John the Apostle writes the Book of Revelation around 95 CE from the island of Patmos, where Emperor Domitian has exiled him for refusing to participate in imperial cult worship. Domitian has escalated demands that subjects throughout the empire honor him as divine, executing or banishing Christians who resist. John addresses seven specific churches in Asia Minor named in Revelation 1:11, congregations facing immediate pressure to burn incense to Caesar or face economic exclusion, imprisonment, or death. In Revelation 5, John has witnessed a scroll sealed with seven seals that no one in heaven or earth could open until the Lamb who was slain proved worthy to break the seals. Chapter 6 opens with the Lamb breaking the first four seals in sequence, each summoning a rider on a colored horse.
The first seal produces a white horse whose rider carries a bow and crown and goes conquering. The second seal produces a red horse whose rider takes peace from the earth and wields a great sword. The third seal produces a black horse whose rider holds scales while a voice announces catastrophic inflation: a denarius, a full day's wage, now buys only enough wheat to feed one person or enough barley to feed three, though oil and wine remain untouched. The fourth seal produces a pale horse whose rider is named Death with Hades following, granted authority over one quarter of the earth to kill by sword, and with hunger, and with death, and with the beasts of the earth. This is not random apocalyptic imagery but the precise four-part covenant curse sequence from Leviticus 26:14-26, where Moses warns that persistent disobedience will trigger enemies conquering Israel, then sword, then famine calibrated to exact grain rationing, then wild beasts, then plague.