6 Cicero de Nat. Deorum, lib. ii. cap. 46. Also Ovid, Minucius Felix, Seneca, and other authorities, as quoted by Rosenmuller on 2 Peter iii. 7.
examined the subject with candid independence holds it as an exegetical axiom that the Apocalypse is neither a pure prophecy, blazing full illumination from Patmos along the track of the coming centuries, nor an exhaustive vision of the experience of the faithful Christian disciple. We are thus brought to the third and, as we think, the correct mode of considering this remarkable work. It is an outburst from the commingled and seething mass of opinions, persecutions, hopes, general experience, and expectation of the time when it was written. This is the view which would naturally arise in the mind of an impartial student from the nature of the case, and from contemplating the fervid faith, suffering, lowering elements, and thick coming events of the apostolic age. It also strikingly corresponds with numerous express statements and with the whole obvious spirit and plan of the work; for its descriptions and appeals have the vivid colors, the thrilling tones, the significantly detailed allusions to experiences and opinions and anticipations notoriously existing at the time, which belong to present or immediately impending scenes. This way of considering the Apocalypse likewise enables one who is acquainted with the early Jewish Christian doctrines, legends, and hopes, to explain clearly a large number of passages in it whose obscurity has puzzled many a commentator. We should be glad to give various illustrations of this, if our limits did not confine us strictly to the one class of texts belonging to the doctrine of a future life. Furthermore, nearly all the most gifted critics, such as Ewald, Bleek, Lucke, De Wette, those whose words on such matters as these are weightiest, now agree in concluding that the Revelation of John was a product springing out of the intense Jewish Christian belief and experience of the age, and referring, in its dramatic scenery and predictions, to occurrences supposed to be then transpiring or very close at hand. Finally, this view in regard to the Apocalypse is strongly confirmed by a comparison of that production with the several other works similar to it in character and nearly contemporaneous in origin. These apocryphal productions were written or compiled according to the pretty general agreement of the great scholars who have criticized them somewhere between the beginning of the first century before, and the middle of the second century after, Christ. We merely propose here, in the briefest manner, to indicate the doctrine of a future life contained in them, as an introduction to an exposition of that contained in the New Testament Apocalypse.
In the TESTAMENT OF THE TWELVE PATRIARCHS it is written that "the under world shall be spoiled through the death of the Most Exalted."7 Again, we read, "The Lord shall make battle against the devil, and conquer him, and rescue from him the captive souls of the righteous. The just shall rejoice in Jerusalem, where the Lord shall reign himself, and every one that believes in him shall reign in truth in the heavens."8 Farther on the writer says of the Lord, after giving an account of his crucifixion, "He shall rise up from the under world and ascend into heaven."9 These extracts seem to imply the common doctrine of that time, that Christ descended into the under world, freed the captive saints, and rose into heaven, and would soon return to establish his throne in Jerusalem, to reign there for a time with his accepted followers.
7 See this book in Fabricii Codex Pseudepigraphus Veteris Testamenti, Test. Lev. sect. iv.
8 Ibid. Test. Dan. sect. v.
9 Ibid. Test. Benj. sect. ix.
The FOURTH BOOK OF EZRA contains scattered declarations and hints of the same nature.10 It describes a vision of the Messiah, on Mount Zion, distributing crowns to those confessors of his name who had died in their fidelity.11 The world is said to be full of sorrows and oppressions; and as the souls of the just ask when the harvest shall come,12 for the good to be rewarded and the wicked to be punished, they are told that the day of liberation is not far distant, though terrible trials and scourges must yet precede it. "My Son Jesus shall be revealed." "My Son the Christ shall die; and then a new age shall come, the earth shall give up the dead, sinners shall be plunged into the bottomless abyss, and Paradise shall appear in all its glory."13 The "Son of God will come and consume his enemies with fire; but the elect will be protected and made happy."14
The ASCENSION OF ISAIAH is principally occupied with an account of the rapture of the soul of that prophet through the seven heavens, and of what he there saw and learned. It describes the descent of Christ, the beloved Son of God, through all the heavens, to the earth; his death; his resurrection after three days; his victory over Satan and his angels, who dwell in the welkin or higher region of the air; and his return to the right hand of God.15 It predicts great apostasy and sin among the disciples of the apostles, and much dissension respecting the nearness of the second advent of Christ.16 It emphatically declares that "Christ shall come with his angels, and shall drag Satan and his powers into Gehenna. Then all the saints shall descend from heaven in their heavenly clothing, and dwell in this world; while the saints who had not died shall be similarly clothed, and after a time leave their bodies here, that they may assume their station in heaven. The general resurrection and judgment will follow, when the ungodly will be devoured by fire."17 The author as Gesenius, with almost all the rest of the critics, says was unquestionably a Jewish Christian, and his principal design was to set forth the speedy second coming of Christ, and the glorious triumph of the saints that would follow with the condign punishment of the wicked.
The first book of the SIBYLLINE ORACLES contains a statement that in the golden age the souls of all men passed peacefully into the under world, to tarry there until the judgment; a prediction of a future Messiah; and an account of his death, resurrection, and ascension. The second book begins with a description of the horrors that will precede the last time, threats against the persecuting tyrants, and promises to the faithful, especially to the martyrs, and closes with an account of the general judgment, when Elijah shall come from heaven, consuming flames break out, all souls be summoned to the tribunal of God at whose right hand Christ will sit, the bodies of the dead be raised, the righteous be purified, and the wicked be plunged into final ruin.
The fundamental thought and aim of the apocryphal BOOK OF ENOCH are the second coming of Christ to judge the world, the encouragement of the Christians, and the warning