John of Patmos and the Final Battle: conspiracy and mental illness

Patmos Island (marked with yellow arrow)

What has become known as the last “book” of the New Testament, Revelation, has its authorship attributed to John of Patmos (Patmos is a small Greek island in the Aegean Sea. It is one of the northernmost islands of the Dodecanesecomplex).  While “Justin Martyr” claims that this John is the same John who allegedly was the brother of Jesus and the author of the Gospel of John (Justin Martyr, Dialogue with Trypho, 81.4) that is not written until the second century, after John of Patmos died–an account that was never intended to be read universally.  Justin had little critical scholarship, and any theological student today would note numerous grammatical and textual errors and inconsistencies.  The author of Revelation identifies himself as “John” several times, but the author of the Gospel of John never identifies himself directly where it would be more imperative and substantive.  While both works liken Jesus to a lamb, they consistently use different words for lamb when referring to him, for example: the Gospel uses αμνος: amnos, Revelation uses αρνίον: arnion (Revelation 5:6, 8, 12, 13; 6:1, 16; 7:9, etc). Lastly, the Gospel is written in nearly flawless Greek, but Revelation contains grammatical errors and stylistic abnormalities which indicate its author may not have been as familiar with the Greek language as the Gospel’s author.  Church Father and bishop Irenaeus (d. 185), gives an even more interesting detail.  He says that the Revelation “was seen no very long time since, but almost in our day, towards the end of Domitian’s reign” (Adversus Haereses 5.30.3), who according to Eusebius had started the persecution (not Nero!) referred to in the book, but the “persecution” was Domitian’s demand that people revere and address him as a god (Cary, E. (trans.) “Dio Cassius’ Roman History, Epitome of Book LXI-LXX.” Loeb Classical Library. Cambridge MA, USA: Harvard University, 1995. p.349; Touilleux, Paul (1935) L’Apocalypse et les cultes de Domitien et de Cybèle. Paris, France: Paul Geuthner, puts the date of authorship to the time of Domitian or Vespasian, and is concurred with by Feuillet, A. (André). L’Apocalypse: état de la question. Paris, France: Desclée de Brouwer, ©1963).

Justin’s Christology was, in the majority of citations, wrong.  His knowledge of the period when Jesus allegedly lived is choppy. Writing in Latin (while the scrolls and early records were written in Greek), Justin’s frequently invented or misused/mistranslated words to meet his own spiritual agenda.  From the writing within the first “chapter” (chapters and verses to the Bible are a modern invention), we read that Patmos was instructed to write to the Seven Churches of Asia (referring to the Roman province of Asia, not the entire continent): Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamos, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, and Laodicea (Revelation 1:11).  The letter was to be read immediately.  The “Second Coming” (Parousia: παρουσία, a word used in the New Testament twenty-four times, but only seventeen times for Jesus; the last time it is used is to talk about “the lawless one” and not about Jesus–it is a reference to a bandit, not Nero, and the word translates as a “presence”–not as a person) was at hand–not in the future.  Eusebius bishop of Caesarea and the monk/saint Jerome ascribe the authorship to John the Presbyter who was an obscure figure in the early church (cf. Ehrman, Bart D. (2004). The New Testament: A Historical Introduction to the Early Christian Writings. New York, NY, USA: Oxford University Press. p. 468, and Harris, Stephen L. (1985), Understanding the Bible. Palo Alto, CA, USA: Mayfield. p. 355).  The word used in the New Testament for the physical return of the Jesus of the New Testament is epiphany: ἐπιφάνεια (epiphaneia, that translates as appearing) and is in the present tense meaning now.  In both cases the word and the “prophecy” is a contemporary plagiarism from the Greek word παρουσία (parusia) used as early as the 3rd century BC to describe the visit of a king or dignitary to a city arranged in order the show his magnificence to the people.  John of Patmos was aware of this as it was common term while he lived, being reinvigorated in common speech and appearing on Roman Advent (adventus in Latin) Coins struck by the cities of Corinth and Patras for Nero’s visit.  The word παρουσία is not used in any contemporary document dated on or around the alleged years of life and death of the New Testament Jesus, except among money changers and Roman soldiers who celebrated any ceremonial visit from a representative of the “Divine King”  (another name for the Emperor Domitian): the emperor of Rome, who Jews saw as a whore since it was commonly known that a petitioner could buy a favorable judgment from Cesar (Emperor).

Patmos was an island for traitors. Traitors were defined as those who practiced magic (associated with Egyptians and especially the chrestianos of Alexandria, Egypt), astrology, and “prophecy” (Pliny Natural History 4.69-70; Tacitus Annals 4.30).  Prophecy was viewed as a covert way of instigating riots against Rome and its citizens as prophecies were read with political implications.  Among Jews, numerology, signaled the Roman Emperor Nero (666)  and  “seven” coupled with mountains (in reality hills) referenced Rome and its foundation and government.  Patmos was never used or sought out as a refuge for “the faithful” of any god.

The “lawless one” (who, in 2 Peter 3:10, is the “Lord Jesus”) was to be destroyed by the “brightness” (education) of the “returning one” (who might have been the Holy Spirit or higher enlightenment) according to the authors of II Thessalonians 2: 8.  This was not intended nor written as a promise of a holocaust of people–only of one person.  This single soul has been incorporated by many theologies.  Each calls “the one who will return” by various names, although in Islam, Muslims refer to this person as Jesus (Qur’an 43:61) since much of the Qur’an is a plagiarism from the Old and New Testaments as Muhammad spent years speaking with and then attempting to convert Jews and Christians who lived and labored in Mecca to his own brand of faith. The name of “Jesus’ is only used as “the spirit of prophecy” Revelation 19:10 to which a Jesus Christ is a “faithful witness” (Revelation 12:17).

The “coming” appears, uniquely in the New Testament as a return only once, and then in Aramaic: Maranatha (either מרנא תא; maranâ’ thâ’ or מרן אתא; maran ‘athâ’ ) in 1 Corinthians 16:22.  It is hinted at in Revelation 22:20: “Amen. Come, Lord Jesus!” The original Greek word was “anathema” (from Koine Greek ἀνάθεμα meaning “something dedicated” from ἀνατίθημι anatithēmi, “I set upon, offer as a votive gift”) originally meant something lifted up as an offering to the gods) and meant a supplication that offers a gift or sacrifice to the god(s) (which is what the word meant in early emerging circles of christianos: the acceptance of the death of Jesus of the New Testament and a pledge to remember the “Lamb of God.”  In II Machabees 9:16, Antiochus promises to adorn with precious gifts (anathemata) the temple he has pillaged; and in Luke 21:5 (it is the only time that it appears in the New Testament) where it details how the temple was built of precious stones and adorned with rich gifts (anathemata).  Anathema did not mean “expulsion” until Constantine I created his catholic (universal) church in 325 CE, at which point it was used to refer to an evil or heresy, or something forbidden and reserved to the god(s): herem (חרם) as found in Leviticus 27:28. It does not become a law within the Roman Catholic church until the pontificate of Pope Zachary (741-52) and then appears only in the chapter Debent duodecim sacerdotes, Cause xi, quest. iii.  The New Testament Jesus makes no use nor mention of it or the acts associated with it in the past, during his life, or in any conversation after he allegedly rose from the dead.

The use of the word ἀνάθεμα in Luke 21:5, has only one rendering: ‘gifts’.  This entry follows the text of the Book of Judith written during the time of the Maccabees (and is a prototype for the beheading of John the Baptist under the name of Holophernes who was a devout soldier of his king. The story can also be compared the stories of Samson (the Greek Hercules) and Jezebel ( אִיזֶבֶל / אִיזָ from a Phoenician legend, as the name is from the Syro-Phoenician language; cf. Ilana Fine, Women reading the Bible backwards (in Hebrew נשים לקרוא את התנ”ך מהסוף להתחלה), p. 86.), where a brave man falls to the deadly charms of a woman.  We read: “The blessed Judith, when her city was besieged, asked of the elders permission to go forth into the camp of the strangers; and, exposing herself to danger, she went out for the love which she bare to her country and people then besieged; and the Lord delivered Holofernes into the hands of a woman” (First Epistle of Clement, chapter 55; cp. Ambrose, Concerning Widows, 7:38). 

The Greek version argues that the work was composed during the kingship “Nebuchadrezzar”, a “King of Assyria,” who “reigns in Nineveh”–a self-serving fiction to excuse the libel about the rule of Tiberius Cesar of Rome).  Judith was neither a popular nor a universally recognized “canon” of the Bible until  Pope Gelasius I demanded that Jerome obey the canons of the dubious third Council of Carthage, held in Africa under Augustine of Hippo in 397.  More in keeping with Augustine’s Manichean background the council declared the canonicity of the Deuterocanon and Jerome reluctantly added Judith to his Vulgate translation (a work with numerous errors and inconsistencies), despite the fact that it was being translated from a different text (in Chaldean) then the Septuagint (LXX) version used in the early centuries for the Old Latin translations.  It is used in conjunction with maranatha since the early christians were “reformed/converted Jews”.

While many modern evangelical extremists, especially those affiliated with the New Apostolic Reformation (NAR) of C. Peter Wagner, argue that the Revelation is a blueprint for the End Times carnage known as Apocalypse, there is no justification for this interpretation in the text.  The Revelation is two stories, or two nightmares, that John Patmos experienced while in captivity.  It is not a sequence of tales nor visions, except in the classic sense that they were foretelling of what the dreamer believed the dreamer would experience.  In both cases, there is classic dementia praecox (schizophrenia) that is a severe mental disorder characterized by intellectual deterioration brought on by social isolation, disorganized speech and behavior, delusions, and hallucinations. The primary disturbance in dementia praecox is one of thinking or cognition  that leads to weeping (Revelation 5:4-5) and self-accusations that John describes of himself (such as fear of “the Great City of Babylon” [Rome] in Revelation 18:10, as John’s god/Jesus represented only terror, fear and other phobia: Revelation 15:4, 19:5, etc. as John’s Jesus was not a god of love for John’s saviour rebukes and chastises those he loves: Revelation 3:19, making the Lord equally demented). Cognitive disintegration refers to a disruption in cognitive or mental functioning such as in attention, memory, and goal-directed behavior, with the end state being Verblödung (deterioration) of mind and body.

The first vision (chs. 1:11-3:22), related by “one like unto the Son of man, clothed with a garment down to the foot, and girt about the paps with a golden girdle”, speaking with “a great voice, as of a trumpet”, are statements addressed to the seven churches of Asia.  It is not a reference to the New Testament Jesus, for it is a reference to one like unto the Son of man (in this we do not find a single reference to John’s Jesus being the Son of God).

In the fourth century CE, John Chrysostom and other bishops argued against including the Revelation in the New Testament canon.  They argued such an inclusion unnecessary and unwarranted, primarily because of the difficulties of interpreting it and noting how easily it could be abused to justify suicide cults that were springing up throughout the known world–similar to what happened in Japan and California several  years ago, and Texas with the Branch Davidian,

David Koresh leader of Branch Davidians Seventh Day Adventists awaiting End Times

led by David Koresh, born Vernon Wayne Howell, was the leader of a Branch Davidian Seventh Day Adventist religious sect that believed the End Times had arrived.  On February 28, 1993, the United States Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF) attempted to execute a search warrant at the Branch Davidian ranch at Mount Carmel, a property located nine miles east-northeast of Waco, Texas. An exchange of gunfire resulted in the deaths of four agents and six followers of David Koresh.  A subsequent 51-day siege by the Federal Bureau of Investigation ended on April 19 when fire destroyed the compound. Seventy-six people (24 of them British nationals) died in the fire, including more than 20 children and two pregnant women, along with then-Davidian leader Vernon Wayne Howell (David Koresh) who had forcibly married several young girls and fathered numerous children in the name of the god of the Bible he read. 

Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas destroyed by fire

The question is Biblical: does a parent have the right to condemn a child to death–as Abraham attempted to slaughter Isaac/Ishmael, etc.  According to Revelation, all people will engage in battle, and according to Matthew 10:35, Jesus will set children against parents and families against each other and that there would never be a time of peace.  It is this message that the Alexandria, Egypt Jews held when they accepted the message of Jesus and carried it with them to Egypt to force Jesus to return on a horse with a drawn sword and kill all non-believers.

Jonestown, Guyana: Peoples Temple mass suicide

The Peoples’ Temple Agricultural Project led by cult leader Jim Jones in Jonestown, Guyana had a similar situation.  Jones, claiming to be the ultimate prophet before the Apocalypse and End Times ordered 918 people committing suicide or murder those who were unwilling to die  on November 18, 1978.  Those sacrificed included babies and small children in quest of achieving Rapture that has no Biblical foundation. A total of 909 Temple members died in Jonestown, all but two from apparent cyanide poisoning, in an event termed “revolutionary suicide” by Jones.  The poisonings in Jonestown followed the murder of five others by Temple members at a nearby Port Kaituma airstrip, including the murder of United States Congressman Leo Ryan, the first member of Congress assassinated in the line of duty in the history of the United States. Small children were killed based on the faith of their parents (Chidester, David (1988). Salvation and Suicide. Bloomington: Indiana University Press; Sargeant, Jack (2002). Death Cults: Murder, Mayhem and Mind Control (True Crime Series). London, UK: Virgin Publishing). 

Heaven's Gate cult members wore Nike shoes to enter the Rapture

A similar fantasy, from misreading texts, came with the mass suicide of the Heaven’s Gate cult led by Marshall Applewhite (1931–1997), who believed he was directly related to Jesus and therefore special and partially divine, and Bonnie Nettles (1928–1985), his nurse after his heart attack, who believed that they were the two witnesses of Revelation 11:3.  Before the group took the name of Heaven’s Gate, it was known as Human Individual Metamorphosis (HIM) and believed they were destined for an immediate Rapture–an insanity preached by Beverly and Tim LeHaye–that has led others to suicide. 

Tim and Beverly LaHaye

Thirty-nine members of the group who had committed suicide in order to reach an alien space craft which they believed was following the Comet Hale-Bopp so that they could appeal directly to Jesus to take up his sword and clean evil from the earth.  For the cult members suicide was nothing more than a purification ritual of “cleaning the vehicle” of the body that contained the soul (Vallee, Jacques (1979). Messengers of Deception: UFO Contacts and Cults. Berkeley, CA, USA: And/Or Press, 1979; cf. Wojik, Daniel, “Apocalyptic and Millenarian Aspects of American UFOism,” in Partridge, Chistopher, ed. (2003). UFO Religions. London, UK; New York, NY, USA: Routledge).

Harold Camping Doomsday prophecy for May 2011

Harold Camping declared the Rapture would occur Saturday, May 21, 2011

Harold Camping on May 21, 2011 broadcast on his California-based Family Radio Worldwide that he had used mathematical predictions to the Bible to predict dates for the end of the world. He first predicted the End Times for September 1994, but when nothing happened, he said he had made a miscalculation.  When his god of Revelation did not completely destroy the Earth and the Universe five months later on October 21, he again claimed an error in his math and is revising his table for Doomsday.  Hundreds committed suicide; others gave everything they had to others–and when the Rapture promised by Camping, the LeHayes, the NAR and its anointed pick for president of the USA Rick Perry, and other defenders of the Rapture did not happen, many were left penniless and homeless.

Ronald Weinland

Ronald Weinland, a Church of God preacher wrote in his book God’s Final Witness, in 2008, that “by the fall of 2008, the United States will have collapsed as a world power and no longer exist as an independent nation”.  A follower of

Herbert W. Armstrong

Hebert W. Armstrong who repeatedly predicted the end of the world and proclaimed that Jesus would return to rule over the entire Planet Earth, Weinland has a new edition planned with a revised forecast.

Michel de Nostradamus, a medieval soothsayer and demented coupleteer, predicted, according to many, that the world would come to an end in July 1999, and a “great king of terror will come from the sky”.  Nostradamus is still being read and believed.

No parent has the right to kill a child, nor does any parent have the right to teach the falsehoods in the name of religion as occurs daily among evangelical extremists and particular fundamentalist cults, such as the Jehovah Witnesses and the NAR.  Compare the cult-directed deaths of over 900 People’s Temple cult members in Jonestown, Guyana in one year (1978), and the about 90 Branch Davidian cult members at Waco in one year (1993), with the below conservative estimate that “between five thousand and twelve thousand” JWs have died “every year … for … fifty years.” Which works out to be an estimated total of between 250,000 and 600,000 unnecessary cult-directed deaths that the Watchtower Bible & Tract Society is blood-guilty of. That is a death toll which is between50 and 120 times the

Jehovah Witness Medical Alert medal

combined total of Jonestown and Waco deaths in one year, repeated every year for fifty years and continuing! All because of the Watchtower’s refusal to allow Jehovah’s Witnesses to have blood transfusions.  There is nothing in the Bible that prohibits blood transfusions–which are a modern medical practice and was not known in the days of either the Old or New Testament.  The Biblical prohibition is against eating blood, only, and the sole Biblical reference Jehovah’s Witnesses site is Genesis 9:3-6 and it is grossly mistranslated in the Jehovah’s Witness version of the Bible (verse 3 permits the eating of all vegetables, fruits, and animals–which is strengthened by 1 Timothy 4:3, verses 4-5 details that blood is the soul, and verse 6 rejects murder):  כָּל־רֶמֶשׂ אֲשֶׁר הוּא־חַי לָכֶם יִהְיֶה לְאָכְלָה כְּיֶרֶק עֵשֶׂב נָתַתִּי לָכֶם אֶת־כֹּל׃  אַךְ־בָּשָׂר בְּנַפְשֹׁו דָמֹו לֹא תֹאכֵלוּ׃  וְאַךְ אֶת־דִּםְכֶם לְנַפְשֹׁתֵיכֶם אֶדְרֹשׁ מִיַּד כָּל־חַיָּה אֶדְרְשֶׁנּוּ וּמִיַּד הָאָדָם מִיַּד אִישׁ אָחִיו אֶדְרֹשׁ אֶת־נֶפֶשׁ הָאָדָם׃ שֹׁפֵךְ דַּם הָאָדָם בָּאָדָם דָּמֹו יִשָּׁפֵךְ כִּי בְּצֶלֶם אֱלֹהִים עָשָׂה אֶת־הָאָדָם׃. 

Charles Taze Russell (1852–1916). Photograph 1911.

The Jehovah’s Witnesses doctrine is novel and new: it was not introduced into the cult until 1945 (Be Guided by the Living God”, The Watchtower, June 15, 2004, page 22; cf. Keep Yourself in God’s Love, Watch Tower Bible & Tract Society, 2008, page 77; ref. Lee Elder, The Associated Jehovah’s Witnesses for Reform on Blood, “Why some Jehovah’s Witnesses accept blood and conscientiously reject official Watchtower Society blood policy”, Journal of Medical Ethics, 2000, Vol 26, pages 375-380).  The Jehovah Witnesses is a millenarian restorationist Christian denomination with nontrinitarian beliefs distinct from mainstream Christianity and believe that the destruction of the present world system at Armageddon is imminent, and that the establishment of God’s kingdom on earth is the only solution for all problems faced by humankind (Michael Hill, ed (1972). “The Embryonic State of a Religious Sect’s Development: The Jehovah’s Witnesses”. Sociological Yearbook of Religion in Britain (5): 11–12), and is more radical than most cults.  Founded in the late 1870s by Charles Taze Russell with the formation of Zion’s Watch Tower Tract Society and has its own “translation” of the Bible that does not match any other version, but expresses millenialism and the ideas of Russell.  They reject inherent immortality of the soul, and hellfire, and consider secular society to be morally corrupt and under the influence of Satan.  Charles Taze Russell believed that the year 1914 would mark the end of a 2520-year period called “the Gentile Times” and a new age would be born but without warfare: the Apocalypse was to be spiritual and only for Jehovah Witnesses who would usher in a monarchy of Jesus (read: Zion’s Watch Tower, July 1, 1879, pg 1: “This is the first number of the first volume of “Zion’s Watch Tower,” and it may not be amiss to state the object of its publication. That we are living “in the last days”—”the day of the Lord”—”the end” of the Gospel age, and consequently, in the dawn of a “new” age.” Cp. Bible Examiner October, 1876 “Gentile Times: When Do They End?” pp 27-8: “The seven times will end in A.D. 1914; when Jerusalem shall be delivered forever … when Gentile Governments shall have been dashed to pieces; when God shall have poured out of his fury upon the nations and they acknowledge him King of Kings and Lord of Lords”).  All of Russell’s predictions of the End Times and the Restoration were proven wrong, but his believers are convinced with each passing generation that they are living in the Final Days, even when there was a sizeable rift in the cult (Penton, M.J. (1997). Apocalypse Delayed. Toronto, ON, Canada: University of Toronto Press. pp. 53).

Dionysius of Alexandria (247 CE) rejected the “Book of” Revelation, upon doctrinal rather than critical grounds. Christians in Syria rejected Revelation as the Montanists relied heavily on it and were opposed to Syrian Christianity. Eusebius (315 CE), the Arian bishop of Caesarea and confident of the Roman Emperor, suspended his judgment, hesitating between the external and internal evidence. Some canons, especially in the Eastern Church, rejected the book, while most others included it. In the ninth century it was included, grudgingly with the Apocalypse of Peter  as being one of the “disputed” books in the Stichometry of St. Nicephorus, Patriarch of Constantinople.  It was accepted and adopted only late, and then only because of bribes strategically placed among weak bishops at various counsels and conferences. 

With the advent of the Protestant Reformation in the sixteenth century, the Revelation was once more in dispute. Martin Luther initially wrote “Christ is neither taught nor known in it”  (For the preface of 1522 see Luther’s Works volume 35 pp. 398–399. Luther later did accept it, as he wrote in his 1530 preface to the same volume, p. 411, most likely out of politically expediency than any true affirmation, but Luther was known to play politics regularly in religion as shown in his An den christlichen Adel deutscher Nation or Address to the German Nobility written c. 1520).  John Calvin wrote about all books of the Bible, but not about Revelation.

John Potmos’ second vision comprising the rest of the book (chapters 4-22) begins with “a door opened in the sky” (Revelation 4:1) and describes the end of the world-involving the final rebellion (battle: πόλεμος) by Satan at Armageddon. The battle is not unique and follows the mythology of numerous civilizations.  In Revelation 16:13-16 “frogs” come out of the dragon and the great beast, a point in Adventist mythology; however, the reference is neither new Christian nor original Hebrew but from ancient Egyptian theology.  

Heqet's discourse on the miracle of birth (ancient Egypt; ref. d'Hatchepsout - IV Urk IV 223)

The frog goddess Heqet was often shown as a

Heqet (Frog Goddess): Egyptian Museum, Caior (664-332 BCE)

frog-headed woman or as a frog and was associated with fertility and resurrection and part of the Nile that renewed the soil each year–for that reason Heqet was a goddess of childbirth. There are four male primeval gods of the Ogdoad – Nun (water), Amen (invisibility), Heh (infinity) and Kek (darkness) and also reflect the Nile’s renewal of the soil), God’s (not Jesus, although the authors claim that there will be and are many false men claiming to be Jesus (Revelation 2:9, 3:9 the latter being more of a repetitive copying than a true verse) final defeat of Satan (Revelation 12:9), and the restoration of peace to the world (Revelation 20:1-15).  The writing about the “beast” and “frogs” follows myths popular at the time.  In each case the dragon or serpent (both representing great worldly knowledge) are considered destroyers, whereas they were creatrix and determined to educate a world away from fantasy toward science and knowledge.  Though the destroyer is a terrifying force as she argues with the guardians of faith and deacons of religion, she brings renewal and new growth after the destruction. 

Kali, Hindu goddess (precedent for the story of Salome and John the Baptist)

As Jane Caputi has written: 

These goddesses were metaphor who expressed their culture’s awareness of the universal Powers of Chaos. They represented the original churning womb  or Crone-stirred cauldron or birth, death, and transmutation—the gaping Hole or spiraling Eye associated with the primordial female Powers in which all of us originate and to which all of us will return, to change once more.

(Caputi, Jane (1993). Gossips, Gorgons, and Crones. Santa Fe, NM, USA: Bear and Co., p. 281). 

Medusa holding Perseus (Museo Archeologico Regionale di Siracusa) 560 BCE

The dragon goddess appears in every religion throughout the Middle East and known Asia, and was a threat to the Jews as many found greater solace in her than in Yahweh or Jesus, leading prophets like John to promise a great war to rid the earth of these deities: Tlazolteotl, filth eater and queen of witches on whom many legendary whores are based; Pele, Hawaiian volcano goddess; the Phoenician/Canaanite dragon-goddess Tiamat (the original Babylonian beast with 5 (or 7) heads; the Norse Angerboda, or Hel, The Hag of the Iron Wood, the Morrigan, Caillech, the Veiled One, with a black face, red teeth and white hair, and Nephthys, wife to Egyptian Set who is the source for the legendary third son of Eve: Seth.

Near the End Times Tiamat "Dragon Beast" carries Whore of Babylon (Russian gloss)

As a writer or writers, or dreamer or dreamers, the author(s) known as John Patmos had no concept of time nor of sequential organization, indicating that the work is the composition of many hands who wrote parts and then the parts were assembled by scribes into what they assumed was a unified work.  More unsettling is the constant intermixture of Hebrew lore with the legends of other people and places. To this end the writer(s) talk about “beasts” and give vivid descriptions of each, such as “the first beast” who is a composite animal with parts from a leopard, bear and lion, thus linking it with the symbolism of Daniel 7, but in reverse order. The time allotted to the “beast”  Revelation 11:3-5: “I will give power unto my two witnesses, and they shall prophecy [preach] 1260 days, clothed in sackcloth.” The length of the ministry of the two witnesses is 1260 days, which is the length of 42 thirty-day months) parallels the time given

Greek sphinx from the Delphi museum: head of a woman, wings of an eagle, body of a lion.

the “little horn” in Daniel 7:25, and the wilderness experience of the woman who has the wings of an eagle (Revelations 12:14; cp. Isaiah 40:31) and was a reference to the time the writers were experiencing–there is no reference to any other century, which is buttressed by  Matthew 24:14 (this has led many to suggest that the account was written within 3-4 years after Jesus died, but Nero was not emperor, Patmos was not a jailed island, and nothing in either texts suggests a cataclysmic end.  More damning is that the “two witnesses” are named in the Old Testament, long before the New Testament Jesus was invented.  The prophecy in Zechariah 3-4 gives the names “Joshua” and “Zerubbabel” to the two men called the “two olive trees” in Zechariah 4:11, and it reveals that they are alive at a time “the foundation of this house” (verse 9) has been laid down. 

Prophet Haggai and the Twin Olive Trees (Zerubbabel and Joshua)

Zechariah and Haggai were two prophets who lived at the time of Ezra and Nehemiah (Ezra 5:1, 6:14).  What the witnesses do in Revelation matches that of the actions of Joshua and Zerubbabel (c. 538 BCE) in Zechariah (Haggai or Aeggeus 1:1:  בִּשְׁנַת שְׁתַּיִם לְדָרְיָוֶשׁ הַמֶּלֶךְ בַּחֹדֶשׁ הַשִּׁשִּׁי בְּיֹום אֶחָד לַחֹדֶשׁ הָיָה דְבַר־יְהוָה בְּיַד־חַגַּי הַנָּבִיא אֶל־זְרֻבָּבֶל בֶּן־שְׁאַלְתִּיאֵל פַּחַת יְהוּדָה וְאֶל־יְהֹושֻׁעַ בֶּן־יְהֹוצָדָק הַכֹּהֵן הַגָּדֹול לֵאמֹר׃ , 2:1-3; cp. Ezra 5:1-2).  The promised battle is nothing more than tribal warfare with swords and rocks–no atomic bombs or twenty-first century weapons.  Moreover, the powers of Joshua and Zerubbabel is identical to that of Moses and Aaron, who had very similar power to plague the world’s dominant power at that time: Pharaoh’s Egypt. Exodus 7-12 describe the famous smiting of Egypt with a series of plagues which turned water into blood which was nothing more that Chromatiaceaebacteria, which thrive in oxygen-deprived water and will kill fish who lead to the more frequent appearance of frogs who live on “lice” a term for flying insects, who if are not killed will appear in swarms to feed on the blood and flesh of people and on grain that becomes moldy if it is not removed from being stored too long in a bin, and if the grain is eaten can lead to death; in ancient Egypt, during times of famine, the first-born male was always fed double portions to preserve the boy’s life so he could reproduce while the rest would die of starvation: the mythology of the plagues of Exodus repeated in Revelation.  Each of these plagues can scientifically be explained.  Each plague is repeated throughout various texts in what became the Bible, not the least of which appears in the fantasy of Elijah’s curse of a plague on the sinful kingdom of Israel with a deadly drought for three and ½ years (I Kings 17:1-18:46, ref: 17:7:  וַיְהִי מִקֵּץ יָמִים וַיִּיבַשׁ הַנָּחַל כִּי לֹא־הָיָה גֶשֶׁם בָּאָרֶץ׃).

Chromatiaceae bacteria, which thrive in oxygen-deprived water and kill fish, in OC Fisher Reservoir in San Angelo State Park in West Texas July 2011

A similar event occurred in Texas in the last week in July, 2011.  Due to unrelenting drought in Texas, the OC Fisher Reservoir in San Angelo State Park in West Texas almost entirely dried up, leaving thousands of dead fish behind because bacteria had turned the stagnant dregs of the lake red the result of Chromatiaceae bacteria, which thrive in oxygen-deprived water.

Patmos refers to “Israel”, but not as a tribe or a people.  Israel, in Revelation 2:14, 7:4, 21:12, is a nation.  In this context it is a reference from Egypt where the Trinity of the ancient Egyptians (Is[is]-Ra-El) is defined as the source of the invasion of the Habiru, a nomadic people who were mercenaries and stole the lands of Canaan (a settled, civilized, advanced people known as Canaanites) because their agricultural god (Yah-weh) who was symbolized as a golden calf (1 Kings 12:28, 29, where Jeroboan sets up two golden statues of the gods Yah in the alleged year 974 BCE. This action was denounced by Ahijah (1 Kings 14:7)  leading to regicide of Nadab (1 Kings 15:27) leading to mass “confusion”–actually a separation of  people and rejection of national unity (1 Kings 16:19-20) that allows the King of Syria [Syrian translates as “high land”] to invade and conquer the nation (2 Chronicles 6:4) being termed the “Beast”. 

Bronze Figurine of Canaanite Nobleman 15-13th century BCE

Syrian rule lasts until 885 BCE, but in 721 BCE the Ten Tribes that Patmos discusses are carried off to Assyria (a word that means “land”: 1 Kings 17:6) an action that Patmos attempts to claim as prophecy for his period of time while awaiting the Lord who never comes following Ze[a]chariah 10:10-11) and his priests were intent to be supreme.  Patmos was a fervent opponent of Syria as in 6 CE Rome added Judea and Samaria to the Syrian nation, and thereafter it becomes a battle ground being overrun by King Sapor I, king of Persia in 258 CE, Chosroes II destroying Antioch in 611 before subduing Palestine in 614 CE.  Muhammad takes parts of Sapor’s domains in 630, leading to further collapse of the Israelite dream of a homeland that was never their land legally.  In the Bible the full-grown City of Hatzor is called the “head of cities (Joshua 11:10).” It commanded a watering spot on an important crossroads along the trade route connecting Egypt with Mesopotamia. Hatzor is mentioned in several old texts from the ancient library in Syrian Mari. They reveal that it was a trade city, merchandized tin, and that Mesopotamia sent two ambassadors to it. Hatzor is also mentioned in Egyptian texts.  Hatzor was the only Canaanite city that the Israelites conquered by fire (Joshua 11:13).

Europe as Gog and Magog

While religious Christian and Jewish fundamentalists attempt to define the Ultimate Battle to be on the lands of Gog (Revelation 20:6) and Magog (Revelation 20:8), the Bible nor history agree.  Gog (translating as “mountains”) was grandson of Joel  (c. 1600 BCE; 1 Chronicles 5:4), and later a prince of various principalities in Scythia (Tartary: Ezekiel 38:2, 3, 14, 16, 18; 39:1, 11).  The same is true with Magog (a word with no major translation), but was the second son of Japheth, grandson of Noah (Genesis 10:2, 1 Chronicles 1:5) who was not a person but the name of tribes (Ezekiel 38:2, 39:6) leading the Israelites to calling it, symbolically, “Pashur” (“terror is on every side”): Jeremiah 20:3:  וַיְהִי מִמָּחֳרָת וַיֹּצֵא פַשְׁחוּר אֶת־יִרְמְיָהוּ מִן־הַמַּהְפָּכֶת וַיֹּאמֶר אֵלָיו יִרְמְיָהוּ לֹא פַשְׁחוּר קָרָא יְהוָה שְׁמֶךָ כִּי אִם־מָגֹור מִסָּבִיב׃ ף, cp. Isaiah 8:3, heightening John of Patmos xenophobia–a form of mental illness (as defined by the American Psychiatric Association, read; and here) as read in Revelation 20:8: καὶ ἐξελεύσεται πλανῆσαι τὰ ἔθνη τὰ ἐν ταῖς τέσσαρσιν γωνίαις τῆς γῆς, τὸν Γὼγ καὶ Μαγώγ, συναγαγεῖν αὐτοὺς εἰς τὸν πόλεμον, ὧν ὁ ἀριθμὸς αὐτῶν ὡς ἡ ἄμμος τῆς θαλάσσης a clear statement of panic disorder and related mental illnesses especially comorbidity in times of assumed or experienced battle and predictions of war as detailed in the : Brian Engdahl, Ph.D., Thomas N. Dikel, M.A., Raina Eberly, Ph.D., and Arthur Blank, Jr., M.D. (1998). “Comorbidity and Course of Psychiatric Disorders in “Community Sample of Former Prisoners of War Comorbidity and Course of Psychiatric Disorders in a Community Sample of Former Prisoners of War”  American Psychiatric Journal 155 (12): 1740.

Eurasia seen as Gog and Magog

To use or cite Revelation as being a prophecy is natural for millions, but negates the understanding of reality and trauma and its effect upon the prophet and those who accept the prophecy.  It is not healthy mentally nor physically.  The Revelation of the New Testament is as mentally unsound and indicates manic depression and deteriorating mental stability on the order of the later

Anna Katharina Emmerick an Apocalyptic seer

case as the Passion of Christ authored by Anne Catherine Emmerich (Ide, Arthur Frederick (2004). Crucifixion: What the Bible Really Says. Chicago, IL, USA: Sepore; much of the fraud in Emmerich’s writing is discussed in Emmerich, Anne Catherine, and Clemens Brentano (2005). The Dolorous Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ. Anvil Publishers, Georgia, pages 49-56; Gibson’s mental state can be found at Neff, David (March 2004). “The Passion of Mel Gibson,” Christianity Today, pp. 30-35). Only a small portion of what the woman wrote has ever been considered factual, a finding even by Roman Catholic priests (Hümpfner, Winfried (1923). Clemens Brentanos Glaubwürdigkeit in seinen Emmerick-Aufzeichnungen; Untersuchung über die Brentano-Emmerick-frage unter erstmaliger Benutzung der tagebücher Brentanos Würzburg, St. Rita-verlag und -druckerei; on Brentanos fraud, see: Suzanne Stahl, “Between God and Gibson: German Mystical and Romantic Sources of ‘The Passion of the Christ’ “, The German Quarterly [published in the USA] Vol. 78, No. 4, Fall, 2005, with the full-text with a subscription (a single copy is available for $12), click here).  Slipping into Alzheimer’s Disease, Pope John Paul II, however, October 3, 2004, raised this delusional woman to the ranks of “Blessed” and on the Vatican website include: “Her words, which have reached innumerable people in many languages from her modest room in Dülmen through the writings of Clemens Brentano, are an outstanding proclamation of the gospel in service to salvation right up to the present day” (Quote from 18th paragraph of Vatican online biography Anna Katharina Emmerick (1774-1824, at http://www.vatican.va/news_services/liturgy/saints/ns_lit_doc_20041003_emmerick_en.html). There is not a single sentence written by this woman who has either Biblical or historical fact as it basis.

For as long as there have been written records in any language, there have been horror stories of a Final Battle.  Such an End Time has been predicted by all religions and by all religious leaders.  We are still here.