The Book of Revelation:  Class 4
The Seven Scenes;
The Seven Bowls of God’s Anger (Rev 11:19 - 16:21)
April 5, 2003

Course Review.  Thus far, we have covered three sections of Revelation:

• The (then) present situation of the Churches in Asia Minor (The Letters to the Seven Churches; Class 1)
• The future of the Church based on the actions of the Roman Empire (the seven seals; Class 2)
• Gods warnings to Rome and Domitian, the emperor (the seven trumpets; Class 3)

Last Class Review (Class 3).  In the last class, John’s revelation turned from views of the heavenly realm to God’s judgment upon the earth.  With each blast of the seven trumpets blown by the angels, a plague or woe was unleashed on the earthly creation. 

In the next section of Revelation, the theme of seven will continue with the seven scenes and the seven bowls of God’s anger.  Christopher Rowland, a Biblical scholar, relates these to each other (see Christopher C. Rowland. "The Book of Revelation." The New Interpreter's Bible, Vol. XII. Leander E. Keck, et al. (Eds).  (Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press. 1998), page 610).

Chapter 12 is a transitional chapter in Revelation, and it fulfills the requirement of prophetic literature to put the visions into historical context of the writer.  John uses this section construct an interpretative view of his people’s history.  In doing this, John was his readers top understand God’s perspective of this history, as a basis for God’s future action(s). 

This is a section of instruction using lessons from history- particularly as John saw how the history of Babylon was parallel to the history of Rome.  Based on what happened then (God seeming to intervene on Israel’s behalf both in terms of the defeat of the Babylonians and the birth/death/resurrection of Jesus), John foresees and a description of consequences that might come about.  And it is all in coded language.

Chapman sees this section in seven scenes, where these scenes paint the history of the past and the future when God will step in and vindicate John’s fellow Christians, not unlike how God stepped in and vindicated the victim in Jesus Christ. 

The Scenes from the Text

The Woman, the Child and the Dragon

Check out the art of this scene at http://www.revelationillustrated.com/shop/image17.asp

John sees a pregnant woman clothed with the sun, the moon at her feet, and a crown of 12 stars giving birth to a male child.  The woman is a metaphor for Israel, BVM, and the Church.  A red dragon appears to kill the child at birth, but the dragon is foiled by God, and the Son is snatched away to heaven (does this story sound familiar?)  The woman who gave birth is given a place by God on the earth that she inhabits form 1,260 days (this is the same as the 42 months (see Class 3) or the 3 ½ years of tribulation described in Daniel).  Meanwhile the red devil is defeated in heaven by Michael the archangel and cast to earth.  The dragon pursues the woman (the Church) and is angry at “those who keep the commandments of God and hold the commandments of God and hold the testimony of Jesus” (12:17b). 

Note that the dragon motif is common to Bible prophecy.  Jeremiah and Ezekiel both portrayed foreign despotic kings as dragons. 

Summary:  This is a re-telling of the story of Jesus birth, his own persecution and death, the development of the church, and how the dragon will make war upon faithful Christians.  Chapman notes that the coded language comes from Greek and Egyptian Mythology (Chapman, 80):

The Blasphemous Beast from the Sea

The Roman navy was a fearsome beast, and land invasion was almost always preceded by naval forces.  This beast is the metaphor for the Roman empire as the ruler of many nations.

The seven headed nature of the beast refers specifically to the seven emperors of Rome who began the terrible persecutions of Christians:  Nero, Galba, Otho, Vitellius, Vespasian, Titus, and Domitian.  There are other ways of counting the Roman emperors (see below). 

Domitian was an emperor who declared himself divine (opposed to some of the previous emperors declared divine by the Roman senate).  This explains why John called the beast “haughty and blasphemous” (13:5). 

John finally calls “for the endurance and faith of the saints” (13:10-b). 

The Beast from the Land (666)

This beastie is a reference to the prophets and the priests of the emperor cult.  It is the third part of the ‘unholy trinity.’

All citizens of Rome were required to declare publicly their allegiance to Rome, and to its emperor through public acts of worship.  The emperor cult was part of this public responsibility.  The cult … “deceives the inhabitants of earth, telling them to make an image for the beast that had been wounded by the sword and yet lived (Nero redivivus); and it was allowed to give breath [it took on a life of its own] to the image of the beast so that the image of the beast could even speak and cause those who would not worship the image of the beast to be killed” (from 13:13-15).

Chapman says that the largest statue of Domitian ever recovered was found in Ephesus – the city of John.  It was large enough for a cultic priest to hide in and make people think the image “spoke.” 

Why is the beast called 666?  This has to do with the Nero (Domitian being seen as a “new Nero”), and the fact that Hebrew letters had numerical equivalents.  “Nero Caesar) spelled in Hebrew is NRON KSR.  Adding together the numerical equivalents of those letters equals 666. 

Note that some manuscripts state that the number of the beast is 616.  If one transliterates the Latin letters of NRON KSR into Hebrew, and does the math one gets 616. 

Summary:  The beast is a direct reference to Rome, it’s power (or abuses of power), and the perception that the Roman empire under Domitian will suffer God’s judgment.  It will be destroyed – just like the metaphorical red dragon.  As proof, John wraps his prediction in the story of God’s judgment on Babylon.  The question for us is where are the beasts today?  Institutions?  Personal?  What separates us from the divine presence?  What do we do to support oppression?

 The Lamb and the 144,000

This is a scene of those who had been marked as Christ’s own singing praises to God on God’s throne in heaven. 

The Interlude:  The Messages from the Three Angels

As in our previous discussions, John inserts an interlude into the surrounding drama.  Some might argue that the preceding image of the 144,000 is part of this interlude. 

In this interlude, the nearness of judgment day is announced by an angel.  A second angel announces that evil Babylon (Rome) is fallen.  A third warns that those who follow the ways of the beast will suffer God’s wrath; those who follow God’s commandments and their faith in Jesus will be rewarded (14:12). 

Summary:  God’s judgment is metaphorically described as coming in the form of a drink from a cup.  John’s theology is that Jesus swallowed God’s cup full of wrath against all humankind for us.  Therefore those who believe are saved from God’s wrath at this time of judgment.

Reaping the Earth’s Harvest

In this section, the Son of Man enters the scene as a celestial reaper to reap the earth of its harvest.  In cooperation with other angels, the vines and their grapes of the earth were cut and pressed in the “great wine press of the wrath of God” (14:20).

Check out the art of this scene at http://www.revelationillustrated.com/shop/image22.asp

The Seven Plagues Poured from God’s Bowl’s of Wrath

Drying of the Euphrates

About 600 years before John wrote this text, Cyrus of Persia diverted the rivers of the Euphrates to dry the river bed so that his troops could invade Babylon on it’s unprotected side.  John may be referring to this episode in history when Cyrus came from the east (see Class 2; The White Horse)

Three “lying frogs” emerge from the mouths of the unholy trinity (dragon and the two beasts).  The lying frogs deceive other nations into allying with Rome.  These nations will do battle at the Hill of Megiddo (Har Megidon).  This area of the western world is considered by some to be the single place where more battles have been fought than at any other.  One of the most revered Kings of Judah, Josiah, was killed here by Pharaoh Neco.

Summary and Comment: What nations will gather?  If you want to read into the text of Revelation from Ezekiel and Daniel, there are four groups of nations under the Beast and one independent.  The first group is represented by Meshech and Tubal, thought by some to represent nations of southern Russia; the second by Persia, Ethiopia, and Libya; the third by Gomer and Togarmah, This is the territory described by Daniel, and symbolized by the lion, the bear, the leopard, and the beast.  Some have extended this kind of thinking to include the nations of Europe as the descendents of Gomer and Togarmah. 

However, when this is done, we 'stretch' the limits of prophetic and apocalyptic literature to the breaking point. Daniel, Ezekiel, and John used imagery and visions (of the other's literature in the case of John) to say something about their times. They were basically saying, "If God did this then, then God will do this now…" They see into the future of their predicament. If someone wanted to do a credible job of modern day prophesy in the Biblical tradition, they would look to the Biblical stories to see the hand of God in them, and then look at their particular situation today to establish a pattern by which the prophet might predict the outcome of a present day situation when God intervenes in that present history. But to claim that the Biblical prophet spoke of modern events is beyond the intent of the prophet.

Modern prophets often look to John's revelation to provide a blueprint of what to look for at the end of times, forgetting that John wrote at a particular time, for a particular audience, with a vision of God's hand at work in history based on the belief in how God has acted in that people's past. Unfortunately when modern prophets misappropriate John's symbolism, "unusual" predictions come about. An example of this was contained in The April 6, 2003 issue of the Sun, the supermarket tabloid in an article by Beth Gimmel entitled, "Last Days Have Begun" (The cover to this issue of the Sun is shown at the right). In this article, Alleged prophecies of Edgar Cayce, The BVM, Pope John Paul II, and Nostradamus are woven together (along with a prediction that the lost city of Atlantis will be discovered off Cuba) to provide evidence that the end of time will occur sometime around 2012. Some of these prophecies include plagues (such as locusts) referred to in revelation.

It is done! 

The wrath of God is completed against Babylon (Rome) and the other nations that cooperate with her.  The end comes with a violent earthquake, and stones of hail weighing one talent (100 pounds) (like the 7^th plague on Egypt).