Book Review: Book of Revelation
Hey, remember that whole don’t throw stones unless your slate is clean thing Jesus preached? (Actually, I took that from Jesus Christ Superstar, but I’m sure he must’ve said something like that, after all he also told people not to be judgy) Well, guess whose slate is clean – God’s. And He has a lot more than stones to throw at all the fornicators, blasphemers, and nudists (according to Revelation 16:15 Jesus would really appreciate it if you put some pants on).
The Book of Revelation is a collaboration between John of Patmos and Jesus Christ, who at the time had reached that level of success where authors believe they don’t need an editor. In fact, the last thing Jesus tells John is that anyone who dares to change anything about his words will die a painful death. This is how we ended up with countless “where do whores go?” in A Dance with Dragons. In the Book of Revelation, we get 2 resurrections, 2 beasts (yes, there are 2 of them), 2 sets of four horsemen, more endings than The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King, and “I heard the voice of harpers harping with their harps” (really, is there any other way to harp?).
John isn’t really from Patmos. That was where he was sent as punishment for following the teachings of Christ. You’ll notice that I didn’t write “for being a Christian”. That’s because John considers himself and the other followers of Christ as the real Jews, as opposed to the other Jews who didn’t think Jesus was the real Messiah. So, while he was in Patmos, John met a sword spitting Jesus with white hair and feet like fine brass who told him how everything is going to end. I honestly don’t know what the hell “his feet like unto fine brass, as if they burned in a furnace” means. I’ve tried to visualize it, but I can’t. This Jesus is wearing a long garment accessorized with a golden belt under his chest, which is apparently described using a word relating to women’s breasts. Since John knows about women and it makes no sense for him to misgender this individual who hasn’t even identified himself yet, does this mean Jesus has moobs?
The first thing Jesus does is ask John to pass some messages to the Seven Asian Churches: Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamos, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, and Laodicea. He’s been watching them and he’s not entirely happy with what he’s seen. Pergamos has some Balaam worshippers. Thyatira has a slutty prophetess that encourages fornication. Sardis has some unspecified issues and Jesus threatens to make them a surprise visit. Laodicea is just meh and Jesus says he’ll vomit them if they don’t start doing something, anything. He encourages them to buy from him “gold tried in the fire”, “white raiment” so they don’t walk around naked (see? told you he didn’t like nudists), and “eyesalve”, which sounds suspiciously like a televangelist grift. He also says he may visit random houses and give the inhabitants the privilege of offering him dinner, which frankly looks like a trick to get a free meal. Smyrna and Philadelphia are the teacher’s pets, and Ephesus is okay but needs improvement. Oh, and if you are a Nicolaitan, JESUS HATES YOU. He tries to give the Seven Churches an incentive to improve by saying that whoever proves worthy will:
- get to eat from the tree of life
- “not be hurt of the second death” (you know, the one that happens after you’re brought back to life and judged unworthy by God)
- get to eat of Jesus’s hidden manna stash
- be given a stone with a new, secret name (okay, this is starting to sound like when someone forgets a birthday and tries to improvise a gift)
- rule nations with an iron fist (well, that’s more like it)
- be given the “morning star” (whatever that i… wait a minute, isn’t that Lucifer’s name?)
- get to dress all in white (which is bad news for all the goths)
- have his name stay in the book of life (which guarantees you’ll be resurrected in the End)
- be made “a pillar in the temple of my God (metaphorically, right?), and he shall go no more out (guess not): and I will write upon him the name of my God, and the name of the city of my God, which is new Jerusalem” (Hmm, how is ending up part of the decoration a reward?)
- get to share a throne with Jesus and God (that better be a big throne)
After this, John gets taken to Heaven.
John’s Heaven is a lot colder than Enoch’s, all gemstones and crystals. God is described as looking like a “jasper and a sardine stone”. Hmm, what? First feet like fine brass and now this? So, everyone and everything is super glowing. God’s squad includes not only 24 elders, but also 4 beasts who continuously sing his praises (which frankly sounds like a pretty shitty job). These same beasts had already been described in Ezekiel 1:5 – 1:12, but by the time John sees them they seem to have had some work done. Ezekiel says they each have four faces – human, calf, lion, and eagle – and four wings. In Revelation 4:6 – 4:8, each of the beasts has a single face and six wings. Both John and Ezekiel agree that they are covered in eyes, though.
Jesus seems to have had a makeover after talking to John about the seven churches because when he next appears he looks like a mutant lamb and is continuously referred to as simply Lamb. Sure, it’s all symbolic and the symbolism is even explained in the text, but why the need for it now? Everyone involved already knows who he is and what he represents. Anyway, Mutant Lamb Jesus is the one who breaks the Seven Seals of the scroll of DOOM and unleashes the End. Thanks a lot, Lamb.
The first 4 seals bring forth the famous Four Horsemen (Revelation 6:2 – 6:8). So, I know one of them is Pestilence, but the only description we’re given is “a white horse: and he who sat on him had a bow; and a crown was given unto him: and he went forth conquering, and to conquer”. Is it because he has a bow like Apollo who could send people the plague with his arrows? Also, a white horse and a pale horse? Did God run out of horse colours by the time He got to Death? And wouldn’t it make more sense for Pestilence to be the one with the pale horse? Interestingly, Famine is told to not affect wine and oil. I guess God wants to keep everyone greasy and drunk. Given how famous the Four Horsemen are, you’d expect them to have more page time, but this is it.
Another famous character of the Book of Revelation is the Beast (Revelation 13). You know, the one whose number is 666. Except, the actual text isn’t as straightforward. There are, in fact, 2 beasts. The first beast is the one that comes out of the sea and gets their power directly from Satan. Beast 1 is mortally wounded but survives, which impresses everyone and leads them to worship both Beast 1 and Satan. This beast has power over the world and all the people whose names aren’t in Jesus’s good humans list. Then, from the earth, will come a second beast. Beast 2 is described as looking like a lamb but speaking as a dragon and encourages even more people to worship Beast 1 by performing miracles. Elsewhere in the text he’s referred to as the beast’s false prophet. Though given that Beast 1 was doing fine on its own I’m not sure why he needed a prophet. It’s Beast 2 who has the 666 number. He’s basically what people think of when they think of the Antichrist and his powers, but unlike Beast 1, his connection to Satan isn’t clearly defined. So, basically all the Apocalypse-inspired movies that present the miracle-performing Beast 2 as the child of Satan and the one who will bring about a reign of evil just decided to simplify things by conflating the 2. Somehow, I doubt Don’t Even Dream of Editing My Book Jesus would be happy about this. The beasts only show up again, briefly, in Revelation 16:13, 16:14, and 19:20.
The fifth seal activates whiny martyr ghosts and the sixth one starts the natural catastrophes and spooky phenomena. Revelation 6:12 has got to be the least poetic description of an eclipse ever: “the sun became black as sackcloth of hair”. Really, John, is that the best you can do? Sigh… The famous seventh seal unlocks the Seven Trumpets of DOOM.
So, Horseman Death did away with ¼ of all life on earth, and now it’s time for the magical trumpets to lay waste to ⅓ of everything. With the first 4 trumpets vegetation is burned, water turns to blood (by the way, there’s a trumpet for the seas and another for rivers and fountains, which feels like cheating just to get another number 7), and days become shorter. The fifth trumpet unleashes Abaddon and his army of long haired, human-faced locusts with scorpion tails. They will attack all those who don’t have God’s seal of protection and torment them like scorpions and their victims will be unable to die to escape their suffering for eterni… actually, it’s just for 5 months. Really, all that build-up for 5 months? The sixth trumpet releases 4 more horsemen with a whole army to eliminate ⅓ of the population. Sigh… This is why you need an editor, Jesus. The seventh trumpet brings God to earth for the (first) final Judgement.
After the Seven Trumpets of DOOM, the earth is “harvested” by two angels with sharp sickles. Revelation 14:19 and 14:20 have some awesomely creepy imagery:
“And the angel thrust in his sickle into the earth, and gathered the vine of the earth, and cast it into the great winepress of the wrath of God.”
“And the winepress was trodden without the city, and blood came out of the winepress, even unto the horse bridles, by the space of a thousand and six furlongs.”
The “harvest” is followed by the Seven Last Plagues, aka the wrath of God. This God really needs to learn some anger management. This time, along with the customary water turned to blood and earthquakes, we get sores, total darkness, and one dried river. The seventh vial tears down the great (and sinful) Babylon, which is a stand-in for Rome. Yes, the Great Whore is just a metaphor for Rome (or any Rome-like city for those of you who believe the Apocalypse is really coming). No, there’s no drunk woman riding around on a red beast (Revelation 17). This type of metaphor can also be found in Ezekiel 16 and 23 (maybe more, but I didn’t read the whole book), where Jerusalem is described as a nympho happily giving herself to heathens with big dicks (especially those Chaldeans with their saucy undergarments). Hmm, I’m no expert, but I think Ezekiel may have suffered from a case of incelness…
After the fall of Babylon there’s much rejoicing, and everyone praises God. All this smiting will be followed by the marriage of the Lamb. Aw, that’s nice. Except not, because it’s time for the beasts and whatever sinners and blasphemers (and probably nudists, too) that are still alive to be fully exterminated. Enter the sword-spitting Word of God (Jesus’s even less nice alter ego), wearing bloody clothes and riding a white horse at the head of a great army. He “should smite the nations; and he shall rule them with a rod of iron: and he treadeth the winepress of the fierceness and wrath of Almighty God”. He also invites all the necrophagous birds to join the “supper of the Great God”, which consists of the corpses of all the people still following the beasts. As for the beasts themselves, they’re thrown into a “lake of fire burning with brimstone”. This is totally not psychotic. Totally. Unlike in The Book of Enoch, humans don’t take part in the smiting of heathens. They just cheer as God and His team kill everyone.
This is still not the End because for some reason, God decided to trap Satan in a bottomless pit for a thousand years instead of just killing him. Such a Bond villain move. So, this is just the first resurrection when all the chosen ones get to live in bliss with God and Jesus. After a thousand years, God releases Satan so he can find himself another army of humans. So, these Two Witnesses who have been telling people to repent and worship God are killed by “the beast that ascendeth out of the bottomless pit”. This is just nuts! Since it’s all taking place one thousand years after the Word of God killed everyone, how can there be any humans left other than God’s chosen ones? Who the hell can the Two Witnesses be preaching to at this point? Anyway, this time, when he’s defeated, Satan is thrown into that same fiery pit where the 2 beasts ended up and presumably won’t be showing up again. Well, finally. After this we get the second resurrection and now all the dead are brought back, so they can be judged by God. The ones deemed worthy will get to live forever while the others get to die a second death and be thrown into the lake of fire along with death and hell. Satan being the Final Boss makes sense, but all the best characters are gone, and we’re left with some faceless army of surprise heathens (again, who are these people?). The Witnesses just come out of nowhere. They’re basically Jesus with better superpowers but with no personality and none of the tragedy. And another resurrection? This is just like a TV show that should’ve ended a couple of seasons ago trying to recapture the magic by recycling old plotlines.
Much like the Antichrist, the Rapture has been mentioned everywhere. I kept waiting for it to happen, but nothing. I ended up googling and apparently Evangelicals took the concept from one of Paul’s letters? You’d think it would be prominently mentioned in the Book of Revelation, right? Well, it’s not. God’s thousand-year reign is called the first resurrection because the chosen ones who get to join Him were martyrs brought back to life. In fact, when the fifth seal is broken and the already dead martyrs ask the ever loving, merciful God to avenge them and save His still alive followers, they’re told those followers will also have to die. The worthy members of the Twelve Tribes are given a seal to protect them from all the death and mass destruction, they’re not actually removed from earth. When In Revelation 14:3 – 14:5 we learn of the one hundred forty-four thousand who “were redeemed from the earth” because they’re innocent, were faithful to Jesus, and “were not defiled with women” (that’s awfully specific, John), the latter is the very first thing we’re told about them, so this doesn’t sound like regular good Christians being spared the horrors of the End of Times. In the beginning, Jesus promises the church of Philadelphia he’ll “keep thee from the hour of temptation, which shall come upon all world, to try them that dwell upon the earth”, but he doesn’t explain how. They could all drop dead to be resurrected later or end up in a coma for all we know. Considering how every step of the End is described here, I’m calling bullshit on that one. Sorry people, you’re just going to have to stay among the unrepentant blasphemers and nudists for 42 months. But don’t worry, God’s seals will keep you safe from the locusts and the falling space debris.
Well, at least we still get to end things with a wedding, right? That’s uplifting. Except the wedding is between Mutant Lamb Jesus and the new Jerusalem created by God for all the faithful to live forever in constant adoration, basking in the heavenly light of Himself and Jesus. Since this wasn’t written by J G Ballard, I’m going to presume the marriage is just metaphorical and no one’s actually humping a city.
After Jesus has shown all this to John, and before he’s all NO EDITING ALLOWED, He refers to himself, among other things, as “the bright and morning star” (Revelation 22:16). Yeah, that’s not suspicious or anything. Poor John got catfished by Lucifer, didn’t he? Well, I guess no villain can resist the urge to monologue. Then again, maybe John just ate some powerful shrooms. Or licked the wrong frog (or the right one since there’s really no other reason for licking frogs). Whatever it was, the Book of Revelation really could’ve used a good editor.
By Danforth