Revelation 2.12-17.
2.12
17
In Isaiah, the Slave says that God “arranged My mouth like a sharp sword,” (Is 49.2) and Jesus’s description of Himself this way was a deliberate reminder that He identified with that Slave. Mouths like swords are found in various parts of the scriptures, sometimes in a positive sense, (He 4.12) sometimes negative. (Ps 57.4) As James pointed out, the tongue could go either way. (Jm 3.9-10) But the general idea is that words have power: They can cut like a scalpel or an axe, to heal or to harm.
Why this was significant to Pergamon in particular was because the city had the second-best library in antiquity. Plutarch told of Marc Antony giving Cleopatra its 200,000 books, (Plutarch, Antony 58.5) ostensibly to add to her library at Alexandria. Parchment—sheepskin-paper—was invented by the Pergamenes; the Latin word for it was pergamenum, which evolved into our own word. Pergamon collected a lot of books, but John’s book, from Jesus, would be particularly significant to them: it contained the “sharp, double-edged scimitar” (v12) of the Living One.
The Great Altar, possibly the biggest pagan altar in antiquity, was constructed around 160 BC to worship the local gods Asklepios the Savior and his daughter Hygeia. (Later Greeks equated these gods with Zeus and Athena-Nicephorus.) Asklepios was represented by a serpent—so you can see how the connection with Satan was made. The Altar became, in the Christians’ minds, Satan’s throne.
Pergamon, like Smyrna, was also a major center of Roma worship, and that’s how the persecution of Christians became such a priority. Pergamon’s first bishop, Antipas, was killed in 92 CE. The tradition is that the local daemons appeared to the pagan priests in a dream and told them that, because of Antipas, they were leaving the city. So they gathered a mob and went to confront him. Antipas’s rather reasonable response was, “When your so-called gods—lords of the universe—are frightened of me, a mortal man, and must flee from this city, do you not recognize that, by this, your faith is an aberration?” Their rather reasonable response was to be really pissed at this; their less-than-reasonable response was to drag him to the temple of Artemis, stuff him into a super-heated bronze statue of an ox, and roast him to death. (Nikolai Velimirović, The Prologue of Ohrid, April 11)
Having your pastor murdered in such a nasty way would shake the faith of your average Christian to the breaking point. “Where was God?” would be the usual reaction. But notice what Jesus said to the angel (and through it, the angel’s church): “You cling to My name and don’t stop trusting Me—even when Antipas, My faithful witness, was killed beside you in Satan’s house.” Meaning the angel was there the whole time Antipas was dying—and, since the angel is God’s representative, meaning that God was there the whole time Antipas was dying. Where was God? Right there.
Why didn’t God or the angel do anything? Because Antipas’s death needed to shake the faith of the Christians in Pergamon. They needed to realize that Christianity requires commitment. Jesus doesn’t want half-hearted followers. If we’re only willing to follow Him when times are good, and complain and leave when times are bad, it’s foolish. (Jb 2.10) Either we’re willing to follow Him in the face of death, (v10) or we ought not to bother. We ought to join a religion where the gods only promise you lots and lots of wealth. Talk to the pagans; they’ll lead you to it.
Jesus had His objections, of course, and the two He mentioned were “followers of Bala’am’s teachings.” Various interpreters think “Bala’am” is a code-word for a leader in the Pergamon church who taught like Bala’am ben Be’or from the bible; various other interpreters think there was a popular book at the time that claimed to be written by Bala’am, but really wasn’t. I figure that, since Jesus specifically referred to Balak (the king of Moab, Balak ben Zippor, who hired Bala’am to curse Israel in Numbers 22). According to myth—which Jesus confirms here—Bala’am, after God had obligated him to bless Israel instead of cursing it, had secretly given Balak advice on how to corrupt Israel by sending them whores. The actions of Moab right after Bala’am’s prophecy (Nu 25.1-3) suggest that Balak followed this advice forthwith. The usual interpretation is that the church was being corrupted, Balak-style, into idolatry. But the wording states that the church was following Bala’am—meaning the church was doing the corrupting. Ever heard of cults who try to entice people by sending attractive “missionaries” to bring smitten fools into their group? Quite possibly the Pergamenes were giving this a try—but were going way too far in their attempts to entice pagans, and were compromising themselves by allowing their “missionaries” to practice a little paganism, or justifying sex with pagans because it might win some. When Paul talked about being all things to all people, (1Co 9.22) he certainly didn’t mean this.
Naturally, you can justify this practice by pointing to the fact that God will forgive everything—in other words, what Nikolas of Antioch taught, and what Jesus critiqued the Ephesians for practicing. (v6) He was willing to shake that church; (v5) He was willing to fight the Pergamenes as well. (v16) Again, not to destroy them; despite the sword imagery, Jesus’s words are correction and healing. But if the angels won’t do their jobs in the churches, Jesus will have to intervene personally.
Now the presence of these heretics is one of those odd little paradoxes we find throughout Christianity. In the face of incredible persecution, you have people who hadn’t lost faith, and were still following Jesus—but were following Him horribly wrong. Persecution may get rid of the half-hearted, but it is not a guarantee of orthodoxy. You can follow Jesus whole-heartedly and wrongly. Heretics are just as likely to stand up under persecution as right-thinking Christians. Never assume that standing firm under persecution equals righteousness. Sometimes you’re standing firm for the wrong things entirely.
Manna (v17) was what God fed the Hebrews in the desert after the Exodus. It was considered bread from heaven, although Jesus pointed out it wasn’t really. (Jn 6.31-32) But there was an idea that once God’s people made it to the Kingdom, they’d once again eat manna. So “hidden manna” (v17) refers to this idea.
The white pebble with the name on it (v17) has also been interpreted in very weird ways. The most common one I’ve heard is that when we get to heaven, God is going to rename us, like He did with Abraham or Israel, ’cause our own names suck. But the reason the name is one “that none but the recipient knows” (v17) is because this isn’t that. These pebbles are tickets. In ancient times, tickets—to sporting events, to concerts, to religious festivals, to anything—were marked stones, and the markings on them were secret, in order to foil forgeries. Jesus is basically saying that the winners were going to get an entry-ticket to the Kingdom.
Rv 2.12: Καὶ τῷ ἀγγέλῳ τῆς ἐν Περγάμῳ ἐκκλησίας γράψον· and to the angel of the (in Pergamum) church, you [continually] write: Τάδε λέγει ὁ ἔχων τὴν ῥομφαίαν τὴν δίστομον τὴν ὀξεῖαν· this says the [one] having the scimitar, the double-edged, the sharp:
2.13: οἶδα ποῦ κατοικεῖς, ὅπου ὁ θρόνος τοῦ σατανᾶ, καὶ κρατεῖς τὸ ὄνομά μου καὶ οὐκ ἠρνήσω τὴν πίστιν μου I know where you inhabit, where the throne of the Satan, and you grasp the name of me and not you deny the faith of me, καὶ ἐν ταῖς ἡμέραις Ἀντιπᾶς ὁ μάρτυς μου ὁ πιστός μου, ὃς ἀπεκτάνθη παρ᾿ ὑμῖν, ὅπου ὁ σατανᾶς κατοικεῖ. and in the days of Antipas, the martyr of me, the faithful [one] of me, who was killed with you, where the Satan inhabits.
2.14: ἀλλ᾿ ἔχω κατὰ σοῦ ὀλίγα ὅτι ἔχεις ἐκεῖ κρατοῦντας τὴν διδαχὴν Βαλαάμ, but I have against you little [things], that you have there [ones] grasping the teaching of Bala’ám, ὃς ἐδίδασκεν τῷ Βαλὰκ βαλεῖν σκάνδαλον ἐνώπιον τῶν υἱῶν Ἰσραὴλ φαγεῖν εἰδωλόθυτα καὶ πορνεῦσαι. who is teaching to the Balák to [continually] throw scandal before the sons of Isra’él [continually] eating [or, to eat] idol-meats and [continually] whoring [or, to commit whoredom].
2.15: οὕτως ἔχεις καὶ σὺ κρατοῦντας τὴν διδαχὴν [τῶν] Νικολαϊτῶν ὁμοίως. thus you have and you [are one] grasping the teaching [of the] Nikola’itans likewise.
2.16: μετανόησον οὖν· εἰ δὲ μή, you repent! therefore, if & not, ἔρχομαί σοι ταχὺ καὶ πολεμήσω μετ᾿ αὐτῶν ἐν τῇ ῥομφαίᾳ τοῦ στόματός μου. I come to you swiftly and I will battle with them in the scimitar of the mouth of me.
2.17: Ὁ ἔχων οὖς ἀκουσάτω τί τὸ πνεῦμα λέγει ταῖς ἐκκλησίαις. the [one] having ear, he hears! what the spirit says to the churches. Τῷ νικῶντι δώσω αὐτῷ τοῦ μάννα τοῦ κεκρυμμένου καὶ δώσω αὐτῷ ψῆφον λευκήν, to the winner I will give to him of the manna, the [stuff] being hidden, and I will give to him [a] pebble, white, καὶ ἐπὶ τὴν ψῆφον ὄνομα καινὸν γεγραμμένον ὃ οὐδεὶς οἶδεν εἰ μὴ ὁ λαμβάνων. and upon the pebble [a] name, new, [which] had been written, which nobody knows if not the [one] taking.
