Robertson Word Pictures - Revelation 11:2 - 11:2

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Robertson Word Pictures - Revelation 11:2 - 11:2


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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:

The court (tēn aulēn). The uncovered yard outside the house. There were usually two, one between the door and the street, the outer court, the other the inner court surrounded by the buildings (Mar 14:66). This is here the outer court, “which is without the temple” (tēn exōthen tou naou), outside of the sanctuary, but within the hieron where the Gentiles could go (carrying out the imagery of the Jerusalem temple).

Leave without (ekbale exōthen). Literally, “cast without” (second aorist active imperative of ekballō.

Do not measure it (mē autēn metrēsēis). Prohibition with mē and the first aorist active (ingressive) subjunctive of metreō. This outer court is left to its fate. In Herod’s temple the outer court was marked off from the inner by “the middle wall of partition” (to mesoitoichon tou phragmou, Eph 2:15), beyond which a Gentile could not go. In this outer court was a house of prayer for the Gentiles (Mar 11:17), but now John is to cast it out and leave to its fate (given to the Gentiles in another sense) to be profaned by them.

They shall tread under foot (patēsousin). Future active of pateō, here to trample with contempt as in Luk 21:24, even the holy city (Mat 4:5; Isa 48:2; Neh 11:1). Charles thinks that only the heavenly city can be so called here (Rev 21:2, Rev 21:10; Rev 22:19) because of Luk 11:8 (Sodom and Gomorrah). But the language may be merely symbolical. See Dan 9:24.

Forty and two months (mēnas tesserakonta kai duo). Accusative of extent of time. This period in Dan 7:25; Dan 12:7. It occurs in three forms in the Apocalypse (forty-two months, here and Rev 13:5; 1260 days, Rev 11:3; Rev 12:6; time, times and half a time or 3-1/2 years, Rev 12:14 and so in Daniel). This period, however its length may be construed, covers the duration of the triumph of the Gentiles, of the prophesying of the two witnesses, of the sojourn of the woman in the wilderness.