Chapter 23 | Table of
Contents | Chapter 25
The Letters to the Seven Churches of Asia
W. M. Ramsay
1904
Chapter 24: The Letter to the Church in Thyatira
These things saith the Son of God, who hath his eyes like a flame of fire, and his
feet are like bright bronze:
I know thy works, and thy love and faith and ministry and patience, and that thy last
works are more than the first. But I have this against thee, that thou sufferest the woman
of thine, Jezebel, which calleth herself a prophetess; and she teacheth and seduceth my
servants to commit fornication, and to eat things sacrificed to idols. And I gave her time
that she should repent; and she willeth not to repent of her fornication. Behold, I set
her on a banqueting couch, and them that commit adultery with her, to enjoy great
tribulation, except they repent of her works. And I will kill her children with death; and
all the churches shall know that I am he which searcheth the reins and hearts: and I will
give unto each one of you according to your works. But to you I say, to the rest that are
in Thyatira, as many as have not this teaching, which know not the deep things of Satan,
as they say; I lay upon you no other burden. Howbeit that which ye have, hold fast till I
come.
And he that overcometh, and he that keepeth my works unto the end, to him will I give
authority over the nations: and he shall rule them with a rod of iron, as the vessels of
the potter are broken to shivers; as I also have received of my Father: and I will give
him the morning star.
He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith to the churches.
This is in many respects the most obscure, as it is certainly the longest, and probably
in a historical view the most instructive of all the Seven Letters. Its obscurity is
doubtless caused in a considerable degree by the fact that the history of Thyatira, and
the character and circumstances of the city in the first century after Christ, are almost
entirely unknown to us. Hence those allusions to the past history and the present
situation of affairs in the city, which we have found the most instructive and
illuminative parts of the letters to Ephesus, Smyrna, and Pergamum, are in the case of
Thyatira the most obscure. We have some idea of what were the proper topics for an orator
to enlarge on when he wished to please the people of Ephesus or Pergamum. We know how a
rhetorician like Aelius Aristides tickled the ears of the Smyrnaeans. We know what events
in the past history of those cities, as well as of Sardis, had sunk into the heart of the
inhabitants, and were remembered by all with ever fresh joy or sorrow. Even in the case of
the secondary cities, Laodicea and Philadelphia, we learn something from various ancient
authorities about the leading facts of their history and present circumstances, the
sources of their wealth, the staple of their trade, the disasters that had befallen them.
But about Thyatira we know extremely little. Historians and ancient writers generally
rarely allude to it, and the numerous inscriptions which have been discovered and
published throw little or no light (so far as we can at present detect) upon the letter
which we are now studying.
There is a considerable resemblance between the Thyatiran and Pergamenian letters.
Those were the only two of the Seven Cities which had been strongly affected by the
Nicolaitan teaching, and both letters are dominated by the strenuous hatred of the writer
for that heresy. Moreover, those two cities lay a little apart from the rest, away in the
north. They were the two Mysian cities of the Seven. Pergamum was always called a Mysian
city. Thyatira was sometimes called "the last, i.e. the most southerly, city of
Mysia"; and it stood in the closest relations with Pergamum, when the latter was the
capital of the Attalid kings; although, in the proverbial uncertainty of the Mysian
frontier, most people considered it a city of Lydia. It may therefore be presumed that the
two had a certain local character in common.
Accordingly, there may be traced a common type both in the preliminary addresses and in
the promises at the end of those two letters. The strength of authority, the sword as the
symbol of the power of life and death, the tessera inscribed with the secret name of
might--such are the topics that give character to the Pergamenian exordium and conclusion.
The Thyatiran letter proceeds from "the Son of God, who hath His eyes like a flame of
fire and His feet like unto brighter bronze" (the very hard alloyed metal, used for
weapons, and under proper treatment assuming a brilliant polished gleam approximating to
gold); to the victorious Christian of Thyatira is promised "authority over the
nations, and he shall rule them with a rod of iron as the vessels of the potter are broken
to shivers"; the terror and, as one might almost say, the cruelty of this promise is
mitigated by the conclusion, "and I will give him the morning star." The spirit
of the address and the promise is throughout of dazzlingly impressive might, the
irresistible strength of a great monarch and a vast well-ordered army.
The words which are used in this Thyatiran address have an appropriateness, which we
can only guess at. The term "chalkolibanos," which may be rather vaguely
rendered "bright bronze," never occurs except in the Apocalypse. Its exact sense
was doubtless known to the guild of the bronze-workers in Thyatira; but only the name of
this city guild has been preserved, without any information as to the industry which they
practised. This is one of the details on which better local knowledge would almost
certainly throw light.
It may be regarded as probable, though no other authority ever mentions this obscure
term, that chalkolibanos was made in Thyatira; but all that can be stated with certainty
is that the city was a trading and manufacturing centre, that we know of an exceptionally
large and varied series of trade-guilds in it, and that among them occurred the
bronze-smiths and modellers in bronze (either as two separate guilds or as one). The word
chalkolibanos occurs also in 1:15, but (as has been pointed out in chapter 13) the
description of "one like unto a son of man," 1:12ff, was obviously composed with
a view to the Seven Letters, so as to exhibit there, united in one personality, the
various characteristics which were to be thereafter mentioned separately in the letters.
Accordingly the chalkolibanos may probably have suggested itself in the first place for
the purposes of the Thyatiran letter; so that its use in 1:15 may be secondary, merely to
prepare for the letter.
The omission of the "sword" as the symbol of might also shows characteristic
accuracy in the choice of details. The sword was the symbol of higher official authority
according to the Roman usage. It shows, therefore, a marked appropriateness that the
writer should use the term "sword" in reference to Pergamum, the official
capital and seat of the Roman Proconsul, but avoid it in the case of Thyatira. On the
other hand the "rod of iron" is expressive of might that is not thought of as
associated with formal authority, but merely arises from innate strength. Thyatira could
not properly bear the sword, but only the iron bar.
The original character of Thyatira had been military. It was a colony of Macedonian
soldiers, planted to guard the long pass leading north and south between the Hermus Valley
and the Caicus Valley, between Sardis and Pergamum. Its tutelary deity was Tyrimnos,
originally apparently a hero, but merged in the divine nature as Apollo Tyrimnaios.
The hero is represented often as a horse-man with a double-edge battle-axe on his
shoulder, an appropriate deity for a military colony. The glitter and brilliance and
smashing power of a great army, or a military colony, or the Divine Author of the
Thyatiran letter, are embodied in him.
In short, just as in the case of Pergamum, so here again, the promise sets the true and
victorious Christian in the place and dignity of the Roman Emperor. Rome was the only
power on earth that exercised authority over the nations, and ruled them with a rod of
iron, and smashed them like potsherds: to the Roman State that description is startlingly
applicable. Accordingly the promise here designates the victor as heir to a greater, more
terrible, more irresistible strength than even the power of the mighty Empire with all its
legions. The opposition was more precisely and antithetically expressed in the case of
Pergamum, at least to the readers who were within the circle of ancient ideas and
education; though probably the modern mind is likely to recognise the antithesis between
the Church and the Empire more readily and clearly in the Thyatiran letter, since we at
the distance of nearly 2,000 years can more readily call up in imagination the military
strength of the Empire and its armies. But in the first century the minds of men were
filled and awed by the thought of the Emperor as the central figure of the whole earth,
concentrating on himself the loyal religious feelings of all nations, and holding in his
hands that complete authority, indefinable because too wide for definition, which the
autocrat of the civilised world exercised by the simple expression of his will; and that
is the idea to which the Pergamenian letter appealed.
It could not escape the attention of an Asian reader at that time that this
irresistible power and strength were promised to the city which was at that time the
smallest and feeblest, and in general estimation the least distinguished and famous, of
all the Seven Cities, except perhaps Philadelphia, which might vie with Thyatira for the
last place on the list.
The local surroundings of Thyatira accentuate this comparatively humble character of
its fortunes. It lies in the middle of a long valley between parallel ridges of hills of
no great elevation, which rise with gentle slope from the valley. Thus there is the most
marked contrast between the situation of Thyatira--now "sleeping safe in the bosom of
the plain" under the peace of the Roman rule, though (if any enemies had existed)
easily open to attack from every side, dominated by even those low and gentle ranges of
hills on east and west, beautiful with a gentle, smiling, luxuriant softness and
grace--and the proud and lofty acropolis of Sardis, or the huge hill of Pergamum, or the
mountain-walls of Ephesus and the castled hill of Smyrna, each with its harbour, or the
long sloping hillside on which Philadelphia rises high above its plain, or the plateau of
Laodicea, not lofty, yet springing sharp and bold from the plain of the Lycus, crowned
with a long line of strong walls and so situated on the protruding apex of a triangular
extent of hilly ground that it seems to stand up in the middle of the plain.
Military skill, such as the Pergamenian kings had at their command, could of course so
fortify Thyatira as to make it strong enough to hold the passage up the long valley. The
importance of the city to the kings lay in the fact that it guarded the road from the
Hermus Valley and the East generally to Pergamum. Its function in the world at first had
been to serve as attendant and guard to the governing royal city. Now, under the long
peace of the Imperial rule, it had become a town of trade and peaceful industry, profiting
by its command of a fertile plain and still more by its situation on a great road; and
beyond all doubt the military character of its foundation by the kings, as a garrison of
Macedonian soldiers to block the road to their capital from the south, was now only a
historical memory.
Thus Thyatira of all the Seven Cities seemed in every way the least fitted by nature
and by history to rule over the nations; and it could not fail to be observed by the Asian
readers as a notable thing, that the Church of this weakest and least famous of the cities
should be promised such a future of strength and universal power. Beyond all doubt the
writer of the Seven Letters, who knew the cities so well, must have been conscious of
this, and must have relied on it for the effect which he aimed at.
As we go through the Seven Letters point by point, each detail confirms our impression
of the unhesitating and sublime confidence in the victory of the Church which prompts and
enlivens them. The Emperor, the Roman State with its patriotism, its religion, and its
armies, the brutal populace of the cities, the Jews, and every other enemy of the Church,
all are raging and persecuting and slaying to the utmost of their power. But their power
is naught. The real Church stands outside of their reach, immeasurably above them, secure
and triumphant, "eternal in the heavens," while the individual Christians work
out their victory in their own life and above all by their death; so that the more
successfully the enemy kills them off, the more absolute is his defeat, and the more
complete and immediate is their victory. The weakest and least honoured among those
Christian martyrs, as he gains his victory by death, is invested with that authority over
the nations, which the proud Empire believed that its officials and governors wielded, and
rules with a power more supreme than that of Rome herself.
The conclusion of the promise, "I will give him the morning star,"
seems to have been added with the calculated intention of expressing the other side of the
Christian character. The honour promised was evidently too exclusively terrible. But the
addition must be in keeping with the rest of the promise. The brightness, gleam and
glitter, as of "an army with banners," which rules through the opening
address and the concluding promise, is expressed in a milder spirit, without the terrible
character, though the brilliance remains or is even increased, in the image of "the
morning star."
Having observed the close relation between the Pergamenian and the Thyatiran letter, we
shall recognise a similar analogy between the Ephesian and the Sardian, and again between
the Smyrnaean and the Philadelphian letters. Those six letters constitute three pairs; and
each pair must be studied not only in its separate parts, but also in the mutual relation
of the two parts. Only the Laodicean letter stands alone, just as Laodicea stood apart
from the other six, the representative of the distant and very different Phrygian land.
As usual, the letter proper begins with the statement that the writer is well
acquainted with the history and fortunes of the Thyatiran Church. The brief first
statement is entirely laudatory. "I know thy works, and thy love and faith and
ministry and patience, and that thy last works are more than the first." Whereas
Ephesus had fallen away from its original spirit and enthusiasm, Thyatira had grown more
energetic as time elapsed.
But after this complimentary opening, the letter denounces the state of the Thyatiran
Church in the most outspoken and unreserved way. It had permitted and encouraged the
Nicolaitan doctrine, and harboured the principal exponent of that teaching in the
Province.
We observe here, first of all, that the Nicolaitan doctrine had not caused any falling
off in the good deeds of the Church. On the contrary, it was probably the emulation
between the two parties or sections of the Church, and the desire of the Nicolaitans to
show that they were quite as fervent in the faith as the simpler Christians whose opinions
they desired to correct, that caused the improvement in the "works" of the
Thyatiran Church. We recognise that it was quite possible for Nicolaitans to continue to
cherish "love and faith and ministry and patience," and to improve in the active
performance of the practical work of a congregation (among which public charities and
subscriptions were doubtless an important part). Public subscriptions for patriotic and
religious purposes were common in the Graeco-Roman world; the two classes were almost
equivalent in ancient feeling; all patriotic purposes took a religious form, and though
only the religious purpose is as a rule mentioned in the inscriptions in which such
contributions are recorded, the real motive in most cases was patriotic, and the custom of
making such subscriptions was undoubtedly kept up by the Christian Church generally (see
Acts 11:29, 24:17; 1 Cor 16:1,2; 2 Cor 9:1-5). The Thyatiran Nicolaitans, true to their
cherished principle of assimilating the Church usage as far as possible to the character
of existing society, would naturally encourage and maintain the custom. It makes this
letter more credible in other points, that in this one it cordially admits and praises the
generosity of the whole Thyatiran Church, including the Nicolaitans.
It seems therefore to be beyond all doubt that, as a rule, the Nicolaitans of Thyatira,
with the prophetess as their leader, were still active and unwearied members of the
Church, "full of good works," and respected by the whole congregation for their
general character and way of life. The sentiment entertained with regard to them by the
congregation is attested by the letter: "Thou sufferest the woman Jezebel, which
calleth herself a prophetess, and she teacheth." It is evident that the lady who
is here so rudely referred to was generally accepted in Thyatira as a regular teacher, and
as a prophetess and leader in the Church. There was no serious, general, active opposition
to her; and therein lay the fault of the whole congregation; she had firmly established
herself in the approval of the congregation; and, as we have seen, she was so respected
because by her liberal and zealous and energetic life she had deserved the public esteem.
She was evidently an active and managing lady after the style of Lydia, the Thyatiran
merchant and head of a household at Philippi; and it is an interesting coincidence that
the only two women of Thyatira mentioned in the New Testament are so like one another in
character. The question might even suggest itself whether they may not be the same person,
since Lydia seems to disappear from Philippian history (so far as we are informed of it)
soon after St. Paul's visit to the city. But this question must undoubtedly be answered in
the negative, for it is utterly improbable that the hostess of St. Paul would ever be
spoken about so mercilessly and savagely as this poor prophetess is here. The prophetess
furnishes just one more example of the great influence exerted by women in the primitive
Church.
The extremely bitter and almost virulent tone in which the prophetess is spoken of
seems, therefore, not to be due to her personal character, but to be caused entirely by
the principles which she set forth in a too persuasive and successful way: she was
exercising an unhealthy influence, and her many excellent qualities made her the more
dangerous, because they increased the authority of her words. At the present day, when we
love milder manners and are full of allowance for difference of opinion and conduct in
others, the harshness with which disapproval is here expressed must seem inharmonious and
repellent. But the writer was influenced by other ways of thinking and different
principles of action; and we should not estimate either him or the prophetess by twentieth
century standards.
It may be added that I have read more than once Professor E. Schurer's paper on the
Thyatiran Jezebel--at first with admiration and interest, but with growing dissatisfaction
during subsequent thought, until in a final closer study of the whole Seven Letters it
seems to me to be entirely mistaken in its whole line of interpretation. He finds in
"Jezebel" a prophetess and priestess of the temple of a Chaldean Sibyl in
Thyatira, where a mixture of pagan rites with Jewish ideas was practised.
It is unnecessary here to dilate on the importance of the order of prophets in the
primitive Church; but we should be glad to know more about this Thyatiran prophetess, a
person of broad views and reasonable mind, who played a prominent pat in a great religious
movement, and perished defeated and decried. She ranks with the Montanist prophetesses of
the second century, or the Cappadocian prophetess about whom Firmilian wrote to Cyprian in
the third century; one of those leading women who seem to have emphasised too strongly one
side of a case, quite reasonable in itself, through failure to see the other side
sufficiently. They all suffer the hard fate of being known only through the mouth of
bitter enemies, whose disapproval of their opinions was expressed in the harsh,
opprobrious, half-figurative language of ancient moral condemnation. Thus for the most
part they are stigmatised as persons of the worst character and the vilest life.
We take a much more favourable view of the character of the lady of Thyatira than the
commentators usually do. Thus Mr. Anderson Scott speaks of her teaching as
"encouragement to licentiousness," and of the "libertinism which was taught
and practised in Thyatira"; and she is generally regarded as entirely false,
abandoned and immoral in her life and her teaching. This usual view is founded mainly on
the misinterpretation of 2:22, which will be explained in the sequel. It seems to us to
miss completely the real character and the serious nature of the question which was being
agitated at the time, and which probably was finally determined and set at rest by the
decision stated in the Seven Letters and in the oral teaching of the author. In this and
various other so-called "heresies" the right side was not so clear and
self-evident as it is commonly represented in the usual popularly accepted histories of
the Church and commentaries on the ancient authorities. The prophetess was not all
evil--that idea is absolutely contradictory of the already quoted words of the letter,
2:19--and the opposite party had no monopoly of the good in practical life.
The strong language of 2:20, 21 is due in part to the common symbolism found in the Old
Testament and elsewhere, describing the lapses of Israel into idolatry as adultery and
gross immorality. But in greater measure it is due to the fact that the idolatrous ritual
of paganism was always in practice associated with immoral customs of various kinds; that,
although a few persons of higher mind and nobler nature might perhaps recognise that the
immorality was not an essential part of the pagan ritual, but was due to degeneracy and
degradation, it was impossible to dissociate the one from the other; and that the
universal opinion of pagan society accepted as natural and justifiable and right--if not
carried to ruinous extremes--such a way of life, with such relations between the sexes, as
Christianity and Judaism have always stigmatised as vicious, degrading, and essentially
wrong. The principles of the Nicolaitans seemed to St. John certain to lead to an
acquiescence in this commonly accepted standard of pagan society, and he held that the
Nicolaitan prophetess was responsible for all that followed from her teaching. That he was
right no one can doubt who studies the history of Greek and Roman and West Asiatic
paganism as a practical force in human life. That there were lofty qualities and some high
ideals in those pagan religions the present writer has always recognised and maintained in
the most emphatic terms; but, in human nature, the inevitable tendency of paganism was
towards a low standard of moral life, as has been set forth more fully in an account of
the Religion of Greece and Asia Minor in Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible, vol.
v., pp. 109-155.
A third reason also determined the author to employ the strong language which occurs in
2:20. Evidently the decision of the Apostolic Council, though relating to a different
question, dictated the form which the author of the letter has employed. That decision was
evidently present in his memory as authoritative on an allied question; and he alludes to
it in an easily understood way, which he evidently expected his readers to appreciate. He
turns in verse 24 to address the section of the Thyatiran Church which had not accepted
the Nicolaitan teaching, and tells them that he lays no other burden upon them. The burden
which has been already imposed on all Christians by the Council is sufficient, "These
necessary things, that ye abstain from things sacrificed to idols...and from fornication"
(Acts 15:28). The expression, "no other burden," implies that the
necessary minimum burden is already before the writer's mind, and that he assumes it to be
also before the readers' mind; he assumes that the readers have already caught the
allusion in 2:20, "She teacheth and seduceth my servants to commit fornication and
to eat things sacrificed to idols," i.e., she teaches them to violate the
fundamental rule of the Apostolic Council. But, as he implies, while this minimum burden
must be borne and cannot be avoided by any sophistry and skilful religious
casuistry--which the Nicolaitans regarded as high transcendental conception of the things
of God, but which is really "the cryptic lore and deep lies of the devil"--he
imposes on them no further burden. This is sufficient, but it is inevitable: there is no
more to be said. The Nicolaitans explain this away, and thereby condemn themselves.
The following sentences are the one main source of all the little we can gather about
the Nicolaitan principles. The allusions in the Pergamenian letter, obscure in themselves,
become more intelligible when read in connection with the words here. The obscurity is due
to our ignorance of what was familiar to the original Asian readers. They were living
through these questions, and caught every allusion and hint that the writer of the letter
makes.
The questions which are here treated belong to an early period in the history of the
Church. They are connected with the general conduct of pagan converts in the Church. How
much should be required of them? What burdens should be imposed on them? The principles
that should regulate their conduct are here regarded, of course, from the point of view of
their relation to the general society of the cities in which they lived. They had for the
most part been members, and some of them leading members, of that society before their
conversion. We may here leave out of sight the Christianised Jews in the Asian
congregations, who had in a way been outside of ordinary pagan society from the beginning;
for, though they were a part, and possibly even an influential part, of the Church, yet
the Seven Letters were not intended specially for them, and hardly touch the questions
that most intimately concerned them. These letters are addressed to pagan converts, and
set forth in a figurative way the principles that they should follow in their relations
with ordinary society and the Roman State.
On the other hand, the relation of the pagan converts to Judaism is hardly alluded to
in the Seven Letters. That question was now past and done with; the final answer had been
given; there was no need for further instructions about it. In practice, of course, the
relation between Jewish Christians and pagan converts continued to exist in the
congregations; but the general principles were now admitted, and were of such a kind as to
place an almost impassable barrier between the national Jews and the Church. To the writer
of the Seven Letters, the Jews were the sham Jews, "the synagogue of Satan,"
according to a twice repeated expression: God had turned away from them, and had preferred
the pagan converts, who now were the true seed of Abraham: the sham Jews would have to
recognise the facts, accept the situation, and humble themselves before the Gentile
Christians: "Behold, I give of the Synagogue of Satan, of them which say they are
Jews and they are not, but speak falsely; behold I will make them to come and worship
before thy feet, and to know that I have loved thee." Thus the situation in the
Church was developed now far beyond what it had been in the time of St. Paul: and his
settlement of the Jewish question had been accepted completely by the Church, and is
stated as emphatically and aggressively here by this Jewish writer as by Paul himself.
It is unnecessary here to repeat the elaborate discussion of this subject which is
given in the Expositor, present series, vol. ii., pp. 429-444; vol. iii., pp.
93-110. There some of the many difficulties are described which presented themselves every
day to the converts from paganism. It was accepted on all hands that they were to continue
to live in the world, and were not to seek to withdraw entirely out of it (1 Cor 5:10).
There were certain accepted customs, rules of politeness and courtesy, ways of living and
acting, which were recommended by their gracious, refined, elegant character, and other
ways which without any special gracefulness were recommended simply because they were the
ordinary methods of behaviour. If we live in a long-established and cultivated society, we
must do many things, not because we specially approve of them, or derive pleasure or
advantage of any kind from them, but simply from consideration for the feelings of others,
who expect us to do as the rest of society does. There are even some things which we
hardly quite approve; and yet we do not feel that we ought to condemn them openly, or
withdraw in a marked way from social gatherings where they are practised. Such extremely
strict carrying out of our own principles would quickly become harsh, rude, and
misanthropic; and would justly expose any one who was often guilty of it to the charge of
self-conceit and spiritual pride.
How much might one accept; and what must one condemn? Such questions as these were
daily presenting themselves to the Christians in the Graeco-Roman cities; and they were
then almost invariably complicated by the additional difficulty that all established
usages, social customs, rules of polite conduct, forms of graceful courtesy, were (with
rare exceptions) implicated in and coloured by idolatrous associations. Grace before meat,
thanksgiving after food, were in the strictest sense slight acts of acknowledgment of the
kindness and the rights of pagan divinities. Such ceremonies had often become mere forms,
and those who complied with those customs were often hardly conscious of the religious
character of the action. How far was the Christian bound to take notice of their
idolatrous character and to avoid acting in accordance with them, or even to express open
disapproval of them? So far as we can gather, the rule laid down by St. Paul, and the
practice of the Church, was that only in quite exceptional, rare cases should open
disapproval of the customs of society be expressed; in many cases, where the idolatrous
connection was not obvious, but only veiled or remote, the Christian might (and perhaps
even ought to) comply with the usual forms, unless his attention was expressly called by
any one of the guests to the idolatrous connection; in that case the rude remark was
equivalent to a challenge to deny or affirm boldly his religion, and the Christian must
affirm his religion, and refuse compliance. Also, where the idolatrous character of the
act was patent and generally recognised, the Christian must refuse compliance. Hence there
was a general tendency among the Christians to avoid situations, offices, and paths of
life, in which the performance of idolatrous ceremonial was necessary; and on this account
they were generally stigmatised as morose, hostile to existing society, and deficient in
active patriotism, if not actually disloyal.
Besides these slighter cases, there were many of a much more serious character. The
Roman soldier, marching under the colours of his regiment, was marching under the standard
of idolatry, for the standards (signa) were all divine, and worship was paid to
them by the soldiers as a duty of the service, and all contained one or more idolatrous
symbols or representations; moreover he was frequently required, standing in his place in
the ranks, to take part in idolatrous acts of worship. The soldier could not retire and
take to some other way of life, for he was bound to the service through a long term of
years. Here, again, the rule and practice of the Church seems to have been that in
ordinary circumstances the converted soldier should remain passive, and as far as possible
silent, during the ceremony at which he was compulsorily present, but should not actively
protest. A similar practice was encouraged by the Church in other departments of life and
work. But in every case, and in every profession, the Christian, who in ordinary
circumstances might remain passive and unprotesting, was liable to be pointedly challenged
as to whether he would willingly perform this act of worship of the deity whom he
considered false. In case of such a challenge, there was only one course open. The
Christian could not comply with a demand which was expressly made a test of his faith.
But apart from those many doubtful cases where the right line of conduct was difficult
to determine and might vary according to circumstances, there was a large number of cases
in which the decision of the early leaders of the Church was absolute and unvarying. In
whatsoever society, or company, or meeting, or ceremonial, the condition of presence and
membership lay in the performance of pagan ritual as an express and declared act of
religion, the Christian must have no part or lot, and could not accept membership or even
be present. Here the Nicolaitans took the opposite view, and could defend their opinion by
many excellent, thoroughly reasonable and highly philosophic arguments. To illustrate this
class of cases, we may take an example of a meeting which was permissible, and of one
which was not, according to the opinion of those early leaders of the Church. A meeting of
the citizens of a city for political purposes was always inaugurated by pagan ritual, and
according to the strict original theory the citizens in this political assembly were all
united in the worship of the patron national deity in whose honour the opening ceremonies
were performed; but the ritual had long become a mere form, and nobody was in practice
conscious that the condition of presence in the assembly lay in the loyal service of the
national deity. The political condition was the only one that was practically remembered:
every member of a city tribe had a right to be present and vote. The Christian citizen
might attend and vote in such a meeting, ignoring and passing in silence the opening
religious ceremony.
But, on the other hand, there were numerous societies for a vast variety of purposes,
the condition of membership in which was professedly and explicitly the willingness to
engage in the worship of a pagan deity, because the society met in the worship of that
deity, the name of the society was often a religious name, and the place of meeting was
dedicated to the deity, and thus was constituted a temple for his worship. The Epistles of
Paul, Peter, Jude, and the Seven Letters, all touch on this topic, and all are agreed: the
true Christian cannot be a member of such clubs or societies. The Nicolaitans taught that
Christians ought to remain members; and doubtless added that they would exercise a good
influence on the societies by continuing in them.
This very simple and practical explanation will, doubtless, seem to many scholars to be
too slight for the serious treatment that the subject receives in the two letters which we
are studying. Such scholars regard grave matters of dogma as being the proper subject for
treatment in the early Christian document; they will probably ridicule the suggestion that
the question, whether a Christian should join a club or not, demanded the serious notice
of an apostle, and declare that this was the sort of question on which the Church kept an
open mind, and left great liberty to individuals to act as they thought right (just as
they did in regard to military service, magistracies, and other important matters); and
they will require that Nicolaitanism should be regarded from a graver dogmatic point of
view. The present writer must confess that those graver subjects of dogma seem to him to
have been much over-estimated; it was not dogma that moved the world, but life.
Frequently, when rival parties and rival nations fought with one another as to which of
two opposed dogmas was the truth, they had been arrayed against one another by more
deep-seated and vital causes, and merely inscribed at the last the dogmas on their
standards or chose them as watchwords or symbols. We are tired of those elaborate
discussions of the fine, wire-drawn, subtle distinctions between sects, and those
elaborate discussions of the principles involved in heresies, and we desire to see the
real differences in life and conduct receive more attention.
It is not difficult to show how important in practical life was this question as to the
right of Christians to be members of social clubs. The clubs were one of the most
deep-rooted customs of Graeco-Roman society: some were social, some political, some for
mutual benefit, but all took a religious form. New religions usually spread by means of
such clubs. The clubs bound their members closely together in virtue of the common
sacrificial meal, a scene of enjoyment following on a religious ceremony. They represented
in its strongest form the pagan spirit in society; and they were strongest among the
middle classes in the great cities, persons who possessed at least some fair amount of
money and made some pretension to education, breeding and knowledge of the world. To hold
aloof from the clubs was to set oneself down as a mean-spirited, grudging, ill-conditioned
person, hostile to existing society, devoid of generous impulse and kindly neighbourly
feeling, an enemy of mankind.
The very fact that this subject was treated (as we have seen) so frequently, shows that
the question was not easily decided, but long occupied the attention of the Church and its
leaders. It was almost purely a social and practical question; and no subject presents
such difficulties to the legislator as one which touches the fabric of society and the
ordinary conduct of life. In 1 Corinthians (as was pointed out in the Expositor,
loc. cit., ii., p. 436) the subject, though not formally brought before St. Paul for
decision, was practically involved in a question which was submitted to him; but he did
not impose any absolute prohibition; and he tried to place the Corinthians on a higher
plane of thought so that they might see clearly all that was involved and judge for
themselves rightly.
After this the question must have frequently called for consideration, and a certain
body of teaching had been formulated. It is clear that the Pergamenian and Thyatiran
letters assume in the readers the knowledge of such teaching as familiar; and 2 Peter
2:1ff refers to the same formulated teaching (Expositor, loc. cit., iii. p. 106ff).
This teaching quoted examples from Old Testament history (especially Balaam or Sodom and
Gomorrah) as a warning of the result that must inevitably follow from laxity in this
matter; it drew scathing pictures of the revelry, licence and intoxication of spirit which
characterised the feasts of these pagan religious societies, where from an early hour in
the afternoon the members, lounging on the dining-couches, ate and drank and were amused
by troops "of singing and of dancing slaves"; it argued that such periodically
recurring scenes of excitement must be fatal to all reasonable, moderate, self-restraining
spirit. The steadily growing body of formulated moral principles on the subject was set
aside by the Nicolaitans, who taught, on the contrary (as is said in 2 Peter, loc. cit.),
that men should have confidence in their own character and judgment, and who promised to
set them free from a hard law, while they were in reality enticing back to lascivious
enjoyment the young converts who had barely "escaped the defilements of the world."
The author of the letters now before us depends for his effect on the knowledge, which
he assumes his readers to possess, of such striking pictures as that in 2 Peter of the
revels accompanying club-feasts. Such revels were not merely condoned by pagan opinion,
but were regarded as a duty, in which graver natures ought occasionally to relax their
seriousness, and yield to the impulses of nature, in order to return again with fresh zest
to the real work of life. St. John had himself often already set before his readers orally
the contrast between that pagan spirit of liberty and animalism, and the true Christian
spirit; and had counselled the Thyatiran prophetess to wiser principles.
Thus, this controversy was of the utmost importance in the early Church. It affected
and determined, more than any other, the relation of the new religion to the existing
forms and character of Graeco-Roman city society. The real meaning of it was this--should
the Church accept the existing forms of society and social unions, or declare war against
them? And this again implied another question--should Christianity conform to the
existing, accepted principles of society, or should it force society to conform to its
principles? When the question is thus put in its full and true implication, we see
forthwith how entirely wrong the Nicolaitans and their Thyatiran prophetess were; we
recognise that the whole future of Christianity was at stake over this question; and we
are struck once more with admiration at the unerring insight with which the Apostles
gauged every question that presented itself in the complicated life of that period, and
the quick sure decision with which they seized and insisted on the essential, and
neglected the accidental and secondary aspects of the case. We can now understand why St.
John condemns that very worthy, active, and managing, but utterly mistaken lady of
Thyatira in such hard and cruel and, one had almost said, unfair language; he saw that she
was fumbling about with questions which she was quite incapable of comprehending, full of
complacent satisfaction with her superficial views as to the fairness and reasonableness
of allowing the poor to profit by those quite praiseworthy associations which did so much
good (though they contained some regrettable features which might easily be ignored by a
philosophic mind), and misusing her influence, acquired by good works and persuasive
speaking, to lead her fellow-Christians astray. If she were successful, Christianity must
melt and be absorbed into the Graeco-Roman society, highly cultivated, but over-developed,
morbid, unhealthy, "fast" (in modern slang). But she would not be successful.
The mind which could see the Church's victory over the destroying Empire consummated in
the death of every Christian had no fear of what the lady of Thyatira might do. "I
will kill her children (i.e., her disciples and perverts) with death; and all the Churches
shall know that I am he which searcheth the reins and hearts." Probably
"death" is here to be understood as "incurable disease," according to
the universal belief that disease (and especially fever, in which there is no visible
affection of any organ) was the weapon of Divine power.
It was a hard and stern discipline, which undoubtedly left out some of the most
charming, right and lovable sides of life and human nature; but it may be doubted if any
less stern discipline could have availed to teach the world as it then was and bend it to
the reign of law. It is a case similar to that of Scotland under the old Calvinistic
regime, stern and hard and narrow; but would any milder and more lovable rule ever have
been able to tame a stubborn and self-willed race, among whom law had never before been
able to establish itself firmly?
And as to the prophetess, she had had long time to think and to learn wisdom; the
question had been agitated for a great many years; but she had learned nothing and
forgotten nothing, and only clung more closely to the policy of compromising with
idolatry. Her end is expressed with a grim irony, which was probably far more full of
meaning to the Thyatirans than to modern readers: there are allusions in the passage that
escape us. She should have her last great sacrificial meal at one of those associations.
"I set her on a dining-couch, and her vile associates with her, and they shall have
opportunity to enjoy great--tribulation: unless they repent, for she has
shown that she cannot repent."
Probably, part of the effect of this denunciation depends on the ancient custom and
usage as regards women. Though women had in many respects a position of considerable
freedom in Anatolian cities, as has been pointed out by many writers, yet it may be
doubted whether ladies of good standing took part in the club-dinners. We do not know
enough on the subject, however, to speak with any confidence; and can only express the
belief that the status of ladies in the Lydian cities lent point to this passage. Possibly
thus to set her down at the dinner table was equivalent to saying that in her own life she
would show the effect of the principles which she taught others to follow, and would sit
at the revels like one of the light women. That women were members of religious
associations (though not, apparently, in great numbers) is of course well know; but that
is only the beginning of the question. What was their position and rule of life? How far
did thy take part in the meal and revel that followed the sacrifice? To these questions an
answer has yet to be discovered.
It may be regarded as certain that the importance of the trade-guilds in Thyatira made
the Nicolaitan doctrine very popular there. The guilds were very numerous in that city,
and are often mentioned in great variety in the inscriptions. It was, certainly, hardly
possible for a tradesman to maintain his business in Thyatira without belonging to the
guild of his trade. The guilds were corporate bodies, taking active measures to protect
the common interests, owning property, passing decrees, and exercising considerable
powers; they also, undoubtedly, were benefit societies, and in many respects healthy and
praiseworthy associations. In no other city are they so conspicuous. It was therefore a
serious thing for a Thyatiran to cut himself off from his guild.
To the remnant of the Thyatiran Church--those who, while suffering the prophetess, and
not showing clearly that they "hated the works of the Nicolaitans," yet had not
actively carried out her teaching in practice--one word was sufficient. It was enough that
they should follow the established principle, and act according to the law as stated in
the Apostolic Council at Jerusalem. No burden beyond that was laid upon them; but that
teaching they must obey, and that burden they must bear, until the coming of the Lord.
NOTE.--A confirmation of the suggestion made above may be found in an inscription just
published in Bulletin de Corresp. Hellen., 1904, p. 24. A leading citizen is there
recorded to have given a dinner, as part of a religious ceremony, to all the male and
female community; and the men dined in one temple and the women in another.
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