2. Note the interpretation of this verse is confirmed by Matt. 25:46, and vice versa.
3. Note that the many ' are spoken of at the end of this Book, in this verse, and in chapter II: 33, 39, and chapter 9: 27.
7. The fact that the witness of the two witnesses, of Rev. 11 is not coincident in time with the Beast, and that their sufferings have finished, they have overcome before the time, times, and half a time of this verse, has not been sufficiently applied to the long period. That system requires the coincidence of the testimony and the persecution, whereas here the whole force of their respective characters is that they are not. During their testimony the witnesses bring judgment and death on those who would touch them, though in sackcloth like Elias. Afterward the Beast reigns, and there are none such. It is not that there may not have been analogous facts—I do not doubt it—but the period of 1,260 days of the Beast is not the period of the testimony. In Rev. 12 joyful triumph, on the close of their trials, accompanies the introduction of the 1,260 days of the woman's flight into the wilderness. This renders the order of the facts clear enough.
Note, all the miraculous power of the two witnesses is judgment on the earth, not of the character of evangelic miracles, the powers of the world to come, where all is the power of Jesus, the blessing of the new Creation in power, but judgment on enemies on the earth, either as against those who held the people of God captive, or the professing people of God in apostasy, Egypt and Israel worshipping Baal, away from the Temple. It is not only in their testimony that they stand before the God of the earth, but in all that they do, the judgments that they execute. Moses and Elias acted thus in judgment and severity for the manifestation of the power of God, whereas the miracles of the Apostles in testimony, that which accompanied their ministry, were the exercise and manifestation of the power of Christ in blessing by the Holy Ghost, earnest of the inheritance of the new state of things, where Christ should reign in power of blessing as Head (Son of God) of the new Creation, in the blessing of the Second Adam. This throws much light also on the position of these two witnesses and is exceedingly interesting as throwing light on the two dispensations.
Note too, the tribulation comes after the placing the abomination of desolation. If it be referred to Titus, as some would, and the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple, then the placing it closed the tribulation. It is merely one among many reasons which show that this application of the passage is impossible.
Note further, the horn is raised up in the 'house of David' (Luke 1:69, 73), but all the expectation, and testimony of the Spirit of God, is connected with the promise to Abraham when Christ is born, not Moses. Note, too, the Angel only speaks of the fact. The least of the saints recognizes the fulfillment of the promise and covenant with Abraham.
11. 'And from the time that the daily [sacrifice] shall be taken away ' (removed) as in chapter 11 'and the abomination that desolateth' (or 'of the desolate') 'set up' (or 'given') 'a thousand two hundred and ninety days.' It may be well to remark here that ‘maketh desolate' has not the same form as in chapter 11:3. There, it is, I suppose, without controversy, the abomination of the desolate, or, at any rate, a full active sense, M'sho-mem (desolation). In chapter 12:11, the form which almost universally has a neuter or passive signification, 'to be desolate,' sho-mem (that makes desolate). At any rate the former is more properly ' desolator,' as I suppose chapter 9: 27, m'sho-mem (‘desolator' or 'desolations') the rather because ka-lah v'ne-che-ratzah (the completion, and that which is decreed) are technical words it would seem: see Isaiah To: 23, speaking of this very time. And note also here that the indignation of chapter 11:36 (where we have the same words, ka-lah and v'ne-che-ratzah, and chapter 8: 19, where the Grecian King at the end is spoken of, is to end in the destruction of the Assyrian (Isaiah 10:25) who is (v. 5) the 'indignation.'