§ 49. THE TWO WITNESSES.'

THE history of the two witnesses occupies the whole space between the first and second judgments. Commencing at the destruction of Jerusalem, (see Rev. 11: 2, 3,) it extends to the completion of the second woe, which immediately precedes the trumpet of the last judgment. Verses 12-18. Forty and two months, or (dropping the symbol) 1260 years, reaching to A. D. 1330, is the period of their appointed testimony; but their death, resurrection, ascension to heaven, and the earthquake and slaughter which constitute the second woe, are posterior to their testimony, and occupy an indefinite period subsequent to the 1260 years. These are evidently the events which have taken place since 1330, when the dispensation immediately preparatory to the second judgment commenced. We may divide the whole period covered by the Apocalypse into four parts, viz: 1, the period of the the first judgment; 2, the period of the testimony of the two witnesses; 3, the period of the ascension of the two witnesses; 4, the period of the second judgment. The first and second of these periods are clearly defined; but the boundaries of the other two are yet to be ascertained.

Since the two witnesses, then, are evidently the representatives of the intermediate dispensation between the first and second judgments-i. e., of the dispensation which has existed over Christendom since the destruction of Jerusalem-it is a matter of some importance to determine who they are, or what they signify. We are not prepared to solve all the enigmas of their history; but we have a general theory about them, which, to our own mind, is satisfactorily established, and sufficient for the purpose of determining the character of the dispensation which succeeded the apostolic age and is now approaching its end. This theory we will proceed to expound.

In the first place, the two witnesses are declared to be 'the two olive trees and the two candlesticks standing before the God of the earth.' Ver. 4.— This refers us to the 4th chapter of Zechariah, where the prophet records his vision of a candlestick with its lamps, supplied with oil by two olive trees. These,' said the angel, referring to the olive trees, are the two anointed ones that stand by the Lord of the whole earth.' Ver. 14. The two witnesses, then, are the two anointed ones' who stood by the Lord of the earth, in Zechariah's time. From this we infer clearly two things: 1, That the two witnesses were literal persons, and not symbols; for if they were symbols, then the olive trees would be symbols of symbols, and the angel's professed explanation when he said, 'These are the two anointed ones,' &c., would be no explanation at all, but only a transmutation of one set of symbols into another: 2, That the two witnesses were not inhabitants of the visible world, but of some inner mansion; for at the time of the destruction of Jerusalem, when they were to commence their testimony among the Gentiles, they must have been four or five hundred years old, since they existed as the two anointed ones of God at the time of the building of the second temple by Zerubbabel.

By an attentive perusal of Zech. 4, the reader will perceive that the object of the vision was to teach the prophet, that Zerubbabel was sustained in his arduous enterprise of rebuilding the temple, not by his own strength, but by the spirit of the Lord; (see ver. 6 ;) just as the light of a lamp is sustained by the oil in its bowl. And then the view of the seer is carried back into the invisible world, where he is shown the channel through which the spirit of God was ministered to Zerubbabel. The oil poured itself into the lamp from two olive trees. These olive trees were two anointed persons, who stood before the God of the earth, deriving their power from him. The links in the chain of agency by which the temple was being built were, 1, the God of the earth; 2, the two anointed ones who stood before him; and 3, Zerubbabel and the visible laborers.

It appears, then, that in Zechariah's time there were two anointed ones who stood as spiritual mediators between God and the visible Jewish church, and superintended the building of the temple. Who were they? The two principal agents of God under the Jewish dispensation were certainly Moses and Elijah. If the two anointed ones were men, it is to be presumed that they were the two men who had the most agency and took the most interest in the affairs of the Jewish dispensation. Moses was in some sense a spiritual mediator while on earth; (see Numb. 11: 25 ;) and Elijah, five hundred years after his ascension, was revealed spiritually according to the prediction of Malachi, (4: 5,) and the declaration of Christ, (Matt. 11: 14,) in John the Baptist. There is reason therefore to suspect, especially from the last mentioned fact, that Moses and Elijah, after their departure from this world, continued to exercise a spiritual supervision and mediation in relation to the Jewish economy, and were the two anointed ones through whom God endued Zerubbabel with power. And as the two anointed ones of Zechariah and the two witnesses of the Apocalypse are expressly declared to be identical, there is the same reason to suspect that the two witnesses also were Moses and Elijah.

Again, Christ (who evidently spoke through his angel in Rev. 11: 3) called the two anointed ones my two witnesses,' as though John, to whom he spoke, knew that he had two witnesses, and would readily understand to whom he referred. Who then would be likely to occur to John's mind as being the two witnesses of Christ? Most obviously Moses and Elijah, whom John (with Peter and James) had seen with Christ in the cloud of glory on the mount. Matt. 17: 3. The manifest purport of the transfiguration-scene was to show the disciples, among other things, that Moses and Elijah were yet living and acting in the affairs of God's kingdom, and that they were the two prime ministers of Christ-the anointed ones that stood before him as the sovereign of the world. John had seen Christ's two witnesses under circumstances never to be forgotten; and he would readily understand that they were the same as the two anointed ones who gave power to Zerubbabel.

Further, the power which is ascribed to the two witnesses, (ver. 5, 6,) of destroying their enemies by miraculous fire, of shutting up the rain of heaven, - of turning waters into blood, and of smiting the earth with all plagues, is precisely the kind of power which was given peculiarly to Moses and Elijah

while on earth. Moses turned waters into blood, (Ex. 7: 20,) and smote Egypt with all manner of plagues. Elijah destroyed two companies of fifty by miraculous fire, (2 Kings 1: 9, &c.,) and shut heaven so that it rained not for three years and six months. 1Kings 17: 1. We do not undertake to say specifically what manifestation of these powers is announced in the apocalyptical vision under consideration; but we affirm that the language of the annunciation is exactly fitted to suggest the idea that the two witnesses were Moses and Elijah.

The threefold combination of coincidences which we have sketched, convinces us that when Christ said, 'I will give power to my two witnesses, and they shall prophesy [in the outer court] a thousand two hundred and threescore days,' he meant, I will give power to Moses and Elijah, who have been my witnesses and agents in the Jewish dispensation, and they shall continue their official work among the Gentiles for another period of 1260 years.'

We are not prepared to propose any theory in regard to the manner in which it is to be understood that the two witnesses were slain by the beast that ascended out of the bottomless pit, and afterward were raised and taken up to heaven. These are details, the explanation of which requires a fuller knowledge of the nature and transactions of the spiritual world than we at present possess. Nor is the explanation of them necessary to our present purpose. It is sufficient that we can gather from them that after 1260 years, i. e. in 1330, the two witnesses finished their testimony among the Gentiles, by a transaction resembling the sacrifice of their master, and have since triumphed over their enemies, and prepared the way of the last judgment.

What we wish to bring distinctly to view as the result of our theory, is, that the dispensation which commenced from the destruction of Jerusalem, was not properly speaking the Christian dispensation, i. e. a continuation of the dispensation introduced by Christ and his apostles, but a second edition of the Jewish dispensation, or a continuation of the dispensation committed to Moses and Elijah. The spiritual life of what has been called the Christian church since the apostolic age has been not a revelation of Christ himself, but of the two witnesses who went before him. John the Baptist was a manifestation of Elijah; so that it was in fact Elijah that was sent as 'a voice in the wilderness to prepare the way of the Lord.' This was his office, and the same was the office of Moses, and of the whole Jewish dispensation. All that is said of the inferiority of John the Baptist to Christ, may properly be taken as an index of the inferiority of the two witnesses to their Master, and of their entire dispensation, to the Christian.

The witnesses were two, because the preparatory dispensation was twofold, legal and prophetic. Moses was the representative of the law. Elijah was the representative of the prophetic spirit, which was intermediate between the law and the gospel, resting in the former, but looking forward to the latter. Christ was the representative of the gospel. As Moses and Elijah are called Christ's two witnesses, so Paul says with a remarkable coincidence of language that the gospel was witnessed by the law and the prophets.' Rom. 3: The dispensation which succeeded the apostolic age, has plainly borne the marks of its secondary origin. We can readily trace in it the footsteps

21.

of the two witnesses, but not of Christ. It has dealt largely in the righteousness of the law, and it has nourished within itself the hopes of the prophets. But the righteousness of God revealed by the gospel, has been wanting. As Christ said the prophets and the law prophesied until John,' so we may now say, with the Apocalypse for our voucher, that, with the exception of the brief parenthesis of the primitive church, the prophets and the law prophesied at least till A. D. 1330.

$50. THE FIRST RESURRECTION.

THE nature, subjects and period of the 'FIRST RESURRECTION,' described by John in Rev. 20, may be determined with entire certainty by the following process.

I. We compare 1 Cor. 15: 51, 52, and 1 Thess. 4: 16, 17, with Matt. 24: 29-34.

1 COR. AND 1 THESS. "We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed. In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed."

MATT. 24: 29-34.

"Immediately after the tribulation of those days [A. D. 70] shall the sun be darkened; and then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven; and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn; and they shall see the Son of "The Lord himself shall descend from man coming in the clouds of heaven, heaven with a shout, with the voice of with power and great glory. And he the archangel and with the trump of shall send his angels with a great sound God and the dead in Christ shall rise of a trumpet, and they shall gather tofirst then we which are alive and re. gether his elect from the four winds,-main, shall be caught up together with from one end of heaven to the other. them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in... Verily I say unto you, this genethe air and so shall we ever be with ration shall not pass till all these things the Lord." be fulfilled."

The parallelism of these passages is manifest in the following particulars. 1. Both columns announce the second advent of Christ. 2. Both predict the sounding of the angelic trumpet. 3. Both make that sounding the sig nal of the gathering of the saints. In Matthew the gathering is simply announced, without explanation of its nature. In the passages from 1 Corinthians and 1 Thessalonians the gathering is described as a resurrection of the dead, a change of the living from mortality to immortality, and a translation of all to the immediate presence of Christ. 4. Both columns set the time of this great transaction very near to the period of Christ's personal ministry. In the first, language is used which plainly indicates that Paul expected that he and others cotemporary with him would be alive at the time of the second advent; and in the second, it is expressly affirmed that Christ would come

and gather his elect immediately after the destruction of Jerusalem, within the lifetime of the generation then present. On the whole, there can be no doubt that both refer to the same events. Of course it is demonstrated that Matt. 24: 31 announces a literal resurrection-a gathering of the saints, liv ing and dead, from Hades and Mortality.

II. We compare Matt. 24: 29-31, with Rev. 6 and 7.

the powers of the heavens shall be sha-and said to the mountains and rocks,

ken. Then shall appear the sign of

the Son of man in heaven; and then

shall all the tribes of the earth mourn.

And they shall see the Son of man com

Fall on us, and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb; for the great day of his wrath is come; and who shall be able to stand? And after these things I saw four angels . . . holding the four winds, . . . and I saw another angel having the seal of the living God, and he cried with a loud voice, . . saying, . Hurt not the earth... till we have sealed the servants of our God in their foreheads. . . . And there were sealed an hundred and forty and four thousand of all the tribes of Israel; of the tribe of Juda twelve thousand; of the tribe of Reuben twelve thousand, &c. And lo a great multitude. . of all nations . . four winds, from one end of heaven to stood before the throne and before the

ing in the clouds of heaven, with power

and great glory. And he shall send his

angels with a great sound of a trumpet,

and they shall gather his elect from the

the other."

Lamb, clothed with white robes. . . They shall hunger no more, neither thirst any more," &c.

The general identity of these passages is too evident to need much comment. In the last paragraphs of the parallel, the following points of unity may be noticed. 1. Both passages announce a gathering of the saints to Christ. 2. Both represent it as a gathering from the four winds. 3. Both ascribe the gathering to the instrumentality of angels. 4. As we have proved that the first announces in general language, a literal resurrection, so in the second we find a variety of terms that plainly point to the same fact: e. g., the saints are sealed with the seal of the living God;' they are clothed with white robes; they have come up out of great tribulation;' they stand before God; they are beyond the reach of hunger and thirst.