Revelation 2:7

A stringent demand for attention (πίστις, ὦτα ψυχῆς : Clem. Alex.) to the utterances of prophets who were inspired by the Spirit (of prophecy, cf. on Revelation 19:10). These as usual are ejaculatory, positive and brief ἐκκλ. scattered local communities, and not a Catholic organisation, being the conception of the Apocalypse, it is for use in their public worship that this book is written (Revelation 1:3). It is a subordinate and literary question whether the seer means in such phrases as this to designate himself (Weinel, 84 f.) liturgically as the speaker, or whether (as the synoptic parallels suggest) they form an integral part of the whole menage. In any case the prophet represents himself simply as the medium for receiving and recording (cf. Revelation 1:19) these oracles of the Spirit (cf. Revelation 14:13; Revelation 19:9, Revelation 20:17). Unlike other writers such as Paul and the authors of Hebrew and 1 John, he occupies a passive rôle, throwing his personal rebuke and counsels into the form Thus saith the Spirit : but this really denotes the confidence felt by the prophet in his own inspiration and authority. The Spirit here, though less definitely than in Hermas, is identified with Jesus speaking through his prophets: it represents sudden counsels and semi-oracular utterances (cf. on Revelation 1:10), not a continuous power in the normal moral life of the saints in general. The seven promises denote security of immortal life (positively as here and Revelation 2:28 or negatively as Revelation 2:11), privilege (personal, Revelation 2:17, or official, Revelation 2:27), honour (Revelation 3:5; Revelation 3:21), or increased intimacy (Revelation 3:12). As usual, (cf. 1 Corinthians 2:9 f.), the higher Christian γνῶσις is connected with eschatology.

Observe the singling out for encouragement and praise of each soldier in the host of the loyal. The effect resembles that produced by Pericles in his panegyric over the Athenians who had fallen in the Peloponnesian war: “together they gave up their lives, yet individually they won this deathless praise” (Thuc. ii. 43, 2). νικῶν (a quasi-perfect), in Herm. Mand. Revelation 12:2; Revelation 12:4 f., Revelation 5:2; Revelation 5:4; Revelation 6:2; Revelation 6:4 (over sin and devil), might have its usual Johannine sense, the struggle being obedience in face of the seductions and hardships which beset people aiming to keep the divine commandments (cf. on John 16:33). For a special application of the term, see Revelation 15:2. But behind the general usage lies the combination of “to be pure or just” and “to conquer or triumph” in the Hebrew ṣédeḳ and the Syriac zedhâ. Furthermore, νικῶν throughout is equivalent to the Egyptian eschatological term “victorious,” applied to those who passed successfully through life's temptations and the judgment after death. Its generic sense is illustrated by 4 Ezra 7 :[128]: “here is the intent of the battle to be fought by man born upon earth: if he be overcome, he shall suffer as thou hast said; but if he conquer, he shall receive the thing of which I speak” (i.e., paradise and its glories). The Essenes according to Josephus (Ant. xviii. 1, 5), held the soul was immortal, περιμάχητον ἡγούμενοι τοῦ δικαίου τὴν πρόσοδον eternal life the reward of an untiring, unsoiled fight against evil. The imagery of the metaphor is drawn from Jewish eschatology which anticipated the reversal of the doom incurred in Eden; cf. Test. Levi, 18, καὶ δώσει τοῖς ἁγίοις φαγεῖν ἐκ τοῦ ξύλου τῆς ζωῆς, also En. xxiv. 1 11, 25., xxxi. 1 3, etc., and (for Egyptian ideas) below on Revelation 3:21. The garden-park of God (π. = a garden with fruit-trees, Wilcken's Griech. Ostraka, i. 157) is one of the intermediate abodes, possibly (as in Slav. En. viii. 1, and Paul) the third heaven where the favoured saints live after death in seclusion and bliss, So Iren. ver 5. 1 (abode of translated) and ver 36, 1 2, where heaven is for the Christians of the hundredfold fruit, paradise for the sixty-fold, and the heavenly city for the thirty-fold (a very ancient Christian tradition). The tree of life blooms in most of the apocalypses (cf. on Revelation 22:2). Philo had already allegorised it into θεοσέβεια ὁ τῆς τελείας ἀρετῆς χαρακτήρ. But the allusion corresponds to the general eschatological principle (borrowed from Babylonia, where cosmological myths passed into eschatological) that the end was to be a transcendently fine renovation of the original state (Barn. vi. 8). μου a deliberate addition to the O.T. phrase; Christ's relation to God guarantees his promise of such a privilege (Revelation 3:12). God's gift (Romans 6:23) is Christ's gift. He is no fair promiser like Antigonus II., whom men dubbed δώσων for his large and unfulfilled undertakings (Plut. Coriol. xi.).