upon the earth in the last days. These miracles constitute the `strong delusion' which will lead men to believe the

lie. The fact that the false prophet will work actual miracles, and the three frog-like spirits of demons seen in the

Revelation will work miracles, should cause us most carefully to pause before we conclude that the possession of a

supernatural power today is necessarily an evidence of Divine origin or approval. Before we commence the section

2:5-18, we ask the question:

In Revelation 5:12 we have a seven-fold ascription of praise which can be grouped as follows:

Solomon - King.

Aaron - Priest.

When these kingly and priestly functions are united we have no longer Solomon and Aaron, but the King-Priest

of the Apocalypse, the Priest after the order of Melchisedec. The crowning with glory and honour (Heb. 2:9) is the

consecration of Christ as the Priest after the order of Melchisedec. `And no man taketh this HONOUR unto himself ...

so also Christ GLORIFIED not Himself' (5:4,5). We shall find an allusion to this position in 3:3:'for this Man was

counted worthy of more GLORY than Moses, inasmuch as He Who hath builded the house hath more HONOUR than

the house'. Thus we find Christ superior in honour and glory to both Moses and Aaron, and when we see Him

crowned with honour and glory we are indeed considering Him Who is the Apostle (Moses) and High Priest (Aaron)

of our profession.

It will be remembered that immediately following the revelation of the Lord's approaching sufferings (Matt. 16),

comes the Transfiguration (Matt. 17). In order to have `an entrance ministered richly into the aionian kingdom of

our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ', the apostle Peter bids the believers of the dispersion remember the

Transfiguration:-

`For we have not followed cunningly devised fables, when we made known unto you the power and coming of our Lord

Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of His majesty. For He received from God the Father HONOUR and GLORY'

(2 Pet. 1:16,17).

We pointed out previously that the `so great salvation' of which the Lord began to speak commences with His

rejection, and is related more closely to the testimony of the second half of Matthew's gospel than to the first. Those

disciples who saw the rejection of the King (Matt. 12,13), could say after the Transfiguration, `We see not yet all

things put under Him, but we see Jesus ... crowned with glory and honour'.

We now turn our attention to the close of Hebrews 2:9, `that He by the grace of God should taste death for every

man'. How are we to understand the expression `taste death'? Is it merely a synonym for death itself? Some say

so, but we distrust this interpretation of so many expressions as synonyms. We feel that there must be a clear reason

why this word is used here, and therefore we turn to the Scriptures for light upon its meaning.

The word is translated in the A.V. `eat' three times, and `taste' twelve times. We shall never plumb the

profoundest depths of the Scriptures `unto perfection', but we shall never find them lapsing into the slightest

approach to error or slovenly usage of language. That Homer may nod is proverbial; that the Scriptures are

infallible is one of the first articles of faith. It is also the impression consistently gained by continual searching. We

are not at all surprised therefore in the case of such divinelyarranged words to find that the first occurrence of the

expression `taste of death' takes us back to the close of Matthew 16, immediately before the record of the

Transfiguration. There is one feature common to all passages referring to the Transfiguration in the Gospels:

immediately before the reference is the statement concerning losing the soul for Christ's sake. Now Peter's epistles

have as their theme present suffering followed by future glory. This is the lesson also of Matthew, chapters 12 and