eclipsenow said in post #313:
It's interesting how you justify yourself. It's literally about the future because it's all (according to your presuppositions before you even get to the passage) detailed literal future events that happen "hereafter".
It hasn't been said that it's all literal.
Also, it's rational to assume that the future (i.e. "things which must be hereafter" Rev. 4:1), highly-detailed, almost entirely literal, and chronological events of Rev. chs. 6-22 have never been fulfilled, when no history book shows them being fulfilled.
If you feel they've been fulfilled, simply quote the historical sources which prove that to be the case.
Just as the glorious return of Jesus in Rev. 19:7-20:3 has never been fulfilled, but will be fulfilled almost entirely literally in our future, so the highly-detailed and chronological events of the preceding tribulation in Rev. chs. 6-18 have never been fulfilled, but will be fulfilled almost entirely literally in our future. Also, the millennium will be literal, and will begin after Jesus' 2nd coming (Rev. 19:7-20:6, Zech. 14:3-21), when he'll reign on the earth with the physically resurrected church for 1,000 years (Rev. 20:4-6, 5:10, 2:26-29, Ps. 2, 66:3-4). Also, Rev. chs. 6-22 aren't a general statement, but are detailed events, for there are so many of them, they're so varied, & they're chronological, & so long. To reduce all of them to a general description of life renders all their myriad, specific & amazing details utterly useless. It's like throwing Rev. chs. 6-22 into the trash, just to be done with them.
But there's one problem with your detailed literal events after the "hereafter". They include Jesus having 7 horns and 7 eyes and a sword tongue!
Re: Rev. 5:6, parts of it are literal (the throne of God in heaven, the 4 beasts, the 24 elders, Jesus having been slain, the 7 Spirits of God, the earth) and parts of Rev. 5:6 are symbolic (Jesus being a Lamb, Jesus having 7 horns, Jesus having 7 eyes).
Also, what verse in Rev. refers to a sword "tongue"?
Rev. 19:15,21's sword could be a literal, spiritual sword, like the literal, spiritual sword in Gen. 3:24.
Also, how does Rev. 5:6 or Rev. 19:15,21 present a "problem" for what's been presented?
No wonder you want to jump to Chapter 6, where you take the 'literal' reading of Revelation and do anything but read it literally!
When referring to the future trib on the earth, jumping to ch. 6 makes sense, for chs. 4-5 will occur only in heaven; they won't be seen by anyone on the earth.
Also, how do you feel a particular verse in Rev. chs. 6-22 has been claimed to be literal, yet then not read literally?
The original Greek word (eikon, G1504) translated as the "image" of the beast (Revelation 13:15) means something that's made in the likeness of something else, such as the image of a man engraved on a coin (Luke 20:24). So an android made in the likeness of the Antichrist (the individual-man aspect of the beast) could be referred to in the Greek as being an eikon of the Antichrist.
The Antichrist's False Prophet (Rev. 13:11-16, 19:20) will cause it to be made, possibly after the Antichrist receives a terrible head wound (Rev. 13:3,14b) which could leave his facial and bodily appearance permanently marred, and which could render him unable to speak clearly (like someone after a bad stroke), so that the Antichrist won't want to appear or speak in public again. Did you ever see that movie "Dave"? It had a President who was in a coma, so his handlers found a regular guy who looked exactly like the President, and had him be a public stand-in for the President. He was able to speak just like the President did. It could be like that with the image of the Antichrist; it could be the Antichrist's "Dave", his double, that appears and speaks (Rev. 13:15) before the world instead of his wounded self. But instead of letting people think that the android image of the Antichrist is the Antichrist himself, the False Prophet could tell people from the beginning that the image is a separate entity than the Antichrist himself, but one who still fully represents the Antichrist.
In Rev. 13:15, the original Greek word translated as "life" or "breath" (pneuma, G4151) can mean "spirit" in the sense of consciousness (1 Cor. 2:11a, Lk. 1:47), so that the android could appear to have a spirit, to have consciousness. The way this could be achieved would be through the android having wireless connections to huge banks of supercomputers running advanced artificial intelligence software. The False Prophet could claim that the consciousness of the Antichrist himself dwells within the android by means of neural networks imprinted with the brain patterns of the Antichrist. But this could be a lie, in that the android won't actually have the Antichrist's consciousness, or any true consciousness, but will only appear to have consciousness. It could pass even the most stringent Turing Test, a test whereby one speaks with a computer and can't tell whether it has consciousness or not, because all its answers are the same as if it had consciousness.
BTW, horns, eyes, and sword tongues are not literal, but are profound biblical symbols with rich theological meanings, and would have been immediately recognisable to a first century Jew utterly familiar with their Old Testament.
What OT verses are you referring to?
E.g., Zech. 3:9 for the 7 eyes?
Zechariah 6:11-12 and Zechariah 3:8-10 meant by type that the Christ would be a high priest (Hebrews 6:20) named "Joshua"/"Jesus" ("Jesus" is the Greek form of the Hebrew name "Joshua"). "The Branch" (Zechariah 6:12, Zechariah 3:8) is a title of the Christ (Isaiah 4:2-6, Jeremiah 33:14-17). And where it says "upon one stone shall be seven eyes" (Zechariah 3:9), this too is fulfilled by Jesus, the stone (1 Peter 2:7), who is at one point symbolically shown as having seven "eyes" (Revelation 5:6). "I will remove the iniquity of that land in one day" (Zechariah 3:9) will be fulfilled by Jesus at his second coming (Isaiah 4:4-6). And Zechariah 3:10 refers to the time of the millennium (Micah 4:4), when the returned Jesus will be ruling the earth from the earthly Jerusalem (Micah 4:1-4).
Re: Jesus' 7 "horns" in Rev. 5:6, they could represent him holding 7 positions of power at the same time (cf. Jesus wearing many crowns at the same time in Rev. 19:12).
Also, again, what verse in Rev. refers to a sword "tongue"?
But you want to make the vast majority of this book utterly incomprehensible to all Christians throughout history . . .
Not at all, for Rev. has always been an unsealed book (Rev. 22:10), meaning that it shouldn't be difficult for Christians (of any generation) to understand it if they simply read it as it's written: chronologically and almost entirely literally. The few parts of it that are symbolic are almost always explained afterward (e.g. Rev. 1:20, 17:9-12), and the few symbols in Rev. that aren't explained afterward (e.g. Rev. 13:2) are usually explained elsewhere in the Bible (e.g. Dan. 7:4-7,17).
Symbolists look to the greater biblical context of the whole bible for the theological meaning of Revelation.
Please indicate how you feel each detail in Rev. chs. 6-22 is a theological symbol explained elsewhere in the Bible.
Not today's newspaper . . .
Futurism looks at today's news re: geopolitics and technology in order to help believers consider different ways for how the never-fulfilled, yet still understandable, and almost entirely literal, highly-detailed prophecies in Rev. chs. 6-18 might be fulfilled in our future.
To understand this we need to know who this woman is. She has the sun, the moon, and the stars. Check out Genesis 37:9, Joseph's dream.
Rev. 12's "woman" represents the church (which is Israel: Rev. 21:9,12). She's clothed with the sun (Rev. 12:1) of righteousness (Mal. 4:2) through her faith in Jesus (Rom. 3:22), just as later we see the church clothed with righteousness (Rev. 19:8). The moon under her feet (Rev. 12:1) represents Satan under her feet (Rom. 16:20) as she overcomes him spiritually by her faith in Jesus (Rev. 12:11). The crown of 12 stars on her head (Rev. 12:1) represents the 12 apostles (Mt. 10:2-4, Acts 1:16-26) who've been placed over the church (1 Cor. 12:28). Her giving birth to the "man child" and its being caught up to the throne of God (Rev. 12:5) immediately before she flees into the wilderness (Rev. 12:6) represents the future, mid-tribulation catching up of the 144,000 male-virgins part of the church in their mortal bodies to the throne of God in heaven (Rev. 14:1,4-5, TR) (like Enoch and Elijah were caught up in their mortal bodies to heaven: Heb. 11:5, 2 Kin. 2:11).
Her fleeing into and remaining in a protected place in the wilderness for a literal 3.5 years (Rev. 12:6,14) represents those in the church on the earth who will flee into and remain in divinely-protected wilderness places on the earth during the Antichrist's (the AC's) future, literal 3.5-year worldwide reign (Rev. 13:5-18). The remnant of her seed (Rev. 12:17) represents those in the church on the earth during that time who won't flee into wilderness places, but will remain in the cities, and will be persecuted in every nation, imprisoned, and beheaded by the AC (Rev. 13:7-10, 14:12-13, 20:4-6, Mt. 24:9-13).
Also, regarding Revelation 12:1, it should be emphasized that Genesis 37:9-10 isn't being referred to there, because in Revelation 12:1, the church/Israel isn't clothed with the man Jacob (cf. Genesis 37:9-10), but with the sun of righteousness (Malachi 4:2), through her faith in Jesus Christ (Romans 3:22), just as later we see the church/Israel clothed with righteousness (Revelation 19:8, cf. also Revelation 21:2,9,12). Also, the church/Israel doesn't have the woman Rachel under her feet (cf. Genesis 37:9-10), but Satan (Romans 16:20), as the church/Israel overcomes him spiritually by her faith in Jesus (Revelation 12:11). Also, the church/Israel doesn't have the twelve sons of Jacob placed over her (cf. Genesis 37:9-10), but the twelve apostles (1 Corinthians 12:28, Matthew 10:2, Acts 1:26), each one of whom is over one of her twelve tribes (Matthew 19:28, Luke 22:30).
Psalm 2 also hopes in this child... the Lord Jesus.
Rev. 12:5's "man child" isn't Jesus, for Rev. 12:5 isn't about past things, but is part of the "things which must be hereafter" (Rev. 4:1b). Rev. chs. 11-14 show from 4 different angles what will happen right before the start and during the same future, literal 3.5-years of the worldwide reign of the Antichrist (Rev. 11:2b-3, 12:6,14, 13:5-8, 14:9-13), which will be during the latter half of the future tribulation of Rev. chs. 6-18/Mt. 24. Regarding "who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron" (Rev. 12:5), along with Jesus (Rev. 19:15, Ps. 2:9) the whole obedient church will rule the nations with a rod of iron (Rev. 2:26-29), on the earth (Rev. 5:10) during the coming millennium (Rev. 20:4-6). Before the millennium, during the trib, at its midpoint, the 144,000 male-virgins part of the church will be caught up bodily to the throne of God in heaven (Rev. 14:1,4-5, TR) as the "man child" (Rev. 12:5-6), and as the firstfruits of the church (Rev. 14:4), in the sense of its best part (cf. Num. 18:12).
Which brings us to a bit of Biblical Theology about the land promises . . .
As was pointed out in a prior post, if even those who are "strangers" in Israel can inherit the land of Israel (Ezek. 47:21-23), then certainly believing Gentiles, who are "no more strangers" to Israel (Eph. 2:12,19), will inherit the land (during the coming millennium of Rev. 20:4-6), and the other promises given to Israel (Eph. 2:12,19, 3:6, Gal. 3:29, Gen. 12:7).
God still has regard for the land of Israel, and Jerusalem especially (Isa. 62:6-7, Ps. 122:6). Even during the future, literal 3.5-year worldwide reign of the Antichrist (Rev. 13:5-18), Jerusalem will still be considered by God to be the holy city (Rev. 11:2, Lk. 21:24), the holy mountain (Dan. 11:45, 9:16). And after the tribulation, at Jesus' 2nd coming, it will be to the Mount of Olives just east of the walled Old City of Jerusalem that Jesus will descend (Zech. 14:4-21, Acts 1:11-12), and then Jesus will rule the whole earth from the earthly Jerusalem during the millennium (Mic. 4:1-4, Zech. 14:8-11,16-21, Rev. 20:4-6).
It's a metaphor for our ongoing quest towards the ultimate 'rest' or 'land' in heaven.
Presently the kingdom of God is in heaven (2 Tim. 4:18, Heb. 12:22-24), and is on the earth spiritually within Christians (Rom. 14:17, Lk. 17:21). In the future, the kingdom will come fully upon the earth as it is in heaven (Mt. 6:10). It will be physically (Lk. 22:30, Mt. 19:28) on the earth (Rev. 5:10), first during the millennium (Rev. 20:4-6, 2:26-29) and then on the new earth (Rev. 21:1-8).
As was pointed out in a prior post, Jesus' kingdom is Israel (Jn. 1:49, 12:13-15, 19:19, Lk. 22:30). That's why at his 2nd coming, he will sit on the earthly throne of David (Lk. 1:32, Isa. 9:7) and restore the kingdom to Israel (Acts 1:6-7, 3:20-21). Jesus is, in his humanity, the son of David (Mt. 1:1, 21:15-16, Rom. 1:3), of the house of David (Lk. 1:69). So at Jesus' 2nd coming, he will restore the tabernacle, the house, of David (Isa. 16:5, Amos 9:11), to its royal glory (2 Sam. 5:12), which it had lost (2 Kin. 17:21a), and fulfill the prophecy and prayer of 2 Sam. 7:16-29. And Jesus will also bring salvation to all the unbelieving elect Jews of the house of David, for they (along with all other unbelieving elect Jews) will come into faith in Jesus when they see him at his 2nd coming (Zech. 12:10-14, 13:1,6, Rom. 11:26-31). And so they'll all become part of the church at that time, for there are no believers outside of the church (Eph. 4:4-6).
After Jesus' 2nd coming (Rev. 19:7-20:3) will occur the millennium (Rev. 20:4-6), during which, Gentile nations will come up to seek the returned Jesus ruling the whole earth (Zech. 8:22, 14:9, Ps. 72:8-11) upon the restored throne of David (Isa. 9:7) in the earthly Jerusalem (Isa. 2:1-4, Zech. 14:8-11,16-19). And the physically resurrected church will reign on the earth with him during the millennium (Rev. 20:4-6, 5:10, 2:26-29), for the church is Israel (Rev. 21:9,12, 1 Pet. 2:9-10).
