Revelation 4:1 - Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible

Bible Comments

REVELATION CHAPTER 4 Revelation 4:1-3 John seeth the throne of God in heaven, Revelation 4:4,5 encompassed with four and twenty elders, Revelation 4:6,7 and four beasts full of eyes before and behind. Revelation 4:8-11 The continual adoration and worship offered by the beasts and elders before him that sat on the throne. After this; after I had the first vision, mentioned Revelation 1:1-20, and had written what it was the pleasure of God I should write to the churches, in a book, perceiving the way God designed to reveal himself to me was by vision. I looked; I looked again, hoping and being desirous to see something further as to the mind of God. And, behold, a door was opened; I saw the heavens opened, as Matthew 3:16 Acts 7:56. In heaven; he, doubtless, meaneth the third heavens. Such a vision, as to this particular, John had at Christ's baptism, Matthew 3:1-17, and Stephen when he was stoned. He also heard the voice of one speaking aloud to him, like the voice he heard, Revelation 1:10; which said, Come up hither, into heaven, the new Jerusalem which is above; as the old Jerusalem stood upon a hill, or rising ground, so as they who went thither are constantly said to go up, Isaiah 2:3 Acts 11:2 Galatians 1:17,18 Galatians 2:1. And I will show thee things which must be hereafter; not which have been, (for to what purpose had that been)? But which shall happen hereafter both to my church and to her enemies: from which it appears, that God did not here show his prophet the destruction of Jerusalem, for that was already past, in the time of Titus Vespasian the Roman emperor, about the year 69, or 70, after the incarnation; this (as all confess) was in Domitian's time, about the 11th or 12th year of his reign, about twenty-six or twenty-seven years after that was past, which makes the notion of two late annotators very strange.

Revelation 4:1

1 After this I looked, and, behold, a door was opened in heaven: and the first voice which I heard was as it were of a trumpet talking with me; which said,Come up hither, and I will shew thee things which must be hereafter.