The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse are symbolic figures that appear in the Book of Revelation, the last book in the New Testament canon. They seem like familiar figures to most of us. Even if you aren’t a Christian or weren’t raised as a Christian, you’ve probably been exposed to the idea of the “Four Horsemen” through popular culture. Popular culture’s portrayal of the Four Horsemen, though, isn’t very accurate. For instance, nearly all popular culture adaptations get the identity of the first horseman wrong.
Even if you have read the original descriptions of the Four Horsemen from the Book of Revelation, chances are you aren’t aware of the complex cultural background and symbolism that these descriptions draw on. For instance, original readers of the Book of Revelation may have imagined the first horseman as a Parthian archer and the fourth horseman, Death, as a naked young man with wings, since that’s how the personification of Death is usually portrayed in ancient Greek art.
Depictions of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse in popular culture
The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse appear quite frequently in contemporary works of fantasy. Of all the images from the Book of Revelation, the Four Horsemen are the ones that seem to appear in popular culture the most frequently. Certainly, I have seen far more television shows that include the Four Horsemen than I have that include the bronze-footed, blazing-eyed, glowing-faced Jesus with a sword coming out of his mouth from chapter one or the four six-winged, eternally-singing living creatures covered all over in eyes from chapter four.
Part of the reason why the Four Horsemen are so popular is probably because, unlike most of the other symbols that appear in the Book of Revelation, the Four Horsemen are fairly straightforward to interpret; they are four figures who are described in the Book of Revelation as harbingers of the End Times and each one symbolizes a specific scourge of mankind. Consequently, they make perfect fantasy antagonists.
For instance, the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse appear as antagonists in the fantasy comedy novel Good Omens, written by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman, which was originally published in 1990. In the novel, the Four Horsemen are War (portrayed as a war correspondent who deliberately sows strife and dissension), Famine (a restaurant tycoon who specializes in selling rich people extremely small portions of absurdly overpriced food), Pollution (who took over after Pestilence retired after the invention of penicillin), and Death (the leader of the group who speaks in ALL CAPS). Instead of riding on horseback, in the novel, the Horsemen ride on motorcycles.
Similarly, all four horsemen of the apocalypse appear as major antagonists in season five of the American dark fantasy television series Supernatural, which aired from September 2009 to May 2010. In the show, the Four Horsemen are War, Famine, Pestilence, and Death. War, Famine, and Pestilence are done away with by the end of season five, but Death survives and becomes a minor recurring character in later seasons until he is eventually killed with his own scythe at the end of season ten.
Both of the works I have mentioned take a deliberately humorous, modernizing approach to the Four Horsemen, so I am willing to excuse some inaccuracies, but it is worth noting that pop culture adaptations seem to not only change the attributes of the Four Horsemen, but actually change who the Horsemen are. Most notably, Pestilence is not one of the Horsemen in the Book of Revelation at all.
Now that we’ve had a look at some of the portrayals of the Four Horsemen that many people today are probably familiar with, let’s take a look at how the Book of Revelation actually describes them.
ABOVE: Shot of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, as portrayed in the television adaptation of Good Omens
A little context about Revelation
The original description of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse comes from the Book of Revelation chapter six. The Book of Revelation is believed to have most likely been written during the reign of the Roman emperor Domitian (ruled 81 – 96 AD). In the first chapter of the book, the author introduces himself by the name Ἰωάννης (Iōánnēs), which is the Greek form of the Hebrew name יוֹחָנָן (Yôḥānān), which means “YHWH is Gracious.” The Greek name Ἰωάννης is usually Anglicized as John.
Although the Book of Revelation is sometimes misattributed to John the Apostle, most scholars agree that it was actually a different man named John who wrote the Book of Revelation—not John the Apostle. The author of the Book of Revelation never describes himself as an apostle and, in fact, he instead describes himself as a “prophet.” Since the Book of Revelation seems to strongly imply at several points that the author regarded apostles and prophets as two different groups (for instance, in Revelation 18:20), the fact that John calls himself a “prophet” strongly suggests that he didn’t consider himself an apostle.
Furthermore, in the Book of Revelation 21:14, John, the author of the Book of Revelation, refers to the Twelve Apostles in a way that seems to suggest that he himself is not one of them. Since Yôḥānān was an extremely common name for Jewish men in the first century AD, we have absolutely no reason to think that the author of Revelation was John the Apostle and actually quite a bit of evidence that seems to suggest that he was not.
In the first chapter, John tells us that he is writing the Book of Revelation on the Greek island of Patmos, where he has been banished because of his fervent love for Jesus. Because he wrote the Book of Revelation on the island of Patmos, the author of the Book of Revelation has been traditionally referred to as “John of Patmos” or “John the Revelator” to distinguish him from John the Apostle.
ABOVE: St. John on Patmos, painted between c. 1649 and c. 1669 by the Flemish painter Gaspar de Crayer
To many modern readers, the imagery in the Book of Revelation seems bizarre and nonsensical. The atheist website RationalWiki is fond of quoting in its footnotes the following description of the Book of Revelation, which it attributes to a lecture by the atheist activist Richard Carrier: “a five hour acid trip so bizarre if you actually made it into a movie it would actually outdo Eraserhead for the title of ‘Most Annoying Weird Movie Ever Made’. It’s basically the ramblings of a guy who has an hours long conversation with the dead spirit of Jesus who appears in the form of fucked up mutant that makes John Carpenter’s The Thing look cuddly.”
Crude language and dated horror movie references aside, even many devout Christians find the Book of Revelation frustrating. I inherited a complete set of William Barclay’s New Testament commentaries from my great-grandfather, who was a minister for the Church of the Brethren. The first page of the first volume on the Book of Revelation states:
“Not only is the Revelation different; it is also notoriously difficult to understand. The result is that has sometimes been abandoned as quite unintelligible and it has sometimes become the playground of religious eccentrics, who use it to map out celestial time-tables of what is to come or find in it evidence for their own eccentricities. One despairing commentator said that there are as many riddles in the Revelation as there are words, and another that the study of the Revelation either finds or leaves a man mad.”
The Book of Revelation, though, is not nearly as nonsensical as it superficially seems. The reason why it seems so bizarre to so many modern readers is because the entire book relies heavily on symbols, ideas, and codes that the author knew his original audience of late first-century AD Jewish Christians would understand. Since modern readers are rarely familiar with the cultural context in which the Book of Revelation was originally written, they often struggle to understand it. By looking at the Book of Revelation in its original historical context as a late first-century AD Jewish Christian document, though, we can begin to understand it.
In examining Revelation as a historical document, we also need to be willing to accept that it was written by a fallible human being and that the predictions contained within it may be wrong. For instance, the author of Revelation repeatedly emphasizes that all the events he predicts will come to pass very, very soon (see for instance Revelation 3:11, 6:10–11, 10:5–6, 12:12, 14:7, 17:9–10, 22:6–7, 22:10, 22:20 etc.). The author of the Book of Revelation undoubtedly thought that the end of the world would come within his own lifetime. Now it’s two thousand years later and the End still hasn’t come, so clearly John of Patmos was wrong about something.
In any case, let’s move on to talk about the Four Horsemen. In the chapter leading up to the description of the Four Horsemen, John of Patmos describes a vision in which he sees a scroll with seven seals and a lamb with seven horns and seven eyes that looks as though it had been slaughtered. The lamb symbolizes Jesus Christ and its seven horns and seven eyes symbolize the seven spirits sent by God to the Earth. John describes the lamb taking up the scroll. As the lamb opens the first four seals, the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse come forth.
ABOVE: Painting by the German painter Matthias Gerung, dating to between c. 1530 and c. 1532, depicting the seven-eyed, seven-horned lamb opening the seven seals as described in the Book of Revelation
The first horseman
The original Greek text of the Book of Revelation 6:1–2 reads as follows:
“καὶ εἶδον ὅτε ἤνοιξεν τὸ ἀρνίον μίαν ἐκ τῶν ἑπτὰ σφραγίδων, καὶ ἤκουσα ἑνὸς ἐκ τῶν τεσσάρων ζῴων λέγοντος ὡς φωνὴ βροντῆς, ἔρχου. καὶ εἶδον, καὶ ἰδοὺ ἵππος λευκός, καὶ ὁ καθήμενος ἐπ᾽ αὐτὸν ἔχων τόξον, καὶ ἐδόθη αὐτῶ στέφανος, καὶ ἐξῆλθεν νικῶν καὶ ἵνα νικήσῃ.”
Here is the same passage in English, as translated in the NRSV:
“Then I saw the Lamb open one of the seven seals, and I heard one of the four living creatures call out, as with a voice of thunder, ‘Come!’ I looked, and there was a white horse! Its rider had a bow; a crown was given to him, and he came out conquering and to conquer.”
In popular culture, the first horseman who rides on the white horse is nearly always interpreted as “Pestilence,” but there is absolutely nothing in the biblical text to suggest that this rider has any connection to disease. Furthermore, the idea of the first rider as symbolizing pestilence only goes back to the early twentieth century. Therefore, I am going to have to say that the interpretation of the first rider as “Pestilence” is just flat-out wrong.
If you actually read the passage from the Book of Revelation, the first rider is clearly and unambiguously associated with conquest. For starters, the white horse itself was a symbol of military victory. When a Roman general had a triumph, his chariot was pulled by white horses.
Furthermore, John of Patmos states that the rider carries a bow. Throughout the Hebrew Bible, the bow is used as a symbol of military might. For instance, the breaking of bows is used as a metaphor for destroying a nation’s military power in the Book of Hosea 1:5 and again in the Book of Psalms 46:9.
ABOVE: Bas relief of the Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius in a Roman triumph from the Arch of Marcus Aurelius on display in the Capitoline Museums. When a Roman general held a triumph, he rode in a chariot pulled by white horses.
John also says that the rider is given a crown, which is a symbol of authority to govern. The associations we have here then are clearly those of conquest: a white horse (symbolizing victory), a bow (symbolizing military might), and a crown (symbolizing authority to govern). When John finishes off his description by saying that the rider “came out conquering and to conquer” he makes it absolutely crystal clear that the first horseman symbolizes military conquest.
I think that the reason why people have tried to reinterpret the first horseman, who is unambiguously portrayed as Conquest, as “Pestilence” is because people normally think of Conquest as being a good thing. Conquest, though, isn’t such a good thing if you happen to be on the receiving end of it. Indeed, anyone reading the Book of Revelation in the late first century AD, upon reading the description of the first horseman, would have immediately thought of the Romans’ greatest enemies to the east: the Parthians.
The Parthians were known for riding on horseback and being highly skilled archers. In works of Roman art, there are many depictions of Parthian archers riding on horseback. Fear of the Parthians was especially great in the late first century AD because the Romans had just fought a war with the Parthians, which lasted from 58 AD to 63 AD.
In 62 AD, two Roman legions under the command of Lucius Caesennius Paetus were actually defeated by the Parthians and forced to surrender in the Battle of Rhandeia. Because John describes the first horseman as a horseback-mounted archer, the immediate image that would have been on every reader’s mind would have been one of Parthian conquest.
ABOVE: Photograph from Wikimedia Commons of an ancient Roman marble relief carving on display in the Turin City Museum of Ancient Art depicting a Parthian archer riding on horseback
The second horseman
The Greek text of the Book of Revelation 6:3–4 reads as follows:
“καὶ ὅτε ἤνοιξεν τὴν σφραγῖδα τὴν δευτέραν, ἤκουσα τοῦ δευτέρου ζῴου λέγοντος, ἔρχου. καὶ ἐξῆλθεν ἄλλος ἵππος πυρρός, καὶ τῶ καθημένῳ ἐπ᾽ αὐτὸν ἐδόθη αὐτῶ λαβεῖν τὴν εἰρήνην ἐκ τῆς γῆς καὶ ἵνα ἀλλήλους σφάξουσιν, καὶ ἐδόθη αὐτῶ μάχαιρα μεγάλη.”
Here is the same passage in English, as translated in the NRSV:
“When he opened the second seal, I heard the second living creature call out, ‘Come!’ And out came another horse, bright red; its rider was permitted to take peace from the earth, so that people would slaughter one another; and he was given a great sword.”
The second horseman is usually interpreted in popular culture as “War.” This interpretation is probably mostly correct, although it is important to clarify what kind of war the second horseman symbolizes. While the first horseman symbolizes Conquest, the second horseman most likely symbolizes specifically Civil War.
The horse is described as bright red. The Greek word that is used to describe the horse is πυρρός (pyrrhós), which literally means “flame-colored.” It makes sense that War should ride on a bright red horse, since red is the color of the blood he has been sent to cause men to spill and the color of the flames that will consume the cities he has been sent to cause men to burn.
The horseman is described as carrying a large sword, which symbolizes the violence he has been sent to cause throughout the Earth. The Greek word that is used here that is translated as “sword” is μάχαιρα (máchaira), which originally referred specifically to kind of large, machete-like knife that was used primarily for slicing rather than stabbing and was especially associated with cavalry fighters. The Greek writer Xenophon (lived 431 – 354 BC) notably recommends that cavalry fighters use a μάχαιρα rather than a ξίφος (xíphos).
By the time the books of the New Testament were being written, the word μάχαιρα had become genericized and it is often used in the New Testament to refer to any kind of sword. Nonetheless, because the man wielding the sword is described as riding on horseback, a μάχαιρα probably is the kind of sword that John was thinking of when he wrote this passage.
ABOVE: Detail of an Attic red-figure pelike from Nola dating to c. 460 BC depicting the god Dionysos impaling the Gigante Eurytos with the spear. In his hand, Eurytos is holding a μάχαιρα.
The idea that the End Times would be heralded by a period of strife and war is prevalent throughout early Christian writings. In the Gospel of Mark 13:12, Jesus is described as saying that, in the End Times, “Brother will betray brother to death, and a father his child, and children will rise against parents and have them put to death.” In the Gospel of Matthew 24:6–8, Jesus is portrayed as saying:
“And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars; see that you are not alarmed; for this must take place, but the end is not yet. For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places: all this is but the beginning of the birth pangs.”
Certainly, this idea that the End Times would be preceded by a period of strife and war must have been exacerbated by the events of the First Romano-Jewish War, which was fought from 66 AD to 73 AD. In summer of 70 AD, the Roman forces under the command of the future emperor Titus sacked the holy city of Jerusalem itself and demolished the Second Temple.
It is extremely likely that the author of the Book of Revelation believed he himself was living in this period of “wars and rumors of wars” that many early Christians believed Jesus had foretold.
ABOVE: Detail of the south inner panel of the Arch of Titus, constructed c. 81 AD, depicting Roman soldiers carrying off the treasures of Jerusalem after the sack of the city in summer of 70 AD
The third horseman
The Greek text of the Book of Revelation 6:5–6 reads as follows:
“καὶ ὅτε ἤνοιξεν τὴν σφραγῖδα τὴν τρίτην, ἤκουσα τοῦ τρίτου ζῴου λέγοντος, ἔρχου. καὶ εἶδον, καὶ ἰδοὺ ἵππος μέλας, καὶ ὁ καθήμενος ἐπ᾽ αὐτὸν ἔχων ζυγὸν ἐν τῇ χειρὶ αὐτοῦ. καὶ ἤκουσα ὡς φωνὴν ἐν μέσῳ τῶν τεσσάρων ζῴων λέγουσαν, χοῖνιξ σίτου δηναρίου, καὶ τρεῖς χοίνικες κριθῶν δηναρίου· καὶ τὸ ἔλαιον καὶ τὸν οἶνον μὴ ἀδικήσῃς.”
Here is the same passage in English, as translated in the NRSV:
“When he opened the third seal, I heard the third living creature call out, ‘Come!’ I looked, and there was a black horse! Its rider held a pair of scales in his hand, and I heard what seemed to be a voice in the midst of the four living creatures saying, ‘A quart of wheat for a day’s pay, and three quarts of barley for a day’s pay, but do not damage the olive oil and the wine!’”
Popular culture has interpreted the third horseman as “Famine.” This interpretation is almost certainly correct. The scales that the figure is described as holding represent the way bread will be measured during the time of famine. In ancient times, when the crops grew well and there was enough bread to go around, people did not need to measure bread by weight. During times of extreme famine and scarcity, however, bread had to be carefully rationed and measured out by weight.
Other descriptions of famine in the Hebrew Bible rely on the same trope of doling out bread by weight. The Book of Leviticus 26:26 describes a famine as follows, as translated in the NRSV:
“When I break your staff of bread, ten women shall bake your bread in a single oven, and they shall dole out your bread by weight; and though you eat, you shall not be satisfied.”
Likewise, the Book of Ezekiel 4:16 describes a famine in similar terms, as translated in the NRSV:
“Then he said to me, Mortal, I am going to break the staff of bread in Jerusalem; they shall eat bread by weight and with fearfulness; and they shall drink water by measure and in dismay.”
Clearly, John of Patmos’s description of Famine carrying a set of scales is drawing on a recurring description from the Hebrew Bible that would have been familiar to the original readers of the Book of Revelation.
ABOVE: Fresco dated to c. 1320 from the Lower Basilica of the Basilica of Saint Francis of Assisi in Assisi, Italy, depicting Famine on his black horse holding his set of scales
The first part of the command given the Famine by the voice in the midst of the four living creatures is easy to make sense of; the voice is saying how much a quart of wheat or barley will cost in the midst of the famine. Needless to say, a single quart of wheat or three quarts of barley for a day’s pay is an exorbitant amount which reflects the scarcity of grain.
The second part of the command—the part about not damaging the olive oil or the wine—may seem a bit more puzzling to modern readers, but it makes more sense when we look at the passage in its original historical context. Olive trees and grape vines have much deeper roots than grain plants, meaning they are more resilient and more capable of surviving even during times of drought.
Thus, during times of drought when grain was exceedingly scarce, people could still count on the olive trees and grape vines to provide them with sustenance. John of Patmos probably included mention of this in order to convey that the famine he is predicting will not be the end of the world itself, but rather merely a harbinger of the approaching End.
ABOVE: Photograph from Wikimedia Commons of an extremely ancient olive tree from the town of Karystos on the Greek island of Euboia. Olive trees are extraordinarily resilient and, in ancient times, they were a generally reliable source of food during times of drought and famine.
The fourth horseman
The Greek text of the Book of Revelation 6:7–8 reads a follows:
“καὶ ὅτε ἤνοιξεν τὴν σφραγῖδα τὴν τετάρτην, ἤκουσα φωνὴν τοῦ τετάρτου ζῴου λέγοντος, ἔρχου. καὶ εἶδον, καὶ ἰδοὺ ἵππος χλωρός, καὶ ὁ καθήμενος ἐπάνω αὐτοῦ ὄνομα αὐτῶ [ὁ] θάνατος, καὶ ὁ ᾅδης ἠκολούθει μετ᾽ αὐτοῦ· καὶ ἐδόθη αὐτοῖς ἐξουσία ἐπὶ τὸ τέταρτον τῆς γῆς, ἀποκτεῖναι ἐν ῥομφαίᾳ καὶ ἐν λιμῶ καὶ ἐν θανάτῳ καὶ ὑπὸ τῶν θηρίων τῆς γῆς.”
Here is the same passage in English, as translated in the NRSV:
“When he opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth living creature call out, ‘Come!’ I looked and there was a pale green horse! Its rider’s name was Death, and Hades followed with him; they were given authority over a fourth of the earth, to kill with sword, famine, and pestilence, and by the wild animals of the earth.”
Of all the four horsemen, the fourth horseman is the only one who is explicitly named in the text of the Book of Revelation itself. The Book of Revelation explicitly identifies the fourth horseman as Θάνατος (Thánatos), which is the Greek word for “Death.”
The personification Death was a recurring figure in ancient Greek folklore, art, and literature. In Greek art, Death is usually portrayed as a nude young man with feathered wings and a sword at his waist. Regardless of what John of Patmos’s intentions were, it is highly probable that this is the image that many of the original readers of the Book of Revelation would have had in mind upon reading the description of the fourth horseman as “Death.”
John of Patmos describes the fourth rider as being followed by “Hades.” In this context, John is probably not referring to Hades the Greek god, but rather Hades, the personification of the Underworld. The word for the Underworld in Hebrew is שְׁאוֹל (Šəʾōl) and the Greek word ᾍδης (Hádēs) is often used in the New Testament as a calque. There is actually a bit of a clever visual metaphor here; Death is, quite literally, followed by the Underworld. Thus, John is saying that, after people die, they go to Sheol, the Underworld.
The horse that Death rides upon is described using the Greek word χλωρός (chlōrós), which refers to the part of the color spectrum ranging from yellow to pale green. In many translations, this word is simply translated as “pale,” which is a bit misleading. John of Patmos is not talking about a white horse, but rather about a horse that is some kind of sickly green color. (Ironically, it is the final horseman, Death, who is associated with disease—not the first. “Pestilence” is even specifically mentioned in the text as one of Death’s attributes.)
ABOVE: Ancient Greek marble relief carving from the drum of a marble column from the Temple of Artemis at Ephesos, dating to between c. 325 and c. 300 BC, depicting Death is a nude young man with feathered wings and a sword at his waist.
Conclusion
The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse described in the Book of Revelation are: Conquest, Civil War, Famine, and Death. Furthermore, contrary to depictions in modern popular culture, in the Book of Revelation, the Four Horsemen are not described as the causes of the End, but rather merely harbingers of the End. John is saying that the End Times will be preceded by conquest, civil war, famine, and death. He would have agreed with the statement attributed to Jesus in the Gospel of Matthew that “all this is but the beginning of the birth pangs.”
Meanwhile, the way that John of Patmos’s original readers would have understood his descriptions of the Four Horsemen would have been influenced by ideas, images, and symbols that were familiar to Christians in the late first century AD that are completely foreign to most readers today, including Parthian horseback-mounted archers, passages in the Hebrew Bible referencing the measuring of bread by weight as a sign of severe famine, and ancient Greek depictions of the personification Death.
Excellent research, presentation and description of The Four Horsemen!
Now, it makes a lot more sense to me the sequence Conquest, Civil War, Famine and Death. Someone or some country conquering others, the consequent civil desperation, leading chaos in all sectors and finally, common death.
Whether these four Seals apply to ancient times to modern times or even times to come, remains to be seen. Also, we tend to generalize the Seals to a large scale happening; might it possible that it would be only applied to a specific area and era?
Thanks.
Bressan
As I talk about in the article above, the author of the Book of Revelation explicitly states multiple times that the events he describes will come to pass very, very soon. Since he was writing in the late first century AD, he was clearly talking about events that he expected to happen in what was, at that time, the immediate future. This means he was expecting the events he describes to happen in the late first century AD and early second century AD. Since his predictions don’t seem to have come true, it is quite apparent that he was wrong about some things.
What an amazing approach! I’ve never think about this subtle distinction between “international war” and “civil war”, that really fits to first and second horsemen.
But I have some points here. The fact that verse 8 cites pestilence is the very reason many interprets the first horseman as this malefit. By exclusion, if war (sword) and famine are obvious, so, pestilence must be the other horseman, what is curious because is ignores the wild animals. Problably because if pestilence threats our society until now (it is plausible even that mankind could be decimated by some super virus), beasts have no longer any chance to do something like it. And even on that times it already was the case, except if we believe in dragons or kaijus.
Or we could consider diseases as micro beasts!
But, really, the descripiton of the white horse horseman completely shuts down this picture. However, is worthy note that the first horseman receive other interpretations, as the anti christ, or even the Christ himself.
My second point is about the third horseman. I do not agree that famine is, for itself, a so precise interpretation as was for the red horse one. It clearly causes scarcity, ou represents it, but I like to consider it as avarice, usury, social and economic issues that frequentely cause so much hunger as natural disaster os wars themselves. Actually, pestilences, or plagues, also causes famine, as it attacks crop fields or herds, and it can includes not only grasshoppers and other insects, but also wild beasts, as crowns or wolves that attacks sheeps.
That is it for now. Once again I congratulates you for the excelent article.
Marcus Valerio XR
Thank you! I am so glad you enjoy my article.
As a side note, though, it is worth pointing out that people in the first century AD did not know that diseases are caused by pathogens, so your interpretation of “diseases as micro beasts” doesn’t really hold. Nevertheless, thank you for your thoughts all the same.
About Apocalypse St. John writes as he sees it, hears and smells it. Ex 1/3 stars fall on earth = John dont know what are Satellites, in the old days we could see 6,000 stars now there are 9,000 those 3,000 are stars. 1/3 of people die on first day = atomic bombs in the sea provoque Tsunami and destroy also 1/3 of the ships. mark of the beast see youtube RFID its under 666 bar code, already thousands possibly million have it on their body. When the native American saw the white man on a train shooting bisons with a rifle he went to his chief and said, i saw the white man on a iron horse with a thunder stick! The chief told him to stop smoking that stuff but he did not know the name of rifle nor train so its the same with John. I could go on and on but hey i got 40 years of study in that book am Canadian born Montreal 1947 now living in Lebanon. If you speak French I got a wowsum book for you about apoc….
p/s most likely St. John wrote >>> Rome the whore of Babylon but it was not politically correct so the word Rome waa erased soon after. The anti christ in here now and of course he is Jewish
Excellent presentation that helps me understand and appreciate better the painting by Benjamin West.
I have read recently that there was no word in ancient Greek for the color Green. And your explanation (chloros) seems to go in this direction. I read that there were many words associated with the ranges of Green (color of the sea, of the moss, of the vegetation, etc.) but no real Green. Can you confirm?
Thank you.
That was fascinating, thank you very much! Researched people like you are going to be a great help for understanding scripture. Thank you for posting!