Tunguska, Pope Leo XIII and the Opening of the Abyss

Artistic representation of the Tunguska Event

The events described at the sounding of the fifth trumpet in the Book of Revelation - which describes the opening of the bottomless pit by a star falling from heaven, is directly related to the later passage in the Apocalypse concerning the binding of Satan for a thousand years. As we have noted previously, the Apocalypse uses the literary device of recapitulation, which while initially obscuring the surface meaning, actually adds greater depth to the text. So in order for some passages to be fully grasped, the book has to be dissected and restructured according to thematic content. Doing so is especially enlightening for the section concerning the fifth trumpet:


And the fifth angel blew his trumpet, and I saw a star fallen from heaven to earth, and he was given the key to the shaft of the bottomless pit. He opened the shaft of the bottomless pit, and from the shaft rose smoke like the smoke of a great furnace, and the sun and the air were darkened with the smoke from the shaft. Then from the smoke came locusts on the earth, and they were given power like the power of scorpions of the earth. (Rev 9:1-3)


The star fallen to earth at the sounding of the fifth trumpet, which has the key to the bottomless pit, is directly associated with the release of Satan at the end of the thousand years described in Rev 20:


Then I saw an angel coming down from heaven, holding in his hand the key to the bottomless pit and a great chain. And he seized the dragon, that ancient serpent, who is the devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years, and threw him into the pit, and shut it and sealed it over him, so that he might not deceive the nations any longer, until the thousand years were ended. After that he must be released for a little while. (Rev 20:1-3)


And when the thousand years are ended, Satan will be released from his prison and will come out to deceive the nations that are at the four corners of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them for battle; their number is like the sand of the sea. (Rev 20:7-8)


Here, we are told that the role of the Devil at the opening of the abyss is to deceive the nations of the earth, and to gather them for battle - a theme which is recapitulated again in the passage concerning the battle of Armageddon in Rev 16:


And I saw, coming out of the mouth of the dragon and out of the mouth of the beast and out of the mouth of the false prophet, three unclean spirits like frogs. For they are demonic spirits, performing signs, who go abroad to the kings of the whole world, to assemble them for battle on the great day of God the Almighty...  And they assembled them at the place that in Hebrew is called Armageddon.
(Rev 16:13-14, 16)


The three unclean spirits proceeding from the mouths of the unholy trinity to gather the nations for war are analogous to the three woes of the Apocalypse - which I argue in Unveiling the Apocalypse represents three world wars. The first woe being equated with the First World War, etc. By viewing the above passages in juxtaposition, we are able to determine that the role of Satan upon his release from his bondage is to gather the nations of the world for war - which is heralded by the falling of a star to earth, and the rise of the monstrous locusts described in Rev 9.
As we noted in the earlier post, The Apocalyptic Locusts,  the description of the strange armour-clad flying locusts which are depicted as some form of "war-horses" in the Apocalypse, has some incredible parallels with the appearance of military aircraft during the early 20th century.
In addition to closely matching the description of military airplanes, the “locusts” of Revelation are based on the locusts “leaping over the mountain tops” described in chapter 2 of the Book of Joel – a portion of the Bible which brings to mind imagery of the practice of “carpet bombing” or "firebombing" used during WW2:

Fire devours before them, and behind them a flame burns. The land is like the garden of Eden before them, but behind them a desolate wilderness, and nothing escapes them. Their appearance is like the appearance of horses, and like war horses they run. As with the rumbling of chariots, they leap on the tops of the mountains, like the crackling of a flame of fire devouring the stubble, like a powerful army drawn up for battle. (Joel 2:3-5)

The firebombing of Toyko, 26th May, 1945

 

 

In another remarkable "coincidence", the first military aircraft were commissioned in 1908 - the exact same year as the Tunguska event - which the most extraordinary meteoroid impact of recorded history.

The Tunguska event of 30th June, 1908, was thought to have been caused by an air burst of a large meteoroid, which exploded during entry into the earth's atmosphere with the force of that around 1,000 times greater than the atom bomb dropped on Hiroshima. Due to the remote location of Tunguska in the sparsely populated Siberian wilderness, there were no reported causalities as a result of the massive explosion caused by this event. Although there were widespread eyewitness testimonies describing the effects, and the impact was recorded by seismometers around the Eurasian landmass.

Because of the political turmoil in Russia at this time period, the Tunguska impact zone was not subject to scientific research until an expedition visited the area in 1921. The scientific expeditions led by Leonid Kulik observed that trees directly below the impact site were scorched, but still standing upright, while there was masses of fallen trees around the area from where the blast radiated.

Photographs from the second Tunguska expedition taken in 1927

In this same time period, the Wright brothers were being commissioned by the U.S army to develop the world's first military airplanes. So the coincidence of these events fulfils the most important aspect of the prophecy of the fifth trumpet - a star falling to earth which heralds the arrival of flying "locust" like creatures of warfare.
Yet this prediction also has some striking affinities with the prophecy of Pope Leo XIII, concerning the period of 100 years when Satan would be granted greater power before his expulsion from the heavenly court (see the earlier post The Prophecy of Pope Leo XIII).  Whilst in St. Peter's basilica, the pontiff was reputed to have heard a conversion between Jesus and Satan, during which the Devil was permitted greater authority for a period of between 75-100 years.  In the earlier post mentioned above, I argue that this vision prompted not only the institution of the St. Michael Prayer, but also the consecration of the world to the Sacred Heart of Jesus on 25th May 1899 - which the Pope himself declared was "the greatest act of my pontificate". So there is a strong possibility that we should count the 100 years of Satan's rule from this momentous date, bringing us up to the year 1999, which I argued in the earlier posts The Fall of Satan and the The Year of the Dragon, was the moment that Satan was finally expelled from the heavenly court - an end-time event explicitly foretold in Scripture. 
Pope Leo's prophecy of Satan being granted greater power for 100 years strongly echoes the passages in Rev 20 concerning the opening of the abyss quoted above: "After that he must be released for a little while" and "when the thousand years are ended, Satan will be released from his prison and will come out to deceive the nations that are at the four corners of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them for battle; their number is like the sand of the sea..."  And of course these passages are also directly related to the star falling to earth with the key to the abyss, which heralds the arrival of the demonic horde of "locusts" mentioned in Rev 9.
In order for this extrapolation to hold, it would have to follow that the "thousand years" mentioned in Rev 20 came to completion around this same time period (at least on one layer of interpretation). In Unveiling the Apocalypse, I argue that we may find a literal period of a thousand years in the first millennium of Christendom, when the Church was still one single body with the pope as its figurehead - in accordance with the prayer of Jesus that "May they all be one" (John 17:21). This millennial reign of Christ's kingdom on earth could be said to have ended at the Great Schism between the Roman Catholic Church and the Eastern Orthodox in 1054 - a thousand years after Christian unity was first established at the Council of Jerusalem circa 50AD, which healed the rift between the Judaizing Christians (led by St. James the Just), and those that sought to spread the Gospel to the Gentiles (such as St. Paul). 
As Christ himself stated: "A kingdom divided against itself cannot stand..." (Matt 12:25) - therefore any earthly reign would have ended with the division of Christianity against itself at the Great Schism. In the same passage Jesus states that the binding of Satan (the "strong man") began with his own ministry: "how can someone enter a strong man's house and plunder his goods, unless he first binds the strong man? Then indeed he may plunder his house." (Matt 12:29). So the period of "a thousand years" must have began with Christ, and to some extent ended with the division of Christianity in the first millennium AD. But it would be almost another thousand years before the prophecy of Pope Leo XIII came into effect. Could the time span between the turn of the first millennium up to the 20th century represent another separate period of "a thousand years"? After which Satan would be unleashed to gather the nations of the earth for war? When nation would be gathered against nation and kingdom against kingdom (Matt 24:7)? We also need to take into account here the fact that the author of the Apocalypse most likely had the Hebrew/Aramaic word rab here, in relation to the period of the thousand years - a word which could also denote any large period of time. So there is a sense of indefiniteness here. 


It is worth noting another Marian apparition which took place around this same time frame which also has a strong correlation with the prophecy of Pope Leo XIII. Just a year after Tunguska, and a month after the U.S army formally introduced the Wright Brothers' Signal Corps Airplane No.1 as the world's first military airplane on 2nd August 1909, a French priest and visionary was visited by an apparition of Our Lady on 9th September 1909. Fr Jean Edouard Lamy (1855-1931), affectionately known as Pere Lamy, was a highly respected priest molded in the vein of St. John Vianney - the Cure D'Ars.

Pere Lamy

Pere Lamy was blessed with many supernatural graces, including being the recipient of heavenly visitations. During his most widely known apparition, at Grey, France, in 1909, the holy priest was visited by the Virgin Mary, who rather enigmatically was accompanied by Lucifer. During this apparition, Pere Lamy was shown visions of the future, including the world wars (see Mystics of the Church and Spirit Daily for more details). It is the succinct words uttered by the manifestation of Lucifer during the opening of this apparition which provides the bridging connection between this vision and the prophecy of Pope Leo XIII. Pere Lamy saw a vision of Our Lady descending from a chapel ceiling, and she was followed by Lucifer. During an exchange between the Blessed Virgin, who was enquiring of his presence, the Demon responded with the telling words "I have leave from the Father". Were these words an early reference to the permission granted to Satan of a hundred years of greater power?
If so, then this is an extraordinary set of convergences on this particular time period - a falling meteoroid causing the largest explosion in human history, at the exact same time as the introduction of the world's first military airplanes, thus fulfilling the words "I saw a star fallen from heaven to earth, and he was given the key to the shaft of the bottomless pit... Then from the smoke came locusts on the earth, and they were given power like the power of scorpions of the earth..."  Moreover, this prophecy was fulfilled at the exact time span from when Pope Leo was told Satan would be granted more power - a prophecy which directly relates to the unlocking of Satan's chains in chapters 9 and 20 of the Book of Revelation, and which appears to have been supernaturally confirmed at this specific moment in time by a French mystic priest.

T.V. Documentary "The Big Bang in Tunguska"

Footage of the 27th July, 1909. test flight, just before the Wright brothers model was officially accepted by the U.S Army as the world's first military airplane.