DreamerOfTheHeart said in post #20:
I can point out exactitudes I know, from the author, such as the identity of the two witnesses (they are one and the same, and the only Christ there has ever been)...
Note that in the never-fulfilled Revelation 11:3-12, God's Two Witnesses could be literally Moses and Elijah. For the two men seen "standing before the God of the earth" (Revelation 11:4) at the Transfiguration were Moses and Elijah (Matthew 17:3). And in Revelation 11:4 the two "olive trees" refer back to the two men who were already standing by the Lord by the time of the prophet Zechariah (Zechariah 4:11,14), which was subsequent to the times of Moses and Elijah.
Moses and Elijah could come down from heaven in their mortal bodies at the midpoint of the future Tribulation of Revelation chapters 6 to 18 and Matthew 24, just as they came down at the Transfiguration (Matthew 17:3). Also, the plagues which God's Two Witnesses will cause (Revelation 11:6,5) will match plagues which Moses and Elijah caused in Old Testament times (James 5:17, Exodus 7:20; 2 Kings 1:10-14).
Elijah never died, but was taken physically into heaven (2 Kings 2:11b). And the archangel Michael retrieved Moses' dead body from Satan (Jude 1:9). Michael could have then taken Moses' recently-dead body into heaven where it could have been resuscitated by God back to mortal life, like how, for example, Lazarus' recently-dead body was resuscitated by God back to mortal life (John 12:1). This would explain how both Moses and Elijah could be alive at the Transfiguration (Matthew 17:3).
God's Two Witnesses will prophesy and bring plagues on the world during the literal 3.5 years (Revelation 11:2b-3,6) of the future Antichrist's worldwide reign (Revelation 13:5,7, Revelation 12:6,14), which will be in the latter half of the future Tribulation of Revelation chapters 6 to 18 and Matthew 24. That is why the Antichrist's reign will legally end (Revelation 11:15) right after the Two Witnesses' time on the earth will end (Revelation 11:12-15). The plagues which they will bring (Revelation 11:6) will be part of the Tribulation's second woe/sixth trumpet (Revelation 11:14, Revelation 9:12-13). The Two Witnesses will be taken physically up to heaven before the Tribulation's seventh trumpet sounds (Revelation 11:12,15).
They may not be witnesses in the sense of evangelizing the world (Acts 1:8). For the original Greek word (martus: G3144) translated as "witnesses" (Revelation 11:3) can also refer to those who witness against people, and bring punishment against them (Acts 7:58). The reason that there will be two witnesses (Revelation 11:3) who will bring plagues to torment the unrepentant world (Revelation 11:6,10b) would be because two witnesses are required to bring judgment against people (1 Timothy 5:19). At the same time, the two "witnesses" could be called that because both of them will be martyred (Revelation 11:7-9). For the same original Greek word translated as "witnesses" (Revelation 11:3) can refer to "martyrs" (Revelation 17:6).
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