THE APOCALYPSE.
DANTE'S "Divine Comedy" is susceptible of no literal interpretation. It is not history nor theology, though it is saturated with both ; it is poetry. A like criticism might be made upon the Book of the Revelation. The writer was not a theologian nor an historian, but a prophet. He was "in the Spirit," he tells us, when he conceived his book, and he spoke, not of what he saw, but as the Spirit gave him utterance. To regard him as a sort of supernatural traveller who has been not only to Rome, but to heaven and to hell, and who described for his reader the seven hills, the golden street, the burning lake, Nero, Satan, and the Bing of heaven, is to use the deadly weapon of literalism to kill the spirit of prophecy, and to make of the prophet not a seer but an impostor. "No man bath seen God at any time," declared St. John. There is no such thing as going up to heaven nor down to hell in search of the Word of God, argued St. Paul, for "the word is nigh thee, even in thy mouth, and in thy heart." "The kingdom of God is within you," said Christ, who spoke "as one having authority " ; and surely no Christian scribe would have consciously contradicted Him.
The scene of the Revelation, like the scene of "The Divine Comedy," is laid in the human soul environed by the spirit of the time. The second could only have been written by an Italian in the Middle Ages, the first only by a Jew in the dawn of the Christian era. The writer is a believer in Christ and the literary descendant of the prophet Daniel. We cannot altogether reconstruct the mediaeval world in which Dante lived. Learned men indicate for us the colouring and outline, but only here and there can we distinguish detail. The meaning of much of the poem is therefore dubious. What is true in this respect of Dante's poetry is true in a greater degree of the prophet's "Revelation." Part of it is, as Luther said, entirely "dark." In the chiaroscuro, how- ever, beautiful and awful forms are still to be seen. The writer breathes an atmosphere of persecution. The smoke of the sacrifice is ever in his nostrils, the cries of the innocent are never out of his ears. The thought of suffering is stamped indelibly upon his imagination. The human instinct to transfer it to guilty shoulders is strong in his heart. Surely, he feels, there must be justice somewhere, an abyss of fire, and a second death. Surely the proud heathen "speaking great things and blasphemies "will expiate somehow the blood of those who endured to the end and died "for the witness of Jesus, and for the word of God," and whose only offence was that they would not worship "the beast, neither his image." Surely, too, the souls of those whose bodies lie beneath the Christian altar will be hereafter received into an abiding city,—not a city like Rome with her slaves and her oppressors, her irksome law, her unbounded license, her religious ritual and her fleshly rites, her schools, her armies, and her amphitheatre, but such a city as Jerusalem of old might prefigure in the mind of a patriot, a New Jerusalem, whose gates shone in the sunset, a city enlightened by the Spirit of God and governed by the precepts of Christ. "I saw no temple therein : for the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the temple of it "; and "the glory of God did lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof."
Such is the hope of final justice which welds together the many sections of the Book of the Revelation. "He that leadeth into captivity shall go into captivity : he that killeth with the sword must be killed with the sword. Here is the patience and the faith of the saints." But the details are blurred, and often defy interpretation. Here and there, as in a damaged mosaic, brilliant fragments remain on which the colours are still fresh. We see "the tree of life, which is in the midst of the paradise of God," and are told that "the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations." What does it mean ? Who can tell us any more ? Yet we cannot forget it. Again, we see "a pale horse : and his name that sat on him was Death, and Hell followed with him." Further on there is another strange rider armed with a bow, who "went forth conquering, and to conquer." Then a white-robed company beside a stream, and we are told that "these are they which came out of great tribulation," and are now at peace where "God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes." The whole region is peopled with angels, and vibrates with their voices. There is a sound as " cf many waters," and as "of a great thunder." Through it come strains of melody, "harpers harping with their harps." From time to time a single voice is distinguishable, and a message is to be heard. "I saw another angel fly in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people, Saying with a loud voice, Fear God, and give glory to him; for the hour of his judgment is come : and worship him that made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and the fountains of waters."
The belief that the Apostle John wrote the Book of the Revelation is now very generally abandoned. From the earliest times, as early as the year 200, we hear of those who doubted its authenticity. For centuries it did not form part of the Greek Canon, and at the time of the Reformation its canonicity was seriously attacked in the West. Luther objected to it, not on historical, but on religious grounds. He "could not see that it was inspired by the Holy Ghost." Our Lord—as He is revealed to us in the rest of Scripture—hardly appeared in the book, he said. Would John have made such an omission ? Zwingli condemned it altogether ; Calvin left it out of his commentary upon the Bible ; but in spite of
serious assaults it has not lost its The Rev. F. C. Porter in his long and deeply interesting article on " Revela- tion " in Hastings's "Dictionary of the Bible" (the more orthodox, our readers may remember, of the two great Biblical dictionaries) thus explains its continuance in the Canon. There was, and is, he thinks, "a consciousness [in the Church] that on the whole the religious faith and feeling of the book predominate over its Apocalyptic form, and give to Apocalyptical language, which the majority cannot under- stand or accept, practically the value of figure for the emotional expression of Christian faith and hope."
How much poorer should we have been had the Church refused to sanction the visions of this seer!—had we never heard him tell his hopes of "a new heaven and a new earth," divine hopes which the Roman fires could not consume. "Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men," he cries, "and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain : for the former things are passed away." At times we see that the sense of his prophetic office was strong upon him. He was constrained to set down his thoughts ; he could not forbear. " Write : for these words are true and faithful," we read. "I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end. I will give unto him that is athirst of the fountain of the water of life freely." It is strange that the English Church, who searched the Scriptures to such wonderful purpose when she compiled her Liturgy, made no use of the following invitation from the Book of the Revelation : "The Spirit and the bride say, Come. And let him that heareth say, Come. And let him that is athirst come. And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely."
Luther, according to Professor Jiilicher, based his trenchant Biblical criticism not so much upon his learning as upon his religious genius ; perhaps that is why his arguments are still so cogent. Truly, we cannot recognise our Lord in the Apocalypse. We hear of the symbolic Lamb, we see the leader of the heavenly host ; but he who in martial pomp avenges the saints, who judges and makes war in righteousness, is not our Lord, whose agony moved Him only to forgiveness. Now and again— for instance, as we read the words "Behold, I stand at the door, and knock "—we do indeed see "one like unto the Son of man,"—" He himself with His human air." But the next moment, as in Browning's vision of Easter Day, He is gone. Perhaps after all the best reason for the reverence Christendom has paid to the Book of the Revelation may be expressed in its own words : "the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy." If its author was not a Christian Apostle, he was without doubt a Christian prophet, and there is faith, hope, and passion in his poetry whose explanation and inspiration is Christ.
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