Marlorat goes about obtaining the
desired effect in very deliberate fashion. It is worth remembering here that
Meyer interpreted the verse as follows:
WOMAN: The church of the faithful.
SUN: Having put on Christ or the
Gospel as a robe. The apostolic church is compared to a woman who is weak by
nature but strong and fecund due to Christ, giving birth to many faithful.
MOON: Administering temporal goods in
conformity with divine commands, and not being subservient to them; or
the access of even the lowliest members of the church to some divine light,
albeit not in its strongest form; or the Law as compared to the Sun of
the Gospel.
TWELVE STARS: The twelve patriarchs or
the twelve apostles, more likely the latter. Moreover, twelve being a number
denoting perfection and universality, it can also denote all those who teach
Christ in pure faith. (Meyer, In Apc, 45r., 48r)
Marlorat cites in extension Meyer’s
interpretation of the apostolic church as the small weak woman made strong by
Christ. He adds to it one line from du Pinet on the church as the bride of
Christ. He then quotes Meyer’s interpretation of the sun which represents the
light of the Gospel and follows it with his own injunction to his readers,
composed of two biblical quotations:
Be such that no one can complain about
you, sincere sons of God, blameless in the midst of a crooked and depraved
generation in which you shine like stars in the world and proffer the world of
life, Phil. 2.15. And also: all you who are baptized, have put on Christ as a
garment, Gal. 3.27. Indeed the church which has put on Christ as garment in her
conversation and doctrine is lit up by the Spirit much more brightly than air
by the sin. (Marlorat, Noui Testamenti Expositio, 1570, 189 col. B) (Irena
Backus, Reformation Readings of the Apocalypse: Geneva, Zurich, and
Wittenberg [Oxford Studies in Historical Theology; Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 2000], 63)
