Vincent's Word Studies And when he had opened the seventh seal, there was silence in heaven about the space of half an hour.
And I saw the seven angels which stood before God; and to them were given seven trumpets. Locusts (ἀκρίδες)
The idea of this plague is from the eighth plague in Egypt (Exodus 10:14, Exodus 10:15). Compare the description of a visitation of locusts in Joel 2. There are three Hebrew words in the Old Testament which appear to mean locust, probably signifying different species. Only this word is employed in the New Testament. Compare Matthew 3:4; Mark 1:6. Scorpions See Ezekiel 2:6; Luke 10:19; Luke 11:12. Shaped like a lobster, living in damp places, under stones, in clefts of walls, cellars, etc. The sting is in the extremity of the tail. The sting of the Syrian scorpion is not fatal, though very painful. The same is true of the West Indian scorpion. Thomson says that those of North Africa are said to be larger, and that their poison frequently causes death. The wilderness of Sinai is especially alluded to as being inhabited by scorpions at the time of the Exodus (Deuteronomy 8:15); and to this very day they are common in the same district. A part of the mountains bordering on Palestine in the south was named from these Akrabbim, Akrab being the Hebrew for scorpion. And another angel came and stood at the altar, having a golden censer; and there was given unto him much incense, that he should offer it with the prayers of all saints upon the golden altar which was before the throne. Green
See on Revelation 6:8. Men which (ἀνθρώπους οἵτινες) The double relative denotes the class. Rev., such men as have, etc. And the smoke of the incense, which came with the prayers of the saints, ascended up before God out of the angel's hand. They should be tormented (βασανισθῶσιν)
See on torments, Matthew 4:24. Striketh (παίσῃ) Dr. Thomson says that the scorpion cannot strike sideways. All accounts agree as to the fearful pain from its sting. And the angel took the censer, and filled it with fire of the altar, and cast it into the earth: and there were voices, and thunderings, and lightnings, and an earthquake. Men
Rather, the men: those tormented. Shall desire (ἐπιθυμήσουσιν) Ἑπι has the force of vehemently, earnestly. Shall flee (φεύξεται) Read φεύγει fleeth. Aeschylus says: "Not justly do mortals hate death, since it is the greatest deliverance from their many woes" ("Fragment"). Herodotus relates the address of Artabanus to Xerxes, when the latter wept on beholding his vast armament. "There is no man, whether it be here among this multitude or elsewhere, who is so happy as not to have felt the wish - I will not say once, but full many a time - that he were dead rather than alive. Calamities fall upon us, sicknesses vex and harass us, and make life, short though it be, to appear long. So death, through the wretchedness of our life, is a most sweet refuge to our race" (vii., 46). And the seven angels which had the seven trumpets prepared themselves to sound. Shapes (ὁμοιώματα)
Lit., likenesses. Horses Compare Joel 2:4. The likeness of a locust to a horse, especially to a horse equipped with armor, is so striking that the insect is named in German Heupferd hay-horse, and in Italian calvaletta little horse. Crowns Not actual crowns, but as crowns. Milligan remarks that any yellow brilliancy about the head of the insect is a sufficient foundation for the figure. As the faces of men There is a distant resemblance to the human countenance in the face of the locust. Men (ἀνθρώπων) is to be taken not as distinguishing sex, but in the generic sense: human faces. The first angel sounded, and there followed hail and fire mingled with blood, and they were cast upon the earth: and the third part of trees was burnt up, and all green grass was burnt up. Hair of women
The antennae of the locust. There is said to be an Arabic proverb in which the antennae of locusts are compared to girls' hair. Teeth of lions Compare Joel 1:6. And the second angel sounded, and as it were a great mountain burning with fire was cast into the sea: and the third part of the sea became blood; Breastplates
The breast of the locust resembles the plates of a horse's armor. Sound of their wings Olivier, a French writer, says: "It in difficult to express the effect produced on us by the sight of the whole atmosphere filled on all sides and to a great height by an innumerable quantity of these insects, whose flight was slow and uniform, and whose noise resembled that of rain." For a graphic description of their numbers and ravages, see Thomson, "Land and Book, Central Palestine and Phoenicia," 295-302. Of chariots of many horses That is, of many-horsed chariots. The Rev., by the insertion of a comma, apparently takes the two clauses as parallel: the sound of chariots, (the sound) of many horses. Tails like unto scorpions The comparison with the insect as it exists in nature fails here, though Smith's "Bible Dictionary" gives a picture of a species of locust, the Acridium Lineola, a species commonly sold for food in the markets of Bagdad, which has a sting in the tail. Stings (κέντρα) Originally any sharp point. A goad. See on pricks, Acts 26:14. Plato uses it of the peg of a top ("Republic," 436). Herodotus of an instrument of torture. Democedes, the Crotoniat physician, having denied his knowledge of medicine to Darius, Darius bade his attendants "bring the scourges and pricking-irons (κέντρα) (3, 30) Sophocles of the buckle-tongues with which Oedipus put out his eyes. "Woe, woe, and woe again! How through me darts the throb these clasps (κέντρων) have caused." "Oedipus Tyrannas," 1318. Of the spur of a cock, the quill of a porcupine, and the stings of insects. continued... And the third part of the creatures which were in the sea, and had life, died; and the third part of the ships were destroyed.
And the third angel sounded, and there fell a great star from heaven, burning as it were a lamp, and it fell upon the third part of the rivers, and upon the fountains of waters; They had a king over them (ἔχουσιν ἐφ' αὐτῶν βασιλέα).
Render, as Rev., they have over them as king. Compare Proverbs 30:27. Hence distinguished from the natural locusts. In Hebrew (Ἑβραΐ̀στὶ) Used only by John. Compare John 5:2; John 19:13, John 19:17, John 19:20; Revelation 16:16. Abaddon Meaning destruction. Compare Job 26:6; Job 28:22; Proverbs 15:11. Here the Destroyer, as is evident from the Greek equivalent Ἁπολλύων Apollyon destroyer. Perdition is personified. It is after John's manner to give the Hebrew with the Greek equivalent. Compare John 1:38, John 1:42; John 4:25; John 9:7; John 11:16, etc. And the name of the star is called Wormwood: and the third part of the waters became wormwood; and many men died of the waters, because they were made bitter. The first woe (ἡ οὐαὶ ἡ μία)
Lit., the one woe. And the fourth angel sounded, and the third part of the sun was smitten, and the third part of the moon, and the third part of the stars; so as the third part of them was darkened, and the day shone not for a third part of it, and the night likewise.
And I beheld, and heard an angel flying through the midst of heaven, saying with a loud voice, Woe, woe, woe, to the inhabiters of the earth by reason of the other voices of the trumpet of the three angels, which are yet to sound! In the great river (ἐπί) Rev., more correctly, at. Euphrates The Euphrates was known as the great River, the River, the Flood. It rises in the mountains of Armenia, breaks through the Taurus range and runs south and southeast until it joins the Tigris in lower Babylonia Its total length is from 1,600 to 1,800 miles, and it is navigable for small craft twelve hundred miles from its mouth. It was the boundary-line of Israel on the northeast (Genesis 15:18; Deuteronomy 1:7; Joshua 1:4. Compare 2 Samuel 8:3-8; 1 Kings 4:21). It thus formed the natural defense of the chosen people against the armies of Assyria. The melting of the mountain snows causes an annual flood, beginning in March and increasing until May. These floods became an emblem of the judgments inflicted by God upon Israel by means of Babylon and Assyria. The brook of Shiloah which flowed past Zion and Moriah was a type of the temple and of its mighty and gracious Lord; and the refusal of allegiance to God by the chosen people is represented as their rejection of the waters of Shiloah which flows softly, and their punishment therefor by the bringing in of the waters of the mighty and great river (Isaiah 8:5-8; compare Jeremiah 17:13). To the prophets the Euphrates was the symbol of all that was disastrous in the divine judgments. Vincent's Word Studies, by Marvin R. Vincent [1886]. Text Courtesy of Internet Sacred Texts Archive. Bible Apps.com |
