In response to the Rapture That Wasn't yesterday, I thought I'd post cliffnotes for Revelations for those who haven't actually read the book. Even if you're an atheist like me, I'd recommend checking it out. It's a fascinating read, very colorful.
It starts with Jesus (who is on fire) giving John dictation for letters to seven churches. I like you guys, but you other guys, knock it off or I'll whoop you. That sort of thing. Also there's some Satanic Jews.
Then John is summoned by an angel to visit heaven. There he sees God, lots of angels, some really freaky beasts, and Jesus (who is now a mutated lamb. He changes shape). God's got this book, right? With seals on it. Nobody can open it, until Jesus the Mutant Lamb steps up.
The first four seals summon the Horsemen. I'd like to note, only Death is named. The other three are supposed to 1. conquer, 2. take away peace, and 3. make things expensive. The fifth seal brings back the dead who were good people, and they chill out in heaven. The sixth seal causes nasty earthquake/blacksun voodoo. Everybody freaks out.
At this point, the Rapture happens. At least I think it's the Rapture (it's only called that in Thessalonians). 144,000 male virgins are "sealed", get everlasting life, and so on.
Anyway, on to the seventh seal! The seventh seal... does nothing for half an hour.
Seriously, that's what it says.
Then we get seven angels with trumpets. Also an angel throws a censor (incense burner) and causes more earthquake voodoo. First trumpet : hail and bloodfire. Second trumpet : fiery mountain, ocean of blood. Third : a star named Wormwood crashes into the rivers. Fourth : 1/3rd of sun, moon, stars blacked out.
Pause while one of the angels has a panic attack.
Fifth trumpet : another star falls. It unlocks the bottomless pit. Horrific chimeraic locust/scorpion/human/horse things swarm out. They sting people, who suffer for five months and can't even kill themselves to stop the pain.
Sixth trumpet : four angels come up from the river, summon a horseman army on more chimera horse/lion/scorpion mounts. They kill 1/3rd of the world.
We pause again so John can talk to an angel with a book. God makes John eat the book. It tastes like honey, but causes indigestion.
Then there's these two prophets. They can cause plague and other voodoo. Suddenly a beast comes out of the bottomless pit and kills them. They stay dead three days, then go to heaven. For the sake of reference, we shall call this Beast A.
Seventh trumpet sounds. Everybody in heaven throws a "Yay God!" party (they do this about every five minutes throughout Revelations).
This part is my favorite. So, there's this pregnant chick, clothed in a sun/moon/stars theme. And there's a seven headed, ten horned (flying purple people eater) dragonbeast, who we later find out is Satan. She runs and hides, because Satan wants to eat the baby. He wars with the angels, they kick him out of heaven. He spots the chick on Earth, tries to drown her with water from his mouth, but fails. She grows eagle wings and flies off. He sulks and goes to fight other people instead.
Satan meets up with another seven headed, ten horned beast (small world!). We shall call this Beast B. Satan and Beast B get people to worship them. Yet another beast (Beast C) gets people to build a statue of Beast B, they worship it (or get shot), they get the mark of the beast (Beast B, I assume) tattooed on them. And it turns out, the Bible blatantly says that 666 is supposed to be a riddle. Some people think it's supposed to be Emperor Nero. Beast B also blasphemes a lot.
So God smites Babylon (the city where the Beast is) and the people worshiping Beast B, by carving it up with sickles and pouring blood from a Winepress of Wrath (coolest symbolism ever!). The beast (B) is slain.
Repeating the constant seven theme, we get seven angels with vials, with plagues in them. They are : 1. body sores, 2. sea of blood, dead fish, 3. rivers of blood, 4. the sun sets people on fire, 5. darkness, 6. the river Euphrates dries up -
We pause while voodoo devil frogs convince some Kings to fight.
- and 7. more earthquakes/lightning.
And then John meets the Whore of Babylon. Man, this woman is slutty. She's done everyone. She's got her own seven headed beast (Beast D), and this one's red. So God makes all the Kings she slept with hate her so much that they cannibalize her.
One of the angels gloats for awhile about how the mighty city of Babylon has fallen, and how great it used to be. I'm sure there's several religious people out there who assume this part is about the USA.
So, it turns out Jesus is getting married! An angel cracks a joke by calling the vultures eating the dead a "marriage supper". The angels throw Beast B and his followers into the lake of fire and kill everyone else. They lock Satan up in the bottomless pit for a thousand years. Jesus rules over the Earth for a thousand years with some of the dead (but not all). But then Satan gets loose and convinces people to fight again. So God burns them all and casts Satan into the lake of fire too.
Then, everybody else comes to life and gets sorted out into good/notgood, and the baddies go to the lake of fire, and the good ones go to a reborn City of Jerusalem, which is really sparkly, and they live with God and Jesus.
Jesus gets married to the anthropomorphized city, and they all live happily ever after. Except for the bad guys. And dogs. Apparently dogs go to hell.
The end! So, what did I take from reading this book? Well, the most interesting thing I noticed is that on several occasions, the visuals in Revelations are blatantly pointed out as being symbolic. One angel even goes into detail about how Beast D's heads represent the various kings, etc. For those who might take the book literally, this sets a very dangerous precedent. Just how many stories in the Bible are metaphorical? Or is Revelations, as some people think, really just a tacked on fanfic by a guy with a lot of enthusiasm (and possibly drugs)?
Whatever the result, it's still a very dramatic, if sometimes perplexing and poorly organized, story.
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