IT may be proper to make some general Remarks, in this Place, concerning the Commentators of the Revelations. They are to be distinguished into four Classes: Some explain this Book in a moral and edifying manner, extracting moral Reflections out of all the Visions which St. John proposes to us; others expound them, as declaring those Signs which are to be the Forerunners of the last Judgment, of the Coming of Antichrist, and his Wars with the Saints; others again, who are Protestants, have falsly and odiously applied what is said of Rome, in its state of Idolatry and Prostitution, to the Pope, and Church of Rome; and, lastly, there are some who explain the Revelations in a literal and historical manner.
The ancient Fathers of the four first Ages, and even of the fifth, could not well succeed in their Comments on the Revelations, if we suppose that this Book relates to the Persecutions which the Church has suffered, to the Inroads of Barbarians on the Roman Empire, and their Invasion of the City of Rome: or, lastly, to the Fall of mystical Babylon, idolatrous Rome, and the Victory obtained by the Church of Christ over its Enemies: because, in their time, these Things had not as yet happened, and the Prophecy was still wraped up in thick darkness; nothing then contributing to clear and unfold it.
From this time, the respect which was generally entertained for Antiquity, restrained Men, for many Ages, from ever thinking to inquire after any other Interpretations of this Book, than such as the old Fathers imagined that they had discovered. But critical Learning, at length, coming again into request, and recovering ground in the two last Ages, Endeavours were used to expound the Revelations in an historical manner; and the several Attempts which have been made, have proved so successful, that, in all probability, the same Method will hereafter be continued.
St. Austin, Irenæus, Hippolytus Bishop of Porto, Methodius, Melito, Dionysius of Alexandria, Basil, Gregory Nazianzen, Tichonius the Donatist, St. Cyril of Alexandria, Gennadius, Cassiodorus, Alcuinus, and Rabanus Maurus, have written upon all, or some part of the Revelations: but their Works are not printed, or at least under the title of Comments on the Revelations; for Irenæus, in his Books against Heresies, has explain’d some Passages of the Revelations, and Justin others, in his Work against Tryphon.
We have one or two Treatises on Antichrist, under the name of St. Hippolytus. Alcuinus wrote the Life of Antichrist, to the Emperor Charlemain: From hence, probably, it has been said, that these Fathers have written upon the Revelations. Cornelius à Lapide quotes a Manuscript Comment on this Book, composed by F. Matthias, a Swede, Confessor to St. Bridget; and another by Peter Galatin, in Manuscript likewise.
Nicolaus Antonius, in his Bibliotheca Hispanica, cites some others besides these: and, I make no question, but that there are many more in the several Libraries of Europe.
Victorinus of Petaw, a City of old Pannonia, situated on the Drave in Stiria, who lived about the end of the third Age, has explain’d the Revelations according to the Hypothesis, which supposes this Book to relate to the last Judgment. His Work is in the third Tome of the large Bibliotheca Patrum, p. 414. separately at Paris, in 1549, and 1609, in 8vo.
St. Hippolytus, Bishop of Porto in Italy, who lived in the beginning of the third Age, wrote upon the Revelations: So St. Jerom tells us, in his Book concerning illustrious Men, p. 61. But this Work has not been handed down to us, nothing remaining of St. Hippolytus’s on this Subject, besides two Treatises upon Antichrist; the second whereof is not his. See Fabricius’s Edition of his Works, or the Title of this Martyr in our Index.
Andreas and Aretas, both Bishops of Cæsarea in Cappadocia, have written Comments on the Revelations, which we have in Latin in the Bibliotheca Patrum; and elsewhere, both in Greek and Latin. They explain the Revelations as relating to the last Judgment. Andreas lived towards the Year 500. and Aretas about 540.
Primasius, Bishop of Adrumetum, in the Province of Bizacium in Africk, and Disciple to St. Austin, has followed the same System, in his Exposition of the Revelations. See his Work in the 10th Tome of the Biblioth. PP. separately at Cologn, in 1535. and at Basil, in 1544, in 8vo.
We think ourselves obliged to place here the new Edition of Cassiodorus’s Comments upon the Epistles, Acts, and Revelations, published at Florence, in 1721, in 8vo. by M. Maffey, with Notes. Cassiodorus explains here some few Places only of the Books he writes upon; and these are neither the most difficult, or obscure. The Explanations are only moral, clear, and natural; or a bare Explanation of some Doctrine.
Ambrose Autpert, or Auspert, Abbot of St. Vincent’s, at Vulturno in Italy, who lived in the 8th Age, about the Year 770, has extracted moral Reflections from the Visions of this Book, which are very edifying. His Comment was printed at Cologn, in 1636, in fol. in ten Books; and in the new Bibliotheca Patrum, tom. 13. p. 403. D. Mabillon, in his Annals, t. 2. p. 247. and M. Baillet, in his Life, on the 19th of June, thinks there is a great deal of Piety discernible in it.
Venerable Bede, in his Comment on the Revelations, acknowledges that this Book contains not only a Description of the seven Churches of Asia, drawn in the three first Chapters, but also the Sufferings, and various Revolutions of the Church; and, lastly, what will happen at the end of the World. It is divided into three Books; and is in tom. 5. of his Works, of the Edition of 1612, in fol.
Bruno of Ast has followed, pretty nearly, the same Method. See the Bibliotheca Patrum, tom. 20. p. 1678. He believes that this Book contains all that shall ever happen to the Church, till the conclusion of the World. His Comment has been printed likewise in the first Tome of his Works.
Berengadius, whose Treatise is printed among the Works of St. Ambrose, lived about the 8th Age. In his Exposition of the Revelations, he supposes, with many others, that this Book describes the Persecutions of the Church, and the last Judgment; but then he has, besides, many moral Reflections. See the new Edition of St. Ambrose, in the Appendix to the second Tome of his Works, p. 498.
Some have supposed that the Comment on the Revelations, which is printed in the Appendix to the third Volume of St. Austin, p. 159. was the Work of Tichonius the Donatist, mentioned by St. Austin, and from whom Primasius and Bede have borrowed something. But the Authors of the new Edition of St. Austin, have shewn very well that this Work was not Tichonius’s; for that has not been delivered down to us. That which we are speaking of, is divided into nineteen Homilies, abounding with moral Reflections.
Alulphus, printed at the end of the new Edition of St. Gregory the Great, has made a Comment on the Revelations, composed in this Father’s own words.
John Hus, printed without the Author’s Name, at Wittemberg, 1528, in 8vo. by the direction of Luther.
Haymo of Halberstadt, Hugh and Richard de S. Victor, OEcumenius, Albertus the Great, St. Anselm, or rather Hervæus, and Thomas Anglicus, have nothing very particular on this Book. Haymo’s Comment, divided into seven Books, is among his Works printed at Paris, in 1533. with what he wrote upon St. Paul, ibid. in 1550. That of Hugh and Richard, in their Works. That of OEcumenius, with his other Comments. That of Albertus Magnus, printed at Basil, in 1506, in 4to. and of St. Anselm, in the old Edition of his Works.
Abbot Rupert is altogether mystical, as well as Bernardin of Siena. Their Comment is among their Works. That of the latter has been much augmented; by John de la Haye, in his Edition at Paris, 1636, in fol. and had been printed separately at Venice, in 1591, in 4to.
Abbot Joachim has also written upon the Revelations, and pretended to be the only Person who has found out a Key to this Book; but he has not had the good luck to convince all his Readers of this. He has been followed by Hubertinus only, and Seraphinus de Ferme, who distributes as he does, into six Ages, all the Events that are to happen to the Church from Jesus Christ, to the last Period of the World. Hubertinus de Casali lived about the Year 1300. His Comment has not hitherto been printed: and Petræus is the only one who speaks of it. He was an Italian; first a Cordelier, afterwards a Carthusian. But that of Seraphin de Ferme is printed in Italian, at Venice; and in Latin at Antwerp, in 1581, in 8vo. He was an Italian, Canon-Regular of Lateran in 1570.
St. Antonin, Lyranus, and Aureolus, divide likewise, into six Ages, whatever shall befal the Church, from its foundation, to the day of Judgment: but they do this in a way different from that of Abbot Joachim. As for Peter Aureolus, he has composed nothing in particular on this Book: but what he has written of it, is comprehended in his Abridgment of the Bible, printed at Venice, 1571. the fifth Edition, in 4to. and at Louvain, 1647. at Roban, 1649, in 8vo. the last Edition, augmented by Stephen Noveller. Aureolus was of Verberie, a Cordelier, and made Bishop of Aix. It appears that he was still living in 1345. in which Year he published his Abridgment, as Denis de Sainte Marthe says, in his Nouvelle France Chretienne, tom. 1. p. 321. However, he was not then Bishop of Aix: Which See, from the Year 1322, was possessed by another Prelate; which gave occasion to some Authors to say that Aureolus died in 1322.
Alphonsus Salmeron discovers no more in the Revelations than the Description of the primitive Times of the Church, its Conflicts with the Jews and Gentiles, and the Victories which it has obtained over both. His Comment is in the 16th Tome of the Madrid Edition, in 1597, in fol.
Lewis Alcasar, a Jesuit, believes the Revelations to be all one Riddle; and that they conceal, under mysterious Obscurities, the State and Successes of the Roman, and more especially of the Primitive Church. He wrote two sorts of Comments upon this Book; printed at Antwerp, in 1614. and at Lyons, in 1618, in fol. In the first he attempts to explain the hidden Sense of it: with this he has joined a Paraphrase. In the second he explains all the Places in the Old Testament, which have any relation to the obscure Passages of the Revelations, and makes a just application of them. It is divided into five Books: The first contains the Allusions to the 38th, 39th, and 40th Chapters of Job; the second, those of the Psalms; the third, the Paraphrase, and Comment upon Canticles; the fourth, a short Abstract of the Chapters in Isaiah, an Explanation of the 36th Chapter of Jeremiah, of the 1st, 10th, 38th, 39th, and 48th of Ezekiel, of the 7th, 8th, 9th, 10th, 11th, and 12th of Daniel; the fifth, an Explanation of the 3d Chapter of Joel, of Habbakkuk and Zachary, from the 1st Chapter to the 7th. All which is printed together at Lyons, 1632, in fol.
He employed twenty Years in this prodigious Work. Cornelius à Lapide thinks there is Wit and Learning in it. M. Simon, in his Critical History of the New Testament, p. 636. says, the Author believes he had discovered the true meaning of the most obscure part of Scripture; but, as Nicholas Antonio observes, in the second Tome of his new Bibliotheca Hispanica, who will warrant that he has succeeded? Bayle, in his Critical Dictionary, expresses much esteem for this Work; tom. 1. p. 171. of the first Edition.
He was of Seville; and, in 1554, turned Jesuit: taught at Cordua, and at Seville; where he died in 1613.
Cornelius à Lapide has written well upon the Revelations. He reports the Opinions of the Ancients and Moderns, and determines for that, which to him appears the best. So that his Comment may serve instead of many others. In his Prolegomena on the Revelations, he criticises other Comments, and gives his Judgment of them. His Comment concludes all the rest written by him.
John Annius, or rather Nannius, of Viterbo in Italy, a Dominican, was born in 1432. and died in 1502. He too wrote two sorts of Works upon this Book, viz. Questions, as Hentenius asserts in his Prologus prefixed to Arethas’s Comment, and a Glossary; printed at Cologn, in 1497, in 4to.The Enarrations of Claudius de Monte Martyrum, or Monmartre, a Parisian, and a Carmelite, were printed ibid. 1550, in 16°.
The Scholia of John Gannai, are in de la Haye’s largest Bible. They were printed likewise with the others on St. Paul’s Epistles, at Paris, 1563, and 1633, in 8vo.
Cælius Pannonius, otherwise called Franciscus Gregorius, Prior of St. Stephen’s of Mount Cælius at Rome, wrote, in the fifteenth Century, upon the Revelations; and Luke de Bruges, in the beginning of the seventeenth. Cælius, or Francis Gregorius of Hungary, made a Collection out of all the Commentators, both ancient and modern; printed at Paris, and at Venice, 1541, 1571, in 8vo. the third Edition.
Francis Ribera, a Jesuit, has literally explain’d this Book. His Comment was printed at Salamanca, 1591, in fol. and at Doway, 1623; in 8vo. the last Edition. See upon the Epistle to the Hebrews.
Blaise Viegas explains it morally. He was a Portugueze of Evora, and a Jesuit. His Comment was printed at Evora, in 1601, in fol. at Paris, 1630, in 4to. the twelfth Edition.
Benedict Pererius has expounded the eight first Chapters of the Revelations, with much Learning and Solidity, in Disputations such as he has written upon some other Books, and already taken notice of by me. These were printed separately at Venice, 1607, in 4to. the second Edition; and in the 3d Tome of his Select Disputations: This is the hundred eighty eighth.
Joan. Kircher, S. I. in Apocalyps. in 4to. Coloniæ Agrippinæ, 1676. He was a German of the Diocess of Cologn, where his short Explication was printed.
Libert. Fromond, his Comment was printed at Louvain, in 1657, in 4to. And Daniel Hervæus, of Nantes, Father of the Oratory, who died in 1694, wrote an historical Explanation; printed at Lyons, in 1684, in 4to. It is not his design to unfold all the Mysteries of this Book, he confesses it would be Rashness to attempt it; but he proposes to apply that to the Revelations which the Historians, as well sacred as profane, tell us to have befallen the Church, in the several Persecutions of it.
Sylveira in Apocalyps. He has also written very usefully on the Gospels; Lugd. 1667, in two Volumes. See upon the Acts.
Antiochus Brondo, of Cagliari, of the Order de la Merci, who flourished till the Year 1620, has explain’d only the three first Chapters, in two Volumes in fol. His Work consists of a Comment, and a Paraphrase; printed at Rome, in 1612, and 1615. There are also Disputations, as F. le Long says, who produces the Title of them.
Alexander Hales, an English Cordelier, made also a large Comment; printed at Paris, 1647, in fol. with John de la Haye’s Annotations, who procured the Edition of it. He died in 1245. None of his other Comments upon Scripture have, as yet, been published, excepting that upon the Psalms, which is generally attributed to Cardinal Hugo; in the second Tome of whose Works it may be found.
James de Bordes, a Norman of Coutances, and a Capuchin, who died in 1669, of his age 75, wrote a Paraphrase, in two Volumes in fol. at Paris, 1658. and an Explanation of all the Figures of the Revelations, ibid. 1659, in fol. The Title of it is, Elucidatio Paraphrastica Apocalypsis Sancti Joannis.
Peter Bulinger, of Troies, Greek Professor, who died in 1590, made a large Comment; which was printed at Paris, in 1597, in 8vo. the second Edition. The Title is, Ecphrasis ac Scholia in Apocalypsim.
Nicholas Charpy, of Sainte Croix, wrote a French Comment, which was printed at Paris, in 1657, in 12mo. M. Du Pin says he died in 1670. that he was a Priest, and Doctor of Divinity.
We have spoken, in the Old Testament, of the Explanation and Version by John Desmaretz.
Varin. Desperieres wrote a Synopsis, in French, of the Secrets in the Revelations; printed at Paris, 1610, in 8vo.
Fredericus, a Venetian Dominican, published an Exposition in Italian; printed at Venice, 1515, in fol. He lived in 1348.
Gregory Ferrarius, an Italian likewise, and a Jesuit, made a Comment, in three Volumes in fol. printed at Milan, in 1654. It is divided into two Parts. He died in 1659.
Stephen Firman, who too was an Italian, and Canon-Regular of Lateran about 1570. wrote an Enarration in his own Language at Venice, and translated into Latin at Antwerp, 1581, in 8vo.
Garzia, or St. Thomas de Villanova, a Spaniard, and Bishop of Valentia, wrote an Exposition, which we find in the second Tome of his Works; printed at Antwerp, 1690, in 4to. He died in 1555.
Charles Hurè, whom we have mentioned above, joined his Notes upon the Revelations with those which he wrote upon the Acts, upon St. Paul’s, and the Canonical Epistles; printed at Paris, 1705, 1709. in seven Volumes in 8vo.
Peter Laserna, a Spaniard, of the Order de la Merci, about the Year 1633, wrote a Comment; printed in 1671.
Gaspar Melo, a Spaniard of Estramadura, of the Order of St. Austin, made a Comment likewise; which was printed at Valladolid, in 1589, in fol.
Andrew Pintus Ramirez, of Lisbon, a Jesuit, commented only the seven Epistles to the seven Churches of Asia; at Lyons, 1652, in fol. He died in 1654.
Peter Serrarius, of whom we have spoken in another Place, made a complete Comment; which was printed at Alcala, 1563, in fol. M. Benigne Bossuet, Bishop of Meaux, mentioned by us in the Article upon the Old Testament, has published a Comment on the Revelations; wherein he historically explains the principal Visions of this Book. This Explanation is one of those which are most esteemed; tho Vitringa was a violent Opposer of it, as we shall take notice lower. We have already said,
ARTICLE LXV. Protestant Commentators upon the Revelations. F the Protestants, we have Beza,
Oelsewhere, that this Work was printed at Paris, in 1689, in 8vo.
M. de la Chetardie, Curate of St. Sulpice at Paris, has since given us a Comment written in the same way, intitled, The Revelations explain’d by Ecclesiastical History, in order to prepossess Catholicks and new Converts against the wrong Interpretations of Protestant Divines; printed for Toubeau, at Bourges, 1692, in 8vo. and afterwards at Paris, with Brass Cuts, for Giffart, in 1701. At the end of this Piece are the Lives of some Emperors, principal Authors of the Persecutions of the Church; the Lives of Constantine and Helen, who were the principal Authors of the Church’s Peace and Deliverance.
M. Du Pin, in 1714, published an Analysis of this Book, containing a new, plain, and literal Explanation of it, clear’d of every thing that might divert the attention of the Reader. With this he has given us eleven Dissertations on the same Subject. He supposes, in general, that the three first Chapters of the Revelations relate to the particular Churches of Asia, and the three last to the end of the World, and the Day of universal Judgment; and that all the rest foretel, in general, the Persecutions suffered by the Faithful, the Punishment of Persecutors, and the Destruction of Idolatry.
In our Comment upon the Revelations, we have endeavoured, with some application, to shew, in an historical and very particular Account, that this Book contains a Prediction of the Church’s Sufferings, its Conflict, Victory, and Triumph; with the Fall of Idolatry, and idolatrous Rome.
A Key to the Revelations, by Noel Aubert de Versè; at Paris, 1703. in two Volumes in 8vo. This Author was first a Calvinist, and Socinian; but, being converted, he composed this Work as a proof of his Conversion, and to confute the dangerous Exposition of the Revelations by Jurieu. He believes the Death and Deification of Julius Cæsar to be as it were the Key, and unravelling of the whole; and affirms the Revelations to have been written under Nero, who, says he, sent St. John into banishment at Patmos. This Author died in 1714. whose Notes upon the Revelations are comprehended in those written by him upon the whole New Testament, printed in fol. several times at Geneva; and at Cambridge, 1642. the last, and fairest Edition.
Henry Bullinger has an hundred Sermons on this Book, printed at Zurich, 1604, in fol. the eighth Edition.
Sebastian Meyer, a Calvinist, and Minister of Bern, wrote a Comment upon the Revelations; printed at Zurich, 1603, in fol. the second Edition.
Francis Lambert made an Exegesis; ibid. 1539, in 8vo. the second Edition. We have already spoken of him. See his Title in the Index.
Out of these, and several others who have written upon the Revelations, Augustin Marlorat composed his Catena.
Viret, and Pugnet, have written on the same Book.
Campegius Vitringa has criticised M. Bossuet’s System upon the Revelations, in his Comment printed at Franekar, 1705, in 4to. and at Amsterdam, 1719. the second Edition, in 4to. and in 1721. See the Catalogue of his Works in the Bibliotheca Philologica, tom. 6. p. 735, 747.
John Marcki, his Comment upon the Revelations was printed at Amsterdam, in 1689, and 1699, in 4to. the second Edition, enlarg’d. It is only an exegetical Analysis. He was a Calvinist of Flanders, and Minister at Leyden.
Besides these, we have, in the large Criticks, Notes by Priceus, a Catholick, Zeger, Drusius, Grotius, Cameronius, Gualterius, Lorinus, and Lewis Capellus; and in the Synopsis, Hammond, Potter, Matthew Cotterius, John Cluverus, Patrick Forbes, Brightman, Pareus, Gerhardus Gravius, John Napier, Cocceius, James Durham, Henry More, Peter du Moulin, and some others, without reckoning those who have written upon all the Scripture, or even upon the whole New Testament.
It may, however, be proper to know, that Francis Potter put out only Explicatio numeri bestiæ, at Amsterdam, 1677, in 8vo. at Basil, 1678. in English at Oxford, 1642.
Matthew Cotterius wrote Expositio perpetua in Apocalypsim; printed separately at Saumur, in 1614, in 4to. and at Sedan, 1625. John Cluverus, Diluculum Apocalypticum; lypticum; at Goslar, 1621, in 8vo. and at Lubeck, 1647, in fol.
Forbes’s Comment, with Notes in English, at London, 1613, in fol. in Latin, at Amsterdam, 1646, in 4to. Thomas Brightman’s Analysis, and Scholia, with an universal Synopsis, and Confutation of Bellarmin, concerning Antichrist; at Frankfort, 1618, in 8vo. at London in English, 1644, in 4to.
David Parœus’s Comment at Heidelberg, 1618, and 1622, in 4to. Gerard Gravius’s Discourses are in German, printed at Hamburg, in 1657, in 4to. He also published Tabulæ Apocalypticæ, at Leyden, 1647, in fol. John Napier’s Comment is in German, printed at Frankfort, in 1627, in 4to. and in English at Edinburgh, in 1611.
Cocceius, or le Cock, has only put out Cogitationes de Apocalypsi. This is in the 5th Tome of his Works. James Durham, an Englishman, put out his Comment, in 1658, in fol. Henry More wrote Apocalypsis Apocalypseos; printed at London, in 1680, in 4to.
See in particular Lewis de Dieu on this Book, and Vitringa above-mentioned.
We must not omit Conrad Graserus, who wrote a Comment intitled, Plaga Regia; printed at Zurich, in 1610, in 4to. Martin Becanus, a Jesuit, who died in 1624, at 63 years of age, wrote an Examination of this Piece by Graserus; printed at Mentz, 1612, in 12mo.