The Meaning of the Book of Revelation: the Four Horsemen
작가: Jonathan S. Rose, Curtis Childs
Transparency is needed to sort things out. Before big change happens, God first reveals what’s really going on.
In the Book of Revelation - the last book of the Word - the apostle John describes a series of apocalyptic visions that he experienced during his exile on the Isle of Patmos, in the Aegean Sea.
In one of these visions, he saw four horsemen, the first riding a white horse, the second a red horse, the third a black, and the fourth - named Death - riding a pale horse. These "Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse" - oft-pictured - are described in Revelation 6:1-8.
What do these horses, and their riders, represent? What do they have to do with us, today? Watch as Curtis Childs and Jonathan Rose explore the hidden Bible meaning of the Four Horsemen in the Book of Revelation, in this video from the Swedenborg and Life Series, from the Swedenborg Foundation.
Plus, to go straight to the source, follow the links below to the places in "Apocalypse Revealed" where Swedenborg explained the inner meaning of this famous Bible story. A good place to start would be Apocalypse Revealed 298.
(참조: Apocalypse Explained 315; Apocalypse Revealed 262-263, 301, 306, 314, 316, 320, 322-323)
This video is a product of the Swedenborg Foundation. Follow these links for further information and other videos: www.youtube.com/user/offTheLeftEye and www.swedenborg.com
The New Jerusalem and its Heavenly Teachings #81
81. From Secrets of Heaven
Love for ourselves and love for the world. Just as love for the Lord and love for our neighbor, or caring, make heaven, so love for ourselves and love for the world, where they are dominant, make hell; so the two pairs of loves are opposites: 2041, 3610, 4225, 4776, 6210, 7366, 7369, 7489, 7490, 8232, 8678, 10455, 10741, 10742, 10743, 10745. Love for ourselves and love for the world are the source of all evils: 1307, 1308, 1321, 1594, 1691, 3413, 7255, 7376, 7488, 7489, 8318, 9335, 9348, 10038, 10742. Love for ourselves and love for the world are the source of contempt for others, enmity, hatred, vengefulness, cruelty, trickery, and therefore every evil and all maliciousness: 6667, 7372, 7373, 7374, 9348, 10038, 10742. To the extent that we give these loves free rein they run wild, and self-love even races all the way to the throne of God: 7375, 8678. Love for ourselves and love for the world are destructive of our communities and of heavenly order: 2045, 2057. It is because of these loves that the human race had to institute governments and people had to subject themselves to a ruling authority in order to be safe: 7364, 10160, 10814. Wherever these loves rule, acts of goodness that are inspired by love and acts of goodness that are inspired by faith 1 are rejected, or stifled, or corrupted: 2041, 7491, 7492, 7643, 8487, 10455, 10743. In these loves there is no life, but instead there is spiritual death: 7494, 10731, 10741. Descriptions of what these loves are like: 1505, 2219, 2363, 2364, 2444, 4221, 4227, 4947, 4949, 5721, 7366-7377, 8678. All craving and obsession come from loving ourselves and the world: 2041, 8910.
[2] Love for ourselves and love for the world should serve as means, and not at all as goals: 7377, 7819, 7820. When we are being reformed these loves are inverted so that they serve as means and not as goals, and the result is that they become like the feet rather than the head: 8995, 9210. People who devote their lives to self-love and love for the world have in effect no inner level, only an outer level without an inner one, because their inner level is closed to heaven but their outer level is open to the world: 10396, 10400, 10409, 10412, 10422, 10429. People who live in self-love and love for the world do not know what caring is, what conscience is, or what the life of heaven is: 7490. To the extent that we devote our lives to self-love and love for the world we do not accept either the love of doing what is good or the truth that builds faith, although these are constantly flowing into us from the Lord: 7491.
[3] For people who devote their lives to self-love and love for the world there are outer restraints, but no inner restraints, so when the outer restraints are removed they plunge into every kind of wickedness: 10744, 10745, 10746. In the spiritual world we all turn toward what we love. If we have devoted our lives to loving the Lord and loving our neighbor, we turn toward the Lord; but if we have devoted our lives to loving ourselves and loving the world, we turn our backs on the Lord: 10130, 10189, 10420, 10742. The nature of worship that has self-love within it: 1304, 1306, 1307, 1308, 1321, 1322. The Lord uses evil people to govern the world, leading them by their own loves, which go back to love for themselves and love for the world: 6481, 6495. Evil people can serve functions and do good and useful things just as much as good people can, because they are intent on prestige and wealth as their rewards, so they act outwardly the same way good people do: 6481, 6495.
[4] All the people in the hells have lives that are devoted to evil practices and consequent false beliefs because of their love for themselves and love for the world: Heaven and Hell 551-565.
각주:
1. The Latin phrase here translated "acts of goodness that are inspired by faith" is bonum fidei, literally, "the good belonging to [or coming from] faith. " Compare Secrets of Heaven 9230:2: "‘The goodness belonging to faith' refers to everything in the church that concerns the way we live and serve others on the basis of the theology taught by the church's faith. In short, it refers to everything that has to do with the formation of an intent to put that theology into practice and with the act of doing so, out of obedience. The truth that makes up the church's faith turns into goodness when we will and do it. " [SS]
