The Revelation of Jesus Christ - The Herald

would be a brief one. However, it is reasonable to suppose this would be the case in view
of the Divine rule of progressive interpretation of prophecy.
In proving the above statements we quote first Irenaeus. In his book "Against Heresies,"
chapter 26, he says, "John in the Apocalypse . . . teaches us what the ten horns shall be,
[that is, the same] which were seen by Daniel."
We thus see that this Christian writer, who lived only about half a century after St. John's
day, linked together the vision of Daniel 7 with those visions that make up the much larger
part of the Apocalypse.
Another quotation from Irenaeus (Book V, chap. 30) shows that he believed that the
manifestation of Antichrist would require first the overthrow of the Empire of Rome then
existing. The quotation reads:
"Let them await, in the first place, the division of the kingdom into ten; then in the next
place, when these kings are reigning, and beginning to set their affairs in order, and
advance their kingdoms, let them learn to acknowledge, that he who shall come claiming
the kingdom [dominion] for himself . . . and containing the aforesaid number (666), is truly
the abomination of desolation."
It seems clear that this writer, who in all probability saw those who had conversed with St.
John, believed that the Apocalypse was already beginning to have its fulfillment in his day
(145 AD). His forecast, although he was ignorant of it, covered nearly four centuries, for it
is an indisputable fact of history that in 476 AD the Roman Empire fell, and shortly after,
in about 539 AD, the Bishop of Rome was occupying the seat of the Roman emperors in
the city of Rome, and was claiming supremacy in religious matters over all peoples of the
Roman earth; and at this time the territory of the Empire was occupied by ten kingdoms.
Hippolytus, who is said to have been a disciple of Irenaeus, held that the Babylon of the
Apocalypse meant Rome. Referring to this he says: "Tell me, blessed John, apostle and
disciple of the Lord, what didst thou see and hear concerning Babylon? Arise and speak
for it sent thee also into banishment."
Indeed, all the early Christian writers held to this view. Tertullian, who lived
contemporary with Irenaeus and Hippolytus, thus writes: "Babylon in our own John, [that
is, the Apocalypse] is a figure of the city of Rome, as being equally proud of her sway over
the saints."
Augustine, who was born 354 AD, in his book, City of God, says: "Rome, the second
Babylon, and the daughter of the first, to which it pleased God to subject the whole world,
and bring it all into one sovereignty is now founded." In another place he calls Rome, "the
western Babylon." In still another he says: "It has not been in vain that this city has
received the mysterious name of Babylon; for Babylon is interpreted confusion, as we have
said elsewhere."