345
A more weighty argument is, that the conjecture xctimp takes away much from the sentiment : for the wonder of them that dwell on the earth is excited not so much by that, that the beast was and is not , as by this, that the beast ‘Trapearat, will be present . Enough of criticism : hut not however to no purpose. The passage is momen- tous. That tetragrammaton, mm, lord, has a magnificent peri- phrasis, o ujv 7tai o rtv xa /' o spyofisvog, who is, and who ivas, and who is to come. But the dwellers on the earth wonder at the beast, as though a kind of antitetragrammaton ; for he was , and is not , and will be present. The Lord is described as o epyo/tevog, coming : the beast napUrai, will be present , when that other king comes , ver. 10 ; and that v apovria, (comp, altogether 2 Thess. ii.) is by far the most destructive. To the Hebrew word, NO, both tpyo^ca and Kupuiu correspond in the LXX. ; and in this place, xa! '7rapeGrcci most appro- priately accords with ?jv xai ovx g an, and it conveys a meaning some- thing less, than if it were said, xai spysrai, or xai serai.
9. "Opr) — (3affiX s7g, mountains — kings) The seven mountains of Borne were formerly defended and adorned with seven citadels. Pacatus in Paneg. : “ These things thou didst survey, O Borne, from thy hills ; and, elevated with seven citadels, thou wast lifted up to a greater height through joy ch. 46. “ These hills,” says
Gr. Fabricius, in ch. 3 of his Borne, “Virgil in his Georgies, and Ausonius in his Epithalamium, on account of the royal dwellings which were at one time situated on them, called the seven Cita- dels.” Those seven mountains were the Palatine, the Capitoline, the Ccelian, the Esguiline, the Viminal, the Quirinal , and the Aventine. But the prophecy regards the seven mountains according to the time of the beast, in which the Palatine is deserted, and the Vatican flourishes. The others are the same as they were of old. Nor indeed have the seven heads of the beast a double signification, — the one of the mountains separately, in a confused manner ; the other of the kings separately, in a distinct manner : but they have one signi- fication only, in such a way, however, that the thing signified is something compound, consisting of a mountain and a king. Some seek for the seven mountains at Jerusalem ; but, as Wolf forcibly teaches, they do not make out their point. See Isa. x. 32. But grant that there were formerly seven mountains there ; there were never seven kings there also, much less were seven mountains joined with seven kings individually : the city itself was destroyed before John wrote; Jerusalem is never called Babylon, even when it is most blamed ; and the order of the prophecy thrusts Babylon into
846