seems to embody and gather together in a personification the powers, the character, the history and life and

unity of the Church. The angel represents the Divine presence and the Divine power in the Church; he is the

Divine guarantee of the vitality and effectiveness of the Church.

This seems clear; but the difficulty begins when we ask what is the relation of the angel to the faults and

sins of his Church, and, above all, to the punishment which awaits and is denounced against those sins.

The Church in Smyrna or in Ephesus suffers from the faults and weaknesses of the men who compose it: it is

guilty of their crimes, and it will be punished in their person. Is the angel, too, guilty of the sins? Is he to

bear the punishment for them?

Undoubtedly the angel is touched and affected by the sins of his Church. Nothing else is conceivable. He

could not be the counterpart or the double of a Church, unless he was affected in some way by its failings.

But the angels of the Churches are addressed, not simply as touched by their faults, but as guilty of them.

Most of the angels have been guilty of serious, even deadly sins. The angel of Sardis is dead, though he

has the name of being alive. The angel of Laodicea is lukewarm and spiritless, and shall be rejected. Threats,

also, are directed against the angels: "I will come against thee," "I will spit thee out of my mouth," "I will

come to thee" (or rather "I will come in displeasure at thee" is the more exact meaning, as Professor Moulton

points out). Again, the angel is regarded as responsible for any neglect of the warning now given, "and

thou shalt not know what hour I will come upon thee": "thou art the wretched one, and poor, and miserable,

and blind, and naked."

These expressions seem to make it clear that the angel could be guilty, and must suffer punishment for his

guilt. This is certainly surprising, and, moreover, it is altogether inconsistent with our previous conclusion

that the angel is the heavenly counterpart of the Church. He who is guilty and responsible for guilt cannot

stand anywhere except on the earth.

The inconsistency, however, is due to the inevitable failure of the writer fully to carry out the symbolism. It

is not so difficult to follow out an allegory perfectly, so long as the writer confines himself to the realm of

pure fancy; but, if he comes into the sphere of reality and fact, he soon finds that the allegory cannot be

wrought out completely; it will not fit the details of life. When John addresses the angels as guilty, he is no

longer t hinking of them, but of the actual Churches which he knew on earth. The symbolism was

complicated and artificial; and, when he began to write the actual letters, he began to feel that he was

addressing the actual Churches, and the symbolism dropped from him in great degree. Nominally he

addresses the Angel, but really he writes to the Church of Ephesus or of Sardis; or rather, all distinction

between the Church and its angel vanishes from his mind. He comes into direct contact with real life, and

thinks no longer of correctness in the use of symbols and in keeping up the elaborate and rather awkward

allegory. He writes naturally, directly, unfettered by symbolical consistency.

The symbolism was imposed on the writer of the Apocalypse by the rather crude literary model, which he

imitated in obedience to a prevalent Jewish fashion. He followed his model very faithfully, so much so that

his work has by some been regarded as a purely Jewish original, slightly modified by additions and

interpolations to a Christian character, but restorable to its original Jewish form by simple excision of a few

words and paragraphs. But we regard the Jewish element in it as traditional, due to the strong hold which

this established form of literature exerted on the author. That element only fettered and impeded him by its

fanciful and unreal character, making his work seem far more Jewish than it really is. Sometimes, however,

the traditional form proves wholly inadequate to express his thoughts; and he discards it for the moment

and speaks freely.

It is therefore vain to attempt to give a rigidly accurate definition of the meaning which is attached to the

term "angel" in these chapters. All that concerns the angels is vague, impalpable, elusive, defying analysis

and scientific precision. You cannot tell where in the Seven Letters, taken one by one, the idea "angel"

drops and the idea "Church" takes its place. You cannot feel certain what characteristics in the Seven

Letters may be regarded as applying to the angels, and what must be separated from them. But the vague