Richard Chenevix Trench · 5 of 13

Introduction, Rev. i. 4-20 · Part 4

By what has been just said it is not intended in the least to affirm that bishops were commonly called Angels in the primitive Church, or called so at all, except with a more or less conscious reference to the use of the word in the Apocalypse. There is a certain mysteriousness, and remoteness from the common language of men, in the adoption of this term, and such there is intended to be. It belongs to the enigmatic symbolic character of the Book, elevated in its language throughout above the level of daily life. Those to whom this title is ascribed are herein presented to the Church as clothed with a peculiar dignity, and are herein themselves reminded that they stand before One, whose ministries of grace and love they should be swift to fulfil on earth, even as those whose names they bear are swift to fulfil them in heaven. There is then a certain, though very partial right in what Origen taught; and “Angel” is a heavenly title here; but a heavenly title which has been borrowed by earth, which has been transferred and applied to men; a transfer not without its analogies in the Old Testament (Eccles. v. 5; Mal. ii. 7; iii. 1); and rendered more easy by the fact that Angel is a name not designating the personality, but the office, of those heavenly beings by whom it properly is borne.

It is not to be supposed that those who believe the government of the Church to have been presbyterian at the first, and who see in the episcopate a result of declension from apostolic purity, should accept these conclusions. At the same time they are far from being at one in the ways by which they have sought to evade the argument for primitive episcopacy which we believe that we are here justified in finding.

Thus some affirm that the Angel represents and stands for not any single person, but the whole body of the προεστῶτες, the collective presbytery, contemplated and addressed not as many, but as one. So for the most part the early anti-episcopal Protestants, Brightman for example; and even Hengstenberg has not disdained to fall back on this unworthy subterfuge; the mere statement of which involves its condemnation. Vitringa (De Synag. Vet. p. 911) with more candour mentions this only to reject it, and finds a clear testimony here for the superior dignity of one in these several Churches; though naturally the episcopate which he thus recognizes, is of the mildest form, of the Usherian type; and Beza in like manner glosses τῷ ἀγγέλῳ, i. e. προεστῶτι; though, curiously enough, he considers that the upgrowth of the tyrannous hierarchy of Rome is evidence sufficient that, however there were προεστῶτες in these apostolic Churches, it was never intended of God that such should always continue in the Church.

But there is a poorer evasion even than this; which has lately been revived by Ebrard. It rests on an entirely gratuitous assumption, on the fiction, namely, that the seven Churches had sent their messengers to St. John at Patmos, therefore called the “Angels,” or messengers (cf. Luke ix. 52) “of the Churches.” These in these Epistles are now successively addrest, that they may bring back his word, or rather the word of Christ, to those Churches from which they had been deputed. But in answering a letter by a messenger, you write by, you do not usually write to, him; nor is it easy to see where is the correspondency between such messengers, subordinate officials of the Churches, and stars; or what the mystery of the relation between them then would be; or how the Lord should set forth as an eminent prerogative of his, that He held the seven stars, that is, the seven messengers. in his right hand (ii. 1). The scheme breaks down at every point, and among many lame and feeble shifts must needs be regarded as the lamest and feeblest of all. I again repeat my conviction that in these Angels we are to recognize the bishops of the several Churches. So many difficulties, embarrassments, improbabilities attend every other solution, all which disappear with the adoption of this, while no others rise in their room, that, were not other interests, often no doubt unconsciously, at work, it would be very hard to understand how any could have ever arrived at a different conclusion.

I will take the opportunity of a pause here between this, the Introduction to the seven Epistles, and the seven Epistles themselves, to say a few needful words on the mystery of the number seven; which only I have left unsaid so long, because unwilling to interrupt the exposition by any thing in the shape of a dissertation; not to say that I found it difficult to attach to any one of those important sevens which have already occurred, considerations which properly belonged to them all.

Even the most careless reader of the Apocalypse must be struck with the manner in which almost every thing there is ordered by sevens. Thus, besides the seven Churches, and their seven Angels, we have already in this first chapter the seven Spirits (ver. 4), the seven candlesticks (ver. 12), the seven stars (ver. 16); and then further the seven lamps of fire (iv. 5), the seven seals (v. 1), the seven horns and seven eyes of the Lamb (v. 6), the seven heavenly Angels and the seven trumpets (viii. 2), the seven thunders (x. 3), the seven heads of the dragon, and the seven crowns upon these heads (xii. 3), the same of the beast rising out of the sea (xiii. 1), the seven last plagues (xv. 1), the seven vials (xv. 7), the seven mountains (xvii. 9), the seven kings (xvii. 10); not to speak of other recurrences, not so obvious, of this number seven as the signature of the Book; as, for instance, the distribution of it into seven visions, the sevenfold ascription of glory to the Lamb (v. 12), and to God (vii. 12).

But indeed the recurrence, and, as I shall seek to show, the symbolic dignity of the number seven runs through the whole of Scripture from first to last,—to say nothing of the echoes of this sense of its significance which abound in every religion of heathendom; and if it is more strongly marked in the Apocalypse than in any other book of Scripture, it is only that this, like so much else, has culminated here. Should it be asked, What is the special significance, and what the sacredness and peculiar dignity of seven, of what is it the signature, the answer is not very hard to give. A careful induction from all the passages where this number cannot be regarded as fortuitous, but is evidently of Divine ordinance and appointment (I call fortuitous such sevens as occur, Acts xix. 14; xx. 6), will leave no doubt that it claims throughont Scripture to be considered as the covenant number, the sign and signature of God’s covenant relation to mankind, and above all to that portion of mankind with which this relation is not potential merely, but actual, namely the Church.

The evidences of this reach back to the very beginning. We meet them first in the hallowing of the seventh day, in pledge and token of the covenant of God with man (Gen. ii. 3; cf. Ezek. xx. 12), as indeed in the binding up of seven in the very word Sabbath. So too circumcision, being the sign of a covenant, is accomplished on the eighth, or after seven days (Gen. xvii. 12; Lev. xii. 3). And as seven is the signature of God’s covenant with man, so of all man’s covenants with his fellows, resting as these do and must, on the anterior covenant with God; thus of treaties of peace (Gen. xxi. 20), of marriages (Judg. xiv. 12). Nor should it be left unnoticed that the word seven is again bound up in the Hebrew word signifying an oath, or a covenant confirmed with an oath. Seven is the number of sacrifice, by aid of which the covenant once established, is continually maintained in its first vigour and strength, and the relations between God and man, which sin is evermore disturbing, and threatening to bring to an end, are restored (2 Chron. xxix. 21; Job xlii. 8; cf. Num. xxiii. 1, 14, 29). It is the number of purification and consecration, as the fruits of the sacrifice (Lev. iv. 6, 17; viii. 11, 33; xiv. 9, 51; xvi. 14, 19; Num. xix. 12, 19), of forgiveness (Matt. xviii. 21, 22; Luke xvii. 4). Then, again, seven is the number of every grace and benefit bestowed upon Israel; which is thus marked as flowing out of the covenant and a consequence of it. The priests compass Jericho seven days, and on the seventh day seven times, that all Israel may know that the city is given into their hands by their God; and that its conquest is a direct and immediate result of their covenant relation to Him (Josh. vi. 4, 15, 16). Naaman is to dip in Jordan seven times, that he may acknowledge the God of Israel the author of his cure (2 Kings v. 10). It is the number of reward to those that are faithful in the covenant (Deut. xxviii. 7; 1 Sam. ii. 5); of punishment to those who are froward in the covenant (Lev. xxvi. 21, 24, 28; Deut. xxviii. 25; 2 Sam. xii. 8; xxiv. 13), or to those who injure the people in it (Gen. iv. 15, 24; Ps. lxxix. 12; Exod. vii. 25); or again of punishment, regarded in the light of a making of amends, a readjusting of the disturbed balances of justice, and so a restoring of harmony between the sinner and the outraged law of God (Prov. vi. 31). All the feasts, as must be obvious to every one, are ordered by seven, or else by seven multiplied into seven (7 x 7), and thus made intenser still. Thus it is, not to recur again to Sabbath, the mother of all feasts, with the Passover (Exod. xii. 15, 16), the feast of weeks (Deut. xvi. 9), of tabernacles (Deut. xvi. 13, 15), the sabbath-year (Lev. xxv. 2, 3; Deut. xv. 1), and the jubilee (Lev. xxv. 8).

Further we may observe that wherever God is at work in the history of other nations outside of the covenant, while yet He would make it plainly to appear that it is for Israel’s sake, and having respect to the covenant, that He is so working, this signature of seven in his dealing with those nations is never wanting. Thus it is the number of the years of plenty and of the years of famine, in sign that these were sent not so much for Egypt’s sake, as for Israel’s, and as conducing to the divine preparation through which the chosen people were to pass (Gen. xli. 26, 27). Seven times pass over Nebuchadnezzar, that he may learn in his abasement how that the God of his Jewish captives is indeed the King over all the earth (Dan. iv. 16, 23, 25). But it would be endless to go through all passages in proof; it would need to quote or refer to a great part of Scripture. I prefer leaving to the student of God’s Word to fill up the sketch which I have drawn, and to find for himself further confirmation of what has been asserted here.

But if it should be further asked, Why has seven been selected for this, what are the grounds of its adoption to this high dignity and honour, the answer does not seem very far to seek. I am indeed aware that in all speculations upon numbers we may very profitably lay to heart the wise caution of Fuller, clothed, as is ever the case with his wisdom, in witty words: “For matter of numbers fancy is never at a loss, like a beggar never out of his way, but hath some haunts where to repose itself. But such as in expounding of Scripture reap more than God did sow there, never eat what they reap thence, because such grainless husks, when seriously threshed out, vanish all into chaff.” And yet I feel very sure that in this matter we need not dread lest we should be threshing barren ears, with only chaff for our pains.

To the question then asked above it may be replied by first calling attention to the fact that the number seven results from the combination of three and four. But can it be shown that these in Scripture have severally any symbolic significance of their own? Assuredly yes. Three, the signature of God; four, that of the world; and thus seven, or these numbers brought into contact and relation, the token and signature of the covenant between these two.

That three is the number of God, of the ever-blessed Trinity, this of itself needs no proof And it is so recognized in Scripture. There are vestiges of this in the Old Testament, in the Trisagion of Isai. vi. 3; in the blessing as from three distinct persons, Num. vi. 24-26; in the prominent position assumed there by the Angel of the Covenant, hereafter to be acknowledged as the second Person of the Trinity, in the often mention not of God, but the Spirit of God, hereafter to be acknowledged as the third (Gen. i. 2; Ps. li. 11). These footprints of the Trinity are purposely more or less obscure, and only clear when they are read in the light of a later revelation; for the office of the Church of the Old Testament was to guard the truth of the unity of the Godhead, not to declare the Trinity; which indeed, so long as polytheism was not overcome, but still had its roots even in the minds of the chosen people itself, could not yet have been safely declared. Here is explanation amply sufficient, of the reserve with which the number three is employed in the Old Testament as the signature of Deity; the reason why this is only perfectly plain and clear in the New.

Four, the next number to three, and growing immediately out of it, is the signature of the world—of the world, not indeed as a rude undigested mass, but as a κόσμος, as the revelation, so far as nature can be the revelation, of God. Four is stamped every where on this the organized world. Thus, not to speak of the four elements, the four seasons, neither of which are recognized in Scripture, we have there the four winds (Ezek. xxxvii. 9; Matt. xxiv. 31; Rev. vii. 1); the four corners of the earth (Rev. vii. 1; xx. 8); the four living creatures, emblems of all creaturely life (Rev. iv. 6), and each of these with four faces and four wings (Ezek. i. 5, 6); the four beasts coming up from the sea, and representing the four great world-empires which in the providence of God should succeed one another (Dan. vii. 3); the four metals composing the image which sets forth the same phases of empire (Dan. ii. 32, 33); the four Gospels, or the foursided Gospel (εὐαγγέλιον τετράγωνον, as one called it of old), in sign of its designation for all the world; the sheet tied at the four corners (Acts x. 11; xi. 5); the four horns, the sum total of the forces of the world as arrayed against the Church (Zech. i. 18); the enumeration, wherever this is wished to be exhaustive, of the inhabitants of the world by four, kindreds, tongues, peoples, and nations (Rev. v. 9; cf. vii. 9; x. 11; xi. 9; xiv. 6; xvii. 15).

There are reasons then amply sufficient why seven, being thus, as it is, made up of three and four, should be itself the signature of the covenant. No mere accident or caprice dictated the selection of it. And if this number of the covenant, then we can account for its constant recurrence in this Book; for admitting, as few would refuse to do, that the idea of God’s covenant with his Church as the key to all history, comes to its head in the Apocalypse, it is nothing wonderful that this Book should be more markedly ordered by seven, and have this number stamped upon it even more strongly, than any other portion of Scripture.