Book of Revelation

[fireheart47]

Dear Quran's Message forum,

Disclaimer

I am a privileged person, who can talk about these topics and explore them without immediate consequences. I am in a warm house, sitting on a computer, writing about controversial topics. Other people can get hurt or killed for saying things like I do. Please be mindful of this.

El Apocalipsis de Juan

The Book of Revelation is a confusing book, and has inspired many people in awful ways, because of fears and feelings of shame. For example, I've worried about being False Prophet or being the Anti-Christ, because I have an imaginative mind and feel fear or shame.

Fears and ideas

One of the important steps in my journey was when I felt I had sold my soul to devil, and met a person, whose father was a pastor. The person I spoke to wore shirts with pentagrams and worshiped the devil at some point in his youth. He later found God again as an adult. He didn't judge me when I cried to him and told him my fears, instead he told me, "You can't sell what's not yours to sell." This inspired me to read the Bible and later Qur'an, and try to understand where these ideas come from.

Here are some observations I've had and things I've learned:

Apocalypse

The word "apocalypse" is often understood as the end of the world. However, in the Bible and in Biblical Greek or Jewish Koine Greek, the word apocalypse (ᾰ̓ποκᾰ́λῠψῐς) means revelation. There is something being revealed in this book. What is being revealed? Above all, the scribes want to reveal the message of Jesus from the Christian perspective. Despite the doomsday prophecies and end of the world ideas, the Book of Revelation ends with hope of an optimistic future.

I believe the Book of Revelation is an allegory meant to reveal the dangers of organized religion in a secret way.

Patterns in scripture

I believe there are patterns in the scriptures placed by scribes to indicate to the readers that the scriptures have been altered. This is not to cause people to lose faith, rather to maintain faith in spite of the reality of human activities and human nature.

For example, in verse Revelation 3:14 in Greek there are three words and between these three words are the Greek letter Omicron. In the Book of Revelation this is common, and it seems like they are chanting or emphasizing these ideas, yet in English they get translated away. In Rev 3:14, the three words are the names of God.

Book of Revelation 3:14, * Originally from BibleHub

Καὶ τῷ ἀγγέλῳ τῆς ἐκκλησίας Λαοδικέων γράψον· Τάδε λέγει ὁ Ἀμήν ὁ μάρτυς ὁ πιστὸς καὶ ἀληθινός ἡ ἀρχὴ τῆς κτίσεως τοῦ θεοῦ·

Rev 3:14 (The New World Translation) * JW bible, had to remove annotations from copy and pasted text.

To the angel of the congregation in La·o·di·ceʹa write: These are the things that the Amen says, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of the creation by God:

However, in another verse with the names of evil, there are 7 Omicron. This indicates to me the scribes cared more about the fear of the Devil and might've secretly worshiped it, because they were being mistreated by organized religion or because they wanted to rebel.

καὶ ἐβλήθη ὁ δράκων ὁ μέγας ὁ ὄφις ὁ ἀρχαῖος ὁ καλούμενος Διάβολος καὶ ὁ Σατανᾶς ὁ πλανῶν τὴν οἰκουμένην ὅλην ἐβλήθη εἰς τὴν γῆν καὶ οἱ ἄγγελοι αὐτοῦ μετ' αὐτοῦ ἐβλήθησαν

So down the great dragon was hurled, the original serpent, the one called Devil and Satan, who is misleading the entire inhabited earth; he was hurled down to the earth, and his angels were hurled down with him.

Words, concepts, and religious systems

One of the things, which has helped me feel less fear is acknowledging the Oneness of Allah. Nothing is outside of the control of Allah. I believe we will never be completely abandoned by Allah. I believe that when the Hebrews (the people crossed over from Euphrates to Mediterranean Sea and Nile River) went to Ancient Egypt (Kemet) they learned concepts from the religious systems of that society. In that society, there were different levels of understanding. The priests knew the deities were archetypes of concepts, allegories and stories to teach ideas, yet the average people or the organized religion taught that they were gods and worshiped them. I believe cult of Set influenced the Hebrews to use this word to describe the evil forces that destroy. It is important then to understand where this comes from.

In this allegory, the most important person is Horus, which represents consciousness and the observer. The Kings would be initiated into a ceremony that would teach them this and give them awareness of the natural order. Osiris represented plants and nature, and Set represented death and conflict. They also represented star systems. Osiris represented Orion and Set represented Alderbaran. In the story, Osiris is dismembered by his evil brother into 14 pieces. Orion constellation is 10 stars. Perhaps, the ancient Egyptians included 14 stars in this constellation and therefore it made the story more powerful and taught the idea of death. A cult formed around Set, despite it being a less important figure in the story. I believe it promoted fighting, power, war, and military. The Ancient Egyptians traded metal for their weapons with the Hittites in Anatolia. The Israelites would've been in the middle of it, part of the trade.

In Hebrew, the word Satan means "to oppose" as it used in the Story of Balak in Book of Numbers (Book of Numbers 22:22).

Think of what Jesus is quoted saying about the nature of God.

Matthew 5:45 (NIV, BibleHub)

that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.

Forgiveness and transformation

I used to fear that I was these evil prophecies in the Bible, even though truly I am not the most evil person I can imagine. I believe all people can be forgiven if they repent. For this reason, I think there is a hidden meaning behind the two witnesses in the story of the Book of Revelation, because they cause all these problems, like the Anti-Christ and the False Prophet. Could they be the same people? Are we waiting for people to realize that forgiveness is free and that people can change?

Inspiration

I believe we should be aware that people can be inspired by the ideas in the Bible, regardless of their true meaning.

The idea of the Mark of the Beast can inspire people to put implants in people and do dangerous evil things, even though the authors of the Book of Revelation weren't necessarily talking about that.

Mark of the Beast

Someone on the internet told me about a verse from the TaNaKh that helped describe the meaning of 666.

1 Kings 10:14 (Tanach.us)

ויהי משקל הזהב אשר בא לשלמה בשנה אחת שש מאות ששים ושש ככר זהב

1 Kings 10:14 (NIV, BibleGateway)

The weight of the gold that Solomon received yearly was 666 talents

Rev 13:16-18 (BSB, BibleHub)

16 And the second beast required all people, small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hand or on their forehead, 17 so that no one could buy or sell unless he had the mark—the name of the beast or the number of its name.

18 Here is a call for wisdom: Let the one who has insight calculate the number of the beast, for it is the number of a man, and that number is 666

I believe that this passage is warning us that organized religions exclude people from charity, based on religious membership. The name "Solomon" is based from roots SLM or ש-ל-מ or س-ل-م. This represents the organized religion, then in Jerusalem. Its members were m-slm. People who weren't m-slm, did not get to participate and did not get help they needed, the help that our scriptures say they should receive from believers.

I believe the mark on the forehead and the hand represent our beliefs and our actions. Those without the mark are those who do not believe the same things or do the same things as the members of the organized religion.

Book of Exodus 13:9 (Tanach.us)

והיה לך לאות על ידך ולזכרון בין עיניך למען תהיה תורת יהוה בפיך כי ביד חזקה הוצאך יהוה ממצרים

Exodus 13:9 (NIV, BibleHub)

This observance will be for you like a sign on your hand and a reminder on your forehead that this law of the LORD is to be on your lips. For the LORD brought you out of Egypt with his mighty hand.

Back in the day of Jesus, the central temple and the organized religion was in Jerusalem. However, today, the non-organized religions of the Nazarenes has organized in Vatican, and the non-organized religion of the Arabs (nomads descended from Israelites and economic partners of Israelites) is centralized in Mecca.

Organized religion is not entirely bad. Without organized religion, we wouldn't have the organization that we do today and there would be too much disorder for us to find meaning and have faith in the wisdom of religious books and traditions. Traditions have wisdom and that is what makes them good. However, they can become the reason why people get hurt.

The Qur'an says again and again that the simple true religion is to pray to God and to give zakat. The Bible also agrees when it says something similar, worship God and love thy neighbor as thyself. This is the worship of the Hidden One, called by many names like God or Allah, and to follow the Golden Rule, known to many religious worldwide.

Sheikh Hamza Yusuf talks about in this video how hidden within the books of the Hindu religion, they believe that God is pure and imageless, like Abrahamic religions. Many educated Hindus believe some of the same ideas as Muslims, Christians and Jews.

Video of Sheikh Hamza Yusuf on alternative YouTube platform called Invidious, hosted on website called Nadeko, which supposedly protects people from being monitored or stops it from affecting YouTube data collection.

https://inv.nadeko.net/watch?v=gYfuRgSQF2w

YouTube

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gYfuRgSQF2w

Thank you for reading what I've shared. This is only my perspective. Please consider it, doubt it, test it and figure out for yourselves. May Allah guide us to the truth. Subhanallah.

Sincerely,
Fireheart47

[fireheart47]

Dear Quran's Message forum,

A Jehovah's Witness once showed me on JW mobile app a verse, which helped me keep my faith and communicate it when studying the scriptures. Because while I studied all the similar words shared between TaNaKh in Hebrew, the Gospels in Greek, and the Qur'an in Arabic, I began to think it was all human and began to lose faith. I also did not want others to feel the same and want to respect our religion(s).

2 Timothy 3:16 (Stephenus Textus Receptus 1550, Greek Parallel, BibleHub)

πᾶσα γραφὴ θεόπνευστος καὶ ὠφέλιμος πρὸς διδασκαλίαν πρὸς ἔλεγχον, πρὸς ἐπανόρθωσιν πρὸς παιδείαν τὴν ἐν δικαιοσύνῃ

2 Timothy 3:16 (NIV, BibleHub)

All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness,

The word γραφὴ indicates that a person had written this. It is text, it is shapes of symbols created by people to communicate ideas, that's how linguists and historians perceive them. The word θεόπνευστος is interesting, because the second part of it πνευστος is similar to the Spanish word "pneumático", which means "tire", like the wheel of a car. The Greek word pneuma and the Spanish word pneumático are related, because a tire is filled with air.

For ancient people, spirit was similar to air, which is mostly invisible to the naked eye. Early scientists would call Carbon Dioxide (CO₂) the spirit of wood. I believe the idea of spirit is the idea of metaphysical properties, a quality of something hidden inside of it, which goes beyond physical barriers.

I believe the words in these books are written by people, who were trained and educated. I believe the words contain the spirit of God, the deep wisdom that God wants us to know so that we can be aware of God, live a better life, and cope with the struggles.

There's a Messianic Jewish Christian named Rabbi Steve Berkson and he runs a ministry on YouTube called MTOI. While I don't agree with everything does, I gain a lot of knowledge and perspective from his sermons on YouTube. He receives a lot of criticism, and so I look beyond the differences and focus on the ideas that resonate with me. He said that in the time of Jesus and the writing of the Gospels, people didn't have the New Testament, a term which many Jewish people and some Christian people don't agree with, because it implies the TaNaKh is less worthy or irrelevant. Therefore, he says that the people writing about scriptures were talking about the Torah and probably would've had difficulty accessing the entire TaNaKh, since perhaps only the central temple would have had all of those scrolls. Made me think.

Sincerely,
Firehear47

[fireheart47]

As-salam aleikum,

Since I've shared some Hebrew scripture, and criticize organized religion & dogmatic traditional people, I think it brings balance to share positive attributes and knowledge I've learned from Jewish people:

I do not agree with everything these people say. For example, today in Israel like many in the USA during wars of 20-21st century, justify violence against people, and then confuse innocent people and antagonists, or justify violence against innocent people. Also like the USA, there are many good people, who are innocent and many who are confused.

For example, here are rabbis who protest war, not just government: https://inv.nadeko.net/watch?v=uSEs5nq3X0k
Or these people who protested war: https://inv.nadeko.net/watch?v=-LX1okX8ziI
And these people: https://www.instagram.com/reel/DEdFLl-NeoB/

Yair Levi - Secret from the Bible "I will bless those who bless you"
https://inv.nadeko.net/watch?v=Ji1UHtZf6HM

Gilgamesh of Utah - 10 Bible Verses That Can't be Translated * He's a great teacher.
https://inv.nadeko.net/watch?v=RsI3lAllM7g

Rabbi Paysach Krohn - You're Going to Make It
https://inv.nadeko.net/watch?v=FFW57ACaWo0

Rabbi Paysach Krohn - Hoshana Rabbah: Setting Our Priorities
https://inv.nadeko.net/watch?v=JykHtVTekoA

Fania Lewando, Vilna Vegetarian Cookbook (1939)
https://www.yivo.org/The-Vilna-Vegetarian-Cookbook

Gilgamesh of Utah Podcast - Johann Reuchlin
https://creators.spotify.com/pod/show/gilgameshofut/episodes/Episode-4---Johann-Reuchlin-e2olur6

Tapfer im Nirgendwo Blog - Juden leben in Köln länger als Deutsche
https://tapferimnirgendwo.com/2016/05/18/ein-denkmal-fuer-eines-der-aeltesten-voelker-deutschlands/

Hope these augment your study of the Hebrew Bible.

Sincerely,
Fireheart47