Book with the seven seals

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High altar of the parish church St. Martin in Ensch
Apocalyptic lamb on the book with the seven seals, Johann Heinrich Rohr, around 1775
El Greco: The fifth seal of the apocalypse

The book with the seven seals is reported in detail from the fifth chapter of the Revelation of John in the New Testament of the Bible . It is described in a very visual and visionary language how the seven seals on an "inside and outside" scroll ( Rev 5,1  EU ) are opened by the lamb (a symbol of Jesus Christ ), which triggers the apocalypse .

The seal

When the first four seals are opened, the four apocalyptic riders are released one after the other on the earth ( Rev 6 : 1-8  EU ).

The fifth seal makes the souls of the martyrs visible under the altar. These demand retribution for their death ( Rev 6: 9-11  EU ).

The sixth seal makes the earth shake, the sun turns black, the moon becomes like blood and the stars fall on the earth ( Rev 6: 12–17  EU ). It is therefore often interpreted as a sign of the end of the world, but also as a sign of the salvation of those who are just before God.

After all, the seventh seal is the definitive end of the previous world. It is devastated by seven angels with trumpets and an eighth with a censer ( Rev 8 : 1-9  EU ).

Cultural reception

In the Middle Ages (around 1150) the spiritual and numerical allegory poem De septem Sigillis , which refers to the vision of the Apostle John and ( symbolically ) to the number seven, was written in Austria.

The expression “For me this is like a book with seven seals” says figuratively that a topic is very difficult to access or difficult to understand.

In terms of art history, the depiction of the opening of the fifth seal by El Greco from the Mannerist era is important.

The Austrian composer Franz Schmidt set the book with seven seals to music as an oratorio in 1936 . The work, which was premiered in Vienna in June 1938 by the Vienna Symphony Orchestra and the Singverein der Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde Wien under Oswald Kabasta , is considered to be one of the most important oratorios of musical late Romanticism .

The seven seals were at the core of the teaching of cult leader David Koresh . The publication of his interpretation of the seven seals planned by him was not finished before his death. The unfinished script is said to have burned in 1993 during the Waco storm .

The Oxford University introduces the book with seven seals in their logo .

See also

Web links

Commons : Book with the Seven Seals  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. Peter Ganz : From the number seven (From the seven seals). In: Author's Lexicon . 2nd Edition. Volume VIII, Col. 1189-1192.