You will need to read the book of Revelation to appreciate this and have some patience. It is a bit of a roller coaster; so if you don’t fancy it, skip to the postscript at the end of the chapter. Take your time and have a mental break now and again.
Now, taking an overall view of the history of the Earth in a nutshell and combining both scientific and biblical references, it should go something like this:
(i) The primeval or primitive stage. The Earth is created; life develops but is subject to cataclysmic events such as volcanic eruption, meteor bombardment and climatic change. These set back and change the development of life on Earth.
(ii) The time of trial. Intelligent life and technology develops, but there are many battles, wars and bloodshed. This comes to an end at the “end of the age”.
(iii) The millennium. Advanced technology has developed. We have overcome most of the world problems and a very long period of peace on Earth is established. Evil is minimised with the defeat of the beast. This is the main purpose of the Earth. The start of it equates with the first death and first resurrection.
(iv) The time of tribulation. The prelude to the end of the world as the sun starts to increase in temperature. There is a promise of a new Earth as our existing world starts to overheat. This equates with the second death and the second resurrection.
(v) The end of the world. Whatever is left is destroyed in the biggest cataclysmic event the world has ever witnessed as the sun enters its red giant stage.
There have been many commentaries written on the book of Revelation and its meaning, some of them being as difficult to understand as the book of Revelation itself. Our way of looking at it provides a new perspective or dimension to its interpretation. You are now going to attempt to understand what John was telling us.
If John’s visions behave in the way most clairvoyant visions appear to behave, then they may not run in a consecutive manner. Whenever we read a storybook, we are used to and expect the consecutive approach. If we take the book of Revelation and read it as a continuous series of events like many others and I may have done, you just become lost and confused. It all seems senseless. However, there may be another way of looking at it.
It is hard to imagine that John experienced the whole of this during one meditation, “in the middle of his tea break” so to speak. They were most likely obtained as a result of a number of different meditations on world history. Therefore, his visions would represent sequences of world events at different and not necessarily consecutive times. These have then been stuck together to form a collage of world events. The key to a better understanding of what is going on is the unscrambling of these and the layering of them side by side in parallel. Each parallel sequence then gives us a different view of the same thing. There would appear to be a series of five, if not six, meditations on world history all telling the same story from a different point of view. When you know where one leaves off and the next one starts, the overall story of world history both past and future emerges. There will still be the little enigmatic image here and there that may or may not mean something. That will give us something to think about in the future. Yet, while most of the world is off on a different track we do not stand much of a chance. For now, we want the main message.
It is important not to get too hung up on detail but to see the broad picture that John was conveying. For example, he cannot describe planes or helicopters because they do not exist. He may also put ships, for example, in a wrong time frame. This is because in his life, ships have always existed. So bearing that in mind lets figure it out.
Nearly two thousand years ago the angel made John eat the contents of the little scroll. Are you now ready? Will it taste sweet as honey in your mouth or will it turn you stomach sour? Those that have ears to hear, let them now hear.
As stated in Chapter 8, Chapters 4, 5 and 6 of Revelation sets the scene where he is invited by God, Jesus or an angel to find out what is in the scroll, which is sealed with seven seals, by the words “Come up here, and I will show you what must take place after this”. Other diverse sentient creatures are there to witness this event. There is something like a lion, a bull calf, one with a face like a man and an eagle. The traditional view of this is that he has been invited to view heaven. That is, that other dimension parallel with our own or the dimension of the spiritual side of life. We are going to take the view that his consciousness has been literally taken upwards above the Earth’s atmosphere to view the physical side of the Universe from a vantage point never before seen. You almost feel that he is being shown a simulation of the Universe with stars and constellations. It is obvious that he is not quite sure at all about what he is seeing because he keeps using the word “like”. This is common with clairvoyants who cannot quite make out what it is they are looking at. The reason that he may be seeing a pictorial representation of the night sky is because, if we take the constellation Leo the lion, we find that at exactly 90 degrees to this, we have Taurus the bull or calf, together with the seven little stars that form the Pleiades. The original term of calf has been replaced with ox in the New International Version of the Bible. If he now turns round and looks to the opposite side of the sky, he finds Centaurus, the creature with a face like a man. At about 90 degrees to that and on the opposite side of the sky to Leo, we find Aquila the eagle situated next to Cygnus the flying swan. By joining opposite constellations, we form a giant cross in the sky. In addition, out of the 24 nearest stars to our own sun, 10 of them are in and around the constellations of Leo, Cygnus and Centaurus. Our nearest star system, a triple system called Alpha Centauri is situated in Centaurus. Considering that there are around 90 constellations, that is a rather higher proportion than one might expect. Perhaps the new Earth that we talked about in the last Chapter is in its very early stages of development encircling one of these stars. He remarks on the fact that the creatures were covered in eyes. These would be the many small stars that you see within a constellation, through a telescope, or in the crystal clarity of outer space. In Revelation Chapter 5.11, there is a remarkable parallel with the number of stars encircling the central core of our galaxy. The correct number of stars from our own advanced astronomical observations and calculations is of the order of one hundred thousand million. Write that number down and then start deleting the zeros as John recites them. Ten thousand times ten thousand and times a thousand again gives you the answer. Go on; tell me he is a thousand out. He calls them angels encircling the throne. We call them stars. John himself says that stars are angels at the end of Chapter 1. They are encircling the central core of the galaxy or the black hole that resides there. It is getting more curious by the minute. The vision culminates with the opening of the seals on world history. The first seal brings the pale horse representing our primitive beginnings. The second seal brings the fiery red horse representing battles, wars and bloodshed on a large scale. This is the time of trial. The third seal or black horse gives us a long period of peace and balance and equates with the millennium. The reference to not harming the oil and the wine may refer to our dependence on energy and food production from the sun during this period. It crops up again later. The fourth seal or pale horse represents the end of the millennium and the start of the decline. The fifth seal heralds the time of great tribulation as time starts to run out as the sun starts to overheat. The sixth seal represents deterioration as the Earth goes through its death throws. Chapter 7 follows on with visions of the hope of new life on a new Earth for those who were saved from the time of tribulation. They are going to be lead to a place where the sun cannot beat on them or any scorching heat and there are springs of living water.
At the start of Chapter 8, the seventh seal is opened there is silence in heaven for about half an hour. The next seven angels line up with trumpets to give their account. The silence probably refers to the fact that the Earth is empty and dead. Meanwhile between verses 3 to 5, the job is completed, as the sun becomes a red giant. The Earth is destroyed. The first account is complete. Notice that it is the seventh seal that brings this account to a close. It is here where we take our own mental tea break and wind the tape back to the beginning. This time it is back to the very beginning of life on Earth.
The various epochs are heralded this time by the sound of trumpets. The first four trumpets appear to equate once again with the early years of creation when the battle between the emergence of life and volcanic or celestial bombardment was underway. Who knows if he ever saw or heard a volcano erupting and the devastation to the environment and the darkness caused by the pollution of the atmosphere? He gives a very good description. His reference to “turning to blood” means turning to the colour of blood. You almost feel at one point that he sees the very meteor that wiped out the dinosaurs.
In Chapter 9, the fifth trumpet brings the evil into the world and the sixth trumpet develops on it. We are now once again in the time of trial. Battles and wars rage between factions, civilisations and countries. The creatures he describes in his visions bear a strong resemblance to modern warfare destroyers. Locusts with the power of scorpions are like gun helicopters. Horses with breastplates and tails like snakes, which inflict injury have a very strong resemblance with the modern tank. The end of Chapter 9 leaves us with our heads buried in the sand. We are ignorant of what we are doing to each other and the Earth. Chapter 10 has us being looked at. Things must change but not yet. We have not advanced enough scientifically to be able to get the job done, hence the little scroll and the non-divulgence of its contents. The time will come at the end of the age when things will change. Chapter 11 must begin as the millennium is on the horizon, if it follows our pattern. It is probably the most difficult section of Revelation to grasp as it is hard to tell who are the “goodies and baddies” in the story. You cannot help wondering if something has been lost in the translation or a sentence has gone missing. It can be very difficult to establish who or what is the subject of each sentence. However, we already know the story so we will use a bit of poetic licence and give it a gentle nudge. The beginning appears to equate with the start of the millennium and the age of accurate measurement and counting. We would call it computing with the type of computing power that we have used to map the human genome for example. We can be highly speculative and wonder if there is a veiled hint in there, not to bother looking in the outer regions of our genome to find the evil gene or genes. The genome together with our consciousness is the temple of life. Imagine that you were measuring a temple with an outer court and it was twenty-four units (approximate number of chromosomes) across. Halve it to give you the centre and that gives you 12. Then halve it again to give you the approximate distance to the wall. It is that number 6 again. Too much stretching? Let’s keep it real; well as real as we can under the circumstances. The impression is that a period of controlled stability is due. There are two witnesses sent representing good. This refers to the appearance of Jesus on the Earth. The two witnesses he regards as God and Jesus because this ties in with his own words in his own Gospel, Chapter 8.17. There is a three and a half year prophecy that takes place. This equates with the ministry of Jesus on the Earth. Now imagine he is looking at a different part of the vision, so that what he sees next is not mixed up with the two witnesses. His attention is drawn towards two olive trees and two lamp stands, which must not be harmed. These equate with the wine and the oil referred to at the appearance of the black horse in the first account (food & energy production from the sun). In verse 5, we have reference to evil in the world. In verse 6 attention is once again drawn to a different part of the vision. “These men” should refer to the evil ones and not the two witnesses. “These men” cause havoc while they themselves are prophesying (doing their own work). Verse 6 tells us of their evil capabilities. Then they are removed as a beast from the Abyss attacks them. They equate with the beasts of evil in the other versions. When they have finished their testimony (done their job) the beast from the Abyss in this version is doing everyone a good turn by disposing of them. In verse 10, the inhabitants of the Earth rejoice and celebrate at the removal of evil from the Earth in the form of these two prophets. Once again, these two are not to be confused with the two witnesses representing good at the beginning. The evil ones have been removed. It is that period of peace again; the millennium. No wonder they were celebrating. Verse 11 has evil returning as in the time of tribulation. Then he has a vision of one group being requested to go up into the heavens while others remain to face the tribulation on the Earth. A song is sung and he has another vision. He interprets this as a temple in the heavens containing the Ark of the Covenant. We know what kind of an ark it is really. We are starting to get the message. The chapter closes with the type of effects we have come to expect as our ark leaves. The second account is complete. Time for another tea break and winding back of the tape. It is curious how the number 7 triggers this off every time. Apparently, 7 stands for completeness. It is the same as the creation account. At the seventh stage, it was complete. There are seven notes that complete the musical scale. Then you start again. By the way, do you know how many times the letters “seven” appear in the Bible? I started to count them on my computer. Half way through, I thought, “I think I already know the answer”. Go on, have a guess. It is somewhere between a hundred and a thousand. Correct! Seven hundred times. Was that planned or is it just a coincidence?
In Chapter 12 we are now back in time again, in the midst of the time of trial and the battle between good and evil. The birth of the male could again represent the birth of Jesus and the rest the resulting evil against him. Chapter 13 gives us the detail of how the three beasts work together and support each other on their evil quest during this period. In Chapter 14, he has a brief slip into the future as he has a vision of the chosen ones who will be redeemed from the Earth. By verse 6, he is back on track towards the end of the time of trial. Verse 6 heralds the millennium, as the beast is about to be defeated. At verse 16 the job is done. Verse 17 to 22 brings us into the time of tribulation, as a second harvest has to take place of the chosen ones. At the start of Chapter 15, the next set of angels line up to give their account. Meanwhile the Earth is destroyed, as the sun becomes a red giant. The sea of glass is space and the fire is obvious. This third account is now complete.
The fourth account starts in Chapter 16 with the pouring out of the seven bowls. Each stage is dealt with briefly, but the salient features are still there. The first bowl has the emergence of life and the inherent evil within it. The second bowl has the bloodletting due to the period of fighting and killing of each other as in the time of trial. The third bowl has the evil being replaced with good as we are pointed in the right direction. We are in the millennium again. The fourth bowl has the sun overheating and the time of tribulation as things go wrong. The fifth bowl is poured out on the river Euphrates to prepare the way for the chosen ones. In the meantime, all hell breaks loose on the Earth. There is a strong temptation here for us to wonder if that is where the new Earth is situated, in the constellation Eridanus (Euphrates). We know that Epsilon Eridani has a Jupiter like planet already and it is only about 10 light years from the Earth. There are also a couple of other stars in the same quadrant of the sky roughly the same distance away. We will just have to wait a few more years to find out. It is here, just before the seventh angel signals the end of the world that we have the reference to Armageddon. I was brought up with the idea of the battle of Armageddon. That is a final battle between good and evil or God versus the antichrist. In our context we can see that it is just a vision of an assembly point where people are gathered before the end. The seventh angel pours out his bowl and we have the final destruction of the Earth. “It is done”. We have a cataclysm the like of which has never occurred since man walked the Earth. It is that number 7 again. The fourth account is complete. Time for another tea break and rewind.
Chapter 17 finds us back in the time of trial and evil in the world. The beast is once again in evidence, this time receiving its power from 10 kings, which act as one. We are told that it is a beast that once was, now is not, and yet will come. It equates with the beast from the sea in a previous version that had the fatal wound, which had healed. It was the one with the number 666. Again, it can do nothing on its own, but relies on others to empower it. Chapter 18 stands on its own as a salutary warning to those civilisations that put self interest and the love of money above all else. You will just have to wade through it and tone the language down. The message is there. Self interest results in defeat. The theme continues in Chapter 19. Verse 11 appears to equate with the appearance of Jesus upon the Earth. The Chapter ends with the promise that evil can be overcome. Chapter 20 deals with the overcoming of evil and the defeat of the beast and his cohorts. The Earth is resurrected, the millennium begins and a very long period of peace ensues. Once again from verse 7 onwards, we have the return of evil as the world enters the time of tribulation as the sun starts to overheat and life on Earth approaches its end.
Chapter 21 reminds us that every end can herald a new beginning. We have a new heaven and Earth and the end becomes a beginning. It is a second resurrection. A description of beautiful cities unfolds of the type you would expect from an advanced civilisation. This is shown to John by the seventh angel with the seventh bowl. We are reminded by the seventh angel at the start of Chapter 22 of what the river of life is all about. It is our near perfect description of the genome again. Twelve trees on each side of the river making a total of twenty-four. They yield their fruit every month (ready for fertilisation); get it? The seventh angel finishes his influence at the end of verse 7 in Chapter 22. The fifth account is complete. Time for another tea break and time shift.
Verse 8 has John back in his own present time and in the time of trial. Verse 11 once again refers to the evil in the world and the ostrich syndrome. Verse 17 tells us that we are responsible for our actions and we can take the free gift of the waters of life if we choose. Then the book rounds off and draws to a close. All has been revealed. It has been revealed five times in all!
Now when I go back to those seven letters to the seven churches that we skipped over in Chapter 7, I am sure there is a similar theme running through them, bringing the total number of revelations to 6. Each revelation tells the same story but with a different slant on it. How many times do we want telling? John was either the first science fiction writer, a great prophet, astrophysicist or all rolled into one. How did he know all this? He really was in tune with how his Universe works.
Just in case anyone has lost the plot, we have opened a big can of worms and cannot get the lid back on. We may be forced by this account to look at our own personal belief system. For myself it would appear that apart from the resurrection of Jesus, the terms death and resurrection, in respect of future events, do not refer to the dead coming out of their graves, so to speak and being given new physical bodies. They refer to two events in the physical Universe, which have to take place. They have to take place because God through Jesus is telling John that this is an absolute fact. The first death is the removal of evil and the first resurrection is the resurrection of the Earth from the time of trial and into the millennium. The second death refers to an event so far in the future that it is too mind boggling to even think of. That is our leaving of our beloved planet to a safe haven as the sun enters the final stages of its life. We have been promised this by God himself, the great Creator. It is the death of the Earth and our resurrection to the new Earth in the physical Universe. Other consequences for myself would appear to be, that there is no devil, only evil in the imagination and actions of humankind, which can be defeated. The spirits of those passed are probably quite happy living in their higher heavenly dimension. To have a life on Earth, perhaps you just incarnate into it. Earth is heaven’s foundation. Heaven needs us. There is no hell. Hell is what you create for yourself by your action. The only fire and brimstone, is reserved for when the Earth is destroyed by what you might call the fires of hell.
It is what a lot of you hoped for in your heart of hearts, isn’t it? So, which bits have each religion or belief system got right in your eyes? That would take some sorting.
There is definitely one very clear message to all the nations of the Earth, leaders of nations and scientists. It does look like we have a future in space exploration and our very long-term future may involve a trip to another local solar system, in search of a new Earth that we have discovered. We will have plenty of time to sort this out. In the meantime we have a far more important job. We have to strive to reach the end of the age and bring an end to the time of trial. We have to strive to enter the millennium, because God, the Universe, wants it that way. Heaven on Earth is our destiny. A brighter day is about to dawn on the horizon.
Discourse or diatribe?
As I reach this final point, a horrible chill runs down my spine as I wonder; if this is all predestined and it all has to happen, has it all happened before? Is one of those nearest red giants or white dwarfs our real ancestral home? Is it now on its way back to the centre of the Galaxy for recycling by our great Creator? Is that why there are discontinuities in the evolution record, because we introduced them when we arrived? Where is the giant spaceship in which we arrived? Is it on the other side of the moon? Is it on Mars? Is it a converted asteroid parked up in orbit somewhere in the solar system waiting rediscovery? Hang on, have we missed something? The end of Revelation Chapter 8 and start of 9? Is it buried beneath the Earth’s surface in the “shaft of the Abyss”? Are we the result of a penal colony from an advanced civilisation? Were we once cast down to the Earth from one of those nearby stars in Draco the dragon? Did they just dump us and leave? You would think that an advanced civilisation would have had the heart to make sure we did not die straight away. Did they infuse the bodies with nano-technology robots so that if a fault occurred they would swarm into action and correct it? Is that why they lived much longer? Is that why lifetimes decreased with each generation? Was there a reserve supply left in the “shaft of the Abyss”? Is that where Jesus went for his training during his missing years? Where is the “shaft of the Abyss”? When we have removed the evil and proved ourselves, do we then have the chance to go to a new Earth in Eridanus? Are they watching us from those stars in Draco the Dragon to see if we can pull ourselves out of the mire? As we moved off towards Eridanus and left our sun behind, looking back, we would see it situated in the constellation Serpens the serpent. We would be leaving behind that ancient serpent that bedevilled us all those years. That sounds very poetic. I have only just found that out by using a 3D star mapper on the Internet. It has just scared the hell out of me! Perhaps they are watching us now. Maybe if we have proved ourselves, they will assist us in the future. If we degraded and became worse, would they come and finish off the job?
There you are I have just deliberately dragged you down, down into the Abyss. Easy isn’t it? The bit about the serpent is definitely correct.
Let’s climb out of it. If they are watching us, by now, they will have had thirty years of our television programs. Will the later programs as they arrive show our steady improvement or degeneration? Am I going insane? Too many questions. I think I need to go and lie down in a darkened room. Too much thinking can seriously damage your brain and that’s another road to hell. Fresh air, sunshine and exercise are more rewarding.
On the other hand, if Revelation only just made it into the Bible, what about those that did not? Have I got the time?
Apologies. I thought you should have a flavour of the turmoil of my brain after that mind-bending exercise.
Postscript
Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.
The Bible: Matthew 6:34
…unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, whoever humbles himself like this little child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.
The Bible: Matthew 18.3
Serve your Lord, who has created you and those who have gone before you, so that you may guard yourselves against evil…..
The Koran: The Cow 21
Just in case you go to bed with cataclysmic visions rippling through you mind, it is chill out time. How did you treat your Universe today? The extent of our own bit of the Universe depends on our importance or influence within it. It may be, for some of us, that our own bit of the Universe extends no further than our own gate. For others it may be different. What cannot have escaped the least astute of us by now, is that when we are working in a positive manner, building up, making the surroundings better, helping others to lead happier lives, then we are working with the flow. We are working with the Universe. If we do the opposite and are destructive, make the surroundings worse and generally work against everyone else, then we are working against the flow and against the Universe. The rules for life have been laid down at various times by people of vision. Jesus himself told us that it was a waste of time for most of us to try to change the world itself. That is the responsibility of those who have the power to do so. We were also encouraged to think more about what we are doing in the present rather than worrying about tomorrow. The summary of the law was to love God and love your neighbour. So, it now becomes clearer. Although we cannot change the world, we can have an impact on our own little bit of it. Whether you are out in the street, garden or countryside, whether actively involved in improving things or just out there appreciating everything, that is exactly what you are doing, loving your own Universe. If you enjoy going to church or any other group activity such as sports or other recreation with like-minded people then do it. If you do not like the organisation you are in, try a different one. If you prefer to be out in the sun or rain enjoying your surroundings on your own or with others then do it. You are loving the Universe that created you. At the end of the day you can ask yourself, “Was I constructive or destructive? Did I build up or knock down? Did I make the environment better or did I make it worse? Did I make someone laugh or did I make them cry? Did I solve a problem or did I make one? Did I please someone or annoy them?”
As far as different religions and belief systems go, we should all be exalting what we have in common. We should be looking with curiosity at each other’s differences and not deriding them. We are all part of the same pot of stew in the end.
How did you treat other life forms with which you share the Universe? Did you catch that spider and set it free or did you kill it? This reminds me of another misconception that some people have. If it were not for spiders, we would be literally up to our ears in insects. So, spiders apart from being ugly and disliked by the majority of us are really our allies. Some people think that when they see them in their sink or bath that they have come up through the plughole and proceed to try to flush them back down. The fact is, that it is impossible for a spider to enter a sink or a bath that way without drowning because of the U bend. By flushing them down you condemn them to an almost certain death. They do have a technique of rolling them selves into a ball with a pocket of air to help them last out and they may then attempt to get back out to avoid drowning, much to the horror of the person trying to get rid of them. The fact is, that spiders just happen to walk into or fall into a bath or sink by accident perhaps after walking in through an open window. Once in, they are trapped, because their feet cannot grip the sides no matter how hard they try. The easiest thing to do is to trap them in a glass and take them outside. Once in the glass they cannot climb out for the same reason that they were trapped in the sink. A piece of card over the top gives extra reassurance. If you do not want them in the sink or bath in the first place then the answer is simple. Make sure that the bath towel that hangs over the side, reaches the bottom of the bath and make sure that a cloth hangs over and into the washbasin. Then the spider can get out and escape, probably back out through the window. Fortunately, plastic window frames appear to make it harder for them to get through in the first place. At my tennis club were always getting spiders in the sink especially during the winter when the clubhouse is not used as much. Since following these simple tips, we have not had one. There you are, you can go to bed and dream about spiders instead.
How many people can be bothered to pick up any litter from outside their own front door and put it in the bin? It does not take less than a minute. Even if every other person did it and compensated for those who cannot be bothered or have the attitude, “I’m not shifting it, I didn’t put it there!” then there would be no litter.
Just as Buddha taught us, it is the simple things that make life worthwhile. It is easy to see whether you are going with the flow or against it. If you are against the Universe then you are working against the very thing that created you and in which you have your being. Do not be surprised if one day it turns against you. We all need to work with our Universe. It is all common sense in the end.
The End
If you have found the ideas expressed of use, why not spread the word by passing on the URL to any other like minded individual.