42. THE ALMIGHTY

42. THE ALMIGHTY

Revelation 1:8. “I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending, saith the Lord, which is, and which was, and which is to come, the Almighty.”

The Greek word for Almighty is “pantokrator.”  This term is found seven times also, in Revelation 4:8; 11:17; 15:3; 16:7, 14; 19:15; 21:22. According to Malina the term literally means "Controller of Everyone and Everything" (Malina, 261*). The like term polokrator was used in the Greek cultures to designate the “god” who exercised control over the pole of the universe, upon which the whole heavens and earth apparently turned. The word pole meant "that central pivot plus all the sky connected with it that rotated around the earth due to the power applied at the pole,” (ibid. 73).That is, this is the position of all power in the universe.  

Malina says of the seven stars of Ursa Major which is the constellation containing the pole star, (often called "the North Star"): "These stars are known variously as simply the 'Seven Stars'; or as 'Septem Triones,' the seven oxen that plow or thresh around the pole,' (in Latin, a common word for northern is 'seven-oxen-ward' septemtrionalis); or 'the Turner,'" (ibid. 92).

On this view, the polokrator held the pivotal stars in his right hand (ibid. 262).  He is, therefore, a universal figure, not merely the Messiah of the small nation of Israel. It is in this idea of the pole as the pivot point upon which the whole universe turns that we find an analogy with the Garner also as a place where the good grain is gathered, ( see Matthew 3:12; Luke 3:17), for the oxen tread out the grain around just such a pole.

Malina says that this polokrator is also identified with the zodiacal constellation of the Lamb/Ram, believed to be the first of the zodiacal signs. [Remember, however, that the Hebrews did not use the word 'zodiac', a circle of animals, but rather 'mazzaroth', meaning "moving things."] The ancients popularly believed that when the sky revolved to the position where the Lamb/Ram was again the first of the signs of the year, then the whole universe would be transformed. By referencing the symbol of the polokrator, the Book Revelation is declaring that Jesus now occupies not only this position of power, but also ALL power. Not only physical power, but ALL kinds of power in the universe. As the Great Lamb of God, the Lamb/Ram, it is the time for the transformation of the universe.

*Malina, Bruce J. On the Genre and Message of Revelation. Hendrickson Publishers. Peabody, Mass. 1995.  

This lesson is an edited excerpt from my book Revelation In Context.
 

My Book is available at the Living Word Bookstore in Shawnee, Oklahoma and is also available online at www.amazon.com  or www.xulonpress.com.

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