Commentary on the Apocalypse

Section Fourteen

157 SECTION FOURTEEN Chapter 40 About the Angel Proclaiming the Imminence of the Future Judgment 14.6–7. 6 And I saw an angel flying in mid-heaven, with an eternal Gospel to evangelize those who dwell on earth, and every nation and tribe and tongue and people, 7 saying in a loud voice, “Fear God and give him glory, for the hour of his judgment has come; and worship him who made heaven and the earth and [the] sea and the fountains of water. he mid-heaven shows the angel, who appeared to be both high and heavenly, having been sent from above to the people below to lead up into heaven through this intermediate place by his own intercession in imitation of God, so as to unite the “body of the Church to Christ, our head,”1 and to predefine the eternal Gospel, as the one of eternity from God. He says this: fear God and do not be afraid of the Antichrist, “who does not have the power to kill the soul along with the body,”2 but [150] battle against him eagerly, for he rules for a little while because of the imminence of judgment and the reward of those who are steadfast. 1. Col 1.18, 24. 2. Mt 10.28. 158 ANDREW OF CAESAREA Chapter 41 About the Angel Announcing the Fall of Babylon 14.8. And another angel, a second one, followed, saying, “Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great! She has watered all nations from the wine of desire of her fornication.” Babylon is the name he significantly gives to the confusion of the world3 and to the tumult of daily life, which, as much as he foretells, is not yet to end. The wine of desire of fornication he calls not only the Bacchanalia of idolatry and the alienation of the mind, but also the drunkenness and lack of control which derives from each sin, according to which all those who are unfaithful4 to God, according to the saying of the Psalmist, will be utterly destroyed.5 Such a Babylon finally falls, and is completely overthrown in the appearance of the Jerusalem above, while the workers of transgression are sent “to the eternal fire.”6 [151] Chapter 42 About the Third Angel Warning the Faithful Not to Accept the Antichrist 14.9–10. 9 And another angel, the third one, followed them, saying in a loud voice, “If anyone worships the beast and its image, and receives a mark on his forehead or on his hand, 10 he also will drink the wine of God’s wrath, poured unmixed into the cup of his anger, and he will be tormented with fire and sulfur in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb. If anyone, it says, bows down to the beastly Antichrist and pursues the ungodly lifestyle modeling him, and either in word or in deed proclaims him God—for this can be clear by the mark given on the forehead and hand—he also will partake with him of the drink of the cup of vengeance, on the one hand 3. Gn 11.9, which provides the meaning of the word “Babel,” derived from the confusion of tongues. 4. Greek: πορνεύοντες, literally, to fornicate against God. 5. Ps 73(72).27. 6. Mt 18.8, 25.41. SECTION FOURTEEN 159 unmixed and separated from the divine mercies because of the righteous judgment, on the other hand having been poured with various punishments on account of the multiplicity and variety of its self-chosen wickedness. Appropriately is the punishment called the wine of wrath, being a consequence of the wine of impiety , making drunk those drinking from it, so that “whoever sins through them is also punished through them.”7 [152] 14.11a. And the smoke of their torment goes up for ever and ever. This smoke must imply either the labored breath that comes out along with the groaning of those being punished emanating up from below,8 or the smoke coming forth from the fire punishing those who have fallen. It is to go up for ever and ever, it says, that we might learn that it is endless, just as the bliss of the righteous , and in like manner also the torment of the sinners. 14.11b. And they have no rest, day or night, these worshipers of the beast and its...