תמונות בעמוד
PDF
ePub

66

"Be not incredu

his name. And when he had prefixed it, we cannot deem it surprising, that he should repeat it, in passages where he relates to them the wonderful sights which he had seen. For such a repetition conveys this assurance; "lous, I John, whom you can trust, whom you can safely believe, I John saw these things." This same Apostle had before given them warning not to believe every pretence to inspiration, but" to try the spirits whether they are of God." It was necessary, therefore, when he sent them this Revelation, to assure them that in receiving it they would not be deceived. He assures them, therefore, that he himself, the only surviving Apostle, the president of the Churches, whom they well knew by the name of John, had seen these visions. There was, therefore, no vain egotism in this repetition, as hath been vainly imagined; it was necessary, and to us of these later times it is a proof, that some person, of considerable weight and influence with the Churches, was the author of the Apocalypse; but his name was John; and who could this be, but John the Apostle and Evangelist? who, we are assured was banished to Patmos, where the visions of it were seen †.

[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]

II. The second objection is, that "though the

* 1 John iv. 1.

+ Hegesippus, apud Euseb. lib. iii. c. 20. 23. Tertullian. Apol. c. 5. Hierom. tom. x. p. 100. Lardner's Supp. ch. ix.

S. 5.

"writer

" writer of the Revelation calls himself John, he " has not shewn us, that he is the Apostle of that "name." Michaelis expects that he should at least have made himself known by some such circumlocution as he had used in the Gospel, "the disciple whom Jesus loved."

In answer to this, it will be sufficient to shew, that such addition to the name of John was totally needless. He wrote to the Seven Churches, and from Patmos, in which island he expresses that "he is suffering tribulation for the "word of God, and the testimony of Jesus "Christ." All the Churches knew that he was then suffering banishment in that island, and they knew the cause of it, "for the word of God." An Epistle, containing the history of a heavenly vision, seen by John in the island of Patmos, required no other addition. What John would write John alone, without other addition or explanation, excepting the great John, John the Apostle and president of all the Churches? A private person would have described himself by the addition of his father's name, according to the custom of the ancients. A Bishop or Presbyter would have added the name of his church; but John, the Apostle, needed no such distinguishing mark or appellation. A fabricator of an Epistle, containing a revelation in St. John's name, would perhaps have added his titles of Apostle of Jesus Christ," &c. or would have introduced some circumlocution in imitation of

[ocr errors]

those

those in his Gospel; but, from the expression, as it now stands, we derive a much stronger evidence that it is the genuine work of St. John*.

III. The third objection is, "That the Reve"lation does not mention the catholic Epistle, nor "the catholic Epistle the Revelation."

This objection Lardner has pronounced to be "of little moment." Michaelis seems to have been of the same opinion, for he has not noted it; if the reader think it deserving of an answer, he is referred to Lardnert.

[ocr errors]

66

IV. Fourthly, it is objected, "That there is a great agreement in sentiment, expression, and manner between Saint John's Gospel and Epistle; "but the Revelation is quite different in all these 66 respects, without any resemblance or fimili"tude."

Michaelis repeats this objection and then

66

* St. Paul, in the opening of his Epistles, has used generally, not always, the term Apostle;" but with him it was more necessary than with St. John, who was confessedly such, having been numbered with the Twelve. St. Paul's right to the apostleship, having been established more privately, had been doubted by some, which leads him to say, "Am not I an Apostle?" &c. (1 Cor. ix. 1.) and, therefore, he generally asserts himself, in his Epistles, to be an Apostle. Saint John had no need to use the term; his authority as an Apostle was undoubted: he, therefore, calls himself by an humbler title, "A brother and compa"nion in tribulation:" so St. James, although an Apostle, mentions himself only as, "A servant of God, and of the Lord "Jesus Christ." Jam. i. 1.1

+ Vol. iv. p. 707.

+ P. 533, 554,..

asks

asks the question, whether it is possible that the author of the one and of the other could be the

same person?

Two methods have been taken to avoid the force of this objection, which has been derived from comparing the imagery, sentiments, and style in these separate works, all attributed to Saint John.

1st. It has been asserted that a prophetical work of St. John, cannot be expected to have resemblance to his Gospels and Epistles.

2dly. The fact has been denied; it has been asserted that this dissimilarity does not exist; that there is in the Apocalypse a strong resem. blance of sentiment and character, to the other written productions of St. John.

I do not find that either of these points have been so clearly proved as to afford satisfaction to the learned. I will suggest another method of

answer.

In perusing the Apocalypse, I remark that the sentiments, the notions, the images presented in the book, are, in very few passages, those of the writer, (such I mean as had been digested in, and arose out of his own mind,) but of that Holy Spirit, or of those heavenly inhabitants, who expressed them to him by symbols, or declared them by speech. The pen of John merely narrates, and frequently in the very words of a heavenly minister. "That which he sees and "hears," he writes, as he is commanded; (ch. i.

19.) but they are not his own ideas from which he writes; he relates simply, and with little or no comment of his own, the heavenly visions which he had seen. Even in those parts of the book, where we should most reasonably expect to meet with the sentiments of the writer, we perceive his mind teeming (as, indeed, was natural) with the newly-acquired images. He uses such at the very outset of his work, even in the Epistolary Address, which is full of those images which had been exhibited to him in the visions. The same are again seen at the close of the book. And, indeed, it is difficult to find many passages wherein the writer has recourse to his own sentiments, and previous store of imagery.

The whole of the second and of the third chapter, and a great part of the first, is delivered in our Lord's own words, and therefore contains his sentiments, his doctrines, not those of the writer, who is commanded to write down the very words of the great Visitor of the Church. We have, indeed, other words of our Lord, related by St. John in the Gospel, with which it may be thought that these words in the Apocalypse may be properly compared. Yet they do not seem to admit this comparison: because the character and office which our Lord is seen to assume in the Apocalypse, is different from that which he bore in the Gospel. He is now no longer the Son of Man, upon earth, the condescending companion and instructor of his disciples;

« הקודםהמשך »