The altar in the text is the altar of sacrifice. Had it been the altar of incense it would have been specified, as in ch. 8:3, “the golden altar before the throne. ” The altar John measured was the altar under which the saints lie, who are slain for the word of the Deity, as in ch. 6:9.
This being so, I proceed further to notice, that the power commanding John to rise up, gave to him “a reed like to a rod.” The use he was ordered to make of it shows that it was a measuring reed. “Rise up,” said the voice of the Spirit, “and
In this we find John in a like situation with Zechariah. They are both in the presence of an angel, and both asleep.
Zechariah does not aid us here. He was briefly informed, that the two olive branches emptying the golden oil through the two golden pipes into the bowl, were “the two Sons of Oil standing before the Lord of all the earth.” They represented Sons generated by the Golden Oil, or “word of truth” — the “unction from the Holy One, which teacheth of all things, and is the truth” (1 John 2:20,27). They stand before the Lord, al-adon, or before the Ruler of all the earth.
Such was the symbolic scene beheld by Zechariah after his symbolic resurrection — two antagonistic powers; the one the Spirit, the other, the mountain-dominion of the world. But, had we no more light thrown upon the subject than granted to the prophet, the truth symbolized would be as inscrutable to us as it was to him. But, happily for them who are “the servants of the Deity sealed in their foreheads” with his seal, the hidden mystery hath been apostolically and apocalyptically revealed.
In the fourth chapter of Zechariah there is a very remarkable symbolic prophecy concerning Zerubbabel and the “great mountain.” In this there is contained a hidden mystery—wisdom concealed, which the prophet confessed he did not understand. The exposition of the eleventh chapter of the apocalypse cannot be satisfactorily unfolded irrespective of Zechariah’s prophecy; for this portion of John’s is a symbolical revelation of the mystery therein contained.
Apoc. 11
1. And there was given to me a reed like a rod: and the angel stood saying, Rise up, and measure the nave of the Deity, and the altar, and those worshipping in it. 2. And the court which is outside of the nave cast away out, and measure it not, for it has been given to the nations; and the Holy City they shall trample forty two months.
From A.D. 312 to A.D. 1794, a period of 1482 years.
THIRD SECTION OF THE SEVENTH SEAL
ACT III - THE SEVENTH TRUMPET
OR
THIRD WOE:
JUDICIALLY AFFECTING BOTH EAST AND WEST
After John, as the representative of all the saints, had eaten up the little scroll of the judgments to be executed when the Angel of the Bow shall have been developed, he was told by the angel in vision, that he “must prophesy again against many peoples and nations and tongues and kings.” In the Acts of the Apostles we have several instances of their prophesying and its effects.