One Awesome Character
“In his right hand he held seven stars, from his mouth came a sharp two-edged sword, and his face was like the sun shining in full strength. When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead. But he laid his right hand on me, saying, “Fear not, I am the first and the last, and the living one. I died, and behold I am alive forevermore, and I have the keys of Death and Hades.“
-Apostle John, Book of Revelation 1:12-18
Outside of the context of evangelism, the average person would read that excerpt and find it to be simply overdramatic. How could a person hold seven stars in his hands? Or reach into his mouth and pull out a double edged blade?! When a person learns that this is an excerpt from the Bible, telling of when Jesus’s disciple John sees the future to come according to Christian belief, he can nod with understanding. The imagery is powerful regardless of whether the reader believes in God or not. The way John writes about Jesus (presumed to be the man pulling weapons out of his mouth and whose face shines like the sun) reveals how significant and powerful a character he is.
For an author to imply such majesty about one character without the writer adding any action into the sentences is in itself extraordinary. In those four sentences alone, the reader can imagine a radiant figure, with words that cut flesh, with limitless control in his hands, instigating fear in those who see him, and the power to be raised from the dead, not to mention live eternally thereafter. Even if I wasn’t a believer in who Christ is, I would still not be able to say that this is not great writing.
2 responses so far
It’s weird that this post has no comments, it is a good one. The excerpt is powerful, showing the might of the character. It is interesting to see how such a short post can do a large amount of work. Some writing requires long paragraphs and many pages to convey a point, whereas some writing can capture al the potency in just a few sentences. It is interesting how pieces of writing can be so different when at first glance, it all looks like words on a page.
I have to agree that the bible, whether a reader is religious or not, is definitely worth reading and perhaps one of the greatest writing of all. Some may find it befuddling and difficult to read, but there are other great versions that can address this problem. I, too, sometimes have difficulty understanding it right away but I think the beauty lies within patiently reading it over and over until you finally realise the great message behind it.