian, who, after reigning
four years, associated Theodosius with himself in the purple; and of
Theodosius, who reigned sixteen years, or till his decease, A.D. 395. The
sounding of the seven angels was, and is (for they will not have ceased to
sound until the reign of the saints shall have been established over all the
apocalyptic earth), the execution of judgment upon the Laodicean Catholic
Apostasy in its imperio-regal constitution. During this preparation-period it
made rapid and gigantic progress in developing “the mystery of iniquity,” after
the working of the Satan with all power and signs and wonders of falsehood, and
with all deceivableness of the iniquity in them who are being destroyed.” It
rapidly filled up that measure of iniquity which rendered it no longer
expedient to defer judgment - to restrain the tempest of “hail and fire mingled
with blood,” which, as a devouring blast, should scorch and torment it unto
death.
It
will, doubtless, be satisfactory to the reader unacquainted with the history of
this period to receive some information respecting it. I shall, therefore, as
briefly as is compatible with clearness, notice the state of the Catholic
Apostasy in the thirty-two years of angel-preparation for the execution of
judgment.
1.
The Apostasy in the Preparation-Period
The
death of Julian left the Ancient Idolatry in possession of the empire, but
without a champion. He had endeavored to thoroughly
Page
13
paganize
the army but had succeeded only in making hypocrites of those who took any
interest in religion. So long as he was the dispenser of the loaves and fishes
of the state, the soldiery bowed the knee to Jupiter; but when the arrow of the
Persian had given victory to “the Galilean,” and the ‘pious Jovian” became the
elect of the fickle host, whose affection had been gained by his comely person,
cheerful temper, and familiar wit, the soldiers again displayed at the head of
their legions the banner of the cross, the Labarum of Constantine, by which was
announced to the people the Superstition of their new emperor(*).
The
first monuments of peace were devoted by Jovian to the restoration of domestic
tranquillity to the church and state. The ‘Christians,” says Gibbon, “had
forgotten the spirit of the gospel, and the pagans had imbibed the spirit of
the church. In private families, the sentiments of nature were extinguished by
the blind fury of zeal and revenge; the majesty of the laws was violated or
abused; the cities of the east were stained with blood, and the most implacable
enemies of the Romans were in the bosom of their country.” As soon as Jovian
was enthroned, he secured the legal establishment of the catholic superstition.
The insidious edicts of Julian were abolished, and the immunities of the
catholic apostasy were restored and enlarged, which gained for him, of course,
the loud and sincere applause of its devotees. The episcopal leaders of their
contending sects, convinced, by experience, how much their fate would depend on
the earliest impressions made on the mind of an untutored soldier, hastened to
the court at Antioch. “The highways of the east were crowded with
Homoousian,(+) and Arian, and Semi-Arian, and Eunomian bishops, who struggled
to outstrip each other in the holy race for the prize of the imperial favor;
the apartments of the palace resounded with their clamors, and the ears of
Jovian were assailed, and perhaps astonished, by the Babel-mixture of
metaphysics and passionate invectives. They discovered at length his admiration
for the celestial virtues of the great Athanasius’,” one of the most persistent
ecclesiastics of which Jezebel could boast in that or any subsequent period of
her career. By this discovery, Jovian was found to be possessed
............................................................................................................................................
(*)The
Labarum was the military standard of Constantine the Great, and of later
“Christian” emperors of Rome. It displayed so-called “Christian” symbols. On
coins struck by Constantine, the pagan goddess of victory was displayed with
the Labarum in order to gain favour with all sections of the populace. -Publishers.
(+)
These are titles given to various religious sects within the Apostate church of
the 4th century. The Homoousians taught that the essence or
substance of the Father and the Son is the same. The Arians taught that Jesus
Christ was mere man. The Eunomians (named after a Bishop of Cyzicus of that
name) was an extreme Arian sect that claimed that there was only a moral
resemblance between the Father and the Son. Eunomian taught that baptism should
be in the name of the Creator, and only into the death of Christ. In opposition
to all these sects, as well as to Trinitarianism (the other extreme). the Truth
proclaimed the doctrine of God manifestation, and of Jesus Christ as the
“begotten Son of God”. - Publishers
Page
14.
of
the spirit of the times, and therefore in fellowship with the zeal and numbers
of the most powerful sect of the Apostasy. Under his reign, Laodiceanism
obtained an easy and lasting victory; and as soon as the sunshine of imperial
patronage was withdrawn, the ancient idolatry, which had been cherished by the
arts of Julian, sunk irrecoverably in the dust. Thus, as justly remarked by
Themistius in his address to Jovian, “in the recent changes, both religions
(Julian’s and Constantine’s) had been alternately disgraced by the seeming
acquisition of worthless proselytes, of those votaries of the reigning purple,
who could pass without a reason, and without a blush, from the church to the
temple, and from the altars of Jupiter to the sacred table of the Christians.”
After
Jovian’s death, Valentinian was elected by the military to the absolute
government of the Roman empire. In thirty days after his own election, he
associated his brother Valens as his colleague in the emperorship. In June,
A.D. 364, they divided the empire between them; Valentinian bestowing on his
brother the rich praefecture of the Eastern Leg of the Babylonian Image, from
the Lower Danube to the confines of Persia; whilst he reserved to himself the
three praefectures of Illyricum, Italy, and Gaul, constituting the Western Leg,
from the extremity of Greece to the Caledonian rampart, and from the rampart to
the foot of Mount Atlas. This division being amicably arranged, preparation for
the angel-trumpeters was advanced a stage. The Emperor of the West
ROMAN
EMPIRE UNDER VALENTLIAN
364~75
Valentinian I, elected by the military to ab-
solute
government, elevated his brother Valens to
co-ruler
in the East. Under their joint rule, the
borders
of the Empire were extended to the
Rhine
frontier and Hadrian’s Wall in Britain.
(NOTE
PICTURE NOT SCANNED)
Page
15
established
his temporary residence at Milan; and the Emperor of the Last returned to
Constantinople, to assume the dominion of fifty provinces.
Both
these men were cruel, and not equally and similarly zealous for the traditions of
the Apostasy. Valens was an Allan, and therefore a persecutor of the
Athanasians. These hostile factions were more equally balanced in the East than
in the Latin West, where the Allan party was but small. The Allan and
Athanasian monks and bishops supported their arguments by invectives, and these
were sometimes followed by blows. Athanasius reigned archbishop in Alexandria
over the most ignorant and ferocious catholics of the empire. Constantinople
and Antioch were occupied by his enemies, the Arians; and every episcopal
vacancy was the occasion of a popular tumult, greatly to the disgust and
contempt of philosophers and pagans. So great was the lust of power, that the
leaders of both factions believed that, if they were not suffered to reign,
they were most cruelly injured and oppressed.
The
western emperor Valentinian reigned over the countries in which the Sealing
Angel was occupied in the work of sealing the servants of the Deity in the
forehead. Though a man whose savage disposition was hardened against pity and
remorse, he uniformly maintained a firm and temperate impartiality in an age of
singular discord and contention among ecclesiastics. He declined with
respectful indifference the subtle questions of their debates; and, while he
remembered that he was a disciple of the church, he never forgot that he was
lord and master of the clergy. The pagans, the Jews, and all the various sects
which acknowledged the divine authority of Christ, were protected by the laws
from arbitrary power, or popular insult; nor did he prohibit any mode of
worship, except those secret and criminal practices which abused the name of
religion for the dark purposes of vice and disorder.
He
published an edict A.D. 370, addressed to Damasus, Bishop of Rome, restraining
the avarice of the clergy. The things he forbid them to practice show in what
they were especially guilty. He admonished the ecclesiastics and monks not to
frequent the houses of widows and virgins; and menaced their disobedience with
the animadversion of the civil authority. These were of that sort Paul
predicted would “creep into houses, and lead captive silly women laden with
sins, led away by divers lusts, ever learning, and never able to come to the
knowledge of the truth” (2 Tim 3:6). These reprobates installed themselves with
these ‘silly women” as their spiritual directors. But Valentinian rightly
discerned the corruptness of their purposes. He therefore forbid their visiting
the houses, or receiving any gift, legacy, or inheritance, from the liberality
of their spiritual daughters. He had to step in as the civil
Page
16
guardian
of domestic happiness and virtue, against the assaults of clerical wolves in
sheep’s clothing, calling themselves christian pastors of Christ’s flock!! By
their professed contempt of the world, they insensibly acquired the most
desirable advantages; the lively attachment, perhaps, of a young and beautiful
woman, the delicate plenty of an opulent household, and the respectful homage
of the slaves, the freedmen and clients of senatorial families. Under this
spiritual direction, the immense fortunes of Roman ladies were gradually
consumed in lavish arms and expensive pilgrimages; and the artful ecclesiastic,
who had assigned himself the first, or possibly the sole, place in the testament
of his spiritual daughter, still presumed to declare, with the smooth face of
hypocrisy, that he was only the instrument of charity and the steward of the
poor. The lucrative, but disgraceful trade which was exercised by the clergy to
defraud the expectations of the natural heirs, had provoked the indignation of
a superstitious age; and two of the most respectable of Latin spiritual
directors, Jerome and Ambrose, honestly confess that the ignominious edict of
Valentinian was just and necessary.
What
Gibbon styles “the splendid vices of the church of the Rome,” in the reign of
Valentinian, and under the spiritual direction of Damasus, its bishop, have
been impartially stated by Ammianus, who says,
The praefecture of Juventius was accompanied with peace and plenty; but
the tranquillity of his government was soon disturbed by a bloody sedition of
the distracted people. The ardor of Damasus and Ursinus to seize the episcopal
seat surpassed the ordinary measure of human ambition. They contended with the
rage of party; the quarrel was maintained by the wounds and death of their
followers; and the praefect, unable to resist or appease the tumult, was
constrained, by superior violence, to retire into the suburbs. Damasus
prevailed; the well-disputed victory remained on the side of his faction; one
hundred and thirty-seven dead bodies were found in the Basilica of Sicininus,
where the christians (!) hold their religious assemblies; and it was long
before the angry minds of the people resumed their accustomed tranquillity.
When I consider the splendor of the capital, I am not astonished that so
valuable a prize should inflame the desires of ambitious men, and produce the
fiercest and most obstinate contest. The successful candidate is secure that he
will be enriched by the offerings of matrons; that as soon as his dress is
composed with becoming care and elegance, he may proceed, in his chariot,
through the streets of Rome; and that the sumptuousness of the imperial table
will not equal the profuse and delicate entertainments provided by the taste
and at the expense of the Roman Pontiffs. How much more rationally (continues
the honest pagan, more christian in spirit than “the christians”) would these
pon-
Page
17
tiffs
consult their true happiness, if instead of alleging the greatness of the city
as an excuse for their manners, they would imitate the exemplary life of some
provincial bishops, whose temperance and sobriety, whose mean apparel and
downcast looks, recommended their pure and modest virtue to the Deity and his
true worshippers.” When the tranquillity of the city was restored by the wisdom
of the prefect Praetextatus , this polite and philosophic pagan, disguising a
reproach in the form of a jest, remarked to the
“right reverend bishop” Damasus, that if he could obtain the bishopric
of Rome, he himself would immediately embrace the christian religion. This
lively picture of the wealth and luxury of the bishops of Rome in the fourth
century becomes the more curious as it represents the intermediate degree between
the humble poverty of the Apostles, and the royal state of an Imperial Pontiff,
whose temporal dominions once extended from the confines of Naples to the Po.
On
the death of Valentinian, A.D. 375, Gratian, his son, a youth of seventeen, and
his brother, Valentinian II, then only four years old became emperors of the
West, so that the government of the Roman world was now exercised in the united
names of Valens and his two nephews. On the fall of Valens in the battle of
Hadrianople, A.D. 378, Gratian appointed Theodosius his successor over the
East. Gratian was a feeble and indolent character, piously credulous, and a
mere tool in he hands of ecclesiastical hypocrites, who procured from him an
edict to punish, as a capital offense, the violation, neglect, or even the
ignorance, of what they were pleased to call the divine law. This would give
them power to persecute and destroy “the servants of the Deity,” then
being impressed with his seal. The
murder of Gratian did not improve the situation; for Theodosius, a name dear to
the Apostasy, was pious and cruel, with strength and activity of mind.
Among
the benefactors of the catholic church, the fame of Constantine has been
rivaled by the glory of Theodosius, who assumed the merit of subduing Arianism,
and abolishing the worship of idols in the Roman world. Theodosius was the
first of the emperors immersed in what the apostasy terms “the true faith of
the Trinity.” As he ascended from the water, still glowing with the warm
feelings of regeneration,” he dictated a solemn edict which proclaimed his own
opinions and prescribed the religion of his subjects. “It is our pleasure,”
said this sacramentally regenerated prince, “that all the nations, which are
governed by our clemency and moderation, should steadfastly adhere to the
religion which was taught by St. Peter to the Romans, which faithful tradition
hath preserved, and which is now professed by the Pontiff Damasus (!) and by
Peter, Bishop of Alexandria, a man of apostolic holiness. According to the
discipline of the Apostles and the doctrine of
Page 18
the
gospel, let us believe the sole Deity of the Father, the Son, and the Holy
Ghost, under an equal majesty, and a pious Trinity. We authorize the followers
of this doctrine to assume the title of ‘CATHOLIC CHRISTIANS’; and as we judge
that all others are extravagant madmen, we brand them with the infamous name of
HERETICS, and declare that their conventicles shall no longer usurp the
respectable appellations of churches. Besides the condemnation of divine justice,
they must expect to suffer the severe penalties which our authority guided by
heavenly wisdom, shall think proper to inflict upon them.,,
This
edict of Theodosius caused great joy to the catholics. He convened, A.D. 381, a
council at Constantinople, of one hundred and fifty bishops, to complete the
theological system which had been established in the council of Nice. They
decreed the equal Deity of the Holy Ghost, which, upon their authority, has
been received by all the deluded nations and all the churches of the Apostasy.
But, whatever the merits of the question, the sober evidence of history will
not allow much weight to the personal authority of these Theodosian fathers. In
an age when the spirituals of the Apostasy were a scandalous degeneration from
apostolic purity, the most worthless and corrupt were always the most eager to
frequent, and disturb the episcopal assemblies. The conflict and fermentation
of so many opposite interests and tempers inflamed the passions of the bishops;
and their ruling passions were the love of gold and the love of dispute. Many
of the same churchmen who now applauded the orthodox piety of Theodosius, had
repeatedly changed, with prudent flexibility, their creeds and opinions; and in
the various revolutions of the church and the state, the religion of their
sovereign was the rule of their obsequious faith. The unjust and disorderly
proceedings of these sycophants forced the gravest members of the council to
dissent and secede; and the clamorous majority, which remained masters of the
field, could be compared only to wasps or magpies, to a flight or cranes, or to
a flock of geese.
The
decrees of the council of Constantinople had set up the standard of catholic
opinion; and the spirituals who governed the beclouded conscience of Theodosius
suggested the most effectual methods of persecution. In the space of fifteen
years, he promulgated at least fifteen severe edicts against the heretics; and,
to deprive them of every hope of escape, he sternly enacted that if any laws or
rescripts should be alleged in their favour, the judges should consider them as
illegal productions either of fraud or forgery. The penal statutes were
directed against the ministers, the assemblies, and the persons of “the heretics”; and the passions of the
legislator were expressed in the language of declamation and invective.
Page
19
Thus
the theory of persecution was established by this regenerated trinitarian
emperor, whose justice and piety have been applauded by the church”; but the
practice of it, in the fullest extent, was reserved for his rival and
colleague, Maximus, then reigning beyond the Alps, the first, among catholic
princes, who shed the blood of his subjects on account of their religious
opinions. These were Priscillian and six of his brethren, who were tortured,
condemned, and executed at Treves. Their tenets being reported by their
enemies, it is not possible to speak with certainty respecting them. Their
rejection by the clergy and their adherents is a presumption in favor of their
being sufferers for the truth. Their death was the subject of a long and
vehement controversy, in which, though Martin, Bishop of Tours, and Ambrose,
Bishop of Milan, proclaimed the eternal damnation of heretics, they both were’
surprised and shocked by the bloody image of their temporal death. Since the
murder of Priscillian by the catholics, they have become scarlet with the blood
of the saints, and drunk with the blood of the witnesses for Jesus (Apoc.
17:6); and their proceedings have been refined and methodized in the “Holy
Office,” which assigns their distinct parts to the ecclesiastical and secular
powers. The victim to be murdered is regularly delivered by the sanguinary
priest to the magistrate, and by the magistrate to the pious executioner, and
the inexorable sentence of their Mother Jezebel, which dclares her charge
against the victim, is hypocritically expressed in the language of pity and
intercession. Who need wonder at seven angels being commissioned to inflict
vengeance upon such a communion of blood? How can wrath cease against men, so
long as the earth is cursed with the presence of catholicism, and its kindred
abominations? The divine indignation can only be appeased by their extirpation
total and complete.
After
the death of Valentinian II, and the overthrow of Maximus, the Roman world was
in the undivided possession of Theodosius; and thus it continued till his
death, A.D. 395, when the separation of the East and the West became final
under his sons Arcadius and Honorius.
About
sixty years after Constantine’s conversion to catholicism, the ancient form of
heathenism was completely superseded by catholic polytheism; and the temples of
the gods were replaced by the Bazaars of Guardian Saints and Angels (Dan.
11:38-39), in which Theodosius, and his sacramentally regenerated
coreligionists, convened under the spiritual direction of reprobate bishops and
presbyters, for the degrading adoration of dead men’s bones, and other relics
they were taught to venerate as sacred. A pagan, treating of this change in the
form of Rome’s polytheism, says: “The monks” (a race of filthy animals, to whom
he is tempted to refuse the name of men) are the authors of the new worship,
which, in the place of those deities who are conceived by the understanding,
has substituted the meanest and most contemptible Slaves, The heads, salted and
pickled, of those infamous male-factors who, for the multitude of their crimes.
have suffered a just and igno-
Page 20
minious
death; their bodies, still marked by the impression of the lash, and the scars
of those tortures which were inflicted by the sentence of the magistrates; such
are the gods which the earth produces in our days; such are the martyrs, the
supreme arbitrators of our prayers and petitions to the Deity, whose tombs are
now consecrated as the objects of the veneration of the people.” This writer
was the spectator of a revolution which raised a multitude of fabulous saints
and victims to the rank of mahuzzim, of celestial and invincible protectors of
the Roman empire! He might well be indignant at the worse than pagan
abomination. Fifty years after the building of Constantinople, the pretended
remains of Samuel, the prophet of Israel, were transported to that city. His
ashes, deposited in a golden vase, and covered with a silken veil, were
delivered by the episcopal mounte-banks into each other’s hands. These fabulous
relics were received by the infatuated catholic multitude with infinitely more
demonstrations of joy and reverence than they would have shown to the real
prophet; the high-ways, from Palestine to the gates of Constantinople, were
filled with an uninterrupted procession; and the emperor Arcadius, at the head
of the most illustriously betitled members of the clergy and senate, advanced
to meet this extraordinary and fictitious guest! The example of Rome and
Constantinople confirmed the superstition, blasphemy and discipline of the
catholic world. The honors of fictitious saints and martyrs, after an ineffectual
protest of the sealed servants of the Deity,(*) were universally established;
and in the age of those conspicuous theological empirics, Ambrose, Jerome, and
Augustine, something was still deemed wanting to the sanctity of a catholic
bazaar, till it had been consecrated by some portion of “holy relics,” which
fixed and inflamed the devotion of the deluded multitude.
The
Catholic Apostasy by the end of the preparation period for angelic sounding had
become a system of organized and established idolatry -of the worship of gods
produced from the earth by the clerical officials of Satan’s kingdom.
Perceiving how profitable were the so-called relics of saints, more valuable to
church-knaves than gold and precious stones, the clergy were as stimulated to
multiply these treasures of the church.” Without regard for truth or
probability they invented names for skeletons, and actions for names. The fame
of the apostles and prophets, and their holy brethren, was darkened by
superstitious fraud and falsehood. To the invincible band of real saints, whose
blood from
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
(*) In a note, Gibbon says: “The presbyter
Vigilantius, the protestant of his age, firmly, though ineffectually, withstood
the superstition of the monks, relies, Saints, fasts, etc., for which Jerome
compares him to the Hydra, Centaurs, Cerherus, etc., and considers him only as
the organ of the daemon.” Whoever will peruse the controversy of Jerome and
Vigilantius, and Augustine’s account of the miracles of Stephen, may speedily
gain some idea of the spirit of the fathers of the Apostasy.
Page 21
beneath
the Altar cried for vengeance against their pagan murderers, the Theodosian
craftsmen added myriads of imaginary heroes, who had never existed except in
the fancy of “daemons speaking lies in hypocrisy; and having their conscience
seared as with a hot iron,” of whom Ambrose, bishop of Milan, his pupil “St.
Augustine,” and “St Jerome,” were notable examples: “and there is reason to
suspect,” says Gibbon, “that Tours might not be the only diocese in which the
bones of a malefactor were adored instead of those of a saint. A superstitious
practice, which tended to increase the temptations of fraud and credulity,
insensibly extinguished the light of history and of reason in,” what he
incorrectly terms, “the christian world.”
But
the progress of catholic idolatry would have been much less rapid and
victorious, if the superstition of the people had not been assisted by the
seasonable aid of what Paul styles, “signs and wonders of falsehood;” that is,
of pretended visions and spurious miracles, to ascertain the authenticity and
virtue of the most suspicious relics. When Ambrose refused to obey the sentence
of banishment decreed against him by the Arian government of Valentinian II.,
and while he and his party were blockaded in the cathedral of Milan, he falsely
declared that he was instructed by a dream, to open the earth in a place where
the relics or remains of two martyrs, Gervasius and Protasius, had been
deposited above three hundred years. Immediately under the church-pavement two
perfect skeletons were found, with the heads separated from their bodies, and a
plentiful effusion of blood. These “holy relics” were presented, in solemn
pomp, to the veneration of his credulous flock. The knavish designs of Ambrose
were admirably promoted by this pretended discovery. Their bones, blood, and
garments, were supposed to contain a healing power; and their praeternatural
influence was said to be communicated to the most distant objects, without
losing any part of its original virtue. The alleged extraordinary cure of a
blind man by touching the garment, and the reluctant confessions of several
daemoniacs, were adduced to justify the Athanasian opinions and sanctity of
this rebel churchman! The truth of these miracles is attested by Saint Ambrose
himself, and by his proselyte, the celebrated Saint Augustin, who, at that time
professed the art of rhetoric in Milan. The Arian court very properly rejected
the testimony of such interested parties; and derided the theatrically
represented cures, exhibited by the contrivance and at the expense of the
archbishop. The effect, however, upon the irrational and strongly deluded
multitude was rapid and irresistible; and the feeble sovereign of Italy found
himself unable to contend with such a favorite of heaven!
The
same “grave and learned Augustin,” afterwards bishop of
Page 22
Hippo
in the Roman Africa, attests the innumerable prodigies performed there by the
relics of Stephen, stoned in the presence of Saul of Tarsus. These were brought
to light by a dream, thrice repeated to one Lucian, a presbyter, residing twenty
miles from Jerusalem. When they were unearthed, the ground trembled, and an
odor, such as that of paradise, was smelt, which instantly cured the various
diseases of seventy-three of the grave-openers. The relics were transported, in
solemn procession, to a house of the dead, called “a church’ by the ignorant
multitude, constructed in their honor on Mount Zion; and the minute particles
of those relics, a drop of blood, or the scrapings of a bone, were
acknowledged, in almost every province of the catholic world, to possess a
divine and miraculous virtue. This “wonder of falsehood” is inserted in his
elaborate work, “The City of God,” which Augustin designed as a solid and
immortal proof of the truth of what he called christianity. He solemnly
enumerates above seventy miracles, performed by Stephen’s relics, of which
three were resurrections from the dead, in the space of two years, and within
the limits of his own diocese! If we enlarge our views to all the dioceses, and
all the saints, of the christian’ world”, says Gibbon, truly, “it will not be
easy to calculate the fables, and the errors, which issued from this
inexhaustible source. But we may surely be allowed to observe, that a miracle
in that age of credulity and superstition, lost its name and its merit, since
it could scarcely be considered as a deviation from the ordinary, and
established, laws of nature.”
The
innumerable “wonders of falsehood,” of which the tombs were the perpetual
theatre, impressed the infatuated crowd with a notion of the state and
constitution of the invisible world, which became the basis of the system of
idol-worship, which darkens the kingdom of the clergy to this day. Whatever
might be the condition of the common herd between death and resurrection of
body, it was fancifully supposed that the disembodied ghosts of so-called
saints and martyrs did not consume that interval in silent and inglorious
sleep. It was imagined (without presuming to determine the place of their
habitation, or the nature of their felicity) that they employed the lively and
active consciousness of their happiness, their virtue, and their powers; and
that they had already secured the possession of their eternal reward. The
supposed enlargement of their intellectual faculties surpassed the measure of
human conception; since they imagined that they had proved by experience, that
they were capable of hearing and understanding the various petitions of their
numerous votaries, who, in the same moment of time, but in the most distant
parts of the world, invoked the name and assistance of Stephen or of Martin.
The confidence of their petitioners was found-
Page 23
ed
on the heathen dogma of inherent immortality; and the supposition, that the
disembodied immortal souls of saints go to Christ at death, and as unclothed
and naked ghosts are reigning with him, and in this their glory cast an eye of
pity upon earth; their worshippers are strongly deluded with the notion that
these naked souls are warmly interested in the prosperity of the church; and
that the individuals, who imitated the fabled example of their faith and piety,
were the peculiar and favorite objects of their most tender regard. Sometimes,
indeed, it was thought that their friendship might be influenced by
considerations of a less exalted kind; that they viewed, with partial
affection, the places which had been consecrated by their birth, their
residence, their death, their burial, or the possession of their relics. They
were regarded as not exempt from pride, avarice, and revenge; hence they were
supposed to approve with gratitude the liberality of their votaries; and to
hurl the keenest bolts of punishment against the impious wretches, who violated
their magnificent shrines, or disbelieved their supernatural power. Severus,
bishop of Minorca, says that the relics of St. Stephen in eight days, converted
in that island five hundred and forty Jews; but, it must not be forgotten, that
they were aided by some potent severities, such as burning the synagogue,
driving the obstinate infidels to starve among the rocks, and so forth. The
immediate, and almost instantaneous, effects, that were supposed to follow the
prayer, or the offense, satisfied the deluded fanatics of the ample measure of
favor and authority enjoyed by Immortal Ghosts in the presence of the Supreme;
and it seemed superfluous to inquire, whether they were continually obliged to
intercede before the throne of grace, or whether they might not be permitted to
exercise, according to the dictates of their benevolence and justice, the
delegated powers of a subordinate ministry. The imagination, which had been
raised by a powerful effort to the contemplation and worship of Eternal Spirit,
eagerly embraced such inferior objects of adoration as were more in keeping
with its gross conceptions and imperfect faculties. The simplicity which is in
Christ, or, as Gibbon styles it, ”the
sublime and simple theology of the primitive christians,” was not only
corrupted, but practically and doctrinally abolished; and the Monarchy of
Heaven, already clouded by metaphysical subtleties, was dethroned by the
introduction of a popular mythology, which restored the reign of a multitude of
gods, which became the Mahuzzim, or ghost-protectors, of the “Religious World.”
Having
thus substituted for the old goels of Greece and Rome, the phantasmata of their
corrupt imaginations, which they decorated with the names of real and
fictitious saints and angels, they next proceeded to institute the rites and
ceremonies, or will-worship, with which they
Page
24
deemed
that their new deities ought to be satisfied. These were such as seemed most
powerfully to affect the senses of the vulgar herd. If, in the beginning of the
fifth century, Paul or Luke, had been raised from the dead, to witness the
festival of some popular saint, or martyr, they would have gazed with
astonishment and indignation on the profane spectacle, which had superseded the
pure and spiritual worship of a christadelphian ecclesia. As soon as the doors
of the Saint-Bazaar, or “church,” were thrown open, they would have been
annoyed by the smoke of incense, the perfume of flowers, and the glare of lamps
and tapers, which diffused at noonday a gaudy, superfluous, and in their
judgment sacrilegious light. If they approached the balustrade of the
Saint-altar, they would have made their way through a prostrate crowd,
consisting for the most part of strangers and pilgrims, who resorted to the
city on the vigil of the feast, and who already felt the “strong delusion,” or
intoxication, of fanaticism, and perhaps of wine. Their devout kisses were
imprinted on the walls and pavement of the Idol-Bazaar; and their fervent “vain
repetitions” were directed, whatever might be the expletives of their
conscience keepers, the priests, to the bones, the blood, or the dust, of the
tutelar of the bazaar, which were usually concealed by a linen or silken veil,
from the eyes of the vulgar. The fanatics frequented the tombs of their
ghost-deities, in the hope of obtaining, from their supposed powerful
intercession, every sort of spiritual, but more especially of temporal,
blessings. They implored the preservation of their health, or the care of their
infirmities; the fruit-fullness of their barren wives, or the safety and
happiness of their children. Whenever they undertook any distant or dangerous
journey, they requested that “the holy martyrs’ would be their guides and
protectors, or Mahuzzim, on the roads; and if they returned without having
experienced any misfortune, they again hastened to the ghost-bazaar tombs, to
celebrate, with grateful thanksgiving’s, their obligations to the memory and
relics of their invisible patrons. The walls were hung round with symbols of
the favors they supposed they had received; eyes, and hands, and feet, of gold
and silver; and memorial pictures, which also soon became objects of idolatry,
represented the image, the attributes, and the miracles of the tutelar
phantasma. All this new system of idolatry was the invention of that spirit of
superstition that reigned incarnate in the presbyters and bishops of the church
who imitated the polytheism and ritual they were impatient to destroy. They had
persuaded themselves, that the ignorant rustics would more cheerfully renounce
the superstition of paganism, if they found some resemblance, some
compensation, in the bosom of their catholicism. This religion of Constantine
achieved, in less than a hundred years, the final
Page 25
conquest
of the old idolatry in all the Roman empire; but the catholic victors
themselves were completely subdued by the heathen arts of their vanquished
rivals.
2.
Preparation-Judgments Upon Ghost-Worshippers
Could
it have been possible for “seducing spirits,” or demons, who had departed from
the faith, and speaking lies in hypocrisy, to have invented and set up such a
system of abomination in the fourth century, and in the name of christianity,
and the Deity not have poured out of His wrath upon the deceivers and the
deceived? The whole Roman Catholic world had gone wondering after the NEW
IDOLATRY, against which none opposed a scriptural testimony but the SEALING
ANGEL, or those engaged in the work of sealing the servants of their Deity with
His seal, in their foreheads. A presbyter or elder, among these took up his pen
to oppose it. His book was directed against the institution of monkery, the celibacy
of the clergy, praying for the dead, and to martyrs, celebrating their vigils,
and lighting up candles to them after the manner of the heathen. Jerome, who is
esteemed a saint and luminary of the catholic
church, and who was a zealous advocate of all these popular
superstitious rites. undertook the task of refuting him, whom he styled “a most
blasphemous heretic,” and “the organ of the Devil.” An individual denounced
after this fashion by a monk, or a clergyman, must have been one of the excellent
of the earth; for it is only such who are obnoxious to their reproach. The
following extract from Saint Jerome’s answer to his book, will satisfactorily
explain the heresy of Vigilantius, for that is his name, who has still the
honor of being enrolled in the list of those who are anathematized as heretics
by the Mother of Harlots, whose citadel is Rome. “That the honor paid to the
rotten bones of saints and martyrs,” says Jerome, “by adoring, kissing,
wrapping them up in silk and vessels of gold. lodging them in their churches,
and lighting up wax candles before them after the manner of the heathen were
the ensigns of idolatry -that the celibacy of the clergy was a heresy, and
their vows of chastity the seminary of lewdness - that to pray to the dead, was
superstitious, inasmuch as the souls of departed saints and martyrs were at
present in Some particular place(*) from which they could not remove themselves
at pleasure, so as to be everywhere present attending to the prayers of their
(*) Vigilantius taught that the souls of
prophets and martyrs were either in loco refrigeni, in a place of cooling, a
cold place, or else under the altar of Deity. But Jerome sternly. yet
ignorantly, tries to refute this “blasphemy.” “Dost thou give laws to Deity?”
says he to Vigilantius. “Thou bindest fetters upon the apostles, that they may
he held in custody till the day of judgment, and be not with their Lord; of
whom it is written, ‘They follow the Lamb whithersoever he goes.’ If the Lamb
be everywhere, therefore, these also who are with the Lamb, are believed to be
everywhere Even as the devil and demons roam about the world”
Page 26
votaries that the sepulchres of the martyrs ought not
to be worshipped, nor their fasts and vigils to be observed - and finally, that
the signs and wonders said to be wrought by their relics, and at their
sepulchres, served to no good end or purpose of religion.”
These
were the sacrilegious tenets, as they are termed by the fanatical and
superstitious Jerome, which he could not hear with patience, or without the
utmost grief, And for which he declares Vigilantius a detestable heretic,
venting his foul-mouthed blasphemies against the relics of the martyrs, which
were working daily signs and wonders. He tells him to go into the churches of
those martyrs, and he would be cleansed from the evil spirit which possessed
him, and feel himself burnt, not with those wax candles which so much offend
him, but with invisible flames, which would force that demon that talked within
him to confess himself to be the same who had personated a Mercury, perhaps, or
a Baechus, or some other of the heathen deities.” Such is the style in which
this renowned father of the church rants and raves through several pages
against the sealed servants of the Deity, who, in the days of the sealing,
protested with Vigilantius against these delusions which had then become so
strong.
As
it may gratify the reader’s curiosity, the following specimen of Jerome’s
absurd manner of refuting their testimony, is presented: “If it were such a
sacrilege or impiety,” says he, “to pay these honors to the relics of saints,
as Vigilantius contends, then the Emperor Constantius must needs be a
sacrilegious person, who translated the holy relics of St. Andrew, Luke, and
Timothy to Constantinople; then Arcadius Augustus, also, must be held
sacrilegious, who translated the bones of the blessed Samuel from Judea, where
they had lain so many ages, into Thrace; then all the bishops were not only
sacrilegious, but stupid too, who submitted to carry a thing the most
contemptible, and nothing but mere dust, in silk and vessels of gold; and
lastly, the people of all the churches must needs be fools, who went out to
meet those holy relics, and received them with as much joy as if they had been
the prophet himself, living and present among them; for the procession was
attended with swarms of people from Palestine, even into Chalcedon, singing
with one voice the praises of Christ, who were yet adoring Samuel perhaps, and
not Christ, whose prophet and Levite Samuel was.
What
a development in this extract from Jerome, one of the greatest luminaries of
the Apostasy in that age, of the darkness and superstition that overspread the
Catholic World, and that in less than a hundred years after the Catholic
superstition was established by law! The sentiments of Jerome were a sample of
the opinions of Ambrose, Augustin, and the clergy at large; how deplorable then
must have been the
Page 27
state
of their flocks! Jerome’s defense of their stupid sacrilege against which the
144,000 lifted up their united voice, and which found a record in the writings
of Vigilantius, is childish and ridiculous. The thing cannot be gainsaid, that
to worship a bone, or a tooth, or the dust of a dead man, however excellent his
character may have been, is idolatrous impiety of the basest, and most
degrading kind. None would attempt to gainsay this but the clergy, who hold
Jerome and his fraternity in admiration. There can be no doubt, therefore, that
the emperors aforesaid were sacrilegious, the bishops both sacrilegious and
stupid, and the people fools; and because of the intense disgust with which the
Lamb contemplated their adulterous prostitution of his name to their gross and
lying vanities, He caused the Seven Angels to prepare to sound; and in the
preparation to execute upon them the calamities I shall now briefly recite.
As
soon as,” says Gibbon, “the death of Julian had relieved the barbarians from
the terror of his name, the most sanguine hopes of rapine and conquest excited
the nations of the east, of the north, and of the south. ”The chiefs of the
Allemanni being offended, crossed the Rhine, A.D. 365, and before Valentinian
could cross the Alps, the villages of the ghost-worshippers of Gaul were in
flames; and before his general could encounter them, they had secured the
captives and spoil in the forests of Germany. In the beginning of the ensuing
year, the military force of the whole nation, in deep and solid columns, broke
through the barrier of the Rhine, during the severity of a northern winter.
This irruption having been repelled, Mentz, the principal city of the Upper
Germany, was unexpectedly attacked A.D. 368, while the relic-worshippers were
celebrating one of their festivals. Rando, a bold and artful leader, suddenly
passed the Rhine, entered the defenseless town, and retired with a multitude of
captive idolators of either sex. Valentinian soon after followed them with a
powerful force, and giving them a signal overthrow, recrossed the Rhine, and
wintered at Treves. As his ambition was not to conquer Germany, he wisely
confined his attention to the important and laborious defense of the Gallic
frontier, against an enemy whose strength was renewed by a stream of daring
volunteers, which incessantly flowed from the most distant tribes of the north.
This influx from distant regions to the frontiers of the catholic world, was a
very important and essential element of the preparation for sounding.
About
the middle of the fourth century the Burgundians, a warlike and numerous people
of the Vandal race, occupied the countries on either side of the Elbe,
insensibly swelled into a powerful kingdom, and finally settled in the days of
the sounding on a flourishing province of the catholic empire.
Page
28
Three
small islands toward the mouth of the Elbe, comprehended in the duchy of
Sleswig-Holstein, were occupied by the Saxons. These were a gate, as it were,
through which poured forth upon the sea and maritime parts of the doomed
empire, inexhaustible swarms of barbarians, who descended from the gloomy
solitudes of their woods and mountains; and as a military confederation
gradually moulded into a national body, under the name and laws of the Saxons,
sallied forth upon the ocean in quest of plunder. In this preparatory enterprise
they acquired an accurate knowledge of the maritime provinces of the West,
after which they extended the scene of their depredations, so that the most
sequestered places had no reason to presume on their security.
In
the preparation for sounding, A.D. 371, under the reign of Valentinian, the
maritime provinces of Gaul were afflicted by the Saxons. They landed from their
frail coasters, and spread desolation among the relic-worshippers with fire and
sword. They were at length repelled, however, as the time of their permanent
settlement under the sounding of the angels had not yet arrived.
From
the reign of Constantine to A.D. 366, that is to say, during an interval of
thirty years, there had been peace between the Catholic Empire and the Goths.
During this period these barbarians under Hermanric, the king of the
Ostrogoths, extended their dominions from the Danube to the Baltic, including
the greater part of Germany and Scythia. The name of Hermanric is almost buried
in oblivion, his exploits are imperfectly known; and the Roman and Greek
worshippers of the dead themselves appeared unconscious of the progress of an
aspiring power, which threatened the liberty of the north, and the peace of
their dominion.
Civil
war between Procopius an usurper, and Valens, A.D. 366 became the occasion of
the Goths crossing the Danube to foment, as the allies of Procopius, the civil
discord of the catholics of the East. The suppression of the usurpation by
Valens, left him free to carry on the war against the Goths alone. “But,” says
Gibbon, “the events scarcely deserve the attention of posterity, except as the
preliminary steps,” or preparation,. “of the approaching decline and fall of
the empire.” The war, which had inflicted much evil on both sides, terminated
A.D. 369; after which the Goths remained tranquil about six years; till they
were violently impelled against the Catholic empire by an innumerable host of
Scythians, who appeared to issue from the frozen regions of the north.
This
period of preparation which opened the way, under the sounding of the four wind
trumpets to the inroads of so many hostile and savage tribes from the Danube to
the Atlantic, was also signalized by terrible and wholesale destruction of
catholic idolators by earthquakes,
Page 29
A.D.
365. On the twenty-first of July, the greatest part of their empire was shaken
by a violent and destructive convulsion of the earth. The shores of the
Mediterranean were left dry by the sudden retreat of the sea, and valleys and
mountains were laid bare, which had never since the Mosaic Era of the globe
been exposed to the sun. But the waters soon returned with the weight of an
immense and irresistible deluge, which was severely felt on the coasts of
Sicily, of Dalmatia, of Greece, and of Egypt; large boats were transported, and
lodged on the roofs of houses, or at the distance of two miles from the shore;
the ghost-worshippers, with their habitations, were swept away by the waters;
and the city of Mexandria, the origenlc birthplace, and alternate throne of Homoousian-ism
and Homoiousianism,(*) annually commemorated the fatal day, on which fifty
thousand Trinitarians and Arians lost their factious and blasphemous lives in
the inundation. This calamity astonished and terrified the subjects of Rome,
who rightly considered these alarming strokes as the prelude only of still more
dreadful calamities, which would ultimate in the submersion of the fabric of
their world.
From
the reign of Valens was a most disastrous period for the Laodicean Apostasy.
‘The fall of the Roman empire,” says Gibbon, may be justly dated from the reign
of Valens.” In this period of disaster, the happiness and security of each
individual were personally attacked; and the arts and labors of ages were
rudely defaced by the barbarians of Scythia and Germany. The invasion of the
Huns from the rear and remoter countries of the north, A.D. 376, precipitated
on the provinces of the west the Gothic nation, which advanced in less than
forty years, from the Danube to the Atlantic, and opened a way by the success
of their arms, to the inroads of so many hostile tribes more savage than
themselves. The original principle of motion was concealed in the remote
countries of the north, whence these destructive emigrations issued.
In
the year 375, Valens, then resident at Antioch, was informed by his officers
who were intrusted with the defense of the Danube, that the north was agitated
by a furious tempest, that the irruption of the Huns, an unknown and monstrous
race of savages, had subverted the power of the Goths; and that the suppliant
multitudes of that warlike nation, whose pride was now humbled in the dust,
covered a space of many miles along the banks of the river. They earnestly
sought permission to cross the Danube, and to settle on the waste lands of Thrace,
promising
(*)
The Homoiousians were a sect in addition to those noted on p 13. which
maintained that the essence of the Son is similar to, but not the same as that
of the Father. How beautiful and clear is
the teaching of the Truth in comparison with the confusion that reigns in the
doctrines of such schismatics---publishers
page
30
perpetual
obedience to the laws, and to defend the limits of the empire. The prayers of
the Goths were most imprudently granted, on condition of delivering up their
arms, and their children to be dispersed through the provinces of Asia, as
hostages to secure the fidelity of their parents. Upon these ignominious
conditions the whole body of the Gothic nation was transported across the
Danube, by the most strenuous diligence of the infatuated officials, who were
careful that not a single barbarian of those who were reserved to subvert the
foundations of Rome, should be left upon the opposite shore. The stipulation,
however, most offensive to the Goths, and the most important to the Romans, was
shamefully eluded by bribery and corruption. The catholic officials allowed
them to retain their arms in exchange for the prostitution of their wives and
daughters, and contributions of cattle and slaves. When the transportation was
finished, and their strength collected on the southern side of the Danube, an
immense camp of two hundred thousand Visigothic warriors in arms, was spread
over the plains and hills of the Lower Maesia, and assumed a threatening and
even a hostile aspect.
The
leaders of the Ostrogoths, Alatheus and Saphrax, pressed also by the Huns in
their rear, sought the like favor that had been granted to the Visigoths. But
this was absolutely refused by Valens, whose suspicions and fears were now
thoroughly aroused. His generals, however, whose attention was solely directed
to the Visigoths whose discontent and hostility they had excited by their
tyranny and avarice, had imprudently disarmed the ships and fortifications
which constituted the defense of the Danube. The fatal oversight was observed,
and improved by Alatheus and Saphrax, who anxiously watched the favorable
moment of escaping from the pursuit of the Huns. By the help of such rafts and
vessels as could be hastily procured, the leaders of the Ostrogoths
transported, without opposition, their king and their army; and boldly fixed a
hostile and independent camp on the territories of the empire.
A
secret union having been formed between these Gothic powers, they were prepared
for a desperate conflict with the catholics who had treated them with great
inhumanity and treachery. The flames of discord and mutual hatred soon burst
forth into a dreadful conflagration. At Marcianopolis, the capital of the Lower
Maesia, about seventy miles from the banks of the Danube, they sought to
purchase supplies in the plentiful markets of the city. They were refused,
however, with insolence and derision; and as their patience was now exhausted,
passionate altercations and angry reproaches ensued. A blow was imprudently
given; a sword was hastily drawn; and the first blood that was spilt in this
accidental quarrel, became the signal of a long and destructive war.
Page 31
Valens
removed from Antioch to Constantinople to be nearer the seat of war. He was
received as the author of the public calamity and provoked to desperate
rashness by the vain reproaches of an ignorant multitude, whose contempt he had
not firmness to resist; he hastened the downfall of the Roman empire, and the
termination of his own inglorious career, by the terrible defeat of
Hadrianople, A.D. 378, in which two thirds of the catholic army of 82,000 horse
and foot were destroyed. The pride of the Goths, who had been joined by their
former enemies the Huns, Alani, and other tribes, was elated by this memorable
victory. The scene of war and tumult was instantly converted into a silent
solitude, and abandoned for other fields. The Gothic inundation rolled from the
walls of Hadrianople to the suburbs of Constantinople. Laden with the spoils of
these, and the adjacent territory, they slowly moved from the Bosphorus to the
mountains which form the western boundary of Thrace; and securing the important
pass of Succi, the Goths who had no longer any resistance to apprehend from the
scattered and vanquished troops of the East, spread themselves over the face of
a fertile and cultivated country, as far as the confines of Italy, and the
Hadriatic sea.
Jerome,
a saint of the Apostasy, vehemently deplores the calamities inflicted by the
Goths and their allies in the provinces of the catholic empire the rapes, the
massacres, the conflagrations, and, above all, the profanation of the
“churches,” that were turned into stables, and the contemptuous treatment of
the pretended relics of fictitious saints, rubbish regarded by him as
worshipful and holy. The triumph of the Goths extended far beyond the limits of
a single day. One of their chiefs was heard to declare, with insolent
moderation, that, for his own part, he was fatigued with slaughter; but that he
was astonished how a people who fled before him like a flock of sheep could
still presume to dispute the possession of their treasures and provinces. The
formidable name of the Goths spread terror among the subjects and soldiers of
the catholic dominion, who, if they had been hastily collected, and led by
Theodosius, the successor of Valens, would have been vanquished by their own
fears. But this more fortunate emperor, through the superior vigor of his mind,
effected the deliverance and peace of the provinces by prudence rather than
valor, which was seconded by favorable circumstances, which he did not fail to
seize upon and improve. By the death of Fritigern, their heroic leader, and the
predecessor and master of the renowned ALARIC, the Gothic confederacy was
broken into many disorderly bands of ferocious robbers, who destroyed every
object which they wanted strength to remove or taste to enjoy, and they often
consumed with improvident rage, the harvests or the granaries which
Page 32
soon
after became necessary for their own subsistence. At length, a very
considerable part, who already felt the inconvenience of anarchy, acknowledged
Athanaric for their king, who, instead of leading them to battle, entered into
treaty with Theodosius, A.D. 382, which resulted in the final capitulation of
the Goths. By this treaty, a numerous colony of Visigoths was settled in
Thrace, and the remains of the Ostrogoths in Phrygia and Lydia, as the allies
of the Roman State. Prudence and necessity extorted the concessions and
privileges of this treaty from Theodosius, who, nevertheless, had the address
to persuade them that they were the voluntary expressions of his sincere
friendship for the Gothic nation. It was apparent, however, to every discerning
eye, that the Goths would long remain the enemies and might soon become the
conquerors of the catholic empire. It was generally believed that they had
signed the treaty of peace with a hostile and insidious spirit, and that their
chiefs had previously bound themselves by a solemn and secret oath, never to
keep faith with the Romans; to maintain the fairest show of loyalty and
friendship, and to watch the favorable moment of rapine, of conquest, and of
revenge. But the renewed outburst of the Gothic tempest was restrained by the
firmness and moderation of Theodosius; so that the public safety seemed to
depend on the life and abilities of a single man.
Such,
then, is the historical illustration of “this unhappy period,” as Gibbon styles
it, in which the Lamb was gathering his hosts and bringing them into position
on the four corners of the earth, that they might be prepared to subvert the
western empire of Rome when the sealing of the 144,000 should have sufficiently
advanced. His hosts were in position, the battle was arrayed, and nothing
remained but that the trumpet should sound “its harsh and mournful music” for
the dreadful combat to begin, that was to hurl fire and blood and bitterness
into the highways and fastness of catholic superstition and crime.
Sounding
Of The Trumpets
All
things being prepared - the iniquity of the catholic apostasy being matured,
the executioners of judgment upon it being ready, and the 144,000 to be taken
from it duly sealed - there was no longer any reason for holding back the
tempests that were appointed to blast “the earth,” “the sea,” and “the trees,”
of the section of the catholic dominion doomed to judicial overthrow. We
proceed, then, to consider them in the order of the release, which was
successive and not con-temporary; that is, the winds did not rush forth against
all “the foul corners of the earth” at the same instant, which would have been
tc make the winds blow against each other instead of against the earth and
Page 33
sea.
In ch. 7:1,2, we are not informed as to the order and effects of the blowing of
the winds. It is not said whether the blowing was consecutive or not. They were
to blow when released, and their blowing would be, in the general, injurious;
this is all that can be extracted from the testimony there. It was reserved for
the latter half of the eighth chapter to reveal the details omitted in the
seventh. These have been sufficiently supplied in the symbolism of the first
four trumpets, which are clearly identical with, and expository of, the four
winds. Indeed, the reference to the winds, inch. 7:1, is a prefatory
announcement to the first four trumpets, as the angel-proclamation of “Woe,” in
ch. 8:13, is prefatory to the last three of the seven. The first four are,
therefore, very properly styled “Wind-Trumpets,” and the last three, “Woes”
(ch. 11:14), or “Woe-Trumpets.”
But,
before proceeding to expound these “winds” and “woes” in detail, it may assist
the reader in the comprehension of so much of the Seventh Seal as is hitherto
interpreted in this work, to present him with the following:
CHRONOLOGICAL
SYNOPSIS
A.D.
324. Opening of the Seventh Seal, marked by the
victory of Constantine over Licinius at Chrysopolis.
Silence
in the heaven a half hour begins.
337. Silence, or peace, ends.
During
this half-hour period the Sealing of 144,000 proceeds
ch.
7, and the prayers of these saints ascend abundantly as incense of supplication
and thanksgiving - ch. 8:3,4.
The
silence ends with the ascension of the three sons of Constantine, who each reign
independently over a distinct division of the catholic empire.
At
their accession, “Fire is cast into the earth, and there were VOICES ‘- ver. 5.
The two brothers and seven of the nephews of Constantine, the praefect
Ablavius, and the patrician Optatus, massacred by order of the “pious”
Constantius.
350. Constans, emperor of the “third” then
comprising Italy, Africa, and the Western Illyricum, assassinated by order of a
usurper.
354. Gallus, the Caesar, a nephew of
Constantine, beheaded by Constantius.
“AND
THERE WERE THUNDERS”
Verse
5.
337. War between the Romans and Persians twenty
three years.
Page 34
356. War with the Allemanni and Franks.
357. War with the Quadi and Samaritans.
“AND
THERE WERE LIGHTNTNGS”
340. Civil war between the sons of Constantine
“the Great,” Constans and Constantine, in which the latter is slain.
350. Usurpation of Magnentius and Vetranio,
which produces a revolt throughout the praefectures of Italy and Gaul, with the
Illyrian countries from the Danube to the extremity of Greece. The civil war
continues three years.
355. Revolt and assassination ot Sylvanus.
“AND
THERE WAS AN EARTHQUAKE”
Verse
S
360. The Roman legions at Paris proclaim Julian,
the last of the House of Constantine, emperor. He declares war against Constantius.
361. Constantius dies, and Julian, the pagan, is
acknowledged. He reforms the court of the second “christian” “sovereign
pontiff” by turning out a thousand barbers, a thousand cuphearers, a thousand
cooks, and eunuchs numerous as clouds of insects on a summer’s day. He appoints
the Tribunal of Chalcedon for the sanguinary punishment of the sycophants of
the former reign. He deprives catholics of the power of tormenting heretics:
orders the pagan temples to be reopened; reestablishes paganism as the religion
of the empire; assumes the pago-sacerdotal functions of the Imperial
Pontificate; erases the name of Christ from the Labarum; undertakes the
rebuilding of the temple in Jerusalem, with a view to a falsification of the
prophecies; the enterprise is defeated by earthquake, whirlwind, and a fiery
eruption from the foundations.
He
orders christians to be called Galileans by way of contempt; abolishes clerical
honors and immunities; prohibits “christians” from teaching schools, or
practicing medicine, or the liberal arts.
He
degrades the clergy to the lowest class of the people; excludes catholics from
all offices of trust and profit, on the plea that it is unlawful for christians
to use the sword either of justice or war; condemns them to make full and ample
satisfaction for the pagan temples they had destroyed in the last reign.
The
result of this earthquake is recorded by the sophist, Libanus, in these words:
“Every part of the world displayed the
Page 35
triumph
of religion, and the grateful prospect of flaming altars, bleeding victims, the
smoke of incense, and a solemn train of priests and prophets, without fear and
without danger. The sound of prayer and music was heard on the tops of the
highest mountains: and the same ox afforded a sacrifice for the gods, and a
supper for their joyous votaries.”
363. Julian is wounded in battle, and dies.
Jovian, a catholic created emperor in his stead. He abolishes the edicts of
Julian, and reestablishes the Catholic Apostasy as the legal and privileged
religion of the state.
“The seven angels which have the seven
trumpets prepare themselves to sound”
ver. 6.
395. Preparation-period
ends with the death of Theodosius.
The Sealing and separating the 144,000 from
among the catholics, previous to judgment, finished.
ROME:
AN EPITOME
According
to Varro, the foundation of the city, was laid by Romulus on the 20th
April, in the year 3961 of the Julian period (3251 years after the creation of
the world, 753 years before the birth of Christ). The Romans conquered nearly
the whole of the then known world. In the time of Julius Caesar, the empire was
bounded by the Euphrates, Taurus, and Armenia on the east; by Africa and
Ethiopia on the south; by the Danube on the north; and by the Atlantic on the
west. It included much of Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa.
On
the death of Constantius at York, in Britain, in 306, the troops under his son,
Constantine, saluted him as emperor. In 313 he had conquered the West and had
established his power in Rome. Licinius remained in the east to oppose him, but
was defeated in battle, and put to death by order of Constantine (his
brother-in-law) in 324. Constantine then reigned alone. He established
Constantinople as the capital of the Empire, and died on 22nd May,
337.
The
Empire was divided into Eastern and Western by Diocletian in 296; but was
reunited under Constans in 340. It was again divided into Eastern and Western
by Valentinian and Valens, the former having made the latter, his brother,
emperor of the West in 364.
The
Western Empire, with Rome as its capital, came to an end in 476 when Odoacer,
king of the Heruli took the city. He assumed the title of King of Italy, and
completed the fall of the Western Empire. The Eastern Empire came to an end
with the capture of Constantinople its capital by the Turks, and the death of
Constantine XIII on 29th May, 1453. Thence afterwards,
Constantinople formed part of the Ottoman Empire, and its name was changed to
Istanbul. It remains the only portion in Europe of the once powerful Turkish
Empire today under Turkish control.- Publishers,
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36
BLOWING OF THE FOUR
WINDS
After
the apostle saw the things represented in the sixth chapter; that is, after he
saw in vision the progressive accomplishment of the tak-mg out of the way of
that power, even of the pagan Greco-Latin or Roman power, which hindered the
revelation of the New Power in the estate of Daniel’s fourth beast - a power
both spiritual and temporal, or ecclesiastical and civil, unknown to the
Augustan Caesars who ruled anterior to Constantine; and germinated from that
“Mystery of Iniquity” which, as tares, was sown and springing forth in growing
vigor in the days of John and Paul; after he saw this power, whom the latter
styles “the Man of Sin, the Son of Perdition,” and “the Lawless One,” exalted
to supreme authority and enthroned; in other words, after the entire exhaustion
of the judgments of the Sixth Seal, he saw “four angels” or powers, divinely
commissioned to destroy, “standing against (epi) the four corners of the earth”
- standing in arms, ready to operate against the four projections of that
“third part of the fourth beast earth” or territory, which was to be the arena
of the first four trumpets -namely, Gaul, Spain, Italy, and Africa. For a time,
even during the time of the sealing of the symbolic 144,000, John saw the
authorities, who had the control of these destroying tempests, “holding” or
restraining “the four winds of the earth, that THE WIND,” the one wind of divine
fury, blowing now against Italy, and then against Africa, and then in a third
and fourth direction, “should not blow against the earth, nor against the sea,
nor against any tree.”
That
the blowing of the wind was a destruction set in motion against the earth, sea,
and trees, is manifest from the proclamation made by the sealing angel
commanding the four destroying messenger-powers not to injure them until the
sealing work was accomplished. In other words, when the foundation was firmly
and thoroughly laid for the witnessing against the rising power of the Beast of
the Outer Court, whose Lion-Mouth would be opened in blasphemy, and, aided by
the ten new regal powers, would overcome the witnesses (Apoc. 11:3-7; 13:6,7);
so that there would be moral force enough to carry on the witnessing against
the Apostasy in its decemregal and papal organization during what might remain
of sackcloth-prophesying for a thousand two hundred and threescore symbolic
days - when the foundation of this witnessing institution was duly organized
and strengthened, then, and not till then, the destroying winds might begin to
blow to the injury of the fourth-beast earth, sea, and trees.
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37
THE
FIRST FOUR TRUMPETS
Though
the wind blow towards divers points, and is styled the east wind, the north
wind, and so-forth, it is still but one and the same wind, air, or spirit in
motion. So with “the four winds” of ch. 7:1, they were the one wind, which,
when blown against Italy, Spain, Gaul, and the Roman Africa, “the four corners
of the earth” to be tempest-tossed, sounded forth destroying blasts, and swept
with withering desolation all green and living things. These hurricanes of
destruction are figuratively styled “trumpets;” and as “the wind” was to sweep
over the four sections of the western Roman third of the fourth beast
territory, each blasting current became a distinct trumpet.
The
sounding of trumpets was a divinely appointed Mosaic institution. It was a holy
convocation, styled “a memorial of blowing of trumpets,” and was celebrated on
the first day of the seventh month - Lev. 23:24. It introduced one of the most
important months of the Hebrew calendar - the month on the tenth of which was
the Day of Covering of Sins; on the fifteenth, the Feast of Tabernacles; and on
every fiftieth tenth, the Jubilee, when sins, were not only covered, but every
man re-turned to his possession and family - Lev. 25:8-17.
The
trumpets used were of silver, two fabricated from a whole piece. They were
blown by the sons of Aaron “for the calling of the assembly, and for the
journeying of the camp.” If they blew with only one, then the princes, heads of
the thousands of Israel gathered themselves to Moses; but when they blew an
alarm with both trumpets, it was for war against the enemy that oppressed them;
and with the assurance that they should be remembered by Yahweh their Elohim,
and be saved from their enemies - Numbers 10:1-10.
When
an alarm was blown it portended great evil. This appears from Jer. 4:5, which
says: “Blow the trumpet in the land: cry, Gather together, and say, Assemble
yourselves, and let us go into the defenced cities. Set up the standard toward
Zion: retire, stay not, for I will bring evil from the north, and a great
destruction. The lion is come up from his thicket, and the destroyer of the
Gentiles is on his way; he is gone forth from his place to make thy land
desolate; and thy cities shall be laid waste without an inhabitant.”
And
again, in Joel 2:1. “Blow the trumpet in Zion, and sound an alarm in my holy
mountain; let all the inhabitants of the land tremble for the day of Yahweh
cometh, for it is nigh at hand; a day of darkness and of gloominess, a day of
clouds and of thick darkness, as the morning spread upon the mountains: a great
people and strong; there hath not been ever the like, neither shall be any more
after it... A fire devoureth before them, and behind them a flame bumeth: the
land is as the garden
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38
of
Eden before them, and behind them a desolate wilderness; yea, and nothing shall
escape them. The appearance of them is as the appearance of horses; and as
horsemen, so shall they run. Like the noise of chariots on the tops of
mountains shall they leap, like the noise of a flame of fire that devoureth the
stubble, as a strong people set in battle array. Before their face the people
shall be much pained; all faces shall gather blackness. They shall run like
mighty men; they shall climb the wall like men of war the earth shall quake before them; the
heavens shall tremble; the sun and the moon shall be dark, and the stars shall
withdraw their shining: and Yahweh shall utter His voice before His army: for
His camp is very great: for he is strong that executeth His word: for the Day
of Yahweh is very terrible, and who can abide it?”
Such
is the illustration furnished by the Spirit of what he means by sounding
trumpets of alarm against the guilty. The sounding of a plurality of trumpets
was indicative of war. This is the indication of nearly all the trumpets of the
apocalypse; not of every trumpet, but of all the Seven trumpets certainly. If
they blew with only one, “then the princes, and heads of the thousands of
Israel gathered themselves to Moses.” None of the seven trumpets indicate a
gathering of the saints, or princes and chiefs of the thousands of Israel, to
the prophet like unto Moses. They only portend evil to the Apostasy - the
throwing down of the walls of Babylon, when the last blast of the seventh shall
have sounded against her from the breath of the kings and priests of Yahweh. But
before this portentous blast is sounded by them, a trumpet is blown of a
different import one that “gathers them
together as the elect from the four winds, from one end of the heaven to the
other” - Matt. 24:31. This is the TRUMPET OF THE JUBILEE, which will bring all
the approved into the possession of the inheritance; and is symbolized, by none
of the seven, but by “an angel flying in mid-heaven having aion-glad tidings to
preach.” These moshkai kesheth, or sounders of the truth, of Isaiah 66:19, and messengers
of Matt. 24:31, go forth “with a trumpet and a great voice,” which declares the
glory of Yahweh among the nations. It has no sound of alarm in it, like the
sounding of the seven. When the saints, in their graves, and we who may remain,
hear this great voice, we shall all gather ourselves together to the Moses-like
prophet - to Jesus “both Lord and Christ.” This gathering accomplished, and the
affairs to be transacted in the presence of the Lord with regard to his
household disposed of - then, what remains to be executed in connection with
the sounding of the seventh and last trumpet will be proceeded with; and the
Lamb, with those “who follow him whithersoever he goeth,” will “execute the
judgment written” against Daniel and John’s beasts, till nothing remains of the
civil and ecclesiastical powers of the world.
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39
In
the prophets, this judicial execution by Jesus and His Brethren, the Elohim of
Israel, is styled “The NAME OF YAHWEH coming from far, burning with his anger
his lips full of indignation, and his tongue as a devouring fire: his breath as
an overflowing stream .... to sift the nations with the sieve of vanity” -
Isaiah 30:27. And Yahweh shall be seen over the sons of Zion, whom he shall
raise up against the sons of Greece; “and ADONAI YAHWEH shall blow the trumpet,
and shall go forth with whirlwinds of the south” - Zech. 9:14. This trumpet
thus divinely blown, is the winding up of the seventh apocalyptic trumpet. All
the preceding events of the seven are operative to the development of this
crisis in which is “filled up the wrath of Deity.”
The
sounding by Adonai Yahweh of this closing blast of the seven is the great
apocalyptic day of sacrifice - the slaying of the beasts, before the sins of
the nations are covered over, and they become “blessed with faithful Abraham,”
and “in Abraham and his seed.” He executes the Second and Third angel-missions,
reaps the harvest, and treads the winepress. All this pertains to “the war of
the great day of Almighty Power.” It prostrates Babylon, breaks in pieces the
powers of the nations, and establishes the power of the kingdom in all the
earth.
The
final purpose, then., of the seven trumpets is to abolish the Laodicean
Apostasy, which enthroned itself in the reign of Constantine the First, and of which
he was the new-born defender of its faith. This is the grand and glorious
consummation prepared for the Catholic and Protestant hierarchies of what the
world styles “Christendom.” They will then have answered their purpose in the
providence of heaven of a spiritual police in aid of the civil government of
the nations. There will be no more any use for them; because the nations being
enlightened and blessed, will no longer require deceivers and impostors to rule
them by terror and imposition. “All nations shall come and worship before thee,
0 Lord; for thy judgments are made manifest” - Apoc. 15:4. Clerical hierarchies
then will be no more; and the truth will cease to be evil spoken of because of
their impiety and folly.
But
these deceivers of “the whole earth that goes wondering after the beast” (ch.
13:3), were not to be permitted the enjoyment of times of bliss during the
centuries of their inhabitation of the high and fat places of the world. They
were image makers, relic and demon worshippers, murderers of the servants of
the Deity, bewitchers of the people with their sorceries, or theological
conceits, corrupters of silly women, and thieves. This is the apocalyptic
indictment against them - ch. 9:20,21; 11:7; 13:6,7,15; 16:6,7; 17:3,6;
18:20,23,24. Was it to be supposed that the Deity would permit these titled and
wealthy blasphemers of His name, and tabernacle; these idolatrous “spirituals
of wickedness in the
Page
40
heavenlies;”
to enjoy all the sweets of life and receive none of the plagues stored up as
His artillery for the day of evil? Such a winking at their iniquity was no part
of His wisdom revealed to John. The trumpets were so arranged in their sounding
as to give the clergy “wormwood” and “blood to drink;” and to be “tormented” to
the gnawing of their tongues for pain and sores-ch. 8:11; 16:6;9:4,5; 16:10,11.
This
judicial operation, however, was not to affect all parts and or-ders of the
clerical dominion at one and the same epoch. When the preparation for beginning
to sound the trumpet was complete in the Gothic occupation of the Illlyran
Third of their domain, the Catholic Empire was permanently divided into Two
LIMBS, as represented by the thighs and legs of Nebuchadnezzar’s Image; the
EASTERN CATHOLIC LIMB being Greek, with Constantinople for its imperial and
ecclesiastical centre; while the WESTERN CATHOLIC LIMB was Latin, with Rome for
its Mother City. This western section consisted of Gaul, Spain, Britain, Italy
and the Roman Africa. This was the first Constantine’s imperiality when he
divided the Fourth Beast dominion with his rivals Licinius, who possessed the
Illyrian Praefecture; and Maximin, who possessed that composed of the Asiatic
provinces and Egypt.
The
judgments of the trumpets were ordered with reference to this threefold
division of the Catholic World. The first four trumpets were to be blown
against the WESTERN THIRD, that its inhabitants of all orders and degrees
(except the sealed ones who were cherished) might be plagued until their power
was broken, and their sovereignty blotted out for a season
MAP
PAGE 40 NOT COPIED
Page
. 41
When
these judicial calamities had settled down into the generation of a new and
rising order of things, judgment was preparing for an ascent from “the Pit of
the Abyss” against the EASTERN THIRD of the catholic domain. It was the mission
of the fifth and sixth trumpets primarily to torment, and then to kill the
political life of the men, who wielded authority and power over the subjects of
this imperial praefecture; and secondarily, of the sixth, to inflict “wars”
upon the unrepentant spirituals of the Western Third, until the seventh should
begin to sound-ch. 11:14.
The
first four trumpets, then, made the Western Praefecture the seat of war - the
third part of the Roman Orb, consisting, as we have said, of Gaul, Spain,
Britain, Italy and the province of Africa, an area upon which, were caused to
bud forth by the judgments that befell, the TEN POWERS seen by Daniel and John
as “Ten Horns” upon the Eighth Read of the Fourth Beast.
It
may be remarked here, that we do not learn from Daniel that the Fourth Beast
had more heads than one. His was a vision of said beast in its constitutional
manifestation coevally with its being slain, and its body politic given to the
burning flame, at a time when judgment is also given to the saints for its
especial destruction. I speak not now of what he saw concerning the Little
Episcopal Horn Power; but of the head. All the horns were seen standing upon
the head of the beast. The history of the past is demonstrative that the Eleven
Horns did not stand on either of the first seven; though, when the uninstructed
in these mysteries under-take to give sketches of the beast, they scatter the
ten horns over all the seven heads. The Horns only began to bud forth in the times
of the Seventh Head, and therefore cannot be placed upon any of the previously
developed six. This seventh was to continue only “a short space.” The beast and
horns have continued many ages since the seventh head fell; unless therefore we
view the horns as standing upon the Eighth Head, we have before us a symbolical
monstrosity of a beast with ten horns and no head for them to stand upon. It is
to John’s writing we are indebted for knowledge about the heads. From him we
learn that the beast of Daniel has Eight Heads; and that it is with the eighth
that the ten horns are allied for “one hour” in a period of conflict with the
lamb and those that are with him - ch. 17:11-14.
The
trumpets were not only destructive of much that existed but formative
rudimentally of future political manifestations. The first four destroyed the
Latin Catholic Imperial state unity of the western third; abolished the
sovereignty of Rome; and formed the ten rudimental powers, which are destined
for world-wide operations in the last hour of their existence. In the first
four trumpets we have to do with things rudi-
Page
42 .
mental;
but in the seventh and last, with the great and marvelous manifestations of the
future, which could by no means have been developed without the preliminary
judgments we proceed now in their apocalyptic order to expound.
ACT
I - FIRST WIND-TRUMPET
The
hurting of the earth by hail and fire, mingled with blood, by which a third
part of the trees, and all green grass is burned up.
A.D.
395, and onwards.
“And
the first angel sounded, and there was hail and fire which had been mingled
with blood, and it was cast into the earth; and the third of the earth, and the
third of the trees was consumed, and every green blade was burned up.
Apoc.
8:7
1. The Symbols Explained
A
prophesy couched in such terms as these indicates nothing but judgment of the
severest kind. It is a tempest of the most scathing description imaginable - a
beating down with hail, scorching with lightning, and causing blood to flow.
The
prophets give us to understand that by such language as this is signified, “A
mighty and strong one casting down to the earth with the hand.” This
interpretation is indicated in Isaiah 28:2; as “Yahweh hath a mighty and strong
one, as a tempest of hail, and a destroying storm, as a flood of mighty waters
overflowing, he shall cast down to the earth with the hand,” or power of the
sword. This was a threatened war against the drunkards of Ephraim, which was
afterwards executed by the King of Assyria who cast down their sovereignty, and
carried them away into a captivity from which they have not yet returned. They
thought themselves secure, and made lies their refuge, and under falsehood hid
themselves. But in the seventeenth verse they are informed that “the hail
should sweep away the refuge of lies, and the waters overflow the hiding
place.”
In
Ezek. 13, we find, that the self-constituted prophets of Israel promising peace
to Jerusalem, when Yahweh had determined there should be no peace for her, is
styled building up a wall, and daubing it with untempered mortar. Ezekiel was
commanded to announce to them, that it should fall by an overflowing shower;
and then addressing
Page
43
the
constituents of the shower, he says, “And ye, 0 great hailstones, shall fall;
and a stormy wind shall rend it.” This prediction was after-wards fulfilled by
the Chaldeans under Nebuchadnezzar, who as great hailstones, a mighty and
strong power, demonstrated the flimsiness and instability of their wall by
laying Jerusalem in ashes and destroying the liars out of her.
In
The Apocalypse, hailstones operate conspicuously in demolishing walls daubed
with untempered mortar, sweeping away the refuges of lies, and overflowing all
hiding places. Beside the place before us, they are brought into play in chs.
11:19 and 16:21. The hail in these two places signifies the same thing - a
mighty and strong power, which falls out of the heaven upon men to plague them
exceedingly. This power is the power of the heaven, the spirit, congealed (if I
may so speak) into spiritual bodies weighing one talent a piece. These are the
hailstones and coals of fire which result from the thunder voice of the Most
High. They are the electrical congelations of the Spirit which beat down the
Assyrian in his latter day overthrow; as it is written, “And Yahweh shall cause
his glorious voice to be heard, and shall show the lighting down of his arm,
with the indignation of anger, and the flame of devouring fire, scattering and
tempest and hailstones; for through the voice of Yahweh shall the Assyrian be
beaten down who smite with a rod,” (Isaiah 30:30). The Assyrian to be beaten
down by these living, precious, and all powerful hailstones, is the Gog of
Ezekiel, the Fourth Beast of Daniel, and the eighth Head in alliance with the
Ten Horns of John. These are destroyed by the saints when judgment is given to
them; they are mighty and strong who fall upon them as a plague of hail and a
destroying storm upon the forest.
“The
third of the earth,” into which the mighty and strong power is cast for
judicial execution, was that third section of the Roman Orb occupied by “the
third of the trees.” A third implies two other thirds. The trees of these two
thirds were not to be affected by the scorching hail-commingled fire. It was to
be confined to one of the thirds, which, as we shall see in our historical
illustration, was the Western Third. This is “the earth,” or arena, of the
first trumpet.
“Trees”
are symbolical of the great men among a people. This is evident from Jotham’s
parable in Judges 9:8. “The trees went forth,” said he, “to anoint a king over
them, and they said unto the Olive Tree, Reign thou over us’.” But , when the
olive, and the fig, and the vine, severally declined to be promoted over the
trees, all the trees with one voice invited the bramble to wear the crown; to
which this prickly bush replied, “If in truth ye anoint me king over you, then
come and put your trust in my shadow; and, if not, let fire come out of the
bramble, and
Page 44
devour
the cedars of Lebanon.” All this is perfectly intelligible, and no sane mind
would think of trying to interpret it upon what is called the literal principle
of hermeneutics. The trees in Jotham’s parable symbolized all the men of
Shechem, and all the house of Millo, in whom the king~making and
king~sustaining power resided. It is unnecessary to adduce further proof of
this notable signification of “trees” in the symbolic language. An aggregation
of wild, uncultivated trees constitutes “a forest.” This is prophetically obnoxious
to the storm of hail, which descends upon it; while the people, or trees of
Yahweh’s planting (Isaiah 61:3) are dwelling securely, as Israel did in Goshen
when the rest of Egypt was desolated and scorched by literal hail mingled with
fire; as it is written, “My people shall dwell in a peaceable habitation, and
in sure (or safe) dwellings, and in quiet resting places, when it shall hail,
coming down on the forest” (Isa. 32:18). This shows that when hail descends on
forest trees, there is no peace, safety, or tranquillity, to the wicked
represented thereby.
“Grass”
is figurative of the multitude. “All flesh is grass” (Isaiah 40:6). It may be
either withered or green and flourishing. Before the blast of this trumpet is
blown, the grass is “green”; but when the trumpet ceases to sound, it is burned
up, and consequently black. Before the hail and fire mingled with blood
descends, the catholic multitude, consisting of priests and people, are “green
grass.” They are so represented, because of their wickedness, and the iniquity
worked by them. The proof of this is found in Psalm 92:7, as, “When the wicked
spring as the grass, and when all the workers of iniquity do flourish, it is
that they shall be destroyed forever.” Grass that springs is green and looks
flourishing. This is sufficient to determine the meaning of the symbol. When it
becomes withered or black, it is “because the Spirit of Yahweh bloweth upon
it,” and the tempest licks it up as stubble (Isaiah 40:7,24).
Hence
then, the symbolism of this trumpet is representative of the Spirit of Yahweh
blowing upon the great men and people of the catholic apostasy of the West. He
did it by destroying agents already in a state of preparation. The hail and
fire mingled with blood were these agents, ready to fall upon the pious
hypocrites of the Latin West, when the time appointed should arrive.
2. Historical Exposition
The
following historical summary from Elliot’s Horae Apocalypticae being strictly
correct, I cannot do better than to lay it before my readers. “The first angel
sounds his trumpet: and lo the same tremendous tempest as before, black with
other clouds from the cold hail-generating countries beyond the Danube, and
charged with lightning
Page
45
and
hail, appears driving westward. “The third of the land,”(*) or continental
provinces of the Western division of the Roman empire, is declared the fatal
scene of ravage. The Asiatic continent and maritime province of Africa are to
remain unharmed by the storm: and the European provinces, too, of the Eastern Empire
mostly to escape. The skirts of the storm discharge themselves, as it passes
forward, on the Rhoetian hill-country. Then quickly its course is towards
Italy. As it sweeps across the Italian frontier, other terrific thunder-clouds
from the distant north-west quarter of the heaven succeed, and intermingle with
the first. Once and again, the almost united tempests spread in devastating
fury over Italy, beyond the Alps and Apennines. Then dividing, a part, impelled
yet further south, bursts with terrific lightnings directly over the
Seven-Hilled Imperial City, and passes thence to the southernmost coast of
Bruttium beyond. A part, driven backward, takes a westerly course over the
Rhine, into Gaul, and far and wide devastates it; then, crossing over the Pyrenaean
chain, pours its fury on the Spanish provinces: nor spends itself till it has
reached the far shores, west and south, of the Atlantic and Mediterranean. Thus
has the entire continental division of the Western Empire been involved in its
ravages. Throughout the whole, the lightning fire runs along the ground, even
as in the plagues of ancient Egypt, burning in wide spreading conflagration
country and town, trees and pasture. And there are signs, too, not to be
mistaken, of the destruction of life, as well as of vegetation: for blood
appears mixed with the fire and hail. Slowly at length the storm subsides,
destroying, however, even in its subsidence. The desolation that it leaves is
frightful. The land was as the garden of Eden before it. It remains a wasted
wilderness.” Vol.1. p. 343.
ALARIC
and RHADAGAISUS were the leading spirits of what Claudian, a contemporary
writer, styles the “hail-storm.” With singular impolicy, Arcadius, the emperor
of the eastern third, which fell to him on the death of Theodosius, made Alaric
Master General of the Eastern Illyricum, and furnished him by so doing with
arms from the imperial armories. During four years he made preparation for the
invasion of the West. Installed by imperial authority in the centre of the
Illyrian Third, he was seated, as Gibbon expresses it, “on the verge, as it
were, of the two empires.” The separate halves of the catholic body politic
were before him, devoted of heaven to be ruthlessly scathed and torn in his
merciless career. As preliminary to this sanguinary enterprise, the chieftains
of his nation, according to ancient custom, raised him upon a shield, and
proclaimed him King of the Visigoths.
(*) Instead of to triton ton dendron, as in
Griesbach’s text, it reads doubtless more correctly as in Tregelles’, to triton
tes ges, kaj to tritofl ton dendron, as rendered in my translation.
Page 46
At
this epoch, the first trumpet sounded, A.D. 395-400. “Fame,” says Claudian, “encircling
with terror her gloomy wings, proclaimed the march of the barbarian army, and
filled Italy with consternation.” The public distress was aggravated by the
fears and reproaches of superstition. The pagans had no omens and sacrifices to
consult; but the infatuated catholics still derived some comfort from what they
regarded as the powerful intercession of saint and martyr ghosts. The emperor
Hon-onus was preeminent in fear. The approach of Alaric to Milan caused the
Emperor to flee, and take refuge at Asta, a small fortified town, in Piedmont,
in which he was hard pressed by the Goths. The timely arrival of the renowned
Stilicho effected his deliverance. The Goths retreated, and were afterwards
defeated at Pollentia. But Alaric soon repaired his losses, and boldly resolved
to break through the unguarded passes of the Apennine, to spread desolation
over the fruitful face of Tuscany, and to conquer or die before the gates of
Rome. Before, however, his threat was carried into effect, another “dark cloud
collected along the coast of the Baltic, and burst in thunder upon the banks of
the upper Danube.” Rhadagaisus, the king of the confederate Germans, passed
without resistance the Alps, the Po, and the Apennine, A.D.406. Many cities of
Italy were pillaged or destroyed. Alaric was a catholic and a leader of a
disciplined army; but, Rhadagaisus was a savage, and a stranger to the manners,
religion and language of the South. The senate and people of Rome, “the trees
and green grass” of the State, trembled while yet his presence was before
Florence, 180 miles from Rome, which he vowed to reduce to a heap of stones and
ashes, and to sacrifice the most illustrious Romans on the altars of those gods
who were appeased by human blood. But the fierceness of this portion of the
hail and fire mingled with blood, was destined to expend itself before
Florence. The strategy of Stilicho again saved the capital, and caused more
than a third of the vast and various multitude of Sueves, Vandals, and
Burgundians, who adhered to the standard of Rhadagaisus, to perish on the
fields of Tuscany. But one hundred thousand Germans still remained in arms
after the death of Rhadagaisus; and the invasion of Gaul, which Alaric had
designed, was executed by the remnant of the great army of the Baltic. “This
memorable passage (of the Rhine) of the Suevi, the Vandals, the Alani, and the
Burgundians, who never afterwards retreated, may be considered,” says Gibbon,
“as the fall of the Roman empire in the countries beyond the Alps; and the
barriers which had so long separated the savage and the civilized nations of
the earth were, from that fatal moment, leveled with the ground.”
The
subjects of Rome in Gaul, ‘”the trees” and “green grass” of the
Page
47
earth,
unconscious of their approaching calamities, enjoyed the state of quiet and
prosperity, which had seldom blessed the frontiers of Gaul. The banks of the
Rhine were crowned, like those of the Tiber, with elegant houses, and
well-cultivated farms. This scene of peace and plenty was suddenly changed into
a desert, and the prospect of the smoking ruins could alone distinguish the
solitude of nature from the desolation of man. The flourishing city of Mentz
was surprised and destroyed; and many thousand catholics massacred in their
temples; and the consuming flames of war spread from the banks of the Rhine
over the greatest part of the seventeen provinces of Gaul. That rich and
extensive country, as far as the ocean, the Alps, and the Pyrenees, was
delivered to “the hail and fire mingled with blood” - the barbarians, who drove
before them, in a promiscuous crowd, the bishop, the senator, and the virgin,
“the trees” and “green grass,” laden with the spoils of their houses and
altars;
The
inroads of the Barbarian nations
during
the period of the sounding of Note
Map pg 47 not shown
the
first trumpets. By 407 the Roman
garrison
in Britain had revolted and
set
up a soldier Emperor of its own
known
as Constantine (not to be con
fused
with Constantine the Great)
At
that time therefore, Britain had
independent
status.
See
Penguin Atlas of Medieval
History.
Page
48
so
that in less than two years, the divided troops of the savages of the Baltic
advanced, without a combat, to the foot of Pyrenees.
As
I am not writing a detailed history of the times, but selecting so much from
history already written as will illustrate what has been fulfilled of The
Apocalypse, it will be unnecessary for me to do more than to note, that the
calamities that befel “the third of the earth” were aggravated by the revolt of
the army in Britain, which renounced its allegiance to the Emperor of the West,
and set up a new emperor, named Constantine, whom they found in the lowest
ranks of the army. He established himself in Britain and Gaul, and received
also the submission of Spain, whose feeble resistance was ineffectual to
prevent the authority of the usurper being acknowledged from the walls of
Antoninus to the columns of Hercules. (*)
Adversity
had exercised and displayed the genius of Alaric; and the fame of his valor
invited to the Gothic standard the bravest of the barbarian warriors, who from
the Euxine to the Rhine were agitated by the desire of rapine and conquest.
After the death of Stilicho, he put his troops in motion, and A.D. 408, with
bold and rapid marches, passed the Alps and the Po; pillaged several cities;
proceeded on to Rimini, stretched his ravages along the sea coast of the
Hadriatic, and meditated the conquest of the ancient Mistress of the World. An
Italian hermit sought to turn him from his purpose; but was silenced by the
solemn asseveration of Alaric, that “he felt a secret and preternatural
impulse, which directed, and even compelled, his march to the gates of Rome.”
During
a period of six hundred and nineteen years “the Queen of the Earth” had never
been violated by the presence of a foreign enemy. The hour had now arrived for
this indignity. The city was blockaded by Alaric, whose vigilance inflicted
upon it at length the horrid calamities of famine. Enraged by hunger, the
desperate devoured the bodies of their victims; and even mothers tasted the
flesh of their slaughtered infants! Many thousands of the inhabitants expired
in their houses, or in the streets, for want of sustenance; and the stench
arising from so many putrid and unburied carcasses, infected the air. At length
Alaric was induced to retire by the payment of an enormous ransom, and to enter
upon negotiations for peace. But these failed through the imbecility and
infatuation of the administration. A second siege of Rome was formed; and a
third followed, A.D. 410, Aug.24. At midnight, the Salanan gate was silently
opened, and the inhabitants were awakened by the tremendous sound of the Gothic
trumpet. Eleven hundred and sixty-
(*) This Constantine is not to be confused with
Constantine “the Great” or his son, Constantine II.
He
was a private soldier of the same name in the British garrison, whom the
legions of that country, with impetuous levity had seated on the throne. He
experienced a measure of success in battle, and extended his influence over
Gaul and Spain - Publishers.
Page
49
three
years after the foundation of Rome, the imperial city, which had subdued and
“civilized” so considerable a part of mankind, was delivered to the licentious
fury of the tribes of Germany and Scythia.
This
awful catastrophe of Rome filled the astonished empire with grief and terror.
The people deplored the afflictions of “the Queen of Cities;” while the clergy,
who applied justly to recent events the lofty metaphors of oriental prophecy,
were foolishly tempted to confound the destruction of the capital, and the
dissolution of the globe.
The
victorious Goths evacuated Rome on the sixth day, and marched into the southern
provinces of Italy, destroying whatever dared to oppose their passage, and
plundering the unresisting country. The “hail and fire mingled with blood”
continued to consume “the trees,” and to burn up “the green grass” for a still
longer period than that reached by the termination of the career of the King of
the Goths. While meditating further conquests beyond the limits of this
trumpet, Alaric was suddenly arrested by the power of death, which fixed, after
a short illness, the fatal term to his conquests. His sepulchre was built in
the bed of the Consentia, a river in Bruttium, and adorned with the spoils and
trophies of Rome. The secret of its location was concealed by restoring the
waters to their accustomed channel, and the massacre of the prisoners employed
in constructing it:- “The last Italian blood,” remarks Elliot, “that mingled
with the fire and hail,” under the judgments of the first trumpet.
ACT
II- SECOND WIND-TRUMPET
The
hurting of the Sea by a great mountain burning with fire being cast into it, by
which the third of the Sea became blood; the third of its living creatures
died; and the third of its ships was destroyed.
A.D. 429 and Onwards Apoc. 8:8,9
“And
the second angel sounded, and, as it were, a great mountain burning with fire
was cast into the sea; and the third of the sea became blood. 9. And the third
of the creatures in the sea, having souls, died; and the third of the ships was
destroyed.”
1.
Symbols Explained
We
are plainly informed in this text, that its terms are not to be understood
“literally”: that the great mountain in a state of intense com-
Page 50
bustion
was not a real mountain, but something analogous thereto. The information is
conveyed by the use of the particle hos, as it were. What John saw represented
was a destroying power of great force and magnitude, judicially affecting the
population of the maritime arena of the Western Third of the Catholic empire.
“The
very etymology of the word mountain,” says Daubuz, “helps out the signification
of the symbol. For ,a mountain(*), comes from (////)in Hiphil (????).This, and
the Chaldee(???), and the Arabic(???) signify to command, subdue, and govern.
So, in our military terms, hills and mountains are said to command the places
about them. Mountains burning with fire together with a strong wind, and seen
by a king in his dream, signify, according to all the interpreters among the
Persians and Egyptians, the destruction of his people by a warlike enemy.”
In
addressing the Babylonian power of Chaldea, the Spirit styles it “a destroying
mountain” - “Behold, I am against thee, 0 Destroying Mountain, saith Yahweh,
which destroyest all the earth” (Jer. 51:25). “A mountain burning with fire” is
a destroying power; and the direct opposite to “mountains that bring peace to
the people.” A mountain burning with fire would throw the sea, if cast therein,
into a bubbling and hissing agitation; it would be “a mountain of prey” but, if
the mountain were burnt, instead of burning, it would represent a great power
deprived of all ability to injure - a power destroyed instead of destroying.
Therefore, saith Yahweh to the power of Babylon which had destroyed all the
earth subjugated by it, “I will stretch out Mine hand upon thee, and roll thee
down from the rocks, and will make thee a burnt mountain;” a prediction that
was fulfilled when He executed “the vengeance of his temple” by Cyrus and his
uncle, “the kings of the Medes
“The
sea” of this trumpet is the politico-geographical arena of its judgments. The
mountain burning, or destroying, with fire was providentially “cast into the
sea.” “Sea, clear and serene, denotes an orderly collection of men in a quiet
and peaceable state. When troubled and tumultuous, a collection of men in
motion and war. Either way, waters signifying peoples (Apoc. 17:15), and the
sea being a collection of waters, the sea becomes the symbol of people,
gathered into one body
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
we
cannot follow the author in this statement. The Hebrew for “mountain” is Har or
Harar, not Dabyr as above. The Hebrew dabar signifies “to command”, and
symbolically mountains can command the bills or plains about them. The term
“mountain” has also been used in a political sense. For example, during the
French Revolution, the largest, and most revolutionary of the parties were the
Jacobins also styled The Montagrards or The Mountain because it sought to
dominate the other parties including the Girondins, another powerful party,
though not as commanding as the Jacobins. Between them the independent members,
and smaller groups were known as the Plain. This usage of Mountain and Plain in
a symbolic and political sense is what Bro. Thomas is referring to:
but
we cannot follow the citation from Daubiat which seems to be incorrect Publishers.
Page
51
politic,
kingdom, or jurisdiction, or united in one design.”
The
four great beasts of Daniel 7 were seen by the prophet to come up out of “the
sea” in consequence of the four winds striving upon the Great Sea. The many
headed beasts of the apocalypse are but symbolical parts of the fourth of these
in Daniel. As the whole came up out of the sea, so therefore must its parts;
and that sea, says the prophet, was “the Great Sea,” or Mediterranean. In this
trumpet-prophecy “the sea” has a twofold signification, the symbolic and
literal. The destroying power was to descend literally upon the maritime region
washed by the waters of the Mediterranean; and symbolically upon the peoples
inhabiting its coasts. The Romans used the term as inclusive of the islands and
maritime coasts of what they regarded as their sea, because situate in the
midst of their domain.
“The
third of the sea.” This, the sea-third, is the sea of the same “third of the
earth,” that was subject to the emperor of the catholic west. It included the
coasts of Spain, Gaul, Italy, and the Roman Africa; with the islands of Sicily,
Sardinia, Corsica, Majorca and Minorca. This sea-third “became blood.” Its
peoples were put to the sword because of the enormity of their blasphemy,
hypocrisy, and crime; for it is on account of these things that the judgments
of heaven are poured out with volcanic fury and destruction upon mankind.
MAP
PAGE 51 NOT SHOWN
.
Page
52
“The
creatures in the sea having souls* were the fish of the symbolic sea; and therefore
fish in a symbolic sense. “A sea being thus considered,” says Daubuz, “as a
kingdom or empire (in the text, the western empire), the living creatures in it
must be typical fishes, or men. But if a sea be considered only of the waters,
of which it is a collection, then the waters will signify the common people;
and the fishes, or the creatures in the sea, living, as having a power to act,
will denote their rulers. And in this sense are the fishes mentioned in Ezek.
29:4,5, explained of the princes of Pharaoh.”
“The
ships.” The introduction of ships into the prophecy indicates that the
judgments of the second trumpet have especial regard to the naval and
commercial interests of “the third.” Job’s days “passed away as swift ships.”
Here ships are used as a metaphor signifying swiftness. In this, his days were
analogous to ships. “They that go down to the sea in ships, do business in the
great waters.” To destroy these ships, then, would be to destroy the business,
whether naval and commercial: and to destroy those who worked them. In
predicting this destruction, there-fore, of the naval and commercial power of
the western third’s dominion, all that was necessary was to say, “the third of
the ships was destroyed.”
2. Historical Exposition
The
following is Mr. Elliott’s sketch of the phenomena of this vision. “A pause
ensues. Then presently there is heard another trumpet-blast of judgment. Now,
is the visitation of the Western Third of the Mediterranean sea, and the
islands and transmarine province included in it; a part hitherto unscathed and
safe. Behold yon giant mountain-rock, blazing with volcanic fires, that
upheaved from the southernmost point of Spain near the straits of Gades, and
cast into the sea, looks like Etna in its raging! Mark how the waters of the
midland sea are agitated by it! The lava pours down the mountain sides. The
igneous stones and ashes of the volcano are scattered for hundreds of miles all
round, on sea and mainland, coasts and islands; first on the coast of Africa,
then on that of the opposite continent, from the Atlantic Straits, all along up
to the head of the Adriatic. Ships appear set on fire by them, at sea and in
the harbors, and light the waters with their conflagrations. Blood marks the
loss of life accompanying; the same as in the former vision. Over the whole
maritime scene of its devastations whatever is habitable appears
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
(*)This
rendering differs from the Common version. exonta psuchas, is there incorrectly
turned into “had life,” as if psuchas were a singular noun. Supposing probably
that “the sea” was wholly literal, they did not like the idea of giving souls
to fish. Had they thought that “the creatures were men and women, souls would
doubtless have been ostentatiously paraded in the text.
Page 53
desolated;
whatever had life, destroyed.”
To
the Vandal power was providentially assigned the judicial execution of the second
trumpet upon the guilty catholic population of the west. Their work began A.D.
429, by their precipitating their destroying hosts, led by GENSERIC their king,
upon the rich and productive province of Africa. Gibbon styles him “the
terrible Genseric; a name, which, in the destruction of the Roman empire, has
deserved an equal rank with the names of Alaric and Attila.” His ambition was
without bounds and without scruples; and prompted him to any enterprise that
promised plunder and dominion. His power was a volcanic mountain vomiting forth
desolation and death upon what he styled “the guilty.”
The
discord of Aetius and Count Boniface, two generals of the Western empire, was
the fatal and immediate cause of the eruption of this Vandal volcano, which
resulted in the loss of Africa and the islands. Boniface, then in arms against
the administration, invited Genseric to an alliance. The Vandal king readily
accepted the invitation; and, by the assistance of the Spaniards, who,
anxiously desiring to get rid of them, furnished him with ships, he transported
his Vandals over the Straits of Gibraltar to the coast of Mauritania where he
mustered about 50,000 effective men.
BARBARIAN
INVASIONS (AD 200-AD430)
Map
not shown
Page
54
When
Genseric landed in Africa, he became the deliverer of the Donatists, who were
then suffering the most rigorous persecution by the catholic officials, lay and
clerical. Among the latter was their zealous enemy, the so-called “Saint”
Augustin, Bishop of Hippo, who died just before his city was taken, A.D. 430,
and, according to Mr. Elliott, was “joined to the white-robed company before
the throne!!” Genseric being an enemy to the catholic faction in power, showed
himself to the Donatists as a powerful deliverer, from whom they might reasonably
expect the repeal of the odious and oppressive edicts of the Roman emperors.
Genseric’s vengeance descended with terrible effect upon the “wolves in sheep’s
clothing,” who had been so long and cruelly oppressing all who were opposed to
the reigning catholic superstition. Under the reign of the Vandals, whose
success they favored, the Donatists of Africa enjoyed an obscure peace of one
hundred years, at the end of which they may again be traced “by the light of
the imperial persecutions.”
At
the time of invasion, Africa was so fruitful as to deserve the name of the
common granary of Rome and of mankind. On a sudden, the seven fruitful
provinces from Tangier to Tripoli were overwhelmed. The Vandals where they
found resistance seldom gave quarter, and the deaths of their comrades were
expiated by the ruin of the cities before which they had fallen. Boniface
having returned to his allegiance, obtained the command of a powerful armament
of ships and land forces, with which he boldly attacked the Vandals before
Hippo. But his defeat irretrievably decided the fate of Africa. Eight years
after the fall of Hippo, Carthage was reduced to ignominious servitude. After
permitting his troops to satiate their rage and avarice, he enjoined all
persons, without fraud or delay, to deliver their gold, silver, jewels, and
valuable furniture or apparel, to his officers; and the attempt to secrete any
part of their patrimony was inexorably punished with torture and death, as an
act of treason against the state. The nobility and senators of Carthage were
condemned to perpetual banishment; and crowds of exiles, of fugitives, and of
ingenuous captives, filled the provinces of the east and west.
With
the capture and sack of Carthage, all resistance to the “mountain burning with
fire” ceased in Africa. By the separation of this province, the internal
prosperity of Rome was irretrievably destroyed. The rapacious Vandals
confiscated the patrimonial estates of the emperors and cut off the regular
subsidies. The distress of the Romans was soon aggravated by an unexpected
attack, June 15, A.D. 455. There being nothing to tempt the rational ambition
of the Vandal king in the direction of the desert, “he cast his eyes,” says
Gibbon, “toward the sea. He
Page 55
resolved
to create a naval power, and his bold resolution was executed with steady and
active perseverance. He animated his daring Vandals to embrace a mode of
warfare which would render every maritime country accessible to their arms;” so
that, “after an interval of six centuries, the fleets that issued from the port
of Carthage again claimed the empire of the Mediterranean.” They vomited fire
upon Sicily, which “became blood” in its conquest and the sack of Palermo. The
Western empire being left without a defender and lawful prince, the avarice of
Genseric increased, and, with a numerous fleet of Vandals and Moors, he cast
the anchors of his burning power into the sea at the mouth of the Tiber. Having
disembarked, he boldly advanced to the gates of Rome. The bishop (for there was
then no Pope, no Pontiff King with temporal power, and “church-states” to be
ruled with a grievous yoke) this bishop
Leo, at the head of his clergy, issued in procession to supplicate with all due
orthodox humility, a restraining of the fierce and burning wrath of the
heretical defender of the Donatists. The Vandal king promised to spare all
non-resistants, to protect the buildings from fire, and to except the captives
from torture. Nevertheless, Rome and its inhabitants were delivered to the
blind passion of his soldiery. The pillage lasted fourteen days and nights.
Among the spoils transported from the city by the king were the Golden Table
and the Seven-Branched Golden Light-stand, brought by Titus to Rome, where they
were deposited in the temple of peace. Nearly four hundred years after, these
spoils of Jerusalem were shipped for Carthage, with the rich plunder of the
catholic bazaars, dedicated to demons called “guardian saints,” and adorned by
the excessive superstition of the coreligionists of Ambrose, Jerome, Augustin,
and company. The gold and silver, amounting to several thousand talents, with
the jewels, brass, and copper, accumulated by rapine, were all removed to the
fleet, which returned laden with thousands of captives, with a prosperous navigation,
to Carthage all except one vessel
bearing the relics of the capitol, which descended to the bottom of the sea.
But
“the sea” had not yet sufficiently “become blood;” nor had “the third of the
creatures in the sea, having souls, died;” nor had “the third of the ships”
been “destroyed.” To bring this about required the revival of “the kingdom of
Italy’s” power of resistance (for the Western empire had been reduced to an
Italian kingdom) to Genseric upon the sea. The four years reign of the
judicious and enterprising Majorian afforded scope for this. Perceiving that
Rome could not be safe while Carthage existed as a hostile state, he determined
to create a maritime power, and by it achieve the conquest of Africa. In three
years he collected an imperial navy of three hundred large galleys, with an
adequate
Page 56 .
proportion
of transports and smaller vessels, in the secure and capacious harbor of
Cathagena in Spain. Hearing of this, and apprehensive of Majorian’s descent at
his own original landing place, Genseric reduced Mauritania into a desert.
Secret intelligence guided him to the anchorage of his foe, whose unguarded
fleet he surprised in the bay of Carthagena. Many of the ships were taken, or
sunk, or burnt, and the preparations of three years were destroyed in a single
day.
For
six years after the death of Majorian, the government of Italy was in the hands
of the Count Ricimer alone, one of the principal commanders of the barbarians,
descended from the Visigoths and Suevi. Under his rule, the kingdom of Italy
was afflicted by the incessant depredations and conflagrations of the Vandalic
“mountain burning with fire.” In the spring of each year, Genseric sallied
forth from the port of Carthage in command of the most important expeditions.
When asked by his pilot what course he should steer, “Leave the determination
to the winds,” said he, “THEY will transport us to the guilty coast whose
inhabitants have provoked the divine justice.” They repeatedly visited the
coasts of Spain, Liguria, Tuscany, Campania, Lucania, Bruttium, Apulia,
Calabria, Venetia, Dalmatia, Epirus, Greece, and Sicily. They subdued the
island of Sardinia, and spread desolation or terror from the columns of
Hercules to the mouth of the Nile; and, as they always embarked a sufficient number
of horses, they had no sooner landed, than they swept the dismayed country with
a body of light cavalry. The fierceness of the scourge is attested by the
massacre of five hundred noble citizens of Zante, whose mangled bodies he cast
into the Ionian sea- “the sea became blood; and the creatures in the sea,
having souls, died.”
The
permission of such sanguinary seventies by Providence can only be accounted for
on the principle of the wicked being Yahweh’s sword for the punishment of the
hypocrisy, blasphemy, superstition, and immorality of the victims. Genseric
seemed to recognize that he was the executioner of “divine justice” upon the
orthodox catholic fraternity that inhabited “the sea”. “The fury of the
Vandals,” says Gibbon, “was confined to the limits of the Western empire” - to
“the third of the sea, and of the creatures, and of the ships.” The Italians,
now destitute of a naval force, through the haughty Ricimer were at length
reduced to address the throne of Constantinople in the language of subjects;
and Italy submitted, as the price and security of the alliance, to accept a
master from the choice of Leo the First, the Emperor of the East, in the person
of Anthemius, who entered Rome as Emperor of the West, April 12, A.D. 467.
Immediately after this, “regardless of the majesty of the purple,” said he, “I
gave my daughter to a Goth; I sacrificed my own blood to the safety of the
republic.” But this did not prevent Ricimer, his
Page 57
daughter’s
husband, from sacking Rome and putting him to death,
A.D.
472.
In
the meantime, however, the alliance developed immense naval and military
preparations on the part of the eastern Romans, languidly aided by the west,
for carrying the war into Africa. One hundred and thirty thousand pound weight of
gold (about £5,200,000), and seven hundred thousand of silver, paid into the
treasury for expenses, reduced the cities to extreme poverty. The fleet it
provided, and which sailed from Constantinople to Carthage, consisted of eleven
hundred and thirteen ships, and the number of soldiers and mariners - “the
creatures in the sea having souls” - exceeded one hundred thousand men. This
formidable navy was increased by a fleet under Marcellinus from the Adriatic.
Consternation seized the Carthaginians; but Genseric beheld the danger with
firmness, and eluded it with his veteran dexterity. Having obtained a truce of
five days to regulate the terms of submission, in this short interval the wind
became favorable to his designs. He manned his largest ships of war with his
bravest Moors and Vandals, who towed after them many large barks filled with
combustible materials. In the obscurity of the night, “as it were a mountain
burning with fire,” these destructive vessels were impelled against the
unguarded and unsuspecting fleet of the Romans. Their close and crowded order
assisted the progress of the fire, which was communicated with rapid and
irresistible violence; and the noise of the wind, the crackling of the flames,
and the dissonant cries of “the creatures in the sea having souls” the soldiers and mariners, who could neither
command nor obey - increased the horror of the tumult. While they labored to
extricate themselves from the fireships, and to save at least a part of the
navy, the galleys of Genseric assaulted them with temperate and disciplined
valor; and many of the Romans, who escaped the fury of the flames, were
destroyed or taken by the victorious Vandals. “More than half the fleet and
army was lost,” and Genseric again became “the Tyrant of the Sea.” The coasts
of Italy, Greece, and Asia, were again exposed to his vengeance; and, before he
died, in the fullness of years and of glory, A.D. 477, he beheld the final
extinction of the Trinitarian Empire of the West. And thus “the third of the
creatures in the sea, having souls, died; and the third of the ships were
destroyed.”
Page
58
ACT
Ill-THIRD WIND-TRUMPET
The
poisoning of the third of the rivers and fountains of waters with a deadly
bitterness, by the Great Blazing Star APSINTHOS falling from the heaven into
them, and causing the death of many.
A.D.
450, and onwards.
“And
the third angel sounded, and a great star blazing as it were a torch fell out
of the heaven: and it fell upon the third of the rivers, and upon the fountains
of waters. Ji. And the name of the star is called the Apsinthian; and the third
of the waters became undrinkable; and many of the men died out of the waters,
because they were made bitter”
Apoc~
8:10,11
1. Symbols Explained
On
account of the luminaries in the natural heaven governing the day and the night
(Gen. 1:14-18), all luminaries in the symbolical language signify ruling
powers; and the light itself is well employed to signify the edicts, laws,
rules, or directions that proceed from them for the good of their subjects.
Thus of the Great King, styled the “Day Star,” and “the Sun of Righteousness,”
it is said in Psalm 119:105, “Thy word is a light unto my path;” and in Hos.
6:5, “Thy judgments are as the light.”
“I
am,” saith the Lord Jesus, “the bright and the Morning Star” -Apoc. 22:16; the
Star which the Spirit compelled Balaam to predict would “come out of Jacob”
(Num. 24:17). By this star is evidently intended a ruler, a conqueror, a great
potentate; for, as the Sceptre of Israel, he is to “smite the princes of Moab,
and to destroy all the children of Sheth.”
A
Star, therefore, sometimes signifies a destroying power. The word is also put
for that which is inconstant, or meteoric in its motions. Hence, in Jude, such
stars are styled “wandering” or shooting stars. In this third trumpet prophecy,
the star seen was of this species. It shot forth out of the heaven. John did
not see it there, shining as a fixed star of great and sparkling, but steady
light; its motion was erratic, wandering or shooting out of the starry sphere
into regions below the ruling heaven. It fell from its position where it was “a
Great Star” in the heaven. It fell, or descended, not because it was expelled
as those stars of the heaven which the Little Horn of the Goat cast down to the
ground, and stamped upon (Dan. 8:9,10) by a superior power; but by its own
precipitancy, derived from the motive power of Deity, whose agent
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it
was for judgment upon the Laodicean Apostasy.
In
symbolic style, “a great star blazing as it were a torch” signifies no good to those
upon whom it is said to fall. Its effects must be conflagrating and deadly. An
ordinary, or literal, blazing torch would be extinguished by falling into
water; but we know that certain bodies cast into that fluid will set it on
fire, and convert it into a solution that would be fatal to the drinker. There
is therefore a decorum, or fitness, in the language of the vision, which is now
known to be founded in the nature of things. Mr. Cunninghame has therefore well
remarked that “the language of symbols is not of arbitrary or uncertain
signification, but is interpretable on fixed principles, to ascertain and
define which, is the first duty of a commentator, as the judicious application
of that language to the events of history is the second.”
“A
shooting star was, in antiquity, the appropriate image of a powerful and
successful invader from a distant country.” “The more I read this wonderful
book” (the Apocalypse), says Bishop Horsley, “the more I am convinced that the
precision of the phraseology is little short of mathematical accuracy. The
language seems highly adorned, but the ornaments are not redundancies: they are
not of that sort that the proposition would remain the same if the epithets
were expunged. And in passages which may seem similar, there never is the
smallest variation of style, but it points to something of diversity, either in
the subject or the predicate. With this notion of the style of the Apocalypse,
I think it of importance to remark that the falling stars of the third and
fifth trumpets fall ‘from heaven,’ or out of the sky,’ but are not said to be
of ‘the stars of heaven,’ which are seen to fall in ch. 6. But, further, that
which falls from heaven,’ or ‘out of the sky,’ upon the sounding of the third
trumpet, is a great star, burning as it were a lamp.
“Lampas,
in the Greek language, is the name of a meteor of a particular sort. From
Pliny’s description, it is evident that lampas was one sort of those meteors
which are commonly called ‘shooting stars.’ It was of that sort, in which a
large ball, appearing first in time, and foremost in the direction of the
motion, draws a long train of bright sparks after it. Such exactly was the
meteor in the vision of the third trumpet.
“The
most remarkable circumstances in these shooting stars are these: 1. They have
no appropriate place in the starry heavens, but are engendered in the lower
regions of the earth’s atmosphere. 2. They shine by a native light; but third,
are visible only while they fall. 4. The motion is rapid. 5. The duration brief.
6. The brightness, while it lasts, intense. 7. The extinction instantaneous. 8.
And when the light is extinguished, nothing remains: the body which emitted the
light is nowhere to be found.”
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The
falling of a great star blazing like a torch out of the heaven, then, was
symbolical of a great destroying power, issuing forth from a lower region of
the political aerial, progressing by its native force with rapid, but brief,
yet intense motion, coming suddenly to the end of its career, and leaving nothing
but a smoking desolation as the memorial of its presence.
“The
heaven” out of which it blazed forth was the heaven under which were “the
rivers and fountains of waters” into which the great star precipitated itself.
“Wherever the scene is laid,” says Daubuz, “heaven signifies, symbolically, the
ruling power or government; that is, the whole assembly of the ruling powers,
which, in respect of the subjects, or earth, are a political heaven, being over
and ruling the subjects as the natural heaven stands over and rules the earth:
so that according to the subject is the term to be limited and, therefore,
Artemidorus, writing in the times of the Roman emperors, makes the country of
Italy to be heaven. As heaven says he, is the abode of gods, so is Italy of kings”
But
after the times of the pagan emperors, and concurrent with those of the
scarcely less pagan Constantine and his successors, the Roman Heaven expanded
itself into the comprehensiveness of the three seats, or thrones, which ruled
over the three thirds, or Imperial Praefectures, into which the dominions of
Daniel’s Fourth Beast, civil and ecclesiastical polity, were divided. These
heavenly thirds are especially recognized in the vision of the fourth trumpet;
and are styled in Dan. 7:27, “the Whole Heaven.” The whole is more than its
parts. These thirds of the heaven have relation to the thirds of the earth, or
Roman Orb; and may be styled, the Byzantine or Constantinopolitan Heavenly, the
Italian Heavenly, and the Illyrian Heavenly, all of them “the abode of kings.”
A shooting star, generally, projects itself obliquely: so, when this “great
star blazing as it were a torch” fell, it fell “out of” its own appropriate
heavenly, into “the waters” under the neighboring third, whose heavenly bodies
were doomed shortly to be eclipsed. It fell from the Illyrian heavenly section
of “the whole heaven,” into the rivers under the Italian Third.
Yahweh
charges Sennacherib with saying by his messengers to Hezekiah: “With the
multitude of my chariots, I have digged and drunk strange waters, and with the
sole of my feet have I dried up all the rivers of fenced places.” These waters
and rivers were the foreign nations he had laid waste. And again: “0 Jacob,
when thou passest through the waters, I will be with thee; and through the
rivers, they shall not overflow thee”: that is, waters or peoples, and rivers
or nations. So they are also explained in Apoc. 16:4-7, where “rivers and
fountains of waters” are declared to be those who have “shed the blood of
saints and prophets”;
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61
and
in ch. 17:15, “the waters” upon whom the Great Harlot sits are peoples, and
multitudes, and nations, and tongues.
But
we are not to suppose that because “waters” signify these populations of earth,
their geography and topography are left undetermined. On the contrary, in the
phrase, “upon the third of the rivers, and upon the foundations of waters,” is
a blending of the literal and the symbolical, which is so frequent in prophecy.
There is a striking illustration of this in Apoc. 17:9,10, where the seven
heads of the beast are symbolical of seven supreme powers, or “kings”; and
literally identical with the seven mountains on which they were successively
located: so “the rivers” pertaining to “the third” represents symbolically the
populations thereof; and their literal chorography in the mountainous and
valley, or river, regions of the Catholic West. These “rivers and fountains of
waters” had not, previously to the times of the third trumpet, done much in the
way of shedding the blood of saints and prophets; they were beginning to
approve this remedy for what they were pleased to style “heresy”: nevertheless,
they had proved themselves bitter persecutors of “the sealed servants of
Deity,” during the one hundred and twenty-five years their rulers, who were all
“pious catholics,” exercised dominion over Italy, Africa, Gaul, Spain and
Britain. The third trumpet was an especial element of the judgment upon them.
Its scorching visitations retaliated upon them bitterness and death for the
bitterness they had caused “the sealed.”
But
after the judgments of the third and fourth trumpets had extinguished the
so-called orthodox catholic power of the West, another power arose out of the
wreck, which was a perfect novelty in the earth. This has been known for more
than a thousand years past as the Papal. It acquired sovereignty over “the
rivers and fountains of waters,” and energized them “to shed the blood of
saints and prophets,” to pour it out abundantly; so that they became worthy to
receive blood to drink, by one who, under the third Vial, gloried in his
resemblance to the Great Star that blazed like a torch in the judicial
execution of the third trumpet retribution. (*)
“And
the name of the star is called ho Apsinthos”. This I have simply transferred as
being the name of the star before the English tongue was written or spoken. As
the star-power did not exist in John’s day, the legetai, “is called,” must be
understood to mean that, in the days of the third trumpet, those who spoke
Greek called it ho Apsinthos. It is a proper name; and is to be taken in a like
sense as the name of the con-queror, styled by men in the days of the third
vial, “the Corsican.” This was applied to the first Napoleon as indicative of
the country from which
“I
will prove.” said Napoleon, “an Attila to Venice.”
Page 62.
he
came; so the Great Star was called by the Greeks, “the Apsinthian,” to
designate the region out of whose heaven he fell blazing upon “the third of the
rivers,” after he had proved a scourge to them.
I
have said that “the Apsinthian” fell upon “the rivers and fountains of waters,”
out of the Illyrian section of the whole heaven of the Roman orb. My reason for
this is that Apsinthos is the name of a river in the Illynan third of the Roman
earth; and is therefore as significative of Illyria, as the Euphrates was of
Assyria, or the Nile of Egypt.
But,
for what reason, may we conclude, did the Spirit select this river of Illyricum
in preference to any other? Because of the signification of the name being
appropriate to the nature of the judgments to be executed by THE ILLYRIAN
POWER, which had been developed in the preparation of the angels of the
trumpets for sounding. The word radically signifies undrinkable from whatever cause.
The trumpet mission of the Illyrian Power was to make the rivers of the third
undrinkable, by putting many of the men of the waters to the sword, that they
might die out from them. This was, as in the Arabic Romance, Antar, it is
expressed, “Death serving them with a cup of apsinth by the sword.”
2. Historical Exposition
The
following is Mr. Elliott’s summary of the phenomena of the vision. “Which,” he
inquires, “is the new scene of judgment? ‘The third of the rivers,’ it is said,
‘and the fountains of waters.’ It begins where yon mighty river to the North
forms the ancient limit between barbarian Germany, and the Illyrian, or Middle
Praefecture of the Roman Empire. Mark the portentous meteor that glares over
it; like a blazing torch trailing its red line of light behind it in the
Northern sky! And see, where the Teiss pouring itself into the Danube, marks
the central point of the base of the Great Illyrian Praefecture; there suddenly
it descends, and blazes, and taints with its sulphurous exhalations the
downward course of that ancient river.
“But
it was the same western third of the empire, as before, that was in this case
too to taste specially of the bitterness of the woe. And mark how, in
fulfillment of its mission, the meteor tracks the course of the Upper Danube,
and then reaches and moves along the Rhenish
frontier
river of the Western Empire; blazing over and poisoning its waters, down even
to the Belgic lowlands. Thence again unquenched it rises; shoots in rapid
course westward; is repelled, as if by some counter electric force, and as from
a region on which it behoved not that it should permanently shed its malignant
influences; then in southerly direction falls on the fountains of European
waters, there where the Alpine snows are dissolving from their eternal
glaciers. Wheresoever it has fallen, the
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63
rivers
and their tributaries have been poisoned by it; and the dead and dying of those
that drink them, appear lying on the banks. Having thus done its part, it
shoots back towards the Danube; there blazes for a moment longer, and is
extinct.”
“In
the reign of ATTILA the Huns,” says Gibbon, “became the terror of the world - a
formidable barbarian, who alternately insulted and invaded the east and the
west, and urged the rapid downfall of the Roman Empire.” He alone among the
conquering meteors, or blazing torches, of ancient or modern times, united the
two mighty kingdoms of Germany and Scythia under one sceptre. Claiming to be
the rightful possessor of the Sword of Mars, he asserted his divine and
indefeasible claim to the dominion of the earth. He soon acquired a sacred
character; and the barbarian princes confessed, in the language of devotion or
flattery, that they could not presume to gaze with a steady eye, on the Divine
Majesty of the King of the Huns. As supreme and sole monarch of the barbarians,
he was able, when he collected his military force, to bring into the field an
army of five, or according to another account, seven hundred thousand troops.
When these were set in rapid motion, they constituted a power, that may be very
appropriately likened to “a Great Star blazing as a torch.”
The
Attila-power, which prevailed from A.D. 433 to 453, was fitly designated “the
Apsinthian,” or Illyrian. It touched the Danube on one hand, and reached with
the other, as far as the Tanais, or Don. On making peace with the
Constantinopolitan power, after a ravaging war of five years to which he was
stirred up by his African ally, the redoubtable GENSERIC, the eastern Catholic
emperor, resigned to Attila an extensive and important territory, which
stretched along the southern banks of the Danube from Belgrade to Nova, in the
diocese of Thrace, a breadth of fifteen day’s journey, and embracing Naissus
within the limits of his dominion. The exact location of his capital is
uncertain; but supposed to have been seated between the Danube, the Teyss, and
the Carpathian hills in the plains of Upper Hungary. All these regions were
embraced in the great Illyrian Praefecture; so that the great Attila-star might
well be styled by its Greek contemporaries of the Byzantine dominion adjacent,
“THE ILLYRIAN;” and by the Spirit symbolically, “the Apsinthian.”
Theodosius
the younger, emperor of the east, having acknowledged Attila, the Illyrian, as
the lord of the Lower Danube, the Huns were now its masters, commanding the
navigation to the Black Sea; and prepared to blaze forth in any direction
Providence might impel them to take. “What fortress,” said the Apsinthian to
the Byzantine ambassadors, “what city, in the wide extent of the Roman Empire,
can hope to exist, secure and impregnable, if it is our pleasure that it should
be
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erased
from the earth?” They knew by experience, that these were not mere words; and
as they were unequal to contend with him in war, they sought to rid themselves
of this “Scourge of God,” by his assassination. But “the Apsinthian” was not to
be thus imperially disposed of till his mission was fulfilled; and then the
Deity would lay his instrument aside in his own way. Attila was informed of the
conspiracy against his life; and though he had the meaner conspirators in his
hands, he disdained to punish them; but reserved his just indignation for the
pious catholic prince who approved his murder. He denounced Theodosius as a
wicked slave, who had clandestinely conspired against his master, “whom fortune
and merit had placed above him” Nevertheless, he consented to pardon the
emperor, and to maintain peace.
All
the history of the Illyrian Conqueror goes to show, that his abode was in “the heaven,”
and that he was “a great star” therein; for he enjoyed the proud satisfaction
of receiving in the same camp, the ambassadors of the eastern and western
empires; and it is only to sovereign and recognized powers, that such
apocalyptic “demons,” are commissioned by the superior gods of their
heavenlies.
The
inglorious life of Theodosius was closed A.D. 450. The Apsinthian Star
forthwith assumed a threatening aspect against both empires. “While mankind,”
says Gibbon, “awaited his decision with awful suspense, Attila sent an equal
defiance to the courts of Ravenna and Constantinople, and his ministers saluted
the two emperors in the same haughty terms, saying, ‘Attila my lord, and thy
lord, commands thee to provide a palace for his immediate reception’.” But “the
Apsinthian” despising the Romans of the east, whom he had so often vanquished,
soon declared his resolution of suspending the easy conquest, till he had
achieved the more glorious and important enterprise of “blazing like a torch
upon the third of the rivers, and upon the fountains of waters;” and thus
unconsciously fulfilled the mission appointed for him by the finger of God.
For
this great and blazing descent upon the Western Third, the kings and nations of
Germany and Scythia, from the Volga to the Danube obeyed the warlike summons of
“the Scourge of God.” From the royal village in the plains of Hungary, he
marched to the conflux of the Rhine and the Neckar, where he was joined by the
Franks. These hostile myri ads were poured with restless violence, into the
Belgic provinces. The consternation of Gaul was universal. Its cities were
besieged and stormed by the Apsinthian Huns, who practised their customary
maxims of war. They made the waters undrinkable; so that multitudes were
separated from them by death; for they were made very bitter. “They involved,”
says Gibbon, “in the promiscuous massacre, the
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65
priests
who served at the altar, and the infants, who in the hour of danger had been
providentially baptized by the bishop; and the flourishing city (Metz) was
delivered to the flames.” From the Rhine and Moselle, Attila marched into the
heart of Gaul; crossed the Seine at Auxerre; and fixed his camp under the walls
of Orleans. From this city, however, he prudently retreated to the plains of
Chalons. The nations from the Volga to the Atlantic were marshalled here under
the Illyrian, and Aetius and Theodoric, the catholic generals of the west. The
results were very bitter to the contending hosts. Many of the Gothic warriors,
who served in that memorable engagement informed Cassiodorius, that it was “a
conflict fierce, various, obstinate, and bloody; such as could not be
paralleled, either in the present or in past ages.”
The
number of the polbi ton anthropon, the “many of the men” who were apsinthianized
in this battle of Chalons, amounted to 162,000, or, according to another
account 300,000. Though Attila was put to the
(Map
pg 65 not copied)
Page 66
worse
in this battle, he threatened his foe with redoubled fury. Prudence, however,
prevailed over revenge; and the allied army of Latin and Gothic catholics
separated, and withdrew from the plains of Chalons. Attila’s retreat beyond the
Rhine confessed the last victory achieved in the name of the western empire.
The Thuringians who served under “the Apsinthian,” made the waters very bitter.
They massacred their hostages and captives; they tortured young maidens with
exquisite and unrelenting rage; their bodies were torn asunder by wild horses,
or their bones were crushed under the weight of rolling wagons; and their
unburied limbs were abandoned on the public roads, as a prey to dogs and
vultures.
Neither
the spirit, the forces, nor the reputation of the Apsinthian Star were impaired
by the failure of the Gallic expedition. It had blazed like a torch, and
embittered the river populations of the country; but it had only partially
executed its mission upon the worshippers of relics and demons. In the ensuing
spring he passed the Alps into Italy with an innumerable host of barbarians. He
laid siege to Aquileia, the most populous and strongest of the maritime cities
of the Hadriatic. The Huns mounted the breach with irresistible fury, and the
succeeding generation could scarcely discover the ruins of Aquileia. After this
dreadful chastisement, this blazing torch descended upon Altinum, Concordia,
and Padua, which were reduced into heaps of stones and ashes. The in-land
towns, Vicenza, Verona, and Bergamo, were exposed to the rapacious cruelty of
his Huns. Milan and Pavia submitted without resistance to the loss of their
wealth; and applauded the unusual clemency, which preserved from the flames the
public, as well as private buildings; and spared the lives of the captive
multitude. After this, the scorching ravages of this Great Star, blazing like a
torch, overspread the rich plains of modern Lombardy, which are divided by the
Po, and bounded by the Alps and Apennine.
“It
is a saying,” says Gibbon, “worthy of the ferocious pride of Attila, that the
grass never grew on the spot where his horse had trod. Yet the savage destroyer
undesignedly laid the foundation of a republic, which revived, in the feudal
state of Europe, the art and spirit of commercial industry.” This was Venice.
Before the Apsinthian descended like a blazing torch upon the Italian province
of Venetia, extending from the confines of Pannonia to the river Addua, and
from the Po to the Rhaetian and Julian Alps, this fertile region was adorned
with fifty cities flourishing in peace and prosperity. They also were swept by
the conflagration; “all was flight,” says Sigonius, “depopulation, slaughter,
slavery, and despair;” but many families who fled from the sword of Attila,
found a safe, though obscure refuge in the hundred islets at the ex-
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tremity
of the Hadriatic. Upon these they laid the foundations of the queen of that
sea, which in after times became the Tyre of the feudal world; “and,” says
Elliott, “he who has seen the fair Venice may do well to remember that he has
seen in it a memorial of the terrors and ravages of that Scourge of God, the
Hun Attila.”
What
a terrible signification there is in the apocalyptic symbols:
This
great blazing star was still craving devastation and blood; and declared his
resolution of carrying his victorious arms to the gates of Rome. But the Star
was meteoric, and, as a meteor, must be of brief duration, and suddenly become
extinct. It had been blazing and scorching among “the rivers and fountains of
waters” during three years; but where was the power to extinguish it? The
barbarians, who had defended Gaul, refused to march to the relief of Italy; and
the succors promised by the Eastern Emperor were distant and doubtful. The only
deliverance was in unqualified submission. The Western Emperor, with the Senate
and people of Rome, by a solemn and suppliant embassy, embraced the salutary
resolution of deprecating the wrath of “the Apsinthian.” The barbarian monarch
listened with favorable, and even respectful attention; and the deliverance of
Italy was purchased by an immense ransom; but before he evacuated the country,
he threatened to return more dreadful, and more implacable, if the treaty were
not faithfully and punctually observed. But his mission being accomplished, he
was of no further use. Having returned to his royal village between the Danube
and the Teiss, the next year, which was A.D. 453, he was suddenly cut off by
apoplexy, and this blazing “terror of the world” lay powerless in death. The
empire and power of the Huns was soon after broken; and the wind of the third
trumpet ceased to blow.
ACT
IV - FOURTH WIND-TRUMPET
The
darkening of the third of the luminaries of the Greco-Latin Catholic firmament
by smiting them; so that the Day and the Night of their system were without
ruling lights, and therefore, shone not for a third of them.
A.D.
476
“And
the fourth angel sounded, and the third of the sun, and the third of the moon,
and the third of the stars, was smitten; so that the third of them was
darkened, and the day shone not the third of it, and the night likewise.”
Apoc.
8:12
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68
1. Symbols Explained
“For
the understanding of the prophesies,” says Sir Isaac Newton truly, “we are, in
the first place, to acquaint ourselves with the figurative language of the
prophets; which is taken from the analogy between the world natural, and an empire
or kingdom considered as a world politic.”
The
sun, moon, and stars are therefore prophetic symbols taken from the natural
world. “The Lord God is a Sun, and Shield” (Psalm 84:11). He is the universe’s
Ruler and Lightgiver, and Protector. This is the signification of sun, as a
symbol, in its largest sense. But, in Jer. 15:9, it is used restrictedly in the
testimony of the Spirit against Jerusalem; as “Her sun is gone down while it is
yet day.” In this instance the sun symbolized the sovereign power and glory of
the commonwealth, of which Jerusalem was the capital. It went down when the
state was destroyed by the Chaldeans. But it shone forth again; and again went
down, when the kingdom was taken away from the Pharisees - when “the sun was
darkened, the moon gave no light, and the stars fell from the Heaven;” and were
thenceforth suppressed superlatively “until He come whose right it is,” even
“the sun and shield.” Then, the Spirit saith to Jerusalem, “the sun shall no
more be thy light by day; neither for brightness shall the moon give light unto
thee; but Yahweh shall be unto thee an everlasting light,” or sun; “and thine
Elohim thy glory. Thy sun shall no more go down; neither shall thy moon
withdraw itself; for Yahweh shall be to thee for the Light,” or sun, “of the
Olahm;” and which is explained to signify, that “the days of Zion’s mourning
shall be ended” - she should no more lose her sovereignty, and mourn the
withdrawal of her ecclesiastical institutions and privileges.
Again,
when the Spirit revealed his purpose to subvert the Egyptian monarchy by the
Chaldean power, he said to the King of Egypt, whom he likened to a dragon, in
the seas, in Ezek. 32:6-8, “I will water with thy blood the land wherein thou
swimmest; and when I shall extinguish thee, I will cover the heaven and make
the stars thereof dark: I will cover the sun with a cloud, and the moon shall
not give her light. All the bright lights of heaven, will I make dark over
thee, and set darkness upon thy land, saith Adonai Yahweh.” The Chaldean power
under Nebuchadnezzar was the “cloud” that covered the sun of Egypt, and made
the stars of its heaven dark, and its moon eclipsed; and the Pharaoh-Dragon
thenceforth swam no more in Egypt.
After
the same manner the prophets spoke when they predicted the overthrow of the
kingdoms of Babylon and Idumea. In foretelling the subversion of the former
power by the Medes and Persians, Isaiah says
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69
in
symbolizing ch. 13:9, “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” - ver. 10; which in verse 11, is
interpreted to signify the punishing of the Chaldean world for evil, “and the
wicked for their iniquity.”
The
threatening against the Idumean sovereignty is in the highly symbolic style of
the sixth seal. “All the host of heaven,” says the Spirit in Isa. 34:4, “shall
be dissolved, and the heavens shall be rolled together as a scroll; and all
their host shall fall down, as the leaf falleth off from the vine, and as a
falling fig from the fig tree. For my sword shall be bathed in heaven;” then
follows the exposition: “Behold, it shall come down upon Idumea, and upon the
people of my curse to judgment.”
Thus,
we see, that the moral universe, the Israelitish, the Egyptian, the Chaldean,
and the Idumean, kingdoms and empires, have all their suns, moons, stars, and
constellations, as well as the natural world or system of things. The supreme
civil and military authority of a state is the sun which sheds forth all the
light, power and glory of the polity. The moon, stars and constellations are
the ecclesiastical and aristocratic orders, which reflect its beams upon the
earth or subjects of the state. They rule the day and the night of their own
polity, which, without their shining, has no distinction of day or night. Like
the natural world luminaries, they are affected by eclipses, darkening, and so
forth, which become causes intercepting or suspending their regular and
peaceful influences upon the peoples.
Daniel’s
fourth beast system of powers has its sun, moon, and stars, as well as the
polities by which it was preceded. Under its pagan constitution, the authority
and power vested in the imperial and senatorial orders were the sun of the
Roman orb; its moon, the priestly orders of the state; and subject kings,
nobles, and magistrates, its stars and constellations. When the pagan
constitution that hindered was taken out of the way, the aerial, or political
expanse, transmitted the rays of the same lights, only that they emitted
influences less intensely heathen than be-fore. The sun, moon and stars which
continued to shine had become “catholic.” They radiated the malign influences
of the Laodicean Apostasy, and were essentially, though not professedly and in
detail, as devilish as of old.
In
the earlier years of Constantine’s reign, the Roman Sun was the one solar
investment of three emperors - Constantine, Licinius, and Maximin. So also,
when “the silence in the heaven about half an hour” had ended, his three sons
were clothed with the sun. In these instances, each emperor’s jurisdiction was
representative of “the third of the sun;” and the ecclesiastical orders in each
imperial jurisdiction, of “the third
Page 70 .
of the moon;” and the nobles
and magistrates also in each, “the third of the stars”. If one of these
emperors made war upon another of them, and defeated him, and incorporated the
dominion of the vanquished in his own jurisdiction, then “the third of the sun
and the third of the moon, and the third of the stars,” would be “darkened” by
Smiting; and there would be no political “day” nor “night” peculiar to that
smitten third.
Now, in the days of the
third trumpet, the sun of the Roman Heaven clothed the emperors of the eastern
and western thirds, to say nothing of the Illyrian. The smiting of one of these
thirds to obliteration from the political map, would be the darkening of that
third in its imperial, ecclesiastical, and aristocratic relations to the
subject peoples of its eclipsed jurisdiction. The unsmitten third would be “the
third of the men,” which so long as it continued a distinct and independent
power, would be regarded as living, or not “killed” (Apoc. 9:18).
When there are no heavenly
bodies visible to a spectator supposed to be standing upon the earth, the
alternations styled day and night, do not exist. To blot out the sun, moon, and
stars of the natural universe, would be to extinguish day and night, and to
establish “darkness upon the face of the deep.” The effect would be analogous
in the political universe. For, as in the case of Egypt, when Pharaoh’s
dominion was abolished, to make all the bright lights of heaven dark, would be
to set darkness upon the land. But, as in the instance of the Greco-Latin
Catholic dominion, if only one third of its sun, moon, and stars be smitten
into obscuration, the day and night of the whole polity would not be
extinguished, but only a proportional third. The imperial catholic day and
night would be restricted to the unsmitten thirds, where the bright lights of
their heaven would still be observed to shine.
2. Historical Exposition
The
phenomena of the fourth trumpet are thus briefly sketched by Mr. Elliott: “The vision
has passed; the fourth angel sounds. Hitherto, though its land, its sea, and
its frontier rivers and fountains of waters have been desolated, yet the sun
has still continued shining on the West-ern Empire as before. But now at length
this too is affected. To the extent of a third part of its orb, it suffers
eclipse. The shadow falls over the Western Empire. Then the night supervenes.
And see the eclipsing influences act on the luminaries of the night also.
Presently the Western third of the moon becomes eclipsed; and of the stars
scattered over the symbolic firmament, all that are in the third of the Roman
sky, are dark-ened also.”
Page 71
Thus,
by the judgments of the first, second, and third, trumpets, the final
catastrophe was preparing, by which the emperors of the west and their
dominions were to be extinguished. Rome’s glory had long departed; its
provinces severally and successively separated from it; the territory still
remaining to it had become like a desert; and its maritime dependencies, and
its fleets and commerce, been annihilated. Little remained to it but the vain
titles and insignia of sovereignty; and now the time was come that, by the
smiting of the fourth trumpet, these too were to be withdrawn; and that the
imperial, or Sixth Head of the Roman Dragon should be “as it were slain unto
death,” and give place to the SEVENTH HEAD, which had not then yet come, and
which, “when he cometh, must continue a short space” (Apoc. 13:3 and 17:10).
The
blast of the fourth trumpet when it began to sound, found Romulus Augustulus,
A.D. 476, the last and feeblest of emperors, upon the throne of the catholic
dominion of the West. He was placed there by his Father Orestes, the secretary
of state to the imperious Attila: and after his death “Patrician, and Master
General” of the barbarian confederates in the service of the Western empire,
who formed the defense and the terror of Italy. They oppressed and insulted the
last remains of Roman freedom and dignity. Their insolence and avarice at
length prompted them peremptorily to demand, that a third part of the lands of
Italy should be immediately divided among them. But Orestes rejected the
audacious demand. The standard of revolt was raised, therefore, by the bold
barbarian ODOACER. From all the camps and garrisons of Italy, the confederates
flocked to the standard of this popular leader. Over-whelmed by the torrent,
Orestes entrenched himself in Pavia, which was stormed and pillaged; and the
tumult could be appeased only by his execution. This “smiting” left Augustulus
at the mercy of Odoacer, whose clemency he was induced to implore.
The
success of this revolt elevated the king of the Heruli to the Vicegerency of
the Emperor of the West. But deeming the imperial office both useless and
expensive, Odoacer determined to abolish it. The unfortunate Augustulus was
made the instrument of his own disgrace, by sending in his resignation to the
Senate. An epistle was addressed by their unanimous decree to Zeno, the
contemporary incumbent of the Byzantine throne. In this document, they solemnly
“disclaim the necessity, or even the wish, of continuing any longer the
succession in Italy; since, in their opinion, the Majesty of a Sole Monarch is
sufficient to pervade and protect, at the same time, both the east and the west.
In their own name, and in the name of the people, they consent that the Throne
of Universal Empire shall be transferred from Rome to Constan-tinople; while
they renounce the right of choosing a master, the only ves-
Page
72
tige
that yet remained of the authority which had given laws to the world. The
republic might safely confide in the civil and military virtues of Odoacer; and
they humbly request, that the Emperor would invest him with the title of
PATRICIAN, and the administration of the diocese of Italy.” After some display
of displeasure and indignation, Zeno’s prudence and vanity prevailed. He was
gratified by the title of SOLE EM-PEROR, and by the statues erected to his
honor in the several quarters of Rome. He gratefully accepted the imperial ensigns,
the sacred ornaments of the throne and palace, which the Patrician Odoacer was
not unwilling to remove from the sight of the people.
Speaking
of Romulus Augustulus, whom Odoacer sent into banishment, Gibbon says, that of
all the nine emperors of the last twenty years
the
empire, Augustulus “would be the least entitled to the notice of posterity, if
his reign, which was marked by the extinction of the Roman empire in the west,
did not leave a memorable era in the history of man-
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- (Map
page 72 not shown)
In
AD 476, the Western Roman Empire came to end when Romulus Augustulus was
deposed. The Eastern Empire gradually eroded until it was brought to its demise
by the Ottoman Power in the over-throw of Constantinople in 1453. In the West,
the Holy Roman Empire was established by Charlemagne, but in the east the
Ottoman Power remained supreme until its decline.
Page
. 73
kind”.
The epoch was, indeed, remarkable and peculiar. The Roman Sun was still
recognized as shining; but still it shed no administrative light in the west.
One third of its face was pervaded by the shadow of a darkening body - the
administration of the Patrician of Italy. By this also the light of the Roman
Moon was diminished one third; for of what account in the state were the bishop
of Rome and his clergy, while “the diocese of Italy” was the patrimony, not of
St. Peter and his pretended successor, but of Odoacer and his military
compatriots?
Odoacer
was the first barbarian who reigned in Italy. The stem Ricimer had exercised
the power, without assuming the title, of a king; so that the patient Romans
were insensibly prepared to acknowledge the royalty of Odoacer and his barbaric
successors. The laws of the emperors were strictly enforced, and the civil
administration of Italy was still exercised by the praetorian praefect and his
subordinates; while the Roman Magistrates were appointed by Odoacer to the
odious and oppressive task of collecting the public revenue. Being an Arian
Catholic, the Trinitarian Catholics of the Italian Diocese were in eclipse.
Their sect no longer constituted the State Church. The bishop of Rome was now
the mere bishop of churches in Rome; and he and his clergy were nothing but
sectaries and dissenters. The absence of catholic abuse of the Patrician by his
contemporaries, attests the toleration which they enjoyed. His praefect,
however, had to interfere in the choice of their bishop that the peace of the
city might be preserved. They regarded this interference with disgust; but
being under eclipse they could not help themselves. The brightness of their
ecclesiasticism was darkened over them; and Trinitarian churches had to submit
to the humiliation and defilement of heretical Arian interference in the
election of a so-called Successor of St. Peter and St. Paul!
Notwithstanding
the prudence and success of Odoacer, his patriciate exhibited the sad prospect
of misery and’ desolation. The country was exhausted by the irretrievable
losses of war, famine, and pestilence; and Gelasius, the Roman bishop, and one
of Odoacer’s subjects, af-firms, that in Aemilia, Tuscany, and the adjacent
provinces, the human species was almost extirpated. The plebeians of Rome, who
were fed by the hand of their master, perished or disappeared, as soon as his
liberality was suppressed; and the senators, “the stars” of the Roman
firmament, bewailed their private loss of wealth and luxury. One third of their
ample estates was appropriated to the use of Odoacer’s confederates. Actual
sufferings were embittered by the fear of more dreadful evils; and as new lands
were allotted to new swarms of barbarians, each senator, or “star,” was
apprehensive lest the arbitrary surveyors should approach his favorite villa,
or his most profitable farm. But the darken-
Page 74
mg power was irresistible,
and absolute master of their fortunes. Desiring to live, they owed some
gratitude to the tyrant who spared their lives; and as he could have taken all,
they had to accept the portion he was pleased to leave as his pure and
voluntary gift.
But the end was not
immediately. The judgments of the fourth trumpet had not yet “slain” the
Imperial Head “as it were to death.” Odoacer was the Patrician Representative
of the Constantinopolitan Imperiality. He had ruled as such during fourteen
years in Rome, and the epoch had now arrived. A.D. 489-493, that he should
succumb to the superior genius of Theodoric, King of the Ostrogoths, who, after
a march of seven hundred miles from the region of Illyria, descended from the
Julian Alps, and displayed his invincible banners on the confines of Italy. After
the loss of two battles, Zeno’s Patrician fled to Ravenna. Favored, however,
again “by fortune,” Odoacer reappeared upon the field in formidable array. The
fierce conflict that ensued was finally decided by the victory of Verona, which
conferred on Theodoric the independent royalty of Italy. The assassination of
Odoacer, A.D. 493, left him without a rival, and the emperor of the East
without a representative to administer the Diocese of Italy. From the Alps to
the extremity of Campania, from Sicily to the Danube, and from Belgrade to the
Atlantic Ocean, Theodoric reigned first King of the Seventh Head of the Beast.
His royalty was proclaimed by the Goths, with a tardy, reluctant and ambiguous
recognition by the emperor of the East. He maintained with a powerful hand,
during a reign of thirty-three years, the balance of the West; and the Greeks
themselves acknowledged that the heretical king of Italy reigned over the
fairest portion of the darkened empire of the West.
“From a tender regard to the
expiring prejudices of Rome, Theodoric declined the name, the purple and the
diadem of the emperors; but he assumed,” says Gibbon, “under the hereditary
title of king, the whole substance and plenitude of imperial prerogative. His
addresses to the Eastern Throne were respectful and ambiguous; he celebrated in
pompous style the harmony of the two republics, applauded his own government as
the perfect similitude of a sole and undivided empire, and claimed above the
kings of the earth the same preeminence which he modestly allowed to the person
or rank of Anastasius.” Thus, while the jurisdiction and authority of the Sixth
Head were completely darkened in Rome, after shining upon its Seven Hills for
five hundred and twenty-four years, they continued in the light of imperial
majesty to illume the eastern third of the catholic firmament. In regard to
Rome, “it was slain as it were to death” by the Gothic sword. It seemed to be
dead beyond all possibility of being “healed” or restored to life. It was
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expelled
from the Seven Hills, and a new form of government established there, a Seventh
Head, which claimed and possessed, and was able to maintain, the preeminence of
its predecessor. In the recognition of the sovereignty of the Seventh Head, and
the Horn-Powers that had established themselves in the sounding of these
tempestuous trumpets, in Gaul, Spain and Africa, by the Sixth Head “the Dragon”
had “ceded to the Beast his power, and his throne and a great authority”; so
that the worshipful allegiance of catholics “in the whole earth” - en hole te
ge -was divided between the Dragon and the Beast: as it is written, “they
worshipped the dragon which gave power to the beast; and they worshipped the
beast saying, Who is like unto the beast? Who is able to make war with him?” -
ch. 13:3,4.
Under
the first king of the Seventh Head, prosperity and peace were revived under the
shadow of the Seven Hills. Theodoric cultivated the affections of the Roman
Senate and people. The nobles were flattered by sonorous epithets and formal
professions of respect; while the people enjoyed, without fear or danger,
order, plenty, and public amusements. But the reign of Theodoric was only a
temporary arrest of judgment. The Seventh Head was only to “continue a short
space”-sixty years, which is “short” compared with the supremacy of the Sixth.
This was to be “healed” of its “deadly wound,” a process to be enacted at a
great cost of blood and treasure. The death wound to the authority of the Sixth
Head could only be “healed” by the destruction of the Seventh. When this should
be abolished, the obscuration of the Imperial Roman “day and night” would
cease. The fourth trumpet does not symbolize the healing of the deadly wound it
judicially inflicted. To this our attention will be recalled in my exposition
of Apoc. 13.
A
WARNING PROCLAMATION
Apoc.
8:~3
“And
I saw, and I heard from one, an eagle flying in midheaven, saying in a loud
voice Woe, woe, woe, to the dwellers upon the earth, from the remaining voices
of the trumpet-call of the three angels hereafter to sound.”
1. Symbols Explained
An
angel, in a symbolic sense, represents a class of agents executing a mission to
which they have been appointed. We have seen this use of the word in ch. 7:3,
where an angel says: “Hurt not the earth and the sea
Page76
until we have sealed the
servants of our Deity.” So also in the text of the English version, the “angel
flying” is representative of a class of agents having a mission to perform.
But Griesbach and other
critical editors of the original text read aetos, an eagle, instead of aggelou,
an angel. Upon this, Elliott remarks:
“The external evidence of
manuscripts is decidedly in favor of the former reading. On the other hand, the
internal evidence of scriptural analogy, with which Griesbach and the rest did
not concern themselves, is as decidedly - indeed, as it seems to me even more
so - against it. For nowhere in the Apocalypse is the proclaiming function
assigned to a bird, or, indeed to any being but an angel or the divine Spirit.
. .1 do not therefore hesitate to retain the reading aggelou.”
Tregelles reads eagle in his
translation, and gives us to understand that it is justified by manuscripts
fourteen hundred years old. This would carry us back to the times of the second
trumpet. In a note upon the word, the American Bible Union editor says: “I
recommend that this reading be adopted and translated eagle; and that the
following note appear in the margin: ‘Or, as a few copies read angel’.”
I believe that eagle was the
original and correct reading, and that it is supported both by the external
evidence of manuscripts, and the internal evidence of apocalyptical testimony.
It affords us a very important clue to the mystery of the text. Mr. Elliott is
unquestionably mistaken in saying that “nowhere in the Apocalypse is the
proclaiming function assigned to a bird. “ We find the very reverse of this is
ch. 6:7, where the fourth living creature, likened to “an eagle flying” in ch.
4:7, makes proclamation, saying, “Come and see!”
“An eagle flying” is the ensign
of one of the camps of “the Israel of God”; and when we consider their relative
position at the time when the Latin Catholic “day and night” were darkened by
the fourth trumpet, it symbolized their community very fitly. The eagle was the
ensign of the sealed servants of the Deity, who, during the tempestuous times
of the first four trumpets, and for centuries after, were protected from
exter-mination by the Serpent-power, in “the two wings of the Great Eagle”- ch.
12:14. They were an eagle “flying” in the “midheaven” of the great
eagle-dominion. They had an angelic mission indicated by the action of flying.
This is motion from one place to another for a purpose. The eagle encampment
was therefore an angel-community; and hence eagle and angel came afterwards to
be traditionally used as equivalents in the text. The angelism of the eagle
flying was to warn “the dwellers upon the earth” of what was still coming upon
them. That flying in mid-heaven is symbolical of preaching, or making
proclamation, is evident from ch. 14:6, where “another angel” is said to “fly
in midheaven having
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77
the
glad tidings of the Aion to preach unto the dwellers upon the earth.”
Midheaven, mesouranema is, according to the decorum of the symbol, the region of
their flight. They are not luminaries of the political heaven; they are not
constituents of the sun, moon, and stars, having no identity, officially or
morally, with the secular and spiritual orders they symbolize. Neither are they
“of the world,” though encamping in the world. “The dwellers upon the- earth”
were the Arian* and Athanasian catholics, and others, to whom they preached.
Hence, the Heavenly they occupied was peculiar to themselves; it was, as it
were, in the midst between the heaven of government and the peoples governed.
In this midheaven they winged their flight as “one” of the four living ones,
the fourth, or eagle flying saying, “Woe, Woe, Woe, to the dwellers upon the
earth” - woes issuing ‘out of the remaining voices of the trumpet call of the
three angels here-after to sound.”
And
because these woes were to issue out of the fifth, sixth and seventh trumpets,
the last three have been appropriately enough styled woe-trumpets. In the ninth
chapter, we enter upon the consideration of the fifth and sixth woes; the
latter not being exhausted till the epoch indicated in ch. 11:13,14. The third
woe will prove the most terrific of all winds and woes; to “the dwellers upon
the earth,” catholics, protestants, “sectaries,” and “infidels”; for, to the
Lion, the Ox, the Man and the FLYING EAGLE - symbols of the saints - will be
given the consummating judgments of the three “Woes,” that they may slay the
beast, and give his body politic to the burning flame - Dan. 7:11,26.
2. Historical Exposition
We
have seen in ch. 7, that the judgments of the first four trumpets were
restrained until the work of sealing the servants of the Deity should be
sufficiently advanced. The tempests that were to wreck the state, and dash it
in pieces upon the rocks, were not to blow until there should be a community of
faithful ones developed, who should be able to read the signs of their times
aright, and be able to instruct others. This is implied in their being “sealed
in their foreheads”. Being thus prepared, when the trumpets sounded they could
call the attention of their contemporaries to the true situation of affairs;
and in so doing deliver them from the superstition and blasphemy of such blind
leaders as Chrysostorn, Jerome, , Ambrose, Cyril, and others, of the catholic
church by law established. These all assumed that the superstition they
The
Arians followed the teaching of Anus (A.D. 250-336) who taught that Christ was
a mere man, and though Son of God was neither equal nor co-eternal with the
Father. He was opposed by Athanasius of Alexandria (297-373) who set forth the
doctrine of the Trinity. Neither understood the Truth relating to God
manifestation. Both refuted it, but from two different viewpoints.
Publisher
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professed
was the true religion; and that when Antichrist appeared, he would be “some
great man raised up by the devil,” who would head “the apostasy,” which could
be no other than a falling away “from the right faith, from truth, and from
good works,” as presented to the dwellers upon the earth in the traditions with
which they made void the word. They taught that Antichrist was to appear in a
Jewish temple, and from among the Jews, and gain the empire of the world. They
were all impressed with the idea that the dissolution of the Roman empire into
ten kingdoms was at hand; their Antichrist would be revealed, and then
destroyed by Christ, about A.D. 500, which was to be the end of the world!
The
gloomy forebodings among them respecting their near future were heightened by
chronological ignorance. They imagined that the world was nearly 6,000 years
old. Hilarion, A.D. 402, thus wrote: “It now wants 101 years to the end of the
Sixth Chiliad about the closing of which the ten kings must arise, Babylon, now
reigning, fall, Antichrist arise and be destroyed by Christ’s coming, and so
the saints’ sabbath millennary begin.” To read the vagaries solemnly propounded
by these Laodiceans, is to remind us of the times in which we live. The
confusion of ideas was truly marvelous. Their speculations were as hairbrained
as those of Mormons, Millerites(*), and clergymen at large, in the age in which
we live. They had been given over to “believe a lie, that they all might be
condemned who believed not the truth; but had pleasure in” their own
righteousness, which was “unrighteousness.” What, then, was to be done in this
extremity? They could no more deliver themselves from their own blasphemies,
than the natural man from his own ignorance. The remedy was at hand, if they
had been sagacious enough to dicern it; but, like our contemporaries, they
cruelly persecuted and denounced it as heresy, and put it from them. The remedy
was the EAGLE-ANGEL preaching of the truth. These preachers being “sealed in
their foreheads,” would be able to explain to them that the dissolution of the
Western Empire was not the end of the world, but a judgment upon them as the
real apostasy foretold by Paul. That they were deceivers and deceived. That the
end of the world was not at hand, nor the reign of the saints either. That the
trumpet-judgments of heaven were a call upon them to “repent of the works of
their hands, that they should not worship daemons, and idols of gold, and
silver, and brass, and stone, and of wood, which can neither see, nor hear, nor
walk; - to repent of their murders, of their sorceries, of their fornication
and of their thefts” (ch.
(*) The Millerites were a branch of a sect
that later developed Into The Seventh Day Adventist Church. For a time some of
them were attracted to the teaching of Bro. Thomas, but their rejection of the
restoration of Israel led to doctrinal controversy, and they became enemies
rather than advocates of the Truth
Publisher.
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9:20,21).
That of all these crimes they were guilty, and had been punished by heretical and
pagan firebrands, as Alaric, Genseric, Attila, and other barbarian scourges;
and that the terrible calamities they endured were not complete. That, as they
repented not of the works of their hands; or, in the words of Jerome, though
“the Roman world rushes to destruction, we bend not our neck in humiliation;”
therefore, “Woe, Woe, Woe” to them, both of the east and the west, because of
the judgments yet to befall them before the end should come.
While
this eagle-angel proclamation was warning the people, war, pestilence, and
famine, in all the reign of Justinian were plaguing them with unexampled
miseries A hundred millions of the human race were exterminated in his reign.
But this was only introductory to the coming ‘woes.” The camp of safety was
with the flying eagle The belief and
obedience of the gospel of the kingdom was then as now the only seal protective
from the sword
(Picture of Eagle pg 79 not shown)
Being the largest bird of Palestine, the eagle was considered the
monarch of the skies It is also identifiable with the standard of Dan
One of the faces of the Cherubim was that of the eagle (Ezek.
1:10:10:14), and one of the four living creatures surrounding the throne of
Rev. 4, is described as “like a flying eagle “(v.7). The speed, vision,
strength, and lofty skimming of the eagle.
are symbolic of the attributes of the Spirit
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OR
FIRST TWO WOE-TRUMPETS
ACT
I - FIFTH TRUMPET; OR, FIRST WOE
SUMMARY
A
star falls out of the heaven into the earth, to whom is given the key of the
pit of the abyss, which he opens; and from its furnace a smoke issues that
darkens the sun and air. Out of the smoke locusts go forth into the earth with
scorpion-power to torment “those men who have not the seal of the Deity upon
their foreheads,” during five months, and to injure them other five. Their king
is styled THE ANGEL OF THE ABYSS; and named in Hebrew, ABADDON; in Greek,
APOLLYON.
TIME
OF EVENTS
From
A.D. 632 to A.D. 932 = 300 years
ARENA
The
territory of the Dragon upon which the imperial “sun” shone before being
darkened by the smoke. See Tabular Analysis Vol.2 p.
110.
TRANSLATION
Apoc. 9:1-12
1. And the fifth angel sounded, and I saw a star
which had fallen out of the heaven into the earth, and there was given to him
the key of the pit of the abyss.
2. And he opened the pit of the abyss: and smoke
ascended out of the pit as it were smoke of a great furnace; and the sun was
darkened, and the air from the smoke of the pit.
3. And out of the smoke came forth locusts into
the earth, and there was given to them power as the scorpions of the earth have
power.
4. And it was commanded them that they should
not injure the grass of the earth, nor any green thing, nor any tree, except
the men only who have not the
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seal
of the Deity upon their foreheads. 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 it striketh a man.
6. And in those days the men shall seek the
death, and shall not find it: and they shall earnestly desire to die, and the
death shall flee from them.
7. And the resemblances of the locusts were like
to horses which had been prepared for war; and upon their heads as it were
chaplets like to gold, and their faces as faces of men. 8. And they had hair as
the tresses of women; and their teeth were as of lions. 9. And they had breasts
as it were breasts of iron: and the sound of their wings as the sound of many
chariots of horses rushing into battle.
10. And they have tails like to scorpions, and
stings were in their tails; and their power to injure the men was five months.
11. And they have over them a king, the Angel of
the Abyss the name for him in Hebrew is Abaddon; and in the Greek, he hath the
name Apollyon.
12. The first woe hath passed away; behold there
come yet two woes after these things.
I. SYMBOLS EXPLAINED
On
the sounding of the fifth angel, John saw “a star.” I need not repeat here what
has already been said about stars. The reader is referred to my explanation of
the symbols of the third trumpet, the subject of which is the “great star
Apsinthos.” The star of the fifth trumpet may also be styled a falling star; or
rather, when John saw it in vision, a
fallen star. Its place was in the heaven, or it could not have proceeded
“out of the heaven.” It was not a fixed star of the heaven, transmitting
through “the air” in “the night” of the Greek catholic world, the reflected
light of the Byzantine “sun.” Had it been a fixed star of the eastern Roman
firmament, its falling would not have been to receive power, but the
deprivation of everything constituting the glory of a star. John may not have
seen it in the act of falling into the earth. The falling had been completed
when he first saw it. This is intimated by the perfect participle pep-tokota,
which signifies “having fallen.” The falling out of the heaven is no part of
the vision’s scenery. It had fallen, or descended, into the earth, as the
Apsinthian Star had fallen, or descended into the rivers and fountains of
water. It did not forsake the heaven as its place, because it had fallen into
the earth; but being a power, a power of the heaven peculiar to itself, it
retained its position there, but fell with destructive effect upon the people
represented by “the earth.”
By
“the earth” in this vision is meant “the dwellers upon the earth;” or the
grass, green things, and trees, which symbolized the unsealed. The eagle-angel community,
constituted of the servants of the Deity sealed in their foreheads, was not to
be tormented by this woe. The sea-
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led
servants of the Deity - the enlightened believers who have obeyed the truth -
are nowhere in the apocalypse styled “the earth”. They are “a Holy Nation.” But
“the earth” apocalyptic is the very reverse. “The earth” is an unholy
generation that “wonders after the beast;” and that “worships the Dragon, and
worships the beast;” and represents the “all kindreds, and tongues, and
nations” subject to the Dragon and Beast forms of government (Apoc. 13:3,4,7).
“The earth,” in the prophecy of the fifth and sixth trumpets, is symbolical of
the secular and ecclesiastical orders and people of the Catholic Apostasy;
which, by the fifth trumpet were to be “tormented” and “injured;” and by the
sixth, to be “killed,” or deprived of all power, authority and rule, over the
Eastern Third of the fourth beast dominion (ch. 9:15,18). “The earth” would
therefore represent the territory upon which these catholic idolaters dwelt.
The sealed servants of the Deity dwelt there likewise, only in “the Two Wings”
of it, where they were “nourished;” and though the locusts swarmed over “the
earth,” they were especially forbidden to torment and injure them, in the
command to injure only the unsealed - ver. 4. Hence, then, when John saw the
Fallen Star “in the earth,” he saw it where it did not naturally belong. It
fell “out of the heaven into the earth;” and being a star of destruction, or a
destroying power, it would make its way “into the earth” by an overwhelming
invasive force. In other words, “the earth” was fallen upon, or invaded, by the
star-power.
1. The Pit of the Abyss
But,
before the star was seen by John “in the earth,” it had acquired possession of
“the Key of the Pit of the Abyss” - he kleis tou phreatos tes abussou. The pit
of the abyss is the geographical locality of the “smoke,” out of which the
locusts issued to invade “the earth.” When the pit was opened smoke arose out
of it. The pit - to phrear - is contiguous to “the earth;” they abut the one
upon the other. It is an immense depression in the surface of the globe,
confining upon Palestine, then a province of the Eastern Third, called the
Greek or Byzantine empire. It is the pit or reservoir, or basin in which lies
the abussos, abyss, or Dead Sea. It is introduced here symbolically to
represent the region styled Arabia, whose tribes inhabited it, and poured out
of it “into the earth.” The Arabic region is well represented as “the pit;” and
locality of “a great furnace;” for the district of the Dead Sea, and of the
whole valley of the Jordan northward to the Lake of Tiberias, is quite a
phenomenon in physical geography, being below the level of the ocean. No other
example of similar depression, or pit, is known. The Lake of Tiberias is 328
feet below the level of the Mediterranean; and from
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thence
the river-valley declines to the Dead Sea, the surface of which is very nearly
1,400 feet below the same level. Owing to the great depth of this “pit,” or
depression of the surface, together with the heights which wall in the valley,
the heat powerfully
accumulates,
or becomes as it were “a great furnace,” by the concentration and reflection of
the solar rays, while the bordering highlands prevent the admission of external
breezes to relieve the temperature. The climate is therefore tropical.
Travelers, on descending into this low and deep country, feel as if they had
entered another zone. They confirm the accuracy of Josephus, who reports that
winter in the plain of Jericho resembled spring,
and
that the inhabitants wore linen garments at the time when the people in other
parts of Judea were shivering in the midst of snow. The balsam-tree, a tropical
plant, which yields the medicinal gum, now called the balsam of Mecca, and is
now limited to Arabia, once flourished in groves near Jericho, and furnished
the renowned balm of Gilead. Apart from the
(Map
page 83 not shown)
Depression
The
Jordan Valley from the Sea of Galilee to the Dead Sea is a phenomenon in
physical geography, being below the level of the ocean. A small plane can fly
above the Dead Sea and yet be below normal sea level The depression extends further south via the
Arabah through Arabia proper to the Gulf
of Aqaba. This area saw the uprise of the Saracen power, the locusts of
Revelation 9.
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margin
of the Jordan, the surface of “the pit” has the aspect of a parched desert
through the months of summer.
Such
are the natural conditions of this “pit of the abyss,” or sea, which constitute
it a fit and proper emblem of the political situation of affairs within its
limits before its locusts issued forth upon the earth. The whole pit was in the
condition of a furnace. In Deut. 4:20, Egypt is styled an iron furnace” to
Israel; and in Isa. 31:8,9, Zion and Jerusalem are styled the place of the fire
and the furnace, whence shall issue the de-struction that is to fall upon the
Assyrian. So this Arabian Pit was the place of a fire burning as a furnace,
which, when it should be “opened,” would pour forth a woeful tormenting power
upon the unsealed inhabitants of the earth. The inhabitants of this pit of the
sea, while they were shut up therein, would be in a state of war and
distraction; for such is the idea conveyed by a burning furnace, which melts
down the crude matters cast into it. A great furnace is never a symbol of peace
and prosperity; but always of the contrary. John saw the pit of the abyss in
this fiery, or embattled, condition before it was opened; but he has revealed
to us no details. He has simply informed us, that a power was developed that
was able to open the pit of the abyss; and to let out the contents thereof,
which he styles “smoke” and “locusts”. This information he conveys in the
words, “and to him (the Star) was given the Key of the Pit of the Abyss; and he
opened the pit of the abyss; and smoke ascended out of the pit. . . and out of
the smoke came forth locusts into the earth.”
2. The Key of the Pit
A
key is symbolical of governmental power and authority. The laying of the key of
the house of David upon the shoulder of Eliakim, was representative of the
bestowal of regal power upon ONE, who should be for a glorious throne to his
father’s house, and have the sole power of opening and shutting (Isa. 22:22).
With the Mohammedans, it is also symbolical of administrative power. “The
Koran,” says M. Peyron, “continually speaks of the Key of God, which opened to
them the gates of the world and of religion. So in the Koran: “Did not God give
to His legate the power of heaven which is above, and fire (the furnace-pit)
which is beneath? With the Key, did he not give him the title and power of a
porter, that he may open to those (the locusts) whom he may have chosen?” The
parentheses in this quotation are mine. The following form of renunciation of
Mohammedanism, enjoined on a convert to the catholic superstition, thus alludes
to Mohammed’s key of heaven: “I anathematize the spurious teaching and
promising of Mohammed among the Saracens; who says, that he is become the Key
holder of Paradise.” The key was also an armorial bearing of the Mohammedans
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85
in
Spain. When they crossed from Africa to Spain, it was on their standard; and
was afterwards sculptured on the archway of the Alhambra, an engraving of which
is given in Mr. Elliott’s work.
In
the apocalypse, there are two keys spoken of in connection with “the abyss;”
this in ch. 9; and another in ch. 20:1. They are, however, not the same. The
former is the key of the pit of the abyss; and the latter, the key of the abyss
itself. The key of the pit was given to the Star of the pit, or the Star who
kindled the furnace of the pit; while the key of the abyss is brought out of
the heaven by the angel thence descending. He descends with power to enlighten
the earth with his glory, and to shut down the Dragon “into the abyss,” out of
which, according to Daniel, he came up - salkan mm yammah - ch. 7:3.
3. The Abyss
This
leads me to remark, that in these places of the apocalypse, abussos is improperly
rendered “bottomless pit.” In Isa. 44:27, what in the Septuagint is abssos, or
abyss, is in the Hebrew tzulah “deep;” and is explained in Jer. 50:38 and
51:36, of Babylon’s power, which is also likened to a dragon therein. Hence, in
Daniel’s time, the eagle-winged lion of Babylon was the dragon of the great
sea, or abyss, so long as its dominion extended to the Mediterranean; but when
it lost that jurisdiction, then its “sea,” or abyss, was said to be “dried up.”
Abyss
is frequently used in the Greek version as synonymous with sea. The following
passages show this sense of the word abussos. In Job 38:30 - “the face of the
abyss is frozen;” 41:31, “he maketh the abyss to boil like a pot; he maketh the
sea like a pot of ointment.” In Isa. 63:13, where is he “that led them through
the abyss” by the hand of Moses? It is manifest that there is nothing
bottomless in the abyss as used in these texts.
In
Rom. 10:7, abyss is used by Paul in asking, “Who shall descend into the abyss?”
in the C.V. deep: and he tells us what sense he attaches to the word in letting
us know the purpose of the descent - “that is,” says he, “to bring up Christ
again from among dead ones, ek nekron.” This is an abyss which is “never full;”
still bottom can be reached when “there shall be no more death, and the grave
shall be destroyed. In this use of the word, abyss does not signify “the
invisible receptacle of departed spirits,” but the common receptacle of dead
bodies; or more strictly speaking, the aggregate of dead bodies themselves.
These are a sea of death, which when living were “a troubled sea, whose waters
cast up mire and dirt” - Isa. 57:20.
The
apocalyptic abyss is this troubled sea of nations, inhabiting the
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countries
circumiacent to the Great Sea; and out of which Daniel’s four beasts arose.
Arabia is physically and politically “the pit” of this “abyss”- physically,
because it is a sandy sea-bottom; and politically, because its tribes may be
regarded as the lowest, or worst of the peoples of the east. The key of the
abyss, that is brought down from heaven by the binding angel, is power to
suppress the Dragon-Government, and to destroy the Beast-Polity of the abyss,
or sea - Apoc. 13:1: and to maintain its suppression for a thousand years. The
abolition of the Dragon-Government will be the reduction of all its officials
in church and state to the common level of mankind; and the depriving them of
all power to recover the position lost during that long period. Thus, they will
be commingled with the waters of the great national abyss - they will have been
“cast into the abyss, and shut up, and sealed” with such a mark of divine
reprobation, that they will be able to deceive the nations by their
hypocritical pretensions, and blasphemous projects, no more for ages.
What
a different key is this to the key of the pit! This key is power given to one
to open the pit to let out clouds of tormentors and destroyers. Their mission
is not to deliver the nations from official and clerical deceivers; but to
torment and injure these blind leaders, and those who are blindly led by them.
These all “have not the seal of the Deity in their foreheads; “ and were
therefore obnoxious to the stinging calamities inflicted by the bold,
licentious, and ferocious swarms emergent from the smoke-clouds of the flaming
pit.
4. The Smoke of the Pit
Until
the power of the Prophet-King, or Star, was matured in “the pit of the abyss,”
the pit was shut; so that neither “smoke” nor “locusts” could issue forth upon
“the earth” to torment and destroy the unsealed. The furnace was roaring with
flaming blast in the pit, from which nothing could come forth until the
acquisition of undisputed authority and power by the star. This he at length
acquired; for it is testified, that “he opened the pit of the abyss.” He had
become a powerful star, ruling over the kingdom of the pit, styled
historically, the kingdom of Arabia; the armies of which no longer in a state
of civil war, but united under the yellow banner of the star, were prepared to
rush through the opened portals of the pit, and to invade the world at large.
And
invade it they did; for when the pit was opened, smoke poured out in columns
vast enough to darken the sun and the air. “Smoke” when considered as
proceeding from fire, signifies punishment and war. Thus Sodom and Gomorrah,
and all the cities of the plain, were situated in the pit of the abyss; and
when they were destroyed, “the smoke of the country went up as the smoke of a
furnace.” Here, the smoke became
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representative
of their judgment. It is the adjunct of anger, as in Deut. 29:20, “The anger of
Yahweh shall smoke against that man;” and in Psa.
74:1,
“0 God, why doth thine anger smoke against the sheep of thy pasture?” Smoke
arising out of a pit, and darkening the sun and air, is symbolical of divine
anger and wrath against the things represented by “the sun and air.” In ch.
9:18, the men obnoxious to the sixth trumpet woe, are said to be “killed by the
fire, by the smoke, and by the brimstone.” In ch. 14:11, smoke is associated
with torment as “the smoke of their tor-ment ascendeth to the aions of the
aions; and they have no rest day nor night;” and inch. 15:8, “the temple was
filled with smoke from the glory of the Deity and from his power;” that is the
wrath contained in the seven vials, and which in its seventh vial consummation
comes for the destruction of the destroyers of the earth - ch. 11:18.
. The Sun And Air Darkened By The Smoke
The
sun is here the symbol of the same imperial majesty as that which was darkened
in its third by the judgments of the fourth trumpet. The darkened third had
recovered its light in the process of reannexing Italy and Africa to the
Byzantine, Greek, or Constantinopolitan, empire in the reign of Justinian. The
“deadly wound” the Sixth Head had received, had been “healed;” and its affairs
restored to order in Italy by the Pragmatic Sanction, A.D. 554. The sun now
shining forth, “the third of the day and of the night,” then recovered their
brightness. The sun, therefore, now shone upon Italy, Africa, Egypt, Palestine,
Syria, Asia Minor, Greece, and the islands of the sea. “The rest of the men not
killed by” the fifth and sixth trumpet plagues, were found in Spain, Gaul,
Britain, Germany, &c. When the sun was darkened by the smoke of the pit,
its light, or power, was quenched in the countries of “the earth” where the
locusts of the smoke established themselves.
Not
only was the sun darkened, but “the air” likewise. In the darkening of the
Roman luminaries by the fourth trumpet “the air” remained unaffected. In
symbolic language, the air denotes the civil and ecclesiastical constitution of
the world. This constitution was not changed when the Seventh Head superseded
the Sixth in Rome. It still continued catholic. The Gothic kingdom of Italy was
a catholic monarchy administered by Arian catholic kings, who distributed civil
and ecclesiastical offices both to Arian and Trinitarian members of the
apostasy. But when the smoke of the pit darkened “the air” all this was changed
where its locusts tormented the unsealed. The aerial constitution became
Arabian. Place and power, in the conquered countries, were only for the locusts
of the smoke; so that if a catholic idolater
88 EXPOSITION
OF THE APOCALYPSE.
would
retain office, he must become a convert to the new superstition, which so
darkened the air politically, that the rays of the spirituals of wickedness in
the Byzantine heaven, could not pass through it for the illumination of their
co-religionists in scorpion-like torment.
In
Apoc. 16:17, “the air” is also the recipient of judgment. But in this instance,
on a much larger scale. The course of the whole world will be changed; so that
every political island and mountain will be abolished. The civil and
ecclesiastical constitutions of all the states and kingdoms will be superseded
by “the law that goes forth from Zion,” which will become “the air” in which
clouds of saints will meet the Lord, and so be ever with him (1 Thess. 4:17).
When the kingdoms of this world become the kingdoms of Yahweh and his Anointed,
“the wise” will be the embodiment of “the air” or firmament; for “they that be
wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament” (Dan. 12:3). No smoke of
the pit, or wrath of vials, will ever darken, or abolish them. They will
al-ways be bright and clear, and give transmission to the healing rays of the
Sun of Righteousness, as his kings and priests over the subject nations of the
earth.
6. “Out of the Smoke Came Forth Locusts
Into The Earth”
“Locusts,”
says Daubuz, “begin to appear in spring, about a month after the equinox, and
are only seen at most during five months. They are wont to arise in such vast
companies, that they form a kind of cloud which eclipses the sun and darkens
the sky; and make so great a noise with their wings as that, according to some,
the sound thereof may be heard at six miles distant. Wherever they fall they
make a most terrible havoc of all the fruits of the earth; and therefore the
people, when they see them flying, are in the greatest consternation. Pliny
says, “That they were looked upon as a plague proceeding from the wrath of the
gods.”
The
head of the locust resembles that of the horse; and therefore the Italians, who
are often troubled with them, call them cavalette, as it were little horses.
“The
Arabians, who know them well, say that the locusts have the thigh of a camel,
the legs of an ostrich, the wings of an eagle, the breast of a lion, their
tails are like a viper’s, and the appearance of horns adorns their heads and
countenance.” As to the teeth of the locusts, Pliny observes that “nothing can
resist them.” For the reasons above given, locusts are the symbol of an army of
enemies coming in great multitudes, with great speed and swiftness to make an
excursion in order to plunder and destroy.
“It
is further to be observed, that locusts are generated in the pits of the earth,
out of which the new progeny arises in the spring.” Volney ob-
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89
(Pictures
on page 89 of Locusts not shown)
The
Locusts (Revelation 9)
The
devastation caused by a plague of locusts is depicted by these illustrations.
The tree above was quickly denuded of all foliage in a very short time. The
photo below illustrates the extent of locust swarms during a plague.
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90
serves,
that “the inhabitants of Syria have remarked that locusts come constantly from
the desert of Arabia.” Indeed, etymologically, an Arab and a locust are almost
the same in radicals, and in pronunciation -arbeh, signifying a locust; and
arbi, an Arab. In Judg. 6:5, in the original, the locust is used to designate
the number and character of invading Arab hosts - “they (the Midianite Arabs
and children of the east) came as locusts for multitude.” In a work styled
Mohammedanism Unveiled, the writer says: “In the Bedouin Romance of Antar, the
locust is introduced as the national emblem of the Ishmaelites.” He adds: “It
is a remarkable coincidence with these illustrative facts, that Mohammedan
tradition speaks of locusts having dropped into the hands of Mohammed, bearing
on their wings their inscription, We are
the army of the Great God’.”
The
Saracen Locusts
A
drawing illustrating the symbolism of the locusts. A bad plague will darken the
sun like smoke (Rev.9:2). The appearance of locusts is so like that of horses
that Italians call them cavelette - cavalry (see Rev.9:7).
It
is evident from the entomology of the insect, that the apocalyptic locusts were
not literally such. The locusts of the first woe had faces of men, and tresses
as those of women, and a king over them. These and other characteristics show
that they were armies of men, whose main force consisted of cavalry,
invincible, licentious, and tormenting; analogous in their destructive
operations to clouds of locusts. They were fitly styled locusts as coming from
Arabia, the native country of the locust, whose name, with the change of a
single letter as arabah for arbeh, signifies a desert- the Arab desert between
the Dead and Red Seas. As of the locust so of the “scorpion,” whose native
locality was considered by the Jews to be the Arabian desert. And they had good
reason for this; for they were reminded by Moses on emerging from it, that it
was “a great and terrible wilderness, wherein were fiery serpents and
scorpions.” “And who know not,” says Elliott, “if facts so notorious be worth
mentioning, that it is Arabia, still Arabia, that is regarded by naturalists as
the original country of the horse; and its wildernesses are the haunts also of
the lion. The entomology of the hieroglyphic is all Arabian.”
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7. “Power Was Given To the Locusts As The
Scorpions Of The Earth Have Power.”
The
bite or sting of the scorpion is generally fatal. Hence, the power of the
locusts was a fatal power. They had scorpion-like tails, and in these tails was
some of their power for destruction. But scorpion-like tails and Stings were
only symbolical of something analogous thereto. In Gibbon, I find the following
solution of the mystery. “A Roman knight,” says he, “who despised the swords
and lances of the Saracens, relates his own fears at the sight and sound of the
mischievous engines that discharged a torrent of the Saracen fire. ‘It came
flying through the air,’ says Joinville, ‘like a winged, long-tailed dragon,
about the thickness of a hogshead, with the report of thunder and the velocity
of lightning; and the darkness of the night was dispelled by the deadly
illumination. The use of the Saracen fire, or, as it was afterwards called, the
Greek fire, was continued to the middle of the 14th century, when
the scientific or casual compound of nitre, sulphur, and charcoal effected a
new revolution in the art of war and the history of mankind. An Arab writer in the Escurial collection,
about the year 1249, thus speaks of what Joinville styles “a winged,
long-tailed dragon,” used by the Saracens: “The scorpions,” says he,
“surrounded and ignited by nitrated powder, glide along like serpents, with a
humming noise, and, when exploded, they blaze brightly and burn. Now, to behold
the matter expelled was as a cloud extended through the air, which gave forth a
dreadful crash like thunder vomiting fire on every side, and breaking down,
burning, and reducing all things to ashes.”
8. Chaplets Like to Gold
The
use of this tormenting Saracen fire constituted the resemblance of the Arabs to
scorpion-tailed locusts. Besides this, they had other remarkable “resemblances”
in their equipment for war. They had, as it were, “chaplets like to gold” - hos
stephanoi. This was only an homoioma - resemblance - not literal golden
circlets. They would be yellow so as to bear a resemblance to gold. They had a
yellow headgear. Ezekiel, inch. 23:42, describes the head-dress of the Sabean
and Keturite Arabs by atereth, rendered in Greek by stephanon, as “Sabeans from
the wilderness, who put beautiful stephans or wreaths upon their heads” that
is, turbans. It was a usual Saying among them that Allah had bestowed four
peculiar things upon the Arabs; and that one of them was, that their turbans
should be to them instead of diadems. “Make a point,” said their prophet, “of wearing
turbans, because it is the way of angels.”
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9. Faces As The Faces Of Men
Another
resemblance of the locusts was that “they had faces as faces of men.” This
distinguished them from the Goths and other kindred barbarian hordes; the faces
of these being noticed by Jerome, who was contemporary with their earliest
invasions, as having faces shaven and smooth, like women’s faces. The beard was
not always worn by the Romans. From Nero to Hadrian, the imperatorial custom
was to have the beard shaven; from Hadrian to Constantine, unshaven;
after-wards (with the exception of Julian), down to Phocas, shaven. But the
locusts did not shave. They wore beards, and so vindicated their relationship
to the bearded race, and their antagonism to all shaven crowns.
Pliny,
who was contemporary with John, speaks of the Arabs as wearing the turban,
having the hair long and uncut, with the mustache on the upper lip, or the
beard, that “venerable sign of manhood,” as Gibbon, in Arab phraseology, calls
it. In the age immediately preceding the great Saracen irruption, in the poem,
Antar, the Arabs are portrayed with mustache and beard, long hair flowing on
the shoulder (“hair as the tresses of women,” which the Greeks regarded as
shameful), and the turban also.
10. “Their Teeth Were As Of Lions”
This
indicated their ferocity. Nothing could successfully resist them in their
ravening upon the prey. The Star styled his first vizier, Ah, the Lion of God.
“Who,” says Mohammed, “will be my Vizier and Lieutenant?” “0 prophet,” replied
Ali, “I am the man. Whoever rises against thee, I will dash out his teeth, tear
out his eyes, break his legs, rip up his belly. 0 prophet, I will be thy
Vizier.” “These words,” says Hallam, “are, as it were, a text upon which the
commentary expands into the whole Saracenic history.” The spirit of Ali was the
spirit of the lion, and became the spirit of the hosts he led to battle, who
were equally entitled with him to the appellation of the lions of God.
11. “And They Had Breasts As It Were Breasts
of Iron”
In
this the thing covered is put for the covering. In the poem Antar, as quoted by
Elliott, the steel or iron cuirasses of the Arab warriors are frequently
noticed; as, “a warrior immersed in steel armor;” “15,000 men armed with
cuirasses, and well accoutered for war;” they were “clothed in iron armor and
brilliant cuirasses;” “out of the dust appeared horsemen clad in iron.” In the
Koran, among God’s gifts to the Arabs, their coats of mail for defense are
specially mentioned; as, “God
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hath
given you coats of mail to defend you in your wars.” The Saracen policy was the
wearing of defensive armor. The breastplate of iron, as symbolized by their
iron breasts, was a descriptive feature answering literally to the Arab
warriors of the sixth and seventh centuries.
12. The Two Periods of Five Months each
The
locusts were to torment the men of the catholic apostasy in church and state
“five months” ver 5 they were also to
“injure” them for “five months”-ver. 10. This is, of course, symbolic time. The
fitness of things requires that the time allotted for symbolic action should be
expressed symbolically and analogically. The entomology of the hieroglyphic
required that it should be five months, and not ten; because locusts are only
seen at most five months, namely, part of April, May, June, July, and August,
with part of September. Yet it would seem that they could not do all the
tormenting and injuring they were appointed to do against “the shaven crowns”
and their deluded votaries in one season of five months, but in two seasons.
The decorum of the symbols, therefore, rejected the record of ten months, and
required the time to be expressed symbolically twice by “five months.” This
period is 150 days, and upon the principle of a day for a year, which is the
basis of the symbolic times of the apocalypse, represents 150 years. Hence, the
locusts were to torment with scorpion torment “the men” of the apostasy until
the end of 150 years; and they were to injure “the rest of the men” not
included in the eastern or Byzantine third, which was politically “killed by
the plagues” of the first and second woes, jintil another 150 years should have
expired. So that the sounding of the fifth trumpet would continue to harass the
men destitute of intelligence in the truth, for not less than 300 years. A
period to be dated from the commencement of the tormentation or military
operation of the locusts in the Roman earth. A.D. 632-33
13. “And They Had Over Them A King”
“The
locusts,” says Solomon, “have no king, yet go they forth all of them by bands.”
As we must not set scripture against scripture, these opposite sayings
concerning locusts must be interpreted so as to harmonize. The apocalyptic
locusts who had a king are not literal locusts, as some ignorantly affirm who
deny the symbolic character of the apocalypse. John records the truth of the
locusts he saw in vision; and Solomon writes the truth concerning literal
locusts. These have no king; but John’s had, and he was apocalyptically named
“the Angel of the Abyss;” not the angel of the Pit of the Abyss, but of the
abyss at large.
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The
locust king-power is styled angel, because it was a messenger of heaven against
the unsealed a destroying angel-power;
and, there-fore, named Abaddon, and Apollyon, names which signify in English,
DESTROYER. The locust king-power was the destroyer of “the abyss” -“the
dwellers upon the earth,” against whom the woe-plague was commissioned, and in
the midst of whom it scattered destruction for three hundred years. In history,
the succession of men who reigned over the locusts are styled CALIPHS and
Commanders of the Faithful.
14. Abaddon - Apollyon
But
why are we informed that the destroying power is called “Abaddon in Hebrew, and
Apollyon in Greek,” and not told what it would be called in Latin, or any other
tongue? The answer is, because it was commissioned primarily and chiefly
against the countries to which the Hebrew and Greek belonged. We are not told
what its name was in Latin, because it was not sent against Italy to “torment”
the Italians. It was the Greek empire, which included Palestine and Syria, upon
which the locusts were to fall with their most destructive energy.
There
is another instance where our attention is claimed to the name of a thing “in
the Hebrew,” and for the same reason. Inch. 16:16, the sixth angel-power
gathers the kings of the earth and of the whole habitable, “into the place
called in the Hebrew tongue Armageddon.” This is equivalent to saying that
Armageddon is in the land where Hebrew was wont to be spoken. So “the abyss,”
where the destroying angel was to torment, was the Holy Land and the Greek
empire, in which he would help to “set up an abomination making desolate 1,290
years” (Dan. 12:11).
“THE
death” which “THE men” of the apostasy so earnestly desired (ver. 6) was not
natural death. This death did not flee from them, but pursued them on every
side, and overtook them by thousands. It was “the death” which could only be
arrived at by the woe-plagues of the sixth trumpet, which was for the slaying
of “the third of the men” of the catholic world. It was political death they
desired, the bitterness of which they had not experienced. Subject to this,
they hoped to find peace and protection from the conqueror, who would cease to
torment and injure them as enemies and foreigners to his rule and institutions.
“The death” at length came in aftertimes; and, when it came, it reduced “the
men” of the Greek catholic superstition and empire to the condition of Rayahs -
mere dogs and slaves in the estimation of their Ottoman superiors. In the depth
of this abyss, they have been prostrated without political life for upwards of
four hundred years. This is their present condition, and will so continue to
be, until “Yahweh shall have bent
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Judah
for himself, filled the bow with Ephraim, and raised up thy sons, O Zion,
against thy sons, 0 Greece, and made Zion as the sword of a mighty man.” This
will change the situation, and be “life from the dead,” not to the Greeks only,
but “to the world” (Zech. 9:13; Rom. 11:15).
II. SYNTHETIC EXPOSITION OF THE FIRST WOE
In
the previous section, I have analyzed in detail the symbols of the first
woe-trumpet. I have resolved them severally into the things they signify. In this
section, I shall put their significations together, and thereby show what the
apostle predicted if he had recorded what he saw in plain unsymbolical terms.
This is what I mean by a synthetic exposition of the first woe.
1. “And the fifth angel sounded, and I saw
one who had acquired power, and become a king, precipitate the forces of his
kingdom upon the territory of the eastern Roman empire. And to this king was
yielded the power of Arabia. 2. And he removed the barriers by which Arabia was
shut up from the world without, and a fiery host issued forth, and, by reason
of the smoking fierceness of their wrath, subverted the imperial Byzantine
authority, and changed the political aerial constitution of the catholic
countries they overrun.
3. “The wrathful hosts that invaded the
eastern Roman empire were Arabians like locusts for multitude; and they had
power fatal as the power of scorpions. 4. And it was commanded them by one,
styled the Commander of the Faithful, that they should not hurt the grass of the
earth, nor any green thing, nor any tree, but only those men who have not the
truth of the Deity in their understandings. 5. And to the Arabians it was given
that they should not extinguish the sovereignty of these men, but that they
should be tormented in war during one hundred and fifty years, with a
scorpion-like torment.
6. “And in those days shall these ignorant
professors of christianity seek political extinction, and shall not find it;
and shall earnestly desire to be a conquered people, and political death by
conquest shall flee from them.
“And
the resemblances of these Arabians when embattled exhibit them as cavalry
prepared for war; and on their heads they wore yellow turbans;
and their faces were bearded, and they had
long flowing hair like the tresses of women; and their spirit was ferocious as
lions.
And they had on polished steel cuirasses; and
the sound of the right and left wings of their armies were of multitudes of
cavalry rushing into battle.
10
And they trailed in their rear, or tails of their hosts, scorpion-artillery for
destruction; and their power to hurt the rest of men westward was also one
hundred and fifty years.
11. “And they had over them a king styled a
CALIPH, the Messenger of Destruction among the subjects of the eastern Roman
empire, or ‘the abyss.’ In the land of the Hebrew, he earned the name Abaddon,
or Destroyer; and in the land of the Greek, that of Apollyon, which signifies
the same.
12. “One woe, that of the fifth trumpet, is
passed away after three
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hundred
years; and, behold, there come two woes more before the consummation - the
sixth and seventh trumpets, after these things.”
III. HISTORICAL EXPOSITION
1. Origin of the Star
Justinian
was invested with the majesty of the Sixth Head of the Dragon, or in other
words, clothed with the sun, during a reign upon the Constantinopolitan throne
of thirty-eight years, from A.D. 527 to A.D. 565. The triple scourge of war,
pestilence, and famine afflicted his subjects, and “his reign is disgraced,”
says Gibbon, “by a visible decrease of the human species, which has never been
repaired in some of the fairest countries of the globe.”
After
Justinian’s death the Byzantine throne was occupied by Justin II., Tiberius
II., Maurice, Phocas, and Heraclius. Phocas reigned from A.D. 602 to A.D. 610;
and his successor Heraclius till A.D. 642. It was in the reign of Heraclius
that the fifth trumpet began to sound; and that “the abomination of desolation”
established itself as the normal condition of things in the Holy Land.
The
events transpiring in the Pit of the Abyss until it was opened by the Star,
were contemporaneous with the first twenty-three years of the reign of
Heraclius. Mohammed, who was the principal agent in the development of the Star-Power,
began his career at Mecca, A.D. 609, by proclaiming the unity of God, and his
own apostleship. In three years he had made fourteen proselytes; and in 613,
assumed the prophetic office. On this occasion he said: “Friends and kinsmen, I
offer you, and I alone can offer, the most precious of gifts, the treasures of
this world, and of the world to come. God has commanded me to call you to this
service. Who among you will support my brethren?” His uncle, Abu Taleb, tried
to turn him from what he considered his impracticable design. “Spare your
remonstrances,” rejoined Mohammed; “if they should place the sun on my right
hand, and the moon on my left, they should not divert me from my course.” Like
Alexander and the Napoleons, first and third, he felt within an impulse
irresistible, which impelled him blindly upon a course, which had been marked
out for him to run in the preparation of a power, that should torment and
destroy the corrupters and enemies of the truth.
For
ten years after, he labored in Mecca to turn the Arabs from idolatry to the
belief and worship of a sole Deity. “Citizens and pilgrims,” said Abu Taleb,
“listen not to the tempter, hearken not to his impious novelties. Stand fast in
the worship of Al Lata and Al Uzzah.”
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Nevertheless,
Abu Taleb, the prince of the republic of Mecca, protected his person from
violence. The leaders of the people repeatedly reproached him for this. “Thy
nephew,” said they, “reviles our religion; he accuses our wise forefathers of
ignorance and folly; silence him quickly, lest he kindle tumult and disorder in
the city. If he persevere, we shall draw our swords against him and his
adherents, and thou shalt be responsible for the blood of thy fellowcitizens.”
On
the death of Abu Taleb, and the accession of Abu Sophian, a zealous votary of
the idols, protection was withdrawn from the deserter and denier of the gods of
Arabia; and Mohammed found it necessary to take flight from Mecca, accompanied
by Abubeker who afterwards succeeded him, and to seek refuge in Medina. The
flight of Mohammed occurred A.D. 622, and has fixed the memorable era of the
Hegira, which still discriminates the lunar years of the Mohammedan nations.
On
his establishment in Medina, this Unitarian Prophet assumed the exercise of the
regal and sacerdotal office. He was now a Pontiff-King in the Pit of the Abyss,
rising into great power and dominion, like that other Pontiff-King in Rome, who
was at the same time, as the spiritual chief of the image-worshippers of “the
abyss,” assuming divine supremacy over “the earth.” Of the two, Mohammed was,
doubtless, less of an impostor than the prophet of the west. The pope is an
idolater, and the prince of idolaters; but the Prince of Medina among his
companions was the champion of the Divine Unity; and the uncompromising enemy
of idolatry in every form. He was now “a star in the heaven,” where he shone
without a rival till A.D. 632. After a reign of six years,
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fifteen hundred Moslems, in
arms and in the field, renewed their oath of allegiance. The deputy of Mecca
witnessed the review, and was astonished at the devout fervor of his
attendants. “I have seen,” said he, ‘the Chosroes of Persia and the Caesars of
Rome, but never did I behold a king among his subjects like Mohammed among his
companions.”
2. The Pit Becomes A Burning Furnace
The
choice of an independent people had exalted the fugitive of Mecca to the rank
of a sovereign; so that he was now invested with the prerogative of forming
alliances, and of waging offensive or defensive war. In other words, being now
the Star of the Pit he possessed the power of kindling within its limits a
burning furnace, in which might be melted down into one homogeneous mass, all
the tribes of Arabia. This was the arduous work before Mohammed in the last
years of his reign -to eradicate idolatry, subdue the Jews, and to conquer the
Arabs, so as to unite all under his standard. His former moderation, the effect
of weakness, was superseded by a fiercer and more sanguinary tone; and he gave
out that he was commanded to propagate his religion by the sword, to destroy
the monuments of idolatry, and to pursue the unbelieving nations of the earth.
The martial prophet fought in person at nine battles, or sieges; and fifty
enterprises of war were achieved in ten years by himself or lieutenants. “The
Key of the Pit of the Abyss was given to him;” nor was he ignorant of the
nature of the key bestowed upon him. “The sword,” said he, “is the key of
heaven and of hell.
It
was not long before the fire was kindled in the furnace of the pit. The battle
of Beder, A.D. 623, was the spark that set the fuel all ablaze. This led to the
battle of Ohad, six miles north of Medina. In this, Mohammed was wounded. In
A.D. 625, Medina was besieged by the troops of Mecca, but without capture; and
on retiring, the enemy no longer hoped to subvert the throne, or to check the
conquests, of the invincible exile.
By
exciting and joining in this attack upon Medina, the Jews of Arabia brought
upon themselves the fierce wrath of the Star of the Pit. The fiery furnace he
had kindled consumed them. Their castles were reduced, and Chaibar, the seat of
the Jewish power in Arabia, submitted to the yoke. Under the reign of Omar, the
Jews of Chaibar were transplanted to Syria; in justification of which he
alleged the dying injunction of Mohammed, that only the one true religion
should be professed in his native land Arabia.
The
attack upon Medina was retaliated upon Mecca. Mohammed assembled ten thousand
soldiers for its conquest. The idolaters being
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hopeless
of success, surrendered at discretion. Their prince, the haughty Abu Sophian,
presented the keys of the city, observing, that the son of Abdallah had
acquired a mighty kingdom, and confessing, under the scimitar of Omar, that he
was the Apostle of the true God. Mohammed forgave the guilt, and united the
factions of Mecca. The chiefs of the idolaters were prostrate at his feet.
“What mercy,” said he, “can you expect from the man whom you have wronged?” “We
confide in the generosity of our kinsman.” “And you shall not confide in vain:
begone! you are safe, you are free!” The people of Mecca deserved their pardon
by the profession of Islam; and after an exile of seven years, the fugitive
missionary was enthroned as the prince and prophet of his native country.
The
conquest of Mecca determined the faith and obedience of the Arabian tribes. Yet
an obstinate remnant still adhered to the idolatry and liberty of their
ancestors. Four thousand pagans descended into the valley of Honain hoping to
take the prophet at disadvantage. At first, the battle prevailed against the
Moslems, and their prophet greatly endangered; “0 my brethren,” he repeatedly
cried with sorrow and indignation, “I am the son of Abdallah, I am the apostle
of truth! 0 man, stand fast in the faith! 0 God, send down thy succor!” The
flying Moslems returned from all sides to the holy standard. The tide of battle
had turned against the idolators, which Mohammed, standing in his stirrups to
overlook the conflict, perceiving, clapped his hands with joy, and exclaimed,
“at last the fire is kindled in the furnace.” His conduct and example had
restored the battle, and he animated his victorious troops to inflict a
merciless revenge.
From
the field of Honain, he marched to the siege of Tayef, sixty miles southeast of
Mecca. After a siege of twenty days; he sounded a retreat, but he retreated
with a song of devout triumph, and affected to pray for the repentance and
safety of the unbelieving city. He was followed by the deputies of Tayef, who
dreaded the repetition of the siege. “Grant us, 0 apostle of God, a truce of
three years, with the toleration of our ancient worship.” “Not a month, not an
hour.” “Excuse us at least from the obligation of prayer.” “Without prayer
religion is of no avail.” They submitted in silence; their temples were
demolished, and the same sentence of destruction was executed on all the idols
of Arabia. His lieutenants, on the shores of the Red Sea, the ocean, and the
gulph of Persia, were saluted by the acclamations of a believing people. Thus,
the fiery wars of this “great furnace” of the pit destroyed idolatry, and
brought the Arab nation to submit to the God and sceptre of Mohammed. The sword
of Arabia was the sword of God, forged and sharpened for judgment upon the
idolators of Syria and Greece. Hitherto, the Pit
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of the Abyss was closed. The
wars raging within were internal fires, whose smoke had not drifted toward the
west. The star-power that had kindled the furnace, had first to subdue all enemies
within the pit of the abyss, before it could issue forth, and precipitate its
incendiary fires upon the nations of the abyss itself.
The key-sword of power was
not only given to the Star of the Pit, but he was to use it in opening the pit.
The fact that the reigning star power in the heaven did open the pit, the
manner in which he opened it, and in what sense the smoke arose from the pit,
and locusts issued out of it “into the earth,” as the falling of the star
therein - is illustrated by what follows.
When
Heraclius, emperor of the Roman world, returned victorious from the Persian
war, A.D. 629, Mohammed having conquered and converted the idolators of Arabia,
and thereby united them into one kingdom, judged that the time had come to
invite the princes and nations of the Catholic Idolatry to abandon the worship
of images and demons, commonly known among the ignorant as the ghosts of dead
men and women. He beheld with great disgust and contempt the condition of the
catholic apostasy from the religion of Christ. He saw what Gibbon relates. “The
christians” (!) says he, “of the seventh century had relapsed into a semblance
of paganism; their public and private vows were addressed to the relics and
images that disgraced the temples of the east: The throne of the Almighty was
darkened by a cloud of martyrs, saints, and angels, the objects of popular
veneration; and the Collyridion heretics who flourished in the fruitful soil of
Arabia, invested the Virgin
MAP
OF MUSLIM CONQUESTS PG 100 NOT SHOWN
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101
Mary
with the name and honors of a goddess.” In the Koran, or Mohammedan Bible, ch.
5., the catholics of the Roman empire are distinctly charged with worshipping
the Virgin Mary as God; and in ch. 9, it is said of the priests and monks
specifically: “Very many of the priests and monks devour the substance of men
in vanity, and obstruct the way of God.” This referred to their fraudulent
gains by the sale, exhibition, and false miracles attached to relics. Mohammed
was right; these shaven crowns “obstructed the way of God,” as the clergy of
all orders and degree in “christendom” have been doing, and are doing, ever
since, even to this day. Though originally an ignorant pagan Arab, and
afterwards but imperfectly instructed in the scriptures, he had become wiser
than the whole catholic world. He not only spurned the gods of his native land,
but he vindicated the Divine Unity against “the infidels” who darkened the
Almighty’s throne by the senseless objects of their disgraceful and
demoralizing superstition. Being the providentially developed military apostle
of the Divine Unity, he offered all idolators, or worshippers of demons, the
alternative of conversion and peace, or idolatry and war. Hearing of the
presence of the Roman emperor at Emesa, he sent an ambassador to him, and
invited him to the profession of Islam. At first their intercourse was
amicable, but their friendship proved of short continuance. One of his envoys
had been murdered; and the rapacious spirit of the Saracens - the lion tooth
characteristic of the locusts - in-flamed by the new religion, or smoking in
the pit, burned to be avenged. The murder afforded their star-King a decent
pretext for gratifying it; and he forthwith ordered the invasion of the
territory of Palestine east-ward of the Jordan, A.D. 630. A small force of
three thousand Saracens encountered the Roman army at Muta. After losing three
generals, they effected a safe retreat under Caled, who afterwards was renowned
as “the Sword of God.” This was the first military action that tried the valor
of the Moslems against a foreign enemy. It was an opening of the pit; the
initiation only of the enterprise in which the forces of the Star may be said
to have got the worst of it.
Mohammed
now solemnly proclaimed war against the Romans. The Moslems were discouraged.
They alleged the intolerable heat of the summer. “Hell,” said the indignant
prophet, “is much hotter.” He advanced at the head of ten thousand horse, and
twenty thousand foot. After a painful march, in which they suffered much from
lassitude and thirst, aggravated by the scorching and pestilential winds of the
desert, they arrived at Tabuc, midway between Medina and Damascus. Beyond this
he did not advance. Caled, however, spread around the terror of his name, and
the prophet received the submission of the tribes and cities, from the
Euphrates to Ailah, at the head of the Red Sea. The power,
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102 .
styled
by Schlegel, “the new power of hell, “was still restricted to “the pit of the
abyss.” An expedition against Syria had been set in motion, but was arrested in
its march at Medina, by the death of Mohammed in that city, A.D. 632.
Mohammed
was succeeded in the throne of the kingdom of Arabia by the venerable Abubeker,
who was now “Successor of the prophet, Caliph, and Commander of the Faithful.”
But the death of Mohammed was the signal of independence; and Abubeker found
himself the chief of a power and religion which tottered to its foundations. He
forthwith assembled an army of forty thousand men to subdue the rebellion,
which sought the reestablishment of the old idolatry. Thus the furnace was
rekindled in the pit of the abyss, and smoke ascended toward the heaven. After
exhorting the Moslems to confide in the aid of God and his apostle, Abubeker attacked
the idolators vigorously. Though unsuccessful at first, he at length broke the
power of the rebels, who, without chief or cause, were suppressed by the power
and discipline of the rising monarchy; and the whole nation again possessed,
and more steadfastly held, the religion of the Koran.
4. The Smoke and Locusts Ascend Out Of The
Pit
The
time had now arrived for the Star-Kingdom-Power of the Arabian Pit to “fall
into the earth,” and to open it completely and permanently for the egress of
the smoke with its clouds of locusts, for “the darkening of the sun and the
air.” At this crisis, as we learn from the fourth verse of the chapter under
consideration, “it was commanded them (the smoke issuing locusts) that they
should not hurt the grass of the earth, nor any green thing, nor any tree; but
those men only who have not the seal of the Deity in their foreheads.” This is
explained by what follows. Abubeker, who was the first caliph, by his victory
over the rebels had restored the unity of the faith and government; and he now
resolved, A.D. 632, to provide immediate exercise for the restless spirit of
the Saracens, in the prosecution of a holy war. He accordingly dispatched a
circular to the locusts of the pit, saying: “This is to acquaint you that I
intend to send the true believers into Syria, to take it out of the hands of
the infidels” (or to darken their sun and air); “and I would have you know that
the fighting for religion is an act of obedience to God.”
The
summons was responded to by numerous intrepid bands of Saracens, who flocked to
the camp at Medina, where they were re-viewed by the Caliph. In his
instructions to the chiefs of the army, he said: “Remember that you are always
in the presence of God, on the verge of death, in the assurance of judgment,
and the hope of Paradise. Avoid injustice and Oppression; consult with your
brethren, and study
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103
to
preserve the love and confidence of your troops. When you fight the battles of the
Lord, acquit yourselves like men, without turning your backs; but let not your
victory be stained with the blood of women or children. Destroy no palm trees,
nor burn any fields of corn. Cut down no fruit trees, nor do any mischief to
cattle, only such as you kill to eat. When you make any covenant or article,
stand to it, and be as good as your word. As you go on, you will find some
religious persons who live retired in monasteries, and propose to themselves to
serve God that way: let them alone, and neither kill them nor destroy their
monasteries. And you will find another sort of people that belong to the
synagogue of Satan, who have shaven crowns.’ be sure you cleave their skulls,
and give them no quarter till they either turn Mohammedans or pay tribute. ~”
These shaven crowns of the synagogue of Satan were THE MEN WHO HAD NOT THE SEAL
OF GOD IN THEIR FOREHEADS; and the alternative of death by the sword,
conversion, or tribute, was the “torment” to which they were to be subjected
during “five months” of years.
5. The Sun And The Air Darkened
After these things, the earth was invaded, and
Damascus, the capital of Syria, attacked. An army of seventy thousand succors -
indifferently styled Syrians, from the place of their birth or warfare; Greeks,
from the religion and language of their sovereign; and Romans, from the
appellation still assumed by the successors of Constantine - were encountered
and dispersed; and, after a siege of seventy days, Damascus was taken by storm
and capitulation, A.D. 634. While being surrendered in one quarter, the city
was betrayed and taken by assault in the opposite. Caled, the Sword of God,
rushed in with his rapacious and sanguinary lion-toothed locusts. “No quarter,”
he cried, “no quarter to the enemies of the Lord;” his trumpets sounded, and a
torrent of Mariolatrous blood was poured into the streets of Damascus. A large
majority of the people accepted the terms of toleration and tribute offered by
Abu Obeidah, the general in chief; but Caled, “the lieutenant of the Commander
of the Faithful,” was for a general massacre. The fury of “the Sword of God”
was at length appeased; nevertheless he sternly declared that, after a respite
of three days, all who left the city as exiles, with Thomas, their valiant,
though unsuccessful defender, might be pursued and destroyed by the Moslems. On
the fourth day, he issued
·
Notwithstanding this precept, the Arabs are the implacable enemies of
the monks, who, in the seventh century, were generally ‘laymen.” They wore
their hair long and disheveled, and shaved their heads when they were ordained
priests. The circular tonsure was sacred and mysterious: it was the crown of
thorns; but it was likewise a royal diadem, and every priest was a king. This
will explain to the reader the origin of the phrase ‘shaven crowns,” which is
figurative of catholic priests.
Page
104
from
Damascus in pursuit. Having overtaken the promiscuous multitude of priests,
monks and citizens, encamped in a pleasant valley, in-sufficiently provided
with arms, and already vanquished by sorrow and fatigue, Caled and his cavalry
rushed upon them, smoking with fury. Except a captive who was pardoned and
dismissed, the Arabs enjoyed the satisfaction of believing that not a
Virgin-Mary worshipper of either sex escaped the edge of their scymitars.
Thus,
the Pit of the Abyss was effectually “opened” by the key-sword in the hand of
the first of the Caliphs. The “smoke of the pit” was curling and drifting over
“the earth” in the direction of the Great Sea. After the battle of Yermuk, the
conquest of Jerusalem, and then of Aleppo and Antioch, Heraclius fled from the
country, and bid an eternal farewell to Syria, which, A.D. 639, bowed under the
sceptre of the Caliphs seven hundred years after Pompey had despoiled the last
of the Macedonian kings. Thus, the sun and the air were darkened by the smoke
of the pit; and Syria, now become Arabian, became the seat and support of the
house “; Ommiyah; and the revenue, the soldiers, the ships of that powerful
kingdom were consecrated to enlarge on every side the empire of the
caliph-kings of the locusts, “the angel of the abyss,” the ABAD DON, in the
land of the Hebrew tongue.
But
the “torment” of the catholic worshippers of images and daemons was not to be
confined to the land of Israel; it was to extend to the countries where Greek
was the vernacular, and there the caliph-power was to be revealed as the most
potent and absolute of the globe. It was to torment with an intensity that
should acquire for it in Greek the name APOLLYON, the destroyer. In the ten
years of the administration of the caliph Omar, the Saracens reduced to his
obedience thirty-six thousand cities or castles, destroyed four thousand
churches or temples of the unbelievers, and erected fourteen hundred mosques
for the exercise of the religion of Mohammed. One hundred years after his
flight from Mecca, the arms and reign of “the Angel of the Abyss” extended from
India to the Atlantic Ocean, over the various and distant provinces which may
be comprised under the names of Persia, Syria, Egypt, Africa, and Spain. Their
armies, which consisted chiefly of cavalry and archers, advanced with the speed
of horses, and fought with the courage of lions; and it excites no little
perplexity in the mind of the historian to explain by what means the church and
state of the Roman world were saved from destruction by so invincible a foe.
But their preservation is attributable, not to the virtue, skill and power of
those establishments, but to the fact that “to them it was given that they
should not kill them.” the Greek Church and State were not to be broken up and
to become politically extinct; and therefore, though Constantinople was twice
be-
Page
105
sieged
by the Saracens, the first time for seven years, and the last for thirteen
months, they could not capture it, and abolish its dominion. They were not to
inflict political death upon the Byzantine Empire, which they would certainly
have done had they captured Constantinople. This consummation was reserved for
the Four Angel-Powers of the Euphrates, under the sixth trumpet. The horse-like
locusts were only to darken, torment, and injure, for a specific period; and
when this was passed, according to the analogy of the insects to which they
were likened, to settle down so as at length to be found no longer tormenting
“the earth.”
6. The Torment and Injury
The
words used by John with respect to their mission are basanizo, and adikeo. The
first is rendered torment, the last, injure. The Spirit, doubtless, intended
different ideas to be represented by the different words. They were to torment,
but not to kill. It is clear from this that killing was not an element of the
torment. Basanidso signifies to rub upon the touchstone, or basanos; hence, to
try the genuineness of a thing. The touchstone used by the Saracen Locusts was
“the Koran, tribute, or the sword.” They rubbed all the unsealed upon this; and
according to the result, was the genuineness, or true character, of the party
in their estimation. If they accepted the Koran, they were then fellowshipped as
devout Moslems, and subjected neither to tribute nor death; but if they
rejected the Koran, or refused to become Mohammedans, which was the same thing,
then they must either pay tribute or be put to death. Such a touchstone as this
could not seriously affect those who had the seal of the Deity in their
foreheads. The Saracens were particularly
(MAP PAGE 105 NOT SHOWN)
Page
106
favorable
to all who were persecuted by the constituted authorities of the Greeks. They
became their protectors and allies, not their tormentors. To the Saracen
touchstone they replied after this sort: “The Greeks are determined to abide
the determination of the sword; but with the Greeks we desire no communion,
either in this world or in the next, and we adjure forever the Byzantine
tyrant, his synod of Chalcedon, and his Melchite slaves. For ourselves, we are
resolved to live and die in the profession of the gospel and unity of Christ.
It is impossible for us to embrace the revelations of your prophet; but we are
desirous of peace, and cheerfully submit to pay tribute, and obedience to his
temporal successors.”
The
word adikeo contains no idea answerable to that of using a touchstone of any
kind. To injure, without defining how the injury should he inflicted, conveys all
the meaning of the word in the text. They were to apply the touchstone five
months of years; and they were to injure, or commit offensive operations, for
an equal length of time. This we shall find was the fact. Power to torment and
injure was divinely appointed to “the Angel of the Abyss” for three hundred
years; and beyond this limitation he could not destroy.
7. The Angel of the Abyss
The
locusts had a king over them, the Angel of the Abyss - not the angel of the pit
of the abyss, but of “the abyss” at large. The star was especially related to
“the pit”; and the Angel-king, to “the abyss. The star-power, as we have seen,
was the kingdom of Arabia before its forces were precipitated upon “the earth”;
while the Destroying Angel of the abyss was the Arabian Empire of the Caliphs,
which, but for the Star-power of the pit, would never have existed in the world
to torment and injure the nations of the abyss.
The caliphs united in their own persons the kingly
and priestly characters. The first caliph was Abubeker, who began to reign on
the death of Mohammed, A.D. 632. In A.D. 718, the end of the first century of
the Hegira, * the caliphs were the most potent and absolute monarchs of the
globe. They reigned by the right of conquest over the nations of the east.
Under the last of the Ommiades, the Arabian empire extended two hundred days’
journey from east to west, from the
The
Hegira, or Flight is the title given to the flight of Mohammed to Medina (then
called Yathrib) from the wrath of the merchants of the polytheistic idolators
of Mecca in A.D. 622. The Islamic calendar dates from 1 July of that year, as
indicated by the letters AH (Anno Hegirae). Thus A.D. 622 is AH 1 in Islamic
time. It is interesting to note that from that period of time 1260 added brings
to 1882, the year Britain occupied Egypt; 1290 brings to 1912 and the Balkan
wars which weakened Turkey; and 1335 brings to 1957 which followed the
successful Suez attack by Israel, and witnessed the signing of the Rome Treaty
that brought into existence the E.E.C. - Publishers.
Page `107
confines
of Tartary and India to the shores of the Atlantic ocean. In the year 750, a
revolution dethroned the caliphs of the house of Omniyah, styled the Omniades,
and set up in their stead the descendants of Abbas, uncle to Mohammed, and
known as the Abbasides. Hitherto, Damascus had been the throne of the Arabian
empire; but it was removed by Almansor to Bagdad, “the City of Peace,” on the
eastern bank of the Tigris, A.D. 762. This was a few miles beyond the old Roman
Euphratean frontier. War was now no longer the passion of the Saracens; their
stern enthusiasm was softened by time and prosperity, and it was no longer easy
to allure them by the hopes of spoil and of paradise. The luxury of the caliphs
relaxed the nerves and terminated the progress of the Arabian empire. The
application of the touchstone now necessarily ceased. The power of the caliphs
being established over “the abyss,” the alternative of “the Koran, tribute, or
the sword,” could no longer be propounded to them. The “torment,” therefore, by
this touchstone was no longer applied. It could not be in the nature of things.
Power was given to them to basanize the Virgin-Mary and image worshippers five
months, and beyond this period they could not “torment.” When did these five
months begin? and how long a period do they represent?
In
answer to the first question, I reply that they began when Abubeker, the first
caliph, fulfilled the fourth verse of this ninth chapter, in commanding the
generals and captains of his Syrian army to apply the touchstone according to
his instructions. This was A.D. 632, which is doubtless the beginning of the
five months of tormentation.
As
to how long a period these five months represent, the key to this question is
the nature of the torment. We now know what this is; and we know also, from
history and the nature of things, that the torment did not cease at the end of
five months of days, but continued for many such terms of five months each. On
the contrary, it continued until there were no more within the scope of the woe
to be tormented, the power of the caliphs having reached the full. In the
sanguinary civil war between the Ommiades and the Abbassides, the Greeks had
seized the opportunity of avenging themselves, and enlarging their limits: so
that, A.D. 781-2, found the Greeks arrogant, and the frontier of the Arabian
empire diminished. This was five months of years, or 150 years, from Abubeker’s
command to torment, or “cleave the skulls” of the shaven crowns of the
synagogue of Satan, and to give them no quarter till they turned Mohammedans or
paid tribute.
But,
though the power to torment had passed away with the period assigned for
tormentation, the Apollyon-Caliphs were still formidable, and powerful for
offensive military operations, such as occur between hostile states. From A.D.
782 to A.D. 805, the caliphs Mohadi and Ha-
108 EXPOSITION OF THE
APOCALYPSE.
roun al Rashid inflicted
great calamities upon the Greeks. Haroun invaded their territories eight times;
and, as often as they declined the payment of the regular tribute, they were
taught to feel that a month of depredation, or adikia, injury, was more costly
than a year of submission. They were exposed to these hostile inroads so long
as the caliphs held the sceptre of the east. In the national and religious
conflicts of the two empires, peace was without confidence, and war without
mercy. Quarter was seldom given in the field; those who escaped the edge of the
sword were condemned to hopeless servitude, or exquisite torture; and a
catholic emperor relates with visible satisfaction the execution of the
Saracens of Crete, who were flayed alive, or plunged into caldrons of boiling
oil.
But, the time allotted for
the Arabian and Greek empires to cease their sanguinary conflicts, in the
beginning of the tenth century was drawing to a close. The destroying power of
the caliph-angel of the abyss, as against the Greek empire, was limited to
three hundred years, or the end of the second period of five months. It was to
decline and fall. The luxury of the caliphs, the rebellion of the
Carmathians,(*) and the revolt of the provinces, at length deprived the Arabs
of the sceptre of the east. The revolt of the provinces circumscribed the
dominions of the caliphs within the walls of Bagdad; until the independent
Persic-Moslem dynasty of the Bowides (+) interposing on account of factions
prevailing there, advanced A.D. 933, to Bagdad; stripped the caliph of his
secular office and supremacy; and reduced him to his spiritual functions as Chief
Pontiff of Islamism, the mere phantom the thenceforward of the departed power
of the Destroying Angel of the Abyss. Thus died “Apollyon” by the suicide of
his own hands twice five months of years, or three complete centuries, from the
issuing of the smoke out of the pit of the abyss A.D. 632.
“The first woe is passed
away,” A.D. 933; “behold, there come yet two woes after these things.”
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
(*)The Carmathians were a Moslem
sect, centered in Bahrein that followed the lead of a Yemenite Moslem named
Ramdan Caimat. They practised a brand of Shi’ism (the Shiites are the dominant
sect in Persia today), and opposed the Caliphate of Baghdad, seeking to weaken
his power. For considerable time they dominated Arabia by the sword, and
attempted to win all the East to their cause by its same persuasive argument. -
Publishers.
(+)The Bowides comprised a dynasty of Persia established by
three brothers descended frum Abu Shaja Buya. Under she reign of she Bowides
(or Buwayids), the language and influence of Persia were restored, and the
Arabs, three hundred and four years after the death of Mohammed, were deprived
of she sceptre of the East. Their political and military influence extended
from she Persian Gulf to she Caspian Sea, and included Baghdad itself. Though
nominal respect was given the Caliphate, its political influence was greatly
weakened under their rule. This prepared the ground for the assumption of
Islamic power by the Turks, and the ultimate establishment of the Ottoman
Empire.-Publishers.
Page 109
ACT
II- SIXTH TRUMPET OR SECOND WOE
1. Eastern Part
Summary
Still
in response to the prayers of all saints, a voice from the four horns of the
golden altar of incense commands the four messenger powers, confined by the
great river Euphrates, to be loosed. They are prepared for successful
aggression against the Byzantine empire during “the hour and day and month and
year,” that, at the end of this period, they may slay with political
extinction, the power of the men who ruled the Eastern Third of the Roman orb,
and worshipped demons and images, and were murderers, and sorcerers,
fornicators, and thieves; and had not been smitten by the judgments of the four
winds - See Tabular Analysis, Vol.2 page 116.
TIME
OF EVENTS
From
April 29, A.D. 1062, to May 29, 1453 - 391 years 30 days.
TRANSLATION
Apoc.
9:13-21
13. And the sixth angel sounded, and I heard
one voice out of the four horns of the altar of gold which is in the sight of
the Deity, saying to the sixth angel, who had the trumpet, “Loose the four
angels, which have been bound by the great river Euphrates.”
15. And the Four Angels having been prepared
were loosed for the hour and day and month and year, that they might kill the
third of the men.
16. And the number of the hosts of the
cavalry was two myriads of myriads: and I heard the number of them.
17. And thus I saw the horses in the vision;
and those who sat upon them having breasts fiery and hyacinthine and
sulphurous; and the heads of the horses were as the heads of lions, and out of
their mouths there burst forth fire and smoke and sulphur. 18. By these three
were killed the third of the men, by the fire and by the smoke and by the
sulphur, bursting forth out of their mouths. For their powers are in their
mouth and in their tails; for their tails are like ser-
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110
pents,
having heads, and with these do they injure.
20. And the rest of the men who were not
killed by these plagues changed not from the works of their hands, that they
might not worship the daemonials and idols of gold and of silver, and of brass,
and of stone, and of wood, which can neither see nor hear, nor walk. 21. And
changed not from their murders, nor from their sorceries, nor from their
fornication, nor from their thefts.
NOTES
In
the above translation there are some variations from the English Version. Instead
of “a voice,” I have rendered phonenmian, one voice; for, although it issued
from the four horns of the altar, there were not four voices, but only one, as
in the text.
Instead
of “in the river,” I have preferred the rendering of epi to potamo, “by the
river;” the preposition is rendered in this sense in Matt. 24:33, “He is near
epi thurais by or at the doors.”
In
verses 17 and 18, I have rendered ekporeuetai and ekporeuo-meno by “burst
forth” and “bursting forth,” instead of “issued or “proceeded,” as in the Bible
Union version. I have so rendered it from the use of the verb in Apoc. 4:5,
where it is used in connection with lightnings and thunders from the throne;
when they go forth, they do it burstingly.
The
phrase to triton ton anthropon, I have rendered “the third of the men,” instead
of “the third part of men,” “part” is
not in the Greek, and the definite article ton, should be translated as
referable to a certain class of men; those of the Byzantine Third, namely, not
having the seal of the Deity in their foreheads. It was that third which was to
be killed, not the third of mankind in general; but “the third of,” or
belonging to, “the men who were unsealed.”
In
verse 16, ho arithmos strateumaton tou hippikou, is rendered in the C.V. “the
number of the army of the horsemen.” This is a version very regardless of the
original. I have translated it the number of the hosts of the cavalry - the
number having regard to the individual troopers in the aggregate.
In
verse 19, the English Version reads “their power is in their mouth and in their
tails.” Griesbach and Tregelles prefer, “the power of the horses is in their
mouth and in their tails.” Greenfield’s edition of Mills, omits “and in their
tails” from the text, and inserts it in the margin. I prefer the reading hai
exousiai auton en to stomati auton eisi, kai en tais ourais auton, their powers
are in their mouth, and in their tails; my reason for this preference will
appear in the exposition.
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111
1. THE SYMBOLS EXPLAINED
1. “One Voice of the Four Horns”
“And
I heard One Voice out of the Four Horns of the Altar of Gold which is in the
sight of the Deity, saying, &c.” This is the same altar as that in the
scene pictured in Apoc. 8:3, which may be fitly reproduced here by way of
remembrance. “And another angel came and stood by the altar, having a golden
censer; and there was given to him many odors, that he might cast for the
prayers of all the saints, upon the golden altar which is in sight of the
throne. And the smoke of the odors for the prayers of the saints ascended out
of the hand of the angel, in the sight of the Deity. And the angel took the
censer, and filled it from the fire of the altar, and cast into the earth and
there were voices and thunders and lightnings and an earthquake. And the Seven
Angels having the seven trumpets prepared themselves that they might sound.”
This
scene is, as it were, a general preface to the sounding of each of the seven
trumpets. That is, each trumpet develops its judgments retributively upon the
enemies of the saints, and responsively to their prayers. The prayers of the
saints were not to be confined to the apostolic age; but to ascend till Christ
the avenger should return. “Men,” said Jesus, “ought always to pray, and not to
faint.” This saying he illus-trated by the parable of the unjust judge and the
widow, in Luke 18:1-8. “Avenge me,” said she, “of mine adversary;” but he would
not, until wearied by her importunity, he complied to get rid of her
complaints. If an unjust judge would do this, “shall not the Deity,” the just
judge of all the earth, “avenge his own elect, who cry day and night unto him,
though he bear long with them? I tell you,” said Jesus, “he will avenge them
speedily. Nevertheless when the Son of Man cometh, shall he find the faith upon
the earth?”
In
all apocalyptic times, the elect of the Deity are represented as crying unto
him “to judge and avenge their blood on them that dwell upon the earth” (ch.
6:10). In Apoc. 8:3-5, the sounding of all the trumpets is dramatically
represented as responsive to “the prayers of all the saints;” and consequently,
not to the prayers of those saints only who lived between A. D. 324 and AD.
395; but also to the prayers of the saints living contemporarily with all the
trumpets. The successive soundings of the first five trumpets have brought us
down to A.D. 933; and we have seen how the safety of the saints was guaranteed
by the command of the Angel of the Abyss to his destroying agents to torment
only the unsealed. The saints were not to be harmed by the special plagues; for
they were “nourished” while the unsealed, who were their enemies, were being
scourged.
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112
In
all the days of their nourishment, which were 1260, their prayers were
“ascending out of the angel’s and in the sight of the Deity.” They ascended as
sweet odors of the golden altar, for his eyes were always upon the Woman’s
place in the wilderness ch. 12:14. Her
seed had been contemporary with the seals as the four living ones full of eyes;
they were coeval with the first five trumpets as the golden altar; with the
sixth, as “the four horns of the altar of gold;” and with the seventh trump et
as the four living ones, and in its seventh vial manifestation, as “the nave of
the Deity” and “the four and twenty elders sitting upon their thrones” (ch.
11:16-17; 15:7). Hence, in all the apocalypse, under one symbol or another, the
saints are discerned in position; and that position is always in opposition to
“the men who have not the seal of the Deity in their foreheads;” and as
constituting no part of the symbols representing their civil and ecclesiastical
organizations.
Now,
although, according to the pattern in the Mosaic Tabernacle. this living altar
of gold has four horns, answering to the four living ones. and four comers of
the square, but one spirit pervades the whole. The multitude of the true
believers which compose the altar “are of one heart and of one soul” (Acts
4:32). In singleness of heart “with one
mind and one mouth they glorified the Deity, even the Father of the Lord Jesus
Christ” (Acts 2:46; Rom. 15:6). With this spirit of unanimity, resulting from
their being sealed in their foreheads with the seal of the living God, they
cause their prayers to ascend as burning odors - as one voice out of the four
horns - and not a distinct and discordant voice from each horn. In “the vision”
there was only “one voice.” It was the voice of the altar of gold, for it
proceeded from the four horns thereof. This voice of prayer said, “Loose the
four angels;” and, in answer to the prayer addressed “to the sixth angel, that
had the trumpet,” “the four angels were loosed.”
This
unanimous voice of prayer, ascending from hearts whose faith was more precious
than gold which perishes, was addressed, I say, to the sixth angel. This was
equivalent to addressing the Father-Deity, whose apocalyptic symbol is “a Lamb
as it had been slain, having Seven Horns and Seven Eyes.” This represents
Omnipotence and Omniscience manifested in flesh that had been slain, and
afterwards “justified in spirit.” These seven horns and seven eyes, viewed
apart from the slain Lamb, represent “the Seven Spirits of the Deity sent forth
into all the earth.” These seven spirits as sent forth are symbolized by the
Seven Angels, who in all the earth sound the seven trumpets. It is the
Omnipotent and Omniscient Spirit, in sevenfold manifestation, that sounds. HE,
incarnate in the Lamb, creates powers in the earth, stirs up their ambitions,
and impels them on to destinies which they can neither control nor
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113
see.
“There is no power,” says Paul, “but of the Deity;” and when judgments are
abroad in a country, the spirit of Yahweh is in an unquiet state (Zech. 6:8).
In the previous trumpets, we have seen illustrations of the terrible nature of
the inquietude of the Spirit. The Goths, Huns, Van-dals, and Saracens, were
embodiments of this unrest. When they acquired motion, they swept as a tornado
over the guilty; fell upon them like hail and fire mingled with blood; plunged
in among them as a great mountain burning with fire; scathed them as with a
burning torch; smote them, darkened them, destroyed them with scorpion-torment,
and killed them, as we shall see, with serpents. And all this in vindication of
“the truth as it is in Jesus;” in retribution of blasphemy, daemon-worship, and
idolatry; and in retaliation of war against the saints, whom they labored, but
too successfully, to subdue.
Now,
the Spirit created and excited these powers as he operated upon Pharaoh when he
hardened his heart; and as he will hereafter operate upon the powers that be
now, when he shall put in their hearts to fulfil his will, and to agree, and
give their kingdom, or power and strength unto the Eighth Head of the Beast,
until his words be fulfilled (ch. 17:13,17). It was the same Spirit that inhabited
the golden altar, only that it was incarnate in the altar by the truth
understood, believed, and obeyed. This incarnation of spirit is holy, and,
standing “in the sight of the Deity,” as his holy altar, “smokes” with the
fragrant odors of enlightened zeal and indignation against “every high thing
that exalts itself against the knowledge of the Deity.” With “one voice” this
emanation of spirit cries day and night, through the angel of the altar, to be
av-enged. This cry ascends from spirit, through spirit, to the Eternal Spirit
-from the truth incarnate in the saints; through “the Lord the Spirit,” who.
makes intercession for them; to the Father of the Lord Jesus Christ. The answer
to this cry sets in motion the whole machinery of judgment exhibited in the
scenery of the apocalypse, which ultimates in the consummation which completely
and thoroughly avenges his elect.
In
addressing the sixth angel, then, the Deity was addressed by the “one voice
from the four horns of the altar of gold.” The Spirit had the trumpet, which he
sounded in the loosing of the four angels, in the killing of the Third, and in
the overthrow of the Tenth of the City (ch. 9:15,18; 11:13); and all of this, a
judicial development through seven centuries, in response to that one voice so
influential before the throne.
The
altar of gold is said to be enopion tou Theou, which I have rendered, “in the
sight of the Deity.” Literally, enopion signifies in the eye, from en, in, and
opi, dative of ops, the eye. The Golden Altar Community is in the eye of the
Deity, in the same sense that the twelve tribes of Israel were in his eye when
they dwelt in the Holy Land; but, when expel-
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led
therefrom by the Assyrians, were said to have been removed out of his sight (2
Kings 17:18). The Golden Altar Community have never been “removed out of his
sight,” as Israel and Judah were. But, can any thing be removed out of the
sight of him who sees all things? In a certain sense it can. Now, concerning
the Holy Land, by way of illustration, Moses says, in Deut. 11:12: “It is a
land which Yahweh thine Elohim careth for; the eyes of Yahweh thine Elohim are
always upon it, from the beginning of the year even unto the end of the year.”
When, therefore, Israel and Judah were dwelling there, they were in his sight;
for his eyes were upon them, being upon the land; but, when expelled, they were
not within the landscape, and, therefore, out of his sight. But they are to
return from captivity; and then, the prophet says, “in the third day he will
raise us up, and we shall live in his sight” (Hos. 6:2); that is, in the Holy
Land. In a like sense, the Golden Altar Community is in his eye, or in his
presence, or before him. It is sojourning, and has been for a long series of
ages, among the nations, kindreds, and tongues, which have been given over to
the Dragon and the Beast, and which have been made drunk by the Mother of
Harlots that sits upon them. But in the midst of all these, it is not hidden
from his sight. It is before him in all the brightness of fine gold. It is the
Altar of gold from which ascends sweet odors in the holy and heavenly in Christ
Jesus.
2. “Loose The Four Angels”
To
loose is the opposite of to bind. The nature of the loosing depends upon that
of the thing bound. The things to be loosed in the text before us are “the four
angels.” These are the symbols of the “two myriads of myriads of cavalry” by
which “the third” is killed. The four angels, therefore, represent four powers.
These were “bound”. A power bound is either a power restrained from action, or
bound by its own territorial limits. An example of the former occurs in the
Dragon shut up in the abyss. Here the Dragon-power is restrained from acting
from
“deceiving the nations.” When it is “loosed,” its wonted action is restored,
and it returns to its old work of deceiving (ch. 20:3,7,8). The four
angel-powers of the sixth trumpet were bound territorially; for we are informed
that they “had been bound - dedemenous - by the great river Euphrates.” This
river was the boundary of their dominion, and divided it from the territory of
“the Third” which they were to kill. To loose these Oriental powers was to
cause them to cross the Euphrates, to invade with their myriads of cavalry the
Eastern Third of the Roman inhabited earth, and to extend their own dominion at
its expense.
They
“had been bound by the great river Euphrates,” until the time of their loosing
arrived. They” were eastern powers, therefore. The
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countries
east of the Euphrates were the area of their preparation for the work they had
to do. They were prepared angel powers; therefore it is written, “The four
angels having been prepared were loosed.” While they were in preparation, or
being prepared, they were confined, or bounded within confines, that did not
extend further west or southwest than the Euphrates. The powers or angels were
not contemporary. They were not all four being prepared at one and the same
time. They were successively prepared messenger-powers, to be brought into
action one after the other. Hence, the loosing of the four angels was not
simultaneous. First, one angel was loosed: then followed an interval; after
that, a second: then a second interval; the third angel was next unbound, and
executed his mission: a third interval then ensued; and, lastly, the fourth
angel was loosed, and he consummated the work of killing “the third.” Thus,
these four angel-powers may very properly be styled Euphratean. The fourth
angel still exists, and Occupies the capital in which the throne of the extinct
“third” flourished for a thousand years. It is, therefore, by origin and
possession, Euphratean; for this “great river” flows through its territory.
Hence, “the Great River Euphrates” is made the symbol of the fourth angel in
the period coincident with the advent of Christ (ch.
16:12,15).
3. Symbolic Period of the Loosing
These
four angel-powers of the Euphratean region of the globe, were loosed for the
execution of a mission to be completed in a specific period - “they were loosed
that they might kill (he third of the men at the end of, eis, until, THE hour,
and day, and month and year,” eniauton. Here was a whole period, which began
with the complete preparation of the first angel-power, and ended with the
consummation of the work of the four angels, which was the putting to death of
“the third” (ver. 18). Of how many years was this period composed? The answer
to this question is, of three hundred and ninety-one years and thirty days. The
time of the preparation of each angel-power, is not stated. The transactions,
which developed the angels beyond the Euphrates, do not enter into the vision;
nor the time they consumed. The period of time has exclusive reference to the
operations of the “two myriads of myriads of cavalry” against the Eastern Third
peoples, after their crossing the Euphrates.
But,
it may be further asked, How are these 391 years and 30 days arrived at? In
answer to this it may be remarked, that it is absolutely certain from the
historical illustration of the fifth trumpet, that the two periods of “five
months” each, were periods of 150 years; and that the whole ten months, or 300
years, was the aeon, or cycle, allotted to the tormenting and injuring
ascendancy of the Caliph-Angel of the Abyss.
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Events
having clearly demonstrated the duration of five months, we are thereby
instructed as to the number of years contained in one month. A symbolical
month, then, is thirty years. When a month, therefore, is as-sociated with
“hour, day and year” in symbolic time, these must be relatively proportional.
The year, eniautos, that which returns into itself or a circuit of time, must
be twelve times the length of “the month;” and “the day” one thirtieth of the
month; and “the hour, “ one twelfth of “the day.” In the case of the five
months events have proved that Apocalyptic time is based upon the principle of
a day for a year. According to this, an eniautos or year, being twelve times
more than a month of years, would be equal to three hundred and sixty ordinary
years; a day, one year; and an hour, thirty days. These added together give the
whole number of years for the period of the execution of the mission of the
four loosed angel myriads of Euphratean cavalry, as stated above; and may be
tabularly presented thus:
Years Days
An Hour, equal to 0 30
A Day, equal to 1 00
A Month, equal to 30 00
A Year, equal to 360 00
Whole Period of the killing 391 30
In
the Greek text the definite article ten is prefixed only to horan, hour. It
does not read, “for the hour, and the day, and the month, and the year;” but, one
article is prefixed to the whole time - eis ten horan and so forth; ‘for,
during or until the end of the hour, “&c. This was, doubt-less,
significant; and designed to indicate, that the divisions of time were to be
taken as proportional parts of a whole period.
4. Number of the Cavalry
“And
the number of the hosts of the cavalry was two myriaas of myriads” - theo
muriathes muriathon. This is the symbolical number of the four angel-powers -
two myriads of myrids hippikou of cavalry -equestrian myriads. The number is
enormous when literally stated; but, however great, is in strict accordance
with the truth of history. A myriad is ten thousand. But this must be
multiplied by two, for there are “two myriads,” or twenty thousand. In the
phrase “two myriads of myriads,” this twenty thousand becomes the multiplier of
“myriads,” which is the multiplicand. If muriathon, genitive plural, is to be
taken as one myriad of ten thousand, then the “two myriads of myriads” will
represent two
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hundred
millions, or twenty thousand ten thousands. These 200,000,000 must not be taken
as the numeration of the angel-hosts at any one time; but as the aggregate of
the equestrian forces of the four angel-powers in all the 391 years and 30 days
of the killing period their numbers were
computed by millions.
5. The Horses and Their Riders
“And
thus I saw the horses in the vision; and those sitting upon them.” The
description which follows exemplifies the “thus.” He saw the equestrian
millions in vision. What a host to contemplate! He beheld them embattled, and
vomiting forth fire and smoke, and deadly missiles. The horses he saw were not
real horses, but horses in vision, or symbolical horses and symbolical riders;
which in solid array and in action presented certain characteristics
illustrative of the historical reality.
I
find the following concerning the horse in symbol in Daubuz. He says: “The
horse was of old used only for warlike expeditions, and not barely to ride,
draw, and drudge, as it is now practised with us. Hence, in that noble
description of the horse, in Job. 39:18-25, there is no notice taken of any
quality of his but what relates to war. So that the horse is the symbol of war
and conquest.” When, therefore, the Spirit saith in Zech. 10:3, “Yahweh
Tz’vaoth hath visited his flock the House of Judah, and hath made them as his
goodly horse in the battle,” the meaning is, that he will ride them as their
Commander-in-Chief, and make them conquerors over his enemies, glorious and
successful.
Thus
in Psa. 45:5 rchav, to ride, is rendered in the Septuagint by basileuein, to
reign. And in several other places to ride, signifies to have dominion.
“Agreeably to this,” the Oneirocritics say, “that if any one dreams that he
rides upon a generous horse, it denotes that he shall obtain dignity, fame,
authority, prosperity, and a good name among the people; in short, all such
things which may accrue to a man by good success in martial affairs.” And
hence, from the horse being an instrument of conquest, and therefore the symbol
of the dignity, fame, power, prosperity, and success he causes, when Carthage
was founded, and a horse’s head was dug up by the workmen, the soothsayers gave
Out that the city would be warlike and powerful.”
“As
a horse is warlike, so he is also a swift creature, and is there-fore not only
the symbol of conquest, but also of the speediness of it” (Joel 2:4; Jer.
4:13).
The
following in Hab. 1:8, concerning the swift, fierce, and invincible career of
the Chaldeans against Judah, is expressive also of that of the four Euphratean
angel-powers, as represented by the equestrian myriads in the sixth trumpet
vision: “Their horses are swifter than the
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leopards,
and are more fierce than the evening wolves: and their horse-men shall spread
themselves, and their horsemen shall come from far; they shall fly as the eagle
hasteth to prey. They shall come all for violence ...... they shall scoff at
the kings, and the princes shall be a scorn unto them: they shall deride every
stronghold; for they shall heap dust, and take it”.
6. Breasts Fiery and Hyacinthine
But,
there were characteristics pertaining to the armed equestrian myriads seen in
vision by John, that Habakkuk did not see in the Chaldean hosts. He says, the
horsemen had breasts thorakas, fiery and hyacin-thine and sulphurous.” These
were breast-works, in military phraseology; and on these were mounted “heads,”
in which were “mouths.” They were equestrian lion-heads, very fierce and
destructive; and out of these horse-lion-head mouths “burst forth fire, and smoke,
and sulphur.” These horses were what is now styled horse-artillery: artillery
drawn by horses, without which they would be of little use in war. “The heads
of the horses were as the heads of lions,” because of their roaring; “and out
of their mouths burst, or roared forth the fire, smoke, and sulphur.” Hence,
the horses in the vision besides being symbolical of the equestrian character,
and of the swift and fierce invincibility, of the Euphratean angel-powers, are
representative of the new and powerful artillery used by the fourth Euphratean
Angel in putting to death “the third” - the third that belonged to the men who
were unsealed. These
The
Apocalypse predicted that the eastern Empire would be brought to its end by
“fire, smoke and brimstone” (or sulphur
Rev.
9:18). This describes the use of cannon and gunpowder. In describing the fall
of the Eastern Empire, Gibbon in The
Decline
And Fall Of The Roman Empire makes specific reference to the use of such
weapons in the overthrow of Constantinople.
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lion-headed
horses, roaring and vomiting fire, smoke, and sulphur out of their mouths, were
cannons belching forth destruction. John saw them mounted on breastworks, which
breasted the troops behind them; and from these “breasts,” as well as from the
“mouths,” burst forth fire; for the riders had “breasts fiery, hyacinthine, and
sulphurous.” He saw these artillery mounted breastworks actively at work; and
the nature of their activity he signifies by the sight and smell. They appeared
to the eye “fiery and hyacinthine.” This is the symbolism of the flash seen on
the discharge of loaded cannon. If a little saltpeter and sulphur be triturated
together, and then thrown into the fire, the hyacinthine color will be seen in
their combustion. In other words, this combustion will be “fiery and
hyacinthine.” Hence, breastworks, lined with cannon in explosive operation,
would be fiery and hyacinthine to the eye, being illuminated with these colors
at every flash. The smell also would be highly “sulphurous,” Owing to the
composition of matters vomited out of the roaring mouths of the great guns.
7. “With the Heads They Do Injure”
But
what he saw and smelt were not mere holiday salutes. He saw and smelt them in the
battles which extinguished the political existence of “the third” - to triton.
There were not only color and smell, but death also, in “the fire, and the
smoke, and the sulphur;” for “by these three,” saith he: “were killed the third
of the men by the fire, and by the smoke, and by the sulphur bursting forth out
of their mouths. And the reason given for the deadliness of these three agents
in combination, when bursting forth from the mouths of the lion-headed horses,
or artillery, is “because their powers are in their mouths and in their tails.”
A cannon, in modern style, is divided into breech, barrel, and mouth. The
Spirit only indicates the mouth and the breech, which he terms the tail, which
is an appendage thereto. These “tails” were “like serpents,” in the similitude
of their destructive operation; for the tails were not head-less. Had they been
headless tails, they could have done no injury; no more than a serpent without
a head. When a serpent injures, it coils, and making a fulcrum of its tail, shoots
forth its head from amid the coils, which are straightened by the spring, and
with its head strikes its victim with a deadly stroke. Hence, the death-dealing
powers of the serpent are in its head, or mouth, and in its tail. So it is with
flying artillery, and with artillery mounted on breastworks, compared herein to
“serpents.” Without the tail of the piece the mouth thereof could not injure;
and without the mouth, or outlet, the tail could do no harm. As in the natural,
“the powers” of these artillery serpents “are in their mouths and in their
tails.” The projecting power is in the tail of the piece; many
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the
projectile were always mouth, or muzzle-loaded - they went through the mouth
into the tail; and being well rammed, they spring or shoot forth with the voice
of a lion, straightening themselves from tail to mouth, out of which they rush
in “fire, smoke, and sulphur,” dealing death and destruction upon what things
soever may be encountered by their “head,” their tail-heads, or cannon balls;
“for their tails have heads, and with these do they injure.” Thus, “by the
fire, and by the smoke, and by the sulphur,” as an exploding power projecting
the tail-heads, were “the third of the men killed.” The scorpions of the first
woe were highly incendiary; but they did not make breaches in walls, and
overturn lofty towers: the serpents of the second woe did all this; and in
opening breaches by their tail-heads, gave admission to the fourth Euphratean
angel-power into the capital of the Eastern Third, where he has been enthroned
upwards of four hundred years, the observed of all observers; some of whom long
for his decease, that they may be enriched by the division of his estate.
8.
Fire, Hyacinth, and Sulphur
“Fire,
hyacinth, and sulphur,” and “fire, smoke, and sulphur,” are symbolical of
gunpowder, which is composed of charcoal, saltpeter, and sulphur. These three
substances in their normal, distinct, and quiescent state, have no resemblance
to fire, hyacinth, and smoke; but while, in combustion, they are the
appearances, which, with the sulphurous smell, most forcibly strike our senses.
Hence, the phenomena resulting from the combustion, become symbolical of the
projecting force, or power, which drives forth the power that strikes with the
stroke of death. Saltpeter, or nitrate of potassa, is symbolized by
hyacinth-color, because of the analogy it bears to it in color when in
deflagration. Nothing could be more significant of this destructive agent,
first used in the warfare of nations in the fourteenth century, than the terms
employed by the Spirit in this vision. The hieroglyphic can mean nothing else
than the great destroying machinery of modern warfare.
9. “Lake of Fire Burning with Sulphur”
It
will be in place here to remark, that “these plagues,” as they are fitly termed
in verse 20, will be terribly operative in the destroying of the body of the
beast, and in the binding of the dragon, and casting of him into the abyss
(Dan. 7:11). They will be swamped in “a fiery stream,” and “be given to the burning
flame.” This is apocalyptically styled, “a Lake of Fire burning with sulphur”
(ch. 19:20). The territory upon
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which
the beast and false prophet dominion exist, will be turned into a lake of fire
by this sulphur-burning machinery of war. The saints will be in that lake,
“executing the judgment written,” in tormenting with fire and sulphur the
worshippers of the beast (ch. 14:10). Fire, sulphur, and smoke, in these
places, symbolize the same agent as they do in the second woe. The governments
are not casting great guns, and storing up munitions of war in vain. They are
preparing them blindly for their own destruction. Their arsenals will fall into
the hands of the Lamb and his people, who will plunge incessant fire upon their
enemies, the smoke of whose torment will ascend, until their power shall be
totally and finally destroyed. From thenceforth, war will be no more for a
thousand years.
10. “The Rest Of The Men”
In
the twelfth verse, the Spirit refers to hoi loipoi ton anthropon “the rest of the
men who were not killed by these plagues.” The to triton ton anthropon, the
third of the men were killed by the plagues. The former class who were not
killed, though filled with consternation at the fate of “the third,” still
flourished in political existence. The fourth Euphratean angel-power, though it
injured them greatly in its wars upon them, was unable to kill them, as he had
slain their brethren of “the third.” The others, hoi loipoi, in habit all those
countries of the Roman orb not included in the Ottoman empire, or fourth
Euphratean angel dominion. They are known as “the Latins,” who in ch .13:4,5,
are said to worship the beast, and to be subject to his Mouth, which speaks
great things and blasphemies. These are said in ch. 9:20, to worship the
Daemonials and idols, the works of their hands. Notwithstanding the signal
overthrow and political annihilation of their daemon and image-worshipping
brethren of the eastern third, they, the Latins of the west, still continued
the same abomination, as at this day. Hence, the work of judgment ceased not
with the death of the third; but continues still, and will continue, until all
“the daemons” are cast out, and “the idols” are thrown to the moles and the
bats, and Yahweh alone is exalted in the glory of his majesty and might (Isa.
2:17-21).
11. “The Daemonials”
In
the English Version of Apoc. 9:20, ta daimonia, is very improperly rendered
“devils.” In my translation I have merely transferred it from the Greek,
leaving it for explanation as a symbol.
Under
the word daimonion, I find the following among other significations of the
noun: “Especially an inferior race of divine beings; the name by which Socrates
called his genius, or the SPIRIT he supposed to
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dwell
within him.” (Not diminutive from daimon, but neuter from daimonios). The root
of the word is daimon, of which one of the senses given is “the souls of men of
the golden age hovering between heaven and earth, and acting as tutelary
deities; they formed the connecting link between gods and men, and so Aeschylus
calls the deified Darius daimon, a daemon; hence, when daimones and theoi are
joined, the daimones are gods of lower rank; and here note, that theos is never
used for daimon, though daimon is for theos. In later authors, as Lucianus, in
general, departed souls” - Liddel and Scott’s Lex.
This
was the sense of the word among the heathen who worshipped images. They
foolishly imagined that all men, women, and children have within them a genius,
spirit or soul which they considered to be a particle of the essence of Deity,
whoever or whatever he might be; and that, therefore, said genius, spirit, or
soul, was absolutely and essentially immortal or deathless. This was the daemon
in a living man, such as Socrates surrendered himself blindly to the guidance
and protection of. But, when men, women, and children, ceased to be creatures
visibly existing, they supposed, that they still continued in being, only
invisible to the naked eye. Their bodies they often burned to ashes, which they
deposited in urns; nevertheless, they supposed that they were still in
existence, only in a new form. They conceited that the real man was the
indwelling soul; and that when the body ceased to breathe, said soul ascended
into the air, or aerial, where it “hovered between heaven and earth.” These
were deified souls - souls made deities by human decrees, or apotheosis. They
styled them “Immortal Gods,” though but “an inferior race of divine beings.” Of
these gods were Darius, Caesar, Alexander, and a host of others, who had made
themselves “great,” in the estimation of the blind multitude, who decreed
divine honors to their souls, and erected statuesque copies of their perished
forms, for the glorification of their friends, and the factions they were
supposed to have adorned. The immortal soul in the aerial called Darius, and
decreed to be a god, was what they called a daemon or a daemon ion. Such
daemons the heathen worshipped, and placed themselves, their families, their
property, and countries, under the protection of. Hence, they styled them
“tutelary deities,” or divine guardians.
“In
classical use,” says Dr. Geo. Campbell, “demon signified a divine being, though
not in the highest order of their divinities, and there-fore supposed not
equivalent to Theos, but superior to human, and consequently, by the maxims of
their theology, a proper object of adoration.” “All demons,” says Plato, “are
an intermediate order between God and mortals.” “It was customary with the
pagans to deify abstract qualities, making them either gods or goddesses, as
suited the gender of
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the
name. They sometimes deified men who had
been their benefactors.” “The proper notion of demons is, beings in respect of
power superior to human, but inferior to that which christians comprehend under
the term divine.’
“What
are men?” says a dialogist in Lucian. The answer is, “Mortal gods. What are
gods? Immortal men. “In fact, immortality disembodied was almost the only
distinction between them. Disembodied immortals is the idea represented by
demons.
“The
pagans were a kind of superstitious atheists,” says another writer, “who
acknowledged no being that corresponds to our idea of a deity. Besides, a great
part of the heathen worship was confessedly paid to ghosts of departed heroes,
of conquerors, and potentates, and of the inventors of arts, whom popular
superstition, after disguising their history with fables and absurdities, had
blindly deified. Now, to all such beings they themselves, as well as the Jews,
assigned the name daimonia, demons.”
The
whole superstructure of paganism is based upon the unscriptural dogma, and
invention of the carnal mind, of an immortal essence in man capable of
disembodied existence after death. But for this stupid fiction there would have
been no daemons, nor any of the thirty thousand gods and goddesses, nor any
guardian saints, or tutelary deities, of ancient and modern Greece and Rome. A
scribe well instructed for the kingdom of the heavens, knows that man has no
such daemon in him; and that however high he may be “in honor,” if he
understand not the truth, “is as the beasts that perish” (Psa. 49:12,20).
In
the apocalypse diamonia occurs only once, and that in ch. 9:20; while daimon in
the genitive plural is found twice, first, inch. 16.14, and then inch. 18:2. In
ch. 9:20, it is really the neuter plural of the adjective daimonios, of, or
pertaining to, daemons: “that they should not worship ta daimonia things
related to daemons” - things supposed to exist in the aerial, “between heaven
and earth.” Inch. 16:14, the word is different, because it refers to different
things, and pertaining to a different region. Both in this text, and, in ch.
18:2, the things signified by daimones are related to earth, though, among the
inhabitants of the Roman earth, they occupy a position analogous to that of the
daemons of the mythical aerial between the political heaven and the peoples
beneath. The habitation of these daemons is the aerial of Babylon; “the hold of
every foul spirit, and cage of every unclean and hateful bird, “such as popes,
cardinals, bishops, priests, monks, and other officials of the state. In ch.
16:14, they are the gods of the political aerial, whose policies, or “spirits,”
develop remarkable and notable events. The daemons of these two texts are men
of high degree - real men of flesh and blood, in the official
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exercise
of power; and not objects of superstitious worship. But this is not the case in
ch. 9:20. Here the things related to daemons are as-sociated with idols or images,
in the phrase ta daimonia kai eidola, where the definite article ta serves both
for daimonia and eidola; and very properly so, because the eidola are the
visible representations of the daemonia.
“The
passage in which,” says Mr. Tayler Lewis, in his Platonic Theology, “we find
the most express and the clearest mention of daemons is in the Epinomis,” which
he renders thus: “Next to these, and under these, the Daemons, an aerial race,
having the third seat, must we honor by prayers.” They are spoken of as
possessing wonderful intelligence, as feeling a deep sympathy in human affairs,
as loving the good, hating the bad, and, in consequence of their middle
position in the air, acting as interpreters and mediators between gods and men.
To the same effect Socrates speaks of them in the Symposium, as: “For the whole
demonial race is between Deity and mortals, acting as interpreters or
messengers to both. Through this passes all divination, and the whole
prophetical art; for Deity mingles not directly with the human race, but
through these media is ever carried on the intercourse between Heaven and men,
both when awake and when asleep.”
Such
were the daimones, daemons, ta daimonia, the things pertaining to daemons, of
pagan antiquity. They were unsubstantial, unreal, imaginary phantasms, and fit
only to make symbols of, as representative of other abominations analogous to,
and as unreal as, themselves.
The
Greeks and Romans have never relaxed their hold upon daemonolatry or
demon-worship to this day. They have only changed the character of their
daemons and idols. When they became catholics they did not really cease to be
pagans; they only “baptized” their daemons, and called them by other names.
Jupiter, the Latins styled St. Peter, and the idol representative of “the
father of the gods and men” became the image of St. Peter, “the Prince of the
Apostles.” Jupiter’s wife, Juno, the Queen of the Universe, was converted by
the Collyridion “heretics,” who changed her name to “Mary, Mother of Mercy,
Queen of the whole world, Mother and Spouse of God.” After this fashion, they
have conferred the names of fabulous saints and angels upon the gods and
daemons of ancient Greece and Rome. All that the old heathens affirmed of their
deities, the modern heathens of the Greek and Latin communions affirm of their
martyrs, saints, and angels. The daemonology of the ancient world is the
daemonology of the Apostasy, catholic and protestant. These are in fellowship
with Plato, Socrates, and other pagans, in their views about “souls” and
“departed spirits”; and, with all their “ripe scholarship,” as they absurdly
style proficiency
Page 125
Illustrations page 125
not shown
The Struggle, as depleted by the Medieval Mind, for the Soul of a Dying
Person.
(Fourteenth Century MS. in British Museum. From Twining’s “Symbols and
Emblems in Christian Art.”
Illustration
not shown
Grecian
Conception of the Departure of the Soul
(Reproduction from wiedemann”s “The Ancient Egyptian Doctrine of
Immortality.”)
These
two illustrations show how closely the fiction of an immortal soul as taught by
the Apostasy
approximates
to the pagan teaching of Grecian
mythology. See comments on p. 124.
Page 126
Book
Cover shown page 126 not shown
The
Dedication of J. Furniss’ Books for Children and Young Persons as were offered
as recommended reading by Roman Catholic booksellers illustrating the blasphemy
of the Roman Catholic Apostasy. See comment on p.124 - Publishers.
Page 127
in
‘the foolishness” of their collegiate “divinities,” they are not one step in advance
of the Platonists upon these subjects. That is, they know no more about souls
and departed spirits, and their post mortem relations, than did they who had no
revelation at all to guide them into truth.
Protestants
and Catholics now believe, with all the heathen, that there is inherent in man
a particle of the Divine Essence, endowed with all the attributes of deity, in
like proportion as part bears to whole. This they call “soul,” or “spirit,” or
“immortal soul;” because they imagine it is incorruptible, indestructible,
deathless. They regard this fiction as the real man. The body, in their
psychology, is of no account. The soul is God in man’s nature - an immortal god
in mortal flesh - both in combination constituting what the pagan poet styles
“a mortal god.” When what is mortal of this god dies, that which they style
“the immortal soul” still lives, and becomes what their brother Lucian
denominates “an immortal man;” that is, a daemon of inferior rank, nevertheless
a god!
Now catholics and protestants hold such gods as these in high esteem.
The old mythologist had thirty thousand daemons; as -
‘For
thrice ten thousand wait upon our earth;
Jove’s
everlasting guards for mortal men.
who roam the world in robes of air conceal’d.”
But
their successors of the Laodicean church have millions. The immortal
soul-daemons of all their favorites are “sainted in heaven,” as soon as they
are supposed “to shuffle off the mortal coil.” The disembodied immortal
soul-daemons of what are called men, women, children, babes, are decreed by
their theologies, or daemonologies, to be saints and angels in the aerial or
sky. The soul-daemon of a babe is transformed into “a little darling angel”
with wings, and is symbolized by painters, as wild in their imaginations as the
poets, by a head with wings peeping out of a cloud. The air, which these
phantoms are supposed to inhabit, they term the “spirit-world,” “the
spirit-land,” “the eternal world,” “the world to come,” “kingdom come,” and so
forth; for, in reference to them in the words of Hesiod, they say -“close at
hand,
Immortal
eyes behold us evermore”
Or,
as Milton expresseth it -“Millions of spiritual creatures walk the earth,
Unseen,
both when we sleep and when we wake.”
But,
though they suppose all individuals of the human race have immortal souls,
catholics do not worship all soul-daemons. All these they suppose to go to
“purgatory”; but it is only those of the dead they
Page
128.
delight
to honor whom they exalt to the aerial between heaven and earth. They do this
by a process in their ecclesiastical court called canonization. Having tried
their characters in this court, and heard all the Devil’s lawyer has to say
against them, they are, in spite of the Devil, decreed to be adorable saints,
and are translated out of purgatory beneath, to the aerial between heaven and
earth!
Apotheosis
was the deification of the disembodied ghosts, or soul daemons, of pagan heroes
and great men, by which they were exalted to the aerial between earth and heaven,
and became, in their new position, adorable daemon gods, interpreters,
mediators, angels or messengers, guardians and protectors of persons, families,
nations, temples, and states. Now, what apotheosis was among the worshippers of
Jupiter, canonization is among the worshippers of the fictitious ghost which
they call “the Virgin Mother and Spouse of God.” It is the next process to what
they style beatification. The ghost supposed to be a blessed or beatified ghost
after a scrutiny of its embodied life, in the presence of the Roman bishop and
his cardinals, is proclaimed a holy one, or what these “worshippers” of the
daemonials and images term “a saint,” upon which the Pontiff decrees the
canonization and appoints the day.
On
the day upon which the beatified soul daemon is installed by sovereign
authority among the saint-protectors and mediators of the Laodicean aerial, the
episcopal chief of the apostasy officiates in white, and his cardinals are
dressed in the same. The temple dedicated to the ghost-god whom they christen
“St Peter,” is hung with rich tapestry, upon which the arms of the Romish High
Priest, and of the prince or state requiring the deification, are embroidered
in gold and silver. A great number of lights blaze around the temple, which is
crowded with a swinish multitude, who await with the impatient devotion of
ignorance and superstition till the new daemonial has made his public entry
into the aerial paradise between earth and heaven, that they may offer up their
petitions to his demon-godship without danger of being rejected.
The
catholic aerial is full of these deified ghosts, whose demonial images and
relics are stored in the church bazaars dedicated to them, for the adoration of
their besotted worshippers. All the apostles, and “the noble army of martyrs,”
and the popes and cardinals, and “the fathers,” and Constantine, and
Theodosius, and St. Ambrose, St. Augustine, St. Jerome, and a countless host of
the same sort of deities, with the Immaculate Goddess Mary, “the Queen of
Heaven,” at the head of them, are all supposed to be there, interceding with
Mary’s Son for the safety and prosperity of their catholic adorers “whose
public and private vows,” says Gibbon, “were addressed to their relics and
images which disgraced the temples of the east.” This catholic aerial is
supposed to be
Page 129
before
the throne. The reader, therefore, may easily perceive the fitness of the
historian’s style, in continuing: “The throne of the Almighty was darkened by a
cloud of martyrs, saints, and angels, the objects of popular veneration; while
the Virgin Mary was invested with the name and honors of a goddess.” They are,
indeed, a cloud darkening the Almighty’s throne, so that no worshipper of
daemonial ghosts, daemonial relics, and daemonial images, can see that throne,
or find transmission for a single sigh.
Such
were the many new deities raised to the rank of celestial and invincible
protectors of the Roman empire. The intelligent reader will know that they
exist only in the intoxicated imaginations of their deluded worshippers, as do
the phantoms seen by an inebriate in delirium tremens. Immortality is neither
innate nor disembodied. “The Deity only hath it,” Paul says; and he only
bestows it upon obedient believers of the truth as it is in the Jesus he
preached; and that bestowal is upon men and women bodily existing; and by
clothing their bodies with incorruptibility and deathlessness after
resurrection from among the dead. This is what the scripture teaches in
opposition to the mythologies of the ancient and modern worlds. If “the
simplicity which is in Christ” had not been departed from, there would have
been no catholic and protestant daemonialism. The dogma of inherent immortality
in sin’s flesh would have remained with the old pagans; but the faith was
departed from by those who ought to have been its earnest defenders. They
abandoned the word, and substituted the vain imaginations of the heathen, which
are all resolvable into the reasonings and speculations of the brain,
unenlightened by revelation of any kind. They became polytheists in spite of
revelation; and polytheists they will remain till Babylon falls; and the divine
reprobation is stamped upon its idolatry in its destruction by the judgment to
be executed by the saints.
The
clergy, who are in all ages the blind adherents and patrons of profitable
errors, came to perceive that this polytheistic daemonialism would be more
valuable to them than gold or precious stones. This stimulated them to a
fraudulent multiplication of daemonial relics, such as the bones, hair, teeth,
toe nails, blood, and so forth, of some fictitious saint or martyr; all of
which were declared to be holy and endowed with miraculous powers for the
healing of the sick, and even for the resurrection of the dead. “Without much
regard for truth or probability,” says Gibbon, “they invented names for
skeletons, and actions for names. The fame of the apostles, and of the holy men
who had imitated their virtues, was darkened by religious fiction. To the
invincible band of genuine and primitive martyrs, they added myriads of
imaginary heroes who had never existed, except in the fancy of crafty or
credulous legen-
daries;
and there is reason to suspect that Tours might not be the only diocese in which
the bones of a malefactor were adored instead of those of a saint.”
But,
he believes that “the progress of superstition would have been much less rapid
and victorious if the faith of the people had not been assisted by the
seasonable aid of visions and miracles” (termed by Paul”all power, and signs,
and wonders of falsehood”) “to ascertain the authenticity and virtue of the
most suspicious relics.” He then gives a account of how the remains of Stephen
were discovered by the appea ance of Gamaliel to one Lucian, a presbyter of
Jerusalem, in the reign ( Theodosius II., A.D. 421-460. The ghost named
Gamaliel revealed the place of Stephen’s
burial. When his alleged coffin came into view, the earth trembled, and an odor
such as that of Paradise was smelt, which instantly cured the various diseases
of seventy-three of the assistants.
These fragrant daemonial relics were transported in clerical procession
to a church-bazaar constructed in their honor on Mount Zion; and th minute
particles of those relics, a drop of blood, or the scrapings of bone, were
acknowledged in almost every province of the Roman world to possess a divine
and miraculous virtue. Augustine, bishop of Hippo, renowned saint of the
Apostasy, and the great exemplar of Mr. Elliott’ “sealed ones,” attests the
innumerable prodigies performed in Africa by the daemonial relics of the
catholic St. Stephen. In his work, the City of God, he enumerates about seventy
miracles, of which three were resurrections from the dead, in the space of two
years, and within the limits of his own diocese! Paul had such “saints” as this
Augustine before his mind when he wrote to Timothy that in later times there
would be ” seducing spirits, with teachings concerning daemonials; speaking lie
in hypocrisy; having their conscience seared as with a hot iron.” If w enlarge
our view to all the dioceses and all the saints of the catholic world, it will
not be easy to calculate the fables and the errors which issued from this
inexhaustible source.
“Whatever
might be the condition of vulgar souls in the long interval between the
dissolution and the resurrection of their bodies, it was evident,” says Gibbon,
satirically, “that the superior spirits (or deified ghosts) of the saints and
martyrs did not consume that portion of their existence in silent and
inglorious sleep. To the pious worshippers, it was evident that these daemonial
spirits enjoyed the lively and active consciousness of their happiness, their
virtues, and their powers, and that they
had already secured the possession of their eternal reward. The enlargement of
their intellectual faculties surpassed the measure of th human imagination,
since it was proved by the (alleged) experience of their worshippers that they
were capable of hearing and understanding
Page 131
the
various petitions of their numerous votaries, who, in the same moment of time,
but in the most distant parts of the world, invoked the name and assistance of
Stephen or of Martin.” The confidence of their suppliants was based on the
supposition that the saints, by daemonial transformation were reigning with
Christ, and were warmly interested in the prosperity of the catholic church;
and that the individuals who im-itated the examples of their faith and piety,
were the peculiar and favorite objects of their most tender regard. They
imagined that the daemonials viewed, with partial affection, the places which
had been consecrated by their birth, their residence, their death, their
burial, or the possession of their relics. In short, as the daemonials of the
aerial were the mere fictions of disordered imaginations, the vagaries of the
human mind in its passion and desires were ascribed to them. Thus, they were as
proud, avaricious, and revengeful as their votaries, neither more nor less. As
all they had to say to their worshippers was said or interpreted by lying and
hypocritical priests and monks, they testified their grateful approbation of
the liberality of their votaries; and hurled the sharpest bolts of punishment
against those impious wretches who violated their magnificent shrines or
disbelieved their supernatural power. “The imagination, which had been raised
by a painful effort to the contemplation and worship of the Universal Cause,
eagerly embraced such inferior objects of adoration as were more proportioned
to its gross conceptions and imperfect faculties. The sublime and simple
theology of the primitive christians was gradually corrupted; and the monarchy
of heaven, already clouded by metaphysical subtleties, was degraded by the
introduction of a popular mythology, which tended to restore the reign of
polytheism.” Gibbon.
Thus,
contemporary with the sounding of the fifth and sixth trumpets the latter of
which did not cease to sound till A.D. 1794, the daemons of pagan Rome
recovered their places in the aerial under new names; and became the patrons
and protectors of the catholic apostasy. These trumpets were terrible judgments
inflicted upon mankind because of their daemonolatry and idolatry.
Protestantism appeared on the stage of action about the time of or a few years
before the killing of the third of the men by the fourth angel power But though
it protested against some catholic abominations of the grosser sort it still
clung tenaciously to the beatified existence of the daemonials in the aerial It
holds to all the absurdities which flow from the dogma of hereditary
immortality, and the disembodied existence of the immortal essence after death.
It erects statues in honor of its departed great, and dedicates them with
clerical prayers and other ceremonies; and proclaims the dead to be alive in
heaven, whence they look down with pleasure and
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132
grateful
satisfaction upon the demonstrations of their admirers. Protestant daemonolatry
is no more agreeable to heaven than the daemon worship of the catholic world.
Behold the vengeance that desolates the protestant South, and that oppresses
the protestant North with death and perplexity. These sectarian sections, being
composed of all kinds of polytheists, are being plagued for reasons similar to
those which caused the locust-torment, and the loosing of the four
trans-Euphratean angel-powers. Erecting statues, and memorial windows in
churches, in honor of “immortal souls in heaven,” is worship, homage, or
reverence, and they who practice such things are as much guilty of “worshipping
the demonials,” as are they who bow down before the image of a “saint.”
‘2.
“Idols”
The
All Seeing Spirit, in ch. 9:20, intimates that the “plagues” of the first and
second woes were designed to abolish, or punish, the worshipping of daemonial
things, and idols or images. There were many other abominations concurrent with
these woes not specified; but daimonia, and eidola, things related to daemons,
and idols, are especially named, because the ages contemporary with the fifth,
and the interval preceding the sixth trumpet, were conspicuous for the legal
establishment of the worship of daemonials, and their idolatrous symbols,
called images or idols.
The
introduction and establishment of daemonial and idol worship as an institution
of the catholic apostasy, was progressive. It began with a “voluntary humility
and worshipping of angels” - and intruding into the unseen, and a vain
inflation of the mind of the flesh, in the apostolic age, as appears from Col.
2:17; and was established as early as the end of the sixth century, but more
firmly by Greek and Papal authority in the eighth and ninth. In the beginning
of the eighth, the idol worship was in full magnitude, and became a striking
characteristic of the Laodicean Apostasy; so that with Jews, Saracens,
Turkmans, Moguls, and Bible Christians, apocalyptically styled “the Golden
Altar,” and the “sealed,” catholics and idolators were and are but different
terms for the same thing.
As
I do not write for “the learned,” who are supposed to know all about the
history of the past, but whose ability to apply it rightly for apocalyptic
exposition is at zero; I shall give the reader a brief account, condensed from
Gibbon, of the idolatry which brought the judgments of the first and second woes
upon “the men” of the Greek and Latin sections of the Roman world.
At
the head of certain ecclesiastical phenomena, by which the decline and fall of
the Roman empire were materially affected, “We may,”
Page 133
says
he, “justly rank the Worship of Images, so fiercely disputed in the eighth and
ninth centuries;” since this question of popular superstition produced the
revolt of Italy from the Greek, or Sixth Dragon-Head of the empire; developed
the temporal power of the popes; and the restoration of the Roman empire of the
west under its last, or Eighth Head.
Images
or idols are symbols. They are symbols which represent the things related to
daemons - ta daimonia. Hence, when a catholic idolater looks upon the statue or
image of Jupiter, which he has been taught to regard as the image of Saint
Peter, that Saint Peter upon which the catholic church is built, he immediately
has before “the mind of his flesh,” ho nous tes sarkos autou, a disembodied
ghost, with a bunch of keys, at the gates of Paradise, called Saint Peter. He
bows before this image and kisses it, as the nearest approach he can make to
bowing be-fore the daemon-ghost in the aerial. It is to him not merely an
image, but a representative image, or idol, before which certain attitudes are
assumed, offerings presented, vows made, prayers repeated, which get no nearer
heaven than the eyes, ears, and pockets of the hypocrites who minister before
the symbol. The first introduction of this symbolic worship was in the
veneration of the cross, and of relics. At first, the experiment of daemonial
relic and image worship was made with caution and scruple. By a slow though
inevitable progression the honors conferred on the original daemon were
transferred to the copy, whether in picture, or in marble, wood, brass, silver
or gold the votary prayed before the image of a deified ghost; and the pagan
rites of genuflection, luminaries, and incense, reappeared in the catholic
church. The use, and even the worship of images, was ineradicably established
before the end of the sixth century. They were fondly cherished by the warm
imagination of the Greeks and Asiatics; and the Pantheon and Vatican were
adorned with the emblems of the new superstition.
Five
hundred years after the crucifixion, a certain bishop “speaking lies in
hypocrisy,” pretended to have discovered a true image of Christ, which he
presented to the devotion of the times. It was enthroned at Edessa in Syria,
where it was adored by the catholics as the immediate creation of the divine
original. The style and sentiments of a Byzantine hymn will declare how far
their worship was removed from the grossest idolatry. “How can we with mortal
eyes contemplate this image, whose celestial splendor the host of heaven
presumes not to behold? He who dwells in heaven condescends this day to visit
us by his venerable image. He who is seated on the cherubim visits us this day
by a picture, which the Father has delineated with his immaculate hand, which
he has formed in an ineffable manner, and which we sanctify by adoring it with
fear and love.” Before the end of the sixth century, these acheiropoietal
Page
134
PICTURE
OF “STATUE OF ST PETER” not shown, page
134
Page
135
images
(images made without hand, were propagated in the camps and cities of the
Eastern Third; they were the objects of worship, and the instruments of
miracles. The fruitful precedent was speedily transferred to the Virgin Mary,
and the daemonials of the catholic air; not very god-like, doubtless, being but
faintly and flatly delineated by monkish artists in the last degeneracy of
taste and genius.
In
the beginning of the eighth century, in the full magnitude of the abuse, many
of the Greeks were awakened to the conviction, that under the name of christianity
they had restored the idolatry of their fathers; and they heard, with grief and
impatience, from Mohammedans and Jews the incessant charge of worshipping
daemonial images, which were incapable of defending themselves, much less the
cities which superstition had placed under their protection. In ten years, the
Saracens had subdued all the daemonially protected cities of Syria, Palestine,
and Egypt, by which conquest, in their opinion, the Lord of hosts had
pronounced a decisive judgment between the adoration and contempt of their mute
and inanimate idols. In this season of distress and dismay, when the
worshippers sought death, but found it not; and desired to die, and the death
fled from them (ch. 9:6) the eloquence of the monks was exercised in the
defense of images. “But,” says the historian, they were now opposed by the
murmurs of many simple or rational christians, who appealed to the evidence of
texts, and of the primitive times, and secretly desired the reformation of the
church.”
This
reformation was attempted by Leo III., surnamed Iconoclast, who ascended the
throne of the Eastern Third, A.D. 726. After ten years, he proscribed the
existence, as well as the use of religious pictures; the church-bazaars of
Constantinople were cleansed from idolatry; the images of Christ, “the Virgin,
and the saints,” were demolished, or a smooth surface of plaster was spread
over the walls of the edifice. For these things, Leo the Isaurian, and his
party, were styled Iconoclasts, or Image breakers; by whom under six emperors,
the East and West were involved in a noisy conflict of one hundred and twenty
years. They held a synod in Constantinople, A.D. 754, which, after a session of
six months, decreed, that all visible symbols of Christ, except in the eucharist,
were either blasphemous or heretical; that image-worship was a corruption of
christianity and a renewal of paganism; that all such monuments of idolatry
should be broken or erased; and that those who should refuse to deliver the
objects of their private superstition were guilty of disobedience to the
authority of the church and of the emperor.
The
execution of the imperial edict was resisted by frequent tumults in
Constantinople and the provinces; the person of Leo was en
Page
136
dangered,
his officers were massacred, and the popular enthusiasm was quelled by the
strongest efforts of the civil and military power. Of the Archipelago, or Holy
Sea, the numerous islands were filled with images and monks; and their votaries
abjured the emperor, without scruple, as the enemy of Christ, his mother, and
the saints. They sallied forth in armed boats and galleys against the capital,
depending upon the succor of a miracle for success. But monkish miracles were
inefficient against Greek fire, which wrapped their fleet in a sheet of flame,
and gave victory to the image breakers; who forthwith suppressed the monks,
ever the faithful slaves of the superstition to which they owed their riches
and influence; dissolved their fraternities; converted their monasteries into magazines,
or barracks; and confiscated their lands, movables, and cat-tle, to the use of
the state. With the habit and profession of monks, the public and private
worship of images was rigorously proscribed; and a solemn abjuration of
idolatry was exacted from the clergy of the Eastern Third of the Roman orb.
The
patient east abjured, with reluctance, her sacred images; while they were
fondly cherished, and vigorously defended, by the Italians. Their popes were
the chief advocates of “the daemonials and idols.” It is agreed, that in the
eighth century, their dominion was founded on rebellion, and that the rebellion
was produced and justified by the heresy of the Iconoclasts. In the epistle of
Pope Gregory II. to the Emperor Leo, A.D. 727, he says: “You now accuse the
catholics of idolatry; and by the accusation you betray your own impiety and
ignorance. To this ignorance we are compelled to adapt the grossness of our
style and arguments: the first elements of holy letters are sufficient for your
confusion; and were you to enter a grammar school, and avow yourself the enemy
of our worship, the simple and pious children would be provoked to cast their
horn books at your head.” After this very episcopal salutation, he maintains a
distinction between the idols of antiquity and the catholic images. The former
were the fanciful representations of phantoms or daemons; while the latter are
the genuine forms of Christ, his mother, and his saints, who have approved by a
crowd of miracles the innocence and merit of this relative worship; and falsely
asserts the perpetual use of images from the apostolic age. Then addressing
Leo, he continues:
“You
assault us, 0 Tyrant! with a carnal and military hand; unarmed and naked, we
can only implore the Christ, the prince of the heavenly host, that he will send
unto you a devil, for the destruction of your body and the salvation of your
soul. You declare with foolish arrogance, I will dispatch my orders to Rome, I
will break in pieces the image of St. Peter; and Gregory, like his predecessor
Martin, shall be transported in chains, and in exile, to the foot of the
imperial throne. Incapable as you
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137
are
of defending your Roman subjects, the maritime situation of the city may
perhaps expose it to your depredations; but we can remove to the distance of
four and twenty stadia, to the first fortress of the Lombards, and then - you
may pursue the winds. Are you ignorant that the popes are the bond of union,
the mediators of peace (daimones, in the sense of ch. 18:2), between the east and
west? The eyes of the nations are fixed on our humility (“pride that apes
humility”); and they revere, as a God upon earth, the apostle Saint Peter,
whose image you threaten to destroy. The barbarians have submitted to the yoke
of the gospel, while you alone are deaf to the voice of the shepherd. These
pious barbarians are kindled into rage: they thirst to avenge the persecution
of the east. Abandon your rash and fatal enterprise; reflect, tremble, and
repent. If you persist, we are innocent of the blood that will be spilt in the
contest; may it fall on your own head.”
When
Leo’s proscriptive edict arrived in Italy, the catholics trembled for their
domestic deities; the images of Christ and the Virgin, of the angels, martyrs,
and saints, were abolished in all the church-bazaars of the country; and a
strong alternative was proposed to the pope, the imperial favor of the Dragon
Chief as the price of compliance, or degradation and exile as the penalty of
disobedience. Gregory refused to submit, and gave the signal of revolt. The
Italians swore to live and die in the defense of the pope, and the holy images.
They destroyed the statues of Leo, withheld the tribute of Italy, and put to an
ignominious death the officials who undertook to enforce his decree. To punish
these flagitious deeds, and to restore the dominion of the Dragon in Italy, Leo
sent a fleet and army into the Adriatic gulf. In a hard fought day, the
invaders were defeated, and the worship of images vindicated in a baptism of
blood. Amidst the triumph of the idolators, their Chief Pontiff, with the
consent of a synod hastily convened, pronounced a general excommunication
against all who by word or deed should attack the traditions of the fathers and
the images of the saints. They spared, however, the relics of the Byzantine
dominion. They delayed and prevented the election of a new emperor, and
exhorted the Italians not to separate from the body of the Roman monarchy: and
till the imperial coronation of Charlemagne, A.D. 799, the government of Rome and
Italy was administered in the name of the successors of Constantine.
While
the popes established in Italy their freedom and dominion, the images, the
first cause of their revolt, were restored in the eastern empire. The tree of
superstition had been hewn down, but the stump was still enrooted in the soil.
The idols were secretly cherished by the monks and women, whose fond alliance
obtained a final victory over the reason and authority of man. The ambitious
empress Irene, A.D. 780,
Page
138
undertook
the ruin of the Iconoclasts. In her restoration of the monks, a thousand images
were exposed to the public veneration; and a thousand lying legends invented of
their sufferings and miracles. The seventh general council was convened at
Nice, A.D. 787. The legates of the Roman God, and the eastern patriarch, sat in
the synod of three hundred and fifty bishops, who unanimously decreed, that the
worship of images is agreeable to scripture and reason, to the fathers and
council of the church. The acts of this council are still extant; a curious
monument of superstition and ignorance, of falsehood and folly. The comparative
merit of image worship and morality in the judgment of these bishops, is
illustrated by the following anecdote. A monk had concluded a truce with the
daemon of fornication on condition of interrupting his daily prayers to a
picture that hung in his cell. His scruples prompted him to consult the Abbot.
“Rather than abstain from adoring Christ and his Mother in their holy images,
it would be better for you,” said he, “to enter every brothel, and visit every
prostitute in the city.”
The
final victory of “the daemonials and idols” was achieved by a second female,
the empress Theodora, who was left guardian of the empire A.D. 842. Her
measures were bold and decisive. She ordered the Iconoclast patriarch to be
whipped with two hundred lashes. Upon this the bishops trembled, the monks
shouted, and idolatry reigned supreme. The churches of France, Germany,
England, and Spain, steered a middle course between the adoration and the
destruction of the idols, which they admitted into their temples, not as
objects of worship, but as lively and useful memorials of faith and history.
Among the barbarians of the west the worship of idols advanced with silent and
insensible progress, because among them were “nourished the Woman and the
Remnant of her seed” (ch. 12:14-17); but a large atonement is made for their
hesitation and delay, by the gross idolatry of the ages which precede the
protestant modification of Romanism, and of the countries, both in Europe and
America, which are still immersed in the gloom of daemonial superstition.
Thus, having become inveterate idolators “the inhabitants of the earth” were given over to their delusions, and nothing remained but to inflict upon them the sanguinary judgments of the three woes, or fifth, sixth, and seventh trumpets. As I have said, the second woe ended in A.D. 1794; and since then, the third woe has been doing its work upon the daemonialists and image worshippers of the European and American sections of the globe. Its judgments have not yet ceased; for “the rest of the men” have “not changed from the works of their hands, that they should not worship the daemonials and idols;” nor have they of the “religious world” abandone