And the court which [is] without the temple cast out, and measure it not; because it has been given [up] to the nations, and the holy city shall they tread under foot forty-two months.
Commentary for this verse has not been generated yet.
And I will give [power] to my two witnesses, and they shall prophesy a thousand two hundred [and] sixty days, clothed in sackcloth.
God promises to raise up two witnesses in a city held down by foreign power. Who they are, why they wear sackcloth, and why God counts their days one by one are the questions this verse raises.
What God gives is the power to make the testimony effective:
Here we have the same word as in chapter 8:3. God says, "I will grant authority to my two witnesses, and they will prophesy" — the word means power, or effectiveness. These things are not given in any order at all; but there is adequate testimony: two lampstands, two olive trees. These witnesses have the power of Moses and Elijah.
God does not leave the trampled city without a witness:
The hostile powers act without hindrance, yet God does not let them defile the city without raising up a witness against them. Verse 3 speaks of this witness... Outwardly the witnesses are marked by the deepest humiliation, shown by their sackcloth. Inwardly they are marked by a shining light, which God gives and keeps burning. The picture comes from Zechariah 4, except that here each witness is an olive tree and a lampstand. The olive tree supplies the oil, and the oil feeds the light. God is the God of the earth, and though the holy city is trampled down He has not given up His claim to the earth. So before He makes good that claim in irresistible power, He maintains His witness in the face of the enemy.
The period is not vague. It lines up exactly with the forty-two months of the previous verse, and both are anchored in a known prophetic timetable:
Note next how long their prophetic testimony lasts. It will be a thousand two hundred and sixty days... The two periods coincide, both being three years and a half... These three and a half years are the last half of Daniel's seventieth week (Daniel 9:25-27). This is the period of Antichrist's terrible rule in Jerusalem, backed and sheltered by all the power of the last head of the Roman empire. At the close of that period Christ will come in glory.
Elsewhere the same span appears as months. Here God counts days, and the change is deliberate:
The Lord speaks of days here, not of forty-two months. It seems He does this to mark how much He values their testimony. He makes as much of it as He can. He does not sum it up together, as He does when He speaks of the beast (Rev. 13:5). Lovingly He speaks of the time as days, as though He were counting them all out.
That counting also guarantees the testimony does not fail early, and does not run late:
Their days of testimony are counted one by one. Theirs is not an on-and-off testimony. It goes on daily till the allotted period is finished, and not a day longer.
Commentators differ here. Some expect named people to return; others take the number as a legal measure:
People have made countless guesses about the number of witnesses... Others, with more reason and with some support from Scripture, suppose that Moses and Elijah are the two witnesses... The number of the witnesses is meant to convey a full and adequate testimony... Jewish law, and here we stand in Jewish circumstances, called for two witnesses to give valid evidence (Deut. 17:6; 19:15).
Others reject personal identification outright while keeping the moral likeness:
I see no proof at all that either Elijah or Moses is one of the two witnesses. The two witnesses stand in the same moral position as those two men, but there is no proof that they are the same people.
In Israel, sackcloth was the everyday dress of grief and of turning back to God (Samuel Ridout). Worn here, it says something about both the message and the men:
Being clothed in sackcloth may show that their message is one that calls aloud for repentance.
Their sorrow is not for themselves. It is over what has become of the people they belong to:
They stand apart from everyone around them, mourning over the terrible falling away of the nation they love, and everyone rejects them. Sackcloth is a fitting emblem of their testimony.
- Given — the witnesses do not produce their own power; God gives it, and it makes their prophesying effective.
- Counted — God speaks of these years in days, but of the beast's time in months. He counts out the days of those who testify for Him.
- Clothed — sackcloth marks grief and a call to repentance. Outwardly they are humbled; inwardly God feeds their light.
- Enough — under Jewish law two witnesses made evidence valid. Commentators differ on whether Moses and Elijah return in person, but the witness carries their power.
- Timed — the testimony runs the full 1,260 days and not one day longer. Then God makes good His claim on the earth in power.