And there was given me a reed like unto a rod: and the angel stood, saying, Rise, and measure the temple of God, and the altar, and them that worship therein.
This Revelation 11:1-19 is a compendious summary of, and introduction to, the detailed prophecies of the same events to come, in Revelation 12:1-17; Revelation 13:1-18; Revelation 14:1-20; Revelation 15:1-8; Revelation 16:1-21; Revelation 17:1-18; Revelation 18:1-24; Revelation 19:1-21; Revelation 20:1-15. Hence, occur anticipatory allusions to subsequent prophecies (cf. Revelation 11:7, "the beast that ascendeth out of the bottomless pit" (not mentioned before), with the detailed accounts, Revelation 13:1; Revelation 13:11; Revelation 17:8; also Revelation 11:8, "the great city," with Revelation 14:8; Revelation 17:1; Revelation 17:5; Revelation 18:10).
And the angel stood. So B, Syriac; omitted in A 'Aleph ('), Vulgate, Coptic. If it be omitted, the reed will agree with "saying." So Wordsworth. The canon [from qaneh (H7070), "a reed"] of Scripture, the measuring reed of the Church, our rule of faith, speaks. So Revelation 16:7, the altar is personified speaking (cf. note). The Spirit speaks in the canon. (John it was who completed the canon.) So Victorinus.
Like unto a rod - straight; of iron (Revelation 2:27), unbending, destroying all error, that 'cannot be broken' (Hebrews 1:8, "a rod," or 'sceptre of straightness,' margin). Added to guard against the reed being thought to be one 'shaken by the wind.' In the abrupt style of the Apocalypse, "saying" may be indefinite for 'one said.' Wordsworth's view agrees with the Greek. So Andreas of Cesarea, in the end of the fifth century (note, Revelation 11:3-4).
The temple, х naon (G3485), distinguished from hieron (G2411), or temple in general] - the Holy Place, 'the sanctuary.'
The altar - of incense, for it alone was in the sanctuary. The measurement of the Holy Place seems to stand parallel to the sealing of the elect of Israel under the sixth seal. It implies, there shall be always an inner true Church, however the outer courts of hollow profession, without self-dedication, be desecrated. God's elect are symbolized by the sanctuary at Jerusalem (1 Corinthians 3:16-17, where the same х naos (G3485)] occurs for "temple" as here). Literal Israel in Jerusalem, with the temple restored (Ezekiel 40:3; Ezekiel 40:5, where also the temple is measured with the measuring reed; Ezekiel 41:1-26; Ezekiel 42:1-20; Ezekiel 43:1-27; Ezekiel 44:1-31), shall stand at the head of the elect Church. The measuring implies at once the exact proportions of the temple to be restored, and the definite completeness (not one wanting) of the numbers of the Israelite and of the Gentile elections. The literal temple at Jerusalem shall be typical forerunner of the heavenly Jerusalem, in which there shall be all temple-no portion exclusively temple.
John's accurately distinguishing in subsequent chapters between God's servants and these who bear the mark of the beast, is the way whereby he fulfils the direction given him to measure the temple. The fact that the temple is distinguished from them that worship therein, favours the view that the spiritual temple-the Jewish and Christian Church-is not exclusively meant, but that the literal temple is also meant. It shall be rebuilt on the return of the Jews to their land. Antichrist shall there put forward his blasphemous claims. The sealed elect of Israel-the head of the elect Church-alone shall refuse his claims. These shall constitute the true sanctuary, here measured - i:e., accurately marked, and kept by God-whereas the rest shall yield to his pretensions. Wordsworth objects, that in the twenty-five passages of Acts, wherein the Jewish temple is mentioned, it is called hieron (G2411), not naos (G3485); so in the apostolic letters; but this is simply because no occasion for mentioning the literal Holy Place х naos (G3485)] occurs in Acts and the epistles; indeed, in Acts 7:48, there does occur naos (G3485), indirectly referring to the Jerusalem temple Holy Place. John 2:20 uses naos of the Jerusalem temple. In addressing Gentile Christians, to whom the literal temple was not familiar, it was to be expected naos should not be in the literal, but the spiritual, sense. In Revelation 11:19, naos is used in a local sense: cf. also Revelation 14:15; Revelation 14:17; Revelation 15:5; Revelation 15:8.