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.

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

640. Verses 5, 6. "And if any one shall desire to hurt them, fire shall go forth out of their mouth, and shall devour their enemies; and if any one shall desire to hurt them, he must thus be killed. These have power to shut heaven, that the rain rain not in the days of their prophecy; and they have power over the waters to turn them into blood, and to smite the earth with every plague as often as they shall desire."

"And if any one shall desire to hurt them," signifies the protection of them by the Lord, lest they should be in any way injured; "fire shall go forth out of their mouth, and shall devour their enemies," signifies that those who should inflict injury upon them should fall into evils and falsities which are from hell, and which destroy them; "and if any one shall desire to hurt them, he must thus be killed," signifies that according to their attempt to inflict evil they perish. "These have power to shut heaven, that the rain rain not in the days of their prophecy," signifies that those who reject the goods and truths of heaven and the church, which proceed from the Lord, receive no influx from heaven; "and they have power over the waters to turn them into blood," signifies that truths with them are turned into falsities of evil; "and to smite the earth with every plague," signifies that the church with them perishes through the lusts (concupiscentiae) of evil; "as often as they shall desire," signifies to inflict evil upon them as often as man assaults the goods of love and the truths of doctrine, which bear witness of the Lord and from which he acknowledges and confesses the Lord.