By Pastor/Evangelist Barbara Lynch

I woke up this morning with a dream. In the dream, a line of people held hands as far as the eye could see on either side. God said:   Stay on the front line. You are a barrier between darkness and light. God spoke further: The strong ones must stay on the front line of battle and protect the weak ones who cannot fight for themselves. They must protect vulnerable humanity, no matter how hard the battle line becomes.

God spoke again: {PANDORA’S BOX HAS BEEN OPENED.} The curse has come upon the world. Inflation is just the beginning, wars, and rumors of wars, with this much devastation across this land.

Revelation 12:  12 (MSG)
12 So rejoice, O Heavens, and all who live there, but doom to earth and sea, For the Devil’s come down on you with both feet; he’s had a great fall; He’s wild and raging with anger; he hasn’t much time and he knows it.

The woes have begun. Mankind is about to forego a great transition. One that has never been witnessed before. The all-consuming dark evil has been loosed upon the land, and only the strong will survive. Children stay your posts at all cost. Do not venture into the unknown uncovered. Take My Son’s blood with you and destroy the darkness on all sides.

My people must come up hither, lean upon My bosom and allow Me total and complete control of life’s circumstances. Now is the time to forge forward into the unknown, and allow Me to lead, guide, and protect you at every juncture in the road that lies before you.

PANDORA’S BOX IS A PROLIFIC SOURCE OF TROUBLE.

What Is Pandora’s Box and Why Was It Significant?

Even if you are not overly familiar with Greek mythology, there is still a good chance that you have heard of Pandora’s box. It’s part of a popular phrase that has been around for decades. However, the story behind it extends back even further, to approximately the 7th century BC. This was when the famous Greek poet Hesiod created his didactic poems called Works and Days, which contained the origin story of Pandora and her infamous box.

If you were trying to roughly summarize the story, it could be described as a re-imagining of the well-known Adam and Eve tale from the Bible, where Eve eats the forbidden fruit and dooms all of humanity. In fact, the two stories share many similarities, and numerous comparisons have been drawn between them.

However, the full story of Pandora’s box is a bit more complex. Here is a brief overview of who Pandora was, what the importance of her box was, and what the famous phrase means in the present day.

The Story of Pandora
Much like Eve from the Bible, Pandora was created by the Gods and was the first female human on Earth. Unfortunately, the intention behind creating Pandora was much more malicious than the intention behind Eve. In fact, the two women were created for opposite reasons: Eve was created to be a wonderful companion to man, while Pandora was created as a form of punishment for man.

The reason for this retribution is that Prometheus openly defied Zeus by stealing fire from Mount Olympus and bringing it down to the humans. Zeus decided to take his revenge by creating the first human female who would be incredibly beautiful and ideal in every way, except he would also bestow upon her the curse of being stubborn, deceitful, and overly curious.

As if this wasn’t already bad enough, Zeus then instructed that she be sent to Prometheus’ brother, Epimetheus. Despite Prometheus’ warnings about not accepting anything from the Gods, his brother was unable to resist the unparalleled beauty of Pandora and fell in love with her.

Before being sent to Epimetheus, however, Pandora was given a jar (or pithos in Greek) which she was told contained numerous blessings from the Gods but was not to be opened. Eventually, her extreme curiosity overcame her, and she decided to open the jar. As soon as she did so, countless evils flew out of the box and plagued humanity. While Pandora attempted to close the jar right away, the only thing she managed to trap back inside was hope.

What is the moral of the story to Pandora’s Box?
It was HOPE. A very wise god had placed in the box among all of the troubles of life the one thing necessary to endure the mess that Pandora created for herself and the rest of us. We still possess hope amid the whirlwinds of death, destruction, war, and pestilence. We have not lost hold of hope.

The container mentioned in the original account was actually a large storage jar, but the word was later mistranslated. In modern times an idiom has grown from the story meaning “Any source of great and unexpected troubles”,[2] or alternatively “A present which seems valuable but which in reality is a curse”

Where Did the Box Come From?
You might have noticed that throughout that entire story, there was no mention of a box. The closest that we got to a box was a jar of evil perils. So where exactly did we get Pandora’s box from? Well, the answer to that actually involves a mistranslation that happened several hundred years ago.

Although there is some debate on which individual is responsible for the mistranslation, it is clear that it occurred during the 16th century and accidentally turned Pandora’s jar into Pandora’s box. From then on, the newly translated copies of the story spread and became more widely known than the original text. So, if it hadn’t been for an inaccurate translation that occurred almost 500 years ago, then today we might all be saying Pandora’s jar instead of Pandora’s box.

How Pandora’s Box Is Used Today
Most people that hear the phrase Pandora’s box today do not think of the ancient Greek myth right away, if at all. Instead, it has come to mean when someone does an action that has unforeseen negative consequences. In this case, you would say that someone has opened Pandora’s box and they would know that bad things are about to happen. It’s similar to the phrase “can of worms.”

Pandora’s box is only one of the many Greek references that have survived thousands of years since their establishment and still exist in modern language.