A few things. — The Sinaitic MS. has “I have much against thee; but the reading, I have against thee that thou lettest alone, &c., is to be preferred.
Jezebel. — Some adopt the reading, “thy wife Jezebel.” From these words it has been thought that there was some personal influence at work for evil in Thyatira. Whether in the household of the “angel” or not is at least doubtful. The sin alleged against her is the same for which the Nicolaitanes are condemned — fornication, and the eating of things sacrificed to idols. If the above view be right, the leader of the exorcists is a woman — regarded by her followers as a prophetess, as one with a real message from God; but viewed by the Lord of the churches as a very Jezebel, teaching and seducing the servants of God. For letting her alone, for being timid, paying too much deference to her spiritual pretensions, for failing to see and to show that the so-called “deep things” of these teachers were depths of Satan, the chief minister is rebuked. A large number of respectable critics regard Jezebel as a name applied to a faction, not as belonging to an individual. It seems best to view the name as symbolical, always remembering that the Jezebel spirit of proud, self-constituted authority, vaunting claims of superior holiness, or higher knowledge, linked with a disregard of — and perhaps a proud contempt for — “legalism,” and followed by open immorality, has again and again run riot in the churches of God.