Woman of the Apocalypse
When the child is taken to heaven, the woman flees on eagle’s wings into the wilderness at a "place prepared of God" for 1,260 days.
The commentary of the New American Bible states that "The woman adorned with the sun, the moon, and the stars (images taken from Genesis 37:9–10) symbolizes God’s people in the Old and the New Testament.
[3] Revelation 12 describes "a woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars" (12:1).
Ancient writers subscribing to the Marian interpretation include Epiphanius,[5] Tychonius[6] (who heavily influenced Augustine), the unknown author of the History of Joseph the Carpenter,[7] Quodvultdeus (a disciple of Augustine), Cassiodorus (Complexiones in Apocalypsi, written c. 570 AD), and the Greek Father Oikoumenios (6th c.), with his contemporary Andreas of Caesarea criticising him for believing so[8].
[13] Pope Pius X explicitly identified the "woman" of the Revelation with the Virgin in his encyclical Ad diem illum.
[14] Pope Benedict XVI also made this identification several times, associating the "crown of twelve stars" with Mary's authority among the saints.
The dragon trying to devour the woman's child at the moment of his birth (Revelation 12:4) is a reference to Herod the Great's attempt to kill the infant Jesus (Matthew 2:16).
[citation needed] In the interpretation of Pius X (1904), the birth is not that of Jesus but "surely ours", (i.e. the Church Militant) "we who, being yet detained in exile, are still to be brought forth to the perfect love of God and eternal happiness".
[10] And John Paul II (1987) to the Protoevangelium interpretation of Genesis 3:15, and by extension the symbolic identification of the Woman with both Mary and Eve.
[20] The Virgin of the Rosary is frequently shown with the crown or halo of twelve stars (but not the crescent moon) in modern depictions (since the 19th century[b]).
Commentators who adhere to Protestant eschatology sometimes identify the woman as the Church, and the man-child she gives birth to are the saints.
[22] According to this interpretation, Revelation 12:17 describes the remnant of the seed of the woman as those who keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ.
[23] Dispensational premillennialists, and amillennialists who believe in multiple valid interpretations will often identify the woman as the nation of Israel.
[22] The woman flees into the wilderness where she is nourished for 1260 days, the equivalent of three and a half years or forty-two months (cf.
[22] In the latter part of the seventieth week, a remnant of Israel will flee into the wilderness to escape the persecution of Antichrist, who is called "the son of destruction", "the lawless one", and "whose coming is in accord with the activity of Satan" (2 Thess.
Jesus, in the Olivet Discourse, warned the people of this time which would occur just prior to His return to set up His earthly, Millennial kingdom (Matt.
The "Seventieth Week of Daniel", and prophecy of the Olivet Discourse, in this belief, are ascribed as concerning the first coming of Christ, the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD (during which enforced emperor worship occurred in the temple of Jerusalem, which was later almost totally destroyed, and many Jews were made slaves in distant lands resulting presumably in their remaining families not knowing what happened to them or where they were), and the establishment of Christ's Church, as it currently exists, both on earth and in heaven.
"[24] Russian Orthodox theologian Sergei Bulgakov (1871–1944) in his interpretation of Revelation notes of the astronomical attributes of the woman in Babylonian, Persian, Greek, and Egyptian mythologies.
In his interpretation, astronomical attributes of a pagan goddess are here "translated into the language of Christian theology and assume the new symbolism.
