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Eureka

AN EXPOSITION OF THE APOCALYPSE
Sixth Edition, 1915
By Dr. John Thomas (first edition written 1861)

 

 

Chapter 4

Section 2 Subsection 2

Of the Number "Twenty-Four"


 
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The twenty-four elders in the temple are a verification in symbol of these promises. The Lamb is there in the midst of them, and all tears are dried from their eyes. They are before the throne, and in the temple ready for service continually. The white garments with which they had been invested indicate the priestly office of the elders. They are "clothed with salvation" (Psa. cxxxii. 16), having been raised from among the dead, and invested with holy spirit nature consubstantially with the High Priest sitting upon the throne. They are victor kings as well as priests, as indicated by their wreaths of gold; and they are "elders," because representatives of their class. Each elder is the symbol of an order, all the immortals being apportioned into twenty-four orders of royal priests after the type of David’s divisions of the Sons of Aaron into four and twenty orders (1 Chron. xxiv). Aaron was a type of Christ in his family and official relations, though not his order. He had two sons, Eleazar and Ithamar; the former name signifying "God is his helper;" and the latter, "the place of Palm Trees." In David’s time, Zadok was the chief of Aaron’s sons in the line of Eleazar; and Ahimelech of those of Ithamar. Zadok signifies "the just one," and Ahimelech "the brother of the king." The interpretation of these names collectively is "God is (Israel’s) helper" in "the place of palm trees," by "the Just One," the "fellow of the King. "There were more chief men of the sons of Eleazar than of the sons of Ithamar. There were sixteen of the former, and eight of the latter; which together made twenty-four elders at the head of as many orders of priests, descendants of Aaron in the kingdom of David, that they might be princes of the sanctuary, and princes of the Elohim.

Such being the priestly arrangement in David’s kingdom, the symbols representative of it in the restoration of the constitution, "as in the days of old," are derived from its ancient polity. When the Lord Jesus shall sit upon David’s throne, "he will sit and rule as a priest upon the throne, and bear the glory;" and as High Priest be the head of the houses of Eleazar and Ithamar, which are represented by the numbers sixteen and eight, or twenty-four. According to this, Eleazar and Ithamar constitute his priestly household. Sixteen of the Elders in John’s vision are figuratively of the house of Eleazar, and eight of the house of Ithamar; or, if named by their representatives in the time of David, sixteen are of the house of Zadok, and eight of the house of Ahimelech. Not, however, fleshly descendants of these men; for in the reconstruction of the government of Israel’s commonwealth, "the flesh profits nothing." All in Christ are "made priests for the Deity," by the fact of being in him; and as he takes the place of Aaron, all in him take the place of Aaron’s sons, and become, by adoption, thus the sons of Zadok. This change of persons does not alter the ordering of things. The twenty-four orders of priests will still obtain in the restored kingdom of David; and are therefore foreshadowed in John’s vision as encircling the throne. Collectively, they are Zadok, the just, and Ithamar, "the place of palm trees;" for they are washed from their sins in the blood of the Just One; and are represented in ch. vii. 9, as "before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, and palms in their hands;" the emblems of salvation and victory. They are also Ahimelech in the presence of David’s Son. They are many in one; all of them the children of a King; children given to Jesus for his brethren; and therefore collectively "the brother of the King," or Christadelphians.

These twenty-four elders, then, are the twenty-four orders of the sons of Zadok, who shall enter into the sanctuary of Yahweh Elohim, and come near to His table to minister unto Him, and shall keep His charge (Ezek. xliv. 15,16). The flesh and blood descendants of Aaron, who ministered in the holy and most holy places in the Mosaic Olahm, will not be permitted in the Millennial Aion to come near unto the throne encircled by the elders. "They shall not come near unto me, saith Yahweh Elohim, to do the office of priest unto me, nor to come near to any of my holy things in the Most Holy; but they shall bear their shame, and their abominations which they have committed. But I will make them keepers of the charge of the house, for all the service thereof, and for all that shall be done therein" (verses 13,14). Thus the natural descendants of Aaron are degraded to an inferior station in the new heavens and earth. They were unfaithful to the Deity under the law. They turned their backs upon him when Israel went astray after their idols, before which they ministered, and caused them to fall into iniquity; and "therefore, saith Yahweh Elohim, I lifted up my hand against them, and they shall bear their iniquity." This they will have to do during the thousand years; in which the saints will fill up the vacancy created by their degradation from their ancient rank near the throne to that of standing before the people to minister to them (verse 11).

But besides the twenty-four orders of Aaron’s sons, there were, in the ecclesiastical department of David’s kingdom, twenty-four orders of Levites, sons of Asaph, Heman, and Jeduthun, whom he separated for the temple service, "to prophesy with harps, with psalteries, and with cymbals, to give thanks and to praise Yahweh Tz’vaoth." The number of those "who were instructed in the songs of Yahweh," were two hundred and eighty-eight, and were divided into twenty-four companies of twelve each, "as well the small as the great, the teacher as the scholar" being reckoned in each twelve (1 Chron. xxv. 1,3,7). These were also typical of those symbolized by the twenty-four elders who were represented to John in ch. v. 8, as "having each one harps and golden censers full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints; and they sang a new song." There are twenty-four symbolical elders because the sons of the High Priest and the singers who did the service of the temple under David’s reign were twenty-four orders each; and in the aggregate typified the saints, the Elohim of Israel, who shall perform the temple service of the restored kingdom of David, when David’s Son, the "Greater than Solomon," shall be High Priest of the kingdom after the Order of Melchizedec. The twenty-four elders represent both the priests and singers of the Ezekiel Temple which is to be built by "the man whose name is The Branch" (Zech. vi. 12,15). There will be twenty-four orders "as in the days of old" (Amos ix. 11); who will be "the harpers harping with their harps, and singing a new song" (Apoc. xiv. 2,3); even "the song of Moses, the servant of God, and the song of the Lamb" (xv. 2-4).

First in design, last in execution, is the order of the apocalyptic visions. The Spirit designs the priestly manifestation of the kingdom, as exhibited in the beginning of this fourth chapter; but it will be the last in execution, for the manifestation cannot obtain until the saints have become victorious over the potentates of the earth. "The victor shall be clothed in white garments;" and it is stated that "the twenty-four elders had been invested with white garments;" which is as much as to say that their wars were over; that they had destroyed the Fourth Beast of Daniel; and that they had taken possession of the kingdom under the whole heaven, and were now entered upon their priestly functions in the presence of the Melchizedec High Priest sitting upon the rainbowed or covenanted throne "in the day of rain."

 

 


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