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We consulted the Biblical End Times category in the Yahoo! Directory and also searched on "four horsemen apocalypse" to reveal a few details about these mysterious riders. Commonly called "the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse," these figures are part of the elaborate imagery found in the Bible's Book of Revelation. Scholars believe this book was written at the end of the first century A.D. The Book of Revelation
recounts the visions experienced by John the Apostle. In Biblical Greek, the word "apocalypse" means revelation, and John's message is meant as a prediction of the future. The book may have been an allegory for the political situation of the time. Passages 6:1 through 6:8 describe the horsemen. In these pages, Jesus Christ is symbolized by the Lamb, and he opens a scroll fastened with seven seals. After he breaks each of the first four seals, one of the horsemen appears. As the first seal breaks, John sees, "a white horse: and he that sat on him had a bow; and a crown was given unto him: and he went forth conquering, and to conquer."
The second seal reveals "another horse that was red: and power was given to him that sat thereon to take peace from the earth, and that they should kill one another: and there was given unto him a great sword." After the third seal is broken, a black horse appears, and the rider holds a pair of balances. John hears a voice say, "A measure of wheat for a penny, and three measures of barley for a penny; and see thou hurt not the oil and the wine." When the fourth seal is broken, the final horse arrives: "a pale horse: and his name that sat on him was Death, and Hell followed with him." John says of the horses, "And power was given unto them over the fourth part of the earth, to kill with sword, and with hunger, and with death, and with the beasts of the earth." The symbolism
of the four horsemen is much debated. The first horse in particular is a source of confusion. Some identify the white horse with Christ because later in Revelation, Christ rides on a white horse. Many others believe the first horseman brings conquest and oppression upon the world in preparation for the next horses. The second horseman is commonly seen as war. The third is usually interpreted as famine, due to the relationship between the scales, food, and money. The final horseman obviously symbolizes death, though sometimes this horseman is considered to be pestilence and disease because the pale color of the horse can be translated as "sickly pale." In Revelation, conquest,
war, famine, and death/pestilence are given power over a quarter of the earth. Humankind suffers even more in this book, but in the end, good finally triumphs over evil.
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