That ye may be tried.—“Those who have read the history of this period can understand the depths of these words.”—Z. '16-346; Jas. 1:2, 3; 1 Pet. 1:6, 7.
And ye shall have tribulation ten days.—“The ten symbolic days refer to the last and most severe persecution under the Roman Emperors—that of the reign of Diocletian, A. D. 303-313.” (Z. '16-346.) “This persecution continued from February 23, A. D. 303, to June 13, A. D. 313. It began in Nicomedia, and became universal. Some were impaled alive; some had their limbs broken, and were left to expire. Some were roasted by slow fires; some suspended by their feet with their heads downward, and, a fire being placed under them, were suffocated by the smoke. Some had melted lead poured down their throats; the flesh of some was torn off with fingers and toes. Houses filled with Christians were set on fire. Numbers of Christians were tied together and thrown into the sea. Seventeen thousand were slain in one month; and during the continuance of this persecution in Egypt alone 144,000 Christians died by violence, besides 700,000 that died through the fatigues of banishment or the public works to which they were condemned. Coins were struck, and inscriptions set up recording the fact that Christian superstition was now utterly exterminated.”—McC.
Be thou faithful unto death.—“It is required of all consecrators that they shall ‘die daily,’ and that the end, with us as with our Lord and Head, shall be literal death. As it is written: ‘I have said, Ye are gods [elohim—mighty ones], all of you sons of the Highest; yet ye shall die like men, ye shall fall like one of the princes’—not like Prince Adam, convicts; but like Prince Jesus, participators in His death. (Psa. 82:6, 7.)”—F. 444.
And I will give thee a Crown of Life.—“The Apostle James speaks of the same crown and calls it the Crown of Life. (Jas. 1:12.) The Apostle Peter speaking of the same calls it the Crown of Glory. (1 Pet. 5:4.) The thought at the bottom of each of these expressions is the same; namely, the custom in olden times of running races and the giving of a crown to the successful runner at the end of the course. Our reward will be the Crown of Life in the sense that we shall get life on the highest plane, inherent life, immortality. It will be a Crown of Righteousness in the sense that only those who are approved of God as righteous will thus be rewarded and glorified—the righteousness of the Lord fulfilled in us who walk not after the flesh, but after the spirit.”—Z. '03-190; Rev. 3:11; 2 Tim. 2:15; Isa. 62:3; Phil. 3:14.
2:11 He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches; he that overcometh.—The overcomer of this Gospel Age only.
Shall not be hurt of the Second Death.—His victory is eternal.
2:12. And [to] BY the angel.—The messenger whose testimony was of special value to the Church while the Papacy was rising into power was Arius. He “maintained that the Son of God was totally and essentially distinct from the Father; that He was the first and noblest of those beings whom God had created—the instrument by whose subordinate operation He formed the Universe; and therefore inferior to the Father both in nature and dignity.” (Buck.) “The controversy spread like a flame throughout the empire. Accordingly the first ecumenical council was held at Nice, A. D. 325, consisting of 318 bishops, most of whom were from the East. The gist of the question to be settled by the Council of Nice lay in the argument of Arius: ‘The Father is a father; the Son is a son; therefore the Father must have existed before the Son; therefore once the Son was not; therefore He was made, like all creatures, of a substance that had not previously existed.’ The creed, as finally adopted, condemned the heresy of Arius and fixed the doctrine as it has been held in the church to this day. Of all the bishops only Thomas of Marmarica, and Secundus of Ptolemais, held out against the threat of banishment by the Emperor. Arius was excommunicated and banished, and his books burnt.”—McC.
“From the time the Nicene Creed was promulgated and accepted, A. D. 325, there was practically no more Bible study for over twelve centuries. During all that time Bible study was considered unnecessary, because the Apostolic Bishops had formulated the creeds as proper statements of the Church's faith. To study the Bible would have meant the studying of how to fight against the Emperor and the bishops.” (Z. '15-253.) “As a result of the failure of these bishops to stand by the Word of the Lord, God's people for centuries have been confessing a Divine trinity, which is incomprehensible; and meantime been neglecting the trinity taught by the Bible, which is more reasonable. If the trinity of the creeds was questioned, hands were lifted in horror, and the questioner was told that the subject was a mystery, which he could not possibly understand, but to doubt which would mean his damnation! The mysterious proposition was sometimes stated to be 3 × 1 is 1; but others stated [pg 031] it differently, 1 × 3 is 1. No wonder if some of the more intelligent specimens of our race declared themselves incapable of understanding such mathematics, and too honest to confess and profess what they could not believe!” (B. S. M.) The witness of Arius created a profound impression. “The doctrine was carried, in the fifth century, into Africa, under the Vandals; and into Asia, under the Goths. But it sunk almost at once, when the Vandals were driven out of Africa, and the Goths out of Italy, by the arms of Justinian. However, it revived again in Italy, under the protection of the Lombards, in the seventh century, and was not extinguished till about the end of the eighth. Arianism was revived in the West by Servetus, in 1531, for which he suffered death.”—Buck.
Of the church in Pergamos.—From Purgos, a tower or citadel. “The name was originally given to a remarkable hill, presenting a conical appearance when viewed from the plain, and strongly fortified by nature and art.” (S. B. D.) Concerning the literal city of Pergamos, of which the rising Papacy was the antitype, we read, “The sumptuousness of the princes raised Pergamos to the rank of the first city of Asia as regards splendor. It was a sort of union of a pagan cathedral city, a university town, and a royal residence, embellished during a succession of years by kings who all had a passion for expenditure and ample means of gratifying it.”—McC.
From the witness by Arius in 325 to the witness by the next special messenger of the Church was the long period of 835 years; and during all that time the Papacy was slowly rising, pushing itself higher and higher. “The first ecumenical council of Nice (325), in its sixth canon, makes only an incidental mention of the Roman bishop. The first pope, in the real sense, was Leo I (440-461). The bishops of the African and the Spanish churches submitted to his demands, and he gained an important foothold even in the East. In Gaul, however, he met with a most determined resistance. Gregory I (590-604) saw that the bishops of Rome could not enjoy the ecclesiastical supremacy at which they aimed until they threw off their political dependency. The triumph of the Catholic Church over Arianism in Spain greatly promoted his plans; but he did not as yet actually possess the power of the mediaeval popes. In the seventh and eighth centuries a series of important events gave the popes a high and influential position among the secular governments of the world. The actual power was, however, for several centuries, not commensurate with their claims and aspirations. In 1073, Hildebrand (Gregory VII), after being for [pg 032] about twenty-five years the guide of the Papal policy, boldly set forth the theory of a theocratic rule of the pope over all the nations of the world. The period from Gregory VII onward is an almost continuous conflict between the popes and the secular governments, during which the former, with an iron firmness, endeavored at first to destroy the direct influence of the princes upon the church, and secondly, to subject all secular governments to the church. This conflict was ended by the Concordat of Worms (1122), by which Emperor Henry V, after the precedence of the governments of England and France, surrendered ‘to God, to St. Peter and Paul, and to the Catholic Church, all right of investiture.’ ” (McC.) The Pergamos (“earthly elevation”) era ended in A. D. 1160, as will be shown.