Revelation 8:3Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

Although what the saints saw, the altar, the censer, and the rest, is depicted here in material form and colored in various ways, all this is invisible and spiritual. The Angel stands before the altar and holds the censer with frankincense. Like incense, He offers to God the prayers of the saints. In these prayers they ask that, for the calamities at the end of the world, the torments of the impious and lawless in the age to come may be eased. They also ask that the Lord, by His coming, may reward those who have labored. This is said further on as well.

John equates the altar with the censer, since it receives the frankincense into itself. And so, when Christ appears, the prayers of the saints are offered to Him by the angels who guide us, as a certain honorable first offering. These prayers are fragrant by nature, but they increase their fragrance through the cooperation of the holy angels. For this reason it is said that much incense was given to Him. Evidently, guidance over men and the transformation of their prayers was given to the angels by God, so that these prayers might be well pleasing to Him. Having received the prayers of the saints, they impart fragrance to them. "And the smoke of the incense, with the prayers of the saints, ascended from the hand of the Angel." Notice that through the mediation of the angels, the fragrance of the prayers of the saints reaches God.

Standing before the altar, He stood before the Church, making Himself the censer from which God received fragrance and became merciful to the world.

In another reading we find "on the altar," because on the altar of the Cross He offered to the Father for us His golden censer, His immaculate body, conceived by the Holy Spirit.

Christ, offering Himself as a sacrifice pleasing to the Lord, also made the torments of the saints' hearts a sacrifice acceptable to God. Born from inward fire, like smoke, this sacrifice is wont to bring forth tears.

The fire from the altar, cast upon the earth, is the judgment of the saints upon this world, accomplished by the servants of God (see Rev 6:9-11).

How, then, is God's love to be reconciled with the terrible scourges that strike the earth? For some, these calamities are deserved, a recompense for iniquity. For others, they are a medicine for sin.

To clarify this passage, one must turn to a parallel passage in the Old Testament. When the Lord wished to destroy the Israelites for their murmuring against Moses and Aaron, Aaron, at Moses' command, had to take a censer, put fire from the altar into it, place incense on the fire, and pray for the people (Num 16:46). Both there and here, intercessory prayers are meant, prayers that turn final destruction away from men. Incense is joined to the prayers of the saints. It has the special property of rising upward. It communicates the same property both to the sacrifices with which it was joined in the Old Testament and, in general, to the prayer of men: "Let my prayer be set forth as incense" (Ps 140:2). Joined to the fragrance of Christ's sacrifice (Eph 5:2), the intercessory prayers of the saints easily ascend before God by the hand of an angel. Here is the basis for the veneration of angels.

And behold, the seven angels who stood before God were ready to sound the trumpets given to them. But another Angel came and stood before the altar, holding a golden censer. Much incense was given to Him, that He might place it, with the prayers of all the saints, upon the golden altar before the throne. And the smoke of the incense, with the prayers of the saints, ascended from the hand of the Angel before God. According to the interpretation of St. Andrew, in their prayers the saints "ask that, for the calamities at the end of the world, the torments of the impious and lawless in the age to come may be eased. They also ask that the Lord, by His coming, may reward those who have labored."