is so prevalent that according to theologian William Barclay, the passage seems to refer to definite persons. Walvoord further pointed out that because the Revelation passage does not specifically identify who the two witnesses are, it would be safer to conclude that they are not related to any previous historical character. As individuals The apocryphal Gospel of Nicodemus (also known as Acts of Pilate) states that those two witnesses who will appear in times of Antichrist to engage in battle with him are Enoch and Elijah: "3. One of them answering, said, I am Enoch, who was translated by the word of God: and this man who is with me, is Elijah the Tishbite, who was translated in a fiery chariot. 4. Here we have hitherto been, and have not tasted death, but are now about to return at the coming of Antichrist, being armed with divine signs and miracles, to engage with him in battle, and to be slain by him at Jerusalem, and to be taken up alive again into the clouds, after 3 days and a half." - Gospel of Nicodemus, Chapter 20:3-4. Others have proposed Moses as one of the witnesses, for his ability to turn water into blood and the power to plague the earth. Early Christian writers such as Tertullian, Irenaeus, and Hippolytus of Rome, have concluded that the two witnesses would be Enoch and Elijah, the two prophets who did not die because God "took" them according to other Biblical passages. As symbols of the church The two witnesses have been interpreted as representing the Church or a similar concept. The 1599 Geneva Study Bible has asserted that the two witnesses are the exclusive purview of the church. Matthew Henry's Complete Commentary on the Whole Bible gives one church interpretation as consisting of believing Jews and that of the gentiles. John Wesley in his commentary on Revelation 11 suggests a more spiritual, almost ambiguous, application. John Gill's Exposition of the Bible interprets the two witnesses as the true Church in counterdistinction to the "antichrist system" of Roman Catholicism. Ross Taylor's Verse by Verse Commentary on Revelation clearly defines the Church as the "two olive trees and the two lampstands." Similarly, the two witnesses have been identified as Israel and the Christian Church. The number two has been associated with the witness of Israel to the gentile nations during the 70th Week of Daniel's