The earliest and most common patristic reading of the woman in Revelation 12 is the Church (or the people of God spanning Old and New Covenants). A Marian identification appears later and is often presented as complementary rather than exclusive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
the Church \/ people of GodHippolytus of Rome (c. 170\u2013235) is the clearest early voice:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n\u201cBy the woman then clothed with the sun, he meant most manifestly the Church, endued with the Father\u2019s word, whose brightness is above the sun. And by the \u2018moon under her feet\u2019 he referred to her being adorned, like the moon, with heavenly glory. And the words, \u2018upon her head a crown of twelve stars,\u2019 refer to the twelve apostles by whom the Church was founded.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n
He interprets her labor as the Church continually bringing forth Christ in believers amid persecution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Victorinus of Pettau (d. 303\/304), author of the oldest surviving Latin commentary on Revelation:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n\u201cThe woman clothed with the sun… is the ancient Church of fathers, and prophets, and saints, and apostles, which had the groans and torments of its longing until it saw that Christ, the fruit of its people according to the flesh, had taken flesh out of the selfsame people.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n
Methodius of Olympus (d. 311):<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n\u201cThe woman who appeared in heaven clothed with the sun… is certainly, according to the accurate interpretation, our mother… whom the prophets… have called sometimes Jerusalem, sometimes a Bride, sometimes Mount Zion, and sometimes the Temple and Tabernacle of God.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n
These readings treat the sun-moon-stars imagery as pointing to the corporate people of God (echoing Joseph\u2019s dream in Genesis 37) and her labor as the Church\u2019s ongoing birth of believers or of Christ in them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
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The earliest and most common patristic reading of the woman in Revelation 12 is the Church (or the people of God spanning Old and New Covenants). A Marian identification appears later and is often presented as complementary rather than exclusive. Earliest interpretations: the Church \/ people of GodHippolytus of Rome (c. 170\u2013235) is the clearest […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8,9,10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1836","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bible","category-saints","category-theotokos"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/douglasgilliland.com\/theology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1836","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/douglasgilliland.com\/theology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/douglasgilliland.com\/theology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/douglasgilliland.com\/theology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/douglasgilliland.com\/theology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1836"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/douglasgilliland.com\/theology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1836\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1837,"href":"https:\/\/douglasgilliland.com\/theology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1836\/revisions\/1837"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/douglasgilliland.com\/theology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1836"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/douglasgilliland.com\/theology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1836"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/douglasgilliland.com\/theology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1836"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}