And the LORD shall be king over all the earth: in that day shall there be one LORD, and his name one.
Ver. 9. And the Lord shall be king over all the earth] At the sounding of the seventh angel the kingdoms of this world shall become the kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ; and he shall reign for ever and over, Revelation 11:15; Revelation 11:17. Cosmographers tell us that if we divide all the known world into 30 parts, the heathen's part is as 19 of this 30; the Mahometans' as six, the Christians' as five only. And of those that profess the name of Christ, three parts, at least, of those five are possessed by idolatrous Papists; who say they believe in one only true God, but indeed set up many he saints and she saints, whom they adore with divine worship; and therein are no better than Pagans. Hence they are called Gentiles, Revelation 11:2, and are said to worship devils, Rev 9:20 cf. 1 Corinthians 10:20. Cardinal Bembus saith of their St Francis, that he was in numerum Deorum ab Ecclesia Rom. relatus. At Rureround, in Gelderland, a play was acted by the Jesuits, A. D. 1622, under the title of the apotheosis of St Ignatius, the founder of that order. In the year 610 Boniface IV ordained the feast of All-saints, after that he had obtained of the emperor the idol temple at Rome, called the Pantheon; wherein he placed the Virgin Mary in the place of Cybele, the mother of the heathen gods. Now the time is yet to come (and oh that it were come!) that, all false worship laid aside and abandoned, the fulness of the Gentiles shall be brought in; and from the Jews, as some gather from this text compared with others, shall the gospel go out to all nations of the world, Isaiah 2:3, who with one consent shall submit themselves to Christ. Asshur and Egypt, all those large and vast countries, the whole tract of the east and of the south, shall embrace the faith of Christ and be converted, Isaiah 19:23,25; Isa 27:12-13 Mic 7:11-12 Psalms 68:31; Psa 72:9-11 Revelation 21:14. O dieculam illam! O for a short time. Neither need we think it incredible; God can hiss for them and fetch them in suddenly; he can cause a nation to conceive and bring forth in one day, Isaiah 66:8,9. A text that Cardinal Pole, in a letter to Pope Julius III, abused, by applying it to the bringing in of Popery again so umversally and suddenly in Queen Mary's days.
Shall there be one Lord] Be the gods of the heathen good fellows, saith one, the true God is a jealous God, and will not share his glory with another. Be it that to Pagans and Papagans a there are gods many and lords many; to us there is but one God, and but one Mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus. As for all others, say we of them, as that heathen once did, Contemno minutos istos Deos modo Iovem propitium habeam, I care not for those petty deities, so long as Jehovah favoureth me. Hear, O Israel, saith Moses, Deuteronomy 6:4, Jehovah, thy God, Jehovah is one. The Hebrew word there used for one hath Daleth, the last letter, which also stands in number for four, extraordinary great in the original; Hebrew Text Note to signify, say the Jewish doctors, that this one God shall be worshipped in the four corners of the earth.
And his name one] That is, one way of worship; all superstitions being abolished, see Micah 4:5. Or, "his name," that is, his glory, as Psalms 8:1, his transcendant excellency shall be super eminent; he shall have a name above all names, that at the name of Jesus every knee may bow. Thus the word "name" is used both in divine and human authors, Genesis 6:1,4. Men of name, that is, of renown; so Numbers 1:16; Num 16:2 Acts 1:15, the number of names, that is, of the chieftains that were fit to act in the election. Contrary whereunto is men without name, Job 30:8, men written in the earth, Jeremiah 17:13, shrouded in the sheet of shame, and whose happiness it is to be forgotten in the city, Ecclesiastes 8:10. - ingloria vita recedit. So the poets call eminent and famous men Nomina, as Ovid doth Augustus:
“ Vive tibi, et longe Nomina magna fuge. ”
And speaking of some famous person, he
saith,
“ Claros inter habens nomina clara viros. ”
a A hostile formation:= Papist, Popish (with allusion to pagan). ŒD