THE
BOOK OF REVELATION
By:
Bertrand L. Comparet
Lesson
#1 Of A Series Of 14, Transcribed From Audio Tapes
Transcribed
By:
Clifton
A. Emahiser’s
Teaching
Ministries
Phone
(419) 435-2836
[Unless
in brackets, all of the message is by Bertrand L. Comparet.]
I will tailor my subject for today to fit the particular day we have. I am going
to drop you right into something deep from the start; that’s the Book of
Revelation. I decided I’d better speak on it, if I am going to because, while
some of it is prophesy of the future, it is developing into an accomplished fact
very rapidly these days. So I want to be able to say, a little later when, after
some of these things have happened: “You see, I told you so.” We all like to
brag a little. It’s a different book than any other in the Bible, although it’s
closest to the Book of Daniel. Daniel received, you know, a number of prophetic
visions, and they were largely symbolic. In fact, you can say they were all
symbolic. On the greater part of them, the meaning of this symbolic message was
explained to him at the time. There were a few that were left to be explained by
the circumstances as they came about, and those tie in with the Book of
Revelation. So here was Daniel in the period from, oh, say 605 B.C. to 535 B.C.,
in
John
begins on the revelation of this thing: “I was in the Spirit on Yahweh’s day,
and heard behind me a great voice, as of a trumpet, saying, I am Alpha and
Omega, the first and the last ...” So he said he turned to look and see who was
speaking to him, “I saw seven golden lamp stands.” Your King James version says
candlesticks, and the word used in the Greek does not mean candlestick at all,
but a stand on which a lamp was placed, and we will see the reason for it. The
lamp in ancient times looked very much like a modern teapot, except they were
very shallow. You put oil in the center pot of the thing, and there was a lid
that fitted over it, and there was a cloth wick in the spout which absorbed the
oil, and you set fire to the wick, and that burned the oil that gave the light.
Thus, these were stands on which a lamp could be set; a pedestal. “I saw seven
golden lamp stands, and in the midst of the seven lamp stands, one like to the
son of man.” Now you will notice that is the title Yahshua the Christ used of
Himself many, many times in His ministry. And John says, “And when I saw him, I
fell at his feet as dead. And he laid his right hand upon me, saying unto me,
Fear not; I am the first and the last: I am he that liveth, and was dead; and,
behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen; and have the keys of hell and of
death.”
You
know, that is the most triumphant statement ever made, the complete conquest of
all evil and its consequences. And, that is something for all of us to observe
with joy. Who was it that was the first and the last? Well, as always, we turn
for confirmation to the Old Testament. Isaiah 44, verse 6: “Thus saith Yahweh
the King of
We’re
going to touch later on this thing – really not today – I give you fair warning,
I’m going to talk to you about this for more than one day. It’s a big subject,
and we can’t skip over it lightly. As we get into latter portions of it, we’re
going to show where some of them dovetail perfectly into Daniel’s prophesy. A
number of things were left unexplained in Daniel, as we read in Daniel 12,
verses 4, 8 and 9, the angel said to him: “But thou, O Daniel, shut up the
words, and seal the book, even to the
time of the end: .... 8 And I heard, but I understood not:
then said I, O my master, what shall
be the end of these things? 9 And
he said, Go thy way, Daniel: for the words are closed up and sealed till the time
of the end.” They weren’t to be understood in his day, but the fact that we can
understand them now tells you something about where we are in Yahweh’s calendar.
We’ve reached the time of the end. Now on the contrary, John was told not to
seal up the Book of Revelation. I don’t know how many different “churches”
you’ve gone to, but in most of them you’ve probably heard the preacher say he
couldn’t understand the Book of Revelation; it was a sealed book to him. Not
because John or the angel sealed it, although it is the most difficult book in
the Bible, being all in symbols. Revelation 22, verse 10: “And he saith unto me,
Seal not the sayings of the prophecy of this book: for the time is at
hand.”
When
John wrote this book – scholars have estimated the time to be 94 A.D. – some
have placed it as late as 96 A.D., but it is within that period. Hence, what
John was told was, in effect, in his day, and would continue on thereafter clear
up to the return of Yahshua the Christ, and indeed, a little beyond. Now the
first revelation that Yahshua the Christ gave to him was in the form of a
message to seven different “churches” [more properly
Ekklesiae, or “Assemblies”]. At that time there were a large number of
cities in Western Asia, and – oh, as far away as
Now
no mention was made of
That
is not a new idea though. The earliest writers, whose works are still in
existence, way back in the 3rd century B.C., had already given that explanation
of it. Looking for confirmation in other parts of the Bible, and to more
thoroughly explain the symbolism used, let’s go back over that opening passage.
John said (Revelation 1:12-16): “And I turned to see the voice that spake with
me. And being turned, I saw seven golden lamp stands; And in the midst of the
seven lamp stands one like unto the
Son of man, clothed with a garment down to the foot, and girt about the paps
with a golden girdle. His head and his hairs were white like wool, as white as snow;
and his eyes were as a flame of fire;
And his feet like unto fine bronze, as if they burned in a furnace; and his
voice as the sound of many waters. And he had in his right hand seven stars: and
out of his mouth went a sharp two-edged sword: and his countenance was as the sun shineth in his strength.”
We
pick up familiar things here which help to tie this in with the rest of the
Bible. That two-edged sword going out of His mouth – turn to Hebrews 4, verse 12: “For the
word of Yahweh is, quick and
powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing
asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and
intents of the heart.” The word of Yahweh, out of his mouth, has more power than
any sword. Now it speaks of his
face shining bright as the sun. In Matthew 17, verse 1, we read of that: “And
after six days, Yahshua taketh Peter, James and John his brother, and bringeth
them up into a high mountain apart, And was transfigured before them: and his
face did shine as the sun, and his raiment was white as the light.” Hence this
is Bible symbolism clearly identified, and again, making clear His authority to
give it. Here were things that were symbolic: He held in his right hand seven
shining stars, and He stood among these seven lamp stands. He explains these
things to John in Revelation 1, verse 20: “The mystery of the seven stars which
thou sawest in my right hand, and the seven golden lamp stands. The seven stars
are the angels of the seven churches, and the seven lamp stands which thou
sawest are the seven churches.” The Bible indicates that not only has Yahweh an
enormously great number of angels who can be assigned to whatever task comes up,
but also that there are certain special guardian angels who are put full time,
you might say, on certain jobs. You’ll remember that one of the prophecies given
to Daniel at 10:13 was given to him by an angel who explained he’d been delayed
getting there because the angel of the Kingdom of Persia fought with him and
delayed him, and said, the great prince, Michael, who stands for thy people came
to my aid, and so here I am. We’re told that the guardian angel of the people of
These
lamp stands – is that something new? No, everything has its roots in the past.
The New Testament has its roots in the Old Testament, and for an explanation of
these lamp stands, let’s go back to the Old Testament – the 4th chapter of
Zechariah: “And the angel that talked with me came again, and waked me, as a man
that is wakened out of his sleep, And said unto me, What seest thou? And I said,
I have looked, and behold a candlestick all of gold, [here
again, that should be lamp stand] with a bowl upon the top of it, and his
seven lamps thereon, and seven pipes to the seven lamps, which are upon the top thereof: And two olive
trees by it, one upon the right side
of the bowl, and the other upon the left side thereof. So I answered and spake to
the angel that talked with me, saying, What are these, my master? Then the angel
that talked with me answered and said unto me, Knowest thou not what these be?
And I said, No, my master. Then he answered and spake unto me, saying, ...” –
And before I go into that, let’s take a moment to examine the scene in which
this came. A little handful [of captives of the House
of Judah, Benjamin and a remnant of Levi] had come back from the
Babylonian captivity to
Again,
nothing new, you’ll remember: “... except Yahweh keep the city, the watchman
waketh but in vain.” It doesn’t
matter what armies you’ve got, or other weapons. If Yahweh is leading and
guarding you, fine. Otherwise, “... Not by might, nor power, but the spirit of
Yahweh ...” [we shall triumph]. “And I answered
again, and said unto him, What be
these two olive branches which through the two golden pipes empty the golden
oil out of themselves? And he
answered me and said, Knowest thou not what these be? And I said, No, my master. Then said
he, These are the two anointed ones,
that stand by the Sovereign of the whole earth.”
Yahshua
the Christ picks up that same theme and develops it in the Book of Revelation.
In Revelation 11, verses 3 and 4, He says unto John: “And I will give power unto my two witnesses, and they
shall prophesy a thousand two hundred and threescore days, clothed in
sackcloth. These are the two olive trees, and the two lamp stands standing
before the Sovereign of the earth.” Therefore we know what our symbolism is. We
are going into the matter of the two witnesses in further detail at a later
time, when we see the historical fulfillment of it.
But
after these witnesses – you’ll remember in many places, especially Isaiah, in
the 43rd chapter, Yahweh had told the nation
Thus,
Yahshua the Christ goes on with this revelation to the apostle John, receiving
the messages to be given to each of these seven “Churches”, in Revelation 2,
verses 1 to 7: “Unto the angel of the Church of Ephesus write; These things
saith he that holdeth the seven stars in his right hand, who walketh in the
midst of the seven golden lamp stands; I know thy works, and thy labour, and thy
patience, and how thou canst not bear them which are evil: and thou hast tried
them which say they are apostles, and are not, and hast found them liars: And
hast borne, and hast patience, and for my name’s sake hast laboured, and hast
not fainted. Nevertheless I have somewhat against thee, because thou hast
left thy first love. Remember therefore from whence thou art fallen, and repent,
and do the first works; or else I will come unto thee quickly, and will remove
thy lamp stand out of his place, except thou repent. But this thou hast, that
thou hatest the deeds of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate. He that hath an
ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches; To him that
overcometh will I give to eat of the tree of life, which is in the midst of the
paradise of Yahweh.”
This
symbolic message was to the “Church” of
Incidentally,
if you will get the writings of, say, half a dozen or eight or ten people who
have written on the Book of Revelation, you will achieve complete confusion,
because no two of them reach the same conclusion on much of anything. There’s
too much wishful thinking going into it. Having decided what they think it is,
they will then endeavor to interpret things to fit their own ideas; and in the
names, the meanings of the names of these seven cities, you will find that to a
great extent. I’ll try to give you the literal meanings of it, and that is why I
think each ought to be called “representative of an age.”
You’ll
remember in the 19th chapter of the Book of Acts, it tells how Paul and some of
the other apostles were in the city of
[Note:
If one will check most references on the Greek goddess Artemis, one will find
almost without exception that it is the same goddess as the Roman Diana. But
there is also some confusion concerning the identity of the Ephesian Diana.
Alexander Hislop, in his The Two
Babylons, on page 30 says: “In general, Diana was depicted as a virgin, and
the patroness of virginity; but the Ephesian Diana was quite different. She was
represented with all the attributes of the Mother of the gods.” Hislop then
directs his readers to figure 8 on page 29, showing an illustration of “Diana of
Ephesus” as a many-breasted god. This is also shown in the 1981 Collier’s Encyclopedia, vol. 9, page
267. Comparet failed to give us his sources on this. – See also note #4 at end
of lesson.]
Ishtar
was the same goddess, or closely related to Astarte, which was the same as
Ashtoreth, or as the Bible calls her, Ashtaroth, the female deity of Baal, the
cult brought to the nation
Starting
this message to the churches, Yahshua the Christ identifies Himself as the head
of the “churches.” He says, “[I am He] that
holdeth the seven stars in his right hand, who walketh in the midst of the seven
golden lamp stands.” He mentions to them, among their good qualities, for which
He praises them, that they had tried the various people who came to them as
apostles and found some of them were false and then rejected them. You’ll find
that in the Book of Acts too;
although not with reference to this one particular city, but as an indication of
that period. Remember that the meaning of the Old Testament religion had become
completely lost; Judaism, based on the Talmud, had taken over. Now, all the law
and the religious ritual of the Old Testament were Christianity from start to
finish. All the religious ritual was symbolic of Yahshua the Christ and the work
He would do. But as always happens, when you get a professional priesthood, the
religious part of it is lost. They like to – this is human quality – magnify
their own importance. And if the religion is explained to you so that you
understand it as well as they do, then they [the
leaders] don’t stand out so greatly. But if they can make it a mystery
which you can’t understand, and say, “Now look, you’re going to burn in hell
unless you come to me, and let me, as a sort of magician, go through
the particular ritual that will get you out of it. Unless you do so, it’s too
bad.” They can make themselves seem important. And it’s only a minority of them
who have ever had the character to resist that temptation. Hence, at the time of
Yahshua the Messiah’s ministry, all of that was forgotten. You remember how
often He rebuked them for not knowing the Scriptures? He wasn’t saying “You’re
to blame because you don’t know the things that are going to be written by the
Apostles for 30 to 40 years yet”; He said “You’re to blame because you don’t
know what’s in the books you already have – search the Scriptures, for in them
you think you have eternal life, and it is they which prophesy of Me.” Well He
taught His disciples, which you’ll remember, that getting back to the original
fundamentals was a difficult job, even with the twelve
Apostles.
The
Bible records several times that, in the last few weeks before the crucifixion,
He told them He was going to be taken by evil men and killed, and He would rise
again on the third day; and yet, when that came to pass they were stunned. They
didn’t remember, He told them all about it in advance. But at any rate, when His
resurrection came, and they saw the reality of all this, they started out with
tremendous enthusiasm – but there weren’t enough of them to go around. There
were needs that they teach people who could add to the number of teachers. And a
lot of them started teaching before they knew enough about it. Now remember,
this didn’t get its start among the pagans. What could you say to somebody who
was a worshiper of Baal, of Molech or of Venus to get him interested in
Christianity? You and He had no common ground to talk about. This started among
the people who had the religion which had been perverted into Judaism, because
to them you could talk in terms of the symbols that they recognized. Even if
they didn’t understand, you could explain it to them. But some of these people
who had not gotten the full message, instead of going out to preach that this is
what the Old Testament was about; that the animal sacrifices and keeping the law
and all of that were simply symbols telling you to expect that your Savior was
going to come and pay the penalty of your sins; they didn’t have that – they
didn’t understand it. Therefore, they went out and taught the way to get
salvation was to go back to the Mosaic law, and keep the law, and no matter how
rotten your character or conduct may be, if you never eat one of the prohibited
foods, and you always keep the right religious holidays, your sin will be
forgiven and you will have salvation regardless. Thus the Book of Acts tells how
the real apostles had a lot of trouble getting these things straightened out and
getting these false teachers weeded out. Hence, Yahshua the Christ says to this
“church” at
By
the year 94 their faith was weakening. Now He said: “You hated the deeds of the
“Nicolaitans.” And who were the Nicolaitans, or what? There is no record either
in the Scriptures, the writings of the early “Church” fathers, or the writings
of any historian [of them]. There is no record
of the existence of any such sect as the Nicolaitans. Neither is there the
record of the existence of any leader called Nicholas from whom the name might
have been taken. So therefore, when He talks about the Nicolaitans, we’re not
looking for a religious sect among them, or the followers of any particular
leader. So what are we looking for? Well, the key is in the meaning of the word
itself. It is derived from two Greek words which mean “to triumph over the
laity.” Hence, already in the first century you found the assumption of priestly
authority coming in. Here were the beginnings of a class of people who didn’t
consider themselves the teachers of Yahweh’s word; they considered
themselves people who had been made lords over the congregation, the same thing
that was to ripen a few centuries later when the evils had become so great in
the Roman Catholic “Church.” Here was a class of clergy triumphing over the
laity of the “Church” approximately from A.D. 30 to, let’s say, A.D. 100
perhaps. Consequently, we had the condition of the “church”, where they had
rejected these false teachers, they had patiently endured trouble and they had
kept the correct faith. However, they were weakening in their enthusiasm and
dedication, but at least they were rejecting the attempts that were being made
to set up a priestly class. [See note #5 at end of
lesson.]
Then
it goes on to the next of these “churches”, the “Church” at Smyrna: “And unto
the angel of the church in Smyrna write; These things saith the first and the
last, which was dead, and is alive;
I know thy works, and tribulation, and poverty, (but thou art rich) and
I know the blasphemy of them which
say they are Judah, and are not, but are the synagogue of Satan. Fear none of
those things which thou shalt suffer: behold, the devil shall cast some of you into prison, that ye may be
tried; and ye shall have tribulation ten days: be thou faithful unto death, and
I will give thee a crown of life. He that hath an ear, let him hear what the
Spirit saith unto the churches; He that overcometh shall not be hurt of the
second death.” Thus, this obviously symbolized the “churches” during a period of
intense persecution. This had already begun by the time John wrote the Book of
Revelation, and it ended sharply at a well defined date, A.D. 313. As I say, the
persecution up to 64 was from the Jews only. From 64 on, you had a period of
persecution from the pagan
But
that concession was one that no Christian could make. He had to recognize one
God only, not the emperor of
The
name of this city,
Hence
you had a constant period of persecution, but these last ten years were
especially vicious. It began with the edict of Emperor Diocletian in 303, and it
ended in the year 313 when the new Emperor Constantine gave his edict that the
“Christian Church” should thereafter be tolerated. Now he didn’t overthrow
paganism, but he said that the “Christian religion” should be recognized as
lawful on an equal footing with any other religion in
The
Well,
he had about a half a dozen or so competitors. You’ve been told before, of
course, that the most vigorous growth of the Christian “Church” has always been
during a period of persecution. Those who were in it only to go along for the
ride, didn’t have what it takes, and they dropped out. The ones that had the
courage and the enthusiasm were the ones that made up the “Church”, and they
were able to attract enough like themselves to keep it growing. Hence, by
Now
we come to the third “Church” in this series, the “Church” at Pergamos. By the
way, if you start looking it up in encyclopedias and histories and so on, you
find some variation in the spelling of it. In your Bible it is Pergamos –
P-e-r-g-a-m-o-s. In some encyclopedias and histories it is called
You
really need to know something about your ancient history to understand this one.
The city of
Remember
that Paul wrote an epistle to the Galatians, which is in your Bible. It has been
generally supposed by many that it was written to these particular Galatians who
were settled in the interior of Asia Minor, but a great many of the best Bible
students have said “No, the particular Gauls that he was writing this to were
not the Gauls from Asia Minor, they were the Gauls settled in France, in the
nation of Gaul there.” But anyway, this king Attalus the 1st was the one
responsible for the settlement in
The
third important king, Attalus the 3rd, who ruled from 138 to 133 B.C., at his
death, by will, bequeathed to the empire of Rome (it was still a republic you
remember) his kingdom, and one more thing: his title as Pontifex Maximus. Let’s
find out something about these things. On the fall of
There
was one reason perhaps for selecting it. Pergamos already was famous for certain
things. It was a center of worship of Asclepius, the healer. They had their
shrine to him, and a school of medicine, and the serpent was the emblem of
Asclepius. You note, that today the emblem of the medical profession is the
staff with the two serpents entwined around it. You will find that, from the
earliest times in the pagan religions, one who was especially a healer was
Asclepius, whose emblem was the serpent. The worship of Asclepius was conducted
with orgies, so common in Asiatic religions. So the priests of the Babylonian
mystery religion knew they would be quite at home there, and they would find a
people among whom they could readily make converts. [See note #9 at end of lesson.]
This
matter of the title of Pontiff. That was the title of the more important priests
of
The
Pontiffs were the theologians, the ones who reduced their religion to systematic
doctrines and taught all the lesser priests. They supervised the calendar,
determined when the religious festivals were, and were the officiating priests
at the dedication of new temples and other important ceremonies. The Pontifex
Maximus, the greatest Pontiff, could be, and sometimes was, a king. King Attalus
the 3rd, king of Pergamos, was Pontifex Maximus, when the
When
Julius Caesar exercised his authority at these ceremonies as Pontifex Maximus,
he appeared in a scarlet robe. He wore on his head a mitered cap as priest of
the pagan god Dagon, the fish god – that tall cap with the top cut into the
image of a gaping fish mouth – and he carried keys of the pagan god Janus and
the Pagan goddess Cybele. Cybele was the same one, whose temple it was in the
city of
Julius
Caesar claimed that he was a descendant of the Roman goddess Venus. And you
know, of course, that Venus can be traced back to the Babylonian Ishtar, who can
be traced back ,in turn, to Semiramis the wife of Nimrod. Hence, you can see
where all of this has its roots. The Emperor Gratian was the first one who
refused the office of Pontifex Maximus, and in fact he abolished it by decree.
But about 378 A.D., the office of Pontifex Maximus was claimed by the Pope. From
the earliest origin of it, it had never been anything but a pagan high
priesthood. [See note #s13 &14 at end of
lesson.]
Well,
getting back to our city of
Christianity
had been tolerated from 313 A.D. and became the official Roman religion in 330,
starting this period of the “Church” of Pergamos. This was a period of the
consistently growing power of the priestly hierarchy. You can say that this
reached its climax under Pope Gregory the 3rd, Gregory the Great, who was Pope
from 590 to 604 A.D. It is said that somebody once asked Satan, “Suppose you
found a truth so tremendously great and clear and obviously true that you just
couldn’t fight against it, what would you do?” He said, “that’s easy, I’d
organize it.” At that time the “Church” was undergoing no persecution. It was
now the official religion of the empire; it received its money subsidies out of
the public treasury. It became the fashionable thing to be a “Christian”, and
you got a lot of people into it who were only nominal “Christians.” But none the
less, it wasn’t taking over the empire fast enough. There were lots and lots of
pagans that remained pagans even though “Christianity” had become the official
religion. Now, how to get them into the “church”? As I say, the more it changes,
the more it is the same. You have your evangelists running around all in a
dither today: “How can we get more people into the ‘church’?” – it doesn’t
matter whether they believe, it doesn’t matter whether they are “Christian” in
their character and conduct, it doesn’t matter at all except you have big
congregations. And it doesn’t matter in the least, whether there are doctrinal
differences as great as between two Christian denominations, as between
Christianity and paganism – get them all together in one big “church.” If
doctrine is separating us, then abandon the doctrine! bring it together into a
political organization. So what’s going on today? same thing as back then: how
to bring in the pagans. If you preached true “Christianity” to them, what
attraction do you have for a man who finds the worship of Venus very
satisfactory to him, because they maintain the temple prostitutes there for his
use. You’re not competing along that line. You don’t have what he’s interested
in. You’re calling him to something that is tough; you’re calling him to give up
whatever evil qualities he had and whatever bad conduct he had. You’re calling
upon him to do his utmost, and the painful utmost to live up to his own highest
principles, and you don’t get those kind of converts very
fast.
This
thing was brought to a climax under Gregory the 1st, he enforced it; they said,
“look, we are making it hard to get the pagans in because we are emphasizing
differences between paganism and ‘Christianity.’” They’re telling these people,
“you’ve got to give up everything you ever thought was holy if you want to
become a ‘Christian.’ That is not good salesmanship; emphasize the similarities,
show them it doesn’t take much of a change. You can come into a ‘Christian
church’ and be quite comfortable there; you have your own pagan holidays, so the
‘church’ will adopt the same thing as an official ‘Church’ holiday, and instead
of your going to the temple of Jupiter, on that day, you come to the ‘Church’,
and instead of calling him Jupiter, you call him St. Peter, and worship him;
instead of worshipping Venus as the queen of heaven and the mother of God, you
come to this ‘church’, and you just change her name to the Virgin Mary, and you
go right on with your same worship and you can be part of this big, rising,
popular ‘Christian Church.’” And that is what they did. You will find in the
writings of a number of the early Christian followers their bitter condemnation
of that fact. But whereas the pagans were mostly faithful to their religion and
they weren’t adopting any ceremonies or Christian holidays of the followers of
Yahshua, rather the “Church” was adopting pagan holidays and pagan rituals right
and left. Well you had that tremendous drive, as I say, to bring in the pagans,
and bring, if need be, pagan worship in order to do it.
So
what is the condemnation given of this “Church” at Pergamos? “I have a few
things against thee, because thou hast there them that hold the doctrine of
Balaam who taught Balac [Balak] to cast a
stumbling block before the children of
CRITICAL
NOTES ON LESSON #1
Comments
by William Finck initialed W.R.F.
Comments
by Clifton A. Emahiser in brackets in lesson text as “your
transcriber”
or
initialed C.A.E. in critical
notes.
Note
#1:
This note has reference to Comparet discussing the approximate date that John
wrote his revelation in the opening paragraph of this lesson. The following
documentation gives evidence to that date:
Ante-Nicene
Fathers,
volume 5, ch. XLIX, par. 3: “John,
again, in Asia, was banished by Domitian the king to the isle of Patmos, in
which also he wrote his Gospel and saw the apocalyptic vision; and in Trajan’s
time he fell asleep at Ephesus, where his remains were sought for, but could not
be found.”
Ante-Nicene
Fathers,
volume 7, ch. X, par. 11: “He says this, because when John said these things he
was on the
Conclusion:
Domitian’s reign was 81 to 96 A.D., and if John was released from prison after
Domitian’s death, that gives us evidence concerning the time period when John
had his vision. Once one understands the dating of John’s vision somewhere
between 81 to 96 A.D., how can anyone agree with the Praeterists’ theory that
all prophecy was fulfilled by 70 A.D.? C.A.E
Note
#2:
Are the seven churches seven different periods? Comparet’s relating of the
earlier churches to different historical periods is more convincing than his
relating of the latter. All of the major criticisms of the seven churches are
still a problem in the world today, and have been all through
time.
The
Ephesians left their first love, i.e. true Christianity. Those of Pergamos and
Thyatira are criticized for fornication. Those of
Is
it meet to take these seven “churches” and find them in organized religion? I’m
not so sure that organized religion can ever represent the people of Yahweh, the
elect,
Comparet
states in lesson #3 that “these early Protestants had followed the advice of
Revelation 18, verse 4: ‘Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of
her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues’.” And also, “As long as the
‘Church’ kept the spirit of the rise of Protestantism, the conditions which
exist today, testing to see whether anything is fit to remain, couldn’t grow up.
While the Spirit of Yahshua is in them, they’ll have the power to put down all
these other things.” Yet he does not suppose that these remarks conflict with
his own account of the murder of millions of Huguenot Protestants? Or with the
fact that so many Germans in
So,
while I am not in complete disagreement with Comparet concerning the seven
“churches”, his explanation is found wanting, and the latter “churches” will
require further study on my part. W.R.F.
Comment
by Clifton A. Emahiser: While I see no harm in correlating the seven
Note
#3:
Was
Comparet
says that “the name
Note
#4:
Cybele is a local Phrygian name, apparently originating in the town of Cybela
(Strabo 10.3.12-13; 12.5.3) for a goddess called by the Greeks “the great
mother” generally, but also “the Idaean mother” or “the Isodromian mother” et
al., depending upon the area where she is being identified, and is equated by
Strabo and others with Rhea, the Greek “”mother of the gods” and wife of Cronus,
father of Zeus. Nowhere is Cybele ever related or equated with
Artemis, the virgin huntress (so naturally connected to the “Amazon” myth) and
sister of Apollo! Comparet makes a great error here.
While
I haven’t presently the resources to investigate Comparet’s equation of Cybele
to Ishtar, it is clear that the Greeks made no such equations. As it has been
shown in my pamphlet (Broken
Cisterns, #’s 1 & 2) that the Greeks did equate to Ashtoreth, or
Astarte, their own Aphroditê – and neither Rhea nor Artemis – and that Astarte
is the Ishtar of the Levant.
There
are always gray areas when the comparisons of these idols of different cultures
are made, since not the same attributes are given to various idols by different
cultures. One culture may have a “mother goddess” associated with fertility, and
then a separate “love” goddess; while another culture may have a “mother
goddess”, and a separate “love” goddess associated with fertility! So not even
among the Greek writers do we find agreement when equating their own idols with
those of other cultures. Yet Cybele is clearly a “mother goddess” associated
with Rhea, and while Ishtar is associated with fertility and love, Artemis bears
none of these attributes! A temple existed at
Note
#5:
Comparet is correct in his assessment of the word “Nicolaitans”, which I would
translate “People-Conquerers.” Thayer wrongly connects the word to the “doctrine
of Baalam” and defines it “destruction of the people.” W.R.F.
Note
#6:
If Comparet’s general view of the seven “churches” being seven periods is
correct, and I don’t disagree with it totally, the Smyrna period had to begin in
the times of Nero, who persecuted the Christians and who is even listed in the
list of 10 persecutions given by Comparet, and not with Domitian. There is no
fault in having the
Note
#7:
At one time I, too, believed that the opinion that Paul wrote “Galatians” to the
Gauls of France was quite tenable. Yet in the context of the events in Acts,
statements of Paul’s, such as that at Romans 15:19 (note Acts 16:6, 18:23) and,
although the epithet “Galatian” is applied to all the Kelts in Gaul, Anatolia
and elsewhere, its general use in reference to the district of Anatolia, I can
not support the idea that the epistle to the Galatians was directly intended for
the Galatians of modern France, and “the best Bible students” who think so are
only thinking wistfully.
W.R.F.
Note
#8:
The Eumenes mentioned here is actually Eumenes II, the son of Attalus I. Eumenes
I was the father of Attalus I and reigned at Pergamos 263-241 B.C. W.R.F.
Note
#9:
Diodorus Siculus writes of Asclepius as if he were a man, and not a ‘god’, who
lived in the generation before the Trojan War, who’s father was a ‘god’, Apollo,
and repeats a myth that Asclepius was slain by Zeus. The three most famous
temples of a deified Asclepius were at Triccê in Thessaly, where the man was
allegedly born,
Note
#10:
It should be noted that while Caesar indeed filled the role of pagan
priest-king, he also was a descendant of Judah-Zarah, if indeed he was a
descendant of Aeneas the Trojan, and so of Darda the Hebrew – and the prophecy
stands, then Caesar by right of birth held the scepter. W.R.F.
Note
#11:
Evidently the mitered cap was employed by many of the pagan cults of the east,
and not only those of the fish-idols, Dagon of the Philistines or Dercetto of
the Syrians (mother of Semiramis, as alleged). But not only that, while I have
not the Greek available for comparison with the other historians, Whiston’s
rendering of the description of Jerusalem’s high priest in the time of
Alexander, by Josephus in Antiquities, says: “... for Alexander,
when he saw the multitude at a distance, in white garments, while the priests
stood clothed with fine linen, and the high priest in purple and scarlet
clothing, with his mitre on his head having the golden plate on which the
name of God was engraved, he approached by himself, and adored that name, and
first saluted the high priest.” (11.8.5 [11:331]). The English word “mitre” appears 13 times
in the O.T. (Strong’s) and the
account of Josephus should be compared to Exodus 28:37 and Lev. 8:9. This
subject requires further investigation in the Greek as well as the Hebrew! W.R.F.
See
comment by Clifton A. Emahiser below, after William Finck’s in Note
#12.
Note
#12:
While it is clear that Attalus III, who died in 133 B.C., did indeed bequeath
his kingdom to Rome, and that became the province of Asia “by the same name as
the continent” (Strabo 13.4.2), the history of the title “Pontifex Maximus” is
not so clear. Writing of a time that, while shrouded in myth, can not be
ignored, Diodorus Siculus discusses the struggle for the throne between Iulius,
a son of Ascanius the son of Aeneas, and Silvius, a son of Aeneas “by Lavinia,
the daughter of Latinus”, and says of its outcome that “Iulius, however, though
he lost the supreme power, was made pontifex maximus and became a kind of
second king; and from him we are told, was sprung the Julian gens which exists
in Rome even to this day” (Diod. Sic. 7.5.8.). Of course, Julius Caesar was a
descendant of this Iulius and a member of the Julian gens (family). So while
Pergamos was a part of ancient Troy, and the title pontifex maximus came from that place,
it may have come not in 133 B.C., but much earlier, as early as 1185 B.C. with
the Trojan colonists who later became Romans. W.R.F.
Comment
by Clifton A. Emahiser: For everything genuine that Yahweh has, Satan has a
fraudulent counterfeit. Therefore, if Yahweh’s priests wear a mitered cap, it is
only reasonable that Satan’s priests wear a mitered cap. For this I would refer
to Achan, who was also a descendant of Zarah
Note
#13:
The ancient poets told the tale of Aeneas being the son of Anchises, a Trojan
Prince and descendant of Darda, and Aphroditê (aka Cytherea), for which see
Hesoid’s Theogony lines 1008-1010. Strabo tells of a painting by Apelles which
was at Drecanum on Cos in a temple called “the Asclepieium ... exceedingly
famous and full of numerous votive offerings”, saying: “And Aphrodite Anadyomenê
used to be there, but it is now dedicated to the deified Caesar in Rome,
Augustus thus having dedicated to his father the female founder of his family”
(14.2.19). Venus being the Roman equivalent of Aphrodite, such beliefs were
common among the Romans as well as the Greeks, where most families were believed
to be descended from some god or goddess, or even several along the way. These
stories were numerous in Greek and Roman histories as well as poetry, for which
reason Paul tells Timothy: “Neither give heed to fables and endless genealogies”
(1 Tim. 1:4), and Titus: “But avoid foolish questions, and genealogies ...”
(Titus 3:9). [See also note #18 below.] W.R.F.
Note
#14:
Gratian became emperor in 378 A.D. “Pope” was not yet an official title at the
time, and “bishop of
Note
#15:
“Antipas” cannot mean “against the Pope.” There is no word “popis” in Greek,
there was no “pope” in the days of the martyrs, and the syllable “pas” can not
be connected to the word “PATER”, or “father” in Greek! Anti can mean “instead,
in the place of” or, more often in composition with other words, “against, in
opposition to”, and PAS means “all, the whole”, and so I would interpret the
name to mean “one who stood against all” opposition, in this context, one who
kept the faith even unto death. W.R.F.
Clifton
A. Emahiser’s comment: It should also be pointed out that the Antipas at Rev.
2:13 should not be confused with the family of Herod Antipas. Evidently Comparet
went to Strong’s, where Antipas is
the Greek word #493, and according to Strong, Anti means “in place of” and the
“pas” is a derivative of #3963 meaning father or parent. Because the modulation
on the tape was so poor, Comparet may have said “pas” rather than “popis.” I
have to agree with Finck that there were no popes in the days of the early
martyrs, and I would have to give an educated guess that this would be “one who
takes the place of his father.” Yet Finck (far superior at the Greek than I)
advises me “While Strong connects ‘pas’ to ‘father’, I find no such etymology in
Greek or in the other lexicographers.”
Note
#16:
I would not call Victor I a “pope” under any circumstances, which is sort of
like calling Simon Peter “pope”, if not as horrible! Was Peter Stuyvesant a “New
Yorker”? Victor I was rather only “bishop of
Note
#17:
Unmentioned by Comparet, “Pergamos” was the citadel of ancient
Note
#18:
As seen in note #13, Lesson #1 (above), Venus (Aphroditê) was said to be the
mother of Aeneas, who fought in the Trojan War. The Greeks, though, believed
Semiramis and Ninus, and the founding of