Revelation 2:17

Revelation 2:17. The promise contained in this verse has always occasioned much difficulty to interpreters. It consists of three parts: (1) To him that overcometh, to him will I give of the hidden manna. The allusion may perhaps be to the pot of manna which was laid up in the innermost sanctuary of the Tabernacle (Exodus 16:33), for we see from chap. Revelation 11:19 that the imagery of the ark within which the manna was stored was familiar to St. John. Such an allusion, however, is at the best indirect, for the manna laid up in the ark was not for food, but in memory of food once enjoyed. It seems better, therefore, to place the emphasis on the thought of the manna itself, that bread from heaven by which Israel was nourished in the wilderness, and which is now replaced in the Christian Church by ‘the bread which cometh down out of heaven, that any one may eat thereof, and not die' (John 6:50). This ‘living bread' is the Lord Jesus Christ Himself, who is now ‘hidden,' but will at length be revealed to the perfect satisfaction and joy of them that wait for Him. It is no valid objection to this view that Christ gives the manna, for He gives Himself, and will give Himself to be the nourishment as well as the reward of His people in the world to come, when He shall be revealed to them as He is (1 John 3:2). The contrast between not eating the meats offered to idols and eating this heavenly banquet may be noticed in passing. (2) And I will give him a white stone. The tendency of the Apocalypse to group its particulars into threes seems to require the separation of this clause from the next following, and to demand that it be considered in itself, and not as simply subordinate to the ‘new name.' In determining the meaning of the ‘white stone,' it will be well to bear in mind that in the Apocalypse ‘white' is not a mere dull white, but a glistering colour, not even necessarily while, and that we must seek for the foundation of the figure in Jewish not in Gentile customs, and in Scripture rather than in rabbinical traditions. We shall thus have to dismiss the idea that it refers to the white pebble of the ballot-box, or to any one of the three following tablets, that given to the victor in the games and having certain privileges attached to it, that which entitled the receiver to the liberal hospitality of the giver, or that which admitted the stranger to the enjoyment of the idol feast. Rejecting these, we may also reject the supposition that the white stone has no more importance than as a medium for the name written on it. Nor does it seem easy to accept the explanation, although more legitimate than any of the above, that it was the Urim which the high priest bore within the breastplate of judgment (Exodus 28:30); for the stone thus referred to was probably a diamond, and we cannot easily conceive that the name here spoken of could be inscribed on such a stone.

In these circumstances, what appears by much the more likely interpretation is that which supposes that we have an allusion to the plate of gold worn on the forehead of the high priest, with the words inscribed on it, Holiness to the Lord. What seems almost condusive upon this point is, that we learn from other passages of this book that it was upon the forehead that the peculiar mark of the child of God was borne (Revelation 3:12; Revelation 7:3; Revelation 14:1; Revelation 22:4; cp. also chap. Revelation 9:4); and we have already had occasion to speak of the importance of that law of interpretation which, in the Apocalypse, leads to the Winging of different passages together for the sake of complementing and completing one another. In adopting this view, however, it ought to be observed that we are not to think of this ‘stone' either as a plate of gold or as a precious stone, supposed by the Seer to be beaten out for the sake of receiving the inscription. Except in the present passage, the word occurs only once in the New Testament, when St. Paul says, ‘I gave my vo te against them' (Acts 26:10). It thus came to denote (derived, it may be, originally from the customs of heathenism) that by which a verdict of either condemnation or acquittal was pronounced, even by Jewish lips. Here, therefore, this underlying idea of acquittal is the prominent idea of the word. Those referred to receive a stone, an ordinary stone of acquittal, but glistering with heavenly brightness, and bearing upon it the motto or legend spoken of in the next clause. (3) And upon the stone a new name written, which no one knoweth saving he that receiveth it. What name is this? Not the Lord's name, for even in chap. Revelation 19:11-13, urged in favour of such a view, the name is given, but the new name bestowed upon the believer, and descriptive of his position, his character, and his joy as an inhabitant of the New Jerusalem. We are not to think that the word ‘knoweth' is used in the sense of outward knowledge, such as that given by reading or translation. It expresses the inward knowledge referred to in John 4:32 (see note there), the knowledge of experience, the blessedness found in the service of their Lord by those who live through Him, and which the world cannot comprehend. The world may read the name of the believer, just as there seems no cause to doubt that the name here spoken of might be read, but it cannot understand its meaning. These things God reveals by His Spirit to His own (cp. 1 Corinthians 2:9-10). We are thus again led to the conclusion that the ‘new name' is neither a name of God nor of Christ, nor of the believer considered as a separate individual. It is a name which speaks of the believer's glorious condition when he is united to the Son and, in Him, to the Father. Before passing from this Epistle, it may be well to notice the correspondence between the reward thus spoken of and that holding fast of the ‘name' of Christ which had been mentioned in Revelation 2:13. As, too, the tree of life was promised to the Christian of Ephesus who should overcome that temptation to false knowledge to which our first parents in Eden yielded, so, when the Christian of Pergamos is not led astray by the error of the new Balaamites, and when he refuses to partake of the offerings of the dead which he might have had from them (Psalms 106:28), he shall receive manna, of which, in its rich nourishment and invigorating properties, the manna of Israel was but the faintest type (John 6:32).