Papists view of a gigantic Mary in Revelation 12.
Who is the Sun Moon & Stars Woman?
The “Shameless Popery” folks love Mary so much, and assign her such supernatural abilities, that they have no problem imagining her to be millions of miles in height, floating in air, and filling up the entire sky. In other words, they visualize her as the woman in the Revelation chapter 12 vision.
Revelation 12:1-6
1 And there appeared a great wonder in heaven; a woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars:
2 And she being with child cried, travailing in birth, and pained to be delivered.
3 And there appeared another wonder in heaven; and behold a great red dragon, having seven heads and ten horns, and seven crowns upon his heads.
4 And his tail drew the third part of the stars of heaven, and did cast them to the earth: and the dragon stood before the woman which was ready to be delivered, for to devour her child as soon as it was born.
5 And she brought forth a man child, who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron: and her child was caught up unto God, and to his throne.
6 And the woman fled into the wilderness, where she hath a place prepared of God, that they should feed her there a thousand two hundred and threescore days.
Now a sane person would assume that a vision of a giant woman has got to stand for something other than a woman, but Catholics don’t think that way. To a Roman Catholic, a humongous woman in a vision is bound to stand for nobody else but Mary because Mary is a magical superstar and she is able to take up whatever amount of space she wants!
Well the Catholics are all wrong – again.
Pagans imagine the vision depicts the reign of either their Church and/or their Mary goddess and her infant when or the day when Roman Catholicism takes over the world. The correct interpretation is of Israel and Moses.
The woman in Revelation 12 is Israel and the son that is born to her is Moses.
The way “To understand a proverb, and the interpretation; the words of the wise, and their dark sayings” is to not depart from the words of scripture in solving them. By that we always mean the KING JAMES BIBLE – the AV 1611 – in English.
Did the Bible previously assign meaning to 12 stars? Yes!
“And he dreamed yet another dream, and told it his brethren, and said, Behold, I have dreamed a dream more; and, behold, the sun and the moon and the eleven stars made obeisance to me. And he told it to his father, and to his brethren: and his father rebuked him, and said unto him, What is this dream that thou hast dreamed? Shall I and thy mother and thy brethren indeed come to bow down ourselves to thee to the earth?” Genesis 37:9-10.
Joseph’s 11 brothers are stars, and the sun and moon are his father and mother. That means 12 stars is Joseph plus his brothers – all the tribes of Israel.
So this vision assigns 12 stars, sun, and moon is the nation of Israel. This woman is wearing these symbols therefore obviously she represents all the Jewish People together. Since this meaning is based on the Bible’s own code-breaking of itself, it is final and trumps anybody else’s interpretation. The woman is Israel; she is not Mary, not the Church, nor anybody else but Israel.
It says, “she brought forth a man child, who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron: and her child was caught up unto God, and to his throne.” Revelation 12:5.
The application of this man-child to Jesus Christ seems to fit very well. He was born a Jew, he is going to rule all nations, he has a rod of iron (Ps 2:9), and he ascended into heaven (Acts 1).
But read carefully, because it isn’t speaking directly here of Christ, it is actually speaking of Moses, who is one of the witnesses described in the prior chapter, Revelation 11.
Those two witnesses in Revelation 11 are Moses and Elijah – obvious not only by the wonders they do, but because Jesus said Elijah would return (Mt. 17:11) when both Moses and Elijah appeared with him at transfiguration (Mt. 17:3), and Malachi mentioned both of them: “Remember ye the law of Moses my servant, which I commanded unto him in Horeb for all Israel, with the statutes and judgments. Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the LORD:” Malachi 4:4-5.
Moses and Elijah, which represent the law and the prophets, will stand at Christ’s right hand and left hand at his kingdom (Zechariah 4:14; Matthew 20:23). Moses is the right-hand servant of the Lamb, executing the law: “…they sing the song of Moses the servant of God, and the song of the Lamb, saying…” Rev. 15:3.
By Christ’s hand Moses was appointed ruler, “This Moses whom they refused, saying, Who made thee a ruler and a judge? the same did God send to be a ruler and a deliverer by the hand of the angel which appeared to him in the bush.” Acts 7:35.
Moses’ law is not about grace – it is about killing lawbreakers: “He that despised Moses’ law died without mercy under two or three witnesses:” Hebrews 10:28. John writes, “For the law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ.” Jn 1:17.
The Bible says, “the law shall go forth of Zion, and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem.” Micah 4:2. That’s Moses’ law going out to rule the nations.
Jesus Christ, of course, is the supreme ruler – but he appoints Moses to rule over the nations by the stringent Mosaic law.
In Rev. 12:4 it says, “the dragon stood before the woman which was ready to be delivered, for to devour her child as soon as it was born.“
However, there was no death threat against Christ on the day he was born. Herod did not seek to kill him until many months later after he realized the wise men were not going to return to inform him where Jesus was (Matthew 2:16). But, on the day when Moses was born there was already in place Pharaoh’s command to kill him – by throwing all the Jewish boys into the Nile at birth. Exodus 1:22.
Also, Herod is not a “dragon” – he was only called a “fox” by Christ (Luke 13:32), but scripture calls Pharaoh a “dragon” – “Pharaoh king of Egypt, the great dragon that lieth in the midst of his rivers…” Ezekiel 29:3. Pharaoh is a type of the devil, and the great red dragon with seven heads is the devil’s world government. Therefore the passage is not about Christ’s birth – but about Moses’ birth to the nation of Israel.
Therefore the vision of Revelation 12 is explained in no uncertain terms by reference to the Holy Scriptures themselves alone. It has nothing to do with Mary nor the Church nor Jesus Christ. There is no need to have a vision portraying the earthly life of Christ since that was already fully dealt with in the gospels, and the Church is explained in the rest of the New Testament. The vision here is a part of the Revelation vision and prophesies of Israel’s struggles during the tribulation period:
Israel’s great law-giver Moses will return (with Elijah) to lead the Jews during the tribulation (probably for 3.5 years- cf. James 5:17), preaching in Jerusalem and performing wonders and burning up any enemies who threaten them (Rev 11:5). At the start of the Great Tribulation, Moses is killed (and Elijah, Rev. 11:8), yet lives again after 3 days and gets caught up to heaven (with Elijah, Rev. 11:12). After that Jerusalem is overrun by their enemies, and the Jews flee into the wilderness of Salah-Petra (Lamentations 4:20).
So Revelation 12 is simply a vision that re-affirms the rest of the prophecies in Revelation (and the entire Bible concerning the tribulation), but adding additional explanation of some of the spiritual warfare that will be transpiring in the heavenlies during that time.
It says, “And his tail drew the third part of the stars of heaven, and did cast them to the earth” v. 4. The traditional meaning is that a third of the angels joined the devil in his rebellion against God – however the verse doesn’t say that at all. In fact, the verse corresponds exactly to the descriptions of the exploits of the beast in Daniel 8:10 “And it waxed great, even to the host of heaven; and it cast down some of the host and of the stars to the ground, and stamped upon them.” Since the 12 stars represent the 12 tribes of Israel, the other stars would stand for all the other tribes of planet earth. That one-third of them are removed suggests that the antichrists of the tribulation will genocide 1/3 of humanity, completely eliminating one-third of the nations from planet earth. (cf. Rev. 6:4; 9:15-18).
Conclusion.
Now we can see why Roman Catholics hate the Jews so much – Christ’s right hand man to govern the world will be Moses, not the Pope.
Of course, glorified Christians are going to reign with Christ – but our role will be exalted – the day-to-day management will be in the hands of the saved Jews who make it through the tribulation and their descendants. We will be like Daniel who got to sit in the King’s gate while his three friends were appointed to run the affairs of the kingdom (Daniel 2:49).
Of course, the pagans in Rome imagine that they are the woman in the vision – which is why they put 12 stars on the European flag – for their goddess Europa, i.e., “Mary”.
Posted on December 16, 2012