The Call to Flee Babylon and the Vision of the Four Chariots

Reasonings separate one from God.

Regarding the question of whether the remembered creature is unclean and finds joy in bad habits, he builds his own beauty from human toil. What follows this, besides that he himself, whom I call the watcher, and his youths live in uncleanness? For this, observing human things, he received this title; but I say human things are the strifes, rivalries, and false zeal, about which the Apostle writes, rebuking those held by them: 'For where there is strife and rivalry among you, are you not human, and are you walking according to the flesh?' (1 Cor 3:3). Those called such flesh, you might graciously say are women, taking on bad habits, perhaps having been struck and eaten by the said watcher, in an allegorical sense, so as to cast out those seized by fear lest they be destroyed, and to raise filters leading to licentiousness.

It is proper for the one taking up wings like a dove to abstain from these women and their wings, in which the one spread out rests, finding 'the Sabbath which remains to the people of God' (Heb 4:9); you will understand the Holy Spirit descending in the form of a dove in the Jordan, whom he holds alone, and everyone who rests between the two covenants, called lots according to: 'If you sleep between the lots, wings of a dove are fluttering about.' To be winged according to these things is blessed; for they take up the one having them into heaven and the things above the world.

Of the two women being winged according to the watcher, hovering over the measure upon which lawlessness sits between heaven and earth—for even the sinful angels, and the earthly demons, and men who 'bear the image of the swine' (Matt 7:6) have tested it—the one seeing the revelation seeing it hovering and being carried away with the measure upon which lawlessness sits, says to the angel speaking in him: 'Where are these carrying the measure?' And the angel answering says: 'To build him a house in the land of Babylon, and they shall set him there upon his preparation' (Rev 18:2). For what other fitting place is there for the one having lawlessness by measure, except the confusion, so that he may find ready...

Will it be a whale to those pressing upon it? Therefore, one must depart and flee from Babylon because the measure has been placed there to be found ready for those willing. Thus the divine word cries out like a herald to one desiring to be diligent: 'Come out of Babylon, fleeing from the land of the Chaldeans' (Rev 18:4). Having understood the vision of the prophet to be such, let us love to have wings formerly, having been made to fly according to the Holy Spirit; for in this way it is most easy to pass into the super-celestial things.

And I turned and lifted my eyes and saw; and behold, four chariots proceeding from between two mountains, and the mountains were mountains of bronze (Zech 6:1). In the first chariot were red horses, and in the second chariot were black horses, and in the third chariot were white horses, and in the fourth chariot were variegated, speckled horses. And I answered and said to the angel speaking in me: 'What are these, Lord?' And the angel speaking in me answered and said: 'These are the four winds of heaven, proceeding to stand ready for the Lord of all the earth' (Zech 6:5). In which chariot were the black horses, they were proceeding toward the earth of the north, and the white horses were proceeding after them, and the speckled horses were proceeding toward the earth of the south, and the variegated horses were proceeding and were looking to go and to go around the earth. And they went around the earth. And he cried out and spoke to me saying: 'Behold, the ones proceeding toward the earth of the north have stilled my wrath in the land of the north' (Zech 6:8).

Turning to receive yet another revelation, the prophet saw four chariots from between two bronze mountains. The first chariot had red horses yoked together, the second black, the third white, the fourth variegated and speckled. Having beheld the four chariots, desiring to learn about them, he inquires of the angel speaking in him what the seen things are. But he answers saying they are the four winds of heaven, making manifest the four climates of the inhabited world. And the black ones were seen proceeding from the land of the north, the white ones proceeding after them; but the speckled and variegated ones were coming from the south. Everything was said to me about the horses as much as possible when they were seen in the first...