How this passage has been read — the sources, oldest to newest.
From the early Church Fathers to now.
A.D. 735A.D. 804
2 Patristic witnesses · 1 Medieval witness
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Patristicbefore A.D. 750
Bede · A.D. 673–735A.D. 735
“And the seventh angel sounded his trumpet, etc. The first six trumpets, compared to the ages of this present world, announced various conflicts of wars for the Church. But the seventh, the herald of eternal Sabbath, proclaims only the victory and dominion of the true king.”
“And the seventh sounded the trumpet: and there were great voices in heaven. This seventh angel sounds the trumpet as the Lord appears for the judgment. By this angel we understand the Church, no longer preaching, but singing mercy and judgment for the Lord. This is why the angel standing upon the earth and the sea swears that time shall be no longer but the end will come with the seventh trumpet. The great voices in heaven, that is in the Church, are thanksgivings; and it is right to call them great, because a great desire is arising concerning great things. John shows where these voices come from, adding, saying: The kingdom of this world— that is the kingdom in which the old enemy used to reign — is become God's and his Christ's, and they shall reign for ever and ever. In them, that is the Father and the Son, the Trinity is understood.”
“As a detour, the vision recounts the matters concerning the two witnesses, who are identified as prophets, and elaborates on all that pertains to them, focusing on their origin and where they have come from. They have come forth from the holy restitution of the future, and that the number of those from the nations surpasses that of Israel, and that those who have pleased God in the New Covenant exceed those in the Old.
And it states that when the seventh angel sounded his trumpet, voices were heard in heaven proclaiming that the kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of God and of His Christ. God always reigns, and He neither began nor will cease to reign over heaven and earth and all things visible and invisible within them, but He is the Ruler and Lord of all things without beginning and without end. Since men also became kings on earth, God had a certain way of sharing kingship with them; but when the earthly kingdom of men is dissolved at the end of the present age, only God will reign. Therefore, it has been said that the kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of God and of His Christ, with the men who ruled on earth and the tyrannical demons having been destroyed and ceased.”
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