In this " book of life " God has the record of our tears. There He may read the story of our private lamentings, our shame, our sorrow, our prayers, our cries, our protests against ourselves, our final humility of soul. And it is the message and gospel of this Scripture that those very things which, for the most part, the world could not see, those things which seemed to ourselves to stop short and to avail nothing, shall be known at the last to
1 D. G. Rossetti.
286 THE OPENING OF THE BOOKS
have been the precious and decisive things, the interceding things, the things which in the sight of God have the saving power, for they are bound up with the eternal intercession of Christ's Passion, and for Christ's sake are accounted for righteousness.
^ The best account of the ideas associated with the Book of Life will be found in an article under that title in the second volume of the Encyclopcedia of Religion and Ethics. In that article Dr. Alfred Jeremias of Leipzig shows that the idea of heavenly books is present in the religion of Babylonia, Egypt, Persia, India, China, and Islam. In the mythology of Babylon, reference is often made to the " tables of destiny," which probably refer to two heavenly tablets, on one of which were written the commands of the gods, on the other the records of the life of men. The idea of a reckoning kept in heaven of men's deeds frequently occurs in the Apocryphal literature. The suggestion of such a reckoning may have come from the roll or register of citizens, such as the register of the citizens of Jerusalem referred to in Is. iv. 3. Such a roll God Himself keeps of the names of His own people. Moses refers to it when he says, " And if not, blot me, I pray thee, out of thy book which thou hast written " (Exod. xxxii. 32). In Ps. Ixxix. 28 it is called the " book of life." In Rev. xiii. 8 it becomes the Lamb's book of life.
It is as the Lamb's book of life that it is referred to in our text. The book contains the names of those who have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. After all the books on which the works of men have been recorded are opened, the Book of Life is opened. Upon the record of the other books, what can a man hope for but condemnation ? But those whose names are found in the Book of Life have been pur- chased unto God through the precious blood of the Lamb. There is therefore now no condemnation to them.^
2. The original record is written, but it is not permanent ; the story is complete, but it is not ineradicable. The writing may be blotted out; the page may be recovered. The story which is spoilt may be written over again. " What I have written I have written," said the obstinate procurator: and many a man has been inclined to take up his words and to repeat them with a meaning which they would not bear as they came from the lips of that astute Roman. " Done is done," we hear men say, " and it can never be undone." There is a sense, of course, in which they
* Expository Times, xxi. 210.
REVELATION xx. 12 287
are right ; there is another and deeper sense in which they are most certainly wrong. Done is not done in the sense that all the consequences to which we, by our sin, have exposed ourselves must inevitably come upon us. Mercy has intervened in order to prevent that. God has given His best that the deepest and darkest penalties to which sin has exposed us may not come upon us. Through His gift its consequences may be diverted, and the sin itself may be put away.
1[ You know the incident in the life of Martin Luther, how the poor monk in his cell was visited in his night visions by the Arch-enemy of souls. The Tempter brought him great rolls which he bade him read, and he saw in his dream that those con- tained the record of his own life, and that they were written with his own hand. And the Tempter said to him, " Is that true ? Did you write it ? " and the poor stricken monk had to confess it was all true, and scroll after scroll was unrolled and the same confession was perforce wrung from him. And then the evil one prepared to take his departure, having reduced the poor monk to abject misery ; but at that moment there came to him as in a flash another vision, and he turned to the Tempter and said, " It is true, every word of it. But write across it all : * The blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin.' " ^
Almightie Judge, how shall poore wretches brook
Thy dreadfuU look, Able a heart of iron to appall.
When thou shalt call For ev'ry man's peculiar book?
What others mean to do, I know not well ;
Yet I heare tell, That some will turn thee to some leaves therein
So void of sinne. That they in merit shall excelL