Heinrich Meyer Commentary - Revelation 12:1 - 12:1

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Heinrich Meyer Commentary - Revelation 12:1 - 12:1


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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:

Rev_12:1 sq. σημεῖον . An appearance whereby something is described, and thus revealed to the seer, σημαίνεται .[3014] In the most general sense, any appearance beheld by John might be called a σημεῖον ( àå ̇ ú ); but although such visions as Rev_6:3 sqq., Rev_8:7 to Rev_9:21, are, therefore, in no way of an allegorical nature, because in themselves they describe things just as the prophet regards them as real (real shedding of blood, Rev_6:3; real famine, Rev_6:5 sqq.; real quaking of the earth, and falling of heavenly bodies, and other real plagues), the σημεῖον in this passage (cf. Rev_12:3; Rev_15:1) has in it something allegorical,—since the context in itself manifests this, and marks it by the particular expression σημεῖον ,—inasmuch as, by the form of the woman that is beheld, it is not the person of an actual woman which is to be represented.

μέγα , “great,” i.e., of large appearance, and, accordingly, of important significance.[3015]

ὤφθη . Cf. Rev_11:19.

ἐν τῷ οὐρανῷ . Heaven is the locality where[3016] signs bringing a revelation manifest themselves to the seer.[3017] So, correctly, De Wette and Hengstenb., only that the former[3018] ascribes to John a repeated inconsistency in reference to the standpoint,—which is regarded as being, from Rev_11:15, again in heaven, but afterwards (Rev_11:18) is imperceptibly transferred to the earth,—while Hengstenb. repeats the error:[3019] “To be in the Spirit, and to be in heaven, is the same,” with which the explanation, “What the seer sees belongs not to sensuous, but supersensuous, spheres,” by no means properly harmonizes. The latter remark is allied to the false interpretation of the ἐν τῷ οὐρανῷ , attempted in a twofold way, according to which the ἐν τ . οὐρ . is understood with reference to the γυνή ,[3020] or the δράκων , Rev_12:3[3021]

γυνή

τεκεῖν . Whether and in what way the Church is to be understood by the woman, cannot be inferred until the close of the entire vision,[3022] since the particular points of the text condition the meaning of the whole. The emblematic description ( περιβεβλημένη

δώδεκα ) represents the woman who is just about bearing, Rev_12:2, in a heavenly brilliancy reminding us of the manifestation of Christ[3023] and of God.[3024]

ΠΕΡΙΒΕΒΛΗΜΈΝΗ ΤῸΝ ἭΛΙΟΝ . Clothed with the sun. The idea resembles that of Psa_104:2,[3025] only that in this passage the description is more concrete, since it is not light in general, but the more definite and perceptible sun, the heavenly body radiating all light, that appears as the dress of the woman,—not “as breastplate, and, accordingly, as an integrant part of the clothing.”[3026] The περιβ . τ . ἥλιον allows a definite allegorical interpretation as little as the two other features of the description, καὶ ἡ σελήνη ὑποκάτω τῶν ποδῶν αὐτῆς and καὶ ἐπὶ τῆς κεφαλῆς αὐτῆς στέφανας ἀστέρων δώδεκα , only that the definite number twelve of the stars is conditioned[3027] in a similar way by the number of the tribes of Israel;[3028] as in Rev_1:16; Rev_1:20, the number seven of stars by the number of particular churches. The reference to the twelve apostles[3029] is incorrect, because the woman appears at all events as mother of Christ, Rev_12:5, and accordingly cannot admit of emblems whose meaning presupposes not only the birth, but also the entire life and work, of the church. For the same reason, the allegorical interpretations of the ἥλιος , as referring to Christ himself as “the sun of righteousness,”[3030] and the σελήνη as referring to “the teachers who borrow their light from Christ,”[3031] or to “the light of the law and prophets far inferior to the light of Christ,”[3032] are to be rejected. Hengstenb. regards the sun and moon as emblems of the uncreated and the created light, which has in itself as little foundation as it stands in harmony with the (correct) reference of the twelve stars to the tribes of Israel; this applies against Beng., who understands by the sun the Christian empire and government, and by the moon the Mohammedan power whose insignia is the crescent. The allegorical interpretation also of the moon, which is “under the feet of the woman,” attempted with various modification,[3033] show their arbitrariness already by the fact that, in one way or another, they disturb the symmetrical relation to the other features of the description, which, as a whole, has only the intention of displaying the holy and glorious nature of the woman from her heavenly form, whereby the individual features of the poetic description are as eminently beautiful as they are naturally striking. For the form of the woman itself appears clothed with the sun, and in the clearest radiancy; she stands also on a body of light, the moon; while a crown of stars—and that twelve—encircle her head also with a peculiar brilliancy.

The woman is with child ( ἐν γαστρὶ ἔχουσα ), and, besides, as the further description immediately afterwards says more explicitly, just about to be delivered (cf. Rev_12:4 sq.): “She cried travailing in birth, and pained to be delivered” ( κράζει ὠδίνουσα , κ . τ . λ .).[3034] [See Note LXVIII., p. 357.]

[3014] Cf. Rev_1:1.

[3015] Cf. Rev_15:1; Rev_15:3; Mat_24:24; Act_6:8; Act_8:13; Joh_1:51; Joh_5:20; Joh_14:12.

[3016] Cf. Rev_4:1.

[3017] Cf. Rev_5:1 sqq., Rev_6:1 sqq., Rev_8:1 sqq., Rev_9:1 sqq., Rev_10:1, Rev_11:15 sqq.

[3018] Cf. Rev_10:1.

[3019] Cf. Rev_4:1 sqq.

[3020] Calov.: “What is signified by the things which John saw in heavenly majesty is fulfilled in the ecclesiastical heaven.” Cf. Vitr., Beng., Auberlen, p. 282.

[3021] Eichh.: “In the air, or, as commonly said, the extreme region of the air; for that same place is to be assigned by the poet to the woman, as was believed to be that of the demons, good and bad, whom he wanted to produce upon the scene.” Cf. Grot.: “In the centre, between heaven and earth. In the matter signified, this means that heavenly and earthly causes mutually concur.”

[3022] See on Rev_12:17.

[3023] Rev_1:13-16. Cf. especially Rev_12:16 : ἡ ὄψις αὐτ . ὡς ὁ ἥλιος , κ . τ . λ .

[3024] Rev_4:3.

[3025] ἀναβαλλόμενος φῶς ὡς ἱμάτιον .

[3026] Ebrard.

[3027] De Wette, Ebrard, Hengstenb., etc.

[3028] Cf. Rev_7:4 sqq.

[3029] Beda, C. a Lap., Stern, Aret., Vitr., etc.

[3030] Andr., Beda, N. de Lyra, C. a Lap., Stern, Aret., Grot., Calov., etc.

[3031] Calov.

[3032] Grot.

[3033] Beda: “The Church of Christ, girdled with light, treads under foot temporal glory.” Vitr.: “Because, mutable things in religion being abolished, an immovable kingdom has followed.” Cf. C. a Lap., Herd., etc. Ebrard: “The moon is the night vanquished by her; the stars are the lights enkindled by her in the night, which vanquish it.”

[3034] Concerning the loose connection of the inf. τεκεῖν with βασανιζομένη , cf. Winer, p. 306 sqq.

NOTES BY THE AMERICAN EDITOR

LXVIII. (a.) Rev_12:1 sq. γυνὴ περιβεβλημένη , κ . τ . λ .

See the full discussion by Düsterdieck at the close of the chapter, who restricts the γυνὴ to the O. T. Church. So Luthardt. Alford marks a transition to another view there stated: “The whole symbolism points to the Church, the bride of God; and of course, from the circumstances afterwards related, the O. T. Church, at least at the beginning of the vision.” Lange very tersely puts the argument for the O. and N. T. Church in undivided unity: “The fact that the woman cannot be referred to the New Testament Church alone, results clearly from Rev_12:5 : the Christian Church did not bear Christ. Holding fast the identity of her in the heaven and her in the wilderness, neither can the woman be significant of the O. T. Church by itself, since the same woman lives on in the wilderness throughout the N. T. period of the cross. The unity of the O. and N. T. Church of God lay, doubtless, much nearer to the contemplation of John than to that of an exegesis whose view is, in many respects, too exclusively fixed upon externalities. Though it is impossible that John could have apprehended the woman as Mary herself, yet the fact was most closely present to his consciousness that this Mary, whose bodily offspring Christ was, was the final concentration of the O. T. theocracy.” Gebhardt: “The Church of God is represented by the figure of a woman in the O. T. (Isa_54:1; Isa_54:13; Isa_66:8; Mic_5:1-3). The question now arises, whether we are here to understand the Church of the O. T. or of the N. T. From the first verse of the chapter to the last, the woman, without doubt, represents the same personality, and the seer cannot have understood, by the woman, the N. T. Church, in distinction from that of the O. T.: the general statements of Rev_12:1-6 are against it, nor is this interpretation helped by limiting the meaning of the Jewish Christian Church. On the other hand, it is utterly impossible to understand by the woman, the O. T. Church in distinction from that of the New; for then not only Rev_12:13-17, but even Rev_12:6, would be without meaning. What, then, are we to understand by the woman? Simply, the Church of God which already existed in the prophetic fact of the old covenant, and which now exists in the time of its fulfilment in Christendom, and will exist in its eternal completion in the new heaven and the new earth.” Beck: “The woman clothed with the sun designates the heavenly kingdom of God, as it unites in itself as the true Church the O. and the N. T. Church of God as a divine Church-kingdom, in contrast with the adulterous church of the flesh. Already in the O. T. covenant of promise and its believers, this divine Church-kingdom had found its external type and external preparation; but in the N. T. spiritual institution, with its spiritual gifts and spiritual men, it had found its inner type and inner preparation: finally, in the future new Church of the new earth, it has both its external and inner completion.” On the particular features, Gerhard (L. T., xi. 34): “Clothed with the sun” = the righteousness assumed by faith, Mal_4:2, and the heavenly glory in which it shall shine hereafter, Mat_13:43. “The moon under her feet” = treading upon all the mutations of earth, and especially heresies which, like the moon, are ever changing. “Crown of twelve stars” = brilliancy of prophetic and apostolic doctrine. “Being in travail” = pains of spiritual birth (Gal_4:19, etc.). Beck regards the sun, as signifying not only the benign influence of the Church in diffusing light and life, but also the glory of the new Jerusalem; while in treading upon the moon, which derives its light from the sun, and is the earthly measure of time and the variable light of the earthly night, he finds portrayed the superiority of the Church above all earthly times and changes, and its eternal lustre uninterrupted by night (Rev_22:5; Isa_60:20). So Luthardt: “She triumphs over night, which for her has passed away.” On “in travail,” see Victorinus: “The ancient Church of the fathers and prophets and saints and apostles, which had the groans of its torments and longings, until it saw that Christ had taken flesh.” Luther, in 1535, expressed the conception of this passage as referring to the Church in its entire chronological compass, in his hymn, Sie ist mir lieb, der werthe Magd. The two last stanzas have been thus rendered by Massie:—

“She wears a crown of purest gold,

Twelve shining stars attend her;

Her raiment, glorious to behold,

Surpasses far in splendor

The sun at noon;

Upon the moon

She stands, the Bride

Of Him who died:

Sore travall is upon her;

She bringeth forth a noble Son,

Whom all the world doth honor;

She bows before His throne.

“Thereat the dragon raged, and stood

With open mouth before her;

But vain was his attempt, for God

His buckler broad threw o’er her.

Up to his throne

He caught his Son,

But left the foe

To rage below.

The mother, sore afflicted,

Alone into the desert fled;

There by her God protected,

By her true Father fed.”

[See also below, Note LXIX.]