But beside the symbolic Lamb we find the Four Living Ones acting a part in connection with the first four seal-periods. They are not introduced into the drama as mere drapery and ornament; but as representative of a class of agents performing a very important part in association with the Lamb during the first four seal-periods.
Such was the secondary agency in this revolutionary event, but
But heark! Hear ye not, O ye servants of the Deity, that “voice of thunder,” issuing from that one of the four living ones like a lion, and inviting you to “Come and see!” It is the voice of the Spirit, as fatal to Domitian as the writing of the same spirit upon the wall was to Belshazzar on the night he was slain. The voice is the opening voice of the first-seal period, A.D. 96. A voice that changed the times, and whitened the situation of the affairs of the great Roman Habitable.
But, in reading the first four seals, the student of this prophecy must have been struck by the symbolization of which the war-horse is the root. What does this sign import? What use does the Spirit of Christ make of the horse in prophecy ? What does He signify by it, and what did he intend it to signify when he exhibited it before John, now
This sixth chapter of the prophecy constitutes the rehearsal of the first six acts of the tragical conflict between the Lamb and his adherents of the one part, and the constituted authorities of Greek and Latin Paganism in Church and State of the other. The translation given is of the text amended by Griesbach, and compared with that of Tregelles, and others, whose rendering, however, has had but little influence with the author.
The opening of the first six seals in order, the cumulative effect of which is the abolition of the heaven which hindered the manifestation of the Lawless Power.
Apoc. 6
In the previous chapter is exhibited “the manifestation of the Sons of the Deity” in the presence of the Eternal Creator, subsequently, of course, to the resurrection of the saints. “The adoption, to wit, the redemption of the Body” from the power of the grave is accomplished; and the time is come for them to execute the judgment given them, and to take the kingdom and possess it under the whole heaven.
“And a Rainbow circled about the Throne in appearance like an emerald. ” — Ch. 4:3