“After describing the works of the Church and its future condition, he recapitulates from the birth of Christ, with an intention to repeat the same things in a different manner, for in this book he repeats under various figures the whole period of the Church’s history.” (St. Bede)
In
a second vision, the seer’s spiritual eye is turned from earth to heaven, from
the Church Militant to the Church Triumphant:-
4.1. After
this I looked, and behold, a door was opened in heaven: and the first voice
which I heard was as it were of a trumpet talking with me; which said: Come up
hither, and I will show thee things which must be hereafter.
“The
fourth chapter contains the beginning of a new, a second vision. The depiction
of a new and magnificent spectacle which opens before the gaze of St. John
begins with a commandment to him to ascend through an open door in heaven so as
to see things which must be hereafter.
The opening of the door signifies the revelation of the hidden mysteries of the
Spirit. By the words Come hither,
the hearer is commanded to put off entirely earthly thinking and be converted
to heavenly thinking.” (Archbishop Averky)
4.2-3. And
immediately I was in the Spirit: and behold, a throne was set in heaven, and
One sat on the throne. And He that sat was to look upon like a jaspar and a
sardine stone; and there was a rainbow about the throne, in sight like unto an
emerald.
“The
throne is the rest of God in the
saints.” (Patriarch Anthimus)
“And immediately I was in the Spirit:
that is, again in a state of ecstasy. This time St. John saw God the Father
Himself sitting upon a throne. His appearance was like the precious stone
jaspar (a stone of the colour green like emerald) and a sardine stone (sard, of
a fiery colour). The first of these colours, green, according to the commentary
of St. Andrew of Caesarea, signifies that the Divine nature is ever
flourishing, life-bearing, and nourishing. The second, the fiery yellow red,
indicates purity and sanctity, which ever remain in God, and His threatening
anger towards those who transgress His will. The union of these two colours
indicates that God chastises sinners, but at the same time is always ready to
forgive one who sincerely repents. The apparition of the One sitting on the
throne was surrounded by a rainbow like an emerald, a stone of green colour
which signifies, as does also the rainbow which appeared after the flood, the
eternal mercy of God towards mankind.
“The
sitting on the throne itself signifies the opening of the judgement of God
which is to be revealed in the last times. This is not yet the terrible Last
Judgement, but a preparatory judgement like those judgements of God which have
occurred many times in the history of mankind to people who have sinned. (For
example, the universal flood, the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrha, the
destruction of Jerusalem, and many others.)
“The
precious stones jaspar and sardine, and likewise the rainbow around the throne,
being a symbol of the ceasing of the wrath of God and the renewal of the world,
signify that the judgement of god upon the world, that is, its fiery
destruction, is to end with its renewal. This is especially indicated also by
the quality of jaspar to heal wounds received by the sword.” (Archbishop
Averky)
“That
sea was an image of the mystery of Holy Baptism. Because between the Throne of
God and the man who desires to approach God’s Throne, there interposes the
water of Baptism, and no one can in any way approach God seated on His Throne
in the highest unless he first traverse the sea of Baptism, as say the
Scriptures: Except a man be born of
water and the Spirit, he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God (John 3.5).
For what reason is it that the sea, which images forth the mystery of Baptism,
is of glass and crystal? We should know that the commentators on the Divine
Scriptures say that it is like glass in a purity that cleanses the souls of
those being baptized, and like crystal on account of its strength which makes
steadfast the heart; furthermore it is for this reason that it is of glass and
crystal because just as the sun’s rays pass through glass and crystal, the
Grace of God, as it were, penetrates the mystery of Baptism, and thereby comes
to the person and illumines the temple of his soul. We can also say, that it is
not in vain that the sea before the Throne of God, which represents the mystery
of Baptism, is of glass and crystal, for the Most Holy Trinity seated upon His
Throne, as it were upon a mirror of glass and crystal, will be revealed and
seen therein, for in Holy Baptism the image of the Trinity is revealed… Let us
say, that the sea before the Throne of God is an image of the mystery of Holy
Baptism, wherein our nature is baptized, and like glass our soul is cleansed from all filthiness of flesh and spirit
(II Corinthians 7.1) and like crystal it is strengthened and illumined.
And it is when God in Trinity looks upon this mystical glass and crystal during
our Baptism, then in truth the trinitarian image is reflected therein.”[1]
“The
opening of a door in heaven and the appearance of the throne signify the
beginning of God’s judgement, which must take place in the last ages in successive
periods, some long, some short, in accordance with their proximity to the
limit, beyond which there are no more limits, no more ages, but one
uninterrupted, endless present. The end of that which is temporal and the
transfer to that which is eternal will take place on earth during the
exceptional circumstances of a rebellion of the earthborn against their
Creator. Such a rebellion, led and inspired by Satan, has been prepared by him
from long ago. The mystery of the planned iniquity is always ready to be
accomplished, but it has been held back, and up to now continues to be held
back, by the piety of the zealots of the glory of God. Such in antiquity were
the holy prophets and apostles of the Lamb of God, slain from the foundation of
the world for the salvation of many. These pious zealots for the glory of God
have struggled to arouse, through fear of God’s judgement, the people who have
been enticed by Satan into starting a rebellion against the great God and our
Saviour Jesus Christ. They were and are successful, with the help of the grace
of the Holy Spirit, in putting off the explosion of the rebellion for whole
centuries, until the preordained number of those saved from the foundation of
the world have entered the Kingdom of God. The end can only come when
everything that could have been drawn out for the heavenly granary will have
been drawn out. When only chaff remain, then will the time of recompense come
near. Long before that the judgement will begin in heaven - but not that final
judgement which will be revealed on earth at the resurrection from the dead.
That last judgement will be the end or conclusion of the present judgement,
that is, it will be the declaration of the final and irrevocable lot of all
those under judgement. And those under judgement will not be only the evil, but
also the good, for all have sinned. And the righteous, for their striving to
follow the path of the Gospel, will be justified, while the evil, who did not
follow the instructions of Gospel charity, will be condemned to eternal
deprivation of light and blessedness, which will be the fiery torment that has
no end. But here, in Revelation, reference is made to the preliminary
judgement of God on the world which began long before the last day; for the
rebellion has been prepared from long ago by various satanic intrigues aimed at
the destruction of the saving ark of the Holy Church, in which all those
seeking deliverance from the flood of sin find reliable salvation…
“There
are innumerable revelations of the judgement of God both in the public and in
the private spheres, only we do not always - or rather, we almost never -
understand these judgements of God; or we understand so later that it remains
only to be eternally sorry for one’s own and people’s ignorance of how one
should act so as not to be subjected to the righteous judgement of God.
“As
regards the preliminary judgement of the world, that is revealed at the end of
time, and lo!, the seer is counted worthy of a revelations concerning this and
announces: a throne was set in heaven,
and One sat on the throne. Who is this? Since here, in contrast to the
previous vision of the Son of God, there is no indication of any human sign, it
is undoubtedly the Father, from Whom is everything.” (St. John of Kronstadt)
4.4. And round
about the throne were four and twenty seats: and upon the seats I saw four and
twenty elders sitting, clothed in white raiment; and they had on their heads
crowns of gold.
The
twenty-four elders are reminiscent of the twenty-four divisions of the sons of
Aaron for the priestly services in the Temple (I Chronicles 24.1-18).
Archbishop
Averky writes: “There are the most varied opinions and suppositions as to whom
one must understand by these elders. One thing is certain: that these are representatives
of humanity who have pleased the Lord. Many suppose, basing themselves on the
promise given to the holy apostles: Ye
also shall sit upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel (Matthew
19.28), that by these twenty-four elders one must understand twelve
representatives of Old Testament humanity - the holy patriarchs and prophets -
and twelve representatives of New Testament humanity - namely, the twelve
apostles of Christ. The white garments are a symbol of purity and eternal
feasting, and the golden crowns are a sign of victory over demons.”
4.5. And out
of the throne proceeded lightnings and thunderings and voices.
“This
indicates how frightful and terrible God is for impenitent sinners who are
unworthy of His mercy and forgiveness. (Compare the manifestation of God on
Mount Sinai (Exodus 9.16).)” (Archbishop Averky)
“But
for those worthy of salvation, the lightnings and thunderings do not cause
fear, but sweetness and enlightenment: the one enlightens their spiritual eyes,
while the other gives pleasure to the hearing.” (St. Andrew of Caesarea)
4.5. And there
were seven lamps of fire burning before the throne, which are the seven spirits
of God.
“By
these seven spirits one must understand either the seven chief angels, as St. Irenaeus
interprets it, or the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit which are enumerated by
the holy Prophet Isaiah (Isaiah 11.2).” (Archbishop Averky)
“Just
as earlier, in 1.4, John gave a blessing to the Churches from the Holy Spirit
under the name of seven spirits under the altar of the Father, so it is evident
that the reference here is to the Person of the Holy Spirit under the form of
seven lamps of fire.” (St. John of Kronstadt)
4.6. And
before the throne there was a sea of glass like unto crystal.
“The
crystal sea, being immobile and still, as opposed to the stormy sea seen later
by St. John (13.1), must signify, in the opinion of many interpreters, ‘the
multitude of the holy heavenly powers’, pure and immortal as they are (St.
Andrew of Caesarea). These are the souls of men who have not been disturbed by
the storms of the sea of life, but like crystal reflect the seven colours of
the rainbow, being penetrated by the seven gifts of the Grace of the Holy
Spirit.” (Archbishop Averky)
“We
may suppose that these are the souls of human beings from the other world. They
are not disturbed by worldly storms, but like crystal, which reflects the seven
colours of the rainbow, they are penetrated by the seven gifts of the grace of
the Holy Spirit. Thus the assembly of these blessed spirits could be
represented by a glass sea, like crystal, before the throne of the Judge, Whom
they are called to attend.” (St. John of Kronstadt)
4.6-8. And in
the midst of the throne, and round about the throne, were four living creatures
full of eyes before and behind. And the first living creature was like a lion,
and the second living creature like a calf, and the third living creature had a
face as a man, and the fourth living creature was like a flying eagle. And the
four living creatures each had six wings about him; and these were full of eyes
within: and they rest neither day nor night, saying: Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God
Almighty, Who was, and is, and is to come.
“These are the powers by which the world is
sustained and whom Isaiah also saw around the throne. Their being full of eyes before and behind
signifies their cherubic knowledge of the past and future, and their six wings - their seraphic readiness to
carry out the Divine commands of the Holy Trinity. These are the angelic beings
that are the highest and closest to the throne of God.
“But
these powers serve as a footstool for the throne of God, and for that reason it
is said: in the midst of the throne, and
round about the throne, were four living creatures. This means that their
faces are turned towards the four corners of the world: the north, the south,
the east and the west, while their backs as it were support the throne of the
Almighty, Who contains everything and everyone.
“As
regards the difference in the external appearance of the four living creatures,
this corresponds to the service of Christ God Himself in the economy of our
salvation: His royal service - as commander of the forces of nature and the
demons; His high-priestly service - as offering a sacrifice for the whole world
and being Himself offered in sacrifice; His prophetic service - as God’s
teacher and evangelist; and human service - as assuming the nature of our race,
for our salvation. To the first corresponds the emblematic representation of a
lion; to the second - of a calf; to the third - of an eagle; and to the fourth
- of a man.” (St. John of Kronstadt)
“Some
think that these living creatures should be understood to be the four elements
and God’s governance and preservation of them, or God’s dominion over the
regions of heaven, earth, sea and the underworld. However, as is clear from the
further description of the appearance of these living creatures, without doubt
they are the very angelic powers who in the mystical vision of the holy Prophet
Ezekiel on the river Chobar (1.5-25) supported the mystical chariot on which
the Lord God sits as King.
“These
four living creatures are as it were emblems of the four evangelists. The
multitude of their eyes indicates the Divine omniscience, the knowledge of
everything past, present and future. These are the highest angelic beings, the
closest to God, who ceaselessly glorify Him (cf. Isaiah 6.2-3).”
(Archbishop Averky)
According
to St. Andrew of Caesarea, the four living creatures signify “the four chief
virtues and the four Gospels. The lion,
as the symbol of courage, signifies the Gospel of John, for he, says Irenaeus,
in describing His pre-eternal Kingdom, announced that in the beginning was the Word (John 1.1); the calf, as the symbol of righteousness,
signifies the Gospel of Luke, who announced the lawful and priestly genealogy
of Christ; the eagle, as the symbol
of moderation, signifies the Gospel of Mark, as being the shortest and
beginning in a prophetic spirit; the man,
as the symbol of wisdom, signifies the Gospel of Matthew, which began its
account of the birth of Christ according to nature, but not according to the
law. These symbols probably also signify the economy of Christ: the lion as King, the calf as Chief Priest - or rather, Sacrifice, the man as incarnate for our sake, and the eagle as giver of the Life-giving
Spirit Who descends on us from above.”
“St.
Irenaeus of Lyons (2nd century) was the first to identify the four living
creatures with the four Evangelists. According to early Orthodox icons (for
example, the mosaics in the basilica of San Vitale in Ravenna) the lion is
identified with St. Mark, the calf with St. Luke, the man with St. Matthew, and
the eagle with St. John.”[2]
St.
Athanasius the Great writes: “The Triad, praised, reverenced and adored, is one
and indivisible and without degrees. It is united without confusion, just as
the Monad also is distinguished without separation. For the fact of these
venerable living creatures offering their praises three times, saying Holy, Holy, Holy, proves that the Three
Persons are perfect; just as by saying Lord
they declare the One Essence.”[3]
St.
Gregory of Nyssa writes: “The mystery of the Trinity was luminously proclaimed
when they uttered that marvellous cry, Holy,
being awestruck with the beauty in each Hypostasis of the Trinity.”[4]
St.
Ambrose writes: “They repeat thrice and say the same word, that even in a hymn
you may understand the distinction of Persons in the Trinity, and the oneness
of the Godhead, and while they say this they proclaim God.”[5]
“They rest neither day nor night, saying:
Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God Almighty, as if to say: they ceased not from
singing all the time. For the greatest and only rest of the saints is with
unwearied voice to sing in heaven the praises of the Most High Trinity, which
is God. But in a deeper sense God can be understood to have rested from His
works.. in that for the sake of His goodness alone He made works capable of
resting in Himself. This can be more clearly understood when we remember that
human weakness embarks upon everyday labours especially so that it should be
able to perceive rest in its works; for the Lord says to it: In the sweat of your face you shall eat
bread (3.19). But God, Who before the creation had perfect rest in Himself
eternally, Himself also rested after the creation of the world.. inasmuch as He
supplies rest for the rational creatures.” (The Venerable Bede).[6]
4.9-11. And
when these living creatures give glory and honour and thanks to Him that sits
on the throne, Who liveth unto the ages of ages, the four and twenty elders
fall down before Him that sits on the throne, and worship Him that lives unto
the ages of ages, and cast their crowns before the throne, saying: Thou art
worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honour and power; for Thou hast created
all things, and for Thy pleasure they exist and were created.
“The four and twenty elders: These words
signify that the elders are participants in the hymns of the heavenly powers
and confess that they received from God the power to win the victory over
spiritual enemies.” (Archbishop Averky)
This
chapter places the emphasis on God as Creator and Preserver of the whole of creation:
the next chapter places the emphasis on Him as Redeemer and Saviour of the
world.
5.1-4. And I
saw in the right hand of Him that sat on the throne a book written within and
on the back side, sealed with seven seals. And I saw a strong angel proclaiming
with a loud voice: who is worthy to open the book, and to loose the seals
thereof? And no one in heaven, nor in earth, nor under the earth was able to
open the book, nor to look thereon. And I wept much, because no one was found
worthy to open and read the book, nor to look thereon.
“Here the
right hand signifies Him Who sits at the right hand of the Father and Who
will come again with glory to judge the living and the dead. This book is Wisdom incarnate. The seven seals are the same as the seven lamps of fire. They signify the
Divine memory, the source of wisdom, sealed with the seven gifts of the Holy
Spirit. In accordance with this book the righteous judgement of God must be
accomplished in the definite sequence of the seven periods of time. But who
understands the mind of God, and to whom is opened that which is sealed in the
memory of the Pre-Eternal One?” (St. John of Kronstadt)
In Thy book shall all men be written (Psalm 138.15).
The Church of the first-born, which
are written in heaven (Hebrews 12.23).
“The
Lord Almighty Whom St. John has seen sitting on the throne holds in His hand a
book written on the outside and inside and sealed with seven seals. Books in
antiquity consisted of pieces of parchment rolled up in a roll or placed on a
round stick, and the whole thing was bound on the outside and sealed by a seal.
Sometimes the book consisted of a piece of parchment which was folded in the
form of a fan and tied from above with a string, being sealed with seals on
each bend or fold of the book. In that case the opening of one seal gave one
the opportunity of opening and reading only one part of the book. The writing
was usually made only on the inner side of the parchment, but in rare cases
both sides were written on. According to the explanation of St. Andrew of
Caesarea and other commentators, by the book which St. John one must understand
‘the most wise memory of God’, in which are registered all things, and likewise
‘the depths of the decrees of God’. In this book, therefore, were registered
all the mystical decrees of the most wise providence of god concerning the
salvation of men.
“The
seven seals signify either the complete confirmation which is known to no one,
or the economy of Him Who searches the depth of the Divine Spirit, something
which can be unsealed by no created being. The book is also to be understood as
the prophecies concerning which Christ Himself said that in part they were
fulfilled in the Gospel (Luke 24.44), but that the others would be fulfilled
in the last days.
“One
of the mighty angels with a loud voice cries out that someone should open this
book, taking off its seven seals. But no one was found worthy, neither in
heaven, nor on earth, nor under the earth, who would dare to do this. This
signifies that the knowledge of the mysteries of God is accessible to no
created being. This inaccessibility is made still greater by the expression nor to look thereon, that is, even to
look at it.” (Archbishop Averky)
And all these things shall be to you as the
words of this sealed book (Isaiah 29.11-12).
St.
Jerome writes: “How many there are today who fancy themselves learned, yet the
Scriptures are a sealed book to them, and one which they cannot open save
through Him Who has the key of David, He
that openeth and no man shutteth; and shutteth, and no man openeth (3.7).”[7]
5.5-6. And one
of the elders saith unto me, Weep not: behold the Lion of the tribe of Judah,
the Root of David, hath prevailed to open the book, and to loose the seven
seals thereof. And I beheld, and lo, in the midst of the throne and of the four
living creatures, and in the midst of the elders, stood a Lamb as if it had
been slain, having seven horns and seven eyes, which are the seven spirits of
God sent forth into all the earth.
St. Hippolytus writes: “Now, as our Lord
Jesus Christ Who is also God was prophesied under the figure of a lion [Genesis
49.9], on account of His royalty and glory, in the same way have the Scriptures
also aforetime spoken of antichrist as a lion, on account of his tyranny and
violence. For the deceiver seeks to liken himself in all things to the Son of
God. Christ is a lion, so antichrist is also a lion; Christ is a king, so
antichrist is also a king. The Saviour was manifested as a lamb, so he too, in
like manner, will appear as a lamb, though within he is a wolf. The Saviour
came into the world in the circumcision, and he will come in the same manner.
The Lord sent apostles among all nations, and he in like manner will send false
apostles. The Saviour gathered together the sheep that were scattered abroad,
and he in like manner will bring together a people that is scattered abroad.
The Lord gave a seal to those who believed on Him, and he will give one in like
manner. The Saviour appeared in the form of man, and he too will come in the
form of a man. The Saviour raised up and showed His holy flesh like a temple,
and he will raise a temple of stone in Jerusalem.”[8]
“The
lion signifies here a powerful being, a hero. It refers to the prophecy of the
Patriarch Jacob concerning the lion of
the tribe of Judah, by which is to be understood the Messiah, Christ (Genesis
49.9-10).
“Having
looked, the seer of mysteries John beheld a
Lamb as if it had been slain, having seven horns and seven eyes. This Lamb,
carrying on Himself traces of the fact that He had been offered in sacrifice
is, of course, the Lamb of God that
taketh away the sin of the world (John 1.29), that is, our Lord
Jesus Christ. He alone is shown to be worthy to open the book of God’s decrees;
for He, having offered Himself as sacrifice for the sins of men, is Himself
revealed as the fulfiller of God’s decrees for the salvation of the human race.
Further, the later opening by Him of the seven seals of the book signifies the
very fulfilment of the Divine decrees by the Only-Begotten Son of God as the
Saviour of mankind. The seven horns are symbols of His power (Psalm
74.11), and the seven eyes signify, as is immediately explained, the seven spirits of God sent forth into
all the earth, that is, the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit which repose in
Christ as the Anointed of God. The Prophet Isaiah already spoke of this (11.2),
as did also the holy Prophet Zechariah (chapter 4). The seven eyes symbolise at
the same time God’s omnipotence. The
Lamb stood in the midst of the throne, that is, there where the Son of God should be, at the right hand of God
the Father.” (Archbishop Averky)
5.7-8. And He
came and took the book out of the right hand of Him that sat upon the throne.
And when He had taken the book, the four living creatures and four and twenty
elders fell down before the Lamb, having every one of them harps, and golden
vials full of odours, which are the prayers of the saints.
“The Lamb… took the book out of the hand of Him that sat on the throne (that
is, He received the power to judge the living and the dead), for the Father
judges no one, but has given all judgement to the Son (John 5.22).” (St.
John of Kronstadt)
“The Lamb took the book out of the hand of Him that sat on the throne and immediately
the four creatures (the seraphim) and the twenty-four elders falling down gave
Him Divine worship. The harps which they had in their hands signify the
harmonious chanting of their souls. The golden cups filled with incense as is
immediately explained, are the prayers
of the saints.” (Archbishop Averky)
For we are unto God a sweet savour of
Christ in those that are saved and in those that perish: to the one we are the
savour of death unto death, and to the other the savour of life unto life (II
Corinthians 2.15-16).
Protopriest
Michael Pomazansky writes: “Life in Christ is a world of prayer. It penetrates
the whole body of the Church, unites every member of the Church with the
Heavenly Father, the members of the earthly Church with themselves, and the
members of the earthly Church with the Heavenly Church. Prayers are the threads
of the living fabric of the Church body, for the prayer of a righteous man availeth much (James 5.16).
The twenty-four elders in heaven at the throne of God fell down before the
Lamb, each having harps and vials filled with incense, which are the prayers of saints (5.8); that is, they offered up
prayer on earth to the heavenly throne.”[9]
5.9-14. And
they chanted a new song, saying: Thou art worthy to take the book and to open
the seals thereof; for Thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God in Thy
blood out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation; and hast made
us unto out God kings and priests; and we shall reign on earth. And I beheld,
and I heard the voice of many angels round about the throne and the living
creatures and the elders; and the number of them was ten thousand times ten
thousand, and thousands of thousands, saying with a loud voice: Worthy is the
Lamb that was slain to receive power, and riches, and wisdom, and strength, and
honour, and glory, and blessing. And every creature which is in heaven, and on
earth, and under the earth, and such as are in the sea, and all that are in
them, heard I saying: Blessing, and honour, and glory, and power, be unto Him
that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb unto the ages of ages. And the
four living creatures said: Amen. And the four and twenty elders fell down and
worshipped Him that liveth unto the ages of ages.
“And
they chanted a hymn to the Son of God, the Redeemer of mankind, an
authentically new song not heard
from the creation of the world, concerning which the Psalmist David already
prophesied (Psalm 97.1). The new
song is that which the Holy Spirit teaches those who have been delivered
from the oldness of the letter and who are enlightened among all tribes and
peoples. Of them he (John) says that they will reign on that earth which the
Lord has promised to the meek (Matthew 5.5). In this song the new
Kingdom of the Son of God is glorified, that Kingdom in which He reigns as the
God-man Who bought it with the high price of His own blood. The redemption of
mankind, although it refers only to man, was nevertheless so astonishing, so
touching and sacred, that it aroused the most lively participation of the whole
choir of heaven, so that all together, angels and men, glorify God for this
work and worshipped Him that liveth unto
the ages of ages.” (Archbishop Averky)
Ye are come unto Mount Sion, and
unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to myriads of
angels, to the general assembly and Church of the first-born, which are written
in the heavens, and to God the Judge of all, and to the spirits of just men
made perfect
(Hebrews 12.22-24).
“And
lo! when in the world above the glorification of the Lamb slain from the
foundation of the world was accomplished, in the world below, on earth, began
His dethronement by the vain wise men of this age, who see supposed faults of
the Divinity in His works, and also faults of righteousness in His most holy
Bride - the holy Church, founded by Him on the tradition of the holy apostles
and prophets for the establishment and confirmation of truth and salvation on
the sinful earth.
“Fear and tremble, O heaven, and be ye shaken,
ye foundations of the earth! Earthly wisdom will shake the pillar and foundation of the truth and will conquer those who
are blind, who until now peacefully entrusted themselves to the leadership of
the most holy Bride of the Lamb.
“The
victory of apostasy hastens the end of the world. Corresponding measures are
undertaken from above, the great judgement is prepared. The Lamb will receive
from the Father the power to judge, and in fulfilment of His promise to the
holy apostles (Mattthew 19.28) makes them and the holy prophets (who
announced His Coming) participants in His judgement on the world.” (St. John of
Kronstadt)
“The
four living creatures and the elders together signify the fact that through
Christ God, Who has joined together that which was separate and destroyed the
middle wall of partition (Ephesians 2.14), a single flesh and a single
Church has been formed from angels and men. And, together with the four living
creatures who surpass the other orders of angels, the elders also, who signify
the fullness of those being saved, are worthy of the song and the worship of
God. May we also be vouchsafed this in Christ Himself, the Giver of peace and
our God, to Whom with the Father and the Holy Spirit may there be glory,
dominion and honour, both now and ever and unto the ages of ages. Amen.” (St.
Andrew of Caesarea)
6.1. And I saw
when the Lamb opened one of the seals, and I heard as it were the noise of
thunder, one of the four living creatures saying, Come and see.
The
noise of thunder signifies judgement; and just as in chapters 4 and 5 we see
God as Creator and Redeemer, so now, from chapters 6 to 11, we see Him as
Judge.
What
judgements do the opening of the seals signify? The answer to this question is
contained, at least in part, in a vision that the Procurator of the Russian
Holy Synod, Count Alexander Petrovich Tolstoy, had in 1871, and in the
interpretation given it by St. Ambrose of Optina. The count wrote to Elder
Ambrose: “It was as if I were in my own house standing in the entrance-hall.
Beyond was a room in which on the ledge between the windows there was a large
icon of the God of Sabaoth that gave out such blinding light that from the
other room (the entrance-hall) it was impossible to look at it. Still further
in was a room in which there were Protopriest Matthew Alexandrovich
Konstantinovsky and the reposed Metropolitan Philaret. And this room was full
of books; along the walls from ceiling to floor there were books; on the long
tables there were piles of books; and while I certainly had to go into this
room, I was held back by fear, and in terror, covering my face with my hand, I
passed through the first room and, on entering the next room, I saw Protopriest
Matthew Alexandrovich dressed in a simple black cassock; on his head was a
skull-cap; in his hands was an unbent book, and he motioned me with his head to
find a similar book and open it. At the same time the metropolitan, turning the
pages of this books said: ‘Rome, Troy, Egypt, Russia, the Bible.’ I saw that in
my book ‘Bible’ was written in very heavy lettering. Suddenly there was a noise
and I woke up in great fear. I thought a lot about what it could all mean. My
dream seemed terrible to me - it would have been better to have seen nothing.
Could I not ask those experienced in the spiritual life concerning the meaning
of this vision in sleep? But an inner voice explained the dream even to me
myself. However, the explanation was so terrible that I did not want to agree
with it.”
St.
Ambrose gave the following interpretation of this vision: “He who was shown
this remarkable vision in sleep, and who then heard the very significant words,
very probably received the explanation of what he had seen and heard through
his guardian angel, since he himself recognized that an inner voice explained
the meaning of the dream to him. However, since we have been asked, we also
shall give our opinion…
“…The
words ‘Rome, Troy, Egypt’ may have the following signification. Rome at the
time of the Nativity of Christ was the capital of the world, and, from the
beginning of the patriarchate, had the primacy of honour; but because of love
of power and deviation from the truth she was later rejected and humiliated.
Ancient Troy and Egypt were notable for the fact that they were punished for
their pride and impiety - the first by destruction, and the second by various
punishments and the drowning of Pharaoh with his army in the Red Sea. But in
Christian times, in the countries where Troy was located there were founded the
Christian patriarchates of Antioch and Constantinople, which flourished for a
long time, embellishing the Orthodox Church with their piety and right dogmas;
but later, according to the inscrutable destinies of God, they were conquered
by barbarians - the Muslims, and up to now have borne this heavy slavery, which
restricts the freedom of Christian piety and right belief. And in Egypt,
together with the ancient impiety, there was from the first times of
Christianity such a flowering of piety that the deserts were populated by tens
of thousands of monastics, not to speak of the great numbers of pious laity
from whom they came. But then, by reason of moral licentiousness, there
followed such an impoverishment of Christian piety in that country that at a
certain time in Alexandria the patriarch remained with only one priest.
“…
After the three portentous names ‘Rome, Troy, Egypt’, the name of ‘Russia’ was
also mentioned - Russia, which at the present time is counted as an independent
Orthodox state, but where the elements of foreign heterodoxy and impiety have
already penetrated and taken root among us and threaten us with the same
sufferings as the above-mentioned countries have undergone.
“Then
there comes the word ‘Bible’. No other state is mentioned. This may signify
that if in Russia, too, because of the
disdain of God’s commandments and the weakening of the canons and decrees of
the Orthodox Church and for other reasons, piety is impoverished, then there
must immediately follow the final fulfilment of that which is written at the
end of the Bible, in the Apocalypse of St. John the Theologian.
“He who saw this vision correctly observed
that the explanation which was given him by an inner voice was terrible.
Terrible will be the Second Coming of Christ and terrible the last judgement of
the world. But not without terrors will also be the period before that when the
Antichrist will reign, as it is said in the Apocalypse: And in those days shall men seek death, and shall not find it; and
death shall flee from them (9.6). The
Antichrist will come during a period of anarchy, as the apostle says: until he that restraineth be taken away
from the midst (II Thessalonians 2.7), that is, when the powers that be no longer exist.”[10]
St.
Ambrose’s identification of him that
restraineth the coming of the Antichrist with the political authorities has
long roots in the patristic interpretation of this passage. St. John
Chrysostom, Blessed Theophylact and others identified him with the Roman
emperor, whose successor, as being the emperor of “the Third Rome”, Russia, was
the Russian Tsar. Thus Bishop Theophanes the Recluse wrote: “The Tsar’s
authority, having in its hands the means of restraining the movements of the
people and relying on Christian principles itself, does not allow the people to
fall away from them, but will restrain it. And since the main work of the
Antichrist will be to turn everyone away from Christ, he will not appear as
long as the Tsar is in power. The latter’s authority will not let him show
himself, but will prevent him from acting in his own spirit. That is what he that restraineth is. When the Tsar’s
authority falls, and the peoples everywhere acquire self-government (republics,
democracies), then the Antichrist will have room to manoeuvre. It will not be
difficult for Satan to train voices urging apostasy from Christ, as experience
showed in the time of the French revolution. Nobody will give a powerful ‘veto’
to this. A humble declaration of faith will not be tolerated. And so, when
these arrangements have been made everywhere, arrangements which are favourable
to the exposure of antichristian aims, then the Antichrist will also appear.
Until that time he waits, and is restrained.” (Archbishop Averky)
We
may conclude, then, that the period of God’s final judgements on the human
race, as symbolised by the breaking of the seven seals of judgement, began with
the fall of Russia and the removal of him
that restraineth (II Thessalonians 2.7), the Russian Tsar. The
following interpretation, therefore, is based on the tentative hypothesis that
the first six seals refer to God’s judgements on mankind in the period from
1914, when the Russian Empire began to fall, to 1949, when Communism reached
its zenith; while the seventh seal refers to the period of God’s judgement on
mankind during the period up to and including the Third World War and
culminating in the seven-year reign of the Antichrist up to the Second Coming
of Christ Himself.
The
Lord Jesus Christ pointed to three signs as marking the beginning of the
apocalyptic period, the beginning of
sorrows, as He called it (Matthew 24.8):
1. The Appearance of False Christs.
For many will come in My name and will
say: I am Christ, and will deceive many (Matthew 24.5; 23-27).
2. Wars. And ye shall hear of wars and rumours of wars: see that ye be not
troubled: for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. For
nation shall rise up against nation, and kingdom against kingdom (Matthew
24.6-7).
3. Natural Catastrophes. And there shall be famines, and
pestilences, and earthquakes in divers places (Matthew 24.7).
One
contemporary epoch corresponds to these three criteria: the epoch of the First
World War and the decades on either side of it.
The
appearance of false Christs began in 1893 with the arrival in America of Swami
Vivekandra in order to present the religion of Hinduism at the Parliament of
Religions. In Russia, too, this was the period in which eastern religions and
their westernised offspring, such as Madame Blavatsky’s theosophical movement,
made their first appearance in society. It is a characteristic belief of these
religions that every man is by nature God and Christ, or can become so by his
own efforts. Under the influence of this belief almost all forms of
Christianity began to suffer inner disintegration, until, by the end of the
twentieth century, it is common to find “Christians” who believe in
reincarnation and the natural divinity of man. Increasingly common, too, has
been the phenomenon of people claiming in a literal sense to be Christ.
This
period was followed by a period of unprecedentedly bloody wars: the First World
War, the Russian Civil War, the War between Turkey and Greece, the War waged
against the Russian people under Lenin and Stalin.
And
this was followed by a period of equally unprecedented natural disasters and
famines, especially in Russia. Prince Eugene Troubetskoy, writing in 1918 when
the worst of these disasters was yet to come, said: “In mankind inner division
is reflected first of all in wars. But wars are not the end, but the beginning
of general divisiveness, which must penetrate into all social relations. As the
Gospel says: When ye shall hear of wars
and rumours of wars, be ye be not troubled: for such things must needs be, but
the end shall not be yet (Mark 13.7; Matthew 24.6; Luke
21.9). The Gospel points to other signs of the general collapse of humanity - famines and troubles (Mark 13.8), pestilences
(Matthew 24.7). We know that all these phenomena are closely linked with
war and constitute its natural consequence. Troubles are born from war, because war shakes the whole state
mechanism, famine - because war and
troubles harm the whole economy of the people, and, finally, pestilences - because war always serves
as the cause of the fiercest epidemics. In the Gospel mention is made of one
more phenomenon which serves as a herald of the speedy end of the universe - earthquakes in places (Matthew
24.7; Mark 13.8; Luke 21.11). The link between these manifestations
of the volcanic forces and the events in the history of humanity in the given
case are not obvious and cannot be revealed by scientific analysis: but the
mystical link between the phenomena of human collapse and the phenomena of
cosmic devastation is quite comprehensible. Since the meaning of universal
history is at the same time the meaning of the existence of the planet earth,
the end of humanity is at the same time its own end; which is why the
coincidence of the catastrophic events of history with fearful sights (Luke 21.11) is completely natural.”[11]
6.2. And I
saw, and behold a white horse: and he that sat on him had a bow; and a crown
was given unto him; and he went forth conquering, and to conquer.
In Zechariah
we read: And I turned, and lifted up
mine eyes, and looked, and behold, there came four chariots out from between
two mountains; and the mountains were mountains of brass. In the first chariot
were red horses; and in the second chariot black horses; and in the third
chariot white horses; and in the fourth chariot grisled and bay horses. Then I
answered and said unto the angel that talked with me: What are these, my lord?
And the angel answered and said unto me: These are the four spirits of the
heavens, which go forth from standing before the Lord of all the earth
(6.1-5).
From
this it is clear that the riders on the horses are angels sent by God to
deliver His judgements on an apostate world (II Chronicles 6.17). Now
angels on white horses intervened in perhaps the most critical battle in the
First World War, the Battle of Mons, in August, 1914. If the Germans had won
that battle, it is likely that they would have captured Paris, defeated the
British and the French and then been in a position to turn the full strength of
their armies on the ill-equipped Russians. But according to eye-witnesses on
both sides, a heavenly band of warriors on white horses intervened on the side
of the British and routed the Germans, who were terrified by their
invulnerability to bullets. Some said that the leader of this band was the
Archangel Michael, others - St. George.[12]
In any case, the British line held, which indirectly gave the Orthodox Russian
empire another two or three years of life.
6.3-4. And
when He had opened the second seal, I heard the second living creature say:
Come and see. And there went out another horse that was red; and power was
given to him that sat thereon to take peace from the earth, and that they
should kill one another; and there was given unto him a great sword.
“The red
horse is the sign either of the shedding of blood or of the heartfelt zeal
of those who suffer for Christ.” (St. Andrew of Caesarea)
The
victories of the Orthodox leaders, who went
forth conquering, and to conquer, were short-lived and inconclusive. In
1917 came the Bolshevik revolution, symbolized here by the colour red. This was
followed by the Russian Civil War of 1918-20 and the peasant revolts of 1921,
which involved more bloodshed than any previous war in human history.
Then shall they deliver you up to be
afflicted, and shall kill you: and ye shall be hated of all nations for My
name’s sake. And then shall many be offended, and shall betray one another, and
shall hate one another. And many false prophets shall rise, and shall deceive
many. And because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold. But
he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved (Matthew
24.9-13).
All
this took place after the Russian revolution of 1917. Many thousands died for
the Faith of Christ, and first of all Tsar Nicholas II and his family. And many
were offended - that is, fell away
from the Faith of Christ, and betrayed their fellow Christians to tortures and
death.
St.
Seraphim of Sarov prophesied: “More than half a century will pass. Then evildoers
will raise their heads high. This will happen without fail: the Lord, seeing
the impenitent evil of their hearts, will allow their enterprises for a short
time. But their sickness will rebound upon their own heads, and the
unrighteousness of their destructive plots will fall upon them. The Russian
land will become red with rivers of blood… Before the birth of the Antichrist
there will be a great, protracted war and a terrible revolution in Russia
passing all bounds of human imagination, for the bloodletting will be most
terrible: the rebellions of Ryazan, Pugachev and the French revolution will be
nothing in comparison with what will take place in Russia. Many people who are
faithful to the fatherland will perish, church property and the monasteries will
be robbed; the Lord’s churches will be desecrated; good rich people will be
robbed and killed, rivers of Russian blood will flow…”[13]
In
1917 Elder Nectarius of Optina recounted the following vision: “His Majesty the
Tsar is not his own master now, so many humiliations does he suffer for his
mistakes. 1918 will be a still harder year. The Lord Tsar with all his family
will be killed, tortured. A pious girl had a vision. She saw Jesus Christ on a
throne, and the twelve apostles round Him, and the sounds of terrible groans
and torments were audible from the earth. And the Apostle Peter asked Christ:
‘When, O Lord, will these torments cease?’ And Jesus Christ answered him: ‘I am
placing a limit to it in 1922, but if people do not repent and come to their
senses, then they will all perish in this way.’ In front of the throne of the
Lord stood his Majesty the Tsar with a great-martyr’s crown on his head. Yes,
this Lord Tsar will be a great-martyr. In his last days he has redeemed his
life. And if the people do not return to the Lord, not only Russia, but the
whole of Europe will be swallowed up…”[14]
The
people did not repent, so the opening of the seals continued:-
6.5-6. And
when He had opened the third seal, I heard the third living creature say: Come
up and see. And I beheld, and lo! a black horse. And he that sat on him had a
pair of balances in his hand. And I heard a voice in the midst of the four
living creatures say: A measure of wheat for a denarius, and three measures of
barley for a denarius; and see thou hurt not the oil and the wine.
The black colour of the horse symbolises
“lamentation over those who have fallen away from the faith in Christ by reason
of the difficulty of the torments” (St. Andrew of Caesarea).
According
to St. Victorinus of Petau, however, the black horse signifies famine[15];
for the weighing out of foodstuffs indicates their scarcity, as it is written: When I afflict you with famine of bread,
then ten women shall bake your loaves in one oven, and they shall render your
loaves by weight; and ye shall eat, and not be satisfied (Leviticus
26.26).
The
Russian Civil War was followed by a terrible famine in the Volga region and, a
few years later, in the Ukraine. The dates of these famines, 1922 and 1933,
figure in St. John of Kronstadt’s vision of 1908, in which he saw “a mass of
people scattered and dying of hunger. They were eating the grass, the earth,
each other. Birds picked at their corpses.”[16]
“The
small measure which John called the Greek word koiniV, which contained only enough wheat to feed
one man for one day, was worth a denarius.”[17]
The
words See thou hurt not the oil and the
wine may indicate that the ministrations of the Church (the oil of
consolation and the vinegar of reproof, or the oil of compassion and the wine
of compunction[18], or the oil
of Holy Chrismation and the wine of Divine Communion) were not to cease during
this period. And indeed they did not. However, in the early 1920s there was a
serious shortage of pure wheat bread and wine in Russia, which led to certain
uncanonical innovations in the materials used in the Eucharist.[19]
Moreover, from 1922 a series of schisms rocked the Russian Church; and these,
combined with the exile and execution of thousands of clergy meant that for
large parts of the country the word of the prophet was fulfilled: Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that
I will send forth a famine on the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for
water, but a famine of hearing the word of God (Amos 8.11).
6.7-8. And
when He had opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth living
creature say: Come and see. And I looked, and behold a pale horse; and the name
of his rider was death, and hades followed after him. And power was given unto
them over the fourth part of the earth, to kill with the sword, and with
hunger, and with death, and with the beasts of the earth.
Schema-Monk
Epiphanius (Chernov) writes: “All believing Russia at the time of the 1917
revolution and up to the 1940s shuddered from the feeling that the event of
which we have just spoken in the words of Revelation had undoubtedly and
with great clarity been fulfilled now before the eyes of the whole of Russia -
the even foreseen in eternity and written down about two thousand years ago…
“Yes,
this pale horse has truly entered
our land - the original Greek text indicates that the horse and his rider have
the name death! For he bears in
himself the fullness of death - not only physical death, but also spiritual [hades]… In may large towns there were
so many deaths that the air itself was suffused with the stench of corpses!”[20]
By
October, 1949, Communism had conquered China and established itself over
approximately a quarter of the earth’s surface. And over the whole of this area
a fitting epitaph would be: We have made
a covenant with hades, and agreements with death (Isaiah 28.15).
For, as Elder Aristocles of Moscow prophesied: “Wherever this evil goes, rivers
of blood will flow.”[21]
The
greatest sufferers were the Russian people. A Soviet demographer calculated
that between 43 and 52 million people died of unnatural deaths in the Soviet
Union in the Stalinist period. Fittingly is the rider said to be pale in colour - clvroV in Greek, the colour of
human flesh…
But
the greatest evil of the time was not the physical death and suffering, but the destruction of faith, the despair, the
spiritual death - the hell of it.
Later, in the decades after Stalin’s death, the persecution became less overt
and the numbers of those killed became smaller. But the spiritual devastation,
if it were possible, increased.
As
a member of the Catacomb Church writes: “We are all living through a terrible
time, the time of the life of man without God, when people… have fallen under
the power of Satan. The atheist and fallen Christian world, blinded by the
diabolical glitter of ‘modernity’ - the spirit of this age - and by the demonic
deception of science, progress, culture and freedom (from each person’s bearing
of his personal saving cross), has quickly become disillusioned in everything,
seeing that ‘indescribable sorrow haunts them day and night’ (‘Word on the
Coming of the Lord’, The Works of St. Ephraim the Syrian); that is,
having been deprived of the grace of the Holy Spirit, people have lost joy in
life. Besides, Satan has increased their despair by the consciousness that they
will die - and that’s it, while others are enjoying life; they dream of
acquiring something unusually happy, but have actually received so little. For
that reason everyone has passionately hurled themselves at pleasures, as if to
get as much as possible. From this iniquity has multiplied (drunkenness,
debauchery, violence) and love has completely cooled off in people. Moreover,
people who would seem to be spiritual and believing, who bear the lofty calling
of Christians.. not only cannot explain what is going on or console others with
the hope of eternal salvation, but themselves go they know not whither. Why is
this? Because the grace of the Holy Spirit has fled. And that is because they
have renounced living faith, because (and this is the main thing) they have
bound themselves with unbreakable bonds, satanic powers, in the person of the
God-fighting Soviet power: they have bound themselves before them in word and
in deed, they have also bound the Church of God, having forgotten the word of
the Apostle Paul that for the Word of
God there is no bond (II Timothy 2.9). They have bound themselves in
that, while preaching about God with the voice of the Church, they have not
truly and fully preached His Holy Will, they have not preached about the
contemporary enemies of the Church of Christ. They have bound themselves before
the atheist authorities so as not to preach about such terrible things as the
coming into the world of the Antichrist, the persecution of the true Church of
Christ; they have bound themselves not to preach about such numbers of victims
of persecution as have not existed in the history of the Church (60 million
believers killed, 1200 bishops, tens of thousands of priests, the destruction
of 50,000 churches and about 800 monasteries). These new servants of the Church
do not mention that faith has been quite quenched by the all-destructive
atheist propaganda. Serving God with their lips, in their works they serve, and
bless others to serve, the beast, the God-fighting society, whose main aim and
final end is the complete extirpation of the faith. And they bless the service
of this society not through bringing the perishing the Light of Christ and the
Word of God, but by strengthening it materially. Besides, they do not present
it as against God, but.. as something the like of which there has not been in
history… But to have faith and do the works of the devil means, according to the
Apostle James (2.19) to be like the demons. Very true was the supposition of
the Holy Fathers that the son of perdition, the Antichrist will sit in the
church of God.. And so, all around there is an absence of living faith, nobody
wants to understand that we are living through an apocalyptic time, that the
Second Coming of Christ and His terrible judgement are near…”[22]
6.9-11. And
when He had opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who
were slain for the word of God, and for the testimony which they held. And they
cried with a loud voice, saying: How long, O Lord, holy and true, does Thou not
judge and avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth? And white robes
were given unto them, that they should rest for a little season, until their
numbers should be completed and their fellow-servants also and their brethren
should be killed as they were.
Not
all those who suffered under the Soviet yoke suffered for Christ’s sake. But
there were enough of them - millions, probably - to call for a special
judgement of God. For just as on the apostate Jews of the first century came all the righteous blood shed upon the
earth, from the blood of righteous Abel unto the blood of Zechariah son of Baruch
(Matthew 23.35), so on apostate mankind of the twentieth century will
come all the blood of the holy new martyrs of Russia.
“The
souls of the righteous who have suffered for Christ, as is clear from this, are
under the altar of the heavenly Church, in the same way that on earth since the
times of the martyrs the custom has been to lay the relics of the holy martyrs
in the foundation of Christian churches and altars. The prayer of the righteous
is explained, of course, not by their desire for personal revenge, but by the
speeding up of the triumph of God’s justice on earth and of that rewarding of
each according to his works which must be accomplished by the Terrible
Judgement, making them partakers of eternal blessedness as having given their
lives for Christ and His Divine teaching. They were given white robes - a
symbol of their virtues - and were told to be patient yet for a little season, until their co-workers and brothers, who
would be killed like them, would fill up their number, so that all together
they might receive their worthy recompense from God.” (Archbishop Averky)
Who
are these other martyrs who are to be killed later? The answer is given in St.
John of Kronstadt’s vision, which closely follows the sequence of the seven
seals: “I hurried and could scarcely keep up with the elder. Then he stopped,
pointed to the east and said: ‘Look!’ I saw a multitude of people with joyful
faces, and in their hands were crosses, gonfalons and candles, and in the
middle of the crowd stood a great altar in the open air, with a golden crown on
it, on which was written in golden letters: for a little season. Around the altar stood patriarchs,
metropolitans, bishops, priests, monks, nuns, desert-dwellers and laypeople.
All were chanting: ‘Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace!’ I crossed
myself, and gave thanks to God. Suddenly the elder made the sign of the Cross
in the air three times. And I saw a mass of bodies and rivers of blood. Angels
flew over the slain and scarcely succeeded in bearing up the Christian souls to
the throne of God. They were chanting: ‘Alleluia’. It was terrible to look on
all this. I wept bitterly and prayed. The elder took me by the hand and said:
‘Don’t weep. The Lord God has deemed this necessary for our weak faith and accursedness,
it must be so. Our Saviour Jesus Christ also suffered and shed His Most Pure
Blood on the Cross. And so there will be
yet many martyrs for Christ, and they will be those who refuse to receive the
seal of the Antichrist, who shed their blood and receive a martyr’s crown.’”[23]
Archbishop
Theophanes of Poltava wrote in 1929: “The comparison of past and present woes
with the corresponding utterances in the Gospels and the Apocalypse gives us
reason to think that now four seals have already been removed by the Lamb from
the book which He Who sits on the Throne and Who was seen by the seer of
mysteries holds in His right hand. Not hundreds, not tens of thousands, but
myriads of thousands of our brothers have laid down their lives for the Word of
God and the testimony concerning the Lamb in the Great War and the horrors of
civil war and anarchy that followed it. These innumerable numbers of those
killed for the Word of God and the testimony concerning the Lamb now cry out to
the Throne of God and call on the righteousness of God to take revenge for the
crimes committed by the sons of this age. And look what reply the Wisdom of God
gives to their fervent petition. He asks them to be calm for a short time until
their co-workers and brothers who will be killed, as they have been, fill up
the number of those crowned with a martyr’s crown (Revelation 6.9-11).
It follows from this that after all the horrors of war and anarchy in the world
calm will nevertheless be given to the world, albeit for a short time. But the
world cannot be calmed without a calmed and restored Russia. But Russia cannot
be restored until the power of darkness in her is cast down and a lawful power,
both according to human law and according to the law of Divine anointing, is
confirmed in her. Consequently, Russia will undoubtedly be restored, and a
lawful power will also be restored in her. But this calm will be given both to
the Russian people and to the other sons of this age in order that they should
prepare themselves for the great struggle with antichristianity, during which
the number of martyrs predetermined from eternity, who must suffer for the Word
of God and for the testimony concerning the Lamb, will be filled up.”[24]
“Many now ask” wrote Metropolitan Anastasius
of New York, “why the Russian people and the Church of Russia are suffering,
and why God does not cut short the evil which nearly everywhere is so visibly
triumphing over good. This last question, taken on a universal scale, has been
vexing mankind from time immemorial.
“‘They
relate,’ we read in the Apophthegmata Patrum, ‘that one day, when
Anthony the Great wondered at the profundity of the dispensation and judgements
of God, he prayed and said: “O Lord, why are there some men who attain a ripe
old age and a feeble physical condition, while others die in childhood? Why are
some poor and others rich? Why do tyrants and malefactors prosper and gain
earthly blessings, while the righteous are oppressed by poverty?” He had long
pondered these questions when he heard a voice say: “O Anthony, look to thyself
and do not subject the judgements of God to thine analysis, for such is harmful
to the soul.”‘
“When
the innocent sufferer Job wished to defend his case before God, he received a
similar answer amid the thunderstorm and tempest: Who is this that hideth counsel from Me, and confineth words in his
heart, and thinketh to conceal them from Me? Gird thy loins like a man; and I
will ask thee, and do thou answer Me… Do not set aside My judgement. Dost thou
think that I have dealt with thee in any other way than that thou mightest
appear to be righteous? Hast thou an arm like the Lord’s, or dost thou thunder
with a voice like His? (Job 38.1-3; 40.3-4).
“The
very friends of God are unable to attain unto the judgements of providence in
the course of world history. King David the prophet said, But as for me, my feet were all but shaken; my steps well nigh had
slipped (Psalm 72.2), when he pondered this mystery. It likewise
troubled the Patriarch Abraham as he called for the loving-kindness of God when
he beheld the condemned cities of Sodom and Gomorrah, and the Prophets Jonah
and Elijah, who demanded that God punish the ungodly; and the writer of Ecclesiastes,
who saw that the race is not to the
swift, nor the battle to the strong, nor yet bread to the wise, nor yet wealth
to men of understanding (Ecclesiastes 9.11). Righteous men knew that
[God’s] eye is too pure to behold evil
doings (Habbakuk 1.13). The Prophet Jeremiah even made so bold as to
try to contend with the Master of all creation Himself, lodging a complaint
against His personal judgements upon the earth: Righteous art Thou, O Lord, that I may make my defence to Thee. Yea, I
will speak to Thee of judgements. Why is it that the way of the ungodly men
doth prosper, that all that deal very treacherously are flourishing? Thou has
planted them, and they have taken root; they have begotten children, and become
fruitful (Jeremiah 12.1-2).
“The
Lord never revealed to any man the plans of His dispensation in their entirety,
not because He did not wish to, but because men are unable to comprehend them
due to the very limited nature of their horizons, which cannot fathom the full
depth of the richness of the wisdom and understanding of God which are revealed
in His divine rule over the world. To understand the ways of the providence of
God in history one must know both the present condition of the world in all its
fullness and the past and future judgements of the universe, for all of this is
indissolubly bound up in the single plan of divine economy, and such a breadth
of knowledge, of course, is inaccessible to man, Thus, an infant cannot
penetrate the thoughts and intentions of his father, who tries to foresee for
him everything that is better, not only in the present, but also in the future,
as well as to join his good with the good of the other members of the family.
“Only
when the fullness of time is reached, the end of the world takes place, and the
kingdom of Christ is opened, will all the incomprehensible judgements of God be
justified for us; before them mankind, redeemed by Christ, will bow down in
reverence, saying Blessing, and glory,
and wisdom, and thanksgiving… be unto our God forever and ever. Until that
time, only occasionally, to a small degree and with particular, deliberate
aims, does God reveal His all-wise will, which leads individual nations and the
whole world along one or another path in history. He reveals it either directly
to His chosen ones, with whom He may converse face to face, or in the very
course of world events, which are directed by His right hand. Jealous for the
glory of God when it is subjected to mockery by the children of disobedience,
the righteous often ask why the Almighty does not immediately wreak vengeance
upon the proud and impious who rise up against His eternal and omnipotent
dominion. It is for this reason that He is God and not man, that He is the Holy
One, as He Himself replies through the prophet (Hosea 11.9). God is too
powerful, reasons Saint John Chrysostom, to wreak vengeance upon anyone
immediately. At that same time, He so far transcends the world that no boastful
tongue can offend or even touch Him. Every blasphemer is truly like a dog
baying at the moon.
“Human
zeal is often intolerant because it is not balanced with love, which comprises
the essence of the divine Nature. The loving-kindness of God often, as it were,
restrains for a time the hand of His chastisement. The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some men count
slackness, but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish,
but that all should come to repentance (II Peter 3.9).
“Thou hast mercy on all, says another
sage of the Old Testament, for Thou
canst do all things, and winkest at the sins of men, because they should amend…
Thou sparest all: for they are Thine, O Lord, Thou lover of souls (Wisdom
11.23,26). His mercy and justice do not want to destroy the tares together with
the wheat, with which they put down roots, as it were, in the same soil. He was
ready to have mercy on condemned Sodom and Gomorrah for the sake of ten
righteous men, so that such would not perish with the ungodly, and He did not
wish to destroy Nineveh for the sake of 120,000 innocent babes and even because
of the irrational beasts which would have been destroyed with the people (Jonah
4.11). The very measurement of time in man’s conception differs entirely from
that in God’s eyes. One day is with the
Lord as thousand years, and a thousand years as one day (II Peter
3.9; Psalm 89.5). Divine providence has ordered all things in measure and number and weight (Wisdom
11.20). With Him everything is appointed its own time and season.
“How long, O Lord holy and true, dost Thou
not judge and avenge our blood on those who dwell on the earth?, the souls
beneath the altar, who had been slain for the Word of God and for the testimony
they gave, cried out with a loud voice, as John the Theologian, the seer of
mysteries, bears witness. And white
robes were given unto every one of them; and it was said unto them that they
should rest yet for a little season, until their fellow servants also and their
brethren, who should be killed as they were, should be fulfilled.”[25]
The
Venerable Bede of Jarrow writes: “The souls of the righteous cry these things,
not from hatred of enemies, but from love of justice.”[26]
6.12-17. And I
beheld when He had opened the sixth seal. And lo! there was a great earthquake;
and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood;
and the stars of heaven fell unto the earth, even as a fig tree casteth her
untimely figs, when she is shaken of a mighty wind. And the heavens departed as
a scroll when it is rolled together; and every mountain and island were moved
out of their places. And the kings of the earth, and the great men, and the
rich men, and the chief captains, and the mighty men, and every bondman, and
every free man, hid themselves in the dens and in the rocks of the mountains;
and said to the mountains and rocks: Fall on us, and hide us from the face of Him
that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb; for the great day
of His wrath is come, and who shall be able to stand?
These terrible images, which are reminiscent
of many other passages in Holy Scripture (cf. Matthew 24.29; Mark
13.24-25; Luke 21.25; Isaiah 34.2-4; Joel 2.32), can be
interpreted in a more literal or a more symbolical sense.
“It
seems to us that this is the transition from the time of persecution to the
time before the Antichrist, when, according to the prophecy, there will be such
plagues in order, perhaps, that people, in thinking about them, should not
refuse to bear the punishments sent by the Antichrist – punishments which, as
we know, have never taken place before.
“The
earthquake, of which we often read in Scripture, is a change of things;
wherefore also, the expression yet once
more I shake the earth (Haggai 2.7) signifies as the Apostle says, the removal of these things that are
shaking (Hebrews 12.26-27).
“The
blackness of the sun and the darkness and blood appearance of the moon
indicate, as the Blessed Cyril has often expressed it, the darkness of soul of
those upon whom the wrath of God will come. And that the stars fell, as has been written also of those deceived by
Antiochus, indicate that those who think themselves to be the lights of the
world will fall, being crushed and defeated by what will happen at that time,
when as the Lord has said, If it were
possible they shall deceive the very elect by reason of the great
tribulation (Matthew 24.24). This is perhaps why there is given here the
indication of the fig tree, which, at the blowing of the wind of the devil,
casts down its fruit while still unripe, since they have not ripened in the
heat of temptations and are not sweetened by grace…
“Whether
all this will turn out in a physical form at the glorious Coming of Christ the
King is known by Him Who possesses the mystical treasury of knowledge and
wisdom.
“The
heaven is not to be subject to corruption and destruction but, as it were, to a
certain rolling up and change for the better. Irenaeus, in his fifth accusatory
Homily against Reason (falsely so-called), says: ‘Neither the essence
nor the being of the creation will perish or will be destroyed, for true and
strong is He Who created it, but the fashion
of this world passeth away (I Corinthians 7.31), the world in which
the transgression was performed.
“At
the coming of Antichrist, those (called here symbolically mountains) who are
leaders either over the good order of the Church or over the worldly dominions,
and the churches of the faithful which are presented here under the image of
islands… will fall from their places.” (St. Andrew of Caesarea).
Again,
the great earthquake could signify the enormous impact of world war; the
changes in the heavens - the terrible sights accompanying thermo-nuclear
warfare; the men fleeing into the dens and caves of the earth - the soldiers
and civilians fleeing into bomb shelters, etc.
But
it is also possible to see all these phenomena as symbols of the moral-spiritual
destruction of the times. Thus Archbishop Theophanes of Poltava wrote in 1936:
“According to the explanation of the Saviour Himself, the stars are the angels of the
churches, that is, the bishops (Revelation
1.20). The religious-moral fall of bishops appears is in this way one of the
most characteristic signs of the last times. Especially terrible is the fall of
bishops when they fall away from the dogmas of the Faith, or, as the apostle
expressed it, when they would pervert
the Gospel of Christ (Galatians 1.7). On such the apostle pronounce anathema: If any man preach any other gospel unto you than that which ye have
received, let him be anathema (Galatians 1.9). And one must not
linger here, he continues: A heretic
after the first and second admonition reject, knowing that he that is such is
subverted, and sinneth, being condemned of himself (Titus 3.10-11).
Otherwise, that is, for indifference towards apostasy from the truth, the
judgement of God can fall on you: because
thou art lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spew thee out of My mouth
(Revelation 3.16). The clouds on the world’s horizon are thickening. The
judgement of God on peoples and hypocritical Christians draws near, beginning
with the heretical and lukewarm hierarchs.”[27]
Following
this line of interpretation, the words the
sun became black mean that the light of Christian truth was obscured by the
darkness of heresy (ecumenism); the moon
became as blood - the official “Church” became an associate of men of blood
and guilty of the blood of the martyrs (sergianism); and the heaven departed as a scroll, every mountain and island being moved
out of their places - traditional norms of behaviour were overturned, and
every church and community of true Christians suffered great upheavals - all of
which has in fact happened in our time.
“The
Lord said that His Coming would be at night (Luke 17.34) because of the
blindness of the world.”[28]
7.1-3. And
after these things I saw four angels standing on the four corners of the earth,
holding the four winds of the earth, that the wind should not blow on the
earth. And I saw another angel ascending from the east, having the seal of the
living God. And he cried with a loud voice to the four angels, to whom it was
given to hurt the earth and the sea, saying: Hurt not the earth, neither the
sea, nor the trees, till we have sealed the servants of our God on their
foreheads.
“In
the seventh chapter,” writes Fr. Alexander Kolesnikov, “the Apostle John turns
to reassuring the faithful at the approach of the last times of the world. At
the beginning he sees four angels, who stand at the four corners of the earth
and to whom it is given to harm the earth and the sea. With this symbol of the
four angels the apostle wishes to represent how the earth and mankind is
condemned by the Providence of God to the miseries of the last times: the
punitive heavenly powers surrounded the sphere of the earth from all corners,
as if saying to the people that there is nowhere they can escape from the
coming miseries.
“But
it appears that there is a way of salvation for the faithful living on the
earth in the last time. So as to separate the faithful from the apostate, seals
are placed on the foreheads of the former. By the symbol of the placing of the
seals the servants of God in the last times are warned by the apostle that,
although the faithful cannot completely escape the woes sent by God upon sinners,
nevertheless they can be saved, not only spiritually, but also bodily… That the
faithful in times of woes also suffer, but many of them save their lives - of
this there are many examples in history. For example, many thousands of
Christians, being directed by Christ’s foretelling of the destruction of
Jerusalem and the necessity of fleeing from it in good time (Matthew
24.16-20), actually fled and thereby were saved, when the Roman armies entered
Palestine in 68. The same point is confirmed by the destiny of many thousands
of church people in the Soviet Union.”[29]
“This
is something like what was revealed to the holy Prophet Ezekiel about the man
clothed in a podir, that is, a long linen garment, who places a seal upon those who groan (Ezekiel
9.4), so as not to destroy the righteous together with the unrighteous (for the
hidden virtues of the saints are unknown even to the angels).” (St. Andrew of
Caesarea).
Jean
Danielou writes: “The tau, the last letter of the Hebrew alphabet, also
in its archaic form an x, was, according to Ezekiel (9.4), the mark of
Yahweh placed upon the forehead of the elect; and as such is referred to in Revelation
7.2. That this mark was thought of as representing the name of God is clear
from Revelation 14.1 and 22.4. But once the move had been made to Greek
territory, the X, the sign of the Divine name, was.. thought of as standing
for.. Christ, and regarded as the first letter of CristoV. It may be recalled that
with regard to the symbolism of the letter tau, Origen reports the
opinion of a Jew who said that tau took its power from the fact that it
was the last letter of the alphabet, and so was equivalent to the Greek W, the sacred letter par
excellence. This seems to touch the very oldest stratum of the rite of the signatio
in Jewish Christian circles, where the Jewish X comes to represent Christ as
God.”[30]
St.
Cyprian of Carthage writes: “As when Egypt was smitten, the Jewish people could
not escape except by the blood and the sign of the lamb; so when the world
shall begin to be desolated and smitten, only he who is found in the blood and
the sign of the Cross shall escape.”[31]
Th.
Yakovlev writes: “The seal of which the prophecy speaks is inexpressibly
important for the Christian soul. Its first seal takes place when the seal of
the gifts of the Holy Spirit is laid upon it at baptism. This is the renewal,
justification and sanctification of its nature, harmed by the sins of the first
parents. The apostle says of this sealing: God Who has anointed us has also
sealed us, and given us the betrothal of the Holy Spirit in our hearts (II
Corinthians 1.21,22).He who preserves this most valuable seal will be
counted worthy to receive the new seal of the living God. The first is a sign
that distinguishes the Christian from the unbeliever; the second distinguishes
the righteous man, who has entered into the dwelling-place of eternal rest and
blessedness, from the iniquitous who are condemned to eternal torment.
“In
what does this seal consist? We do not know, and it is useless to seek out this
knowledge…”[32]
“We
do not know what this seal consists of, and there is no need to seek this out.
Perhaps it will be the sign of the precious Cross of the Lord, by which it will
be possible to distinguish believers from unbelievers and apostates; or perhaps
it will be the seal of martyrdom for Christ.” (Archbishop Averky)
“This
will primarily be fulfilled during the time of the coming of Antichrist, when
the seal of the Life-giving Cross will distinguish the unfaithful from the
faithful, who will bear the sign of the Cross before them unashamed and with
boldness… The virtuous will need the angelic help before the coming of
disasters, and this will be by the power of the seal of the Spirit which will
be given us. But this seal will reveal its power only to the extent that we
show our activity.” (St. Andrew of Caesarea)
That
God will separate the good from the evil before the disasters strike is
indicated by the vision of a white hand which appeared above the Russian town
of Tambov in the 1970s and wrote the following in broad daylight: “1. The bad
leads to the good. 2. It is now winter for My people. 3. Days of repentance. 4.
Not one righteous soul will remain among the depraved, and not one debauched
soul will remain among righteous souls. 5. Be attentive to My salvation. 6.
Bring forth fruits of repentance. 7. Salvation awaits those who fear the Lord.
8. Let there be an awareness of responsibility in all your actions. The time is
near! 9. Truly, I will come… I will not delay. Amen.”[33]
7.4-8. And I
heard the number of those who were sealed; and there were sealed a hundred and
forty and four thousand of all the tribes of the children of Israel. Of the
tribe of Judah were sealed twelve thousand. Of the tribe of Reuben were sealed
twelve thousand. Of the tribe of Gad were sealed twelve thousand. Of the tribe
of Aser were sealed twelve thousand. Of the tribe of Nephthalim were sealed
twelve thousand. Of the tribe of Manasses were sealed twelve thousand. Of the
tribe of Simeon were sealed twelve thousand. Of the tribe of Levi were sealed
twelve thousand. Of the tribe of Issachar were sealed twelve thousand. Of the
tribe of Zabulon were sealed twelve thousand. Of the tribe of Joseph were
sealed twelve thousand. Of the tribe of Benjamin were sealed twelve thousand.
“The
number 144,000, like other numbers in the Apocalypse, does not have a
numerical, but a symbolical significance.” (Protopriest Alexander Mileant).[34]
“The
precise equality of the numbers of those saved from each tribe, it seems to me,
indicates the fruitfulness of apostolic seed, because the number twelve taken
twelve times and multiplied by a thousand gives the number indicated here, for
they were the disciples of the seed which fell on the ground and brought forth
the multiple fruits of universal salvation” (St. Andrew of Caesarea).
“This
sealing will begin with the Israelites, who before the end of the world will be
converted to Christ, as St. Paul predicts (Romans 9.27, 11.26).[35]
In each of the twelve tribes there will be twelve thousand sealed, and 144,000
in all. Of these tribes only the tribe of Dan is not mentioned, because from
it, according to tradition, will come the Antichrist. In place of the tribe of
Dan is mentioned the priestly tribe of Levi which previously had not entered
into the twelve tribes. Such a limited number is mentioned, perhaps, in order
to show how small is the number of the sons of Israel who are saved in
comparison with the uncountable multitude of those who have loved the Lord
Jesus Christ from among all the other formerly pagan people of the earth.”
(Archbishop Averky)
St.
Hippolytus writes: “Moses says: Dan is a
lion’s whelp, and shall leap out of Basan (Deuteronomy 32.33)… In
naming the tribe of Dan, he clearly pointed out the tribe from which the
Antichrist is destined to spring. For just as Christ springs from the tribe of
Judah, so the Antichrist is to spring from the tribe of Dan… That it is indeed
from the tribe of Dan that the tyrannical king, the son of the devil, is
destined to arise, the prophet witnesses when he says: Dan shall judge his people, as one tribe too in Israel (Genesis
49.16)… Jeremiah, too speaks to this effect: We shall hear the neighing of his swift horses out of Dan: the whole
land quaked at the sound of the riding of his horses (Jeremiah
8.16).”[36]
7.9-14. After
this I beheld, and lo! a great multitude, which no man could number, of all
nations, and kindreds, and peoples, and tongues, stood before the throne, and
before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, and with palms in their hands; and
cried with a loud voice, saying: Salvation to our God Who sitteth upon the
throne, and unto the Lamb. And all the angels stood round about the throne, and
about the elders and the four living creatures, and fell before the throne on
their faces, and worshipped God, saying: Amen: Blessing, and glory, and wisdom,
and thanksgiving, and honour, and power, and might, be unto our God unto the
ages of ages. Amen. And one of the elders answered, saying unto me: Who are
these who are arrayed in white robes? and whence came they? And I said unto
him: Sir, thou knowest. And he said to me: These are they who came out of the
great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and made them white in the
blood of the Lamb.
“These
in white robes are those of whom David speaks: If I should count them they are more in number than the sand (Psalm
138.18) - those who earlier suffered as martyrs for Christ and those who, from
every tribe and people, are to receive sufferings with courage in the last
times. By the pouring out of their blood for Christ some of them have white,
and others will make white, the garment of their deeds.” (St. Andrew of
Caesarea)
“In
their hands they have palm branches - signs of victory over the devil. Their
lot is one of eternal rejoicing before the throne of God.” (Archbishop Averky)
The
waving of palm branches was an element in the Feast of Tabernacles (Leviticus
23.40), the feast of ingathering, the last feast in the Jewish calendar and the
only one that has not yet received a Christian fulfilment. Perhaps, therefore,
there is a looking forward here to the time when this feast will be fulfilled,
marking the gathering in of the fullness
of the Gentiles of which St. Paul speaks (Romans 11.25). The fulfilment of
this feast may be referred to in another prophecy: Then every one that survives of all the nations that have come against
Jerusalem shall go up year after year to worship the King, the Lord of Hosts,
and to keep the feast of Tabernacles (Zechariah 14.16).[37]
Therefore
this great multitude consists of the
Gentile martyrs who come through the
great tribulation of the last times - the persecution of the Antichrist.
Together with the martyrs of previous persecutions, they, together with the
Jews who will be saved, constitute all
Israel (Romans 11.26); for the believing Jews and Gentiles together
make up the whole Church of Christ, which is the Israel of God (Galatians 6.16). Or, according to Oecumenius’ interpretation, “all Israel is written instead of ‘the
greater part’ of the Jews, who turn away from their sins and towards the Lord”.
For,
as the apostle says: I would not,
brethren, that ye should be ignorant of this mystery, lest ye should be wise in
your own conceits: that blindness in part is happened to Israel, until the
fulness of the Gentiles be come in. And so all Israel shall be saved: as it is
written, There shall come out of Zion the deliverer, and shall turn away
ungodliness from Jacob; for this is My covenant unto them, when I shall take
away their sins (Romans 11.25-27).
7.15.
Therefore are they before the throne of God, and serve Him day and night in His
temple; and He that sitteth on the throne shall dwell among them.
“As
the highest reward that they will receive, it is indicated that they shall
remain before the throne of God, serving Him day and night - indicating figuratively the uninterruptedness of
this service; for, as St. Andrew says, ‘There will be no night there, but a
single day, illuminated not by a material sun, but by the spiritual Sun of
righteousness. And perhaps by night
is to be understood hidden and profound mysteries, and by day what is clear and easy to receive. The temple of God is the creation which has been renewed by the Spirit,
or, more precisely, those who have preserved the pledge of the Spirit whole and
unquenched; in whom God has promised to dwell
and walk (II Corinthians)’.” (Archbishop Averky)
7.16-17. They
shall hunger no more, neither thirst any more, neither shall the sun light on them,
nor any heat. For the Lamb Who is in the midst of throne shall feed them, and
shall lead them unto living fountains of waters. And God shall wipe away all
tears from their eyes.
The Lord is my Shepherd, and I shall
not want. In a place of green pasture, there hath He made me to dwell; beside
the water of rest hath He nurtured me (Psalm 22.1-2).
“They shall have the bread of heaven and the
water of life, and they will have no pain and will endure no misfortunes such
as are depicted in the form of the sun and heat, for the time of sufferings has
passed.” (St. Andrew of Caesarea)
“The
Lamb Himself shall feed them, that
is, guide them, and they shall be vouchsafed an abundant outpouring of the Holy
Spirit (living fountains of waters).
The Lord said also of the believer that out
of his belly shall flow rivers of living water (John 7.38). The
saints, being then abundantly nourished by it, and having acquired perfect
knowledge after the cessation of private knowledge, and being delivered from
corruption and change, will remain in endless rejoicing and joy.” (Archbishop
Averky)
8.1. And when
He had opened the seventh seal, there was silence in heaven about the space of
half an hour.
The
opening of the first six seals occupies the space of one chapter (6). After a
pause (chapter 7) comes the seventh seal, whose first six trumpets occupy the
space of two chapters (8 and 9), and whose seventh trumpet, after another pause
(chapter 10), occupies the space of a further chapter (11) - the last in this
vision. Taking as a chronological anchor chapter 8, verses 10 and 11, which
clearly refer to the disaster which took place at Chernobyl in 1986, we may
tentatively hypothesize that the opening of the seven seals symbolise the
following periods: the period of war, revolution and martyrdom from 1914 to1949
(chapter 6); the period of peace between the Second and Third World Wars
(chapter 7); the period leading up to (chapter 8) and including the Third World
War (chapter 9); the period of peace after the Third World War (chapter 10);
and the period of the seven-year reign of the Antichrist (chapter 11).
According
to this schema, the silence in heaven
about the space of half an hour refers to a kind of “holding of breath”
before the terrible catastrophes of the Third World War. For “it is like that
in the physical world, too; the approach of a storm is often preceded by a deep
quietness. This silence in the heavens signified the concentration of the reverent
attention of the angels and men standing before the throne of God in
expectation of the terrible signs of the wrath of God before the end of this
age and the appearance of the Kingdom of Christ.” (Archbishop Averky)
8.2-3. And I
saw the seven angels who stood before God; and to them were given seven
trumpets. And another stood at the altar, having a golden censer; and there was
given unto him much incense, that he should offer it with the prayers of all
saints upon the golden altar which was before the throne.
“Before
the first seven angels, as chastisers of the erring human race, the saints,
with an angel at their head, stand before God in prayer for men. St. Andrew of
Caesarea says that the saints will entreat God that ‘after the disasters which
strike at the end of the world, the torments of impious and lawless men might
be lessened in the future age and that by His Coming He might reward those who
have laboured.’
“At
the same time, the saints will again and again entreat God, just as they
entreated Him at the removing of the fifth seal (6.9-11), that He might
manifest His righteous judgement against the lawless and the persecutors of the
Faith of Christ and might cause the fierceness of the tormentors to cease.”
(Archbishop Averky)
For the effectual fervent prayer of a
righteous man availeth much (James 5.16).
8.4-5. And the
smoke of the incense, which came with the prayers of the saints, ascended up
before God out of the angel’s hand. And the angel took the censer, and filled
it with fire of the altar, and cast it into the earth; and there were voices,
and thunderings, and lightnings, and an earthquake.
“The casting of the fire of the censer on the
earth indicates the Divine judgement manifested on earth. See Ezekiel
10.2) where the coals of fire scattered over the city indicate the chastisement
of Jerusalem.”[38]
And He said to the man clothed with
the long robe: Go in between the wheels that are under the cherubs, and fill
thine hands with coals of fire from between the cherubs, and scatter them over
the city (Ezekiel
10.2).
“The
punishments described immediately after this are without doubt the consequences
of this prayer. The Lord shows here that He does not ignore the prayers of His
faithful servants. The voices and
the thunderings and the rest
‘indicate,’ according to St. Andrew of Caesarea, ‘the horrors which are to
occur before the end (of the world), just as on Mount Sinai they served as
symbols of the Divine Presence which frightened everyone and brought the most
sensible of them to conversion’.” (Archbishop Averky)
“The
man who is immersed in the vanity of this life forgets about heaven and the
fact that the saints care about us and help us. Our Orthodox temple and our
Divine services remind us of the spiritual unity of the heavenly-earthly
Church. If we look more closely into the visions of the Apocalypse which are
presented here, we shall see a striking similarity with our temple and order of
liturgy. In heaven there is an altar and the slain Lamb, elders in golden
crowns surrounding the throne, seven lampstands, censers with incense, and the
assemblies of those standing in front. How close this description is to all
that takes places with us in the altar during the Divine Liturgy! With us, as
in heaven, there is an altar, and the Lamb in the sacred Communion Gifts,
clergy-elders surrounding the altar, a seven-branched candlestick, a censer
with fragrant smoke ascending. Here the clergy and the chanters and the
worshippers unite with the angels and saints into one choir for the glorification
of God worshipped in Trinity: ‘Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord of Sabaoth, heaven and
earth are full of Thy glory…’ Truly, in our temple everything reminds us of
this and supports our link with the heavenly Church.” (Protopriest Alexander
Mileant)
8.6. And the
seven angels who had the seven trumpets prepared themselves to sound.
“Here
there follows the sounding of the trumpets one after the other, of all seven
angels, which are accompanied each time by great disasters and punishments for the
earth and its inhabitants.” (Archbishop Averky)
8.7. The first
angel sounded, and there followed hail and fire mingled with blood, and they
were cast upon the earth; and the third part of trees was burned up, and all
green grass was burned up.
“The fire
mingled with blood indicates the destruction of cities,… their fires and
blood-letting, during which, as we shall see, not less than one third of all
the creatures living on earth will be killed; for wars exterminate not only
men, but also everything produced on earth. Our supposition and opinion
regarding this is confirmed by the blessed Joel, for he says that before the
coming of the great day there will be sent on earth blood and fire and vapour of smoke (Joel 2.30).” (St. Andrew
of Caesarea)
“The
chastisements of God follow gradually, indicating the mercy and long-suffering
of God calling sinners to repentance. At first the chastisement of God strikes
a third of the trees and all the green grass. Wheat and other grasses are
burned to the root - those things which are necessary for the sustenance of men
and animals. By hail and fire mingled
with blood… cast upon the earth many commentators understand a war of
extermination. Does this not refer to an aerial bombardment with its
destructive incendiary bombs?” (Archbishop Averky)
We
may perhaps also see the effects of the pollution of the environment indicated
here.
8.8-9. And the
second angel sounded, and as it were a great mountain burning with fire was
cast into the sea; and the third part of the sea became blood; and the third
part of the ships were destroyed.
This verse is paralleled by the second vial
of wrath poured out by the second angel in Revelation 16.3.
“One
may suppose that on the bottom of one of the oceans there will open up a volcano
whose fiery lava will fill the third part of the water basins of the earth,
bringing death to everything alive. Others think that what is referred to here
are bloody sea battles with the help of newly invented murderous weapons.”
(Archbishop Averky)
Fr.
Stephen Krasovitsky writes: “The mountain
could well be the melting of gigantic mountains of ice at the poles under the
influence of ‘the greenhouse effect’ and the widening of ‘holes’ in the ozone
layer above the Antarctic, which allows burning ultra-violet rays to pass
through unhindered. As a result of the melting of the ice-caps there will be a
merging of the waters of the oceans with microscopic algae of a red colour
coming from the depths of the sea to the surface. These will consume oxygen, as
a result of which the water will look like blood, and a third part of the
living creatures of the sea will die. Scientists supposed that the approach of
the greenhouse effect will take place almost instantaneously and will be
accompanied by cyclones, tornadoes and floods, as a result of which not only
the inhabitants of the earth will suffer, but especially those who will be on
the sea at that time (the third part of
the ships will be destroyed).”[39]
According
to a prophecy of the Catacomb Church Eldress Seraphima of Michurinsk, all the
Christians will be rounded up and incarcerated on the Arctic island of Novaia
Zemlia. But a sudden change of weather for the warmer will save them.[40]
Such a change could take place either as a result of global warming or a result
of the general heating of the earth’s atmosphere during a nuclear holocaust.
However,
a great mountain burning with fire cast
into the sea suggests another explanation. Novikova writes: “Reading the
prophecies, we have often asked ourselves a series of questions: ‘Can a “pillar
of fire” arise in the sea after an earthquake?’ Will the smell of sulphur
spread everywhere, and will there be a toxic hail causing sores on the bodies
of men and a poisoning of the water that gives the water the taste of
wormwood?’ These forecasts related to the future, and it just so happens that
we are really confronted with the approach of an ecological catastrophe, a part
of which is the poisoning of the waters of the Pacific Ocean by hydrogen
sulphide…
“The
Black Sea is located in a seismically dangerous zone. During an earthquake
sharp movements of the sea bottom could elicit landslips and the destruction of
a thickness of sedimentary rocks. The gases released by this burst out onto the
surface of the sea. The slightest spark - and the sea ignites, and a ‘pillar of
fire’ rises over us. Then streams of fuel impregnated with the moisture of the
atmosphere rise up. Gradually the moisture condenses and even in fine weather
clouds are formed. Burning hydrogen sulphide spreads suffocating odours of
sulphur, while the product of the burning (sulphur dioxide), uniting with
water, produces sulphuric acid. A cloud is formed out of which an acid hail
falls, poisoning all the fresh water. There is no doubt that the picture
‘drawn’ by the scientists truly signifies the end of the world…”[41]
8.10-11. And
the third angel sounded, and there fell a great star from heaven, burning as it
were a lamp, and it fell upon third part of the rivers, and upon the fountains
of waters; and the name of the star is called Wormwood; and the third part of
the waters became wormwood; and many men died of the waters, because they were
made bitter.
Cf. 16.4: The third angel poured his bowl into the rivers and the fountains of
waters, and they became blood.
“The
star indicates either that all this comes upon men from the heavens, or it
signifies the devil, of whom Isaiah says: How
has Lucifer fallen from heaven, that rose in the morning! (14.12). For he, making
men drunk through pleasures by his stormy and bitter corruption, is allowed by
God to bring a tormenting tribulation, if not upon all, then at any rate upon
the third part.” (St. Andrew of Caesarea)
The
word translated “wormwood” in English is “chernobyl” in Ukrainian; and on April
29th, 1986, a nuclear reactor exploded at Chernobyl in the Ukraine, causing
widespread and long-lasting pollution and an ever-rising toll of deaths and
misformed births.
This
extraordinary “coincidence” leads one to speculate that the whole of this
passage (8.7-11, perhaps also 12) refers to the whole of that epoch
contemporaneous with our own, when environmental disasters of the Chernobyl
type have brought disaster to that third of the world which is, or was, under communist
domination.
8.12. And the
fourth angel sounded, and the third part of the sun was smitten, and the third
part of the moon, and the third part of the stars; so that the third part of
them was darkened, and the day shone not for a third part of it, and the night
likewise.
“We think that this is akin to what is said
about the sun and the moon by Joel (Joel 2.10) and which has already
been ordained by the decree of the Master for the end. We repeat that the third
part of the luminaries and stars indicates the third part of the duration of
the day and night. From this we understand that God at that time will bring
about disasters not all at
once; for, allowing only a third part of time to be damaged, in the remaining
and large part he secretly calls to repentance. Indeed, who can bear the cup of
Divine wrath unmingled?” (St. Andrew of Caesarea).
“It
is not possible for us to understand this at the present time. One thing is
clear: that this is to be accompanied by various disasters for men - bad harvest,
famine, and so forth.” (Archbishop Averky)
Perhaps
the darkening of the celestial bodies refers to the effects of the destruction
of the oil wells in Kuwait at the end of the Gulf War in 1991, which led to a
darkening of the sun.
Or
perhaps this passage refers to spiritual catastrophes taking place in the souls
of men: the eclipse of the Sun of Righteousness, Jesus Christ; the connivance
of the moon, i.e. the Church, in murder, as the Moscow Patriarchate has
connived at the murder of so many of the new martyrs of Russia; and the falling
of stars, that is, bishops, into heresy (for example, ecumenism).
8.13. And I
beheld, and heard an angel flying through the midst of heaven, saying with a
loud voice: Woe, woe to the inhabitants of the earth by reason of the other
voices of the trumpet of the three angels, which are yet to sound!
“For those who have their dwelling in the
heavens, the disasters and sufferings are the cause of receiving unfading
crowns and rewards” (St. Andrew of Caesarea).
Ivan Marchevsky writes: “Here, in some very
old manuscripts from the 3rd to the 5th centuries (Oxyrhynch. 2; Sinaiticus;
Alexandrinus), instead of an angel
there is an eagle - the herald of
woes, of wars (Luke 17.37).”[42]
“This
voice of the angel indicates the love of mankind and the compassion of the
divine angels, who feel pity for the impenitent men who are subjected to such
disasters.” (Archbishop Averky)
9.1-3. And the
fifth angel sounded, and I saw a star fall from heaven unto the earth; and to
him was given the key of the bottomless pit. And he opened the bottomless pit;
and there arose a smoke out of the pit, as the smoke of a great furnace; and
the sun and the air were darkened by reason of the smoke of the pit. And there
came out of the smoke locusts upon the earth; and unto them was given power, as
the scorpions of the earth have power.
“With
regard to the star, I think it is an angel of God. By God’s permission he leads
out of the pit the evil demons who have been condemned, those whom Christ bound
when He was incarnate, so that they might do their work before the end and then
be subjected to endless torment.” (St. Andrew of Caesarea)
That
there are evil demons confined in hades is revealed by the holy apostle Jude: The angels which kept not their first
estate, but left their own habitation, He hath reserved in everlasting chains
under darkness (v. 6).
That
God can use such demons for His own righteous purposes is revealed by the story
of the ten plagues of Egypt, so similar to these plagues of the last times; for
they, as David says, were the wrath of
His anger, anger and wrath and affliction, a mission performed by evil angels
(Psalm 77.53).
However,
the following verses suggests that the locusts are not simply demons, but men
or man-made machines used as the instruments of demons:
9.4-10. And it
was commanded them that they should not hurt the grass of the earth, neither
any green thing, neither any tree; but only those men who have not the seal of
God on their foreheads. And to them it was given that they should not kill
them, but that they should be tormented five months: and their torment was as
the torment of a scorpion, when he striketh a man. And in those days shall men
seek death, and shall not find it; and shall desire to die, and death shall
flee from them. And the shapes of the locusts were like unto horses prepared
unto battle; and on their heads were as it were crowns like gold, and their
faces were as the faces of men. And they had hair as the hair of women, and
their teeth as the teeth of lions. And they had breastplates, as it were
breastplates of iron; and the sound of their wings was as the sound of chariots
of many horses running to battle. And they had tails like unto scorpions, and
there were stings in their tails; and their power was to hurt men five months.
“That
death does not come even though men desire it indicates that this depends upon
the decree of God, Who considers it profitable through the bitterness of the
disasters which are sent to make the sin which is the very cause of such
disasters hateful to men” (St. Andrew of Caesarea).
“Contemporary commentators, not with a
certain reason, find a kinship between these locusts and aeroplanes and their
bombing attacks.” (Archbishop Averky)
We
can go further: the locusts bear a striking resemblance to Russian
helicopter-gunships of the “Hind” type.[43]
The resemblance to helicopters can be seen in frescoes depicting this scene
from the Apocalypse on the walls of Dionysiou monastery, Mount Athos.
Their appearance is as the appearance of
horses; and as horsemen, so shall they pursue. As the sound of chariots on the
tops of mountains shall they leap… The locust.. even My great army, which I
sent against you (Joel 2.4-5, 3.25).
9.11. And they
had a king over them, which is the angel of the bottomless pit, whose name in
the Hebrew tongue is Abaddon, but in the Greek tongue hath his name Apollyon.
“By
the king of these locusts, who bears the name angel of the bottomless pit - “Abaddon” in Hebrew, “Apollyon” in
Greek - the commentators understand the devil.” (Archbishop Averky)
“Apollyon”
means “destroyer”.[44]
The
fact that the name of this demon is given in both Hebrew and Greek may mean
that the events here described are of particular importance for both the Jews
and the Gentiles. Our supposition is that the locust invasion is a Russian
invasion of the Middle East, beginning with the conquest of Constantinople and
Turkey and continuing with the conquest of Egypt and Israel. Several of the
Greek prophets speak of the conquest of Constantinople by a blonde race
beginning with the letter “R”.[45]
This occupation will last “until the fifth hour” (St. Constantine’s tomb) or
“for six and five” (St. Methodius of Patara)[46]
- which is not very clear, but is at least consistent with the Apocalypse’s five months. Moreover, the climax of
the prophecy of Hieromartyr Constantius the Russian of Constantinople covers a
period of little over five months: “On July 8th two unheard-of wars will
coincide. On August 12th there will be an unbearable heatwave. On December 18th
half mankind will perish.”[47]
It
is at this point that the following Old Testament prophecies begin to help us: Ezekiel
38 and 39, Joel 2, Amos 7.1-3, Daniel 11.40-45 and Zechariah
14. Ezekiel says that in the last times an unprecedentedly mighty army will
come from the extreme north against Israel called Gog and Magog, which most ancient commentators identified with the
region north of the Black Sea[48],
or Ros, Mosoch and Tubal.[49]
Now Ros is the ancient name for Russia; and Tubal, according to Blessed Theodoretus of Cyrus, is Georgia.[50]
That
there is a link between the locusts and Gog, which is in turn linked with
Russia, is strikingly indicated by the words of Amos: Behold, a swarm of locusts coming from the east; and behold, one
caterpillar, King Gog (Amos 7.1).
The
identification with Russia is made still more likely by the fact that there is
a link between the leader of the locusts, Apollyon,
or Apollo, and the original meaning of the word “Russia”. Thus Fr. Stephen
Krasovitsky writes: “The Apocalypse here calls the devil the angel of the bottomless pit: in Hebrew - Abaddon, but in Greek -
Apollyon. The cult of Apollo in the north is the cult of the god Hors, to which
in pagan antiquity human sacrifices were brought. From the name Horse [whose
symbol is the horse] arose the names ‘hrosy’, ‘rosy’, the people of the Rossy
(Russy).”[51]
This
host are said to be accompanied by the Persians
and Ethiopians and Libyans, Gomer
(Crimea), Thorgamah (Armenia) and many other nations. This looks like a re-creation of the Soviet Union together
with its Middle Eastern allies. They are challenged by Sabba (North Yemen), Daedan (Saudi
Arabia) and Carthaginian merchants
(Lebanon?), as well as by Israel and
Egypt; while there shall escape out of his hand Edom, Moab and the chief of
the children of Ammon (Jordan?) (Daniel 11.41). This mighty army
will conquer Israel and Egypt and will take an enormous amount of plunder. On
its way back from Egypt, however, while it is on the mountains of Israel between the Dead and the Mediterranean
Seas, it will suffer complete destruction in a manner reminiscent of the
effects of a nuclear explosion: And this
shall be the plague with which the Lord will smite all the peoples that wage
war against Jerusalem: their flesh shall rot while they are still on their
feet, they eyes shall rot in their sockets, and their tongues shall rot in
their mouths (Zechariah 14.12).
St.
Andrew of Caesarea writes of Ezekiel’s Gog and Magog as follows: “Some
interpreters of the prophet have referred them to the battle of the Assyrians
under Sennacherib with Hezekiah. But this event took place many years before
the prophecy of Ezekiel. Others refer them to the defeat of the peoples who
attacked the inhabitants of Jerusalem when they, after the Babylonian
captivity, wanted to repair and strengthen the walls of the city in accordance
with the command, first of the Persian Cyrus, and then of Darius. They also
refer them to the armies of Antiochus, which were defeated by the Maccabees. It
is clear, however, that their advent corresponds above all to the last times.
It is possible to assert this, first, because nowhere in the sacred books is
there mention of wars of the Jews with the Scythians, only of wars with
neighbouring peoples who envied their sudden enrichment; secondly, because it
is written concerning Gog that he will be prepared from ancient times and will
come in the last times; and thirdly, because in this revelation foretelling the
future (Revelation 20) it is said that Gog and Magog will come at the
end of this age.”
However,
while the invasion of Gog will undoubtedly take place “at the end of the age”,
it will not itself bring this age to an end. This is indicated by the fact that
after the great battle there will be a seven-year “mopping up” period, which is
described in the rest of Ezekiel 39. For these things must first come to pass; but the end is not by and by
(Luke 21.9).
9.12-19. One
woe is past; and behold, there come two more woes hereafter. And the sixth
angel sounded, and I heard a voice from the four horns of the golden altar
which is before God, saying to the sixth angel which had the trumpet: Loose the
four angels which are bound in the great river Euphrates. And the four angels
were loosed, which were prepared for an hour, and a day, and a month, and a
year, for to slay the third part of men. And the number of the army of the
horsemen were two hundred thousand thousand: and I heard the number of them. And
thus I saw the horses in the vision, and those that sat on them, having
breastplates of fire, and of jacinth, and brimstone; and the heads of the horse
were as the heads of lions; and out of their mouths issued fire and smoke and
brimstone. By these three was the third part of men killed, by the fire, and
the smoke, and by the brimstone which issued out of their mouths. For their
power is in their mouth, and in their tails; for their tails were like unto
serpents, and had heads, with them they do hurt.
“Some say that these four angels are Michael,
Gabriel, Uriel and Raphael, who, bound by the joy of the contemplation of God,
will be loosed on the day of judgement together with an innumerable multitude
of angels to judge the impious, of whom a third will be annihilated. But I
think that these four angels are the most cunning demons who were bound at the
coming of Christ and who, by the command of God which comes from the heavenly
altar (an image of which was the ancient tabernacle), are loosed by the Divine
angel to agitate the peoples not only against Christians, but also against each
other, so that through this some might be manifested as tested, faithful and
worthy of the best rewards, the highest mansions and dwellings like ripe wheat;
while others, like tares, the impious, inconstant sinners and unrepentant and
here justly punished, might receive a yet harder condemnation at the judgement.
And that they were bound at the Euphrates is nothing strange, for, by God’s
permission, some were condemned until the time in the bottomless pit, others in
wine, and some in other places, so that after the final end of the battle
against men they might be subjected to eternal torments. Perhaps the mention of
the Euphrates is an indication that Antichrist will come from those lands” (St.
Andrew of Caesarea).
Although
some have interpreted this army as coming from literally just beyond the
Euphrates, that is, Iraq, there seems no other nation on earth that can put an
army of two hundred million men into the field except China - and it was from China that the holy elders John of
Kronstadt, Aristocles of Moscow and Theodosius of Minvody saw the deliverance
of Russia coming. Alternatively, the Euphrates, flowing as it does through the
Muslim countries of Turkey, Syria and Iraq, may signify a Pan-Islamic alliance
directed against Russia, perhaps in union with the Chinese.[52]
Since
the first Gulf war of 1990 and the second of 2003, Mesopotamia or Iraq has
again become the epicentre of world events. Perhaps what is meant is that these
wars will serve as the beginning of that series of events leading to the Third
World War – events undoubtedly incited by demons, but allowed and ultimately
controlled by the all-powerful Providence of God.
The
description of the army is similar to the description of the locusts; so
perhaps their fiery horses are also mechanized weapons of war - aircraft or
“frightful mounted army tanks which spout forth fire” (Archbishop Averky).
Here, however, they may belong to a Chinese-Islamic alliance rather than to the
Russians. They are said to destroy about a third of mankind; but since some of
the previous plagues are already said to have destroyed a third of mankind, we
should perhaps conclude that a third, or perhaps two thirds of mankind will be
destroyed by all the plagues and wars of chapters eight and nine taken
together.
Hieromartyr
Constantius the Russian said that on December 18 of a certain year “one half of
mankind will perish”[53],
and St. Cosmas of Aitolia said that as a result of “the general war” “three
countries will become one”.[54]
St.
Cosmas also said: “We shall see people flying through the air like blackbirds,
and casting fire onto the earth. People will run to the grave and shout: ‘Come
out, yet dead, let us lie in your graves’.”[55]
9.20-21. And
the rest of the men who were not killed by these plagues yet repented not of
the works of their hands, that they should not worship demons, and idols of
gold, and silver, and brass, and stone, and of wood, which neither see, nor
hear, nor walk; neither repented they of their murders, nor of their sorceries,
nor of their fornication, nor of their thefts.
The
materialism of the last days is here represented under the image of
idol-worship. For materialists are in essence idolators, whose god is their belly (Philippians
3.19), who worship, not God, but Mammon. Therefore neither be ye idolators, as were some of them; as it is written: The
people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play. Neither let us commit
fornication, as some of them committed, and fell in one day three and twenty
thousand. Neither let us tempt Christ, as some of them also tempted, and were
destroyed by serpents. Neither murmer ye, as some them also murmured, and were
destroyed of the destroyer. Now all these things happened unto them for
examples; and they are written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the
ages have come (I Corinthians 10.7-11).
Murders here could include the
extraordinary number of abortions that now take place in almost every
“civilized” country.
10.1-2. And I
saw another mighty angel come down from heaven, clothed with a cloud; and a
rainbow was upon his head, and his face was as it were the sun, and his feet as
pillars of fire. And he had in his hand a little book open; and he set his
right foot upon the sea, and his left foot on the earth.
As
in 4.3, we again see the image of the rainbow, which signifies the mercy of God
after catastrophe. And after the Third World War, according to the Greek and
Russian prophets, there will be a period of peace and regeneration, in which
Orthodox Christianity will triumph. This will be a “breathing space” before the
final battle in the time of the personal Antichrist, and may be that short rest
mentioned in 6.9.
“This
appearance has the form of an introductory account before the seventh and final
trumpet. It stops the continuation of the prophetic allegories but does not
interrupt them… St. Andrew of Caesarea considers that this is… perhaps one of
the seraphim adorned with the glory of God. His standing on the sea and on the
earth signifies dominion over the elements of the earthly world: ‘The pillars
of fire signify the fear and punishment brought by the angel upon the impious
who have robbed on the earth and the sea’.” (Archbishop Averky)
However,
this figure might also be the holy Archangel Michael. For in Daniel,
after the destruction of the king of the
north, we read that Michael the
great prince shall stand up, that stands over the children of men (12.1).
Moreover, St. Ephraim the Syrian identifies the destroyer of Gog and Magog’s
army with the Archangel Michael: “Then Divine Justice will call upon Michael,
the leader of the hosts, and send him to destroy their camps, as the camps of
Sennacherib. At the command, and with his mighty and terrible sword, the angel
shall go forth and destroy their armies in the twinkling of an eye, and in the
same moment Divine Justice, thundering from on high, shall destroy their camps
with rocks of fire. Their slain shall lie upon the ground, innumerable as the
sands. Beasts and men shall die, and the whole camp shall perish, and flame
shall be set loose against the sea and against the islands. The bow of Gog, the
evil king, shall fall from his left hand, and the arrows from his left (Ezekiel
39.3); and his camp shall be wholly destroyed. Then the Lord from His glorious
heaven shall set up His peace. And the kingdom of the Romans [the Orthodox
Christian empire] shall rise in place of this latter people, and establish its
dominion upon the earth, even to its ends, and there shall be no one who will
resist it…”[56]
It
is not known whether the resurrected empire mentioned here by St. Ephraim is the
New Rome, Constantinople, whose resurrection is foretold by several Greek
prophecies, or the Third Rome, Russia, whose resurrection is prophesied by a
number of recent Russian prophecies. Perhaps it is both. But one thing is
clear: that the state defeated in the world war, and called locusts in Joel and Revelation,
and Gog and Magog in Ezekiel,
is Russia. Thus St. Nilus the Myrrh-gusher says: “All the nations of Europe
will be armed against Russia. The Tsar [i.e. the Russian leader, whatever his
contemporary title] will summon all his European and Asiatic peoples. The
belligerents will meet in an immensely wide plain where a terrific battle will
be fought and will last for eight days. The result will be a victory of the
West over the Russians.”[57]
It
seems reasonable to identify this eight-day battle with the two three-day
battles mentioned by the anonymous Athonite prophet of 1053, which also ends in
the defeat of Russia, the intervention of an angel and the resurrection of
Orthodoxy: “Battle of seven states for Constantinople and slaughter for three
days. Victory of the largest state over the six. Union of the six states
against the seventh, Russia, and slaughter for three days. Cessation of the war by an Angel of Christ God, and handing over of
the city to the Greeks. Submission of the Latins to the unerring faith of the
Orthodox. Exaltation of the Orthodox faith from the East to the West. Cessation
of the Roman papacy. Declaration of one patriarch for the whole of Europe for
five or fifty years. In the seventh is no wretched man; no one is banished.
Returning to the arms of Mother Church rejoicing. Thus shall it be. Thus shall
it be. Amen.”
St.
Agathangelus confirms that the Roman papacy will bow to the Truth of Orthodoxy:
“Stone will not be left upon stone in your walls, and you will be desolate like
the holy city of David. You will humble your haughty neck and go to worship
with him who conquered my sanctuary in Byzantium.” And he also confirms the
fifty-year peace: “For full fifty years peace shall reign. Truth shall triumph,
and the sky will rejoice in true glory. The Orthodox faith will be exalted and
will spring from East to West to be blessed and praised… Then God shall be
glorified, and man shall see the works of His omnipotence. May it be so. It
shall be so. Amen.”[58]
It
is of these years that the Lord says through the Prophet Joel: I will restore all those years that the
locusts have taken (2.25).
After
the world war, according to the Greek prophecies, an Orthodox king will come to
power in Constantinople with the name of John. who, according to Emperor Leo
the Wise, will nationalise essential goods and services, make homosexuality a
capital offence, cleanse the Church of false priests and install true ones.
This is in accordance with another, anonymous prophecy, which says that he will
“chase the bad priests from the sanctuary and re-establish God’s altar”.[59]And
according to St. Nilus the Myrrh-gusher he will convene “a last and Eighth
Ecumenical Council to deal with the disputes of heretics and separate the wheat
from the chaff.”[60] As we have
seen, St. Seraphim of Sarov also prophesied the convening of a last great
Council - but by a Russian emperor. According to St. Andrew the
Fool-for-Christ, he will “lay his right hand on the nations all around, taming
the blonde nations”, and Hieromartyr Methodius says that he “will go out
against the Ishmaelites [i.e. the Muslims]”, and “will divide them into three
parts. The first part” he will destroy “with the sword”, “but the second he
will baptize”, and the third he will enslave in the East.[61]
St. Cosmas of Aitolia prophesied that “the Turks will learn the mysteries three
times faster than the Christians.”[62]
Then, continues St. Methodius, “the earth’s treasures will be opened up and
everyone will become rich. There will be no paupers, the earth will bring forth
a hundred-fold, and the weapons of war will be turned into ploughs and scythes.
And he [the king] will reign for thirty-five years.”[63]
As St. Cosmas puts it:: “Happy will he be who lives after the general war. He
will eat with silver spoons.”[64]
Let
us consider some further prophecies:-
1.
Hieromonk Anthony of St. Sabbas’ Monastery, based on Anonymous Greek Prophecies
(8th or 9th century): “The last days have not yet
arrived, and it is completely wrong to consider that we are on the threshold of
the coming of the antichrist, because one last flourishing of Orthodoxy is
still to come, this time in the whole world, headed by Russia. This will take
place after a terrible war in which either one half or two thirds of humanity
will perish, and which will be stopped by a voice from heaven: ‘And the
Gospel will be preached throughout the world’.
“1)
For until that time there will have been preached, not the Gospel of Christ,
but the Gospel distorted by heretics.
“2)
There will be a period of universal prosperity - but not for long.
“3)
In Russia during this period there will an Orthodox tsar, whom the Lord will
reveal to the Russian people.
“And
after this the world will again be corrupted and will no longer be capable of
correction. Then the Lord will allow the enthronement of the Antichrist.”[65]
2.
Another Anonymous Prophecy from St. Sabbas’ Monastery (8th or 9th century):
“At various times this great people [the Russians] will fall into sin and for this
will be chastised through considerable trials. In about a thousand years [i.e.
in the 1900s] this people, chosen by God, will falter in its Faith and its
standing for the Truth of Christ. It will become proud of its earthly might and
glory, will cease to seek the Kingdom and will want paradise not in Heaven but
on this sinful earth.
“However
not all this people will tread this broad and pernicious path, though a
substantial majority will, especially its governing class. On account of this
great fall, a terrible fiery trial will be sent from on high to this people
which will despise the ways of God. Rivers of blood shall flow across their
land, brother shall slay brother, more than once famine shall visit the land
and gather its dread harvest, nearly all the churches and other holy places
shall be destroyed or suffer sacrilege, many shall perish.
“A
part of this people, rejecting iniquity and untruth, will pass over the borders
of their homeland and will be dispersed like unto the people of the Jews all
over the world. Nevertheless the Lord will not show His wrath on them to the
uttermost. The blood of thousands of martyrs will cry to the heavens for mercy.
A spirit of sobriety will grow among this chosen people and they will return to
God. At last this period of cleansing trial, appointed by the Righteous Judge,
will come to an end, and once more Holy Orthodoxy will shine forth and those
northern lands will be resplendent with the brightness of a faith reborn.
“This
wonderful light of Christ will shine forth from there and enlighten all the
peoples of the earth. This will be helped by that part of the people
providentially sent ahead into the diaspora, who will create centres of
Orthodoxy - churches of God all over the world. Christianity will then be
revealed in all its heavenly beauty and fullness. Most of the peoples of the
world will become Christian. And for a time a period of peace, prosperity and
Christian living will come to the whole world…
“And
then? Then, when the fullness of time has come, a great decline in faith will
begin and everything foretold in the Holy Scriptures will occur. Antichrist
will appear and the world will end.”[66]
3.
Monk Abel the Prophet (+1831). In a conversation with Tsar Paul I (+1801),
after prophesying the destinies of all the Tsars from Paul I to Nicholas II:
“What is impossible for man is possible for God. God delays with His help, but
it is said that he will give it soon and will raise the horn of Russian
salvation. And there will arise a great prince from your race in exile, who
stands for the sons of his people. He will be a chosen one of God, and on his
head will be blessing. He will be the only one comprehensible to all, the very
heart of Russia will sense him. His appearance will be sovereign and radiant, and
nobody will say: ‘The Tsar is here or there’, but all will say: ‘That’s him’.
The will of the people will submit to the mercy of God, and he himself will
confirm his calling… His name has occurred three times in Russian history. Two
of the same name have already been on the throne, but not on the Tsar’s throne.
But he will sit on the Tsar’s throne as the third. In him will be the salvation
and happiness of the Russian realm.”
4.
St. Seraphim of Sarov (+1833): “There will one day be a Tsar who will glorify
me [Nicholas II glorified St. Seraphim in 1903], after which there will be a
great disturbance in Russia, much blood will flow because they will rise up
against this Tsar and autocracy, but God will magnify the Tsar”.
“More than half a century will pass. Then evildoers will raise their heads high. This will happen without fail: the Lord, seeing the impenitent evil of their hearts, will allow their enterprises for a short time. But their sickness will rebound upon their own heads, and the unrighteousness of their destructive plots will fall upon them. The Russian land will become red with rivers of blood…
“Before
the birth of the Antichrist there will be a great, protracted war and a
terrible revolution in Russia passing all bounds of human imagination, for the
bloodletting will be most terrible: the rebellions of Ryazan, Pugachev and the
French revolution will be nothing in comparison with what will take place in
Russia. Many people who are faithful to the fatherland will perish, church
property and the monasteries will be robbed; the Lord’s churches will be
desecrated; good people will be robbed of their riches and killed, rivers of
Russian blood will flow… But the Lord will have mercy on Russia and will bring
her along the path of great sufferings to glory.”
“The
Lord has revealed to me, wretched Seraphim, that there will be great woes on
the Russian land, the Orthodox faith will be trampled on, and the hierarchs of
the Church of God and other clergy will depart from the purity of Orthodoxy.
And for this the Lord will severely punish them. I, wretched Seraphim, besought
the Lord for three days and three nights that He would rather deprive me of the
Kingdom of Heaven, but have mercy on them. But the Lord replied: ‘I will not
have mercy on them; for they teach the teachings of men, and with their tongue
honour Me, but their heart is far from Me.’”
“The
Lord has ordained that I, poor Seraphim, am to live much longer than 100 years
[he died for the first time at the age of 73 in 1833]. By that time the Russian
hierarchs will become so impious that they will not even believe in the most
important dogma of the Faith of Christ – the resurrection of Christ and the
general resurrection. That is why it will be pleasing to the Lord God to take
me from this very temporary life for a time and then, for the establishment of
the dogma of the resurrection, to raise me, and my resurrection will be like
the resurrection of the seven youths in the cave of Okhlon… After my
resurrection I will go from Sarov to Diveyevo, when I will preach universal
repentance. At this great miracle people will assemble in Diveyevo from all the
ends of the earth, and there, preaching repentance to them, I will open four
relics. Then Diveyevo will be a universal wonder, for from it the Lord God will
send the Light of Salvation not only for Russia, but also for the whole world
in the times of the Antichrist. I will open four relics and I myself will lie
down between them as the fifth. But then will come the end of everything…”
“I
think… that the eighth thousand [of years: 1992 A.D. = 7500 since the creation
of the world] will pass. I think that it will pass!… Everything will pass and
come to an end. And the monasteries… will be destroyed, but at poor Seraphim’s
in Diveyevo the bloodless Sacrifice [the true Eucharist] will be celebrated
until the very day of the coming of Christ.”
“Constantinople
and Jerusalem will be inhabited by the combined powers of Russia and the
others. At the division of Turkey almost all will go to Russia, and Russia with
the united forces of many other States will take Vienna, and about 7 million
native Viennese will remain under the house of the Hapsburgs, and there the
territory of the Austrian empire will be constructed. To France for her love
for the Mother of God, the holy Madonna, will be given up to 17 million
Frenchmen with its capital in the city of Rheims, while Paris will be
completely destroyed… When the Russian Empire will receive 170 million into its
dominion, we must expect the appearance of the Antichrist. 1) The Antichrist
will be born in Russia between Petersburg and Moscow, in that great town which
will be formed after the union of all the Slavic tribes with Russia. It will be
the second capital of the Russian Kingdom and will be called ‘Moscow-Petrograd’,
or ‘the City of the End’, which name will be given to it by the Lord God, the
Holy Spirit, Who foresees everything from afar. 2) Before the birth of the
Antichrist an Eighth Ecumenical Council must be convened of all the Churches
under the One Head, Christ and under the one Protecting Veil of the Mother of
God [according to St. Nilus the myrrh-gusher: “a last and eighth Ecumenical
Council to deal with the disputes of heretics and separate the wheat from the
chaff]. Its aim will be to unite and reunite all the holy Churches of Christ
against the growing antichristian tendency under a single Head, Christ the
Life-Giver, and under a single Protecting Veil of His Most Pure Mother, and to
deliver to a final curse against the whole of Masonry and all the parties
similar to it (under whatever names they may appear), the leaders of whom have
one common aim: under the pretext of complete egalitarian earthly prosperity,
and with the aid of people who have been made fanatical by them, to create
anarchy in all states and to destroy Christianity throughout the world, and,
finally, by the power of gold concentrated in their hands, to subdue the whole
world to antichristianity in the person of a single autocratic, God-fighting
tsar - one king over the whole world.
“Satan
was the first revolutionary and through this fell from heaven. Between the
teaching of his followers and the teaching of the Lord Jesus Christ there is
nothing in common, but a huge gulf. The Lord through the doing of the
commandments given by Him calls mankind to heaven, where righteousness dwells.
The spirit of darkness promises the building of paradise on earth.
“The
Jews and the Slavs are the two peoples of the destinies of God, the vessels and
witnesses of Him, the unbroken arks; but the other peoples will be as it were
spittle which the Lord will spit out of His mouth. The Jews were scattered over
the face of the whole earth because they did not accept and did not recognise
the Lord Jesus Christ. But in the times of the Antichrist many Jews will be
converted to Christ, since they will understand that the Messiah whom they
mistakenly wait for is none other than he about whom our Lord Jesus Christ
said: ‘I have come in the name of My Father, and they have not received Me,
another will come in his own name, and they will receive him.’ And so, in spite
of their great crime before God, the Jews were and are a people beloved before
God. But the Slavs are beloved of God because they will preserve true faith in
the Lord Jesus Christ to the end. They will completely reject the Antichrist
and will not accept him as the Messiah, for which they will be counted worthy
of great blessings by God. They will be the first and most powerful people on
the earth, and there will be no more powerful state than the Russian-Slavic in
the world.
“Jesus Christ, the true God-man, the Son of God the Father by the descent of the Holy Spirit, was born in Israel, while the true antichrist-man-god will be born amidst the Slavs and Russians. He will be the son of a virgin adulteress of the tribe of Dan and the son of the devil through the artificial transfer to her of male seed, with which the spirit of darkness will dwell together in her womb. But one of the Russians who will live to the birth of the Antichrist will, like Simeon the God-receiver, who blessed the Child Jesus and announced His nativity to the world, will curse the antichrist at his birth and will announce to the world that he is the true antichrist.” [67]
5.
Elder Porphyrius of Glinsk (+1868) said: “In due course, faith will
collapse in Russia. The brilliance of earthly glory will blind the mind. The
word of truth will be defiled, but with regard to the Faith, some from among
the people, unknown to the world, will come forward and restore what was
scorned.”[68]
6.
Archimandrite Jonah (Miroshnichenko) (+1902) said: “You will see what will
happen in fifty years’ time: everyone will forsake the Law of God and will fall
away from the faith, but then they will again come to their senses and turn
back and live in a Christian manner.”[69]
7.
Elder Barnabas of Gethsemane Skete (+1906): “Persecutions against the faith
will constantly increase. There will be unheard-of grief and darkness, and
almost all the churches will be closed. But when it will seem that it is
impossible to endure any longer, then deliverance will come. There will be a
flowering. Churches will even begin to be built. But this will be a flowering
before the end.”[70]
8.
St. John of Kronstadt (+1908): “I foresee the restoration of a powerful
Russia, still stronger and mightier than before. On the bones of these martyrs,
remember, as on a strong foundation, will the new Russia we built - according
to the old model; strong in her faith in Christ God and in the Holy Trinity!
And there will be, in accordance with the covenant of the holy Prince Vladimir,
a single Church! Russian people have ceased to understand what Rus’ is: it is
the footstool of the Lord’s Throne! The Russian person must understand this and
thank God that he is Russian”.[71]
“The
Church will remain unshaken to the end of the age, and a Monarch of Russia, if
he remains faithful to the Orthodox Church, will be established on the Throne
of Russia until the end of the age.”[72]
9.
Elder Aristocles of Moscow (+1918): “An evil will shortly take Russia, and
wherever this evil goes, rivers of blood will flow. It is not the Russian soul,
but an imposition on the Russian soul. It is not an ideology, nor a philosophy,
but a spirit from hell. In the last days Germany will be divided. France will
be just nothing. Italy will be judged by natural disasters. Britain will lose
her empire and all her colonies and will come to almost total ruin, but will be
saved by praying enthroned women. America will feed the world, but will finally
collapse. Russia and China will destroy each other. Finally, Russia will be
free and from her believers will go forth and turn many from the nations to
God.”[73]
“Now
we are undergoing the times before the Antichrist. But Russia will yet be delivered.
There will be much suffering, much torture. The whole of Russia will become a
prison, and one must greatly entreat the Lord for forgiveness. One must repent
of one’s sins and fear to do even the least sin, but strive to do good, even
the smallest. For even the wing of a fly has weight, and God’s scales are
exact. And when even the smallest of good in the cup tips the balance, then
will God reveal His mercy upon Russia.”
“The end will come through China. There will be an extraordinary outburst and a miracle of God will be manifested. And there will be an entirely different life, but all this will not be for long.”
“God
will remove all leaders, so that Russian people should look only at Him.
Everyone will reject Russia, other states will renounce her, delivering her to
herself – this is so that Russian people should hope on the help of the Lord.
You will hear that in other countries disorders have begun similar to those in
Russia. You will hear of war, and there will be wars. But wait until the Germans
take up arms, for they are chosen as God’s weapon to punish Russia – but also
as a weapon of deliverance later. The
Cross of Christ will shine over the whole world and our Homeland will be
magnified and will become as a lighthouse in the darkness for all.”[74]
10.
Martyr-Eldress Duniushka of Siberia (+1918): “Brother will rise up against
brother! They will destroy everything acquired by their ancestors… They will
sweep away religion, and -- most importantly -- there will be no master in the
land!” The master in the land, of course, is the Tsar’ – God’s Anointed One! He
cannot go anywhere. This trouble will come upon everyone and grind them up, as
though in a meat-grinder… The war will end, and its end will turn the whole
country upside-down. Insurgents will appear – leaders – who will incite the
people against the Tsar’… It will be terrible!
“And later, they will seize upon religion. They will sweep away that which has been gathered through the ages and assiduously preserved by our ancestors. But it will be impossible for them to root it out; the roots will remain – and, after many years, they’ll give forth a most-beautiful bloom and fruit…
“The Tsar will leave the nation, which shouldn’t be, but this has been foretold to him from Above. This is His destiny. There is no way that He can evade it. For this, He will receive a martyr’s crown on earth, for which he will then receive an eternal crown, a Heavenly one… He will be a prayerful Intercessor for the nation and the people, when the chastisement fallen upon dozens of generations for the harm done to God’s Anointed One will reach an end… The generations to come will bear the responsibility for this act on the part of their ancestors… The disaster in the land will disperse the people; they will be scattered to various countries, losing touch with one another. But, wherever Russians go, they will bring their culture and their religion.
“At the far end of Russia,
there will be an enormous earthquake. The waters will break out of the ocean,
flooding the continent, and many nations will perish. Many diseases beyond
understanding will appear… The face of the earth will change… The people will
comprehend their guilt; they will come to understand how far they have departed
from God and from His teachings, and then they will begin to be reborn
spiritually, gradually being cleansed physically, as well. People will become
vegetarians. By that time, many animals will have vanished. The horse and the
dog will only be seen in pictures; and later – the cow, the goat, and the sheep
will disappear forever from our planet… People will no longer be interested in
politics, and the spiritual principle of each nation will predominate…
“Russia will be supreme in the
world. Her name will be ‘Holy Rus’. All sects and religions will pour into
Orthodoxy… But Orthodoxy, and -- essentially speaking -- religion, will draw
closer to what it was in Apostolic times. . . . In those centuries to come,
there will no longer be any tsars or kings. In ‘Holy Rus’,’ a Prince will
reign, who will come from the nation that gave us our religion [i.e.,
Byzantium]. He will be a supremely spiritual person, who will provide the
opportunity for uplifting the moral fibre and the spiritual principles of the
nation…
“In the course of one of those
centuries, Asia will bestir herself; she will try to penetrate into Europe, but
her attempts will be futile. No one will ever overcome ‘Holy Rus’, and only
through her will salvation come to the world… “[75]
11.
Hieromartyr Andronicus, Archbishop of Perm (+1918): “For its oath-breaking
God has for the time being taken reason and will from the whole people, until
they repent. It will be slow, but they will repent, at first gradually, but
then they will completely recover their spiritual sight, they will feel
strength and, like Ilya Muromets, will cast off this horror which has wrapped
round the whole of our country… Perhaps I will not be alive, but I do not
abandon my hope and confidence that Russia will be resurrected and return to
God.”[76]
12.
Elder Anatolius (Potapov) of Optina (+1922) “There will be a storm. And the
Russian ship will be destroyed. Yes, it will happen, but, you know, people can
be saved on splinters and wreckage. Not all, not all will perish…” But he also
prophesied that canonical unity would be restored: “A great miracle of God will
be revealed. And all the splinters and wreckage will, by the will of God and
His might, be gathered together and united, and the ship will be recreated in
its beauty and will go along the path foreordained for it by God. That’s how it
will be, a miracle manifest to all…”[77]
13.
Elder Alexis (Mechev) of Moscow (+1922): “When the time comes, God will
sent the necessary people, who will do this work [the salvation of Russia] and
will annihilate the Bolsheviks in the same way that a storm breaks the wood of
a mast.”[78]
14.
Elder Nectarius of Optina (+1928): “Russia will arise, and materially she
will not be wealthy. But in spirit she will be wealthy, and in Optina there
will yet be seven luminaries, seven pillars.”[79]
15.
Martyr-Eldress Agatha of Belorussia (+1939): “The atheist Soviet power will
vanish, and all its servants will perish. The True Orthodox Faith will triumph,
and people will be baptised as at one time they were baptized under St.
Vladimir.”[80]
16.
Archbishop Theophanes of Poltava (+1940): “The coming of the Antichrist
draws nigh and is very near. But before the coming of the Antichrist Russia
must yet be restored - to be sure, for a short time. And in Russia there must
be a Tsar forechosen by the Lord Himself. He will be a man of burning faith,
great mind and iron will. This much has been revealed about him…”[81]
“He will not be a Romanov, but he will be of the Romanovs according to the
maternal line.”[82]
“I
do not speak from myself. But that which I have heard from the God-inspired
elders, that I have passed on… The Lord will have mercy on Russia for the sake
of the small remnant of true believers. In Russia, the elders said, in
accordance with the will of the people, the Monarchy, Autocratic power, will be
re-established. The Lord has forechosen the future Tsar. He will be a man of
fiery faith, having the mind of a genius and a will of iron. First of all he
will introduce order in the Orthodox Church, removing all the untrue, heretical
and lukewarm hierarchs. And many, very many - with few exceptions, all - will
be deposed, and new, true, unshakeable hierarchs will take their place. He will
be of the family of the Romanovs according to the female line. Russia will be a
powerful state, but only for ‘a short time’… And then the Antichrist will come
into the world, with all the horrors of the end as described in the
Apocalypse.”[83]
17. Hieroschemamonk Seraphim
(Vyritsky) of Moscow (+1942): “When the East will get stronger, everything will become
shaky. Numbers are on their side. But not only that: they have sober workers
and industrious people, while there is such drunkenness with us… There will
come a time when Russia will be torn into pieces. At first they will divide it,
and then they will begin to steal its wealth. The West will do everything to
help the destruction of Russia and for a time will give its eastern part to
China. The Far East will fall into the hands of Japan, and Siberia – to the
Chinese, who will begin to move into Russia, marry Russian women and in the end
by cunning and craftiness will seize the territory of Siberia as far as the
Urals. But when China will want to go further, the West will resist and will
not allow it… The East will be baptised in Russia. The whole heavenly world,
together with those on earth, understand this, and pray for the enlightenment
of the East.”
18.
Elder Theodosius (Kashin) of Minvody (+1948) said, shortly after the
outbreak of war with Germany in 1941: “Do you really think that that was the
war (1941-45)?! The war is still to come. It will begin from the east. And then
from all sides, like locusts, the enemies will spread over Russia… That will be
the war!”
“During
that memorable conversation,” wrote Schema-Archimandrite Seraphim (Tyapochkin),
“a woman from a Siberian town was present. The elder said to her: ‘You will
receive a martyr’s crown from the hands of the Chinese in your town’s stadium,
where they will drive the Christians who live there and those who do not agree
with their rule. This was the reply to her doubts with regard to the words of
the elder that practically the whole of Siberia will be captured by the
Chinese. The elder told what had been revealed to him about the future of
Russia, he did not name dates, he only emphasized that the time for the
accomplishment of his words was in the hands of God, and much depended on how
the spiritual life of the Russian Church would develop, insofar as the strength
of faith in God among the Russian people would correspond to the believers’
struggles in prayer… The elder said that the collapse of Russia, in spite of
her apparent strength and the cruelty of the authorities, would take place very
quickly. At first the Slavic peoples will be split off, then the Union
republics will fall away: the Baltic, Central Asia and Caucasian republics and
Moldavia. After this central power in Russia will weaken still more, so that
autonomous republics and regions will begin to separate themselves. Then a
great collapse will take place: the power of the Centre will cease to be
recognized de facto by the autonomous regions, which will try to live
independently and will no longer pay any attention to orders from Moscow. The
greatest tragedy will be the seizure of Siberia by China. This will not take
place through military means: in consequence of the weakening of the
authorities and the open frontiers, masses of Chinese will move into Siberia,
will snap up property, enterprises and flats. By means of bribery, intimidation
and agreements with the authorities, they will gradually take control of the
economic life of the towns. Everything will take place in such a way that one
morning the Russians living in Siberia will wake up… in a Chinese state. The
destiny of those who remain there will be tragic, but not hopeless. The Chinese will deal cruelly with
every attempt at resistance. (That was why the elder prophesied a martyric end
in the stadium of the Siberian town for many Orthodox and patriots of the
Homeland.) The West will assist this creeping conquest of our land and in every
way support the military and economic might of China out of hatred for Russia.
But then they will see the danger for themselves, and when the Chinese try to
conquer the Urals, this time by military might, and go even further, they will
by all means hinder this and will even be able to help Russia in deflecting the
invasion from the East. Russia must stand her ground in this battle; after
sufferings and complete impoverishment she will find in herself the strength to
recover. And the coming regeneration will begin in the lands conquered by the
enemies, in the midst of Russians left in the former republics of the Union.
There Russian people will realise what they have lost, will recognise
themselves to be citizens of that Fatherland which is still alive, and will
want to help her rise from the ashes. Many Russians living abroad will begin to
help the re-establishment of life in Russia… Many of those who are able to flee
from persecutions will return to the immemorial Russian lands so as to fill up
the abandoned villages, till the neglected fields and use the mineral resources
that remain untapped. The Lord will send help, and, in spite of the fact that
the country will have lost its main seams of raw materials, they will find the
oil and gas without which a contemporary economy cannot work, in Russia. The
elder said that the Lord would permit the loss of huge territories given to
Russia because we ourselves were not able to use them worthily, but only
spoiled and polluted them… But the Lord will leave in Russia’s possession those
lands which became the cradle of the Russian people and were the base of the
Great Russian state. This is the territory of the Great Muscovite Principality
of the 16th century with outlets to the Black, Caspian and North
seas. Russia will not be rich, but still she will be able to feed herself and
force others to reckon with her. To the question: “What will happen to Ukraine
and Belorussia?” the elder replied that everything is in the hands of God.
Those among those people who are against union with Russia – even if they
consider themselves to be believers – will become servants of the devil. The
Slavic peoples have one destiny, and the monastic Fathers of the Kiev Caves
[Lavra] will yet utter their weighty word – they together with the choir of the
new martyrs of Russia will by their prayers obtain a new Union of the three
brother peoples. The posed one more question to him – on the possibility of the
restoration of a monarchy in Russia. The elder replied that this restoration
must be earned. It exists as a possibility, but not as something
pre-determined. If we are worthy, the Russian people will elect a Tsar, but
this will become possible before the very enthronement of the Antichrist or
even after it – for a very short time.”[84]
19.
Blessed Pelagia of Ryazan (+1968): “The bishops of the Russian Orthodox
Church will fall away from the truth of the Orthodox Faith, they will not
believe in the prophecies of the resurrection of Russia. To reprove them St.
Seraphim of Sarov will be raised from the dead… He will reprove the clergy for
their treachery and betrayal, and will preach repentance to the whole world.
Seraphim of Sarov will explain the whole of history, will recount everything
and will reprove the pastors like children, will show them how to cross
themselves, and much else… After such wonderful miracles the clergy will have a
devotion for the Lord, that is, it will teach the people to serve the
batyushka-tsar with all their heart.
“The
Antichrist will come to power and will begin to persecute Orthodoxy. And then
the Lord will reveal His tsar in Russia. He will be of royal family and will be
a strong defender of our faith… When the Lord will give this very intelligent
person, life will be good!… The Antichrist will declare himself from America.
And the whole world will bow down to him except Tsarist Orthodox Russia.”
10.3-4. And
cried with a loud voice, as when a lion roareth. And when he cried, seven
thunders uttered their voices. And when the seven thunders had uttered their
voices, I was about to write. And I heard a voice from heaven saying unto me:
Seal up those things which the seven thunders uttered, and write them not.
Again,
we are reminded of Daniel: And thou,
Daniel, close the words, and seal the book to the time of the end; until many
are taught, and knowledge is increased (12.4). Here the sealing of the
prophecy of the seven thunders may signify the postponement of the final
judgement of the world, and a brief period of peace and prosperity, as
indicated by the prophets quoted above.
10.5-6. And
the angel whom I saw stand upon the sea and upon the earth lifted up his hand
to heaven, and sware by Him Who liveth unto the ages of ages, Who created
heaven, and the things that therein are, and the earth, and the things that
therein are, and the sea, and things which are therein, that there should be
time no longer.
The
doctrine of God the Creator is emphasized here after the destruction of that
generation of men who, through the evil doctrine of Darwinism, rejected the
existence of the Creator, Who is the
Beginning of every beginning (I Chronicles 29.12). And in general
the apostasy of the Christian world has gone so far that the re-conversion of
the world must begin with this primary doctrine, a reaffirmation of the
teaching that in the beginning God
created the heavens and the earth (Genesis 1.1).
As
the Church proclaims on the Sunday of Orthodoxy: “To those who deny the
existence of God and affirm that this world is self-existent, and everything in
it arose by chance and not by the Providence of God, anathema, anathema, anathema.”
“There should be time no longer, i.e.
the usual cycle of the elements of the world is to cease; there will be no time
as measured by the sun and eternity will begin.” (Archbishop Averky)
“For
time,” writes St. John of Damascus, “will not be counted by days and nights
even after the resurrection, but there will rather be one day with no evening,
wherein the Sun of Righteousness will shine brightly on the righteous, but for
the sinful there will be night profound and limitless.”[85]
“Here
it is important that the angel swore by
Him Who liveth unto the ages of ages, i.e., by God Himself. Consequently
those sectarians are wrong who consider that no oath whatsoever is to be
allowed.” (Archbishop Averky).
10.7. But in
the days of the voice of the seventh angel, when he shall begin to sound, the
mystery of God should be finished, as He hath declared to His servants the
prophets.
“That
is, there shall soon begin the last of the seven epochs of the existence of the
world and the seventh angel shall trumpet. Then will come to an end the mystery of God prophesied by our
prophets, that is, the end of the world and everything that is to occur in
connection with it.” (Archbishop Averky)
Or;
there will begin the last of the seven parts of the last period in the world’s
history, that period which began with the First World War and the Russian
revolution, and will end with the reign of the personal Antichrist.
According
to Th. Yakovlev, the mystery here referred to “has now been revealed,
being that which the apostles often referred to (Ephesians 1.8, 3.6) –
the conversion of the Gentiles, which took place swiftly throughout the world
after the destruction of Roman lordship and superstition.”[86]
However, if we are right in referring this prophecy to a much later date, to
the time of the Third World War and its aftermath, then the mystery can
still refer to the conversion of the Gentiles, but this time truly
throughout the whole world, far beyond the limits of the Roman empire.
For the angelic voice that ends the war, as we have seen, declares: And the
Gospel will be preached throughout the world.
10.8-11. And the
voice which I heard from heaven spake unto me again, and said: Go and take the
little book which is open in the hand of the angel who standeth upon the sea
and upon the earth. And went unto the angel, and said unto him: Give me the
little book. And he said unto me: Take it, and eat it up; and it shall make thy
belly bitter, but it shall be in thy mouth as sweet as honey. And I took the
little book out of the angel’s hand, and ate it up; and it was in my mouth as
sweet as honey. And as soon as I had eaten it, my belly was bitter. And he said
unto me: thou must prophesy again before peoples, and nations, and tongues, and
kings.
“Here
is indicated the fact that St. John has received the prophetic gift just as the
Old Testament prophets received it. For example, the holy Prophet Ezekiel, to
whom it was likewise commanded to eat a scroll of a book before he was sent by
the Lord to preach to the house of Israel (Ezekiel 2.8-10, 3.1-4).
“The
sweetness and bitterness in the explanation of St. Andrew signify the
following: ‘Sweet for you.’ he says, ‘is the knowledge of the future. At the
same time it is bitter for the
belly, i.e. the heart, the dwelling place of the food of the Word because of
compassion for those who will have to endure the punishments sent down by God’s
decrees. This is also to be interpreted in another way inasmuch as the holy
evangelist had not experienced evil deeds; by this swallowing of the book which
contained the deeds of the impious is indicated to him that at the beginning of
sin there is sweetness, and after the accomplishment, bitterness, by reason of
revenge and reward.’ (St. Andrew of Caesarea) The compassionate heart of the
apostle could not but feel the whole bitterness of the grief which awaits
sinful mankind. In conclusion, St. John received the command to prophesy.”
(Archbishop Averky)
The
fact that St. John is told that he must
prophesy before many peoples, and nations, and tongues, and kings may
indicate that in the very last period of world history which is about to be unfolded
in the Apocalypse - the reign of the personal Antichrist, described in chapter
11 - St. John himself will play an important role alongside the two witnesses;
for there is a tradition, based, it would seem, on the mystery surrounding his
death and burial, after which no body was found[87],
that St. John will be resurrected from the dead to preach in the flesh against
the Antichrist.[88]
Some
of the Fathers - St. Hippolytus, St. Ambrose of Milan, St. Gregory of Tours and
St. Simeon the Translator - believed that St. John disappeared rather than
died. Others, however, - St. Jerome, St. Augustine, St. Isidore and St.
Epiphanius - said that he did die. And still others - the Fathers of the Third
Ecumenical Council, St. Celestine and St. John Chrysostom - spoke of his relics
as having existed.
A
not dissimilar tradition is recounted in the Gospel itself: Then Peter, turning about, seeth the
disciple whom Jesus loved following; who also leaned on His breast at supper,
and said: Lord, who is he that betrayeth thee? Peter, seeing him, saith to
Jesus: Lord, and what shall this man do? Jesus saith unto him: If I will that
he tarry till I come, what is that to thee? Follow thou Me. Then went this
saying abroad among the brethren that that disciple should not die. Yet Jesus
said not unto him: he shall not die; but: if I will that he tarry till I come,
what is that to thee? (John 21.20-23). John himself, it should be
noted, is rather non-committal about the tradition, pointing out only that the
Lord did not expressly say that he would not die. We are left with the
impression that there is some mystery here, which John either did not know, or
did not wish to reveal…
Blessed
Theophylactus of Bulgaria interprets the Lord’s words concerning him to mean:
“I desire that he remain as he is until I return and destroy Jerusalem”
(Jerusalem was destroyed in 70 A.D., after the death of Saints Peter and Paul,
but before the death of St. John). St. John Chrysostom and St. Cyril, however,
give them no more than a conditional meaning: “Even if I desired that this
disciple should remain in the world until I return to judge it, what is it to
you?” In the face of such a diversity of opinions, it would seem best to remain
as non-committal as the holy evangelist himself, and to follow St. Jerome’s
advice: “Our best course is to commit the whole matter to God, for Whom nothing
is impossible, rather than to wish to settle anything rashly by our own
authority, whereof we should not approve…”[89]
Anna
Ilyinskaya writes: “A spiritual son of the elder Fr. Alexis Mechev, Bishop
Stefan (Nikitin) was convinced that before the end of history the Church would
be ruled by the Apostle John, who is preserved in some unattainable place by
the Lord for his last service. The same prophecy was made by the Optina Elder
Nectarius… His spiritual daughter, the nun Nectaria (Kontsevich) asked:
‘Batyushka, they say that John the Theologian will come.’ He replied: ‘That
will all take place, but this is a great mystery…’”[90]
11.1-2. And
there was given me a reed like unto a rod. And the angel stood, saying: Rise,
and measure the temple of God, and the altar, and those that worship therein.
But the court which is without the temple leave out, and measure it not; for it
is given unto the Gentiles; and the holy city shall they tread under foot forty
and two months.
“The
temple of the living God is the Church in which the rational sacrifices are
offered by us. The court which is
without is the society of unbelievers and Jews who are unworthy of the
angelic measuring (i.e. the definition of the degree of their moral perfection
and corresponding blessedness) because of their impiety.” (St. Andrew of
Caesarea)
“The
treading underfoot of the Holy City, Jerusalem, or the Ecumenical Church, for
the course of forty-two months signifies that at the time of the coming of the
Antichrist the faithful will be persecuted for the course of three and a half
years.
“Some
interpreters suppose that this measurement of the temple signifies the speedy
destruction of the Old Testament temple in Jerusalem on the site of which there
is to be raised a New Testament Christian Church, just like a similar
measurement of the temple by means of a reed was given in a vision to the
Prophet Ezekiel (chapters 40-45), signifying the restoration of the destroyed
temple. Others consider that the inner court which was measured by the apostle
signifies the Church of the first-born
in heaven (Hebrews 12.23), the heavenly sanctuary; and that the
outer court left without measurement is the Church of Christ on earth which
must endure persecution, at first from the pagans, and then, in the last times,
from the Antichrist. The miserable condition of the earthly Church is limited,
however, to this period of forty-two months. Some interpreters have seen the
fulfilment of the prophecy of forty-two months in the persecution of
Diocletian, which was distinguished by its great cruelty and which lasted from
February 23rd, 305 to July 25th, 308, which is about three and a half years. The
persecution touches only the outward court, that is, the external aspect of the
life of Christians, whose property will be taken away. They will be subjected
to tortures, while the inner sanctuary of their souls will remain untouched.”
(Archbishop Averky)
The
period three and a half years has great significance in the history of the
people of God. Thus the holy Prophet Elijah spent three and a half years in the
wilderness, fleeing from Jezebel. And in the time of the Maccabees the temple
was desecrated for three and a half years by Antiochus Epiphanes. And “Jesus
Himself spent three and a half years in Egypt, fleeing from Herod.” (Patriarch
Anthimus). And the Christians fled to Pella for three and a half years during
the Romans’ siege of Jerusalem in 66-70 A.D. And the persecution of Diocletian
lasted for three and a half years. And the first period of persecution of the
Russian Church by the Soviet Antichrist lasted for about three and a half
years, from October, 1917 to March, 1921, when the last major rebellion against
Soviet rule, by the sailors of Kronstadt, was crushed. Finally, the persecution
of the personal Antichrist will last for three and a half years.
St,
Gregory the Great writes: “And He spoke
to me and said to me: Go in and shut thyself up in the midst of thy house (Ezekiel
3.24). Why is it that the Prophet is led from the midst of the people of Israel
to the plain, and afterward called from the plain to his house unless that the
grace of preaching was removed from the people of the Jews and scattered among
the breadth of the Gentiles? Nevertheless at the end of the world when the Jews
return to the Faith, as the Prophet is led back to his house, so preaching will
again have its habitation among his people, the preaching which now shines on
the plain among the diverse nations. For it is written: Until the fullness of the Gentiles should come in, and so all Israel
should be saved (Romans 11.25-26). Because it is also said through
another Prophet: If the number of the
children of Israel be as the sand of the sea, a remnant shall be saved (Es.
10.22, Romans 9.27). Therefore the Prophet may go out from the midst of
the people to the plain, and return from the plain to the house, so that the
preaching which happened in Judea may go out to the nations, and when the
nations are replete with the Faith the spiritual Judea may go out to receive
the gifts of doctrine which she lost. Then the Prophet is commanded to be shut
in his house, because in the time of Antichrist the converted mass of the Jews
will be restrained by harsh tribulation by the nations which have remained in
infidelity. Thus it is written: But the
court which is without the temple leave out, and measure it not; for it is
given unto the Gentiles; and the holy city shall they tread under foot forty
and two months (Revelation 11.2).”[91]
This
last period in the history of the Church, the reign of the personal Antichrist,
will be prepared by a drastic decline in Christian morality throughout the
world. Thus when “iniquity shall have multiplied, and all creatures become
defiled,” says St. Ephraim, “Divine Justice shall appear, and shall wholly
destroy the people, and, coming from perdition, the man of iniquity shall be
revealed upon the earth, the seducer of men and disturber of the whole earth.”[92]
St.
Andrew the Fool-for-Christ writes: “When his reign [that of the last Orthodox
emperor] has ended, the beginning of
sorrows will set in. Then the son of iniquity will arise and reign in this
city for three and a half years, and cause such wickedness to be done as has
not been committed since the beginning of the world. He will decree that
fathers should lie with their daughters and mothers with their sons and
brothers with their sisters, and whoever refuses to do so will be punished with
death. The stench and abomination will rise up before the Lord, Who will be
bitterly angered, and He will command His thunder and lightning to smite the
earth. Many cities will be burned down, and men will be paralysed with fear.”[93]
Monasticism
will be especially persecuted, as we can see in the following prophecy of St.
Moses the Egyptian which covers the whole period from the collective Antichrist
to the personal Antichrist: “After this the servant of God Moses saw that a
cloud and storm and dark mist of most terrible temptations fell upon the monks
from the direction of the north [Russia?], and that the monks were persecuted,
together with the monastic schema, by a ruinous combination of heresies, and
many were forced to cast aside the schema and marry. Then the few strugglers
who have been proved as gold and silver in the furnace will triumph in great
sorrow and distress of persecutions. And as many as will appear proved and
victorious in such terrible temptations will be magnified and glorified and
honoured by God more than those who bore the heat of the day and the burning
and frost of the night. After this the servant of God Moses saw that that storm
of sorrows and temptations had passed, together with the distress of terrible
heresies, and it became peaceful and calm. Again, however, after the passing of
some years the angelic order of the monks will be neglected, and temptations
will arise even fiercer and more numerous than the first. And he saw that the
monks impiously had intercourse with the nuns, and that tyranny was mixed with
evil desire so that even the unwilling were corrupted. And the priests were
defiled by fornication, and their wives committed adultery, as they themselves
did with other women. Then the wrath of God will come and consume that wicked
generation, and it will go into the eternal fire.”[94]
Again,
Abba Ischyrion was asked by his monks: “What have we accomplished?” “We have
fulfilled the commandments of God,” replied Ischyrion. “And what will those who
come after us accomplish?” “They will accomplish what we have accomplished, but
only half as much as we.” “And those after them?” “Those in the last days will
have no monastic training, but such assaults and temptations will come upon
them that they will, through these trials, be revealed in the Kingdom of God as
greater than us and than our fathers.”[95]
St.
Niphon of Constantia said: “In the last times those who will serve God in truth
will successfully hide themselves from people and will not perform wonders and
signs in their midst as at the present time, but will go on the path of
activity mixed with humility, and in the Kingdom of Heaven they will be greater
than the Fathers who have been glorified with signs.” “My son! There will not
be lacking holy men until the end of time! But in the last days they will
conceal themselves from people and will please God in such humility that they
will be higher in the Kingdom of Heaven that the first wonderworking fathers.
And their reward will be so great because in those days there will be nobody
performing miracles before their eyes, and people will of themselves receive
zeal and the fear of God in their hearts, for at that time the hierarchical
rank will be unskilled and will not love wisdom and reason, and will worry only
about gain. The monks will be similar to them because of their possession of
great properties; from vainglory their eyes will be darkened, and those who
love God with all their heart will be despised by them; the love of money will
reign in them with all its strength. But woe to the monks who love gold: they
will not see the Face of God! If the monks and novices who lend money on
interest do not depart from this evil quickly, they will be called usurers here
and their prayer will not be accepted, and their fasting will be useless, and
the offering of sacrifices to God and alms will all be counted as abomination
and defilement. They will go by the broad path…”[96]
St.
Narses of Armenia says: “Then if there be grinding two in one mill, the one
shall be taken and the other left. And there shall shoot forth the leaf of the
fig tree, which is the Antichrist. The branches shooting up are his ministers.”[97]
11.3-6. And I
will give power unto My two witnesses, and they shall prophesy a thousand two
hundred and three score days, clothed in sackcloth. These are the two olive
trees, and the two candlesticks standing before the God of the earth. And if
any man will hurt them, fire proceedeth out of their mouth, and devoureth their
enemies. And if any man will hurt them, he must in this manner be killed. These
have power to shut heaven, that it rain not in the days of their prophecy, and
have power over waters, to turn them to blood, and to smite the earth with all
plagues, as often as they will.
According to St. Hippolytus of Roma and the
constant tradition of the Church, these two witnesses, or olive trees
or candlesticks are the Prophets
Enoch and Elijah.
“For when Enoch and Elijah preach,” writes St.
Gregory the Great, “the two who are named the two olive trees by Zechariah (4.3), and the two candlesticks by John, - many of the Jews who then remain
faithless will return to recognition of the truth, as it is said of Elijah: Elijah shall come and restore all things
(Matthew 17.11).”[98]
I will send you Elijah the Tishbite,
who will restore the heart of the father to the son, lest I come and utterly
smite the earth (Malachi 4.5,6)… “And He also teaches with all this the reason
for his coming. And what is this reason? That when He has come, he may persuade
the Jews to believe in Christ, so they may not all utterly perish at His
coming… Hence the extreme accuracy of the expression: He did not say He will restore the heart of the son to the
father, but of the father to the son.
For the Jews being father to the apostles, His meaning is that He will restore
to the doctrines of their sons, that is, of the apostles, the hearts of the
fathers, that is, the Jewish people’s mind.”[99]
“For God gave three laws to the human race:
the natural law, which God commanded Adam in Paradise, and instilled as innate
into the nature of each one of us, and the written law, which He gave to the
Jews on Sinai through Moses, and the Gospel law, which our Lord Jesus Christ
gave through the holy Apostles in Jerusalem. In the last times witnesses of
these laws must appear. Enoch will come as the witness of the natural law, and
Elijah - of the Mosaic law, and the present Evangelist [John] - of the Gospel
law. [John] will be killed together with Enoch and Elijah in the time of the
Antichrist.” (Patriarch Anthimus)[100]
“For the whole course of this time, 1260
days, two witnesses of God will preach repentance to men and convert them from
the deception of the Antichrist. By these two witnesses all the holy fathers and
teachers of the Church almost unanimously understand the Old Testament
righteous ones Enoch and Elijah, who were taken alive into heaven. During their
preaching, while possessing authority and power over the elements in order to
chastise the impious and bring them to their sense, they themselves will be
unharmed.” (Archbishop Averky)
And Enoch walked with God, and he
was not; for God took him (Genesis 5.24). By faith
Enoch was translated, that he should not see death (Hebrews 11.5). And Elijah went up by a whirlwind into
heaven (IV Kings 2.11).
“O
wondrous Grace of God! For He offers a treatment equal in power to the wound.
Just as the false Christ will possess every diabolical activity, and all his
false signs and miracles will be more glorious than all sorcerers and
deceivers, so also will God arm these saints with the power of true signs and
miracles, so that by offering truth and light they may overthrow the lie and
darkness and convert the deceived either by the word of teaching or by the blows
of chastisement (drought, fire, changes in the elements, and so forth), and may
expose the deceiver himself without themselves suffering in the least either
through him or others.” (St. Andrew of Caesarea)
11.7-8. And
when they shall have finished their testimony, the beast that ascendeth out of
the bottomless pit shall make war against them, and shall overcome them, and
kill them. And their dead bodies shall lie in the street of the great city
which spiritually is called Sodom and Egypt, where also our Lord was crucified.
“During
their preaching activity, endowed with power and authority over the elements
for the punishment and instruction of the impious, they will themselves be
invulnerable. And only at the end of their mission, after a period of three and
a half years, the beast that ascendeth
from the bottomless pit (i.e. the Antichrist) will be allowed by God to
kill the preachers, and their corpses will be thrown into the streets of the
great city, which spiritually is called
Sodom and Egypt, where also our Lord was crucified, that is, apparently,
the city of Jerusalem where the Antichrist will found his kingdom, giving
himself out to be the Messiah who was promised by the prophets.” (Archbishop
Averky)
“In
this city he will establish his kingdom and royal throne in the likeness of
David… so as to prove that he is Christ who fulfils the prophet’s words: I shall restore the fallen tabernacle of
David and raise up that which was fallen (Amos 9.11). These words
the Jews will accept and refer to his coming.” (St. Andrew of Caesarea)
St.
Ephraim writes: “When the son of perdition has drawn to his purpose the whole
world, Enoch and Elijah shall be sent to refute the evil one by a question filled
with mildness. Coming to him, these holy men, that they may expose the son of
perdition before the multitudes round about him, will say: ‘If you are God,
show us what we now ask of you. In what place do the men of old, Enoch and
Elijah, lie hidden?’ Then the evil one will at once answer the holy men: ‘If I
wish to seek for them in heaven, or in the depths of the sea, every abode lies
open to me. There is no other God but me, and I can do all things in heaven and
on earth.’ They shall answer the son of perdition: ‘If you are God, call the
dead, and they will rise up. For it is written in the books of the prophets,
and also by the apostles, that Christ, when He shall appear, will raise the
dead from their tombs. If you do not show us this, we shall conclude that He
Who was crucified is greater than you; for He raised the dead, and was Himself
raised to heaven in great glory.’ In that moment the evil one, angered against
the saints, seizing his sword, will most abominably sever the necks of the just
men.”[101]
11.9-10. And
they of the kindreds and tongues and nations shall see their bodies three days
and a half, and shall not suffer their dead bodies to be put in graves. And
they that dwell upon the earth shall rejoice over them, and make merry, and
shall send gifts to one another; because these two prophets tormented those
that dwelt on the earth.
“These
people will be deceived by the false miracles of the Antichrist who, with the
cooperation of the devil, will be the most glorious of all sorcerers and deceivers;
he will not allow the prophets to be given over to burial, and will rejoice in
their death, because these two prophets
tormented those that dwelt on the earth, arousing their consciences.”
(Archbishop Averky)
St.
Narses of Armenia says: “There is rejoicing among the false prophets, when they
behold the death of the true prophets. Then doth the great dragon himself, the
son of perdition, cry aloud in the hearing of all, and say: Behold ye my mighty
power. Since for many a year they had been immortal, and no others can be
rescued from my hands. And no one hath been able to overcome my might. And yet
more doth his wickedness flame up in the land, whom the Lord Jesus shall
utterly destroy with the breath of His mouth.”[102]
This
world-wide rejoicing over the deaths of the prophets suggests a worldwide form
of communications, perhaps television, relaying these events live to millions.[103]
St.
Nilus the Myrrh-gusher writes: “After the murder of Enoch and Elijah,
Antichrist will release his most wicked followers (he will free the evil
spirits, which he had restrained until now). These offspring or spirits of evil
are adultery, fornication, homosexuality, murder, plundering, robbery, lies,
tortures, buying and selling of people, and the buying of boys and girls for
fornication with them, like unto the dogs in the streets. Antichrist will
command these evil spirits who obey him to drive people into doing ten times as
much evil as formerly.”[104]
The
men of that time will be deceived, not because they had no opportunity to come
to a knowledge of the truth, but, on the contrary, because they flew in the
face of the truth as it was openly revealed to them.
For,
as the Apostle Paul says: Then shall
that wicked man be revealed, whom the Lord shall consume with the spirit of His
mouth, and shall destroy with the brightness of His Coming; even him, whose
coming is after the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying
wonders, and with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish;
because they received not the love of the truth, that they should believe a
lie; that they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure
in unrighteousness (II Thessalonians 2.8-12).
Blessed
Theodoretus writes: “The Antichrist will not rule over all, but only over those
who are worthy of perdition, who, even if he had not come, would still have
deprived themselves of salvation.”[105]
And St. John of Damascus writes that the Antichrist will lure to himself “those
who have a weak and feeble mind; he will seduce and tear them away from the
living God.”[106] However,
as St. Ephraim says, “many people will be found pleasing to God, for whom it
will be possible, in the mountains and desert places, to save themselves by
much prayer… For God, seeing their many tears and sincere faith, will have
mercy on them, as a tender Father, and will keep them.”[107]
St.
Seraphim of Sarov said of the temptations facing the faithful Christians of
these last times: “When this age comes to an end, at first the Antichrist will
remove the crosses from the churches and destroy the monasteries… Then life
will be short. The angels will scarcely be able to collect the souls… In the
days of that great sorrow of which it is said that no flesh could be saved
unless, for the sake of the elect, those days will be cut short - in those days
the remnant of the faithful are to experience in themselves something like that
which was experienced by the Lord Himself when He, hanging on the Cross, being
perfect God and perfect Man, felt Himself so forsaken by His Divinity that He
cried out to Him: My God, My God, why
hast Thou forsaken Me? The last Christians also will experience in
themselves a similar abandonment of humanity by the grace of God, but only for
a very short time, after the passing of which the Lord will not delay
immediately to appear in all His glory, and all the holy angels with Him. And
then will be performed in all its fullness everything foreordained from the
ages in the pre-eternal counsel of the Holy Trinity.”[108]
11.11-12. And
after three days and a half the Spirit of life from God entered into them, and
they stood upon their feet; and great fear fell upon those who saw them. And
they heard a great voice from heaven, saying unto them: Come up hither. And
they ascended up to heaven in a cloud; and their enemies beheld them.
“The
evil joy of the impious will be not be long in duration. In three and a half
days the holy prophets will be brought to life by God and raised up to heaven.”
(Archbishop Averky)
11.13. And the
same hour there was a great earthquake, and the tenth part of the city fell,
and in the earthquake were slain of men seven thousand; and the remnant were
affrighted, and gave glory to the God of heaven.
“At
the same time a great earthquake will take place, a tenth part of the city will
be destroyed and seven thousand men will perish, and the remained being seized
with fear will send up glory to the God of heaven. Thus a decisive blow will be
given to the work of the Antichrist.” (Archbishop Averky)
The
figure “seven thousand” recalls the seven
thousand who have not bowed their knees to Baal in the time of the Prophet
Elijah’s first coming to earth (III Kings 19.18).
St.
Hippolytus teaches that Enoch and Elijah will preach for three-and-a-half years
and will be killed in the middle of the Antichrist’s seven-year reign. “As also
it was announced to Daniel: And one week
shall establish the covenant with many; and in the midst of the week My
sacrifice and drink-offering shall be taken away (9.27) - that the one week
[of years] might be shown to be divided into two. The two witnesses, then,
shall preach three years and a half; and the Antichrist shall wage war against
the saints during the rest of the week, and desolate the world.”[109]
And on the holy place shall be the
abomination of desolations; and at the end of time an end shall be put to the
desolation… (Daniel 9.27)
The abomination of desolation,
according to St. Hippolytus, is the Antichrist, “who announces desolation to
the world”; while the sacrifice and oblation are that “which are now
offered to God in every place by the nations” - in other words, the sacrament
of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ.[110]
Thus, according to the same Father, “the honourable Body and Blood of Christ
will not be offered in those days. Public Divine services will be
discontinued.”[111]
This may be the second woe:
11.14. The
second woe is past; and, behold, the third woe cometh quickly.
The
three woes may correspond to the three phases of God’s judgement in the seventh
seal: the Third World War, the reign of the personal Antichrist, and the last
and most terrible judgement when Christ Himself will come in glory.
However,
two passages from Daniel suggest that there is a certain pause between
the defeat of the Antichrist and the final consummation. The first is: The dominion of the rest of the wild beasts
was taken away; but a prolonging of life was given them for a time and a time
(7.12). And the second is: From the time
of the removal of the perpetual sacrifice, when the abomination of desolation
shall be set up, there shall be a thousand two hundred and ninety days. Blessed is he that waits, and comes to the
thousand three hundred and thirty-five days (12.11-12).
St.
Hippolytus comments on the second passage: “When the abomination of desolation
comes and wages war against the saints, whoever will survive his days, and
reach the forty-five days, while the other period of fifty days advances, to
him the Kingdom of Heaven comes. The Antichrist indeed enters even into part of
the fifty days, but the saints shall inherit the Kingdom along with Christ.”[112]
But
why, asks Blessed Jerome, is there a silence of 45 days after the defeat of the
Antichrist? God only knows, he replies, but suggests that this putting off of
the kingdom of the saints is a testing of their patience.[113]
Perhaps
the extra forty-five days mentioned
by Daniel are related to the forty
days mentioned by St. Ephraim the Syrian as intervening between the fall of the
Antichrist and the Last Judgement: “The angels approaching shall seize the
accursed, and in the same moment the Lord shall command from His heavens, and
He shall overthrow the accursed and all his forces and on the instant the
angels shall thrust them down to gehenna. And all who believed in him shall be
thrust down amid the flames. Then the Lord shall descend from on high, amid the
fearful glory of the angels, and His chariot shall halt between heaven and
earth. He shall speak to the sea and it shall dry up, and the fish shall die in
the midst of it. The heavens and the earth shall be dissolved, and become
darkness and gloom. The Lord shall send fire upon the earth, continuing for
forty days, and shall purify it from iniquity, and from the pollution of sin.”[114]
An
unknown Russian priest, the author of a work entitled The Apocalypse,
writes: “According to the tradition of the Glinsk elders, it is also thought
that after the casting of the Antichrist and the false prophet alive into the
gehenna of fire, this world will not immediately come to an end after this.
There will pass another 45 days, and then will come the Terrible Judgement.
When the heavens are opened and the King of Glory, our Lord Jesus Christ, will
appear sitting on a white horse, and when He by the Spirit of His mouth will
kill the Antichrist and the false prophet and those who are with him in
Armageddon, the end of the world will not come immediately after this, but in
the heavens there will remain shining with an ineffable heavenly light that
Cross of the Lord which will precede the Lord of Glory, and on which He was
crucified in the days of His first Coming to earth.
“This
honourable Cross of the Lord will shine in the heavens for 45 days until the
Second Coming of the Lord at the Terrible Judgement, by its appearance calling
those who have remained alive to repentance. Although the Antichrist and the
false prophet will no longer be on earth, the ancient snake-devil will continue
to act on it together with Gog and Magog, thinking to sweep off the face of the
earth the city of Jerusalem in Palestine, where there will begin to gather the
Orthodox Christians who have been hiding in the wilderness and who now feel
some relief from the fact that the Antichrist is no more and that the whole of
his power has been shattered at one moment – it was sufficient merely for
Christ the Saviour to appear in the heavens. The whole world, confused by the
Antichrist and having drunk to the dregs the punishments of God will once more,
by the mercy of God, be called to repentance by the voiceless shining in the
heavens of the honourable Cross. And everyone who calls on the name of the Lord
will be saved!
“Although
the people, deceived by the Antichrist, bowed down to him and received his
seal, and although they thereby lost the capacity to cross themselves, thereby
falling away by their terrible renunciation of Christ the Saviour, our true
God, and although they will have lost the Divine grace of Christ, nevertheless
there will awake in some at the sight of the Cross shining in the heavens a
feeling of repentance and sorrow that they recognised the evil, miserable and
vain Antichrist as God and bowed down to him. Now, at the sight of the Cross of
the Lord, they will bitterly groan and weep about this, and the merciful and
man-loving Lord, not wishing the death of a sinner, but rather that he should
repent, will return His grace to such a Christian…
“St.
Demetrius of Rostov says: ‘After the ruinous death of the Antichrist, those who
remain alive will be given a time for repentance by God, as we see in the
prophecy of Daniel (12.11-12), in which the Angel said that the Antichrist
would reign for 1290 days, and then he added: Blessed is he that waits, and comes to the thousand three hundred and
thirty-five days, that is, there are still 45 days after the death of the
Antichrist.”[115]
11.15-17. And
the seventh angel sounded; and there were great voices in heaven, saying: The
kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of His Christ;
and He shall reign unto the ages of ages. And the four and twenty elders, who
sat before God on their seats, fell upon their faces, and worshipped God,
saying: We give Thee thanks, O Lord God Almighty, Who art, and wast, and art to
come; because Thou has taken to Thee Thy great power, and hast reigned.
The
sounding of the seventh trumpet of the seventh seal heralds the Second Coming
of Christ in glory.
The
Lord called Satan the prince of this
world (John 12.31). And Satan himself claimed to have dominion over the
world when he tempted the Lord, showing Him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them, and saying: All these things will I give Thee, if Thou
wilt fall down and worship me (Matthew 4.8-9). Christ rejected this
temptation; but the Antichrist will accept it, which is why he will be given
power over the whole world.
However,
this power is temporary and illusory. He Who said to Pilate: Thou couldest have no power at all against
Me, unless it were given thee from above (John 19.11; cf. Wisdom
6.1-3), only grants power to the devil and his servants so that sinners may
taste the bitter fruit of their sin and turn to the only true King and God. In
the end, the illusory power of the devil will be smashed and all power given to
Him to Whom every knee should bow, of
things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth (Philippians
2.10).
11.18. And the
nations were angry, and Thy wrath is come, and the time of the dead, that they
should be judged, and that Thou shouldest give reward unto Thy servants the
prophets, and to the saints, and those that fear Thy name, shall and great; and
shouldest destroy those that destroy the earth.
“Finally,
after having been long-suffering, He sends against the unbelieving nations,
which are angry at this as if it were a new or strange teaching, their
punishment. The time of the dead
indicates the time of the resurrection of the dead, in which to each will be
given a reward corresponding to his deeds.
“By
the prophets, and the saints, and those
that fear His name, one may understand three degrees of men: those who
offer fruit a hundredfold, sixtyfold, and thirtyfold (Matthew 13.23).
The apostles, however, will receive the first place and sit on twelve thrones. Small and great, we think, refer either
to the lesser saints and those who surpass them, or else the small are sinners
who have been belittled, and the great are the righteous” (St. Andrew of
Caesarea)
11.19. And the
temple of God was opened in heaven, and there was seen in His temple the ark of
His testament; and there were lightnings, and voices, and thunderings, and an
earthquake, and great hail.
“Then, from the mountains of Palestine, the
Ark of the Covenant will appear. The Prophet Jeremiah hid the Ark and the Holy
Fire in a deep well. When they took water from that well it burst into flame.
But the Ark itself they did not find.”[116]
The
opening of heaven and the appearance of the ark refers to “the revelation of
the good things prepared for the saints, which things, according to the
apostle, are all hidden in Christ, in Whom dwelleth
the fulness of the Godhead bodily (Colossians 2.3-9). These things
will be revealed at the same time that the lawless and impious ones will be
sent frightful voices, lightnings, thunderings, and hail. The change of the
present world in the earthquake symbolises the torments of gehenna.” (St.
Andrew of Caesarea)
According
to St. Athanasius the Great, the lightnings
signify the holy apostles, and the thunderings
- the evangelical teaching.[117]
Earthquakes are one of the signs of
the End, according to the Lord Himself (Matthew 24.7; cf. Revelation
16.18). Grant Jeffrey writes: “Massive earthquakes are now occurring worldwide
in diverse places. Enormous forces
are accumulating far beneath the massive tectonic plates supporting the
continents. Scientists warn that the major earthquakes felt recently in
California, Japan, and other parts of the Pacific Rim are only a foretaste of
the coming ‘Big One’, the most massive earthquake in human history. Major
‘killer’ quakes (7.2 or greater on the Richter Scale) occurred only once per
decade throughout history until our century. However, since A.D. 1900, the
growth in major earthquakes has been relentless. From 1900 to 1949 it averaged
three major quakes per decade. From 1949 the increase became awesome with 9
killer quakes in the 1950s; 13 in the 1960s’ 56 in the 1970s and an amazing 74
major quakes in the 1980s. Finally, in the 1990s, at the present rate, we will
experience 125 major killer quakes in the decade… The prophets warned that the
planet will be shaken in the last days as never before. The judgement of God
will finally unleash the greatest earthquake in history…”[118]
According
to many of the Fathers, the Second Coming of Christ will be preceded by the
sign of the Cross, the sign of the Son
of man in heaven (Matthew 24.30). Thus St. Narses: “Then doth appear
in brilliancy the royal sign unto the strengthening of those that took refuge
in Him unto the glory of the just ones, for that they bound themselves in His
love. The parts of the all-victorious cross flash with light, and the hosts of
the holy Church.. take their full growth along with the Lord’s cross; and full
of light they are yet eclipsed by its light. Let the nations mourn, for He
cometh to judge them that were not sealed therewith, them that knew it not the
sign of the Lord.
“Then
there cometh from heaven in unspeakable glory the King of glory. The heavens
are shrivelled up and are consumed like wax before the fire. Rivers running
free and full of gloom pour down from on high, purifying the earth from all
lawlessness and foul deeds. There are heard the voices of the army of light.
There stir the hosts of heaven, and the great trumpet sounds among the tombs.
Arise, ye dead, to meet the Bridegroom! For He is here, He is come in His
Father’s glory. Arise, just ones and sinners, and receive your reward!
“Then
with grief inconsolable shall mourn the creation that is not ready. And in
haste they don their bodies that are indestructible. Then the sinners appear in
sombre and shadow-like bodies, for they are tinged with the works of their
wickedness. Foremost walk in person the elect in resplendent bodies; they are
lifted up from earth in clouds of light to meet Christ, and the heavenly ones
wonder at them and say: What have they done upon earth, for they come in a
crowd unto the Lord full of joy? The Lord will make answer and say to them:
These are My good soldiers, who denied themselves, and renounced the earth and
crucified themselves along with their passions and desires for their love of
Me. Now therefore I will give them joy unending. And when the angels shall hear
this, they will say: Ye are blessed by the Lord; rejoice ye therefore in your
gladness.
“Then
the King of glory shall sit down on His throne; and angels with awe minister
unto Him. And first of all Satan is bound without inquisition, and is
dispatched into the abyss of Tartarus. And with cruel torments are bound his
hosts on the left hand, for they taught men evil works. They do not deserve to
be brought to judgement, since they have no defence to make before His
tribunal. And without delay they are removed out of His sight. But the just
shall stand on His right hand in hope of the good reward. The sinners also
stand there in great shame, each for retribution for his deeds. The assize is
met and the books are opened; they are bound together in sheaves like the tares
and are cast into the unquenchable fire. But unto some also are shut the doors
of the blissful wedding, so that they cannot see and look upon the Heavenly
Bridegroom; and because they have not lit the torches of pity, He saith unto
them: I know you not, get ye out of My sight. But before this the King
bestoweth the heavenly crown upon the worthy, saying unto them: Come, ye
blessed ones of My Father, and inherit the Kingdom made ready for you from the
beginning of the world.”[119]
St.
Ephraim writes: “A throne shall be prepared, and the Son shall sit upon the
right hand, and twelve seats shall be placed for the twelve apostles; dwellings
adorned for the martyrs, and a palace for the saints. The angels shall sound
their trumpets, and the dead shall rise from their graves. And in a moment the
angels shall gather together all the children of Adam, and they shall bring the
wheat into the barn, but the chaff shall they cast into fire: the good shall
enter into the Kingdom, and the evil shall dwell in gehenna. The just shall fly
to heaven, and the sinner shall be burned with fire. The martyrs shall fly to
the bridal chambers, and the evil go out into darkness. But Christ shall reign
forever, and He shall be King unto generations of generations. To Him be glory;
and upon us be mercy, unto the ages of ages. Amen. Amen.”[120]
[1] 1984 Trinity Russian Orthodox Calendar, Jordanville; translated by Valentina B. Vinokourova, in The Shepherd, vol. XIX, no. 5, January, 1999, p. 6.
[2] Rose, op. cit., p. 112, note. Holy Apostles Convent writes: “Although the early Church Fathers generally agree that the four living creatures symbolized the Evangelists, there was a diversity of opinion about which creature represented which Gospel writer. Saint Irenaeos thought that Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John were prefigured by the man, the eagle, the calf, and the lion respectively [Adv. Haer. 3, 11, 8 (SC 211:160, 175-170, 236).] Blessed Jerome and St. Gregory the Dialogist prefer the order of man, lion, calf, and eagle. The Venerable Bede consistently followed the order lion, man, calf, eagle [In Apocalypsin (P.L. 93:144A-B; In Lucam (CCSL 120: 6, 68-10, 22).]” (The Orthodox New Testament, volume 2, Buena Vista, CO, 1999, p. 559).
[3] St. Athanasius, On Luke 10.22, 6.
[4] St. Gregory of Nyssa, Against Eunomius, book I. In Eerdmans, Nicene Fathers, second series, V:64.
[5] St. Ambrose of Milan, Of the Holy Spirit, vook III, ch. 16 (110). In Eerdmans, Nicene Fathers, second series, X: 151.
[6] St. Bede, On Genesis 2.2.
[7] St. Jerome, Letter 53 to Paulinus, 5.
[8] St. Hippolytus, Treatise on Christ and Antichrist, 6. In Eerdmans, Ante-Nicene Fathers, V:206.
[9] Pomazansky, “On the Question of the ‘Toll-Houses’”, in Selected Essays, Holy Trinity Monastery, Jordanville, 1996, p. 239.
[10] St. Ambrose of Optina, Letters, Sergiev Posad, 1908, part 1, pp. 21-22 (in Russian).
[11] Troubetskoy, op. cit., p. 53.
[12] “The Angels of Mons”, This England, Winter, 1982.
[13] St. Seraphim, quoted by Protopriest Victor Potapov, “God is betrayed by silence” (in Russian). See also Literaturnaia Ucheba, January-February, 1991, pp. 131-134 (in Russian).
[14] Quoted by Kontzevich, Optina Desert and its Era, Jordanville, N.Y.: Holy Trinity Monastery, 1970, pp. 498-99 (in Russian).
[15] St. Victorinus, op. cit., coll. 329A.
[16] St. John of Kronstadt, in Fomin, op. cit., p. 139.
[17] Th. Yakovlev, in Barsov, op. cit., p. 113.
[18] As in the prayer of Schema-Hieromonk Nilus of St. Nilus of Sora Hermitage (+1870): “Pour forth on me the oil of thy compassion and grant me to overflow with the wine of compunction” (Orthodox Life, vol. 32, no. 6, November-December, 1982, p. 47).
[19] See Hieromartyr Mark (Novoselov), op. cit., Letter 4.
[20] Chernov, The Catacomb Church in the Russian Land, Mayford, 1980 (typescript) (in Russian).
[21] Elder Aristocles, in “To the memory of Abbess Barbara”, Orthodox Life, vol. 33, no. 4, July-August, 1983.
[22] “An Apocalyptic Time”, For Orthodoxy and Autocracy, I, 24 June, 1986 (in Russian).
[23] St. John of Kronstadt, in Fomin, op. cit., p. 140.
[24] Archbishop Theophanes, quoted in Richard Betts, Vyacheslav Marchenko, Confessor of the Royal Family. Hierarch Theophanes of Poltava, Moscow: Russian section of the Valaam Society of America, 1994, pp. 152-153 (in Russian).
[25] Metropolitan Anastasius (Gribanovsky), Conversations with My Own Heart, Jordanville, 1948; translated in Living Orthodoxy, N 101, vol. XVII, no. 5, September-October, 1996, pp. 19-21.
[26] St. Bede, On Genesis 4.10.
[27] The Letters of Archbishop Theophanes of Poltava and Pereyaslavl, op. cit., pp. 28-29.
[28] Bishop Ignatius Brianchaninov; cited in Marchevsky, op. cit., p. 106.
[29] Kolesnikov, The Seer of the Future, Jordanville, N.Y.: Holy Trinity Monastery, 1972 (in Russian).
[30] Danielou, The Theology of Jewish Christianity, London: Darton, Longman & Todd, 1964, p. 154.
[31] St. Cyprian, Treatise 5, 22.
[32] Yakovlev, in Barsov, op. cit., p. 117.
[33] Orthodox Life, July-August, 1977.
[34] However, Hieromartyr Victorinus wrote: “That Catholic Church in which in the last days a hundred and forty-four thousand of the people of Elijah (i.e. the Jews) shall believe…He indicates the very number of the Jews to be converted, and of the Gentiles a great multitude” (Commentary on the Apocalypse, 7.9, in Ante-Nicene Library, Edinburgh: T.& T. Clark, 1870, vol. XVIII). See also St. Hilary of Poitiers, On Matthew 10.14; St. Augustine, The City of God, XX, 29; St. Gregory the Great, On Ezekiel, Hom. 12,7; St. John Chrysostom, On Matthew, Hom. 58, 1; Blessed Theodoretus, On Daniel 12.1 and On Malachi 4.1.
[35] The conversion of the Jews in the last times is prophesied in many Old Testament Scriptures (cf. Ezekiel 36.24-28; Jeremiah 31.33; Hosea 3.4-5; Zechariah 12.7, 10). (V.M.)
[36] St. Hippolytus, On Christ and Antichrist, 14; translated in The Ante-Nicene Fathers, Eerdmans Publishing Company, vol. V.
[37] See Appendix 1: The Feast of Tabernacles.
[38] Rose, op. cit., p. 144, note.
[39] Krasovitsky,
[40] Monk Epiphanius (Chernov), op. cit..
[41] Svetlana Novikova, “Are we ourselves preparing the end of the world?” Banner of Youth (Znamya Yunosti), May 16, 1995, p. 3 (in Russian).
[42] Marchevsky, op. cit., p. 116.
[43] Michael Sadykiewicz, “The deadly flying herd of Hinds facing Nato”, The Sunday Times (London), 9 January, 1983, p. 11.
[44] Marchevsky, op. cit., p. 119.
[45] See the prophecies of Hieromartyr Methodius of Patara, St. Andrew the Fool-for-Christ of Constantinople, St. Tarasius of Constantinople, Emperor Leo the Wise, Hieromartyr Cosmas of Aitolia and on the tomb and column of St. Constantine the Great, translated in Sotiropoulos, op. cit.
[46] Quoted in Delimpasy, Terrible and Wonderful Things, Athens, 1986, pp. 36 (in Greek).
[47] Bishop Gregory of Messenia, op. cit.
[48] cf. Josephus, On Antiquities, VI, 1; St. Proclus of Constantinople, in Socrates’ Ecclesiastical History, VII, 41.
[49] St. Jerome interpreted Ros, Mosoch and Tubal to mean “head”, “insanity” and “universal”. See his Commentary on Ezekiel, 454, P.L. 25 (in Latin).
[50] Blessed Theodoretus, Commentary on Isaiah, 66.19. Henry Morris (The Genesis Record, Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker Book House, 1976, pp. 247-248) believes Mosoch (or Mesech) to be Moscow and Tubal - Tobolsk! Plumptre (The Bible Educator, London: Cassell, Petter & Green, vol. III, p. 251) writes: “The name Gog seems to be found in the name Gogarene, a district of Armenia, west of the Caspian (Strabo, xi, 528)… [Mesech] are generally identified with the Moschi, a race inhabiting part of the country between the Euxine and Caspian seas, and who were subdued by Tiglath-pileser I. They were neighbours to Tubal, a race dealing in iron, a branch of trade for which the south-east coast of the Euxine was early famous. The name Muscovy is thought with fair probability to be derived from Meshech (Rawlinson, Ancient Monuments ii. 65).”
[51] Krasovitsky, Christ or Hors?, Moscow: Erebus, 1996, pp. 16-17; “The Cult of Apollo in Northern Europe”, Angel Valaama, N 10, September, 1994, pp. 2-3; “Gog and Magog”, Orthodox Tver, nos. 5-6 (18-19), May-June, 1996, p. 4 (in Russian)
[52] Marchevsky, op. cit., p. 119.
[53] Bishop Gregory of Messenia, op. cit.
[54] Metropolitan Augustine of Florina, St. Cosmas of Aitolia, Athens: Stavros, 1981, p. 343 (in Greek).
[55] “Prorochestva o poslednikh vremenakh svyashchenomuchenika Kosmy”, Pravoslavnaia Rus’, N 2(1479), January 15/28, 1993, p. 10 (in Russian).
[56] St. Ephraim, Sermon on Gog and Magog and on the end and consummation; translated by M.F. Toal, The Sunday Sermons of the Great Fathers, London: Longmans, 1963, vol. 4, p. 355. Following in this tradition, the Venerable Bede (and with only small alterations, the French monk Adso, Libellus de Antichristo) says of the last Orthodox king: “And then will arise a king by name and of steadfast mind. The same will be the steadfast king of the Romans and Greeks… And the king himself will have before his eyes the Scripture saying: the king of the Romans [will] claim for himself [acquire] the whole kingdom of the lands [of the Christians]; therefore will he lay waste all the islands and cities [of the heathen], and destroy all the temples of the false gods, and all the pagans will he call to baptism, and the cross of Christ shall be raised over all the temples.” During the reign of this king the Jews will be converted, and he will vanquish the nations of Gog and Mag with their twelve or twenty-two kingdoms. “[And thereafter the king] will come to Jerusalem, and there laying aside his diadem, he will resign unto God the Father and His Son Christ Jesus the Christian kingdom (Migne, P.L. 90, p. 1183).
[57] Bishop Gregory of Messenia, op. cit.; A. Panagopoulos, Saints and Wise Men on what is going to happen, Athens: Agios Nikodemos.
[58] Op. cit., pp. 12, 19.
[59] Quoted in Delimpasy, op. cit., p. 65.
[60] Quoted in Sotiropoulos, op. cit.
[61] Quoted in Delimpasy, op. cit., p. 64.
[62] Quoted in Delimpasy, op. cit., p. 74.
[63] Quoted in Sotiropoulos, op. cit.
[64] Quoted in Delimpasy, op. cit., pp. 72-73.
[65] Quoted in Fomin , op. cit., p. 316.
[66] The Orthodox Herald, January-February, 1996 (in Russian); Fomin, op. cit., pp. 316-318; translated in Fr. Andrew Phillips, Orthodox Christianity and the English Tradition, English Orthodox Trust, 1995, pp. 299-300.
[67] St. Seraphim, from various sources, including a text supplied by Fr. Victor Potapov. See also Literaturnaia Ucheba, January-February, 1991, pp. 131-134 (in Russian).
[68] Elder Porphyrius, in Fr. Theodosius Clare, The Glinsk Patericon, Wildwood, CA: St. Xenia Skete, 1984, p. 129.
[69] Fomin, S. & Fomina, T. Rossia pered Vtorym Prishestviem, Sergiev Posad, 1998, third edition, volume II, p. 331 (in Russian).
[70] Elder Barnabas, in Fr. Seraphim Rose, “The Future of Russia and the End of the World”, The Orthodox Word, 1981, vol. 17, nos. 100-101, p. 211. Most of Fr. Seraphim’s quotations were taken from Orthodox Russia, N 21, 1969.
[71] St. John of Krsontadt, in Fomin, op. cit., p. 249. Fomin and Fomina, vol. II, p. 331.
[72] Fomin and Fomina, op. cit., p. 338.
[73] Schema-Monk Epiphanius (Chernov), personal communication.
[74] Elder Aristocles, in Rose, “The Future of Russia”, op. cit.; Fomin & Fomina, op. cit., p. 435; “To the Memory of Abbess Barbara”, Orthodox Life, vol. 33, no. 4, July-August, 1983, and I.K. Sursky, Father John of Kronstadt, Belgrade, 1941, p. 325 (in Russian). St. John of Kronstadt also prophesied that the deliverance of Russia would come from the East (Sursky, op. cit., vol. 2, p. 24), as did the Elder Theodosius of Minvody (Schema-Monk Epiphanius (Chernov), The Catacomb Church in the Russian Land (typescript, Mayford, 1980, in Russian)).
[75] St. Duniushka, http://www.geocities.com/kitezhgrad/prophets/duniushka.html. Excerpted from the Diary of) V. Zarskaya-Altayeva.Translated into English by G. Spruksts, from the Russian text appearing in “The Russian Community Bulletin Of Seattle”, vol. 16, No. 161, March 1986, pp. 3 - 6. English language translation copyright © 1986, 2002 (with revisions) by The Russian Cultural Heritage Society, The St. Stefan Of Perm’ Guild, and the Translator. All rights reserved.
[76] Archbishop Andronicus, On the Church, On Russia, Fryazino, 1997, p. 124; Fomin and Fomina, op. cit., p. 331.
[77] Elder Anatolius, in Rose, op. cit.; The Russian Pilgrim, N 7, 1993, p. 38 (in Russian); Fomin and Fomina, op. cit., p. 333.
[78] Elder Alexis, in Sursky, op. cit., p. 196; ); Fomin and Fomina, op. cit., p. 332..
[79] Elder Nectarius, in Rose, op. cit.
[80] Martyr-Eldress Agatha, in I.M. Andreyev, op. cit., pp. 422-423.
[81] Fomin &
Fomina, op. cit., p. 436.
[82] Archbishop Theophanes, in Schema-Monk Epiphanius (Chernov), personal communication; Fomin & Fomina, op. cit., p. 436.
[83] Archbishop Theophanes, in Betts, Marchenko, op. cit., pp. 111-112; Fomin & Fomina, op. cit., p. 436.
[84] Fomin, & Fomina, op. cit., vol. II, pp. 473-473.
[85] St. Damascene, Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith, II, 1. Metropolitan Anthony (Khrapovitsky) writes: “Eternal life should be understood in this sense, that there, in the words of the Apocalypse, there should be time no longer, that is, the surrounding conditions and circumstances will not change.” (in Archbishop Nicon (Rklitsky), The Life and Works of his Beatitude Anthony, Metropolitan of Kiev and Galich, Montreal, 1965, volume V, p. 135 (in Russian)).
[86] Yakovlev, in Barsov, op. cit., p. 134.
[87] Thus St. Ambrose writes: “Of his [John’s] death some have doubted: of his passage through the fire [which guards Paradise] none can doubt, because he is in Paradise, and is not separated from Christ” (On Psalm 118, 20, 11). Again, St. Gregory of Tours writes: “John, Apostle and Evangelist, after having fulfilled his course, both of meritorious conflict and most salutory preaching, went down alive into the grave, and ordered that he should be covered with earth” (On Miracles, book 1). He adds that manna was said to flow from his grave.
[88] Marchevsky, op. cit., pp. 124-125.
[89] St. Jerome, To Paula and Eustochium, quoted by Thomas Livius, The Blessed Virgin in the Fathers of the First Six Centuries, London: Burns & Oates, 1893, p. 375.
[90] Ilyinskaya, Tajna Startsa Feodosia, Moscow: “Pravoslavnij Palomnik”, 1997, p. 198 (in Russian). Again, Elder Theodosius (Kashin) of Minvody said that “in the last times the Apostle of love – that was what his disciples called John the Theologian – will preach in the Caucasus” (Fomin and Fomina, op. cit., vol. II, p. 521).
[91] St. Gregory, Homilies on Ezekiel, book I, 12, 6; translated by Theodosia Gray, Etna, Ca.: Center for Traditionalist Orthodox Studies, 1990, p. 143.
[92] St. Ephraim, op. cit.
[93] St. Andrew, translated by Cyril Mango, Byzantium, London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1980, p. 209.
[94] St. Moses, in Bishop Gregory, op. cit.; Panagopoulos, op. cit.
[95] Abba Ischyrion, translated in Bishop Nikolai Velimirovic, The Prologue from Ochrid, Birmingham: Lazarica Press, 1986, part one, February 5.
[96] St. Niphon, in Fomin, op. cit., pp. 268-269.
[97] St. Narses, in Bousset, op. cit., p. 255.
[98] St. Gregory, Homilies on Ezekiel.
[99] St. John Chrysostom, Homily 57 on Matthew, 1.
[100] St. Hippolytus also says that John will be killed by the Antichrist together with Enoch and Elijah. See Discourse on the End of the World, and on Antichrist, and on the Second Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, 21. For further patristic references to St. John’s preaching with Enoch and Elijah at the end of the world, see W. Bousset, The Antichrist Legend, London: Hutchinson, 1895, and Rev. P. Huchede, History of Antichrist, Rockford, Ill.: Tan Books, 1968, pp. 31-32.
[101] St. Ephraim, op. cit., p. 357. But St. Victorinus (Commentary on the Apocalypse) says that “the raising of the dead to life is mentioned among the wonders wrought by this false prophet”.
[102] St. Narses, in Bousset, op. cit., p. 257.
[103] Grant Jeffrey, The Signature of God, Wheaton, Ill.: Tyndale Publishing, 1996, p. 196.
[104] St. Nilus, in Archimandrite Panteleimon, op. cit., p. 84.
[105] Blessed Theodoretus, Commentary on II Thessalonians.
[106] St. Damascene, Oration on the Transfiguration of the Lord.
[107] St. Ephraim, Oration on the Coming of the Lord.
[108] St. Seraphim, in Fomin, op. cit., p. 342.
[109] St. Hippolytus, Commentary on Daniel, 30.
[110] St. Hippolytus, op. cit., 22. There is a tradition that the last Divine Liturgy will be celebrated on Mount Athos. See Marchevsky, op. cit., p. 157 and note.
[111]
St. Hippolytus, in Fomin, op. cit., p. 268. However, Metropolitan
Philaret of Moscow, commenting on I Corinthians 11.26, “For as often as
ye eat this bread, and drink this cup, ye do show the Lord’s death till He
come”, disputes this interpretation: “Here we find an important truth in the
small word ‘till’. In order better to understand this, I direct the speech of the
Apostle to the question will Christians eat the mystical Bread and drink of the
Chalice of the Lord? We find the answer in the words of the Apostle: ‘till He
come,’ i.e., the mystery of the Body and Blood of Christ will take place
without interruption in the true Church of Christ till the very second coming
of Christ, or till the end of time, which has the same meaning. Since this
cannot be without the grace of the priesthood, nd the grace of the priesthood
cannot exist without the grace of an hierarchy, then clearly the grace of the
office of bishop, according to the foresight of the Apostle, will be in the
Church in all times and uninterrupted channels will flow even up to the bring
of the approach of the kingdom of glory.” After quoting this passage, Hieromonk
Ignaty (Trepatschko) writes: “The ancient Fathers of the Church express the
same opinion. St. John Chrysostom says: ‘Showing that the Holy Eucharist will
be till the end of the world, the Apostle Paul said: “till He comes”. St. John
of Damascus and St. Ephraim the Syrian concur with this view” (“The Church of
Christ in the Time of the Antichrist”, Orthodox Life, vol. 41, no. 2,
March-April, 1991, p. 40). And St. Seraphim of
Sarov prophesied: “The monasteries will be
destroyed, but at poor Seraphim’s in Diveyevo until the very day of the Comng
of Christ the bloodless Sacrifice will be performed” (Fomin and Fomina, op.
cit., vol.1, p. 318).
[112] St. Hippolytus, Treatise on Christ and Antichrist, 40.
[113] St. Jerome, Commentary on Daniel, 4, XII, 12; M.P.G. 25, col. 579B; CCSL 75A: 943, 671-944, 677). See also the Venerable Bede, On the Apocalypse (P.L. 93: 154C) and On What Isaiah Says (P.L. 94:708), in W. Trent Foley and Arthur G. Holder, Bede: A Biblical Miscellany, Liverpool University Press, 1999, p. 49.
[114] St. Ephraim, op. cit., p. 357.
[115] Fomin and Fomina, op. cit., vol. II, pp. 556, 557.
[116] St. John Maximovich, “A Talk on the Dread Judgement”, in Man of God: Saint John of Shanghai and San Francisco, Redding, Ca.: Nikodemos Orthodox Publication Society, 1994, p. 179.
[117] St. Athanasius, Commentary on Psalm 76, 11; M.P.G. 27, coll.348.
[118] Jeffrey, op. cit. p. 194.
[119] St. Narses, in Bousset, op. cit., pp. 257-259.
[120] St. Ephraim, op. cit., pp. 357-358.