My Little Corner of the Universe

I found this interesting picture in the book From Paradise Lost to Paradise Regained. Here, it shows 5 horsemen.



But the book Revelation... It's Grand Climax at Hand! shows just four.



So, this started to baffle me. A little bit of searching took me to Revelation 6.8 that says: "And I saw, and, look! a pale horse; and the one seated upon it had the name Death. And Ha´des was closely following him. And authority was given them over the fourth part of the earth, to kill with a long sword and with food shortage and with deadly plague and by the wild beasts of the earth."

So does this mean that "Hades", on his own horse followed "Death" in the pale horse? Or does it mean that "Hades" is on the same horse as "Death"? Or is it that "Hades" simply does not have a horse, but is following "Death" either way?

The Watchtower, January 1, 1981, Questions from Readers (which was about 10 months and 3 days before I was born (just a Roy Reyes factoid) answered this question. It mentions that no one can say for sure which possibility is the correct one. What we can say for sure is that, according to the apostle John, he saw four riders on the white, red, black, and pale colored horses... (maybe that had a itty-bitty influence in L. Frank Baum novels of horses of a different color...)

Anyway, back to reality, the article also mentions how it's not necessary, though, to be dogmatic if there was really a fifth horse or not. John's description tells us what he considered more important, on how closely "Hades" followed "Death". That saying that those people that die prematurely -in war, hunger, or plagues- are collected by "Hades", the common grave of humankind (Revelation 20.13)

Interesting, huh?

Proverbios 4.18 "Pero la senda de los justos es como la luz brillante que va haciéndose más y más clara hasta que el día queda firmemente establecido."