亨利·阿尔福（Henry Alford，1810-1871）. Explore “Ten Thousand Times Ten Thousand”: song information and official sources.
Hope for the end of the age · New heavens and new earth
The title borrows the numerical image in Revelation 5:11: “I looked, and I heard something like a voice of many angels around the throne, the living creatures, and the elders. The number of them was ten thousands of ten thousands, and thousands of thousands”. Scripture there first describes angels; Alford uses the image for the redeemed saints' immense company. A New Testament scholar and Dean of Canterbury, he portrays fulfilment as entering a city: crowds of redeemed people coming in after battle has ended. The third stanza's reunion after the days of separation is especially comforting. Revelation 7:17 promises, “for the Lamb who is in the middle of the throne shepherds them and leads them to springs of life-giving waters. And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.” For recently bereaved believers, this hope includes a gathered multitude and belonging, beyond an individual's rest.
All Saints' Day, memorials and funerals; teaching on Revelation 5 or 7.