The Seventh Seal: Apocalypse, prophecy and asteroid Apophis in 2029

The prophecies of the Apocalypse, with its seals, trumpets and bowls, could be read in light of astronomical events such as the approach of the asteroid **Apophis** in 2029, raising a scenario of global catastrophe.

The **Apocalypse**, that book of the New Testament that has given so many headaches and still does, is a fascinating text. It is presented to us as a prophecy, but the idea of prophecy, as we understand it today, is usually laden with mysticism and esotericism. However, if we look back, around **1814**, one **Laplace** was already imagining a theoretical "machine" capable of foreseeing the future if physics developed in a deterministic way. An idea that, seen this way, invites us to reread certain ancient texts from a different perspective.

One could even think of the three great Abrahamic religions as a common thread, an evolution of contact with some other "entity". Of course, this is if we widen the frame. If we stick to a purely scientific, atheist view, and dismiss telepathy as science fiction, anyone claiming to hear voices or see visions would end up, today, with a diagnosis of schizophrenia. A thousand years ago, that meant the pyre for witchcraft. Pogre has clearly been made. But it is also true that there are subjects that perhaps have not been explored enough.

The problem is that the world, unfortunately, is full of charlatans, of people living day to day and, worse still, of those with less noble intentions. Despite everything, the New Testament has survived to our days as part of the modern Bible. And if we take a look at its content, making certain claims today could land us straight in a psychiatric ward. In Judaism, for example, not much credit is given to it. But if we stop at the basic scheme of the **Apocalypse**: seven seals, seven trumpets and seven bowls, the structure is clear.

And the thing becomes relevant now, although there are always those predicting the end of the world, because of the proximity of **Apophis**, an asteroid expected in **2029**. If we analyse the content of the "seven trumpets", we could interpret them as emergency sirens, the kind that sound before catastrophes. What they describe, if we read it properly, seems to be a "nuclear winter" caused by the impact of a meteorite.

If we add to this that between **2026** and **2036** a period of some **2000 years** since the crucifixion of Jesus is completed (whose exact date is unclear, but coincides with the period of **Pontius Pilate** in the region), one does not need to be very religious or very superstitious to feel a certain unease. And if we pull the thread backwards, and think that the trumpets could have a scientific meaning in their descriptions, the picture becomes interesting.

## The trumpets as a cosmic warning

The descriptions of the "seven trumpets" point to a series of catastrophic events. They speak of fires, extreme and unusual atmospheric phenomena, impacts and tsunamis, contamination of the waters. Then, an obscuring of the atmosphere, described as the loss of a third of the luminosity, affecting the sun, the moon and the stars. Plagues stemming from ecological imbalance trinc and, finally, a war triggered by the situation, with the impression that the winter ahead could be, this time, a nuclear one.

It is a reading that, to say the least, makes your hair stand on end. And one wonders whether the seals, those that open the way to the trumpets, could also have an earthly explanation. It starts with the four horsemen: Conquest, War, Famine and Death. Have we seen these horsemen more often than usual lately? They are the first four "seals". The fifth is especially striking, as it refers to those who have died "for the word of God".

If we analyse the Abrahamic religions sequentially and transversally, Christianity is a modification of Judaism, and Sarracin an amendment to both. If we understand this sequence as a decreasing interaction with some other "entity", it is easy to identify that "word of God" with the Abrahamic covenant itself and the legacy of the "chosen people". Has anyone recently suffered sorrows beyond the usual because of that choice? Think of **Gaza**, for example. That could be the fifth seal.

## The sixth seal and the predictions

And the sixth seal? The darkened sun… (even if a local phenomenon, it gives food for thought), stars falling to the earth (like the **Perseids**), the red moon… (I missed that eclipse), earthquakes… A subtle reading of these events could give us a full house in many latitudes. Although with that "wrath of the lamb", one no longer knows what to expect.

Here it is worth a digression to talk about the figure of **Billy Meier**. He is known as the "prophet of the seventh seal", or so I understand. He is an emblematic figure of "contactism", claiming to be in communication with beings from the **Pleiades** since his childhood. There are worse vices, of course. For some he is emblematic, for others, widely discredited. Controversial, no doubt. The fact is that this man predicted in **1981** that a "red meteorite" would split Eurasia in half. As with the biblical prophecy, anyone reading this is a good candidate to be caught by surprise.

The New Testament is far more detailed, because after that there are still the seven bowls. It speaks of a false prophet, of that "mark of the beast" without which no one will be able to buy or sell… but that would be later on. It would seem, and I know there are always people looking for the signs of the end of the world in their present, that we are in the times of the seventh seal. Silence in the heavens.

## Apophis: the trial by fire

Maybe yes, maybe no. In the end, the description of **John** resembles that of a shepherd who has been handed a PowerPoint of the Apocalypse, and who has tried to grasp what he could, as best he could. The answer to whether this small cluster of synchronicities is more chance than causality we shall have in **2029**.

The forecast is that **Apophis**, whose colour I do not know, but if it entered the atmosphere I assure you it would turn quite red, will pass at some **32,000 km** distance. That is less than a tenth of the distance to the moon and closer than the orbit of some satellites. It is supposed to be about **350 metres** in diameter. The one that wiped out the dinosaurs was several kilometres larger, but the truth is we have no record of an impact of that magnitude.

The truth is it is going to be a good spell for astronomy around here: three eclipses in a row and the passage of **Apophis** as the finale. It is supposed to pass by and return to orbit farther away in **2036**, but these calculations, let's say, are always subject to the error of chaotic systems. Small differences in measurement can produce very different outcomes. It is quite possible that after the pass in **2029** the orbit will have to be recalculated for the next approach. That is, if it really passes by, which remains to be seen. If what is proposed were true, it would be humiliating that someone had calculated an event **2000 years** in advance and with greater precision. It would be, in our eyes, a miracle.

So there we have it, a new **2012** on the horizon. So that there is at least something to look forward to. Rereading the **Apocalypse** at leisure, for example. With the certainty, or not, that "millenarianism is going to arrive".