A. 3a,§12 - Book of Revelation, Explained

¤ Chapter 12 speaks of two signs in heaven, the first of which is great. It is a Woman clothed in the sun, and the moon under her feet, and a crown of twelve stars on her head (Rev. 12:1).

The same features are found only once in the Bible. With Jacob/Israel, his wife and his twelve sons. They are ancestors of the Jewish people (Gen. 37:9-10).

¤ God's chosen people represented Her (and will in the future represent Her) (Deu. 7:6-8).

Here this people, this Woman, gave birth to the Lord Jesus (Rev. 12:2, 5).

¤ The moon under Her feet had previously been the Law. Now the Woman is represented by the Gentile church, Her being clothed with the sun by Grace, and the twelve stars in Her crown by the twelve apostles. The teaching of the apostles, the perfect interpretation of the Word, is the crowning of the New Testament (Gal. 4:21-31).

In the same way, She as the Mother of the believers with the name (New) Jerusalem is a symbolic representation of God’s Freedom Covenant (Gal. 4:26).

¤ She is the Body of Christ, the heavenly Family, into which we are baptized by the Holy Spirit (1Cor. 12:13, 27).

In the near future, clothed with the sun, the people of Israel will represent Her {Hep. 10:16-17 (Jer. 30-31, 1d§1-3, 15e3)}

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¤ The second sign in heaven is a huge fire-red dragon with seven heads, ten horns, and seven royal crowns on its heads (Rev. 12:3).

It is a symbol for the devil (/slanderer) [= Satan = old serpent = huge dragon = deceiver] (Rev. 12:9).

¤ The dragon on earth, on the other hand, is a shadow image of this dragon and represents the devil and his thoughts here {Heb. 8:5, etc. (4a§1317)}.

Thus, the sixth head of the dragon (the Roman Empire) tried to kill Jesus when He was born. King Herod, for example, a part of this emperorship, tried this in Bethlehem (Mat. 2:16; Rev. 12:4b).

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¤ In ancient times, the dragon had been a God-protecting cherub, from which injustice had once been found (Ezek. 28:11-19).

After this, he and its angels had been hurled down out of heaven to the earth (Rev. 12:7-9).

¤ In Eden he subsequently led the first humans, Adam and Eve, astray. Although both fell differently. First, in the serpent, he met Eve (Gen. 3:1-6; Ezek. 28:13a), 1Tim. 2:13-14, <For Adam was formed first, and then Eve. 14. And it was not Adam who was deceived, but the woman who was deceived and fell into transgression.>

Eve sinned by not calling on Adam to help. For the woman is of the man. She ought to be the glory of her husband, the representative of her husband, just as a man ought to be the image and glory of God (cf. 1Cor. 11:7-8).

¤ Satan had suggested something strange to her and Adam would have been capable to see through it. Just as later Jesus Christ was able to resist the devil with the words “it is written” (Mat. 4:1-11).

Adam, on the other hand, sinned when he listened to his wife and ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. He knew that God had forbidden it (Gen. 3:17).

¤ Dying had been a consequence of this from which Christ redeemed us (Rm. 5:12 etc. and Gal. 3:13).

Later, Jesus Christ not only perfectly resisted the devil. He was willing to sacrifice His own sinless life, thereby justifying and sanctifying everyone who believes in Him and lives for Him (before or) after this (Titus 2:11-14).

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¤ The serpent had been the most developed of all animals. A human ape, that could even speak, and was genetically almost like a human (cf. Gen. 3:1-5).

Regrettably, it had allowed itself to be used by the dragon/Satan. Something it could have refused. That is why God then condemned it to go on its belly and to eat dust (cf. Gen. 3:14).

¤ Thus through the serpent the devil had approached Eve and raped her (Rev. 12:9a).

As a result, Cain was born. However, for Eve, that had been a miraculous experience (Gen. 4:1).

¤ For mankind, it was the beginning of a sad struggle for the Truth, Gen. 3:15. <”…. And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her Seed; He will bruise your head, and you will bruise His heel.”>

Satan's removal from Heaven would have been final. But after the sin fall he regained access to God as accuser (Gen. 2:17; Rev. 12:10b).

¤ According to the Jewish calendar, after about four thousand years, the specific Seed of the woman, Immanuel [God with us], appeared (Isa. 7:14; Mat. 1:18-23).

With His sacrificial death, Jesus Christ broke the power of the devil (Heb. 2:14b).

¤ Once again the dragon was defeated and cast out (John 12:31; Rev. 12:7-10).

And in the same way, every believer must be sober-minded and alert, and must resist firm in faith the devil (1Pet. 5:8-9; Rev. 12:11).