The Revelation of Jesus Christ - The Herald

order to the consumption of the daily holocausts and of the voluntary burnt-offerings and
peace offerings; as well as also to look to the ashes left from the burning, and take charge
of them as sacred things. Thus his bearing part in the prefigured judgment might seem to
indicate two things respecting it. (1) It indicated that it was as a sacrifice to the Divine
Justice that the vine was to be gathered, and its clusters trod in the wine-press; . . . the
heaven-derived altar-fire being the perpetual visible symbol among the Jews of God's
justice; . . . (2) It pointed to one special cause of God's wrath against the earth's inhabitants,
namely their slaughter of the martyrs; whose [symbolical] ashes, as of acceptable selfdevoted
holocausts, mixed with those of the great propitiatory burnt-offering, had long
been accumulating (under this angel's charge, it is to be supposed) beside the Apocalyptic
[symbolical] altar. Already early in the drama a voice had been heard by St. John from the
souls of the witnesses slain for Christ beneath the altar, 'Lord, how long dost Thou not
avenge our blood on those that dwell on the earth.' . . . Now, however (and perhaps with
some last notable act of martyrdom marking the epoch), the cry of this angel issuing forth
from the interior of, or hollow beneath the altar, proclaimed that their number was
completed; . . . the asserted power of the two witnesses to bring down fire from heaven
against their injurers to consume them, about to be fearfully illustrated before the world;
and the earth to disclose her blood, and no more cover her slain."
The following comment by Mr. Russell, which has special reference to the Great
Company's connection with this last "great time of trouble" (Rev. 7:9-11), in which the false
"vine of the earth" will be destroyed, is to the point and has an important bearing on this
symbolic angel and his cry. It was given in an explanation of the antitypical fulfillment of
the words of the Savior to the Jewish nation, "That upon you may come all the righteous
blood shed upon the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel unto the blood of Zacharias,
son of Barachias, whom ye slew between the temple and the altar." (Matt. 23:35.) The
comment follows:
"This was the 'wrath to the uttermost' which came upon Jerusalem and that seems to have
squared up the account so far as the past was concerned. A new beginning was made
there, just as a new dispensation began. The antitypical Priesthood and the antitypical
Levites then came on the scene, and throughout this Gospel Age also the Lord has taken
cognizance of the death of all His consecrated people. If any one is guilty of the death of
one of the Lord's saintly, consecrated ones, he brings himself under a special obligation
and responsibility. There seems to be a special charge of Justice against whoever is
culpable, or responsible for the death or persecution of His saints. There is a suggestion
along this line (Rev. 6:9,10), where the souls of those who were beheaded for the witness of
Jesus and the testimony of the Word of God are said to cry out, 'How long! How long! oh
Lord, dost Thou not judge and avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth.' This
seems to symbolically picture, not the crying of any individual, for these individuals were
dead and had no knowledge, no appreciation of the things at all--'the dead know not
anything'--but it was Justice that cried, as in Abel's case, after he was dead. They had
nothing to do with the crying of their blood. It was the voice of Justice."