Chapter Two

Letters to the churches: Ephesus (1–7), Smyrna (8–11), Pergamum (12–17), and Thyatira (18–29), consisting of an address, praise and rebuke, exhortation, and promise of reward.

Revelation 2:1. To the angel of the church in Ephesus write: Thus says He who holds the seven stars in His right hand, He who walks in the midst of the seven golden lamp stands: Revelation 2:2. I know your works, and your labor, and your endurance, and that you cannot bear those who are evil, and you tested those who call themselves apostles, yet are not, and found them to be liars; Revelation 2:3. and you have endured and have patience, and for My name’s sake have labored and have not grown weary. Starting with the second chapter, there follows the exposition of those very letters which the holy John was commanded to write and send to the churches of Asia Minor. All seven letters in their external form are quite similar to one another and consist equally of an inscription, an introduction, the main part, an exhortation, and a reward. In the inscription is indicated the name of the church; in the introduction is depicted the Lord appearing to John with an attribute corresponding to the state of the given church; in the main part are described its virtues and defects; in the exhortation is the call to a perfect life, while the reward is the recompense for that life. The church of Ephesus is placed first among the seven churches as the nearest to the island of Patmos. Ephesus was a glorious ancient city on the shore of the Icarian Sea between Smyrna and Miletus. The Lord addresses the leader (angel) of the Ephesian church, pointing to his attributes: the seven lampstands and seven stars, and says: I know your deeds, that is, your entire life as a manifestation of your soul; I know your efforts to stand at the height of moral perfection; and I know your perseverance, with which you bear all persecution and oppression from the gentiles. To the praise of the Ephesians is placed their attitude toward the wicked, that is, toward people of poor morality, and toward those uninvited and ill-intentioned preachers. For the Ephesians, with their apparently not entirely clear Christian doctrinal knowledge, it was necessary to have great love and devotion to the Apostle Paul and John in order to remain faithful to their Christian teaching and not abandon it.

Revelation 2:4. But I have this against you, that you have left your first love. Revelation 2:5. Therefore remember from where you have fallen, and repent, and do the first works; but if not, I will come to you and will remove your lamp stand from its place, if you do not repent. Clearly, their love previously, manifested in works of mercy, was incomparably stronger than now. Since nothing can replace love, the Ephesians are advised to set aside the pride of their Christian knowledge and hard work, to repent of their present coldness, and to return to their former works of love. In verse 5, the Lord threatens the Ephesians with his punishing visitation, threatens them with the loss of his saving grace. The lampstand of which we speak here is the church with its leaders and gracious gifts. All this the Lord threatens to take from the Ephesians and transfer elsewhere. Now in place of the ancient magnificent Ephesus, owing to a heap of ruins, rises a small village Aia-Soluk, where stands a mosque built from the former church of John the Theologian. Thus has this lampstand of primitive Christianity been removed from its place.

Revelation 2:6. Yet this you have, that you hate the works of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate. But comforting and encouraging the Ephesians, the Lord gives them praise for their aversion to the heresy of the Nicolaitans, which came from Nicolaus, an Antiochian proselyte and one of the seven deacons of the Jerusalem church. In Ephesus the Nicolaitans were hated and driven out, as they represented in their teaching a complete dissoluteness opposed to the wise restraint of the Ephesian Christians, who generally did not tolerate the wicked.

Revelation 2:7. He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches: To him who overcomes, I will grant to eat of the tree of life which is in the paradise of God. The exhortation joined to the letter to the Ephesian church is the usual call to attentiveness found in Holy Scripture (Matt 11:15; Luke 8:8). On the surface, not Jesus Christ but the Holy Spirit is presented, because the Holy Spirit is the power that enlightened the Old Testament prophets, the apostles, and now John himself, and likewise every believer in receiving the revelation. The reward fully corresponds to the description of the virtues of the Ephesian Christians. For their strict temperance and hatred of the intemperate Nicolaitans, they are promised to taste the fruits of the tree of life. In accordance with Rev 22:2, this tree of life can be understood as that blessed tree which in the future life in the New Jerusalem will constitute one of the conditions and sources of blessedness, just as in the first paradise the tree of life was (Gen 2:9).

Revelation 2:8. And to the angel of the church in Smyrna write: Thus says the First and the Last, He who was dead and behold, is alive: The city of Smyrna belonged to the most ancient cities of Asia Minor. The Smyrnan church arose after the year 70. Smyrna to this day retains the dignity of a metropolis, and in its outward state surpasses all the ancient Christian cities of this region. To the bishop of this church, perhaps to the holy Polycarp, the Lord directs his revelation. His words contain an indication of Jesus Christ as the Almighty who in himself indicates the purpose of existence. And the resurrection of Jesus Christ assures Christians of the possibility of obtaining eternal blessedness after the general resurrection and judgment.

Revelation 2:9. I know your works and tribulation and poverty [though you are rich], and the slander of those who say they are Jews and are not, but are a synagogue of Satan. With the words of verse 9, the Lord draws the Smyrnians to the thought of his providential omniscience. He sees human suffering and material poverty; but he values patient Christian hope and devotion to God, which are here called Christian wealth. The Apocalypse calls the Jews a synagogue of Satan, thereby indicating that it has in view the Jews who have become decidedly hostile toward Christianity. And their synagogal authority made the Jews especially powerful and harmful in this respect (Jas 2:6-7).

Revelation 2:10. Do not fear any of the things you are about to suffer. Behold, the devil is about to cast some of you into prison, that you may be tested, and you will have tribulation for ten days. Be faithful until death, and I will give you the crown of life. In the near future the Smyrnians were destined to undergo great suffering, particular disasters, and persecutions. But now the Smyrnians hear that the Lord Almighty looks upon them with his all-seeing eye. The comfort and encouragement here is chiefly in indicating the chief cause of these sufferings, their purpose, and their duration. Persecutions of Christians and the imprisonment of many of them in prison will occur at the instigation of the devil (1 Pet 4:12). But God, having permitted the devil in the near future to stir up persecution against the Smyrnan Christians, will limit his activity to a brief time. For Christians, death itself, which will be the lot of some of them during persecutions, should not be fearful. This death will only be a transition into a new, blessed, and eternal life: the crown is the symbol of reward and glorification (2 Tim 4:8; 1 Pet 5:4).

Revelation 2:11. He who has an ear [to hear], let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches: He who overcomes will not be hurt by the second death. Following the customary exhortation to attentiveness, the Smyrnan Christians are given the promise of reward: deliverance from the second death. The second death is indeed Gehenna (Matt 5:29-30; Luke 12:5). It is death both second and other (special). It comes only for those who experience the first death, that is, the separation of soul and body, and consists in the final deprivation of a person of divine grace. Liberation from this eternal death, in other words, from eternal torment, is what the Lord promises the Smyrnan Christians persecuted for their faith.

Revelation 2:12. And to the angel of the church in Pergamum write: Thus says He who has the sharp two-edged sword: Pergamum, to whose church’s angel the Lord addresses himself in verse 12, was in antiquity the chief city of Media and for a time even the capital of the Pergamene kingdom. The Christian church in Pergamum, though surrounded by the darkness of superstition, did not dim its faith; and this lampstand of ancient Christianity shines even now with the pure light of Christian teaching. In the expression of the Lord’s address to the Pergamene bishop, there is an indication of the special property of the Divine word, which is manifested in correction, in warning, and in calling a person to repentance and self-improvement.

Revelation 2:13. I know your works, and that you dwell where Satan’s throne is; and you hold fast My name, and did not deny My faith even in the days of Antipas, My faithful witness, who was killed among you, where Satan dwells. In the words ‘Satan’s throne’ is meant the special position of Pergamum in the spread of pagan religion. In Pergamum, near the temple of Asclepius, was established an extensive learned-religious society—an institution where priests were the exclusive physicians of all ailments. The serpent, being the sacred symbol of the Pergamene god and usually kept alive in his temple, was for Christians an object of aversion as a symbol of the prince of darkness, the author of paganism. Thus the city of Pergamum itself can be called by preference the throne of Satan. The Lord praises the Pergamene Christians because, despite their unfortunate position among the most crude and fanatical pagan population, they remained true Christians. The reference to the particular historical fact of Antipas’s martyrdom is a vivid confirmation of the firmness of the faith of the Pergamene Christians. Antipas, who held the position of Pergamene bishop, was tortured around 93 AD, being roasted in the belly of a heated bronze bull.

Revelation 2:14. But I have a few things against you, because you have there some who hold the teaching of Balaam, who taught Balak to set a stumbling block before the sons of Israel, to eat things sacrificed to idols and to commit fornication. Rev 2:15. Similarly, you also have those who hold to the teaching of the Nicolaitans, which I hate. To the praise for virtues is added a rebuke, consisting of a reproach to the Pergamene Christians for their indulgent attitude toward the Nicolaitans, compared to Balaam for their dissoluteness. The Nicolaitans properly did not belong to the Pergamene Christian community; they were apparently excommunicated from it, though they lived in the same city.

Revelation 2:16. Therefore repent; but if not, I will come to you quickly and will wage war against them with the sword of My mouth. The warning and call to a stricter attitude toward the Nicolaitans is directed only at the faithful Christians. Regarding the heretics, a more severe threat is pronounced. If they do not repent, the Lord will visit Pergamum with his punishing hand and will strike the heretics with the sword of his mouth. By this sword one can understand the extraordinary action of divine providence, striking the wicked sometimes by a single utterance of his almighty word.

Revelation 2:17. He who has an ear [to hear], let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches: To him who overcomes, I will give to eat of the hidden manna; and I will give him a white stone, and on the stone a new name written, which no one knows except the one who receives it. The comparison of two rewards—the hidden manna and the white stone—speaks with full clarity that these reward objects are only symbols. By the hidden manna one can understand the body and blood of Jesus Christ, which believers partake of in the sacrament of the Eucharist. Thus this reward concerns not only the future life but also the present, consisting in the impartation of mystical divine grace. The white stone with an inscription should remind the readers of the Apocalypse of that small pebble which was given both at trial to denote acquittal or condemnation and during competition in games as an expression of reward. And symbolically depicted in it is the judgment of God’s court over each Christian, according to which he receives either punishment or reward. Here on earth and there in heaven, this reward is special for each one (no one knows except the one who receives it), as the blessed state of his spirit.

Revelation 2:18. And to the angel of the church in Thyatira write: Thus says the Son of God, who has eyes like a flame of fire, and His feet are like burnished bronze: Thyatira, to which the fourth letter is addressed, was a small Lydian city of Asia Minor and was a Macedonian colony. At present it is a Muslim city; the number of Orthodox Christians is small, and their only church stands in the middle of a cemetery and is almost entirely overgrown with earth. In addressing the Thyatiran Christians, the Lord by his epithet points to the properties of his divine nature: fire combines in itself both the beneficial property of warming and vivifying (the goodness of God) and the property of cleansing and destroying (the justice of God).

Revelation 2:19. I know your works and your love and faith and service and endurance, and that your latter works are greater than the first. The Lord praises the Thyatirans for 1) their mercy and love for their neighbors; 2) their conscious assimilation of the doctrines of Christian faith; 3) their patient endurance of earthly misfortunes and sorrows; and 4) their Christian striving for greater perfection in virtues.

Revelation 2:20. But I have this against you, that you tolerate the woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophetess, and teaches and leads astray My servants to commit fornication and to eat things sacrificed to idols. For the Thyatirans, with their pure Christian life, indulgence toward the woman Jezebel presented a moral danger. Under this woman can be seen both a symbolic designation of the Nicolaitan heresy and a historical person, the known woman Jezebel, who, falsely claiming to be a prophet, inclined Christians to acts contrary to Christian morality, to the heresy of the Nicolaitans. Possessing the authority of a prophet, she the more powerfully, boldly, and successfully inclined many Christians to dissolute life and to contempt for Christian discipline (eating food sacrificed to idols).

Revelation 2:21. I gave her time to repent, but she refuses to repent of her fornication. Revelation 2:22. Behold, I will cast her upon a bed, and those committing adultery with her into great tribulation, if they do not repent of her deeds. Revelation 2:23. And I will kill her children with death; and all the churches will know that I am He who searches minds and hearts, and I will give each of you according to your works. The Lord gave time to repent both to Jezebel and to the Thyatirans, but in vain. No repentance followed, and therefore in verse 22 the threat of God’s judgment now coming is expressed. The judgment and punishment begin with Jezebel as the instigator of impiety; she is struck by illness, binding her to her bed. To those who committed immorality with her and by her teaching hold heretical doctrine, the Lord threatens great tribulation.

Revelation 2:24. But to you and the rest in Thyatira, who do not hold this teaching, who have not known the deep things of Satan, I say, I will not impose on you any other burden; Revelation 2:25. only hold fast what you have until I come. Speech to the faithful of the Thyatiran church. By “others” are meant the Christians not yet led astray by the false teaching and temptations of Jezebel’s sect. They are characterized by the Lord as avoiding the teaching of this false prophet and not knowing the so-called depths of Satan. By the depths of Satan one must understand the very philosophical system of the Gnostic heresy, which must be called the depth of Satan, the highest manifestation of the devil’s works. The Gnostics boasted of their philosophical system and regarded all those not sharing in it as wretched ignoramuses. But the Lord remarks that the Thyatirans should not be disturbed, for their salvation is sufficed by the law of God, God’s revelation, by following which they have already achieved considerable moral perfection.

Revelation 2:26. He who overcomes and keeps My works until the end, I will give authority over the nations, Revelation 2:27. and he will rule them with a rod of iron, as the vessels of pottery are broken to pieces, as I also have received from My Father; Reward will be given only to those who remain victorious in enduring suffering and toil until the end of their earthly life. Authority over the nations, as a reward to the Thyatirans, will be expressed in ruling them with an iron scepter and in breaking them like clay vessels. The iron scepter is the symbol of firm authority, clay vessels the symbol of weakness and worthlessness. By nations one must understand generally people not belonging to the Kingdom of God. By authority over the nations (properly by rewards) is understood the high position of the righteous before all other people both here on earth (in the sense of the authority of their moral power) and especially after death, when as glorified they act on the living through their prayers and intercession before the throne of the Most High.

Revelation 2:28. and I will give him the morning star. Revelation 2:29. He who has an ear [to hear], let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. By the morning star must be understood Jesus Christ himself, who is the light that enlightens every person (John 1:9). Namely, the light of Christ’s teaching and enlightenment, assimilated by the righteous and manifested in their life, can be and is for others a guiding star and draws them to imitation and perfection. * * * Notes Norov 248; Zhdanov 132. Zhdanov 139. Ewald. Hengstenberg, Zhdanov 171, 172. Ebrard, Hengstenberg. Andrew of Caesarea, Suller, Hengstenberg, Zhdanov.