Online Resource Library
Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadHeinrich Meyer Commentary - Revelation 8:1 - 8:1
(Show All Books | Show All Chapters)
This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
Rev_8:1. ὅταν . In the sense of ὅτε ,[2386] as is not unusual among the Byzantines.[2387]
ΣΙΓῊ ἘΝ Τῷ ΟὐΡΑΝῷ Ὡς ἩΜΊΩΡΟΝ . The silence in heaven, lasting about[2388] a half-hour, begins at the place where the songs of praise still resound, Rev_7:10 sqq. The voice also of the elder who speaks immediately before the opening of the seventh seal is silent. When the Lamb took the book with the seven seals, the music of the harp and the song of praise resounded in heaven, Rev_5:8 sqq.; also at the opening of the first six seals, it was in many ways audible;[2389] but when the last seal is opened, a profound silence ensues. The reason for this is the anxious expectation of the inhabitants of heaven, who not only after the precedency of the sixth seal must now expect the final decisive catastrophe, but, also, can infer the proximity of that catastrophe from the appearing of the seven angels, and their being furnished with trumpets. The σιγὴ ἐν τῷ οὐρανῷ is thus a “silent expectation and contemplation of the seven trumpets,”[2390] and, as an expression of “the stupor of the heavenly beings,” belongs to “the adornment and fitness of the dramatic scene.”[2391] Thus, essentially, Andr., Areth., Par., Vieg., Rib., Aret., Calov., Beng., Ew., De Wette, Stern, Ebrard, all of whom are one on the main point,[2392] that the σιγή does not compose the entire contents of the seventh seal, but that rather from this last seal the entire series of trumpet-visions is developed. If this is denied, as by Vitr., and recently by Hengstenb., not only is the organic connection of the visions as a whole rent,—since “the group of the seven trumpets” appears immediately beside “the group of the seven seals,”[2393] but results follow with respect to the exposition as a whole, and in its details, that are entirely inadmissible. Hengstenb. interprets the σιγὴ ἐν τ . οὐρ ., as the silencing of the enemies of Christ and his Church, which corresponds with their mourning,[2394] and is regarded as caused by the punishments of the preceding six seals. And, besides, the ἐν τῷ οὐρανῷ , which alone is strong enough to render this mode of statement impossible, is explained away by the remark: “Heaven here comes into consideration only as a theatre (Rev_6:1, Rev_12:1). In reality the silence belongs to the earth”!
Vitr. seeks, in a better way, to meet the demands of the text. He refutes, first, the view according to which it is thought that in Rev_8:1-6 the entire contents of the seventh seal are described,[2395] by the excellent remark that already, in Rev_8:2, the angels of the trumpets enter, and that Rev_8:2-6 contain in general a certain preparation for Rev_8:7 sqq. But while Vitr. thus properly hesitates to sunder Rev_8:2 sqq. from Rev_8:7 sqq., he separates Rev_8:1 from Rev_8:2 sqq. by finding in Rev_8:1 the contents of the seventh seal, i.e., the complete conclusion of the series of seal-visions, according to their prophetic significance extending until the end of the world, which, in their way, comprise the entire breadth of Apocalyptic prophecy; for from this it necessarily follows that the prophecy begins again with the first trumpet-vision, which runs parallel to the first seal-vision, etc. The σιγὴ ἐν τ . οὐρ . designates, according to Vitr., “the condition of the most recent period of the Church, in which the Church in the possession of peace, tranquillity, and an abundance of all spiritual blessings, celebrates a triumph over its enemies.” This σιγή , therefore, actually lasts a long time, although it appears to John a half-hour,[2396]—as Lange with entire consistency says, one thousand years.[2397] The connection with the trumpet-visions lies in the fact that here “the Spirit explains in what way and by what steps God led the Church into that state,” viz., as those trumpet-visions describe: “Evils intended for the punishment of the Roman Empire, the enemy of the Church of Christ, to be terminated in the total destruction of the same empire.” There are two main points characteristic of this mode of conception, which is best advocated by Vitr., in which, however, the distortion is evident; viz., the explanation of the ΣΙΓῊ ἘΝ Τ . ΟὐΡ ., and the statement of the connection with the trumpet-visions. If it is assumed that the seventh seal brings nothing else than that ΣΙΓῊ ,—although as well after the events of the first six seals, as after the interposed ch. 7, a certain fulness of significant contents is to be expected,—the question for which neither reasons are assigned, nor to which an answer is in any way given in the context itself, is raised; viz., as to what that ΣΙΓΉ “means,” i.e, what historical fact, what state of the world or Church, is typified by that ΣΙΓΉ whose allegorical meaning is presupposed. And this question arbitrarily raised can be answered only arbitrarily: the ΣΙΓΉ means the sabbath rest of the Church after the plagues of the first six seals,[2398] “the beginning of the eternal rest,”[2399] the thousand-years rest before the final end,[2400] or perhaps, in case the sixth seal be not regarded as extending so far, the rest of the Church under Constantine.[2401] As to what the ΣΙΓΉ “means,” expositors of an entirely different class have investigated also when they even with formal correctness acknowledged that not only does the seventh seal contain that ΣΙΓΉ , but also the seven trumpets introduce it. Here belong especially the expositors who refer ch. 8 also to the events of the Romano-Judaic war. According to Grot., the ΣΙΓῊ ( ἘΝ Τ . ΟὐΡ .) is the brief rest of the winds of Rev_7:1 (which are at the four corners of the earth!). Wetst. explains more minutely: “Since all things now looked to a revolt of the Jews, a brief pause followed by the intervention of Agrippa and the priests.”[2402] Alcas.: “The remarkable forbearance of Christians who silently endured persecution from the Jews.” Against all these arbitrary explanations, we must hold fast simply to the text, which says that at the opening of the seventh seal a profound silence occurred in heaven, where the sealed book was opened,—a silence which “signifies” something earthly, as little as the speech and songs heard in heaven at the opening of the preceding seals. But thereby the knowledge is gained that such silence occurs just because of the peculiar contents of this seal. Thereby, besides, the exposition is preserved from the second offence against the context, with which not only Beda but also Ebrard, etc., are chargeable, viz., the idea of a recapitulation in the entire series of trumpet-visions. For what Beda expressly says[2403] is said essentially not only by Vitr., but also, e.g., by Ebrard, when he passes the opinion that in the trumpets, “a retrogression, as it were, is taken,” viz., by the representation “of classes and kinds of judicial punishments which belong only to the godless,[2404] and that, too, not first after or with the sixth seal, but even already before.” In exegetical principle, this exposition stands upon a line with the one of N. de Lyra, who, by the theory of recapitulation, explains that only the conflict of the Church with heretics is portrayed, after[2405] its conflict against tyrants, the heathen oppressors, is stated. Accordingly, the exposition in the trumpet-visions can recur again to the centuries of Church history, from which, on the other side, all sort of facts have already been gathered for ch. 6, in order to show the fulfilment of prophecy. The only apparent occasion which the context gives for the idea that the trumpet-visions recur again before the sixth seal—an idea which has led not only to the further statement that the individual trumpets in some way concur with the individual seals, but also to numberless and unlimited attempts to find the fulfilment of the individual trumpet-visions in historical events—lies in the fact that the final catastrophe, the extreme end, whose description is to be expected after chs. 6. and 7 in the seventh seal, does not yet, at least immediately, appear.[2406] But the expedient adopted here by many expositors to limit the contents of the seventh seal to Rev_8:1, and to understand the σιγὴ ἐν τ . οὐρ . as the eternal rest of the perfected Church, or the eternal silencing of condemned enemies, has been proved to be mistaken. Yet that difficulty is solved by the view, attained already by Ew., Lücke, De Wette, Rinck,[2407] into the skilful, carefully designed plan of the entire book, which here, just from the fact that from the last seal a new series of visions is to proceed, describes the trial of the patience of saints who are regarded as awaiting the day of the Lord;[2408] but at the same time the expectation excited by the events of the first six seals, and increased by the entire ch. 7, as well as by the silence occurring at the opening of the seventh seal, that in this last seal the final completion is to come, in no way deceives, since the full conclusion is actually disclosed in the seventh seal, although only through a long series of visions in whose chain the trumpet-visions themselves form only the first members.[2409]
[2386] See Critical Notes.
[2387] Winer, p. 290.
[2388] ὡς ; cf. Joh_1:40; Joh_6:19; Joh_11:18; Mar_5:13; Luk_8:2.
[2389] Rev_6:1; Rev_6:3; Rev_6:5; Rev_6:7; Rev_6:9; Rev_6:12.
[2390] C. a Lap.
[2391] Eichh.
[2392] Cf. also Grot., Wetst., Herder, etc., who in other respects deny the reference of the whole.
[2393] Hengstenb.
[2394] Mat_24:30.
[2395] Braun, Select. Sacr., ii. cc. 1.
[2396] Cf. Aret., Bengel; the latter of whom reckoned the ἡμίμωρον as about four ordinary days.
[2397] Cf. also Beda, Hofm., etc.
[2398] Beda, Hofm., Christiani.
[2399] Vict., Primas.
[2400] Lange.
[2401] Laun, Brightm.
[2402] Josephus, B. J., ii. 15, 2.
[2403] “But now he recapitulates from the origin, in order to say the same things in another way.”
[2404] Cf., on the other hand, the general remarks above on ch. 7.
[2405] Up to Rev_6:17.
[2406] Other reasons, as that asserted by Ebrard: “How could the third part of the sun and moon be darkened (Rev_8:12), after they have first lost all their ight” (Rev_6:12)?—from which it would follow that Rev_6:12 actually belongs after Rev_8:12,—may be contradicted directly from their own standpoint. For against such considerations, it may be said: How Son_6:12 speak of the entire moon, when in Rev_8:12 the third of it is already eclipsed?
[2407] Cf. also Beng.
[2408] Cf. Rev_13:10, Rev_14:12.
[2409] Cf. Introduction, p.