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Pergamum is the incomplete Church: valiant and earnest, it is oblivious of the new demand made upon it: it is indifferent to subtle inward influences, which are corrupting its teachers, and endangering the spiritual life of its members. Its earnest devotion is put in the forefront — "I know where thou dwellest, where Satan's throne is; and thou art holding fast My name." Out of that acknowledgment comes the rebuke of their fault: they who have done so much can do more; they can repent of their laxity, be faithful amid the requirements of to-day. The Church is in danger from erroneous thinking as well as from apostasy, and faithful leaders must not trifle with that danger. "Thou hast there some that hold to the teaching of Balaam"; thou hast them, and thou retainest them. Heretics inculcating immorality are tolerated. The pastor is not doing his duty; those are being cherished whose teaching the Lord hates. The heretics are in imminent danger; the Lord will correct by judgments the Church that allows itself to be careless. "Repent therefore; or else I come to thee quickly, and I make war against them with the sword of My mouth." There are two or three general lessons coming out of this description:

1. The first is, that a Church cannot live on its past. The memory of Antipas was not enough for Pergamum, nor even the share of the Church in Antipas's martyr spirit and martyr crown. A revived historical consciousness is one of the most marked features in the life of to-day: it has lent new interest to our studies, and given dignity to our social sense. But it has brought dangers with it; our appreciation of the past may weaken our feeling of personal responsibility and of present needs.

2. A second lesson is, that a Church cannot live on a single virtue. If days like those of Antipas had come back, doubtless Pergamum would have been faithful as before; but as the times were different, new graces were called for. Christian character is like the tree of life which John saw in the city of God, "bearing twelve manner of fruits, yielding its fruit every month; and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations."

3. A third lesson may be read from the story of Pergamum to the Churches of to-day: earnestness is not everything in ethical and spiritual life. The easy demeanour which marked English society in the middle of this century has given place to a quickened moral intensity which is full of promise. But some ominous symptoms have also appeared. One man feels earnest, and straightway he does something eccentric; another feels earnest, and he indulges in outrageous speech; a third is reckless in conduct, pleading as his excuse when evil results follow that he was so deeply moved. Earnestness is a good foundation for a virtuous life, but it is not in itself a virtue; it may be of the temperament rather than of the character; without earnestness there is no stability, but a man may be very earnest and very defective. The special fault of Pergamum was indifference to the error of the Nicolaitans. What the error was we see clearly enough in ver. 14 — Balaam "taught Balak to cast a stumbling-block before the children of Israel, to eat things sacrificed to idols, and to commit fornication." There was a determined effort on the part of some false teachers among the Churches in Asia at this time to break down the wise restrictions of the Council of Jerusalem, and to declare both these practices lawful, even commendable. We see the prevalence of this error in Ephesus and Thyatira as well as in Pergamum. But the development of it was not the same in the various Churches. In Thyatira it was associated with the ecstatic utterances of a woman, and a reign of false sentiment was setting in. In Pergamum, as we gather from the reference to Balaam, there was a deliberate trading on the lusts of the people. This connection of heresy with covetousness is distinctly asserted in the Second Epistle of Peter and in the Epistle of Jude. "Balaam, the son of Beor, loved the hire of wrong. doing"; the "ungodly men, who were turning the grace of God into lasciviousness," "ran riotously in the error of Balaam for hire." Browning has shown us, in "Mr. Sludge the Medium," how subtly covetousness and untruthfulness are intertwined; and how the self-deceiving impostor may become the cynical trader on human weaknesses. More than one revelation of the inner life of circles "spiritualistic," "aesthetic," "theosophic," and circles for improving the relations of the sexes — has been made in our own time, showing how pruriency and greed and contempt for the credulous may all unite under the pretence of larger intuitions and more advanced knowledge than belong to the simple believer. We can understand what may have conduced to the spread of Nicolaitan teaching among simple persons who were very far from failing under the condemnation of Balaam.

(1) The teaching appealed to their curiosity, their longing after hidden knowledge, and flattered them with a promise of a freemasonry of thought. The desire to penetrate into the realities which lie behind received forms of truth, to draw clear distinctions between the abiding and the temporary in morals, is not wrong; it may come from a noble purpose and minister to human advancement. But it may also be very ignoble, If we be impelled by lust after what is forbidden, or an idle inquisitiveness concerning what is concealed, we are making ourselves ready to fall a prey to men who live upon the credulous.

(2) The teaching appealed to their love of freedom; and here, too, we may make modern applications. The man of science investigates all things; nothing is regarded by him as a forbidden subject of inquiry; he knows that all knowledge may be turned to high uses; and his mind is clean. But those who are tickled by a desire to know what is secret are sure to be defiled. The democrat who wants all to be able to do their best is followed by the man who is thinking only that he has as many rights as others; the woman who knows she has powers which she can use, and demands the liberty to use them, by her who clamours for the latchkey. The one motive is as debasing as the other is noble.

(3) A few words in the longer recension of Ignatius's letter to the Philadelphians furnish a third reason for the spread of Nicolaitan error. One of the characteristic doctrines of the is there said to be, that pleasure was set forth as the end of the blessed life — a doctrine which might too easily beguile simple souls who believed that joy was an essential element in the nature of God and one of the fruits of the Spirit. The subtlety of this error, the baseness of applying one of the loftiest truths of the sacrificial life to sanction revelry and fornication, may well have provoked the Lord's reference to the two-edged sword here, and His words to the Church at Ephesus, "which deeds I hate." There can be nothing in common between the preachers of self-indulgence and Him who "pleased not Himself." The mystic words of promise to him that overcometh — "to him will I give of the hidden manna." etc. — have reference to the pretense of esoteric teaching by which many innocent and gracious are ed astray. There is a wisdom which is revealed to the initiated, a higher doctrine which is ever appearing under every simple setting forth of truth. It is found by the obedient, by those who revere law, and control passion, and are content with a simple following of Christ. "The secret of the Lord is with them that fear Him, and He will show them His covenant." All the ways of the Lord are ways of initiation into the Divine mysteries. The "hidden manna" falls day by day about the tents of those who are content to follow Christ without ambition, in prudent simplicity and pious order. The "new name" which Christ gives to each one who overcomes is not to be known except by him who receives it; that is to say, the deepest things of personal spiritual life are not for public preaching.

(A. Mackennal, D. D.)

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KJV: And to the angel of the church in Pergamos write; These things saith he which hath the sharp sword with two edges;

WEB: "To the angel of the assembly in Pergamum write: "He who has the sharp two-edged sword says these things: