I was recently reading a book about the book of Revelations and I thought I would share some of what I had learned. It has been used as to describe the future, or the life of the first Christians or a principle. The Protestants used to think the beast in the book of Revelation was the Catholic church so it has been used before in different context. Apparently the style of apocalyptic language used was common for Jews at the time from 200 BC to 200 AD and was used as Jews were under persecution and to keep the person safe that wrote it they wrote in metaphors that only people that knew the bible could understand. In conclusion there is no guarantee that John was on mushrooms when he wrote the book as some of my friends think. There are a lot of references to the old testament in the book of Revelations. Somethings are explained in the book like the stars represent the angels and so forth. Some numbers are symbolic and are used again and again.
| Number | Meaning |
| 3 1/2 | a small number |
| 3 | God’s number, the trinity |
| 4 | The number of creation, 4 corners of the earth |
| 6 | one of from 7, human number, sinful number |
| 7 | perfection 3+4=7 |
| 10 | multitude, 10x10x10 a great big number |
| 12 | the 12 tribes of Israel, 12 apostles |
The author was usually anonymous yet so was not the case for this book. It was common for countries to be represented by an animal like in the case of Rom a beast. Colors also represented different things:
| Color | Meaning |
| white | victory, lordship, glory |
| black | evil or disaster |
| red | blood and violence |
| Yellowish Green | death |
| purpel, scarlet | god lessness and shame |
The meaning in the book of Revelations
The book was meant to read aloud as to not get to stuck on details. The meaning is to press worship as the theme comes up again and again in the book. It also describes Jesus in the similar case with God so it strengthens the case for Jesus divinity.
Do you find the symbolism interesting?
Source
Mikael Tellbe (2017), Libris, Lammet och odjuret En guide till uppenbarelseboken
Check out my other stuff
Är Gud verklig? – Is God real? https://creativemichaela.com/?p=800
A year of the Lord’s favor and a day of vengeance https://creativemichaela.com/?p=958
Judge not https://creativemichaela.com/?p=953
Leave a Reply