Revelation 20:1
The Binding of Satan. The First Resurrection. Chap. 20 Revelation 20:1-6 1. _the bottomless pit_ See on Revelation 9:1. _in his hand_ Lit. ON HIS HAND hung over it.... [ Continue Reading ]
The Binding of Satan. The First Resurrection. Chap. 20 Revelation 20:1-6 1. _the bottomless pit_ See on Revelation 9:1. _in his hand_ Lit. ON HIS HAND hung over it.... [ Continue Reading ]
_that old serpent_ Revelation 12:9.... [ Continue Reading ]
_and shut him up … upon him_ Read, AND SHUT AND SEALED [IT] OVER HIM: the opening of Revelation 9:2 is undone. _he must be loosed_ Revelation 5:7.... [ Continue Reading ]
_thrones_ Daniel 7:9. "They" who sat upon them, to whom judgement (i.e. the right of judging: see 1 Corinthians 6:2-3) was given are identified by Daniel 7:22 as "the saints of the Most High" saints, plainly, in the modern sense, as distinguished from angels. [_I saw the souls_ Cf. Revelation 6:9.... [ Continue Reading ]
_But_ Should be omitted; there is more authority for reading "and." _This is the first resurrection_ Here, as with the Millennium, there is the question whether these words are to be understood literally. In fact, the interpretation of these words, literally or otherwise, is the turning-point of th... [ Continue Reading ]
_Blessed and holy_&c. He is sure of eternal blessedness, absolutely and indefeasibly consecrated to God. "Holy" refers to the relation to God into which this brings him, not to the foregoing faithfulness that is implied in his being admitted into it. _the second death_ See Revelation 2:11, and Reve... [ Continue Reading ]
The Loosing of Satan, the War of Gog and Magog, the Judgement on the Devil, the Beast, and the False Prophet, Revelation 20:7-10 7. _Satan shall be loosed_ "for a little season," as we heard in Revelation 20:3. The words are different from the "short time" of Revelation 12:12, and we have no reason... [ Continue Reading ]
_the nations which are_&c. It almost seems as though the kingdom of Christ and of His Saints had not been world-wide, but had been, like the Roman empire of St John's day, or the Christendom of our own, a wide but limited region of light in the midst of a barbarous world. It is not therefore certain... [ Continue Reading ]
_And they went up_&c. The Seer does not pass easily over the immense space of time during which the world is too happy to have a history. He _sees_the establishment of the earthly kingdom of Christ, and _foretells_its end: it is only gradually that he comes to see the end also brought before his vie... [ Continue Reading ]
_And the devil that deceived them_ Lit. THAT DECEIVETH, but the sense is general: as if we were to say "their deceiver." _into the lake_&c. Revelation 19:20. _where_ Read, WHERE ALSO. _the beast and the false prophet_are] It might be better to supply WERE CAST. That they are there still, not cons... [ Continue Reading ]
The great white Throne, the General Resurrection, the Judgement on all the Dead and on Death and Hell, Revelation 20:11-15 11. _a great white throne_ Probably not absolutely the same as that of Revelation 4:2 &c.: the King is to sit now not as Lawgiver or Administrator but as Judge. Possibly it is... [ Continue Reading ]
_small and great_ Read THE GREAT AND THE SMALL. The sense, as in Revelation 19:5, is probably to indicate the nothingness of human distinctions before God. Those who are "great in the Kingdom of Heaven" have been raised already, Revelation 20:4. _before God_ Read, BEFORE THE THRONE. This verse ther... [ Continue Reading ]
_death and hell_ See Revelation 6:8. _Sheol_, the Hebrew equivalent of _Hades_, seems not quite determined in meaning between the receptacle of the bodies of the dead and of their souls, but is sometimes translateable as "the grave." Here it seems implied that those who died in the sea are not in Ha... [ Continue Reading ]
_And death and hell were cast_&c. They are enemies of God, 1 Corinthians 15:26, and to be destroyed at Christ's triumph, _ib._54. But though no doubt presented to St John as individual demon figures (see Revelation 6:8), we are probably not to understand that they are real persons, like the Devil an... [ Continue Reading ]
_And whosoever_&c. "By the works of the Law shall no flesh be justified." Any who are not in the number of those saved by God's free grace, are sure to have sins recorded against them, sufficient for a judgement "out of those things which were written in the books" to end in this terrible sentence.... [ Continue Reading ]