Revelation 2:8Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

He is the First as God, and the Last as the One who became man in the last days and opened for us the gates of eternal life by His three-day death.

The Lord calls Himself the First according to the essence of the Godhead. He calls Himself the Last, evidently, according to His becoming man and the divine economy in the flesh. As He continues: "Who was dead, and behold, is alive." In other words, He is the One who underwent the trial of death and by death put death to death.

To this church John speaks about enduring persecutions, as also follows from its name. For Smyrna is the myrrh tree, symbolizing the mortification of the flesh.

The angel of the Church of Smyrna receives neither condemnation nor threats of punishment, but only praise, consolation, and promise. Therefore one may think that there were few bad Christians in Smyrna.

Polycarp, a disciple of John, was bishop there, and in old age he died a martyr's death. The Church of Smyrna is the second Church and represents the Church of the times of martyrdom.

This Church began soon after Christ's Ascension with the protomartyr Stephen, and ends around the middle of the fourth century, between 320 and 330.

To this Church the Lord declares Himself to be the First and the Last, who died and now lives. The One for whom Christians die first died for them.

"To the angel of the Church in Smyrna." According to the common opinion of the interpreters, the bishop of the Church of Smyrna was Saint Polycarp, disciple of the Apostle John. He was burned at the stake in 169 or 166, or, according to more recent studies, in 155. Yet his episcopate in Smyrna cannot be reconciled with an early date for the writing of the Apocalypse. Before his death, Polycarp declared that he had served Christ for eighty-six years. This evidently indicated the time since his conversion. It therefore falls in the year 83 or 80, or at the very earliest in 69. The Apocalypse was written earlier. Smyrna is known even now by this name, though it is not so famous. Among the Turks it is called Izmir.

What did the Lord command to be written to the angel of the Church of Smyrna? Rev 2:8-11.

He commanded that it be written that the affliction for Christ's name and the poverty of the Smyrnean Christians, in the earthly sense, are known to the Lord. Their slander and reviling from the Jews are likewise known to Him.

He also wrote that persecutions from the devil and tribulation for ten days await the Smyrneans. Yet they must be faithful unto death, in order to receive the crown of life and be delivered from the second death.

"And ye shall have tribulation ten days" (Rev 2:10). The definite number ten is plainly taken here instead of an indefinite one, in the sense of the duration of the persecutions awaiting the Church of Smyrna.

In the epistle to the Church of Smyrna and her bishop, who together had to be faithful unto death, Christ consoles the suffering Smyrneans concerning the fate awaiting them.

He points to His power, since He holds the beginning and end of all things in His authority. He also points to the fact that He Himself underwent death and now lives.

The Lord then says that the Smyrnean Christians belong to the poorest class of society in wealthy and splendid Smyrna. Yet their spiritual wealth is well known to the Lord: their firmness in faith and virtue.

The Lord also consoles the suffering by saying that the blasphemies brought against them by those still calling themselves by the glorious name of Jews are well known to Him.