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drought, but also shows His majesty in heaven , by taking up the two witnesses into heaven .
14. 'H oval 7i ds urspoiy the second woe) This, according to D. Lange, designates the period of the rage of antichrist , consisting of 42 months. Comm. Ap. f. 221. But the four angels in the Euphrates plainly brought on the second woe. See Erkl. Offenb. p. 73, etc.
J15. 'O efidopog, the seventh ) The principal trumpet is that of the seventh angel. This closely approached the very times of the apostles : but it was about to have a long continuance. The near approach of the events, which were about to follow in it, were often viewed by the apostles separately, and held forth by them to the view of the faithful : but in consequence of the length of the inter- val, scoffers denied the end itself, in which the course- of the events was about to issue ; while the faithful did not fully comprehend the long continuance of the interval. Each class furnished the apostles with a reason for explaining the mystery more fully : 2 Pet. iii. 2 ; 2 Thess. ii.
Whether Gabriel is the angel here meant, we propose in the German Exegesis as a subject of consideration for the reader. And the very name agrees ; for is God , and “QJ a man ,
strong . Therefore that name exhibits the sum of the message to Mary, Luke i. 31, 35 ; and here of the commencement of the trumpet in heaven : for, ch. xii. 5, there is born u/og appriv ; that is, TDJ ta, Isa. ix. 5. I give no definition ; I make no conjecture ; I only inquire. But that which follows I affirm : This trumpet is the most important of all, which both of itself has here a most joyful meaning, and renders joyful all the trumpets of the former angels, but only to the inhabitants of heaven. Wherefore they are not to be heard, who here prefer to nterpret sorrowful trumpets , used by the Jews in excommunication, rather than festive trumpets. The injury arising from the abuse of Jewish antiquities, in the explana- tion of the New Testament, and especially of the Apocalypse, is greater than the advantage arising from the use of the same. Truth is learned from the very clearness of the text, containing its own aurdpxeiav (self-dependent completeness) ; the abuse introduces errors. We see other examples on ch. xiii. 18 (Annot. ii. § 2), and on ch. xiv. 20, xvii. 9, note 1. It would be better not to have recourse to the books of the Jews, if no better reward for the labour could be
1 7) ovoti i) rpi'rYi, the third woe ) This is predicted finally, ch. xii. 12 : then ch. xiii. and xiv. it actually follows. — V. g.
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