''Platos Atlantis & Saint Johns Revelation are the Same Story''

[pLANeT@LANTis]

Seems to me The Bible took off where Plato left off.

[pLANeT@LANTis]

These two controversial books: Platos ''Atlantis'' and Saint John the Divine ''Revelation'' were written 165 miles apart on opposite sides of the Aegean Sea [AGNC] at about the same latitude at 37.3 to 38 degrees N. Plato wrote THE ATLANTIS STORY in Athens on the Western side of he Aegean Sea and about 400 years later Saint John The Divine wrote REVELATION in a cave on the Island of Patmos 165 miles to the East of Athens on the Eastern Side of the Aegean Sea. 

[Arcturus]

Other researchers have made a similar point. The part of Revelation that some think relates to Atlantis:

Revelation 18

New International Version (NIV)
Lament Over Fallen Babylon

18 After this I saw another angel coming down from heaven. He had great authority, and the earth was illuminated by his splendor. 2 With a mighty voice he shouted:

“‘Fallen! Fallen is Babylon the Great!’[a]
    She has become a dwelling for demons
and a haunt for every impure spirit,
    a haunt for every unclean bird,
    a haunt for every unclean and detestable animal.
3 For all the nations have drunk
    the maddening wine of her adulteries.
The kings of the earth committed adultery with her,
    and the merchants of the earth grew rich from her excessive luxuries.”
Warning to Escape Babylon’s Judgment

4 Then I heard another voice from heaven say:

“‘Come out of her, my people,’
    so that you will not share in her sins,
    so that you will not receive any of her plagues;
5 for her sins are piled up to heaven,
    and God has remembered her crimes.
6 Give back to her as she has given;
    pay her back double for what she has done.
    Pour her a double portion from her own cup.
7 Give her as much torment and grief
    as the glory and luxury she gave herself.
In her heart she boasts,
    ‘I sit enthroned as queen.
I am not a widow;[c]
    I will never mourn.’
8 Therefore in one day her plagues will overtake her:
    death, mourning and famine.
She will be consumed by fire,
    for mighty is the Lord God who judges her.
Threefold Woe Over Babylon’s Fall

9 “When the kings of the earth who committed adultery with her and shared her luxury see the smoke of her burning, they will weep and mourn over her. 10 Terrified at her torment, they will stand far off and cry:

“‘Woe! Woe to you, great city,
    you mighty city of Babylon!
In one hour your doom has come!’

11 “The merchants of the earth will weep and mourn over her because no one buys their cargoes anymore— 12 cargoes of gold, silver, precious stones and pearls; fine linen, purple, silk and scarlet cloth; every sort of citron wood, and articles of every kind made of ivory, costly wood, bronze, iron and marble; 13 cargoes of cinnamon and spice, of incense, myrrh and frankincense, of wine and olive oil, of fine flour and wheat; cattle and sheep; horses and carriages; and human beings sold as slaves.

14 “They will say, ‘The fruit you longed for is gone from you. All your luxury and splendor have vanished, never to be recovered.’ 15 The merchants who sold these things and gained their wealth from her will stand far off, terrified at her torment. They will weep and mourn 16 and cry out:

“‘Woe! Woe to you, great city,
    dressed in fine linen, purple and scarlet,
    and glittering with gold, precious stones and pearls!
17 In one hour such great wealth has been brought to ruin!’

“Every sea captain, and all who travel by ship, the sailors, and all who earn their living from the sea, will stand far off. 18 When they see the smoke of her burning, they will exclaim, ‘Was there ever a city like this great city?’ 19 They will throw dust on their heads, and with weeping and mourning cry out:

“‘Woe! Woe to you, great city,
    where all who had ships on the sea
    became rich through her wealth!
In one hour she has been brought to ruin!’

20 “Rejoice over her, you heavens!
    Rejoice, you people of God!
    Rejoice, apostles and prophets!
For God has judged her
    with the judgment she imposed on you.”
The Finality of Babylon’s Doom

21 Then a mighty angel picked up a boulder the size of a large millstone and threw it into the sea, and said:

“With such violence
    the great city of Babylon will be thrown down,
    never to be found again.
22 The music of harpists and musicians, pipers and trumpeters,
    will never be heard in you again.
No worker of any trade
    will ever be found in you again.
The sound of a millstone
    will never be heard in you again.
23 The light of a lamp
    will never shine in you again.
The voice of bridegroom and bride
    will never be heard in you again.
Your merchants were the world’s important people.
    By your magic spell all the nations were led astray.
24 In her was found the blood of prophets and of God’s holy people,
    of all who have been slaughtered on the earth.”


http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Revelation+18

[Arcturus]

And yet, it doesn't really list any geographic location for this Babylon so it's hard to make a complete connection.

[pLANeT@LANTis]

Hi Arcturus, as Plato also does not give a specific geographic location, we thus have these Atlantis forums debating the location of Atlantis! 

 

[Arcturus]

Well, he doesn't give a specific location, but he does say it lay beyond the Pillars of Hercules and in the Atlantic Ocean, right..?

Welcome to the forum, by the way.

[pLANeT@LANTis]

Thanks for the welcome. According to the many topics here there are many that speculate the actual location of the Pillars of Hercules, anywhere from a half dozen to a dozen or so possibilities, many with convincing arguments. Others even debate the location of the Atlantic Ocean as it would have been known by Plato from his observation point on the Acropolis in Athens on the Plain of Attica approximately 6 miles from the Port of Piraeus in the Aegean Sea, and whether Atlantic was named after Atlantis or Atlantis was named after Atlantic or was the word "Atlantis" simply a derivative and an invention by Plato of all those Alpha words popular back in his day! Now I'm tying this into John symbolically mentioning the Alpha and Omega at the beginning and at the end of Revelation and how John may have been inspired by Platos' Atlantis story and took it to a whole other level of Geometry, Numerology and Symbolism mixed with Mysticism.

[pLANeT@LANTis]

 For example the passage from your above quote:

21 Then a mighty angel picked up a boulder the size of a large millstone and threw it into the sea, and said:

“With such violence
    the great city of Babylon will be thrown down,
    never to be found again"

 the sound of a millstone
    will never be heard in you again
[/quote]

The definition of "millstone" from Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary, 1: either of two circular stones used for grinding  2 a: something that grinds or crushes  b: a heavy burden

Now may I suggest that John without mentioning Atlantis used the analogy of "millstone" to describe the central circular city being thrown into the sea by an Almighty cosmic force. They had been crushing their neighbors and had become a heavy burden on earth, and were never to be found or heard from again.

[pLANeT@LANTis]

Scholars and theologians tend to believe Johns' writing Revelation may have been inspired from the Book of Daniel. It's interesting to note that John used "Babylon" in his story and the fact that Daniel had been exiled to Babylon as a boy and the fact that John had also been exiled, to the Greek Island of Patmos. Of course in Johns' day the new Babylon was Rome, but a writer would not dare mention Rome in a negative way. In the same way Plato would not mention the Athenian Aristocracy which he despised. So in a way they were referencing the same thing, the ruthless ruling power of their day and its' ultimate destruction they fantasized about in a storyline. Platos' story takes place in the distant past as apparent historical fact and Johns' story takes place in the distant future as prophecy thru a Vision. But ultimately they are talking about the same thing, the absolute catastrophic destruction of an entire civilization thru cosmic, natural and manmade forces.

[Arcturus]

I think that the pillars were pretty well-defined by Plato's time, and I know the Atlantic was defined by the age of Herodotus, who wrote before Plato.

But say for a moment they weren't, and that Revelations is describing, in part, the death of Atlantis. What location do you believe it was at?

[pLANeT@LANTis]

Well that is a very loaded question, and I have at least three different perspectives on that. First of all, from all the arguments that I have read here and from other forums on this topic, my research would allow me to conclude that the whole Earth is Atlantis. Even tho Plato may not have been aware of it, we know today the entire earth is covered with stone markers and megalithic structures creating a global grid. This grid alone is evidence of an advanced civilization that predates any dates that even Plato was capable of conceiving. Platos' Atlantis in my opinion was one piece of the much bigger picture which he could not fully comprehend. But with all the resources available to him at the newly completed Parthenon which was the latest computer and Think Tank of the time, Plato did manage to envision some kind of world grid when he published his "Theory of Forms".

[pLANeT@LANTis]

   The second perspective is from the point of view of Plato himself as he sat on the steps of the newly constructed Parthenon (447 B.C. - 438 B.C.), one of the most glorious temples in the the known world at that time. It is important to note that Plato as a boy growing up in the presence of such a magnificent structure would have been rubbing shoulders with the families of the architects, engineers, sculptors and stone workers who had worked on its' construction. His thorough knowledge of geometry no doubt was partly due to the influence of the Parthenon itself and what also brought together all those thinkers , philosophers and artists that we recognize today as the Glories of Ancient Greece.
   As a young man searching for knowledge and the mysteries of the universe, Plato would have been sitting on the steps of the Parthenon staring out to sea to the south 6 plus miles away, as many young soul searching Athenians have done over the years until recently as the steps are now barricaded because of the heavy tourist traffic.
   Plato looking around him from this vantage point would have seen low lying hills to the east and west, and the mountain range to the north protecting the central plain of Attica and the Acropolis from the cold north winds. Whether coincidental or not this geographical layout closely resembles Platos' description of the central city of Atlantis. Therefore I conclude Atlantis from Platos' literary perspective, or better know as 'artistic license' was
 actually portraying Athens itself as he foresaw the downfall of the Glorious Greek Empire, as powerful negative forces began controlling and taking over Greece from the inside. He attributed this to the greedy Athenian Autocracy; as we can also witness today the same evil force that has now occupied America and controls the American government, media and military.

[Arcturus]

I've listened to the Atlantis as literary metaphor argument and believe that certain elements of it carry weight. Philosophers of his time often invented scenarios to prove a point. And Plato was disillusioned with Athenian society, make no mistake!

On the other hand, why come up with the Atlantis metaphor when he already had the Republic, a more comprehensive allegory than Timaeus and Critias combined could be? And numerous times in both dialogues, he labels the stories as "true," something he does not state in the Republic, that I remember. Also, Solon actually did make a trip to Egypt and in Plutarchs's "Life of Solon," he does suggest that the story has a basis in fact, but that Plato embellished it somewhat.

As for the whole world being Atlantis, I'll go you one better and ask this, what if this whole world had been named Atlantis before it was named the Earth..? All the ruins about us then might very well be remnants of this ancient empire.

[pLANeT@LANTis]

   Interesting you bring The Republic into this discussion, as the beginning of this document and the very first line of this 400 plus page masterpiece mentions "Piraeus", the port where Socrates and his companions are about to return to "the city", referring to Athens and the Acropolis. In those days if you did not have access to a horse, meant one would have to walk the 6 some miles, which had become a problem for the elderly!
   This is exactly what I was alluding to in the above post  when I was describing the view from Platos' perspective sitting on the steps of the Parthenon, as he overlooked the port of Piraeus to the south. As I also said the newly completed Parthenon was the computer of its' day and the "information highway" was that 6 plus miles to the port and back, where news and merchandise was arriving by ships from the various parts of the Ancient World. One of the most traveled routes would have been the Athens/Alexandria/Athens line from Egypt to Greece, where stories on the tongues of sailors and captains were being carried from places further south like Ethiopia and Arabia, and from the Far East, East Indies and India. I'm sure the most credible and factually based stories guaranteed each individual sailor or captain on every visit the best room and dining and entertainment available during their stay at the port of Piraeus.

[pLANeT@LANTis]

   So as The Republic starts its dialogues with Socrates at the port of Piraeus, we are told they are there celebrating the festival to the goddess Artemis. lt's most likely these celebrations coincided with the busiest times of the shipping season, and the philosophers like Socrates and the other great minds would frequently make this trek to the port on such occasions to gather Data to be processed later at the data collection center known as the Parthenon.
   Plato and others would have recognized this method of collecting data as cumbersome and time consuming. They would have discussed more effective ways to accomplish this necessary acquisition. So Plato using his wild imagination would have conjured up a magnificent plan to bring these worldly sea going vessels to the base of the Parthenon. In his plan he would have envisioned perfectly circular canals encircling the Acropolis with the Temple on top, and with the main canal in a straight line running to the sea 6 plus miles away. Plato in his most exhuberant state of creative mind would have consulted the experts of various fields about the possibility of turning this wild plan into reality. Conversing with the likes of Geologists,  Engineers, Builders and Construction experts they would have told him; "You are mad Plato, only the hand of God could accomplish such an extraordinary feat."
   Plato disappointed, would have spent many days and
weeks pondering the opinions and sarcasm of his professional peers. He then in his imaginative writings would promote the God most capable of  creating this most fantastic of engineering marvels that he had envisioned as the circular city of Poseidon.
   The goddess Athena had won the competition over Poseidon in having this city on the hill named after her, but in Platos' imagination, he inwardly and secretly awarded the winner to him.