Commentary on Revelation - 2011

An introduction to the Revelation including documentary evidence to the antiquity of the Revelation and some of the historical testimony that John the apostle and author of the Gospel bearing that name also recorded the Revelation.

See below for program notes. See also  http://christreich.org/content/notes-revelation for program notes, related papers and other information as this series develops. 

Like the rest of the New Testament, there are many witnesses to the text of the Revelation which are quite old, however when the Christogenea New Testament translation was created, the concern centered exclusively with those manuscripts which are esteemed to predate the 6th Century AD, which was the time of Justinian and when the Roman church first began to extend its reach and consolidate its power over Christendom. So that the listener has an idea of the age of sources for the text, here are the relevant witnesses to the Revelation which are from that remotest antiquity:

I 1 A revelation from Yahshua Christ which Yahweh had given to Him to show to His servants the things which are necessary to happen quickly, and He having sent explained through His messenger to His servant Iohannes, 2 who bore witness to the Word of Yahweh and the testimony of Yahshua Christ, as many things as he had seen. 3 Blessed is he reading and those hearing the words of the prophecy and keeping the things written in it, for the time is near.

This John who “bore witness to the Word of Yahweh” must therefore be that John who wrote the Gospel, which he considered to be the Word which became flesh (John 1:14). As it was discussed in the opening notes of this presentation, there are many witnesses from the second and third centuries of the Christian era which also attest to the Apostle John's authorship of the Revelation.

II “1 For the messenger of the assembly in Ephesos, write: Thus says He commanding the seven stars in His right hand, He walking in the midst of the seven golden lampstands: 2 I know your works and your toil and patience, and that you are not able to bear evils, and have tried those calling themselves ambassadors yet they are not, and you have found them liars, 3 and you have patience and have endured on account of My Name and have not grown weary. 4 But I hold against you that you have left your first love. 5 Therefore remember from where you have fallen and repent and do these first works. But if not, I shall come to you and I shall remove your lampstand from its place, if you should not repent. 6 This other thing you have: that you hate the works of the people-conquerors, which I also hate. 7 He having an ear must hear what the Spirit says to the assemblies! To he who prevails I shall give to him to eat from the tree of life which is in the paradise of Yahweh.

Ephesos: The word is apparently from ephesis, which is a word with a wide variety of meanings. It may be a throwing, hurling or shooting, or in another sense permission or license. The name may also be appetite or desire, and so it may mean desirable. There was a famous festival held there in honor of the idol Artemis from the earliest times, and the town may have grown up around that, since if the name does refer to throwing and hurling, it seems to be named after the games. This town was long famous for its large but roofless temple of Artemis, whom the Romans called Diana.

Chapter 3 Program Introduction:

From last week we have been covering the messages to the seven Assemblies of Asia. Last week from Chapter 2 we have already discussed the messages to the assemblies of Ephesos, Smurna, and Pergamos. 

We saw it mentioned to the Ephesians that they had left their first love, which must have been that Gospel and Christian instruction brought to them by Paul of Tarsus, and they were warned to return to it. They were complimented for rejecting false apostles, and especially also the Nicolaitans, who were evidently pedlars of idolatry and licentiousness, and who also bore a form of what may be called proto-Gnosticism, as we had seen from the early Christian writers. From their name, which means “people-conquerors”, it is evident that those promoters of a professional priesthood, which have forever sought to subvert and rule over the people, is being described.

We then saw in the message to the church at Smurna, which means anointing, that this assembly was not criticized. Rather, they were warned about those enemies of Yahweh who would persecute them, and encouraged to stand firm in the face of that persecution.

Revelation Chapter 5 – Yahweh's Covenant People, 01-08-2011

V 1 And I saw at the right hand of Him sitting upon the throne a scroll, written on the inside and on the back, having been sealed with seven seals. 2 And I saw a mighty messenger proclaiming with a great voice: “Who is worthy to open the scroll and to loosen its seven seals?” 3 And no one was able in heaven nor upon the earth nor under the earth to open the scroll or to see it. 4 And I wept much, because no one is found worthy to open the scroll or to see it. 5 And one from among the elders says to me: “Weep not! Behold! The lion of the tribe of Judah, the root of David, has prevailed to open the scroll and its seven seals!”

Yahshua Christ is the Lion of Judah and He is also the root of David. This is the Christian Paradox, and it has been argued since the time of Christ: For that reason Christ asked the Pharisees “If David then call him Lord, how is he his son?”, as we see recorded at Matthew 22:45. That He is God, Yahweh Himself having come as one of His own sons, is the only way that He could possibly be both the Root and the Offspring of David (cf. Isaiah 11:1, 10, Rev. 22:16). Of all of the sons of Adam, only Yahshua is worthy to open the seven seals, because only Yahshua is blameless and only Yahshua is God. Only God Himself can see the future. The scroll is a metaphorical device, and it is about to be opened in these images which are related to John. The complete opening of the scroll is in stages. First there are 6 seals, and then a seventh which itself consists of seven trumpets. The seventh trumpet consists of the pouring of seven vials, so we have a picture of sevens nested to three levels.

Revelation Chapters 6 and 7 – Yahweh's Covenant People, 01-22-2011

In Chapter 5 we saw a scroll with seven seals, and the scroll had writing on it front and back. Only Yahshua Christ Himself – who is the lion of the tribe of Judah and the root of David - was able to open the seven seals, and each time he opens one, we see a pronouncement is made concerning things which are to happen upon the earth. The seventh seal itself contains 7 trumpets, and the seventh trumpet contains seven vials. The first seal is finally opened at the beginning of Chapter 6. I must say that the imagery of Revelation Chapter 5 hearkens to a challenge which Yahweh made at Isaiah 41:21-29, where we see that only Yahweh can tell us the past or the future, and therefore all other prophets are false. This passage in Isaiah is a direct challenge to all false religions:

Christogenea 02-11-2011: Revelation Chapters 8 and 9

Here I am going to pick up roughly where Eli James and I had left off with our series on the Revelation three weeks ago. I know a lot of people are disappointed that a schism has developed between Eli and I, but I want you all to know that this has nothing to do with personalities. It only has to do with academic practices and the fact that – as can be evidenced over the programs that Eli has done since January 23^rd – our beliefs related to Scripture have grown much too far apart for me to continue working with him. While I enjoyed the two years I spent working with Eli, it is over, and the end of our working relationship is permanent. Now I pray that I am able to continue this Revelation series, presenting what little I can discern to the best of my ability.

Revelation Chapters 10 and 11 – February 18th, 2011

Last week we discussed Chapters 8 and 9 of the Revelation of Yahshua Christ. It is my persuasion that with that program we saw with all certainty the fulfillment of prophecy in history whereby we have every reason to believe the Bible, and know that our God is true. This is the very challenge that Yahweh our God Himself gives to us, addressing the idols of the people, the false gods, in Isaiah Chapter 41, verses 21 through 29, where the King James Version says “21 Produce your cause, saith the LORD; bring forth your strong reasons, saith the King of Jacob. 22 Let them bring them forth, and shew us what shall happen: let them shew the former things, what they be, that we may consider them, and know the latter end of them; or declare us things for to come. 23 Shew the things that are to come hereafter, that we may know that ye are gods: yea, do good, or do evil, that we may be dismayed, and behold it together. 24 Behold, ye are of nothing, and your work of nought: an abomination is he that chooseth you. 25 I have raised up one from the north, and he shall come: from the rising of the sun shall he call upon my name: and he shall come upon princes as upon morter, and as the potter treadeth clay. 26 Who hath declared from the beginning, that we may know? and beforetime, that we may say, He is righteous? yea, there is none that sheweth, yea, there is none that declareth, yea, there is none that heareth your words. 27 The first shall say to Zion, Behold, behold them: and I will give to Jerusalem one that bringeth good tidings. 28 For I beheld, and there was no man; even among them, and there was no counsellor, that, when I asked of them, could answer a word. 29 Behold, they are all vanity; their works are nothing: their molten images are wind and confusion.” If one can elucidate the things of the past and also reveal the things of the future, then one is God indeed....

Revelation Chapter 12 – February 25th, 2011

In Revelation chapters 6 through 8 we have seen in prophecy both the fall of Rome and the rise of Justinian. Then in chapter 9 we saw the conquests of Islam. In chapters 10 and 11, we saw the period known to us as the Reformation, and the independence of the Saxon peoples from the Romish church. Once these prophecies are examined and their manifestation in history are realized, it is absolutely clear that Yahshua Christ related a broad panorama of future events to John, which events have been the defining moments in the history of our race over nearly 2000 years.

As an aside, it may be observed that much of the imagery seen here in Revelation chapter 12 is not new to readers of the Hebrew Bible, nor was it new to Greeks and Romans. For instance, the Greeks had many old stories about the casting down of the serpent Typhon by Zeus, or the Python by Apollo. Since it can be demonstrated that Greek origins are found in the East, and especially with the Hebrews, these stories are certainly recognizable as embellishments on the memory of the oldest Hebrew accounts.

In Revelation chapters 1 through 5 we saw the identification of the Christ as Yahweh, in the flesh, and the messages to seven assemblies, assemblies with errors and attitudes that are still with us today. The only assemblies which were not criticized were those of Smyrna, a name which refers to the oil of anointing, and Philadelphia, which means brotherly love. If we emulate those things, neither will we be condemned in the day of Christ. Then we saw the vision of Yahweh's throne, and the vision of the Lamb and the scroll with seven seals. The opening of each seal would reveal some great event in history, as told in Revelation chapters 6 through 11. The seventh seal consisted of seven trumpets, and with our interpretation of these seals and trumpets we saw history as it was revealed beforetime, from the beginnings of the Roman Empire through its fall, and then the Arab and Turkic invasions of Christendom, ending with the Reformation and the return of the people of Yahweh to the Word of Yahweh. The Eurocentricity of all of these prophecies reveals the European peoples to be the people of God, and none of these prophecies ever describe the jews – except those which reference Satan, notably Revelation 2:9, 3:9, and Chapter 12. These things can also be proven from ancient history. Revelation Chapter 12 is a prophecy with many aspects, and it is evident that it was not only a description of the fall of Satan and the birth of the Christ child, but it was also a description of the founding of the people of God on the North American continent – and the birth of this great Christian nation. Just as the adversaries of our God attempted to kill His Christ as soon as the child was born, so also they have been attempting to destroy this nation from its very inception.

Revelation Chapter 13 capped off a lengthy series of prophecies which took us through Israel's 2520 years of punishment. During the first 1260 years, God's people were ruled over by a series of tyrannical empires. During the second 1260 years, by the office and institution of the papacy. We saw how this all correlates to like prophecies in Daniel chapters 2 and 7. Here we shall proceed with Revelation chapter 14.

XIV 1 And I looked, and behold! The Lamb stood upon Mount Sion, and with Him a hundred forty-four thousand having His Name and the Name of His Father written upon their foreheads. 2 And I heard a sound from out of heaven like a sound of many waters and like a sound of great thunder, and the sound which I heard like lyre-players playing on their lyres. 3 And they sang a new song before the throne and before the four living creatures and the elders, and no one was able to learn the song except the hundred forty-four thousand, those having been purchased from the earth. 4 These are they who have not been defiled with women, for they are virgins. These are they who follow the Lamb wherever He should go. These have been purchased from among men, a first-fruit for Yahweh and for the Lamb, 5 and in their mouths a lie is not found: they are blameless.

Through Revelation chapter 13 we saw the conditions which Israel would suffer under her prophesied 2520 years - or seven times - of punishment, after being put out of the old kingdom. These were seen in a vision of two images. The first image in chapter 12, was a vision of the woman with the twelve stars – the twelve tribes of Israel - and the nature of her persecutors, and the second was in chapter 13, a vision of the beasts which would rule over the woman, those who would tyrannize her. In chapters 10 and 11 we saw the conditions which released the woman – the collective people of Israel – from that tyranny, for they embraced the Word of God with the opening of the Little Book. So chapters 12 and 13 were a reflection of what was yet to transpire, written by John as long as 1800 years in advance, and much of it was also foretold in his visions in the earlier chapters of the Revelation. Because it was a reflection of events, some of which were in the past and some far off in the future when it was actually written, it could not possibly have been understood until after it had happened. The prophetic words of God do not come to us - except with perhaps a few exceptions - so that we may read them and see the future. Rather, they come to us that we may read them, look back at our history, and know that God is true. He is true, because He was able to reveal these things to us before they transpired – we have His record of it, and now we know it to be true even though we could not in times past see it for ourselves, even though we had His Word! This is indeed a Christian paradox. 

Revelation Chapters 19 & 20 - April 1^st, 2011

In Revelation chapters 14 through 16 we saw that this age was the age of the harvest of both the parched and ripe vines of the earth, and that this was that time of Jacob's trouble foretold in the Old Testament in Jeremiah 30:7 and Daniel 12:1. Then we saw the conditions for this age described, and we were given a means by which to identify them, and the causes of them, so long as they are understood in connection with the previous chapters. It is evident that this last age began with the end of the power of the papacy over the kings of Europe, and the emancipation of the jews in the time of Napoleon.

In Revelation chapters 17 and 18 we then saw a description of the great whore and the beast which she rode upon. It is evident that the beast is the same old globalist system of control and economics and world trade that had been set up in past ages and in different ways by the same old dragon, satan – the internationalist jews and their Kenite and Canaanite ancestors. We see that the whore joins herself to the beast, but in reality the beast hates the whore. That is exactly the situation which we have in the world today! How could the relationship of the White race with the jew be described more succinctly? The internationalist jews hate the White race, and they endeavor to destroy it in miscegenation and with the wars which they constantly instigate. Yet the beast makes it is profits from the Whites who conduct business with it, sweat from White brows, and innovation from White minds, all which allow the beast to do what it does in the first place. Try to find a viable financial endeavor to capitalize in the bowels of Africa or Asia or among the squat-monsters of South America, without using anything that was invented or created by a White man. It is practically impossible.

Revelation chapters 21 and 22 – Christogenea on Talkshoe, April 8^th, 2011

In Revelation chapters 17 and 18 we saw a vision of the great whore, the people of Israel, joined to the beast, which is the globalist system of international commerce, one-world government and one-world religion organized and controlled by world jewry. We saw a vision of the collapse of this system, Mystery Babylon, which is what we await today. The proper answer as to where we are in Revelation is this: we are beyond Revelation 16:12, because the kings from the east are a great power in the world today, which our people are in awe of and are indebted and beholden to at this very moment, and we are also beyond Revelation 17:17, because since the Federal Reserve Act in this country, but even sooner in some of the other Israel nations, our kingdom has indeed been handed over to the beast, all the people of the earth being deceived by the unclean spirits emanating from the mouth of the beast and from the mouth of the False Prophet, while under the economic control of the jew. Now we await that seventh bowl, or vial, of the wrath of Yahweh, which causes Babylon to finally fall, mentioned at Revelation 16:17 and fully described in chapter 18. Once that last bowl of the wrath of Yahweh is poured, it is time to utter the call, “You come out from her, My people, that you should not partake in her errors, and that you would not receive from of her wounds.” The children of Yahweh shall at that time render to their enemies double the treatment they had received while they were enslaved to the beast. As the prophet Micah says, arise and thresh, O Daughter of Zion!