74. 17 The reference in Matthew 24:21 to “a great affliction such as has never existed since the world began and will never exist again” means an attack by falsities and the resulting end — the devastation — of all truth in the Christian denominations of today.
Survey of Teachings of the New Church#87
87. 20 Adamant devotees of the modern-day view that faith is what justifies us are depicted in the Book of Revelation as the dragon, its two beasts, and the locusts. This belief (when strongly held) is depicted there as the great city that is spiritually called Sodom and Egypt, where the two witnesses were killed, and as the pit of the abyss from which the locusts came forth.
