IN a version of the Apocalypse, printed in “The Prospect," (vol. page 158,) it is proposed to translate this verse as follows:" And their dead body shall lie in the great street of the city, which spiritually is called Sodom and Egypt, where also their Lord was crucified." A foot note adds, "It is evident that Jerusalem (literal or symbolical) is the city referred to in the preceding verses, and determined to be the city in question by the words which follow."
Now, quite agreed that the note so far is correct, I cannot but acknowledge increasing hesitation, on various grounds, as to the supposed amendment. The authorized version has “the street of the great city," and conveys the more natural sense of the Greek. Indeed, the only version known to me which adopts the proposed rendering, is that of Lausanne, (second edition, 1840) in which we read, " leurs cadavres seront sur la gran& place de la ville, qui est appelée," &c.
1.—As to the text, without delaying to comment on the question of αὐτῶνinstead of ἠμῶν—a reading now adopted by every judicious critic and resting upon the authority of the three uncial and at least thirty other MSS., not to speak of the Vulgate, Coptic, /Ethiopic, Syriac, Armenian, and other versions, and directing our attention more particularly to the first clause of the verse, I think it may be safely said that the weight of the more ancient MSS. inclines to the following: καὶτὸπτῶμααὐτῶνἐπὶτῆςπλατείαςτῆςπόλεωςτῆςμεγάλης, ἤτιςκαλεῖταιπνευματικῶςΣόδομακαὶΑἴγυπτος, ὄπουκαὶὁΚύριοςαὐτῶνἐσταυπώρώθη. Certain it is that A. C., and twenty-five manuscripts in cursive characters, support the insertion of the article before πόλεως. Accordingly, such is the reading of the Complutensian editors, of Bongo: Matthiae, Lachmann, Tischendorf and Tregelles. From my own knowledge, I can state that the opinion of the present Regius Professor of Greek at Oxford, of the Biblical Greek Professor at Dublin, and of Professor Dunbar, of Edinburgh, coincides with their judgment. On the other hand, in the Textus Receptus that article is omitted, and so the editions of Griesbach, Knappe, and Scholz, with others of lesser note.
2.—The rendering would depend, for the most part, I think, upon the reading which is preferred. Thus, if we take the vulgar text, I do not see how one can translate ἐπὶτῆςπλατείαςπόλεωςτῆςμεγάλης, "on the street of the great city." It offends against the well-known and admitted rule that if a noun has another with it in an oblique ease, either both have the article or neither. Undoubtedly, exceptions there are to this rule, but there is a principle which governs these exceptions. Does the present instance resemble them? I think not. The only exception which Matthiae cites is the following from Xen. Cyrop. 6, 3, 8, συνεκάλεσεκαὶἱππέωνκαὶπεζῶνκαὶἁρμάτωντούςἡγεμόνας.The reason is plaits. The commanders are the designated object of the mind; not so the cavalry, infantry, and chariots, which characterize them. Τῶν, might have been inserted before the first only of the genitives, or before each of them; but either arrangement would have modified the meaning, by introducing additional ideas to those which the author had in view. In both cases it would have made specific objects of the bodies commanded: in the latter, separate objects; in the former, things in themselves, independent, no doubt, but all forming one object in mental apprehension. The reader of Middleton's treatise will remember that the Bishop pronounces Origen's phrase ὁκαιρὸςσύκων to be incorrect Greek; because he believed the insertion of the article before the governed noun to be required by its presence before the governing noun, as is no doubt usually the case. But, without appealing to well-known passages in Plato, Herodotus, or others, τὸαἴματαύρωνκαὶτράγων (Heb.9:13) is a plain instance from the New Testament itself; which is irreconcilable with the rule. Is then tine insertion or omission of the article optional in such eases? By no means. Both might be true, but they do not assert the same thing. The one merely characterizes; the other presents a positive object before the mind.
If it be said we have the article connected with μεγάλης, and therefore it was not necessary before πόλεως, the answer is, that, if the design of the inspired writer had been to convey the idea of " the great city," the regular mode of expression would have been τῆςπόλτῆςμεγ (as in Rev. 16:10; 17:11; 18:10, 16, 18, 10,) or τῆςμεγ. πόλ (as in Rev. 18:21.) Some might refer to Βαβυλὼνἡμεγάλη, but this is the common anarthrous case of a proper yenta followed, by a description which has the article. If κινδυνοὺςτοὺςμεγίστουςbe cited as more in point, I can only ask the reader to examine the passage where it occurs in the Nicomachean Ethics, and he will see that the philosopher had a rhetorical object its view when he wrote thus. Some endure dangers-any dangers, yea, the greatest. A species of climax seem to be intended, and is secured by the phrase: this would have been defeated by writing τοὺςμεγ. κινδ. Somewhat similar is 1 Tim. 5:3, χήραςτίματὰςὔντως"honour widows," and then the apostle qualifies the thought by adding "that are widows indeed." But these eases are obviously distinct from “the great city," supposing that to be the idea which was meant in Rev. 11:8. What reason can be assigned for departing from the usual formulae, which regulate the phrase everywhere else in the book? If it be said that all the old versions present that idea, this would serve to confirm the hypothesis that they all read τῆςπόλεως. Primasius, it may be added, renders the passage “in medio civitatis illius magnac," which still implies the same reading.
Perhaps it was the omission of the article which led Boothroyd to propose " the broad city, the great out " a strange phrase, yet, nevertheless, the nearest approach to the force of the ordinary text, inasmuch as πλατείαςis most simply made an adjective, if you omit τῆςbefore πόλεως. So Wetstein understands it, though he prefers the sense of deserta; which at least proves, as a learned person observes, that, in his judgment, the anarthrous construction forces us to consider πλ. adjectivally.
The author of the Horae Apocalypticae, vol. 2., page 365, has, in note 3, " πλατειᾳ remarked on afterwards." This is clearly a mistake; it ought to be πλατείας.So it is given in note 2, referred to in page 385: "It may be well to observe, that the correct reading of the Greek text seems to be επιτηςπλατεαιςτηςπολεωςτηςμεγαλης, with the της inserted before πολεως. So Tregelles, in his late elaborate and critical edition of the Apocalyptic text; it being so given alike in the Codex Alexandrines and Codex Ephraemi, as well as many others." But the error of πλατείᾳ for πλατείαςoccurs again in a supplement to vol. iv., page 512, where in a note it is said, Εντῃπλατειᾳτηςπολεωςτηςμεγαλης . This, as the best reading is given by Tregelles. The omission of the first τηςas in other editions, makes no difference in the point of the designation." It is probable that in the first and third of these passages, the author quoted from memory; one cannot easily account for the mistake otherwise. If the text had really been ἐντῇπλατείᾳ instead ofἐπὶτῆςπλ. two of the proposed renderings could have had no place. The authorized and usual versions must have been right, it might be truly said, beyond all question. Tregelles exhibits the latter reading, not the former.—Next, we have seen that the omission of the article so far from making no difference, renders the common rendering, to say the least, very suspicious, because it seems to violate grammar, and compels us to regard as more exact the version of those who take πλατείας as an adjective.
3.—As regards the interpretation of the verse, it is scarcely possible for any man to deny that in the preceding part we are on Jewish ground. Some may contend that this is a mystic scene, and that its application is Christendom; others, that it is the literal temple of God, altar, and worshippers therein, &c.; and that Gentiles, as such, shall tread down the city, the holy city of Jerusalem, for a certain defined and brief term; that two sackcloth-robed witnesses shall prophesy there, who have power to shut; heaven and plague the earth, and are miraculously protected till the completion of their 1260 days' testimony. Now, if the scene of this testimony be Jerusalem, (necessarily the center of worship and witness to the God or Lord of the earths, see 2 Chron. 7:12-21,) what reason can there be to transport the dead bodies of the witnesses from east to west? from Jerusalem to Rome? On earth, the Only place which is ever styled “the holy city," is Jerusalem. Such it will be really under the reign of Christ, when there shall no more come into it the uncircumcised and the unclean. (Is. 52:1.) Nay, even in the captivity at Babylon, notwithstanding the evil and judgment of the city called by God's name, Daniel, in the spirit of faith, still speaks of Jerusalem as His holy city. (Dan. 9:24.) And this is the more apposite, as there is a manifest link between the reserved bisected seventieth week of Daniel and the Apocalypse, the former half-week, as I believe, answering to Rev. 11:1-13, the very scene which we are considering, if the application be made to the final crisis. After the return of the remnant, it is just the same. The Spirit of God, in Neh. 11:1, 18, still describes Jerusalem as “the holy city." But then do we not hear of “the great city “in verse 8? Is this inapplicable to Jerusalem on the Futurist theory? In nowise. Nay, we may just remark that (in the same book, where, we have seen, it is alluded to as the holy city,) Neh. 7:4 speaks of it as a city broad and great:καὶἡπόλιςπλατεῖακαὶμεγάλη. In Ps. 48:1, 2, we read: "Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised in the city of our God, in the mountain of his holiness. Beautiful for situation, the joy of the whole earth, is mount Zion, on the sides of the north, the city of the great King." This is evidently referred to in Matt. 5:35, where it is distinctly treated as “the city of the great King," as in the former chapter (4:5) it appears as " the holy city." (See also Matt. 27:53.) It is almost needless to observe that “great " ought to disappear from the description of the holy city Jerusalem in Rev. 21:10, τὴνμεγάλην being properly omitted by all critics.
But it has been urged, from the days of Jerome to Mr. Elliott, that the real, literal Jerusalem was never called Egypt. The answer is that, if you mean by “called," expressly so designated in Scripture, certainly Babylon was never so called. So that the utmost that could be pretended is, that both stand on equal ground. Would it be true to say that they do so stand? I think not. In Isaiah 1:10, Jerusalem is denounced as Sodom. “hear the word of the Lord, ye rulers of Sodom." Is Babylon ever thus called in the Word of God? Nowhere. Jerusalem is, and Babylon is not, called Sodom in the Bible. Again, if the reader consult Ezek. 16, he will see, in that touching sketch of God's past and future dealings with Jerusalem, that not only is Sodom here also treated as near of kin, “thy sister Sodom," but the charge is, " Thou hast also committed fornication with the Egyptians thy neighbours." Is Babylon ever so charged in the Old Testament? Is she ever accused of fornication with Egypt? Nowhere. How does Mr. E. prove that Babylon, or Rome, is thus called? Why that Grosteste spoke of "Egyptian bondage!" Wicliff of the sages of Pharaoh! and Luther of the darkness of Egypt! as the appellation Sodom was applied to the same state and city by the Romanist Peter Damian, Pope Leo IX., Baronius, as well as by others!—As to two arguments of Berengaud, a commentator of the ninth century,) which Mr. E. gives in a note to page 388, they are hardly worth noticing: they seem not even directed against the idea of a future Jerusalem. Jerusalem has been destroyed. Does this show that it cannot be rebuilt upon its old site? It is not to be called Sodom and Egypt, because Christians dwell there. This is doubly false, in the type and in the antitype. The moral character of Sodom and Egypt was unchanged, although just Lot dwelt in the one, and God's people groaned in the other, till the eve of the judgment which overtook their adversaries. Even so, if faith once regarded Jerusalem as the holy city, when in point of sorrowful fact it was as Sodom, I cannot see why it may not be so again. Is the guilt of Sodom, is the dark oppression of Egypt, incompatible with religious profession? Alas! we know it is not; and therefore these terms may spiritually and with perfect suitableness attach to the literal Jerusalem in its future condition.
At the same time, I am by no means prepared to deny that the Spirit of God had in view a twofold application, as in the prophecy generally, so here in particular.—In general, it would be "the world " at large. It is the world emphatically on which, in the gospel of John, the gravamen of the guilt of the Cross is ever made to rest, not the Jews, not the Gentiles only, but " the world;" and this would well fall in with the suggestion of Jerome. —In particular, it would be Jerusalem. In that locality, where Christ was rejected and crucified, Anti-Christ will be received, and will sit in the temple of God.
There is no force in the argument that because the beast of verse 7 is the Roman beast, therefore the city of verse 8 must be Rome. For it is clear from the last verse of Dan. 9. and elsewhere, that a Roman prince, yet to come, is to covenant with the mass of the Jewish people, and subsequently to set himself up in that city either in his own person, or by a sort of blasphemous high priest, viz. the second beast, his viceroy. Thus, diabolically imitating the Lord Christ, (who is Son of man, and so head of the Gentiles, as well as the Jewish Messiah,) the last horn of the beast may assume Jewish sovereignty as well as the empire of the west, and hence figure religiously at Jerusalem as well as civilly at Rome, though all his power be an open revolt against God. Accordingly, there seems little difficulty in understanding that “the holy city," (verse 2,) " the great city," if it be rightly so translated in verse 8, and " the city," (verse 13,) are various aspects of the same Jerusalem, view it as you will, literally or mystically. Still less is there difficulty in seeing that the Roman beast, which has already enacted so conspicuous a part at and after the first advent, may reappear upon the same stage before the Lord returns again in glory. This at least gives unity to the picture which is vainly sought in the scheme which transports Jerusalem and Babylon into the same scene.
While it appears then, that it would be going too far to pronounce the proposed construction absolutely illegitimate, an exactly parallel ease has not yet been produced. The expression μεγάληπόλις is familiar, whereas μεγάληπλατεῖα is not. Therefore, if the latter had been intended, might we not have expected means taken in order to preserve the reader from gliding into the former, and so misconstruing the thought? This might have been done by a collocation which would exclude all ambiguity; viz. by writing ἐπὶτῆςπλατείαςτῆςμεγ. Τόλ. ἤτις.... But such is not the fact. Are we, therefore, shut up in the conclusion that “the great city" of Rev.11. is Babylon? Confessedly, the great city of Rev. 14.-18. is Rome, or Babylon. But is it the only great city in the estimate of the Spirit of God? Or may we not consider, on the contrary, that the latter part of Rev. 11:8 distinctly and positively guards us against the use which some have made of the expression? Assuredly, the analogy of the Old Testament does not restrict it to one city as its exclusive property. Thus we find Nineveh repeatedly styled “the great city “in the prophecy of Jonah. Is it, therefore, the designation of that city solely? By no means. We afterwards read of Βαβυλὼνἡμεγάλη in the prophecy of Daniel, (4:30,) which seems evidently a foreshadowing of the Apocalyptic Babylon. If the Spirit of God had simply said, "upon the street of the great city," his intention might have been mistaken; but, immediately after, He adds certain exegetical words, which are nowhere applied in Scripture to Babylon, but are all of them substantially, and most of them in express terms, said of Jerusalem only. It was Jerusalem that committed fornication with Egypt, sinking back into the world out of which Israel was called; and not Babylon, but Jerusalem was branded as Sodom: therein also the Lord was crucified. These particulars seem designedly supplied to hinder us from imagining that the great city here named is the same great city which is elsewhere so fully described. And when we come to consider the whole context, it seems plain that “the holy city," which is surely Jerusalem and not Babylon, is the central locality of the vision. Might we not call Paris “the great city," dilating on its luxuries, objects of art, sins and siege, and yet have said a little before, without impropriety and in the same essay, "the great city in which the author of Paradise Lost was born?" The two cities, London and Paris, ought not to be confounded, because the same designation was applied with perfect truth to each, and the less, as in one case it was so explained and restricted as in strictness to exclude not only the other, but every other locality on earth. To this may be added an observation, for which I am indebted to a learned person, that Jerusalem is in actual possession of the title "the great city" outside the range of Scripture, if that be thought of any weight. See the Sibylline Oracles, (book 5, verses 153, 225, 412,) where the Jewish forger denounces vengeance for the destruction of the capital and people of Judea.
On the whole, then, I think that the common reading is wrong; that the authorized version is right; and that the clauses which follow “the great city " in Rev. 11:8 were meant, in part at least, to prevent the reader from confounding this great city with another whose evil and judgment occupy so large a portion of the prophecy in subsequent chapters. The great city here alluded to is that one where the Lord was crucified, i.e. Jerusalem. Whether it is to be taken literally or figuratively, whether applicable to the dispensation, or to the crisis, or to both, are different questions; but I have no doubt that Jerusalem is intended here.