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.

(Referenties: Apocalypse Explained 315; Apocalypse Revealed 262-263, 301, 306, 314, 316, 320, 322-323)

943. And the Lord God of the holy prophets sent His angel to show His servants the things which must shortly take place. This symbolically means that the Lord who gave the Word contained in both Testaments has revealed through heaven to people who possess truths from Him what must surely come to pass.

The Lord God of the holy prophets symbolizes the Lord who gave the Word contained in both Testaments, for prophets symbolize people who teach truths from the Word, in an abstract sense the church's doctrinal truth (nos. 8, 173), and in a broad sense the Word itself. Moreover, because the holy prophets symbolize the Word, therefore they symbolize the Word contained in both Testaments.

The Lord God's sending an angel to show His servants the things which must shortly take place means, symbolically, that the Lord has revealed to people who possess truths from Him what must surely come to pass. The angel here symbolizes heaven, as in nos. 5, 65, 644, 647, 648, 910 above. His servants symbolize people who possess truths from the Lord (nos. 3, 380, 937). And shortly symbolically means surely (no. 4). Thus the things which must shortly take place mean things which must surely come to pass.

[2] The angel here symbolizes heaven because the Lord spoke with John through heaven, and He spoke with the prophets also through heaven. He speaks through heaven with everyone with whom He speaks. That is because the angelic heaven in general is like a single individual, whose soul and life is the Lord. Consequently everything the Lord says is uttered by Him through heaven, as everything a person's soul and mind say is uttered through the body.

That the whole angelic heaven in its entirety resembles a single individual, and that this is owing to the Lord, may be seen in nos. 5 above, and in the book Heaven and Hell (London, 1758), nos. 59 - 86. See also Angelic Wisdom Regarding Divine Providence, nos. 64-69 , 162-164, 201-204, and Angelic Wisdom Regarding Divine Love and Wisdom, nos. 11 , 19, 133, 288.

[3] But I will explain this mystery. The Lord speaks through heaven, yet it is not the angels there who speak, who do not even know what the Lord is saying. Only some of them know - those who are with the person with whom the Lord is noticeably speaking from heaven, as He did with John and some of the prophets. For the influx of the Lord through heaven is like the influx of the soul through the body. It is the body, indeed, that speaks and acts, and that also senses something of the influx, yet the body does nothing of itself as though on its own, but is impelled to act. Such is the case with the Lord's speaking with a person, indeed with all of the Lord's influx through heaven. This I have been given to know from much empirical observation.

Angels in heaven, as well as spirits beneath the heavens, know nothing of a person, just as a person knows nothing of them, because the state of spirits and angels is a spiritual one, while that of people is a natural one. These two states are affiliated only through correspondences, and affiliation through correspondences causes them to be present together in affections, but not as regards thoughts. Consequently one knows nothing of the other. That is to say, a person knows nothing of the spirits with whom he is affiliated as to his affections, and the spirits know nothing of the person. For what is not present in a person's thought, but only in his affection, is unknown, because it is not apparent and not seen.

The Lord alone knows people's thoughts.