Chapter XXXVI.—ST. JOHN'S WRITINGS.
After the terrible event which has just been related, the Jews who still remained in the land, ceased for a time to oppose the Romans. It was the submission of despair; for they felt that they had no power to resist, and ruin and desolation surrounded them on all sides. The once flourishing fields and plains of Judæa were covered with dead bodies; most of the celebrated cities were merely heaps of ruins. All the fighting men were removed from Jerusalem, and only some women and old men were allowed to take up their abode amongst the ruins of their beloved city.
The Emperor only allowed the Jews to observe the forms of their own religion, on condition of their paying to the Temple of Jupiter Capitolinus, one of the heathen deities, the tax hitherto paid by every Jew for the service of the Temple, or House of the Lord. Ever since Judæa had been made a Roman province, the Jews had been allowed to collect their own taxes: the annual tribute to the temple they looked upon as an offering to God, Whose subjects they were. The Emperor now, in their opinion, usurped the place of God; and this was a great affliction to the Jews; whilst the use to which the tax was to be put, and the severity exercised in collecting it, made these unhappy people feel it to be an intolerable disgrace and burden.
Vespasian died nine years after the destruction of Jerusalem, a.d. 79, and his son Titus became Emperor. Titus reigned for only two years, and was succeeded by his brother Domitian, a.d. 81.
We have reason to believe that only one of the Apostles was alive when Titus took Jerusalem: this was St. John, the disciple "whom Jesus loved." As the Bible tells us nothing concerning this holy man, during the time that St. Paul was journeying about, we cannot be sure as to what he was doing; but he is supposed to have remained in his native land, and probably in Jerusalem itself, till he saw the city compassed by foreign soldiers, and beheld the other signs of its approaching ruin, as foretold by his Divine Master. Then it is believed, that St. John travelled through Parthia, India, and Arabia; and also founded Churches at Smyrna, Pergamos, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, Laodicia, and other places in Asia Minor; after which, he passed some time at Ephesus. There is a story that he afterwards went to Rome, and was, by the order of Domitian, who persecuted the Christians most cruelly, thrown into a large vessel of boiling oil. But instead of dying in tortures, as was expected, the Lord preserved him, and he came out unhurt. We may well believe this story, though we cannot be quite sure that it is true. After this, Domitian banished the Apostle, now a very old man, to the island of Patmos, in the southern part of the Archipelago. At Patmos, the Lord sent St. John a most wonderful vision; and his account of it forms part of the New Testament, where it is called "The Revelation of St. John the Divine": it is also called the "Apocalypse." "Revelation" means some hidden secret thing made known. "Apocalypse" comes from a Greek word, meaning the same as Revelation.
The Apocalypse is a book of prophecies, revealing and foretelling in mysterious language, events which are to happen even to the end of the world. It is of course very difficult to understand any of the prophecies in this book, and quite impossible to do so perfectly; but like every other part of Scripture, it teaches men to be holy. In the first chapter of this book, St. John tells us himself, that this Revelation was made known to him in the isle of Patmos, to which he had been banished on account of his religion.
Domitian persecuted the Jews as well as the Christians; and great numbers of both were put to death by this tyrannical and wicked Emperor, who proposed to destroy all the descendants of David, lest any one of them should attempt to become king of Judæa. Some grandsons of the Apostle Jude, or Thaddeus, who was of the family of David, were brought before the Emperor; but on being asked concerning the kingdom of Christ, they declared that it was a spiritual, not a temporal kingdom; and as they were very poor, and could only by the hardest labour contrive to support themselves, and pay the tax demanded by the Romans, he spared them, as persons who were not to be feared. Some of the Jews, who had retired to Alexandria, had endeavoured to get up a disturbance there; but the Jews, who had long lived quietly in that city, fearful of the consequence of any revolt, gave up their seditious countrymen to the Romans, who put them to death: they were obstinate to the last, and even their children suffered the greatest tortures, rather than acknowledge the Roman Emperor to be their master. Such conduct, however mistaken it may have been, sets a good example to Christians in every age. These Jews believed that to submit to the Roman Emperor was contrary to their duty to God; and therefore they bore any sufferings rather than do it. Let us ever be ready and willing to suffer, rather than do anything which we believe to be contrary to our duty to God.
The Emperor Domitian, displeased with what had happened in Alexandria, ordered the temple which had been built in that city to be shut up; lest, under pretence of public worship, the Jews of that place should meet there and plot rebellion.
Domitian died a.d. 96, and was succeeded by Nerva, who immediately set St. John at liberty: the Apostle at once left Patmos, and went into Asia Minor, where he wrote the account of the wonderful Vision or Revelation made to him in that island. Very soon afterwards, St. John wrote the three Epistles called by his name.