And I saw when the Lamb opened
one of the seals, and I heard, as
it were the noise of thunder,
one of the four beasts saying,
Come and see.
2. And I saw, and behold
a white horse: and he that sat on him
had a bow; and a crown was
given unto him: and he went forth
conquering, and to conquer.
We have now reached the point where
the thrilling interest of this book commences.
With the opening of the seals of the book of God’s
purposes we have the prophecies of the future, the
unfolding of the events to be, described under appropriate
symbols. The contents of six seals are contained
in this and the following chapter, while the seventh
occupies the remainder of the volume.
A word relative to the plan of the
prophecies will be appropriate at this time.
I will again state what will be made very clear hereafter that
the events are narrated by series, and not by centuries.
A particular theme is taken up and carried through
to its completion, then the narrative returns and
another subject is traced to its end. Thus, the
entire book consists of a number of distinct parallel
series covering the same ground.
Upon the opening of the first seal,
John is summoned as with a voice of thunder by one
of the living creatures to draw near; and the object
that meets his vision is a white horse with its rider.
The symbol is that of a victorious warrior, being
drawn from the civil and military life of the Romans.
The symbol is one of dignity. It does not consist
of some inanimate object such as a mountain, a sea,
or a river, neither is it a wild ferocious beast;
but it is that of a living, active, intelligent being,
and he, as denoted by various insignia, a conqueror.
He rides a white horse, such as victors used in triumphal
procession; his bow and crown are also symbols of
victory. He goes forth conquering and to conquer,
or to make conquests.
This symbol is a faithful representation
of the early triumphs of Christianity in its aggressive
conflict with the huge systems of error with which
it had to contend. Some have supposed that the
rider represented Jesus Christ; but this can not be,
for many reasons, two of which I will give. First.
Christ always appears on the symbolic stage in his
own character, unrepresented by another, for the reason,
as before stated, that there is no creature that can
analagously represent Him who claims equality with
God. Not one name or attribute peculiar to him
is mentioned in the description. Second.
There are four horsemen brought to view in this chapter,
and the symbols all being drawn from the same department,
must have the same general application. If the
first horseman symbolizes a definite personage,
so do the remaining three; but we should have great
difficulty in identifying the last three, giving them
an individual application.
Others make the first horseman a symbol
of the gospel itself, but the gospel is not a living,
active, intelligent agent, such as the symbol evidently
is, but is only a system of the revealed truth.
All congruity and appropriateness in the comparison
is lacking.
But let us give this symbol further
consideration. It is not enough that its interpretation
alone be given, but the reader is justly entitled to
a knowledge of the process by which we arrive at the
truth. In the first place, we have a symbol of
great dignity and excellence, and we must look for
an object of corresponding character. The symbol
is that of a living agent, and consequently, we must
look for its fulfillment in an active, intelligent
agent. The purity, or whiteness, of the horse
on which the rider was seated would indicate an agency
of mild, beneficent character. Finally, the symbol
is drawn, as before stated, from the civil and military
life of the Romans. Now, according to the laws
of symbolic language, a symbol never represents an
object like itself, but an analagous one in another
department. A wild beast does not represent a
wild beast, but something of analagous character.
Seven fat and seven lean kine do not represent kine
like themselves, but something analagous seven
years of plenty and as many of famine. There are
only two great series of events described in the Revelation the
history of ecclesiastical events and the political
history of certain nations. The present symbol
is drawn from one of these departments the
political or the civil life of the Romans; and leaving
the latter department to find its signification in
another department, we have no place to go except
into the department of ecclesiastical affairs.
Entering, therefore, the spiritual realm, and looking
about us for an object that perfectly meets every
requirement of the symbol, we find it in the humble
ministers of Christ, who boldly went forth in
obedience to the divine command to extend the peaceful
triumphs of the cross and to carry the gospel of the
kingdom of God “into all the world.”
Mark 16:15-18; Mat 28:19, 20. This succession
of faithful, holy, devoted men is worthy of a place
in Apocalyptic vision. They went forth “conquering
and to conquer”; and the victories they gained
were such as the world never witnessed before.
Worthy are they to wear a victor’s crown, for
they have “fought a good fight.”
Because of its connection with events
following, it is necessary for us to consider the
divine position of these first ministers of the church.
Their equality is clearly taught in the New
Testament. Christ gave them the express command,
“Be not ye called Rabbi: for one is your
Master, even Christ; and all ye are brethren.”
Mat 23:8. When two of the disciples manifested
a desire to gain preeminence over their brethren and
their aspirations displeased the ten, Christ said to
them all, “Ye know that the princes of the Gentiles
exercise dominion over them, and they that are great
exercise authority upon them. But it shall
not be so among you.” Mat 20:25, 26.
Thus a perfect standard of equality in the ministry
is lifted up. The beloved apostle, the writer
of the Revelation, when addressing the elders of the
seven churches of Asia in particular, humbly and affectionately
represented himself as their “brother
and companion in tribulation.” Rev 1:9.
I will now adduce the testimony of
several creditable historians, who are compelled to
admit the humble equality of the New Testament ministry,
notwithstanding the fact that some of them belonged
to churches containing a very unequal ministry.
Mosheim says: The rulers of the church were called their
presbyters or bishops, which two titles are, in the New Testament, undoubtedly
applied to the same order of men.... Let no one confound the bishops of this
primitive and golden period of the church, with those of whom we read in the
following ages. For, though they were both distinguished by the same name, yet
they differed extremely, and that in many respects.
This fact is now admitted by nearly
all denominations, even Episcopalians. In the
work entitled “Episcopacy Tested by Scripture,”
published by the Protestant Episcopal Tract Society,
New York, the author, one of their able advocates,
makes the following admission concerning the title
bishop in the New Testament, “that the
name is there given to the middle order or presbyters;
and all that we read in the New Testament concerning
bishops, including of course the words overseer
and oversight, which have the same derivation, is to be regarded as
pertaining to that middle grade the presbyters or elders.
The noted historian Waddington, also
an Episcopalian, makes the same admission in the following
words: “It is also true that in the earliest
government of the first Christian society, that of
Jerusalem, not the elders only, but the ‘whole
church’ were associated with the apostles; and
it is even certain that the terms bishop
and elder or presbyter were, in the
first instances, and for a short period, sometimes
used synomously, and indiscriminately applied to the
same order in the ministry.” The italicizing is mine.
The well-known historian Milman, also
an Episcopalian, in his History of Christianity, says,
“The earliest Christian communities appear to
have been ruled and represented, in the absence of
the apostle who was their first founder, by their
elders, who are likewise called bishops, or overseers
of the church.” Page 194.
Kurtz, in his Church History, says:
“To aid them in their work, or to supply their
places in their absence (Acts 14:23), the apostles
ordained rulers in every church, who bore the common
name of elders from their dignity, and of bishops
from the nature of their office. That originally
the elders were the same as the bishops, we gather
with absolute certainty from the statements of the
New Testament and of Clement of Rome, a disciple of
the apostles. (See his first epistle to the Corinthians,
Chaps 42, 44:52.) 1. The presbyters are expressly
called bishops compare [the Greek especially]
Acts 20:17 with verse 28, and Titus 1:5 with verse
7. 2. The office of presbyter is described as
next to and highest after that of apostle (Acts 15:6,
22). Similarly, the elders are represented as
those to whom alone the rule, the teaching and the
care of the church is entrusted (1 Tim 5:17; 1 Pet
5:1, etc.).... In [several] passages of
the New Testament and of Clement we read of many bishops
in one and the same church. In the face of such
indubitable evidence, it is difficult to account for
the pertinacity with which Romish and Anglican theologians
insist that these two offices had from the first been
different in name and functions.... Even Jerome,
Augustine, Urban II. (1091) and Petrus Lombardus admit
that originally the two had been identical. It
was reserved for the Council of Trent to convert this
truth into a heresy.”
Chrysostom, Theodoret, and others also admitted the
same.
Many similar historical testimonies
now lying before me to the humble equality of the
New Testament ministry could be added; but lest the
reader become weary, I will conclude with the following
beautiful description from D’Aubigne in his
noted History of the Reformation: “The
church was in the beginning a community of brethren,
guided by a few of the brethren.”
Again, “All Christians were priests of the living
God, with humble pastors as their guides.
With this description of the early
ministers of Christ, who went forth under the symbol
of the first horseman to disciple all nations, we have
the events pertaining to the early history of the church,
laid before us; until the opening of the second seal
brings us to another important phase of its history.
3. And when he had opened
the second seal, I heard the second
beast say, Come and see.
4. And there went out another horse
that was red: and power was given to him
that sat thereon to take peace from the earth, and
that they should kill one another: and there
was given unto him a great sword.
The symbol of this seal is that of
a rider going forth on a red horse armed with a great
sword with which to take peace from the earth and to
kill. It is drawn from the same source as that
of the preceding one, but differing greatly in the
character of the horseman and the object of his mission.
The symbol is one of great dignity a living,
intelligent agent drawn from civil and
military life. For the same reason as given before,
we must go out of the department of civil life into
the history of religious affairs to find its fulfilment.
Notice, also, the peculiar characteristics
of this horseman and wherein he differs from that
of the first seal. The color of the horse is red,
denoting something very different from the peace, purity,
and benignity of the white. Instead of gaining
glorious spiritual conquests and triumphs, like him
of the first seal, he was to take peace from the earth.
In the place of a victor’s crown, he possesses
“a great sword” with which to kill, denoting
an agent of great destruction.
Where shall we look in the history
of religious affairs to find the object that meets
the requirements of this symbol? Who were the
active, intelligent agents that appeared as the great
opposers of the establishment of Christianity by the
rider of the white horse? We find the answer
undoubtedly in the propagators of the Pagan religions.
As soon as Christianity began to gain a foothold in
the Roman Empire, the priests and supporters of Paganism
were exasperated to the last degree, and they determined
to crush out the Christian religion. An example
of Pagan opposition is found in the nineteenth chapter
of Acts, where it is recorded that the preaching of
the gospel so stirred the people of Ephesus that they
were filled with wrath and for the space of about two
hours cried out, saying, “Great is Diana of the
Ephesians!” This great conflict between Christianity
and Paganism will be more fully described under other
symbols in a subsequent chapter, therefore I will make
this description brief.
The destruction of life brought about
by this rider of the red horse doubtless signifies
the great slaughter of the Christians at the hands
of the Pagans. During ten seasons of severe persecution,
which occurred under the reigns of the emperors Nero,
Domitian, Trajan, Marcus Aurelius, Septimus Severus,
Maximus, Decius, Gallus, Valerian, and Diocletian,
the Christians suffered every indignity that their
relentless persecutors could heap upon them. They
had their eyes burned out with red-hot irons; they
were dragged about with ropes until life was extinct;
they were beheaded, stoned to death, crucified, thrown
to wild beasts, burned at the stake; yet “they
overcame by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word
of their testimony; and they loved not their lives
unto the death.” Chap 12:11.
It may appear at first that taking
the rider of the horse as a symbolic agent but the
killing which he effected as literal, is an inconsistency
and a variation from the laws of symbolic language;
but such is not necessarily the case. One principle
laid down in the beginning was, that the description
of an object or event must necessarily be literal when
no symbolic object could be found to analagously represent
it. The destruction of human life could not well
be represented symbolically, there being no destruction
analagous to it whose meaning would be obvious; hence
it must appear as a literal description. This
is proved by many texts in the Revelation that will
admit of no other application; such as verses 9-11
of this chapter; chapter 13:10; 17:6; etc.
But the literal destruction of life
may be chosen as a symbol to represent a destruction
to which it is plainly analagous; such as the destruction
of spiritual life, the overthrow of the civil or ecclesiastical
institutions of society, etc. That it is
sometimes employed thus as a symbol will be shown
clearly in subsequent chapters. Hence, in every
instance where killing men is the work of a symbolic
agent, the context, or general series of events with
which it is connected, must determine whether the
literal or symbolical signification is intended.
In the present prophecy under consideration it is
much more consistent to give it the literal application;
for the devotees of Paganism did not destroy the spiritual
life of the church, which would be an analagous killing;
neither did they succeed in overthrowing the structure
of Christianity.
5. And when he had opened
the third seal, I heard the third
beast say, Come and see.
And I beheld, and lo a black horse; and
he that sat on him had a pair
of balances in his hand.
6. And I heard a voice
in the midst of the four beasts say, A
measure of wheat for a penny,
and three measures of barley for a
penny; and see thou hurt not
the oil and the wine.
This symbol is also that of a horseman,
differing from the preceding ones only in his characteristics.
He is seated upon a black horse, denoting something
dark or appalling in its nature, the very opposite
of that of the first seal. He possesses no bow
nor crown, but instead he has a pair of balances in
his hand for weighing food. This he deals out
only at exorbitant prices “a measure
of wheat for a penny, and three measures of barley
for a penny.” The penny, or denarius, is
equal to about fifteen cents of our money, and was
the ordinary wages of a day laborer. In the parable
of our Lord recorded in Mat 20, the householder is
represented as hiring laborers for a penny a day to
labor in his vineyard. The measure, or choenix,
of wheat was the usual daily allowance of food for
a man. So according to the rate given, it would
require a day’s labor to supply food sufficient
for one man, which shows an enormous price placed
upon these necessaries of life. In ordinary times
the penny would procure about twenty measures of wheat
instead of one, and fifty or sixty measures of barley
instead of three. Surely this represents famine
prices.
The expression “see thou hurt
not the oil and the wine” seems to have some
direct connection with the exorbitant schedule of food
rates. The following facts of history, as recorded
by Lord, will serve to make the matter clear:
“The taxes required in the Roman empire, to sustain
the court and civil service, the army and desolating
wars, and the hungry brood of office-holders, as well
as to provide largesses to the soldiers, were
excessive in the extreme, so as to prove an almost
insupportable burden to the people. The ordinary
and economical expenses of the government were great;
but when we take into view that during a period of
seventy-two years previous to Diocletian, there were
twenty-six individuals who held the imperial crown,
besides a great number of unsuccessful aspirants,
and that each of these must secure the favor of the
army and the people by large donations of money, we
may well conceive that the taxes and exactions laid
to raise the needed amount must have proved a crushing
burden. They were so great as sometimes to strip
men of their wealth and reduce them to poverty.
These were laid upon everything that could be brought
into service. Nothing was too insignificant to
escape.... The taxes might be paid in money, or
in produce, grain, fruit, oil, or whatever else it
might be;... The exactions were so excessive
that the people were led to avoid them in every possible
mode, as men always will under such circumstances.”
Once in fifteen years, a Roman indiction, an assessor
would go round to levy upon the products of the soil,
and the assessment was made according to the amount
of the yield. One method adopted to secure a lower
assessment at this time was that of mutilating their
fruit trees and vines. We find among the Roman
laws severe enactments against such as “feign
poverty, or cut a vine, or stint the fruit of a tree”
in order to avoid a fair valuation, and the penalty
attached was the death of the offender and the confiscation
of all his property. The fact that this law existed
shows that the offense was committed and also that
the exactions of the government must have been of
the most oppressive kind.
With these facts before us it is easy
to discern the nature of the symbol, being that of
a Roman magistrate prepared to enforce his severe
exactions upon the people at the exorbitant rate of
three measures of wheat for a penny and three measures
of barley for a penny, accompanied by the solemn injunction,
“See thou hurt not the oil and the wine,”
that is, the olive-trees and the vines.
It is evident that we must, as before,
go out of the department of civil and military life
into the realm of ecclesiastical history to find the
true fulfilment of this symbol. The black color
of the horse would denote something directly opposite
to that of the first seal; and since the symbol of
the first seal represented the establishment of the
pure gospel of Jesus Christ, this symbol must represent
the great apostasy and spiritual darkness that covered
the world at a later period. And if the horseman
of the first seal represented the chosen ministry who
went forth in a glorious mission to win trophies of
grace, the horseman of this seal must represent an
apostate ministry, possessing power and authority
to enforce the severest exactions upon the bread of
life, thus producing a desolating spiritual famine.
This marvelous change from the humble
apostolic ministry to an apostate one did not occur
suddenly, but by degrees; and as it has a great bearing
upon other lines of truth to be brought out in subsequent
chapters, it will be profitable to consider the most
important steps by which this transformation was effected.
When the desire for precedence or
superiority first manifested itself among the disciples,
Christ repressed it (Mat 20:25, 26), and it appeared
no more in their midst; but before the close of the
first century it is evident that a thirst for preeminence
existed in the hearts of some who had been the servants
of the church. An example of this is to be found
in Diotrephes, who exalted himself above his ministerial
associates. The Apostle John says concerning him:
“I wrote unto the church: but Diotrephes,
who loveth to have the preeminence among them, receiveth
us not. Wherefore if I come, I will remember his
deeds which he doeth, prating against us with malicious
words: and not content therewith, neither doth
he himself receive the brethren, and forbiddeth them
that would, and casteth them out of the church.”
3 John 9, 10.
In the historical extracts given in
the explanation of the first horseman, it is clear
that the first ministers were all equal; but a time
came about the close of the first century when the
most influential among the clergy grasped the power
and exalted themselves to a position of authority
over the rest. The manner in which this transformation
was effected is explained by the learned Gieseler
as follows: “After the death of the apostles,
and the pupils of the apostles, to whom the general
direction of the churches had always been conceded,
some one amongst the presbyters of each church was
suffered gradually to take the lead in its affairs.
In the same irregular way the title of bishop
was appropriated to the first presbyter. In the days when the apostles were
active in the affairs of the church there were but two classes in the ministry
elders, or bishops, and deacons; but when one of the presbyters was exalted to a
higher position than the rest and assumed to himself the exclusive use of the
word bishop, there were three classes. To quote the words of Geo. P. Fisher:
After we cross the limit of the first century we find that with each board of
elders there is a person to whom the name of bishop is specially applied,
although, for a long time, he is likewise often called a presbyter. In other
words, in the room of a two-fold, we have a three-fold ministry. Hist. of the
Christian Church.
The height to which the single bishop
of authority in a church had been exalted is well
illustrated in the Ignatian Epistles. Ignatius
was bishop of Antioch and was condemned by the emperor
Trajan to suffer death by being thrown to the wild
beasts in the amphitheatre in Rome. His execution
in this manner took place Dec 20, A.D 107. He
wrote a number of epistles, a few extracts from which
I will give. “Wherefore it is fitting that
ye should run together in accordance with the will
of your bishop, which thing also ye do. For your
justly renowned presbytery, worthy of God, is fitted
as exactly to the bishop as the strings are to the
harp.” To the Ephesians. “See
that ye all follow the bishop, even as Jesus Christ
does the Father.... Let no man do anything connected
with the church without the bishop.” To
the Smyrnaean’s. “It is
not lawful without the bishop either to baptize or
to celebrate a love-feast; but whatsoever he shall
approve of, that is also pleasing to God.” Smyrnaean’s. “It is well
to reverence both God and the bishop. He who
honors the bishop has been honored of God; but he
who does anything without the knowledge of the bishop,
does [in reality] serve the devil.” Smyrnaean’s.
The power of these bishops advanced
steadily during the second century. The churches
of the cities where they were located extended themselves
into the surrounding country and smaller towns, and
the presbyters or elders of these inferior churches
were presided over by the bishop of their mother church,
and in this manner the great system of diocesan episcopacy
was developed.
In the latter part of the second century
when the disputes concerning Easter and Montanism
arose, the custom of diocesan bishops consulting with
each other on important doctrines began, and this developed
in the third century into regular provincial synods,
or councils. On account of the ecclesiastical
or political importance of the cities in which they
were located, certain bishops had a special deference
given them, and they were not slow to take advantage
of the opportunity to exalt themselves to the presidency
of these councils; and in a very short time they possessed
immense power and constituted entirely a separate order,
designated by the term metropolitan.
The manner in which this important
step in the great apostasy was taken and the effects
produced thereby is well described in the words of
the historian Mosheim (referring to events of the
third century), from whom I quote: “In
process of time, all the Christian churches of a province
were formed into one large ecclesiastical body, which,
like confederate states, assembled at certain times,
in order to deliberate about the common interests
of the whole.... These councils ... changed
the whole face of the church, and gave it a new
form; for by them the ancient privileges of the people
were considerably diminished, and the power and authority
of the bishops greatly augmented.... At their
first appearance in these general councils, they acknowledged
that they were no more than the delegates of their
respective churches, and that they acted in the name,
and by the appointment of their people. But they
soon changed this humble tone, imperceptibly extended
the limits of their authority, turned their influence
into dominion, and their councils into laws; and openly
asserted, at length, that Christ had empowered them
to prescribe to his people, authoritative rules
of faith and manners.... The order and decency
of these assemblies required that some one of the provincial
bishops met in council, should be invested with a superior
degree of power and authority; and hence the rights
of metropolitans derive their origin. Church History.
When a usurping clergy grasps the
power to prescribe “authoritative rules of faith
and manners,” to employ the words of Mosheim,
we may well conceive that the true amount of pure
spiritual food was exceedingly small and could be
procured only at starvation rates. He who reads
the ecclesiastical events of the third century will
find it only too true that many of the cardinal virtues
of apostolic Christianity were almost lost sight of
and that a great spiritual famine existed in the earth
over which this dark horseman of the third seal careered.
Instead of salvation through the Spirit of God being
carefully taught, baptismal regeneration was exalted,
and the people were instructed in the saving virtues
of the eucharist. The Platonic idea concerning
sin having its seat in the flesh was adopted, and
therefore perfect victory or sanctification was made
to consist in the mortification of the natural appetites
and desires of the body, with the result that a life
of fasting, celibacy, or self-inflicted torture was
looked upon as the surest means of obtaining the favor
of Heaven. The writings of such eminent church
Fathers as Tertullian, Origen, Cyprian and others now
lying before me, contain the surest evidences of the
woeful extent to which this dark cloud of superstition
and error had settled down over the world during the
period of which I write.
7. And when he had opened
the fourth seal, I heard the voice of
the fourth beast say, Come
and see.
8. And I looked, and behold a pale
horse: and his name that sat on him was Death,
and Hell followed with him. And power was given
unto them over the fourth part of the earth, to kill
with sword, and with hunger, and with death, and
with the beasts of the earth.
The usual interpretation given this
horse and its rider is to apply it to the desolating
wars and famines that occurred in the Roman Empire.
This view is embodied in the celebrated painting “Death
on the Pale Horse,” in which death is represented
as going forth with war, pestilence, famine, and wild
beasts, to ravage the Roman empire. We are informed
by historians that dreadful pestilences and famines
did prevail and in some places nearly depopulated
the country, and that the remaining inhabitants could
not make head against the beasts that multiplied in
the land. But the fact that such events occurred
is not sufficient proof that this symbol has reference
to such. Famines and pestilences may have occurred
many times without forming a part of the Apocalyptic
vision.
The greatest objection to giving this
part of the vision such a literal interpretation is,
that it fails to bring out its symbolic character.
To what, then, does it refer? We have, as before,
a horseman, indicating that the agent is one of the
same general character, differing mainly in his features
and mission. This horse was of a livid, cadaverous
hue, denoting an agent of ghastly, terrible nature.
The living rider bore the awful name of “Death,”
or as in the original, “The Death,” by
way of emphasis. Death literally was not the
agent it is not so stated but
the rider was termed The Death, or The Destroyer, because
of his terrible mission; and Hell followed with him.
Applying the laws of symbolic language
as heretofore, it is evident that this symbol represents
a great persecuting ecclesiastical power. And
with this thought before us, we can scarcely fail to
recognize it as a true description of the Papacy.
The great apostasy, described under the preceding
seal, prepared the way for the final and complete
establishment of the “man of sin”; but
during the period there brought to view the ministers
of religion, power-seeking and apostate as they were,
were unable to enforce their claims by the power of
persecution. Under the present seal, however,
is represented a later stage of their corruption,
when a great hierarchal system, sustained and upheld
by the arm of civil power, was able to bear tyrannical
rule over a great portion of the earth. During
this period clerical ambition and usurpation reached
its greatest height.
After speaking of the power possessed
by the metropolitans, Mosheim says: “The
universal church had now the appearance of one vast
republic, formed by a combination of a great number
of little states. This occasioned the creation
of a new order of ecclesiastics, who were appointed
in different parts of the world, as heads of the church, and whose office
it was to preserve the consistence and union of that immense body, whose members
were so widely dispersed throughout the nations. Such was the nature and office
of the Patriarchs.
Thus, the bishops, or metropolitans,
of certain of the most important cities were exalted
to a still higher position as special heads
of the church. They were termed Exarchs
at first, after the title of the provincial governors,
but afterwards received the more ecclesiastical appellation
Patriarchs. The term Patriarch had been
in use for a long time in the church signifying merely
a bishop, irrespective of the dignity he possessed,
but it was finally limited to this higher class of
the clergy, in which sense I now employ it. The
cities that first enjoyed this chief distinction were
Alexandria, Rome, and Antioch. The general council
of Nice (A.D 325) in its sixth canon recognized the
superior authority already possessed by these cities.
See D’Aubigne’s Hist, of Reformation. The general council of Constantinople
in its third canon placed the bishop of Constantinople
in the same rank with the other three Patriarchs;
and the general council of Calcedon exalted the See
of Jerusalem to a similar dignity, doubtless because
of its ancient importance as the birthplace of Christianity.
Thus, Patriarchs were established in the five political
capitals of the Roman empire; and they were considered
the “heads of the church,” having
spiritual authority over the whole empire. These
were the only Patriarchates of importance. Certain
ecclesiastics of the Church of Rome even at the present
time bear the honorary title Patriarch; but, to quote
the words of the Encyclopædia Britannica, “In
a strictly technical sense, however, that church recognizes
only five Patriarchates, those of Constantinople,
Alexandria, Jerusalem, Antioch, and Rome.”
Art. Patriarch. In the years 637 to 640
Jerusalem, Alexandria, and Antioch fell into the hands
of the Saracen followers of Mohammed, which terminated
their importance, and later the Greek schism separated
the Patriarch of Constantinople from Rome; and thus
the Patriarch of Rome was left in undisputed possession
of the field and was soon recognized as universal
head of the church. So under the symbol of this
dread rider on a pale horse is portrayed the great
hierarchal system by which the Papacy was fully developed
in the West.
It is fitting that we notice particularly
the agents of destruction employed by this rider.
He possesses a sword with which to kill the
same instrument wielded by the rider of the red horse but
it is evident that he uses it with more terrific energy,
by reason of which he receives the name Death, or
The Destroyer. It is possible, also, that in
this case a sword, wielded by the hand of an ecclesiastical
power, may be used as a symbol of a spiritual cutting
off, or excommunication. The sword of excommunication
has been the most terrible ever wielded by human hand.
When this pale horseman was careering over the world
in the zenith of his power, excommunication and interdiction
were the terror of individuals and the scourge of
nations. At his word the rights of an individual
as king, ruler, husband or father, nay, even as a man,
were forfeited, and he was shunned like one infected
with the leprosy. At his command the offices
of religion were suspended in a nation, and its dead
lay unburied, until its proud ruler humbled himself
at the feet of the ecclesiastical tyrant who bore
rule over the “fourth part of the earth."
The loss of life by spiritual famine
was extreme. The Word of God, which is spirit
and life to God’s people (Jno 6:63), was laid
under interdict and the common people deprived of
its benefits. At the time the black horse appeared,
a little food could be obtained at famine prices; but
when the fourth arrived, he was empowered to kill “with
hunger.” Also, one of his agents of destruction
was death, or pestilence, a fit symbol of false and
blasphemous doctrines breathed forth like a deadly
pestilence blasting everything within its reach.
Invocation of saints, worship of images, relics, celibacy,
works of supererogation, indulgences, and purgatory these
were the enforced principles of religion, and like
a pest they settled down upon the people everywhere.
This rider also brought into operation
“the beasts of the earth” to aid him in
his destructive work. To kill with sword or hunger
shows that such work of destruction is performed solely
by him who has it in his power; but to kill with beasts
indicates that they perform the deadly work
according to their own natures. Nothing
is clearer than the fact that wild beasts stand as
a symbol of persecuting tyrannical governments; hence
we are to understand that this rider was to employ
also the arm of civil power to aid him in the deadly
work. How strikingly this represents the historical
facts of the case! In all truly Roman Catholic
countries the civil governments were only a cipher
or tool in the hands of the church, and the ecclesiastics
were the real rulers of the kingdom. But whenever
any dark work of persecution was to be performed,
the wild beast was let loose to accomplish the result.
When charged, however, with the bloody work, the Catholics
always answer, “Oh, we never persecute don’t
you see, it is the wild beasts that are covered with
gore our hands are clean,” yet they
themselves held the chain that bound the savage monsters.
We shall have occasion in a subsequent chapter to
trace further the pathway of this dread rider as he
reels onward in the career of ages, “drunken
with the blood of the saints.”
This work of destruction performed
by the dread rider on the pale horse is considered
by many as a literal description of the persecutions
of the Papacy. While Catholics usually charge
the civil powers with this bloody work, it is an undeniable
fact of history that the Popes often ordered or sanctioned
crusades against the Waldenses, Albigenses, and other
peoples (see remarks on verses 9-11, Chap 17:6), in
which the sword, starvation, and every other means
of cruelty imaginable were brought into use to exterminate
the so-called heresy. And in view of the fact
explained in the comments on verses 3 and 4 of this
chapter, that killing is sometimes to be understood
in a literal sense on account of there being nothing
to analagously represent such destruction of life,
it is not a violation of the laws of symbolic language
thus to interpret it. It might be consistent
in this case to give it a twofold application; the
agreeing facts of history regarding the Papacy strongly
suggest it. Thus, the sword could signify
a literal destruction of life, as in verse 4, and
also, in the present case, an ecclesiastical cutting
off by the Papacy, or excommunication; and hunger
could signify literal death by starvation, and also,
as in verses 5 and 6, a destruction of spiritual life,
etc.
Where, let me ask, in the whole compass
of human writings can be found a series of events
of such thrilling interest, so great in magnitude,
as is contained in these eight verses? Who but
the Omnipotent could have conceived such a wonderful
development of the power of iniquity and with such
master-strokes of power compressed them into so small
a scene of symbolic imagery? The impress of divinity
is here speaking from every line.
9. And when he had opened
the fifth seal, I saw under the altar
the souls of them that were
slain for the word of God, and for
the testimony which they held:
10. And they cried with
a loud voice, saying, How long, O Lord,
holy and true, dost thou not
judge and avenge our blood on them
that dwell on the earth?
11. And white robes were given
unto every one of them; and it was said unto them,
that they should rest yet for a little season,
until their fellowservants also and their brethren,
that should be killed as they were, should be
fulfilled.
Upon the opening of this seal the
scene changes entirely. No more horsemen appear,
but instead the souls of the martyrs are seen at the
altar crying for vindication of their blood upon the
cruel oppressors of earth. The question arises,
Are these souls symbols of something else, or are
they what they are here stated to be, “the souls
of them that were slain”? Evidently, the
latter, appearing under their own name and character,
because they can not properly be symbolized. They
were disembodied spirits, and where is there anything
of analagous character to represent such? Angels
can not; for whenever they are employed as symbols,
it is to designate distinguished agencies among men.
They therefore appear under their own appropriate
title as “the souls of them that were
slain.”
These souls appeared “under
the altar,” that is, at the foot of the altar,
being the same as that described in Chap 8:3 “And
another angel came and stood at the altar, having
a golden censer, and there was given unto him much
incense, that he should offer it with the prayers of
all saints upon the golden altar which was before the
throne.” Thus, the heavenly world, as opened
up before John, appeared symbolized after the sanctuary
of the temple in which stood the golden altar, or altar
of incense. Some have supposed that the brazen
altar was the one referred to, signifying the living
sacrifice these souls made of themselves to God.
But there is no altar mentioned in the symbols except
the golden altar. Besides, these were not sacrificial
victims; for Christ was made a complete sacrifice
for sin, while these only suffered martyrdom because
of their faithfulness to the cause of Christ.
It is much more reasonable to suppose that their interceding
cries went up from the golden altar, where the “prayers
of all saints” ascended with much incense.
Their prayers to God for the avenging
of their blood shows the expectation on their part
that the judgments of Heaven would descend upon the
cruel and haughty persecutors and oppressors of earth,
and their surprise was that the day of retribution
had been so long delayed. The history of the
church as developed under the preceding seals gives
particular force to this cry of the martyrs. For
nearly three centuries the civil power of Pagan Rome
had been employed to crush the cause of God.
During ten terrible seasons of persecution they had
been crucified, slain with the sword, sawn asunder,
devoured by beasts in the arena, and given to the
flames. When Constantine, a nominal Christian
emperor, ascended the throne and protected religion
by law, it was believed that persecutions must
cease; but soon the discovery was made that the sword
had only changed hands, there having risen an ecclesiastical
hierarchy destined to “glut itself upon the
blood of which heathen Rome had only tasted.”
The world was now made the arena for the terrible coursings
of the pale horseman, and the “beasts of the
earth” were let loose to fall with savage fury
upon their helpless victims, until millions lost their
lives at the instigation of the apostate Church of
Rome. Is it any wonder that the souls of these
martyrs should cry unto God for the vindication of
their righteous blood?
It is said that “white robes
were given unto every one of them.” By
referring to Chap 3:4; 7:9, 13, 14, it will be seen
that “white garments” and “white
robes” are sometimes used as a symbol to describe
a part of the heavenly inheritance. The martyr-spirits,
although impatient at the delay of avenging judgment,
received a righteous reward. But the period of
tribulation to the church was not yet oVer The
cup of iniquity in the hands of her enemies was not
yet full, and they were told to “rest for a
little season, until their fellowservants also, and
their brethren, that should be killed as they were,
should be fulfilled.” The account given
seems to indicate an important epoch, a period in
which the martyrs had reason to expect the vindication
of their righteous blood, but which, instead, was
to be followed by another great period of persecution.
Considering the time of the events already described
in this series of prophecy, we have no difficulty in
fixing the chronology of this event at the dividing-point
between the era of Papal supremacy and the age of
Protestantism or at the Reformation of
the Sixteenth Century. Did severe slaughter and
persecution follow the Reformation? Witness the
reign of Mary Tudor, frequently styled “Bloody
Mary.” During three years of her reign,
1555 to 1558, two hundred and eighty-eight were burnt
alive in England! Think of the inhuman massacre
of the innocent Waldenses of southern France by the
violent bigot Oppede (1545), who slew eight hundred
men in one town, and thrust the women into a barn
filled with straw and reduced the whole to ashes only
a sample of his barbarity; or of their oppression in
southern Italy by Pope Pius IV. (1560), at whose command
they were slain by thousands, the throats of eighty-eight
men being cut on one occasion by a single executioner!
Witness the horrible massacre of St. Bartholomew in
Paris (Aug 21, 1572), when the Queen dowager, the
infamous Catherine de Medici, lured immense numbers
of the innocent Hugenots into the city under the pretext
of witnessing a marriage between the Hugenot Henry,
king of Navarre, and the sister of Charles IX., king
of France when the gates were closed and
the work of wholesale slaughter began at a given signal
and raged for three days, during which time from six
to ten thousand were butchered in Paris alone!
Think of the rivers of blood in the Netherlands, where
the Duke of Alva boasted that in the short space of
six weeks he had put eighteen thousand to death!
Witness the dragoonading methods and other inhuman
persecutions to “wear out the saints of
the Most High,” that followed the revocation
of the Edict of Nantes (1685) by Louis XIV., king of
France, during whose reign three hundred thousand were
brutally butchered while Pope Innocent
XI. extolled the king by special letter as follows:
“The Catholic church shall most assuredly record
in her sacred annals a work of such devotion toward
her, and CELEBRATE YOUR NAME WITH NEVER-DYING
PRAISES ... for this most excellent undertaking"!!
My heart sickens with horror in the contemplation of
such events. Eternal God! can thy righteous eye
behold such heart-rending scenes of earth, and thy
hand of power not be extended to humble to the dust
these cruel, haughty oppressors of thy people?
12. And I beheld when
he had opened the sixth seal, and, lo,
there was a great earthquake;
and the sun became black as
sackcloth of hair, and the
moon became as blood;
13. And the stars of
heaven fell unto the earth, even as a
fig-tree casteth her untimely
figs, when she is shaken of a
mighty wind.
14. And the heaven departed
as a scroll when it is rolled
together; and every mountain
and island were moved out of their
places.
15. And the kings of the earth,
and the great men, and the rich men, and the chief
captains, and the mighty men, and every bondman,
and every free man, hid themselves in the dens and
in the rocks of the mountains;
16. And said to the mountains
and rocks, Fall on us, and hide us
from the face of him that
sitteth on the throne, and from the
wrath of the Lamb;
17. For the great day
of his wrath is come; and who shall be
able to stand?
Upon the opening of this seal the
scene changes again. The symbols are all drawn
from an entirely different source. We are taken
out of the department of civil life into the scenes
of nature, which is a clear evidence that the history
of the church is no longer under consideration.
Had God intended to here continue her history, he would
no doubt have employed symbols derived from the same
source as those preceding, so as to prevent our being
led astray. No more horsemen or living characters
appear, but we behold the most terrific convulsions
of nature a mighty earthquake, the darkening
of the sun and the moon, the falling of the stars,
and finally the dissolution of the heavens, together
with the mountains and the islands being removed.
If the history of the church is no longer under consideration,
this great change of symbols directs us with absolute
certainty into the political and civil world for their
fulfilment. Of course, we are not to suppose
that this is a literal description.
In this manner the dignity and the
excellence in the use and the interpretation of symbols
is preserved. To describe the religious history
of the church, noble symbols chosen from the department
of human life are selected; while symbols drawn from
an inferior department that of nature are
chosen to represent political affairs. This point
will appear very clear as we proceed in the interpretation
of the Apocalypse. It is just what we might naturally
expect.
The question may be asked, If these
symbols from nature represent political affairs, where
in the events of civil history shall we look for their
fulfilment? Every one will readily perceive the
analogy between an earthquake and a political revolution,
when all society is in a state of agitation as when
the solid earth trembles. It is also evident
that the sun, moon, and stars bear the same analagous
relationship to the earth that kings, rulers, and princes
do to the body politic; while the firmament of heaven
is analagous to the entire fabric of civil government,
the symbolic heaven in which the symbolic orbs are
set to give light.
The symbols, then, point us to the
most terrible revolutions when society
is in a state of agitation, when kingdoms are overthrown
and their rulers and princes thrown from their positions
or made objects of the most gloomy terror; yea, when
the entire fabric of civil government is finally overthrown
and all the institutions and organizations of society
are swept away as with a tornado. This is the
time of consternation to the great men of earth, when
they shall hide “themselves in the dens and
in the rocks of the mountains,” and say to the
mountains and rocks, “Fall on us and hide us
from the face of him that sitteth on the throne, and
from the wrath of the Lamb: for the great day
of his wrath is come; and who shall be able to stand?”
This is the time that the martyrs looked forward to
when they cried, “How long, O Lord, holy and
true, dost thou not judge and avenge our blood on them
that dwell on the earth?” A large portion of
the Apocalypse is occupied with the history of these
persecuting powers, civil and ecclesiastical.
It is their dominacy that constitutes the long period
of tribulation to the church, when the witnesses prophesy
in sackcloth and the faithful are ground into the
dust by the feet of these proud oppressors as they
stand in the high places of the earth. But the
cries of the slaughtered saints have ascended to the
throne as incense; God speaks; the judgments of Heaven
descend upon these lofty ones; and a voice from heaven
declares, “They have shed the blood of saints
and prophets, and thou hast given them blood to
drink; for they are worthy.”
This is surely a striking combination
of symbols, and the way they are arranged would indicate
that their fulfilment occupied a considerable period
of time. First we have a great earthquake, afterwards
the darkening of the sun and the moon, with the falling
of the stars, and finally the dissolution of the heavens
themselves, with the sweeping away of mountains and
islands. This description covers the same period
as that described under the seven last plagues, beginning
with certain fearful revolutions in which the nations
that had slaughtered the millions of God’s people
were given “blood to drink,” and ending
finally in “the great day of his wrath”
that shall sweep them from their positions eternally.
The full explanation of these events can not at present
be appreciated by the reader, therefore I reserve it
for the future, to be more fully developed under other
symbols.
In these six seals we have a vivid
outline of mighty events, political and ecclesiastical,
extending from the earliest stage of Christianity to
the end of time. This description in advance was
no mere human production. No human foresight
would have detected, and no mortal mind would have
conceived, events so wonderful and so farreaching in
their character. Any other history would sooner
have been imagined. It takes divine wisdom to
understand the true position of the church in the
present, and she can scarcely read her past history
by natural wisdom alone, much less outline the future.
First the establishment of Christianity is symbolized,
then the violence of the Pagan party, the apostasy,
and final establishment of the “man of sin,”
until the millions of earth are crushed by the spiritual
tyranny or by the arm of civil power, and the cry
of the martyrs goes up “How long, O Lord?”
But they are told to rest “a little season,”
when they shall witness the hand of God laid upon
these persecuting nations of earth, convulsing them
in the most fearful revolutions, and ending finally
in their complete overthrow in that last “great
day of God Almighty.”